Rain, rain go away

The fall rains are here. It turned pretty cold yesterday. It's not supposed to get cold until after Easter. I know--it's backwards. Everything is backwards down here. Sigh...Easter in the fall, just isn't the same. Speaking of Easter, I am thinking of doing Easter baskets for the kids this year. I haven't done it in the past--mostly because Cupcake was not a candy eater last year. But this year they are older and I think they would get a huge kick out of it. That should be something fun to do this week.

I am still a bit sick, but starting to feel human again. Let me just say, for the record, shingles suck! I started the anti-viral early and so only had two spots which are almost gone after 5 days of medicine. That is a miracle. No more weeks and weeks of spotty sickness. Today I am mostly just tired and still a bit achy. DH has promised to come home after staff meeting. We'll see. I made him swear--no talking, no stopping, no hitting his office after the meeting--just straight to the car and back home. Our main baby sitter is in the US this week, so we must rely on each other.

Yesterday, we sold our TV. The BIG ONE! Yup. We did it. We are considering not having TV at all, but feel like it is valuable when you need the occasional distraction for the kids and we do have company from time to time (like his parents) who would appreciate at least being able to watch a movie. We still won't have cable or anything like that--so get absolutely no TV channels. Everyone always asks us, "how do you stay informed?" What's funny is we are better informed now than before. We read our news online and can follow the US sites. The NZ news is hopelessly slow and flawed. They will often report a story as true that has already been debunked in America and more often then not, they just make-up want they want to report. Seriously. Everyone knows and talks about it, but they do it anyway.

Tomorrow the exterminator is coming. It will cost $250 to do the whole house. That's for spiders (yuck!), roaches, beetles, flies, etc. Yesterday I found two white tail spiders (they bite and some consider poisonous)  in a big washing machine box we kept in the garage/play room. They were feeding on another spider. I know--gross! I freaked. Then calmly I went to get the spray, a flip flop, and the paper towels. I killed them both. I made DH put the box out for recycling. He was sad because the kids love to play in it. But I could never trust it not to have spiders now. Oh, my skin is crawling just thinking about it. We have a grey spider infestation outside. They  make webs all over our house, the deck and the car. And they are the white tail spiders main food. The lady called today about making the appointment--during breakfast--and proceeded to tell me how the white tail spider likes to live in the attic and drop down out of light fixtures. I had to make her stop before I barfed all over my breakfast. I am definitely an arachnophobe. She says the treatment should last a year, but some people need it every six months depending on your area. I bet we need it twice a year since we back up to farms and council reserve land, surrounded by forests. UGH. Still--we are paying $30 a month for automatic spray re-fills that aren't killing the spiders, so this isn't much more (less if we only have to do once a year).

The kids are playing in their little house on the deck. It is miserably damp and cold. I wish I crawl back into my warm bed already. Come one DH, hurry home.