Rob and Carla .net

Happy Holidays everybody. Enjoy some pictures of our Florida "snow" (frost) and our Christmas decorations this year.

Who knew GoDaddy pays attention to the little guy. After my (public) grumbling a few weeks ago I got a call from a Go Daddy representative. First to warn me I wasn't allowed to block their ads (oops.) Second to let me find an alternative to their ad-sponsored free site. Since I don't get a lot of traffic, nor use anything but Blogger, it was very nice of them to offer to set me up using Blogger's hosting services. He walked me through the very complicated domain set up on their end. Sadly, Blogger tries to walk you through it but I was very confused by the end. If you didn't notice, for about two weeks robandcarla.net was down, however. Blogger wouldn't let me publish to anything but robandcarla.blogspot.com. I had to wade through a ton of online help files (mostly this site, very good resource if you can figure out where to start: here ) to find the one setting that was messing everything up. Comment here if you want to know exactly what I ended up doing. But we

I didn't know this, but GoDaddy doesn't have "free" hosting anymore. Well, they do, but they were about to charge me for what I had. I ended up having to back up my site, cancel my hosting account, create their "free" one and upload what I backed up. The reason I put free in quotes, is this site is now funded by the lovely advertising you see at the top. Grrr.. And they also charge for email addresses now. So much for having everything included with domain registration. When I started this site I had all sorts of plans, but really it became just easier to use Blogger. I see Google offers free email hosting and web hosting with Blogger, as long as I try not to get too fancy. I'll probably try it out when I have more time, but I did just pay for two more years of robandcarla.net. I really shouldn't complain. GoDaddy's been pretty good over the years and their customer service has been awesome. You just get used to some things being free...

Just some photos from our early Halloween Prep. I might add, we doubled our candy this year. Hopefully we won't run out again. <grin>

Two months ago we went to a furniture store on our way back from St. Pete. While walking through into the store, Carla and I both literally stopped in our tracks when we see this entertainment unit. We got excited as it seemed to be the first piece of furniture that'd be able to fill that space in our family room and we also fit our style. We came home with a pamphlet that its dimensions, etc. So we made sure it'd fit, but then forgot about it. A month goes by and we get all these coupons for that furniture store in the mail, plus they're having a "tax free" sale. So we go back to convince ourselves that we really should get it. After buying it on credit, and a couple hours of playing with the numbers, it's ours! And a few weeks later, we get home delivery... What did I say? A perfect fit.

I finally gave up the truck. He had a good home with us but we finally felt it was time. We fell in love with the Ford Edge. The following is our new car. Still no name.

  I finally used one of my Christmas presents.

Carla's sister is home for the summer and staying with us. It's a great use of all that room upstairs. And obviously Bluebell and Calli love the extra attention. Renee took probably the cutest picture of Blue to date:

Sad news: one by one the baby birds disappeared until all we were left with was an empty nest.

Rob took the puppy out for a walk this afternoon and he was passing this tree in our backyard: He found this in the tree: When he looked closer, he discovered that it looks like this: So, in a couple of weeks, there will be babies in the tree! Happy Mother's Day!

Carla and I went to her mother's for Mother's Day. Carla's mom has adopted a new cat... a rag doll. Here's a picture of him hiding from Bluebell in a fruit basket. He's huge! and only 10 months old.

Bluebell found a turtle in the backyard. I saved it by putting it in the water.

The magnolia tree has bloomed! Here are some pictures.

Today is my 2nd attempt to return home from San Francisco. Yesterday my flight was delayed 2 hours. Which meant I would miss my connection in Las Vegas. Now, while I'd rather been stuck in Vegas than San Francisco (It's Vegas, baby!), I wouldn't have a place to stay like I do here. After much arguing and angling, I resolved myself to staying here and maybe working an extra day. The next flight they could get me on was the exact same red-eye, only a day later. Now, I think I did learn something about USAir... #1 they don't look at other airlines unless asked. #2 they don't look at alternative cities unless asked. #3 they don't play nicely with Southwest. #4 they told me the next flight available was Saturday (tomorrow) until I pounded my fist. Needless to say I know it's a holiday weekend and there could be worse places to be stuck than SF, but I think it's a sad reality we're looking at when airline customer service has become so pathetic they'

As you know, we have a cat and a puppy. The cat has never really taken to using a traditional scratching post. She prefers items made of cardboard. But, we kept the post around just in case. Well, on Monday 3/17, Bluebell decided that she liked the scratching post and tried to eat it. I came home from work to find a messy floor and a sad doggy.

A little tid-bit about Verizon FIOS. They give you a wireless router but only support it the first year. After that you have to pay to replace it. Better than the cable company I guess who just gives you a modem. Sent from my cell phone.