Hence the Fence, Part II

(Yes, there is a "Hence the Fence, part I". Imagine that. And look at the date on it... it is an OLD post.)

So there has been some craziness going on with my backyard fence for at LEAST the past year.

It's been leaning something awful, with one stick holding it up... barely holding it up.

Then I was leaving for work one morning, and I saw this.

UGGGGGGH. I was O_O!!!

And my silly behind went back there and tried to lift the completely fallen part back up into place.

SHOOT. That was a fruitless effort.

Look at this tomfoolery.

UGGGHHHH.

Now, like I said, the fence was weathered and was falling down. And my next door neighbor, well, his part had completely fell down, and at some point he had his part of the broken down fence removed. And I noticed something: the locals had started using our yards as a cutthrough from our street to the next street over.

I tell you, it's a bit jarring when I sweeping off my front porch or washing dishes and I spy someone just walking past the side of my house. VERY jarring.

This wasn't that big of a deal. But when I saw a whole SECTION of my fence down, I had to do something fast.

Why? Because of one thing, really. My neighbors across the street have moved, and I suspect (don't quote me on this), that some locals are using my back yard as a route for raiding that house of its appliances or AC or something like that.

And I can't have that.

So I was extra motivated to stay the least.

By the end of the day (a Thursday), I'd found a contractor to tare out that fence and build another. We were mailing contracts and deposits at 10 pm that night.

And when I arrived home on Friday evening from work, Home Depot had delivered all of this fella's supplies were in my backyard. (He'd said that he refused to stand in line at Home Depot buying things when he can get his supplies delivered by Home Depot. Apparently that is popular now with the contractors).

By midmorning Saturday, the contractor was out there knocking down the fence. And by the time I was leaving for my book club meeting, he'd had it down, and I could see the neighbor's backyard.

I told him to keep the old posts up if they were in good condition. Good enough. I wasn't trying to do nothing pretty. The neighbors gotta stare at the posts, not me. Humph.

That old fencing was busted! Super raggedy! Uggh!

And by Saturday night? I had a NEW beautiful fence.

How lovely is that? And one of the locals slid up on me and convinced me to allow him to get rid of the weeds and trim a tree or two. Worked out well enough.

The fence extended about 3 feet over into my neighbor's yard, but dude ain't said a word. And I know he's been looking at it. His yard was the big cut through part. No more! Although I do plan on talking to him about it if I see him anytime soon.

But within 48 hours of first making a call, the fence got done. Part of me had been wanting to get the fence taken down, as far back as 2016, but a neighbor on the other street behind me and one house over filed a lawsuit to move the fence. It was decided that they would move my 2 FEET OF my FENCE at their expense. Such BS!! My lawyer said don't have the old fencing taken down until they move it.

That was 3 years ago. They never did.

They wanted to work out something with me, but I sicced a lawyer on them. There was no way I was signing paperwork with all the gentrification going on. I may have been signing away my house, since they pushing up on folks to move out so the white folks can move in.

But now, I have a NEW fence. And it is beautiful. And there's no locals cutting through my yard.

Heck I may even spend a little time in the backyard!

Mattress Tales!

This post right here goes out to Ginae.

Because she has been waiting for my matress post!

Here you go, gal!

Anyway, I needed a new mattress set for my master bedroom. The old one was 10 or 11 years old, and it was time for a new one.

No, my old mattress wasn't some nice Sealy Posturepedic. I couldn't afford that back in 2001. I bought a matress set off a guy who was suppose to be an interior designer. A friend had told me about him. He didn't "look" like an interior designer. He looked like a red neck. I was living in New Orleans at the time, and LadyTee was visiting. He took us to a storage facility, to some storage slot.

Me and LadyTee were set to beat the cheese out of this dude if he was shady...

But...

He was an interior designer for real. And in his 20ft by 20ft storage unit, he had lovely mattresses and furniture. We had a fine time in there, looking around.

I bought a king size set with support rails for $400 bucks.

What a lovely deal.

Then we decided to get on out of there.

That stuff coulda been fenced. Mighta been hot.

And LadyLee is too cute for prison.

BUT. We bought it.

That's my story. The short story of my old matress. Good matress, but cheap.

Alas, time for a new one.

I didn't wanna do all this research about it. I just knew I needed something and how much I wanted to spend. That is all. If I laid on that sucka and it felt alright. Then cool. Let's roll with it.

So, I went down to the local mattress spot. Yeah, I did a little bit of looking around on the internet to get a thought or two about what I wanted and different prices. So I was just going to wander around the local mattress spot and see what I thought.

Interesting place. Especially when I walked in and saw $2000 matrresses.

I lay on them. And they felt okay. But uh, no. I wasn't trying to spend $2000 bucks. NOPE.

My goal was $700-900 dollars. I continued to follow the saleswoman around the store.

Lovely chick.She was a big girl like me.

We will call her "Sista Wanda".

Such a nice saleswoman. They taught her well.

Because she ran me over to those Tem.per.ped.ic memor.ary foam beds.



I didn't lay on them. I pressed my hand to them. I mean, they felt alright. I didn't get chill bumps from touching them.

I wasn't laying on NUTHING that cost $5000.


Oh it was cute. You can press the area around the wine glass, and the glass wouldn't fall over.

Cute.

Sista Wanda talked about it. She's a great saleswoman.

I had to tell her... "Look honey, if you hear tell of me having this mattress in my house, you can assume it fell off the back of the mattress truck. And I tied it to the top of my Mazda and took it home."

She had a look on her face that said "I can't wait to call all my friends and talk bad about you."

Not in the budget, babes!!!

And I have had friends over the years who have paid upwards for $3000 for a mattress set. They say it feels good. Real good. And i believe them.

Better feel good. But the Oldgirl was gonna pass...

Then she tried to sell me these interesting pillows.



I pressed my hand to it.

"They are coconut oil infused," Sista Wanda said. "Really nice."

I pressed my face to it. Inhaled hard. "Ooooh, that right there smell good."

Coconut oil. I like coconut oil. I use it on my natural hair.

I inhaled the pillow again. I could get with these. "How much are they?"

"$129.00," Sista Wanda said.

*ladylee letting out a holler and throwing pillow down like it's a rattlesnake*

"$129.00?" I yelled, my voice a good ten octaves higher than normal.

"Yes," she said.

I laughed.



"Yo homie, hold up. That's like, that's like for like a set of 4, right? 4 for 129?"

"No," Sista Wanda said, lovingly as if talking to a small child in danger of having a temper tantrum. "They are $129.00 each."

I smirked. "Honey, if you hear tell of me having those pillows, you know I stole them... Out of somebody's house."

Sista Wanda had that look on her face again. One of difficulty and confusion. Like she was searching her mind for the training on how to properly deal with fools who walk in the store.

"If I pay all that type money for a bed and accessories, I better be spending 18 hours in that bed!"

"Come on, now," Sista Wanda said. "Nothing like a nice bed."

I am sure that is true. But for $5000 dollars for the bed and $130 pillows, I better be spending 18 hours in that bed...

With a man, some liquor, some BBQ ribs...

and a bag of weed.

I'm just saying.

That is all.

Needless to say, she left all that alone.

I kept gravitating over to a cheaper memory foam set. It was on sale. It felt really good.



I lay on a bunch of beds and I liked it best. That low price probably made it feel very good.

That is a queen set. The king set was $150 dollars more.

I bought both. Really because I could get them both delivered for one fee. I was a little miffed at the delivery fees. So that was best for me, since in a perfect world I wanted 2 mattress sets. I plan on moving upstairs sometime soon.

And there they are in their rooms.

Upstairs bedroom.



I rarely go upstairs. I live downstairs. Upstairs was my sister's domain before she moved out in June 2010. I'd been meaning to get up there, but was lollygagging. After getting a few things done to the bathroom and cleaning up up there... I have to say that I like it... Feels like I have a second house!

Here is the bed in the downstairs master bedroom.

I hang out downstairs more. I am trying my best to break in both beds.

I covered both sets with waterproof covers. Sista Wanda was trying to sell those to me too, for $119 per set. Uh no. She left me alone.

(My sister later hollered. "Girl you can get the mattress covers for $25 dollars at Wal.Mart!!"

She was right.)

I LOVE the new mattresses. Memory foam is the bomb. That is all.

Get yourself a good high thread sheet set and it is ON!

I did more research after buying the beds. (I know. I am backwards). You can get away with buying a cheaper bed, and then go buy the memory foam mattress pads. Not the same thickness, but I think it would work. Memory foam mattress pads are aroung $200. After adding everything up, I did okay.

But I got two nice mattresses, with about 4 inches of memory foam, for about $1400 bucks total. You cannot beat that.

Sista Wanda is the bomb. She worked in some friends and family jazz, etc... Hooked me up for buying 2 sets. (Maybe she didn't, and that's what she told me. Once I started whining about buying 2 sets, she started jumping down on the prices).

I have had the sets two and a half months. I love them. I am sleeping better. No strange pains when I wake up...

And that is all I can ask.

I am satisfied.

Yes indeed.

Well, Ginae... and blog fam in general... that's my illustrious mattress post.

I hope you enjoyed it!

Look What I Got!

A couple of days ago, I had a new shower head installed...

I LOVE it. You can switch from the overhead shower to the handheld shower, and I can run them both at the same time. I had water all over the place!

Poor Oscar-Tyrone... He poked his head in the shower and caught a face full of water with that handheld part. He was a might bit angry with me the rest of the day. Serves him right. He needs to stop being so doggone nosey.

I rarely go upstairs, but I am moving up there for the fall and winter, and thought it would be a good idea to tidy it up upstairs. I plan on painting the upstairs bathroom with a nice suede paint like I have downstairs. We will see.

Plus, a certain chicken say she coming down for the weekend in a couple of weeks. I would hate for her to have to get butt-nekked and go outside and wash herself off with the water hose in the front yard.

The crackheads would love that. I think I will save her the harrassment.

LOL!

The shower has been busted for the longest! I had this stupid fear of getting that and a sink issue fixed. You know how plumbers like to charge you. This is my year to get things done, and that was one of them. Needless to say, it has never been as bad as I thought it would be. I will continue to work on this.

I sent a picture of my master bathroom bathtub to Serenity, as she is a bubble bath type of chicken.



She takes a bubblebath every day. She said she would never get out of it.

I know I was saying that I was going to use the cheese outta those jets in the tub. I was gonna take a good jetted bath every single dday! But I rarely turn them on. Gotta be careful about how much bubble bath I put in there, because with those jets, suds and bubbles are EVERYWHERE!

LOL

That's it for my home improvement for now...

Still trying to paint the kitchen.


Excuse the mess. One of ya'll need to come clean up my kitchen. Hmph.

As you can see, I am not there yet. I hope to work it out by year's end, or brang a joker in to do it for a few bucks. I have NO idea how I'm going to paint over and above the sink and around the fridge.

Maybe I can dip Oscar in a little paint... throw him up there and let him work it out.

Hmm...