The Cure for Boredom is Curiosity.

I've done most of my last minute errands before I leave.
Went to the drugstore and stocked up on travel items. I love tiny bottles and tubes of everything! It's so much fun.

Dexter has been ready to go to the kennel since this morning. I had to trick the cat out from under the bed. Poor thing thinks she's being abandoned again. I would love to be able to leave her at home by herself, but that's just asking for trouble. It breaks my heart to take them to the kennel though. Dexter loves it because he gets to play. Bella just takes every opportunity to escape. I don't know what I'm going to do when I have kids and need a babysitter. It won't be the kids crying because mommy is leaving, it will be mommy boo-hooing.

And lucky me that I took them to the kennel when I did. I was gone about 40 minutes. When I got back, I started having a little freak out because I thought the tree in front of the house had fallen. Well, a tree did fall, but it was the tree in front of the neighbors house. It fell where I had the car parked earlier! I was thanking my lucky stars that I left when I did because it would have been me and/or the car that got hit instead of the sidewalk.

I need to pack and get my backpack together. I still need to email Patty a few last minute stuff. And I need to check the final nail polish color. I need to make a list.

I've finally finished washing all the sheets, blankets, pillows, towels and anything else that wasn't nailed down or too big to fit in the washer.

I also finally figured out where the lint trap is on my washer. I bought one of the washer/dryer combos - more out of space necessity than that's the one I had to have. I really do like it, but for weeks I've been wondering "where does all the lint go?" It can't all go down the drain. It's also a ventless dryer so basically it evaporates the water from your clothes rather than heating them up to dry them out. I read through the manual front to back, even the Spanish section in case I missed something in English. If you take into consideration that my Spanish SUCKS, then you understand that I was grasping at straws.

Today I found the lint catcher thingy. I heard the washer ding ding ding-ing at me that something was wrong. I thought that the load was probably off balance, so I went to go readjust. NO! I had a different error code. I grabbed the useless manual and turned to the error code troubleshooting section - check for bent section of drain hose or clean out drain filter. There's a drain filter? I check the hose - no kink. I flip through the manual to find where to access the drain filter. That's what that little square box on the front is for. I pry it open like it says and voilå! the drain filter. I followed the directions and pulled out basically a wad of dog and cat hair. No wonder the drain was clogged. Now that I've found this secret compartment, I will be cleaning it on a regular basis.

I also freaked the bejeebers out of myself cleaning out that filter. When I unscrewed the filter, water came pouring out into the floor. I grabbed a towel to wipe up the mess, wiping under the washer in the process. I pushed a black many legged thing, that looked dead, out from under the edge of the washer. I eeked, left the laundry room to go run around the house "ewwwwwww" ing and to find a shoe to make sure it was dead. You know those little black spider rings that people give out at Halloween? Yes, under the washer is where Bella left this one. She is happily playing with it now. I'm sure I'll wake up in the middle of the night with it dropped into my hand when she decides it time to play fetch.

The dog and I made a much needed trip to the vet. All of his shots are updated and he is legal to be in Berkeley. More importantly he has a place to stay while we're gone. We go to a teaching vet clinic, so Dexter gets to be a teaching dog while we're gone. I think he's excited about this because everybody gives him cookies and kisses.

Other than an exciting trip to the library and a jaunt to get dinner, the rest of my day has been uneventful. I still need to vacuum and mop all the floors. Yuck, housework.