Hehe, Ostrich I am glad to see the water is receding there. It is here as well and although we didn't have that many people that had to be evacuated. Yeah, she is a beaut. For some reason this one was set in the middle of a bunch of morden blush which complimented the color and made it glow...probably a selling technique that got me :) I will get the camera and tripod out and try to get some pictures that do it justice. Now I have to learn about rose care lol.... as I know nothing :) SCG

I won't if SO gets in it to take his lunch to work. I'm trying my best when I do cook to make it reasonable amounts for just the two of us.

I'm still here and appreciate all of your comments. Jemdandy, I do those things. I offer to help regularly, but she is unhappy with the quality of my cleaning, so she prefers to do it herself (which creates more stress on her). Yes, there is definitely a lot of stress due to my father and the remodeling. Then, pile on the stress from my wife's job and it becomes very very stressful. We are hoping the stress level will drop when the remodeling is finished. I am not completely clueless. On Tuesday, my wife was under a lot of stress and I seemed to deal with it farily well. At least, she was not upset at me and I think she actually felt better after talking to me. However, yesterday was worse, and she felt worse after talking to me. I listened, I care, I felt for her, but I did not give her the empathy in terms of verbal feedback she is looking for. I thought I was, but in fact I did not. Generally, the problems start after work when either I walk in the door (if she is home first), or when she walks in the door (if I am home first). If she says, "I am on overload" this is my clue to watch out, that there are problems, it will be a rough evening, and I need to do my very best to try to empathize with her. She wants me to demonstrably say things which exhibit empathy, like, "no wonder you are overwhelemed, anyone would be with what you are going through." Or, "It is amazing what you have to deal with. I am really impressed with how well you handled that situation." Sometimes I say these things and sometimes I don't. Also, I need to communicate absolutely everything, which I still have not gotten used to. For example, last night, after our blow-up, we went to bed. She seemed to be calming down. It was late, I had just gone to bed and she was in the master bathroom getting ready to come to bed. There was a loud noise. She came out and asked me if I heard a loud noise coming from the guest bathroom. She was concerned that my father was in there and perhaps had fallen down. I said I didn't hear any noise. (In retrospect I did hear a noise but I thought it was coming from the master bath, not the guest bath). I get up, take a quick look in the guest bath, realize my father wasn't in there, and came back to bed. This morning she told me she was very unhappy with me about this behavior. Do you know why? I do in retrospect. I didn't communicate! Before I got out of bed, I should have said to her, "I'll go check it out." Then, when I came back to bed, I should have said, "I took a quick look but my dad wasn't in there." I was tired and I just wasn't thinking. Her response to this is that I obviously think so little of her that I can't even be bothered with telling her what I am doing or what I find out. As though it isn't important for her to know. No, I did not, do not, think along the lines she alledges. I was trying to respond to her concerns as best I could. Mostly, I just didn't think at all. It must have been around 11:30 p.m. and my brain was shutting down for the night. While I should have been a better communicator, I did the best I could do. That was a good example as to how I get in trouble and why my wife is unhappy with me and may just leave me.

Lmao! You remind me of some of the kids I've known.. "Don't touch the stove it's hot.. DO NOT touch the stove, it's HOT.. HOTTTTTTTTTTT...Hmmm.. maybe we need some polysporin for that burn?" LOL.. Not laughing at you so much as being glad there is someone else out there that just HAS to follow their own path! Just stand back once you call in the "blazers"..that fire can be hot! Have to agree with you on the "dirty" effect though.. walking through showrooms, all I want to do is find my rag and wash down the cabinets.. oh wait.. it's SUPPOSED to look like that!