Believe it or not I got Ducher instead of Duchess of Brabant last week. That is really funny. Same exact problem but, I got mine from Chamblee's. Luckily, I noticed it 2 days later when I was planting it. I called them right up and they apologized and sent me my Duchess on Monday. It should be here by Thursday. The best part was they told me to keep Dutcher. Of course, being that they were sending another order, I had to add to it. It must be a label thing as when I first opened the Box and looked at all the Labels I didn't notice it either. I think we both got lucky as I've done some homework on Dutcher and think we'll grow to like him. Dan

The drywall guy (the one who sanded off the heavy uneven texture throughout the entire house) said that he could fix it. It would be a 3" by 25" area on each side. That shouldn't be too bad. I'm going to look at it tonight to see if I can just live with the 9in backsplash. I saw it for the first time in front of the tile guy so I couldn't really focus because I was trying not to let him see the fire coming out of my ears! As of last night, the impression I got was "gee I wish I could have subway tiled the entire wall, but I ran out of either money or tile." 3-6" backsplash says I just wanted a backsplash. A 9" backsplash of three 3" tiles just looks stupid. At least it did last night. Yes, EVERYTHING in writing if I ever build again. EVERYTHING!!!!!!! I had more faith in people before this. I never in my wildest dreams thought so many people could screw up. I remember after the first ordeal on day1 with the house not fitting on the lot when they went to form. I thought, well, surely they have to make one mistake--no biggie--they won't make anymore. HA! What mistake HAVEN'T they made? the roofer and the stucco guy did good. everyone else has been a total let down--even the driveway guys.

Thanks for the responses. There's a large body of thought (and evidence, actually) that "juvenile spaying" is the way to go. I did a LOT of reading on the topic before taking THE BABY in for the procedure, and all of it was very in favor. It's only considered a juvenile spay if they're 16 weeks or younger and she was right at 16 weeks. In shelters, they're spaying them at six weeks old. The new anesthetics (I'm told) are a world apart from the older anesthetics - which was the main reason for delaying surgery until a dog had some age on her. The pros are, the puppies heal much faster and there are fewer complications. The cons are (this is my own opinion), it's not pretty to lock a puppy in a crate with an e-collar for most of her 24-hour day. This is precious socialization time, and she *has* to be quiet so she has to either be on drugs, or spend a bit of time in the crate - for the first few days, anyway. And now with this complication, she's in there until the infection heals (which I hope is no more than a couple days away). She can not be running around and/or jumping - which is what she longs to do. Prior to this, we had a lot of fun, taking long walks and going to the dog park every day and playing catch in the back yard. She was a tired dog and a good dog. Now she's been cooped up for six days and is all fired up. I dunno. The juvenile spay is supposed to be THE thing. I thought it was the best thing to do for my little dog and I spent a whole lot of time doing my research before I made these arrangements. We got into trouble when she licked her stitches and/or when she insisted on jumping up and down like she was a coiled spring. Rose

I know you are not being mean spirited, indianagardengirl. You are trying to get me to move forward. It took us time to make the decision to apply for our tree permit, and then to go through the process. Had the tree been able to be removed, it would have brought us peace of mind as the possibility of water damage would have been greatly reduced to almost nil. So now, moving on, means making difficult decisions: move (very difficult as I still have children living with me); do an addition to the house that would require removal of the tree (difficult choice and expensive); prune the tree (easy choice; but still have the risk of water damage); remove the tree (pay a fine which could be substantial, but unknown). Part of me finds some comfort in educating and helping others about our tree bylaw.