Merry Halloween to all!  I like this holiday, for no particular reason.  Usually solid Fall weather, festive people running around…  What’s not to like.  We even went to an honest to goodness Halloween party this year.  Saturday night was the annual “blind beer tasting” over at our friends Michael and Alaina’s house.  I believe it’s the sixth annual, and it seems to get a little bigger and better every year.  This year the Halloween theme was a new twist, and I think it was well received.  The same good food and “interesting” beers to sample, mixed in with some truly unusual costumes.

In other random news, we had our carpet replaced last week.  Big deal, people.  It was a little disappointing to be ripping out carpet after only three years in this house, but it was thrashed.  I know we had the cheap stuff put in when they built it, but come on.  Well, whatever, I guess.  We got two quotes, one from the friendly local big-box store and one from an independent contractor.  We ended up going with the independent guy, mainly based on the fact that he was considerably cheaper.  (Which is how we make most of our decisions, for better or worse.)  They did a great job on the carpet, we are quite pleased.  Nothing like some fluffy soft carpet under your feet in the morning, the old stuff was all matted down and gross.  Now the “furniture moving” part of the deal might have been a small let-down.  The deal was they would move all the junk (which there is no small amount of) out of the way, and lay down the carpet.  Well, maybe I didn’t read the fine print, but I erroneously assumed this would also include moving said junk back in place.  Ohhhh, bummer.  In all fairness, I think they just underestimated the size of the job and were ready to get out of our house, and bailed on us.  And, truth be told, as it was my highly-prized Friday evening, I was ready for them to get out of the house too.  So, we have nice new carpet, but also a sizable unplanned project.  Or maybe it’ll just stay where it is, who knows.  I’m kind of getting used to having the bedroom furniture in the master bath.  You can just hop out of the shower and there’s your clothes, right there and handy.  And having the office in the garage?  Not bad at all, and we gain an extra bedroom.  True, it would be nice to have the car in the garage where it belongs, but these are the small trade-offs you have to make sometimes.