Dryer

We had a washer and dryer set come with the house when we bought it. The dryer wasn't the greatest: It took two 90-minute cycles to dry most loads of laundry. We attributed this mostly to the long vent pipe that was actually smaller than the standard. And I didn't care that much, because it was a dryer that was mine and I could use it however much I wanted. Three weeks ago, the timer on the dryer broke and it refused to run at all. Given that I didn't know how old it was to begin with, I opted to just buy a new one, which was delivered by Sears yesterday.

When the guys removed the old dryer, the first thing I noticed was that the vent pipe was full of lint. Seriously, FULL. They just replaced the entire initial jog of flexible pipe and I vacuumed the reachable end of the firm pipe, as well. Then they installed the new one, which is just the latest model of the old one (which, among other things, was one of the few that will fit through the basement door and fit neatly into the available space).

A single cycle--not even, it hadn't finished yet--just dried a full washer load of sheets and towels. This is awesome.

The Trick or Treat Report

After last year, when we went through 12 bags of candy in about three hours, we were very concerned that the full day of Halloween would blow us away. Things actually weren't too bad, probably in-line with last year: The waves starting coming around 4ish and lasted until 7ish, and we went through 3.5 Costco bags of assorted candies. (probably 500-some pieces). Our block is an attractive neighborhood hotspot.

ARR traded in 26 pieces of cow-milk candy for 26 candies he could eat (gummis, starbusts, skittles), and got a dozen or so more. This included discovering pixie sticks. He also likely got too many cookies and cupcakes over the course of Friday and Saturday.

Jethrien will likely post the pictures, but ARR dressed as Cookie Monster, which he picked out himself at the costume store. Jethrien dressed as a baker to accompany him trick-or-treating; I just put on my cultist's robes to sit on the stoop with the candy bowl.

(Also of note: We had a Rocky Horroween party, as much for Mith and Puel's birthdays as anything else, on Friday night. I made far too much meatloaf and roast veggies. On Saturday, our dryer was delivered in the morning; then Jethrien's uncles came for lunch and ARR had a great time playing with them; then we had family naptime; the trick-or-treating; and then Xannoside, Ivy03 and their respective partners all came over and we watched The Nightmare Before Christmas after ARR went to bed.)