So, today . . .

mrs. fix it, part 2

2012-01-07T23:50:00.000-08:00

**i took pictures to go with this blog, but i am having issues getting them from my phone into the blog, which is why this blog is being posted a few days later than it actually happened. eventually i hope to resolve my problem and add pictures...

so today . . . i planned to spend the day at home. in my pajamas. doing a few small projects, but mostly huddled up with my computer and new slippers. this was my plan. of course, it was thwarted...

my problems today actually started yesterday. with cleaning the sink. and fixing the plumbing. because during those moments when i couldn't work on the sink, i decided to recover our dining room chairs.

we got our dining room set from rollie's parents a long time ago. i love family heirlooms. they complete me :) this dining room set belonged to rollie's maternal grandmother, who i never met. we got the set from his mom, who got it from her mom. i feel lucky that we got it, because it probably should have gone to rollie's sister--you know, from mom to daughter to granddaughter--but since rollie's sister already had a dining room set, this one found its way to our house.

i love this dining room set. i love the reddish color of the wood. i love the curvy cut out chair backs. i love the way the ends of the table drop down so that it can be really small, (even though i never use it that way.) but when we got it, what i didn't love was the color of the seats. the seats were a rose colored tapestry with little blue accents. they were pretty, but they were pink. sort of. and at the time we got the set, pink was not on my list of decorating colors. i was into black and white and red! i wanted a fabric that would sort of go with the style, but not look dated. and what i found had a sort of black stripe with rows of reddish roses in between.

i loved that fabric, and it has been on those chairs for a lot of years. but over time it has faded. and i was just not loving it in this house. but i left it, because i had told diandra that when she got into her own house, she could have the dining room set. of course, i told her that before we bought this house, when i thought that we were going to downsize and not have enough room for it. but now it is in our new dining room, and it looks so good with the wood floors and the paint... so i talked to diandra and we struck a deal, and i'll be keeping the dining room set. for now. i think.

so, it was time to recover the seats! i remembered this as being a quick and easy project. i looked at my pile of fabric and found a piece that i thought would be perfect! so last night after rollie went to bed, i took the old fabric off one of the chair seats and got it ready to recover. but then i got tired and went to bed.

those chair seats were going to be my first project this morning, because rollie was playing basketball which meant i had to put the sink project off until later in the day. and doing the chair seats first had the added benefit of letting me stay in my pajamas. (in case you are wondering about my sudden attachment to wearing my pajamas around the house, i asked for flannel pajama pants for christmas. and i got some! and adorable "hello, kitty" slippers!! and now, that is all i want to wear. they are comfy, cozy, and cute.) so i unfolded the fabric... only to discover that it wasn't one big piece. it was several smaller pieces, none of which were big enough to cover the chair cushions. this was not a good start to my saturday...

i was bummed. i slouched on the couch for a while, but i finally got dressed and announced to rollie that i was going to do some errands. i had decided to go to lowe's to ask someone about my plumbing issues, but the bigger problem was going to be finding fabric. there are just not a lot of fabric stores around anymore. i had seen one storefront across from the mall that said "rugs! fabrics!" but most days they have a "going out of business" sign outside, which i figured meant a limited selection. but i was desperate, so i went in...

... and the angels sang! there were rolls of fabric everywhere! in every color! but you know how i am about making decisions... i knew i was in trouble. and it got even worse, because as i was walking around i remembered that i had been looking for a shower curtain for the downstairs bathroom, and i needed to recover the headboard on our bed... i was like a rat in a maze--a rat who couldn't make a decision. i put rolls of fabric into my cart. i took rolls of fabric out of my cart. i sent pictures to rollie--which is what saved me! after over an hour, i finally found my way out into the parking lot, with fabric for my dining room chairs AND a shower curtain :) the decision about fabric for our headboard will just have to wait for another day.

then i went to lowe's. i don't go to lowe's very often, because home depot is just around the corner from our house. and lowe's is at the long beach town center, AND the parking lot at the long beach town center is like the seventh level of hell--especially on a saturday. but that one last plumbing fixture was bugging me, so i decided to brave the parking lot in hopes of finding an answer to my problem.

i found the plumbing section and a guy in a red vest. whose name was NOT steve! i showed him the picture i had taken of the underside of my plumbing fixtures and he said, "oh sure! you just have to twist this piece here to tighten your fixture."

now. was that hard? no, it was not. i guess if you know what you are talking about, the solution is easy. and now i had a solution! i made a quick detour through lighting to get a new glass globe for the old ceiling fan that manuel had installed in our downstairs bedroom, and rushed home. i had a solution, and i was anxious to finish up my plumbing project. but when i got home, i was once again thwarted, because rollie was taking a nap. rollie often takes a nap on saturday after playing basketball all morning, which is fine, but today his nap was interfering with my projects!

you know how patient i am (not!) but i tried to wait. first i distracted myself by playing with my new fabrics, but i didn't want to get started on a project and then have to drop it when rollie woke up. so next i decided to change the glass part of the ceiling fan with the new one i had just bought. i took the old one off and tried to put the new one up, only to discover that it was too big. this did not make me happy! now i am going to have to brave the long beach town center parking lot again to return the stupid, non-fitting glass part of the ceiling fan!

unless it accidentally breaks first...

i finally decided i could fix the faucet by myself. i mean, i knew what to do, i just had to figure out how to do it all by myself. i poked around rollie's workbench until i found the spray stuff that would loosen the rust. because of course there was rust! the faucet had been loose which meant water was dripping underneath it sometimes. i squiggled underneath the sink and tried to maneuver the spray into position... and managed to knock the long pointy part off. which meant i had to squiggle out from under the sink to retrieve it, reattach it, and try again. which i did.

(can i just say here that it is no easy task to get positioned under our kitchen sink! there is no room to turn over or around, which means you have to go in on your back. which kills so many muscles that i can't even list them all! and then your torso is elevated about six inches from where your legs are trying to just stay out of the way, which is torturous to your back! and THEN to get out, you have to hold your torso up off the floor while trying to get your head clear of the sink, garbage disposal, and all that tubing, which makes your abdomen scream like an angry toddler. now that i think about it, it is probably pretty good exercise...)

after spraying the loosening goo, i waited a few minutes, grabbed my pliers and tried to twist the tightening piece. it wouldn't budge. but the pliers fell out of my hand and landed on my face. fortunately they didn't hit my eyes. unfortunately, they did hit my expensive glasses. i decided maybe i shouldn't be wearing my expensive glasses while laying under the sink holding a pair of pliers in my hand. so i took them off and attempted to twist the tightening piece again. and again, i dropped the pliers. fortunately this time they didn't hit my face--they hit my shoulder, which was a little too close to my unprotected face for my comfort.

i decided i needed safety glasses.

but i didn't have safety glasses! i know rollie has safety glasses, but he was asleep. so i used my sunglasses instead. i have a pair of those fit-over sunglasses that i can wear over my regular glasses. they are big and ugly, but i have customized them with swarovsky crystals, which makes them cuter... they are still pretty big, though... i was really hoping i wouldn't drop the pliers on them, since the only other pair of sunglasses i have do not have swarovsky crystals on them, and since we live in the land of eternal sunshine, i kind of need sunglasses. but i figured if i was going to drop those pliers again, better to wreck my sunglasses than my eyes...

i worked under that sink for about half an hour. i was getting nowhere fast. it finally became clear to me that this was not a one woman project--i was going to have to wait until rollie woke up. which he finally did. and no sooner did his groggy little head move his recliner into the upright position, than i was right there telling him about my morning... the fabric store... lowe's... the plumbing stuff... how we still needed to hang the bathroom mirror (oh there is a story there too, but i think i will save that for another day.) all the poor man wanted to do was watch a little basketball and let his brain wake up, but he could see that i was in "let's get it done" mode. so he came downstairs, gathered a few tools, and watched me head back under the sink.

we finally got that thing tightened! finally! i was the muscle under the sink, but rollie knew which tools would get the job done. if he hadn't handed me some sort of socket wrench with a bendy handle, and firmly held the faucet in place while i used that tool to tighten it, we would still probably be dealing with a wiggly faucet. or paying someone $500 to replace it!

i came out from under that sink today, and i felt powerful!! i felt awesome! i made rollie high five me, and i said, "WE ROCK!" (yes, to diandra's chagrin, i actually say things like that...) and so, now our kitchen sink is clean and shiny AND the faucets work properly...

...and it looks so good, that now i hate to use it.

mrs. fix it, part 1

2012-01-06T23:59:00.000-08:00

so today . . . i had an "if you give a mouse a cookie" evening...

"if you give a mouse a cookie," is a children's book that illustrates how one thing leads to another. which leads to another. and another. and that's what happened to me this evening. it all started with cleaning my kitchen sink...

when we moved into our new house, i determined that i was going to keep it sparkly clean and shiny. this is a bigger challenge for me than you might think. we have two dogs and lots of stuff. this means muddy puppy feet walking on our floors, pet hair taking up residence wherever it can find an unguarded space, and stuff that doesn't really have a place of it's own...which means that it ends up on the dining room table... or the kitchen counter... or the bedroom chair... well, you get the idea. and since i have a regular job, i don't have lots of time to dedicate to keeping up with it all. so sometimes my house threatens to eat me.

but when we moved, i determined that was not going to happen any more! the first step was buying a house that would be easy to maintain, which meant wood flooring instead of carpets. which we did. the second step was not to move all of the stuff. which we didn't. i donated a ton of stuff to charity and filled a small dumpster with the things i was pretty sure no one else would want. the third step was to find a place for everything in the new house--if it didn't have a place, i was going to get rid of it--that way everything could be put away. which i mostly did, but i admit there are still a few things... and the last step was figuring out some sort of system for cleaning. because if i don't have a system, nothing gets done. it doesn't always get done even when i have a system, but at least it has a chance... so i got a microfiber duster, two roombas, a spin mop, and decided i was ready...

...and then i went back to work. and everything house related sort of started falling apart. i managed to keep my head above water, but just barely. so of course i started looking for solutions (that's where the microfiber duster and the spin mop came in.) i made lists. i downloaded apps on my ipad. i cruised the internet. and one day, while cruising the internet, i found a site that said keeping your house neat and orderly all starts with cleaning your kitchen sink. well, i wanted my house to be neat and orderly, but the method of cleaning the kitchen sink sounded very involved! and that's not all--once it was cleaned, you were supposed to keep it clean and shiny every single day! and you know how i am about doing anything every single day. so i chose to ignore this particular site.

which i did. until today. because today i was home all afternoon, and so i decided to put the christmas dishes away. but that meant i had to wash a couple of them, and that put me in close proximity to the sink, which made me start thinking about having a clean sink, and a clean house, and the next thing i knew, i was filling the small sink with hot, bleachy water...

i filled the small sink with hot bleachy water, because i wasn't really sure how this was going to turn out. and our big sink is big! and deep! which means it takes a lot of water to fill it up. so i decided to start with the small sink. i let it soak for an hour. then i followed the rest of the directions for a sparkly clean and shiny sink. and then i moved on to the faucets. and as i was working on the faucets, i realized that they were loose. and the soap dispenser didn't work. so i fixed the soap dispenser (i think,) and scrubbed the faucets, and dried and shined everything up, but those faucets were still loose. and now they were bothering me, because my small sink looked so good!

i thought there had to be a way to tighten them, so i took everything out from under the sink. and put it on the counter. now my previously clean counters were full of stuff, but it was nice and clean under the sink. i flopped down onto the kitchen floor and squiggled my way into the empty cabinet. it was dark in there. and i didn't have a light. so i squiggled back out and got a clip-on flashlight and dove back under the sink.

there is a lot of flexible tubing under my sink. and the sink is extra deep. and there is also a giant garbage disposal under there, which made it hard to move around. which is why i was under the sink instead of rollie. but i knew i was going to need help. i couldn't tighten whatever had to be tightened without someone holding the faucets steady. so i yelled for rollie, and he came to see what i needed. but all he could see were my feet and legs--the rest of me was buried under the sink...

"i need help!" i said. although i'm pretty sure those words weren't necessary. i'm pretty sure that it was fairly clear that i needed help. "what do you want me to do?" he asked. "just hold the faucet still while i try to tighten it up." this sounds simple enough, but over the course of the next half hour, rollie retrieved tools from the garage for me to use, he tried not to step on the part of me that was hanging out of the cabinet, and he finally handed me my phone so i could take pictures of what i was dealing with. because just like everything else that the previous homeowner decided to do himself, these faucets had not been installed exactly according to the directions...

i had rollie pull me out of the abyss, and i announced, "i'm going to home depot. i'm sure i need parts." rollie said, "let's just buy a new faucet. we can have manuel install it." but i had looked fancy kitchen faucets up online--i knew how expensive they were. "no," i said, "i think we can fix it." so i grabbed my phone with the photos i had taken, and the checkbook, and went to home depot.

home depot was no help at all. "yep," steve said, (i think every male employee at home depot is named steve. it may even be a job requirement, because every time i go there for help, the guy's name tag says steve!) "it looks like you need some parts to fix that. we don't sell those parts." of course they don't. "if you know the manufacturer, you might be able to get parts online." thanks, steve, thanks a lot...

i was not ready to give up. i came home and started looking online for my faucets, and miraculously, without a manufacturer or model number, i found them! and then i found installation instructions!! yessss!!! i could see by the installation instructions how to tighten one of the faucet pieces. so i yelled for rollie and stuffed myself back under the sink. i figured out a way to prop my flashlight up so that i could use both hands, and prepared to tighten. but there was a problem. of course. the fitting wouldn't budge.

this is where the expertise of a guy with a fully stocked workbench comes in handy :) "it's stuck," i said. "i can't move it." "wait a minute," rollie said, "i'll be right back." and he disappeared. and i waited. twisted like a pretzel under the sink. but it was worth it, because when he came back, he handed me an aerosol can of something guaranteed to unstick stuff. so i sprayed it (and hoped it wouldn't drip on my face,) and waited. and it worked! i was finally able to tighten the fitting so that one more piece of our faucet was tight. but as i emerged from under the sink, i realized that my shirt and hair were wet. this is never a good thing when you are working under a sink. i felt the floor of the cabinet, and sure enough, there was a good sized puddle. "uh oh," i said to rollie, "i think something is wrong..."

did i mention how many pipes and flexible tubing and stuff were under the sink? and did i mention how i just barely fit under there?? and did i mention that it was impossible to maneuver without bumping into something??? well, apparently in all my squiggling about, i had bumped the drain pipe in the big sink and dislodged the connection. i was now really, really glad that i hadn't filled that sink up with water and bleach to soak! i ran to get towels while rollie reconnected the pipes. and then he went to bed. i think he had reached his "help julie with whatever impossible project she has decided to tackle" limit for the day.

did i mention that rollie gets a little uneasy when i get into "i can fix it!" mode? just because one time i tried to fix the washing machine with a screwdriver without disconnecting it... sheesh.

anyway, now there was only one piece left. this one was going to be a challenge. this was the one that steve at home depot said needed a part that they didn't have. but i had sort of reached my plumbing "fix it" limit for the day since rollie had gone to bed, because that meant there was no one to extract me from under the sink if i decided to go back in...

...which brought me back to cleaning my sink. because i had only done the smaller one earlier, just to see how it turned out. but now that all but one of my faucet components were tightened, i decided to clean the other sink. so i filled it with hot, bleachy water, and waited for an hour, and shined it up, and now it looks beautiful!

of course, now the countertops are filled with all the stuff from under the sink, but i can fix that tomorrow. tomorrow i am going to figure out how to tighten that last faucet component...

...or drown trying!

is this what rock bottom feels like??

2012-01-04T22:15:00.000-08:00

so today . . . i bought meat. from shopping tv.

yes, i have apparently turned into one of THOSE people...

shopping tv is a slippery slope. i started watching it several years ago. i was turning 40 and decided that i was now a grown up and would no longer wear fashion jewelry. i was going for the real stuff or nothing at all. i blame my birthday. and rollie. and our friend ron, who is a jeweler...

i've always loved jewelry. my great-grandpa was a rock hound, and that love for turning an ugly old rock into something beautiful was also a part of my dad's genetic material. he taught earth science to 8th graders, and the kids in his classes were the luckiest ones at highland park junior high school, because if you were in my dad's science class, you got to cut and polish rocks! it was awesome!!

then after we were married for a few years, rollie started buying me nice jewelry for special occasions like my birthday. this was made possible, because we had a friend in our church who was a jeweler--not the kind who owned a jewelry store, but the kind who made and repaired the jewelry for the jewelry stores--he had connections!! and so i got kind of spoiled, because when ron and rollie would put their heads together, the result was always something amazing!

but then we moved. and while ron was still accessible, he was also far away, which complicated the logistics of adding to my collection. and we had moved to a small town, which meant very limited options for jewelry buying.

that's when i discovered shopping tv.

i started out by just watching, you know, just because i enjoy looking at beautiful things. eventually i made a small purchase, and then occasionally after that i would buy something else. it was great! everything looked so sparkly and shiny, and the choices seemed endless!

and then we moved to california where ron was even further away, and i didn't have cable tv. but guess what? i could still get one shopping channel! and since there weren't a lot of other choices, i started watching more shopping tv, just because i like to look at beautiful things!

and then one day, when i was sitting in the family room with my computer, looking for something to watch, i tuned into a show that was selling skin care products. it seemed kind of interesting, and so i watched it. this increased my options, because now i could watch jewelry shows and skin care shows. and it worked out pretty good. i found some skin care products that were reasonably priced, and i bought a pair of earrings or two along the way...

and then i started watching electronics shows, because really, there was quite a lot of good information about electronics in those shows. and you know, sometimes we need electronics, so i figured that the more i learned, the better. and i took that information and used it when it was time to buy a computer or a camera or a tv.

until the day when i actually bought a tv from them...

and then one day, they had a show on with clothes made out of some kind of fabric that they promised wouldn't wrinkle OR attract dog hair! does this sound like some sort of miracle to you?!?! well, it did to me, and so i continued to watch... i didn't buy anything, but i continued to watch, just in case... which led to shoe shows... and handbag shows...

i told you it was a slippery slope...

by now it may be hard for you to believe, but there were some shows that i refused to watch. they just held no interest for me at all! like the cooking shows. what a waste of time, i thought, to sit there and watch people cook when i couldn't eat or even smell the food, AND when i didn't like to cook anyway? and why would you buy cookware from shopping tv when you could get perfectly good pans at target?!? or tj maxx???

and then the inventor who invented the hangers that now fill my closets (oh yes, i guess i forgot to mention when i started watching the closet organizing shows...) invented this new non-stick cookware that is guaranteed up to 850 degrees! and i figured even when i burn something, it probably doesn't exceed 850 degrees! and we were moving into our new house, with our new kitchen, and it just screamed for new pans, and these pans had RED, SPARKLY, non-stick exteriors. and so we bought them...

but still i had standards! although, as you can see, my standards were gradually falling...

i still refused to watch cleaning shows (oh wait, maybe not totally, because i did buy a spin mop...) and christmas in july shows, and coin collecting shows (ok, i did occasionally watch coin collecting shows--especially when they were talking about the state quarters, but i've never purchased any coins!) and toy shows, and underwear shows (yes, they actually sell underwear on tv!) and food shows.

food shows are the worst. first of all, i find most of the food to be ridiculously priced. if i want chocolate chip cookies, i will just go to del taco and get a dozen for $5! i don't need to spend $39.95 and get a cookie jar too! and buffalo burgers?!?! i don't care how healthy they are, i am not buying them from shopping tv and having them shipped to my house! meat in the mail??? that is just wrong!

or so i thought. because last night i was watching shopping tv while cleaning the kitchen (this is a bonus of having the kitchen and family room open to each other,) and they started selling steaks? why didn't i just turn it off? well, my hands were in the soapy water in the sink, and i was almost done anyway, so i just let it run...

they started talking about how these were the only steaks that had been approved with the "heart healthy" label... and then they talked about how lean they were... and then they talked about how many ways you could prepare them... and THEN they gave the price! and you are not going to believe this, but one of those steaks cost less than the sourdough jack cheeseburger i had eaten for lunch! they are petite steaks, but it was still a pretty good price. especially since i NEVER buy steak at the grocery store. if i am going to eat a steak, i am going to eat it in a restaurant where it has been prepared by someone who knows what they are doing! at home we mostly eat hamburger and chicken. so, i thought, this would be a good way to add some variety to my sad and pathetic repertoire of dinners that i can cook...

so i bought the steaks. it took a chunk of my grocery money, but i did the math, and we can eat two of those steaks with some broccoli and salad and have a pretty nice meal for less than it costs us to eat at rubio's! (i know! it's hard to believe!!) we won't be eating them every day, but it will be a nice change of pace from meatballs and chicken quesadillas. i hope...

...because, you see, i do tend to leave things in my freezer, just for the security of knowing that i have food in there. and i am going to have to remember to take them out of the freezer in time so that they can thaw before i need to cook them. and i'm not really sure how to cook them.

but we have meat coming. in the mail.

i think maybe i had better clean out the freezer, and tell rollie that we might need a barbecue after all...

95 years is a looong time to wait...

2012-01-02T22:00:00.000-08:00

so today . . . the ducks played in the rose bowl. and won :) and that is all.

(of course that is not all! you have to know there is a story here...)

i don't watch sports very much anymore. i don't actually watch tv that much... mostly i listen to it and glance at it as i am doing other things. but when you are watching a football game or a basketball game, you kind of have to keep your eyes on the tv, which sort of puts my multi-tasking out of commission. this is not true with baseball. sometimes you can "watch" a whole baseball game without ever looking at the tv, and not miss a thing...

i have found that i enjoy watching sports a whole lot more when i am watching with other people. when we lived in southern oregon, we watched every trailblazer game that was on. mostly we watched with our friends, ron and joanne--sometimes at our house and sometimes at theirs. and pizza was usually involved... but then we moved to southern california, and finding fans who share my love of oregon teams is somewhat difficult. not to mention, finding televised games of oregon teams is not all that easy either, when you don't have cable...

but today, the stars aligned, and this morning rollie asked me, "do you want to watch the ducks game with me?" it stopped me in my tracks. rollie never asks me to watch a game with him--mostly because he chooses to cheer for the evil lakers, and he is smart enough to know that we might not be able to live in the same house any more if we ever lose our minds long enough to try watching a laker game together... but he was talking about the ducks. and unless the ducks are playing usc, we can both cheer for them.

however... even though i don't usually watch sports with rollie, i can hear him watching them. you may wonder how i can hear him watching something?? it's easy. whenever there is a really terrible call or a really spectacular play, he makes noise. let's just say he gets somewhat emotionally involved with his sports teams...

but i really, really wanted to watch the ducks today. it's the rose bowl, for goodness sake! and i really, really didn't want to watch it by myself. but i also really, really didn't want to watch it if the ducks were going to lose, and make rollie feel cranky! (i get cranky when i don't get my carbs, and rollie gets cranky when his teams lose. don't judge.) so when he asked me if i wanted to watch the game, i said yes, but only if he could promise me he wouldn't get too personally involved. he looked at me like he had no clue what i was talking about! "you know," i said, "i want to have fun watching the game, and it won't be fun if you get cranky." "i won't get cranky," he said. "the game is scheduled to start at 2:00, so i will tivo it and then we can start watching about 3:00." he said this with a big smile on his face, like it was the greatest idea ever. "oh," i said, "then no, i don't want to watch with you..."

ok, now before you all start sending rollie letters of sympathy because he is married to me, let me explain. rollie NEVER watches his sports live. he ALWAYS tivos them. and then, when he watches them, he zips through the commercials, half time, and any slow parts of the game--like replays! he watches a lot of sports, and this method allows him to keep up with all his teams and still have a life. but this is not how i like to watch a game. so i said, "i can't watch that way. my brain needs time to process. i need to talk about what is happening. i might need to go get a snack... or two, depending on how long the game is!" he looked at me like he thought i might be from another planet, (i am! men are from mars, women are from venus... duh!) but for some reason, he agreed to my unreasonable demands--and if you need proof that he loves me, there it is!

but i love him too, so while i was on my way to 7-11 to get my personal supply of diet lemon cokesi for the game, i decided i could probably live with zipping through the commercials and half time, if we could just let the rest of the game play. (see? i am not totally unreasonable! i can compromise... unless you want me to watch a laker game--i do have standards, you know.) so at 3:00, we settled in with our leftover orange chicken and sodas to watch the game.

as the game started, the camera panned across the field. "i've been there, you know," i said. i say this every time i get the chance. "yes," he said, "i know. you've been there. you have a picture of the grass." "i don't just have a picture of the grass--i actually STOOD on the grass. right in the middle of that field. and then i took a picture." it is necessary for me to remind him of this, because when we were in college, rollie traveled all over europe with a singing group. and when we are watching movies that are set in italy or spain or portugal (to name a just a few of the countries he has been in,) he always says, "i've been there!" this is interesting information the first 20 times you hear it, but after being married more than 30 years... well, you know, i am sorry to say sometimes my eyes roll--all on their own, of course. until a few years ago, my only opportunity to utter those same words was when watching field of dreams, which is set in iowa, i think. because i've been there. to iowa... and to the rose bowl :) did i mention that i stood in the middle of the field :))

it was a good game! i mean, i can say that now, since it is over and we won. my idea of a good game is when my team gets way ahead early, and then stays ahead. this was not that kind of game. touchdown after touchdown was scored! penalties were called. players were hurt. rose bowl records were shattered! and i talked. and talked. and cheered. and talked.

rollie was oddly silent. i finally said, "you are never going to ask me to watch a game with you again, are you?" he just looked at me and smiled. "i am being calm," he said, "i'm not getting too involved." "ok," i said, "that's good, but i need to talk about the game and what is happening and how i feel about it. i need some communication and interaction here!" and so the game went on. and we got a little emotionally involved...

but thankfully we were cheering for the same team to win. and thankfully the team we were cheering for did win--for the first time since 1917! it was pretty awesome. (and i'm pretty sure it only happened because i finally found my duck tshirt and put it on!)
so now i am thinking we should watch more sports together. i can cheer for the angels :) if we ever get a professional football team in la, i can cheer for them. i can probably even cheer for usc, unless they are playing the ducks. or the beavers. (rollie is probably reading this and thinking OH NNOOOOO! WHAT HAVE I DONE?!?) i see lots of afternoons and evenings in our future, eating snacks and sodas, watching sports together, talking, and cheering our team on...

... as long as it isn't basketball...

my anti-resolutions...

2012-01-01T23:59:00.000-08:00

so today . . . is the first day of a brand new year. and the first day of a brand new month. AND the first day of a brand new week.

it just screams out for resolutions, doesn't it :)

i mean, that is kind of the ultimate trifecta of new beginnings. it is taking everything within me NOT to make any resolutions under these conditions. my ocd tendencies love the symmetry of it, but i know that making resolutions is a complete waste of time for me. i am the queen of good intentions, but when it comes to actually accomplishing things, let's just say there is some room for improvement...

and so, for the first day of 2012, here is a list of THE TOP TEN THINGS I AM NOT GOING TO TRY TO ACCOMPLISH IN 2012!

10. i will NOT try to exercise every day. it is never going to happen. i hate to exercise. i know it is good for me, but until exercise equals some sort of pay-off (and no, improved health apparently doesn't count in my world,) it will not be happening every day. now, if eating chocolate chip cookies was good for my health, i could probably commit to that! then again, maybe not. maybe i am just not programmed to do anything every single day... until i die...

9. i will NOT try to eat healthier. i've done that. the truth is, my eating habits have improved. but the truth also is, i love carbs and i tend to get a little cranky when i don't get them. so then i give in and eat chocolate chip cookies from del taco by the dozen or a whole tub of costco cream puffs in one day. i'm pretty sure that is really not good for me. so i've decided that no food is off limits any more. (except spinach. and squid. i'm pretty sure those foods will kill me!) i'll just try to eat whatever i want, but maybe not all at one time...

8. i will NOT watch less tv. i like to watch tv. my mom hardly watches any tv at all. i don't know how she does it! she says there isn't that much on that she enjoys watching, but my tivo is almost always busy recording stuff for me to watch. and there are so many choices! this morning i watched a show on the science channel called "how things are made." did you know that when they harvest the tiny peppers for tabasco sauce, they have to do it by hand? and before they pick a tiny pepper, they have to match it's color to a red stick that they carry around with them? i am serious, people!! and then, they put millions of those tiny peppers into wooden barrels and let them ferment for three years before they make them into tabasco sauce!!! who knew? and don't even get me started on how cheese graters are made...

7. i will NOT be on time for work. i've tried. it is impossible. i'm pretty sure that even if i lived in my car in the parking lot of my school, i would be late (and also smelly...) i am on time sometimes. i am even occasionally early. but i am done stressing while i sit at a red light, or worrying all the way to work about whether my time card will read 8:00 or 8:03 (or 8:12, but that doesn't happen too often.) because it doesn't seem to matter what time i get up, or what i have to do in the morning, i am almost always a few minutes late.

6. i will NOT blog every day. i would like to. and i know some of you would like me to, too :) i did it for a while. but now that i am walking the dogs and trying to cook dinner, there are days when i have to choose between blogging and getting into bed before midnight. (ok, i guess even when i wasn't walking the dogs and cooking dinner, there were still days when i had to choose between blogging and getting into bed before midnight. the difference now is that i've finally realized i need to sleep worse than i need to blog. which is unfortunate, because i like to blog more than i like to sleep!) don't worry though, i won't STOP blogging. ever. i just won't be doing it every single day. probably.

5. i will NOT try to solve everybody's problems. i want all the people i love to be happy and healthy. obviously! and so, when there is a problem, i want to fix it. i don't think that is unusual for a mom-sister-daughter-wife-friend. but i can't do it. even if i have a perfectly good solution, i can't make the people i love take my perfectly good advice. so this year, i am going to be saying "ok, God, i trust you with this" a lot more than i'm going to be saying "why don't you try this!" to my friends and family. it isn't going to be easy. i've been giving it a trial run for the last two weeks, and it isn't easy. sometimes i have to say it over and over and over again... and then staple my lips shut...

4. i will NOT mail christmas cards out. it has been years since i have actually mailed cards out anywhere close to christmas. it isn't that i don't want to communicate with people and share the joy of christmas--i LOVE getting christmas cards--it's just that i never seem to get it done! for one thing, every year it gets harder to find a card that expresses what christmas is all about AND has a pretty enough picture that i want to spend my money on it... and then there are all those decisions about who to send cards to... and writing a christmas letter that is informative without sounding whiny or braggy... (i know braggy isn't really a word, but it fit the pattern. and you know, snarky wasn't a word until i invented it, and now it is used everywhere! so maybe braggy will catch on...) and then actually going to the post office (which i hate almost as much as going to the dentist...) and yet, every year i think i will do it. and then i don't. and i feel so guilty...

3. i will NOT try to accomplish everything in one year. maybe i won't try to accomplish anything in one year! (ok, that isn't going to happen--i am too co-dependent on my lists to try not to accomplish anything. i am embarrassed by the number of list-making and organizational apps i have on my iproducts. i need to know i have a plan, even if i know i will never complete it...) i accomplished a lot this year. i thought that once i had made the move to the new house, and had purged a whole patio full of stuff, and was unpacked, that i would finally be done cleaning out and organizing my house. i thought i would finally just get to live in my house, knowing where everything was and able to find whatever i needed. but it didn't quite turn out that way... i'm still organizing and finding better places for things. and it doesn't seem to matter how much we do to the house, the list of things to be done continues to grow. so i am just going to have to wrap my brain around the fact that i will never be done with my "to do" list. ever.

2. i will NOT make any big changes. there were times when i thought 2011 was going to kill me. as i said yesterday, 2011 was all about change, and i hate change! i felt unsettled and off balance for most of the year. i had to adjust to a lot of new circumstances, and although many of them were actually good circumstances, you know how my brain works... and so 2012 is going to be the year of maintaining the status quo. i'm going to spend this next year settling into the way my life is now, with all of it's changes from the last year. i'm not going to be pushing forward, and hopefully i won't be falling back. in 2012 i'm just going to sit on the back of the bicycle built for two, and coast...

and the number one thing i will not try to accomplish in 2012...

1. i will NOT take my life for granted. i have friends who lost people they loved dearly this past year. i have friends who have battled with health issues. i have friends who have had to deal with difficult family relationships. i have friends who have been on the wrong end of downsizing. we don't live in a world full of warm fuzzies any more, and none of us knows what tomorrow is going to bring! but... i have a family who loves me more than i deserve. i have a steady paycheck (well, except for the summers...) i have a pretty cute roof over my head and more food than i need to eat. i don't have any debilitating health issues. i can pretty much do what i want to do.

and so in 2012, i'm going to! i'm going to call my mom and dad more often... wear flannel pajama pants around the house... go to the beach... smile more often at rollie... eat at new places... wear perfume... watch girly movies with diandra... wear my party dresses... spend more time on the patio with my kindle... buy fresh flowers... and learn to dance, all by myself...

...just because it makes me happy :)

ch-ch-ch-changes, part deux

2011-12-31T23:26:00.001-08:00

so today . . . is the last day of 2011. i thought i should probably blog...

i have been a terrible blogger this year! in fact, i am not sure i have blogged enough to even be called a blogger!! i should probably just be called "a woman with a computer and a blogspot address who thinks about blogging but never actually does it..." but that is kind of long, and i don't really like it, so next year i promise to do better!

(oh man, there i go, making new year's resolutions already! i hate new year's resolutions! they always make me feel like a big, fat failure, because i can never keep them. ever. so forget i said that... because if i make a resolution like that, it will certainly be the kiss of death for my blog!)

2011 was a year of changes. ultimately all the changes were good, but they were not without consequences. i was tired. i was busy. i was confused and overwhelmed. i was exhausted. my brain ceased to function quite frequently. there were days i couldn't keep my eyes open and nights when i didn't sleep. and so my blogging became sporadic...

...and then i got an ipad. and an iphone. which made it worse!

yes, one of the biggest changes of 2011 was learning to navigate apple's operating system--you know, the one that is so intuitive?? yes, well maybe it is intuitive if you are a child! but for a person who has been using microsoft products for the last 25 years, i find it more than a little bit challenging. and yet, i am strangely madly in love with my new electronics. you know how in the movies the good girls are always falling for the bad boys? you know those boys are going to get them into trouble, and yet the good girls fall for them every. single. time. well, my iproducts are my bad boys...

how has this affected my blogging? it's like this... i used to spend my evenings sitting on my couch, watching tv, and surfing the internet with my cute little laptop. i would "shop" a little, catch up on what all my fb friends were doing, farm a little, and then blog. but now? now i spend my evenings sitting on my couch, watching tv, and surfing the internet on my ipad. i check my email, look for new, free apps to download, and maybe "shop" a little. but what i do not do is farm (because the ipad doesn't support most fb games,) or blog. because i can't.

i can't blog from my ipad. my blogger site doesn't work with apple's operating system. i need an app for that! and there is one for the phone, but not for the ipad. i went into the apple store for help, and we managed to figure out how i could post a blog, but it isn't easy! it is time consuming and frustrating and doesn't always work. so, if i want to blog, i have to get up off the couch and trade my ipad for my laptop, and i am sorry to tell you that there are days when i just don't have the oomph to do that! and so my blogging suffered...

and then i was busy. i was out of town in february, march, august, september, october, november, and december for 5-10 days each time. i was the mother of the bride on st. patrick's day in las vegas. i looked for a house, bought a house, packed up our old house, and moved into our new house. i hired and supervised painters, gardeners, and other miscellaneous workers. i taught school. i did laundry, walked the dogs, cleaned the house, and finally started cooking again. i shopped for family room couches, a washer and dryer, and a new front door... i am still shopping for a new front door... i spoke at two retreats and a christmas brunch. i was busy.

and then our family changed. in 2011 i became a mother-in-law. i'm not so sure how i feel about that. i always say that diandra is pretty much perfect. and she is. but "pretty much" leaves a little room for those days that we all have occasionally... and somehow, miraculously, her husband, javier knows how to deal with those days and make them better. i am very glad that my darling daughter is married to a man who is the yin to her yang. i'm glad she found a man who loves her like her dad loves me, and like my dad loves my mom. but now i have a son-in-law, a cuban son-in-law, who doesn't like to smile in pictures (although he is getting better,) who hugs everyone (EVERYONE,) who eats my string cheese by BITING it (everyone knows you have to peel the strings off to eat string cheese!) and is just a bit inscrutable. and so i am not quite sure what to do with him. our family dynamic has changed, and it is a little unnerving at times... our nest is empty (well, except for our two weird pups,) and we miss having our little chick around.

2011 was defined by changes. and sometimes chaos. it was all about just getting through the next few days... or weeks... or months... it was about homecomings and leaving home. it was about crisis management and problem solving. and yet, when i look back over the last year, i am struck by how blessed we are! we live in the land of eternal sunshine. we have good, steady jobs. we have a lovely new home (even if the garage roof does have a leak!) we are mostly happy and healthy.

i am hoping that in 2012 we are going to find some balance in our lives and get back into a routine. i am hoping that we are done dealing with major changes for a while. i am hoping that life is going to get back to normal... even if normal is going to be different than it has ever been before.

so here we go... on to 2012... let the blogging resume!

Tagging along, part 1

2011-12-19T01:46:00.001-08:00

So today . . . I second shot my first wedding! Well, sort of...

About a month ago, my daughter the super awesome wedding photographer, asked me if I wanted to travel to the San Francisco bay area this weekend with her. I said yesyesyesofcourseidoyes!!!! And so here I am.

On the way up, Diandra asked if I wanted to help her during the wedding. I said yesyesofcourseidoyes!!! But, since I'm not a photographer, I didn't know how much help I would be. Once we got started though, I found that there were a lot of things I could do. I ran errands. I held things. I fetched and carried. And I took a few pictures too... With diandra's new iphone4s!

I had to be a little sneaky, because I didn't want people to think the wedding photos were being taken with a phone! But whenever I get to go with Diandra on a photo shoot, I love taking pictures of her taking pictures. So I did! And the bride and groom were so cute that I couldn't help taking some of them too. And I was going to post some of my pretty great shots, but I'm blogging on my iPad and can't figure out how to add photos. And it is now 1:46 a.m. and we have to get up EARLY tomorrow and drive home. Well actually, I won't be going home-Diandra will take me directly to lax because I am flying to Portland for Christmas tomorrow!

And so, while today was loooong, it was wonderful too! I love going to weddings with Diandra. She is super awesome and so good at what she does. It makes me so proud to watch her capture the beauty and emotions of such an important day for people. And rumor has it that I might get the opportunity to go with her again...

a christmas pageant... with a twist

2011-11-28T22:05:00.000-08:00

so today . . . i am more than a little concerned about what is going to happen with our christmas pageant at school this year...

yes, it is that time again--time to make decisions about what we are going to do for our christmas program. the first year i worked at my current school, i didn't really have a good idea about what was expected. i figured i would teach my kindergarteners a christmas song, and when it was our turn we would sing. their parents would get to see them up in front of everyone, snap a few pictures, and everyone would go home happy.

i was so naive.

in the middle of october, teachers started talking about the christmas program. i ignored it. christmas was still two months away, and how long could it take to teach my kids a song? so we continued working on fall projects and didn't think too much about the christmas program.

at the beginning of november, i started hearing christmas songs wafting down the hallway during music time. i seemed to be the only one who was not yet practicing a christmas song. i decided maybe i should at least choose something, just in case it turned out to be harder than i thought. so i found a nice little song (called happy birthday, Jesus) that had lovely words and a mellow sound, and started teaching it to the kids.

they were less than thrilled. "do we have to sing that song again?" they started whining... in mid-november... "yes," i said. "we have to learn this song so that we can sing for our parents for christmas." but i knew i was in trouble if they were already tired of it with still a month to go before the performance.

and then right before thanksgiving, one of the teachers asked me if i had sent home a letter yet about the costumes for the program. costumes? they needed costumes?? yes, she went on to explain, the parents would provide the costumes, or money to purchase the costumes if i preferred. they were used to it. i just had to send a letter home. and it was best to do it now, she said, before they got busy with christmas stuff.

we hadn't even had our thanksgiving feast yet. we were still busy making pilgrim costumes...

and my song didn't really need costuming. it wasn't about sheep and shepherds or little drummer boys or stars and angels. it was just a nice little song about christmas being all about Jesus. you know, because it is His birthday!!!

ok, so, apparently i needed costumes. i listened to the song again, and decided i would just have the kids dress in party clothes--whatever they already had in their little closets that looked nice would be fine. and it wouldn't cost anybody anything. so i wrote the note to the parents, knowing they would be relieved, and went back to thinking about thanksgiving.

until the next day...

until the next day when the first parent came into my classroom and said, "what do you mean they don't need a costume for the christmas program! it's the CHRISTMAS PROGRAM!! they need costumes!!!!" i tried to explain that costumes were not going to enhance our performance. in fact, costumes would probably distract from the message of our very meaningful song. i assured them that it was going to be fine. our performance would be wonderful. they didn't need to worry about it.

i'm sure they worried about it.

two weeks before the christmas program, the same teacher who asked me about costumes (she really was trying to help me--i was so clueless,) told me that we were going to start practicing on the stage in the gym. every day, we would practice. and not just our class--all the classes. so, it appeared that for two weeks, we were going to spend the better part of our morning sitting on the floor of the gym watching the other classes practice their songs until it was finally our turn. because since the kindergarteners are the oldest, they are always last... and maybe i should mention here that the actual program was not going to take place in the gym--it was going to be in the sanctuary--so i was not sure how helpful all this gym practicing was going to be anyway. not to mention the fact that we weren't getting anything else done! and i was supposed to start reading groups in december...

the next day we tromped up to the gym with everyone else, and that's when i realized that i was in big t.r.o.u.b.l.e. the other classes had hand motions. they had dance routines. their songs were lively and fun. those kids didn't know all the words to their songs, but boy could they move! AND apparently they were also going to have costumes!

my class was going to stand there in their party clothes and sing a song. no motions. no dancing. no costumes.

i was pretty sure that i would be out of a job after the christmas program...

and then the next year, our director decided that instead of just singing a song, the three older classes should put on a christmas pageant. she had seen one done somewhere else and thought it would be a good idea if we did one.

i was pretty sure it wasn't a good idea. but since i'm not in charge of the world, i was suddenly in charge of the christmas pageant.

ok, well technically i wasn't in charge of the pageant, but i had plenty to do. i rewrote the script, because whoever had written the original script had clearly not had four and five year olds as actors. the school bought costumes for the people parts, but the teachers were assigned the task of making the animal costumes, since oriental trading company didn't sell animal costumes. since i was still the new guy, i sort of stood back and watched as the other teachers tried to figure out what to do. finally i couldn't take it any more! "i'll make all the sheep costumes," i said, "if you guys can do the others." they quickly agreed, since there was a pattern for the other animals, but not for the sheep. so i grabbed my bundle of fleecy fabric and headed home...

during the day, we practiced the program--we practiced the speaking parts, and we practiced where to stand and when to move, and we practiced the song. and we didn't make any progress on reading groups... and then at night the teachers stitched our little fingers off (well, not me. i used a sewing machine. but as i later found out, none of the other teachers could use a sewing machine, so the other costumes were stitched by hand, or GLUED together!) we didn't get a lot of work done at school, but it looked like the pageant was coming together.

and it did. it took a lot of work that first year, and all of us were ready to jump off a bridge and cancel christmas, but the kids looked cute, and their parents took pictures, and everyone went home happy--especially the teachers, because the pageant was DONE!!

unfortunately, we did such a good job, and the kids looked SO cute, and the parents took SO many pictures, and everyone was SO happy, that we were expected to do the pageant again the next year... and the next year... and the next year...

but this year is going to be a little bit different. this year our kids are younger--they are about six months younger than what we usually have--which will make a difference in the pageant. we don't have enough kids who can handle speaking parts, so this year i will narrate the story while the kids (in their costumes, of course) will act it out. and then we will sing a lively song at the end. with hand motions :-)

this year, we decided to wait until after thanksgiving to start working on our song. which meant that today was the day! so during music time, i started describing to the kids what we were going to do, and why we were going to be singing the same song over and over and over again until we knew it really well. they seemed to be listening, so i went on to describe how we would act out the story and how we would wear costumes. and then aiden raised his hand, and excitedly said, "can i be spiderman?"

spiderman? in the christmas pageant?? i can see it now...

and then sadie said, "i want to be rapunzel!"

spiderman and rapunzel in bethlehem... it's only a matter of time before the angry birds try to get in on the act too!

a memorable thanksgiving...

2011-11-23T23:59:00.000-08:00

today's blog is dedicated to larry and tracie swanson. they were our first "couple" friends and have the dubious distinction of being the guests at our first thanksgiving meal. just so you know, they are still alive...

so today . . . is thanksgiving eve. and i think the time has come to tell you about the first time i cooked thanksgiving dinner. all. by. myself...

when rollie and i got married, we were really young--probably too young to be making such huge life decisions. i had very little real life experience. i went from living with my mom and dad, to living in a dorm room, to living with rollie. and while i knew how to dust and vacuum and clean the bathroom (thank you for making me do chores, mom!) i didn't really know how to cook. when i lived at home, my dad always made oatmeal for our breakfast (sometimes chocolate oatmeal! thank you dad!) we all ate hot lunch at our respective schools, and my mom cooked dinner. and then i went away to college and discovered the joys of saga food services! choices, choices, choices, and none of them required me to get near a stove!! so basically, rollie married someone who could bake chocolate chip cookies and zucchini bread...

but when our first thanksgiving rolled around, i decided i wanted to cook a big thanksgiving dinner. mostly i decided this because our thanksgiving vacation was only four days long which really didn't leave us enough time to go home for thanksgiving. so even though my foray into providing meals for our new family had pretty much consisted of kraft macaroni and cheese and hamburger helpers, i was prepared to do whatever i had to do to make our first thanksgiving memorable...

... and it was. but not for the reasons you might think...

it started right after halloween. i got out the cookbooks people had thoughtfully given us for wedding gifts and started planning. i made a menu. i made a grocery list. i made a timeline. because as anyone who has ever cooked a thanksgiving dinner knows, you need a timeline. thanksgiving dinner does not just happen, people--it takes planning! i'm not so sure i realized this before... it seemed like all my previous thanksgiving dinners had just sort of appeared. i guess that's what happens when you aren't the grownup responsible for feeding the hungry hoard of family members. but this year, it was all up to me.

we were on an extremely tight budget when we were first married. extremely tight. i'm pretty sure that is why we ate so much kraft macaroni and cheese, because i could buy four boxes for a dollar. so going to the grocery store and buying whatever i needed all in one week was not an option. i had to divide the list so i could buy the non-perishable items early and watch for the best deal on a frozen turkey. it became clear to me, as i pushed my shopping cart up and down the grocery store aisles, that i was not going to be able to afford everything on my list. i was going to have to make choices...

but this was our first thanksgiving! i wanted it to be memorable! so i started looking for cheaper alternatives. as i was comparing prices, the first thing i noticed was that those bags of dried bread cubes that the stuffing recipe called for were kind of expensive. but i needed dried bread cubes if i was going to make stuffing. but i couldn't afford the dried bread cubes. so i decided to make my own. bread was cheap. i figured i could buy a couple of loaves of bread, cut the slices up into cubes, dry them, and ta-da! i would have bread cubes for my stuffing.

and that is exactly what i did. it took me one whole afternoon, but i cut up three loaves of bread (because i wanted to make sure i had enough) into tiny, half inch cubes. then i spread them out on every cookie sheet i had. i discovered that i didn't have enough cookie sheets, so i put aluminum foil on every horizontal surface i could find and covered it with soft bread cubes. and then i waited for them to dry...

i did all of this several days before thanksgiving, because i had no idea how long it was going to take bread cubes to dry. and i figured that once they were dry i could bag them up and save them until the big day. plus, i knew it was going to be a lot of work to cook thanksgiving dinner, and this was one thing i could do early...

and then there was the turkey. i was used to buying meat one pound of hamburger at a time--which i would then divide into thirds and use when making hamburger helper (i told you, our budget was TIGHT!) but i had decided we needed at least a 20 pound turkey! (yes, i know there were only two of us, but the bigger the bird, the more meat. right?) thankfully(?) our freezer was nearly empty. so once i found a grocery store where i could buy a turkey for about 10 cents a pound (if i bought $25 worth of other groceries, which is about all i had,) i rooted around in the frozen turkey bin until i found the biggest turkey they had--a 23 pound bird! i put that thing in my cart, feeling like i had hit the jackpot, and headed home to try to cram it into my freezer.

a 23 pound turkey is pretty big. especially when you live in a basement apartment and your refrigerator has a small freezer...

i finally got the bird tucked away, lined up the rest of my cans and boxes of food, smiled at my drying bread cubes, and waited for thanksgiving...

i say waited, but i was busy! i was still going to classes, doing homework, trying to figure out what i could make for dinner each night with a can of tuna fish, and turning my bread cubes over so that they would dry evenly and quickly.

the weekend before thanksgiving i was talking to my mom on the phone, and i was telling her about my plans for our thanksgiving meal. my biggest worry was how i was going to get everything ready to eat at the same time! i had quite a menu planned and only one oven, which i was pretty sure was going to be filled up with turkey. "well," my mom said, "whatever you do, don't make your own stuffing! just use the stove top stuffing."

just use the stove top stuffing? what was stove top stuffing, and why didn't i know about it?!?! i didn't know about it, because i was never in the kitchen when the actual cooking was happening. "you know, stove top stuffing," my mom continued. "you buy it in a box at the grocery store. then you just boil water, empty the package into the boiling water, cover it and wait a few minutes, and you have stuffing!"

this would have been good to know. it would have been especially good to know before i had spent the last several days cubing bread slices and babysitting them so that they would dry evenly. i looked around my kitchen at my 5, 386 nearly dry bread cubes and said, "i think it might be too late for stove top stuffing..." i quickly recovered. "besides," i continued, "i want to make real stuffing, the kind that goes inside the turkey. this is our first thanksgiving, and i want it to be memorable."

there was that word again...

when i finished up my classes on the day before thanksgiving, i decided i should get out my menu for the next day and get organized. and, i thought, it was probably time to take the turkey out of the freezer so it could thaw...

yep, my 23 pound turkey was still in the freezer, frozen as solid as a rock! blissfully ignorant, i took it out of the freezer and plopped in into the kitchen sink to thaw. hmmm, i thought, i should probably get out the cookbook and find out how long it was going to take to cook the turkey. we had invited company over for thanksgiving dinner, and i wanted to make sure everything was done at the same time. i flipped through the cookbook, and that's when i saw it. that's when i saw how long it takes to thaw a 23 pound frozen turkey!

we were in biiiig trouble!

i spent the rest of the afternoon and evening thawing that big hunk of meat! that turkey had more warm baths than a messy toddler! i dunked it in warm water. i ran water inside it. and that's when i found the bag of giblets. "what's this?" i said to rollie. (it should be noted here that rollie knew exactly what it was, while i didn't have a clue. in hindsight, perhaps he should have been the one cooking thanksgiving dinner...) he removed the bag of giblets, (because there was no way i was touching that!) and i continued pouring water inside the thawing turkey. finally, around midnight, i decided the bird was thawed enough, because i needed to go to bed! i had a lot of cooking to do the next day, and according the the cookbook, a 23 pound stuffed turkey was going to take several hours to cook, which meant i was going to have to get up about 4 a.m.

i felt like overall, things were progressing nicely. my jello salad was made. the bread cubes were hard as rocks (which i hoped was a good thing!) i had a bag of frozen corn and a bag of frozen peas ready to be microwaved. my pumpkin and peach pies were done (i told you i could bake--it's cooking that gives me grief!) and delicious squishy dinner rolls were ready to be warmed and served. i was pretty sure the only thing that had the potential to ruin my memorable first thanksgiving was that turkey...

i got up at 4 a.m. so did rollie. actually, rollie is probably the one who woke up first and had to drag me into the kitchen. i pulled out the biggest bowl i had and mixed up the stuffing. (it may surprise you to learn that i had waaaay more dried bread cubes than i needed. clearly i did not have an accurate picture of the size of the inside of a turkey... even a 23 pound turkey.) when i got out the roasting pan and the brown-in bag, i saw that there were instructions with the brown-in bag... and those instructions said that if i cooked my stuffed turkey in the brown-in bag, it would only take 4-5 hours...

did i mention it was 4 a.m.?

our company wasn't coming until early afternoon, so i put the stupid turkey in the stupid brown-in bag, put the whole stupid thing back in the stupid refrigerator and went back to bed...

around noon, it looked like things were finally coming together. the turkey was smelling really good. i had disposed of the extra bread cubes. the table was set. it was time to make the sweet potato balls.

sweet potato balls are a family tradition. we had had sweet potato balls at every thanksgiving i could remember, although again, i had never actually been involved in making them. but how hard could it be? take a big marshmallow, cover it with mashed up canned sweet potatoes, roll the ball in crushed corn flakes, and bake! time was getting short, so rollie was helping me. "what are these?" he asked. "sweet potato balls! we have them every year at thanksgiving!" "are they good?" he asked. "i guess so," i answered. "i don't like sweet potatoes, so i never eat them." "then why are we having them if you don't like them?" he asked.

he sure was asking a lot of questions!

"because," i explained, "it's thanksgiving, and we always have them at thanksgiving. don't you like them?" "well," he said, "i don't know. i don't really like sweet potatoes either..." so there we were, our hands covered in sweet potato goo and crushed cornflakes, making something that neither one of us liked. "maybe larry or tracie will like them," i said. "let's hope so," rollie replied...

we took the turkey out of the oven and reset it for the sweet potato balls. we carefully cut the brown-in bag off, and i started to scoop out the stuffing. it was looking pretty good! and it smelled delicious!! maybe i was going to be able to pull off this thanksgiving dinner thing after all. rollie started slicing up the turkey while i finished up the other food.'

"uh, julie?" he said. "yes?" i answered. and then he said, "i think there is something wrong with the turkey."

these are not the words you want to hear on thanksgiving, especially when you have company arriving at any minute. these are not the words you want to hear on thanksgiving when you have pretty much spent your whole grocery budget on this one meal, hoping to live on the leftovers for a while. these are not the words you want to hear on your first thanksgiving, when all you wanted was for it to be memorable.

i was afraid to look. rollie kept poking around, and then he reached down into the bird and held something up. "what is that?!?!?!" i asked, horrified, looking at the brown, drippy mass in his hand. he said, "i think it is more of the giblet stuff..."

who knew that a turkey had TWO secret compartments where giblet stuff could be hidden...

i learned a lot our first thanksgiving. i learned that thanksgiving dinner isn't just a meal, it is a week long ordeal. i learned that if you have to get up at 4 a.m. it is easier if someone else gets up with you. i learned that you don't have to cook the same amount of food to feed four people that your mother cooked to fed thirty or forty!

and i learned that the most memorable things are sometimes the ones that don't go exactly according to plan...

oh, and when cooking a turkey, look out! there are giblets in both ends!!

a blog... motivated by threats!

2011-11-22T23:45:00.000-08:00

so today . . . i got this message on facebook--"i'm going to quit looking at your blog."

ok, it has been a while since i blogged. in fact, my blogging has been kind of hit and miss for the last several months. we've house hunted. we've married off our daughter. we've moved. we've unpacked... mostly. we've gone on vacation. we've had company. i've thought bloggy thoughts, but just couldn't seem to get them written down. as i've said before, i have to be in a certain frame of mind to blog, and i just haven't been there.

here's where i've been. smack the snooze alarm twice and then get up--go to my new, close, neighborhood 7-11 for a diet lemon cokesi on my way to work--spend the day trying to work with 10 pre-k kids, 5 kindergarteners, 2 curriculums, and 1 brain saying, "quit and go home!"--go home and change clothes--walk the dogs--make dinner, eat dinner, clean up after dinner--take a shower--do miscellaneous household stuff--catch up on facebook and email--go to bed.

do you see blogging anywhere in that list? me either. but i'm not ready to give it up. not yet. here's why...

TOP TEN REASONS I'M NOT READY TO STOP BLOGGING

10. it makes me think. my friend wendy says i think too much. sometimes i probably do. i wake up thinking about stuff. i go to sleep thinking about stuff. my brain never rests. this can be a problem, but blogging makes me think in funny ways. one of my favorite things to do is take an ordinary situation and make it funny. but that takes brain power, because i can't lie--everything i write has to be true... or at least as true as my memory is acurate :-) lately my brain has been sadly underpowered. i think i need an auxiliary brain...

9. i've invested too much to quit. i've written 684 blog posts! that is a lot of hours of thinking and writing and editing. it is too much to just write it off as something i did for a while and walk away. i want to reach 1000! maybe 2000! maybe 10,000!!

8. it helps me remember my life. i am shocked at how much i forget. sometimes i go back and read my old blogs and can't believe how many things would be lost forever if i hadn't blogged.

7. it reminds me of my friends and family who don't see me every day but read my blog. i think about you when i am writing, and i think about what i think you will think about what i am writing, and i think about if i should i write what i am writing because of what you might think about it...

(...maybe wendy is right...)

6. it makes me think (there i go again,) positively--mostly. i have come to realize that i am not really the optimist i like to think that i am. even though i want to be tigger, i am really a lot more eeyore. but who wants to read a whiny blog every day? who wants to write a whiny blog every day?? so while once in a while eeyore shoves tigger out of the way and gets to write a whiny blog, i try to get tigger to do most of them.

5. it makes me feel like a writer. i never knew i might want to be a writer until i started blogging. and then i started seeing ebooks that were really just a compilation of someone's blogs. i'll probably never write a real book, but now that ebooks are an option, who knows... considering some of the stuff that is out there in ebookland, maybe i will! my ebook might not be the best one, but it would certainly not be the worst one either!

4. it worries some people when i don't blog--namely, my mother-in-law :-) when i don't blog, she thinks something is wrong, and she worries about me. and she isn't completely wrong... there usually is a reason when i don't blog, and it isn't always a lack of time. but it also isn't usually as bad as she might think it is. some days are just ordinary and offer me no blogworthy material.

3. it keeps me from quitting my day job. this seems counter-intuitive to me, but it is true. it seems as though if i didn't work, then i would have more time to do all the other stuff i do--like blogging. but, i think to myself, what if i stopped working and then didn't have anything to blog about? what if i stopped working and never left the house? what if i stopped working and my blogs were reduced to "so today . . . i watched shopping tv and ate a tuna fish sandwich. of course, i only ate a tuna fish sandwich, because i burned the toasted cheese. it's nearly impossible to burn a tuna fish sandwich..." hmmm. ok, maybe that would work... maybe i should think about quitting my day job, because that sort of sounded like the beginning of a pretty good blog...

2. it lets people see who i wish i was. actually, my blog is who i am on good days... on those days when everything is right side up and all sunshiny. all of my days are not like that. i wish they were, but they are not. but writing the blog helps me be that person i want to be. it helps me find the humor in sometimes not so funny situations. it forces my brain to live in the land of unicorns and rainbows instead of gloom and doom--(ok, maybe not unicorns and rainbows. that is a little too sweet for me. maybe puppies and daisies...) it is a risk-free way to share myself with whoever wants to spend five minutes on my blog. it's who i wish i was, all the time, every day. even when i'm not...

and the #1 reason i don't want to stop blogging?

1. because my dad is threatening to quit looking at my blog!

yes, that facebook comment came from my dad. my dad! my dad, who can barely type, left me that message. i love my dad. and for him to take 20 minutes to type those few words (ok, i might be exaggerating that just a little bit,) made me realize that i needed to get back to it! i needed to stop putting it off, put pen to paper (so to speak,) and blog something.

so here it is, dad. a blog. not my best one, but at least when you click on that icon we put on your computer desktop that takes you directly to my blog (did you all know you could do that?!?!) there will be something new to read. at least for today.

i'm not making any promises about tomorrow...

jury box or jump house?

2011-10-31T23:45:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i was surrounded by super heroes and princesses. tiny ones... yes, it's halloween again.

halloween is not my favorite holiday for many, many reasons, but one of the main ones is tiny children coming to school in costume. i know, i know, i sound like the halloween scrooge, but tiny children in costumes result in cranky teacher miss julie. partly because tiny children in costumes tend to be very rambunctious (not necessarily a good thing when there are a gazillion of them in a classroom--at least it sure seems like a gazillion,) and partly because it means it is harvest festival day...

harvest festival day is second only to sports day on my list of most miserable school days, with picture day running a close third... but those are blogs for another day. today was harvest festival day...

here's how it works. first, most of the children come to school in costumes--costumes with numerous parts to them. there are tiaras and swords and helmets and magic wands and pompoms and cowboy hats. none of these things are easy or comfortable for the children to wear, but they are part of the costume. and so, while they want to wear them, all that stuff just gets in their way. but they want to wear it! so they wear it for a while. and then about the time we get outside and get involved in the activities, they decide they don't want to wear it anymore. and guess what happens then???

and then there are the activities. usually there are five or six different stations, and we have a schedule. each class spends about 20 minutes at each station. which would be fine, except the picture taking station only takes about five minutes, and the kids would stay at the jumper station all morning! and while the face painting station only takes a few minutes for each child, it can easily take 20 minutes to paint the faces of a whole class. which means getting your face painted for 3 minutes and sitting and waiting for everyone else for the next 17 minutes. if we are lucky. because it is halloween! and they are in costume!! no one is going to sit for 17 minutes, waiting patiently for their friends to get their faces painted. and so it is a constant juggling act between hurrying to get done at some stations before our time is up, and keeping a class full of four and five year olds occupied at other stations with nothing to do... let's just say, we sang every song i could think of... some of them twice...

and this year we had the added bonus of fishing--for real, live goldfish. the kids loved it! i am not so sure their parents are going to love it. because assuming that the fish lives until the end of the school day, those parents are going to have to make a stop on the way home to get a fish bowl, fish food, and colored rocks (because you cannot have a fish bowl without colored rocks! and who knows how long it will take them to choose the perfect color!!) on a day when they need to get right home and get ready for trick or treating. and then, before they get home, that fish will have a name. and then, tomorrow morning, the fish will be dead...

call me a pessimist, but it's the truth.

sleeping beauty's plastic jewels kept coming apart. the sequins on the cheerleader's dress were blinding everyone in the sunshine. spiderman didn't want to go to the bathroom, because he would have to take his costume off for a few minutes. spider girl (who even knew there was such a thing! but there she was in all her pink, tulle glory,) informed me she was not spider girl! she was afraid of spiders, so she was the black widow--even though there wasn't a spot of black on her costume, and she had no idea what a widow was. and when i tried to tell her that a black widow was a kind of spider (because i'd left my brain in bed this morning,) she started to cry. normally i am immune to crying, but she was working her way up to a full blown melt down, and it was harvest festival day, so i did the only thing i could do--i agreed with her erroneous 4 1/2 year old thinking. fine. you want to be the black widow, which is not a spider? fine. just stop crying...

i'm so ashamed...

and then there was the child who didn't wear a costume, telling the cheerleader in the sparkly dress "your costume is ugly!" as the cheerleader's dad came into the classroom to tell his darling daughter "have a nice day..." and the cute little girl who i thought was dressed as a cowgirl, only to find out (after i had complimented her on her costume,) that she wasn't wearing a costume. and the boy in my class who is consumed by angry birds mania, but wouldn't wear the bird costume for the picture, because it was blue. because, as everyone knows, the cool bird is the red one!

and then, again, there was spiderman... spiderman is my wild child this year. we try to keep one of our eyes on him all the time, because he is fast, he is impulsive, and we never know what he is going to do next. but today, in his spiderman suit, he was much calmer. i don't know if it is because the suit was somewhat restrictive when he tried to move (meaning almost too small,) or if it came with special spidey powers, but i am thinking of asking his mom if he can wear the suit every day...

i thought i might miss the harvest festival this year. i am scheduled for jury duty this week, so you know, there was a possibility... i don't think i have ever wished that my number would get called for jury duty before, but this year, a nice quiet day in the waiting room at the courthouse, reading my book sounded like a lovely alternative to the somewhat chaotic (and this year, HOT) harvest festival. i even did my jury orientation online over the weekend so that if i was called, i could sleep in just a bit on the first day. but today was not my first day. and tomorrow won't be either. so now i am back to hoping that they don't call my number for jury duty...

...unless they could do it on picture day ;-)

a new collection?

2011-10-22T23:59:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i cleaned out my closet. again.

i'm sure you are getting tired of hearing about my closet. i've blogged about it before. more than once. i really thought that when we moved, i had finally cleaned it out for the last time. i got rid of bags and bags of stuff. and then i unpacked into my new closet and realized that i still didn't have enough room for everything...

well, i had enough room for everything, but only if i squished the hangers together so tightly that i couldn't get anything out. and i use skinny velvet covered hangers, so it isn't like those hefty plastic hangers were hogging all the room. i had things stacked so high that i couldn't remove anything without fear of an avalanche. this is not the way i wanted to live! so i cleaned my closet out again. and then a couple of weeks later i did it again.

we have only lived in this house for two and a half months, and i've cleaned out my closet three times...

it seems like i spent my whole summer packing and moving and unpacking. which, mostly i did. but it still wasn't enough time to get completely settled. even though the majority of our stuff had found a place, there were still random boxes and piles of stuff here and there. and where did it bug me the most? in our bedroom! (ok, that's a lie. actually the garage bugs me the most, but there isn't a lot i can do about it right now. it's day is coming, but it isn't today...) so today i decided it was time to get it under control!

i'm sure it is not a coincidence that this happened today, because we are going to be out of town for a couple of days, and you know what that means... yep, clean all night! only this time i can't do that. because this time rollie and i are speaking at this retreat, which means i can't just skip the sessions and sleep. which is what i usually do :-) AND i'm going to need my brain, especially when it is my turn to speak. so i can't stay up all night. i just can't. so everything isn't going to get done to my satisfaction. but the closet is!

i started in on the closet earlier today, but you know my attention span... so i would work for a bit, eat a snack, watch some hgtv (which, btw, is giving me waaay too many ideas, now that i have a house!) rotate the laundry, check facebook (yeah, it's saturday. i can check it all day long. sadly, all my friends apparently have lives, so not much was happening online today...) move some furniture around, move it back, work in the closet some more, play with the dogs... you get the idea.

really, working in our bedroom was a bigger job than just the closet, because our bedroom is really big. so when we moved, i put all the easy stuff away and sort of stacked the rest in the empty half of the room. but then i needed stuff in those boxes full of stuff that i didn't know where to put, and so i would open a box, take something out, see something else and think, "oh, that's where that is," and take something else out, and then leave the box open, because i might need something else in there... i'm sure a picture is forming in your mind... it isn't pretty, is it...

so clearly i had to tackle that stuff too. which i did. but this complicated my closet project, because i kept finding more clothes. that i liked. that i didn't want to get rid of. that i didn't really have room for in my closet.

part of my problem is that i am trying to get by without buying a dresser. we have this big closet (at least it looked big when it was empty!) and so i am convinced that we should be able to get all our clothes in there. really! if we can't get all our clothes in there, then we have too many clothes!

apparently we have too many clothes. actually, apparently i have too many clothes, because i am hogging over half of the closet and still don't have enough room. rollie, on the other hand, seems to be fine. of course, all he has are shirts and pants. he doesn't have shirts and pants and dresses and skirts and vests and sweaters and jackets...

but i am determined. so i moved things around. i refolded stuff so that no space would be wasted. i put two pairs of boots in one box (i know, shocking isn't it!) and i finally got everything in, organized in such a way that i could also get stuff out too. i was feeling pretty happy!

and then, as i continued to put stuff away from the messy side of the room, i found a stack of jeans. five pairs of jeans, to be exact, neatly folded, hiding under some pillows. this was not good, not good at all... i went back into my closet to see what could be done. sadly, nothing could be done. i was out of space. i sorted through my jeans again to see if there were any that didn't fit or were too ratty to wear or that i just didn't like any more. but that didn't work either--they were all perfectly wearable. i should be glad! i had 34 pairs of jeans that i liked, that fit, that were already paid for. but the problem is, I HAVE 34 PAIRS OF JEANS!!!

sigh. when did i turn into my daughter?

because diandra is the queen of jeans. i do not even want to guess how many pairs of jeans that girl has. and when she goes shopping, what does she buy? more jeans.

maybe it is a reaction to her earlier jeans issues. because when she was a teenager, living at home, and i was buying her jeans, we had issues. she wanted jeans that sat below her waist, and i did not want her to have them. tops were shorter then, and my daughter was not going to run around with even the tiniest gap between her top and her jeans! we spent hours in dressing rooms! hours!! she would choose some jeans and try them on. i would say they were too low. she would say moo-oom! i would say you are not wearing those out of the house. she would say but i like them. i would say no. and eventually we would find a pair that we could both tolerate. and then we would go to another store, and it would start all over again. neither one of us would be happy, but at least she would be clothed.

and then she became an adult and started buying her own jeans. amazingly, she still took me along! "want to go to the mall?" she would say. "i need to get some jeans." inwardly i would groan, but since it would mean an afternoon with diandra, i would go. she didn't say moo-ooom anymore, but she still didn't always like my opinion. which didn't stop me from giving it, even though i no longer had the power to just say "no." which turned out ok, because instead of rolling her eyes at me, she started listening to me. and sometimes she even agreed with me. occasionally :-)

jeans shopping was always such an ordeal. and yet still we did it. diandra was always on the search for that perfect pair of jeans... which seemed to be just out of our grasp. we found lots of nearly perfect jeans, seemingly perfect jeans, or but the price is right jeans. but perfect jeans? highly elusive. and so, even though she always had a drawer full, or two, or three, she always seemed to need just one more pair...

i, on the other hand, only had five or six pair total--light blue, dark blue, black, short (to wear with flat shoes,) and longer (to wear with boots.) really. i thought six pair should be perfectly adequate. and it was.

until today. because today i couldn't fit all of my jeans into my closet. i had several stacks of jeans, sorted by style--skinny jeans, "jeggings" (which is the dumbest word ever. i hate to even write it, but it's what they are called,) boot cut, cargo, and capri. (don't worry, i only had one pair of capris.) i tried rearranging them. i tried folding them differently. i tried to get rid of just a few more pair. it didn't help. i still couldn't get them all in the closet. i finally had to put a few pair on top of some shoes...

when did this happen?!? where did all these jeans come from?!?! i hate to buy jeans. hate. it! and yet apparently i have bought them, because they didn't just materialize on their own, and i'm pretty sure denim hasn't figured out how to procreate. and i never purposely go shopping for jeans. if i happen across a pair, while shopping with diandra, i will get them, but i never say to myself, "i need a new pair of jeans. i think i will go to the mall." never. but i also apparently never get rid of a pair either, and so their numbers increase...

i don't know what i'm going to do. it seems ridiculous to get rid of perfectly good jeans that are already paid for that fit me. and i'm certainly not going to give up going to the mall with my daughter (which, let's face it, is really the issue here. because when i go with her, jeans just seem to follow me home...) so i guess there is only one thing to do...

... start planning my takeover strategy for rollie's side of the closet.

:-)

dog walkers

2011-10-17T23:59:00.000-07:00

so today . . . we walked the dogs. and i cooked. i'm pretty sure they are passing out coats and mittens in hell...

things have kind of gotten out of control around here. (is gotten even a word? i mean, i know i don't use capital letters when i blog. and i've totally butchered all the grammatical rules of sentence structure and paragraph formation. by choice. for effect. but i think i draw the line at using words like 'wanna' and 'gonna.' i'm just not sure if gotten fits into that category...) we have been busy. we have no consistency or predictability to our schedules. when we come home from work, there is always something that needs to be done. and on those rare times when nothing is demanding our immediate attention, we sort of just want to sit. we don't want to go change into our sneakers and walk the dogs. or cook. i know these are two separate issues, but for some strange reason, in my mind they are connected...

i know we need to walk the dogs--mia needs to expend some of her excess energy, which she usually reserves so that she can bark at whatever happens to walk past our house, and milo... well, milo is chubby. exceptionally chubby. i worry about milo's weight. and mine, just a little bit, because i have noticed that i can no longer eat a dozen chocolate chip cookies from del taco all by myself in one day and still comfortably get into my jeans. and i'm not buying bigger jeans! at least, not yet...

i've been planning to walk the dogs for quite some time now. in fact, it has been one of my new year's resolutions for the past few years. but since i keep making the same resolution over and over and over again, you can probably figure out that my follow through is not all that good. i've read that to be consistent with exercise, you need to "buddy up" with someone. of course the logical someone for me to buddy up with is rollie. i've brought it up a few times, but he always scoffs and sneers and looks at me like, "what?!? do i LOOK like a little old lady?? walking isn't REAL exercise. REAL exercise requires a ball and rules and a referee. besides, you would never be able to keep up with me. i would have to walk so slowly to stay with you, that it wouldn't do any good at all."

(i feel i should just point out here that rollie never actually said any of those words. that is just the conversation that happened in my head when i said, "maybe you should walk with me," and he looked at me with an expression of confusion and disbelief. i don't recall he ever actually said any words. but i could read it all in his face...)

and truthfully, i didn't really push it. because if he walked with me then i couldn't listen to my ipod--i would be forced to have a conversation. not that i don't like to talk to my husband, it's just that i never get to listen to my ipod, and walking is the perfect opportunity. plus, if rollie decided he wanted to walk with me, then i couldn't wimp out. i would have to go. every day. and while one part of my brain really wants that, another part just wants to watch tv and drink soda pop. and so, it has been several months since i walked the dogs...

and then, a couple of weeks ago, rollie came home from a meeting and said, "i think we should start walking the dogs together."

whaaaat?!?!?! seriously?!?!??!? because as i said, every time i brought it up, his expression pretty much said, "walking is sissy exercise!" but instead of reminding him of that, i just said, "thank you Jesus!" and listened to his plan. he had apparently heard a speaker talk about stress and health and how walking was probably the best daily exercise to do--it can be done anywhere, any time, it doesn't require any special equipment or a gym membership, and half an hour a day is adequate. rollie, of course, thought we should walk an hour. because, you know, if half an hour is adequate, then an hour would be better! so last monday, we walked the dogs...

the first obstacle was getting them leashed up. they are used to wearing collars, but when we walk them, they need harnesses. because mia thinks she is a contender for the kentucky derby, and milo thinks he is a big dog, capable of taking down any cat or rotweiller we happen to encounter. yes, they can be a little hard to control... rollie, bless his little pink heart, was going to walk mia. he thought she should sit and stay while he put her harness on, and then walk calmly beside him. silly boy! clearly he has never walked mia. she gets so excited to go for a walk that she can't stop wiggling and jumping around. and the more he said, "mia! sit!" the more excited she got! and then, there's milo. he is perpetual motion. and trying to get his harness snapped around his chubby little body is always a challenge. but we finally managed to get the harnesses on and the leashes clipped and headed out the door into our new neighborhood. with our dogs. for the first time. together...

since our dogs are different sizes--as are rollie and i--finding a pace we can all live with isn't that easy. we all start out really fast, but milo fades first. when milo fades, we all slow down. the first day we walked, he didn't even make it half way around the block. and when i say he didn't make it, what i mean is he just stopped walking. he stopped. he wouldn't budge. he plopped his 18 pound body down and refused to move. he was done. so, i picked him up and carried him the rest of the way. mia was glad to pull rollie along, and since we had only been walking for about five minutes, i just kept going... carrying our 18 pound chihuahua.

that was day one. on day two, milo made it quite a bit further. on day three, he did pretty good again, but still needed to be carried about half of the way home. rollie had seen me carry milo the previous two days, me with my scrawny little arms, and so he thought he would be nice and give me a break. he took milo in his arms and gave me mia's leash. we hadn't gone far when he said, "this dog is heavy! i don't know how you carried him so long!!" i know he was thinking, "i don't know how you carried him so long with those scrawny little arms," but he didn't say it. he didn't say it, because my scrawny little arms had carried that fat, little dog longer than his big muscular arms had. "it's the mom in me," i said. "moms have to be able to carry at least 20 pounds around. think about how much toddlers weigh!" i don't really mind carrying milo while we finish walking. i've seen people walk with hand held weights for increased exercise benefits--my extra 20 pounds is just furry and cute! but we do get some funny looks...

our neighborhood is pretty quiet. it is a walled community. walled, not gated. which means that anyone can get in, but why would they? there is no place to go! the only traffic at 5:00 at night are people coming home from work who live here. this is great for us, because we have to walk our unruly pets in the street...

we have to walk our unruly pets in the street for a couple of reasons. first of all, the sidewalk isn't wide enough for all four of us, which makes talking impossible. and secondly, milo feels the need to mark every vertical surface he passes. and some horizontal ones too! if we walk on the sidewalk, it takes us FOREVER to get around the block. so we walk in the street, which doesn't completely deter milo from marking the whole neighborhood as his territory--he just looks for car tires, garbage cans, the occasional random pine cone, the CURB... milo doesn't so much walk for the exercise as he walks for the opportunity to do his business someplace other than his own yard.

the first day we walked, i forgot to take a plastic bag in case he pooped. i say 'in case,' but it is not so much a possibility as an inevitability. milo always poops when we walk. always. but since it has been a while since we walked, i forgot to take a bag. and sure enough, halfway around the block, he stopped. i knew what was about to happen. he was going to make a doggie bomb right there in front of God and everybody... including the two neighbors that just happened to be in their front yards. and i didn't have a bag! this was not good, not good at all. i tried to keep him moving. i thought if i could just keep him walking, maybe he could wait...

he couldn't.

and there is was. right in the middle of the street in front of the entrance to our neighborhood. and we had no bag. we were in deep and serious you know what... we couldn't just walk on like nothing had happened! people had seen us!! and there was physical evidence! so rollie and i had this loud conversation about how, oh no, we had forgotten to bring a bag but it was ok, we would just go home and get one and walk around the block again and pick up milo's little gift the next time we came by...

i'm pretty sure those neighbors went into their houses and watched for us to return. they probably had their phones in hand, ready to dial the city poop police if we didn't come back and clean up after our pup. which, of course, we did. talking loudly again, just so that everyone within earshot would know that we are NOT the kind of people who walk our dogs and let them poop wherever they want to and then just walk off and leave it! no sir! we are the kind of people who will go out of our way to make sure our streets are safe for people to walk on after dark without fear of, well, you know...

it's stressful being the new kids on the block...

handyman? or addition to the family... ??

2011-10-15T23:59:00.000-07:00

so today . . . the home improvements continue...

it seems like everything that needs to be done turns into a big, hairy deal!

it's been about a month since our handyman, manuel, was here. he came in sort of an emergency situation at the end of august to put in a doggie door. our pups need back yard access, especially when we are not home, and since we were getting ready to be out of town for several days, we needed a doggie door. right away.

it shouldn't have been an emergency situation. i have known from the time we bought our house that we were going to need unrestricted puppy access from the house to the back yard. and if our family room had sliding glass doors, that wouldn't have been a problem. but it doesn't. it has french doors. you cannot easily install a doggie door in french doors...

each french door has a "sidelight" next to it. i had never heard the term sidelight, until i started scouring the internet looking for doggie door alternatives. but once i realized it was a real thing, with a name and everything, i thought that surely i could get one with a doggie door in it.

i was wrong.

but i was sure i was right! so i spent weeks and weeks following every little rabbit trail that google decided to send me on, trying to find a doggie door that would fit in that space. and what i discovered what that no one makes such a thing. oh they probably will, in a few years, now that french doors seem to be the popular choice for back yard entrance. but as usual, i am ahead of my time. i need one now!

i considered putting a doggie door flap in the door that leads from the garage to the back yard. but then the pups would have to be in the garage when we weren't home--not an acceptable solution for us. i contemplated replacing the french doors with sliding glass ones--but i really like the french doors. i even thought about cutting a hole in the wall for a doggie door flap! yes, i was getting desperate.

and the clock was ticking...

because the first time we went out of town, for our vacation, not having a doggie door created problems. and we were getting ready to leave again. twice. this problem had to be solved...

so we went to petco and bought a doggie door--the kind you use for sliding glass doors. our plan was to have manuel just cut the hole a little bigger in the sidelight and pop the doggie door in. it sounded so much easier than it turned out to be! manuel measured. he went to home depot. he came back and looked at the sidelight again. and his conclusion was that it couldn't be done.

which was ok with me, because i didn't really want him to cut into the sidelight anyway! i mean, we want a doggie door now, but what if a time comes when we don't want a doggie door? what if (heaven forbid) we have to sell our house? we would need the sidelights to match, wouldn't we? so manuel and i discussed it, and decided that he would take the sidelight out, and put the doggie door into the space, and frame around it. which was what i had wanted all along...on that same day, manuel also installed my dining room light and the new light for the entry way. which is a good thing, because that entry way light was slowly killing my soul! it was heavy, and elaborate, and HUGE, and every time i walked through the front door and saw it, it made me feel cranky!! so we can all thank manuel for my improved mood :-)

then we went out of town. twice. and my mom and dad came to visit. once. and i went back to work. every day. and things got busy... but i kept seeing things that still needed to be done.

so i called manuel to see if he could come back today to tackle the list again. he came, and he brought a friend. i think his plan was to finish everything on the list. today! as it turned out, he was just a bit optimistic. it seemed like everything they tried to do resulted in problems...

they tried to get the remote to work for our ceiling fan. but guess what? when the fan was installed, they apparently threw out the signal thing for the remote! who does that?!?!? who installs anything without using all the pieces??? did they just look at that little signal box and think, "oh we probably don't need this..." and throw it away???

they tried to install a light in the ceiling of one of the extra bedrooms. but first they had to find the center of the room. which they did. only to discover that they couldn't hang a light there. so after cutting the first hole, they had to cut a second one. and then then had to cut several holes in the wall to disconnect the electrical outlet from the switch. because apparently in 1967 it was popular to switch an outlet rather than install a ceiling light...

thankfully they also know how to repair the holes.
they tried to move the downstairs bathroom light so that it would be centered over the vanity. because the vanity in that bathroom was the first thing to go when we moved in. i hated the one that was in there. hated. it. so rollie replaced it. and the sink. and the faucets. and now it is beautiful! but since the new vanity is smaller than the original one, the light fixture is now off center... so they cut a new hole, but then they looked at the clock and realized they needed to leave. right away!! and so they just put the old fixture back up. for now.
i wanted another outlet installed in our bathroom. for some reason, our large master bathroom only has one outlet. and it is on rollie's side of the counter. but i am the one who needs it! someone said, "why don't you just trade sides?" i'll tell you why... my side has all the counter space. and drawers. and i need that space! but it isn't good if i am trying to dry my hair while rollie is trying to brush his teeth. someone could get electrocuted!! or stepped on... so here is my side of the bathroom with my new outlet. it is the only project that was actually completed today.but it's ok, because manuel has assured me that he can come back soon. i'm glad, because that light fixture in the downstairs bathroom? it is now the source of my crankiness...

i guess this is what home ownership is all about--projects. sadly, we have no skills. well, i think i have skills, but mostly i have good intentions. rollie has skills, but no time to use them. and so, we have manuel. it looks as though manuel will be spending several weekends with us.

i'm starting to think it might be cheaper to adopt him...

a christmas blog... sort of...

2011-10-13T23:55:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i discovered the elusive christmas peacock...

what? you didn't know there was such a thing as a christmas peacock? where have you been, mars?????

i love christmas. it is my favorite holiday! and one of the things i love about it is the decorations. does the world ever look prettier than in the month of december? lights, sparkles, snow, poinsettias, holly, and of course baby Jesus--i love it!

but not in october. october is supposed to be about pumpkins and pretty colored leaves and cornstalks. october is supposed to be when you break out your sweaters and scarves and maybe buy a new pair of fuzzy boots from costco--which you have to do in october or the ones in your size will be gone! and then you will have to wait a whole year to get a gray pair! (oops. digressing again...) october is all about crisp, cool days, and nights scented with pumpkin spice candles...

...not christmas peacocks.

i get the whole "christmas in july" thing. if you are someone who plans ahead, then july is probably about the right time for you to start your shopping. (who am i kidding. if you are someone who plans ahead, you started your christmas shopping the day after christmas!) and i understand how, when the thermometer says 95 degrees and you have been wearing your shorts and flipflops for two months, the promise of snow-covered evergreens and twinkly lights could be inviting. but the truth is, i have never, ever seen anyone buy a christmas tree in october. ever. and yet, that's when the majority of the stores have decided it is time to break out the christmas gear...

i am all for long christmas celebrations. our tradition has always been to put the christmas tree up the day after thanksgiving and leave it up until martin luther king, jr day in january. why, you may ask, is that our tradition? well, i have a lot of christmas decorations. it takes me a couple of days to get everything out, put the decorations up, and put all the boxes back where they belong. so the long weekend after thanksgiving works for me. especially since it seems like it is impossible to find a free weekend in december. in fact, i have discovered that if i don't get the tree up before i go back to school after thanksgiving, it probably isn't going to happen.

yes, we have had more than one christmas without a tree.

and i like to leave it up for a while after christmas, because it seems like we are always so busy in december that we don't really get to just sit and enjoy the beauty of the decorations--that's what january is for! and taking it all down and cleaning and dusting everything takes waaaay longer than getting it out. in fact, a three day weekend really isn't enough. and since, in my current job, i have to work on martin luther king, jr day, sometimes i have to wait until president's day to clean the christmas from my house!

and yes, i know president's day is in february...

i'm sure the stores think that if they put the christmas stuff out early, we will all start thinking christmasy thoughts and start spending money. and they probably think that if we start spending it early enough, we will spend more.

and they are probably right.

because apparently anything can be a christmas decoration if you put a santa hat on it. this seems to be especially true when it comes to yard decorations. unless you have a nativity set in your yard, odds are most of your yard decorations are wearing santa hats. put a santa hat on a teddy bear and it becomes a christmas decoration. put a santa hat on a tall, green, skinny, furry guy and suddenly he is a christmas decoration. put a santa hat on a penguin or a dog or a singing fish, and it becomes a christmas decoration. i can sort of understand the thinking behind a flamingo wearing a santa hat--if you live in florida. but today i saw a christmas peacock. yes, i said peacock. a PEACOCK!!!!

i found myself at home depot this afternoon. we are having more work done on the house this weekend, so i needed to get supplies. and as i was wandering about, looking for a microfiber dust mop (no, that isn't for the work this weekend. that is to help me corral all the dog hair that i can now see on my wood floors!) i saw this...(no, your eyes are not playing tricks on you. there is the elusive christmas peacock, nestled between the elusive christmas flamingo and the more traditional lighted deer.) home depot had devoted a large area to christmas decorations. which i guess is ok. maybe people do like getting into the christmas spirit two months early--while shopping for paint and light fixtures and crown molding... maybe people really will think, "i need some christmas decorations--let's go to home depot!" but i have to admit, it isn't the first place i would think of to bulk up my christmas decoration inventory...

home depot has given quite a bit of retail space to stuff that is probably going to just sit there for another month and a half before anyone starts buying it. because really, where are you going to put an 8 foot lighted artificial tree for the next two months? or those large lighted snowmen? or the lighted grazing deer? and even if you have a place to put them, who is going to buy a GIANT ILLUMINATED CHRISTMAS PEACOCK?!?!? and what does a peacock have to do with christmas anyway?? and why am i even thinking about christmas in october?!?!?

curses, home depot, i feel you trying to suck me into your early christmas vortex. i wonder if i can find my santa hat...

they're coming... :-)

2011-10-12T23:55:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i thought i could do it all...

my dad is a painter--a house painter. actually my dad has done a lot of things. his main job was as a junior high science teacher, but he has also sold real estate, been a pastor, fished on his own boat commercially, and made gemstone jewelry, in addition to painting houses and probably a whole lot of other stuff that i can't think of right now. i don't recall ever helping him paint, but i was around him enough when he was painting, that i seemed to think that i could paint too. and i have painted. a lot!

but my dad does more than just paint. he can pretty much fix anything on a house. i can remember many times when someone would hire him to come in and repair a bad job they had already paid someone else to do. he seemed to always figure out a way to fix the mess. and so, for some reason, i think i can fix things too.

once, i almost electrocuted myself trying to fix something inside the washing machine with a screwdriver...

so today, when home depot called to tell me that our plantation shutters were ready to be installed, and could they DO IT ON FRIDAY, my plans for the next couple of days changed. because i hadn't really expected the shutters to be ready so soon. and there was some repair work that needed to be done around the windowsills...

so i texted rollie. "good news and bad news. our shutters are here :) but the walls aren't ready :( i guess i'll be going to home depot after school today to figure out how to mud the walls." yes, that was my plan. i was going to go online while my little dumplings napped and look for an instructional video on how to mud and texture walls. then after school i would go to home depot for supplies. and then tomorrow after school i would fix those walls, and by friday everything would be perfectly prepared for my new shutters! it seemed like a perfectly reasonable plan to me.

rollie did not respond to my text.

he was working from home today, so i got to meet him for lunch. "so," i said, "did you get my text about the shutters?" "yes," he said, "but i'm not sure you should try to fix the walls. why don't you just call jose'?"

i'll tell you why i wasn't going to call jose'--first of all, i needed the work done by tomorrow! you can't just call someone up and say hey, can you come do this job for me tomorrow?!? that's ridiculous! and secondly, i was pretty sure i didn't want to pay someone to do something that i was perfectly capable of doing--even if i'd never done it before and really didn't have the time to do it.

i patiently explained this to my husband. who responded by saying, "i don't know. i don't think i've got the skills to do it..." well that was ok. i wasn't asking him to do it. i was going to do it! my dad is a painter and general all purpose fix it guy. i was pretty sure i had inherited some sort of "fix it" gene. after all, i'd sprayed texture on a wall repair from an aerosol can before. i was pretty sure it wasn't going to be that hard. and besides, really this was just a precautionary repair. probably the frame around the shutters was going to cover it up anyway. i was just going to mud and texture and paint where the window trim had been, just in case the new trim wasn't quite big enough.

"really," rollie said, "just call jose'. you know he will do a good job." what i knew was that rollie did not want me to tackle this job. he was probably picturing what might happen. i'm sure he could just see me covered in mud, crying, at midnight when it was too late to call someone else, because i couldn't make the mud stick to the wall or make it smooth or get the texture right... i don't doubt that he knew i would give it a good try, but i'm pretty sure he also knew there was a slight possibility that i might just make a big mess. and my dad lives too far away to come and fix it by friday...

and truthfully, i was sort of picturing that possibility myself, because there have been more than a few nights when i have been buried in a project at midnight, bumping up against a deadline, crying because i knew there was no way i was going to finish on time. so i gave in. i called jose'. mostly because while i might be able to do what needed to be done, i knew it was going to take me waaaay longer than it would take someone like jose' who knew what they were doing. and i knew that while my results might be ok, jose's results would be really good. BUT, if he couldn't do it tomorrow, then i would just have to do it myself.

so i called him. and jose', bless his little pink heart, said he would come over tonight to take a look at what needed to be done. and he thought he could work it out to do it thursday morning. which means i can spend my thursday evening doing something much more fun, and still get my shutters installed on friday...

i am thankful for my mom who raised me to think i could do anything. and for my dad who showed me that there is no limit to what one person can do. but there are times when it is a good idea to step back and let the professionals do what they have been trained to do. and so i am also thankful for my husband who says, "call a professional..."

...because my "i can do it" attitude is sometimes a problem. i should NOT be allowed near the inner workings of a washing machine with a metal screwdriver!! i should NEVER stand on the very top rung of a ladder! and i should probably not try to mud, texture, and paint around my windows under such a tight schedule, when there is no room for error...

thankfully i don't have to. because i know jose' and i am pretty sure he can do anything :-)

the siren song of the ipad...

2011-10-10T23:10:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i was sitting at my desk, minding my own business, when ethan came over and said, "what's that?" he was pointing to my ipad. i said, "it's my computer." he looked at me and said, "that's not a computer! what is it?"

oh, apple people, somehow your world-wide domination of the tablet computer market has totally missed ONE four year old...

i've been having computer issues. i now have an old netbook (whose fan is going to go out any day now, which i am sure is going to result in it's self-destruction, a la mission impossible,) a newer laptop (which can burn dvds and has a nice big screen and is so pristine that i don't want to transfer all my messy files to it,) and an ipad. i know, its ridiculous. i would love to just use one device, but i can't seem to get everything organized and transferred. so my netbook is currently holding almost all my digital files hostage, while the newer laptop just sits there because it is too big to carry around. and then there is the ipad...

i sort of love the ipad, even though there are things it can't do. it doesn't have a memory card slot. it doesn't have a usb port. and you can't play anything that requires flash player on it. to me, those are three BIG issues. and yet, i have an ipad, and i sort of love it.

i looked at other tablets made by other companies. they had memory card slots. they had usb ports. and they would play flash player. and yet what did i get? an ipad.

i think apple is evil. really. where do worms live? in apples. what did the evil witch give to snow white? an apple. what did adam and eve eat that was the beginning of all our problems?!?!?!?! the apple.

do you see my point?

and really, if you think about apple devices, they are evil too. they are arrogant. they are flashy. they don't play nicely with others--it is either all apple or no apple. they don't just want your money, they want your soul...

and somehow they get it. even now, i am continually frustrated by some of the shortcomings of my ipad--i can't view everything on the internet that i want to see. i can't transfer digital files easily onto it or off of it. it won't let me manipulate my photos. i can't even sync my iphone to it!!!! realistically, i should be putting it in a garage sale and buying a xoom or a galaxy!

and yet, i sort of love it.

there is no logical reason for this. well, unless you look at the apps. the free apps. oh. my. goodness. i was a little embarrassed when i went in to the apple store to get some help, and they saw how many games i had. did you know there are four different angry birds games? that i know of?? i don't even know how to play all those games! and yet, i check the app store every few days to see what else i can download for free.

i think i might need a support group...

i didn't want to love my apple devices. it's that rebel in me--everybody else thinks they are great, so i will not! but i did. they continue to torment me with their unfamiliar (to me) operating system. they lure me away from the things i should be doing (like sleeping) with their unlimited apps. they remind me of all that they are capable of doing, if only i will purchase a data plan. they are sleek, and cool, and they make me feel tech-savvy (which is quite a trick considering that i have no clue how to make them do anything they don't want to do...)

the first day i took the ipad to school, every child in the class came to my desk at some point and said, "oh, you have an ipad!" they were impressed. would they have been equally impressed with a xoom or a galaxy? i don't think so. they kept trying to touch the screen. this is a problem. it is a problem that i never had to worry about with my laptop. my kids can't seem to keep their hands off the stuff on my desk, and my computer is no exception. but if they touched the laptop, not much would happen. with the ipad's touchscreen though, STUFF HAPPENS! which of course makes them want to touch it again! and again...

and how do they even know what an ipad is. they are tiny children! they can't even read yet!!! one little boy said, "i'm getting an ipad for christmas." now i know that could just be wishful thinking, but sadly, i don't think it is out of the realm of possibility. a five year old with an ipad.

apple wins.

and yet, ethan could not be convinced that my ipad was a computer. finally, i pulled my netbook out. i had both computers at school today, because if i need to print something, i need a computer with a usb port! which, as i may have mentioned, THE IPAD DOESN'T HAVE!!! so i pulled the netbook out, set it on my desk as ethan was saying, "yeah, yeah, yeah..." and opened it up. "now that's a computer," he said.

so maybe apple doesn't have everyone's soul. maybe just because i have fallen prey to their siren song doesn't mean everyone will. maybe others will be stronger and able to resist the sleekness, the cool factor, the illuminated apple icon...

then again, maybe not.

just ask my mom :-)

a teaser... although it sounds more like an excuse...

2011-10-09T22:26:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i am going to bed instead of finishing my blog.

i started a blog. actually i started two--this is blog number three! but i can hardly keep my eyes open... and i have to get up for work tomorrow. my weekends are not all that restful these days. so i work all week at school, and then all weekend at home. and then it is time to start again...

i'm not complaining. really, i'm not. i'm just tired. so i'm going to bed. i will try to finish today's blog tomorrow, but you will have to look for it to post before this blog, because i am going to give it today's date. but don't look for it until late tomorrow or even tuesday, because i still have to finish writing it.

did i confuse you? sorry about that, but i think my brain has already left the building...

just check back. i would like to say today's blog was going to be a tribute to steve jobs, but that wouldn't exactly be accurate...

our dogs + rain = you don't want to know...

2011-10-05T23:30:00.000-07:00

so today . . . it rained again.

i promised myself i was not going to blog about the rain today. i know some of you get as tired of my weather blogs as you do of my food blogs. but here are the cold, hard facts, people: food and the weather pretty much rule my days. i go to bed thinking about what the weather will be like the next day and deciding what to wear. because if i have to make clothing decisions at 7:00 in the morning, it is not going to be pretty--or i am going to be late. and even after i get dressed, i have to decide if i should wear a coat... or a sweater... or wonder if a scarf around my neck would keep me warm enough... because it may start out cool, but by 11:30 when we are out on the playground it might be hot! but by the time i leave to come home, it might be cool again. or really hot!! you just never know...

and the awful truth is, i think about food all day. what will i eat for breakfast? do i have time to run by mcdonald's and get cinnamon melts? or should i be good and just eat my usual hard boiled egg. will the lunch at school be something delicious like macaroni and cheese? or will it be that noodle-y stuff... or will i even eat at school?!? i could go to jack in the box... or 7-11 for a salad and a brownie... or now that i have an hour for lunch, i could even go home... of course then i would have to actually make something to eat, which would reduce my actual eating time, so maybe it is better to go to jack in the box instead. or 7-11...

and what about dinner?

you see, no matter what else happens during the day, food and the weather are always on my mind. and today it rained. real rain, not that sissy socal stuff. i even had to wear a coat. with a hood. and the only coat i have with a hood is a long, down-filled puffy coat with fur around the hood. i bought it a few years ago just before we headed to oregon for christmas, because they were expecting a big snowstorm. so yes, considering we were just having rain today, it was maybe overkill... but i don't like to carry an umbrella. or get wet. so i left the house looking like nanook of the north... in southern california... in october...

and then i spent the next hour telling parents to take the tiny, colorful umbrellas that they let their children bring to school, home with them. because what am i going to do with 15 drippy hello kitty angry birds spiderman dora the explorer umbrellas in my classroom all day?!?!? i've got my hands full with tiny hello kitty angry birds spiderman dora the explorer coats and boots! WET coats and boots...

rollie worked at home today, so once again i braved the rain to meet him for lunch. he said mia had spent the morning sitting on the floor next to his chair with her front paw on his leg. this is her signal for "can i please sit in your lap? please?? please?????" mia is not really a lap dog--she is all pointy elbows and paws. but she tries. especially if it is raining, because mia does not like the rain. at all. milo, on the other hand, had come in soaking wet... i saw this as real progress, because when milo first came to live with us, he would not go out in the rain unless i carried him out and stood over him with an umbrella. thank goodness it only rains two or three times a year here...

by the time i left school to come home for the day, it had pretty much stopped raining. as soon as i walked into the house, rollie said, "did you see the garage door??" well, yes, i thought, i had to open it to get my car into the garage. but i hadn't seen anything out of the ordinary... so when he took me back out to the garage to show me what he was talking about, it was clear that i was looking at the wrong garage door.
"when i got home from lunch today, mia was soaking wet!" he said. "she was so wet i had to dry her off with a towel. and then i saw this!" yes, our precious pooch had frantically clawed her way clear through the door!

in all fairness, this door was damaged when we moved into the house. we aren't really sure what happened here before we moved in, but there were some violence issues, and the side door into the garage was one of the casualties. it had been repaired with wood putty, i think, and our painters did a great job of trying to make it look good, but it was still damaged. we knew we were going to have to replace it, we just hadn't done it yet.

i think we will be doing it soon.

because for some strange reason, when rollie left to meet me for lunch today, mia went outside. in the rain of which she is so deathly afraid. and apparently she tried to get back into the house... through the side garage door. i don't know why she would do that! she can go in and out of the house whenever she wants to--we had a doggie door specially constructed to fit next to the french doors so she and milo could go in and out even when we aren't home. but clearly something spooked her. she must have really panicked! she was only home alone for an hour...

as we were sitting in the family room talking about it, i happened to glance out the french doors, and this is what i saw...
i'm pretty sure milo is the culprit in this situation. again, i don't understand it. our patio overhang covers about three feet of grass next to the patio. and he had clearly been out in the rain earlier in the day! i guess i should appreciate that he got as close to the grass as he could without actually going on the grass...but come on!!

this was a rough day for our pups. they are california dogs. they don't do rain.

but thankfully we've now had our two days of precipitation for the fall. sunshine is back in the forecast for tomorrow... right where it belongs!

maybe tomorrow's blog won't be about the weather...

a rainy day blog...

2011-10-04T23:10:00.000-07:00

so today . . . it rained.

i know it rained, because when i pulled out of the 7-11 parking lot this morning, my tires skidded on the wet pavement.

you know that song, "it never rains in california..." well, it is almost true. almost. but not today. today it rained.

rain was in the forecast for tomorrow, but not for today. so when i looked out the kitchen window this morning and noticed that the ground was wet, i thought, "oh wow, it must be getting cooler. the water from the sprinkler hasn't evaporated yet..."

(this is how i know i am turning into a california person. an oregon person wouldn't even notice that the ground was wet! oregon's ground is wet most of the time in the fall! but rain doesn't even enter the mind of a california person--we immediately think "sprinklers!")

i finished gathering up my stuff and went out to the car. i opened the garage door and noticed the driveway was wet too. and getting wetter by the second. and then i saw it. rain.

to be clear, it was california rain--there was water in the air, but it was still safe to wear suede boots. i didn't know how long it was going to stay that way though, so we took the preventative measure of putting electrical tape on those two small cracks that have developed in the roof of my car. thankfully rollie was working from home today and could help me, because since we moved, i'm not sure i could find the electrical tape. i know it is in the garage (which is rollie's territory,) and so i know it has a specific place (like all of rollie's stuff.) i just don't know where that specific place is...

it took a little time to complete the rainproofing of my roof. thankfully i had the time. i have learned that if i set my alarm a little bit earlier and only hit the snooze button once, i have time to make a quick stop at 7-11 and still make it to work on time...

yes, i said on time!! i haven't been late to work once this year! of course, i've only worked seven days, but i think i have turned over a new leaf. apparently being docked 15 minutes of pay isn't enough to get me out of bed earlier, but the promise of a gigantic diet lemon cokesi is! of course, i wish i could survive the day without that infusion of a fizzy, caffeinated drink, but i've been so tired since i went back to work that i've NEEDED it. of course, maybe if i slept a few more minutes in the morning instead of going to 7-11, i wouldn't need it...

but i digress.

i walked in and out of 7-11 without the aid of an umbrella (you see, i am still an oregon person at heart,) but again, to be fair, i did get the parking space right in front of the door. my brain was still not really registering the fact that it was RAINING! how could it be raining?!?! just yesterday i was wearing tank tops and flip flops. i had acquiesced to the cooler temperatures today by donning boots and a sweater, but still... and then my tires squealed out of the 7-11 parking lot...

i was not going terribly fast. however, there were cars approaching me, and they were going terribly fast. so when i hit the gas and felt my tires spin but did not feel my car move, i knew it must be raining. i should have registered "rain" when i had to turn on my lights or use my windshield wipers, but it was early and i was sort of on autopilot (remember, i only hit the snooze button once!) my tires finally gained traction and propelled me toward the first of four stop lights that have become my arch nemeses...

i hate those four stop lights. really. if i could rat them out for their inconsistent and inconsiderate behavior and send them off to traffic light jail, i would. they are never green. never. i always have to wait. and sometimes i have to wait through two or even three rotations at the left turn light. this morning i had time to tweet and post to facebook about my squealing tires before i finally got through that light! (i'm pretty sure it isn't breaking the law to tweet while you are just sitting still at a stupid red left turn light. i think tweeting while sitting at a red light might be the only thing between certain motorists--who shall remain nameless--and road rage...)

i got to school with my diet lemon cokesi (which is no small task, considering that the cup is so big it won't fit in any of my cup holders, so i have to put it in the passenger seat and prop it up with my handbag. which i hate to do, because my handbag is cloth and i'm always afraid that when i turn a corner, my soda will spill on it. or worse yet, completely tip over and spill everywhere! that happened once. it was awful. so to try to prevent that, i put my right hand on the cup to steady it when i go around corners. which wouldn't be a big deal, except my car has a manual transmission which requires me to use that same right hand to shift. it's a good thing i am coordinated...) i knew it was going to be a long day. tonight was open house and i wasn't quite ready. it was also art day. art day on the same day as open house!! what was i thinking?!?!? AND since it was raining, we were going to be stuck in the classroom for recess, which meant energetic kids with nowhere to expend that energy...

i slurped my diet lemon cokesi and hoped for the best...

we got through the morning without any major catastrophes. and then this afternoon i went into the classroom next door to help a teacher who had a screaming, crying three year old who would. not. stop. so i was talking quietly to the child and patting him on the back and just generally trying to get him to calm down and be quiet. because sometimes crying is contagious--especially if you are three and were just awakened from a nap that was not quite long enough! he got a little quieter, but he wouldn't stop crying! and i needed to go back to my own class to finish getting ready for open house! but since i had come in to help, i didn't feel like i could just leave without accomplishing my goal of turning a wailing three year old into a smiling one... so i started talking to the other three year olds sitting at his table having their snack. we were talking about what they were eating, when one precious dumpling looked right at me and said, "i eat boogers!"

okaaayyy... not really information that i wanted to know, but it got the attention of the screaming child, who momentarily stopped screaming to see what was going to happen next...

here's what happened next. "did you see the rain this morning?" i asked.

yep, i deflected and redirected. and it worked. this time. because to a southern california three year old, rain is a BIG deal! he might remember the afternoon it rained last spring, but odds are he doesn't really remember it raining before today. oh, he's heard people talk about it, like they talk about snow and colored leaves falling in october and wide open spaces, but he has had very little, if any, experience with it.

and so, we talked about rain. and the crying child stopped. and the booger-eating child ate his crackers instead. and i managed to escape back to the relative calm of my own classroom...

...just in time for a birthday party. a birthday party in a classroom full of kids who have been inside all day because of the rain. i looked at the clock, breathed a sigh of relief, left my class in the capable hands of others, and headed out into the rain...

...only to be pleasantly surprised by dry ground and sunshine.

yep, it never rains in california... at least not for long :-)

caution! this is what it looks like inside my brain.

2011-09-28T22:40:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i've been thinking about making some changes to my blog. this is where you come in...

it seems like life is getting a bit more complicated for me lately. i'm trying to keep an awful lot of balls in the air. and when that happens, the ball that typically gets dropped first is my blog. but i love to blog! i don't so much love all the other balls. i've seriously contemplated getting rid of some of them, but the time doesn't seem to be right to let any of them go. i am working toward that though. i am hopeful that maybe a few years down the road i'll have half as many balls, and they will all be happily defying gravity.

do you have any idea what i am trying to say? i'm not quite sure i do either.

i'm feeling the need to simplify and focus, but in practical terms it isn't going to happen right away. moving was a huge undertaking this summer! well, maybe not so much the actual moving as the decision-making that was involved. but the result has been so worth it! hard to get rid of stuff? yes, but so glad to be living a bit lighter... and going back to work takes major chunks of available time out of my day. and makes me tired. i've only been back at work for three days, and i'm already starting to get that 'swamped' feeling. it's not so easy to simplify. or focus.

the problem is, some new balls have been added to my juggling act recently. so in my quest to keep my head above water, i am afraid that i might not be as consistent blogging every day has i have been. or would like to be. because as i said, i love to blog. but it is more time consuming than you might think. but i also know that you, my loyal blog readers, are busy too. and i am sure it is unbearably disappointing :-) to come to my blog and find that i haven't written anything new. day after day after day...

so i am thinking of adding the an option that would notify you by email when i post a new blog. then you wouldn't have to come check every day--you could just look for an email telling you that something new is waiting to be read! i kind of thought this might be a good idea.

but then...

but then i thought, wait. if i do that, then they will only come when i have written something new, and that will slow the traffic on the blog. which doesn't really matter to me at this point, but what if someday i decide to try to market it or make a little extra cash by selling ads? i need lots of hits to make that worthwhile. and if all 19 of my followers only come when there is a new post, i could be in trouble.

but then i thought, get serious. i will never have enough traffic to make any money at this. and even if i did, do i really want to subject my 19 loyal followers to a bunch of ads? (not to mention the fact that i am pretty sure that not all 19 of my followers actually still read my blog every day...) ads would just clutter up my blog! would there even be room for the ridiculous number of labels i have used to organize my blogs if i added ads? or my hilarious (at least to me) tweets? probably not. and what is more important? for you to read that i saw a pigeon wandering around in costco, or for you to have the opportunity to be directed to another site trying to pry money out of your wallet?? i like to think that you would rather hear about the pigeon. and i think i would rather have you hear about the pigeon, than make 4 cents when you click on an ad...

which brings us back to my original question--should i add the gadget that lets you subscribe by email to my new posts? or do you like the anticipation of "will there be a new blog today?" every time you type in www.jewelielyn.blogspot.com? or is the disappointment that occurs when you don't find a new blog too devastating to deal with more than once or twice a week?

perhaps i overestimate my importance in your world...

everything i have read about 'how to get traffic to your blog' says that you should always ask a question. a question encourages a response from those who read. which makes them feel connected, and gets people interested and talking, and then they mention it to their friends, and eventually those friends will come check it out. and that is how you build a large enough base of readers to support ads. but the purpose of my blog has never been to be interactive or have a gajillion followers. i just like to write. and hear myself think. and tell stories. and try to make you laugh (although apparently not today. today you are getting stream of consciousness thinking. i think i'm too tired to be funny today.) so i don't ask questions. i do, however, always hope you will just spontaneously comment. just like you look forward to my blog posts (i think,) i look forward to your comments. so maybe i should ask questions...

but the problem is, i don't like to do things the way i am expected to do them. ever. i'm not a rebel, i just think the unexpected is much more interesting than the status quo. and i would rather be interesting than predictable. so maybe i should continue not asking questions...

...except then how would i know if you want the email notification option?

what we have here is a veritable "catch 22." so here's my solution. i'm not going to ask if you all would like the email notification. i think i might just add it, and then if you are one of those busy people who don't spend your evenings clicking around websites just for fun, you can use it. but, if you are one of those random, spontaneous people who like a surprise now and then, you can ignore it. either way, the blog will still be here, waiting to be read and commented on...

just maybe not every single day.

a day in the life...

2011-09-26T21:25:00.001-07:00

so today . . . i went back to work.

it started off pretty good. i didn't have too much trouble waking up--i only hit the snooze button once! I had everything ready to go, so i was up and out the door in about half an hour. but before i could even get out of our neighborhood, i had to turn around. i had my computer bag, my books, and my lunch... but i forgot to grab something for my breakfast. i would have loved to just swing by 7-11 and snag a brownie, but i am trying to eat better now that i am getting back to work. so i turned around, went back home, and found a hard boiled egg and a cheese stick in the refrigerator and headed back out, confident that now i wouldn't starve...

it took me longer than i anticipated to get to work. even though i still live just a mile and a half away, now i have to go through four stop lights instead of two... and one of those is a left turn... and i am driving on much busier streets, which means more cars sitting at those lights, which means there is a risk that i won't get through on the first green. and then there was construction (although, it was going the opposite way i was going, but still...)

i got to school and went to clock in, but i couldn't find my time card. which was really unfortunate, because for the first time in a long time, i wasn't late. in fact, i was about 7 minutes early, and i wanted it documented!! but my time card was not at the bottom of the rack where it usually is.

my time card position is a bit of an issue for me. i have worked at this particular school for 8 years, but my time card is always at the bottom! other people have been hired since me, but my time card is still always at the bottom. my time card never seems to be able to work it's way up the ladder, because i don't work in the summer. occasionally during the school year, it will manage to go up one or two spaces, only to lose that coveted ground in july when i don't show up for work for two months. then in september, there i am, back at the bottom. this seems so unfair, but i have finally resigned myself to the situation and have tried to embrace it with the thought that at least it is always quick and easy for me to find my time card. which is especially important on those days when i am playing "beat the clock." but since my card wasn't there in it's usual spot at the bottom, i just thought maybe they had forgotten i was coming back today. after all, i am three weeks late starting school, and we have someone new working in the office, so maybe she forgot...

as it turns out, she didn't forget. she promoted me! because there i was, in time card slot #3! yes, i am now #3!!! i cannot even tell you how awesome this is... and i know, you are all sitting there thinking, "this girl needs to get a life! who cares what slot their time card resides in?!?" well, clearly i do! AND not only was my time card now in slot #3, but i clocked in EARLY.

and no, the world didn't end at 7:56 this morning.

my day was off to a pretty good start. then i walked into my classroom...

let me just say here, that i had an awesome substitute while i was gone. really. there are only a couple of people that i would have felt comfortable leaving with my brand new class for the first three weeks of school, and i got one of them. but she hadn't been in the classroom since friday afternoon, and i think gremlins had gotten in...

the tables were moved. there were work papers everywhere. i am pretty sure that on friday afternoon, those work papers were organized, but by this morning, let's just say they were somewhat more randomly arranged. i started trying to make sense of it all and find the things i needed to get through the day. but i also had a room full of preschoolers that hadn't had play time in my room yet, so they were somewhat exuberant in their explorations and needed some supervision.

i continued to move furniture and plow through papers. and then i realized it was time for music...

i love music. i hate leading music time at school. ms. martha and i have finally figured out a schedule that makes us both hate it just a little bit less, but that schedule has me doing music on mondays. and today was monday. which meant i was going to be leading music today. ok, i thought, this won't be so bad. i haven't led music all summer. maybe it will even be fun to do some of the songs i like. so i put a cd in the player and got started. but all of these children are new to our classes. they don't know our songs yet. and as much as i hate leading music, try leading a bunch of kids who don't know the songs yet, while one of them continually runs around swinging his arms, hitting as many kids as he can. yes, my day was going downhill fast...

--the new table arrangement for the pre-k kids was not working out.
--the bathroom light was burned out, and the janitor doesn't come in on mondays.
--we had wheat thins for snack. (i love wheat thins. four and five year olds do not.)

and then it was time for language class. this is one of my schedule changes this year. the kindergarteners go to the same language class as the pre-k kids, which means that on monday, wednesday, and friday i have a 45 minute planning time. YIPPEE!!! i sure needed it today! i spent 15 minutes at the copy machine, 20 minutes moving tables in and out of the room (because something HAD to be done with those pre-k kids,) and ten more minutes looking for the top of my desk under all those papers. but at least i was alone in my room, and it was quiet. briefly.

actually, it was quiet longer than i expected. because usually the kids come back from their language classes at 11:15. but today they didn't come back. and i didn't go looking for them! i just said, "thank you Jesus," and kept shuffling papers. and then suddenly, there they were, all lined up in the hallway and ready to go outside.

some things had apparently changed in the last three weeks...

it was cloudy today, which made for a nice time outside. until i saw a little girl take a nosedive over the front of her scooter and plant her face on the sidewalk. she cried. and bled. and bled and bled and bled. thankfully none of her teeth fell out, but i couldn't tell that immediately because of all the blood! i don't do well when kids are bleeding from their heads. i was the first teacher to reach her, but i quickly handed her off to ms. jessica (my friend who bumped me up to time card slot #3.) ms. jessica is fearless and can handle anything! she saved my bacon more than once today. because later in the day, our toilet (in the bathroom with no light) clogged and overflowed. i don't do well with bathroom incidents either. (i know what you are thinking--why do i teach in a preschool when i can't handle blood and bathroom issues. my answer is, usually i teach kindergarten where we have very few of those issues. but add four year olds to the mix and things are quite different...)

the day did have a few bright spots.
--my lunch time was changed to 12:00-1:00. not only did i get a whole hour (instead of my usual half hour,) but i got it during the kid's lunch time! which means i didn't have to serve lunch. or try to convince them to eat their veggies. or put them down for their naps. ms. jessica got to do all of that :)
--i didn't call anyone by the wrong name. of course, sometimes i avoided using a name if i wasn't sure... but the point is, i didn't call anyone by the wrong name!!
--i got the homework out on time and only had to ask one parent to wait for it. and that only happened because they were early.
--i found the top of my desk. it took me until 5:15, but i found it.
--i have a class full of cute kids. they aren't going to be easy, but they are going to be fun. i think.

and let's not forget that no matter what happened today, or what happens tomorrow, my time card is in slot #3!

i am now just two slots away from being #1...

hehehe...

hi ho, hi ho, it's back to work i go...

2011-09-25T22:45:00.000-07:00

so today . . . is my last day of summer "vacation."

i say "vacation," because it hasn't been all that restful. i've spent my summer packing, moving, unpacking, trying to get rid of stuff, trying to get someone to take the stuff i want to get rid of, finding places for everything i have left, deciding i need to get rid of some more stuff, and packing and unpacking for business trips. i've spent hours in airports waiting for connecting flights. i've eaten more meals than i care to admit at the burger king which is close to my new house. i've also spent more time than i care to admit at ross, t.j. maxx, and marshall's trying to track down cool and inexpensive and useful things for the new house. which seems contradictory, i know, considering how i have been trying to get rid of stuff. but sometimes new spaces require different things...

i am still in love with my new house (even after some neighbor anonymously complained about our dogs barking "incessantly" during the night, which maybe they did, but 'man up' and sign the note so i can come talk to you!!) and the way it is coming together. i just wish i had been able to spend more days on the porch swing with my book instead of wandering around thinking, "where am i going to put this?!?" but it had to be done. my "to do" list is still a mile long, but most of the big things have been accomplished. and now, it is time to go back to work...

i am starting three weeks late this year, because we had to be out of town for a couple of weeks, and then my mom and dad were able to visit during the week in between :-) so tomorrow is my first day of the new school year with my new students. but i am sort of feeling like the new kid...

usually before school starts, i have spent many, many hours preparing my classroom and materials, and when the kids come in on the first day, they are coming into my space. this year, i only had a few hours to prepare things in august, and now the kids have been there for three weeks without me, so i am sort of coming into their space. it is going to be interesting...

my class is different this year. i have a split class like i've had the last couple of years, but this year i have more pre-k children than kindergarten. since i've been out of town, i haven't been in the classroom since august. usually i plan ahead so that on monday morning, all my materials are prepped for the week. but i wasn't there last week. so i am going in tomorrow armed with only my lesson plan from last year and my teacher voice.

while i don't really feel ready to go back tomorrow, i think it will be good for me. i think i need to get back into a routine. i know that when my alarm goes off in the morning, i am going to smack it a time or two before i actually get up. i know i will wish i had cinnamon melts for breakfast instead of my usual hard boiled egg. i know i am probably going to be playing "race the clock" as i head out the door and discover what kind of traffic perils lie in wait on my new route to school. i know i will mix up the names of some of my new little dumplings. i know my lunch break will seem too short. and i am pretty sure that when it is finally time to go home, i will probably turn the wrong direction out of the parking lot and head to my old house...

but i also know i will get to bed at a more reasonable hour (i hope,) i will drink more water, i will make someone laugh, i will roll my eyes at least once, and i will get a natural dose of vitamin D during recess. and i will help tiny children to learn something new, to get along with each other, and to make good choices. i hope. because that is what gets me out of bed in the morning...

... well, that, and the promise of a paycheck ;-)

adventures in cooking #1

2011-09-16T23:36:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i cooked. it wasn't pretty.

i have this brand new lovely kitchen. it has new cherry cabinets. it has wood laminate flooring. it has stainless steel appliances and granite countertops. it has big windows and is open to the family room. it is beautiful! i love to be in it, so i've decided i should start cooking again.

i actually decided this about five or six weeks ago. it was one of those nights after rollie was staying at the new house, but i was still packing up the old house. all alone. which was ok--i didn't really want rollie to help me pack, because i knew at that point his idea of packing was going to be to throw everything into the dumpster! so i was all alone in a big, not empty enough, very quiet house, but nothing was getting packed. i just kept walking from room to room, picking things up, moving them around, but making no progress. i needed noise.

i cannot explain it, but my brain seems to need noise to function properly. which was a problem, because all the tvs that could get hd programming were gone. all i had left was the small, old tv that i used in the scary room, and it was not hd ready! it only got one channel. but luckily the channel it got was shopping tv! so i flipped it on, and started packing boxes...

i was packing boxes with half my brain, but the other half was watching shopping tv. nine o'clock rolled around, which is midnight in florida. this meant it was time for a new "today's special!" so i stopped for a minute to watch. and guess what? the new "today's special" was a set of cookware. and it came in red...

i have cookware. i got most of it as wedding gifts, so it is kind of old. but it is still in pretty good condition, because, you know, i don't use it all that often. but this new cookware had clear glass lids (the better to see what you are cooking, my dear!) a new type of ceramic non-stick interior surface (good for temperatures up to 850 degrees!!) and did i mention it was red? and sparkly? clearly this cookware was made for me.

i texted rollie--"i think if i am going to start cooking in our beautiful new kitchen, i need new pans. red ones." he replied, "ok."

ok?!?! what kind of a response is that?? i needed clarification.

"what do you mean, ok? do you mean it's ok with you if i buy them? or do you mean ok YOU will buy them? or do you mean ok, yeah, i'll believe it when i see it?!?"

and his response? "yes." (there was also a goofy smiley icon with weird eyes and the tongue sticking out. sadly for you, i can't figure out how to get that into my blog.)

"ok, then i'll take that as a yes! thank you!!"

this was a bluff. because here's how the finances work in our household--rollie keeps track of the money and pays the bills, and i don't worry about it. (although there are written instructions in case something happens to him-like he gets lost in the bermuda triangle, which could happen-and then i would have to keep track of the money and pay the bills.) i used to keep track of the money and pay the bills, but mostly i would spend it. so this way works out much better. which is why i was checking with him before purchasing a new set of cookware.

"well," he texted, "you are working and have some money to spend... or how about this? how about if i buy them after the third home-cooked meal in the new house."

he is so funny...

"it will be too late by then! they will be sold out! but you are right. i chose to buy shoes and jewelry instead... and it isn't like i don't have pans... or like i actually use them..."

i know you can't technically hear 'tone of voice' in a text, but i am pretty sure he detected my not so cleverly hidden whining and sighing. ever mindful of my feelings, he texted back. "oh, it's a sale. ok, how about if you buy them tonight, and i will reimburse you after the third meal you cook in them?"

i was beginning to think he didn't believe me when i said i was going to start cooking more. and clearly he had forgotten that it was summer, which meant i wasn't working OR getting a paycheck. i mean, i had money, but i might need it for something... like, like, well you know, SOMETHING...

i finally ordered the cookware, and it came while we were on vacation. but after we got home from vacation, i was busy still unpacking boxes, and then we had to leave on a business trip, and then my mom and dad came... so not a lot of cooking was been going on...

which brings us to tonight. we had planned to take my mom and dad to eat at ruby's in seal beach. it sits on the end of the pier, and the food is really good, and i thought it would be fun to be at the beach and drink a milkshake! but it was cloudy all day today. all day!! not a great day to go eat at the beach. and rollie was feeling a little under the weather. and my dad had his nose in a book. and my mom and i were learning how to use our new electronic devices. so we decided to eat at home.

we have eaten at home some since they got here--mostly bologna sandwiches. WHICH WE LIKE!! but this was dinner, so i thought it should be hot. and yet, we were all kind of busy... so, toasted cheese sandwiches it was!

i got out the bread and the cheese and the butter. i unlocked the cooktop and turned it on. i got out my new frying pan :-) and proceeded to make toasted cheese sandwiches for my dad and rollie, because yes, this frying pan was big enough to make two toasted cheese sandwiches at once!

here is how i make toasted cheese sandwiches--i butter one piece of bread and plop it in the pan. then i slice the cheese and put it on top. and then i butter the other piece of bread and put it on top of the cheese. then i flip it. typically this works. but tonight was not typical...

because you see, not only had i never before used this particular frying pan, i had also never before used this particular burner on my cooktop, which meant i wasn't quite sure how hot was hot enough. apparently "7" was too hot. because no sooner had i finished constructing the second sandwich for my dad, than i thought there was an awful lot of smoke coming from the first sandwich.

"quick," i said to my mom, who happened to be standing in front of the utensil drawer (because how would she know that was the utensil drawer--we hadn't used any utensils!) "move! i need to get the spatula!" (i never know if spatula is the right word for that flat thing you use to turn stuff over with. i've always called it a pancake turner, but it seems kind of odd to call it a pancake turner when using it to flip an egg or a hamburger or a toasted cheese sandwich.) i opened the utensil drawer only to find... wooden spoons. no spatulas. or pancake turners. and then i remembered...

when diandra moved back in with us three years ago, some of her kitchen utensils were much better than mine (obviously, since i had been "using" mine for over 25 years!) so i had just tossed my old ones out and replaced them with her new ones. but now that she was planning to move out again, i had packed her newish utensils with her stuff. which meant that i had no spatula. or pancake turner. what i did have was a smoking pile of bread, butter, and cheese and nothing to flip it with.

i grabbed the only thing i could find. the cheese slicer. it was small, but at least it was flat. it was not however, a spatula. or a pancake turner. i tried to flip the sandwich only to have everything slide off to one side...

oh nonononono! i cannot have a misaligned toasted cheese sandwich! it might be burned, but those bread edges were going to line up properly and that cheese was going to stay inside! i flicked the now burned piece of bread repeatedly until everything was square, and then repeated the process with my dad's sandwich, which was also threatening to burn.

"you might want to turn the heat down a little," said my mom.

she is obviously the cook in the family.

it hadn't even occurred to me to turn down the heat. i was just trying to keep the sandwiches moving so that at least the second side wouldn't be burned. after her suggestion, i turned the burner down to "5"...

i've been cooking on a gas stove top for the last 20 years. on a gas stove top when you turn the flame down, it is immediately cooler. this is not true of an electric burner. electric burners take a while to cool down--especially if you have already heated them up to "7."

my dad's sandwich wasn't too bad. i can't say the same for rollie's. my mom (bless her little pink heart,) said, "why don't i eat that one, and you can make rollie another one." ok i thought, i've got the hang of this now. surely if i make a third sandwich, it will be perfect...

so i turned the burner down, buttered another piece of bread, and proceeded to make another toasted cheese sandwich, thinking "third time's a charm..."

sadly, it wasn't. not even close.but the good news is, i've now cooked in my new pans three times--i made toasted cheese sandwiches tonight, and i've boiled eggs. twice.

the bad news is, i appear to have forgotten how to cook!

i'm pretty sure that even though i have new, red, sparkly pans in my cupboard, they are not going to forget our names at rubio's...

let the wild rumpus begin!

2011-09-02T23:30:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i am alone in my new house, all by myself, for three whole days :-)

i love my family. they are my favorite people on the planet. so i'm not quite sure why, but i occasionally need some extended solitude in my own house.

when we lived in oregon, rollie used to leave me fairly regularly. he would make short out-of-town trips every few months. but since we have moved to southern california, it almost never happens. because all of his meetings are now less than an hour away. unless traffic is bad. but traffic is never bad enough that he has to stay overnight somewhere...

this has been a craaaazy summer. between packing and moving and unpacking and going on vacation and starting school three weeks later than i normally do, i have completely lost track of time. which is how i find myself sitting here tonight all by myself...

...because several weeks ago, rollie was asked to speak at a retreat this weekend. he said yes. the retreat is for the church where my school is, so i thought it would be fun to go for at least part of it. but we are leaving on tuesday for a business trip and won't be back until saturday. which isn't a big deal, except my mom and dad are coming to visit NEXT FRIDAY. before we get home. so i have a lot to do...

and then, as i mentioned, i am not going to start working until the end of september. a perfectly capable substitute will be teaching my class. my wonderful assistant will be there to assist her. so i decided i was not going to even try to whip my classroom into shape. i decided i would just leave it alone and deal with it at the end of the month, and instead use the time to finish unpacking. and then, i got the class list...

for the first time, i will have more pre-k kids than kindergarteners. i am not thrilled about this, but that's the way it goes. at least i still have a job! but this change in enrollment is going to be a problem unless i make some changes in the classroom. so i spent almost five hours cleaning and rearranging furniture this afternoon. and i'm still not done. i'll be going back for a short (i hope!) time tomorrow morning. because i am almost done. i think.

and then, rollie asked me if i wanted to teach one of the sessions at the retreat. he asked me this about a month ago, and since it would help him and it's easy for me, i said, "sure!" i said this a month ago when i thought i was almost done unpacking (which clearly i wasn't!) so now i have to make some notes about what i am going to say tomorrow night. i know what i am going to say, and i don't get nervous about speaking, but if i don't have notes i tend to get off track--which can be entertaining, but sometimes i forget to say what i had planned to say...

...which is exactly what is happening on my blog tonight!! this was supposed to be about being home alone, and look what i've written so far! sheesh...

ok, so i'm home alone. i worked at school until almost 8:00 tonight, and then went to target. at 8:00 at night!! probably not a good idea. but i knew since i would be home alone, i was going to need snacks. and new nail polish. and while i was there, of course i wandered about. i found a perfect lamp to put on my piano, and it was on sale for only $13! but then as i looked at it, i realized that i was going to need to buy a shade. so i looked at shades, but the shades cost more than the base! the base!! the part with all the electrical parts (and a bonus free light bulb,) was cheaper than the part consisting of a wire and a bit of fabric. which was bad enough, but then i couldn't figure out how to attach the shade to the lamp. i thought maybe that was why it was on sale, but there were lots of lamps with no visible way to attach a shade, so i don't know...

and then i saw these.pillow pets of the anaheim angels rally monkey!! (ok, i know they are now the los angeles angels, but really, i don't know how anyone who calls themselves a fan can refer to them that way! los angeles has a team--the dodgers. angels stadium is in anaheim. they are, and always will be, the anaheim angels. it isn't rocket science, people. it's marketing.) i love pillow pets! i have loved them since i went on a hunt to find one for my nephew at christmas. they are cute and soft and cushy. the main reason i don't already have one, is that i haven't been able choose just one. but i think now i have--this is the pillow pet for me. sadly, it didn't get to come home with me today, because i was already carrying nail polish, cheetos, a shade-less lamp, and a bag of chocolate chip cookies. (oh, did i forget to mention the cookies? they weren't my first choice, but i couldn't find the devil donuts.)

i wandered back to the lawn and garden section by way of the school supplies. thankfully my hands were too full to pick up any pens or markers, but there was a giant CLEARANCE sign above the outdoor stuff. i don't know what there is about clearance signs that make me suddenly feel the need to purchase something. i was looking at gardening tools (even though we have a gardener who takes care of our yard,) decorative pots in all sizes and colors (even though we have all these empty plant beds around the edges of our yard just screaming for me to plant something in them,) and grilling accessories (even though we don't have a bar-be-que yet.) i managed to talk some sense into myself and headed for the cash registers. without any clearance merchandise.

and then a miracle happened (other than making it out of the store without buying any clearance merchandise)...

...because i have a track record at target. it doesn't matter what line i get into, the people ahead of me in line inevitably have problems with their transactions. my line is always, ALWAYS the slowest line in the store. always. but tonight i found a cash register with no line at all! the cashier was just standing there, probably counting the minutes until the store would close and she could go home.

it was pretty exciting for me.

i got home, pillow petless, but with snacks and new nail polish. i let the dogs out, watched some tivo and ate my sourdough jack. i was home alone. in my new house. and feeling pretty good.

and then i needed to go upstairs...

i don't normally get weird about being home alone. but i started up the stairs, and then realized that the back door was open. the back door was open, because we don't have a doggie door installed yet. so when we are home, we just leave the back door open so the pups can go in and out whenever they want. but it suddenly occurred to me that if i went upstairs, and the dogs followed me, then someone could come in the back door unnoticed. and i watch enough tv to know that when someone sneaks in your back door, it never ends well.

i turned around and closed and locked the door. i started to set the alarm, but then remembered that i can't set the alarm if the upstairs windows are open. since we have a big covered patio, our upstairs windows are apparently vulnerable to intrusions. although, it seems to me that by the time a crazed criminal could scramble up onto our tiled roof and get through a window, the dogs would have alerted the whole neighborhood and mia would be waiting to eat him. or her. but who am i to argue with the security company...

so here i sit. all alone. by myself in my new house.

for three more days :-)

it's just paint!!!

2011-08-30T23:40:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i agreed to have the outside of my house painted next week. while i am out of town...

i know what you are thinking. "are you insane?!?!?!" i know, i know. i clearly remember the baby boy blue room. i know that the odds that my house will be painted exactly like i want it when i am not here to make sure it is done right are probably slim. but it is either have it done that week or the week my parents are visiting. and i want to get it DONE! so i choose to trust my painter...

i was hoping to have the painting done a couple of weeks ago, but it took some time to get my colors chosen and approved. living in our city is kind of like living in a gigantic homeowner's association. you can't park your car on the street overnight--even in front of your own house. you have to take your exterior christmas decorations down by january 15th. your library card expires every couple of years and you have to go back in and prove that you still live within the city limits. your garbage cans can't be visible from the street...

...and you have to get a permit to do anything to your house. want to replace your windows with new, energy efficient ones or build a covered patio in your own backyard? you need a permit. want to rip out all your landscaping so you can redo it and make it beautiful? you need a permit (and don't even think about astroturf--i'm pretty sure they will throw you in jail for that!) you even need a permit to replace your dishwasher! in your kitchen!!!

so you can imagine that our lovely city is not going to let you paint your house just any old color. oh no, you have to choose from their palette, have it approved, and... yes, get a permit.

i logged onto the city's website to view their color palette. bland, blah earth tones with some darker colors allowed as accents. i was underwhelmed. i drove around our neighborhood and looked at houses and saw... lots of earth tones. some people clearly did not get city approval for their colors, but others were pretty creative with the limited choices on the website. i was starting to debate the merits of just painting the house whatever i wanted and then feigning ignorance if i got caught. but i hate it when people do that! the whole "ask forgiveness, not permission" thing just irritates me--i think it's arrogant--so i was determined to do the right thing and get my paint permit.

knowing that my computer didn't necessarily represent the city's colors accurately, i headed to home depot (yes, i am still mad at their carpet people, but the paint people have been good to me. so far.) the city's website said to go choose paint colors and then bring them in for approval. ok. i liked the sound of that. maybe there would be a bit of flexibility after all. i knew i wanted the body of the house to be a lovely shade of pale yellow--not too bright, not too light--just a nice, medium yellow. i did not want brown, tan, beige, terra cotta, or white. the style of our house just screams, "i am a bungalow! paint me yellow!!" of course, our house isn't a bungalow. it is a 2,367 square foot two story house. but from the front, it looks like a bungalow. i can't explain it--it is like a freak of nature (or architecture.) i was pretty sure there were some nice yellows in the city's palette, so i thought i was off to a good start...

then i needed trim colors. white, of course. how could the city argue with white. the windows have white trim. the garage door is white. surely they would let me use white. but i needed something else for some contrast. what to choose, what to choose...

i'll admit i was influenced by the ugly red painted brick on our walkway. i had asked jose' what we could do with that, and he said we could paint it. he suggested gray. ok! so all the painted brick would be charcoal gray, and then we could use a lighter gray to accent the trim. but i really, really wanted a purple door. i was pretty sure the city wouldn't let me have it, but just in case, i picked up a purple chip anyway...

i headed for city hall. after a quick stop at the sheriff's office to register our security system (they probably even have my shoe size somewhere in their files...) i went to the city planning desk. i was not the first one there. the guy ahead of me had just moved into the city and wanted to fix the hand railing on his staircase. he wanted to make it safe and bring it up to code. you would think this would be something the city would support. you would be wrong.

i listened to him go around and around with the city planner about that hand railing. because apparently if he was going to replace the hand railing, then he had to bring the whole staircase up to code, which would mean ripping the existing stairs out and rebuilding them. which would mean changing the pitch and width of the stairs. which would mean there wouldn't be room for his staircase in it's current location...

you see where this is going.

he was so frustrated. and i was starting to wonder what would happen to me if i just slowly started moving backwards toward the door. i think he was wishing he had never purchased a house in our lovely city. i was thinking just wait until he gets a parking ticket for parking in front of his own house overnight. i hid the purple paint chip in my pocket.

finally it was my turn. i started filling out my paperwork and when i got to the part where it asked for my paint colors, the city planner pulled out "the book." clearly "close" was not going to be good enough. i was going to have to use their exact colors. so i gave him my yellow. i thought that was safe. "oh," he said, "that looks pretty bright!"

were we looking at the same paint chip?!? i don't think so, because the paint chip i was looking at was barely pigmented! "well," i said, "i looked at the palette online, and there were several yellow tones. some were much darker than this." he looked at me like i had just grown fangs and horns! he flipped his book open and found a divider tab that said, "yellow." score one for me, because i am pretty sure he wouldn't need a divider tab if there was just one acceptable shade of yellow. we found one that was almost exactly the color i had in my hand. he then went to his file box, and pulled out the paint chip of the "approved" yellow that was the closest to mine and handed it to me. "what's this for?" i asked. "that is the paint color for your house. take it to the paint store and they will match it," he replied.

ok, i could see how this was going to work. close was definitely not going to be good enough.

we continued. we finally found paint colors that were acceptable to both of us. it was going so well, that i pulled out the purple paint chip. "and," i said, "i was thinking that this would be really pretty, just on the front door..." he didn't even bat an eye, he just started flipping through his book.

i had seen the palette. i knew purple was not a part of it. pretty soon he pulled out a dark reddish rust color. "how about this?" he asked.

eewww. it was not even close. i laid it down with my other colors, and said, "no, i don't think so. i guess if i can't have purple, i'll just use the gray." what i wanted to say was, "are you kidding me?!?! would you put that color on YOUR house?!?! you probably don't even live here. and if you do, you probably sign all your own paperwork..." but i didn't. it's probably not the smartest move to antagonize someone who holds the power to make you paint your house bland and trim it with boring. "ok then," he said, "all you have to do is finish filling out the paperwork."

oh boy. more paperwork. i continued filling in the blanks. and then i got to the part where it said that i would throw my body in front of a speeding train before i would paint even one small brick or stone on my house. whaaaat? NOW we were going to have a problem. because that horrendously painted red brick was not going to look good with the rest of my colors. which was not even the issue. the issue was that I HATED IT!!! there had to be a solution. i could live without a purple door if i had to, but that brick had to be painted.

at this point i was seriously considering just repainting the house in it's current colors, which would not require a permit. but the trim is pink. i am not really a pink person. it had to be changed.

i confess that i thought about lying and then just doing what i wanted to do anyway. the bureaucracy was killing me!! but i soldiered on. i told him the brick was already painted. i told him how ugly it was. i appealed to his sense of color. i tried to explain how terrible it was going to look with my new paint colors, and how all i really wanted to do was to bring the outside of my house up to the city's high standards. (hey, i can throw it around with the best of them!) finally he said, "it is already painted?" "yes," i said, "it is already painted this awful fake brick red. and it is chipping. badly! and i think the charcoal gray will make it look more natural. like stone." he looked me right in the eye. i looked right back at him, with a combination of pleading and thank you for agreeing with me in my eyes. "ok," he said, "i think i can sign off on that."

yes! success!!

and so now i have city approved paint colors. i have a paint crew scheduled. all that is left to do is to explain to the painters which colors i want painted where, and then go out of town...

i'm pretty sure this is where the trouble really begins...

snug as a bug in a rug :-)

2011-08-27T23:30:00.000-07:00

so today . . . my baby is back in the garage! yay!!

no, not diandra! diandra is in oregon helping her best friend get married.

i'm talking about my car.

my car has had a rough few months. it all started at the old house when i noticed the hot water heater was leaking a bit--quite a bit, actually--which meant moving all the (now) wet boxes that i had stacked in front of it to the other side of the garage. where my car was usually parked. which meant that my car had to be moved to the driveway... the cold, dark, wet from the neighbor's sprinkler overspray, driveway...

and then we bought a house, which meant i had to start packing boxes. but the boxes had to be put somewhere, and the house was starting to look like ground zero, so some of the packed boxes joined the previously wet boxes in the other side of the garage... where my car was usually parked. which meant my car had to huddle in the driveway for a little longer...

and then we moved to the new house where we no longer had a three car garage. now we had a cozy two car garage. but here's the thing about two car garages--they are designed to hold two cars. just two. and when you have two cars that you would like to keep in the garage, that doesn't leave a lot of room for washers and dryers. or workbenches and tools. or golf clubs and bowling balls. or a shop vac and a bowflex. and so my car was still camped out on the driveway...

but the lack of space in the new garage was only part of the problem. the other part of the problem was that we didn't get any remotes for the garage door opener. our new garage has a really nice garage door opener, and it works just great... IF you stand in the doorway to the house and press the button. it is quiet. it is fast. it has a laser safety feature. but no remotes. and so the only way to open and close the garage door is by pressing the switch next to the door into the house and then running out of the garage as fast as you can. which is complicated by the laser beam safety. because when you break that laser beam, the door stops. so to get out of the garage, you have to hit the button by the door, run really fast toward the driveway, leap OVER the laser beam (which, btw, you can't see,) and hope you don't smack your head on the descending garage door.

and of course you can't do any of that from inside the car.

so until the problem of the remotes could be fixed, my car still sat in the driveway...

our realtor, jill, assured us that she could take care of this remote problem. we were not going to get any remotes from the sellers. they were not the most cooperative people we have ever encountered. but rollie climbed up on a ladder, wrote down all the necessary numbers from the unit, and jill ordered new remotes from amazon...

problem solved.

maybe in the real world, but in julieland, the problem was NOT solved. the garage door openers from amazon wouldn't work. rollie tried everything! so jill called a garage door opener guy, and he came out, and HE tried everything, and it still wouldn't work.

and my car was still sitting in the driveway, collecting dust and water marks from our sprinkler overspray. i was seriously starting to worry about the paint. watermarks on black shiny paint are not good... not good at all!

and then, while we were on vacation a couple of weeks ago, jill had the garage door opener guy come back, and he connected some sort of device to the garage door opener so that it would work with a new set of remotes.

yay! my car was pretty excited. so was rollie. so was i...

... until we got back from vacation, and i opened the garage door only to remember that i had put a bunch of boxes in the garage in order to get the last of the stuff out of the old house. so now even though i had garage door openers that worked, i still couldn't get my car into the garage...

sigh.

i immediately started trying to unpack those boxes to clear out that space. but i kept getting sidetracked. like yesterday. yesterday, i rearranged the kitchen cabinets. yes i said rearranged! i unpacked the kitchen a month ago, but i found a few more kitchen things in the boxes in the garage yesterday. and when i brought them in to find a place for them, i found that there wasn't a place for them. so i rearranged things. in the kitchen. which used up time i could have spent unpacking more boxes...

you see, this is why it is taking me so long to unpack! i want everything to be in the perfect place. but i don't always immediately know where the perfect place is. so even after i have unpacked, i am still moving things around...

but a few days ago, i was alarmed by how terrible my car was looking. i was suddenly worried that maybe the paint was going to be ruined, if i didn't get it in the garage pretty soon. so i stayed up until 3:00 a.m. last night working in the garage. and finally, i had cleared enough space to get my car into the garage!

oh it still isn't perfect. there are a bunch of boxes that are diandra's which need to be moved to her storage unit. there are some boxes that need to go to my school. and rollie hasn't had a chance to put up the shelving yet that is going to hold the bowling balls and golf clubs. so one side of my car is still crowded. but the important thing is that when the sprinklers go off at 5:00 a.m. the water is not going to be hitting my nice, clean, shiny car...

because now my car is nice and shiny and clean. rollie took it to the car wash today. and those water spots? they wouldn't come off. it was pretty bad. but those car wash guys have some tricks up their sleeves, and they somehow used some clay to remove the water deposits from my paint. and now my car is very shiny, and happy, sitting in our new garage.which is where it is going to stay! because that car wash magic? i'm sure it is cheaper than a new paint job, but maybe not by much...

the perfect carry-on bag? only time will tell...

2011-08-26T23:45:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i bought my first backpack.

well, technically rollie bought it, but i picked it out. well, TECHNICALLY, i am the one who handed over the visa, but rollie will be paying the bill...

ok. the truth is, rollie drove me to the outlet mall, and then sat in the car figuring out how to use the sirius radio while i chose a gift for myself. because yesterday was our anniversary, and anniversaries mean gifts...

at least, they mean gifts if you are me. sadly for rollie, we got married at the end of august, and since i don't get paid during the summer, by the end of august my purchasing power is pretty much maxed out at 7-11. rollie, on the other hand, saves most of his expendable cash, so i am always the lucky recipient of something wonderful. yes, life just isn't fair :-)

so this morning off we went to the outlet mall.

i could spend all day at the outlet mall, but i didn't want to do that today. we don't have a doggie door installed yet, so our pups were going to be "imprisoned" in the house while we were gone, and i didn't really want to test their limits! this meant i needed a plan, a goal, a purpose. i didn't have time to scour the racks in all my favorite stores looking for the best deals--today, i needed to shop like a man! today i needed tunnel vision! today i needed to decide what i was going to buy, find it, pay for it, and take it home.

when we recently flew to new york, it became clear that i needed a new carry-on bag. i almost killed myself more than once, schlepping my suitcase, carry-on, and handbag through airports, onto shuttles, and into motels--especially since two of my toes were broken! (and before you say why wasn't rollie handling my bags, he helped me as much as he could, but his hands were full too! i wish i had video of trying to go up the escalator ahead of rollie, tipping all my bags over, and nearly taking him out! i'm lucky he stayed within ten feet of me after that!!)

my current carry-on bag is the result of lots of research and thought--of course. until the last few years, i rarely flew. but when it looked like diandra and i would maybe be making a trip to portland every summer, i quickly decided i needed a better carry-on bag. because i didn't own a handbag big enough for everything i wanted to take on the plane with me.

needless to say, i don't travel light...

i need a lot on an airplane. it doesn't matter if i am flying for two hours or twenty hours, i take a lot of stuff with me. first of all, there are just some things that i don't trust in my checked baggage. you hear stories about valuables disappearing out of people's luggage all the time... cameras, computers, jewelry. and so when i travel, if my bags are going to be out of my sight, i feel compelled to carry my "valuables" with me.

and that includes the cords to all my electronics. yes, that's right, i don't even put the cords to my electronics in my checked bags. my luggage does not end up at the same place as i do an inordinately high percentage of the time. i'm pretty sure i can live for 24 hours without clean clothes or a comb, but if my electronics go dead and i can't recharge them? let's just say, it won't be pretty...

(rollie does not get this at all. he travels with a tiny little bag that pretty much holds his ipad, a set of earbuds, and maybe a few snacks.)

in addition to my "valuables," i also have to take hard candy (if i don't vigorously suck on hard candy when we start our descent, i am pretty sure my eardrums will explode,) magazines (because they won't let you turn on your electronics while the plane is taking off and landing. which, btw is totally ridiculous! one time when we flew, i thought my phone was off, but it wasn't, and everything proceeded according to schedule--the airplane's instruments did NOT go crazy!!) snacks (that tiny pack of snack mix is just not enough. if you are sitting next to me on an airplane, you might not want to go to sleep until you have your snack in your hand. otherwise, your snack might end up in my hand. and then my mouth,) and my inflatable travel pillow.

oh, and my polar fleece blanket--even in the summer.

i don't travel anywhere without my polar fleece blanket. but when i fly, my blanket serves two purposes, the obvious one being to keep me from freezing when they crank up the a/c on the plane. the not so obvious purpose is to hide my handbag from the flight attendants. for some reason, the last few times i have flown, they say EVERYTHING has to be stowed either in the overhead bins or under the seat in front of you. but there is never enough room for my carry-on bag AND my handbag under that seat! but if i put my bag in the overhead bin, then i can't get to my snacks and magazines and electronics and inflatable travel pillow. so my solution is to put the carry-on under the seat in front of me, and then hide my handbag behind my back or in my lap and cover up with my blanket. then when the flight attendants walk through the cabin, checking for take-off infractions, they just think i am cold and they move on... so far, rollie hasn't turned me in, but i fear that one day he is going to feel compelled, for the safety of the rest of the passengers, to point out my deception to the flight attendants. of course, that will be the last time we ever fly together...

which is just another reason that i need a better carry-on.

i really thought that if i could find a carry-on with wheels, my problems would be solved! so a few years ago i went to the orange county swap meet with my list of requirements--wheels, cheap, big enough to hold all my necessities, yet small enough to fit under an airplane seat, and cute. because if i have to carry something around with me all day, it had better be cute! so i was ecstatic when i found this bag!it was perfect! i bought it and prepared to fly to portland...

but as it turned out, it was not the perfect bag. the wheels were better than having to carry it, but i had trouble maneuvering it and my larger bag. i could get a lot in it, but it fit so tightly under the seat that i couldn't get anything out of it. and yet i kept telling myself, through gritted teeth, that it was perfect.

and then a couple of weeks ago, we traveled to new york.

i couldn't balance my bags. they kept tipping over. they would get stuck every time i had to roll them over a gap to get onto an elevator or a tram. and then they fell down the escalator, smacking into rollie, almost taking me with them, and holding up everyone behind us.

it was not my finest moment.

it was suddenly clear to me that i needed a different type of carry-on bag. and i needed it before i took another trip. which is happening in about a week!

so i did what i always do when i need to buy something--i got on the internet. i searched. i googled. my requirements had changed a bit (i decided instead of wheels, i needed a really good cross-body bag or backpack,) but i still couldn't find anything! i haunted discount stores (because it's the end of august and my bank account is dwindling!!) with no success. and our next trip was getting closer and closer. so when rollie said, "let's go shopping for your anniversary present. what do you want to look for?" i immediately thought about a new carry-on bag.

rollie has a backpack. it's a nice medium-sized black leather backpack. it is very nice, but i really didn't want a backpack. rollie really wanted me to get a backpack. he thought it would be the easiest way for my to carry my stuff and still be able to drive my larger suitcase. but i didn't want a backpack. i wasn't going to get a backpack. all the backpacks i saw either looked like they should be carried by a 12 year old girl or a man. or the fabric was awful! so even though i considered backpacks, i ended up rejecting them all...

instead i looked at tote bags. i looked at large handbags. i looked at messenger bags. i looked at cross-body bags. i even looked at laptop bags. but none of them were perfect. they were too big to fit under the seat, or too small to hold all my stuff, or there was no outside pocket for my phone, or the fabric was too floppy to hold it's shape. or they were just too ugly!

i finally bought a backpack.

the one i decided on is pretty cute. the fabric is a nice heavier weight. the size seems just right (i think.) i didn't have to pay for it, because it was my anniversary gift. i think carrying it on my back will make it easier for me to get my larger bag where it needs to go without knocking anyone down or hurting anyone who might be behind me on an escalator. i think it is going to be the perfect travel bag......if all my stuff will fit into it...

Hello. Remember me? I've been packing and moving and not blogging. And now I'm going on vacation for 10 days. But when I come back, I'll blog. I pro

2011-08-02T12:20:00.000-07:00

sorry, no blog tonight... oh wait...

2011-07-07T23:07:00.000-07:00

so today . . . there will be no blog. here's why...the move is finally happening. i hope. as you can see, there is still packing to be done. we have spent the last two weeks trying to get everything done in the new house before we moved in, but it has been a nightmare for me! decision after decision after decision. and not making decisions. and changing my decisions... it has not been pretty, people!

the interior painting went well. i only had to have the painters repaint one room. it was the man room. everything else looked exactly like i had pictured it, but the man room was baby boy blue, not the muted turquoise i had in mind. i tried to like it, but i just couldn't. i didn't know how they had gotten the color so very wrong! i went to get more paint chips, chose a new color of blue, went back to the house, put it up on the wall, and guess what? it was the exact same color. i don't know how it could look so different up on the wall, but it sure did. when i told jose' he was going to have to go get another color of paint and paint the room again, he just smiled and said, "no problem!" and so, the painting was completed and the new color looks good. and i only changed my mind once!

i spent several days working on the wood floor that was hidden under the awful carpeting in the master bedroom. i spent most of one saturday just pulling up the tack strips and the staples from the padding--over 1300 inches of tack strips and hundreds of staples. and then i spent the next saturday and sunday afternoons cleaning it, square by square. it was a lot of work and every muscle in my body ached! but when i got done, it looked sooooo good!

last weekend we had new windows installed in all the rooms upstairs. i have never seen windows replaced, but since i was on my hands and knees working on the wood floor, i got to see the process. either it was much simpler than i thought it would be, or those two window installers were just really, really good. either way, it didn't take them long and we had beautiful new windows. although, i learned that i should not watch work in progress. i kept thinking, "oh no! the windows are too small! oh no! the windows aren't level! oh no! i can see that foamy stuff all the way around the window! oh no! these are going to look awful!!" i was feeling a little sick and wishing maybe i had spent the big bucks and just hired home depot. but as it turns out, i am glad i went the cheap route, because they turned out really nice.

we have prairie shutters coming (if i can find a way to get my window sills trimmed down--none of my windowsills are level!) i've scheduled grass for the backyard, and i am currently doing battle with lowe's over carpet installation. (i am mad at them. i will never, ever use them again. but i am madder at home depot's carpet people, and i need carpet NOW, so i don't have a lot of options. if i had taken care of this two weeks ago, i would have had more options. but two weeks ago i was busy making paint decisions and trying to get rid of the leftover furniture the seller's left and degreasing the kitchen--which, btw, i am still doing--and so carpet was not the high priority it should have been...)

i also should have been packing. but rollie had a plan and it seemed so simple. he said to just pack the things i wanted to take, and then after we had all that stuff moved, we would dispose of the stuff we had left. it seemed like a good plan. and i especially liked it, because it didn't sound like it required a lot of actual packing. but it does...

and so, that is where i am right now. packing. this is not the fun part of moving. but it is necessary, so i guess i had better get back to it...

...which is why there will be no blog tonight.

super store? or nightmare at 10:00 a.m.?

2011-07-05T23:57:00.001-07:00

so today . . . i went to a "new" wal-mart super store. i felt like the dumbest rat in the maze...

one of the things i love about wal-mart is that they have just a few different floor plans for their stores. i like this. i like that i can go into a wal-mart in long beach, california or woodburn, oregon or orlando, florida, and i know where things are. usually i do not go into wal-mart to shop--that's what target is for! no, usually i go into wal-mart to buy what i need quickly and get out...

but not today. because today i had the unfortunate "pleasure" of finding myself in a wal-mart super store.

i like the concept of a super store. i like being able to go to one store to get groceries, toiletries, dvds, shoes (ok, not really. i don't buy my shoes at wal-mart. but i like knowing i could, if i wanted to!) plants, and car parts. the problem is, in a super store i can't seem to find anything...

maybe there are also just a few floor plans for the wal-mart super stores, but i don't know them yet. this is only the second super store i have been in! the first one was a couple of years ago when we were in orlando. i couldn't find anything then, either, but since we were on vacation it wasn't such a big deal. i wasn't in a hurry. i didn't really have an agenda. i just went in to see what i could find. today was a completely different story...

today i had a plan. and stuff to do!! i couldn't spend all day exploring and wandering around this new wal-mart!! i just needed a few things--milk bones, toilet paper (for the new house. i noticed the supplies i had already taken over were diminishing...) vinegar (which i had read online would degrease kitchen cabinets. i don't know what those people cooked in that kitchen, but there were some stubborn grease splatters to deal with,) and a spray bottle for the vinegar. i went whipping through the store, tossing my purchases into my basket... well, maybe whipping through the store is a bit of an exaggeration, because the first thing i noticed about this super store was that there wasn't a lot of room between aisles for carts. i prefer to navigate through stores without a shopping cart. but today, even though i was only buying four things, one of those things was toilet paper. and whenever i am forced to buy toilet paper, i buy a LOT of toilet paper, my goal being fewer trips to wal-mart. so i had a cart.

i quickly discovered that today there were a lot of people with carts in wal-mart. i don't know what is the matter with everyone!! didn't they have enough excitement yesterday??? didn't they have company over for bar-be-que or battle the crowds at the park to watch the fireworks or spend the day out in the heat???? why wasn't everyone at home recuperating from the fourth of july?!?!?! clearly, the independence day celebrations weren't celebratory enough!

but i am a big girl. i have lived in the shadow of a metropolis for ten years. i know about crowds. so as i maneuvered at a more moderate pace than normal, through the unfamiliar aisles of the wal-mart super store, i just kept saying to myself, "at least you are not at work today. at least you only need a few things. at least you get to move into a beautiful house in two days..." AAACCCKKKKK!!! TWO DAYS?!?!?! ok, that didn't help. i just needed to get my stuff and get out of there! i had the toilet paper (24 double rolls, thank you very much!) i had milk bones. i headed to where i thought the empty spray bottles would be. but then i detoured through the kitchen section...

(i hear you, wendy. i hear you saying, "why would you even go into the kitchen section? you hate the kitchen. you don't cook. there can't be anything in there that you could possibly need or want!!!" and to that i say, au contraire my friend, because i am moving my stuff into a new kitchen! this opens up all kinds of opportunities for new ways of organizing things--because while i might not like to cook, i do like to organize!)

i started throwing things in my cart. i had a bamboo silverware organizer (good for the environment and HALF the cost of the exact same thing at lowe's!) and then i saw some cool looking black and tan plastic modular drawer dividers (maybe not so good for the environment, but the colors would go perfectly in my new kitchen!) and then there was a RED dish drainer (and before you ask, yes, the new house has a dishwasher, but i find that it is easier to wash the dishes by hand since we mostly use glasses and silverware.) there was shelf paper, because you know, one cannot move into a new residence without installing new shelf paper. and then i started to throw a bamboo corner shelf unit into the cart, when i finally stopped myself. "wait a minute," i said to myself, "what am i doing here! what am i going to do with this cool corner bamboo shelf? just because it is cool, doesn't mean i have to buy it! i probably don't really need any of this stuff. and i have a budget! a budget!! if i buy all this stuff, i am going to have to do without something else! put it back! put it all back, and go get vinegar and a spray bottle! do it now before i have to threaten you with thoughts of no new carpeting!!!"

sometimes i am no fun at all...

so i put all the extra stuff back and went in search of a spray bottle. i thought the logical place to find it would be with the paper goods and cleaning supplies. i had already been back there once to get toilet paper, and i didn't see any spray bottles, but i thought maybe i just hadn't looked very carefully. (i would like to mention here that in a REGULAR wal-mart, not a super store wal-mart, i would know just where to find everything! sadly, i was not in a regular wal-mart.) i did not see any spray bottles. so i wandered a bit more. i found myself in the grocery aisles (perhaps i should tell you at this point that i had not eaten breakfast yet. when i left the house this morning, i was just going to do a couple of quick errands and then treat myself to mcdonald's. it would have been a good plan if the super store didn't currently have me in it's evil clutches!) and i was hungry. i thought it might be a devil donut kind of day, but i couldn't find the kind i like. curses!! so i bought baby carrots with ranch dressing, and apples with peanut butter. and then i threw in a small bag of crunchy cheetos for nutritional balance. and then i happened upon the vinegar, so i tossed that in my cart, feeling virtuous, because vinegar was on my list!

so was a spray bottle, but i was having no luck finding one.

i decided my only hope was to find a wal-mart employee and beg for help. i pushed my cart through the narrow, crowded aisles from one end of the store to the other, and i did not see one employee. not one. it's like somebody called ahead and said, "there is a lady in a 2001 red old navy fourth of july shirt and denim shorts (which have seen better days,) looking for help. RUN! HIDE! DO NOT MAKE EYE CONTACT!!!"

ok, maybe i am just slightly paranoid, but i am telling you, i could not find ANYONE in a blue jacket to help me. but i did not give up! oh no i did not! although, i was starting to consider buying a cheap cleaner and dumping it out, just so i could have the spray bottle...

i finally found a guy stocking shelves. before he could scuttle away from me into the next row, i said, "EXCUSE ME!" (i was thinking, "don't even TRY to get away from me. i will run you over with my cart and not experience one second of remorse. i need help! and you are wearing a blue wal-mart jacket and a walkie-talkie. you are REQUIRED to help me!!") he looked at me like i was going to accost him (maybe he could read minds...) but he didn't move. so i continued. "can you please tell me where i might find empty spray bottles?" i said this very nicely, and smiled. he quickly said, "i think they are with the paper goods and cleaning supplies. or you might find a small one in health and beauty." and then he bolted. he was quick.

ok, well i had already looked in paper goods and cleaning supplies--twice--but maybe i had missed it. so back i went. i looked carefully at every product on the shelves, and found exactly zero empty spray bottles. by now, i decided even a tiny, travel sized spray bottle would be better than none, so i took off toward health and beauty. and found nothing.

perhaps i should not have said "might find..."

i had now been wandering around wal-mart for an hour. i was tired. i was HUNGRY. and i had just discovered that when they turned the wal-mart into a super store and added all those groceries aisles, they took out the mcdonald's.

i was not enjoying my morning...

if i was going to get out of this without someone getting hurt, then i was going to need help. serious help. i don't like to ask for help when i am looking for something in a store though, because my friend becky used to be a secret shopper for a chain of grocery stores. i went with her once, and the thing i remember from that trip was that when she asked an employee where something was, they were not just supposed to tell her how to find it--they were supposed to take her there. i remember that every time i have to ask for help. and i hate it, because they always take me from point a to point b in the quickest way possible. what if something catches my eye, and i want to stop and check it out? what if i see someone i know? (ok, i never see someone i know. but it could happen...) what if i change my mind, and they have wasted a trip clear across the store, and then they stand there and look at me like 'really? do you think i have the time to take you on a tour of the store today? i have work to do, you know. serious work. and now you have just wasted five minutes of my valuable time. don't even look at me! i am going on my break!!' but today all those concerns went out the window. i needed a spray bottle, and i needed it now. but the "bait" was no longer enticing me to navigate this stupid superstore maze by myself. i was starting to feel like the rat that says, "the heck with it," and starts crawling over the walls. so i grabbed the first employee i found, and asked if she could help me find an empty spray bottle. and she did.

she took me right to them. they were with the ironing boards. THE IRONING BOARDS!!! i would think a plastic bottle of any kind would be the last thing you would want near a hot iron, but since they haven't asked me to organize the wal-mart superstores yet, i guess that is where they are. i thanked the kind lady in the blue jacket profusely and headed toward the cash registers with my list complete.

i did not pass GO. i did not collect $200. i did not stop at mcdonald's.

i did, however, decide that in the future perhaps i should avoid wal-mart super stores at all costs.

home owners: day 4

2011-06-22T23:59:00.000-07:00

so today . . . we discovered that we have sprinklers in the back yard.

our back yard is kind of a mess. among other issues, it has no grass. as someone who grew up in the pacific northwest, this is strange to me. i just think a yard should have grass--otherwise, it is just landscaping...

shortly after we were married, we visited rollie's parents in tucson, arizona. i'd never been to tucson before. i didn't really know what to expect. thankfully it was spring, not summer, and the desert was in bloom! his mom and dad did an awesome job of choosing the most interesting things for us to see and do. i still remember that as one of our best vacations! but when we got there, i immediately noticed that lots of homes did not have grass in their front yards. they were landscaped, but with a totally different kind of vegetation than i was used to. as the week wore on, i came to appreciate the beauty of rocks and succulents and cactus plants... as long as it wasn't in MY yard...

when we started looking for a house a few months ago, one of the things that was important to us was the backyard. rollie's job has more than it's share of stress, and we knew that he was going to need a place to escape and regain his equilibrium. we even passed up a beautifully remodeled house on a quiet cul-de-sac because it backed up to a school field, and we knew our pups would never stop barking and the neighbors would hate us because our dogs would never stop barking and how restful would THAT be?!?!?!

so we needed grass. or a pool...

no, we need grass. we have dogs and dogs need grass for, well, you know what for. at least i think dogs need grass. but maybe they don't. one of the houses we looked at had a pool in the backyard. i kind of wanted a pool. i don't know why--i can't swim, and i get somewhat panicky if i am dropped into water where my feet can't touch the bottom, and this pool was really deep. (ok, let's be honest here. if my feet can't touch the bottom, i will die. i can't swim. i've taken swimming lessons, but every swimming teacher i've ever had has been baffled by my inability to successfully propel my body forward through the water. i kick. i pull my skinny little arms through the water. i hold my breath. and i go nowhere. i use a kick board, and i go backwards! i. can't. swim. and yet, i kind of wanted a pool...) what we found was that the houses we could afford that had pools usually didn't have any grass--the back yard would pretty much be filled with water and concrete. but i noticed that there were two dogs living in this one house we looked at that had a pool. so i scoped out every nook and cranny in the backyard looking for the dogs' bathroom. i found nothing. finally i asked, "where do your dogs go to the bathroom?" i thought that if buying this house was a possibility, i needed to know! "oh," the owner said, "they just go on the concrete in the back yard, and then we hose it off!"

ok, we would not be buying THAT house...

besides, by the time we got to the garage, i was pretty sure the concrete in the back yard was not the only place those two dogs relieved themselves.

maybe our dogs are just spoiled. they have always had grass, and a doggie door to give them direct access to the back yard. so even though our new house doesn't actually have grass yet, at least there is a decent sized patch of dirt where grass could be (and will be) installed.

although our yard has no grass, it does have sprinklers--some were buried, but they were there. so rollie decided to test them. he turned the water on, and half of the sprinklers shot water out into the "yard." success! he turned those off and turned the others on, and suddenly our yard was inhabited by "old faithful!" water was shooting up into the air and flooding a section of the yard. clearly, we were missing a sprinkler head... but at least we now knew where the sprinklers were supposed to be!

i think this is a good sign. it means we won't have to dig trenches and lay pvc pipe to get water--we will just have to buy a few sprinkler heads and a timer. so i consider myself lucky!

because i can live without a pool, but i NEED some soft green grass. and so do my pups.

home owners: day 2

2011-06-21T22:46:00.000-07:00

so today . . . my new house is a mess.

i knew that knocking down the popcorn ceiling was going to be messy--that is largely why we decided to do it now while the house was empty. but jose' (our painter,) and his helper have been working for most of two days shrouding everything in plastic.they've used miles of tape!! they started by covering all the floors with yards and yards of paper in preparation for painting, but when i said we had decided to have them do the ceilings as well, that's when, somewhere on the planet, plastic sheeting production kicked into overdrive...

while they made my house look like a construction site, i spent the day cleaning in the kitchen. and waiting for the guy from the gas company to turn on the gas...

i've never really paid attention to the utilities before. i flip a switch and i have power. i turn on a faucet and water comes out. i know we pay for the power and water that we use, but i've never paid any attention to all the equipment it takes to get that power and water to me. but when a house changes hands, you don't just automatically get power and water. oh no. you have to jump through hoops and wait around all day and hope that you don't need power or water until the utility guys get there to turn it on.

when the electric company came, she just read the meter and left. they hadn't actually turned the power off, so that one was easy. when the water guy came, well, i don't know exactly what he did, because that was yesterday and i had my hands kind of full with the locksmith, shutter guy, and carpet guy. i just know that i didn't have water, and then i did.

but the gas company was another story. i guess it's because gas can kill you. the gas company guy was not fooling around! he checked out all the places where we needed gas (and there seem to be a lot of them,) and then he said, "come with me. i need to show you some things..." uh oh. this can't be good. he didn't say it in a "this is your lucky day" kind of voice. he was using the "voice of doom."

did i mention that this guy was HUGE!! he was tall. he was hefty. he looked samoan. he had facial hair. and he looked serious!! i was pretty sure he was going to tell me that our house was just about to blow up if we didn't pour major money into the gas lines...

he proceeded to tell me what he was going to turn on and what he was not going to turn on. i didn't know there were options, but apparently there were. the result was, i would have hot water, but no heat until a fixed hose was replaced with a flexible one, and i couldn't use the fireplace until the damper was removed. this is ok with me. it is june. it will be a little while before i need either the fireplace or the heater...

and he didn't even want to talk about the spa equipment...

remember the spa? the 11 x 7 foot in-ground spa that is now buried under the deck?? suspiciously??? yes, well, all that equipment runs on gas, but since the spa is filled with dirt instead of water, he decided to pretend that it wasn't there at all.

ok, we were making progress!

and then the carpet guy arrived. a new carpet guy, thank goodness. one who did not know my previous history with keys and locks and locksmiths. we went upstairs to measure the bedrooms for carpeting. i waited, and he measured. i waited, and he wrote down numbers. i waited, and he went over to the corner of the master bedroom and pulled up the carpeting. i waited, and he dropped it back into place and moved on to the next room...

when my mom found out that our house was built in 1967, she told me to look under the carpets before i had them replaced. she said that when they built their house, they were given the choice of hardwood floors or wall-to-wall carpeting. they chose the carpet, as did a lot of people. now she wishes she had chosen the wood, but you know, it was 1967... who knew that 45 years later she would have to pay big bucks to get wood flooring. in 1967, wall-to-wall carpeting probably seemed luxurious. and she had two kids with bare feet who played on the floor...

and so i had planned to look under the carpets, but i'd been kind of busy and had just forgotten about it. so when the carpet guy left, i went back upstairs, held my breath, and pulled back the carpet. and guess what? it was my lucky day after all!!

it was wood. there was wood under that awful carpeting! and the part i saw was in really good shape! of course, it was a corner. a corner wouldn't get a lot of wear and tear. so i pulled back some more. it still looked good. i pulled it back about a third of the way into the room. it was dirty, but when i wiped a few squares with a damp cloth, it looked really good! it was smooth and unmarred and shiny. it didn't look like it had ever even been walked on! i couldn't believe it! i immediately texted rollie and my mom and a couple of friends and posted a picture to facebook. i was so excited! not only had i found a wood floor, but it was a wood floor in excellent condition! i was not going to have to sand and refinish it before we could use it. i was not going to have to pay for new carpeting--and let me tell you, in a 500 square foot room, that was a big deal!! i was just going to have to vacuum it and wipe it down and it was going to be beautiful.

and then i thought, what about the walk-in closet? i grabbed some pliers and headed into the closet. and guess what?? yep, more wood flooring in the closet. i was feeling lucky. i was feeling like i had won the lottery!

and then i thought, i wonder if the other two bedrooms have wood... so my pliers and i raced to the small bedroom. i held my breath, lifted up the yukky carpeting, and saw... blonde faux wood vinyl tiles. UGLY blonde faux wood vinyl tiles. i went a little more slowly to the third bedroom, lifted up a carpet edge and found more... ugly blonde faux wood vinyl tiles... which were probably glued firmly down over lovely wood parquet floors.

now i felt like the i.r.s. was after my lottery winnings...

but you know what? even if the i.r.s. takes half of your lottery winnings, you are still left with more than you started with! so i went back into my bedroom and sat down to admire my free bonus wood parquet floor. the more i looked at it, the more i loved it! and i felt lucky again...

...because while you can't win them all, sometimes, you win one :-)

home owners: day 1

2011-06-20T23:15:00.000-07:00

so today . . . is a new day. today i will not lock myself out of the house. i hope. today will be day one of home ownership!

our house is wonderful. it is beautiful. but it isn't perfect. it was built in 1967 (the same year that my mom and dad built their house. i find this to be an interesting coincidence. i don't remember a lot of details about my childhood, but i vividly remember that house being built. i remember the big empty rooms, the soft dust in the backyard, and eating a lot of meals at a&w. i remember being there late at night while my mom stained and varnished miles of woodwork. i don't exactly remember my dad painting, but i'm pretty sure he did--he is a painter! why would he pay someone else to do that!) and so it was time for some updating. while remodeling had been done on the first floor, the upstairs had been pretty much ignored. we had managed to save up some money for improvements, and today was the day i was going to get estimates from EVERYONE. then i planned to look at the estimates, decide what we could afford to have done, and get things scheduled. i figured we would be in our house by the end of the week, improvements completed.

i am so naive.

of course, it didn't help that i couldn't get into the house this morning until the locksmith arrived! he was scheduled to come at 9:00 a.m. so was the painter. i had scheduled the painter a few days ago, before i knew i was going to NEED a locksmith first thing monday morning. and then the carpet guy from home depot was going to come at 10:00. the shutter guy was coming at 11:00 and the window guy was coming at noon. oh, and the salvation army was supposed to come and pick up all the stuff left by the sellers sometime during the day...

yes, the sellers left a bunch of stuff in the garage. apparently no one wanted it. i sure didn't want it! the only thing they had that i wanted were the cool stools that were at the kitchen counter. of course, they took those, along with all the toilet paper...

when we did our final walk through last monday, the house was supposed to be empty. it wasn't. of course. the ex-wife's attorney had acquired an order that prohibited any furniture from being removed from the property. this made the sellers mad! really mad!! "she took 80 percent of the furniture when she moved out, and now she wants more?!?!?!" was the general sentiment. they were all supposed to meet at the house last friday and decide who was going to get what (doesn't that sound like fun??) but apparently when the dust settled, there were some things that no one wanted, so they just left them in the garage and arranged for the salvation army to pick them up today. which would have been fine, except someone needed to be there to let the salvation army into the garage! i quickly volunteered. rollie would be at work, and somehow i didn't think it would be a good thing to have the seller's sister hanging around all day while i was getting work estimates...

i got to the house just before 9:00, and the painter arrived a few minutes later. i explained to him why we had to sit on the front step instead of going into the house. he just smiled and said, "ok, no problem." he says no problem a lot. he is the most agreeable man i know. and he knows me, so when i told him i had locked us out of the house within hours of getting the keys, he didn't seem all that surprised...

we waited. and waited. i decided we could at least talk about the outside painting, so we did. that took about 10 minutes. and then we waited some more. finally about 9:45 a guy showed up with a clipboard. "hi!" i said, "you must be the locksmith!" "nooo," he said, "i'm here to measure for carpet." i explained that we were waiting for a locksmith to let us in, and he said, "how did you lock yourself out?"

why do people ask me this? it is irrelevant! does it matter how i locked myself out? no. no it doesn't. the only relevant fact for the carpet guy was that we couldn't get in, which might make him late for his next appointment. but short of saying, "it's none of your business," there was no way to avoid the question, so i told him. he smirked and shook his head.

we waited. and waited. the carpet guy kept looking at his watch and rolling his eyes. he said, "do you even know if he is coming?!?" i did not like the carpet guy. i know he had a schedule and all, but he was kind of condescending and mean. so i called, and the locksmith said he was on his way and would be there in 5 minutes. this elicited another smirk and eye roll from the carpet guy. "i've heard THAT before," he said, "they always say 5 minutes..."

i hate to admit it, but the carpet guy was right. twenty minutes later the locksmith showed up. and he seemed to be in no hurry. he got his tools out of his truck and sauntered to the front door. and then, for the third time today, i was asked, "how did you lock yourself out?"

"WHO CARES?!??! WHO CARES HOW I LOCKED MYSELF OUT?!?!? I JUST DID. JUST GET ME INTO MY HOUSE!!!!!"

no, i didn't yell that, but i was certainly thinking it. so i edited the story and told it again. and the locksmith continued to try to break into my house. and the carpet guy continued to look at his watch every three minutes. and the painter continued to wait patiently and smile whenever i looked at him. i was beginning to love the painter...

but not the locksmith. he could not pick the lock! he worked on that lock for 15 minutes! i didn't think it would be that hard. on tv it only takes them seconds to get through locked doors, and they don't have a box full of tools and a license that allows them to legally break in! they just stick a hairpin in the lock, jiggle it around for 10 seconds, and it unlocks. clearly our locksmith had never been to prison...

the carpet guy stopped checking his watch and sighing long enough to suggest that maybe we should try a different lock. well, we could try the garage door, but then we would have to also break into the door leading from the garage to the house, because i was sure rollie had locked that door as well! so instead, we went to the french doors in the back. "no," the locksmith said, "i'd have to drill that lock. let's go try the front door again." the carpet guy had had enough. he said he had other appointments, and i would have to reschedule. then he left. i was glad. my poor house had enough karma issues without adding a cranky carpet guy to the mix...

two minutes after the carpet guy left, the locksmith popped the lock. of course...

and so, we were finally in. i got the locksmith busy on re-keying my new doorknobs so that ONE key would open them all. and then the shutter guy arrived. i sent him off to measure windows while i talked to the painter and waited for the salvation army to arrive...

i waited all day for the salvation army. they never came. i don't know what happened. maybe they had the wrong address. i rescheduled the carpet measuring for tomorrow. the shutter guy gave me his estimate. i thought about calling an ambulance to resuscitate me, but instead i managed to say, "i'll have to think about that and get back to you..." like maybe when i win the lottery...

but the painter is my hero. he worked all day covering the floors and walls to prep for painting. he is going to remove the popcorn ceilings, paint everything inside (including all the baseboards, crown moldings, doors, and closet interiors,) and also the outside. and he isn't just going to paint--he is going to repair and sand and make the inside of my 45 year old house look like new construction. yes, he is a miracle worker!

and i haven't seen him roll his eyes once!

home owners: ground zero

2011-06-19T23:59:00.002-07:00

so tonight . . . we went to burger king for dinner. but since we now own a brand new house, we decided to get take out and then take it HOME to eat!

(i keep saying we are homeowners, but really, it isn't ours. yet. it belongs to bank of america. but they seem to be ok with letting us live there for the next 20 years as long as we keep paying them... i just hope they appreciate the improvements we are making in their house!)

i kind of wanted to spend some time in my new house without being surrounded by hostility. every time we have been in the house, there has been DRAMA! i just wanted to wander around and breathe... and smile! i had paint samples to look at (because the painter is coming tomorrow,) and measuring to do and lists to make... i was finally going to have some fun in my new house! and i was excited about it!

but i was also hungry. and even though the kitchen is a cook's dream, tonight it wasn't mine, because there wasn't any food in it! so we locked all the doors and went out to the car. and that is when we discovered that the garage door was still open...

the garage door has been another issue. the garage door openers seem to have gone awol. the ex-husband's family is sure that the ex-wife has them--in fact, they had disconnected it just in case she decided to try to get in and take their stuff. so the only way to open and close the door is to use the manual switch inside the garage. rollie punched the button, and nothing happened. so of course, he punched it again. and again. and again. and still nothing happened. he had had it working earlier, so he couldn't figure out why suddenly it wouldn't close! we tried everything we could think of, until out of desperation, he had me flip a switch in the opposite corner of the garage. this seemed to provide power to the switch, and so garage door finally closed. (don't ask my why a switch clear across the garage has to be on in order for the manual garage door opener switch to work... i can't wait until our replacement remotes get here!)

we got in the car to go get dinner, and immediately realized that we didn't know where to go. right now we live just a few blocks away from several places to eat, but the new house is just far enough away that we weren't quite sure what was close. we drove around until we found a burger king, bought food, and went back to the house. now we had food, but no chairs to sit on, so we went out to the back yard and sat on the step. it was so nice and quiet. we munched our burgers and talked about what we wanted to do with the backyard. lost in conversation about sod and sprinklers and strawberry bushes and tomato plants (yes, i am still trying to convince myself they are yummy!) we sat on the step for quite a while. when it started to get dark, we picked up our trash and went into the house.

at least, that was our plan. but there was a problem. the back door seemed to be locked.

i'm not sure exactly how it got locked. i had unlocked it when we went out, and i had left the keys IN the deadbolt so that they wouldn't get misplaced, since we only had one set of keys. and there they were, in the lock, inside the house. and the door was locked. "i think we are locked out!" i said to rollie. "where are the keys?" he asked. what did he mean, where are the keys?!? i had TOLD him i was going to leave them in the deadbolt so they wouldn't get lost! and what had he said?? let me think a minute here... oh yeah, he had said he didn't think i should leave them in the lock, because jill told him that the doorknob would still turn even when it was locked... and THERE WAS NO KEY FOR THAT DOORKNOB... and so it was easy to get locked out!!

so i stand corrected. FOUR different keys to the outside doors apparently weren't enough. apparently we needed FIVE different keys.

(just so you know, this was all rollie's fault... he gave ME the only set of keys. THE ONLY SET!! does the man not know me at all?!?!?!? i misplace things all the time! clearly, he should have been the keeper of the keys. AND he locked the front door after we went into the house with our food. i hardly ever lock the front door. usually my hands are full of stuff and by the time i empty my hands, i have forgotten all about locking the door. he is always bugging me, "don't forget to lock the front door." or "why isn't the front door locked?" sometimes i just get the look--the one that says, "really? you left the front door unlocked again? why don't you just put a sign in the yard that says 'come on in and burgle us...'")

when we discovered we were locked out, i immediately sent rollie to check the front door, which i knew was an exercise in futility, because i KNEW he had locked it behind him, but hope springs eternal... and in this case, dies. because of course the front door was locked, as were all the other doors.

ok, i admit it--it wasn't really rollie's fault.

it was the seller's fault. i mean, come on!! only one key for each lock?? i have a difficult time believing that they only had one key for each lock. four people were living here! are you telling me they all shared one set of keys??? i don't think so. i am pretty sure it was just their final salvo in the war over the house. and who uses a different key for each door anyway?!?!? burglars aren't going to use a key, so i'm not sure it enhances security at all! it just enhances my ability to lock us out!

we tried every door. and of course, rollie had locked them all. we were not going to get back into our new house. at least, not tonight...

did i mention that my purse was still in the house?

thankfully my phone was still in my pocket. i pulled it out and called jill. "hi jill," i said. "oh hi," she said, "are you enjoying your new house?" i could hear the smile in her voice. jill is our friend, and she was so happy that we were finally in our house. "well, actually, we are kind of locked out of the house..." there was silence. and then laughter. LAUGHTER!!! ok, i love jill, but i am not sure this was an appropriate response! "did you try the other doors," she asked?

really? REALLY????? did she think i was calling her when i knew she was celebrating father's day with her family, before first trying every conceivable way of getting in?!?!?!

"yes, we have tried all the doors. we are locked out. i'm not sure what to do."

this is not the first time i have been locked out of a house--not even close! but there is always someone i can call who has an extra key. sometimes it takes a while, but i can always find help. the problem was, this house was too new. we had only had it about two hours. no one else had a key--WE only had one set!!

jill finally stopped laughing long enough to help me find a locksmith. since it wasn't an emergency, we made an appointment for 9:00 a.m. tomorrow. i was just glad jill had stopped laughing. i had detected a slight maniacal edge to it. i'm sure she thought that when she handed us those keys, the whole house-hunting nightmare was finally going to be over.

but it wasn't. clearly she doesn't read my blogs...

so the locksmith was coming in the morning--what should we do now? we decided we should go to home depot and buy new doorknobs. i know, i know--closing the barn door after the horse is already gone. but now that our brains had finally tumbled to the fact that all the doorknobs were different, we realized it would be a waste of money to have the mismatched doorknobs re-keyed. because i was pretty sure my ocd-ness was not going to let me live in a house with doorknobs like that!

it was now 8:30 p.m. thankfully home depot is pretty close. i thought we would dash in, grab four doorknobs, pay, and dash out. it was a good plan. until i saw the rows and rows and rows of doorknobs...

you've heard the term "heaven on earth?" this was not that. this was the other place...

i had exactly half an hour to make a decision about doorknobs--a decision i didn't even know i was going to have to make, so it was a decision i was totally unprepared for. i just started looking for a brushed stainless steel doorknob. and i found one. actually i found about 25! so the decision-making part of my brain tried to kick into overdrive--i knew it wasn't going to be pretty.

i had to choose a shape. but they are all packaged up so you can't hold one in your hand! how did i know which doorknob i wanted to grip every time i went in or out of my house for the next 20 years?!?!?! and then rollie further confused me by talking about exterior doorknobs vs interior doorknobs. and THEN he said we needed a dummy doorknob for our double front door. a DUMMY doorknob?!?!?! i had no idea what that was, but it didn't sound very nice.

i finally picked one. rollie picked up three more that were exactly the same, (because let me tell you, OUR exterior doorknobs are all going to MATCH!) and we started moving toward the cash registers. but my heart was pounding. i was having a little trouble breathing. i felt a little panicky. i stopped and said, "i'm not sure about these doorknobs."

i AM sure rollie just wanted to scream "JUST GET THE DOORKNOBS!!!!!!! SHEESH!!! IT IS JUST A DOORKNOB!!!!!" but he knows me, and loves me anyway. so what he SAID was, "ok, then let's go back and look again." and he patiently pointed out every single brushed steel doorknob that was available--even the ones that we both knew i was not going to buy because they were ridiculously expensive! we discussed the pros and cons of different brands and ratings and shapes and sizes. he gave up the lever looking doorknobs, even though he liked them, because i said i thought they would look like an evil, villianous moustache on our double front doors and the back french doors. and then, at a few minutes to 9:00 we were at the cash register--with the first doorknobs i had picked...

i'm not counting this as day one of home ownership. i'm not. i think taking possession of a house sort of implies that you can get into it. and i can't. so in the future, june 19, 2011 will be referred to as ground zero--the day it began...

or father's day...

or better yet, DIANDRA'S BIRTHDAY :-)

it will NOT be referred to as the first time julie locked herself out of the new house! because, you know, that implies that there will be other times...

home owners: the beginning...

2011-06-19T23:57:00.000-07:00

so today . . . is the big day. all the ducks are in a row, and we are supposed to take possession of our new house. according to all the paperwork, we were supposed to get the keys no later than 5:00 p.m. today.

you may notice i said "supposed to..."

nothing in this whole process of buying a house has gone according to plan. nothing. in fact, rollie and i were just talking about how we actually bought this house without really checking out every nook and cranny. we would ask each other questions, and it was surprising how much we didn't know. and yet, here we are, with a house that i'm sure still holds surprises...

so at 5:00 when rollie came into the family room and said, "it's 5:00. have you heard from our realtor yet?" i said no. i was pretty sure we weren't going to hear by 5:00, even though all the paperwork said we would...

at 5:20 the phone rang. it was jill, our realtor. she had the keys! it was finally time to "take possession" of our new house. we were so excited!

when we got there, jill handed us four keys. four different keys--one for the front door, one for the back door, one for the outside garage door and one for the door between the garage and the house. yes, we had exactly ONE key for each lock. one. but at least we had keys!!

we walked slowly through the empty house, seeing some things for the first time...

--every outside doorknob is different, which is why there are four keys! the outside garage door doesn't even have a knob! the deadbolt is installed where the doorknob should be, and then a hook is screwed into the door to be used as a handle, i guess... (i took a picture of this specifically for my blog. but i took it with my iphone. and i can't get photos from my iphone to my computer without ms. martha or ms. jessica! and since i am on summer vacation, i am on my own... so sadly you do not get to see this ridiculous doorknobless, deadbolted door.)

--there is a random knob in the middle of the inside of the front door.

--there was a pretty long, shallow scratch in the flooring in one room. it doesn't scream at you when you walk in the room, but still... i guess we should be glad that with all those wood floors, that was the only casualty.

--there was no continuity to anything! when i stood in the living room, every light switch plate that i saw was different--brass, white, silver... some light switches had a regular switch, some had a toggle, some had a weird sort of fader, some had a kind of automatic switch. there are several different kinds of doorknobs IN THE HOUSE. sometimes even on the same door...

--there is a mystery push-button by the kitchen sink, and although we pushed it several times, we don't know WHAT it does. apparently it doesn't do anything!

--they took all the toilet paper, but left the heavy drapes. (ok, now i didn't expect that they would leave us ANYTHING, but really. what is the thought process that happens when you are taking a partial roll of toilet paper off the holder and packing it...)

--we are going to have to get a new washer and dryer, because ours are electric and the hook-ups are gas. darn :-)

--the dining room light fixture is massive!

somehow it didn't look quite as big when there was a table under it. and it is kind of ugly. and heavy. and it has those little candle looking lights with lampshades on them... it may be the first casualty of our new home-ownership... (and if any of you have this particular light fixture in your home, i am sorry i called it ugly. maybe a more tactful way to put it is, it isn't quite to my taste...)

but we also noticed some good things...

--the fireplace is really pretty--we had never been able to get a good look at it, because it is right under where they had their tv. and they were always watching tv! it has a lovely wood mantle and granite hearth.

although that little garland decoration has got to go!

--the family room is hard-wired for surround sound, and there is every kind of audio/visual hook-up that a guy could want. sadly for rollie, we cannot say this about the man room. yet.

--there are sprinkler heads in the back yard. we didn't notice them before, because they are partially buried. so maybe there is a sprinkler system, just not any grass.

--the garage is all sheet-rocked and painted. there was so much stuff in it, it was hard to tell. and there is still stuff in it, because they couldn't get the salvation army to come pick it up on a sunday. do they even know what the salvation army is?!?!? of course they aren't going to pick up stuff on a sunday! (oh my goodness--just wait until you read the blog about why that stuff is still in the garage...)

--the storage shed (which i am sure the city of cerritos will make us remove if they ever discover that it is there) is pretty spacious. although, rollie has already laid claim to it's spaciousness, so really this is irrelevant to ME!

--two of our neighbors have dogs. (this is both good and bad--good, because i think they will be more tolerant of our dogs' barking, but bad, because our dogs will probably bark more!)

--some of the switch plate covers are really cool. some of them. the rest are icky,

but i am hopeful that i can find more of the cool ones...

it was nice to finally be in our new home. it isn't perfect. yet. but we have some plans for a facelift. and when we get done, then i am sure it will be perfect. but for now, we are going to go to burger king, get some dinner, and come back and eat it at our new house.

just because we CAN! :-)

a shift...

2011-06-19T23:45:00.000-07:00

so today . . . is diandra's birthday. and father's day. and sunday. i am experiencing a blogging dilemma.

first of all, usually i don't even blog on sundays. my sundays tend to be very predictable. they go something like this: church, lunch, nap, dinner, a little tv, bedtime. my sundays are not fertile ground for blogging material. even for my overactive brain.

but at lunch today, diandra informed me that she would be looking forward to her birthday blog, since today was her birthday. she said this in the presence of her father, who reminded her that it was also father's day. but since diandra has had the dubious distinction of being an only child, she is of the opinion that her birthday trumps everything else. and although she graciously took her dad to a movie today to celebrate father's day, she is right. her birthday usually wins.

(and i love you dad, but you are fishing today. which is one of the things you love to do most, so i am glad that is how you are spending your special day. but you aren't home to read a blog about yourself anyway, so i guess i will wait until YOUR birthday to write a blog for you. happy father's day!)

since birthdays come around only once a year, it has been twelve months since diandra's last birthday blog. i couldn't remember what i had written--probably you can't remember either! but in my continuing quest to keep from repeating myself, i went back and read her birthday blogs from 2009 and 2010. they were pretty good. if you missed them, you should go read them now.

as i read, i realized how much i admire my daughter. she is an amazing woman! and i use the word "woman" here for the first time when referring to her (i think,) because this last year is the year diandra turned into an adult...

some people think that when their children turn 18, they become adults. i have heard more than one parent say, "well, what can i do? they are 18, you know. legally they are an adult..." (this usually comes at the end of a sad story about their child making some poor decisions, as 18 year olds sometimes do.) this always perplexes me. just because a child can legally vote, they do not magically turn into an adult on the eve of their 18th birthday. being an adult is not about one's age--it is about one's maturity. it is about losing that self-serving, self-centered focus and starting to realize the world does not revolve around them. it is about being responsible, making good decisions, owning up to bad ones, and having a broader perspective than "it's all about me, me, me!!!"

some people never turn into adults...

but this year, diandra did. i have blogged about her enough that you all know i think she is the most perfect daughter on planet earth. is she always perfect? no. do i agree with every decision she makes? no, (just ask her belly button.) does she still roll her eyes at me? maybe occasionally... but her perspective is different. she isn't looking at things like a kid anymore. she is thinking more like an adult.

today diandra turns 26 years old. she has faced some very difficult things since her 18th birthday. she has not always been in control of her life, but she has taken responsibility for it. she has made hard choices, unpopular choices, maybe even a bad choice or two, but she has learned from all of those choices. she is able to deal with her emotional ups and downs, rather than being ruled by them. she is being who she is, not who she thinks everyone else wants her to be. she knows she is just a part of the world, not the center of the universe...

...unless it is june 19th. because june 19th is her birthday. and so on june 19th it IS all about her--even if june 19th falls on a sunday... which is also father's day...

i love you, diandra! you are an amazing woman! i think your 27th year is going to be awesome!!!

you are still my favorite daughter :-)

did you miss me?

2011-06-18T23:50:00.000-07:00

so today . . . it has been a month since my last post. a whole month.

i hope this never happens again. i love to blog, but the last month of my life has been hectic, stressful, and aggravating. it has not been funny... well, unless you are of the mindset that sometimes your only choices are to laugh or cry... then maybe there have been a few moments of laughter, but only because the situation has been so ridiculous as to almost be unbelievable.

we bought a house. we don't actually get the keys until tomorrow, but the papers are all signed and the money is somewhere on it's way from our bank to the seller's bank. it has not been an easy process. someday, i will write out the whole crazy story. but for now, let me just mention a few of the things we have been dealing with...

--a beautiful house.

--a crime committed on the property.

--an ex-wife and an incarcerated ex-husband.

--a court order forcing ex-husband to accept our offer.

--lovely wood floors.

--convicted felon's parents currently living in the beautiful house.

--very angry sister with power of attorney for jailed brother.

--an unbelievable struggle over a refrigerator.

--a huge master suite with walk-in closet and two sinks in the bathroom.

--icky bedroom carpeting.

--possible court sanctions against 401k of the man behind bars if cooperation continues to be non-existent.

--quiet street lined with messy pine trees.

--disappearing garage storage cabinets.

--a waiver of liability in case of injury during the final walk-thru?!?!?

--a misdirected email which further inflamed the situation.

--an abandoned pool table.

--dead grass?? maybe, maybe not... tomorrow we will see.

--an excellent house inspection report.

--except for termites. (hey, it is southern california. we have bugs.)

--who gets what? a final struggle over furnishings.

--an empty window replacement warehouse.

--a buried inground spa, covered up by a deck (i'm pretty sure there is a dead body under there...)

--$1000 here, $1000 there... sheesh! when will it end?!?!?!

and if that weren't enough, there were all the end-of-the-year school things that had to be done--assessments, report cards, class parties, field trips, final work booklets... i am still not finished. one of my afternoons next week will be spent not getting paid at school, cleaning up for the summer.

and did i mention that i haven't packed any boxes yet? no? well, i haven't. i'm too scared that a cock roach will hitch a ride to the new house. (thanks, mom!)

this is why i took some time off from blogging. i am telling you, if i had been blogging everything that has happened in the last month, some of you would have accused me of making it up--yes, it is that weird!

BUT, school is now over for me until next fall. and whether the family of the guy in the orange jumpsuit likes it or not, the sale has been completed. now all that is left to do is arrange to have it painted. and carpet laid in the two bedrooms. and sprinklers and grass installed in the back yard. and new windows installed upstairs. and window shutters. and the locks rekeyed!

oh, and sitting at the house on monday from 7:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. waiting for the salvation army to come and take away the furniture that neither the ex-wife or the ex-husband's family wanted. yes, it is going to be a loooong day...

it's ok, though, because i have been waiting almost two months to get to sit inside that house. all. by. myself.

:-)

my perfect vehicle springs a leak...

2011-05-18T23:57:00.000-07:00

so today . . . it rained.

IT RAINED!!! does anyone know that it is already the middle of may?!?!? we should not be having rain. we should be having lovely sunshin-y days, the kind of days that make you want to skip work and lay in the backyard under a tree with a book. that's may! not dashing from the house to the car, juggling bags and drinks and car keys and trying to find an umbrella...

of course if my car was in the garage where it belongs, this wouldn't be such an issue. but right now, my car is living out in the cold.

my car is living out in the cold, because the hot water heater is leaking. it is a small drip, but small drips add up! and since the hot water heater is in the garage, leaking creates issues. you may remember the last time there was water in the garage... my poor car paid the price! so the first thing i did when i noticed the leak was to move my car out of the garage and onto the driveway!

the second thing i did was to move all of the boxes of stuff that had the hot water heater surrounded, out into the main area of the garage to dry out.

and that's about as far as i got. i thought maybe i would just start my sorting and packing and getting rid of stuff with those boxes. but then i got busy... and so the boxes still sit in the garage where my car belongs, while my car languishes in the driveway...

...which might be ok, if we were having our normal weather. but it is RAINING!! which would still be ok, if the roof of my car didn't have a couple of tiny cracks in it.

oh yes, my most perfect car has two small cracks in the top. apparently there are two stress points on my convertible top. they have been reinforced, but i put the top up and down all the time. up and down and up and down. i noticed that it was showing some wear and tear, but i had no idea how bad it was, until a couple of months ago when i was sitting in the car while putting the top up, AND I SAW BLUE SKY THROUGH MY ROOF! it was just a teeny, tiny sliver of sky, but still, it was sky!

after the initial shock, i didn't worry about it too much. it rarely rains here and my car is in the garage most of the time. and then i realized that rain was not my real enemy (well, it might be my enemy, but it never rains in california...) my real enemy was the car wash. and when i realized that i couldn't take my car to the car wash with those two tiny little cracks in the roof, i decided i needed to get it fixed! i sure didn't want to drive around in a dirty car--black cars should be shiny and sleek.

so i called to see how much a new roof would cost. and then i decided i wouldn't be getting a new roof for a while. for quite a while.

my next move was the internet, because you can find a solution for anything on the internet, right? so i started searching for ways to repair a vinyl roof top. and i found some, but they all looked like they had the potential to go disasterously wrong! and it was going to take time, which is something in kind of short supply for me right now. i needed a quick solution, because my car was dirty and scattered rain showers were in the forecast. i thought maybe i could use that wide, clear packing tape short term, but i couldn't get it to stick to the roof! the vinyl on my roof has a pebbled texture, and that clear tape just wouldn't seal.

so i came up with another solution.

duct tape.

yes duct tape. it is strong, it is water resistant, and i already had some in the garage. i am of the opinion that you can fix just about anything with duct tape. so i got out my scissors and my roll of duct tape and headed for my car...

it was a pretty simple process to cut a piece of duct tape and cover the cracks in my roof. but as i surveyed my handiwork, i was not satisfied. my roof is black and the duct tape is silver. normally i like things that are silver, but this just looked tacky, tacky, tacky. this was not a perfect soution. i needed something else... something black... something like a black permanent marker...

did you know that if you want to color a piece of silver duct tape black, you have to move your black permanent marker slowly? because if you don't, it leaves little silver tracks...

well, it wasn't a perfect solution, but i thought at least it would keep the water out until i could decide what to do. it rained a little bit, and my car stayed dry inside, so i thought maybe this was going to work!

and then we had a sunny day. and another sunny day. and a hot sunny day. and then a whole week of hot sunny days. and that is when i learned that duct tape adhesive sort of melts in the heat, because it wasn't long before my customized duct tape had loosened enough to blow off my roof. so now, not only was my roof back to being at the mercy of any passing water, but as a bonus, there were big white rectangles of leftover duct tape adhesive on my roof!

i tried to get it off, but it was soooo sticky! and it had melted down into the spaces between the pebbled texture of the vinyl--not enough to seal the cracks of course, just enough to make a big ugly mess.

i gave up. it hardly ever rains anyway, and i decided i would just have to drive around with a dirty car until i could save up $2,500 for a new roof!!!

and then, a couple of weeks ago while i was at school, rollie somehow miraculously removed all that icky adhesive, washed the car, and temporarily repaired the cracks. with electrical tape. black electrical tape. black electrical tape that also eventually fell off the roof, but at least any adhesive residue is black. it was a brilliant solution.

so my car is once again waterproof. i hope. because while the rain is supposed to end today, i am thinking my baby needs a bath!

inspection day!

2011-05-17T23:50:00.000-07:00

so today . . . was our house inspection--not of the house we live in (thank goodness!) but of the house we want to buy...

this house has had me on a roller coaster. the first time i saw it, i liked it. but then i wasn't sure. then rollie saw it, and he loved it! and i liked it even better the second time. but i still wasn't sure...

(of course, it took me so long to make a decision about a new camera that rollie just finally bought me one. i fear that buying a house is going to be the same.)

and then the husband refused to sign our offer. and i thought, "ok, maybe this isn't the house for us after all..." but i was kind of sad about it. and then the wife said, "oh nonononono! he is not going to mess this up! he will sign those papers if i have get a judge to order him to do it!" (ok well those might not have been her exact words--i don't know what her exact words were--but it must have been something like that.) so we waited for the judge to rule. and i worried that someone else would swoop in and steal the house away from us, because by then i had decided it was the only house for us! and if we didn't get it, i was going to be seriously bummed!

but no one swooped in, and the judge ruled, and then the ball was back in our court. so we scheduled the inspection and got excited to see the house again! and then the sellers said we had to move the inspection a few days. and then i got impatient and irritated by their shenanigans! (at least, i thought it was shenanigans. maybe it was just circumstances, but it felt like shenanigans to me!) and so we waited through another weekend... and hoped that it was going to be ok...

but while we were waiting, again, our realtor emailed us the report from a home inspection that had been done last october. she told us that after the home inspection, those prospective buyers had backed out. oh great. now i was back to thinking that maybe this wasn't going to be our house after all. maybe it had insurmountable issues. maybe there really was a dead body buried under the deck...

maybe i should just pretend i was shopping for a camera and let rollie choose one for me.

which brings us to today. finally, we were going to get back into the house for a closer look. i had my clipboard. i had a 25 foot measuring tape. i had paint chip samples. i had my camera. i was prepared to document that house to within an inch of it's life! and i was excited. i was done waiting. it was time to spring into action and buy a house!

and then i got there...

rollie was already there with our realtor and the inspector. i took diandra in to show her around, and was quickly met by the the seller's sister (you know, the one who was "sick") who decided that i should not be let loose in the house unattended. she was not in a very good mood. this spoiled my plan. and my fun. i don't think she wants to sell the house, either--which of course makes me determined to get it!

i know, i am perverse.

with the seller's sister there (who, it turns out, really was probably sick--she still didn't look so good,) i didn't feel all that comfortable wandering about measuring things and looking at paint chips. so instead of spending two hours preparing, in detail, my plans for redecorating, i followed rollie and the inspector, surreptitiously measuring windows and floors and closets as i could, and then trying to remember the numbers in my head until i could note them in my phone. because while i started out with a clipboard, i had left it in the car. thankfully i still had my 25 foot tape measure and my camera in my purse...

as i listened to the inspector talk, i started swinging back to the "maybe this isn't the house for us" camp. because although he wasn't finding anything major, there sure was a lot of little stuff that needed to be taken care of. and it just sounded like a lot of work! and it made me irritated that we were spending so much money on a house and still had to fix it up!

when the inspection was over, the inspector said that it was a good house--no red flags. it was safe to go ahead and buy it. so i think we will. the location is good. it has lots of space and light. and the kitchen is awesome! (i know, you think it will be wasted on me, but maybe i will start cooking more often...) we should get the full report tomorrow, and then we will start making lists and scheduling workers and planning color schemes and looking at plants and prioritizing it all...

...because now i am very firmly back in the "this is definitely the only house for us" camp! i love it! so i am getting off the roller coaster now and heading to home depot.

i'm pretty sure that before we are done, rubio's is not going to be the only place where they know us by name ;-)

some weeks i laugh, some weeks i come unglued...

2011-05-15T23:31:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i realized i haven't blogged in several days. again. i've been a little distracted lately...

we need to buy a house. like right now. after looking at several, we put an offer in on one that we liked. the owners finally accepted and signed our offer, but it took a court order to make it happen. and time. we have spent a lot of time just waiting. but finally their signatures are on the right lines...

this was no simple task. first the wife signed, but the husband wouldn't. so the wife took him to court and the judge ordered him to sign. so he did. but not on the same document as the wife. or on the correct line--he signed on the buyer's signature line, not the seller's...

i'm starting to think that he doesn't really want to sell this house...

but the judge ordered the papers to be signed last monday. so we scheduled the home inspection for friday afternoon. we were pretty excited. we made a plan. rollie was going to follow the inspector around so he understood all the technical "inspectory" stuff, and i was going to take photos like crazy and measure everything! because we want to have new windows installed upstairs, and some grass put in the back yard, and some carpeting possibly replaced. and we will need window coverings and a security system. so if i take pictures and get measurements, we can have all that scheduled as soon as we know when we will get the keys!

which was a great idea, until we got the call on wednesday saying the home inspection had to be postponed, because the husband's sister, who is living in the house with their parents, was sick. and apparently was planning to be sick through the weekend. so we had to put all our excitement on hold for four more days...

four more days is an eternity to me right now. patience is not one of my virtues. in fact, patience doesn't even try to hang out with my other virtues! (hey! i have other virtues... i'm sure i do...) so of course, all i have been able to think about since wednesday was the house. and not being able to see it. and mentally placing furniture in it without knowing if it would actually fit. and wondering if milo will be able to haul his chubby little body up the stairs since they aren't carpeted. and worrying that the inspection will uncover insurmountable issues and propel us back to square one! and we will have lost three weeks in the process! and we will have to live in a tent in the park!

this is why i haven't blogged. i am not so much funny right now, as sort of starting to come apart at the seams.

and i don't have time to come apart at the seams, because buying a new house is not the only thing in my life right now! i wish it was!! but it isn't...

school is winding up for the year in just five weeks. open house is next weekend, which means producing copious amounts of amazing artwork, mounting it, and hanging it on the walls. which means taking down all the stuff the kids have been randomly taping up for the last several weeks. which seems kind of backwards to me... so now i have to decide how to incorporate the amazing artwork i am sure we are going to do this week, with the "artwork" they have been producing on their own that they are so proud of, and display it all! and clean the room from top to bottom. and prepare my presentation for prospective kindergarten students. AND complete the curriculum that we have to complete this week. and then spend four hours at school on saturday morning AT the open house...

oh, and create a photo album of one of diandra's weddings for an impatient bride. i say impatient, but she is just excited to get her album. and we promised it to her by the weekend, so i have to get busy! i should have started it weeks ago, especially since i am using a new program to create it which will take time to figure out. but as i said, i've been a little distracted...

and then, assuming we get to do the inspection tuesday afternoon, you know where my mind is going to go... it is going to go into house fixing overdrive!! and then there will be the packing to do. and now i am freaked out about packing anything, because after the cock roach blog, my mom said to be careful that we didn't take any WITH us!! YIKES!! i hadn't even thought of that! so now i am afraid to pack my boxes in case those sneaky bugs (and i'm not really sure they should be called bugs, because they are waaaay to big to be squashed...) try to hitch a ride and move with us!

and so, i haven't blogged much this week. i didn't think you would enjoy hearing me whine about my life every day. so, to spare you, i just crammed it all into this one whiny blog that covered the whole week.

lucky you ;-)

So today I hate my iPhone! It won't email me my photos! Or let me blog!!!!! Which is why this is all in the title line. I'll they again tomorrow.

2011-05-11T00:54:00.000-07:00

2011-05-08T23:48:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i've procrastinated too long and now it is late and my eyes are closing...

i had a nice mother's day. and i want to tell you about it, really i do. in fact, i have the blog about 1/3 written. but my brain is turning to oatmeal. and i have to get up in the morning and go to work. and it is the mother's day blog, so i want it to be good! so rather than stay up for another hour (which is probably how long it would take me to write it, as tired as i am,) i am going to bed now. i will finish the mother's day blog tomorrow and just post it under today's date--because i can manipulate the date and time of posting, you know ;-) and then i will also post a regular blog tomorrow... providing something blogworthy happens...

... and if nothing interesting happens, i guess i could always let a cricket loose in diandra's room...

;-)

mother's day meals

2011-05-08T22:02:00.000-07:00

***disclaimer***

although there is some humor in today's blog, it is NOT going to measure up to the cock roach story. i'm sorry, but that kind of hilarity doesn't happen every day. however, that doesn't mean you won't smile once or twice...

so today . . . was mother's day. normally mother's day for me is all about a day spent shopping with my daughter. but not this year. this year all the drama revolved around food...

it started at lunch. diandra was busy until later in the day, so rollie and i had lunch at tgifriday's. although we eat out a lot, we rarely go to tgifriday's. i don't know why--i love the food there, and we go right past it on our way to rubios... but since today was mother's day, i got to choose the restaurant. this meant we were NOT eating at rubios--we were going to eat someplace where you got to actually hold a menu, and you didn't have to order standing up.

i am not averse to eating holiday meals at fast food places, but i just wanted to go someplace different today. when i got to the restaurant, rollie was already sitting at a table. yes, i said table. i looked around. there were empty booths, but for some reason they made him sit at a table... and it was noisy in that part of the restaurant--no cushy booths to soak up the sound, i guess. i sat with him for a couple of minutes and realized that if we stayed there, i was not going to hear a word he said. and more importantly, he was not going to hear a word i said!! so we asked if we could move to a booth, and were quickly moved... into the bar.

although we don't drink, i don't usually mind sitting in the bar. usually it is dark and quiet there, and you get pretty good service. i thought it might be an especially good idea today, since it was mother's day and the restaurant was probably soon going to be swarming with children and dads taking mom out to lunch. but not in the bar. in the bar, it was going to be nice and quiet and child-free...

we perused our menus and made our lunch selections. the waitress brought us our cokes with lemon wedges. and then a funny thing happened... suddenly i was surrounded by basketball players wearing purple and gold! yes, the evil lakers had invaded my mother's day lunch!!

i don't know why i hadn't noticed the giant tv screens when we sat down. (this is rollie, making an "L" with his fingers. i always thought this was the universal symbol for "loser," but he tells me it is for "lakers." today, as it turns out, it meant both...) i guess, since they were mounted high on the walls and were each showing something different, they just didn't register with my brain. but when they were all suddenly tuned to the same station, and the volume was cranked up, my brain sat up and took notice.

somebody, somewhere, who probably lives thousands of miles away from their mother, had scheduled game 4 of the second round of playoff games for mother's day, and the evil lakers were down 0-3.

just my luck! mother's day, and everyone in that restaurant was trying to get a look at that game! because this was not just another game. this was big. this was "win it now or go home" time. and we had the best seat in the house--well, the best seat if you are a laker fan. which i am not. we were surrounded by eight big screen tvs, all playing the game simultaneously. on mother's day!!!

i weighed my options. oh, i had options, all right... i could pick up my diet coke and move as far away from those tvs as i could get, but then i would be back to the noisy, child-filled part of the restaurant. i could demand that rollie totally ignore the game and focus on ME--after all, it was mother's day! but realistically there was no way he could avoid those eight giant tv screens. i could politely ask if they could turn just ONE giant screen to shopping tv :-) yeah, i'm sure they would do that...

i opted to stay where i was, eat my delicious food, and ignore the evil lakers. which i did.

shortly after we got home i got a text from diandra. she was going to be gone longer than she had thought, which was ok with me--i found i was pretty sleepy (probably from staying up too late the night before,) and a nap sounded like a great idea! which it was.

by the time diandra got home, we had decided to hang out in the family room with our computers and the tv and the big bag of snacks that she had brought home! yes, it was going to be a goooood mother's day! but after decimating the contents of the bag from 7-11 (which had a few surprises in it,) we thought maybe we should eat some real food. you know, to kind of dilute the amount of sugar we had just eaten... this meant a trip somewhere...

i wanted jack in the box. diandra didn't know what she wanted--all she knew was that she didn't want jack in the box. she finally settled on el pollo loco, and off we went. and everything was fine, until we were sitting in the drive-thru lane at el pollo loco. because the car ahead of us had a wienerschnitzel hotdog on it's antenna, and that's when diandra said, "we never think of wienerschnitzel when we are deciding where to eat!" "do you want wienerschnitzel?" i asked her. "yes, i think i do!" she said.

well, this was just great! there we were, boxed in at the drive through at el pollo loco, and neither of us wanted to eat there! i thought we might just refuse to order and then drive right on out the other side, but that seemed sort of rude. and yet, neither of us wanted their food!! so when it was my turn to order, i found myself ordering a diet coke. and that is all.

we drove back past our house to wienerschnitzel. i thought. until diandra said, "where are you going?!?!?" "to wienerschitzel! isn't that where you wanted to go?" "yes," she said, "but you are going the wrong way!!" "no i'm not! it is just up here a little further, by the gas station." "NO," she said, "it is over by target!"

ok, there is a wienerschnitzel over by target, but i had forgotten about that one. and now we were almost to the other one. but the one by target is closer to jack in the box, so we ended up turning around and going back, again, the way we had just come...

you would think gas didn't cost almost $4.50...

there was some discussion as to how we were going to get to that wienerschnitzel, but after a couple of nearly wrong turns we found ourselves in the drive-thru lane.

i've only eaten at wienerschnitzel a couple of times. i mean, i can make a chili dog at home! i don't need to go out for that. but by now we had been gone for over half an hour, and i was getting hungry! so i just decided to get my food from wienerschnitzel and save jack in the box for another day.

as diandra pulled out her debit card, she said, "you are a cheap date." i took this to mean that it wasn't expensive to feed me. "well," i said, "cheap dates get asked out again." this is my way of thinking--i would rather eat at jack in the box (or wienerschnitzel or el pollo loco or even mcdonald's) several times than at a really swanky restaurant once. so i guess i am a cheap date.

not that i don't like to eat at nice restaurants, but it is a lot of money to spend if it turns out you don't like it...

or if a whole basketball team shows up to try to ruin your mother's day lunch!!

an uninvited "guest"

2011-05-06T23:40:00.000-07:00

so today . . . the cock roach is dead. rollie must be home.

rollie left on tuesday for kansas city. he had to attend some meetings with all the other new guys doing the same job he is doing, but in different parts of the country. now that he has actually been doing the job for three months, i guess it was finally time for some training...

and so, diandra and i were home alone.

i don't mind being home alone. i never really feel like i am alone anyway, because of our two pups. and this time i had the added advantage of having diandra living with us--which is a situation that i am not going to be able to enjoy much longer. because at the end of the summer her husband will come home from kuwait, and then i am pretty sure she isn't going to be living with me any more! so i was looking forward to having some fun with my daughter while rollie was gone...

...and then i heard the scream. "MOM!!!!! THERE'S A COCK ROACH IN MY ROOM!!!!!!!" (believe me, the uppercase letters and exclamation points are not an exaggeration!)

this is not the first time we have found a cock roach in her room. this is the second time. in a month.

the last time we found one, rollie was gone too. diandra saw it on her dresser, behind a box, among some envelopes. and that's when she screamed. i went running up to her room, but when she showed me where she had seen it, i did not know how we were going to trap it, because it wasn't on a flat surface. and those things are hard to trap even when they are on the floor! then i remembered how our preschool director had sprayed a spider with an aerosol substance to kill it, so i said to diandra, "go get some hairspray!" she looked at me like i had lost my mind! i explained what we were going to do with the hairspray, but she said, "what if it doesn't kill it--what if it just makes it mad!!" an interesting idea. i wasn't sure i wanted to deal with an angry cock roach. what would an angry cock roach do? it occurred to me that it might resort to flying to escape. i said to diandra, "ok, maybe we shouldn't do that. it might try to fly away." "IT MIGHT TRY TO FLY AWAY?!?!?! COCK ROACHES CAN FLY?!?!?!?"

oops. perhaps i should not have mentioned that to her, because this resulted in some hysterical crying. now she had one more thing to worry about. "GET IT, MOM, GET IT!!!" i was trying to get it. but i didn't want it to get me! and it was not cooperating!

i finally decided that we were going to have to get it off the dresser and out into the hall, where we could trap it, (because it didn't look like killing it was going to be an option for us if we couldn't hairspray it to death,) but we were going to have to accomplish this without losing visual contact--which is not that easy, when you remember that cock roaches prefer the dark and will just keep trying to move out of the light. and they are fast! i thought about it for a minute and formulated a plan.

"ok," i said, "here's what we are going to do. i am going to try to flick the cock roach off your dresser toward the door. hopefully he will ricochet off the door and out into the hallway. then hopefully i can get out there and trap him under the cup before he scuttles away." "BUT WHAT IF HE STARTS FLYING?!?!?!" she said. and then the hysterical crying began again.

this was not going well. i was not all that confident in my abilities, but somebody had to be brave here, and it was clearly not going to be diandra. it was time to be the mom! "diandra, get on the bed! you should be safe there!" the bed was behind me, the exact opposite direction i was hoping to fling the cock roach. she was not reassured. "BUT WHAT IF IT GETS ME?!?!?!?" she said. and so i said, "put that blanket over your head. then if it does fly, it can't get you." i said it couldn't get her, and technically it couldn't, but i'm telling you... if that thing flew into the blanket she now had over her head she would feel it, and i did not think there were enough sedatives in the world to calm her down if that happened!

i carefully positioned myself between diandra and the cock roach, and prepared to fling it against the door and into the hallway. i just prayed it wouldn't fly and land on me. because if that happened, i was pretty sure i would scream or faint or something, and if that happened, i would probably just die, because there was no way diandra was coming out from under that blanket to save me! she would probably run screaming from the room and leave me there, passed out, at the mercy of the giant cock roach...

the cock roach climbed up on an envelope. i lifted it, (the envelope, NOT the cock roach,) ready to fling, but it just sat there. so i slowly moved toward the hallway (yes, i had the heebie-jeebies--i could just feel it crawing on me...) and then it moved! i screamed and threw the envelope out into the hall. diandra screamed, and started crying again. i yelled at her, "GIVE ME THE CUP, GIVE ME THE CUP!" i was trying to maintain visual contact so that it wouldn't crawl under something and escape. she practically threw the cup at me, ran back into her bedroom, and closed the door--leaving me alone in the hallway with the cock roach...

clearly, we were not in this together. it was sink or swim. do or die. i was on my own...

i zeroed in on the cock roach. it attempted an escape--it headed for the bookcase and tried to crawl behind it. had it been successful, it would have evaded capture. but i did NOT want that thing loose in the house. if i didn't catch it, we were going to have to load up the dogs and head to the motel 6! so i kept pursuing it, until i finally managed to trap it under the cup.

and there it waited until rollie got home the next day.

which brings us to last tuesday night. again, rollie was out of town. and again, i heard the scream, "MOM!! THERE IS A COCK ROACH IN MY ROOM! AGAIN!! COME AND GET IT!!!" i grabbed the cock roach cup and headed up the stairs. diandra was on the bed crying. she was crying, because she had LOST visual contact and didn't know where the cock roach was.

i wanted to cry too. this was serious, people!! that thing could ambush us at any moment!!!

but i couldn't cry--i'm the mom. so i talked to her in soothing tones, moved her away from the danger zone, and started slowly moving things around, sort of hoping i would find it. (and sort of hoping i wouldn't! because if i found it, i was going to have to try to trap it again. but if i didn't find it, it would be loose in the house! talk about being between a rock and a hard place...) and then diandra screamed, "THERE IT IS!" which resulted in me screaming, "WHERE?!?!?!" as i jumped up onto the bed with her. ( which, let's be honest here, was not going to save either one of us. this was a cock roach, not a mouse. and as we both now knew, cock roaches can fly!!!) she pointed, "RIGHT THERE!!" i slammed the cup down over the cock roach. i didn't even think, or gauge distances, or take into account the size and position of it's ridiculously long and creepily roving antenne--i just slammed that cup down and trapped it. it started running around and around and around the inside perimeter of the cup. this creeped us both out, so we ran out of the room and closed the door.

and left the cock roach there for three days until rollie came home.

i sort of figured it might just suffocate before rollie got to it. but it didn't. those things are tough! diandra, of course, had to occasionally go back into her room to get stuff, but there was NO WAY she was going to sleep in there. the cock roach was trapped on her dresser, right next to her bed! she said that every time she went in there, it was trying to dig it's way out!! now i had a whole new nightmare to deal with... because not only can cock roaches fly, they apparently can also dig!

i'm not sure we are ever letting rollie go out of town again. ever.

my failed attempt at "teaching" humor...

2011-05-05T23:05:00.000-07:00

so today . . . it occurs to me that five year olds just can't tell jokes...

"if april showers are may flowers, then what is it?"

"pilgrims. AHAHAHAHAHA!"

yes, the "hilarity" continues. i heard various versions of that joke all. day. long. i kept trying to correct them, and they kept mangling it. and it didn't matter how they told it, they always ended it with a big, fake laugh. and then i heard more "jokes," all of which also ended with big fake laughs. apparently they think a joke is just a question with an answer that is totally unrelated and is followed by a big fake laugh. i think the laugh is to indicate that they have just told you a joke... you know, in case you can't tell by how funny it is. or isn't.

and then it happened. nicholas told a real joke. correctly.

"knock! knock!"

"who's there?"

"orange."

"orange who?"

you know how it goes. he continued.

"knock! knock!"

"who's there?"

"orange."

"orange who?"

the little girl he had chosen as the victim for his joke was confused, and starting to lose interest. i was pulling for him, and hoping he would see he was losing her and just jump to the punchline. but he is five. he doesn't know how to read those social cues and respond yet. and whoever had taught him the joke had probably said to use "orange" three times. so he did.

"knock! knock!"

"who's there?"

"orange."

"orange WHO?"

"JUST TELL HER THE PUNCHLINE," i was thinking!! "QUICKLY BEFORE SHE RUINS YOUR PERFECTLY RECITED JOKE!!!" he continued.

"knock! knock!"

"who's there?"

"banana."

wait a minute. that's not right. banana doesn't make any sense.

oh shoot. i am telling it wrong...

AHAHAHAHAHA!

(note: this is a true story. i did not realize i had messed up the joke until the end of the blog. i thought about going back to correct it, so that it would be told the way it actually happened, but i decided my mistake was funnier than the story i was trying to tell, so i left it. nicholas, however, did tell the joke correctly. sadly, the little girl did not "get" it. maybe that's why five year olds don't waste any brain cells trying to remember jokes correctly...)

the waiting game...

2011-05-03T23:35:00.000-07:00

so today . . . this is not going to be a funny blog--just warning you, so that you can go watch a sitcom if you need a good laugh today.

we are trying to buy a house. trying. we have looked at 19 houses and finally settled on the first house i saw. so we made an offer. and the owners made a counter offer. and we responded to their counter offer. and that is where the trouble began...

sadly, the people selling the house are getting divorced. sadly for them, and sadly for us. because, for them, coming to terms on the sale of this house is not just about selling a house--it's also about the end of a relationship. and sadly for us, because until we come to terms, we don't have a house.

we really like this house. it is spacious. it has had some pretty extensive updating--wood laminate floors, new windows, cherry kitchen cabinets, granite counter tops, and a huge covered area in the back yard. it has four bedrooms and three bathrooms, a living room and a family room. the location is good, and if they agree to our price, then it is also a good deal.

if they agree to our price...

because even though house prices are down, housing is still not what you could call "affordable" in southern california. the bank has agreed to loan us an adequate amount to purchase a home, but those funds are not unlimited. this house has been on the market for several months. they are anxious to sell it. i'm sure their realtor is anxious to sell it. we are anxious to buy it. we are their first serious offer. the wife has signed off on it, but the husband thinks they can get more money. and maybe they could, if they didn't need to sell it fairly quickly. but they do. they are out of resources. they are supporting separate households, as well as this house. they need to sell it.

and yet, the husband hangs on...

the wife has had enough. she wants to sell the house and be done with it. she is taking the husband to court to force him to agree to our offer. on friday, the realtors said if we could just wait a little bit, they thought it would all work out.

and so, we waited...

they went to court today, but the husband's attorney didn't show up. so they scheduled a second court appearance for next monday. in the mean time, the husband wants to send us another counter offer, but the wife won't sign. she doesn't want to play his games. she wants to sell the house and be done with it.

and so we wait some more...and hope that no one else makes a higher offer while we are waiting...

we said we were not going to fall in love with a house until the papers were signed. we said we could walk away if our offer wasn't accepted. we said when we found the right house, everything would work out.

and that was all true. at first...

but now we have been thinking about this house for a couple of weeks. as we were deciding if this was the house for us, i started mentally arranging my furniture in it, and choosing colors for the bedrooms, and thinking about what kind of plants i wanted to put in the backyard. i've driven past it after school and clocked how far it was to t.j. maxx (which, btw, is dangerously close...) and so now, it kind of feels like it is supposed to be our house. it feels like home.

but maybe it isn't...

maybe there is something we don't know about this house. maybe the plumbing is about to fall through the ceiling. or maybe the neighborhood is filled with obnoxious teenagers (i'm not saying all teenagers are obnoxious, but you know that some of them are. and what if they all live in this particular neighborhood. with their obnoxious parents. and their obnoxious cars. and their obnoxious pets... wait, i guess i'd better back off on the obnoxious pet part--we have two noisy dogs...) maybe when the big earthquake hits, the gigantic pine trees that the city so "graciously" planted in front of the house are going to fall over onto the house and destroy it. maybe there is a dead body buried under the deck...

i trust God, even when it comes to buying a house. i know He has a plan, i just don't always know what it is! but i trust Him. so i am trying to be patient and philosophical about it. i'm trying not to worry. i'm trying to pack up my emotions until monday. i'm trusting that if this is our house, He will protect it for us. i'm trusting that if this isn't our house, He will help me to let it go. i'm trusting that if someone else comes in with a higher offer, i can keep from second-guessing our decisions.

patience and trust. two virtues that are not natural to my personality.

yeah, i am not loving my life right now...

randomness

2011-05-02T23:56:00.000-07:00

so today . . . has been quite a day...

9:30 a.m.

it started at school when we were doing calendar time. the kids were sitting on the rug, and we were talking about going from april to may. the cutout that said "april" had raindrops on it, and the cutout that said "may" had daisies on it. so i decided it was time to teach my students a joke, a real joke. you know, the kind where the punchline is actually related to the rest of it!

first we talked about the saying "april showers bring may flowers." and then i said, "so, if april showers bring may flowers, what do mayflowers bring?" i knew they would probably not guess the correct answer, but their responses were so serious! i guess they thought we were doing science, because their answers ranged from more flowers to sunshine to bees. i finally said, "ok, but this is going to be a joke. so the answer is going to be funny." they were clearly lost. (i was just glad no one said "poop," because they seem to find that hilarious!) so i finally just told them the answer. and they just looked at me blankly. then i explained why it was funny. they still didn't laugh. i said, "it's a joke!" but apparently when you are six, it is not...

however, apparently when you are six, a lot of other stuff is--like "if you mix pink and red you get orange." and then, just in case i didn't "get" it, "that's a joke!" yes, they may not have understood the joke i tried to teach them, but they understood the part where you clarify at the end by saying, "it's a joke!" i'll bet i heard that phrase 85 times today--and it ALWAYS followed some random, nonsensical group of sentences. always.

10:45 a.m.

later in the morning, i had a few free minutes, so i decided to check my email. of course, my computer would not connect to the internet... but never fear! my iphone4 was near!! so i hit the email button, and it promptly informed me that my username or password were incorrect...

... oh yeah... probably because yesterday when i was trying to log in to hotmail on my new computer (which doesn't know any of my passwords yet!) i was desperate to get my email, so i reset my password. which meant now i couldn't access it on either my old netbook or my phone, unless i knew the new password. which, of course, i didn't. because when i was resetting the password, i told the new computer to remember it, not realizing that now my other electronics would be locked out...

ok, no problem. i would just wait until i got home to check my email. i need to get used to using the new computer anyway. (for some reason when i get new electronic equipment, it takes me a while to actually USE it. i get so impatient waiting for it to get here, and then when it finally arrives, i don't want to use it, for fear of messing it up.)

11:45 a.m.

there were birthday cupcakes in the kitchen. i knew this, because it was nicholas's birthday, and his mom told me she had brought two trays of cupcakes (that's 24 for those of you who never buy cupcakes.) we usually have our birthday parties in the afternoon after naptime, but i was thinking about what i was going to have for lunch, and wondering if maybe i should have a salad since birthday cupcakes were on the agenda. but you never know what the birthday cupcakes are going to be like. sometimes parents buy white cupcakes with white frosting, thinking it won't be quite so bad for the kids. i think, at least chocolate cupcakes have cocoa in them. which comes from a bean. which makes it a vegetable. but clearly many people do not share my view...

i decided that while i was on my break, i should check out the cupcake situation. so i went into the kitchen to see if we were going to have delicious chocolate cupcakes or icky white ones, only to find out that we might not have any cupcakes at all...

...because there had been a communication mix up, and the birthday cupcakes had already been mostly eaten by the classmates of nicholas's younger sister! there were only nine cupcakes left, and we have 14-16 children in the afternoon! thankfully the remaining cupcakes were chocolate, but there weren't enough! as we sorted out the incident, it quickly became clear that we needed more cupcakes. so during lunch, ms. amy went to the store... and she brought back RED VELVET CUPCAKES!!

(can i just say, i was pretty sure the kids were going to be eating the chocolate cupcakes, because i was pretty sure i was going to be eating a red velvet one!)

5:45 p.m.

after dinner i went to walmart to "pick up a few things." you know how that goes. mostly i needed toilet paper and small milk bones, but walmart was out of small milk bones. we need small milk bones at our house, because our dogs have trained me that if i am leaving to go anywhere, they get a milk bone...

it started out as sort of comfort food when they were left home alone--whoever was the last one out of the house would give them each a milk bone. but it seemed as though i was almost always the last one out of the house (i'm sure this has nothing to do with the fact that i am almost always running late!) so usually i was the one handing out the treat. and now things have evolved... now, rollie and diandra can both be home, but if i head toward the garage door, i will find at least one pup standing there, wagging their tail, looking up at me with big bright eyes, just hoping for a treat.

i cannot resist. i'm sure that is why they do it!

and so, we go through a lot of milk bones. but today i had to settle for liver snaps. the dogs will probably be thrilled!

6:30 p.m.

i got this text: "are you ever coming home?" i got this text from diandra just as i was pulling into the driveway, so i didn't bother to respond. i had told her i wouldn't be coming straight home from work today, but she had forgotten. we talked for a few minutes and then i changed my clothes--into my flannel pajama pants...

my flannel pajama pants are a leftover from a christmas present 5 or 6 years ago. they are navy blue with dogs wearing santa hats all over them. and they are a men's size large. i wear them at home sometimes because they are soooo comfortable, but only my family gets the dubious "pleasure" of seeing them. they are perfect for an evening of sitting on the couch and working on computer stuff. which is what i was doing when diandra said she didn't feel so good, but she thought a soda might help...

well, that's just great, but we didn't have any soda, because i still am trying to drink less of it by not keeping it in the house! she thought maybe we could go to 7-11, but in case you didn't know it, 7-11 does not have drive thru window, and i had just put on my flannel pajama pants! i thought that maybe if i ignored her, she would forget about it. but she didn't.

"so, when are we going," she said.

"i don't want to go," i replied. " i don't want to put on pants." she just looked at me.

"how about this," i said, "you can go in, and i'll drive the getaway car."

"are you suggesting we rob the 7-11," she asked?

"no," i said, "i don't think i drive well enough--we would get caught."

we went to 7-11. i waited in the car while diandra went in. she came out and got back into the car, and i was going to show her how i could drive a getaway car (you know, just in case she ever needed me to,) but i was thwarted by traffic--i couldn't even get out of the parking lot!

i suddenly realized that i didn't feel all that great either. i said, "i have a headache. it's all the pressure of driving the getaway car."

diandra said, "you're going 30 miles an hour!!"

"hey!" i said, "i am not! i'm going 38!" and then my precious darling daughter, the one who i was driving around with $4.29 gas in my tank said, "you're the worst getaway car driver ever."

i thought maybe she was still fixated on my speed. "well," i said, "we could put the top down--then it would feel like we were going faster! and anyway, i can't be the worst getaway car driver ever, because i've never been caught!"

"NO ONE IS CHASING US!!!" she said. technically true, but still...

8:00 p.m.

when we got home, i finally got settled in with my computer. it was time to check my email. i went to hotmail... and it asked me for my password... the password i just changed yesterday... that i can't remember... (yeah, i guess i didn't tell the new computer to remember it either.) so i look at my options, and the first one offers to email me my password.

who writes these things!?!?! how am i going to get an email with my password in it, when i can't check my email, because i don't know my password!!! i am ranting about this to diandra, when she says, "don't you have another email address?"

oh. i didn't think of that...

but it doesn't matter anyway, because my other electronics don't know it, so i need to reset it anyway. i click the "reset password" button, answer the security question (which thankfully i CAN remember the answer to,) and proceed to try to think of yet another password...

and btw, if i can reset the password by answering the security question, why can't they just tell me the password if i answer the security question correctly?? what's the difference?!?!?

11:51 p.m.

my headache is worse. i still don't have a house (oh, you don't even want to know what is happening there--although, as i am sure i will eventually blog it, you will eventually find out...) it is going to be HOT tomorrow. and the next day. and i still have seven weeks of school left. and i still can't get into my email...

but the good news is, if any of you need a getaway car driver, i might be available. i might even put the top down...

a rude awakening!

2011-04-28T23:30:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i had a near death experience. in the shower.

when i get up in the morning, i am not really alert. my eyes are open, but they don't really see anything. my brain struggles to begin conscious thought. really, i am on autopilot until about 10:00. so i am not always aware of the details of my surroundings...

this morning i felt my way along the wall until i reached the shower. i turned the water on, and continued sleeping. i opened my eyes briefly so i could find the shampoo, and then closed them again--because really, i can't see my hair while i'm shampooing it anyway...

near the end of my shower, i finally opened my eyes all the way. and then i saw it--a big, fat, hairy (well, i couldn't actually SEE that it was hairy, because i wasn't wearing my glasses and my eyes were five feet away, but i know it was hairy!!) SPIDER!!! IN THE SHOWER!!! WITH ME!!!!!!!

let me just say, if i was diandra, shrieking, screaming, crying, and panicking would have ensued. we would have all gone running, thinking she was fighting off a knife-wielding psychopath instead of a spider. she would not have been able to get out of that shower fast enough!! i, however, kept my cool. mostly...

i am not so much afraid of spiders, as i am creeped out by them. i am capable of grabbing a tissue and eliminating any feckless spiders that happen across my path, but that doesn't mean i want to be surprised by one. i don't want my bare foot to find one in my shoe. i don't want one to drop on my head and crawl down my arm. and i certainly don't want to take a shower with one!

my poor sleeping brain wasn't quite sure what to do. my first thought was to drown it. i was in the shower, after all--there was plenty of water. but i was kind of afraid that if i moved the stream of water to kill the spider, it might flee from the water--toward me! i couldn't squish it with a tissue, because a) there were no tissues within reach, and b) a tissue would just disintegrate in the shower and then i would be HOLDING a spider! i couldn't yell for help, because i was alone. in the house. with a spider. IN MY SHOWER!!!

i decided that perhaps my best course of action was to get out of the shower. and fast. so i turned off the water, grabbed my towel and started to dry off. in the shower.

yes, i dry off in the shower--i have to. our shower is right inside the bathroom door, so if i step out onto the bathmat without drying off first, then the bathmat is wet! and then every time i go in or out of the bathroom, in my bare or stockinged feet, my feet get wet. and i hate having wet feet! (technically, we probably don't even need a bath mat since we can't step on it with our wet feet, but i just think we should have one. at least it feels nice on my feet before i step into the shower.) so yes, there i was, drying off in the shower, with one eye on that spider.

actually, both eyes were on the spider. i just knew that once the water was off, he was going to start running laps around the shower floor, and then he would eventually get dizzy and stagger into the center of the shower WHERE MY FEET WERE!!! sure enough, he started moving clockwise. he got to the side where the door was (i don't know how he knew that was where the door was... do spiders even know what a door is?!?!?) and started to climb up the side toward freedom. i thought this was an excellent idea! but he couldn't seem to get out!! he would crawl a little way up and then slide down, crawl up a bit and then slide down. clearly he was not getting anywhere...

and then he turned around and headed straight. for. me!

by now i was almost dry--everything except my feet and my dripping hair! i backed into the corner of the shower, drying off one foot. he kept coming. the foot that was still on the shower floor started tingling. i just knew he was going to be on my foot in seconds! i slid my foot as far away as i could get and started angling toward the door...

and then he crawled down the drain.

DOWN THE DRAIN!! OF HIS OWN FREE WILL!!! didn't he know that there was water down there? didn't he know that spiders can't swim? didn't he know that soon rollie would be getting in the shower and he would be toast???

i don't know. maybe the spider was not a morning person either and was running on auto pilot like i had been. (you notice i say "had been," because now i was thoroughly and completely awake!!) or maybe he had just had enough! maybe he was tired of living in fear of diandra's screams and my looming tissues... maybe we had annihilated all the other spiders in our house, and he could see the handwriting on the wall...

either way, apparently i was not in the shower with a knife-wielding psychopath... just with a suicidal spider...

the siren song of costco...

2011-04-26T22:30:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i went to costco. it was time. we were out of almonds.

going to the grocery store is not my favorite thing to do. it ranks right up there with cleaning the shower or going to the dentist. but sometimes i have to go. we need food that i can only get at costco--like two pound bags of almonds or five dozen eggs or a giant bag of kettle corn (which, btw, is only 150 calories per serving. and guess what? a serving is 2 1/2 cups!!! this is new knowledge that i gained while shopping at costco today! now the big bag of kettle corn is on my 'must have it' list.)

i had put off going to costco as long as i could. but this morning we were totally out of almonds, which is 1/3 of rollie's breakfast. thankfully, i had a small bag of trail mix (no almonds, but it did have peanuts and raisins, and bonus m&ms,) so i left that out for him--you know, because it's sort of my responsibility to make sure we have cheese and eggs and nuts at all times, and i didn't make it to the store yesterday. so i knew i had to go today.

when i left school and headed for costco, i realized that i was going to drive right past the house we are hoping to buy--well, not right past, but really close to it--so i decided to make a short detour and just drive by again...

i didn't have the address, but i've been there twice. how hard could it be to find it? it is in a housing development, surrounded by a cement block wall, with only one entrance. i figured if i got in, i would eventually find it.

eventually turned out to be right! i made it to the street that the house is on with no problems. and then i turned the wrong way. i went left when i should have gone right. this was not good, not good at all. i had no idea there could be so many dead ends and cul-de-sacs in such a small area! it seemed like no matter where i went, i had to turn around and go back! i kept thinking that if i just went a little further, i could get out. i was wrong.

i finally got turned around the right way and found the house... and a whole street lined with giant pine trees!

how could i have missed that before?!? our possible new house is on a street lined with pine trees! i am not a fan of pine trees, unless i am in oregon. that is where pine trees belong! they look normal up there! in southern california, they look like they are lost, like somehow they were on their way north when they just got too tired to continue, and so they put their roots down here. i don't like it. it isn't a deal breaker, but i don't like it.

eventually i found my way out of the housing development, and continued on to costco. i was just there to get the staples of our diet--lettuce, broccoli, cheese, bananas, dried mangoes, almonds and pecans, eggs, and wheat thins. (ok, we eat other stuff too, but this is what i get at costco.) i walked in, flipped my card at the entrance guard, and stopped.

i was in big trouble.

let's just say that if you are in the process of buying a new home, you should probably stay out of costco unless you have a credit card with a zero balance.

before i even got to the first aisle, i saw a commercial grade garden hose, water resistant throw pillows (for that outdoor furniture i will one day have,) and refrigerators (because we might have to buy one.) and then it occurred to me that costco might be a good place to get a whole bunch of stuff we will need when we move into a new house.

but not today. today i did not have an empty credit card with me. today i do not yet have a new house. today the house i am living in does not have room for anything else! so today was not the day to stock up on new house stuff.

i turned my cart toward the lettuce, moving quickly past all the shiny kitchen gadgets. because even though i don't like to cook, i looooove shiny kitchen gadgets. if it plugs in and whirrs, i want it. i might never, ever use it, but i like having shiny kitchen gadgets in my kitchen. because you just never know when i might be inspired to prepare something... i got the lettuce and turned toward the cheese. but to get to the cheese, i had to go through the bakery...

ah, the bakery... the bakery at costco is like the fourth level of hell. it lures and entices you with the delicious smells that are created when white sugar and flour are baked together. if they sold any of those baked good individually, i would be in deep and serious trouble! but since you have to buy them in great quantities, i can usually resist.

i got the cheese and then braved the cold of the giant cooler to add some eggs to my cart. while i was on my way to get wheat thins, i spied the outdoor furniture...

ok, we are going to need outdoor furniture. one of the things we like about the new house is the back yard. it isn't great yet, but we have plans for it. big plans. and i am pretty sure that at some point outdoor furniture is going to be a part of those plans. so it is good to know what the options are...

i sat in chairs. i sat on loveseats. i sat at tables and pretended i was having 'breakfast out on the terrace.'

i moved on to the nuts. i finished my shopping and headed home. i did not go past the new house again.

i don't know if we are going to get this house. they've asked for another day to think about it. they may reject our offer, and i don't want to get too attached until i see if it is going to be ours. but if it is, i see more than one trip to costco in our future. because costco pretty much seems to have everything a new house needs...

...except the kitchen sink. thankfully, we won't need a kitchen sink!

did we just make a decision?!?

2011-04-25T23:31:00.000-07:00

so today . . . we made an offer on a house. i feel a little sick.

i don't know whether to be excited that we might get the house or scared that we might get the house. so i seem to have compromised by feeling a little nauseated...

after my first big day of house hunting by myself, i dragged rollie out to dinner and told him every little detail of every house i had seen--even the ones i didn't like! and i showed him the photos i had taken. and then i made him drive by the teeny tiny house, because it happened to be really, really close to rubio's (which you would think would be a selling point.) i'm sure he was exhausted, and he hadn't even looked at any actual houses!

and then last wednesday afternoon, our realtor called and said she had found the PERFECT HOUSE, but it had just come on the market and we needed to see it IMMEDIATELY or it might be gone!! well. the perfect house. ok, then. rollie was available, so we piled into jill's car (jill is our exceptional realtor,) and headed out...

as we drove, i read the listing sheet--out loud, for everyone's benefit! it sounded nearly perfect. we walked in, and i immediately fell in love. it was beautiful! it had been totally remodeled--tile and wood flooring, crown molding, new kitchen cabinets and appliances, new windows, and NEW BATHROOM FIXTURES (i cannot tell you how many icky showers i have looked at!) the closets were small, but it was all one level--there is only so much room in a one story home!

and then we went into the back yard...

a nice back yard is important to us. we have beautiful weather here most of the year, so we want to be able to hang out in our back yard. BUT i don't want to be surrounded by two story homes overlooking our space, and i don't want the house behind me to be right next to my fence! this is not so easy to find. i keep saying to jill, "we need a back yard that is quiet, relaxing, private..." yeah, in l.a. fortunately, in addition to all the other wonderfulness in this house, the back yard was private, because there was no one living behind it. unfortunately, there was a school behind it.

ok, maybe for most people that wouldn't be such a big deal. but we have these two dogs... and they like to bark... sometimes i even think they just pretend they hear something outside so that they can race out the doggie door and bark their little furry heads off! so living right next to a school yard was probably not going to work for us, because there would be kids there. and our dogs would bark at the kids. and the neighbors would call animal control. and then there would be a big neighborhood controversy--people would choose up sides. it might get ugly.

yeah, as beautiful as it was, this was probably not the house for us.

but all was not lost. jill said there was another house with the same floor plan, in a different neighborhood that was also available. we went to look at it, and it wasn't bad--at least there was no school behind it--but after looking at the completely remodeled house, it was just not very appealing to see dated kitchen cabinets and wall to wall carpeting and icky bathrooms...

i was starting to feel like we might never find anything.

and then i talked to a friend of mine who said they had looked at 32 houses before they bought one! ok, so maybe it was unrealistic to expect to find a house so quickly. maybe this was like house hunter's initiation. "don't get discouraged," she said, "keep looking. you will find the house that is right for you. just keep looking." and so, we did.

we arranged to meet jill on saturday to see another batch of houses. this time, rollie was able to come.

seeing houses with rollie was a different experience. it was kind of like when we went house hunting on his ipad. i tended to move quickly, get a feel for the house, and move on. rollie was much, much slower. he looked at details. he asked questions. he talked to the people who were currently living in the houses! let's just say, it took us about an hour longer to see fewer houses than when jill and i went alone.

BUT the first house we took him to see was the first house i had seen on my first day of house hunting. and he loved it! i had been talking about it, because as we looked at other houses, i just kept coming back to that one. it isn't perfect--it only has a two car garage, the laundry facilities are in the two car garage, and there is no pool. (ok, the pool was kind of a long shot anyway, but this is california! i feel as though i should have a pool!!) and so we continued on to look at more houses. but at the end of the day, we both thought maybe the first house we saw was the house we should get. so today we made an offer.and now all we can do is wait. and then wait some more. i can't get excited, because if we don't get the house, i don't want to be disappointed. i'm not even absolutely 100% sure that this is the house we should get, because you never know... there might be a better house out there somewhere. but i am 100% sure that if we don't get this house, i will be disappointed--at least until we find a better house. but what if we don't find a better house? what if we end up paying just as much money for a smaller house? or a house with loud neighbors? or what if we get this house and it has loud neighbors? or dogs that engage in barking contests with our dogs?

WHAT THE HECK ARE WE DOING?!?!?!?!?!

...sigh. it's ok. really it is. i am not stressed. i am not worried. either we will get this house or we won't. it will be fine. really. it will be fine.

but just in case, i have located our tent...

if only i didn't need a paycheck...

2011-04-19T23:15:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i am thinking about quitting my job and becoming diandra's photography assistant.

diandra had a big photo shoot today. it was a styled shoot, and as she was telling me about all the vendors involved, i asked her how many photographers would be there, and she said... just one. it sounded like a very complicated shoot, and it soon became clear that it would be good if she had some help. so i sent some text messages and talked to some people, and was able to take the afternoon off work and rearrange an appointment so that i could go with her.

i dashed home at noon, changed my clothes, grabbed an extra sweater and a coat (because we were going to be at the beach and it was cool today,) and we headed south to san clemente.

it was a beautiful day! we were right by the beach, but we spent most of the day at the venue, which was beautiful!! it was an old casino, built in 1937, that had gone through several transformations during the last century. in world war 2 it was a naval lookout station, it was a moose lodge for a while, and was also used as an entertainment venue. it has recently been remodeled to host weddings and events, and it was a gorgeous place! there are beautiful outdoor areas with fireplaces and native vegetation, a ballroom with a domed lighted ceiling, terracotta tiled floors in the large meeting rooms, and details, details, details. it was so unique, it made me want to plan a huge party! i'm sure all five of my friends would come ;-)

we met the other people who were going to be involved today, and then diandra started shooting details. i babysat her lenses, held the diffusion shield, kept track of what the client wanted, moved stuff around and put it back, and generally did what i could to help diandra so that she could focus on getting the shots she wanted. and i loved every minute of it!

and then she asked me for her wide angle lens...

uh oh. i looked into her shoot sac. i saw four lenses. apparently one of them was a wide angle lens, but i had no idea which one. i surreptitiously took one out and looked at it. nope, it didn't say "wide angle" anywhere. i checked the next one. it said 50mm. hmmm, it didn't say wide angle either. i picked up another one. still no words, just numbers, numbers, numbers. after checking the last lens, i knew i was in trouble. i did not know which one was the wide angle lens. i didn't want to hand her the wrong one, and i was trying to act like i assisted her all the time, so i didn't really want to have to ask her. i quickly checked them all again, but it became clear that i was going to have to get some help. i walked over to diandra and quietly said, "um, it doesn't say wide angle on any of the lenses."

she is still laughing about it.

she explained the numbers to me, AGAIN, and soon i had it figured out. in fact, i learned a lot of things today, so i was thinking that maybe it was time for a top ten list...

TOP TEN THINGS I LEARNED ABOUT BEING A PHOTOGRAPHER'S ASSISTANT TODAY...

10. wait to take a bathroom break until the photographer is ready to take a bathroom break. it isn't good if the photographer is standing around, wasting their valuable time, because the assistant drank a huge diet soda on the way to the shoot and had to go use the facilities. even if your excuse was that you were scoping out locations...

9. don't drink more than the photographer. why? see #10...

8. remember where the shootsac is. the shootsac is the most valuable item at the shoot--except for the camera. it is filled with lenses, batteries, memory cards, business cards... in other words, it needs to be available to the photographer at all times. i tried to keep the shootsac with me, but sometimes i had to put it down to shade the details diandra was shooting. and then we would move on to something else. and then i would turn around to get a lens and the shootsac would be gone! and i would have to try to remember where i had left it and go get it. it seemed like no matter where we were, the shootsac would be hiding the lenses at the other side of the venue. i think the shootsac thinks i am after it's job! it's pretty smart, because i might be :-)

7. the food is just there to look beautiful. don't eat it--at least not until the photographer says she is done shooting it! a styled shoot is all about the photographs. sometimes that means the food isn't exactly real. but today, the food from sweet cream bakery in san clemente was real. and beautiful. and delicious. i know it was delicious, because after looking at it all afternoon, we finally got to eat it. i ate a red velvet cake pop. and then i ate another one. i was really, really glad that the food was real at this shoot! so was everyone else. everyone who was involved today was standing just out of camera range, waiting for diandra to say, "ok, i'm done shooting the desserts." those biblical locusts had nothing on us!!!

6. don't put a small point and shoot camera into the top of the shootsac. i was carrying so much stuff back and forth that it seemed like a good idea at the time, and maybe it was... right up until the moment that it fell out of the shootsac onto the ceramic tiles... which brings me to...

5. don't drop my camera. of course i had my camera with me! it was a day full of photo ops!! i looooove to take pictures of diandra taking pictures. but i had to squeeze that in between juggling her lenses and the diffusion shield and tweeting about how much fun i was having. i've dropped my camera before, and it has always survived, so i wasn't really worried. but then, the next photo i took looked like this:suddenly i was thinking maybe i should have stayed at work and earned my paycheck this afternoon, because it looked like i might be replacing a camera... thankfully it was just a lens cover malfunction. i fixed it, and then took some more pictures of diandra shooting pictures.4. keep extra ponytail bands in the shootsac. it was a bit windy yesterday, and we were outside most of the time. i spent a lot of time with my arms fully extended above my head holding a diffuser shade. which was fine, until the wind blew my hair across my face, and i couldn't breathe--or move to brush it away!! it was kind of like having a bug crawling up your arm or a tiny rock in your shoe. it drove me crazy!!! thankfully, diandra had an extra ponytail band in the shootsac...

3. know when to shut up. it isn't as easy as it sounds! when i look at pictures, i always see the messy background or the hair that is out of place. i see the scrap of paper that has blown under the adirondack chair, or the four yellow dandelions in the yard full of beautiful green grass, or the sprinkler head in the middle of the picture, and so i want to make sure they don't get in the shot. but i also don't want to break diandra's train of thought as she moves through her shoot. sometimes i see a shot from a different angle that i think would be a great picture, so i suggest it. but i also don't want to sound like i am trying to tell her what to do, so sometimes i don't. it is a fine line to walk...2. don't leave the lenses at the location. this seems somewhat unnecessary to say. and yet, i walked off to the car at the end of the day without the shootsac. thankfully i remembered before we got out of the parking lot.

and the number one thing i learned about being a photographer's assistant today...

1. if they borrow your diamond ring for the shoot, make sure to get it back! yeah, we were sitting in the car, ready to leave, when travis--the groom model--came running across the parking lot with my ring in his hand. several times during the day i had thought, "don't forget to get your ring... don't forget to get your ring..." but by the end of the day, it was dark and we were tired, and i just forgot... luckily we were working with honest people!

on the way home, i told diandra how much i had enjoyed the day. i even offered to quit my job if i could be her assistant. she said it had been a big help to have me there today, but that usually she didn't really need an assistant. i tried to convince her that she did! she told me that she probably couldn't match my paycheck. this is probably true... ...but my paycheck doesn't buy days spent in the sunshine watching my daughter do what she loves best, and getting to be a part of it!

snack attack!

2011-04-18T23:13:00.000-07:00

so today . . . i am in big trouble. today i discovered that one doesn't need ice cream in order to eat the toppings.

you know i try to eat healthy most of the time. you know this, because i go on and on and on about it... but lately i am having a hard time staying on the straight and narrow. lately i just want to live on crunchy cheetos and brownies and ice cream, with an occasional banana thrown in, you know, just so i can pretend that i still have some sort of moral compass.

to aid me in my quest for nutritious food choices, i do not buy unhealthy snack food at the grocery store. or costco. especially costco, because at costco you cannot buy just one small bag of some terrible snack food--you have to buy a huge bag. or two bags forever joined by shrink-wrapped cellophane. in fact, when we finished off our last 12 pack of pepsi one, i decided i would no longer buy it. if i didn't have it in the house, i figured, i wouldn't have any soda to drink, which would force me to drink something more healthful--like water. this seemed like a good idea. it was a good idea. except that i still have car keys and a vehicle with gas in the tank (although it cost me $42 to fill my teeny tiny tank today!) and a 7-11 just about a mile away... i think i have been at 7-11 almost every day since i decided not to buy any more pepsi one.

clearly my plan is not working...

it is really not working, because when i go to 7-11 for a diet lemon cokesi, i almost always buy a brownie. or two. or three. and a bag of crunchy cheetos. or two. it is becoming a problem. friday, when i made my daily run for a soda, i also put a brownie on the counter. "only one today?" said the lady manning the cash register. yeah, that store clerk has my number. i might, in fact, be slightly addicted to soda and brownies.

or maybe it is just the sugar. sometimes i just want something sweet. but since, as i said, i don't really keep sweet snacks in the house, this can be a problem.

i don't have any sugar in my kitchen. we exorcised our kitchen from the evils of sugar a few years ago. but there are days when i still go looking for it. there were no cookies in the cookie jar, no chocolate kisses in the candy dish, no cans of frosting in the cupboard, no chocolate chips in the freezer. and no ice cream.

i knew we didn't have any cookies or candy or frosting or chocolate or ice cream, and yet i went looking anyway. i needed some sugar and i didn't want to have to drive to get it, because i was already wearing my flannel pants (the ones that are about 10 sizes too big for me,) and it was dark outside. i was in for the night!

and then i found some butterscotch ice cream topping...

i knew we didn't have any ice cream. i knew, because i had already checked the freezer for any hidden deliciousness and found that there wasn't any. but that jar of butterscotch topping lured me in. i was standing there thinking about dipping a spoon in it, when i saw the nut container.

now we were getting somewhere...

i put some chopped nuts in a small bowl and drizzled the butterscotch topping over it. (ok, here's the truth. there was no drizzling happening. i added butterscotch topping by the spoonful! and then i added even more. those nuts were almost swimming in a pool of butterscotch!) and then i sort of mixed it all together. and it tasted pretty good! even without the ice cream.

i guess desperation is the mother of invention. i guess it isn't safe to keep butterscotch topping in the refrigerator anymore. i guess maybe i should go to bed earlier, before the munchies attack me.

i guess it isn't enough to expunge the sugar from the kitchen. i guess i am also going to have to exercise a bit of self-control.

sigh. i am doomed.