What's worse than a wet dog? A longhaired cat soaked to the bone that wants to cuddle.

My head is splitting. Dd pushed me over the edge yesterday and my head started to pound. I took a bunch of ibuprofen but it didn't touch the pain. Since dh is doing the BOE (Board of Equalization: where homeowners bitch about their assessments and present their case to get it lowered and dh explains how he arrived at their assessment) thing this week I had to take dd to soccer practice. The last soccer practice of the season. All the parents who showed up were supposed to scrimmage against the kids. I declined. "The Crane"'s mama showed up late and I don't think she grasped the concept of the scrimmage. She jumped right in and promptly kicked my kid and knocked her down. Dd is 7. Dh was playing, too, and having a great time. Meanwhile, the mama's 4 yo dd decided to entertain me. I should have just left.

I took the long way home to clear my head and some punk ran a red light and nearly hit me. I slammed on the brakes and he drove away oblivious as hell. Not my day.

Woke up this morning with the same headache. I think dd must have sensed how close I was to the edge and decided to leave me alone. Dh must have read the riot act to her yesterday on the way home from practice because she didn't give me any grief at all this a.m. She even made her bed without being told. Not that my telling her to do something would mean it got done. Quite the contrary. Her friend Lauren is having a birthday party in a couple of weeks and dh must be dangling that over her head. I doubt she'll be attending. She won't be able to help herself. I doubt if she can maintain the whole day. I'm too much of a temptation for her.

What else? I'm on Vitamin D therapy and it's making me sick. I don't know if it has anything to do with my headaches or if the headaches are making me nauseated instead of the pills. I take one 50K iu pill a week.

I'm also on a diet. I had gotten down to 132 (with a target weight of 125) but since I started the diet I'm back up to 137. Go figure.

I haven't heard any peepers yet so I guess not. Three times thru glass according to some old wives.

Made a sponge cake this morning. Pineapple/orange. Not even a hint of carob. I'm sure dh will find something wrong with it anyway. He's good at that.

In the process of making bread sans bread machine. First time I ever used the dough hook on the KA. They sure got a workout today. I had both going on the sponge cake. I dragged out the kneading board that Dad made. I love that thing. It has a lip that grabs onto the edge of the table so when I knead the dough the board stays put.
I'm making English Muffins. first time. I'm quivering in anticipation.

I must have an ear or sinus infection again. My teeth are killing me and my ear is itching like crazy. Ibuprofen isn't touching the pain. It's going to make eating the english muffins interesting but I'm willing to grimace and bear it.

Little squirrel wasn't very enthusiastic with brekkie. He's sleeping now and I haven't heard a peep. It's about time to reheat the rice pack. I hope the little bugger pulls through. Nibble the cat climbed up the sweet gum tree to get a squirrel and ran across the nest and babies quite by accident. The mama squirrel tried her best to lure Nibble away but he wasn't playing. He raked the babies out sending them plummeting to the ground. He picked them up and carried them to the azalea clearing and munched down on one immediately. The other he decided to play with for a bit. He soon grew tired and walked away.
On the way to walking dd to the school bus I checked out the carnage and found the little baby still alive with relatively few injuries. I don't expect it to make it unfortunately. It's been eating the puppy formula I've mixed up but not with any great gusto. It's just so tiny. The eyes haven't opened yet and the ears are just starting to open. Baby is still hairless as well. I wish there was some way to get mama and baby back together.

You're gonna cringe when I say this but here goes: I've got 8 cats in the house right now. Yes, I said 8, E I G H T.

• Grendal
• Smudge
• Pip
• Toast
• Orville
• & Wilbur

They are the kittens that I picked up down the road on Halloween. There presence was enough to send Tootsie packing. She moved next door. The new neighbours had just moved in and they left the door open since it was such a nice day... to air the house out and all. Tootsie saw it as an invitation and moved on in. They found her asleep in their bed. That didn't last long and she soon became an "outdoor" cat. She would thumb her nose at us occasionally but keep her distance. Two nights ago it started to sleet and snow. It was really cold so she decided to grace us with her presence once more. It's still cold out. She's currently in the bedroom in her old bed and loving every minute of it.

Nibble doesn't want to sleep in the house that dh built for them either. He's asleep on the chair behind me. Nibble and Tootsie hate each other so they have to be kept separated. The kittens reside in the sunroom most of the time but are allowed to run rampant thru the house when the other cats are outside. They have to stay in the sunroom when Tootsie is visiting. They love Uncle Nibble and won't leave him alone to eat which pisses him off. Literally. He'll start marking his territory throughout the house if all the kittens are out. He tolerates Toast though. Which is good because Toast doesn't like to stay in the sunroom and will throw himself against the french doors repeatedly until I either spray him with water or let him out because he's becoming waterlogged.

And that's how it is at the House of Dander.

All of my plans for Christmas fell thru so I'm sitting home alone waiting for the turkey to cook. Dh and dd went off to spend the day with dh's extended family...an excrutiating event for me. Mom and Dad bailed on me this morning. Yesterday they said they were coming but then it started to rain so....
I baked two different batches of cookies for them and I'm sitting here listening to morose Christmas music and knocking them back one after another. So not what I had planned.

Thought I'd sneak in a coffee before my world is set askew. Dd gets home from school soon and it will be utter chaos here. It's not exactly quiet...the little rooster wants back in the house so bad. He and his brother keep crowing at each other. I had the gray rooster out for a bit. Long enough to clean his house and load him back in. Both feet are shot now and he tips over on his nose when he tries to stand. I don't know what to do with him. I'm going to see if the gang will let the black rooster shack up with them tonight. There really isn't room for both of them in the box now. He'll probably be scared but he'll get over it. I have a feeling I'll have to gurk his brother anyway. The quality of life for a paralyzed chicken probably isn't that great.

Not much else going on. Went to the annual Christmas White Elephant Soiree yesterday. ACK! No booze to be had. Of course, it was only noon. It really wasn't any fun. Dd didn't want to have anything to do with her cousins. I imagine they are still trying to get her to do things. Little bastards. FIL wasn't speaking to anyone. I made a point of walking up to him and speaking pleasantly even though I wanted to tell him to go fuck himself. Dh ignored him. It was so bad that FIL only hit the chow line once because we were sitting right next to it and dh was facing it. At least that's my take on it. FIL has NEVER stopped at one plate before now. All in all it was very uncomfortable. The white elephant gifts this year were crappy. They get cheaper and cheaper every year and now that the little kids are involved we can't "steal" gifts because the kids cry. Granddad "stole" a bag of candy that Matt opened and he started crying so Ann gave it back. Plus, the kids take so long that it really drags it out. My choice turned out to be a bottle of wine and I got to keep it. I thought it was one of the better gifts out there. At least it has a cork.
We gave a set of his and her's dress watches...with diamonds on the face. We've had them for ages and will never use them so we thought we'd class up the game. Scott and Missy brought something from their stash of wedding gifts. Scott proclaimed that they had a closet full of the stuff. You could tell Missy was embarrassed. She finally said that the things just weren't their style. Way to go there...every person in the room had gone to their wedding and given them a gift. Some people have no class whatsoever. She still won't speak to me unless I speak first. I guess I'm beneath her since her family is so fabulously wealthy.

Well, school's out. *sigh* Blessed calm, I'll see you tomorrow...

Some things go really well together. Some don't. Dh can eat a combo of anything. It doesn't matter to him. He'll eat spaghetti with a side of oatmeal. He doesn't care. For me, though, there has to be some semblance of aesthetics...visually as well as good taste. For instance, who is the genius behind peanut butter on celery? Dh could live off of it. It's totally illogical to me and not the least bit appetizing. However, he finds my habit of applesauce on french fries disgusting. That's nothing I just dreamed up on my own. People have been eating potato latkes with applesauce for ages.
Here in the south (aka Virginia) I've seen tons of people putting salt on their apples. All I can say is WTF? But those same people think that the Northern habit of eating sharp cheddar with a hot slice of apple pie is bizarre.
Back when I was still in highschool I was employed as the cook for a tiny tiny restaurant on highway 58. It was simply called THE Restaurant. The cook who trained me put bacon grease in everything. Her husband would come in everyday guzzling a mountain dew with peanuts in it. Twentysix years later and I still can't wrap my head around that one.
Mint flavoured ice cream is another one I don't get. Dh loves it. It tastes like toothpaste to me and mint toothpaste makes me gag. How in hell he can sit there and shovel down a heaping bowlful of that swill is beyond me. Meanwhile, common condiments give him the heebie-jeebies. Mayo is his cryptonite...or whatever was superman's achilles heel. I think I could even get him to puke just by talking about it. That will be an experiment for another time.

Just thought I'd list the schools I went to for future reference.

Kindergarten: Bethlehem Township Grade School (West Portal, NJ Lived in Hampton)
First: BTGS
Second: Must have started the beginning of the school year at BTGS.
Second: Harrison Valley Elementary School (Harrison Valley, PA Lived at the Graves house.) Started late.
Third: HVES (Lived in Ulysses, PA at the Tarbox farm.)
Fourth: HVES First part of year.
Fourth: Back to West Portal, NJ. Lived in house next to BTGS. Was bussed to different township school.
Fifth: Back to BTGS (NJ) for first part of school.
Fifth: Back to HVES (PA) for rest of school year. Ran away from home with Buddy Rhinehart on the last day of school because Mom & Dad told me we were moving again.
Sixth: Stuarts Draft Middle School. (Stuarts Draft, VA Lived on the dairy farm in Staunton, VA) Started school late.
Sixth: Last 6 weeks of school spent at Warren Hills Middle School, Washington, NJ.
Seventh: Riverhead Middle School Greenville, VA Back to the dairy. Started late.
Eighth: Riverhead High School, Greenville, VA
Ninth: Riverheads HS for the first part IIRC
Ninth: Kennard Dale High School, Fawn Grove, PA Lived in Stewartstown, PA
Tenth: KDHS first 6 weeks of school.
Tenth: Tunstall High School, Dry Fork, VA (Lived in Axton, VA)
Eleventh: THS
Twelfth: THS Graduated 1981. (Not since Kindergarten and 1st did I spend two whole years in one school.)

No wonder I have social issues. For a long time I couldn't remember where I was for most of 6th grade. I always thought I spent the last part of 5th at Stuarts Draft Middle School but I remember having Gus K. as my teacher in 5th in PA and also running away. So, it must have been 6th grade. But, why would we leave the dairy farm? I know Mom & Dad were off to Florida looking for property and that's why I was going to school in Jersey. That was a nightmare. Then we came back to the dairy farm and I started school on the hill. I was always getting beat up by those two boys and the teachers would let them. The teachers would always put us together for group projects and I'd get my assed kicked every time. That's about the same time that my brother went off the deep end and started trying to kill me at every opportunity. Those were some tough years.

Ahhh, the breakfast of champions. The coffee is Gevalia Costa Rican Peaberry or something like that. It's a light coffee and I now understand what they mean when they say it has "fruity" undertones. It's tasty but not robust enough for me. If I want wimpy coffee I'll go to Starbucks which always makes my stomach do a slow greasy roll about a half hour after drinking it.

Well, it's December 1st. Time to get all festive and shit. Dh put the lights on the tree. I got the antique ornaments out of the attic. Well, maybe not antique but they are at least 40 years old. I'll probably lose a few this year. Nibble was climbing in the tree the other night. This is his first Christmas with us. Should be interesting. Shopping for him will be easy...he likes brown paper bags and toilet paper tubes. Dh snuck another gift under the tree last night. I'm clueless as to what to get him. Maybe something manly from Lowes. I believe dd is covered. I bought some fleece yesterday to make her a robe and some flannel to make jammies. She wants a pink blanket for her bed, too. I may have to run back to Hancocks to pick something up while it's on sale. I need to go to the Tractor Supply Co. to pick up one of the horse collections. She's been eyeballing my Breyers models and we can't have that. Some of those molds were discontinued. I've had those horses for 30 years at least. It's amazing that they never got broken in all the countless moves that we made. (Note: I remember where I was for 6th grade now. It had to have been Stuarts Draft Middle School. I started 5th at BTGS in NJ. I ended 5th at Harrison Valley ES in PA. I started school late at Stuarts Draft Middle School in VA. I don't know how late or why but I broke my wrist the first day of school. The gym teacher called me a yankee bitch. I ended 6th grade at Warren Hills in NJ. That only lasted 6 weeks.

Damn, gotta go. Dh called and wants me to pick up gymboree stock for the ggo. I've slipped into 3rd place after having held 1st all year.

I changed the template on my blog tonight and noticed that you had left comments on some of my posts. They never showed up on the other template!!! Now I feel all warm and fuzzy because you commented.

Have you tried these things? They are addictive as hell. I love them. Dh beats my time consistently. I don't know how he does it. I've watched him and his logic is out there. I am the Queen of Logic and I can't wrap my head around it.

Soduko

The 5 star puzzles are wicked but doable. I've done one in under 30 minutes which is great for me. Dh did one in 17 IIRC. Bastard. I think it was in retaliation for my having beat him in upwords the other day. I did today's 3 star in 8:52. Not bad. I think that maybe the numbers are intimidating to me. I'm not a big math person. I'm grooving on the music, too. Very restful.

I've got it. Way too much to do and so very little time. I should be on the road right now but I feel like writing is important...more important...and I want to get something down before I go. Even if it's mindless blather for which I am so well known. Riiiight.

I spent a chunk of time this morning on the library site checking to see if they had any of the books that are listed for sale in the pinetree garden seed catalogue. I put a few on reserve. I also perused the mcCall's site and found a few patterns I want to pick up this week while they are only $1.00 each. Not that I'll ever do anything with them you understand. I have a whole collection of patterns that have never been cut and are either way outdated or dd has outgrown them long ago. I can't even give them away at MD. (Although I doubt that has anything to do with the patterns.)

I spent last night googling my ass off trying to find something to do with my IRL time. From ice skating a couple hours a week to a hiking group, yoga every day this week to a sewing class at Hancock's, quilting with the persian pickle girls to a once-a-month writing group at a tiny little bookstore in Chester. I had wanted to do some cycling at the AmFam today but they require a 48 hour sign up. Must be popular. Maybe they should think about expanding, eh?

I think maybe I should volunteer at the library at dd's school. I used to play librarian when I was a kid. I had a card catalogue of all my books and friends had to sign them out when they borrowed them. Yes, I was a geek back then, too. Not as bad as dh though, who keeps a list of books he's read so he won't make the mistake of rereading one. Can you imagine the chaos that would ensue if that were to happen???

Oops...sorry. Drifted off there for a bit with an old issue of Budget Living. April/May 2003. It's on my desk for some reason...maybe the fountain in the livestock watering tank article. Hmmmm, wonder if that would make a good goldfish pond if I slapped a liner in it? Eh, never happen. Dh is concerned because I hauled out the little chicken house for the roosters yesterday. It's sitting in front of the garage and he doesn't like the looks of it. Too bad. Reminds me: I need to get another clear vinyl shower curtain to use as a cover for the short run. It's working beautifully on the big chicken house run. The air is heated in the covered run and it enters the insulated box where it's trapped. Very snuggly in there. A nice place to curl up for a nap if it weren't for all the chicken shit. Tootsie doesn't seem to mind it in the nest box. Good to know the birds will be warm as long as the sun is out.

My head aches and I feel queasy. Dd didn't feel well this morning so she went back to bed. I checked up on her periodically and asked her if she felt like she had to throw up. She said no. Five minutes later, as dh and I were eating lunch, we heard an awful noise and then dd started crying and screaming. She had barfed all over herself and the bed. I still haven't finished the laundry from where she wet the bed on Wednesday. I'm having a hard time catching up. Everything got wet including the bedskirt. She's had a hard couple of days. Anyway, I got her in the bathtub and she puked several times during her bath and several times after. I made her some ginger twist tea hoping it would settle her stomach but she puked several times after that, too. I fixed her up a bed on the floor and plugged in her Barbie movies and she settled down and went to sleep. She had applesauce for supper and managed to keep it down so far. My poor baby is so listless and pale.
My head has been pounding for a couple of hours now. Dh whipped through the 5star sudoku in 17:22. I did it under 30 minutes the first time but can't seem to wrap my head around it again. I just can't concentrate. I did give him a sound thrashing in upwords though.
Bleh... I can't even concentrate on this.
Nibble got in another fight this afternoon. I went down the street calling for him and some guy came running up asking if I found a cat. I told him I heard a couple fighting. He said some white cat was tangling with his cat all the time. I told him the white cat was mine. I mentioned that Nibble was always coming home bloodied up and the guy said he was glad that he got as good as he gave because his cat had received a fairly deep gash. Then he said "That is not going to be allowed to continue." WTF??? What does he intend on doing about it? I've had to take my cat to the vet already from fighting with his cat. It comes up into our yard and spends so much time next door with Charlie that I thought it was one of his cats. The guy made it sound as if it was all Nibble's doing. Nibble was trying to get away from his cat. Whatever. I guess we all feel a little punchy in this house today.

I spent yesterday on my dead ass. I hardly did anything at all. I may have been retaliating against dh's bonehead argument but I think in reality I was just being lazy. So, I surfed the web for hours. I was looking for something...anything...that would give me the answers I need. I found a great site:
43 things

and spent a large chunk of time looking at all the things other people were wanting to do but not actually doing. Kind of depressing but also kind of liberating to know that I'm not the only one unfulfilled in my life. So I started my list but only made it to 10 so far. I'll try to link it here later when I can concentrate. Right now I'm thinking about too many things.

I also checked out myspace.com and several blogs and saw all the wonderfully creative ideas people put into them and remembered that I used to be creative...once upon a time. The rut that I've gotten myself into has extremely steep sides and I'm having trouble crawling out. Hell, I can't even see over the edge some days. Maybe if I started digging I'd come out the other side.
I used to think that if I did enough different things in my life I would have something in common with more people and that I'd have more friends. Like, I'd be able to talk to someone about the view from the Eiffel Tower or the taste of real italian Pizza straight from the oven in Firenze. Or, watching the sun rise over the Blue Ridge Parkway burning off the mist as it climbs higher. Or, what a dolphin's skin feels like. Or, what it's like watching a calf being born. Or, how to incubate eggs. Or, what it felt like to be at Stonehenge. I've had a wild ride to say the least. So many memories to share...
But it didn't work out that way.

Boy, was I put in my place this evening. This is the weekend and as every weekend since we moved up here dh puttered around and did his thing...fixing this, tweaking that, but not exerting himself in any way. I was doing laundry, washing dishes, cleaning the floors, making the beds, cleaning the mirrors, dusting, etc. The same normal freaking menial labour that I do every day of my life.
Dh took dd out to do his errands this morning. He left around 10:45. I couldn't go with them. He said he was going to do his Christmas shopping. Plus, he was going to go to Lowe's and then the grocery store. Target was his destination. He was back home at precisely 12:00. With the Sunday traffic I imagine he spent 15 minutes per store to get his shopping done.

Anyway, back to my ego...
At 3:00 it's happy time. He parks his ass in the beach chair and pops the top on a cold one. He urged me to join him so I got a cup of coffee and headed out. We waited until the sun dipped behind the trees and the temperature dropped. We go inside, play a game of cards and complete a geography quiz in the paper. At that point he packs everything up and begins his evening personal chores. I go outside to fill the chicken's food pan, make sure they have water and shut them up for the night. Then I have to get the two chicks into their pen and bring it in the house. Then I have to break down their daytime camp, get them scratch and water and set them up for the night. Then I have to sweep the library floor since dh did the bulk of his puttering in there today. I have to bring in any plants I have outside since it'll freeze tonight. Then I have to get dd's backpack loaded for school tomorrow. Meanwhile, dh is out of the shower and he draws dd's bath for her. I unload the dryer and fold the clothes. Then I get dd's jammies ready for her.
Time to cook supper. I had thawed out a lb. of sausage. I had planned on cooking up some angel hair pasta but the pan and the strainer needed to be washed. Dh was now ensconced in the lazyboy recliner, the remote in one hand searching for sports of any kind and his crossword puzzle in the other.
"Hey 'dh', could you help me?" I needed to chop up some peppers and onions. Since he didn't put in 8 hours at the office I felt it was fair that he help make dinner. "Can you wash the spaghetti pot and strainer for me?"
"Don't you have another pot?" he asks.
"No, I always use that pan."
Blah blah blah. So then he decides that there are enough leftovers in the fridge that I don't have to cook except maybe a little something for myself. Somehow the argument turns really bad. He suggests that I don't like to cook, that he's never asked me to cook, and won't ever ask me to help him because he knows I don't want to. I guess that means I shouldn't have asked him to help me.
So he paints me as a lazy shiftless bitch. I shouldn't have asked him to wash a damn pot because he wouldn't ask me to do it. Logical.
I got a cup of tea and sat down at the computer. Suddenly he wants me to cook the spaghetti. He offers to wash the pot. "It's too late now. You said I didn't have to cook." Dd calls from the bathroom for her daddy. I fight the urge to go check on her. Finally dh asks me what she wants. "I don't know. She's calling for you." He checks on her and then tells me she just asked him a question and I should have gone and answered it for her. "She wasn't calling for me." I replied. Dd calls me to help her dry her hair and I fix her up while dh is getting their supper ready. I take my shower right after. When I get out dh has washed all the dishes. He apologizes.
It still stings tho. I told him it wasn't fair that he gets to quit at 5 everyday (3 on the weekends) and I never get to. Not until after he's fallen asleep in front of the tv. Some nights I'm still tending to laundry at midnight. He said that I was sitting down at 3 also. "But," I said, "I have to go back to work. You never do." If I got a job outside the home I'd still be working when I got home.

No, not really. Very pleasant day today...weatherwise. The little chickens enjoyed their time outside in their playpen. Dh fixed the 14' shelf in the library today. It pisses me off so bad to have to go behind a so-called professional and redo the work that we paid them to do. The interior work was done by the second contractor who dared us to sue him as he walked off the job. Never again. We have a fantastic plumber but all the rest of the "contractors" are worthless.

I did a load of laundry and baked two banana breads. Tried to "health" it up a bit. Cut the oil in half and used applesauce for part. Also sprinkled toasted wheat germ on the top of the loaves as they were baking. Very tasty but the loaves cracked very badly this time around. I had intended on making some cookies as well but I really can't get anything done when both dh and dd are home. They both require so much attention and a ton of validation. In fact, dh is sulking right now because I raised my tone of voice to him earlier and that apparently hurt his feelings. We had a conversation just yesterday about how overly sensitive he is and how I'm not allowed to express my feelings if they happen to be negative in fear of hurting his feelings. I dare not criticize nor raise my voice or else dh will give me the cold shoulder until he can talk himself thru it and then lecture me about it. It's a real pita. My feelings don't account for shit in this house.
What was the argument about you ask? We had pasta for supper. There were some ravioli leftover from a couple of days ago. Dh asked me if I wanted a couple with my other pasta. I said, "yes". I'm busy getting dd's plate ready the way she likes it so I don't have world war 3 on my hands.
Dh asks, "do you want a couple of these ravioli?"
"I said yes!" Well, apparently it was a tad snippy. I didn't think so but I do so hate for someone to re-ask a question because they didn't bother listening to the answer the first time around.
"It was just a question. You don't need to snap at me," dh said, looking like I just killed his dog.
And so on and so on ad nauseum.

Sometimes I just want to run away from home.

Oh hell, just read the last entry again. Nothing different. Mom sent me an email to tell me what she had for breakfast. A bagel. I was riveted.
I put flannel on the beds today and washed a load of clothes. I decided to hang all of dd's clothes so she could pick out her own outfit without pulling everything out of the dresser and leaving it piled on the floor. Got a note from the teacher today. It seems dd was VERY moody today and barely escaped a yellow light. Tell me something I don't know lady. When is she not moody? That's what I'd like to know. This kid isn't even 6 yo and she's got a huge chip on her shoulder already. I can't wait for her teen years. I didn't even get a kiss goodnight. She's probably pissed because I cleaned her room today. I really cleaned it, too. On Monday, while she's in school, it's going to get even cleaner. ;o|

Forgot to mention that I got my first seed catalogue of the season a couple of days ago. Once upon a time they would at least wait until January to send them out. It's like Christmas trees. Back in the day you wouldn't see Christmas tree lots until December but I saw a fully loaded tree back in the beginning of October. And there were a bunch of cut trees outside the Food Lion today. Have people become desperate for the Christmas feeling? Last year I can't recall seeing and/or hearing a single bell ringer. They used to be all over the place...annoying actually. Maybe they're all rung out.

Something weird did happen today. I was choking. Badly. I couldn't breathe. I was gagging. Tears were pouring down my face. Fairly typical with this cold I've had. After I get rid of all this snot and mucous I swear I'll be wearing a size 5. Anyway, as I was struggling, dh kept telling me to drink some water. I knew that wasn't going to help. I had to clear the passage and water wasn't going to do it. And suddenly my grandmother's face flashed into my mind and I remembered her saying to eat a chunk of bread with butter on it. So I did. And I could breathe again. The bread was like a plunger pushing all that crap out of the way. Worked like a charm. I miss that old woman. She died in 1981.

It's cold in this house. It's going to dip down into the 20s tonight. I need to bring the Christmas tree in so it doesn't get zapped. That's a 2-person job tho. I need to go dig out the birdbath heater but first I need to replace the damned birdbath. I've been looking for a couple of months now fruitlessly. I don't want to pay $50-$100 for a freestanding birdbath when I have a perfectly good pedestal already. I'll probably end up fabricating it out of some piece of crap I've got laying out in the barn/garage. It won't be pretty but it will be functional which is the important thing.
I wrapped the chicken "run" in clear vinyl and closed the end off with a piece of rigid insulation (blueboard) and it's rather nice and toasty in there when the sun is out. I don't know what to do with the two chicks. They're not old enough to be added to the flock yet and they haven't sufficient feathers yet to withstand next week's hard freezes. They didn't go out yesterday because of the threat of violent weather. Today may be their last day out for some time. I covered part of their run as well so they will have a windblock if nothing else. I seriously don't want them in the library for the winter...particularly since they have started crowing. Kung Pao insisted on coming into the library yesterday to lay her egg. It was comical really. She scrabbles round and round trying to make a nest in the box while her two kids sit back and trill rather sweetly. (My house really isn't a barn as you may think. The chickens are in a sterlite storage container covered with a wire top. They are bantams so they are very small and the box is large.)

I'm killing time until the library opens at 10:00. I have some books on hold that I need to pick up. I also have the first season of LOST on hold. (claps with mad glee) I didn't really like the episode of LOST last night. The first 48 days for the tail section survivors... It's really hard to care about those people since they've been so shitty to Michael, Sawyer, and Jin. And then to have that raving bitch shoot Shannon.... Yes, I love LOST. Dh sends me emails from work with little tidbits from the show as he comes across them on the web. He's such a sweety.

I think I may go to Hancock's today as well. I'm in the mood to sew and I still need to make those draft dodgers even though dh replaced all the thresholds and we got a new stormdoor. I'm sure I've got enough scrap fabric to make them but I've been holed up in this house for way too long and I need to get out before I go mad. Besides, I told the kid I would make her a princess dress to replace the one that didn't fit (Halloween). If I don't follow thru I'll never hear the end of it. How can I expect her to complete her projects when I don't complete my own. Doink.

I need to work on the book today, too. I had a brainstorm last night and I want to get cracking on it. It's so liberating not having that lawsuit looming over my head all the time. I don't have to feel guilty doing something that I want to do instead of preparing our case. Not to say that it's over because we still have to collect but there is a definite plan in place now. I used to be a debt collector (Asset Recovery Systems) and was quite successful. The pen is a very powerful tool.

Here I sit with a million and one things I could be doing... instead I waste my time with my pathetic ramblings in a blog that doesn't even hold my interest.

I discovered this morning that both of the chicks that Kung Pao hatched are roosters. What luck. Kung Pao is busily grinding away under the hosta in the shade garden...she dug a hole there last week and I found an egg there yesterday. She also has a nest in the chocolate mint barrel and another one in the barn that I fixed up for her. That's the nice one and the one she uses the least. She's the only hen laying at the moment. If ShrinkyDink is nesting somewhere I'll never find it since her eggs are so small. Fluffy has gone broody and I lift her off the nest several times a day. I was hoping that at least one of the new chicks would be a hen. Oh well.
I gave Peck away and the lady hasn't brought my carrier back yet like she said she would. I guess I'll have to go get it.
The new little roosters are busily practicing their crowing out in the library, which can hardly be called the library anymore since dh took the book shelf down. Their tinny little voices are like nails on a chalkboard. Literally. I love birds. Really. But I have to say that chickens aren't anything more than bags of shit rolled in feathers.

Why the pathetic rambling you ask? (or maybe you don't)...
I'm at a loss of what to do with my time. Yesterday dh had his day in court appealing our previous case against the contractor. He won! I can hardly get excited about the outcome. We got less than half of what we were asking and it took 1½ years to get this far with no guarantee that we will ever see a nickel of it. But, strangely enough, I'm satisfied. It was just so anticlimactic. One of the co-defendants didn't even bother to show up. Our witness is incarcerated in another county. I guess if we had his testimony we would have gotten more but we were told we would have to resubmit a subpoena (for another $12 since the judge was sick and changed the hearing date) and we didn't have time since we just found out he was in lockup. Plus, we would have had to file additional reports and pay more fees (sheriff's time and transportation costs) and having a convict as your "expert witness" doesn't really go in one's favour. Oh well. Live and Learn.

What else? I've failed miserably at NaNoWriMo yet again. No surprise there. I left Mama-Drama two weeks ago and nobody noticed. I logged in yesterday to check the admin panel and read a few posts and noticed that everything was basically the same as when I left. Literally SCDD. That's rather anticlimactic as well. I had hoped after putting in the time that I have at MD and the work that I put into it that I would have at least one friend on the board who would notice my absense. I think I'll always be invisible no matter what I do. Now that I have all this free time on my hands maybe I can devote some of it toward adding hacks to MD. Or maybe I won't. I don't think anyone cares. MD is not what I had hoped it would be. It's either high drama or benign posts with very little in between. I had hoped that it would become a board where women could exchange ideas, could debate different subjects, discuss current events. It's either fluff or flagellation.

Went to our first Parent/Teacher conference today. Dh took time off from work to attend. As we were walking down the hall to the classroom he said he didn't want me getting in the teacher's face. WTF? I know how to conduct myself properly. His attitude floored me. I told him I was going to strongly suggest that dd be put into an accelerated reading program since she is reading chapter books and the teacher had told dd that she wasn't ready for them yet.

According to the teacher dd has excelled at everything and is at the top of the class. She tested 100% on nearly everything. She misspelled one word out of 20 and she only needed a 4 to pass. The teacher was gushing. She said that dd was reading from the 1st grade reading list and that she was going to put her in an accelerated reading group next week. No prompting from me at all. I'm so proud. Dh said he was extremely impressed. High praise coming from him.

I've got a terrible habit of holding onto things well past their usefulness. Held until it is meaningless beyond sentimentality. Do these things make me feel safe? Do they make me feel like I'm any less alone?
I'm 42 and I have a stranglehold on the past. I should have noticed long ago that I was wasting my time, that, as always, nothing good would come of it.
15 years ago I stepped away from my life. I boarded a plane and touched down 9 hours later on foreign soil. I was reborn. It was glorious.
Well, the cocoon I've woven around myself in the past 8 years has started to constrict my breathing. I've been tearing away at it until my fingers are bloodied and I'm ready to fly. There will be no 9 hour flight this time however.

Saw a great movie the other night...The Village. Really creepy. I kind of guessed that all wasn't as it appeared but it still shocked me and also left me with some unanswered questions. Dh took it back to the library yesterday but I put a hold on it again. I'm number seven of seven requests. It may be awhile before I see it again.

So, here I am preparing myself for another boring, long, uneventful day. I'll read the court procedure book and get pissed off at the contractor again...just like yesterday and the day before. I'm burnt out on it. We can't do it without a lawyer and we can't afford a lawyer. The one that worked with dh during the equalization hearings told him that it would cost him nearly everything that we may gain so it wasn't worth it. I don't understand the system. There is a con artist out there ripping people off...repeatedly...and since they aren't knocking down big $$$ per scam they are basically untouchable. Meanwhile, there are government employees out there enabling them. It makes me sick.

Here it is November. It will get nearly 80 degrees today. The mornings are beautifully crisp. We haven't had a frost yet but I'll have to bring the plants in next week probably. I have several geraniums (pelargoniums?) and a couple of lemon verbenas. Plus, the Christmas tree. I don't know where I'm going to put them since the chickens are still in the room. The chicks are just now getting their adult feathers and they look really ratty. Mom calls them teenagers when they are at this stage. Kung Pao would be able to keep them warm during the night but she'd be likely to run off with the grownups at first light and mornings are much too cold for them. I need to call the neighbour and ask her if she still wants Peck. Dh really wants me to get rid of Trouble since he's become so agressive. Neither of them bother me except with their miserable crowing all the time but Peck attacks dd and Trouble attacks dh so I need to let them go. I guess I should do that today. I hate to do it. For all I know they may become Thanksgiving dinner.

This is Day ONE of NaNoWriMo. I don't know if I have 6 pages in me today but I think I'll try. Maybe it will help improve my outlook which has been in the toilet lately. Better get cracking on it if I'm going to do it.....

My world keeps shrinking and it's swallowing me up, pressing closer and closer. I've got a million things to do but I can't focus long enough to get anything done. Dd keeps opening and closing the french doors and each click of the lock grates on my last nerve. "Stay in or stay out" I say. Click. "Pick a place to play and stay there" I repeat. Click. Click. In the time it takes me to make this entry I will be interrupted a score of times, I'll start several chores and wander off on a tangent only to come back and try to type a few more lines before dd demands my attention again. I'll get a cup of tea, let it go cold, reheat it several times because I've forgotten it in the microwave...

I'm trying to write a novel. Again. Totally different from the one with Dylan and Jennifer...The DaVinci Experiment (started LONG before The DaVinci Code I might add). Maybe when school starts next month I'll be able to start work on it again. I hope so. I think it's a good story.
Writing is a lot harder than it used to be. I have way too many distractions and don't have nearly the vocabulary I used to....mommy brain or early menopause is kicking my ass.

Dd just came in, leaned against me and started playing my calculator like it was a piano. Her hair is in dire need of brushing and/or cutting but she will allow me to do neither. I think the hair fairy, like the toenail fairy, will have to pay a visit during the night.

I wanted to talk about the wide open world of my youth...
I was born in New Jersey and back then it was wide open. I lived on a skinny dirt road called Black Brook Rd. click click The calculator is back. The calculator is gone again. click
We had a beautiful home that my father built himself. The grounds were terraced and landscaped and perfect. We had an inground pool. We had a big garden that was routinely overrun by rabbits and we had chickens. I remember collecting eggs in the hay baler.
This was the house where I learned to ride my bike. The house where I had my 6yo birthday party. The house where the monster peered through my bedroom window and filled me with dread that has lasted a lifetime. My brother had yet to start trying to kill me, but my grandfather had. click Calculator again. A trade. A meltdown. click and crying. Wailing. Temper tantrum. click More whining and crying. slam

I'm going to shut myself in the closet for awhile. click

Is it possible to be TOO considerate? Or TOO friendly? How are you supposed to know if people are truly your friends or are just humouring you? Perhaps, merely tolerating you because they have nothing better to do at the moment. At what lengths should one attempt to go to reach out to someone in friendship?
I have a friend who calls me quite often. She tells me all about her family problems, the back breaking schedule that she keeps for herself and complains incessantly about, and about the great time she recently had with her best friend. We don't see each other very often because of her rigid overscheduled lifestyle. We got together fairly recently and it was exhausting. Not because we did anything athletic or exciting but because it was several hours of listening and trying to appear interested in her incessant chatter. It is nearly impossible to get a word in edgewise and quite impossible to get an entire sentence out before being interrupted, and having the topic swept back to her. I feel like the stand-in when her real friend is unavailable.

Obversely, there are a few people with whom I would like to spend some time getting to know better. These attempts often fail for whatever reason. Maybe I appear too needy, or exhibit stalkeresque traits. Perhaps the "killing gift" kicks in and people quietly slip away to change their phone numbers. Who knows.

I think it must take great skill in having a balanced friendship where one is not dominant over the other and where the people involved have actual two-sided conversations.

One day I asked my 5 yo dd if she needed a bath and she replied, "I don't smell like anything but sweetness."
Went to target for school supplies today. Are you kidding me??? Why in hell does she need 4 boxes of crayons, 4 bottles of glue, and 20 freaking No. 2 pencils? She hasn't used that much in the 5 years she's been on this earth for pete's sake.
I love this time of year. Especially when the rubber band man shows up on tv.

Sponge Bob and Round Ass have once again trashed my parents' house and then bugged out. Probably sticking them for the last month's rent and the electric bill. Just like last time. This time they left behind a ton of garbage and a cat. But they didn't forget the air conditioning unit that didn't belong to them.
So, once again, Mom and Dad have to replace all the carpet and have to patch the hundreds of nail holes in the walls. Well, at least now I can visit them again without having to deal with Bob's juvenile bullshit. What a loser. Mom says that's it for him. She's never going to help him out again...particularly since he verbally accosted her and blamed her for everything bad that has happened to him in his life. I'm not sure I believe her because he is her son after all and he will be back. It's inevitable. He's always been an arrogant, pompous, self-centered asshole and one day he'll tell his boss how to do his job and he'll be fired AGAIN and he won't have anyplace to go since he's burned every bridge he's ever had.

Mom and Dad were trying to sell their place...well, probably not really trying...and now they won't advertise again until they remodel the guest house and put vinyl siding on the main house. Dad is 82. Mom is 74. They're not going anywhere.

And now for some local news: I still have some painting to do in the sunroom but other than that it's finished. My next project is pulling up the carpet in the hallway and refinishing the hardwood floor. I scrubbed the hell out of my shower yesterday and discovered that I really need to tear the whole thing down and rebuild it. There is a leak, or was at one time, behind the shower head and the sheetrock is spongy there. And it's regular sheetrock, too. The whole wall will need to be torn down and replaced with backerboard. I also wanted to replace the vinyl in the kitchen with ceramic tile but I'll have to wait until next year's budget since the asshole contractor from last year ate up our budget for this year. Dick.

The garden is producing pretty well so far this year. I've actually harvested squash this year. Yellow crookneck and zucchini. I'm loving it. I've got delicata and lakota coming on as well. I'm glad I only planted two short rows of string beans. I got a mess with my first picking with just a half row and picked the rest and gave it to Charlie next door. He must have planted his late because he hasn't gotten any yet in his garden.
I had to do something different with the garden this year. I used one of the lightweight insect barriers as a shade cloth over the peppers and tomatoes and it has worked wonders. It was amazing to see that the plants under the shade cloth looked fine but the rest of the garden was limp, wilted, and half dead looking. So last weekend Jim and I erected a shade "tent" for some of the squash. What a world of difference. The insect barrier allows rain to pass thru and diminishes the light by 5% but it's enough to give the plants some respite from the scorching heat.
This is how I did it: Cut two 10' pieces of small bore pvc in half to create four 5' pieces. These are flexible which I find important so the shade cloth won't rip in the wind. Take another pvc pipe in a larger bore and cut into lengths of about 2' each. These short pieces are pounded into the ground at the corners of the plot. They have to be long enough to offer some stability to the smaller pvc. Drill a hole completely thru the top of the small bore pvc about an inch or so from one end. Take a piece of coat hanger or wire and thread it thru the hole and form it into a ring. Tie the corner of the shade cloth to this ring. Drop the 5' piece of pvc into the foundation pvc that's in the ground. Repeat with other 3 corners. The shade cloth is about 4.5 feet off the ground so one can go under it to weed and water and harvest. The sides are open so the ventilation is great and the bees can still get in there to do their pollination thing. I'll update if I run across any problems with it.

What I've been up to (on the lighter side):
I got my belly button pierced finally on Friday the 13th of all days. Now, watch my legs get gangrenous and fall off. I leafed thru a tattoo magazine while I was waiting for this chick to get her tongue pierced and happened to see Kelly's half-page layout. Kelly is a long-time member of Mama-Drama and is adored by many. She looked good. :o)

I picked up some pepper plants and various other things at the berry farm this afternoon. Planted 5 of them. I had to wait for dh to till the garden plot again. I swear sometimes I just want to haul off and kick him square in the ass. I asked him to till it with the tiller but he decided to turn it with a shovel instead. Well, that just causes more work for me because I have to bust up the clods and rake it all smooth whereas the tiller would bust up the clods for me. *sigh*
My secret to excellent pepper production is in the planting. I sink bottomless black plastic pots in the garden. I plant the pepper seedling inside leaving ample room for mulch and compost. When I water I fill the pot to the rim and all the water and nutrients go straight to the roots. No run off. Plus, the black plastic releases heat at night and keeps the crawling gnawing bugs at bay.

I had to make some wire cages to fit over my squash and cuke hills today. The cat has taken to shitting at the base of the hill and letting gravity help cover her prize. I discovered this in a most unpleasant manner when shoring up one of the crumbled hills. *barf* On a good note tho...this year the seeds are actually germinating. I've planted delicata squash for 2 years without a single seed sprouting. This year I got a pack of seeds at Walmart and they are busting up. Third year is the charm I guess. Same with the lemon cucumbers. I must have sown 30 seeds last year with maybe two making it to maturity. I think I harvested a single cucumber. This year every seed I planted has germinated. Go figure. I'm glad I didn't sow 30 seeds this year!

Not so much on the light side, April 27, 2005: Chigliak died. I had taken her to the vet since she just seemed so run down and the vet had nothing but bad news. She had heartworms so bad that the larva were present in her blood draw. She had a heart murmur. She was so anemic that she would need a transfusion but that it probably wouldn't help and the treatment for the heartworms would surely kill her. Poor old dog. I guess she was about 15 years old. Someone had dumped her and the rest of her litter next to a dumpster out in the middle of nowhere...in July....in blinding heat...with no water and no chance for survival. Assholes. I took two of the pups, Chigliak and Moose. Chigliak was a really good dog. I miss her. So does Tuco. It appears that he tried to dig her up last night. I'll need to add some more cobblestones to her grave. I've lost all three of my long term pets in 6 months.

I registered my child for kindergarten. I'm looking forward to the extra time I'll have this fall but I'm also experiencing a little anxiety because my kid is going to public school. I hated public school. Maybe if we hadn't moved around so much I would have liked it but it was pure hell for me. So much weird shit happens at public schools these days. I'm going to pull a Scarlet O'Hara on this topic and think about it some other day.

Lots of other things have happened but those boring little tidbits of my day to day life will have to wait until another day. Eastenders awaits!

We went to Williamsburg today to listen to a time-share spiel. We received a card in the mail about it and decided wth... we hadn't been to W'burg in about a year and we had nothing else planned so why not. We didn't know anything about it but figured our chances of getting timeshares from the inlaws were coming to a close.

Well, I was completely unimpressed immediately upon arrival. There was the main building and a "model" building that was being remodelled already. The salesman reeked. I was getting nauseated sitting next to him. He smelled like an ashtray full of old butts....wet butts. Gak. His hands were grubby. Nothing wrong with that...mine get grubby as hell when I'm pulling weeds in the garden but I seriously doubt this guy had ever bent down to pull a weed, even if he were physically able to, which I doubt. Something told me that his grungy, ragged fingernails held the contents of his breakfast burrito.

So, he starts his thing and is completely disorganized. He's flipping his pages back and forth trying to find this or that to show us. Really bad. I wander off to check on the kid. He still hasn't got his shit together when I get back. Finally we go off to see the models. I'm unimpressed. They are painted the most ungodly purple I've ever seen. The dining room walls are deep maroon, sage green, AND gold. Holy shit... it was fugly! The interior doors were those cheap ass pressed fiberglass jobs. Maybe even fisher-price plastic. The rooms were small. The guy said when the other buildings are built the rooms will be bigger and the interior fixtures would be better...bigger tvs, nicer doors, bigger tubs. Whatever dude.

Then off to have a "virtual tour" of the timeshare. There was a flat screen tv in the hallway upstairs...we had to take the elevator since the guy would never have made the stairs. Apparently this particular timeshare was going to be a themed water park. I'm not sure how people dressed in colonial era costumes are supposed to fit in with a water park but hey...I've got an open mind. The thing was supposed to be a big domed building where you enter on the second floor into a cave opening and there will be smoke coming from the doors where you enter. (I've got a chill already.) After that it just gets bizarre but he did mention Starbucks half a dozen times.

After the "virtual tour" we looked at a miniature model. The salesman is gabbing away about all the newspaper articles, blahblah, when I interrupt him to ask why the tabletop model didn't look anything like the "virtual" model. He said that was there first plan and it had changed and they hadn't gotten the new model made yet. Ok.

Back to the table to start negotiations. Now it gets really weird. He calls the second string over. (The third string is sitting against the far wall just waiting to coerce someone into signing away their child's college fund). The second string guy starts writing down numbers and dh is saying, nope, no good. Can't swing it. I detect a hint of snottiness about the guy. So I cut to the chase, decide to end it there and say, "You know, I'm a kind of hand's on person and just don't feel comfortable investing in something that I can't see." I thought it was a fairly reasonable excuse. They wanted $15K for a small 2 bedroom unit that we could only use in certain times of the year. The guy says, "didn't you see the model?" I replied, "Yes, I did, but that isn't the domed building." He countered with, "Well, you saw the virtual tour." (His tone was getting snarky, iykwim.) I said, "Yes, but the final outcome may be quite a bit different than the "virtual" model." We had seen absolutely no floor plans of the proposed buildings, just an illustrator's rendition of what the place would look like. Plus, the first salesman had only said that the rooms would be "bigger". He made some comment, can't remember what it was, but I said "We had an addition built onto our house last year. The photo (our virtual model) that we showed the contractor was beautiful and we said we wanted it to look like that. We ended up with something so bad we had to pay another contractor to redo it which put us way over budget. That's why I'm cautious." This is where the guy starts antagonizing me. Dh said he was afraid we were going to start shouting at each other.

He said "This is a multimillion dollar project. We're not going to hire just anybody off the street." I said, "I don't care how much you pay them, there is always the chance that the builders may take shortcuts in order to make more money." The building that we were in, and that they were remodelling was only four years old. Why a four year old building needs to be remodelled is beyond me. Then the guy really gets in my face. Remember, he's trying to sell me a timeshare. He starts mouthing off, "are you trying to group us in with all the corrupt contractors now?" I said, "no, I'm not saying that. But it happens." He continues, "Well, we research the contractors we hire." And then they got up and left. Right in the middle of my saying "we researched ours as well..." The second string guy just left in a snit. The first guy said "someone will be over to finish your paperwork." No handshake. No 'have a nice day'. No 'thanks for coming out'. I was like "WTF???"

Then dh told me I was too aggressive. That I could have been nicer. I replayed it over and over and damn it to hell, the other guy started it. I just finished it. I'm not going to give someone $15K based on a freaking drawing of something they hadn't even broken ground on yet. Get real. That had to be the most unusual sales ploy anyone has ever used on me before. The old "antagonize the punter into buying the timeshare" routine.

I planted broccoli plants out today and two kinds of carrots...both heirloom varieties...touchon or something like that and atomic red. I also raked one of the other raised beds smooth so it is ready to plant in the next few days (if it doesn't rain) and I still have 1.5 beds to level. My poor hands are dry, cracked, stained and bleeding. My back is killing me and I'm asleep on my feet. I love spring.
Chickens were out all day having fun in the sun. They are loving their new run and house.
Started outlining a new perennial bed the other day. I bought an edger from the tractor supply store. Things are really shaping up around here. I've got volunteer aquilegia everywhere.

I'm not getting what I need from the web anymore...or perhaps I never got it at all and I'm just now willing to throw in the towel. I'm the empty beer can that was tossed out on the information superhighway, run over by a couple of semis, and so faded that no one can make out my label anymore.
I've had my widdle fewwings hurt I guess. I wish I were more charismatic but I'm not and that will never change. I'm just, eh...what was her name? You know, the mole, wasn't that her? Didn't she used to be a mod or something?

They're not really telemarketers....it's the sheriff's department, or the state police, or the fire dept retirement fund. Holy shit! They call all the freaking time. Last night around 8:30 the state police called. Dh told them he was eating dinner. Just a minute ago the phone rang. I picked it up. Dead silence. I almost hung up as I usually do because that's a sure sign of a computer placed call. Finally this deep monotone voice comes on the line and says "is this Mrs. XXXXX?" (The voice was eerily familiar....like the voice that woke Elaine Benes up in the middle of the night from the AMA.) I said yes. The monotone started the spiel. I interrupted and said "Look, we already got a call last night." The voice said "Are you going to make a contribution today?" I said no. Silence. Finally the voice said 'fine' and hung up.

The day before yesterday I got a call from the sheriff's department. The man asked me how I would feel if my child disappeared. WTF??? He then proceeded to talk about how much money I could contribute to wtf-ever he was trying to promote. I said he could send me any paperwork involved but that I wasn't going to commit to a dollar figure on tape...he said I was being recorded. He continued to pump me for a contribution. I said if you send me the paperwork I'll send something in but I will not give you a dollar figure over the phone. He said thanks and hung up. Jesus. If I don't give them at least $20 they don't want anything? WTF is up with that?

Even if you say no to these people they still call back every freaking day. I'm to the point that I don't want to answer the phone anymore. Who does one complain to about something like this? I pay so much money per month just for the privelege of having my phone hooked up and I have to deal with this shit? Grrrrr!

I have a few minutes before I have to go pick up the kid from preschool and while I'm waiting for the building inspectors to show up. So much trouble for a 10X14 foot space. Go figure.

Watched dodgeball (movie) the other night. Stupid but it had it's moments. Ben Stiller gives me the creeps. The best part was the cameo from Lance Armstrong. That was a shocker. Speaking of Lance, he has finally announced that he will be competing in this year's Tour de France....going for his 7th consecutive win. Can he do it? Yes, he can! I used to make fun of dh because he is riveted to the tv during the tour but now I find myself drawn to it as well. Can't beat 'em, join 'em.

Speaking of dodgeball...when I played it in school we called it Slaughterball. I loved it because I was good at it and I could pound those assholes who were always beating up on me throughout the week. Funny thing...I was always picked last...it never failed...but most of the time I was at least one of the final four, if not the survivor. I really hate popularity contests.

Speaking of popularity contests...Faith doesn't seem to be winning any at Mama-Drama. I can understand it to a degree. When she bugged out MD was little more than a soapbox for people to bitch and moan about AW and scammers. Now it is a community and some people feel like she is an outsider coming in to rock the boat. I don't know how I feel about it. I'm disappointed that she wouldn't sell MD to me. Some days I feel like saying tamp it. I've put in a lot of hours at MD, I've crawled all over the web trying to learn how to take care of business so we wouldn't have to rely on anybody else to run it. I've searched for new things to add that would keep it fresh and I've tried to make sure that all the technical stuff got handled. That wasn't always easy because I seldom got responses from my PMs or emails. I was really afraid that the domain was going to lapse since it had already "expired" by the time Faith renewed it. At least I don't have to worry about that for two years. :o) After all the jostling, the corrupted data, the board wars, and the schism taking place, it's a wonder we're here at all.

What else can I go on about? Gardening? I've only started one flat so far. 24 broccoli, 12 tomatoes (brandywine), and 36 peppers. We went to a family birthday party at Bill & Jen's on Sunday. (That deserves a post all on it's own.) Granddad (dh's) asked me about the garden and put his "order" in for some pepper plants. FIL put in his order for tomato plants. Both are millionaires. You'd think they could spend a couple of bucks and buy them at Lowes.

Speaking of money...I spent a large portion of yesterday online researching schools. Dd will be attending kindergarten this fall. Woohoo!!!! I am not happy with the SOL scores from the public school she would be attending. There is a newer school, which is closer, that has much better scores, but has many more students and is out of our zone. And there is a private school that interested me a great deal. I broached the subject with dh when he got home and he shot it down in a heartbeat. He doesn't want me to homeschool and refuses to send her to private school because he doesn't want to change his standard of living. What freaking standard of living??? He comes home and parks his ass in front of the tv. Yeah, that eats up a lot of funds, particularly since we have basic cable because he won't pay for a better tier. He went to private school the whole nine yards. It was wasted on him. I told him last night he wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed so private vs public was no indication of intelligence. BUT the private school offered more than the basics.
I remember back when I was in highschool we had two english classes: mainstream and honours. They had to do it that way because you couldn't grade on a curve if some students were A+ and half the class would fail. By moving the higher scoring students to the honour's english class you could now grade on a curve and those students who were getting 70s and not passing were suddenly the high scorers for that class. Pretty sad.

Well, the inspector showed up and I'm embarrassed that he saw my messy house but the room has finally passed all inspections. Time to pick the kid up from school. Hey, the sun is shining!

It's going to trial. The asshole contractor and his shady wife contested the allegations. The law is on our side tho. We have a guarantee on their contract, a breach of implied warranty, and their reputation in past dirty dealings in our favour.
If you enter into a contract when you know you don't have the proper license and then falsify a government application to get a permit you leave a paper trail of deceit. There's no way to deny something like that.

Ironically, it has been exactly one year since we signed the contract to have the addition built onto the back of the house. And it's still not done.
Over the past couple of days I've managed to reduce page upon page of bitching and moaning over the addition onto 4 index cards. I think I hit all the high points. We're suing because he didn't build the room we negotiated for, he built it his way, poorly, and illegally. That about sums it up.
His contract (illegal) guaranteed materials and workmanship. He deviated from the materials AND he had no skills. We're asking for all of it back. Everything we paid him.
It's like going to a Honda dealership, ordering a silver Civic, and getting a baby blue Pinto hatchback...or the "family truckster" instead. Unfortunately, this is not the last thing we have to do. If we win a judgement, we have to try and collect it. If that doesn't work, we have to apply to the state's contractor's fund. We may never see a dime.

The room was inspected Tuesday. It didn't pass. We need a final electrical inspection and we need to install handrails on the deck even though it's not in the code. We specifically built the deck at a certain height so we wouldn't need rails but the inspector said that since it had 3 steps we had to have rails. WTFever. Besides that, the deck isn't even on the building permit and we may have to pay an additional $48 for an amended permit. Logically, since the deck isn't on the permit, the inspector should have passed the room. *sigh* I'll be so glad when this is all over.

Time for a story...

Once upon a time I worked with a real bitch-child. The boss's daughter. One year I was elected by the other employees (V and R) to buy the bitch-child a birthday present. This was no easy feat since she hated me and was totally bereft of any social skills whatsoever. I thought and I thought. What could I possibly get this freaking little punk bitch that she wouldn't be able to criticize. It was tough since she was a master of the backhand complement but I finally got it.....a nice photo frame complete with a picture of her and her boyfriend that I coerced from her mother (who was just as devoid of tact).
Next obstacle....the card. It had to be completely neutral and utterly pleasant...not my forte.
Finally the day arrived. The bitch-child stood expectantly for the gift from her minions.
The card...simple...elegant. She turned to V and said "Oh, what a lovely card. Thank you V." To which V replied, "Don't thank me. Cat picked it out." She simply said "oh". The card was cast aside as she happily shred open her gift. Her eyes lit up when she saw the photo in the exquisite frame. She turned to V again and said "Oh, it's beautiful! Thank you so much!" To which V again replied, "Don't thank me. Cat picked that out, too."
And then the little bitch-child looked straight at me and said "oh, I didn't think she had that much class."
End of story....well, except the part where I told her to kiss my ass.

My point? I worked for this company for 3 years as a collection agent and I brought in a ton of money which my boss later embezzled from his clients. And not once was I ever given any recognition for exceeding their expectations. Typically, as in the previous entry about the Tobacco Exchange, someone else got the bonus or the raise. I got laid off. Pushed aside while someone else took the credit for the work I had done for the past 3 years.

Wow, and now, at MD, I'm just an admin working for someone who has been involved all of two months. All I can say is 'ouch'.

I took the decorations off of the Christmas tree today. I plugged it in last night for the last time and dh panicked that someone in the neighbourhood might see it and think we were deranged or something. He gets into a tizzy over the most curious things.
It has always been a very depressing task for me...the undoing of Christmas. It's almost as if I'm packing away the "good will toward men" along with the ornaments that grow shabbier and shabbier each year. The spirit of the season comes to a screeching halt when the doors of Walmart open the morning after.
What happened to all the bell ringers? I saw only one this year. He was standing outside of Michael's with his red kettle, ringing his bell half-heartedly. I gave dd 50¢ to donate and she thought it was great. There used to be somebody jangling away in front of every major store.
I miss Christmas the way it used to be...the ribbon candy, the bowl of nuts to crack, cheese on fancy crackers, snow, the smell of cedar and cookies. The television broadcasted wall to wall hallmark commercials, the same old comfortable Christmas shows, and Christmas merchandising didn't show up in the stores until AFTER Thanksgiving. Oranges still bring back very vivid memories of Christmases past. And figs strung on raffia. Nobody had them this year.
I just feel like Christmas was incomplete this year. I used to stay up past midnight every Christmas eve and spend time with my cats. Just the three of us. We'd sit and watch the shifting patterns of light that were thrown on the ceiling from the tree. They would purr and purr. That didn't happen this year. That part of Christmas is gone for me now.
So, everything is packed away and ready to be put up in the attic. People have gone back to being bitchy, and apathetic. I wish the Christmas spirit would hang around a little longer. I need some.

Of all the assinine ideas....
The local government guy, (we'll call him B.R.) called A.C. (Asshole Contractor) this morning and told him he had until the end of this month to get his licensing in order or else he would be swearing out a warrant on him. A.C. was highly upset and asked if maybe he could come to our house and finish the work he started instead. He was just convicted and fined $500 because of my letter campaign...why in hell would he think we would allow him back on our property particularly since I told him I would have him arrested for trespassing if he showed up? What a freaking moron.

Dh went to court last Friday as witness for the state against the first contractor who bilked us out of 8K. I reported him and they took him to court for violation of occupational code 54.1-111. He was found guilty and fined $500, 90 days suspended. A slap on the wrist really....compared to $8,000. (Plus the additional $4,000 to redo what he screwed up.)
According to the prosecutor, the defendant admitted to everything and implicated his wife as well. Dh was told to contact another guy after the trial...local government...and they have plans on having him arrested for working without a business license. I don't know if dh will have to testify during that case.
I was right about them coming from Florida. They had told us they moved from Buffalo, NY, but I tracked them to Florida. I love the internet.
Anyway, we have to get a copy of the transcripts of the trial if we plan on going after Mrs. Asshole Contractor. We were told we have a 50-50 chance of getting money back from the state contractor's fund. I don't like those odds much.
So, today I have to write up a report for the local guy complete with photos. Cake and Pie.

It was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. On November 27th I took my beloved cat, Bastet, to the vet for the last time. When I got up that morning she was lying on the kitchen floor in her own mess. She had thrown up all over herself the night before and had frightening convulsions that clearly were painful. She wouldn't drink her milk or even eat a piece of cheese, so I wasn't able to medicate her. Her front legs would twitch and quiver as she was lying down and her back legs just didn't function anymore. It was time.
I can't go into detail right now. She was euthanized and I stayed with her throughout the procedure. She is buried next to her brother who died October 26th. She spent most of the summer laying under the tigerlily fronds like a big lazy jungle cat. I really miss her. I miss them both.

The steroid shot that Bastet got last night has done a world of good for her. She's not leaping and racing but she is able to walk, albeit shakily. She has gone to the potty each time I wheeled her bed over to the tray, she is eating well, and the pill was history hidden in a lump of extra sharp cheddar. She's a sucker for a piece of cheese. So was Goliath. I am hopeful that she will be back to her old self in a couple of days. For now she is sleeping in the bottom half of a large pet carrier. We took the top off so she wouldn't be so secluded and we roll it from room to room so she can be a part of what's going on. When she gets done with her business she gets right back in on her own so I guess it's pretty comfortable for her. I ripped open a brown paper bag, her bed of choice, and lined the bottom of it. She seems happy enough. I even caught her purring last night. I went over her vet records this morning when I was waiting for the taped joints in the floor to dry. She has had a bunch of steroid shots over the years. She used to get them for her skin condition. At $20-$24 bucks a pop they sure added up. That's alot of money for a cat you can't really pet. They never seemed to help her skin, though. I also tried feeding her a special diet provided by the vet for a couple of months. Cha-Ching. No help. The only thing that helped was eliminating fish from her diet. That's pretty tough to do considering fish is an ingredient in nearly every canned and bagged cat food on the market today.
I fed her Alpo dogfood tonight as I ran out of her usual brand and there was no fish in it. She hooved it down. Unfortunately, dogfood doesn't have taurine in it and she needs that.

We started laying tile in the sunroom today. I ran out of tape for the backerboard joints so dh picked up another roll when he went to Lowes for the rest of the tile. I taped and "mudded" the joints, then we had lunch and then the fun began. The room is really out of square so we are having to fudge the spacing a bit between the tiles. I had hoped that we could just use my little 1/4" spacers but that won't work on all of it. This is the first time I've set 12" tiles. I tiled the bathroom vanity and tiled the big custom walk in shower at Tunstall but that was with 4" tiles. I've also laid a few 6" quarry tiles. I'm hoping that the 12" will be super easy since there is less of them. We've encountered a few high spots already due to the floor not being quite level. I'd love to pound that asshole contractor in the mouth.
I'm hoping that we get most of the floor done tomorrow. I would like for it to be grouted and the walls and ceiling spackled, sanded, and painted by Thanksgiving which means I'm really going to have to pour it on in the next few days. My hands hurt!

She's sliding down the slippery slope. Two days ago she stopped walking. At first she tried to get her legs under her but only one was able to support her so she kept falling down. Yesterday she quit trying and dragged herself from spot to spot. She made her way to her food dish and also to the potty tray. Today, however, she couldn't make it. We got home after running errands all day to find her laying in the hallway. She had taken a crap and it was stuck all over her. I got the cat carrier out of the barn, the same one that her brother died in two weeks ago, and loaded her up for a trip to the vet.
She suggested euthanasia. I couldn't do it without trying something else first. Bastet still enjoys a snooze in a warm patch of sunshine, she'll purr and purr, kneading the air with her paws. She also looks forward to her meals and a warm cup of milk at night. So we opted for a steroid shot this evening to see if that would help with any inflammation she may have in her joints. I've got pills to give to her for a few days as well. If they don't help her I don't know what I'll do. The vet also said that Bastet had a heart murmur.
My poor old cat.

I worked there as a cocktail waitress while I was in college. I got paid $2.01 an hour plus tips which were very good because I was fast and I worked my ass off. After the punters left at 2:00 a.m. the waitresses had to clean up, wrap silverware for the lunch shift the next day. By law we were supposed to be paid minimum wage after 2 because we couldn't earn tips to supplement our pay but we never did. In fact, at the end of the night we had to pay a percentage of our tips to the bartenders who made more money than we did and didn't have to clean up. They sat around drinking while we worked. I started work at 4:00 and usually got off at 3:00-3:30. I busted my ass for nearly 12 hours for $25 day after day after day. To add insult to injury we also had to chip in a few dollars each to give to JellyBean and Shirley to clean the kitchen and mop the floors. Lots of times I refused because I couldn't afford it. I was paying rent, tuition for classes I couldn't stay awake thru, and groceries for my alcoholic boyfriend, who, btw, was one of the bartenders.

The other bartender who worked the happy hour shift, damn, what was her name...doesn't matter....she worked to socialize and would never mix my drinks for me. I had to go behind the bar to mix my own and then serve them. That's how I learned how to mix. At the end of the shift she was always there with her hand out waiting for her cut. I stopped tipping her. She turned me in because I was too young to mix legally. Didn't matter. The boss didn't want to lose me because I sold ALOT of drinks and I actually checked ids. I was the first person in town to prosecute someone for drinking underage with a fake id. It was a very big deal since the town fought liquor-by-the-drink so hard.

What am I rambling on about? After I had been there for over a year and had seen a complete overhaul of the staff a couple times over the manager decided that the restaurant needed a supervisor for the cocktail staff. I was all over it. I was senior staff, the big money maker, and even worked parties at the boss's house. I could step in behind the bar and was always willing to come in at any time to work lunch, or serve dinner. So one night when the rest of the cocktail staff showed up, around 9ish, the manager called us together for a meeting. The bartenders and bouncers were there, too. (Oh yeah, Jane A. that was her name and her daddy was one of the rich folk in town).
Anyway, Rodney, the manager started talking about the new position and what it entailed and then said, "the new cocktail supervisor will be Berkley C. B. III. He doesn't know anything about the job but he'll learn." And Berkley, who often came to my apt to get drunk with my boyfriend, and got the cocktail waitresses to put long island ice teas in the walk-in freezer so he could drink on the job, looked right at me and smiled. His parents had the biggest, poshest house in town. He didn't need the job but he was friends with the manager and his parents were friends with the restaurant owner. He didn't know the job, didn't know the first thing about ABC laws, but he got the job. The staff congratulated him on getting the promotion and when I asked the manager, later, why Berkley got the job and I didn't, he told me 'if you don't like it you can leave.' I left.

It's funny how some things in life keep recurring over and over again. You bust your ass doing things to make it right, to make everybody happy, and you get shit on. And if you dare ask 'why?' you get told 'if you don't like it you can leave.' I'm tired of giving so much and then being treated like I'm nothing. I'm tired of people smiling to my face and then stabbing me in the back. I'm tired of pouring myself into something and then someone else taking the credit. I'm tired of being called a bitch because I'm not a lemming.

You know what's funny? People used to try and make me feel guilty for not contributing to JellyBean and Shirley because they were "mentally impaired" and were broke all the time. We did most of the cleanup for them anyway. After I left I heard that JellyBean and Shirley got busted for selling steaks and booze out the backdoor of the restaurant when they were supposed to be cleaning. I guess they were cleaning up, in a way. Funny, the new cocktail supervisor, who was also responsible for the liquor inventory, didn't notice the thefts and apparently they had been doing it for some time.

It's laying on the desk like a missed pototo chip, curling at the edges. Gross. Dh liberated it from dd's big toe last night while she slept. We surreptiously tried to steal it the night before last but got caught when dd suddenly awoke. Dh had the flashlight poised on her digit and I was slowly trying to twist the defunct nail off. I tried to make her think that she had had a bad dream and that she had called out to us and that is why we were there. I don't think she bought it.

She stubbed her toe about two months ago. I figured she would get a nasty bruise under the nail but she never did. Instead, a new nail started to grow under the old one and just popped the old one off. Unfortunately, it hung on for dear life at one corner, a mere thread, and she was certain that it would cause excruciating pain to remove it. So I did what any resourceful mother would do. I bribed her. But she's much too crafty for that. She knows whatever I offer her, she'll end up getting anyway. I tried another tactic. I lied to her. I told her that the ToothFairy had a cousin, an unpopular and often misunderstood cousin. The lure of treasure under her pillow was still not enough. So, once again, under the cover of darkness, dh with clippers and flashlight in hand, crept into her bedroom and stole that toenail with one swift, decisive snip.

Now I have the defunct toenail and she, totally unaware of our chicanery, is 41¢ richer. I think it was a fair trade.

Goliath passed away this morning between 6:00-6:20. We've been together for 16 or 17 years. My friend Wanda called me early one spring day in (probably) 1988 while I was living in South Boston. The trailer park next to her house was flooded again and some kittens were stranded and she needed me to come out and rescue them. I told her on the phone that I couldn't have any cats in my apartment and I really didn't want to come out there. She leaned on me. I caved. So I waded out into the park and retrieved a floating bucket that had 3 of the cutest little balls of fur I've ever seen in it.
On that day I became Mom to Bastet and Goliath. The third kitten was adopted by someone else and grew up to be a huge long haired cat. Goliath was a black and tan dsh and Bastet is solid black except for about 3 hairs on her chest. Goliath was nearly eviscerated twice by dogs. The second time I left him at the vet's overnight and he started to slide downhill. I went to visit early the next day and found him laying in a puddle of his own urine. I soaked it up with newspapers and took my cat out of there. He got a severe infection which ate away his skin, dissolved the sutures and left his guts wide open. I cleaned him up several times a day by injecting hydrogen peroxide into the opening and flushing out the pus. I also applied a necrotizing agent around the opening to dissolve any dead tissue. It took awhile but he healed up nicely.
When I first started writing seriously he used to lay in a basket on top of the drafting table where my word processor was set up. A shaft of sunlight came thru the window and fell right on that basket and he would purr and purr and purr. I remember one time when we were living in the Grandin Court house in Roanoke, Goliath started meowing really loudly from the bottom of the stairs. I got out of bed, went to the laundryroom and let Bastet out. I had inadvertantly locked her in and Goliath told me so I could let her out. I didn't even stop to think. I was that close to Goliath. I was devastated when he got laryngitis a few years ago. I feared I would never have another "conversation" with my best friend again. Yep, I may be nuts but I sure do love that cat.
So, I planted him today. I laid him to rest where he always used to lay to rest. Right in the middle of my flower bed. I was forever fussing at him for flattening my flowers and creating voids. Now he's there forever in his favourite place. He used to sit out there, which was right outside my bedroom window, and wake me up in the morning. I sure do miss him.

Geez, how violent can the first chapter be? It opens with the farmer taking an axe out to the barn to kill the runt pig in the new litter because it'll never amount to anything. I checked the inscription in the front of the book and saw that my mom gave it to me in 1973. I was 10 years old. Of course, this isn't the first time I read it but it had been awhile and I was just now reading it to my 4 year old. In chapter two, the pig, Wilbur, reached the age of 5 weeks old and the farmer told his daughter, Fern, who clearly loves Wilbur to pieces, that she has to sell it because he refuses to feed it anymore. Nice, huh? So, at the end of the chapter she sold her beloved pig to her Uncle for $6 and Wilbur is moved from his happy home under the blossoming apple tree and his cozy little house with the sweet fresh straw inside to the dank, dark, foul smelling basement of the uncle's barn where he now sleeps in a pile of shit. Lovely. My yes, but it's a heart warming story. You just have to wade through gloom and despair to get to the warm bits.
It's like reading Grimm's Household Tales, otherwise known as nightmare fodder, to her at bedtime. Yep, because you are small, you are worthless, of no consequence, and aren't worth wasting food on. Ouch.
And then there's Charlotte, the spider. Doesn't she die in the end? Maybe we should switch to Black Beauty. She likes horses. Oh, wait. The horse is nearly beaten to death on the street. Hmmm. The Velveteen Rabbit. Holy Smokes. Open a vein why don't you? Old Yeller. Riiiiight. Where the Red Fern Grows. That story still haunts me. Way too graphic. Chronicles of Narnia? Maybe.
Is four years old too soon for Nancy Drew? Not much gratuitous sex and violence in those.

Part of me wants to dust off the book and get the main characters out of the sack. Another part says "why bother?" Hell, they've been there for over 10 years. I've brought it out and reread it a few times and I'm generally happy with the various scenes but I just can't tie it together fluently. How do I get from the floating body to the DaVinci project? OT: I got the idea from an article in the Roanoke newspaper where they found an unidentified body floating in the river. The man had a return plane ticket to D.C. and court papers for adoption records in his briefcase.
Ok, back to the subject at hand. Motivation, or lack thereof. I've got Debbie Travis' Painted House on in the background and can't even focus on this blog entry. I use to be able to concentrate with a singular purpose. When I was heavily into portraiture I could remain slumped over my art for hours on end, diligently working until it was finished for if I stopped at any time it would never get done. Now I can't even finish a sinkful of dishes in one session. I'm always leaving the silverware to soak until the water turns cold and flat. So, you see, not only do I lack motivation, but I lack the focus as well. I'll blame that on my child. I now have the attention span of a gnat.
Meanwhile, Debbie is turning a beautiful diningroom into a nightmare in eggplant and celedon. Gag.
blahblahblah I should be in bed but instead I am thinking about everything else BUT writing. Like: should I go with dh and dd to the birthday soiree tomorrow and also visit his grandmother? Or, should I stay home and wallow in the "peace and quiet" and use that time to lay the underlayment in the addition, free from "PLAY WITH ME!" and "I'M THIRSTY"? If I do that tomorrow while they are out of my hair then I'll be able to lay the tile next week. Provided, of course, that I can get a dozen boxes of the tile.
Whew! They finally finished the diningroom and it was God Awful! I can see that room getting several coats of stainblocker after she leaves. And here I am worried about pumpkin on my walls. I think what I'll do in the addition is paint it pumpkin, glaze it with a lighter shade in the same family (or darker, who knows) and then lay an open garbage bag over it, brush it out and then rip it off. It would definitely take care of hiding the monstrous spackle job the last asshole contractor did.
Oh, speaking of asshole contractors... Dh went to court this morning to testify against said asshole contractor and the case was continued. Again. Anyway, dh spoke to the investigator's boss and they mentioned going after Mrs. Asshole Contractor. What a freaking concept especially since my complaint was against her, too, and Mr. Asshole Contractor has about 15 judgements against him already which would put us in the realm of "when hell freezes over" to get any restitution from him.
But I digress. To write or not to write. I registered for the NaNoWriMo. I can't really say I have a chance in hell of finishing a novel in a month's time. I can't really say I'll make a dent. I can say that I will make an effort to spend my time wisely and TRY to pound out a page or two a day. I better have a discussion with my characters and see where Winston and Jennifer want me to take this.

I had the inlaws over for dinner last night. We invited them for Sunday but they changed plans and it was no longer convenient. They were, however, free Saturday afternoon. Dh's stepdad said he wanted bean soup. Ok. I've never had someone tell me what they wanted when inviting them to dinner but ok. I'd have to make something in addition to bean soup because MIL won't eat it. Whatever.
Dh asked if they could pick up his grandma and bring her. That was fine.
Dh called grandma and invited her. She's been calling him lately saying she is very lonely and her back hurts and she's generally unhappy. (Quick history: Her 53 y.o. useless son, dh's sperm donor father, had a stroke last July. He's in a nursing home living his life exactly the way he wants it... right down to someone wiping his ass for him. He's got a phone, tv, vcr and yet grandma has to go feed him his lunch every day. She's 80-something. She sold her house and moved into a retirement home where her lifelong friends already live. But she blows them off everytime they ask her to join them so they don't ask anymore. Her life is consumed with her lowlife, scum sucking son and it's killing her.)
She declined the offer. Dh called his mom and told her not to pick her up. Less than five minutes later she called back and said she would come but that she would call in the afternoon if she wasn't feeling better. Dh called his mom back. A little later grandma calls again and tells dh she can't come because "your daddy has a tummy ache". So? For heaven's sake woman, he's 53 freaking years old. Four year olds get "tummy aches".
Again...whatever.
So MIL&FIL finally get here at 5:20. They were supposed to be here between 4 -4:30 and they are the king and queen of punctuality. They come in the door complaining about how long it took to get here. (They live 30 minutes away... 45 if there's any traffic. However, we only get invited to their "holiday house" which is 1½ hours away.) They come bearing gifts: some breakfast hot pockets and two dubious bbq rib shaped sandwiches and a card game for dd. Dh entertains while I finish cooking. BTW, I made the bean soup. I soaked the beans and cooked them for over two hours. I put in 1/2 lb. of thick smoked bacon. It was perfection as far as I'm concerned.
I call them to the table and MIL immediately says she's not eating any of the soup. Fine. I knew that. FIL starts eating and then tells me he doesn't eat fatty meat anymore and digs out all the bacon. Then says the next time we visit them he'll make some real bean soup for me. He says he's found a really good brand of bean and bacon soup in a can at the dollar store.
Dear Martha, would I be remiss in my obligation as a hostess if I told him I hope he chokes on it?

For those 2 point 3 people who come back to my blog occasionally to see if anything drama worthy has been posted I am about to reveal a diet sized slice of my psyche.
I have the killing gift. I can kill a friendship in a heartbeat without even trying. I can kill a good time just by showing up. I can kill an appetite, a conversation, a thread, a tune, a tone. I can even kill time. I may be killing my marriage and my dd's childhood. I don't know. I'm certainly not aware of doing it but it happens just the same.
Dh says 'we have to get you medicated' while pressing another draft cider into my bottle shaped fist. Alcoholism is fine as long as I'm in a good mood apparently. (No, I'm not an alcoholic. Not even a real drinker. One night of multiple Tequila Kamikazes took care of that, tyvm.)
So what's the gift you ask? A vibe. A subconscious, apparently evil, vibe that emanates from my soul, if indeed I possess one, like reverse ESP, that strikes the fight or flight response in a large majority of people whose lives are unfortunate enough to collide with mine.
I've had the gift my entire life. It wasn't so noticeable in my childhood because we lived such an isolated lifestyle. My parents are isolationists. I don't know how that happened. I remember my mom having friends and going to art classes, etc. but in the early 70s it just stopped. She made an attempt to keep me somewhat social by having the neighbour girls over for craft day, which was the coolest thing in the world, but they had to walk cross country about a mile to get to our house. Think little house on the prairie type stuff but with trees and people with guns. (The sheriff shot his BIL because he thought he was a groundhog. That should give you an indication.) It didn't last long. Apparently the porkchop around my neck wasn't sufficient to get the dog to play with me, if you know what I mean. I spent most of my time communing with nature and perfecting my highbeam flirtation with gravity. Beams in the barn loft perhaps 30 feet above the ground. It's a wonder I didn't do a swandive.
In the mid-70s my brother decided to try and snuff me out. 1976 was a particularly bad year. Knives, drowning, strangulation. He wasn't picky. Whatever got the job done. Fortunately, he was incredibly inept. We really don't speak any more. Karma is currently kicking his ass.
I've been engaged a number of times. "Well, there's something!" you might say. On quiet reflection, though, I can only surmise that alcohol and other illegal substances must block the vibe to an extent. Like a natural forcefield. Once sobriety is sustained for a period of time, the glow of the relationship takes a header. I can't explain my relationship with my dh which has lasted unerringly for nine years now, seven married. He must be one of the few people who isn't bothered by the vibe. He knows it's there though. He's an odd duck himself, an emotionally stunted only child of a broken home. He has successfully blocked out his childhood and his Catholic upbringing which is probably the sole reason we are together. If he didn't have that built-in defense mechanism we probably never would have gotten past the first date.
So there you have it. A sliver of my psyche or psychosis, whichever you prefer.