M is for Marriage

A dear friend of ours got married on April 1st. We were fortunate enough to be able to take some time off from our lives (work and school and such) and attend. It took place in Kansas City, MO.


We road tripped out there, going a day early and Dave booked us into a hotel that overlooked the Kansas City Royals baseball field. When we were driving past the ball field, a bunch of fireworks went off! The hotel Dave booked had a great view of the ballpark and also a really nice waterpark. We totally surprised the boys with that! Dave bought the tickets cheap with the hotel booking, but we didn't tell the boys about it. When we got there, we asked the boys if they wanted check out the pool and they said a resounding YES, so we all got our suits on and took the elevator down. We got to the water park area and you should've seen their faces! We stayed and played at the water park for nearly 4 hours!



After that, we got dressed and went to a place we saw on one our favorite shows, Diner's Drive-In's and Dives. It's a little pizza joint called Grinder's that's also (by the look of the patrons) a hipster hang-out/art gallery. The food was excellent!



Then we went back to the hotel and fell into beds and slept deliciously until the morning. The next morning we had an excellent breakfast buffet at the hotel and then we checked out, we picked up the $10 zoo tickets we purchased with the booking.



The wedding didn't start until 4p that afternoon so those zoo tix were one of Dave's best ideas yet! The KS zoo was really nice! We had a great time walking around and seeing all the beasties.



The polar bear encasement's main part was about a story up from the water encased part and there was a huge plexiglass to watch the bear play in the water. It would swim around a little rock island, swoop (under water) RightNext to the plexiglass, plant his giant back feet against the plexi and give a mighty shove so he'd cruise halfway across the watery part on his back. It was SO cool to be that close! We'd put our hands up to his paws when he'd shove off and it was amazing how large those paws are!



We also had a couple of interesting encounters with monkeys. We saw the baboons and they were right up against the plexiglass hanging out, a big female and a baby female (not a tiny baby but about a year old). The big female looked at me and smacked her hand on a rock. I smacked my hand on my leg and that female freakin' LAUNCHED herself at the plexiglass! Snarling and screeching - it was nuts!! Then the little one followed suit and they kept baring fangs and slamming into the plexi. It was really scary! I thought, "Good thing that plastic is so strong or she'd rip my throat out!"



In the rain forest exhibit, I had my other monkey connection. There was a black and white gibbon high up in his enclosure. He was looking right at me, tilting his head back and forth like a bird. I started mimicking and it gradually made it's way closer and closer to me. It would tilt it's head and I would tilt. It would make poochy lips and so would I. Slowly and surely, it made it's way to the glass right next to me and then it put its hand on the glass and I put my hand against his hand on my side. Then he turned his back on me, rubbed his back on the glass and looked up at me. I patted the glass and he patted the glass, then patted his back. Poor lonely thing wanted me to scratch his back!



After our zoo adventures we went to the new hotel where the reception was to be held. The wedding was at 4p at a church. We dropped the boys at the hotel, dashed to the nearest Target to get the wedding gift we picked off her registry, dashed back to the hotel, got everyone ready for the wedding and off to the church we went.



The boys were just shy of 8 and 10 and this is the first time they'd ever been in a church. We explained that it was going to be very quiet and they were likely to be bored but they needed to stay quiet and still as they could manage. They did beautifully! We sat in the last pew and there were hymnals and little pencils and pieces of paper. T and Dave played hangman, D2 worked on a note for D'Lynn ("Congratulations on your marryiage") and I perused the hymnal.



The ceremony was very sweet. The bride and groom wrote a letter to each other w/o showing them until the female minister (priestess? hah!) read them aloud. Her's was sweet and romantic, his very funny. He wrote, "After our first few dates, I knew that I wanted to spend all my time with.... Sky. I knew I didn't want to live without her so I'd better ask D'Lynn to marry me." [Sky is D'Lynn's dog.]



After the wedding, everyone headed back to the hotel. D'Lynn and her man are brilliant! The reception wasn't until 7p. The hotel was a short distance from the airport so people flying in for the wedding didn't need to rent a car AND the hotel has a FREE happy hour from 5-7p. I'm not just talking well drinks here. It was all drinks! I discovered White Russians and promptly had about 5. It's like drinking toffee!



The reception was lovely! A DJ, a slide show of the couple, all kinds of great food! And an open bar but with the hotel's happy hour, people were pretty well already set for drinking!



The boys had their first fancy shirts with ties (clip-on)....





Here they are with D'Lynn, our lovely bride...




When the reception started, we found a table and D'Lynn was making the rounds saying hello to everyone. T tapped her on the shoulder and shocked us all by saying, "May I have this dance?" He led her to the dance floor and he got the first dance with the bride. None of us had the heart to tell him she's supposed to have the first dance with her new husband.

T and D2 were dancin' fools once the real dance started! After we all ate and they had the bride/groom dance, the bride/father-of-the-bride dance, cutting the cake, etc., the boys were on the dance floor for almost 2 hours! T even asked the flower girls for a dance but they both turned him down. Too young and boys are still icky. I'm so proud of him for asking, though!

It was a wonderful wedding, a much-needed mini-vacation and a fabulous trip!

D'Lynn - Best of luck in your new life, Ruth!

L is for Lolly

I just finished listening to the latest Joshilyn Jackson audiobook - Backseat Saints. I love her stuff! Backseat Saints is her fourth book and I have listened to them all via audiobook with the author reading it. When I listen to audiobooks, I prefer the author to read it, that way you get exACTly where/what inflections they were thinking when they wrote it.



This book is just as excellent as the others. The main character, Rose Mae Lolly (audiobook, so that's probably all spelled wrong), is actually a tiny side character from a previous book (Gods in Alabama) but the author wondered what happened to her and so wrote a whole other book with Rose Mae as the central character.



Books like this have convinced me I can't write fiction. The way she seamlessly segues from past to present to past in her books is a thing of art. And there will be setups in the book that never seem like setups. It will be this tiny bit of seemingly unimportant information said in passing that later becomes a pretty significant detail to the story. It's amazing how she does it!



In a previous post, I said I was in a reading slump and that I was stuck on that Forest House book. I also re-informed y'all that once I start a book (or a movie), I can't leave it. I HAVE to finish it. It's like a compulsion. Forest House almost beat me. It took over 3 months for me to get through it. I considered putting it aside for awhile and reading other books (another thing I can never bring myself to do) but I decided against it. Then I got sick.



I never get sick. I come from good peasant stock and I rarely even get a cold. But Brothers and Sisters, I got knocked the fuck out. I was so sick that I called in to work and I work from home! I ached all over - the sheets hurt! - and I had so much snot that (and, yes, I know how gross this is) whenever I'd blow my nose only half would be in the tissue. I was in a sea of misery and mucus and pain.



I didn't want TV (which, in and of itself, tells people who know me how sick I was) and I thought about reading but when I looked at Forest House, it seemed too..... rich. Like having a stomach virus and trying to eat an entire sticky toffee pudding. You know how delicious it is and also you know if you try it, you're only asking for trouble. So I put it aside.


I read Secret Diary of a Call Girl. It was a book made from a blog and so the "chapters" were short and the book was deliciously salacious and I flew through it in a few days. It was the perfect chicken broth for my tired and aching head. On the cover, was a picture of Billie Piper who, apparently, plays the Call Girl in the Showtime series made from this book. A bit shocking to me since I only know her as Rose from Dr. Who! My library didn't have the book or the series. I ordered the book a coupla weeks earlier off amazon and it arrived just in time for my dog-sick days. I'm going to have to do an inter-library transfer to see the series.



After I got better, I trudged through the last 100 pages of Forest House. GAH. It ended badly. Like Hamlet only with more death and misery. sigh. There's 3+ months I'll never get back.



I forced myself through the rest of it because we were going on a small road trip and I wanted to read something else for that. I started and finished Christopher Moore's You Suck in TWO days! I flew through it, laughing out loud most of the time. It's the sequel to his Bloodsucking Fiends and it was perfection! I'm reading the third one - Bite Me - and it's going a bit slower. The first 30 pages or so are just backstory and having just read the other two... it seems a bit slow. But it's still funny!



I'm also reading short stories by Richard Matheson. How have I never heard of this guy before?? His stories are creepy and tense and well written. I was reading the 4th story in the book when I noticed the quote on the front cover, "The author who influenced me most as a writer was Richard Matheson", Stephen King. Wow. SK is one of my all-time favorite writers!


What else.... I'm on a crazy cookbook kick. I take my lunch to school 4 days a week and even though I'm making awesome turkey-spinach-thinly-sliced-green-apple-and-Havarti sandwiches, it's getting old. I've looked at so many cookbooks that it's all starting to blend in. And I never really have time to cook anyway! Any suggestions? It doesn't have to be cold food but there's only 3 microwaves and about 30 students with the same 20 minute lunch! I'm open to hot and cold stuff, it's just got to be something I can throw together quickly.



I also picked a book from the library and even though I'm in the middle of two other books, I started to read it while the kids played in the park next to the library. It's called The Hottest Dishes of the Tartar Cuisine by Alina Bronsky. Sounds like another cookbook but it's not. I'm only on page 24 and it's already engaging and funny and odd and I really like it! Oh, and the Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks (son of Mel Brooks). I had just started that but Dave finished his book and despite having over 300 books in this house he had nothing to read. (He's declared all my books to be "lame" or "too girly" and won't even attempt most of them.) He started the Zombie book last night. Guess the reading mojo is back and kicked into high gear!


Up next for audiobooks..... The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo series. Or not, I just checked and there's 20 people ahead of me! Any suggestions?



Reading is fundamental, Ruth!

K is for KAL

I signed up on Ravelry for a KAL. (For those who don't know, that's a Knit-A-Long and yes, most knitters know that A-Long is actually one word - along.) I normally hate KAL's since I never finish any and it's just pressure for no reason. Not that these KAL's are all serious with KAL police or anything. The only pressure is what I put on myself.


Anyway, I saw this particular KAL and it looked doable and fun. It was an ornament-a-month and that appealed to me since that's something I've been thinking about doing for the boys for a few years now. Every January we hit the after-xmas sales and let them pick a new ornament. We also have the ornaments they've made over the years. They are already pretty well set for when they have trees of their own someday! Even so, I've wanted to make them some ornaments. I was going to do 2 a month so in December, they would each have 12 to add to their collections!



I've done one each.



Here's D2's pickle ornament, Pickly...



I asked what face he wanted on it and he said he wanted it to be surprised at all the presents under the tree.



Here's T's Mr. Pickles....




I asked T what face he wanted and he said he wanted Mr. Pickles to be happy about the presents! They slay me.



So that's all I've done with this KAL. Well, these and adding to my queue the other 11 I want to make them.



As for the rest of my knitting goals, I'm hat crazy. I've made at least 6 hats this year, I'm halfway through one sweater, 1/3 of the way through 2 others and I'm working on several socks.



In other news....
I can't thank you guys enough for the tremendous outpouring of kindness and support about my last post! School is going really well and I adore it! It's challenging and fun and my 4 other classmates are great. The teacher is outstanding and I'm really getting it. Today, my brain wouldn't work as well as it did last week, but there's going to be days like that so I'm OK with it. It's weird because the slower I do the "writing" (which is what they call it - like typing but faster/more efficient), the worse I do. When I stop wrangling my brain and just let it flow, my hands do better.


Last Wed was my birthday (41!) and on Tues., Dave called and said, "I've got something that's going to change your life." I said, "Divorce papers?" (We laughed because that's how we do it!) He wouldn't tell me the surprise and when he came home, he handed me my birthday present.


I think I've mentioned in the past that Dave is the best at giving presents. If he had asked me what I wanted for my birthday, I would have said this exact thing he got me. I didn't ask for anything for my b'day this year, we spent $450 on a new laptop for school, we are paying about $60 a week extra on gas for me to get to school and the cost of school.... oy. But he still gets me a present.... it's one of those dealies that you plug into the bottom of your ipod and it plays through the radio! So I am no longer at the mercy of DJ's during my commute!!


When I came home from school, there were two lovely handmade cards from my boys on my desk. I took the day off. As long-timers here may remember, I NEVER work on my birthday (except once during Basic Training, when I had no choice). I did go to school because that's not work for me!



On Sunday, I went to my knitting group and LaDonna brought a 12 pack of giant muffins from Mimi's Cafe, Jen brought fancy cupcakes and they all pitched in to get me a gas card from Cosco!



What a great birthday!



Many years to come, Ruth!

J is for Justice

Lots to tell, you might want to get a snack….


I believe I’ve mentioned that I’ve been depressed lately. It was getting hard to breathe. I got a job and that eased up a bit but then it got as bad if not worse. I’d wake up and look at that desk and that chair and think about my job and how I talk to Xtards 40 hours a week and I’d think, “Is this my life for the rest of my life??” And after I take the kids to school, I’d go back to bed until I had to sign in to my computer for work at 2:30p. I’d stay in bed and sleep or watch movies and try to breathe.


I’ve had some bad times in my life. I’ve had some really Very Bad Things happen when I was a kid and I’ve had times that were just really difficult. Through the bad times, I always had a spark of optimism because I always knew it couldn’t last. I knew that something would change or I would change and it couldn’t be like that always. I think that’s the biggest difference between my brother and me. I don’t think when he was in the pitch black tunnel he ever realized that no matter what, eventually there would be light again when you came to the end of it. I think that’s why he had so much trouble with addiction all his life. He sees the here and now and needs an escape. I always waited for (or sought out) the light.


For the first time in my life, I had no hope. I couldn’t see an end to where we are now. No way out. I owe $50K to my in-laws for the business that failed and I sit at a desk in my bedroom and make $9 an hour. At 40, I find myself with no marketable skills. The massage market here is so flooded that even with my 10 years experience, I can’t get a job.


I looked around to see what was out there and thought seriously about going back to school. Dave kept telling me we can’t afford it and he’s absolutely right but I can’t sit around doing nothing either. Since the economy tanked my business and I have my current job now, I realize that making $9/an hour is never going to do anything to get us out of debt.


I have about $5K in credit card debt from trying to keep my business afloat and Dave has about $200K in debt from buying the landscaping business he has. His business is doing so-so. We make our bills and that’s it. With the economy, many people are choosing to take care of their own yards and there are tons of fly-by-night operations that will charge 1/3 of what we charge. (Doing front and back yard for $15?! There’s no way they are making money off that.)


If something doesn’t change, we will never be able to let the kids play sports or have music lessons or summer camp or a backyard in a real house.


I’m going back to school. Not real school. I signed up at the court reporting school in Denver. I know that may seem out of the blue but I have actually been interested in it since before I got out of the Army. I looked in to an at-home course right before I got out of the Army (waaaaaaay back in 1995-96, not everyone had computers and most online courses were scams) but using your GI Bill before you get out of the Army eats it up twice as fast as using it after.


When I got out of the Army I dicked around the Community College for two years, trying to figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up (I know, I know, still waiting), then I started thinking about the court reporting again and I was also looking into massage school.


I flipped a coin.


Just kidding, I didn’t flip a coin. There was no court reporting school in Tucson and there was an excellent massage school, so…… touching strangers it was.


Back to the present….


I was looking into online court reporting courses and Denver Academy of Court Reporting came up. I called and got information. I started making small hints and comments in Dave’s direction. I had a webinar with the school. I had a long talk with Dave. I went to take a tour of the school and Dave came with me. (We thought it was going to be about a half hour tops but we ended up being there for 2 hours!!). I called the agencies that hire out the court reporters. I emailed a lawyer and a paralegal that I know with my questions. (My main question being, in this age of technology, is this even a viable thing anymore? Apparently, all around is a resounding yes, so that’s good news!)


Dave and I went back and forth with it. There was quite a few of frustrated arguments but, as usual, I got my way (at least that’s what he said). His biggest fear is about the cost of school. I know it’s another big debt to be adding but in the long run, I’ll be making much better money and hopefully I can get a job with some benefits. His other, entirely valid, concern is the commute. The school is on the other side of Denver and the commute is going to cost $15 a day just in gas money.


One of the biggest frustrations I had in our discussions was the fact that he kept saying, “It’s not going to be easy. You complain that you don’t get enough sleep as it is and with school, you’ll be getting less.” “It’s not going to be easy….this.” “It’s not going to be easy….that.”


Finally I yelled at him, “I’m not looking for EASY. Stop saying that!! I am looking for something I think I would be good at and that wouldn’t make me want to kill myself rather than go to work!”


Dave: How do you know you’ll like it? Everything you’ve ever done, you end up hating!! Massage, your recruiting business, Target, the job you have now.


Me: What are you talking about?!? I didn’t hate massage or the recruiting.


Dave: You always bitched about every job you’ve ever had. Me: So do you!! When have you EVER had a job you even remotely liked, Dave? At least I enjoyed the massage and the recruiting. People bitch about their jobs , even if they love them! That’s why it’s called “work” and not fucking “Disneyland”. I liked massage and the recruiting but it wasn’t viable out here and I have to find something else. As for Target and my current job, we needed money so I found a job. It’s not something I want to do for the rest of my life!


Dave: What should we tell my parents?


Me: [trying not to explode into red mist, I say quietly….deadly…]They are NOT in charge of our lives. We’ll tell them I’m going back to school.


Dave: Are we going to tell them we shut down your business?


Me: [yelling again, screaming it actually] YES!! I wanted to tell them a year ago when we did it. Every time we see them [at least twice a week, btw], I get all nauseous and nervous wondering if they are going to ask me about the business and what the hell am I going to say? I’ll remind them of when your brother got laid off and he had to go back to school to update his resume/learning/life and get another/better job. This is no different!


Dave: Fine. We’ll just be like America owing China. We’ll just keep on borrowing money until we are owned by China.


Me: The difference is that this is actually a step to stop having to borrow money and to have a better life.


The next day I dropped the kids at school and went to the in-laws place to talk with them. By myself. Without telling/asking Dave. I know he would’ve wanted to come with me but I felt that this was my failure so it was my responsibility to deal with this. Like a big stupid-head, I started crying the minute I walked in the door but I laid it all out. I told them we had to shut down my business because it was costing money without making any money. I told them we were still going to do our best to pay them back and Dave’s mom said, “No. We’re going to rip up the papers [we did a promissory note] and don’t worry about that.” I said that was ridiculous and we are going to pay it back, it was just going to take longer. I told them about going back to school and that it was a commute and expensive but that I didn’t see any other way to have a better life for all of us.


Anyway, we had a long talk and I apologized profusely for not being able to make the business fly and explained that with the economy tanking, it just wasn’t viable anymore.


They were very kind about it all and Dave’s mom’s only concern was that the children didn’t “suffer” because of it. The only change the boys will see is that they have to walk to and from school now. It kind of freaks the MIL out but they are almost 8 and 10 and it’s not that long a walk (part of it is by a major road though and that makes me nervous too but so far, they’re fine).


I’m enrolled and writing this during a break on my fourth day of school. Everything I’ve heard about this program, the key is practice until your fingers bleed. One can get through the program as fast as one can pick up the speeds. After first quarter, one should be able to write (they call it writing instead of typing) at 40 words per minute (WPM) and upon graduation, one should be at 225 WPM. Every day I come home, Dave asks, “Do you have it down yet?” He’s only half-joking. It’s a 2 year program but you can progress through the speeds and the fastest anyone’s finished is 18 months. That’s my goal. The program has a 75% drop-out rate. That’s not my goal. That’s not even an option. I really like it so far and I am already getting it down. Dave also likes to tease me about my lack of tact/poker face. He’s all, “You’ll either start crying if things are sad or you’ll stand up in court and point to the accused and yell ‘GUILTY’ .” Hah, hah.


So here’s my day now…..


I work from 2:30-11p and go to bed. In the morning I wake at 6:45a to make the commute to school, I get there at 8a and set up to practice; I have class from 8:30a-1:30p. I haul ass home to sign into my computer for work by 2:30p. That’s M-W, I have class on Thurs also but that’s one of my days off, so I’ll be staying after class to practice.


I figured out how I can practice while working but I need another outlet so I’ll be adding to the 10 octopi already under my work desk. I also figured out that I can work an extra 6 hours a week to make up the gas money. Dave’s all, “You are NOT going to want to work another 6 hours a week!” and I countered with, “Well, you don’t’ want to mow anymore but we can’t afford to hire the employees we had last year. We all have to make sacrifices, you more than any of us, Dave. I’ll be fine.”


Another sacrifice is my Sunday knitting group. We meet every Sunday morning for about 4 hours or so. We switch off, one week in HR, where I live, the next in Parker, where I used to live. I won’t be making the Parker ones anymore. The cost of gas alone, combined with my weekly commute gas bill…. I have to cut the Parker meets. Sucks but it will give me more time to practice or to jump on for a few extra hours at work.


There is another student making the same commute and I’ve approached her about car-pooling but she’s all skittish about it and while she’s said yes, I’m having a difficult time pinning her down to it. I don’t know if it’ll work anyway since I have to leave so fast after work. I’m afraid I’ll have to change my schedule from 2:30-11p to 3-11:30p which is going to be less sleep and suck more.


I’m adding a donation box to my blog. I know some people object to those but they don’t have to use it and it’s my blog so I’ll do as I please here, right? Hah! If you like what I write and you feel like you wanna.... it's on the bar of stuff on the left. If anyone wants to buy about $30K in debt (at 10%, $250 a month payments) let me know. (Riiiiiight.) Or if anyone has a tiny car that sips gas or a motorcycle (and a few lessons) that I can borrow for a couple of years, let me know (riiiiiiiight). I’m going to start doing some other things to up my Stitch Saver business and any other (legal) thing I can think of to add income to our little debt the size of China.


Somewhere in all that, I’ve got to schedule time to practice, practice, practice to get through the speeds (and therefore, school) as quickly as possible to get out in the work force. Oh yea, and see the boys a few minutes per day.


I’ll miss my little guys most, Ruth!

I is for Insecure

T is in choir. He heard about it last Sep. and wanted to join. The day before the first rehearsal, he came home and said, “I don’t want to do it.” I asked what happened and he said that the choir from last year sang at assembly and he just didn’t want to be in it anymore. I asked, “Why? Were they really bad or really good?” He said they were really good. I said, “Are you nervous or scared you won’t be that good?” and he nodded. I told him, “T. You should still try it. The beauty of choir is that, even if you aren’t that great, they teach you how to be better! And who knows, maybe you’re already pretty good! The thing is, you’ll never know if you don’t at least try it.”


He was still skeptical so I told him a little secret, “Little Man, you have music in your heritage. Oma [my mom] plays piano and organ and she was in choir all through high school and college! She even has a record of her college choir and she has this really great solo in it. Her dad used to write music and had several songs published! I played flute in elementary school and jr. high. Music is already a part of you!”


That convinced him.


I said he should go to the first two rehearsals and if he didn’t like it he didn’t have to participate. Then we had a little life talk… I told him how awful it would be to go through life being too scared to try things he really had an interest in. I explained that without taking risks, he’ll miss out on a lot of fun and all the things he may truly love! I also grounded it in a touch of reality that there were going to be things he tried that he wouldn’t like, sometimes even things where he’ll fall flat on his face! But without trying different things, he’ll never know which way he wants to go in life. (I left out the part about me not liking the flute and how I really/still wanted to learn the piano.)


He went to the first practice, had a blast and is still in choir. He isn’t crazy about getting up so early to go to practice before school, but he’s still with it and I’m very proud of him!




T is the one to the left of the really blonde kid in the front row. Sorry for the craptastic pic's, we are still trying to figure out our new camera. Here's T and D2 with T's choir teacher. (D2 is so silly!)





I have this friend who is absolutely fearless. She thought it would be fun to go sky-diving and she went. She has over 100 jumps now. That led to a job in aviation and then she thought, "That looks like fun!" and got her pilot's license! As far as I can tell, if she thinks something would be interesting, she just up and tries it. That's crazy to me! I'm so jealous!


It takes me years to get to a point where I'm comfortable enough to try something I want to do. It took me 2 years to call the massage school to even see if they take the GI Bill. A simple yes or no and I could've started my life a lot earlier! Of course it was yes and I signed up a week before my class started. So lame!


I've recently conquered (well, attempted anyway) a knitting fear. I've said for years that I'm going to learn fair-isle. I have 2 projects on my list for this year that involve fair isle. They are both small-ish and I finished the first one last week. It came out OK, not perfect by any stretch but here it is....




(Wow, my new camera really does suck ass! Anyone know how to work a Nikon Cool pix?)


Anyway, I want my kids to be fearless and try anything and everything that interests them! Not in a flaky, can't-decide-what-I-want-to-do-with-my-life kind of way, but in a I'm-finding-what-I-love way. As I talked about in the last post, I'm trying to make some changes to set the example. More on that in the next post....


Fearlessly diving into the breach, Ruth!

H is for Hoarding

I come from a short line of pack-rats. My mom and her mom are/were pack-rats. (My grandma was #11 out of 12 kids so I can't imagine her mom keeping anything that couldn't be considered a hand-me-down!
I have watched that Hoarders show exactly once. It's so crazy! And the people on that show have SO much stuff that I don't feel like a pack-rat at all. I feel like I have an adequate amount of junk and that I am perfectly normal. I know I have definite Hoarder tendencies but I do my best to keep them in check if for no other reason then I don't want my kids to end up like me! I see T heading that way already. Every toy, rock, bit of clothing, book, etc. that he's ever owned or laid eyes on will be his forever. I was making them clean their room and I held up a small plastic cup and asked who it belonged to and T said it was his. I asked if I could toss it and he got all mopey about it. I made him toss it.


I'm waiting for the day when they do what I did to my mom. When I was 11, my mom was hassling me about my messy room and wanted me to clean it. Without saying a word, I took her by the hand and led her in to her own room and presented her space. It was like a cyclone hit in there. I had a tornado and she had a cyclone. She laughed and made a deal where I never had to clean my room unless hers was clean. (I never had to clean my room much.)


So back to that Hoarders show.... They focused on 2 women, one who lives alone and one who's 16 year old son called Child Services on her because he could no longer get to his bed for all the crap she was hoarding.


The first woman had a 3 bedroom house, so all totaled..... about 6 rooms in the house. She travelled a lot with her job and whenever she traveled she was well and when she was home she was very sick. When the clean-up crew showed up, in the first day, with the first 3 rooms, they removed FIVE TONS of stuff! Five. Tons.

Her house had those little hoarder trails throughout. A thin line into the kitchen where the fridge and all the cabinets were blocked with stuff. A small trail to a bathroom where the shower and sink were completely inaccessible (she could still use the toilet though!). A sliver of floor into a bedroom where she slept on a small, hard chair because the bed was buried. There was about 2 inches of mouse crap in drifts under all that stuff they took from those first three rooms (no wonder she's sick when she's home,right?).


They had the woman outside and the clean-up man showed her a children's board book and asked if she even knew anyone with a child that age anymore. She said she would find someone to give it to. Then he said, "No. What family is going to allow you to give this book to their toddler?? It's covered in rat feces and urine." She said, "I can clean it up!" He said, "No. You can't clean urine off a book." He finally convinced her to let him throw it away.


It was tooth and nail the whole time and after three days, the clean-up guy finally gave up and told the therapist that the lady was no where near ready to let them finish the job. I think the final straw for clean-up guy was when they got through the first three rooms and uncovered a door. A whole 'nother room, they didn't even know about. They opened the door and behind the door was floor-to-ceiling stuff. You couldn't get in the room! It was full of things from Home Shopping Network - most still in the shipping boxes! One of the boxes had a $600 set of pots and pans when they opened it. It was under so many things that some of the pots had actually collapsed under the weight and the set was useless. Wild.


The other woman (the one who's son turned her in) had 2 grown daughters that live within a coupla miles from her. When it was clean-up day, the woman had a panic attack and she started tearing in to her daughters, mostly about the fact that they never visit and bring their toddler children (her grandkids) to visit even though they live so close. One daughter said, "Mom. Last time we brought them, Sally was nearly crushed by falling bins! You call and it's always the same argument how you have all this stuff and we never help you. There's TWENTY people here today and their sole purpose is to help clean up and you won't let them." Mom said, "You need to read your bible."


Wow. Just..... wow. I'm guessing she was referring to the honor your parents or respect your elders bits of the Bible but I'm quite sure (I'd lay money) that she pulls out that little gem every time she's losing an argument.


She finally let them clean out her house and was all overjoyed and felt so much "lighter and happier" and vowed never to go back to that way of life again. And 6 months later, her son had to call Child Services on her again.


We were watching a CSI episode that also dealt with a hoarder as their primary story line. The hoarder in the episode was a highly organized hoarder and all her stuff was in matching bins! After we saw the episode, Dave looked at me and said, "Doesn't that make you want to get rid of some of your stuff?" (He's always harping on me to get rid of my stuff.) I said, "No. It makes me want to buy more bins!!"


I actually am going through my bins in our garage. When we moved from Parker, to where we are now, we moved into a smaller place. We went from a 3 bedroom, 2 car garage, finished partial basement house to a 1 car garage, 2 (large, master-bedroom-sized) bedroom, no basement townhouse/condo thing. 90% of my yarn and a bunch of other miscellaneous stuff has been generously housed at a friend's house in Parker since September 2009.


There are things in our garage that I want in our house but it's hard to find the room. The boys have 2 small bookcases in their room. One actually holds books, the other holds treasures. I made them move the treasure so I could give them the set of children's classics that I received as a gift when I was in 3rd grade. I want them to have them (have access to them) while they are still young enough to really enjoy them.


Other then that, it's time for me to go through all my stuff and start making some hard decisions.


But wait.... is it that time yet? I remembered that Dave has this little mobile home that we own as part of his business. It used to be the office but we moved the office stuff to our home (partly because it's just more convenient, mainly because that little house has no bathroom), so now it sits on the property he rents to store his equipment and we even pay $30/month extra for it to have electricity we rarely use. It has 2 big office spaces and one smaller room. We had a bit of an argument about it. He says he's put stuff in those rooms and there's no room for more. After some angry back and forth (mostly him telling me to get rid of some crap; mostly me saying it's my crap and I shouldn't have to get rid of it if I didn't want to), he agreed to move some stuff around so I can put some things there. I figure it can be my pay for being the secretary for his business.


Dreaming of matching bins, Ruth!

G is for Goals

Last year [2009] I didn't do nearly as much reading as I am normally capable of. I didn't even do the R.I.P. Challenge this year [2010]. I think I read maybe 7 books in 2010. Another goal in 2011 is a lot more reading.

Here's my book list so far:
Forest House - Marion Zimmer Bradley (started this a few days ago)

Hansel and Gretel

Dark Tower V - Stephen King

The Kiss - Katherine Harrison

Poisonwood Bible - Barabara Kingsolver

Fatal Cure - Robin Cook

You Suck and Bite Me - Christopher Moore

Frankenstein - Mary Shelley (R.I.P. Challenge)

Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert A. Heinlein (R.I.P. Challenge)

Daywatch - (R.I.P. Challenge)

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies - (R.I.P. Challenge)

I also want to read more plays so I'm going to read at least one play each from my favorite playwrights - Shakespeare, Tennessee Williams, and Oscar Wilde.



OK, I wrote the above a few days before the new year and I am still trudging through Forest House. It's not bad, but it's just not really grabbing me and last night, when I realized it's March and I still have over 200 pages left!, I think I might do something I NEVER do. I think I might actually put it down for a bit and crank out a couple other books.



I definitely want to crank out the Christopher Moore books and maybe a play or two and that may jump start me getting back to reading.



I hate putting a book down. I can't stand not knowing the end of the story even if the story sucks.



Forest House does not suck. It's really quite good but it's sort of the same as Mists of Avalon in that everyone is being used by older people with political agendas and no one seems to have any choices.



I did read a book last year that was almost sucky. I don't want to say the name of it because if it was at all my cup of tea, it probably wouldn't have been sucky. It was a "cozy" mystery so no blood or guts and it was all very sanitary. I don't much care for sanitary. There were over 200 pages and by page 30 I knew who was going to die, how they would die, who killed them and what the motive was. I was wrong about the way the victim died and half-right about the motive. Blah.



Sometime last year, or maybe even the year before, I completely lost my reading mojo. I used to be insatiable with books. I watch a ton of TV and movies but I always read, too, but lately, I just don't ever feel like reading. It makes me sad because I feel like I'm losing something I once loved.

My knitting goals are coming along. I finished a WIP pair of socks and a bath mat I started 3 years ago, I've made about 6 hats, 2 pickle ornaments and I'm making progress on two sweaters. I throw in a bunch of little stuff here and there to make myself believe I've finished lots of things.

One of the things I did to help with my knitting goals was to make a list of what to work on each week:
Monday - Hats
Tuesday - Socks
Wednesday - Socks
Thursday - Dealer's Choice
Friday - Sweaters
Saturday - Sweaters
Sunday - WIP/UFO's

I know it seems like a special piece of crazy but it's really working for me! And it's not set in stone, if I want to work on something non-hat on Monday, I do.

My health goals haven't even been attempted. I was working out like crazy for 8 months, I lost 20 pounds and 2 sizes but I hit a wall and haven't worked out in months. I bought a size 12 pair of pants at Old Navy (yay!) and they are already a bit loose (double yay!). No explanation for it other then maybe because I quit grazing all the time, I'm still losing weight?

In anticipation of this year's Alphabet Soup, I started this post and a couple others at the end of last year. Just wrote down ideas for letters and a line or two to remind me what I wanted to write about. When I wrote this one initially, it was all full of promise and hope, but as March rolls around and I see where I'm at, it's ending with a bunch of Fail. That's not depressing at all.

A bowl full of sunshine, Ruth!