out of the office

see you in a few weeks.

alexander and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day

except my name isn't alexander. but i still had a terrible. horrible. no good. very bad day.

motherhood

a gift. that you can't return. or exchange. or get your money back for a refund.

check please

this morning i ran errands after wal-mart. at kohl's i was standing in line waiting. and waiting. because granny had to write a check. yes. i said write a check. and she was not only writing a check but she had to write the amount in the register. okay. it's one thing to still be writing checks. but to not have duplicate checks. that's just plain absurd. she could have better spent her time talking to me about how cool her hoover floormate was that she was buying. but instead had to waste her time. and mine. and i use the term granny because she wasn't one of those cute old lady help me across the street grannies. she was one of those in between grannies. one that should know better. next was barnes and noble. now all i was expecting to find here was a county by county map of indiana. but what i found was much better. a fifty percent off sale on all items with a white sticker. and since they were moving there were a lot of white stickers. so i get in line with an armload of things. none of which included the map i originally went there for in the first place. and i get behind none other than another check writing lady. the only thing that would have made it better is if she had a mullet.

brown belt, brown belt what do you see?

earlier this week my husband went out of town. for two days. two. long. days. he got back very late thursday night. i had been sleeping nicely in our bed. until he came home. and started snoring. then i was sleeping nicely on the couch. i was even dreaming. i can't remember the last time i had a dream. as i was getting into my new hybrid with suicide doors from playing a softball game in the dark on the beach i opened my eyes to my husband standing in front of me. he was asking me where i put his brown belt. number one i didn't wear his brown belt so i wouldn't know where it is at. and number two so why was he waking me up asking me is what i was thinking. so i get up to help him look for it and he is tired. and in a bad mood. and still can't find his belt. now i am tired. and in a bad mood. and can't find his belt. i told him he would just have to wear his black belt. so when he gets home from work i noticed he had on a brown belt. i asked him if he found it. he said no. he just flipped his black one over to brown. just a thought but why didn't he think of that before he woke me up?

house of cards

when we moved ten miles south of common sense we decided to treat ourselves to new construction. we got a treat alright. i should have gone with my gut. after settling on a price we find out the builder insists that we can't move in until the 72 hours right of refusal is over. the way he acted was like he built the perfect house and it was our privilege to own it. we should have just forfeited our earnest money right then and there at the closing and ran. but we didn't. before we even signed papers i had an issue with our address. no one could find it in their system. because the listing agent put the wrong freaking address in his listing. i must have spent over a week arguing with utility companies trying to figure out why no one could find our address. so, after signing papers instead of spending the first night in our new home that we just gave him a check for we stayed in a hotel. after the 72 hours was up my husband stayed in the home until we moved our belongings two weeks later. with no hot water. in either shower. i can't remember why the plumber took so long for the repair but the cartridges in the shower handles were in backward. in both showers. apparently, he never ran the water after he installed them. genius. onto the appliances. now we scheduled the move two weeks after the papers were signed so we could get the water softener in place, utilities and appliances hooked up. so all we had to do was unpack. when the appliances arrived the dishwasher didn't fit. there was an outlet on the side of the cabinet that did not allow for the dishwasher to slide back far enough into the cabinet. it finally got fixed. well after thanksgiving. after four tries. four. plus, when they originally ran the water line it wasn't tight. so, water had been dripping from a pipe for months before we even moved in causing the floor of the cabinet to become bubbled from sitting water. the stove. i hope it never breaks. they literally had to squeeze the sides to get it to fit in it's space. and when they got it back as far as they could they couldn't push it back to the wall because the outlet was above the cord recess in the back of the stove. so, out it came. they flipped the outlet but it still sticks out from the wall. microwave. oh, the cabinets above didn't allow enough space. they forgot to put spacers on either side of the upper cabinet. so on the floor it sat. the refrigerator fit. barely. it squeaks when you pull it in and out of it's space. the trim around it varies from no space to a quarter of an inch depending on where you look. so, two weeks later when the movers came we had a dishwasher in the middle of the kitchen, a microwave on the floor and a refrigerator that couldn't dispense water. yeah. i went to get a glass of water the morning of the move and all i got was a horrific sound. and no water. i called the appliance store and they said to unplug it. they could get to us in the next day. uh, we have a freezer full of meat. okay, guy will be out that afternoon. in the meantime, cabinet guy is here to fix the microwave opening. just then, the movers get here. so now i have cabinet guy, refrigerator guy, dishwasher in the middle of the kitchen, microwave on the floor, movers putting things wherever it is convenient for them and now the stove needs to be pulled out for cabinet guy. good luck. all while i was home alone and my husband at work. just in case you were wondering we ordered standard sized appliances. and when the microwave was finally able to be placed it had a dent in the bottom from sitting on the floor. they were able to get most of it out. and i let it slide because you can't see it. and they were nice enough to come out at no charge. twice. next was the tape the movers used to protect the floor. they taped down flat cardboard boxes to protect the floors. it left strips of adhesive in more than a dozen places on the kitchen floor. the doorknobs on three doors did not latch properly and could be opened by pushing on them even though they were locked. including the service door to the garage which opened with each strong gust of wind. this was a nice feature especially in our bathroom. now with backyard neighbors, a bathroom door that faces the backyard and a two year old that has to turn on every light in the house. when you're on the can. the vinyl floor in both bathrooms is now coming up. the third stall garage was to be started the week after we signed the papers. it was to take four weeks. it is now march and it is now just getting finished. oh, but not without issue. of course. when they framed it it was raining. they quit that day at 3 pm. when i went out the next morning there was a flood in our garage. i am not sure why they left so early when they could have put the paper up on the roof. and prevented the flood. i don't think they actually started the garage until december. we signed the papers in october. after months of being incomplete earlier this week the cement got poured for the third stall driveway. they came and leveled the dirt and put the pad of cement in front of the service door. while doing that i was standing in our bathroom. i heard and felt a large thud. and then heard the words damn it. sure enough. went outside and they ran into the side of the house and now there is a huge hole in the siding. the service light is still not hooked up and now our cement is chipping in our driveway. the builder is telling us it is from road salt from off of our cars and parking on the driveway during the winter. well, i have a news flash. several of them actually. we don't normally park in our driveway in the winter. because it snows. but since it took them 4 months instead of 4 weeks to complete our garage we couldn't move our belongings in the third stall. they were in our two stall. not allowing us to put our cars in the garage. plus it made it real convenient with small children. because it started snowing about two weeks after we moved in and just stopped about a week ago. and if it was road salt everyone would have chipping in their driveway. but the funny thing is we never put any additional salt on our driveway. because i kept forgetting to pick some up at the store. so what little that would have come off of our cars could not have done that much damage. if any. he said we could seal the new third stall driveway so it wouldn't chip. okay. well, if he knew that salt chipped the cement why didn't he seal it when he built the house to prevent it in the first place. and if he didn't why didn't he mention it to us before the snow fell so we could have sealed it. oh, and another thing. my brother-in-law is a chemical engineer. for pgi. and they make cement fiber. and road salt has absolutely nothing to do with chipping cement. this is the longest hand of cards i have ever played. and i have a feeling it's far from over.

driving miss crazy

i have known my friend moho since the seventh grade. little did i know she would later try to kill me. three times. that i know of. the first time was on nurmi drive in midland. i am not sure why but it is the only drive within the city of midland that is still not paved. i don't remember the circumstance of our jaunt down this road in high school. i use the word jaunt because i am quite certain we were not obeying the posted speed limit of twenty-five miles per hour. anyway, before i knew it my feet were on the dashboard, we were spinning around and there was dust. everywhere. when the dust settled and the coughing stopped there was moho. bright, beautiful teeth grinning ear to ear and laughing that evil little giggle. i must not forget to mention we were in a chevette. yep. the smallest car ever made at the time. i am not sure if her parents ever drove with her. if they had i am sure they would have chosen a larger vehicle. the second time was, again, in high school. We had driven to saginaw to go shopping. or something. on the way back we were merging onto a highway. apparently, the car in front of us wasn't going fast enough for moho. so, she passes them. on the entrance ramp. going about one hundred ten miles per hour. in a chevette. the third and last incident that i am aware of took place in cadillac. on the ski hill. i am petrified of heights. petrified. moho assured me we wouldn't go up the big hill. i should have know better. she said this isn't the big one. but as we made our way up the slope i felt short of breath. because there is less oxygen when you get up that high. and it was the big one. surprisingly, i made it down the hill in one piece even though i was still shaking. and short of breath. from lack of oxygen. when we were at the bottom moho motioned for me to go over by her and try a run. the run with caution tape across it. the one that said do not enter. the one that hadn't been groomed since 1983. the one the chunks of snow were the size of basketballs. yeah. that one. i don't know how we made it through but we did. and we ended up at that same lift. the not so big one. and there was no where to go but up. the other day i was catching up with moho. she hasn't changed much. just a bigger car. she got a ticket in cleveland for aggresive driving. she ran not one but two stop signs in nashville. and ran another stop sign in baltimore. with her boss in the car. and this is just since the beginning of the year. yes, it's only march. she will always be my friend. but i refuse to let her drive when i am in the car. anywhere.