Show me the money!

Being the last day of the month, this means my renter owes me 950 smackeroos tomorrow. This definitely adds to my good mood.

Happy Leap Day

Not only is it leap day but it's Friday, yay! Reasons for my good mood - not only is it Friday but it's snowing... and I'm going to RO first after work so I don't have to take my normal route home (which is a nightmare, only one way to go). I miss having 15 different ways to get home and I miss driving home through upscaleness.

Oh RO, let me count the ways I miss you.

1) my hair salon (do I need to say more?)

2) the downtown RO restaurants

3) the shopping

4) the parents - ok scratch that, turns out I don't miss them so much

5) the movies

6) the post office (that actually delivers mail on time)

7) my manicurist

8) people

Yes - people. There are actually people out and about and a bustling downtown area. Imagine that. I actually run into neighbors while I'm shopping and they ACTUALLY say hi!

Justifiable Homicide

Dear Husband,
Don't get me wrong, I love you to death. With that said (your favorite phrase), you can be the most inconsiderate human.

When I'm about 3/4's of the way through watching Idol and you come in the room with your 9 yo daughter and grab the remote while she says "what else is on" and you flip it to Deal or No Deal, that may end up being where you meet your death. I thought this went without saying but I guess I was wrong.

This bizarre tendancy to put me in a situation where you ask me to tell you it's wrong (like your
12 and not 47) in front of said 9 yo is a crafty manipulation - cudos on that.

I'm pretty sure that nobody will be punished for your death because in our current judicial system, this constitutes justifiable homicide.

I have learned to live with your inconsiderate bathroom habits, your ability to eat $100 worth of food in 3 days then complain when there is nothing to eat, or the fact that the noise
of me cleaning up your mess in the kitchen while I'm supposed to be on my way to work bothers you while you are working...

but THIS - is not acceptable.

ps: using "um" after every third word during a work conference call is not a positive trait.

Love,
Wife

Work it out Wednesday

My friend Ashley is addicted to Fly Lady. I think today is Work it out Wednesday. Ok. I plan to figure out a way to partition off my food in the refrigerator. If I don't have my Healthy Choice fudge bars I will kill someone. Also, why am I the only one who goes to the grocery store? I know this man had groceries before we were married? Something doesn't seem right.

My mom quite possibly has Alzheimer's. Seriously. My sister is trying to figure out a way to tackle this. I guess this is on her Work it out Wednesday list. Also, mommy dearest is getting spinal injections for pain. She doesn't even know what condition she is being treated for. My guess is osteoarthritis has reached a critical point. My sister thinks it may be even more serious and her back may start breaking.

I missed Princess' play at school last night. She was Mozart. I was looking forward to this. Why do they schedule these things at 6:30? By the time I left work at 5:30, there was ice on the roads to deal with. It took me an hour and a half to get home. I'm not sure if Princess is upset or not but I will see tonight. According to her mother she was supposedly near tears because I wasn't there. I've learned to take what her mother says with a grain of salt (or less). Hopefully I will have a Princess as Mozart picture to post later.

The baby fish are getting big. We cleaned out the fish tank last weekend and the swamp mess is now clean! I don't care what anyone says, the fish are happy. Now Oliver can see the fish better. He looks at me like "this show comes in so much better now". He is a goofy cat, I love him.

Haven't heard from my new renter (Janet). I need to stop calling her my renter. Mr. Right reminded me of the Eddie Murphy skit "cil my landlord cil my landlord".... "C I L my landlord". The biggest part of her move was last Saturday.

I'm going to treat myself to a new haircut at my RO salon on Friday so I will do a drive by on the house and a little stalking. I know, I just got my hair cut. I actually don't so much like it. Looks a little too republican for me. Need to go in a different direction (ie. back to the way it was). I feel like I have a bowl on my head.

Mr. Right said something this morning about going to Texas in April. I don't associate Texas with fun but he said it will be fun. This is work related and right away I'm suspicious that it is one of those 'come on down and work here yall' field trips. It's a weekend. It includes kids??? WTH? I was excited until I found out it wouldn't be a dirty couples weekend. They said something about daycare. Yeah right. I can just see Princess sitting in daycare (the Texas version of day care where they beat your kids into submission) while we go off and do something fun. Riiiight. That will happen. It was nice of Mr. Right to explain what the weather in Texas is like in April (as if I didn't live there for a year). I had to smile. Yeah, it's not hot in April, uh huh. Last time I checked, April is when grass cutting starts here and when I start to forget about winter. Last time I was in Texas in April I
just about threw myself off a bridge because I thought I would fry :) Why can't they plan these things for when northerners really need a winter break?

I am officially a slum lord!

I am supposed to meet my renter tonight at my house at 6:15 pm to give her the keys.

I tried every way I could think of to avoid having to do this hand-off in person, I even tried to get her to pickup the keys via an unlocked door by herself.

Second thought, that didn't seem like a good idea.

I just have this problem with crying in front of people I don't know.

The act of handing somebody the keys to my house so they can LIVE there will feel like ripping my heart out.

Will she appreciate those wood floors I had done?

Does she care that the back room took me two months and one strange friendship with a Ukranian man to complete?

Does she know what it's like to try to sleep in while there are 5 guys walking around on your roof pounding in new shingles?

Was it her that stood there and watched a back hoe dig the side yard up and pour cement?

Did she hospice her sick old cat for two years in that house?

Does she have anything to do with all the perennials and miscellaneous plants in the front?

Was it her OCD that made her trim every blade of grass every single Saturday every single summer? Nope.

Does she care that I spent $250 on that stupid mission porch light?

Did she surf the web for days looking for just the right mailbox to fit in an impossibly small but that's where I want to put it spot?

Did she wait all day for some guy to show up and hookup the new gas fireplace?

Was it her that cleaned up after the 'we clean up after our jobs' plumbers when they put in all new copper and a hot water heater? Uh, no.

Did she wonder what the hell the guy meant when he said he had to put his snake in her main drain?

Was it her that celebrated by dancing around the entire house at 2am after kicking out her dead beat omg we've been divorced for a year already get the hell out ex-husband?? No, I don't think so.

Will she make new memories in my house? Probably.

Will I cry every time I hear about it? Yep.

Will I fall apart if she tells me she went to the Palladium to see a movie then ate dinner at Little Tree? Yes.

Will she thank me when she blows all her money because she lives 10 minutes from my mall? Probably not.

Instead of harboring any hatred, I decided that I will take her rent checks and deposit them. I am even going to leave a bottle of champagne in the refrigerator for her big move in.

Maybe she won't see thru me.

She keeps telling me how excited she is. Yeah I bet you are sweetheart. No, you can't use the back room as your bedroom stupid.

I bequeath to her the stalker dude from 2 doors down. Oh come on, he is harmless!

I just hope I can control my overwhelming urge to move her couch to the right spot because you know she won't put it where it belongs :)

I love President's Day!

Happy President's Day to all my fellow Fed workers! These holidays are a perk I don't think I could ever give up. I like to use each one to shop a really cool find. This one is my IKEA wine rack. It is stainless steel so it looks so AWESOME next to my stainless fridge. Ok, I put Pellegrino bottles in it for now. I normally have about 6 bottles of good wine around the house. I don't like to keep too much because we don't drink it fast enough. Our trips up north to wine country usually mean a day of wine tasting and a house full of really good wine. Anyone who says that wine has to be made from grapes is crazy. Some of the best wine comes from cherries. Now I have seen wine being made from other fruits as well, like papaya.

This weekend was crazy around the house. We gave the house a heart transplant (new furnace). Why does it seem like it's always something? P is QUITE the handyman, he installed it with his brother (who is a furnace installer). This furnace we got is very efficient. Since I am so sensitive to airborne allergens, I can tell there is a definite improvement in the air quality. The furnace that was removed was totally shot. Just in time because although it was 50 yesterday, we are in for a cold week. I feel bad for my renter who is moving later this week (but I will still take her check!).

Princess' Excellent Ski Adventure

Princess absolutely loves to ski. Here she is going over a hill (and showing off a little). Alpine Valley is about a mile from the house. Since this week is winter break, Daddy took her skiing a few times. ALL day. I think Daddy is getting too old for this? Nah! She wiped out today and everyone thought she broke her leg. It must be nice to be 9 and get back up after taking a hit like that and move on.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Mr. Right personally delivered these to my office today. If
you knew how close his work is to my
building, you wouldn't be surprised. For dinner we took Princess to dinner. She seemed really excited that it was Valentine's Day. Mr. Right got her a gift and I think that made her very happy for some reason. It's probably nice to know that I don't get ALL of the attention :) On the card next to the flowers it says "asking you to marry me is the smartest thing I ever did". Alot of the guys around the office were barfing all day.

The annual Sock Hop

Princess was really excited for the annual sock hop last night at her school. Of course the conversation went a little like this -

Me "so lets go to BB to eat dinner first"

Princess and Daddy "but they have pizza there"

Me "I don't eat that crap"

Princess and Daddy "but it starts now"

Me "fine"

cut to at the sock hop -

Princess "I'm starving"

Daddy "there is no food here". When will they ever listen to me? Probaby never. This is Princess on the left with one of her best buds Samantha (right).

Love my curtains

I love these curtains... Americanblinds.com is the best! Yes, that is a snow storm you see out the window. Daddy and Princess are going skiing tomorrow. Princess is VERY excited. I am too - to have some alone time. You can see how we have large evergreens for privacy all around the back yard. I don't think P really had an appreciation for these trees but I know this is AWESOME. Especially when it snows, so pretty. Lots and lots of privacy. After living in a bedroom community, you come to appreciate privacy.

My living room furnitue

It is really weird on my brain to see my living room furniture here. I looked at my house for 13 years. Of course P is like "huh what it's furniture".

Whatever.

Baby Daddy

I'm pretty sure the orange and black fish you see here is the baby daddy. He follows the yellow tail molly around constantly. I did think she had a fat belly for a while there, but it didn't really register because I thought we had all females. Typical. The babies are pretty small right now, but I will be watching to see what they look like, which should definitely point me in the direction of the dirty little boy :)

We have babies!

The other night, P was checking out the fish tank and low and behold... we have babies! Uh, I thought we had all female fish but obviously somebody was wrong and there is a boy in there. P had to remind me that I'm a liberal and these things happen, but I still am keeping my eye out for the culprit. Oliver loves to sit his head on his paws on the side of the tank and watch the fish from above. I can tell he is thinking the babies would make excellent sushi.

Moving Day

Well, the day has come to move the rest of my furniture from my house. Since my renter will be moving in February 21st, it's time to get all the furniture I had left for staging moved. This means I also have to decide what to get rid of. Now I have a better idea of what new things I need to buy :) Luckily, my renter wants me to leave my dining room furniture. It doesn't really go at the new house, but I didn't want to get rid of it either, and I had no place to store it. I will probably leave a few other things in the basement too. I still have to go back to clean and to pack a few more boxes of small things. The basement had accumulated 13 years of crap!

Where is his red hair?

Under the cap, that's where.

I'm officially old - I'm a Great Aunt!

Yesterday morning, baby Isaac decided to show up. I ran over to the hospital from work to see him. He has red hair!!! These pictures were taken with my phone (not bad). My neice pushed for about 14 minutes and he was born. She looks great. I can hardly wait to see him with his eyes open. He had a rough morning so he was taking a nap the whole time I was there. I didn't see him respond to other noises in the room, but whenever he heard mommy's voice, he would start to open his eyes a little. He is the cutest baby ever, looks perfect. Most babies are kindof ugly IMO, all scrunched up and kindof deformed. Not this kid. He looks perfect.