Past-Imperfect

Hello Yall

2009-11-06T03:50:15Z

Hello, yall. Sorry I've been so quiet here. October was full of car stuff, and I've written more over at the other place. Things are winding down with all that. My last event is an autocross on November 15th. And to do that, it was back to the shop with the car this week to repair a leaking fuel line. I don't even want to look at the cash I've poured into the car this year. Apparently, however much it is, it's been worth it!

I can't believe it's November and we're staring down the double-barrel of Thanksgiving and Christmas. Really? Already? Alrighty then. The tradition of Thanksgiving at our house will resume this year. DreamGuy's clan is down in numbers, so there's no need to rent the big place we've used the past couple of years. My sister and her kids are coming, as they have for many years running. I love having them here! I'm trembling at the idea of doing a huge full meal in this teeny kitchen. It'll work, somehow.

Speaking of work, yeah. It has been largely unpleasant. No big drama lately, but morale is at an all-time low, and people are turning on each other. It's really kind of sad what some people will do in service of their egos, regardless the impact. My annual apprai$al is coming up next month, and that should be a big ball of fun. Over the past year, my peers have had some pretty lousy, brutal, soul-crushing experiences, and they've all been around much longer than I have. It does not bode well. I've just spent the last week trying to get a document out and good lord it's been an insane process, mostly because the person I'm reporting to "doesn't do computers." Can you imagine? So annoying.

The news is blaring about the deadliest shooting ever at a military base. Fort Hood. So horrible. And that's all I'm going to say about that.

My calendar is already filling up with holiday events. The DreamGuy Family Christmas party, my Porsche club party at Barber Motorsports Museum, our office Thanksgiving and holiday parties. My thoughts still drift often to two years ago now, when my father went into the hospital two days after Christmas. I could hardly even remember what we did last year (Xmas eve at my sister's, Xmas day at DreamGuy's family home). I realize I've postponed the bulk of my grieving about my father, too.

That was an odd thing to learn, but we've been dealing with lawyers reviewing my dad's case for possible legal action, and when it looked like there was nothing to be done, I realized that all this time part of me has been on hold, continuing the same fight that started when my father was in the hospital and we realized he was dying before our eyes at the end of his nightmarish five-month hospitalization. That same fight goes on in this process, and the idea of it ending is...very difficult. The idea of it ending with some kind of consequences and sense of justice makes that only slightly better. Someday soon this fight will be over, and...I can hardly imagine it. It's been lurking there all this time, taking up more importance than I ever realized.

Wow could this be any more of a downer? Sure it could!

DreamGuy is once again unemployed. The dream job turned out to be a royal clusterfuck. I started getting really pissed paying the cell phone bill every month, swallowing hard over funding the business my husband worked for and which did not provide him any cell phone or phone allowance, yet which required him to have a cell phone. Hardly any travel expense reimbursement to speak of. Nor any kind of supplies (paper, printer ink, copying expense). All that came out of pocket, and let's just say that there have been many months when we spent more on that damned job than he brought in. Of course, they fucked him out of his last paycheck. Fuckers. Fuck them. So! DreamGuy is looking for work.

I'm doing the lab rat thing in that drug study, and it's going OK. I haven't noticed any side effects, which could either be because I'm not taking the real drug, or because if I am it's not causing me any side effects. My skin condition is minimally active right now, which could be because it's just that way sometimes, or because I'm getting the good stuff and it's working. I hate giving myself injections. They sting like bloody hell. And my friends, it's just no fun at all to take off all my clothes and every inch of my most nethery nether-regions examined under a bright light, every spot counted and described and measured. Every appointment. It takes a long time. And it's humiliating. But hopefully it'll do me some good, and the $25 I get per appointment lessens the sting ever so very, very slightly.

My finances are kind of a mess, and I find I'm having to do some extraordinary juggling. I have no business dumping money into my car, and I am kind of juvenile about it. I act out some of my anger by being, at bottom, irresponsible with what money I have, spending it on my car instead of paying bills. I get angry over things like DreamGuy getting a good lead on a job and then sitting on his ass and deciding he doesn't need to look for anything else. Because he is supposed to talk to this lady on Monday about this job that this other guy says is a great job. They aren't actually hiring, and they're a federal contractor and their contract is up in December and questionable beyond. And the job only pays sporadically. And involves lots of travel which is not reimbursed. And I work all day and come home and start dinner and DreamGuy? GOES OUT TO A BAR. Goofs off all day then goes out spending what little money he has investigating dive bars.

So I get my fuel lines replaced. Order the in-car camera. Buy the $75 tank of gas that I'll blow through in a day at an event. Whatever. He did some kind of land deal with his parents that yielded him some cash so he's no hurting. Months of paying everything have me in a hole. He has paid the utilities the last two months, and has otherwise been super stingy. I feel like he should feel some responsiblity to help me, but he doesn't. So I "help" myself. Ha.

Pat Metheny Alert! He's got some crazy "Orchestron" project, and he goes on tour next March when the CD will be released. Today, I ordered our tickets for the April 8th show at the Ferst Center at Georgia Tech. My 2010 birthday should be fun. Indy car racing is coming to Barber for the first time, and I think the big event is on my birthday, the 11th. I hope to be there.

Wow what a bunch of bitching and kvetching! Sorry, I don't know how to dress it up. I'm no Weetabix, no Mopie, no Dooce. I'm just me.

Before I go, let me poke you to go vote for the dogs every day! Yes, several times a day if you can. We are in third place right now, a hundred votes behind the leader. We have until the 9th. Please go vote - again!

Pimping the Pups!

2009-11-02T23:59:25Z

Is anybody still checking this thing? Sorry I've been such a total slacker. Catch-up to come soon. But first, I'm going to be all obnoxious and I'm going to pimp our pups! Rosie and Tess have entered a Dog of the Week contest sponsored by Kuranda Dog Beds. These are the beds I got back in the spring, the ones that have proven to be indestructible. Not only that, but Rosie and Tess really do love their beds. The vet said Rosie needed to have some support and be up off the floor for her bum knees, and we were never able to create that situation for her because they destroyed every bed we tried until these. If Rosie and Tess win the contest, a Kuranda bed will be donated to Birmingham TEARS in their name. And I think they win a fleece pad (wow, that will be interesting...). If you would be so kind, please go vote for Rosie and Tess for Kuranda Dog Bed Dog of the Week!

Click the pic to Vote!

Ghosty Things

2009-10-19T07:08:52Z

Often when we talk to people about how old our new house is, they make comments involving ghosts. "Wow, it must be full of ghosts!" or "Have you had any ghosts?" I've never thought much about that. I mean, when we looked at the place, I tuned in my super spidey ghost-sensing senses and determined that I didn't get any "bad vibes" anywhere on the property. Nothing gave me the creeps. That was enough for me.

Since moving in, there have been no strange footsteps in the night, chains in the attic, or shadows moving in the corner of my eye (which, in my personal experience, would more likely involve a small rodent than a ghost). Or there hadn't been.

Enter...the metronome.

I have this old Seth Thomas metronome. I forget where I picked it up, maybe at a yard sale, or from a friend, or a student. I have no clue anymore. It's kind of pyramid shaped, with a wood panel on the front that comes off. Under the panel is a plate with a bunch of numbers, and a long flat metal piece with a weight that slides up and down it. You release the metal piece from its little clamp on the top, and depending where the weight is positioned, it goes tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick tick at varying speeds. You use it to keep time when practicing music. These were replaced in the 1960s with big boxy electric metromes with a blinking red light, and more currently, with tiny hand-held things. I bet there's an app for that, actually. This one is probably fifty or more years old. Looks like this:

Anyway. The metronome. I stuck it on one of the bookshelves when I moved into my little upstairs office. I forget where I was the first time it started ticking on its own. I was upstairs somewhere. I just figured the cat attacked it, the panel had come loose and fallen off, and maybe that metal piece wasn't clamped down, the floors are super slanty in there and whatever, I clamped it, secured the panel, and put it back on the shelf. You can see it in this photo on the third shelf from the bottom, on the left side.

One night last week, I was here in the kitchen, with the TV on, doing a little tidying up. DreamGuy had just gone to bed. The TV had been left on in the den as well. A sound caught my ear, "tick tick tick tick tick...." and I turned off the TV. Then I turned off the den TV. Still with the tick tick tick. I followed my ears which led me up the stairs. "That sounds like the a metronome..." I thought, as I follwed my ears to my office. There was the metronome, on the shelf where I'd left it. The wood panel was laying on the floor and it was tick tick ticking away.

I clamped the metal piece, put the wood panel on, and returned it to the shelf. And that was the first time I wondered about the question of ghosts myself. I'll keep you posted.

Car Crush and Lab Rat

2009-10-06T23:51:37Z

Well I've gone and done it. I am signing up for a medical study which is testing a new drug for the treatment of Hidradenitis Suppurativa. As the study documentation says, there is currently no (NO, none, zip, zilch, nada) FDA-approved treatment for HS. This study may help to change that. The benefits of using this stuff look to be good, and they outweigh any side effects according to what's out there. For the first 26 weeks I may get a placebo, but for the last 26 I'll get the real thing. I spent today going from place to place getting all sorts of things checked out. It was exhausting, but I got it all done in one day straight through.

And I got my car checked out on a break between appointments over lunch. I've got a driver's ed event this weekend at the same track where I drove my very first track event last year. I'm really looking forward to it. Rumor has it, My Real Driving Coach will be there. I'm actually supposed to see him after work tomorrow to go for a ride-along. And then again Saturday at the driver's ed thing. My car checked out fine, and my replacement numbers should be here later this week.

Speaking of cars, I met my car crush today! There is this really neat purple VW Fastback that's been driving by since we moved here. I know the guy lives around here somewhere. I caught him at an intersection a few days ago and hollered across the street, "Love your car!" Finally today I saw him stopped near my house. I pulled over, got out and gawked. The owner is a young college kid and he's just had the car a few months. I'm guessing it's older than he is - it's a 1971. He didn't know much about it, but he confirmed that it's a rear-engine air-cooled car. It has the most awesome exhaust sound! Sadly I didn't get to hear it close up, since the owner had locked his keys into the car and was waiting for his dad to come rescue him with the spare key. In his VW Thing! Hahaha. Sorry I had to miss that.

Work sucks. I'll leave that right there.

DreamGuy is working hard but not reaping much benefit. He's looking to see what else might be out there. He's tired of volunteering at a for-profit company, and I sure can't blame him. I could use a break, frankly.

I had the best time at Road Atlanta, but the rain-out was a real bummer. I did get to shake Pat Long's hand, introduce myself, and get his autograph on my helmet, so that was great. The car I'm rooting for (Long's #45) had a chance to sew up the championship for the year, but that didn't happen. There's one more race this season - this coming Saturday, when I'll be out driving myself. I think it's going to be replayed on Sunday so that will be neat. Even though I'll know the results long before then. Much of this is set out in excruciating detail over at my car-centric blog. As if this is not that!

Well how boring is this? Sorry. It's a weird time. Not bad weird, just weird.

A Day at the Races

2009-09-28T06:15:28Z

It was awesome and I'm so glad I went. And I do not regret taking the 911, nor do I regret the cost and effort that went into getting it spiffed up before I left. Even though this is what my car looked like in the club corral about midway through Saturday:

Bunch of photos HERE.

And a video, just random video I shot strung together, no music, just sights & scenes from the weekend:

I'm whooped so I'm outta here.

Getting There From Here

2009-09-23T04:04:41Z

It's that time of year again, Petit le Mans at Road Atlanta. The weather is presenting all manner of challenges. You can't get there from here by interstate right now. Hopefully they'll be open by the time I head that way on Thursday night or early Friday morning. There are alternate routes, of course. But then I have to decide if I'm driving the sports car or the SUV. I can't get into the car corral or the club area or do parade laps unless I bring the sports car. I've got friends working the course and I'm waiting on a report about the grounds. If it's a bog, I may rethink the whole thing.

Otherwise I'll be having a big heap-o-fun at Road Atlanta this weekend. Woo!

Work sucks. Money is tight. The weather has been nuts and I've been battling ants driven indoors by all the rain. Did I mention that work sucks? Rough times there right now. Time and energy-sucking in a big way.

More to come as travel plans develop - or not.

sisterkatherine @ 2009-09-11T11:12:00

2009-09-11T16:39:54Z

My Tuscaloosa friend, Skip, put together this incredible slideshow memorializing his rescue and photography mission to NYC in the days after 9/11 Check it out. He did another one looking at it five years later.

Birthday Bandito

2009-09-01T06:46:09Z

Birthday Bandito

Well that's what I call a party! I wasn't able to find a suitable crown for DreamGuy, but I found this sombrero, and some mylar letters to smack on the front: "OLD". Hee! He also had a scepter kind of thing that has a button you can push and it makes the most awesome magic-y sound. It was very popular for all manner of uses over the course of the night.

I guess we had about fifty people here, but I think we ended up with beer and food for 150. So we had a LOT leftover. And I saved the catering containers and packed it all up to send home with my sister. Who ended up coming alone - the kids were back home for various reasons. The beer stayed here, and we're trying to figure out how to store it for the long haul.

A big crew of DreamGuy's work folks came, including his "blue-blood" boss and his sorority-Sue wife. They are so sweet in that proper Southern way, but that whole country club scene with its many traditional seasonal formal events is just...not us. They were typically sweet, though, and brought a huge bottle of nice champagne which we used to have several birthday toasts. A solid crew of maybe a dozen of our closest friends from T-town made the trip, and that was incredibly cool. We loved having some time with them. We had a few neighbors. None of my work folks, none of my car folks, though.

The cake turned out better than I could have imagined. I gave them my hand-drawn doodle, and as roughly-formed as the letters are, I swear it looks like they blew up my doodle and made a template out of it for the letters, including my crazy patterns that filled the biggest letters. I loved it, and it was de-licious!

Interestingly, my BestGalPal from Atlanta did not show up. I called her during the day on Saturday to find out about her arrival time. And she totally blew me off and didn't show up or call or text or anything. Until Sunday, when I got a text saying she'd emailed me about a work thing that came up and oops hope she didn't cause any problems! Well my sister did end up in a hotel room, but that was OK as she was here with her latest boyfriend and was happy to have her privacy.

And the guest room certainly did not go to waste - we had a houseful of people who crashed on every available horizontal surface. Two guys were going to sleep in their cars parked on the street, and I got them to pull into the gated back yard. The street out front is pretty busy, and a walkway for all manner of characters, as we know. So I woke up Sunday morning to a back yard full of cars, and a guy sleeping on three dining room chairs pushed together. Six pots of coffee and a tray of ready-made cinnamon rolls later, the last guest pulled out of here at noon.

The evening was not without its drama. One of our dearest friends tried to insist on leaving. She'd had way too many shots of tequila to make the hour-long drive home. We tried to get her keys, but she wasn't having that. So we had a slightly trailer-trashy moment where one of my gaybors was sprawled across the hood of her car yelling "open the hood! open the hood", and I was standing in the door on the driver's side trying to find the hood latch while keeping my friend from starting up. I got the latch open and another guy was at the ready to yank the battery cable loose. And then she burst into tears and said, "I have cancer and I have to go home and take my medicine!" and then things got seriously weird for a while. I ended up driving her home at about 1:30. She doesn't have cancer, but she does have a pretty serious illness and a pretty rigid medical regimen of treatment for it.

However. I think the "I must go home right now" part of it was mostly tequila-induced. As late as it was, I couldn't imagine that 4-5 hours would make that big a difference. It's not like she's sticking to the regimen anyway - she's not supposed to be drinking at all. Which none of us knew, of course. Anyway. I got her home and the party was still going strong when I got back at 2:30. The folks who remained moved to the back porch. Deck. Whatever. And they hauled the three huge coolers of beer back there, too, which was awesome, because I didn't want to leave them on the front porch overnight. DreamGuy was out by the time I got back, but I had plenty of company for another good couple of hours. And then there was the putting away of the food and the finding of the coffee pot and the "breakfast" prep for the morning.

It was a great night. But I'm glad to have it behind us! My husband is an OLD MAN, yall.

I've been crashing for long naps in the late afternoons/early evenings. I did that tonight, and woke up around midnight with the remains of dinner to deal with before I could go to bed. After cleaning all that up, I was wide awake. Of course! But I have a lot going on at work this week, starting tomorrow morning. So off I go!

Leftovers

2009-08-29T08:31:57Z

Click the pic for a guided tour of my fridge!

So there I was standing at the sink, painstakingly carefully peeling boiled eggs under running water, when my cell phone rang. It was my neighbor calling from the venue of the big charity event he'd attended. If I was willing to come get it, a boatload of beer leftover from the event was mine. They had already called earlier to tell me not to buy flowers - they were bringing me the centerpieces to flower up my house for the party. Oh, and I might want some of the food, too.

Do I have the best neighbors in the world or what? I grabbed my keys and got to the venue in about ten minutes. I called for directions to the loading dock, and there they were, loading beer from the serving bins into coolers which they put into the back of my car. The floral centerpieces were already boxed up and waiting, and those were loaded up, too. Then they took me to check out the food.

One of the best Mexican restaurants in town had catered the dinner, and there were huge catering tins full of queso, salsa, taquitos, stuffed jalapeno poppers, and tri-colored tortilla chips. There was no way I could cram all this into my fridge, and of course, they offered to put some in their fridge for me. I got a tin of each, along with a massive tray of wrap sandwich rounds. And some other stuff, I don't even know what-all.

They helped me get everything into the house, and then the real fun began. Where the holy fucking hell was I going to put all this stuff. Slightly more complicated, where the holy fucking hell was I going to set all this up to serve for the party? I'd already gotten all my platters and serving bowls out and placed things according to my little plan. I started by getting everything put away, no easy feat, and took to the porch to rework the party food plan.

No way everything will fit in the dining room, and I think the best way to serve the queso will be to put it in my big crock pot. So I'll set up the big tins of stuff on the island in the kitchen, with the crock pot plugged in at the end near the wall. The sandwiches, veggie and fruit trays, cheese and crackers, chips and dip will go on the dining room table. I've still got to think through the drink service. I think we'll put coolers full of beer on the front and back porches, and put sodas, ice and cups on the sideboard in the dining room. Still have to think this through - and maybe add a table, because there's got to be room for the big-ass cake.

So yeah, I have the best neighbors in the world. Or, as they told me they prefer to be called, "The Best Gaybors." Oh. Have I told you about the TV show I'm writing? It's going to be called "Meet the Gaybors." It's me and DreamGuy and our neighbors sitting on the front porch. The premise is that people will come by with their friend they think might be gay, and we'll check them out. We will just have casual conversation on the porch. But if any of us thinks the person is gay, you'll see all sorts of special effects thingies going off over our heads on TV. The person being assessed will not be aware that they are being checked out for gayness, of course.

This show could never happen because of the obvious liability issues, but DreamGuy and I had fun sitting on the porch working out the whole concept, and our neighbors got a huge kick out of the idea. They keep calling and texting with suggested show names. I had originally thought "Gaydar Love," with "Radar Love" as the theme song. Can't you just hear it? "We've got a thing..that's called...Gaydar Love." "Meet the Gaybors" would need some sort of Leave it to Beaver-type them song, I think. Anyway I'm not wild about either of these titles. Suggestions welcome!

I told them I was going to make big banners for them to wear at the party saying, "Best Neighbors in the World," to which one of them responded, "Best GAY-bors in the world. If I'm wearing a banner, it better say GAY-bors!"

Downhill Slide

2009-08-27T04:38:32Z

The weekend in Atlanta was great. The weather could not have been more perfect - 80's, breezy, and low humidity. Well, low as it can be after the torrential rains Friday night. That was one hellish drive, complicated by our attempts to circumvent stretches of interstate slowed down by lane closures and construction. Both times, we ended up bailing out, and backtracking to return to the interstate.

But that aside, it was a great weekend. Wonderful to see our friends at our usual B&B, and fun taking DreamGuy from place to place in East Atlanta and Little Five Points to enjoy some nice meals. DreamGuy definitely got his drink on, and we somehow managed to pick up a cute lesbian bartender along the way. Ha! Well she was our bartender at one place we stopped, and then we were at dinner when she walked up to where we were sitting at the patio bar. Turns out she was there to meet her girlfriend who was a waitress at this place. They were fun (drunk) company for a while.

So now it's all about the big party this weekend. I've just gotten all my obsessive lists together. Of course, I started out saying I was going to keep it simple, no cooking. Except deviled eggs. Over the week, add to that hummus, pasta salad, and baked brie. My sister and her kids arrive Saturday afternoon. My best Atlanta girlfriend and her hubby will arrive also. They're all staying here. I got the last of the "must do" fix-it things taken care of yesterday, and the house got a good cleaning today. I'll try to get most of the shopping done tomorrow (Thursday) night, and most of the cooking done on Friday afternoon. Saturday I'll have to get the cake, ice, and balloons.

We've had maybe 30 folks respond to the eVite that they are coming. And probably that many more who've emailed and called to say they're coming. I'm thinking we should expect 75-100 people. It's hard to tell. But it's shaping up to be a great gathering of friends. I designed the cake myself, and had planned to bake it and execute the design myself. But I bailed on that at the last minute when my idea outgrew my personal skillset. Me taking my first foray with fondant for DreamGuy's 50th birthday cake = recipe for disaster. I've left it to the professionals! It's coming from a bakery known for their delicious cakes, and this one will be all chocolate.

So I feel like a celebrity, what the the mention on internet rock star Robyn's site and all. Woohoo! I was up in her neck of the woods on Monday, chasing witnesses hither and yon, with marginal success. I had gotten in touch ahead of time to arrange to get some eggs and a couple of their home-grown and home-processed chickens. I almost called Robyn last night as I was putting a chicken casserole together. That is some yummy chicken! Even stewed, it's a little more stout than store-bought commercially processed meat. But it tastes great, and I like knowing where it came from. Thanks Fred & Robyn! Hey if I had known you had cherry tomatoes on the premises, I'd have knocked you over to get to them! It's been a slow summer for tomatoes. Oh and I have to say - Jake and Elwood? ADORABLE. I guess all kittens are adorable, and really, how do you keep from complete and total adorable kitten overload??

Little Road Trip

2009-08-21T23:05:57Z

We're off to Atlanta for the weekend. Watch the flickr page for photos uploaded from the road. Assuming we see something worth capturing - we always seem to. Catch you on the other side!

Another Place

2009-08-18T03:02:06Z

Well howdy, yall. I've not been around here much, have I? It's been a busy time. And in my "spare" time, I have actually been writing in another venue. I've been there a little more often than here lately.

The Crooked Acres eggs were a big hit, served deviled-style at my office party on Friday night. That's the first of two parties in two weeks here. On the weekend in bewteen (this coming weekend) we're going to Atlanta. On the 29th, we're having a 50th birthday bash for DreamGuy, and an open-house kind of thing to celebrate and share our new digs. The Crooked Acres Chernobyl Cherry Jam was a big hit also, by the way, served atop a baked brie en croute. De-lish!

I'm trying to get more sleep, so I'm just popping in here to say hello. Hello!

Crooked Acres

2009-08-03T03:51:32Z

Bella asked in the comments if I was going to stop at Bitchypoo-land while I am up there in the coming weeks. Been there, done that! I was just there in the past week or so, and Robyn was, as always, the consummate hostess. We took a walk about the grounds, I got some George & Gracie lovin, and we watched some chicken-sex. Awesome! ha! I'd gone up under the pretense of buying some eggs (aigs!). I really did need some eggs, but I needed a break from my crazy work schedule up there even more. Nothing like rocking on the Crooked Acres front porch, glass of iced tea in hand, listening to chicken sex.

Did I hand Robyn the camera to take a picture of me? No, I did not. Did I include Robyn in the picture I took? Why no, I did not. Could I have been making a dopier face when I took this photo? Yeah, probably.

I've been experimenting in the kitchen and this weekend's project was a winner I am definitely going to call Figgy Piggy. Let's see if I can put the actual recipe together:

FIGGY PIGGY

4 pork chops, 1.5", with a pocket cut into each

STUFFING
12 small fresh figs, chopped fine
1/2 c bread crumbs
1 T cherry habanero jam
1/4 c yellow onion chopped fine
2 T green onions chopped fine
1/4 c mushrooms chopped fine
1/2 c mild cheese, finely shredded
1/4 t each fresh ground salt & pepper
1/4 C walnuts, chopped fine
2 T butter, softened
1 T ea fresh thyme, basil, rosemary, your choice one, all or none
Mix above together until it just holds shape in your hand; adjust butter more or less to get it to form into a ball or patty

Divide the stuffing into 4 portions and stuff each chop with a portion. Season chops liberally on each side with salt & pepper. Heat 2T oil in a skillet and sear the chops, about 2 min on each side. Place chops into baking dish and bake at 350 30 minutes. Reserve fat in skillet for sauce.

FIG GLAZE
12 small fresh figs, halved
1/4 c yellow onion chopped fine
2 cloves garlic chopped
1 c red wine
2 T balsamic vinegar
1/2 c broth or water
1 T cherry habanero jam

Saute onions in skillet until they begin to soften, add garlic and saute another minute or two until garlic softens. Add figs, toss gently over medium heat until figs begin to stick. Add vinegar, then deglaze the pan with 1 c red wine, scraping all the bits from the bottom of the pan. Add water or broth and bring to a simmer. Lower heat and simmer very gently about 30 minutes to reduce by half. Add cherry habanero jam and work it in as it melts.

Remove chops from the oven, pour sauce over, return to oven for 10 minutes. Remove, let sit 10 minutes before serving.

Cook's notes: I forgot the walnuts, and would like to try it with pine nuts or pistachios. It's fine with no nuts. For bread crumbs, I toasted a handful of stale bread crusts and pulverized them. The taste ended up being a bit strong - next time I'd use a better bread, or Panko-style crumbs. Extra stuffing can be formed into a patty and baked along with the chops. I didn't have balsamic vinegar, so I substituted balsamic vinaigrette, worked fine (Paul Newman brand). For the cheese, I used Publix brand six cheese Italian blend. For the jam, of course, I had on hand Crooked Acres Chernobyl Cherry Habanero Jam (currently sold out, sorry!). Hot stuff, indeed! I imagine any hot/sweet jam or sauce would do here, even perhaps your basic pepper jelly.

New Month, New Do

2009-08-01T22:24:25Z

I hate this picture, but wanted to give my three loyal readers a look at my new hair-do. I didn't think it was that big a change, really. Until I went to see my nail tech, the one who did my pedicures for oh, nine years before I left Tuscaloosa two months ago. She did not recognize me until I spoke to her, same with the shop manager. Later, I stopped at another store where I've known the clerk for many years. I walked in and said, "Hey girl!" and she looked at me blankly before exclaiming how she didn't recognize me. Hmm...

I can't believe I only made one post here for all of July. Wow. Well it's been a crazy time. I'm still madly working at getting the house in order, layer by layer. It's really looking like home now, with art going up on the walls, the fridge in place with the icemaker hooked up, and all that fun stuff. Work has been pretty nuts, with a couple of my cases blossoming into intensive inve$tigations involving travel up to Bitchypoo territory. In addition to the usual work stuff, I'm coordinating a summer food drive, part of a national effort by f3deral 3mployees.

Intermission

OK well I'm in the middle of a little cooking project. I received a bounty of figs from my friend Mims, and I planned to find a recipe involving pork chops and figs and whatever else. I'm going to wing it with ideas from a few different recipes, and make a stuffing of figs, walnuts, grated cheese and bread crumbs, with a little sauteed onion and garlic. Once that's in the oven, I'll deglaze the pan with some wine and poach a few more figs to make a glazed fig sauce. I should call it Figgy Piggy.

On that note...I'm out for now.

Getting Sorted

2009-07-21T02:32:33Z

On the 4th of July, we could see the fireworks from our guest room window.

Yes, we got unpacked - mostly! I conquered the mountain of kitchen boxes that took up most of the dining room, and got the kitchen sorted first. I found a good-enough china cabinet on Craigslist, with immediately delivery being its most attractive feature. The home-done carving is...interesting, either charming or hideous, depending the mood I'm in when I look at it. Then we moved the art to the space where the kitchen boxes were, and that freed up the living room to be set up. Then I assembled a bajillion bookcases and we unpacked books and cds all over the place. Then I got some spacesaver bags and started trying to compress all the bed linens for storage. Then it was time to start hanging art!

The first floor is coose to finished. The guest room is getting there. My office is a bit bare, but getting there. Our master bedroom and DreamGuy's office are still slightly nightmarish with the disorganization and clothing and box chaos. Our first-overnight-guests-to-be didn't stay last weekend as planned. Next deadline: August 14 we're having a party for my office here.

By then my sliding kitchen shelves should be here and I can put the finishing touches on the kitchen. The restaurant shelving I put in the mud room has been a godsend. That's basically my pantry. It's cramped in there doing laundry, but I'm adapting. Same with the tiny kitchen. I find myself standing in one spot turning in circles sometimes, trying to remember where basic things are. But on the other hand, it's a much smaller area to keep clean.

The dogs basically have their own room, and they seem quite content. They have their same indestructible dog beds, and those are holding up great. They seem to like their king-of-the-mountain view from the deck, though they still get confused when they see a dog out on the street, then get down at ground level where the privacy fence blocks their view down there. Their appetites were a little wonky at first, but that's to be expected - they have to adjust too. Their appetites seem quite normal now, and they're not showing any signs of stress. They seem quite happy in their new digs.

The dogs love walking here, but I only take them when DreamGuy can come along. I used to take them together, and I've done that some here, but it is a different thing here. Many more people and dogs and cats out and about at all hours. We always run into somebody, and if one of them gets worked up and starts to pull, god help me. Both of them? It's all I can do to stay on my feet. Not really safe for them or for me. I walk them one at a time, or we walk them together. Overall, they're doing great about passing people and other dogs without being ridiculous. They're mostly polite, actually. With people moreso than with other dogs. I never know with other dogs and tend to give them wide berth.

Beau the Cat seems to like it here fine as well. Since he's been known to pee on beds in times of chaos past, we first confined him to the "Animal Suite" for a few days. Then we gave him run of the house except we kept all the upstairs rooms closed off. Once things were pretty well laid out and tidied up, we started letting him into those rooms, and he has made the guest room his place to be, surrounded by the same basic furniture that was around him in his favorite room at the last house.

At long last, we found a fridge. It's not a good fit - it's not true "counter depth" which would be 24" deep. That's exactly the depth of our space. We found a used one 27" wide. With the coils behind and the door hinges, it ends up sticking out a good 6". But for the price difference, we are sucking it up on the aesthetics. Otherwise it's juuuuust right and we love it. We will love it more once the icemaker and filtered water are hooked up.

A Break for Some Fun

2009-06-29T07:51:42Z

Did I forget to post here that I drove at Barber a week ago? The Saturday after the Friday we closed on the house, I was off to Barber for a high performance driver's ed weekend. The photographer got some nice shots of my car, and I'll be able to post them directly once I get the cd, but in the meantime, you can check them out by clicking HERE.

It was super duper awesomely fun! I am improving, if slowly. My instructor this last time was so encouraging and positive. And he helped me figure something out. It's not that I'm afraid to go fast. I do love to go fast! But I start to lift way early as I approach the corners, especially the tough ones, because I'm not at all confident with my braking. Braking on the race track is completely backward from what we do on the street. You basically stand on the brake as hard as you can short of locking them up (no anti-lock on my old car).

I know this somewhere deep down, recalling how my helmet has bounced off many a windshield upon application of the brakes at speed with a real racer at the wheel. It's one of those things I worked out early on, and forgot from lack of use. My driving coach came to visit me in the paddock before I went out on Saturday, and he swears we're going to get some time to work together in July. I won't hold my breath, but it would be fantastic to get over that hump. All that said, I did pretty well. I got passed a lot, but I wasn't the only one. I held my own in the corners, but was overpowered in the straights. There were several cars who stayed behind me for entire sessions. I have several complete sections of the track worked out very well, but I still get a little rattled with lots of traffic around me. Once I get a handle on that, I'll be ready for a check-ride, and then a solo driver once I'm checked off. I'm in no hurry for that, but it's out there.

In other news, I got the cabinet and shelves home from Sam's, DreamGuy and I and a dolly hefted them into the house, and I got those puppies put together and pressed into use.

My search for bookcases for my office was fruitless on Saturday, but on Sunday we hit some discount furniture places (headboard! score!) and finally, Target. There, I found what looked like they'd be good enough bookcases for me: two five shelf units, two three shelf units. It was hell getting the huge boxes into the car, and then quadruple hell once we were home getting them into the house and up the stairs.

Then it was time to put them together. These bookcases could not be a bigger pain in the ass, and if I read the instructions correctly, they whole unit can hold a maximum of 65 pounds? For real? I'll have to be sure they're well-anchored, and see if they don't explode under the weight of the boxes of books I have planned for them.

And then there's the sheet music. I thought tonight about finding some young violin student or new violin teacher to give the whole mess to. It's all my study books from my very first beginner book to the last, a collection of Paganini etudes (which I could never, ever play), all my solo and chamber group sheet music, and all my orchestra parts and excerpt books used to prepare for orchestral auditions. Lots of it has tremendous sentimental value, but it's been doing nothing more than gathering dust for years, and I just don't know if it's worth trying to find a place for. I'll get to the bottom of the rest and see how I feel about it down the line.

The new kitchen shelves are seriously loaded down, and I'm maybe a third of the way through the boxes. I still don't know what I'm going to do with dishes and glasses. There is literally no good place for them in the current set-up. If I can easily find some sliding shelves, that will do the trick in a lower cabinet, but the sizes are odd, and it's all a bit more involved than I hoped it'd be. So all my dishes and glasses remain boxed, but I'm working my way through the rest of everything else. The spices are in. The bakeware and gadgets are finding their homes. The seldom-used small appliances are lining up nicely. I'm still curious about where a few things are, but no sense wondering much until I dig out from under the mountain of boxes. I'm sure it's all in there...somewhere.

As usual, I'm all turned around sleep-wise. I was up half of last night unpacking, then I slept in this morning, and had another exhausting day today. After spending the evening wrestling with assembling those PITA bookcases, I dug into some more kitchen boxes. When I heard the dogs getting restless, I brought them out for a late romp, and I've got the laptop set up on the table back here. It's so nice out late at night. The rest of the time, it's insufferably hot and humid these days.

Tomorrow I work at home, and I'd thought I'd get a jump-start on a report I need to finish up, but I started here, and you see where that got us!

Goings On Are Going On

2009-06-27T05:35:33Z

The last entry sat posted as "private" when I meant to go back and make it public long ago. Sorry bout that.

To catch up, we did close on the house, a week ago today. Halleluia! While I did end up paying that $400, I still came out ahead due to another change in another part of the overall transaction.

We have a rental fridge and are still scouring the universe for an affordable unit that will fit into the bizarrely small place carved out for a fridge in our postage-stamp-sized kitchen. But today I did pin down a storage solution, and tomorrow at least the elements will be in house. I will have to do some assembly and get help placing the pieces, but by this time tomorrow night I hope to have the things in place so that I can start unpacking and setting up the kitchen. I have yet to do anything but microwave leftovers in my new kitchen. We've not even done a first grocery shopping.

Since I'm sure you're dying to know, after examining a whole gaggle of options, from custom shelving to installed shelving systems to Ikea units to Home Depot track shelving where I landed was commercial kitchen storage. The sizes I need are kind of odd (no surprise there) so I wasn't able to find what I needed at the local restaurant salvage place. The guy there kindly directed me to Sam's, where the angels sang! I'm getting an 18" deep X 48" wide 6-shelf chrome wire unit, and a 36" wide x 18" deep 2 door stainless steel storage cabinet. I may or may not put the doors on it.

It's going to be tight in there, especially once all the stuff is loaded in. And my dryer opens the wrong way, so it's all kind of ridiculous. But it is what it is, and it's way past time to get out of boxes and start really settling in here. I had a couple of movers come over this afternoon to help me get some huge pieces up and down the stairs, and from the front porch to the back, to their final destinations. It took me awhile to decide where to put things, but that much we have pretty much down as of today.

The huge wardrobe boxes with our hanging clothes are finally getting emptied into our newly outfitted closets. Now I have half the living room piled up with empty boxes, half of which need breaking down. The other part of the living room is full of our art. Once we get the boxes all unpacked or stashed, we'll finally be ready to decide what art is going to go where.

Right now I've got my laptop set up on the Alabama art table on the back deck under the gazebo. The red art sofa is out back here now, too. The dogs are milling about, and the summer bugs are making a great big racket. Our house backs up to a quiet corner of a private park, and it's really nice back here. We have everything oriented to minimize the part of the view that looks toward the parking lot of the apartments next door.

Space Invader

2009-06-17T02:49:45Z

I think I may need to write a book or a wacky TV show script. Here's the past 24 hours:

10:30 last night: front door opens as I approach, strange guy trying to push his way in. I push back, close the big heavy door, throw the lock, flip on the porch light, call DreamGuy, "There's somebody at the door. Come down here and see if you know him." Meanwhile the guy is hollering and sounds drunk. DreamGuy gets down here, we open the door, and there sits a guy in one of the rockers. "Why you gotta be so harsh with the lights on?" He's got my smokes in his hand and I snatch them back and say, "Now give me back my cell phone please." I'd left them out front when I came into the house to look for something. Denial, threat to call the cops, bye-bye stranger, cops come, roll eyes at the idea of us filing a report over a cell phone, conveniently overlooking the whole "trying to push into the house" part of things. Whatever. Welcome to the neighborhood!

As the cop pulls off, the guy comes loping back up the street with his buddy. "See? I told you I didn't steal your cell phone. Wanna buy some cologne?"

DreamGuy told him to go away, and off he went. We call the cop back and tell him where the guy is headed. And his name is Bart.

11:00pm-5:00 am: adrenaline rush keeps me awake. I move things around, make lists, and take my porch breaks out back under the gazebo we finished assembling and drilling to the deck moments before a big thunderstorm busted out.

7:00 this morning: I hear the doorbell ring, but I'm not putting it together in my sleep. DreamGuy gets up, pulls on pants, goes to the door, comes back to me in the bed. "Did you move your car down the street last night?" I go out front, and there are two cops and a guy yelling, "I HAVE TO GO TO WORK! WHERE ARE YOUR CAR KEYS???" And my car is gone.

Doh! Apparently MushMouth McDrunkypants snatched my keys along with my cell phone, came back later, took my car for a little ride, cleaned a few things out of the back, and left it in the alley blocking this guy's exit from his driveway. He's still yelling, "GET YOUR CAR OUT OF MY WAY, I HAVE TO GET TO WORK. WHERE ARE YOUR KEYS? DON'T YOU HAVE A SPARE SET???? I HAVE TO GO TO WORK!"

Tow truck comes, hauls my car down the alley about five houses and as he's dropping it in back of the house, I remember where the keys are. I mean, I remember which box they are in, but not where the box is. Fifteen minutes later, I have the keys. Just in time to pay for the $130 ride on the tow truck.

Also on the keyring were all the keys to the house (five doors, two locks on each). Without my phone, I was dead in the water. I was due for an upgrade anyway (and I also had the insurance) so I came home with a nice new phone and started making calls. Sorry, work, I can't make it in today. My car was stolen! That's always a great excuse. Tho I'm lucky nobody said, "You can walk the mile and a half, Kathy...."

So. Locksmith. Honda dealer. Hundreds more dollars.

And I no longer feel at all comfortable sitting on my own front porch after DreamGuy's gone to bed. That pisses me off.

So when the seller tried to jack me up to pay for a $400 closing expense that was caused by something stupid he did, I fairly shreiked at my agent, "NO. NO MORE MONEY. I HAVE HAD IT. I'M NOT UNPACKED YET, AND I DON'T GIVE A SHIT. I'LL MOVE THE FUCK OUT OF HERE SO FAST IT'LL MAKE HIS HEAD SPIN. NO. MORE. MONEY." Then I told her not to really tell him that. I prefer to hold that card close and only play it as an extreme measure.

Ten minutes later my agent called back. "He was so snotty, I told him just what you said, you don't give a shit, you don't care who pays it but you are not paying that $400."

Oops. Hee!

We're supposed to close Friday at noon. The selling agent is also selling the house next door. I told my agent, "You know, all his buyers will be ten feet from my front door, and if they ask me anything about the neighborhood, all I have to do is tell them about last night's adventure. He better figure that shit out and wise up."

Yeah, big talker, huh? So we'll see what happens. We'll either pay the $400 or not. We'll either close on this deal (FINALLY) or not. Honest to God, at this point, I really don't care what happens. Moving is such a pain, but we've been in transition so long now, what the hell.

Home is Where The Dogs Are

2009-06-15T05:32:31Z

Just when things seemed they couldn't get any crazier, they did. The seller kindly let us move into the house on Wednesday, conditioned on us closing Friday.

Yeah, you see that coming a mile off.

Turns out my mortgage guy dropped the ball on a piece of paperwork (failing to clear out the prior loan application account number from when we had an offer on that other house) and we were told Thursday it would be 3-5 more days. The mortgage guy was very nice, and admitted that it was his mistake. But that didn't help me much. We flipped out, Seller flipped out, Seller's agent flipped out.

The deal was that if we didn't close, the seller could give us written notice to vacate, and we'd have to be out in 3 days, or pay $100/day holdover until we got out. And that's just for our occupancy of the house. The sales contract technically "expired" too. Fun, fun and fun! Late Friday night I emailed the seller's agent asking him about our status, what the seller planned to do, basically whether we should unpack or call the movers. His reply was, "Don't start unpacking."

That wasn't very helpful.

Saturday, we did work something out, whereby I'm now paying exorbitant rent to stay here until we close. And if we don't hear from my mortgage guy by Wednesday that we're clear to close by this Friday, then I drop my mortgage guy and start the whole mortgage app process over again with his guy.

The good news is, we got the go-ahead to really move in, permission to punch holes in things and bring the critters here. I went ahead and did things that will have to be done by anyone to live here anyway, like get the dryer vent cut in, and get some droopy lattice removed from where it was barely hanging onto the deck (OVER MY CAR). I spent a very long day sorting and moving things around to get the critter quarters all set up.

We've been calling the downstairs master suite the "den," but given how much room the dog pen takes up, I think it should rightfully be called the Dog House. We may reconfigure things at some point down the road, but for now, as I type, everybody's tucked in safe and sound for the night.

This time we took two cars to do the animal transporting. The animals rode in my car, and DreamGuy filled his up with all their crap (pen, beds, food and supplies). Lately, Beau has been crapping in his carrier on every trip in the car. Today, I sat his carrier on the front seat next to me and tried to comfort him on the way home. He seemed just fine, settling into his little bed in there and purring.

Just as I pulled up in front of the house, though, the unmistakable aroma of cat shit filled the car. Dammit. So DreamGuy and I quickly got the dogs into the back yard, and I took the carrier into the downstairs master bath, extracted Beau, cleaned him up, and cleaned up the mess in the carrier. Poop, and a bunch of puke, too. Poor baby does not like riding in the car one little bit does he?

We left the dogs outside to check out the yard while we hauled all their stuff in and got their area set up. Beau's food and water are in the bathroom, and his new litter box is sitting in a washing machine drain pan (1" tall plastic 3" square plastic tray) in the shower stall. I tucked his food & water around the corner so the dogs can't watch him while he eats. The dog pen is near the back door, big enough for both beds and a little moving around room. For food & water mats, I picked up a couple of boot trays (found near the door mats in Wal-Mart) which are perfect for this purpose.

The critter sitter said the dogs had only been eating about half their food during their month-long stay with her. But by the time we fed them tonight, they cleaned their bowls in record time. DreamGuy took them for a short walk around the block while I got a few more things sorted, then we left them be and ordered Steak-Out for our own dinner. Which we ate at the table on the front porch, the only horizontal surface in the house that is not piled high with stuff.

Eventually we'll let Beau have the run of the house. But for a day or so, he's confined to Critter Quarters. He has a tendency to pee on things when he's anxious, and this house is still in enough chaos that I know he'll be rooting around in boxes to take a dump, and pissing in the middle of my bed, if I just leave him to his own devices. Once he seems settled in, we'll let him out and about. But I will keep the bedroom doors shut just in case!

I took the dogs out for their evening constitutional, and they seem to like the yard just fine. We were worried about Rosey and all the deck stairs between the yard and the back door. She's clearly in pain with her "good" knee, and she tends to hop up the stairs. I'll have to get her into the orthopedist soon to check that out. For now, though, she's on an anti-inflammatory, and despite all the stairs, she's not limping or anything.

If you notice a spike in Wal-Mart stock this week, that would be me, buying buttloads of Wal-Mart crap. I mean, who wants to pack a dirty plunger to take to their new home? Not me. Lots of things like that, I trashed planning to replace. So today was the day. It took me two trips, actually, and I still need a few things. But we have doormats, a door bell, and a flag to hang tomorrow. DreamGuy helped me screw the bracket onto the front porch column using my new cordless drill. I got a level, too, and plan to take a stab at installing the towel racks myself. Those things come with a template that you hang on the wall, with all the places to drill the holes clearly marked on the paper. Should be easy-peasy. Right? Uh, yeah.

So I'm just forging ahead assuming all will work out this week. I've had all kinds of contractors out here. I have gotten estimates to install some closet interior organizer stuff for all the closets (under $500 for the whole house, I love these people) since currently each one has a single cheap-ass vinyl-coated wire rack with not so much as a hanging bar for clothes. I have had every window in the house measured and I've put a deposit on faux-wood blinds (another awesome deal) - that might happen this week. In the meantime, I've slapped up these temporary pleated trim-to-fit paper shades with a sticky strip across the top. Can't beat it for $5/window.

I've had a fencing contractor out here to see about replacing the rolling driveway gate since it...doesn't roll. Tomorrow I'm getting a quote for the most critical of the foundation work. I've worked out a McGyver-like remedy to the underside of the deck where the dog house is, and where I'd like to park my car. It involves adding a few strips of wood to make a secondary frame and staple-gunning some tarps up for the short term.

I've been quite the handygirl, lately. I've installed a wireless doorbell. Whee! Even more fun, we got a 10X10 foot gazebo to put on the deck in back, and I got the whole four-square frame put together and standing up before the storms hit. Good thing we didn't get the top on - it'd have blown away like a cheap umbrella. And boy did we have some storms. A tree fell behind a house across the street; another had massive limbs down in their front yard, obscuring their porch (but not hurting it). We live on the side of Red Mountain, and the sound of the thunder bouncing off the mountain is truly awe-inspiring. And scary!

One of my favorite things about living here is that we're less than a mile from four (FOUR!) different Lebanese restaurants, and as many Korean, Vietnamese, and Indian places, too. If I head out of the neighborhood to the south, I pass a big Lebanese flag sign which marks the entrance to the Phoenician Club. My father would have loved it.

The family's already talking about Thanksgiving here. Lord help us! The kitchen is so tiny and impossible for storage and efficient use. I am basically having to turn the mud room into a huge pantry. I mean, for real, there is not a single cabinet in the kitchen appropriate for storing plates and glasses. The single wall-mounted cabinet that would work is tucked so far back into a recessed corner that I can't reach it, even with a step stool. I'll have to put seldom-used things there (and crawl up on the counter to do it), and either get drawer-shelves put into a lower cabinet, or use some pantry space for dish storage.

OK well I'm all typed out for the moment. I sat down to do some work I wanted to get a jump-start on for tomorrow. Ha! It's after midnight. Time to check on the critters and head on to bed.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Waiting, Still

2009-06-09T12:57:55Z

Random crap:

The mover is available either tomorrow, or Monday. Nothing in between.

We have yet to close. Or get a closing date certain.

If we don't close by Friday, I lose $2K, and I don't know what happens after that.

Our short-stay is up. Tonight's our last night here. Tomorrow we pack up our crap into our cars, and we have not decided where we'll stay tomorrow night.

The NASA-SE that I drove in was....OK. A bit over my head. The autocross I drove Sunday was great. Much learned at both, much fun, too. Also, too hot.

sisterkatherine @ 2009-05-27T09:51:00

2009-05-27T15:02:14Z

We're not wild about our temporary accommodations, but they'll do. We got moved out of the house, got the stuff into storage, and got ourselves set up in our short-stay apartment.

Meanwhile, I totaled DreamGuy's car in a rather spectacular accident last Thursday. It was weird and fast and I'm still not totally sure what happened. Except the FedUps truck won. That much we can say for sure. So on Memorial Day weekend we were car-shopping. DreamGuy found a decent ride, and now we have a pair of CR-Vs out front.

I'm signed up to drive at Barber this weekend. Finally, some fun!

Hopefully we'll have a closing date by the end of this week and we can make plans to be reunited with our stuff and our critters. Man, I miss my babies! We've been to see them twice and it's been hard to leave them each time. They are being spoiled and no longer show much concern about coming with us when we go. Sniff!

Well this is just a quickie to catch us up. I'm off to BitchypooLand today. If I had the means to cook right now, I'd slide on over there and pick up some aigs! Next time....

Blur

2009-05-19T07:00:14Z

Today was as wild and crazy as I predicted it would be. Thank God for my dear friend who came over for a last blitz of packing. I don't know what I was thinking when I left myself on the schedule for work today. Doh! Lucky for me, work is at a very low simmer right now. So it was a blur of a day. But I don't think I'll have to stay up all night. I have a few odds and ends in my office to get together, and a big box in the kitchen with some awkwardly sized things, and one more box in the living room to fill up, tape and mark. Pack, pack, and pack!

The garage was supposed to be DreamGuy's job from way back, but not much has happened in there since he took that on. My friend and I got out there today and flew through some organizing and packing and repacking of soggy boxes. At some point I ordered a pizza, but a friend came over as we were eating, and I left my lunch sitting on the table to see what was up with him. I still have to watch my blood sugar, and have basically been subsisting on protein shakes.

The storage containers arrived right on time this morning, early actually. I confirmed the movers' arrival for tomorrow morning, made calls to cut off or transfer all the utilities, hounded my mortgage agent, and packed, packed, packed. Late this afternoon, DreamGuy took his office computers over to his parents' for safekeeping. I sat down to check email, and again, DOH! DreamGuy took the internet-connected computer with him. So off to the Verizon store I went. I'd been planning to get a wireless broadband card anyway, so I got that and took some time out to set it up and get it going. It's slower than DSL, but it'll do for now.

Just on the heels of the anniversary of my father's death, I was gutted tonight when I opened a box of mystery stuff to find keepsakes of my father's that my mother had sent home with me during her move-out last November. I have no recollection of packing this box or bringing it back here, but I've found all sorts of boxes of random stuff around here that I brought back from theres, so I can't say I was at all surprised.

In this box, I found the remains of my father's coin and stamp collections, some Lebanese flag pins, and a few other odds and ends, including a sweatshirt. Immediately my father's familiar scent hit my nose, and I burst into tears. I held the sweatshirt to my face and breathed in his scent. It made me so sad. I wanted to keep this smell forever. I know that's impossible, but hey, it's been a year already, and it's still there. So I crammed the sweatshirt into a big zip-loc bag, hoping that would preseve it a bit longer. Le sigh...

The entertainment center I hoped to get rid of was still here after the garage sale, so I cut the price to a ridiculously low $50 and relisted it on craigslist. I heart craigslist! I put in the ad that it had to go tonight. I had several contacts, and basically said whoever shows up first with the money and a truck can have the thing. At 9:20 I got an email from a guy across town, and he was here with his truck by 10:00 to take it away. This was the last relic of my first marriage, and I'd long ago gotten rid of the old skool stereo that used to fill it. We sold my TV in the yard sale, so I really had no need for it, and didn't want to drag it ot my next home. Buh-bye entertainment center!

Well I better finish up the odds and ends and get my butt to bed. Tomorrow is going to be another long, wild and crazy day. Tomorrow night our furniture will be packed, so we'll stay in a nearby motel, and come back in the morning to meet the guys who are taking the containers to storage.

Getting Down to It

2009-05-18T06:17:46Z

What a weekend. I am bone-tired, but too wired to sleep, so here I am. Yesterday, the garage sale went pretty well, considering we had torrential rain starting at 10:00 in the morning, and continuing for the afternoon. We had lots of people come, some having seen a mention of DreamGuy's former store in the ad, where we noted we were liquidating the last of the store's vintage Playboys and memorabilia. DreamGuy really enjoyed seeing some old friends.

I'd guess we got rid of about 75% of what we'd hoped to. Our handyman is going to take the dryer and anything else he wants to fiddle with and fix, and he'll take the rest to the dump for us. As soon as the sale was over, I loaded up every single decent item and took it straight to a local charity. Then I stopped at U-Haul and got a few huge boxes, and picked up the mattress covers I had on my list to pick up Monday.

This morning, we put the dogs out for their morning constitutional, washed their bedding and bowls, packed up their pen and beds, and loaded it all into the car (except the bedding, which I forgot to pack). It was like a puzzle trying to get all the big dog stuff, the dogs, the cat, and us into the car. Off to Birmingham for trip number one. I had imagined it would be all heart-wrenching to take them away from here for the last time. But honestly, I was too damned busy trying to keep us on schedule to think much about it. Screw the pictures and the fond farewells. We gotta go!

True to form, Beau took a shit in the carrier about halfway there, so we were treated to that lovely odor for much of the trip. When we got there, we got the dogs in first, then I got Beau out of the carrier and took him in, and went back out to deal with the poop. The easiest solution was to toss the cat bed he pooped on, and that's what I did. Right into the trash. The dogs were nervous, but they seemed OK. We all sat on the sofa and had a nice snuggle, something we haven't been able to do here since we moved all the furniture around. We got everybody settled, did a little sniffly goodbye-saying, and we were off.

Back home, we loaded up all of our artwork and my violins and guitars. We needed both vehicles for the second trip. Again, it was quite the puzzle getting everything packed up. I had to get out the Honda manual and read about how to disengage part of the back seatbelts and flip the seats all the way forward to create a big cargo bay. It took a good long time to work it out, but we got loaded up and back to Birmingham right when we'd planned to. While DreamGuy started unloading our stuff into the new neighbor's house, I met the real estate agent next door at our house-to-be, and did some more thorough measuring and noting of things that needed noting, such as paint colors, numbers of windows needing blinds or shades, that kind of thing.

We're still not sure exactly how we want to set up. The downstairs master is going to be our den. The upstairs master bedroom is not quite as large as one of the guest rooms, and I'm tempted to suggest that we make the larger of the guest rooms the master. DreamGuy was going to make his office in the sitting room off the master, so I could make my office in the master bedroom and that area would be like our "office suite." But then using a guest room for the master, we'd have to share the jack-and-jill bathroom with overnight guests. Which we have about once a year so...we'll see. Plenty of time to figure that out.

Over at the neighbor's house, I found DreamGuy had mostly finished the moving of the crap. I only had to make about five trips, and man am I out of shape. We had to go up two stories to their third floor, and oh my lord, I had to take a break after every trip! So sad. The neighbor guy was so, so sweet. I had asked them what types of wine they liked, and DreamGuy brought them a nice bottle of something they liked. Or rather, we left the bottle DreamGuy bought at home, so DreamGuy went to a nearby store that now carries his wines, and bought them a bottle to give them tonight. We'll bring them the other one next time we see them.

We went to a nice little place for a Middle Eastern dinner, and then it was back home again. And now I'm really starting to feel the crunch. So, so much to do. While the Utah Grand Prix replay was on TV, I dug into my office and made good progress. I dozed off a couple of times, but really wanted to finish a few things in here. My boy Patrick Long and his co-driver Joerg Bergmeister came in first for GT2 and that was great to see. But I did already know the outcome, since I'd gotten a Flying Lizards text message as soon as the race was over letting me know they'd come in first. W00t!

Once the race was over, I headed out to the garage to get a handle on that. We have several boxes that got drenched that need repacking, and I really wanted to pack up all my Porsche parts and get all that straight. I got that done, but by midnight, it was clear I was going to need the whole day tomorrow to finish the rest of what needs doing. I hadn't planned to take tomorrow off. I'd already put in to be off Tuesday and Wednesday, but I just dropped my supervisor a note to say I'll be off Monday as well.

So here I sit, surrounded by total chaos. I know this is the very hardest part. I've done this before, and no matter how hard I work, how much I plan, and how well I stay on plan, the 24 hours before the trucks come to load up are just total complete chaos. Everything is everywhere and somehow it all has to get straight by 9:00 Tuesday morning. And it will.

I'm glad I got into the house today. That revived my excitement about the whole thing. We love the house, we love the neighborhood, and we're going to love living right in the city. It felt good to be reminded of the reason behind all the current insanity.

Alright, I'm feeling droopy again. Time to get some sleep so I can get up and have a wild and crazy day of getting my shit together.

Daddy

2009-05-17T15:34:19Z

Yesterday was the one-year anniversary of my father's death. And I still can't believe he's gone. As the day approached, I found myself getting weepy over reminders, memories. As I type, my family is gathered in Atlanta at a Mass being said in his memory at the old family church. The months leading to his death were so torturous for him, and for us. I still find it so hard to make any sense of it.

We have come a million miles since that day a year ago, too. The family home is gone, lingering memories in the form of things all around me in boxes now. Mom is living alone in a tiny apartment. The Lincoln is gone, replaced by a car my mother can drive. The mint, so abundant in the garden patch near their old back door, is mowed to the ground, and my efforts to propogate some of it at my own house here ended in dismal failure. That just fits in with the rest of the sadness.

We have come a million miles since that day a year ago, but today I am right back there. I don't know what else to say except he's gone. He's gone, and I can't believe it, and I miss him more than I ever imagined possible.

Trust

2009-05-16T17:17:27Z

So a nice little family bought the washer and dryer. They gave us half down to hold them, and came back later with a truck to settle up and take them home. An hour later, the truck pulled back up and the man came to the door and said that the dryer wasn't working. "Oh gosh, I'm sorry. It was working when we put it into storage. Just bring it back and I'll give you back your money." "Bring it back?" "Yeah, just bring it back and I'll give you back your money."

Off he drove, to get the dryer. Or not. Is it a scam? They drove a hard bargain, then tried to leave without paying the second half, then when giving us the second half, joked that they were only giving us half of that. Haha! No problem. Does the dryer not work and he thought I'd just give him back his money because he said it didn't work? Is he trying to get a dryer for free? Is the dryer really broken? DreamGuy allowed as it's entirely possible, noting that it had fickle electronics. Maybe it didn't like the ride in the back of the truck. Either way, I'm happy to give him back his money. I asked him to bring the dryer back without thinking, but after he left, I wondered if I was being a jerk. For what it's worth, DreamGuy says he'd have done the same thing.

I guess if he was trying to scam us, and he wants to keep the dryer for what he paid, he'll just never come back. Or he'll pull back up with the dryer, leave it, and get his money back. I'd like to think I could tell the difference between an honest person and a liar, but who really can?

Edited to add: The guys did come back with the dryer. I gave them their money, and they turned around and spent most of it wheeling and dealing over other items. I felt kind of bad about asking them to bring back the dryer, but what's a girl to do?