First Step: Small Victories

Dammit I didn't mean for it to be this long between writing.  There was a flurry!  I was on a roll!  And then...wtf...?  I wrote twelve different times since then but I got distracted in the middle and now it's three weeks later and...hi.

I cleaned out my pantry today.  There was an unacceptable moth problem.  It had to be done.

In unrelated news, I roasted beets with butter on the grill tonight and braised the leafy beet tops like fresh spinach.  Two side dishes for the price of one!  You should know two things here: 1.  I'm not historically a fan of beets and 2. I will rat out my own terrible cooking quicker than anybody.  So please take my word for it when I tell you, they were fantastic and if you're open to new things you should give this a shot.

BEET RECIPE (feel free to skip ahead)

Get a bunch of beets with the leafy stems still attached.
Wash said beets.

Braised leafy stems part: 
Cut off the stems and rough chop in 1 inch sized (ish) pieces.
With a little bit of water still on them, place them in a skillet with a lid.
Cook and toss over medium heat until they're wilty.
Butter, salt.  voila.

Whole Beet part: 
Lightly peel the beet bodies.
Cut into potato salad sized pieces.
Throw 'em in a foil packet with a couple TBSPs of butter.
Grill on medium hot for about half an hour.
Awesome.

My sister likes them with Balsalmic dressing.  I thought they were fine plain.

Anyway, that was my food discovery tonight because I've been in the market for cheap fresh vegetables the kids haven't tried yet and someone mentioned that today.  So I'm sharing with you.  *curtsy

What else...hmm...if you live within 500 miles or a day's drive of Virginia Beach and the business you work for is looking for a destination to have a meeting or conference or something, please let me know.  Even if you already have an in-house person who plans events normally, I can work with her and get you guys a local's eye view of the area.  Even if you've been here four times, I promise we have so much better stuff you don't even know about yet, too many people come here and end up with all the crappy, touristy stuff.  I would be honored to be your sherpa.

Also, I've been letting the Things stay at home alone while I go to work for a few hours in the mornings.  Despite my fears, they've told me they don't feel "neglectioned" at all and I'm a good mom for trusting them.  Before you roll your eyes to the point of needing replacement surgery, let me relay this morning's check-in conversation with Thing 1.

"Hey kiddo, how's it going?"
"Pretty good.  [thing 2] is out playing"
"Did you have breakfast yet?"
"Not yet.  I just got up.  I'm about to do my workout.  Then I'm gonna have some breakfast and take a shower."
"Wow.  Okay."
"Oh, also, I changed the toilet paper roll"
*blink
*blink
"What?"
"Yeah.  Is it okay if I do some laundry later?"
"Um...yeah.  Of course.  You remember how?"
"Uh...well...you know what, let me call you back when I'm ready for that."
"'kay."
"'kay, bye Mom."

Now, the fact that HE CHANGED THE TOILET PAPER ROLL WITHOUT BEING ASKED practically deserves a parade.  And when he called me back later for the laundry instructions?  *sigh.

I'm just really super proud of him is all.

Oh, and hey, Future Daughter in Law?  You're welcome.

The Oven Exploded and Other Things

I blow out lightbulbs like birthday candles.  Microwaves, video players and other small appliances too.  Sometimes room fuses, once the whole house.  Once the cul de sac went out but they never pinned that one on me officially.  Anyway, today I blew out the oven.

See, I've been meaning to make Oatmeal Raisin cookies for a week or two just because I forget why.  And today in a  fit of prehistoric hormonal imperative, cookies got made.  I was kvelling on the phone with Audrey while the second tray of cookies were in the oven.  And...PHZZZT!  POW!  WTF?!

It sounded like a combination of ice maker and garbage disposal, but it came from my oven.

"Um, hey, can you hold on a minute?  I think my oven just exploded."
"What?  You're joking, right?  Are you kidding?  You have to be kidding."
"Um...I...uh..." *spies something glowing and possibly on fire inside the oven* "What the...I need to call you back."

I opened the oven and tried to figure out what the hell I was looking at.  It wasn't a flame.  It looked like it could maybe turn into one, but at the time it was just...this glowy thing in the back of the oven.

I took the cookies out.
Took the wire racks out.
Poured baking soda on it just in case it was grease.
The glowing didn't stop.

I kind of wished I had a fire extinguisher?  but after the baking soda I realized there was no flame to put out so I just stood there and stared at the glowing and realized the open oven door was letting air get to it and if there's any truth to science, that was probably not an ideal situation for avoiding a fire.  *put racks back in place*  *close oven door*

Huh.

Meanwhile, I have two 9 year old boys, Thing 2 and friend, standing in the kitchen sucking on popsicles and staring into the oven with me wondering what we might be supposed to do next.

So I flipped off the oven at the fuse box and the glowy part of the heating element went dark.   And the best I can come up with is that the oven is staying off until further notice.

Thank god I replaced the fuel line on the grill.

Anyway, that was a brief moment this afternoon.  The rest of the week has had me doing other things.

Like...

I applied for my passport on Tuesday.

I'm okay with the picture.  Although I wish I'd contemplated a hairbrush.

So you don't think I'm totally uncivilized, I did have a passport before but that was in my married name and I've not only gone back to my maiden name since but also I changed my first name and middle name too which makes for lots of paperwork and WHEE! but also, I lost my first passport a million years ago anyway so I HAD to get a new one because I have an international vacation coming up in a little while that I'll tell you about later.  In a surprising and totally coincidental turn of events, it's going to take place near a teen beauty pageant scholarship competition.  Thusly, Thing 1 will always remember that puberty started mid July 2011. *shakes head*

Random kite surfer

What else?  Oh, I took the kids to the beach the other afternoon.  For no reason other than Thing 2 was bored and I needed something else to do besides be in the house.  Sometimes even though it feels like I should be chained to a radiator for the safety of the villagers, getting my feet in the sand is more calming.

Thing 1 & 2 just digging in the sand

I remember afternoons like that when I was their age.  Doing Spelling homework in front of the ocean.  Pretty outstanding memory to have.  *wistful sigh.  Anyway...







And this weekend is the big church carnival.  Not my church obvs.  My church can be found in the previous two pictures.  But it's the neighborhood Catholic church and we go every year because they have awesome rides and creepy carnies and a not at all bad flea market section.

And sometimes you see stuff like this.

And it triangulates you exactly at "*gasp!*  Precious!", "It feels like just yesterday..." and "...holy christ Thing 1 is starting middle school in three months."

So there's just all kinds of interesting things going on here lately.  

The Doctor Is In

So Thing 1, my 10 year old, showed me an itchy spot on his back last month.  Looked like some bug got under his shirt and bit the hell out of his shoulder blade area.  I smacked on some Neoporin and let it be. 

The outlaws got involved.  Alarmists.  HE NEEDS A DOCTOR.  I don't trust the medical profession but I rolled my eyes and went along with it because I don't have THAT much of a god complex.  If the kid's sick and needs medicine...then let's get that.

After one month we've been on Four doctor visits.  Two Pediatricians.  Three Nurses.  Four Dermatologists.  Three tests.  Six different medicines. And more guesses than I can even remember.  Including: Strep Throat?  Allergies?  Poison Ivy?  Poison Oak?  Chicken pox?  Herpes?  Pityriasis lichenoides et varioliformis acuta?
Lymphoma?  ETC?!  WE DON'T KNOW!  SEND IT TO THE LAB!

After all that.  After one month of over $200 in co-pays and prescriptions...you know what it was?

Bug bites.

Fuckers.

But they said I can give Thing 1 Prednisone just in case.  if I want to. for no reason whatsover.  they'll write a scrip for it.  When my eyes almost fell out from the rolling of NO the doctor hastily left the room.  Okay then!  No need for a follow up!  Call us if you need to! 

Prednisone.  Like, Hey, if you want to sign him up for chemotherapy just in case you have really good insurance and some free time...we have a chair available!

Asshole.

Bug bites.  Lysol.  Neosporin.

Don't ever doubt me again.

No thanks, I'm good right here

"I called the guy.  About gettin' that thing.  You found them things yet?  Yer goin' on Monday."

My mother outlaw opened a phone conversation with that this afternoon.  I had NO IDEA what the hell she was talking about either.  I always need more words from her.  Or none at all.  either way.  "Uhhh...what?" I responded.

"You know, for that...thing."
"Ooooh.  THAT thing.  right.  okay, Monday's fine."  what the fuck is this?  code or something?  No specific nouns EVER?!  totally ridiculous.  But I know what she's talking about now.  It helps to be a telephone psychic sometimes.

Translation: "I called the passport office about getting passports for the boys.  Do you have their birth certificates ready?  You and X have an appointment Monday afternoon to fill out paperwork."

"That thing" she was referring to is the cruise X wants to take the boys on over Thanksgiving.  I don't even know if you can get passports that quickly but heaven forbid I stand in the way of one of their brilliant last minute ideas.

Am I going on this cruise with them?  Absofuckinglutely not.  You are out of your mind if you think I'm stupid enough to do something like that.  Know why?  The last time X and I spent any amount of time together was last Summer when I went with them down to Carolina for a few days.  X and I got along fine.  We even took the kids to a concert together when we got back home.  Happy family fun time, right?  uh, sure.  We even went out to dinner just the two of us one night.  Why?  I forget.  Certainly not for reconciliation purposes or anything, there should be no confusion over that ever. Ever.  We were getting along; we're still friends most of the time.  We were just going to talk.  whatever.  It's not important.

Anyway, that night at the restaurant was from hell.  Utter hell.  I've never witnessed X wear a bigger ass hat without getting violent than he did that night.  Did you know it's possible to both proposition a waitress then insult her about something completely unrelated AND make up your own language in the space of two minutes?  I've seen it done is all I'm saying.  And you know those super schmancy bottles of Louis XIII cognac in the lit up case behind the bar?  Order as many of those as you want.  You want to shoot them back like cheap tequila?  seems a bit wasteful to me but cheers.  Just don't forget your wallet next time.  forthelove.

And then for reasons I cannot currently fathom, we went to an event together a couple days after that.  I split off from the party later on to meet up with some friends from college and X got jealous.  The next day he called my father for a meeting unbeknownst to me and told him that I basically slept with people in public that night and really hurt his feelings and that he was no longer giving me alimony from that point forward.  Lies of course.  Delusions.  The fact that my father didn't defend me against this wet brained cirrhotic insanity nightmare pissed me off like you read about though because not a word of it was truth.  And I was suddenly inspired to rip out all the carpet in the living room and paint 400 square feet of concrete in a lovely tile pattern.  We all have different ways of coping.

Anyway, X and I are friends again but the boundaries are clearly drawn.  We do not socialize near each other.  ever.  So, cruise?  please.  like I'm new.  No cruise.

But I'll go ahead and help the boys go on a cruise to the Bahamas for a few days.  X seems to have sobered up lately.  I'm taking his word for it.  I have faith this will not end poorly.  And I'm actually pretty skeptical the cruise will happen at all.  But I can't express any doubt to the outlaws.

Sometimes I feel like one of those patients in the psych ward who's just pretending to take her pills.

Scattered

Almost eight solid months of writing every day.  It seemed like a good idea at the time.  Sometimes thoughts don't organize themselves at the speed I need to make these any more than rough drafts of what could be much better pieces of observational text. 

My friend Audrey is in a relationship I absolutely despise to the point I offer to kill her fiancee almost every day via email.  Or at the very least make my way over to where ever he is and slam him in the face with a brick.  I mean, I love men but this guy is a pig from hell.  (Yes, Audrey reads this and no, these sentiments will not be a shocking surprise for her to read as she drinks her morning coffee tomorrow.  Hi, Audrey.)  Anyway they're going through this thing right now that makes me so hopeful her journey into self-loathing will end, like, today...as we speak?  maybe?  But it won't.  It's the same as every other time I thought she was at a breaking point.  She is a distance runner who passed my Aw-Hail-No mile marker a loooong time ago.  The current WTF shenanigans?  Just another day that ends in Y for her.  ugh.  (Here for you, Audrey.  Please let me kill him.  I've Googled...we can DO this.  text me when you're ready, I'll get a sitter.)

My X is still dealing with Advanced Cirrhosis.  He's going for his Liver Transplant follow up appointment tomorrow.  I'm not going with this time.  It's just a follow up.  He didn't qualify last time because of the improvement/stasis/whatever.  Whether he's still improving or getting worse he won't qualify for a transplant tomorrow either.  His 20 year high school reunion party is next weekend and I can't figure out if he'll play the sympathy-ish "I'm so mature; I've really learned my lesson" card or if he'll go in the "I got a Rep to protect" direction for always being the BigPartyFunGuy. Y'know...most likely to get naked, dance on a table, beat the shit out of somebody then pass out in a bathtub...I'm pretty sure in that order.  It's only a few hours of a party.  Could really go either way here.  If I choose correctly and start a betting pool?  I could finance my whole blogapalooza for next year.

I have been so tangled up in le blogosphere that I haven't done anything this week for MY high school reunion.  But I have scheduled another committee meeting for next Thursday so I know I'll be in hyperdrive for that very, very soon. 

The Things got Airsoft rifles today.  We've already had one injury.  A slightly manic neighbor kid darted in front of target practice because...I think his anxiety meds were wearing off.  Thing 2 nailed him in the back by accident.  Thing 2 got his gun taken away.  Neighbor kid got an ice pack.  Fingers crossed I don't get socially shredded for this.  pleasepleaseplease.

And I don't even know why I write anymore other than to just get thoughts out of my head but sometimes I can't get them out the way I want and somebody told me over the weekend that if it becomes a chore I shouldn't force myself to write but I hardly ever did homework in high school and I think keeping up with something every day is important and I would rather it be writing than doing laundry even though god knows the laundry needs some attention. 

In a nutshell or several, that is what I'm thinking about today.