Auntie's Hideaway

Okay, so... let's see... I went to see an orthopedic specialist two weeks ago about my knee. Verdict, yes, I banged it up good and proper, I also have osteo-arthritis in my right knee (not unexpected, considering the way I've injured it in the past), and... at some point will need intervention. I'm too young and active for knee replacement, he could do surgery to clean out all the crunch stuff in there, but it would come back eventually (also true), or there's an injection he could give me after the inflammation and irritation calms down in my knee called "Synvisc One" that would basically replace the fluid that lubricates and cushions the joints in my knee. He's had good results with that one, and it turns out that the mom of one of Mr. Impossible's team mates has had it and said, "OMG, Auntie... get it. It's wonderful. I can move, I can walk, and it doesn't hurt!!"

You know... I was doing pretty well there for a long time. I mean, I was able to run and play with my kids, and while stairs were tricky at times, mostly, things with Rice Crispy Knee were good. Until now.

So for the time being, Dr. S. gave me a steroid injection in Rice Crispy Knee to calm down the inflammation and help with the pain, and advised me to stay off of it as much as possible, no stairs, no bending it, no kneeling, no lifting, etc., and to use a crutch when I needed to walk around.

Okay, cool, I can do that, and I promise, I've been very, very good. Very good. Except, I haven't told my mom about it because... really, she would freak for no good reason, and right now, I just can't see the point of upsetting her. Really. Besides, I really, really don't want to hear the "Marching Band Ruined Your Health, And So Did Drum Corps, If You'd Only Stayed In Swimming And If You'd Only Gone to Bellaire High School, You'd Be So Much Better Off" lecture again. I got a five year break from that one, but now that she has Alzheimer's, she doesn't remember settling that one so... it's being recycled. Yay.

Last week, the Impertinent Daughter turned... sixteen.

*incipient freak-out*

Have I mentioned how awesome my daughter is? May the 4th is her birthday, it's Star Wars Day, and "The Avengers" came out in the theaters. TRIPLE BONUS!!! So... we took her to San Marcos for dinner at her favorite Chinese restaurant, where the Impossible Son got this in his fortune cookie...



If you can't read it, it says, "About time I got out of that cookie!"

After that, we went to the theater where I'd pre-ordered tickets and got in line. And hey, I just have to say, I really like this "ordering movie tickets online" thing, because the show was sold out!! It was awesome!! Yes, yes, I know, welcome to the 21st century, Auntie.

I learned a valuable lesson that day, too. The Impertinent Daughter is absolutely NEVER allowed to ever, ever, EVER drink Mountain Dew again. As far as she's concerned, it's a controlled substance. OMG... one of her friends gave her a can for her birthday, and she was feeling tired when she got home from school. She wanted to stay awake for the movie, she said, so she decided to drink the Mountain Dew with her snack. This is around 4:30 p.m.

Holy Mackinoly, y'all, that child was wired for sound!! I mean, seriously, she talked nonstop (except when she was eating, and even then it was a close thing) from 4:35 until 1 a.m.!!!! EVEN DURING THE MOVIE.

I would shush her so I could hear the dialogue, and I'll say this for her, unless her enthusiasm got away from her, she mostly kept her voice really soft and quiet, which had irritations of it's own, because I couldn't hear her well enough to understand her!! And she tried valiently to be quiet in the car on the way home after, but... chatter chatter chatter!!! At least it mostly made sense!!

"The Avengers" was ... awesome by the way!!! Just... oh, yeah, gonna go see that again just so we can catch what we missed the first time!!!

The Impossible Son had a soccer game Saturday, and didn't play like himself at all. By Saturday evening, he had a fever of 103 F (39.4 C). That was fun. Turned out to be a virus that's blasting its way through town. The Impertinent Daughter fell victim to it Sunday night, but her temperature didn't get as high as the Impossible One's did, thank goodness. Mr. Impossible missed Monday, and Miss Priss should be back at school tomorrow.

After her doctor's appointment tomorrow, I shall retire to the couch with pillows to prop up Rice Crispy Knee with an ice pack and not do one damn thing until the kids get home from school!!!

So... Saturday, the Impossible Son's U12 team had a game in Temple, which is about a two hour drive from here, and it was a very frustrating endeavor, for many reasons. Mostly because we only had 6 players, and we play 8 v 8. Most of our players didn't come because their parents decided it was "too far" and just... didn't want to go.

WTF??

Okay, so don't even get me started on that or we will be here all day while Auntie vents her spleen about idiotic soccer parents who plonk down money for their kids to play soccer... and then freak out because they have to actually go outside their comfort zone so their kid can play soccer.

Yeah, I don't get it, either.

Anyhow, the fields in Temple were extensive, and when we finally found our team, we were walking across ground that had been affected by the last bout of rains we'd gotten about a week and a half ago. I had just looked down and said, "Oh, hey, there are holes here! Better be careful, I don't want to find one the hard waaAAAAAY!!" and down I went.

*sigh*

My left ankle turned outward and actually bent so that the outside of my foot was flat to the ground, and the next thing I knew, the ground was rushing up to hit me and slammed my right knee straight down onto hard-packed soil. Right on my kneecap.

It hurt so bad, I almost threw up right then and there.

Managed to roll onto my butt and snarled, "Don't touch me! Just don't touch me!" at all the hands waving in my face. The Husbandly One was right there with me, most likely wanting to snatch me right back up, but I couldn't bear anyone touching me until I could get a handle on the pain. And you know, my right knee is my bad knee. In fact, when I pulled my capris up to look at the damage, I was half terrified I'd see my kneecap on my shin, like I did all those years ago in boot camp.

Oh, so don't want to remember that!!

Fortunately, my kneecap was right where it belonged, I had just scraped my knee to hell and gone, and knocked loose all the calcium and other crap collected on the back of the kneecap so that it felt like my knee was full of gravel.

Thank goodness I hadn't worn shorts, like I originally intended!! Or it would have been even more of a bloody mess than it was. Eeyuck!

Of course, it feels like I have a rock inside my knee now, but I'm not limping any more. Stairs are a problem, though, and this means my weekly battle with the Laundry Monster is going to be iffy. Oh well. We don't need towels and clothes, right?

Is it wrong for me to be ready for this year to be over already?

*sigh*

You know, I haven't posted a Weird Animal Story in a while, mainly because the Killer Psycho Mockingbirds have been relatively quiet. So... I guess we were kind of overdue.

So... this morning. We troop out of the house so I can take the kids to school, and as we get to the car, I pause. Why? Because there's this huge BUZZARD, also known as a turkey vulture in the street behind my car. Just sort of... hanging out. You know. "Doopty doo, doopty doo, nothing to worry about folks, hyuk, just doin' mah buzzard thang heere, heh... don't mind me, now, y'all just... pretend I'm not here!"

Riiiiiight.

And he won't move. Usually, buzzards don't like being approached, and will take off if you get too close. Not this one. I figured whatever it was that was dead, it must be really, er... tasty. Or something. Problem was, I couldn't smell anything dead nearby, and didn't see anything, either. So, I herded the kids into the car and had to back up creatively so I didn't end up with a big ol' turkey buzzard stuck to my rear bumper. And it was as I was pulling out that I realized what had attracted Mr. Buzzard.

Our neighbors had this... this... HUGE FISH lying in their front yard against the mutual hedge between our properties. I swear the thing must have been six feet long!! NO WONDER Mr. Buzzard was so determined to stick around, I mean, he must have thought he'd hit the Mother Lode of Dead Crap!!

Okay, so... the kids were freaking out, and laughing hysterically, and kept looking back to see if he'd approached the Big Dead Fish yet the whole way up the street.

The Impossible Son looked back as we turned and said, "He's going for it!"

So... we get to the Impossible Son's school, and there is a truck in front of us that has a... tiny deer sitting on the hitch. No, seriously. A tiny little deer, sitting cross-legged on the hitch with one of it's forelegs up in the air, like it's saying, "Hi there!!"

The Impertinent One said, "Oh, I wonder if it's like the cow Papa and I saw on a truck once! When they hit the turn signal, the cow's eyes glowed red and the legs went up and down!"

"Yaaaaagh!" I said. "That sounds creepy!! And distracting!!"

The truck didn't turn, so the kids were disappointed. However, after I dropped the Impossible Son off, and then went to drop Miss Impertinent off at the high school, the truck appeared again, turning out of the driveway of one of the schools I pass on the way home, and there was the tiny deer again. This time, the truck turned, and THE DEER WAVED AT ME AND KICKED ONE LEG UP AND DOWN!!

O.O

I almost had a car accident, I was so... mesmerized...

So, when I got home, Mr. Turkey Buzzard was pecking half-heartedly at the Big Dead Fish, and I could swear he was saying, "WTF is this shit??" I peeked around the hedge and realized his problem right away.

It was a TAXIDERMIED Big Dead Fish!! In fact, it had lost most of its scales at some point, and there was fiber sticking out from where it had split at the top, and oh, the reek!!! Evidently, the bushes sort of protected us from it.

Mr. Buzzard gave this indignant squawk and sort of hop-flapped away before taking off for something less well-preserved. I mean, seriously, it's pretty bad when you manage to disgust a BUZZARD.

Is it just me, or is 2012 so far just... full of suck?

And we still have eight more months to go.

...

Bloody marvelous, that.

So, what has Auntie been up to lately?

Coping, mostly.

The Impertinent Daughter has recovered from her concussion and is back playing soccer. In fact, her final game is next week.

The Impossible Son is also playing soccer, and is doing well. School-wise, however, math continues to be his Achilles heel, and I have gotten to the point of throwing up my hands. Seriously, his math problems are not going to improve without outside intervention, because he is being confused between what the school is trying to teach him (and I'm using the word "teach" very lightly here) and what we're trying to teach him. Getting his teacher to send home homework has been like pulling hen's teeth. It's frustrating and excruciating watching him try to do what little gets sent home.

He's making A's and B's in all his other subjects. He's got a really high grade in science! But he's making D's and F's in math.

*head-desk*

And then there's my mom.

Okay, so... Mom is in the beginning stages of Alzheimer's. Yeah, I didn't see that one coming at all. But then, we know almost nothing about her mother's family, because she was raised by her father's family, and they couldn't stand her mother's family. So, for all we know, there are people in her mom's family who had Alzheimer's. People in her dad's family tended to be as sharp as a tack up until the day they died. Some of them had strokes, but even paralyzed and unable to talk, their minds were still sharp and clear.

Mom is getting vague and dithery, and forgets what she's said half the time. Her short term memory is going. I already knew that. This, though... yeah, really caught me off guard. It's really difficult to accept that this bright, intelligent, sassy woman is going to... fade away.

Okay, I can't write about that any more.

Anyhow, she gave us a scare earlier this week. Got up and didn't feel right, went to call the Flaky Sister, and by the time my sister got to her, Mom couldn't talk and was glassy eyed. Flaky called 911 after getting her back in the bed, and she was rushed to the hospital with a suspected stroke.

After some tests, however, they determined she had a Transient Ischemic Attack, also known as a T.I.A. or mini-stroke. They gave her some medication and within the hour, she was back to her normal self. Or, as normal as she gets these days. They kept her, though, because she needed to be checked over, and decided to go ahead and run some tests she's been needing, but been avoiding (because she hates hospitals). She should be coming home today, though.

I've been staying in contact with the Blonde Sister through all this, because we decided after an event earlier this month that the Flaky Sister is simply not allowed to call me and "let Auntie know" what's going on with Mom. Why? Because the Flaky Sister is simply incapable of telling me, "Mom has bronchitis and they put her on antibiotics, oh, and when they did a chest x-ray, they figured out she has very light emphysema."

No, it's more like, "Mom's been feeling pretty bad, she's been coughing so hard she shakes and so we took her to the doctor and after an x-ray, they found spots on her lungs, and she now has emphysema, so her smoking when we were kids is coming back to bite her in the ass, and the doctor wants to put her on a bronchodilator, but I said no because it will make her heart work to hard, and she'll freak out, and we won't have her with us much longer, so you need to start accepting that now."

O_o

The Blonde Sister's version? "Mom's been coughing, so we got her in to see the doctor. She has bronchitis, and while he was listening to her chest, he heard some extra wheezing, so he sent her for x-rays. The x-ray came back clear, but there are signs of mild emphysema. However, two days of antibiotics and the wheezing has cleared, so it's not affecting her too badly. Funny thing is, when she saw the doctor last week about the cough, the doctor wanted her to take Mucinex to loosen the phlegm, but for some reason, she heard it as "Benadryl." And so she was taking that, but not only that, she'd forget she'd taken it, and would take more, so that's why she was all woozy and dizzy and sleepy all the time. I've hidden the Benadryl so she can't take it any more. Other than that, she's fine!"

Yeah, I'm not liking Flaky Sister so much lately. If she doesn't watch it, I'm going to give her a good whack upside the head with a Clue by Four.

*sigh*

And I am soooooo not looking forward to next week. The Impossible Son will be taking the S.T.A.A.R. tests, which have taken place of the TAKS testing that has been the bane of our existence over the last few years. He'll probably do just fine in science and reading, but math?

*groans*

It's hard not to feel like I'm failing him in this. It's hard seeing him struggle like I struggled. And it's hard to feel helpless. Dammit.

You know, after watching this... I feel better...

So, after the Impossible Son's soccer practice, it was decided to head to our favorite local Tex-Mex restaurant, Mr. Taco. We were in the mood for fajitas, or at least the Husbandly One, the Impertinent Daughter, and I were. We have discovered that Mr. Taco's "fajitas for two" plate feeds the three of us nicely. The Impossible Son had his usual chicken strips, no gravy.

We forgot that Thursdays are live mariachi band night.

Did I mention there are all hard surfaces at Mr. Taco, with nothing to absorb sound?

o_O

Anyhow, yeah, it was loud, but the food was worth it! Once we'd eaten ourselves to a lull, the Impertinent One begged a pen off me, grabbed a clean napkin, and immediately began to sketch the mariachi band members, then took it to them before fleeing back to our table.



They passed it around among themselves, looking at it intently, then marched over to our table and serenaded her with "Just My Imagination," and a Spanish/English version of "I Just Called To Say I Love You."

Her smile was incandescent, and she giggled almost the entire time, hiding her face every once in a while, but mostly beaming at them with delight. I rubbed her back from time to time when it looked like she was getting overwhelmed, but mostly? She absolutely loved it!

I think she was also chuffed that two of the mariachi singers actually fought over who would get to sing to her! And if you've never seen a violinist and a trumpet player arguing over who is gonna sing to the pretty girl, then you have no idea what you missed!

I think she's just beginning to have an inkling of the doors her art can open for her. This is going to be an interesting journey to watch!

Friday was a very eventful day in our household, some good, some not so good, and some downright alarming!

I'll start off with the good. We got our central air/central heating unit replaced, and it only took one day, and while it came with its own horrors, it was a definite Good Thing.

The horrors?

Well, first off, when they pulled out the coil? Okay, one thing you should know about an air conditioning system is the coil should be kept clean. It should be flushed out and cleaned twice a year at the very least, monthly if you want to be particular. I knew this. When we had window units, this was something we did regularly because it kept them running efficiently.

With the central whole house unit, though, that's a bit trickier, and with the unit we had, it was pretty much impossible.

And it wouldn't have mattered, because apparently no one ever cleaned the damned thing! There was an inch and a half mat of... hair. And dust. And dirt. And other things it doesn't bear thinking about. The A/C guys figure that thing hasn't been cleaned since 2003, the last time it was fully serviced. We couldn't have cleaned it anyway, because it was inaccessible. What really chaps my hide? When the fan motor burned out in 2010, and the capacitor burned out last summer, one of the first things they should have done was check the coil and clean it. Because... a dirty coil will freeze over and cause the fan to work harder and eventually burn the motor out, or burn the capacitor out.

They never looked at the coil. Just asked us if we used filters regularly, and when we said yes, said, "Okay, you're good." And that was that.

O_O

Okay... so, the next thing? When they opened the intake register? There was carpet on the floor inside the intake chamber. And... it was full of dirt and MOLDY. They rolled it into a plastic bag and carried it quickly out of the house and disposed of it, then cleaned the chamber out thoroughly, even asking if I had bleach, because they hadn't expected to have to swab the chamber out. And then spent time drying it thoroughly.

No wonder I kept getting pneumonia!! No wonder the kids kept getting upper respiratory infections. No wonder the Husbandly One kept getting sinus infections!! No wonder the Impossible Son was almost constantly congested!! It makes me want to bang my head into a wall!!

Okay, so they cleaned everything, replaced it all, sealed it all, and put a ceiling in the closet where the unit is housed... no, there was no ceiling in the closet. It was open to the attic and that was a problem, too! Anyhow, there's new ductwork up there, everything's been taped and sealed, and then they turned the A/C on (because it was a warm day and the house was stuffy).

Normally, it takes about half an hour to cool the house off after turning the A/C on.

In ten minutes, I was shivering!!

I was sitting at the kitchen table, defragging the laptop and doing other maintenance on it, and nearly jumped when papers on the table started... fluttering. And I blinked when I realized I could feel air moving against my face. Mr. A/C Guy comes in and says, "How's that?"

I said, "What's that breeze? Do you still have the front door open?"

He grinned at me. "Nope. That's coming from the overhead vent."

Y'all... we've never been able to feel the air coming from the vents. Well, not from a distance. We'd have to hold our hands up to the vents to tell it was working.

Right about that moment, the wind chime I have hanging from the kitchen vent started softly chiming. It's never done that before!!

Totally AWESOME!!

And when they got the heat set up? WONDERFUL!! It's a sealed system, so no more checking obsessively to make sure the pilot light is still lit, and worrying that it's gone out every time the wind starts blowing outside. SO AWESOME!!

And the house is actually warm!! I no longer go around bundled up in the house like a little Eskimo, as THO puts it.

Totally full of WIN!!

Yes, those idiots at Mr. Blow Hard's company really screwed us. Oh, yeah, when they replaced the fan motor? They put in a super-charged fan motor, so it would work with the crappy, dirty coil and not burn out. Not only that, but they replaced the 30 amp circuit with a 40 amp without telling us so the fan would work and not overload the circuit.

Yeah, that has to be replaced. Yay.

*grumble grumble grumble*

Put all of that together and it explains why our power bills were so damn high!

But... YAY NEW SYSTEM!!!

The Impertinent One had a game Friday night, and right about the time that Mr. A/C Guy was putting the finishing touches on our system, I got a text from her. Their game, which had been scheduled for 6 pm, had been moved to 5 pm. Which meant scrambling to get food into them before game time.

Except they didn't. They pretty much had them practicing until fifteen minutes before the game, and then they had to change out and set up, and nowhere in there was there time for the junior varsity team to eat, or even text their folks to ask for so much as a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. So basically, they hadn't eaten since lunch.

Oh, and did I mention it was cold and rainy by that point?

Not that cold and rainy is a problem, but on an empty stomach, it is.

To say that they didn't play well would be a major understatement. We had a lot of injuries in that game, including the Impertinent Daughter.

AND I MISSED IT!!

I was answering a parent's questions, trying to keep an eye on the Impossible Son (who was living up to his name, believe me), and on the field, but I missed Miss Impertinent taking a ball to the face straight off her opponent's knee. By the time I was focused on the field again, she was on the bench. And she stayed on the bench through the rest of the first half, and part of the second half until one of the coaches noticed her face was swelling, so they sent her to the trainer, who slapped ice on it.

Her eye was swollen shut, apparently.

The Tall Blonde noticed that the Impertinent One was sitting on the trainer's cart, and after looking through the zoom lens of her camera, determined she had an ice bag held to her face. Then we heard that she had a headache, and that was all I knew until the end of the game when I was finally able to make my way to the team's bench, just in time to hear the trainer assessing her for a concussion.

O_o

So... I got her home, did my own assessment, and decided to keep her home and resting until Monday, when I could get her in to see the family doctor. She had a headache, but it wasn't severe. Her face was swollen where she'd been hit by the ball, but had improved by the time we got home, and she was fairly steady on her feet. By Sunday, though, she couldn't walk a straight line if her life depended on it. And she was sleepy. We kept an eye on her, and I got her in to see the doctor first thing on Monday.

The physician's assistant did her assessment and said, "CT scan time!" The verdict? A mild concussion, so she's benched by the doctor until the 10th, and benched by the district's concussion protocol until the 17th, provided she passes the trainer's assessment.

I'm glad of this, because when I was in high school sports, their concussion protocol consisted of, "Can you still see? Can you still stand up? Okay, rub some dirt on it and GET BACK IN THE GAME!!"

In other words, unless you were bleeding out your eyeballs and nose, you were fine to play, especially if you were one of the better players.

I'm glad this is no longer true!

Still, the coach looked like she was sucking on a lemon someone had found in the garbage when we let her know. Oh, well, my priority is my kid, not the coach's happiness.

So, new CA/CH unit - YAY!!

Mild concussion - BOO!!

And there you go!

The Impertinent Daughter had an AWESOME game tonight!! And Junior Varsity won their game, 3 to 0!! She had two truly sweet corner kicks and many assists, and omg, y'all... she was so fast tonight!! I'M SO PROUD!!!

*dance of joy, dance of joy*

GO LADY LIONS!!!

Can I just... step off the roller coaster for a few minutes? Kinda feeling dizzy... just a bit.

Let's see, we're having to replace the central air/central heating unit in our house because (1) it has reached the age where there are no spare parts available any longer and (2) even if there were spare parts available, it wouldn't be safe to fix.

*sigh*

Yeah, that was fun. The guy who came to repair it works for the company who installed it in the first place some twenty years ago, and after first telling me what needed fixing and how much it would cost, then telling me the parts that needed fixing needed to be replaced, then telling me they don't make those parts any more, I got to deal with the blustering, Good Ol' Boy owner of said company. Mr. Good Ol' Boy took one look at me and decided that I was the type that could be easily manipulated into what he wanted me to do, and proceeded to try to intimidate me into agreeing with him that his company should be the ones to do the work.

Y'all know that went over like a lead balloon, right?

Funny how Mr. Blow Hard and his tech went all through the closet where the CA/CH unit is housed, with Mr. Blow Hard taking measurements and loudly telling his tech that they'd have to rip out the wall, and probably part of the floor to put in a new coil, and he would recommend a contractor to rebuild the wall after they were done replacing the unit, blah, blah, blah, and it never occurred to him that I was texting the Husbandly One basically a blow by blow account of what was going on while I sat quietly at the kitchen table with the laptop. Mostly, Mr. Blow Hard shouted out a series of arcane numbers that I'm guessing were supposed to be measurements of some kind, or maybe it was just supposed to impress me with how technical he was...

When he finally "presented" me with his "findings," I said politely, "Well, I'll discuss this with my husband, and we'll let you know what we decide."

He frowned, then smiled indulgently and looked at his tech, nodding as he said, "Oh, right. You'll discuss this with your husband." He snickered. "You mean, you'll ask him what to do and then do what he tells you."

Yeah, that pretty much made me see red, but I just raised an eyebrow and said, "No, I mean I'll discuss it with my husband. We're partners. Neither one of us makes big money decisions on our own. We talk it out, go over the pros and cons, and go from there. Sometimes he has the final say, sometimes I have the final say, but either way, it gets discussed, we do research, and decide how big a hit our budget can take, because it affects both of us. So when I say we'll discuss it and let you know, that's precisely what I mean. You have a problem with that?"

"Well, if you go with us, you won't have to pay the service fee for this visit," Mr. Blow Hard said, still trying to work the intimidation factor. "But if you go with someone else, I'll have to send you a bill for $85."

"That's fine," I said with a sweet smile. "We'll let you know."

"You should decide soon, because we might be booked up," he said as he headed for the door.

"We'll take that chance," I said firmly. "Bye now."

Yeah, that was fun.

We called a couple of companies, but decided on one recommended to us by the Tall Blonde. What settled it was (1) he got back to us and (2) he didn't just look at the main unit. He also went up into the attic to check the ducts and connections, and went under the house to check the coil and the drains. He was very patient with my questions, and also cleared up a mystery that's been driving us crazy for some time now.

Every time the A/C or the heat came on, I'd smell this... faint burning odor that made the back of my throat burn, and would sometimes set my asthma off. We had the unit checked several times because of this, but there was never anything we could find to explain it.

Then Mr. A/C guy takes a look at the duct work and peers up at the top of our unit and goes, "Huh."

Yeah, that's not a good sound, either.

Seems that when Mr. Blow Hard's company installed the unit, they used a type of duct work that has since been banned in our country because it's... well, basically a piece of crap. And when all the new ductwork was installed, they left this original duct work in place where the unit connects to it all. Basically, what happens to the crap duct is that it dries out and starts cracking, then dry rots and gets blown about in the system. That's what I've been smelling every time the unit comes on.

Mr. A/C said, "What I don't understand is why they left it there. Because even if the new duct wouldn't fit, there's a way to work around it and adapt it, so... why leave the old stuff? It's not safe!"

Well, judging by the crap unit Mr. Blow Hard wanted us to buy, I'd say it was done to cut corners. After all, how many homeowners actually look up into their attic to see what they've got up there? And how many of those that do would know what to look for or what they're even looking at?

We're fortunate that the weather has been mild, though the first three or four nights after we lost our heat were tough, because it got down in the thirties. Thank goodness for lots of blankets!! This house holds on to the cold like you wouldn't believe, and I've had to open the windows during the day just so I can feel my fingers!!

The Impertinent Daughter's team survived a three day soccer tournament over last weekend, and so did we! Again, in San Marcos at the fields where the Impossible Son and I froze our katooshies off. And, yes, it was cold, but not as cold as last year! Friday night, they were in first place, but by Saturday afternoon, because of the bizarre point system the folks who were running the tournament were using, the JV found themselves playing for third.

I'm still not sure where we placed, because every person I've asked have said something different. Personally, I think they placed pi.

Hey, it makes about as much sense as that point system!!

And the Impossible Son has started soccer practice for the rec league this week, which is going to be frustrating, I can tell already. Why? Because once again, there weren't enough coaches for the record FIVE U12 teams that were formed this season, so they basically started grabbing any warm body. And one of the warm bodies is the woman who is coaching my son's team.

I have nothing against her. She's a good person, I've known her since the Impertinent Daughter started playing soccer, and now her daughter and mine are playing JV for the high school. It's cool. However... she's never coached soccer before in her life and has no idea where to start. The good news is, she knows this, and has enlisted the help of several girls on the high school team, as well as any parents who have any sort of know how, or is willing to help out. This can work, I've seen it work before.

I've also seen it go to hell in a handbasket.

So... I'm hoping and keeping my fingers crossed that things will go well. However, the Husbandly One and I have decided this will be Mr. Impossible's last season playing here. If he plays rec league next fall, it will be in San Marcos.

And that is the State of Auntie so far. Woo.

Originally posted by morgandawn at Seems I Am Not The Only One....

You know, if we could get enough people to do this and pull this off, it would send a powerful message to the industry who started this ridiculous campaign. Hit 'em in the pocketbooks, folks. Hit 'em HARD.

Wow, has this year flown by or what?

It's been pretty cool having the Husbandly One home, and we've gotten a lot done over his vacation. We've rearranged the living room, and bought a shelving unit to go around the television that makes us feel more like grownups and less like college students making do with whatever they can find in garage sales and on curbs. Heh. What's nice about it is we've finally managed to corral the hordes of books, dvds, and games that seemed to be continually scattered around the living room with no set place to keep them, and what we did have was inadequate in the extreme.

It was also a good excuse to purge those movies and games nobody watches or plays.

Now if we can just figure out how to arrange the couches so that we can watch tv/play games without getting cricks in our necks, or cutting off the ability to walk straight from the front door to the kitchen, something of vital importance when one's arms are full of groceries. Normally, when we have a movie we want to watch, we just pull the big couch around and pile up on it and push it back to the wall when the movie is over. But sometimes, that's a pain in the neck.

We've also tossed out/gotten rid of things in the kitchens that were cluttering up the counters, and I did a major cleanout/reorganization of the cabinets last night. That was both awesome and terrifying. Awesome, because it felt good to see those shelves neatened up and with so much more room on them because of the stuff I threw out. Terrifying, because we had stuff in there from when we were first married, I kid you not! In fact, some of it was older than our marriage, stuff from my great-aunt's house that somehow just kept getting shoved in boxes and moved with us over the years. I mean, seriously, I found a bottle of Karo syrup that had to be nearly thirty years old!! We never use Karo syrup!! And I found the source of the odd little moths we keep finding fluttering around the house. It was in a canister of ancient anise seeds my great aunt must have bought years ago that was more caterpillar husks than it was seeds!! There was also a jar of rancid ground nutmeg that had ... fermented and smelled... eurgh!!! I mean, why was I keeping this stuff? WHY??

I think the last time I was that horrified, I was cleaning out the cabinets in my great aunt's house and found two cases full of vials of sheep's placenta that my great aunt had apparently been using to keep her skin soft and wrinkle free. One case had been half used, but she had economically put the empty vials back in place. I'd been finding those odd little glass vials all over the place and had been greatly mystified by them up until that point. YUCK!! I'd opened one and it smelled horrible, and I thought, well, that explains why she smelled the way she did.

*shudder*

So, it was wonderful to get rid of all of the out-dated stuff, the inexplicable stuff, and the just plain gross stuff.

Still have some stuff left to do, but I think we can tackle most of that on the weekends coming up. Definitely need to clear off the disaster area that is my computer desk. It's become it's own gravitational anomaly, I swear. Miss Impossible puts all her artwork on my desk, both kids put important papers there, the Husbandly One deposits things there, and of course, so do I, and right now, it's a jumbled mess. It's like a hoarder's house... just on a desk. Empty picture frames, drawings, my sketchbook, hand lotion, lens filters, various articles of clothing, packages, papers, papers, photos, more papers, drawings, pencils, pens, more papers, a POS camera, bottles, earrings, even more papers, boxes, books, more books, a few dvds, hats, even more books... I ought to take a panoramic shot of my desk just so y'all can see.

On second thought, I might be too embarrassed for y'all to see my desk.

Oh, what the hell... here...



Sad, isn't it?

*sigh*

I'm sure the mess is contributing to my writing issues. Yes, I'm still having writing issues. And let me tell you, it sucks. It sucks big time. I mean, I'm writing, I am, just... not anything I can post, really. My head is still crammed full of ideas that are literally just... screaming to get out. And... I just can't. I'm blocked, and it's frustrating. It's been, what, two years now?

And as I've mentioned before, I know what one of the principal causes is (not my desk), and I'm still having trouble moving beyond it. Because the doubts that were seeded have just... overgrown. I guess it's time for a huge mental weeding or something. I know I can write, and I know I'm pretty damn good at it. I even know what I'm good at writing, and you know what? The world has already had one Erma Bombeck, it doesn't need another, and I'm not her, anyway, so... no, I won't be writing that. I have my blog for humor writing, and that's just fine with me.

I mean, come on, I'm even having writer's block where my goddamned blog is concerned, let's not make it worse, all right?

So... mental weeding, and... mental floss, whatever it takes. But dammit, I need to write because it hurts not to!!

So... if I'm going to have any sort of list resembling a vague outline of New Year's Resolutions, this is what it would look like:

1.) Clean off toxic waste dump disaster area known as "desk" and create an art dump for the daughter.

2.) Write, dammit.

3.) Write more, dammit.

4.) Write and get paid for it, dammit!!!

There. I feel better now!

... at least they didn't wait until we'd gone to sleep to wake us up all over again.

Still, do you have any idea how terrifying it is to be bent over, digging in a drawer to look for those gift bags from last Christmas because nobody can remember where the stockings are, and feel a hard, knobby, bony finger poke you in the side while a voice that sounds like a chain smoking six year old says, "Santa's running late, we got hung up in Poughkeepsie, and then there was a block party going on in Tulsa with search lights... Santa's way behind schedule, and you've got balls to blow up, here's the pump!"

I thought my heart was going to jump out of my mouth!!

I think the only reason that elf isn't dead, dead, dead is because (1) no gifts for the kids EVER, and (2) the Husbandly One wouldn't let me clock him with the lamp. He really likes that lamp. THO, that is.

So... yeah, it's 2:21 a.m., and we're done putting out the presents under the little artificial tree THO and I had the first year we were married. Yes, we still have it, and it looks so cute and completely dwarfed by presents! And I'm sure in the morning, I'll feel more charitable toward the elves, but right now? Not so much.

It was easier when the kids were smaller. Santa did the bulk of the present lay-out, and we just filled out the corners with the presents we'd gotten them. But since the kids have gotten older, it seems Santa is more and more pressed for time.

I'm beginning to wonder, though.

Anyhow, Happy Holidays to all my friends! Hopefully, you're getting more sleep than I am!!

I want to thank everyone for wishing the Husbandly One and I a happy anniversary! And I wish to thank kathrynthegr8 for the snowman cookie!! Hee!!

The kids and THO are on Christmas break, which means we've been busy, busy, busy pretty much since Saturday! We've mostly finished up Christmas shopping (most of our shopping for the kids was done online) and have bought and assembled a new shelving unit for the living room that will help corral the DVD's and games that were threatening to take over the entire house. Not to mention make us feel a little bit more like grownups and not so much like college students only pretending to be grownups!

Now we just need to replace the aging, wheezing, nearly dying refrigerator, and we'll be good!

That and catch up on sleep.

I'm enjoying having THO home, and it's going to be difficult when he goes back to work. Of course, it's throwing me off my schedule, but you know what? I don't mind it one bit. Because I really like having him around. It's like having my own personal man-candy wandering around the house... wait a minute... he is my own personal man-candy...

*dies laughing*

Okay, now y'all know exactly where my mind is, don't you?

We made the decision not to try to drive in to Houston on Christmas day this year. As much as I love my mom and would like to see my family, the truth is we've gotten used to having our own tradition of watching the kids open their presents and having a sort of lazy day at home, thanks to freezes and weather that made driving not so great an option. And you know, we're always so sleep deprived on Christmas day, thanks to Santa's elves waking us up at ungodly hours of the night to tell us Santa hit a whiteout in Omaha, or NORAD decided to scramble fighters because they thought Santa's sleigh was a bogey coming in to bomb New York and thus threw him off his schedule. So the elves wake us up, because Santa's dropping the presents off and WE have to set them up, because he has to hit New Mexico before 3:30 a.m. or he'll be late... yeah, I hate that.

Seems like that's been happening more and more often, lately.

Those elves have damn hard, knobby fingers, too. And they leave wet spots in the carpet from the melting snow. Damn it.

Anyhow, we're pretty sleep deprived, between that and the kids getting us up way before we're ready to get up, and making the three hour drive into Houston, staying for two or three, then the three hour drive back just... doesn't look so attractive, know what I mean?

We'll go sometime next week. I hope.

*sigh*

In the meantime, we have our own thing, and... I'm pretty darn okay with it. Just so long as we get the tree up between now and Christmas!

Don't. Even. Ask.

So, today we have a bit more shopping to do, and then we're done! And I need to do a bit of wrapping, and figure out what to get the Tall Blonde as thanks for taking me out for a girl's afternoon out and getting my hair cut as my Christmas present from HER, and... man, I am so stumped!!

Chocolate. Can't go wrong with chocolate, right? Lots and lots.

I'll figure it out. Hopefully sometime BEFORE Christmas. Which is... in two days.

*head-desk*

Okay, time for me to get up and get busy! Happy Holidays to you all if I don't get to post again!

Our marriage is twenty one years old today, and therefore, old enough to drink. The Husbandly One says we should take it out, get it drunk, and do wicked, naughty, evil things to it!!

*merry laughter*

He has the best ideas!!!

I'm fresh from a game of In A Pickle, and oh, boy, my sides ache from laughing!!

The Husbandly One and I love playing games of In A Pickle with the kids, because not only do we get into hilariously silly word strings, but... our kids learn to think on their feet, they learn to use their skills of persuasion and argument, and they learn to think creatively while justifying their choices.

It's a win-win, because while THO and I are demonstrating the skills we want our kids to learn, we're also getting a glimpse into the way they think. And, disturbingly enough, they're getting a glimpse into how we think!

So, while we started with a cheeseburger eating moose in a bedroom, the Impossible Son added that it was all in fear, and he had to justify that all of that would fit in a fear, and we had a lively (and somewhat hysterical) discussion about irrational fears, and THO wasn't quite convinced that fear of a cheeseburger eating moose was the same as the fear of being watched by a duck. However, the Impertinent Daughter chimed in that she was sure there were many Americans who were afraid of having a moose in their bedroom, and that she, herself, would be very disturbed by a moose in her bedroom, and if it were eating cheeseburgers, that would definitely cause mental scarring for life.

I had pretty much laid my head down on the table at this point, in helpless tears of laughter.

So, once Mr. Impossible, with the help of his sister, had won his case, I decided that all of this was in the mind of a girl, and I got the pickle.

We've had a great deal of fun with this game, probably more than we're supposed to, because with our geeky brains, we probably get a whole hell of a lot more mileage out of the words than most people would. Come on, seriously, how many people would look at the words, "Venus Fly Trap," in their hand and think, "OMG, I know just how to use this!!" and go on a word string that has a Reflection of a Venus Fly Trap in a Mirror on a Submarine in a Parade? Or starts cackling with glee when they see, "Nun," and end up with Ants in a Nun in a Marriage (we didn't say she was a good nun) in a Warehouse in Paris?

Whenever someone goes a little too weird or too far, the rest of us make that game show buzzer noise, "EEEHHHHHH!!!" and "No, no, no, sorry, can't have a blimp in a cat, even if the cat is as big as a house, or a toilet in an elephant, because even if an elephant is bigger than a toilet, how would it get in there? An elephant is big, but has a small mouth!"

I won't even go into the arguments to justify how a toilet can get into an elephant!!

Of course, as the game goes on, we all get more desperate to not lose a turn, and it just gets crazier and wilder until we're all laughing so hard that we can't breathe, and I just ... can't help but find it so awesome that we can all do this, that we all get to do this together. To be as nerdy and silly and just plain goofy and... life is good.

Yeah. Life is good.

ArtDungeon.net is ... is... GONE!! What happened??? WHY????

*weeps*

Well, this is a milestone of sorts.

This is the first time in years that I've made it through the entire month of November without getting pneumonia

"is chuffed*

Really, this is quite an achievement for me! Seriously. I've been wrestling with the Asthma Monster for well over twenty years now, and the last ten have sucked majorly. Seeing the gastroenterologist last year was the best thing that ever happened to me. Seriously.

Well, second best. The best thing that ever happened to me is meeting the Husbandly One. Period.

Anyhow, it wasn't like I was having major heartburn all the time. Just... every once in a while. Though there were foods I couldn't eat without getting major heartburn, like ... spaghetti. So, I never considered acid reflux an issue connected with my asthma, even after my dad was diagnosed with esophageal cancer. That's why, when I had the major stomach pain last year and had to see a surgeon, I thought he was kind of nuts for suggesting that acid reflux was causing the majority of my severe asthma problems. But I took the medication he prescribed, because I was in serious pain and figured it couldn't hurt.

By the time I got to see the gastroenterologist three weeks later, it was as if I didn't have asthma any more at all.

It was the weirdest feeling, too. Not feeling like everything in my chest was too tight. Being able to draw in a deep breath and it didn't hurt. Coughing, and actually being able to clear my airway!

And it's still that way. Still. That's why I was throwing such a hissy fit about the Dexilant, the medication I take for acid reflux, because it feels like it's given me my life back, you know? I mean, THO and I finally decided to just skip the insurance and pay for it ourselves, and the drug company sent us a discount card that means it only costs $60 to refill it, instead of $150, which is a win in my book any day!

So, this year, I admit, when November rolled around, I was still kind of resigned to first getting bronchitis, and I did get a mild case of it, which would lead into pneumonia by the middle of the month. Usually just before Thanksgiving. Or immediately after, because driving into Houston is just asking for trouble on my part, as many of you very well know.

And... that didn't happen this year. If it's not the pollen and crap blowing around on the strong cold fronts that start in November here, it's turning on our heater that does it. But... not this year. And trust me, I'm not questioning it, I'm deliriously happy about it! This is a good thing!

So... I'm going to sit here and just... enjoy the breathing regularly without discomfort thing. Because that's just... totally awesome.

So, yay, LJ is under another DDOS attack again. Is it me, or is this happening like... every other month? Seriously, you can almost set your watch to these attacks!!

*grumblegrumblegrumble*

The first book I ever wrote was about fire lizards. I loved the idea of fire lizards! I loved the idea of finding eggs in hot sands on the beach, and having one break open and a hungry little dragonet pouncing out, all hungry and creeling, and because I just happened to be carrying a lunch bag, WHAM!... Impression.

Of course, I was fifteen and the book was for my sophomore English class in high school. But I wrote it, illustrated it myself, and hand-bound it. It won first prize in a creative writing contest I didn't even know about, but my teacher entered it on the sly. I was very proud of that book.

And, of course, I wrote it because I was Pern-crazy.

I read my first Pern novel when I was about twelve. It was Dragonsong by Anne McCaffrey, and I fell utterly in love with it. Well, actually, to tell you the truth, I fell in love with the illustration on the cover of the book, which is how I usually picked books when I was a kid. I would be intrigued by cover illustrations, and then get hooked by the words inside.

After that, I was doodling fire lizards all over the place. They showed up in my notebooks, in corners of my textbooks, on my piano music, napkins at lunch...

And then I discovered Dragonflight... and discovered there were more books by this wonderful, wonderful woman. Crystal Singer, and the Dinosaur Planet series, and her shorts in Get Off The Unicorn, and The Ship Who Sang...

I had always wanted to be a writer, when I wasn't wanting to be a astronaut/veterinarian/engineer/pianist/artist/scientist/dancer... well, you get the picture. My family is full of story tellers. But this woman... her writing set my imagination on fire, and I really, really started wanting it. Starting taking it seriously, and working at it. I started thinking it was possible.

Thank you, Anne McCaffrey, for all those wonderful hours sitting up on the roof, curled up in the shade of the tallow tree, reading about dragons and their riders, fighting against Thread, and Masterharper Robinton, and Menolly, and for the amazing Captain Sassinak and her brilliant fight against the Planet Pirates, and for Killashandra and the Heptite Guild, and the Rowan and Jeff Raven, and Afra and Damia, and... everything you taught me. I am going to miss you.

Rest in peace...