Not Like the Others

As I type this, I am sitting in my kitchen, ostensibly cleaning it. My method of cleaning is not really what you’d call orthodox, however. So far it’s consisted of running the dishwasher and standing next to the sink to scoop all the overflowing dishwasher draingage water into a bucket, which I then take in the bathroom and pour down the toilet.  Simultaneously, I am running the oven at 420 degrees, trying to burn off the very last of the caked-on olive oil that I could not scrub off. After that I may just be able to use the oven again. To ensure that the smoke alarms aren’t activated by my unique oven- cleaning method, I am running the exhaust fan over the stove on high, as well as running the exhaust fan in the bathroom. I am also sitting near the oven to watch in case copious amounts of smoke start pouring out, so I can intervene. Much like I am intervening in the kitchen sink/dishwasher drain fiasco that’s happening behind me. Since that’s not really enough to keep my interest, I am also washing some clothes downstairs, hoping that the drain down there is unfrozen, and that I won’t go down in a few minutes to a flooded basement full of soap suds.

It’s Extreme Household Maintenance, and it’s not for the faint of heart.

Epic Handbag Adventures

Only now am I able to discuss with a reasonable level of calm the HORROR, the TRAGEDY, the ABSOLUTE CALAMITY which befell me last weekend. While returning to my humble abode on Friday night, in no slight state of inebriation, I chanced to discover that my BAG, my FAVORITE GOING OUT BAG had sustained an injury most grievous. Namely: one of the straps was broken loose of its mooring, and flapping most ineffectually in the chill night air.

This bag and I have a history dating at least 10 years, and possible 11. Purchased at the Esprit store in Amsterdam in 1998 or 1999, it was one of the first “expensive” bag purchases of my (at that time young) life. I can’t remember what I paid for it, and even if I did it would have been in guilders and the price wouldn’t make any sense now since the debut of the Euro, but however much it was, it was purchased at full price (!) and I remember that it made me a little nervous to be spending that much money at the time, and I hid the receipt from my boyfriend. My friends in Amsterdam teased me constantly for my grandma-handbag fetish, but when I saw this little black number sitting on a shelf I knew it had to be mine.

Numerous are its charms, and hidden features, but a few of the highlights are:

• It is black. This is key for any bag I am to carry long-term.
• It is leather, not some icky-sticky fabric.
• The sides are hard, not soft, carefully protecting all my delicate goods within
• The top has a most cunning silver clasp, which snaps closed with a satisfyingly deep click
• The top of the bag closes entirely, preventing things falling out, or falling in
• It is deceptively small and almost Mary Poppins-esque in its ability to hold things. I have had a full night’s load of stuff in it and still found room to add my gloves, a scarf and paperback book that a friend gave me. It’s much bigger on the inside than it is on the outside.
• At this point it’s well-worn and loved, so I don’t mind taking it out to bars and getting drinks spilled on it and whatnot
• It has the perfect strap length, enabling it to be held loosely in the hand (to attract purse-snatchers, if one is of a mood to do that) or over the shoulder, with the bag fitting closely under one’s upper arm (not bouncing annoyingly against one’s hip) This also is perfect for being out at bars, because it frees up one’s hands to hold a drink and gently prod malingerers out of one’s way, but it doesn’t leave your bag dangling so low down that it is vulnerable to pick-pockets and getting carelessly jostled/caught on barstools.
• It is most stylish and classically granny-ish, still as delightfully in fashion today as it was the day I bought it

In short, it’s a perfect fucking bag. So I am going to have to get that strap fixed. I’ve heard there’s a place on Big Bend that can do that, but by all means if you have a suggestion for a good bag-fixer person, please let me know.

Observe how epic, and the sadly broken strappage.

I have a replacement bag pinch-hitting for my fave bag, but even though it’s of a similar size/shape it’s fabric (gross if you spill something on it) with only short/hand-held handles and it only snaps closed on the top, which means things can fall in and out of it. And  I have to carry that one out tonight. Boo.

Attempt at replacement bag 1. Wrong color, good length straps, but too large with unwieldy top-flap.

Attempt at replacement bag 2. Good color, good size, but fabric, with odd length handles and only a snap closure on top.

In other news, I bought two new dresses, a new top and two new pairs of sandals today. I am having the hardest goddamn time finding shoes right now, since I need shoes that are loose enough to not squeeze the broken part of my left foot. That usually equals something like a slingback. However slingbacks are exactly what you don’t want to wear when you have plantar fasciitis, like I do in my right foot. For that I need a closed-back shoe with a slightly elevated heel. But that puts too much stress on the broken foot, and it also doesn’t help my right knee, which is all jacked up from walking funny to accommodate the left foot. See how ridiculous this gets? I need arch support on the right, which aggravates the left, and I basically only feel totally comfortable when I am barefoot. And to top all that off, I would actually like to have shoes the are, you know, cute. Pretty much impossible. So  you can imagine my delight at  finding two new pairs of sandals today which I think will actually be comfortable on both sides of my fucked-up lower extremities. And I debated buying both pairs, and then I realized how hard it was to find anything that suits my weird-ass needs, and totally bought both. Fuck it.

Totally random, but this is the only pretty thing in my garden at the moment, so you’re getting  a picture of it.

Bleeding Hearts. Glad they survived the snow/frost.

Laundry Woes

OK, so I have been thinking lately that my whites weren’t as bright as they should be. Because that’s the kind of thing you think about when your life is made of 1/3 FAIL, 1/3 stultifying boredom and 1/3 OCD. And I want my whites to be nice and bright so I can use my massive brain power to ponder other things, so I decided to try a different detergent, convinced that my Tide Pure Essentials With Baking Soda and White Lilac wasn’t cutting it.

I got this Arm & Hammer with OxiClean! stuff, thinking that sounds, like, extra cleantastic. Arm & Hammer, we like that, that’s good stuff, that’s baking soda. We like their toothpaste to clean our teeth, so their detergent to clean our clothes must also be nice, right? And Oxiclean has those commercials, so that must work well, right?

NO!

By the power of all that is holy, NO!

I washed my darks in the regular Tide this week and my whites in the Arm & Hammer shit.

Let me let you in on a little-known secret. This Arm & Hammer with OxiClean! smells extremely offensive. More than just “Hrm, that’s not as nice as I would want.” It’s OFFENDING MY ACTUAL NOSTRILS REALLY BADLY.

I kept thinking that the smell on the clothes couldn’t be half as bad as the smell of the actual substance, but I can assure you that it is!

Today the only thing I am wearing that was washed in this treacherous, nose-hair-singing morass of chemical stew is my bra, and just having the bra on, under my clothes, has been enough to aggravate me all day long. It stinks so bad that I think it is psychosomatically giving me a rash. Last night I was going to put the white sheets on that I had just washed in this mess, but already I was thinking “What is up with the stink, for serious?” and I put on some sheets that I had in the closet instead. Thank all that is holy that I did so, because if I had to sleep next to this INFERNAL, UNGODLY, DISGUSTING, NAUSEATING STINK I think I would really die of the odor. To death. By the stench. I can’t even describe what it smells like. I think what most closely describes it is if you took all the chemicals in your high school science lab and mixed them up in a large beaker of water and put them on a hot plate with on old sweat sock sticking out of it and left it for about 17 hours, until it was a boiled down stew and then you blew that up with a car battery, Arm& Hammer detergent with OxiClean! is about the smell you might get.

In short, this stuff smells VERY VERY BAD. I am not joking, it’s gross. I would rather have some seriously dingy whites than smell so patently offensive. Better to launder your delicate lacy unmentionables in the Bog of Eternal Stench than even contemplate purchasing this horrific, stinking stuff. Now I am going to throw all my whites back in the hamper to be rewashed, and throw this bottle of crap in the dumpster. Barf.

Winter/Summer Garden Animation

Grabbed a garden shot this morning, loved the contrast between winter and summer. The summer picture was taken in early July, right after I got back from my Savannah vacation. The garden was at the height of lushness. Ah, some day it will be summer again.

(Note the absence of dogs in the winter picture – chihuahuas have no patience for snow.)

Water Heater Saga, Part #Whine

The guy came again to fix the water heater. Well, a guy came. Not the same guy. After a week with no hot water I had to get this shit fixed, but I couldn’t have another day out of the office to wait for the repair people.

So my parents came out here. No wait, first they went to UPS at 7:30 a.m. to pick up the spare part, then they came out here and waited at my house from 8-3:30 for the guy to actually come, just so I wouldn’t have to miss work. I am so suffused with guilt at that that I kind of want to vomit up part of my brain. Of course the guilt is combined with loving them and a sort of horrified gratitude for their doing something so tedious in order to help me.

When have I ever been able to accept help gracefully?

Never, that’s when.

Heater was fixed and running when the guy left, then my parents stayed around for about 45 minutes after I got home from work to make sure it kept running. Since then I haven’t checked it. I am so sick of that thing that I just can’t bring myself to care about it anymore.

Because I was anxious and upset and guilty about my parents, I had an anxious and upset day. Work was the same level of nonsensical bullshit as ever, but I hadn’t any sanity reserve with which to tolerate it today, so I had a minor freak out. And now I am depressed and don’t know what to do with myself. Everything I look at is freaking me out, everything I think about is upsetting me. I should just go take some tranquilizers and forget about it.

I should be happy and satisfied and grateful. I should feel blessed and lucky and content. Instead I want to rip off my skin and throw it in the backyard, just to rid myself of whatever it is about me that makes me feel this way.

I just think I am the wrong sort of person. I got beamed down into the wrong world, at the wrong time, and nothing is ever going to fit.

Tranquilizers ho.

Wait, did I miss November somehow?

I can’t believe how this month has passed. All in a hazy swirl of neon lights and a big fat cloud of cigarette smoke. It’s been all words, drinks and drama. It was October when Jake originally got sick, because I was home for Halloween, remember? How is it possible that I’ve been compulsively checking him for red spots for more than a month? He seems to be doing well on these medications, and I will take him in soon for more blood work. Not too soon, though. I am tired of them jabbing him.

I took off every Friday in November to give me more time to get my NaNo book written, and it really helped. I finished NaNo a day early, and will post more on that later. It was amazing, and I can’t believe I did it. So I am glad I took the time off. I also needed this break from work, and I needed to be able to look forward to not being in the office one day a week. This month it has seemed more like work is just something I have to do sometimes rather than the All Encompassing, Never Ending Badness That Rules My Waking World.

And now it’s December. Well, tomorrow it will be. Holidays, festivity, snow. I have to work THREE WHOLE WEEKS in a row with no days off except weekends! Eeek! But then I get a nice chunk of time off work, almost two full weeks. So that’s much to look forward to.

The house… well, I am continually challenged by the perils of home ownership. This time coming to me in the form of a malfunctioning water heater. I loathe dealing with things like this. The interminable phone calls, the arguing with people who don’t speak English, the waiting for repair people, the phone calls back to India, the arguing, the realizing it’s still not working even though the guy just left and swore it was fine. The having to shower at your friend’s place. The feeling that if only you were somewhat smarter you could sort this out. The feeling that you’re the only person in the wold this kind of thing happens to.  Bah to all of it. And when this gets sorted out it’s just going to be something else, some other broken down malfunctioning thing. It wears on me, wears me out. I am trying to just breathe deeply and deal with it as it happens, but it’s hard.

One day I am going to learn to roll with the punches, but you know better than to think today’s that day.

Anyway, that’s all for this month. I blinked and I missed it. But if I recall correctly, it was a lot of fun.

Dear Total Shitbag Night: You Suck.

Gah. What a night I have had. Day? Fine. Well, not exactly fine, because great heaving wracking menstrual cramps woke me at 4 in the morning, leaving me to writhe in agony until 6, when the alarm went off and I realized I looked like I’d been hit in the face with a sack that was chock full of “Holy shit you look awful!” bricks. Given the fact that I knew I was going to be feeling worse not better as the day progressed, I gave up and called in sick.

The rest of the day was halfway decent. I am almost out of any serious painkillers, and since apparently I have the only doctors in the world who want their patients to suffer excruciating pain, I can’t get anymore legally, I was carefully rationing them. But still, I could deal. Until around 5pm I went to try to take a nice hot shower, to help me work out a plot issue I was having with my book.

No hot water.

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Adieu… Adieu…

Parting is such sweet sorrow…

Help me bid a fond farewell to what I presume will be the last of the summer’s roses.

Today’s Image Brought to You by the Letters “P” and “G”

On My Windowsill

Still kind of fascinated with this begonia on my windowsill. It’s beautiful, but somewhat meaty and terrifying as well.

See full size at Flickr, if you’ve an interest.

New Neighbors, Apparently

Well, my worst suspicions confirmed, the U-Haul arrived today. The crazy guy across the street said that they were moving in “the big stuff” today and they were asking him if he knew me. I said that I hoped he told them I had a pack of 18 itty-bitty yippy dogs and was a crazy-ass bitch to boot. Which is mostly true anyway. What total and complete fucktards. Imagine buying a house that shares a common wall with another house and never even SPEAKING to the person living in the next house? How fuckwitted do you have to be? (never mind that I did the same thing, the realtor fucking lied to me straight-out, talking about a three-foot brick firewall. Up his ass maybe. Fucker.) But I also know that they can’t have even seen their own air-conditioner, FF S,because that’s in my yard, to which they have no access while touring the place. Who buys a house without looking at the air conditioner? What house inspector would settle for that? And without wanting to get into my basement to see the venting and stuff? Which I would totally not allow, which would be their first clue that this house might have some issues. And they’re going to have to remove that ratty old AC unit from my yard soon-like, too.

Anyway, I don’t know if I accidentally left my radio off one day and that was the day they came to look at the place, or if maybe the blaring music coming from the other side of the wall didn’t clue them in. I don’t know. I am so upset, I have been crying all day, just at the thought of what I have in store for me with new neighbors. My blood pressure has to be through the roof, and I feel like I want to barf. Todd tried to say that they might be nice, but the situation we’re in doesn’t lend itself to prolonged “niceness.” The first time they have a fight, or turn their stereo up past 20, I am going to freak out. And I will spend the next however long living with the feeling that someone can hear every word I say. For someone with my paranoid tendencies this is not conducive to happy and peaceful living.

And wouldn’t you know it, just when I let my guard down and thought “Ok, things at work are marginally better, maybe my life isn’t the biggest shithole in the history of the world after all.” And then bam, the peace and quiet of my home gets snatched from my grasp, probably permanently. I try to look on the bright side. I try not to be pessimistic, but for FUCK’S SAKE, something is always happening to me. I have no peace, and I don’t think I ever will. And somehow I am sure it’s all my fault, like I have the wrong attitude or something.

Anyway, they were only moving some stuff today it seems like, and are not there now. I haven’t met them yet, obviously. I don’t have the heart for it, and I am a little afraid that I would freak out on them.

One day I will accept completely that bad shit is constantly happening to me (and always will) and that I should give up on wanting to be happy and just appreciate fucking sunbeams and shit. But that day is not today, apparently.

Today’s Photos Brought to You by:

The Rex Begonia on the windowsill

Today’s Gerbera Daisy

brought to you by the Garden.

Just another Bombtract

Garden is currently looking like a bomb hit it, but it’s too damn hot and way too buggy to be out working in it.

God, that’s embarasassing, weeds-a-plenty here. (Weeds don’t preclude chihuahua enjoyment, luckily) I planned to get up mega-early this morning to clean things up, but a night of drinking in combo with some prescription meds meant that I was unfit for duty at 6 a.m. or even 8 a.m. and then it was too hot.

Anyway:

The hibiscus started blooming this week and is gorgeous as last year.

And this sunflower was supposed to be pink, but I just don’t see it.

How I <3 My Homeownership Status

Have to do laundry out the fuck, cut the grass and repair/repaint a stair rail thingee today. Not really in the mood for all of it, but when it’s done I will feel like I haven’t wasted my WHOLE 4-day weekend hanging out with asstards and fuckwits. Also I think I repaired my leaky faucet in the upstairs bathroom yesterday, and if so… hooray for me, I have been meaning to do that for a year.

My friend Dave sent me a link to the bare-bones version of the audio cables I need to rip my vinyl, which ended up being $21.90 on ebay, with shipping, so that’s MUCH more my speed. OK, so sometimes it DOES (literally) pay to establish and maintain friendships. Fine. :-p