Home Again Home Again Bibbity Boo

Happy Halloween! Goodness me, it has been quite a while since I came up with something to say here. Since last we met, I have been to hell and back. Actually, closer to heaven - I went to New York for four days! It was lovely, nice and crisp fall weather, plenty of walking around but not nearly too much, pretty good food and quality time with the Smith girls. I did no shopping, as I have no money, but my mother made sure I didn't spend TOO much on anything else, either. Thanks for lunch, Suzanne! Unfortunately, I managed to escape from New York with no photographic evidence suitable for internet consumption. I tell you, my own forgetfullness and a crapped-out battery are a lethal combination.

The best part of the trip was when I got a phone call about a possible job! I scheduled the interview for 1:00 today, so I really should be ironing my "professional attire" right now. Luckily, travelling on time-change weekend means that one can wake up at 6:40 in the morning and feel FINE, just FINE. So far I am on my third load of laundry and I've planted some spinach, lettuce, garlic and shallots in the new garden box.

OH YEAH. Did I mention that My Husband, Mr. Manual Labor 2005, built three garden beds yesterday, and filled two with planting medium? He was sacked the fuck out when I got home last night, but he had WORKED HARD to PROVIDE for his family. It was the least I could do to plant some shit in there, in the hopes that we can grow some of our own food if I go much longer without gainful employment.

In lieu of New York pictures, I give you our backyard breadbasket:

Another Day, Where's That Dollar?

Okay, kiddos. The time we all knew was coming? Well, it is here. The Family Budget has been made, and it looks like we can make it on only the Mr's salary....if we can live on about $10/day each. That is for food, gas, clothes and most important - booze.

Sad to say, that is not enough. Okay, maybe it is enough for food and gas, but we Smiths can't live on a booze budget of $0/day. We've tried, and it can't be done. Goddammit, there goes my deam of living as a kept woman.

It is time to get Serious about the Job Search Aught-Five. Shit.

In other news, I am about to go blow some of our non-existant dough in New York! Woo! I get to see my sister, and hang with my moms, and experience Fall in the city! I am most looking forward to some tasty Italian food, and perhaps some mouse hunting in my sister's Harlem apartment. If it is up to me, we will be dining at Artisanal. I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but I loves me some cheese. So a restaurant devoted to said delicacy is my kind of place. Fondue! $15 grilled cheese! I LOVES IT.

As much as I love cheese - and that is a lot, believe me - I love this cheesy photo more...

Have I Mentioned

that my inlaws will be visiting this weekend? Yep. They arrive tomorrow afternoon, a couple of hours before the Mr. gets home from work. Coincidentally, today I painted the bathroom. Errather, I finished painting the cabinet doors this afternoon (originally sanded and prepped a month ago) and then after dinner got a bug up my ass to paint the walls. So tomorrow I just have to screw the doors back on their hinges, and unpack the four boxes of bathroom stuff that have been waiting since we moved. Oh, and if I can I should also cut down and hem our old shower curtain to be used in the bathroom window.

I have become much more comfortable with my inlaws in the five years since we first met, but I am still sometimes flummoxed by them. It always shocks me when someone seems to have no discernable opinions or desires. How can that be? I always suspect that they DO SO know what they want to do, or eat, or watch, but for some reason they just don't want to tell ME about it. It is usually a puzzle trying to figure out what to do, and then a mystery whether they enjoyed it.

Also, next weekend will be spent in New York with my mom and grandmother, visiting my sister. Exciting, but I am responsible for booking a hotel room and so far have been a total failure. They might as well have asked me to find a job in Austin, that's how NOT GOOD I have done at the job so far.

Here's a picture of Addie to illustrate why I call her "possum head"

Progress Photos

When last you saw pictures of my home, it was empty and had gleaming hardwood floors. I realized today when sweetney asked for photos of other people's homes (which I am so in favor of, by the way - I LOVE to see what everyone else is doing) that I haven't posted anything since.

SO, let's all imagine that I just moved in, and there are still boxes everywhere, shall we? Then, when I post more pictures later this week you can be all impressed at how fast we've moved in.

Here's the living room with boxes:



And the kitchen:



And our bedroom the day of the move in:



Since these pictures were taken we've made a lot of progress, but are now stalled. We got enough unpacked that we could live in the house, but there is plenty more that isn't required for daily living that remains packed away, waiting for the bathroom to be painted, shelves to be installed in the laundry room, or just generally for me to get off my ass.

Let's see how that goes - right now, I'm still in my bathrobe at 2:30 in the afternoon. To be fair, I did go volunteer this morning and went to three stores before coming home to lunch and shower. But still - on the couch surfing the internet in one's robe almost in time for Dr. Phil? Not something to be proud of.

Ain't Nothin But Ho's and Tricks

Karo had her baby!!

No pictures yet, but if the Mr. and I have been able to Influence People, young Slav will be named Kasimir...because how cool would a kid named Kaz be?

Even though I would rather be spayed at the Humane Society than ask my own mother for advice (! Imagine! Asking your mom to TELL YOU WHAT TO DO??! That is INSANITY DEFINED.) I have no problem asking Mrs. Zulkey.com.

Also, I really really hate the new Pussy Cat Dolls song "Don't Cha" for a variety of reasons, not the least of which it is basically a slut anthem. But what REALLY bugs me is that I can't get the freaking chorus out of my head. FUCKING SLUTS! They get you every time.

Party Trick

This is me and my grandmother jitterbugging the hell out of the dance floor at my cousin's wedding over the weekend. Sorry about leaving that freaky Pink Eye photo up for so long. It's just that, well, there isn't much to report.

Addie got fixed on Tuesday. Y'all didn't know she was broken, did you? Well, she went back to the Humane Society to get spayed and it is terribly sad, she's still all fucked up. They sliced her from tail to tongue, and she couldn't walk when I got her home that evening she was still so woozy. Pissed herself a few times - it was awful. Had I known that they were going to do such a brutal back-room sort of job, I think I would have just paid for it at a proper vet's. At least they gave her a tattoo to remember it by (apparently, they tattoo the dogs in case they end up at the shelter again, for some reason). It is like she went to Mexico to "get some work done" and staggered back home with a "Slippery When Wet" tattoo on her left thigh.

So the past couple of days have been spent with a terrier attached to my hip - she doesn't seem to want to be alone. The explosive diarrhea is just a bonus. Thank god for tile floors, is all I'm saying.

In addition to the sick doggie, I've had an overflowing sink and a doctor's appointment to deal with. Apparently, I don't have pink eye. I KNOW! I couldn't figure out how I had gotten it either! Get this - it is ALLERGIES.

See, my eye was itching on Saturday night and Sunday morning, and in my drunken stupor (remember - wedding) I rubbed it so hard I BRUISED my eyeball. Yep. I didn't have a lash in there, it was just ALLERGIES. Conveniently, the Mr. found out that HE didn't have bronchitis, it was ALLERGIES for HIM, too! Methinks that doctors just diagnose allergies when they don't know what's going on, but I have these tasty prescription eye drops to take care of the itchy eyes from now on. Only, and this is sort of gross - the eye drops aren't tasty at all. They taste gross and I hate using them. How do I know this? Somehow, when I put them in my eyes, one minute later I can taste something nasty on my tongue. Because our bodies, they are just one big plumbing system and I guess your eyes somehow drain into your throat. Isn't that DISGUSTING? But why haven't we found a way to capitalize on this? For those of us with strong gag reflexes, we should be able to shoot tequila or something through our eyeballs. Now THAT would be a good party trick!

Okay, I need to go get dressed and make the bed. Karo went into labor! She's at the hospital and is going to squirt that baby right out! Talk about explosive diarrhea, that is like the BM of a lifetime!

WARNING: Explicit Photos Ahead

I seem to have contracted the Pink Eye.

Y'all, in case you didn't know, Pink Eye is unpleasant. I managed to live lo these twenty-nine years without experiencing the enjoyable sensations of simultaneous itching and throbbing in the ocular region. in other news, it turns out my mom has been on to something with this hot compress business this whole time. I thought she had made that shit up, but apparently it is an officially sanctioned remedy.

Let us hope that I am able to a)find a doctor to see me tomorrow and 2. get insurance coverage.



And third, that Addie stops being so cute that I want to carry her around in a purse.

Tug Of Peace

Bink and Addie are learning that the family that plays together stays together.

So far so good on the new dog front. The girls have spent more time playing chase and tug of war than snarly fighting (although there have been some real snarly times too. Bink actually flipped Addie over this morning) and it looks like this adoption business will take.

You know how They Say that pets are good for your health, both mental and physical? It is the Truth, what They Say. Having a new dog around has noticeably improved my mood the past few days (well, that and the P part of PMS has passed). Yesterday I got out of the shower and was all wrapped up in various towels and sat down on the couch with the laptop (the first step in conquering your addiction is to admit that you have one, right?) and Addie hopped right up and started licking my face, neck and ears as if I were a tasty cone of Dulce de Leche Cheesecake Ice Cream. Which actually exists, by the way - Blue Bell Dulce de Leche Cheesecake Ice Cream is available in your grocer's freezer section, if you are as lucky as I am.

Internets, I tell you. You don't know a mood enhancer until you've been licked up one side and down the other by Addie Smith. It brought back memories of my first makeout session with Aaron Seward - that little pink tounge gave me the ear cleaning of my life! Who needs Q-tips when you've got a puppy?

This One Will Love Me The Most

Smith Sisters

Bink and the player to be named later

Is It Truth or Just a Memory?

I think about my father every day, and I assume that I always will. Usually they are just fleeting thoughts, flashes of memory. Every once in a while I still stumble over using the past tense when I mention him in conversation. He has been dead for more than seven years.

My husband never met him, and I don't think I've done a good job of introducing them to each other. Words constantly fail me when I try to explain my father. To me, so much of what made him such a wonderful man was the experience of being around him, I know I can't do that justice so for the most part I don't try. It is too frustrating. It would be easy to create the Legend of Mr. Smith - in a lot of ways it has happened anyway - and a legend somehow just pushes my father further from my reality. I don't want a mythic figure, I don't miss an allegory. I miss my father.

So this morning, when I got an email from an old high school friend I haven't spent time with in years, I felt relief. If there is a Legend of Mr. Smith, maybe I am not the only one passing it down.

"I was sitting by the creek near my house today
listening to the water and thinking about your dad. I
was remembering sitting around the kitchen table with
one or both of you, him, your mom, Janice and the
assorted friends you always had floating through the
house. I was thinking of how we had such
thought-provoking, enlightening and always funny
discussions over tortilla chips and salsa.

I just wanted you both to know that your dad still
very much lives in the hearts and minds of others. He
was such a lovable man."

Don't Ask, I Tell

Don't ask me how I know this, but

If you take three or four cloves of roasted garlic, and you mash them up with a little bit of mayo and a bunch of shredded romano, and schmear that on toast, and then put it under the broiler until it is bubbling and getting crispy, it tastes really. fucking. good.

A New Addition!

The Mr. and I are pleased to announce that we are expecting!

(to take home a new dog this week)

What the fuck is wrong with me? Why is it that I see a scruffy terrier and instantly adore it? Normal people, normal people love dogs that love them back. Normal people want dogs that are easy to please, that are easy to train, that don't have the devil in them. I, apparently, want to sleep with Lucifer himself.

Saturday I went to the Humane Society and was trained to be a dogwalker volunteer. It reinforced several things for me - one, I can be somewhat socially awkward but GODDAMN it could be worse. A bunch of animal shelter volunteers, when asked to discuss something amongst themselves, will sit in silence for a good minute and a half if allowed to do so. B, cat people are freakier than dog people. Sorry, but it has to be said. I will allow that terrier people are the cat fanciers of the dog world, so it counts as self-mockery. Third, I am a sucker. While being trained to get dogs in and out of their kennels with the least amount of fuss (not as easy as you might imagine) I kept walking past Maddie, who was yipping at everything that moved in her shit-smeared kennel. It was love at first sight.

The dog we will be adopting is a nine month old Jack Russell Terrier. Go to that site, and you will see what I'm talking about. This is an organization devoted to these dogs, and they basically broadcast the message "RUN! If you value your sanity, DO NOT get a JRT! They suck! They are mean and dirty and misbehave and attack each other! Go away!" Surest way to get me to do something? Tell me not to. So Bink and Maddie* met each other today and got along...well, they didn't kill each other. Which for terriers is like having a nooner or something. Everyone was encouraged, we put our money down, she'll get spayed, we bought a crate, and she should be with us Wednesday night maybe. Good stuff!

No, I didn't take pictures. I keep forgetting the camera exists, and I still haven't found the cable.


*she doesn't seem to know her name, so we're thinking about changing it. Perhaps to Gertrude. Gertie?