mind melting

We finished House of Cards. Orange is the New Black is long gone. The new season of Helix is not here yet... we need a show.
So I started browsing Netflix and while Chris won't watch HIMYM, he did agree to watch Dr. Who. We're about 5 episodes in, and while it's really a silly show, I like it. I do not see, however, how it has such a massive fandom. Maybe that comes after the 5th episode?

immediately

Flew back in to Texas this afternoon, then went grocery shopping and got all the ingredients for (gf) rice krispie treats-- with peanut butter. I had completely forgotten that my grandma does that and they are DELISH. I miss that woman.

P.S. Our cheese is on its way back with Ash, so I have to wait a couple days for cheesy deliciousness-- minus curds because they were sold out. Tragic!!

CHEESE

omg cheese. Good cheese. Curds. For the love of cheese. After this weekend I'm not going to poo for a week.


#worthit

safe

Google is not your friend when you don't feel well.
Which is why I like my gastroenterologist. He took me seriously. He kept saying, "We're going to take care of you," which made me feel so much better about everything. Hopefully we'll get some answers soon.

Also I'm pretty much done being poked with needles this week. I've had blood drawn 3 times this week. I've only got two arms... one ended up with a big sore bruise, and the other one got stuck twice, in the exact same spot. Eesh.

mirror

I would like to record that today, for the first time in my life, I looked into the mirror and I saw my mother. Like whoa. Caught me off guard.

I've always looked a lot more like my dad, but she was there for a few seconds before she was gone and I couldn't see her anymore. Couldn't catch that same angle again. But my mother was definitely there, in my face.

I went camping.

We went camping with some friends this weekend. In the woods. On a lake.

I haven't really been camping since I was 13. It was after that 2-week long stretch of camping up and down the California coast and I was pretty done with camping forever.

Apparently forever means 16 years. Chris has been dying to go camping so I told him he got 24 hours of enthusiastic, bitch-free camping, but after 24 hours, I want to leave. Let's be realistic here.

That system turned out to work very well. Camping itself isn't all that bad. I actually enjoyed myself- the break from technology and the fresh air. Not to mention it's relatively cheap. There were even bathrooms and running water, although peeing in the woods isn't really all that bad. It certainly helped that the weather was nice-ish- A little hot but air conditioning was not a necessity.

On the second evening, the nature (ie: caterpillar poo raining down, bees, and ants) was starting to get to me. I needed a shower and a good night's sleep in a proper bed. Fortunately, it was right at the 24 hour mark, and our departure was uneventful.

Oddly enough, I kinda want to do it again. Just for 24 hours, of course.

missing

BY the way, one of my favorite blogs took a break.
I totally get it and it's none of my damn business anyway, but I'm totally bummed!

It's weird how you get used to stupid stuff like that and then when it's gone you miss it.
Hmph. I like to decompress by reading about other people's random thoughts and lives.

At least Suze still puts rad stuff out there. *cough* Ash *cough*

COOKIES

Like I've mentioned before, I'm a huge fan of coffee/tea and dessert.
(Coffee with leftover cake is like the best breakfast ever.)

In the winter time I usually develop a habit of green tea in the afternoons, most of the time accompanied by cookies or something else sweet. I'm seriously looking forward to that habit. It's still too hot to enjoy a hot cup of tea at 3pm. I've got to give it a couple more months.

Regardless of the accompaniment, lately I've been digging cookies. Most recently, peanut butter. They've always been my favorite. But mostly because they're hard to screw up. Muffins, cake, scones, biscuits, and other baked goods of the gluten free variety area always fickle. Cookies turn out right 95% of the time.

I've got my old standbys of chocolate chip, oatmeal, etc.

But I'm always on the lookout for new cookies.

When I find those pumpkin hershey's kisses (any day now... the pumpkin craze is upon us), I'm making these chai pumkin spice cookies.

I saw this recipe like 2 years ago and kept it tucked away.

Also in the back of my mind are these cookies.

 LOOK at the sugar on the outside. Mmnom.

All right, enough about cookies. I should really eat a salad...

weird things my husband does

Remember way back when, when I talked about how you don't know people's strange little habits until you live with them? P.S. Chris hangs his towel up now but still likes to leave his dishes about. I'm slowly convincing him to form new habits that include picking up after himself... Right now there's an empty beer bottle on the coffee table, and the chocolate milk cup from last night will surely sit crusting on his nightstand all day. *eye twitch*

Anyway. I've got a new one. We've lived together for what, about 10 months now? I've noticed this before but only recently decided that it's a regular habit.

When he pees, he flushes the toilet mid-pee. Not like normal people, who wait until they're done and then flush. At one point he said he likes to race the flush; try to finish before it's done flushing. However I've noticed that most often, the flush wins. Meaning there's traces of pee water in the toilet like all the time. Which is why I'm glad I have those Clorox tabs in the water tank. (Btw Those things are actually really great at keeping the toilet clean between scrubbings)

So anyway. That's another thing.
I don't think I have too many strange habits, besides being randomly anal about keeping things clean... bathrooms and kitchens are pristine, but floors and dusting are not a priority.

saving

Once again, I bought a can of coffee to use in the Keurig's little reusable filter thingy.

Hello, old friend. (Sue, Mom had it!)
Once again, it's terrible! I'm officially admitting that I am coffee-spoiled. Not to say that I won't drink it; I'll drink terrible coffee if I need to.

Which brings me to other things related to saving a few bucks. Now that Chris is back in school, we're committed to living on one income. After working so hard to be debt-free, accruing more debt is simply not an option.
We lowered our cell phone bill and cable bill just by calling and getting rid of a few features. Yes, it's a bit more inconvenient not being able to watch HGTV in the living room, and we have to be careful how much data we use on our phones, but we will get used to it.
We switch cars when he drives to school, because mine gets better gas mileage. I'm totally getting used to driving that truck. I even backed it into the parking spot the other day, on the first try. Hoss.
We've already learned how to minimize the grocery bills, shopping sales & Aldi.
I've even started making plans for Christmas. [We've got a lot of credit card points & such.]

Like I've said many times before, I spent 7 years in college; I know how to be poor.

I keep that joking that one day we'll look back and say, "Remember how poor we were when we were first married?" like everyone always does. Except we're not really all that poor compared to a lot of people, so it's all relative.

Hey there, mediocre cup of coffee.

adult woes

Dammit. Our water bill has been $100+ for the past 2 months. This is not ideal, seeing as how we're struggling to break even and I only budget $60 max for water. Which shouldn't be a problem since we've never even gone over $40 before in the old house. How do we use 35,000 gallons of water a month?? My guess is the sprinkler system. The damn grass will just have to suffer with less watering. We'll see where that takes us.

The back gate has broken again, so I have to bungee cord it shut. Classy digs over here.

Where is the clear silicone caulk? I can find every other combination of caulk except the clear silicone stuff. Pah.

Laundry room progress

I spent a large part of Friday night bringing my newly painted laundry room back into a useful state. Kuz, you know, I will eventually need to do laundry.

1 and 2: I got these hooks a while back, and Mom gave me this really cute bird art that spoke to me during that same hobby lobby trip. After that, the room started to take on a bird theme. Hadn't really planned on that, but I decided to go with it. More on that in a sec.

3: This old washboard came from Chris's grandma. Haven't done much research on it yet to see if it's purely decorational, or if it was actually functional at one point in time.

4: Shelves containing many useful things, including dish towels and clothespins, but my favorite is my box of tools; most importantly, the picture-hanging tools. They'd previously been haphazardly thrown in a cardboard box and shoved in a cabinet. This is much better.

Back to birds.

Akhtar gave me this artistic owl drawing for Christmas a few years back, and it looks dashing next to the eyesore of a hot water heater. (Still not sure how to disguise that.)

On the wall opposite the machines:

Very useful hooks. I place an extra curtain rod across them and use it to hang freshly dried laundry. Also hung the street sign that mysteriously arrived in my possession one day long ago...

If you're wondering where all of the laundry soap and bleach and dryer sheets are, they're in the cabinets. Along with cans of paint, some miscellaneous vases, and 2 sets of patio lights. Among other things.

So that was pretty much my Friday night. A lot can get done when you don't drink booze and watch Desperate Housewives.

grocery trip

There are few things more discouraging than an empty fridge. Sunday morning there was literally nothing but half-used condiments, a mostly-empty gallon of milk, some eggs, and a tub of hummus. Oh yeah, and that penguin that holds baking soda. P.S. Also about 4 blocks of cheese. Can't run out of that.

No leftovers. No fruits. No veggies. No lunchmeat. Bare.
(A great opportunity to wipe down the shelves, though.)

So Sunday I dared to venture out to the grocery store. It was raining, so I figured that would keep most of the Sunday hordes at home. Fortunately, I was right.

I leisurely pushed my cart into the produce aisle. Desperate for something fresh. Oranges, raspberries, apples, bananas. Cucumber, sweet potato, spinach, carrots.
[Side note: Anyone else feel really self-conscious picking out cucumbers and other phallic items? While I tend to inspect my produce carefully before it goes into the cart, the opposite goes for cucumbers and zucchini. I pick quickly without much lingering...]

So me and this little old lady in this adorable raincoat were the only people in the produce section. I said hi to the guy restocking apples. The old lady got really into picking out broccoli. Like for real, tossing them around looking for the perfect one. I bet she wouldn't have done that if it was cucumber.

Then I slowly ventured down the aisles. The only time I ever go to that store is to pick up something quick, so I took my time checking stuff out. They have a large selection of gluten free stuff-- new stuff I hadn't seen before. Their store brands, though, aren't labeled gluten free. Walmart and Kroger brands are labeled, I guess Randall's needs to catch up.

I stopped to pick out a bouquet of flowers. Something about fresh flowers really brightens up the house and makes me happy. A few slabs of meat. I had to go back to the baking aisle 3 times because I forgot I needed brown sugar, baking soda, and also yeast. A fresh loaf of bread for Chris. The biggest jar of peanut butter they had.

That store is always more expensive than the other stores, but if you pick your stuff out right, you can manage to leave with a decent bill.

A quick checkout and 60 bucks later (See? Not too bad), I walked out into the rain with groceries for the week. I had brought the tote bag that we usually take to Aldi, but I got self conscious at the last minute and left it in the car. So when I got to the car, I put all the bags into the tote bag for an easier trip into the house. I know, I could have just taken it into the store. It's weird.

A drive through the neighborhood in the rain. Coming to complete stops at the stop signs. No hurry.

I really love grocery shopping, especially when it's not rushed and I get to take my time. That rarely happens anymore. Lately we have to get there before noon to avoid the crowds, then I have to fight foreigners for cheap, second-rate produce and often leave without things we need simply because that store doesn't carry them. Going after work isn't really ideal either, because grocery stores after work when you're tired and hungry = annoying. In a nutshell, grocery shopping is not as fun as it used to be.

Like I said, this trip was quite the treat. You know I really love a good grocery shopping trip.

not again

I woke up this morning looking forward to a glorious day of shopping with Mom, Ash, and Calvin. Unfortunately, I spent most of it trying not to puke in Kohl's.   womp. womp.   Expectations squashed.

No clue why the stomach rebelled. Right before we left to go shopping, I ate some of that new Chex GF Oatmeal. Maybe the oatmeal was somehow contaminated? Would they really let gluten get into the product?

Whatever the reason it was this time, I tried not to let it ruin the day. I didn't want to spend yet another day sick and lonely with a bottle of pepto and a heating pad, and I especially hate being the one who ruins everyone else's good time. I felt a little better after taking the one last Zofran I had stashed in my purse, leftover from the stomach flu. After a little break, we went back out to do a little more shopping.

Still, it was one of those days that no matter what, the tummy was not going to stay calm. You'd think after so many years of this I'd be used to it, but the longer this goes on, the more frustrating it is. I'm so discouraged and worried. Maybe it's time for another round of doctor's visits, get yet another opinion. Hey, at least this time I'll have health insurance!

ghost ish

So more about this potential ghost.
It's subtle. This ghost is not an in-your-face type of ghost. It moves things around slightly so that you almost wonder if you are imagining it.

It's mostly things like seeing an open drawer or cabinet and I could swear that I closed it when I left the room a few minutes ago. Or noticing something has been shifted slightly when I specifically placed it a certain way.

For example, the position of the kitchen curtains the other night. I did the dishes, then checked on my plants- I have two small cuttings in water on the kitchen windowsill, and I'm trying to encourage root formation so I can re-plant. It's going quite well, actually. I like to keep the curtains open enough so that I can see my plants because I think they look pretty. So I checked on them, went into the office, and when I went back into the kitchen a while later, the curtains were moved so that one side was covering one of the plants. Now, I could swear that they were open because I checked on the plants and I would have noticed if the curtain was covering one. But, maybe I just didn't pay attention. Those types of things.

Overall, it's not disruptive and only a tad creepy, because like I said, it may just be me. And like Andrea said, now if only I can get the ghost to do laundry...

so yeah

Oddly enough, last night I went to sleep fine and slept fine. Except when Pumpkin found a bell ball in the middle of the night and I was woken up by jingles.

I kinda don't know what to do first. I literally have a list (I like lists, okay) of things I want to do. I should probably do something productive like organize my chaos of a craft room, but I'm not really in an organizing mood.

What I'd normally do is drink a glass of wine and watch Desperate Housewives, but there's no drinking on these drugs. Speaking of, I'm on a higher dose now. My mood has improved drastically, but my mood has not improved much. Not sure what happens next. Also, the second I turn down wine, people automatically think I'm pregnant. Not sure how to interpret that. I guess people know I like my wine.

Got my flu shot today at work. Yay for free flu shots!

It kind of amazes me that people pay for pets. I don't think it would ever occur to me to go out and buy a cat or a dog. But, I guess that's how people get pets when they don't find them outside of their workplace.

All right, enough random.

alone

Chris is on his way to West Texas for a weekend doing various manly things.

This is significant. I haven't spent a night alone since he's been home. I've hardly even spent more than a couple of hours alone in the last 10 months.
I haven't spent a night alone in this house, EVER.  I'm not 100% comfortable in this house yet. In fact, it took me a good 6 months to get used to the last house. Cue paranoia that someone is lurking in the shadows. Never mind the security system. I keep looking over my shoulder, feeling like someone is behind me. *Looks over shoulder* *looks over other shoulder.*

Which brings me to this crazy feeling... Alone used to be the norm. Now, he is the norm. How wonderful.

When he first came home, he would sometimes actually startle me because I wouldn't be expecting someone to be sitting on the couch watching tv or in the kitchen getting something to eat. It was difficult to sleep in the same bed. His crap was everywhere.

Now, we're used to all of that. Again, how wonderful. The normal I waited so long for is now actually my life.

P.S. The unconfirmed "ghost" moved the kitchen curtains tonight. More on that later.

Laundry room madness

What's new? Not much. Just work, eat, sleep, etc.

However, a few weekends ago I randomly decided it was time to start painting the laundry room. So on a Sunday afternoon, in my underwear, I started painting over the ugly gold/mustard color with Kiltz.

Goodbye, ugly. (The pictures don't do it justice. The first and last are more representative of the actual color)

I originally wanted to paint the laundry room a mint color, similar to this color inspiration:

[Also I don't think my mint obsession will go away until I finally paint something mint. I'm thinking about that sherbert orange monstrosity]

After looking at a bunch of paint sample colors over the span of two weeks, the two colors we actually bought testers for and tried were Aqua Seawind (Don't you love the name?) and Echo Lake Aqua.

The color we liked most was Echo Lake Aqua.

As you can see, this is not mint. Mint just didn't look right in that room. Especially since it gets zero natural light. I'm trying to convince Chris we can cut a window in the door...

Anyway. Yesterday I painted it and now it looks fresh, crisp, and bright. It occurred to me that the color looks an awful lot like the master bathroom color, but after looking they're actually very different. The undertones in this one are more teal, the bathroom is more of a greyish blue. Again, the second picture is closest to the way it actually looks.

Oy, that door. Once everything was painted it became very clear that it is gnarly. Not even CLOSE to white. That's going to be painted... once we figure out the window situation...

Needless to say, this is not even close to being done, but at least the most disruptive part is done.

Painting... check.
New switch covers
Finding shelves that fit next to the dryer
Camouflaging the hot water heater
Adding hooks for broom, swiffer, etc.
Constructing a continuous shelf to cover the washer/ dryer.
Or... possibly stacking the washer and dryer. We won't make that call until we replace the water heater with a tankless one when it dies.

You wouldn't think a laundry room would require so much planning, but we walk through it multiple times every day. It's still pretty cramped with the dryer being so close to the door, but we're figuring it out.