Really Trying Not to be a Bitch

I hate confrontation.  I'm not good at it.  I plan out everything I'm going to say, but once I start talking, most of what I planned goes right out the window.  Not all of it, just the important bits, and only enough to make it completely obvious that at least half of what I am saying was completely rehearsed.  Unfortunately, if something doesn't happen with the bathroom guys, I think I'm going to flip the fuck out.

The good news is, they chose to show up today.  It's the first time in a few days, and I was beginning to worry.  No explanation, and when George asked where they've been, they just said they were busy.  Umm...?  I'll be honest, they're cheap.  That's why we continue putting up with this.  That said, we're talking cheap as far as home renovations go, which really isn't cheap at all.  Even if their prices are substantially lower than everyone else, it's still a chunk and for all of that, I really expect them to show up.  Or at least call.

Then, when they do show up, they've taken to only staying two or three hours, so nothing is getting done.  I get that some of the things (tile, for example) require time to set, but most of the time, that's not the case.  It's my understanding that this project should have taken a week or so.  They've been "working" on it for the better part of the month, and it's not even halfway finished.  Last week, they told us it would be done Friday.  We assumed (incorrectly) that meant it would be done last Friday.  I don't even think it'll be halfway done this Friday.  In fact, I'm wondering if they had any specific Friday in mind or if they just meant some nondescript Friday of the future.  I'm sort of thinking the latter.

Also, I'm sick of them drinking all of my coffee.  I probably wouldn't care about that if I wasn't already pissed off, but I like a particular coffee and it's one of the few things I splurge on for myself.  It's not like they're having a couple cups, I'm making at least two extra pots a day, which, again, wouldn't be a big deal if I didn't already want to punch them.  Since I'm nitpicking, I'll also throw in that they're careless about making sure the door is shut and my dog has gotten out twice.  If I'm home, I make sure to check it every time they go or out, but I can't just sit at home for the next six months, waiting to see if the door is shut properly.  But, I can't let my dog get out, either.  My dog is really dumb and if she didn't get hit by a car, she'd probably fall off the cliff or get lost or some other horrible fate.  I love my stupid dog, so that would be really sad.

Anyway, I'm over the whole thing.  I think if they don't show up tomorrow, they're done and I'll finish the stupid thing myself.  In a week. 

Hooray!

I'm violently ill, but that did not stop me from going to The Disney Store today!

That's all I got today.  I am a trooper, and now I'm going to watch my movie.  Yes, my movie, not Pie's movie.

Things I Can't Do Anymore

I moved out when I was 18.  I went straight from living with my parents to living with George.  While we were saving for our house, George and I tried having roommates, which was an absolute nightmare, but I guess my loss is your gain as it's a spectacular story.  For a different day, though.  The point today is that I've never lived alone.  And every now and then, it hits me that I never will.  Which is mostly fine, and I wouldn't give up my family for anything and all of that, but I do wish I'd tried it before they came along.

I used to do things that really freaked George out.  Like get in my car and just leave for a few days.  I didn't have a phone, and if I did, I probably wouldn't have answered it, so I totally get why this bothered him, but it was something I needed to do.  For me.  I always left a note that I wasn't upset or angry or leaving him, I was just going on vacation.  I did this quite often, and to be honest, I think it would pissed me off if the shoe was on the other foot.  George, as always, was nonplussed by my behavior, but he just accepted it as one of those things.  He didn't like it, but he didn't get mad at me over it, either.  George is a saint.

I never really knew where I was going, either, I just went.  I had this game, where I'd assign a fairly common word to each direction, turn the radio on and whichever word I heard first was the way I went.  I'd find small, but interesting towns and eat in their local restaurants and stay in their cheap motels.  Sometimes I'd chat with the locals and others, I'd just keep to myself.  Sometimes I was me, and others I'd make up whole new personalities to try out on people I'd never see again.

Another time, I moved into a hotel for three weeks and didn't talk to anyone other than the lady at the front desk and the guy who occasionally brought my food.  I mostly ate stuff I packed, though, so that was infrequent and the desk lady was just me calling down to extend my stay.  George and my mom were both convinced someone was going to find me dead in there, but they were wrong.  I just felt like being antisocial.  Really antisocial.

Anyway, I don't get to do these things anymore.  I won't get to for many, many more years.  Gone are the days of subsisting on nothing but caffeinated beverages and nicotine.  There's actually food in my fridge, rather than just condiments and booze.  I socialize on a daily basis.  My mother no longer worries that I'm stuck in some sort of heart wrenching depression (even though I've never been depressed in my life.)  I don't sit around in my undergarments, listening to bad music and fighting with people on the internet anymore.   Sometimes I find these things a little sad, but then neat little things happen, like George letting me pick the movie or Pie learning to draw people (better than I can, I should add) and it's all okay.

Still, there's only one month until George takes Pie on her first camping trip.  They're going for four days.  I can't wait.

I'm Supposed to be Drunk Right Now.

I'm not, which is dreadfully unfortunate, but the marital unit got called into work, and we have a general agreement that there will be at least one sober adult in the house at all times until the little is capable of getting herself outside in the event of a fire.  I don't remember making that agreement, but it probably is a good idea.

So, I'm not drunk, I can't sleep, and it's 3 in the morning.  I know, I can blog!  I know a few people have been worried that I died or something, so this seems like a great time to clear that up.  I didn't.  I've just been lazy.  No...  I really haven't even been lazy.  I've just been really antisocial lately, even for me.  It's a combination of other projects (which my husband made fun of me for, so I won't talk about them right now) and the bathroom guys.

The bathroom guys are at least two hours late every day, and twice they neglected to show up at all.  There's no call, no "Hey, we'll be late tomorrow," they just don't show up.  It's really irritating because it means Pie and I are stuck here waiting.  Too much time at home is negatively impacting her behavior and by the time they do get here, I'm ready to punch someone.  Supposedly, the bathroom will be done on Friday.  George is hopeful, and I don't have the heart to tell him I'm pretty sure they mean next Friday.  Or two Fridays from now.  They did get the floor tiles put down, though.  No grout, just the tiles.  It's also become increasingly apparent that George and I have very different visions of the end result.

Pie has this Disney Princess CD player.  I keep it in the kitchen, since I usually just listen to music on one of the computers, but I don't have a computer in the kitchen.  (Yes, I do have a computer in every other room I routinely spend time in.  In my defense, they're mostly spare parts computers.)  Anyway, it has a microphone and everything!  I'm too lazy to go take a picture, but that's what Google images are for, right?

Since my parents bought it for her two Christmases ago, this thing has been nothing more than a source of humiliating moments for me.  I love to sing.  This would be an excellent time to mention that my singing is both godawful and ear shatteringly loud. After a decade, George is used to it, but I really feel for Pie, especially in the car.  Surprisingly, she actually seems to like it.  I can't wait to hear her opinion when she's a teenager!  If all my restraint goes out the car window, the kitchen is at least ten times worse.  There's something about a pink CD player and a microphone that makes it impossible for me NOT to sing.  It also compels me to sing the cheesiest stuff I can find!

The guy in my attic still won't let me live down the time he had to come down stairs to ask me to bring my countertop karaoke to a more reasonable level.  That's fine, I deserve it, but I also feel the need to point out that he was the creeper who stood there watching for at least two songs before saying something.  If he's going to keep calling me Fieval, I'm going to start calling him Peeping Tom.  It doesn't really help that George thinks this is awesome and encourages him.

Anyway, the bathroom guys were supposed to be here at noon.  When I started dinner (at quarter after four) I'd simply assumed they weren't coming for the day.  I didn't give it a second thought when I popped in a CD full of cheesy 80's music and started the chicken.  I was belting lyrics out at an excruciating volume when something caught in my peripheral vision.  Hey!  It was the bathroom guys!  They decided to show up after all!  Since I can't imagine standing at someone's backdoor and just watching them, I figured they'd just got there.  I just turned it down, holstered the microphone (along with my raging disappointment) and went on making the salad.  I didn't think anything else of it until they packed up for the evening.

"See you tomorrow, Tonsils!"

George looked at me, looked at them, looked back at me and started cracking up.  The other guy starting singing.  I just rolled my eyes.  Seriously?  It's not like this hasn't happened before.  They can try all they want, my chops are unbustable!  It was only after they left that George told me they've been calling me that all week.  Nice.

I'm a Crazy Person Magnet

I swear this shit only happens to me.

A couple months ago, we decided to try out this once a week home preschool program for Pie.  We don't want to put her in a traditional preschool (no need, no point) but this was at home, she'd gain another education influence, and I might learn some new things to do with her.  Fantastic!  This was absolutely ideal.  Only, shortly after we started, we realized the teacher is an asshole.  She's an over-sharer.  I'm an over-sharer, so I really don't have a ton of room to criticize, except I do have a basic grasp on discretion and when to use it.  She does not, and apparently considers her drug and bedroom habits appropriate discussion points.  In front of my three year old.

I really don't care what she (or, aside from my husband, any other adult) does in her free time, but the time she is at my house is not her free time.  That's her paid time assisting in the educational experience of my child.  Not only that, but my not caring means exactly that--I don't care.  Do what you want, keep it to yourself.  I'm not a foam pad parent, but I think it's reasonable not to want the tiny human I'm raising to hear about someone's visit to the free clinic or hear the detailed version of that bloody nose not being caused by the dry winter.  True stories, my friends. 

George hates her.  Hates.  He's been on me to quit for the majority of the time we've been doing it, but I've stuck it out because Pie really enjoys it.  Honestly, the lessons she brings aren't anything new, and for the most part, I've been doing the same activities with Pie for years.  Still, it's a change of pace and that's been good.  I don't know.  We've discussed keeping personal affairs personal, and she'll back off for a week, but overall, it hasn't done much good.  We always end up back at square one shortly after.  We're not even close.  I mean, I guess it would be easier to understand if we were, say, friends or something, but casual acquaintances would be a better description.

She really enjoys sending extremely graphic text messages to her boyfriend.  That's cool.  Not my business, except every now and then, a message makes it to my inbox instead, making it my business.  That's cool, too.  George and I get a giggle and move on.  Except today, instead of a stray text, I got a rather... um... colorful picture message.  Okay...

I texted her that I had received a message that was clearly not meant for me.  She called me, freaking out and insisting that sometimes people get messages that show up from her phone even though they're from someone unknown.  (Yeah, it confused me, too.)  Except, for not sending it, she sure seemed to know what was sent.  Just for shits and giggles (read: because George was pissed off) I called Verizon to see if that was, in fact, a possibility.

If anyone is new here, I loathe phone calls, so that was bad enough, but it seems someone at Verizon is omniscient and decided to make it extra difficult by having their strangest phone agent take my call.  His name was Cory.  I gave Cory the gist of the situation, and asked if it was possible these texts were from a stranger, but showing up under her number anyway.  And if it was possible, how likely.  Cory, weird or not, was very pleasant and helpful and placed me on hold to go look into it.

When he returned, he informed me the probability of what she said happened actually happening is more or less zero.  He didn't, however, think it was malicious.  Neither did I, so that wasn't really important, but that didn't stop him from going into a barrage of rather senseless and difficult to follow stories to back it up, anyway.

One time, Cory from Verizon took a picture of his butt.  He meant to text it to his wife, but sent it to his mother-in-law instead.  That's pretty cool, plus it was relevant, and made me laugh, but it all went downhill from there as he launched into some story about how teenagers are assholes and when he was a teenager he was an asshole and he did things that weren't nice and he knew they weren't nice but he did them anyway and now he feels bad but he didn't when he was an asshole teenager.  Yeah, it didn't make sense to me, either.  I have no idea what he did, and even less of an idea what the hell he was talking about or how it relates to pictures of Pie's home preschool teacher's taco, but I guess he was an asshole as a teenager.  I also guess you're allowed to use the word "asshole" to customers if you work for Verizon.  I'll keep that in mind if I ever need a job.

Then, he started talking about movies.  At this point, I started transcribing the conversation, because I'd figured out it was probably blog worthy.

"Did you see that new movie? It has that guy in it and he's a politician. He was also a general in that war movie."  He was talking really fast, and I like to imagine, throwing his arms about wildly.


"Umm... No..."  I actually know this is true, even with Cory's nondescript description.  That's because the only movies I've seen this year have been children's movies.  The word "new" was all I needed.


"You should see it!  It was good.  But yeah that guy had a problem like this.  Are you sure you didn't see that movie?"

"Was it animated?"

"No, but it's new. With that actor guy..."  Clearly, Cory enjoyed this movie enough to remember all the finest details!

"That helps. If it wasn't animated, I haven't seen it."

"Oh. Okay." He sounded really disappointed, and now I feel like maybe I should Google "movie about a politician who appears to be sending obscene picture messages even though he really isn't and is played by the same actor who played a general in that war movie".  If anything comes up, I can watch it and give Cory a call back to discuss our thoughts on the film and how it relates to my personal situation.

Proud Mom Moment!

I've avoided using Pie's real name or picture here.  It's not really out of fear of creepy stalkers or anything.  For one thing, I think I've already given out enough information that if someone wanted to stalk me, they could.  For another, I think any stalker I did pick up would be bored witless after about 15 minutes.

The thing about Pie is that she's only three right now.  In ten years, she'll be thirteen, and while I thoroughly look forward to embarrassing her teenage self, I think it's only fair to do it on a level playing field.  The possibility of some future person using something against her that I posted here doesn't seem right.  Besides, my husband is afraid of creepy stalkers, so we've stuck to using a nickname and MS Paint drawings of her.

But, this was too cool to not post!

Ihra-Pie!

I was making dinner, when she ran into the kitchen waving this paper in my face.  She's known how to spell her name (and a few other simple words) for a while, but lately she's really been interested in reading and writing and letters.  So, for the past few weeks, we've really been working at it.  I'd write things lightly in pencil, she'd trace them.  She'd tirelessly ask about the letter magnets (which no longer stick to the fridge) as I did the dishes.  We went through an entire pack of bath crayons this month.

And tonight, as I was slicing the meat for the fajitas, it apparently clicked.  She picked up a blue crayon and wrote her name.

I didn't even want to be a parent.  I knew any child of mine would be doomed based solely on the fact that I gave birth to it, and that's before considering that I'd be raising it, too!  The facts that a tiny human being can write her name when she couldn't yesterday, and that I'm the one who taught her are things I can't wrap my mind around.  I'm so insanely proud of both of us, and this is one of those few moments when I feel like maybe I'm not fucking it all up.  Like, despite me, she may turn out okay.  Maybe even because of me.

And, although I never thought I'd be this person, I'll admit it:  I teared up a bit.

In other news, Happy Ides of March!

I Drank Too Much Coffee (Again)

And for some reason, I have decided this merits a blog entry.  I don't mean "too much" as in a I had a couple cups and now I can't sleep--I mean too much as in I had several pots and now my vision is a bit spotty, my hands are shaky, and I'm narrating this out loud, way faster than my piss-poor typing skills can keep up with.  Also, seeing as there isn't a responsible adult around to stop me (my husband is asleep, like a normal person) I went ahead and started another pot.  I'm on a roll tonight.

Sorry.  I got distracted and I can't remember where I was going with that.  It'll come back to me, but for now I'll talk about my bathroom.  Talk, because yes, I'm still talking.  To myself, only different because it's sort of like I'm talking to you fine folks.  Except I'm the only person answering.  Never mind.  Bathroom.

We're completely redoing it.  It's going to be awesome, but right now it's just a huge pain in my ass, keeping me stuck in the house all day as strange people come in and out.  This is what it looked like yesterday:

With the lack of floor, I can finally show off my scary basement without actually having to go down there.  I'm pretty sure it's full of dead people and spiders the size of dogs.  Small dogs, but still.  Next year's home improvement project is to wall-in an area and create a home theater.  Also, we're going to turn the secret room into a speakeasy!  Hopefully, that will happen next year, too.

Anyway, the bathroom now has a floor and a toilet, which is good.  George was fairly sure I'd forget and fall through the gaping hole in the middle of the night and, unable to move, the spiders would eat me.  (Okay, the last part was mine.  But he really was worried about the first part.)  I don't know if that means he doesn't give me enough credit or he just knows me too well.  I'd take a picture of the bathroom now, but I don't know where my camera is and I don't feel like looking for it.  Just picture that room with a floor and toilet.  Not actual flooring (that's stacked up in the kitchen) just a sub-floor.  That's it.  Tomorrow we're getting new pipes and drywall!

Oh yeah, half way through that, I remembered what I was talking (still talking) about earlier.  I've discovered that in addition to my coffee problem, I might have an internet problem.  It's nothing major, and it's not affecting my family or home, but if I'm at the computer, I don't last 10 minutes before ending up online.  I guess it's only a problem because it takes away from other interests and hobbies.  Tonight I solved this by taking my laptop to a restaurant where I was fairly certain I would not get a signal.  It worked!  I sat there and drank coffee and wrote.  For over five hours.  I can drink a lot of coffee in five hours, especially if I don't have to get up and get it myself.  I'm a terrible writer, so I still question my productivity here, but at least I wasn't on the internet.  I'm also wondering if I narrated myself at the restaurant.  Boy, I hope not because that would have been really unfortunate for the people behind me.

I have no idea where I'm going with this, and to be honest, sitting down is killing me.  I had very high hopes when I started, but I keep losing my focus so it's just all over the place and awful.  I think I'm going to go eat some buffalo wings, pace around my house, and probably delete this in the morning.  In the mean time, here's a picture of my new crayons!

The red thing is a sharpener.  It doesn't work, which is disappointing, but it was a nice thought.

On a final note, I really can't wait for Cedar Point to open.  It's that time of year that I start to get really excited about it.