Life is an adventure

This weekend included re-arranging my bedroom. I've got some things to sort but I can't even believe it's done. I normally keep everything in the same place because I don't care too much about aesthetics and my surroundings. The vacuum really had a work out, I think I had to empty it more than 3 times. I've got the inspection report on the townhouse, a little more work than I thought but I think I can make it happen. After I close on it, I'm going to have an open house and make a list of things I'm asking for help on the townhouse. It will be hard for me to ask for that help but it will be a good step for me. I've got lots of people asking to help and I don't know how to choose, it's overwhelming for me. 

no parade due to weather which is ok, didn't meet R but that's ok too.

Dinner with my Dad's partner. Tomorrow is off so I'll have to see what kind of trouble I can get into. 4 days left of work before summer schedule. I really liked having Friday and Monday off as a slow slide into it.

I'll be helping my mom move way up north in about 10 days. She dropped some stuff off at my house that I will enjoy using at the townhouse. I need to start coming up with a list of things I'll need at the townhouse.

Teh boy started school today. I can't believe he's a junior in high school. When I got home from work today we ran to Target to pick up some school supplies and etc. He's okay with Target tennis shoes so I won't complain. I did end up buying him this brown leather zippered planner (which he will take out the planner part and insert his school planner). I think he just wants to have a zippered planner with little tablets for taking notes with). I enjoyed hearing about his classes.

This weekend was good, we camped out at our friend J's house along with 3 other couples and a handful of kids. P wasn't feeling so good after pushing herself too much the last couple of weeks at work so she slept in the last couple of mornings. We had good times with friends we haven't hung out with for a while. She did her watercolor painting and I assembled some peace signs that I'm going to send to family and etc to honor my Dad.

Monday we went to the state fair. I didn't think that we'd have lots of energy especially with as hot as it was. We volunteered with the Sesquincentenial booth for a few hours and then had some food (cheese curds, slice of pizza, ice cream, lemonade, corn dog) attended the Toby Keith concert. We had great seats, 5th row center. I just hated sitting next to the lady who sat too close to me (I tend to have big private space). We got some really fun pics. I'm not much of a Toby Keith fan but P chose to surprise me with a date night. I like it when she plans things for us.



On a sad note, her friend J (who lives in Iowa) lost her sister on Sunday. She had late stage brain cancer and lost the war. She was younger than P which makes me worry a little bit. J is also chronically sick with wegeners disease. P wanted to go down there but J didn't want her to do. I feel bad for P because she obviously cares deeply for J but she keeps everyone at arms length. I met J once when she came up here, she's a riot but I do get a sense of sadness about her.

 It's been a good weekend. Saturday we went to camping world to check it out...we didn't find anything for our camper. We stopped at Best Buy and I picked up a new laptop. The one I had before had a problem with the display. If I wanted to use it as a desktop I could buy a monitor. If I could find a new display, I could repair it but we couldn't find one. It's really too bad that computers are now disposible. I did find a nice vaio which was a demo, $200 off. P said she'd buy me a nice laptop bag as a congrats on my new job. Saturday night we had dinner with some friends at the local german restaurant. P and I got the sampler platter, yummy. They brought P a prize, she was given Squawkers McCaw it's hilarious to play with. 

Sunday we had a great time visiting with friends at a BBQ. Nice gathering and good to see folks. Although there were comments that some of our friends felt that others weren't as close as we had been. I'm not sure what that is about...I enjoy everyone as individuals and if some folks are "pulling away" or whatever, that's okay. I just enjoy them when we have time for it. I brought a DQ cake to celebrate with the crew. I dropped P home and then I ran into town to pick up an order at REI and my computer (they had to re-do the hard drive). 

less than 4 weeks left of my "old" job. I'm looking forward to being done and after that we're going to disney world to celebrate P's birthday. Who knows what's going to happen after that. I'm looking forward to finding out when I start my new job. I do want to get going on dealing with my Dad's estate, finishing the bathrooms, organizing the house and etc.

 Ugh, things have been too busy lately. Friday I was very happy to go have dinner with friends. I enjoy the restaurant and friends are always great!. Saturday the boy went to an orientation to the arts high school in this state. His father actually showed up to join us. P let me drive her car to keep us safe in the first measurable snowfall. I brought home lunch and then proceeded to take a nap. I meant to only sleep an hour and P was going to wake me up but she fell asleep too. 

Sunday I woke up and spent too much time shoveling the driveway. The boy helped but he kept trying to get out of it. It was a lot of work because my driveway is so wide. He even took the shovel I was using when I put it down. He's old enough and should be strong enough to work at least as much as I do, but he didn't. Of course, Sunday night my arms were ACHING from the work. I had to take some advil to get rid of the pain so I could sleep.

That night, we had dinner with R from Pittsburgh, she was in town because her Grandma died. It was a good dinner at the Caspian Bistro which is just like this restaurant but in MN of course! After that, P went to work and drove L(R2's gf back home because she has finals) R, R2 and I went to Dunn Bros. down the street. This is where everything got worse! R was driving her dead grandmothers car. She couldn't figure out how to turn off her headlights so she just left them on while we went in. She figured it would be fine for a half hour. We went in, had our warm drinks and then when we went to leave. She realized her lights were dimming. She went to unlock the car but only had the electronic lock thingy and it didn't have enough power to unlock it. This meant that it slowly dimmed until it went out as she tried to figure out what to do. Dunn Bros. closes at 10pm. She doesn't have an auto service and lucky for her, I do and had a few weeks where my old one and my new one crossed over. We needed both a lock out AND a jump. The guy got there about 9:45 and had some trouble popping the lock on her car. It took like 45 minutes+ before it was popped. The coffee shop had closed and kicked us out. R was in sucyh a rush to leave Pittsburgh she neglected to bring a winter coat! She was standing in a t-shirt and a hoodie in weather that was 10 degrees! Thankfully there were lofts right there that had a heated entrance where we waited while the guy worked his magic. R2 waited in my car, I'm sure he was frusturated. I was HUGELY frusturated but what could I do.  R was just as mad at everything herself but mostly kept it together. The car had some trouble being jumped and that took a while too. After the car was running, we sat in the parking lot waiting for the guy to leave because I was sitting in her car since I was the passenger autoclub card holder. I was afraid that he'd report this and I'd loose my membership. After about 15 minutes, I realized that it was my "old" membership and if I did get a bill, I'd just send it to her. I didn't start to leave until 11pm. It takes an hour to get home, it was Sunday night and I had needed to do laundry before Monday. She was going to drive her grandma's car back to Pittsburgh and I meant to call her to see how she's doing but so far I'm too frusturated to care yet. 

Today, it's snowing some more. I got some laundry done, changed the sheets on my bed FINALLY. I also updated my ipod with new episodes of "The Story" and "This American Life"

Work is boring, I've got to teach tomorrow and I've got a list of things to do. 

Yeah, there's another job I'm going to apply for, I would LOVE have it. It would be perfect, close enough to home and PERMANENT.

 I'm really ready for a little time off. This weekend was good but I'm procrastinating for next week. Friday P, teh boy and I went to see a good friend's art show opening and then for a very good dinner. Teh boy was very excited about being in a very different place with interesting food, architecture and people.

Saturday with a lot of help from a friend and P, I got my office cleaned. It's very cool. They're getting me to think of all that I should be doing with my house besides cleaning (new windows, and etc).  I feel a little bad because I didn't do a whole lot of the cleaning but I was getting off all the files from my old computer and putting it on the laptop. I'm giving my old computer to my sister who doesn't have one. Saturday night P and I went to hear a favorite local musician of mine see petermayer.net  it was good.

Sunday we woke up for church but didn't make it, went back to sleep. P made lunch and was telling me that I need to replace my stove. Then she went to open the oven and the handle came off....I suppose it's time. Only problem is that I won't be able to get to it until after this week. Good thing is that I won't be home most of the week. I've got to go to the Library conference where I'm presenting and doing a poster session. I'm currently working on my poster session stuff. (yeah, really I'm procrastinating). It just feels so much like grad school!

Okay, back to work I go!

P came home early on Friday morning. It made it very hard to go to work. I think I'm finally coming back to my regular life slowly but surely. P says I've been gone, I say I've been grieving. Obviously, it's all new to us on how we grieve together. I know I definately do go inward when I'm not taking care of other people. I don't even know what I need really....  I'm a talking she's not so much. I know that she's been trying to be there for me, helping me out in ways. I need to watch for them to recognize it since she doesn't say anything. Sometimes in my grief, I'm oblivious or don't recognize her efforts, I think it's important to recognize people's efforts. Last weekend, she stocked my freezer. 

This weekend she wasn't feeling well on Friday when I came home from work. I let her sleep, she needed it. The boy and I cooked dinner, hoping she'd wake up but okay if she didn't. The boy talks about how he doesn't know how to cook despite having taken years of home ec. I finally said that we could cook together, I figure it would be good for us to have some time together. We made baked pork chops with stuffing, mashed potatoes and corn on the cob. I think it gave him some confidence in cooking. Hopefully we'll keep it up. The boy went to sleep and P woke up just as I was going to go to bed early. We ended up running to the store that must not be named walmart. It's what's open 24 hours a day in my area. She needed her coke. She ended up spending quite a bit of money, including an automatic catbox and two collars for the cats (Jinx already took his off and it's missing). She bought the cat box to try and make my life easier. She stayed up and I went to bed after the store. She wants to clean up the basement so that we can do crafts with our friends. I think it would be fun but cleaning the basement is just not one of my priorities. 

When I woke up on Saturday, after a slow start we first picked up a new lawnmower (the old one is finally dying) went to Bob and Scooters,  I mean, Dave and Busters.  She wanted to do this in support of finding things to do with the boy that he would enjoy. We ended up staying there a couple of hours and had a good time. The boy said it was better than Space Aliens  Food was pretty good. We ran into friends on the way out. At home, P wasn't feeling well and laid down. We were going to go to games night with friends but with P not feeling well, I was okay staying home. 

Sunday the plan was to go to church (early service because going to the late one runs the risk for P to run into T which makes her uncomfortable). I love going to church with her. We stopped to look at a camper (16 ft scamp) for sale before I dropped her off and I went to coffee. While driving to church we talked about our friend B who has a drinking problem. I think it's time for us to sit her down and tell her how much we're concerned about her.

After I got home, P was ready for a nap, I snuggled her down. very nice! The boy and I made fake frappicinos, dinner and then laundry. P left for work but we had a very good weekend. Good conversation with the boy, he's interested in going to same high school as anterastilis, I'll have to ask her about it.
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 Yeah, I never made it to my meeting on Friday night. I got home to get my computer and just couldn't make it out the door. Saturday we went to my Dad's land to spread some seed for grass near the house. We really only had enough to get to the first foot out from the house. We'll have to bring more. We also felt that we should post a no trespassing and no hunting sign "cause we're freaked about liability issues. Sunday was spent working on cleaning the bedroom. I ended up with lots of laundry and P got enough of her stuff out of the bedroom too. Now we just have to clean the room she put it in. It didn't help that she's sick.

Busy day at work. I hardly had time to do anything but meetings and ref desk.

Oh, the other thing that is really exciting, a friend of mine who is a carpenter had her tools stolen from her garage. Unfortunately, she didn't have renter's insurance. Another friend of ours who is an artist, put up a painting of hers to auction off to raise funds. The Exciting news is that we won! Check out the beautiful picture!

Okay, I'm going home...nice thing is that I'll work late tomorrow so I can sleep in tomorrow morning! YIPEE I'll probably spend the morning organizing and making calls regarding my Dad's estate. If I'm lucky, I might get some more cleaning in.

Camp is next weekend. That's where P and I met. We have to go...looks like it will be a bit cool.

Friday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 58.

Friday Night: Partly cloudy, with a low around 39.

Saturday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 63.

Saturday Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 43.

Sunday: Mostly sunny, with a high near 65.