A Bug Named George

Apr 262012
 

I’m still AWOL.  Or maybe MIA.  I might even be ROTFLMAO.

Whatever I am, it certainly isn’t completing everything I wanted to this week.   Oh, I’ve accomplished most of everything on my *outdoors* list, but I still have one more thing to do:  plant the Sweet Peas.  I don’t know why I’m procrastinating this.  It’s an easy enough job.

– Dig hole

– Drop seed

– Cover with dirt

– Water

– Repeat

So what am I waiting for?  Meh, I don’t know.  Maybe I’m waiting for some sort of inspiration to kick me in the fanny and boot me out the door.  Does inspiration do that?  Maybe I’m supposed to look for it in order to grab onto it.  It must be outside because it certainly isn’t anywhere by my computer.

Could that little bug on that leaf be my inspiration?  You know, like Jiminy Cricket was Pinocchio’s conscious?  That would be so cool!  I’d name him George, and hug him and squeeze him and pull his little tail… oh, wait a minute, wrong cartoon.

OK, I need to get away from this computer for a while.

Hopefully I’ll be able to get out of this funk over the weekend and back to my old witty posts come Monday.

Wish me luck and have a great weekend!

 

I Blame My Parents for Being an Idiot

Apr 242012
 

I know that I said that I was going to be AWOL for a couple days (and I am) but I just had a realization that I had to share.

And that is those guys on Storm Chasers are C R A Z Y!!  I  was relaxing after slaving the day at work/transplanting plants/watching them slump over from shock/emptying the dishwasher/reloading the dishwasher/leveling out the rest of the fill in the “new” gardens and I looked up to the TV (which has the Weather Channel as my *background noise*) and saw these wild tornadoes and those dudes exclaiming how awesome they were.

Yes, tornadoes are awesome.  When you are a hundred miles away from them tucked safely in a storm shelter or basement.  NOT 500 feet from a death storm that is causing total destruction to the world and getting close to ending your life.

I remember when I was little and the sirens would blare that there was a tornado warning.  Mom would usher us little ones to the basement and get us all comfy with books and such to keep our minds of the possibility that the world as we knew it could be gone any minute.  Once we were distracted (or so she thought) she would go back up the stairs to see if the storm had hit yet.

Umm, helllloooo, your supposed to be down here with us cowering like a little baby and praying to a higher power, remember?  So, if a tornado hit, we were going to be orphans because you couldn’t bear to be down in the safety of the basement with us?  You had to see where the storm was at?  That is what radios and TV are for, Superwoman!

Maybe she was waiting to see where our Dad was at, which was probably still in the field on the combine watching the twister from hell and going “Hmmm…. looks like it’s heading toward our house.  Glad I’m not there.”

Obviously my parents did not set a good example for us kids, because I did the same shit when my kids were little.  Only I would make sure that Rick was down in the basement with them so that they would have at least one parent left behind to raise them.

So when somebody says “Won’t you please think of the children,” I can say “Yes, I did.”

 

The Book That Changed My Attitude

Apr 182012
 

Yesterday was shit.

Let me correct that:  yesterday my attitude was shit.  Don’t ask me why, but it was just one of those days when I didn’t want to be around people and if you looked at me the wrong way you ran the risk getting killed by “the look.”

I hate those days.  Hate.  HATE.  HATE.  And there’s absolutely nothing I can do about it.  If someone had tried to be all Mary Sunshine and tell me to look on the bright side of things, I think I would have shoved that sunshine somewhere on their person.

So on days like those, I try to just shut out everyone in the world and focus on my little crappy space and hope that the day comes to an end quickly and that no one gets hurt.

My foul mood came to a quick halt when I arrive home and opened the front door to a *plop* from a little brown package from Amazon.com.

WOOT!  It arrived!!  I’ve been waiting a billion years for this to come (OK, a month or so, but it seemed much longer) and it showed up at just the right moment.

Jenny Lawson, aka The Bloggess, is one of the funniest, frankest, craziest women to rule the blogesphere.  The best part about her?  She’s 100% real.  From taxidermied alligators to her love affair with Will Wheaton, she’ll keep you coming back everyday for more.

When I opened the book, I didn’t need to go any farther than the “thank you” page to know that this book was going to make my telleveryonetoorderthisbookbecauseitsdabomb list:

“I want to thank everyone who helped me create this book,

except for that guy who yelled at me in Kmart when I was eight

because he thought I was being “too rowdy.”

You’re an asshole, sir.”

Everyone should be as honest as that!

Thanks for coming through when I needed you most, Jenny.  Your book made me laugh out loud* (which brought strange looks from the cats) and made my shitty attitude melt away.

I wish I had some taxidermied frogs to send you as a thank you gift, but my daughter kinda freaked out when I told her what they were and when I found them many years later they were kinda gross.

 

*Seriously, the chapter “Stanley, the Magical Talking Squirrel” had me laughing so hard that tears were running down my cheeks!

 

Taxes, Snow and Apple Blossoms

Apr 162012
 

Today was proof positive that Mother Nature is in control.  Unbeknownst to me, April 16 = snow in the Northwoods (and here I thought it was just the due date for getting taxes done).  About 1/2 inch was ordered today, and another unknown fact came about that I was unaware of:  the ground was cold enough to let it accumulate. 

Which makes me sad, because all I can think about are the strawberry plants and all my other perennials getting cold under that blanket of white.

One thing that I didn’t have to worry about were my little starter plants in the new greenhouse.  They are all nice and toasty warm because of the space heater we placed in it.  I finally have some tomato plants popping up through the soil, and some of the flower seeds that I planted have joined the party.

There’s always one sign of Spring that I miss:  Apple Blossoms.  When we moved up north, Nichole would always send me pictures of our old apple trees when they were in bloom.  These pictures always made me smile with fond memories.  So when we went down to the old homestead on Saturday, I was practically giddy, hoping that I would get to see those blossoms with my very own eyes for the first time in 11 years.

Well, they weren’t in full bloom yet, but they did try their hardest to show me that everything was fine and dandy in the apple world.  I think it’s about time that I got a couple trees and plant them on the new lots we’re buying.

Then I can take pictures in the Spring and send them to Nichole.

 

Closing Another Chapter

Apr 152012
 

I had been watching the forecast all week, praying that the weather would be good.  I was teased almost daily:  yes, there will be rain; no, it will be sunny.  The weather gods certainly weren’t going to make this easy.

And then Saturday morning came and the sun shone brightly.  Well, at least it did in the Northwoods.  But we were heading south to the old homestead to clean out the garage in preparation for the new renters that would soon be moving in.  We had a big chore ahead of us and I really didn’t want cold, crappy rain to hamper our efforts.

As we left the safety of the big woods, the sky looked ominous.  Was it rain?  Fog?  Oh, there’s some sun poking through, maybe it was just dark clouds giving me a little scare.  Little did I know that just a few miles a head of us there was rain coming down… and by the time we reached our halfway mark it had moved on and it was going to be beautiful weather for our task ahead.

Phew… dodged that bullet!

Nichole & Corey were gracious enough to volunteer in our efforts to clean out 20 years of accumulated junk.  Not just stuff that Rick & I had left behind, but things that our daughters had stashed away over the years when they had stayed in the house after we moved north.  And it wasn’t your normal garage either (remember, we don’t do normal in this family):  there was an attic to the garage that was plum full of crap stuff.

After 4 hours, the 10 yard dumpster we rented was overflowing.

So was the trailer that the kids had brought as well as the back of their pickup.

We had our own share of treasures that we brought home, along with old computer equipment that has to be hauled to the recycling center.

Lots of memories were rediscovered that day as we picked through boxes:  old photos, clothes, my diary from when I was young (which promptly went in the dumpster), games the kids used to play when they were little.

And if you think that we did all of this heavy lifting and sorting on an empty stomach, you’re sorely mistaken.  Nichole brought homemade breads, fruit, crackers and cheese curds (yummy!) to keep our strength up (thanks Colie!!)

Another chapter was closed that day.  One that contained many years of our life in that little town by the Rush River.  But new pages are being written every day as we go about our life in the Northwoods.

And some day there will be another garage that will need to be cleaned out.  And this one has a bigger attic to it.

 

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