Monday, June 23, 2008

The Mutt and the truck and how they met

The Mutt: Max. AKA Stinky Butt Mutt, Dumb Mutt, Mutt Face, Pretty Boy Mutt, ADHD Stupid Mutt, &%$#@!!!!(that's Marty's name for him as I don't use THAT kind of language).


The Truck: Pat's baby.


Background: Max is a great dog but is basically still a puppy (9months old). He has no fear of vehicles so is always be right there running around as we pull in the driveway in which ever vehicle we chose from our personal used car lot. {At this point we have seven vehicles and 4 people, when we have everyone here then there's 9 vehicles I think that qualifies as a used car lot don't you?}

Last Thursday afternoon Pat gets ready to leave for town when all of a sudden he comes back in the house and says "I think I ran over the dog"! He then added "But I think he's okay cause he's running around". I give him the 'I can't believe you just said that' look (we both got it from several people after telling them the story). Seems that Max ran under the pickup between the front and back tires. Pat felt the truck bump over something and then heard Max yelping. We go out and Max is running around with a little bit of a limp. I decided to take him to the vet to have him checked out. The Doc was asking if we were sure he was run over cause by that time Max wasn't even acting like his hinney was tender. So the puppy angel that watches over Max earned her keep that day. Max is still an ADHD Stupid Mutt and I'm not sure he's learned to respect the fact that cars are bigger than him and not his personal toys. I'm sure in his twisted logic doggy mind he'll have figured out that since he got run over by the truck he got to take a ride in the car and that's always a treat so maybe he should do it more often.

Oh yes and Pat's truck is the envy of most the young men of the town who love the smell, sound and feel of diesel and who also don't have families to support and can spend all their hard earned cash on trucks with fancy chrome semi stacks and custom built bumpers. Many moons ago Marty used to be that way, then came The Blonde and his life changed for the better.......or so I tend to think.

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

The blonde 'loves' pink

Here's my hot pink baby.

I love my hot pink ipod! I take it everywhere. It fills my life with music. It's my 'precious'. I was a little panicky earlier as I wanted to use it and my 'precious' wouldn't work. OMG!!!!! Did I save the receipt? Do I have to reload everything? Did I lock it the last time I used it? Yup! I'm really feeling the blondeness right now.

I'm finding that I'm turning into a pink lover. It's not what you might think. I'm not going froo-froo. It's purely a self preservation thing. As in I want to preserve my 'things' for myself.
As a mom I'm a push over. The boys just have to look at something I own that's electronic in nature and I'm handing it over. I'm an electronic enabler. You'd think that as they are either in or entering adult hood that I wouldn't still have this problem, but alas, I DO! So in an effort to save myself I started buying pink.
Another example.




My last razr was a nice silver one. Wil's cell phone wasn't that great. I got the pathetic puppy dog look and "if you ever want to trade phones Mom I would like it" speech. I admit, I caved and traded. His cell phone really was a piece of......well I don't like to use crude descriptive words. So I bought a nice used 'pink' razr. Pink is my safety net. My out.
Now I just have to start painting all my things pink. Like the lap top, wii (Tom & Jamie have that right now), PS2 (Ben has that now), boombox (Pat has that), PS3 (that's technically half Wil's so I suppose I can't convert it to pink), my lovely 42" LCD piece of 'art' hanging in the living room, the car, the camera etc........

I suppose I could just say NOOOOOOO. But I'm just so happy they like electronic thingys I'm compelled to enable. I should form a support group EEA-Electronic Enablers Anonymous. I keep thinking I'm bad cause Marty doesn't have this problem. But I'm sure if any of them showed the merest in trains he would be dumping stuff all over them.

Saturday, June 14, 2008

Why blondie why?

One of the questions I get asked all the time is why I work 3rd shift. When I get to the part of my answer that I really like it I get a blank look then another WHY?. I'll have to take a picture at work one of these nights so you can see a visual. Two words...EMPTY ISLES. Now I know we need customers to survive and thrive. I just like working when there aren't too many of them. I can think, I can hum/sing, I can space off (don't need to think too hard when you're slinging boxes of diapers), I can pray, the possibilities are endless. There's also the $1.50 and hour more. I also like to drive around town during my lunch break at 2:30 am. There's something about seeing your town at that hour. It's quiet, it's pretty, it's a little surreal, it's safe. Because it's a small town I can get away with this. There aren't too many gangs. I usually see at least one city cop cruiser and 4 or 5 cars. I'm also getting to know the drive through night crew at McDonalds. They know just how I like my Sugar-Free Vanilla Iced Coffee (one splenda) and my cheeseburger (plain). It's also a good excuse to become a recluse. On my days off I keep pretty much the same hours and who wants to catch a cup of coffee at 3am? Marty and I have adjusted to our evenings together. To some that wouldn't seem to be a problem. Spending evenings with your husband is a blessing right? We had 10 years where I was gone at least 3 nights a week or more working. So all this togetherness took a little adjustment, at least on my part.
So here's to the night shift and those that work it. At Wally World we keep the groceries on the shelves, the bedding ready for your bed, the paper ready for your printer, boat horns for the teenagers to use anywhere but on the river, the diapers are there to cradle the babies butts (I no longer like the smell of new unused diapers) and the TVs are right there calling to you "buy me, I would look great on your wall". We make sure it's there for you and enjoy the quiet at least until assistant manager Darren walks through yelling enthusiastically "fired up?" expecting an equally enthusiastic "fired up" in response.

Friday, June 13, 2008

The Blonde in the basement, a rememberance of the snakes!

So the last couple of weeks we've spent some quality time in the basement. It's tornado season and has been kinda wild. I must confess that if it's light out I'm usually on the front porch watching the clouds whirling and twirling on by. But in the dark I'd rather be safe than sorry. I was raised in the days before the weather channel and live coverage when the way to forecast tornadoes was to stand outside and watch them touch down. I lived (and live) in the country where there weren't and still aren't sirens. I 'knew' what a wall cloud was before they called them that. And if the clouds were twirling above you and were an interesting shade of green it was time to go inside.
Back to the basement. During the whirling time I was relaxing on the futon in Pat's room thankful that we don't have the company of snakes down there.
One of the reasons we got a nice little price break on this property was cause of the snakes in the basement. At first I was thinking there were just a few big ones but during the months that followed we (I use the term we loosely I provided more support as in "boys go downstairs and do a snake check")killed around 60 snakes. Some small, some large, as in I'm 5'1+" and they were as long as me. We've been snake free for 8 years and I'm quite happy about that. I can hide in the basement and not worry about 5 foot long crawly things joining us in our safe place.

Friday, June 06, 2008

7 months of WHAT???

The last 7 months in a nutshell:

Went through a minor bathroom remodel. Our bath/laundry area was one long room. Marty was home a lot in Jan & Feb, a whole lot, like "don't you work anymore?" a lot "maybe you should sell yourself on the corner" a lot. But I digress that's water under the bridge, a bank loan to pay the lumber bills under the bridge. So we split the bath and laundry area, pocket doors make this magic possible. It's nice to be able to close the door so I can't see the mountain of dirty clothes for a little bit. I also got a nice new marble countertop. Oh and I finally got the wall papered the other night before I went to work, gotta be in the paperin' mood in order for it to work right just took 4 months to get in that mood. I had to do some very creative piecing, didn't have much left over from when I papered a few years back. In fact I had a small 12" X 12" piece of paper left over, that's literally cutting it pretty close.

The most adorable grandson in the world turned 1 in March. Kota reminds me of his dad so much it's almost eerie. He has ornery stamped all over his face and is cuter than a button.

The most beautiful grandaughter in the world is mine. The DRAMA just increases each and every minute. Light and sunshine then in the blink of an eye darkness and a dirty look, she's 2 1/2 ...hmmmmmm........13..............hmmmmmm......

I've adjusted to the life of a vampire. For the most part love working the night shift. There are moments though. Like when I wake up at 4 in the afternoon and have no idea what time it is, it's very surreal. I'm never quite sure what day of the week it is cause my 'weekend' is Tues and Wed. But oh the quietness at 3 am is a wonderful thing at Wally world. Have also been reaping the rewards of having good health insurance coverage as we've all had to see the Dr. this winter, even disgustingly healthy #3 son was sick. Our Wally World is an incubus of viral filth. Haven't ever been sick so much over a winter.

#4 son, My baby turned 16, that seems to be the beginning of my letting go phase with the boys. Just a taste of the 'empty' nest.....Which leads to.....

Had a couple of months when I really couldn't remember why I married the studdly one. Studdly wasn't a real word till I typed it out, now I've made it so. Yes Jean Luc Piccard I can make it so too. (If you've never watched Star Trek TNG that will make no sense to you). Oh yeah back to the studdly one. It's all better now, I'm in love again, but the commitment factor played a big part in the reason he survived. A word of wisdom from the peri-menopausal Blonde, you can't live by your feelings, they're all over the place, kind of like my most beautiful 2 1/2 year old grandaughter.

#3 son turned 18 and is Mr. Independent. I must take a pic of his new/used pickup with the semi exhaust stacks and his tat, soon to be tats. He's done with school. I'm down to homeschooling one.

#2 son stopped working for his dad and got a job with a company that's building onto our local power plant. He's making loads of dough but his job will be over soon. They got a new/used Durango.

Almost daughter-in-law got her associates degree in Criminal Justice and will start working on her Bachelors in August and is raising a family and is doing daycare. Can you tell I'm VERY impressed and proud of her?

Found out #1 son's reserve unit will be deployed in December and out of the country by Feb. Not looking forward to that time but have been expecting it for a couple of years. He got a new/used pick up.

After a long break I'm starting to do some creative stuff again. I love my pretty paper, touching it, tearing it, gluing it, crumpling it, smelling it.......p-a-p-e-r. Some people collect antiques, I collect paper.

I've only been out of Nebraska City 4 times in the last 7 months. Not a bad thing I just can't believe it. But then when you have to take a loan out just to gas up your car who can afford to drive to the big city.

Paid off my car. It's so tempting to get something else but that lack of car payment will probably allow me to actually put gas in said car, which gets pretty good gas mileage and is reliable. But did you notice that 3 of my 4 got new/used vehicles? We also bought a new/used work van that #1 drives. I'm suffering from new/used vehicle envy. Have to make myself not look at the car sale adds in the paper and drive by car lots. Must-fight-temptation. The studdly one has put his foot down and said "NO NEW/USED CARS". Remember how well that worked for President Bush #1 with the tax issue?

We have a new member in the family. Max, an adhd preteen german shepherd, joined the Clan in April. He's settling down some. He has a thing for squeeky toys, must have one in his mouth all the time, like a pacifier. A good dog though. A good addition!

My life in a nutshell. Pretty good. Full.