For context to this post, my mom died a couple of weeks ago

Bless him, my dad is still hanging onto his sobriety. Alone. He's not in any kind of program or treatment. But he's very much into Entenmann's chocolate loaf cake, Lay's, and diet Coke.

I had to tell him this morning that the funeral director is coming by his house on Saturday with my mom's ashes in an urn.

He's been waiting for this, but hearing it's actually going to happen on a real calendar date was upsetting. Me saying the word to tell him was upsetting. Upsetting him is upsetting.

He says he's going to put her urn on the wine bar (a huge, monstrous marble and wrought iron cabinet that looks like the Godfather movies threw up in the hallway) so he can talk to her every day when he walks by. He's been planning this since she was alive, but the reality of it actually happening in a couple of days was too much for him and he cried into the phone with me.
One of my mom's friends offered to come by and take my mom's clothes out of the house for him and he didn't realize that he was allowed to tell her no, and say he wasn't ready. I told him that it's completely natural for him to want to wait, and that her friend would 100% understand and respect this.
He cancelled his doctor appointment, and hasn't really been out of the house because the thought of talking to anyone who might ask about my mom is too much for him to bear to have to explain. I told him that's totally fine too. He said that he's only sleeping a couple of hours a night and that his eyes and face hurt from crying.
I had to explain grief to him as if he were a child. He's 84. I said, "a horrible thing has happened to you and it's OK to cry and be upset as long as you want to".
You are normal, you old weirdo.
I told him that grief is natural and no one expects you to carry on like nothing happened. Well, I screamed all of this into the phone because the man has significant hearing loss, and I had to scream it all twice because he also has dementia.

Today I decided is the day that I'm going to make all of the calls I have to make, like telling their bank and the cable company that she is dead. I'm going to have to call the oxygen company and ask them to come and pick up all of the hoses, tanks and equipment that are tucked around all over their house. Stuff like that. I have a headache thinking about it, and looking at the UPS envelope I got in the mail the other day from the funeral home that has all of the copies of her death certificate that I ordered.
Anyhoo... I'm sad to have to do all of these things and the idea of having to be in charge of so much of my dad's life is terrifying, especially long distance.

The News Round Up - This Is (Not) Important So Gather Round

MDH and I got a new bed. I may have mentioned in an earlier post that we were planning to buy one, but I'm too lazy to go back and check for sure, which is interesting because normally nothing pleases me more than rereading my own posts over and over again like a crazy narcassistic gasbag, what was I talking about? Oh yes... MDH and I finally got a new bed. It's fucking amazing. Life changing. Trans formative. I'm a new woman.

Our old bed sucked. It was old. And small. And had begun to sag in the middle when we were both in it. Folded up like a taco. It was also noisy and not in a sexy let's get it on er-ah, er-ah squeaky way, but in a bouncy, jostling each other awake every time you make the slightest movement kind of way. It's was annoying. If you dropped a bowling ball on that bed I'm quite sure it would have knocked over a glass of red wine in the other room.

Dye Hard

I was only able to watch the first 5 minutes of the Oprah show that I had recorded on my DVR because that's all I was able to stand of Oprah's bad dancing and John Travolta's horrible dye job. First of all, Oprah stop moving. Don't dance girl. Just stop.

More importantly, John Travolta, you are an old man, it's time to be gray. You are fooling no one.

The Visitors

So in a couple of weeks my crazy aunt Liz, my sister* and my niece** are all coming to visit us at our new Texas digs. I'm excited and nervous at the same time. They have never come to visit us. Ever.

I think the whole thing started when I told my sister about my surgery, after my recovery was nearly complete mind you. I think that she and Liz thought that they were going to come here and somehow take care of me. Well thank god I foiled that plan by waiting until after I was better before I told anybody about it. Now when they come we can just have fun. Although I can't help but wonder how they thought I'd still need taking care of when they didn't book their flights until 6 weeks after I was officially recovered. Nice try. Let's just party.

I got in big trouble, by the way, for not telling anyone in my family (besides my parents) about my being sick and having surgery until after the fact. I didn't want to make a million phone calls telling the world about my rather personal, crotch related ordeal, so when I was ready for people to know there was only one phone call necessary. My sister***. I knew once she knew then everyone in my family, whether they were interested or not, would know.

And damned if the fucking phone didn't start ringing less then 30 minutes after my initial call with her ended. This is exactly what I had tried to avoid - talking about my uterus and having multiple conversations involving the words "cervix" and "ovaries" to a million different people who, although technically family, are not necessarily the people I'd like to discuss this shit with.

Thankfully, I was mostly healed and recovered and better able to handle such discussions than I was prior to the surgery when I was quite irritable (to put it mildly) and ill.

Crazy aunt Liz is my dad's sister and the one that came down to the hotel restaurant for breakfast in her housecoat and slippers at the last family reunion MDH and I attended. She didn't have her teeth in either. Other members of my family also came down to breakfast in the hotel restaurant unwashed and uncombed wearing sweats, pajama pants and t-shirts and flip-flops. Somehow though that doesn't seem quite as shocking as a housecoat and slippers because you often (sadly) see people**** in public wearing sweats and pajama pants with t-shirts and flip-flops. A housecoat and slippers seems a bit intimate of attire for public airings.

Anyhoo... my family all think I'm a huge prig because I give a shit about such things as whether or not I shower and appear fully dressed in public and that's totally OK with me.

I know that many people in my family also think that I'm a prig because I read a lot, I sometimes use big fancy words and make an effort to use correct grammar when I speak (or write***** (I fail sometimes, but they probably wouldn't know that)). I don't watch Dog the Bounty Hunter, follow NASCAR, go to church or listen to country music. I know they all love me, as I love them, but I'm not one of them.

As a result of this most of my adult life, with a few exceptions here and there, I have chosen to keep my family at arms length, so it'll be weird to have so many of them here all at once.

*She's actually my cousin, but when we were children I lived with her family for about a year or so, until my dad could get his shit together after my mom left us. Even after I went to live with my dad again I continued to spend a great deal of time at her family's house throughout my life. I went on family vacations with them and spent several weekend with them throughout the year. and we have always felt like sisters. We made a pact when we were teenagers and decided that because we were really sisters in our hearts we would always refer to each other thusly. At this stage in our lives it's weird to keep doing it, but we continue to do it because we have always done it. It's awkward however when I talk about her to other people who don't know her and I have recently taken to referring to her as my cousin rather than feeling like a liar and having to explain about how she's my sister, but not really my sister. I assume she's doing the same, but it has never come up.

**Her kids have always called me "Aunt Lady".

***Fifteen years ago she would have been one of the first to know, before the fact even, but we aren't as close as we once. I really don't like her husband very much and the feeling is mutual I think. I used to hang around and do stuff with them anyway and just put up with his bullshit, but as the kids got older and busier and I got older and busier I had less time and patience. Also, it was always a one way street in that I always had to go to their house (about an hour away) and they rarely seemed able to make the effort to come to me, and that shit gets old after awhile, especially if her husband was going to act like a total asshat the whole time I was there. I wish I liked him. I've tried to like him. But there it is.

****People who are not me.

*****It's all I can do not to have an embolism when I read some of my family members posts on Facebook.

A Tale of Two Cities - Part 1

It's been an interesting coupla years in Ladyland. We live about an hour from the Gulf of Mexico now, which has been an adjustment, to say the least. In Dallas we lived in a dry, moisture sucking, pizza oven, where we live now has moisture, vegetation, and steady tropical rains that are more akin to a sousvide water oven (look it up, kids). 

In other words, my skin looks amazing and hydrated, but my hair is a bit on the unruly side, and I'm in a constant battle with swamp ass. These days most of my outfits could easily be mistaken for swim suit cover ups, and I do not for the life of me, honest to John, remember the last time I wore socks.

This past year has dealt our family serious blows in the form of the deaths of two of my brothers in law. The good* ones too, Las Vegas and Syracuse. So I'm left with the two scarier ones, Miami and Knucklehead. Obviously this has been extremely stressful for MDH, who in the case of Las Vegas was left responsible for cleaning up after his god damned mess.

Last October, when my DH was in Austin with friends getting together and preparing to attend a music festival he got a call from someone from the Las Vegas police, to tell him that his oldest (and most seemingly normal) brother had taken an upscale suite with comped points from one of the swankier hotel casinos, where he stayed for 2 weeks before carefully laying out plastic lawn and garden bags on the sumptuous, king sized bed and blowing his brains out with a pistol.

Apparently his body laid there for 5 full days before the cleaning staff alerted hotel management. Apparently his head was, for lack of a better way to describe it, gone.

MDH upon getting the call immediately alerted Miami and Syracuse and it was decided that Miami would get on the next flight to Las Vegas to be with MDH and do things like identify the body, and sort out whatever needed to be sorted out, which turned out to be a fucking lot, and Syracuse would drive immediately to Boston so that the news of Las Vegas' death could be given to my MIL in person by someone she trusts.

So that happened.

Fast forward to November. Thanksgiving weekend to be exact, when I never wanted to run away and join the circus more in my life because Miami demanded that the absolute best time ever to have a memorial service for Las Vegas would be THE FRIDAY AFTER THANKSGIVING. Of course the absolute worst time of year for traveling. Of course the absolute worst time for someone who lives in the tropics and doesn't even own a coat anymore to travel to FUCKING BOSTON, where it's freezing fucking cold. Not to mention that frankly I really didn't feel like memorializing Las Vegas. I went because it was important to MDH, and that was the end of it. 

Syracuse had pneumonia and couldn't make it, which made me jealous, (why can't I get pneumonia and skip this stupid thing?) and infuriated Miami so deeply that he declared it unforgivable and that Syracuse was "dead to me", and refused to take his calls anymore.

Anyhoo... somehow I survived that ordeal, and it WAS an ordeal, because anything involving MDH's family is never without dramas, death threats, ridiculous unnecessary complications and drunken brawls. Somehow we also always end up footing the bill for all of this shit, which only makes me more angry. If anything, I was glad to get to spend some time with my MIL, and hug her, and cry together, and reassure her that she didn't have to ever do anything that she didn't want to do, like go to this insane memorial service.

Fast forward to late December, when we learn that Syracuse does not only not have pneumonia, he as been diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer and has about 6 months to live. He died** the 2nd week in March.

In between the 2 deaths, MIL came down and spent almost 8 weeks with us in Texas. She had been home for just slightly more than a week when Syracuse died. MDH was with Syracuse when he died, and had been there for about a week and a half prior. He had flown home with his mother from Texas, because she can no longer fly by herself, and then rented a car and drove to Syracuse to be with his brother in his final days.

Then he drove back to Boston. Knucklehead had been given the responsibility this time of telling my MIL about the death of her son, but when he arrived at her apartment he found her barely conscious on the floor next to the couch. Apparently she'd had a stroke the previous day, but just chose to lay there, her cell phone in her robe pocket, because she, "didn't want to bother anybody". 

This is the part where I scream.

And I've pretty much been screaming ever since. Starting with finding out that she had out right LIED to me while she was visiting about what medications she was supposed to be taking. Medications which included pills to lower her cholesterol, which she told her doctor in the hospital after the stroke that SHE decided she didn't need anymore.

It's now almost August, and she's still in a rehab facility in Boston. We're not sure what is going to happen next.

In Part 2 of this story, which I will try and write tomorrow, I will explain to you the evil, conniving nature of Knucklehead, and the various ways that he has been nothing but a piece of shit since all of this has gone down.


*Tolerable and mostly polite to me, but still misogynistic and unpleasant to be around for longer than a few hours.

*People die. They are dead. They don't pass, pass away, cease to exist, or whatever other sugar coated phrases people like to use. They die and they are fucking dead.

It's Time to Unfurl the Blog Again

Life has handed me enough lately, and it's time to get real. I need to express my true self, which is something that simply cannot be done on Facebook (without consequences, like my elderly aunts trying to pipe in and help, or people expressing genuine and loving feelings of condolence, and/or sympathy, or my aunt Pauline responding uncomprehendingly in all caps to my sarcastic post a year and a half later and thereby opening the floodgates of unwanted responses all over again.)

Then I remembered this blog, like a beacon of hope. THIS IS WHY I CREATED IT IN THE FIRST PLACE!! 

And now it fills me with joy and a slight bit of disgust to tell you this:

Apparently I post too many things about cats on the Book of Face because someone that I know, or used to know a long time ago, but am a barely acquainted with now online, posted what you see below on my timeline.

What the living fuck is this piece of shit? She kinda sorta thought I might like it. Jesus fucking christ what have I become?

I'm hoping to recover from this blow to my self image, and apparently my public image in which I have become seriously uncool. I have become a crazy cat lady. I have become the kind of person who would kinda might like that bag. I refuse to believe this, and yet I also vowed when I saw it to stop posting anything about cats for a very long time, or perhaps never again.

I'm also hoping to start posting here more. I'm thinking I need it. I'm thinking that it would be a really good thing for me to start converting the ugly poisoned thoughts in my head into something sort of funny, and thus turning negatives into positives, or at the very least neutralizing the situation.

Oh my god. That fucking bag. What the shit, dudes?

Stop Making Sense

The same person* who takes great pride in eating directly out of cans (because it saves him having to wash dishes), and boastfully uses the same coffee mug, for a multitude of beverages from morning until bedtime, coffee (obviously), orange juice, soda, milk, beer (what have you), without ever rinsing it, is somehow also the same person who sparked out yesterday with an emotional decree:

"You shouldn't open the blinds during the day!!!  Eventually the carpet will fade."

Um, what? 

Hey, fuck you Heloise.  I'm opening the blinds.

What am I Howard Hughes?  If you suggest that I start wearing slippers made from tissue boxes because it helps prevent scuffs on hardwood flooring I am just as likely to tell you to go piss up a rope.  On second thought, don't do that.  There's a distinct line between fading and piss, let's not cross it.

To be fair there have been a lot of emotional decrees lately.  I get it, it's a new house, and we are filling it almost daily with new furnishings and bits and bobs.  We want it to stay nice.

1.  There will be no eating or drinking of beverages, other than ice or water, or any combination of the two, while in the living room or while sitting upon or near any of the new furniture.  (This is my rule, but I often find myself watching the new giant TV while standing just on the other side of the back of the sofa, feet firmly planted on the tile in the breakfast nook**, munching on a snack and thinking about how fucking stupid my new rule is and, if MDH isn't home, eventually breaking this rule by planting my snacky ass right on the new sofa and munching away.)

2.  The bed will be made daily by the person who remains in it the longest.  (Or in other words, last one up is a rotten egg.  This is also my rule.  What the hell is wrong with me?)

3.  The kitchen counter and bar will no longer be a repository for mail and crap from the bottom of a purse or pockets or any combination of these items.  (Yep.  Also my rule.  The rest of the rule should say: All mail and crap, etc., is to be shoveled haphazardly into the black hole next to the sink hereby referred to as "the menu drawer" before MDH arrives home from work.)

I suppose the theme of this post, if there has to be one is that I project my crazy shit onto MDH, make my own rules, promptly break them, and then hide it. 

Seriously though, not opening the blinds to keep the carpet from fading?  

Since I'm no longer allowed to enjoy sunshine in my own home, why don't we just never walk on it either.  In fact, let's just kill ourselves (neatly, over plastic in the garage, don't get nutty, concrete absorbs stains) so that we can hover over the new furniture and finishes, enjoying the glory of it all as ghostly spirits, so that it can all remain perfect and pristine forever and ever.

Maybe we can compromise and just wear sheets around the house in order to minimize the dust particles we shed.

No.  Fuck the carpet.  I want to live.  Preferably in my new home which, by the way, gets excellent light all day, which, by the way, is one of the reasons we moved here.

Right.  Now, please shut up, turn the sofa cushion over and pass me the popcorn. 

It's fine.

*In hindsight I'm not sure that I made it perfectly clear that it's MDH I'm referring to as the person who eats directly out of cans and uses the same mug all day without rinsing it.

**We don't have a table in there yet, so I will probably feel less stupid when I don't have to stand up while I'm snacking.  Probably.

How Now Brown Couch?

What goes hand in hand with my obsession with the new house better than my obsession with decorating and furnishing it?

Nothing.  Not a damn thing.

I have been trying to be ultra low key about it in my real life, with family, friends and the people I interact with daily, because I'm sure if I really talked about furniture shopping, out loud, with real people, half as much as I'm tempted to, that sooner rather than later, some one would come along and bash my obnoxious head in. 

But you know what?  I can say it here, on my trusty old blog.  Ahem:

It's possible that I've never been more excited about anything in my entire life. 

Maybe getting married, but I feel like I have to say that.  Polite society dictates that I should pretend to be more excited about love and family than I am about shopping for a new sofa, like a grown ass woman, for the first time in my entire life.  I want to shout it from the rooftops - I'M GETTING A BRAND NEW SOFA!!!!

I will love it, and pet it, and call it George.  But not too much.  I can't risk pilling or stains.

Cue the confetti* and operatic arias from high on the mountain tops.  This shit is important.

In real life though, nobody wants to hear the ridiculous level of earnestness in my voice as I iron out the decision making process regarding a splurge on the suede toss pillows versus the more affordable twill.  They will probably want to smother me equally with either fabric selection.

Nobody wants to listen to me yammer on, bright-eyed and nearly combustible, about a rolled arm versus a track arm.  Who besides me would possibly give a shit?  Maybe MDH, but frankly I'm asking for his input as little as possible, lest he should voice a real opinion and cause me to not get my way.

In fact, in order to keep him quiet and continue shopping as if I lived alone, I have placated him with the promise of something very special indeed.  A reclining armchair**.  A leather one.  And if a leather reclining armchair is not enough to keep MDH out of my grill, this one is electronic.  Oohhh... magical.  Yes.  There are such things as electronic reclining armchairs designed to appeal to the laziest humans among us.  If you are so lazy that you can't even be bothered to maneuver a lever with your hand in order to lay down in your bedlike chair - this is the chair for YOU.  Bang.  Push a button and the chair will recline and come back up automatically.

*What are you kidding me?  Don't throw that confetti - who's going to clean that shit up?

**Style of said armchair was subject to my final approval.  I'm not having some ugly ass chair in my beautiful new house.

Have I mentioned that we bought a house?

what's up chicken butts? 

This shit is harder than I remember and I think that's pretty obvious based on what I resorted to for an opening sentence for my first post since March.  My apologies.  I haven't written much more than work related emails and drippy Facebook posts for several months.

I'll cut to the chase and dive right into a numbered list of things that are up my chicken butt:

1.  We bought a house. 

It's your standard Texas-style stone and brick, brown suburban house.  Some might call it cookie-cutter, and I might tell them to go fuck themselves because I've been living out of goddamn boxes for the past 3 years and that's a tiring way to live after awhile.

The house is entirely bigger than anything we'd ever need.  We feel a bit silly since it's just the two of us and a cat, but we chose this particular model with my mother in law in mind, because there are 2 master suites on the first floor, so she could come stay with us for extended visits and never have to climb any stairs.  I love my mother in law.

2.  The woman who sold us this house is a leathery piece of shit and I hope that I never have to communicate with her again after we close or as long as I live, whichever comes first.

She looks about 800 years old, smokes electric cigarettes in the model home where her office is, and seems to think nobody will notice the smell.  She has a tall, teased out Ladybird Johnson style hairdo and wears neon colored suits and turquoise jewelry.  These things are all fine.  In fact when I first met her I thought she was a hoot.  Get a load of this old broad!

You go 800 year old lady!  Go ahead and smoke your electric cigs in public.  Go ahead, be leathery and have cotton candy on your head and call it hair.  What do I care? 

Good for you for somehow figuring out how to embalm yourself while still alive by using a combination of Aquanet, nicotine and Hawaiian Tropic spf 8.  Way to go Leatherybird Johnson.

But don't lie to me through your dentures and get my hopes all up about what the builder can and can't do for us, you sack of shit.  And that is all I have to say about that.

3.  I'm still working from home and haven't lost my fucking mind completely. 

Not completely, although it is quite maddening from time to time. 

The longer I do it the more clear it has become that although the policies at my company are very open to work from home situations and remote employees like myself, the policies and technology used by the IT department (which is also my department btw) to support us... is ummm not designed to support us at all. 

My laptop died recently and it took 1 full week for them to figure out what to do about it.  I had to ship it to them.  Bullshit.  Then I had to wait another full week after I shipped it for them to ship it back to me.  Also bullshit.  They wouldn't ship it directly to my home, because the policy says it has to be shipped a corporate recognized branch office.  Bullshit.  Bullshit.  Bullshit.

So I ended up going half the month not being able to accomplish much of anything.  I could work remotely using (a remote system of logging in that rhymes with) Bitfrix from my home computer, but the connections are so slow and sketchy that the best outcome of this story is that I didn't slit my wrists when it took me an over hour and half to send out an email with an attachment. 

I didn't kill myself, but I cried a lot.  Like, a LOT.  As in, it's been several weeks and my face is still a bit blotchy.

It's also a bummer as a remote employee to constantly get sent group invitations to lunch meetings, potlucks and having to respond to meeting invitations by asking for a call-in number.

4.  Did I mention that we bought a house?  We finally bought a fucking house!!!  Motherfuckin' A, man!!  I don't have to feel terrible for hating my upstairs neighbors and their goddamn barking dogs and anvil footed children who seemingly do nothing but run back and forth across my ceiling all night and wake up screaming bloody murder every morning and carry on all day running around and screaming and tossing toys and shit off the balcony.  Oh dear Llyod in heaven how I loathe them.

5.  I'm stressed out because we bought a house.  We're moving again for the 6th time in 11 years.  We still have that horrid house in Michigan that is still under water.  We had a tenant, but had to evict him because he was regularly 4 months behind on the rent.  Now the property management company has told us that no one will lease it out because the kitchen needs remodeled.  So we're in the process of remodeling a kitchen long distance. IT'S ALL TOO MUCH TO TAKE!!!!!

6.  I'm a bit consumed with the new house.

Anyhoo... that's it.  This is all I can manage for now.

I'm out of practice wrapping up blog posts into tidy packages with bows and ribbons like I used to do.  Besides, where the fuck is my scotch tape?  I can't find anything around here so I sure as hell can't find any ribbon.  Get out out of here.  This post is over.

(I love you.)

Ah-ha! That's Who It Is

MDH and I watched that movie Ted recently.  If I'm being polite I'll say it wasn't my cup of tea.  If I'm not being polite I'll say it suh-hucked. 

Sue me.  I don't think Seth McFarlane is all that funny.  And I noticed that they used up quite a lot of dialog mentioning over and over again that Mark Wahlberg's character in the movie is 35.  In fact they never shut up about it.  Perhaps because he has the crows feet and furrowed forehead of a 65 year old meth addict and his acting is... well.. I guess we needed convincing.

Anyhoo... I've been bugged for days, not about the stupid movie, but because that damn talking teddy bear reminds me of someone.  Who the hell could it be?  That voice sounds exactly just like.... and that crass, dismissive manner of speaking about women and Jews and saying fuck in front of everyone ... if I could only.... it's right there....

then the phone rang.  Eureka!

 

=

My brother in law Syracuse!!  (AKA Captain Caveman)

 

 

 

Yes ladies, he's STILL single.

Nobody In Their Right Mind Would Need This - Special "Get Away from Me With That" Edition

My bout of writer's block has lasted long enough that I'm ready to throw in the towel and refer to the salad days of my blogging as a fluke.  Seriously, sometimes I look back at some of my old posts and wonder just who the hell wrote them.

In an attempt to recapture some of that blogging magic I have decided to return to my roots.  Yes.  I decided to revisit the original source of inspiration when I started this blog - the largest compository of stupid unnessary consumer products - the Harriet Carter catalog.  I also decided to check in on my other old favorite - Skymall.

Let's see what's new in the world of wasting your MeeMaw and PeePaws money shall we?

Protein Ketchup


"Protein Ketchup is the first protein-fortified condiment. With 15 grams of protein, zero fat, and two servings of tomatoes in every "dipper-style" one-ounce cup, Protein Ketchup delivers the taste and mouthfeel you expect, with the nutrition you want."

 

 


First of all, shut up and stop saying "mouthfeel" you pervert.  And B, why not just eat something besides french fries and onion rings, eh Fattie?  I shudder to think of what kind of terrifying DNA alteration would happen if you slather this shit on a genetically modified beef patty.  I can say nothing nice about this except, at least it's not mayonnaise.

Hot Dog Slice 'n' Serve

I had to include this.  I mean, what an important invention for the 21st century and beyond.  Oh sure, laugh now, but we are going to need this when the robots take over and ban the use of all butter knives.

Pulse Massager and Pads

Apparently not for people who live alone. I mean how are you going to stick all that stuff on your back all by yourself.  What a useless piece of shit.  What else are you going to do with four little vibrating suction... cups... if you're at home by yourself... wait. Nevermind.  Genius.

Hot Feet Microwave Slippers

 

Because your house doesn't stink enough already?  I don't know about you, but my slippers smell like rotten chili-cheese fritos and are probably the last thing I'd want to put anywhere near a location where food is prepared.
 

Greetings from the Suburban Bayou

MDH likes to take what he calls a "radio nap" on Saturday mornings sometimes.  Basically, he sleeps in and snoozes with NPR going on the clock radio next to his side of the bed.  If you're an NPR fan, then you are familiar with the typical line up.  Car Talk, Only a Game, Weekend Edition, etc..

When we woke up on our first Saturday in our new apartment in Houston, he turned on the radio, but having just unpacked the clock radio and plugging it into the wall, the station that was NPR in Dallas, corresponded with a much different type of station in Houston.  Rather than a soothing stream of sedate and intellectual banter came a boisterous, knee clapping hootenanny.  Yes... NPR station in Dallas = Zydeco station in Houston.

Instead of this:

We got this:

and it was rather awesome.

 

It was our first indication of how different our life might be here, as compared to Dallas, and any other place either one of us has ever lived.  Prior to the Zydeco dance party radio station, we really didn't think that culturally there would be that much difference between Dallas and Houston.  Naive Yankees that we are.

 

So far my least favorite thing about living in Houston is Houston.  It's just damn hard to get around.  The highways don't connect and nothing is marked until you get right up on it, hoping like hell you are in the correct lane to make a snap decision.  It's as if the entire road system was designed by some asshat whose motto was one of these three:

 

1.  Inspirational: 
What doesn't kill the motorists will only make them stronger.

 

2.  Cruel: 
Get lost losers!

 

3.  Apathetic: 
Fuck it all, I'm going to lunch.

 

If you have the misfortune to be in the wrong lane when your turn is coming you are fucked forever.  There is bumper to bumper traffic moving at 80 miles per hour so forget it.  You should just relax, change your plans and go somewhere else.  Call yourself impulsive and keep moving.

 

The longer we live here though, the more we are able to carve a little niche for ourselves and figure out that there are some pretty great things too, as long as we continue to be brave or stupid enough to keep getting back in the car.

 

Here are some great things about living in Houston:

 

1.  Leaving Houston.  This city is located within easy driving distance to New Orleans, Austin, San Antionio and our beloved Dallas.

 

2.  Food.  We are not going hungry here.  We live about 15 minutes from an enormous Chinatown area, albeit weird because it's not the kind you normally expect where there's a brightly colored gate with dragons and pagoda lamps.  The Chinatown in Houston takes up a several mile stretch of beige strip malls, but don't let the blandness of it all fool you.  There are treasures here.  Endless noodle shops, dumpling houses, all day Dim-Sum and of course we are not restricted to just Chinese influence here.  It really ought to be called Asiatown.

 

3.  Trees and water.  Although Dallas is certainly rich with hot and sunny weather, this lady was missing trees and moisture, which Houston has in abundance, in addition to hot and sunny weather.

 

4.  MDH is gainfully employed and comes home happy and fullfilled every night.  This man has been miserable as long as I've known him, professionally that is.  The man has found his calling, his dream job and he's down right adorable when he's not grumpy.  I'm not sure how long this will last, but I'm going to enjoy it while it's happening.

 

5.  That's it for now.  We've only been here a few months.



 

I Grace the Internet With My Presence Once Again

Holy cats.  It's been nearly a year since my last post.  A year!  Nearly an entire year has gone by where I've been either too busy or too uninspired to write anything. 

I have a few notes scattered randomly around on post-its and wadded up napkins in the various boxes of what remains of my home office in Dallas.  What I thought were clever turns of phrase, random thoughts and meaningful insights that I've been collecting over time and jotting down, I have recently discovered are actually wadded up bits of paper and napkin with smeary words scrawled on them that no longer have any meaning.

You'll just have to take my word for it - some shit went down in the last year.  Things happened regardless of whether or not they were documented on my poor old blog.  Some things were shitty and some things were great, but mostly MDH and I just plodded along the same as we always do.

I'm going to throw out some bulleted highlights of major events that passed to hopefully catch you up with life in Ladyland:

1.  Let's begin with this:  I got a job.  Yes.  Someone was wise enough to hire me for realsies.  A full time, permanent job with Large Corporation.  Fin-a-fucking-ly.  My contract was up in a week and my boss had been trying to create a position for me and get it ironed out and approved by the powers that be and it didn't pan out.  Fortunately his boss decided it would be silly to lose me so she gave me a list of open positions and said apply for one of these.  I did and then I was promptly interviewed, vetted and hired by the end of the week.  Full time.  Permanent.  Awesome.

2.  Unfortunately the day before I was offered the job, my poor darling was "let go" from his job.  The job we moved halfway across the country for.  The job that he had been reaching for throughout his career.  Basically he was fired without cause.  They gave him a six month severance and relieved him of his 2 year contract and subsequently the responsibility of having to pay back* a penny of the (enormous amount of) cash they gave us to move to Texas only a mere year earlier.

Frankly,  to me it was the best thing that could've happened.  He'd worked hard his whole life and soared to the eagle's nest on high only to discover it was filled with bird shit and decaying carcasses.  MDH got what he thought was his dream job, but his boss was the biggest, smarmiest asshole imaginable.  His boss, Satan, was the nightmare we all have of intense corporate greed combined with an arrogant ego gone mad.  My proud and brilliant husband was subjected to daily humiliations, and constant blame for the stupid and costly decisions his boss was making. 

I've never seen MDH laid so low.  Eventually the truth will out, as they say, and MDH's habit of saying exactly what is on his mind, combined with his bullshit intolerant nature began creating a stir in his company and causing Satan some discomfort.  Basically, MDH exposed the naked emperor.

3.  He was out of work for 6 months.  Six long, miserable months of doubting himself and thinking of desperate schemes for severe and ill-advised (ie. ridiculous) career changes.  Most of the time MDH is a cynical pessimist, but there is a hopeful spark in him that flared considerably during this time.  A pesky spark I was constantly having to tamp out because it kept coming up with cockamamie ideas like abandoning the experience and value of a 25 year career for opening hot dog carts, buying a bar, selling long term disability insurance or becoming a realtor.  These careers are totally fine and many people are quite successful in them, but MDH is a mega-star in his chosen field.  Also he loves what he does.  He was impatient and thinking like a desperate man.  I had to keep reminding that we were not desperate.  Hold on Babe, just wait, the right thing will come along and of course it did.  More than just the right thing, it was an amazing thing.  Dream job.  Dream company.
4.  Unfortunately the dream job with the dream company is located in Houston.  So we moved.  Again.  We live in Houston now, for what has been exactly one month as of today, and that's all I have to say about that at this time. 

*The relocation policy was pretty standard.  The company pays a butt load of money to move you, so they typically make you sign a contract that says if you leave the company before a certain amount of time has passed you have to pay them back all of the moving expenses they gave you.  It's usually 2 or 3 years.

Exertion or effort directed to produce or accomplish something...

In case you were wondering,  I'm now employed, at yet another Large Corporation.  Almost gainfully.  I started about a week after my last post. 

I'm still considered a contractor, but now I'm in a situation that's called "contract to hire".  How exciting.  What exactly does that mean, you may ask?  I have no bloody idea, I may answer, but I'm keeping my nose clean, my mind open, and my fingers crossed, hoping that I may leverage my, charm and good looks, along with my kick-ass project management skills, into a full time, permanent gig.  We shall see.

Actually, at this point I have finished the planning portion of the project I have been given to manage and am now in full swing project-doing.  The project-doing phase has required me to move down from the shiny, cushy, corporate HQ office tower to a satellite call center, located close enough to my apartment that I can walk to work.  Although my commute is much improved, I'm having trouble adjusting from the professional, corporate culture to which I have become accustomed, to the elementary school level environment of the call center. 

I've been handed a crack team of ladies, or maybe a team of crack ladies, who are actually doing the work-work.  They have all been plucked from the mundane obscurity of the giant call center just for my project, and are considered the cream of the call center crop.  My role involves assigning tasks, doing the analysis as the project moves along, and to my surprise, a large degree of coaching, babysitting and mentoring. 

Basically it's 12 young women, all under the age of 25, and me, stuffed into a room together.  It's noisy, and frequently unprofessional and ridiculous in ways that I never considered possible before last month.  Every day I feel like I'm running a daycare.  I shouldn't have to ask you not to read the newspaper while you're at work, but on the other hand I don't need you to tell me every time you go to the ladies room to pee either. 

I'd like to strike some kind of balance where people use their own common sense to decide what is the right way to behave in a professional setting, but I'm beginning to come unravelled as I discover what has become the new norm among this next generation of working adults. 

There is a young woman (not the newspaper reader) who arrives every morning swaddled in a fleece blanket with Elvis on it.  It might be a snuggie.  Do they make snuggies with Elvis on them?  Whatever you want to call it, she wears it all day, every day.  Why?  Why?  All I can think of is that old adage "dress for the job you want, not the job you have".  What kind of career path does a fleece blankie prepare you for? 

Anyhoo... after a month of working with these young women I have discovered that I'm not only an old farty-fart who is out of touch with popular culture, I'm also a workaholic crank with a sour disposition and little patience for trifflin' bullshit.  Yeah.  It's a revelation.

You see... when I'm at work, call me cuckoo, but I WORK.  As in to work.  I agreed when I took the job that Large Corporation will pay a certain amount of money in exchange for me coming in every day and performing a particular service, so that's pretty much what I do.  I don't paint my nails or read magazines or call my stupid boyfriend or text my 10 best friends or balance my checkbook or shop online for boots.  It's not called lazy-ass-entitled-spoiled-motherfuckering, it's called WORK.

In an effort to bring some kind of order to the madness I've laid down some simple ground rules, in addition to the company policies they are required to follow.

1.  Shut up.

2.  Keep it down.

3.  Quiet please.

4.  Please shut the fuck up.

5.  Do your work.  There is work that needs to be done and a strict timeline in which to do it, so DO IT and button your damn lips.  Unless you have a question, in which case you should ask the question.  Then do your work while shutting up.

Now that I've said all that (this is the part where I get all high and mighty), let me also say to Large Corporations everywhere: When it comes to labor, you get what you pay for. 

When you treat people like shit, they will act shitty.  The young women who were chosen to work with me on this project are bright and capable and I have to remind them of this every goddamn day because they don't seem to ever get any other positive messages from the management of the company.  In addition to the real work that I have to do, I have to take time out of every day to perform like a flippin' cheerleader in order to get them all motivated and acting like they give even the slightest crap about themselves and the work they are doing.

If you give people incentives and spend the money on proper training programs and make them feel important and valuable, then your employees might actually become important and valuable to your organization.
 

Bonus Fact

Fact:  I would rather rake out my own left eye with a pickle fork than see the new Footloose movie.

Miami Facts

Miami does have a certain mystique about him, I'll give him that.  But that's it.  I'm not going to give him anything else.  He's been here as a house guest for eleven days as of this morning and I feel as though I have nothing left to give.  And yet... he's got that certain something...
He's not quite like that guy from the Dos Equis ads, The Most Interesting Man In the World, about whom Miami said, with not just a little disdain in his tone, and I quote, "Didja know dat guy is in actualities a Jew?", even though MDH and I tried several times to explain to him that The Most Interesting Man In the World is fact not a real person, and that perhaps the actor portraying him in the ads may in fact be of Jewish persuasion, but regardless of the actors religion or ethnic origins it is not important because IT'S A FUCKING BEER CAMPAIGN!!

Anyhoo... in order to turn this shit sack of a situation into a bowl of rose petals, I've decided to once again post my observations about my most intriguing brother in law here on my blog (i.e.. free therapy) in the hopes that my pain will become humor. As some of you may already know, all four of my brothers in law are crass and comically misogynistic in their own ways, but Miami wears the crown... or takes off his shirt.  So below are some things randomly observed and experienced during Miami's still happening recent home invasion visit.

Fact:  About 5 minutes after arriving in our home, 11 long, long days ago, he made a cell phone call and it went down something like this:

Miami:  Yeh.  I made it.  I'm here.  I'm calling you to tell you.  You happy now?
Muffled Girly Female Voice: (Gushing from Miami's Phone)  AWWEEE Mwhah Mwah Goo Mwah
Miami:  So dats it.  I'm here.  I'm gonna hang up now and visit with my family.  I'll maybe call you later. (Non committal).
Muffled Girly Female Voice: (Pouty) AWWright.  AWWlove you!
Miami:  Yeh.  Gotta go.  Bye.
Miami:  (To MDH and me) Bagh!  Married chicks, so needy.

Fact:  Miami remembers everyone's birthday and anniversary that he knows and will call them promptly at 6:30am on the big day.  Tuesday was the birthday of my brother in law Las Vegas's ex-wife Geena.

Miami:  Bagh!* I called Geena dis mornin' to wish hers a happy birthday, but she mustnawta been home.
Me:  At 6:30?
Miami:  Yeh, dats when I call everyone.

Fact:  Miami is one of the reasons we don't have a home phone anymore.

Fact:  I went into the guest room, which is also MDH's office and closet, to retrieve a copy of a bill the day after Miami's arrival, while MDH and Miami were out a nearby bar watching the Patriots game, and discovered snapshots of two very different slutty looking women boldly scotch taped to the wall over the desk.  My first reaction was to assume that one of them was Muffled Girly Female Voice, but with Miami one does not assume anything.

Fact:  I have never to this moment asked who these women are, but did ask MDH to please explain to Miami why we don't scotch tape, or otherwise semi-permanently affix anything, including snap shots of strange, slutty women to the walls of other people's homes, no matter how long one intends to stay.

Fact:  One afternoon last week Miami doused himself in baby oil and went down to the pool for about 2 and a half hours using a moth eaten, weather beaten, pilly old blanket instead of one of the plush and generously portioned beach towels I laid out for him to use for the pool.

Fact:  I was not offended that he didn't use our beach towels, but did find his preference odd.

Fact:  Yesterday morning as Miami was passing through the living room he stopped, chugged two Coors Tall Boys within the span of 10 minutes as told me all about the new Ken Burns series on PBS called "Prohibition" and wondered if I'd had a chance to catch any of it while I was visiting my parents in Florida over the weekend.  Apparently it's a great series.

Fact:  It was 8:30 am.

Fact:  Also yesterday morning Miami called me out to the balcony and introduced me to a fifty-ish looking neighborlady that I have sometimes seen walking her adorable little toy terrier around the apartment complex. Jackie has an expensive looking haircut, nails that look professionally done and even though she is usually wearing a velour warm up suit (designer label) or some outfit of a similar nature, she is always fully made up, bedecked in sparkly jewelry and pink flip-flops with a little kitten heel.  Miami had somehow struck up a conversation with her from our 2nd floor balcony during a smoke break and discovered that she's an IT recruiter for a large healthcare company who works from her home and discussed with her in graphic detail, well... me... and the fact that I'm "a real smart cookie" and am looking for a job in healthcare IT.

Fact:  She took her dog back to her apartment and came by again a few minutes later and gave me her card and asked me to email her a copy of my resume.

Fact:  I'd no sooner walked upstairs after she gave me her card and Miami came over and took it from me, mumbling something about how he was going to email her his resume too.  He's an out of work construction foreman and in no way looking for a job in healthcare IT.

Fact:  He'd apparently emailed back and forth with Jackie all day and when I came downstairs at around 3pm I noticed he was gone and he didn't come back until MDH came home from work, well after 5pm.  When he came home MDH asked him where he'd been and he said hanging out over at Jackie's place with a couple of the other neighbors trying to network to find a job. 
MDH:  Wearing that?
Miami:  Yeh.  It was casual.
MDH:  Were other people wearing shirts?
Miami:  I dunno.  I do not pay attention to such trivial details.

Fact:  I scoured the guest room bathroom including the bathtub and shower the day prior to Miami's arrival.  It was spotless.  And white.  Very white.  I haven't cleaned it since because MDH won't let me, and it's driving me crazy because for some reason the bottom of the tub is black.  Serious Black.  Rimmed with gray streaks.  How does this happen when the only person currently bathing in it lays around my guest room all day?

Fact:  I realize that that last sentence is in fact a question and not a fact.

Fact:  Six months ago Miami called MDH and asked him to loan him $8000 because he found a 3 bedroom, 2 bath condo in Coral Gables being advertised in the paper for $8000.  It never occurred to him that it was a misprint or a rip off.  We didn't loan him the money.

Fact:  Two years ago when Miami was also out of work he called MDH and asked him to buy him a plane ticket to Costa Rica because he had found construction work there.  The company would pay for his room and board while he worked, but he had to pay to fly himself there.  MDH bought him the ticket.

Fact:  The day after Miami was supposed to arrive in Costa Rica he called MDH and asked him to wire him some money because he hadn't counted on the airline charging him to bring all his stuff with him (4 Rubbermaid totes filled with all of Miami's worldly possessions, such as coffee brewer, toaster, blankets, pillows, etc..).  He'd missed his original flight over the totes, so MDH rebooked it for him, with a fee and loaned him the money to pay for all of the totes.

Fact:  Miami called MDH 2 days after arriving in Costa Rica upon realizing the whole thing was a scam** and begged MDH to buy him a ticket home.  And all of his totes.

Fact:  Miami seems to really have taken a shine to our cat Turtle.  He clicks and tuts at him and Turtle piles onto his lap without waiting to be invited and proudly allows Miami to pet him behind the ears.  The other night Miami asked MDH if he could brush the cat.  MDH told him no, but could not explain why.

Fact:  I would have let Miami brush the cat, but stayed out of it and didn't press the issue.

Fact:  The day I left for Florida Miami wasted no time making himself more at home in my absence by helping himself to our collection of red wines (only the Italian ones) and whipping up 2 pounds of baked ziti in my kitchen.

Fact:  Two pounds is a buttload of pasta so I fully expected some leftover baked ziti when I returned home, but the only traces of it were a missing ball of prova, a significant dent in my chunk of 18 month aged parm and the cemented bips of carbon and char that won't seem to budge from my good lasagna pan.  Oh yes let's not forget the rust spots on my good knives that were run through the dishwasher.

New Fact:  MDH paid Miami a few hundred bucks to leave today and he is now gone.  He left during the course of my writing this post.  I heard them early this morning in the guest room quietly mumbling out a negotiation so that I wouldn't hear, and then mere seconds after the mumbling stopped Miami came out of the room with a stack of beat up cardboard boxes and blankets (which I can only assume were his belongings) and began trekking them out to his car.

*"Bagh!"  Is the noise that Miami and also MDH's brother Knucklehead often make when starting a conversation or reacting to new information.

**Miami told a tale of being placed into a room with 4 other men who explained to him that they were slave labor and had never been paid because the company charged them exorbitant rent and took it out of their paychecks so none of them had been able to feed themselves and be able to afford a ticket home.  It was like something stolen from a Charles Dickens nightmare.  So basically Miami sold himself into slavery, but is lucky enough to have a brother who is able to bail him out of this constant, ridiculous bullshit.  My hand to God this shit is true, or at least it's true that this is the story that Miami told us.  With Miami you never can be sure.  It's that mystique.

There Will Be Rum

I'm leaving very early tomorrow morning to visit my parents in Florida.  Alone.  MDH will be busy here with work and keeping Miami out of trouble, which as you will read below shouldn't be too difficult as the man doesn't appear to be up to much.

So yes, Miami is still here.  The real mystery is will he be here when I get home next week. 

Although I don't have much to complain about*, it has been a little weird being home all day while he's here all day also.  Except it's like he's not really here, except that he is.  He mostly has been staying in the guest room and I've mostly been doing what I normally do.  I ask him if he wants to join me when I go out to run errands and he usually says no.  I ask him if he wants something to eat when I eat and he says no.  I keep trying to engage him to join us in whatever it is we are doing, but he always says no.

When he first arrived I noticed that he didn't eat anything for breakfast or lunch, but he would have dinner with us if I cooked something, and not only eat everything I put in front of him, but also rave about how great it tasted.  Then he stopped having dinner with us too - so I wondered, is he eating anything??  Then Tuesday afternoon I opened up the microwave to defrost some meat for dinner and, much to my surprise, there was a 12" meatball sub in there.  I have no idea where it came from, when Miami might have left the apartment to go out and get it, or how long it had been lurking in my microwave.  I defrosted the meat and put the sub back where I found it.

So... yeah... there's a tiny, furtive, half naked brown man who has taken over a section of our apartment like a little chainsmoking vole**.  He comes out of his room (Wait.  See what I did there?  I called it his room.  It's not his room.  It's my guest room... anyhoo) and goes immediately to the balcony to smoke, occasionally he'll mumble something that I don't understand, but then he's gone so quickly that I don't have time to ask him to repeat what he said and frankly I don't really give a shit.

*Now instead of washing the paper plates he's apparently just putting the ones he uses back on the stack of unused paper plates.  The other day I grabbed a paper plate off the top of the stack and it was dotted with olive oil and bread crumbs from what appeared to be yet another submarine sandwich.

**MDH apparently told Miami to "stay outta her way", referring to me, while he was here with me and MDH was at work all day.  Miami was apparently also told that he was not allowed to consume any alcoholic beverages while MDH is not at home.***

***Ugh.  It explains a lot and makes me feel queasy and all the more happy to be skee-daddling off to my folks house in Florida for a few days.

Miami Vice Day 3

So far so good.  My brother in law Miami arrived Friday afternoon with very little drama or fanfare.  He has a designated smoking spot on the covered and smaller of our two balconies and an entire guest suite to himself and he seems to be pretty content.  Ten days has been announced as the length of the visit, after which time I'm not sure what is happening.  He will either move on to stay with MDH's other brother Las Vegas or visit his son Phoenix, currently doing time in Arizona.

Over the years I've never really spent more than a few hours with Miami and I talk to him on the phone occasionally, so I honestly don't know the man.  Here is what I am learning:

Miami is very self contained.  He brought his own ashtray, an enormous coffee mug that he fills up with slightly more than half of the 12 cup pots of coffee I have been brewing, and a 32" flat screen HD TV, which he wasted no time in hooking up to the cable outlet in our guest room.  All of this is fine with me, much to my surprise.  It's MDH that is running around apoplectic and constantly apologizing to me for what he perceives to be Miami behaving inappropriately.  Yes, that's a lot of coffee, but we can make more.  It's fine.

Yes, the covered balcony and parts nearby, are currently reeking powerfully of cigarette smoke and ashtray.  Also, the guest room has a strong essence of old-man-who-smokes-a-lot emanating from Miami's clothes, luggage and assorted belongings.  It totally stinks, but the smell will dissipate eventually and all of the linens will be washed.  In bleach.  That's how I roll anyway.  Not a biggie.

Yes, Miami has a propensity for walking around shirtless while wearing tiny shorts and rinsing off paper plates and putting them in the dish drainer, which is weird right?  I probably should have separated that last sentence into two sentences, but I didn't so I'll just clarify that his wearing tiny shorts is unrelated to the washing paper plates thing.  I mean, he doesn't specifically strip down to tiny shorts in order to perform the washing of paper plates.   Anyhoo... we all have strange habits and quirks.  He apparently thinks it's weird that I use paper plates.*

Miami often talks like a character from a 1950's gangster film, which I find quite charming.  He said that Phoenix "wood-na got picked up if some stoolie had-na dropped a dime on 'im".  He called me "dollface" the other day and I nearly swooned.

So it's day three and I'm here to report that there is nothing to report.

*The paper plates are a new thing.  The kitchen in this apartment is so tiny that I only unpacked the bare minimum of dinnerware when we moved in, so we only have 4 place settings.  It's weird to me too, but I sure as hell am not going to wash and reuse paper plates.  Miami washes them and sticks them in the drainer and as soon as he walks away I put them into the recycle bin.**

**OK.  That's a lie.  I put them in the trash.  We don't have recycling here and I haven't figured out yet where to take the recycling.  Or for that matter where the fuck to put it while it's accumulating.  This place is tiny and I barely have enough room for the things I want to keep, let alone the shit I want to throw away.  Sue me.***

***I have become an environmental terrorist and feel really weird and guilty about not recycling.  I used to love recycling in the Tundra.  It made me feel good, but the Tundra made it easy to recycle as it was just part of the city trash collection.  Also we had lots of space for the recycling bins.  Here they collect the trash twice a week, but no recycling.  I'll figure it out eventually, but until then I have recycling shame.