springading.com

Even with a day off in the middle of this week, it’s been a long week. It’ll be even longer because I’ve opted to work overtime tomorrow, but to be honest, not having to cram 10 hours of overtime in 5 days is nice.

And when I’m tired, I just think of this man:

This man needs an ed-u-ma-cay-shun!

My boy toy is in college and needs that degree. But he doesn’t need any lessons giving me the old stink-eye to get me out of bed on a Sunday morning.

(OMG, he’s so cute.)

Other sources of inspiration come clad in fur:

Gremlin helping me try to figure out my digital camera.

Last weekend, I became obsessed with trying to get better with my digital camera. As you can see, Gremlin tried his best to help me.

Gremlin is giving me the FAIL! look.

As you can tell by the above blurry photo…I’m not good with my digital camera. Sorry, Gremster. You’re still the master.

Anyway, last weekend was a pretty good one–but it didn’t come without an impact.

Jim decided I needed to go out for a change. On a whim, he took me to Michael’s in O’Fallon to buy some yarn. I’d wanted to make Gremlin a cat bed for a while because the poor thing has been pitiful since Emmy peed on his and ruined it. And Gremlin, being the little trooper that he is, kept climbing into empty Coke boxes and sleeping in them.

Anyway, Jim knew that seeing Gremlin sleeping like a HOBO in empty Coke boxes broke my heart into a millions pieces (yeah, I have a heart…weird, I know), so he insisted that I buy some yarn. It was a wicked afternoon. By wicked, I mean delightfully wicked, that we were being bad. We were wasting about a half a tank of gas that I hadn’t budgeted for this little trip, we ate at Arby’s, for which I also hadn’t budgeted, and I bought $15 for 2 skeins of blue and brown yarn. Guess what? I didn’t budget for that either.

We came back and between that day and the next, I made this:

Gremlin's new pad.

Okay, so it’s more of a pad with a lip on it than a bed. As it turns out, those 2 skeins of extra bulky yarn were not enough to give it higher sides. Still, I plopped it on the ground, figuring it’ll have to do for now. It’s gotta be better than a Coke box. And guess what? HE LOVES IT.

So do Piper and Emmy, though. Piper’s next on my list. Emmy, since she is the one who PEED IN EVERYONE’S BEDS, can wait. Hmph.

Anyway, actually getting out of the house, driving, and getting something that I wanted for a change–and ask Jim, the last time I actually bought myself something that wasn’t grocery related was sometime in June, and it was yarn for a baby blanket–this was something I really needed.

While I made Gremlin’s so-called bed, Jim carved our pumpkin:

Our first pumpkin together.

Yup, this is our first pumpkin together. We had meant to get one last year, but Jim’s nana died on Halloween–I think it was Halloween, or it might have been the day before–so we never got one. Also, subsequently, because we were so busy with the wake, I never did make Jim that birthday cake I had promised him.

Speed through the week–moves at work, new/old cubicle neighbors, work eval (I’m doing good!)–and we get to yesterday, Jim’s birthday, where I finally realize the impact of our little fun last weekend.

So, yesterday, I had the day off. I took it off just to work on Jim’s birthday cake, buy his present, get ready for his special birthday dinner…all that good stuff. Jim went to school because guess what? They don’t let you out for your birthday, heh.

So I dropped him off, got home, and the first thing I did was checked our bank account.

The amount in the bank wasn’t so horrible. But I had mailed out a couple of bills a few days ago that hadn’t been cashed yet. Figure that amount from what the bank thinks I have.

Bad. Bad. As in I couldn’t even afford Moe’s bad.

Panic. Panic big time. Seriously? How could we have this little after bills? I know we spent a little last weekend, but that can break us?

The answer is yes. It can. I should know better to ever think I can spend $15 on myself. (Or Gremlin.) Good thing I froze my Warcraft account.

I tried to calm down. I knew I was getting paid at midnight, but did I want to risk assuming one of those checked wouldn’t get cashed today?

I checked one of the places that I sent money to. I found an old check, noted the date I had written on it, and saw that it took them about 6 days from that date to cash the check. This last check had only been mailed three days ago. I decided to risk it. But don’t think that it didn’t give me an ulcer.

And if I’m gonna risk it, I’m gonna risk it big. How? I got Jim Batman Arkham City, that’s how. Then I spend $20 on dinner, all while praying that at least one of those checks do not clear within the next 8 hours.

Got everything, came home. Made Jim’s cake. I don’t have round cake pans anymore (another “lost during the divorce shuffle,” I’m guessing), so I have to make do with this rectangle pan whose appearance neither Jim nor I can explain. We both say we didn’t come into the relationship with this pan, and yet…there it is.

So, the recipe says for this 13×9 pan, I need to bake it at least 40 minutes. I happened to check it at 32. “That looks done to me,” I said, confused. I noticed the temperature was above the 350 I had put it at. I took the cake out and checked it with a toothpick. It came out clean.

After a lot of prodding, I finally managed to get the cake out of the pan, but not fully intact. Now, it’s been a while since I’ve made a cake, I’ll grant you, but I’ve never really had problems. I was already annoyed that my cake was breaking apart on me, but when I ate one of those crumbs, I was even more annoyed. It was pretty dry.

I threw it away, picked Jim up, went to watch him play Warhammer at Castle Perilous, read A Dance with Dragons.

Came back home. Tried second batch. Meanwhile, Jim tries the frosting that’s already been made and concurs with my assessment: The frosting is damn good.

The second batch was bad all because I was completely stupid. “3 1/2 teaspoons of baking soda,” I read aloud–as I grabbed the salt. You know how that went.

By now, I’m tired, my feet hurt, and I am furious. I have a breakdown. Jim calms me down. I stand up, ready to try again.

Mix everything up. Wait for oven to preheat to 350.

Wait. It’s at 370. Move the knob down a notch. Check 10 minutes later. It’s at 325.

“Oh,” I groaned. “I forgot…” Our oven doesn’t do 350. It will go above or below, but it will not cook at 350. I put the cake in, already disheartened. I’m hovering over the stove. After it cooks 20 minutes, I’m checking it every five. The minute the toothpick comes out clean, I’m on that thing, pulling it out of the oven.

This time, I had cooked it in a glass pan. I didn’t like how flat the other one had made it. We flipped it over, and we immediately noticed 2 things. 1) This cake didn’t want to slip out easily either, and 2) One side was burnt, while the other was barely browned.

“DAMN IT,” I said. “I completely forgot that our oven doesn’t cook evenly.”

Yes, folks, I did know this. When I cooked bread a couple months ago, I commented to Jim that I didn’t think our oven cooked evenly because one loaf was drier than the other. Want proof that your oven is doing such a thing? Cook a rectangular cake.

So I knew this about our oven…and forgot. I wish I hadn’t forgotten. Maybe I would have thought to ask Jim’s mom to borrow her oven. This should tell you how very little baking we do.

Jim asks that I frost the cake anyway so we can try it. I do. We each had a piece. Jim insisted it wasn’t so bad, but I thought it was awful. My piece was burnt and had this terrible texture. I’ve never cooked anything so terrible in my life. I actually felt humiliated.

“At last you tried,” Jim said, trying to be helpful.

“But I’ve never actually tried and failed,” I complained. “Not with anything I actually cared about. I’ve never failed at baking!”

Jim tried to console me, telling me that it wasn’t my fault. I can’t fight an oven that doesn’t cook evenly. It doesn’t stop me from feeling like a complete failure, though. And what’s worse? Because I made three batches of cake batter, I used most of the milk, so we didn’t have enough milk to make the soup I had planned on making Jim for dinner. We ended up ordering pizza instead, on the credit card that had a little bit of money left on it.

So yeah, I’m pretty sure I ruined Jim’s birthday. But at least he can take solace in Batman, I guess.

So, here are the lessons for the week:

1. Budget for entertainment because if all you do is work, you WILL need something just for you. Even if it’s only for yarn, lunch, and gas.

2. Do your best not to live in crappy apartments with crappy appliances. But if you must, try not to go too crazy on the yarn so you can move ASAP. Preferably in a place with an oven where you can actually cook something at 350 .

3. Husbands are great pumpkin-gutters, but cats are terrible photography instructors.

They’re also bad about reminding you to go to bed because you have work in the morning. Gah! Good night. Here’s hoping this Friday will lead to another awesome weekend–but easier on the wallet.

This week was a good week. Another niece had a baby. Went to Jim’s family reunion. We were the most recently married, so we won a peppermill with different kinds of pepper to be used in it. Awesome! I’ve always wanted a peppermill. Went to Jim’s mom’s to see his aunt and cousin. Got belated birthday giftcards, one to Chili’s and the other to Houlihan’s.

Jim and I have already planned on using one of those this weekend. Oh my god, I’ve missed eating out.

A really wonderful thing that we got was from Jim’s aunt. It was a belated wedding present–a check. A check, might I add, that covered the rest of Jim’s school books (we couldn’t afford to get them all) and will pay for his calculator for his math class, too. HUGE WEIGHT off our shoulders, let me tell you. Now the extra money I’ve been making from overtime will be shoved over into savings to save up for new tires instead.

Jim and I have been noticeably less stressed since we got that. Someone is getting a thank you card.

What else? I’ve been cooking a lot. Cookies, pancakes, bread, and brownies–all from scratch, no boxes here! Cheaper to make it yourself. Besides, I miss cooking. Know what I miss even more? A big kitchen to cook in. But at least I have an appreciative husband to eat all this stuff.

Oh, yeah, something I’ve failed to mention: Jim is off the Chantix–he’s been a non-smoker for over two months–but he is now eating a ton. It may sound odd, but it makes me happy. I always hated that I could actually outeat him. Now I can’t keep up.

That’s not the only appetite of his that’s gone up. BOW-BOW-CHIKA-CHIKA-BOW-BOW. (That’s supposed to be porn music, not a weird puppy chow jingle or something.) Needless to say, we’ve been a very happy couple lately.

And you know what was a really nice way to end a really nice week? This link, posted by my friend Paul on his Tumblr. He has to know that I’m going to totally repost an article called “10 Badass Women from Fantasy Literature,” ESPECIALLY when, right at the top, it features one of my favorites from Game of Thrones, Arya Stark.

One could argue that Arya is a little girl, not a woman. I’d like to see how well you argue with Needle up your nose.

Anyway, this reminded me that I had been thinking about writing my own list of my favorite women in sci-fi/fantasy for a while now. (Hm, that seems like a very Paul-like thing to do. Maybe he’s a bad influence on me!) I’ve never written it, though, because it would be hard to do a top 10 or anything like that. I mean, I could come up with ten favorites just from Babylon 5 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer alone.

Still…someday.

But not tonight. Tonight is for sleeping. Tomorrow is for overtime.

This week may have been good, but I didn’t say it was done.

You missed my birthday. It’s okay, you’re forgiven. I had a nice day with Jim–he decided to take the day off–and we hiked around Garden of the Gods. I use the word “hike” loosely, as we got through it in only 15 minutes, leaving me convinced that we missed part of the trail. Oh, well.

Mostly, I’m here because it’s Friday and Jim’s out. Yup, we’re back to Friday night games, which means Friday night posts will probably be more common. Not like I have much to say. I’m still mostly working and doing very little else. The only thing that’s been up that I haven’t mentioned on here is that something is…wrong. Healthwise, I mean. I think. I don’t know.

It started a few weeks ago. I seriously thought I was having a heart attack. I haven’t been in that much pain in a long time. Then it subsided, but some of the symptoms persist.

Yeah, I’ll probably be heading to the doctor soon. I don’t think it’s a heart attack, but I’ve been having difficulties breathing and my arm has been feeling weird for quite a while, which, incidentally, has been annoying me because it’s making it much more difficult to knit. I can’t seem to get my left hand to work like usual. Kinda sucks, since I’m left-handed.

Anyway, in other news, we have a new baby in the family. Alas, she was a little too early for my birthday, so she made it on my dad’s instead. Here’s a picture that I’ve managed to snag:

Lily Marie, my great-niece.

Let’s end this post on a good note, shall we?

My bestest friend in the whole world and soon-to-be husband was born today.  So it’s a damn good day.

I’ve been having a lot of dreams lately.  I don’t know what’s going on with my brain, but it’s like something unlocked, and it’s going to town on the dreamfront.  Last night, I had a dream that Jim and I had a large, ranch-style house with many doors.  We were sitting at the table, figuring out expenses for our wedding.  In the dream, the size of the wedding had grown, and so had the price, especially since we planned on paying for everyone’s hotel rooms. 

Thank god we don’t plan on any of this–you know, many people or motels or anything like that.

Anyway, Jim left through the door to get something.  I followed him, setting a big box of soda down as I did.  Don’t ask me where the soda came from.  So we went outside, went through another door to another section of the house, went back outside, and then started back through the original door that lead to the dining room.  Unfortunately, I had very stupidly left the soda box right in the doorway, and Jim tripped over it.  And he hurt himself–bad.  He started screaming.

The weird thing?  I woke up at this part, and I could still hear him screaming.  But there he was next to me, in real life, sleeping peacefully.

Jim thinks the audio thing is kind of weird–you know, how I could actually hear it while I was awake.  Is this uncommon?  I didn’t think it was. 

Anyway, as usual, I’m about to head out to work.  At least it’s Friday.  I’m even more anxious than usual to get home tonight because Jim claims that he’s got a surprise for me, that it’s got to be tonight (maybe that’s why he insisted on cancelling game?), and–interestingly enough–it’s not related to my birthday.

Gotta say:  I’m curious.

I keep going rounds with this post.  What to tell, what not to tell, and of the things I’d mention, how brief or expanded that thing should be.  And then I decided I was feeling too sick and tired and going to bed, until a really loud cicada did its thing right outside my door and threw all short-term sleeping plans out the door.

So.  Here.  Now.  Listening to a meditation CD with no intentions of actually meditating, sitting here with a sour stomach, dreading work the next day and realizing that this crappy feeling is why people do drugs.  I think.

Two weeks without Internet (that’s to a power-spike inducing storm) means a lot has happened.  For one, Jim’s moved in all his stuff.  We’re “official.”  We have most furniture we need except for a sofa, and I think we’re about to score one of those.  We’re both excited about that.

What else?  Oh.  A girl from Jim’s past (read: one-night stand) decided to apply at his workplace and, surprisingly, got the job there.  Neither Jim nor I are pleased; Jim’s made his boss promise that he would never get stuck working with her.  (No, Jim doesn’t dislike all girls in his past, just like I don’t hate all the guys in mine, but this one, if I recall right, was the one he described as “stupid and just really mean,” so I’m thinking she’s probably not good co-worker material either.)  At any rate, Jim’s looking for a new job and we’re both talking more seriously about relocating.  The problem?  The economy!  Thanks, Economy, you suck and are making our lives way harder.

What else has happened?  Oh, yeah.  Yours truly had a birthday.  It was honestly the best birthday I remember having.  For one, I actually got a cake.  Last year was actually the first time I got a cake from someone else since I was a teenager, and that was from my sister.  My ex-husband never bothered; I always made or bought my own.  I didn’t even realize how many people would be appalled by that later on when I was single.  I was used to it. 

But I digress.  This birthday…well, orginally, Jim was supposed to have the entire day off, as he asked for it off.  As it turns out, though, Jim’s long time friend’s girlfriend had just broken up with him (oh, that was the other big drama of the last two weeks, really nasty stuff, but that’s not my story to tell–he’s better off, though, if you ask me) and asked Jim to take half of the shift while the guy’s roommate covered the other half.  So Jim worked in the morning, picked up a cake, then walked into our place with lit candles and singing happy birthday.  Later that day, he took me to the state fair (I had never been to one before) and took me on the ferris wheel because he knew I had been itching to go on one for the last few years.  We kissed at the top, so that was romantic.

That’s another new thing–I’ve never been with a romantic guy before.  I used to not like the idea, but I gotta say, it does have its moments.

Jim won me a cheap, entirely overpriced bear which we turned over to a little girl who had been eyeing it.  (Really, what does a 33 year old woman need with a stuffed panda anyway?)  We also rode some ride called the Pirate Ship or something and he had roasted corn.  He gave me some books for my birthday and took me out to dinner.  It was great.  But the best present came late.

A few days before my birthday, Jim had told me that he had ordered an Amy Tan book at Barnes ‘n’ Noble.  Last week, we finally went to pick it up.  I knew something was up when Jim and I went to the cashier, then he handed me a five and asked if I’d leave and get him a soda.  I just figured he didn’t want me to know the price or something.  Some people are weird about those things.  But I went off, came back, handed him his soda, and we went back to the car. 

“I have bad news,” Jim said.  “They gave me the wrong book.”  He handed me the bag.  He was surprisingly calm about the whole thing.

“Okay,” I said.  I opened the bag and pulled out the book to see what I got instead.  And then I flipped out because Jim, the sneaky man, had never ordered an Amy Tan book, nor did he intend to.  Instead, he had ordered Witches of Karres, one of my favorite books left behind with my ex-husband–and one, from my understanding, that isn’t exactly easy to find.  Or last I had heard, anyway.  So I was excited.

“I had to do a lot of work for that book,” he told me later.  He told me the story: He knows a woman who works at Barnes ‘n’ Noble and called in a favor from her.  The challenge?  He couldn’t remember the title of the book except that the first couple words where “witches of” and he had no idea who the author was.  He and the woman went through every book they could find that started with “witches of”–something she claimed she wouldn’t normally do for customers but would for him because they “went way back.”

For once, the fact that Jim knows everyone around here came in useful.

That gift, by the way, got the biggest reaction out of me than any other gift.  My parents would be jealous, as they’d tried to get big reactions out of me all while I was growing up.  I’m not normally a big “reactor.”  You could give me a million dollars, and I’d say simply, “thanks,” put it aside, and change the subject.

Speaking of changing subjects, the bugs have shut up.  I know I’m ending this abruptly, but meh.  I’m tired.  I’m going to bed.

Oh, but an important note: After nearly 3 years after splitting up with my ex, I finally saw the first check from him towards the $6,200 he owes me.  I think when the judge told my ex he didn’t want to see him in there again, that paying back me wasn’t an option but an order, my ex realized it was time to throw in the towel.  Now, why he decided to swing by my apartment in person to deliver it is beyond me–my co-workers think he wants to “get some” (ew)–but you know what?  As long as I get my money back, even in small chunks, I don’t care.  I’m just glad to have one less thing to worry about.  God knows I have enough.