Category: Life

Life

24-Hour Job

Karen

I’m taking a hint from the gals at The Secret is in the Sauce and getting back to blogging basics. I’ll be periodically posting blog articles from year’s past in the next few weeks.

Here is my very first blog post from my Blogger.com blog. It’s dated January 23, 2005. I’ll follow the article with a few updated comments.

Hello!

This is me. 🙂


(updated picture)

Whew. It’s been a long day and I can’t believe it’s over. Every single minute of my day was taken today. You know what’s really tough? Being self-employed. Now that the laundry has been done, folded and put away, the floors have been mopped, my family has been fed and the kids have been put to sleep, it’s now time for me to go to “work.” My client runs spots to help make people aware of all the kids in the state of Missouri that need good homes. It’s a worthy cause and I’m proud to be a part of it. Anyhoo, they gave me a tape with 13 spots on it that I have to convert from a VHS tape to a Windows Media file. No easy task, let me tell ya. Not to mention, it’s time consuming.

I also received a newsletter from the middle school who’s website I maintain and I have to update various parts of the site with that information. Another time consuming task. However, it’s my “job.”

Being self-employed is not all it’s cracked up to be. Yes, I feel very fortunate that we’re in a situation that I’m able to do that, however, working from home has drawbacks as well – you NEVER get away from your job. Imagine that for a minute.

It’s been a long day. Your boss has been breathing down your neck about a project that needs to be completed yesterday. There are grants to write, there are reports to finish, papers to file – the day speeds by. Ahh…time to go home. Grab a quick bite to eat on the way home, kick your feet up and watch TV. Zone time. We all love a little zone time.

But what happens when you’re self-employed? Here’s my day:

Get up at 5;15 a.m. and work out.
Get home in time to take my oldest son to school. (Yes, I’m still sweaty and nasty)
Come home, jump into the shower.
Just finish drying my hair and it’s time to take my youngest to school. (yes, I look really bad. Imagine frizzy bed hair and you have a good picture)
Come home, finish getting ready.
Catch up on emails. (This usually takes WAY longer than it should. I currently maintain four websites and am in the middle of building three).
IF I catch up on emails and website maintenance, I grab my laptop and head to the library to get some writing done. (Yes, it’s true. I ACTUALLY DO write).

But alas, it’s lunchtime and I’m starving because I forgot to eat breakfast – again. So, I hurriedly pack up my laptop (only 1000 words today? I’ll do better tomorrow) come home, heat some soup, catch up on emails (yes, there are generally half a dozen waiting for me by that time).

It’s now 1:00 and I have to leave in an hour and 15 minutes to pick up my middle schooler.

The beds haven’t been made, the bathrooms are still a mess, and the kitchen has been hit by a tornado. I have just enough time to straighten up the house before I pick up son number one.

I get to the school at 2:15 p.m. I get there early because it’s one of those six one way, half a dozen the other way situations. If I don’t get there early, then I end up parking on the street as opposed to actually making it into the driveway of the school. This way, getting there early, I get a good “spot” and Dude can find me fast. What do I do for the 30 minutes I’m waiting? I’m usually brainstorming about my writing or I take a break and read. (Every writer MUST read. Am I right, writers?)

Dude gets out. I drop him off at home so he can have 30 minutes of solitude and get his homework done. I immediately head over to my youngest son’s school. He gets out at 3:25 p.m. It’s now 3:00 p.m. Again, I catch up on work or read – depending on what sort of deadline I have coming up. Getting to my youngest son’s school early is not an option, it’s a MUST. I have NEVER seen traffic so jam-packed in all my life. It’s a true bottle neck. Couple that with the fact that people are generally inconsiderate and impatient and you have a recipe for disaster. Every parking space is taken, the field across the street (with the “NO PARKING” sign, how ironic is that), is jam-packed with cars. The car line is literally backed up into the street (it got so bad the city finally budgeted a two lane road in front of the school because traffic would be backed up for a mile). If I don’t get there early, I won’t actually get to pick Jazz up until 3:45 p.m. Yes, it’s that bad. It’s crazy, the chances people take with their children. You wouldn’t believe the number of adults half-dragging their kids across the parking lot, weaving in and out of moving cars just to save a few precious moments. It absolutely boggles my mind.

We get home and the homework questions begin. The schools assign so much homework it’s like I’m homeschooling them. This usually lasts until dinner (most times past dinner).

We have to eat.

I fix dinner. The hubby gets home. He’s tired and wants to talk about his day. He needs and deserves my attention. We always sit around the dinner table and have dinner together. We rarely eat in front of the TV. After dinner, the kids finish up their homework, hubby cleans up (it’s a deal we have – whoever cooks, the other one cleans up). The boys usually have math homework which is a taboo subject for me. I’m absolutely stupid in math. No, really. I’ll be honest. Numbers and I…well, we just don’t mix. Funny, I use to be a bank teller, (and damn good at it), go figure. (Was that a pun?)

While Kev is working with the boys, I’m usually wrapping things up on the computer and finally, shutting the thing down. (By this time, I’m so sick of looking at the thing I’m seriously thinking about throwing it out the window.

Kids go to bed, and me and Kev spend some time together. By this time it’s 8:30 p.m. and I can barely keep my eyes open. I cautiously plan for tomorrow – I’m going to write 2000 words tomorrow! *snort* Yeah right.

The weekends are slower, but only just. There are chores to do, grocery shopping and of course the neighbor kids HAVE to come over and play. Again, today was completely busy because I had to “work.” When you’re a wife, a mother, and you’re self-employed, the work never stops.

So let’s see – a 9 to 5 job, or a 24-hour job. Which is better?

For me? The 24-hour job. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

****************

And here we are, in 2010 and I’m still doing the same thing. Granted, I have several more schools and several new responsibilities, but I’m doing it and I love it.

And working from home? Really isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. For one, it’s sometimes really hard to get motivated to get any work done. There are so many things around the house that I would rather be doing, errands I need to run, naps to power through (kidding, well, sort of), it’s really hard for someone like me who lacks discipline even under ideal conditions.

However, things are about to change around here. I’m taking a class and moving forward. Though I have no intentions of giving up the webmaster gig, I have it down to a science and it’s really only part-time now, I’m ready to take my life in a different direction, to begin a new chapter in my life.

The days of working from home are definitely numbered.

Day-By-Day, Life

On the Hunt, Upcoming Photography Session

Karen


(photo credit)

I went shopping today.

All.

Day.

Long.

If you don’t know? I’m not the biggest fan of shopping. In fact, it’s pretty safe to say, I loathe it.

But here’s the thing, we’re hosting Kevin’s family for Thanksgiving dinner this year (we switch off with his two sisters, so this means we host dinner every third year), it’s our turn, and we use these dinners as an excuse to spruce up the house a little bit.

We did the kitchen back in March, now, it’s time to turn our focus on the living room and dining room.

After we finished our weekly grocery shopping torture errand, Kevin and I went to look go look at “our” sofa and love seat. We’ve been looking at this one set for a few weeks now and we keep coming back to it.

And the cherry on the milk shake? The set was on sale. In fact, if we paid cash, they would knock an extra 20% off the price.

*ZOINKS!*

But still, we hesitated. We hadn’t checked out one last furniture store and Kevin, being Kevin, would never let me live it down if we bought this set and then we saw something else we might have liked better. (And yes, we would known about it because even though we buy something, Kevin still looks for that object long after the transaction has gone through. It drives me nuts! And then, God forbid the thing goes on sale – I never hear the end of it!!).

So, we went and looked. And Kevin actually saw a few sets that he really liked. But none of them were recliners, and the set we’ve had our eye on is not only a recliner in the sofa, but in the love seat, too. Which is a huge plus. (I didn’t tell him this, but I personally didn’t like what he picked out and they were so not comfortable, but when we’re out looking, I’ve learned just to keep my mouth shut and let the man look. He ultimately comes around to my way of thinking sooner or later. HA!)

It was time to pick the boys up from school by the time we finished looking at these sloppy seconds (*ahem*) and we took the opportunity to weigh the pros and cons of all of the sofas we looked at at this point.

By the time the boys walked up to my car, we had decided to go ahead and buy the set we liked and take advantage of the sale price. (The sale ended at midnight tonight).

We dropped the boys off, went to the store and bought our set. Kevin feels pretty good about it (the price was still a little high, but I’m El Cheapo and really, anything over ten bucks is too expensive in my book) and it will take about one or two weeks before they come in.

Which works out perfectly, because we need time to get our floor installed.

We headed to Micheal’s next. (Micheal’s is a craft store). I’ve been toying with the idea of painting our front bathroom and doing sort of a sunflower theme in there. (Hence, the sunflower picture you see above). I have no idea where the sunflower idea came from, but that’s what I’m shooting for now. We bought four really big sunflowers for our over-sized vase (and they were 40% off – SCORE!). I’m even thinking about buying a few prints off istockphoto.com and getting them framed, but Kevin thinks this might actually end up costing us more than simply buying ready-made art. I’m not so sure – I have a few ideas up my sleeve on how we could possibly make it affordable, but again, we’ll see.

After Micheal’s, we went to Kirkland’s to try and find a funky mirror to put over the new table in the foyer.

No luck. We saw several interesting pieces, but nothing that was our style (whatever the heck that might be – I KNOW our style, I just can’t put a name to it). We did see one really thought-provoking piece though. In fact, Kevin spotted it and sort of talked me into being interested. I might talk more about this piece in a few days, it all depends on whether we buy it or not. I think we’re leaning toward buying it right now and if we do, we will be taking about two giant steps out of our comfort zone – it’s that out there. But we both like it, in a “let’s do something surprising” sort of way, so we’ll see how we feel about this piece after a few nights of sleeping on it. (I was actually going to link to this piece through Kirkland’s website, but I couldn’t find it so – BOO!)

Next? We went to Lowe’s to try and find a paint color for our living room. Unbeknownst to my sister-in-law, the color she picked out for our walls almost perfectly matches our sofa and love seat and I can’t quite visualize how that might look – khaki walls, khaki furniture, won’t that look just a little TOO perfect? But my sister-in-law is assuring me it’ll look fabulous (matte walls against glossy furniture) so AGAIN, we’ll see. I think Kevin and I are going to try the color and just see where it takes us. It’s a bit darker than we’re used to, but I trust my sister-in-law’s taste, so we’ll …

Well. You get the idea.

(Side note: I did find a mirror that might work over that foyer table, though).

Ugh. My brain is spinning from all of the home decor ideas swirling around. It’s like one big echo in there (because we all know my brain doesn’t take up too much space). I think if we can get this thing to come together, it’s going to look awesome. I hope.

******

I finally made an appointment to get Dude’s senior pictures taken today. We only have until October 15th to turn in his senior portrait in order to make the yearbook deadline so we really need to get this taken care of.

Dude has flat out refused to do the whole 50 poses-changing clothes thing, so we’re just going to get some head shots. I’m disappointed, but not surprised. Dude is my low-key sort of son. He likes to keep things simple and unassuming.

His appointment is this coming Tuesday at 4:30. (I was surprised that they were able to get me in so soon). We’re going through About Faces Photography (love that name) and though I’m looking forward to getting some really good pictures of Dude, I’m not looking forward to the process. The package we’re paying for only has between 5 to 10 poses, so I’m sure it won’t take that long to get through, I just don’t know how comfortable (or terrified/annoyed) Dude is going to be.

The gal told us that we will pick the photos we want right after the session. They are familiar with the school’s portrait requirements for the yearbook, so we won’t have to worry about that part. All we’ll have to do is pick out the best one and preen like proud parents. I’m sure we’ll buy extras.

So that’s something else I need to do this weekend – take Dude out to buy him a new shirt. Preferably something a little nicer than a plain t-shirt, which is his style of choice.

Dude also had a senior meeting this past week at school. I’ve yet to figure out what that was all about, so we’ll likely sit down and talk about that, too.

******

Kevin is playing at a private birthday party tomorrow night, so I will be taking that time to get some work caught up. I have a feeling I’m not going to have a lot of time to get any work done this next week, what with us moving furniture and getting ready for the floor guy.

******

We also need to hem Jazz’s band pants. Though he doesn’t have any idea when he’ll be required to wear his uniform for the first time, experience tells me it’ll probably be the next football game, which is this coming Friday.

******

Two of my four textbooks have shipped. Yippee! I hope the other two get here in a timely manner. I”m really looking forward to starting this class.

******

I caught Kevin looking at help wanted ads today. I talked him off the edge. I really think he should be the stay-at-home dad for a while and let me bring home the bacon.

Don’t laugh. It’s gonna happen. 🙂

******

I’ve been drinking the Reliv. Actually, it’s one scoop of Reliv and one scoop of some sort of protein powder that Kevin drinks. I have to say, I do feel like I have more energy.

But it’s early yet. Let’s see how it performs, long term.

Life

My Family Sticks Me in a Corner

Karen

I saw this over at Laurin Evans’ blog and thought I’d share my writing/working space, too.

My desk, my electronic life, is actually stuffed into a corner of the family room.

I didn’t bother cleaning my desk for this post – I just grabbed my camera, scooted my chair back and *click*, there you go.

Starting from the left side of the photo:

That is an information about the day of my birth plaque. My sister gave it to me for my 40th birthday. It has all sorts of interesting tidbits about little-known facts about the day I was born. For example:

  • 190,000 American soldiers are in Vietnam, Anti-war protests start.
  • Enormous power failure causes 9-hour blackout in eastern Canada and U.S., leading to surge in national birthrates nine months later.
  • Black leader Malcolm X is killed at Harlem rally. Riots occur for six days in Watts section of Los Angeles.
  • Winston Churchill dies.
  • The Gateway Arch in St. Louis is completed.
  • Sony introduces the Betamax, a home video tape recorder. Nearly all of NBC’s programs are in color.
  • Bell bottom pants and long-haired boys are the fashion.
  • Medicare passes.
  • “The Sound of Music,” “A Thousand Clowns” and “Dr. Zhivago” debut.
  • “Wild, Wild West”, “Hogan’s Heroes”, “Green Acres”, “I Dream of Jeannie” and “Batman” are the hot TV shows.

Interesting stuff, right? (Okay, interesting to ME).

That’s the stereo I use to play the music from my iTouch on. (And the music I then tweet from the blip.fm website). I also listen to talk radio there, too. (*gasp* Say it ain’t so!!)

All of the papers you see stuck in the CD slots? I have no idea what those are. I just keep them there to fool my husband into thinking I’m actually working on something. (Okay not really. Though it’s true I have no idea what 3/4 of them are).

The clutter on my desk? Pretty normal. I have at least one, or two squares of paper towels on my desk because I almost always have something to eat at my desk (can you see the Nutter Butters? And you thought I tweeted that to be funny. Reader, when will you learn to take me seriously?).

There’s also a JCPenney catalog, a pretty purple journal that I just can’t bring myself to write in cause it’s so pretty, a brochure to a portrait place that I want to take Dude to to get his senior pictures taken (NO, I still haven’t made that appointment – I SUCK!), an appointment card for Jazz’s next dentist appointment, and the days I ripped off my Baby Blues calendar that I keep for scrap paper and to use as bookmarks because I’m notorious for losing bookmarks and that gets expensive over time.

The picture to the right is my diploma from the college I graduated from in ’03. (Why yes, I am proud of that expensive piece of paper, thanks).

So, as you can see, I have nothing to look at, which doesn’t stop me from being distracted, I can assure you.

But if you look to your right, you’ll see this:

This is our back door. Dude is sitting in Kevin’s office, playing XBox. So, I can get a glimpse of the outside world on occasion. That chair? Is where Kevin sits to read. In fact, he’s reading right now. And he’s reading this, in case you were interested. Oh yes, yes he is.

When you look to your left, you see this:

I don’t look to my left very much. You can see why, right?

I am a huge multi-tasking procrastinator. Let me explain. I will have no less than about five windows open at one time. I continually toggle between Facebook, Twitter, my blog, the weather, Flickr (if I’m posting pictures), Google Reader and Google – because I’m constantly Googling something that I’m curious about or I need information for.

I also have my Dreamweaver program open at all times (I maintain websites for the schools), PhotoShop Elements (because I’m constantly editing photos or making graphics for said websites), and of course, my Outlook that is scheduled to check for mail every 20 minutes, but I get impatient, or caught up, and I routinely run it to see if I gotten any new mail.

In between reading these sites, posting on Twitter, updating websites, or answering emails, I blog. Or I’m reading other blogs. And often times, I’m doing them all at the same time. Because I find that I think better when I’m not thinking. For instance, when I’m trying to think of something to write, I’ll work, or do something else while I stew on what to write, and often times, something will come to me while I’m doing something else.

I’ve always been that way – I like to have several things going on at the same time because I tend to force myself to focus more. It’s when I have nothing to do, or am bored, that I get absolutely nothing done. And when I say nothing, I mean, I’ve showered. That’s the extent of my accomplishments on those days.

The busier I am, the more productive I am. Does anyone else have this problem?

Often times, Kevin is sitting in that chair, reading, and I’m at my computer trying to write something, or thinking about writing something while Tweeting, or checking Facebook, or reading a blog post, or watching a video and Kevin is like a back seat driver, only he’s looking over my shoulder and asking me, every few seconds, “what’s that,” or “who’s that,” or “what are you tweeting,” or “who’s on Facebook” or, “who just emailed you, ” or …. AARGH!

I can’t work like that. So. When he’s reading, like now, I go to plan B.

My laptop. On the dining room table.

Which I’m writing this blog post on right now.

I CAN NOT focus, or work, when someone is in the same room as I am. I have to be alone with my thoughts. It must be quiet. I can listen to music as I work on websites, but whenever I write something, whether that’s a blog post, a story, or even an email, it must be absolutely silent or I snap and snarl like a rapid dog.

I’m normally such a pleasant person to be around, unless I’m trying to write or working on new designs.

Then? Not so much.

Maybe THAT’S why my family sticks me in the corner.

Ah. It all makes so much sense now.

Day-By-Day

Tired, Class, Floor

Karen


(photo credit)

I am tired.

No. Tired doesn’t even cut it, I am fatigued. Actually, I’ve crossed the fatigued threshold, I am exhausted.

And here’s the kicker – I haven’t even DONE anything! I mean, other than living life, taking care of my family, working (and how taxing can that be, I work on the computer!), cleaning, baking, and doing the normal weekly errands, I honestly haven’t done anything.

And before you read that and go, “but Karen, that’s a lot!” It’s truly not. It’s not any more than any of you guys do on a daily basis and yet, I am so tired I can’t even keep my eyes open.

I’ve dealt with fatigue my entire life. I was able to combat it for so many years because I worked jobs that kept me physically active. If I’m constantly moving, then I don’t have the time to get tired.

And when I got home, I slept like the dead.

But now, now that I sit in front of the computer all day long, and I’m not physically active, it (whatever “it” is), catches up to me and I honestly can’t think, I can’t move, I can’t keep my eyes open.

I’m not depressed. At least, I don’t think I am. I’m not bored (most of the time). I’m not stressed (okay, maybe I’m a little stressed – this not having steady income coming in every month is sort of taxing, but we’re okay, financially, if we continue to play our cards right), I think my fatigue stems from something physical – I’ve always battled anemia and when I remember to take my iron, I usually snap out of my fatigue.

The problem is, I’ve been taking my iron and I’m STILL dead tired.

One problem is because I haven’t been exercising. But I’ve been too tired to exercise. Which is a stupid excuse because you actually have more energy when you exercise, but it’s the getting started part that’s hard. Once you get get going, it’s not that bad and I end up feeling great! And I sleep good.

Which is another reason I’m so tired all the time; I’m not sleeping. I toss and turn and jerk myself awake three or four times a night to check the time. I don’t want to oversleep. Even though the boys have their own alarms, and they use them, I need to get up because, well, how is it fair that they have to get up early every morning and I sleep in? If I’m up, it’s easier for them to get up. Not to mention, I need to get up. It’s morning, it’s time to get the day started.

So, I know I’m not getting quality REM sleep, which only exasperates the problem.

I’m so tired of feeling tired all the time. Something must change.

Beginning this evening, no matter how tired I am, I am going to get on that treadmill and walk/jog my three miles. I might even do 20 minutes of Turbo Jam.

I’ve gained weight. Which does not help the tired factor. But even at my skinniest, I’m still tired.

I’m tired of being tired. Oh. I already said that. See? I’m so tired, I’m repeating myself.

I’m breaking down. I’m going to try the stuff my in-laws sell. It’s called Reliv and they SWEAR by it. Kevin has also been drinking a shake every morning and he’s been a blur ever since. I’m like walking in slow motion and he’s buzzing around me at top speed – it’s frustrating and a little embarrassing.

So. Beginning tomorrow morning, I will drink some Reliv. I will try and remember to update you guys on how it makes me feel. I only hope it serves to inject a little energy into me because I can’t go on feeling this way. I have plans. I have a future mapped out for me. I can’t afford to be tired.

Literally.

I finally broke down and bought my textbooks today. As in, just now.

I had been oscillating back and forth on whether I wanted to buy them or not. Which is stupid because I’ve already signed up, and paid for, the class. The books were not cheap. And I even went the third party route on Amazon.

I think I hesitated on ordering them because once I hit that “pay” button, there was no going back. I was making a commitment to pursue this paralegal career choice.

I MADE the commitment. It’s a done deal.

My class starts next Wednesday. It’s an online class through a vocational college here in town. I have to sign on every Wednesday and Friday to get my assignments.

This class is the first of a series of six. It’s a non-credit class that is designed to prepare me for a paralegal career. Since I already have a Bachelor’s of Science (in Professional Writing), then all I should be required to do is take these preparation courses and then take the paralegal certificate exam. After that, I should be able to get a job as a paralegal. I figure with my writing degree, that should give me an edge.

Keyword: should.

I am polishing my resume. This is actually quite a process because I haven’t had a job outside the home in seven years. Though I’ve technically been “working”, it probably won’t translate into anything impressive when I get to the interviewing stage.

At any rate, I found a site that lists attorneys in my area and I plan on trolling those sites to see if they are possibly hiring. And by hiring, I mean looking for law clerks or even receptionists. I am not too proud to take a lowly position just so I can get my foot in the door.

I’m quite confident that once I’m in, I’ll impress their socks off and they will wonder how they ever got along without me.

Am I being overly confident, especially given the disaster that is Obama’s economy right now?

Possibly. But I prefer to call it optimistic. 🙂

Now I get to sweat it out for the next week and hope my textbooks come in a timely manner. Of course, if they don’t, I have no one to blame but myself.

As usual.

We asked the same people we bought our kitchen tile from to come out and measure our living room / dining room – they came yesterday.

Then they called us today to give us an estimate on how much they would charge to rip out our carpets, haul it off, and then install our wood floor.

It’s about what we expected.

Expensive.

However, we’ve been talking about doing this for years and we feel like now is the time to do it.

It’s a dark, polished maple and we’re really excited to get it down.

Actually, we’ll be even more excited after it’s installed. Moving furniture is going to be a challenge with Kevin out of commission (sort of), but that’s the perk of having two teenage boys —

cheap labor.

Day-By-Day

Day-By-Day

Karen


(I seriously love this picture – alas, it’s not mine )

The small, insignificant, day-by-day things that happen in my life.

Sunday, August 29, 2010

Newsflash: I like my mother-in-law. I’ve been blessed with one of the few women in the world who will give me my space, but be there when I need her, who has a sense of humor, but doesn’t take me too seriously, who is a constant presence in our lives without being a pest (most of the time. *wink*). She was an absolute rock for me when Kevin had his motorcycle accident in April.

I was fond of her before the accident; I think the world of her now after the accident.

Today was her birthday.

The woman is in her upper 60’s, but looks like she’s in her 50’s. Her and my father-in-law stay incredibly active (in fact, I honestly can’t keep up with the woman – she left me in the dust those two weeks we lived in the hospital in Columbia to take care of my husband – she often times kept watch while I tried to catch up on a few ZzzZz’s), and as a result, they both get around like they’re in their 50’s.

It’s very inspiring to watch them and to be around them. (And a lesson for all us, stay active, stay young!)

Kevin and I bought her a gift card to the JCPenney Home Store because she loves to shop for her home. We had only planned on dropping by her house and giving her the card and gift, but we ended up staying an hour because one of my sisters-in-law and her family had driven up minutes before we had, then my other sister-in-law drove up a little while later – so it ended up being an impromptu family get together.

One of the reasons I like my in-law family so much is because they make an effort to include me in their conversation. I ended up sitting on the sofa, by myself, while the rest of the family sat in a semi-circle in front of me. I didn’t even think of me being off by myself until my mother-in-law made a joke of it – we all laughed, they started asking me questions, I responded, we laughed some more … it was nice.

I can honestly say that I feel like a part of their family. They’ve been very warm to me and truly are some of the nicest people I’ve ever met.

I know it’s not exactly “cool” to admit that you like your in-laws, but well, since when have I been cool?

Exactly.

We were on the verge of leaving, when my sister-in-law asked if they could come over. I had asked her opinion about what we should do about our living room/dining room because we want to rip the carpets out and put in hardwood floors and we honestly have no idea if we want to go dark, or light – we already have so much oak furniture in the rooms that we don’t want to match it exactly, that would just look weird, in my opinion.

Since I’m about the furthest thing from being a Susie Homemaker, I asked my sister-in-law because oh my gosh, you should see her house. It’s gorgeous!! And I love her taste. She also has a knack of finding the best deals on things so I trust her.

They came over and we talked about possibilities for about twenty minutes. She is actually going to make a trip up to Lowe’s to see if she can get some ideas for us.

I think that’s about the sweetest thing ever. I can’t believe she’s going to go out of her way like that, but she says she really enjoys decorating (I tease her about going into business, but I’m actually quite serious) and I can’t wait to see what she comes up with.

Now my next question is, how in the world can I compensate her for her time and talents?? Any ideas?

~*~*~*~*~

Monday, August 30, 2010

Took Jazz to the orthodontist today. He’s had braces … for about a year now. I know he got them last year, and I know he started school without them, so that must mean he got them in September sometime.

Being precise is too exhausting.

He’s doing well with them. He didn’t handle them as well as Dude, and I knew he wouldn’t. Jazz doesn’t tolerant pain/discomfort as well as Dude does. Jazz’s teeth weren’t that bad, to look at him. But after examining the mold they did of his mouth, his teeth were actually pretty bad. Jazz’s biggest problem is his overbite. If you look at his profile, you can see where his upper lip pushes forward over his teeth. I don’t think he’ll have to wear them as long as Dude, but he’ll have to wear them most of his high school years.

I make a point of making sure he doesn’t have any sort of adjustment appointments in October – he has competitions every week and I think it would be rather mean to make him endure mouth pain while he’s trying to play his saxophone and perform. I’m always very conscious about when next appointments are scheduled – at all times. I wouldn’t want the boys to feel bad over the holidays or their birthdays, either. That either makes me a really good mom, or a really anal mom. Maybe both.

Kevin and I went and looked at the leather sofa / loveseat we have our eye on again last night. I was thinking it was more of a dove color when in fact, it’s more a khaki color. I actually prefer the khaki color as I think that might go better in our room, anyway. I think we’ve decided on a dark floor, like walnut dark, but nothing is set in stone at this point. If we buy the khaki sofa set, we’ll have to repaint our walls – they’re currently khaki. It’s always something, isn’t it?

We also can’t find a leather sleeper sofa that we like. I would like a sleeper because I don’t sleep with Kevin – we have determined, after years of not sleeping that we don’t sleep well with EACH OTHER. And when we get sleep, we’re less likely to argue or get on each other’s nerves … so it works out. If we can’t find a leather sleeper (because Kevin really has his heart set on leather), then I’ll have to sleep on an air mattress again. Which is fine, actually, it’s really comfortable, but it makes Kevin feel bad. Which … might not be a bad thing, actually. Lol

Ragweed is on the rise. Which means my eyes are constantly watering. I’m also feeling REALLY tired and run down and it’s really an effort for me to get motivated to do anything. This time of year would be perfect, if I could just get used to the ragweed.

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Wednesday, September 1, 2010

My day started off with a bang – no literally, I woke to a clap of thunder. By the time it was time to take the boys to school, it was pouring. And it’s continued to pour all day. In fact, I just heard on the radio that we broke a record – three inches. And I heard that about three hours ago.

It’s still raining. And according to radar, it’s sticking around most of the night.

I got back from dropping the boys off at school to learn that Kevin had listed our sofa and love seat on Craig’s List. We had agreed we would buy a new sofa set, but I didn’t realize he was going to list it so soon. Not fifteen minutes after listing it, we got a phone call – the woman wanted to come out today to take a look at them, and if she liked them, would pick them up on Friday (when the weather was nicer).

While we were waiting for this woman to arrive, we noticed that our crawl space was starting to fill up with water. This is a common problem with us as our house is sort of on a slope, so we get a lot of run off. When it rains really hard for an extended period of time (like today), our sump pump just can’t keep up. In addition, a pipe had come loose on it so it wasn’t pumping any water out.

Kevin actually crawled (but more like swam) over to the sump pump and fixed it. It started gushing out water and was working fine for about 20 minutes, when the stupid pipe came loose again. He was getting ready to crawl back under the house when our lady and her husband arrived to look at our sofa set.

They took one look, sat down for ten seconds and decided they wanted it – right then. It was POURING outside, but that didn’t deter them from loading the pieces up. I’m sure they got quite soaked in the process. Kevin and I couldn’t figure out why she just didn’t come back on a nice day. I just hope they didn’t ruin them.

After they left, Kevin suggested we go to Lowe’s and buy another sump pump, place it in the opening to the crawl space, run a hose out of our back door, through the garage and pump the water out that way. Then he wouldn’t have to crawl back under the house and if the thing started acting up, it would be right there.

He could also use the second sump pump to use with the french drain that he wants to install on the north side of our house (because it’s currently a lake on that side of the house, which is not helping the water situation in our crawl space).

So, we bought the pump, he installed it and it’s currently pumping water out of our crawl space.

Here’s a picture:

1. Out of the crawl space. 2. Out the back door. 3. Through the garage.

It doesn’t pump out water as hard as the other sump pump, but we figure it should pump out most of it by the morning. IF it ever stops raining, that is.

Our living room is HUGE without our sofa set. Kevin is thinking we should just buy a sofa and nix the love seat … but, I like love seats, so we’ll see.

In the meantime, we have our lawn chairs.

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I love Oh life because they send you an email at 8:00 p.m. every night asking you how your day went. You reply to the email and it automatically posts to your Oh Life account.

These entries are raw, immediate and from the heart. You can expect to see these updates every Wednesday and Sunday (or thereabouts)

Thanks for reading.

Day-By-Day

Day-By-Day

Karen


(photo credit)

The small, insignificant, day-by-day things that happen in my life.

Thursday, August 26, 2010

I had a very productive day. I got a lot of work done, and answered a lot of emails. It was a comfortable pace all day – I would answer a few emails, finish the requests and then get a few more emails. I was able to easily keep on top of things all day and didn’t feel overwhelmed. I even got a few compliments on my work, which only served to encourage me more.

I need to focus on getting my work website back up and running. Well, technically, it’s running, but it’s very outdated. I don’t know if I told you this, but I reserved the karenmaxwell.com domain as well as the karenmaxwell.net domain. I’m thinking I’m going to use the .net domain for my professional site (because most of the sites I’ve designed link to that website and it would just be easier to leave it as it) and use the .com domain for my writing.

*snort* That all sounds so nice, doesn’t it? My writing site? Like I do any writing to PUT on a writing site … but whatever.

I dream big. Hush.

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Friday, August 27, 2010

So. The car.

We went and picked it up today, and we’re another $200 bucks poorer. The mechanic said that there were three computer codes that they couldn’t clear out, one was for this, one was for that, and the last one had something to do with the ignition system. I didn’t quite catch what it all meant, but I’m gathering, from what he said, that it could be a potential problem down the road. Whose bright idea was it to put computers in cars again? *sigh* At any rate, it’s fixed – for now. I’ll probably go driving with Dude tomorrow (I have to make sure he gets out and drives otherwise, he’ll get rusty. Trust me, the boy doesn’t move out of his computer chair – he needs to get out in the real world once in a while).

We still haven’t decided what to do with the car, long term. For now, I think we’re going to hang on to the car and see what happens. I just HATE putting too much money into it because we’ve already put more money into the heap than its book value. I’m especially sensitive to this because I used to work in the consumer loan department at the bank and I saw, way too many times to count, too many people disappointed (and even upset!) because all of the “improvements” or repairs they made to their car didn’t help the market value out one bit. It’s all about the market value, people.

Kevin has been trolling Craig’s List for a new car, for him. I’m totally okay with this. He’s been driving his truck for about four years now and has (constantly) talked about wanting a car for a while. I think he should go for it. I’ve been encouraging him to buy a car, he’s the one always nixing the idea. But he’s finding a few good deals through Craig’s List, so I have a feeling we might be car looking before long. Our biggest problem is where are we going to store these cars? We only have a two-car garage, the Cavalier already sits in our backyard. We need a garage, but it’s going to cost about $10K to $15K to build so …

We had a little drama after school today. Dude and Jazz meet at a door after school and then walk out to my car together. Only, Jazz didn’t show up and when the boys didn’t turn up at their normal time, I called Dude. He didn’t know where he was and he was getting really annoyed. I wasn’t worried, I just figured Jazz was doing something with the band and when I suggested Dude walk down to the band room, well, no would be putting it mildly.

After about five minutes, I called him back, “Jazz is getting his uniform,” he said.

“Oh,” I said, “then you might as well come on out to the car.”

When Dude arrived at the car, he was furious – as in, unreasonably furious, as in, I thought the boy would blow an artery furious. I was a bit alarmed at his anger. He was upset because he was tired of having to wait for Jazz every day. But, even if Dude didn’t wait for Jazz every day and came out to the car the ahead of him, he would be upset because we still had to wait on him. And even if he was driving, he would still have to wait on Jazz before he could take off. Now granted, Jazz won’t be hurried – he runs on his own time, but he’s also involved in band and extracurricular activities require time.

My point to Dude was – he’s spoiled. He’s not used to having to wait for anything. All of his entertainment is instantaneous; I’ve always been there or handled things for him in a timely matter. It’s always been BAM, BAM, BAM for Dude – no inconvenience. We had a pretty good talk (after he calmed down) and I think he realizes he needs to chill out about having to wait for things. I mean, the world does not exist for him. And before you ask, yes, I told him he was spoiled and yes, I told him I blamed myself.

I’m nothing if not honest with my kids and with myself.

We nearly passed out when Jazz arrived with his band uniform. Even though he got the same uniform as last year (they number them somehow) and even though we dry cleaned the uniform at the end of last year’s season, that thing stunk to high heaven. They must store those things somewhere damp because the mold was nearly palpable. We took it straight to the dry cleaners. I’ll take a picture of him wearing it and post it soon. His first football game is next Friday. I’m looking forward to it.

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Saturday, August 28, 2010

Audio version:

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I love Oh life because they send you an email at 8:00 p.m. every night asking you how your day went. You reply to the email and it automatically posts to your Oh Life account.

I recorded the audio version through Audio Boo. You only have five minutes to record something – GO.

These entries are raw, immediate and from the heart. You can expect to see these updates every Wednesday and Sunday (or thereabouts)

Thanks for reading.

Life

If It’s Broke, Then Fix It … or Sell It

Karen

Yesterday was a craptastic day. Seriously. It was like we were all … off or something. Dude, Kevin and I all snapped at each other (Jazz was actually in pretty good spirits and steered clear of us) and before the day was out, I felt like I had a big sign taped to my back:

“Bite my head off, please”

At any rate, we’re all better today .. I don’t know what the deal was yesterday, but anyhoo …

In addition to everyone being “sensitive” (that’s code for difficult), Kevin went to the doctor.

It didn’t have anything to do with his accident. In fact, the man is doing really well, he still waddles a bit when he walks, but he’s truly getting better and better every day and he no longer has to take pain pills – now he’s just really sore and even that is not as bad as it used to be.

No. He went to our family doctor because he’s tired of being hungry all the time. And when I say the man is hungry all the time, I mean all the time.

Kevin has a pre-breakfast, breakfast, lunch, afternoon snack, dinner, a post-dinner snack and then often times gets up at 2:00 in the morning to eat something again.

It’s insane. I have stressed for years about his constant hunger – which is another reason I love cruises – I don’t have to stress about where his next meal is going to come from.

I’m not kidding folks, it’s really a problem. It’s like he’s never satisfied. And if that wasn’t bad enough, his blood sugar drops and he starts shaking and his usual good humor takes a nose dive – he’s an outright jerk if he allows it to go on for very long.

He’s been like this for years. Ever since I’ve known him, he’s always been a bottomless pit. And the man never gains weight, which is infuriating, at least to me. Because HELLO!? That’s not normal!

But since he’s grown up with this “condition”, he thinks it is normal, so he doesn’t understand how I can gain weight so easily just snacking on a chocolate bar.

In fact his entire family is like that – they can eat and never gain weight. If I didn’t like them so much, I would totally hate them because WTF??

He said the straw that broke the camel’s back for him was when we were on vacation. We would be out touring St. John, New Brunswick or Halifax, Nova Scotia, and he would complain about being hungry, every fifteen minutes. It got so bad, even our boys, our TEENAGE BOTTOMLESS PITS, started teasing him about being hungry all the time.

In addition to being hungry all the time, he doesn’t sleep well. He never has. He goes to sleep okay, but he doesn’t stay asleep. We did figure out that he has sleep apena and he now sleeps with a CPAP machine, which has helped, but he still wakes up to pee or because he’s hungry. It’s a vicious cycle and he’s a walking zombie because he never stays asleep long enough to get some solid REM sleep.

Anyway, he went in, had five vials of blood drawn and is having a series of tests done; I’m most interested in his thyroid. I think it’s overactive, but I only know what Google tells me so …

****

This car?

Looks nice, right? But it’s turning out to be a major pain in our butt.

It’s a ’99 Chevy Cavalier. And it has a moonroof and is really a pretty cool little car, but it’s not running very well.

Wait. Scratch that. It’s not running AT ALL.

*sigh*

First, it was the ignition system. It shorted out and we had to replace the whole thing complete with reprogramming the computer so it would accept the key and yadda-yadda-yadda.

Then, yesterday, (which only added to the crap factor that was yesterday), Dude and I drove up to Wal-Mart so I could buy a few things, including eggs because we were planning on having breakfast for dinner that night.

Remember that I have eggs.

Dude wasn’t that happy to begin with. He was tired. He had homework, but I assured him we would make a quick trip up there and back – fifteen minutes tops. AND, I would buy him some poptarts.

He agreed. (Like he had a choice).

We got into the car, the car started. No problems so far. He drove us to Wal-Mart (and really should have honked at the moron that turned right in front of him). We did our shopping. We walked to the car, he unlocked the trunk (because I thought it might a little cooler in the trunk since I also needed to run over to Staples and buy Jazz a folder with brads because Wal-Mart didn’t have any [yeah, Dude wasn’t happy about that little proposed detour]) and we got into the car.

And the stupid, freaking thing wouldn’t start! AARGH!!

We tried several times. We probably spent nearly ten minutes trying to coax the thing to start.

We only succeeded in flooding it.

I called Kevin and he came up to rescue us. He tried to start it, no go.

By this time, I’m picturing all of us sick with salmonella because I’ve got eggs in the trunk of the car. And it’s 85 degrees outside. And Dude has homework and he’s getting impatient to get back home to do it so he can get on his computer (kids have to do homework first before getting on the games). So, we took Dude back home, I put the eggs into the fridge and we went back up to Wal-Mart.

Kevin called AAA (by the way, HIGHLY recommend you become members of AAA – we met our membership fee just in the two tows we’ve had to have in the past few months because towing is free if you’re a member) and waited for the tow truck to show up.

He arrived about twenty minutes later and towed the stupid car away.

We took it back to the same garage that fixed us up last time (Kevin really likes them) and heard back from them today on what the problem was.

Apparently, the actual ignition switch is bad.

WAIT a doggone minute here! I thought we just paid them boo-coo bucks to fix this problem before??!! Well, they said that they tested it and it appeared to be getting power so they didn’t replace it, trying to save us money.

*SIGH*. I was a bit annoyed with them, but Kevin talked me off the edge and now …

… what?

We no longer trust this car. We’re just lucky the boys weren’t out in the boonies somewhere when this happened. Or in the middle of an intersection.

It could always be so much worse.

We’re discussing our options. We absolutely don’t want the boys driving a car that can’t be trusted. So … now we’re thinking of trading it in for something a little newer and more reliable.

We had toyed with the idea of the boys driving Kevin’s truck and he would buy a car. He’s been wanting to buy himself one for quite some time now. But … teenage boys driving an F150 truck? That truck is a monster and has a lot of power. Not to mention, is about five feet longer than a car and … no. We just didn’t feel comfortable with that option.

Then I came up with an idea:

Why don’t they just drive my Vibe and I would buy a new car? The Vibe is only three years old, is in great shape, very reliable, easy to drive and … ?

We’re still thinking about it. We’re going to check out some lots tomorrow when we go pick up the Cavalier. We’re keeping our options open right now. We might actually get a better deal on a new car as opposed to a used car right now because everyone is either making their old cars last longer, or buying used cars because no one can afford a new car in this economy. (This “Summer of Recovery” economy. *snort*)

But ugh. Do we really want a car payment right now?

Not really.

At any rate, we have to do something, this cool-looking Cavalier has got to go.

(maybe)