nothing to say....

I always go blank and need a day or two of ‘normal’ to get back into the swing of things after my routine shifts because of something like a sickness or a long weekend… now I’ve had back to back illness and holiday so I’m doubly blank!!

I’m still not feeling great… still a little gunky in the sinuses (probably because I’m not doing all I can to clear them out) and still have a bit of a cough… and it seems like I’m very easily wiped out by the smallest things - I’m much better than I was but still not 100% - I don’t get sick very often (unless you count headaches as sickness) but man when I do I get slammed with some whoppers!! I almost always seem to get these illnesses that take a month to go away… what usually happens is I get better soooooooooo sloooowwwwly that I can’t decide if I’m actually better or just getting used to feeling like crap

after last weekend though, being as sick as I felt I REALLY realized how good I feel when I normally think I feel so-so at best – I MUST try to remember to NOT take feeling decent for granted!! Sam should have taken a picture of me last Sunday when I was on death’s door, as a reminder of what crap REALLY feels like haaaa

anyway… enough about that!!

we had a nice weekend… quiet and relaxing which is always a plus!! we had some sex, watched some movies (déjà vu and touristas) I fell asleep during déjà vu so I don’t know about that but touristas wasn’t worth the $5 except to remind me to never get drunk in a non english speaking country (unless I want to have my organs stolen!!) if you like girls in bikinis you might get a little enjoyment out of touristas... otherwise don't wast your money

what else? we had meant to go plant shopping (for the garden) last weekend but since I was so sick nothing got done, so this weekend we went on a wild goose chase in search of a specific type of tomato - because memorial day weekend is NO time to be plant shopping we didn’t have much luck… but we found some other stuff that looks interesting

here is my man toiling away in the garden in his big floppy hat

~clicky to biggy~


YEE HAW!! (he has to protect his delicate skin from burning you know!!) hehehe

he planted pretty much the whole garden while I sat back, relaxed and took pictures haaaa

anyway… that's pretty much it I guess… we didn’t really do much of anything all weekend and it was very nice!!

I really enjoyed hardly doing a thing for 3 whole days but as is always the case after the weekend, this place is a mess and I have a bunch of catching up to do... I think I'm all caught up in blogland (in other words I have no excuse to procrastinate any longer) so I'm off to plant my 20 gazillion morning glory and sunflower seeds and then cut the grass - which, as you can see in the picture, is desperately needed!!

zip-a-dee-doo-dah...

call me crazy but I just love a clothes line!! I love standing outside carefully hanging up each shirt and sock and towel - feeling the warmth of the sun and the breeze blowing around sweet summer air - hearing the birds sing… watching the butterflies flutter around from flower to flower

it’s peaceful and nice and it makes me smile… I don’t know why… something about doing that kind of ‘old fashioned’ wifey/girly stuff just makes me happy

I didn’t grow up with a clothes line (or with anyone who enjoyed housework or any other housewifey stuff for that matter) so it must just be something in my weird little head

in fact I had never used a clothes line at all until about 8 years ago when we broke out of my mother’s house for the first time and were out on our own – we had a short detour… living with my grandfather for about 8 months… his laundry situation was weird… the washer was upstairs near the kitchen and the dryer was down in the cellar – you had to walk down a long flight of very narrow stairs which were made even narrower by one of those whitaker stair lift chair thingies that carries invalids up and down stairs which had been installed several years earlier when my grandma (who’s been dead for 15 years) broke her ankle

I found all this up and down and maneuvering around his obstacle course to be a huge pain in the ass – especially since he had a perfectly good clothes line 30 feet from the kitchen door that NOBODY EVER used!! in my whole entire life the ONLY time I ever saw anything hanging on that line was after we’d be swimming, on the way back down to the house from the pool, sometimes grandma would hang our beach towels on the line to dry for the next day – but usually we just hung them on the back of a lounge chair or something

I didn’t know how I felt about the extra time it would take to do things this way but I was willing to give it a try… plus it would save on electricity which would make me feel like less of a mooch AND help the environment at the same time – WOO HOO

I TOTALLY fell in love with line drying!! I found myself looking forward to laundry day... I would skip along merrily whistling Disney tunes with a bluebird on my shoulder while I happily hung our clothes out to dry... I just thought it was the greatest thing ever!! I was so sad to not be able to do it anymore when we left there and moved into our first apartment… especially when I learned I had to drag 40 thousand tons of laundry a block and a half away to the laundromat every week!!

for a time there since our living room was so huge I TRIED putting up a line IN the house… but that was just too much of a pain… carrying WET clothes a block and a half home and up 3 flights of stairs and then having to duck and weave in and out of the laundry as it dried – bah!!

so when we moved in here I was pretty excited to have a yard again – the first thing I asked for was a clothes line!! that was 4 years ago!!

I’ve bugged Sam to put up a line for me for FOUR freakin’ years… that’s 4 long years of using my mother’s dryer which means I have to try to hold my breath so’s to not be poisoned in her yucky smoke filled mold factory – where she always opens the dryer door before I can get over there to get the laundry and we end up walking around smelling like moldy ashtrays all week!!

it was getting to the point where I REALLY hated doing laundry… I stopped going over to get it when it was done and started having him do it when he got home from work just so I could avoid going over there as much as possible… because we have to limit our time over there in order to avoid respiratory issues from her smoky mold factory and because her house is not set up for laundry folding and whatnot anyway we had been stuffing all the clean clothes right out of the dryer and into a pillow case – so of course all our clothes were wrinkled all to hell

it has MANY times been a source of arguments for us since I would usually get lazy about folding the laundry – because by the time he gets home and gets it for me I'm in the middle of making dinner... so I set the bag off in a corner somewhere and forget about it - then he has to dig around in it for socks and underwear every morning until I FINALLY get off my ass and fold it, which could be anywhere from days to even a week later when I need the pillow case again to do more laundry

it's something that is always hanging over my head making me feel like crap… he works hard and I don’t like him getting frustrated by stupid shit like my crammed full, wrinkly laundry bag situation – it wouldn't usually stop me from neglecting the laundry… it would just make me feel like crap and sometimes we'll both get frustrated and argue about it

finally I told him, enough is enough... I HATE dealing with this crap every week!! plus one way or another I NEED to limit my contact with mom and her toxic house!! so two weeks ago he FINALLY put up my super awesome clothes line - ZIP-A-DEE-DOO-DAH!!

and now that I have that back, everything is all better!! no more nagging him to go get the laundry for me – no more smoky, moldy, smelly, wrinkly clothes – no more tripping over laundry bags or arguing about putting the clothes away - I can be a good little wifey again

now when it’s time to put the laundry away, I bring hangers out to the line with me and hang each item neatly and gather them up on the other side of a clothes pin to keep them from chasing me as I skip my way down the line… I hang the socks up in pairs so that when I take them down I can fold them right away and throw them in the laundry basket – everything is neat and crisp and full of fresh air and sunshine and happiness and love

of course it can’t always be a zip-a-dee-doo-dah day - sometimes while we're whistling along, that stupid bluebird swoops down and poops on my parade!!

on the mend....

so I’m feeling a bit better today… I guess A LOT better actually because I’m actually sitting here catching up, reading and commenting so much I’ve totally lost track of what I was going to say HERE today!!

it seems like the whole last week has been a big blur – and my mind is still a bit fuzzy… I think all this snot is backing up into my brain or something!!

BUT I FINALLY have partial use of at least one of my nostrils, which means I can taste bits and pieces of food and that is always nice… I HATE when I can’t taste anything!! it seems like such a waste of calories, ya know? mmmm here’s some yummy nutritious and delicious soup to make you all well again… but all you get to ‘taste’ is some chunky dish water… YUM!!

anyway… nothing exciting has happened here in kittyville lately… not that I would have noticed if it had

I got a phone call the other day which I reluctantly (because I was feeling pretty crappy and didn’t have the energy to talk) answered anyway because the caller ID said ‘unknown name – unknown number’ and my curiosity got the better of me… as usual

a male voice asked for me… I never know what to say when someone asks me for me… clearly I don’t know you if you don’t know that I’m me, ya know?

I said ‘you got me!’ all kinda giggly because I was in a very weird mood… he proceeds to tell me his name (Jack White) from soandsoblahblahblah…

all I heard was JACK WHITE (everyone knows I have a huge crush on Jack White) I totally cut him off mid explanation shrieking JACK WHITE!! just my luck you would FINALLY call me while I have drippy eyes, a clogged up head and am coughing up yellow globs!!

don’t feel bad… he didn’t get my excitement either – not being the REAL Jack White... just some imposter trying to trick me into not hanging up on him before he could tell me I’ve neglected to pay some medical bill which I’ve been intentionally not paying… of course he doesn’t know that… I continued joking with him, making light of the situation – I did learn one thing… when he said I should get a payment off ASAP so’s to avoid any ‘further collection efforts’

I’ve always been curious what that means, exactly… they’ve written and called – really what MORE can they do? so I asked and he seemed unsure – like nobody had ever asked him that before… I asked ‘is someone going to come here and break my ankles or something?’

oh no ma’am! there will just be more paperwork, more letters etc. oh yes I surely do want to do my best to save you the trouble of having to mail me a letter once a month reminding me that I owe Dr. Soandso $125

now that you’ve made THAT clear AND called me MA'AM (GAH!!) - I’ll get right on it!!

the reason I’ve neglected to pay this particular medical bill (when I’ve been very good about paying all the others) is that they were uncooperative when I tried to make a payment agreement with them – I can only afford $25 a month and they wanted at least $50!! they said they wouldn’t stop it from going to a collection agency if it wasn’t paid in full before that time came (they only hold bills so long before they send them to collection EVEN if you’ve been making regular payments) so I said screw it… it’s $25 or zero!! I didn’t like their attitude…. so I chose zero

that was 6 months ago… it has gone to collection now which is where Jack was calling from… and they were even LESS cooperative!! they didn’t want to let me pay less than $75 a month!!

blah blah blah – I’m rambling again!!

anyway… I told you nothing exciting has happened - this COULD have been exciting if he was the REAL Jack White!! but as it was this imposter didn’t really appreciate my humor… and I’m sure the real Jack White would have fallen over laughing at my silly jokes

fortunately I already have a REAL man who laughs at all my jokes and loves me and takes care of me when I’m deathly ill from a sinus infection that more closely resembles the plague – who kisses my forehead and wishes he could be sick for me and makes me dinner and cleans up my snotty tissues and gropes me even though I look like I just crawled out of a swamp!!

SO THERE fake Jack White… take your bill and shove it!! I’ll pay it when I’m good and ready and not a minute sooner!! and if you give me any more crap I WILL send you a check… wrapped in a yellow globby snot rag!!

WOO HOO!!

sick

head hurts - jaw hurts - chest hurts - watery eye - stuffy/runny nose - coughing up yellow stuff - wheezing - sneezing - sinuses want to explode - ears popping - eyes hurt - fever - possibly dying

I've been on antibiotics since Friday night for what the doctor seemed to think MIGHT be a sinus or other upper respiratory infection - but it seems like all I do is get worse!!

I don't know what to do but rest... so that's what I'll do - I just wanted to pop in and explain why I haven't been around - and may not be for a couple more days... if I manage to survive at all!!

all good vibes, prayers, well wishes and whatever else you guys might think will help are appreciated hehehe

I hope all is well with all of you!!

~g'night

getting things done...

well I ROCK!! it’s not even 8:30 in the morning and I already have my dishes done, the laundry off the line and put away and the garbage burned… and now I’m getting this done!! WOO HOO - of course I don’t have much to say…

it’s looking like it’s gonna be an uncomfortably warm and muggy day today – it’s already at least 75º and I don’t know if it’s just allergies or I’m coming down with a cold but I’ve had a scratchy throat and cough since last night so I’m gonna try to take it a little easy today…

anyway since my sister and niece moved to yucky old Arizona I don’t get to talk to them very often and usually when my sister is around to talk it’s because the kiddo is at nursery school so I get to talk to her even less :(

although I talked to her a couple weeks ago while she was drawing a picture for her little friend’s birthday which made me sad because we used to paint and draw together all the time and I don’t have ANY new stuff of hers to hang up - so I got an idea… I told her I would draw her a picture and then she could draw me one back and we can keep in touch that way – of course that all depends on my sister mailing her pictures to me… so we’ll see how that goes

but that’s what I’m gonna do today after I get this place straightened up a bit… I’ll probably put on the AC, pop in a movie and draw my niece a little picture – which will work out well because I’m HOPING to write her a book all about HER for her birthday and I’m gonna try to work out the kinks with the illustrations on these drawings… so wish me luck… or maybe it’s not luck I need so much as stick-to-itiveness hehehe THAT is something I’m NOT good with at all!! I’m the queen of abandoning projects… here’s hoping I don’t abandon this one for another year (I had planned to do this last year) but kids grow so fast I can’t keep putting this off or before I know it she’ll be WAY too old for a goofy old book

ok I’m starving and out of things to say so I guess that means it's time to split...

Joey & Amy sittin’ in a tree…

B - A - R - F - I - N - G

it figures – the one day I decide to flip on the news and see whats happening in the world, I learn that Joey Buttafuoco and Amy Fisher are back together!! I assume you remember who they are… but if not I linked their ‘wikibios’ for ya…

haaaa on second though I realize nobody clicks on links so the long and the short of it is that Joey was/is a pig who (15 years ago) in his mid 30’s, while married with children, had an affair with Amy who was 16 at the time… in an attempt to get Joey’s wife (Mary Jo) out of the picture Amy put a bullet in her head, leaving her permanently disfigured

anyway… Amy went to jail and eventually grew up, got married and had kids, she even wrote a couple books and of course has been on tv from time to time telling her story to anyone who will listen - Mary Jo FINALLY, several years later, kicked Joey's sorry ass to the curb - somewhere in between his own jail sentences, and tv appearances he remarried - but now each of their spouses has filed for divorce because it seems the dynamic dimwits have found a new and possibly even more disturbing way to extend their 15 minutes of fame...

apparently the two are scheduled to have a romantic dinner at a NY restaurant, which will be filmed by a tv producer in the hopes of turning them into the next big reality series!! don't believe me? read it for yourself

I don’t know whether to puke or set my VCR!!

peking princess...

pretty isn't she? well not for long!! if she doesn't stop acting like such a fucking princess I'm afraid I'm going to have to skin her fuzzy ass and turn her into chop suey!!

wait... what exactly IS chop suey? if I'm gonna cook my cat I wanna be sure to make something that will disguise what a huge pain in the ass she is!! whaddaya think - kung po kitty? aah I'm sure she would demand that any dish she's going to be turned into, be delicately prepared with only the finest ingredients and garnished with lily petals or some other princessy nonsense that looks better than it tastes...

seriously - I don't know what to do with her!! I know cats have strange personality quirks - I've had some weird ones in my day... but this one is just plain NUTS!! if everything isn't just so she objects in the most obnoxious ways...

for example... if you dare fall asleep without making sure she has the freshest cleanest mountain spring water, she'll clang her bowl against the wall repeatedly until you wake up and freshen it for her - even if you just gave her fresh water 2 hours ago!!

THEN once you're up you might as well pee, right? while you're sitting there HOPING to pee quickly without any distractions so that you can MAYBE get back to sleep - she pries the door open with her titanium claws and jumps up to drink whatever water has pooled near the drain of the sink!! hmph!! suddenly drain water is sufficient? she couldn't have made do with that and just let me sleep??!!

also if after you come home from a particularly tiring grocery shopping trip, you don't get EVERYTHING put away in a timely manner (you leave the non-perishables in the bags on the floor while you rest a moment and try to decompress) she scratches at the bags as if to say 'these groceries aren't going to put themselves away!!'

she can't stand clutter!! the slightest mess makes her very nervous... as with most people who have TINY houses and too much stuff, we're always fighting to not have every flat surface completely covered with papers and other assorted junk - even though she's not supposed to be up on any tables or counters and she KNOWS this - apparently she can't resist... she seems to want very much to be tall like us so she can look us in the eye (it's much easier for a cat to give someone the hairy scary eyeball when she's actually at eye level... or close to it) but she still flips out if there is too much mess - she paces back and forth and knocks things over until someone straightens up!!

ahem I know this is where you keep your mail but I'M trying to walk here and I don't particularly care if your bills fall down behind the table and don't get paid... for I am a princess so I know I shall always be cared for and pampered... I don't need electricity... especially if it means I don't have to warn you AGAIN about that damn wind blowing machine that messes my beautiful fur!!

which brings me to the MOST irritating thing about this cat... her thermostat issues - if she's not just the perfectly right temperature she becomes a total spaz!! this is a problem all year, if the heat isn't turned up high enough she flips out - but it's the worst this time of year when it's warm out and you need a fan or AC - she can't stand AC because it makes her cold and a fan is no better for the same reason PLUS like I said she hates the wind to blow and mess up her beautiful fur!! but she ONLY wants to sleep on or very near one of us, which only makes us warmer!! I know it's horribly selfish of me but I refuse to sweat and suffocate to accommodate her!!

this upsets her greatly!! she shows this by (depending on if I'm in the bed or my recliner) repeatedly jumping up on my lap and pacing back and forth between the tables on either side of the chair or jumping up on the bed near my face and climbing over my head, up over Sam's head and off the other side of the bed - circling around and just as I get back to sleep she starts all over again!!

she'll do this ALL NIGHT LONG

thanks to her I've been up since a little after 3am!! so here I am feeling all headachey and exhausted - meanwhile now that nobody is trying to sleep, suddenly the fan doesn't bother her AT ALL... she's lounged out on a chair peacefully sleeping in a sunbeam!!



GAH!!

sweet & sour meower, anyone?!!

my hero...

having felt comfortable and secure for the last year, in the knowledge that we were saving the money to avert this property tax problem - and then having the rug pulled out from under me… when the shit hit the fan last week I did my typical basket case routine – I got an instant headache and my brain stopped working, as you can imagine it would when you suddenly hear that despite all your efforts, you may wind up living under a bridge before long…

somehow the day went from morning to evening and I had no idea where the time went… between phone calls from my sister and my grandfather trying to figure a way out of this mess my mother had gotten us into - and dealing with my mother who seemed to be bordering on suicidal - somehow I always wind up in the middle and I can only take so much before I shut down!! it was almost like I blacked out and woke up 9 hours later

after a LONG day of total chaos and family insanity, Sam walked in to find me in complete meltdown mode… slumped over the kitchen counter with my head in my hands… totally exhausted - he had no idea what was going on… I wasn’t looking forward to filling him in on this little development but all day long I kept wished he would hurry up and get home - somehow he always makes me feel better – and this time was no different…

I started out all wound up, spewing the days events at him – I didn’t even give him a chance to take his shoes off or sit down I just unloaded the day on him

instead of flipping out (like I’m sure he was tempted to do) he just let me go on – I instantly felt a thousand times better having him there to lean on, just like I knew I would… I always do!!

I know that with him I can get through anything… no matter what, we always get by!! we’ve been through a lot of unpleasantness together and as long as we stick together we always work our way through it…

half way through spilling this load of crap, I just looked at him and I felt somehow at peace… like 'so what if she loses our home' we have eachother and WE always come out ok!! by now we’re skilled at making the best out of unpleasant situations hehehe

all day long I was winding up tighter and tighter, ready to spin off into outer space – and seeing him just made that all melt away… I was just so glad to have him there to help mellow me out… to absorb part of the chaos or whatever it is he does that makes me feel so much better when I’m near him

I don’t always show it very well but I hope he knows how grateful I am to be traveling through life with him by my side...

better grab a snack… this is gonna be a long one!!

I probably should have done this post (vent, rant whatever ya wanna call it) in installments but it's not exactly pleasant so I just kinda wanna get it out and be done with it!!

when I was little we were 'the family with money' all our friends thought we were rich... I don’t know what ‘rich’ means but compared to our friends, maybe we were - who knows?

my mother certainly didn't grow up poor, my grandparents did very well for themselves and did their best to spoil us kids rotten – for most of my childhood (from about 5-14) we lived with my mothers boyfriend who certainly wasn't hurtin' for money – if maintenance or repairs were needed on the house or cars it was not an issue - he owned a grocery store so we were never hungry and there was really nothing that we ever wanted or needed that we had to live without… sometimes we had to wait for a birthday or Christmas – that was just good sense though, it had nothing to do with having to save up money or anything

but none of this money was my mothers so when we left there when I was about 14 everything changed!! she decided to open her own store… something she technically should have been very successful with but due to a few bad choices and some bad luck (or bad karma!!) it wasn't long before there was no money!! my sister did the smart thing and stayed away from home as much as possible but I’m the kid who always hovered around, listening in… tuning in to every nuance of mood shift so I could try to spring into action to do whatever I could to smooth things out… to maintain some level of… I dunno… non misery? seriously I’m surprised I didn’t have an ulcer by the time I was 12!!

anyway before long, bill collectors were calling and my mother was making me answer the phone to tell them the lie du jour... she would get all depressed and say things like 'we're gonna lose the house if we don’t get some money' – I was convinced we were all gonna end up homeless and it scared me to death!! I started becoming extremely anxious (even more so than I was and I was ALWAYS anxious even when I was very little) if she didn't ask outright (which she had no problem doing) I’m quite sure she said these things like ‘they’re gonna take the house’ in a passive aggressive attempt to get sympathetic offers of help… of course I would offer up any money I had to pay the bills - christmas money, birthday money etc. but it never ended – it still hasn’t ended!! she’s still talking about losing the house only NOW I know it’s a realistic concern… she’s consistently a year or more behind on her property taxes…

for a little refresher on this situation go HERE

anyway… my mother has pretty much been out of work for the majority of the last 2-3 years!! and before that she was going to school and basically living off of student loans and financial aid… being a student doesn’t pay very well!! she’s had a hard time finding permanent employment since she finished school… she hasn’t worked AT ALL in over a year now (actually she just started a new job yesterday which she FINALLY took out of desperation… but it pays about what a high school kid would make… nowhere near enough money to live on… especially with the financial hole she must be in!!)

I think a big part of her problem is depression… which she chooses to alleviate with mass quantities of vodka… instead of driving around looking for help wanted signs she sits in her house and plays free cell and watches reruns of law & order

a couple years ago there was a big property tax scare – she needed to come up with back taxes ASAP or ‘they’re gonna take the house’ there was nothing I could do… I didn’t have that kind of money!! so back came the fear of becoming homeless - fortunately my grandfather bailed her out (yet again) and Sam and I had a roof over our heads for another year or two…

at that point we decided that to avoid the stress of having this happen again, we were going to stop paying her rent for however long it took to sock away the next chunk of overdue tax money… what she said was about $3000… in order to save that much money it meant we would have to not pay rent for 6 months – like I said she was unemployed and the rent money ($500 a month) was her only income but I didn’t care!! come hell or high water I was going to make sure that Sam and I did NOT have to worry about having a roof over our heads and if I couldn’t count on her to take care of it I damn sure would, whether she liked it or not… whether she had food in her fridge or clothes on her back or heat or hot water or what… I didn’t care!! I wanted to have the peace of mind of KNOWING that the taxes would be paid and we would have a roof over our heads…

so that’s just what I did… I gave her a chance to get a job and do the right thing and then 7 months before the taxes were due I stopped paying rent – it was only going to take 6 months but I wanted one buffer month in there just in case of emergencies (of which I knew she’d have a few where she’d be asking to tap into the tax money!!) I was right she sapped pretty much the entire buffer month out of there… and would have taken more if I would have let her!!

anyway… the taxes are due at the end of this month and I’ve been on her ass for a couple of weeks to tell me exactly what is owed to ‘THIS’ date – because more money is tacked on for each day (because it’s already overdue) I thought if we payed it sooner rather than later she/we could save a few bucks… why pay them more than we have to… you don’t have to wait until midnight of the fucking deadline date if you have the money!!

she’s been somewhat evasive… I wasn’t sure if it was just laziness on her part and she just wasn’t bothering to call and find out or if there was something else going on but I was starting to get a little nervous… I just had a feeling that something was not right!!

skipping ahead to another layer of the story…

a few nights ago my sister called me to say that my mother had called her asking for money to pay her electric bill and car insurance!!

now in case you don’t remember… my sister used to live a few minutes away but due to financial issues caused by her divorce had to sell her house and move in with virtual strangers (an aunt and uncle she had never met) 2000 miles away!! any money she has is money she has to live on while she learns a new trade and starts a new life for her and her daughter!!

my mother originally asked her for $1,200!! my sister said she wouldn’t give her a dime more than what I would normally pay for one months rent ($500) – that way she would be assured of being paid back right away by me sending our rent check straight to her instead of giving it to my mother… mom reluctantly agreed and said she’d be happy just to get her WAY overdue electric bill paid - $420 (by the way if my mother doesn’t have electricity WE don’t have water because our water gets here by way of HER electric water pump)

I told sis that until I knew exactly how much the taxes are that I couldn’t guarantee her anything - I was starting to get nervous… and angry!!

my sister told me to find out EXACTLY how much money was owed for the taxes so I knew how much (if any) of our next rent check had to go to that… my sister would then lend my mother whatever was left and I would pay her back - in other words if we still needed another $200 for the taxes my sister would only be able to lend her $300 because that is all I could guarantee to pay her back out of next months rent money - get it? I hope so!! hehehe

sis was calling me at 11 the next morning for the answer… first thing that morning I went over and asked my mother AGAIN to find out exactly how much the taxes are and told her my sister was NOT going to give her a dime unless she knew I could pay it back

she started getting all pissy and stomping around saying things like ‘I wonder if she remembers that she owes me $150 for getting her car towed (3 years ago!!)
I said I have no fucking clue you’ll have to take that up with her – I want to know how much the taxes are ASAP!! then I left

about 20 minutes later she walks into my house and says ‘we’re so screwed’ – somehow I was NOT surprised… I KNEW something was off about this whole tax thing… it turns out she’s TWO years overdue (actually 3 including this year but apparently she doesn’t consider that actually DUE until they’re about to change the locks on her) anyway instead of owing $3000 she REALLY owes $6000!!!! by the end of this month or they take possession of the property and she then has until october to get them all THREE years ($9000) before the house goes up for auction

call me crazy but I just can’t wrap my mind around the idea of NOT KNOWING you are TWO years behind on your property taxes!! she doesn’t even have a mortgage so $3000 a year in property taxes is ALL she has to worry about in order to keep a roof over her head!!

what kind of difference would it make in your life if all you had to pay in order to guarantee a permanent roof over your head was $250 a month?!!!

so anyway now we have bigger fish to fry than her electric getting shut off and us not having water – we have less than a month to pay the tax people twice what I’ve managed to save in the last 6 months!! so much for me making sure the taxes get paid come hell or high water!! there’s NO WAY we can come up with another $3000!!

at this point I’m VERY tempted to take the saved tax money and whatever other cash I can come up with, get in the truck and drive as far away from here as possible!!

but once again grandpa bailed her out! on one hand I’m glad… that buys us one more year before this happens again and we have to worry about being homeless… on the other hand I think it’s INSANE that at 54 years old she’s still being bailed out by everyone around her!!

what would she do if some other non related tenant was living here who didn’t have the inside scoop on her financial situation? if I hadn’t thought enough to say fuck it and stop paying rent she wouldn’t have a single dime of that money – would she have asked her father for SIX THOUSAND DOLLARS??!! would he have been willing to give it to her??!! could he even afford to??!! by now she must owe him WELL OVER 10 grand NOT including this 3 she’s about to borrow!!! he knows he’s never gonna see a dime of that money!!

I think the only reason he’s willing to give her THIS money is because 1. he knows I’ll be out on my ear if she loses her property and 2. I’ll be sending him our rent money directly for the next 6 months instead of giving it to her and trusting her to send it to him (the last time she said she’d pay him back with our rent money she never did… but he knows I will!!) so he know he’ll at least get THIS money back…

my grandpa is an old man and he’s got mild alzheimers… does he really need this kind of crap??!! I’m SO angry that she is involving him in this!!

when him and his wife called me to make sure they were understanding everything correctly (or to make sure she wasn't lying) I told them that if it wasn’t for me living here I would have a very hard time not suggesting they not bail her out!! we all know it’s just a matter of time before she needs to be bailed out again!!

my sister called him and told him that he should give me that money so Sam and I could get the hell out of dodge before she sucks us down the drain with her... but if he had done that I couldn't have accepted it - unlike everyone else in my family I just can't take money that I can't afford to pay back!!

I told them if there was ANY way we could take the money we’ve saved and move away I would do it in a heartbeat!! at least I think I would… I like to think that I wouldn’t flake at the last minute and feel some obligation to stay here and continue trying to save her from herself!!

I hate even saying that but this is ridiculous… she is my mother NOT my child… if anybody wants to ask why I don’t have kids – THIS is one of the major reasons… I already have one irresponsible 54 year old!! how did her responsibilities become mine???!!

I fully agree (assuming our parents raised us to be prepared for the world and stand on our own two feet) that if the time comes and they need to be taken care of that we as their children should be there for them… take them in if need be or take care of them in whatever way necessary – if I had kids I like to think they would want to take care of me in my old age!!

but this is NOT that – THIS is INSANE!!

she’s 54 NOT 74!! and this isn’t a case of taking care of mom after she broke her hip or had a stroke – this is a case of the child being the parent!! this has been going on since I actually WAS a child!!

it’s not good for me to be here!! the stress of her is slowly killing me!! no wonder I need blood pressure medication at the ripe old age of 34!!

and she’s acting so moody and depressed I’m literally afraid to go over to her house for fear of walking in on a suicide scene!! several years ago Sam and I came home one night from visiting his family and found her semi conscious, half naked surrounded by a shit load of empty pills packets… I do NOT want to relive THAT scene!!

so my plan is to lock my doors and avoid the phone as much as possible – for the rest of the week anyway… for now it seems like the taxes will be paid and she told grandpa that we couldn't start paying him until July so that June's rent could cover the electric bill my sister is paying for her, so her electric is covered - of course I’m sorta waiting for the other shoe to drop but I’m not gonna worry about it… it’s a BEAUTIFUL day!! looks like it’s gonna be an equally beautiful weekend… mom is at work so I can’t get any bad news from her - and Sam just called to say he’s coming home early… YAY!! so I’m off to make a grocery list and get some sewing done… I know this has been a super long post and you’re probably eager to get the hell out of here but it wouldn’t be Friday if I didn’t post another TOTALLY AWESOME VIDEO!! hehehe have a GREAT weekend everyone!!

~ENJOY!!

more questions and stuff...

I’m determined to enjoy this beautiful rainy day and not waste it rotting in front of this idiot box!! I have nothing worthwhile to say anyway unless you wanna hear about the continuing saga of my mother the mooch or about the strawberry rhubarb crunch I made yesterday? – haaa didn’t think so!! therefore I’m taking this opportunity to FINALLY answer Whirly’s interview questions…

he asked:

1. What was your absolute favoritest Saturday morning cartoon?

when I was REALLY little it was probably a toss up between captain caveman and magilla gorilla – but when I was a little older I’d say it was the smurfs – however my all time favorite cartoons would have to be the Flintstones and Woody Woodpecker

2. If you could meet any historical figure who would it be, and why?

this is similar to Mary’s 1st question… and equally difficult to answer because I can’t think of ANY historical figures… or at least I wouldn’t care to meet any of the ones I’m thinking of… I have no reason to meet any historical figures I guess

questions like this make me feel stupid on account of apparently I should be more interested in history or historical figures hehehe

the only historical figures that immediately come to mind are George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Jesus – I couldn’t care less about the first two and assuming Jesus didn’t speak English, what good would it do to meet him?

I guess the reason for wanting to meet a historical figure would be that you have questions to ask them or something – I can’t think of anyone from history who I have any questions for… so I guess the answer is nobody

3. What did you and Sam wear to your wedding?

I wore a white kinda gauzy cotton dress (which I later dyed black and wore until it fell apart… at which point I cut off the ‘skirt’ and wore it as a shirt until IT fell apart) – he wore black jeans and a black Jimi Hendrix t-shirt… but at the last minute apparently someone forced him to wear a white dress shirt over that for the ceremony

4. Lentils: starch or protein?

I consider them protein… but I think they’re pretty high in carbs too

5. ostriches or emus?

I had to look them up to see what the hell the difference is – and I’m still not sure but I think I’ll have to go with ostriches

look how CUTE they are!!! at least I think these are ostriches hehehe

go on... give 'em the ol' clickeroo!! if you don't, they'll cry!! you don't wanna make an ostrich cry - do you?!!