Inane Chatter

Sunday, John replaced the side mirror on his car (it was cracked, and he needs to get the car inspected), and then he replaced the door-lock relay in my car.  Remember that?  How I’ve had manual locks for FOREVER because they kept cycling on and off and draining the battery so John unplugged the relay?  Well, he ordered a new one and installed it Sunday, and now our fingers are crossed that it was actually the relay that was bad and not the switch in the door.  We’ll know if my battery dies.  So yesterday morning, in the cold, I half-expected us to have to take John’s car to boxing since surely my battery would be dead.  But no – it started right up.  Hooray!  And then it started up again when we left boxing, and again when I left for work.  Hooray and hooray again!

Then I got to work and heard from John.  His day didn’t go so well.

HIS car wouldn’t start.  I was already gone, so I couldn’t jump it for him.  He tried to pop-start it, but he couldn’t get enough momentum to back out of the driveway and into the street.  (Our driveway has a little bit of an incline towards the street, but not much.)  Then he tried to push it back up the driveway and let it roll back again, but that didn’t work.  After about half an hour, the neighbor we almost NEVER talk to (the one who mows his lawn (when he mows it) in khakis and a button-down shirt) came out to go to work, so John got him to jump it (which I’m sure took a lot of explaining on John’s side).

Side note: I just typed “hump” instead of “jump”, and I had to pause for giggles.  And more giggles, because that really would take a lot of explaining on John’s side.

Okay, I’m back.  So, his day didn’t start off well.  THEN he found out that his window wouldn’t work when he tried to order lunch in the drive-thru.  It just wouldn’t roll down (he assumes he did something when he replaced the mirror on Sunday).  It’s always embarrassing when you have to open your door to place your order.  In the cold.  At lunch time on a weekday when there’s a line of cars behind you.

Poor John.  At least his car has started without assistance every time since then.  Of course, then today arrived, with its two to three inches of snow.  We shoveled the driveway, and I started to head off to work, but I changed my mind when I heard they hadn’t even plowed our parking lot yet (at the office, at ten after eight), and then I fishtailed a bit when I took a turn at the bottom of the street, so I came home just as John was backing out of the driveway.  I gave him my car and stayed home.  It STILL took him 25 minutes to go 3 miles, but at least he was in a car with 4-wheel drive instead of rear-wheel drive.

Cars and winter – these do not a good combination make.

It’s January, and the holidays are over.  The countdown to spring has officially begun.  (It’s a long way off.)  But it’s not all bad.  Our house is under contract, the buyers’ condo is on the market, they haven’t returned our HOA docs in horror, there’s a three-day weekend this month, and my birthday is next month.  I will survive.

January appears to be confused.  Yesterday, the high was 45.  Today, almost 65.  I went for a run.  It was nice.  Tonight’s low is 35, which happens to also be tomorrow’s high, and then it’s going to be in the 20s for a few days.  I suppose that’s closer to normal, but come on!  I didn’t actually ask for winter.

1. The bread pudding at Ford’s Fish Shack is really really good.  White chocolate and blueberries and some sort of delicious sauce and vanilla ice cream and WOW.  We split one tonight, in honor of our delayed anniversary dinner.  Also, their crab cakes are good.  Also, they’re crazy popular.  The first reservation I could get for tonight (I called at 4pm) was at 9pm.  So instead of waiting, we ate early (like before 5) because we’re old married people.  But dude – it was good.

2. Friends is on Netflix now!  I mentioned it to my esthetician (I had a facial last night), and she got so excited.  We spent the last half-hour of my appointment quoting our favorite lines and giggling like idiots.  It was fun.

Because John’s family knows us so well, we got two copies of the game Geek Out for Christmas.  It seems silly to own it twice, so after playing Lords of Waterdeep with Jess and Chuck on New Year’s Eve (good game, lots of fun), we decided to exchange a redundant Geek Out for that one.

Well, we haven’t done it yet, but if we make it to the mall soon, we will.  At least a decision was made.  Margaret, when you decide to start your LARPing career, you should aim for the scary dark-elf-type person on the right for your first costume.  I don’t know who she is, but she looks like she could kick some ass.

We haven’t played Geek Out yet, but it’s a trivia game (that can also be played by two people), so maybe we’ll give it a try this weekend.

Happy 2015!  It’s starting off well, actually.  Last night, we heard from our agent that the buyers we’ve been nursing along for the past couple of weeks signed our last counter-offer!  Woohoo!  I haven’t seen the official final copy yet, but unless our agent is playing a very cruel joke, we have a ratified contract on our house!  HOORAY!  We’re a half-step closer to our magical future.  Now we just need to get the buyers’ condo sold.  Anyone looking to buy a condo near me?

I don’t generally enjoy the year-in-review articles and lists (except for Tom and Lorenzo’s Best and Worst Dressed lists – those are awesome), and I’m not going to do one myself.  I don’t know what would be on it, anyway.  But it’s New Year’s Eve, and we can all say goodbye to 2014 (and good riddance) and hello to 2015.  In 2015, we WILL move out of this house.  We WILL.

Cheers!

What should one do when one can’t think of anything to write?  One could stay far away from the blog, to avoid publishing the vapid contents of one’s brain, but I’m afraid that cat is out of the bag.  One could surf the internet looking for inspiration, but that assumes one isn’t working and should not be on the internet at all.  One could rifle through one’s memories of the past week, full of holiday cheer and conviviality and whatnot, searching for stories to tell one’s adoring readership, but then one might remember the last week was rather low-key and was already mined for interesting tidbits.  One might consider regaling one’s public with details of the sinus issues one is currently experiencing, but one might reconsider, as that would be unseemly, impolite, and gross.  One could try changing one’s writing style, but one might be worried about sounding stilted or snobbish.  One wouldn’t want that.  Best not to try it.

Warm toast is one of the best smells.  Have they made a candle scented like that yet?  Probably, but why don’t I have one?  Hm.  It would make me hungry.  I should stay away.  If you love toast, too, children, please enjoy the following video (introduced to me by our very own Sparky).

The holiday season sinus problems have begun.  Well, they started yesterday, but last night was bad, and this morning I just can’t breathe through my nose.  I’m not enjoying my status as a mouth-breather.  Other than that, I feel fine.  Mostly.

Hm.  Maybe I don’t feel fine.  I’m going to sit here on the couch and stare blankly at my book.  I believe we will be postponing our anniversary dinner.

I’m sure I’ve said this before, but I’m always relieved to pull into our driveway after a few days’ absence and find the house still standing.  And there’s always the relief of being HOME.  I’m HOME.  I’m wearing comfy pajamas and sitting on my own comfy couch about to finish watching Broadchurch and what on earth am I still doing online?

This is the oddest Christmas.  We’re enjoying ourselves, but it seems like we’ve spent most of the last few days waiting.  Tuesday, we were waiting for work to be over so we could hit the road.  On Christmas Eve, we were waiting for Tom and Tania to arrive.  On Christmas Day, we were waiting for Emily and Sean to arrive.  None of this is bad, and we’ve certainly enjoyed ourselves while waiting, but it’s so different from other years.  Much more low-key.  It’s been a very nice Christmas, actually, odd and all.  Very late nights, though.  I’m SO tired.

It was a rainy Christmas Eve, and our plans to walk around the historic part of the nearby town were scuttled (it’s a lot less pleasant in the wet), so we had a cozy day inside.  Molly and I started a puzzle, we played some card games, watched Superman (Molly had never seen it before), went out to dinner, played Cranium, and then played several rounds of Bananagrams while waiting for Tom and Tania to arrive.  We had a good time, very low-key, but I’m exhausted.  Now it’s a foggy Christmas Eve (although it’s past midnight, so I suppose it’s actually a foggy Christmas – regardless, it looks like Rudolph has some work to do), and I’m heading to bed.

Last night we found ourselves driving through the rain in the dark,  singing along to the radio (Christmas songs and others), and what should pop into my brain but “harses, harses, harses, harses”.  We did not immediately switch to Delilah or Dr. Laura or whatever (my Meg Ryan channeling has its limits), so I missed my opportunity to star in a romantic comedy.

The prep is almost over.  We’ve bought all the Christmas presents, wrapped everything, and picked up everything we’ll need.  The laundry is done, and the house is not a complete disaster.  All that’s left is to pack and do a little light cleaning.

I was going to post something last night, but Broadchurch is finally on Netflix.  (!!Yay!!)  We watched the first episode on YouTube months ago, but that was kind of a pain, so we figured we’d wait.  Last night we watched three episodes (hence the lack of posting), and only the knowledge that Doug would beat us senseless if we were too tired to defend ourselves in class this morning kept us from watching the last two.  Now we’re going to have to wait for the weekend.  It’s going to be difficult.  Turns out I missed seeing David Tennant on my television screen.  (Sigh.  I love him.)

So we went to bed, but my book kept me up later than I’d planned (I just started Attachments by Rainbow Rowell), and then I had a dream about a zombie woman who was attacking my car (which has NOTHING to do with my book – there are no zombies (yet)), so I’m pretty darn tired this morning anyway.  Starbucks helps.  At least my drink was right today.  I went Monday morning, and for the first time in forever (who’s singing with me?), they got my drink WRONG.  Like god-awful wrong.  And I didn’t realize it until I got to the office.  It didn’t ruin my morning or anything (I’m not that much of a drama queen), but it was awful.  I like mint, and I like mint chocolate, but I don’t want mint anywhere near my coffee.  A peppermint white mocha smells horrendous and tastes worse.  I shudder just thinking about it.

It’s that time again, kiddies.  Time to bake ALL the cookies.  138 of them, to be exact (although it’s 137  now – we ate one).  Not as many as last year, somehow.  Did I bake bigger cookies?  Or did John eat more batter?  Anyway, the cookies are cooling, and two more sweet potato pies are in the oven.  The toffee bark and peppermint bark get made tomorrow (they’re way easier – melt, mix, freeze, break into pieces).

We’ve determined that we are NOT going to the mall tomorrow.  It would have been just for fun, anyway, since we’re done with the shopping, but why make the trip if we really don’t have to?  No open house tomorrow (we’re taking the next couple of weeks off, although we’re available for showings, of course), so we don’t have to scramble to clean up or disappear.  It’ll be great.  We can sleep in, wrap some presents, leave the house if we feel like it…  That works for me.

We watched Knights of Badassdom last night.  Mom, you’ll hate it.  Don’t bother.  Same goes for you, Margaret.  Everyone else who hangs out around here would probably enjoy it (if you haven’t already seen it – I’m looking at you, Randy.  You’ve seen it, haven’t you?), silly as it is.  Full disclosure – it’s about LARPing.  And there go Mom and Margaret.  Bye, guys!  We still love you!

It was fun, and we liked it.  Great review, right?  That’s what they pay me for.  Except for the paying part.  And the “they” part.  There’s no “they”.

I’m not sure exactly how it happened, but I have been roped into agreeing to do karaoke with coworkers at some future happy hour.  It’s one of those things I can’t really back out of.  I love to sing (haaaaaave you met me?), so I wouldn’t have thought I’d be nervous about this, but I’ve never done karaoke.  I’m more than willing to try it (I think it sounds like fun), but I’m not as comfortable trying it with coworkers.  I like these people, but they’re not my best friends at work.  They’re also not total strangers.  I think I’d be more comfortable in front of total strangers.

Anyway, it’s not that serious, and I’ll manage when the time comes.  That time was supposed to be last night, but the central instigator had to bail (he’d forgotten about his daughter’s Christmas pageant), so I escaped, relieved.  I need more time to figure out what my song possibilities are.  Gotta have options, right?  Now I have more time to overthink this.

We have a decorating contest at work every year.  I never participate (I don’t even decorate at home, most years), but some people go all out.  It’s amazing.  I share an office with one of the contest judges, and she likes to decorate (we can’t compete, but still), so I now work in a winter wonderland.  Sort of.  It’s like a winter-ish okay-land.  She put fake snow on a couple of shelves and on her desk, added some plush snowmen and a snow globe, and she hung little ornaments on my fake plant.  I think the fake snow looks like clouds, like we should have Care Bears instead of snowmen.

There’s a remarkable resemblance, right?

On my fake plant, the fake snow looks like fog.

My plant is hidden in the mist.  Very mysterious.

And then we have South Park snowmen frolicking on the window.

So festive.  (Such fun!)  Our office is NOTHING like the cubes belonging to the people who take this seriously.  One guy built a gingerbread house around his cube.  Roof, walls, and a door.  It looks great.  Another guy painted 12 pictures, all Christmas-themed but patterned after famous paintings, and turned his cube into an art gallery.  It’s incredible.  This guy goes all out every year (he recreated the Grinch Who Stole Christmas last year, complete with security video of the Grinch stealing Christmas), but I think this year is his best.  The paintings are REALLY good.

I’ve been pretty good about the exercise part of “eat right and exercise”, but eating right has been difficult.  I’m sure it would get easier if I EVER went grocery shopping, but I don’t do that.  (Let’s not be crazy.)  Eating out for nearly every meal can be done in a relatively healthy way, though (and it can be done without spending THAT much money, too).  It’s not bad when I’m out already, like at work, or on the way home from work.  Panera is a staple of our diet – they have lots of healthy options and they make portion control pretty easy.  (We might be keeping them in business.)  We run into a problem when we’re home, we have no food in the house, and we don’t want to go anywhere to get it.  That’s when the bad choices get made.  Don’t want to leave the house?  Order a pizza!  Tired of pizza?  Order Chinese!  Don’t want either?  There’s a pasta place that delivers enormous portions of everything.  Really?  Sounds great!  So weekends kill me.  I wish Panera delivered.

I want to want to go to the grocery store.  I want to want to plan ahead and have healthy lunches and snacks.  That’s a good first step, right?  Step 1: Want to change.  Hey, that might be step 2.

Step 1: Recognize the problem.

I eat like crap.

Step 2: Want to change to fix the problem.

I don’t want to eat like crap anymore.  I want to eat healthy food like a healthy person.

Step 3: Make lists and plans for change to fix the problem.  (You thought Step 3 was going to be fixing the problem, didn’t you?  Ha ha!  You were wrong.)

Step 4: Fix the problem.

I’m at Step 2, contemplating Step 3.  I do have small victories here and there.  There’s a SuperTarget near my office, and twice in two weeks I’ve picked up a small package of veggies and dip for lunch.  It’s delicious and healthy!  Good for me and makes me feel good!  And then I’m hungry again by mid-afternoon, but this is an obstacle I can overcome with more healthy snacks.  That I will have to go to the store to get.  Drat! Foiled again.

I’ve been in need of a new laptop for a while now.  I can’t even upgrade my poor pretty pink Dell to the latest Ubuntu version.  My graphics card can’t handle it.  I bought it…6 years ago?  Maybe?  It’s been a while, anyway.  It’s slowing down, and sometimes the fan rattles, and it just can’t do anything anymore.  I’m in need.  In support of The Plan, we both need laptops that can handle work needs (I’ll need Windows, John needs processing power), and sure, we haven’t sold our house yet, but that’ll happen any day now, right?  And in the meantime, I really do need a new laptop.  Really.  So….why not get a cool one?  The coolest one out there?  We decided that new laptops would be our Christmas presents to each other, and once we found the ones we wanted, we didn’t see any reason to wait.    They arrived last week.  And mine is SO COOL.  I got the Lenovo Yoga 2 Pro.  Lightweight, touch screen, pretty powerful.  It’s COOL.  And pretty.  I got the silver one.