More on the House

So, the outside is now pretty much done, except for painting the siding. I think this means we can probably call Dish to come out and put the satellite back up soon. That will be great...we'll be able to watch the Mavs/Suns series, which can't possibly be as exciting as the series with San Antonio, but should be good nonetheless. By the way, if you missed that San Antonio series, you missed some of the best basketball in the history of basketball. It was pretty amazing. Anyway, our house has passed the inspections for electrical and HVAC, and we are supposed get the framing inspected today. If we complete that trifecta and get another green card, we should be getting sheet rock on Friday or Saturday and then hardwoods installed Monday. That just leaves trim and painting and finishing out the closet. I'll try to get a decent picture of the inside soon.

Separated at Birth?

Me and Buddha.

Teachers

In 7th grade I had a math teacher named Mr. Mezzles. His name was pronounced like "measles." He was very mean, and I think he had a chip on his shoulder because of his name and because he was very short and bearded, so he looked like a troll.

In high school, there was a teacher named Mrs. English. She taught English. My English teacher was named Mrs. French. There was also a teacher named Miss Spell, but she taught Physics. She was sorta crazy, and always wore socks and sandals. My French teachers were named Madame Parrot, Madame Moula, and Monsieur Tanton. Madame Moula, in spite of her name, appeared to be very poor. Monsieur Tanton was nice, but ALWAYS had sweat rings, even in winter. Years later when I was a substitute teacher at my high school, I was shocked one day in the teacher's lounge to discover that Madame Moula and Monsieur Tanton were smokers. I don't know why this was shocking.

What's More Annoying?

The Snuggle Fabric Softener Bear or the helpful paperclip pop-up on Microsoft Word?

Pioneer Days

I never could have made it as a pioneer. I like having all mod cons. As you know, we haven't had TV for a few weeks. Not THAT big of a deal, biggest whip is not being able to watch basketball. But on Friday, things got worse. The computer crashed, so we were without internet all weekend. The computer is now mostly repaired, but we are still not using the internet because we don't have an anti-virus loaded yet. So, no TV, no internet. All weekend, I had no idea what was happening in the world. I had no idea of the weather report. No email. No bloggability. Plus, inside our house were the many mosquitos let in by the construction crew, so we were fighting bugs all weekend. I think we killed most of them. Kev is a skilled mosquito killer. Anyway, I'm glad I'm not a pioneer.

So, sorry if you have commented or emailed and gotten no reply, that's why, and I'm sorry. I am at work now, and hope to get to some email and blogging before my client arrives.

And when we can use the internet at home again, I'll put up a few pictures of addition progress. Estimated finish date: June 9.

P= 14 days!

Back View / Side View

It looks like some electrical stuff was done today too. Things are progressing. Noise isn't too bad. Worst part is mosquitos are getting in. I just got bit right under my eye.

Me-oh My-oh

Yesterday I made a big ol' pot of Jambalaya. I should have maybe made it a little spicier, but it was still good and reminded me of being in New Orleans. New Orleans has some of the best food ever. Kev must have liked it, because he took this picture. Anyway, if you have never had Jambalaya, you should make some. It is really fun and easy to make. It is so good that the great Hank Williams Sr. even wrote a song about it.
The only thing I didn't like was that this time I had to take the tails off the shrimp myself. Usually the fishmonger has already done that gruesome task for me. It is almost worse than cleaning chicken.
We are going to have it again tomorrow night, and freeze the rest for the days ahead when I am too tired to cook.

Speaking of which:

P=19 days...

Roof

It's beginning to look a lot like a real roof. Maybe shingles today?

Touchdown Arthur Jefferson!!!!!

Well, last night we were up until midnight listening to the great Mark Followill and his over-excited call of the Mavs game in a scary and stressful OT victory over the Spurs. Sometimes Followill gets so excited that you can't understand a word he says, and it takes a few seconds to figure out what actually happened. But that's OK. Especially when the alternative is listening to the Frankensteinian Glowing-haired repetative Bill Walton and his ABC crew. They are terrible. Anyway, it was a great game, and it puts the Mavs up 3-1 in the series. They are certainly proving themselves.

In other sports news, Triple-A Sacramento's Tim Rall has not played in a while, and I was worried, but as it turns out, he's on the DL. I can't find out any info on his injury, so maybe Marty can help us out. I am just glad whatever it is hasn't gotten him sent back to Midland, at least as far as I can tell.

And the 1st-place Rangers FINALLY beat the Yankees.

There is your sports for today.

Palo Pinto Circus

We now live under the Big Top.
But I think we are a little closer to having a roof.

Mother's Day Flowers

Use your imagination. Is it just me, or do those flowers look like big ol' owl eyes?

The Horses are on the Track

The following is a list of things that should maybe happen during the next few weeks, but we don't know the timing or order. Which comes first? Place your bets!

1. The Peanut will arrive.
2. My belly button will go from innie to outie.
3. The guys will finish our addition.
4. Kev will get his car back from the ridiculous garage.
5. LarryFeathers will blog.

The weekend was good. We went to the lake for a Mother's Day picnic with my mom and dad and LarryF. I thought it was fun because the weather was great and I even got to play a little smash-ball. Last night, Kev beat me at Stratego and then we played with Lincoln Logs (much more my speed than Stratego). AND the Mavs won game three on Saturday.

Now the builders are here, and it's about to get loud, so I am heading out. Maybe we will have a roof when I get home.

Countdown to Peanut - 21 days

Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters

We have very little roof left. I fear critters may invade. Will be glad when roof work is done.

Busy Weekend Ahead

I am at my office, and I have rarely been so happy to come to work. It is SO loud at my house today. They are doing roof work, and whatever they were up to this morning was making the whole house shake. I have a client coming over this afternoon, so it may not be an easy session. We'll see how it goes.

Tonight, I think we are going to the movies. You know what that means: BBQ chicken wrap! Woo hoo! Then, tomorrow morning, we are going to a class at the hospital to learn, as Kev says, how to "operate the baby." We will learn infant safety and CPR, plus bathing and caring for newborns and stuff like that. I think it will be a good class. Tomorrow night, I am going to Larry Feathers' house to watch the TIVOed season finale of the Office, which I missed because we have no TV. Then, the 3rd game of the Mavs/Spurs series is on, so I will stay over there and watch that. Sunday is Mother's Day, and we are all going on a picnic. I am looking forward to being outside. It is supposed to be cool out.

So, not a lot of down time, but staying busy is good. Countdown to Peanut: 25 Days.

Moving Right Along

Continued progress on the room. Thankfully the air is cooler and the rain has stopped. Work on the roof starts soon.

Sad/Happy Blog

As I type this, our Dish is coming down. No more TV for us. Glad I got to see the Mav's game last night.

On a happier note, berries are back in season, and they are delightful!

We Have a Wall!

This is the progress so far. It is all blurry because I could not keep the lens from fogging up due to exreme humidity.

Noisy Day on Palo Pinto

I've got to hand it to the builders. They are really working hard. I feel sorry for them, because it is REALLY hot and humid today. I'm actually kinda worried about the one guy who appears to be about 80 years old. We now have a floor. It looks like a big stage. It makes me want to get out my tap shoes. I'll go out and take a picture after the guys leave so I can put it here on the blog. Anyway, whatever they are working on today is making a lot of noise. The lady next door who has a day-care center in her house is probably not having much luck with nap-time.

Meanwhile, I am working hard to get all my proverbial ducks in a row before the arrival of the Peanut. I have a long list, and I've been checking things off, but it's wearing me out. Kev has been working hard too, assembling various baby accessories like pack-n-plays and bouncey seats and strollers. We've been practicing how to use all that stuff...it is more complicated than you might think.

Tonight is game 2 of the Spurs/Mavs series, and I still have confidence in the Mavericks in spite of Sunday's loss. I am making chicken marsala for dinner, which is a big step for me, as I've had a strong aversion to it through most of my pregnancy. We'll see how it goes.

Countdown to Peanut = 27 days.

Boo!

I am working on a list of people to haunt if I am ever a ghost. I won't hurt anyone, just play tricks on them. Here is what I have so far:

1. Rush Guy: I will steal all his Rush CDs and replace them with Celine Dion, John Denver, and Kenny G. Then I will set his radio to the smooth jazz station and make it come on really loud in the middle of the night every night. I will re-string his guitar backwards. Then I will get a ghost friend with some technical skills to make his amp only go to volume level one.
2. Elizabeth Newman (builder of McMansions): I will hide one shoe from every pair she owns. I will replace her hairspray with something that smells bad. I will gather up all the Elizabeth Newman signs and put them in her yard.
3. Rachel Ray: I will hide her giant salad tongs and put green dye in her toothpaste.

That's all I have so far. And then when I finish all that, I will go to good people's houses and do nice things for them, like doing their laundry or baking them some key lime pie or brownies.

The Daytona Beach Incident

Last night, I was awake for a long time in the middle of the night. These days, I wake up a lot, but I can usually go back to sleep. Not last night. There was a big loud storm, and I was up for two or three hours. I tried to hypnotize myself back to sleep, but it didn't work, so I finally gave up and decided to let stream of consiousness take over and see what would happen. Stream of consiousness can take you to strange and unexpected places, and last night, for no reason I can think of, it took me to a trip to Florida I took when I was 5 or 6 years old. My grandparents frequented Florida, and this particular time, my aunt, uncle, and two cousins joined them and I was invited along. My family didn't go because my brother was too little, and I guess my parents had to work. I don't remember a whole lot about the trip, but here is what I DO remember:

We rented a house a couple of blocks from the beach. The house was very weird to me because instead of grass, the whole yard was rocks. The house also had a waterbed, which I thought was SO cool, but I didn't get to sleep on it. I am pretty sure I slept on the couch in the living room. One day, we went to the beach, which I don't really remember. Now, I need to tell you that when I was a little kid, I had really good hair. It was long and sort of wavy and thick and soft. This was, of course, many years before I was struck by lightning, turning my hair to frizzfrocks, which has only been out-done by my current pregnancy-induced hay-head. But that's another story. Upon returning from the beach, my good kid hair was full of tangles because of the wind and salt-water. My Aunt Sarah decided to comb the tangles out. This part, I remember well. The conversation went something like this:

OW!
Hold still, Tara.
OW!
Hold still, Tara.
You're hurting me!
Hold still!
OW!
Patty's (my mom) gonna kill me if we have to cut your hair.
I want my mom!
Hold still!
OW!

This went on for at least half an hour, as those were some pretty stubborn tangles, and my aunt didn't have the good tangle-getting-out skills that my mom had. She was pulling and yanking and cussing and it really really hurt. I was not happy.

The next day, it was time to go to the beach again. It was then that I was informed I would be wearing my grandma's shower cap, so that any subsequent tangles could be avoided. Even at my young age, I knew this was a serious fashion no-no, but I was just a kid and did what I was told. Somewhere there are photos of me on the beach in a shower cap. It was SO humiliating. After that, I decided I wanted to go home, and I made a lot of noise about it, demanding that we must cut the trip short and return to Indiana, where people didn't force other people to wear ridiculous headgear in public places. I didn't get my way, and I am pretty sure that may behavior caused my grandpa to stop speaking to me for several hours. Later that night, we made up and watched the Major League Baseball All-Star game together, rooting for the National League because we were Reds fans. That is my best memory from the trip.

We also went to Disney, but to be honest, it didn't make much of an impression on me. All I can remember is my cousin Curt whining to go on Space Mountain over and over again. I think he got his way, too.