Oops, I Did it Again

Well the Showalters are looking into refinancing the homestead.  What with me having given up some significant wages in the last year, and the interest rates being low, it looks like a way to possibly save a few bucks a month.  (What's that?  I could get a job you say?  Hmph.) 

We lined up an appraisal for Monday morning at 11:00 a.m.  Enough time for me to get my house, and myself, in tip-top shape for "the man" to come look at my home and judge the dickens out of it. 

Sunday night we made jokes about how I was going to be home by myself for the appraisal and that maybe I should show a little skin, if you know what I mean (wink, wink), in order to get a better value on the house.  Skin.  Honestly.  That's all we were talking about.  An ankle, maybe an exposed knee.  Get your minds out of the gutter people.  Alright, maybe flashing a hoot had been talked about.  But it was pure jest. 

Or so I thought.

Because honestly, who shows up an hour and fifteen minutes early to an appraisal?  When has a repair person, or the cable guy, or the plumber shown up early - ever?  The answer is: they don't.  If they give you a window they are always near the tail end of that window. 

So I woke up on Monday morning and got my house cleaned, all in my pj's.  Now all my pajamas are cozy, fleecy, utilitarian numbers.  So I often stay in them until I really need to get out of them.  Why get in clean clothes to clean the house and dirty them up?  I think it's good stewardship.  (Although I did have that awkward encounter with one of my piano students who popped by in the morning to reschedule her lesson last week.)  So at 9:45, a generous amount of time before my 11:00 appointment, I went into my bedroom and started changing.  One pair of jeans and a brassiere later came a knock on the door.  I immediately hit the deck like a gun shot had gone off. 

The problem is that several years ago we repainted our bedroom and hung up roman shades on the windows.  We quickly discovered that they are SEE THROUGH from the outside of the house!  It's ridiculous.  So I really need to get some fabric to hang behind them.  But the headboard of the bed covers the front window pretty good so unless you're standing on the porch, looking in to the front window, you really can't see much.  So I haven't worried about it even though I probably should get it taken care of. 

But who knows what the early appraiser saw.  Did he decide to do a little checking around before knocking on my door?  I can just hear him saying to his young son who was with him, "Son, this is why you don't call if you are going to show up early."  In the end it was a frazzled and embarrassed woman who answered the front door, having exposed herself to the working man. 

And no, it didn't seem to help the appraisal, which makes me feel all the dirtier.  Guess he didn't like what he saw.  Ugh. 

Week Report

Well, there's nothing much to report from here.  It's been a pretty quiet week overall. 

There was that one evening that Brian and I played euchre with friends and he went ape-crazy over a very well-played and strategic move that I made.  He yelled at me for minutes.  He pouted for hours.  I gently urged him to apologize for his behavior for about two days:

• Laying in bed saying, "are you sure there isn't anything you want to say to me?" 
• Kissing him goodbye as he heads to work fishing, "is that everything then? Does anything look a little different now that you've had a good night's sleep?" 
• Snuggling on the couch, whispering in his ear, "are you ready to admit you were wrong yet?"

But I got nothin'.  He is stubbornly clinging to his deluded sense of euchre morals. 

Then there was that one night that I went ape-crazy a few nights after the euchre incident.  And I mean, I really lost my cool in an uncharacteristic way and said a load of stuff that was cruel and untrue.  Geez Louise.  After thirteen years of marriage you'd think we'd have this figured out.  Clearly that is not the case.

I, however, apologized immediately.  (You like my self-righteous superiority?)

But I was still a little sore at him for a day or two. 

Then there was the evening that I decided to make venison chili that I simply couldn't enjoy.  And then in the morning I threw up.  HA!  It could have been that I didn't eat much of the chili therefore I stuffed myself with odds and ends I found in the fridge and chances are one of those things had, shall we say, turned?  But the chili put me in such a state of extreme hunger that I was forced to eat rotten food.  I still blame it on the chili.

And I'm glad it's no longer in my belly.

I don't know what I'm going to do with the remaining ground venison and the venison steaks seeing as I don't like it and will therefore, likely not be cooking with it.  Oh and poor Brian was SO excited about that meat.  SO EXCITED!  (A co-worker of his hunted Darrel the Christmas deer for us.)  I don't want to be wasteful but...gross.

And then there's this:

This is a beautiful calendar that Brian's mother gave us for Christmas.  And I hung it up with great joy when the new year hit.  (I actually REALLY love the ritual of changing the calendars.) 

But last week I looked more closely at it - and my mind when into a complete tailspin.  Honestly, it turned to mush for moments as I grappled with the utter confusion the images brought on.  Look more closely.

For the love of everything holy, who is the cruel person that decided this was a good idea?  It looks so much like a regular calendar that I had been reading the days all wrong.  For who knows how long?  (Well, probably not that long considering it's only the 12th.)  What if I've made crazy plans for 27th thinking it's a Saturday?  There is potential for mayhem here.  Now that I'm on to it's little tricks though, I'll be on my guard.  But not cool, calendar maker.  Not cool.  (But Linda, I do love the calendar.  I'm just saying, perhaps a warning would have been in order.)

Blah, Blah, Blah, New Years Resolutions, Blah, Blah

Oh 2011, how you loom brightly before me with your endless possibilities and promises of new/good things.  I have so many things that I resolve to do in this year that my head is swimming.  I was going to stick to just one thing and then I decided that lacked enough ambition for 2011 to respect. 

On new year's eve I decided I wanted to start a new tradition, inspired largely by the burning of Zozobra that I witnessed in New Mexico.  I found the burning of my "glooms" to be so cathartic that I wanted a little more of that in my life.  So I sent Brian outside with a challenge: to create fire using several pieces of soggy wood and a few newspapers.  He did not disappoint.  An hour later he had a blaze going worthy of burning the most wicked of glooms.  We wrote our woes down on slips of paper and cast them into the fire.  Gloom!  You shall haunt us no more!

Resolutions:  (Laces her fingers together, cracks her knuckles, rubs her hands together, prepares to type.)

1. As per my earlier entry, stop obsessing over what others think of me.  I have decided that when I find myself in the throes of obsession I will inform Brian who has been instructed to then slap me across the face and tell me to get a hold of myself, thereby creating a link between obsession and physical pain that should cure this bad habit.
2. Earn more money for our household, i.e. pull my own weight around here.
3. Stop obsessing over money and self-worth.
4. Drink more water for the love of Pete.
5. Read more books.
6. Stop feeling guilt over reading books.
7. Knit myself a garment that actually looks good on me.
8. Stop being a vampire bat and actually have a regular sleep schedule.
9. Move to Europe.
10. Be content in Indiana.
11. Become a travel agent.
12. Win the mega millions and be independently wealthy and move to Barbados.
13. Find out what I want to be when I grow up.
14. Embrace a simpler life - without feeling guilt that I am not living up to my potential.
15. Stop accumulating so much STUFF!  Stop buying stuff and wanting stuff...
16. Right after I get my new pair of boots.
17. Be kinder to Brian, avoiding references to his large head (both figuratively and literally) and the gray hairs on it.
18. Blog more.  I totally blew it last year.  I was going to try to beat my 2009 number and failed.
19. Be healthier - including the need to quit singing songs about how much I love butter.
20. Find the solution to world peace.

Okay, some of these are more dreams than resolutions.  But I don't care what you think.  (There.  See.  That wasn't so hard.)  HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!