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Sunday, July 31, 2005
Today, Sarah and I are going to go to church and to the aquarium get tattoos and shave our heads and go on an all-night whiskey and cocaine binge with some guys we met at the docks. (hi mom!) Hint: the tip-off that I'm kidding is that I can't really drink whiskey successfully.
Last night, we watched some classic MST3K: Parts: The Clonus Horror (currently in theatres as The Island), and The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies. I gave Sarah a brief and inept knitting lesson, and she made excellent progress.
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Saturday, July 30, 2005
Fabulous niece Sarah and I are having a fine time. She's only been here a couple of days, but we've been so very very busy it seems like longer!
Thursday was just an insane day of moving stuff around; Dennis' grandparents are moving and they offered us their gas grill and a big ol' leather barcolounger, so I got some hired teenage muscle from St. Ned's and went to get that. The chair is perfectly broken in and I predict that there will be naps taken in it.
Sarah started the new Harry Potter on the plane out here and finished it in the car yesterday. We drove down to the outlets in Freaking Gilroy to do some school-related shopping. I got a very silly purse for $12 at the Banana Republic outlet. It's green and matches my car and has enough room for a smallish portable knitting project. I also got a Chococat tape dispenser for my desk at work from the half-price Sanrio store. I'm hoping it will keep my tape from being stolen all the time.
This morning we are going to go see Dennis on his last Saturday at the record barn. He traded in a bunch of CDs yesterday and gave Sarah the $75 trade slip, so there will be shopping. I'm glad that some CDs left our place, although I'm sure there are many many more new ones waiting in the PO box. He is making good progress on packing up all the music here. I'm not touching it, since I don't know how the system of piles works. There's stuff to be reviewed, stuff for the next review column, people he wants to talk to, etc. etc. etc. One of the first tasks when we start setting up the new place will be figuring out where the piles are going to go.
Anyway, after we finish amusing ourselves in Berkeley, we're going to go hang out at Ryan's, and she's going to show us how to make icing flowers and we're going to watch a bunch of MST3K and relax a bit. Tomorrow is the Monterey Aquarium and a Hookslide show, and Monday we're going to Santa Cruz. She goes back to Michigan on Tuesday, and then the long tedious moving process begins.
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Tuesday, July 26, 2005
I was seduced by a sign promising just-picked sweet corn. I am not made of stone!
Clyde decided that she wanted some, too, and attacked the cob. It looked something like this:
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Sunday, July 24, 2005
I'm going to take a year off from deacon school. I've been doing a lot of discernment this summer, and I don't think I'm done with it yet.
 I know I'm going to get shit for this decision, but it's really not some kind of 'I don't want to make toys! I want to be a DENTIST!' moment. It's more that what I'm doing now isn't working. Honestly? I suspect it's not working because I negotiated this big contract with God and went ahead even though mine is the only signature on the paper.
Which is kind of a sucky thing to realize, what with my alleged holiness and all.
I don't know if I'm saying No or Not Yet, but I don't feel like I can go back until I chip away at this a little more.
There's a part of me that just really, really wants some kind of order and structure and validation to this whole faith thing, and one place to look for all of that is in preparation for ordained ministry. You do this and this and this and you learn these things and you jump through these hoops and then the bishop stamps you on the head and then you're not just some big weirdo who couldn't handle the real world. There's an element of ego to it, too, in the temptation of thinking you would be slightly better than everyone else with a collar. Even though that's not at all true, I sometimes see a bit of that motivation flickering around the edges for me. And I just wonder what is driving this Must! Do! This! Now! bus that I've been on. I don't think the urgency is God's, I think it's mine.
And, of course, in my even more selfish moments, I really want to just sink into this life we're putting together and enjoy some of the blessings that have been piling up. I want to have friends over, and knit, and sew, and get my body healthier, and teach Godly Play, and sexually harass Dennis the Sexton, and write more. A lot of those things got pushed aside last year.
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I got a lot of packing done yesterday with Ryan's help. Most of the glasses and dishes are safely tucked into boxes. Yay! That's the stuff that's the most tedious to do, the stuff that requires all the bubblewrap. I got most of our books boxed up, too. We have a lot of books. So far, so good.
I think I may be a knitter. At church this morning, the person in front of me was wearing a beautiful lace knit cardigan, and I proceeded to un-knit it with my eyes through the rest of the service. Rita was sitting next to me doing the same thing.
Rita and I collaborated on going-away presents for some kids from St. Ned's whose family is moving to NYC. We knit a hat and a muff out of purple Fun Fur for the girl, 2, and I made a set of Godzilla Mittens for the boy. I couldn't do the back-bumps convincingly with so little space, though, so I left those off. He reacted about the same way that Leigh did when she got hers; there was much biting. I should probably apologize to his parents.
Dennis and I are both getting really excited about the move; we keep thinking of yet more reasons why living in Sunnyvale is going to rock. I just really love our life right now, even with all the chaos and the bubble wrap and the slightly frayed nerves and regularly-scheduled super freakouts that seem to be part of, as U-Haul calls it, America's Moving Adventure. Yeah, I'll show you adventure.
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Friday, July 22, 2005
My car wasn't ready last night, so the Mothership gave me a loaner. I ended up driving a new Touareg home. This was probably a good thing, because if they had given me, say, a Beetle convertible, I might not have wanted to give it back. But giving up the Touareg won't be a problem. Because it is GIANORMOUS. The name is fun, though, in an Ikea kind of way. "The Touareg comes in five large boxes, and is assembled with a hex wrench and white glue."
I have to admit, I'm kind of in love with Sunnyvale VW at this point, which is weird because I've always been an independent mechanic sort of girl. They quoted me a good price on my upcoming 100k mile (gulp) service, so I'll probably take it back there in a couple months.
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Thursday, July 21, 2005
I'm feeling quite good today. I wanted to make a note of that because it probably won't be too long before I go into moving overload and build a complex fort out of cardboard boxes and packing tape and refuse to come out. But today...today is good.
My car is at the VW Mothership, getting the window fixed For Free, thanks to the 'oops, our windows kind of suck' extended warranty. I'm buying it some shiny new more-functional redesigned window switches and getting its oil changed while it's there, but they're getting the window up out of the door and installing the new switches free. Yay! Happy! And I should be able to get it to the body shop right after we move to fix its ouchies. I'm letting that slip to the back burner for now.
Ryan is coming over to help me pack on Saturday. It's actually not so much that I need help packing, it's that I need someone to keep me from NOT packing. She is an excellent packing and de-cluttering drill sergeant, and that is exactly what I need. That, and noodles from Slurp on Telegraph, which is our planned field trip for lunch. I will miss Slurp.
I have to get on top of this packing thing, because fabulous niece Sarah, 14 (although I am probably contractually obligated to note that she'll be 15 in a couple of weeks), arrives on Wednesday for a visit with her crazy aunt. We're going to have an excellent time. We need to get together with Sarah the Hussy to have maximum Sara/Sarah density per square foot.
Happy Thursday!
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We all know the image of Jesus knocking at the door, asking us to open our homes our hearts. It has been depicted in art of many mediums and many styles. But, I'm sorry, this is just Jesus locking himself out of the house after taking a shower:
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Tuesday, July 19, 2005
The new issue of Bust (August/September) was waiting for me when I got home. I have some sewing pattern reviews on page 27. It's my second piece for Bust, and the first one that doesn't have the word fuck in it about fifteen times. But you're welcome to slip it in at random while you're reading.
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I'm trying to train all of our belongings to jump into boxes on their own. It is not working. Only Clyde will jump into the boxes uninvited. I think we're just going to have to pack everything. Sigh.
We gave the slumlord notice; we're going to keep the love shack through August 15th. We can get into the new place on August 1st, so that will allow us a bit of transition time.
Dennis gave notice at the record barn today; he ain't workin' there no more. In a couple of weeks, anyway. Once we get moved, he's going to be the new facilities manager at St. Ned's, or, if you speak Episcopalian, the Sexton. Huh huh huh huh. She said Sexton. This rocks on many, many levels. I really need the help keeping this place running, and I know he'll do a great job. Plus it's very flexible; stuff has to get done but he doesn't have to be here at set times too often, so he can build his schedule around writing and doing interviews with musicians. And maybe swinging by to have lunch with his wife once in a while.
Yes, the church secretary is already sexually harassing the new sexton. It's like a bad British comedy at our house.
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Sunday, July 17, 2005
Naaarrrrgh. As we left church this morning, Dennis was driving and when he went to roll his window up, we heard a shattering sound and nothing else happened. So my driver-side window has broken. Inside the door. Bleh.
I think I could make a decent case for this being caused by the accident...I mean, I can't think of any other times that something has slammed into the car recently. I'm paying my glass deductible now to get it taken care of, but I'll definitely be documenting it for the other insurance company. Which means, if this is like the last accident I had, I will see the money again sometime in late 2006.
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Saturday, July 16, 2005
Yay, I have photos of the Fairy Godchild in her Monkey Sweater!
 | "but if my sweater rocks this much, why do I have to wear shoes, too?" |
Stylish yet practical, the monkey sweater is perfect for the toddler mom on the go!
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The monkey on the back (heh...monkey on your back!) is from the backpack pattern in Stitch-n-Bitch, and I charted the banana for the front myself. There's more about the sweater here. I was reasonably happy with it, although the yarn turned out to be one of the ones that deeply resents having the ends woven in.
I currently have four active projects on needles, which must be some kind of record for me.
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I stayed awake far too late last night, engaging in useless mindfuckery, so Dennis let me sleep in this morning and went off to work without waking me. And I had this email waiting for me:
...you are SO amazingly loved by me and God, both. There's almost too many good things in the works. Worry is natural, in fact, it's crucial to the
process. Letting go of it and then finding ourselves still standing is
one of the ways the Lord shows us how faith is rewarded. I'm concerned about
aspects of all that's happening right now. We've barely had a week to absorb
it. But, darling one, we will pack all that needs packing and discard the
rest. We will shine when it seems like we're tarnished for good. Enjoy a day
where you ponder these FACTS and start to realize that great things await
just beyond our ability to see them...
Talk to you later, sleepy gal.
I love the way he just cuts right through my bullshit to what's true. I am constantly in awe of him.
Now I'm going to put on my Anxiety Present from last night, a Waifs CD that Dennis thought was very Sara, and get crackin' on some packin'.
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Friday, July 15, 2005
I'm feeling a bit better this evening. It's just that I don't even know where to start packing, and every time I look at something or think of something in the apartment my next thought is, "I'll have to pack that." So much packing. I'm taking furniture apart with my eyes.
Tomorrow I'm going to start in on some of the stuff that I pulled out of the kitchen when the ceiling fell. Anything that hasn't been used since then can't be that important, so it's going box-ward. I'm going to do the FlyLady thing and number the boxes as they're packed, so I'll know that these first boxes can be unpacked last.
I went to Target this afternoon; I guess a call went out to the Hive Mind or something, because it was unusually busy there and I kept getting into cart wars. Diet Crack is 4 cases for $10, yay. I also loaded up on cheap tuna for Clyde; I bought all they had, which was 25 cans. Based on my cart, I'm Crazy Tuna Lady, who apparently lives on nothing but tuna and soda, and seems to need a ridiculous amount of packing tape.
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I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out I'm not freaking out All moving and no money makes Sara something something
So, um, I'm not freaking out. Really.
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Wednesday, July 13, 2005
I've been pretty calm about moving, but today I'm freaking out just the tiniest little bit. It's just so much change all at once. Good change, but still, the idea of packing just makes me want to scream and flail about on the floor. Wah! Wah!
I'm really looking forward to building a home with Dennis from scratch, though. He lived in the love shack for years and years (and with a previous wife for a while) before I moved in, and even though I made a lot of changes, at some level it is still his place. It's hard to find a way to say that without making it sound like he did something wrong; it wasn't that at all. I'm just going to enjoy starting something new with him.
But, yeah, the freaking out isn't helping. I feel like I'm like an overstimulated kid who can't take one more second at Chuck E. Cheese. I might start spouting gibberish and waving my arms in the air if one more form of distraction presents itself. What will be the straw that causes the camel's psychotic break? No one knows. Makes life more interesting, doesn't it?
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Monday, July 11, 2005
I went to lunch today with our former youth minister, who is now the diocesan youth coordinator. We go to In-n-Out a lot, and maybe there has been some speculation about us, because the girl at the counter asked us today if we are...
[wait for it]
NUNS!
Clearly, I need to start wearing makeup again. Immediately. I'm giving off NunVibes!?!??!!!
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Saturday, July 09, 2005
Dennis brought home a bootleg of the Star Wars Holiday Special from 1978 this evening. Wow. Just wow.
Perhaps you might enjoy the review at Oh, the Humanity.
Happy Life Day, everyone.
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psst...we found an apartment.
Yes, we're moving down to Sunnyvale...and it only took a freeway accident and a falling ceiling for me to get the message. The Holy Spirit rolls its non-corporeal eyes at my thickness sometimes.
I'm about to get kind of woo-woo here, so feel free to skip this part. But, seriously, everything that has happened starting with the accident just feels like something clicking into place. The accident kept me from going all ninja painter on the bathroom last weekend, which meant that there wasn't another project in process when the ceiling fell. The ceiling falling broke the inertia of living in the love shack, and the accident pretty much ended my love affair with my commute. So I threw out an email to someone @ St. Ned's who owns rental property. Who happens to have a unit coming vacant which happens to be a one-bedroom in our price range where we could bring the kitty.
It's a great place; I think it's a bit smaller than the love shack, but it's got a dishwasher and a laundry room, which are both major upgrades for us. It also has a little fenced-in patio area by the front door, and big closets and lots of storage. I have mentally claimed half the linen closet for my fabric and yarn stash, but I suspect that may need to be negotiated with Dennis. It's about ten minutes away from work, which is a lot better than an hour-plus. SassyPriest will be our next door neighbor; I think we should just declare the building an outpost of St. Ned's and work there. In our pajamas.
My friend Cristopher got ordained today at St. Ned's. The bishop thought it was at 1:00, but it was at 11:00, so there was a little drama around finding the bishop. I wondered if there was an Amber Alert equivalent for stray clergy...Have You Seen This Bishop? But he got there and it was a wonderful service. We were all invited to wear red; clergy usually wear red stoles (the color of the Holy Spirit) for ordinations, but Cristopher wanted to include everyone. We do the 'wear red' thing for Pentecost every year, and I was surprised to see how much more festive it made everything seem. Note to self for possible future ordination. But that's a whole other working of the Holy Spirit in my life which is a much, much longer blog entry.
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Thursday, July 07, 2005
This was out on the front steps:
(Please don't use "Drano" it's damage drain pipes)
So that's what came out of the place upstairs. Guess it explains the leak.
This calls for some gratuitous Clyde cuteness.
widdle pink feets!
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Tuesday, July 05, 2005
It was weird driving by the scene of the accident today on my way to work. I don't know how it works in other places, but here all the accident debris and broken glass get brushed to the side of the road and picked up at some point in the distant future. It's not uncommon to see an entire bumper by the side of the freeway. So when I went by the accident scene, I saw parts of the SUV that was hit, all arranged in a nice sparkly little pile. The SUV lost a lot of parts.
St. Ned's has a shopvac, so TheRev is going to load that up in my car and I'll take it home for Battle:Grit.
[MST3K dorkage ahead]
 The new issue of Knitty is up, and includes this scarf. Which made me think of this design, which made me want to make a Mitchell scarf. Which is wrong. So very, very wrong. But I am good at intarsia now...and I can make charts...
(or just get a t-shirt of it here)
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Monday, July 04, 2005
Taa-freaking-daa:The Damage
I've cleaned up most of the debris, so there's nothing good to see there. Now it's mostly just grit. Grit grit grit. I have to admit that I'm rethinking the wisdom of my whole open shelves/baskets look, because every. freaking. thing. is covered in a layer of dust and bits of whatever ceiling is made from. I have a pair of old clogs I've been slipping in and out of to go into the kitchen to avoid tracking, so at least the grit is sort of contained. I'm trying to get my hands on a shopvac to deal with the de-gritification.
Dennis is home and I am very happy, because I missed him like crazy.
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Saturday, July 02, 2005
Or, in our case, our ceiling is our floor. On our floor, anyway. At least in the kitchen. Because our freaking celing just fell down. ARRRGH. There is a big ol' hole over the sink, where the clomping yoga chick upstairs has had a leak forever, and she wouldn't let the landlord in to fix it.
Fuckity. I really can't move well enough to completely clean it up, either. I'm actually in more pain today than I was yesterday. Ow.
Yeah, I'm not scoring too high in the Love Thy Neighbor category today.
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I think the great ceiling apocalypse is over; the last pieces fell a couple of hours ago, and what's left seems to be anchored. I've managed to sweep/rake most of the big pieces out the back door, working for a few minutes at a time. It looks like a couple dishes got broken by falling ceiling, but I was able to clear out a bunch of stuff after the first pieces fell, so my glitter nativity was rescued from its shelf over the sink before that part came down.
I would love to post a photo, but Dennis has the camera at High Sierra.
Clyde has been back in her Panic Room all afternoon. She has a favorite spot in the very back of the bedroom closet where nothing can get her. There's a little place where the humans are allowed to leave offerings of cat treats for later retrieval, but that's as interactive as it gets.
I really wonder what will happen now with the landlord; he doesn't put any money into this place that he doesn't have to, and I have visions of him just nailing plywood over the hole. The kitchen is the only room that I've put a lot of effort into, so I will be severely cheesed if he doesn't at least get it back to a point where I can repaint the ceiling. After all, I live in a neighborhood of half-million-dollar houses! I want swankiness and glamour, dammit. Although the neighbors have knocked $50k off their asking price, so maybe the world has not gone completely mad after all.
It is good that I'm not in the process of painting the bathroom, though, so that's one bright spot. Imagine having to deal with all this debris on top of having to move plastic tarps in order to pee. That's just too damn much upheaval.
Big picture, I just really don't know what to do here...I mean, is this the equivalent of the voice in the Amityville Horror saying, "geeett ooouuuuut," is it going to be the thing that gets some work done here so that it's better, or is it something else? I'm trying not to panic or freak out or run in circles yelling THERE IS A GIANT FUCKING HOLE IN MY CEILING, especially since just walking hurts today. I am trying to trust that if we do need to move, something will fall into place, like a good apartment, and a way to pay for it. It's not working, but I am trying.
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Friday, July 01, 2005
Ow. Ow. Ow. Ow. I am in a world of hurt.
I got myself to the dr this morning; Ibuprofin is my friend.
I'm supposed to rest all weekend, not lift anything, and do the ice/heat thing. I declined prescription pain meds, but am now wondering if that was such a great idea after all. I'll have to do physical therapy if I'm not better in a few weeks, but I should be ok by then.
Yeah, the bathroom's not getting painted. I wish the new Harry Potter was out now, because this would be the perfect opportunity to read it.
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