Memo to All: Today is Torture Little Bit Day

Or at least that is how LB is acting... I swear, you would think by the sound of her screams that feeding her, changing her, and holding her close is a form of Chinese water torture. My usually happy little baby is letting me know in no uncertain terms that she is pissed. Unfortunately, as she lacks certain necessary communication skills, I am clueless as to why. Is it bad that I've given up trying to please her and have instead resorted to sticking her in her swing in the hopes that it will eventually shut her up? And that if it doesn't work, well, at least I was able to get a shower? Perhaps I really AM torturing her after all.

In other news, this here blog is going to be moved in the next couple of weeks - so be on the lookout for that. Hopefully it will be sooner rather than later but with the disproportionate rate with which our closing date is drawing near (quickly) and the number of boxes I have packed (zero), the move to the new web address might ended up being a month or more away.

All New Everything

I am officially no longer an employee of Sona MedSpa. I've got two new gigs that I'm excited about - one a part-time job for a huge, nationwide investment firm and the other a sales consultant gig for a friend's technology firm. Basically I'm working the part-time job until the technology firm takes off and becomes stable, consistent income at which point I'll be able to work from home.

Also, we are less than a month away from closing on our houses and I am VERY ready for that to be over. The purchasing experience has been great but the selling experience... let's just say it sucks hard. I'm going to be trying my best not to stick a pen in the eye of our buyer at closing.

Full Speed Ahead

Well, we sold our house - in five days. Luckily, we also found a house in that amount of time and our offer was (eventually) accepted.

So now Mr. L and I have five weeks to pack the house, with a month-old infant in tow, no less. I'm also returning to work this week, but will probably only be working at my current job for a few weeks. I'll expound more on that when all is said and done, if we ever get to that point.

I swear, we don't ever slow down around here. I am really hoping that once we move into the new house we can just chill the hell out for a while.

I'm worn out.

Life Comes At You Fast

Let's try and recap the last month or so:

• da Momma deployed for Iraq
• Little Bit arrived
• Father-in-law was hospitalized for an eight inch blood clot in his thigh
• My computer died
• Mr. L's computer died
  
• L and I decided to sell our house
• L and I started looking for a new house
• Little Bit was diagnosed with thrush
• I was diagnosed with thrush - in my BREASTS

So yeah, things have been REAL hairy around our house.

Good Morning!

Mr. L woke me up this morning (which is a much nicer way to awake than to the sounds of a fussy baby) and the first thing he said was, "I am so sorry to wake you, but you have to look outside."

SNOW!!

I haven't seen snow since I moved down to North Carolina two years ago and I've MISSED it. Imagine that, me - missing snow!

It was also nice to wake up and realize that Little Bit had almost completely slept through the night. I was only up once with her for a quick change and a bite to eat. My happy little baby generally sleeps in four hour increments during the night, giving mommy and daddy some much needed sleep.

Hopefully we can keep this up!

Holy Expanding Bellies, Batman!

Seriously, where does the time go? It's been a month since I last updated this thing and I could have sworn it was a only a week or so!

Mr. L and I have been eight hundred different kinds of busy getting ready for the appearance of the girl child and trying to maintain our regular personal and work lives to boot. There isn't really anything of much interest going on right now, just waiting and waiting and waiting.

Hopefully I'll pop soon, due date is less than two weeks away - weeeeeeeee!

Clearly Bob Vila I Am Not

So last night, ten to two in the morning to be exact, our water heater decided it had had enough. And it's not as if it could just decide it was done and not work, no no, in the R household, things must go out with a bang.

So after a $1300 estimate from the plumber to replace the damned thing, L and I decide we will just head to Lowe's and install a new water heater ourselves. Surely our sanity is not worth $1300, no?

After returning from Lowe's a few hundred dollars poorer, L realizes he needs more items and asks me to return and get them. Now let me back up here for a second and relay to you the fact that I HATE going to the hardware store for items that L needs because a) I'm never really sure what the hell it is he's talking about and b) sometimes he isn't either, he just wants me to ask some customer service rep for help.

Soooooo, I trot on into the hardware store (and by trot I mean waddle because let's face it, I feel like I have a watermelon between my legs) and start hunting for a ninety-degree copper elbow and some copper piping to fit. L keeps telling me he needs everything to be 3/4" so this is what I'm picking up, though I'm beginning to wonder how the hell he is going to join this stuff together as it is all the same diameter.

"Um, I don't know how this fits together, L."

"Look for a coupling sleeve."

"Um, there isn't anything here marked "coupling sleeve," just "coupling" and it's all the same diameter, nothing fits into each other."

"Go ask for help."

*sigh*

And by sigh I mean, "I really wish you would get your ass down here and do this because even if I ask for help I STILL DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU NEED SO HOW CAN I DESCRIBE IT??"

So along comes Joe, who is trying very hard to take the "customer service" out of Customer Service Representative.

"I need some kind of copper something to fit into this 3/4" elbow - my husband said I need a coupling sleeve... ?"

"There's no such thing."

"Ok, can you tell me how I'm supposed to make this copper pipe thingy fit into this elbow thingy?"

"That's a coupling."

"What's a coupling?"

"The "copper pipe thingy" you're holding."

"Ok, how do I make it fit into -- "

And without one word he takes the coupling away from me and hands me a 3/4" diameter piece of copper pipe which - VOILA! - fits perfectly.

"Oh, I gotcha. Sorry, I had no idea what my husband needed."

"If you have no idea, why isn't he here getting it then?"

Joe, I misjudged you. You are indeed a smart man.

LUAU!!

October 27th and we finally have heat! As Mr. L and I moved into the house in the late spring, we never had a reason to turn the heat on and therefore we had no idea that we had GAS HEAT and needed to call the GAS COMPANY to have it turned on.

So when we finally went to use our heat in the first week of October, imagine our surprise when it didn't work - and by surprise I mean witness the deathly scowl of a six-month pregnant chick who is cold.

Of course the GAS COMPANY cannot immediately send someone out, nooooo. They make you wait a week, during which time you learn the very fine art of piling on shirt, after shirt, after sweater, after sweater, after blanket (much like this dude) in a sad attempt to stay warm - and no, piling on extreme amounts of clothing is not conducive to moving around. After said week has passed, the GAS COMPANY is a no show and when you call to see what the hell happened because hello! we're fucking cold over here, they tell you the earliest they can dispatch someone is the following week.

I actually started looking forward to going to work so I could thaw out. *shudder*

Yay! No more fumes!

Well, I had a whole post typed up and ready to roll but somehow managed to delete it. So instead of witty commentary, you just get pictures as I no longer feel like typing it all out again.

Voila! I give you House of R - now in Technicolor!

Bathroom

Master Bedroom

Hallway

Entryway

Living Room

Kitchen

Sunroom / Dog Room

And yes, I am flash-challenged when it comes to operating a camera.

I'll take toxic fumes for a thousand, Alex

So Mr. L and I are painting the house, and by we I mean he is and I'm trying to not inhale too many paint fumes.

I went a teensy bit crazy with the colors and was worried that L wouldn't like them, but they look fabulous. At this point we have five rooms down and one to go, nevermind the fact that the last room is going to be a bitch because of the cathedral ceilings and really should count as two.

I'll post pictures after everything has been painted (including trim and crown moulding - blech) and the house is clean again.

I think it's time to break out the Old English...

...and dust this puppy off. :o)

I'm not even going to try to catch up on the past, oh, seven months that I've let this thing rot but I will bring y'all up to speed on the most important things:

1. Bought a house
2. Old house is broken into on THE DAY we are moving out
3. Rear-ended on the freeway while driving up to see my parents in Delaware
4. Came back from Delaware, found out we're pregnant
5. Much freaking out ensued
6. Mr. L is out on a training ride for a charity cycling event and is hit by a truck
7. Even more freaking out ensued
8. Dropped to part-time at work in order to take care of L (currently known as Broken Hip Boy™ or Hobbes)

So yeah, my summer has been a rollercoaster to say the least. Hopefully now that I'm working a little less - ok, who am I kidding? I'll be working the same amount if not more, just not in an actual "office" - I can keep up with this thing a little better... but no promises. :)

Holy Shit

Buying a house = really fucking stressful and emotionally draining.

That is all.

It's getting dusty in here

My apologies for the long hiatus (you know, to the three people who actually read this), it's been a stressful few weeks. Allow me to give you a quick run down:

1. Quit Mega-Stressful Job from Hell™
2. Started new, less stressful job
3. Found out I was pregnant (despite being on birth control)
4. Had miscarriage
5. Parents come to town
6. Thanksgiving
7. Some how made it through Thanksgiving without strangling my mom (henceforth known as Da Momma)
8. Found out I was pregnant, again
9. Decide that husband has ultra-strong swimmers
10. Second miscarriage
11. Twenty-second birthday
12. Christmas

I have many things to blog about so keep an eye out for many entries to come!

I've been a bad, bad blogger

I've got a pile of rants coming, I promise... I just can't seem to ever catch up with all this bloody work!

Mr. L wants to see a movie tonight, I'm baking cookies with the mum-in-law all day tomorrow, and Sunday is the All Day Laundry Day from Hell™ so it could be a few days until you get your updates.

*hangs head*

Apparently I've sprouted hips

So I've finally caved and have begun to clean unpack my house. Whilst unpacking, I came across a box of things I had purchased and for one reason or another didn't work out. I had always planned on auctioning said items on eBay but had just never gotten around to it.

In the box were a pair of breeches I purchased in July 2004 online that ended up being the wrong waist cut for me. You see, I used to be straight as a board with no hips whatsoever. Riding apparel companies try to make people like that feel better by labeling breeches with no hips "modest cut." People with normal hips were "regular cut" and people with hips were "hourglass cut." Somehow I had received a pair of "hourglass cut" breeches and when I put them on, my nonexistant hips swam in fabric. Obviously this was not the look I was going for. God only knows why I didn't return them considering the price, but I threw them in the eBay box to be auctioned.

I'm not sure what possessed me, but I threw those bad boys on today and they fit like a glove. I stood in front of my mirror in total disbelief and asked, "Where the hell did those come from?!"

Eventually, there will be updates...

...but not quite yet. The past week has been filled with new jobs, flat tires, broken glasses, and negative pregnancy tests, oh my!

Updates soon, I promise! But in the meantime, behold the cuteness that is my dog, Cami. She recently had a birthday and is now a year old.

Mrs. Clean I am not

I have got to get in the cleaning mode. Ok, correction: I have got to get into the unpacking mode. Mr. L and I have lived in the new house for just over a month and I still am only 50% unpacked. You would think with all the time off I had this week I would unpack but noooo, I was lazy instead and watched too much E! True Hollywood Story.

Damn that show, damn it for being so addictive.

I think the problem is that the unpacked boxes are easy to ignore... we've strategically located them to the three rooms we use the least: the den and the two spare bedrooms. What I need to do is start moving them out into the middle of the hallway for me to trip and curse over twenty times.

Hopefully I will get my act together and have everything unpacked before Thanksgiving. Holy god my mom would flip her shit if she saw all of this.

Turns out...

...NASCAR is pretty much the same in person as it is on TV, except for the whole drunken, hillbilly factor.

A bunch of cars go around a bunch of times on a track owned by people with a bunch of money. The end.

Oh, and as a little FYI from me to you, if you see a man dressed like a cop standing around with other men dressed as cops, they are not cops. They are lazy assholes off-duty police officers and for god's sake Tony Stewart just took the lead and no, they will not assist you with the drunkard spewing beer everywhere.

/rant

And they're off!

Or do they only say that in horse racing?

Either way, apparently I am to attend my first NASCAR race tonight. I'm not sure I've spent enough time in the sun burning the back of my neck for this but perhaps there could be some enjoyment.

The husband, henceforth known as L, asked me if I owned any earplugs... uh, yes I do, let me pull them out of my ass. Though considering my boss, perhaps they wouldn't be a bad investment.

Details at eleven!