Mmm mmm good

So my mom and Aunt Nancy are in town briefly as they are heading over the Continental Divide to attend my cousin's wedding. In an effort to extricate herself from the boxes and boxes of my childhood memories, my mom has been schlepping car loads of my little-kid stuff across the western states and onto my dining room table.

I like seeing my kid stuff again, but got visibly excited when my mom pulled into town last night:
My Easy-Bake Oven. I love you, Easy-Bake Oven. I don't know why I ever cast you aside. Can you ever forgive me?

I hope so.

I can't wait to fire this bad girl up and make me some cake.

She's on to me

Sunday Margaret walked out the front door with the phone in her hand.

Margaret: "Mama, your mom's* on the phone."

Me: "OK."

Margaret: "She wants to talk to you."

As she hands me the phone, she smirks and adds: "About your behavior."

I stare at the back of her head as she walks away and wonder where she comes up with these things. She's going to be 7 next month.

*Margaret calls my mom "Gramma." But when Mar talks to me about my mom she always refers to her as "your mom." She never says, "Gramma's on the phone." It's always, "You mom's on the phone." This strikes me as odd. But my dear little one is odd. Maybe I'll start calling her "Oddly."

Screening

No holiday weekend is ever long enough. This Memorial Day holiday was no exception.

We didn't go anywhere, opting instead to get some work done on our house (and have bar-be-cues every night with our super-awesome friends). As I mentioned here, we finally got the body of our house painted.

Now we just have to finish the trim. And for some reason, someone convinced us to do a fancy two-tone trim. OK, it was me. I'm all full of ideas that seem good — that is until the time comes to actually make the idea a reality.

So now we're full steam ahead. We got most of the pink accent color done and a fair bit of the green, but we still have a long way to go.

And to slow things down, I decided that the front porch needed new window screens. The old ones are just way too ratty to try to paint and reuse.

See in this picture, the dark green screen in the narrow window. It not be a-lookin' too good.
Here's a closer look lest you don't believe how truly worn out these screens are:
Yeah, not good.

So we headed out to the home improvement store, bought a truck load of incredibily expensive lumber and got to work. Of course, each window was custom built for this house back in 1925, so each screen has to be tailor fit.

It's tedious and slow, but the results are so worth it. Check out this window screen that we made all by ourselves:
Bill and I rock so hard.

So, we're at two down and 8 to go. I can see this project ending up like the paint job on the Golden Gate Bridge — once we finish it will be time to start again.

I checked my shoe

And sometimes you've got to call bullshit.

I posted over here.

What is in toothpaste anyway?

There's something about my oral hygiene routine that has a profound effect on Frida, the wunder kitten.

Every morning while I am getting ready for work, Frida joins me in the bathroom. I like the company (unless she's hungry, then she'll walk around all swishy-tailed being cute. If I don't pay attention then she starts nibbling on my ankles with her pointy-sharp kitty teeth — not cute) ... for the most part.

It's seems that the sound of my toothbrush against my teeth or the smell of the toothpaste or the act of my arm moving up and down has a laxative affect on Frida. More often than not, Frida makes a deposit into the cat-poo bank while I'm brushing my teeth.

I wouldn't care except that we still have the litter pan in the bathroom ... where I brush my teeth.

So the smell of her kitty poo wafts up and invades my senses while I'm trying to freshen myself up for the day.

Needless to say, it's a horrible combination. I'm practically puking every morning.

So why don't I just move the litter box? 'the hell? Mostly because it would require some sort of plan. I would have to figure out a place where it wouldn't be easily accessible to the dog (Quincy can get to it now, but she doesn't seem very interested in the Almond Roca buffet where it is). And then I'd have to move it there ... and that all just seems too much effort.

So, I'll just keep gagging through my teethbrushing ... and wishing I wasn't so lazy.

Fortune

My Fortune Cookie told me: You are destined to lead a religious cult full of people who paint their faces purple. Get a cookie from Miss Fortune

And I'm supposed to be surprised by this?

New thing I love

This blog entry.

Read it and maybe you'll be next on my list of "new things I love."

Desperate times call for desperate measures

It's like a drug ... playing music is (so sayeth rivetergirl in the guise of Yoda).

And I like it. I'm just not satisfied to play at home to my cats anymore. I miss playing with my band.

We're trying to finish our second CD and we don't have another show until the end of June, so we're not practicing regularly. Band practice has been a constant in my weekly schedule for a few years now.

I got so desperate I decided to play my acoustic guitar at open mic night last night for no good reason other than I needed to play some music. Luckily Kelley volunteered to go with me. I sang two songs and Kelley sang one.
And it was really fun. The place was packed — which for some reason amazes me. It was a Tuesday night and open mic didn't even start until 10. Don't people have jobs?

Kelley and I went first so we could go home and get to bed. Yeah, we're rock stars and all, but a girl still needs her beauty sleep if she's gonna make it to work in the morning.
I love this one. Kelley looks concerned, like she's thinking, "Yo heifer, open your eyes and sing already."

I get to record tonight. I'm excited about that. It's been a while since I've been in the studio and I'm looking forward to getting back to it.

I'm very excited about this new CD and am anxious for us to get it done.

Woot! to music.

Don't get the Wrong Impressions

Saturday night Bill's band, the Wrong Impressions, rocked the famous Quincy Bar.

It was a full house and the crowd was jumping. I was amazed at all the new faces there. They played great and had a kick-ass time.

Here's a slide show of pictures from that night:

Will you click it for 50 bucks?

Of course you would.

So click. Here. Now.

The Haute Mamas are having a contest and the grand prize is a $50 gift certificate to giftcertificates.com.

50 bucks, 'the hell?

Look at that face

Doesn't get much cuter than that, eh?

Yeah, not long after we got home Saturday morning from our bike ride to the downtown bike celebration did I decide Bill needed some yelling and I was the girl to do it.

Saturday was going to be a busy day for us and I didn't want to waste any of it yelling — and definitely not yelling at Bill for no good reason. But I did.

By noon Saturday, I realized that I was getting yet another migraine headache. It was the fourth day in a row and I was at the end of my coping rope.

I can stand the actual pain-in-the-head part of migraines. It's the other crap, like the nausea, that comes with it that gets to me and makes me understand the act of trepanation — you know, where people drill holes in their skulls to let the demons out. Yeah, that totally makes sense to me. And after years of trying treatment after treatment, I'm thinking that it just might be worth a try.

I mean, how else are those evil demons gonna get out of my head anyway?

Does anyone know a good trepanner?

Workin' at the car wash

I'm not very good at car maintenance. I promised myself that I take better care of this car, but have only marginally succeeded, in that I wash it more than any other car I've owned (believe me, that is not saying much).

So after several days of driving around a filthy car, I decided it was time to make a stop at the car wash.

Mar loves going through the car wash, although she prefers the one our neighbor, Jenn, goes to as it has "octopus arms." I mean, really, what's better than octopus arms?

But to not disappoint her, we went to the car wash with the "colors that smell good." (Now there's a marketing idea that will make a million.)

Yep, I pay a buck or two more for a car wash to listen to Mar delight in having what the car wash calls "triple conditioners" squirted on to the car.

Why does a car need triple conditioners? Is it getting split ends? I have no idea but we saw someone get the triple conditioners once and Mar thought it was the second coming ... the second coming of car wash coolness that is.

So I paid the extra money yesterday so we could see this:

I can't imagine that these technicolor "triple conditioners" do more than act as a giant glue stick. Now, my once clean car is covered in an even coat of yellow pollen that embedded itself into those psychedelic so-called conditioners.

At least they smell good.

All hail the greatness of TV

While Margaret is slopping down her breakfast gruel each morning, we let her watch TV. I know, I know, she could probably be learning Spanish or how to make a nuclear bomb out of a piece of wheat toast, but we let her watch TV.

She used to watch Dragon Tales with a fervor usually reserved for sightings of the Pope or Elvis, but then just recently she discovered How It's Made on the Discovery Channel.

If you get the Discovery Channel and haven't yet watched this show, I would recommend it. It's a half-hour show and feature three or four items and show you ... uh, how it's made. It's really very cool. And we've all been amazed to see how bubble gum and gloves and kites and putty knives and garage doors are made.

So this morning as Mar was getting ready for school and saying good-bye to her cousins, she stopped when she read How It's Made start. The announcer listed the items that were going to be covered and when he said peanut butter, Margaret cried out, "Oh good! Now I can see if they really make peanut butter out of cockroach legs like everybody says."

Not sure where "everybody" is getting their information, but I'm thrilled that the mighty TV is setting the record straight — that peanut butter isn't made from cockroach legs, but peanuts and rat poo.

Someone had a hosed up childhood

I found this link on dooce.


This is just one of the many uber disturbing yet morbidly fascinating works by Patricia Waller.Her work is twisted in the most awesome way. But don't take my word for it, click over and see for yourself.

Pictures

I was so full of whine this morning that I forgot to include these photos:

On the ledge outside the orginal portion of the Fairy Caves.

Inside the caves where Margaret was freezing to death. Freezing at 52 degrees.

Enough with the drilling already

Caution: The following will contains whining and foot stomping.

Ouch! My tooth ... or I should say, what's left of my tooth hurts.

I had to go in this morning and have a tooth prepped for a crown. The decay was deep and the tooth was small and the pain is big and my lip is numb (or gum, as Margaret says).

My lip is so numb that the couple of times I was asked to stand up and rinse it out, my lip formed a fountain and the water would shoot out the top like a spout. I squirted my hair. It sucked but still make me laugh.

Owwwah! My jaw hurts ... and my lip.

Stupid teeth and their rottingness.

OK, enough of that already. Click over here to see my Glenwood Springs report card.

Happy Mother's Day to me ...

and to all the mothers I know!

My Mother's Day rocked.

I was the first one up, so I threw the breakfast casseroles that we got from Supper Solutions in the oven and jumped in the shower. By the time I was done, the kids were up and the rest of the adults shortly after.

We ate our yummy breakfast, gathered a bunch of water and drove down the highway for our Mother's Day hike up to Hanging Lake.

When we arrived in Glenwood Springs Friday night we drove down to the Hanging Lake Trailhead parking lot and walked down the riverfront trail under the highway and past the dam. Then we walked up the path to the trailhead and it was then that we decided that we'd hike it on Mother's Day.

I'd never been up there before and was excited for the trip. There are a lot of signs warning that the trail is difficult and that people should be prepared. So we got ourselves as prepared as we could and took off.

The signs were correct in that it is a steep, uphill climb up to the pristine lake. But it's only 1.2 miles and we trucked right up it, lead by my fearless nephew — who, it seems, was born to climb.

I really enjoyed the hike even though I was huffing and puffing through most of the uphill trek. The only thing that bothered me were the people who think that prohibitive signs don't apply to them. There were numerous signs saying, "No dogs" yet people were dragging their dogs up the narrow and very busy trail nonetheless.

Gah people! There's a reason that dogs are prohibited. Not the least of which is the fact that the lake is pristine and that we all need to do our part to keep it that way. And maybe there's a large part of me that thinks rules are for following — yeah, a big, puckered, anal-retentive part of me.

But anyway ...

There were bunches of people up there and Bill was inspired to play, "Good Game" with unsuspecting hikers.

"Good Game" is a game that is spun off the tradition of walking across the field after any kind of high school athletic event and "shake" hands with the other team. The shaking of the hands reduced to very ingenuine high-5 type hand slaps accompanied by a lack-luster "Good game" comment.

So what we would do was wait until perfect strangers were hiking by us and offer our hands while saying "Good game" or "high five." It is amazing that most people would give us a high five usually while smiling. Most people seem to get the absurdity of it.

One lady did not see to be delighted by Bill's "Good game" offering but slapped his hand nonetheless. After Bill passed, one of her hiking mates offered, "At least he didn't slap your butt."

Ha!

So the whole hike was fun. Margaret did great. She's a great hiker and can hike just as far as I can — hopefully that distance will grow for both of us over this summer as I was complete exhilarated by the hike and looking forward to doing more.

Oh and I got some great Mother's Day gifts. Mar painted a nice terra cotta pot at school which came with a great card that suggests I am 27 years old ... Happy Mother's Day to me indeed! And Bill bought me these shoes — but in black, of course.

I bought these for Mar at the beginning of spring and she has never complained about her feet once. She hiked Hanging Lake wearing them and they served her well. So I was stoked to get a pair for myself.

I have been coveting these shoes forever and plan on wearing them every day for the rest of my life ... or the shoe's life, which ever comes first.

R&R family style

I'm taking tomorrow off work so we can go with my brother and his family to Glenwood Springs for the weekend. It couldn't have come at a better time. The semester may not be over yet, but our batteries are running low.

We're all staying at a "resort cabin" here and we're going to take the kids here on Saturday. Bill and I are looking forward to doing some sitting on the cabin's deck. Lord know we are in need of some serious sitting.

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We are really enjoying our time with my fam.

Last night we went out to eat and proved again why people avoid eating out with the Dearings and/or McCrackens:

(This photo was taken by Margaret. I love the reflection in my sunglasses.)

Because it's not good enough to just sit and enjoy a meal, we constructed the Tower of Condiments. Ta Da!!!
But all good things must come to an end.
My niece, Mackenzie. She'll be 10 in July and is about the most demure thing I've ever known. I just love that about her.


My nephew, Colby, he turned 8 in January.

Colby and Mar are two peas in a pod. They both love to give into the frenzy that is childhood — which is awesomeness ... for the most part.

But really, the three of these kids have so much fun together. They are a force to be reckoned with, to be sure.

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Bill and I had our parent-teacher conference this morning. You can read about it over here.

Taking too much pleasure

Last night after a long day Bill asked me to look at the bottom of his foot. He said it felt like he had a splinter.

Upon examination, I found a red bump and decided that if there was something in there, the skin had healed over it.

Armed with a flash light, magnifying glass, safety pin, tweezers and some peroxide and assisted by my sister in law, Lisa, we began excavating the red bump.

I started through the layers of skin gently at first while Lisa held the light. Every now and then, I'd hit the offending spot and Bill would shriek and jerk his foot back.

Lisa and I would laugh.

I dug some more, Bill moaned and we laughed.

It wasn't really funny, I guess. But the sight of us with flash light and magnifying glass and tweezers and Bill panting like he was in labor was absurd enough to delight our sick senses of humor.

I continued to dig deeper with the safety pin and then clean the area with the peroxide. Bill would go, "Oooowwwwahhhh! Oh gawddddd!" and jerk his foot around.

Lisa and I would laugh.

Ultimately, we found nothing in his foot, but Lisa and I got a good laugh.

Stranded

Wearing thrown-on sweat pants and no shoes, my brother raced to get me to work on time this morning, despite the fact that my car is parked in my driveway ready to take me to work ... except for one thing ...

I ain't got no keys.

Bill had an early appointment this morning and left the house before me. When I was heading out the door, I found that my keys were not hanging on our key hook.

But, Bill's work keys were hanging on the hook.

Doh! He has both sets of car keys.

Bill's so lucky that it's Taco Tuesday and a former employee brought in some yummy-smelling tacos.

How's this one?

My dear sister in law didn't care for the picture of her that I posted yesterday over here.
Here's one of her with Frida (pronounced Fwida Nut Nut), not at all looking like this:

Disturbing

I was going to find a picture to post of one of those cymbal monkeys for the previous post when I found this.

Make sure you click the magnify button.

Devil cymbal monkey.

Yeah, disturbingauctions.com. People send them links to strange items up for auction like this:
And this:

And this t-shirt:

Wait, no, that's a picture of me and the t-shirt that the Fruita Fat Tire Festival bike guys gave me. I actually wore this out Friday night when I went with Kelley downtown to see this guy play some music.

Disturbing, indeed.

The fam's in town

Click over here to see pictures of my brother and his family. They're here for a couple of weeks to see how we Western Slopers hang.

The cool thing about the weekend was that they pulled into our driveway just as we were finished cleaning up after doing this:

We painted the rest of our house Saturday ... OK, actually Bill's friend and co-worker, Dennis, used his fancy-schmancy painting machine to paint the house and we did what we could to help.

Mostly, I stood there and clapped like one of those cymbal monkeys.

Yeah, it's been a long time coming. We started this project in April ...

of 2004.

Yeah, three years ago we started the project of painting the house. And you know what? It's was really not any fun. So two years ago we finished painting the front and put in a new screen door and called it good like the true white trashies that we are.

But now we have a house that is all one color.

OK, OK, we still have to do the trim, but this is a great step forward. Fer reals, yo.

Can't type ... eating

Just another reason why I love my job: Today the fine folks who organize things arranged a little pre-Cinco de Mayo feast. Our little conference room is chock full o' Mexican-y goodness. Mmm, green chili.

Yeah, eating good food on Friday. There's nothing better ... except maybe a big ole Margarita on the rocks, with salt, thank you very much.

Hello there

A big howdy to all the Haute Mamas visitors.

Richie outed my little blog here on our Haute Mamas blog while talking about Bill's and my game of "whose garbage is better?" Nothing like posting pictures of one's garbage to pique people's interest.

Unfortunately, it seems that all our "good" trash has been picked clean, so Bill and I are going to have to come up with a new game. Perhaps a spirited game of "What did that green, fuzzy thing in the back of the fridge used to be?" or maybe, "guess who's turn it is to clean the toilet?"

But for now we're tangled up "Let's finally finish painting the outside of the house after three years" and "Let's try to at least pretend the inside of the house is presentable since we have company coming this weekend"!

Ooohhhhhah! Don't you wish you lived with us?

Picture-y goodness!

Most awesome picture of Mar ever

I have no story to accompany this picture, but it's so awesome in so many ways. I may have to make up a story about it so I can post it tomorrow on my Haute Mamas blog.

Speaking of the Haute Mamas, today is our 1-year anniversary, so click over here and read what we have to say about our blog so far. You can see pictures of us trying to get our picture taken.

Garbage game

Lookit this pile o' garbage. What do you see?
Do you see a child's booster seat? Why yes indeed. Do you see a plastic lawn mower? No, you don't.

I am the winner. The winner of the garbage game. Woo hoo!

It's a tie

Regarding Bill and my bet on the curb junk, by the time I got home from work yesterday both CD rack and the bed frame were gone.

We're now wagering on a plastic lawn mower(me) and a booster seat(Bill).

Now it's getting personal.

Fruita Fat Tire Festival 2007

Like I said Friday, my band played the Fruita Fat Tire Festival last year and we had a great time, so we were looking forward to playing it again this year.

We had such a good time last year that I was afraid that this year would pale in comparison.

There was not reason for worry. We had a really fun time. The weather was gorgeous (last year was really windy and cold) and the crowd ... let's just say that despite our fears that last year was a fluke, the crowd had a great time.

So did we. Check out these pictures:
And the best part was these guys came back again this year:
They have special t-shirts made for each year and are happy to give us more cowbell. These cyclists are a super fun time and they even gave me one of their t-shirts which I'm wearing in these pictures but I wasn't smart enough to get a picture of it. Also one of their guys, who couldn't make it this year, is now nicknamed Ham Pants after our ever-endearing song about lucious rumps. How awesome is that?

Now there's a dog AND a guy named Ham Pants! Sweet!

We kept calling them the mustache guys because of their t-shirts from last year (I'll take a picture of the t-shirt at home during my lunch hour — it's so not appropriate for children or those who have a sense of decency, but it's funny). Next year I'm going to learn their names.