There Ya' Go

It is a rainy morning which means I would rather spend all day in bed with a self-replenishing cup of coffee and a great book. Since I have kids, that isn't happening. I think I'll blog instead. Ready? Let's go.

• I am still trying to figure out where self respect went. The other day hubby and I took a  little time for date night. Love date night and that we're able to leave the kids for a little bit. We went to the mall to get the boy's birthday present. As we were coming out of the mall, package in hand, there was a couple coming into the mall. They were both wearing pajamas. Um, what?!? Are you kidding me. Since hubby and I were holding hands, he took a quick second to squeeze my hand. Kinda hard. Like he was telling me to shut my mouth until we got to the van. And that was exactly what I did. I am not the submissive type, but sometimes I know what hubby is saying when he doesn't use his words. He was saying "It's date night. We're about to go eat dinner. I'd like to do that with all my teeth." Fine. But, are you kidding me? What the hell? They were tattooed and pierced to within an inch of their lives. And you go out in public with cartoon characters on your pajamas. Are you 4? Grow up. Put on some damn clothes!! Have some self respect. All that stuff you did to your body is negated when you wear Spongebob pants to the mall. And fuzzy slippers. I'm taking away their "bad ass" card. Good grief. Guess who's gonna rule our country one day?
• After we left the mall, we went to a Mexican food chain restaurant. You pick up a menu at the door, then walk to the counter to order. As we were sitting waiting for our food another couple walked in. They were wearing wedding rings, but I can't say that they were married to each other. When they walked in, they each picked up a menu. He walked to the counter when he had made up his mind, leaving her standing by the door. When they sat down at the table next to ours, they both pulled out their phones. We left before they did, but the whole time we were there, they said not one word to each other. Not. One. Word. I felt sorry for them. Call me a quitter, but when it gets to the point that you say nothing to each other, you only play on your phone, that would be the time to call it over and done. I don't know them. Maybe that's how they are in public. Maybe they're different at home. Maybe not.
• I like short blog titles. They don't even have to pertain to the blog. I follow one blog written by a woman in Texas who is so stinkin' funny. She usually has these long blog titles that used to drive me crazy. Sometimes they're two sentences long. Then I noticed that some of my blog titles are long. And getting longer. Great. I'm actually starting to dig it a little more. When you read the title of my blogs, and it's a short story, please feel free to let me know. I will rein them in. Please and thank you.
• I feel strong when I dance. It doesn't matter if it's the Wii or dance class or standing out front of CiCi's pizza during a youth fund raiser. Yeah, that was me. Just honk and wave. Everyone else did. I like the way my muscles feel. They feel long and lean and strong and endorphins storm through my body. My knee doesn't like it very much and I have to ice it and take two Advil when I'm done. I missed a dance class because I was sick. Hated it! Nothing I could do about it. There was no way I could have danced without hacking up a lung. Not attractive and I was not feeling well enough to clean up the mess. That and when I get sick, if it's respiratory, like this was, I get a touch of asthma. Not good for dancing. When I went back this week I had to learn from the beginning and learn quick. They were moving on. OK. One of my dance friends said she couldn't believe how quickly I picked it up. I love it! Makes me wish I had followed my dream to dance in music videos when I was younger. Imagine where I could be now. Yeah, I would still be sitting in my room blogging. But I would hopefully have bedroom furniture that matched.   
• I needed to send an email the other day while we were out. I don't email from my phone. Call me crazy. But I really needed to send this one. I did all the stuff to add my email to my phone, and then the dinger went off saying I had email. As I was clearing the emails, an old one popped up. It was the one from my SIL that accused me of ruining the fishing trip my FIL was going to take. It started bringing up all that ick again. I didn't even have to read it, just see the "subject" line. The only decision she could ever make that I would agree with would be her decision to fall off the face of the earth. The icky feeling didn't last long and I was pretty happy about that part. I sent my email, deleted what I needed to, and took email off my phone. Moving on to happier stuff.
• Speaking of my phone, what did I ever do before I had this thing? I take notes on it. I added the note about my first topic to remember to blog about it later. I used it to take pics of the Lego sets the boy wanted for Christmas. I saw a book that reminded me of Big Sis, so I took a pic and texted it to her. Hubby wanted slippers. I saw some on sale so I took a pic and texted it to him. He said no, but thanks for thinkng of him. I'm glad he said no, because they were really ugly. REALLY ugly. I like that I can play word games wherever I am. I have Hanging, Words, and Scramble with Friends. Look out world! Music wherever I go. That is my favorite part.
• I haven't watched the morning news in I don't know how long. I could turn on the TV in the living room and listen to it while I cruise the internet, but I don't want to wake the kids yet. I get about an hour or so in the morning all to myself. I'd like to keep it that way. I don't miss it much anymore. I do miss having TV in the bedroom while we go to sleep. I like the noise. It gets turned off sometime during the night, or I really wouldn't sleep. We don't watch much news anymore. I just don't care to be brought down every night listening to how mean and cruel people are to each other. We get a channel that is all local weather, and that's all we need. They can keep that other junk.

I think that's it for now. I've cleared the notes off my phone and my paper. Well, except the ones that go on the other blog. That's for later, though. See ya'!!

New Year, New You or, What the Hell Is Wrong With Me the Way I Am?

Good grief, if I hear that one more time I may have to strangle someone. You can be a new you without the new year. My nephew had posted something along the lines that you can say new you all you want, but it's still the old you underneath. That doesn't mean people can't change. I am certainly not the same person I was 10 years ago, or even 5 years ago. I still have some of the same traits, but I look at the world and react differently than I used to. You can teach an old dog new tricks. I guess one thing that will never change is that if you tell me no, I'll do it anyway and kick ass at it. And the other thing that doesn't change: my love of bullet points. Here's a few now.

• I don't make resolutions. I love to hear them, I just don't make them. I don't like to exercise, but I like to dance and do yoga. If I made a resoltion to go to the gym, I would find every excuse in the book to not go. Sticking to a budget is hard for me. I like to spend money. It doesn't help that we have things that we need to spend money on. We need a new dishwasher, washing machine, front stairs, a fence, and supplies for a square foot garden. My goal is to be a better wife, mother, friend, daughter, sister, aunt, woman, person than I was yesterday. Sometimes it works. Sometimes, maybe not.
• There is a new hydroponics store in our area. Hubby spends a LOT of time there, picking the owner's brain. Some things do really well in our tower. We can grow lettuce all day long. Our tomatoes and peppers had a lack luster showing. Cucumbers and squash out the wazoo. But not our current crop of squash that gets about as big around as a 50 cent piece, then withers on the vine. It can be a little frustrating. The guy at the store said something very wise. If it blooms, grow it together. If it doesn't bloom, grow it together. Well, duh. That only makes the most sense ever. And when we look back at what worked well when planted together and what didn't, he's right. Right now, broccoli is kicking ass! We didn't realize that brussel sprouts took so long, or we would have planted those a lot earlier than we did. The cold snap seems to have energized the plants, too. We've even managed to get a couple of strawberries off the plants we got for Christmas. Trial and error.
• And sense there are things that we can't grow in the tower, like onions and carrots and potatoes, we're planting a square foot garden. Hubby's been pulling out the shrubs at the end of the house to clear out some room. It has also cleared out a bunch of bugs. I despise bugs. We are hoping to plant tomatoes and cucumbers and zucchini as well. I wonder if bok choy likes the spring? We already have a deep container for planting potatoes. They have to be mounded with dirt. Then pile more on top. Then a little more. The more you cover, the more potatoes you get. When it's time to empty the tower and clean it, we'll move it around the corner to join the garden. One day we would like to have a second one. Hubby's working on a prototype because he is weird that way. He wants to use the buckets that our beans and rice came in. Guess we need to get to eating that stuff.
• We order brown rice, black beans, and lentils in bulk. Sounds funny, doesn't it? I order spices in bulk, so why not? I also order popcorn in bulk. Love me some popcorn. It's a company called BreadBecker's. When we get our taxes back, hubby wants a grain mill. Then we can grind grain as we need to use it instead of buying the stuff from the store that has lost most of it's nutritional value. Which means I'll be buying grain in bulk as well. Someone needs to teach me how to use the cool opener thingy that you have to have to seal the bucket with. And I need the cookbook. So much freshly ground grain, so little time. Just call me Laura Ingalls. 
• Doing our research about health and nutrtion and how they tie together, hubby has come to a crossroads. Hubby will no longer eat pork. Good thing he found this out after Christmas since we had ham. He may have been a very hungry man. Pigs will eat anything, including their own babies. I knew that, and I'm pretty sure I told him that. Maybe he didn't believe me, I don't know. And, of course, I had just bought a pack of pork chops. We don't eat much pork anyway, but there was a sale. It was the first time in probably 4 or 5 months, except the ham, that I bought pork anyway. So last night we ate the last of it. Poor hubby. The look on his face during dinner. I buy turkey bacon, so that won't be much of a change. I want to try beef bacon. Maybe if I have a little extra money at co-op, I'll see if they have some. I like beef sausage, but not turkey. I really like venison sausage, but I haven't been able to get that for years. Changes, they are a-coming.
• We ordered a kitchen composter. Yippee!! I have wanted one for awhile. We found one at the hydroponics store (told you hubby's been spending some time there). We still have a compost pile outside, but hubby moved it. It was on top of the hill, since that's where we had the garden for awhile. Hubby moved it so it will be closer to the new garden. The yard compost will go in that. The kitchen scraps will go in the inside composter. Please pray for the worms that I will be able to keep them alive and composting.  
• I almost burned the house down overnight. Never get a snack at night and forget the oven is on. Hubby and I had the munchies. He dragged out the beef summer sausage (yes, the food. Mind out of the gutter.) and I threw some garlic bread in the oven to warm up. And after we stuffed ourselves with meat, cheese, and crackers, we forgot about the bread. Until this morning when I was wondering what that burning smell was. I knew it couldn't be the heater. I jumped out of bed, which is never good with my back, and ran to the kitchen, kicking myself the whole way. That was really good garlic bread, darnit! Not so much this morning. This morning it was charcoal. Well, crap. 
• I have got to stop saying "crap". It's getting some of my younger friends in trouble with their parents. And my kids are starting to say it. I'm trying to use stuff or junk. Good days with the bad days is how I take that one. Come on, good days...

That's all I've got for now. Just the same ol' me. Or the new me. Or, me like I am, an ever evolving creature of habit. Yeah, that's something to figure out, isn't it? Good luck with that. May all of your years, not just the new one, be fruitful and prosperous and joy filled. Peace.