spotzle | Recent Entries

That single wide for sale that I mentioned is pending. I'm anxious to see what it actually goes for since you can buy a brand-freaking-new one for about $60k and this one is going for $225k-are-you-on-crack?

What is the proper punctuation for re? I could have just typed out regarding.

Mermaids are a thing in the smut world. Just thought you should know that. Don't ask.

We are going to be renting out the trailer — again. Housing crisis is to the point where a fifth wheel with no running water and you have to flush with a bucket of water (into another bucket), and the electricity is provided through a cord running to our shop is actually a desirable option. I am so fucking glad we bought when we did. Prices exploded almost right afterwards and it's just getting worse. I've been seriously mulling over putting up like two or three tiny houses out back. How crazy is that? Nutso. Because the local commune is too expensive to move into and I'm not even joking. Seriously. It's down the street and you can't afford it.

Our life is about to change for, like, two years.

Yesterday we did the Great Phone Swap. S and I got new iphone 7s. O and P got our old 6's... and E got O's old 5c. She's beyond thrilled. However, to add a new line it was more cost effective if we signed up for Direct TV.

Guess who's finally leaping into the 90's. And we get HBO with it now so we're going to *start* Game of Thrones. Which should take us the full two years to watch so it works out.

For those who don't know us very well, we've never even had cable TV in our 23 years of marriage so this kind of a big deal in the house.

S and E are on their way to Texas for a week. They are boarding right now in fact. E's new phone is loaded up with games and music (she is the music one in the family) and she has a brand new book to read on the flight.

Another trip to the dermatologist for a check up. This is where she takes this magnifying glass thing and looks over every inch of skin. Fun! Not. But go do this because so far she's caught some bits that would have turned cancerous if left long enough. And I had no idea about them until she showed me.

Also, I now look like I've been stung by a bee. Right on the lip. Uff da!

Teachers who spring last minute book reports a mere three weeks before school is out for the summer and due on the last day of school can eat my dick.

Bitch.

I planted a pretty rose bush over by the chicken coop and every so often, when the blooms are spent I have my Gweneth Paltrow moment, tossing the no longer fresh flower petals over to the chickens where they happily gobble them up. I say Gweneth Paltrow moment because I swear this is something she'd do totally unironically.

"If you don't get your eggs from free range chickens fed on organic, pesticide free rose petals then you really are missing out. Try it!"

P finally got the undercut I've talked her into *and* had it flat ironed. She looks so different now! Normally her hair is wider than her shoulders. If Hermione was a redhead, that's P.

Speaking of Hermione, we finally saw the new Beauty and the Beast movie. LOVED IT.

It's just the two of us this weekend. Everyone else is in Ocean Shores. Tomorrow we go see Wonder Woman again. :)

Billions of pictures of my last two days here. Both P's hair cut and yesterday's zoo trip. :)

https://www.flickr.com/photos/spotzle/

Edit: Okay about the undercut. P's hair is... velcro. Like, it sticks to itself and you can brush it but it will start to knot up within seconds. So I talked her into an undercut and a deep conditioning treatment hoping to just make it better because honestly her hair looks like a neglected collie within hours. It mats up terribly. So we go to the salon, I explain the problem to the stylist and tell her whatever P wants is fine, but please we need help with the knots.

Okay.

So she gets her wash and conditioning. She gets her undercut (for which I had to go over for a consultation because P didn't know how much she wanted off or how short to cut it) and then the flat ironing started. And she flat ironed. and flat ironed. and flat ironed. and flat ironed. foreverrrrrrrrrr. To the point where, you guessed it, her hair started knotting up again. So I'm sitting there watching and cracking up because this hairdresser has P's hair in her fist and is trying to separate a section of it but she *can't* because it's already starting to mat up and then she starts trying to pull it apart and then she looks at me and gives me this helpless look like, "oh?? my. god." Because she just had it washed and conditioned and brushed out and why is it clinging to itself already??

P's hair is a force to be reckoned with. But she likes her new look. I give it until morning until it's back to normal.

Real estate is reaching that frenzy where reasonable people have started hallucinating. A double wide trailer down the street - no land at all - is going for $225k.

Another house fairly close by with very nearly the same specs as ours - including land - is going for 1.2 million dollars (this sounds better if you say it like Dr. Evil.)

I am keeping an eye on both of them just for curiosity's sake.

Surprisingly not a whole lot of people in our neighborhood are selling. Mostly because, like us, where would we go?

So many things to talk about and I've forgotten half of them. My brain space is limited.

We did a tour of P's new high school tonight. Yes! She starts high school next year. WHAT?? Also, it turns out I'm 100% allergic to it. It's new therefore something inside is still degassing and it irritated my eyes to the point where I wanted to claw them out of my head. It was only in buildings one and two which had carpet. Something in the glue I guess? Building three didn't have carpet in it so it has to be that.

Also, the weight room was in use and it's all windows. Did my very best not to ogle, but the next generation is glorious.

Speaking of, it's all windows. So much light coming from in and out of the buildings. Most of the classrooms were glass walls that you could slide open on tracks? Very fancy. Which means, I guess that they didn't get air conditioning and this was how they're keeping the air flowing. But it's a very pretty campus. P's kind of excited to go.

Wordpress is a pain to figure out.

Um... I have new shoes.

What else is there? Ohhhhhhhhhhh, end of year stuff. In short: It sucks.

After last falls disappointing wasp invasion, we took the hive away from the bee place and brought it in next to the workshop meaning to overwinter it inside. Which we totally never got around to. Just draped a tarp over it and said good enough because we're classy like that. Anyway, when we brought the chicks out (kept in Norman's extra large dog crate) we used the tarp to cover them up just to bring that class level up a notch or two. And S got to work on the chicken tractor.

I requested a chicken tractor (actually about three or four) because they would be too small to put in with the older birds and too big to keep in the garage. But I liked the idea of them getting fresh grass every day. The coop is all dirt now. S, being S, agreed... And got to working.

And created what we've dubbed: The Chicken Monster Truck (say that with reverberating echoes, it's much more effective). It's 8'x8'x6'8"tall. Some of you have already seen it on Facebook. Guys? Why?

Back to the bees. I first noticed the curious bee about a week ago. Buzzing around the newly exposed hive, sniffing at the lingering honey scents that might have survived the wet winter. Then a few more bees showed up — I guess that first bee was the realtor. Then more and more bees until one afternoon the hive was buzzing. Literally. They just decided to move in!

The only problem was, it was next to the workshop and right where the kids play. In the dead of night when all the bees were asleep save one lonely bee on the night shift, S and I snuck it back out to the bee place and thanked our lucky stars that neither of us woke up the hive and that we didn't have to spend another $200 for a nuc.

Honey and eggs, y'all.

Did I ever mention my aunt dated Greg Allman back in the early nineties? I never got the chance to meet him (making this sort of story entirely ridiculous), but he was the one that got her started producing music and TV shows. She's not famous*, you won't have heard of her unless you're *really* big on the South Florida music scene, but he was very encouraging to her, which, for my aunt Chrystal, was a rare thing to find in another human.

Goodbye, Tattoo Man. You will absolutely be missed.

* it's actually my great uncle on my father's side who is relatively famous and you might have heard of him if you're really, really into music production. But that's another half-told story.

So last Saturday when I took E to her singing lessons (yes! she does this now) I was listening to Wait! Wait! Don't Tell Me, and their first caller/contestant was a very sweet lady from one of the M states in the Midwest (I forget which one). And they asked her, what did she do up there in her M state and she said, "I write Jane Austen fan fiction." Like it was just this normal thing everyone did (and in my world, this is true)

I did a mental victory lap at her daring because 1) it's national radio and she gave her real name and 2) they didn't mess with her about it. Well, they did, but not for writing it, but because they joke with everyone about everything. They were very respectful. I'm wondering if they would have blinked more if it was like, One Direction fanfic or something less "legit" than Austen.

I know fanfic has become much more mainstream and acceptable these days, but I still won't tell people I write it. I barely acknowledge it to myself.

Speaking of, *whisper* I started a new one yesterday, which was nice. I've written a few things since then, but they were original (OMG! WOW!). I don't prefer one over the other, but writing fanfic is like putting on a really comfortable sweater. It just feels good.

Also, I didn't recognize her name. Must be a new one.;)

Okay but have any of you seen One Punch Man yet? You really, really need to. There's only 14 episodes. Totally worth your time.

The influx of Californians have driven the housing market up here to a frenetic level that hasn't been seen since before the housing bubble burst ten years ago. It. Is. Insane. So much so that one of our friends is moving to another state because he can't afford rent. He makes $70k a year. $70k and he can't afford rent! They're building houses on plots of land that should only realistically be used for one or two homes at most. And they still aren't building new schools. They still aren't widening roads, though they have thoughtfully started tolling them.

The estimated value for our home has gone up over $225k and we are pretty sure we could get a lot more should they figure out how to develop it. Our difficulty? Even if we sold it for that much, we still couldn't afford a place to live.

So where will we all move once prices reach Silicon Valley levels? This can't be sustained for much longer.

So it turns out both S and I have seriously been thinking about moving. I mean together as a family, not separately. We probably won't because it's a huge hassle and we'd have the nearly insurmountable problem of where would we go and how would we eat because jobs, but we're sorely tempted. I'm even looking at Florida. FLORIDA! What is wrong with me? (lack of sun, obvs)

We're smack in the middle of The Month of Cake. Baby S is 4, P is 14 today, S turns 44 on Saturday, then P2 is 7 on the 11th.

We're all doing really well. It's been a shit year, but all things considered we're doing just fine.

E and P2's school did a lip dub and here it is if you want to see kids awkwardly lip sync to popular songs. :) (no, really, it's cute)

Saw a P&P&Zombies funko pop at the bookstore and it turns out I still am not over it and will never forgive myself.

UGH!

I am so stupid and FAQ isnt' helping, but how do you search for users so I can subscribe? The little search box on the right doesn't like to help me no matter what drop down option I choose and I feel like an idiot.