You are currently browsing the monthly archive for July 2006.
…until your basement goes and floods. How does this happen on a 100-degree day, you ask? Simple! You have your not-so-handy husband (God bless’m) change the lint filter for the washer, he accidentally dislodges the washer from the water line, and then when you go to put a load in, BAM! Thirty minutes later when I go down there to check on it, there’s an inch of water EVERYWHERE. It’s soaked everything in the “front” basement room to the furnace to the back storage room including, but not limited to, the Christmas tree box.
The clincher?
1. He returned the wet/dry vac to Wal-Mart last week because after a year, we hadn’t even taken it out of the box.
2. Rhys is out of pajamas. And it’s 5:00 PM.
3. I am out of underwear.
4. More importantly, Michael is out of underwear.
[insert various I TOLD YOU SOs here]
Waiting on said husband to come home and clean it up.
….and she knows how to use them! Yep, our little peanut-head is walking.
Nobody really likes looking at other people’s vacation photos, but that’s just too darn bad.
miss and mrs. universe
don & pam (lindsay’s folks)
michael & i on the jet ski (aka, the death wish)
um, michael with the camera
steak dinner with the fam
rhys the pirate
…he’s single, has a job and owns his own home, ladies!
first popsicle – get into my belly!
icharus
the obligatory family photo (okay, it was my idea)
So we got back from vacation on Tuesday, and by Wednesday at 10 AM our neighbor, Brian, was at the front door asking if he could have the stones in front of our house that make up a lame landscaping wall. We had told him a couple of months ago that we were going to tear it all out anyway, so the answer was yes. He saved us time and money, and the poor guy, in over 100 degree heat, had it all out and hauled over to his house across the street by mid-afternoon. I guess he’s going to make a firepit out of it all. We could have used it for a makeshift patio, but he was so eager to tear it out right then that we couldn’t refuse the free labor!
Later in the evening, Brian brought over a fresh loaf of chocolate-chip zucchini bread for us and invited us to a neighborhood get-together Friday night. After 2 1/2 years in this town and not much luck making friends beyond our coworkers, this was a welcome invitation. Thank God for kind neighbors.
Tomorrow morning we leave for vacation in Okoboji. Yep, it’s still Iowa, but it’s fun. My family’s been going there since I was 5, and this will be the first time that Michael goes. I feel like a kid again, laying out my clothes and thinking about what I want to spend my money on at the Emporium. When I was little I always got a T-shirt made (gasp! custom t-shirts! how DO they do it?!), and a 1/2 pound of smooth n’ meltys from the candy shop to eat on the boat. My sister and I spent most of our packing time filling up our Caboodles with hair accessories, Tinkerbell makeup, and little things to play with in the car (why I always brought my polished-rock collection I still don’t know, but it seemed like a vacationy thing to do at the time). My Caboodle was dark purple with a hot pink handle and two rows of swinging trays inside. And a rotating mirror. When we’d get out of the car to go to our hotel room, each of us kids carried our Caboodle (maybe my brother had something else, I don’t remember) and a pillow.
I think this weekend is the University of Okoboji’s homecoming weekend. Which means nothing except for a 1/2 marathon and a lot more tipsy people roaming around Arnold’s Park. Hoo-rah!
How cool is my salon, you ask? Pretty dang cool. They were asked by the local alternative newspaper to makeover Barbie, and this is what they came up with. Most original of the bunch. They even got the tattooist across the street to do that little number on her chest. If you’re ever in Des Moines and need a new ‘do, go see the girls at Blondies Beauty Parlor. They’ll ‘do ya right! (photo from the Juice, 7.12.06)
You know what’s sad? Me listening to a German radio station over the internet just to feel like I’m in Berlin – ultra-cool, hip, modern. The lilting German dialect of the DJs is just what you need when you’re stuck in Iowa on a dreary, humid day. Check out JazzRadio 101.9 FM Berlin (www.jazzradio.net). Sometimes the music is lame, but never the location!
Today it’s raining….finally. One day after I get our kiddie pool set up in the backyard. Go figure. It’s the perfect day for Miles Davis (Kind of Blue), list-making, more coffee, and a good book. Summer rain’s the best, because you can open your windows and the warm, rainy smell comes inside. How perfect! We need this rain. Makes me feel a lot better about spending the day doing laundry. Good justification for naps, too. After traveling every weekend for the past five, it feels good to have this ’slow’ day at home today. Gonna hunker down and watch the rain fill up the pool from the dining room. Pen in hand, it’s also a good day for writing. Catching some inspiration today, just like the pool outside.
