Look! It's Casper the Surfing Ghost!

Oh I know what I forgot...We went to Hawaii! Check that…we didn’t just go to Hawaii…we were Hawaii. For 7 glorious days we were sunshine, and luaus and sand and surf…and…and…are you ready to barf yet? Oh calm down, I haven’t left my usually snarky self behind. We were also hurricanes and cancelled fishing trips and poi. But mainly we were rainbows and butterflies. We had so much fun I cried big fat tears when we left. Shocking, I know. It might have had something to do with leaving these little faces behind:
But let's get on with the recap, shall we? The trip was really fabulous. Sure Hurricane Felicia served notice that apparently no matter where I go I’m under threat of having wonderful plans ruined by a hurricane…even if my destination hasn’t seen one in 17 years. Yes, 17. But luckily we mostly missed it and all that suffered was our planned fishing trip which was cancelled. Apparently Captain Rusty didn’t get the memo that we’re from Houston and we OWN hurricanes. Or we get owned by hurricanes? I can never keep that straight. Anyway, one big plan that did not get cancelled…surfing. The HSH and the HSB were suuuuper excited about this. The SIL-E was smart and came up with an excuse to stay and watch from the beach. Me? I pretended like I was suuuuuper excited, while simultaneously telling anyone who would listen that I would probably break my face. My strategy behind this was that if I didn’t break my face, I would seem like a surfing goddess and if I did…well, I warned you didn’t I?

I was surprised (read: not at all) that the HSH and the HSB took to surfing faster than an FBI agent going undercover to bust a band of surfing bank robbers.


Me? I was pretty close to achieving surfing goddess status, except for one minor detail…uhhhh, I don’t know if anyone knew this but you have to keep paddling out into the surf to catch waves. I had no idea how difficult this would be. I didn’t try to kid myself that I’m sort sort of crazy in shape person who would whiz on out there, but good lord. I thought I was going to die. And that was just on the first time out there, never mind all the subsequent times I had to return to catch another wave. At one point I was being lapped by a 17 year old kid who was also taking a lesson and thought he was being helpful by telling me ‘it helps if you cup your hands m’am’ Was that necessary kid? Sure I’m sucking wind like an 80 year old but did you really have to throw the m’am in there for emphasis?? Thanks jerk. I felt better when he totally wiped out on his next wave. Yeah, I’m that petty (and pale apparently). Anyway, I was proud of myself for sticking with it, despite my arms feeling like jelly after about 20 minutes. Oh who am I kidding? More like 5 minutes. I was also proud that our little group was the furthest out there, and I managed to tough it out and not prevent the boys from catching the ‘big’ waves. I had a great time, but I’m not going to lie…when our instructor, Chelsea, told us it was time to head in…I didn’t exactly start crying. Here is a picture of me cheering on the HSH--really just an excuse to rest my arms.
Afterwards we enjoyed mai tai’s at Duke’s…
Yes I know my visor is cockeyed. I couldn’t lift my arms above my head to fix it.

So Long Summer

Just because I wasn't blogging, doesn't mean I wasn't living! For your enjoyment here is a brief recap of the summer:

I celebrated the 4th of July with some of my littlest friends

We took niece#1 to the circus for the first time...
Where we made some big friends....

And some bendy ones...

"Holy cow Tia...is that natural?"
We celebrated T's bachelorette party...
and wedding...

Old friends came to visit...Wait. I know I'm forgetting something...

Progress

I haven’t blogged in a while. I’m not going to apologize because I’m not really all that sorry. I’m also not going to lie and claim that I’ve been busy, because I really haven’t been that busy. We have had a nice lazy, low key summer highlighted by a couple fun trips. I WILL commit to blogging about those in the coming week. Namely, Hawaii. We had a blast. One of us is really tan, the other is really burnt, and it is totally not in the order that most of you would probably guess! I need to download some pictures and then I will post about the whole thing. I’ll give you a preview: We had a blast. Oh wait, I already said that.

In the mean time, we are getting closer to getting the house just so. We still have a ways to go, but we did have a major development today. We got our long awaited dining room table! I am pretty fired up. It is this table from Pottery Barn. However we didn’t get it from Pottery Barn, we got it from this place for a fraction of the price. I was REALLY on the fence about it. We know lots of people that have ordered from this place before and for every one person who has had a great experience there is one that has had a nightmare one. In the end, my cheapness won out. I would rate our experience with them a 10 I suppose, if for no other reason than nothing went wrong. It was easy to pick out (I knew exactly what I wanted), ordering was painless, it was delivered pretty much exactly when they said it would be (the one negative was that it takes forever, but we were prepared for this by our previously mentioned friends and Chic told us as much up front), and it was in perfect shape when it was delivered.

Here is a picture of it in the room. It looks very naked to me with none of my usual tablescaping going on, but I’ll work on it and get back to you.

Mahalo!

My Passive Agressive Nature

Between a temperamental A/C (its been out twice more since the last post), a big snafu at the office, and a really overwhelming feeling of missing my family this week (I get like this when they are all in the same spot and I’m not there…made worse by the fact that they are in Hawaii and I’m in Hotson.) you’d think I have enough on my plate to not let something little get under my skin.

You’d be Wrong.

One of my new neighbors has college aged children who are home for the summer. And they are popular. I know this because they have a constant stream of SUV’s parked at their house. Only, they aren’t parked at their house. They are parked at my house. Always. Its not like there are 5 cars at any given time, and they are using the area in front of my house as overflow parking. Rather, its always one or two cars, and they insist on parking in front of my house, despite the fact that there are 30 yards of perfectly good, unused, curb space in front of the house they are visiting. For a while, I thought I was being irrational. I mean, does it really matter where they park? But the more I think about it, the more it needles at me. I mean, if they would just pull up a few feet, they would be in front of the correct house, but they refuse to do this. And its not just every once in a while. It's every day. Evvvverrrrryyy.

As much as it annoys me, it drives the HSH even crazier. He came home the other day and we had some visitors in our driveway, so he wanted to park in the street. Only he couldn’t because our neighbor’s guests had monopolized the space in front of our house. It wasn’t a big deal because the HSH just had to drive a few feet further down and park in front of their house, but that just made it worse to him! I mean, why couldn’t THEY park there, and leave our curb to us and OUR guests? I thought his head was going to pop off his neck.

So this all begs the question: What do we do about it? I know the mature thing to do is just say something to them. Find some way to politely ask them to please pull forward. But the thing is, I don’t know how to phrase it without sounding like a total bitch. The Rice2029 crew are firm proponents of the direct method (as our new neighbors, they have been monitoring the situation closely). Even little Emily is confused by the situation, asking me last time she was there "Is that your car Posies?" Jason (who also lives in the neighborhood and has noticed/commented on the situation) thinks I should leave a note. He is only saying this though so he can take a picture for one of our favorite websites. Other suggested solutions range from the mildly passive aggressive (parking there myself and hope they get the hint) to the downright hostile (I’m sure you can imagine). And trust me, everyone has a suggestion because everyone who has been to our house has noticed, and thinks its unusual. So its not just me, if you were wondering. I'm not sure what to do! I don't want to get off on the wrong foot with my new neighbors, especially since they seem super nice in every other regard, but this is really driving me batty!

So what do you guys think? Should I say something? Should I just suffer in silence (yes, this is my version of silence) and hope the problem fixes itself eventually? Should I start leaving nails and glass in the gutter in the middle of the night? Guide me wise ones. (And no, the nails/glass thing is not really on the table as an eligible solution.)


And just because I haven’t had pictures in my posts lately, and everyone knows what a drag that is, here is a cute one of Rip. He always parks his car in front of the correct house.

Surface of the Sun Hot

I have decided being an adult sucks. I would like to return my membership card NOW. Who do I turn this thing in to? If you could direct me to the correct state or federal bureaucracy I would appreciate it. Or maybe I need to turn it back in to my parents. I’m not sure who, but at this point I’m desperate.

I adore my new house, but ownership has not come without some heartache. We’ve had a variety of things go wrong, but we keep reminding ourselves, the house is over 60 years old. We knew these things were going to happen, and planned for it. First it was the chimney. Then the light in my oven doesn’t work (and no it’s not the lightbulb). Then a leak from the A/C. Then the driveway seems to be disappearing before my eyes. And mysteriously, I seem to only be able to get hot water out of my kitchen faucet. Nothing has been overwhelmingly expensive. We have one of those home warranty thingees and to this point things have been more annoying, than major.

Then on Sunday we returned from coast. I walked into the house. Started going through the mail and suddenly said aloud to Ripken “is it just me or is it REALLY hot in here.” I heard the HSH pipe up from the back bedroom, “yeah, right?” Walk over to the thermostat. It’s set to 74, but the temperature inside the house is 95. 95 degrees. Like… inside my living room, not my garage.

If you woke up this morning wondering “how many trips from the warranty company’s A/C repair guy does it take before your house is cool again” the answer is 5. AND COUNTING. Their level of incompetence is astounding. I’m not just being mean because I haven’t been able to blow dry my hair in 4 days, or apply makeup without having it instantly melt off. I mean REALLY. I don’t want to bore you with the litany of examples but please take my word for it. Luckily the HSH is a genius and purchased a window unit on Sunday after the first ridiculous attempt by the a/c guy to fix our stuff. We have been camped out in the master bedroom since then, as it is the only room in the house that doesn’t require I hand out ice packs and extra deodorant upon entry. It’s a little like sleeping in a wind tunnel, but it beats “sleeping” in a 95 degree house.

The feeling of futility stems from the fact that I’m sure I could find a more competent A/C guy in about the time it takes me to break a sweat after entering my house (aprox. 1 nanosecond) but naturally if I do that, the warranty company won’t foot the bill. I might add, this is AFTER the warranty company came in and “fixed” the A/C because there was a leak in the drip pan and recommended a couple of other small repairs to prevent THE VERY SITUATION WE ARE IN RIGHT NOW (i.e. having to go without A/C in the dead of a Houston summer). So to recap: they replaced some part on my functioning air conditioning unit that “could go out on me at any time” and 1 week later, I’m mysteriously without the loving joys of central air. What the hell, people?! Now they’ve been to my house 4 times with either no part, or the wrong part, and of course every time promising that NEXT time it would all be fixed.

I miss the days where I knew nothing about air conditioning units and my biggest “home” related worry was whether or not my dorm fridge could hold enough beer for the weekend.

update: two seconds after I hit publish the HSH texted me to say the supervisor was at the house, and had fixed the problem. The other guy had the wires crossed. No really. Wires crossed. And you thought I was making the incompetent part up.

Things You Wish You Knew About Your City

I have lived in this fair city for a number of years now, but I was not born nor was I raised here. Because of this, I typically assume that if I know about some little treasure in the city, everyone else does as well. It’s not always rational, but hey…life is full of incorrect assumptions.

In conversation the other day I made an offhand remark to the crew over at Rice2029, and was met with quizzical stares. Say what? You guys don’t know about the magic that is Heberts? My oh my. Let me introduce you to my friend: the deboned stuffed whole chicken. These things are a true lazy person’s treasure. They come magically deboned (I have no desire to know how that is done), and stuffed with a variety of goodness. After hearing that they had never had the pleasure of enjoying this Cajun oddity, I invited Mamma V, Em, Kwon, and THC over for a meal. We had the HS favorite of the Shrimp Rice Dressing stuffed chicken, and I took advantage of the company to venture into one of my favorites, the Broccoli Cheese Rice Dressing Stuffed Chicken. (The HSH doesn’t like broccoli!) If you live in Houston, I highly recommend this place. You simply open, put in baking dish, put in oven and about an hour later, you enjoy your dinner. Easy peasy. I go for the fresh, unfrozen, chickens at the back of the store. They do frozen too, but I’m into instant gratification. They have a variety of other things as well. Some we’ve tried and lots we haven’t. We’ve never gone wrong.

We followed dinner up with arts and crafts time. No really. I keep sidewalk chalk around for the nieces and assorted other kiddos who are at my house from time to time. Em wasn’t the only one who enjoyed it.

Everyone Needs A Friend Like This

This is what my daily Instant Messenger conversations with KK (the artist formally known as McD) look like.

ME: if you were a patio furniture grouping that was open on one side....
ME: would you be open twds the house, or twds the yard
KK: house
KK: cause then you welcome the folks in and enjoy the ambiance of the yard behind you...
KK: rather than worrying if the killer who is robbing your house as you blindly face the yard is going to get you before he leaves?

I don’t know which is more unusual. That she never said “what kind of question is that?” (duh. The kind I ask.) or that her logic totally made sense to me.

Here is how it turned out. The first picture was taken while the cushion covers were in the washer. It was a risky move (it said not to machine wash, but I was desperate) that paid off. Ok maybe not "risky" in the traditional sense of the word. More like wearing-white-out-of-season, or putting-potato-skins-in-the-garbage-disposal risky. (Don't try that last one, I have and let me give the preview: lots of dirty looks, and dirty words from the hubby, or who ever your designated fixer is).