Life's been good to me so far

Tonight I made one of my Signature Recipes (mmmhmm, with an emphasis on the "mmm") as we had Laura and her two kids, as well as Shaun over.

Elise said, "My Brian, and Liz-beth, my Ora, and Shaun?!?! ALL PEOPLE, my house?!?! No BELIEVE!!!"

She was excited.

If you would like people to come from far and wide (or...close and nothing else to do...) to eat at your house, here is the recipe:

"sauce"

1. sautee a diced yellow onion and some minced garlic in olive oil and butter/your preferred butter alternative

2. throw in a billion (10 roma or 6 full sized) chopped tomatoes - I leave it in pretty big pieces; simmer for a couple of minutes

3. squeeze in juice of half a lemon, sprinkle on a teaspoon of sugar, salt rather heavily, and then throw in a bunch of chopped fresh basil; stir and leave alone for a few minutes

4. add 1-3 (your choice...I veer towards 3) crates of mushrooms and, once they're cooked in, a couple of big handfuls of spinach or arugula (just until wilted)

"chicken" ...it doesn't make sense to have chicken in quotes like that. Oh well.

1. put boneless skinless tenderloins (or whatever you like better) on the George Foreman with a lot of seasoned salt rubbed in, and then lemon juice and season salt it more as you rip it up after it's cooked

"pasta" (again, this system was not thought through well)

1. boil it. I prefer linguini

Pasta, then sauce, then chicken on your plate, followed by mozzarella. It's so good.

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Last night I had an Usborne show down is Islamorada. The house turned out to be a mansion by the sea; an entire wall was made of glass. The sun set over the gulf through it as we ate really good appetizers the host (also named Tina Marie) prepared. I saw four living rooms while I was there. Multiple balconies. Finger paint smeared on every wall. It was a whole gathering of women who had waited for education, travel and affluence before having kids, and now they stand around sipping wine and laughing as the toddlers paint on the doors and tiles and expensive furniture. Lots of broad gesturing - they all run a cooperative Montessori school together (where I now have a book fair scheduled in early December).
People were really nice and I made about $100 profit off of 4 hours of work (including the drive there and back). In the bathroom hung a sampler that read, "I dreamed of mermaids, motorcycles and a man who can dance". Other Tina said that was what made her move to Florida, and told us all to go check out the artist's website. Even though I know that most people in the Keys chose to move there at some point in their adult lives, it's still strange to me to really meet and know the transplants, as everyone I've ever been close with or gone to see is native.

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Intense Feelings. That is the story of this week. Grant having a sugar deprivation meltdown. Me having random financial stress/PMS/bizarre-side-effects-of-yeast-die-off following-the-end-of-my-antibiotics meltdowns. Total joy and happiness over kittens, driving with loud music and rolled down windows with the ocean outside, and little people love. I'm either crawling through a maze of forts with Gloria, Isaac and Jake, or feeling like I'm about to throw up because the electric bill is too backed up and I really, really am not sure how to fix this...situation...I'm having with some dance studio people and our financed JUMP fees.

Worst:
-leak from hurricane shutter bolts coming through exterior wall and messing up floor in the officeBob's room, is back...it pours every day this time of year
-a couple of checks bounced and now we have to fix things before that escalates into a nightmare
-major sleep disturbances are making me wonder if it's even possible that I could still be feeling the effects of two days of prednisone from a couple of weeks ago, OR WHAT. I haven't dreaded going to bed like this since the worst of my pre-therapy PTSD junk in 2008
-a situation at the dance studio got out of control and now even though I have not defaulted or done wrong in any way, someone else trying to help us has it coming back on them in a terrible way and I feel SO BADLY and am really, really stressed about it...I can't give details because it's too possible for someone connected to read this but it's just awful the way this has happened
-horrible multi-day allergy attack that's had my eyes swollen and been really irritating
-Aaron's cast depression coupled with a serious rebellious, mischevious phase for Elise are making bedtime a 3 hour ordeal that feels like spinning in circles...so over it
-my laptop is broken and I'm worried I've lost some of my most recent, not-yet-backed up writing work as well as MY LAPTOP :/

Best:
-Isaac and Jake are both drawing the most clever, hilarious stuff everyday - I'm going to be posting some of it soon, they are amazing and I am loving their explanations as much as their work
-I'm really excited about my new registered and self-hosted wordpress blog, which is almost ready to be unveiled...Grant managed to get my whole 7+ years of LJ onto it, with ALL COMMENTS and pictures and formatting and EVERYTHING, and all my freaking icons and the ability to use them when I post, and tags, and I'm impressed. I'm even happy with how it looks, from our own pictures...super soon.
-our school days are going very well - that is another thing I'll be posting more details about soon. We're going one entry per day through a LIFE "100 People Who Changed the World" book, that always leads to tons of discussion, and doing an anatomy unit that is really fun and I have a lot of great resources here for, and I FINALLY found my Story of the World Teacher's Guide, and Ananda has completed most of the stuff she was most behind in...I'm feeling very good about it all. Jake is writing his name and all letters and numbers, Isaac is copying whole sentences and reading simple books. Aaron has gone beyond one sentence entries in his nature journal and is even trying to be funny.
-the kittens are freaking adorable and doing so well...Chrysanthemum was from what the breeder called "a charmed litter" as all eight of them thrived so much from day 1 and there was never a single complication - that is how this is looking :) We have pretty solid homes lined up for 2 and a maybe for a third, so far, which I think is pretty good considering they're only about 2 1/2 weeks old. I'm way too taken with one little boy that just reminds me a little too much of a cat I used to love...we'll see how that goes. Watching Chrysanthemum carry them back to the nest when they wander off and clean them and things is great. She's earned a new level of respect from my sister, who watches her wearily try to get them all settled with hard earned empathy.
-the house has been pretty consistently cleaner than usual and it's starting to feel like I can keep it that way

Stupid 4am and I'm going to mass in the morning AFTER Cybele comes and picks up her guinea pigs grumblegrumble...

Last night was good stuff - Gloria and Lj came over for dinner and hanging out.


He's labeled this "Big Pimpin" on facebook :p

After all the kids were in bed we sat up talking for hours. They just lost a friend in the horrible hospital where I got ptsd from general mistreatment and emotional abuse. Yes, I think that place is evil, far beyond my normal dislike of hospitals in general (Jackson Hospital, Miami - and I just saw an article in the Herald today where a grand jury is sighting it as one big mess of failures...and they have ethics lawsuits pending, and Medicaid fraud prosecution by the govt, and it's just a truly dirty hospital where nobody speaks the same language as anybody else and there are cops everywhere INSIDE and they assume everyone walking in is a problem).

(after going to bed at 4:30 am last night) Today I:

-got up at 7:30, woke Ananda up, took my prednisone

-made Annie's breakfast and packed her lunch, MADE her brush her hair and find her socks and on

-thawed out and gave Chrysanthemum chicken

-cleaned out bedding, food and water in bantam chick cage

-got my Miami Children's Hospital Usborne contacts, and a local school's contact info, along with my standard water bottle-iPod-cell phone-shoes stuff together

-talked to Ananda until she was distracted from being moody on the 30 minute drive, dropped her off at GS Camp

-called my school contact and got put off, and MCH and got a meeting set up, on my 30 minute drive back to Dr Fletcher's office

-read my on-loan-from-Carolyn copy of a Roald Dahl short story collection (he writes for adults, too, what?!) in the waiting room

-got the wick taken out of my ear, another (different) antibiotic presciption, a bizarrely creepy puff of antibiotic powder ON MY EARDRUM (shudder), a follow up appt scheduled

-BLARED and yelled along with I'm on a Boat on the way home, because obviously I have that on my iPod

-came in, woke everyone else up...got Elise dressed, got her, Jake and Isaac breakfast, got her fish oil, Jake his (infected cavity) antibiotics, and all 3 little kids their probiotics - took my own probiotics and emergen-c

-joked and laughed with Grant and the kids, then cuddled with Aaron with Grant for awhile as he is still in Cast Depression everyday until his arm gets out on parole

-made Grant a frozen pizza in the oven, myself a giant salad (romaine, peas, tomatoes, seeds, chicken, kalamata olives, croutons), talked about money stress bs from insane medical bills piling up until he had to get in the shower

-called my mother to ask if she could provide emergency financial help since we're supporting Bob; she's in a worse place than us. Borrowed $15 from Bob.

-took a nap while he set the little kids up with a movie and took off for work

-woke up one hour later, made them all get their shoes and shirts and things on, and went to pick up Ananda from GS Camp - Elise came in with me this time to sign her out, and they all took turns playing with the GPS the whole way there and back behind us as Annie (up front) tells me all about her day. She was part of a belly dancing show her unit put on for all the other girls (the week's theme is India) and LOVED the whole made up skit the older unit did as their finale

-picked up my $9.97 antibiotics from the pharmacy drive-thru and then put the other $5 in the gas tank, thinking this $15 thing worked out - as I pumped, got a call on the cell from the bank saying someone's check for a book order was returned. Called that person and left a self-depricating and humorous email about what they'd like to do that hopefully put them slightly at ease about an embarrassing situation

-got home with everyone - approved Ananda's making a bunch of hard boiled eggs while I George Foreman'd turkey bacon and cut up oranges, while talking on the phone to the check person who called me back mortified with credit card info and big future order plans, as well as Dama about basic training stuff and things I don't know

-spent an hour at the computer in what felt like a prednisone haze trying to figure out how to input orders until I realized it's not me, my computer or our connection...their system was just down o_O During this time I made the facebook update that if my OrderPro site had a face, I would shoot it in the face.

-checked on Chrysanthemum, fed her a bunch of cat food, scrubbed a bunch of diarrhea poop off the carpet in there :x Febreeze, which I hate. Set the box fan up outside the accordian doors blowing out from the room to ventilate because it has no vents/windows (it's like a huge carpeted storage closet). Found that she had moved all the kittens to the (enclosed) litter box and after some research decided she was trying to hide them because she felt threatened by Bob. C lets us pet her and hang out with what appears to be no stress, but if Bob goes in there she HISSES AND SPITS - I don't know if it's the giant army boots near her tiny kittens or the fact that he once sprayed her with my alcohol/vinegar solution as a punishment for being in heat and making a racket (believe me, this was discussed). Had a talk with her and set up a new cave like spot in there in a new place and we moved the kittens together (really - she took two, I took five).

-found out my sister needed company and had excess dinner - so I went and got her and Brian and Elizabeth and they fed us and we hung out and showed each other YouTube videos of note and Brian saw kittens and played with guinea pigs. He likes The Circus, which is what they call our house (as Aaron rides by on his unicycle...)

-while they were here, I overheard my brother lay down one of his real, destined to be classic new quotes. I'm not sure what inspired it but he said to my sister, "No, I took an online quiz and it actually said I am a vampire."

I can't remember anything beyond this because it's 5:42am and Grant and I are laughing at Regretsy and contemplating a whole family sleepover with Kristin, Darrian, Naja and others next Friday... I have an Usborne show tomorrow afternoon, and he has to work this weekend, and I have to go back to the ent on Monday morning, and Jake has tooth extractions on Tuesday morning, and both of those days the other kids are also going to VBS and GEEZ LOUISE LET'S JUST GO NUTS.

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Let me give you peeps my delirious recap of convo'ing with Grant about blogs and profits and so on:

I have a lot of people saying things to me like "professional design person" and "well educated, LOT OF WORK" and all these things. On the one hand, you're all totally right. On the other hand, I don't want or expect to be some kind of real internet superstar. Like I don't need or dream of ten thousand dollars a month from blogging. I'd be pretty thrilled with a couple hundred bucks, because this is something I do anyway. I've always done it. It just takes up a lot less Rubbermaid under the bed storage containers these past 7 years, now that it's electronic. So if I can make some money somehow in the process, that rocks! But I'm not going to magically start being an award winning photographer with balanced colors in my layout who runs a spellcheck. Basically what I'm saying is, if people like me enough that I can be widely read as I am - as a great big mess of blessings and mistakes and reality without a theme or a solid political affiliation or a business plan - that is awesome! If not, well, I'll still be doing this and loving it that I've really made some of the best friends and had some of the craziest experiences, from livejournal.

Anyway I really do value input and opinions and appreciate everything that's been said. Some of it is hugely helpful and will definitely be put to good use. I just ALSO think there either is a niche out there with a demographic that is interested in me rambling long windedly with made up words and showing everyone my chickens in irregularly sized pics, or there isn't. Does this make sense? Also I was all "See, look at THIS!!!" tonight when I noticed that freaking hyperbole and a half is also blogspot (in addition to cakewrecks and Anna Maria Horner). Lord Whimsy, too. These are all people supporting themselves completely (AND WELL) off of either their blog or what their blog is about, who I respect, and they're pretty damned varied. I am still kind of put out that blogspot doesn't have a real place for icons and won't allow comment threading, and those factors alone are probably enough to drive me to wordpress, but I'm just saying....whatever I'm saying. I've been recognized at home and on vacation, received donations from all over the world such that we could stay in Boston for 2 extra months, I've been taken out to lunch by people who act like they're honored to meet me, and I get 4000 pageloads a week. This may be small potatoes in the blogosphere but to me, it's CRAZY. NUTS. I feel like I must be doing something right in all my ineptitude. Maybe people just like to shake their heads about what should be getting done differently so much that they can't stay away - I actually think there could be something to that.


This has been a long week.