I am married to a nerd. I don’t feel bad calling him out on the interwebz because he is fully aware of his nerdyness. As a child the trusty husband would take computers apart for fun. Ask the trusty MIL about the time he did something to their computer during mid-terms during her masters coursework and she had to wake him up to fix it. No technological upgrade in our house comes without a price. It has been well documented on various blogs (here, here, here and here). I may pay the price for all of this work, but in the end it is pretty cool. My computer is custom built and our TV set-up is da bomb. It does come with written instructions for all babysitters, but it’s all good. I can stream Netflix, Hulu and LastFM from my computer to the TV. I have a DVR, Wii and Xbox. There are benefits to having a nerdy husband.
Last week the trusty husband finally received a bonus from work. It has been a very long time since he’s received a bonus or a merit increase (thankyouverymuch a-hole ex-president). My husband works his ass off. He never fully takes a vacation. He is forever checking his email on his phone and does it all with such grace it is amazing. So when he found out he was going to get this bonus he said he was going to buy himself a new TV. He is horribly jealous of anyone who has a flat screen TV. I was ok with the purchase. It wasn’t my money to spend so why not.
Let’ take a moment to also note that along with the nerdyness, my husband is a cheap Swede. This isn’t derogatory, just a fact of life.
Here’s where buying a TV gets painful.
Our entertainment center was not large enough to hold a new 42″ television thus requiring the purchase of a new entertainment center. Trusty husband looks online and finds what he thinks will work. Being the cheap Swede that he is cheap Swedish furniture is an excellent compromise. Last Thursday we head north to the big blue building where you get to keep your pants on*. When seeing the new entertainment center in person I hemmed and hawed over it. I wasn’t sure. I caved, but made a few add-on adjustments like drawers and doors. Read: I spent more money. We walked out having spent more money than he was originally anticipating. He pretty much had a panic attack the rest of the night.
By Friday he had recovered because that was TV buying day. In addition to the TV he also purchased a blueray player. I spent the afternoon at the church preparing for a fundraiser dinner that was Saturday night. When I got home the trusty husband had assembled the entertainment center and I had to do the adjoining book case. No prob. I’m pro at IKEA furniture. I slap together the book case and drawers. We go to put on the doors, but have to move the drawer hardware up because I had it in the wrong spot. Then we went to put in the drawers. They didn’t fit. A 20 minute discussion argument over doors and drawers ensued. Screw it and move on. I just want to watch TV. The Canada vs. Slovakia hockey game was on and I was missing it.
We get the TV mounted in the cabinet. (It is slightly crooked, but we are trying to ignore that for the time being) We start putting other stuff into the cabinet. Blueray player, check. Xbox… feck. It doesn’t fit into the spot we wanted it to go. Try the cable box in that spot. Nope. Does the stereo (which pretty much controls all of the sound for all of this stuff) fit? Nope. Danger! Danger! Elle is over tired, sore from standing all day and missing a very important hockey game. I gave up and went to bed.
Where we stand at the moment is more cables had to be purchased. The trusty husband also has to purchase a USB hub because apparently I either sold our extra one in a garage sale or it was in a box that went to the Goodwill. How was I supposed to know we’d need that? We had to move the stereo to the book case and cut a hole in the back so the cables will come out. He has to extend all of the speaker wire because it won’t reach the stereo. We have to return the doors we purchased for the cabinet and purchase two more drawers and to run the whole shebang we still need a PhD.
Basically, purchasing a new TV was a complete disaster with the exception that the picture is utterly amazing. We keep putting DVDs in the player just to see the difference. The new Star Trek in high def on a blueray player is almost as good as in the theater. Now if we only had surround sound**…
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*Years ago there was a radio commercial for IKEA and they were giving directions. They were it’s the big blue building where you get to keep your pants on, not the big white building where you have to take your pants off (the neighboring hospital)
**When we had our house re-roofed last fall all of the banging around loosened the surround sound speakers from the housings and one fell out and was hanging by the wires. I didn’t want to leave it like that so I pulled it down. When I did that I broke a connector so we also need new surround sound speakers.
So it think I’m going through a mid-life crisis. Ha! I bet you thought I’d bring this up January didn’t you? Trick’s on you. I’ve been writing multiple posts at night an scheduling them to auto post at 3 a.m. every day. Truth be told… all of this mid-life crisis stuff started popping up in January. It wasn’t until now that I got around to writing about it.
Right… personal identity crisis. I’m on a track to lose some of the weight that I’ve gained. Things are going better for me in the emotion department, but I’m still in need of some kind of change. I attempted my usual “paint a room” solution, but that backfired when I found out I wasn’t going to get to keep my office. I’m still in the need of some change.
I am also tired of feeling like a tired old mom. Here are the things I’m considering doing…
1) cutting my hair. This isn’t unusual. Cutting my hair is my fall back change thing. The trouble is that I’m going to China in July and I wanted to grow my hair out so that it was fairly low maintenance while I was there. Believe it or not, my hair is less maintenance when it is long as opposed to short.
2) I’m considering unconventional haircut.
This is the photo I like, but imagine the back being longer on one side. It would be a little 80s, but I think it has the potential to turn out cute.
3) I’m considering coloring my hair. Now that should totally not come as a shock. Typically my hair is colored. Especially since the onslaught of grey hair. However, I’m thinking about above mentioned hairstyle with chunky color in the front and the possibility of throwing in an off the wall color (purple or pink) just for fun. The crazy color would be the wash out kind like I had before, but it would be fun.
I’ve also considered that bleach blonde like pictured above, but I’m too much of a sissy to go through the pain of totally bleaching out my hair.
4) Here’s the big one… I’m considering getting my nose pierced. I’m 33 years old. Honestly, why am I considering this? I have no clue. I just want to do it. My fear is my allergies and my constant need to wipe my nose. I still want to do it.
So am I totally crazy and really in need of a vacation or should I go for the whole shebang?
Last Wednesday I spent the majority of the day in my kitchen standing. Without shoes on. By that evening my foot was in terrible pain. I was fairly certain that it was just because I stood all day. Without shoes on.
I have horribly bad feet. They are pancake flat. If I have to stand for long periods of time I need shoes. Moreover, shoes with a certain kind of support. I’ve found that Birkenstocks fit the bill. I’ve worn them for years when I had jobs that required me to stand for long periods of time. So much so that I’ve worn the sole and most of the cork off of one pair. In recent years I’ve discovered that Crocs are a nice fill in. However, me being as dumb as I am, forgot to put on shoes.
Thursday morning came and my foot still hurt. I really did a number on it. Friday… still hurt. By Saturday I was beginning to question my standing and began wondering if I had accidentally run into something and broken my foot. Sunday wasn’t much better. By Sunday I was significantly limping and no amount of foot support or type of shoe was going to fix the problem. We went to a Super Bowl party (where I spent a portion of it playing Wii bowling while sitting) and right around half time I was asking the trusty husband if the hockey bag was in the car because I was going to use sock tape to tape up my foot to see if that helped. We didn’t. I just limped around some more.
The good news is today my foot hurts less than it did yesterday. This leads me to believe that 1) I stood too long without shoes on and 2) yes, I am dumb.
Hopefully tomorrow it will feel even better and I can get to work on that 5 miles a week walking goal.
I know we’ve all had our fair share of crappy days. Here is a typical yesterday for me.
The trusty husband has been out of town since Sunday. This left me and the boy alone… for a week. We are both still alive as of this writing. Yesterday was slightly questionable.
The boy and I both got out of bed when the dog started barking. 7:00 a.m. That was nice. Usually she starts barking 10 minutes before the alarm goes off. The boy goes into the bathroom. A few minutes later I hear, “mom, I need your help.” Due to some stickage the boy peed down his leg and all over his pjs. I said accidents happen and sent him off to find sweats. We found sweats (that were too small because I haven’t don’t laundry all week). The child put them on, but then started saying he wanted a different shirt because his pj shirt didn’t match his sweats. I told him no because he was just going to have to change again after breakfast. To this he started screaming. Of course he did, I hadn’t had coffee yet. We argued about that for a while until I told him just to get dressed for the day, but he had to pick out clothes because for the love of god I needed coffee.
Coffee brewing I sit down to watch exactly 2 seconds of the morning “news” (GMA doesn’t exactly count as news). Then there was more screaming from behind his closed bedroom door. I asked what now and his issue was that he couldn’t get his jeans snapped. Instead of asking for assistance like a normal human being he became Screamasaurus, the evil child that makes your ears bleed. This went on for 10 minutes.
I finished making breakfast and finally had my coffee in hand and my day could finally begin. We manage (mostly) to get through breakfast. I go to do my morning work blog reading and the boy does his homework. Yes, there is homework in preschool. I tell him it is time to go to school and to put socks and shoes on. He goes through 3 pair of socks to find ones he can get on his feet, complaining the entire time. I threaten to send him to school without shoes or socks unless he gets them on now. *ching* another point for parent of the year.
9:00 we finally leave the house (10 minutes late)
We walk in the door at school and I notice the cart of lunchboxes. Frick. It’s lunch day. Every Wednesday is lunch day. The boy looks so sad and I send him off to class promising him a lunch *ching ching* 2 points.
I run upstairs to drop off my stuff in my office (holla! I have an office now) and notice the bag of leftover communion bread sitting on the counter. I had planned to run to the grocery and find something for the child, but hells no, I’m gonna raid the church kitchen.
I throw together a lunch of a PBJ sandwich (complete with concecrated challah bread, goldfish crackers, animal crackers, a capri sun I found in the fridge and 1/4 of the pear I brought for my own snack. Hey, at least I brought food for someone. I later find out that the child ate the entire lunch.
We get home and I decide that I’m going to try to finish the skirt I started earlier this week and try to finish the blouse that goes with it so I have a nice new outfit to wear to work tomorrow. I spend the afternoon cutting out fabric, and start on the hem of my skirt. All of a sudden the needle goes over a pin and hits it in the wrong spot. Snaps the needle, bends the shit out of the pin and then the worst happens. I dislodge everything and the broken tip of the needle falls into the sewing machine. Now this isn’t the free serger we are talking about here. This is the very nice sewing machine I purchased 3 years ago for a hefty sum of money. I clear everything from the machine and go to take out the broken needle. As I use a dime (I can’t find my sewing machine screwdriver) to loosen the needle screw the needle bar moves to the left. That’s not supposed to happen. I spent the next hour totally taking apart my sewing machine to try to fix it, but no luck. It is busted. I even tried walking away and coming back to it. Nope.
I pack the boy and my sewing machine into the car and drive off to the fabric store. I showed the machine to the Viking lady. She does all the same stuff I did with equally crappy results. It needs service. Service=money. Did I mention that our chocolate fridge died last week? Even worse, the repair guy won’t be back until the 7th meaning I won’t get my machine back until the 21st at the earliest. No new outfit for me.
The rest of the evening was mostly ok. I fed the child frozen mac n’ cheese and I ate leftover pizza. I laid on the couch with my laptop and watched one of the greatest movies in the world.
I swear this stuff only happens to me.
I decided to join the quilters group at church. The median age of the quilters group is about 82. I do it because I like old church ladies and the quilts go to a good cause. Old church ladies make the best snacks.
A few weeks ago I was working with one of the ladies and another woman came over asking if I had any use for a serger. I always have use for sewing equipment. I asked how much the person wanted for the serger and this woman was pretty sure the lady was giving it away (it was coming from this lady’s neighbor). Hells yes I’ll take a free serger. I’ll take a free anything (by the way, does anyone have a free refrigerator? The Sweet Hope one died last week and I have to make truffles the first two weeks of February). I agree to the free serger and last Monday the quilter lady showed up with the thing. Sweet!
Last Wednesday I busted it out to give it a shot. 45 minutes of trying to thread the thing and I was cooking with gas. I needed something to sew so I decided to make the dog a new sweater (don’t ask). I get to sewing and all of a sudden my new serger comes to a grinding halt. Ok, it was more of a long drawn out squeaky halt. I do what any other sane and handy person would do, I first oiled the snot out of it and then took it apart and then I read the directions. The directions that say the machine is made from oil impregnated metal and shouldn’t need to be oiled because it makes a linty mess and the lint acts like a giant oil sponge and could clog things up. And also when I took the back off of it the motor was kinda hot and sparky when I ran the machine. Hello, linty.
So then I started looking for a new motor. Because honestly those sewing machine repair guys are a bunch of rip-off artists (kinda like a certain locksmith).
I let the serger sit for a while and when the trusty husband got home I told him the saga of my FREE machine. I then proceeded to show him my bunk serger and damn if that thing didn’t work properly. I hate it when my free shit works like it is supposed to. How else am I going to find stuff to complain about?
Then Friday I had the day to myself so I went to the fabric store for new serger thread that wasn’t blue or red and while I was at it I thought I’d get new needles for it. I’m sure the thing could stand to have a needle change. I carefully wrote down the type of needle I needed. I’m not a complete idiot.
I poured over the types of needles and settled on an 11/75 universal. I get home, spend the next hour rethreading and rethreading and moving needles and rethreading and moving needles and rethreading this darn machine. The needle would not catch the other threads. I was stumped. I then pulled the old needle out of the trash to find out that they are totally different lengths and the ones I bought would not work. And by this time I’d used the machine so much trying to get stuff to work that it was doing it’s squeaky hot burny thing and well, I gave up.
But I got a free serger (that I can only use for 5 minutes at a shot).
