Not my forte.

Waiting, that is.

I’m waiting for March to end.

I’m waiting to hear from the person to whom I offered a job.

I’m waiting for Spring Break to end.

Bleh.

Yard monkeys in my bed.

My children have their own rooms. Their own beds, even. However, in recent months? I cannot keep them OUT of MY bed. It’s become seriously annoying.

They’re on spring break (two weeks!) right now, and it’s gotten worse. It’s like a vacation, so they get to sleep wherever they want in the basement – this usually translates to them falling asleep in front of a movie or tv show. Then, sometime in the wee hours, they magically appear in my bed. I usually vaguely notice, which is enough to peeve me, as I detest being bothered while sleeping (my third favourite pasttime. The first 2 are yours to guess.).

This morning, I was awakened by J’s feet. Under my cheek. He was horizontal in the bed, with his head on A’s shoulder. I had spent at least 3 hours wrestling with him over the covers – the child is an oven at night, and he sleeps uncovered 98% of the time, even at -35C. I, on the other hand, love my cozy little cave of blankets, and do not appreciate gaps in the perimeter. Gaps = drafts. ARGH.

Tonight, A was supposed to sleep next door. J tried to last night, and was home at 10:30. A’s stomach hurts tonight, so he’s back. J? Asleep in my bed. I should carry his ass to his own bed. He might stay there.

Or I might wake up with feet in my face again. Sigh.

Ice is really…um…icy.

I detest this time of year. Two weeks ago, it was -20C. Then it got rather warm (above 0 counts!) and WHAMMO, the snow started melting. Too fast.

My dad was nice enough to install ice catcher thingies (totally their official name) on the metal roof above our garage. This roof has been the bane of my existence each winter, dropping shit tons of snow at random times, sometimes on my head. All that snow tends to compact into a beautiful, solid berm of ice.

Ice is for drinks. It’s not for the entryway to my house. But hey, it’s there every damn year.

So. The ice catcher thingies worked really well, and kept the snow on the roof. The ice berm still formed, but in a much smaller manner than usual – I really have to ask our snow plow guy to stop leaving the big pile right in front of the garage. Still, it’s there. And now the snow on the roof is melting. Drip by drip. Guess where that water goes? Between the ice berm and the garage wall, of course!

Thus, this is my life right now:

Wake up, take dogs out. Cross fingers that Goldie will not go into a 4-legged sprawl on ice outside garage door.
Take hammer to ice (bought a shiny new sledgehammer for just this thing!). At 6 am. Hi, neighbours!
Shovel broken ice, tossing it onto the driveway.
Go to work.
Upon return home, walk through 1-2 inches of water that have pooled between the goddamn ice berm and the door. Two soakers, coming up.
Unload stuff in house (purse, mail), return to garage.
Shovel WATER with snow shovel. Unintentionally soak dogs, who are too stupid to move when told.
Go inside, make dinner, etc.
Return outside at bedtime to let the dogs out, discover newly formed ice rink between berm & door.
Swear loudly, ignore it until morning.
Rinse & repeat.

ARGH.

Furniture that works.

Chaise lounge #2 has fully functional legs, I am happy to report. Photo will be somewhere in this post (no, it won’t, because I can’t get it to show up…). J has decided that he must walk on it. I have decided that this habit annoys me. It’s been here 1 day.

Stupidly, I cracked open New Moon at 10 pm last night. Sleep? I don’t need no stinkin’ sleep. 2:30 am bedtime + 6:45 am wake up (thanks, internal clock, you RAWK while I’m on vacation) = really bitchy Jen. It also equals naptime at highly inconvenient noon hour, as this coincides with J’s request for food. Moar food. Feed me NOW. It’s NOON, can’t you see I’m starving?

GAh.

Some kind of vacation I’m having. Five days off with the kids. Wheee-hooo. Admittedly, their grandfather will be taking them somewhere that’s not here on Tuesday. Can’t wait for that! Also included in my time off: board meeting for daycare, staff meeting for daycare (don’t fucking ask, it’s all bullshit), SPCA meeting. I really know how to partay.

From CatLand: Gizmo’s new favourite thing to worship/figure out/stalk is the water machine. Gotta get a photo of that. Mouse has decided I’m HIS person, and he must follow me everywhere. He’s kind of cool. Other cats being doused with water for daring to lay a claw on the new lounger.

A whole bunch of little things…

My parents are moving back to Vancouver. Lots of reasons, the biggest two being their house won’t sell (even at a much-reduced price), and my dad misses golfing. He’s accustomed to golfing year-round. Not possible here, what with the 6 months of winter (5 really, but you have to lump Mud Season in there). I’m not upset about this change – my relationship with my mom will go back to the norm, and I really don’t feel we’ve seen that much more of my dad since he moved here. The downside to this is they’re going to sell their place here….the cabin has been part of the family for 19 years, so that’ll be a big change.

I seem to be morphing into a “cool” mom. What else could explain the fact that I agreed to buy an amp for my 10 yr old’s electric guitar? OMG. The noise.

The carpet-ruining peeing dog is still with us. She had a good two-week run without one accident, then smashed it all to hell last week. Knock on wood, we seem to be back on track. She did have another go with the bleeding callus on her leg, tho. Goddamn temp dropped to -30C, and voila! It split open a bit. Ick.

The cats are suffering badly from cabin fever. The temp is up again, and the snow is melting, but it’s far too slow for anyone’s liking. Mouse usually helps me take out the dogs every morning, then comes back in immediately.

We all loved having D home for a week, but I could have done without the “I’m on vacation, pass me a beer!” attitude. It’s going to be a huge adjustment once he moves home….going to have to cure him of a few ailments (leaveupthetoiletseat-itis, dropclothesathisass-itis, ignoredirtydishes-itis, among others) when that day comes.

This weekend marks the first in a while that I have no plans. Between birthday parties, awards dinners, soccer inventory day, an auction, and the soccer signup, I’m DONE. Need time off. And on that note, I’m off to find a book. Or a movie. Something that doesn’t require me to expend energy.

Asshattery 101.

To the supplier of the lovely lounger (chaise lounge) I bought from Sears: checking to see that the legs actually screw into the holes provided would be a great step to add to your manufacturing process. Seriously. Legs 1 & 2: no problem. Leg 3: fell out if I tightened it too far. Leg 4: wouldn’t catch and stay no matter how much I cursed it’s existence on this earth. Thanks for the joy of moving an unwieldy, if light, piece of furniture into my home only to have to repackage it and return it. Loved that. I fervently hope that the reordered lounger works, or I am going to lose mah shit.

To the letter-writing assclown, of whom I am mightily tired: FUCK OFF. You said your piece. We get it. Your approval, however, means about as much as a pile of ant shit.

/end rant

Things.

D is home for a week. A whole, entire, lovely week. He arrived on Thursday night, and will be here until Thursday morning. The boys are loving it! I am too, for many reasons. Heh.

The new oven is working out well, with one small drawback. Because it’s bigger, and has a smoothtop, the cats have decided they need to jump on it. A LOT. D pointed this out to me as he was making his 40th (or so) instant coffee yesterday. My response went something like this: “Well, I guess they’ll only get burned once before they figure it out.” He thinks I’m a cold bitch. I think I’m a realist. I can barely make sure the little shits aren’t on my counter, or on the table knocking over water glasses, or scratching my furniture to hell. At least the stove comes with a feature that will teach them better.

Ever have one of those days at work? I had an entire week like that. Suffice it to say, some people are just assholes. Especially when their failure to plan somehow makes them think it’s MY fucking emergency.

Got through all my staff reviews at work. Even my mom’s. I’m good with the whole boss thing, but we’ve both realized that it’s already affecting our mother/daughter relationship. As in, we don’t spend much time together – not even talking on the phone – outside of work. I think it’ll be another year or maybe two, and I’ll be ready for her to retire. We’ve had this chat, so she knows where I stand.

Not much else new & exciting here. I was at our soccer auction last night, and ended up with a gift certificate for two wills. Seemed like a good plan…we have life insurance, but have never gotten around to the will thing. I also ended up with what is quite possibly the ugliest $32 hat ever (I paid $7), but hey, Oz likes it. Best moment of the night: seeing that nobody bid on a ball cap donated by my competition in town. That took the sting out of the fact that my donation (umbrella/golf balls) didn’t fetch very much money.