I believe my wonderful Revereware non-stick skillet has seen its last days of use. It had started to be not quite so non-stick anymore a few months ago. Last night, it finally just stuck. Everything stuck, and not in the usual way things stick to regular skillets. No, it really, really stuck, as though the whole thing had been coated with Superglue just before I put the pork cutlets into it. I am bummed. I use that skillet for everything, and it will have to be replaced ASAP.

The same size is going to be about $20, which isn’t bad. I used it, really, really used it, for about five years. I may convince Lin I should upgrade to the 10″ or 12″ size. They aren’t much more expensive, and it would be nice to be able to get two large pork chops into the same skillet to cook at the same time … or to have room to stir one-dish meals in the skillet. I’d be happy with just having the same size again though. I just miss my heavy non-stick skillet!!!

At the moment, it’s outside with oven cleaner sprayed on it. I feel fairly certain that’s not going to be anything for it’s lack of non-sticking functionality, but if I could just salvage it to use for panbread, which doesn’t require it to be non-stick, that would be great. It’s just the right size for stove-top cornbread for two. The oven cleaner probably won’t work, but I have tried everything else. I figured it was worth a shot.

As soon as I am done fussing with that, I have to go check on my plants and get the chili started for tonight. Mmmmm. Chili. Alas, unless the oven cleaner works on the skillet, there will be no cornbread. Very sad, but I suppose we will survive. Chili is good with or without cornbread.

Today has sucked mightily. Yes, it has.

Tomorrow will be better. It has to be. There’s really nowhere to go but up.

The only enjoyable moments of my day were brought to me by my silly cats and my plants.

That’s all I have to say about today.

I remind someone they need to do something. They say they will do it. I ask them a week later if they have done it, and they haven’t. Two days later, I ask them to please do the thing they need to do and remind them it really needs to be done, and they say they will.

I wake up on Monday morning, and the thing that was supposed to have been done hasn’t been done, and I am left fixing the multitude of problems not doing it has caused. Yet … again … all the time, over and over.

“I’m sorry.”

Sorries aren’t cutting it anymore. If they were actually sorry, it would have only happened once, not all the damn time.

I’d swear there are no small children in my life at all, and yet I look at the adults around me, and every last one of them, all older than myself, act exactly like small, irresponsible children. And I’m the one who’s always treated like the five-year-old? I must be one smart five-year-old, seeing as I am the one who always has to sort out the problems caused by adults not doing the things they know they have to do.

Yeah … this Monday has started off just great. Just … freaking … great.

Happy Mother’s Day to all you moms out there. Hope you are having a good one and the weather is nice for your day.

My mom is at a pow wow and having a great time.

I’m feeling somewhat better today. Still have a raging headache though. Blech.

I think I’ll go watch my plants grow for a while since it’s so beautiful outside today.

If you need me this afternoon, I’ll be on the porch watching my plants grow or at friv.com playing flash games … or napping. But first, we have to make the trek across town to get food at the farmers market. Neither of us wants to go, but we haven’t been in about a month, so we kind of have to go.

Those peppers I posted a photo of just yesterday? Doubled in size this morning. And that Better Boy tomato plant? Grew another three inches. Everything is really taking off! Makes it so exciting to step out on the porch every morning to see what’s changed!

Better go make us some more coffee. We need a kick in the butt something bad this morning. Zero motivation to do anything.

There are cats squabbling over who gets to sit in the window beside me and stare at the birds in the yard, and there are men in the living room watching Dr. Strangelove in hi-def at sound volumes I, in the other room, would describe as deafening.

Meanwhile, I am hormonally cranky, have a nasty headache, and am starving. Could everyone just keep it down please?!

And where’s the pizza? I need pizza now.

There are times when it seems to me I am the only American that still understands the English language. This is one of those times.

A few days ago, I think, Obama said that McCain was “losing his bearings.” Naturally, some of McCain’s aides are now barking about how ageist it is to say that.

A person doesn’t have to be old to lose their bearings. It’s not like he said McCain was becoming senile or losing his marbles. Those are the sorts of things I have been saying about him, because he is not the same John McCain I used to know and like … and yes, he does seem to be getting old, not just physically.

Yet the blogosphere and the 24 hour news circuit are alive with people ranting about how rude it is to say that McCain is losing his bearings, because it is a stab at his age. My suggestion is for these folks to learn how to use a dictionary, since they obviously don’t know the meanings of simple words and phrases.

Meanwhile, I will continue to believe that McCain is senile and losing his marbles.

My plan this afternoon had been to go out and plant some flower seeds under the little tree in the front yard. I grabbed my garden tools and headed out there to do battle with the Bermuda Grass currently growing under said tree. Well, I chopped and chopped and chopped, and I tried to pull that grass up, but I got nowhere with it. I gave up. I hate Bermuda Grass, but it makes up about 50% of the grass in the yard, so we can’t exactly kill it all. Replacing all the sod in the front yard is not in the budget.

I then moved on to the end of the flowerbed that Lin had started removing the grass and weeds from. I cleaned it up some more and planted a whole bunch of old seeds there: sunflowers, marigolds, and two others whose names I can’t recall. These seeds are really old and past their use-by date. I have no idea if anything will actually come up. I’ll just water it and keep the weeds out, and we’ll see what happens. Something is bound to come up.

Then the stupid rabbits will probably eat it.

I might try again under that tree tomorrow, depending on how I feel. I’m all hormonal, crampy and unhappy, and chopping around, even the little I did, didn’t make that any better. In fact, my neck is killing me from the chopping and pulling. My back isn’t too happy either. But I really want something other than Bermuda Grass under that tree, and I have a bunch more seeds, both old and new, to use up. I want some more flowers in my yard!

Puttering in the yard was the only thing of note I did all day.

Tomorrow I’d like to putter in the yard some more and do an hour in the Box Room, now that the trash bin is empty again. I can finally throw more stuff away! Yippee!

When I wasn’t being bothered by Annoying Boy yesterday afternoon, I spent a good long time sitting out on the porch watching my plants grow and reading. It was a beautiful day, and I didn’t want to miss the chance to welcome each tiny tomato as it popped into existence. You may think I am joking, but I am not. Over the course of an afternoon spent on my porch, I saw tiny tomatoes popping into existence.

I’d read a chapter of my book, and then take a break from the sitting still to hover over the plants like a doting mother. Every time I did that, I noticed a new tiny tomato on one of the plants. When I noticed the first one, I thought maybe I had just not noticed it before. By the time I saw a second new tomato that hadn’t been there earlier in the day, I’d already been staring at those plants for so long, there was no mistaking the fact I was seeing a new tomato where there had been no tomato just an hour before. It was crazy!

All three Sugar Snack plants have four or more little tomatoes on them, and more flowers popping out almost as I watch. Also, Mr. Stripey just gets more and more blooms every day too. While Mr. Stripey is large enough to be getting tomatoes, I do worry that I should have removed the blooms off the Sugar Snacks to let them get a little larger first. They are all still so small. It’s a little late now. I guess whatever happens … happens.

To be honest, I have been regretting getting all those extra plants. Or rather, I have been regretting getting all those plants from the place I got them. The quality of the seedlings was somewhat poor, but I hadn’t seen the TAMU jalepenos anywhere else, and every other place was totally out of any sort of cherry tomatoes. I really didn’t need any of them though, and I should have just stuck to the original plan to have the two Earthboxes with a couple of plants in them.

It’s lucky for the potted tomatoes that the Sugar Snacks have attracted my attention with tomatoes, because all those plantings have been growing so little and looking so poorly, no matter what I do for them, I had begun considering taking them out of the pots and sticking them in the front flowerbed … to be left to their own survival devices. Then I could use those pots for something a little more productive, like the cucumbers I have yet to get started. I may still put some of those tomato plants out to pasture in the flowerbed, but they all earned another week or two of being doted on, thanks to the appearance of some tiny tomatoes.

The Best Boy plants are probably cheering on the Sugar Snacks wildly. I was very close to just ripping them out of their pots and tossing them two days ago. They refuse to grow, they continue to look awful, and I hold out little hope they will ever produce even one tomato. Since I didn’t buy them, they were extras others couldn’t use and were going to toss, I don’t have to feel guilt about abandoning them to the flowerbed or just throwing them away. I never wanted the Best Boys anyway, but it’s hard to say no to little old ladies when they want to give you something. But I am willing to give them a little more time now, thanks to the Sugar Snacks … and being too lazy to dig holes in the flowerbed and move plants. It’s hot as hell out there today.

So, aside from having an encounter with Annoying Boy, I had a blast all afternoon reading and watching my plants grow, and boy are they doing just that! I wish I could do that every afternoon, but alas, I don’t have that much leisure time. Somebody has to do the housework around here and feed the inhabitants. I do think I will plan my day tomorrow to allow for more time sitting on the porch watching plants grow and reading. It made for a wonderful day.

NOTE: It’s getting late, I am incredibly tired from goofing off most of the day watching my plants grow and puttering around the yard, I have a serious headache, and I need a shower before bed. Once again, I am not going to bother proofreading this, so if it sounds insane, it just sounds insane. I’m posting it anyway.

It’s long, so it’s going behind the cut.
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I’m having continuing stress-like feelings about one of my friends. It’s that feeling which informs me I am having inner conversations about whether or not I want this person in my life. That’s a harsh thing to be considering, but there you have it. I’m not angry. I’m not even upset. I guess I’m just disappointed. That happens in interpersonal relationships.

While I believe that even the best among us are capable of doing and saying and thinking stupid, evil things, I believe in forgiveness. I have forgiven people for things that … well … many other people wouldn’t, and I meant it. That doesn’t mean I don’t reserve the right to be angry or upset. I do. I am fully capable of knowing why someone did what they did and understanding their rationale for it. I can forgive them for doing it. They did the best they could in the situation, for their own reasons, and they failed to live up to my (or society’s) standards and expectations. We all fail at things … do the wrong thing … at least a few times in life.

Now for the parable:

When I drove a ratty old car, banged up and barely chugging along, large trucks that took up two parking spaces used to make the blood vessels in my temples pop. Selfish bastards! Assholes! Even though it made me angry, because I needed a parking space too, I was capable of understanding a few important points from their view: parking spaces are made way the hell too small in order to cram more cars in, large trucks are not easy to maneuver in a cramped parking lot, and many people in ratty old cars don’t take care not to leave dings and scratches on other people’s car doors (which they can’t really help too much, owing to the smallness of the parking lots). It still made me angry, and I still thought it was an asshole-like thing to do, but I forgave them. After all, I was generally driving rather large ratty old cars, and they are no joy in the parking lot department either.

Then I started driving a new and large truck, and I personally got to see the other side of the story. My hypothesis about the reasons that so many large trucks take up two parking spaces was correct. Not all people who take up two parking spaces are selfish assholes. I feel fairly certain I am not a selfish asshole, and yet, even I occasionally park the truck like crap, and I leave it like that. I did it today. I am certain it pissed someone off. I’m sorry. My reasons for leaving my truck parked like crap? The only parking spot available where there where two together, which is almost required in some parts of the lot in order to even get the truck into a spot (due to those tight parking spaces), is located in such a way that it requires me to turn sharper than my vehicle is able and no amount of point turning is going to make a difference. The truck just can’t get fully into either open space.

I gave it a try, and there was nowhere else to park where the truck would fit. I didn’t really want to waste a bunch of gas driving in circles or going home and coming back, and I didn’t want to walk a block with all my groceries. So … I got out and went and did my shopping. I felt bad about the fact that second space was going to be unusable by any type of automobile, but what to do? I have a life I am trying to get through too.

When I came out, the store had emptied dramatically. I must have arrived right at the end of the morning rush. The parking lot was growing bare, and there, all by itself, sat my truck … obviously parked like crap. It looked stupid sitting there badly parked, without all the other cars that had been around earlier making the proper parking impossible. I feel certain someone driving through that parking lot at that time called me an ass, or made a comment about people who drive large trucks. I might have.

I forgive them for hating me, as they haven’t had to park the thing in a cramped and crowded parking lot that barely accommodates large vehicles. After they walk a mile in my shoes, we can talk about it again. Though I do believe I have to amend my original theories as to why people who drive large trucks sometimes park like crap. It had absolutely nothing at all to do with keeping people from dinging my truck, and I suspect that might be the case for a lot of the others as well. This does not, of course, apply to people who consciously and willfully take up two entire parking spaces, as though they didn’t even TRY to park correctly, repeatedly and all the time. Those people are assholes.

Which brings me to my next point:

My forgiveness is not endless and bottomless. I am not perfect. If I were capable of forgiving everyone for everything, I’d be walking on water right about now … just for the fun of it. When a behavior that I feel is “bad” is repeated over, and over, and over with no growth, change or improvement, my patience and forgiveness runs out. I’ll still eventually forgive the person, but I won’t necessarily have that person in my life anymore. No animosity or anger are involved in that decision. That’s just the way it is. That person is doing/saying/thinking something that doesn’t sit well with me, and I may understand why, but I don’t have to keep being exposed to it and being made upset by it.

Go forth and be happy, but please be happy somewhere else. Or be unhappy. Your choice.

I have so much going on in my head these days. There’s more I’d like to say about this, but it’s getting so late. The situation is on-going, so it is bound to come up again soon. Eventually, I will have to decide whether or not I am seeing a pattern of behavior I can’t move past. Have my friend and I really grown so far apart? I hate that feeling. It always brings up additional questions, like … were they always like that and I never noticed before? I hate that feeling too.

This is probably a strange and rambling post, but I’m too tired to be bothered to proofread it. Forgive me?

Lin and I have been amusing ourselves by watching the fuss on CNN over the late arriving Lake County, Indiana primary results. We are amused because those are the stomping grounds of our northern family members. Lin was born in Hammond and grew up all over that area. I got my tattoo in Gary. We have friends and family members sprinkled there like salt and pepper on a steak. It doesn’t make the national news often, if ever, so that’s been interesting.

I’ve had a rotten headache all evening, and I just ache all over. I think I’ll go take a nice hot shower and get ready for bed. Maybe by the time I am done, the primaries for today will be over. If not, at least I can pass out while waiting with nice clean hair.

Even though nothing much got done around here today, it’s been a long day. I am so, so tired.

I love my man.

My man looked at the plans for the fridge today, and then with only a plastic fork, a mirror, and his finger, he has restored the in-from-the-door functionality to my freezer door. Tonight, I shall have crushed ice in my Dr Pepper once again!

I do love my man.

The cats aren’t too sure they like this new whirring and grinding noise in the kitchen. Every time I use it, they fly around the house … tails looking like bottle brushes and ears laid back … as though they were being chased by a large and angry dog. It’s very hilarious.

Ronin will eventually mourn the fixing of the ice crusher. Why? One of his favorite things in the world is to stand at my feet as soon as I open the freezer door, waiting patiently for me to drop the one or two ice cubes I always drop when getting ice out of the inner bin. Yes, to Ronin, few things are more exciting and fun that batting an ice cube across the room into some unseen corner to melt, thereby leaving a small, cold puddle for some bare human foot to step in later when it’s dark. Yes, indeed, that is very, very fun (for Ronin).

I can’t believe I finally have crushed ice again. I feel so civilized!

I made it to the grocery store this morning. Nothing eventful happened, other than I noticed the prices have gone up again.

While nothing exciting or particularly interesting happened while I was shopping, I did have a fun little experience at the checkout. I was standing in one of the many long, long lines looking forward to being there for at least 20 or 30 minutes, considering how slowly the cashiers were moving. I don’t really mind. Standing by my basket is easy compared to pushing the thing around.

So I was just standing there watching people, taking sneaky phone photos, and reading the headlines on magazines, when a very sweet looking young, male employee walks up and suggests I use the self-check, which I was standing right beside and which wasn’t being used by anyone. I don’t do self-check. My reason being that with food prices the way they are, the store can pay someone to check my goods through, put them in bags for me, and offer to help me out with them. I didn’t feel like trying to explain to the nice young man why I refuse to use the self-check and didn’t mind standing in a long line, so I just told him that I had never used it.

He offered to help me. I was bored, and I saw an opportunity to play my dumb blond role, so I took it. Without any promoting for me, he checked all my goods through the self-check for me while explaining how it worked, and he put them in bags, and he put them back in my basket for me … and offered to get someone to help me out with them. Yes, playing my Dumb Blond role got me out of the store at least 20 minutes faster, and I still got full service!

In exchange, I taught him the meaning of the word Luddite, which I claimed to be. He was actually bright enough and inquisitive enough to have a conversation with, and so I asked him if he wasn’t concerned that the jobs of unskilled workers are being replaced by machines and electronics more and more often. He replied that he had thought about it, but that there would be other jobs that would be created, and after all, even though he wasn’t standing at a register, he still had a job. I then asked him what would happen to that job when self-check is everywhere and everyone knows how to use them and aren’t afraid of them? Did he think they would still pay him to stand there doing nothing? “I hadn’t thought about that.”

He thanked me for teaching him a new word and for the chat, and my hope for the future of American youth has been restored. He was a bright kid, and I don’t expect he will be standing around teaching people how to use the self-check for long, if he plays his cards right. I think I’ll make sure to chat with him whenever I see him there. Maybe I can teach him some more new words and keep him thinking about things. If he seems interested enough, I might even give him some books to read.

I sure hope that one gets to college. Young people who think and want to learn seem so rare these days.

I need to ask Lin if he listens to his songs on the Shuffle in order or on the shuffle setting. That’s not what I sat down here to gripe about. It’s just a personal reminder.

I have a set of battery operated Christmas lights sitting on the desk beside me, and I have no size C batteries. How am I supposed to rate their level of coolness and appropriateness for further ownership, if I can’t tell how they look turned on? They give me ideas, but I need to see them on! Dammit!

I was going to get rid of my vast collection of Christmas lights. I swear I own more Christmas lights than people who actually bother to decorate (and celebrate) Christmas. I suspect I will lose the battle and keep them all. I also suspect that at least one wall of the New Room, as I am now calling it, will be covered with Christmas lights and sheer white cotton sheeting.

Lin is going to have a cow. He may even have twins. We haven’t exactly discussed what is going to happen when that room is actually a usable room. Perhaps he hasn’t even considered what I might start doing in there once there aren’t any more boxes. My thinking is this: Much like conquering and exploring nations crossed treacherous and long miles to go to new lands, where they promptly claimed it, planted a flag, and began development, I too am making a dangerous and lengthy quest. And when I get there … I am damn well planting my flag, claiming it, and beginning development. Mine. My room. My Precious.

I have never had a room that was really, in any way, private and totally 100% mine to do with as I wished. Never. My childhood bedroom was the room off the kitchen and dining room … and it was the path to the bathroom for everyone. There wasn’t even a door between the kitchen and my bedroom, and the back door was right there at the join of the two rooms, so everyone could always see, and often walked through, my bedroom all the damn time. The first thing this meant is I had little to no privacy in my room. The second thing this meant was my room always had to look at least moderately tidy and clean. It also meant I was stuck with a room with bright yellow and white striped wallpaper — with a tiny pattern in the stripes — and a bright yellow ceiling, with white wood trim everywhere. I was stuck with it because the lady who owned the house previously, from whom my parents had bought it, and who lived right next door and shared a driveway with us, had done the wallpapering herself. Any changes to the decor were forbidden, and even posters were frowned upon. Even as a kid, I was not allowed to do anything to my room.

And did I mention little or no privacy in my room?

Then there were dormitories, more dormitories, small apartments with roommates, boyfriends, boyfriends, and then husbands. All the time presided over by landlords (or parents) telling me what I could or could not do to my living area, and in most situations, still no room of my own and no actual private space. Not that this ever especially bothered me. I was used to it.

The older I got, the more it started bothering me. It really, really started bothering me at the apartment. Twelve years with two adults, a cat, and a ton of unneeded stuff crammed into one small apartment for about twelve years and not being able to walk up to a wall and just splash paint on it … and nowhere, really nowhere, to get away from each other or everything? When we moved into the house, our level of heavy arguing fell right off. When you put animals in a cage that is too small for them all to have their appropriate amount of space, they do tend to try to kill each other. But even hear at the house, we are still somewhat on top of each other. Sharing the den with Lin has been nice, but it would be nice to see what it was like to not have to share space … and I need to take the New Room, because it has a door that closes and I need the cats to not get into my art supplies and projects.

But … I am going to have to set up a wireless network so I can remove myself from the Den. I’m not sure I want to move it to the New Room, but it has to go somewhere. It wouldn’t be fair to keep it in the Den and claim the New Room as well. I’ve been thinking of putting it in the living room, eventually.

Anyway…

I want my own room. I want to be able to go into my room and paint rainbows and flowers on the walls, if I feel like it. I want to string Christmas lights wherever I like. I want a door that closes. I want an Orb Cave. Maybe not forever, but for right now. I require control of some personal space!!! Just once!!!

Lin is sure to have a cow or two, and I don’t think it can be avoided, but the deal was we would each get our own room, and we haven’t kept that promise to ourselves. He’s been getting robbed of his room as much as I have. I’m going to fix that problem, and then I am going to land on the gleaming hardwood floor, plant the Just Orb flag, and claim the new country as my own!

Mine. My own. My Precious.

I better feel better tomorrow. I want to get back to work on it!