Man, this weekend went by in a flash, and I didn’t get hardly anything done that I’d intended. I’m twitchy and feel unsettled and like there’s something I’m forgetting to do, but I’ll be damned if I can figure out what it is.
I got 9/10ths of my Christmas shopping done over the weekend, just need to get a few more things, and I’m all set. My parents told us not to get them anything this year, and that had a snowball effect wherein I said to Fred “Why don’t you tell your parents not to get us anything this year, too, we’ll just get stuff for the kids?”, because it’s kind of ridiculous – we give them gift cards, they give us gift cards, what’s the point? As adults, if there’s something we want or need, we usually go and get it, and I know pretty much everyone else is the same.
We’re getting presents for the kids (this includes Fred’s niece and nephew and their significant others, even though they’re not really “kids”, they’ll probably be “kids” ’til they’re 40 or so!) and calling it good enough. It takes the pressure off the Christmas season, for sure. Fred and I aren’t giving each other gifts either – some years we do, more often we don’t. We’re old and boring and get each other gifts through the year, so why add to the pressure at Christmas?
I don’t even have to get a lot of stuff for the Spud – she wants a new phone, so when she comes to visit in January we’re going to the T-M0bile store and getting her a new one. I did want her to have a few small things to open from us at Christmas, though, and when she asked if I had the other Twilight books, I told her I’d get them for her for Christmas.
(Yes, the child is into the Twilight thing. ::DESPAIR:: )
So anyway, I’ve made a lot of headway as far as Christmas goes, but I still feel unsettled and twitchy like I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop.
I have to admit, I think it might be the fact that I went back on the birth control pill. I started it the Sunday after my last period started, and I’ve had two weeks of straight breakthrough bleeding. It’s more annoying than troublesome, but man. It’s REALLY annoying. If it doesn’t stop within the week, I’ll probably go off the pill. The only reason I went back on it was because I was tired of having my period every month like clockwork, not ’cause I wanted to bleed MORE, for the love of god.
Anyway.
So the weekend consisted mostly of doing laundry, running errands with Fred, going to Lacon Trade Days on Saturday (basically a flea market with animals on the side) to look at geese and turkeys, both of which are known to protect chickens. I’m not anti-turkeys, but I’d rather bring them up from babies rather than try to introduce adults to the flock. I am, however, anti-geese.
I loathe geese.
LOATHE THEM. With the hissing and the attitude, I cannot stand goddamn geese. It doesn’t help that a few years ago we were feeding ducks and geese at the University of Alabama and I wasn’t fast enough with the crackers for one asshole of a goose so s/he BIT MY ASS.
We didn’t end up buying any turkeys or geese, to my relief, though we did buy a hooded sweatshirt for me (I was FUCKING FREEZING) and some socks for him, and a bag of nice-looking onions. I would have been willing to hang out and look at more stuff, but did I mention that I was fucking freezing? Because I was. And I DO NOT LIKE TO BE COLD, thank you.
We stopped at the movie store on the way home and rented several movies (and the last couple of discs of last season’s Dexter), and then puttered around the house for the rest of Saturday.
Sunday we had to go out early in the morning to buy some fencing stuff, and then Fred spent part of the day working on the fence around the back forty. At one point I looked out and he was squatted down by one part of the fence, and there were about forty chickens gathered around him inspecting his work.
They crack me up.
I went out and held t-posts while Fred pounded them into the ground, and then in the afternoon we ran to Nearville to the pet store and made a few more stops. After dinner, we went back out so Fred could get more fencing stuff and I could look around, then we went to L0we’s.
Why, you are asking me, did we go to L0we’s?
Well, let me tell you. This year, I decided that it was ridiculous to have a fireplace and a shed full of seasoned firewood and not use it. So I declared that this was the year that I’d make fires in the fireplace on cold days and keep them going, and so every day for the past four or five days I’ve been making fires.
And kicking ass at it, if I may say so myself.
But the screen in front of the fireplace is a freestanding screen, not one of those ones attached to the fireplace, and it’s a screen the people who sold us this house left behind. And as is usual, it was a piece of shit. Every time I picked it up to move it out of the way, something fell off of it. Yesterday morning, it fell into two pieces.
Clearly, we needed a new screen.
So we stood in L0we’s, and I dithered about which screen I wanted, and finally I chose the mid-range one, and I’ll tell you this – I didn’t fully appreciate how much of a cheap and flimsy piece of shit the old screen was until I took the new one out of the box.
With all this errand-running and working outside, I think Fred was ready for bed by about 7:00. We watched the last two episodes of Dexter, and then we watched The Amazing Race, and then we watched My Name is Earl, and then we went to bed.
So, yeah. Exciting weekend.
(I’m not complaining!)
I was going to go to the mall today, but I need a day where I can just putter around the house, so I’m going to do that today.
I love my Crane humidifier (thank you, Sara, for the suggestion!). Not only is it adorable, it’s very quiet. And the fact that the steam comes out of the pig’s ears is a bonus.
These kittens are all such love bugs.
More pictures over at Love & Hisses.
Okay, two more videos from Dorkville!
(The DorkCast, if you will.)
Dorkville Take 8 from Nance on Vimeo.
Dorkville – Take 9 from Nance on Vimeo.
In these videos, Rick was in charge of running the camera, and he thought to himself “What angle would be the least flattering for these two women?”, and then he ran with it.
DAMN YOU RICK!
There’s a point in one of the videos (the second one, I think) where Nance mentions that I mocked a blogger’s child. I didn’t say anything NASTY about the child, it was just mildly rude (and it wasn’t about their appearance, it was a personality thing), and no I won’t tell you who it was, but I’ll tell you that I guarantee you they don’t read me, and I don’t think they read Nance either.
SO IT WASN’T YOUR CHILD.
Okay?
Okay.
Sheriff Mama keeps an eye on the back yard. She sees what’s going on and she disapproves.
Previously
2007: Stinkerbelle: “I have put my stamp of love upon him, and now I shall lay here and seethe with hatred for those hussies who think they can have him. THEY CANNOT.”
2006: Newton (full name: Newton “Newtie” McNewterton, the salty country kitty) is pretty, yet aloof. It drives the wimmins CRAYZEE.
2005: “Us”? Who’s this “us” kemosabe?
2004: I suppose I need to actually start buying lottery tickets to make these dreams come true.
2003: And also because you Canadians are so cool that I want to canoodle with each and every one of you.
2002: No entry.
2001: No entry.
2000: God bless the internet and online merchants, god bless their little black hearts.
1999: More Christmas talk.