9:30 a.m. - October 13, 2006
Can You Spare....
Ah, geez.
I just did the unpossible.
I decided against renewing some race tickets.
Yes, it�s quite true, but there�s a good reason for it.
Caysh money, baby. Caysh money. As in, real life at age 40 with a wife and two kids ain�t cheap, even in BFE land.
So the F-1 tickets for next year had to go. I know I have friends who help pick up some of the tab, but still right now we�ve got a lot of other stuff going on.
For one, Liz is sick. Now, while that�s not a financial stressor, it still stinks. Katie had the sniffles last weekend, and usually when Liz gets sick, she just doesn�t get the sniffles. She�s hit in the head with a 2 x 4, and right now she�s in that mode. I took Katie to preschool today so she could sleep in.
We�re taking a trip to Oklahoma in early November. This is the final piece of the puzzle with Liz�s mom, as the sisters will spread her ashes at the family farm in Shattuck, Oklahoma. Now, THAT�S BFE land. Hopefully this will be the final piece of closure so that all of the grief and the stresses that have been plaguing us can disappear.
However, it will take time to get out there. First, we�re driving to Wichita and bunking with Snow White and her family, and then making the four hour trip down to Shattuck from there the next day.
And with two wee ones, we�re going to take two days to get to Kansas. Normally, Liz and I can knock it out in one 11 to 12 hour car trip, but with two kids, potty breaks, lunch breaks, jankiness and what not, two days probably would work best. Plus, this is Kristin�s first big car ride, too.
Oh, and we�re probably going to rent a mini van. Oh, and our nephew from Arizona is going to join us. He�s going to take a tour of Wabash, then come out to Kansas and Oklahoma with us.
Two nights in hotels, plus gas, plus food adds up. While it�s not extravagant, it�s not cheap.
Then there�s the normal stuff like oil changes and the like. Liz�s car needed a new battery, which is better than what we thought it was.
Then there�s stuff around the house. Notice that tree in front of our house to the right?
Well, I always thought it was a willow. It�s not. It�s a Chinese Elm.
And it grows and grows and grows. We need to get it trimmed, else someone walking on the sidewalk (or some dude mowing the lawn � me) will get decapitated. And you know, if that happens, I don�t expect anyone to be overly sad � so much so they have to cremate a dead bird in the parking lot of my office.
So we have contracted someone to trim the thing, but they can�t get to it yet because the ground is too wet. They have to drive onto the yard to trim it, which makes sense. But they don�t want to screw up the yard (thankfully) so they have to wait until it�s dry.
Then there�s my iPod. I sense the end is near for this battery. Last night, I wanted to take it with me while I swept up the gallons of food on our kitchen floor (little Kristin has quite the arm � and the chunks of pot roast and carrots make for inviting projectiles). I started a playlist, moved to the second song, and BLAMMO! It was done. Just.like.that. I had just taken it off of the charger.
So that�s some money there. Like I�m going to open that bad boy up and see what happens.
Then there�s our kitchen sink. It�s clogged. Two days ago, I got some Liquid Plumr and it didn�t help. Last night, I got Drano Max, and it seems to be even worse. Sigh.
I don�t know nothin� �bout plumbin� no pipes.
One wonders what�s down there to make it a big ol� clog. A few days ago, our downstairs toilet clogged and it took a Herculean effort by me to get it unplugged. It looked like someone (remaining nameless) put some meatloaf in the toilet without telling us when she was supposed to be eating it. Anyway, that�s always a possibility that some foreign object has been lodged in the sink, and no amount of liquid glop will help.
And then there�s the phone call I got Wednesday at work. One you never want to hear in your life.
�Honey, I think we have a wasps nest inside our house.�
A what? Where? How? And all of those other newspaper questions?
I took a look. In our library, on one of the lights, right where it bolts onto the crossbeam, there seems to be a cluster of wasp-like insects. (We have 11-foot ceilings, so I can�t really tell without getting a ladder, and do you really think that I�m going to stand on a latter just to verify that those mf�s are wasps? Hah.)
That beam is where they ran the cable into the house back in the day, so I bet it got hollowed out a bit and yeah, a gang of wasps could have claimed it as their turf.
Now the question is how to get rid of them without killing us. Because death by fumigation is a bad thing.
Anyway, we are not destitute, really. Things are going as well as possible for the stressors that have overtaken our lives recently. But you know what I really need?
I need to land on one of those Community Chest cards that read �Bank Error In Your Favor�.
Now, what do I need to roll to get on that square?
