Packing

I packed some yesterday. I leave my family in one week, and I just started packing yesterday. I packed only necessary items yesterday.

Stuff like China. And glass ware. Oh, and one box of books. (which I have to repack, because no one can lift the dang thing.)

Then I decided to go into my "craft room/library" formerly known as Kat's old bedroom.

I bagged up all my fabric, one nice big trash bag full. I tossed lots of marginal craft items, you know, those scraps and miscellaneous...stuff, that you might use someday, so you keep it. I packed up all my embroidery stuff and my pattern books.

Now, is any of this stuff useful? Is any of this stuff important and will it be anything I will personally use in the next two months while I'm homeless? No.

Have I packed anything that I will need--things like, clothes, food, personal hygiene stuff, sheets, blankets, etc? Nope, not one item.

But, I've made a mental list of what all I think I need to take.

1. TV with DVD player and VHS player for those nights I'm alone in the house.
2. Stereo with CD's to listen to when I don't have any DVD's or VHS tapes.
3. My embroidery stuff, so I can cross stitch or embroidery tea towels at night while relaxing in front of the TV or Stereo. (unless I'm at Mom and Dad's)
4. Work clothes.
5. Shoes.
6. Necessary clothing items.
7. One dresser.
8. Maybe one linen cabinet (cause it's taking up space and won't show well in realty brochure...)
9. Kev's collectible cars and my collectible Garfield stuff so I can list it on EBay. (we bought a digital camera yesterday, just to do this...)
10. Food--yet to be determined.
11. books. I always pack books. Always.
12. At least two boxes to go to my new office.

I'm sure there's more that I'll need, it's just that I'm really procrastinating about packing. I need to get on the ball, but motivation is seriously lacking. Everything is so up-in-the-air, and I don't like things being up-in-the-air. This week is it, my last week. I've got to do something besides procrastinating....

Pants

I've warned those that I love that this Blog might have lots of venting in it until we are all settled.

So today, I'm venting. I'm venting about...

ladies slacks, or pants. Whichever is proper these days. I don't really care, but I'm gonna vent about them and I'm gonna call them pants.

I hate buying pants. I hate buying them. Why?

Because, I have long legs. And, a long torso. Makes shopping delightful.

So, my black pants wore out. They flat wore out, so I needed new ones. I found the same brand as my black pants, but they changed the styling, so the size of my old black pants is not the same size as my new black pants. The new ones are lower waisted, which is better for me, because the waist band will not be rolling down to my waist. But, sadly, they are a different size. And more sadly, the blankety-blank-blank store didn't have talls, or long pants.

So, because I needed black pants without holes in them, I bought some in this different size, in medium length.

Big mistake. They are too short. They barely come to the top of my shoes. So when I walk, they flap around my ankles. Too short. I hate them. HATE THEM!

Uggh.

I'm going shopping again, looking for black pants with long legs and then I'll have a pair to donate to someone with short legs, cause I'm never wearing these goofy things ever again.

Note to self: NEVER, NEVER BUY AVERAGE LENGTH PANTS AGAIN. Next time, go naked.

Car Fever

Andy has car fever. It's a bad case, he's having hot and cold flashes. He breaks into a sweat daily. He can't drive by the car lot without that rubber-necking reflex kicking in. If he's driving, he also suffers from that jerking motion, sending the car into the car lot. He's on to be on a first name basis with the car dealers, who do all they can to ease the pain and suffering of this dread disease.

When they see him coming, the whip out the old estimate pad and quote him a price and they're nice enough to figure the tax for him too.

There's no treatment for this fever, only a cure. An expensive cure...

The cure will only cost $10,000 or so.


I have the pleasure to hear daily how he hates driving the Ranger pickup, you know, that Ranger pickup that he blew up the motor in this summer? That Ranger pickup, which he hasn't yet paid a dime for a new motor. The bank of Mom and Dad hasn't called in the note yet, but he hasn't volunteered any funds either. I take that back, he paid for the sensor that we just got replaced...$158.

But, the Ranger, which is paid for and which only has to have liability insurance on it, just isn't cool. He needs a car. And he's pushing really hard right now, because Kev's car isn't working at the moment. So Andy, for the past two days, has had to bring his mother to work and his sister to school (gasp)! And then (horrors) he has had to pick his mother up from work and (gasp) drive her home! And if that isn't bad enough, his mother also has to take him to work and then drop off a vehicle for him to drive home in. Oh, the humiliation, his friends and co-workers have to see that he doesn't have his very own car. They have to see his Mom bring him to work. They have to see him talk to his mom when she drops off the keys. It's just more than he can bear.

Here's his rationale...we need to let him buy a car of his very own so that we, his deserving parents, would have a spare car, so that when one of our vehicles isn't working, we would have that spare and we wouldn't have to inconvenience him. Yeah, right.

So, he wants a car. Not just any old car either, but a Mustang, a cool car, with standard transmission, a fast car.

He wants to trade OUR Ranger in on a car for him--one that he buys, one that he tinkers with and "punks" out.

And he's really not subtle, and he's really annoying, and he's not taking NO for an answer.

So being the wonderful, loving, supportive Mother that I am, I called the dealership yesterday. I talked to a dealer, who has been visiting with Andy, but who also knows Kev and I. (Hey, it's a small town!) He understands our problem, as he is the father of a 15 year old who is campaigning for a RED Mustang. Anyway, he told me how much the Mustang was and what interest rate we'd get (10%, cause we, the evil parents would have to co-sign), and what payments would be for 48 months...$250 a month.

Then, I called the Insurance Company. I know the gal at the Insurance Office. We chatted about our daughters and about moving and about teenagers and cars while she looked up the VIN and what insurance would be on a 2002 Mustang V6 Coupe for a 16 year old boy with not-so-good grades, using the lowest deductibles. $1550 a year...or $130 a month. (It's nice having friends in high places who can manipulate the database!)

Last night, we broke the news to Andy--the cost of buying this car. Then his loving, and less supportive father asked what his last paycheck amounted to.

$125, for 2 weeks work. Ouch. Reality hit. He pouted. We didn't. I didn't even gloat. I wanted to, but I refrained from showing any emotion even resembling satisfaction, or self-righteousness. I am always supportive and understanding. Always, just ask me!

I realize this isn't a cure, it's just a band aid, but for now, hopefully, the car fever will subside.

Headache

It's 8:30 a.m. and I already have a "College Headache".

It's a tension headache. But most of my stress and tension comes from the College, so that's what we call these headaches. It will get worse and eventually develop into a migraine. By tonight, all I will want to do is crawl into bed and cry from the pain.

Today's headache probably isn't all college related. It's probably related to the stress of moving and not having packed a thing. It's related to having a house to sell and not having it listed yet, and not quite ready to list yet. It's the stress of not having a clue where we will be living. It's the stress of me wondering if I'm messing up and screwing up the lives of my family.

It's related to a car that isn't running which inconveniences Andy, Kevin and me. Andy's inconvenienced because he has to take me to school and then I have to take him to work. Kevin is inconvenienced because he has to take the Diesel, which uses more fuel and more expensive fuel. And it inconveniences me because I can't leave campus all day and I have to listen to my son whine about having mean parents who won't let him buy a car of his very own.

My headache is related to having an employee out all day today. She's my right arm and I'm really aware of how short our time together is.

The college is contributing to my headache because we are finally close to finishing up negotiations, and I have several meetings related to that this week. All are stressful. And I need to wrap up things here, which is stressful.

I need to learn how to stress without internalizing everything. My jaw is so tight already today, that it aches--at 8:30 in the morning.

Wonder if anyone would notice if I put some good old relaxing booze in my Dr Pepper...that just might be the ticket...Maybe I'd be better off asking those of you who pray to ask the Man Upstairs to help me cope with this stress. That's probably better than booze...but... booze does taste good...

Just kidding...really...

He made me cry.

I cried at work today, not 1/2 an hour ago.

All week, I've had folks come in saying "I heard a rumor that you were leaving." No big deal. The rumor is true, I'm leaving.

This was no different, a fellow teacher came in, one who started here the same year I did.

"I heard a rumor, " he said.

"It's true." I replied.

He then went on to say the nicest thing. He was sincere and well, it made me cry.

All he said was thank you for always being nice to him, and that he wished me well.

The interesting part is this gentleman isn't a colleague that I'm close to. I'm not. He's almost a stereotypical absent-minded professor.

And he made me cry.

I don't like to cry. I don't want to cry. I'm still fighting this. But this man's good-bye was probably the most sincere one I've gotten yet.

And he made me cry.

This leaving thing just might prove to be harder than I thought.