The scene: Hotel Bar. The VIM has just finished his set for the evening. His audience: many drunk golfers letting loose on a Weekend Getaway.
Very Drunk Golfer: Hey, man, we’re not finished listening to you yet. Whaddya say we load you and your guitar into the back of our car and you can keep on playing while we drive around and run into shit?
Station Square, Pittsburgh
Another thing I can check off of my “Do Before I Die” list: See Elvis Costello sing Alison live. The concert (Elvis Costello and Emmylou Harris) was excellent. The only downside was that the audience was crammed into the amphitheater. There was no way to avoid touching the stranger sitting next to me. I’m not a touch-phobe or anything, but the last thing I want on a humid 90 degree day is to have a stranger’s sweaty, meaty thigh smack up against my OWN sweaty, meaty thigh.
The concert, sitting in the best seats I’ll ever sit in during a baseball game, the fried calamari, and the great view from our hotel room more than made up for the few hours of sweaty stranger thigh.
Filed under: Daily
Grass (actually, just the mowing of grass) has been a thorn in my side since I moved here 4 years ago. I don’t have a big yard. It’s small, flat, and has no obstructions. It should be a dream to mow. In a perfect world, it IS a dream to mow. In a perfect world, though, I don’t have weird neighbors.
When I first moved here, one neighbor, Max, asked me if I wanted him to mow my lawn when he mowed his. I accepted and thanked him. Yeah, I could have done it myself, but with an irregular schedule, it easier just to pay a few bucks and know it’s done (plus, I don’t own a lawn mower.) One day I came home from work and a another neighbor, Timmy had mowed (mown?) . I thanked him but explained that Max was mowing for me. Timmy threw a fit. Seriously. His face turned bright red and his hands were in tight fists. “But I always mowed this yard before you moved here! I want to mow all the yards next to mine at the same time so they all look the same!” It would have been funny if he hadn’t scared the almighty crap out of me. Both Max and Timmy are a little…God, I don’t even know how to be politically correct here…slow. Max is an 8 year old boy in a 50 year old man’s body. He still lives with his mom next door. Timmy is younger, also still lives with his mom. They moved away a few years ago, but when he lived next door, I was about half afraid of him. Especially after the big Lawn Mowing To-Do.
Yes, there was a big Lawn Mowing To-Do. Max and Timmy, fighting over who was going to mow my tiny tiny bit of yard. My yard was being mowed like, 4 times a week. They were bleeding me dry. I finally had to tell them both that I would cut my own damn grass. I started borrowing my grandmother’s mower, and wheeling it back to my house. I was surprised to find that it only took 20 minutes, tops, to complete the task. I actually ENJOYED mowing.
I told the story of the big Lawn Mowing To-Do to a gentleman who had asked me out on a date. The date wasn’t going particularly well (he talked about nothing but his exwife, who turned into a bitch after she started making more money than him, and by the way, how much money do YOU make a year?) and I needed something, ANYTHING to get him to stop asking me what I normally pay in utility bill a month and how much my car payment was. We chuckled imagining 2 grown men fighting over a tiny bit of grass, then he asked me how much I paid in rent.
The next weekend I mowed my grass on Friday night. Saturday morning I heard a strange sound in my front yard. Dateman. On a riding lawn mower. He rode his lawn mower clear across town to come mow my lawn for me. Yes, it COULD have been a sweet gesture if I wasn’t so freaked out, and if I didn’t say clearly SEVERAL TIMES during the Lawn Mowing To-Do story that I was happy to finally be mowing my own yard. WHY DOES EVERYONE WANT TO MOW MY LAWN???
Things settled down a bit after that. I mowed my own yard the rest of that summer and the next. A couple times last year I came home to find Max had mowed and then wanted me to pay him for it. It’s not the money, I swear. It’s just the fact that he didn’t even ASK me first. He just did it. As I paid him, I thanked him, but explained that I wanted to mow my own yard. I enjoyed it, and it was good exercise for me. Everything would be good for a month or so, then he’d do it again. Argh!
This summer he finally wore me down. I couldn’t get it across that I didn’t appreciate him mowing without asking, then standing on my porch as I drove up from work wanting to be paid. Or even worse, if he didn’t see my drive up, he would just walk into my house later in the evening and ask for his money.
So I came to terms with Max mowing my yard. I convinced myself that it was worth it, that I wouldn’t get upset when I came home from work to find that yet again he had mowed without asking me first. It was all good. Better than good. It was great. I wouldn’t have to worry about anything anymore.
One night this week, as I got home, I saw that Max had mowed. Had mowed his own yard, anyhow. For some reason, now that I want and EXPECT him to mow my yard, he hasn’t.
This is why my grass is tall enough to harbor small animals. I guess I’ll be borrowing my grandmother’s lawn mower this afternoon. *sigh*
I can’t win.
Yesterday was Stomach Bug Saturday. Within an hour of being awake, everything that wasn’t nailed down inside of me had exited at warp speed.
I don’t really have anything else to say about that…
Filed under: Lists
- It’s been so long since I’ve updated my blog that I forgot my WordPress password.
- I am in possession of one of the largest zucchinis I have ever seen. I don’t have a clue what I’m going to do with it.
- When I bought my car in February, I told myself I didn’t want or need air conditioning. I never used the air conditioner in my old car. It makes me sneeze. It uses more gas. Blah blah blah. Oh, it made so much sense when it was 37 degrees outside.
- The spam comments on this blog are out of control. I can’t keep up with keeping them deleted. I hate spam. Spam sucks.
- If I ever start a band, I’m going to name it Remnants of Dennis.
- I’m spending part of my workday on the golf course today. I’m not actually golfing, I’m…well, actually it’s a long story and not really important. Anyhow…the VIM made it a point SEVERAL TIMES to warn me about the dangers of flying golf balls. They Hurt!!! They Move Fast!!! Stay Alert!!! I’m developing a golf ball phobia. Oh well, what’s 4 hours or so of hyper-alert dodging?
I’m not a goal setter. I don’t know where I want to be in 5 years (other than to be happy and content), and I’m not particularly working toward being a better, smarter, more organized, wealthier, thinner, person. To Do lists give me the hives.
I do, however, keep a little quiet to-do list in my head. There are no tasks or tangible goals on it. There is no item on it that I want to stress out about or rush headlong to tackle. It’s simply a list of things that will complete some part of my life. I want to visit the graves of my ancestors. I want to take a creative writing class.
Sometimes I cross things off the list that I didn’t even know were ON the list until after I already experience it – things that I didn’t know would complete some part of my life. This weekend I sat outdoors, next to the Ben Franklin Bridge, under a beautiful sunset, listening to James Taylor sing Carolina in my Mind live. It wasn’t a huge part of my life that was completed that evening, but perfect moments don’t always have to be big and brash and bold, do they?
Filed under: Unsent Letters
Dear Blog,
It’s time that I come clean and get this all out on the table.
I’ve been unfaithful.
It’s not you…really! I promise! I love you. Your patience, your consistency, you memory. You probably won’t believe me, but I miss you terribly. Even when I’m with the other site, it’s you I’m yearning for.
What does the other site have that you don’t, you ask? Don’t ask questions like that. You’re two completely different sites. You’re perfect the way you are. The other site is nice and new and exciting, but EXTREMELY high maintenance. It needs me right now, Blog. It needs me to shape and create it, and I can’t let it down.Oh, there will be a point where the other site will pretty much run itself and I won’t be there every day, editing and tweaking and moving things around and cropping images. That’s the day I’m longing for, dearest blog. The day I can come back to you full time. At least until the next time.
You’re always on my mind,
Elle
Other people post pictures of their cat. I don’t have a cat, so I’ll post pictures of my flowers.
I always think of the larkspur as a gift. I bought bagged soil a couple years ago to freshen up my little garden. Apparently the soil I bought was full, TEEMING even, with larkspur seeds. All these little ferny things kept popping up between my carefully planted pansies and petunias. I pulled them out but they kept coming. I let a few go to see what would happen. Larkspur happened. A lot of it. So much larkspur, in fact, that over the past few summers it’s pretty much smothered everything else out. And like an indulgent parent, I let it go. I love it. And it saves me a lot of time and effort in picking out annuals.
This morning I noticed one rebel Queen Anne’s Lace mixed in with the larkspur. I’ve decided she can stay.
Other people post pictures of their cat. I don’t have a cat, so I’ll post pictures of my flowers.
I always think of the larkspur as a gift. I bought bagged soil a couple years ago to freshen up my little garden. Apparently the soil I bought was full, TEEMING even, with larkspur seeds. All these little ferny things kept popping up between my carefully planted pansies and petunias. I pulled them out but they kept coming. I let a few go to see what would happen. Larkspur happened. A lot of it. So much larkspur, in fact, that over the past few summers it’s pretty much smothered everything else out. And like an indulgent parent, I let it go. I love it. And it saves me a lot of time and effort in picking out annuals.
This morning I noticed one rebel Queen Anne’s Lace mixed in with the larkspur. I’ve decided she can stay.
Other people post pictures of their cat. I don’t have a cat, so I’ll post pictures of my flowers.
I always think of the larkspur as a gift. I bought bagged soil a couple years ago to freshen up my little garden. Apparently the soil I bought was full, TEEMING even, with larkspur seeds. All these little ferny things kept popping up between my carefully planted pansies and petunias. I pulled them out but they kept coming. I let a few go to see what would happen. Larkspur happened. A lot of it. So much larkspur, in fact, that over the past few summers it’s pretty much smothered everything else out. And like an indulgent parent, I let it go. I love it. And it saves me a lot of time and effort in picking out annuals.
This morning I noticed one rebel Queen Anne’s Lace mixed in with the larkspur. I’ve decided she can stay.
