I Really Suck at Dating…
But I’m getting better, at least at picking my dates.
We had a really great time and we were also real about the chances our relationship is going to succeed. I know, talking about our chances and they aren’t that good but still just moving right along. First, there is quite an age difference. He hasn’t owned up to how old he is but his eldest son is five years younger than I am. Not that he looks it or acts it, which is a good thing. He’s probably 60+.
Then, as he pointed out, we’re at different places in our lives. He has four grandsons and I’m still raising my first child. I’m starting grad school and he’s already retired from one company and works for another. He’s going through a divorce and I’ve never even stepped into the ring once. I know his soon-to-be ex-wife and I really like her. He was a widow for almost 25 years before he married her. I think their divorce is a tragedy but also the best thing for both of them.
We laughed when Nate started texting me about when I was coming home. He said that paternalism is only going to get stronger. Having raised two boys by himself, he knows what I’m going through with being a single parent. Nate sounds much different than his step-son, for which I am grateful, because his step-son and his actions is one of the reasons he’s getting divorced.
He seems to feel as though I’m going to meet a Native American in Washington and move lock, stock, and barrel to the Northwest. I told him if that were so I hoped he looked more like Jacob Black than Harry Clearwater. I lost him with that.
We talked about our reactions should we bump into each other at the Bistro dating other people, which we were both cool with and intend on dating other people. Well, he does. He’s the first date I’ve enjoyed that I’ve found in this town.
Speaking of my trip to the NW, everyone is like, “Oh, it rains so much up there…” Port Townsend lies in the Olympic Mountain Rain Shadow so it only receives 16-18 inches of precipitation a year, by comparison, where I live now gets about 44 inches of precipitation a year. That isn’t to say the sun shines more, just that the clouds don’t pee as much. Plus, the high temperature doesn’t even reach 70. Still taking my raincoat!
I am so looking forward to this trip. I can’t even begin to express it. I’m getting myself a new netbook, hopefully. Money is tight right now. I had to expend a great deal to get me there and work is up and down. Still can make do with my old laptop but she’s much heavier and Nate can use the Netbook for school as well. Still have to arrange transportation from Seattle to Fort Worden. Other than that, I think I’m good.
Bought a new suitcase that meets all of the requirements for domestic and international flights because Lady knows I’m not paying MORE money for them to carry my luggage. My mother said that if anyone can make do with a carry-on piece of luggage for over a week, it is me. Yes, it is. Nate is still lobbying to go although he knows he can’t. He likes to give me a hard time but I know it’s because he wants to hang out with me and that makes me feel good.
I’m taking him to the one place I know he’ll have fun – the Taste of All at FestivALL. I can’t imagine getting more bang for my buck with him than at a food tasting expo. The restaurant will be there so he will have even more of an opportunity to get food. I can’t keep him fed. He has stretch marks really bad on his knee caps, all the way up his legs, and now they’ve migrated below the knee. Just a testament to how fast he’s growing.
He hasn’t had his medicine since right before school let out. Since he’s growing so fast I wanted him to be able to eat all he needed and wanted. Hasn’t put on a pound! Brat. He’s been a little annoying without the meds, more so just… HYPER! I’ve tried and tried and tried to get him interested in a sport, ANY SPORT, to no avail. I take him swimming and I’m taking him bowling as soon as I can.
Gotta go to work. Ya’ll take care.
NY Times Vid
This is a video on the New York Times website about water contamination by coal companies. I went to high school with the lady featured in the video and she lives about 5 miles from where I grew up. Very sad, folks. Very sad.
Nanny Crocker
Well, as you know, when I’m trying to make myself feel better, I cook, more often, I bake.
Yesterday I got a wild hair and decided to make crab stuffed mushrooms. Word to the wise, use a lot of spices. They were fabulous! I used cream cheese in the filling, next time though, I’d like to try a different recipe. It was enough for dinner for two nights. So, economical as well.
I then decided I wanted something sweet. Its almost that time of the month and I’ma cravin’. I don’t have a lot of baking goods in my house so I had to choose something that I already had the ingredients for. I finally found a recipe for cinnamon bundt cake. I love cinnamon and it included walnuts, which I like. However, I didn’t have walnuts, so I used pecans, and I love pecans – almost as much as peaches.
And because I’m a little ADD and because I had set things down on the recipe, I kind of missed the fact that the cinnamon/sugar mixture was to go between batter layers and I just added cinnamon to the whole batter. Instead of a cinnamon swirl bundt cake, I have a pecan cinnamon bundt cake.
Its delish. Nate says so as well, and he’s not much of nut eater, and although he likes cinnamon, he doesn’t love cinnamon, but he loves Mama’s bundt cake. I thought that the pecans gave it a nice flavor and he said it gave it a nice crunchiness.
We just had some, warm from the oven, with butter and cold milk. YUM. Nate was also impressed that my bundt didn’t stick and came out PERFECT.
In other news, I talked to Nate’s uncle’s girlfriend today. She had called and left a message wanting our address so she could send Nate a card for his birthday. She had left a message to start with and part of it referenced that they knew what was going on with Jeff and they fully understood.
I guess they would since they’ve lived next door to him for as long as Nate’s been on this Earth. She said they missed Nate and she said, “I always had a good time with Nate. He was never a bit of trouble.” Nate’s very close to their daughter, who is just 18 months younger. I know he spent a lot of time there.
I don’t trust her much. Over 13 years, you learn. I let Nate know that I’d talked to her and gotten his cousin’s cellphone number. He shrugged. Other than his sister, he’s pretty much against anything having to do with the paternal side of his family. His uncle is an alcoholic too, although a different type than Jeff, but still an alcoholic. His other uncle is a drug addict and I don’t know much about the one that lives out of state but I’ve heard he’s an alcoholic too.
There are eight grandchildren in the family (the eldest doesn’t have any children), and none of them have the same mother. Honestly, I always thought that was a little bizarre. Nate is the only one that does not carry his father’ s last name.
Things are probably going to roll by the end of the week. I’ll keep you updated.
I’m going to go meditate now.
Brushes
Sometimes things are just right down interesting at the restaurant. We do get to have our little brushes with celebrity although not on the noise level of Chelsea Clinton visiting. However, Rosie served one of the Osmond clan and a former child star on Sunday night. She was the daughter on “Give Me A Break” with Nell Carter, so you can Google that if you wish.
On MondayI had my own brush and probably was the only one in the restaurant who would have given two shits that it was this particular man who found his way into my section. He was an older gentleman and one that I was fairly certain I had met before. However, as we all know, putting a finger on that particular memory can be daunting.
He was a huge cut-up and kept making me laugh and I kept wondering who the hell he was. As I made another pass, I noticed he had laid his business card on the table and I read his name – Roy Lee Cooke.
Because I’m shy, I slammed my ass in the booth across from him, next to one of his lunch companions and asked, “Where are you from?”
He grinned and said, “MACKDowell County.” (McDowell, for the rest of us.)
I smiled and said, “You’re a rocket boy.”
He smiled and nodded. See, I knew I had met him before, probably 9 or 10 years earlier at the annual October Sky Festival in Coalwood, WV. He asked about my trip there and I reminded him that was the year is was blue cold and Homer Hickam’s press agent or some such gent had gotten a little too close to the kerosene heater and set himself on fire.
I told him how saddened I was to lose my signed “October Sky” copy in my housefire and he said, “Well, come on down, we’ll get you another one. I’ll even get the dead one’s signature for you.” OMG! He was referring to Sherman Siers, who passed away in the mid 70’s. The gentleman sitting with Roy Lee asked how he planned on doing that.
Roy Lee said, “Because I’ll sign for him!”
No, it probably wasn’t polite to laugh, but I did anyway. He gave me his business card and extracted a promise from me to return to Coalwood for this year’s festival. Since Nate will be simultaneously reading “October Sky” and taking WV Studies next year, it will be a very educational trip for him. He swears he remembers going to Coalwood, but, I’m not quite sure and besides, he was only three or four at the time.
I haven’t read “October Sky” for a few years, probably two, since I made a habit of picking it up and reading it to remind myself that when you have a dream, a few friends willing to pick you up, dust you off, and get in trouble with you, it doesn’t matter where you’re from or your circumstances, you can achieve great things.
The annual October Sky Festival is on October 3rd this year, so make your travel plans now. I would be happy to provide an escort to Coalwood, which is somewhere between BFE and the end of the Earth. Just to give you an idea of how far out it really is, the nearest point from Coalwood to an Interstate is 40 miles.
If you’d like to make a weekend of it, we could head down Highway 16 and across 83, through the town named after my forefathers, and over to Jolo and The Church of the Lord Jesus, one of the few Pentacostal churches in America where they speak in tongues, drink poison, and handle snakes.
We could also visit War, WV, the southern-most incorporated city in WV. It has 15 churches and 1,000 residents and since only about 40 % of the population attends, well, that’s about 26 people per service. Hey, no line at the baptismal, unless of course they’re a particular kind of Baptist that only believes in baptizing in the river.
My grandparents believed that you could only be baptized in the river, until they got a baptismal at the church. I guess ya gotta have a backup plan. If you feel enough spirit to be layed out in the Coal River in January, well, have at it.
Anyway, back to Coalwood. Also in the vicinity is the Berwind Wildlife Management Area, perfect for campers, fishermen, hikers, and hunters.
And that’s about all there is. So, mark your calendars, pack the Dramamine (if you don’t know what a switchback is, you’ll learn), and join me in Coalwood on October 3rd.
Did You Say It?
Rabbit, rabbit, that is. I did! Then realized that my registration expired on my vehicle on the 1st. Not so lucky, or maybe it is that I realized it and can get that taken care of this week.
Sagacious Hillbilly asked just how happy I wanted to be. Well, we all know that happiness is relative. You may be happy in one aspect and miserable in another. Some people say that happiness is a choice you make everyday. I try to remember that. I try to look on the bright side.
Things could be a lot worse. Changing your life is a difficult maneuver and is never without a shit-ton of stress. Stress makes me crabby. Stress makes me thin which then leads to my clothes not fitting which makes me crabby. If I exercise to offset my stress, well, that just makes me thinner too, which then makes me crabbier because, again, my clothes don’t fit and then I get crabby because I don’t have a lot of money to buy clothes that do fit.
However, speaking German makes me happy and I did write my host parents today using the new Deustch-Englisch dictionary they sent me for Christmas. I asked my host father why the German word for thunderstorm is Gewitter when the German words for thunder and storm are Donner and Sturm. It should be Donnersturm because Germans love compound words. By the way, the German word for lightning is Blitzen. Donner and Blitzen, get it? I hope you get it!
And, because peaches make me happy, I’m eating some Carbmaster yogurt. A lot of calcium, protein and peaches, not to mention some L. Acidophilus and B. Bifidum for healthy intestinal flora.
Do you ever watch BBC? I love watching the show about being what you eat except I never was sure about how much the folks weigh because I didn’t know the equivalent weight measure of a “stone.” I now know a stone is 14 lbs. I also watch “Clean House” because it makes me feel better about the fact my house is not nearly as cluttered as some out there. And, I also watch “What Not To Wear” and take Clint and Stacy with me when I actually do go shopping.
Okay, I’m sorta happy now. I have to go mow grass before work. And just so you know, if you ask for a Hummer in Germany, they’ll give you a lobster. Tschuss!
Most Neglected
Object… My fridge.
And you thought I was going to say my blog. No where near it folks, no where near it! I chucked 99% of the crap out of my fridge and started over again. Nate left the milk out overnight a week ago when making his favorite late night snack of cereal. He left the jelly out a few nights later after making his other favorite late night snack… peanut butter and jelly.
Other than some pinto beans and cornbread, the rest was pretty old. Plus, given that I have a ginormous oppossum living in the dense jungle of railroad brush in front of my house, I only put out food garbage the night before trash runs in the lock-top trash contrainers, in the hopes that Ginormo and I don’t have an early morning run-in over stray food left on my porch. He may be so ugly he’s cute, but that still means he’s ugly.
Chico reminded me it was time for his second worming by puking food and worms all over my leg on the way home from taking Nate to school the other day. Okay, maybe I waited a bit too long on the second worming. I almost puked myself as he REINGESTED said food and worms. BLECH! BLECH! BLECH!
Needless to say, Chico met our vet the same day. He weighs… 2 lbs. 10 oz. and he was such a good puppy about getting his shots. He’s a little spoiled.
I’m thinking of taking Nate and going to King’s Island this weekend. I’m due a really good paycheck.
I’m also thinking of taking voice lessons this summer from a lady who used to hostess for us. She is our former bartender’s girlfriend and they stopped by the restaurant the other night and I mentioned singing to her and she said she was giving lessons. I’ve always wanted to and I need something for me.
I also went to my first counseling session on Tuesday. I’ll be taking Nate to his first on Thursday.
I started cutting the grass on Sunday, I finally finished it today. Now the part that I cut Sunday needs cut again.
I haven’t been reading any blogs. I hope you’re all okay. We’re doing fine.
Rabbit, Rabbit!
Oh wait, that’s not a rabbit.
This is a rabbit! Whooo-eeee, look at that Hoss.
Ha! This time I remembered. Its Beltane (May Day) so get out there and enjoy some sunshine and fresh air, if you have any. Its raining here so dancing around the bonfire nekkid will have to wait. Traditionally, this is the time to light two fires and drive your herds between the two for purfication and protection. However, not having much of a herd, unless you count cats as a herd, I tend to celebrate Beltane in the Germanic way, with a Maypole, fertility rituals, and a long walk in the forest.
Sadly, I have no Maypole, do not wish to be fertile, except in a monetary sense, and walking in my yard in the rain will have to suffice for a walk in the forest. I do have to make a casserole today so lighting the oven will have to substitute for a bonfire.
Hope you have a prosperous month and a beautiful day!
It Just Never Stops
Life, that is. I’ve been so busy this week with everything. I have had downtime but that hasn’t included blogging or reading blogs or even answering e-mails. It just includes working, spending time with Nate, mowing grass, weedeating, cleaning house, and playing with the dog. I haven’t even seen my boyfriend that much, except at work, where we both tend to be too much. He worked half a day or so on his day off and I worked somewhat on my day off so it really isn’t much of a day off when you still go into work.
On top of that, yesterday, after getting into my trunk no less than three times, I managed to break my key off on turn # 4. This is bad, as my trunk key is also the key for the rest of the car. No one, except for maybe my dad, has another key to my car. My dad lives over an hour away.
I called the local dealership and found that they are so stringent about key codes that unless I bought the car from them, I didn’t, or had work done on the car there, I DID, then they couldn’t make me a key. Seems some car thieves/chopshoppers, had stolen a bunch of key codes and done some very bad things and now the FBI is very, very anal about keys.
To make matters worse, I had no ID, no money, no nothing, since it was all locked inside my car. I couldn’t get a hold of T-Bird and I didn’t really feel like bothering ETW or The Blonde Goddess to give me a ride over to the dealership. Instead, it being a beautiful day and me having a little time before I had to pick up Nate, or rather, just enough time to schlep to the dealership, get the key and schlep back before having to pick up Nate, I walked.
Its 3 1/2 miles. Luckily, I’m used to walking a lot and T-Bird was able to come and pick me up. She called me when I was at the foot of the bridge going over the river and said she would be over and just to wait at the dealership since her one working vehicle was in use. The guy was very nice and just asked that I bring my ID back because they have to keep my info on file for SEVEN YEARS. How crazy is that???
Good news is, he didn’t charge me for the key and my broken off key still works with the other broken off piece in the trunk so I can still open my trunk.
And that is how I spent part of my afternoon yesterday!
Happy Holidays!
Hope you are all enjoying your holiday season. I am without Internet service, which is why I haven’t been around. I’ll take care of that with the bucks I’ve made working 12-15 hour days. I’m butt-ass tired. Just tired, but Nate has had a great Christmas despite the drama and I’m looking forward to taking a long winter’s nap.
May the Lord and Lady bless you and keep you always.
Nanner
‘Tis the Season for TMJ
I thought I had escaped it this year. It normally hits around Thanksgiving but this year, it has waited this long to rear its ugly head. Perhaps its because the Christmas rush has taken longer to kick in here. Who knows. I just hate it.
The weather has been in flux for several days. My sinuses are singing, loudly, and my jaw pops right along with that rythmn. I’ve been up since 3:30 or so. It had just started snowing and now they’re issuing school delays. I figure I’ll wait another 18 minutes to see if they are going to delay Nate’s school then take another shower to help loosen the muscles in my jaw and wash the vestiges of vapor rub from my body.
The pain is tolerable at this point, thanks to ibuprofen and vapor rub. I did doze on the couch but when I went back to bed my sinuses started draining, causing me to cough and cough and cough. Ugh.
Plus, yesterday was just a clusterfuck. I thought I was off work and looking forward to it. Luckily, I went in anyway to get some paperwork done, and since we’ve been busy, I took my work clothes. Good thing, because I wasn’t off yesterday. I still had to leave early because I had to pick up Nate’s medicine and Nate, for that matter.
I doubt if there is a delay that I can count on Jeff to take Nate to school for me since he called at 11:00 last night, either drunk or stoned on pills or both. Its hard to tell sometimes. He said he loved me so it may have been his pills. Hell, he may have been asleep for all I know. That’s been known to happen.
Its still pitch black outside and from the window I can’t tell if its still snowing, although the radar says, “Yes, its been snowing outside and its going to snow more because you’re under a Winter Weather Advisory, dumbass.” I don’t feel like opening the front door and looking, or even opening the window to listen for the delicate sound of snow falling. It smells like snow. Its cold like snow.
Time for my shower.
Anything Goes 