I hate to use my public forum to take care of a personal problem, but I need to take a minute to straighten something out with Johnny Depp. Allow me to explain. Last week, the husband and I were on vacation to celebrate our anniversary. I use the terms 'vacation' and 'celebrate' lightly - we spent most of the time doing things to ready the condo for sale, looking for houses in CollegeTown, and hanging out with family. These things had left us more stressed out than we were before the vacation. So when Melinda emailed to see if I could come watch Sweeney Todd, I declined. The husband and I were going to be all couple-y. In the email, I uttered (typed, really) the following ominous sentence, or something like it: "Perhaps Johnny and I are not meant to be." That was a mistake, and I realize it now.
Before I get too far ahead of myself, I should explain what I had in mind for the remainder of the vacation. I thought perhaps we would find a beach and walk along it hand-in-hand. (Yes, this is the Midwest in early April, but dream with me, people.) I thought we would find a coffeehouse and engage in spirited but intellectual debate before lapsing into silence and staring lovingly into each other's eyes. I did not think we would get a lesson in plumbing, Murphy's Law, and why you shouldn't live in a building from 1911.
On Friday, while I was in the shower, the husband noticed that our desk lamp was acting weird. When he examined further, the bulb exploded, and popped the circuit breaker. The husband went downstairs to fix it. And thus our adventure began. Rather than finishing my shower in peace and sitting down to a relaxing evening, I watched as the bathroom light went off and on and off and on again. (Our breakers aren't labelled.) Then I heard an "oh crap." While the husband was downstairs he had seen water dripping. After a lengthy series of tests involving taping over drains and turning on and off various configurations of faucets, we determined that it's the shower. The shower pipes are ensconced behind the wall. To fix this problem, we will either have to remove the bathroom tile and put a hole in the shower wall or take down the kitchen cabinets and put a hole in that wall. Bear in mind that we figured this out over the course of our last two days of vacation, and that solving this problem will require either the spending of $1,000+ dollars or an entire day of the husband working closely with his father. Neither appeals to anyone involved.
Now, Johnny, I haven't forgotten about you. We need to talk. My husband says that the paint being worn away near the drip probably means it's been happening for a while, but I know that you are behind this. You were, after all, in Crown Point, IN shooting a movie recently. That is right over the state line, and very near to where my parents and siblings live (parents and siblings who could tell you my address, I might add). And your exposure to movie set design and special effects would make it relatively easy to fake some eroded paint.
Look, I know that it must have hurt when I said we weren't meant for each other. But Johnny, here's the thing. I'm married now. And you've got a little thing going with that nice woman from France, right? You just can't spend your free time shimmying up my shower pipes and committing vandalism any more. Plus, Johnny, you were never really mine, were you? You belong to all of the people of the world who like men (and especially the aforementioned French woman). I belong to the husband, and that's for the best, since he also belongs to me. We've got the papers and everything.
Johnny, you'll always have a special place in my heart. I'm sorry to have hurt your feelings, and I forgive you for causing us a giant headache. But you need to leave the husband and me in peace. It's really what's best for everyone.
Actually, Johnny, wait a moment. If you want to make it up to us - and I'm sure that you do - I know of a beautiful 2-bedroom condo for sale. It's in need of some small repairs, but what's a little plumbing between former soulmates? Call me; we'll work it out.
Friday, April 11, 2008
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Major Life Changes
Goodness, but I've been a horribly negligent blogger. I apologize for that. In my defense though, Major Life Changes are afoot.
The husband has gotten accepted into graduate school with a tuition waiver and a stipend. This is super exciting, of course. For too long, we have come home after hellish commutes, tired from our jobs - of which mine is frustrating and his is soul-crushing - to a dog who is sad because he's been alone for nearly 10 hours. But no more! Now we will live in CollegeTown in the central part of the state. We will own a house! We will not deal with traffic! We will own chickens!
Have I shared about the evolution of our dreams? Remember alpaca? That was so four months ago. We moved on to thinking we wanted a few acres with some sheep. (They are more affordable, among other things. I'd be happy to elaborate, but I doubt that you care.) And while we always wanted plants and chickens, those things became more important. So we visited CollegeTown to look at land, and the thing that we realized is that to buy an affordable plot of less than 10 acres, we are probably going to need to be a bit too far from campus. So we talked and drove around and eventually decided that a house in the vicinity of campus with a relatively large yard for a vegetable garden would be fine, so long as we could have chickens. Shortly after resolving to Google "CollegeTown chicken ordinances" when we got back, we drove by a house and saw two chickens, strutting and pecking and generally looking chicken-y. Sure enough, Google confirmed that chickens are allowed in CollegeTown.
So we're pretty excited. We will be more excited if someone buys our condo and/or I get a job. In my weaker moments, I get entrenched in the more negative, anxiety-ridden aspects of it all. But life is about risk, right? And someone will buy the condo and someone else will hire me. It will work out. And when it does, we will be much closer to our Beautiful Life, in which we are hipster hippies who buy nothing from the Man but implements with which to screw him.
The husband has gotten accepted into graduate school with a tuition waiver and a stipend. This is super exciting, of course. For too long, we have come home after hellish commutes, tired from our jobs - of which mine is frustrating and his is soul-crushing - to a dog who is sad because he's been alone for nearly 10 hours. But no more! Now we will live in CollegeTown in the central part of the state. We will own a house! We will not deal with traffic! We will own chickens!
Have I shared about the evolution of our dreams? Remember alpaca? That was so four months ago. We moved on to thinking we wanted a few acres with some sheep. (They are more affordable, among other things. I'd be happy to elaborate, but I doubt that you care.) And while we always wanted plants and chickens, those things became more important. So we visited CollegeTown to look at land, and the thing that we realized is that to buy an affordable plot of less than 10 acres, we are probably going to need to be a bit too far from campus. So we talked and drove around and eventually decided that a house in the vicinity of campus with a relatively large yard for a vegetable garden would be fine, so long as we could have chickens. Shortly after resolving to Google "CollegeTown chicken ordinances" when we got back, we drove by a house and saw two chickens, strutting and pecking and generally looking chicken-y. Sure enough, Google confirmed that chickens are allowed in CollegeTown.
So we're pretty excited. We will be more excited if someone buys our condo and/or I get a job. In my weaker moments, I get entrenched in the more negative, anxiety-ridden aspects of it all. But life is about risk, right? And someone will buy the condo and someone else will hire me. It will work out. And when it does, we will be much closer to our Beautiful Life, in which we are hipster hippies who buy nothing from the Man but implements with which to screw him.
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