One month.

If everything goes as it should, the movers arrive in one month. 

One 53 foot long truck.  One day.  Five men.  All mine. 

Shut up. 

I asked for movers.  Mr. MM works often seven days a week (he is working right now, it's a seven day week - fourteen day week - 28 day?  I don't know?) and just, no.  We don't have that much stuff, but moving from a house with three flights of stairs to another with the same - is a lot of painful lifting and, no.  I don't have local friends.  Call me lazy if you'd like.  I've had enough head injury in the last year to say, HELL NAH I AIN'T DOING IT.

"Good luck getting help, too."  It's easier just to put the crazy cost of moving on a credit card, paying it off with the next bonus, and skipping the potential vacation next summer. (Yeah, we skipped it this year too, because Elliott.)

If you have not bought or sold a house before, it can get quite expensive on either side.  Stuff pops up (either expected, like inspections, known problems....) or unexpectedly like things that you simply must have done for a buyer's mortgage to go through. (There's many rules and regulations based on the kind of buyer.)  We did not live here long enough or earn that much equity to really make out on the deal.  We put a lot of money into the house, and you don't usually get it back. 

In funner news!  Cleaning up!  Packing, a little?  And...

We have to eat up all the remaining fresh food and the kids are like, this is all that is left:

Except I got the off-brand kind, and it's not EVEN THE SAME.

We have some serious problems over here.  I'll be blogging real quick because I need to make grocery money.

 

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Lots to catch up on, so I'll start backwards.

We are buying a new-to-us house.

Which means we are selling our house. 

We were able to successfully find a buyer on the first day of showings and that meant that we had the Find A House Immediately.  Why are we doing this?!  Because, my parents sold their house (my childhood home) and moved in.  Our house isn't large enough to fit myself, the husband, the five kids AND my parents.   We discussed doing just this a year or two ago -- but then Elliott arrived (... which I still haven't really discussed here on the blog?) and life has just been warp speed.

We had tossed around the idea of building an in-law apartment, or addition, but it just was not going to work out on this property.  So, sell the house - find another!  Easy enough! 

For me:  A House Is Just A Shell.  You move shells as your life changes.  You - your family gets bigger, you get smaller. I see other people who get very attached to the material part of their homes, and want to drag it around with them - but?  Shake that shit off. 

I do not get that attached to my shell.  I like moving.  I see it as a fresh start, a new beginning.  Putting aside all the monetary costs involved,  $1000 deposit, $1000 home inspection, etc etc etc. moving can be really f - u - n. 

Right at the moment, we are nine people living in a house with one bath on the main floor and one kitchen and too many teenagers and a mobile baby and it can be A Bit Intense. 

Everyone in this house likes their own space.  My kids don't want to share bedrooms.  They have been sharing here, there, everywhere, just to make it work -- and the baby hasn't had a room anywhere, yet.  He still won't in the new house.  He has been in my bed since day one. 

I really can't worry about that, I mean, there's a garage?  (KIDDING.)  All I had asked for was a bedroom and a bathroom I could have access to without a queue at any given time.   SCORE.   And maybe a kitchen to roller skate in where I could line up 12 pizzas at a time for too many teenagers and guests.

We found one close to our current location, so that the kids can remain in college, 12th, 9th, 4th grade in their current schools.  It is quite nice - and with the basement in-law, it's larger than ours.  If all goes well with inspections, we should be moved in by November 1.

-Send Xanax, groceries, cleaning ladies, moving men and anti-seizure vibes!  Also seeking product to review.

 

Bad dreams and bouncing ships and real estate in Maine

I don't sleep well in an empty-ish house.  I have nightmares that are frighteningly realistic when there's nobody in my bed.  The positive is that I quickly forget them if I get OUT of bed and do something.  I will not analyze this last one - and I am going to blame my daughter for renting a very disturbing movie last night that must have crept inside my subconscious.  

SHIVER.

My younger kids and spouse took off to Busch Gardens and Colonial Williamsburg for the last few days.  They're currently en route home -- it is a long. drive. home.

I did not go for a couple reasons - first off - my dog just spent a week at a sitter's house because we went on a cruise and we would have had to board her again.  She promptly came home and pooped on the carpet.  

Next, this trip was sort of unplanned -- Dad and kids were planning to go white water rafting (which I was not planning to join them on... rafting would have been fun, however my youngest was too little to join) and they had canceled that trip and made this one last minute and sort of just went on the fly.  

I do not do well on amusement park rides, in fact I don't go on them at all.  To bring this a bit on the topic of WLS, sure I understand that a huge part of many people's journeys is to "fit on a rollercoaster again!"  

But for me? 

Oh. hell. naw.  I do fit.  I didn't fit for a time.  I don't care that I fit.  It was never a "non-scale victory" in my mind because I didn't care to go back, you know?

I never, ever enjoyed rides as a big girl.  Disney -- Waterparks -- all of it -- LOATHE. THEM.  I enjoy them much much less now.  

I believe that the epilepsy diagnoses and subsequent antiseizure medications make movement-dizziness and perception much more of a problem than it was prior to seizures and meds.  This became crystal clear on our recent cruise of the Northern Atlantic Ocean, where I became visually sea-sick every time I saw the waves and felt the ship bump.  My brains - eyes - can't handle the disconnect anymore.  It took nearly a week to stop feeling the ship move in my head, so getting on a ride to make that feeling happen on purpose is not really enticing to me.

I do miss taking photographs in parks like Busch - and while being a tourist - but hate to waste the $$.$$ on getting me in the park just to be the event timeline photographer.  (Which is often my role in any location with moving parts.)

Anyway while they were off, I went to the neurologist to update about my failed WADA test and redo ...(separate post to come, my brains are special!) and a quick trip to Maine with my parents and oldest daughter.

We visited Ogunquit, ME and the Nubble Lighthouse.  I've decided that fore a mere several million dollars, I could live in either location, thanks.

Strictly hip hop, or I ain't singing this. My TED unreview.

NSFW or kids -

My kids don't know that Marky Mark ever had a funky bunch. You see, I was in middle school when that song came out, and Mark Wahlberg and his funky bunch were popular.  Mark Wahlberg is also from my hometown. So, when Beantown boys make famous, people notice. Take a moment to enjoy the Bunch.

I heard of TED from my kids. Right. "But all our friends have seen it!"

Magic Mike! In which I realize I am not a typical girl.

I wrote this on my MM Facebook page yesterday, and got varying reactions from full-on apathy to You Simply Do Not Understand The Art!1!1!

Melting Mama Â· 2,444 like this

21 hours ago Â·  

• Dear target audience, Are you serious? Really? Magic Mike? The collective lot of you are squealing over a boy born in 1980. 
  
  http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi889627417/

And last night, I went to see the movie.  I apologize, internet, curiosity sucked me in.  The online female SQUEE over this movie is palpable.  Moist, even.

No really.   The response online so far has been  -

Brr, where's my feety pajamas?

Why doesn't anyone send pajamas for "review?"

Just saying.  I get body shapers (which I am about three weeks late in posting about, because my camera man is NEVER home)  among other things, a couple that I have also yet to post about <g> but can't a girl get a wooby?

I am FREEZING.  We're already down 1/2 tank of oil, and trying to conserve resources here, which means, putting on more clothes this winter.

I don't (Ever. No, EVER, I think my last PJ's came from my mother on Christmas two or three years ago?) buy myself pajamas, I usually wear old worn out tee shirts and stretchy type pants.  In fact, that's pretty much my Career Wear too.  I go to work in vitamin t-shirts and bleached out sweats.  SEXY!

My eight year old has pajama day at school tomorrow, and this put ideas in her head about perfect matched sets of sleepwear, which she does not have.  She often wears hand-me-downs to bed, old tees and sweats, because I don't buy polyester nightgowns with Justin Bieber on them.

But, we don't have any pretty outfits and slippers she wanted to wear to school.  This means that Mr. is hitting the mall after work tonight for a "puppy pajama set, or a kitty one, but if you can't find it, get pink or purple and then slippers that match in the same color, and a robe, that HAS TO MATCH."  I may give her some long johns, in white, even if it's my fault for having a single catalog available that she flipped through to give him EXACT. Shopping. Instructions.  (I don't really get catalogs, because I don't shop.  Since the days of Lane Bryant, nothing much comes through mail-order.)

I just got sucked in to Feety Pajama websites, and if I get ONE pair for me, I have to get one for everybody, and GAAAAH, forget it, I am back in my free t-shirt, 'cause.  I can't haz six woobys.  I want two for myself.  I'm greedy, and freezing.

Do you have footie pajamas?  Where did you get them?  Can I buy twelve pairs?  Two for each of us? Please?

I'm going to be a hoarder now.

I watched Animal Hoarders the other night, and while Mr. MM looked on in horror at "How could anybody do that?" 

I thought for a minute, you know what? 

THERE IS NOTHING CUTER THAN ONE MONTH OLD KITTENS, and THERE IS NO REASON TO GIVE THEM AWAY YOU KNOW.  Really.  Why?  We can haz five cats!  We haz room!

That's crazy talk.  I do not need five cats.  I already have a vacuum compulsion issue, and with Dyson #1 half-broken and Dyson #2 AT the Dyson Factory getting serviced, I would die of fur inhalation.  Five kitties is a no good, very bad idea, but entirely understandable.

I can see how someone would very easily slip into one, two, twenty-five cats! Soon, your house is filled with Kitten Chow and litter and the neighbors are Smelling you. 

(It isn't responsible, I know, save me from the "spay and neuter your pets" speech, I am clearly aware of this, as my INDOOR CAT got knocked up.)

No.  I will not be keeping five cats.  But, I can see if I were alone in a big house, how it might be tempting.  Meow. 

 If you aren't CLEAR - WATCH THIS.  DIS-GUST-ING.  Or this, if you're not sure.

A is for ...

I have been enrolled in my online college courses course for two weeks and What Have I Learned?  

That it would have been preferable to have paid attention from ages 12-16 if at all to the rules of writing a sentence.  This process could not be more yawn-inducing.  I have the attention span of a gnat that has been floating in a Red Bull.  

Getting me to sit and complete an assignment that does not interest me in the least -- it is a challenge.  I will do anything to get up and walk away from it, even if I am unaware that I am walking away.  This goes for everything that bores, challenges or drives me batty.  I check OUT.  Bye-bye.  (Even blog related things, which I typically love and do immediately. Give me a shitty product, watch how fast I ignore it.)

For particular situations it is beneficial, perhaps when there is something I should walk away from, like an insane housewife that is sending me hate mail!   (Because it would cost me less in lawyer fees.) However, when we are talking about a simple college assignment, it doesn't really help at all to get up and go play with the vacuum and pretend I am sucking up someone's head.

"Please highlight the fragmented sentence and document the comma spliceahmajigwhocares!?!?!?"

Again, I wish I had paid some attention in my formative years to so that maybe I would not need to take THESE classes now at age 31.  I don't want to.  </end whine>  Perhaps I can balance the I don't want to's with I Want To's! and pick up another class that actually interests me at the same time as each of these have-to's?  

Anyway, I got a 94% for the first two weeks. 
 

The Apple Jacks are sending me a subliminal message.

It's the last day of school vacation, and I need groceries.  Dad's working, and I have completely OCD'ed on Peapod again.  I always do this, I fill my cart and quit, because it kills me to see the price in advance, I have the whole cart > estimation thing down pat, but I am still one cheap mofo. 

I'm up to $300.00 and it's making me want to tip it over and go to Wal-Mart.   (I did.  It timed out on me, and I gave up.)

BUT -

I am distracted.  I keep following the pattern of ads above the categories.  You want veggies?

   

Soy milk?

   

Tofu - you say?
   

How about brown rice?
    
 
See?  I search for what I want, get distracted, and I'm thinking, "OH, POP-EMS!  Those used to be FUN!"  Advertising doesn't work?  HA.

     

*No, there's none-of-that in my cart, but I'm still not wanting to check out.  :P

 

House Ugly.

We haven't done much of anything to fix this house or update it.  Aside from emergencies, that is, we've had several plumbing emergencies, a septic emergency, a couple floods, and so on.  Much of that is because we got into serious debt updating parts of our last house, and now, to do it all over again will take time.  

Among the needs?  Fixing the downstairs bathroom, dealing with the half-finished basement which was apparently where The Party Was At for the previous owners.  

(Cigarette burn holes in the wood, a list of phone numbers scrawled into the wood above my freezer, footprints on the wall in the "family room," that scare my girls, because how did feet get THERE?)

Replacing siding -- part of which has apparent bullet holes, etc..etc.  And, I can't even get started on the yard, that just makes me angry.

I have had no inspiration to do anything with the inside of the house.  Every wall is painted generic taupe -- since we bought this as a bank-repo'ed house -- it was a flip.  They painted over all the evils, cleaned it bare, scrubbed the floors and sold it at a profit.  

It has zero personality, aside from the redneck homemade BB gun holes by the porch, and graffiti in the basement.  There's even a tiny Anarchy symbol inscribed on my daughters' door in the basement.  Lovely.

Have I mentioned that I LOATHE this house?  Recently?  No?  Let me tell you again.  I hate it.

But, it's where we live.  I am fortunate enough that we HAVE a house.  It's twice the size of our last house, and I am thankful to have enough space to hide from my kids.  It's unlikely that we will move again -- at least not unless it became profitable to do so.  HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.

I guess I have to learn to like it, and start doing work to it.  It may take forever or longer considering my lack of hand-eye coordination aka hiring nice mens to come and do it, but, I will.  

What prompted this?  I saw wallpaper.  I have a room large enough to pull this off:

 

Or a reasonable facsimile.  Sure, I could do it, but it will peel off and be crooked.  But, it's the inspiration to get STARTED somehow, even if it just means getting a SHELF up.

 

Tall Ships in Plymouth, MA

I didn't purchase tickets to get on the three boats that are docked in the harbor right now, The Mayflower (which is here all the time,) "The Amistad, and "The Peacemaker." I came home and looked up the last two - and sort of wish I HAD.

Anti-fireworks.

We left long before the chaos of the pyrotechnics.

Friday.

Weight - NO.

In no particular order, in fact I had nothing until quite late.  It's bizarre, though, the minute I eat?  I FEEL LIKE DIRT.  Coincidence - or was I just tired?  I don't know, but it was immediate, you'd expect that I was noshing on carbs - but it wasn't.  The MOMENT I eat - I spiral into STARVING.

• Soy milk in coffee a bunch'o'times
• 4:30 pm - 3 half-ounce frozen meatballs + 1 Atkins Caramel Fudge Brownie Bar
• 1 low fat string cheese
• 1/2 turkey sausage/egg sandwich from frozen, minus half the bread, no egg and no cheese.  (LOL, did you catch that?  I ate the sausage and bread it sat on. The kid shared with me.)
• 2 light waffles, fake butter
• Mid-night - 4 peanut butter crackers

Totals: 1,078 52g 104g 15g 19g 64g

Special deal, holidazing and ANGST!

I just rushed to get my lawn mowed so that when you drive by it doesn't totally resemble a jungle since we have had so. much. rain. and whaddya know?  THE SUN IS OUT!  We have been living in a rain forest for weeks and weeks, and this yard is just, ick.  I miss my old yard, we had sort of gotten landscaping under control, had a fence, and it was already done.  To start over with a blank slate really blows.

So, happy fourth!  That's tomorrow.  Yay.  I don't like fireworks.  I like parties -- but no thank you on the fireworks -- and the little one is terrified of loud noises.  In fact I think the boy is actually working all day tomorrow -- and we don't have plans.  *lights a sparkler, woo*

4th of July Weekend Celebration at GastricBypassSupplements.com

This weekend only - save 10% on all purchases over $25.00. And don't forget you can get 'Free Shipping' on all orders over $99.00. Use this coupon code when your are checking out  - JULY4

Woot.  Time to stock on my liquid courage, because....

I'm starting a 28 day Bariatric Bootcamp this week!  *ANGST!* 

It's time.  I cannot go this path any further, Beth has got to get a GRIP on her snackgrazingmealignoringchewingcud.  It's never been this hard to quit -- I know a lot of it has to do with the anti-seizure meds that are WORKING... so I have to get my own grip.  I am going to be following the plan here, because look! it's mah face!  

Somehow I needed this.  I needed it NOW.  The timing is pretty damn impeccable.  Time to cut out the games and just DO SOMETHING TO GET MY REAR IN GEAR. 

I really have no excuses.  I mean, seriously, get a grip, woman.

I plan to photograph and blog my progress, it's necessary to keep myself motivated.  I will do an official weigh-in on Monday, and off I go.

This was a test.

I made it home from the grocery store during a downpour.  There were cars pulled over everywhere.  That's one way to get me excited about driving again.  Then, bringing in mostly refrigerated items in a lightening storm. 

Fun!

More proof that I am going to find illegal substances in the walls.

I have a pile of moving boxes, assorted junk, things that I have found in the house... in the garage to be hauled away, the trash pick up won't take all of it, and it's getting wet.  I call 1-800-GOTJUNK.  They are here.

"Wow, this house has come a long way."

"You have been here?"

"Well, sorta."

Duuuuuuuuuude.  Maybe his number is one of many written on my basement wall?

“A good wife is one who can mow the lawn in the summer and put up the storm windows in the winter.”

Uh, sure.   I have always been a lawn-mower, but this house has no storm windows 0r a storm door.  It's on the list.

There's currently a huge gaping hole in the front of my house.  I wish my wood-stove was usable because it's getting mighty chilly up in here.  Soon, there will be two gaping bay window-sized holes.  Brr.  It's window-installation day one.  Yesterday was foiled as day one, it started hailing when the installers got here.

I am hoping the new windows will help weather-proof this place, it is SO drafty.  I hate buying so much oil, and we are blowing through it like water with the heat constantly jacked up.  By jacked up I mean 68 degrees, and it's running to keep it up that high, all the time. 

Next year, I really would like to replace the wood burning stoves with something else, pellets? 

*chatter chatter*

baby, it's cold outside.

We celebrated part of NY Eve by driving to the hospital for my hematology intake.  We spun out in our own driveway, and I nearly lost my mind.  But.  I wasn't canceling.  I can't miss any. more. appointments.   There was ZERO visibilty on the way there - I have never NOT seen the road like that.  WHEE.

Now... I'll brb with more in a moment.

We have a little...

...kitten.

Photos to follow. She's currently in Tristan-free areas. I think her name will be...

Our dog is Rizzo. We already have a Sandy in the family, so?

Next.

Nearly all of the goodness of yesterday is gone.  I sent it away with everybody, and while I did keep a pie here, I tasted it, and it isn't very good.  I should really be eating leftover asparagus for breakfast, but.  all I want is coffee.  To be perfectly honest, all I really want to do is get out there in the crush of sick humanity with all the crazy mothers who are out there For A Deal and pretend to shop for the holidaze.  I woke up in time to do it - but there is no way on earth I would bring four kids to the mall or Wal-Mart on this day, so no, it ain't happening.

Do you shop on the blackest of Fridays?  I always worked on it, so I am used to the busy-ness of it - I kind of enjoy it.