How Hot Is It?

It’s so hot that our annual summer work bbq (which is now an “ice cream social” to save money) has been moved INDOORS. Is that irony?

It’s so hot that I didn’t even bother to blow dry my hair this morning.

It’s so hot that, for dinner last night, we had a picnic of meat, cheese and fruit on our bedroom floor.

It’s so hot that my head is pounding and my stomach is sick and all I’ve been able to eat today is a banana.

It’s so hot that public libraries are closing because they don’t have air conditioning and the heat levels inside are nearing “dangerous”.

It’s so hot that I thought the poor lady who bought the VERY LAST FAN at Rite Aid last night was going to get mugged on the way to her car.

It’s so hot that I can’t even contemplate having a cup of coffee. And that just pisses me off.

It’s so hot that I have worn nothing but skirts and dresses all week. I miss my blue jeans. And my sweatshirt.

It is so hot that we can’t even think about anything else. It’s all we talk about, think about and complain about. Oh, there a few people (like my mother, who doesn’t even live here) who absolutely love it. No one is really talking to them, though. It was fun to hit a new record, but okay, we’re done with it now. Let’s get back to that cold, dreary weather we all love so much.

Oh! According to Weather.com, it looks like we might get some showers on August 7! Woohoo!

Ud pate....so....hawt....ug

We hit 101 degrees today. In Seattle. The same city that was snowed in for three weeks last winter. Now we're burning up.

But global warming is a myth.
Yep.

**********

So, what else is going on, besides our famous weather? No one came to our open house on Sunday. That was a bit disappointing, but the house hasn't even been on the market for week, so it's a little early to start freaking out.

Oh, but you know me. It doesn't take much for me to freak out. Like Sunday morning, for instance. We were rushing around, trying to clean up and get out of the house by 10:30am because the open house was at 11:00am and it was already hot and for the love of puppies, why the hell can't you just PUT YOUR SHOES AWAY??

I may have had a meltdown. I may have thrown the garbage in the garbage can a little too forcefully. There were tears. And comments like "What the hell was I thinking, taking all of this on RIGHT NOW?!"

I may have scared Todd a smidge.

My therapist suggests that I am slightly stressed. Who knew?

But not to worry. All is good. Stress is to be expected during all of this. We're tacking the three biggest stress factors, all at once. The key is look at the big picture. Just a few more months and our house will have sold, we'll be moved into the new house and we'll have gotten through the wedding festivities. Then we'll be sitting on a plane, headed to Kauai.

Oh yea.

And we will not be moving, selling or marrying EVER AGAIN. Life will be gravy from here on out. Well, except for the whole teenager thing.

**********

The rest of Sunday was lovely. I took off and had breakfast by myself down at Alki, then sat and watched the water and talked to a friend on the phone. Then I drove down to Nichole's baby shower. Lots of cute things. And when I got home, Trish and Dan were here, so we made a little deli dinner and chatted about our wedding and their pregnancy. Everyone seems to be in some form of change. Pregnancy, buying a home, having a baby. Big year.

**********

And this week is just spent laying on the floor in the basement. This is the only time I love having the bedrooms down here. It's like a different climate.

We've got another three days or so of unbelievable weather, but then we drop down into the 80s this weekend. Ha. "Drop down". Funny.

Feelin' Hot, Hot, Hot

Please send snow.

House For Sale

It's official.
The house went on the market yesterday.

After five days of busting our tushies, putting stuff in storage, wiping down walls, window sills, windows, doors, door frames, kitchen cabinets, dusting, polishing, sanding, painting, and hiring people to do the yard and haul junk away, we are EXHAUSTED. I have never known this kind of tired. And I don't know how people do this more than once in their lifetime.

Oh, I've MOVED a lot. I am an expert packer and mover. Moving is one thing. Selling is a completely different beast. We had the house ready to show yesterday, although it didn't get on the market until last night, and it was a good thing. We got a call from an agent at 10am, wanting to come by in an hour. So we woke the kids and took them to Denny's. I can see how this will get old really quickly.

So, let's hope for a quick sell, shall we?

My Horoscope For Today

From Yahoo:

Quickie
Go ahead -- be daring. The universe will rise to meet you in your endeavors.

Man, I hope so.

I feel like we’re leaping through the air, flappin’ our arms, trying to keep ourselves up until we spot that metaphorical net. You know, leap and the net will appear?

Okay. We’ve leapt!

Where the hell’s the net?

Overview
You're feeling the buzz today, and you can't help but share it with others! Now is the best time for you to get folks together and see if you can't make something extra-crazy happen!

I don’t want “extra-crazy”. My life is “extra-crazy”.
At this point, I would be happy with “secure”.

I don’t ask for much.

What Would Happen If I Actually Stood Still?

Gawd help me, we made an offer on a house.
Actually, I made an offer on a master bedroom closet. Trust me. It’s totally worth it.

It’s a custom closet, complete with little shoe racks that you stand your shoes up on (My babies will love it!) and pull out shelves and little cubbies for your socks. There’s a vanity IN THE CLOSET with a sink and a cabinet and I can get ready in the morning IN THE CLOSET, surrounded by my shoes. I may just sleep in there.

Okay, the house that is attached to this closet is really nice, too.

We’ve been house hunting off and on for about year. You know this. We’ve blogged about it. But last week, a house that we’d been stalking for a couple of months finally dropped into our price range. So we pounced. And whadya know, the sellers actually accepted our offer. Huh. It’s a short sale, so we won’t know anything for a few weeks (funny, huh? Short sales take so much longer….weird) but man alive, I’m learning some grown up stuff. The mind boggles.

To add to the fun, we sat down with our agent on Saturday and filled out all the paperwork to list our house (well, Todd’s house really. But he’ll correct me and say “our” house. So okay fine, OUR house. But it’s still Todd’s house. I didn’t sign anything).

We filled in all the cute little boxes that say how great the house is (soaking tub, bath off master, high-speed internet, carport-attached) and signed and initialed a bunch of papers. It was all very exciting.

And I will say the question that asks “Has this property ever been involved in a fire, flood, earthquake, yada yada yada” was THE MOST fun to answer. We needed an extra sheet of paper.

Oh, but then it was all very nauseating because our agent said she wanted to list it on Thursday.

THIS Thursday. Five days from now Thursday.

Um…then we should get to cleaning, yes?

And we did. At 6:30am on Sunday. Todd was awakened early (by my snoring. Sorry sweetie.) so he got up, and that woke me and then my mind started racing (see: panicking) about everything that had to be done, so I just went ahead and got started. We were muy productive. We two trips to storage, each in our respective cars, we cleared out the office, we cleared out the bedroom and closet.

We finally came to a stop at 6pm so we could clean up, take Kayleigh to rehearsal and then go out for a much needed margarita.

So, this week is about cleaning. Deep, deep cleaning. Like, wiping down the baseboards and doors and walls and the inside of the fridge and the windows. And taking my wedding dress to the seamstress for hemming. And rehearsals. And counseling appointments. And movie meetings. And movie shoots. And listing a house. And waiting to hear back about the new house. And tae kwon do. And belt tests! And baby showers (yay, Nichole!!)

Ack.
What day is it?

**********

This post brought to you by wine and chocolate. Because I see a lot of it in the near future. Tropical honeymoon be damned.

Lessons About The Facebook

I would like to give props to my Mama. She accidentally got herself a Facebook profile!

Isn't that the coolest?!

I'm still waiting for her to update her status.

But be careful!! Some people just don't understand how to use the Facebook. As evidenced here.

Although that the first one is hysterical.
Because it's true.

Oh, She With The Curious Mind

Back in 2000, I started temping at WRQ (a software company, not a radio station) after I quit my jobs at the montessori school and at the dance studio. I had been working 15 hour days, and had no social life.

So I decided to suck it up and go back into an office. Easy money, 8 to 5 day, and health insurance. My assignment was for four months and it was mindless work. I moved information from one database to another, to get ready for the implementation of a new customer service database named Siebel.

Well, four months turned into six months, and six months turned into a year and then I finally got hired on full time. And my boss was a nice man named David.

David gave me more responsibility. I was in charge of cleaning the database. I merged duplicate entries, I retyped information so that it was all uniform and consistent (yes, it was a dream job). But in the process of cleaning this data, I started to notice that the sales people were using it in different ways. Therefore, the data was being entered inconsistently and I was having to retype everything. I realize now that was simply job security, but I’m all about efficiency and doing it right the first time.

So I started to talk to the sales people and ask them about their processes. How did they use the database? What information did they need to extract from the database? What part of the database did they not use? What part did they hate? We ended up making some changes to the database and doing training sessions for the sales people, so that everyone was on the same page and using the information the same way. Go Raechelle.

When it came time for my first review, I was praised in most everyway. I was a good worker, I was fast, I was punctual, I was fun to work with. But David gave me one ding. He said “Raechelle needlessly concerns herself with tasks that do not relate to her job.”

Um. Needlessly?

I’ve been telling this story a lot lately. As a buyer, I’m buying things that are very foreign to me. Pipette tips, hexahydrate, a geneamp PCR. Stuff like that. And I like to ask my customer what these things are used for, so I have a better understanding of what we need should the vendor ask me when I’m placing the order.

And I can hear David in my head saying, “You’re just the buyer, Raechelle. You don’t need to concern yourself with what this stuff is. Just do your job. Just buy the stuff.”

I tell David to shut up.

Because my inquisivitiveness has paid off. I am in the middle of trying to get these cartridges from our vendor, but our vendor ran out completely, so we only got seven of the 30 we ordered. I had no idea what these things were, only that our lab folks were calling on a daily basis says, “We REALLY need these! We’re running out. PLEASE see what you can do!” (This is the part of my job I don’t like so much.)

And the kicker with these cartridges is that they all have to be of the same lot. I had no idea what this meant, but I kept telling the vendor “Yes, please send the remaining cartridges, but please make sure they are of the same lot.” The vendor should know what that means, right?

Finally, the manager of the lab called me to get an update. She’d been hearing updates, but wanted to know first hand where we stood. I had been doing everything in my power to get these freakin’ cartridges (not really even knowing what they’re for) but the vendor kept telling me they just don’t have any, but they would be getting a shipment of them in soon. I told all of this to the manager, and she was very sweet and thanked me for doing what I could. Then I asked her, even as I heard David’s voice in my head, “What do these things do? Why are they so important?”

Well.
Before these cartridges came along, our lab people had to manually separate blood samples. Pull the white from the red, then extract DNA then separate something else. These cartridges do all of that for them in one spin. What used to take them hours to do now, with these cartridges, takes seconds.

Sold!

I called the vendor back and asked to speak to a manager. I said we would be out of these cartridges in the next five days and if we do not have our remaining shipment, there was going to be hell to pay. And these puppies MUST BE from the same lot because if they are not, we have to test that lot and to test a lot uses four cartridges. FOUR WHOLE CARTRIDGES. So, by gawd, they better be from the same lot because a case of 100 cartridges (tiny, little cartridges) is $800 and we are not wasting FOUR CARTRIDGES to test these lots because you can’t seem to get them all from one lot when THAT’S YOUR JOB.

Yes, yes. Feeeeeel the power.

Well, the cartridges came in, and they were all from the same lot and the manager of the lab thanked me profusely for keeping on the vendor and I look like I know what I’m doing. And now when the order comes through for these things, I AM ON IT.

So.
In my opinion, asking questions isn’t such a bad thing, now is it?

Weekend Update

As per usual, this weekend was a non-stop, breakneck speed whirlwind of productiveness and socializing. I fear the day when all of this catches up with me.

Friday night, I caught a ride with my work buddy CB to the Junction after work to meet up with Todd and enjoy my first festival of the summer (in mid-July), the West Seattle Summerfest. We saw the band Gunbunny (the drummer was in Ordinary Angels), met up with some friends for happy hour and food, then toodled around until Mudhoney came on.

Slight tangent: For those of you not from ‘round here, Mudhoney is one of the very first Seattle grunge bands. Their song “Touch Me I’m Sick” was referenced in the movie Singles. Matt Dillon’s band’s song “Touch Me I’m Dick” was a wee bit of a rip off.

Anywho, we listened for about 15 minutes, said, “Woohoo, we saw Mudhoney!” then went and got another drink.

Saturday, up and out early to pick up Ruby. Apparently there was a broken cable in the driver’s side door which was shorting out a specific fuse. Who knew? So everything is working now. Except the tachometer is a little sticky. I’m not so concerned about that, though.

After picking up Ruby, we went by Metropolitan Market and ordered our flowers for the wedding! The Flower Dude said we were very easy (he has no idea). We went in saying “We need this many boutonnieres, this many bouquets and this many centerpieces. We want this color, and this flower.” BAM, done! Except I forgot about corsages. Crap. Sorry, mom. You gotta wear a flower. Deal with it.

And after the flowers, a quick bite to eat, then on to Lincoln Park to attend a friend’s birthday picnic. And boy howdy, it was hot. I think it got into the 80’s on Saturday and sitting outside in the sun was a shock to the system. Luckily, half of the picnic table was shaded, so there was relief.

Then, back home where, after a quick nap, I got a wild hair and washed Ruby. While listening to thunder! It was just like being in Texas again.

And later, there was curling up in the bedroom, watching X-Men, which I had never seen. And I liked it!

Sunday, up early again, this time due to a certain 15 year old who was up early. But that’s okay. Jamie was due to arrive at 10:30am, and then she, Kayleigh and I were off to shop for bridesmaids’ dresses.

I was in a bit of a panic at this point. Since I only had two dresses to think about, I thought, oh, we’ll just go to David’s Bridal and (hopefully) buy off the rack. Kayleigh is 11, growing like a weed and not enthusiastic about wearing a dress at all, so I wasn’t going to put much effort into it. But after hearing through the grapevine that bridesmaids’ dresses take about four months to order and get in, I lost it. Official wedding panic set in and it lit a fire under my ass. What if I have to actually ORDER ONE for her? So, off to David’s Bridal we went. Luckily, we found one that she’s comfortable in, and Jamie even found a couple that she liked, so whew, we don’t have to order one. We do have to go to another store, as the Southcenter David’s Bridal didn’t have the correct size for Kayleigh, but that’s easy enough. The Lynnwood store does, so we’ll just go up there this week sometime.

So, flowers, done! Dresses, done!

Now I need to make an appointment with a seamstress for my alterations on my dress. It’s really just hemming it up and putting on a bustle. No letting out or taking in. Anywhere!

Let’s see….where were we?

Ah, David’s Bridal.

After dress shopping we stopped for a quick lunch, then dashed back home, so Todd and I could go look at yet another house. Which was just okay. Sigh…..but! It was right across the street from one we had looked at a month ago, and that house has since dropped in price, twice! So we looked at it again. And found even more great things about it.

We’ll take the kids to look at it this week and then figure out what we want to do at this point. There will be more pros and cons lists. I’m sure of it.

And after looking at houses, we slowed things down. Made dinner, ran Kayleigh to rehearsal, and settled in for some Family Guy.

This week looks to be just as jam packed as the weekend. Tae kwon do classes, another visit to a couple of houses, lunch with friends, counseling for everyone and then the reward for a busy week, the Kirby Krackle show on Friday!

I can’t believe it’s only Monday.

Update on the Edith Macefield House

If you remember, back in February of 2008, Edith Macefield turned down one million dollars when developers tried to buy her house. Then Edith passed away in June of 2008 and left the house to the construction supervisor.

Yesterday, in the Seattle Times, there was an article about Edith’s house being sold to a motivational speaker.

MyBallard.com also has a informative article about plans for the house.

I'm not so sure how I feel about the plan. Seems shady to me. But at least the house isn't getting torn down.

In the end, Edith wins. Her house still stands.

Weekend Update

A brief recap of our long, holiday weekend.

Friday, I made the trek to Ballard for the much anticipated pedicure, followed by some errands and a trip to Goodwill. When in Ballard….

That afternoon, Todd and I met up with our real estate agent to look at a couple more houses, one of which may be just the break we’ve been looking for. But it’s too soon to talk it about or get our hopes up.

Unfortunately, our hopes are up because we spent a few hours at Home Depot on Saturday pricing stoves, refrigerators, cabinets, countertops, flooring, tile, front doors and other fun house stuff. There may be a spreadsheet. I’m not at liberty to say, really.

Sunday was the day to try on The Dress. I picked up Stephanie and Isabella and we headed off to I Do Bridal, where Jamie was waiting for us. There was much oohing and ahhing as The Dress fit P E R E C T L Y. I’ll need to have it hemmed up a couple of inches and have a bustle put on, but other than that…..like a glove. Despite being bloated! (I love my uterus!)

To celebrate The Dress fitting perfectly, we went out for crepes afterwards. I’m bettin’ that dress don’t fit so perfect anymore. Ack.

After crepes, I took Stephanie and Isabella home, and, so as not to tempt my fiancé, I hung my wedding dress in Stephanie’s closet. In my ex-boyfriend’s girlfriend’s closet. Stephanie likes to say we are so “new millennium”.

Back in January, Todd and I were talking about our wedding party and how we’re happy to only have two people standing up there with us. Todd rattled off the names of the men he could possibly have, if we were doing a large wedding party, and I rattled off three names, then hit a wall. I don’t have too many close girlfriends. But then Stephanie’s name popped into my head, so I looked at Todd and said, “How fantastic would it be to have Stephanie up there with me?!” Heads = exploding.

Anyway, the rest of Sunday was very domestic. Grocery shopping, cooking dinner, making s’mores, then doing a little more purging of some random boxes and filers. Just when I think we’re finished and have cleared out every box or bag of papers, we find another one. It’s job security, really. Keeps me busy.

And welcome to Monday.

When’s the next holiday? September?
Crap.

Happy Fourth of July

Like the red, white and blue cocktail picks in our margaritas? This was the extent of our partying for the holiday.

We didn't really do much today. Kayleigh is at a sleepover. Tyler is playing games in his room. I made potato salad (from scratch!) to go with our hot dogs and watermelon for dinner. Our dessert was cake like sugar cookies with blue frosting and red and white sprinkles.

Maybe we'll watch the fireworks on TV later. Ooh. Maybe on the big screen. Feel like we're RIGHT THERE. Because we don't really want to be RIGHT THERE. Because there's too many damn people RIGHT THERE.

Happy Fourth to you.

I Broke My Own Rule

I wore flip flops to work today.
And I annoyed myself as soon as I walked to my cube.

But it's supposed to be 80 degrees and it's the day before a holiday weekend and I have on my brand new-I-don't-care-if-it-looks-like-a-nightgown-I'm-bloated-and-it's-comfy-dammit dress and the only "shoes" that look good with it are my black flip flops.

Oh, but let's up the Raechelle Is Crazy anty, shall we?

My toenail polish is chipped.

I KNOW!

Not only am I showing my toes AT WORK, my polish is disgusting. Red, chipped and disgusting. And I don't care.

Because I have a pedicure tomorrow. Hee.

Every now and then, when the circumstances are just right, I can not care. It's rare, but it happens.

I'm sure I'll be wound up and back to normal tomorrow.
At least until my pedicure....

Giddy

MY WEDDING DRESS IS IN!!

A whole month early! So, I have an appointment on Sunday at the shop to try it on and make sure it's what I ordered. Jamie will accompany me.

And no, that's not a picture of my dress, silly.

Weekend Update….and then some

Let’s see…

The last you heard, TBFE and I had jaunted off to the romantic city of Tacoma (ha!) to see Adam and Kris. And now I am hell bent on going to Portland during the only possible weekend that will work for the next three months - last weekend in July. I think Todd and I deserve a few days away to remind ourselves why we like each other. We tend to forget these things. Or maybe it’s just me. Todd seems to remember better than I do. I get bogged down with real life. And laundry.

So, if you’d like play family and have your very own teenagers for a weekend (Fri thru Sunday), please contact me. The rental fee is small.

Where were we?

Ah, Saturday.

On Saturday, I got up early (9am, which is early for me) and set out for Jamie’s. But there was a marathon going on and the normal 20 minute drive took 50 minutes because 99 was closed, as was 1st Ave downtown, which I did not know about, so I ended up on the freeway, which was a parking lot, like always, but finally! I arrived and was welcomed with mini quiches and chocolate croissants and coffee and mimosas. Because Jamie loves me.

We cleaned out her storage area in the basement and man, I wish I’d taken before and after photos! It was amazing! You'll just have to imagine it. Before: stuff piled high and crammed in. After: stuff neatly organized on shelves and enough space to actually crawl into. Wow!

After our cleaning fest, I headed back home (after receiving a text from Todd that simply said “Kill me.”) to help prepare with Kayleigh’s End of School Luau. She had three friends over and I’m guessing they had something that included a whole lotta sugar before I got there. They were running circles in the house (we have dubbed the upstairs “the dog run”), squealing at the top of their lungs. Ah, youth. Good times.

Todd and I took turns supervising, then hiding, until finally the pizza arrived and the girls sat to eat and watch Dr. Horrible. Todd and I watched, too. While we drank pina coladas. Tyler pretty much hid in his bedroom the entire night. Except when he’d emerge for food.

Two of the girls ended up staying the night, which wasn’t bad at all, and after they settled down in Kayleigh’s bedroom, Todd and I retired relatively early.

Sunday morning, Todd went off to coffee with his buddy, Ron, the photographer who did our Christmas photos. Ron has also agreed to be our wedding photographer, as well.

Speaking of the wedding, FIVE MONTHS, people. FIVE MONTHS AWAY. Crazy.

While Todd was at coffee, I made pancakes for the girls, then got on a cleaning bender. By the time Todd got home, I was full of energy and ready to go do something productive. So we headed down to Alki to collect some rocks for something (can’t tell ya) then to Metropolitan Market to make an appointment to talk flowers for the wedding, then to Petco to get Tom a tag (and some kitty pillows and some mylar balls and a little fuzzy ball on a spring….love the kitties) then back home, where we made nachos for dinner after laying around in the sun for two hours. What a lovely Sunday.

And thus begins a short week!

We get Friday off, so I’m thinkin’ Rae-rae needs a pedicure (UPDATE: pedicure scheduled). I still have a very generous Habitude gift certificate to use, but I’ve had option paralysis and can’t decide what I want to do with it. I think a pedicure is justified since we’re finally in flip-flop season. Maybe a facial, too. Never had one.

I also need to take my car back down to Goodyear. Oh, slight tangent.

Happy anniversary, Ruby!!
It was our three year anniversary on Sunday, Summer Solstice. I didn’t even give her a hug. Crap.

But she’s needs some attention now. There are things that aren’t working. The remote door locks, the interior lights, the radio, the clock. The needles on the speedometer, the tachometer and the gas gauge flip out when I start her. Dad and Todd both said it's a bad fuse, but when looking at the fuse chart, it looks like some things on a particular fuse work, while one thing doesn’t. Now I’m wondering if it’s more rat damage that’s either 1) just surfacing because the cable finally snapped or 2) we have a new rat. Dammit.

So, I'll go by Goodyear at some point and have them check her out. I should probably do it soon. I really miss my radio.