The Twisted World of Fiber, Hooks, Needles, Wheels and Dating after Widowhood

This is my story, and I'm sticking to it. Warts and all. I wanted to call it 'Seriously? WTF?', but that doesn't quite explain it all. Or does it?

Thursday, December 23, 2010

Comcast vs the Power Grid


Well, The Boy finally got a service call Comcast, also know at our house as either “The Company That Sucks Moose Cock”, or “Sucks Monkey Balls”.  Take your pick.  It was scheduled for Tuesday between 1 & 3.  At 2pm, they called and said the guy got a flat tire, so they were rescheduling for Wednesday. I already had rescheduled a delivery to my house and took the day off work to wait for their installers.  The Boy went ballistic on them, so they sent a different crew.  This is where the REAL trouble began.  The service guy shows up with a rookie trainee, and proceeds to let him drill through the molding and wall to the outside. While he waited in the nice warm truck.  Leaving the rookie totally unsupervised.   Apparently, no one measured, and the kid drilled dead center into the power line that runs into the electric meter.  The rookie is lucky to be alive.  How he didn't get electrocuted, we will never know.  The siding on the house is burned, the shrub and grass was on fire, and power to 2 blocks was knocked out.  This takes incompetence to a new level.  We had to get PSE&G to do an emergency call to reset the transformers in the neighborhood.  And each time a neighbor asked the Comcast people what happened, they said it wasn't them.  They have nothing to do with power.  Really?  REALLY?????  The Boy was on duty clear across the County and had to be reassigned to take care of this, and an electrician had to come restore temporary power.  He STILL didn’t have cable or internet.  Comcast sure lives up to their service commitment, don’t they?
The electrician came back in the morning to give him new service and a new electric meter.  The cable guy, who promised to be there between 8 & 8:30am, showed up promptly at 9:30.  The head supervisor said that they will take care of the electrician’s charges (ya think?!) and replace the burned siding.  Since it is a color that they will never match, I think they have to reside the whole house, don’t you?

Friday, December 17, 2010

A Novelette


A million things have happened since my last blog post.  Thanksgiving dinner sucked.  I was supposed to fry the turkey, but it rained/sleeted all day, so into the oven it went.  The Daughter Figure was running late, so she asked that we hold dinner for an hour.  No problem- except that I left the turkey in the oven instead of putting it on the counter.  It was dry.  The ham was major salty (not my fault), the fresh cranberry sauce tasted like ass because I forgot to put the apples in it, my sister's green bean casserole was soupy, and nobody made mashed potatoes. Sigh……….
 The Boy didn’t close on his house when he was supposed to.  He closed a week later, but is finally in his house.  He has curtains in the living room, and blankets and towels on the windows in the bedroom.  lol    There is food in the fridge, and the BF helped us take down the wall between the living room and dining room.  Speaking of The BF, he moved in last Wednesday morning, and The Boy moved out that afternoon.  I drove the U-Haul from here to Middletown & back, unloaded it, then reloaded it with The Boy’s stuff.  We made a few trips between the houses, and then returned the truck that night, but not before my back went out and I had to make a trip to the chiropractor at 6:30pm.  There were still major remnants of The Boy around the house, but I have slowly removed most traces of him by loading his crap in the back of my car and dropping it on his porch.  He continues to have a fairly major presence in the basement (2 drum sets), and we won’t even mention the garage or shed.  lolol
The Boy has gone over a week without cable and internet.  Did you know that Comcast sucks moose cock?  Big time?  It seems that the last tenants of the house left without paying their bill or returning their equipment.  Because of this, The Boy has had to fax proof that he owns the house to Comcast corporate offices- TWICE.  The renters were Hispanic, and he is German.  The name is TOTALLY different. After seeing a deed, a bill addressed to him, his license and his social security card, you would think it would all be good, but apparently, that’s not how they roll at Comcast.  He still has no response from them, so I think he will be saying “Hello, Fios!”
Things have gone well at my house with The BF having moved in with the 3 cats.  The dogs are fascinated with them, and the cats do a lot of hissing and swatting.  All is right with the world. And they didn’t eat the conure yet, so I guess that’s a good thing.  They also seem to be very leery of the chinchilla- I think he moves too quickly and makes a lot of noise on his wheel,  and they don’t like that.  I have had discussions with both the dogs and the cats about living in harmony, but it hasn’t sunk in.  I have told the cats if they don’t run, the dogs won’t chase them.  And I told the dogs that the cats do not appreciate your barking in their face with your ass in the air.  And they don’t like to have their butts sniffed.   The good thing about having dogs and cats is that you don’t really have to scoop the poop out of the litter box.  The dogs do it for you.  Hahahaha  Blech!!!!
I was worried about The Daughter Figure coming home now that The BF has moved in, but when he got home from work yesterday, she asked him if she could hug him.  I almost cried.  But I didn’t.  ‘Cause I’m German.  We all went to dinner and had a nice time.  When we got back home, they spent a lot of time together playing with the cats and looking up stuff on the internet.  I am keeping my fingers crossed.

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Another ribbing project


I am making yet another scarf.  The BF was watching me make his beautiful black alpaca scarf, and asked who it was for.  I said him, and he said he thought he asked for red.  Sigh…….  Why would you ask for a black hat and a red scarf?  So……………….  I have 3 skeins of Knit Picks Swish in red, and am making his scarf from that, but working on it in stealth mode.  It is a cool 3x2 ribbing that I will wire block to have the ribs stand apart.  Then he can throw it in the washing machine and panic when it dries back to it’s original shape.  I will enjoy that.  lol  I am also making a ribbed hat for the older nephew and The Boy’s girlfriend.  The smaller hat started out on dpns, but I am going to convert it to magic loop, because I think it goes much faster for me.
                We are supposed to be closing on The Boy’s house today, but the lawyer hasn’t come up with the exact closing costs yet, the seller hasn’t proved that he completed all repairs we agreed on, and the underwriter is fucking insane.  It is not good enough that they have signed gift letters from me for what I am giving toward the down payment.  Nor is it good enough that they have front and back copies of the checks deposited into his account.  They want statements showing that I actually had the money in the account.  Fine- I gave them all that.  Now they want a statement showing the money actually came out of that account?  WTF?  Seriously!  The checks show where it was drawn from- they have statements with more than enough money in the account.  And the money is not coming from a regular bank account.  It is life insurance proceeds in an account with Prudential- who apparently has never heard of the internet, let alone a fax machine.  Grrrrrrr!  It takes them a week to do anything, and will only send stuff through postal mail.  It took speaking to 3 people for them to agree to send out a mini-statement showing the last 2 checks I wrote for this crap actually came from that account.  Now we wait.

Monday, November 15, 2010

A Case of the Blahs


Since Friday, I have been hit with a case of the blahs.  I can’t seem to shake it, no matter what I do.  I went to the shore house on Friday night to do some cleaning out and fixing up.  On Saturday, I was able to shake off this feeling for a few hours by installing a tub surround and a new vinyl floor in the bathroom- all.by. myself!  (pix to follow) But by 10:00 Saturday night it was back.  I think it’s a combination of the anniversary of The Husband’s passing, The Daughter Figure being away at school for her 20th birthday, The Boy closing on his house (supposedly) next week, and not seeing The BF since last Wednesday. 
I really need to get my act together, as this is a busy week- book club tonight (don’t tell anyone, but I didn’t read the book- I don’t even know the name of it)  lol, The BF is coming tomorrow for dinner and shoe shopping (for him), and I am going to try to drag him to meet my knitting group at Starbucks, under the guise of just getting a coffee.  Bbbwwwaaaahhhhhh!!!!  On second thought, I think I’ll ask him if he is ready to meet them.  They can be more overwhelming (in a good way) than my actual family.  J On Wednesday, I have my spinning guild meeting, and I need to have 2 bobbins of something spun up so we can practice plying.  Which is a good thing, because I suck at plying.  Lolol  I may have to split something  already on bobbins to do this with.  I need to go to the grocery store, return things at Kohl’s and Old Navy, and drop off my dry cleaning.  Oh, and fold the laundry.  And clean my death-trap of a bedroom.  And find my kitchen table, which is buried under tons of papers, knitting patterns and yarn. 
I think I’ll just go home and knit.

Monday, November 8, 2010

A Closing?

The Boy has a closing date(s).  Anywhere from November 23rd to December 1st.  WTF?  I’ve closed on 2 other houses and have never been this far in without a firm closing date!  The Title search was started on the 2nd.  A Bulk Sale notice was sent to the State.  It takes 10 days for them to respond, which in NJ terms, probably means 3 weeks.  Sigh……  Did you know that if you purchase a house from a seller that was renting out the property, a Bulk Sale notice goes to the State?  If not, the PURCHASER can be held liable for taxes not paid on the rent collected.  How fucked up is that?  How is a purchaser supposed to know that a seller was renting the property?  Only in NJ! 
            I have to start boxing up stuff for The Boy to take to his new house.  He is getting ½ the glasses and mugs in the cabinet.  He can have ½ the towels, and I think I have dishes in the basement.  He has a nice set of couches and a big screen tv to take. He also has not one, but TWO drum sets.  I have a 2nd couch he can have for the basement REC room if he wants, an old 19” tv, an end table for the living room, and he has a coffee table at my sister’s apartment.  I will give him a starter amount of utensils and a utensil holder for the drawer.  I have 10 gajillion pots and pans he can choose from, and carving knives galore.  He can take his bedroom dressers, which were my brothers.  That makes them about 40 years old.  If I were him, they’d go in one of the guest rooms.  He can also take my old kitchen table.  I just don’t have any chairs for it anymore.  lol   And The BF is donating his old table they can use on the sun porch.  The Boy has my Grandmother’s Craftmatic Adjustable full size bed.  Now tell me, what 26 year old has a Craftmatic Adjustable?  lmao   The frame is great, but the mattress is crap, so that would also do well in a spare bedroom.  I will be getting a new King size bed to accommodate The BF and the menagerie, so The Boy can have my Queen if he wants, or he can buy himself a completely new bedroom set- mattress and all.

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Accomplishments

        What a great day.  I cleaned The BF's apartment and took his stuff to the laundromat.  I don't think I've been in a laundromat in 20 years.  Some things never change.  lol  I put most of his stuff in a giant washer, then put the towels and other stuff in a smaller one.  Then I waited.  And knit. And listened to everyone speaking Spanish.  And knit some more.  Top 40 playing on the radio.  Yuk.  lol  When the larger machine stopped, I opened the door and water came pouring out.  It never drained for the spin cycle.  Sigh....  The attendant was very nice, and went to get a mop while I tried to get the sopping wet clothes into the next machine.  He then got it going for me.  The. Whole. Fucking. Wash. Cycle.  AGAIN.  I cannot believe he couldn't just set it to spin.  Grrrr.  So, I knit some more.  And dried and folded the smaller load.  And wondered why I didn't drive the whole damned pile of clothes the hour and 15 minutes to my house and wash everything in my nice machine.  Couldn't have taken much longer.  :-)  When I got home, I continued the cleaning thing.  I tackled the back room, which is my computer room.  It was getting hard to find the computer, and this room is going to become the 'cat' room/man cave when The BF moves in.  There wasn't even a spot big enough on the couch in here for a cat to lay on, so I jumped in and shoveled all the shit out.  A laundry basket full of yarn, 2 bags of garbage and 3 bags of paper to recycle later, and it looks like a room again.  :-)  I wish I had a before picture. The white ceramic stove is where I keep all my spinning fiber.  And that's my Minimalist hanging over the chair.  The room is done in an Oriental motif, so ignore the Southwest pattern on the couch.  The slipcover is in the wash.

        I finished one of the three October squares that were supposed to be mailed by October 20th.  I suck.  I admit it, ok?  The second one is on the needles and half-way finished.  I am dreading the 3rd one, because she asked for it to be in fingering weight.  Seriously?  Who the fuck makes a blanket out of 12x12 fingering weight squares?  And how long will this take me to make?

Friday, November 5, 2010

Less than 2 Weeks


On November 18th, it will be one year since I lost my husband.  It doesn’t seem like it was that long ago, yet it seems a lifetime away.  The Daughter Figure and The Boy, which were so aptly named by him, take a different route to the healing than I have.  The Boy still has moments of frustration and anger.  They always got along pretty well, and did all kinds of stuff together.  He can laugh about stuff his father did and said, but does not discuss his feelings or acknowledge that he misses him.  Typical Boy. 
The Daughter Figure, on the other hand, had a different relationship with him.  For most of her life, they argued and fought.  Neither saw that they were of the same mold.  Except she has breasts.  Toward the end of her senior year in High School, they became closer.  He was so proud of her accomplishments, and her acceptance to University of Michigan.  She was away at school when he got sick, and the last time she spoke to him, he had to talk her down from a panic attack.  We didn’t know that less than 24 hours later he would be on a ventilator in an induced coma.  She beat herself up for a long time going over that last conversation because she felt that he needed her and she had been selfish.  My words could not change how she felt.  Only time has eased her pain a little.
As for me, I miss him, but not in the same way they do. We had a different kind of relationship.  After 27 years of marriage, I loved him, but was not ‘in love’ with him.  We had been through too much.  I had been hurt and disappointed too many times.  It was nothing torrid or despicable, it was just our different views of family and life and time (not) spent together.  I viewed our relationship from a different perspective than he did for a very long time.  We were old friends, and sometimes best friends, but not lovers.  That time had long passed.
  I knew from the minute the hospital called that night at 1:30am.  I knew he would not be coming home.  My grieving started 3 weeks before he died.  Maybe that made it easier when it finally did happen.  Maybe I’m too German.  Or too Russian.  Or too damaged.  I don’t know.  I stayed with him in the ICU as much as they would allow.  I didn’t want him to be alone. I owed him that much.  I talked to him about what was going on at home and at work.  I wiped away his sweat.  I combed his hair.  I stroked him arm.  But he wasn’t there.  Only his shell was there, and the sound of all the machines and the ventilator.