Sometimes Life Just Reaches Up and Kicks You In The Butt!!!

Yes, I know that is a weird title for a post, but it's been 20 days since I have written a post so it needs to be dramatic, don't you think?? Not to mention the fact that is exactly how I feel right now.

This month has been a month I would really like to forget and fortunately for me, I have some short term memory loss...because I am already forgetting some of the less eventful parts of it.

I want to start off by saying that I slept nearly 10 hours today and I'm still tired, so as soon as I am done with this post I'm going to go back to bed! I have had a sinus infection this week and usually when I get a sinus infection I just sleep or lay around the majority of the time. This time -- not so much! I have had to work, although I did take one night off. Just couldn't do it...so weak and tired, and I slept all night with the exception of about 30 minutes that I got up to eat something and put That Other Kid back to sleep.

Let's start this post with the beginning of my tragic tale. You know how the mechanics always tell you to "change your oil every 3 months or 3000 miles?" DON'T IGNORE THEM! NO MATTER WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO, CHANGE YOUR DANG OIL!! BEG, PLEAD, BORROW MONEY...JUST CHANGE THE OIL!! Why am I talking about this? Because I ruined an engine this month by NOT CHANGING the oil and it's going to cost us a measly $2000!! Just when we thought we were going to finally make enough money to pay ALL the BILLS for the month!! Oops, not gonna happen this month. Fortunately, we found an engine with only 39k miles on it for $1000 after spending the entire weekend on the internet searching for sites that might have a new/rebuilt engine for our slightly old truck and our "normal" mechanic is going to let us pay him off in installment payments. It pays to do business with people who understand tough times.

Next up, in my crazy month -- 3 drivers trying to share 1 vehicle. That would be the car for That Kid who lives in the dorms 30 minutes away. He doesn't have a lot of places to go right now, but I have to work Sunday night through Friday morning which means I have to have a car to take me there and get back home. He has class at 9 am Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and did I happen to mention that it takes me 45 minutes to get home from work if I leave right at 7 a.m. (sometimes it happens that I don't get out of there till 7:15 or later, too) and him 45 or more minutes to get back to school in the morning rush hour?? And then let's add in the fact that since dh has been getting busy with work again (can you say THANK YOU, GOD???!!!) he has had numerous appointments as well!! It's been a scheduling nightmare some days!! But we have been managing it although there are times it has been a major hassle and we have had to rely on friends to get us places at times, we have managed. We are hoping to get the truck back by the end of this next week. I'm sure That Kid will be happy to have his car back, too! I'm so glad I raised a good kid!

On the healthy lifestyle and fitness side of my life...it has kind of s*cked this month although I have not gotten too out of control. I have consumed more cokes and junk this month than is my normal. A couple of the ladies I work with overnight have noticed that I am not eating as well as normal and that really means I need to watch it I will fall into some seriously BAD HABITS!! Time to say goodbye to those cokes and candy bars during break time!! I haven't exercised HARDLY any but I did manage to go from 193.2 on the 7th of April to 189.4 this past Wednesday. That's almost 4 pounds I lost this month....of course, I should have lost 4 pounds from this low of 189.4, but WHATEVER!! The Spring Fling challenge is over wtih at the Sisterhood and I didn't meet my goal of weighing 185 by the end of the challenge but I am pleased with myself that I have not let the circumstances of my life TAKE CONTROL OF ME and ruin everything that I have worked for the past year. I also bought myself a pair of pajamas this morning before coming home from work (because all of mine were FALLING OFF me and although my dh likes my jammies falling off me it is hard to sleep with them sliding off my hips!) and I was able to buy a size 12/14!!! I rushed right home and put them on and they FIT GREAT!! I can't tell you how happy that made me feel! I just might have to buy another pair!!

I am now working on the sales floor and so I am not busting my butt with heavy manual labor every night so I am going to have to start really working out again. I have to say I am looking forward to exercising consistently again. I have missed it sooooo much. I wanted to start again this past week but with the sinus infection I barely was able to minimally function. I am happy to report that I think the medication is working so I am hoping to at least do some basic exercising tomorrow. Maybe not bust my butt, sweat a ton, exercise but at least get the heart moving again. I'm looking forward to it!

In other news, That Other Kid has been doing an amazing job of entertaining himself while I have been sleeping during the day. He has been playing with legos and creating some awesome "inventions". He has also made our living room a skateboard park a couple of times this week using books from the school bookcase along with all his supplies of Tech Deck skateboard ramps. However, he has complained (numerous times) that he needs a skateboard ramp with stairs so that the skaters can go up and down the stairs and "grind". Where does he come up with all this?? Oh yeah, he has a big brother!! Not to mention, if it is "an extreme sport" he is interested in it!

He has been doing school over at a friend's house and has completed one of his math books for the year already. I need to pick up the pace and get some school work done in the afternoons here because I feel he is falling behind with his reading/phonics work. Math and handwriting he has down pretty well. Science we do with a class every other Friday so that is taken care of although I would like to do some simple experiments at home. That leaves Geography and reading/phonics for me to take care of in the afternoons. I haven't really figured out how to "do it all", but I think now that I am no longer having to work so hard physically at work it will be easier to handle some more things at home. I hope so anyway!! My house is a wreck and my kid has been ignored long enough!! Let's see how it works this week...and hopefully I can report in with good news next week.

I hope ya'll have a good week and remember....DON'T NEGLECT YOUR VEHICLE!!! A public service reminder!!!

Tomorrow Is a Happy/Sad Day

After tomorrow this scene will be one that won't be seen at my house very much so this past week has been full of emotional upheavals for me. You see tomorrow morning about 9:30 a.m. I will leave my house with That Kid and That Other Kid and I will come home ONLY with That Other Kid....I'm taking him down to college where he will start classes on Monday as a COLLEGE FRESHMAN!! I ask, how can that be?? He will be living in the Dorms and has 2 roommates. That should be interesting???!! I'm glad I'm not his roommates. He is a SLOB and he likes to leave his junk EVERYWHERE!! But God knows I love him and so does he. I have been an emotional basketcase all day long. My dh continues asking me what he can do to help, and I just start crying.

He's on his way to Sonic right now, to buy me a hot fudge sundae with caramel. I know that it isn't really going to help me feel better once it's gone, but I am feeling a need to have some comfort food, so that's on the list of comfort food.

We have spent the past couple of days packing up all his stuff. Determining what is going to the garage, and what is going to school with him. Of course, there are a couple of bags of just TRASH, too. We went shopping on Sunday to get the things he will need for school. Toiletries, school supplies, a cool chair, a water cooler so he can drink good clean water, laundry supplies, cleaning supplies, you get the picture...everything you need to live on your own! I even bought toilet paper and paper towels for him! You know that stuff is expensive when you buy a TON of it, right??

We also decided to bite the bullet and get a new, used car that will not break down every month so now That Kid has a new car for college. He is responsible for the car payments, which were amazingly inexpensive by today's standards. He is thrilled to have a car that he doesn't have to worry about breaking down and it has a back seat so he can take his little brother places, and his friends! Of course, since he'll be busy with school and work there won't be many opportunities for socializing or doing things with his brother. But, at least he CAN!






Now the dealership is trying to sell us a second vehicle, but the vehicle they were trying to sell us had 38,000 miles on it and had several cosmetic problems. It also STUNK!! So I ask, would you buy a new/used car that had these problems? Or am I just being anal? When I buy a new or used car I want it to look and smell like a new car!
Not to mention it's not the car that I originally wanted to look at from this dealership. So, as you can see this week is full of emotions and changes in my life.
My house is a disaster, my emotions are a disaster and That Other Kid is feeling neglected, but after tomorrow he will become my full focus and he will probably be smothered with attention, since my first baby won't be around to love on.

Once I regroup from this week, I have to reorganize and clean the house and prepare for homeschooling kindergarten with That Other Kid. Oh how am I going to survive the next few weeks??!!

Cars!!!! UGHH

They drive me batty!!! Yes, they do! We are a 2 car family, with "under normal conditions" 3 drivers. Do you see a problem yet? I do, but of course it is my life, so yeah...

Do you know what happens every year around the first part of March while living in Texas? The temperature raises to "unseasonable" temperatures of 80 degrees or more. Did you know that driving around in traffic, on the highway with no Air Conditioning can be rather annoying? No, well trust me on this one it is. The ac is not working in our truck (the vehicle that is actually in working order right now). Of course, the ac works in our other car, but the clutch isn't....kinda hard to drive a standard transmission car without a clutch; did you know that? So we are 3 drivers driving 1 vehicle without a air conditioner...and guess what today the temperature is supposed to be "well into the 80's". Whatever that means, huh? And of course the person who is most sensitive to these warm temperatures is the person who has numerous meetings today! (That would be dh.)

Well I'm off to play Wii with That Other Kid and try to accomplish something around the house today, since I can't go anywhere; not that I really want to anyway....what with the warm weather and the no ac problem...ya know??!!

Good News/Bad News

Ok, don't you hate it when someone starts a conversation saying that they have good news and bad news, which do you want first???

Well, of course, you want to hear the good news first...this buffers any blows that the bad news could cause. So without further ado, here is my GOOD NEWS!!!

I have worked out at the gym 5 days this week as well as watching very carefully what I have been eating and drinking. I only had one 32 ounce coke this week, which is probably a true testament to my will power this week. All that hard work and dedication has paid off --- I LOST 4 pounds and 4 ounces since Monday morning!!! thankyouverymuch!!!

Ok, now on to the bad news....That Kid had a wreck in our truck this afternoon. HE WAS NOT HURT and the car that he hit took off as fast as he could possibly go....so we are guessing he had no insurance, so it falls back to our insurance. So that's 2 wrecks and 4 speeding tickets he's had in the 2 years of driving....What do you think that's gonna do to our insurance premiums?????? So I got to deal with the insurance company, car rental place, tow trucks, etc. this afternoon. Sounds fun, NOT!! Monday I will have to contact the repair shop to get the truck fixed. We aren't really in a big hurry to get the truck fixed though, cuz the car rental place goofed up and gave us a Nissan Xterra to drive while we are getting our car fixed....and I guarantee you this truck is MUCH nicer and newer than ours!

Well hope you guys all have a good weekend...I plan to do some driving around this weekend in the Xterra!!

Car Maintenance

I'm going to take this moment in time to grumble about CARS!! I HATE CARS.....I wish we still lived in the horse and buggy era, and before you say anything negative about that era of time, please read on for my reasons.

When I was a teenager and first learning to drive, back in the dark ages according to That Kid, my dad taught me many valuable lessons -- not just learning how to drive, but some of the basic maintenance things like checking your oil, adding oil, changing out wiper blades, raising the car up on the jack, changing the tire, etc. I found it all boring and tedious, but as the dutiful daughter who wanted to drive her own car someday I listened. My first car was a '66 Chevy Impala (Maroon) and it was the BEST car. It was well built and had been taken care of by previous owners. I paid $500 of MY OWN HARD EARNED MONEY on that car and I thought it was the BEST....till the day I decided to skip school and WRECKED it...try explaining why you're not in school nowhere near your high school to your parents and you need them to help you call a wrecker cuz you just wrecked your car! Trust me it's not EASY!
Anyway, I digress. My parents bailed me out, grounded me, and made me pay for the repairs on my car. Fortunately, my cousin was a mechanic and did bodywork on cars for fun! He repaired it for $100!

From that point on, my car LEAKED OIL something awful! The day I got rid of it, about a year later, I had added 2 1/2 quarts of oil when I left home and 3 hours later it was EMPTY! I'm lucky I didn't blow the engine before I sold it off to the used car dealer!

My dad was adament about me caring for my own car....so I got used to it. About 2 weeks before dh and I got married he blew his engineby running it out of oil and driving on the highway, so when dh and I got married MY car was our only car for the first 2 or so years. Since I was used to caring for MY car I just kept doing it. I made sure the tires had air, oil was changed, inspections were done, registrations were done on time, etc, etc, etc,. Well some 20 + years of marriage the trend has continued. I am the one to take the cars for routine maintenance and I am the one who deals with mechanics when something needs repaired. I am the reason we have windshield wiper blades, tires, batteries, state inspections, annual registrations, etc.

And when something goes AWRY I am blamed! Even on the CAR that I NEVER DRIVE and don't like driving!

This happened this past week and I am grumpy about it still! Why am I responsible for maintenance on a car I NEVER DRIVE??? About 2 weeks ago dh got in the "hot rod" and realized the rear tires were low, so he aired them up. A few days later he drove it again and they were low again. He called me saying the tires need checked out, take care of it asap. Ok....I say...I forget about it since I never drive it. Then this week he drives it again and the tires still need air. Fix it he says...so I go to fix it, and the Firestone people can't do anything with the tires cuz they have wheel locks on it and we can't find the key! 2 days later That Kid gets in the car to go somewhere and the tire is FLAT, and I mean FLATTER than a pancake, but he doesn't realize it till he is a mile from home. He calls me and says my tire is flat! HELP!! He gets a ride...and I get to deal with a flat tire....over $400 later we have a new tire and no more wheel locks on our hub caps. Gee, what a bargain, huh?
Now, I will be teaching my son how to care for his car the way my dad did with me...and hopefully we won't have to have another experience like this again!

Now I ask, who cares for your cars?? I'm a little disgusted that I was the one that had to deal with all this mess. Soooo I ask, who handles your car maintenance??? Just curious.....