clickmom

what I would tell Evan if only ....

Things I would tell Evan (away for over 3 weeks now) if he had just let us rent a mobile phone for him on his trip instead of insisting that he would find a way to get a new SIM card for an old iphone, which I doubted he'd be able to do since it's not like his camp has just flown half way across the world to hang out at a mobile phone store.  (In his defense, but not really, he updated his facebook status to let us know he was alive when they got there, I think he tried to call us one day from someone else's phone,  and did send one text a couple of weeks ago from another person's phone saying he was having an amazing time and not to try to text him back at that number)

1. I miss you so much I want to cry.  (Except Evan knows that when I say "I want to cry" what I actually mean is that "It makes me cry" , but I don't want to advertise what a wussy I am.)

2.  Remember when Josh left for his camp and I accussed him of eating the bag of mini kit bars we bought for you?  He was innocent!!  But they did melt in the car, so I had to open them to see if they were still edible.  The answer is NOT EVEN CLOSE.

3. I miss you so much I want to cry.  (See number 1.)

4. It's really boring for young people at the lake this summer.  I'm preoccupied with trying to get stuff done for school.  No one is around.  It's a good thing you are on a trip.  You're definitely happier where you are.

5.  I miss you so much I want to cry.  (See numbers 1 and 3.)

6. Kirk came for a visit and he completely understood my organization of the yet to be matched puzzle pieces, became obsessed with the puzzle and wouldn't leave until it was finished.  Now it is done and still taking up half the kitchen island.  I'm going to have to break down and put it back in the box.  I just need photographic evidence first.  

7. I miss you so much I've been crying.  Because I just want to hear from you but mostly because you'll be back for 10 days before I can even see you since I'll be at school, making your trip seem like it's almost 6 weeks long.

8. Speaking of school, I am so nervous, I wish you were here to talk me down off the ledge.  I'm nervous about being the only old person, about not knowing enough photoshop, about being out of it linguistically and not knowing what they are talking about.  I've been having anxiety dreams, that's how nervous I am.

9. I'm crying right now and if only you'd just shoot me a one word text with something like "HAPPY" or "FINE" or "TERRIFIC"  it would brighten up my whole day.

10.  Matt has been slacking off in the communication department too. I feel like I'm demanding here, but I just want to know you guys are well.  At least I can email him and he'll get back to me.  

11. I miss you.

12. I thought Josh's voice changed at camp, but I wrong.  He had a hoarse voice for the entire time he was at camp and for about 3 days when he got home but now it is back to normal.  I was going around telling everyone Josh was going to have a voice like Uncle Max.  I guess we have to wait and see now.  

 13.  I seriously very much miss you.

14. Pop Pop's first wife died and there was a mysterious beeping in our house.  I thought maybe it was pop pop letting me know, but it turned out to be the carbon monoxide detector dying because they only last for 5 years and ours are exactly five years old.  We have a nice quiet house and new carbon monoxide detectors now.  Not sure if pop pop is reaching out to me or not.  I think I'll need something more obvious and less coincidental.  Perhaps he can write me a letter and let me know he is fine on the other side.

15.  I still miss you.

Bargaining

Dear Universe,

The reason for the beeping that has been sounding every 6 or 12 minutes for 29 hours now still eludes me. Interestingly enough my father's first wife died sometime over the weekend and the email from my step sister said "if you get some signs from Dad or your mom you'll know what is going on." My step sister did not know about the beeping.

Perhaps there is a simpler excuse. I'm thinking there might be some kind of short in the house alarm system despite the fact that last night the technician I spoke to over the phone assured me that everything was sound. I called and requested a service visit anyway.

When I am downstairs the beeping seems to be coming from upstairs and when I am upstairs the beeping sounds as if it is coming from downstairs. Now I know how peanut's dog feels after having one of his eardrums removed. We both look from side to side and have no idea which direction the sound comes from. I am a poodle.

I am also desperately tired. You try sleeping with a mystery beep chiming in the background. I have been out of bed for three hours now and as if to mock my lack of sound sleep the skies have gotten progressively darker.

I love the sound of pounding rain. Too bad I stepped in bear bait poo yesterday and left my favorite sneakers outside. Rain itself only wets them. I still need to find a stick and drag my feet through long grass. Maybe after the ark lands and we hit dry land.

It's been four days since bear bait got shaved down and I still see skin. Also, she rolled over for me to pet her belly yesterday and they missed a strip down her chest. She has an upside down Mohawk. She thinks she is bad ass.

Stop the beeping please.
Thanks for your time and attention,
Clickmom

seas of crumbled paper

Josh and his new voice are home.  Like many 12 year olds in 2013 he is happy to spend the entire day snuggled up to his lap top.  I took him to play miniature golf instead.  We had a blast and he beat me.  I didn't let him beat me either, but it was tough to overcome his two hole-in-ones.  

I often take photos of bear bait while we stroll some bucolic forest, or what ever I'm photographing (these days it is a near by dam) and I have those photos in a folder, planning on one day making a little book of my dog stepping into my photos, usually appearing just in time to fill up some otherwise dead speace, so in essence she is actually pretty handy.  Except now that is shaven, she looks so bizarre to me.  I guess I've never really seen her shape before.  She has huge feet (a family trait, so she fits right in) and she is super buff.  This girl is 75 pounds of solid rock muscle.  I'm surprised how lithe  (or is it buff?) and athletic she looks when you strip her of her beautiful long shiny black fur.  I still prefer her with fur,  it's kind of like seeing your child cross dress or something.  It just doesn't compute.  I took photos anyway, but I'll have to see what they look like on the big screen before I commit to do anything with them.

After spending about a thousand hours planning how I am going to do my latest series I finally settled on an answer.  I was going to pick up big glass plates with which to make big glass negatives today and the one place where I was told I could get them was closed.  Bummer!  Then I found a closer place, so I'll get them tomorrow and tomorrow night I will be hunched over the desk cranking out some work.  I found and watched (took notes too!)  some video tutorials today which helped me to understand exactly how I can get the effects I want, so I am pretty set.  

Once upon a time I was an architecture major.  When we got our assignments all the students would hop onto their stools in the vast rooms filled with drafting tables and scribble and scribble ideas onto tracing paper, ripping and crumbling and tossing different versions like mad for days and days until the room was a sea of crumbled paper and they finally came up with some idea they liked.  One friend of mine sat at his drafting table with his head in his hands for days until finally, with the best of intentions, I gingerly suggested he get to work before he runs out of time.  He looked at me quite surprised and said he had been planning his boards in his head, and with that he proceeded to whip out a final project without any scribbling, no reams of wasted paper, and nothing at all dramatic.  I learned a lesson that day and in the 30 years since I was a freshman architecture major have finally learned to work out the kinks before I put pen to paper.  Or paint to glass, or photos in photo shop, or even lift that camera to my face.  

Of course sometimes you can't plan things out, but when I can, I do.  I'd call the dude and thank him for that life lesson, but somewhere along the line he dumped me as a friend.  

weird, huh.

When I listened to the recording that said my jury duty was cancelled and I had fulfilled my duty simply by agreeing to do it this ball of happiness welled up inside me and rose to my throat and I thought "Who cares!" and I shouted out my happiness while sitting in my car in my garage.  I knew I didn't want to do jury duty, I knew the time of year couldn't be a worse choice, and that I also worried about how much I need to do before I go to school 11 days from now.  But I didn't realize how physically tied in a knot over the whole thing I was until it rose up inside me and left out of my mouth through my shout.  Best possible outcome.

On my way back to the lake I took a side trip to visit Josh at his camp.  He's called me a few times over the summer and every time I ask him if he's hoarse or if he's been shouting and he always tells me he's justy fine and then I ask him why he sounds so weird.  When I showed up yesterday he was walking across the camp with a couple of other boys, and I called to him and he ran towards me and when he opened his mouth that strange voice came out I realized HIS VOICE CHANGED.  How I can drop him off at camp with a smooth baby voice and a week later he has a husly man voice is beyond my comprehension.  The oddest thing about Josh's voice changing is that he doesn't sound like the husband or either of his brothers.  Josh kind of sounds like the husband's brother, who has a gravelly smoker's voice.  Weird, huh.

1,999

We finished this morning. It had become a real group effort. In the end I had house guests who were even more obsessed than I was! Now I kind of miss it.

some stuff I told Matt and Josh today

Yesterday I saw a black bear walking down the street towards the highway.  It was so thick and heavy looking, but cuddly and cute, so I can see why people like teddy bears.  The real things are adorable, even though I was thankful to be in my car where I could just floor it and leave if the bear decided he wanted to bite my head off or completely shred me with his bear claws or worse.

Speaking of bears, bear bait smells real bad this summer, not sure what that is about.  Our old best dog smelled a bit towards the end so I am wondering if cancer has a smell and I can smell it.  I felt another hard bump on the top of her head today but I'm not going to panic, because even if it was something bad, chances are I wouldn't put her through any treatment.  As in, even if she has a tumor, I'm not giving her chemo because chemo is just cruel on a dog.  And even if I bring her to the vet they'd have to knock her out to biopsy it and she had such a hard time with the anesthesia last time.  Also, every other lump we've biopsied has been nothing serious.  

I also saw an eagle today.  I was swimming across the cove and it swooped down and glided right over me.  It was awesome.

Obsessed

This was my puzzle this morning. Since this morning I have almost completed the triangle on the right side and about half of God and Adam. God is particularly exciting for some unknown reason. Especially since a blue bearded, jacked old dude in a pink toga is not my own personal vision of God. I actually fist pumped when I found his arm pit. Who am I?

delightfully quiet

Day one: no kids.  

I asked my new town house cleaners to come to utopia.  Now I have no kids and a spotless house.  I wish I could slow time down for the next few days.   I am toying with the idea of shaving bear bait.  If she wasn't such a bumpy dog I just might have a go at her.  I'm afraid of what I'd see though.  It might not be so pretty. 

I am frighteningly obsessed with the 1,999 piece puzzle.  I can sit there for hours and feel like I have accomplished so much only to realize I've placed 5 pieces.  I feel the need to finish though.  Go figure.  

Yesterday I took a delightful evening swim when I got back from dropping Evan at his camp.  I was concerend because I was in hip pain while swimming Saturday from my slipping incident last Wednesday, but I was okay last night.  I put some flippers on and bear bait and I swam a long distance.  It felt great.  My shoulders loosened up too.  My whole neck and shoulder area is still not right after the fall onto ice out of sylvia last february.

In case you're wondering, I do miss sylvia.  I miss her power, her height, her much better radio reception. The only time I don't miss her is when I am standing at the pump and I can fill my tank up for half the cost.  Then I smirk and feel like I can drive my hated new car, blue, she doesn't deserve a good name,  for the next five years.

Then this afternoon I went to the utopian chiropracter (I need one in every port) and told him how I did the unintentional split by stepping on the rolling duffle bag and how I could tell my hips were rotated when I walked and how the one leg burned in the hip joint for two days, bla bla bla and he poked around on me and declares my pelvis to be tilted.  I wanted very badly to tell the dude that I had just told him that.   I wonder, if I won the lottery, how much I'd have to pay the stepford chiro to move closer to me.  He has such great bedside manner.

I was on the fence about doing an evening swim today because while I wanted to swim very much I was also HUNGRY, having skipped lunch.   I decided to make my food before I swam so I could gobble it up as soon as I got out of the lake and that was a great choice because not even ten minutes later it was pouring rain and before I knew it I could hear the thunder rumbling not far off.  I did manage to swim for about an hour this morning, I joined the old lady group, so it wasn't like exercise because they swim and chat the same time, though I do swim with the swiftest of the AARP crowd, and I have to say swimming feels fabulous and I am going to join the Y when I get back to new town and I am going to make myself swim several times a week at least because I think I have reached the point where low impact exercise is more than appreciated, it might be mandatory.  Also, the Y was the one place that had an expresso bike, and two years later I still long for that perfect specimin of glorious exercise bike.  I will have to look the other way as I pass the grimier sections of the Y, and not pay attention at all to the sad sad icky locker room where flip flops will not be optional.  At least they have a sauna.  I can't wait to flounce around naked and bake in the sauna.  The exhibitionist in me has been so deprived with out the posh club!  God, I miss the posh club more every day.

RIP Sheesh

Just found out yesterday that one of my utopian neighbors accidentally backed her mini van over her dog and killed her.  (Not Amaising, Amaising is fine, this was a different neighbor and a different dog)   This now departed dog, Sheesh,  was one of bear bait's playmates.  It was a dog you could get bear bait excited about by saying "Wanna go see Sheesh?" out loud.  This was a small dog with a big dog personality.  I really liked this dog. 

I'm kind of horrified.  My first response was to tell the driver "She didn't suffer!"  (She backed up over Sheesh's  head) , but then the driver told me how she held poor little Sheesh as she convulsed before she died.  I'm having a hard time shaking the image.    Also, now I want to shake the driver and yell "How could you be so careless!?!"   Another neighbor told me that she knows scads of people who accidentally run over their dogs.  I guess it happens often.  

I'm still kind of sick over it.

amaising

You should know that the grill repair man did show up just to tell us that we needed an electrician because there was nothing wrong with the grill other than it wouldn't spark because there was a problem with the outlet.  I was disappointed that he didn't fix it but happy that there were no batteries involved.   A battery operated grill seems kind of dumb to me, and now I have two 9 volt batteries lying around and you never when that will come in handy!

First time in the lake today.  Up until today every time I thought it was hot enough to get into the lake it started to thunder.  It felt incredible and tomorrow starts my summer of long distance swimming.  When I get home I might just join the Y just so I can swim and swim away.   Have I ever mentioned how much I hate walking around with wet hair?  

I don't think I've watched more than an hour of televsision since getting to utopia, and I like it like that.  I don't even care that I fell asleep during the season premiere of dexter last week because I know I can watch it on demand whenever I feel like it.   It's kind of weird not knowing any news though.  I did puruse a news site today.  I missed a lot, but strangely enough, I couldn;t care less.

I am going to make a determined effort to avoid using the word "amazing."  It is so overused that it is beginning to seem like a meaningless spacer word to me.  This is especially true in the case of people announcing their love for other people on facebook and calling the receiver of love an amazing son, daughter, husband, friend, etc....     Less literate people use amazing in place of meaningful words.  We are all amazing.  Expand your vocabulary people. 

Also, the dog neighbor at the end of our driveway is named Maisy and I have nick named her "amaising" so now if you call your beloved amazing you are essentially calling him/her an adorable dog that lives at the end of my driveway and chews on puzzle pieces.  That is how it goes in my head.