And It Only Took Us Seven Years

So I spent my entire weekend painting. And as longtime blog readers probably know, if there is something I hate more than painting, it's...no. There is nothing I hate more than painting. 

Top Five Things Amy Hates:

5) Raw onions

4) Corked wine

3) Movies where children or animals die

2) Injustice

1) Painting

On Saturday I painted the boys' bathroom. Like, the whole thing. By myself! This gigantic personal accomplishment, however, was slightly underwhelming in the end because I painted a white bathroom a...slightly different shade of white. In person, I swear it makes a HUGE difference. (Especially since I sort-of suspect that the white "paint" the previous owners used was actually just primer, as I don't think anybody sells a shade called "Mental Institution Lightbulb Whitey-White.") But it certainly doesn't make for very exciting before/after pictures. Also, it's a damn bathroom.

Check out the new towel bar! It's from Homé Depöt! I bought it because it was a towel bar. 

(Towels are from Ikea. Prints are from here. I love them, but my children do not read them. At all. EVER.)

Then we painted all the hallways and staircases, and that was even MORE exciting because we painted them the same color. This bold interior decorating decision was made because "wall scuffs that have probably been there since we moved in" is a really passé trend that I am just so over. 

THEN we painted the living room. This crazy burst of progress was made possible because we bribed some friends with pizza and beer in exchange for manual labor, which is the best kind of bribe for the best kind of friends. 

Noah also helped. For practically free! We didn't even have to give him any beer! Kid has no idea how to bargain.

And so the formerly brown living room is now a...slightly different shade of brown. 

Whatever. I love it and can't stop talking about how much I love it and how much I wish we'd just up and painted it ages ago, like what's our lazy-ass DAMAGE, yo? This wasn't so bad, especially since we pawned most of the annoying parts off on somebody else. Think they'd come back again and paint my office? I will go as high as pizza, beer and Velveeta dip, if I have to. 

(I promise that the stepladder will be removed from the corner at some point in mid-2014.)

Though FOR THE RECORD, thanks to Noah's offer to also serve as the project's photographer, I do have documentation that I did actually paint and participate. In the form of like, 300 identical photos of my ass, in various stages of blurriness.

So glam, so unshowered, and so beautifully coordinated with that stupid ankle brace. I am a goddamned walking (limping) lifestyle inspiration. 

I Can Haz Cat? No I Cannot Haz Cat.

If it were up to ME, today's entry would have been the story about my new cat.

Unfortunately, OTHER PEOPLE IN MY HOUSE do not subscribe to the "finders keepers also she really, really likes me!" philosophy of pet adoption. 

I was watching TV and kept wondering when someone on the show was going to acknowledge the crazy high-pitched meowing happening just offscreen. When it never happened, it dawned on me that OH. That there is a real cat. Who is definitely not MY cat, who is plenty prone to yowling but who has a much deeper voice. But damn, that is some loud-ass meowing.

I got up to investigate, by which I mean I walked confusedly around my house with a dumb baffled look for awhile, because...cat? Hello cat? Are you there? Yes, This Is Dog, etc. And then I discovered a cat pacing in front of our kitchen window. It saw me and amped up its already desperate-sounding meowing. I walked out the front door and it ran right to me, purring and rubbing and sqwinching and in the 15 seconds it took me to pick it up and bring it inside I was already like, "WHELP I GUESS I HAVE A NEW CAT NOW ISN'T THAT JUST THE DARNEDEST THING."

Jason, on the other hand, was not onboard with my version of events. At all. First it took me 10 minutes to convince him that this was, in fact, A CAT, and that I had not just scooped up a baby lynx or mountain lion or pygmy tiger and brought it inside my home. 

Then he pointed out that MAYBE it wasn't the best idea to bring a strange cat into a house with three children and another cat and a dog because fleas? Vaccines? Rabies?

But it was obvious that the new love of my life was a very well-cared for cat. it was a girl, and although she had no collar and was thankfully not declawed, her coat and eyes and teeth were all beautiful and healthy. The popping sound of a can of wet cat food brought her running and she scarfed it up, and then daintily moved on to a bowl of kibble. She recognized the word "treat" and offered up her belly for me to rub.

I decided that she was an indoor cat who'd tragically gotten out and lost. Maybe her family had moved. Maybe she'd been abandoned. I decided that I was her savior, who would love her and care for her and put up a few dutiful flyers and then take her to the vet — where we would sadly learn that there was no microchip, alas! — and no one would call about the flyers AND SHE WOULD BE MINE. 

(Note that my fantasy world did not deal with the fact that Max [and probably Ceiba as well] would FUH-FREAK the fuck out over this cat — currently the only plan for that involved shutting them in our bedroom upstairs. Not exactly a long-term solution, but the practical part of my brain was not exactly firing on all cylinders in the face of SOFT FUZZY KITTEH BELLEH.)

I put on my shoes so I could run out for a litter box and maybe a collar and a bed and ooohhh some jingle balls and fuzzy mice, like Max used to love before he got all old and crotchedy. Jason put on his shoes so he could go see if anyone was outside looking for their damn cat.

As the hours went by, however, it became increasingly clear that the cat was not down with my vision of our happy, snuggly future together. She wanted back out. She'd had her food and gotten her explores on, and now she was ready to hit the road again. And she was getting increasingly ornery about it. I tried to pick her up again and she sank her teeth into my arm and kicked off my chest with her back claws. 

"It's okay!" I said, while running my bleeding wounds under some water. "I understand! It's a lot of love to accept all at once! You've been hurt before! You need some time and your space! WE CAN MAKE THIS WORK I SWEAR I STILL LOOOOOVVVVVVEEE YOU."

Jason coaxed her into a travel crate with some treats and went back out. Two different neighbors finally confirmed what I was starting to accept as the real story: She was definitely a neighborhood cat who liked to be out at night. Despite months of sightings, she remained clean and well-cared for (i.e. not a mangy-looking wild cat or indoor cat with no coping skills). She was notoriously friendly and one neighbor admitted that she thought she was a bit of a con artist when it came to begging for food. She'd shown up at her door, too, and although she didn't let the cat in (LIKE A SUCKER, LIKE MEEEEE) she did put some food and water out. 

"I didn't see her around in the winter so I stopped." our neighbor explained. "I think she mostly goes out when the weather is nice. Since she didn't find food here she probably decided to try another house." 

We came back home and watched the cat desperately search our house for a means of escape. She howled pathetically at every window and door. Jason told me it was time to admit we had someone's pet and needed to let her back out. I cried and protested that that would be irresponsible since we didn't know for SURE, besides, she was hungry! No collar! Let me keep her overnight and search for the owners in the morning. Maybe she's just looking for a litter box! LET ME GO BUY HER A LITTER BOX I PROMISE NOT TO BUY MOUSIE TOYS OR A COLLAR WITH THE NAME "ROCKY" ON IT BECAUSE I UNDERSTAND IF YOU WANT TO BE INCLUDED IN THE NAME DISCUSSION. 

Jason let her out. We followed her for half a block before she crossed a lawn and entered the house through a pet door in the garage. 

Oh.

Okay. 

Never mind. 

So in the end, I do not have a new cat. I let Max and Ceiba out of our bedroom and they spent a couple hours running around and determining FOR SURE that whatever animal had been here was definitely gone. I grumbled about collars and pet tags and traffic and tried to get Max to cuddle with me, but I guess I smelled like Other Cat and he wanted nothing to do with me. The whole evening ended up being kind of a bummer. 

But still. Of all the crazy wildlife that has randomly invaded my home over the years, she was by far my favorite. 

Things That Happened This Week

1. I officially gave up on the art of carefully crafted and creative blog titles. OBVIOUSLY. Suck it, SEO. We have no use for you around these parts.

2. We had the bathtub in the boys' bathroom repaired and reglazed. It made the entire house smell like a giant magic marker. The guy doing the work didn't even wear a MASK, meanwhile I could feel my brain cells having a giant tripped-out rave before overdosing on whippits. And then a unicorn walked by. But hey! The bathtub looks fantastic. 

3. Ezra's brain, meanwhile, is doing just fine. The bathroom hullabaloo meant I temporarily relocated our extensive stash of bathtub letters to his room. He quickly got to work finding the very best ones. 

(Please ignore the piles of laundry. I am enfeebled! I cannot carry loads of laundry down the stairs in my current condition. Beause ye.  My ankle injury. Is totally why this completely out-of-the-ordinary level of mess is happening. Yeeeeah. That's the ticket.)

(Oh, and obviously the children were not here during the bathrub reglazing. They were off in the fresh air, doing wholesome activities with the sitter, while I tried to get work done in between bouts of arguing with the giant purple snails on the ceiling. Can you believe they don't like Game of Thrones? Jesus Christ.)

At Ezra's last parent-teacher conference, I mentioned my concerns over his lack of letter recognition and general disinterest in drawing or writing beyond some half-hearted scribbles. I was like, "look, I get that Montessori thinks milestone charts are a facist tool of the development oppressors or something, but COME ON. I PAY MONEY. TEACH MY KID WHAT STUFF HE NEEDS REAL GOOD."

Naturally, I shouldn't have bothered, because Ezra proceeded to explode in the reading/writing/drawing departments almost immediately. I bought him a small Moleskine notebook like the one his teacher uses, and within a few days he was drawing elaborate stories involving outer space and beaches (in outer space) and minivans (in outer space). Attempts at writing letters and his name soon followed. I think our chalkboard wall and drawing table in the kitchen helped too, once I made a point of plopping his butt there and insisting he spend some time coloring every day. 

(Please ignore the overflowing recyling bin in the background. We simply love the earth THAT MUCH.)

4. Ike's hair went insane. For reference, I've spent the last month trying to get a decent picture of these two little baby curls on the back of his head:

I figured I was going to have to cave soon-ish and cut them off, because the rest of his hair was growing long and straight and mullet-ish. The curls were like a weird extra hair appendage growing straight off the back of his head, and seemed permanently gooped up with jelly and syrup.

And then BAM.

The humidity spiked this week and his hair lost its damn mind. Almost every hair on his head is now a perfect, gloriously towheaded ringlet. 

If you think Imma let scissors anywhere near this child's head anytime soon, you be tripping. You be tripping magic-marker-scented unicorn balls, lady.

Though I admit it can look a little Wolverine-like at times, like right after a bath.

And I suspect he's getting tired of me taking a million photographs of his beautiful hairs. 

(PS: Lana. Lana! LAAAAAANNNNNNNAAAAAAAAAAA!)

MOM. STAHP. STAHP MOM STAHP.

(Please ignore the pile of paint cans in the background. I'd put them away except the kids like building a drum set out of them. And then fighting over the paint-can drum set. Even though we own an actual goddamn drum set. This Christmas I'm giving them gift cards to Home Depot and a box of plastic bags.)

(Also, If you'd like to have your shit thoroughly freaked out by GENETICS, HOW DO THEY WORK?, I suggest poking through the archives in the June/July/August range of 2007.) 

5. Max said hi.

And kissy face.

(Please ignore the...ah, fuck it. There are random computer cables, a double chin and a curtain pullback that my husband hung too far away from the window to be useful. THIS IS REAL LIFE.)

Baby, It's Cold Outside, But Let's Not Be Ridiculous About It

Oh my God, this week. Fuck you, week! Get off my lawn.

I'm concerned I'm becoming one of those bloggers who starts off every entry with an apology/explanation for why they haven't been blogging, which: Shut up. You're blogging right now! GET ON WITH IT. 

On Wednesday we had the terribly exciting pleasure of getting a new heating system installed in our house. Our heat pump actually died two months ago, but thanks to the mild weather (and occasional use of the emergency heat setting) we were able to procrastinate on the replacement until now. "Now" being when I heard Ezra matter-of-factly explain to a playmate that "the floors in my house are like ice-skating." OKAY FINE. YOU COULD JUST WEAR TWO PAIRS OF SOCKS BUT WHATEVER. 

So of course, the day we finally scheduled the installation was the week the weather plummeted down to the mid-20s. Holy shitbags, was this house cold. The kids and I wore double-sweaters and basically stayed in bed under the covers all day until the new system was up and running. The good news, obviously, is that we have heat and are grateful and fortunate and blahhhhhh one single day without heat, boo freaking hoo, AMERICA.

The bad news is that goddamn, heat pumps are expensive and also letting Noah bring LEGOS into my bed was a bad call. 

Yesterday, I spent literally MY ENTIRE MORNING on a post about the American Horror Story finale, which was supposed to be something funny and short and breezy and then (as these things always seem to go for me) went off the talky-run-on rails and turned into a damn research paper about Final Girls, Character Motivations & the Authentic Redemption of Self, With Bonus Zombies & Adam Levine's Chopped-Off Arm. Time well spent, I'm sure.

1,700-plus words later, I hit publish on that and then took all three children to the doctor for belated physicals. (We switched pediatricians which is always a seamlessly easy thing to do logistical paperwork nightmare.) Ezra and Ike needed multiple vaccinations and even though Noah didn't need any he wouldn't stop talking about SHOTS SHOTS SHOTS WHEN DOES EZRA GET HIS SHOTS and so I ended up with two kids screaming from SHOTS and one kid who was sympathy-sobbing over the SHOTS and Ezra apparently failed some fine-motor-skill milestone and Ike needs prescription butt paste and then Ezra ran away from me in the parking lot because SHOTS and...

...you know? I don't really want to talk about it anymore. Instead, here is a picture of Ike hiding under the exam table while wearing Ezra's Angry Birds hat.

Today? Well. Today I am sick with a terrible cold, where my chest hurts and my throat hurts and my head hurts and all my sinus pockets (tubes? are sinuses more like tubes?) in my face hurt. And apparently we're going to get an inch of snow tonight so the entire DC area is all adorably panicked and the schools are sending everybody home early, which: GREAT, THERE GOES MY PLAN TO DAY-DRINK SOME NYQUIL. 

Have a good weekend, everybody. Stay warm and may you not wake up to find LEGOS in your pajama bottoms. 

I'm Too Embarrassed To Accurately Title This Post Because STUPID

Have we established that our household is especially prone to really weird-ass homeowner-related crises? From multiple extended power outages whenever there's like, wind or a slight drizzle to OVEN FIRES to ZOMG BIRDS/MICE/SQUIRRELS, our house really seems to enjoy forcing us to confront our dazzling lack of adult coping skills. 

Last night I made some homemade chicken tenders for dinner, and served them with a dazzing array of absolutely not-homemade dipping sauces. (Exotic foodie stuff, like "honey mustard" and "ketchup" and "I think this is BBQ sauce that's been in the fridge since 2008 but the label got pulled off but I'm sure it's fine because bottled condiments last forever like Twinkies, right?") I put everybody's favorite respective dipping sauce into small food-prep bowls, like this one:

You may notice the ridge of this particular bowl is a tad beat-up looking. That will be important later.

You may ALSO notice (or not, because we sure as hell didn't) that this bowl is almost EXACTLY the same size of the average kitchen sink drain. That will also be important.

One of our delightfully helpful children deposited his dinner dishes directly into the sink. Jason proceeded to run the water and the garbage disposal, failing to notice that this bowl was floating around in there, until...

SCHHHHWWWOOMMPP.

The bowl settled directly into the drain, where it got stuck. Like, perfectly, completely stuck. It sealed up the drain and was completely immovable and ungrabbable, like a concave drain-stop.

Huh. Okay. Now...what?

After trying (and failing) to dislodge the bowl using 1) a butter knife, 2) an oyster shucker, 3) a fondue fork, and 4) a goddamn mini-crowbar thing and a giant rubber mallet, I decided to turn to the Google.

And wouldn't you know it, despite this being...uh...an extremely, almost painfully specific problem, I discovered that lo, we were far from the only people in the world to get a prep bowl lodged in our sink drain. Yahoo Answers was full of advice, as were several message board threads. Use a plunger! Fill the sink with ice so the bowl will contract! No, hot water! No, use cooking oil! Run the dishwasher! 

(Speaking of service-y advice, this blog still gets a shocking number of search referrals re: iPhones dropped in toilets. Happy to help, Internet!)

Unfortunately, the thing that ended up working for most people was breaking the bowl. Which is doable if you're talking about a glass Pyrex bowl, but we were dealing with a melamine bowl. Which I had bought instead of the Pyrex because these came in a variety of pretty, Martha-Stewart-approved colors. 

(THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT, MARTHA.)

And this time, Googling "how to break a melamine prep bowl that is currently wedged in a sink drain under four inches of muck-water" did not return any results. We were on our own, out in Idiotville. We were going to have to call a plumber and get the stupid garbage disposal stupid disconnected so we could push the stupid bowl out in the other stupid direction and it was going to cost stupid money because STUPID.

The plumber came this morning. He repeated our futile attempts to dislodge one side of the bowl with a screwdriver and a hammer. Then a different mini-crowbar. He really didn't feel like disconnecting the garbage disposal either, which was a nice thing for us to have in common. We bonded a little bit there, in our joint bafflement over how the FUCK to get this stupid bowl out of the drain. 

Finally he went back to his truck and came back with a giant-ass drill. 

Fast-forward to now, when we're down 95 damn dollars and one prep bowl*, and I would just like to contribute this tiny bit of knowledge to the universe, or at least the portion of the universe that may currently be searching for a solution to their melamine-prep-bowl-lodged-in-sink problem: Get a giant-ass drill and drill a hole in that motherfucker. BOOM. 

Once it's sufficiently shattered, you can finally get a grip on the bowl and pull it out. Then wash your hands. That standing muck-water of leftover condiments was no joke. 

*We're actually down six prep bowls, because I promptly chucked every single one of those suckers and ordered some silicone prep bowls instead. Look at me! Learning and stuff and shit. Baaah. 

My Winning Formula: Talk Ramble Talkyspeak Unrelated Baby Picture

Man. Did I really only post two times this week? Did I really have that little say about the ENDLESSLY FASCINATING SUBJECT that is myself? Damn, I am losing my narcissistic grip, or something.

It's the week before BlogHer (and even more importantly, one week before SPARKLECORN 2012 OH HELL YEAH), and I'm doing my yearly routine of running around like a newly headless chicken trying to get everything done. It's REALLY HARD to get everything done when you have no head, guys. I really don't recommend it. 

I have so much to do! So many feelings about things that I feel!

Like: My Other Job is consuming my life, but in a good way. (And I'm not trying to be all secretive about it, for the record. I mean, find me on LinkedIn and it's all right there. It's more that it would probably bore y'all to tears, unless maybe you're in the IT field and super geeked about Azure and SharePoint development and hybrid cloud scenarios. Not that there's anything wrong with being geeked about those things. Those things are awesome, frankly. Fuck yeah hybrid cloud! Somebody start me a Tumblr!) So it's weird to suddenly ditch all that for a few days, to go from being some Sooper Professhunal Blog & Social Media Person to...well. That girl who climbed on a table and took bites of a giant unicorn cake's ass last year. 

Also like: I'm pretty sure the baby will wean while I'm gone and on the one hand, okay, he's gotten really extra bite-y this week and is losing interest anyway and my crap supply is crap with a side of double crap, but on the other hand, nooooooooooo. Wah. Etc. 

Anyway. He's still delicious. 

I chew on his face a lot, yes. His whole head is like a baked potato topped with downy spun sugar.

PS. Chalkboard wall protip, coming from someone who has been a chalkboard wall professional for all of five days now: You can completely and easily erase the chalk residue with Endust sprayed on a dry towel. Works like a charm, and also quickly, which is good for when you realize you left up a vaguely obscene doodle from the night before, right as your children are coming downstairs for breakfast. 

Home Improvementish, Part Three

You know what's even harder than painting your kitchen? Photographing your newly-painted kitchen. I cannot, for the life of me, take an accurate photo of the new color scheme. The walls look too blue (they are grey) and the backsplash looks too yellow (there is no yellow in the backsplash at all, whutdahell).

(Here's the before. We opted not to replace the cabinets [cuz $$$$], save for replacing a few damaged doors. We did the backsplash and painting ourselves, so the counter ended up being the only big expense. And even that we got on sale. Thus, more money leftover for booze and fancy cheese.)

(INVEST IN WHAT MATTERS, PEOPLE.)

(The microwave and the Range What Did Catch On Fire That One Time will be replaced with stainless to match...eventually. 2015, maybe. You know how we do things around here. I don't want to sprain anything on all this forward progress.)

The counters are actually a blend of greens and blacks and browns and tie everything (including the troublesome reddish floors) together pretty nicely in person, but in photos tend to either look all black or all green. Whatever. At least the new cabinet handles look mostly like themselves?

Another photography protip: Take pictures of the cool magnetic/chalkboard accent wall (stolen from inspired by Tracey and Charlie's recent kitchen faceliftening) BEFORE setting  your children loose with the chalk.

Or at least, remember to buy a damn eraser first. Whuups.

It required about million coats of the magnetic primer and a several more of chalkboard paint, but the boys are thrilled with it. Drawing on the walls? Both allowed and encourage? Are you kidding me with this nonsense? 

This is a scene from the Avatar cartoon series, according to Noah. Ezra is adding some kitty cats. 

We also painted the dining room, aka the shittiest room in the house (no windows, low ceiling), which was previously painted brown and dark red. Add in all our too-big and too-dark furniture, and ta-da! Welcome to our claustrophobic bordello. Pass the yams.

I'm thinking of swapping out the chairs (they need reupholstering anyway, and there is NO WAY I'm bothering with that until we officially No Longer Have Toddler Butts Sitting On Them & Spilling All The Things) with something more modern. Less heavy and dark. Thots? 

Next on the painting/makeover docket: Our bedroom and the living room. Though that one is going to require some serious home organization solutions, because...well...

BITCH YOU DON'T KNOW MY LIFE.

I MEAN, MAYBE YOU DO, SINCE YOU READ MY BLOG ABOUT MY LIFE. 

OH GOD STOP JUDGING MEEEEEEEE.

Home Improvementish, Part Two

So first of all, this:

KEGGER IN THE DINING ROOM, GUYS. ALSO HELP YOURSELF TO SOME TOAST.

In what is officially the slowest-moving, most-procrastinated kitchen makeover EVER, we finally got around to painting the damn walls this weekend. It tooks us several more weeks to decide on a color, and then...I don't know. The decision took a lot out of us. We had to lie down for awhile. Or a month.

And then we also painted the dining room, getting rid of the gloomy blood-red half-wall that I once declared would be "the first thing to go" when we moved in. (Six years ago.) (But who's counting?) 

In the meantime, this:

TOE VS. SHOPVAC, A BATTLE FOR THE AGES.

My toes continue to be reinforced with toothpicks and silly putty, as I managed to fucking DESTROY my middle toe right in the middle of the project by tripping over the vaccuum cleaner. I've never broken this particular toe before, though, so that's fun. Painful, painful fun. Maybe I should put some booze on it.

Anyway, as much as I would LOVE to show you photos of the finished rooms, it should come as no surprise that...uh...we're still a day or two away from putting shit back in its place and stuff.

Plus I need time to recover from the trip to Ikea that I took by myself, with Noah and Ezra, in search of cabinet handles, only to find that Smaland was over capacity and the wait was at least an hour. And whatever, I'm just here for cabinet handles and that will take 10 minutes so I'll just take the kids into Ikea with me, it'll be fine.

Two hours (plus 26 cabinet handles, one desk lamp and a medicine cabinet for the guest bathroom) later, my toe had swollen to the size of an EKTORP, I'd run out of privileges to revoke and lives to threaten and my children had loudly and officially declared me to be the meanest mommy in the entire world. 

And then I came home and accidentally threw myself against a freshly-painted doorjam in a dramatic NEVER AGAIN flourish.

All in all, a ragingly productive weekend for me, as long as you set the bar low, like at NOT DYING as the baseline criteria for success and moving up from there.

WE HAVE THE POWAH

Last night, we finally came home to a glorious sight:

And it only took five days! 120 hours!  

We also came home to the glorious sounds of 1) both televisions merrily blasting away, having apparently been on at the initial moment of derecho-fueled KABOOM, 2) our security alarm screeching at top volume, helpfully alerting us to the fact that it had lost power so...I dunno...go down to the basement to check things out. I'm sure everything is fine and not at all full of murderous hobos.

I really need to publicly and slobberiffically thank Tracey and Charlie for taking us all in this week, providing food and shelter and coffee and showers that didn't feel like getting doused with ice-cold razorblades. Oh, and fireworks.  

(Please note the dead tree hovering over a power line in this photo. The composition suggests that the firework could be seen as a jubiliant celebration of the human spirit [love, friendship, childhood magic and new traditions, etc.] over both the thwarting efforts of nature and the failings of modern convenience...or simply a representation that we were really fucking stupid for sending explode-y type things up in the sky in the close vicinity of both.)

(Nah, it's the first thing. DEFINITELY THE FIRST THING.)

Wifi Refugee Camp

So we (along with two million of our closest friends) lost power on Friday night during the storm LAND HURRICANE WHAT THE FREAKING HELL. We'll likely remain without power for several more days, because fuck us, that's why. (Also: massive trees and downed lines all over the place. That too.)

It's been a long weekend of driving around in the car to keep our phones charged and our children entertained, which sounds easy until you suddenly realize oh hi empty gas tank and powerless gas stations as far as the non-functioning GPS can see because the cell towers are out and WHAT IS THIS LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE? I NEED INFORMATION ABOUT WHERE TO FIND COFFEE.

But besides the fact that my children's bedroom is 90+ degrees and smells like the inside of a gym bag (and let's be honest, my children ain't much better), we are fortunate. We live pretty much in the dead honest center of where the storm touched down. The big trees that fell on our street missed cars and roofs and — oh jebus — people. I battled Wizard-of-Oz style mid-storm to get our wildly flapping screen doors shut and bolted but in the end, we didn't even lose a single plant in the garden. Driving around is surreal and creepy because many, many people in our neighborhood clearly weren't as lucky. 

Sure is a pain in the privileged ass, though. 

We've taken refuge up at Tracey and Charlie's, greedily soaking up their wifi and outlets to charge our greedy electronics while our greedy children soak up television and non-spoiled milk. We brought Ceiba, wine and a casual attitude about day drinking. And a load of laundry. Cuz PRACTICAL. 

I have also claimed the best seat in the house as mah own:

(No, not the preshus cuddly baby. Look behind me. Aw, yeah.)