daisy

This is my new favorite thing about our little house. Daisy. She's a little old Asian woman who lives directly behind us. Apparently, she lost her husband last year so she's all alone. Whenever she hears us in the back yard she peeks her tiny little garden hat covered head over our fence (with the help of a step ladder) and judges our garden. "You grow peas?" she'll ask. "Oh yes, we are growing some peas over in that back corner over there. (i point to our dirt patch.) They're not ready yet. Still babies." She giggles and climbs down from her perch. A few minutes later she emerges with a HUGE bag of peas fresh from her lush and overgrown garden. "You like these." I stretch to reach the bag of goodies. "Oh thank you, Daisy!" Time passes as she watches us struggle with the weeds in our dirt patch. "You grow tomatoes?" Oh, yes... we are growing a tomato plant. See?" as i point again at our brown sod. She climbs down from her perch and this time emerges with a HUGE bag of tomatoes. "You like these." she says. I can hear her giggle as i take them. This continues with some regularity. It seems Daisy takes great pleasure in our sophomoric gardening ways.

I love Daisy. Her mere existence makes me smile.

pen

So whats the deal with the little ladies who wear a pen on a chain around their neck? I can understand wearing your glasses on a chain. You really need your glasses and sometimes you might forget where you put them. But a pen? On a chain? around your neck? Is there a need for this? Like, maybe you might run into a fed ex guy and UNEXPECTEDLY be asked to sign for something? Or maybe you were working on a crossword puzzle and you might SUDDENLY think of the answer to 5 across? Maybe its a germ phobia type thing? Maybe these ladies are asked to sign in before they can get on the elevator for work and they don't want to use that icky soiled pen that everyone else has touched?

This pen around the neck thing has been bothering me for a few days now. Weird, i know...but i cant let it go. CAN SOMEBODY TELL ME WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY????

free paper

Is it such a crime to read somebody else's newspaper on the train? Sheeesh. I cant afford a paper every morning so i just sort of leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeean and read somebody else's. Well, this morning i got the look. You know the one. The one that says, "Hey lady! Get your own damn paper!" But i didn't care. I was in the middle of a good article. I kept reading. Then he moved ever so slightly to his left. Just enough so that i couldn't see that last paragraph. UGH. C'mon people. I thought voting for Obama meant we were socialists now. Share your paper!

Re-do

This morning when i woke up i decided i wanted to go to work dressed like a tuff guy. You ever do that? Just wake up and want to kick the world's ass? I put on my jeans and rolled them up to make these big, fat cuffs. I laced up my well worn black leather motorcycle boots. I pulled a faded grey t-shirt over my head and rolled up the sleeves. I walked out of the bedroom with a big smile on my face. Like, look at me, world! I'm gonna kick your ass! And then Michelle walked in the front door. (use screeching record sound effect here) She had taken Banjo for a walk. "Yer not going to WORK like that, are you?" She ran off and rifled through my dresser drawers to pick out an outfit more suitable for work. well, according to her. And now I look like a golfer. So much for ass kickin'...just meet me at the country club at tee time.

Party House

Michelle bought some catnip for Roscoe and Ethel and accidentally left it on the front porch. It was the actual plant...not just dried up leaves in a plastic tub or stuffed into a fake mouse. Oh yah, this was the good stuff, baby! Fresh on the vine. The next morning we walked out onto the porch and felt a little like parents who left their teenager home alone for the weekend. We found the flower pot. It was ravaged! Knocked over with all the catnip leaves completely chewed off. We can only IMAGINE the party going on outside our front door last night...We ended up taking Roscoe's cell phone away. Seriously, No more drug hookups for him.

the pile

Hello! Its been a while since we've chatted. I've had the flu. Not the nasty piggy flu...I don't think. Just the regular one that makes you sound like Brenda Vaccaro. If you're not old enough for that reference just imagine a nasty smokers cough and you're in the ball park. Anywhoooo, I'm close to getting back to my old self so i thought i'd give you an update on the house. At this time we have something in the backyard we like to simply call "The Pile." Once upon a time "The Pile" was actually sheets of concrete the previous owners poured to cover a nasty blackberry thicket. I went to the local hardware store and laid down my hard earned 30 bucks for the finest concrete smashing device on the shelf. Yep, a good ol' fashioned sledge hammer. Me and my trusty sledge hammer smashed and banged and crushed all that cement into baby concrete balls. It took a full weekend but i did it. Which i neatly piled up in the corner of the yard. and there it sits. In the corner. for weeks now. It talks to me at night. It tells me i'm a hillbilly for leaving a big pile of cement in the corner. It whispers as i leave for work each morning. "Here i am.. that big ugly pile of rocks you left in the corner." We finally made some calls to see if we could get someone to release me from the grasp of "The Pile." So far the offers are almost as bad as just leaving the pile for the next owner of the house to deal with. The offer on the table is: He drives his big ol' dump truck over to the house. Leaves it over night and WE (two little ladies) load the cement pile into a wheel barrow and roll it out to his big truck and load it for him. Then he shows up the next day to drive it to the dump. And guess how much he wants for this service? 350 BUCKS! Are you kidding?

So there "The Pile" sits. Staring at me. Laughing at me..... taunting me............