laundry is my hobby

2006-09-18T09:40:00.000-07:00

So Wood bought a new truck this weekend. The Ranger was just too small for the three of them, and it seems he has to haul the adult-sized children more and more. So what did he get,you ask?

A Honda.

A Honda Ridgeline. OOOOhhhhh.

He's been looking at this truck for about a year now, and I've been dragging my feet because of this or that (mainly the payment, and the fact that it doesn't affect me since I'm never the one who has to cram into the little leprechaun -size jumpseat.). Well, the time is now. He did most of his "shopping" on line, and last year we went to one of the dealers on the east side of town to look, but didn't drive, since we knew we weren't buying at that time. That dealership had a few Ridgelines on the lot, but all were top-of-the-line tricked out leather/compass/juicebox holder styles, way above our budget (budget-Ha).

So when we decided to actually get physical this time we weren't too sure we'd be able to find a regular old plain jane just a good stereo type model on the lot. Well, the internet search resulted in a phone call from a different dealership, one closer to home, so I told the Man we had an appointment at 10:00 am Saturday morning. Boy, for a guy buying a truck he sure made an ucky face and dragged his feet. Blamed it on benadryl. Ok, whatever.

So we get there. There's one on the lot. One. It's white. That's good, it's the preferred color. It's an 06. That's ok too, we're not proud. But it doesn't have the stereo configuration that he had his heart set on. But wait! There's an 07, back here, hot off the truck, barely checked in by the dealership! Be still his heart!

We do the drive around the block, getting to know the salesman, (recently relocated from Maryland, his lifelong home, wife and daughter came out in early summer, loving the complete absence of grass in his yard and the one-story house, had a rear-ender first thing after moving to town, has neck problems, is seeing an orthopedic/spine surgeon with whom (?) I work on occasion, prognosis looks good as soon as the lawyer settles and the insurance pays-ah, Vegas)
and it's a done deal.

So we do the paperwork, the credit app, go to the finace office, listen to his additional deals for warranties and such, sign here, shake hands, wait for the vehicle to be detailed for "delivery". Delivery? To the door around the corner. Whatever.

So now we're talking to the girl from the customer service department. Reminds me of Pooh.
A cutie, has a one-year old at home who likes to put everything in the toilet. Ah, the good old days of toddlers.

It's ready! Customer service cutie accomanies us out to give us the once over with the truck so we know all the cute buttons and warnings and where the hell the spare and jack are.

She shows us the trunk (a truck trunk!), and points out the release latch. "In case that dead body isn't really dead", I say. She looks at me and says "Right! Exactly!"

Then she points out the drain plug in the bottom of the truck/trunk, and turns to me and says "And if you need to rinse it out, all you have to do is hose it out and let it drain! In case, well, you know." "In case it really is dead?" My kind of girl.

So we get home and show the kids their new ride, and sure enough, a body will fit in the truck/trunk.

2006-09-05T19:54:00.000-07:00

Did the long haul to the homestead and back this holiday weekend. This involves going over Hoover Dam. Twice. So add up the number of trips we've done since we've moved to these parts and multiply by two and in all those opportunities I've never seen anything like this, till now. Thanks to Flip for being quick with the camera.

2006-08-23T08:33:00.000-07:00

The pond has five fish. I know this for a fact. As a newbie pondkeeper, I am beset with green algae water. So a few weeks ago I drained the pond and discovered that yes, there are definitly five little fishies (out of ten). I restored the pond and added an ultra-violet filter and a bigger biological filter and now the piscine pets have clear water and I need Wood to install a fourplex electrical outlet for all my accessories. Maybe two fourplexes(plexi) if I ever get around to installing lights.

I was relating to a surgeon at work my fish status, five happy fish and all, and he said

"Five out of ten? That's a fifty-percent mortality rate!"

I said to him

"No, no, no. That's a fifty-percent survival rate!"

2006-08-23T08:07:00.000-07:00

Birthday train part 2

My dad used to deliver propane to the rural customers in Yavapai county some years ago. I would go with him on occasion, and it was interesting how some people lived so simply, so far away from anyone else.

So my dad, the propane road-warrior, recalled to me how the train had to go uphill on its way to Hillside. He said we could catch up to it and watch it again there. What the heck, I said, and we went on a little oh, fifteen, twenty mile jaunt to Hillside and sure enough, we had just toured the main street (only street) and here came the same train (I think I can I think I can I think I can.....) so we hustled over through an abandoned-looking lot to get a closer view and the engineer blew the whistle for us again and I think I was happier for the boy than the boy knew how to be for himself. (The lot was not abandoned was we thought, but turned out to be part of an operation that made houses out of styrofoam. The guy gave us a little tour and all but he wasn't the best PR guy because I still am not sure it they made just insulation or the whole house. There was metal of various configurations which could have been structural supports and huge sheets of styrofoam which he cut with an electrified wire-neat!- but he said the business wasn't doing so good and he was shutting the place down.)

Heading back to Las Vegas that afternoon, we made the obligatory stop at the Sonic in Kingman, and oh my stars did we see not one but two trains during our stop.

So let's see, the total train tally for the thirteenth birthday weekend comes to

Lego trains 2
other train models 1
trains spotted/stalked 5 (four if you count two viewings of one train)

I make it 8. Eight items of intense interest. Woo Hoo!

2006-08-08T06:17:00.000-07:00

"BIG FAT IN YOUR FACE FN A!!!!"

microbiology is done.

2006-08-06T22:28:00.000-07:00

The boy had a birthday a few weeks ago. He's 13 now, all teen-agey. Hard to tell these days which behavior is due to autism and which is just teen angst. His sister is angsty as all get out, so it would follow that he is too.

We spent his birthday weekend in Wilhoit with the grandparents. Wilhoit is actually part of the miniscule sparsley populated region that includes Skull Valley and Kirkland (or Kirkland Junction).

If you started in Prescott, Arizona, and went south on Hwy 89, you would pass right through Wilhoit and probably miss it, unless you were jonesing for a beer at the biker bar in Nowhere, which doesn't have a sign anymore because people kept stealing it. Since Nowhere ceased advertising itself, the two little burgs have melded into a micropolis called Wilhoit, but it's still so small its mailing address is Kirkland, some miles away to the westish, and, paradoxically, is even smaller than the aggregated Wilhoit.

His birthday is usually train heavy, since that is an enduring fascination. When he was smaller it was the wooden Thomas-the-tank-engine type of train. Now it's more Legos and viewing real trains. We make regular pilgrimages to Boulder City to see the parked train there (more on that later).

Every trip over to see the grandparents includes a stop in lovely Kingman at the Sonic drive thru on Andy Devine Rd (part of the old Rt. 66). The train line there is always busy, so it's a good bet that we will see one anytime we stop there. And the bathrooms aren't too terribly nasty. We were rewarded with a glimpse of a BNSF (Burlington Northern Santa Fe) barreling through whilst we sipped our cherry-limeade slushies and munched our tater-tots.

Saturday afternoon we traveled over to Skull Valley, specifically the Skull Valley elementary school. The tracks run inbetween the road and the school, and it is a fairly pleasant wait under the big cottonwood trees. But not this day. It was pretty hot, being July and all, and not much of a breeze, and something about his sister kept the Boy keyed up and cranky. We ended taking a short walk to the general store (everything from feed for livestock to ice cream) for a cold drink. I'm guessing he has frustrated that no train was magically appearing. He did calm down somewhat, and we went back to Grandma's for a little birthday cake and unwrapping of the trains. Sunday, however, was a different story.

Sunday we tootled around the homestead till about noon. Since the guy from the railroad had confirmed that we could not know the time a train might pass our location (thank you terrorists), we decided to take another chance and went back to our perch under the cottonwood trees. It was just me, Grandpa, and the Boy in my little car, and Wood and Flip in his tiny truck. We were there maybe thirty minutes when we were made quite happy by the sound of the train whistle. We were about thirty yards from the tracks, so it was quite loud and when we gestured for more whistle (mime the pull of the cord) oh boy did we get an earful. I had my hand on the Boy's chest and his heart was just pounding. He was a happy guy. What a treat for a birthday boy.

As we were headed home, my dad mentioned that we could catch up with the train, if we wanted. If we wanted!!? At Kirkland Junction, Wood and the girl turned left to go back to the homestead and we turned right. Towards Hillside/Bagdad.

2006-07-30T17:12:00.000-07:00

No fishies. Well, maybe one or three, it's hard to tell. But out of a total of 10 little fishies introduced to the pond o death, glimpsing one or two is rather disappointing. Wood says it's cats. I have to reluctantly agree, but doubts linger because 1: the fish are really small, large guppy size and 2: no evidence of cat squatting, ie no disturbed shrubbery or bark, no carcasses, no cat shit or cat fur dangling from the mouths of dogs I JUST DON'T KNOW.
The suspicion is pretty strong, but being born in Missouri is really a curse sometimes, and I find myself wishing for a pond cam, just for proof.
At least the water is clear, and the fountains sound lovely.

2006-07-25T21:03:00.000-07:00

Oppenheimer the Gardener is at it again.
The pond is back up and running, with the addition of water plants and 5 (count 'em) little fishies.
If I still have any fishies in a month, I'll be a somewhat happy camper.

2006-07-25T20:45:00.000-07:00

We made a semiannual trek through the Bellagio conservatory/gardens a few weeks ago. Boy, were we SURPRISED! The Boy was thrilled no end to find model trains all over the place. Up, down, through the trees, through tunnels and towns, it was a delight for his little autistic perseveration. They had his favorite, a BNSF, nearly close enough to touch.

Here's a village scene, with the favorite. We stood and watched this little cutie for some time.

Same train, different angle, with tunnel.

The ladybug trolley scurried by a wooden boot/house, underneath a great castle.

And the crowning piece, a miniature Bellagio, complete with fountains. All these buildings and bridges were made of wood and plant parts. Some were pine cone leaves/blades, twigs, seed pods, acorn cups, pieces of bark, all craftily glued together in amazing detail.
We enjoyed it so much we went back the next day, too.

2006-07-11T23:17:00.000-07:00

Volunteer tomatoes were doing great there in the ersatz mulch pile...till I found a suicide caterpiller munching away. So I pulled it off (no easy feat-they're tenacious) and put it under the bird feeder, thinking that was that.

Well, that was a few days ago. Today I was admiring my (ahem) handiwork and there were not one, but SIX caterpillars on my now leafless tomatoes. Since I had not invested a lot either monetarily nor emotionally on these catepillar targets, I pulled them up and put plants and all under the bird feeder (Fresh Meat!).

Wood was there as I was pulling and placing the target tomatoes, and as I was gazing in dismay at the now very murky green pond, he asked me,

"Do you think Oppenheimer was a gardener?"

"The Father of the Bomb?" I asked, thinking Wood might be more confused than I.

"Yeah," he said, " 'I am become Death, destroyer of worlds' and all that".

"Shut. Up."

2006-07-06T09:12:00.000-07:00

So. I got called to work for a "bring-back" the other night. A bring-back is a procedure done on a patient (usually open heart) when their condition indicates that there may be excessive bleeding or sudden clotting of a graft and they would benefit from a re-exploration of the chest. It is usually a quick procedure involving re-opening the sternum, removing a bunch of clots or cauterizing the underside of the ribcage where the sternal wires go inbetween the ribs and around the sternum.
I had scrubbed for this case earlier in the day, and when I came in to the lounge on my way to the dressing room, the surgeon told me that this would be a real quick case, just a pacer wire exchange. Apparently the patient (who had artery bypasses and a mitral valve repair) was not benefitting from the temporary pacing wires that had been placed earlier and was experiencing low blood pressure and erratic rhythm.
We get in there and do a minimal opening, just enough to see the old wire and poke in a new one, and the patient is just not responding-poor rhythm, low pressure.
"FUCK!" shouts the surgeon. This is not unusual for this surgeon, who is of, um, mediterranean descent by way of, um, New York, I think, and, at any rate, is rather loud and boisterous on most good days and here it was midnight-thirty and he'd done a full day's work and had another to go. "FUCK YOU YOU FUCKING FUCK FUCK FUCKER!".
"WHAT THE FUCK" said the anestheologist.
"DOUBLE FUCK" I said.
And the patient got better.
And we all felt better.

2006-06-22T08:57:00.000-07:00

Okay okay. I won't do any more pond posts, but I had to post these two.

2006-06-21T23:54:00.000-07:00

So. We had big doins this past weekend at the Oceanside, er, beach.

That's the beginning. The trench and the first course of brick took most of the day. I have to give credit to the MAN, who did the lion's share of the work. Did I mention it was hard digging? In caliche? Did I mention that those stupid bricks had to be level front/back left/right AND level with neighbor bricks? Have I mentioned how the MAN did the hardest work on one of the hottest days this year? Did I mention it was hot out? Way. HOT.

When arthur says it's this hot, it's siesta time.

So the next steps, which pretty much rounded out the first day. Funny how a ton of sand doesn't go quite as far as you might think.

And at last, fountain and plants. And a big red carp. Ceramic, that is.
The boy moved the chair there all on his own. He'd been waiting so long. SOOO long. I made the mistake of purchasing the liners first, some months ago (before it was hellishly hot), and he has been most persistent reminding us about the pond. When he really wants to communicate, which is rare, he'll get right in our face, almost nose to nose, and say his one word or phrase, in this case, "Pond." He must've gotten tired of us saying, "not today" or "later, it's too hot" because he started saying "POND" in a much clearer, louder voice.
Gawd, are we suckers for for a clear loud voice. He did help dig, and haul, and stack, and fill, and most of all, enjoy.
I think he likes it.

2006-06-07T23:43:00.000-07:00

So, I am back to my old hobby. Dryer's fixed. Washer has a new knob. But it was close there, when things were at their darkest, no dryer, knob on the washer breaking off, I was this close to spending several hundred dollars to fix $20 worth of problems. Arrgh.

For some reason, one of my bird of paradise plants is dying. Other one looks great, so I'm not sure what the problem might be, since I treat them the same. Just dunno. Divided the aloe vera plant, and I'm not so sure it was the best time of year to do that. But my sister passed along a bunch of hens-and-chicks, and I had more than one pot of those so I had to uncrowd the aloe to intersperse with the hens-and-chicks and oh, well, that's how it goes when I start getting my hands in the dirt.

The volunteer tomatoes are doing amazingly well. For something springing up in the ersatz mulch pile, they're looking better than any I've paid good money for. Hope I haven't jinxed myself. The strawberry's a goner. I guess Flip's right-I don't bring home plants, I bring home more "victims".

2006-06-07T23:40:00.000-07:00

Here we are back from the first annual Las Vegas Walk Now.

Tired feet. The Boy walked the whole way, bless his heart. We ended up raising over $800, just short of our goal of $1000. Not bad for the first year, I think.
Thanks to all who generously donated to this cause, by all accounts it was a very successful and fun day.

2006-06-07T23:32:00.000-07:00

Here we are at the first annual Walk Now 5K walk to raise funds for Cure Autism Now.

2006-05-08T21:30:00.000-07:00

Laundry is not my hobby. Not today. Probably not tomorrow.

Well, it kinda is. Here's the thing. The dryer is merely a tumbler. Which would be cool if it was a tumbler on the Batman Begins scale. No. With my luck or lack thereof, I get a big spinny metal tube that throws the clothes around while they air dry. Arrrgh. Good news is, the weather is cooperating, it was nearly 90 degrees today. That man o' mine strung up an erstaz clothesline on the patio when we found out we had to wait for a week for the $5.00 part to be non-expeditiously mailed to us. The $5.00 part comes on the heels of the $150.00 (expedited) burner assembly, which, when assembled, didn't work. Seems the problem is, ah, electrical. Wood's buddies when he told them, asked first thing, "What did your meter tell you?" Well, it's Wood in sheep's clothing, kicking himself for not putting his electrical meter on the darn thing right off. Turns out the problem isn't the gas flow, it's the overtemp thermostat breaker thingy. But boy, have we got a good look at how the lint piles up in, under and around a dryer. And the belt configuration! We could go on for, oh, minutes, about how the belt configuration is terribly difficult to figure out when it falls off before you get a good look at it (but there's pictures on the internet, thank geeks).
So, here I am, it's Monday night, I'm not on call, the laundry can wait a little bit, must be time for, hmmmm, VODKA! No guilt.

2006-05-04T23:37:00.000-07:00

So, I'm hanging in the hallway at work, waiting for the opportune moment to relieve my coworkers for a lunch break, shooting the shit with one of the perfusionists who covers our hospital (a perfusionist operates the heart-lung machine that keeps you alive when your heart is being sliced and sewn). One of the newer heart surgeons, a Texan of Indian (bombay not blackfoot) extraction, walks up and relates this story:

"So you know what? I was standing up at the front, and this breast surgeon guy comes up to me and says

'I don't like your coat. It looks like something a resident would wear.'

(Heart surgeon wears a knee length lab-type white jacket embroidered with his name and title)

I looked at him and said "Excuse me?" and he told me

'I don't like your coat and I don't think you should be wearing your boots into the operating room.'

(oh yeah, he wears his cowboy boots. To work. In the OR. )

like that's any of his business what shoes I fucking wear and so I told him

"If you have a problem with my jacket or my shoes, we can settle this right now. Otherwise, you just stay out of my heart room and I'll stay out of your breast room (heart surgeon is all of 5' 4" 130 lbs soaking wet with his boots on). Can you believe this shit?"

I told him no, I couldn't believe this shit, but another staff member who heard the tale said

"Good, I'm glad Dr. Boob got put in his place."

Jeez, some people.

Ghost Town 2

2006-04-30T12:29:00.000-07:00

Ghost Town 2
Originally uploaded by teejaybee19.

Same scene, with LIGHTNING.

Ghost Town 1

2006-04-30T12:28:00.000-07:00

Ghost Town 1
Originally uploaded by teejaybee19.

Goldfield Ghost town, as seen by the Boy. For some reason, it's raining.

church tornado

2006-04-30T12:24:00.000-07:00

church tornado
Originally uploaded by teejaybee19.

Same scene, with TORNADO.
Sucks to go to church in Goldfield.

2006-04-29T19:59:00.000-07:00

Well, the pictures don't really do it justice. The first is the front gate, with this big elevator thingy and a huge ore bucket thingy. This second is a view from the train around the back, so the church you see is actually behind the elevator thingy in the first view. Confused? Well, the boy draws a much better picture.

2006-04-26T07:58:00.000-07:00

Apache Junction.....site of the most wonderful object of recent obsession by the Boy-Goldfield Ghost town. Is his excitement evident? Well, it was to those who know him.
Apache Juction is a little hole-in-the-wall wide-spot-in-the-road that is quickly being swallowed up by the metastasization of Phoenix on the south and east. We rendezvous-ed with the Pooh and had a great time, walking up the block-long street that is Goldfield, peeking in the storefronts, and of course, riding the train. The town of Goldfield was really a working mining town, its inhabitants brought up over a million dollars' worth of gold from a not-very impressive hole in the ground, there at the base of the Superstition Mountains.

The train makes a loop around the site, at a speed of about 5 mph, with frequent photo op stops. It turned out to be a pleasant way to spend about an hour out and about on a beautiful spring day in the desert.

The whole experience made quite an impression on the Boy. He's been drawing some interesting pictures.

2006-04-12T20:27:00.000-07:00

Spring.....Break!

Kids are on spring break this week. So I took the week off (all three working days, that is), and headed to AZ to see the family.

No peace to be found. Well, maybe a little, down south. We departd Las Vegas early Saturday morning and stopped by Prescott to catch up with my brother, who lives in Tucson (the younger older brother). The original plan was to proceed straight to Tucson, do not pass go, do not collect $200, and have a nice night or two with my brother and his wife and drink in he lovely Sonoran ambience and a few margaritas. What happened was, my brother ended up sporting up to Prescott from Tucson to check on the status of the great demolition happening in Wilhoit. Oh, I didn't mention that?

The Wilhoit compound is getting new digs. The old (and I mean OLD) "mobile" home that the parents have been living in has been literally torn to pieces to make way for a newer one-one from this decade. So my pa, the workahoilic, the one who traveled to HAWAII while suffering congestive heart failure (diagnosed after he returned), the one who can't say no and can't slow down and never asks for help, is running the demolition/prep at the homestead. My assorted local male relatives have been down to help as they can, but I think my dad (the horriblest pack-rat) is afraid they might throw away something he can reuse or wants to keep for otherwise obscure known-only-to-him reasons. I dunno, it's just a guess. But he's had plenty offers of help, and has been waving them off from time to time. So, when I asked my ma how things were going, she seemed to think they were going allright. But she did let slip that he told her that he had to stop for a bit during the work the other day and that his chest hurt. She's worried crazy about him, living in one of the sheds on the property, while she's camping with my sister up in town. so, here in this roundabout way, is why my brother came up from Tucson, and we got together in Prescott before reuniting down in Tucson later in the day. My brother cruised by the demo site and thought is looked okay and that Dad looked okay. I said hi/bye to my sister and my mom, the kids had a bite to eat and a potty break and off we went.

We blew right through Phoenix, since Pooh wasn't sure what her plans were for the day, and got to Oro Valley, just north of Tucson, just in time to see my brother's wife's herd of horses out at their property before going into the town of Catalina for some really good Mexican food at Lupe's. No margarita, though. We retired early and got up at 0530 (thanks, Boy), and had a couple of quick hikes before we left for Phoenix to rendezvous with the Pooh.

Which, we did, although it was in Apache Junction.

2006-03-26T10:30:00.000-08:00

spring!

Spring is springing out all over here. The irises that I brought from mom's in AZ are starting to bloom, the fortnight lilies that were divided last fall are almost all starting to bloom, the lone hollyhock from my friend Linda is comin up, oh, and 2 (TWO!) hummingbirds this morning (at once).

Took a walk yesteday around the "pond" (a flood control catch basin, one of dozens around town), and it felt great. Worked into the wee hours Friday night/am, slept til noon, and during the walk it felt like a great weight lifted off my shoulders-not on call. Ahhhhh.

2006-02-27T04:11:00.000-08:00

Toad. Turd. Troll. Trogolodyte. Twit.

Just some private pet names for surgeons, starting with the letter "t". What else are you gonna do at 2 am, grafting coronaries with an asshole?

2006-02-20T12:11:00.000-08:00

Shoe's back. Work sucks even more. I feel a change is in order. Or out of order. I need a change. Soon.

2006-02-08T23:43:00.000-08:00

Arrgh. Life's been on the stressful side lately.

Gotta make plans for the summer when The Boy is out of school and Flip goes to Washington for her annual respite (huh, where's mine and Wood's?). Do we ask a stranger into our lives again, or shuffle our work schedules around again in order to cover? It never gets easy. I don't suppose it ever will.

The Boy is still taking the stool softening laxative polyethelene glycol, which makes him have a smeary butt, so we've been putting him in paper underpants (outgrew the overnight diaper/pants, into the real Depends brand). If we don't watch him carefully, he'll leave them wadded inside his jeans and then the dog gets them and eats them. Ew. Yeah, and who gets to clean that up?

We've just started increasing his dose of Abilify, since his stims are increasing and he's becoming sensitive again to the sound of blinkers in the car and the ever-present airplanes and he's banging on his head more. So far he seems to be doing okay at school, only one notice sent home lately.

Flip had a rough time with school last semester. I was hoping my procrastinating tendency would skip over her generation but, no, she's as bad as the rest of us and so now we get to be homework nazis and general pains in her ass. She's plenty bright, just not self-driven.

Signed up for a microbiology class, a pre-req for the nursing degree. Yikes. My turn to be self-driven. And I like biology. My photographic memory ran out of film sometime ago, so now I gotta really work at getting things to go in and come out on demand.

Working at the hospital of last resort really SUCKED last week. Grumpy docs taking their frustration out on me and other staff, and I mean really inappropriately (throwing instruments etc.). I know I'm not a perfect scrub, hell I'm really barely competent, but there's things I know and I know that surgeons can be a surly lot, capricious, mean, passive-aggressive and half the time it has no connection to your skills as a scrub, you just happen to be in the same space with them. I've seen mediocre surgeons do poor surgery because they're pissed off because of some scheduling conflict at another hospital, or because the patient they operated on previously that day is coding in the recovery room and he's stuck scrubbed in.

Today is my Monday (I work 3 twelves, 11a to 11p Wed, Thurs, Fri), and I went to put on my two-week old size 37 navy blue mediplog shoes, and I can find only one. Just one. FNA. At least the jerk coulda taken both shoes.

So I wrote a note on one of our notice boards:

Look out for a one-legged thief wearing a size 37 navy blue mediplog shoe...TeeJay would like a word...

BNSF in Kirkland Junction

2006-01-17T08:36:00.000-08:00

BNSF in Kirkland Junction
Originally uploaded by teejaybee19.

Spent the weekend in Az. with the Family. All the siblings (all 6!), siblings' spouses (most of them) and siblings' offsprings, some extra cousins and our favorite Auntie and family from Wisconsin. Wilhoit may never be the same.
The Boy and I took a drive on Sunday, taking the long way into Prescott, through Kirkland Junction and Skull Valley. And look what we found parked across the road from the steakhouse/school/post office! Only his most favorite thing in the world at least in legos. So I pulled over to get a photo, and as I am cajoling and pleading for the Boy to smile like a boy and not a chimpanzee, a voice from the engine calls "You want to get a picture from the steps up here?" Wow! "Yeah you bet" I say to him. To the boy I say,
"C'mon buddy, you wanna get on the train?"

"no" he says in his flat, I'm-pretty-sure-I-don't-want-to voice.

"What? It's a BNSF! Your favorite thing in the whole world! Here it is, right in front of you, they're ASKING you to get on and have your picture taken. C'mon!"

"no"

I explain to the guy waiting for us on the train that the Boy is autistic, and might need a little help with this situation. He does the blinky thing that tells me he doesn't know much about autism and now he thinks the Boy is weird, which the Boy is, often.
The outcome was, no getting on the train, but we did manage to get off one picture with a natural facial expression.
Go figure.

hammer time

2005-12-29T20:39:00.000-08:00

hammer time
Originally uploaded by teejaybee19.

Santa scored big time with the gift of a bird feeder kit for the Boy. He Who Has Little Sense of Time could not hardly wait for the paint to dry and his dad to come home so they could start the great assembling. Dad is a big brave man to hold the nail for the Boy to hammer (I shoulda been using video-Doh!). The boy really does like doing this stuff, but he is so impatient. Perhaps the day will come when he will read the instructions himself, and ever so carefully, do the assembling solo.

Sawmill Express

2005-12-27T21:07:00.000-08:00

Sawmill Express
Originally uploaded by teejaybee19.

The Boy's newest fascination fits perfectly on the only table in the house.

white flower

2005-12-20T19:35:00.000-08:00

white flower
Originally uploaded by teejaybee19.

what he said
As so eloquently noted in the comments section, my man loves me bunches.

This was taken (by me!) in Tacoma Wa, in the front yard of Wood's parents home. Their magnolia tree was blooming wonderfully the year we were there, and here was this blossom, so perfectly white and hiding coyly behind the leaves, and right at my eye level. How lucky can a girl get.

2005-12-15T08:29:00.000-08:00

Nevada Southern Railway

had their annual Santa Claus train run, and yes, the Boy knew all about it. So we hiked on over to Boulder City, turned left at the A&W, and found the train.
The boy was quite pleased. More with the train than Santa, I think, but when asked, the Boy admitted that he liked Santa. Not that that helped Santa any, when he came by ho-ho-hoing the Boy just sat there not looking and Santa glanced at me and I just mouthed "Thank you" and they went on their Santa way. That's usually how it is in public situations with lots of people and there's no time for patience and pulling communication from autistic boys. It's nice that the didn't ignore him, it really is. The sad part is that the boy seems to ignore, but he may not be. He may really want to pull the beard or ask for the Lincoln Log Sawmill Express or who knows what, but he doesn't do or say it. I don't know if he gets flustered, or he's shy, or if it really is autism and he has nothing to say, but there are times when, if he really wants to let you know something, he makes sure you know (i.e. Lincoln Logs Sawmill Express:the websites, the Ebay sites, the pictures printed from the websites, the in-your-face asking almost daily), but even that is brought forth at least verbally with significant prompted effort.

So the train makes a trip, out and back, a distance one way of about a half mile. We sat in a car similar to the one pictured behind the Boy, which is an open car with benches down the middle, to sit back-to-back with total strangers and gaze at the beautiful Nevada scenery. We sat on the sunny side, which turned out to be a good thing since it was a rather brisk day but the sun made it quite bearable. The boy wanted to ride it again, but there was quite a crowd waiting already, so we came home. We'll probably catch it again in the spring.

(I had to cajole him to smile more, urm, normally, since usually when you ask him to smile for a photo, he grimaces, showing all his teeth and gums like a chimpanzee. He actually looks kinda happy here, though.)

2005-11-29T09:58:00.000-08:00

always a surprise.

My older older brother (as opposed to my younger older brother) came over yesterday morning. We had a cuppa and a nice chat. Ripley T. Dog did her amazing fetch trick for him, not really a surprise since I believe it's pathological and she can't not do it.

No, the surprise, the first surprise was seeing a hummingbird at the feeder. Here we are, nigh into December, and yessiree bob, there's a pretty supping at the sipper. I had brought all the others down, and refreshed the nectar, but I really didn't think I'd see any till maybe March. So, a nice surprise for the morning. Revisited in the evening, so Flip and Wood were able to marvel as well. What a treat for us!

My older older brother lives here in town, and is, in fact, the reason we live here in this town. He invited us. We're not sure if he regrets it by now. Especially since the gas stove incident...

We lived in Arizona before coming here, and we had a house. We rented the house out for awhile when we first moved here, since it was a mutually beneficial situation. Then the renter bought his own house, and we convinced my sister to buy our house (now it's like an heirloom house, we'll just pass it around the family). My sister dolled the house up real pretty, new floors and paint, and she wanted a new stove in the kitchen. I said "Great! I'll take this one since mine in Vegas is electric and EVERYTHING else in the house is gas." I figured my brother, the former propane guru, could lend us a hand hooking it up, since there was no gas stub poking out of the wall behind the (ew) electric stove. So. This is like, hmm, let me think, a year ago? So this gas stove has been sitting in my garage (in my parking spot in my garage) for about a year, so I finally make the plan and tell the key players (Wood and my brother) that the great gas install is going to happen now. Well, by golly, did they come through for me. I am blessed with handy men because they cut a hole in the wall behind the stove and they ran pipe through the ceiling and made connections and I don't know what all but it ended up that I could now bring in the gas stove. Well..while they were doing that...

Seeing as how it had been sitting in the garage for about a year, I figured the gas stove needed a bit of a dust off and started, well, dusting it off and in my dusting off found rodent turds in my gas stove. We'd had a bit of mouse trouble previously, but bait and traps seemed to take care of it. So I thought, well, I'll just clean this really well and use lots of bleach and rinse and scrub and vacuum and it'll be just fine. So some vigorous scrubbing later, I manage the magic machine into the kitchen and the boys hook it up and now they are off doing other guy things (the nice thing about Wood working with my brother is the swearing is SO much less). So I turn the stove to "self clean", which involves locking the door and the temperature getting really hot for a period of time and supposedly, any spills in the oven are turned to ash and easily swept out with a damp sponge. That's what the pictures look like, anyway. Well, the oven got to maybe 200 degrees when the stench started. Kind of an ammonia-y stench, like, pee stenchy kinda smell. Twenty minutes of this an I'm starting to have an anaphylactic reaction and throw open the doors, windows, turn on the fans, cover my nose and evacuate the children. After thirty minutes I turn it off and admit defeat. Out goes the gas stove, to the curb, leaving a trail (after cleaning! acck!) of rodent turds all the way. Apparently little mousie didn't just explore the stovetop, he explored the oven, the broiler, the insulation, the whole damn thing. I came this close to running out for a brand new gas stove, but I resisted. The electric came back in, plugged back in, works just fine, for an electric stove. Sigh...

The garbage guy doesn't pick up rodent fece laden stoves on his regular run, so we took the thing to the recycling place, thinking at least we're not throwing this big chunk of metal in the landfill, and for our troubles we get, hmm, a dollar twenty?

And the presence of the electric stove in my kitchen was not overlooked by my older older brother.

2005-11-13T21:49:00.000-08:00

As prolific Flip pointed out, we escaped the city for a few hours Friday. The Boy was out of school, and she's always out of school, so I took a day from work and we made a day of it. We went out to Bonnie Springs, just past Red Rock canyon, which is the closest scenic spot if it's nature you're wanting to look at.

I asked the Boy that morning if he wanted to go to Red Rock and go for a hike, and he looked right at me and very clearly stated "Old Nevada." Hmph. This guy, he is something else. This must have been percolating in his brain for I don't know, months I guess. His fascination with trains and his blossoming computer search skills and, I think, a previous school outing had led him to a website about Bonnie Springs and Old Nevada. But this had been a significantly long time ago, and I myself had forgotten about it. He hadn't. Boop! There it is, in perfectly understandable English-"Old Nevada". So, I ask him, find out the hours, see if it's open. And he Googles it. Right there in front of me. "Flip, look, look at what he's doing!" She turns, looks, and grins. "Cool!" Yes, I'm thinking "cool", too, but then the obsessive paranoid in my brain says "What!!?? Are you NUTS? He's GOOGLING and he's gonna wind up on porn sites and who knows what" and okay, he's just looking for train stuff. So far, he's just finding train stuff (he found an audio site that broadcasts the actual radio traffic from a station in Colorado, train stuff, real train stuff. Huh.). But I digress. He finds the site, we find out the hours and now we have a plan. I had to BEG Flip to go ("C'mon, it'll blow the stink off'n ya", to quote my late Grandpappy), she tends to be homebodyish like her dad.

We really did blow the stink off, driving on the scenic route with the windows down, enjoying the sunny day, guilt free. I told Flip to keep her eyes peeled for wild burros and horses, since they are frequently sighted in that area, but not by me. Sure enough, we saw 'em. Kinda hard to miss since tourists like to stop on the 65 mph road with no shoulder two-lane highway and pet the nice wild animals. Makes for a truly scenic trip.

But we made it there right after opening time, and yeah, the guy brandished his gun (not really pointing at anybody, but he did clear leather and it kinda pissed me off.) I asked the Boy the rhetorical question "What do you want to do?" and he said "Train", but it pulled out just as we walked up. In we go to see the sights of Old Nevada. Flip pretty much sums it up. Maybe it's better on Saturday, but on this November Friday it just seemed pretty sad, as attractions go. We went back to the train, where Flip declared her independence and went to the petting zoo and the Boy and I got on the tiny rattly twenty different coats of paint train with the sign posted "tips are appreciated". What his fascination is, I don't know. The scenery was pretty nice, though. The property is right at the the bottom and I mean bottom of the Spring Mountains, with the Red Rock canyon recreation area off to the side, the road to Pahrump on the other and a big ole mesa being mined for gypsum inbetween the city and us. I could see the high water mark in the creek bed from our recent rains, and that little dry creek was pretty busy then, probably five feet deep and twelve feet wide in spots. Enought to knock you off your feet. The little train makes a loop probably a half-mile in length down to a lower parking lot and past the motel/resort with theme rooms (with satellite!) and back to the main entrance. We tried to find Flip amongst the animals, but saw the wallaby and buffalo instead and went back out to wait. We're sitting on the train to ride again and she pops up all excited about the wolves and such, god she's so beautiful when she smiles. So is he. We ride the train together and see a big ole hawk take off from a tree real close. She gets to take a photo of the burros on our way out (not on the highway, I'm no tourist), and all in all, (except for the part where she wiped animal lick all over the car) it was a very pleasant afternoon. Thanks for the suggestion, buddy.

2005-11-06T22:06:00.000-08:00

"Ah, but your friend here is only mostly dead....mostly dead is still somewhat alive."

The powerbook funeral has been delayed, due wholly to the exquisitely aligned gears in Wood's brain, constantly whirring whilst I lay comatose, even with the light on.

After I worked to save lives at the local hospital of last resort, we took the ailing #2 wife to the local Mac store (recently CLOSED on Saturdays-damn them), so then off to the local Apple Store at the local Mall on the Strip because we just had to have a diagnosis. While the boy and I tried to find a quiet place to hang out (hah) the local Genius at the local Genius bar blew the bellows of bad news and and asked what did Wood need her for and they both heard "hard drive" and well, into the black bag with the #2 wife and home we go. All the while Wood's just chattering away, his mouth going almost as fast as his exquisite brain, "Techno techno techno techno five hundred dollars techno techno only three hundred dollars installed techno techno" (imagine chipmunk speed). The man is panicked about his data.

We get home, have dinner, mope around, put the boy to bed, lounge around a bit, then I go off to bed. I seem to recall him climbing in beside me...but it may be I just dreamed it.

Turns out after I go to bed he happens to look in his bag and AHA! the #2 wife is softly blinking in her little black, um, bag. Rapture! Blazing hope! Fervent desire! (where can I get one of those blinky things?) He opens his powerbook and there's his desktop. Voy-la, as they say in France. So he scurries to his desk in the bedroom to back up, hook up, do whatever it is his exquisite brain tells him he must do to avoid the pain, even turning on the bedroom light on the ceiling fan. He tells me this in the morning, how he was frantic to get things hooked up, backed up etc etc, all the while darting glances over his shoulder at my comatose form, worried that I might wake at any moment. What a thoughtful obsessive man.

It was successful, at any rate. He cobbled together some kind of life support for the seductress and she does not die at this time. And I know just where to look for him...

2005-11-04T00:38:00.000-08:00

General unhappiness and discontent at home and about.

Wood's laptop is in critical condition, and he seems to be coming down with whatever the Boy is getting over virus-wise.

No joy when dinner is Cracklin' Oat Bran. (But we've established that it is a popular food group in the household.) 'Course, I had the pleasure of having V8 juice and graham crackers for dinner, since I was scrubbed through dinner and forgot to put my peanut butter away last week and it got stolen and I already ate the tuna and tomato soup earlier this week (My locker is a veritable corner grocery of non-perishable emegency food items) and I haven't made a work-food shopping dash yet. Sigh. No one to blame but myself. Where's that darn goat when you need one....and just how does one "scape" it?

Went to AZ to see the folks and Pooh. All seem to be fine. Ma won at Scrabble, and Flip held her own pretty well, aside from the math errors, she made some good plays. Dad enjoyed watching Master and Commander (with subtitles on), and we made it through Shawshank redemption with some wincing and apologies (sorry Ma, I forgot it was so,um raw). Great stories, both. Made it home with seed pods from the Mexican bird-of-paradise, a few leaves from the christmas cactus, and plenty of roots of bearded iris (corms, I think they're called, gnarly shrimpy shaped things). Something to look forward to come spring.

So, anyway, let's go work in the garden, or prepare for the zombie apocolypse, whichever pleases you most.

2005-10-22T20:30:00.000-07:00

Anniversary's coming up in December. Seventeen years. Today Wood finds out two things: First, I buy gas at more than one station. Two, I prefer diet Pepsi to Coke (any flavor). Hands me my blankie and pillow and says "Bye. Been good up to now."

I think this stems from the Great Cereal Rebellion. I buy cereal based on two criteria (hmm, a duplicity of coincidence...or coincidence of duplicity, yeah, that's it) one, it has at least a vague reference to nutrition, two, it costs less than $3.00. Unfortunately for some cereal eaters at this address, this has resulted in a disappointing selection. There are at least two of us who benefit from increased fiber in our diets, so Raisin Bran and Shredded Wheat are pretty much a staple. If the name brand isn't on sale, the store brand usually is. I like the Cheerios with the dried berries (berry blend or strawberry, yumm) when it comes around on sale, but even then it's usually at the top of the register at $3.00/box. The Boy gets to pick a box now and again (Cocoa-Puffs, I swear to god, and Flip ate em too), but it pretty much ends up being the same kinda stuff every week. So the other day I come home and find a list next to my computer. "Cinnamon Toast Crunch. Cracklin' Oat Bran. Any other cereal that costs $5.00/box and has no store brand equivalent." "What's this?" I ask of Flip. "Dad says you never buy cereal he likes. So we made a list." Subtle little shift on the fence-"we", implies a division, a difference, a divergence (doh! alliteration run amok!). So at the store today I find Cracklin' Oat Bran ON SALE for $3.50/box. Do I buy it? Do I? Do I dare cross the line of frugal shopping and price vs. principle vs. happy regular husband? Wait, um, how many lines was that?
Well, yes. I love my man, love my girl, love my boy, and if cereal at $3.50 a box does it for them, then, by golly, I'm their huckleberry.

On a completely different note, as we were driving out and about today, we saw a Jag with the plate (DESYNER), and Wood admires the car (and its driver) murmuring "jag, huh..." and I say "Yeah, but what's Des Whiner?" He looks at the plate, looks at me, and shaking his head says "Designer." I laughed till I couldn't hardly drive. Betcha I'm not the only one who reads it that way. Pooh, do you remember the Straits of Wanda Fucha?

Gotta laugh sometimes.

2005-10-20T08:16:00.000-07:00

Load of the day: towels.

Had some wonderful rains here. (Flip and I saw a ruby-throated hummingbird at the feeder right in the middle of a downpour. Sweet!)

It takes a couple of hours for the city smell to wash away and the desert smell to come out, but when that creosote fragrance comes washing in the door, it brings peace to your soul. I can just picture, even here in the middle of the ugly city, the desert around Tucson, with saguaro, creosote (aka greasewood) ocotillo, cholla and any number of scrubby grasses, their colors washed vivid by the rain, set on wet earth, stretching to thank the low clouds draping the hills. I guess it's a sign of a desert-raised mind that a low cloudy day is such a thing of wonder. I don't remember thinking a low cloudy day in Tacoma was such a great thing, (perhaps I was always comparing to Tucson...) but I certainly recall that a sunny day was a cause for celebration ("I can't come into work today, the sun is shining....").

Pooh's 25 now. Had her B-day yesterday. She had her fifth birthday when I was in Basic Training. I was 25.

Fascinating perspective, this age. I talk to my mom, who was concerns about her mom (my granny), and concerns about her own retirement etc, and then I talk to Pooh, who is just starting out in her adult life, and here I am inbetween. I can remember 25 pretty well, and 50 is pretty close, and my mom is looking at 70, and I can picture this thread, this blood-thread, woman-thread, this connection stretching foreward and back to infinity (or just around the corner...) and it just makes me wonder. Makes me feel small to think of all those before me (did they have this moment? did they mark it somehow? would I be able to find it) and how they coped in so many different situations that I will never be exposed to. And what about Pooh, and Flip? Will their future be significantly different? Will they too be mothers and have these thoughts? In twenty years can I look at Flip and say "I told you so. I wasn't making it up."?

Well, anyway.

2005-10-12T09:53:00.000-07:00

Autism classroom smack-down!

The Boy came home yesterday with livid bruises on his forehead and a strap-like bruise across his throat. Not the first time for bruises, but the first time this school year and pretty darn mean-looking.

I talked to his teacher this morning, and it turns out that the classroom lost an aide to injury so they've been working short (sounds like he was solo yesterday), and the scenario was this: somebody laughed until they snorted and the snorting upset the Boy and he started hitting himself and that caused more laughing/snorting which caused more hitting ad nauseum. The poor teacher, I can just see him refereeing two or more 100+ lb. no-common-sense-no-self-control-outta-control-nearly-men. He's got a pair to come back for year two.

We discussed the possibility of taking the Boy out for at least one period to a regular classroom, accompanied by an aide, in order to decrease his exposure to inappropriate behaviors (duh, ya think?). So, we'll see how it goes. It's never easy.

Poor Flip. Seems the bank won't let a 14year-old have an account unless they are getting paychecks or something. Hmmm...I suppose I could start cutting her checks for her work here at home....hmmm. She was bumming, but a trip to Dick Blick's helps take the sting out of being too young still.

2005-10-11T08:13:00.000-07:00

Well, hush my mouth. Sitting out on the patio yesterday evening, we saw a hummingbird. guess I'll leave the feeder out a little longer.

Flip was in a good mood yesterday. She watched The Boy while we took our working but stinky gas stove (future post) to the recyclers. Wanna know what a gas stove is worth when you take it to be recycled? $1.40. Yup. I told Wood I'd buy him a drink next time I'm not on call (um...several days from now). Hah. Need to find a cheap place with cheap specials. Sounds like we're having Black Label in the kitchen. (Remember generic label beer?).

At any rate, Flip was singing along with the music and Wood says "What a great kid." So I figure a great kid like that deserves brownies, which reminds me of Wood's birthday last month...

It's his birthday and it's my day off, so I made brownies for his birthday. The Boy was very helpful, (he likes to get the eggs and will occasionally mix the batter and helps lick the spoon. He just hovers at times right at my elbow, so eager to help, it's hard to say get lost, so you just gotta let him help.) The brownies come out of the oven, all hot and shiny, and Hovering Boy starts putting the candy Happy Birthday letters on, just loving it. Over too soon. He sees the candles on the counter (a mere token number, no way in hell am I putting 36 candles on a square pan of brownies) and I tell him, sure, put the candles on. So he proceeds with great deliberation to put candles around the brownies and boop! we're done. So...Flip wanders by a little later and says "where are the candles?" "What?" We look at the brownies and sure enough, the three-inch candles that Hovering Boy put in with such great care are now half-inch little stumpy things. Seems brownies hot out of the oven will indeed melt your average birthday candle within minutes. Within the brownies. I'll bet Wood is one of the few lucky individuals who has ever had premium wax-filled brownies for his birthday. Maybe it'll catch on...but you gotta sing real fast!

well, not really.

2005-10-10T11:11:00.000-07:00

But, since Wood and Flip are SO insistent that I have a voice and (gasp) things to say that might be interesting, I caved.
Hey, it might be fun. I learn things about Flip and Wood and Rachie by reading their sites, mayhaps mine might reveal as well.

As for the title, well, it's just something I do a lot of, and, well, okay. It's a dumb title. I do have definite opinions about how many bath towels constitute a load (6 max-to leave room for sufficient agitation) and which detergent works best (Tide, with a shot of Zout), but I am not the queen of clean.

I merely do the things that need to get done, and think. Wood says "what are you thinking about?", and I have to stop and, well, think. My folks would call it daydreaming or woolgathering (stupid, that, just leave it blow on the wind. Sheep make more). I look at the yard and see the possibilities for future landscaping or the way the wind piles the pine needles here but not there and how much wind does it take to move a pile of needles and how efficient it is to burn the needles versus filling twenty plastic bags that don't decompose but Las Vegas frowns on burning things in your yard (but will often frown and look away if your neighbors trust you and you stand guard with the garden hose). See?

So, here it is October. The hummingbirds that we have enjoyed so much this summer seem to have moved on. Haven't seen any for a couple of weeks. I'll put the feeders away til spring. Probably ought to bring the coleus in before it gets too cold. The pineapple, too. Wonder if it'll ever bloom/fruit? It's two years old now...hmm...here I go....

Okay well, there's an introduction to the blog. Stay tuned for the Laundry Load of the Day.

Welcome to my little corner of this little house in this not-so-little town.