Updates

• turtle's good! With its quick onset and resolution, we're thinking a touch of food poisoning.
• We received several very lovely things in the mail last night, including secret Christmas giftables, some awesome books for turtle, some new dyes for my tie-dyeing and a TOTALLY EXCELLENT messenger bag that someone made for me. I'll post photos of it when I have a chance.
• I've just heard from some mutual friends that toad has housing, at least for now. Hot damn and hallelujah!
  

I know better than to let the radio silence fool me
Last night, I arrived home from work to find turtle puking her guts out--we're thinking food poisoning or a touch of some gastrointestinal yuckitude, but whatever it was, it was unpleasant, for sure.

Naturally, in the midst of that, toad started calling again. I missed the first call, picked up the second and told her it wasn't a good time and she'd have to call some other time, and picked up the third and talked with her. She doesn't have housing, she needs friends she can rely on and she doesn't know many people here anymore. And that's fine, but it doesn't tell me what she thinks she wants from me. I told her that I don't have money to give her ("I wouldn't take your money, anyway! I don't need it!") nor do I have a place for her to stay.

She wants me to find a friend of mine she can stay with and/or rent from. I told her, straight out, that there's no way in hell I'm recommending her as a renter or a houseguest, given that it took ten months to get her to leave my house after we split. She argued the point, claiming that she left in May. She wanted to argue more, I told her that it didn't matter, that it was still MONTHS and I wasn't going to recommend her to anyone because of it.

She played the "I was your partner for YEARS" card and told me that if I were in need, she'd do whatever she could. Which is bullshit and I told her so--she wouldn't have even answered her phone.

In the end, I told her that I can't help her and that I need her to quit calling me.

I'm not holding my breath.

Scenes from the camping

And, home again
We're back from a lovely weekend of camping in Ohio near the Indiana line--nice to be home again, but I'm sad that that's our last big trip of the summer. We did plan another trip with some of the folks we met on this last one, so that's cool, but I'm all melancholy about the end of summer.

toad continues to loom on the edges of things. I spoke with her briefly the night before we left. When it became clear that it was going to be another marathon conversation with me suggesting ways to find housing (craigslist, university housing lists, queer newspaper) for her to reject (too impersonal, doesn't want "student" housing, too impersonal), I wished her luck with her search and hung up. I didn't have cell service at the campground and it looks like she called a few times. Hopefully, she'll leave me be, but I'm not really holding my breath.

We're having big, serious money stress. Things will be okay in the long run, but the short run is really, really hard. I'm ready for things to be better any time now.

Updates on all and sundry
Mason has a bladder infection. Naturally, because he's my boy, he refused to pee for them yesterday and had to be kept overnight. The good news is plentiful: no crystals, nothing that we did wrong, and they gave him an antibiotic shot rather than pills or drops, which is AWESOME. He's down to a svelte 15 pounds (he was 22 for a while) and very happy to be home! We missed the heck out of him!

toad called again last night--she's all kinds of freaked out because she doesn't have a place to live, yet resistant to doing anything that might result in housing (like, for example, answering an ad). I listened, offered nothing and did my best to keep her sister in the loop, at said sister's request.

Finally, please send up a prayer for Banou and her family--their fabulous, gigantic, fuzzy, wonderful, hilarious Buddy died unexpectedly yesterday. The whole Village will miss him, but especially his girls, Small Friends C and H.

More on toad
My former colleague, J, said that toad came over to their house last night just after 7. They didn't want to deal with her, so they didn't answer the door. She stayed anyhow, and waited for them, even after my colleague had her sister swing by and say, "Oh, did we miss them? We're meeting up--they must have left already!" toad was there for over an hour, waiting for them to show up. They finally came outside and told her that she needs to quit coming by, that they can't help her.

She apparently spent the night before last in her car at a rest stop in the next town over.

J's partner called the crisis center today and was told pretty much what I'd told them--that toad knows what she's doing and knows how to get people to do what she wants them to do and that if they let her stay, they're unlikely to be able to get her to leave.

A prayer for Mason Winston, please
He's at the vet. They're keeping him until he pees. We're not sure what's wrong, but he's straining to urinate and doing so in unacceptable places.

Poor little mancat.

Just when I thought it was all good...
I was home sick yesterday. I had a bad headache and intestinal distress and, frankly, I was a mess over this whole toad thing. I HATE it that I had to tell her to quit calling me. I HATE it that she put me in that position.

HATE.

This morning, I returned to work to find an email from a former colleague and current friend. She and I worked together about ten years ago and got to be friends, though we don't keep up much anymore. toad and I went to a Christmas party hosted by her and her partner once and to an Oscars party once. On Saturday, toad showed up at their house, telling them she's back in town and has nowhere to stay. She never actually asked if she could stay with them, but kept on saying she has "nowhere to go."

When this friend asked toad whether she's in touch with me, toad's response was, "Not really, no. She has a family, now," which at least means that she HEARD me when I told her that I have other priorities and can't be at her beck and call. Of course, when my friend and I spoke this morning, her first comment was to congratulate me for being a mom. Mleh.

In any case, toad's been calling her several times a day, showing up at their house and last night they pretty much had to boot her out after 10 p.m. They offered to pay for three nights of a hotel stay for her while she got some long-term housing set up, but she declined.

I just have no idea what to make of any of this.

Have I mentioned that she's got a job a block from my office?

A hundred foods you should eat
Those I've eaten are in bold.
1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. Peanut butter and jelly sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi (mango lassi and sweet lassi)
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin (Interesting. http://www.smokymountainnews.com/issues/3_01/3_07_01/back_then.shtml)
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frogs’ legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake

toad. AGAIN.
Her temporary housing fell through--she started calling last night about 7:30. At 4 or so today I told her that I couldn't help her, I'm sure she'll figure it out and that she shouldn't call again, please.

I feel like a first-class asshole, but it had to be done.

Facebook
I love Facebook--I've gotten reconnected with all sorts of people. The exchange student we hosted for a summer when I was 15 found me. I found my best friend from sixth grade who moved away the summer after. I'm even connected, now, with a woman who went to my high school but we didn't know each other, and it turns out that she's now friends with a bunch of my friends, having met them in seminary.

What I don't love is the eggs that hatch into horses or pasta dishes or whatever. They freak me out.

Signs
Last week, turtle and I spent more than our fair share of time standing in line, mostly at the school turtle will start in the fall (I'm beyond thrilled for her--she event got grant money to pay for her tuition, fees and books!). There was one moment, in particular, when we were standing there and I was debating about whether I should tell her about the guy two back from us who was waiting to speak to a financial aid counselor. He was wearing plush ears and a long tail.

I told her, figuring there was no way in hell she'd believe me later. I was right!

Camping with Superdad and Annoyingboy
A few weeks ago, we did a little camping at a horse camp. It's a cool little out of the way campground with no electric and one pump for water. It's quiet and shady and just lovely.

Or it was until Superdad and Annoyingboy arrived.

Honestly, that's not entirely true, because we had a run in with Bitchy Little Preteen before they arrived, which included her walking through our campsite WHILE WE WERE THERE to go to the bathroom. When I asked her to please use the road on her way out, that she was cutting through our campsite, she responded with an exasperated, "FINE!" and a toss of her hair. That would have been fine--the tacks in our tent beneath our air mattress were NOT fine, nor were the nails in our tire. Little shit.

It's my guess that Superdad has weekend visitation with his 7 year old son and it's his goal to pack as much fun and joy into his time as possible, and I totally understand that, but that requires more planning than Superdad did. They arrived at the campsite at about 8 p.m.--closing in on dark with that many trees--and they had to pitch their tent in the dusk/dark, which is never fun.

It's less fun when you haven't eaten, and Superdad and Annoyingboy hadn't eaten. Annoyingboy had a whiny, sing-song voice and used it for EVERY SYLLABLE UTTERED. Superdad had no idea what to do with him.

It was tough to get the fire started. They brought no firewood, just a hacksaw, which Superdad used to fell small trees bordering the site. All the while, Annoyingboy whined about being hungry and cold and bored.

Annoyingboy finally nearly fell into the fire and Superdad redirected him to sparklers, which he suggested that he light on his own.

Moving beyond the kid plan
As I've said here, we're done ttc. I'm not totally over it (nor do I expect to be--it's been just a few months since we found out that our final attempt yielded nothing), but I'm working on doing some things for myself and for us as a couple that might sort of fill in some of the space I've been holding open for kids.

Right now, our basement is a playroom. The toys and books are mostly there. I painted a chalkboard on the wall on one end of the room. turtle and I talked some this morning and have decided to re-purpose the room into a place for arts and crafts. I already do my tie dye in the laundry room (which is also in the basement), but this would give us some storage (and crafting space) for the jewelry making, the painting and drawing, and maybe the swapping, even.

We have three bedrooms--one is ours, one is the office (and where I keep my swapping stuff) and one is the kid room. The crib is in there, as is the twin bed and all manner of crap that we've been tossing in there because there's no good spot to put it. We're also reorganizing that space--the crib will go back to its home (or to the attic), all the kid stuff will be stored, sold or traded, and we're going to move my clothes in there so I'll have a dressing room of sorts. Right now (and for the foreseeable future), turtle's schedule is later than mine and she hates it when I'm running in and out in the morning, getting ready. So, this will solve that part, as well as giving us more space in our bedroom.

We're also trying to go camping more often. I don't know how not camping has been part of getting ready for kids (though when we were ttc, it made more sense not to go because of the temping and the swim teams and whatever, and maybe in terms of saving our money), but we haven't gone as much as we'd like. We're changing that--we went twice last week when I was on vacation, we're going overnight on Saturday and we're meeting up with a bunch of folks in Ohio in a few weeks for a long weekend.

If you've got any other suggestions for how to ease this transition, I'm listening.

It's 6 a.m. and I've been up for two hours. You?
Sometimes when I'm quiet here, it's because I'm out having fun--camping, spending time with the Small Friends, making tie-dye, reading--you know. Fun.

Sometimes, though, I'm quiet here because I'm not coping. This is one of those times.

The fact that toad is back in town is stressing me out like you would not believe. I have a CV to reformat and I hate that kind of thing but we really need the money. The cat boxes need to be changed. I need to vacuum. I need to load the photos of my new stock. I need to set up an etsy shop for turtle's jewelry. I need to quit smoking. Again.

Stressed. So very stressed.

Back to the formatting.

A break from the formatting to add this:



Cute new stuff at dyetyke, including some black and red combos that are TOTALLY hot.

Behold Lorenzo, the mighty hunter

Beach muck advisory: Please do not eat the beach muck*
We had a mostly fabulous time camping--the less fabulous was pretty darn entertaining and will come up in a future post, no doubt! We spent a few nights near turtle's extended family last weekend--her grandfather had a big birthday so we did the party thing, hung out with various family members, and I ate my weight in marshmallows (which I love, but only over a campfire).

Then, we spent a few nights along Lake Huron--the weather was perfect, the company was wonderful, and turtle's nephew is now SIX!

In other news, toad has apparently arrived in town. I haven't heard from her, which is just fine with me. Hopefully she'll get settled and soon--from what I gather, she has no job, nowhere to live and no cell phone at this point. Yuck.

*Title is from a sign on the beach--of which I have no photo, of course.