Diarrhea Ch-Ch, Diarrhea Ch-Ch

You're walking down the hall and you see in on the wall, diarrhea ch-ch, diarrhea ch-ch.

Remember that song from when you were a kid?

My upstairs neighbor has diarrhea. Apparently it's a pretty bad case and it doesn't seem to be going away. Don't worry - I don't know this because I can hear him in the bathroom or anything, I know it because he was loudly talking to his mother on the phone the other day, detailing his bowel movements to her. It's gross anyway, I know.

Severe weather alert

There was a severe weather alert on weather.com this morning for the coastal area of southern California. Turns out mild fog is considered severe weather here. So strange...

In NM, when there was a severe weather alert, it was no joke. There were flash floods, thunder storms so loud they would shake the house, snow storms with zero visibility...

Watch out people, the marine layer is thick this morning!

I am Hypocrite, Hear me Roar!

So somehow I've managed to get roped into being a co-chair for a Meal Planning group for my church. Basically, once a month, we get together and discuss tactics for preparing meals, being healthy, and who knows what else. The reason I have no idea is that I've never even gone to this group once so how I ended up co-chair is beyond me.

Regardless, I am and tonight they asked me to prepare a bit about 'snacking healthy' to present to the other ladies. I am having a hard time with this topic because I don't snack healthy. Okay, sometimes I do but other times I don't. And those times that I don't, I really don't. For example I have been known to 'snack' on the following:

1- A giant bowl of popcorn with an entire stick of butter melted and drizzled over it.
2- Nearly an entire pan of brownies.
3- Sometimes I fill up a mug with an abhorrent amount of cheese and I'll zap it in the microwave until it's thoroughly melted. Then I'll eat the whole thing straight.
4- If pizza is around, I'll eat 2 or 3 slices (too many) - and then I'll proceed to eat the toppings and cheese off the rest of the entire pizza.
5- At least half a bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips.
6- Probably about 12 cookies in one sitting.

You get the picture. So what on earth am I doing telling anyone how to snack healthy? I just feel like a chump even broaching the subject. Uhggghh...

Coincidence or cosmic punishment?

Our check engine light came on in our Subaru a few weeks before we moved from NM. We took it in and they told us our evap system needed to be replaced. So we had it replaces, among other general maintenance things. Total cost? Around $1k. A week later our check engine light came on again. Needless to say we were not pleased. We took it back in and they claimed there was nothing wrong with our car - maybe we hadn't screwed the gas cap on tight enough. They turned the light off and tightened the cap and we were off to CA shortly thereafter. Two weeks later (last Friday) the check engine light came on again as Mr X was driving the car to the DMV here to register it. At the DMV they asked him to pull his car around back for an 18-point inspection required for registering out-of-state vehicles in CA. Mr X said OK, walked out the door, got in his car and drove home. Between the engine light and the shattered windshield (courtesy of a shove of a surfboard by Mr X the week before) our poor car wasn't passing the inspection. *sigh* The trouble is that our car's registration in NM runs out at the end of this month and if we can't get it registered here ASAP we are in a precarious situation.

We purchased a new washer & dryer upon our arrival here. They were delivered last Friday and Mr X and I proceeded to get them set up and going. The washer was fine, the dryer didn't work. After some guidance from my dad and some friends here, we determined that it wasn't our faulty installation, but the dryer itself. Home Depot wouldn't let us simply return it - we were required to call a technician...a technician that wouldn't be able to get to us for 3 days. Mr. Technician showed up today and it WAS the dryer - some loose wires I guess.

Mr X and I were settling in for a nice meal and a movie at home on Saturday when about 15 minutes into our show our receiver/DVD player died. It smelled of burnt metal and wouldn't start up again. I guess our surround sound system/DVD player/receiver are all useless now.

This morning as I was on my way to take our car into the shop for the check engine light, I got pulled over and ticketed for speeding. The irritating part is that I was going the same speed or slower than the cars all around me. The reason I got flagged over (the cop was on foot beside his hidden motorcycle) was that there happened to be enough room between me and the car in front of me that he could single me out and run into the middle of the road to signal me over. If I'd been going a little faster and tailgating I'm certain it wouldn't have happened. I have never received a ticket in any other state other than CA and in CA I seem to get pulled over and ticketed an abnormally high amount of times.

Mr X is having a rough go of it at work and he's been totally stressed out because of it all.

Oh - and I got suckered (read: guilted) into playing the piano for the Spanish Branch's main church meeting on Sunday. I haven't touched the piano in 2 and half years. Is this what I get for going to church? I won't re-live the memory of how painful and embarrassing the experience was for me so I won't go into details - it's enough to let you know that there were an inordinate amount of moments where the audience was singing A Capella. I can play the piano....barely. I shouldn't be ALLOWED to play in public ever. It's not a talent I possess, not now or even when I DID practice regularly. (Note: I don't get better with practice - that should tell you something.)

Hopefully this is all a coincidence/bad month rather than just the way our new life here is destined to play out.

Pics of the inside

I know I promised you pictures of the inside of our little duplex so here they are.

This is the front door/entryway. If you're uncontrollably jealous right now of the wooden pepper mill-looking accent in the entryway, I completely understand. Everyone should be so lucky to have this in their homes. :-) (Actually, I do kind of like it - it makes the place a little more unique.)

Here we have the living room. Pretty basic. I don't think the walls were painted before we moved in and the carpet is in dire need of replacement, but that's the life of a renter. Note: We still aren't totally moved in so there's some pictures and still need to go up along with a few other things here and there. But who knows when I'll get around to finishing all that. I've got too much to do what with being unemployed and all.


The kitchen is small but it's bright. I like that the floor is tile rather than linoleum.


This is in the office, in case you were wondering...

The bathroom is actually well put together - since there is only one bathroom, it was very smart of whoever designed this to put the sink and cabinet area outside of the room with the shower/toilet. I like the setup.

How do people land these jobs?

Allow me to fill you in on my neighbors and friends:

First off, we live in a duplex. The guy that lives above us is single and probably mid-forties. As far as I can tell he either works from home or he has no job at all. He's home all day long. He is prone to strange behavior at night. For example, a couple nights ago he was up all night (keeping us up as well) hauling stuff from his place to some other guy's van outside. All. Night. Long. Strange, no? Maybe he's running some sort of illicit business from home. He better not have a meth lab cooking up there, that's all I can say. Some days he appears to sleep all day. Other days he's up at 6 in the morning, just getting back from a nice little bike ride. Anyway - whatever his situation, it's not the norm. Or is it?

Next up - next door neighbor. He appears to also work from home. He keeps fairly regular hours and during the normal working hours he's on his phone constantly. The reason I know he's on the phone all the time isn't because I'm spying on him - it's because he keeps all of his windows open, as do I, and he talks so loudly it's as if he's right here in my house. Since my fig tree leans over onto his property he's a bit possessive of his share of the precious fruit and he runs outside clapping wildly at the birds when they swoop in for some figgy snacks.

Most of Mr X's friends here seem to have abnormal work schedules as well. One of them is the only employee in So Cal so he has an office all to himself. Sometimes he goes into the office and sometimes he doesn't...it appears to be on an as needed basis (this is not to say that he doesn't work hard, he simply has a very flexible situation). Another friend works as a drafter for his boss and he has such a good relationship with his boss that he pretty much sets his own hours as well. Yet another friend owns his own company so he just does what he needs/has to and then also squeezes in what he pleases, as he sees fit - he calls the shots.

I suppose this means Mr X fits in with his friends since he works out of his home office part of the time. But what is strange to me is that it just seems like over here in CA, there is an abundance of 'alternative' work situations and schedules. It's nice to see because I really hope I can make that happen for myself. I got the sense that in ABQ these sort of working situations where somehow frowned upon because I didn't encounter them often there.

What's your take? Are alternative work schedules the norm where you live? I'm curious...

Aahhh! Young love..

Last weekend, Friday to be exact, my little brother came down to visit me. I think this was the third time I've seen my baby brother in about 4+ years. Crazy, huh? Yeah, I'd practically forgotten what he looked like. Kidding. But really people - he never had a single chest hair when I 'used' to know him so it was weird to see that he's got way more chest hair than my own husband now. Anyway, my brother wanted to introduce his girlfriend to us so she came as well. That was nice. She seems like a fun young lady and she makes R (my brother) happy (maybe giddy is a better word) so that's good. She's got some points against her in my book though because she could probably fit her entire body into one leg of my pants. So basically I look enormous next to her. :-)

Here is R and his lady-friend, H. They are standing in the cactus gardens in Balboa Park, San Diego.

Here's more of the cactus gardens.

Here is the Prado in Balboa Park. It's a beautiful place.

This is the Atrium at Balboa Park. Below are some of the plants in (or around) it.

This picture reminds me of New Mexico so this is for you NM.

We took R & H to the Children's Pool in La Jolla to see the seals.

Here are 3 of the seals - they kind of blend in with the rocks so look closely.

We also took R & H surfing that afternoon. The surf was small but that was good since H doesn't know how. She was a good sport and even caught a few waves. Both she and R stayed out until they started turning purple.

I had a nice time and it was good to see family again. Hopefully they enjoyed themselves as much as we did.

Figs and Toasted Almonds Brie

This is what I ended up making with some of my figs. Mine didn't look as pretty as this but it was really good. I would definitely make it again. Here's the recipe, if you're interested:

INGREDIENTS

1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tablespoons water
6 fresh figs, stemmed and quartered
1 (14 ounce) round 4 1/4-inch diameter round Brie cheese
1/2 cup toasted almonds
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 C).

Heat brown sugar and water in a small saucepan over medium heat until sugar is completely dissolved. Add figs and vanilla, and cook until softened, about 10 minutes. Stir in almonds. Place brie wheel in a baking dish, and pour fig mixture over the top.
Bake in the preheated oven for 10 to 15 minutes, or until softened but not melted. Serve with crackers.

Views from my tiny apartment

Okay, Mr X was my hero and found the camera cord for our computer last night. Isn't that nice? So here are some of the pictures I took so far. These are just the pictures of our back yard and the lovely views from our patio. I'll post pictures of our actual apartment later. It's not quite photo ready yet.

This first one is of our back yard. The hedge in front has these tiny white flowers that are very fragrant and I've always loved them. I actually tried to grow them in NM. They seem to be doing okay so far there. The tree you see is the fig tree. The pink stuff is from the bougainvillea that drapes over our patio. Some of the other bushes are Oleanders. The reason I took so many yard pictures is probably because in NM there's an abundance of rocks and dirt, so I am obsessing over anything green and lush and flowery these days.

This is a close up of some of our figs. I'm pretty sure this one got stolen yesterday though... *sigh* If anyone knows of any good fig recipes, send them my way please. I plan on picking them all and using them before the gardeners come back for more next week.

This is a close of of the Oleander bloom.

This is a close up of those tiny fragrant flowers in the hedges.

This is our grass! Yes, we have grass instead of rocks now. I love how the bougainvillea drops all it's petals all over our grass all the time. Maybe some would think it is annoying and messy but I think it's lovely.

These last pictures are the view we have from our back patio. Of course we can't see the surf, but we can see the ocean for sure. I absolutely love it. When our apartment seems too stuffy and small I can just go out to the patio and see this view - it reminds me that I don't care so much about the frustrations of small living spaces when I can see this.

This last picture is the of the flowers Mr X bought for me upon our arrival here. He knew I wanted to make our little apartment as 'pretty' as possible so he bought me some flowers to help. He's so sweet.

Peculiar don't you think?

I am curious if this has ever happened to any of you out there:

Every now and again I lose sensation in my toes. Not all of my toes. Just one or two at a time. It typically lasts about a week or so and then I mysteriously (and thankfully) regain the feeling in those toes again. It doesn't happen often either - usually once every year or two. It pretty much drives me crazy and when it does happen I can be seen banging on my toe(s) or massaging the little things like mad or sometimes even poking at them with things that should hurt a bit. Nothing.

Speaking of figs...

Today the gardeners came to tidy up our yard. The did a nice job - trimming, mowing, raking, watering, etc. And then, right before they left, they came back and STOLE my figs! Yup, right in front of me they picked 4 or 5 and took off! I suppose technically they are Dudley's figs since he's the landlord, but I'm renting right now so they are MINE. I had great plans for some figgy pudding. *sigh*

It's NOT like riding a bike...

I'm sure you wouldn't mind seeing some pictures of our palatial pad right about now. Or maybe some photos of the lush greenery here (including the fig tree in my back yard). You'd probably like to see some pictures of the sparkling rolling ocean at the very least. The good news is that I have been diligently snapping all of these pictures for the sole purpose of giving good blog. The bad news is that I can't find the special cable that connects my camera to my computer anywhere. I'm really annoyed about it and I'm NOT going to go out and buy another because the second I do I'll come home to find that cord magically laying in the middle of our living room floor. Or something similar. So I will double my efforts to find that cord so I can put some pretty pictures up for all of those that want to live vicariously near the ocean through my blog.

I've gone surfing a few times since I got here and I have to say that I was surprised to learn that surfing is not like riding a bike. At all. I think I'm worse now than I was the first time I tried to learn. My balance is off, the sweet spot on my board is elusive and I'm completely illiterate when it comes to reading the waves. BUT...yesterday I finally caught a few waves and even clumsily rode them all the way in. And then I couldn't stop smiling.

On being unemployed

I have been officially unemployed for 10 days now. Many people have told me to relax and try to enjoy the time away from work. When they said this I nodded and smiled and took their words to heart, promising myself that I would indeed follow this sound advice. This morning I have come to the conclusion that relaxing and unemployment do not mesh where I'm concerned. I feel edgy and nervous and, more frustrating than all, useless. I feel like I'm not pulling my weight or contributing. I feel like everybody (including myself) is watching, waiting to see if and when I'll get a job. Aside from a few months post-college graduation, I've had a job consistently since I was 15. So naturally after 15 years of working, it is a foreign thing to be unemployed. I am fully confident that lacking a job wouldn't bother me one bit (I've got better things to do with my time, right?) if we didn't financially need me to bring in more money. But we do and thus the anxiousness will likely not abate until I've not only secured a job, but worked at that job for a few months. (There's always the initial worry for me that a few weeks into the job I'll get fired for incompetence or something.)

This morning I applied for several jobs. Keep your fingers crossed for me and say some prayers please.