Technical Difficulties

On Tuesday of last week, Daulton was sick. When he came in to work, he told me this. I let him go work on a puzzle in the Community Room. Five minutes later I heard him rush to the bathroom and was then treated to the sound of him vomiting for awhile.
Anna got sick at work on Wednesday, but she said she felt better after she puked. I know I often feel better after puking.
It has snowed a decent amount the past week. Schools were cancelled last Monday. Some were cancelled last Tuesday, and those that weren't had two-hour delays. Snow was cancelled again on Thursday, and if it weren't for finals, I'm sure it would have been cancelled on Friday as well. The kids at church definitely wanted the snow day on Friday. I know at least one of them was indignant that they didn't cancel school on Friday, and thus she went into school completely unprepared for the finals that awaited her.
I had to clear the sidewalks a few times.
Anna's Christmas presents arrived today.
Anna's friend Chelsey decided to have a Christmas concert/fundraiser thing that featured herself. She asked Anna to sing a couple of songs with her. It was Friday night. Anna and Chelsey actually sound very good together, but on her own, I'm tempted to hit Chelsey with a brick (it's impossible to make you understand what she does when she sings without you actually hearing her, so I won't even try). They sang Christmas songs. People were impressed (naturally).
On our way home, the window on the driver's side door got stuck half-way down. It stubbornly refused to shut. I ended up driving it out to Anna's parents so I could borrow their car while we left the Explorer in their garage.
Anna had to work Saturday until one, and at two, we had one last practice scheduled for the Christmas program. While Anna was at work, I went in search of fog machine liquid to use as an effect in the program. I figured my best bet was checking party stores. Google Maps told me there was a Party City in the outlets in Edinburgh, but it lied. I wasted quite awhile circling the building, making sure I hadn't missed it. By the time I realized Google maps had lied to me, I also realized I had an hour and a half to find fog liquid before I had to be back to pick up Anna from work. The next closest party stores were in Greenwood, which is a 40 minute drive. I floored it. Except, I was driving an thirty year old diesel BMW, and it had a horrible time trying to reach highway speed. When I reached Greenwood, I realized every person in Indiana and all of their out-of-state relatives were Christmas shopping, and the roads were insane. I finally made my way into Party City. I located the fog machines. I located the empty space above the fog machine liquid label. I looked at the clock and figured that if I headed back to Columbus at that moment, I would be on time to pick up Anna. I checked Google Maps, and it told me there was a USA Party Supply up the road a couple miles. I hopped in the car, cussed at traffic, and finally made it. Fortunately, they did have the liquid I needed. I floored it all the way back to Columbus, and I ended up getting Anna fifteen minutes late. She didn't kill me though, so that was good.
Cade kept doing jigs and yelling the songs during practice. He didn't know his lines, and he gave Anna a constant narration of his train-of-thought even while she was trying to have everyone act like it was the actually performance. We were terrified of what would happen on Sunday. (Remember, this is the same kid who threw a bell during a song at Easter)
Anna promised the kids pizza after play practice. Cade had been told by his father that he couldn't have any pizza since he was going to a party afterwards and shouldn't ruin his appetite. Anna knew this, so she didn't give Cade any pizza. Cade sat and cried. One of the other adults didn't know about the party and gave Cade some pizza. Cade was happy again. I felt bad when Cade wasn't eating pizza. I know I would have probably cried too when I was his age. Heck, I probably would have punched someone.
Sunday was the day of the program. To sum it up, everything we thought would go wrong didn't, and everything we were sure about went wrong, or I could shorten that to "technical difficulties." In the space between the first and the second songs, some of the kids were supposed to be changing while others continued to act. When the time for the second song came, I called the kids who had changed back onto the stage. During the song, I heard a noise behind me and turned to find three of the kids who were supposed to be out on stage singing telling me they hadn't realized they were supposed to be out there yet. I just had them sit still. The fog machine didn't work when the time came to use it (that was especially painful to me, considering my adventure to get the fog liquid). For one scene, we wanted to project a video depicting the manger scene. When the time came for that, I went to hit "Play" and realized someone had unplugged the projector. It took a couple minutes for the thing to heat up and be ready to play. Anna actually got to announce to the congregation that we were having technical difficulties. Perhaps the most annoying incident though was during out black-light hands performance (We had on white gloves, had the sanctuary dark, and made shapes with our hands in front of black-lights. I think it was pretty cool.) Partway through the song, the speakers started cutting in and out and crackling badly. We were using a stereo connected to the bigger sound system. Sometimes the sound would come out of the system, sometimes it would come out of half the system, sometimes it only came out of the smaller stereo speakers, and sometimes it even cut out completely. We still aren't sure what happened to cause it, but it was super distracting. The kids held it together though. Then when it was all said and done, we found out that the video camera we had purchased for the purpose of being able to record this program had quit shortly into the performance.
Technical difficulties.
Tebow didn't get killed on Sunday. I was wrong. Now they are saying he will start the last two games. At least the stands won't be empty.
I think the Broncos best bet is to trade their top five draft pick for some second round picks in the draft and build up their defense. Oh enver Broncos, you've taken the "D" out of Denver.
Sunday night was the family Christmas for Anna's mother's side. Anna's mother has something like 10 siblings (I'm really not sure), and there were at least thirty people at Anna's parent's house for this party. Anna and I tried to hide downstairs with her cousins, Scott and Rachel and play Wii. Unfortunately, Daulton showed up, along with a couple other midget relatives, so we had to pretend we would rather watch Christmas movies on TV in order to keep them from playing with the Wii. Even so, Daulton kept asking if he could play Wii.
Toward the end of the evening, everyone was forced together for a family picture. When it was done, Daulton kept saying that he wanted "a photo of that picture." He, honest to goodness, used that exact phrase multiple times. I told Anna and Rachel, I would like to make sure he does get a photo of that picture. I'll just make sure it's taken from far far away.
A little girl kept following Daulton around and calling him Justin Bieber. This was hilarious. But you know, if you put freckles on Justin Bieber and gave her darker hair, she might look an awful lot like Daulton. Poor Daulton, as a pre-pubescent boy, he looks like a pre-pubescent girl.
Yesterday morning, I took Anna to work and then picked up the Explorer and took it into the shop. The shop is a mile from our apartment, so I figured I'd just walk back after I dropped off the car, but when one of the employees at the shop saw me walking they hopped in a car and offered to drive me. When the car was finished though, I didn't have someone to take to get it, so I walked. This would be fine normally, except it turns out I had to walk the majority of the way through very dense snow that was beginning to crust over. I definitely rolled my ankle a little. And my shoes, which were finally starting to dry out from clearing all the snow last week, are still wet as I write this. But the window is no longer stuck.
Daulton's last day was today. It is now Christmas break of the kids. Maybe this time Daulton will stay out of trouble, and I won't ever have to see him again. Except I'll probably have to see him on Christmas day when we go to Anna's grandmother's (the nice one) Christmas party. And then of course, I'll have to see him next Christmas as well. That is providing he doesn't actually end up in jail by that time.
Now that I think about it, I think we do have some wrapping paper here. This means I can wrap Anna's present without having to worry about sneaking it over to her parent's without her seeing it.
People who read this blog: Jana
You all knew Jana read this blog, but this time she is doing it from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. This is exciting because it adds another country to those that have visited this blog. Have fun riding elephants and eating monkey brains, Jana.
Happy Kwanzaa, everyone.

Daulton Again

Daulton is 16. He still hasn't hit puberty. In fact, he still talks with that hard to understand little kid voice that most five year olds have. Sometimes I really do struggle to figure out what he's saying.
I was checking the mailbox last Tuesday before I opened up the office, and I glanced out into the parking lot. A small child was exiting a car. I was confused. Why wasn't this small child in school. This small child approached. Yeah, you know who it was.
I'm pretty sure the first thing out of Daulton's mouth was "Are you mad at me, Geoff? Are you mad at me for getting in trouble again? It wasn't my fault. I didn't do anything." But of course, it might also have been, "I murdered several people and have been trafficking drugs for the Mafia." I couldn't really say.
As near as I can tell, this is Daulton's explanation for how he ended up back with me (I can't be positive about all of this because I was serious about him talking like a five year old kid). According to Daulton, it all started at a party. Apparently Daulton is cool enough and mature enough to hang out at parties with people his age. But he promised me there were no drugs or alcohol at this party. So Daulton and the other party-goers were minding their own business when a couple of punks showed up with guns and such and crashed the party. Daulton, of course, ran for his life. These punks decided he was a good target, so they hit him with a car. This car then caused enough damage that Daulton was hospitalized and prescribed hydrocodone for his pain. When Daulton went back to school something (he won't tell me what, he says he doesn't remember) made him so angry that the hydrocodone interacted with his ADHD medication , and he passed out. (This is the part that is especially unclear to me) I think he implied that he did some crazy stuff before he passed out, but again, he says he doesn't remember. In any case, he claims he woke up in the hospital and was informed that he was kicked out of school again.
As for Macy, I hadn't seen her for a week prior to Daulton showing up. If I had to guess, I would say that she quit coming to school altogether, was officially dumped from the program, and is now spending a month in juvenile detention.
Anna's sick.
Church was snowed out last night. This cost us one of our last practices before the children's Christmas program. I think they'll be alright though. They've worked hard.
George and Katie receive "meals-on-wheels" dinners. There's a cycle of at least five different people who deliver these meals. One particular lady is always accompanied by a young man with obvious mental and physical issues. From the little contact I've had with him, I would guess he has the mental competency of a toddler. He can talk, but it's never more than a repeated "hi" like you would get from a friendly four year old. On Wednesday, they were here to deliver meals. After they left, Daulton tells me "Hey Geoff, that guy just called me an "n" word. I should have punched him in his face, shouldn't I?" I tried to tell Daulton that I doubted that guy said any such thing and that he was mentally challenged. Daulton insisted that he should still have punched the guy in the face. I tried to convince him that he just misunderstood the guy, but I don't think Daulton bought it.
An old friend of Anna's parents, who attends church with us, invited Anna, her parents, and me over for dinner on Friday night. I'm pretty sure it's a Christmas tradition that she and Anna's parents have dinner together, and now that we live in the area, Anna and I are involved in the tradition too. It was nice. She had some homemade jelly. I ate way too many biscuits.
It snowed a few inches yesterday. There really wasn't that much snow, but it drifted badly. I couldn't open the porch door to take Daisy outside.
Anna's supposed to work in the morning. I don't know if she's going to be well enough to go. Unfortunately, she's supposed to call in two hours in advance if she's going to miss work. Thus, I think she's going to wake up at 5 a.m. tomorrow to see how she feels. No one feels well at 5 a.m.
Someone take this box of Mike and Ike's away from me.
I bought Anna some pseudoephedrine yesterday. As I'm sure you know, you have to sell your soul to the devil to be able to purchase the stuff. It always makes me feel like a criminal when they ask to see my driver's license in order to buy something.
I'm not looking forward to the Broncos' rebuilding process. This isn't going to be pretty.
McDaniels took a team that hadn't gone worse than 7-9 (except for the year following Elway's retirement) since 1990 and turned it into one of the worst in the NFL. Right now, I contend that they are the worst team in the NFL. I think the Panthers would beat us like a redheaded step-child. We won't win another game this year. Poor Studesville. This isn't his fault. He never had a chance.
It is times like these when I am grateful that there is hope to be found in the Rockies.

I'm Conflicted

Jon, I dedicate this post to you. Your griping has given me the motivation to do this.
The Broncos just fired the best coach they ever had. I can't believe they would let a gem like McDaniels get away.
I fixed most of Thanksgiving dinner. I made the turkey. I made the dressing. I made the potatoes. I made the gravy. I made an asiago strata. No one dead. It was a minor miracle.
I was shooting to have everything ready to eat at 1 p.m. At 12:45 I was on schedule but then my phone rang. Bobbie had locked herself out. Anna and her mom volunteered to go let Bobbie in so I could finish the cooking. That was very kind of them. They will be sainted by the Catholic church for their goodness. I wanted to murder Bobbie. I am not kind. I might have throttled her if I had gone to let her in. Her carelessness delayed our Thanksgiving dinner by over half an hour. There is a special place in Hell for people who delay Thanksgiving dinner.
Anna had to work at 6 a.m. on one of the week days following Thanksgiving. At three that morning, the emergency pull cord alarm started going off. I bolted out of bed, threw some clothes on, grabbed my keys, and rushed into the hallway. In the hallway, I found Beulah standing outside of her apartment and the emergency light blinking over her door. So had she set her bed on fire? Had she just subdued a cat-burglar? Had her cable stopped working? No. She "heard" Katie fall out of bed (Beulah lives in the apartment next to Katie). Like heck she heard Katie fall out of bed. Beulah is nearly as deaf as Katie. Beulah can't hear it if you bang on her door. And of course, Katie can't hear it if you knock on her door. So there was no way of actually verifying that Katie was alright without entering her apartment at three in the morning to see if she was in bed or not. Apparently Beulah had been trying to knock on Katie's door, and obviously, the best thing to do when she didn't get a response was to pull her own emergency alarm to wake me up. So I stood there at three in the morning wondering how on earth to make Beulah go to bed and turn the stupid alarm off. I knew the Katie had her own emergency pull cord. I also knew that Katie wears a "help! I've fallen, and I can't get up" alarm around her neck. If she fell out of bed and couldn't get up, she'd be able to use those herself. If she fell out of bed and was dead, well, then she was dead. There was no reason for me to go into her apartment to check on her, even if Beulah thought she heard something. This was my solution: I walked outside, waited a second, came back in and informed Beulah that I could see nothing wrong through Katie's windows and told her to go to bed and shut off the freaking alarm.
I can't tell of all these people are getting crazier all at once or if I am just getting really sick of them.
Bobbie regularly just walks into other people's apartments.
The other day she was walking around the building for at least an hour, muttering about how she'd be ashamed to live in such filth (referring to Katie and George and Alice and who knows who else she thinks is filthy).
I quoted this on Facebook, but it's worth repeating. The other day, Bobbie came into the office and was talking to me about who knows what. In middle of the conversation, she announced that "Columbus wants to name that school over there (there's an elementary a block away) after me. I've worked my whole life. Dr. Shed says there's nothing wrong with my mind. I'm just stressed."
I keep listening to this new song "Waiting for the End" by Linkin Park, on repeat. I'm not a big Linkin Park fan, but this might be the best thing I've heard out of mainstream music in.....ever.
We keep practicing for the Christmas program. Sometimes I'm afraid Anna's head will explode from stress.
Gray.
I put up the Christmas tree the other day. Chief promptly made it look like poop. I'm not sure if it's even worth trying to put the ornaments back on it that he's torn off. Maybe if he knocks more than half of them off, I will put half of the ones he has knocked off back on. If I keep doing that, I can at least make sure there is always one ornament on the tree.
My ear itches.
The furnace for the common areas of the building is broken. It's rather chilly on the hallway.
I guess this is the point where I talk about what you really want to know. Just what is my reaction to the Donkeys firing McDummy (I know that's lame, but the better ones are also filled with expletives)?
There are pros and cons to this move. The biggest pro to me is that McDaniels can't do anymore personnel damage. He won't be able to jack up another draft, and he won't be able to trade away talent for people who will ride the bench. This also is a sign that the Denver ownership honestly does care that the Broncos club at least appears to have integrity. There's a reason the Patriots are thought of as an evil empire. This was one of my biggest reasons for not wanting McDaniels hired in the first place, and I am glad that it was a factor in his removal. This will also mean that McDaniels won't be poking around in the defense anymore. He took an above average defense last year and turned it epically bad by deciding the defensive coordinator was too competent (or something). Hopefully, this will also teach ownership a lesson and prevent them from giving the power of the general manager to the head coach.
There are other pros, but those are the major ones. Unfortunately there are also cons.
Instead of McDaniels getting a chance to prove himself in a third year, we are going to have to watch another coach rebuild the team that he decimated. Remember, McDaniels was supposed to be an instant success. The Broncos were supposed to be a playoff team last year. Except that instead of sticking with the team he was handed, McDaniels shipped out nearly 80% of that roster in the past two years. Now we have one of the worst teams in football, and it's much harder to bring in talent than it is to ship it out. And even when we do get the talent in, it is going to take time for it all to gel. Also, what happens to Tebow? What happens to Orton? What happens to Quinn? Is Tebow going to get a fair chance with another coach? But it's possible that they might just play Tebow to put butts in the seats. If that's the case, will Orton get shoved aside for someone who isn't ready to play?
The bottom line is that I am glad McDaniels is gone. I think that it's the right move. I don't care that the Broncos have to pay three coaches next year. I'm just not looking forward to the rebuilding process that the Broncos have coming.
I would like to point out something I said last year before the season even started. I wondered then, and I am almost certain now that McDaniels was just a plant by Belichick to destroy an opponent from the inside out. That seems to be the common thread to all the coaches that have emerged from his coaching tree.
So yeah, that's it.
Oh, and Daulton is back.

Out of Order

Anna and I were jolted out of sleep at about 6 a.m. on Tuesday morning by the sound of frantic violent knocking on our door. I scrambled for some clothes and rushed to the door. I glanced through the peephole and saw nothing, so I opened the door and stepped into the hall. I still saw nothing. I started to check down the other hall when I heard the same knocking, this time on someone else's door. It was George. He was beating on Pat's door with his cane. I asked him what was wrong. He needed a quarter. I was ready to commit murder. I did give George a quarter because I did not want George to keep going down the hallway banging on people's doors with his cane.
One of our dryers is broken. I have it clearly labeled as "Out of Order." But apparently having a sign posted on a dryer over-top the coin slot and control panel isn't enough to tell an illiterate person you might not want to use this dryer. Apparently it's also not enough of a clue that the dryer's display lights are not on. You know how I know this? George needed a quarter because Katie put all of her quarters into the broken dryer. I was ready to commit double homicide.
One of the washing machines has been leaking onto the laundry room floor. I had the repairman out today to fix it. When we entered the laundry room, we discovered George and Katie in there up to their old tricks. And what do you know? Katie put all of her quarters into the still broken dryer. I was regretting not committing those murders.
Macy faked illness on Monday and Thursday to get out of going to Restart. I was talking to Anna about her, and how much she depresses me. I don't see how she has any hope for a decent life. I cannot imagine she actually graduates high school. I can't even picture her making it out of her freshman year. How can people have the ability to make such life changing decisions before they understand the consequences?
UnderOath just released a new album. I was never really a huge fan of them, but I think I really like this new album. Dispensing with their drummer/clean vocalist has done them a world of good.
I'm thirsty. I have a bunch of AriZona Pomegranate Green Tea in the car. I don't have it sitting in a gold plated person refrigerator next to my computer. My life is fail.
When I do get ridiculously wealthy, Jana I am going to buy your soul and make you my slave. That way you can spend the rest of your life in misery under my capitalist pig reign.
Daisy smells like a swamp monster's anal glands.
We got a new bookshelf. It is located conveniently so that it makes a good place to drop off any mail or bills that we get and need to keep within easy reach. Unfortunately, Howie decided this bookshelf makes a good perch. He now intentionally shoves everything off the top so that he can lay down comfortably.
Anna works too hard. Someone should give her a billion dollars so that she can retire.
Bobbie told me today that Alice shoved her and shook her. I don't know if this is true or not. If it is true then Bobbie deserved it.
Goodnight people. Hugs not drugs.

John had a girlfriend

Last week apparently, the police pulled a dead body out of a shack across the street. Anna and I were on our way out to the car when we ran into Mike. He informed us of this. When we walked outside, sure enough, there were a bunch of cops surrounding a shack across the street with a bunch of onlookers. According to Mike, the person had been dead for several days.
Macy quit Restart on Wednesday. Don't worry. Her probation officer intervened, and she was back on Thursday. According to Macy, she just got sick of the whole school thing on Wednesday and decided the best course of action was to simply walk out of the program. I guess her probation officer managed to convince her that three hours at restart for another month and a half was better than juvenile detention for a month, with no chance to ever go back to school again.
We gave Daisy a bath the other day, but she stinks again.
I'm out of AriZona Pomegranate Green Tea again. No one has ever suffered more.
On Thursday, John came in to the office with a woman I hadn't seen before. She announced that she was his girlfriend and that she wanted to move in with him. I told her that I would have to contact my boss about it since I didn't know if non-relations could be added to a lease. She then spent fifteen minutes acting like it was up to me and repeating these phrases: "I'm a trustworthy person" "Me and John are in love" "I will always pay my rent on time" "We're going to get married." It didn't matter how many times I told her that it was not up to me. She wouldn't shut up. I assured her I would contact my boss right away, and I would tell her what my boss had to say about the situation. Finally, they left. Except, they came back again later that day. This time she wanted to know what exactly I said in my email to my boss. I told her. I was then treated to fifteen more minutes of her repeating the same phrases as before.
On Friday, I was treated to the same thing. It was worse though because I had to start explaining that I really had not heard from my boss yet, and that it really wasn't up to me. So she added another phrase to her repertoire: "I understand that." The problem with that phrase is that it was always followed by a "but." And I got to hear fifteen more minutes of about how she and John will get married and how she will pay her rent. Once she repeated herself enough, she decided she would also inform me that John had no hot water. I went with them to check. I turned on the kitchen sink. It was plenty hot. I had her feel it. She told me it was lukewarm. I turned on the shower. It was plenty hot. She told me it was lukewarm. She asked if I could turn up the water heater. I explained that there were only two water heaters for the whole building, and if I turned them up any higher, I'd risk the old people burning themselves. She looked at me like I was crazy. I just wanted to grab her head and scream "I'm sorry that you think the waters cold, but if I turn it up any higher, you will melt!"
Today, they did not come to the office, but I learned this was simply because they were not on the premises. I was loading dishes into the community dishwasher when they came in. You know what happened next. When she finally shut up, I went back to the apartment. Then comes a knock on the door. There she is again, laughing at my misery. Well maybe she wasn't laughing, but she was telling me that they had locked themselves out of John's bathroom. So I got to listen to her whole spiel while I manipulated the lock with a tiny screwdriver. This time I was treated to another new phrase: "we can't let this happen again."
Tonight, Anna and I pulled up to the apartment. As soon as we stepped out of the car, John opened up his door and tells me, "Don't worry about her anymore. We got into it over my kids. She was talking down about them, so I told her to get the Hell out." I assured him that I was sorry to hear that. But I couldn't help laughing a little as Anna and I walked away.
We held a Reformation Day party on Saturday for the church kids. We helped them carve pumpkins (which really meant that I ended up carving most of the pumpkins), we fed them lots of candy, and we went on a hayride. My butt may never be the same after that hayride. There wasn't room in the hay-cart, so Anna and I sat in the bed of the pickup. I couldn't feel my man-bits.
Yes, in case you were wondering, I have been doing some deer hunting. No, I haven't killed anything. I've passed up a few shots on does. I actually would have shot two of them, except there was an even bigger doe behind them, but she winded me before I got a shot at her. On Saturday morning, I did see a rather nice buck, but he chose not to actually walk by my stand.
I should shower.
My butt is still seriously sore.
Sky blue boxer-briefs with black and white horizontal stripes.
It's bedtime. Anna has to get up early to continue her national chain of bakery/cafe restaurants training.

59-14

59-14
59-14
59-14
59-14
59-14
59-14
59-14
59-14

I would like to take this opportunity to point at that even when the Donkeys were 6-0 last year I never wavered in my hatred of Josh McDaniels.
So now we send London two of the worst teams in the NFL for their viewing pleasure.
You have no idea how depressed I am that the NBA season has started.
I honestly wonder if the only reason Josh McDaniels is still in Denver is because Jay Cutler has been so bad in Chicago.
And, as someone so astutely pointed out, why was Kyle Orton still playing in the second half of that game on Sunday? Did McDaniels have him on his fantasy team and needed the points?
Anna got a new job. She has been hired by a national cafe/bakery place that is opening a store in Columbus. She is currently doing her training in Greenwood while the construction is being finished on the new store here. According to Anna, every single one of the employees in Greenwood either has their degree or is working towards it. I think Anna likes the job. I'm going to enjoy the food.
Macy can't pronounce her 'L's. They come out as 'W's.
I'm hungry.
It stormed pretty violently this morning. I heard the tornado sirens going off several times. I was actually surprised that none of the old people were pounding on my door in terror. I guess they were too deaf to hear it. I debated whether or not I should tell them of a coming tornado if one actually seemed imminent. I don't think it would do any good. There isn't any basement to this place. There isn't a safer place to go. It would just scare them.
We're having a 'Reformation Day' party on Saturday night with the kids from church. We'll carve pumpkins. I'm going to make my pumpkin epically awesome. You will be jealous. By the way, it's not really a 'Reformation Day' party, but at this church, we can't call it a Halloween party either.
The hunger pangs are overpowering my will to continue writing.
Gray.
People who read this blog: No one. Ever.
I'm lying. I don't know why you silly people keep coming here, though.

Not with a bang but a whimper

I feel bad for the exterminator. You need a hazmat suit (or at the very least, a gas mask) to enter George and Katie's apartments. When he was here on Wednesday, Katie's apartment was as bad as it has ever been. When she opened the door, I literally had to suppress a gag. I heard the exterminator take a huge breath behind me and then watched his face turn red as he held his breath while spraying Katie's apartment. You cannot understand how bad it is. George was in there with here, and they had obviously been smoking all day. It must have been 80 degrees in there, and the apartment looked like it was in a fog. Our exterminator deserves an award for valor or something.
The Broncos are awful. They make me cry.
Sunday's game is "Orange Sunday," which I suppose might help the fans at the game be more enthusiastic about watching their team flail around like a dying chimpanzee on hallucinogenic drugs. They play the Jets. The "experts" seem to be arguing whether the Jets, Ravens, or Steelers are the NFL's best team. I, however, am not sold on the Jets. I think they are a fluke. Therefore, I give the Broncos a small chance in this game, but this does not mean I think they will win. I'm going to go with a final of 27-20.
I should have posted a prediction for last weeks game. It would have looked awfully close to the final score.
Someone, please kill McDaniels.
I've seen a few deer so far this season. I've passed up three different does so far. They were all on the small side.
Anna is not so secretly delighted each time I come back and report that I have yet to shoot a deer.
I think Chief might have brain damage. He keeps looking at me with his left eye half closed.
Anna has gotten the chance to sub for several different music teachers. She always seems to enjoy it. Sadly though, she hasn't had any awesome stories about horrible children burning down the schools.
George now has a "representative payee" to control his money. He has to have this because all his money somehow ends up in the hands of hookers. He says they steal from him, and yet he lets them come back every month. I think he gives them the money and then won't admit to it. Regardless, he has been appointed a woman to keep his finances in order so that there is money to pay for food and rent. She is mad at me because I told her we couldn't set up an electronic transfer for George's rent.
Last Sunday was pastor appreciation Sunday. They gave us a bunch of candy and a gift card. I didn't realize they thought of us as pastors.
We're trying to write a Christmas program. We're going to have one of the little girls dress up as a young version of one of the guys in the congregation. This will mean full cowboy getup, and I am pushing for her to grow a full beard and a handlebar mustache as well.
I actually showered earlier, so I don't need to shower right now.
Gray.
Howie is rubbing up against my leg. He is plotting my demise.
Anna isn't feeling well tonight. I hope she isn't getting sick.
Anna found some videos on youtube with instructions for do-it-yourself silk-screening, and we are going to make shirts for the kids. We made a couple practice ones. They look pretty decent. We think the kids will like them.
Anna's aunt feel and broke her hip a week ago. She's only a couple years older than my parents. She seems too young to have broken a hip. I can't imagine my parents with broken hips.
Anna likes to point it out when she sees gray hairs in my beard or hair.
The inside of my right ear itches.
Hey guys, that reunion we had the other day was awesome. Jana, I can't believe you did that thing with Bob. I'm so glad we didn't invite Sara. She smells funny.
There were two ladies here the other day to see George. I think they might have been daytime hookers. They were asking him if he wanted to go to a Halloween party. They wanted to dress him up as a pimp.
We went to a high school football game on Friday night. One of the girls from church is in marching band, and we wanted to show our support. It happened to be Anna's alma mater, and we had to make every effort to avoid eye contact with anyone for fear that they would remember her and we'd be caught talking with them awkwardly for hours. On the plus side, the football team actually won which, as I understand it, is a minor miracle.
People who hate on Columbus Day should go die.
Anna came up with this really cool (and slightly creepy) sounding piano line, and she is currently recording it, so she doesn't forget it. Sometimes Howie likes to play along on the piano with her.
Anna is the most metal person I know.
Project 86 is releasing a live album this year. I think that's rather awesome. You should all buy it because you need to spend your money on music you won't like.
Speaking of music you won't like, you should all listen to Norma Jean's album "Meridional." I can't stop.
People who read this blog: Aussie's
Someone from Queensland, Australia found our blog by googling "Hoff's Adventures." I wonder if they were looking for David Hasselhoff. That's creepy. I despise my nickname.

DuhduhduhDEER Season

I mentioned in my last post that I didn't really expect Macy to return (I said this on Tuesday). Well guess what, she was there on Wednesday. She walked in with a lady I didn't recognize, and Macy introduced her to me as her sister. The lady clarified for me that she is Macy's "sister" from Big Brother/Big Sister. She will be having lunch with Macy every Wednesday and walking her over to the apartments after. I now expect that I'll have Macy approximately once a week, on Wednesdays.
Marilyn called me yesterday morning to tell me that I needed to get a repairman for one of the washing machines. She said it was full off suds after she tried to wash her cat bed. I checked on it, and it was indeed full of suds. I figured the best thing to do was to try to wash something else in it to see what happened, so I stuck a dirty blanket in it. It worked just fine. Marilyn must have just gone crazy with her laundry detergent.
Deer season opened yesterday. I saw seven, five does and two bucks. I didn't have a shot at any of them. I didn't see any this morning, but a front was coming in and that often means the deer don't move.
The Rockies have thoroughly demonstrated how much they hate Ubaldo Jimenez. In what could have been the final bright spot in a very disappointing season, they flushed his eight scoreless innings of work today down the drain and said, "we don't want you to win 20 games this year."
I still can't get enough of Norma Jeans' new album "Meridional." It's definitely their best album, and it's the best album I've heard in awhile, period.
Anna wants me to come up with a memory verse for the kids for tomorrow. I'm thinking that Leviticus 11:19, Deuteronomy 25:11-12, or Genesis 38:9-10 would be good options.
I should shower tonight.
Now that it is fall, the beard is making its epic return. My chin is awfully itchy.
Marilyn told me her screen door wasn't closing fast enough. I checked it. It closed fine. She wanted me to fix it. I replaced the hydraulic closer on the door. It closed the exact same way as the old one.
My Bejeweled Blitz score is pretty epic this week. Sara, make sure that Kevin understands that, though he might get the occasional decent score, he will never be as awesome as Anna or I are.
I think Bejeweled Blitz will give me carpal tunnel syndrome.
I'm getting thirsty.
Camouflage Taz.
There's nothing like a technical death metal rendition of "How Great Thou Art" to brighten your evening.
The Donkeys play the Titans on Sunday, in Nashville. If the Donkeys were at home I would give them the edge. If the game was at 4 o'clock, I would give them the edge. But historically western teams do not do well in 1 o'clock games. I honestly think that it's a matter of bio-rhythms. Therefore, I'm going to say that the Donkeys lose 20-17. I don't think they get stomped on. I think they can keep Chris Johnson from doing enough damage to turn it into the blowout some experts are predicting, but there is no way they can get it in the end zone enough against the Titans' defense.
People who read this blog: a Marshall Islander
I have no idea how they found our blog. There wasn't any evidence of them googling anything. They just appeared out of nowhere. Creepy.

Please don't drool on our food

!@#$
We now return to your regularly scheduled blog wishing that Josh McDaniels would die and leave us in peace.
It's a depressing time for Colorado sports fans.
I removed a wash cloth from James' garbage disposal today.
In theory, I am supposed to have a new slave. Her name is Macy. I say "in theory" because she has officially been my slave for two weeks, but I have only seen her three times. In fact, I haven't seen her since last Tuesday. This doesn't particularly surprise me, and I actually kind of expected it. Why? She told me on her first day that she was kicked out of school for truancy and had skipped over 130 days of school last year. When I asked her how she felt about getting kicked out of the Restart program, she didn't seem at all phased. She actually told me she was weighing whether or not it was worth the 30 days in juvenile detention she would get if she just quit coming. I figure that's probably where she is now.
Anna's father took off Friday and Monday, so that he could spend a four day weekend riding horses with Anna's mother. They stayed at the Horseman Campground in the Brown County State Park. Anna and I went up to see them a few times while they were there. We sat around the fire and watched Poopface roll around in the dirt.
Our friend Jennifer, who I am sure I have mentioned in this blog before, got married while she was doing her Army training in Hawaii. She and her husband just finished up their training, and they came to visit Indiana for a bit before they have to report to Fort Carson, in the Springs, for their first assignment. Anna and I spent a good deal of time with her and her husband, Bobby, while they were here. Jennifer brought Anna a ukulele from Hawaii. When Anna got it, she conveniently neglected to mention to Jennifer that she already had two ukuleles. The one from Hawaii has a shark on it though, so that's pretty cool.
I've had a headache much of the day today. I am currently trying to cure it by blasting metal through my headphones. I think it's working.
You have no idea how depressed I am about certain professional sports related teams.
On the positive side, deer season starts Friday. I need to go site my bow in for broadheads tomorrow.
Anna was giving Dani and Lexy piano lessons on Friday, and Lexy nearly chopped off her finger. I felt very bad about this and very embarrassed when Lexy told her mom. Fortunately, I am exaggerating the extent of the damage, and it looks like Lexy will be able to keep her finger.
A couple Sundays ago, the church celebrated what they call "Homecoming." Lots of old people showed up, after church there was a big meal, and after that several people sang some songs and played some music. Anna was asked to sing a few songs. She did wonderful, as always. Anna's grandma was asked to play the piano. Two other people were asked to play and sing. I wanted to punch everyone but Anna. I wanted to punch Anna's grandmother because of who she is. I wanted to punch the other two people because they were obviously performing just to show off and not because they felt any need to honor God or anything so insignificant as that.
Anna had a half day of substituting on Thursday, and when she came back, we ate lunch together in my office. We though Blizzards sounded good, so we picked up some DQ to eat. While we were eating lunch George walks right into the office without saying a word and starts digging through our food. He was leaning right over top of our Blizzards, so I quickly slid them away from him for fear of drool. He dug through our food for a little bit and then muttered something which I took to mean "Hast thou stolen from me mine Meals on Wheels repast?" I assured him that we had not taken his Meals on Wheels, and in fact, I told him that I had heard from the Meals on Wheels people that he wasn't getting them anymore. He shrugged and left.
I don't have much else to say.
Sky blue boxer-briefs with black horizontal stripes.
People who read this blog: Perverts
I just want you to know that people are still finding this blog by googling that whole GGW in North Vernon event.

Keep your pants on, and turn around

We went to Colorado.
The day we left Bobbie told me that someone was 'like to die' while I was gone.
We rented a car. It was a Kia Soul. I think Anna wants one now.
We drove to the far side of Missouri the first night and stayed in a hotel just outside of Kansas City. The next day we drove from Kansas City to Colorado Springs.
We got in to the Springs at about eight that night. My mom set up an air mattress in my sister's room (my sister having taken her bed with her to college). It was actually the nicest air mattress I've been on. The first couple nights we thought it was leaking because we had to fill it up every few hours to keep it comfortable, but I think, since it was the first time it had been used, it was just stretching out. It got better the longer we were there.
We arrived on a Saturday. On Sunday my parent's church celebrated its fiftieth anniversary. They had five of the ten pastors in the church's history at the service, and they all took part in some form or another. There was a lunch afterwards, but I was sad to discover it wasn't a potluck because I wanted to show Anna how a Colorado potluck doesn't have all the yellow food you find in an Indiana pitch-in.
I was blown away when I discovered all the high schoolers in the church were the ones I still picture as little kids from my days in Colorado. I was also rather surprised how many people didn't seem to recognize me either.
On Monday, Anna and I met Heather in Castle Rock for coffee. It was a good time. It was awesome to have a chance to get Heather to ourselves for a bit before all the wedding craziness happened. She was surprisingly relaxed for a bride-to-be during the week of her wedding.
My parents took Anna and me out for dinner on Monday night. They chose Carrabba's. I had never been there before. It seemed overpriced. Anna went for the cheapest thing on the menu: grilled chicken. It was $11, and it was the smallest chicken breast I've ever seen.
Tuesday night, we were invited to have dinner with Greg and Bri and Greg's parents. We got to meet Greg and Bri's two kids: Amos and Jaela. They are cute. They made me laugh a lot. Jaela never stopped smiling. We had a great time just sitting and talking to Greg for awhile. But it was absolutely shocking to watch a little kid run up to him and call him 'Daddy'.
On Wednesday, Anna and I drove up to Greeley to see my sister. She's contemplating getting married to a hobbit. I asked her if he has hairy feet. She said that I had better not make fun of his height to his face, or he will hate me forever. I don't think I could make fun of his height to his face without straining my back from bending over so far.
While we were in Colorado, I discovered that the Rockies had a make-up game against the Phillies on Thursday. I also knew that all of our friends would be getting in to Denver that night. I thought to myself, "self, we should go see the Rockies play the Phillies and then we'll already be up there to meet up with our friends." So we did. Except the Rockies decided to rain on my parade, and they blew a four run lead. I was very sad. I might have hit the seat in front of me a few times. But we had our friends to see.
We all had a suite together in a hotel in Denver. I was expecting two rooms of four beds, but it was actually like a small two bedroom apartment with three beds total. Anna and I got to be the 'parents' and got to stay on our own in one room while the others divided up the two beds in the other bedroom. Oddly enough, somehow that translated into Jana sleeping on the fold-out bed in the couch.
The best thing about seeing Janna, Sara, Bob, and Jon again was that it wasn't weird at all. It was just awesome.
That first night we sat around and played 'The Game of Things' for awhile. While we played, I think Sara was slowly losing her mind out of exhaustion, and Jana kept making fun of the rest of us who were used to the Eastern Time Zone. I don't know how we didn't get kicked out of the hotel. Sara was as loud as I've ever heard her.
Friday morning, Heather had us all meet at a local breakfast place called Snooze. It must have been a pretty neat place because we saw a guy from the Food Network there. I had pancakes. They were very good. The place was kind of cool. We spotted a waitress with a tattoo of Michigan with a star over what could have been the Holland area. She even looked Dutch. We figured it would be rude to ask since she wasn't actually our waitress.
After breakfast with Heather, those of us not actually getting married the next day went down to the Garden of the Gods. Jon and Bob broke the rules and climbed on the rocks. There was a couple getting their wedding pictures taken. We're probably in half of them. Ranger Jon explained all the geologic formations to us.
After we were done at the Garden of the Gods, we got dinner at Chick-fil-a so that Jon could experience it for the first time. I never did get his reaction. Jon, please comment with your reaction to your first Chick-fil-a experience.
That night, Heather and Jordan came over to our suite and played the game of things with us. I guess we were their bachelor and bachelorette parties all in one.
The wedding wasn't until five on Saturday so we drove over to Red Rocks. Though I've lived much of my life in Colorado, I had never been to Red Rocks. I must say that after seeing it, I'm disappointed that there was never a concert there I was interested in seeing. It would be awesome.
We went to Hammond's Candies to see their free factory tour. It wasn't terrible. It wasn't great. It would have been much better if they were actually making candy while we were there. I guess we got in too late because they were pretty much done with their daily candy making. From there, we went back to the hotel to change for the wedding.
The wedding was at a 'tennis pavilion', except I didn't see anything related to tennis anywhere. I'm still not sure where we were or what the building was that we were behind, but it seemed to be part of this big estate in the middle of Denver. The ceremony itself was held in a relatively small area with lots of grass and brick work and vines, and it was lovely. But that was only a small part of a much larger garden area full of walkways and flowers and trees. It really was a wonderful place for a wedding.
The reception included a dinner complete with genuine barbeque (smoked) beef brisket. It was awesome. Therefore, Heather, I give your reception two thumbs up.
There was dancing. I didn't dance. I would have slow danced with Anna, but there weren't too many slow dancing songs. We stayed around for several hours chatting and hanging out. Heather and Jordan did a good job of trying to see everyone who had come to the wedding. It was nice to be able to get to give her a proper goodbye before we all went our separate ways.
On Sunday, we decided to walk around the 16th Street Mall for awhile before Jana had to go to the airport for her flight back to California. After we had walked up and down the mall for awhile, Anna and I took Jana to the airport while Jon tagged along. The rest of our friends went on a tour of Coors (the brewery, not the ballpark). We had a nice civil discussion about immigration law while we took Jana to the airport. It was sad getting to the airport. We didn't want to say good bye to our hipster commie friend.
Anna wanted a ukuleles. So after we got rid of that dirty communist, we went in search of a music shop that sold ukuleles. We found one. Anna found herself a new ukulele. She was happy.
We spent much of our hang out time in the company of Ben and Sarah, who are friends of our friends from Calvin. Anna and I hardly knew them at all, but because of their friendship with our friends, they accompanied us on most of our adventures. Sarah had a couple friends who lived in Colorado Springs. So on Sunday night, she arranged to meet them for dinner. Anna, Jon, and I all drove down to the Springs to meet up with everyone else for dinner. I felt bad for Jon the whole time. He ended up stuck at the end of the table looking very lonely with Sarah and her two friends. Anna and I were on the other end with Bob and Sara. We weren't lonely. We were just amused that Sara still felt drunk from the brewery tour.
We went to a Rockies game on Monday. That was awesome. Tulowitzki hit a long home run, and the Rockies actually won. Ubaldo Jimenez was the starting pitcher, and we got to see him get his team record setting 18th win. We all got very sunburned. Poor Sara is probably still feeling it in her knees. Frankly, I'm surprised I haven't developed skin cancer on my ankle yet.
That night, we decided to just order pizza and hang out in the suite. We ordered carryout from Domino's. We used online ordering. The website even told us the name of the person making our pizza. I can't remember what the name was for sure. It might have been Jenny. Jon and I went to pick it up. We gave "Jenny" about twenty minutes to make our pizza before we went. When we showed up, we discovered that "Jenny" was the only one working and that she was frazzled out of her mind. Our pizza ended up taking twice as long as it should have, but we got a free two liter of Coke out of it.
Jon's flight was Monday night. Sara and Bob took him to the airport. It was sad to see him go as well.
Sara and Bob left before we did on Tuesday morning to make their flights. We said a sad farewell.
Anna and I were the last to leave. My mom ended up actually wanting to meet one more time before we hit the road. So we met for breakfast at a little place called Le Peep. We then said goodbye to her and hit the road.
We drove from Denver to just outside of Kansas City on Tuesday. The bathroom in our motel smelled faintly of pee, and we were awoken in the morning by someone opening and then closing our door.
All the residents have my cell number in case of an emergency. We were about two hours from Columbus when my phone started ringing. I answered. It was Beulah. Beulah wanted me to know that her porch light was out. Apparently that constitutes an emergency. I was just grateful I didn't get any ridiculous calls while I was actually in Colorado.
We arrived back here on Wednesday night. The apartment hadn't burned down. No residents had died. I think it turned out to be a very successful trip.

Whatever you do, don't die

The Saturday after the HUD audit, Anna and I took a CPR course. She needs it to get her Indiana teacher's license. I don't need it, but we thought it might be useful around all these old people (though the odds of me trying to save their lives might be pretty slim). There were about eleven people in the class. It sounded like most of them were getting their yearly recertification for CPR for their various jobs. We got to play with dummies on the floor. Then we got to take a test. We took the test together. The instructor had the class come up with a consensus answer and then told us if we were all right. Apparently, they figure that if we are paying to take the class there is no need to know whether or not we really understand. So we all passed. And I feel pretty helpless.
On Wednesday and Thursday of the following week, I had to go to Bloomington for a corporate meeting. I had only actually met three people from the company before. Now I was surrounded by eighty or so of them.
The first day was spent with introductions and then a session on fair housing with some representatives from HUD. The ladies from HUD doing the fair housing, combined with the lady from HUD who did the audit, made me pretty convinced you need to suffer some sort of mental retardation to work for the government.
The second day we got bombarded with three ring binders full of forms and verifications and acknowledgements and contracts to sell our souls to the devil. Two whole binders were dedicated to the rules and regulations involved in verifying the income of people seeking HUD subsidy. I don't know what half the stuff means.
For the two days of the meeting, I sat at a table with my boss and four other people who work for her (three property managers, and the assistant to one of the other property managers). David was one of the managers at the table. If I had any doubts about his sexuality after meeting him the previous week, they were all wiped away (or confirmed) when he and the property manager from Kentucky decided that they were long lost twins/soul mates and they should braid each other's hair.
I'm sure I had more to say about the corporate meeting, but I forget it all.

Anna is taking the Praxis in the morning. She'll rock it. She's a smart cookie.
I keep seeing birth and pregnancy announcements on Facebook for girls that I knew in high school. It's still weird to me. I can't imagine having a kid yet.
The Rockies are thoroughly pissing me off.
Heather is getting married in two and a half weeks. That's pretty cool. Colorado is pretty cool. Being in Colorado for this wedding will be pretty cool.
Anna played her penny whistle in church on Sunday while her dad played the harmonica and another guy from church played the guitar. It was so metal.
People who read this blog: Some Israelite
Someone from Jerusalem found this blog by Googling "hands bigger than any man." I'm not sure what this person was looking for, but they found this blog. They are probably now convinced that the Messiah is writing a blog in Indiana. I'll bet they are already trying to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem.

Tebowmania

This has been a stressful couple weeks.
As you know, the residents at the property I managed receive assistance from HUD for their housing. This means that we have to follow all sorts of special rules and use special forms and follow special procedure to keep HUD happy. HUD checks up on these things occasionally to make sure that we are living up to their expectations. I don't know how frequently they usually do it, but this property has been around for six years and had never had an inspection...until now.
I found out about the inspection about a week and a half before it happened. I spend the next week freaking out because I didn't know what to expect, and I had never really been trained in the proper handling of any of the paperwork. I figured I was going to get fired for screwing some random thing up.
My boss came down the Monday before the inspection (which was scheduled for a Thursday). She brought with her the property manager, David, who has the same job I do in Indianapolis. She had never been through one of these audits at this type of property, but he had. When they showed up, she seemed all tense and worried, but he was pretty relaxed. He knew the lady who was doing the audit and assured us that she would be easy. This would be her first audit, and everything would be fine. She would just come and look around the property and check some files to make sure we were calculating rent properly. My boss was of the opinion that any first time auditor would be hard because they would go by the book on everything. In either case, they both agreed it should only take a couple of hours.
On a side note, this property manager from Indy is very gay. When he and my boss came down, they decided to go introduce themselves to the new Lieutenants at Corps next door. I happened to see one of the Lieutenants while my boss and David were at lunch. He says to me, "What do you think of that David guy?" I told him that this was the first time I had met him. He replied, "He's a little different, don't you think?"
That Monday, the same day my boss and David came down, Mary moved out of her apartment. Part of the audit involves the HUD inspector looking at all vacant units. I am supposed to turn all vacated units in three days. Anna and her mother generously offered to help me paint this one. I don't know how I would have done it without their help, but together, we were able to get the apartment painted by Wednesday night.
My boss showed up at 8 a.m. the Thursday of the audit, to make sure we had everything together before the scheduled audit time of 9 a.m. Linda, the auditor, showed up on time at 9. She looked like a troll.
Linda had the gait of a penguin, a bald spot, buck teeth, and an air of genuine idiocy about her.
The first thing we did was sit down and go through 24 (I'm serious) pages of questions about operating procedure at the property. As soon as we realized she was asking us about things even my boss had never heard of, we knew we were in trouble.
As it turns out, some new government regulations took effect on the first of August. The government didn't seem to find it necessary to inform anyone.
The day started dragging on. My boss and I would exchange looks of exasperation. My back was killing me from sitting still so long.
At one point, Linda decided she needed to go to CVS for a calculator (I think she planned on checking all the rent calculations right there with us). When she came back, she had her calculator and a disposable camera. She promptly broke the camera by prying the shutter release button off. She couldn't understand why it didn't work. My boss patiently tried to explain to her that the 'flap' should have stayed where it was because it was how you took the picture. Linda didn't believe her. She spent about half an hour trying to make the camera work without the shutter release. I spent about half an hour trying to keep a straight face.
The day was dragging like this blog entry. After five hours, she started telling us she would be done soon. After six hours, she assured us that she was almost done.
After seven and a half hours, Linda finally waddled out to her car and left, but I really think she only did so because my boss made it very clear that she had to leave to pick up her kids from the babysitter.
My boss left at the same time, with a vow to murder David.
I went back to our apartment glad that I hadn't been fired yet.

In other news, today was the Donkey's first pre-season game. This means that it was Tim Tebow's NFL debut. He threw for just over a hundred yards and ran for a touchdown. This means that the media is all excited, and I'm sure that many uneducated Donkey fans are excited as well. I, however, can tell you that Tebow was playing as the third string quarterback against third string defenders. I will not get excited until he wins us a Super Bowl.
The Rockies don't want Jimenez to reach 20 wins. They don't even want him to reach 18 wins. They want to make sure he gets at least a no decision or a loss in the rest of his games. They want him to lose his one run gems. They refuse to hold a lead for him in the ninth inning. Basically, I think they hate the guy.
I stink right now. It has been so hot and humid, and today, I spent a little too long in a car devoid of air conditioning.
There is much more I have to write about, but this post is already too long. Maybe I will get the motivation to tell you more about everything that is important in life soon, my faithful readers.
People who live here: John
John moved in to 103 last week, after Mary moved out. He is Katie's ex-husband. Because of this, he and Katie have the same last name. Except, they don't. Her's has a 'u' in it, where his has a 'w'. I noticed this on his application but figured I just couldn't read the writing, but I was really shocked when I saw his SS card. I asked their daughter about this when she was helping him with his paperwork. She said the kids didn't realize it until they got older and started having to get things like driver's licenses. Apparently, amongst the children the last name was spelled two different ways as well. After learning this, I think I can guess what happened. Remember that Katie is completely illiterate (and I think John might be as well). I am willing to bet that when they got married, someone had to fill out the marriage certificate and the name change application for them, and they replaced the 'w' with the 'u'. I am also willing to bet that when the various children were born they just showed someone a driver's license to give them the spelling of the last name, and thus the kid's last name was determined by which parent's license was produced.

Football season! Football season! Wherefore art thou, Football Season?

I don't actually want it to be football season yet. I know that the Broncos will just be terrible and depress me. But the Rockies are doing an excellent job of depressing me at the moment.
I had to replace the light fixture in Katie's living room ceiling. The changing of the fixture itself isn't hard, but Katie's apartment makes it torture. Please, recall with me that Katie does nothing but smoke all day long. Then picture that in combination with an apartment in which she refuses to use her air conditioner. I'd be willing to bet the air was 90 degrees near the ceiling. And she sat there the whole time, smoking a cigarette and watching me stifle.
Cade was jumping up and down on the couch on Monday. Anna told him to stop. He did it one more time, landed awkwardly on a pillow, and fell into the couch, slightly twisting his arm. He claimed he broke it. Except, he didn't start crying until after he realized Anna and I weren't going to act concerned about it. Once he did start crying, he stopped every time we looked away from him, but if he caught us glancing his direction, he screwed up his eyes and started making faces like he was dying. When his mother picked him up, he asked to be taken to the doctor. She just told him the doctor's office was closed.
I'm slightly stinky right now.
We've been trying to get the various problems with our car repaired. Today, we were going to have Anna's father replace a part that the auto-parts store suggested we try. Anna's father and I looked for awhile, and we could not figure out where this part was supposed to go. Anna's parents had to go to church, so I went to shut the hood, and it didn't shut all the way. I tried to open it. It wouldn't open. Anna's father tried to pry it with a crowbar. It wouldn't budge. He had to leave for church of course. So I continued on without him. I spent over half an hour pulling and pounding and jerking and prying and screaming and praying at that thing without it moving at all. Finally, I laid my face right on the hood, uttered one last desperation prayer, and pulled again on the release latch. It popped free instantly, and the hood opened right up.
While we were at the in-laws, waiting for them to get back from church, Anna's father's cell kept ringing. It was Anna's grandmother. She wouldn't quit calling, but there was no way on earth we were going to answer. She even tried calling Anna's phone. She did finally leave a voice mail on Anna's phone, and now we have discovered that we are eating dinner at her place on Friday night. Yay. And by 'yay,' I mean 'boo.'
Anna has a substitute teacher meeting tomorrow morning.
I'm getting hungry again.
We had Poop Face at the in-laws' place the other day to burn some energy, and when we let her inside, we found her to be absolutely covered with burs. I think she still has them tangled in her beard and around her paws. She looked ridiculous.
Last week, we took Cade to the in-laws' pool so he could swim. While he was swimming, I killed 27 horse flies with a broom.
The grass is getting very brown.
My right ear canal is starting to itch, but I don't want to remove my headphones to scratch it.
Red.
A new Best Buy opened up here. That's cool. It means I won't have to drive up to Greenwood to find a lot of the CDs I want.
Yes, I do still buy CDs. I want something physical to hold while I listen to an album for the first time. I want to see the artwork. I want to try to figure out the band's intent. I don't want to just download it and add it to another playlist.
I want Chinese food.
My chin itches.
Goodnight, minions.

Hammer Time!

Cade can spend hours on end screaming. I'm not exaggerating. I sit in the office and listen to him scream the entire time I am there. Poor Anna has to listen to this up close.
Katie gets Meals on Wheels delivered everyday. The other day the guy was handing her her bag in front of the office, and she looked at it and said that it wasn't the right one. The guy asked her if that was her last name on the bag, and she said 'no.' Then she took the bag into the office and showed me. Sure enough, her last name was printed plain as day on the bag. I knew she was illiterate. I did not know that she could only recognize her name if both the first and last name were present.
Last Friday, Anna and I went to Cincinnati to watch the Rockies play the Reds. Before the game started, we heard the public address announcer mention that MC Hammer was there. I didn't really pay attention to what all he said about him, but I thought that that was kind of weird and cool. Anna leaned over to me and said that all she wanted was to hear MC Hammer sing "Take Me Out To The Ballgame," and sure enough, when it came time for the seventh inning stretch, Hammer was there leading the stadium in song. We laughed and thought that was pretty cool, and then we heard that not only would there be a fireworks show after the game because it was a Friday night, but MC Hammer would have a concert after the game as well. Yeah, it was that awesome. I had never in my life imagined I'd go to a ball game and get to see "U Can't Touch This" and "Too Legit to Quit" performed live (Sara, I could only think of you as I watched him do his famous dance movies). The fireworks were pretty sweet as well. As Anna said, there were four or five times when we thought "surely this must be the finale" and would have gone away very impressed, but they just kept going.
The problem with me become terrible at updating this blog is that I always forget all the good stuff I have to write about. Now it will never be remembered and is disappearing into nothingness.
I don't know what to tell you, my faithful readers. I fail.
I have started doing the same question answering service as Anna, and I keep wanting to end all of my statements with the sign out phrase I use on there. It bothers me.
Chief is bad.
Howie is good.
Poop Face smells like poop.
I killed 27 horse flies today. I used a broom.
Red.
I picked up the new Haste the Day and Norma Jean albums. I am disappointed with Haste the Day, but I really like the new Norma Jean.
Speaking of music, I occasionally like to do those silly Facebook quizzes where you put your music library on shuffle and click next to answer all the questions. Here are mine from today:

Will I get far in life?
-Embraced, Point of Recognition

How do my friends see me?:
-Breathing Murder, Living Sacrifice

Where will I get married?:
-Under Lock and Key, MxPx

What is the story of my life?:
-Skin Shed, Argyle Park

What is/was high school like?:
-Bring the Heat, Disciple

How can I get ahead in life?:
-On Legendary, Further Seems Forever

What is the best thing about me?:
-Cult of She, He is Legend

How is today going to be?:
-It's Hard Not to Shake With a Gun in Your Mouth, Zao

What is in store for this weekend?:
-Distorted, Living Sacrifice

What song describes my parents?:
-Per Te, Josh Groban

my grandparents?:
-Angry Sunset, Crash Rickshaw

How is my life going?
-Mad World, Gary Jules (Donnie Darko soundtrack)

What song will they play at my funeral?:
-A Mad Russian's Christmas, Trans-Siberian Orchestra

How does the world see me?:
-Trip the Land-mine, Trenches

Will I have a happy life?
-Ambient Diablo, Narcissus

What do my friends really think of me?:
-For you, Staind

How can I make myself happy?:
-Family System, Chevelle

What should I do with my life?:
-Beat the Devil, Rackets & Drapes

Will I ever have children?
-Revolution, P.O.D.

What is some good advice?:
-Bloodsucker Pt. 2, As Cities Burn

What is my signature dancing song?:
-Emerge, Living Sacrifice

What do I think my current theme song is?:
-Forevermore, Spoken

What does everyone else think my current theme song is?:
-Company Car, Switchfoot

NOW! Pick 10 friends and the next ten songs will be for them!

Friend 1: Anna - The Flame that Guides Us Home, Demon Hunter

Friend 2: Jana - Something We Can't Be, Project 86

Friend 3: Sara - Hymn A L'Amour, Josh Groban (weird)

Friend 4: Heather - No Grave Concern, Living Sacrifice

Friend 5: Andi - Oh Lonely Grave, Maylene & the Sons of Disaster

Friend 6: Bob - Pink Maggit, Deftones

Friend 7: Jon - Screams of the Undead, Demon Hunter

Friend 8: Christopher - Get Out, Rod Laver

Friend 9: Jeremy - Police Truck, Dead Kennedys

Friend 10: Kendra - Swarming Spirits, Tourniquet

I know Bob and Christopher and perhaps Jeremy don't read this blog, but they may have seen this on Facebook. Anyway, I know there are two people who read this blog regularly who aren't on Facebook, and I think they deserve songs too.

Friend 11: Joel-The Hand, The Furnace, The Straight Face; Project 86

Friend 12: Aimee-Toreador II, Apocalyptica

I don't have much else to say. Goodnight.

July 5th and 6th

I made pretzels again last night. I guess they were a sort of anniversary present thing to me. I don't know what Anna got.
My mom was here for a little over a week. Her brother (who lives two hours from here, in Dayton, OH) had surgery a couple months ago and hasn't been doing well. My mom went back and forth a few times. Unfortunately, she decided she should be here for the 4th of July, so she could hear my sermon. She actually videotaped it without my knowledge. Then she had the audacity to burn dvd copies for my my uncle, grandfather, and father-in-law. I am ashamed.
Poop Face stinks again.
Anna and I saw Toy Story 3 this afternoon. It was very enjoyable. We also discovered that the local theater now has five dollar tickets all day, Mon-Thurs. We will certainly take advantage of this fact.
We set off our fireworks on Monday night after the fireworks stands started dropping prices on all their inventory.
Anna got me a subscription to HM magazine for my birthday. Conveniently enough, my first issue happens to have been the 25th anniversary issue for the magazine. It came complete with a "Top 100 Christian Rock Albums" list. The thing about such lists is that they are guaranteed to upset people. I understand that. But I will still allow myself to be upset by the inclusion of bands such as Flyleaf, Family Force 5, and Pax217. These are low points in Christian music, not high points.
For our anniversary, Anna got a me a Colorado Rockies shirt. I have decided it is lucky. I was wearing it on Tuesday night, when the Rockies won after being down six runs in the bottom of the 9th. I about pooped myself.
Why do you people still read this thing? I've been terrible at updating? You sicken me with your sick fascination with my sick sense of humor. I think I'm going to be sick.
Blue.
My wrist hurts.
People who live here: #117 Patsy
Patsy just moved in last week. Somehow she managed to lose her apartment keys between signing the lease and actually trying to get moved in to her apartment. She still hasn't found them. Patsy is missing half of her teeth. And by "half of her teeth," I mean that Patsy appears to only have teeth on the left side of her mouth. Patsy is a talker. She gives fifteen minute stories to answer a "yes or no" question. I can tell that her family and friends are well aware of this because when they have been around I have noticed them attempting to give quick answers before her and head her off before she gets going. It never works. She has to say was she started saying. There is no way around it.

Joel! Guess what Geoffrey is playing on the 4th! Give up? ...He's playing "God of our Fathers."

I hope that makes your whole entire week. :)

Pretzels

I'm blogging while I wait for the pretzel dough I'm making to finish rising.
I am blogging in clothes for once.
Camouflage Taz boxers.
I don't even remember the last time I updated you, my faithful readers, on anythings. I'm also too lazy to go read my last post. So instead of trying to fill you all in on these last couple chaotic and painful weeks, I will just pretend like they never happened, and they will forever be a void in history.
Troy Tulowitzki broke his wrist. That sucks. He had finally started hitting for power, and now we are having to fill his spot with Jonathan Herrera, who hasn't shown much in the way of hitting prowess.
I like Starburst candy.
Cade came over yesterday. He took a nap from 7-11, woke up, and promptly announced to Anna that it might be time for his morning nap. As you can probably guess, he did not go back to sleep. Instead, he spent most of the rest of the day terrorizing Daisy (or Poop Face, as I like to call her).
I need to stop eating these Starbursts.
Anna's father is about to enter into "shutdown" at his place of employment, which means he'll be working seven twelve hour days for a month or two. The first Sunday that he will miss for this happens to be July 4th, and he has asked if I would be willing to give the sermon that morning. I said I would. I don't really care that that day happens to be my birthday, but what I am worried about is it being the 4th and not knowing what expectations the congregation has for a patriotic sermon.
That reminds me. I need to dig out my trumpet. I said I'd play the National Anthem on the 4th.
Anna signed up to answer questions for a text message and phone based question answering service. She gets paid $.02 per question she answers, but on a good night, she can answer a thousand questions. Sometimes I sit with her while she does it, and we laugh at the ridiculous things people ask.
Bobbie likes to lean against the door at the end of the hallway and watch the vegetable stand across the road.
I still feel like Poop Face is a completely different dog now that she has gotten a haircut.
I think we'll go over to Anna's parents' tonight and bring some of these pretzels that I'm making. Anna wants to go swimming. I'm allergic to swimming and water in general.
The latest forecast says it's supposed to reach 97 degrees tomorrow. We'll probably take Cade over to Anna's parents' to swim. Remind me to put sunscreen on the little bugger (though to look at him after his vacation to South Carolina, I doubt his parents worried too much about sunscreen themselves).
People who read this blog: Someone near Florrisant, CO.
I'm seeing a few hits from a wireless connection out of Florrisant, Colorado. I've been through Florrisant. Quite frankly, I'm surprised it's capable of having wireless internet, but in any case, I have a sneaking suspicion this might actually be our friend Kendra, who is currently vacationing in Colorado. Kendra, if that's you, I'd like to say howdy. And then you die.

Anna here.

This morning I thought I heard birds outside my window. It was lovely! Until I realized that the "birds" I was hearing was really some funky sound my nose was making when I breathed in.

Awesome.

One Year

It has been one year since I took this job.
I have a cold.
Anna hurt her back.
Chief Moses Puddington Chestertonfieldvillefordburg is still rotten.
Howie is still awesome.
Daisy smells.
The Rockies have a better record right now than they did a year ago.
No one has died at the apartment since I took this job. I hope that trend continues.
George told me Katie needed something today, but I couldn't understand what. I went to see Katie. Her garbage disposal wasn't working. I hit the reset button and turned it on. It made a terrible noise. I got a flashlight. I found a piece of what appears to be porcelain in the disposal. At first, I was afraid it was a tooth (did I ever mention that when Pearl moved out of her apartment last summer, I found a tooth in one of the kitchen drawers?).
Darbie is done for the summer. In the fall, she will go back to regular school.
On Friday, Phyllis introduced us (Anna, Darbie, and me) to her brand new great-great-grandchild. Yes, you read that right. I said great-great-grandchild. Phyllis is 69.
I'm watching "Deadliest Catch" at the moment, and I can't decide if I'm reading significance into the editing of the show because I know that Captain Phil died or if the show was edited with his imminent demise in mind.
I'm moving towards the snotty portion of my cold. My eyes are starting to water as the snot leaks out of my nose.
I made chicken fingers tonight.
Memorial Day weekend was awesome because I got to watch not one but two Rockies games on the MLB network (including Jimenez' complete game shutout of the Giants).
The church held a fish fry on Sunday night. The fish was tasty. People brought tasty side dishes. The kids are funny. I enjoyed myself (as much as I could due to the cold I could feel coming).
Since I mentioned "Deadliest Catch," I feel I should assure my faithful readers that I am not one to delude myself into thinking I could do that job. I know I couldn't. I value sleep way too much and function way too poorly without it.
Anna's parents went horseback riding yesterday. I think they had a good time. Unfortunately, when they were finished riding and ready to head home, they made the sad discovery that their truck had broken down. This led to Anna's father spending the night in the park with the horses and spending all day today fixing his truck.
Bobbie knocked on the door this afternoon wanting $25 in quarters. I told her I would give them to her tomorrow.
I'm kind of thirsty. Fortunately, I replenished my supply of AriZona Pomegranate Green Tea. Unfortunately, I don't have a mini-fridge by my computer.
Good night, faithful readers.

Blame Anna

Something.
Something else.
Something else entirely.
Something related to the previous something, elaborating on that something.
Something loosely related via train-of-thought to the previous something.
Something about a four-legged being.
Something else about a four-legged being.
Something sports related.
Something about bodily functions.
Something made up based on stereotypes of people from a certain geographical location.

Anna here.

So, as it turns out, for a number of really icky reasons, the subbing stuff completely fell apart leaving one very, very sad Anna. I was actually really getting to like those guys. But such is life. I had two great weeks with them, anyway. :)

Seeing as how the subbing thing doesn't appear to be working out, I think I'm going to write children's stories. The first one is about the terrifying things they do to you at the dentist when the doors are closed and your mommy can't come in and save you. All the art will be drawn by my left hand. Just kidding.

Heavy Metal

Bobbie asked for $30 in quarters yesterday.
Daisy had diarrhea for several days last week. She's pooping normal now though.
I have internet in the office now. That's nice.
Anna substituted for two weeks at the middle school. Her last day was yesterday.
I helped her come up with a unit on the history of metal for one of her classes. The last day of the unit was today, meaning the substitute that started today had to play several music videos of varying metal bands to the class in order to illustrate the different sub-genres of modern metal. The thought of this classically trained sub presenting death, thrash, and metalcore to a bunch of middle schoolers makes me feel all warm and fuzzy on the inside.
Coming up with a unit on metal with Anna made me both happy and sad. I was happy that we were corrupting these kids, but I realized as we did it just how much we were having to skip over. Metal should at the very least be an entire semester course, not a week long unit of study.
Troy Tulowitzki homered again tonight. It would seem that he is finally coming around.
A lady who applied for an apartment a few months ago but was rejected because she told me she was 58 (you have to be 62), came back in today. Now she is telling me that she is really 62, and she was just lying to me before because she thought you had to be under 62 to live here. She told me she lost her drivers license so she couldn't prove her age. I let her fill out an application, but I told her that she would need to bring me a drivers license to be able to get the apartment. I even explained that all her information would have to be verified. She didn't seem phased.
Alice came by yesterday to tell me that her garbage disposal wasn't working. I messed with it and got it to start, but it made a horrible noise. So I stopped it and got a flashlight to look inside. There's a penny stuck in it. I'm going to have to take the whole thing apart to get the penny out.
Someone from church gave Anna's parents some liver. Anna's mom won't touch the stuff, so I fixed it tonight for her father. I'd never cooked liver before (I'd never actually tasted it before), but I guess it turned out edible. I wasn't bothered by the taste, but it just seemed really mealy.
Anna's sister graduated from college this month. We had a graduation party at her parent's house. I grilled burgers. Sarah thinks she is a vegetarian so I grilled bean patties for her.
Noah was baptized after church on Sunday. I hope he really understood it.
Bobbie came by the other day hopping mad. Someone had given her a Canadian quarter. She tried to use it to do laundry, but the machine wouldn't accept it. Naturally, this led Bobbie to conclude that everything that ever went wrong with the washers was due to Canadian quarters.
People who read this blog: Perverts
There are still people coming to this blog because of the GGW in NV. I feel weird about this.

Anna.

Hoffer is a beast at blogging. I, on the other hand, am not. I am, however, a beast at being tall, so you can still feel free to be jealous.

JANA- I like your pictures on your blog. Lots. That is all.

So I took what I thought was going to be a 2 week position at a middle school where I've been filling in for a friend who is on maternity leave. As it turns out, I'll be staying until the end of school which is pretty cool. I'll be getting teacher's pay for 1 1/2 weeks which is significantly better than substitute pay. Looks like the Explorer will be able to get completely fixed now.

Subbing at the middle school is pretty tough, actually. There's so much drama. Sooo many girls crying who want to sit in the office to cool off. There are 3 girls in the building who are pregnant. Two are 7th graders and one is an 8th grader. It's very different from the elementary schools I've been subbing at, but it can be a lot of fun, too. They started naming random objects in the room. The wall is Wallace, the floor is Floorace, the door is Doorace, etc. They named me "Lois" because I'm low. Ha. So I started giving them old people names. I hope I don't die in the next 2 1/2 weeks.

I also found out I may be babysitting for my favorite 5 year old all summer. I won't know for sure for awhile, but I hope this works out. He's gonna wear me out, but I think we'll have tons of fun. I plan on going on tons of fun trips with my little pal, Cade. He says things like, "Anna, I believe I should go hunt an elephant," and "I'm a real cowboy!" Awesome.

Well, I really should start grading more tests so I don't have a freakout Monday morning when I don't have them to pass out. No wonder my friend (and their teacher) gave them so many free points. All of them would fail with the exception of 2 or 3 people. Someone got a 5%. That's with them having the study guide knowing that it contains the test questions. Oh well.

Hope the weekend is treating you all amazingly.

Mother's Day

I made a breakfast for the residents yesterday. I made pancakes, bacon, and a fruit salad. Someone complained that there wasn't any sausage. They can bite me.
Bobbie is craaaazy.
I'm getting internet in the office. The modem should arrive tomorrow.
The kids sang a song this morning for the mothers. The mothers cried. The kids gave the mothers "roses" composed of Hershey Kisses, cellophane, and wire. The mothers cried. Anna and I handmade the "roses." We cried.
We ate dinner with Anna's parents. Then we tried to go see Anna's grandmother, but she wasn't home. That made it the best Mother's Day that Anna and her mom ever had.
People at church keep telling us we need to have kids. People aren't even asking anymore. They are just telling. Some are even telling us they are praying for it.
Anna will be substituting for a maternity leave for the next two weeks. The school apparently didn't know this until a half hour ago. Anna had to tell them.
Chief is sitting on the floor watching me, but his body is facing the other way. That just seems uncomfortable.
How can the Rockies let Jimenez get his first loss in a game where he gave up only one run on two hits in seven innings?
Anna's grandmother Carol (the final wife of Anna's maternal grandfather) came up from Tennessee yesterday. Anna's mother, aunt, cousin, and I all had lunch with her at Texas Roadhouse. I ate a country fried steak.
I still need to call my mother and wish her a happy greeting card holiday.

Never Again

I will never post again, or maybe I will.
Some of the kids at church made us a card and had the other kids sign it. It was nice.
I grilled chicken thighs tonight. Half of them I seasoned Mexican style and the other half I marinated in teriyaki sauce and basted in a sweet chili sauce while they grilled.
It has been raining quite a bit.
Our rose bush is in bloom. It has at least four full blooms at the moment and another fifteen or so coming.
The Rockies are somewhat of a mess right now.
I never did comment on the Broncos' draft, did I? Well this is my comment. Time will tell about Tebow. My problem with the pick is the timing. Everyone in the universe, except apparently Josh McDaniels, thought that Clausen and McCoy were better prospects than Tebow. So why on earth was it necessary to trade back into the first round to select him? And forget the fact that we can look back and see how far Clausen and McCoy dropped. If Tebow really had to be McDaniels' pick then all he had to do was wait until at least Clausen was drafted before he needed to be nervous about another team taking Tebow. AND WHY IN THE WORLD DID WE TRADE FOR BRADY QUINN?
As far as the rest of the draft goes, did McDaniels watch his team play last year? If so, why did it take him something like five picks before he selected a defensive player?
For the first time since we moved into this apartment, I am washing our dishes in the Community Room's dishwasher. It just seemed a waste that it never got used.
Anna is preparing the children for Mothers' Day by teaching them a song to sing on Sunday morning. She also had them plant some flowers a couple weeks ago, and today, they painted flower pots that they will transplant their flowers into for Sunday as well.
Chief Moses Puddington Chestertonfieldville won't leave me alone (I've decided that I should always refer to him by his full name because to not do so would be an injustice to his awesomeness).
I shaved my beard. Anna thinks I look like my dad now.
Speaking of my father, he managed to get another turkey a couple weeks ago. He's thinking about going back out and trying to get a second one before the season ends. I'd like to shoot one myself, and I know exactly where to find them. Unfortunately, I can't get permission on either piece of property.
I think I shall go have some chocolate milk.
People who read this blog: a bunch of perverts
I'm pretty sure that at least ten different people have found this blog by googling the GGW incident. Most visitors have been from NV, but there have been others from various parts of Indiana. They probably aren't really perverts. I'm guessing most of them are curious to figure out if anyone they know ended up on the bus. Or maybe they are just verifying that it actually happened. In same ways, the GGW bus going to NV is like AOL naming Columbus one of the ten must see places in the U.S. It's all just mind-boggling.

Various Things

It's been too long since my last post. I can't remember anything that has happened. I can't even remember what I wrote about last time, and I am far too lazy to go read my last entry.
I vaguely remember Katie coming to the office to tell me that George's door wasn't working right. She was referring to his front door which happened to be working just fine, but I did notice that his pantry door was out of track. I put it back in for him. He seemed baffled that anything could be done about it.
I also remember that at some point last week I was at the in-laws' house when I got a very angry sounding call from James' eldest daughter. She was upset that James' air conditioner was out again. I told her that I was not in town at the moment and would not be able to do anything until the morning. This just made her more upset. Fortunately, I was able to get back to the apartment around eight that night, and I stopped by his apartment to check out the problem. The air conditioner was definitely broken. I called the repairman first thing in the morning. It turns out a part was just blown, completely unrelated to the previous problem. It took him about five minutes to fix it.
I was sitting in the office at some point this week when I saw a stretcher wheeling someone into the building. That seemed odd. Usually, they wheel people out. The especially wheel people out who they have covered in a blanket like they are dead. As it turns out, it was Bobbie. She wasn't dead. Instead, she had been forced to go to the hospital that morning in her nightgown which somehow she had bleed through, so they were kind enough to give her a ride back and escort her into her apartment to save her dignity.
Later that same day, Bobbie came storming into the office hopping mad. The first thing she did was demand the number for who to complain to in Bloomington. She assured me that Susie (her power of attorney) was going to raise Hell. It took a couple minutes before I could even ask her why. The answer: "I never get to do my warshin'." According to Bobbie, the laundry room is always in use. So naturally I asked her if anyone was using it at the moment. Well no, she admitted. Then she tried to tell me that she'd been sick for two weeks and hadn't been able to do her "warshin'." My guess is then that when she did finally try to do her laundry someone happened to be using it. But Bobbie wasn't done. She then took off into a rant about how she was about to bleed to death that morning, and no one would answer the door to help her. I don't know what was wrong with her, but I do know that I'd be surprised if anyone answered the door to her banging on it at four or five in the morning.
George's insurance agent came to see him this week. She had been with him for awhile when she rushed into my office on the brink of tears telling me that someone was stealing George's money. George was telling her that someone was writing checks in his name. She wanted to know if I knew anything about it. I didn't really know what to say. She told me that he needed to go see the police and that she would take him the next day. When she left, George came into the office and essentially told me the same thing she did. He said someone was taking money out of his account and writing checks in his name. He said that he didn't know who it would be. His insurance agent came back the next day to take him to the police and the bank, and they were gone for awhile. When they came back, she stopped back in the office to tell me that George had been the one writing the checks the whole time. What I don't know is 1) if George really had been hiding the fact that he was writing the checks and confessed when pressed 2) if George forgot about writing the checks or 3) George knows who is writing the checks and is protecting them from the police (as is his history with his floozies).
Jon, you nailed it. I've had all sorts of visitors to this blog because I mentioned the whole "Girls Gone Wild" thing. But they weren't just searching the GGW. They were specifically searching the fiasco in NV. There were several hits from NV itself and even some from other cities like Bloomington. Anna's guess is that the Bloomington hit is an IU student from NV. All of this makes it relatively likely that Anna might even know some of these people. Or as Anna said, it means that at the very least she knows someone who knows each and every one of these people. Bunch of perverts here in southern Indiana.

Often

George walked into the office this week carrying a year old cable bill. I couldn't understand what he was asking me. All I could do was tell him that the bill was a year old. He came back about fifteen minutes later with an up to date phone bill. I looked at it and saw that not only was he up to date on payment but he had a $9 credit on his account. I told him this, and he seemed just as confused as when he came in in the first place. He left shaking his head. I have no idea what that was all about.
Bobbie is paranoid. She'd said and done things before that should have clued me in, but it really occurred to me this week just how paranoid she is. I think I probably mentioned this last summer, but one of the first things Bobbie ever told me was about "that Mexican over there in the trailer park dressin' in women's clothes and lookin' in my window." I know I mentioned how she had rolled up paper and stuffed it in her peephole. She's afraid people are spying on her through it. This week she came to me and went off on one of her long multiply tangential rants about everything under the sun, but in the midst of all the nonsense, I noticed her again focusing on the idea that people are wanting to look in on her through her bedroom window.
Aw-fun or Awf-tun? It grates on me when people abuse the English language, but I should admit a dialectical bias when I decide who I believe to be correct. Naturally, everyone from Colorado is right. So lately, I've been noticing every time I hear someone pronounce "often" sans the "t" sound. I don't do this. The "t" is in the word so it should be pronounced. There is no such thing as a silent "t" in this type of construction. But then Anna tells me that in voice lessons she was instructed to sing "often" without the "t" sound. I thought to myself, "self, how can educated people instruct their students to abuse the English language so?" But, I reasoned, this is the same voice teacher who pronounces "larynx" as "lair-in-ix." I tried to forget about it, but I couldn't escape people saying "awfun." So I looked it up, and to my surprise, the preferred pronunciation in the dictionary is "aw-fun." How could this be?!?! This is wrong! I did more reading. It turns out that the "t" was lost sometime between the 15th and 17th centuries as speakers got lazy. The lazy intellectuals of the 17th century decided that was alright by them so "aw-fun" became standard. When people in the 19th rediscovered the concept of spelling, they also rediscovered the "t" in "often." I suppose that it makes sense then for classically trained singers to sing "aw-fun" because that's how the composers of those songs heard it, but any pedant who tries to tell me that "awf-tun" is incorrect will get a swift kick in the balls.
Apparently Darbie hardly sleeps at night. She looks half dead each time she comes into the office so I've taken to asking her when she went to bed. Most nights as it turns out, she doesn't go to bed until three or four in the morning, and she has to get up at five to make the bus. I guess she does most of her sleeping on the bus ride to and from school.
Two more toilet paper rolls can be chalked up to Daisy's casualty list.
Our car has started to really idle funny this week. I took it to Autozone so they could get the computer readout from the car. It turns out that we have a bad O2 sensor. For those of you unfamiliar with an O2 sensor, it monitors the amount of oxygen in the exhaust system of the car and determines from this information what the mix of fuel and air should be in the engine. With the sensor out, the mix in the engine is off and ta-da, a sputtering engine. Hopefully, I can take it in on Monday.
I'm hungry.
Daisy has a nasty looking scabbed over spot on her neck, under her chin. I think we're going to have to stick her in a "cone of shame" until it heals.
Yesterday was tax day. Boo.
On Wednesday, Jennings County was filled with excitement over the arrival of the "Girls Gone Wild" bus in North Vernon. Facebook was filled with all sorts of commentary on the subject. Status updates ranged from fears that certain people's own mothers might end up on video to those wondering if they were doing a special series of "Meth-heads Gone Wild" to those who were tempted to buy this particular video just to see of they graduated with anyone on it. The general consensus was that North Vernon was about the stupidest place for the bus to go and expect to find attractive girls willing to expose themselves. My personal theory is that they are going for the corruption of mid-western goody two-shoes farm girls angle after spending so long on the beaches of California and Florida.
People who read this blog: Some random person from Brazil.
Since the only thing I know about Brazil is that it is full of transvestites, I can only assume that our visitor was a tranny. I have to wonder then what a transvestite might have found of interest in our blog. The imagination runs wild.