Hello Murphy...

I've been waiting for you... And now I'd just like to kick you in the teeth. M'kay?

I know they say that bad things happen in threes. This is why I personally am a fan of the number 2... not 3. And I think this morning I reached my number 3...

This morning my crazy, pot-smoking landlord (from now on known as CPSL) informed me that because he is unable to pay his bills that he will be raising my rent... which he can do because I am on a month-to-month lease. I informed CPSL thanks, but no thanks. I'll be leaving at the end of July. This is the one time that paying first and last will come in handy, methinks...

So, the grueling task of finding a new home has begun.

Wish me luck. I'm gonna need it...

Crystal...

You know when you have that moment of clarity? You know the one...

The one where you are talking with someone and you say something that really means nothing and then you actually hear what you just said and all of a sudden you have that moment...

The one where there is so much baggage attached to it and now you've opened that can of worms... again. Yeah, that moment.

I hate those moments.

Hate is a strong word...

But I'm willing to go out on a limb with this one.

OK, folks. I'm warning you right now... this entry is about girlie stuff, so if you don't want to know, just skip this one right now.

For those of you still here... well, you might regret that decision in a minute.

So, every month I have to deal with "that time of the month" (from here on out known as THE CURSE) and all that THE CURSE entails... mainly, cramps. And lots of them.

I have been dealing with this since I was in my teens, so you'd think I'd be used to this by now... after all I have been doing this for 21 years. Which, by the way, is 252 months roughly. After over 200 times I think I have reached the expert level of THE CURSE... although there was that 5 year stretch (before BC caused me to jump on the crazy train) that I was on depo-provera and it was heaven. No cramps... no nothing. Fabulous!!

Anyway, this month was no exception... except that it was the exception. On any given month I have cramps, sometimes get sick but once the pain meds kick in, I'm good to go... usually.

Not this month... nooooooo. Couldn't just be simple. Had to be difficult. And really damn painful. I haven't had one like that in years... over 10 if I had to guess. It was if a small alien was trying to claw it's way out of my uterus. With a spoon. And dull knife. And possibly had a few friends in there helping him. I had pain in my hips, in my back, down my legs, in my knees for cryin' out loud. There was a time there for a while that if someone had walked up and put a gun to my head I would have helped them pull the trigger.

And the usually good-to-go pain meds? Yeah, not making a dent. At. All. Nothing...

I seriously thought I was dying for about 6 hours there. Or wanted to die. Either way...

I am getting to that age where I am seriously considering just having it all taken out. At this point I really don't think I want to go through an actual pregnancy... not when I can adopt and have someone else do the heavy lifting for me...

And I seriously hate those internal organs... the ovaries and uterus are no friends of mine.

The date movie dichotomy...

So I'm sitting here watching TV with Farmer last night when a commercial for the movie "Dear John" came on. Farmer just checked out and started fiddling around on his computer. I also didn't give the commercial much thought until the end when it stated "A great date-night movie". At that point I just started laughing.

Farmer, hearing my amusement, perks up and questions me on what I find so funny. I explain to him the funny statement about the movie. Why did I find it funny, you ask? Well, let me 'splain...

First let's just get out of the way that "Dear John" is a chick-flick. It is one of those movies filled with ultra-romantic and completely unrealistic relationship plots... yes, my favorite kind of movie. But there are only 2 reasons why a heterosexual man goes to a movie like this:

1. He's married.
2. He's just recently started dating.

These 2 things may seem to be basically the same, but the reasons behind why they go are completely different.

Man #1 (the married guy) has, over the years, figured out that it is way easier to just agree to go... thus avoiding the fight that will ensue if he voices that he'd like to go see Rambo 20 instead.

Man #2 on the other hand is trying to earn brownie points to be used on a hopefully not too distant occasion.

Either way, we (the women, that is) win. We get to see the movie and pretend like our man is just as romantic as the one on the screen... until we get home, that is.

Sleep... Why hast thou forsaken me?

Happy Memorial weekend to you all. Shock of all shocks I have Monday off and so with the 3-day weekend I have decided to come visit Farmer and pester - I mean perk up - his life. Isn't that nice of me? Yeah, I thought so too...

Anyway, had a good day yesterday. Went for a walk in the morning. Trudged up the road twice to get Elmo from the corrals up there (forgot the halter the first time). Took Elmo out for a little bit of a ride. Watched all 3 "Bourne" movies back-to-back-to-back. By then I was pretty pooped and decided to turn in for the night.

I had been asleep for a couple of hours (I think) when all of a sudden I was being startled awake by the most god-forsaken sound... An elk was bugling throughout the house. Well, actually it was Farmer's ringtone for when something is going wrong with his irrigation system.

I have since found out it went off at 2am, 3:48am, 3:50am, 3:54am and 6:02am. What it felt like though is - almost back asleep... nope, never mind. Wide awake again.

Ah, the joys of the farmer's life. It is now 9:48am and Farmer still has no idea what the problem is.

Oh, crap. Does that mean I'm in for a repeat tonight? I hope not. That would make me very sad... It's a damn good thing that Farmer's company is worth being bugled out of bed for.

Battle "ships"...

There are two types of "ships" I'm referring to, here... relation-ships and friend-ships.

The friend variety I am great at. Vary rarely do I have major problems with my friends. When I do, they are resolved quickly and with minimal drama.

The relation kind on the other hand is a whole 'nuther story. If you've been reading this blog for any length of time then you are just as painfully aware as I am as to how bad I really am at the relation part. For some reason when transitioning from friend to relation something in my head goes bad. Kind of like wiring that has a short. All of a sudden I am compelled to fit the other person unfortunate enough to find themselves on the other side of the relation into a predetermined box of my imagining. I have a specific idea of what this relation should look like and I try to force them to fit into it... now.

This, I am learning, is bad... they don't want to fit into my box, they want to determine their own.

Huh... go figure.

Or maybe they don't even want a box... maybe they want a circle or something completely crazy like a triangle. What I'm finding is that it's not up to me.

Again... go figure.

But I am starting to get some practice at letting things just be what they are. There are people in my life who just don't fit into any particular category and I'm finding that this is just fine. I'm not going to die... really.

No, really.

Trust me, you're not the only one who's shocked to discover this little tidbit of information. It's been quite the revelation for me, as well. So maybe I can take these revelations from the friend side of things and eventually apply it to the relation-ship.

But I'm in no hurry. For now I like things just the way they are...

It slimed me...

This weekend I'm at the parental's for one reason and one reason only... to get the pool open.

For those of you who have pools, you will understand my feelings of dread when I was informed by my mother (aka flip-flop... she wanted a nick-name too) that I would be joining them this weekend for this wondrous event. Oh joy...

So this morning we start with the pool covers. Yes, covers... plural. Before anything else can happen the debris has to be removed from the covers. And since the covers have been on since last October and since my parent's house is next to a park there was a lot of debris... you know, leaves, branches, roof shingles... did I mention my parents really need a new roof?

So I strain as much off as I can. And then we start to remove the first cover. The first one is a net like cover that is supposed to keep all the major stuff off of the winter cover. So we pull that and it comes off without too much trouble. The only problem? The net is too big to keep the thousands of pine needles from falling through and to the winter cover below. Dang it!!

Oh well... I hose that one off, we fold it up and then start to remove the big, heavy winter cover. This is where it all goes awry.

Because all of the pine needles are now on the winter cover we can't just pull it off. We have to grab it by one end and walk it along keeping the pine needles gathered up in the middle. I'm thinking that as we pull it along the water will drain as we go. Um, yeah... not so much.

So we have the one end of the cover down to the other end of the pool... Flip-flop and El Dub have the cover by both ends while I am standing in the middle pulling from there. And as we start to pull, not only does the cover start to come out, but all the water and pine needles do too. Next thing I know, I am ankle deep in green goo (known as pool water) and pine needles. My once-white socks now resemble something from the swamp-thing. My shoes are nowhere to be seen under all the water and needles.

The cover, which is covered in green algae, has rubbed up against me and has left slime trails up and down my left leg and both arms. I look like I've just been hugged by a giant slug... not my best look. Flip-flop figures that as long as I'm covered in slime and wet anyway, that I should just finish the job and hose the cover down as well. As I start to hose it down, it starts pouring down rain. I don't even notice because I already resemble a drowned rat.

But the covers are off.

However, the pool is still green.

And a stunning shade of green, too... 

For now, we'll just let the chemicals work on that little problem...