snowballs in hell

our house and snow.
zack watches all from his window perch.


the snowflakes were a foot in diameter....


seriously though, the snow was just plain cool!


zack still watches. he is watching you....

right now...

But it never snows here.

First things first...Thanksgiving was greatgreatgreat! We had 15 people total, and it was a perfect fit in the wee Minty. But I wish I'd taken more pictures for the blog. Still new to this whole "blogging" thing. Did you know that "blogging" is short for "web logging"? How interesting.

Uhh, anyway...particularly I wish we had pictures of the ice cream sandwiches I made for dessert! (they turned out sort of lumpy, but it was really satisfying to see them all laid out on a serving platter. Plus, they were dee-licious!) Also I wish we had pictures of the lovely and talented Sara assembling her yummy veggie terrine and calmly stepping in to teach Aa how to make gravy. (It smelled really good, and made me miss meat.)

In fact, the whole Thanksgiving weekend was awesome. Our friend Vivien came up from Portland (hi Viv!) and stayed till Saturday. And we met her new "friend" Joel. He's cool and is a spaz about his dog too. Excellent to find others like us. And then Sunday suddenly turned into The Best Day Ever -- the snow started to fall, so we got the fireplace going and sat on the couch watching the snow fall, eating leftovers, drinking tea, and cuddling. This was the day Zack discovered how much he loves the fireplace. He lay in front of it all afternoon, occasionally shifting to try to get his face closer to the heat.

Ok, and not to turn this into a diatribe about how insane it is that the city of Seattle shuts down whenever snow falls, but IT'S INSANE THAT THE CITY OF SEATTLE SHUTS DOWN WHENEVER SNOW FALLS. Monday night, I found myself trapped in the U-District because my bus "stopped running". Uh, what? Yesterday morning I walked most of the way to work b/c once again no buses showed up. OK, and I get that there are hills, and it gets icy, and that's really awful for drivers and buses alike. But I've been here for almost six years now, and can think of three times snow has fallen and caused the city to basically shut down. So this whole argument native Seattleites keep lobbing at me about how "it never snows here!" just doesn't work anymore. IT'S NOT ACCEPTABLE TO SHUT A WHOLE CITY TRANSIT SYSTEM DOWN BECAUSE OF A HALF INCH OF SNOW. IF IT HAPPENS EVERY TWO YEARS THAT'S FREQUENT ENOUGH TO MAYBE PLAN BETTER. GET MORE THAN TWO SNOWPLOWS. HIRE MORE PEOPLE TO DRIVE SALT TRUCKS.

Ok, done. The crazy dysfunction of the city's transit aside, I do like me this weather. And I admit that I also like the fact that I'm not facing three more months of this weather. It's a really welcome respite from the rain, that's for sure.

Brine It Baby!!!

turkey...snow...zack...so much to love. so much to learn.

won't you take a look?

do it now or i'll hit you in the mouth.

dishwasher day two...candles in the wind.

this is how tight the fit was. Tom had to do careful sawing with his sawsall, jigsaw, and i think he may have even had to use his teeth in order to get this just right. the fear? that the tile counter top would collapse...



see the shiny new electrical cable? it's rad. it's shiny. it's ours.




this is the circuit breaker box. it's even more rad.

sometimes i sit in the basement and say prayers to it in pig latin.



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AND finally....the happy couple with the happy dishwasher!





(note: zack was holding up the camera with his tail)

dogs and windows

news flash: zack has a new perch.

watch him watch...

appliance defiance (no frackin' dishwasher will get the best of me!)

picture the following:
Lazy saturday afternoon sunshine bursting through the windows of the the Minty Fresh.
birds are chirping.
zack is staring at the wall.
Our breakfasts are settling in our tummys.
And Tom, the ultimate handyman, arrives at our door with a belt full of tools and more than saws that i have guitars.
The Minty is going to get a dishwasher today.

And so it began, our picture perfect 50's era plywood cabinet (and some of our precious storage space...) was cut away to make room for our sleek and sexy german engineered dish washing cylon!.

hopefully it won't rise up against us.

As we moved forward with the install...i'd like to remind you of three points:
**start big time movie style WWII music**
1. the 1958 era kitchen was not designed for a modern dishwasher.
2. the 2006 dishwasher was not designed for a 1958 kitchen.
3. i was born sometime between the two.
**end big time movie style WWII music**

at the end of day 1...
it became apparent that this was not going to be a "trivial" experience.

zack finally made the leap to myspace...

next to the lobster costume, this is the dorkiest thing i've ever done:
http://www.myspace.com/thezacker

please be his friend.

especially if you're a pig bone or a squirrel.

glue, screws, and folk songs

not much to report this week:

i fixed our dining room table.

i have not hooked up our stereo.

the clown wall paper still freaks me out.

zack likes to eat the bones of other animals.

My dog gets annoyed when I treat him like a stuffed animal. He doesn't like it when I kiss him on his little wrinkled forehead, or when I hug him. He is aloof and catlike, a fancy little horse, and I believe he sees these actions as an affront to his dignity. I believe (and sadly Aa and I have discussed this) that he sees himself as this large, tough-ass wild animal. Not the adorable little fuzzbucket Aa and I see.

I just realized last night when I kissed Zack for the 800th time that he was getting annoyed. How do I know he was he annoyed? He sighed and pushed me away with his front paws. "Dammit woman, I'm trying to sleep after a full day of frolicking and looking impossibly adorable. I know I'm all precious and cuddled up but THAT'S ENOUGH".

That's kind of messed up, that I can love on my *dog* so much that he pushes me away.

house vs. home vs. property vs. me vs. you and your stupid fucking grizzly bear.

few random thoughts here late on a Monday afternoon.

another weekend in the minty with the J and the Zacker and the multitude of H2O molecules that have decided to call a part of our basement their new home. lots of stuff accomplished, lots more to do. how different from the water are we? a lot actually. we've got hair. water doesn't have hair. of course if you're bald, then does that make you water? probably not. i am probably wrong. anyway...

boxes were emptied; books were shelved.

which..btw...you have to wonder how many times I've moved some of my books...and to what end? am i happier because I've kept my 13 year old copy of Electricity and Magnetism? should i be happier? or should i have ditched it years ago? you tell me.

(and what a funny thing to keep around right? it's the LAWS OF PHYSICS. why do i need my own unique copy? shouldn't i be able to derive them from F=ma or perhaps from looking out the window?)

other things...other things.

as noted in J's earlier post...dishwasher should be in this weekend...along with some other electrical goodies...new outside light...few grounded outlets. safety first kids. unless you're buying chocolate flavored meth from the guy down the street, and then well, you're on your own, right?

i like posting. it's fun.

hugs.

the double A.

New appliances are *very* exciting.

We bought a fridge. It's the nicest goddamn fridge I've ever had in a place I've lived ever in my whole life. The freezer's on the bottom and it's a drawer. We had it installed on Thurs and I've spent time every day opening the refrigerator door, looking around inside, and then closing the door. Then I open the freezer drawer, look around inside, and close it. It's...freaking...awesome.

We also bought a dishwasher, and miracle of miracles, just met an electrician today who will help us install it next Saturday (thank Jeebus before Thanksgiving). I am almost speechless-excited about not having to wash dishes anymore. Currently, I'm trying to convince Aa to turn our little broom closet into a bar (inspiration from this awesome place!) And I'm sitting in the bedroom staring at our big closet, thinkin' about some redesign ideas there too. Boy oh boy!

Good Saturday

Finally, all of the teevee-fixing work is done. We now get to really start unpacking and settling into this place -- no more sleeping elsewhere to let the floors be re-done, to let re-painting happen. Yesterday, we both had the day off from work and we started cleaning out the basement, getting rid of crap we've been carting around with us since Chicago, since before Chicago. It felt almost giddy it was so liberating.

Today, I'm lying in bed cuddling with the dog, listening to Aa do dishes in the kitchen. It's really nice. We're home.

The rain is gone in more ways than one

So our basement definitely leaks. Not a lot, but enough. And any leaking is too much in a basement. So that will be an expensive pain in the ass. Thankfully, the rain has stopped. In fact fittingly the sun was out this morning. Nice work, God.

Yes, it's exciting that the Democrats have won so many races across the country and have taken control of the House -- possibly the Senate. The question on many analysts, voters, and pundits' lips now is: what are they going to do next? I have a suggestion: they should fix our leaky basement. I don't want the government in my bedroom or body, but they can totally get all in my basement.

One more thing about the elections and then this blog will return to its actual topic, which is The Minty: I know many people who are just plain old thrilled about the election results, and downright gleeful about Rumsfeld stepping down. But I would like to offer this: despite the fact that Democrats won all over the country, this election was still about the Republicans. The next election will also be about the Republicans unless the Democrats get an actual identity real quick-like. This is not a Democratic victory. It is a not-Republican victory. Democrats are still not framing any political discourse in this country. Still. Fucking STILL. That better change or this euphoria so many of my friends are feeling? So, so short-lived.

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED

12 years too long.

now the dems need to actually do something.

boxes are death

so it ends up that we have a lot of stuff. some might call it crap. i might call it crap. in fact, i'm calling it crap. things that were moved here from chicago to seattle. wallingford to fremont, and now, fremont to ballard.

we keep moving west. i can't wait to live in korea. should be nice. i love the food.

anyway, as to my point: we have stuff that we don't need, don't want and it's wearing us down.

SO...this friday we will rent a van and load it up with everything we don't need anymore (sans the guitars and a few books and more than a few uncle tupelo tshirts...) and drop it all of at good will. screw craigslist...i'm sure we could make more than a few dollars with our old stuff...but so be it. it's better to get rid of it than to try and "sell" it.

i will, however, be keeping all of my old ATM receipts neatly tucked away in random plastic bags hidden stochastically around the house.

Let's get on building that ark now

So when we were thinking about buying The Minty, we noticed there was a crack in the basement. All of the documentation said that there was really only leaking during heavy rains. "Heavy rains" are really not that frequent here, and while we knew that fixing the crack was important, we also figured we probably had a little time. We negotiated to get some money to fix the crack, but then the teevee show happened. So we haven't fixed it yet. Most of our stuff is in the basement right now too; repainting and redoing floors has meant we haven't been able to unpack much.

And now, BEHOLD! Rains unlike the Seattle area has seen for the last decade. Yay!

In other, but related, news: I've decided it's time to buy a raincoat, after 5+ years of living in the Northwest. Maybe we can use Aa's old raincoat, which is what I've been wearing, to seal up that crack in the basement.

And finally today, I've discovered the most miserable part of my day is dragging my extremely rain-averse dog outside in the morning, yanking him along on his leash, begging him to poop. Regardless of the outcome it sucks. Doing it feels pathetic and cruel, but not making him poop and leaving him all day feels petty and cruel. So it's a real win-win for me.

Haters

So Aa was the one who was there this AM when the painters and the carpenter came. It sounds like they were kind of grumpy and mean. They said we were the first people they had to do corrective work for. (We wouldn't have asked if it hadn't been repeatedly offered.) The carpenter called the shelves his "babies" and wouldn't let us keep them (we just wanted to reconfigure them to be a little more practical).

Now, why does this bother me so much, that they were crappy to Aa? Because I like people to like me. And I like people to like Aa. And this means that those guys were probably talking shit about us. And even though I totally talk shit about other people (I would say "I try not to" but it is kind of fun), it...bothers...me...that these dudes talked shit about us.

But actually, now that I admit that I like talking about other people, why shouldn't they have a little fun talking about us? Huh. I feel better now. Wow. Thanks, blog.

argh the painter guy is coming today to change some of the things the teevee ppl did but we've been living with stuff for a while and now we kind of like it, argh argh argh [pouds head against desk]

[secret to Kristy: I like the green too! But not on *all* the walls.]

Puff The Magic Earl Gray Lover

Tomorrow the painter guy comes back to paint over some of the crazier stuff (mainly the metallic ceilings). Also the shelving thingie is coming down, which I must admit I'm sort of bummed about. It's kind of cool. But as Aa keeps saying, way impractical. And we don't have the room for impractical coolness, not on that scale. Sigh.

In other news: I have gone off coffee for the second time in my life. (I am sucking down tea like...um...a thing that sucks down a great deal of tea. Perhaps an imaginary thing. A unicorn. A unicorn that really, really loves tea.) Today is day 1. I have a headache and my eyes water periodically and I basically hate my coffee-drinking colleagues. How much coffee gets drunk in a public radio newsroom in the Pacific Northwest? I bet you know the answer to that question.

zack the lobster (or how i crossed the line...)

J and I crossed the line of dog ownership. or rather, i crossed the line when i walked into the pet store and asked "do you have any dog costumes?"

someone should have stopped me.

but without further ado...i give thee...

ZACK THE LOBSTER!!!