NoodleDog

I have noticed lately that the updates to my once well-tended blog here have been few and far between. I see others’ journals, all updated and written-in, and am sad that I have nothing to report. And it’s not that I just don’t have time (although I don’t, really, I’m stealing time from work at this very minute), it’s that I really have nothing to elaborate on in order to stretch it into a worthy entry. Sure, my entries are long. But that’s because I care, people. Because I CARE.

The trick is that I’m slipping into a rut. I can feel it. I know from ruts, folks. I have been in long, long ruts for many a year here or there. College ruts, working-a-menial-job ruts, dating-a-jackass ruts, you name it. I can spot a rut miles away.

The problem with this particular rut is that it defies definition. It’s not a typical rut in that I get up, go to work, come home, go to bed, and then do it all over again the next day. No, this rut is different. This rut involves getting up, going to work, then various strange activities in the afternoons/evenings. Mostly boring activities, like work-related meetings, or cleaning the house, or working on something to do with either the condo or the house.

Oh, say… I do have some news. Last week, we sold the condo. Finally. I will tell you all about it after I am finished telling you about the rut.

So these afternoon/evening activities, if you can call them that, are sapping the life out of me. Oh, I complain. I complain bitterly. I also keep in mind how lucky I am to have such a life of leisure, and that my biggest worries are the work I have to do on the HOUSE I LIVE IN, the many VEHICLES WE DRIVE, caring for the GARDEN I GET TO PLAY IN, or going to the JOB THAT PAYS ME. Yes. Burdens, every last one of them, right? No. But they can cause a bit of a rut.

Like the housecleaning, for instance. We were in so much of a down-swing this past weekend that we didn’t even clean the house. We worked at one of my properties instead, cut down a few errant trees and brought the wood and debris back to the house. I am having a hard time getting my trades to do the little things. And of course, it is the little things that get noticed by the Boards… So Rob is going to start up a little business, incorporate and I can have him do these small jobs and get paid. He’s so handy!! And this way, everyone wins – the Boards’ small jobs get done, first thing, he’ll be less expensive than the contractors I tend to use for a second thing, and this way, he doesn’t have to find another job when the TELUS union goes on strike. So it’s all good. I hope.

However, it does add to our list of things we have to do. See, now instead of just doing work at home, we have to add in doing work at the condos, too.

I didn’t feel very sociable over the weekend. I’m not sure if it’s because I’m getting depressed about my hair or what. But we went to a wedding shower for Teron, and it was alright, but after about an hour, I really wanted to go home. And Rob had abandoned me to go and get another beer, but never came back. So there I was, sitting in a lawn chair, surrounded by couples and families and children, just sitting there by myself. Not that I don’t love Teron – I do. They’re great! And fun! But the situation made me feel out of place, and I’m trying to work with these issues I have with feeling out of place.

I think the hair thing is key. I notice whenever my hair starts to fade out, nothing else is right. I mean, the clothes don’t fit right, my shoes feel funny, the car feels off, I feel like I can’t talk, I know people are disrespecting me every where I turn… So one of the largest contributors to the rut is the hair. I will be trying to get a hair appointment this week sometime. I have to book something during the week because on the weekend, I have a get-together to go to in Banff, and the only day my hairdresser works on the weekend is Saturday.

Oh, and that’s ANOTHER thing: the get-together is a stagette party for Hailey, of Tony and Hailey, and at this party, we are going to the Banff Springs Spa. The girls all chose various spa treatments to have done, and if you didn’t speak right up about what sort of massage or mud bath you wanted, you ended up with having your nails done. I have never, ever, in my life, had my nails done. I am not at all sure what to expect. I’m not sure if I should cut them before I go, or if they’ll do it there. I’m not sure if they’ll put polish on them or what. I’m a little nervous. I have a strange fear and loathing of the nail clippers. I never, ever clip my nails. My toenails, sure, but not my fingernails. For my fingernails, when they get too long, I just file ‘em down. I make ‘em nice and pointy, too, so if a serial killer tries to kill me, I’ll just scratch him with my very long, pointy nails and there will be trace evidence under the nails, but the killer will also bear the mark of my scratches that the forensics people can match up. Ha!! They are also handy for opening plastic bags without having to go and get the scissors.

I also leave my nails fairly long, too. Nature’s cycle dictates that they’ll grow really nicely for a while, then I’ll catch one on a flying dog or in a gate somewhere, and it will snap, and then in sympathy, all the other nails will snap or get caught on something and I’ll start over with much shorter nails again. So I’m a little nervous about having my nails done. I’m just not that kind of girl. I can’t relax while someone works on my nails. I mean, it took me more than ten years to get to the point where I was comfortable having my hair done, and I relax now more because I know my hairdresser pretty well and I like what she does. I don’t know if I’ll ever be comfortable with someone filing my nails for me.

Especially for money.

It’s not that I’m cheap. Oh, I can pinch a penny, sure, but I can also drop a grand and just shrug “oh, well”. It’s that what I spend my money on has to be worthwhile or justified in my mind, and spending money on someone filing my nails really makes me nervous.

Ok. So lemme tell you about the sale of my condo (again). It’s sold. Yay! See how easy that was? The right person just had to see it, was all. It’s a nice little place – three bedrooms up, nice big kitchen down, living room off the kitchen, basement partially finished… you get the idea. It’s a condo, not a luxury mansion. So this woman came and saw it last week, and then came back with her realtor and her kid and her dad and her dad’s wife… and all these people traipsed through it, and her dad made such un-useful comments like “I don’t see that you put in the electrical box right – it’s gonna leak cold air all winter…” to which I had to reply “No, we wired it professionally – we use the little plastic pocket-sleeve-thingies to prevent any cool air from coming around the switches…” and he looked suitably impressed. I think she liked it, though, because her realtor then dropped an offer at my house that evening, and I countered (because the realtor wants some money for doing the deal, and I am opposed to that, so had to build it back in to the sale price), and they accepted, and that was it. It’s now sold. The realtor is a bit of a tenacious thing – when I don’t answer her call or call her back within one minute of her call, she will call continuously every minute until I either answer or call back myself. When in reality, what I feel like doing is throwing the phone into the river. Or possibly the realtor...

I have learned one thing from this entire process: I am so terribly, terribly bad at these sorts of things. I cannot sell. I have a principle: if you want it, buy it, and if you don’t want it, don’t buy it. I can’t make you want something. I don’t want to make you want something. I can show it to you, I can say “here it is, I think it’s nice…” and if you like it, you can buy it. If you don’t want it, just don’t call me. I’m cool with that. It was getting to the point where I was going to have to have Rob deal with the people because he’s so much more a people person than I am.

But it has sold, and I am glad, and providing their home inspector doesn’t discover the killer bees nesting nearby, the sale should go through just fine.

(I have killer bees, possibly, at that property, since I manage it as well. Had I forgotten to tell you all about that? Well, the exterminator thinks they’re Africanized honeybees, but the jury is still out – I am having a few dead samples sent over to the university for identification and will post a whole ‘nother story about it…)