Conversations with my Mother: Losing my mind edition

Me: “Hi mom. Still interested in helping with the pre-move stuff? Because Hublet goes back to work a week before school starts, and that week would be a good time for you to come – I’m planning on letting you pack the china, because I suck at it.”

Mom: (Looks at calendar). “Sure! I can come after the luncheon on that Tuesday, and stay until Saturday!”

Me: “Oh my God – you think it’s going to take 4 days to pack the kitchen stuff? We’re never going to make it!”

Mom: “Um, sweetie? Hublet will be back at work that week, right?”

Me: “Yeah, so there shouldn’t be anyone in your way…”

Mom: “Yes, but The Boy doesn’t start school until that next Monday.”

Me: “So?”

Mom: “Well, part of the reason I’m coming is so that your not-quite-eight-year-old won’t be left home alone for an entire week.”

Me: “Oh. You know, I totally forgot about The Boy.”

Mom: “I noticed.”

Me: “He’s so low-maintenance I keep losing him in the shuffle. Hope I remember to feed him.”

Mom: “Me, too. You seem a little stressed, dear. I could come earlier if you’d like.”

Me: “No, it’ll be fine. Hublet will remind me if I forget something Boy-related.”

Mom: “Ookay. I’ll just call to check in later, then.”

Apologies for the Radio Silence

We finally got an offer on our house. So now we need to buy another one and move, hopefully within the next 4 weeks. No problem, right?

On the bright side, my mother is beside herself with anticipatory glee. I feel as though I should put all the local furniture stores on alert…

Sometimes, you’ve just got to commit.

There’s a restaurant space at the corner of the main intersection in my little slice of upper redneckia which has seen approximately 8 different tenants in the 12 or so years that I’ve lived out here.  It’s been a family restaurant, an oyster bar, a sports bar, and a couple of other iterations that I cannot recall, primarily because I never go there.  On second thought, that may be the root of the problem. 

It’s not that our little area can’t support restaurants, but that for whatever reason the succession of entrepreneurs in that space haven’t hit upon the right formula for our area.  And granted, it’s kind of an odd area, with the half-million dollar homes located across the street from tobacco fields and the occasional lone trailer, but I would think that would count as an opportunity to reach a wider clientele, right?

Apparently, I am not the only person with such thoughts.  A couple of weeks ago, as I waited at the stoplight I happened to notice that a new sign had appeared outside the doomed restaurant.  Capriccio 42, it read, and it had the soothing earth tones and swirly font that marked it as a sign for an Italian bistro-type joint.  “Oh, man,” I thought, “not like there isn’t already enough competition in the Italian restaurant market out here,” and I prepared to dismiss this effort  just as I had the oyster bar and seafood shacks before it.

  And then I read the bottom of the sign:  Featuring Japanese and Italian cuisine!

What?  I reread the sign.  Yes folks, here in upper redneckia you can have your veal parmigian with a nice California roll.  Or perhaps pizza with raw eel–I don’t know.

I’ve gotta give them points for trying to simultaneously appeal to the blue collar and white collar denizens of our town, but at the same time, I wonder if they wouldn’t have been better off  just picking one.  Time will tell.

I Just Paid $10.99 to Waterboard Myself

Because I am pregnant, I have the cold from hell, and all my most favorite-ist cold medications (I’m talking to you, sweet Nyquil, prince of dreamless and easy-breathing slumber) are off limits.

My Cat Doesn’t Want us to Move

She’s subtle, but she gets the point across.

We had two showings scheduled for this week, and so we put the cat outside during the day.  That way we don’t have to deal with a litterbox and the attendant mess and odor.

Naturally, the cat took it upon herself to discover a nest of baby rabbits.

We can’t prove it, but we’re pretty sure that the realtor was confronted with a rabbit corpse on the sidewalk when he or she arrived for the first showing, because there was a dead rabbit in the grass when we got home, but we know that our cat only ever kills and eats vermin on one specific concrete section of our sidewalk.  Sorry about that, nameless/faceless realtor!

Yesterday, Hublet was able to come home before the showing and bury the carcass that the cat had thoughtfully left in its appointed place on the sidewalk.

I am tempted to just tape a note to the front door:  “Fresh rabbit meat and slightly used pet cat  – $100 extra.”

I wonder if I’d have any takers?

What Day is it Again?

Seriously.  A long weekend followed by a snow day and I’m pretty much out for the count.  Plus I can’t lift my arms above my head from flinging The Boy and his sled down the street…but a large time was had by all.  Plus I got to play an impromptu game of “duelling rednecks” with our neighbor down the street, which is always fun:

Me:  (watching the California rednecks two doors down and their across-the-street neighbor, Duane (yes, really), bust out the go-kart, tie an inflatable raft to the back, fill it with kids and go roaring down the road) How long before the raft pops?

Neighbor from upstate New York:  I give it one trip around the block.

Me:  Reminds me of the time we got the 20 inches of snow and I looked out the window and saw a pickup truck dragging a bass boat full of kids behind it.  I thought, “Well, that’s officially the most redneck thing I’ve seen in this neighborhood.”

Neighbor:  I can beat that.  When we first moved to Raleigh and we had a decent snow I saw a dude in a 4×4 dragging a detached car hood behind him.  Kids were hanging onto the hood for dear life–I thought, “I wonder if he just has that thing lying around for such an occasion, or if he actually took it off a car to use as a sled?”

Me:  You win.