spritechan | Entries tagged with haley

Uh oh, have fallen behind on these again. You’d think with all the time I’ve spent in the bathroom as a result of my urethral issues that I’d be able to get entries written easily. Unfortunately this isn’t the case, for a couple reasons. One, I have nothing to write when all I’m doing is sitting on the toilet with a hot pad in my abdomen, and two, it’s hard to focus when I’m begging the universe for some relief from the pressure in my bladder and knives in my urethra.

So, most of the day was spent in this fashion, sitting for up to two hours at a time, leaving for a few minutes to a half hour, rinse and repeat. I often start worse in the morning and then slowly improve or go up and down as the day wears on. I started the day at like an 8/10 in the pain scale, and was like 4.5 by the time Steve and Tyler got home. Steve arrived and offered to drive me to get Jamba Juice, as I had not been able to eat all day. We got back home just as Tyler was pulling up. We haven’t seen Tyler in weeks! He’s been busy with his stepdaughter’s various sports and dance-related engagements (I think she’s like 8) so he’s been canceling on us for more than he’s been coming along. He also just bought a house and has been moving into it, but I think now they’re solidly moved in. He actually lives very close to one of the game shops we go to, which to him (and maybe Steve?) means that with the alternating on who’s driving, that we should mix it up, store-wise, depending on whose turn it is, to prevent too much driving back and forth between the game stores, Catrina’s, and home. I feel like that sentence makes literally no sense but I’m gonna roll with it.

Aaaanyway. Tyler picked us up and we headed to hi score, which we haven’t gone to in awhile. On the way there, Bre texted me back about a question I’d asked her on Haley’s behalf (I don’t know if I mentioned it here, but Haley got fired from her job after working for them for 5 years, and she’s afraid she’ll never get another job again). She answered my question and we quickly got on alternating topics of my constant pain (she’s an RN) and on her very positive experience with medication (she swears by it and attritubutes her not being dead to it) and finally, FINALLY, Haley is interested enough in getting relief from her incurable mental illness to hear about it (Bethany had a bad experience on medication and is loud about her dislike of medications). As a result of these discussions and the extreme discomfort I was feeling, I admittedly wasn’t very present for the actual game shopping.

After Hi score we went to Catrina’s (per the new schedule we will only visit one game store instead of two each week). I got my food to go, because I learned from last week that eating even an hour and a half before yoga results in heartburn and a physical nightmare. Even with the pain I was adamant about going to yoga, because I made a new friend last week and I feel like it’s important to keep that social link up. And also I wanted to go to yoga dammit!

Yoga is at 8, and Brandi (the teacher) checked in with me about how I was doing. She did this when she met me last week, which is common with a new teacher, but I was surprised that she was very, “Anything I need to know about you this week?” So I told her, and she encouraged me to modify or pass on some of the hip opening poses if they were too much pressure or too painful. I happily did just that, opting for different poses when I felt like it was too much. Thankfully I didn’t need to run out to pee, which has happened before. When I got in, my friend waved me over and I was so flattered. It’s really not fair that I look so unique, because everyone remembers me, but so many people look the same to me in the beginning. She looks like every other blonde, thin suburban mom so I was glad she took the initiative in getting my attention. :)

I felt so good after yoga, but I was excited to get home to Steve. He bought us a 65” TCL TV recently but it wasn’t up to his standards (there was quite a bit of “dirty screen effect”), so he’s opting to try a Sony instead. This means he had to pack up an absurdly large TV into an even larger, more absurd box.

The rest of the evening was spent relaxing with Games Done Quick VODs of the Spyro and Mario Bros. 3 variety!

So we went to bed around 9:40, and I woke up several times with such bad reflux that I basically was vomiting in my mouth/choking/coughing. If that wasn’t bad enough, at 3am I woke up so cold and couldn’t get warm. I was shivering so much and asked Steve to cuddle me. My joints (fingers, knees, elbows) hurt so badly that I started to cry when Steve held me. He was not warm like I was hoping; he felt cold too. He of course told me that I was burning up and broke into a sweat immediately upon touching my skin. Eventually he went and got me another blanket for myself and gave me some NyQuil, as he had to get up in a couple hours. As I lay there waiting for the meds to kick in, I thought about how when Haley is sick, she just tolerates it. She never puts medication, even OTCs, into her body unless she absolutely must (and the only thing I can think of over the last 5 years was when she got her first UTI and waited until it was a kidney infection to prove to herself it wasn’t going away). I was grateful I don’t have a mental illness that makes me suffer like she does. Eventually the NyQuil started to work and my pain subsided enough for me to fall asleep.

I woke up 13 hours later, well-timed to a concerned text from Steve about whether I was alive or not. I was much better, my fever broke at some point, and my joints were still tender but not super terrible. But I had to spend the day in basically a hangover state, all gingerly moving about and taking it easy.

Haley came over to get a shirt she left over at my place and we laid outside for awhile until it suddenly started to rain. We talked about how I value people who have passion about things and hobbies and interests, and Haley values people who... have passion about their personality? It was really hard for her to put into words and I kind of feel like I know what she’s getting at. The difference I guess is that I think if people have no hobbies or passions, they’re kind of empty and boring, and she feels the opposite - that you’re “deeper” if you are interested only in other people and getting hype from simply being around them, and that if your life is a hobby you have less substance to YOU as a person. It’s actually a very interesting way to look at two opposing perspectives.

Personally I can’t imagine how boring and frustrating life would be if you had to rely on others to entertain you or make you feel fulfilled. You’d experience so much disappointment when everyone fell short of your high expectations and demands. I love having hobbies and sharing in the passion for them. She particularly asked a lot about Ben and Sean and why we like them, because they’re the quintessential “normal” people that Haley wants nothing to do with. It was so hard to explain the good vibes that I get from them, and how we share hobbies but also are different in a lot of ways, and how much I appreciate the way Ben talks about both things he loves and things he hates, and how Sean is observant, responsive, and independent in her own ways and has hobbies that overlap with Ben’s but she also has her own interests too that are unique and cool.

Soon after she left, Steve got home and left again to trade in his PS4 for a PS4 pro, and I showered and got ready for dinner. Soon after, Scott and Nick showed up and we met Courtney, Joe Waid, his girlfriend Megan and Quimby at India Palace. The place was packed and I learned that Courtney always calls ahead, when Steve and I have never done that. They were able to seat us in a weird spot in just a few minutes. The food was delicious as always, though I ate very little because I was still feeling a bit weird. I was pretty quiet, as was most of the group, most of the time. It’s like everyone was having a tired adult day.

After India Palace a few of us walked over to Starbucks for drinks and then headed back to our place. Steve’s plans for his birthday were to play Hidden Agenda, a game developed by the same people who made Until Dawn and played very similarly. Until Dawn is an amazing survival horror game that I insist you find a way to play, because it is SO GOOD. Choices affect outcomes and story. Hidden Agenda can be played as a story or as competitive between people. The group chose competitive, and each chapter in the story, someone random would get a “hidden agenda” to try to make something happen (or not). These events impacted parts of the story, and everyone got to vote between two choices during parts of conversations or scenes. Most choices were majority vote but some were “everyone has to agree” choices.

In the end, the group got a bad ending, but our suspicion over who the identity of the killer was confirmed, and now I want to play through the story to see how my decisions alone would shape the narrative. I LOVE these kinds of games, “choose your own adventure” for the modern day.

It was after midnight when the game ended, and Joe waid and Megan had left around 11, but he texted me asking for updates when the game was over, haha.

Bedtime and Kripp! Tomorrow is Larvitar day in Pokémon Go... and also about 50 million other things we’re doing.

Tealie is gone for 2 school days, Friday and Monday. For Friday, her sub was Josie, which was nice, because Josie has been subbing at Parkway for like 2 years, and she puts up with a lot of shit. Like, not only are our kids extremely difficult with subs generally no matter what we do, Josie is trans and that concept is very difficult to middle school children. Particularly students living in more "ghetto" areas... and toxic black culture makes it really difficult to accept homosexuality as a general rule, and add in trans issues? Tough. There are a lot of kids who staunchly refer to her as a "he" I know some change has been occurring, but most of my African American boys still don't even tolerate any male wearing pink (though picking like, pink pencils, pencil pouches, binders etc. is acceptable) and call it gay - what is this, 1985?

Anyway, I let Josie handle the class as a whole because she's persistent, and I got to spend most of the time teaching Malik 2-step equations. I really enjoy teaching 7th grade math, and him knowing he was learning 7th grade math concepts made him try REALLY hard. I made him a folder and put it in a special place and everything and he was so proud. Later in the day Pa sent a picture of a billion tiny pieces of paper that used to be his social studies test, and I found it really funny. Pa is so goddamn annoying, always complaining, and she has just been getting worse and worse. She never sees the humor in what kids are doing and I refuse to play into her negativity. I got so pissed at her for a bitchy email she sent to like 20 people but directed at me (asking a question I had ALREADY ANSWERED HER A FEW DAYS AGO) calling me out, and I started typing up a super angry response before going to one of the school social workers and having her help me write a more professional email. lol.

After I was done at Parkway, I headed out to Saint Paul to meet Bethany and Haley at the place where Bethany decided to order her wedding cake from for, you guessed it, a cake tasting! I knew exactly where it was because MHR (where I worked when I was a mental health case manager) is two buildings down from it. When we walked in, Haley of course got off on the wrong foot with the cake lady by telling her that she was Bethany (after the lady had already addressed Bethany as herself), and she did not find Haley's trickery funny. Then EVERYONE got off on the wrong foot, because the lady noticed that the wedding date is a Wednesday, and said they don't deliver cakes during the week. Bethany countered that over the phone she had been quoted a *delivery* fee and she had given them the date, and they went back and forth a bit with the lady basically saying they only hire drivers for Fridays and weekends, and Haley jumping in now and then to try to push the lady to "make an exception." Both Bethany and I got the vibe that it was non-negotiable, and everyone was annoyed. I was very surprised that Bethany didn't just walk away (she later said she had been considering it), because the woman was LEGIT judging Bethany for having a weekday wedding, saying "no one" gets married in the middle of the week and eventually straight up asked, "So why did you pick that date?" Bethany and Jake picked 8/8/18 because when they started dating, they each owned cars with the license plate 808, and 8/8 happened to fall on a Wednesday.

The cakes we tasted were all very good, my top favorites being lemon, a strawberry/fruity concoction, and a Bailey's/fudge. Bethany said she doesn't really like lemon, but her two favorites were the other two that I liked. The Neopolitan was also good. Bethany wanted a cheaper cake because she and Jaked don't even really care about cake or what it looks like, and I think she did pretty well at $475 for 90 people.

When we were finished with the cake and the humorless woman, it was time for lunch (and clearly me playing hooky... whoops). We went to JSelby's and Bethany got a caesar salad and I got a "philly" (again, everything there is vegan) and it was NOT good. But the chips and dip were fine.

I dropped the other two back off at their cars, and then called Steve and asked if I should go to work for 45 minutes orrrr just come home. We both voted come home. HAPPY FRIDAY YA'LL.

Steve showed me the changes he made to the game room when I got home. He's been cultivating the perfect layout, shifting things around as systems filled up, and now we're to the point that mid-room shelving is necessary, and he'd found a layout he liked. I love going into the game room while he shows me either games, or room arrangements, or we just kind of sit in there and chat. I particularly love just laying out on the floor, and the cats feel the same way. They're not allowed in the game room (we keep the door closed when we're not in there) because they're naughty and will knock everything over, so when WE are in there it's this rare forbidden treat for them to join us. Also I think it's one of the coolest, temperature-wise, in the house. Feels nice and it always smells good in there.

Once we were finished with the game room we decided to walk around the neighborhood doing raids in Pokemon Go, and wandering around the park spinning stops and catching Pokemon. It was really hot out again and we sat in the shade for awhile at the park scrolling between social media and P-Go, and it was just really nice. A lot of people were at the park, the baseball fields, the skate park and there was a family having a graduation party and grilling too. Good vibes. We started getting hungry and couldn't figure out what sounded good, just that we wanted to be outside. I suggested Jamba Juice and Five Guys. Of course I meant "Let's get the Mango Chia seed Jamba drink and eat Five Guys fries because they have a patio and a smoothie isn't enough to sustain either of us." We did exactly that, except Steve also got a burger from 5 Guys. Even if I ate meat, I would not want a five guys burger. They are the most lamest of burgers. We ate our food and caught mmore Pokemon. It was awesome.

Eventually we agreed we were both quite tired and decided to go home and nap. We ended up falling asleep for like, 4 hours. Lol. Then Steve got up and it was like 9:30 and Andy had been texting him all day about coming over for a bonfire. I had initially encouraged him to go, but he was reluctant. When we got up from the nap Steve said he felt like he should go, but I was feeling really tired and lazy and wanted to either go back to sleep or just lay in bed. Steve didn't think he'd be gone that long and I ended up slightly more awake, thinking he'd be home within an hour or two. I just scrolled on my phone and tagged Steve in memes and talked with Bethany and Haley in the group chat, but mostly I was bored and lonely and wished I'd gone if I'd known Steve was gonna be gone so long (but I also was enjoying being in bed, god is it nice not to have to leave lol). Steve got home around 12:30am, which was pretty late considering we plan to get up early enough to beat the rush at Birchwood Cafe for breakfast. It was nice having him home again, and a very cuddly sleep ensued, and quite easily considering how much we'd already slept!

Today I got up at 5:40... finally! A reasonable time! Showered and got coffee, but still took too long to sit down; Steve and I only had like 15 minutes. After he left, I just... could NOT get myself motivated to leave. I left so unbelievably late that I texted Tealie so she'd know I was coming in, and tell Malik and Vincente I'd be late. As I was walking in, I got a text from her:

Malik, "A couple minutes does not mean 20 minutes!!!!" I walked up soon after and we laughed sooo much about it, and Malik came flying out of the room trying to look extremely indignant, asking if I got Tealie's text. Still laughing, I told him I did, and apologized, and he couldn't help but crack a smile.

First block was a nightmare, they were just being so annoying. Nothing really egregious to note other than Darius, who is this tiny EBD child who I could palm in one hand and crumple him up, but when he gets mad, starts calling us the meanest names he can as if he can have any bearing on us other than annoyance. Today he was asked to leave when he kept shouting "ear rape," and he refused for several minutes, with lots of fuck you's etc. Tealie and I then convened at the front of the room, just sort of quietly venting and developing a backup plan for if they can't show they can cook, but we must have looked so serious that some of the kids got really concerned and they shushed each other into silence, staring at us, which was actually really interesting and amusing. I'm guessing Darius kept muttering to himself as we used the opportunity to talk to them about our newly developed plan (usually it's a lot of "No one cares" and "Shut up"s), because several different kids in his vicinity separately told him to stop, and Darius REALLY should know not to say anything about me in front of Vincente, because he is my biggest defender. They almost came to blows but I was able to direct Darius out of the room while Tealie managed Vincente. While I filled out his write-up and figured out how I wanted to talk to him, he had his head down on the table and called me a "piece of shit" a bunch of times (LOL!!!). I was just annoyed, not even mad, as usual. I'm so TIRED! I just don't want to deal! The end of the year is usually really fun, because we do so many projects and get to hang out with the kids, but this year it's like they're very different. Closed off, not as relaxed. Sucks!

When I was finishing up with a couple of phone calls at work, Haley texted me asking if I wanted to get lunch. I assumed she was doing laundry at my place today because she told me yesterday to leave the door unlocked but never came, but no, she just wanted to fill some time. At the TIME I thought she was already in the area so I agreed, but I had a lot of errands to run today and I wanted to get them all in. Turns out she was just at home and met me at my place after I got my eyebrows and lip waxed. Omg, getting my facce waxed feels sooo good. I love when they brush, trim, and pluck the eyebrow hairs after waxing (I only have them get the stray hairs), and even though I mostly get peach fuzz on my upper lip, I can't stand the feeling of having a mustache so I get that waxed too. So smooooth.

We went to eat at JSelby's, a vegan place in St. Paul. I got the Chili dog, fries, and their carrot cake soyclone, which is like a DairyQueen blizzard. All of it was quite good but I was so full I felt sick after. While we were there we talked a lot about Haley's boyfriend/ex-boyfriend, mostly. She was fine when we were hanging out but she spiraled later when Derek liked an instagram pic of another girl.

Dropped her off at home so she could leave, and then I went to the DMV to order a new license (because... ah... I lost mine........ again). Did you know if you have an expired license and the yellow paper that it makes your old license valid until you receive your new one?? I found that super interesting. I plan to test it out when attempting to buy drinks. Anyway, that took about a half hour of waiting in line, then I stopped at Cub for cat food. I ran into Jason, Steve's old coworker/friend, and we exchanged pleasantries. It's always good to see Jason, but this is at least the second time that I've gone to say goodbye and RIGHT then someone would come talk to him and I've ALWAYS been behind him. Today it was a random old guy at the self-checkout, and I was in his blind spot, and I stood there for such a long time like trying to lean into his line of sight* that I began to feel really awkward about overstaying my welcome, and just turned and made a break for it.

After that I picked up Steve and we went to Menards for a watering can for my hangy plant and some grass stuff. When we got home, Steve decided to mow the lawn and I cleaned out my car. It is SO GOOD to have a clean car again! The sweatshirt pileup was getting out of control, and it sorely needed a vacuuming. I also got to listen to fun music! When Steve was mowing I swear to god I looked to see if any neighbors were around and I didn't see any, so I knid of flashed Steve (just a lot of cleavage) and then I looked again and the damn neighbors across the cul-de-sac were in their driveway. lol.

Our lawn literally overnight exploded with dandelions. Lord.

When I was finished with my car I came inside and picked up a bit, going through some knitting books, needles and knicknacks Steve's mom brought down of his grandma's for me to pick through. When my phone is charged enough I'll add my favorite from today's books. When I was going through her stuff at her house, I think the oldest thing I found was a small knitting catalogue from the 1950's. She did actually have a few useful things for me - some decent needles, a few crochet hooks, and giant knitting needles!!! She had a set of 4 size 35 DPNs for god knows what, and ONE size 50. I need to find another 50 ASAP so I can REALLY make that giant blanket.
I blocked the cowl and my Pi Shawl. I'e never knit a large garment with lace before, and they weren't kidding about how much it grows! I was really pleasantly surprised.

*Real time: ~10 seconds

Uh oh, today was another morning where the sleep was just too damn good and suddenly it was far too late for morning coffee. The good news for me was that I had a paperwork day today and as such, didn't actually need to be at work by a certain time. On top of that, I'm done in a month with this district completely soooo.... I may not be the best employee right now.

I ended up doing a lot of catching up with typing, and it was frustrating that there was always a piece or two I needed that I couldn't just get by, say, testing a kid. I needed information from specific teachers. So I sent some emails and wrote what I could find. Overall it was a really boring day so I spent a lot of the inbetween texting Steve and tagging him in memes, and chatting with Bethany and Haley. It was a really good day for talking with Steve via text, but he was gone for FAR too long. Thankfully I'm gonna figure out a way to have lunch with him tomorrow, because god my days are lame without him! My principal at Nokomis emailed me congratulating me on "picking a great leader" of a prinicipal for next year, because everyone knows everyone in education. She also told everyone at their staff meeting, so I gotta prepare for questions over the next week or so.

Before noon Steve sent the confirmation that he got that job at the U of MN!!! I'm SO happy for him and SO proud. The university has a ton of perks that the hiring manager filled him in on, such as good healthcare, free undergrad degrees and 75% reduction in cost for graduate degrees, and even though his job is basically the same as what he does now, he's getting even more money (and he already made a decent amount). Even with my reduction in pay by switching districts, we still come out ahead. It's funny that his hiring manager was so eager to share the perks, because my new principal did the exact same thing when he offered me the position - he talked about how good the healthcare is in particular plus the district contribution. St. Paul does similar but the healthcare isn't as good. For example, vision isn't covered at all, but they do cover most of the premium. Now Steve doesn't have to give a shit about his job anymore, or, he can give even less of a shit. He's defintiely Michael Scott after Michael gives his 2-week notice:

So. Of course we were both excited all day to celebrate. When I told Bethany and Haley about it, of course Haley wanted to come to dinner, and I felt bad turning her down because she really WAS happy for him and we hang out with her so little these days. Once Steve got home we got WAY too snuggly and fell asleep for about 45 minutes, and it was much needed. As it's after 11 and I'm definitely going to regret staying up so late, I'm thinking I'll likely need a nap tomorrow, too.

Haley, Steve and I went to Acapulco, and Steve soon told us Nick was going to be able to make it after all. Haley made a small scene by really wanting a booth and barely waiting for them to clean one off before sitting in it, and it was really funny with Nick having to sit by her. She alternated between talking about her ex/boyfriend, asking inappropriate questions about Nick's sex life, demanding he show her his Tinder account after he told her he saw her on there (he refused and stood his ground), eating her food messily, and passing around pictures of her butt in a thong and having us vote on them (I'd voted earlier and the boys ended up picking the same one as I did). Nick was really funny because he seemed VERY nervous about looking at the pics until I gave permission. Honestly I do appreciate it, because I am weird about Haley sometimes but she's not like, a THREAT or anything. She never does these things in like a malicious or sneaky way, she legitimately is curious. It's really hard to explain because she obviously wants people to think the pics are sexy, but she's not being annoying about it. UGH I CAN'T EXPLAIN IT. Like there's a difference between her and other girls. Like the intent. I don't know. Either way, I guess I'm protective of her AND my friendships and I'm not worried about her with Steve or my friends. It was an amusing time and I'm glad she felt animated and talkative today.

She left after dinner but Nick came over. The boys played handhelds and I decided to play ITG. The first couple of songs I did terribly on, but after a few more I really started warming up, and I ended up doing pretty well. I finally got the star (96%) on Anubis and Summer in Belize, improved my Hand of Time to above 97%, and got the tri-star (99%) on The Game. We recently read in Ben's book, written in 2013, that he had just gotten his 2nd quad (100%), so we went to his Groovestats to see which song it was. It was The Game. Only 25 more excellents to improve and I'm there!! lol. Damn you Ben and your amazing accuracy!! Nah, I'm proud of the improvements I made, and I felt really good about the play today. I even tried a few new 12's and even though I couldn't pass them, it really felt like a stamina/getting tired issue vs ability. None of them seemed too hard, footwise, just my ability to not get tired out. I have optimism of being able to pass another 12 soon.

It's worth mentioning that I beat Steve at Rummikub yesterday, but it was a really good game. We'd been operating on the system of the 2nd person being able to take one last turn after the other person goes "out," but yesterday was the first time we played without that rule, so the game became much more intense and nervewracking, lol. I'm still only beating him by a few points, but that could change at any time!

Today was the first Saturday of garage sale season, which for us means that Steve woke up early (for a weekend — it's still two hours later than we wake up for work). We meant to get up at 6:30 for coffee time, but we went to bed past midnight and I continue to suck at sleeping.

My tracker caught 2 times of me being awake. Usually my sleep tracker doesn't even recognize when I'm awake, because I don't move around enough. As I said, I usually find myself staring into the dark. You will note the 158 audio catches, which include snoring (from either of us), but are usually me tossing and turning. The light sleep is often me being awake. I've tried calibrating it multiple times to track my wakefulness, but the app just won't believe me when my heart rate isn't spiking. /rant

You'll note that I have a giant orange bar on the right. When Steve left, I decided to go back to sleep until 9, at which time I'd go to the farmer's market. Instead I laid there anxiously as Connie, Grandma, or Ronnie came in and out of the house 100 times as the garage sale got underway. I stubbornly stayed in bed anyway, desperate for more Z's, listening to Day9 play Hearthstone.

When that didn't work, I invited Haley out with me and went to pick her up. She was in a decent mood, updating me on the Derek situation and I updated her on the garage sale situation. She also described her horrible experience at the doctor about her possible fibroids or cysts, and I started to actually feel faint/dizzy/gray as my trauma reaction to anything in the cervix/uterus area spiked.

We got a parking spot a bit away but not terrible, and we wandered around the market. It's still too early for most of the produce, especially with such an extended winter and literally no spring, but the flowers were out, and that's what I was there for. We started at the front, which is comprised of vendors of various goods - clothing, jewelry, honey, meat, cheese, bread, sauces, tea, etc. I bought some sticky rice and veggies from my favorite Hmong food place (and they put out a new curry spice mix to go with their sweet potato noodles so I bought both), and Haley bought a lemon poppyseed muffin. She also bought a mug from our "Mug Lady" before we went back to the flowers.

This year I decided to go with a brights theme - orange, red, and yellow. I bought some Dahlia, Merigold, one other, and I bought some medium-sized white flowers as filler to mix it up. I hadn't cleaned out my garden at all yet this year so I wasn't sure how many perennials had come back, and I didn't want to buy too many. Haley and I spent a lot of time going back on forth on what was ugly and what wasn't. I also ended up, for the first time, buying a plant that goes in a hanging pot and should cascade out of it. When I asked the woman if it could be indoors, she got REALLY weird about it and stammered that they only raised plants to go outside. ...okay, that's what I was asking. Haley has a bunch of plants that go indoors in hanging pots. Her response had the tone of complete shock at the idea of an indoor plant, like my question was WAY out of left field. Steve has called me out a few times lately for being unnecessarily snappy to customer service people (I dispute one for sure) so I made a concerted effort not to react to her and just said thanks (in a not-bitchy tone) and said I'd put it outside.

After the farmer's market I dropped Haley off at home, got gas and a car wash (discovered that my driver window has several weak spots in the seal, lol), and bought a hanging container for the new plant as well as compost and potting soil from Menards. When I got home I had to quickly drop all the stuff off before driving Steve and myself over to Baker's Square for lunch with Steve's parents and grandpa. This is a bi-monthly thing, as Steve's grandpa is 90 and still living independently and his parents live 4 hours away. Before we got there Steve and I made our "Bingo cards" on what phrases or topics would be brought up at the lunch.

Steve's mom won the bingo game, though she doesn't know it. At the end, we were doing the Minnesota Goodbye aka standing outside of the doors of the restaurant, half blocking them, and continuing to talk while edging in the direction of our cars before coming back in for hugs, and Mama Aker started shotgunning phrases and topics at us, as if she remembered about it and needed to squeeze in as many phrases as possible. She ended with, "I haven't seen you in so long I was gonna ask if Steve got a new girlfriend!" and right at that second, a woman was walking toward the door. Mama Aker pointed at her and said, "You really should get that shirt!" The woman's shirt read, I didn't want to come. We both burst out laughing, knowing how fucking good she got me. It was amazing, I'm proud of that super sick burn. Shows me that Steve and Amy didn't get their humor from nowhere.

After that, Steve and I got Starbucks (he got his usual Americano and I got the new cold press with foam drink) and I took us to Half Price Books. I didn't find anything - I was looking for a specific sock knitting book - but Steve ended up with a couple cheap games.

We headed home and hung out outside while the garage sale wrapped up. I started weeding the garden: cleaning out the leaves, clipping the dead perennials and moving the old stuff out of the new growth, managing the ants with my cinammon spray, and ignoring my cousin Danny's awkward stares as much as possible. Steve sat nearby. They started packing up, and Danny and Ronnie (Danny's dad) started bickering about whatever, and I didn't see what happened but Ronnie is so damn unstable and as he tried to stalk up the driveway (at best he can manage a painful-looking lurch) he lost his balance and fell on his "good" side. It was extra embarrassing because grandma got all stressed and he couldn't stand easily and Danny just stared and there were people AT the garage sale still looking. It was sooo awkward. He was at least agreeable for a few minutes to sit down, but he almost fell at least two more times before they left. God! Just stop!!! Soon after that it started lightly raining for no reason so we had to bring everything in while my aunt and grandma muttered about mold... kayyyy. It let up soon enough so we could finish packing up the stuff and I could get back to the garden.

They got everything out of the garage to take to Ronnie's to try to sell there, which was surprising and a huge relief. Connie still has stuff in our guest room, but not nearly as much and she's promised to get it all out in the next couple weeks. So I finished the garden. It looks good, but I think will need a couple more flowers. Oh well, guess I have to go to the farmer's market again (yay!).

I got done planting with 10 minutes to spare before my tutoring lesson with Riria (she's been my student for almost 4 years). Lesson was good, but her connection wasn't great. We finished Charlotte's Web and I made the mistake of asking if she had an English book she wanted to read, and of COURSE she chose Hachiko, so I'll probably cry.

Nick and Scott came over, I ordered a pizza and Steve went to get it while I finally took pictures and posted my haul from Yarnover on Instagram and updated my Ravelry. Soooo excited. After that I came down here with the boys and started my newest project. I REALLY want to start like 2 different shawls and another pair of socks (and I have Steve's socks on the needles), but I was a responsible person and cast on for Mom's Mother's day gift: Curious Cats fingerless gloves. I'm already done with the cuff and am about to start the pattern. The wonders of worsted weight yarn and larger needles!!

During that time, Nick started Uncharted 2, Scott played something handheld, and Steve fell asleep (he had a big day!). We chatted about woodshop classes we took in school and other random things. Eventually Steve woke up from his nap, we all talked a bit more, and then it was P-gas time*. Steve and I had planned to go Ghost Hunting in Pokemon Go tonight, but we're both too beat. There will be other nights for spooky romance!

*P-Gas = poison gas. A method of kicking his friends out since the beginning of time, wherein at a certain point in the night the room fills with a toxic gas that forces everyone but us to evacuate. Steve has prevented so many tragic incidents from occurring by being vigilant all these years.