AnnieF

Sink flange baffle arrived and has been installed, on the flange, being baffling. Mission accomplished. :) Happy Saturday, everyone. :)

Vibes heading your way, dusky and Endeavour. Is there a dental college near you, dusky? I know two people who have gotten some pretty major work done for a discounted price because it was done by dental students (under supervision). Just throwing it out there. :)

Big vibes coming your way, Erratic. :)

"Flanj." A poetic person could try rhyming it with "orange" ("Eat the segments of the delicious orange/and discard the rest, avoiding the flange") (I never said I was poetic. :P)

And they were separated for years? How many years are we talking about here? That does seem weird, that's for sure. Do you think they were embarrassed, maybe? Posted this in the other place, but I'm putting it here too because I can't stop saying it in my head: sink flange baffle. After much Googling, I finally figured out that that's what the rubber doodad that sits inside the hole in the sink is called. The doughnut-shaped metal piece that creates the hole is the flange, and the rubber gasket is the baffle. Sink flange baffle. Go ahead, try it out. "Sink flange baffle." Hee hee.

Truth. This is my exact situation: the F-let is 12 and the F-ster is 15. He can get his learner's permit in August. I wouldn't have thought that I'd be so, so ready for him to start driving, but here we are. I'm a SAHM and driving the kids around is my job. It makes life easy for Mr F, that's for damn sure. He can go to work and not worry about whether the kids are getting to where they need to go, 'cause I'll do that. If I were also working full-time, it would be difficult to manage all the transpo needs. My friends who do it seem to have created networks of people in the same situation. They draw up rotas and everything, heh. I am veering between being happy that the F-ster will be able to drive himself around, and terrified. Parenting! :-) TRUTH. SO MUCH TRUTH.

What I've been told about 3 kids vs 2 kids is that the parents have to switch from a man-to-man defense to a zone defense. Hee hee. ;) Two in diapers at the same time does not sound super-fun, but meh. It's diapers. Eventually they're a distant memory. I had two in diapers and cribs for a short while -- there was an overlap between the F-ster and the F-let both in cribs, so I didn't get to reuse crib #1 for kid #2. That was kind of annoying, but in the end I gave both of those cribs to a woman who worked at the F-ster's daycare who was having twins. She was beyond thrilled to get that furniture, so it all worked out in the end. Would you have to buy more furniture? Probably also a good idea to have two diaper pails, not just one. Logistics, whee! :-) ETA: all my blather is getting the cart ahead of the horse, and Erratic, it sounds to me like you are looking at this exactly the right way. If the match feels right, then there you go. I'm sending you so many good wishes and vibes and love and support. :)

That is...a lot for your friend and her partner, let's call him Tory, to think about. That is going from zero to really fast in a very short time frame. Tory and partner would have a full range of young children experiences happening not sequentially, but all at once. Very young infant? Check. Toddler at an age that's mobile enough to be dangerous but nowhere near mature enough to understand danger? Check. Kindergartner (?) who is probably going to need a lot of explanations about, well, everything (not just adoption circumstances, but also those very important questions like "Why is the sky blue?" and "When Superman uses x-ray vision, can he see his own skeleton?") Check. Does that mean that I think that Tory and partner should not go for it? No, definitely not. If "they," screw it, if you think you two can dive in and do it, and it is your real, true gut feeling deep inside that you want this, you want this family of three kids and a full house and noise and skinned knees and tears and sleepless nights and laughter and joy and wonder, then do it. But only if you won't look back with regret. It will be so hard. I only have two, and they didn't arrive in one package, and there were times in the early days when my younger son was very new when I wondered what the hell I had done, and how I was going to survive it. Those days passed. :) Having been your friend for 8 years, I think you are up to the challenge. But that's the opinion of an online friend who can't possibly know which way the scales weighing "Super Excited" vs "Absolute Terror" are balancing for you and Kory. And of course it's not so simple, because Super Excited and Absolute Terror are all mixed up. I truly wish you a decision-making process that feels right for the two of you. Sending you so much love, Erratic. :)

I'm sending you the leftovers from our house closing, Endeavour, since it went very smoothly and we've got plenty left. To an easy close! :-)

Thanks for the sympathy, everyone. That really shook me up (partly also because while I didn't have contraband in the car this time, I often do. And my medicine is a felony in this state, so yeah. To say I was freaked out doesn't even cover it). And today I'll be doing more illegal driving, whee! I have to take the F-let to school, and then get the car smogged (has to be smogged before it can be registered). If you are seeing a Catch-22 in this situation, you are correct. Apparently one is supposed to go to the DMV somehow and get a 1-day permit to allow you to drive an unregistered vehicle). The DMV is of course not conveniently located on a bus line. I'm going to risk it. Wish me luck! ETA: I'm back, car is smogged and registered. Whew.

Just got a traffic ticket (driving w/ expired tags, whoops) and when I got home just now I had a delayed stress reaction, shaking and crying. Police scare me, and I'm a middle-aged white lady. I can't even begin to imagine how it feels to be a real target (ie, black). How has this become our country, where a traffic stop leads to the cop warning me that I could be arrested if I don't fix this, in a tone meant to intimidate, not inform? Why try to scare me (btw, it worked, good job Officer Unfriendly)? I don't even know what else to say. That was a horrible experience, and it was just a routine traffic stop. We don't live in the place where I thought we lived. I've known that for a while, that the US is not a beacon of freedom, but an oligarchical police state. But getting reminded is awful, and I don't have to live it every day, like many people do. Still crying, don't know what else to say.

Oh god, these people. And the thing is, I'm not losing any weight. Our bodies are complicated and shit, and the bullcrap idea of "calories in, calories out" does not actually work in real-life humans, so yeah. Staying right at the same weight, c'est la vie. I have baffled a couple of people when I told them that in fact no, this isn't making me lose weight, but I don't care. It's just so baked into our damn culture: "Weight loss=good!" There are more important things, but I had a hard time trying to convince those two women of that. (Of course they were both women. Of course.) Yep. Benevolent racism, like benevolent sexism, is definitely a thing. And just like in that commercial, it's very often people of Asian descent who get to "enjoy" being told that they are all super smart and they all (ALL) know math and science. Any kind of stereotype that says that ALL people in a particular group are the same is not cool. Even if the stereotype is supposedly positive. That ad would've had me saying "oh HELL no." I made a noise somewhat like this: "Snorfbahahaueghahhhhheeee." :-) ETA why does editing a post screw up the formatting? Grrr...

Yes and yes. It's a nerve-signaling problem, and it is intermittent, although it is much more frequent (as in, nearly 100% of the time) than it used to be. Every now and then I will smell something clear as day, to the exclusion of everything that also has an odor in the same vicinity. And mostly what I can force myself to eat is stuff with very strong flavors. Curry is my current best friend, heh. The other issue, unfortunately, is that I'm also intermittently having the feeling that anything I swallow is stuck in my throat. And I mean, like, a drink of water. This is extremely unpleasant, as you can imagine, so that's also standing in the way of me being able to eat much. Blergh. I really don't recommend this MS thing. Don't sign up for it, y'all. It's a trap! ;) cko, thanks for the Soylent idea; it won't work for me, as the two main ingredients (rice and oats*) are both things I don't eat, but I appreciate you thinking of it. :) *When I started doing the Paleo thing (2.5 years now!) I cut out all the grains. All of 'em, even though they might not all be pain contributors. I am super unwilling to try to reintroduce any grains back into my diet to see which ones are okay, because pain. My pain noticeably decreased when I cut the grains out, and I don't care enough about any of them to try them again. I hope everyone has a wonderful day. I hope you all know how much it means to me to have this community of friends to vent to and feel supported by. I don't do any MS-specific support groups or anything, because they never get my sense of humor (too dark. Always too dark. Pfft) and the "support" is often crap like "God only gives us as much as we can handle" which yeahno. Thank you all so much. You're awesome. :-)

We're closing on our old house today! This morning I get to call the power, water, garbage, and insurance companies, and cancel those accounts! Truly, today is awesome, for on this day we stop paying double on all that shit. Wheeeeee!!! I complained about this on FB, but I'm going to put it here too, because it really does suck: my sense of taste/smell are compromised, and it is very difficult to force oneself to eat when nothing tastes like anything. I am currently living on pistachios and coffee with cream in it. Healthy! :/ Super huge vibes all around! I'm going to be in a good mood all day because of getting this huge financial burden gone, so I invite you to share in my good cheer. Yay for all the things! Heh. :-)

Thanks for the well wishes, everyone. :) Y'all are the best.

My mother is taking it particularly hard because she always hoped she could "save" her sister. My mother's family of origin is full of alcoholism and abuse, and this sister took the brunt of some real awfulness. She lived here for several years in the late 70s/early 80s, and looking back at it now as an adult, I can see that my mother saw her sister as a "project," which alas is not a good way to try to help someone. Ugh, it's just all so sad. Some kinds of abuse can't be recovered from, it seems.

Have a great time, Erratic! My mother's youngest sister died this week (she has four sisters; all the others are alive). She'd had cancer for years, and was really in pain and suffering, so it's for the best. I knew her the most when I was a tween/ young teen, and I have some good memories. I will miss her. But oh, the anguish in my mother's voice when she called me with the news. Do. Not. Like. :(

The non-reply is also handy. Coworker: "[Fox News bullshit! Benghazi!]". dusky: "Huh." Or "hmm." Or "Wow." Or "You don't say." All very flat and neutral. Sometimes it works. ;) I wish you luck: this person sounds like an asshole, frankly.

That's a pretty swanky hotel in Nob Hill, Harvester, so we'd be able to meet up and do San Francisco-y stuff pretty easily, 'cause that location puts you near all the usuals (Chinatown, Fisherman's Wharf, Union Square). I wouldn't be able to afford to stay in Nob Hill, but that's no worry. Happily, much cheaper accommodations can be found not too far from there. (We may want to confer on this point, Darkpool.) Continued good real estate vibes, Endeavour. I'm down to the last couple of weeks before escrow closes on my old house, and like most things that take forever, it's these final days that are the most excruciatingly long. :/

I could probably be in SF then. Very much would love to meet you in person, Harvester. :)

I'm thinking of you with love, cko.

Huge real estate vibes, Endeavour. As it happens, my old house (the one that my family and I moved out of last July) is also finally on the market. Because when a contractor says 6 weeks, he means 6 months. But it's finally going to be gone, no longer a huge drag on our finances and my peace of mind. We've accepted an offer, actually, and inspections happened last Friday. There's some stuff to be fixed, but there wasn't anything deal-breaking, so fingers crossed that the deal goes through. And the person who made the offer is a local politician, daughter of another very well-known local politician, so when I told my mom who it was, she laughed and laughed, because Reno really is a podunk f'in place, heh. So, anyway, big huge real estate vibes!! :-) Smoke from Siberia is making things horrible and choky this morning. Because it's not enough that we're going to have a horrible summer from California smoke. Noooo, let's also have some come over the top of the world, for maximum wtfery.

Hee hee, you go, cko ;) Yep, we're over here by the dry goods. :P This, a lot.

Big, big, HUGE vibes coming your way, L&b. :)

Words I'm not used to seeing put together like that. ;)