Tuesday - migraine sleeping, pic courtesy of Sammy
Wednesday - Isaac's bruised, sprained ankle
Thursday - travel back pack...NY is close, people! What this doesn't really show is that it's nearly as big as Sammy. He could, actually, comfortably sit in it...
There's an ice cream shop close to our home. It's one of our favorites. We sneak in probably more often than we should...It makes me sick nearly every time (we're trying to figure out why...we're assuming it's the fat in it, but I digress...), but we still go. It's a town staple, packed on date nights and random afternoons. It's lovely to have something like that to count on.
The last time we were there, enjoying a pre-dinner banana split, I kept thinking of the other ice cream shop we used to have here in town and how I'm glad it's gone. I don't have really happy memories surrounding it, even though I loved it. You see? It's where Isaac once broke up with me...
I remember the day perfectly. It was in June. About 2 1/2 months after we started dating. We had a long conversation over ice cream. I remember crying. I remember, very clearly, asking Isaac to stop being the meanie-head that just broke up with me and be my best friend for a second. And he did. Sat there and listened while I railed against "the guy" who had just broken my heart. You see? I was not only devastated that I had just lost my boyfriend, I was terrified that I was losing my best friend as well. But that isn't part of this story...
This all happened, sitting in a booth in the ice cream shop known as PMS (seriously). I cried. I begged. I hated we were in public because I don't cry pretty. I've been broken up with several times and this was the first time I had to deal with it so publicly. But more than all of that (well, except for the lost best friend part...) was that my beloved ice cream shop was now tainted forever with the memories of being dumped by the love of my life. Harsh.
So, yes. I'm glad it's gone, now that we are back here. I'm glad we have another shop to sneak away to. I'm glad that I don't have to sit there with my happy family and remember how I nearly lost it all. Remember that conversation and how my face contorted into sobs at the news. Even though happy memories would slowly replace the bad...it seems easier to just have it gone and not go through it.
On the other hand. They had fabulous ice cream. I really do miss that.
A couple of months before Isaac and I moved to Portland, our downstairs neighbors started a fire. The story we were told is that he started to fry fries in a deep fryer and called his mom and forgot about them. The story I believe is that he was higher than the sky and forgot about them...but that may just be me and a whole bunch of conjecture upon suspicion... It wasn't a horrible fire, but we had quite a bit of smoke damage in our apartment...that never went away for as long as we lived there. Which, turned out, to not be very much longer. If I try hard, I can still smell the ozone they pumped in to clean up the smoke smell. The entire situation was...well, awful.
That night, our landlords expected us to just stay in the apartment. I thought they should spring for a hotel room since the clean up wasn't starting until the next day. It was, um, a sore point. But we finally won. They paid for a room at a local "hotel" for us. If I were to ever say the name to my local friends, I'm sure I'd be met with looks of confusion (what is that?!) or horror (SERIOUSLY?!?). At the time, we were just tired and wanted to sleep. So we cautiously entered our room. Up to this point, I've only ever been in one other hotel room in my life that scared me as much. That was in California when I was seven. I'm pretty sure it was a hooker hotel, with the vibrating bed and purple crushed velvet comforter. It sure did leave an impression on my little impressionable brain! But this. The fire hotel. Esh. Even Isaac, my husband who doesn't get ruffled by ANYTHING, was horrified. It looked like there could have been many a questionable activity take place over its history. Or, you know, 10 minutes before we showed up. The bathroom was in the corner with no door. I think there was a half wall, but I know it was just...there. You took a step, pulled a curtain and the shower was there, over a little lip in the floor, complete with a drain afterthought in the middle of the concrete. Savory, showering literal inches from the toilet with no real barrier. I can't believe I didn't hold out for a home with that exact floor plan...
The bed. Well, now, I may puke recalling. It was April, thankfully, and still chilly, so we were dressed (sweats, sweatshirts) for maximum coverage. Isaac mentioned maybe we should sleep fully clothed, including shoes, on top of the comforter. And we tried. We really did. For a couple of hours, we 'slept' with one eye open, afraid to move. About 3 am, we called time of death on the stay and ran back to our smoke filled apartment. We opened all the windows (it was in the 20s!), piled on the blankets and hats and tried to sleep and not freeze to death until Isaac had to go to work.
After he left, I called my sister. I tried not to, but I totally broke down in tears. I'm sure due to shear exhaustion. While they were cramped in their apartment, the insisted we stay with them. I spent the morning on the phone with our landlord, letting her know that we would NOT be staying in their choice of hotel until clean up was finished and demanding they put us in a habitable place. She declined. The offer was they would pay for the room we stayed in the night before or nothing. I opted for nothing. And then we had a spark. We were going to have to break our lease and pay a fee in order to move to Oregon when we needed. Money we didn't have. And we were sweating it, because we had to move and we'd either have to come up with the money to break the lease or pay double rent for the overlapping two months. My sister said we could stay until we had to move. So that was no longer an issue. And because they weren't working with us, I called again and asked since there was so much smoke damage and clean up was taking so long, if we could just be let out of our contract early - no penalty - and we'd call it good on the whole "you aren't providing us a habitable place to stay" issue. Because she knew a good deal when she heard one, she agreed. We moved our stuff into my sister's 'extra' room (oh to have so little, again!) and some into storage, didn't clean the apartment (bonus!), got our deposit back and camped out on our mattress for the next month.
And while it probably wasn't that great for my sister and her family, it was definitely better for us. Who knows how long our health would have held up, should we have had to stay in that hotel or, HEAVEN FORBID, actually had to shower there. I shudder at the thought. And well, now? Now we just chuckle every time we pass it. The last time we noticed it had a fresh coat of paint. And we wondered if that extended to the interior as well. I somehow doubt it...
Speaking of disgusting, that reminds me. I should TOTALLY tell you about the Portland cat restaurant sometime.
We went to see Something Borrowed last weekend. And I, despite all reviews, loved it. I loved to hate Kate Hudson (which comes easily for me) and I identified with Rachel a *little too* much. I'm excited to read the book.
With the Blogger problem last week, I lost all my comments on my Gift-y post. Which is a shame. I loved them all. Especially the rare one from Isaac.
Three garden boxes are built, dirt is in and strawberries, lettuce, spinach, swiss chard, lime basil, lavendar and beets are in. But most importantly? It looks as if we have some actual movement in the yard. Yay!
I opened up a store email this weekend (I think it was Land's End) and what did I see? A chambray romper. Oh my...Holiday. Celebrate, indeed.
Sammy asked a girl out on his first date this weekend. I had a little stroke. We were at the Farmer's Market with my friend Deb and her little girl and Sammy made sure he was always holding Claire's hand and talking to her and then, as we turned the corner, I hear Sammy say, "Would you like to go to the playground with me?". Oi with the poodles! At least he's inappropriately dating politely...
The wind is crazy. Just saying.
We're building a dig sight for Sammy this weekend. I think he's going to be pretty happy. Especially since he had a poor pathetic look on his face all last weekend realizing there was no where he could bury cars due to the weeds. The horrid weeds that haunt my dreams and I fear will never leave my life. Or, you know, something. ANYWAY. We're building a dig sight. Which is really going to be an overgrown garden box. Very exciting. If your name is Sammy. And you're four. And have a great need to bury cars in dirt.
My sunburn really hurts. I will never learn, that first nice day of the year.
Easy A is a great movie.
I taught in church yesterday. I've had the lesson planned for a couple of months. It was all stored in the iPad. However, Sunday morning in church, I turned it on and the app update erased all of my notes. I don't do well with the winging. I very nearly made all of us get out 15 minutes early. Which, honestly, would have been awesome. Alas...
