I love going to check out the completely insane and arbitrary real estate valuations on Zillow.com. They usually over-rate my property by something close to $20k, which makes me feel good, even though I know it's way off. Plus, you can fill out a completely fictitious set of repairs that you have supposedly done on the house, and they don't require any proof. The updated valuation is kept as a private one, so others don't see your fantasy real-estate appraisal, but it gives me hope that if I ever do get all these things done, my house will be worth about twice as much as it is now, and I will have gotten a really great deal on it. Of course, all this comes crashing down when you consider I live in a depressed neighborhood that doesn't seem slated for revitalization anytime soon, but what the hey.... it's still fun to look.
The last few weeks have been really boring. Well, not to me, but from the outside, I must have the dullest life imaginable. Last Friday, I took off from work unexpectedly, because I didn't feel like going. It's the one good thing about grad school, and the trade off for the extremely low pay - you can generally skip whenever there's a day without classes, or crucial experiments, and in most cases, there is no need to inform anyone that you won't be there. I have tried calling in to my boss when I'm actually sick, and the end result is usually that she doesn't get the message because she herself played hookey that day. But I digress....
What did I do with my fabulous day off? I watched TV, of course! D has a free version of Tivo called MythTV that has taken him 4 years to get working right, but it records Law & Order, cartoons, and Homicide: Life on the Street for me. It also records Steven Segal and Chuck Norris movies for some reason, and every single Star Trek episode ever made (I think that's where it got the idea that we might like Chuck Norris), so there are downsides. But usually when I get home, I'll watch some Homicide, which is a pretty good show. After TV time, I did actually manage to do some cleaning, and then I put up insulation in the attic. Which was fun, but also a pain to do by yourself. Still it needed to be done, and I'm glad I made some progress. I did however, discover that I need to buy more insulation, as the Pepto-Bismol color only covers about half of the attic right now. And our staple gun is unreliable.
See what I mean? I'm boring. D & I have been watching Heroes almost every night now, although thankfully we're through Season 1 and I can get back to work. Other than that, we: put out the trash on trash night, snuggle, talk about which building permits we need, find some way to eat that doesn't involve actually having to cook (only the last couple of weeks), play with the cats, do laundry. He also does things on the laptop, that almost always involve a program called Putty. I hate this program, as he opens it and leaves it running on all my computers, and it eats up their battery life & processing capacity. But I'm sure it's a small price to pay for someone who is generally very silly, and therefore fun to be around. And now does laundry (though I'm still trying to get him to understand that part of doing laundry is putting it away, not just piling the clean stuff on the bed, where it can be a) vomited on by bathroom kitty; b) thrown on the floor with the dirty laundry & rewashed without ever being dirtied; or c) folded and put away by an irate, and muttering, Ericka. Baby steps to household chore equality.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
My house is "zestimated" at 50,000 more than i paid for it, and I believe the zestimate has it listed a couple hundred square feet larger than it actually is, maybe they threw in the porch as living space, which it could be if you don't mind lizards and spiders as big as your hand.Don't do his laundry. I know he's cool and you love him, but why can't you feign ignorance just like a man? Wash and dry and fold your stuff,and find creative solutions to clutter, like the boxer shorts collection under my bathroom sink- the laundry basket is 11 feet away(or 25 on Zillow), so if someone leaves their boxer shorts on the bathroom floor every night after they take a shower, that must mean they want them to stay in there, right? I just prefer that the dirty shorts be out of sight, but I can't force anyone to adhere to my silly Victorian rules of bathroom tidiness,so I tuck them away for that person. And they never seem to notice, sometimes they wander around looking puzzled, but I say natural consequence,man. Wanda Sykes has a routine about this exactly- she did her own laundry, and when her husband complained that he was out of clean underwear, she pointed out that she had a whole drawerful, and he was welcome to borrow a pair to tide him over.Shaun does all kinds of stuff around the house, more than his share, considering that I don't work, but sometimes the other penis wielding members of the household need to be reminded that bosoms don't contain all the secrets of homemaking,and just like women who claim"I can't cook" are saying"I am lazy and won't try", guys who do a half assed job at chores are saying"I'm doing this badly so you will realize it's easier to do it yourself" and "I am a lazy slob" Whew! Sorry!See what being the grownup does to you?!
Dear Aunt Ericka, who do you think it is? Its Michael. If you have not heard of the story pointy shovel vs. feather than I'll tell you.It all began when mom was sitting on the floor. Then Calvin came up and said " Let's battle mom! Here's your weapon!" Calvin had the pointy shovel and he gave mom a feather. Not fair!
Love,
Michael
Post a Comment