Merry Chrissssssstmasssssss

Who are the people, er, creatures in your neighborhood, in your neighborhood, in your neigh-bor-hooo-oood? Happened about 5 minutes from our house.

In other news, we're seriously considering signing with the first real estate agent we met. He's quite a salesman and seems to have great contacts near, far, and everywhere in between. We're also second-guessing ourselves, or I should say, I'm second guessing myself. Poor Brad is just trying to keep up with my flaky emotions. But a conversation with a dear friend yesterday brought up some thoughts-- have we given Florida a REAL try? What if we HAD to stay here- like if Brad's parents were ill or something... what if we didn't have a choice to leave? Can we say we've given it our all? I don't know.

I know I miss the midwest, the seasons, the people, the city... and just writing that makes me feel so sure we have good reasons to move. See what I mean about flaky? I can't even maintain an opinion for one sentence. So at this unstable point, I think we're going to list the house sort of as a fleece for God. If his direction is for us to move, then he'll sell the house. If not, maybe we'll stick around for another year. At least down here we have stable jobs and are financially ok, even if we're not in love with our job options. That's more than a lot of people can say right now.

Last night we met with that other real estate guy. He was super nice and gave us a good education and ran numbers with us to find a bottom line. But he wasn't nearly as aggressive as the first guy, and in this market, sellers need an aggressive agent. He'd be a great buyer's agent, I think. After we met with him and realized we'll probably walk away with maybe $5000 in our pocket -- grr-- on a house that has appreciated much more than that (dang fees), we went out to Uno's and had some Chicago-style pizza. Then we went to the light thing at the nature center which was fun and festive. While we were there we ran into a former colleague of mine at the middle school here-- my favorite of the colleagues. She's still there and hanging in, trying to make a difference, bless her heart. Seriously, bless her, Lord. She deserves it! The administration hasn't changed at all, and if I ever doubted leaving there, my mind was once again made up last night with her stories. SOOOO glad to be out of there. We also got some pictures taken with Santa, because, well, why not?






It was close to when they were closing, and I think the photo lady was getting a little bored with all the little kids getting pictures taken. She saw us and asked if we felt like having a little fun with it... and we're always up for having a little fun... poor Santa.

The Goose is Getting Fat...

We're almost ready for Christmas after a big push this weekend to get preparations taken care of. We shopped on Saturday morning, met for lunch at Chili's, and then went tree shopping. We first went to a tent in the Sam's Club parking lot. There were beautiful, perfectly shaped trees with heavenly aroma and hellish price tags. I loved the 10 footers-- why not, since we have the vaulted ceilings? I'll tell you why not. Because $179 is too much for a dead tree which will be thrown away in two weeks. Even the small six footers were around $60. We decided to hit Lowe's.

Lowe's had their trees priced much more reasonably, so for $26.88 we got ourselves a lovely six foot tree of some kind I can't remember. We wrapped it in our painting drop cloth and bungee-corded it closed so it wouldn't get needles all over the inside of my trunk and car. You know that old commercial where the dad is trying to talk to his daughter about not smoking pot? When he rolls himself up in a white blanket on her floor, like a joint? Our tree very much resembled a six foot long joint. I took a pic- I'll post it soon.

We put it up, did a little trimming, and the thing is perfect! I even rubbed the needles to make sure no green paint would come off. (Our first tree two years ago from Menard's was painted green. If you rubbed the needles the fake green would come off on your fingers. It was pretty funny.) Well, our Lowe's tree had no green residue. It's real through and through. And it smells divine. We spent Sunday evening decorating it and making the living room look actually Christmasy.

We met on Sunday afternoon with a realtor. We got a name from the Christian Chamber of Southwest Florida-- there was a full-page impressive ad for this lady real estate agent, so I called to see what working with a real estate agent is like. She called back to say she is having health problems but would send her number one partner. So Gordon came over on Sunday afternoon-- what a salesman! Man, when you see a person who is just right for his or her job, there's something great about that. We listened to what he had to say, asked some questions, and pretty much decided after he left that we'd let things sit over the holidays and then would start up again after January 1st. But then he called yesterday to see what we had decided, and he gently reminded me that the population down here swells quite a bit over the next week and we might want to take advantage of that. So, being the comparison shoppers we are, we have a call into another real estate agent and we'll try to meet with him tonight or tomorrow, and then we'll make a decision. With the market as slow as it is, unless we have an agent who can get the word out wider than we can, the house will just sit here.

Today is our holiday lunch at work, followed by a meeting until 2 p.m. And tonight is the four-year-anniversary of Brad's and my first date! Four years ago he picked me up in his navy blue Jetta, took me to Flat Top Grill, which we learned was under construction. We walked a block down to the Asian place on Davis, but after looking at the menu neither of us were interested. So we finally went to That Little Mexican Cafe where he talked and I listened. In the middle of it I went to the restroom to call my friend Burns (her last name) and tell her it was the best first date I'd ever had. After dinner we drove around looking at Christmas lights in the Sauganash area of Chicago.

So tonight Brad's making dinner and then we're going to see the Holiday Arbor Lites at the local nature center. Four years of dating, three years ago engaged, exactly two and a half years ago married. Thank you, God, for the gift of my husband!

A few of you have written, worried about my mental health. I'm doing better, just taking it a day at a time. That straw that broke the camel's back was apparently a big straw and I'm feeling a bit chemically down, if you know what I mean. I have a doctor's appointment in early February and will probably ask for something to put a little pep in my step then. Thanks for your concern, and for not running away when I share things that are deeply personal like this.

Have a great Wednesday, all!

A little better

Friends and family,

Thanks for your words of encouragement and comfort. I'm feeling a little better today after spending yesterday sad, realizing I've been "hanging in there" and "mustering up" pretty much since we got to this state. There's no more muster left in me, and losing this house was the straw that broke the camel's back. I'm still angry at God-- I can't see his hand here and the last few things he's done show me he likes to say "ha ha, sucks to be you". "Here's a Honda Accord, the car you've wanted since you could drive. Oh, but now it's broken. Ah ha, sucks to be you!" "Here's a job in construction that you've wanted for a long time. Oh, but now you will forever be an office girl and never actually get promoted. Ah ha, sucks to be you." "Here's a house I want you to think is yours. It's your hope that you're getting out of Florida. Oh, I just gave it to someone else. Ah ha, sucks to be you."

I know somewhere that that is not who God is. But right now it's all I can see. I'm afraid to even think it-- it's pretty much the maddest I've ever been at God. I don't want to piss him off further and get smited and have to live all my frickin days in Florida. But I'm believing that he's bigger than my anger and maybe things will be ok eventually. In the meantime I've been reminded (thanks Mom, Steph, and Sam) to grieve. We've lost a lot this year and had our share of disappointments, and maybe we haven't fully grieved those losses. So I plan to spend the next joyous few days grieving. Irony.

I called a realtor this afternoon and left a message. We want to explore that route, even if we don't hire her for a little while. It just seems so costly, but maybe it's a necessary evil if we want to get out of here.

Tonight is a Christmas party put on by one of Brad's clients. Should be fun.

I'm just heartbroken.

Remember when I told you we found a house in Columbus, and I just *knew* it was for us?

I learned today that it has sold. It's under contract right now and is scheduled to close in January. I've been in and out of tears all day. And I know there are a million other houses out there, there are more fish in the sea, God has a plan, blah blah blah. But I am so very sad. I feel stuck in this forsaken state where I am a fish out of water, I feel resourceless and alone, and just this close to the edge of depression.

And I don't have a safe place to go with my sadness-- no friends down here who are safe, no church, no community. And the family we have down here wants us to stay anyway, so I can't really expect sympathy from them. The holidays are really hard since my parents split, my friends aren't coming after all, I've been sick and then too busy to put up any decorations yet so Christmas just feels like one giant failure, and now this. I don't think I can take one more bit of sad. I feel like I've been crammed into a cardboard box that's too small, and this house was my only straw for air, and now it's gone. I had asked the realtor to contact me if there was interest and perhaps we could consider alternative options to "sell our house, then buy another" -- like renting out our house or something, if time was of the essence. But she did not contact me, and now it's not ours.

And the thing is, it's not about *this* house. It's what the house represented to me -- hope. I just so truly felt that this was for us. I *knew*, like I've known about only a few things ever-- I knew I had to move back to Chicago from Baltimore, I knew Brad was The One, I knew we had to move to Florida, I knew when I saw our house down here that it was the one for us. And I thought I knew about this house. This leaves me doubting what I think I know, leaves me doubting my gut. When that happens, I usually see it as a sign I'm edging toward depression and need to do a little therapy check-up. Only I can't find a good therapist down here. Believe me, I've tried. There are plenty of pastoral counselors or life coaches-- neither of which are what I'm looking for. I just feel resourceless and alone. And sad.

Here it is. RIP, dream.

Now I'm scared God is going to make us stay in Florida. And that just makes me want to wail.

House For Sale!

"Hats! Hats for sale! Fifty cents a hat!"

Did you ever read that story of the man selling hats and the monkey in the tree... can't remember the title but I'm sure my mother could recite the whole thing. Anyway, whenever I hear anything is for sale, I think of that man yelling, "HATS! Hats for sale! Fifty cents a hat!" in my mother's singsong voice.

Whew-- I am all over the place today! Sorry. What I meant to post about is that our HOUSE is for sale! Check out our house blog and tell me what you think. Mom just suggested that we empty out our closet and photo it again so it looks more spacious-- I think I like that suggestion a lot. And I know the contact info says Kathy, but that does not give YOU permission to call me that. Kathy is my aunt and also my mother's friend, but I am Kathleen. I just put Kathy so if someone calls and asks for Kathy, I know it's house related. Not sure why I wanted to do that, but I did it anyway.

Read it, scour it, critique it, and send me your comments. Thanks, friends!

Return from Zombieland

And I don't mean Africa.

We got home on Sunday night (11/26) and barely made it home alive. Brad, who had not slept on the 18 hours of flying, dozed in the car while I worked. with. all. my. might. to keep my eyes open while driving across Alligator Alley. This is not a place you want to pull over and take a quick doze. The 8 foot high fences have barbed wire and an electric line in them to keep the alligators from climbing over the fences (I'm not kidding), but you don't want to take your chances. As soon as we hit the first exit past the toll booth to leave the alley, I asked Brad to take over driving. I kept drifting off at the wheel, and I hear that's not such a good thing.

So we got home, slept, and woke up around 4:30 a.m. on Monday dur to jet lag. And Monday was a good day. We felt in good health if a bit tired, napped, played Brad's newest addiction, Scrabble, opened Bob Evans at 6 a.m., ran a few errands, and slept some more. It was his birthday so we went to Ralph and Chris's for dessert in the evening and then came home and crashed.

Tuesday morning I woke up, ate cinnamon toast not knowing it would be for the last time, and went to work. I got there around 7:45 since we were still waking up at the crack of 4:30 a.m. Around 8:30 my office started spinning. Around 9:15 I lost the first piece of toast. At 9:45 I decided to head for home. I'll spare you the details except to say it was a good thing I grabbed a big coffee cup as I headed out the door. I've never hurled while driving before. And I sure as heck don't want to do it again.

I called Mom and Shelley on the way home to see if I should go home or go get tested for malaria. Both said to go home and wait it out, although I was certain I was on death's door. Miraculously, after retching for a while, I felt better. My dad called about five minutes after the last heave and we had a lovely chat which brought my spirits up immensely.

For the next three days my upchucker was quiet, but my downchucker wasn't happy. (I'm trying not to be too grody.) And did I mention our toilet was broken? It's not so much fun when one has to go NOW, to have to quickly turn on the water to the potty and then take care of urgent business. And then turn off the toilet again. Multiple times a day.

But I got ahead of myself. Tuesday was throwup day, and Wednesday morning I woke up with a doozy of a cold. So please forgive me for not blogging much lately. I've been meaning to, really. For the rest of the week I slept, watched minimal tv, slept, and made jello, which task was made easier with help from my fun birthday present of a plug-in teapot. Boils 6 cups of water in under 2 minutes. Makes jello-making quick, thankfully.

Brad caught the same cold bug on Thursday and has been fighting it ever since. I went to work on Thursday morning (why did I have to be the hero?) and after a few hours left and stocked up at CVS. I brought home anything that looked like a cold remedy and laid it all out, combined with what we already had in stock, on the counter. Brad came home early, too, and we had ourselves a nice little cold-remedy buffet. His terribly sore throat called for the Tylenol liquid stuff. My congested head and sneezing called for Wal-itin, the walgreens version of Claritin. Which did no good for me so it came off the buffet.

On Friday I got to the grocery. It took me the better part of two hours to get around the place, but we hadn't been in a month and only had peach jello left. So I stocked up and came home and slept the rest of the day.

All weekend we slept, ate little bits here and there, played Scrabble, and slept more. We've both worked every day this week but taken off a few hours early most days to get more sleep in. We're just now feeling like we're returning from Zombieland.

Oh, and we had to take our anti-malaria drugs for a full week after returning home, which tend to upset tummies and cause wacked out dreams. We can attest to both. The dreams... seriously! Where do they come from?

And we have fixed the toilet, thank you very much. We were about to call a plumber when I thought to first ask one of my smart bosses on Wednesday. He told me to buy a $4 flapper at Lowe's and do it ourselves. And wouldn't you know, the thing is fixed! Hooray. We went out to eat after going to Lowe's-- remember we have a limited assortment of restaurants within 15 minutes of us. Our choices are Steak and Shake, Bob Evans, Chick-Fil-A, Burger King, McDonalds, Taco Bell, Long John Silver's (I swear they were done in by the health department like ten years ago, but I guess not), and Applebees. We picked the last one, rather, I picked the last one as I am forever tempted by their commercials and want to give them just one more try to not disappoint me. But they always do disappoint me. Applebees, if you ever want our business again, you're going to have to learn to not drown the chicken and rice in watery orange sauce. And you're going to have to get a host staff who can at least fake being welcoming and giving a snit if we come or go. And you might consider menus that don't look like the last person licked them and then chewed on the edges. Maybe fewer tv's with CNN of all things (!)-- I hear there are better channels for the bar area. And, oh, maybe not wiping the rice from the table onto my seat. But who am I? I'm not Mrs. Applebee, so I probably should keep my comments to myself. (finish rant)

Mom sent us a bunch of her Africa pictures and Steph did, too, so I'm working on getting a recap ready for you all. It really was an amazing trip. We saw two game parks-- the Samburu and the Masai Mara. The scenery and animals at each were different and amazing. I can't wait to show you pictures-- I'll try to do that this weekend.

This weekend might be Christmas tree time for us. We're going to finish prepping the house for the market and will finish our house blog and put it on craigslist down here. I'll also link to it here in case any of you wish to purchase a lovely home in Florida. (I'm thinking of you, dear reader in Oklahoma! Or anyone in the cold midwest! It's 70 here!) Once the house is photographed and that blog is done, we'll get a tree and decorate the house. Did anyone see the HGTV special on the White House's decorations? That red ball ornament tree was breathtaking. Think I could talk Brad into an unconventional "tree" this year? My mom always decorated with those red ornaments, teaching her ladylike daughters to say "red ornaments" instead of "red balls" ("But why, Mommy?"). I just love the shiny redness of them. I might fill up some glass jars with them in the kitchen or something.

Oh, and yesterday after work I spent an hour and a half at Ulta. My mother-in-law gave me a gift card there for my birthday and my sister convinced me that the reason my eyes get bloodshot when I wear makeup is because the makeup is from my wedding. Two and a half years ago. Which she says is really gross. After I took those 47 self-portraits to break in the company camera I realized that I look like I've really let myself go. Not a fun feeling. So I'll start with blow-drying my hair on a more regular basis instead of drip drying, and I'll slap on a little pretty in the morning. Ulta helped with that last night-- buy one, get one free on their Ulta-brand makeup. I way overspent the gift card but I'm excited to go play with stuff tonight.

Have a good weekend, all. And Katie, I'm sure Brad would be honored if you named your Jetta after him. In fact, I'm sure he'd love to hear all about the ins and outs of your new car! Congrats!