Yvette's Inner Geek Blog

It's not yet 8am and I'm at my computer ready to work, and feeling good about getting some work and personal shit done today. Working from home probably helps that attitude out a lot.

That, and some loud, bitchin' streaming internet radio from WOXY.com, the Future of Rock n' Roll.  

I've been missing Ohio lately. Or maybe missing life outside of Utah? I always have that feeling when the Sunday paper arrives with a major special "LDS Week" section in it (that is seriously bigger than the rest of the "news" portion of the newspaper). For the uninitated, that means it's Mormon week here in Utah: the biannual opportunity for Mormons from around the world to feel extra Mormon as they flock to Salt Lake City and/or their televisions to spend an entire weekend engrossed in the dictated-to-be-prophetic General Conference.

From what I've seen and been told, it's celebrated like the Superbowl, but with less beer and coffee and more dressed-up clothing and crock-pot foods.  And Jello with all sorts of weird things floating in it.

During this particular extra Mormon time in the area where I now own a home, these are the things I miss from Life Before Utah:

• More than one tiny Starbucks (or any other coffee shop) in the area.
• Stores open on Sunday that should be open on Sunday (like Bed Bath & Beyond, Best Buy, Old Navy, the GREAT used bookstore in downtown SLC)
  
• Major League Baseball (it's opening day today, and the closest team is a day's drive away in Arizona... I miss baseball a lot, but Ben misses it SO much more)
• Bars. Local Holes in the Wall, Sports Bars, Microbreweries, even the opportunity to go to dance clubs (not that I necessarily would, but who the hell knows?)
• Friends (I do have some here, Mormon and non-Mormon, but it's not nearly the same as the base of geeky, vice-laden local college and work friends I used to have)
• Being within driving distance of Michigan, Chicago, anywhere in Ohio, Philadelphia, St. Louis (still kicking myself for not driving to St. Louis to visit friends when I had the chance)
• Drivers who actually understood how to drive (and followed the rules for the most part)
  

There are still good things about Utah. In fact, I made a list of things that I want to do and/or see while we are living here. But that's for another blog post... I need to get to work like I said I was going to this morning. I'm feeling bloggy, though.  

I'm back, baby! 

Posted by Yvette at 06:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tags: Around Town & Beyond | Friends & Relationships | Personal

My Norwegians have gone, and I've almost made it through the work week that started at 5am on Monday with the two hour round-trip drive to the airport to drop them and my sister off. Ben had to drive his car, too, because we couldn't fit all of them and their luggage into just one of our cars.

OMG, I'm just done. Done with this day, done with this week, and done with a lot of other things. I've been in a self-imposed blogging hiatus that didn't start intentionally, but now is dangerously close to becoming a groove. I've written notes in my little journal that I sometimes carry in my purse, but turning those into blog fodder hasn't been extraordinarily successful in the past. Gah.

It was great to see my Norwegian friends-who-feel-like-family, and they weren't repulsed by the imperfect state of our house. But as with any visitors, it does feel good to get back to normal after they leave... though there a vacant spot left from the lack of their company, and frankly I feel jetlagged even though I have no real reason to. Oh, and my stomach has been upset today which is just fantastic.

Oh, and the contractor guys started to replace our skylights and tear off shingles and then recommended that we have the whole roof replaced. We were under the impression that our roof was new when we bought the house. But apparently just the top layer was newish, and like everything in our house, had been a cosmetic patch-up job over a damaged foundation. So what the hell, Ben doesn't really need a new car this year, right? After the initial shock, and then consultation with various other friends and family, we gave them the green light just to get it all done so we can move on with our lives. 

So maybe all of that is contributing to the stomach cramping and general hate-it-all feeling. Plus the fact that I still have to do our taxes and it's almost April. Maybe I'll be in a sunnier disposition next time I blog, because for God's sake, nobody wants to read emo drivel from their friend, let alone a stranger. Sorry 'boot that.

Please give me a couple days, and I'll get back on track. I have a few blog drafts saved and a lot to say about more interesting stuff than my personal level of distress.  

Posted by Yvette at 09:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)
Tags: Friends & Relationships | House & Home | Personal

Several times this week, I've started blog entries and not finished them. This week has been a feverish flurry of working at work and at home and doing some necessary shopping in between to prepare for My Norwegians, as I began to call them recently. See, they're more than friends, but not technically family... it makes sense to me and is easier to say than "My host family from when I was an exchange student eleven years ago in Norway.

O GAWD, has it been eleven years?

My day has been filled with true Norwenglish, as we spoke a blend of Norwegian and English to each other and to Ben (who only understands English and is really nice about not being included in snippets of conversation where we barely realize what language we're speaking). They have gone to bed, I drank a little more coffee, wine and Norwegian aquavit than my stomach would prefer, and now I am thinking about going to bed at 10:30 on Saturday night. Lame.

I am taking all of next week off and will be traveling to San Francisco for a couple days with Ben and My Norwegians. Hopefully I will be able to finish the blog entries that I started to write about before we leave. Ooooo, suspense! 

Posted by Yvette at 09:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tags: Friends & Relationships | House & Home | Personal

Phoebe eats about everything she finds that will fit in her mouth. If it is on the floor and should be swept up, chances are good that our little feline Roomba will eat it before it can be thrown away.

This is particularly disconcerting while Ben is in the middle of home improvement projects like drywall repair, paint removal, and fiberglass anything.

On Friday, Ben cut a hole in a wall upstairs so he could crawl through it to put a hole in the floorboard to prepare for ductwork related to installing a new bathroom fan. He also removed some ductwork that was rendered useless after we had a new furnace installed that separated the upstairs into two HVAC zones.

He made sure that the door was closed to the room where the hole was cut so that none of the cats would wander in. Well, Phoebe found a way to endanger herself regardless.

The old ductwork led to a vent in the upstairs bedroom, where the the door was not closed because it was in the process of being replaced. Phoebe managed to pull the vent cover away from the hole and crawled into the fiberglass-laden area with a dangerously big gaping hole in floor, plus a myriad of other dangers to a pet who tastes and/or eats everything not bolted down.

We're not sure how long she was up there, but Ben noticed the vent pulled off and heard a mew... it didn't take too long to coerce her out safely, but still. This is an area in which Ben wore a ventilating mask without me asking him to... fiberglass in the lungs being something that we agree is plain awful, and not a symbol of manhood like fiberglass in the hands.

I wiped her down with a wet washcloth after Ben pulled her out, and she was apparently fine after that. With the exception of her crying for the entirety of Sunday morning and into the afternoon that worried me greatly. We've already determined that she has anxiety problems (and they even make kitty Zoloft for that, but we haven't gone to a kitty psychologist yet) so the crying could be from a number of things: general anxiety from a closed bedroom door that had been open, a toy mouse left upstairs that she wanted, fiberglass in the lungs, fiberglass in the digestive system, or who knows. The last two obviously being of the most concern. 

She finally stopped crying after we opened the (now replaced) bedroom door. We watched as she ran directly to the (now replaced and blocked with a paint can) vent cover that she had pulled off before. She tried everything in her kitty power to pull it off again, and it was interesting to watch. Luckily she didn't suspect that it was one of us who put that paint can there. She finally gave up and, having mildly satisfied her curiosty/anxieties (OMG did I close that vent cover after going in I can't remember maybe I need to go back up there and double check and OMG did I pace back and forth and taste every bit of loose fiberglass I could find, etc.) and was quiet after that.

WEAK STOMACHS DO NOT READ. Later on, she exploded some of her insides politely within the litter box. The smell was anything but polite, so she must have gotten into something up there. Early Monday morning, around 4am, she started hacking up a hairball/fiberglassball, which if you've ever been jolted awake to that sound you know how pleasant it is. But nothing actually came out. It just sounded like we were going to have to watch her die slowly and painfully as her insides expanded like a pigeon that ate dry rice and whatever was inside blocked her esophogus and there wasn't a thing we could do about it.

Luckily it didn't come to that and she's been her perky, anxious, Roomba self after that. She'll still cry like she's stuck in a bear trap once in a while, which we're good at ignoring nowadays. But LOOK at that face. When we pick her up while she's crying, she starts purring like a rattly, well-loved old car and everything is forgiven. And isn't that what love is all about? 

Posted by Yvette at 01:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tags: DIY | House & Home | My 3 Cats | Personal

On the two year anniversary of the day we signed the papers for our house, you'd think that Ben and I would be having a big ol' celerbration. Technically we have until March 17th, St. Patrick's Day, to celebrate homeownership because the processing of the title took so goddamn long.

But no, we're at the tail-end of a two month "we can do this" whirlwind of home improvements and "settling in" things that needed to be done before our international visitors arrive on Friday night. I channeled my natural project management skillz and made a checklist with a March 14 deadline that will still have items unchecked before the weekend, but we've done a good chunk of work and I'm proud of us.

This past weekend's accomplishments include (but are not limited to):

• Having a new mattress delivered!
• Moving older mattress upstairs to the guest room (big pain in the ass)
  
• Cleaning and clearing away most of the clutter in the dining room and kitchen (big countertops are great, once you can find them under all your stuff)
• Clearing away a good portion of clutter from my office
• Going to Home Depot for the one millionth time
  
• Patching drywall around more shitty, dangerous outlets (that will probably be replaced tonight)
  
• Nearly finishing the replacement of the guest room door
  
• Nearly finishing the installation of a new fan in the bathroom*
  

Most of the cleaning/de-cluttering fell into my court and the "man stuff," of course, into Ben's. As much of a feminist as I am, there's something to be said about division of labor working out for everyone. I'm better at organizing (though I'm not allowed to use my label maker nearly as much as I'd like), putting away laundry where I want it and planning/preparing the house for guests; Ben is better at electrical wiring, fending off fiberglass, inhaling paint fumes, and heavy lifting.

*The new fan is not a simple replacement. The retarded monkeys who built this house did not actually install a vent from the bathroom exhaust fan to the outside world. Also, it was decided that we needed a bigger fan.  So Ben spent much of the weekend in a tiny attic crawl space, where he cut a hole in the floorboards, fought through insulation that will surely need to be replaced and fixed up all the wiring to accomodate a larger fan. There was a cloud of testosterone oozing out of his pores for most of the weekend, particularly after his jaunt with power tools in the crawl space. And he proudly showed off all the cuts and red bumps on his hands from imbedded fiberglass and only needed help removing one splinter.

"Why the hell weren't you wearing gloves up there?" I asked.
"Cuts and splinters are a symbol of manhood," he said.
"You're stupid," I said.

Later on, for a completely different reason, Ben inspired a one-liner that I warned him would be a little harsh. He still wanted to hear it.

"You have to get a degree in Stupid to be that stupid." 

Overall, Ben and I had a good and fairly productive weekend. Probably because I barely touched my computer... which I plan to be touchin' lots (in addition to touchin' my Wii remote) after our visitors leave. We're really looking forward to seeing them and spending time with them, but we're definitely ready for a break from housework.

Oh, and maybe, just maybe, those DAMN SKYLIGHTS will be installed the week after our visitors leave. 

Posted by Yvette at 07:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tags: DIY | House & Home | Personal

The video that actually started yesterday's political post was sent to me from my darling husband (please don't make me write DH b/c I do not approve LOL ROTFL BBQ). It helped me start out my morning on the right foot.

My favorite quotes from this clip:

"...this country is based on the fantasy that the government is the voice of the people."

"From now on, We at Diebold will see to it that we properly safeguard the illusion of democracy for all Americans."
"Well, let's hope so"

The second video for today, in my first-time ever crossover of politics and cat themes on this blog, is from the same guy, Simon Tofield, who animated the other short and delightful cat film I posted on this blog where truth in comedy is explored in intimate detail for anyone who's ever had a cat. All three of my cats are indoor-only for various reasons, and somehow they still manage to do things like this.

Posted by Yvette at 08:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tags: Fun! | My 3 Cats | Politics & Religion | TV & Movies | Teh Interweb

I no longer live in Ohio, where I think my independent vote actually mattered in the general election. (I can vote for Democrats, Libertarians or Ralph Nader until until my spleen bleeds out in Utah and it won't make a lick of difference.)

So I took a peek at at CNN's breakdown of Democratic Primaries by County, and noticed the trend that remains constant no matter who is on the election ticket: the larger the city, the more liberal (or, in this case, "fresh-thinking") the vote.

That darker blue "abberation" between Cinci and Columbus is the unmarked location of Dayton (home of the Wright Brothers). Toledo didn't register as a big city by percentages because it's not one... it's just that place you have to drive through to get to Detroit or Chicago on I-80. I'm sure that many people from Toledo would agree (including Katie Holmes).

The percentages for Obama and Clinton, even in more urban locations, are still pretty close. I think it's refreshing to have two candidates who are so neck-in-neck for the top of the Democratic ticket, and of course it's history in the making because one of them is a white woman and the other a black man.

P.S. Sorry, Utah, but you fail when it comes to choosing the right presidential Republican candidate.

Posted by Yvette at 08:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Tags: Politics & Religion

Does it mean that I'm a writer if, when I de-clutter my house, I find bits of paper and napkins with story ideas scrawled on them? And journals or semi-personal notebooks that I had forgotten ever existed?

One of the more interesting things I found amongst the multitude of Boxes of Unknown (ultimately knowable as school papers, awards, notes and miscellaneous bits of memorabilia from elementary school through college) was a hand-drawn postcard I made and painted with watercolors.

As you can see below, I obviously intended to send it to my religious (Catholic) grandmother but somehow ended up keeping it instead. Perhaps I selfishly decided that I couldn't bear to part with my own artwork, or maybe my mother didn't think it was a good idea for my grandmother to know that I had gone to a Methodist Sunday School lesson after spending the night at my best friend's house. It's dated a month or two after my eight-year-old chihuahua mix dog, Sprinkles, escaped from a kennel while we were on vacation and was subsequently hit by a car.  

I'm sure that my grandmother would have appreciated receiving this postcard if for nothing more than to know that I was thinking about her. She passed away almost two years ago so it's too late to surprise her with it at this point.

But if there's a heaven, and if the Internet is available up there, I hope that she knows I'm thinking about her now and I regret not sending her that postcard fifteen years ago.

Posted by Yvette at 09:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Tags: Friends & Relationships | Memories | Personal | Politics & Religion | Reading, Writing & Books

It's been another hard-working weekend for me as Ben and I continue to prepare for the arrival of our Norwegian visitors in (yikes) less than two weeks.

Ben took a break from sawing, sanding, painting, banging, swearing, etc to bottle his four batches of nearly-complete liquid bread: a blacker-than-black stout, an India Pale Ale, a Honey Wheat and a Blueberry Wheat. I helped by using my labeling the bottlecaps with my otherwise underused stamps and inks (I know I'll use these! They're awesome! I said when I thought I was going to be crafty on a regular basis).

I've been digging through old papers and boxes of CRAP that have moved with me for many years and also some relatively new stuff. It sucks to be a pack rat, and I've been better about throwing and giving things away lately. But sorting through everything I already have is a pain in the ass, as well as in my back from too much hunching over while sitting on the floor... I can hear my mother telling me that I'll get scoliosis.  But our junk storage room with a futon is slowly turning into a more usable guest room with a crafting area. It turns out that a 5 foot brown folding table can actually look nice when it's covered with a tablecloth that hangs close to the floor.

Will our house be ready to impress the people who took me in as an exchange student eleven years ago? Probably Definitely not as much as we would like. The skylights will not be replaced in time due to our contractor not understanding that we WANTED THEM REPLACED LAST YEAR and we do not want to wait until he has a bid for the specific back door we also want him to install. At this point, I'm hoping that they will finish with all the work we need them to do by the middle of April (because we don't want them here while we have visitors). We had to add one more delightful project to the contractor's list: installing a pipe that will actually lead smelly air and humidity away from the house once bathroom fans suck it up. The original builders didn't think of that, apparently?

Yep. Our house was built by retarded buffoons, previously "maintained" by drunken monkeys and then flipped by corner-cutting assholes.

For all the work he's done around the house, at least Ben has been able to derive some pleasure out of the whole thing by acquiring more power tools.

Posted by Yvette at 02:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tags: House & Home | Personal | Review