Did I want a basement? No. I did not.

So over the weekend Eric removed what he could from the cold faucet that leads to the washing machine. We went to Home Depot and consulted a white-haired old man, who gave us a part. (Red. They were all red. Our hot faucet, incidentally, is blue.) We went home and discovered that the part Eric had removed was only part of what the replacement would be. We further discovered that the rest of the part won't come off because it's been welded there.

Today it rained. Buckets. Buckets and pails and horse-drawn carts. And in the basement I can see the reflection of the ceiling. There's half an inch of water down there. We knew there was a leak, but we didn't know it was this bad. It will take days to dry. I suppose it doesn't matter so much since we can't use the laundry anyway (though I think I recall that the dryer still has darks in it), but why is our basement so problematic? No offense to Eric, but I'm really glad my dad is coming in two weeks to fix things.

Sans nose, sans spite

We're running into problems with Eric going back to school for his teaching certificate--specifically (well, somewhat specifically; there are some piddly details), he may have to quit his current teaching position in order to do all the requirements for student teaching. He and his mom were talking about it (while Edith and I discussed having a yoga night at my place on Mondays with her yoga instructor) and his mom essentially said that if it were her, either she'd insist on having the current teaching experience fulfill her requirements or she wouldn't get the degree. Eric has a somewhat more moderate response, and I have an even milder one. I'm not excited about hoops, but I don't get all excited about avoiding them or pointing them out either. If it were me, I'd be annoyed that I couldn't substitute but I'd accept that the school's guidelines are what I have to live by. Is it reasonable, to change my life to accommodate other people's rules? Or is it better to push at other people to change to suit my rules?

I suppose it depends on who has the power. In this case, the school has certification power. So we may end up having to rely on my job and perhaps a part-time job of Eric's next year to pay our mortgage. (In which case I really hope I did well on those assessments.) The next few days should tell.

Postulates

"The brunch would be a good activity for Aunt K, Mom, me, etc., if you still need an assignment," Dad wrote to me today. We still have ten months, do we not? No, nine. Jesus, nine. Still, I'm finding myself surprised that Dad seems to have an even greater need to have everything for this wedding planned in advance than I do. Maybe it's because he's so far away and wants to know what I'm thinking, or to feel more involved. I'm figuring we'll spend a fair amount of time when they come out in September talking about it, even though we already plan to (1) have the parents meet each other (2) do wedding dress stuff with Mom and me (3) do house repair/maintenance stuff with Dad and Eric. Or at least Dad asked for a Daddy-Do list, and Eric will probably not be able to hide behind homework the entire time. (Not that he would actually do that.)

Eric's first day of school was today--both as a teacher and as a student. Well, the teacher bit was an in-service type of thing. The student bit went well, he said, though he's still nervous about this whole going-back-to-school proposition. I can see that. I would be if it were me. I've had a couple of vague thoughts about it being me, but nothing strong enough to act on since I passed up the science writing idea. I do want to work on freelance writing...though I'm finding myself curiously averse to actually sitting down and figuring out markets and writing queries and such. Is it inertia? Lack of practice? Fear of failure?

Speaking of fear of failure, I took the assessment tests for the job I applied for. First was the work styles questionnaire, which had perhaps 20 unique questions but 230 items to respond to. I'd love to see what my profile ended up being. Then yesterday I took a verbal reasoning and a numerical reasoning test. I finished the verbal one quickly but ran out of time with two questions to go on the numerical one, which annoyed me. I hope I got enough of the questions I did answer (98 out of 100, so not bad really) right. The other four people taking the test all seemed to be already employees--while we waited for the computers to be loaded up they were discussing fantasy football/baseball/whatever picks and the quarterly meeting. Or maybe there's a rival company I don't know about and the company is trying to steal away all its rival's key employees in one fell swoop. Though in that case I don't know why I was there.

I've been slowly doing better, now that the house is pretty much settled and I'm at least employed if not happy in it. I'm eating better and exercising more and, again slowly, getting more actual stuff done. The sucky part about being depressed about being unemployed was that being depressed prevented me from doing anything good with all that time I had.

There was also something Eric said a few days ago. We were playing World of Warcraft with some members of his guild--our guild, technically, but they only let me in because I'm his SO and a majority agreed SOs should be let in; but the majority wasn't a very big one and I've heard enough about them that I haven't shaken my perception of them as elitist and therefore not welcoming me. Even though some of them explicitly have. Anyway, there was something I wanted while we were playing (taming a Worg in Blackrock Spire, if you must know) and it wasn't communicated clearly to the rest of the group because Eric was doing it (he had originated the idea) and I was keeping quiet, and we ended up killing the Worgs instead of taming them and Eric said, "You never speak up for yourself!" My immediate reaction was, "I don't feel I can ask these people for anything!" but he's right. For various reasons, I don't speak up for myself. Because it's easier, because I'm shy, because I don't want to hurt other people's feelings or take anything away from them, because long ago I imbibed the cultural view that an assertive woman is a bitch. I've alienated enough people already by being myself. No reason to add any more demands to other people's plates.

--He said something once about letting myself be who I am, and I said, "Doing what other people want is part of who I am." That's not always bad, but I do it more than I ought; much of my frustration with our relationship (which, mind you, is not a lot) is because of that.

Anyway, he's right. I have self-esteem issues. Personality defects, if you will. It will take time to fix them, if I ever can. But I promised I'd try. So I suppose I should write back to Dad and tell him that organizing the brunch would be an awesome task for him and Mom and Aunt K to take over, and also the family party the night before (the night of the wedding), but let's cool it with the wedding talk until September, because there's only so much of it I can take and I'm the bride.

You were with me all the while.

I have finally, finally, finally finished the DNA scarf. This was the project I started last summer, when Edith came back from Germany with a bag that said "Peek & Cloppenberg" on it. "I have a present for you, Eric," she said, handing him the bag. "But Jenny has to put it together first." In it was black German microspun. Eric, of course, wanted a DNA scarf. He also wanted it to be accurate, or at least more accurate, so I had to redo the chart. And then I worked on it very, very slowly. But now? Now it is done.

The stuff beside it is what I bought at the Michigan Fiber Festival, from which I was driving (well, riding) back when I finished the scarf. I also bought a couple of very pretty skeins of yarn for Edith's birthday. I was highly, highly tempted to buy some for myself as well (not to mention a spinning wheel and a small loom and a basketful of pewter buttons), but I kept to the budget and the items I wanted. The spindle at the bottom is a Bosworth Mini made out of bloodwood. I had intended to buy a laceweight spindle, and a paduak one because for some reason I just liked the way it looked online. This one is not quite laceweight, but the man selling them assured me it would spin paper-thin yarn if I wished. He made quite sure I had some spinning experience before he was willing to sell it to me. (Lighter spindles are harder to learn on.) As for the bloodwood, I fell in love with the shimmer and the depth and anyway, the paduak one I'd seen at another booth was more expensive. Above it is some soy silk, which I bought just for playing with. I need to decrease my yarn stash, so no more buying yarn until I get rid of what I've got--but I haven't yet put a similar embargo on buying fiber (though I think I may have to after this) so that was what I restricted myself to.

Above that is the bag of merino/tencel I bought and then spun a small sample of on my new spindle on the way home. (It was a three-hour drive, so yes, I had time for both that and finishing the DNA scarf.) I bought it in order to see if it would work for that hat Eric wants. When I got home I also spun a small sample of some merino/silk I already had and knitted both samples into swatches, and I'm afraid the merino/silk wins. It's noticeably softer; the merino/tencel was almost coarse. My bag wasn't as mixed as well as it ought to have been, but merino itself ought to be softer than that--I think. In any case, Eric has approved the merino/silk, so my next step is dyeing. I need to anyway--I have, I think, eight different types of fiber and only two of them already have any color to them.

Housewarming

After a few frantic days of cleaning and cooking and a few more days of technical difficulties involving batteries, chargers, and USB hookups, I have housewarming pictures. However, I've just realized that posting pictures of my friends and (to-be) relatives without their permission is not such a hot idea, so here are a few representative, non-hominid-containing samples.

The housewarming went well, I think. Only one person we expected didn't show up. We played no games, but that was because people were eating ice cream and talking. It was a nice day, and I think most people trickled through the kitchen to the back, where Eric grilled and the formerly=laden pear tree quietly grew.

We hadn't quite gotten everything done--putting up shelves and hooks, for example--but it was presentable enough, I think. We made peach iced tea and homemade salsa and macaroni salad (Eric insisted on buying a gallon-plus container because he loved it so much he wanted lots extra) and pasta salad and a veggie tray, and served beef franks and hamburgers (mixed with onions, bread crumbs, salt and pepper...quite like meatloaf, actually) and, of course, the ice cream. We served strawberry, peach, chocolate, and orange, and people seemed to agree that everything was excellent except the peach, which needed more peach flavor. Our ice cream quest is not yet finished. Not that it would be anyway...I still haven't made Mexican chocolate or perfected chai.

I gave a couple of tours to people who hadn't seen the place, and felt a little awkward as hostess since I knew these people only through Eric. It was also odd to think that some of them will be my relatives this time next year. Fortunately I've got a year to get to know them better. Plus now they know I make really good salsa and ice cream.

After the last ice cream had been eaten and the last DVD knocked carefully behind the entertainment center by one-year-old Zander, we found that the kitchen wasn't quite as loaded with dirty dishes as we (or at least I) had feared and were happy to retreat to our usual posts: the computer room and (in my case) the sewing room. We have plans for the library, too. For one thing, we plan for it eventually to be the nursery. Bev told me the other day, "I passed the baby test! My coworker had brought her baby to work and I held him, and I was able to give him back without wanting another one!" Eric and I completely fail the baby test. We failed it in the grocery store; we failed it in the mall, even in the midst of despairing for humanity;* and we failed it absolutely with Zander being adorable in our house.

*(Don't I look like Mimi Smartypants?) Among other things, we passed a Piercing Pagoda and noticed a mother impassively watching as her little girl, maybe two or three, screamed and wept while the kiosk girl attempted to pierce her--the little girl's--ears. We agreed that a child of ours may pierce her (or his) ears; but the child will need to be the one initiating the idea, capable of taking care of said ears in order to prevent infection, and preferably in possession of an age in the double digits.

Now we're going to be putting up the last few things to make the house ours: coat hooks in the front entry, closet-type shelves in the sewing room closet to store coats and dresses and suits, hooks in the bedroom closet to hang scarves and hats from. We are also dealing with possible changes: Eric has registered for his first classes in pursuit of his education degree, and I've got an assessment test to take next Tuesday for that potential new job. It's hard to hammer and drill when we're keeping our fingers crossed that everything will go as smoothly as we hope it will.

Things making me tired.

We're in training for Eric to start getting up early in the mornings. Unfortunately this means I have to get up early in the mornings too. I'm so sleepy.

We just got back from Lowe's (using our new-homeowner 10% off coupon) to get new deadbolts, because ours are sticking unbearably and we can no longer actually lock or unlock the front door from the outside.

Eric mowed down my raspberry bush. And my dill. And my peas. And my cantaloupe plants. In his defense, the bush was low and small, and so were the cantaloupes. He claims he didn't know what they were and furthermore I had told him the raspberry bush had died. Next year I will be putting up fences so that he can't get to the plants--or better yet, carrying out the plan of killing everything in that plot and then starting over and adding a gravel walkway so that he can't get a lawnmower in there at all without malicious intent.

In the meantime, my tomato plants (which even he can't say look like grass) are flowering but not fruiting. I picked one red tomato from the ones growing from the junk pile by our driveway. We finally opened up the garage doors to park in there so that we can get past each other in the driveway, but I don't want to run over the tomatoes still growing there.

The interview Friday went okay. I made a couple of obvious mistakes, and I'm not sure how the lady who interviewed me took a couple of my answers. She did at least ask me questions, so that's something. It would be a great job, I think, though the benefits aren't so hot and it's now important to me to be able to keep the long weekend that my parents are coming in free and also a day before the wedding and a week sometime that summer. We did not get a schedule of who stays home when this week at work. I don't know if this means that we won't, or that the supervisor is finding himself overwhelmed and can't quite bear to invite another round of recrimination yet. He still hasn't answered my repeatedly e-mailed question of why there was a trainee in the office the same day he announced we didn't have enough work to go around.

There won't be very many people coming to the housewarming. This is okay, as the ice cream we made for it this weekend (strawberry, peach, chocolate, and orange) is so good we're going to be eating some of it this week and it's nice not to have to make too much more. I have two more curtains and a lot of uncleaned floors to go.

We want your marriage to succeed, as long as you don't mind a threesome with Jesus.

I'm trying to find a nonreligious premarital counseling or education class. Eric and I are firm agnostics, and we don't like the idea of being told how to handle our marriage by a Christian or other religion-based person--plus we don't know any, and it would be weird to walk into a random church and say, "Hi, we don't go to this church, or any church at all, and we don't know you, but would you talk to us about our marriage?" We called private counselors and found they're really, really expensive (especially since I have to pay to get a bumper replaced and I'm staying home from work involuntarily today). I e-mailed the Ohio Department of Mental Health about this some time ago, asking for suggestions. They suggested asking my county mental health board. I called them today and they had no idea; there are no publicly funded agencies that do that sort of thing. "It's not a mental health issue," explained the first person I talked to. The second person I talked to could only suggest a nondenominational minister, private counseling (which I already said I'd investigated and couldn't afford), or calling 211, a United Way info call center. I tried calling and, at least on my cell phone, it didn't work.

I can't find my phone book (did I mention our house is haunted? The vents used to sing, but now they've stopped and instead inexplicable things have been disappearing: the power cord to my printer, the extra bits to my screwdriver, and now the phone book) so I went online and spent the last forty-five minutes or so trying to find something local and non-Christian. There are many people advertising themselves as premarital counselors or educators; their sites are pink and purple, or yellow and blue, and hard to navigate and read. There are licensed counselors, licensed and certified counselors, and educators who took a one-day course or use a teacher-in-a-box kit. Not reassuring. (I also did a brief search of "Jewish premarital counseling," just to assure myself that they have it. They do; they get it through their rabbis. So do Muslims. This site has a history of American marriage prep programs, which is interesting if not helpful.)

This article says it baldly: if you aren't religious, you're on your own or stuck with higher fees. I'm full of angry energy about this. If they're trying to get covenant marriages into law and prevent divorces and all that, and they are, and they're focusing on premarital counseling to help, why can't I get premarital counseling without getting it from someone who will inevitably believe I'm going to Hell for not believing in his/her God? At this point I want to go get a master's in counseling psychology and start my own nonreligious premarital counseling practice. Offering workshops for people who can't afford several sessions of private counseling. With a quiet, tasteful, easy-to-navigate website, thank you very much.

Car talk

Tomorrow is my day to stay home from work. If the HR person is amenable, I may be spending part of it at an interview: the job I applied for this morning she wrote to me about this afternoon (about four hours later) to say they'd like me to come in for an interview this week if possible. I may or may not actually get the job but it was a very nice ego boost to read it, and tomorrow would be a wonderfully convenient day to go in if she doesn't mind the short notice. I wish I'd checked my e-mail on my lunch hour (I'm not supposed to, but my motivation to obey their strictures is not high right now).

Also, Lisa, the Grand Cherokee owner, called today finally. She began, "I've decided that I'm not going to drive around town for you. I called [my insurance company] and [the dealer she got her quote from] and [my insurance company] says [the dealer she got her quote from] is an authorized dealer and [the dealer she got her quote from] says the bumper can't be fixed, it has to be replaced. So you need to file with your insurance company and get this taken care of." I said, "If it's okay with you, I'd prefer to skip insurance and just give you a check directly." She said, "Oh!...Okay! Well, anytime in the next few days is great." I suspect someone taught her that the best defense is a good offense.

I told Mom and Dad about the above news, and Mom said that I should file a claim with my insurance after all because my deductible only applies to fixing my car, not fixing other people's. Eric recommended not filing because the increase probably still wouldn't be worth it. After some hunting around on the Internet, I think I agree. Insurance is, apparently, only for catastrophes (or when it's the other person's fault). So I will drop off the check (made out to [the dealer she got her quote from]) tomorrow. And maybe someday I'll get my car repaired, but first I've got a lot of dinners out not to eat and several books and movies not to buy.

About to have some free time.

At work yesterday we got an e-mail with the supervisor: "I've been having several meetings with the owners of the company. They are not happy with our productivity. Therefore, they are requiring me to send home 15-20 people per day [out of around 100] when we don't have enough work for everyone." Also yesterday, a new trainee was touring and listening in while we worked. Today, I'm looking through the classifieds.

Homemade

Here is my first hat made from, as Eric said, nothing but sheep:



It took three days to dry. It's a thick hat. I'm utterly pleased with it, even more so when Eric tried it on and said he might not mind having a hat such as that, except that the wool was a little itchy. So I may have to get some merino/silk or merino/cotton blend in gray or blue to make him a hat out of nothing but sheep. (A spindle and needles will be involved along the way.)

I've finally sent out an e-mail about the housewarming. This is not to say that everything's done--the seventh curtain of the twelve is still lying, hems pinned, on my sewing table, and the end tables that are destined for the basement are still in the living room--but we can be done in a short enough time. Plus we want to make more homemade ice cream.

I have yet to hear from Lisa on the results of her visit to the other shop. I called her to no avail yesterday, and I forgot to today. I'm vaguely figuring that she's calling her insurance company out of spite and is perhaps arguing with them about how she has to get the scratches fixed. If that happens and they refuse to pay for the damage (and therefore to get me to pay for it), am I still responsible for it? Dunno. I imagine my insurance company would probably have contacted me, though, so perhaps she won the lottery and is too happy to pay attention to little matters like her car and my peace of mind. I'm hoping I'll find out tomorrow.

We've made some progress around here other than the hat: Eric has confirmed he has a best man, we worked on the wedding favors, I put up the curtain rod in my sewing room, we ascertained that the basement has only one leak, though we don't know exactly where or what to do about it. I also called my mom for a long talk about the wedding, relationships, etc. Bev called me yesterday and (among other things) told me that Dad had been asking her questions about the wedding in a manner that made her think they wished I would share more of the wedding plans with them. I haven't been doing this principally becuase we haven't been developing the plans yet, but I called anyway and got Dad's advice on the basement and Mom's advice on dresses, food, after-wedding parties and so on. When they come out in September I foresee Mom and I spending a lot of time doing wedding-planning stuff and Eric and Dad doing a lot of house-repair stuff.

I also ended up asking her if it was okay with them that I was getting married, because I had never really asked them if it was okay and I knew they had had some reservations about how my relationship with Eric got started (well, the romantic portion of it) and the timing of the engagement. Mom said of course it was, and that she was happy I had someone to take care of me instead of living alone, and why was I so worried? I've been tense and anxious and irritable for a while, mostly due to all these changes that I'm still adjusting to, I think, plus extra stressors like the car incident and the check-ordering fiasco. (I think I've got that one sorted out now.) Plus the job is dissatisfactory. I've been trying to be quiet and bear things and get through my probation period, but Eric suggested that maybe that wasn't the way to do it and if I started asking questions and making suggestions about the things I find dissatisfactory, maybe they'll change or at least management will know that I'm thinking about such things. I'm going to try to be more active in changing the other things that are making me unsettled.

We went shopping Saturday and getting into my car Eric discovered that on the side of the driveway, right in front of the pile of wood slats and old weeds that the previous owners said he would get rid of but didn't, are a bunch of tomato plants with huge green tomatoes on them. The tomatoes I planted in the back are tall (apparently I'm supposed to pinch the tips so that they won't grow taller and will instead grow outwards) but only have flowers on them. I don't know where these tomato plants came from, but I was happy to see them growing and thriving, even in a bad place with no attention paid to them at all. I don't know that it's a metaphor--it's probably only a renewed hope that I'll have homemade salsa sometime this summer after all--but I'll take happiness however I can get it. I'm not nearly as miserable as I was before I moved up here, but there's still room for improvement. Which I will try to make happen.

Plodding on.

I called around about the repair for the neighbor's car. (It's not a Rover, it's a Grand Cherokee.) One place said you can't repair a plastic bumper, another one said you can. Neighbor will be calling the place that said you can, though she expresses skepticism. I also asked about paying for whatever charges the leasing company hit her for, and she said "Oh, no. That's not an option. They want new. I've leased every car there is, and they see everything." I'm dubious about this, but whatever. I'm anticipating having to fork over a check for two-thirds our mortgage this month. This is decidedly unappealing. But having this hanging over me is even more so. I'll be glad to be finished with it.

We cleaned up everything except the library for company on Sunday, Brenda and Edith and Michelle. We also served them strawberry ice cream. They were pleased, though we still don't have the texture quite right. We're going to have to do more experiments. Lots and lots of experiments. Think of all that poor ice cream we're going to have to go through. We're thinking of having four flavors of homemade ice cream for the wedding. We're uncertain as to whether we'll be making them or if someone else will when the time comes, but we do want to develop the recipes. And sometime I really want to try chai ice cream and Mexican chocolate ice cream, though those will be small batches consumed only by Edith and me, as Eric has declared them anathema.

Last night I tried to turn on my computer and it wouldn't fully load up Windows. So we reset it and started in Safe Mode and Last Known Good Configuration and flashed the BIOS and did a Windows Repair and nothing worked...and then we tried Last Known Good Configuration again and it booted. Apparently it was a virus. I had no antivirus software running because we didn't think to put any on after the last time we reformatted this computer. I have some now, the AVG Free Edition. If you haven't already, check your antivirus software.

Fiber geek.

I'm sitting here making a hat out of the chunky yarn I made from that brown roving I bought a while ago. Incidentally, the Hayden hat didn't work out for the other yarn I made; it needs more robust yarn. I may make wrist warmers or suchlike instead, or I may try a sample square of weaving with it. I do believe I am a fiber geek. Proof: I want to go to the Michigan Fiber Festival. It's the third weekend in August, which works nicely as Eric's friend is having a party the first weekend in August and we're tentatively planning on having our housewarming party the second weekend in August. (I'm hoping to finish the picking-up this weekend and do a serious floor cleaning, as our socks are still getting dirty, and then it's just picture-hanging and curtain-making. I've made three pairs so far, and they're in the washer to see if they'll get softer--they should, as they're linen and cotton. I can easily make three more pairs in three weeks.)

I will see lots of sheep and lots of yarn. I will buy a lace spindle (which reminds me, there's a fundraiser for sending spinning wheels and charkhas--wheel-like cotton-spinning machines--to Africa, which is pretty cool as they do it with spindles currently and do it to earn a living, and I now know that spindles are pretty slow when it comes to making enough yarn to make a fabric to sew your clothes out of). I will look at spinning wheels. I was kind of sort of contemplating maybe buying one then, if I could find one I liked for not too much, but the woman across the street called me today and said the estimate on her Jeep's damage was $620. I really did only scratch it a bit, so I'm thinking this is absurd and due to some auto shop's perfidy, so I'm going to wait for the copy of the estimate she promised me and see if I (or James) can de-BS it and get a more reasonable number. But if I can't, there goes much mad money. I've got a mortgage now, you know.

It's curtains for me.

The living room is clear, except for the end tables that will eventually be taking up residence in the basement. We hooked up the electronics and watched Galaxy Quest a few days ago while we did this. Now we've got the library to put together (i.e. get all the textbooks out of their boxes and onto shelves, probably get more shelves, rescue Eric's other books from storage, and--according to his wish--alphabetize books within genre) and the dining room to finish off (a couple of boxes of knickknacks). And locks and the leaky faucets in the basement to replace. But otherwise: we're basically done!

Except that the windows are uncovered. That's not true, exactly; two of them, now, are hung with curtains. There are six. See, I had bought this lovely linen/cotton material at $2.77 a yard (making it about $6 a window, rather than the $40 it would have cost by buying from, say, Target) and promised to make curtains. After all, how hard could they be? And indeed they're not hard; all I have to do is cut the appropriate length and trim an inch off the selvedge (because it's slightly discolored at the edges, which is why it was $2.77 a yard) and cut that piece in half and seam up three sides (with nice mitred corners) and sew a big loop on the end. And indeed it's not hard, but I just didn't want to do it. But the windows get very big and black at night and it's not very pleasant to sit and watch a movie, or sit and read, in the living room with those windows staring. So last night I finally got motivated and finished the second pair and cut lengths for the other four pairs. I will do my best to complete at least one curtain a night until they're finished. Then I get to work on the front door, the back door, the stairway window, and the bathroom window, but only once I find the right fabric at the right price. I'm figuring that at this rate, my sewing machine is paying for itself even if I didn't use it for enjoyment with quilting.

We've also been looking for a premarital counselor. This is something we'd discussed before--because our history is, well, odd, and we've both got some concerns because of it, we wanted to talk to someone. But Eric priced it a few days ago and it's going to be about $120 an hour, several sessions at least, and insurance won't cover it. As Eric said, that's a lot of dishes to throw at each other we could simply buy instead. I suggested a workshop or a class, which I've heard of as cheaper (though less individualized), and focusing more on skills for problem-solving, communication, etc. Eric liked that idea, and so I've been looking around--but can't find anything that isn't religious. I think this is interesting, particularly considering that several states are currently proposing making covenant marriages, which would require premarital counseling, a legal option. I wrote to the Ohio Department of Mental Health and asked if they had any suggestions on nonreligious premarital education. The very nice guy who responded suggested that I try the county mental health board. He added something about, "If there is any question of who you should speak to, ask for the Client's Rights Officer. They tend to be good at problem-solving." I get the feeling that this is not a question they're prepared to answer. I did more poking around and found that Ohio State University apparently offers classes, and also a newsletter. It's mostly one-page briefs on listening, communication, being willing to face conflict, knowing your partner, and so on. Reading through it I'm feeling that the education bit isn't going to be so much a problem as the concerns-about-our-history bit. Eric has said that perhaps we don't need a counselor if we keep talking about it between ourselves. I think this makes sense, but now I'm feeling disappointed that there aren't the resources to talk to someone about this--something that might, you know, prevent a divorce, if that were an option with us--without paying someone several hundred dollars.

Also I have just discovered that my bank and my check company are having a tiff and I'm caught in the middle, so I need to call people to yell at them. One thing about this job, it's certainly making me braver about calling people.

Kicking things off right.

Eric is up in Ann Arbor today, playing D&D with a group of friends he's been playing D&D with for years. So I came home and made harira, except with Great Northern beans instead of chickpeas because we don't have any, and called my mom. Mom was packing for her first move in twenty-one years and all she wanted to talk about was the wedding. She conceded it was very reasonable of us to drop the wedding planning until the house was in order, then wanted to know: what sort of food were we serving? Who were my bridesmaids? What colors had we picked? Had I selected bridesmaid dresses yet? (Michelle wanted to know this too. Apparently it's one of the first decisions a bride has to make. Or maybe it's just the decision the wedding party wants to know about.) I asked her about flowers and she said, "Does Eric wear a suit to work?"

I said no, he wears slacks and a tie, and she said, "Oh. Because in Korean tradition the bride's parents give the groom a suit. Would he ever need to wear a suit?"

I said of course, he could definitely use a suit, and she asked me about sizes because Nordstrom is having their Anniversary Sale (the good one; the other is the Half-Yearly Sale, and it's not as good) soon and she wants to be able to get something good if she sees it. Then she said, "Have you made his mother a quilt?"

I said yes, actually, for Christmas, and she said, "What kind? Because we give the groom's parents a blanket. So I was thinking you could make a quilt." I said that the quilt was a small Christmas lap quilt, and I could certainly make her another, bigger, better one; and she said she could also just buy a mink (note: fake, I think it's actually nylon, but soft and snuggly and available only in Oriental stores for some reason) blanket for her, but maybe it would be nice if I made it, and I said that would be fine, I have almost a year, and she said that was true, and we'd think about it.

She also said that traditionally, the grooms' parents give the bride lots of clothes, but obviously she didn't expect them to do that. "But I'm doing my part," she said. I'm going to have to ask her more about Korean weddings. It hadn't occurred to me to ask her about them, because from what my cousin Unhae said, and from the videos we watched of her wedding and her sister's, I figured they were Westernized; but maybe that's not so, or maybe Mom's thinking about weddings in her own time. Either way, I would very much like to be able to include some traditional Korean aspects in the wedding.

Meat + Veggie = Dinner

I love grocery shopping. I don't know why. Maybe it's because I'm still (yes, after--dear God--seven years now) in the discovery stage of cooking: I can buy these, and turn it into this! I wonder what other combinations would taste good! Maybe it's because I never got over that I'm-a-big-girl-and-I-can-pay-for-it-all-by-myself thing. (Probably not, since I don't like clothes shopping anymore.) Maybe it's because I just like food. I went today, and filled my basket to the brim with bread and vegetables and blueberries for $1.77 a pint and ground beef and raspberry lemonade ($1 each, down from $1.59, and I bought the last four).

Yes, ground beef. I now shop for a meat eater. It's strange. I have a very basic understanding of how to pick beef out--bright red, sirloin is leaner than round is leaner than chuck, big chunks of fat are undesirable--but I haven't gotten feedback on it in...well, I'm not sure I ever got feedback, since Mom never sent me to the meat section to get anything, she got it herself and told me what she was looking for. But if I had it would have been eleven years ago. I've bought sausages and frozen chicken chunks for Eric before, but those are standardized and require no thought. Beef, though, is important to the boy. He still considers meat the main part of his meal, though what we've been doing is having a main vegetarian dish with a side or two that I'll have and another--a little chunk or slice of meat--for him. I'm hoping to someday change this view of things, but I suspect it's going to take a long time.

I may be able to help it along slightly. My schedule, wherein I work from 12:30 to 9 PM most nights, doesn't make it easy for me to do much cooking, and this is starting to drive me crazy. There's only so much canned soup and pasta with canned sauce I can eat. So I'm going to start cooking (or preparing) in the mornings and make food for myself like I'm used to. There are some things that he likes too--cheesy potato casserole, fried rice--but not enough to satisfy me So I've informed him that the kitchen will be producing peanut broccoli pasta and Pad Thai and artichoke-lentil pasta and roasted vegetables and couscous salad, and he says he's okay with it. He's even going to try a bite of all but the most esoteric stuff (or things he already doesn't like, such as peanut sauce). I hope to expand our list of mutually liked foods. Or I'm just going to have to become rich enough to hire a cook.

A mess, but coming along.

The house is mostly done. We've got some more boxes to unpack, and some furniture of Eric's to get rid of, and a place to find for storing blankets, but the kitchen and dining room and bathroom and bedroom and computer room and sewing room and library are functional. And that's all anyone really needs. The TV isn't hooked up, and at this rate may not be for weeks, especially if I never finish sewing the curtains. But priorities, people.

Also the pipes leading to the washer leak. But we're on it.

The Fourth of July was memorable for the bad and overly loud band (the Nutones) and the family that was lighting sparklers and trying to burn the grass with them. Oh, and nice fireworks and kettle corn. The Toledo celebration isn't bad at all.

We've made ridiculously rich chocolate ice cream, the sort of thing that couldn't be used in Death by Chocolate because adding more to it would actually make it distasteful.

And then there's the car. A description pulled from my e-mail to M:

Last Monday I backed out in a hurry because I thought I was going to be late for work and failed to see the black Jeep Rover that's always parked right across from our driveway, and crunched into it. I pulled over and dashed a very quick note on a
scrap of paper. Walking to the Jeep I noticed there wasn't much damage, a little paint scraping. Walking back to my car I noticed a huge dent in my rear bumper guard and a broken taillight cover. (The light itself still works...I think.) I turned out to be exactly on time for work. That night I came home, talked to Eric about it, and
when we went out to go to his mom's there was a note sticking out of the mailbox where there hadn't been one before: "I live at 153 Cornell. You hit my Jeep Rover. Call me to discuss," with name and phone number. I was annoyed because why hadn't she called me, and why hadn't she knocked. It was too late to call then, but I called about four times on July 4 and got a busy signal each time, then called July 5 and left a message, then called July 6 at a different time and left a mesage. No reply, and I decided I'd given it a good-faith shot and stopped calling.

Today, I heard the phone ring while I was at work, and when I checked it for some reason I decided to check voicemail, even though there was no little icon. Four messages, two of them from Jeep Rover Owner. So I called and said I hadn't received her earlier message, which I'm not sure she believed, and said if she got an estimate I'd give her or them a check. She seemed a little taken aback, but I'm not sure why; it's not like I'd give her a blank check or she'd have me take her car in. Anyway, it was extremely minor damage, probably just requiring sanding and repainting, so I'm not expecting it to be too much...but we'll see. And then there's my car, which at least needs its taillight cover repaired. Plus new tires and a flush and fill and maybe new spark plugs, but that was from before. Grrr. However, the lesson is that a Jeep Rover really is build tough. (Though I think that's the Ford slogan.)

So there you have it. Things are a mess but coming along.

Preview of what I would write if I weren't too busy and cranky and hot.

Annoying day. Reasons: (1) People who use their answering machines to screen callers, then pick up the phone at the tail end of the message, forcing me to repeat myself and change all my notation for the call. (1a) People who throw my printout away because I wasn't there the very instant it printed but instead arrived two minutes later. (2) Fiance is doing all the painting and I think the color I picked for the sewing room is too yellow and not enough orange. (3) Tornado sirens forcing me to hang up in the middle of a call to huddle in the downstairs hallway for an hour.

Jennifer Homeowner has flashbacks

Ah, paint. Eric and I painted the living room and entryway today. We meant to do it completely, but that was before we realized that (a) we didn't have enough tape and (b) we didn't have enough paint. They're both mostly windows and archways so I had thought the one gallon would be enough, but no. And since we're painting over a dull dark green, we need at least one more coat. The rooms look much lighter, though, and I had no mishaps such as the ones I had the last time I painted.

We also taped off another room upstairs (aside from the living room, we've got two bedrooms and the bath to paint--we painted the basement a few days ago, because the previous owners had inexplicably painted most of it black, and with the white down there it's marvelously brighter) and discovered that the previous homeowners may have been fix-it types, they weren't very good fix-it types. There was a small desk built into a narrow corner in the room destined to be my sewing room, and the supports for it were actually glued to the walls. Eric got some satisfaction out of smashing them with a hammer until they broke off and then spackling up the holes (plaster would probably have been better, but we didn't have any and we did have the spackle handy).

Also, last night while Eric was playing World of Warcraft I did my part of our bargain that gets Eric to mow the lawn, and started taking care of the garden. Behind the garage is a square of earth, about as big as the garage, with a raised bed in the middle and a pear and an Asian pear around. My eventual plan is to clear this area of grass entirely and have herbs, vegetables, and fruit bushes, but this year I'm starting small. So I planted a raspberry bush near the Asian pear, and two pepper and two tomato plants, and some peas, and mint and basil and dill around the chives plant that Edith gave me and that Eric mowed down because I hadn't put enough dirt around it to make it clear it wasn't a particularly big clump of grass. I also cleared most of the raised bed. The previous owners had placed black plastic over one half of this, and in the other they'd planted strawberries...and then, over the plastic, they apparently planted lettuce, because there were four clumps of it, growing out of shallow roots in the little bit of dirt on top of the plastic. And in the non-plastic area, the strawberry plants were dwarfed by spiky yellow-flowered weeds. I got Michelle to whack some of them for me by pointing out that when they were cleared, she could see the strawberries hidden in the greenery, and she could eat any she found. In the meantime, I spread the 240 lb of topsoil and 40 lb of garden soil I'd bought (at about 2.5 cents a pound, for the topsoil at least) and planted. I'm not sure what to do to kill off the rest of the grass for next year--I've only covered about a quarter of what I eventually want to have as planting ground. I figure I'll have a gravel U-shaped path around the raised bed, but for the rest, do I cover it with dirt this year and wait for the grass beneath it to die, or do it early spring next year, or cover it with plastic now, or what?

Anyway, I have plants planted, as well as cantaloupe seeds started inside the house. We've got the first coat of paint on the front room and entry. The U-Haul is reserved for next Saturday. We bought an ice cream maker. We're well on our way to moving in.

Still life with fish and cherries

We have achieved house! It currently has no utilities, since the owner cancelled them for Friday (when we were originally closing) and we hadn't signed up for them yet, but I'll be fixing that in a few minutes. Then I'll be going over to clean what I can without water or electricity. The owner left a ridiculous amount of stuff, including an exercise bike in the basement (I wish he'd asked, as that would be heavy as heck to carry upstairs, but fortunately it works and I could actually use something like that), a couple of nice glass pitchers, an array of clean mugs in the top shelf of the dishwasher, a carefully packed box of funny glass, a stuffed toy, and an opened cup of blueberry yogurt. We're glad we went to look (and unload book boxes from my trunk, after 8 months of driving them around) last night. Pictures will be forthcoming, but probably not until the real/virtual housewarming. Rest assured it is a wonderful house, even if it is making both of us slightly uneasy for different reasons.

I dreamed about cleaning a fish tank last night. I dream this often, and it's usually in different places, but I've always forgotten that it was there and there are always more live fish than you'd expect from me forgetting it and therefore not feeding them. I don't know what this means. I did own an aquarium from age eight to twenty inclusive, but I haven't had one now for years. Though, actually, another of the things the owner left was a hundred-gallon aquarium, also in the basement, so maybe that triggered it.

In other news: I appear to be allergic to cherries. Two nights ago I ate some cherries and started sneezing and sore-throating. My tongue also itched a little, but I was figuring I was starting a cold so didn't pay attention. The next day, I felt better. Then I ate a few cherries I'd brought as a snack and my nose started running and my throat started hurting and my tongue started itching. It turns out cherries are closely related to hazelnuts, which I already know I'm allergic to (but more closely to almonds, which I'm not). Cherries. A chocolate allergy would almost be better. At least then I'd be avoiding something not particularly good for me. But cherries are luscious and wonderful and seasonal. Plus they're also related to peaches. If I become allergic to peaches, I will be one unhappy vegetarian.

Jewelry stores: the horror.

There are further difficulties with closing. Specifically, the title company has not given me a final number. Without this I haven't been able to get to the bank to get a cashier's check, and we're closing at 4 on Monday--I can't make that time either, but Eric can and I'll just be late; they'll have to put up with it since I'll theoretically be the one with the money--and I work that morning so I have no time to get to the bank that day either. I think it'll work out that I can call the bank and pick it up on my way to closing, but I'm not pleased with Louisville Title right now.

However, we resolved the other stuff, including the electrical work we'd requested--it turns out that our inspector may not have known what he was talking about, which is a little disturbing. We didn't get the quote for a whole-house rewire as we'd requested, but the essential stuff is safe now so we're not going to worry about it yet.

Now, jewelry stores. I've been meaning to write this down for a week and kept forgetting whenever I had time to sit down and do it. I haven't been in a jewelry store since--no, that's not true. I went to a jewelry store in 2002 to pick out a watch for my graduation present, but Mom was with me and was ruthless about getting salespeople out of our way. Before that was several years earlier, also with Mom, but Mom was looking for a nice present for Dad and the salesman kept pressuring her to buy a particular piece she was looking at. I didn't like that. I was also pressuring Mom, because I liked the piece and I thought she should get it, but that was different: I was the daughter, and I had a right. They should have been leaving her alone. (She did end up getting it, though I think it took longer because she was trying to make up her own mind while ignoring both me and the salesman.)

Anyway, last week Eric and I stopped at Kay Jewelers to look at wedding rings because we'd been discussing wedding planning and figured hey, why not. So we stepped into the store, finding the right case almost immediately, and a saleswoman swooped.

"Finding anything you like?" she said. "Looking for anything in particular? Let me know if you want to examine something." Then, before we could do more than thank her, "Let me show you some of these new tungsten rings. See the hammered finish on these? I think that's lovely. You might consider our Superior Fit (or whatever) rings. See how they're concave on the inside? That's so the edges don't become sharp." The insides were convex. She said to Eric, "Are you a diamond man, or do you want something a little more simple? We have yellow or white gold here, and some two-tone rings here. We have thinner versions for the ladies," she said to me. "What's your ring look like?"

I lifted my hand and showed her my sapphire, and her face contorted itself from normal salesperson cheerful into a rigid polite. "That's very nice," she said, and quickly talked about other things. It was clear that she was horrified that my ring was not a diamond, and probable that she felt none of the rings she was showing me would be a suitable match, as I had probably gotten my ring from a Cracker Jack box. Or perhaps she figured Eric had been too cheap to get me a diamond and therefore we wouldn't be such a good sale. She sailed on with her pitch nonetheless, talking nonstop until we said, "Thanks for showing us the rings," and walked out.

It took me a while to recover. I never had such a jewelry experience before--or any other sales experience, except maybe shopping for my car. I had no idea walking into a jewelry store was such an ordeal. I wonder if all jewelry stores are like this, and if they've tried noninvasive salespeople or just assumed raptors are the best way to get people to part with large sums of money for tiny rocks and metal. Eric and I had already decided that we would never be able to buy gemstone jewelry anywhere other than at the gem show (where we got my ring last year--have I mentioned how much I love this ring? I still hold it up in different lights to see how it sparkles and changes hue) and now I'm not sure I'll be able to buy jewelry anywhere else, except maybe on eBay.