The Great House Hunt

I think we might need a new photo. I kind of feel like this isn't a good representation of me anymore - like maybe there are a few grays now or something. Anyways, to the point of my post today: Home Ownership, aka the American Dream. It was recently brought to my attention that I do not own a home. Yes, I've been paying rent on time now for several years, but apparently that rent is doing nothing but badness to me and my future well-being. It's flying out of my checking account and directly into my landlord's hands and leaving me with nothing but a roof over my head and a very low level of stress in my life. That is not good. I can no longer hop from home to home, refusing to decorate my dwelling, not having to deal with lawn maintenance, and just being an overall lazy arse. I have now entered the "why don't you buy a house" phase of my late 20's. As we all know, there is a checklist in life. Whether you like it or not, ignore it or live by it, there is a checklist. It starts at 18 and gradually builds up as you approach 30. Once you round the corner at 25, people start taking notice of how far you're getting on the checklist. It goes something like this (I'll use mine as an example):

Graduate high school - check

Go to college/graduate - check

Get a job - check

Relationship time/marriage - TBA

Buy a house - TBA

Kiddies - TBA

Don't get divorced - TBA

Retire comfortably on your 401k's and IRA's - TBA

Now of course this is different for everyone as we are all unique and have custom checklists. But I would guess that everyone has a checklist ingrained in them from birth, whether it was parental or societal pressure forming that list...doesn't really matter. My point is that I have entered the "Buy a House" phase of my checklist. Our readers might notice that I kinda skipped over the "Relationship time/marriage" part for now, which makes "Buy a house" even more adventurous (In my experience, if you skip one of the phases and enter the next phase, things are probably going to get stressful - and don't forget to start saving for retirement ASAP!).

Ok, so. I've been looking at houses. I've been through 3 (looking at 2 more today) and nothing has really jumped out at me and said "THIS IS IT!" like everyone says will happen. (So many parallels to dating, but I digress) Before you get overly concerned that I'm only doing this because I feel checklist pressure, allow me to assure you that I remain fully in control here, despite a total and complete meltdown last week. Yes, I agree that now is the time to buy. I am thrilled about the First-Time Home Buyer tax credit ($8000 bucks), I would enjoy my own walls for once and I have been itching to actually decorate something. I'd love for my dog to kill grass that I own so that I can stop worrying about replacing it when I move, and it would be nice to build equity even though I have no idea what that means. Basically, I'd like to invest in my future, aka my retirement accounts are never going to do anything so I need to make bucks off of real estate.

I see the positives and I am weighing the negatives and I do feel that a house would be cool. At the same time though, it's basically majorly stressful. As a single person, I have one income and don't really have a back-up plan if everything goes bust and I am suddenly broke. My accounts are only going to stretch so far before I join the ranks of the foreclosed. Yes, I am looking at the worst possible outcome, but I like to be prepared for all possibilities. No, I'm not going to buy more house than I can afford and I am going to pray every night that the roof is the best roof ever and the furnace loves nothing more than to keep me warm and if all goes well I will come out of this a proud and unscathed homeowner. We shall see.

If nothing else, this gives me some solid blog material, so expect some updates on my house-hunting adventure. Until then I will be taking lawn-mowing classes and will try to come to terms with taxes. Wish me luck.

not okay...

After several of our friends raved and insisted that we go see the latest comedy flick The Hangover, Nick and I finally made it to the theater a few weeks ago. We went to see it on a Tuesday night, a rarity for us, but Nick isn't working and there was a showing that allowed me to be in bed by 11pm so I decided to live on the edge for an evening. At first things seemed to be going our way. We walked up to the box office expecting to pay the exorbitant price of $10.00 per person and were delighted to see that all non new-release movies Sunday-Thursday are just $5.00 a ticket, for anybody at any showtime! Great, I thought! This allowed me to mostly guilt free spend the other $10.00 I saved on a buttery popcorn and diet Pepsi. Since the movie had been out for a few weeks it was in a smaller theater but we got there in time to get great middle-half-way up seats. I had to snicker when the previews started and I heard the distinctive cracking sound of a beer can opening and looked over to find a few college co-eds slugging back some brewskis but knowing what this movie was about, I wasn't surprised by the all adult crowd. About half way into the previews I noticed someone wheel something into the theater. After focusing my eyes for a second I realized with shock that it was a guy pushing a stroller! His wife or girlfriend was behind him and in a matter of seconds pulled out a bumbling little tyke from the carriage and left the stroller by the stairwell. Thoughts of, "Surely they are not bringing a 1ish year old child into a movie theater, and an adult themed movie at that!" Boy was I wrong, they scanned the rows for open seats and I secretly prayed that they wouldn't ask Nick or I to move and make room for their little guy in the seat next to us. The seats were mostly full but they managed to find 2 in the row directly behind us, which after doing the math in my head meant that one of them would have to hold the baby throughout the entire show. Now, I have friends and family that have small children and I totally understand that parents need to get out and see movies too but is it normal to take them to a rated R movie where the rest of the audience is adult?? I know they don't get what's going on when they're that young but the kid was chirping, gurgling, screeching, and laughing all throughout the movie! There's a reasonable chance I'll eat my words in the next 10 years when I want to see a movie and no one can babysit my kid and I really don't feel like going to see G-Force, (that horrendous looking movie about hamster FBI agents), where all the other kids will be laughing and making noise through it but I'll at least give the baby some benadryl or brandy! Okay so I'm kidding, I won't drug my child so I can go see a dumb movie but I can't ever see myself imposing on other people like that. Now did it ruin the movie? No because the movie was absolutely hysterical and Bradley Cooper is totally on my free pass list but it was certainly annoying and I just want to let everyone know that I swear to only take my super young kids to kid friendly movies where they can laugh, scream, upchuck, etc... and it will seem totally appropriate.

BTW, the hype is totally worth it, The Hangover is hilarious!

Can you bottle jet lag?

With the auto companies on summer shutdown for a few weeks my schedule has gotten rather flexible. I wasn't scheduled to work until 11am so I was able to set my alarm for 8:45 this morning which allowed me to get a workout in before showering. Nick and I golfed last night, or rather he golfed and I attempted to keep from losing too many balls with my shots from the fairway, so we had a late dinner and finally got to bed around 11:30 when Chelsea Lately comes on. Nick's ability to sleep in rivals that of a college student so even with my late wake up call I assumed he'd still be snoozing till 11am.

This past Monday he just returned from a 12 day guys golf trip to Ireland and his body clock is all messed up so I couldn't figure out if I was imagining, fantasizing or just plain dreaming when I woke up this morning. I hit the snooze button once for that extra 7 minutes then finally rolled over to grab my crackberry and see who was after me at the office. We sleep with a fan and an air filter so WWIII could pretty much start on our front lawn at night and we'd have no idea. I reached over my foot to find one of Nick's feet for our morning footsie tradition and was confused when I didn't feel anything. I rolled over only to come face to face with the body pillow he hugs at night minus Nick. I finally got up and switched off the air filter and still heard a loud air sucking sound and started to really wonder if I was hearing things or if I'd accidentally taken too much Benadryl last night. I walked out of the room to follow the noise and began to wonder if I'd left something on last night while beginning my descent of the basement stairs. The fog hadn't quite cleared from my head because I couldn't seem to process the scene in front of me. There was Nick, dressed in shorts and a shirt looking awfully awake while vacuuming the basement. I know this doesn't sound that weird but it was 8:55am and I don't know if I've ever seen Nick vacuum the basement, let alone before the crack of noon. He finally noticed my presence and the confusion on my face when I asked if he was alright. He just chuckled and said, "jet lag...woke up at 8 and couldn't get back to sleep so I thought I'd get going on vaccuuming the basement and around my CD's." Peering at his desk I noticed that he'd done some organizing as well, (something I'd been waiting for him to tackle for the last 9 months). I don't know what is so different about his body clock being off and him just randomly waking up early on a Saturday but this is the only time I can recall him finding some shred of self-motivated urge to clean and his explanation was the jet lag! I'm gonna have to send him off on more international trips in the future if this is what happens. I wonder if the jet lag is worse, like if he goes to Australia, maybe I can get him to repaint the garage or clean out the gutters or scrub the toilets?? That'd be fantastic!

Sadness

I was on my way to the NKOTB show when I heard the sad news about Michael Jackson. Between the concert and the breaking news about MJ, it's safe to say that last night was a straight flashback from 1989. I kept waiting for Doc to fix the flux capacitor so I could get out of there.

In honor of MJ, feel free to post your childhood memories and be totally cheeseball. I'll always remember him as the Michael Jackson from Bad. You know, very early plastic surgery phase, still on top of the world and keeping the crazy at bay. Bad was the first album that I ever owned, as a gift from my parents, when I was 6 years old. So thanks to MJ for making me shake my booty.

More on the NKOTB concert later (or as I like to call it "The Jordan Knight is OMG Still Hot Tour")

Oh Oh Oh Oh Oh, Oh Oh Oh Oh

The Right Stuff...huh. I'm going to see the boy band formally known as New Kids on the Block, now just NKOTB, this evening. That's right, you are jealous. I'll have a full report tomorrow or Saturday for you. It's a very last minute deal and I certainly was unprepared for the emotional baggage that comes with seeing your childhood idols again after 20 years. I'm a firm believer in leaving things in the past, but a free ticket is a free ticket. Will I revert back to my 8-year-old self and sing along to my old favorites? Will I pass out from the hysteria? Will I just sit there and think...my god...I had horrendous taste as a child? Likely. Maybe I was right way back in 1989...maybe Jordan Knight and I ARE supposed to be together forever and this is how we will meet.

Either way, I will let you know how it turns out.

Serious Question

Ok, so I go on vacation to San Francisco/Santa Cruz/Napa Valley and two days before our return to the D I woke up with a raw sore throat. That night the back of my throat started to tickle and sure enough I woke up the next day with a cough. Sunday came and my voice started to go froggy, I spent Monday and Tuesday exhausted from nights of sleepless coughing and days of explaining to our customers, vendors, etc... why I sounded like a man. I finally got a good night of sleep on Tuesday and felt my voice loosening up yesterday along with the phlegm in my chest only to start sneezing and blowing my nose while having to do the suck in breath thing between bites of food at dinner last night. Today I've sneezed several times; on my shoes, on my hands, on the ground, on my desk and have covered nearly ever surface in snot. Now I realize there's probably no one left reading right now but I have a serious question to ask. Where does the snot come from and have I always had this much in my head? Is it becuase of some bacteria or virus that it's just now making its cry for freedom through my throat and nose?? I thought I was on the upswing of this thing and now I'm starting to wonder...figures I would go alllll winter long without even a touch of the flu or a cold and as soon as summer and my vacation hits, BAM, onslaught of wheezing, sore throat, coughing and runny nose! It couldn't be the fact that I was totally off my mostly healthy routine while in Northern Cali, eating every unhealthy thing I came across and washing it down with several forms of alcohol while sleeping restlessly in 4 different hotel beds for 6 nights, not to mention slacking on any form of exercise....nah, couldn't be that.

Sharing is Caring

Hi all...just wanted to share this photo. I had lots of interesting topics floating around in my head today, but forgot them all the moment this appeared on my screen. I think the other topics had something to do with Jon & Kate being genius media whores (but those poor little children!). I'm going to let this photo sink in for a few minutes and come back with my rant/rave about America's favorite trainwreck family.