LifePundit

How to Find Your Rabbit a New Home

Meet Clover, our pose-able bunny. Now say goodbye to her.

You can't really appreciate her from this photo, but I'll try to explain. If you lay her down on her back, she will stay there. If you move her feet/legs into different positions while she is on her back, she will keep them where you put them. Yes, she's a pose-able rabbit.

We've been posing her for two years. But after you've run through all the poses, exactly what do you do with a rabbit?

We decided that maybe she needed another home. A more creative home, where perhaps she would be free to pose however she desires. But nobody I knew wanted a bunny. Not even a pose-able bunny.

Then one day, an e-mail from a 4-H leader landed in my inbox promoting a chicken project. So, I hit "reply all" (yes, if I need to get rid of a rabbit bad enough I will spam you) and suggested that we had a rabbit suitable for a rabbit project. Complete with hutch, etc.

And I was deluged with responses -- none of them threatening to turn me in for spamming. So Clover now has a new home. Happy Easter, Happy Bunny, Happy New Family. Happy Me.

But that wasn't the end of it. Another parent with an unwanted pet saw the brilliance of my spamming the 4-H mailing list and the next thing to hit my inbox was an e-mail declaring: Free Hermit Crabs to Good Home, All Supplies Included.

I don't know if those hermit crabs found a new home or not, but we had a hermit crab once. Worst pet ever. It never moved while you looked at it. I would place the shell the crab was hermitting in in one location in the cage/tank, and if the shell was somewhere else the next day, I took that as a signal that the thing was still alive. I soaked it on schedule, fed it, saw nothing to clean up but cleaned it up anyway. We had to move it out of Lily's bedroom because it could scale the plastic walls of its tank, making a terrible screeching sound like claws on a chalk board. You not only couldn't sleep with that noise -- you couldn't breathe. If you turned on the light, all you saw was Still Life with Crab. Don't know how it did it but it did.

One day the shell stayed put. And it stayed put the next day. And the next day. What a heartbreaker that was (just kidding).

But that's still not the end.

Next to land in my inbox was this reply-all message: "Don't need a chicken, a rabbit, or a hermit crab, but will raise you a horse." And thus went the pitch for a non-free to good home horse.

I assume all is well with Clover. I told a friend what had happened, and she said, "You do know what they do with 4-H rabbits."

Uh oh. "What?"

"You do know what they do with 4-H cows and pigs," she said. Yes, I know. I hadn't thought about this. In the 4-H horse projects, you don't eat the horse.

"Well, they said they'd send me pictures," I said defensively. "And she's a small rabbit -- not much meat."

"If they said they'd send you pictures, it's probably all right. Just hope they don't send you recipes."

Thanks a lot. What else are friends for?

A Master Procrastinator Reveals Her Secrets

There is no one who is better at procrastinating than me. I have some articles that were due last Friday. They are interesting articles I'm writing for one of my favorite clients. But I am stuck. It isn't writer's block. It's .... being a master procrastinator.

I will tell what I did today in hopes that you can learn from me. Writing this post is also one more task to help me achieve my procrastination goals.

Here’s what I’ve done today instead of finishing my articles:

• Vacuumed

• Mopped
• Cleared kitchenette area and cleaned it up (I’m talking moving furniture into the living room until we decide what to do with the old stuff) to make room for when the new table and chairs come tomorrow
• Reorganized part of laundry room (!!!)
• Six loads of laundry (no folding, though; we’ll be clean but wrinkled)
• And get this. Went to Lowe’s and bought stick-down vinyl tile, cut out the damaged part of the laundry room floor, and used a box cutter to cut the stick-down (non-matching) vinyl tile squares into shapes that resembled the part of the floor I cut out (not a very workmanlike fit) and stuck them down. They pretty much look like dooky but at least the old vinyl that was rolled back, tearing, splitting and catching on the laundry room door and breaking off into pieces is gone. Who knows. It looks so bad I might get a new floor out of this (way overdue), if Paul even notices it. However, that was not my intention. I thought I was suddenly a vinyl floor installer. The guy at Lowe’s told me how to do it. (I had to reglue part of the old floor around the edges where I cut the piece out). And even though I had picked up some stick-down tile a few months ago and finally decided which color was the closest, it was discontinued, so I picked out a color on the spot. Uh oh. The existing floor is a golden white; the pieced in squares are a grey-white.
  

Then, I had an appointment with a friend, which I decided not to cancel because that was yet another excuse not to write the articles -- plus she's leaving for Mexico tomorrow so I needed to wish her bon voyage, When I told her what I'd been up to she said that was an awful lot of work for procrastination and probably it would have been easier to just write the articles.  (I love her.)

 She also had some insight into how/why I get myself into this. When something is due, I take a militaristic approach to managing me. I say to myself that I can’t do anything fun until I’ve gotten my work done. She called this taking myself hostage. And, like any good hostage, I resist.

Then the next thing I did was to pick up Lily from school. But she didn't feel well, so I took her to the local

Doc in the Box. Lily is okay – unless she’s coming down with the flu, a virus or has a brain tumor on her pituitary gland. 

How comforting that last is.

There was guy at the doc’s who is one of those skating car hops at Sonic. He had just been run over by an SUV. The manager of Sonic stopped the SUV driver, who was mad that the car hop had “hit” his car. The guy looked pretty good for having been run over by an SUV. He was very chatty, a dreadlocked soul with tattoos who looked like the shock of it all was almost worse than the injuries, though I think he had a broken knee cap and was swaddled from hip to toe on one side with all manner of padded devices. I even overheard that maybe a hip was out of joint. Maybe he was chatty because they had him feeling little pain.

Okay, suppertime. Then I really will write those articles. I always do -- eventually.

My Job is to Make You Feel Good About Christmas

So far, Christmas is upside down. No matter what you haven't done for Christmas, you're ahead of me. I've bought three gifts. One for the piano teacher, and two joke gifts for friends I met for dinner.

The only signs of Christmas at our house are a festive vinyl tablecloth (the real ones are in the attic), a Wal-Mart "seasonal" bouquet and the Christmas cards we've received from the friends who haven't given up on us.

Our tree isn't up. (And will be right-side-up.) No wreath on the door. There's just a warm spot under the bed where I've been hiding, curled up in a fetal position. That's it.

Paul is STILL working every day and night on his office. They moved this week. Sort of. The office still isn't finished, Paul doesn't own a desk (he was using his former landlord's desk), and the cube assemblers are still assembling. Cube assembly is the only job Paul has discovered he can't do himself.

You say Christmas is one week away? Well, at least it's not tomorrow.

We'll get the tree up this weekend (except that Paul and I both have bad colds, Lily's just now off crutches from a horse fall -- nothing broken -- and he's so worn out I hate to ask him to help do anything). We'll go Christmas shopping or maybe send gift cards from Amazon to out-of-state relatives. It's just one of those years.

I did buy Christmas cards in a moment of misplaced optimism. Get this: Did you know that Wal-Mart has a section for Christian Christmas cards? That did make shopping handy-dandy, but I found this odd. Do they have a section for Jewish Hanukkah cards?

And I'm looking forward to cooking Christmas dinner because it's going to be different. I'm using the Silver Palate's recipe for lobster bisque, Paul is murdering the lobsters, and we'll have good bread, a salad and tiramisu (Lily's request and she'll probably make it) for dessert. That feels lavish and simple all at the same time. I'm just sorry that there won't be leftovers to live on for days afterwards. Oh well.

My wicked MiL is coming, but we've set boundaries on for how long. (Right. Boundary trampling is a sport for her.) And then I'm going to visit my mother, who, with any luck, will know who I am. Or, even more importantly, will know who she is.

I won't let Paul put the icicle lights up anymore. They do look pretty on our porch but, no lie, one year I couldn't get them down until July. Never again.

So all you smug Internets who've been ready for Christmas since the day after Thanksgiving, good for you. My wish for Christmas is that we'll get the decorations down before July.

Is it Procrastination or Preparation?

It's good to be missed. Thank you, Nancy. What am I doing? Procrastinating! And I've found a better way to procrastinate than blogging: cleaning up and making plans for 2009.

Sort of like planning your New Year's resolutions early, only without actually having to start them for a month.

I've also been driving. Soon I'll be a Teamster, just from hauling Lily around where she needs to go. Minimum of 60 miles per day. More than that if she actually goes anywhere other than school.

So what's going to be different in 2009?

I'm going to be walking while working. I've got a new treadmill and Paul is going to build me a desk (right Paul?) as soon as he's finished renovating his new office and moving in (scheduled for this weekend. The toilet is out of our den!). Right now I'm using a piece of pink Styrofoam for my treadmill desk but it's not very stable. Walking while working is supposed to improve your health, your sleep, burn calories and annoy the cat. A Mayo Clinic researcher says that you can lose 67 pounds a year simply by slowly walking while you work. I don't want to lose 67 pounds (but I might after Christmas candy). To see a video about the concept, click here.

I'm going to do JaNoWriMo. I didn't "win" NaNoWriMo, but was very pleased with how much more I wrote so I've signed up for a similar but less technically spectacular (the web site, I mean) event where you do the same thing: write 50,000 words in a month, only the month is January. I'm going to write a romance that you will never, ever see with my name on it. Frissons everywhere!

Then there are other goals that I'd like to keep to myself. Such as not seeing my MiL at all in 2009.

How about you?

I Want a Dumpster for Christmas

This year for Christmas, I want the anti-gift. I want a dumpster.

I asked for a dumpster once before. Paul said they are too expensive. Paul is frugal. I don't get diamonds or dumpsters.

I'm doing my big, end-of-year Dung Shui, and Everything Must Go. This feels very therapeutic, especially with so many misbehaving people in my life. I can't declutter people from my life, but I can declutter stuff.

Lily started it. She wants to repaint her room and get rid of all the animal prints and other things she considers childish. She's purged everything and most of it has gone to Goodwill. I got in the spirit of things and sent some fancy evening dresses I no longer have anywhere to wear. The lady at Goodwill was thrilled and said that she would put them out immediately because there were girls looking for party clothes.

And I'm not making this up -- as soon as I got home I received an invitation to a black tie dance. if you want to get invited to a party, get rid of your party clothes.

Still, I'm going to keep getting rid of stuff that isn't useful or beautiful. And though I don't quite know what I will wear to that dance, I hope those girls have a great time in my evening dresses. Something will turn up for me (it's probably forgotten in the back of a closet) and I'm thrilled that things I wasn't using (I thought) will bring others joy.

I guess there's a reason it's called Goodwill.

Blogging is Too Much Fun to be Permissable Procrastination Tool

Nancy, you missed me! Thank you!

I haven't been blogging for three reasons:

1. I didn't have anything nice to say, and so I didn't say anything;

2. When I wasn't whining about how nothing works in this house, I was out having fun with friends (yes, I have one or two left) or inside getting really mad at technology and putting more duct tape on my computer (figuratively speaking) because I'm not about to get a new one as long as they all come with Vista;

3. I've had a chance to "audition" to be a speech writer for a person (non-politician) for whom I'd very much like to be a speech writer. I'd like to say that I've been working non-stop to land this great gig, but I've mainly been stressing over it, losing sleep and doing acceptable procrastination activities, such as cleaning my office, doing laundry, exercising and hauling lightning-damaged electrical equipment to the dump. I also took two carloads of stuff to the church garage sale (proceeds go to Habitat). I didn't allow myself to blog because blogging is fun and nothing fun is allowed while procrastinating.

Approved procrastination activities are the things you should do every day or every week, but save them up until you have a project.

If my house is clean, my laundry is sparklingly done and my blown TVs are in the dump, you know I am procrastinating heavily.

There are others "auditioning" for the speech writer job. I sent my speech in yesterday and am not sure how I feel about it. I don't know the man, have never met him, and have only seen short clips of him on the Internet. I don't know his message or his style or what he wanted to say to this particular audience. I don't know the history or future plans of the institution he heads, though I am impressed by it. I suspect my style is too conversational and not eloquent and dignified enough, but who knows. Maybe he'll like it. I have him being humorous in several places in the speech I wrote for him, which is something entirely missing from everything else I've seen or read that he's done. He's more a "thousand points of light" kind of guy than a "did you hear the one about ....." fellow.

Still, all audiences like a little levity, and I don't think he's anti-humor. Or maybe I'm just not all that funny. Or maybe I am funny and he's not. Or maybe he'll love me because he'll love the adoration of awake, laughing audiences. Assuming he gives the speech a try and doesn't use one of my competitor's more grandiose ones that start off with stupid, convoluted structures like "Four-score and seven...." Who'd hang around and listen to that? Nothing memorable there.

Anyway, in theory, I would love this steady work and love to write speeches (especially since I don't have to give them, in case the jokes fail). But, if he doesn't feel like my style works for him, it probably wouldn't be a good fit anyway.

In the meantime, you won't believe how clean my house is.

Dung Shui!

This is not my office. My piles of stuff aren't so neat.

It's the beginning of the month and I'm a couple of days late "Dung Shui-ing" my office, a habit I'm trying to pick up from my class with Margie Lawson. Why are some habits, like organizing and cleaning up, so much harder to acquire than habits, such as leaving everything a mess? Why doesn't healthy food taste as good as unhealthy food?

Who knows. Maybe I'll find a candy bar in the mess. That's my incentive. Got my great big trash can, my box of file folders and a book on iPod. Dung Shui! If you don't hear back from me, I had a cave-in and was crushed.

Spring is ... Brown!

Here's a tablecloth I didn't buy at Bed Bath & Beyond. It was the most cheerful they had short of something too cheerful such as you'd find on a beach in the Caribbean. Somebody with style and imagination could make this one look all springy and serene, but not me.

I'm grateful for what we have, I honestly am. We've been eating off the same Villeroy & Boch everyday china since we got married in 1985. Every day we use it for every single meal and I think I cook and we eat at least six times a day. It's lovely, really, and very durable. We've broken very little. I'm truly grateful and am wondering if it's going to outlive me, which would be fine. It's discontinued. So am I. And I'm glad to have it -- really I am. Here's a photo:

Yes, this pattern looks springy. But I've been looking at these springy plates for close to 23 years. They don't look springy anymore. They look like plates. I don't think spring when I see them. I think, "Uh oh. Don't know what's for supper. Again."

But now it's spring. And I'd like to look at something different. I know I could go out and buy a box of cheap fun china from somewhere (like I did in grad school) and have a change of pace, or at least something different to look at, but I can't write about people starving to death one day and then write about how I'm bored with my plates and so I bought new ones (that won't hold up as well) just because I could. (Plus where do you put it all? Send my existing everyday china to Somalia to make room?)

But I can justify going out to get a fresh new, non-stained, colorful spring tablecloth. I'll take vinyl. I'll take cloth. I don't care. Just give my eyes a break. So I went to the mall and I'm here to tell you that spring has sprung -- and it's brown.

I like brown. But not for a spring tablecloth. Target also had wimpy green, sophisticated black and white, an understated soft blue-green that matches the Albertina, and a navy ikat. And lots of brown. Brown, brown and beige. Is it fall and nobody told me? Here's a very pretty table runner that would clash with my plates, but I'd buy it anyway. Except it doesn't look springy.

If you want colors you have to  get vinyl outdoor tablecloths, but I don't want to have to wear my sunglasses at supper. I'm all for garish -- outdoors.

All things considered, if all I have to complain about is that I can't find a tablecloth I like, life is good. Really good.

Hope it is for you, too. Happy Brown Spring!

Can This Organizer Get Me Organized?

This is a paid post. I'm a sucker for organizers.

And yes, Nancy and Daphne my dear friends from college, I still struggle to have a clear path through my house so people can walk. (My dorm room is the only one featured in our college yearbook for excess personality, i.e., catastrophic messiness.)

I have gotten better over the years. But it's a struggle, and I need all the tools, organizers and gizmos I can find to help me do it.

I firmly believe, though I cannot prove it, that if everything has a place, then I will be organized. This Buxton Bag, which in the South we would call a pocketbook even if it is sort of half shoulder-bag and distant cousin to a backpack, says it can organize your life. Or rather, the ad says so. I don't think the pocketbook talks, although maybe it should. Because you see, I might start off with everything in its place, but I wouldn't leave it that way. I need a pocketbook that says, "Put that phone back where it goes."

Buxton Bag Review The Buxton products I've had in the past have been well made and well designed. In fact, the checkbook and wallet I carry now are both Buxton, and not a soul told me to tell you that even if it is true. Which it is. And this Buxton leather shoulder organizer bag looks like a good deal. If I could only find my wallet down in the bowels of my current non-Buxton pocketbook, I might even buy this organizer bag.

Festooning the Void

This is a paid post but it fits right in with what I'm scheming to do. We got The Void painted and got rid of the Bowflex. I was hoping for blue-green but got blue. It's a blue I like so once we got it painted we quit and skipped the idea of the colorwash. It was hard enough to get it painted blue. (There's somebody in this house who would dispute the use of the word "we.")

I went to the library and got all of their books about sewing valences (sorry, other patrons). It's really hard to get excited about curtains, valances, or other stuff than can be frumpy or ostentatious. It's extra hard when the books you are looking at are all from the '70s and '80s. Not that you'd think valances would change all that much. Then, I found a book with some really attractive things in it. Not sure what was the difference. I'll write about that later and give you the book's title.

So I've picked out a simple design that uses two fabrics, which solves my problem of deciding between my two favorite fabrics. Now I need to measure for the fabric and find the curtain rods, or poles. I really don't like to sew, but how bad can this be?

That's why I'm writing this ad. I need curtain rods, window poles, whatever you want to call them. I'm going to start by browsing at http://www.terrysfabrics.co.uk/cat_curtain-poles.php. Terry's Fabrics has helpful advice, such as how to measure your window for poles, (they call them poles, and I can go along with that). They've got a nice inventory and some interesting designs to consider.

I haven't decided how fancy I'm going to get on this. I start out ambitious, and end up doing something like buying a placemat from Target and hanging it over a curtain rod. (I have seriously done that in one bathroom, and it looks fabulous, actually!)

I will post pictures when I'm finally finished. I'm sure you can't wait.

We actually have done some fun stuff around here. Well, it was fun when it was finished.

To read my advertising policy, click here.