Planes, plains and automobiles.

Example of the anthill I referred to in last post:

This pic is the girls of 5th period plus me... they were a fun class. 

Then it's ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh sweet freedom.   

We are getting better at being hosts, and we really really like it ... We had several teachers over on the afternoon school let out.  And we had the two guys I play guitar with at church and their girlfriends over one night.  Here they are gathered around my granddaddy's table.  (My mom and aunt are looking at this picture and saying, "SEE, Look how many people can sit around a round, pedastal table.  You just can't sit that many people around a regular table as you can a round pedastal table...")

Some improvements have been made in regards to the house....

Like this new table in the happy nook

and these plants Joe planted by the mail box.

And just regular grooming and maintenance.  

So far, I haven't exactly found a place in the yard work.  My job has mainly been turning off the sprinkler and snapping pictures (from the window) of all moments when the husband looks extra precious at work.  

 As usual we started with Special Session 1 at Camp Bratton Green where we got to be married at camp for the first time.   Which means we got to stay in the same cabin... which really means we only have to pack one tube of tooth paste!

On our way to camp... Joe had been awake since about 5:30 (so excited he was)

 Then a few lazy days interrupted by a couple weekend trips to a bachelor party for Joe and a wedding in Alabama.

 Joe began learning Yankee Doodle on the mandolin.  

(we've decided we may need to get summer jobs next year.)

 This past weekend we went Nebraska.  NO, not to the College World Series to see MS State play baseball (my crew was composed exclusively of 3 Ole Miss fans and one "I don't care" fan).  Joe's grandmother lives there.  I mean, really, what are the odds we would plan a trip to NE during the exact time of the CWS?  Everyone in Omaha (airport people/ car rental guys) assumed that's what we were there for first.  But no.  Joe hasn't seen his grandma in about 8 years.  A couple months ago Joe watched some documentary on older people and it inspired him to call his grandma which, in turn, sparked some sentimental tears and inspired him to "plan" a trip to see her.  I say "plan" because for Joe this means calling up his sister Marguerite, encouraging her to come with her husband Chris, which ultimately results in her planning the trip for us.

Total trip:   Friday - Monday.  

Friday we ran into a 4-hour weather delay in the Chicago airport.  Joe is a somewhat restless traveler in the best of conditions.  The 4 delay almost sent him over the edge. 

A good citizen did stop and ask if he was ok.  

"No ma'am, he just does this."

Besides Grandma, I met 3 cousins (plus their spouses), 1 uncle and 1 aunt.  Oh and one new little cousin.

Saturday:
Breakfast... Uncle Randy has it prepared by like 7:30 even though no one (including Grandma) woke up til 8:30 or 9.  Eggs are room temp and unsalted (confirming the rumors we'd heard about bland, mid-west food).  Cousins begin to invade the house.

Morning Activity:   Boys go to car museum.  Girls do what girls do.  Pedicures.

Me and two cousins.

And Grandma got her first manicure...ever... at age 88.  She talked about it over and over again throughout the rest of the weekend.  

Grandma and Marguerite in below picture.  Marguerite said Grandma barely moved during the whole manicure.  She didn't want them to cut her finger off. 

The rest of the afternoon went like this:

-Eat at local diner.
    Grandma talks about manicure
-Walk through down town
-Dairy Queen
-naps at Grandma's - ooo and ahhh at the 3 month baby cousin that came to town.  Grandma
  shows off her manicure to the newest arrival of cousins.
-Dinner at Ruby Tuesdays
-Some tv time then bed time.


Sunday:
-Breakfast - same idea as Saturday.  Less cousins.  Grandma's manicure looks great with church outfit
-Church with Grandma... this made her very happy.
-Lunch - Uncle Randy brings KFC home.  We had literally just eaten breakfast.
-Drive to Grandma's old house and to see the assisted living place she hopes to live.  (This was a
  caravan of at least 4 vehicles.)
-Back to Grandma's.  Ooo and ahhh over baby cousin some more.
-All cousins depart.  Joe, Marguerite, Chris and I go to movies.  World War Z  (more snacks are eaten)
-Dinner - leftover chicken but Uncle Randy had provided us with Chinese take-out menus just in case.
-Park with Grandma.  Really pretty park.  Had a tower we climbed.

After eating and sleeping for 2 days straight, if felt awesome to run up some stairs. 

Things about Nebraska I/we noticed:  

-Pretty pretty land.  However we were disappointed that the corn wasn't full grown yet.  There were times while driving that we could've easily been cruising through the MS delta. 

-Lots of wind.  Little humidity

-Little to no black people.  Which we really noticed when at the movies a preview came on for Anchor Men 2... Will Ferrell makes some ass-like racial comments at a table full of black people.  I think if we'd been in a theater with more black people it would've gotten more laughs.  Maybe the Nebraskans don't get those kind of jokes since that culture isn't a strong presence in NE.  Or maybe it just wasn't funny.   Either way- I saw maybe 2 black people the whole time.  And one was from west Africa.  

-Top local news stories are about farming and reports of yearly deaths in giant grain holders.    

-If the southern accent makes a person sound a little stupid (even when he/she says smart things) then the mid-west accent makes people sound like nerds.   

-Nebraska dictionary:   guys and gals,  what else ya got there, oh my gash (pronounce my like "eye"), ruts (instead of roots), pick-up (not truck or pick-up truck.. just a pick-up), and "I suppose" used as a response for more than an answer to a question.  Example:  someone says, "Oh my gash that's a pretty pick-up"  you respond with "I suppose." 

-One of the cousins' names was Myra (I think spelled Mira actually) -- which I've decided is maybe the most midwestern name.  Much like double names are to the south, I think midwestern names need some strong vowel action.

-"Rednecks" exist everywhere.  But even though they look like rednecks in NE (jeans, boots, "pick-ups") they don't sound like it.  Look country.  Sound nerdy.  

Finally got home Monday night after a 14-hour travel day: 

3 hour car drive to Omaha

1 hour 15 min. flight to Chicago

1 hour 45 min. flight to Jackson

3 hour drive to Oxford   

buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I took several pictures of old pictures around Grandma's house.  I will leave you with one of my favorites of Joe's family (pre-Susan). 

Tied to an anthill

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One time, when we were like 10 and 12, my dad entered us (Dylan, Dad, and me) in the country club’s “Father-Daughter, Father-Son Golf tournament.”  A weekend long tournament with two kids who A) weren’t that interested in golf and B)were definitely not good at golf… oh and C) I think we did this two years in a row.   Not really sure why Dad did this.  I suppose it had its fun moments.  While it’s a very memorable experience, we (as a family) don’t necessarily refer to it as a fond memory...mainly because our baby raccoons were killed by the next-door neighbor-dogs the last morning of one of the tournaments. 

The best part of the whole thing was when the local news camera came around and interviewed my dad and the other dad in our golfing group.  When asked how the weekend had been my dad answered, “Oh, it’s kind of like being tied to an anthill.”  Needless to say they weren’t really looking for that answer, and in the final cut they used the other dad’s cheesy answer about how great it was to spend time with his son who was home from school, or some BS, and then just a brief clip of my dad swinging his golf club like a pro. 

This is what the last days of school are like.  Between state testing, AP testing and field trips… there isn’t a day when you have a whole class at once.  And even if you did, there’s no way you could do anything too academic with them.  Nearing the end of April you can start to feel the tension of rebellion building in their teenage temperaments as you hesitantly ask them to---read p. 212, do Actividad 9, or GOD FORBID take in new information you’re trying to teach.  Once they start taking daily AP or State tests…they’re done.  Not to mention you are also done.  You, as a teacher, have no creative energy left in you.  So you’re left with what can only be described as baby-sitting and as much as you’d like to think high school kids can handle just chillin’ and talking to each other… they can’t.  They are just as antsy and energetic as 4-year-olds at times.  Here is one video of Joel (giant, power lifting champ) coming up with an activity one day when 4th period had been held for like 45 minutes longer than normal (due to testing). 

So you gotta find something that keeps them busy but doesn’t require too much brain work.  My solution to this was to make them do presentations this past week.  Each Spanish 2 student doing a 3-minute presentation in Spanish.  Could water-boarding possibly be that painful?  Ok, that’s insensitive.  Water-boarding is OBVIOUSLY 1,000,000 times worse than sitting through 90 awful presentations, but I’m telling you…it was, at the very least, awful and something I probably won’t do again next year.  One kid mainly read off the multiple awards his baseball player won AND the year in which he won them.  (FYI, “1978” in Spanish is read “mil novecientos setenta y ocho”… imagine how long it took him to read like 9 of those off).  My students were even looking at me and saying, “Mrs. Maples, this has to be awful for you.  It’s been awful for us to sit through but you know how bad their Spanish actually is.”

My options were either terrible, torturous Spanish presentations or being tied to an anthill the whole week (instead of just these last two days.)  Neither option is ideal.  But at this point I’m writing this from the end of the tunnel.  Today was the last day of classes and it’s glorious.  You look back and think, “wow, not sure how I made it, but here I am…I’ve actually made it, and I managed to NOT cuss out a kid.” 

Sweet sweet summer is here at last.. well in a week it will be... when the anthill will finally cave and let me go free.  

  

Happy Nook, Prom, and House guests

Thing about living in a house #15) ---- The sound of people cutting grass ... This happens mostly on the weekends but the sound could also be during the week.  Back in apartment life you may have a crew of leaf blowers and weed eaters come by once a week... but that would just swoosh right on by in like 5 minutes.  The hum of neighborhood grass cutting can possibly be heard all day depending on which neighbor starts cutting when. 

In case I haven't made it clear, my aunt Bet is our interior decorator.  She gets the credit for what has been happening with our furniture, etc.   Over spring break she helped us pick out these chairs and fabric to go with our super fun kitchen rug.  Before we even moved into the house I had a vision for a little happy kitchen nook for reading, coffee, visiting, ya know ... all things happy.  So I've been awaiting these chairs even before I had them picked out in reality. 

Friday April 18 I get the call.  The chairs have arrived.... in Sherman, MS.  Joe runs home to switch out my car for his (small) truck during his planning period.  We thought we were set.  Didn't think twice about anything else we might need to get these chairs (and ottomans) home.  Sherman is only 40 minutes away.  

As they load the first chair into the back of the Ford Ranger we realize we are not all set.  All four pieces of furniture are NOT going to fit in the back.  We do not have any rope to tie them down.  For some damn reason this furniture warehouse does not have any either.  It's fine.  I'll ride in the back cab (no back seats in this whittle truck) and we'll shove the ottomans in the front seat. 

 Leaving the store.  Thanks for all your help, Premier (said with sarcasm)

Here is the best I could do in capturing my predicament.

                                                My view from the back

We thought we had everything under control.  I was watching the chairs (wrapped in plastic) in the back and Joe pushed the gas to about 55 as we pulled onto the highway.  The plastic really started flapping... and acting more like a sail than protective covering... just as Joe increased the speed one chair started moving.  The wind was pushing it back towards the other chair.  

I start saying, "Whoa... whoa whoa..."

Then it tilted forward and it's rear end was in the air.

"Stop STOP STOP"

Just as I was preparing myself to watch my new happy chair tip over the side and crash into 5 pieces Joe managed to slow the truck and the chair settled back into its spot.  

We pull over. 

Regroup.  

Lay chairs down a different way.

Poke holes in plastic. 

Joe tied one chair down with a measly little rope he had and I gripped the plastic of the other one through the back window.  And this is how we made it back to Oxford. 

The whole way I just kept thinking, please let us make it back.  I promise to never be this stupid again when picking up furniture.  Just let us get these chairs home.  I'm so sorry cute little chairs. 

We just didn't think it through AT ALL.  But here they are.  Cute as can be.  Little do they know that one of them almost bit the dust...or highway.

I'd like to say that every weekend morning we have been lounging in cute, happy chairs but that just hasn't been our life.  First, we had prom.  Prom is an all day set up.  Theme this year -- under the big top.

Joe has always had a secret dream of being a carnie.  His hands just aren't quite small enough for the job.  After seeing this picture I think he'd make an awesome cookie monster. 

Not only did we have decoration duty, but this year I also had beauty duty for Joe's sweet sis Susan.  She's a junior.  She has hair of gold.

                                                       And this PRECIOUS boyfriend. 

I volunteered Joe and I to be her surrogate parents and go take pictures of her and her friends.  (Joe's dad will have none of these shenanigans and even though his mom is a big band booster mom... she was clearly not going to the park for picture taking)

After picture time was costume time.  We owe all our thanks to Joe's mom.  She is a costume maniac.  She rented various props from a costume store so we could have options. 

Last year was Midnight in Paris and we looked like this. 
 

This year

                                 Joe juggled fire as the kids were arriving. 

It's possible we have even more fun than the kids on prom night. 

Thing about having a house (even a new one) #22 -- the shit that goes wrong (which has its own sublist of 5,987 things)   We noticed this lovely bulge in our base board (or is it a floor board... no definitely not floor....side board?)  by our shower.  We've identified the leak, gotten the plumber to fix it and are now waiting on the builder to come replace the now black and mildewing board. 

Thing about having a house #29 --- The waiting game.  It's impossible to play this game when you work.  I can't wait at the house for the plumber or builder to come.  Luckily Joe's mom is more than willing to help us out in this arena as well as costume making....and there's always summer.

It's possible we hold the record for the most number of house guests during the first 2 months of moving in to a new home.  Overnight guests include (in order of appearance):  Bet, Mom, Dylan, Claire, Grae, Elise, Andrew, Corey and Kathryn (and their two kids), Mary Robinson.

Then other friendly faces who were just passing through...

Kristen Doster...

Elizabeth Barnett

We hadn't seen those two chicks in AGES...


We've managed a little porch sittin...... but certainly not enough.  Look how inviting.  You can come too. 

Run Run Rudolph

Lately... lately has been crazy.

You know that scene in Home Alone... when they are in a hurry to get to the airport and "Run Run Rudolph" is playing?  THAT is how I've felt.  Every Day.  Pretty much every day since spring break.  From the time the alarm goes off it is like Chuck Berry singing in my ear, "Run run rudolph, Santa gotta make it to town."  (of course I googled that singer's name... who actually knows the name of the guy who sings run run rudolph?)

Joe and I have both been like this.  I looked at him the other day and said, "How do people do this AND take care of another living creature?"  Sue's pretty tulips didn't last too long.  I have a dream of owning two kittens come August...but that just may not happen til we get a grip on this fast speed at which we're traveling. 

Joe has some excuses... he's taking a class and in charge of the intramural program at school.  His Rudolph's got places to go.  I, however, am just trying (and often failing) to get to 2 exercise classes a week while feeding and dressing myself like every other normal functioning human.   True, school is still taking up a lot of my energy right now.  I'm really hoping 3rd year teaching lives up to the rumors I hear... that it is actually easier than the first two. 

As for working on the house... ha.  We don't even have time to really enjoy the house we've put together so far, let alone improve upon it.  I don't even have the energy to update my photos and post pictures of my sweet little kitchen chairs we picked up Friday (story later on how that went).

To top it off... I think we're getting sick.  And we have a wedding this weekend.  Joe has been in bed since 8:15 and he took a 2 hour nap this afternoon.  That's a sign right?  He's getting sick.  I'm doing my usual overdose of vitamins in hopes of heading the damn thing off.  Today, when my fifth period got back from lunch, I announced that we were having quiet time.  10 minutes of quiet time.  (5th period is 20 minutes longer than all the others.)  They loved it.  I loved it.  We are all exhausted.  We're having quiet time every day from now on.  Thank god for summer.  If there wasn't a summer, then something would have to give.  But there is a summer.  That's when it'll slow down.  I just hope my Rudolph doesn't run out of gas before then.  

P.S. I don't know why some of the words on my blog are underlined and orange like a link to something.  I didn't make them like that.  I don't know how to unmake them. 

House life

Other randomness about living in a house:

5) (or whatever number I'm on from last blog post) - Driving time! -- so this is maybe one of my top
      favorite changes.  We used to live 30 seconds from the school.  Literally.  Like, I should've been walking to school, but that never happened.  Take that environmentalist tomfoolery somewhere else for this one.  It is a rare day in MS that you get beautiful walking weather in the morning AND afternoon.  Plus I am "bag lady" going and leaving school.  Plus I got cute shoes.  ANYWAY,
When your "drive" is that short, you don't have time to take even one sip of coffee or listen to one second of radio.  The second your butt settles into the seat it is time to get out of the car.  I have thoroughly enjoyed my looooong and relaxing 10 minute drive to work.  I even eat my breakfast in the car as I sip my coffee MULTIPLE times to the sound of NPR/MPB - and I get to hear the complete news story!  It's truly fabulous.  And it's extra fabulous the mornings Joe and I ride together (does this make up for us not walking to school?... I think so)

6) Driving time part 2 = phone time.   I can make more phone calls now that I have some car time.  In Tallahassee this was always the time I caught up with Mom or some friends.  But since moving to Oxford I'm rarely in the car long enough to make a phone call as everything is only 3 or 5 minutes away.

7) Neighbors -- all you get from apartment neighbors is noise through the walls.  We barely ever saw them.  House neighbors you see occasionally and never have to hear them through the walls.  (we had a guitar player on the other side of the bedroom back at the apartment).  Also, (and this has made us feel super old) you might have an awesome neighbor that brings you tulips and cookies.  Sue from New York is proving to be quite the friendly neighbor with excellent taste in flowers and desserts.

8) Light switches -- there are a million of them.  We spent the first few days just figuring out what they do.  But no matter how many times I go to turn a light off/on I still manage to try all the wrong switches first.   It would be tacky to label them right?  

8.2) Motion lights... this light switch had to be turned off.  One night I thought we were getting robbed because I heard the screen door bang and then the motion light outside our bedroom kept blinking.  This light has been turned off until we can get the sensor fixed or something because it had me creeping around the house peering out every window looking for robbers at 3 am.  I don't know what my plan was if I'd actually seen robbers.  Joe slept soundly until I poked him and informed him the screen door kept banging.  He was unconcerned. 


9) Entertaining -  you don't invite people over for dinner in an apartment. . . at least not our weeee one.  Sure, we had people come stay for the weekend but we didn't have people over just because.  Especially since our other friends here have houses.  But now, we can entertain guests.  So far we've had 2 dinner nights with friends and 1 porch sitting afternoon with crawfish (and friends).  The first couple that came over was Amber and Duncan.  We set the table and then sat by the window waiting for them to get here... I felt like we were kids waiting for our birthday party to start.  So excited.

Mike and Murry 


Crawfish with Christine and Jarrot (sp?)













Spring breaking --not at our house.  Just trying to make him look cooler than those house slippers did.

We bought a house

I never want to buy another house as long as I live.  So it's a good thing I'm in love with this one.

We started really courting this house in January.  It was the most exhausting courtship.  Going to banks, discovering how important credit was (and how detrimental NO credit was), and learning a WHOLE new vocabulary related to house buying.  Some of our favorites:
esgro
origination fee
amorization
earnest money

I feel like I really learned to speak another language.  And like another language, I now find myself having conversations in this language.  Conversations I never used to have but can now have with people who know this language too.  Conversations that start up and about half way through I think "Oh wow we are really talking about this.  How boring / foreign this would've been to me a year ago or even a 4 months ago."

Once things started rolling with the bank and the headache of daily scanning documents came to an end (they even needed my FSU diploma) we really started to believe we might get this house.  I didn't let myself get excited until the day before closing.  Again, "are you excited??" -- NO, this is not exciting.  Nothing about buying the house was exciting to me.  Exhausting.  Tedious.  Time consuming.  Those are adjectives I'd use.  "Exciting" is saved until AFTER the closing.

We closed March 1.   We took a half day off of school.  It was lightly snowing as we ran around the house with the inspector who was inspecting the house literally 2 hours before we were supposed to close.  Then, we signed a gozillion documents in a nice little law office and just like that - the house was ours.

We moved in right before spring break.  I dislike moving almost as much as house buying.  But Joe got some big strong boys from the power lifting team to help.  You'd think the worst would be moving the big stuff, but for me it's all the random little crap that is a pain.  On the last day we were trying to get all the random little crap out of the apt. things happened like:  Joe dropping and shattering a glass jar on the kitchen floor or me tracking in a dollop of dog poo on my shoe.  Small things in the end but headaches at the time.

We LUCKED out and overheard a girl at church talking about this estate sale she was running.  We went to look at what she had and scored two bedroom sets of wooden furniture. 

 There's another wooden bed frame and dresser with mirror for the guest bedroom.  So come one come all .. you are invited to our house.

We have quickly entered the world of decorating (which comes with vocab of it's own).  This we learned is called a "great room."  And it is a great room.  Or it will be one day when we get it looking great. 

 Joe and our couch cushion as we traveled Oxford to find rugs.  We're gonna need lots of rugs.  Sound is bouncing all around our empty concrete floors. 

 He found this chair.  Major improvement from ugly orange one.  Look at that comfort. 

 We didn't buy this rug.  But we looked at lots like it.  I don't have a pic of the one we picked.  It'll be here soon.

 Things about living in a house (especially one with no rugs) :  1) You need house shoes.  House shoes also mean that the sound of shuffling feet on the floor is becoming very familiar. 

2) Infinite space (or seemingly infinite space compared to apartment).  The kitchen is suuuch a long walk from the bathroom in the morning.  Your cell phone can ring and you don't even have time to reach it... you may not even hear it.  This didn't happen in the apartment.  If Joe is out in the "great room" and I'm in the bathroom... I may as well be in Memphis. 

3) Unsolicited (yet much needed) advice -  big things in life tend to come with this.  Weddings, Kids, and Houses.  People got either advice or stories about their own and they like to share it with you.  Seeing as how most adults our age and older live in a house, there is plenty of advice going around.  But it's advice you really try and listen to cause it's your house...and you wanna get it right.
 
4) The answer to "What'd you do this week or over the break?" is and will probably forever be "We worked on the house." 

We are old.  
More on the exciting world of interior decorating later.