September 13, 8am

Check out our lushness in the backyard. Bogey's peetree stayed up and its leaves don't even look tussled, but the neighbor's tree came crashing down on top of our fence behind it. Ike was nice enough to help remove the porch roofing which Ryan was wanting to replace anyway. We spent much of last week cutting down trees and dragging them to huge piles. It is a Heavy Pickup Day Trashman's wet dream out there or I guess the people who aspire to and eventually become heavytrashdaypickupgarbagemen. Nearly every pile in our neighborhood is taller than me. I hate to admit this because it displays my pathetic gauge of funness, but it really wasn't so bad. It was actually a pretty good time. I got new gloves. Yay for gloves! We barbecued and socialized with our neighbors that are either a little scary or a little too friendly. I met a lot of people who I am desperately tempted to make fun of, but I'd feel way too guilty because their weird matched their nice. Maybe in time...



This is our tenth day without power. We're not supposed to get it back until at least Thursday. I know we are fortunate relative to what happened further south, but damn! This is depressing! I spent an hour and a half washing dishes on Saturday. An hour and a half! I am talking about the chore kind of dishes and not the sexy kind of dishes. I can't even imagine what hand washing clothes is going to be like. Maybe I will take the advice of my imaginary childhood friend and start turning my underthings inside out to get an extra wear out of them. Hey! It wasn't my idea! It was Friendy's! I started The Book Thief yesterday and finished it today. Yes, I am bragging. That book is like 550 pages and you all know how well I read even when I am armed with a fat pencil and my armskin. It's one of the best books I've ever read and I keep looking at it and wanting to hug it.

2 years ago today I met my boyfriend and he won my heart with the line, "You don't want to know how tall I am; you want to know how big it is." I was appalled. I am not that kind of girl! What does he think I am?? Some kind of slut?? So I took my panties and my assortment of rubbers and I rolled out of the bed of his pickup and ran down the road in the rain looking for my friend who was blowing his friend in the back of another pick up.

I am just kidding about all that. Except for he really did use that line on me before he changed tactics and tried to lure me to his house with ketchup and mustard and various other condiments. However, I resisted. The next day when he called, I yelled at him for thinking I was a slut. So he asked for a date and I reluctantly accepted and when he dropped me off from a very nice dinner, he barely even kissed me and I was all WTF??? He doesn't want to hit this??? and so began Us. We're not going to celebrate right now, but I felt like I should bust his balls in a safe forum that my grandmother, my mom, all my friends and co-workers read.