hqueen's collection of Far From the Usual stuff.

[hqueen13]

Thanks yall!!

It's been 5 exhausting days. I was supposed to come in the office yesterday, but I just couldn't do it. I didn't even know where my work pants or shoes were at that time. Thankfully my office peeps are awesome and didn't mind that I was out. BO, my one coworker that's a good friend said she wasn't surprised that I wasn't coming in. I was like gee thanks! LOL

SO. It's been absolutely exhausting. This has been SO much harder than it should have been due to the needing to split everything up. We have a 10x20 storage unit, a 5x7.5 storage unit, we have things at the BF's house, things at GH's house, things at TM's barn, my horse at my TM's barn, the cats at the BF's parent's house, the chinchilla at TW's house, and my chickens at my other friend's farm. I DO NOT LIKE THIS! But for the most part it will all resolve in 30 days. The horse will take longer, but I'm aiming to have that done in a few months, too. I can't stand not having him out my window.

Friday was crazy. I made about 5 runs to various locations in my truck between the storage unit, GH's house, and the BF's house and then back to GH's house. Saturday the BF's family came, which was mostly a help. The BF's dad is such a hypocrite, and I say that with love. "You have so much stuff, blah blah blah blah...." But you can't walk into his garage. But we have so much stuff. For real. Anyway, he kept working away and we took care of a lot of it.

A change of plans on Friday night meant that my riding instructor didn't come up as planned for our lessons. We were expecting crazy rain on Sunday, so they cancelled her trip. That helped because I didn't have to drive to the airport and get her, but it also meant I had to deal with Storm without her help, too. It worked out fine, and my friend JO came up with her trailer, and then NP got there a little bit later. Between the 3 of us we managed ok. It took JO in the front of the trailer shaking a bucket of grain, and NP at the back encouraging him forward gently with the whip, and me holding the lead rope. At first I was trying to hold the grain and the rope, but the trouble was I had to duck under the chest bar (I really dislike doing it that way!), which meant that Storm followed the bucket down, and then I couldn't get his head back up without him going backwards again. So that's when JO took the bucket and we got him in on the second try with that method. In the 5 minute ride over to TM's farm he got really sweaty. The good news was that he backed off the trailer and stood very still. So we stood there for a few minutes and I just waited for him to be ready to move his feet. He did fine, even though he was worried in the trailer. He got a little nervous when the horse that is in the paddock next to the driveway started racing around, and then two other horses were moved out of the paddock that he was going in. TM decided to put him by himself so that I can use the hay I've already paid for, and that way I don't have to buy into the group hay. That was fine, because he was surrounded by other horses. I put him out and he had a bit of a run around, and then settled down a bit. I finally headed back to the house, and dove into the craziness there.

The BF's mom came up, and I asked her if she could run a few errands for me, and she agreed, and agreed to bring back lunch, which was a big help! She helped me get a few things ready to move, and then I sent her off to take care of returning the verizon boxes and dropping a bunch of stuff off at goodwill. The BF and his brother headed out with the full truck and trailer to got the unit and I stayed behind to work on several things and kept pointing at stuff for his dad and other brother to do.

After we took a break and ate lunch, the BF's mom suggested that she go ahead and take the cats back home with her so they could start getting used to things and so that they would be out of our way and we could leave the doors open without trapping them in a room. I sadly agreed, and so we began to gather their things up. She cleaned off the cat tree (they're not exactly fans of 'animal smells' (they must really shudder when they come in my house...)) and so she cleaned it up really good (which I do appreciate anyway!). She got everything loaded, and then we got the cats into the carrier. I have one "small dog" sized carrier that I picked up from someone along the way, and so we followed my friend JS's suggestion, and tipped it up on it's end, she grabbed Mercury and I grabbed Specter, and we gently dropped them into the carrier together. They went in super easily (really not sure that's going to work a second time...). Mercury crawled out from under Spec as we tipped it back onto its bottom again, and had this look like "Mom, he's touching me! Get him off me!"

When they got to their house, Merc bolted out of the carrier and ran around totally disoriented, and then hid under a table in the living room corner. Spec wouldn't even come out of the carrier at all. She finally had to dump him out. He had a much harder time with it than Merc, which surprised me. I didn't make it over there to see them until Monday, and that helped. Every time I visit Spec manages to come out a little bit more, so he's making progress, especially when we are around. I think part of the issue is that their house is so much noisier than ours ever was. There are more people and they come and go a lot and the TV's are on all night. Even the BF had trouble sleeping the night he slept over there.

Sunday it POURED, it started Saturday night, and rained all the way to early afternoon. We managed to work a lot in the house while it was raining and then took a load up to the unit in the afternoon of all my artwork, and we were able to get another load down to his parent's house. It started raining again in the afternoon late, and rained a lot overnight as well. We ended up with 1.75" out of it, and it made it really interesting trying to get things done. We still managed, and were able to get the upstairs totally cleared out by Sunday evening, even with having to go to the unit and rearrange quite a bit to make more space for the fridge and dishwasher. Monday we set to work on the kitchen and the rest of the downstairs. The kitchen took so much longer than I would have liked because of the challenge of figuring out where it was all going to go. Who needed to have it and would it spoil. We managed to get it done, and then finally decided as it was getting so late that the smartest thing to do would be to load up my truck with a load to take to GH's house, and then drive down there and sleep in a bed in comfort. The BF would get up and go to work on Tuesday morning, I'd unload at GH's, and then drive back up to the farm and work on getting more things organized. I took 5 loads in my truck that day total. I did another run to GH's, then came back and got loaded up to take the rest of the stuff to the BF's house, met him down there so we could leave his Jeep, and then came back up to the farm and continued packing. The BF's dad came up again and helped us load up the final stuff. I was a bit irritated because I had a full load on my truck that needed to go to GH's and there was one more load we needed to make. I mentioned to his dad that I should probably run down and unload and then come back while they finished getting the rest of the stuff loaded up. He said no he wanted to make sure we had it all on the trailer first. I guess he thought it would take me a while to do that (I could have been down and back in less than an hour). Instead I mostly stood around while they loaded stuff on the trailer in the freezing cold (low of 36!) without enough clothes on, and then FINALLY they finished up at 11 something and so we took everything to GH's house and unloaded and then headed back up to get the final stuff done. It BARELY fit and as it was we left a few things that we had to pick up the next day.

I was supposed to go into the office, but when I fell into bed at 1:40 freezing cold (I can't sleep until I'm warm) I knew I wasn't going to be able to manage. Not to mention the fact that I had no idea where all my clothes were. Most were sitting in the suitcases where I dumped them in the garage. I also hadn't had a shower in 2 days and I hurt all over.

I woke up at 7 (still earlier than I wanted to!) and got into a nice hot shower and that made me feel a little better. I rearranged the garage, and got the car unloaded, and made piles of things that needed to go into the house, things that needed to go to storage, and the things I was going to leave in the garage. Once I got everything into the house I felt a bit better about all of it. The BF called me and said he was going to be in the area so I met him for lunch, which was a fun treat. He was supposed to get off early, which he did get home about 3:30, which was earlier than usual, but not as early as I'd have liked!

We took the truck and trailer up to TM's farm and unloaded everything into her barn. That didn't take us long, but it took more effort than I would have liked because her old bank barn has a half wall down the side so everything had to be lifted over the wall. We managed most everything except for one barrel that was too full to hoof it over the wall. The BF is already planning on making her stairs to make it easier. We'll see if he gets to that within a month or not.

We finished that and ran back to the farm to pick up the last few things, including the bale spike, and then headed out. It felt so strange to be leaving, and gone. I didn't cry much, but it was really emotional to leave. It doesn't help that I have to wait before things get better. I had no idea where a lot of stuff is because the BF's brothers and dad moved so much of it.

I did manage to negotiate that they are going to pay me for the 6 stall mats and the washing machine that we put in. I could use the mats (not right away of course, but eventually), and I didn't want to hoof the washing machine out of there. So I have to go pick up that money tonight. I also have to get over to TM's farm and figure out how this self care co-op is going to work. She's been covering for me for the past week and I need to get in there and start working to keep things fair.

Tomorrow I have yoga to go to and not much else. I'm planning on recovering a little more. TM and I are supposed to go to lunch and run some errands. I need to take a load up to the storage unit, and then I want to stop by the tack consignment shop and pick up a few things that will make life easier. Hopefully I can get the rest of my furniture where it needs to be in the room so I can finish getting that set up. I'm ready to be settled for a while in one place and catch up on several things that I need to catch up on! (the budget being one of them!!)

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Oh. My. Gosh! Girl - you have been through the wringer with this move!

I do NOT envy you one bit on that....but glad you've got the first part done! Sucks that you'll have to do it again when you close on the new place - but it will be a happier move the next time!

Hang in there - this too will pass!

 

[hqueen13]

Thanks, FEM. Yes, it will pass, eventually! I'm really ready for it to be over already. This being dependent on others thing is uncomfortable and tiring.

We had a decent weekend. Saturday didn't go as planned. The BF ended up doing whatever he was doing at his house for ever, so we didn't leave from my place to go to the dump with the old mattress until much later than I expected, it was heading towards noon already. I got a few things done in the house in the morning while waiting on him, but not a lot. I was frustrated with not getting more done, but it is what it is.

We also stopped by a friend's place to see their Suburban that they are considering selling. It's got 150k miles on it, which is about 65k less than my truck currently has. It is an 11, and my truck is a 00. It needs a few minor things, but nothing major, and runs well and has good brakes as far as we could tell. But it is also worth about $13,000.00. They're gracious enough to consider a payment plan, but I'm not sure I want to commit to something like that anyway. I really really need to pay off some debt and get myself organized. My grandparents gifted me $1000.00, which made me cry because I was really not expecting that at all, but I don't know that I want to dump it into a new vehicle. I'm just really torn over it, but since my truck stranded my temporarily and ran so strangely last week I'm a bit worried.

Oh, I guess I haven't updated since then. On Friday TM and I went out and did some running around. We went shopping, and got lunch together and I took the last load that will fit into the unit up there. When we got back into the truck after our last stop at the tack consignment shop, I cranked the truck and it was idling really bad, it was revving the engine up to almost 1500 RPMs, just sitting there. I put it in gear and we were able to drive fine, but every time I slowed or stopped the revving kicked in again. Then we were headed down a faster rd (55mph speedlimit) and decided to turn on the a/c because the truck was stinking from the oil or gas or something, and it was giving us a headache. Next thing I know I'm just losing power. Gas pedal pushed down and nothing is happening and the needles are falling. Turned off the a/c, but that didn't help, and so we pulled over to the side of the road and I turned it off. I was on the phone with the BF (who was very very far away, but still attempting to walk me through troubleshooting) when a cop pulled up behind us with his lights on. I was very grateful because traffic moves FAST on this road, and even though we had a wide shoulder, it was still scary. I hung up the phone with the BF since the cop was there and he asked us all sorts of questions also trying to trouble shoot. He finally suggested that I try to start it up again and see what happens... and sure enough it started FINE. My friend and I are left standing there looking silly on the side of the road. I drove it to her house and dropped her off and didn't turn it off, and then got home just fine, and it's been totally fine ever since. That doesn't make me feel very good though!

So anyway, back to Saturday, we finally got a move on, and then I realized there was rain coming in that afternoon, so we decided to go ahead and get the small bales that I was supposed to pick up from my hay man. He told me he was out on a combine (naturally) but that the BF could drive the tractor with the cat's claw attachment on it to load the hay into the back of the truck. The small bales are banded into 21 bale "bricks" as they are called. We had 1 brick (I think I told this story) that busted repeatedly when the BF was trying to load it up to take it back down to his farm. He let me know it was sitting by the door and he hadn't run it back through the machine to make it into a fresh brick again, so we could load that up if we wanted to. I was waiting in the truck and finally saw the BF walking back up out of the barn, and he waved me down. It had busted AGAIN. He was MAD. He started to try to tell me to get it stacked up again and I was like this is stupid. It's 21 bales. We can load that easily in just about the same amount of time it would take for him to restack it and try to get it banded together to hope that it would hold together to put it in the back of the truck. I was even more irritated when I realized that a couple of the bales had busted. That's money on the ground wasted! The BF had to toss in there an off handed comment when I suggested that I get in the back of the truck to stack it that I was leaving the hard work to him. So I started tossing the bales up there myself. I was REALLY ticked by that point. Whatever. We got it loaded in less than 10 minutes, and decided with the rain coming it was better to just take it up to TM's and unload it where it would be safe. As luck had it one of the other boarders and her BF were hanging around and they offered to lend a hand. She asked if we wanted help and I said "I will never ever turn down help to move hay, ever." So we got it unloaded and stacked in a matter of a few minutes. We grabbed a few things out of her barn that we had in storage and headed back to my house.

We had a party to go to for his cousin's engagement, neither one of us were thrilled about it, but now we had to go to both houses because my clothes were at my house and his nice clothes were at his house and we both stunk and had hay dust everywhere. So we swung by my house and grabbed clothes for me, and then headed down to his house. We parked the pickup truck and then went and jumped in the shower and then drove his jeep up to his aunt's house for the party. There were a LOT of people there, most of which we didn't know. So we just mingled, mostly talking to family, and ate, and then headed out pretty early. I still had horses to feed for the evening, so we stopped by on the way home and then he dropped me off for the night.

I forgot daylight savings time happened from Sat to Sun, so I woke up extra early but didn't know that because my alarm clock that should have changed automatically didn't. I meditated, and then realized how early it was, but decided to just get up and head out anyway. I went and took care of the ponies, and then went up to TM's and took care of Storm for her so she didn't have to. I kind of miss doing my usual barn chores. I need to catch up with her and get settled into a regular schedule anyway. As I was finishing I was craving a real breakfast, so I texted the BF and asked him to meet me at a great local place. I ordered a full breakfast, they had pumpkin pancakes (with cream cheese icing, I shouldn't have, but it was so good!), and I had eggs and bacon and hash brown potatoes to go with my pancake. It was soooo yummy!

After that, we headed up to the farm one last time to clean up the chicken coop. Hilariously, JB was using it as a deer blind and had the screen and fan out of the window so he could shoot. I thought it was brilliant, and so we cleaned up around he. It ended up that he didn't want us to clear it out anyway because he was going to put the chicken litter on his garden but can't yet because he's not ready for it. So we just piled it up on the door side so it will be easy to clear out. We chatted with him for a little while as we were pulling out. I'm going to miss his sense of humor. He's one of the funniest guys that I know. It's just his mannerisms and word choice that make him hilarious.

We decided to head to BJ's to get some things for the BF to make for his lunches and ended up spending way more than I wanted. I made the BF fork over some cash for that one, too. After that he wasn't feeling well so we went and got lunch, and then headed back down to his house with the intent to cook him some meals. He got discouraged when the steak didn't cook like he wanted it too, and so he abandoned that. He finally grabbed some clothes and we just headed back over to my house. We had arranged dinner with our other friends, TW and VO, who are neighbors to the friends I'm living with, and so we decided to crash and take a nap for a while before we got up to take a shower and head two driveways over. The BF woke up with a start when he saw the alarm clock that still hadn't caught up to the time, so we got up and showered and then got ready to go.

We had a great dinner with amazing food as always, and he dropped me off at a not horrible time. But when I got in the house, SH and GH came down and said that they think that one of the cats peed on some of the containers that I had brought in. I smelled it too, and was very upset to bring something like that in their house. I just don't know how it happened. The cats had been really good, so it is frustrating to me that they did that. They helped me carry them out to the garage and I'll leave them out there until I can get a chance to figure out what is what and get things cleaned. Honestly, it's just the clothes so it can stay out there anyway, I just have to get my winter clothes out so that I have something warmer to wear when it dips into the 20's this week. Not all that excited about that.

We chatted for a little while after we got all the trunks moved, and then I finally crashed about 10:30. I didn't sleep well, and woke up early so I just headed into the office. Good news is that means I can leave early, so that helps.

Other than that, we're hanging in there. I'm tired, and not happy about not living together because it's making communication that much more complicated. But we're surviving, so it should all work out.

The cats are doing better at his parent's house, so that makes me happy. Specter is finally playing again, which is a good thing. Storm is settling in, though slower than I'd like. Other than all that mess, not much to report.

 

[sumi]

Goodness, you have a lot going on, but it sounds like things are slowly falling into place!

 

[frustratedearthmother]

Holy Cow...your life is crazy right now. But, you're another couple steps closer to having all this behind you. I had to laugh about the hay bale brick making - men want things to work their way even if it takes longer, lol.

 

[hqueen13]

Thanks @sumi
FEM, um, yes, they only think that way. I swear the BF relies almost solely on machine power when sometimes man power would just be faster. Just get it done with your hands already!!

This weekend had it's ups and downs.
Oh, the wine and pizza workshop was fun! And yummy! I should have known better than to expect a real recipe from Italians! We just got a list of ingredients for their sauce, but nothing on the ratios and how much you put in! They did give us the dough recipe, which was cool, and showed us how to make it. I guess that part is the trickier part anyway. We had a lot of fun and ate good pizza. Now I can't wait to do that at home.

KN's flight was late, so it took a while to get her, but we finally got home about 11:30. GH had told me that the BF could just stay over since we were going to get in late, which was very nice of them. I got up the next morning and got ready to go and picked up KN again and stopped to get coffee for her before we got started with lessons. LH couldn't be there, so she let AC have her time slot. She didn't bring a horse so Storm got a 2 hour lesson, part with me and part with AC. That worked out really well because I could observe him and stand next to KN and ask questions. He did very very well, and worked really hard. We finally stopped after about an hour and a half because he had put in so much effort even though it didn't look like much. Those kinds of changes are really subtle but take a lot of effort on the horse's part. I was pleased with everything, not TOO cold in all my layers. I was so grateful that it wasn't windy, that helped tremendously, and the sun got warmer as we worked.

After that I was going to go put a check in the bank, but then realized it was Veteran's day, so I headed home. I changed clothes and did a little computer work while waiting on the BF to get himself sorted out. He wasn't really getting moving, so I ended up going over to my friend's house to give her some things she had me order for her. LC has the most amazing barn that I've been in. It's beautiful, with huge stalls, and very open. It even has radiant heat in the floor!!! That keeps it about 50 degrees in the winter when it's super cold. They thought of so many things when they designed the place, I love all the little details. They have a ceiling fan over every stall, auto waterers, and the barn aisle is big enough that they can get a tractor in it. They split some of the corner spaces to make slightly smaller stalls, but still very roomy, and made tack areas and everything. It's impressive. Not to mention the beautiful indoor as well. Then she took me down to their new house that they are building. HOLY WOW it's crazy beautiful. It's all timber framed with huge posts and beams that are gorgeous. The entire outside is reclaimed barn stone. The windows are amazing, and everything is just amazing. I can't even describe it. I am looking forward to going back and taking some photos when it's finished because I dream of having a house like that some day (smaller, seriously, hers is WAY too big!).

I finally left there and went and picked up the BF and we headed out to get dinner. It took him longer to get ready so we were late getting to some places which meant we tried 3 places before we found one that didn't have a ridiculous wait. We ended up at our favorite tex mex place, which was fine. We got home about 7 and debated turning up the hot tub, but he was already falling asleep in the car so I just voted to go to bed. After our late night Saturday we needed the sleep.

We got up on Sunday and went to breakfast at the place around the corner (so glad I won't be living this close to it for long!), and then headed to his house to get some things prepared for him for the week. I was hoping we'd be there before everyone else woke up, but unfortunately that didn't quite work out that way. He ended up in the kitchen prepping his lunches while they were trying to fix breakfast, and everybody had to tell him how he should be making lunches. Then right before we were leaving he found that one of the cats had pooped on his sweatshirt, despite me cleaning the litter box already that morning. He threw that in the washer, and we finally got down the road again. He was in his jeep since we needed to get both cars back to my house.

By the time we got to my house, he had a text from his brother's girlfriend that the cats had also peed on the couch. His mom was pretty mad. I can sort of understand that, but all this started last week when his dad stuck the litter box outside because he thought it stunk. Why they put them right in front of the TV I don't know. Their house is a mess, and so there aren't many places to put things.

So things aren't so great around there right now. I got ticked at him for how he reacted to the cats peeing on the couch (he told his brother's girlfriend that maybe we should take them outside and shoot them. Nothing makes me more angry than that kind of response, I don't care if you're stressed). So I went in the house and just left him outside. He was putting up the shelves so that we could get things stored a little better in the garage, and I just decided I didn't want to be around him. I was really close to telling him to just leave and go back to his house.

He finally came in and we talked things over. I realize that he's super stressed about the whole situation, and I can also tell that being in his parent's house is making it all that much worse. So we finally decided to go run some errands, and grabbed lunch along the way. We got back home and decided to get into the hot tub, so I turned up the temp, and then went and met with the neighbor who needs their chicken coop cleaned out because she's 7 months pregnant and already has 2 little ones and just can't keep up. She and I chatted until I was freezing, and then I went and cared for the horses before going back in the house to thaw out again. The hot tub was finally warm and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves trying out all the seats and the jets and the lights and the crazy features. We got out and heated up a frozen pizza for dinner.

He had to go back to the house to grab his clothes, and since his parents were leaving for the beach he had waited until the evening. He got there to find that they had put them in the basement, which is ok. But his mom had put the food and water right in front of their litter box. And then she threw the toys down the stairs. They had closed the sliding pocket door, and put one of the ScatMats in front of the steps. But they hadn't bothered to get the batter pack and turn it on. So while the BF was upstairs talking to his brother, one of the cats came up. He asked his brother if he'd let them out, and he said no. That's when he found the door and the mat not even turned on. I guess his mom was too mad to bother asking for help to get it set up properly. So the BF fixed it so that the cats wouldn't be able to let themselves out, and then moved the litter boxes so that they were back where they had been and made sure they were taken care of. I think it will be better for them to be in the basement and not bothered right now. They need some alone time to settle down and just be by themselves. There's been so much disruption to their routine, and then moving things around that they can't figure things out. I have a call arranged with my friend who is my go to for support with my animals and so she's going to check in with them this afternoon and see if we can figure out what's going on and help them to get things straight again. I feel back for them, and want to figure out what will help. I wish they didn't have to be there at all because I don't even like the energy of the house. His mom is willing to love them when everything is all perfect, but not when it isn't. And that irritates the crap out of me about them. And his dad just doesn't care about them as beings at all, and would do something so stupid as to put the litter box outside. So I don't blame the cats for being pissed.

So we'll see how that settles out. I sent another message to our lender this morning to see if we can get the settlement date set because I'm so done with all this back and forth mess. I want to be in the house where we can start getting ourselves back in order and settled again.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

OH boy - there's nothing easy about your arrangements right now... Poor cats! They seem befuddled by all this. Can't blame them when there's so much change going on.

Hope the lender was able to give you good news about the closing date. You, BF, AND the cats need some stability right now!

 

[sumi]

I swear the BF relies almost solely on machine power when sometimes man power would just be faster. Just get it done with your hands already!!

Sounds like the Irish. I saw road maintenance guys clean up leaves from the roadside with a digger once. I kid you not. With three more workers standing watching. (And there weren't that many leaves)

 

[sumi]

Caught up Fingers, toes and eyes crossed you'll get settled soon, all of you! It's been in the works a while already, hasn't it? So it should all be sorted soon

 

[baymule]

What a mess. Family dynamics, between homes, pets, your stress levels should be through the roof. Take a hot soaking bath with a glass of wine.