Blog

Finally….the site is live. Actually, there are two new domain names, but they both go to SoLongLandlord.us. The question on my mind: ….how do i help people remember that the domain name extension is .us and not .com?

Joe is truly a master at that web stuff! I’ve never had so much fun learning html. I got to spend time sitting behind him and leaning over his shoulder and watching and soaking up all the shortcuts. It takes me a full day to do what he can do in about an hour. His fingers kind of dance around the keyboard…..

The new site is hosted by lamphost.net, which is owned and operated by Matt Brown. LAMPhost is an acronym for Linux, Apache, MySql and PHP. His site is easy to maneuver and understand, his services are priced right and your stuff gets done fast. Thanx, Matt.

Did a little painting tonight with Mickele . It was wonderful. I miss color. I miss getting my fingers in it.

quick recap for the kids:
did you check out the new Strong Bad for this week? the new site joe and i have been working on is finally done…mostly…. only 2 more days till i see you, if you don’t count friday, since that’s the day i’m going to see you, and only 1 more day if you don’t count tomorrow since it’s almost midnight and practically wednesday already……

Well, I have a confession to make. Last Wednesday came and went and my website and phone voicemail service are not live and the over 400 pieces of mail were not sent, although they were folded into thirds on Friday and labeled with addresses. (Thanx to my roommate Mike for all her help.)
I’ve started getting off anti-depressants. There are extenuating circumstances.
I’ve stopped smoking. Again. For good, I hope.
I had a tat re-inked.
I get another one re-inked tomorrow morning.
I went to see ‘Shanghai Knights’ with Joe. I almost cried, it was so good. Jackie Chan has a wonderful gift for his fight choreography and Owen Wilson is truly a king of his own special brand of self-centered, deadpan humor.
I talked to some of my kids on AOL Instant Messenger a few times this week.
I found a new paper supply store.
I tried out a new burger resteraunt.
I vacuumed the stairs.
I folded two loads of laundry. I didn’t put them away.
I printed the first 100 pages of my book 3 times until I ran out of paper.
I didn’t wear makeup today or fix my hair.
I watched Terminator 2 for the first time.
All in all it was a good week/weekend.

quick recap for the kids:
life is good, i see you this weekend. YIPPEE!
lovefrommom

I’m still working on getting my business going. I really do love the broker I’m working with now. She has a wealth of information for me to learn from and a lot of experience as well. This Wednesday my new websites and 800 number will go live. I’ll also be sending out the first of the new monthly flyers as well as 500 postcards to drum up leads. My hope is that in a few months I’ll be able to work from referrals only and not have to waste valuable time trying to scare up my next clients. I think the business will run much better that way.

I spent part of the weekend with my kids in Moorpark. We went to the mall and wasted time together which was great. We saw a semi-ok movie. I sat in between Tony and Ty. It was one of those moments where I wished I was two of me so I could sit by everyone at the same time. We found a cheap-ish hotel and ate In-and-Out burgers for dinner. Alex and I did our nails, as usual. This time we picked a ‘Valentine’ red. It’s a fabulous color. We watched ‘The Majestic’, starring Jim Carrey, which I previously have not wanted to see due to the fact that Jim Carrey is supposed to be funny in my book. I had a hard time watching him be serious. I guess that’s not very open-minded of me.

Did errands today. Watched Joe Millionaire tonight with Joe, Mickele and Craig. Everyone is asleep except me and Mickele…I can hear her banging keys in the next room. I can’t sleep. My mind won’t turn off. It’s not insomnia exactly. I just know I have so many things I need to get done and I can’t quit thinking about them.

At lunch today, Joe took me to a place called the Hash House. I absolutely LOVED this place and look forward to going back sometime. They served great food on these huge oversized plates that were decorated in some fashion or another with garnish. But you’re probably thinking a sprig of parsley, and I’m talking about a small tree of rosemary stuck through Joe’s steak sandwich about 6 or 7 inches high and standing up straight like a small Christmas tree. Not to mention that the homemade biscuits are the size of your fist. My pancake was larger than a normal sized dinner plate. It was amazing! And the utensils are oversized as well. Joe thinks that maybe they are trying to help you feel like a little kid again, with the oversized everything. The waitress was much nicer than I deserved, but I loved her. And I only dropped one fork and one knife on the floor: one on each side, so the weight was equally distributed….

quick recap for the kids:
seeing you was wonderful and i can hardly wait for valentine’s weekend, work is still going forward, sometime i’m going to take you to the hash house, it’s nice to feel like a kid every once in awhile.
much love,
mom

Things are going forward: it’s a better direction that backward or staying in the same place.

At work: I love my new broker, Teresa Thompson. I like her business plans and the way she treats her clients. She’s very flexible and helpful to someone coming over to her brokerage house. Today I bought a toll free number soon to be announced, ordered 500 lead address to send postcards to here in the North County Area, ordered the postcards to send out, bought 2 new domain names soon to be announced and drafted newspaper and postcard ads and learned more about how to build a referral-based business. It was a busy day but extremely fulfilling.

At home: My friend Mickele Hughes has finally moved in. She’s also my PR specialist for the book and the creative energy in the home has shifted in a good way. I plan on using the new energy to my utmost advantage and create, create, create in any venue possible. Craig, my other room mate, has been a little trepidatious about my good friend moving in, but I think in time everyone will learn a whole heck-uv-alot from each other. Craig has also created a spreadsheet chore-chart for us to follow. On the one hand, it makes me laugh and on the other hand, I’m glad, because now I don’t have to think about what he wants done…I can read it and check off the little box.

In the Family: For a few days there, it was touch and go as far as the kids, Derek and I were concerned. We didn’t agree about everything and have since come to a compromise. It’s interesting to try to work things out when you start bringing in new significant other etc. I’m going to be seeing the kids more, and I’m ecstatic about that!

About That Joe: Joe continues to be a constant source of love and strength to me. It’s been a pretty rough week/weekend, but he helps me feel strong like an ox. It’s nice to have someone in my corner.

quick recap for the kids:
work is looking up, mike moved in and she says hey, your dad and i both love you SO MUCH and we’re working things out as best as we can, still lots of things i like about joe and he says hey to you, too.

I’m learning some wonderful lessons about natural consequences. I think that somewhere in my mind I thought that there would be an excuse to get out of things to a certain point, but I’m learning otherwise. And, to be more blunt, sometimes you get ‘punished’ for doing the right thing. Punished sounds like a strong word but that’s what it feels like. And I’m not really sorry, either. I’m just always fascinated by life.

I quit working where I was the other day and have moved to a new brokerage house. The things going on at Financial Company X were not all on the up-and-up. When I quit, I realized that just because it was the right thing to do didn’t make it easy and it set me back financially about 2 months, which I really couldn’t afford. So I’m back to panicking about money for a while, but I guess that’s ok. Deep down inside I know that God has a plan for me and I’m doing my best to tap into it and go along with it.

On the upside: the new brokerage house, Company B, is still close enough to my home that the commute isn’t bad and I can work from home a lot of the time which I love. The broker, Teresa, is much more flexible as far as the loan programs and lenders I can work with and her commission structure is so much better. I know in the long run this was the right thing to do. It’s this short run of the next two months that has me worried.
I wasn’t able to see my kids last month because I wasn’t able to pay my bills here at the house and it looks like it will be the case again. This is the part that really kills me. I’m sure I’m learning something here but all it feels like right now is pain. I miss my kids so much.

I will see them for dinner tonight. I’m driving up there to switch CPU’s with my daughter. If I’m going to be working from home I need a good one and the one I have has decided to go AWOL. Hopefully her dad can fix it for her.
Peace, Love and Understanding.

quick recap for the kids:
doing the right thing isn’t easy sometimes, and more often than not, it’s pretty hard but still right, i’m starting with a new company, i miss you all so much and can’t wait for dinner tonight, thanx, ali for switching computers with me.
mom

Trying to be mature is such a hard thing. Who wouldn’t rather spend the day doing as little as possible if it were possible? I do get in moods where I enjoy work and get a lot of constructive things done, but I’d have to say that the majority of the time, sitting on my bed and reading or watching movies with room service would be fine. Today is Saturday and I slept in till after 1pm. I did nothing for a few hours and then drove over to Joe’s and have done nothing over here for a few hours. It’s been a great day. I don’t know if I’d like it everyday but I’d like a chance to find out.

When I was growing up and it was time to clean my room or mow the lawn, I was a master at procrastinating my day away. I would start looking at the mess on my floor about 9 or 10 am. Within the next two hours I would have lifted maybe a dirty sock or two and possibly a shirt from off the top of a book lying on the floor while lying prone next to it and staring up at the ceiling. During this time, at least 3 of my siblings would have come in to check on me and see how ‘it was coming along’. I would tell them it was way too hard of a job to do on my own. They in turn would assure me that I was 6/7/8/9/10/11/12 now and able to do it on my own. Sometimes they would tell me that I couldn’t come out for lunch until I was done/half way done/part way done/put one of the socks I looked at in the hamper. It didn’t happen. Eventually, by the time it was 1 pm and they were tired of waiting to eat, I would be allowed to come out with the disclaimer that it was happening this time and never again and that right after I was finished it was back to the room cleaning job.

Do you know how long you can take to eat peas? Each one is unique and should be looked over as a work of art. Especially if there are little pieces of pepper floating in the butter and can be manipulated into constellations around the main green planet.

By 3:30, my sister or brother would finish being understanding, confiscate my plate and march me back in my room where a mere 2 or more hours would pass while I languished on the floor and cried about how hard my life was. By 5 or 6, one of them would come in the room, spend less than 10 minutes picking things up and release me to the rest of the day, such as it was. They didn’t stay mad at me. After all, I was the baby sister.

Mowing the lawn or sweeping off the cement was a similar experience with the exception of the dirty socks. I’m lucky my brothers and sisters were so understanding. I felt, truly, that my life was harder than everyone else’s. And there is a glimpse into Leah’s childhood.

My job has taken an interesting turn. I’ll speak more about it in a few weeks. Sufficeth to say, changes are happening and once again, God has figured things out for me before I even got there.

quick recap for the kids:
sometimes doing nothing is enough, don’t try to act like i did about doing your chores…i’m not as nice as my brothers and sisters, i miss you so much this weekend and i’m doing everything i can do ensure it won’t happen again.
mom

I’m strong as an ox.
I’m smart like a fox.
I don’t have to climb beanstalks
and I try to look at the leafstalks.
I don’t live in a box.
I have a great home.

My life isn’t cakewalks,
but it isn’t like cellblocks.
I try to use the crosswalks
although they could say ‘she jaywalks…’
But hardly anyone ever gawks.
I have a wonderful life.

When I see someone that balks,
in the city or the boondocks,
when they get to life’s roadblocks
and their voice kind of squawks,
I pull out my toolbox.
I help when I can.

I’ll listen to the jukebox.
I’ve never had smallpox.
I like to check the mailbox.
I believe in shamrocks.
The beach is my sandbox.
I love where I live.

I’ve found some new building blocks.
Sometimes I play with colored chalks
and forget to check the clocks.
Even as it tick tocks
I don’t think that it mocks.
I’m thankful for my talents.

I spend my day doing docs.
Sometimes I wear nice frocks.
No one at work has Mohawks.
Some clients I’d like to put in headlocks.
Sometimes I’d rather throw rocks.
But I’m really good at my job.

I don’t need padlocks
or to prance around like peacocks.
With my boyfriend I have great talks.
My faith unlocks
help from God’s entire flocks.
In Him I am secure.

I don’t mean to be on a soapbox.
I don’t even have matching socks.
But when opportunity knocks
and I have a chance to outfox
the adversary and put him in padlocks,
I’ll do whatever I can.

L.

quick recap for the kids:
no idea…i don’t even know what to say about this particular outburst except…why not? i miss you SO MUCH and can’t wait to see whenever i can next…

His hands sliced through the air between them; his index fingers moving away from each other, down and then back together in the shape of a rectangle. He carefully grasped the sides and laid the red sign he had drawn in the air down on her chest. It was the size and shape of the ‘Yes! We’re OPEN’ sign that hangs in the pet shop window even though it’s a lie after 6 at night until 9 the next morning. She watched the white, curving script flow from his fingertip as he wrote, ‘Thank you for not smoking!’ And her lungs sent a thank you out as well.

…..except the kids weren’t with me. Besides that, it really was the best birthday party I ever had. Good friends over, my boyfriend cooked enchiladas for me and all the guests, my roommate reminded me how to play the game ‘spoons’ that I had forgotten about since junior high school and it was so much fun playing it last night.

Notwithstanding, I still feel a little melancholy about turning another year older and not being anywhere close to who I want to be. I realize that ‘that person’ is a long way off and I remind myself of that when I get impatient. Patience is something I’m working on. All I can do is be someone that I want to hang out with. Since I am with myself 24/7, it’s important to like myself and want to be with myself.
Sometimes this is a hard thing for me. Sometimes it’s not. I think it depends on a variety of factors, all of which are hard to pinpoint or watch out for all the time, but I’m getting better at identifying problem areas.

I’m still trying to quit using the cancer sticks. I really hate them but have never been able to truly quit using them. Why? I believe in God’s power to help me overcome anything that hurts me in my life whether someone else is/has done it to me or I myself am/have done it to me. Why is this different? Why don’t I open myself up enough and have enough faith to let God carry this hurt away from me, too? Why do I feel the need to keep falling back on this bad habit? Why do I hurt myself? These are the questions that I ask. Not rhetorically….I expect answers at some point. I’m 32 and wish I had all the answers already, but alas, I’m merely human and a relatively young human at that, if you take into account that pre-flood, humans lived for hundreds of years. I’m practically an infant.

Yes, I seem to be struggling with the age issue…. 🙂

When done right, relationships are scary. They are intense. Wonderful. Comforting. Claustrophobic. Time consuming. Resource eating. Thought provoking. Patience trying. Soul-search-instigating. Deer-in-the-headlights-petrifying. Clothes-fresh-from-the-dryer warming. Finding-your-best-friend-in-1st-grade identifying. Hearing-mom-bustling-in-the-kitchen comforting. Roller-coaster thrilling. Bad-equilibrium balance-upsetting. It’s absolutely fascinating.

I miss my kids. I’ll see them this weekend.

quick recap for the kids:
it was so awesome to get to talk to you all for a second on my birthday nite and wish it could have been longer, had a fun birthday party and wished you could have been there, remind me to teach you how to play spoons, i’m getting older all the time and trying to act my age, still working on liking myself and DON”T EVER START SMOKING……
so much love,
mom

I found out today that my work is starting a profit sharing program this year. I’m happy about that.

Today I wore my ‘Pee-wee Herman’ shoes. They are black, lace-up, oxford, dress shoes with a four inch heel in the back and a 2 inch platform under the toe. I’m literally just over 6 feet tall when I wear them. Talk about empowering! They are cute and fun to wear for about 2 hours and then I’m over it. Too bad that I work for 9 hours……

This afternoon I went to lunch with my good friend and discussed how we’re both Alpha females and yet get along beautifully. I like all the things about her that are really just reminding me of myself. Does that make me totally self-centered and egotistical?

I started a painting. Finally. It’s been months since I’ve painted. It’s a huge 5 ft. square canvas. I’ve been a little scared to do it, I must confess. I haven’t done any work since I was fully integrated and I’ve been nervous about how being well would affect the outcome of my paintings. You know how all the great artists are insane. Well, I’m not anymore. It feels great to express myself again. Will my work still be good?

Still struggling with cigarettes. I know I can win this war with cancer sticks. God’s on my side.

quick recap for the kids:
the only thing better than having a job and getting paid is getting a little more money at the end of the year for doing the same amount of work, and then there are shoes: fashion statement/death trap/toe contortion…not just things to cover your dogs, i’m painting again…count on a mess in the office when you come see me which incidentally can’t be soon enough.
mom

Derek recently gave me a couple of sacks of family photos and old letters. It was difficult for me to go through and look at my life as it was. I’ve successfully avoided looking at things that remind me of how much I’ve lost these past few years but today I had the desire to forge ahead and face it square in the face.

What did I see?
I saw my beautiful children. All four as I remember them in so many different places and spaces and ages. I don’t know how much of this is prejudice but I swear I have the most beautiful and photogenic children of all time. Soon, I’ll scan some of the photos I looked through and post them on a page on my site so you can all see. Then you’ll know what I’m talking about.

What else did I see?
My marriage. In all it’s phases. Derek and I put in almost fourteen years. I can honestly say that we tried everything we could think of to try to make our family stay together. Divorce is ugly and sad. Neither one of us wanted to give up. But I can also honestly say that we are both so much happier now that I know we made the right choice. I can feel God helping us make the best out of the mess we made for our children’s sake. And I’m so glad that my children’s father is such a great dad and that he found a great woman to bring into their lives. I feel God everywhere in my life.

What else was there?
Old photos of my childhood and art I had done in junior high school, letters and cards from my parents and grandparents and high school report cards. It was strange to see young me. I feel like it was ages ago, a hundred years, not 20. I had long permed hair in a few photos. I gained and lost weight. I looked sadly lost and broken in many of them. In a few I look almost happy.

I think I’ll make a photo album.

I like to think I’m a fairly positive person. I’ve had hard things in my life but so does everyone. And I don’t like when people do the comparing thing and say to me that my things where harder than theirs or other people’s. Hard things are hard things and I think God doles them out fairly according to what is hard for you and challenges you. What seems overwhelming to me might just be the right degree of hardship for you. So when I’m looking back on my life and seeing hard things or looking ahead at things that seem like they might be too much for me, I’m getting pretty good at just talking to God about it and trying to find the good things to think about. The hard things are going to happen no matter what my frame of mind is. I might as well look at the positives while they happen.

I just re-read what I wrote and I come off sounding all mature and everything…yikes…..

Joe put me on his back today and spun in circles. Not only does that seem like it couldn’t have really happened according to today’s physics laws but it seems like a bad idea all the way around in general…..except I loved it and so did Joe. Strange….the little things that make me happy……..

quick recap for the kids:
i faced some of my fears today, you could all be in the movies and i hope none of you will be, your dad and i both love you very much and we’re both happy and i hope you all are too, i’m trying to be positive, God loves us all, i still act like a kid sometimes even at the risk of breaking people’s bodies with my weight…..