Normal Life

Life has returned more or less to normal since my crazy August... I'm glad the fall is here--the weather has turned from hot to cool (being in the 70's mind you) in no time and we're experiencing some beautiful weather. Very overcast, but who cares?

Last night was our next-to-the-last book club of year 2... It's hard to believe. We lost two more members, so we're down to 10 now with two openings, but I've decided not to recruit until after the 1st of the year. We are having all our year-end parties and stuff, so it's not really fair to ask someone to come in and promptly drop $50 on stuff when they haven't participated for the first 11 months. I did put up a cool MySpace for the book club at http://www.myspace.com/novalitchicks and our final book of the year was chosen as The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. I already read it, so I get a free pass for the month. I am looking forward to hammering out the next set of books in October, since I've been looking for a good book to chew on. Last night we discussed Wuthering Heights and it was a great discussion. Sometimes these things come out of nowhere--lesson learned: quit sweating it and just pick a book. Things flow.

Speaking of MySpace, I've started finding family members on it and it's been fun to see what my crazy cousins have been up to. The only thing I miss about our family being spread apart is that I am not close to my cousins--and so many people are. I'm lucky to have my sister nearby. It would be interesting to be a part of one of those families that never moves away from each other--at least for a while. I'm sure it'd get old after a while.

The big news: Judy has, mercifully, been offered and accepted a new job!!!!! She will now be working for the Firefly Children's Network, which works to help Russian orphans with real or perceived disabilities by educating caregivers and reducing institutionalization. The job has real promotion potential and she'll be helping them set up a DC office. The hilarious part? Her old job, which she is leaving in less than 2 weeks now(!), is hiring two people to replace her. Those bastards should have done that ages ago. I hope she'll keep in touch with some of her friends from there so we can find out how they are managing without her.

Continuing to read and see movies and watch Project Runway... And I'm freakin' addicted to MySpace... It's sick, truly. When I start finding ex-boyfriends on there, look out. (I've looked, but they must not be registered!) We saw "Little Miss Sunshine" over Labor Day weekend and LOVED IT. I also LOVED The Memory Keeper's Daughter. I'll blog a better review later, but suffice it to say, it was the best book I've read this year.

So now I'll be contemplating yardwork now that the weather is better, and our next home improvement projects... The beach room is complete now that there is furniture in there--I'm so proud of the room, but sad it's done!!! It's a beautiful room and the furniture is perfect. Looking forward, we are considering remodeling the General's bathroom, which looks every one of its 32 years, but I don't know how to go about it... So I'll start looking into what it takes to replace vanities, medicine chests, lighting, etc. We also desperately need to replace windows and carpet and to install a railing on the front porch and stairs before winter... FUN! Damned houses are expensive.

In bunny news, Rambo is back and Rocky's adoption fell through, so we've still got 3 babies. Rambo was traumatized by whatever his experience was and has been an absolute basket case since. He is now litter trained again, but is systematically destroying his cage, and when he gets out, he just lays by his mother's cage (he's staying at Judy's) and stares at her. He doesn't move or run around. He just lays there. Poor baby. So we'll be even more selective than before about placing these guys... I'm probably going to wind up building a cube cage for the girls, and separating them soon, as they've started ripping out each other's fur, which is not good. I've found some plans on line that look good and I'm excited to get that project underway.

I've also nearly completed the chair refinishing project. My mom brought some butt ugly, but comfortable, dining room chairs up from Florida, and I've removed the seats and spray painted them; now I just need to charge up the staple gun and recover the seats themselves. The only hold up is that I lost our iron during our move last year (it's probably in the storage closet from hell), and can't iron the fabric. I meant to grab Joe's iron yesterday, but forgot. So I'll probably get a cheapie one at Walmart and complete them this weekend. Then they'll be done for when my mom gets here next week--I know she'll be impressed. They are really nice and look totally different.

That's about it!!! I'm looking forward to the coming weeks--they are chock full of stuff to do, but look very, very interesting. Thursday is my first Survivors of Suicide (SOS) support group. I'm hosting a MyPC event, another presidential field trip, on Saturday to Chatham Manor here in Fredericksburg on Saturday. Sunday is my mother-in-law's birthday. Next week is our ladies only supper club and then my mom will be arriving... I have a CD exchange, tickets to see a lecture or show or something about Second City at the Natural History Museum, my dad's birthday, and the National Book Festival. Not to mention trying to find time to catch up with friends--our little posse has all been going in different directions all month and we've all been missing each other, so we're hoping to catch up soon... I'm exhausted just thinking about it! :-)