Tuesday, November 4, 2008

Chivalry Is Not Dead

Weird day. I couldn't sleep past 5:40 so I got up and made monkey bread for breakfast, hung some more laundry to dry in the kitchen and checked for when the polls open. The monkey bread was good but not done in the middle (I couldn't find my Bundt pan), the supervisor of election's website did not have a time up for when the polls opened. I left the house at 7:30 to go vote while Del stayed with the kids. No food, no coffee. I didn't think I'd actually be gone that long.

When I got to the polling place the line was about 1/2 a mile long. There was no way I was going to stand in that line with no breakfast...so I went back home. Del left for work and stopped by the polling place on his way and then when he was getting near the front he called and told me to come by. He stood in line for nearly one hour and then gave his place in line for me so I wouldn't have to stand in the line as a big, chubby, tired, cranky pregnant lady. Isn't he fabulous? So I voted, and then he had to stand in line again while I took the kids home. Fortunately this time he only had to stand in line about half an hour.

Am I ever glad this election cycle is over. I'm sick of politics. The funniest thing I heard today was from Ann Coulter, of all people. I think she's a bit odd and sometimes off her rocker, but she said something along the lines of, "Well, at least if Obama get in we can start saying "I told you so right away." It doesn't sound so funny now, but it did at the time. I just keep praying that God will have mercy on our country, despite our headlong plunge into hedonism en masse.

Other than that I've killed two wasp nests, sprayed our hibiscus for aphids and researched how to prune hibiscus and stop Mexican Petunias from taking over your yard. I think I'm going to have to cut them all down, pull the roots on much of the plant and divest the garden of the grassy weeds and then see what grows up in the Spring. There's not much else to do in the winter. Most people's Mexican Petunias are 2-3 feet tall. Ours are taller than me. Here's Ella in front of them to show how tall they are.

Here's a picture of Ella in the palms we have that I think are totally fantastic and of the chaos I must tame in the front yard before we start getting notices from the HOA.Oh and this ugly mystery plant that I plan to pull up and destroy unless someone tells me that it does something spectacular. I like the red and yellow and green one with big leaves but the other one is really ugly.

The best thing is that yesterday I figured out how to clean the tile. I hate tile and if we ever get the chance we're going to rid ourselves of all the tile downstairs and put in something more forgiving to the girls' faces. But anyway, they waxed this tile for some really dumb reason. You're not supposed to wax ceramic tile, so I've read. Anyway, there are tiny bits of wax everywhere; you can feel it when you walk and see it. Oh it's so gross. It's all black and gross. I was about to just go out and hire someone to clean the tile (since The Maids don't really clean, they just maintain but we won't get into that frustrating story) when I read that Simple Green works as a good wax stripper and tile cleaner.

Being an Army family, we like Simple Green. If the Army uses it, it must be good. And on top of that, it doesn't have anything really deadly in it like, say...oh...hydrochloric acid. I mean really! Is that necessary? Anyway, Ella and I set to the tile yesterday with some hot water, Simple Green and scrub brushes and look at the difference.

Isn't it amazing. Now I just have to scrub about 1500 more square feet of this tile, on my hands and knees. Doesn't it sound fun? Don't you want to come over and help me?

8 comments:

Johanna said...

Ha, ha, ha, I've been scrubbing tile with simple green this last week, too! I did the boys bathroom and the laundry room, which in our house is also a multi purpose room - it is really big. The sense of accomplishment is so great on that because it makes such a big difference!

Aphids are a pain in the neck to get rid of, aren't they? You could pray for a swarm of lady bugs. They eat aphids!

Joanna said...

Yeah, I think a good pruning for that hibiscus is definitely in order. It'll help get rid of the aphids and make the sidewalk a wee bit more accessible. Did I spell that right? I don't feel like looking it up.

Are you trying to throw yourself into labor? I just realized that since baby is breech they'll schedule a c/s one week early, that means I only have 9 weeks left!!!!! Woohoo. Sigh...pros and cons I guess. Ugh, the slow recovery. Yuck, I'd rather wait another week.

Anonymous said...

Vinegar works wonders on tile too :)

It was sooo sweet of your dh to stand in line for you :) Me and my dh always go vote together. We always have. :)

Unknown said...

That's so nice of Del to wait in line for you! Since all I've been hearing about are the long lines, I thought for sure we'd run into them too. But there was no wait for me and Shane said he was the only one there besides the people working. We sure were lucky!

Ladybugs are a good idea! I bet you could buy them on the internet! That would be pretty funny.

And the tile looks great! You could get some grout sealer and that would help it stay clean longer. They didn't use it in our apartment and the grout got stained and gross really quickly. But I'm not going to worry about it since we'll be moving soon.

M said...

I have heard that any good garden nursery often sells ladybugs and as long as there is ample food to eat they will stick around. We needed to get some this past summer and never did.... before the plant died of the infestation.

...and when you go to get the lady bugs, take a leaf of the mysterious plants along and they can probably tell you what they are, if interested.

Is that the same wasp nest that got me???? If so, what took so long, and good riddance! If not, man don't you hate those pesky things???

congrats on the tile. I would never have thought of mr green or whatever it is for tile... I will never buy tile again though so it doesn't matter!

When did you find out that this one was breach??? Is there other issues or is there a possibility that the doctors can try and turn this one or that she will still turn herself???? A C-section and you just haven't mixed in the past....

Good job Del.

Unknown said...

Weren't one of the other girls breach around the same time?

Unknown said...

I meant to say "wasn't", not "weren't" ... :)

Joanna said...

Yes, Sarah was breech. Sigh. She had no interest in turning and her little sister isn't showing any sign of wanting to turn either. We saw on ultrasound at 21 weeks that she was breech. I can always tell that she's still that way because her hard little head is up by my lung instead of down in my pelvis where it's supposed to be.

Yes, Meagan it's your favorite wasp nest. Sorry about that. But they're all dead now. I didn't get a picture of that one, just the huge one in the palmetto bush. It took us a long time to kill it because there were so many other things to do. You should see Del's list of things to do. I mean, we have 3.5 bathrooms and we can only use 1/2 a bathroom at a time. LOL. It's quite comical actually.

I'll show you what happened to the mystery plant tomorrow.