Selling the car from hell's little brother

Nina abandoned the car-from-hell's little brother in my neighborhood last February. At the beginning of April I found out it had been there for 2 months. They moved to New York and gave the title to her dad to sell, but he can't get into the neighborhood to show it. (Thanks to it being gated and all.)

It was running when they left but it doesn't start now. Thanks to their bad care of it, it is in poor condition and won't get half of the book value. I'll be lucky if my HOA doesn't just tow it away, now that the license tag has been removed.

Know anyone who wants a junker? I'll throw in a box of homemade cookies, but you have to call my ex-husband if you want the title.

Tell us what's in YOUR flatware drawer!

I have the stainless steel flatware from my aunt and uncle that's vaguely Scandinavian in design. It is so cool looking, but the tines on the fork are so shallow that I drop a lot of food. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!

Then, there's the picnic set my sister gave me on my 50th birthday. It's kind of cheap looking but it has sentimental value to me. And the flowers are so cheerful! One of the forks is missing, go figure.

Then, there is the hammered set that came from Publix back in the 90's as some kind of promotion. It's a good, heavy, quality stainless. Too bad I don't care for the way it looks. But it's only one place setting, right?

And then there's the teaspoon that was a sample from Oneida back when we could fill out a tiny coupon in the back of Glamour magazine and for the shipping cost of $.25 they would send you the spoon! I'm pretty sure I did this in the early 1970's, in my first round of single days.

And then, there are the stray pieces that came in from who knows where. I think they may have followed me home from a potluck, or have been brought to my former house when we had bunches of people over. Group "eat-togethers" sometimes caused a little chaos. Is that my son-in-law's pet spoon that he left behind? I can't remember when most of the strays showed up.

My point is, as a grownup it's ok if I have matching flatware, so why can't I decide what I want and just get it?

I lied on my census form, again.

So, my daughter and her husband have moved 2 times since they left my house, a mere seven weeks ago. They were asked to leave all 3 places. My house, a shared apartment and an illegal boarding house.

So, I asked my daughter if they had filled out a census at any of their new homes. Nope, its the last thing on their minds right now. On April 1 they are officially homeless, all their possessions in a truck and driving to NY to live with his parents next.

So, I lied. I put both of them on my census form.

Thirty years ago, on April 1, 1980, I got married at the courthouse in the morning and we went home and my hubs replaced the kitchen sink while I filled out the census form. It was the long form, too. So when it came to the question about indoor plumbing, I lied and said we had it. But right at that moment there was no water running to the house and we didn't.

In both these cases, I didn't mind lying for the better good of the statistics.

My daughter lost her job the day after they were told to leave the boardinghouse. My son-in-law hates Florida and this seemed like an omen that they should go back to his little town in upstate NY.

But the census office, here in Florida, keeps calling my house, to offer her a job.

20 or more packages of hand sewing needles

So, I'm in my sewing room, yay! And I am looking for a particular hook and eye style I know I have in that big box of notions.

I wasn't there to organize, only find what I wanted, but I kept running into these packages of hand sewing needles. So I started to pull them out so they could be put in a plastic bag. Containerized, if you will. I found over 20 packages of hand sewing needles. What?!?

Some of them are so old I remember using them in high school. I graduated 40 years ago, BTW. They've got some rust on them now so I'll dump them after I finish writing this. But they aren't the oldest needles there, oh no. There are needles in there that I inherited from Mimi, and one package I either got from Nanny or my original mother.

I have no idea why there are so many packages of needles. I spent most of the 90's trying to avoid hand sewing, LOL. And I sewed a lot in the 90's.

I found duplicates of many sewing notions that have me scratching my head. For example, I must have 5 seam gauges. OK, but why do I have 4 different rotary cutters? Several seam rippers, and enough Perfect Waist for at least 15 waistbands. Lot's of thread and elastic, but that didn't surprise me.

The biggest surprise was the Windows startup disk from my (former) laptop at work. Who put that there and why didn't I notice it until now? Did I mention it was a big box?

My laundry room drives me nuts, part 2

Yeah, I'm obsessing about laundry, or rather, my laundry equipment.

My dryer was taking 2 hours and 3 restarts to do a load of towels. A regular load, not an overcrowded one. Other items were taking as long as well.

The general opinion on the message boards was that I needed to have my dryer vents cleaned. I did and it did improve the performance of the dryer. So what's my problem/whine now?

I really want one of those energy efficient, water saving washing machines. My current washer works fine even if it doesn't spin out stuff as dry as my last 3 washers (I've moved some, ok?) but I have washer envy for my sister's new equipment. The washer doesn't have an agitator, you just dump in the stuff and it doesn't do the strangle and stretch dance around the center pole.

So, my old equipment (14 year old dryer and 11 year old washer) works well enough that I don't have to get new ones based on need. Why don't I just buy the new ones while I can? Next month will be cash for appliance clunkers here in Florida. Perfect timing, right? Well you can't always get what you want.

I don't have enough room in this laundry closet for the Maytags like my sister's. I am pretty sure I can't fit them in if they are over 26 inches deep. In the 3 appliance stores I visited, I only saw one model of washing machine that was even remotely like the one I really want. It has a mini agitator which only sticks up about 4 or 5 inches. So close and yet so far.

When the guy was here cleaning the dryer vent I saw what was going on behind the dryer and washer and realized that the washer is on the right because the water hoses are too short to move it to the left. All I need are new hoses. The dryer vent hose, on the other hand is pretty long, but has been kind of mushed up between the dryer and the wall. Not to mention how many twists and turns it takes.

Public Service announcement: If you haven't cleaned your dryer vents in over a year, please do so now. Mine vents to the roof, and there was a big wad of lint near the roof that was starting to turn black. It could have been a fire.

Some of my neighbors have never had their vents cleaned. These houses were built in 1996 and '97. Ugh oh. Most of my neighbors are older, since this is a 55+ community. Oh, and my roofmate doesn't even have a dryer vent in his roof where the machines would be. I don't see any vents on his house except for the toilets. Could he be venting into the attic? Yikes! I confess, I've never looked in my attic so I don't know if they are sealed between the two houses.

If I ignore my desire for new laundry equipment will it go away?

When muffins try to overachieve...

This is what happens when you put in baking powder and realize it should have been baking soda, so you put that in too. They rise up too soon and then cave in, spreading all over the top surface of the muffin tin.

There is a joke in there but I can't tell it.

Anyway I did this with the carrot muffins not just once, but twice. In two weeks. You would think I'd remember my failure and learn from it, right? No, I had to dig out the muffins with a spoon and serve the delicious crumbs in a bowl. Twice in two weeks. They were tasty as all good carrot muffins should be, but more like a dessert than a breakfast food or snack.

Good thing I love dessert for breakfast. Now, where's that cream cheese frosting?

I'm sewing again! Yay!

So, after vacuuming and scrubbing the den I moved my sewing stuff back in there and I am loving it. Friday I sat down and sewed for 20 minutes before I stood up and said, "That chair has got to go".

I was actually using a metal folding chair and it hurt. So Friday night I went to 3 different Office Depots to find an armless task chair. Woo hoo, I am nearly finished with the pants I cut out in November 2008. Really, all I need to do is the hem and waist closure. Really.


Now, this is something I hate to see. I am sewing along and I look up to see I am almost out of thread. NO! NO! A thousand times NO! If I have to stop and make a trip to Jo-Anns for thread I won't get out of there in less than an hour and I am likely to purchase a new project, and when I get home I won't be sewing anymore today. I am easily distracted, I am.

Seriously, I need to finish these pants so I can then sew the skirt and shirt-jacket I cut out on July 4, 2007. After that I can pick a different UFO*. I have enough to keep me busy until Christmas 2013 or so.

*[Unfinished object]