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long weekend long three days of unpaid labor
December 18, 2017, 6:58 P.M.
I expected a nice long stretch of alone time on Thursday (Spouse's school night), so I came home, poured myself a nice big drink, and set about getting the tree up, first thing. It really shouldn't have taken that long to get a pre-assembled, pre-lit, pre-decorated, four-foot Christmas tree set up, but if I don't do things right off the bat when I get home, then they tend to not get done.
So I wrestled it upstairs, took the dust covers off, fluffed it and shaped it, and plugged it in. Then spent approximately twice as long as that took, vacuuming up all the damned glitter that it shed. (Spouse inflicted this thing on me--I would never have selected one that had been "glitterized".)
And just as I put away the vacuum and sat down to enjoy my drink..."Hi, Hon! You're home early!"
Yeah, not a real class night, since it was the end of the semester. He just gave the teacher his gift, wished him a merry, and came home.
So I screwed the top on my drink (good thing I "drink my liquor from an old fruit jar", I guess.), changed out of my glittery shirt, and put some shoes on so we could run out for a quick bite of dinner. We just went over to Tommy's--it was a ghost town, and so we had a very quick bite. I had a fish sandwich & chicken soup, and he had a full turkey dinner plate.
After we got home, he pretty much went straight to bed, and I relaxed and finished my drink.
Friday, I got up early in order to have some peace and quiet, but Spouse decided he wanted to get up early too. Joy. He and the dog went over to McDonald's and picked up breakfast, then we planned out our morning errands over Egg McMuffins and hash browns.
We went to Menard's, because they had a coffeemaker on sale for $14.99 and Spouse wanted to pick up one for his department at work. We also got some shipping boxes, and and a few other things. Then Fresh Thyme, because they had rib roast for $6.99/lb and Spouse decided that's what he's making for Christmas (Eve) dinner.
We stopped at Shopko, so I could shop for clothes and he could sleep in the car while I shopped for clothes. I'm very glad I stopped, because the combination of sales and clearance was phenomenal, and I got three pair of work pants, three sweaters, and another one of those coordinated tops (shirt/cardi in one with matching scarf)--for $126.00. As much as I hate trying on clothes, it was certainly worth it that time!
After that, we did Aldi for a few things, and by then Sam's was open.
I handed in my voucher and re-joined Sam's--that went surprisingly well, actually. But after we shopped, Spouse proclaimed hate for the place. Said he found it dirty and expensive. (Don't care. Told him he doesn't have to go--I didn't join for him.)
After I joined, I walked straight over to the vision center and made an eye appointment for Jan 5th. I'm still in their system, they still have the same Doctor, and I'm determined to get rid of these POS Costco glasses.
Then he starts moaning about how hungry he is, so we went to the brand new Burger King and had something I, personally, haven't had in about a decade--a Whopper. And it was pretty good! In fact, if it had been hot, it would have been fantastic. But I guess they don't allow fast food to be hot anymore?
So once we got all that done, and he was fed, I thought we were finished--but he wanted to run all the way our to Penzey's becasue he was out of Prime Rib Rub and chili powder. So we did, and it turned out to be advantageous because he got a $8.99 bottle of the rub for free when he bought the $3.99 chili powder. (they were out of the promotional item of the month, so they substituted an item of your choice)
Finally got home and got everything schlepped into the house, whereupon he faded out on me as per usual and I got to put everything away myself.
Followed by doing three loads of laundry, by myself.
And baking two batched of cookies (replacement batch of peanut butter cookies, and a batch of spritz. By myself.*
The spritz was to be the very last batch, and thank goodness, because it almost goddam broke me. I had to finish mixing it by hand, and I almost dislocated my shoulder doing it.
You see--since the beginning of the baking season, I've been asking Spouse to adjust the clearance on the KitchenAid, because the bowl was sitting too low and it wasn't mixing well. It's pretty simple. (I could have done it but damn--sometimes you need to draw the line, you know? You adjust a screww, you use a dime in the bowl to see if it's working properly. 15 minutes, tops.
As I say--pretty simple. But he never managed to get around to it, despite the mixer being out, clean, and available for adjustment for significant periods of time on the past four weekends. And even if it was put away, I would have whipped it out in a split second if he's said he wanted to fix it. The only times it ever occurred to him were when it was actually full of dough.
Having to finish most of my doughs by hand made this probably the roughest bake season since before I GOT the KitchenAid in 2010.
And yes, he finally fixed it. Just as soon as I was pretty much done with it for the season.
So anyway--we're still on Friday, mind you--we've got errands run-- including trying on clothes--and I've put everything away, installed a plastic bag caddy on the kitchen wall, mixed/baked/decorated/put away two batches of cookies, and cleaned up all the messes, and did all the dishes, and ran up and down the stairs innumerable times doing three loads of laundry and assorted other stuff, and wrote out, addressed and stamped more Christmas cards, and SUNUVABITCH! Was I ever frigging exhausted.
So I went in the kitchen and made most of dinner. He did cook the taco meat, but I shredded the cheese and the lettuce, cut up the tomatoes and the lime, set the table, and warmed the tortillas. And he half-assed washed the dishes, so points for that, I guess. (Most of the mess was disposable, so not really too many points. )
I was to the point where I was ready to drop, so I was pleased to flop into my chair and zone out for a while on the computer. Not for long, though, because he wasn't done demanding attention. He ordered up homemade cocoa and cookies for dessert. At least he washed those dishes, too.
As usual, once his belly was full he went to bed. Peace at last!
I slept in a bit on Saturday, being completely worn out and all. He "baked" some canned cinnamon rolls for breakfast and I choked a couple down, even though they were the kind I don't like. Hey, he kind of half-ass tried, right?
After that, he went back to bed and gabbed on the phone to my aunt and cousin, while I clipped the dog's nails, then gave the living room and dining room a thorough vacuuming, and finished by giving the entire tub and shower enclosure a vigorous scouring. Since at that point I was naked, sweaty, and in the shower anyway, I went ahead and took my shower, combed my hair and got dressed. Which he bitched about, because I was apparently "imposing my schedule on him" by bathing. Told him I really didn't care, my timeline had nothing to do with his, and whatever. Then I went and did more laundry.
After he was dressed, we went out and ran a few remaining errands. B needed dry dog food, so we went to Costco. I needed a few things, myself--I picked up a big bottle of their version of Bailey's Irish Cream (a gift), bought some more of those fantastic wool trail socks I've fallen in love with, and I got myself a box of probiotics. I'm going on them for 100 days (# of doses in the box) and see if they make a positive difference in my IBS-C. I can't deal with the swinging back and forth from one extreme to another any more. It's (literally) tearing me a new one.
While at Costco, we decided to pick up a rotisserie chicken to reheat for dinner, since we were planning to have chicken anyway and that was a cheap and easy way to do it. Then we popped into Meijer for a couple things and I mailed the latest batch of cards. Came home, I put shit away, yadayadayada. At that point, I honestly thought I was close to "done" for the weekend, and could commence to relaxing and doing some self-care items on my agenda (shave, dye my hair, do my nails, etc.).
I never learn, do I?
So I'm sitting in my recliner, talking about being all done with the baking, and he starts going on and on, patting himself on the back for "fixing" my mixer, so I'm kind of ignoring him and reading my emails because it's really pissing me off and I'm trying to hold my tongue.
Then I hear this: "So your're done baking? Uhhh...so you aren't going to make any gingerbread this year?
Okay. I have been planning my baking since Halloween, and I told him repeatedly that I was taking requests, so if he thought of anything special he wanted, he should tell me right away, before it was too late.
Why yes, I did spend a portion of Saturday afternoon making gingerbread dough.
And because his specific request for Iced Gingerbread necessitated three things that I avoid as much as possible--chilling dough, rolling out dough, and spreading icing on cookies--I ended up spending most of my fucking Sunday in there, too.
Dinner, fortunately, was pretty easy--heated up the chicken, peeled & mashed potatoes, made some peas and a little gravy, and it was quite delicious. We shared dish duties, and my stomach was bothering me so I didn't eat much. (Maybe the probiotics? Maybe the fact that the man is driving me nuts?)
Sunday was supposed to be relaxation day, of course--once we got the baking packed up and ready to ship. Spouse had announced that he intended to go out and move his car, then come in, shower, and spend the day lounging in his new pajamas (I gave him his present early because I'm sick of seeing him in those awful sweatpants.)
He also announced that he wanted a breakfast casserole for Sunday breakfast--which is a great thing if you have a lot of leftover things to use up, but in this case, I just ended having to make breakfast twice, because I had to cook the bacon and the potatoes, then put them into the casserole and cook that.
And clean up the mess, and do the dishes. And then, load half the kitchen into a laundry basket and haul it out of there, so I would have room to roll dough. And scrub the kitchen counter thoroughly, so I had a clean surface on which to roll dough.
And then, of course, I had to roll the damned dough!
The recipe I used was pretty good for that, actually. And I used a hint I'd gotten a couple of months ago--roll the dough ON the parchment, and instead of moving the cookies to the cookie sheet, just peel away the excess and slide the parchment on, cookies and all. Worked very well! It took quite a while, though, because I only did about four cookies at a time. I used the airbakes, and kept the cookies in the middle, so nothing would burn. So three dozen meant 9 panfuls, at about 9 minutes per pan. (And I still managed to scorch hell out of one pan of cookies, by getting distracted)
Of course, the baking was only the half--or third--of it. I cleaned up the roll-out mess while they were cooling, and then once they were cool, I made the icing and slapped it on. More mess, of course--powdered sugar everywhere, no matter how careful you try to be.
Then, two large trays of iced cookies that need to set, and I have sooo much more to do...I found a place for them out of the way, and Spouse rose from his tomb to help with the packing.
And that didn't go what you would call real well. The boxes were too big, we didn't have enough packing, he had to leave and go try to find bubble wrap...every single bit of which was at least partly his fault--but not the way he saw it. But LST--we got it done eventually. (He took them to work this morning and shipped them out.)
Then he went back to lay down and I put the kitchen all back together again once more. This was about 3:30. At four, I was back in the kitchen getting the dog fed, and by 4:15 he was crying for dinner, so back again I went, to heat up his soup, because apparently a cold chicken sandwich on a paper plate wasn't messy enough, or enough effort out of me, or something.
I spent about 90% of my waking hours in there yesterday, and I am pretty sure I exceded my breaking point fairly early.
I gotta say--if he doesn't get on a shift where we don't have to spend every minute at home in each other's company, I am going to have a breakdown.
I have never been able to stand that, ever--and with him...sick, or whatever is wrong with him that he refuses to deal with--it is a thousand times worse than it ever was before. I honestly think he believes that I am trying to get into better shape just so I can take care of him--and that that means he doesn't have to bother.
But at least that was almost the last shit he pulled for the weekend. (he made very sure he woke me up a 2:30 in the morning this morning, when he got up to pee.)
*You know, since I have to do all of these things by myself--you know what would be really nice? IF I COULD ACTUALLY BE BY MYSELF!
Reading: "A Madcap Cruise" (1905), by Oric Bates--I set this aside for now, because it's iritating, and because my library hold became available:
Carrie Fisher's "Wishful Drinking" (2008). I've seen the HBO special, and I may have read this back when it came out--it all seems very familiar--but as we approach the fist anniversary of her passing, I felt I kinda needed some Carrie Fisher.
Seasonal Selection this week is "How It Happened" (1914), by Kate Langley Bosher. A re-read, but a rather cute one.
Listening: Today's Christmas music: Chris Isaak Christmas
Inked Up: No changes. No time for them--been too busy to pen much at all. Bexley 10th Anniversary with custom italic nib is inked with Montblanc Irish green, the Conklin Duragraph fine nib with the usual Pelikan 4001 Brilliant Brown, and the Sheaffer Intensity medium with Robert Oster Blue Water Ice.
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