All's Quiet...

because All's EMPTY!!

Last week my brother was approved for an apartment - in the complex next door, but hey, its not IN my apartment!They are about 95% moved out as of last night, and once I make the phone call to give the go-ahead (which will be as soon as I shower this morning..) the guys will come back, finish moving AND clean the office/guest bedroom, bathroom, living room (and if I can swing it, lol, the kitchen)

In the last two weeks, I had a few major blowups. My stress level peaked, and I just couldn't take it anymore. Though I was promised in March that I'd never have to ask for help, if I didn't ask, nothing would get done. Matt and I had been so busy that we hadn't cooked in our kitchen for probably 2 weeks, yet I was loading and unloading the dishwasher, and CONSTANTLY hand washing the rest, multiple times a week (sometimes multiple times a day!) Because I couldn't really get into my office or my closet, I couldn't put ANY of my Avon stuff away, so I had a huge pile of stuff in my living room, on top of other huge piles of stuff I couldn't put away. Matt and I couldn't relax, because there was always something that needed doing - dishes, laundry, TRYING to stay organized, my brother or his friend wandering around, watching TV, coming and going. It was infinitely frustrating, and I'd had it. Thankfully, just two weeks later (a LONG two weeks...), we'll have our home back. I felt a little bad, I didn't want them to think we were kicking them out, that they weren't welcome, but this place just isn't big enough for four adults, especially when keeping house is left to only ONE of them :(

Tonight's Dinner Was Brought To You By The Letter "P"

Matt had class tonight, which means "fend for yourself".

I made pancakes. (laced with cinnamon, homemade vanilla and baby chocolate chips. In shapes like "pancake" and "X" and "M" and "O")

My brother made a pizza. Mexican, to be specific.


my kitchen was quite the random mixture of smells.

**update**

Matt came home from school and made a PB&J.

Happy Easter

Safeway recently had a wonderful sale on meat. One that we were too busy to take advantage of (holding auditions pretty much every night last week), but Alan & Company made worthwhile. We had two lovely steak dinners, but otherwise, have been eating out. A lot. Auditions every night will do that..



not to mention my FILTHY kitchen.



As you've probably already read my last post about the dish situation, I won't recap. (Though I will add that the floor wasn't ever mopped and the dishes that couldn't fit or can't go in the dishwasher sat in the sink for ANOTHER two days...)



Then, & Company wanted another steak. He grabbed the first pan within reach. My pizza pan. Have you ever seen a pizza pan? They're great. Nicely sized, round, nonstick. Full of holes so the crust can bake evenly.



Full of holes.



Have you ever cooked a steak? Or seen the obscene amount of juices that cook OUT of a steak?



FULL. OF. HOLES!!!!!!!



I wonder if, at this point in my story, you're cringing as much as I did when I saw the sticky, caramelized, BURNT disaster that was now my oven. But I'm a nice person. How does a nice person say "WTF WERE YOU THINKING YOU IDIOT! YOU'D BETTER CLEAN THAT %&$* UP RIGHT NOW BEFORE I LOSE MY MIND!!!!" without saying exactly that...and going batshitcrazy? I mean, for almost two weeks, I'd been too tired, too busy to cook in my own kitchen, all the while having to clean up messes in the kitchen I'm not cooking in, and now THIS?

So yesterday, after a lovely Easter brunch, I spent a few hours cleaning the oven. And I insisted later that & Company mop the floor - which, thankfully, it appeared that he had done last night.

I'm sorry if this sounds fragmented - I had to put this post on hold yesterday and have lost both my train of thought and my frustrations...

Anyway, I received the worst news on Friday afternoon. My dog Taylor has cancer. She'll be with us for a few more weeks, at best. Taylor was my service dog through Canine Companions for Independence. She was by my side for the majority of the last 10 years - LITERALLY, by my side. That was her job. I was heartbroken when I let my mom take her back to Michigan when we moved here, but I knew that it was best for her, at her age, to "retire" with a large yard and a pond she loves to swim in.

So I've been a weepy mess since Friday night. Coupled with PMS and irritations from our houseguests (shall I start the countdown until the end of the month now?), it has not been a happy weekend. Its been a rotten year for pets. First Buttons is near-death (and she's doing better, I should add, but she's still twenty..). Matt's cat Chester is a few years younger than Buttons, and is going through the same renal failure issues, but will probably go before Buttons does, and now Taylor. My heart hurts, and all I want to do is fly home to see her, but I know that I just can't handle that.

I'll post a few pictures of Taylor later.

I won't lie. I'm a little irked.

Last week, we made chili. In a massive, massive pot that is difficult for me to wash.

It sat there for A FULL WEEK, until last night, when I finally gave in and struggled to wash it (and then it sat on the counter, because I can't reach where it is stored..until I ASKED to have it put away this morning)

Alan and his friend are making dinner. It smells great, and there will be food for me too, which I appreciate, but in no less than 7 minutes, ALL of my cutting boards and non-steak knife knives were dirty. Onions, cilantro and stuff all over the kitchen floor, and I'm out of tin foil, which I bought just two weeks ago, and an expensive bottle of olive oil that was pretty new too.

If this kitchen is a disaster area when I get up in the morning, I am going to flip. I'm PMSing, and I'm irritated as fuck.

*****UPDATE*****

Thank heavens, no heads will roll. Adamo loaded the dishwasher, washed ALL of the counters, and said he intends to mop the floor when we've gone to bed.

Feeling just a little blue

So its hard enough lately that I feel like i never see Matt anymore. Tonight, for example, he gets home around 6pm. Tonight, I have a meeting at 6:30, so I'll be rushing off just as soon as he walks in the door. I won't get home until about 9.

Lately, I've been experiencing quite a bit of "baby fever". We'd talked previously about starting our family once he'd finished his first year of school, and with the end of his first year rapidly approaching, the baby fever just keeps getting stronger. I'm so unbelievably ready to start a family with him, and I'd been waiting for hell, an hour alone with him to talk to him about it again, see where we stand.

He just reconnected with an old friend from HS (a girl I know for a fact he was head over heels for...) and they've been chatting about what they've been up to, spouses, family, etc, and he told her that we are waiting to start our family until he's finished with school. I won't lie - my heart hurts a little after hearing that. I feel like every time we get closer to the previously discussed dates ("a couple years after the wedding", "perhaps this Christmas" - that was 2 years ago - , "maybe next summer", "after I finish a year of school"), it just gets pushed farther and farther away. I KNOW he wants to have children, so that's not the issue, I just don't know how many more times I can handle it being pushed away. Being a mother is one of the things I want MOST in my life. I've never been particularly career-minded, power suits and pumps, business lunches and bringing work home with me. I just want to be a Mom, you know? I want to raise a family, take care of our home, etc. Stupid, I'm sure, but that's the way it is.

We moved out here so he could work towards realizing his dream. When do I get to realize mine?

home alone. at last!

Its Monday afternoon, so that means I'm home from work, and Matt's off to class for the rest of the day. Today, my brother started his new job, and his friend is out doing...whatever. Don't care :)

I have the house ALLLLLLL to myself. For at least the next couple hours, anyway. I think I'm going to curl up on MY couch and watch a mindless chick-flick until I fall asleep. Just as I was dozing off last night, Friend decided to take a shower and shave. I was startled awake from that barely-asleep-mode, hearing the rush of water in the sink, then TAPTAPTAPTAP - the razor on the counter, for five minutes. At 11:30pm. Come ON. New house rule...if you need to shower and shave on Sunday, do it before I go to bed! It took me an hour to fall back to sleep :(

On another note, about a month ago, I was invited to be a mark. Trendspotter for the next 6 months. I'll have a chance to see goodies in advance, and I'm super excited about it. One of the things the mark. staff in NYC wanted of us was to try Twitter, to see if it might be something worth looking into, so, ta-da...you can find me on Twitter as "isabella09".

Don't get too excited. I don't text, and I'm not online nearly as much as I used to be, so I have nothing to say :)

I have no interesting title to put here.

So today it was discussed that Matt and I would be paid $400 to cover "rent" for my brother and his friend for the rest of March and probably ALL of April. My brother was just offered the plush hotel job and likely starts next week. His friend is still jobless, but hopefully, that will change soon. End of April is their deadline, and while I'm fine with the decision, the end of April seems a looong way away...

In other news, I just learned that I made Honor Society - my huge sales goal that I'd set for myself this time last year! I'm super excited, but its kept me busy these last few weeks, which is why I've been away from the blog.

I've been helping Matt with his next film too, scouting locations, making contacts, planning for the makeup I'll be using on set.

And as a result, I'm exhausted.