Many of you have been asking to see pictures of my house. So here you go.
There are a couple of other bedrooms which I didn’t take pictures of which I’m using for storage at present.
I stumbled upon Fox’s sitcom, The War at Home tonight. Fox is generally known as a maverick station always pushing the limits. The War at Home is no exception. Tonight’s episode featured the parents trying to figure out if their teenaged daughter was having sex. During the course of the show the issue of sex was dropped, and marijuana use was the topic of discussion for the rest of the show. It seems that the father had a pot stash which turned up missing. The rest of the show involved showing the younger teenaged son buying pot and the other two teenaged kids implying they had smoked pot. The mother ended up finding pot in her son’s room, but wasn’t shown disciplining her son. Instead the next scene showed the parents saying “You’re sure you flushed the pot?” At the end of the episode the grandmother is shown smoking pot which garnered the biggest laugh of the whole show.
Since when is drug use funny? The show touched upon how pot will lead to much harder drugs, but the main line of the story was that pot use was funny.
I can remember watching 9 to 5 as an afternoon movie, with the pot smoking scene completely cut out. Many times it still is cut out today. Yet Fox thinks that pot use is not only acceptable to air on Sunday night (when most families are watching), it also makes a point to tell America that pot use is hilarious.
I’m in search of an elusive church pew. Today my dad and I went to the Nashville Flea Market held at the fairgrounds on the 4th weekend of each month. I hadn’t been back since my grade school years, when my mom would drag me there looking for depression glasses.
What I’ve found is that many of the antique furniture look like they would have fit nicely in Miss Havisham’s house right beside that rotting wedding cake. I couldn’t imagine anyone really wanting to buy that type of furniture, except to put in their attic for safe keeping. Then whenever they’d need money they would get it out and sell it at the flea market, or if it was old enough, some museum.
I would have gotten a kitchen table straight from the 50’s, but I don’t think it would have looked good in my house.
There were of course the usual redneck things…the Nascar stuff and other things which you would only find hanging up in some trailer. And some of the merchants seemed pretty shady. Seemed to have that carny look to them.
So we didn’t find a church pew. But we found everything else. Including bathroom supplies. Who would go to the Nashville flea market to get their health and beauty aids, when there is a Walmart or Fred’s right next door. And on the same line of thinking, who would bother renting a booth at the flea market to sell such items? I’ll never know.
So I spoke to a lady at P.J. Antiques in Mt. Juliet. She said the best place to shop were antique places. She occassionally gets pews in, but they always go fast. Needly to say she didn’t even mention Ebay.
Many of you who know me have heard me talk about my old job. This is the same job I affectionately refer to as the job from h*ll.
I worked for a manager who I could never please. He was an older man, who had worked for the same organization for 15 years (and he didn’t let you forget it).
Things started to go downhill when he found me reading a Time magazine at my desk. I truly didn’t have anything to do at the job and was too apprehensive about it to ask him for something to do. I figured I would be given some type of meaningless activity. Sure enough, many times I was given meaningless activities, nothing of which challenged me. Entire afternoons were spent shreading documents. An hour was spent on the phone calling area Office Maxes just to find just the right type of sticker to go on nametags.
Then there was the time my manager lost a piece of paper in his office and accused me of taking it or knowing who took it. Since I sat right outside of his office, it was obvious that I should act as his doorman and report any person who comes into his office to take sheets of paper. So per his direction I had to go around and ask coworkers if they had seen his paper. After about an hour of him going absolutely nuts over it, he finally called some coworkers into his office to try to sort things out. Instead he found that he had just misplaced the paper, logging it in twice. It was a mistake on his part. I asked him about it that same day. He explained how it was misplaced but didn’t offer any type of apology for me.
In June I had seen his name disappear on the organization’s webpage. I figured one of three things had happened. He retired, was fired, or left on his own. Then just this week I Googled his name and found an obituary on him. I scoured the organization’s webpage and could not find any reference to his death. Curiousity got the best of me and I inquired about it from a worker who I knew from there.
He filled a backpack full of rocks and walked into the spillway at Radnor Lake. He left specific instructions for his secretary to give a note to the HR rep at a certain time. The staff, always trying to follow his exact direction, did exactly what he said they should do. By the time they got the news, it was too late. It was just time to recover his body.
Obviously he was a very unhappy person and make others around him unhappy. Perfectionist. Control freak. Even up until the very end he wanted control.
Coworkers were left shocked. Some grieved. Many were (and still are) very angry. Why didn’t someone do something about him? Why did it take something like this for people to pay attention? It happens all the time. A control freak gets in some type of power at an organization. Those people who are the head of the organization seem ignorant or unwilling to keep this person at bay. And then it comes to this.
So now I know that it wasn’t me who was crazy. I’m really not trying to make light of a bad situation. How ironic it was that this person worked with doctors all day as part of the organization’s purpose. Yet it was he himself who was in need of a doctor.
If anything hearing the news brings closure for me. I think if I hadn’t gone through that crucible, I would not be the homeowner I am today.
I wish I were making this stuff up. You can’t write a stranger experience.
I guess things are coming along just fine. I’ve got a whole set of boxes which need unpacking, which I will get to eventually. “Eventually” just might mean the night before I have company over. Right now it just seems like an unsurmountable task.
There are a few other things which I’d like to get for the house.
No one should have been surprised. There were predictions long before this happened. Of course hindsight is 20/20. “If we had only known, we would have built a stronger levee.” Then of course you could always argue that it was the French’s fault for building the city there in the first place. Let’s see. I wonder if we should build a city sandwiched between a river and a lake…AND on land below sea level?
New Orleans will never be the same again. I’m not even sure things will get back to normal before Mardi Gras. If I were a resident of NOLA, I’d pack up and leave and never come back.
Then there’s this for you to ponder.
A coworker asked me how I was dealing with the events in New Orleans. I haven’t been emotionally attached to it. I can watch CNN or MSNBC all day and somehow not get emotionally attached to anything I see. Call it being jaded. I guess things have gotten too complicated in my life for me to “feel” anymore. I wish I could change that. Maybe it will…with time.
I am in my house. Moving is a pain. I must have made 10 trips back and forth. The necessities are moved. It’s just a matter of picking up some odds and ends.
I’m getting used to the yardwork. The first time I mowed I wore myself out. Tried to run it as fas as I could with the push mower. This afternoon I did it at a much slower pace. And it seemed to work out better. I’m not as worn out. Still trying to master the weedeater. I never had a need or reason to use the weedeater before, surprisngly.
And I won’t lie to you. It does get lonely here. My coworkers say I could get a cat, which I probably will eventually. I don’t want a cat that will mess up my furniture. I have a nice living room set and would like to keep it that way.
I think things are working out for the best. A year ago I would have never thought about buying my own home and living away from my parents. The Lord tends to put barriers and obsticles in our ways to make us stronger.
The thing I keep asking myself is “Am I happier than I was before?” Folks have told me that I will “LOVE” living by myself. “LOVE” is a relative term, even in the Greek language. I guess time will only tell.
I guess I should post some pics and/or have friends over. That will happen soon enough.
Devil’s Playground documents the real life events in Amish teenagers’ lives during their rumspringa. At the age of 16 Amish teens are given the chance to experience the outside (non-Amish) world and decide if they want to live the rest of their lives as Amish.
After their period of rumspringa the vast majority (90%) decide to return to their church. This is not too surprisingly since many Amish communities practice shunning (excommunication). Families disown their children who decide to live in the “English” world. Church leaders teach that those on the outside culture are condemned to hell.
The documentary follows the lives of several Amish teens including Faron Yoder. Faron is shown experimenting in chrystal meth and tells about his experiences as a drug dealer. It is only after he is threated that he decides to go clean (for a time) so that he can narc on the other drug dealers.
Another older formerly Amish woman is shown talking about her depression which she says started around the time she turned 16. Ultimately she decided to leave the church so that she could attend college. (Amish have no education past the 8th grade; higher education is seen as prideful). When she left her church she was shunned and her family cut off communication of her in hopes that she would return to her Amish roots.
Having been restricted for the first 16 years of their lives, it is not surprisng that many Amish teens let loose and go wild during their rumspringa, moreso than a typical American teenager. Local police confirm that the wildest and largest parties are thrown by Amish youth. For Amish boys is means drinking in excess, driving cars, smoking, and sometimes experimenting with drugs. During rumspringa Amish boys tend not to wear their traditional Amish clothing, while the girls tend to keep their traditional bonnets and plain dresses. The movie shows the surreal scenes of Amish girls with bonnets at a drinking party and local concert.
The Amish truly live “off the grid.” Faron is shown hooking up a battery to his television so that he may play video games. An Amish home is shown, with gas lamps and 13 Bibles, but no television or electricity.
The Amish are very caught up in tradition especially with worship, sometimes to the point that the tradition itself becomes more important than the act of worship. For example, during Amish worship services, when a man reads from the Bible, the women turn their back to him and stare toward the wall. No one knows why they do this, not even the Amish themselves. Women explain its because their mother did it, while their mother’s mother did it and so on…
During the worship services men and women sit segregated from each other. You will be very unlikely to see an Amish church, as the Amish worship in houses and barns. Most Amish houses are built with a big basement to accomidate church worship services which might take place there from time to time. The film didn’t show Amish worship services and only showed a handful of Amish adults. Amish usually don’t want to be filmed.
Devil’s Playground is one of the few Amish related documentaries which I’ve seen. It is worth watching for viewers interested in the subject. The movie does contain strong language and shows scenes of drug abuse.
Moving is very tiring. I’m sure things are going to get lost in the process. But I’m making sure I keep track of the things I’ll need most. Seems like I could have picked a cooler part of the year to move. Lately it has been unbearably hot outside…so much so that many people have put off yard work for cooler times. The grass at my yard is pretty much dead, which is a blessing in disguise since I won’t have to mow.
So its been a matter of shuttling my stuff back and forth 15 minutes down the road. The best thing I can compare it to is when I first moved out to college. When I went to Lipscomb’s High Rise dorm in August 1993, I had no idea what to take. So I took it all, even stuff I couldn’t possibly use. The following years I took less and less. This time I’m taking EVERYTHING I own. Very few stuff will be left behind, except for some childhood sentimental items which my mom wants to keep.
Plus the first time I moved out to college it was a drastic change to my environment. This time is no different. I imagine, just like my first year at college, my first year on my own will have some bumps along the way. That’s to be expected. My friend told me that the first time he moved out a few weeks later he thought to himself “I’ve just made the biggest mistake of my life.” Things will probably get stressful. But I’m thinking this will be my independence day.
Bedroom suits: Its one of those things which I don’t really get too excited about. I never really found one that I couldn’t live without. So I got the next closest thing which wasn’t too gaudy. The place I went to had some really ugly stuff that I’m sure would have looked good during colonial times, but not in the 21st century. Here it what I picked out. Simple, practical. I would have loved to have kept my bed. But my mom wanted to keep it seemingly how its supposedly my greatgrandmother’s. Sentimental in her mind. I like it because it sets high, a typical design back then, possibly because the floor was to drafty.
I went furniture shopping today. I ended up purchasing a living room set, bedroom set, and a fridge. With the exception of a mattress it’s all I need to move in. ETA is 2 weeks from today.
I’m very satisfied with my living room set. Its dark green and very comfortable. Many other sofas tend to be firm and uncomfortable. Almost like a museum piece. I made a point to pick out one that I could fall asleep on.
Got a black fridge. I have always wanted a side-by-side fridge. One where you’d be able to get water and ice from the door. My parents were always economical and had the generic freezer on top horizontal variety. So I decided to spurge and get the side-by-side.
The bedroom set is not something that positively fits me. But I’m not necessarily a fan of beds. Apart from sleeping on them, there’s really not too much to them.
I had no idea that there are big differences in matresses. I had always had a cheap firm mattress. Economical but not very good on the back. And yet there are nice foam mattresses which contour to your body. The downside is they are very expensive. I really shouldn’t have laid down on those foam mattresses. Now I know what I’m missing.
So I guess things are really coming together.
