My Desk Smells Like Pizza

When I got it into my head to move to Hawaii, my mother told me right off the bat, “You know this means no birthdays (with us), no Christmas (with us), no more seeing the baby, right?” and I said yes. Quickly and without hesitation. I knew I wouldn't be there with my family anymore. (I was actually sort of looking forward to being alone for Christmas and not having to make a huge deal about it.) What I didn't know was that I wouldn't be there for my family.

That may seem like a no-brainer, but, for me, it wasn't. I'm kind of nutsy about my little brother and sister, and absolutely crazy about my niece. I fought with them like I fight with everyone (violently and loudly) but I love them to death. I took my brother out driving (me driving, not him) at least once a week, and we would get some sort of food and just talk for an hour or two. I went out with my little sister to go shopping or, once a month, going to our favorite sushi place and splitting the order. I talked to them (read: lectured them) on these drives, and I'm sure they loved that. And when I found out my older sister was going to have a baby, all I could think about was being an aunt, and, for everything I had in mind, my niece and I would have to be a lot closer—like, at least two states between us. So I didn't realize until I held my first online conversation with my little sister that I couldn't run upstairs and bop her in the face for something stupid she said. I also wouldn't he able to go home every day and talk to my mom and dad. This stuff didn't occur to me until after I'd moved, after I hated my job, hated thinking about money, had my first late phone bill and bad things had happened and my mom couldn't talk sense into me and make me see reason.

With the exception of their living situation, I watch the first seasons of Friends and have surprising affiliation with situations I used to not understand.

WE INTERRUPT THIS BLOG TO BRING YOU THIS BREAKING NEWS: Iron Man just came on my Pandora radio and, oh, dear god, I feel so much better.

[Five and a half minutes of awesomeness later] Anyway.

Ella, my cat, comes home on the 26^th. I work that night at Narbes, but I have the next day off and I'm going to work on getting her to like me again, because I know she won't. I haven't been to visit her in a while, but when I did she would get really pissy, and even bit me once—I wasn't handling her right, but she still put her teeth around my finger, and she's never done that before. So this is probably going to be like when I first got her and I'll have to reestablish the relationship. Good times.

Our carpet is still wet.

We are moving on the 16^th... but we have to be out of here on the 15^th. We only officially started moving things into our new house yesterday.

This was a mistake.

Last night, AK-47 got assistance from a friend's dad and we started moving things. That was fun. I actually haven't seen the bulk of the new house; I've seen the living room and front lanai.

Today, we had an appointment to have our carpets cleaned, so everything in the rooms had to be gone. That... sucked. There is a lot of crap in this apartment. There is 4½ peoples' worth of stuff in here. Even with a lot of it gone yesterday, we... have things.

The carpet cleaner was scheduled to arrive at 2. Hamburglar, AK-47 and I started clearing at 10. At noon, the guy called and said “Hey, can I come sooner? Like, now?”

“Um, no. We're not ready for you.”

“Okay, I'll come at two.”

Hamburglar and I were done by one. AK-47 was still working, but she was also done by 2. The guy, however, called at 1:45 to say he would be here at 2:30.

Uhmmm?

Alright. We took this time to clean a little bit more, goof off and all around become quite bored. When the guy came, we had to CLEAN OUT THE BATHROOM so his dumbass could use our tub for his water crap.

Me: “.....What.” There was nothing about that mentioned in my phone call to the operators.

After this, AK-47, Hamburglar and I went downstairs to sit around, be cold (“You can close the door,” AK-47 boldly states) and wonder at the workings of the universe.

The guy is done in a record 40 minutes. The carpet actually looks a lot better; like, there is more color than there are stains now, oh my god. He claims it will be done in 4 to 6 hours.

We had planned for this. We were aware that we would not be able to move anything this day. We didn't really have anything planned for the day. First order of business was to pick up ZombieSlayer and Katana. We then went to Curry House.

We also had to get some keys made. So we went to WalMart. They could not do this one key that we had. So we went to Sears (Katana had a moment of self-affirmation. She hates the jewelry section of Sears but she went through it. Yay.) They were able to make some of our keys, but not the main one. Damn.

We still have four hours to kill, so we hang around the patio section, sitting and talking and being tired of being out of the house. We make plans for tomorrow. AK-47 and I are going to commandeer LionDancer's van and make several high-priority trips to and from the new house. Yay, oh my god.

We drop ZombieSlayer off at the house she is sitting, and go home.

WHAT THE FUCK.

WHAT THE FUCKING HELL.

WHAT. THE. FUCK.

The carpet is still wet.

It has been 7 hours. SEVEN. HOURS.

We are sleeping on PLASTIC BAGS because all of our bedding stuff is on the lanai where we cannot reach it.

I am, as I type this, planning out my strongly worded message for the carpet cleaner's company. This is some major bullshit.

Pictures to follow.

P.S. AK-47 doesn't name her cold-blooded pets, which is bloodist. I named as many as I could. I named one of her bettas Tumor for... an unfortunately obvious reason.

P.P.S. Hamburglar was color-guard captain, and the high school across the lanai has nothing on them. They are not original at all.