Lost, Broken Peaches

Lost

We went to Ohio a couple weekends ago to go to Cedar Point (yes, I’ll blog about it once I get the pictures off my phone…). On the way there we had a layover in Denver. I don’t know about you, but I love the Denver airport. It’s a big maze of moving sidewalks. Maybe it’s all the times I’ve been delayed there for hours and hours and entertained myself by walking around on the miles of moving sidewalks (could that be why it’s called the mile high city?). As our plane was taxi-ing out to fly to Detroit, they told everyone to turn off their cell phones, so being the obnoxious person I am, I poked Dave and reminded him a ton of times to turn off his cell phone. When we landed in Detroit I realized that…nope, I never turned my cell phone off. In fact…nope. I didn’t even have my cell phone. I left it in the Denver airport! :-( I’ve emailed the airline lost and found and the airport lost and found a billion times, and they don’t have it either. So I’ve been almost 2 weeks without a cell phone, hoping that it will turn up somewhere. I might cave and use Dave’s old one soon.
But today I finally got around to changing my voice mail message. It now says: “Hey, this is Sarah. I lost my phone so that’s why you’re listening to this right now instead of talking to me. If you want to talk to me, please call me at work or on Dave’s phone. I’m at work all day and sometimes with Dave in the evening and weekends. My work number is XXX-XXX-XXXX and Dave’s number is XXX-XXX-XXXX. If you don’t actually want to talk to me, leave me a message, or just hang up. Thanks! Bye!”
Teehee, I’m so clever.

Broken

Our downstairs neighbors had to move out. They’ve been living there for 4+ years. I have mixed feelings. I don’t miss the Mexican polka music coming up through the vents, or the smells of whatever it is they’re cooking, or burning. Dave’s really excited to have the garage for his jeep. It’s awesome to not ever get blocked in by their cars, and great that I don’t have to wonder what all the lint in the washer that gets all over my darks is from. Hopefully the next tenants will speak English.
I do feel bad for them though. They had to move because she lost her job. Stupid economy. And they weren’t terrible to have as basement neighbors.
A few days after they left I went to do some laundry. Our laundry room is downstairs in this creepy room that I have to not think about or I’ll freak out. The whole room is coated with spiderwebs that have lint all over them because the dryer isn’t hooked up to its vent tube—gives me the hibijibies. So I washed a huge load of towels. When I put them in the dryer, the dryer wouldn’t start. Awesome. I hung them to dry, and now they’re all crunchy, like towels get when you don’t dry them in the dryer. We investigated the problem on Memorial day because, well, we were out of clean clothes. Turns out all the electricity downstairs has been turned off. The washer is on our electricity, the dryer is on their electricity. That was very smart planning by the electricians.
So last night I washed a huge load of necessities that we are completely out of, if you know what I mean. Then when Dave got home (remember, I don’t have a phone) he called his parents (this is at like 11pm) to see if we could use their dryer. Fun.

Peaches

To end on a good note, I’ve re-discovered canned peaches. They’re absolutely delicious. We bought a case of them on sale at Smith’s. I usually take a whole can with the can opener to work for my snack, to the great disappointment of Dave when he tries to make Chili-mac for lunch and there’s no can opener! (I chuckle)
Here’s a great secret—canned peaches chopped up to bits by a blender go amazing in pancake mix! Yum! You bite into the pancake and there are little bits of juicy fruity deliciousness. I don’t like blueberry pancakes, but oh man, I think peach pancakes are my favorite ever. They’re even better if you spread some cream cheese on them before pouring syrup on them. In fact I’m eating that right this minute. :-)

Vroom Vroom

Have you ever called your boss to see if she could get someone to give you a ride to work…an hour late? I just did.
Let me start at the beginning. For the next two months, we have the wellness challenge to walk 8,000 steps a day with an average of 40,000 a week. The first week was last week and I quickly realized how much I don’t walk around with a desk job. Dave walked enough every day easy. So this week I decided to ride my bike to work every day to help me get my steps in (there’s a conversion chart). Monday and Tuesday went well. Today I’m going somewhere right after work, so I decided it’d be best if I drove, so I wouldn’t be late.
Let’s back up again. On Monday we went to my niece’s 4th birthday party. Erik made his famous orange chicken. YUM! And then she opened presents. While we were there, Dave had Erik listen to the BMW engine with his special stethoscope, because it was making a strange noise. Turns out the something pulley was wobbling loose. So we decided to park it when we got home, until it’s fixed and sold. Dave is finally as fed up with it as I am. Wait, no, I shouldn’t say as fed up, more like, he is just fed up as well.


On our way home, the engine threw the serpentine belt on the freeway. Yikes! We were hoping we’d make it home on battery instead of alternator. Yeah right. Without the coolant circulating the engine quickly overheated and we had to pull off the road. We left the car there overnight and secretly kinda hoped that it would get stolen. Anyway, turns out it might just need a couple new bolts. I do believe we can afford bolts. Since the BMW is out of order, Dave’s been driving the Nissan, because it had gas in it, and I’ve been riding my bike, because it doesn’t take any gas.


I went out to the Honda to drive to work this morning, and, you guessed it, it didn’t start. I couldn’t call Dave because he’s working in the temple this morning. My neighbors were all gone at work. So I called my boss and said “hey, my car won’t start, can you send someone to pick me up?” So one of my student employees checked out one of the cars and came and got me. Now I just have to figure out how to get to where I’m going after work.
I think broken cars are contagious.

Lost and Found

So this is our new hamster. She has yet to be named. I got her from Dave’s sister, whose hamsters had babies. I of course picked the cutest, and biggest one. I’ve never had a desire to own a hamster because they’re nocturnal, and the only experience I have had with them is keeping me awake during sleepovers at my friend Jamie’s house. Darn thing and it’s squeaky wheel!

However, I love pets, and it was free, so why not!? Why not, indeed! Pets and I don’t get along very well. This little trickster got out of her cage when I accidentally left the lid open. What a space cadet! She got out on Wednesday evening, so I left food out for her that night, including a small stem of broccoli, which she loves, and went to bed. Thursday morning the broccoli was gone, so I knew she was still alive…somewhere. We live in a house built in the ‘20s so she could have really been anywhere: attic crawlspace, heating ducts, under the bathtub, etc. But I found the broccoli at the doorway to our office. Since I was already late for work (as usual) I closed the office door and left for the day.

When I returned home that evening, I attacked the office. The office is the messiest room in our house. It’s our stash room that we never fully unpacked when we moved in. So it gave me good reason to clean it. I threw away all the random trash and started moving stuff gradually into the hallway. Then, there she was! Behind one of the boxes! I moved the box so I could have a better angle to catch her, and…there she wasn’t! I looked around and she was all the way across the room! Silly rodent.

I caught her and put her back in her cage, and that picture is her rehydrating herself after her 24 hour office safari adventure.

I’m thinking of naming her after Houdini in some way.