We’re still in the process of moving.  We have vacated our duplex and now our stuff is in two garages, one not-lived-in house, and one room that looks like a laundry volcano explosion.  I’m have to admit, it felt like a major step in the wrong direction to be carting my worldly goods back into dear old Mom and Dad’s.  However, I can’t say there’s much to complain about when I get home from work to find a home-cooked meal on the table, or when Leslie plays beauty shop on my hair every time I need it straightened or styled.  I’m getting pretty spoiled, in some ways.  It will be very ideal when I live in my own sweet casa, but have my take-home chef and personal beautician a mere minutes away.

I’ve had a policy of not watching any movies that star my favorite peeps from The Office.  Life is so simple  when Jim is Jim and Pam is Pam, without any confusing other characters and stories interfering with the world of Dunder Mifflin, Scranton (for instance, me watching Juno: “Wait, why is Dwight working at a convenience store?”)  Anyway, I was getting my nails done the other day (hip, hooray!) and I picked up an OK! magazine to read while I let them dry.  Argh!  I accidentally read a feature on Jenna Fisher about her split with her husband.  Also, it revealed that she is actually five years older than John Krasinski/Jim.  The world of Scranton is all conflicted for me now!  You may laugh, but it is truly harder for me to suspend disbelief now.  Grr, I was right all along.

From all of our house work, I’ve realized that there are two ways to approach home improvement.  There are those who see a something broken and think, “I can fix that.”  Then, there’s others who see something broken and think, “I guess I need to buy another one.”  I’m definitely in the latter category.  It’s kind of embarrassing, because it makes me feel a little bit like I lack tenacity.  But I have to admit, when I’ve been scraping a door for two hours (or, two days) and the paint is still not all gone, I start thinking to myself, “How much could a door cost?  Fifty bucks?  One hundred?  It would be so worth it.”  True story: one time in college I went to Lowe’s and priced stove drip pans because mine had black gunk on it and I didn’t want to wash them.  This is not the way of the Watsons.  I’ve scraped along side my mother-in-law, and even when I’m about to cry in despair, she’s still plugging along as if the thought of complaining hasn’t even occurred to her.  It’s been a good exercise in perseverance for me.

In other news, in case God is needing some new methods for eternal punishment, I have some new ideas.  One, scraping stubborn paint off of a complicated, ridged surface.  Two, painting white paint over white primer.  I’ve been sympathizing a lot with Sisyphus lately.

So, now you know what I’ve been doing lately instead of blogging.  Stick around- either life will settle back to normal and I can tell you some great stories from my new batch of fourth graders, or I’ll have gone crazy and I can tell you about some of my new neighbors in the asylum.