PTVO (Post Traumatic Volunteer Overload) and bathroom remodeling hell.

Sorry I have been remiss in writing. I was suffering from PTVO - Post Traumatic Volunteer Overload and bathroom remodeling hell(I'll get into that later). I'm sure many of you reading this have experienced it. Especially when your kids go to different schools. It's all well and good in the beginning of the school year. You are refreshed from the summer break. You have all the best intentions.  You want to help.You sign up for this committee and that board etc. etc... It seems harmless. You can handle it. After all, we have so much free time right?! (ha-ha) It was somewhat manageable up until the kids got back from winter vacation- then the floodgates burst. Two fundraising gala/auctions on back to back Saturdays. If you attend these auctions, but are not involved in the planning, you have no earthly idea how much work is involved to pull off one of these events. It takes an army of Moms working for months-each assigned to a specific duty- to have it run smoothly. One of my schools has it down pat. It is still a tremendous amount of work, but these women are like a well oiled machine.  The same group has run it for years. The other group, though well intentioned, was filled with mostly first time volunteers and not very many of them at that. When that happens, hours upon hours are eaten up batting around idea after idea. Disagreements are common place and I always take it upon myself to be a buffer in between clashing personalities. It is exhausting. My blood pressure probably went up about 30 points. The good thing is, in the end, both auctions raised well over a hundred thousand dollars and I lost 20 pounds. Stress does have its virtues.
    Now onto to my never ending bathroom remodel. I ended up having to gut my 1980's style master bathroom due to a huge leak. I thought, it shouldn't take long- it's just a bathroom. Wrong. I haven't had a master bathroom for going on 4 months! Now I know why people hire contractors. Just getting people to show up for work is a job unto itself! My plumber comes for literally 8 minutes at a time to do one little thing- then he is off to another job-never completing mine. He totally overbooks himself. I can't withhold payment, because he doesn't even want it until the job is complete, which at this rate, might be in early 2015! He is what I like to call an Eeyore. You know the sad sack donkey from the Winnie The Pooh stories.  His attitude is pitiful. He is nice, but at a certain point you dread speaking with him because you don't want to hear anymore complaints about how bad his life is. His unhappiness is exactly why my bleeding heart can't fire him. Finally, as he was nearing the end of months of plumbing work that someone else would have finished in a couple of days- he fell in a hole on another job and  broke his leg. Thus, I am still bathing in my kids bathroom with a duck faucet cover. Painting the damn room is another horror story. I hired someone to paint the room at 130 dollars a day. I thought, at most it would take 2 days- the walls were already patched and mostly sanded. Well, on day 5 -he was still not done! Only one coat was on  and the toilet closet only had primer on it. You probably already know this-Never pay someone by the day. I learned my lesson the hard way. I fired him, but now I'm 650 in and my bathroom is still not done being painted. I feel like an over trusting idiot. At this point, I probably could have gone to trade school and learned how to be a handy-woman and done all this crap myself, but I don't have the time, I'm too busy volunteering at school.

 

O Christmas Tree.

I still have my artificial Christmas tree up.  I know it's January 15th,  judge away. Let's face it,  there is no joy in taking down the tree. Nobody is sipping hot chocolate while listening to the Bing Crosby holiday cd. Before the tree goes up everyone giddily clammers around to help put up the decorations-now my whole family is conveniently too busy, including me. I have to find places for all the new toys and games the kids got as gifts. They are now laying around the house in assorted and sometimes odd places. I found a nerf gun behind the toilet in the bathroom.  I found the beans from Don't Spill The Beans in a coffee cup in the pantry. I opened the coat closet and the Words With Friends board game fell on my head. We are literally overflowing with stuff. On top of that, we discovered a major leak in our master shower that has now caused a domino effect. As I type there are two men above me demolishing our whole master bathroom. Now I have to deal with constant pounding and a coat of dust sprinkled over everything I own for the next few weeks or in contractor time, months. On the upside when I had to empty out our bathroom, I found 97 beauty supplies that I didn't remember I had. Does hair moose go bad?

  So back to the tree. I did take off all the decorations. I didn't want people to drive by, see the lights and shake their heads in disgust of my inability to make time to do the most un-wonderful job of the season. Happy January.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

Shocking, I know, but one of my new year resolutions is to lose weight...again. My very spiritual friend told me I should not call them resolutions but instead I should set intentions. She said that new intentions allow for the setting of attainable and measurable goals for the mind and body. Okay, I'm not really that new age but it makes sense to me. Here are my intentions for 2014:
(Starting Jan. 5th-because I have too many yummy dinners lined up that I don't want to miss out on.)

1.  I intend to go to Weight Watchers (again) and not skip a  meeting because I had a 22 point cinnamon roll that day for breakfast. (For those of you not familiar with ww you generally get 26 points for the entire day.)

2.  I intend to exercice at least 3 times a week. (Even when the sudden overwhelming desire to nap overcomes me as soon as I put on my sneakers.)

3.  I intend to clean out my closet and throw out all the clothes that do not fit. (Lets face it, I'm never gonna fit into those size 6 red & gold pegged tuxedo pants and even if I did, the 8o's fashion trend has come and gone.)

4.  I intend not to go on Web MD and search all of my aches and pains. (Which in turn will cause me to assume I have cancer, which will then cause me to eat a pan of brownies, because who cares I'm going to die soon anyway.) 

5.  I intend to go to bed by 11:30pm at the latest. (Even when I am binge watching Game of Thrones or Orange Is The New Black and I just want to watch one more episode.)

My wish for all of you is to have a year filled with good health, laughter and an occasional cupcake.