Just give it 108% and it will work out.
It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence, to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words: "And this, too, shall pass away." How much it expresses! How chastening in the hour of pride! -- how consoling in the depths of affliction!
mono no aware, dudes. That which is good, beautiful, and/or true is only such because it is passing.
(But that doesn't mean you appreciate the passing for itself)
I especially do this when I'm waiting to hear an outcome that I have no control over.
This is known as controlling your expectations, no?
I'm going to a charity dinner for mono awareness.
5: Because too many people are mono no aware?
This is known as controlling your expectations, no?
I was braced for someone to tell me this was a well-documented strategy.
||
Can I tell you guys about something strange? There have been odd, (mostly) benign changes to our house that neither David nor I can explain.
Back in February, we came home to find two of our bourbon bottles empty and lined up, next to untouched bottles of more expensive booze. Weird, since we didn't drink it, but there had been a bunch of workers coming through and we figured it was one of them. But why leave the bottles? Wouldn't a worker drinking our booze hide those?
In April, we were gone for the weekend and when we got back, someone had taken our welcome mat from the front porch and left a nicer one. No one we know has fessed up. Who switches out front porch welcome mats.
Last night, when we got home from fireworks, the house was normal. But this morning, there was a slice and a half of dried-out deli meat on our bedroom floor. Not a kind we have in the house. Why is there deli meat on my bedroom floor?
We had just about decided that the cat brought it in (from where? It wasn't chewed up.), when I noticed a new magnet on the fridge. We now have a homemade magnet of a large-breasted nude fairy with wings sitting on a mushroom. Not ours. Not there before. Why? How?
I am so confused, since we would have noticed deli meat on the bedroom floor last night, and I don't remember that magnet yesterday, although it is possible for an extra fridge magnet to slip one's notice. Nothing else is missing or disturbed. I am notably lax about security, having told anyone I know about the outdoor key. But the front door was chained last night. The cat window has had a block on it since we got robbed last fall. Only a very small person could get through that. The back door may have been unlocked, but someone entering there would have to pass by the new, excitable puppy, which would generally mean a lot of pattering and noise. Also, I tend to think I locked it, since that's my habit. But maybe not.
I'm a light sleeper, I think. I generally wake to noises and fall back asleep no problem. D didn't wake, because I notice when he gets out of bed.
So why is there deli meat on my floor? Where is the new (tacky) magnet from? Who drank our booze? Who switched the welcome mat?
|>
That IS weird! Are you a shoemaker?
Maybe the cat is taking Ambien and is doing all those things without realizing it.
That would freak me out so much !! What? Huh? My best guess is one of you is a sleepwalker and the other is more of a sound sleeper than you realized. Do you have other people who come into your house during the day? Set up a webcam, man.
Unless there's a store right next door, you'd really have to be the king of sleepwalkers to go out and buy a magnet.
The magnet looks homemade. It is also a bit gritty, so maybe it was on the ground and got picked up and put on our fridge by the cobbler's elves. Who might like some lightweight fairy porn.
13: Assumes facts not in evidence. The magnet is described as homemade: possibly we're looking at sleep-crafting rather than sleep-shopping.
We don't know of other people who come into our house during the day. One time, a friend was out for a long run and used the outdoor key to use our bathroom. That was unexplained for a bit (why is the toilet seat up?), but then he told us.
Do your difficult neighbors still live next door? Any chance they're gaslighting you?
If it were me, I'd check the doors before going to bed and remove the key from outside. I'm crazy that way.
You have an alcoholic or drug addict neighbor or friend with a key who has been passing out in your place while on benders. Possibly confused about his own home vs. your house. The new doormat was because he threw up on the doormat.
That would be AWESOME. I would totally respect it if they were pulling shit to get back at me for the noise. But no. They've moved to the suburbs where they belong.
(By coincidence, the nice husband works in the same small group as my boyfriend. If we socialize with his work, I'm likely to see those two again. Which is fine by me, since I'm at ease with my own behavior.)
Second the webcam. Unless... someone already set up a webcam without you knowing!
Not exactly the same situation, but: a friend of mine who is looking to buy a house went into an empty one last weekend with her realtor. They both noticed that the place smelled very funny. They went through a few rooms before reaching the kitchen, where they found a gas stove with all four burners on high and a large candle sitting on the counter next to the stove, burning.
Yeah. I think Halford got it in one. I sure hope so.
Well, yeah, about the doors and the key. But the front door was for sure chained. Using the back door would very likely wake the puppy, which I doubt I would sleep through.
A lot hinges on how deeply I sleep, which is of course hard to say from the inside. At least some parts of the night, I wake easily and am alert right away.
Obtain firearms and set up a system of lethal tripwire traps before going to bed.
Nothing could possibly go wrong.
I guess that's not really the same situation at all, is it? But your story did remind me of it, for some reason.
More seriously, that would freak me the fuck out.
22: Somebody was trying to blow-up the house and a hidden pilot light saved it? I can't figure what is happening there.
Megan, congratulations on handling this so levelly, which I couldn't. I'd be outta there, with David, the cat and no other identifying paraphernalia, gone to the other side of the country under a new name.
Addict on benders is possible, but nothing else is disturbed, not couch covers, nor towels, nor food in the fridge, nor papers on tables. It doesn't feel like someone had been there.
What kinda drug leads to new fridge magnets and deli meat?
At least some parts of the night, I wake easily and am alert right away.
I think 'some' is maybe the key part of that sentence.
9: This is what USB or WiFi video cameras and compatible motion detection software on PCs are for.
Not exactly the same situation, but: a friend of mine who is looking to buy a house went into an empty one last weekend with her realtor. They both noticed that the place smelled very funny. They went through a few rooms before reaching the kitchen, where they found a gas stove with all four burners on high and a large candle sitting on the counter next to the stove, burning.
When looking for an apartment I went into one with one of the representatives of the landlord. First, he was confused because the place seemed to be empty although the current tenant was still paying rent. Then a couple minutes later, we went into the kitchen and almost got attacked by a dog that had been sleeping in a big pen. I guess if you have the money it could make sense to pay for two apartments, one for you and one for your dog, but this building didn't allow dogs anyway.
30: Ambien, according to the apostropher.
Deli meat, I'd guess the cat or the dog somehow -- picked it out of someone's garbage and dragged it home. Not chewed up? Maybe the cat dragged it in and then the dog scared her away from it?
Fridge magnet -- erm, I don't know your guy at all. But is there any chance at all he brought it home as amusing, you reacted to it as the most astonishingly tacky thing you'd ever seen, and he retreated to 'Yeah, I have no idea at all where that came from'? That's a little Three's Company for any real-world interaction, but it's not absolutely implausible to me.
The deli meat was probably some animal. Maybe not your own cat. Squirrel or raccoon? Those guys are always leaving other people's food garbage in my yard, and I wouldn't put it past them to come in an open window for a quiet place to eat (and then change its mind when it smelled cat or puppy or something.)
Congrats on the puppy! That is awesome.
34: I love that story about him and his wife waking up bedecked in feather boas and evening gowns, or however it actually played out.
Nothing could possibly go wrong.
Especially since we have to get up to take the puppy out at night.
The level handling is three-fold. First, I've lived communally for years and have lots of guests and stuff, so I don't generally have a protective sense about my house. It sees a ton of turnover and traffic, so I'm not that shocked by one more.
Second, it doesn't feel like a person has been there. It isn't like there's food missing and a dirty plate out and the towels messed. The meat and magnet are really odd, but the house doesn't feel disturbed.
Third, I'm just not scared of most people, so if there is a person, I'm not pre-scared before I assess that he's actually a threat. So far, he likes large-breasted nude fairies.
So far, he likes large-breasted nude fairies.
That's pretty much a universal.
37: me too. Can anyone find it?
I did recently discover that all the litter in my yard that I'd been blaming on those damn teenagers in the alley is actually, at least in part and probably in whole, the work of the damn squirrels. They're raiding trash cans in the alley and carrying the garbage into my yard.
Googling "apostropher" "feather boas" is all you need to do.
Raccoons are possible. They've come in before. But they're usually noisy. I have to say, I'd feel more threatened that raccoons are coming into my bedroom than I would be for some person on a bender. Raccoons are awful.
We saw the magnet together, examined it puzzled, and put it back on the fridge. It isn't his usual tastes. If he'd seen it before, he is a fantastic actor. I didn't immediately mock it, causing him to deny his participation.
Urple has squirrels in a way none of us can understand.
43.1: I'd be worried about rabies in that case.
Yeah, the puppy is pretty fun. He does a lot of happy wriggling.
Have you tried leaving out a bowl of milk? Could be a brownie.
After today, I wouldn't mind if the puppy were more grown and a bit more protective of the house (than I am). We got him in small part for house security.
The raccoons will probably kill him before he gets big enough to kill them. Simple veldt-logic.
If raccoons are replacing Megan's door mat, the days of human dominance on this planet are numbered.
I have worried about puppy-raccoon encounters in the night, if one of them gets cornered. He'll get real big, so he should eventually have the edge on them, but that's not yet.
I'd guess sleepwalking to explain the magnet and deli meat. This doesn't require sleep-shopping or sleep-arts-and-crafts. Someone could have picked the magnet up from a ditch and thought it looked funny. As for the meat, exactly how different is it from what you normally have in the house? If you normally have no deli meat in the house at all, or you normally have only roast beef and this is clearly salami, then fair enough, something weird is going on. But if it's, say, clearly salami and you normally have pastrami in the house, I wouldn't assume I could tell them apart after a piece has been in the open for an indeterminate amount of time. (Maybe only a few hours, but then again, maybe the sleepwalker put it on top of the bookcase for a week beforehand.)
if it's, say, clearly salami
I think it's abundantly clear that we're dealing with snortadella here.
A jogging-through friend of yours could have picked the magnet up in a ditch, too.
Joggers who pick up trash and bring it into your house while not mentioning that they'd been inside your house make the best friends of all.
Is there any chance you're just forgetting some friend who was in the house in the last couple of days, who might have left the magnet as a gift/prank? I wouldn't count on having noticed it the same day if you have anything else on the fridge.
Yeah, the magnet sounds like something someone found on the ground and assumed was yours, and helpfully put it up on the fridge. Like, the squirrels put it in the yard, and someone dropped by to see if you were home, saw the magnet and was all "oh, that's just the kind of wacky magnet Megan likes, it must've gotten kicked out the door" or something.
The bourbon bottles definitely sounds like poltergeists though.
The meat isn't like anything we have in the house. D eats thinly sliced turkey; this looked to be a thick slice of roast beef.
Yeah, maybe the magnet appeared before. I can't be sure I/we'd have seen it before.
That's a shitty deli. Send the beef back and demand thin slices.
I doubt anyone thinks that's my type of wacky magnet, but someone might well have picked it up and put it on my fridge just 'cause she had it with her. I would do that at someone else's house, had I picked up a magnet on the way in.
Frankly ghosts that leave you beef and pornography are all right with me. If that is the face of the contemporary ghost, I say bring on the ghosts.
Although it's dried out, inedible, beef, and unappealing tacky porn. So it's like being taunted by poltergeists.
Paging Sarah Wynde! Can you get your people onto this, please.
Seriously, though: it's time to change the locks.
Maybe the deli meat was used to chill out your puppy dog! Call Jupiter Jones.
No, really, how perfect is this case for an aspiring tween detective? Do you know any spunky tomboys that don't quite fit in?
You can't just assume spunky tomboys who don't fit in are going to be breaking and entering.
Holy crap Megan, that's crazy!
Holy crap,
that's crazy!
But here's my number,
so call me maybe...instead of breaking and entering.
71 s/b
Holy crap Meg!
That's just crazy!
But maybe Ambien
just made you hazy
Waking up in a gown and boa would be way better than waking up regular, but with deli meat on the floor.
If I had to rank them, I'd probably go:
1. Waking up regular
2. Waking up with deli meat on the floor, provenance known.
3. Waking up in a gown
4. Waking up with deli meat on the floor, provenance unknown.
Regularity and mysterious deli meat have an interaction term in my utility function.
74: Does it not matter where the gown came from? And what if it's a gown made of meat of unknown origin?
77: that meat sure looks good on you. It'd look even better dessicated on my kitchen floor.
Or what if there's someone else in the gown with you? That might be creepy. Or just someone else's meat?
The mental image of pepperoni sequins is giving me greater glee than I should like to admit.
"Hey! You got your salami in my gown!"
"Hey! You got your gown in my salami!"
Hijinx, passion.
We were playing Taboo recently, and Jammies' clue that he gave for "pepperoni" was "This is how big nipples are!"
Now I'm terrified of falling asleep and finding deli meat on the floor when I awaken.
83: it isn't like a horse-head in your bed, I think. Well, maybe if it's mortadeli.
I hope that by pepperoni he meant pepperoni slices, and by nipple he meant areola.
I hope by pepperoni slices you mean pepper poni, and by areola you me arugula.
I changed the lock on my front door
so you can't see me anymore
And you can't come inside my house
and you can't lie down on my couch
I changed the lock on my front door
I put a chain on my back door
so you can't leave deli on my floor
And you can't put a magnet on my fridge
Don't want no fairies with big tits
I put a chain on my back door
To the OP: In my experience other than the tragic deaths of President Kennedy and Howard Havermeyer, and the car wreck after prom; things turn not as good as you hope but better than you fear.
Other than that, Mr. Stormcrow, how was the prom?
The Kennedy assassination succeeded beyond your wildest expectations?
It's been 50 years and no one is on to him yet.
The Kennedy assassination succeeded beyond your wildest expectations?
No, the Kennedy assassination was tragic - he says as much. It was the MLK assassination that was better than he feared.
Can I tell you guys about something strange? There have been odd, (mostly) benign changes to our house that neither David nor I can explain.
FTFY, Megan.
I pretty much phrase any news to AB in good news-bad news terms. It's sometimes comical how imbalanced the two are ("Bad news is that the garage collapsed and destroyed the car; the good news is that I hadn't gotten around to changing the oil"), but I do think it's part of my weltanschauung.
Heh. My friend Chris got booted from his super cool office with the window when someone much senior got booted. Chris's boss came in to tell him.
Boss: I have good news and bad news.
Chris: Alright. What's the bad news?
Boss: The much senior person gets your office.
Chris: (pretty much knew it was coming) OK. What's the good news?
Boss: There is no good news.
That's how I want to tell people things from now on.
Remember when my mom offered me the air conditioning, but I turned it down because my house stays cool because it is old and designed for that? And everyone was all, no, that's fucked, you need air on. And I was all, no, it stays cool so long as I run the whole house fan at night and shut everything during the day. And everyone was all, no, you just don't understand what "cool" and "comfortable" mean because living in hot Sacramento has cooked your brain.
Anyway, we have a thermometer in the thermostat, so now we can talk about this with real numbers. On a hundred degree day, the house heated up to 77 degrees by noon and has stayed there. So if that is a reasonable indoor temperature in your book, then I was accurately reporting how my house behaves and I didn't either need an air conditioner.
On a hundred degree day, the house heated up to 77 degrees by noon and has stayed there.
Totally reasonable. Two questions:
1) Weren't you worried that some other energy efficiency improvement was going to reduce the ventilation?
2) How quickly does it cool down when the outside temp drops below the house temp? I would not be happy if it was still 77 at 1:00 AM.
But, very impressive -- clearly the people who built the house knew something about heat and ventilation.
Yeah, I was afraid that the insulation would disrupt the leakiness (breathing) of the house. The compromise was that I didn't have them seal the floor, which I figure is adjacent to a bunch of air above the 60 degree ground.
Well, the second the outdoor temperature is cooler then the house, I can turn on the whole house fan and turnover all the air in here in three minutes.
I can open all the windows and doors and turn over all the air in the house, is what I meant to say.
Is your mom messing with your stuff so you'll get AC after becoming afraid to open a window?
98
Remember when my mom offered me the air conditioning, but I turned it down because my house stays cool because it is old and designed for that? ...
And because you live somewhere where it gets cool at night even when it is hot during the day.
Doesn't the unsealed floor leave you cold in the winter?
Yes, the Delta breeze is what keeps Sacramento from being Fresno or Redding.
Well, with the house entirely uninsulated until this year, it is hard to say what leaves us cold in the winter. Could be the walls, windows, attic. The energy audit guys were fairly appalled. Now that we have insulation, maybe we can detect an effect from the floors net winter. I had them insulated but not sealed; the ground below and the crawlspace aren't going to be as cold as the exposed temperature.
It is true that whole house fans are awesome. Unfortunately, not many houses are equipped with them.
I was tempted to do a Fortunately - Unfortunately routine, but I won't.