Month the Twelfth: December 2006

In which our hero and our heroine agree: we need more sleep

Adath's Suessical went up. The parents loved it.

I started rehearsals for The Jeweler's Shop, because Kidder fired his SM and begged me to take over.

Adam started working on the amp for his new speakers.

I'm still working at the bookstore, too.

We went to Madison for Christmas.

Adam's parents came up to stay at our house this week.

We get to see Smochs tomorrow night while she's visiting from Korea.

We get to see Annie on Saturday night while she's visiting from NYC.

WHERE'S THE SNOW??

And a partridge in a pear tree. Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all week. Please tip your wait staff.

Month the Eleventh: November 2006

In which our hero buys the sports car of his dreams

Okay, well, it's not quite Adam's dream car, but it's pretty sweet all on it's own. We ended up one weekend with three cars that didn't run and I had a fit and demanded that we go and buy a new car. So we did. We bought a 2003 Nissan Sentra SER Spec V, a Sunburst Yellow 6-speed, and Adam's been thoroughly enjoying it. He's enjoying it so much that he's blocked all memory of having the 1993 Sentra, which is still in the driveway. Anyone want it? Put a new clutch in, it's all yours!

I was still in rehearsals for the youth group musical, which was slowly looking like it might fool the parents into thinking it was actually theatre, and working at the bookstore, which was slowly contributing to a list of possible Christmas presents for our families.

With the dining room project done, Adam launched into a project for himself--he built himself a pair of stereo speakers. They sound quite good, too, which has made several of his guy friends suggest a similar project for themselves, which would be fun for Adam but unfortunate for the list of projects that I wrote for Adam to do. Go figure.

Erin and Scott stopped by right before Thanksgiving on their drive from WA to IN, going back for one of Erin's job placements and hoping to find a job for Scott and stay in the Indy area. We never get to spend enough time with them, so it was really nice to be able to host them for a few days.

My parents came up for Thanksgiving, which was nice since we were so busy up here. Mom did some Christmas shopping at the bookstore, and Dad made super yummy Cornish Rock Hens for Thanksgiving dinner. It was lovely, as usual. I'm sure one of these days, they'll get tired of always coming up for Thanksgiving, but until then I'm going to enjoy the fact that they do!

Month the Tenth: October 2007

In which our hero and his dog have their birthdays and our heroine gets busy

Adam turned 32, Arrow turned 1, and Erin turned 30. For her birthday, we bought Erin a book called 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. Which lived in Adam's car for several weeks until I finally sent her another copy from the bookstore.

Ah, yes. The bookstore. I started working a part time job at the downtown Barnes & Noble, mostly to afford a new car, but also because life is just better with a discount on books. I had also started rehearsals with the Adath Youth Group on their production of Suessical, so any night that I wasn't at rehearsal, I was at the bookstore, and so weekends became the precious house project time.

We had promised ourselves that the dining room would be done by Adam's birthday party, so we were working hard toward that goal. Adam completed the refinishing process on the wood trim, which looks beautiful. We spent an afternoon scrubbing the hardwood floor until that looked nice again. Then we put the rug down, and revelled in what an awesome job we did choosing paint colors. Most of the furniture went back in, and a few of the art pieces went back on the walls, and we were party-ready. In all, that project is 90% done. We still need to replace the outlet hardware and put up curtains, and then it will be complete!

I also went to the eye doctor for the first time in 5 years and ordered myself new glasses. It's amazing how much nicer life is when you can see it clearly. There's all kinds of cliches there that I'm not going to say.

Month the Ninth: September 2006

In which our heroine paints picture rails and then goes on vacation with our hero

With the dining room finally painted, it was time to put up the picture rails. Since our house is over 90 years old, the walls are built out of plaster and lathe, which makes it difficult to hang anything on the wall. Since I refuse to live without artwork, we decided that picture rails were a good idea. I also refused to spend the time making them match the existing trim, so I simply painted them the same color as the walls they are on. We also put picture rails in the upstairs hallway, but those aren't quite finished yet.

We spend the third week of September up at the Cottage with my parents, Alex and Amanda. My cousin Tim took us four-wheeling on some of the trails that they've been building by the hunting camps. We had a lot of fun with that. We also drove up to do some sight seeing by Lake Superior, which I haven't seen in many years. We took Arrow with us on this trip, and he had a blast running around in the marshes that have appeared in the last several years. The water level in Green Bay has been dropping consistantly for years, so instead of 10 feet of beach, we have 100 yards of swamp. We were glad to be there after mosquito season!

Not too much else went on in September, but Google Calendar says I had lunch with lots of downtown friends. Yay, me!

Month the Eighth: August 2006

In which our hero fixes the car and then goes on vacation with our heroine

August was a rollercoaster month. Adam and Chris put a new alternator in the Malibu, after several days of worrying about how to pay for more car repairs. Then Adam drove Arrow up north to stay with Jason the Musher for a week. We then drove over to MI with my parents for my cousin's wedding, and then my folks dropped us off in Chicago. We stayed a night with Karen (thanks, sweetie!) and she drove us to the airport to catch a flight to Grand Cayman. Adam's parents picked us up at that airport and we spent a week with them and with Erin and Scott at the Tortuga Resort. It was a lot of fun to spend time with Adam's side of the family. We see them so seldomly that it's really special when we do.

After vacation, Adam and Jason arranged the second Arrow trade-off, and he came home. Adam found it interesting to see how Arrow's understanding of pack dynamics had changed while visiting his birth pack. At the dog park, Arrow seemed to get along easier with more dogs, which meant everyone had more fun.

August was hot, too, with a week long heat wave that included at least four days over 100 degrees. This was the first year that we had put the A/C units in the windows, and even just running the most efficient on a low setting made a big difference in the temperature inside the house. We had to do a lot of watering outside, and most of the flowers survived, but the lawn was dead by the end of the month. We've started thinking seriously about how we can achieve more shade on the South side of the house, so that we can save our grass. It's no fun playing croquet on dirt.

Month the Seventh: July 2006

In which our hero and heroine hate oil and love latex

July started off really well. We had our usual party on the 4th, which was a great success. Lots of folks came over and had fun playing lawn games and table games. We went up to Powderhorn Park for the fireworks, which were a bit traumatic for the dog, but were fun for the rest of us.

The weekend before the party, we declined an invitation to the UP and decided to paint the dining room walls. We took our color choices to the paint store, and brought home all kinds of paint. Because there had been wallpaper up on the walls, we had to use oil based primers. Man, what a pain the neck! That stuff is so totally annoying. Once the primers were up, we were able to see some of the cracks and divets that we had missed before, so those got plastered up. Then it was on to the real paint, which was latex, thank God.

We started with the South wall, which is the red wall. We had chosen a color that matched our area rug, and we knew that it was going to take a few coats, which it did, but it ended up looking really lovely. The other walls became a nice neutral creamish, and the whole room started to look like a real room again.

Except, you know, for the massively ugly stripped wood. Hmpf.

The rest of July was spent dealing with a huge flat of verbenas that I brought home from the garden store. Note to self: no more flats of flowers! They are pretty plants, but they've taken over the yard. Oops!

Month the Sixth: June 2006

In which our hero and heroine experiment with not-so-hermetic seals

Once MND closed, we were able to go back to spending copious amounts of time sweating together in the dining room--and not in the fun sense. With the wallpaper down, many flaws were revealed in the dining room walls. First, we washed the walls. Then, we plastered up lots and lots of cracks, and some outright holes. We tried to keep the plastered parts from being too rough, but then we decided to just sand the walls entirely to get the last of the paste residue off.

So, we broke out the plastic drop cloth and taped off the door to the kitchen and the archway into the living room. We managed to create an inward air flow from the living room, and supplemented that with fans blowing out the dining room windows. Which was good because we were in there in the middle of June, two already sweaty people with masks on, wielding power sanders. Whew. But, that part went quickly, and then it was just a matter of washing dust off of everything, and then we were ready to paint. Yay!

Five Golden Months: May 2006

In which our heroine takes time off from theatre, and our hero says, "Thank God."

Mu's Midsummer Night's Dream performed in May to very favorable reviews. After closing my fifth show in a calendar year, I intended to take the next calendar year off from theatre. Ha ha ha. Ahem, more on that later.

The dining room redecoration dragged on, with not too much getting done during May. Adam was burned out on working by himself, and we were starting to need to get yardwork done, so that project was pretty much on hold.

Sadly, May was also the month that we began to spend money on car repairs again, which was a disappointing repeat of 2004 and 2005. We started talking seriously about needing more income and a new car for Adam.

May saw Arrow turn 7 months old. He was done with vaccines, he'd been neutered and microchipped, and he was licensed to play. Adam had bought a city dog park license, but we ended up starting to enjoy one of the parks that isn't run by the city. As the days became longer, it was really nice to be able to spend an hour or so letting Arrow run off energy with other dogs.

Month the Fourth: April 2006

Wow, I can't believe I'm keeping up with this so far. Fair warning, though, I may have to catch up on Monday because I don't think I'll take the time to post this weekend. Right, on to that other thing.

In which our heroine has "time off" and gives up mandys for Lent

April was the break between Cowboy vs Samurai performances and Midsummer Night's Dream rehearsals. I believe there was some Netflix watching, some sleeping, and lots of working on the dining room.

This was also about the time that Arrow was neutered and done with his vaccinations. We got his city license and his dog park license. I think it's also about when the lake in Powderhorn Park thawed out, and Arrow fell into it. Poor puppy had only ever walked on the lake when it was frozen, and he walked right off the pier into the water!

April also meant tax fun, which was extra exciting this year because of buying the house last year. 2007 might mean an investment in tax software (I know, RG, you told me so).

All in all, a rather quiet month, which was good.

Month the Third: March 2006

In which our hero discovers the future plans of our heroine.

March means my birthday! And this year, it wasn't on Easter! We continued the tradition of partying at Nye's, and had lots of fun. New additions to this year's party were Mo and Mikey, but we lost Steve to the pressures of fatherhood and marriage. Which prompted me to say to Adam, "So, I'm turning 30 next year. You know what that means." He said, "You're getting old?" I said, "We should get pregnant!" He had another drink.

The great dining room project went on...and on...and on. The wallpaper came down, and the underneath layer of pasty paper was steamed off. The trim continued to be stripped. Adam began to bemoan the fact that we couldn't have people over for long Sunday breakfasts. Cowboy vs Samurai performed at Mixed Blood Theater, and I began giving tours at the museum. And maybe I drank too much on my birthday because that's all I can remember.

Month the Second: February 2006

February we started puppy classes with Arrow, and he quickly learned Sit and Down. He knows other things now, but that was the extent of his formal education so far. He started to lose his puppy teeth, but not his love of tearing apart anything in reach of his crate.

The dining room work progressed without me, because I started rehearsals for Cowboy vs Samurai with Mu Productions. Adam continued to work on stripping the woodwork, which continued to be a pain in the neck (and wrist, and back, and butt, and knees).

The big change in February was that I started a new job, as the Asst Curator at the Wells Fargo History Museum in downtown Minneapolis. It's been awesome being able to indulge my love of learning and teaching and to be able to work on projects that actually get completed. I've really enjoyed my first 10 months here.

The judges give February 2006 a 7.5 overall.

In Honor Of Today

Being, as it is, the 12th of December, and being, as it is, the season of the 12 days of Christmas, and being, as I am, lazy and poor, here is the new holiday plan.

Over the next 12 days, I will attempt to write the Thorne Year In Review, in which I cover highlights from each of the last 12 months. (This might be fun, if I don't fail miserably and write 9 blogs on the 22nd. Tee hee hee!)

So, without further ado, I give you...

Month The First, January 2006: In which our heroes discover a misconception

At the beginning of January, Adam and I were recovering from having my entire family here for Christmas. It was our first Chrismas and New Years at Thorne House, and my parents, Alex and Amanda were all up to visit. We had a lovely time watching movies and playing games and doing a few house projects.

January was also the first whole month that Arrow lived with us. He was an adorable fuzzy little baby dog, who spent most of his time sleeping or running around like a mad thing. We had a few accidents, but we all got housebroken pretty painlessly, thank goodness. His favorite toy was Squeaky Monkey (RIP).

And then we started the Great Dining Room Redecoration! With our area rug in place, we finally got to choose our paint colors. We began the process of stripping the paint off of all of the wood trim, and discovered what an incredible pain in the ass that was. As the end of the month drew nigh, we realized that our original estimate of getting the room done before February was WAY WAY OFF. And the work went on...

The New Shape of Awsomeness

Do you know what isn't awsome? Having a broken car. Even if your car is awsome, if it is broken that awsomeness is completely negated.

Having three broken cars, then, is three times as not-awsome. And that lack of awsomeness had come to my house, was sleeping on the sofa, and didn't look like it was trying very hard to get it's own apartment.

THE SENTRA. Now anything that sees 194,000 miles on the clock is pretty awsome. But something with 194,000 miles on the clock that is broken no longer manages to impress. I got the '93 sentra with 72,000 miles back in probably '98 or '99. It's been a good car, but I always said 'When the clutch finally goes, I will stop putting money in it.' Now the throw-out bearing is busted, which causes the clutch cable to snap. Should the throw out bearing be fixed it might see a quarter million miles... care to gamble on it? Start the bidding at $50 in the comments!

THE MALIBU. In an effort to assist us, Mel's parents gave us custody of this ... car. It's only got something like 115,000 on it. But in it's relatively short time I was proud to replace the alternator on it with my own two hands (and Chris Smith's hands as well). After that it began leaking coolant much more seriously than at the rather modest rate it had been. That was a fried lower intake gasket. Fixing that involves removing an engine mount, and had to be done professionally. At least when the electrical system ate itself it had the good graces to do so at home in the garage. Now it doesn't turn itself on, so how many actual miles are on the thing is sort of a guess since the odo is digital.

THE BLAZER. Long ago the Blazer suffered a catastrophic oil leak. Mel's Blazer has the towing package, and that includes an oil cooler. In the times before we knew each other one line (feed or return? I dunno) broke, and all the oil went on the road. Now it was time for the other line to break. This caused Mel to dispair, and after having it fixed we sent it to her parents, who gave us the Malibu in stead. But Mel's parents are good sports, and when we began to suffer more automotive misfortune they returned the Blazer to us. It (and they) showed up just as the Malibu entered it's current state of brokenness. What a lovely time for the exhaust line behind the muffler to fall off! 'No problem,' I thought. The muffler was still in place, and after a bit of wrestling I got the dragging section of pipe removed from the truck. The next day, however, the Blazer began idling roughly, smelling like gas, and wanting to stall.

Now the stage was set. Three broken cars. (The Blazer has since been fixed, professionally.) Mel and I began to dispair. It was at this time that Mel concluded: We have to buy a car.

And now we have a 2003 Nissan Sentra SE-R spec-V, with 44,000 miles. It is so far the newest car I have owned. It is way way the coolest. It's got 175 horsepower and a 6-speed manual transmission. It is 'Sunburst' (yellow). The picture above is not the exact car I own, but it's the same year, trim level, and color. And the totally best part is that my insurance company doesn't differentiate between the seat of awsomness SE-R spec-V and the base trim level. That's right. My car insures at the same rate as the the ubiquitous Sentra XE.

Read about my car here. And here. Find out about the whole Sentra line here.

My new car is totally the coolest thing in the world. I wake up and go to sleep smiling. I love everyone. Rainbows and butterflies follow me everywhere.

I have to figure out what to do with the broken '93 Sentra and the broken Malibu.

Long ago, there was a party.

Long ago, in the time of October, there was a party.


Many other parties would follow it, for Halloween was coming, and that is a time of great festivity.


But this party came first, because it's celebration was more than just Halloween.


First among these things was the Birth-Day of Adam Thorne. As had happened every year, for 31 years previous, the anniversary of his birth, October 25th, brought cheers from good and righteous people everywhere, and snarls and gnashing of teeth from those unfortunate enough to face him over a video game controller. May this thirty second year see his video prowess undiminished!



Second among these was the first anniversary of the birth of Arrow, Adam's faithful companion, and bane of backyard landscaping. One year previously, on October the 20th Arrow entered the world among a litter of 6 pups out of "Tiny". We have the tin-foil evidence that Arrow has found some hershey's kisses since the night of the party, so if any of you hid any around the house know that your face may get chewed off.


Finally among these things is the completion of the Dining Room. The south wall is "Sizzling Haute" - that is to say red. The other walls are "Kansas Grain." The picture rails are installed. The wood work is stripped and washed and stripped and washed and stripped again and washed again and sanded and washed and pre-stained and sanded and washed and stained (maybe twice) and sealed 3 times with a little more sanding and washing in between.


AND LO! On October 21st there was a party, and ever after all those who were not present were known as SQUARES.

The Shape Of Awsomeness

I am here to tell you, people, what the most awsome thing in the universe is. And that is:

THA CAST IRON SKILLET, YO! Now some people might not be down with da SEA-EYE-ESS. They might say "I put my bacon in it and turn it on, and the center cooks but the outside stays raw!"

To these people I say: The Skillzet is from another time, G. You gotta know how it works. It takes time to make a thing go right, and it takes time to heat up the IRON. Turn on your burner. Put the skillet in place. Then go thaw your bacon, or get those cherry turnovers started, or go smooch on your wife since she's prolly still layin around in bed anyway. When you come back, throw that bacon in the C.I.S. and WHAA-CHOW that biz is cooked, yo. Once the skillet is hot there is NO STOPPING IT. Bacon. Eggs. A turkey. Your dog. Jackie Chan. The cast iron will FRY THAT **** UP and you can't even slow it down. Your bacon will be perfectly cooked, end to freakin end.

FURTHERMORE when you are sitting at the table and you gotta lean way back because you are full of the breakfasty goodness and your wife is like "You gonna do the dishes?" You can be like "Aw, shuga, we gotta let the skillet cool off before we can clean it." She won't believe you. But the skillet will be uncomfortably warm to the touch for a good half hour. Even after you dump a couple cups of cold water in it (water that is now hot, greasy, and splashing on you). Add to that the fact that it weighs like 30 pounds and the idea of maneuvering it around in the sink will be right out. This leaves you time to socialize with your breakfast guests, if you have any, or make out with your wife if there are no guests. Either way, perfect morning - courtesy of the CAST IRON SKILLET!

Time to Out the Lurker

My darling husband said to me on Saturday that I should stop posting boring posts about dreams, and start posting interesting posts about his birthday party and his new car.

To which I say (most lovingly): nobody's stopping you, sweetheart.

So if anyone else has ideas about what Adam should blog about, now's your chance to tell him (most lovingly).

Because it's only interesting in my head

Last night I dreamed that my brother and my cousin Warren (the two Annapolis grads in the family) were battling demons, or maybe they were just incompetent kings, at the Cottage in Upper MI.

Then my alarm went off, and when I hit snooze I dreamed that I was at the Student Union of UW-Madison. I was assisting Neil Gaiman as he judged a contest for Best Cake Made in the Shape of a Comic or Graphic Novel Character. This mostly meant that I had to find him a cup of tea, and he got to eat yummy cake.

Highways of Communication

Last night I dreamed that Adam was a bridge engineer. Will someone please analyze this stuff? Seriously.

Life has gotten crazy. For those who didn't know, I picked up a part time job at the downtown Barnes & Noble (hello, discount!), and I've been rehearsing a show with a youth group in St Louis Park. Adam has been valiantly picking up the household pieces and keeping the dog appeased. His life just got much happier, though, and we'll get pix up as soon as we can.

The upshot is, there's not a lot of blogging going on, and not even a lot of emailing, so if you're feeling neglected, you should call me and put yourself on our calendar for some time in mid-November or early December. We love you, we really do.

smochs

I had a dream about you, too! I dreamed that you came back from Korea for a visit, and you surprised me at a restaurant or a bar or someplace. I was all excited and I asked you how long you were going to stay and you said, "Adriano wants to leave tomorrow night to go back to Korea." I said, "So, can I hang out with you tomorrow morning?" You said, "No, I'm acting for the performing arts section of the SAT."

What?

So, I got really angry and I went over to Marc and Becky's house (which was not their actual house, of course, it was some huge rambling one level house with a big greenhouse/sauna combination) and I was telling Marc how awful it was that you were leaving again, but he had some kind of weird facial muscle disease and all he wanted me to do was make coffee for him. But this is Marc, right, so he had this crazy technological coffee maker and I couldn't figure out how to make it work, and I got more and more angry, so I left without making him coffee. (Sorry, dude!)

Then I woke up. Seriously, what?

Minus 50 thousand words.

Don't worry, the pictures will be back.

Eventually.

I deleted some off of Flickr to make room for others, completely forgetting that it would delete the links here. Argh.