The Battle of the Spouses

Spouses fight about different things. Kids... money... and whether the man was lying or just being nice when he said you didn't look fat in your new dress.

Blair and I are currently engaged in the reoccurring passive-aggressive "Who Will Be The One To Empty The Kitchen Trashcan" battle. The rules are simple:

1. Never admit you've actually noticed the trashcan is full to bursting and needs to be emptied.
2. Instead, earn points by continuing to fold, stuff, and tuck garbage into every available nook and crevice.
3. However, you LOSE points if your significant other catches you folding, stuffing, or tucking instead of emptying.
4. Strategy is employed if, while stuffing, you are able to convince your spouse that a) "There's still room for more," or b) "I'll take care of this in just a minute," and then walk away.
5. The game is won when your opponent either breaks down and takes the trash out due to there being no more room or when they pass out over the trash due to the toxic fumes created by the mixture of old Windex bottles and banana peels. (Note: Upon awakening, the passer outer must still admit defeat and be the one to empty the trash.)
6. Bonus points are available if, when the trash is being taken outside, you can sneak into the kitchen and place a fresh bag in the can, thereby earning the right to claim that "we emptied the garbage together."

My road today is fraught with danger. Blair left for work and the can is close to spilling over. Well-played, my love. However, I am the master stuffer, so the game is not over yet.

And even if it is, I am very close to winning the "I used the last bathroom tissue but I'm going to wait until you break down and replace the box" war.  So there.

Missing the TV

Against all odds, Blair and I have stuck to the "no TV" rule we put in play in January. We now record two shows each week - The Big Bang Theory and The Biggest Loser and watch them when we can skip over commercials. We're also allowed to watch movies as the point was to reduce the mindless clicking from channel to channel that ate up hours of our time. 

The first two months were great. I was amazed at how much TIME I had on my hands with no TV. Plus, we seemed to be using our new extra time productively, getting to long put off chores or doing extras like painting my writing room.

The buzz has tapered off however, and recently I find myself longing to fling down on the couch for a mindless two-hour TV session. Part of it is the quiet. I'm home alone all day working, which is fine. I have no desire to watch TV then. But once Blair comes home and we've eaten and chatted, we might each settle in with a book or laptop and then the quiet gets to me. I want noise. Conversations. Even if they're not my own. I want to watch people interacting and laugh at the contrived situations a show's writer has come up with. I want to be engaged in something that doesn't require me looking at a computer screen. I am an avid reader but a little variety now and again would be nice.

I think what's needed is a new "to do" list of activities. We made a list when we started this endeavour and I have no idea where it now resides, if that tells you anything. I do remember we had "play chess" on there. It's been over 2 months and so far the chess set has been dragged out not once. What is happening is that we're going to bed earlier. I don't think the point of no TV should be to get bored and turn in early. That's just sad. 

What can we do instead? Off the top of my head... 

• Go for a walk. Yeah, it's cold. So what? Suck it up.
• Work out with weights. Another New Years resolution fallen by the wayside.
• More sex (We're married. It's allowed.)
• Play games. It doesn't have to be as mentally consuming as chess. There's cards, Trivial Pursuit, and a host of board games in our cabinet.
• Go out or have people over. This is admittedly a challenge as we live so far out in the boonies. But it wouldn't kill me to drive in to Winston to meet Blair for dinner, or find a mid-week play to attend.
• PHOTOS.  We have, let's see, I'd say about a BAZILLION digital photos that need organizing. Sorted into categories on the computer, bad ones deleted, good ones printed out. I also want to start a photo wall in our hallway and we need to select photos for that as well.
• Home repair - one of the never ending joys of living in a historic home is that something is always falling off, falling down, or in need of a good nail or two.
• Kitty Time. For as much as we love our girls, sometimes they get the short end of the stick attention wise. A rousing 2-minute game of "Chase the Laser Light" each night would likely be welcomed.
• Questions. I love things like The Book of Questions that stimulate far-ranging conversation. Blair, while not as big a fan as me, is at least usually willing to play along. 
• Brainstorm for things such as new fund-raisers for APSRC. Spend time on APSRC related activities.

Okay, I'm tapped out for the morning. But please, please, post your ideas on how we might spend our time. I think this craving the TV is but a momentary lull. Help us get through to the other side! =)

Finally! Snow...

There's white stuff on the ground that, if my Mid-Western upbringing recalls correctly, is called "SNOW." We haven't had a real snow here in my part of North Carolina for almost 5 years. Yesterday Blair and I were reading in the library with a hard rain outside and suddenly--POOF. It was snow falling instead of rain. I walked around the house, staring rapt out of every window, reluctant to miss a minute of the fresh beauty. When the kids next door ran outside to jump on their trampoline, sending snow flying, I considered joining them and frankly am mad at myself that I didn't. 

It's not a hard enough snow to keep Blair home for the day, although you wouldn't know that from the frantic broadcasts of the local media. They're playing up the "danger" aspects of the snow for all it's worth. Still... I have power which makes it easy to be smug. A couple of friends are 10 hours plus w/out power and I suspect not enjoying nature's miracle as much as me.

OliviaRight now I'm ensconced behind my writing desk at the front window, admiring the wisps of snow that flurry the air whenever the wind blows. The snow is untouched in front of our house except for tiny kitty paw-prints from the aptly named "Snowball," our neighbor's cat. Celine Deon is singing in the background, Lucy_Cat is sniffing the radio where Celine's voice is coming from, and at last sighting, Olivia was passed out upstairs. 

I hope the snow lasts. Once every five years just isn't enough.

Food Processor: Friend or Foe?

Our camera is on the blink which is just as well as I'm not so sure I want documented evidence of the mess I make when  I "cook." It may be time to bow to reality and admit that I just don't have the cooking gene in me. None of this chopping, measuring, pouring stuff comes naturally to me and, frankly, when you find yourself screaming at the frozen spinach because it didn't have the foresight to thaw itself, chances are good you were never meant to be in the kitchen in the first place...

But my lack of culinary skills didn't stop me from purchasing a 10-cup (that's right) food processor this weekend. I've been bypassing tasty recipes for years under the "I don't have the equipment to make it properly" excuse and decided enough was enough. I too, want to join millions of family across America enjoying tasty home-cooked food processed meals.

What I didn't foresee was that one must apparently some have kind of advanced engineering degree to even put the thing together. I had tubes and plastic covers and graters and blades spread across every kitchen counter as I debated whether I needed to pour myself a cup of gin to get through the instruction manual. I powered through, however, plugged in the food processor and hit PULSE.

Nothing.

Shake, shake. I hit PULSE again. Still nothing. Rattle, shake. Silence. That gin is looking mighty fine about now.

The instructions say if the bowl isn't properly locked in place the machine won't operate. So I jiggle the bowl free only to discover that disengages the blade, which I can't push back down because the food in the bowl is now blocking where the blade needs to be and son of a @#$$@# I go to the cupboard and dump everything in the food processing bowl into a regular bowl, refit the bowl and blade onto the machine, dump everything back in, make a small sacrificial offering to the cooking gods and hit PULSE.

YES!! We have pulse action.

As I add ingredients, a little bit of the pulsed food is flying free from the side chute thingee. As I see no way to prevent this occurrence, I file it in the already overstuffed, "I'll deal with that later" section of my brain.

So I get this lasagna sauce made and everything in the crock pot and take a step back to view my kitchen. Spinach strands, tomato pulp, onion skins and every pot, pan, and measuring cup I own stare back at me. I spend 20 minutes longer cleaning the kitchen than I did preparing the recipe, including the 10 minutes it took to disassemble and wipe down the food processor. 

This is progress? It would have been quicker for me to bow hunt and dress a deer. Probably less of a struggle too. 

What Blair doesn't know is that a counter full of food processor parts awaits his return home tonight. I have no idea where we're going to store this thing. But I'm pretty sure I've decided that's not my problem.

I'll let you know how the sauce turns out. For all this work, it better kill over Ragu.