Venus & Mars

You may or may not recall my post on July 6, 2009 about the new tenant who moved in next door.  I marveled at how quickly he was moved in among other things.  Well, he moved out today.  Initially it only took 2 hours to load the small rental panel truck.  While he was hardly ever home in the last year, he must have acquired a few more “things” while living there because it took him 3 more trips in his SUV to get all of his stuff moved.  From the time between loads, I surmised that he didn’t move too far away, not that it matters one way or another.  I just find the amount of possessions men have an intriguing topic.  They have so few!  I can honestly say that I don’t know one woman who could have her house packed in less than 3.5 hours.  I wonder why that is?  It seems that articles on women often refer to them as detail-oriented.  Does that mean that “things” play a more important part in their lives?  I don’t know…I just know that I’m always baffled when I see what possessions men have/need in their lives vs. women.

Hell...Version #3

I feel like I'm walking through the proverbial valley of darkness with evil and hopelessness surrounding me.  Just when you think the legal mess (or as my brother says “clusterf*ck”) may be coming to an end, BAM!  You get slammed to the ground.  Apparently Thursday's letter from OC (opposing counsel) took a greater toll on me than I consciously realized or admitted.  Since then, I've been exhausted and not connected the two till just now.  Each night I've wound up going to bed at 9:30 because I can't keep my eyes open.  Yesterday, I lay down to take a nap and woke up 2 hours later, I lay down today "just for a few minutes" and woke up 4 hours later!  Geesh!  I could go right back and pick up where I left off!  I feel drugged without having taken anything.  It's just like the other times when these letters/actions would put me in bed for days/weeks at a time.  I really thought I was past that.  Obviously I’m not.  I'm very sad and ticked off about it at the same time if that makes any sense.  A whole totally beautiful day blown on an unconscious reaction to idiotbrain.

More Things No One Tells You...

I've come to the conclusion that a lawyer does not read  much of what you give them.  Ok, maybe they do, but I find myself having to reiterate what I've already turned in more often than not.  The discovery clerks read whatever you and the opposite side submit looking for errors and omissions on everyone's part and then they inform the lawyer who zips off a legalese letter to the other lawyer.  If nothing is found wanting, then the clerk tells the lawyer that everything has been accounted for, but I'd swear the lawyer does not read a thing you wrote in any depth.  

Sounds utterly astounding, I know, but I'm living proof!  In the last 4+ years I have submitted answers and documentation to the other side's Special Interrogatories and Demands for Production of Documents, the last set of these had 75 multiple answer questions, all which required documentation and many were repeats of previous rounds.  I typed and copied reams of responses and documents that each time seemed to fill at least one bank box.  I have put together agendas for meetings with my lawyer, only to arrive and have him tell me to tell him what I wrote!  Maybe it's some beneficial technique they use, I have no idea.

Currently, I’ve discovered that the new lawyer for doltoid merely took paperwork the previous lawyer put together without really looking at any documentation I supplied, and worked up a new settlement from that information.  Sadly, the information used was a conglomeration of old and new facts and figures skewed to make me look like the vilest, crookedest, most calculating wife on the planet (of course, that is their job I guess).  If they had looked at any of my paperwork, a very different picture would have been painted.  Four years and many trees wasted. 

I’m also now convinced that doltoid has repeatedly told so many lies to make himself look good over the last 4 years that he now actually believes them.  It’s amazing how delusional a person can become.

Another Version of Hell

After a spectacularly stellar summer (as in 70's & 80's) we have finally entered into the part of summer that most sane (my opinion) people dread...HEAT.  Yesterday it was supposed to be 101F with 15% humidity.  It was 109F.  Today it's supposed to be 105F with 12% humidity, which means it'll be 115F here!  The only saving grace is the extreme dryness.  So it doesn't feel so hot.  In fact yesterday, I felt cooler than I had a few days ago when it was in the high 90's with some humidity!

With this kind of heat and dryness comes the inevitable wild fires.  Yesterday at about 2 p.m. I was coming out of Trader Joe's and there in a canyon up in the foothills was a beginning of a plume of smoke.  I'd heard a lot of sirens about an hour before and noticed one city's fire truck go by and then another city's go by and at that point I was pretty sure there was a forest fire somewhere nearby.

So sure enough, an hour later, there it was.  After having one of my electrical sockets spark and flame while I was vacuuming a few weeks ago, I got to see up close, just how much gear the fire fighters have to wear.  Talk about cumbersome!  And then to have to be out in blazing sun and heat with the fire and smoke, I don't know how they do it!!!  I've heard this same thing commented on in the news, but after seeing the gentlemen at close range, I really appreciate what they go through and do!

No Ordinary Miracles

Dogs are miracles with paws.

~Attributed to Susan Ariel Rainbow Kennedy

And I thank the universe for this little miracle.  He is what keeps me here when I want to throw my hands up in the air and leave forever.  I still can’t get over how everything worked to finally deliver him to me…all the disappointments and false starts.  If I were a religious person I would say “God works in mysterious ways” or something to the effect that my path is guided by a knowledge greater than mine and that angels keep watch over me.  I do think angels keep watch but at times I must say that I feel like I’ve been deserted.  So when I saw that quote, I had to share it because I think Mr. Blue IS an angel put right here to watch over me.  And oddly, as always in my life, things just present themselves to me when most needed.  I hope you’re lucky enough to feel that someone watches over you...be it your mom, dad, brother, sister, grandparent, aunt, uncle, lover, best friend or pet.

This is Blue "discovering" a great, crunchy toy in an empty water bottle.  Unfortunately, they have a very short life span in his paws!  Go hug your angel!  Right now!

Haunted

Life is a horrible beast.  It mauls you and leaves you alive...but dead…to life itself.  Numbness is all that exists for you.  I can't believe that this divorce is so royally goofed up (saying one word but thinking another)!  I mean, Tiger and Elin are already divorced!  Not even a year!!!  Me?  Year FIVE.  I cannot believe it.

Do you like the photo?  I think it has a kind of a "House on the Haunted Hill" look to it which sort of fits my mood today.  I still remember my dad taking us to see that movie.  My brother and I were in grade school.  Dad chose the movie.  When it was shown in 1959, the theaters rigged up a ghost on a wire that "flew" down from the screen top towards the audience at the end of the movie.  Fortunately, my mother caught wind of this and removed us to the lobby before we saw that.  At the time, we were both annoyed having to miss the end of the movie.  As it was for 2 years afterwards, neither my brother nor I could fall asleep in the dark without a nightlight in our rooms!  I'll never forget the thick rope coming in through the barred windows of the mansion and twining around....screeeeaammmm!!!!!!  

Funny...neither of us has any desire to see scary movies to this day! 

Found this on Wikipedia.  Hopefully it's okay to use this poster after all these years.  I just thought it was fun to see "gruesome" in 1959 vs. what we have today.  Oh, and I totally forgot Vincent Price was in it!

Where to begin?

Well, the truck was gone by this a.m. so that's good.  I must say I can't believe I got my panties in such a bunch over something so little.  On the other hand, the feeling of total lack of control over my life for the last 4+ years would account for insanely needing to feel in control of something.  Anything!

So now to wait...some more.

4th Anniversary of Hell

It’s so amazing to me how utterly insensitive renters can be.  I work out of my rented house and my view of the outdoors is limited but at least I can see the comings and goings of people on and across the street. It’s always lined with parked cars since none of the “2-on-a-lot” rental properties that comprise this section of town have any garages (I have one of the few).  The view is always changing with people and cars coming and going all day long.  So along comes this toad of a guy who must work the third shift and gets “home” about noon.  This jerk doesn’t even live on this block or street but parks his big white utility truck with ladders on top in front of my house.  Once he’s back to his rental, he’s there for anywhere from 1 to 4 days.  Luckily, until today he hasn’t totally blocked my view or my driveway…till today.  It’s very hot here today (has been for the last 3 days) and so I’m assuming he wanted his truck in maximum shade.  The front yard of this rental is home to a HUGE Live Oak that offers incredible shade.  The problem is, he has totally eclipsed my view of anything but his big honking truck (the thing has to be at least 9 feet tall) and it’s what I’ll probably get to see for the whole weekend.  He doesn’t even live near where he parked!  He lives somewhere across and down the street and over on the other side of the next block!  Normally I try not to wish ill on people because karmically I don’t think it’s a good thing.  But today is different.  Having lived in this rental house for 4 years now, you’d think I’d be immune to such annoyances.  In fact the level of my anger at this idiot even surprised me!

Let’s see, could it be because of yesterday?  Why yes, I bet that could be it!  After emailing and voice mailing my lawyer’s secretary, Jen for over a week, asking if the counter offer had been accepted since the 45 days my idiot lawyer said we should give them had passed, I finally got an email from her.  Turns out the lawyer working on the other side, quit the firm!  This was the lawyer they hired when one of the partners became too ill to work.  So no one’s been doing anything and had I not kept on Jen, the other side most likely wouldn’t have disclosed this little tidbit for as long as possible! As I told Jen, it really makes me question the ethics of the other firm and the judicial system in general.

If you figure Jen spoke to the other side on July 29 (see my entry for that day which is a whole other muddle) and we didn’t hear anything till yesterday about the lawyer quiting…that’s 21+ days that have been wasted.  In a follow up email to me, Jen said she was sorry but that this was  “unfortunately going to take some time (for the other side) to adjust and get back in the spin of things”.  I have never worked in a business that had so many excuses for delaying things!  No wonder this country is so pathetic…all the politicians are lawyers who (I swear) live to delay things!

So if you’re watching a TV show about lawyers, and you see a lot getting done and everyone looking really brilliant and so on, remember…it IS. ONLY. TV.  Nothing even remotely like it happens in real life.  It’s all a fairytale.

What’s even more annoying is that today officially marks the start of YEAR NUMBER FIVE of this divorce.  Four years ago today doltoid was served divorce papers at an airport upon his arrival “home”.
Unbelievable. 

Be careful what you’re remembered for…

Betts, was a copywriter I met at a large San Francisco furniture store.  I was hired to expand their advertising department.  She was utterly uncooperative in working with any new people, of which there were a lot after my arrival.  She thought she was very sophisticated, worldly and above the others.  She had no plans to work with the new program and so became what is often referred to as “dead wood”, someone who brought nothing positive to a changing situation.  I would eventually wind up firing her because she went on her own personal strike and stopped writing anything that could be used without another writer having to “fix it up”.  

Despite all the machinations she went through just to be contrary I’ll never forget the thing I remember most about her.  We were in the ladies room at the office and she was wearing a black pencil skirt with a Channel style jacket in crayon yellow with matching heels.  Out of the blue she said to me “The janitorial service really needs to be changed, they aren’t very good”.  I looked at her and before I could say anything, she sidled up to me and said, “You know they don’t clean under the toilet seats, I always check”.  To this day, 25 years later, the image of Betts lifting the toilet seat and peering under, that’s what comes to mind when I think of Betts.  Luckily it’s not real often.  So be careful what you’re remembered for.  Oh, and I am perfect by the way.

The Postcard Project

I just ran across a bunch of vintage postcards that my brother "recycled" a few years ago.  It was for a project called "Wish you were here".  He picked 20 friends to grace with this fabulous correspondence art.  On each postcard, he wrote a little story about a particular trip or facet of a trip he'd taken.  It was wonderful to receive these missives out of the blue.  There's something magical now-a-days about a little card of paper traveling across a city, county, state, country, continent or ocean on it's own.  Swept toward its destination by unseen, unknown hands into those of a friend or loved one.  The ability to write a concise miniature journal entry is something I admire.

You can probably tell from this blog that I might be prone to write very long letters/emails (or not).  Well, I am.  I’ve been told so as well.  Running across the postcard project made me question why they tend to be so long.  I think they’re lengthy because to me it’s like spending time with the person that you’re writing.  As I write, I’m thinking of them and things they’ve said and done and my responses, reactions and so on.  It really is like a little visit with that friend or relative where nothing else interrupts or distracts.  Just a nice little visit when I haven’t seen someone in a while.  Think back to the post card and pioneer times before that.  People and loved ones separated not just by distance but time (no flying cross country in 5 hours back then).  You always see in the movies how the person “saves” the letter to read and it’s like a little visit because you know the writer spent time and thought on you and what they were describing to you.   With that I’ll bid adieu to this little tangent and say in honor of the postcard project…Wish you were here!

Wag the Dog

Talked to my lawyer today.  We could go to court but it would serve no purpose.  The judge is essentially useless until you actually say this is a trial. I just don't get it. Since doltoid holds all the cards (money) we have no leverage.  This entire divorce is a joke, it's totally manufactured by doltoid.  Reminds me of the movie "Wag the Dog".  Sort of a parallel manufactured "war".  I liked the movie better than the real-life version.

My lawyer sent his lawyer a one-sentence letter that said essentially  "Hello??? We need an answer to our counter-offer".  I told the appointment person to make a new court date ASAP to "go to trial" so I can get this over!!!  I should write a self-help site but odds are a billion ambulance chasers would sue.  I have to stop I just can't write any more about this and must change the subject or start screaming at the top of my lungs.  The doglet is a very good thing for getting me out of holes like this.

Still no name for my doglet.  I've toyed with: Blue, Dillon/Dylan, Flannigan, Finnegan, Parker, Buttons, MacKenna, Casey and now I'm playing with Moochi, Whistler (he responds well to a whistle), Cassidy, Sundance, Bloomsberry and Michele (shell). I have no clue.  Nothing sticks like in the past.  I even tried “red fox” with Babel Fish in an assortment of languages!  Nothing seems to work.  Poor dog.