That's My Bix!

The weekend was one of those weirdly long and satisfying weekends that seem to only happen once a quarter. Esteban didn’t have his Dorkathalon, and instead we pottered around the house all evening and went to bed at a reasonable hour (Hello we are old).

On Saturday morning, we let the pug and the cat play it out on the bed (their favorite arena for Roman-Greco) for a good half an hour, then were at the Farmer’s Market by 7:30, when it was already packed, and therefore I was grumpy. I left my newish (a gift from Esteban) rainslicker green Crate and Barrel shopping trolley in the car, because when it’s crowded, it makes me feel as annoying as one of the Mommy tourist-shoppers with the gigantic SUV-stroller things (I’m totally making gross judgments now, but the way they shop tells me that they are not there because they are locavores or interested in the freshest and most amazing produce but rather because they see Isla Fisher and Naomi Watts shopping at the Grove farmer’s market and want to play pretend. If it were any other way, they would be a little more interested in the items in the stalls and less interested in scanning the crowd looking for faces they recognize from Gymboree) that fucking stop in the middle of the fucking crowd because they just have to UPDATE TWITTER ON THEIR BLACKBERRY. (Breathe. Breathe. Must work on reducing stress.) Due to the lack of trolley, I tended to be a little more choosy in my selections, so only got some black cherries, fresh cheese curds, some amazing Lizanthus flowers and then because I couldn’t resist, five stems of the most beautiful snowy white lilies, which is basically my floral Achilles heel. Had I had more hands, I probably would have picked up some new potatoes and maybe a shitton of blueberries. I haven’t done any jam sessions this season so far, but I do have a bunch of stuff stocked in the freezer for when the mood strikes. It’s not ideal to make jam with frozen fruit, but it’s better than the plasticy stuff that one buys at the grocery store.

After the Farmer’s Market, it was still relatively early, so we hit Sbux and then trekked to the good meat place (should I capitalize that? Because that’s how I think of it now. Good Meat Place) where we stocked up on various meat stuff for the week. We got into a habit of planning out our meals for the week when I was on my sabbatical, and found that it actually makes our life feel much less hectic (not to mention that we make better nutritional choices when we go into 5 pm with a plan).  After that, Esteban had brewing, so he went off to make of the beers, and I went home to throw myself into (fucking) laundry and cleaning up the disaster that is our bedroom. I got through most of the laundry (a feat made possibly only due to the fact that we’ve now succeeding in converting the spare room into a first floor laundry room, thanks to Ward’s craftsmanship) and got through the majority of the piles of stuff in our bedroom.

I wish I wouldn’t pile things. It’s like half-assed cleaning: you pick up something from one area in the house and just move it to a central holding area of clutter, which in our case, is our bedroom for two reasons: it’s the biggest room in the house and no one sees it. But why get it 90% of the way to being “Put Away” only to fail to follow through that tiny little bit and instead create 100% clutter again? It’s the opposite of efficiency. I’m my own worst enemy.

After that, I had our fantasy football draft. Last season, after it became clear that my second-to-last draft position had hurt me far too much, I purposely tanked my season to ensure a fantastic draft spot (#1 baby!), so I should be poised for a fantastic season. Esteban drafted immediately after me (he too had had a lousy spot, since the year previous, we played each other in our Fantasy Superbowl… I keep trying to turn that into a “that’s what she said” but I…just…can’t…quite).  Afterwards, Esteban finished his making of the beers and I hit Target for the first time in months (and managed to spend less than a hundred dollars, I don’t even recognize myself anymore) and went home to rescue the pug from her crate and finish up on the bedroom. Haven’t gotten the chaos completely controlled yet, but at least you can walk through the room in the dark and not worry about stubbing your toe on a half-unpacked suitcase or full hamper of folded laundry.

By the time he got home, we realized that there was a Packer’s pre-season game on, and neither of us really felt like doing any cooking, so I ordered take out from a half-hearted Chili’s To Go and we watched the Packer game until neither of us cared anymore and went to bed.

The Clampetts were camping all weekend, so we opened all of the windows in our bedroom (normally the windows on the wall that faces their driveway stay firmly closed with blinds drawn tight) and I had the luxury of waking up gently to a room filled with light and cool, languid breezes that kept the duvet and pillows cool and crisp, birds chirping from three directions. We only slept until 8:30 but it felt like forever. We had a slow morning start, but then finally roused ourselves, hit the shower, and decided to make up for keeping Ave in her crate for so long on Saturday (during the Fantasy draft, which was like four hours… someone’s spoiled) and took her to the Kaukauna dog park.  There weren’t a lot of small dogs there so we ended up hanging out in the large dog area, where the dogs mostly ignored Ave (although a very anxious Irish Setter decided to try to rush Ave, who would have NONE OF THAT, thank you very much, and then we were all treated to a very panicked Irish Setter running away from a put out pug that was about 1/5th her size). Then another dog came who apparently had problems with smaller dogs and snapped at Ave several times. Since I didn’t feel right about forcing the owner to keep his dog on a leash when we were not really supposed to be in the large dog area anyway, I suggested that we stick a fork in the morning’s outing. We packed up the pug and started to head home, talking about the area’s pug get together, we wondered about that dog park, which was supposedly not too far away. We looked it up on the phone and went to find it, ending up in an area that was completely NOT IT.  Then we got turned the right way and found the Appleton dog park, which was…well, that’s apparently where the little dogs went! We saw Welsh Corgis and Jack Russells, and a little baby water spaniel and a Brussels Griffon and some little random fluffy dogs. Ave ran and ran and ran and flirted with the puppies and played havoc with a basset hound.  Best dog park ever! Of course, Ave was in pug heaven. Two dog parks in one morning! The puglet was pooped and snored loudly the entire way home.

Esteban had his Sunday Dorkathlon, so I spent the remainder of the day doing not much of anything. More (fucking) laundry, the realization that we have way too many clothes, hand-washed a skirt that’s been waiting for attention since LA, caught up on Top Chef Masters, and then it was only 4 o’clock, so I thought I’d swing by Ward and June’s and let Ave run around their backyard with their dog Cricket, since it was still so lovely outside and I didn’t have to worry about her getting overheated (pugs don’t deal with heat very well and can be injured when overheating). They were apparently spending the day driving through Door County (brilliant day for it), so I let myself in and took their Sunday paper out to the deck and let the dogs run around for an hour. Then I went home, started cooking a beef roast that will be burrito-fodder later in the week, and settled in to watch True Blood, Mad Men and Hung.

I don’t know if it was the home game or the fact that the temperature was unseasonably cool (in fact, I wore a sweater and jeans on Saturday), but I’m not the only one who has noticed that fall is creeping into Green Bay. There’s something about the way the light changes, the way it slants a hair to the left, the way the rays sharpen the focus on everything until you start to feel like everything’s in High Def (or maybe BluRay, I have no idea what that looks like, though). My bloggy neighbor mentioned something similar, at almost the same moment that I was starting to suspect the change had started. Even so, I’ve noticed that the leaves have started getting that muddy deep green that happens right before they start to loose their chlorophyl.  My satisfaction at cleaning up the bedroom can assuredly be categorized as nesting. It seems as though mass merchandisers notice this phenomenon too, or maybe the home sections of the Target and Bed Bath and Beyond sales flyers only looked all salty and delicious to me alone, with those lacivious 8×10 rugs and those wanton slipper chairs. Soon, I predict I’ll be back to drooling over furniture porn, planning a road trip to Ikea, forgetting the screaming toddlers and the everpresent stench of cheap meatballs that permeates the epicenter (or Epicenttr). I haven’t even peaked at the latest copy of Metropolitan Home, haven’t checked Apartment Therapy in days, but soon, mon ami, so very soon. And already the very first harbinger: today I willingly put on a pair of socks. Good bye, summer girl, we hardly knew ye.