by Kathy Brasby | Jul 28, 2015 | Stories
This ugly house had all sorts of surprises. The good ones included finding hardwood floors under the tattered carpet. The bad ones included finding the ceiling collapsed on the floor in the basement bathroom.
Ugly houses are often that way, with surprises at every turn.
Where the paint was chipped, we found pea green underneath. Who’d paint their living room that color? I mean all the walls, not just an accent wall.
As a contrast, the hallway was painted Pepto-Bismol pink.
Surprise!
You get the idea.
The dining room had a small storage door about four feet above the floor which I assumed was a coat closet. I know you’re ahead of me on this one so you already know it wasn’t a coat closet.
Inside was a small chamber with three stairs starting at the front and rising to the back, neatly wrapped in fresh carpet like a furry Christmas gift. No ribbon.
The problem was the stairs filled the compartment, ending at the top.
I’ve seen stairs that were steeper than climbing a 14,000’ mountain. I’ve seen stairs where the paint had long worn away by many trudging feet. I’ve seen stairs that wound around a pole from basement to loft.
But I had never before seen this: the stairway to nowhere.
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by Kathy Brasby | Jul 24, 2015 | Stories
We were looking for a church home. Our five-year-old son was looking for heaven.Which he found at the church we visited.
It had many children to play with plus a huge box of donuts sitting on a table, free for the taking. This was his definition of heaven.
When the service began, he joined us but, before the second song, he headed to the back. His father followed and found him in the bathroom, heaving his breakfast.
“Are you OK?” my husband asked.
He was. He washed his face, straightened his shoulders, and nodded.
“What happened? Are you sick?”
Our son shook his head. “No, I ate too many donuts.”
“How many did you eat?”
“Seven.”
His father laughed. “Wow.” And then he seized the parenting moment. “So did you learn anything from this little episode?”
“Yep,” he said. “Stop at six.”
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by Kathy Brasby | Jul 21, 2015 | Stories
Buying an old house is a little like the first vacation after you get married: you’re not really sure what you’ll discover there.
But that hasn’t slowed my husband and me. I am referring to buying old houses. Our first vacation is so far behind us that we can actually laugh about all those expectations.
Because my husband is a construction genius, we like the ugly houses that we can either renovate and flip or remodel and rent out.
We bought the house on Beaver Avenue through an eviction/foreclosure. The contents of the house had been hauled out to the garage with the door left open. The idea was that people could rummage through the stuff and take what they wanted.
In the six months before the house was sold to us, nobody went through the stuff. Not only do we live in a small town, we live in a pretty honest small town.
That meant that the garage contents were ours. Yippee. If the previous tenants didn’t want them and the neighbors wouldn’t loot them, we knew we’d find some real treasures.
So we began the sorting process.
Would you believe we found a tattered wedding album and an x-ray among the treasures?
It was like an archeological dig but without the little brushes and tomb curses. As the slave labor (OK, they were our kids but that’s what they called themselves) dug their way through the pile, they picked up a scent.
“Maybe it’s a body,” said the boy. He was always good for a new explosion or creative bloodshed.
His sister wasn’t intimidated. “Hope it’s on your side,” she said.
They tossed aside more trash and dug deeper into the garage. The smell morphed into a definite stink.
When it crossed over from stink to stench, they bailed.
That’s what mothers are for, right?
So I donned mask and gloves for the final exploration. Some yo-yo (and I’m being really nice here) had pulled a frozen turkey out of the freezer at the eviction, wrapped it in a plastic bag, and left it in a trash can at the back of the garage. For six months.
Buying an old house isn’t a vacation after all. It might be about tomb curses, though.
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by Kathy Brasby | Jul 14, 2015 | Stories
I have a friend who claims to love doing laundry. She’s still my friend, which, I hope, reveals a ton about my tolerance level.
My children were all instructed in the operation of our washing machine so that, by the time they could climb, they could do their own laundry.
A result of teaching the kids to do their own laundry is that they now can use their bedroom dresser drawers for books and computer programs because those drawers never see clothes. They draw clean clothes from the laundry baskets.
At least that’s the theory. Sometimes clean and dirty co-mingle on the floor.
I did mention I’m tolerant, right?
I cannot blame my upbringing for this laundry tolerance. My mother was a Type-A laundrist. A laundrist is someone who takes the chore of laundry seriously. Even to the point of folding and stashing clothes on the same day they were washed.
I’ve resisted such nonsense.
One day my husband came home with a story about the wife of one of his customers who ironed all her husband’s underwear. It wasn’t a hint. My husband has no illusions about my laundry abilities.
I don’t even fold my own underwear. Why would I iron his?
But recently our washing machine went belly up and my husband decided he wanted a front-loading set, those new energy-efficient machines that should save water and electricity.
So we have a new set with portholes facing into our laundry room. My husband is bummed that the dryer doesn’t fold the clothes, but he’s adjusting. I’m bummed the clothes don’t come out on hangers. I’m adjusting, too.
But I do have one concern. Our grandson, at 18 months, now likes to stand at the glass windows and watch the clothes tumble.
And I’m worried that this might be planting the seeds of a whole new generation of laundrists.
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by Kathy Brasby | Jul 7, 2015 | Stories
If it wasn’t for Jeff Huddlestern, I might think my calendar was absolutely perfect.
I am not one of those people who alphabetizes their to-do list and writes down the content of their chest freezer.
But I do keep a meticulous calendar.
Finding a calendar that synched between my computer, my phone, and my tablet was perfect because I have a tendency to lose those cute paper calendars that fit in your purse or pocket. Apparently, those climb on some shelf in my office and then flatten themselves under a stack of books for about four years when they leap onto the top of my desk to announce that I’ve forgotten that dentist appointment in 2012.
My ears still sting from the piano teacher who reamed me after the fourth time in three months that I forgot to take the kids to lessons.
I’m not bitter. I’m desperate.
But these days you’d be so proud. I can log in my next lunch appointment on my smartphone while sitting at the table with my friend and I can send her an email reminder before we pay the check. When I get home, my computer calendar already knows about the next lunch date.
And here’s the best part: I can set alarms to kick me out the door for an appointment. Think military boot kicks.
So I’ve been sashaying around doing the “yeeeesssss” dance just like the football guys after a touchdown. I may not be organized but I had this.
Until Jeff Huddlestern showed up on my calendar.
And Simon Jettison and Terry Montgomery.
Who are these people?
Exactly my point. I do not know.
Why would these unknown people plant their birthdays on my calendar? I think they joined me when Corpus Christi popped up on my calendar.
But I can cope. The alerts still work. My lunch appointment is still logged in. I didn’t lose the family birthdays.
My calendar system is good but I’ve quit doing the victory sashay.
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by Kathy Brasby | Jun 30, 2015 | Stories
My rich uncle in Nigeria – the one who wanted to help me inherit the million bucks – appears to have abandoned me. So has the thoughtful lady who emailed me stating that my resume is so impressive that she’ll send me money just for laundering hers.
That’s an impressive resume, but I digress.
Recently I got an email from my sweet employer informing me that I am eligible to get some of my pay in advance. “We know it has been a difficult month for everyone, so this is to make life that little bit easier.”
And who hasn’t had a difficult month? Wow, I mean I dropped an old glass in the kitchen and had to sweep up the broken pieces. Plus the mailman was late one day and I had to go to the mailbox twice. And, as the final straw, the last lightbulb went out above our dining room table.
I needed this.
My boss also included a link that contained “goldbar.” Who would question that?
I only had to verify that this was my account. I glanced to the top of the email, where I was clearly identified as “Hello.“ And there was the link again, with the gold bar buried in between a menagerie of letters and numbers.
Dollar signs were doing the cha-cha before my eyes.
Just for clicking that link, I would receive over $2,890 with the rest transferred at the end of the month as normal. Heh, heh, my boss had obviously forgotten that the last time I’d gotten a check for over $2,890 it was for the quarter, not the month.
But this was my account and this was my thoughtful employer. And there was the gold bar.
All I had to do was click a link.
My mouse hovered. My mind spun. And then I remembered. I’m self-employed.
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