When I was in high school, my boyfriend gave me the Vampire Chronicles set of novels by Anne Rice for my birthday or for Christmas and I devoured them.  A couple of weeks ago, inspired by a renewed interest in vampire lore thanks to True Blood, I picked up Interview with the Vampire and reread the first fifty or so pages.  Isn’t it amazing how you’re brought back to another time and place while you read?

I think that the combination of working with words and pages for a living all day, and a lack of time at night has caused me to lose the ability to read.  Not literally, of course, but I seem to be missing the ability to sit and get lost, really lost in a good book the way I could as a kid.  I used to read novels by a night light in bed, long after my mom and dad and brother had gone to bed.  I would sit up in our back yard maple tree and become totally immersed in the books I brought up there to read.  Some kids called me a book worm and they were right.

This morning I had a solid hour to really lose myself in a book and it was terrific, like I was 17 again.  And now I’ve got Twilight sitting here on the coffee table.  I’m about to open it.  I may not be back for a few days…

(Tomorrow is the Blogger Holiday Cookie Party…it’s not to late to participate!)

(This is it! The end of NaBloPoMo!  And I did it!  Yay!)

Thursday was Graham’s last day at the job site he’s been working on.  He’s been working at a new Lowe’s store here, where they’ve recently begun to make their debut in Ontario.  You know, because Home Depot AND Rona aren’t enough, we also need to have Lowe’s to choose from when we need to buy, say, a new bath tub.

We knew that the job he was on was only going to be short term.  The company on the site was responsible for installing all of the shelving inside the new store, and Graham spent about a week and a half on a crew drilling holes into the concrete floor so the shelving could be bolted in place.  I was glad he was working indoors for a change, since on his previous job he was down in a muddy trench building concrete forms.

On his way home from the last day on the job Thursday, he wasted no time calling his union to let them know he’d been laid off, and asked to be put back on “The List”, which is what you do when you’re a carpenter, evidently.

When this whole process started for us, the end of one of Graham’s jobs was stressful for me.  I’m what you call a bit of a Control Freak (in case you didn’t notice), and if I can’t enter his income into my pretty little spreadsheet, I get nervous.  I’m getting used to a little bit of uncertainty where Graham’s job is concerned, though, so on Thursday when he came home and said he was an unemployed bum again (his words, not mine), I just shrugged.  I knew he’d be called as soon as a new job opening became available.  And it certainly helps to have the second restaurant income to keep us afloat in case the next job is a little while away.

Fortunately, the union called just yesterday and Graham will be going to work on a new job site on Monday, so he’ll only have missed a day’s wage.  It’s a new company, a new skill for him to learn, a new group of guys for him to meet and work with.  It’s actually quite amazing, this ability he has to be so flexible, so willing to tackle what is literally a new job every few months.  I’m extremely grateful that in a time and place in which many people are likely to lose their jobs (if they haven’t already), we will probably be able to maintain gainful employment for the foreseeable future.

In any event, I’m really proud of him for being so proactive about all of this, for his willingness to keep plodding along, to keep getting up at 5:00 in the morning to meet each new day with such a great attitude.  And he looks pretty cute in his coveralls, too.

]]> http://www.assertagirl.com/2008/11/29/my-husband-the-carpenter/feed/ 5 http://www.assertagirl.com/2008/11/28/the-annual-nablopomo-bulleted-list-post/ http://www.assertagirl.com/2008/11/28/the-annual-nablopomo-bulleted-list-post/#comments Fri, 28 Nov 2008 16:18:45 +0000 Amy http://www.assertagirl.com/?p=965 Continue reading →]]>

I’m working a split shift at the restaurant today (gotta leave the house in 20 minutes and my hair is still wet) so I’m not sure if I’ll be able to write something with a little more substance before the clock strikes midnight.

Instead, it’s the annual NaBloPoMo bulleted list post!

• I put $100 into our savings account today. It was really fun, more than I imagined it would be. It will also be fun to pay for having our roof done in cash when I’ve saved up enough by spring to do just that. Isn’t it weird how your idea of what is “fun” changes as you get older?
• Went to Costco yesterday and didn’t buy any vats of anything but did come home with a truckload of carbohydrates: cranberry orange loaf, multi-grain rolls and a giant rosemary foccacia. All of which made Graham hoot with delight.
• The Twilight book is INSIDE THE HOUSE. Her Bad Mother was kind enough to loan it to me yesterday but I haven’t started reading it yet. I walk by its place in the kitchen and eye it suspiciously. Will it really suck me in?
• I’m hoping to get our Christmas decorations down from the loft in the garage this weekend. My office is having a decorating challenge thing where employees get to take time during the day to decorate their cubicles. Work at home employees get to decorate their offices and send in photos. I have a little tree I’ll put up in this room to make things festive. Maybe I’ll stack piles of proofs beneath it in lieu of gifts.
• If you’re shopping in America today, well, you’re crazy. But I hope you have fun.

Happy (Black) Friday!

You know the Christmas season is officially upon you when twice in two days you’ve cleaned up cat vomit that was a little extra sparkly since it contained hacked up bits of glittery ribbon you used to wrap the stocking stuffers.

If you get a gift from me this Christmas, I can’t promise the ribbon and/or wrap won’t be half chewed off.

You’re probably sick and tired of hearing about me whine about how I want a new house.  Well, that’s all I’ve got for today.  That, and the fact it’s just four weeks until Christmas Eve.  Yikes!

The good news on the house front is that our current mortgage has a portability option on it.  The bad news is that we’d still need a 5% down payment and who knows where that will come from?  It would have to come from savings, I guess, which would mean we’d have to wait longer than I’d like to make the move.  I guess I could pick up some more shifts at the restaurant.  I already smell like pizza three nights a week.  Why not make it four?

I promise I’ll try not to go on and on and on and on about the house thing, but it’s a little difficult when it’s almost all I can think about.  I keep imagining us there inside that house, Graham in the family room while I make dinner, the fireplace glowing in the corner…

I’d also just like to mention that I finally got around to setting up my review site, Assertagirl Reviews.  Feel free to check it out if you’re into reading about cleaning products and other household items that come my way.  For my Canadian readers, I’ll be posting some comments there about new President’s Choice holiday products in time for Christmas cooking and entertaining very soon.

And don’t forget…the Blogger Holiday Cookie Party is on December 1st!  Post your recipe and a badge in the next week or so to participate.