Life on Mars - You Can't Make This Sh-t Up

I haven't been posting my Life on Mars series lately. Honestly I think you would all be bored with the next door lady pulling everything out of her shed and leaving it in the yard, or the crazy guy fishing on a barely frozen lake, the youngest boy getting hit in the eye on a regular basis, or the ambulances coming to the next door neighbors at least once a month, maybe more. I know I get tired of it. And quite honestly, if it weren't for the photo's I like to take, I'm not sure I'd believe any of it either. But sad to say, it's all true.

Life here is - well - always unexpected. You would think that living on a lake in the country, it would be peaceful. And it does have it's moments. I think though, that there is something terribly wrong with the water here and it makes people a little odd. But even nature can have an unexplained and sometimes perilous sense of humor here.

Take today for example. Although I'm sure this happened earlier this week, because after we started swearing about it, the youngest boy declared that he TOLD us there was a tree on our house. We always get branches on the roof, so we just assumed that was what he was talking about, not an actual tree. But as I was shooting picture outside of my daughter wearing some lovely jackets she made, I glanced over my shoulder and saw this tree on our house. How did we miss a thing like that.

This is not a little tree. This is, I would say, a 30 foot pine that fell over and is leaning on our overhang, over my bedroom and reaching across the whole length of the house from front to back. One good wind or heavy snowfall and that sucker could snap in half and come crashing down. I have to write this story tonight, because I may not be here tomorrow to tell it. The insurance company is supposed to send out someone to remove it tomorrow. I hope they do. It's kind of scary.

Like I said, hard to believe sometimes, but you really can't make this stuff up.

Life on Mars - After the Fall

I haven't posted much lately. Not that I don't have time, or that my life has been uneventful. Far from it. I guess that Falling down the steps of the house, and the stiffness that came of it, just threw me out of whack.

It's been overt 2 weeks now, and all that remains is a 3" x 1 1/2" lump, a 3" diameter bruise over my tailbone, and a 3" X 7" bruise on my butt cheek. (Don't even think to visualize). The bruise on my elbow is barely noticeable.

I guess I was lucky, the wood on the back porch is kind of rotten and moldy and the steps get slippery when it rains. I usually hold the rails, but I was mad at the pup who peed in the kitchen and I was running her out cursing. Both my feet flew out from under me and fortunately I landed on my back near my hip on the edge of the stairs. I actually feel blessed, because it was a very hard fall, and my spine was just a few inches away. It could have been much worse.

Long story but short version, I tell the lady owner and she yells and swears at me. Then she comes over later  with sandpaper step treads (not really waterproof) and gets mad when we say that there is no way in hell that the sticky backing will stick to the moldy rotten steps. (I actually said it much nicer). Then her husband comes over and starts swearing at me and tells me he's going to raise the rent $100 a month and then tells me to leave, all because I fell down the stairs and told them I wasn't going to the hospital, because I didn't want them to have to claim in on their insurance. What a couple of freaks.




Other than that, we had a very late Halloween, due to Sandy. I'm sure some kids in Jersey haven't even had theirs yet. Emer dressed in gore and when Poppy posted the pics, friends thought it was another real accident. No Emer is not the accident prone one. Very realistic bullet hole, but once again Emer is entirely inappropriate as he wore this costume to the neighborhood where kids were shot at the High School last year.



Luna was an adorable little witch, but she wasn't very happy. She hates coats, shoes and hats.

The Dink is a Spy of some sort. Video Game character.

Puppy is growing. Business is post Halloween slow, but we're taking the opportunity to rearrange the house to better suit the needs of growing children with a school in the home. (moving the business into the living room instead of the bedroom), which means I get to move into a bedroom instead of the living room. Bottom bunk bed, but better than the living room sofa.