It's been a while since I posted about cancer, so I figured it was time. Here goes.

Cancer is dumb.

There you go.

Seriously, I mean it. It's dumb. And once it's there, the person who has it has to live with the fact that it may come back at any time, so there's always a shadow hanging over everybody. And when you have multiple people in one family with it, especially when it's different kinds with different treatments, it's even scarier because you know what the treatments they haven't had do, and you wonder if they're going to have to do that next. Or who it will hit next.

Ugh.

So every time there's a checkup, it's scary. And every time somebody gets a cold, it's scary. When they feel more tired than usual or get what used to be anormal kind of illness, it's scary. It's just scary all the time.

Also, you remember all life events as either before the cancer or after the cancer, and the person becomes defined as the person with X kind of cancer, which is super awful.

So, cancer is dumb and I hate it.

A lot.

The end.

The following is a post about bodily functions. If you are easily offended by fart talk, you might want to skip reading this one.

I am working by myself in the office, and it smells like farts in here.

I am not farting.

Now, granted, I have been known to let one loose on occasion, but today I just haven't felt like it was necessary. Yet.

Every few minutes, though, I get a distinct whiff of pretty strong fart smell, and it's making me a little queasy because it's pretty burly. Like, cabbage, old socks and cow poop mixed into a nose-burning aroma that keeps getting sprayed in here.

BUT IT'S JUST ME TODAY.

Is there a fart ghost? Am I being haunted? If so, that's messed up. Worst kind of ghost I've ever imagined. 

Also, if it's fart smell from someone working in the other part of the office, they should patent that and use it as some kind of non-deadly (as far as I know) chemical weapon to subdue people who need to be, you know, subdued.

If it was me, I'd calm right down if I was threatened with this kind of nasal assault. It would really only take one time, and then I would totally behave forever.

I can't figure this out. How is it getting in here? Everyone else is so far away. Seriously.

There is one person whom I suspect is the culprit, but I can't figure out how she's spreading that holiday cheer up in my neighborhood. She hasn't even been near the door to my office. I really can't fathom her farts (which are truly impressive both in smell and longevity) traveling the amount of distance necessary to reek up the entire joint this way. 

I guess I'll never know.

For the love of Mike, guys, make it stop. My nose is extremely offended. Unsafe work environment. For reals.

I have to do a shoutout to my parents. After the events of the last 39 years, I feel like a blog post is the least I can do.

My parents did not want two kids, but I surprised them anyway, and they've always made me feel like an integral part of the Riedel experience, even though I was obviously deposited into my mother's baby growing area by aliens who have spent the last few decades guffawing at our family photos because, yeah.

I was the messiest child an OCD mother could've imagined, always crafting it up and such, and never really getting my dishes into the sink. They let me live, and never gave me crap because I had to create. They just tried to contain the tornado of Pegasus drawings and woodcrafts and scarves.

Ha ha ha. There's no containing that. Good try, though.

When it became apparent that I needed to have a career in the arts, and would therefore live on their couch forever, they never said an unencouraging word. They backed me up in every way, even when I chose the section of the arts that is the worst choice a bookwormy introvert could make. They got me trained up for my weird singing choice and always say super nice stuff. My dad even hooks me up sometimes with photos of performances in which I look decent. I know. It's amazing.

My parents are going through so much sicky barftasticness right now, and they remain kind, encouraging, and supportive. My mom even kept her sobbing down to five minutes when we broke the news about moving away so we could have a try at our dream house.

Really. Only the one time for five minutes and then she kept it together. Even when we moved into her house, made a nuisance of ourselves for three weeks, and then left again.

Everywhere I go, if they know my parents in the place, I hear about how special they are. And not just by people who want to kiss my butt because I'm fancy now. Every. Body. It's crazy.

But they are. And they are accepting and love all of our friends and never judge us, even when we do dumb things. Let's face facts: That happens A LOT.

(Just to clarify, that doesn't mean they don't give us crap...that is their right and privilege, and I would never want to take that away from them...that's the price you pay, man.)

So, mom and dad, who don't read this blog anyway so I can say what I want, thank you. Thank you for letting me be myself, even when myself is a mess. I love you right back.

As of today, we've been in our new house a month! We are really loving it, but there are some things to get used to.

First of all, the blinds in the bedroom are not blackout blinds. That means that by 6:30, the bedroom is fully light. Ugh. Sometimes on weekends, I like to sleep until 7:30. We are going to need to get some new window coverings. I need that extra hour.

Secondly, the tile floor has these weird random little black spots on it. They drive me crazy because I think, "MOUSE POOP!!!" and then I run and get all of my cleaning gear (mask, Lysol, gloves, hazard suit, you know, all the stuff normal people put on to clean up one tiny piece of excrement), and then I realize it's a spot on the floor. But, I guess, better safe than sorry.

The weirdest thing of all is the dark. We are from a tiny town. Tiny. No night life at all, and our street didn't have a light on it or anything, so I'm used to it getting pretty dark at night. Nothing like here, though. Last night I drove home from a late rehearsal, and I was honestly nervous that I would pull into the wrong driveway. It gets a level of dark here that is a little freaky. Definitely opens up possibilities for an alien invasion, I tell you.

Otherwise, it's been great. Santa Fe is an amazing town and we love being a little more out in the "country" even though we're closer to the city. The extra land is totally worth the drive every day. Except at 4:45 am. Then I hate it a little.

But only until I've had my coffee. Then it's good again.

Okay, story time.

So we bought this beautiful house that was in our price range because it's never been updated. Like, 1990s oak cabinets and pink and purple tile on the kitchen wall and the floors are Saltillo-looking tile that is cracked and needs to be stripped and sealed.

But, really, that's all cosmetic. Plus, I don't want to pay for somebody's home improvement projects. I'd rather wait and pick good quality stuff myself and then have exactly what we like. At any rate, all of the remodeling we saw around here didn't go with the style of the houses so it looked weird and crappy.

At any rate, we bought a solid house that needs a little work. So that's what we were expecting.

Then we closed and got in here. Wowzers.

Nothing major, still, but, holy crap, the mice had a party. Like, a Taco Bell and beer party and everyone missed the toilet. 

I know. Gross. But there was SO MUCH POOP.

We were off for a week to clean, but before that I came down for a couple of afternoons to just get started, and I'm really glad I did. When they stopped renting the house and decided to sell, no one was in here for a good long time. And they had some places where the mice could get in, so they just came on in and made themselves at home for what appeared to be a while.

A long while. So much poop. So. Much.

Have I mentioned poop?

And the pee. I think the pee is worse because at least you can see all of the poop and get rid of it, but the pee is in places you can't see or get to, and the smell doesn't go away once it dries out. 

So, anyway, once they were ready to start showing, they had a pest company come in and seal up the house, so no more mice were coming in, but they didn't clean up the mess. Not at all. So that's what I was contending with.

I know, we live in the country, sort of, dirt road and all. There will be mice. That's fine, as long as they stay off my roof and out of my house. Because they pee on the roof, too, and that also stinks.

Seriously. I cleaned up mouse pee for a solid week. So much P.U. and there were always new areas popping up that I didn't find before. And if you know me, you know that I can't handle smells. If the world smelled like bleach, my job would be done.

I feel like we've finally gotten the pee situation under control, but I still go through the house on alert, just in case I missed something. It was EVERYWHERE. The kitchen alone took a solid three days of heavy scrubbing, and I felt like my arms would fall off before I was done.

Still worth it, though. I love this house so much. Look at this view! AAAAHHHH!!! Feels like we've finally found our way home.

I'm back.

Yep, try to stay calm. I will, too.

Basically, my old iPad died and I forgot how to log in and I didn't want to reset my password because I knew it was a really good one (obviously, as I couldn't remember it for like six weeks). So then I all of a sudden just remembered and decided to go for it.

Everything has changed since the last time I logged on, but whoa. It's all pretty darn good.

Not to say it was easy.

The month from the middle of June to the middle of July was probably the hottest, sweatiest, grossest month of my life. To start with, it was like a billion degrees. A billion. And after we moved out of our beautiful little house into my parents' house, the lovely air conditioned paradise we had created was just gone.

My parents, who are awesome and let us stay with them a few weeks while we closed on our houses and got the new one cleaned (that is a whole post in itself....for reals....barftastic), do not like the arctic atmosphere that we prefer. Plus, we were doing a lot of hauling, lifting, moving, cleaning, you know, all that delightful stuff to do during a massively hot summer.

This is all to say that there was a lot of sweat and bad hair. I also got pimples, which is weird, and gained a few more pounds because I just gave up on working out and eating vegetables. Lovely plan, me.

Nevertheless, we kept going and after a couple of weeks of cleaning, scrubbing, unpacking, and dealing with contractors (who were fantastic, which is a miracle in itself), we are now living in our dream house and pretty excited to be here.

Really. No sarcasm. It's unbelievable that we get to be here.

Next time, though, stories. Gross, gross stories.

Oh my goodness gracious.

The last couple of weeks have been super rough. The move is moving right along, boxes are packed and ready to go, our room at my parents' house is almost ready, and the concert I've been preparing for is now over, and it went very well.

But last week, our birdy girl got sick, and I absolutely lost my mind.

Quite seriously. It was awful. I uncovered her cage one morning to find her fluffed up in the corner and shutting her eyes. For those who aren't familiar with birds, that's really unusual behavior. She also barfed up seed on Andrew. That was pretty weird, too.

We had an anxious day and night, then my Dad and I took her to the vet the next morning. 

It's terrible how few vets see small non-mammals. Even the emergency vet couldn't see her. So we had to wait, which ended up being okay, because the vet we took her to was fantastic.

It turns out that the longer days, combined with extra cuddling time (which I thought would help her be less stressed during the move) were stimulating her to lay eggs. That, combined with the stress of moving furniture and all, made for a very hormonal, stressed out, and wanting to mate kiddo.

Yes, the bird wanted to start a family. With me.

So I went home, did some research, and discovered all the things I've been doing wrong. Tickling her birdie armpits? Wrong. Feeding a seed diet? Wrong. And most wrong of all was my bobbing my head at her when she bobbed her head at me. That's basically bird speak for, "Hey baby. Let's make some eggs."

Yeeeeaaaahhhhhh. 

So I stopped all that, we changed her diet, and we are keeping her room a little warmer and giving her more dark time. That's it. And she's back to her old self. Well, except that the petting is at a minimum because it's baby-making season and we're being careful, so sometimes we have some hurt feelings. Otherwise, it's going great.

Thank God. It was just too much there, for a bit.

Now back to stressing about the move. Woohoo!