Moms on strike

Today I checked out an amazing blog post by Holly Robinson, a freelance writer who works from home. A mom of three, ages 6 -16, she went on strike to show her family what it is, exactly, that she does around the house.

It’s a long, detailed description of how the seven days she spent on strike went, and it got me thinking. I would love to go on strike, so my husband could see how much housework and what not I do around the house.

Sure, he’s pretty good at keeping up with dishes, he cooks (more than me, usually), he mows the lawn and keeps up our car maintenance. Outside of those things, though, he doesn’t really DO anything around the house. He plays with Hannah (age 2) and our pets, but mostly he plays video games or whatever. I just had to explain to him why you can’t let Hannah stay up in her room for 30 minutes after she wakes up from a nap because she trashes her bedroom. She’s two, and she’s bored, for Pete’s sake! What else is she going to do?

I am usually the one to clean the kitchen, sweep, vacuum (though he’s been better about that since being home on summer vacation), and I’m the only one that does laundry. In his defense, he did fix the washer when it was broken, and he’s kind of a “d0-it-yourself-er,” because he’s tiled two floors in our house, and has the ambition to remodel our bathroom soon. Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s great. But sometimes it makes me want to go on strike too.

He claims he “doesn’t see”  the clutter that’s in our house. I would be the first one to believe that. I can’t tell you the number of times he’s walked by piles of clothes and not done anything about it. But I’d love to not do anything for a week and see what happens.

Oh sure, I’d still go to my job, but I mean not do anything around the house. No cooking, no cleaning, no laundry, no feeding the pets, no shopping. I’ll play with my daughter, but the discipline and everything? That would be all him. I would get to be the one to go out two or three nights a week, instead of him going to a rehearsal, I would just go out with a friend or something and let him do everything at home.

I don’t think I’d have the conviction to stick to it though. I guess this just means that we should talk about some of that stuff. Who knows, maybe I’ll get home today, and the new storm windows will be installed on my upstairs windows and the broken screen in the front of the house will be fixed. All without prompting. Maybe.

At the moment...

So, Wednesday afternoon, my mom calls me up and starts launching off on me about how I shouldn't be selling myself short and that I can do so much more than substitute teach, blah, blah, blah. Finally, I had hit my breaking point, and I let it all out, telling her that she shouldn't be worrying about me, we wouldn't have made the decision for me to leave my job if we hadn't know what we'd be in for, that I have been looking for a job, my plan wasn't to substitute teach for the rest of my life... so on and so forth. I finally just told her that she and my dad need to stop calling me up and making me feel like crap because I got myself out of a bad situation, in which I was calling in to work sick more often than I had sick days, that I was dreading getting up and going to work, and that since I had left my job, I had actively been looking for a new one, but that I wanted to find something I would be happy with, because I didn't want a bunch of jobs that I stayed at for 6 months to a year on my résumé, since that makes me look unreliable. Finally she just said that they would stop worrying about me. I doubt that's the case, but at least I haven't heard from them since that day. I was thinking about calling my mom this morning, but part of me doesn't really want to do that. I am tired of them thinking that I made a bad choice and that all this horrible stuff will happen because of it. I don't believe I did make a bad choice, because (surprise, surprise) I haven't been sick since I left my job. I like being able to sleep at night not worrying about my caseload. I've got some ideas of what I want to do, it's just a matter of being able to implement them.

Thursday I subbed in an elementary school. I had a pretty good time, but I was subbing for a special ed teacher that usually pulls the kids out of the classroom, so I really just went into the room and sat with them. It made for a kind of boring day. Then, the classroom teacher of the room I was supposed to be in for the last two hours of the day told me that she didn't need me there, so I sat in the Sp. Ed. office and read a book for two hours. I couldn't do anything on the computer, because one of the other Sp. Ed. teachers yelled at me for being on it.

Yesterday, John had a teacher workshop day, so I didn't have to go in again. I went grocery shopping and got my hair trimmed. I always feel better after I do that, so I'm definitely more pumped up again. Tomorrow I'll pick up the Sunday paper to look for some jobs again. I'm not sure what John and I are going to do today, but we've got to find something. Last weekend, we did nothing, and I was SOOOO bored. John played FFIX most of the day Saturday, but that just isn't something I can do - I can't sit in front of a video game for 5 hours at a time. Hopefully today we'll find something to do.

Anyway - breakfast time...

My new glasses...

So I have a whole new look =) I got some new glasses today, which I'm exceptionally excited about. They're much different than any that I've had before, which makes me happy, but they're not totally wacky looking like some that I tried on today. I don't have any photos of me wearing them, yet, but when I do, I promise to post. But I'm really excited about them, because I'm going to be wearing them much more often. Granted, I will still be wearing my contacts, but my contacts can be really expensive, so I'm trying to mitigate the cost slightly by wearing my glasses more, so I had to get some I really wanted to wear. John says he likes them, which is important to me, because no one wants to be married to someone who doesn't want to look at them anymore!

Our basement has finally stopped flooding, as well, which is exceptionally exciting! My father in law is going to be coming over to help John with the pump on Friday (I'll be far, far away, shopping at the Christmas Tree Shop with Kim!) and hopefully that should be the last of it. John wants to wait until the end of November to put the room back together, but I say the sooner the better! I found this new flooring online that looks like it could be a good idea. One of my moms coworkers daughters used it in her basement, and they love it, because if anything happens to their basement, they don't have to pull it up and it doesn't get wrecked. So I think we should look into that.

John and I are a little upset about the way plans for Christmas have been unfolding lately. We were discussing with our respective families this weekend about how we are having everyone over for Christmas (I know, it's early to be planning yet, but it's good to know where everyone will be for the holidays) and right away his mom starts in with "Well, how are we going to do gifts, what if Melissa's parents get us something?" and so on and so forth. So then I'm talking to my mom, and she's all "Well, we'll just give you your gifts another time, and we'll just have a nice dinner and visit on Christmas." And I'm all "HOLD UP!" This is NOT how Christmas is supposed to work. Tell me if this makes sense: Have Christmas with your respective immediate families (opening gifts, whatever it is you do), then everyone gets together and opens presents together. The Streeters don't buy for the Cardins, the Cardin's don't buy for the Streeters, and John and I are just left in the middle. Does that make sense to everyone else?

Anyway, I'm going to go watch the Patriots game now. Catch y'all later.

Carpet in the basement

Last week was a rough one at work, and it's only going to get worse. I've been filing on a lot of families lately, and I actually have to trials to testify in next month. Not excited about that at all.
Friday night I got home from work and let Kane out of his crate, only to discover that our carpet in the den in the basement was totally soaked - and I mean soaked. We went into the unfinished part of the room and there was water everywhere, but we couldn't figure out where it had been coming from because it was all in the middle of the room. So we spent a good portion of Saturday night drying it out. We were up until 11:30 or so working on it. We had FINALLY started to make some headway, so we went to bed. The next morning I got up, went to let Kane out, and SPLASH!! Right down into the den. Oh. My. God. So I let Kane out, and the floor is TOTALLY soaked again. I mean absolutely DRENCHED. Fortunately nothing has been ruined, except maybe the carpet. So we go to church, then we went to Home Depot to get a new wet/dry vac, because we were borrowing my dads. His didn't have any attachments with it, so we sent it back to him with my sister that night. John sucked over 14 gallons of water out of the carpet alone, and it was STILL soaked. And I should add that it wasn't even the whole carpet that was wet, just around the edges of the room, but it was coming out from the wall like 2 feet or more in some places.
We can't figure out where the water is coming from or anything. So we called the insurance company and we had these people over today to dry out the basement. They said we did a good job mitigating it, but they ended up ripping up the carpet so the floor could try out, as well as the walls. They'll be back on Wednesday to pick up the 5 industrial fans and the industrial dehumidifier. I can't wait to see our electric bill for October. Ugh.
Anyway, I'll keep the world updated when I find out more from the plumber. I need to go pick up some stuff before he gets here.

Random Thoughts

Sometimes I wonder what my life would be like if I had done things differently. Now, don't get me wrong, I am very, VERY happy with my life right now. I love my husband and my house and wouldn't trade them for anything! But yesterday I was walking through downtown Portsmouth on my way to a home visit for work, and I walked past this apartment building that really made me wonder what my life would have been like if, say, I'd gone to college in a different town, or if John and I didn't reconnect and eventually fall in love, etc. It was this big ol' brick building, the kind you would see in Boston, or Washington D.C. Okay, definitely don't get me wrong, I really don't want to live in either of those places, but you get what I mean, right?

Sometimes I wonder if my life had been done differently if I would have better stayed in touch with my friends from high school and/or college. I feel like the people I was such good friends with and I have drifted apart so much that I don't really know anything about them anymore, but I feel like I should be so much more in touch with them. Maybe some of it has to do with my recent discovery of the anxiety I have when I go out.

That's a whole different story though. I've recently started paying more attention to(though I've been aware of it for some time) the almost paralyzing anxiety I get when I go out somewhere, ususally by myself. There are some places that I don't get it - my next door neighbors house, work, church, church related meetings, out with a friend (so long as it's something that I initiate). But that's about it! But I'm okay when it comes to having people over. It's really bizarre.

Work was awful today. One of my clients was arrested last night. Another one was indicted on perjury charges. It seems like every time I turn around one of my assessments is blowing up, or I'm getting a new one to add to my caseload of... well 17 currently. Then if that's not bad enough, I'm getting yelled at by my supervisor because I was out sick all last week and my supervisor was yelling at me today about how I've got to make time in my day tomorrow to see three families. That's not so much the issue, as I've got to be at RCIA at 7pm. I really need to be there because I missed last week due to being ill and I CAN'T miss this week. I was, and am, really excited about being on the team this year that when I told my supervisor that it was going to be hard to fit all of that in because I need to be in Dover at 7pm and she said "Well, I guess you'll have to make it work." Or something to that effect. I came home totally ready to cry and I'm SO ready to be done with this. I just can't continue like this.

Anyway, that's enough ranting and raving for tonight. Oh, I'm having a jewelry party on Oct. 11th at 7pm. Its a Wednesday. If you're interested in coming, just e-mail me an RSVP so I can plan enough snacks.

My "Holiday" Editorial

Okay, normally, I LOVE Christsmas. Love everything about Christmas, the snow, the songs, the trees, the food... all of it. BUT, this is really starting to get me irritated.

Christmas vs. Holiday.

What the hell is this all about anyway? Holiday trees? So, what, we put them up for the 4th of July too? Ooh, or maybe for Labor Day! Better yet, Arbor Day! Hey, they're holiday TREES, so why not use them to celebrate Arbor day? Like one of my coworkers said (and no offense meant to anyone who reads this and is Jewish), "We don't call a menorah 'Holiday candles.'" Or, as the woman said on CNN said, "Maybe we should stop calling Veterans Day Veterans Day because not everyone in the country is a veteran."
"The Boston Christmas tree situation is symbolic of what's happening ... around the country," said Mathew Staver, president and general counsel of Liberty Counsel. "Government officials, either because of misinformation, or private retailers, for politically correct reasons, are trying to secularize Christmas. "To rename a Christmas tree as a holiday tree is as offensive as renaming a Jewish menorah a candlestick," Mr. Staver said. (Taken from: http://washingtontimes.com/metro/20051129-120703-5977r.htm)

I told John the other day, this country has become so politically correct, it's offensive. Lowe's, the home improvement store, decided to advertise selling Holiday trees (see this referenced story here: http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=47634), yet the banner on the front of the store said in Spanish that they were selling Christmas trees. Go figure. "The American Family Association says its supporters contacted Lowe's to express their displeasure. The company responded in a statement: 'To ensure consistency of our message and to avoid confusion among our customers, we are now referring to the trees only as 'Christmas Trees.' We have also removed a banner that read 'Holiday Trees' from the front of our stores.'"

"'It's good to know Lowe's is a company that listens to their customers, a rarity in today's politically correct retail marketplace,' [AFA President Tim Wildmon] said. Wildmon added, 'Since they can't take Christ out of Christmas, many national retailers are trying to simply do away with Christmas.'"

Can't take Christ out of Christmas? Why the heck would you WANT to?! Every holiday has it's basis in something. This one just happens to be based in the Christian faith!

In Boston, the furor of changing the name of the city's Christmas tree to a Holiday tree was intense. "The Nova Scotia logger who cut down the 48-foot (14-meter) tree was indignant and said he would not have donated the tree if he had known of the name change.

'I'd have cut it down and put it through the chipper,' Donnie Hatt told a Canadian newspaper. 'If they decide it should be a holiday tree, I'll tell them to send it back. If it was a holiday tree, you might as well put it up at Easter.'" (See the story here: http://today.reuters.com/news/newsarticle.aspx?type=domesticNews&storyid=2005-11-25T225326Z_01_KRA582362_RTRUKOC_0_US-LIFE-TREE.xml&rpc=22) "Boston Mayor Thomas Menino said he would keep calling the Nova Scotia spruce a "Christmas tree" regardless of what it said on the city's official Web site. 'I grew up with a Christmas tree, I'm going to stay with a Christmas tree,' Menino told reporters on Thursday."

The following came from this website: http://washingtontimes.com/metro/20051129-120703-5977r.htm
Calling a Christmas tree a Christmas tree has become a politically charged prospect in jurisdictions across the country -- from Boston to Sacramento and in dozens of communities in between.
"It's a growing problem," said Jared N. Leland, spokesman and legal counsel for the Becket Fund, a District-based legal and educational institute. "Celebrating the season with Christmas trees ... and leaving them named 'Christmas' is simply recognizing the religious nature of people. Christmas should be able to be called Christmas."

But enough from what the newspapers and online articles have to say about everything. Thanks to some guy on the raido Friday, I'm even over the use of X-mas instead of Christmas. Apparently the use of that came from the Greek, as the letter Chi (pronounced ki) is written looking like the letter X, and is equvalent to the letters "Ch" in English. Therefore, it was just shortened.
I know most of this stuff is about the difference between a Christmas tree and a holiday tree. That's probably because that's where most of the argument has been. But let me tell you what I believe:
I believe that everyone has the right to celebrate the holiday of their choosing without fear of offending someone else.
I believe that Christmas should (and will!) always remain Christmas, regardless of what people try to do with it.
I believe that people can put a wreath, or a Merry Christmas doormat or a menorah in a highly visible spot and not have to feel threatened by doing it.
I believe that people who see that wreath, the Merry Christmas doormat or a menorah have enough moral values to know they are a symbol of the holiday that the person they belong to choose to celebrate and will respect them.
I believe in Christ, therefore, I believe in Christmas and the spirit of Christmas.
And, I believe that Dave Barry put it best when he said "In the old days, it was not called the Holiday Season; the Christians called it 'Christmas' and went to church; the Jews called it 'Hanukkah' and went to synagogue; the atheists went to parties and drank. People passing each other on the street would say 'Merry Christmas!' or 'Happy Hanukkah!' or (to the atheists) 'Look out for the wall!'"

Life As We Know It

Okay, so I realized this morning that my graduation date from UNH was 14 weeks ago. I still haven't recieved my diploma, and I'm a little irritated about this. It's not like I NEED to have it, but it would be nice being officially done with them for now, and knowing that I actually have a degree. It's making me a little nervous that maybe something happened and I'm one credit away from actually having my degree. That would SUCK! Anyway, if any of you had this issue when you finished up at UNH, please let me know so I can know to not be that worried.
Next, I decided this weekend to quit my job. It's just time for me to move on. I'm going to give my notice tomorrow and my last day will be 12/23. That way, I can fully enjoy my Christmas, and then take some time to really enjoy my Christmas and New Years. Then, I'm going to start substitute teaching and if that doesn't work out, find a job somewhere else. The state has only 51 days left to get me a job (but who's counting, right?), so I'm not going to hold my breath much longer.
There really isn't much more for me to update, other than those two things... At least, I can't think of anything at the moment. I'm trying to figure out why all of a sudden I can't put images into my livejournal, so forgive me if all of a sudden my posts look weird. I guess that's it for now.

Another Ranting Entry

So yesterday I get this call from the Manchester DCYF. "Hi Melissa? This is Marie Noonan. Is now a good time?" So I take the call in the conference room at work so that 1) I'm not tying up the shared phone in the medical records room and 2) So that if she's calling to offer me the job, I won't be all thrilled in front of everyone and if she's calling to turn me down for the job I won't burst into tears in front of everyone. So I get back on the phone and she's like "Well, I'm sorry to have to do this on a Friday and while you're at work..." so my next thought is "f*** you, call me at home on Thursday then." And she starts in about how they're not going to hire me because "despite having gone through 7 months of an internship and 13 core trainings, or whatever it was" - VER BATIM - they "didn't feel I had come to grasp what the mission of DCYF is" and so on and so forth. Then she goes on to tell me that part of it was because I didn't discuss safety for the children and safety plans and so on, which is bullshit because I KNOW I talked about safety and stuff - they DIRECTLY ASKED ME ABOUT IT! I'm so fed up with this whole thing. How in God's name can you give someone a grant to pay for all of their tuition and mandatory student fees and then, when the whole thing is over, be like "ha ha, we were just kidding, we didn't really thing you'd be good at child protective service work anyway." Like I told my mom, no wonder the Manchester office has such a high turn over rate - no one wants to deal with a supervisor that's going to talk to her co-workers that way.
I went on about this forever with John last night. I'm starting to develop a complex from all of this, starting to think that I really must be an awful social worker. I really do think that I must suck at it and I've totally missed my calling. Well, if that's the case, I don't know what the hell my calling was, because I didn't even hear the phone ring, let alone missed the call.
My mother just called me. I'm 24 years old and married. I think I know how to dress myself to go to a craft fair. She's like "So many people have been asking if you're going to be there today! You might want to wear something a little nicer than jeans!" And I'm like "Mom, I wear something nicer than jeans to work every day. I'm not wearing anything other THAN jeans to this thing today." You know, if I could take it back telling my mom that I was going to the craft fair at her church today, I would, and I would go over to the one at the Dover High School instead. Call up Bonnie - "Hey! What's on the agenda for today? Want to hit up a huge craft fair in Dover?" That would be much more fun. John's starting to get sick, but I hope he feels well enough to come to my parents this weekend, otherwise today is going to suck.
Anyway, I'm going to go lay down again. I've been up since 6, it's 7:48 now and it's SATURDAY. Holy crap do I need a vacation.

More of my life

Wednesday I had a job interview in the Manchester DCYF. I don't know when I'll hear anything though, because they couldn't give me a rough estimate. I technically interviewed for two positions, so I need to submit my application and stuff for the other one. One position is in family service (essentially - case management) and the other is in assessment (which is the investigation part of it). I applied for the family service postion, because that's what opened first, so I need to send stuff in for the assessment postion, especially since that's the job I REALLY want. So when I finish this entry, I've got to print out another copy of my resume so I can get it all in the mail today.
I think the interview went pretty well, but It's hard to say. It's like I've been telling people, I didn't get any warm fuzzies, but I didn't leave feeling like they hated me either. So I just have to wait. Again. This is the suckiest part of interviewing. That, and the "So why do you want to work in THIS office?" question. But they have to hire me on somewhere, right? Right??
This weekend should be a nice an mellow one, after the last few busy (but fun) weekends we've had. Last weekend was supposed to be my sister in laws wedding, but she up and postponed it two weeks before hand. I mentioned that in my last entry though. I do still feel bad for her, but if Jen and Steve are going to have issues, it's good they get them worked out now, rather than AFTER getting married. Not that I wish them anything bad, I just hope they figure out what's right for them. So instead we went to John's parents house and then went shopping that night. John and I each got some new jeans (much needed!), a couple of "new-to-us" movies (how could we go wrong when used movies at Game Stop were two for $10?!), and I found the game Myst at EB for only 2 bucks! So I've been working on that, but I'm pretty close to finishing it this time. The last time I played it I was like... 15 and couldn't figure it out to save my life. I'll probably make some pumpkin bread this weekend and carve the pumpkin my parents brought John, Molly and I last weekend when they came over for dinner.
Anyway, I'm going to go take care of that whole resume printing thing now. Have a great weekend everyone!
Oh, and Sarah SKILLIN, (hehehe!) I'm glad to see you made it home safe and sound from your honemoon! Your wedding was fun!

Screw Laconia and Rochester!!!!

Funny how when you're waiting to hear back from job interviews the all get back to you on the same day with the same answer. "Hi Melissa? This is ____________ from DCYF Laconia. I was just calling to let you know that the position has been filled, but we're going to keep your resume and application on file for...." blah blah blah. My favorite was "The Letter" I got from Rochester "Dear Ms. Cardin, Thank you for interviewing for the Child Protective Service Worker assessment position in the Rochester District Office on September 1, 2005. This letter is to advise you that you have not been seleted for the position. Although you possess skills and knowledge applicable to the postion, the candidate selected was better able to articulate their understanding of the role of the CPSW assessment postion. If you have any questions regarding the above, please feel free to contact me." That is such bullshit. You're "advising" me the postion has been filled? Couldn't you "notify" me, or "inform" me? And whats this crap about the other person being "better able to articulate their understanding of the role" ??? Evidentally I don't speak clearly enough for you. Or perhaps I just didn't learn enough while I was an intern in YOUR office?! This is crap.
So here I am again starting from square one. I guess I'll have to start applying in offices that are farther away than I wanted, but fine. I'm sick of my job at the doctors office anyway. We've had two people quit in the last two weeks, then we hired someone on and we're pretty sure she's going to quit too, because she hasn't shown up for her first two full days of work. She came in for one day last week and that was the last anyone's seen of her. She called out sick yesterday, and today she just didn't show up. She didn't call, didn't come in, nothing.
I was just really hoping for one of these to work out. Especially Rochester. I REALLY, really, really wanted that job. More so than, I think, I let on before, and more than even John knew. It's weird... not getting this job was like... getting dumped almost! It really hurt. It's kind of a crappy analogy, but it's the best I can come up with for the way I feel about it.
Anyway, that's all for now. I have a headache and need to put away laundry. Then I'm eating ice cream and watching an episode of Law and Order:SVU.

So, Hows Married Life Treating you

That is the most God-aweful question in the whole universe! Every answer you give to it is wrong! If you say that things are great, people tell you to just wait, that'll all change. And of course, you don't want to say it sucks if it doesn't, and even if it did at the moment they asked you that, either 1) you're not going to tell them that, or 2) They're going to say "Oh, you haven't been married long enough to be having issues yet." And if you say "So far, so good" They'll say "Oh, what, you're expecting it to get bad???" So from here on in, no one is allowed to ask me how married life is treating me (if you're married - if you're single it's okay to ask). And if you do ask, I'm going to either plead the fifth or ignore the question entirely.
There, now that we've had that little conversation, moving right along...
Things are going well here, for the most part. I had my interview in Rochester, which I already wrote about, and then on the 2nd, I had an interview in Laconia. I think that one went awful. I should have an answer from Rochester the beginning of this week, Francine (the supervisor there) thought, and Laconia said I won't get an answer for the next couple of weeks. I'm up against two other UNH people for the Rochester job (at least I'm pretty sure I am) and I'm up against a UNH IV-E student, a Plymouth State IV-E student and Lord knows how many other people. I'm a nervous wreck about this. I'm really hoping for Rochester, so everyone please keep your fingers crossed, and know that as soon as I hear anything I will have a new entry up.
Anyway, I'm going to go eat an ice cream sandwich and sit outside for a bit. Catch up with everyone later!