Earlier in the week, Andrew got a notice from the Environmental Protection Agency telling him he needed to clean up some brush that he'd put in a pile in the back of our property (off the alley). At first, we thought maybe one of our neighbors was nutzo and "turned us in" but then on closer inspection/reading, we realized that it was just a random neighborhood check - probably because the same agency mows the lawn of the house on the corner once a month (smooth!). We felt a little stupid, but did have to laugh a little at the irony because we realized that we wouldn't have gotten a notice had we just let everything behind the garage grow back into the Little Garage of Horrors. It wasn't a big deal, though Andrew has yet to clean up the mess (tsk tsk!) before they come back on Friday.
Feeling oddly motivated, today I decided to clean up my potted herb garden. Since I hurt my back, Andrew let my tomatoes fall into disrepair, and a bunch of weeds crept through the wood chips around the pots. At our last session, my PT told me to up my activity level, so I figured messing around in the garden was fine. After I moved the first pot, I saw a huge centipede and I got that creepy crawly feeling. I got the rest of the pots moved, and then I spotted a big huge spider sitting on her web.
This is the point where I bailed. I came back inside, sat down in my study (planning on blogging about my short-lived gardening attempt that I'd left in a mess for Andrew to clean up). All of a sudden, I heard a bunch of dishes clanking around in the kitchen. Morty was in our kitchen sink, freaking out about a cat he saw outside.
We've been waging the war against neighborhood/feral kitties all summer. Morty is territorial and has "Retaliation Aggression Syndrome" which means he'll get angry at the cats outside and then see Elmo, get confused, and beat the crud out of Elmo. It's kinda scary (and resulted in Andrew going to the emergency room once this summer when Morty got loose and ran outside to wage real war on one of these kitties). We found that a mixture of "kitty repellent" (looks like kitty litter, smells different) and moth balls got the cats off our property, but recently the cats have been creeping back.
Being the brilliant person I am, I decided to chase after the cat. I walked out the back door, closed it behind me, and went running. The cat ran off, and I felt exhilarated, since I haven't run in about a month.
Then I turned around and realized that I closed the back door. The back door that locks automatically. The back door with the replaced lock. Taking a deep breath, I located our hidden key. No luck - we were still hiding the key for the old lock.
I had no idea what time it was - I knew it was somewhere between 4 and 6, and Andrew would be home at 6:30. I had no shoes, and was wearing a tank top and short shorts - no bra - so this is not the clothing where you can go over and knock on your neighbor's door.
It was at that point that I went back and faced the spider and finished the gardening chores. I also tried to weed the cracks in the driveway, but that got boring, so I retreated to our front porch and did my best creepy old man impression as I just watched the goings on of the neighborhood.
Andrew came home at some point, so clearly I was rescued. But, I learned a valuable lesson that I should have learned in ohhhh 4th grade: always have a freakin key!
In other news, Andrew volunteered with United Way today and was paired up with a kid at lunchtime as a part of Big Brothers/Big Sisters. He's contemplating signing up - he had a fun time hanging out with the kid, learning the ins and outs of monkey bars and "take-aways" (subtraction). I'm in favor - sounds like there could be some fun dinner time conversations to come.
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