An Eclectic Mind

Too weird for words.

You might think that Norbert is a pretty unusual name. In this country, it is. But it’s also the name of my father and brother. In the tiny NJ town where I spent many of my early years, there were four Norberts — two pairs of fathers and sons — among the 2,000 or so residents.

But that’s not what I’m blogging about. I’m blogging about Hurricane Norbert, which is currently off the west coast of Mexico, heading north. It’s a hurricane with the same name as my brother.

What’s weird is that the previous Pacific hurricane was named Marie, which is pretty darn close to my name.

Okay, you’re saying. That’s an interesting coincidence. But it’s not exactly your name so it really isn’t worth blogging about.

True. But an earlier Atlantic hurricane this season was named Laura. That’s exactly my sister’s name.

So you tell me: what are the chances of three named hurricanes, all happening one after the other, being named almost exactly for all three of the kids in a single family?

Too weird for words.

Deep Thoughts family, hurricanes, weather

A review of a somewhat trying week.

It’s Friday at about 5 AM. I’m sitting at the kitchen table with my laptop and cup of coffee. Alex, my parrot, is having his breakfast atop his cage. He’s quiet right now, except for the sound of his beak hitting the ceramic bowl each time he picks out a piece of scrambled egg and his tiny footsteps as he moves into his favorite eating position at the edge of the cage top where he can watch me. The refrigerator is humming and the heat is on. Other than that, and the sound of the laptops keys as I hit them, the house is completely quiet.

The last of our house guests are gone. They left on Wednesday morning. I feel an incredible amount of freedom. “Free at last” was the way Mike put it when he got home on Wednesday afternoon. I don’t think we’ll have back-to-back house guest groups again.

The refrigerator has just clicked off.

Last Friday at this time, I was preparing for the first day’s breakfast for the second group of house guests, Mike’s mom and her friend Mildred. I wake up very early and need coffee quite soon after getting out of bed. Once I’m awake and in the kitchen, Alex is awake. And once Alex is awake, he’s talking and whistling just like any self-respecting parrot. At least he doesn’t scream. But some of those whistles can be pretty bad. If I can put his breakfast in front of him quickly, I can minimize the noise, since he’s generally very quiet while eating. But sometimes he just doesn’t want to come out of his cage and other times he eats quickly to get on with the noisier part of his morning routine. As a result, any house guest who is not deaf is likely to wake up not long after we do. Then he or she wanders into the kitchen and comments about how early it is. This week, I prepared the coffee pot for my guests when I made my own coffee. They drink decaf, I don’t. I have a Black and Decker Cup at a Time coffee maker which brews one cup of coffee at a time, right into the serving cup. This is my third one; I’ve had one for about fifteen years now. Mike doesn’t usually drink coffee in the morning and I won’t drink coffee unless it’s very fresh. I mean, it has to be brewed just before I drink it. (That’s the reason I’m willing to pay $3 for a latte; at least it’s made fresh for me.) I also have a 12-cup Braun coffee maker. That’s what I fixed up for Julia and Mildred every morning. As soon as one of them appeared — normally Julia; Mildred is hard of hearing so she doesn’t hear Alex in the morning — I turned on the pot and let it do its thing. Whether they finished the eight cups I brewed them every morning was up to them. (Of course, 8 coffee pot cups only equals 4 real cups.)

I went to work on Friday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, so I didn’t spend much time with this group of house guests. That was probably a pretty good idea, since I was already suffering from house guest burnout. Mike took them to the Grand Canyon on Sunday, since Mildred had never seen it before. Mildred, like Julia, is in her 80s and was born and raised in New York. They live in the same apartment building in Queens, with lovely views of the Throgs Neck Bridge. They’re New Yorkers, through and through. (Who else would arrive with two dozen real bagels, lox, cream cheese, and white fish?) This trip to the west was a real eye-opener for Mildred.

She told me that she wanted to see the Grand Canyon because of something her grandson had said. He told her that he’d had all kinds of religious training, but he’d always had small doubts about the existence of God. But when he went to the Grand Canyon, he said he knew there had to be a God because there was no other way something that beautiful could exist.

Mike had reservations for two rooms on the rim for Sunday night, so that’s when they had to go. But on Sunday morning, when they left, snow showers were forecasted for that day with snow predicted for Monday. Temperatures were in the low thirties during the day. Julia didn’t want to go, but left it up to Mildred.

“We’ll give you some time to think about it,” Mike said to her on Sunday morning.

“How much time?” Mildred wanted to know.

“How much do you need?”

“Twelve minutes.”

“Okay, let us know in twelve minutes.”

“I want to go,” she immediately replied.

So they went. We advised them to bring warm clothing, but when it didn’t seem as if what they’d packed was warm enough, Mike packed a few extra coats, hats, and pairs of socks. I watched them drive away, knowing I had just over 24 hours to myself.

Unfortunately, I really needed that time off. Earlier in the week, I’d stepped foot into my rental house to learn that the previous tenant and her son had trashed the place. The carpet, which was soiled throughout with dog poop and urine, right down to the padding, had to be replaced. The walls had to be repainted. Celia, my cleaning person, had spent about six hours trying to clean the kitchen and needed another day to finish the house. I’d spent about two hours with her that Thursday, just dumping trash left in the kitchen and throughout the house. The painter’s prep guy had been there on Friday, taking down the window coverings and prepping walls and window sills. I’d stopped by that day with two friends of mine to remove the 1,100 AOL CD ROM discs the tenant’s brat had thumb-tacked to the ceiling.

I spent Sunday just lazing around the house. I read, I even watched a few movies on TV. The weather was rainy and not very pleasant. I didn’t really want to be outside anyway. And I certainly didn’t want to go into the house on Jackson Street.

On Monday morning, I went to work. I’m between books right now. That doesn’t mean I don’t have a book lined up yet, though. I actually have two of them. One is a revision of my Mac OS X book for the next version, called Tiger. The other is a revision of my QuickBooks for Mac book. I’m under contract for one book and will soon be under contract for the second. Both books are for Peachpit Press. But I’m also working with an eBook publisher to do a pair of PDF format books for a new eBook imprint called SpiderWorks. And I usually spend the time between books writing articles for Informit.com and FileMaker Advisor.

That’s not all that’s on my plate. I’m also doing work for Flying M Air, my helicopter tour company. I’m waiting for the delivery of my Robinson Raven II helicopter. I got the bad news on Monday: the helicopter’s delivery date had been pushed back three weeks and would not be until the first week in January. That meant I’d have to cancel the gig I’d tentatively scheduled for December 31 at Stanton. One of the things I needed to do for Flying M Air was line up other flying gigs. There’s the potential to make a lot of money at these gigs and I’m trying to schedule at least two a month to cover the cost of the helicopter. Lining up gigs meant finding events that helicopter rides would work at, contacting the organizers, and getting permission to fly. I had about a 50% acceptance rate among those people who responded, but not everyone could be contacted by e-mail. I also needed to finish up the paperwork for my Single Pilot Part 135 certificate. This would enable me to offer air taxi services, which is not possible under my current Part 91 status. (This is all FAA stuff.) Finally, I needed to get permission from the BLM and state land offices to land my helicopter at the remote locations I wanted to fly passengers to.

So I had a lot to do on Monday and for the rest of the week. But I was in full procrastination mode. I get like that sometimes. I keep busy doing things that need to be done, but I somehow avoid doing the high priority things. For example, I really needed to get together an outline for my Mac OS X book. I had the beta software installed and had spent some time looking at it. But it wasn’t until Wednesday that I finally submitted an outline. Apparently, my editor is also in procrastination mode, because although he promised to get back to me the next day with comments, I never heard from him.

The whole week went like that at work, keeping busy from the time I arrived — normally around 7 AM — to the time I left — about 2 to 3 PM. In between, I made lots of trips to Jackson Street, to check on the painters, let in the carpet guys, and measure the place. Measuring was for a special project. I’d gotten a phone call from someone at ADOT (Arizona Department of Transportation). She was looking for unfurnished rentals for some of the people who’d be working on the bypass project in Wickenburg over the coming years. Holy cow! Is it possible that I could get the place rented that quickly? When she asked for square feet, I made a special trip to measure the place for her. I now know it’s 1,400 square feet. I also measured the condo my office is in. Heck, if they’re willing to rent that, too, I’ll move out into one of the studio apartments I own (something I’ve been considering for a while) and let them have it. It would be nice to get some regular income from that place again.

I also had to begin the process that would take my former tenant to small claims court in an attempt to get back some of the $4,300 I spent to restore the house to rentable condition. The limit for small claims court is $2,500 and I’m going for all of it. It cost me $2,200 to replace the carpet she destroyed and the back bedroom definitely required professional repainting. I took a lot of pictures. Unfortunately, the painters tore out the carpet (because of the smell) before they painted, so I didn’t get as many photos of the carpet while still on the floor as I would have liked. No matter. My friends John and Lorna helped me photograph carpet sections, including the underside, outside on the driveway. I printed the photos yesterday and they do a fine job of documenting the damage. I also took a few carpet sections that I could display in court. I wonder if the judge will want to sniff them.

The rental house is coming along nicely. The carpet guys, who were supposed to come next Tuesday, had a cancellation and were able to do the job yesterday. They very kindly used some vinyl tile leftover from another job to retile the front bathroom, charging me just $30 for labor. I can’t blame the damage there on the tenant — it was already pretty worn — but it’s nice to get the place fixed up a bit more. At this point, I’ve already replaced all of the floor covering in the house and I’ve only owned it for four years. I replaced the back bedroom’s floor covering twice. Today’s the day when I write the big checks to pay for all of this work.

Meanwhile, that entire property is up for sale. It includes the house and four studio apartments in a separate building. The studios are fully furnished and quite nice. The house will be wonderful when it’s done. There’s a potential buyer lined up, and he’ll be presenting a formal offer today. But I already know that his price is low and he wants me to finance part of the purchase. I’m probably going to have to say no. When I’m finished typing this, I’ll crunch some numbers to see what I need in case I need to present a counter-offer.

Plan B is already in the works. I’m getting a separate water and gas meter for the house. If the rental with ADOT falls through, I’ll officially split the house property from the apartment property — they’re already on two separate tax parcels. I’ll sell the house and use the money from that transaction to pay off the mortgage on the whole property. Then I’ll move my office into Apartment #4, which is bright and airy and has excellent views of the mountains. I’ll fix up the condo and sell that. That won’t get me as much money as the sale of the house and apartments, but I will own the apartments free and clear. Income on the three remaining apartments is $1200/month. Expenses are less than $400/month. So that’s a nice little income each month. And if I need cash, I can always refinance the apartments and take out a loan on it.

So that gives you an idea of what’s going through my mind. A lot. Too much, maybe.

Last night, we went out to dinner at the Mecca with John and Lorna. I’m getting to be a regular at the Mecca. They make excellent margaritas. Afterwards, we talked John and Lorna into coming to see The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, which was playing at Wickenburg’s oneplex next door. I’d heard good reviews about the movie on NPR. But those reviewers must either have kids or undeveloped brains. The movie did have a few jokes that only an adult could pick up, but there weren’t enough of them to sustain me. Seeing a movie like that makes me glad I don’t have kids. Thank heavens the movie was short. Fortunately, National Treasure starts today and I think that’ll be a bit more enjoyable for the over-six crowd.

So it’s Friday morning, at about 6 AM. Alex is in full talking mode. “Hey now!” That’s his favorite new thing to say. And “Are you a duck?” Mike will be down shortly and Jack the Dog will be with him. Mike will have tea and Jack will eat up all the egg Alex dropped on the floor. I’ll put this away and clean up around Alex’s cage. In an hour, I’ll go to the office and try not to procrastinate any more than I already have this week. And, with luck, the meeting with the possible buyer will go well and I’ll sell my rental property once and for all.

But at least the house guests are gone.

Days in My Life family, for sale, Grand Canyon, home, real estate, videos

On how it seems to be everyone or no one when it comes to guests.

Mike and I moved to Arizona about eight years ago now and moved into our current house about nine months later. Both of our families still live back east — in New York, New Jersey, and Florida (where old New Yorkers go). None of them could understand why we’d made the move out west. We told them about the improved quality of life and the reduced cost of living. We told them about having horses and chickens, about seeing billions of stars in clear skies almost every night, about warm weather in the winter time. But it wasn’t until they started coming out here to visit that they began to understand.

They’d come alone or in pairs at first. Mike and I worked out of the house so two of our three bedrooms were home offices. Mike’s was the easiest to convert to a spare bedroom, with a futon that flattened out to a queen sized bed. My office was too full of computer equipment and related junk to make a good guest room. (Sometimes I even had trouble with it as an office.) People would come and stay a few days. Occasionally, they’d stay longer. Mike’s mom stayed 10 days once.

We had a flood of house guests one Christmas. Mike’s entire family came: mother, brother, sister, niece. No one wanted to share the part-time guest room with Mike’s mom, so we wound up sticking people all over the house and elsewhere. Mike’s niece on the queen-sized sofa bed in the upstairs den. Mike’s brother on the living room sofa. Mike’s sister — well, she wanted her own room, so we stuck her in the Log Wagon Inn. She wasn’t very happy with that, either, but frankly I’m not sure if anything would have made her happy.

When we moved the offices out of the house, we fixed up the two bedrooms. One of them became a full-time guest room, with a full-sized bed, dresser, night table, chair, and tiny bookshelf. We even cleared out most of the closet so guests could hang their clothes. The other room became a library, with bookshelves, Mike’s old desk, and that futon. It didn’t take much to turn that into a guest room when we needed it.

Oddly enough, we had very few visitors for a long time. (I think we were all still trying to recover from Mike’s family’s visit.) Mike’s cousin Ricky, who, like us, discovered the benefits of going west, lives in Seattle and visited regularly almost every year. He goes to the Gem and Mineral show in Tucson every winter and we can usually convince him to come with us to Quartzsite for a few days. We also had a friend from back east stop in for a few days. He was the perfect house guest because we hardly ever saw him. He’d get up, join us for coffee in the morning, then take his rental car out for the day. He’d return after dinner, spend some time chatting with us, and hit the sack. No need for us to miss work, plan day trips, and fret over meals.

My dad came for a visit with his wife, too. They actually came twice in the same year. The first time, I think they had some plane tickets they had to use up and decided to use them to see us. My dad hardly ever flies — he prefers to drive everywhere — but even he wasn’t prepared to drive from Florida. They spent a few days with us, then moved on to Las Vegas to spend a few days with distant members of her family. The second time, they went to Las Vegas, then came back to spend a few days with us.

This year, the flood returned. My brother and his wife had been wanting to visit for a long time. I suggested that they come for Thanksgiving. Somehow the idea came up that it would be nice to have the whole family out, including my sister, mother, and stepfather. My mother and stepfather live in Florida (not near my father; that would be too weird) and don’t get up north to see my sister and brother in New Jersey very often. I made a bet with my brother that if I invited my mother, she wouldn’t come. I lost the bet. And my sister came, too. So for five days, I had all five of them in the house. It was the first time we made full use of both guest rooms. My sister was a good sport and slept on the living room sofa.

The flood continued, two days after the last of that group departed, Mike’s mom and her friend arrived. That was yesterday and they’re staying for a week. They’re both in their eighties and they move slowly. Very slowly. They have trouble with the four steps that lead down to the two guest rooms. Coming upstairs to admire the view from our den and our new bedroom furniture was like taking them on a trip to the top of K2. Well, maybe not that bad.

So here it is, December 3, and we’ve had almost nonstop house guests since November 20. It’s difficult for me. I’m basically a loner and need a certain amount of time to myself. I normally get that in the morning. I wake up around 4:30 AM, go downstairs, make coffee, and make Alex the Bird his breakfast. I have until 5:45, when Mike comes down, to write blog entries, organize my day, and put things into perspective. But with house guests, when I wake up and go down, Alex’s whistles and chattering wakes up the house guests. In no time at all, they’re wandering into the kitchen, complaining about how early we wake up (and go to sleep), and needing coffee, food, entertainment. And asking questions.

It’s the questions that are the toughest for me. It seems like a nonstop barrage of questions. Questions about Alex, questions about what they see outside the window, questions about little noises the house makes. Questions about breakfast, plans for the day, the temperature outside. Questions about Alex and Jack and the horses and the chickens. Questions about the neighbor’s dogs and horses and kids. Questions about things around the house that aren’t common in houses back east, like the garbage disposal and compactor. Questions about what I’m doing and what they can do to help.

It’s this last question that really kills me. I work efficiently, accustomed to doing things on my own, with no one in my way. Suddenly there are offers to help me. But to get the help they’re offering, I have to help them. For example, imagine this exchange:

“Do you want me to set the table for dinner?”

“Sure. Thanks.”

“Okay, where are the plates?”

I stop what I’m doing to open the cabinet.

A moment later: “And the silverware is in this drawer?” They open the wrong drawer.

“Next to that drawer.”

They open another wrong drawer.

I come over and open the right drawer.

“Oh. Which knives should I use?”

“I don’t care. Either one.”

A running narrative follows, concerning the pros and cons of steak knives over table knives, which are commonly known as butter knives in my family. I have to pay attention and make appropriate comments. I then have to verbally confirm that the table setter has made the correct choice, even though I just said I didn’t care which knives were selected.

“Do you have napkins?”

“The drawer under the silverware.”

“These are cloth napkins. Don’t you have paper?”

“Cloth is fine. We always use cloth.”

“But we don’t need cloth napkins. Don’t you have paper napkins?”

“Don’t you like cloth napkins?”

“Yeah, but we don’t use them at home.”

“Well we do. Use the cloth napkins.”

They put out the cloth napkins, commenting on how paper napkins are good enough for them and that it’s a lot of work to wash all those napkins. Then: “How about glasses? Where are they?”

“In the cabinet with the plates.”

“Oh, yeah.” They open the cabinet again. “Which ones should I use?”

“The big ones.”

“You mean the tall ones?”"Yes, that’s fine.”

“There’s only six of them. There are seven of us. Are there any in the dishwasher?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, if there is, I can wash one. Then we’ll have enough.”

“You can use the short ones. There should be enough.”

“Well, it’s no bother to wash a glass if you have one in the dishwasher. Should I look?”

“Yeah. Go ahead.”

They attempt to open the dishwasher, but it’s latched. “I can’t get this open. How do you open it?”

Get the idea? Obviously, I’d rather not have help that requires so much help to get. And frankly, it bugs me that there needs to be so much conversation over what I think are trivial things. The cloth napkins are a perfect example. Almost every single house guest this year has made a big deal over my napkins. They aren’t anything special. They’re restaurant style cloth napkins that I throw into the laundry with the rest of my dirty wash and fold when they come out of the dryer. I don’t iron them, I don’t starch them. It takes only a few moments extra to deal with them and they’re so much nicer than paper. Why wouldn’t I use cloth napkins if I like them? Why make a big deal about them? Why ask so many questions?

I guess my stress level is beginning to show.

Anyway, Mike and I rate guests on their maintenance level. The less maintenance a guest requires, the more pleasant the guest is to have in the house. So far this year, my mother and stepfather have rated highest. We just stuck them in the guest room, showed them where the towels were, and let them do their thing. They made their own breakfast, went on their own day trips, and even set the table without asking questions. They got a high rating. My sister also rated pretty high, although she didn’t do much in the way of entertaining herself. My brother and his wife were down a bit on the scale. Too many questions! And I don’t think they would have done anything without someone taking the lead. And Mike’s mom and her friend will definitely rate very low. Mike’s mom has already asked more questions in three hours of waking time than my whole family combined. And we really can’t expect them to entertain themselves when they have so much trouble just walking around.

Ah, I hear my house guests stirring down below. Time to put up the decaf coffee and debate what’s for breakfast.

Days in My Life Christmas, family, home