One of the goals of living in this house is to produce as much of our own food as possible. There's enough space--really more than enough space--for an expansive vegetable garden. (My husband is a canning fiend-how many men do you know who have their own pressure canners and love to use them?) We've planted four citrus trees and four pomegranate bushes already, and have tomatoes, peppers, strawberries and corn going in some temporary raised beds we put in so we could feel like we were making progress while waiting for the permits. Once we move in this weekend, I'm going to clear out the bed that runs along the cinderblock wall separating us from the funeral home next door (yeah, funeral home next door. They held services for John Steinbeck there before his ashes were interred at a local cemetery) and start planting the berry bushes that eventually will cover the wall. I'll start the herbs going as well--I've gotten some good advice from the folks at Rocket Farms. The water department is coming next week to install the new water main, and once that's done we'll start working on the drip irrigation system for the beds that eventually will cover the entire front yard.
And we want chickens. Urban chickens. We got fairly spoiled living around the block from Fred Dodsworth, who along with his wife Linda has a very active egg operation going in their backyard. But urban chickens were no big deal in Berkeley; it wasn't unusual to see one that had escaped from its yard and gone wandering down the street. There were far weirder things to see in Berkeley.
(Photo used with permission under a Creative Commons' license.)
Fresh eggs are out of this world. Nothing compares, at least nothing you can buy in a store. And so it is with a heavy heart that I make the following proclamation: I am about to become an urban chicken outlaw. Because in the city of Salinas, there are no chickens allowed--at least not in my mixed-use neighborhood. (Meth labs? No worries. Illegal car repair shops? They turn a blind eye. Urban chickens? You're a scofflaw.)
I understand completely that noise and smell are concerns. We only have one living neighbor, Mike the Sprinkler guy, with whom we share a fence on the north side of the house. The three houses next to his are all empty and in foreclosure. On our other side is the funeral home, behind us is an alley, and across the alley is one restaurant and a bunch of shops. We're not planning on roosters, and fewer than a half dozen laying hens for eggs, with the coop positioned in the rear yard adjacent to the alley.
It's not a matter of "if you do it right, you can have them" as far as the city is concerned. We're going to seek out a conditional use permit, because I believe in following the process just to amuse myself. We'll lobby the city council, we'll seek the CUP, but in the end, we're probably going to become illegal chicken ranchers.
They're lucky Chuck won't actually let me get a goat.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Sunday, June 20, 2010
El Grupo, FMLN and You
This morning my husband and I drove our eldest son Bobby to San Francisco International Airport for a flight that will eventually land him in El Salvador. To the question, "Why is your son going to El Salvador," my standard answer is officially, "Because I am an idiot."
I guess the real answer is somewhat more difficult to figure out. My son has parents who are overeducated overachievers who way the hell oversheltered him for the first 14 years of his life. And then we moved to Berkeley two years ago and it all went to hell. Sort of. I think the best thing about Berkeley is that it's a great place to raise free-range children. Our youngest, Sam, started taking BART by himself when he was 11 because his best friend moved to the other side of the Caldecott Tunnel. We would drop him at our end, they would pick him up on their end. We armed both of them with bus passes and let them head off to Eudamonia in downtown Berkeley. Or to the ledges outside of Berkeley High where the skate punks gather. And every time they walked out the door, my heart would seize until they came home.
And then I moved them back to Salinas and pissed them both off.
I think I'm hoping Bobby will figure out his life during a few weeks in Central America. He's a low-ambition kid, a smart as hell, exceedingly eloquent 16-year-old kid who has no interest in performing for his parents or for his teachers. He always has a few books going, he loves theater and music and baseball. He thinks he wants to join the Peace Corps, but that could change by tomorrow.
Our friend Max has been planning this trip to El Salvador, Guatemala and Belize for months. His wife, Feliciana, needs to be in Guatemala for the next nine days to ... celebrate? mourn? the first year anniversary of her father's death. Max is going to take his boys, Bobby and a fourth teenager--the son of another set of friends--surfing and hiking and for Spanish lessions in El Salvador before they head to Guatemala on Thursday, where they will work at a clinic sponsored by Max's congregation and hopefully help out with any work that needs to be done at Feliciana's house. She was raised in the mountains, three hours away from electricity, and with both of her parents gone, the small farm and the house now are hers.
We met all of them at the airport this morning, where Dr. P, the mom of the fourth teen, asked me how I was doing with the trip. Because her husband (we'll call him RFM, for Really Famous Musician) was freaking the hell out. Dr. P will be joining them on Thursday, when I will start freaking out a little less.
"I'm freaking out too," I said. "Do you have your prescription pad? Can I have some valium?"
She didn't and I couldn't. But we sat in a lounge area while the boys got their boarding passes and talked about our worries.
Chuck: Dengue Fever. You're on your back for eight days and you can't take care of your own basic needs.
RFM: Nodding. Yeah, that's a bad one.
Me: I'm worried about kidnapping, illegal organ harvesting and Central American jails.
Dr. P: You can't be worried about organ harvesting. That's not a legitimate fear.
Me: It's my fear and I'll worry if I want to.
RFM: Condoms. I forgot to tell him about condoms.
Me: Yeah, we went over that one last night.
Dr. P, eyes widening: Condoms? You don't think ... really? Condoms?
Me: They're teenage boys.
RFM, sighing: I'll go tell him.
We lingered on as the boys and Max wended their way through the security line. I wrapped myself around my baby's neck and hung on until it was embarrassing for both of us.
And then I let him go.
I guess the real answer is somewhat more difficult to figure out. My son has parents who are overeducated overachievers who way the hell oversheltered him for the first 14 years of his life. And then we moved to Berkeley two years ago and it all went to hell. Sort of. I think the best thing about Berkeley is that it's a great place to raise free-range children. Our youngest, Sam, started taking BART by himself when he was 11 because his best friend moved to the other side of the Caldecott Tunnel. We would drop him at our end, they would pick him up on their end. We armed both of them with bus passes and let them head off to Eudamonia in downtown Berkeley. Or to the ledges outside of Berkeley High where the skate punks gather. And every time they walked out the door, my heart would seize until they came home.
And then I moved them back to Salinas and pissed them both off.
I think I'm hoping Bobby will figure out his life during a few weeks in Central America. He's a low-ambition kid, a smart as hell, exceedingly eloquent 16-year-old kid who has no interest in performing for his parents or for his teachers. He always has a few books going, he loves theater and music and baseball. He thinks he wants to join the Peace Corps, but that could change by tomorrow.
Our friend Max has been planning this trip to El Salvador, Guatemala and Belize for months. His wife, Feliciana, needs to be in Guatemala for the next nine days to ... celebrate? mourn? the first year anniversary of her father's death. Max is going to take his boys, Bobby and a fourth teenager--the son of another set of friends--surfing and hiking and for Spanish lessions in El Salvador before they head to Guatemala on Thursday, where they will work at a clinic sponsored by Max's congregation and hopefully help out with any work that needs to be done at Feliciana's house. She was raised in the mountains, three hours away from electricity, and with both of her parents gone, the small farm and the house now are hers.
We met all of them at the airport this morning, where Dr. P, the mom of the fourth teen, asked me how I was doing with the trip. Because her husband (we'll call him RFM, for Really Famous Musician) was freaking the hell out. Dr. P will be joining them on Thursday, when I will start freaking out a little less.
"I'm freaking out too," I said. "Do you have your prescription pad? Can I have some valium?"
She didn't and I couldn't. But we sat in a lounge area while the boys got their boarding passes and talked about our worries.
Chuck: Dengue Fever. You're on your back for eight days and you can't take care of your own basic needs.
RFM: Nodding. Yeah, that's a bad one.
Me: I'm worried about kidnapping, illegal organ harvesting and Central American jails.
Dr. P: You can't be worried about organ harvesting. That's not a legitimate fear.
Me: It's my fear and I'll worry if I want to.
RFM: Condoms. I forgot to tell him about condoms.
Me: Yeah, we went over that one last night.
Dr. P, eyes widening: Condoms? You don't think ... really? Condoms?
Me: They're teenage boys.
RFM, sighing: I'll go tell him.
We lingered on as the boys and Max wended their way through the security line. I wrapped myself around my baby's neck and hung on until it was embarrassing for both of us.
And then I let him go.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Almost Maybe
The apartment seems so much smaller now that it has walls.
Small is relative, of course. But with two adults, two men-children (a 16-year-old and a 12-year-old who is almost taller than me), plus a smelly little Jack Russell, the accommodations will be at the very least cozy, bordering on, "Oh for God's sake, go outside and play catch until it's too dark to see the ball" as we prepare to once again live together in the basement at House226.
We'll be moving in next weekend. We were hoping for this weekend, but Chuck won't be able to start tiling until Friday.
What's good: the together part. We've been living separately (me and the dog at our friend Todd's, Chuck and the boys at his mother's), for almost three months, and everyone is going a little crazy. Bobby is leaving this weekend for two weeks in Guatemala and El Salvador, and lately when I go to see everyone after work, I'm getting frantic communication from my mother-in-law. He's been sleeping all day, she says, he hasn't eaten or drank anything and she's worried that he will die in Guatemala because of his heart condition. (He's been sleeping all day because he stays up all night, he's a teenager and he's on vacation. How that translates to death in Guatemala, I don't know. I didn't say it made sense. Work with me here.)
What's hard: the together part. I thought we were cramped in Berkeley (1,200 square feet, plus the rat-to-human ratio was against us) but the basement at 226 is about 800 feet. It should only be for a month or two, and the boys will be gone for about a month of it at various camps, but it will still be tight. It will give us time, though, to work on the yard more, get everything planted that I want to plant and possibly keep the hookers from invading the yard on Sunday mornings.
Or at least that's the hope of Dawn, the nice woman who owns the restaurant across the alley from our back fence. I met her the other day when we were there talking to Al, arguing over the carpeting he wants to put in the basement bedrooms. (It'll be nice, he said, a change from the rest of the apartment. Yeah, I said, it will be like traveling to a new world -- ooh, I was in Tile Land here in the kitchen, but I think I'll go to Carpet Land here in the bedroom. He won that round, because the carpeting is less expensive than the laminate. But if he thinks of suggesting carpeting for the main house, I will cut him.)
Anyway, Dawn saw us outside and introduced herself. She's so happy people are moving in-if we need anything, please let her know. And maybe people living there will keep the hookers from climbing over the fence like they do on Sunday mornings.
Whadda what?
"Why Sunday mornings? Why do you think they choose Sunday morning?" I asked her. "I honestly don't know, but here's the part of the fence they've broken down trying to get into your yard," she said.
Speaking of the yard, there's a new group called Sustainable Salinas that wants to transform people's lawns into vegetable gardens. They're looking for a yard where they can run a pilot program, and they want to talk to us about using our yard as a test case. I'm excited about the possibility--it's what we want to do anyway, and we have a small budget for the raised beds and irrigation--but this could mean some free manual labor too.
Small is relative, of course. But with two adults, two men-children (a 16-year-old and a 12-year-old who is almost taller than me), plus a smelly little Jack Russell, the accommodations will be at the very least cozy, bordering on, "Oh for God's sake, go outside and play catch until it's too dark to see the ball" as we prepare to once again live together in the basement at House226.
We'll be moving in next weekend. We were hoping for this weekend, but Chuck won't be able to start tiling until Friday.
What's good: the together part. We've been living separately (me and the dog at our friend Todd's, Chuck and the boys at his mother's), for almost three months, and everyone is going a little crazy. Bobby is leaving this weekend for two weeks in Guatemala and El Salvador, and lately when I go to see everyone after work, I'm getting frantic communication from my mother-in-law. He's been sleeping all day, she says, he hasn't eaten or drank anything and she's worried that he will die in Guatemala because of his heart condition. (He's been sleeping all day because he stays up all night, he's a teenager and he's on vacation. How that translates to death in Guatemala, I don't know. I didn't say it made sense. Work with me here.)
What's hard: the together part. I thought we were cramped in Berkeley (1,200 square feet, plus the rat-to-human ratio was against us) but the basement at 226 is about 800 feet. It should only be for a month or two, and the boys will be gone for about a month of it at various camps, but it will still be tight. It will give us time, though, to work on the yard more, get everything planted that I want to plant and possibly keep the hookers from invading the yard on Sunday mornings.
Or at least that's the hope of Dawn, the nice woman who owns the restaurant across the alley from our back fence. I met her the other day when we were there talking to Al, arguing over the carpeting he wants to put in the basement bedrooms. (It'll be nice, he said, a change from the rest of the apartment. Yeah, I said, it will be like traveling to a new world -- ooh, I was in Tile Land here in the kitchen, but I think I'll go to Carpet Land here in the bedroom. He won that round, because the carpeting is less expensive than the laminate. But if he thinks of suggesting carpeting for the main house, I will cut him.)
Anyway, Dawn saw us outside and introduced herself. She's so happy people are moving in-if we need anything, please let her know. And maybe people living there will keep the hookers from climbing over the fence like they do on Sunday mornings.
Whadda what?
"Why Sunday mornings? Why do you think they choose Sunday morning?" I asked her. "I honestly don't know, but here's the part of the fence they've broken down trying to get into your yard," she said.
Speaking of the yard, there's a new group called Sustainable Salinas that wants to transform people's lawns into vegetable gardens. They're looking for a yard where they can run a pilot program, and they want to talk to us about using our yard as a test case. I'm excited about the possibility--it's what we want to do anyway, and we have a small budget for the raised beds and irrigation--but this could mean some free manual labor too.
Sunday, May 23, 2010
Losing It
I had a weird little week, almost all of it unrelated to the house until today.
Tuesday: Blew a tire on 101 while driving to work. End up being towed back to Salinas. No, I don't have a spare tire. It's a Mini-there's no place to put a spare.
Wednesday: Mostly normal until 5 p.m., when I got an invite from Gov. Schwarzenegger's office to attend the launch of the Green Products Institute the next morning at the Googleplex.
Thursday: Drive to Google. Trying to find parking when the driver of the Jeep in front of me stops, throws it into reverse and slams in to my car while trying to snag a parking spot of his own. It really was a slam, because his bumper rode up on my hood. (That sounds sort of dirty, doesn't it?)
Thursday, 15 minutes later: Go into initiative launch. YouTube founder Chad Hurley is adorably nervous introducing the Governator. What's Rosario Dawson doing on stage, besides looking chic? Google is like heaven, with dogs everywhere, bicycles everywhere, sand volleyball courts and free food. Green products, yay, green certification, yay, and then Arnold drops the bombshell that Toyota is going into business with Tesla to make Electric Vehicles in California. For the next 10 hours, I do nothing but that story.
Friday: Take the Mini to the shop to get the estimate from the guy's insurance company. As an aside, GEICO? I've never met a more on top of it company. They set me up with a rental. I head out, stop at Safeway to grab lunch and go back to the office. Somewhere between the grocery store and the office, my purse disappears, with my new driver's license, two credit cards and my new camera in it. Geico calls, $3 k in damage and they mostly have to replace the front end.
Saturday: Make a critical error in judgement in agreeing to see Magruber. Not only the worst movie I've ever seen, but possibly the worst movie ever made.
Sunday: Husband goes to the house and finds out that one of the contractor's guys has forgotten to lock the door, someone has broken in and thrown around a bunch of construction materials. I go to the Salinas PD to file a report and am told my the cadet at the desk that I can't file a report because I don't have ID. I tell him I don't have ID because my purse was stolen. He suggests that maybe I should call my husband. I suggest instead that I call the watch commander. Which I do. Extra patrols at night until we move in and the promise that the cadet will never do something that stupid again are forthcoming.
Aside:
The watch commander sent over a patrol car. We were over there weeding and planting some berry bushes. The officer asked when we bought the house and whether we were going to have offices there. It's the second time this week that someone asked if we were planning on having offices there (because the previous owner was going to turn it into an office building) and it was the second time someone seemed perplexed that we were planning on living there.
I think there's a supposition that if you're a white professional living in Salinas, you're going to choose to live somewhere not Old Town. (Not true.) There's a supposition that if you're white, you probably think Old Town is dangerous (not true). If you think Old Town is dangerous, I believe you've never lived anywhere dangerous.
Salinas is a funny place. It's deeply screwed up, but it knows it's deeply screwed up. That's a mindset I can get behind.
Berkeley? Deeply screwed up and never really wanted to admit it.
Tuesday: Blew a tire on 101 while driving to work. End up being towed back to Salinas. No, I don't have a spare tire. It's a Mini-there's no place to put a spare.
Wednesday: Mostly normal until 5 p.m., when I got an invite from Gov. Schwarzenegger's office to attend the launch of the Green Products Institute the next morning at the Googleplex.
Thursday: Drive to Google. Trying to find parking when the driver of the Jeep in front of me stops, throws it into reverse and slams in to my car while trying to snag a parking spot of his own. It really was a slam, because his bumper rode up on my hood. (That sounds sort of dirty, doesn't it?)
Thursday, 15 minutes later: Go into initiative launch. YouTube founder Chad Hurley is adorably nervous introducing the Governator. What's Rosario Dawson doing on stage, besides looking chic? Google is like heaven, with dogs everywhere, bicycles everywhere, sand volleyball courts and free food. Green products, yay, green certification, yay, and then Arnold drops the bombshell that Toyota is going into business with Tesla to make Electric Vehicles in California. For the next 10 hours, I do nothing but that story.
Friday: Take the Mini to the shop to get the estimate from the guy's insurance company. As an aside, GEICO? I've never met a more on top of it company. They set me up with a rental. I head out, stop at Safeway to grab lunch and go back to the office. Somewhere between the grocery store and the office, my purse disappears, with my new driver's license, two credit cards and my new camera in it. Geico calls, $3 k in damage and they mostly have to replace the front end.
Saturday: Make a critical error in judgement in agreeing to see Magruber. Not only the worst movie I've ever seen, but possibly the worst movie ever made.
Sunday: Husband goes to the house and finds out that one of the contractor's guys has forgotten to lock the door, someone has broken in and thrown around a bunch of construction materials. I go to the Salinas PD to file a report and am told my the cadet at the desk that I can't file a report because I don't have ID. I tell him I don't have ID because my purse was stolen. He suggests that maybe I should call my husband. I suggest instead that I call the watch commander. Which I do. Extra patrols at night until we move in and the promise that the cadet will never do something that stupid again are forthcoming.
Aside:
The watch commander sent over a patrol car. We were over there weeding and planting some berry bushes. The officer asked when we bought the house and whether we were going to have offices there. It's the second time this week that someone asked if we were planning on having offices there (because the previous owner was going to turn it into an office building) and it was the second time someone seemed perplexed that we were planning on living there.
I think there's a supposition that if you're a white professional living in Salinas, you're going to choose to live somewhere not Old Town. (Not true.) There's a supposition that if you're white, you probably think Old Town is dangerous (not true). If you think Old Town is dangerous, I believe you've never lived anywhere dangerous.
Salinas is a funny place. It's deeply screwed up, but it knows it's deeply screwed up. That's a mindset I can get behind.
Berkeley? Deeply screwed up and never really wanted to admit it.
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Meet Al
This is Al.
Al is our contractor. And the fact that he is standing in my front yard means one thing: work has begun.
When we last left off, it was May 4 and we had just found out that our permit was approved. It meant that Todd the Barista could stop threatening the permit department with sudden denial of caffeine. It meant that I could stop crocheting a voodoo doll that looked strangely like the head of the planning department. It meant that work could start.
But Al had a job to finish in San Something or Other. San Rafael, maybe. I'm not sure. He came down last week to pay for the permit, purchase his Salinas business license and start figuring out the job site. (One thing he figured out almost immediately: his foreman would be sleeping at the house during the week so all of their tools wouldn't get ripped off. Some little rat bastards broke in a few weeks ago before we put new locks on the doors and broke a window and damaged most of the screens.)
Mike the Sprinkler Guy started installing sprinklers in the basement this morning, and plans to finish installation for the whole house by Monday. Al and his guys started working on installing the new water main today, and called for the rough plumbing and electrical inspection for tomorrow. He doesn't expect to pass; he is, gasp, an out-of-town contractor, and a city usually likes to flex their muscles a little bit with the new guys. (Do not make me start crocheting again, Rob the Planner.) Once the rough inspection is complete, I get to have walls--hopefully sometime next week--and shortly thereafter, I get to live with my family again. In the basement.
In the basement, because this permit is for the basement work only. Before we get the permit for the rest of the house, we have to finish the site plan inspection. We had to hire a civil engineer (I'm referring to him by his last name in the same tone of voice Seinfeld used to say "Newman!) for the parking area and curb work, and his plans just came in today.
Friday, we will hit IKEA to buy cabinets for the basement, and order the tile. The strawberry plants are doing well, as is Sam's corn, and the lemon and lime trees are full of buds. One of the pomegranate bushes also is thriving, but I'm not yet sure about the other two.
(As to why we chose a, gasp, out-of-town contractor: I needed one qualified and certified to do an FHA 203k project, and when we started this process, I couldn't find one in Salinas. There is one now, but his website just launched this year.) So for every Salinas resident who is a winner of the lucky sperm lottery (meaning your grandparent's grandparents came here 150 years ago and bought all the land, leaving their offspring with a grandiose sense of entitlement and very little ambition) and has shot me a look or questioned why we're using a, gasp, out of town contractor?
Now you know.
Al is our contractor. And the fact that he is standing in my front yard means one thing: work has begun.
When we last left off, it was May 4 and we had just found out that our permit was approved. It meant that Todd the Barista could stop threatening the permit department with sudden denial of caffeine. It meant that I could stop crocheting a voodoo doll that looked strangely like the head of the planning department. It meant that work could start.
But Al had a job to finish in San Something or Other. San Rafael, maybe. I'm not sure. He came down last week to pay for the permit, purchase his Salinas business license and start figuring out the job site. (One thing he figured out almost immediately: his foreman would be sleeping at the house during the week so all of their tools wouldn't get ripped off. Some little rat bastards broke in a few weeks ago before we put new locks on the doors and broke a window and damaged most of the screens.)
Mike the Sprinkler Guy started installing sprinklers in the basement this morning, and plans to finish installation for the whole house by Monday. Al and his guys started working on installing the new water main today, and called for the rough plumbing and electrical inspection for tomorrow. He doesn't expect to pass; he is, gasp, an out-of-town contractor, and a city usually likes to flex their muscles a little bit with the new guys. (Do not make me start crocheting again, Rob the Planner.) Once the rough inspection is complete, I get to have walls--hopefully sometime next week--and shortly thereafter, I get to live with my family again. In the basement.
In the basement, because this permit is for the basement work only. Before we get the permit for the rest of the house, we have to finish the site plan inspection. We had to hire a civil engineer (I'm referring to him by his last name in the same tone of voice Seinfeld used to say "Newman!) for the parking area and curb work, and his plans just came in today.
Friday, we will hit IKEA to buy cabinets for the basement, and order the tile. The strawberry plants are doing well, as is Sam's corn, and the lemon and lime trees are full of buds. One of the pomegranate bushes also is thriving, but I'm not yet sure about the other two.
(As to why we chose a, gasp, out-of-town contractor: I needed one qualified and certified to do an FHA 203k project, and when we started this process, I couldn't find one in Salinas. There is one now, but his website just launched this year.) So for every Salinas resident who is a winner of the lucky sperm lottery (meaning your grandparent's grandparents came here 150 years ago and bought all the land, leaving their offspring with a grandiose sense of entitlement and very little ambition) and has shot me a look or questioned why we're using a, gasp, out of town contractor?
Now you know.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
Liftoff
After six weeks of begging and raging and begging and raging, as of this morning, we have a building permit.
Thanks to my housemate Todd, who as owner of the Cherry Bean Coffeehouse in Salinas has reminded the permit people every morning for the past week that if they want to continue enjoying their caffeine, they should move faster.
Expanded post to come later.
Thanks to my housemate Todd, who as owner of the Cherry Bean Coffeehouse in Salinas has reminded the permit people every morning for the past week that if they want to continue enjoying their caffeine, they should move faster.
Expanded post to come later.
Friday, April 16, 2010
Stop Calling, Stop Calling I Don't Wanna Hear Anymore ...
First, watch this. It's incredibly charming and will put you in a mood better than the one you're in now:
Last Tuesday marked the one month anniversary of submitting our plans. One month, we were told by Plan Checker Joey, was about how long it was taking to turn the plans around between the three departments--planning, fire and engineering--doing the checking.
Joey finished in three weeks, with a list several pages long of changes the city required of the architect. Fire similarly was done in about three week, and we all know what they wanted. Architect Josh turned Joey's list in about a week, while also getting the proper cuts and drawings we would need to find a fire sprinkler company that would actually answer the phone when we called and not treat us like complete chumps because the think we have more money than we really do. (As an aside, those rumors about the economy making businesses more responsive because they need the work, and local government entities being more responsive because they've come to realize the value of a taxpayer base? Complete bullshit. But I digress.)
Where were we. Planning? Check. Fire? Check? Engineering ...
Where was engineering?
When I was freelancing full-time, I wrote one and sometimes two stories a week about Salinas. I got to know some of the city folks fairly well, including the head city engineer. So on Wednesday about 5 p.m., I called and asked to speak to said engineer and threw in my affiliation so he would remember me.
He was in a meeting, the very nice lady on the phone said. Would I care to leave a message?
I would, I said. I gave her my name, my number and asked her to write down the following exactly as I said it.
"Please tell him I said, 'You are sucking my will to live.'" I told her. She giggled and said she would pass on the message.
Two seconds later, my phone rings. It's another woman from the engineering department who in a very cautious tone asked what my message was regarding. I told her, 226 (street name redacted so crazy and not particularly bright stalkers have a harder time finding me). She said she would give him the message as soon as he was out of his meeting.
Ten minutes later, my phone rings again. Engineer: Hello, how are you, why am I sucking your will to live?
"226 (street name redacted, yada yada)," I told him. "Yes," he said, "I just got the draft last night, but the name on them is Chuck M(complete last name redacted, crazy stalkers, see above)."
"Yeah," I said. "I'm Mrs. M. And you're sucking my will to live."
Engineer said that completely unrelated to my call, he was taking the plans home that evening. They then would go back to the junior planner (not quite sure what she's been doing the past month) and if they were clean, they would be ready on Monday.
Which is good, because our living situation is becoming untenable. (Not mine, really, because Roommate Todd, a completely intense person when it comes to his professional life as a coffeehouse owner, is a most laid back roommate around. Feed him once in awhile and he's happy.) But Chuck and the boys, who are living with his mother owing to the cat allergy thing, are having a different experience.
I know it's not unusual for adult children to move back home with their parents due to the economy. I left for Northwestern when I was 17 and with the exception of a few weeks here and there, I never lived at home again. Chuck left for the Naval Academy about the same time, and with the exception of a day or two here and there, the U.S. government owned his ass for the next nine years, with me taking co-ownership halfway through.
That was almost 20 years ago. I know it's stressful going from living by yourself to suddenly having your adult son and two grandkids living under your roof. But the stress is getting to everyone.
Our friend Larry shakes his head at our situation. "Your life has become a sitcom. Professional woman moves in with gay roommate, her husband and kids move in with his mother, and your best friend teaches homies how to quilt." My life has become a sitcom--a really bad one.
Last Tuesday marked the one month anniversary of submitting our plans. One month, we were told by Plan Checker Joey, was about how long it was taking to turn the plans around between the three departments--planning, fire and engineering--doing the checking.
Joey finished in three weeks, with a list several pages long of changes the city required of the architect. Fire similarly was done in about three week, and we all know what they wanted. Architect Josh turned Joey's list in about a week, while also getting the proper cuts and drawings we would need to find a fire sprinkler company that would actually answer the phone when we called and not treat us like complete chumps because the think we have more money than we really do. (As an aside, those rumors about the economy making businesses more responsive because they need the work, and local government entities being more responsive because they've come to realize the value of a taxpayer base? Complete bullshit. But I digress.)
Where were we. Planning? Check. Fire? Check? Engineering ...
Where was engineering?
When I was freelancing full-time, I wrote one and sometimes two stories a week about Salinas. I got to know some of the city folks fairly well, including the head city engineer. So on Wednesday about 5 p.m., I called and asked to speak to said engineer and threw in my affiliation so he would remember me.
He was in a meeting, the very nice lady on the phone said. Would I care to leave a message?
I would, I said. I gave her my name, my number and asked her to write down the following exactly as I said it.
"Please tell him I said, 'You are sucking my will to live.'" I told her. She giggled and said she would pass on the message.
Two seconds later, my phone rings. It's another woman from the engineering department who in a very cautious tone asked what my message was regarding. I told her, 226 (street name redacted so crazy and not particularly bright stalkers have a harder time finding me). She said she would give him the message as soon as he was out of his meeting.
Ten minutes later, my phone rings again. Engineer: Hello, how are you, why am I sucking your will to live?
"226 (street name redacted, yada yada)," I told him. "Yes," he said, "I just got the draft last night, but the name on them is Chuck M(complete last name redacted, crazy stalkers, see above)."
"Yeah," I said. "I'm Mrs. M. And you're sucking my will to live."
Engineer said that completely unrelated to my call, he was taking the plans home that evening. They then would go back to the junior planner (not quite sure what she's been doing the past month) and if they were clean, they would be ready on Monday.
Which is good, because our living situation is becoming untenable. (Not mine, really, because Roommate Todd, a completely intense person when it comes to his professional life as a coffeehouse owner, is a most laid back roommate around. Feed him once in awhile and he's happy.) But Chuck and the boys, who are living with his mother owing to the cat allergy thing, are having a different experience.
I know it's not unusual for adult children to move back home with their parents due to the economy. I left for Northwestern when I was 17 and with the exception of a few weeks here and there, I never lived at home again. Chuck left for the Naval Academy about the same time, and with the exception of a day or two here and there, the U.S. government owned his ass for the next nine years, with me taking co-ownership halfway through.
That was almost 20 years ago. I know it's stressful going from living by yourself to suddenly having your adult son and two grandkids living under your roof. But the stress is getting to everyone.
Our friend Larry shakes his head at our situation. "Your life has become a sitcom. Professional woman moves in with gay roommate, her husband and kids move in with his mother, and your best friend teaches homies how to quilt." My life has become a sitcom--a really bad one.
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