My life, for what it's worth, part 2

I am excited for Michael tonight.  He's on a date! He dated one woman for six years, I thought they would get married and I was very happy about that.  I really loved her.  When they broke up, I was almost more upset than he was. It's been three years now, and he hasn't been on one date.  His life is happy and fulfilled, he has a good job and lots of friends, but I keep wishing he'd put himself out there a little bit. So for some reason this weekend, he made himself a profile on OkCupid, and two women wanted to meet him.  The first thought she might have time for him today but she was too busy filling out applications to medical school.  Hmph, I say.  Priorities. The second one he was meeting at 8 tonight for drinks and tapas.  At 9:30 he texted me that he knew I was fussing, and he wanted to let me know it was going really well.  Heh.  That boy knows me almost better than I know myself.   So yay!  Michael's ...

Here we are almost halfway through summer, and it's going so fast! Part of it is that when my dad died during tax season, I put a bunch of people on extension.  They would normally have filed on time if I nagged them, but I didn't feel like nagging this year.  So they're coming in to finish up now. Part of it is that I have signed up for a series on online classes.  One of them was awful, my first (and last) experience with a for profit university.  I could have just bought the book and learned as much as I did.  Probably more because I would have read the whole book instead of just a few chapters.  One of them (through the local community college, for 1/5 the price of the first one) is quite good and I'm learning a lot.  Very pleased with how that's going.  But these classes do require homework time. Part of it is that Joe doesn't feel good at all.  He had the kidney stone last year, and has just never really gotten back to normal afte...

I guess all those good resolutions about writing more often weren't worth much, were they?  It's been so long it's taken me five minutes to figure out how to write a new entry. Since I last wrote, tax season ended, our best yet.  It looks like we are going to need to move to a new office.  The one we have is very nice, but we hired an employee this year and it's getting a bit small.  More importantly, the landlord leased most of our floor to a very young and enthusiastic church group.  They use their space for choir practice, complete with drums and electric guitar, and youth group, with kids running up and down the halls yelling.  Most unprofessional.  So we've been looking at new places to rent.  It seems like a lot of work. Mom and I had a good time in Hawaii.  When we left, I was seriously worried about her.  Her stomach hurt, she said, so she wasn't eating.  She'd lost ten pounds (and if you know my mother, you'd know that'...

I had a client come in today whose son was born the same week as Emily.  The son has graduated high school and is now attending the school of "failure to launch," as his father put it.  He was dating an 18 year old who dropped out of high school.  Her parents did not want them "living in sin" because they are active in their church, so they took the young couple to a minister and helped them get married.  Now they're living in the girl's parents' basement with no education and no jobs.  My clients are beside themselves. I texted Emily that I was appreciating her rather more than usual today.  Her response was that this is a good time to tell me she's pregnant and has a meth problem.  SIGH.  Everyone else thinks she's hilarious. _______________________________________________________________________________ Ten more days until the end of tax season, and I'm not working on one of them.  This is starting to seem achievable, despite the ver...

My mom.  Honestly.  I'd forgotten what it's like to travel with her. As I mentioned before, this has been a revolting winter in Seattle, and I am going to die if I don't get to see some sunshine soon.  So I told my mom I wanted to go to Maui after tax season.  She hemmed and hawed (but she doesn't have any new summer clothes!) but finally agreed to let me buy her a ticket. Then she fussed very hard, because our tickets are non-refundable and what if there's some festival in Hawaii that week and we can't get a hotel? I started looking for a hotel.  I sent her one that looked promising.  She said it looked like a fire trap, but, and I quote, "whatever you pick, I'm sure it will be fine."  Sigh.  I sent her another one.  She honestly doesn't care, but maybe she should ask her friends who stay on Maui where they go.  Fine, please do.  I sent another suggestion.  She countered with the name of the condo her parents used t...

Last week, my business partner caught a nasty cold, and she insisted on coming to work every day.  I begged her to go home.  I told her how mad I'd be if I got sick.  And she would not leave.  Anybody care to guess where this is going? I haven't been sick in years.  Probably not since I left my former employer, where people would call in too sick to work and then come in to do their taxes and cough all over me.  I already had one cold this winter, and now I have a worse one.  Ugh.  My partner feels so sad and sorry, but I know she'll do it again.  Maybe I should get pneumonia to teach her a lesson. The good news is that I finally got caught up on all the work I got behind on when Dad was sick and then planning for the funeral.  For awhile there I was more behind than I've ever been.  Today I put the finishing touches on the last one, and then I brought myself home and put myself to bed.  I am going to go in briefly tomorrow...

So much has happened since my last post.  My mom kept my dad home for another week, even though something clearly had broken in his brain.  He stayed up all night, every night, calling out, reaching for something on the ceiling, trying to get out of bed.  And of course, mom gamely "slept" next to him, telling him to settle down, keeping him in bed, not getting any sleep herself.  I went over there on Friday morning and her hands were shaking and she was gray.  I'm not ashamed to say I cried to make her call and get someone to come watch my dad at night that night. So she got a good night's sleep, which was good, because the next day she decided to take him to see the doctor.  The doctor took one look and called the ambulance to take him to the hospital, where he had every test known to man and was finally admitted.  They never did figure out what exactly had happened, but he was just out of his mind. Monday was the worst day ever.  I got there...