The Soup Ladies is a non-profit group that shows up to calls to feed first responders. A friend of mine’s Mom has been involved with the group for some time and I’m more than happy to get the word spread for more exposure.

They are holding a first annual dinner and auction, Friday, 10 September 2010 at the Meridian Valley Golf and Country Club. Cost $75pp. Contact Linda by email at thesoupladies@live.com. All proceeds benefit The Soup Ladies mission in the greater King and Pierce County in Washington state.

Can’t make the event? Donations gladly accepted.

Ok, I may be exaggerating here, it could be a full 30 seconds. OR wait, it could be even less, as all it takes is seeing telestaff on the phone and you know some day’s schedule is about to change.

Sure, I know that we left school supplies until the last minute. We got school clothes done almost 2 weeks ago, but I haven’t bought any of the supplies. I have time, they don’t start until tomorrow. lol The plan was for hubby to go today and then tonight we were going to hit a last dinner out with the kids. Oh, you caught the “was” and “were”? Yeah, that was the plan before the call came in at 10:20 last night.

I have hours of work to get done for a client (YAH) and it was going to spill over into tomorrow already. Now it will spill into a late night since I need to runaround getting everything finished up for school. Which obviously means I’m not at home working. Poor planning and I don’t think I’ve ever been this last minute. Adapting all plans on short notice is a main part of life as a firefighter’s wife. It’s only going to only happen on days that are already full.

It’s hard to believe that the summer is over. Sure there is going to be decent weather at times, but the kids are back to school tomorrow and that means no more trips anywhere for a while.

Instead of going out to dinner, we’re going to plan a big fiesta at home. Quesadillas, nachos, taco’s and whatever else the kids can come up with. I think I’ll encourage the oldest to make some cupcakes as well. She’s a cupcake wars junkie and we found some yummy recipes.

Holidays will be here before we know it. Passing up OT isn’t ever easy and it’s almost always something we can change our schedule around to accommodate. I guess it’s a good thing I’ve never really been a scheduled person, so it may be easier for me to roll with than some. Who knows?

Is it pretty easy for you to work around the last minute OT?
photo credit: intenteffect

It’s not just because he’s a fireman that I feel this way.  I felt this way since I was lucky enough to snag him 20 years ago.  Every day he’s with me, he makes me smile.

Yes, I’m sappy as hell right now, I’m watching P.S. I Love You for the upteenth millionth time. I freaking hate this movie as it makes me bawl like a baby. No matter how much I want to not cry. I cry within 15 minutes of it. lol Not just cry, but uncontrollable sobbing. UGH, so pretty.

I swore I wouldn’t watch it again without making hubby watch it with me. He ticked me off so I swore I’d make him watch this chickflix. I never force him. lol But this one, now I’m not sure I can share. OR maybe I need to commiserate with the only other person that can relate?

He’s never worked in anything that was safe. I try every day not to take it for granted. It’s not easy, but honestly, you never know when it’s time for one of us to go. I know that I don’t want to be pissed off about the dishes, the socks on the floor or any other little thing. I try to keep things in perspective and I think it helps that he does as well. We aren’t big arguers which is good and bad of course. Bad in things may not get worked out as quickly as if we just had it out. But definitely good in the fact that we aren’t sending each other down the road in an angry tirade.

I made a vow a long time ago not to send him out the door while angry and without saying I Love You. I may not have been successful every single day, but it’s my goal to keep to that. Especially now that he’s got so much on his plate for a full 24 hours. Before it was just construction bullshit, both of us only gave so much of a *hit about. But now, it’s his life and it’s our life. So when work stuff comes up, it does make an impact if he doesn’t deal with it.

But none of that is us or matters in what I’m saying really. I never thought I’d be lucky enough to have a man who is my best friend, in my life, let alone for 20 years in my life. I try not to take any day for granted as every day is a blessing and a day to make at least a couple of new memories. lol I’m not going on spiritual on you with that, I just mean that I do give thanks to all that are listening that I still have him.

I’m not sure that this doesn’t sound like a desperate woman’s post now. It’s not that way, it’s mutual. lol I just really try to focus on us working things out quickly. It’s way past time for a date nite and I’ll bring up if he feels the same way. But I know that because of his past experiences, and our horrible traffic, we don’t take a “have a good day at work, bye” for granted.

So when hubby’s at work, do you cook?

I don’t all that often.  There are usually leftovers in the fridge and the kids and I will rummage through them.  I’ll add a salad and maybe a fresh veggie or side to our choices.

Kids found other places to spend the night and I don’t want to eat leftovers.  But I also don’t want to go start the BBQ for just me.  I’d make up a lot of food for lunches and dinner tomorrow, but it just seems weird to light the BBQ for only me.  lol  I’m going to work really hard at not calling delivery.  I’m sure there has to be something around here I can pretend is unhealthy.

I have a new book I could start, or plenty of online stuff I should be working on.  I bought I Love a Fire Fighter: What the Family Needs to Know and of course I’m dieing to dig into it so I can do a review. I’m going to review it differently than The Fireman’s Wife. If I feel the need to comment about the book as I read, I will. Then I’ll also do a big review linking any posts about it up.

So you may see a few little changes here on the blog as I work tonight on odd projects and work on brainstorming other ideas for this blog. If you have anything you’d like to see or get more information on please let me know.

The more I write this post the more I want that teriyaki chicken marinating in the fridge.  I just may end up cooking for one, for the first time in a long while.  Do I have enough charcoal?
photo credit: russelljsmith

Unexpected overtime can be nice.  Especially to get the OT at the beginning of the month.  However, it’s disconcerting when it happens and you weren’t really ready for it.

I guess I should have been, the OT started going out almost 48 hours before because of the deployments to Eastern Wa for the wildfires.  But, it didn’t dawn on me that it would keep going because of the deployments.  DUH

He’s on 48 and with the school year starting up, believe me it will be completely necessary.  What was missed today?  The first thing completely missed was his 20 year reunion.  However, we were already going to miss it because of prior engagements.  It just stinks that I had to do all the other engagements alone.  Oh well, such is life right?  At least my phone didn’t run out of battery so I could complain to him about it all. tee-hee-hee

Today I get to sleep in completely.  No hubby coming home from work to wake me up and no kids at home.  I’ll look to any positive I can find.  Otherwise it will just be depressing.  Of course, it’s sad already that I’m up so late.  I don’t take the ambien much unless he’s at work.

With our schedule being so crazy this summer I will take all these quiet moments and try to put them to good use.  I have quite a bit in store for this blog and my order of new books to review is supposed to be here on Monday!

Any books you’d like to hear reviews on?  I’m going to read some of hubby’s books as well so I can do some Christmas present reviews for you all as well.  I told hubby he has to step up and answer some questions.  I also told him he has to figure out who borrowed his  B Shifter book so I can read it first!  How can you forget who you loaned a book out to? UGH, MEN!

Tons of projects are completed or in process.  Man, hubby’s been working his ass off at home, my parent’s house and then extra at work too.  Happy to see a couple of days of much lower key activity during this 4 day.  Starting it off with dinner and a fire with friends sure helped   I’m just glad that he didn’t burn down the new fence he put up.  I did tell him I was going to literally LMAO if it happened since the two guys couldn’t stop loading wood on the fire.  Damn firefighters.

Planned out the back patio and now we are sitting out on the falling apart deck just chillin’.  Our weather has been nice and warm for a few weeks now and it’s just so nice to be outside. Now I need to get a new laptop battery so I can sit out longer.

It’s been months since a 4-day meant I saw my hubby unless we were camping.  Even the last one that we went to the lake he was doing projects.  With my luck he’ll do all this work, we’ll put the house on the market and not even get to enjoy it next year cause the house will sell.  At least when the patio gets poured, we are also doing a cover for it.  We can sit out back most of the year since we have months of temperate weather here in Seattle.  We would just like to not sit in the rain.

He has this set coming up and then most of the next 2 off.  However, a bunch of yardwork with an excavator is set to be worked on Sunday and then the wood for my parents house comes in.  He’ll be helping my parents build their new addition because that’s just the kind of guy he is.  He’s worried someone will take advantage or do it half-assed OR mostly likely both.  So we’ll all be down at my parents a lot this month.  At least I won’t have to cook much.

I know there are times that go farther between posting than I’d like.  It’s not for lack of ideas, it’s because I try to be smart and think before posting.  I refuse to be like so many other sites and post info that in my opinion violates privacy laws.  I try hard about that and it’s not easy for me as I’m such an open book.

Tonight and day, hubby has been busy.  He’s been helping my Dad build a fence, finished up two big projects here at the house and had a busy set.  It was rough to send him and rough for him to go to work today because he’s been so busy.  TOO BUSY!  We run off to friends when he gets off work and then he’s said he’ll start another side of our fence the next day when we get back from the lake.  NO, I don’t think he will  I’m pretty sure we need to go have a fun day of play with the youngest.

Anyway, the blog title.  Do you post TMI on your blog?  Do you think before you post?  It’s a rough line.

For one thing I don’t want to embarrass my family.  To many people know who we are because of FB.  The internet is not as anonymous as it was when I first started building sites when the dinosaurs were around.

Secondly, I don’t want to have hubby lose his job or be reprimanded.  Quite a few from his work follow my FB account and updates from this blog go to that account.  While I don’t have a worry about corporate for anything I say, I am aware of how things could affect his work.  Yes, I hate that and it can stifle talk.  However, I’m thankful that I’ve always been a horrible liar and any opinions that do come out of my mouth are backed up by some facts and I will own them as my opinions.  Feel free to send me more facts so I can change my opinion by facts presented.  From years of my Dad being in government, my holding positions on boards and now hubbies job, yes I do know things I’m not supposed to.  After 16 years I’m aware of this and I don’t post and I don’t talk about many, many things.  It’s a rough line for me at times to know what may be public knowledge so I just ignore it until later. lol

Right now, hubby has had a super busy day.  How do I know this?  I thankfully got to see him. I passed him driving the engine (HOT!) and then did a turn around so I could drop stuff off at the station for him.  But since then I haven’t heard anything.  It’s always a wonder if it’s that busy or if his phone ran out of juice. lol  I haven’t been home so I’m not sure if sirens have been rocking or not.  Then we’ve had movies up loud so we can’t hear outside noise as much either.

But it’s almost midnight and we’ll be going to the lake with friends for a few days.  Man I’m excited to see him for more than a few minutes.

This wasn’t too far from my house. Not dangerously close by any means, but a little ways down the road. I wasn’t home and my friend texted me to tell me the district must have just blown up because there were sirens going from both stations like crazy.

We heard a plane had crashed and sadly that has happened a few times during hubbies career.  I hoped it wasn’t too bad. We live by a private air strip and people build there own planes. Now that’s a brilliant idea isn’t it?

Luckily it wasn’t that bad and the old man made an emergency landing. His ultralight stalled from what I can find out on the tv channels and he landed in the field and ended upside down. There’s some cool footage and pics.

Hubby’s not in the footage and I can’t get a good pic of the extra rigs there that were first called out to see if he’d even made the call.  It was a busy morning.  But there’s a lot of guys in the pictures that owe some ice cream tonight.  I made sure and posted the link on facebook so they can be called out.

Well last night I posted about summer schedules, hubby called me outside to help with the gate and then the call came in for OT today. Our friends are all out of town so we knew we’d get it. lmao Hey, it’s the price they pay for winning this snobby charity event golf tickets that pricetag would BLOW YOUR MIND. Anyway, I don’t mean snobby for realz. But they will be mingling with celebs.

I was lmao when he said what the call was. Of course take it, we’re only doing projects and we could get the gate done before bed. Not to mention we just put the fence and big gate in and the new skylight. Doesn’t hurt to get a little of that back. lol

True to fashion, the planned 4 day is broken up. He ended up working with some guys we really like AND he’s working third on the engine. So he’s loving his day of work today. I got an unexpected day of no one at home. It’s a late night watching movies on the newly streaming Wii with netflix, catching up on my blogs and hitting this hill of laundry.

Jealous?

I think tomorrow I will finish painting the master bath finally. Our buddy is coming over to roof in the new skylight in the main bath. I can’t wait to have light in there again. Our old one was leaking so it’s been covered for months. That will be 2 projects off our big list this summer! SWEET

Wow, it’s only our 4th summer after getting hired and so much has happened that his seniority isn’t bad. We’ve had 2 groups of rookies hired and recently merged with another district. We aren’t that close to the bottom anymore and that means…? WOW, time off during the summer? WHAT?!

We went into this gig knowing that we’d never have time off in the summer. We’d been warned and we knew as the rookie you don’t get to pick. But here we are with a lot of time off.

It’s not easy to schedule work around, but it’s very difficult to complain about it. This year we are finally getting over some bills and getting projects done around the house. OK, he’s mostly getting projects done. But he used to be a carpenter in his past life, if I help it typically takes longer. lol

Camping, short trips and projects galore. Oh, then there are the friends stopping over, the bday parties, the weddings and the just getting together cause we want to BBQ’s. It’s packed and I’m having a heck of a time getting sites updated. This means it’s time to sell off more sites and scale back. If it doesn’t get updated much this summer, it’s outta here.