I’ve never been a fan of hunting, and I always liked deer, until they destroyed my garden.  But since I no longer have a garden, I’m back on the side of non-hunters.  I suppose I see the benefits of thinning out the herds, but I can’t understand calling it a “sport” when the opponents can’t shoot back.  That’s why this is the best article I’ve seen all day:

Montana Hunter attacked by a deer he thought was dead.

You go for it, Buck!  Level that playing field!

I could write an epic tale of every detail of the move, but instead, I’ll tell you about the most epic thing.

My crew of helpers consisted of Birmingham, Flick, Tucker, KT, KrisD and J-dog. (I totally just made up those two last nicknames, I’m not feeling certain about them yet…)  KrisD and J-dog are getting married next month and own a truck, and we all had just come back from their bachelor and bachelorette parties on Saturday, so that’s why I put them on all the heavy lifting.  Flick, Tucker, and Birmingham also did their share of packing, lifting, and convincing me to toss out crap I don’t need.  And I put KT on unscrewing duty because she’s the organized type that I trust to make sure I take home every nail and screw I ever put into the walls.

KT diligently unscrewed everything I screwed: curtain rods, picture hooks, compact florescent light bulbs.  I asked her to remove the closet rod, which was actually a bamboo pole left by the previous tenants that was suspended from the ceiling by twine held in with brackets, hanging in the anti-room.  Birmingham created it for me back in the days of the broken ankle when I needed a way to access my clothes without going upstairs.  It went up quite easily, and held up well, so I continued to use it for my clothes even after I regained the ability to walk.

I was off somewhere organizing something, and much of my stuff was already in the new place when KT started unscrewing the first bracket suspending the rod from the ceiling.  And that’s when we all heard her yell.  And when we all came running over to see what had happened, there was water cascading from the ceiling.  Before I could even figure out what happened, I went running to find the waterlesbian (of all people) because I remember her once telling me that there was only one water shut-off for the entire farm.

And while I’m doing that, Birmingham figured out he could turn the water off with the water heater in the bathroom.  Once I’ve found the waterlesbian, and she’s lifted the two termite-infested, and I mean infested plywood sheets that cover a hole in the ground and put a nearby ladder into the hole to turn off the water, Birmingham is running across the property waving his hands in the universal sign for “we fucked up, cease this crazy activity at once.”

But the waterlesbian was already down the hole turning off the water, so Birmingham told me on the DL that we had actually caused the problem, because one of the screws holding in the closet rod was actually screwed into one of the water pipes.  When KT unscrewed it, the waters were free to flow again.  As I was running across the farm, they had re-screwed in the braket, and turned the water back on via the hot water heater, and the flood had stopped.

But it was kind of too late to call off the waterlesbian, who now wanted to know why she had crawled into a termite-infested hole to turn off all the water on the property.  So she came over to find Flick mopping up the soaking wet anti-room and KT trying to dry off herself while looking for a good hiding place for the drill.  I explained to the waterlesbian that a screw was holding a bracket in place and it had been screwed directly into the pipes in the ceiling, which are made of plastic, even though having plastic pipes for your main water is a terrible, terrible idea.

“But you put the screw in, right?” she asks, clearly thinking about the security deposit check that she doesn’t want to give to me.

“The bamboo poles were left here by the previous tenant,” I tell her, which is not a lie!

“But you screwed the brakets into the celing?”

“No, I didn’t.”  Also not a lie!  Birmingham did it!

“Then why were you taking them out?”

“I delegated the unscrewing task to a friend, and I decided I wanted to take the poles down.  Who would have known that there was a plastic water pipe in the half and inch away from the ceiling, and that this tiny screw was holding it all together?”

“But didn’t you hang this here?”

Secure in my truthyness, I went for the full lie.  “The previous tenants had this hanging here, but I’m the one who used it as a closet when I broke my ankle and couldn’t even get up the stairs of my own home.  I have no idea why they put it up there.  They left a lot of stuff here when I moved in.”

“They were just assholes.”

“I know.  I can’t believe that they just left this cottage in the middle of their lease in February and that you didn’t even get a chance to do a walk-through before I moved in.  Almost everything in this cottage that was left in a condition that you don’t like was their fault.  Additionally, you really should think about replacing the plastic water pipes.  It’s amazing that these pipes held together as long as they did.  Imagine if this flood had happened when all my clothes were here.”

“Well, I’m sorry that this happened, but it looks like you’re doing a really good job cleaning.  I have your check if you want to come pick it up.”

And I did indeed get the check.  When I picked it up, the waterlesbian asked the landlesbian if she wanted to do a final walkthrough.  But the landlesbian was engrossed in the news on TV.  The waterlesbian asked one more time if she wanted to check on the condition of the cottage, and the landlesbian looked at the two of us and said:

“Fuck the cottage.”

And those were the last words she said to me.

While I was away from the Internet, not much happened in the real world.  I went grocery shopping, got a little further in the Douglas Adams book, and watched the movie “The Kite Runner.”  Which was as always,  not as good as the book, but still pretty good, and made me want to go to Afghanistan, in 1978.  Afghanistan today?  Not so much.

The other thing that happened was the incident that made me decide I need to move.  The landlesbian has always been a funny presence in my life, saying eccentric things and being generally difficult to deal with.  But in the end, I live peacefully in this ramshackle cottage with a great backyard, and she’s usually pretty quiet and sticks to her own half of the property.  Additionally, there are six blissful winter months where she lives at her place in the city.

But then a few weeks ago, she deteriorated quickly, and I don’t just mean that she’s calling me “Isabel Archer,” because that made the vaguest sense.  I mean that I come home to find her ranting and raving in the backyard, yelling about the patriarchy, religion, Connecticut, whatever.  The point is that what she’s yelling about isn’t logical and she’s moved into the house next door to me (which has been vacant since my awesome neighbors moved two months ago), and according to the waterlesbian, she’s planning on staying for the entire winter.

The day in question, I came home for lunch, and she was blocking my path, yelling about something.  I told her, “I can’t talk to you when you’re yelling at me, landlesbian” and as I tried to walk by her, she grabbed my shoulder and turned me around and kept yelling.  I got inside after that, but I was shaking.

Directly afterwards, I went to talk to the waterlesbian. (and for the record, no one is really certain what her relationship to the landlesbian is.  She lives on the farm sometimes, but her home address is in another part of the state, and sometime she’s gone for long periods of time.)  She responded quickly to that, and told the landlesbian not do do that anymore and to apologize to me.  The whole thing felt a lot like dealing with an unruly preschooler.  It made me feel sad on top of being scared and shaken.

At the first chance I had, I started looking for a new place.  I did just sign a lease for another year at the cottage, but considering how quickly she’s gotten this bad, I don’t see her getting better, and I think I need to get out.

She is at least coherent enough to cash my rent check.  Damn it.  I was kind of hoping she’d lose that, like the time she left her set of keys in my door when she was replacing the smoke detector.  Those spare keys are still in my possession…

In the meantime, I’m parking my car near the side of the house, and sneaking in the front door in the hopes that she’s in the backyard and won’t notice me.  I try to leave for swimming before 6am, not go home for lunch, to the gym after work, and maybe I’ll go to the coffee shop or somewhere else after the gym.  There are rare occasions when I really want to make dinner or I absolutely need to have a nap after work, and I feel like I’m taking a huge chance of running into her while she’s in a state.  At least I’m going to be gone all this weekend, but I tell you, I wouldn’t be surprised if I came home to find that my home had been burned to the ground.  Saddened, but not surprised.

Anyone know any good one bedroom places five minutes from my work with at least 20 acres of backyard and no landlesbians to speak of?  And in the meantime, does anyone have good advice on how to deal with a legitimately crazy person?

Admittedly, I went in more interested in being air conditioned for two and a half hours, not because I was hoping it would be The Greatest Movie Of All Time.  But still, I was kind of disappointed.  Not to write a movie review or anything, I just thought that it was convoluted and overly self-important, and I think it’s a tragedy to bring Cillian Murphy into a movie and then only put him in one scene where he has a bag over his head 90% of the time.  Also, I just can’t stand movies where stuff gets wantonly destroyed.  Under no circumstance should anyone crash a car that is worth more money than I will make in my entire life.

And yes, Heath Ledger was great like they all say, but that wasn’t enough to make me want to sit though it again or heartily recommend it to everyone I know.  All that being said, it was still better than The Ruins.

Other than that, I had a totally rocking weekend where I went sailing and got to ride in a convertible and ate homemade ice cream in a complete affront to no-sugar July.  And then I had an encounter with the landlesbian.

I’m almost loathe to tell stories, because I think she’s reached a tipping point of going from eccentric to actually certifiable.  Her tangents are even more tangential and her outbursts are even more outbursty.  And she’s been leaving lights on all night long, and they shine into my backyard.  Earlier, I was leaving the house and she was standing around, looking at my tomato plant.

“Noelle, your tomato is ready to be eaten.”

“I noticed, I’m planning on leaving it on the vine another day and then I’ll pick it.  You can have it if you want it though.” (I’m practically a sharecropper!)

“You need to pick it and show it to your friends!”

“Or I could just eat it.”

“You know, we have a great bounty and history here in Connecticut and New York and it needs to be shared with friends!”

“um, right.”

“In fact, in Connecticut they have stone houses that are so old, they charge you $100 an hour to restore them.  So think about that!”

“Would you like the tomato, landlesbian?”

“It’s just a damn shame how much they charge you to restore buildings.”  (I am not aware that she owns any property with stone structures in Connecticut, but whatever.)

“Anyway, I think I need to go now.”

“You’re just like Isabel Archer.  Now pick that tomato and show it off!”

I told her I would and drove off as quickly and deliberately as possible.  I did not pick the tomato at that time.  I hope I don’t come home to find that she’s burned down the plant in revenge or something.  And I sure as heck hope that she doesn’t get recruited by the Joker as part of his army of the insane.

Because she couldn’t understand what I was talking about when I told her the bats were making noises DIRECTLY ABOVE MY BED, I finally stopped trying to explain the location and told her I would just draw a diagram so she could show it to the carpenter, and then he could get his butt up on the roof and plug the hole the bats were calling their front door.

Wanting her not to miss a thing, the diagram looked a little like this:

Not my best, refrigerator-worthy work, but I think it got the point across.

This morning, the landlesbian was wandering the grounds as I popped outside, in my PJ’s, to mail a letter.

“Did you go swimming this morning, Noelle?” she screams across the property.

“No, landlesbian, I did not.  That was yesterday.  I’m just mailing a letter.”

“I really liked your picture.”

(not sure what she means, fearing that she somehow found out about the blog, or maybe was talking about the photos inside my house…) “What picture?”

“The one on your door!  You’re just like Isabel Archer from Henry James.  Have you read James, do you know who she is?”

(the answer is no, and yes, but I really want to get inside and put on pants and go to work) “Yes, I’m familiar…”

“She drew pictures, too.”  (Diagrams of bats?) “Henry James was very sad, because he was gay.  He was never as popular as Edith Wharton, and that made him upset.  Did you see the Williams sisters at Wimbledon?”

“um, yes?”

“They are the best female athletes in the world.”

“uh… They are good.”  I should have shut up but then I had to say, “But right now I find Dara Torres the most inspirational.  She’s a swimmer.”

“I don’t know of her.  My inspiration is Proust.”

“I don’t think he was much of a swimmer.  I need to go inside now and get ready for work.”

“You have to go to work at 7:00 in the morning?  Did the bats bother you last night?”

“I still have to eat breakfast before I go, and no, I heard no bats last night.  Please thank the carpenter for taking care of it.”

“He’s such a diva.  You’re such an Isabel Archer.”

Note to self, read Henry James.  Possibly get a discount on rent?

That’s how I thought until last night, when I came home, high from how great the swim went.

These used to be my tomatoes:

And my lush beets and spinach: (Not pictured: plastic fence that has been trampled.)

Gone. Every last one. Gone. Eaten. Left untouched: radishes and Brussels Sprouts, vegetables I’m not interested in eating but planted just because I was told they were easy. I’m so pissed. I actually had trouble sleeping last night because I was so upset. My next door neighbor, who fed Micki for me over the weekend, talked to me this morning and told me she was sad because her cat died on Saturday. I empathized for a minute, and then I was all, “I know how you feel, because I lost my beets!”

If I see a deer anywhere near me for the rest of the summer, I’m going to shoot it between the eyes. I no longer have any sympathy for those jerks. All the respect I paid them over the years, and this is how they repay me. So I guess after work today, I’m going to have to bend over my sore back and shoulders and pick up the pieces. Anyone have any suggestions? Is it too late to plant anew?

One thing that helps is that I’m currently listening to “The Worst Hard Time” in my car. It gives me a little perspective. Compared to what the homesteaders lost in the dust bowl of the 1930′s, a few eaten greens is not going to kill me. Back then, families lost their entire gardens when they were burned by the static electricity in the dust storms. And that was all they had to eat. I’m still in the position where I can pick up some pre-washed spinach at Stop & Shop. But still, if I see those doe eyes looking at me, my face is going to be the last thing those doe eyes ever see.

The Shower Stool went for $10.  I marked it at $25, but a woman wanted it for her 95 year old father, which meant that my naked butt meant nothing as far as increasing the price.  I also noticed that most people, when bargaining down more than a dollar or two, liked to include a sob story of why they needed the item at an extreme discount.  For instance, my air conditioner was also marked at $25, but a woman offered $10 with the explanation that it was for her divorced friend whose kids were currently dying of heat.  Whatever, dude.  Just don’t make me put it into your car for you.

The Ansel Adams calendar went for 50 cents, along with my 2001 Brian Froud Fairies calendar, which I marked down to 25 cents.

Mookie Wilson did not sell, because I adamantly priced him at $10 and refused to sell him to anyone who would not admit he was the greatest Met of all time.  Perhaps it will be Ebay for him, or maybe my dashboard.  Who knows?

Sorry, Sister Alyson, the nail art sold for $3.  It was the last thing to go before the skies opened up and ended our sale three and a half hours early on Saturday afternoon.  But the man who bought it was really happy, and we didn’t tell him that hours earlier Birmingham had come to visit and used it to make faces with his tongue sticking out.

Wilson Philips and Shari Lewis are still in my possession, even though I priced the tapes at 5 for $1 and 8 for $1.50 (no one fell for the shady 8 tape deal).  But, I did sell the “No Son Of Mine” single to a dude who was really excited about it.  For his dollar, he also got Tesla, Warrant, Poison and Ozzy Ozborne.  Then, as he and his wild hair got back into his pickup, he told me he was “jazzed to go to work because now he had his favorite music to listen to!”

But my biggest success of all was the cookies.  Knowing that I wasn’t selling many big ticket items, I decided to have a little bake sale on the side.  I made these: Citrus-Drizzled Cranberry-Oatmeal Cookies.

I wrapped them up in cling wrap and a ribbon, and sold them in packages of two for 50 cents.  These cookies are madly easy to make, and they’ve garnered me some serious compliments.  Sometimes I make extras to give to my neighbor in exchange for the wifi he lets me bum. (I don’t know what I’m going to do when he moves in July.)  They sold pretty well over the course of Friday, one guy bought two at once.  Then, a few hours later, he returned and bought everything I had left!  Lacking the ingredients for more cookies, I made Jenna Fischer’s 88 calorie brownies for Saturday.  They were delish, but not as popular.  So the extras went down to New Jersey with me on Sunday and became instant father’s day brownies.

All in all, I earned about a third of a stimulus check for my efforts.  Nice work if you can get it.

Because they want to purge their stuff before they go, we are having a moving sale on Friday and Saturday. Even though I’m staying put for another year, I think it’s a good idea to jettison some of the stuff that I never want to move to a new home. Last night, I went to pricing some of my personal treasures, and I got stuck on a few items, unsure of their value in a free market.

So you, blog reader, are the next contestant on “The Price is ????”!!!! What in the world would you pay for the following…

Shower stool. Good for the elderly who have trouble standing in showers or the 30-somethings who have broken their ankles. I paid $35 for it at the pharmacy and got a few week’s worth of use out of it before I was able to stand on my own two feet. So the question is: is it worth less because my bare ass has been on it, or is it worth more because my bare ass has been on it?

Okay, so this is a 2005 calendar. That does not help anyone. I’ll give you that. But it’s super glossy and huge, and the pictures are quite beautiful. Would anyone pay for 12 black and white photos, suitable for framing? (if you get the frame your damn self?)

Mookie Wilson bobblehead doll. I will never have a more favorite baseball player than the Mets’own 1st baseman, #1, Mookie Wilson. Even though the glory days of ’86 are long over, he had a brief stint as the 1st base coach for the Brooklyn Cyclones. And to celebrate, the Cyclones held bobblehead giveaway day. I can’t remember who I dragged to the game with me (probably Birmingham) but I made sure to get to that game an hour before the start so I could be one of the first 2,500 fans to get the doll. But you know what? It’s been sitting in that styrofoam case ever since. Time to go, Mooks. Thanks for the memories. But at what price?

UPDATE: He’s currently $10.50 on Ebay

This nail art thing was fun for a while, but it weighs more than most 3rd graders, and I don’t want to move it again. I gave it a little Michelle Obama fist-bump to make it look more friendly. At what cost, freedom?

Wilson Phillips. On Tape. Yeah, so here’s the thing. I’m 30. That means I came of age in the late 80′s and early 90′s, right before CD’s became the preferred conveyor of music and right after records got abandoned. Most of my bad album purchases were actually bad CD Cassette purchases, and you better believe that I was willing to hit “stop” and “rewind” and “play” over and over just to hear “Hold On” one more time and remember the night that Ryan MacGregor slow danced with me at summer camp.

But is that worth anything to anyone? Not pictured: “Genisis’s “No Son of MIne” on cassette single, EMF’s “Unbelievable” on cassette single, and a whole lot of mix tapes that took a whole lot of hours away from my high school and college education.

Speaking of tapes. Seriously, why do I have this? When I was old enough for this kind of stuff, they were still putting things out on record. Oh wait. Look closer. It’s autographed. By Shari Lewis!

Forget it. There’s just some stuff you can’t sell.

I can’t find any information on this mural, other than it was done by some high school students at an art school. I hope they make something of the vacant lot here.

My front door and a downed tree. Looks like lightning hit it, because there’s a black mark on the break, and it smells like Christmas.

The view from my front door.

That tree again, doing its best to keep away the jerks who like to drive on my road at 50MPH.

The landlesbian moved her car there to keep it safe in the storm. It’s a good thing she didn’t pull it up another foot.

The storm took down part of the fence in my garden, and somehow dropped a bunch of weeds all over the place.

I spray painted a dead tree with red paint.

After we did all that, I played in my garden for a little while to assure that those beets do arrive, and to take my new header photo (the above was like take 20 or something, I really, really need a new camera…) When I was done, I cleaned up my fingernails and some of the kickballers and I went across the river to have dinner at a Mexican place for a friend’s birthday. While over there, I got a voice mail from the Landlesbian.

Noelle, Noelle, this is {first name}, {first name} {last name}, your {landlesbian}. Darling, when we signed the lease this morning, we forgot. We forgot to collect this month’s rent. Would you be so kind as to leave it at the house on Monday? Thanks, dear. Yours truly, {first name} {last name}.

Oops. At least we both forgot, so she knows I’m not holding a protest over $7 or something.