Cannot navigate rooms. House has become Boxtown, USA.

And Bagtown, too. Can’t forget about your bags. Or they may riot due to underrepresentation.

Speaking of underrepresentation, I’ll bet my local perennial woody plants wished they had a political voice, because yesterday I came home to this:

Note: there used to be a whole tree here on the side of our house, right in the middle of that sawdust.

Thanks for your “landscaping,” rental manager! How did you know I hated trees?!

As with anything else in life, I can break this new development down into a pro/con list.

PRO:

  1. Wow, we have an expanded view of the mountains!

CONS:

  1. No shade on house = hot house. Here in California, they apparently don’t believe in pesky things like insulation. Our poor casa needs all the help it can get.
  2. I actually had this thought: OMG, the wedding is next week! And now when people come to our house, this is the first impression they’ll get!

For the sake of comparison, here is a visual approximation of how the front of my house used to look:

Except… you know. With actual leaves and stuff.

MOVING ON.

Yesterday, in addition to picking up my dress from the alterations place, I received the last bit of my wedding accoutrements in the mail. They are strange. And by “strange” I mean “not bridal.” And by “not bridal” I mean, here’s a picture:

Shoes, shrug, button necklace and peacock feather hair fascinator.

I must admit I was a little unnerved by this unbridalness. So unnerved that I have been very reluctant to share my accoutrements with anyone. I mean, okay, brightly colored shoes have arguably become an acceptable thing in the wedding world, lately. But hello, buttons instead of pearls or diamonds? In my head, I can already hear the naysayers gasping. But then I realized something: I have different tastes, and that’s okay. Everyone has different tastes. I need to own that instead of being embarrassed that my appearance doesn’t conform to some standard I have in my head.* What it all basically boiled down to is that I bought what I liked. That has been the driving force behind the entire wedding, actually — the beau and I simply bought or chose what we liked, even if it didn’t match anything else — so it’s fitting that I rolled with that same philosophy here.

Bonus: the button necklace was only $30. Custom-made.

In other news, my mother called me today. A snippet of our conversation follows:

Me (with just a touch of “poor me” whine): “Maaaa,** I got the stomach flu!”
Mom: “Aww shoot, sweetie.”
Me: “No, Mom. Not shoot. Shit is more appropriate here. This kind of occasion calls for cussing.”
Mom (indulgently): “Aww shit, mofo.”

At least she has a sense of humor.

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* Like nearly everyone else on planet earth, I have problems being myself sometimes.

** I call my mom “Ma” sometimes, like my dad called his mother. I think of it fondly as a midwestern thing, even if it isn’t.