Hal-isms, Vol. 62

"I should go in the bathroom. I have cramps."

"I'm a reasonable person. Actually, I think I'm quite wonderful."

"I'm not used to un-Norwegians."

"There's another one. Walkin'. With a grocery bag. That's all you do down here."

"Well, I better put my eye drops in and go to bed. You know what I don't have? Baby Aspirin."

"I raised you kids by telling each one I loved the other one."

Joys of Living in Construction Debris

When you have to use your rear-facing camera for a mirror because your house isn't done yet:

Some Up North Fishin' Photos for your Viewing Pleasure

Happy 49th Anniversary, Mom and Dad!

Happy 49th!

This was a rough year -- my parents spent a good five months of it apart while my mom lived in Minneapolis to get her cancer treatments at Abbott -- but they're through that and past it now and back together and bickering again just like normal.

Just try to get a photo of them together though... 

Not until Beata photo bombs, anyway. (We've got another jokester-Hexum-impostor vying for favorite daughter position) -- 

Guys: I love you. Now no more cancer, now I mean it!

Conduit Lighting

Future home for naked pendant Edison bulbs -- exposed wiring hidden in plumbing conduit:

Insulation!

Future kitchen

Future loft

Future bedroom

Future loft

And new poured concrete footings in the basement! To hold the house up!

Road Rage

The Virginia Piper Cancer Institute' s Department of Radiation Oncology is located on the south side of busy three-lane one-way 26th Street in Minneapolis, Minnesota. And if you're not careful and don't start changing lanes to get over to the south side well in advance, you could miss the parking lot, which is in the middle of a block just shortly after a stoplighted intersection. See what I mean?

Good old irritating 26th...

I had to bring my mom to radiation in the mornings, and that meant I was also usually late for work.

One morning, I forgot to get over to the left side of the road before the intersection and found myself stuck in a situation not unlike the photo above. I was going to miss that parking lot if I didn't hurry up and rudely cut a bunch of people off to get over.

I waved my hand out of my window and moved over one lane, and attempted to move over another lane. I had to get in front of a white van and when I was in the middle of doing so, he was like, "what.are.you.doing?"

"I'M TAKING MY MOM TO RADIATION"! I screamed out the window. Take that. White van man. Cancer. Boom.

Signed,

Kady playing-the-cancer-card-as-often-as-possible Hexum

Elevators

Keri and I were in the elevator at the Duluth Radisson on a recent trip up north. We shared it with a very pregnant woman.

"Do you know where the pool is?" I asked.

"No." she said.

"Well, you better find out", I said, "you're about to be a mom."

She looked at me like UM...WHAT and then said, "I'm already a mom, I have two kids."

And then I was like, "So...where's the pool?"

TA DA!!!!!

I didn't mean anything by it, SHEESH.

Hanna, the Engagement and Her Uncle Pete

So, Hanna got engaged. 

She's getting married in January to a very nice kid named Dan. I think they make a terrific pair and am happy for them and blah blah blah. But that's not the point of this story. 

The point of this story is that as soon as she accepted Dan's proposal, she started making phone calls to her aunties and uncles to share the happy news.

Here is a transcript of the conversation between Hanna and my brother, her Uncle Pete:

P: "Hello?"

H: "I'm engaged"

P: "Do you love him?"

H: "Yes."

P: "Did he buy you a ring?"

H: "Yes."

P: "Is he a good man?"

H: "Yes."

P: "Does he have a good job?"

H: "Yes."

P: "Can he take care of you?"
H: "Yes."

P: "Who is this?"

Hal-isms, Vol. 61

"It's muggy and stifling and prejudicial."

"Why don't you keep estranging me until you have to text me in my grave?"

"You buncha gun totin' city folks. Eatin' at Arby's."

"Boy I should buy this paper - there's all sort of tragedy."

"I'm back up to only four pounds down."

Sunday Favorites: Who's Your Boyfriend

New to A Lady Reveals Nothing? You've missed SO MUCH. Not to worry. Every Sunday, I dig through the archives to re-post an old favorite. Mostly because I'm too lazy to come up with new content every single day. Enjoy! This story originally appeared on April 12, 2011:




I thought cutting my hair would be a really good idea for my year-off-travel-the-world-adventure. I regretted it almost immediately.  The cut would be adorable if it were possible to have access to a shower in a real bathroom and a blow dryer and flat iron and styling products every day. 

See?  Adorbs!

But that's just not the reality of it. Here's what usually ends up happening:

Even the Koala is embarrassed for me.

The fact is, long hair is just easier. You would think the opposite were true, but it's not. If there's no time, long hair can be thrown into a messy traveler's ponytail. Short hair just sticks up in every direction, and not in a good way.  And when you decide it's time to grow it out, there's no awesome consistent stylist to help you look good through the process.

A couple things have made all of this even worse:

• My travel companions have all been beautiful, long-haired women. 
• I have a propensity towards flannel.

"Awwww, so nice of her to bring her little brother!"

Flannel.  And backpacks.

_____

As you can imagine, some assumptions are probably being made.  In Nicaragua, I was with Dustin, Ted, and Nicole. We were walking around pretty late in Granada, and we were pretty sure that we were offered a prostitute. Dustin said, "well, we guys probably do look a little desperate and Kady's haircut isn't helping."

_____

While in Thailand, Summer had this to say (not entirely the fault of my haircut, but hilarious anyways):

"We saved 4 bucks a night by going with a fan-cooled room instead of air-conditioning. The fan was between two twin beds and the sound of it oscillating was unbearable. So we turned off the oscillation and pushed the beds together to ensure maximum fan-cooling. I may or may not have been guilty of knowing the fan leaned a full degree or two in my favor.

"We were awakened far too early by the housekeeper. I answered the door trying to cover myself up in my t-shirt with that blank look on my face one has at 8:30 in the morning when on a beach vacation. I declined any cleaning service and turned to survey the view the cleaning lady had just gotten- the highlights being: Kady lying languidly in a bed wearing not much more than a sheet... and a bottle of five dollar Thai rum at the foot of two twin beds awkwardly pushed together."

That day, she said to me, "don't move".  "DO NOT MOVE."  And grabbed her camera to take this picture:

Click here for Summer's full story.

Good Little Helper

I wanted so badly to be involved in my project. And I was sometimes! My brother-in-law and my old friend from way back when were my framing contractors and they were both very good about showing me how to do things and patiently watching while I screwed it up, and then fixing them.

Things I'm proud of:

• I made the cuts for every single stud wall on the upper section of my house!
• I helped shingle the entire front of the house (the short part)!
• I used a sawzall and cut stuff!
• I ripped boards!
• I routered the holes for some of the stair treads!
• I used a nail gun!
• This photo:

• I painted a lot of the exterior of the house.

• I painted almost all of the fascia boards - which included one coat of primer and two coats of black paint, all outside during the month of March:

But mostly, they just sent me to Menards to pick up stuff that I didn't know what it was. And so I have tons of photos on my camera like this which I would then text to the guys to see if what I was getting was right:

Which, by the way is a VERY IMPORTANT JOB AND NOT EVERYBODY CAN DO IT. 

I helped!!!

25 Years Ago

My sister Keri got married in 1990 -- Here's what my family looked like then: 

Five daughters, one curling iron, seventy-five yards of forest green lace, three under wire bras and two trainers:

Yes, the breast buds were coming in nicely...

Boss Lady

During construction I would have to run to the house to check on things after leaving my office-y job. Which meant that I could be seen climbing around a construction mess in a skirt quite often.

 

Here's a picture of me climbing out the front window hole on the second story to get out to the roof of the front section of my home and feeling something "funny" on the bottom of my high-heeled shoes: 



Job Hazards

Upside to Cancer?

SPOILER ALERT:

THERE ISN'T ONE.

But...IF you were counting, and you guys know I am an optimist and ever the consummate Pollyanna so: my mom did get a handicapped tag and I did get to put it in my car and that was wildly convenient in certain circumstances. 

Minnehaha Falls at Night

Look at this lovely waterfall not two miles from my house:

 

 

Moving Day!

As much as I loved that little 1+ bedroom upstairs triplex apartment, of course when I bought my little house that meant I had to eventually leave it. It was sad, especially when I saw all my worldly belongings laid out on the grass out front.

 

Life goes on, right?

 

...All of said worldly belongings went on to sit on a trailer in my new house garage for two months while I waited for construction to complete.

 

 

Sunday Favorites: I Don't Have a Microwave

New to A Lady Reveals Nothing? You've missed SO MUCH. Not to worry. Every Sunday, I dig through the archives to repost an old favorite. Mostly because I'm too lazy to come up with new content every single day. Enjoy! This story originally appeared on September 26, 2014:

 


I don't have a microwave in my apartment.

1. There is no room for a microwave. My refrigerator is in the hallway for Gosh Sakes.
2. I don't want to spend the money on a microwave. I want to spend my money on plane tickets and bold-colored-printed-pants.
3. I am better than everyone and I wouldn't dream of unhealthily microwaving my food.
4. I like re-heating stuff up in a saucepan. It makes me feel like a pioneer woman taking care of my 5 kids over a campfire next to the wagon wheel.

However, almost every single day at work, I eat one of these:

Image stolen from http://www.missbargainhuntress.com

"Ready in 5 minutes"

Some day I'll tell you all about how I don't have a TV.

Stairway to the Loft

See these rectangular holes below? I made them! With a router. That I broke. Twice. The stair treads go in there.

 

It's Shake and Bake! And I helped!