The Life of An Empty Nester

 I think it's finally hit me that I (we) are empty nesters. I came home today, put the groceries up and sat down with the dogs. I read a bit, took a nap, put up clean dishes.....just piddled about. Went out to the garden and watered - and it hit me. I'm an empty nester. No kid to pick up anymore. No band or theatre schedule to live and die by. No worrying about what time my kid is going to be home from work or their friend's houses. I still have Life360 on them and know where they are but it's different now. I was more nervous about their whereabouts when they lived at home then I am now that they are in Washington. It's just bizarre.  And then there are the socks. My socks don't come up missing anymore. My kid was constantly gaslighting me about my socks but no bullshit - since they left I'm not ordering socks off of Amazon because mine were disappearing. Seriously. It's like a new world. 

I'm also eating a sandwich for dinner. And drinking a bottle a wine. Guess that's also a result of being an empty nester. I'm slowly getting used to not cooking. I always cooked for an army since we had a teenage boy in the house and it was a hard habit to break. Then I was cooking for three but I still cooked like there were five of us. Gary and I are slowly adapting to being by ourselves and not making enormous meals. It's hard sometimes. Food is my love language and I want to feed everyone that I love. Or like. Go away if I don't like you. I won't feed  you.

I've got one final exam to take. I've finished my extra credit research studies and the exam in Psychology and the Law is all I have left. I went on a semi-tangent on last Thursday's shitshow about the criminal justice system. Bottom line - don't get in trouble. And, NEVER, EVER speak without an attorney present. EVER. I MEAN EVER PEOPLE. Our system is so fucked up. So fucked up. Just don't do it. Anyways....I've thoroughly enjoyed this semester. Summer semester starts May 30th. I'm so excited. ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY IS ON THE SCHEDULE!!! I can't wait, ya'll! My fall semester is going to be fire. I'm just so ate up with school, ya'll. I love it. I just want to stay in school and keep learning. It makes me so damn happy.

My garden is doing amazing. I'm so happy with how everything is looking and even with all of the rain we've been getting, I'm still watering just about every day. I don't normally use pesticides but bugs have been bad this year. I dusted everything with Sevin Dust. Sometimes you do what you have to do. I bought a veggie wash to clean my veggies just to be on the safe side. I don't sell them at Farmer's Market and if I give them to the neighbors or family, I always let them know what's on them. 

That's really all I have for ya'll. It's a Tuesday and I've had my wine, I've watered my garden and it's been a good night. I need to study for my test and stay on top of orders this week. We are going to St. Jo in a few weeks to cook chili and see HAYES CARLL HELL YEAH and then to Jamaica Beach. I'm not sure if I'll even cook chili while I'm there. The water may be too much of a temptation for me. We are taking Muriel, my 1974 Lark and Lemmy and Waylon. This should be fun.

Kelly

Well, The World Didn't End.......

The eclipse has come and gone. We survived. The aliens did not come and beam us up. Not even this dude......

Lord B made himself a foil hat and wore it while he was mowing before the big event and then during the eclipse. Everyone in our neighborhood took a picture of him. I took a video of him mowing and sent it to our kiddo and they DIED. You can't make this shit up.

Speaking of the kiddo, they will be home in two weeks. They're only staying for a few days and have a friend's baby shower to attend. They'll also need to spend plenty of time with Gammy so I'm not sure that we will see them all that much. That's okay...they need to spend time with my mom. Juice will be back in September for Twenty One Pilots. We have floor tickets but there will be no overnight camping on the street for barricade position. They're going to have to tough it out at the back of the floor like the rest of the regular people. The ticket buying process last week went smoothly for the Austin and Dallas tickets. Gary and I were finished buying tickets within five minutes. Then I had to wait for tickets to go on sale for the Seattle show, where the kiddo will see them. The Ticketmaster site kept crashing and kicking me back out into the queue and I would have to enter the presale code AGAIN, wait to buy tickets and watch them vanish while I was trying to buy them. Floor sold out the first time I was in the queue and it was like playing Whack a Mole to get the ones I ended up with for them and their partner. Yes, they are nosebleed tickets, but I'm so glad I was able to get them. I had that feeling in my stomach and my mouth was getting hot - you know how you get before you're going to throw up - while I was trying to secure tickets. They're going to see them here in Dallas with me but they want to see them in Seattle as well. And they are paying me for their tickets since they are a gainfully employed adult now! That was last week's ticket saga. The next task is to find an AirBnB or good hotel for the stay in Austin over Labor Day weekend for my birthday celebrations and Twenty One Pilots. A good friend is joining us and I can't wait to show them around Austin. It's going to be a great time!

I've registered for my summer classes and I'm taking Abnormal Psychology (yes, FINALLY!), Business Communications, and Research in The Digital Age. Tomorrow I register for fall classes and I have Philosophy (my minor), Contemporary Moral Issues, Psychopharmacology, and Learning scheduled. I'm really excited about the next two semesters. I'm getting really close to the finish line and I should be able to graduate by Fall 2025. I can't believe I've come so far since I started this journey in 2021. I'm really proud of myself for sticking with it and not stopping with my associates degree. My goal when I started was to get my Master's in counseling. A Master's degree is still my goal but I'm not 100% sure it will be in counseling. I've been thinking about continuing with psychology or even social work. Lots of possibilities.

I went to the SPCA with my dad last Friday and looked at a few dogs. My mom is on hospice and really, really wants another dog. She misses having a dog around and all of us (me, my sister, and my dad) all agree that a dog would bring a lot of joy into my mom's daily life and help her deal with what is happening. So off we went and met a precious little girl named Remi. I was like come on Bowden, this is the one. But, he wasn't ready to pull the trigger, so to speak. So he thought about it and Sunday we went back and he adopted her! She was so good on the ride to their house and she loved the toys that my sister had for her when she got to her new home. And being a shelter dog, you know she loved running in the backyard. Remi is so sweet and gets up on the couch with my mom and dad. My mom is on oxygen and I think Remi is really aware of that so she's very careful around her. She likes to lay in my sister's bed while she games and likes bites of toast from mom. I'm so glad they adopted her. Remi is playful and goofy and I know she's going to keep my mom's spirits up with everything going on. 

Have you subscribed to Mild Bill's monthly newsletter? Go to the website and about halfway down there is a place to sign up. Each month I send an email out with spice info, a discount code, and other chili world/spice happenings. I will be scheduling Competition Chili 101 classes this week and sending an email and FB blast out once the dates are set. 

I made bucatini with meatballs and sauce the other night and it was delicious. If you don't subscribe to the NY Times Cooking subscription, do yourself a favor and spend the $6 every month to have access to hundreds of thousands of killer recipes. Melissa Clark's meatball recipe is foolproof and I make Marcella Hazan's tomato sauce regularly. I made the meatballs the other night but I took the easy way out and used Michael's of Brooklyn's Homestyle Gravy in a jar. That is an excellent brand of sauce that you can find at Brookshires, Sprouts, and Amazon. We love it. It isn't full of preservatives and it's not overly sweet. I normally make my own sauce but when I don't feel like it, Michael's is what I use. I think it's much better than Rao's, which is overrated in my opinion. I've put the meatball recipe on the recipe page of the blog. The recipe calls for a pound of meat, panko crumbs, and an egg and then your seasonings of choice. The recipe I'm sharing is how I make it.

I think I'm going to call it a night. I have to get up at 3:45am to be ready for registration which opens at 4am tomorrow morning. I was going to work on psychology and the law but I'll get it done this week. I'm not behind, but I want to stay caught up, ya know. I've got one of my playlists going in the background and one of the songs from Game of Thrones is playing. It's the song that played when Arya Stark killed the Night King. That was such an amazing series. I told Gary I want to start watching House of Dragon. I may rewatch GOT. I've read the books and I don't think George R.R. Martin is ever going to finish the series. Anyways...yes, I'm that person. I read the books. And I let you know if they make the books into a series or a movie. Oh, do I let you know...haha!

Kelly