I love me some Orkinman. There is nothing like a insecticide-toting guy killing scorpions and other vermin to grind my gears. Oh, baby.

My husband and I see so little of each other lately. Last night, he came home and mowed the lawn, while I weedwhacked, checked on eating kids and bathed a spaghetti-splattered baby girl. Mike shut off the mower when it was shooting sparks periodically into the very dry vegetation he was trying to mow down.

And things are getting crazy. My husband's grandparents are trying to sell their store. After his grandmother had a heart attack, that was that. Family politics kicked in and Mike's mom and uncle told the grandparents that they were too old to continue on at this Mom and Pop store thing. Uncle got a realtor and put the place on the market and they are currently mid-dicker on an offer. We are all talking about what would happen if they do sell and what the timeline will be and how to make it all work.

Mostly, it involves that I will be going up there on a near weekly basis for the next month or two on weekends to help Grammy clean things out. For the next two weeks, I will probably take the kids up, while Mike works his overtime and get things organized. For example, she's got a dresser up there that she's been trying to get rid of that I could really use. She's also got a china cupboard she's told me I can have, which I'm totally ecstatic for. The only problem I see with said china cabinet is that it is low to the ground. It looks like it's supposed to go on top of a hutch, but, of course, Grammy doesn't have a hutch. Of course, I could be convinced, easily that I require a hutch. I think I could get a plain wood one and stain it and seal it to match.

I think more than anything, I love Mike's grandparents and when they are gone there are these things that would be memories of them. What disturbs me about this giving away of stuff is that Grammy has been touched with her own mortality and that giving away things like this amounts to her acknowledgement of that and her own attempt to prepare for her own death. My grandmother was doing that, too.

She was giving away her house to her grandson and his wife. Cousin Frances asked for a picture and Grams gave it to her. Her house was positively sparse as if she'd already given everything away. And there was what she told me at Grandpa's grave,"I didn't have them engrave it with his death because I hope to be here soon and I didn't want anyone to waste the money."

I still miss my grandfather terribly. I remain heartbroken that I had to leave my grandmother.