So, we're going to my mother-in-law's wedding. Inherently, this isn't a bad thing, but I am always dreadfully nervous around Mike's family and I invariably feel like I never fit in, so it's hard (read "a complete and total bitch and a half).

However, on the good news front, Mike and I talked about it and we bought his older brother's ticket to go. That means that Chris will be inherently nice to us, which is a cool thing. Also, we'd told his mom initially that she could help us pay it, but when he didn't need a bus ticket, too, we gave that to her as a wedding present. Her wedding present is that she gets all four sons at her wedding.

Mike says we've killed two birds with one stone because we don't have to buy Chris or Mom a Christmas gift now. I'm all over that. Of course, I'm spending a fortune on Mike this year. I took his original star wars poster to a framing place and am getting it cleaned up, matted, and framed for him for Christmas. I told him I was spending a lot on his Christmas gift, but that he wasn't to spend an equivalent amount of money on me. Mostly, I just want a homemade wool hat from this local artisans' group. My head gets cold when I walk in the mornings because it's 20 freakin' degrees at 545AM and I realize it's a simple thing, but it's important to me, too.

I figure I look all scary with my hood pulled up and I don't like how most of my hoods fall over my eyes and don't seal onto my head very well. Call me old and cranky, but I don't like being cold and when my head and hands get cold, I feel like I'm living in a frigidaire all day long.

My office doesn't help that because I'm pretty sure it is a frigidaire. I've taken to wearing two layers when I go in in the morning because otherwise I freeze my bippy off. No, I don't know what a bippy is, but I'm guessing it's cold, okay?

I've got to do some light shopping today at lunch for Thanksgiving and I think we're out of money, which is only because I've been spending it hand over foot and not tracking it at all because I haven't figured out how to work and do that, too, but I'm going to talk to Mike and make a plan. I think honestly it would help if I could just get my PDA stand to work and then I could track that stuff in spare moments, of which there are a couple, at work. There's some down time with this job -- because people's computers don't break all the time and the legislature isn't always in session either.

Lately, however, the thing of note in our house is vermin. That's right, folks, vermin. We've got mice. Lotsa mice. I had one nonchalantly skipping across my livingroom on Sunday. I trapped it in the china cupboard and then realized that there wasn't much I was willing to do to kill it that involved bludgeoning it with my squeamish 9 year old completely flipping out about our visiting rodent at my shoulder. I unobviously let it out and tried to encourage the cat to kill it, but the cat, who hasn't been inside much since she was a kitten was completely freaked about being brought inside in the first place and just ran back out the door to the great outdoors, which to her was much more of a known variable.

I went out to the garage and found my big bag of mousetraps, and I got out the big jumbo jar of peanutbutter and I baited a bunch of traps and put them down. The one on the side of the fridge was sprung on Monday. However, the mouse in it was large and gray. The mouse we'd seen was small and brown, which made me come to realize if you can see 1 mouse, there are 20 of its partying friends you're not seeing, so I checked the towel drawers for mouse poo and to my chagrin, noted that yes, they'd been sleeping and shitting in my towels again. So I emptied out the back of both towel drawers and dropped in baited traps.

So yesterday, the back of drawer number 2 had a mouse that appeared similar in stature and color to the little varmit that had been in the livingroom on Sunday. Nonetheless, the traps remain baited and ready for some mousehuntin' and killin'. Last night, Mike thought to mention that we should probably wash the china. I told him, that yes, we probably should, but we weren't going to do that until Turkey Day because I wanted to be POSITIVE that no sneaky shitting little gray or brown little rodent had been anywhere near the china I was serving Thanksgiving dinner on. He agreed and we both shuddered and made grimaces and went to bed.

Anyhow, I am thankful for my friends -- online and in the flesh, my family (even my in-laws), and mousetraps. Have a Happy Thanksgiving!