I'm Here - For a Hot Minute:

My intronets connection is more spotty than usual, seeing as I don't have my usual couch spot to grab the perfect free connection that I'm used to.

My couch (and 99 point 5/8ths of the rest of my belongings) is on a trailer in my garage at the moment.

We have our old mattress top on the floor in the living room for our bed tonight, and my computer is perched on a tiny little "accent" table to simulate the spot where it used to be.

This set-up is eerily reminiscent of when we first moved to this house. We didn't have a lick of furniture, outside of the fridge, until we had owned the house a few weeks. Everything got delivered here and there as we moved in slowly.

Heck, even after we moved in, having a fireplace during the winter was such a novel concept, we'd sleep on the floor right in front of it as it died down in the late evening. That's where we're sleeping tonight. Being as it's the heart of summer in the Central Valley of CA, there's no fire in the hearth. Oh, and there are four cats more than we arrived here with originally.

This is it. Our last night in Porterville. I'm really glad Mike is here to share it with me. We get to walk away from this town together, and neither one of us wishes different.

We're both disappointed in different ways.

His parents have really let him down, and all their talk of "family is the most important thing" has only shown him it's only that . . . talk. There is no substance behind their words.

I'm disappointed in this town. "Gateway to the Sequoias" . . . "All-American City" . . . "Porterville. The Good Life". Hardly. Going back home, I won't be bombarded with the boom-box stereos rattling my kitchen windows, or the amplified mariachi music from my neighbor's yard at 12:30am, or the dogs running the streets, or the illegal fireworks, or the . . . hell. You name it. All the "broken window" issues this town doesn't address.

Well, I didn't plan on writing this post tonight, that's for sure.

I thought I'd give my review of "wall-E" since I did go see it yesterday, and talk about how I knit for the first time ever in a movie theater, and that I kept the streak going by being the only one seated for the showing. Hell, I even planned on writing about how my MIL took back the sewing machine she gave me a few years ago.

Maybe for another day.

Tonight is for Goodbye, but also for Hello.

Hello to SLO, and a huge HELLO to all my friends that come see me over there, and an excited Hello to what the future holds there. Like I've said - I'd rather be poor in a town I love than in a town I hate.

"Adios" Porterville. Don't go away mad. Just go away.