“Torture Chamber Masquerades As Great Outdoors” “Effects Of ‘The Fall’ Descend Upon Unsuspecting Iowans” “Little Black Transporter Becomes Gypsy Wagon” “Dillers Are Hit By ‘New Stuff Overload’” “Dillers Are Blessed In Epic Proportions” “Family Is Coerced Into Posing For Picture” “Body Is Possessed By Good Year Blimp” “Exercise Increases Depression, One Lady Testifies”

Seriously. Cold weather was not in God’s perfect plan. Go back and read your Bible if you don’t believe me. He did NOT create Adam and Eve wearing clothes. Which brings me to another revelation: I guess nudist colonies would have worked in the garden of Eden. But anyone who believes they are fine now is just greatly delusional. The fall DID happen. The effects will continue until we get all new stuff. So basically, I don’t have to like cold weather any more than I like sin. It is just torture.

Speaking of new stuff… it all started a couple of months ago. New things began slowly trickling into our home. Well, in the last two weeks the trickle became more like a flood. (notice all the Bible themes here) This has been a good flood, though slightly overwhelming at times. Being on a budget, we are more accustomed to getting maybe one new thing once a month or less. Probably it is more like a couple of new things a year, considering that we are talking about REAL new things. Things like carseats and washing machines and electric woks and rice cookers and pressure cookers and iron skillets and video cameras and vacuums and approximately a bajillion and one other smaller things which are too numerous to mention here! The point is, it is quite fun to get these things, but each one does not get quite the special attention and enjoyment that it would get had it been acquired in the normal singular fashion. At least not directly upon arriving at home it does not. It did take us a while to get the inner workings of the carseat all figured out. And we actually sat around watching our new washer go through it’s whole cycle. We also swept all of our floors without emptying the vacuum so that we could marvel at the collection. By the way, some of that stuff wasn’t technically NEW, namely the kitchen stuff. The vacuum WAS wonderfully new, however, and it was made possible by Christmas money from our three grandmas. Blessed clean floors. Last night David cooked a frozen chicken in the pressure cooker and according to him it only took an hour. I only cautioned him about five times in the duration not to get blown up. (HE was the one that was originally hesitant about getting one.)

As for our little black transporter, well, it is currently carrying around quite a few older things that needed to leave to make room for the rest. It desperately hopes to be emptied tomorrow, as it is rather weary of all the clattering and squeaking that has subsequently taken over its interior.

Key words in the Dillers lives: healthier, cleaner, more organized. Oh yeah, and denial. One can not think too much about the responsibility looming ever closer, or one might just become inordinately stressed out and go slightly crazy. As it is, I’m finding it very difficult to find any motivation whatsoever to exercise because for the last six months it has had the exact opposite effect that one would hope… who knows, if it weren’t for mom exercising with me I might really BE the Good Year blimp.

Here’s another picture.