OK, so now Kevin's grandmother CAN'T take us because if she does she'll lose her assistance (live in nurse, financial aide, etc.).  which leaves us back at square one with nowhere to go and no way to get there and only a bit over a week to solve the whole futtering mess or Luc and I will end up living in a shelter or a cardboard box or something.

And ya'll wonder just WHY it is I spend so much time wishing I was, just maybe, um, well, DEAD???

Trying to keep Luc pretty oblivious to my current stress level gets harder the worse things get and I really just do NOT know what to do or where to turn or anything like that...

I want to lay down and throw a giant sized kiddie temper tantrum because this is just all so hard and life just freaking hurts too much right now.

I'm 42 years old...  I spent almost half my teen years plus a good chunk of my early adulthood supporting my daughter and myself.  Things have been bad, off and on, over the years, but not like this.  NEVER like this.  I'm just so...  lost...  right now...

OK, so the court has officially given us until a week from Sunday to get outta here.  Kev just called a little while ago to give me the news.  He's calling his grandmother, so my fingers and toes and everything I can cross IS crossed.  Gods, much as I don't WANT to do things this way, right now it's the only option LEFT, sucky as it is.  So I have to hope and pray she DOES say yes...  *sigh*

If she does at least for a little while there'll be a lot less stress on me about things.  There will still be SOME stress, but of a different type at least.  The kind that will at least, perhaps, let me sleep at night.  More along the lines of the kind of stress that making nice with someone you're not super fond of but have to play nice with gives ya...  which is a lot easier to deal with on a day-to-day basis than the kind of stress that the fear of living in a cardboard box brings.

Don't get me wrong...  I don't hate her or anything like that.  It's, well, odd.  See, I believe that even if you don't like your daughter-in-law you should NEVER let your grandkids KNOW it, ya know?  When your grand kids know that when you say "that woman" you actually MEAN their mother, well, it just ain't right.  And, of course, since I love Kev's mom, well, you can see who's side of the fence, so to speak, I'm on.  You know me, always defensive over those I care about...  LOL!  And cases like this make it hard NOT on the DIL in question, but on the grand kids growing up...  which is just downright WRONG...

So anyway, waiting to hear back from Kevin about the grandma thing so I'll know just HOW I'm starting to pack.  If we're staying with her it means I can take certain things with me that I might not be able to take elsewhere...  *sigh*

More later, if I'm up to it...

Three strikes, you're out...  in the ball game of life!

OK, so apparently I have NO friends with space available who can or will take Luc and I in.  Doesn't surprise me much, since most of them are as bad off, financially, as we are...  or so close to it that it don't make much difference.  Kev'll only be able to kick over like $200 a month or so towards out "upkeep" so it's not like we can actually really afford a fair share of rent.  With that we're lucky if we can buy our own food.

The folks in TX don't have room for us or, for whatever reason (oh, silly little things like leases and whatnot) can't take us.  Both good and bad.  Would have liked to have seen Mom and the rest...  Luc would have had cousins and what have you to visit and play with...  etc...

Our last ditch hope is a slim one.  MAYBE Kev's grandmother'll let us come stay with her.  Proof that I can get along with ANYONE, if I really HAVE to.  Not that I don't LIKE her...  just a few, um, familial issues.  She has the space (nice big finished basement that could be a living/bed/playroom for Luc and myself), she's near enough for Kev to visit us regularly (just down in White Plains), her house is paid off (doesn't need rent money, as it were).  With Kev kicking some to me I can get us food and maybe pay for a cable modem.  At least I can pack a bit more than "whatever will fit in suitcases", like Luc's toys and my computer...  silly little essentials like that, ya know?  I can even bring a TV and the PS2 (games and dvds) to keep us semi-sane while there.

She's very old and ill, so Luc and I can stay pretty much to ourselves in the basement, where he can run and play without worrying too much about noise carrying upstairs to her.  It could work, at least for the "short term", which is what we're looking at right now.  A couple or so months...  I can do it if I have to.  Hell, she'll probably LOVE it, cause she'll get to see her little great-grandbaby, who she actually ADORES.

Fingers crossed, candles lit, prayers said, and just MAYBE, by this time tomorrow I can finally freaking SLEEP without driving myself insane...  little mice-thoughts tripping along the mental wheel, ever spinning in the silence of my brain...

ain't easy, especially when there is literally NO money to spare.  The big court date is tomorrow and Kevin is having some REAL bad feelings.  Kinda funny, considering I'm usually the one with the, shall we say, "warning lables" as to things turning real bad on us.

DD and Jme are gonna go back to NJ and stay with Chris and Mike (other dear friends of ours).  Which is good for them in a LOT of ways...  at least DD will be around other people so, if Jme does anything she'll be in a "safety zone".  I don't know EXACTLY why, but he kinda worries me, and I usually go with those kinda feelings.  I'd be a LOT more worried about DD if they found a little place of their own...

Don't know exactly WHAT we're gonna do if things go majorly south tomorrow.  I mean, Luc and I don't HAVE anywhere to go or anyone to run TO.  Realistically, Kev would be MUCH better off without worrying over the two of us for a month or three while he could build himself up.  Even putting all our stuff in storage and sending us some $$ here and there to cover expenses and the like he'd STILL have few, if any, expenses (cause he could go stay with Lee).  That would, in all honesty, give him time to get his business up and running and get some $$ banked and such so that we copuld come back and all be together again...

It's just that, well...  while HE has a bad feeling about the court blowing up in our faces I have the same kinda creepy-bad feeling about Luc and I being totally away from him for a few months.  With his car repo'd he'd only get to come see us if and when Lee let him borrow her car, so would we even SEE him unless we came to visit?  And, if we DID come visit, it would be for short periods of time because Lee barely has room for her and Kevin, so where would WE be, eh?  Especially since I don't drive and would have to rely on someone from wherever I was staying being willing to drive me all the way into Derby to visit.

Haven't been sleeping well, in case you couldn't tell by the rambling, worried and frustrated turn my "conversation" here has taken...  too many thoughts running through my brain, too many funky dreams, too much, well, everything just dumping down on me and I'm feeling like a rat trapped in a maze with no way out...

More later, I guess, when we see how things are and what's up and all that jazz...  any more NOW and I'll end up breaking down and crying and with Luc around that's the very LAST thing that I want to do...

even suckier, if at all possible...

Yesterday they repo'd Kevin's car, which leaves him even MORE screwed in the work department...

He also went to get our eviction case re-opened, which he DID have some luck with at least.  Now there's a court date set for next week and we just have to keep out fingers crossed that the landlord ends up more screwed than we are by the whole thing.

There's some general talk of, if we're too beyond screwed, "farming" Luc and I out elsewhere (who knows, I might have a friend or two with space and a big heart left somewhere...) while he goes to stay with Lee for "a couple of months" until things pick up and he can bank some money to bring us all back together as a family once more.  I live in dread of this, because I fear we'd never come back from it.  Luc is old enough now to notice such silly things as barely seeing his daddy, and I think it might be harmful to his mind on some level.  I know it feels harmful to me...  because I just have this gut deep feeling that, if we ARE forced to take this step it'll be the beginning of the end of, well, everything.

Although there are also times I think, in the long dark hours where I'm trying to sleep, how much better Kevin's life might just be without Luc and me...  I know I never want to ACT on those feelings, you know?  I dunno...  too many times I dream the razors edge, no more now because I don't want to break down in front of the boy...  I do NOT want him to have the teeniest clue as to just how bad things are and how much worse they might GET...

We just went through our DVD and game collection to see what we might, just possible, be able to get a couple of bucks for from the pawn shop...  also starting to pack things up as I can to make sure they're all done up right, just in case we end up having to move in a hurry or whatever...

So freaking tired...

have my nervous breakdown now???

Seems I never get to, and if anyone in this house needs it it's me.  But no, I've gotta "keep it together" for the kid, or for the stressed-depressed hubby, or the stressed and agitated roomie (DD), or the stressed and volatile roomie (Jme).  Someone ALWYAS needs me to be the supportive, calm and rational one, soothing their stress, fears, frustrations and tears.  The only one who DOESN'T is Jme, mostly because he's extremely anti-social and deals with his issues by staying up all night and sleeping all day so I really don't have to deal with him much.  Plus he's pretty good at working on DD's stress level, at least.

So, here's the current scoop on why my life sucks more every day...

Thursday we have to have $35 for Kevin to go to court and get our housing case re-opened so we (hopefully) don't get evicted immediately, in the dead of winter, with no-where to go and a 4 year old.

Because out landlord STILL hasn't fixed the furnace OR allowed us to order oil our electric bill was over $600 just this month, due to needing space heaters to warm up SOME of the rooms in the house!  We have a shut off notice for the electricity and need to come up with $850 by Jan 31st or we're MORE than screwed...  that is IF we still have a place to live!

I have lost about 20 pounds in the past 6 months.  This means I'm 5'8" and weight in at a whopping 115 pounds.  Clothes I haven't been able to wear in 6 or more years are now a little too BIG on me. 
On this I'll just say that I make damn sure Luc eats.  Hell, if I have to start cutting off body parts of mine to feed him, I will.  Of course, that's all saying we still have a stove to cook on in 2 weeks between the electric company and the landlord.

Our cupboards are pretty freaking bare, these days...  but we still have some pasta, and a few random thingies here and there, so we're not completely starved.  Actually have some stwe I made still in the fridge (tonight's supper) and one frozen pork roast (Big Y had a buy 1 get 2 sale, so $15 for 3 2+ pound roasts was worth it, but I'm kinda getting tired of pork...  LOL!).  We ate the last of the Mac n Cheese yesterday, but that, at least, is cheap, and if I can get more than the $35 Kevin needs for the court tomorrow then I can get some more.

So, um, yeah is it any wonder why I can't sleep, have very f'ed up dreams, headaches all the time and spend plenty of time wishing I was no longer amongst the living???

Ah screw it, I'm just freaking tired...

Can you hear the sarcasm oozing???

So, our landlord, who has STILL refused to fix the furnace or allow us to order oil for almost a bloody YEAR is now getting up off his cheap lazy butt and taking us to the wonderful world of Eviction proceedings.  I wonder if he realizes just HOW stupid it is to do any, let alone ALL of the following :

1.  Attempt to evict anyone just before the holiday season...

2.  Attempt to evict anyone with a small child during the winter months...

3.  Attempt to evict someone for non-payment of rent when they have a small child and NO heat or HOT WATER for almost a YEAR...

4.  Evict someone when there are "slumlord laws" which would force him to make certain LEGALLY NECESSARY repairs to the house which he has been too lazy and cheap to do, and which will cost HIM a good chunk of change in fees and fines and, if I get the Board of Health involved, quite possible jail time...

Of course, NONE of that alleviates the general stress of the whole mess.  And I still have no "spare" cash to even get Luc anything FOR Yule...  so no matter what life sucketh big time...  *sigh*

In the aftermath of my birthday, nothing earth shattering happened!  LOL!

I received some WONDERFUL gifties from my online Sisters and Friends.  Some are being "shown off" in my photo album here.  Others (not shown) are an AWESOME Tube Pack (also from Sicara), and a membership to Lovelight Pixels from the sweet Katja (Berliner Baerin).

The hubby gave me (yet another IOU) and a cake he bought with my money cause he's as beyond broke as I am, of course!  LOL!  DD and Jme bought me a brand new mouse, which made me VERY happy...  because, um, it actually WORKD, which is more than I could say for EITHER of the ones I already owned!  *giggles*

Other than that, well, not all that much happened around here.  Life is pretty much, as always, "same old/same old".  I keep hoping to have good - or at LEAST interesting! - news to put on up here one day.  Sorry my life is rather boring!  LOL!

Luc is SUPER smart and becoming a most excellent speller!  I mean, he was slow to begin speaking but his vocabulary is now HUGE and he can consitantly spell words some 1st and 2nd graders have problems with right.  He was quicker to pick up math concepts than speech, but now he's chugging along like a little bullet train!  LOLOL!

Honestly, he is my bright rainbow in a very grey world...  and if it wasn't for him there are days I just wouldn't even bother getting up.  That's how rotten I feel far too much of the time.  So I guess it's a good thing I got the little monkey, eh???

Anyway, all for now dear reader...  or dear self if no-one else is bothering to read!  *grin*

OK, so today is my 42nd birthday.  Yep, today is the answer to the eternal question of "Life the Universe and Everything"...  at least, according to "The HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy" series...  The only answer I have, however, is, well, will today be ANY better than yesterday???  LOL!

Honestly, I'm just tired...  tired of wondering how we're gonna pay the bills, buy food, whatever...   Sometimes I wish I didn't HAVE to wake up every morning just to face those same questions yet AGAIN, just like I hate the fact that those questions run through my brain every night until I feel like I hardly ever sleep any more.

Yeah, I know there are people with worse problems out there, and I truly feel for them...  but it's MY problems that are bothering me the most.  Luckily Luc is still little, and thus birthdays and "Winter Holiday of Choice" are easy to provide for him, at least somewhat.  *sigh*  Ah, well, if I just keep telling myself things could be worse, sooner or later maybe I'll finally convince myself that things aren't THAT bad after all...  LOL!

Some real sweeties in the pixel world have given me gifties (Thank you Tanya and Katja! you SO rock!) and sent me little notes to wish me a happy one.  The hubby hasn't called yet to wish me one, but I'm kinda used to him getting "too busy" to remember to call.  He DID buy me a nummy chocolate fudge cake yesterday, though, so I know he remembers it's my "day"!  LOLOL!

Other than that, pretty much "same old/same old" here in out little nut house...  which is neither good nor bad, it just IS...  *grin*