Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: Start your week smiling with your friends. Kathy's aunt and Michelle Frechette. It's time to get ready for some weekly motivation with WP motivate.
[00:00:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
Happy Friday, Cathy.
Happiest of happy Fridays to you, Michelle. How are you?
[00:00:20] Speaker A: I'm good. How are you?
[00:00:23] Speaker B: It's a great day. It's a great day here. The weather, it has been hot all weekend. Woke up this morning and it was cold. So I'm like, score. I'm not ready for heat. Gotta buy an air conditioner for the upstairs for this on this weekend. And so I get to say. I say adieu to some money.
[00:00:40] Speaker A: It's been nice. Thanks for showing up for a little while, at least. Yeah, it was nice knowing ya. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Enjoy your new home.
Aka somebody else's wallet.
[00:00:54] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:00:57] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. So what's new? Anything to celebrate?
[00:01:05] Speaker B: Well, yes, I did wake up to Taylor Swift's new album. I was never a swiftie. My daughter dropped Taylor Swift on me last year. And I'm like, oh, she sings this song, too. And then I went into the whole, like, evermore folklore, the more poetic, melodic types of things, and I really enjoyed those. And now this album is kind of like those. And it's also one of the producers is a guy from the band called the national that my son has been really into. So it's kind of like my two kids together singing. Like, I just have this. I'm enjoying it. So I woke up really early this morning and I'm like, oh, it dropped last night and started listening to it and went for a walk and listened to it. And now I have the rest of the afternoon off and I'm going to listen to it and celebrating that.
But, yeah, I'm just, like, feeling in a sort of a celebratory mood of just like, what is. I'm feeling very grateful for what is.
[00:02:00] Speaker A: How about you?
[00:02:00] Speaker B: Do you have anything to celebrate?
[00:02:02] Speaker A: Um, I'm taking Monday off. I got somebody coming over to do a bunch of work on the house, and a week from today, I close on ownership of this house. So I will be. I will own this house as well. Condo as of next Friday. Yeah. So that's kind of exciting.
[00:02:18] Speaker B: That's very exciting. I know that's been a long time coming for you. So I'm really happy that that's getting finalized.
[00:02:23] Speaker A: Thank you. Yeah, it's been. It's been a little bit of a struggle here and there, but, yeah, finally.
[00:02:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:31] Speaker A: Agreed on a price.
[00:02:32] Speaker B: Do you feel celebratory about it or do you feel more like just, ugh, relief.
[00:02:36] Speaker A: It's. It's a little bit of relief, a little bit of fear. I've never actually owned a home by myself before. The only other home I ever owned was with my ex husband, and he got that foreclosed on us.
I know people sometimes say, well, how did you not know? Because the mortgage was in his name and he hid it until we couldn't hide it anymore, and we actually got, like, notice of eviction, basically. So, yeah, so this will be the first time, and thanks to my dad's inheritance, I will just pay cash for it and not even have to deal with a mortgage. So I'll just own it outright. Yeah. I mean, you know, my dark humor is like, well, thanks, dad, for dying, but it is what it is. I didn't make him die, you know, whatever. But, yeah, so it's just one of those things. And I guess relief a little bit, but also, like, I mean, I've technically. Not technically, I've de facto owned it for the last few years since I moved in anyway, so, like, if there needs to be a repair, I have to deal with it. It's not like I've had. It's not like my mom and stepdad, who I'm buying it from, have been landlords in any stretch of the imagination. I take care of them, they don't care. Take care of the home and me. So basically it'll just be more of same, only I don't have to worry about, you know, anything with it. It'll just be mine.
[00:03:57] Speaker B: Yeah. So nice.
[00:03:59] Speaker A: Yeah. Thanks.
[00:04:00] Speaker B: Well, that's something to celebrate.
[00:04:01] Speaker A: That's great. Yeah, for sure.
[00:04:02] Speaker B: It's definitely. I mean, just having that solid, trusted foundation underneath you where you don't have to worry about.
Well, you'll have to worry about something. I'm sure houses like to find, like, little things you never knew existed and. Yeah, here's something to worry about. Hey, spunky thing.
[00:04:23] Speaker A: I've been trying to figure out when, how old the water heater is, and I can't find any information on how old the water heater is because I just know that's going to be the next thing to go. And I want to buy a new one before it does, you know, but most everything else. And I'm going to do some upgrades. I'm going to replace the doors. The doors are the original hollow core doors from. When did they purchase this? They purchased this in 1987, so. Wow.
87, something like that. 88. 88. They purchased this in 1988. And so, like, they never replaced a door like, it's all just the original. They were the first owners. But, you know, it's a. It's a condo, so it came with whatever the standard bill is. The brass doorknobs. Like, I'm just going to replace things with, like, brushed nickel and things that make me feel a little bit happier about the place.
Yeah. And, like, my mother loved the handles that she. The brass handles she put on the kitchen cupboards. I replaced those suckers, like, within the first 30 days I lived here. But, you know, things like that where I have the ability to tear out some things in the bathroom and put in a pedestal sink and things that just make more sense to me. All in due time, of course, and get some painting done and some general repairs. But, yeah. So, anyway, homeownership. Whoo.
[00:05:40] Speaker B: Whoa. Well, I have a teenager who's trying to earn some money to buy your phone back, so she's painting a room upstairs that bright red, and bright red is kind of. I don't know.
[00:05:54] Speaker A: She's painting it bright red, or she's replacing the red.
[00:05:57] Speaker B: It's gonna be, like, more of a.
Like, a thundercalla blue, I guess, is.
[00:06:06] Speaker A: The color we chose.
[00:06:07] Speaker B: It's gonna be, like, a darker blue, but sort of like, a grayish blue.
And. Yeah, it's the. It's a game room. And using it for storage, like, on my husband's, there's a box called important things in there, and I'm like, how's this important?
[00:06:25] Speaker A: Who decided this was important? Why is this on the spot? What is it?
[00:06:30] Speaker B: He's got, like, plastic joke mustaches and, like, look at the important stuff. It's been, like, kind of a joke going through some of this stuff. So, like, anyway, we're getting all the stuff out of there. We're going to turn it into, like, an actual place. Like, when friends come over that I know about that room and, like, hang out, it can be, like, a place for. For them to hang out. So it's kind of an upstairs, teenager y hangout room. But I'm thinking I might do some stuff up there, too. Maybe I'll put a second office up there where I can't hear anything downstairs.
[00:07:04] Speaker A: I don't know how many coats. How many coats of the blue is it going to take to cover red?
[00:07:11] Speaker B: I have no idea. So previous owners were, like, really into, I think, Ohio State University or something. So it was like, the OSU. Like, even the doorknob handles had OSU on them, and. And they're like, can we take those? And I'm like, have fun with. So I have to replace the. Like, that room had. Like, I literally haven't touched it. It's just been storage. And so I'm kind of reclaiming that room back. And. I don't know, we'll. We'll see what happens with it. It's Claire's painting. She's taped up.
Yeah.
[00:07:44] Speaker A: Well, the room. The room I'm in right now, this office, my home office, my. Like I said, my parents have owned this since it was built. And when I went back to college, when I went to do my graduate school, I moved back in here with them so that they could help take care of my daughter when I was at night school, twice, two nights a week.
So we lived here for, I don't know, four or five years before I moved out and rented another house. So when we moved out, my mother, my stepdad, decided that this bedroom, because this was the bed, was our second bedroom, would be their television room. So they took the tv out of the living room, which was, you know, just for entertaining guests or whatever, and this was their.
[00:08:23] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:08:24] Speaker A: What did she call it? The. The family room. I don't know why that's called a family room, but it is anyway. But she loves americana. Like, she loves that, like, old, like, not red, but like that antique red. Not blue, but like that antique blue. Right. And so this one wall with the window was painted that red color, and the other walls were white, and the ceiling was painted dark blue.
[00:08:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:08:54] Speaker A: So one of the first things I did was, all of this gets white. I am not doing a thing in that room until it's all white. I can't deal with it. I have so many things I wanted to put on walls, and I like seeing things I don't want. Things I don't believe in. Like, storage. Storage, right. Like, people who have storage lockers for years and years and years. Cause they don't wanna part with their stuff. You're not touching your stuff. You're not. It's you. You know, like, psychologically, you own it somewhere. But I. The things that I want. I want to be able to touch and see, and I don't want to have to go dig through a box to remember a memento for my grandmother or whatever. So, yeah, my. My storage room holds.
[00:09:31] Speaker B: My storage room.
[00:09:33] Speaker A: Go ahead. Sorry. My storage room holds, like, Christmas decorations and toilet paper and my toolboxes and just stuff like that. Right. So it's not like, oh, I need to find those memories kind of thing.
[00:09:47] Speaker B: Yeah. There's, like, some cleaning philosophy of like, you pick. You hold. It's japanese, maybe, and you pick it up and you hold it. And if it brings you joy, you keep it. And if it doesn't bring you joy, you get rid of it.
[00:10:01] Speaker A: Yeah. Marie Kondo?
[00:10:03] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:04] Speaker A: Is it Marie Kondo? Yeah. So she was doing this. It sparks joy. If it sparks joy, you keep it. If it's utilitarian, like, you have to have pots and pans, for example, you keep those as well. Right, but, um. But. But anything like clothing or tchotchkes or whatever, if it doesn't spark joy, then you give it away or throw it away or recycle or whatever.
[00:10:23] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:23] Speaker A: But I've also been practicing the art of swedish death cleaning. Do you know what that is?
[00:10:30] Speaker B: My aunt sent me a message a couple years ago. She said that she was swedish death cleaning, and she needed to talk to me about some things. And I was just, like, in the middle of dealing with all that stuff, and I'm like, I don't know if I can handle swedish death cleaning right now.
[00:10:46] Speaker A: And then it just kind of, like, fell by the wayside.
[00:10:48] Speaker B: I don't know what she was actually up to. What is swedish death cleaning?
[00:10:51] Speaker A: Yeah. So swedish death cleaning is the idea that you're not saving things for future generations. So the idea is that someday when I die, whether it's tomorrow or 30 years from now or 40, I don't know. I'm 55. How many more years have I got? I don't know, 30, 40. But the idea that at some point when I die, my daughter has to deal with everything I own. I don't have a spouse. I don't have any other children. It's just her. Right. And so she's going to walk into this home that I think of. Everything inside of this house, like I said, is things that I like or things that I use, and she's going to be like, holy shit, there's so much stuff in here to have to deal with. And so when I do the sparks joy thing, too, right? Like, what do I really want? What do I really need? But, like, the two drawers in this desk, I probably clean those out twice a year because I just shove shit in there all the time, and then I'll go through it, and it's. They're both full. And, like, I know everything that's in those drawers is not stuff I need. It's stuff that came back from a word camp or somebody sent me in the mail or whatever. So I'll go through and try to deal with as much of that stuff as possible, so that everything that's left for her to deal with will either be a memory she wants to keep or something she can sell or give away.
Yeah, but, you know, I want her to have things that she can make money off of, my Lego collection or things that remind her of me that she would hold sentimentally. But I've given her permission that when I die someday, she doesn't have to keep anything she doesn't have. Just because something was sentimental to me doesn't mean it has to be sentimental to her. Sure. You know, and along those lines, like, when my mother does pass away, at some point, I'm getting rid of a ton of stuff that's still in this condo that was hers that she still asks about. Oh, do you still have this, that, or the other thing? You know? Of course, mom. It's in. It's in the cupboard. It's in there, wherever. But there are things that I don't want but I can't get rid of yet because she's still attached to them. I've given my daughter permission to not have to deal with any of that.
[00:12:56] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:12:59] Speaker A: So I celebrate that too, right? Like, every time I clean things out, like, stuff goes to the garbage or I put it on the free cycle site and people come pick it up. That's exciting. I love that things can have new life with other people, that somebody might want your junk, and then if nobody wants your junk, then it's time for recycle or landfill or whatever, you know, things go to. But, yeah, little things like that.
[00:13:23] Speaker B: But, yeah, I started going through the garage with my son the last time he was here. And, well, first I was like, okay, I want you to go through all of Mark's tools because anything that you think I should need, like screwdriver, hammer, he bought me a drill because Mark's drill's battery was, like, dead. And he's like, no, you need a Milwaukee. You know how sons are if they're just like, yeah, yeah, gotta have a Milwaukee drill. So I've got, like, this fancy Milwaukee drill. And he got me a chainsaw too. I can chainsaw. That's so much fun.
[00:13:50] Speaker A: I love that.
I would have one leg. If I. If I hold the chainsaw, I would drop it and I would lose a leg. That's what I'm saying.
[00:14:00] Speaker B: Claire likes to make jokes about how we're in Texas and you like chainsaw.
[00:14:04] Speaker A: Is what's going on here.
[00:14:06] Speaker B: Yeah. Um, but I had him go through all of Mark's tools. Like, there's stuff in there. I don't even know what it does, you know, like, he came in and he's like, why is that cabinet off its hinge? I'm like, because it fell off.
[00:14:20] Speaker A: What do you want me to do about it?
[00:14:22] Speaker B: I don't know. So he like, fixed that. There's like curtain rod that's came out of the drywall. Like all of the little things where.
[00:14:30] Speaker A: I'm just like, well, I guess this.
[00:14:31] Speaker B: Is my life now. I'm not going to be able to fix it, right? I should be able to, but I can't. I know where my limits are. Unhack a website, I'm your girl.
[00:14:42] Speaker A: Fixing cars, not so much. I'm going to tree a loss.
[00:14:47] Speaker B: I don't know what to do. So he started going through all of Mark's tools and stuff and I'm like, just take it all. Take everything that I'm never going to touch. And I still have, I have pans that you use for gold panning. Like, because when we were in California, I was like, oh, let's go gold. Like, because you could if you wanted to, but I never did. And, but we still have like, what am I going to do with this stuff?
[00:15:13] Speaker A: Ebay.
[00:15:13] Speaker B: Like, what is anybody in Texas going to do with this stuff? I guess I'll just ship it up to friends up in Shasta and say, here we go, gold pants.
[00:15:19] Speaker A: Either that or you could, you could let Claire buy back her phone by ebaying all the stuff you don't want to keep.
[00:15:26] Speaker B: Oh, I tried that with her and Amazon with used books, but every once, some of them back here are some of Mark's books where I'm like, oh, this looks good. I might read this one. It's been a hard thing. But I told her, just start going through books and look up the prices. Anything over $20, write it on the list and we'll get it listed right. But then she just kind of like forgot, you know, just, yeah, teenagers and how they get disinterested and things and.
[00:15:54] Speaker A: So very, very easily. Yes.
[00:15:56] Speaker B: Now I have to do it all and it's so many books and I'm not good at this because, yeah, they start collecting up here. I already have a bookshelf in my room. That of stuff. I've gone through my books a few times and yeah, I'm just, it's hard. I'm having a hard time with stuff. This seems to be a conversation that.
[00:16:16] Speaker A: We keep having a hard time with stuff.
It is hard because we, we are corporal people that like things. Right. Like we need things. We don't need everything, but we need things and we like things and what do they call it? Retail therapy is a thing.
[00:16:38] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:16:39] Speaker A: You know, I will scroll Amazon sometimes just looking for things that piqued my interest. Yeah. But then I got to make room for it. So like, oh, I want more legos. Where would I like to build it? Where would I put them? Where, where could I put more legos in this house? Yeah. 1400 square feet. I got no room to hang anything.
[00:17:02] Speaker B: The funny thing is, is like the bigger you go in a house, the more you just get stuck.
[00:17:06] Speaker A: You feel the space.
[00:17:07] Speaker B: Yeah, it just happens. It just comes out of nowhere. I don't know for sure, but I have to down. I mean, as soon as Claire is out. 830 something days. Not that I'm counting.
Maybe counting a little.
[00:17:21] Speaker A: A little. Just a little.
[00:17:22] Speaker B: I love my daughter very much.
[00:17:24] Speaker A: I know you do.
[00:17:25] Speaker B: 15 is tough, but yeah, when she's gone, it's like, I don't need this much house, you know? And I would like something all on one level and maybe not in Texas.
[00:17:36] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:17:37] Speaker B: Until then, I'm going through stuff.
[00:17:41] Speaker A: Gotta deal with what you gotta deal with.
[00:17:43] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:17:44] Speaker A: I've become obsessed with lamps. I love lamps. Yeah, I love light. I like things to be lit up and I just. I see lamps and I want to buy my different lamp all the time. I have a chandelier over my bed and another chandelier in the corner of my bedroom, kind of smaller version of the same one over my jewelry box. And like, I love that you walk into my bedroom and there's a chandelier over my bed. It's just so cute. I mean, I'm the only one that sees it, but it makes me happy. Right. That's all that matters. But I love, like the salt lamp that I have over here. What you can't see next to it is like this bowl lamp from Ikea that's this beautiful lit up bowl. I've got my. I can't point right. What is this thing called? Lava lamp. I've got my lava lamp up here. I've got this lit up sign, this on the air sign, which is hard to see in the. In the video.
And there's this. These lamps that I saw that I want so badly. And it's like this woman, like fifties style, right? It's like a bust and the light bulb is her blowing a bubble. Like, it looks like she's blowing a bubble. And that's the light bulb. I'm like, it's like $120 or something. I'm like, how can I justify that when I literally have no surface to put it on? Like, what would I get rid of to buy that lamp? So, yeah, I don't know. Obsessed with all the things.
[00:19:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:19:03] Speaker A: All the time on things, but, yeah, I don't know. But, yeah. And so you have the afternoon off. So I'm like, you get to go play after we get out of here. I'm off on Monday. Yeah. So that's a celebration. What are you gonna do at your time besides listen to Taylor Swift?
[00:19:20] Speaker B: I'll be listening to Taylor Swift. I am going to home Depot to buy paint, and I'm gonna go, wow. Because I couldn't go earlier, and I'm gonna listen to Taylor Swift, and I might go for. Just, like, go for a walk by myself without the dogs. They're crazy right now because it's springtime, and the smells are just like, yeah, more. And so they are driving me insane. So I've been going for walks on my own without dogs, and it's. I can hear myself think. I can hear my podcasts properly. I'll be able to hear Taylor and analyze her lyrics. I love all the Easter eggs. I'm not good at that. I go on instagram, like, why?
[00:20:03] Speaker A: If somebody's.
[00:20:04] Speaker B: Oh, that's what that means.
So, yeah, my guilty pleasures. And a friend of mine sent me a free coupons for free pizza, so I'm gonna score some free pizza tonight.
[00:20:16] Speaker A: So nice.
[00:20:17] Speaker B: Those are my celebrations.
[00:20:19] Speaker A: I will hear Taylor Swift's music if it makes its way into TikTok.
Yeah. And it probably will.
[00:20:26] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm sure it will.
It's everywhere to me. Just. Cause, you know, you look at it once, and then it's like, the algorithm is, like, more.
[00:20:35] Speaker A: Would you like some more of that? We have more.
[00:20:39] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And it's. It's everywhere right now, so. But, yeah, there's some really good songs on our album, so I. So far, I'm pretty happy with what I'm finding, and so I'm just gonna enjoy it.
[00:20:51] Speaker A: Good.
[00:20:52] Speaker B: I love that fun.
[00:20:54] Speaker A: That is fun. And it is nice to be able to just do some things you want to do and listen to the things you want to listen to and just kind of, I don't know, mellow out. Can we still say mellow up?
[00:21:05] Speaker B: Yeah. Just having downtime. Nobody wants anything for me. I don't have anything I have to do.
[00:21:12] Speaker A: Yep.
[00:21:13] Speaker B: Except pull the. There's poison ivy growing again behind the air conditioner that's getting replaced. So I'm gonna have to get that out of there before the air conditioner guy comes on Sunday.
[00:21:22] Speaker A: So are you allergic to poison ivy?
[00:21:25] Speaker B: The last time I pulled out all that, when it was dead, I pulled it all out. It was a lot of it back in there, and I pulled it all out, and of course, it got me, like, right on my finger here.
[00:21:35] Speaker A: So when I put people up, look.
[00:21:38] Speaker B: At my poison ivy scar. And so I've got a scar from it, and I have gloves on and everything, and I'm like, how do you.
[00:21:43] Speaker A: Get through the glove?
[00:21:44] Speaker B: So. But.
[00:21:45] Speaker A: So now you need rubber gloves inside your gardening gloves?
[00:21:49] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. It's just such a pain. Texas, when I lived in Mount Shasta, there was no poison ivy because we were at such a high elevation, it didn't grow. So you go off into the forests and into the woods and stuff, and you wouldn't have any problem because it just didn't grow at that elevation. At least that's what people told me. And there were just like, less fleas and ticks and snakes and all of the things that I get to enjoy here in Texas.
[00:22:16] Speaker A: We do have. We don't have chiggers here, but we do have poison ivy and we have some snakes. Not as many as poisonous or venomous ones as you do, I'm guessing. We have no one of those little things, the arachnid things that scorpions. We don't have any scorpions here. Yeah, we do have poison ivy, but knock on wood, I have never gotten poison ivy my whole life, so I don't know if I'm not allergic to it like most people are, or if I just have never come into contact with it enough to know. But I'm not willing to test the theory. So nobody send it to me in the mail to see if I can rub it all over myself and see if I break out. But I've never had an allergic reaction to it, so I've never had to.
[00:22:55] Speaker B: Really deal with it until here. And then I was just like, I think that is what it is, and it is what it is.
But anyway, yeah. The trauma of having to deal with.
[00:23:10] Speaker A: Texas.
I hear you. I hear you. Well, whatever else you do this weekend, I hope you do get some downtime for yourself. Don't make it all about the gym and the painting and all that. Enjoy the music. Have a glass of wine or something if you want, and have a good weekend.
[00:23:28] Speaker B: Yeah, you too. I hope you have a wonderful weekend and that.
[00:23:31] Speaker A: Thank you.
[00:23:32] Speaker B: Sun is shining and.
[00:23:34] Speaker A: Yep, if it's nice. Tomorrow I'm gonna go take pictures of birds or try to.
[00:23:38] Speaker B: Awesome.
[00:23:39] Speaker A: If the birds will. They don't, like, actually just come and pose. So, you know, it's. It's a little more challenging than just go take pictures of birds, but I'm gonna try. Yeah. Yeah.
Somebody once asked me, how do you get them to pose for you? I'm like, patience. You just wait for them to land and you're really still and you take a picture.
[00:23:59] Speaker B: I keep seeing all these, like, birds showing up to people who feed them with gifts. And so there's like, crows do this a lot. Like, if they know you're feeding them, they'll give. Give you gifts. So I've been, like, trying to feed. We have crows everywhere, and so I've been trying to feed them, but as soon as I go outside, they all fly away from me. And I'm like, seeds.
[00:24:18] Speaker A: But I have, I have. I brought your lunch. I know I have a bird feeder here, but the squirrels like it more than anything else. And so once my bird seed is gone, I think I'm getting rid of the bird feeder. Really? Yeah.
[00:24:30] Speaker B: It was good while it lasted.
[00:24:31] Speaker A: It was. It was a good quarter of a year. Yeah. Anyway, well, join us again next week, folks, where we don't know what we'll talk about. And we may just meander over thoughts and things, like sometimes we do, like today, but it's what we do. It's always a trip and how we hope that you enjoy it even a quarter as much as we do. We'll see y'all next week.
[00:24:53] Speaker B: Bye bye.
[00:24:56] Speaker A: This has been WP. Motivate with Kathy's aunt and Michelle Freshette. To learn more or to sponsor us, go to wpmotivate.com.
