"...just want to be able to enjoy the sunshine."

I really hate that I feel like I have to go into stealth mode to go into my own back yard, but it hasn't rained in a few days and my garden needed to be watered. After peeking out the back windows several times I concluded that nobody was home behind us and went outside with Sawyer while Branflake was napping.

In all honesty, I've been avoiding our back-door neighbors. Not only the neighbors with the future serial killer son, but our elderly neighbor and her middle-aged daughter that also live behind us. 

It's not that I don't like them. They're nice people, but I cannot relate to a woman who is fifteen years my senior, stuck in the 80s, mooches off of her recently widowed mother, and is dating a man the same age as my father.

They don't seem to have anything better to do with their time than watch whatever I'm doing throughout the day. I feel like I'm being watched all the time. No matter what time of day I let Sawyer out, they will also let their dog out within five minutes. Whenever I go out I always wind up in a conversation about a fight the daughter is having with her boyfriend, how depressed the mother is about the death of her husband (please note I am not an unsympathetic person, I realize that it's difficult to lose a loved one, but I am also not a grief counselor and barely know these people),  how much the daughter wishes she could have children, issues with one of her other daughters keeping her grandchildren away from her, and other personal, family business. It's awkward.

If I'm not getting an earful about personal problems, I'm getting unsolicited parenting advice or being treated like a child myself. Example: One day I commented that I wanted to go into the woods and clip some flowering dogwood branches. The mother gasped in horror and said that she "refused" to "allow" me to go into the woods because of snakes. I went anyway and didn't see a single snake.

Even P.B. has to borrow my Leave-Me-The-Fuck-Alone headphones à la Natalie Portman in Garden State to mow the lawn.

If I bring Branflake out they beg me to bring him over to visit and they will kiss him and call themselves "aunt" and "grandma." Sorry, but Branflake has two aunts and two grandmas already. I don't think he needs to be confused by people referring to themselves with family titles when we've only known each other for a few months. In my opinion family titles should be reserved for family and friends that are so close we consider them family.

I'm not against a block party on occasion, but I don't want to get into anyone's business and I don't want anyone in mine. Maybe I'm this way because Central Floridians in general are not friendly people (blame all the tourists), but sometimes I don't feel like talking or visiting and just want to be able to enjoy the sunshine.

Happiness is a stick and a bed of sun-warmed clover.

I saw Chili and Cornbread in a Jar on Pinterest recently and decided to try it last night.

Because we're so close to closing we're on a tight budget just to make sure we can put every penny we can into savings. To keep it cheap I used canned chili and boxed cornbread so the meal for the two of us cost less than four dollars.

Taste-wise, the meal was as good as we could expect for canned chili and 33-cent cornbread. However, as cute as it looked, serving it in jars just wasn't practical. With a normal-length spoon it was just hard to get to. P.B. said he felt like a monkey being teased with a banana. We ended up dumping our jars into bowls (and making more dishes for me to wash).

 Perhaps with a longer spoon?