It's been Tuesday long enough...

I don't actually have much to say, but I was tired of the last unhappy post being up at the top and all unhappy-like.

So...um... Yeah.

Oh! Happy Beltane yesterday.

I'm feeling all listless today. I have work to do, I'm just not interested in doing it. This morning was spent in a boring and seemingly irrelevant meeting. Well, it's relevant for some people, but wasn't for me. Which got me off to a not-caring-so-much start. It's now almost three, and I still haven't managed to accomplish much, except to discover that I don't remember my login for my photobucket account, and it doesn't recognize any of my email addresses. Good think I still have that webshots account!

I leave you with an old photo of Nova and Sabre biting each other. Nova's gotten a little fatter, but other than that (and the fact that I left the ugly couch with my ex-husband) not much about this photo is different now.



Click for big.

And it's only Tuesday...

Yesterday Fred's cat Sparkie died. He got her as a kitten before he started high school, and she was a lovely, sweet, talkative girl who loved to sit on laps and beg for chicken at the dinner table. She was somewhere between fifteen and seventeen years old and had been going downhill since Christmas, so this wasn't a surprise, but it is still very difficult.

When I got home yesterday I got a call from a friend telling me that another friend has kicked her husband out. There is hope for reconciliation, but he screwed up large and it will be a long road back. And there's a possibility that there won't be reconciliation, which means a whole different set of difficulties, and an entirely different long road.

Borrowed from The Bears:

Sabre:

In a Past Life...

You Were: A Friendly Viking. Where You Lived: Saudi Arabia. How You Died: Dysentery.

Who Were You In a Past Life?

Callie:

In a Past Life...

You Were: An Insane Alchemist. Where You Lived: Australia. How You Died: Hung for treason.

Who Were You In a Past Life?

Nova:

In a Past Life...

You Were: A Banished Dancer. Where You Lived: Texas. How You Died: Hung for treason.

Who Were You In a Past Life?

Hm. I don't like the sound off all that treason. Maybe this explains the de riguer 3 a.m. fighting? Callie and Nova are staging an uprising!

Better

Thanks to every one who said nice things. It made me smile!

Today is better. Yesterday was a pms day, which didn't help matters. I'm also still adjusting to Fred being on afternoons, which makes me pouty. It'll get better, I know.

I'm still tired, but the scare I had last week when I found a lump in my right boob has passed (turned out to be an infection of some kind, and is clearing up nicely with antibiotics), and I'm looking forward to getting back into doing some physical activity.

Off to a branch meeting soon, which means getting home late, but also means free food.

Can't wait to hug my kitties and do some knitting.

*sigh*

One more job interviewed for, one more "thanks, but no thanks" letter.

This morning (after driving for 2 hours) I had a construction worker swear at me for attempting not to run him over while he was crossing the street against a red light.

It's 8:41 and I've already cried once.


Can we not have today, please?

I am frustrated.

I keep trying to donate to things, like Knitters Without Borders. And trying to help people out with their Million Dollar Cat Fund like Crazy Aunt Purl while also getting a neat-o messenger/knitting bag.

I went out and got myself a Paypal account, and transfered some money over. I've been waiting for over a week for the transfer to take effect. Finally today I got the email! Rejoicing!

Then...swearing. Because those places I want to give money to/buy things from? They only take credit cards. I can (and will) still donate to Buffyguide and I can toss some money into the Million Dollar Cat Fund without getting a fun, new messenger bag. But I'm still pretty frustrated.

Just when you think....

....that life is settling down a bit....

So we got our house back. The room mate and boyfriend moved out last Saturday with a minimum of fuss.

Fred and I have started to settle back into a routine and re-work chore responsibilites, etc, etc.

Then on Tuesday Fred was told that he's being switched to straight afternoons. Monday to Friday 3:30 pm to midnight. While I get up at 5:15 am. So there will only be nation of two time from sometime Saturday morning after I finish at the Farmer's Market and when I have to go to bed Sunday night.

That fortress of solitude joke? Not so funny now.

*sigh*

I am looking for the positive in this though.

Since I will have no reason to run home after work, I can drop Amanda off and go straight to the gym, every night. That's five gym days a week. Much better than my current one to two days.

I will get plenty of alone time for reading, knitting, catching up on Oprah, meditating and taking long hot smelly baths.

After going to the gym I can come home and putter. I putter better when I throw on some Indigo Girls or other folksy, feministy kinda music and sing along at the top of my lungs. Since the cats will be the only other people home, and they have no opinion on folksy, feministy singers one way or the other, I'm good to go.

I am certain that there is a point to this. That there is something for me to learn here, just as there was with the Great Room Mate Debacle of '05. 'Cause if there isn't a point? If this is just the universe fucking with me? Wow, that would make me cranky.

Leone, your sister turned me on to Robin McKinley, and I ADORE Sunshine. I am also a big fan of the Anita Blake books, Allison. Sadly the book I read last week was neither, and not particularly well written. I can't remember where I am in either the Blake series or in the Gentry series, so I haven't picked any up in a while.

This week I'm back to driving. It's only Tuesday and I'm already pooped. And have only managed to read about 20 pages of Kathy Reichs' Grave Secrets.

I was at Lewiscraft today (local-ish craft store chain that has been bought out and is closing down). I was trying to get stuff to knit a yoga mat bag and a cabled newsboy cap from the Stitch 'n Bitch Nation book. Unfortunately, when it's a store closing down sale you take what you can get. Instead of 100% cotton and a 50/50 alpaca/merino blend I got more Bernat Soft Boucle in Richest Red, bringing my stash total to 6 skeins, with which I am going to attempt a tubular shrug.

I've decided that my particular brand of knitting is called Commando Knitting. Although not in the underwear sense. Here's how it goes: I see a pattern that I like, or some yarn that makes me happy, or I have a device or other thing that needs a cozy; I say to myself "You know, I think I'd like to change that and make it different/better/more suited to be exactly what I need."; throwing caution to the wind I swatch using different sizes needles and a different weight yarn than is called for in the pattern, and I may fix the pattern a little too so that the lace is more visible or something (there's usually a lot of frogging involved in this step). Then I knit. And wind up with pretty good stuff on the whole, at least so far.

It's a similar to the attitude I've always taken towards my hair. Bad dye job? Horrible perm? Silly looking cut? Bah! It grows back, just shave it down to about an inch.

Crazy Aunt Purl calls it Living Out Loud. Natasha Bedingfield calls it living life with arms wide open. I'm not sure which I like better, but I'm having lots of fun.

Enough of that.

OK, so it's time to get the unhappy post off the top of the blog.

Things are better. We're at t minus 4 days until the move-out date. *dances* Since the soon-to-be-ex-roommate has been on vacation while doing house stuff, I have been taking the bus for the better part of the last two weeks. What a difference it makes! Sadly, paying for a car and taking the bus, just not an option right now. Depending on how high gas prices get, I may reconsider, we'll see. And no, I'm not willing to get rid of my car. It gives me the independence to get up at oh-my-goodness-it's-early o'clock on a Saturday and go to the farmer's market, the chiropractor and the grocery store, and be home and back in bed for a snuggle before 10 am. Not giving that up, no sirree bob. Still, the chance for some extra shut-eye in the morning (on the bus!) has been lovely. Plus, I've managed to read 4 whole books! In less than two weeks!

Work is feh. Which is a combination of 'meh' (apathy) and a bit of annoyance. The previously mentioned exciting project is really just a big pain in my tuchuss. But! I get to spend some time over the next couple of weeks assisting with planning a client appreciation/milestone celebration event. Which is a tiny step towards my "someday I want to be a wedding planner" dream.

Whee!

What's the opposite of Spring Fever?

Usually around this time of year I get a burst of energy. Days are getting warmer and sunnier and longer. Things are starting to grow. Birdies are happily twittering all over the place. The kitties are turning into kamikaze furballs. Even Fred is a little perkier than usual.

I am not. I am tired. And sad. And having a hard time getting out of bed in the morning, nevermind getting excited about getting out of bed. It's not every day, and it's not all day long on the days that I feel like this, but there's getting to be more not-wanting-to-get-out-of-bed days than not. I'm still getting out of bed, but that's mostly because I need the paycheque. Oh, and some days (again, not every day) I just can't stop eating. Not always stuff that's bad for me, but still, it is possible to eat too much celery.

Maybe I'm depressed? I don't know. I've been treated for it in the past, and it felt different than this. This is more like extreme boredom with my life. Except that aside from my job/commute (didn't get that last one that I interviewed for, by the way), my weight and a couple of things that will take care of themselves in about 19 days, I quite like my life. I have a home that I have plans to make into a lovely home. I have a boyfriend and cats and family and friends who all love me and I love them all back. I'm still looking for a job and still going to the gym. I go for walks and I do things I enjoy like going to the farmer's market, and singing, and having tea with my girlfriends. So why, when I have all of this wonderful stuff going on, do I just want to pull the covers up over my head and snuggle with a kitty while knitting things and watching Oprah?

Fantastic!

I need help! Last night I finally watched The Christmas Invasion and now I need more of The Doctor. Please give me your favourite Doctor related links, especially if they have episode transcripts. Feeding my new mini-obsession will also help to keep my mind off that job I still haven't heard anything about.

Scattered!

I'm just all over the place today, be warned!

Waiting sucks

I am waiting to hear back from an interview I had earlier this week. It's almost 3:30 on Friday afternoon, which means that I'm unlikely to hear anything today, and that I will have to continue to wait through the weekend. My tummy is kinda knotty and I just want to know what's going on!

I am waiting for the room mate to move out. Thirty days. It's not very long, not much longer at all as a matter of fact, but I'm impatient. Then end of the tunnel is right there and I can see the light, but it's not enough to read by.

Best Lunch Ever

Today I treated myself to lunch. I went to Sammy's in the food court downstairs and got a spinach salad with dried cranberries, walnuts, fresh strawberries, salmon and strawberry dressing on it, and a can of V-8. It made me very, very happy.

I [heart] My iPod!

Fred surprised me with an iPod (financial obligations be damned! Damned, I say! *whimper* But this is not going to be complainy, this is going to be about how much I [heart] my iPod). Mine is white and her name is Emmeline. Don't ask me why, that's just the name that came to me while we were getting to know each other Wednesday afternoon. She helped me knit, she helped me do laundry and we danced around while we hung up shirts, she helped me do the dishes and empty the dishwasher. Yesterday we went for a walk together to the grocery store to get some sushi, and tonight we're going to the gym. I am going to knit her a cozy with a trap door on the front to get at the control wheel thingy (like those jammies with feet!), and a pocket to keep her earphones in, and a place to put an armband through when for when we're pumping iron. I am also going to knit her a cord cozy to keep her earphone cord from getting all tangly and chewed by cats. I love her so very, very much. Right now I have about 180 songs on her, some of which have to come off, and then a lot more need to go on. We still have some getting-to-know-you stuff to do, like learning how to make a playlist, but I think that this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Singing on Sunday

This Sunday we're off to Burlington for singing and spending time with friends. Yay!

Notes from the evil one, the helper-cat and the pretty one.

Stolen from The Spawnkitty and Chuck. Us kitties got to stick together, yo. Solidaritoo!

Ten Top Trivia Tips about Callie!

1. All of the roles in Shakespeare's plays - including the female roles - were originally played by Callie.
2. About one tenth of Callie is permanently covered in ice.
3. Callie is often used in place of milk in food photography, because milk goes soggy more quickly than Callie.
4. Callie was named after Callie the taxi driver in Frank Capra's 'It's a Wonderful Life'.
5. A bride should wear something old, something new, something borrowed, and Callie.
6. Callie can fly at an average speed of fifteen kilometres an hour!
7. There are 336 dimples on Callie!
8. The liquid inside Callie can be used as a substitute for blood plasma.
9. Marie Antoinette never said 'let them eat cake' - this is a mistranslation of 'let them eat Callie'!
10. Thirty-five percent of the people who use personal ads for dating are Callie.

I am interested in - do tell me aboutherhimitthem

Comments from Callie:
2. That 1/10th is because you people keep opening that door that we can't get out. It's not my fault the wild calls to me.
5. Try to wear me. Just try it. You'll wind up with a lot more piercings than you have now, pinky.
9. That should read "this is a mistranslation of let them eat ribbon".

Ten Top Trivia Tips about Sabre!

1. Michelangelo finished his great statue of Sabre in 1504, after eighteen months work.
2. Sabre is the world's smallest mammal.
3. Sabre has little need for water and is capable of going for months without drinking at all.
4. Sabre, from the movie of the same name, had green blood.
5. A female ferret will die if it goes into heat and cannot find Sabre.
6. The risk of being struck by Sabre is one occurence every 9,300 years.
7. Four-fifths of the surface of Sabre is covered in water!
8. Research indicates that Sabre will be attracted to people who have recently eaten bananas.
9. Sabre can pollinate up to six times more efficiently than the honeybee.
10. The Eskimos have over fifty words for Sabre.

I am interested in - do tell me aboutherhimitthem

Comments from Sabre:
3. Unless you have milk. Then I will climb your leg to get to the bottom of the cereal bowl.
6. Unless you are Callie or Nova. Then the chances go up exponentially.

Ten Top Trivia Tips about Nova!

1. Nova does not have toes.
2. Nova cannot jump!
3. In Japan it is considered rude to talk with Nova in your mouth.
4. Nova can drink over 25 gallons of water at a time.
5. Nova can grow up to three feet in a 24 hour period.
6. Influenza got its name because people believed the disease was caused by the evil "influence" of Nova.
7. In 1982 Time Magazine named Nova its 'Man of the Year'!
8. It takes 8 minutes for light to travel from the Sun's surface to Nova.
9. Over 2000 people have now climbed Nova, with roughly ten percent dying on the way down.
10. On average, women blink nearly twice as much as Nova.

I am interested in - do tell me aboutherhimitthem

Comments from Angela (because Nova is busy being pretty. And sleeping.):
1. In fact, Nova has a lot of toes that she cleans very loudly when I am trying to watch tv.
5. This is true. She can be a tiny, adorable ball of white fur curled up on the back of the couch in the afternoon, then that night she is a gigantic, heavy, stretched out bunch of white fur, crushing my chest and cutting off my air flow.
10. Nova has a reverse blink. She keeps her eyes closed most of the time, and opens them every once in a while to make sure that she's still being suffciently adored.

More responsibility!

Excitement! Terror! Confusion!

In the past day and a half I've been handed a whole bunch of stuff to do. Most of it formatting, not much of it requiring huge amounts of thought. It's stuff I like to do, but not stuff that challenges me. The challenge comes in when I have to juggle multiple deadlines and multiple managers with entirely different ideas of what my priorities should be. The joys of assisting a department rather than a person...

Anywho, just now I've been handed another project. It will only require about 2 hours of my time a week, so it's not huge in terms of fitting it in with what I'm already doing. The intimidating part is that it's important! It's not just formatting a resume or report for someone, or making sure that they have food and room for a meeting. No! I am now responsible for updating the spreadsheet that tells everyone what the status of the projects one of the departments is working on. This is a job that usually falls to a Project Coordinator, and yet me! The lowly Admin Assistant has been given this. I get to talk to the manager in charge of the practice, and go from there. It's mine to run with; I own it.

Gah!

I know that I can do this. In fact, one of the things that's had me dissatisfied in this job is the lack of responsibility I have. So on the one hand, I'm very excited about this. On the other hand I'm terrified because the scope of most of my projects is much, much less than this. Like ordering business cards for people. So I'm also terrified, because I've been doing stuff that a potted plant could do for most of the past year and my running-things skills are out of practice. I'm also confused. I've been looking for a new job. I'm very, very tired of driving for 3 hours a day, and this job has been getting to the point where it's just not worth it anymore. But. What if this is the start of something? What happens if I decide I *like* my job? Oy.

Deep down I know those are rhetorical questions. I doubt that I will ever love what I do here enough for it to be worth the drive, and the exhaustion, disconnection and lack of personal time that goes along with it. Still, I'm hoping that I'll stop dreading getting up in the morning while I look for something else.

On a completely random and unrelated note, I use exclamation marks in my titles. A lot!

Pickles and knitting

Today is a better day. Thank you to everyone who gave me support and hugs and advice. I've been trying to go to bed earlier and I've been playing my Valentine's Day gift (Green Day's Bullet in a Bible live CD) in the car pretty much non-stop because it's hard to be sleepy when you're resisting the urge to headbang. Which, like sleeping, isn't a really good thing to do while you're driving.

Today I went out at lunchtime. My friend L. and I went to Chapters then to Subway. I picked up the second SnB knitting book, the SnB Project Journal and the new O magazine. I can't wait to get home and figure out new knitting stuff to do. Last weeked I knitted so much that I got a bump on one of my fingers. I just love this knitting stuff.

At Subway I got a footlong chickenbaconranch sub, and I got pickles on it.

So today's betterness is brought to you (and me!) by pickles and knitting.

Sick, tired, frustrated.

Warning: there's gonna be some self-pity. I've been torn about making complainy posts here because I know people who are much sicker, much more tired and likely much more frustrated than I am. I am reminded, though, that my world is mine and other people's worlds are theirs. In my world I'm sick, tired and frustrated.

Almost two weeks ago the roommate caught a cold. She was working at a conference for a couple of days and stayed in the city. On the Friday of that week, instead of staying home and getting better, she elected to come to the office which meant a grand total of 3 hours spent trapped in a car with me (this was how she once described our daily commute. Yes, I'm having a hard time letting go of that one.) Last Monday I came down with the cold: sore throat, headache, chills, fever, etc. I spent two days at home (until the fever went away) and have been steadily getting better since. Except for the coughing. It's not bad during the day as long as I keep up a steady supply of water and don't let my throat dry out. Nighttime is another story. I cough if I lay down too flat, I cough if I don't lay down flat enough, I cough if I get too warm, I cough if I get too cold. I've been through 3 different cough remedies, and I'm still waking myself up coughing at 2 am.

This brings me to #2, tired. I. Am. Exhausted. This morning I was fighting sleep while driving the 401. Biting my tongue to shock myself into alertness, that sort of thing. Highly dangerous. Not the first time either. I don't know what to do about it. The roommate doesn't drive, and usually falls asleep herself. Even if she doesn't, there's little to no conversation so it's not like I get any stimulation from that area. I do listen to the radio, and change to cd sometimes, loud stuff like Blink-182 and Green Day. I have a coffee with me every morning. I have tried going to bed earlier at night, but at some point I need time to have life and getting home at 7 or 7:30 at night doesn't leave much time for relaxing. Last night there was laundry to do, dinner to make and clean up from and lunches to make. Fred does help me since he knows how tired I am, so it's not like I'm doing it all alone. Still. In order to get anything at all done on an average night (never mind one on which I want to go to the gym) I rarely sit down to relax before 10. Which, when I get up at 5:30 in the morning is technically past by bedtime. I'm burning out.

Which brings me to #3: frustration. I feel stuck. I don't have time to do things I really want to do. I'm looking for a new job close to home, which would certainly help with the situation, but I can't take a job just to take a job closer to home. I had an interview at a place in Kitchener, but I turned down a second interview because while it was only a 1/2 hour drive from home, it was a large pay cut, a contract with no guarantee of a job at the end of 10 months, and what promised to be pretty boring work. I've spent every day since I turned down the second interview wondering if I made a mistake, but I don't want to take a job just for the sake of getting a job. I want to do something that I won't hate; I don't have to be in love with it, I just don't want to hate it. I'm not challenged at work right now and as a result of that (plus the exhaustion) I've started to make mistakes. I don't like making mistakes. I get upset and embarrassed. Then it flows into my personal life and I make mistakes there, and I get more upset and more embarrassed. While I was trying in vain to fall asleep last night I relived over and over again the embarrassment I felt when I mis-read an email from a member of a group I sing with, and sent an answer out to a whole bunch of people, which showed I obviously didn't read the first email very carefully, and I felt like a numpty.

Another part of feeling stuck is that I'm waiting. Waiting to get my house back, waiting for everyone to be ready to move on to the next part of our lives, waiting for there to be enough time, enough space, enough money. Waiting. I'm taking control of the things that I can (going to the gym, job searching, stuff like that). Some of the waiting will be done soon (about 2 months at this point). Some of it (like the money part) likely never will be, since really, how much money is enough?

I'm all over the map, here, I know. This is a peek inside my brain these days, and it distresses me because it's not what I'm usually like. *sigh* If anyone's looking for me, I'll be napping under my desk.

Remembering isn't just for November

As I was driving in to work this morning I heard on the news that another Canadian soldier was killed in Afghanistan this morning.

It made me think of one of my friends who is currently serving in the Canadian armed forces. He's in Canada right now, but has been told that he can expect to be deployed in the Spring.

When I got to work this morning I had an email from that friend that had this tribute link in it. Warning, it made me cry. Then again, I'm a giant mushball at the best of times. Still, the fact that another name has been added to the list of our fallen soldiers is a sad thing.

I know that the numbers of dead U.S. soldiers is far, far higher, and that the civilian deaths in the Middle East are also off the charts. I guess it's just that this feels so much closer to home for me, and is certainly closer to my heart.

Ninja Name Generators

For Ryan!

And thanks to Kim. [thumbs up]

From Ninjaburger: Hansuke Hidari -san

From rumandmonkey.com:

My Secret Ninja Name is Transexual the Retarted Ninja.
Take The Secret Ninja Name Generator today!
Created with Rum and Monkey's Name Generator Generator.

And for lots of other Ninja info (be aware that it makes noise as soon as it opens): RealUltimatePower


I'd still rather be a Pirate. Yar.

Stuck!

Ever been in one of those positions where you have too much you want to say?

There are about a bazillion things I want to write about but they're all kinda half formed and incoherent. It's even affecting my ability to coherently comment on other people's blogs, beyond cute one-linery type things.

I need unsticking.

Gar, mateys!

My pirate name is:

Mad Anne Bonney

Every pirate is a little bit crazy. You, though, are more than just a little bit. You can be a little bit unpredictable, but a pirate's life is far from full of certainties, so that fits in pretty well. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from fidius.org.