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Lots has been going on around here. Earlier this week I lost my voice. The first day was pretty cool in that I sounded like Dr. Melfi from the Sopranos. Puddin' spent one morning in the car making me talk for him so I could entertain him with, "I just don't think that would be appropriate, Anthony." and other therapeutic quotes. But alas, it quickly degenerated into truck stop waitress. So my quotes shifted to "you want grits with that?" instead.

I think I've almost got my voice back. It's a little funky now and then, but so far so good. My latest frustration has been my right ear's decision to completely stop up and either feel like it has an ice pick in it or ring incessantly. Ringing is much preferable, let me tell you.

Another milestone is that I joined Curves last week. talked so highly of it and there is a location literally across the street from my office. There's another one only a smidge over a mile from my house, so things look convenient in that respect.

I was greeted by the world's most enthusiastic trainer who gave me his schpeal and a short tour of the building. This place in question, is really just a big room with the "circuit" in it and a room to change. But for $29/month, I really can't complain. I'm hoping that it will be a good way for me to decompress from work on the way home and still have time to get to the house before Sarah does the doggie potty dance.

The astounding thing is that I got Mrs. Bossman to join. That isn't so astounding in that she had been wanting to join before. But it might be nice to see a familiar face in the room. But the big deal is that I got my mother to join. I'm so excited! I might go work out at the one by the house, just so I could work out with her. I'm really proud of her for going. I think she was starting to feel back when the "proactive" nurses call from the insurance company asking what she's doing to help her heart. So now she can tell them that she's going to Curves. :) Go mom!

Due to my cold, Puddin' and I didn't do much this weekend but go to Corby's for dinner and BJ's to browse. I found bootleg jeans in a 36" inseam so I'm soooo pleased with my hem touching the floor. I even had to roll them up a bit. For my height, this is truly a novelty. We visited my new sofa that I will buy as soon as I have a space for it and some extra cash. And I picked up the latest Futurama season on DVD. All in all a relaxing weekend.

I'm off to find some dinner and then move some furniture around the office. We have lots of changes happening over the next few weeks with new employees and employees moving here so I've got to make some space for them. The exercise of dragging desks around and spatially organizing my space will be a welcome relief from the work today.

Empty Hours

I'm at the cusp of 30,000 miles on my car. I purchased it on January 6, 2003 with 6 miles on it. I need to replace all four of my tires this week before they make that decision for me as an emergency on the side of the road. But this isn't about my car or my tread. Rich and I had a very pleasant weekend together. He was getting over being sick and I was getting over being sick of work. But we came together and formed an ingenious plan of sitting around, reading comics, sleeping in late and generally being lazy. It was the best valentine gift ever.

Rich coined a term (or we did it together) of "empty hours." In our relationship, being that we live in different cities approximately 100 miles from each other, we spend a fair amount of our time travelling to be together or spending our time together en route to other projects. So we don't have a lot of time together when there is not a stop watch ticking off the hours until one or both of us have to leave. There have been times when we've spent more time in the car each way than we have awake at the destination.

So when we have an opportunity to spend several "empty hours" together - hours when we don't have any real plans or the biggest commitment we have that day if finding lunch - those become little gems. And this weekend was choke full of empty hours for us.

We went to bed at 11pm and didn't wake up until 10am the next day. We played video games and puttered and went to the grocery store and sorted laundry and it was absolutely fantastic. We wandered around the mall with no real objective and came home with only a few random purchases.

So when I go back to work and the hours are crammed with activity and there seems to be so many things that need to get done and never enough time, I can think back on my weekend and how I was much happier to be under the covers with the Puddin' than in the cold rain of an outdoor event or basking in the glow of a computer screen.

The Good, the Bad and the Stupid and Ugly

Good and bad things over the past few days... I am low on cash these days for random purchases like new tires and insulin pumps etc. I filed my taxes and should be getting a sizeable check for my refund.

I have that shaky low blood sugar desperate for food feeling right now. I am currently eating Breyers chocolate ice cream and licking the bottom of the bowl.

I had a pretty crappy University (all two hours of it that I was there) in that I spent too much time doing mundane things or talking to folks I didn't really want to talk to at the time. I felt annoyed and upset about the whole thing. But I did see Sue take on a position she's been looking forward to and was very proud of her. Go team!

Work has been annoying the crap out of me in tangible and intangible ways. While driving through peanut farms Saturday I had a client call about his web server not working when I would have sworn it did Friday night after moving his server. I lost power on my laptop and walked on site to University to find a corner with power and connected via cellular modem to his server to fix the stupid mistake I should have found the night before. My client was very grateful and pleasant on the phone, they said I saved the day and thanked me again this morning. And my cool employee will be moving here from our remote office next month to hopefully make some of these transitions smoother. She also might sell me her kick ass washer and dryer for a bargain price so she can upgrade.

We drove way the hell out to "Surprising Suffolk" (Virginia's largest city) to go to Dave and Alex's wedding. I was crying and mopey up until an hour before the wedding. The wedding was beautiful, the reception pleasant, an old man hit on me telling me I was gorgeous while Puddin' and I slow-danced and I kicked butt on the electric slide with the Puddin' cheering me on from the bar. We likened my dancing and his support to his fighting and my cheering from the sidelines. I left in a good mood and on Rich's arm and he gracefully allowed me to sleep the entire way home while he drove my snoozing butt back to the house.

I'm trying to not be fretful and pissy about everything I see, but my usual optimism has fallen by the wayside these days. I'm just in an "everything is stupid and ugly" frame of mind it seems.

But I'm taking joy in cleaning my sewing room, finding old mementos, walking my dog on a daily basis and petting the luscious black cat.