Here is where I write stuff

My feet hurt. I spent tonight making cookies. You see, my mom gave me her old stand mixer when she got a new Kitchenaid one, and I had to try it out to make sure it wasn't damaged while in transit to my apartment. I am happy to report that it is in perfect working order. And now I have lots of cookies to take to work tomorrow. I made my chai oatmeal cookies, and also some toffee and chocolate chip cookies. Toffee + chocolate = nom nom nom.

I have been listening to They Might Be Giants alllllllll night.

I spent my last two nights volunteering at After Dark In The Park, a non-scary semi-Halloween festival kind of thing at River Legacy Park. On Friday night was in the craft area with sparklyaria, helping kids make owl puppets out of paper bags. I posted a picture to Twitter of Al 2.0. The original Al was added to the sign for the owl table because he was such an awesome owl. I had so much fun watching the kids make their owls, and having them name their owls. I think my favorite owl name of the night was "Petals".

Saturday night, I was put on the Starlight Stroll with gutterballjen, where we were put in charge of flashlights for the Eyeshine trail. Basically they had a bunch of little reflectors on popsicle sticks made to look like eyes, hidden all along this short little dark trail. We gave flashlights to the kids to hold by their head, and they were supposed to try to find all the pairs of eyes, and thus learn about how some animals have a reflective layer in their eyes to help gather light. Of course, most kids just wanted to run down the trail with the flashlights, so we let them. There was one kid who went down the trail with his dad, and they spent a really long time trying to find them all, reeeeeeally exploring. With us at the table was a Mexican Red-Kneed Tarantula, which attracted even more kids than the flashlights. He didn't have a name, so Jeni and I named him Paco. The guy that was guarding him and talking about him to the kids was really cool. He also had the spider's skin from the last time it had shed, and he let the kids touch that to keep from aggravating the spider too much. Since it was chilly, he had a couple of hand warmers that Paco sat on to keep warm. Paco really was a nice spider.

What else? Tomorrow is back to work. Things have slowed down a bit, so things are less stressful. I'm taking almost all of my cookies to work to give away, because whoa so many cookies. Next weekend I'm babysitting, going out to my aunt's house after work on Thursday and staying through Sunday. After that, it's all about planning things for the NaNo kick-off.

Speaking of Nano! I hope you all have voted in my first poll! I'm so excited to finally have the first poll going. I'm probably going to get up early Wednesday to check it and post the next poll. I really hope I end up with something fun to write.

Oh hey LJ, I haven't really updated in about five years or something. Let's make a list. Well, a list-ish thing.

TODAY: I went to dinner with my dad for belated Father's Day goodness. Of course, since I left straight from work, I couldn't give him his present, since it was at home, but that can be delivered later.

YESTERDAY: I harangued the OwnerGuy of NEW YORK'S FAMOUS PIZZA AND FRIED CHICKEN (that name will never get old) for not having falafel. You see, last week he told me that he does have falafel and hummus, just not on the menu. Yesterday, he was all "oh noooooo, I hate falafel, it looks gross, whine whine whine" so I griped at him. Then he gave me free hummus to shut me up. The hummus was delicious. By the way, have I told you guys about this place? It's pretty amazing. I drive by it on my way home from work, and the sign has intrigued me since they put it up a few months ago. I was really curious, but also kind of frightened- I figured that no place could really do pizza and fried chicken well. Then finally a few weeks ago we gave the place a try and it turns out the food is delicious, and they also serve burgers, Italian food, Greek food, and wing in addition to the pizza and fried chicken. And the OwnerGuy is a firm believer in picking on people. The abuse we've been missing since Steve left Coffee Haus can now be gotten at NEW YORK'S FAMOUS PIZZA AND FRIED CHICKEN. (seriously, say that name out loud, it's amazing)

LAST WEEKEND: I worked. Guys, going from 4 8-hour days to suddenly working long days PLUS long weekend days is hard. But we are getting crap done, and that is a Good Thing(tm). That's part of the reason I've not been so posty- I'm just tired.

RECENTLY: I've also been playing a lot of The Sims 3. My homeless girl grew up, suffered through her teenage years (high school was very stressful, and trying to work a job on top of that while sleeping in a park was hard on her), and finally became a young adult. Then she moved out of her dad's abandoned park to her own empty lot, and bought a couch with the money she made working at the grocery store as a teen. She had just a couch on the lot, then she got a job in an office building and saved up until she could make a 2x2 room for a toilet. She doesn't have a sink yet, but that's definitely next. Her lifetime wish is to have a net worth of 100,000 Simoleans. So far she's up to almost 2,000. As soon as she can afford a bed, so she can actually get enough sleep to function, she's going to start fishing and rock collecting and gardening for money. She is very determined to get herself out of the pit her father is in. I'm secretly rooting for her.

NOT RECENTLY AT ALL: I took this picture:

I actually took this picture in May of 2008, and forgot to post it. I think it's another example of an amazingly-named business.

BACK TO RECENTLY: So last... uhh... Saturday? I think? Let's call it Saturday. On Saturday I met up with drninja at Tandoor for delicious Indian food and excellent hanging-out-age. We caught up and reminisced, and then the waitress assumed we were a couple, just like old times. It was kind of hilarious. And now I need to find that program I used to rip DVDs to my computer, so I can get the last two episodes of The Hitchhiker's Guide DVD set that I borrowed from him. I can't even remember what it's called anymore.

OVERALL: Life is busy, but quite good!

We have the day off! No, we have the WEEKEND off! This was completely unexpected. BossLady said she was trying to get us a weekend off yesterday, and we were hoping, but we didn't really know for sure until she didn't call us in this morning. Woo!

I have Big Plans for this weekend. Cooking, cleaning, knitting, reading, Animal Crossing, and lots of SLEEP. Oh, and lots of cuddling my cats. They aren't quite sure what to do with me home all day. I think they missed me. Hawking slept on/with me all night, which she usually doesn't do, and now Tesla refuses to leave my lap for anything.

Let's make a list!
- Open windows!
- Clean kitchen & run dishwasher
- Clean catbox
- Clean bedroom
- Clean closet
- Go through all the junk that's accumulated and trash it.
- Hopefully find coupon for the converter box so my TV will work after they switch to digital
- Take out trash
- Make nontraditional feijoada in my crockpot with venison
- Make rice in my new rice maker (that Brandy gave me last night) (*glee*)
- Consume delicious feijoada & rice
- Watch Indiana Jones movies lent to me by coworker
- Knit swatches!
- Begin knitting Rogue with awesome colored cables
- Read new George MacDonald book I got from paperbackswap.com
- Play Animal Crossing
- Upload last two days' pictures for Project 365

This list makes me happy. I will probably do most of it today, and spend tomorrow being wonderfully lazy. I am going to revel in this weekend off.

PS: I LOVE PAPERBACKSWAP.COM SO MUCH. I'm mailing off books that are just collecting dust on my shelf, and getting GEORGE MACDONALD in return! I got my first book last night, and I have another already winging it's way to me. My fangirly heart is very pleased by this.

PPS: Tesla is laying on my left arm, from elbow to wrist. I think she's trying to tell me something.

I am awake! For like the first time all week. Guys, it has been a crazy week. Going in to work early and staying late, every day? Not so much fun. But the paycheck will be magnificent. Working overtime sucks, but that paycheck sure is wonderful.

It's funny, I have to keep reminding myself that I'm not working tomorrow. My mind is convinced that work is all there is. But no! Tomorrow I am sleeping the heck in.

So if you look up the word pathetic in the dictionary, you will see a picture of Hawking. That kitten's life is so tragic! Last night I was cruel, so cruel to her, by locking her out of my bedroom while I was trying to sleep without a kitten playing with my toes. I am so mean. She cried due to the extreeeeeeme tragicness of it all. And then, of course, I caved and let her back in. Because I am a sucker.

Last night I started writing on a Thing. It's actually an idea from News From Poughkeepsie, one that really struck my fancy. I'm having fun with it so far, and I have an idea of where I'm going, I just have no idea why an entire apartment building would seclude itself from the world other than being a cult.

Hawking has decided to teeth on George, my stuffed dog that wears headphones that are secretly speakers. It is intensely amusing to see this little kitten hauling around a stuffed dog five times her size. But he's a tough dog, so long as she doesn't discover the pocket with the headphone jack.

I have an idea. I really want to clean out my closet. I want to toss all the junk that is in there and condense all the stuff I actually want to keep into just a few boxes or something. Then I want to get some cheap sheets or something and move my cats' litter boxes into that closet. Since I never use it, it would still be out of the way, but it'd be bigger. And then I could put some of my wire shelves into the coat closet that currently houses the litter boxes and finally have a pantry. This "using my counter as a pantry" thing is getting old. Also, being unable to use my Costco card to stock up for cheaps just because I don't have room is frustrating. I might get started on it tomorrow, but I kind of doubt it. Tomorrow needs to be laundry day first, then other stuff. But it is a plan. The only problem is the few clothing items I do keep in my closet. I figure the closet is big enough that I could possibly keep the clothes in the opposite corner with no ill effects, or I could use more of the wire shelving to rig something in my room proper. I'll figure something out, though. I want a pantry!

Oh! I am always amused my wank in non-wanky communities. The best was when there was DRAMA in weathernerds, but the girl was deleting comments so I didn't get the full effect. In cooking, though, DRAMA gets fun, because there are so many members. 99% of the time is it a totally drama-free community, but every once in a while we get someone come in with something really stupid, like a request to put all "unhealthy" recipes behind a cut to promote healthy living, and much fun is had. I love that community so much.

Remember that idea I had almost a month ago to make a mix cd of really EPIC songs? Well, it's coming together nicely. Right now I'm putting it in a good order and trying to decide how many Muse songs I really want on there. I don't want it to be all OMG MUSE but then again I can't decide between a couple of songs to pick one to keep. Decisions are hard! Because Mix CDs are serious business, yo. I'm also trying to decide if I want to do the burn-and-mail thing, or if I want to do it all on Muxtape. Or I might just zip it all up and post it to my own webspace. Decisions!

I feel like I have a lot more to say. I'm feeling talky. I slept today after getting home from work. I napped from about 5 to 9:30. I needed it, but now I'm going to be up all night and it's going to throw me off. I should go lay down and play Animal Crossing or something. I think that's what I'll do.

We are NOT working this weekend.










ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh yes.

We worked today, and we are working tomorrow! Today was a full 8-5 day, but tomorrow hopefully will not be so long. We are going in at 10, and I am hoping to leave by... oh... 10:30? Maybe? But probably not.

Today was actually fairly stressful! I was given a project that involved deciding how things should be set in the system, but it was all very subjective and opinion-based and involved things that I know nothing about. And to make it more exciting, I was given contradictory instructions at one point. But I bravely soldiered through it, and made it make sense to me. And if it is wrong, well, that's what they get for making me do it. So there :P

(Also the changes I made are not really tracked by the system so it won't have my initials all over it, that helped relieve the stress, plus it's the kind of thing that is so subjective that it's wildly inconsistent all the time anyways)

So! I am working this weekend, but I will have a pass to Not Work next weekend, so I can MOOOOVE. I am so excited! Four days! I can say that because it is after midnight and therefore it is technically Sunday.

I had something else to say, but I forgot.

Oh! But I do want to say this: One of my little side-goals for 2008 is to whine less in my journal. Like in this post, instead of whining about how stressful and worrisome this project was, I didn't whine, and even made light of it! I think that this will be a good thing because a) who wants to hear whining?, and b) making light of it reduces the stress for ME. So! It is my goal. So far I am successful! 6 days down, 360 to go!

I feel like I had something important to say, but I forgot.

We did our gift exchange at work today. I love my office. I got candy, I got gift cards (yes, plural), I got toys for Tesla, I got a journal and address book, I got socks, and I got a stuffed frog that is a computer screen cleaner thing. Earlier this week I also got a little windup dinosaur and a gooshy lightup thing. I should take pictures.

I have a ridiculous number of toys on my desk. Plus all my sharpies and highlighters. It's kind of amazing that I get any work done.

For our Secret Santa, I drew my boss' name. I got her a little sparkly snowflake necklace on a silver chain. She liked it :-)

For everyone else I brought gigantic chocolate bars.

There is food everywhere in this building! It is kind of ridiculous, but more awesome than anything else. It is all delicious. But now I am very full and very sleepy.

Today feels like a Friday. Not a whole lot of actual work is getting done. Tomorrow is going to suck, even less is going to get done and we will all want to be gone. I wonder if they will let us leave early. That would be awesome.

I'll stop littering your flists with rambling now.

I clocked in to work at 6:38am, and clocked out at 8:50pm.

I'm tired.

(And I'm still behind)

(and I am NOT going in early tomorrow)

I've only written 500-some-odd words today, because I was doing this: ( Apartment layouts! )

Next time I'm procrastinating I have time, I might try to figure out how to arrange my furniture in the new place. If it's 582sqft, that's about 24 feet on a side, since it's pretty much a square. I bet I could approximate things and arrange my furniture nicely in photoshop.

I'm so obsessing over the new place. I keep the brochure with my floor plan with me at all times, and out on my desk at work, so I can look at it whenever I want. It makes me happy. I really can't wait. I'm going to start throwing things on craigslist soon, like my VCR without cables and my stereo I never use, just so I feel like I'm DOING something. I don't want to just wait until January. I might start boxing up some of my books and stuff soon. I mean, I'm not going to be rereading anything this month, because of NaNoWriMo, so I might as well. I could put them in my little gold "trunk", which sort-of seals, to keep critters from crawling in and moving with me.



In other news, I forgot to set my alarm clock last night. This morning I woke up five minutes before I was supposed to be at work. I sent a text to my supervisor lady to explain, then showered and went to work. I love that I can just text and be okay when stuff like that happens. My workplace is so awesomely casual.

Q: How many warehouse guys does it take to put together a file cart?

A: NONE! You have to do it yourself.



Because they don't know how.

And they can't figure it out.

And the (really simple) directions mysteriously fell in the trash.


In other news, I got to put together a file cart today! Well, after taking apart what the warehouse guys had done so far, because they'd been doing it backwards. I am waiting for them to bring me another one, because apparently another department ordered one, too.