Inane Chatter

We’re back home from a wonderful week in France.  We had two days of beautiful weather, then lots of rainy days in a row (COLD rainy days), and then the day we flew out (which I think is still yesterday) was lovely.  Tease.  Pictures soon.  We slept about 10 hours last night.  Went to bed around 7:30, lights out at 8.  It wasn’t even dark outside yet, but to us, 8pm felt like 2am.  Now I’m good.  Riley is happy to be home, and so are we.  (He was a little confused about why we were all going to bed before the sun, but he went with it.)

We spent Saturday wincing at all the hammering and other assorted loud noises coming from upstairs as a team of four put in hardwood floors.   Totally worth it, but man, it was loud.  And COLD.  They had windows open up there and a saw set up on the front porch, so they had to keep going outside, meaning the door was always open.  On top of that, it snowed all morning and then my car wouldn’t start, so we just huddled in the dining room with the dogs and lit a fire.  And played on the internet.  And read.  And reshelved books.

Starting Saturday night, we became crazy people who clean.  And clean.  And clean.  And also crazy people who walk into a mattress store and buy a new bed in less than 20 minutes.  And then tie it to the roof of the car and drive home.  On the coldest,windiest day of the year.  (This was Sunday, I think).  And then, because Monday was New Year’s Eve and we were having people over and some of them were spending the night (and this new bed was for the guest room), we became the crazy people who have to run out and buy sheets and then wash them so they can go on the bed.  (This new bed that is a double, which is a size we’ve never owned before, so we didn’t have any sheets that would fit.)  On the day people are actually coming over.  And THEN, because I’m a crazy person who is also an idiot, I went to Wegmans on one of the four worst days of the year to go to Wegmans to get everything we’d need for these people coming over in LESS THAN FOUR HOURS.  What are the four worst days of the year to go to Wegmans?  The day before Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, the day before Easter, and NEW YEAR’S EVE.  It was a madhouse.  And they were completely out of the yummy pre-made dips made of cheesy goodness that I usually get.  Otherwise, I found everything I was looking for.  I just had to fight for some of it.

New Year’s Eve was fun, but as John and I were dragging our tired asses to bed at 2am that night, I came to a realization.  The demographics of our little group have changed.  (Okay, yes, duh – I know.)  Our friends have babies, and babies mean schedules and crying and parents who leave early to put said babies to bed.  All of that is perfectly understandable (and we love their babies and love to see their babies), but if half of our guests are going to go home long before midnight, maybe New Year’s Eve isn’t the best night to have our little get-together.  (Also, DAMN I’m tired today.  2am is entirely too late for me.) Instead, I declare Derby Day to be our day.  It’s always a Saturday (so no one has to work), it doesn’t immediately follow any other holiday (so no one’s exhausted from family and travel), it starts earlier, and there’s no obligation to make it to midnight (although people are more than welcome to stay late).  And it’s fun!

(I think we should try to do a summery picnic thing on the Mall (or somewhere in DC when the weather’s nice), too.  Easier for everyone to get to and also fun!)

That’s what I learned from New Year’s Eve this year.  I’ll show you the screaming sheep I found tomorrow.

Home now.  Still sick.  Thoroughly exhausted.  I think I could have been good at writing telegrams.  We were right on the edges of that big snowstorm that is heading northeast, so there were multiple accidents on the highway this afternoon, and John and I took an alternate route home.  It took us five hours, but the GPS said staying on the highway would have taken almost seven.  Eight, really, since we’d been on the road for an hour when we checked. So we’re home, and the car is unloaded, and the Chinese food has been ordered, and John is out getting milk and yogurt.  Roxy is resting on her own bed.  She was really good this past week.  Very quiet, no accidents, no incidents with Mabel – she was the perfect houseguest-dog.  My head feels both clearer and runnier than it has for days.  I think that’s an improvement, but I’m so over this horrible cold/congestion/sinus infection/HORRIBLE THING I could just scream.  But that would make me cough. And THAT would make me dive head first into a fire pit.  (Because it might feel better.  Also because it was 57 degrees in the house when we walked in, and a fire pit would probably be warmer.)

The last two or three days have been lovely and almost warm.  Now it’s windy and freakin’ cold.  I guess it’s time, but I don’t have to like it.  I’m catching up (a little) on the internet today, and I just had to share this.  The Bloggess posted it the other day, and it’s just about the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen.

We made it through the big storm unscathed.  Well, I haven’t been outside yet, so I guess there could be some damage, but we didn’t hear anything, and John went in to work both days, so he would have seen something.  Last night was the only time the winds really picked up.  Even the rain is finally letting up.  That’s very good news, since Riley is a little stir-crazy.  He spent a lot of today gazing longingly out the front window.

I did a bad, bad thing today.  I opened the giant bag of mini Snickers.  I kept it in the other room, but that didn’t stop me as much as I was hoping it would.  I will be doing my best (over John’s objections, I’m sure) to give away every last bit of this candy tomorrow night.

I’ve seen the weather maps, and I’ve read the forecasts, and I’ve seen the pictures.  I know it’s supposed to get really bad, but I thought that was supposed to have happened by now.  It’s been raining steadily since last night, and we’ve had the occasional wind gust, but so far, that’s it.  Maybe I should shut up right now and stop tempting fate.  The power flickered three times in a row about half an hour ago, but it’s still on, and we still have internet.  For now.  Yes, I just knocked on wood.

You can’t tell by looking out the window today, but apparently, the world is going to end soon.  Probably Tuesday.  Judging by the crowd at Wegmans this morning, though, everyone is pessimistic about that and planning for the apocalypse to occur tomorrow.  Yes, I was part of that crowd, but not for the same reasons.  Not out of panic.  I went because we had NO food in the house.   You know, the normal reason you go to the grocery store.  Something I’ve been avoiding for the past couple of weeks because, I don’t know, going to the grocery store sucks.  I went, and we have food, but we’re still going out for dinner tonight because I told one of the neighbors we were (as my excuse not to go to her house for bunko).  She lives across the street, so we kinda have to actually leave the house.  Damn.

Oh my god, guys, the high for Sunday is only going to be 51 degrees.  It’s 80 today.  Is the world insane?  (Yes, but for other reasons.)  Are we all going to get sick now from the temperature ups and downs? (Again, yes.)  Am I going to make sure I spend some time enjoying the warm air this evening?  (Very much yes.)  I may also stop by DSW on my way home.  The weather may be nice for the last time this year, but I’ve got priorities.

Today was supposed to be all rainy and stormy.  So far, though, it’s not rainy and stormy enough.  Actually, it hasn’t been stormy at all, and that’s rather disappointing.  Somewhat disappointing.  If it had been really stormy earlier, I’d've been all annoyed that I couldn’t just go home and enjoy it from there.

But, really, where’s the rain?

Stupid weather.  Sure, we need the rain, but did it have to come with a 20-degree temperature drop?

I am homeworked out.  I got a ton of work done this weekend and was still able to hang out with John and his parents for a few hours last night and this morning (because I’m amazing like that).  For anyone keeping track, my SQL homework is 100% done, with only the final exam left, and I finished one of the last two chapters in statistics and the corresponding quiz, with only one more chapter (these are super-long chapters), quiz, and the final left to go for that class, too.  If I can take the SQL final after work on Tuesday, I can finish the last statistics chapter and quiz by the weekend and then take the final early  next week and be DONE.

Of course, if I’m going to hold to that schedule, I’ll have to do all my internetting during the day…

It’s not cold enough.  I should be happy about that (I hate being cold), but it’s hard to feel Christmas-y (or Hanukkah-y – yes, I’ve been lighting candles this year.  Please pick your jaw up off the floor.  That’s not sanitary.) when you barely need a coat to go outside.  I’ll get over it.  Just as soon as we hit the road.  Which can’t be soon enough for me.  What I’m really looking forward to is the time off.  I need a long, long break.  Or maybe…yeah, we don’t talk about that on the internet.

I also didn’t mean to publish that yet.  The Publish button looked a lot like the Save Draft button just then.  Whoops.  (For those of you coming late to the party, first of all, shame on you.  Get it together and be on time.  Secondly, it’s kind of obvious what just happened, so this explanation is unnecessary.)

I regret my choice of post title now.  Not just because it’s dumb, although that should be enough.  No, I regret it because that song is stuck in my head now.  I like it fine, but I’ve been having this problem all day, and I can’t settle on a song I’d be happy to have looping through my brain all day.  I woke up this morning to the theme from The Price is Right (thanks to the episode of How I Met Your Mother we watched last night), but I started to tell John about it and immediately switched to “You Were On My Mind” by We Five.  (John, you were right.  It’s We Five.)  Maybe I can get that one back.  I’ve always liked that song. Wish me luck!

My moods are tied way too closely to the weather.*  I woke up to a bright and sunny (and cold and windy, but who cares when you’re inside?) morning, was in no rush to get up, and had tea and pop tarts.  (Mmm…pop tarts.)  Then I found the funniest thread on reddit about mispronounced words, I’ve been laughing my ass off for about 20 minutes, and I can’t imagine why I wouldn’t start every day like this.

*This is not entirely true.  There are plenty of rainy, snowy, or otherwise gloomy days when I am happy as a clam (usually because I’m snuggled up warm and dry with a book).

Do I live in North Dakota?  Near any Great Lake?  Do I live in ALASKA?  No.  Do I live below the Mason-Dixon line?  Yes.  Is it October still?  YES.  Then why WHY did I wake up to this this morning?

It doesn't look so bad here, but it was early.

I mean, really, weather, what’s going on here?  The snow switched to sleet briefly and then right back to snow.  It came down steadily ALL DAY LONG.  I don’t live in #$*&% Minnesota, people!

If this is an omen, I may not be leaving the house this winter.  I’ll have to get my groceries airlifted in.  New tires just became a higher priority.  Maybe I should teach the dogs how to pull a sled.  And I can learn to snowshoe.

On top of that, it seems we now have two dogs with stomach problems, so off to the vet we will go (again) Monday morning.

(Obviously – or maybe not if you’re ignoring the news – everyone in the Northeast has it worse than us, but that is not the point.  It’s not even Halloween yet, for crying out loud.)

And I’m not talking about the weather.  Sure, it’s cold, rainy, and gloomy, but I plan to stay inside most of the day, all cozy with the dogs.  No, John and I got up and got ready to go out (he’s heading to his parents’, I was going to run a couple of quick errands), but before we could leave (thankfully, really), Roxy had a seizure.  She’s been having them about one every week and a half or so, and I knew she was due for one this weekend.  That was one of the reasons I had planned to stay home with her rather than go to PA in the first place.  And maybe she did me a favor by getting it over with first thing – now I don’t have to worry about it every time I leave the house.  Not for another week and a half, anyway.  We (me and Roxy) spent about half an hour on the floor together, me holding her still, her drooling and panting on my right shoulder and arm.  I certainly won’t be going out in the clothes I was wearing, and that sweater might be a goner.

She’s partway back to herself now (she’s eating).  Once she recognizes her name, I’ll feel comfortable leaving.

It’s raining again.  Still.  Some sunshine would be nice, pretty please.

I think writing for a living would not be a good idea.  For me.  Meaning I would not be able to make a living at it.  Put some pressure on me to write (even this) when I don’t have anything particular in mind and I freeze.  Stare at the screen.  Find everything else do to first.  And then write about the weather.  Hello, rain!

…but I recently had two “Are you kidding me?” moments.  One was today.  I usually keep a close eye on the forecast, but for some reason this week, I just haven’t.  John’ll tell you I prefer to trust weather.com than my own arm stuck out the front door.  I didn’t do either of those things today.  I just left the house to go to the store in shorts, a t-shirt, and flip-flops.  It was 60 degrees out, overcast, and breezy.  I was a little chilly.  In my defense, it was 80 yesterday and it isn’t fall yet…  But a guy at Wegmans still totally made fun of me.

My other moment was last weekend, and it was more of the “oh, that really DOES make a difference” kind.  I was helping John unload the IKEA boxes from the car on Saturday, and I usually have a really hard time wrestling with the bookshelf boxes.  Those things are heavy, and in the past, I’ve nearly dropped them on the way into the house because I just couldn’t hold my end up anymore.  Not this time, though.  I wouldn’t say it was easy or that the shelves were light (I certainly can’t carry them on my own), but it was no big deal.  I find it very unlikely that they’ve gotten lighter since my birthday (the last time we bought some), so the only conclusion I can come to is, hey!  Those strength classes I’ve been going to twice a week for the last seven months?  They work!  Amazing, mixed with a little of course they do, ya idiot.

Once again, the impetus behind my semi-quasi-half-assed (but still!) massive cleaning effort today is not the desire to live an uncluttered, streak-free, dog hair-free life.  Oh, no, I can live quite happily with clutter piled high and nose tracks on the windows, as evidenced by the state of the house.  I do have some pride though, and I refuse to allow someone – anyone (other than John) – to see the house like this.  Unless they helped put it that way.  And unless they’re in John’s band.  I don’t go to great lengths to clean up when the band comes over to rehearse.  Although maybe I should.  ANYway, I’m cleaning because we’re expecting a visitor this weekend.  Not just a visitor – a refugee fleeing the hurricane.  A refugee with cats!  Because cats shouldn’t have to fend for themselves in the middle of a hurricane.  Instead, they’ll have to fend for themselves in a house with dogs.  Honestly, I’m not sure which they’d prefer.  We’ll manage just fine.  Although based on the weather right now, it seems totally ridiculous to be planning for a hurricane.  It’s sunny, a little muggy, bright blue sky, fluffy white clouds that are not in the least bit intimidating…

Oh, speaking of intimidating, I passed a car yesterday (a dinky, dented, old Honda or something – not impressive (not that there’s anything wrong with Hondas – I’m just painting a picture)) with the license plate DOMN8U.  Really?  In that car?  Napoleon complex much?  It’s so aggressive and hateful.  Maybe I’m reading too much into it.

Update: My house will not be a haven for hurricane refugees after all.  But hey – it’s clean!  So I can enjoy that.  And I’ll see my refugee friend in a couple of weeks.  All is well.

All this rain means walking the dogs is out of the question.  So maybe it’s gloomy for them.  It’s been raining almost non-stop all day long.  Very good for the lawn.  I wish I could send some of this rain to Texas.  They need it.

Wait – it stopped.  Walking the dogs is back on the table.  Well, not literally.  I would ruin our pretty (expensive) dining room table if I walked the dogs on it.  And it wouldn’t be good exercise for them.  Not long enough.  Aaaaannnnd…that was dumb.  Moving on.

But not very far. Since I find myself incapable of writing anything anyone might want to read today, I’ll leave you with this video (courtesy of the The Daily What and Say OMG (I think that’s where the original came from)).  It’s only 2 minutes, and the payoff is totally worth the wait.

I have been busy.  Good busy and bad busy.  The bad busy parts stress me out.  The good busy parts are things I could do all the time, every day.  And if I could get rid of the bad busy parts, I’d have time for things I like to do when I’m not doing the good busy parts, like playing on the internet.  Like READING.  John looked over at my book the other night, noticed I wasn’t even halfway through it, and told me it felt like I’d been reading that book forEVER.  I’m not sure in exactly what way how long I spend reading a particular book affects him, but if he noticed I haven’t been reading much, then I really haven’t been reading much.  Tragic.

I spent most of the last three days (all weekend and much of Monday) working on my statistics project.  (This is one of the good busy things.)  Nothing about it was hard, but there were a lot of pieces and the instructions were confusing.  I tried to get clarification from my professor, but since I never heard back, I made some decisions based on what the instructions would have said if I’d written them.  I hope they were the right decisions.  I turned it in late last night.  One big task done.  Yay!  Actually, that was the main good busy thing.  The one that took most of my time.  I talked to Corey finally (he’s going to disown me if I put him off any longer) – hooray for change!  Also, I, uh, bought more wine from my favorite local wineries and went to Borders.  Again.  These were very important errands.  Really.  Oh, and I saw Crazy, Stupid, Love Saturday night with a woman I know from the gym.  It was cute.  Ryan Gosling’s ears are too small to be believed.  Seriously tiny ears.

I did one other kinda major good busy thing this weekend.  Big accomplishment for me.  (Big.)  I ran 10 miles Sunday morning.  Ten whole miles.  I wasn’t very fast, and I walked a little bit, but I did it.  I am no longer afraid that I won’t be able to finish the race in October.  I did it.  The last mile was really hard (it wasn’t early morning anymore and the sun was high and the shade had disappeared and I’d been running for nearly two hours and it was my tenth mile), but I realized as I started it that I’d never run this far before (8 miles – two weeks ago – was my longest run until Sunday morning).  And with every step I took, I was running farther.  Each step was one more than I’d ever run before.  There aren’t very many times I’ll be able to say that.

So that was my weekend.  The good busy stuff is all cool and great (now that I’ve turned in my statistics project), but it doesn’t end there.  I have two more quizzes and a final to complete by next Thursday for statistics, and my next calculus class (differential equations this semester) started yesterday.  I’m so glad my classes only overlap by a week and a half.  Any more than that and I’d be seriously considering quitting my job.  I don’t know how people manage working full-time and going to school at the same time.  With just one class at a time and no extra-curricular work activities (don’t get me started), when I can leave work at work, I can manage.  Anything more and my head starts to spin, Exorcist-style.  (It’s not pretty.)  But yesterday, even though it was a Monday and I had work to do and a project to finish, was a really good day.  The weather was perfect, I had the windows open to catch the very breezy breeze, I got a lot done, my legs didn’t hurt from the run the day before, and my strength class that night was calming.  (I really like my gym.)

———Break for earthquake———

This post was going to have an ending, but then there was an earthquake.  Nothing else got done today.  The earthquake ate my ending.

This particular Tuesday has a weird vibe.  It’s just after 10:30am.  I’ve been to the gym and joined two conference calls (a daily occurrence now – who the hell wants to start every day with two conference calls?).  Neither of those things are out of the ordinary.  I had some coffee.  Haven’t eaten anything yet, which may be contributing to the feeling (I can hear a croissant whispering my name), but what else?

Part 1: The windows are open.  It’s August.  It’s supposed to be hot and sticky and grossly muggy.  I’m not complaining – I’m thrilled to hear the breeze in the trees and the summer insects buzzing or droning or cricketing or whatever is they do, thrilled to have turned the A/C off for the first time in months.  It’s just weird.  Makes it feel like early fall and I’m not quite ready for early fall.

Part 2: I’ve already talked to Mom and Dad.  Before breakfast!  It’s throwing my whole schedule off.

Part 3: I have gotten things DONE already.  Left messages, rescheduled appointments, refilled prescriptions…I’m on a roll.

[Several hours later]

I was on a roll.  A few hours ago, the sunlight was mid-morning fresh, the birds were chirping, and the breeze was breezing.  Since then, I’ve gotten bogged down in the things I’m supposed to be doing (I was doing them before, but everything was light! and cheerful! and oh, what a beautiful morning!), the cool fresh air that was tickling my elbows turned hot, and the sunlight turned stale.

I can still turn this around.  There’s time.  The solution?  Lunch!  A turkey sandwich with cucumber slices on toast.  Seriously.  I don’t think I’m asking too much of one sandwich.  I get cranky when I’m hungry.  Lunch will save the day.