hope

Love/hate relationship with my phone (mostly love)

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I LOVE my phone.  I’ve said this before, and I’m sure I’ll say it again.  It’s a Google Nexus 5: it’s the right size, and it doesn’t have any Samsung or Sprint or Verizon or any other crap on it.  I can be as minimal as I want with apps.  It’s pretty, and I like the way it works.

BUT.

It’s getting old, and it’s not working as well as it used to.  It had that battery problem.  Well, the battery problem is slowly coming back.  It sometimes sends calls straight to voicemail, no ringing.  I only find out I missed a call when I get the voicemail notification.  Sometimes it won’t let me send texts.  Often (like most of the time), when I’m not on wi-fi, I can’t connect to the cellular network for data AT ALL (but I can still make calls).

Well, it’s old, and I should cut it some slack, right?  I wouldn’t (and didn’t) yell at my old dogs when they couldn’t walk as fast as they used to or when I had to carry them outside.

I do love my phone, but when it starts acting up, I treat it badly.  I get so frustrated.  Sometimes I yell.  (I’m so ashamed of myself right now.)  Worst of all, I think about replacing it.  The thing is, I want this phone.  There’s a Google Nexus 6, but it’s bigger.   I don’t want bigger.  There’s a Google Nexus 5x, which is the newer model, but I’m not ready to invest $400 in it yet.  I’ve used the Samsung Galaxy phones for work for years now, and I really don’t like them (although the newest one, the S7, is kind of okay).

Luckily, Woot came to my rescue last week.  There was a day they were selling new (NEW!) Google Nexus 5s for $150.  I bought one, and it should arrive this Thursday.  Replacing my phone with its twin should be okay, right?  It’s not the new model, I’m not giving up on it, I’m just…trading sideways.  I feel a little bad, but I’m also pinning all my hopes on this new phone.  PLEASE ring instead of sending calls to voicemail.  PLEASE let me use my data plan when I’m not on wi-fi.  PLEASE let me send texts normally and receive group texts in real time.  Please?

Horror movies

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One of my coworkers is a horror movie buff. I noticed a reddit thread the other day about horror movies that were actually horrifying, and I thought of that coworker, so I sent him the link.  (I didn’t actually read the discussion myself.  Not my thing.)  He then proceeded to make me a list, a very long list, of good horror movies that I should see (his definition, of course).  There are 18(ish) movies on that list.  I humored him, of course, and maybe I’ll watch some of them, but for the most part, I think that would be a really stupid move for me.  I am easily scared.  Easily freaked out.  Like, woke-up-from-a-nightmare-the-other-night-and-was-too-afraid-to-go-back-to-sleep easily freaked out (for real – that happened Sunday night).  The Sixth Sense gave me nightmares, for crying out loud.

I want to like scary movies, but almost every time I try one, I end up regretting it.  It’s not fun.  I  have mostly learned from those past mistakes.  I know it’s not a good idea for me try any of the movies on his list, but I still kind of want to.  Maybe during the day.  A bright, sunny day.  Which is how I watched Cabin in the Woods, suggested by the same coworker (he didn’t suggest the middle of the day part – that was my idea).  I really enjoyed that one, but it’s not a typical horror movie, so I’m not sure it counts.

Should I try again?  Maybe I’ll become inured to them.  I’ll toughen up and be able to just enjoy the movie and let it go after.  Or should I give it up?  I’m 36 years old – maybe that’s old enough to know I’m not going to get over this.

I don’t feel like giving up.

Here’s his list (not comprehensive, and in no particular order – he was thinking of them off the top of his head):

  • Let The Right One In
  • High Tension
  • Eden Lake
  • The Orphanage
  • Audition
  • Pontypool
  • Babadook
  • Bad Milo
  • Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Verner
  • Evil Dead movies
  • Dead Alive
  • Dog Soldiers
  • The Grey (he says it’s not scary, but it’s good)
  • The Mist
  • Pan’s Labyrinth
  • Silent Hill
  • Slither
  • Sunshine
  • The Thing
  • Trick ‘r Treat

There’s no way it’ll be this easy

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We got an interesting call this afternoon.  Since we took the house off the market around Thanksgiving last fall, we’ve been dodging two or three calls a day from local realtors trying to get us to list with them.  We almost never answer the house phone anymore because it’s ALWAYS a real estate agent.  We’re going to go back on the market, but we’re going to sell it ourselves.  Anyway, I got distracted while working from home today, and I picked up the phone when it rang.  It was someone in real estate asking us if we were still looking to sell our home because she might have some potential buyers.  Hm.  She asked if we’d like her agent to call us.  Sure.  I hung up.  John said there’s no way they actually have interested buyers – this must be another ploy to get us to list with them.  Well, I can get rid of them if that’s the case.  So then we got another call.  I recognized the name as an agent who showed our house once last fall when our regular agent wasn’t available (actually, she didn’t – a junior member of her team did), although she didn’t remember us until a few minutes in.  Anyway, she has buyers looking in our area.  I told her we’re listing it ourselves and we aren’t really ready to go back on the market just yet, but we’re close.  And I said if they’re in a rush, given some notice, we might be able to prep the house to show it to them sooner, but we’ll definitely need notice because we are NOT show-ready now.  I didn’t tell her our master bathroom is still without a toilet (currently hanging out in the office) and vanity.  Hopefully we’ll have finished the bathroom before anyone wants to see it.  If not, well, we’ll just tell them our plan and hope it doesn’t scare them away.  John is spackling.  Then we can paint.  I would really like to have the bathroom back together by the end of the weekend.

Oh, she asked what we’re asking for it.  Yeah…we haven’t really talked about that yet.  So I told her I could tell her what we listed it for last fall, and that we’d probably start in that ballpark this time, too.  Hope that was okay. What am I saying?  Of course it was okay.  These buyers, whoever they are, are not going to want our house.  That’s how this is going to go, assuming this wasn’t some diabolical plot by our former agent to sabotage our For Sale By Owner plans and sneak back in as the listing agent through her colleagues.

There’s just no way.

But wouldn’t it be nice?

Positive Thinking

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This week is going to be a good week.  And when I say good, I mean uneventful, quiet, restful, and not at all like last week.  Work will slow down from last week’s breakneck pace.  John will continue to get better.  No one is coming over this weekend, so I won’t have to race around and plan and shop and clean.  It’s going to be heavenly.