TV

More free time please

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I finished The Power of One tonight.  Really liked it, but I thought the ending was too abrupt.  I want more!  Good thing there’s a sequel.  Too bad John wants to read it first.

I would really (REALLY) like to have a lazy weekend, but I don’t think that’s in the cards.  What would I do with my lazy weekend?  Weeds marathon.  There are five seasons available on Netflix Instant, and John and I are in the middle of the second season.  Maybe we’ll take breaks from replacing the brakes on my car and other chores and have a couple of mini-marathons.  Maybe.  And Arrested Development.  (Did you follow me there?)  We’re still in the first season on that show.  There’s just too much TV to watch!

Don’t rush me, sonny

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I don’t like deadlines.  I’ll admit that they’re necessary, and if I didn’t have deadlines I’d never do anything I didn’t want to do.  There are lots of things I do want to do that would never get done, either.  They’re important, deadlines.  But they make me nervous.  Anxious.  Not like before, but I’d rather not have any anxiety at all.  I suppose it comes with responsibility.  And I know myself; if I didn’t have work deadlines to worry about, I’d find something else.

But let’s not worry right now, okay?  Now is for relaxing.  Now is for winding down, for reading this book I haven’t been spending enough time with, for breathing deeply and counting backwards on clocks and other things that Greg said in yesterday’s comments.  We’ve been watching Weeds (we’re in season 2), and the theme song is on a loop in my head (there’s always something).  Maybe I can meditate to “Little Boxes”.

Deep breaths.

We’re THIS close…

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…to cancelling our cable.  Like maybe on Monday.  Our computer arrived yesterday, in parts, and we put it together tonight.  Had to solve a few puzzles, but once we did, John hooked it up to the TV, turned it on, and we started seeing computer-type things on the screen!  Woohoo!  John will load Linux on it tomorrow (not sure yet which version), and we’ll be all set.  So totally awesome.  Now I just need to order a presentation-type mouse.  Those are cool.

Down with cable!  Except for internet.  I like our cable modem.  Down with cable TV!

My attempt at a normal post

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…

Hi.

…

So if I’m not talking about work, I’m not talking about anything?  Feels that way.  I’ll try harder.  Remember that time when…no.  Do you ever feel like…no.  How about those Nats?  NO.

Roku is awesome.  Netflix instant is awesome.  Someday, John will put together a computer we can devote to the TV so we can cancel our cable and that will be awesome.  In the last week, we’ve started watching Weeds (love it), Arrested Development (LOVE it), and Doctor Who (like it and expecting it to get better – we’re only three episodes in).  There’s some really good TV out there.  And that’s awesome.  🙂

You know what else is awesome, in a bullying kind of way?  Riley.  He grabbed one of the chewy bones, laid it on the floor right next to the other one, and is guarding them both.  He doesn’t care about chewing on them, oh no.  He just doesn’t want Roxy to have them.  It’s the only power he has.

This is not normal.

Fixed!

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Today, we took Step One in the Cancel the Cable Already! Plan.  Actually, we took Step 1 a few days ago when we ordered the Roku.  It arrived today, we set it up, we’ve tested it out, and tonight we’re going to watch a movie.  How exactly does this help us in the Cancel the Cable Already! Plan?  Um…I won’t be DVRing movies from Comcast anymore.  It doesn’t help with current TV, either.  Really, I think it’s a mindset change.  We have a Roku!  Next step is to put together a nice-looking, unobtrusive computer that can live near the TV and provide the link to the internet.  Soon.

Speaking of the internet, we had to go to our local Comcast office this morning to pick up a new modem.  That fixed our connection problem.  I’m so relieved.  I didn’t want to have to wait until Monday night for a technician to show up (or not show up) and then tell us they can’t fix our problem (which is what they were saying on the phone last night).

A little housekeeping, figuratively speaking: Roxy had four seizures in 15 minutes Thursday night (late, of course).  The vet probably considers that one seizure.  She hasn’t had any since then, so technically, I think it doesn’t count as a cluster.  She desperately needed a bath after that, so I brushed 2 tons of hair of her (the furminator is awesome), and then gave her a bath on the deck this afternoon.  She’s all clean and sparkly now.

Some literal housekeeping: I helped John sort and clean out a big part of the basement today.  We boxed up all of our inventory books and stacked them in a corner, got rid of some trash, put a few more things aside for donation, and rearranged the whole east side, giving the band more room in their corner and making it easier for John to get to his weight bench.  More importantly, John used the shop vac to get rid of a lot of dust and a TON of dog hair.  The basement looks a whole lot better, unfinished as it is, when it’s not coated in dog hair.  I could say that about everything, I think.  Except dogs.

World Cup – you’d think I wouldn’t care, right?

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We have had the nicest day.  We got up a little on the early side, went for a run – that reminds me.  I had just started the last mile, I was on my way home, I’d been enjoying my run and the beautiful morning, and then I ran into my old boss.  NOT someone I wanted to see.  We were fake-polite to each other for a few minutes, but that was long enough to really irritate me and put a damper on the rest of my run.  I got over it, though.  We took care of the lawn and the weeding, went out to lunch, spent a few minutes browsing in Best Buy, and then we came home and started watching the USA-England World Cup match.  We stopped about an hour in to go to the movies (Get Him to the Greek – very funny), and now we’re back and we’re watching the rest of the game.  The noise in the stadium is kinda weird.  Like it’s a crowd of angry bees, not people.  Maybe a swarm of irritated kazoos.

They’re all so cute.  Must be a requirement.  Part of the tryout.  You can run, you can kick, you can do whatever else it is soccer players have to do, and you’re good-looking.  You’re in.  Have you seen these guys?  Particularly Bocanegra (captain of the US team) and Green (goalie for England).  Very attractive guys.

Fighting exhaustion

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I’m home (yay), and I’m so glad, ’cause if I have to be this tired, I prefer to be home to deal with it.  My flight left Raleigh-Durham at 6:10 this morning.  Which meant I had to be at the airport at 5am.  Which means I had to have already returned my rental car, and that means I had to leave my hotel by 4:30.  So I got up at 3:30.  AM.  The very definition of the middle of the night.  And because I’m not all that bright, I didn’t go to bed until almost 10 last night.  I slept like a rock who didn’t want to wake up when the alarm went off.  But the low-level anxiety I always feel about getting to the airport on time forced me to be alert enough to make sure I didn’t leave anything in the hotel, drive to the airport (which was only 5 exits away), and return the car.  Once I got to the terminal, though, I started to fade.  I got an iced vanilla chai (my favorite) and a croissant at Starbucks and read my book until boarding.  Fun fact about Raleigh-Durham International: there’s a used bookstore right next to the Starbucks!  Great idea for an airport concourse.

I got my second wind (sort of) once I got on the plane, and I had a pleasant conversation with the guy sitting next to me for about half the flight, mostly about TV shows.

Him: Did you watch Lost?

Me: Yeah.  Do you think about that every time you get on a plane?

Him: Yup.  And we’re in the tail section.  We’re doomed.

From there we covered The Unusuals (should never have been canceled), which led to Firefly (tragically canceled), which led to everything Nathan Fillion has ever been in, which led to Castle, which is his new favorite show now that Lost is over.  And I may have to agree.  I love Castle.  Anyway, he was a nice guy, and it was a pleasant flight.

My third wind (I napped a little on the plane) got me home and to the dry cleaners, and then through my run and my shower, but when I tried to leave the house (around 1:30) to get my car inspected and renew the dogs’ licenses, I had to turn the car around and go back home (I made that decision at the bottom of the hill – not far from the house).  I napped for an hour (and woke up feeling like seven more would be a good idea) and then took care of the dogs and the licenses.  Now I’m home, fighting to stay awake so I’ll sleep normally tonight.  Looks like I don’t get a fourth wind.  But this is helping.

It’s finally over

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Okay, we finished Lost.  The whole thing was worth it for Sun/Jin and Sawyer/Juliet.  I cried at both.  We also saw the new Robin Hood movie today (stupid, but fun).  And we started catching up on Glee.  Lots of TV today.  But that’s not all we did.  We mowed, weeded, mulched, and pruned, and after that, we went to Borders.  Busy day.

I gave the dogs a little bit of leftover turkey from my sandwich (Wegman’s sub – SO good), and they’re drooling at (and on) my heels now.  They’re not letting me out of their sight in case I have more goodies in my pockets.  Smart dogs.

Good episode

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I just watched the “Brown Betty” episode of Fringe.  There was a detective story (noir, but with a few touches of futuristic technology – cool combination), singing, and Peter and Olivia almost/kinda falling in love, all in the guise of a story told to a little girl…I think I really like Joshua Jackson.

John stayed home with Roxy today.  No seizures.  She napped the day away.  I wish I could be home.  But it’s Wednesday night already (isn’t it?  I can’t tell.), and I only have one more work day to go.

Forgive me, Internet, for quitting now.  I haven’t been sleeping well in this hotel bed (I think I hate the pillows – too squishy), I haven’t gone for a run in I don’t know how many days, and I’m really tired.

Noooooo!!!!

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John and I just watched the two latest episodes of Lost (so we’re all caught up for now), and I’m a little sad.  I may have shed a couple of tears.  (Shh…don’t tell anybody.)

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Famous relatives and abandoned blogs

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Okay, okay.  I accept that what happened to me yesterday morning was a panic attack, and I’ll call the doctor in the morning.

TV, anyone?

I love the theme song for Treme (on HBO).  John and I haven’t decided if we want to keep watching it, but we had to watch the first two episodes.  Required viewing in this family.  Why?  Check out the concierge in the second episode.  She’s related to ME!  How cool is that?  The concierge in question (who Steve Zahn waved at!) is my soon-to-be-famous sister-in-law.  So, you know, kind of related to me.  Close enough.

Candy, I thought you were great.  Even though we were watching for you, we were caught by surprise when you did appear, and then there was much squealing and pausing and rewinding and rewatching.  (I’ll take credit for most, if not all, of the squealing.)  We couldn’t possibly delete the episode from our DVR, of course.  We’ll have to show it to everyone who comes over.  And we started with Jess on Saturday night.  So for the next…I don’t know how long, everyone who enters the house will have to watch Candy’s scene in Treme.  🙂  You think I’m kidding?  Just wait.

Go visit Curiosity. She’s listing her priorities for life (and making fun of Victoria’s Secret models).  Who can resist?

You know what bugs me?  (In a little way, not a big way.)  Finding a blog I like, and then realizing they don’t update every day.  And it’s not just that they don’t update every day (’cause that’s okay.  People are allowed to lead busy lives and do other things and NOT update the blog every single day.  Yes, you have my permission.), but then they don’t update every few days, and then it’s been a week, and then two months.  It’s so disappointing!  I bookmarked you because I liked you!  I liked to read you!  And then you abandoned me.  How could you?  *sob*  (Mom, I’m not talking about you, since I talk to you every day, and you tell me the things you would blog about.  I feel up to date on you.  But if I didn’t actually know you, and I found your blog some other way, then yes, I’d be talking about you.  (Was that too harsh?  I didn’t mean to be harsh.))  I have five or six blogs bookmarked that fall in this category, and since I already don’t have the time read all the blogs I bookmark (but I really want to), I may have to clear those few out.

I’m sorry, I spaced out again.

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I can’t concentrate.  Not happening.  The band is rehearsing (Roxy’s fine – no more seizures today), I was trying to do a couple of things to be ready for work tomorrow, but those are going to have to wait (I’ll get in early tomorrow and do them), I’m trying to watch TV (Fringe – I’m like three episodes behind.  Speaking of TV, or movies – actresses, anyway – there’s a woman in my class this week who looks dead on like a very young (pre-Grease young) Stockard Channing.  She’s SO cute, it’s almost irritating.  Why can’t I be that cute?)), and I can barely keep a thought in my head long enough to write it down.  I certainly can’t write a coherent sentence (as I found out after re-reading that one).  I’m not even sure I can call that a style choice.  It’s just messy.  And not coherent.  Which I already said.

See?

My lack of concentration led me to stalk the Internet, and I’m sorry, Bloggess, but I think you need to move in next door to me.  Yesterday’s post made me howl.  (With laughter, not pain.  In case that needed to be explained.  Shouldn’t by now.  In fact, your assumption whenever I mention the Bloggess should be that I’ve fallen out of my chair from laughing so hard.)

I’m going to put the computer down and try to finish this episode of Fringe.  Then?  Bed.

Look what we did!

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By we, of course, I mean mostly John.  After mowing the lawn (John), some light weeding (me), dog poop scooping (me), and then tying up a sagging bush (blame the three feet of snow that sat on top of it for a month) with neon yellow string (mostly John), John decided that today was the day to somehow attach these extra pieces of latticework (or trellis?  not sure what you’d call it) to the corner of the deck.  In the morning, we’ll have a little shade.  I haven’t figured out what to do about late afternoon.  I took pictures!  I forgot to take a before picture, but here’s one when we were two-thirds of the way done.

Actually, here’s a before picture, no trellis yet, with John hard at work doing…something.  On a ladder.

And here’s the finished product.  From the yard…

…and from the deck.

Since I had my camera out, I figured I’d take some pictures of the yard when it’s at its best.  And the dogs.  So here’s most of the backyard, with my flower bed in need of mulching.  Maybe next weekend.

Here’s the rose bush that’s trying to take over the deck.

Technically, that’s two rose bushes.  Here are few pictures of the dogs taking advantage of the shade.

It’s breezy and the wind chimes are…chiming, I guess, and we could hear them clearly if the windows were open, but did you see how high the pollen count was today?  My car is covered, and even though I was outside most of the day, there’s no way I’m letting clouds of pollen get into the house.

Most of the day got away from us, but all the chores are done (minus the grocery shopping) and John asked for two hours to himself so he can concentrate on his project for school before we settle in with dinner and maybe a movie.   He’ll have to spend much of tomorrow on his project, too, but at least he’ll have done something today, and he won’t have to worry about the lawn and stuff.  And tomorrow morning, we can catch up on the four hours of Lost we have saved on the DVR.  Hopefully, the rest of my weekend will include nothing more taxing than a morning run tomorrow, catching up on TV, lots of Internet time (I have to get my fix in on the weekends, now that I know what my weeks at work look like), a trip to Wegman’s (hardly a chore), and some play time outside with the dogs.  Maybe at the dog park.

For now, I need a shower.  And comfy clothes.  And I’m in for the night.  Oh, one more thing for tomorrow – set up a couple of lunch dates with a couple of friends.

Not as bad

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Today was not as bad as yesterday.  Different, certainly.  And I kind of forced it to be better.  The day still started too early, and I was still on my feet all day, but after I collapsed into a chair during our lunch break, my coworker brought my sandwich to me, unasked, so I could spend the entire break off my feet.  He’s a nice guy. I had already decided not to run today (SO hot outside), so that automatically freed up some time once I got home, but unfortunately, about an hour of it was taken up by work stuff that came up during my commute.  (It kinda sucks when your whole team is spread out across all four time zones.  We all rely on each other, and that means we have to be available when the guy in Seattle needs help (for example).)  I’d planned to take the dogs to the dog park, but by the time I was free to go, it was almost sunset (when the dog park closes).  So that was out.  I spent some time with them in the yard, but it’s not the same.  (For them.  It’s about the same for me.)  Anyway, I forced my day to be better by making sure I had time to myself (and I ordered Indian (my favorite) for dinner).  I thought I’d make it Internet time, but it turned into TV time instead.  I watched a couple of shows John has never been interested in.  He gave up on Flashforward after the third episode (I should have), and he never even started Cougar Town.  Stupid name, but I like the show.

I’m having DVR priority issues again.  Why does every show I want to see come on Tuesdays at 10?  We record Southland and The Good Wife every week, and we want to keep up with V, but it comes on at the same time.  So annoying.  We’ll have to resort to hulu.com for V, I guess.  (Yes, we watch a lot of TV.  Someday, I’ll list our shows by night they get recorded, which is a mostly meaningless piece of information to me.  I don’t care when it’s on.  I just want to make sure it gets recorded so we can watch it later.  The DVR is the greatest invention EVER.)

Anyway, it’s after nine and I need to head in the direction of bed.  Which reminds me…I’m expecting my sleep to be interrupted tonight.  John said Roxy had a seizure this morning before he left for work.  Normal length, and it was a cluster (one followed by another), and if she follows her pattern, she’s already a little overdue for the next one.   We’re still investigating switching her to a new medication.  We’re looking for other (cheaper) ways we can get it.

Oh, was that John’s car door?  He mentioned he might get out of class early tonight…

Yeah, not his car door.  A neighbor’s.  I’m tired and I need to go to bed, but I just started to browse through my regular sites and I miss having time to play on the Internet. Yes, I’ve said it before, and yes, I could have this evening if I’d skipped all the TV, but it’s too late now, and I’m tired.  So, Internet, I’m sorry I’m neglecting you.  Forgive me?

Censoring myself

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I discarded a post that went into detail about the annoying verbal habits of a coworker of mine.  SO annoying.  But that’s the sort of thing that can get me in trouble, work-wise, and I decided not to post it.  I’m applying the lessons I learned from Dooce.  Who was in town yesterday, incidentally, because she was invited to participate in a forum on workplace flexibility at the White House.  She planned an informal get-together last night, and much as I would have loved to be there to meet all these people I’ve been chatting with, the timing didn’t work out for me.  Sad.

You know, it’s hard to avoid writing about work sometimes.  I just deleted a couple of sentences about John’s work situation.

Well, since I can’t manage to think about much else, I’m going to quit.  We watched an episode of Castle tonight, but it took nearly two hours to get through it.  We took turns pausing it to vent about the day.  We do feel better, though, and we were able to finish the episode.  (Oh no for Beckett!)   I love that show.

I must be crazy

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Am I an optimist or an idiot?  I know which one I felt like this evening.  I had two days’ worth of evidence that going to work early was not going to mean I could leave early, but I decided to give it another try.  I was at work by 8am today.  Again.  It was almost 6pm before I left, and I worked through lunch.  (Like I usually do.)  So I’ve officially given up.  Or, according to Einstein, I’m insane. Of course, my schedule changes completely starting on Monday, so it hardly matters.

Man, that was negative.

My hard drive arrived yesterday (yay!), so I installed it when I got home.  That part was ridiculously easy.  It shouldn’t even be called an installation.  I unscrewed the old one and screwed the new one in.  Done.  Of course, I was still missing an operating system, but John downloaded Ubuntu for me last night and burned it to CD, so I popped it into the CD drive .  And ran into errors.  Pages and pages and constant scrolling of errors.  John came home, burned me a new CD, ran into more trouble, and has spent much of the evening trying to figure out why I can’t install Ubuntu on my laptop.  Eventually, he gave up.  I just watched him install Fedora instead.  I’m installing Linux; I really don’t care which version.

Heh.  John just named my computer Flyza Minnelli.  (Do you watch Modern Family?  You should.)

SO much better

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I’m still sniffling (and snuffling) and coughing, but so much less, and I feel SO much better.  I ended up working later than I planned (again, I know), but I still had an hour of daylight when I got home, so I went for a short run with the dogs.  It felt really good, and I feel really good.  I thought it might never happen again.  I didn’t do any cleaning tonight, though – wait! Not true.  I cleared off the island.  But there’s a lot more to do, so that’s how I’ll be spending the next two evenings.  Probably.  I should.  I’m sure I will.

No internet again today.  I miss my blogs.  It seems a little ridiculous to think that I may have to set aside dedicated internet time the same way I set aside exercise time or reading time.  But hey, if that’s what it takes…

Lately, I’m getting all my news from the POTUS Sirius radio station (110 – “Politics of the United States for the people of the United States”) in the mornings and a handful of Washington Post headlines throughout the day.  Not as well-rounded as I’d like, but that takes internet time I don’t have.

I just made a resolution to stop complaining about not having enough time to play on the internet.  Starting…now.

Our local WETA channel is showing Ed Sullivan’s Rock and Roll Classics, a DVD set they’re trying to sell.  It’s something I’d love to have, but for now, it’s making it really hard to turn the TV off.  John is glued to the screen, and I keep running back and forth so I can actually see The Turtles or The Young Rascals.  I’m ready to settle in for sleep, but PBS keeps pulling me back in.  Such a bad influence.

Allergies suck. And blow.

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Who likes to get to work early and then work late?  I do!  (Brown noser.)  And my throat hurts.  I’m pretty certain I can blame this on allergies and the change in the weather.  But it SUCKS.  So much.  And even when the ibuprofen is working and my throat only hurts a tiny bit, it hurts a lot when I sneeze.

Enough of that.  I spent about half of today reminding myself that it wasn’t Friday.  I thought yesterday was Thursday, too.  But tomorrow really IS Friday, and that’s nothing but good.  John is running the error checking/scanning thing I couldn’t find the other day on my poor broken laptop, but it looks like it froze in the middle of it.  So much for that.

(My throat hurts when I yawn.  What’s up with that?)

I have nothing internet-y to share with you today.  I’m sorry.  What with getting to work early and then staying late (and actually working the whole time) and then making dinner and spending some quality TV time with John, I haven’t had time to play on the good old interwebs today.  My plan for the next 12 hours is to take my medicine, go to bed with water and ibuprofen nearby, prop myself up on several pillows, and hopefully wake up tomorrow morning with a relatively clear head and non-scratchy throat so I can run.  It’s been several days.  Oh, the humidifier.  Can’t forget to set up the humidifier.

Good news!  Tomorrow’s pollen forecast is low.  Hope it stays that way.  I don’t want to have another of those springs.

Another linking post

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It’s been a link-filled day.  Actually, it’s just been a link-filled couple of hours, and that includes the time from the morning.  Not much time playing on the internet today.  Lots of time running around a federal building downtown (from corner to corner and up and down nine floors (yay for elevators, but I really wish this building would put in those moving sidewalks like in the airport)) and then lots of time in a cramped room that can barely be called a conference room.  It’s more like a storage closet that happened to have a LAN drop and a phone.  But hey, I’m home, I’ve had dinner, I’ve watched an episode of The Inbetweeners, and I’m about to run away to my room to dampen the sound of the band in the basement.  It’s not fair that I complain about them all the time.  I like them, and they’re good, and I (mostly) like their song choices, but listening to the same songs over and over at such a high volume, in the evening after work when all I want to do is relax (and write run-on sentences), gets old.

Anyway, the links.  Dooce made me laugh again, but I’m a little scared that leprechauns are going to tap at my window in the night.  Also, check out these pictures at Desire To Inspire.  Min, I can see you in this house.  Some of the rooms more than others (the 1st, 6th, 9th, and 12th pictures in particular).

For Mom, here’s a link to a really funny Passover-ish post at Three Word Chant.  Happy almost Passover!  (At Wegman’s, of course, Passover started two weeks ago and will go on for quite some time.  No procrastination for them.)

http://www.desiretoinspire.net/blog/2010/3/10/kate-morris.html