Category Archives: Whining

is it over yet?

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I am stressed. Really stressed. This whole loan thing is making me crazy. I won’t get into the details because it’s probably boring to people who aren’t directly affected by it, but let’s just say that it reminds me of a quote from one of my college buddies: “Money is like toilet paper. It only matters when you don’t have any.” And right now, folks, we are fresh out of t.p., and it is a BIG, BIG deal. So let’s sum up how I’m coping with this:

1. I’ve had a headache nearly every day for the past 2 weeks.
2. I’m taking over-the-counter sleep aids to get to sleep at night, otherwise I lie awake, twitching and worrying.
3. Since I’m sleeping pretty horribly lately, on Friday night I came home from work and immediately crawled into bed. It was around 5:00. I told Dave to wake me up after an hour, but he didn’t. I woke myself up around 8:30 p.m. I had dinner, went back to bed, and slept until 11:00 a.m. on Saturday.
4. I spent most of the day Saturday cleaning, which is how I often deal with stress. There’s something that happens to me when I feel like my life is out of my control, so I start taking charge of the things I can control – namely, how clean my kitchen is. I ended up cleaning the entire downstairs. It felt pretty good to get that done, too.
5. I spent all day Sunday in bed. Call it hiding, I guess. Dave stayed there with me. He played video games on his laptop, I watched movies. I went downstairs long enough to do one load of laundry, but otherwise, we stayed in our room. I even brought our dinner (re-heated pizza – yow, what a gourmet chef I am!) upstairs on a tray for us to eat in bed. Crazy.

Then last night, I got home from work, and I was so frazzled that I felt like I could explode at any minute. Every nerve ending was on edge. So I grabbed my iPod and I went for a walk. And it was strange – just that 30 minutes of alone time (just me & my “workout tunes” playlist), and I felt so much calmer when I got home. No more headache. Go figure. Maybe it was because I stopped to pet the neighbor’s goats, and they always make me smile because they’re so darn cute, and I love that little “neeeeh” sound they make when they see me approaching. Maybe it’s because Madonna’s Ray of Light album has a calming influence on me. More than likely, I think it’s just a sign that I need to get more exercise. So I’m going to try to work on that.

Isn't it supposed to be spring yet?

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Someone please explain to me why it’s April and there was frost on my car this morning? And why I’m still wearing turtlenecks? Anyone? Ok.

This week has been very stressful for us, money-wise, although I think we may have things figured out now. Bad news: we have to have our septic tank pumped and inspected. Eww. Good news: after it’s repaired and the backyard no longer smells like raw sewage (once again: eww), we should be ready to proceed with our home equity loan. Operative word there being “should” – this process has been delayed so many times & hit so many snags that I now have no faith in it whatsoever. Anyway.

So yeah, I’ve been a bit stressed. Oddly, it seems like it’s all the financial stuff of paying for the wedding, rather than the wedding itself, that’s freaking me out. I’m actually really looking forward to the wedding part – first of all, I’ve known for ages that Dave is my “marriage & babies guy,” and I’m thrilled that we have the opportunity to make it official in front of our family & friends. Also, it’ll be great to have everyone here, and I’m excited that they’ll get to see our house at the rehearsal dinner. And the wedding should be small enough (looks like we’ll have less than 30 people there total) that I’ll actually get to feel like I was able to spend time with everyone. So that’s all wonderful. But this whole money thing… Yeesh. I don’t cope with financial problems very well. I had a dream the other night that I went to pick up my wedding dress on the day before our wedding, and not only was it was 2 sizes too small, but it was also turquoise. I cried a lot in my dream. I’m not sure what that symbolizes, but I think it means I’m feeling a bit frazzled. Dave’s been good about making me lie down and relax when I get home in the evenings so I’ll stop pacing around the house & freaking out. As of yesterday, we figured out a solution that should make things ok for the time being, but I’m still worried about all of the other hidden expenses that lie ahead in the next 5 weeks. I think I inherited this worrywart gene from my dad. Gotta love genetics. To quote Winnie the Pooh, “bother, bother, bother.”

Hope everyone has a great weekend. I’ll try to be back to my normal chipper self (hey, quit snickering) next week.

oh what a week…

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…and it’s only Tuesday. Let’s hammer out the bad news first, shall we? It seems that death abounds.

* My cousin Alphagal’s dog died over the weekend. I shall miss reading Modean’s entries on his dog blog, and it’s always heartbreaking to lose a pet, so my heart goes out to her & SNG.
* My best friend Kris’s grandmother died over the weekend of lung cancer. The good news is that this may finally be what scares Kris into quitting smoking. But still, it’s her grandma, and she’s (understandably) upset, so that’s no good.
* My friend Naina, who’s been having a not-so-fabulous year thus far anyway, lost both her aunt and cousin in a car accident over the weekend. Her uncle was in the car too, he’s stable in ICU. These are relatives that she was extremely close to – she usually introduced her cousin to people as her brother. And I’m pretty sure he was around our age, mid to late 20’s. So that’s just horrible.

In the category of not-really-good news, but not as bad as above:

* Dave’s kitties have a vet appointment this afternoon, because at least 2 of them have tapeworms. And if they share a litter box, that means they probably all have them. Gross, gross, gross. I’m just glad I’m not involved in trying to wrangle 3 cats into the car to go to the vet – that’ll be Dave & Steve’s fun afternoon task.
* We had our house appraised on Sunday, for what is hopefully the final step in the 2-month-long process of trying to get a home equity loan. We need the money for the deck that Steve is building, the driveway we want to put in (good-bye, gravel!), to replace the siding on the house, and oh yeah, to pay for our wedding, so it’s sort of infuriating that they didn’t tell us that we needed the damn appraisal until now, when we started this process back in mid-February. The good part of the appraisal: the house might possibly be cleaner now than it has ever been (I sort of went nuts at the idea of having a stranger evaluating our home). The bad part: it’s yet another delay in this ridiculously long & painful process of getting a loan. I have taken on the role of the Annoying Borrower – I’m calling the loan officer at least twice a day. “Have you gotten the report yet? Has it gone to the underwriters? When do we sign??” I figure that she’s the moron who didn’t inform us up front about all of the documentation that we were going to need, so I feel no guilt whatsoever in nagging her.

In happy news:
* We have an officiant for our wedding, an inter-denominational minister named Reverend Mary. I spoke with her yesterday and liked her immediately. Apparently she really gets to know the couples that she marries before the wedding, so she can make the ceremony very personal. She’s going to give Dave and me homework to do, sort of like a form of pre-marriage counseling, so I think that’s cool.
* Dave has made it 10 days with no cigarettes, so I think he has officially left the “trying to quit smoking” phase and entered the “has officially quit” phase. Yay!
* Last night, we got home and found that Steve had cleaned the garage – and he even built shelves on one of the walls so we have storage space! I was so excited that I could’ve kissed him. Except that he’s about to be my brother-in-law, and that would be weird.
* My old apartment, which I was still paying for because of weird lease circumstances, has been rented to a new tenant, which means I am officially off the hook, and I’ll get refunded for half of this month’s rent. That’s awesome.
* I am getting married in exactly 40 days. Whoo-hoo!

There will be no male strippers, thank you

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The week thus far:
* My car wouldn’t start yesterday morning. I’ve had it for nearly 4 years, and it has never, ever not started before. Dave finally managed to get it running, but it was making some weird rattling noise, unlike anything it has ever done. I wigged out. We took it to the dealership, and I’m waiting to find out how much this is going to cost to fix. My poor car. My poor little car that always runs perfectly, so I never take it in for tune-ups. I’m such an irresponsible car-owner. Cry!

* I can’t stop sniffling. I think I stirred up too much dust when I was trying to clean 2 nights ago. I took a decongestant, so now I’m sniffling slightly less, and I feel full-on stoned instead. I’m not sure which option is better, honestly.

* I forgot to mention last week that I sliced through the fingernail of my left index finger when I was chopping up turkey bacon to put in my omelet. It still hurts, and I’m basically waiting for the top half of my fingernail to fall off. Fun! It’s so gross, I wear a band-aid on it so no one (particularly me) has to see it. I have a feeling that I’m going to need one single acrylic fingernail for my wedding, and this pisses me off immensely.

* We had our cake-tasting last night. Hoo lordy, that was fun. Bring on the cake samples! Whee!

* The deck-building (courtesy of future brother-in-law Steve) is in full swing, and I have resigned myself to the fact that there is going to be dirt, as well as little muddy cat paw prints, all over the downstairs of our house. Every time I see the dirt, I give a little sigh of resignation instead of reaching for the broom, and every time, I die a tiny death. It’s killing me to leave the dirt there, but there’s no point in trying to clean it yet, when I know full well that more dirt is right behind it. In a couple of weeks, the deck will be built, so humans and felines alike will have a place to wipe their grubby little footsies before they enter our abode. Whee again!

* Tomorrow, I’m flying to Memphis for my bridal shower/bachelorette party. My girlfriends from college are throwing it for me, it should be a lot of fun. And since I couldn’t decide on a gift registry until recently (we just combined 2 households, we have too many dishes as it is, do I really have to go pick out a china pattern??), they’re making it a lingerie-themed shower. Translation: I’m going to Memphis congested & grumpy (see above), and I’ll come back hung over with a suitcase full of trashy underpants. Whee times three!!

Hope everyone has a happy Easter.

starting a new routine

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Yesterday marked my very first day at the Giant Software Company. It looks like it’s going to be really good – I like the people on the team that I’ve met so far, my boss is really cool, and it involves lots of fun writing stuff, which I enjoy doing. So that’s good. Adjusting to office life again, however, is kicking my butt. I spent the last 6 months at my previous job working from home, which meant I’d usually roll out of bed around 9:00, work in my PJ’s for a couple of hours, then take a break for “lunch” (actually breakfast for me), and get dressed. Now, however, I’m up at 6 a.m., and putting my make-up on is something I do within the first half hour of being awake. I am so not used to this. My eyes ache from having gunk slapped on them from the second I wake up. And before any of you guys offer helpful suggestions: yes, I must wear make-up. I am a southern girl, and I was “brought up right,” and that means that I have not left the house without at least a little powder & mascara since I was 13 years old. Don’t waste your breath telling me that I look fine without it, I know better. I am a girly-girl, and I am proud of it.

Anyway, the point is: I’m tired. Really tired. The kind of tired where you go to bed at 9:30 at night, and you still feel beat the next morning. Dave and I are carpooling because he works less than a 1/2-mile away, and since we have to drive past our gym on our commute, we’re making an effort to keep our gym clothes in the car so we can stop & work out on our way home in the evenings. We didn’t go yesterday because I was so beat, and we needed groceries, so we just went to the store & headed home. But today, I am determined to go. We’ve been pretty lazy about it for the past couple of weeks, and my hope is that I’ll have more energy if I start working out regularly again. We’ll see.

Back to the work stuff: I have an officemate, who seems nice. She talks to herself about whatever it is that she’s working on, but I have been known to do the same thing on occasion, so it doesn’t bother me. I’m pretty good at tuning people out when I know they aren’t addressing me. I’m just grateful for the fact that I have an office and not a cubicle. And there’s free soda here, so I feel that I have officially found my Promised Land. Ah, diet coke, how do I love thee…

In other news, I’m getting married exactly 2 months from today. Yay!

irresponsible pet owners

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It appears that we have acquired semi-partial ownership of a dog. Dave mentioned to me before that there’s a brown lab that sometimes shows up at the house, and if it’s cold and/or rainy, he lets her in to hang out for a while. Apparently that was the case at about 5 a.m. this morning; I vaguely remember him telling me that the dog was here, but I was half-asleep at the time. When I went downstairs at 8:30 a.m., she was sleeping in the living room. (The cats, meanwhile, were keeping a safe distance upstairs.) She’s very sweet and friendly, but I noticed there was an I.D. tag on her collar. It says her name is Rose, and there was a phone number. So I called the number, got the answering machine, and left a message basically saying that I hope they aren’t worried about Rose, but she’s at our house, left our number, and that we’d like to know where she lives so we can take her home. I didn’t say, “And you should build a freaking fence,” even though that’s what I was thinking. I gave Rose a turkey dog, which she gobbled down in about 1/2 a second, and then I put her outside so I could make breakfast. She has since wandered off – hopefully she’s gone home, but who knows.

In other news, the job drama continues. It occurred to me that I’ve never mentioned the name of my company on here, so I’d probably be safe to talk about what’s going on. In short: They wanted me to go to California every week for 3 months. I don’t know if y’all remember how depressed I got when I did that last summer, but it was awful. I really don’t want to do it again. Nevermind the fact that I’m in the middle of a move, and if I’m gone 5 days a week, all I want to do on the weekends is collapse, and there’s no way I’ll have the energy to pack. It’s more about the fact that I hate traveling for work, I hate airports/flying, and I’m getting settled into this new life routine here with Dave, and I don’t want to get immediately yanked out of it. And 3 months? Is a damn long time. Plus, who knows if the project will end up getting extended longer than that, or if I’ll immediately get put on a different project that requires me to fly somewhere else every week, etc. So Dave & I talked about it and we decided that I should quit, and we could get by on one income for a while. (Which is very scary for me, since I’m not used to being dependent on anyone.) I told this to my career manager, and he’s going to see if I can possibly get a spot in the company’s internal IT group, which would keep me based in Seattle, rather than being a consultant for the western region. Meanwhile, I’m on the job hunt, just in case. So even though it’ll most likely work out fine no matter what happens, it’s still a very stressful in-between time right now.

Also, I have a Microsoft certification exam tomorrow. This is the re-take of the exam that I flunked 6 months ago. I usually re-take them immediately, while the material is still fresh in my mind. But at the time, I was planning to go to Atlanta to say good-bye to my cousin, who died a week later, and somehow studying just managed to slip off of my to-do list. But I’m doing it now. So Friday around 2:30 p.m. Pacific time, send lots of smart vibes in my direction. Much appreciated.

As for last night’s Project Runway, there’s a great recap of it over on Catoptric, so I’ll defer to that rather than repeat what’s already been said.

Sunday catch-up

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Sorry it’s been a week since I’ve written anything. Life has been a bit crazy lately, but the main reason for my lack of posting is because last week, our high-speed modem broke. So for nearly 4 days, Dave and I were sharing one measly little dial-up connection. Blogging at 32K? I think not.

So let’s see, what did I do last week? Well, I went to the dentist (twice), went to my regular doc and finally got some drugs to get rid of this sinus thing that’s been driving me crazy since November, we cleaned (most of) Dave’s garage, and moved a lot of stuff out of my apartment and into said garage. Oh yeah, and we goofed off a lot. Having limited Internet access seems to make for a perfect time to catch up on junk TV and video games. [Speaking of which, I did watch Project Runway this past week, but couldn’t post anything about it because it was while we were on dial-up. All I can say is that I am glad Kevin is gone. I was tired of listening to his whiny voice and looking at his buck teeth. Next, they must destroy Wendy and her horrible skunk-striped highlights.]

Movies we rented this week:
* Wicker Park – We made it through the first 15 or 20 minutes, and we were both so totally bored and uninterested that we turned it off. Josh Hartnett should really just stop. I’m not kidding.
* Saved – So great! It was such a reminder of my good little Christian high school, where the girls back-stab you in the name of Jesus. That movie has totally solidified Mandy Moore as a brilliant actress in my mind.
* Dogville – Has anyone else seen this?? It was so strange. I mean, it was good, but my god, that was a dark, rough movie to watch. Plus the fact that it’s 3 hours long. And don’t get me wrong, I really love Nicole Kidman. I think she’s a great actress and a beautiful woman. But she needs to stop with the botox and the collagen now. She should be playing roles that are her age, not 20-something-ish ingenue types. It’s starting to get silly. We all remember you in Dead Calm, Nic, and we know that movie was a long time ago. You’re pushing 40, and you’re still hot. Accept it.

On a more serious note, there’s a lot of crazy changes/stress-inducing stuff that started happening with my job this past week, which I can’t really talk about in too much detail right now. (Paranoid, I know, but you never know who’s reading this stuff. If you really want to know, email me & I’ll tell you.) It could end up being something really positive, but right now it’s a nebulous gray area, and I’m a bit freaked. All I can do is ask everyone who reads this to send happy-job vibes in my direction. It’d be much appreciated.