Author Archives: Cindy

another Seattle yuppie, walking home from work in the rain

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I survived the first day. It was all orientation stuff, I didn’t actually do any real work. I got a new laptop, though — and a nifty little backpack to help me carry it around. The backpack seems to be relatively waterproof, which is fortunate since it drizzled on me the entire walk home. I think I like walking to & from work, it’s just going to take me a while to get used to it. Allowing twenty minutes to go one mile is a little foreign to me.

I can’t really think of what else to say about my day, except that it was good. I’m completely exhausted — I guess staying up half the night worrying about the new job will do that to you. So I’m crashing early. The end.

nervous tummy

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I start the new job tomorrow. I feel scared, unprepared, underqualified…. It’s weird, I can’t remember the last time I felt this way about starting a new job. I’m usually excited and looking forward to it, but this job just seems way too good for me. Like halfway through the first day, they’re going to figure out that I’m not smart enough and fire me. I have never questioned my own intelligence before, it’s one of the few things that I’ve always been confident about, so I don’t know why I suddenly feel shaky now. Maybe it’s because I’ve never done this type of work before, and I’ll be working with hundreds of other engineers who have been doing this for years, and I’m worried that they’re going to think I’m a moron because I’m not walking in the door knowing all of the stuff that they know. What if they think I’m dumb? (For some reason, the mother from Carrie, saying “they’re all going to laugh at you!” keeps looping through my mind.)

Oh, screw this. I’m going to Ikea to buy a medicine cabinet for my bathroom.

Unrelated: I had a date on Friday night. This was the 2nd date with this particular guy. The first date, I was 5-10 minutes early, and he was 5-10 minutes late. No biggie. This time, I was 5 minutes late, and he was TWENTY MINUTES late. I made a comment about how I was going to give him 10 more minutes before I left, and his response was “oh, am I late?” Are you kidding me? You know you’re late, just grow some balls & apologize and be done with it. He’s a nice enough guy, I guess, but he’s sort of boring, and there’s no click or spark or attraction or whatever. Oh, and I think he’s a Republican. Which I find amusing, since he’s a Canadian. So, that will be the last date for him.

However, the place where we had our date was about 2 blocks from my apartment, and I was worried he was going to try to walk me home, so as we were passing Safeway, I made a comment that I needed to just dash in & grab myself some breakfast for tomorrow. So we said goodnight (quick, awkward hug) and went our separate ways. Only I didn’t go to Safeway — I went to the bar across the street, which had been recommended to me earlier in the week by Cute Mover Boy. This bar was a pretty fun place, I got hit on at least 10 times in the first 15 minutes. Many drinks were purchased for me (always a plus). An hour or so later, I had met a very cute guy, given him my phone number AND kissed him goodnight. I seriously doubt he’ll call, and I’m not sure I even want him to because it seems kind of sleazy to pick someone up in a bar like that. But the attention was nice, and I thought it was funny that I had a date and ended up kissing someone who was not my date. Yep, living downtown is going to be fun.

pics!

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I think I’ve almost got this photo gallery thing figured out. I found a free PHP script, courtesy of SquidFingers, which I suppose I should thank Scott’s friend Gwen for linking to on her site. (Only I don’t know if she reads this or not, but just in case: thanks, Gwen!)

It took a while, but I think I figured out how to customize it for my own personal use. I’m sure it’s not the prettiest photo gallery out there, but this whole PHP editing thing is new to me, so cut me some slack. It’s better than all those individual pages with frames that I was using before. It may be some time before I get all of my photos back online, but I got a couple of photo albums to start off with. Yay!

the story

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Just because I noticed the link on Carl’s site about “what’s a poobou”, and because I’m getting tired of answering that question so much, I created a page that explains exactly what PooBou means, for those of you who are curious. I’m even adding a link to it on my sidebar. Hope that helps.

Oh, and Carl, we comment on each other’s blogs often enough that you’re getting added to my links section too. I hope you feel suitably honored.

ow

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Well, I survived. The movers came yesterday & got everything, and I spent the rest of the day trying to unpack & get settled. There’s still a lot to be done, of course, but the furniture is where I want it for the most part. And once again proving that klutzy people shouldn’t ever be trusted to move heavy objects: I am so scratched & bruised that I look like some kind of domestic violence victim. And my back hurts like you wouldn’t believe.

I really love the apartment, and I only have 2 really small problems, involving phone lines/high-speed Internet stuff, which is no big deal & it’ll get taken care of soon enough. But the movers were really good and didn’t break anything (unlike the last guys I had), so I’m happy about that. One of them was really cute and I think he was definitely flirting with me. He even said something near the end about how he was sad that they were almost done because we wouldn’t be able to hang out anymore. Awww. However, there was one thing he said that I wasn’t quite sure how to interpret, and I need opinions on this:

Cute mover boy: Did you get those pants at Old Navy?
{Side note: I was wearing black yoga pants w/ a gray & white racing stripe down the side. These were the same pants I wore the day before, and the day before that. I don’t get dressed up on Moving Weekend.}
Me: No, I think I got them at the Sports Authority about a thousand years ago.
Cute mover boy: Well, they’ve held up well.

Now, was that last line a comment in response to my “thousand years ago” remark, or was it a reference to my ass, which was holding the pants up? I was totally baffled. I’m pretty sure he was checking out my butt when he made the comment — I mean, honestly, do guys look at a girl’s pants just to try to figure out where she shops? Either way, the flirting/compliments were nice, because I thought I looked grubby & disgusting that day. And after wearing the same outfit for 3 days in a row, I’m sure I had some serious Girl Funk going on. But maybe some guys are into that. Who knows.

Anyway, Teenie survived the move ok, and she seems to like the place so far. Now I’ll just have to wait & see if she starts licking herself bald like she’s done the last several times I’ve moved. I have the vitamin E oil ready just in case she gets blisters again. Poor kitty.

mad props & a shout-out

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I have to take a moment to say how incredibly blessed I feel this weekend to have my friends. Nate, Scott & Krissy all went way above and beyond the call of duty to help me move yesterday, and they never griped about it once (I think I probably whined more than anyone, honestly). And I have to say, as much as I tend to complain about Krissy, she really trumped the guys on this one. They each put in a couple of hours apiece, which was awesome, but Krissy showed up at my place with a freakin’ rented utility van — we got almost all of my apartment in there, with the exception of some large pieces of furniture. Granted, I realize that Krissy has ulterior motives for helping me — she’s moving herself sometime in the next couple of weeks, and she wants me to help her when she does. In fact, since we still have the van today (Easter is a holiday at the van rental place, so we have it until Monday morning), we’re going to use it to haul her scuba gear down to her soon-to-be-roommate’s place. But that’s fine. I don’t have that much left to organize before tomorrow anyway.

The point is, you three are my rock stars, and I love you guys.

Side note: I had a true geek moment yesterday when we were packing & loading the van. I realized that I am totally willing to pack up my stereo & CD’s, and my TV/VCR, but mention that I might have to live without my computer for more than 24 hours, and I break out in a cold sweat. So that’s still here. I’ll put it in my car before the movers show up tomorrow morning. Yep, I’m a nerd, no doubt about it.

just call me the Happy f'ing Homemaker

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I think I almost killed my apartment last night. In addition to packing, I’m also trying to make sure that the apartment is as clean as humanly possible when I leave so I can get my deposit back. I swept out the garage over the weekend. A couple of days ago, I cleaned the stove & the burners, as well as those little catch-sinks under the burners. Last night I thought I’d tackle the oven. I have a self-cleaning oven, but I’ve never used the self-cleaning feature. I like to think of myself as a reasonably intelligent person, and it seemed fairly logical to me, so I took the can of oven cleaner (which, btw, also cleans up that grimy stuff at the bottom of your bathtub really well — it eats through all kinds of gunk), sprayed the inside of the oven, then turned on the self-cleaner.

I noticed a couple of minutes later that there was a lot of smoke coming through the vent, so I turned on the fan over the stove and disconnected my smoke alarm, since I have the most sensitive smoke alarm in the world & it goes off if I have too many candles lit. Happy that my oven was now cleansing itself away, I went back to watching the episode of “Queer Eye” that I had taped the night before.

A few minutes passed, then I started coughing. I looked into the kitchen, and it was FILLED with smoke. As in, I could no longer see the cabinets and they were only maybe 20 feet away. And the smoke was rapidly filling the rest of the apartment. I ran into the kitchen, felt my way to the oven & turned it off. Then I opened my bedroom window, my front door, and the sliding glass door to let the place air out. That wasn’t really helping too much since the smoke was just hovering, so I grabbed a fan, rigged it up in the kitchen (choking & coughing the whole time) and aimed the fan toward the door so it would blow the smoke outside. I grabbed Teenie & my cell phone, and we sat out on the balcony (the only place I could breathe) while I called my mom to ask her what I should do. Mom, of course, has never had a self-cleaning oven, so she didn’t have a clue.

Since my mom was no help, I called Kris, who asked me “did you read the bottle of oven cleaner to see if you’re supposed to use it on self-cleaning ovens?” Umm… no. Duh. By this point, the apartment was clear even though it still smelled really bad, but I figured at least I wouldn’t die of smoke inhalation, so I went back in & looked at it. Turns out you’re supposed to spray the stuff, wait 2 hours, THEN turn on the self-cleaning feature. Oops.

A few hours later, I went at the goo inside the oven with a washcloth, and it wiped up pretty easily. So I guess it worked. But I’m not using my oven for the rest of my time in this place, because I’m afraid it’ll start smoking & smell weird again. And when I woke up today, I was all congested & could barely breathe. I guess inhaling toxic chemicals will have that effect.

Oh, and speaking of toxic chemicals, this story is fascinating, but it totally messed me up yesterday. I have been unable to get some of these images out of my head.