Saving myself

NaBloPoMo starts in 2 days, and I need to collect fodder for my entries. So until then, expect little.

Though I will add this…tomorrow is Halloween, one of my favorite holidays and it doesn’t have much to do with candy. It’s just that the decorations are so fun. I have a couple Peanuts figurines from the Great Pumpkin (Snoopy and Lucy) which I love to have them up at my desk. Of course then people play with them and I revert to my childhood, “Leave my toys alone! Get your own toys! Mine! Mine! Mine!”

Sorry, but I had to do it

Last night, JB came over to learn the art of how Moe makes her fantabulous apple pies. After a little trouble with the crust, we put it all together (mostly she put it all together, including Moe’s neurotic obsession with layering the apples) and baked that baby up. According to my calculations, that was one of the better pies I’ve had. Yummy! Well done, JB! :)

I am an octopus

Options are a great thing. I’ve said this before, I know. But sometimes the way those options can pull at your psyche can be painful.

Lately I feel like I am being pulled in many directions – toward a possible new job, toward moving, toward taking classes again, toward staying put, toward loyalty to one, toward loyalty to self, toward a different possible job, toward happiness any way.

“It’s good to have options,” I was told last night. And it’s true. (I have to keep telling myself that.) But sometimes I just wish I was 7 again, and the world was simple. I would curl up with my Trixie Belden books and just read the world away.

It’s a damn good thing I don’t have a computer or internet at home. Could you imagine the debt I’d have?
The internet is addictive and I think I am thus addicted. But while I only have it at work, I can somewhat control it.

But that doesn’t stop me from buying this yesterday:

I had tried this at K&E’s over Labor Day weekend and LOVED it. Yes, I’m using the word LOVE here about a chair that swings from a tree. O was having a 12% off plus $1 shipping today so I sucked it up and bought one.

Now I just need to find a tree and a smart, handsome, burly man to help me put it up.

Justification

“I hate when she makes me feel like I have to apologize.”

“Don’t apologize. There are children starving in China. She didn’t feed them either.”

Sucker for punishment

So I just signed up for NaBloPoMo – Thanks, M. Kennedy! – and I think I’m a little stupid. But alas, when has that EVER been in question.

So NaBloPoMo is a project to encourage blogging every day. It’s kind of like NaNoWriMo which I have toyed with taking on, but I just don’t have a plotline or characters or idea.

But M. Kennedy is the coolest and if she’s going to start a NaBloPoMo then I’m going to join in.

And HUGE kudos go to JB who helped me get the button on my sidebar. Maybe that should be my focus for the month – learn html so I don’t have to bug my friends via IM to help me with things like this. :)

Wannabe

Okay, so I know I’m cool and all, but is this necessary? Guess who wants to be me? Yep. It’s almost sad. I’d be worried about her if she wasn’t so cool herself. :)

Caught – hook, line and sinker

Yep, I’ve been caught. Caught by the cold bug. Wow. It’s been awhile since I’ve been this sick, and this one did wipe me out. I ran home this weekend to say so-long to a couple friends leaving for a trip and somehow I caught a cold. Saturday it didn’t hit and even Sunday I was feeling okay, just a bit groggy and sniffly. But Monday. Oh Monday.

Monday, Monday, can't trust that day
Monday, Monday, sometimes it just turns out that way
Oh Monday mornin' you gave me no warnin' of what was to be
That Monday evenin' you would still be here with me

Okay, so I took a little liberty with the verse but seriously…guh. I actually took a partial sick day. Yes, me, the workaholic of all workaholics (except maybe my mother who is officially retired yet still works more than I do), I took the afternoon off.

And what an afternoon it was – I went to Target and bought soup and movies to enjoy in my sickness but ended up sleeping from 1:30 til 6 straight through. *sigh* I guess needed it. Soup and sleep – those are the keys to happiness and health apparently.

But today I am feeling better. I still sound awful and I have the occasional moment of “why God why?” but for the most part I’m doing better. I just can’t wait to sleep again. And i hope I don't get sick again soon - since apparently it causes me to break into song.

Anyway

Tartlets. Tartlets. Tartlets.

The word has lost all meaning.

I made a Free-Form Harvest Apple Tart last night…seriously, that was the name. Here’s what it looks like. It was actually quite tasty.

The Real Thing

Eons ago, it seems, I visited E&K and bought new shoes. I had posted a shot of what the almost looked like, but here they are – the real thing!

New Camera!

So here is my first favorite pic with my new camera. I haven’t dinked with it at all – straight from the Power Shot. :)

On Writing

“Writing, I think, is not always an act of creation. Sometimes I think it’s like a poison that inhabits your being, and the only way to get rid of it is to have the pen press deeply and quickly on the empty pages, releasing your darkest secrets and your most shameful thoughts, which may be minor discretions to most, but to you are something you have to expel in order to free yourself. …to look at our own lives and to expose as much as you can allow yourself to, is to bring relief and understanding to what pains you.” – Neil Simon from The Play Goes On: A Memoir, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1999

Profound, is it not? Though the pen pressed deeply and quickly on empty pages doesn’t work for me…my mind works too quickly to keep up with my slow hands…I type. And typing out deep, dark secrets can be very scary but also liberating. It’s like on “Prison Break” this week where the druggie FBI guy tells Tweener that it’s refreshing to confess and get it off your chest. So is writing a form of confession? Will someday there be writing confessionals or a website where you choose the sins you’ve committed and up pops your penance?

I don’t know that I do this enough (ha! I know some of your are thinking, hello! Have you not read your past few blogs?). maybe I need to let myself out there a bit more…talk about things I haven’t – relationships, life, work, etc. – more in details with a better explanation than all the beating around the bush I do. That could be dangerous though. But if I’m living my life, is it that much more dangerous to put it out on the web? Oh wait, maybe yes.

Either way, writing/typing is very therapeutic. Plus, apparently it sounds professional when I’m sitting at my work desk typing away – even though I’m typing away emails to cute boys or IM’s to fun friends.

Free for the taking

This is the best project I’ve seen in a long time.

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In my goal to try to stay positive, here are a few good things today:

• I slept almost completely through the night last night. I did wake up once but I was able to readjust myself, snuggle in under the covers, and completely re-immerse myself in my sleeping state. So that’s good at least.
• I (finally!) bought a digital camera last night. I started adding up the cost of the disposable ones (cost of camera, developing, digital disc, etc.) and this will be so much cheaper in the long run. I got a Canon Power Shot A530. I was a little hesitant on this, having looked at the Panasonic Lumix, but this has a viewfinder and pretty much the same features. We’ll see, I guess. It feels like a toy, but it’s nice to have a camera that will take pictures without red-eyes. And since it’s fun like a toy, I’ll probably use it. PLUS, Best Buy had a super cheap deal on 1GB disks (on sale for $20 after rebate, this week only!).
• Tonight I head to the Guthrie for Lost in Yonkers. I really love that I have season tickets. I know I wouldn’t be going to these shows if I didn’t and I’d be missing out on some great theatre.
• I got to talk to K today (thanks for calling!). It’s good to reconnect with friends who are on much more solid ground than I am. I always feel calmer after talking with her. She has a great head on her shoulders and is truly one of my dearest friends.

So that’s my life so far. It’s it grand.

p.s. Send a hug. Donate to the Susan G. Komen Foundation.

Pink for October

As many of you know, October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. Also as many of you know, this awareness month holds a special place in my heart. So I am going Pink for October. I didn’t realize they did this til I read Dave’s entry from the weekend. But this is a great idea. If you’d like to know more about Breast Cancer and ways to help, please check out the Susan G. Komen Foundation.

It's early

Apparently, I’m having trouble lately with this concept called sleeping. Even as I type that I yawn, but I know if I go back to bed right now, I’ll toss and turn for another 45 minutes or so, so I might as well sit here and type and speed up the process, right?

So this time it’s 2:58 a.m. It’s the first work-day of October and all should be right with the world. “Should” being the operative word there, since we all know it’s so not true. But the roller-coaster month of September is finished and finished with a bang, well, as much of a bang as I can pull off.

Friday night was a bust, as usual. I worked until 5:30 p.m. (which was a first in a long time…usually I’m done by 4 sometimes 3 on Fridays) and then came home and vegged. Saturday was the busy day. After helping a new worker open the store, so to speak, Tim and I headed to the Twins game (we had gotten tickets from one of the profs). After about killing Tim trying to find the super-secret parking garage JB and I always use, I also ran into a couple people I knew would be at the game but really didn’t think I’d see (why would I expect to see two friends in a stadium of 40,000?). Tim and I had walked up one of the entry ways to a section and as we’re looking for seats I hear, “Sara?!” As I turned around there was my friend Debbie. Too fun. The other was a friend from SD. We both knew we’d be there but had no idea where we’d be sitting (ah, general admission). But funny enough, we ended up on the same level only a few sections from each other and we ran into each other heading to the restroom. How random! And since the game was pretty much a bust until the bottom of the ninth anyway, these two encounters truly made the game.

Hey! I’m not the only one up at the butt-crack of dawn. One my neighbors upstairs is moving around. Interesting…

Anyway, back to my odd and pathetic life. After the game, Tim and I worked out plans for he, Aaron and I to meet up with another of my friends, Stephanie, later that night. She was going to the Gopher game (it was a weekend for MN sports, ladies and gentleman) and so we worked out plans to meet up later at the Chatterbox. That was awesome. The cider was a-flowing and Aaron and I challenged each other on Atari (Ms. Pac-Man) and Nintendo (Mario Bros 3), the latter of which I had never played before and O! did it show. We shut Chatterbox down and I got home about 2:45 a.m. I’m just glad it wasn’t a bell or early service weekend.

After church I went to work at the Fall Faculty Tea at the Prez’s house. Though I tend to dread it to begin with, I usually do have a good time. Getting to see the faculty outside of classes and mingle through is always fun, until they start introducing me to their spouses and those few colleagues who don’t know me as “This is voice of Luther Seminary; she runs the place.” Yeah, thanks, but that last part doesn’t apply as much anymore. But I had nice conversations with one who said she has more fun talking with the staff than with the faculty and an emeriti faculty who offered to write me a character reference anytime I need one. “So I’ve got that going for me, which is nice.”*

I went to bed early last night to try to make up for all my weekend festivities and to rest up for today. Today is the Fall Gathering – the first event of the year for SPOT and my latest worry: I didn’t get centerpieces made for the tables; I forgot to check on what decorations we have on hand at school; I didn’t get the napkins sorted out (one fall, two brown, one fall, two brown, etc.); I need to put together the program for who’s new and who’s not; what if I miss someone; who am I going to miss; I need to call Kathy H to get her the details; did I order the right kind and enough food; am I doing anything right anymore; what if they hate it; what if no one comes?

*Carl, Caddyshack

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Ok, it’s not 3:21 and I’m still not tired. In fact, I’m more awake now. Crap. This is what I get. I suppose I could read the exciting Sunday paper.

I have a system with my Sunday paper: I go through the paper section by section, but pulling out the sections I want to read and setting off to the side those I don’t (often these are the sports, car, houses, apartments and opinion sections). Then I go through the ads and pull out those I would shop, setting aside the clothing and random stores (like Fleet Farm) where I rarely go. If something catches my eye on the cover I may keep it. Then I read the comics. Anything I like I cut out and set aside to mail or keep (I’m a pack-rat - it’s sad, really). Then it’s going backwards through the items I set aside – first the USA Weekend, then the ads, then the sections, usually ending with the job openings and movie listings. Then what I’m not keeping for the week I put in a brown sack for recycling. But I didn’t quite finish my system yesterday. I was late to choir, then came home and sorted through the camera ads so I can buy one that will work for me, then the tea. When I got home after the tea and chatting with Aaron and Tim I was exhausted. I watched Desperate Housewives and went to bed. Ah, the story of moe, because now we are full circle and here we are – up in the middle of the night typing a blog entry. Sad, really.

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Okay, I feel more awake now than I did 45 minutes ago, but I think I’ll attempt some sleep again. Maybe I should set my stuff out so I don’t forget anything first, then sleep. Yeah, that’s the ticket…good idea, moe. At least I have one brilliant thought – too bad I’m wasting it on that and at this early in the morning.

And if it helps…they are still awake upstairs, too.

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Update: getting up at 3 a.m. is good to clear the mind, but maybe it works too well. I work up at 7:04 and am supposed to be at work at 7:30 a.m. whoops.