Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Wednesday December 28, 2011

Well, it was an interesting day. I talked to Marv about his use of the phrase "she's just a friend" in responding to a waitress' question: "Is this your daughter?" He was irritated that it would upset me and basically couldn't understand WHY that would bother me. I said, "Well, if I said, 'He's just a guy I know' about you, wouldn't that hurt your feelings?" He seemed to think about that for a second before agreeing that it would. However, he didn't seem to concede that he'd done anything wrong, and didn't want to talk about it. (Told me I shouldn't have brought it up.) Sigh.

In other news, I scraped my hand open on something, and I can't figure out what, but I'm bleeding. It doesn't hurt, but surprised me when I saw it. I'm at Barnes and Noble again today. I have to be at work in half an hour, but this is part of my attempt to write something every day. Marv said I should, and I think it's a good idea. (Which contradicts his statement, "I guess I just can't do anything right.")

I asked Grey about the situation, because he and Marv have such similar personalities. He said that he thought I was justified in being upset, and that once Marv had a chance to think about it, he would come around. He said, "I usually do eventually, so I'm sure he will, too." LOL I'm sure he's right, and I wish that it hadn't hurt my feelings, but it did. Basically, Marv tossed out some "Fine. I guess I just won't say anything ever again" type comments. Which I'm familiar with from my teenaged children.

I think his relationship maturity has never been necessarily stretched, so this is growing pains for both of us. Most of the time, it's all good, but once in a while...ARG!

I'm working tonight until 8pm. Have to get the schedule done, which entails a lot of rearranging, and not everyone is going to be happy about it, that's for sure. But it is what it is.

I've been trying to jog more regularly. I'm trying to get up to a regular three mile ability by Valentine's Day. It's hard when I don't get home until so late, but tonight I'm going to try again. I have an inhaler now, and that's helped enormously.

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

December 27, 2011

At the moment, I'm sitting in the Barnes and Noble store in Burnsville listening to an elderly man's conversation on the phone. Every word. And I'm at least 50 feet away from him. It's kind of amazing really, and I find myself wondering if he's hard of hearing or if the person he's conversing with is. I actually thought I was, but now I'm starting to think that I may, in fact, have really GOOD hearing, because there's not one word that isn't clear as a bell.

I'm sitting next to the Sparknotes, which I think is the equivalent of Cliff Notes, which is the study guide that we used to use when I was in school. I'm reading the list of books in short and thinking that I need to get on the stick if I'm going to read all of these before I die. Some I read in high school, and those I don't remember well. A couple I've read and re-read. some I read in college. Most I never read but feel that I should.

Greyson got "For Whom the Bell Tolls" for Christmas, and I wonder if I should get him the study guide - he's more likely to at least browse THAT. I think he learned a valuable lesson about writing lists for the relatives for Christmas...to actually do that. He said he would be happy with whatever he got this year, and I think he found out that that was not necessarily true.

Gabe got a compound bow. Last year the kids got pellet guns. I'm trying to figure out why the outlaws are arming my kids. It doesn't make much sense. We don't hunt, shoot, have any latent violent tendencies that I know of...it's a mystery.

I went to the thrift store today and bought a sweater set, a pair of pants, a wool jacket and a cute sweater. I put on the pink sweater when I got out to the car, and was feeling pretty fancy until I took a sip of my hot chocolate and spilled all over my sweater. That might have been a record: 5 minutes from donning the item to ruination. So I'm wearing the sweater part of the sweater set. The pants need to be washed before I can wear them, so I'm wearing my kind of worn out pair.

It's 11am, and I have to be to work in an hour. I work until 8pm tonight. I'm MOD. Then I'll head to Marv's and watch Chopped.

Monday, April 18, 2011

Conversation about my job...

So, are you gonna try to stick it out for a year?

I'm going to try to stick it out until I like it.

That might not happen in your lifetime.

After two years, they put 12% into a retirement fund for you.

Well, that would be good considering you're not going to get any social security.

(Insert political diatribe.)

Guess who that conversation happened with?

Nikki and Gypsy

Nikki and Gypsy LOVE each other. They are inseparable. And they LOVE Marv and I. They're not really anti-social. Gypsy was SO scared when she first came to us. Terrified of even being with people. Now you can hardly get her off of you. Marv and I marvel often that this is the same dog that you couldn't get near you a year and a half ago. But she gets very nervous in crowds.

Nikki is just still really scared. We had a birthday party at the house a few weeks ago though and she was really great. She stayed behind Marv's chair most of the time, but she was curious and peered out from behind the chair most of the time. Gypsy sat in the middle of the room like she owned the place. LOL

SOME DAY they will be walkable. But still too skittish. They get easily frightened by the sounds around them, cars, bikes, etc. And tend to bolt, which is bad on a leash and scary because if they ever DID get off, they could run into the street. So I don't walk them out and about yet. I take them to the dog park and let them run around. There they are happy, outgoing and friendly with the other dogs. Still scared of people though. Though now Gypsy will let strangers pet her. But she'll sidle up next to me and sit against my leg while they do. Nikki will Reeaaaaach with her nose to sniff them, but bolt if they try to touch her. But frankly, the fact that she gets close enough even to TRY to sniff them is a huge improvement. The first time we went to the dog park she found a hidden tree and curled up under it. Took us twenty minutes to find her.

Nikki started taking Prozac Saturday. I'm really curious as to what effect this might have on her.

Twitchy day

The theme these past couple of days seems to be twitching and compulsion. Yesterday at work at the Y my eye kept twitching for no apparent reason. I was talking to Erin and I made a joke about how some problem kept making my eye twitch, and she said, "Oh my God, your eye really IS twitching!" LOL Makes me seem so much more sensitive than I actually am.

Then today I'm in a meeting with Dave, Scott and Barb and my leg was twitching. Not sure why. But it looked like I was bouncing my leg impatiently. I wasn't feeling particularly impatient. In fact, I was concentrating on looking interested - not an easy task at most of these meetings.

I left work at 4:30 today - early for me - and headed to Boston's to have dinner with Pinky and Marv. Marv and I split a "Da Vinci Chicken" pizza. It was a pizza crust with spinach/artichoke dip with chicken and cheese. I'm unsure of the connection to Da Vinci, but it was really yummy. There were chunks of artichoke on it as well, but I asked them to keep it on Marv's side of the pizza.

After that, I headed home with the plan to get my computer and head somewhere so I could do some writing. But I walked out of the house and realized that I'd better plant those chokecherry trees that I got free at work before they drowned in the water bucket. So I planted six trees and in so doing so saw all the weeds. Well, you know where that ended up...two hours later it was dark and I had one garden completely free of weeds! If I could do that area every day, I'd be done in about a week!

I'm at McDonalds now - where the internet connection is. And there was a man sitting in the booth next to me either suffering from Parkinsons or some other disorder where he shook constantly. Reminded me of all my twitching.

Saturday was Healthy Kids Day at the Y. We had about 2 million kids there. It was actually a lot of fun. I hung out for quite a while in the Fitness room swinging the jumprope for kids to jump over. It was just not the same without the jumprope chants. None of the other parents nor I could remember! I really like doing the events. It feels very energizing. Unlike the paperwork and tedium that I usually deal with.