Commute

Ah, the dreary, mind numbing, aggravating, dismal, stressful drive to work. Gridlocked roads, uncooperative lights, drivers eating breakfast or doing their makeup as they swerve into the next lane. Aggressive distracted, oblivious, dangerous, and slow drivers.

The above was no small reason why i decided to move extremely close to my work. Things to avoid turning my car into a ramming vehicle and why my steering wheel doesn't have dents in it from banging my head or gripping too tightly.

I DESPISE a long commute. So much so that I'm willing to pay more to live int he city where my work is. And indeed with this most recent move, i have found the following.

It takes me less time to ride a bike leisurely to work than it takes most of my co-workers to drive when they're in a hurry.

Don't hate me, we all make choices and this is one that was important to me. In fact it takes me only three turns to arrive safely at work. My only frustration along the one long road when people ignore the posted speed limit and drive ten miles under just to be sure they don't get pulled over or miss their turn.

There are buses nearby if i so choose to take that route. And in the event of a major catastrophe, as our annual evacuation drill notes....i can walk home. This truly is a great idea.

Other news:
The best wake up call ever is trying on a pair of old jeans you stopped wearing, and finding that they fit! without a muffin top!

Sayings

In my life, i've picked up sayings, quotes, or limericks. They travel with me in the back of my head, much as they do with anyone else.

The one on my mind right now is more of a play on words than an actual quote. I got it when i worked my second official job at a movie theater. I had been slated to work in the box office because my till was always spot on. And they had us throw up all these window decals for Eddie Murphy's Haunted Mansion film (wow, that just dated me).

I cannot stress to you how much i hate window decals. I have some kind of OCD when it comes to windows. Streaks are like nails on a chalkboard for me. Bird poop has me shaking my fist at the bird who dared fly over my car and relieve itself. And unless window decals are put on perfectly....i can spend literally hours pressing out the bubbles. Which is why my normal station was regularly cleaned between rushes for all the people who poked at the glass or annoying kids smudging their dirty noses and mouths all over.

Anyway, back to the decals. There was one decal on my side of the box office glass that took me a while to figure out. Hey, i was 16. In keeping with the haunted mansion theme...it was a headstone with the "name" Claire Voyant. Read it fast, and you have clairvoyant or someone that can see or know what other people can't. Soon after that, i started telling people who had assumed i knew something. "My name is Anne ...not Claire Voyant"

Sometimes i wish it were just that easy. To be able to understand where people are coming from without them having to tell you. To see why they feel the way they do, and what is prompting them to react in a certain way. Sometimes it seems like it would make everything better. And then i realize that it would also take away how we learn for ourselves.

The adventures of dating Jon

I've said it from the beginning. Jon and I have the weirdest dates ever. Things start out traditional then gradually morph into something totally unromantic, which usually ends up with some kind of inside joke.

Examples:
Date 1:
Jon and I both showed up the the pre-arranged restaurant not far from either of our houses on time and proceed to avoid working on our Nano's (it was November) by talking. For three hours. In that time...there were cop sirens going up and down the street behind me every few minutes. I don't know if the local police department had some kind of speed trap set up, but by like the tenth siren and lights to go by, i pulled up the collar of my sweater-coat and tried to hide myself from view, and hoarsly whispered, "They're looking for me." Of course it was all a joke but this led to a conversation about the tactics the swat team would use in order to corner me in the restaurant and even alluding to what i had done to cause such a reaction. Now whenever Jon and I notice a siren go by, I get a shifty look and occasionally duck behind Jon for cover.

Date 2 or 3?:
I went and visited Jon's place the first night where he introduced me to Firefly and we demurely sat on completely opposite ends of the couch, not even touching. By the third "date" we were facing each other on the couch and touching feet. We were in the middle of a conversation about one of our stories when i looked at his shoulder where his shirt neck pulled away from his skin. There was a fairly small spider the size of a dime in the process of crawling out of his shirt. Normal girl: Freak out and alert him to the spider with a scream and a pointed finger. Me: "Don't move" then lean in really close and gently brush the spider up onto my hand and flick it onto the coffee table where it died a quick death from a notepad. I imagine he had been hoping for a kiss, but instead, I asked him what else he kept down there. You can imagine what weird suggestions we both came up with.

Ok, Fast-forwarding now to our most recent "date". Don't worry, there was plenty of other weird dates in-between. Like how he got to meet my dad without warning at the grocery store deli, or getting roped into helping me pack for my move.

Growing up, my grandma lived about a half hour away. Mom would frequently make the trip to go take my grandma who didn't drive to the store or out to dinner or anywhere just to get her out of the house. I was usually taken along for this trip so i have fond memories of certain restaurants, stores, playgrounds, and nearby beaches. Since i never drove to her house before she died when i was 14, I have to rely on memories and landmarks to get to those places again. After picking up Jon from the airport, i told him we were really close to all those places i remembered. I ended up taking him by my grandmother's old house, and the beach at the bottom of that hill.

We got out and started wandering around, picking up the best preserved shell and just talking about nothing. Romantic walk on the beach holding hands when all of a sudden not five feet from us, a huge fountain shoots out of the ground. And sticking out just an inch or two is the siphon for a Geoduck ("Gooey ducks"- check them out for a laugh) The rest of the afternoon was spent trying to make geoducksto squirt on camera. We came away laughing and rather wet.

After over six months with this great guy, I have to say, the weird dates almost always turn out to be the best ones.

Gradual diminishing

I woke up early yesterday morning, looking around for who was nudging my bed. By the time i realized that we were having a minor earthquake, it was already over. I stayed awake for several more minutes to see if it would start up again, but within ten minutes, i estimate that i was passed out again.
Later, I started out yesterday in SUCH a good mood. I woke up on time without any residual tiredness at all, enjoyed a leisurely breakfast, I even got to work early and the sun was shining. At work, everyone was all abuzz about the earthquake. And despite my distaste for hypochondriacs, i found myself feeling exuberant. I texted my boyfriend. Originally from California...i figured he had slept straight through the earthquake.

"Top news story of the day! There was an earthquake...and we actually FELT it! OMG!"
"Lol"
"Yeah, we are such lightweights when it comes to earthquakes"
"Lol"

The day went along like normal. Broken copy machines (also known as 'Load Paper'), phone calls, power point presentations, metrics, and trying to stay out of trouble.

I'm not really sure what started to happen. But i found that as the day progressed, with every new person that i talked to, my mood was diminishing. But 4:00pm, i was hiding in my cubicle working on some tedious "extra" metrics so that i wouldn't have to talk to anyone. By the time 5:00 rolled around, all i wanted to do the rest of the night was something that didn't involve technology, media, or people.
I went home, turned off my laptop, put my phone on silent and started reading a book I had borrowed, but had been too busy in the last couple of weeks to start.
I'll save the review for later. But i got through about 220 out of 286 pages in about 3 hours. I fell asleep with my finger between the pages sitting in my oversize chair and didn't move again until almost 1am where i transferred myself to my bed and slept again.
It felt good after such a long absence to go back to just the simple things that i spent most of my youth living for. I would read sometimes in upwards of forty books a summer.

All i know is that the last thing i wanted was to talk to anyone. I started the day in such a good mood, with a smile on my face and a bounce in my step. And i ended it hiding under a warm blanket with a book and more pumpkin seeds.

Spring Clean is complete

I had been "moved" into my apartment for almost two months. There were still boxes everywhere, and moving from room to room was an obstacle course. I have been assuring boyfriend Jon that i don't normally live with this much mess. That when i lived alone before for those few short months, my house was kept at a reasonable state of clean.
He really had not had a lot of reason to believe me. Let's just leave it at that.
I decided about three weeks ago that i needed a serious incentive to finish unpacking and getting my apartment to the state i had envisioned. My only problem was that some of the stuff had no where to go. But that was efficiently taken care of by the creation of my DVD stand and my TV stand. Both are now in place and filled with all the random stuff that had been taking over my living room.
I also got my dad's help framing and my mother's help in hanging the wall art which has been sitting in my dresser drawers for a little over a year. Mirriors, calendars, wall sconces, floating shelves, and white boards all went up. The remaining six boxes were emptied and taken out to the recycle bins. Stuff magically found places, and slowly but surely, i was all but done.
I sat down and literally a minute later, my incentive to complete these tasks...arrived. I had invited my family over for a bbq. A couple of my oldest friends were able to join us too. Next thing i knew my home was filled It's looking like my capacity is about 8 before the place becomes too cramped.
I was exhausted, sore, and bordering on cranky but very happy to see people i care about enjoying themselves in my new home. There was good food, good company and my dad even had an audience to regale with stories.
And even though i was happy to share my now clean home with my family and friends...i was also relieved when they helped me clean up, take some of the extra food and leave. I was exhausted and promptly laid down. Had i known how tired i was going to be, i might have canceled. But I'm glad now that i didn't. I simply MUST do this again soon.

And just when i thought i could lay down and recover with some deep sleep...my smoke detector goes berzerk at 1:10am. It took me 45 minutes to figure out that No, my apartment was not on fire, No....there was no carbon monoxide, No, it didn't need fresh batteries....but that we had a power outage and the beeping was just it resetting itself. Turns out...the is only one way to tell that i have had a power outage. My microwave clock.