I turned 27 exactly a week ago, and I think that has a lot to do with my reluctance to post. I was really okay with being 26, but I'm not so sure about 27. On the other hand, it's kind of fun because I'm still getting carded when I buy alcohol, and the surprise on the faces of the checkout clerks when they see my actual date of birth is amusing.
I had a good birthday, nice and mellow. Alix treated me to lunch at Saccone's (good pizza, hard to find in Austin) and she likes eggplant too, so we had eggplant, onions, and mushrooms on our half. The kids had cheese on theirs. We hung out for a while at her place and her daughter entertained me by having me read stories. It actually made me realize that I kind of miss reading to the kids I used to babysit for. Alix has really cool kids. I had made some punk CDs for a friend and was listening to one in the car when we went to lunch to see if it had any flaws, and apparently the kids liked it, so I burned copies of the CDs for them too.
My folks got me a DVD player, a super cool digital rendering of what the stars looked like at the exact time of my birth, and a huge bag of gourmet food that was all inspired by the bottle of olive oil they bought me in Italy. It also included dried mushrooms from Italy, pasta, bread spreads, cookies, biscotti, tortellini, sundried tomatoes and balsamic vinegar. I need to put together a feast.
Since then, I've mostly been trying not to have a meltdown at work. I've been feeling excessively stressed out, I've been the only person in education helpdesk every evening, sometimes starting as early as 7pm and I really just can't do it by myself, especially since I'm new at this. I constantly feel like I'm doing a cruddy job, and then I get good feedback and I just don't know what to make of that. Either it means I'm not doing a crappy job, or it means they just haven't been listening when I was. I feel very lucky that I wasn't scheduled to work yesterday, 10.2 just came out and apparently it was crazy busy, I don't think I could've handled that. I have tomorrow off too, and Mondays are always nuts. I hope Tuesday is better.
I spent yesterday running errands (Toys R Us doesn't have big tubs of generic Legos, dammit) so I now have a million blank CDs and enough cables to get my DVD player and the VCR and the Gamecube all hooked up at once. I got a nice little box at Radio Hack that lets me switch between all of them by just pushing buttons. I'm in geek heaven. The only thing that could make it better is a remote to control it, but I guess I'll have that when I eventually get a receiver. Other than that, I shaved, bleached, and dyed a friend's hair, drank beer, and sat on my ass. Which is a pretty successful weekend, as far as I'm concerned. I have managed to avoid cleaning my apartment much, or doing training for work from home.
8.4.2002
clean stuff
Yesterday I managed to finish scrubbing the countertops (well, except for the patch under the microwave, I'll do that today), cleaned the sink, took all the magnets (including the little word magnets, which I tossed because they were grungy) off the fridge and cleaned it (wow, I had no idea the fridge was supposed to be white...), washed all the magnets I was keeping and put them back, swept and mopped the kitchen floor, moved all the stuff off the bathroom counter/sink area and washed it and put things back where they should be, and cleaned the bathroom mirror.
I also went to the post office to finally send my expired passport to the SSA so they can fix my birthdate (which THEY screwed up in their records) and found out that effective yesterday, August 3rd, the post office near me will not be open on Saturdays. I'm really not loving government offices right now, especially since someone driving an enormous custom van who apparently doesn't understand what "yield" means nearly killed me on my way there. I had nowhere to go, so I sped up in hopes that I could get past them before they shot out on to the access road and luckily they screeched to a halt. I think it scared them more than it scared me, they were sitting at that yield sign for a long time.
My other errands of the day included buying more TP, paper towels, and toilet bowl cleaner (did I mention I cleaned the toilet?). I also paid all my bills. I was thinking that I might have to extend my lease another 6 months here so I can afford deposits etc. for a new place, but I think I can pull it off since I won't have another insurance payment due until November. I need to take a look at a calendar and figure out where my paychecks fall, because I'd like to actually have a one or two week overlap period so I can still be living here and moving stuff over there just so that there's no pressure. I'll need to uHaul the furniture, but I could cart boxes to wherever to make moving day easier. I still haven't figured out where I'm moving, though, so I should probably tackle that soon, next weekend would be good.
Anyway, I feel like I got a ton of stuff accomplished, and once I get the surface grime cleaned up, I can start tossing stuff I don't need. Anyone need a rice cooker?
fun stuff
Lest you think that my whole weekend was spent scrubbing the floors like Cinderella, I had fun Friday night. I went out to dinner with Leslie and her friend and had tasty pasta with lemon pepper cream sauce, and avocado soup to start, best meal I've had in a long time. After that we went to a coworker's party for a little while. It was nice seeing people outside of the work context, but it was deadly hot and I was exhausted, so it was a bit of a relief when Leslie decided it was time to go. I think I was in bed by 1:30, which would be early even for a weeknight, normally.
