"Live" Blogging My Day

At about 10 last night, the bathroom ceiling started leaking. This was not as great a concern as the great ceiling leak of a few months ago.... this leaking stopped as soon as our air conditioning kicked on - so I'm at home this morning waiting until the apartment office opens up and I can get maintenance to deal with the problem.

And, because I'm home all day, I figured I'd blog about it. (This post will be updated through out the day)

6:30am - Wake up, check emails & blogs while eating breakfast and steeping tea.
Maybe it's because I'm not going to work today.... but I actually woke up on time (well, mostly on time - I count any alarm before 7 as "on time"). It's IWSG day over on my ABK blog, so I visited a few people on the blog hop and looked at some other blogs I follow, as well as going through my emails - does anyone else wake up to a lot of junk each morning?

7:00am - get dressed, make the bed, start the dryer.
Remember that tea I started a half hour ago? It's still steeping. I'm pulling on real clothes and putting the bed together while the dog... dogs my footsteps. I start the dryer to fluff the towels I've needed to put away since sunday, and pull the tea bag out of my tea and add sugar and lemon.

7:30am - Take the dog out for her morning walk
This is when I usually leave for work. Instead, I'm tripping down the stairs with my ewok and headed for the park so she can have her morning grass sniffing. The landscapers are out, blowing the leaves from the rock beds, running their giant riding lawn mowers, and generally stirring up a lot of dust. On the way back in to the building, I check the office hours (I'm usually more concerned about when they close.)

7:50am - start this blog post
I'm at my desk - finally drinking my tea - and typing this up.

(8am Tea - Fresh and Easy White Pomegranate)

8:00am - Do a half hour apartment cleaning session.
Whether or not maintenance cares about the state of the apartment, I do. Life gets it messy, and so I'm leaving you now to turn on Pandora and do a half hour quick-clean-up.

8:34am - Get set up to get my writing done for the day.
I've got a pile of inputs and edits to get done, but for the next half hour, I'm going to try to get my full day's writing down. It's just 715-words, so hopefully it isn't too rough.

8:58am - Writing done and then on to revisions
I used write or die and got 722-words of the next Flynn novella done. Now,I'm going to go make myself another cup of tea and dig into my revisions. Lu is passed out in her bed - which is always better than sitting at the window barking at passing cars.

(9am Tea - The Republic of Tea "Hi-Caf Teas" Toasted Coconut black tea)

10:10am - Editing break, Call the office
Two chapters input (after a false start with the red pen) and It's time to make a call down to get maintenance up here. They didn't answer the phone prompting me to walk down there instead. I got the request put in and came back upstairs. They should be here before noon.

10:50am - Back to work (This is the reason it is difficult for me to work from home)
I took a small break - getting the last of the dishes done (putting away the run washer, refilling it and doing the handwashes) and the very final bit of laundry. So now I'm diving back into chapter 10. We'll see how much I can get done before it's time to take a lunch break.

10:56 - Note!
Marty Robbins' "El Paso" just came on Pandora.... It reminds me of my childhood and is a perfect  soundtrack for the part of this book I'm working on.

(11:00am Tea - Lipton Green Tea - Orange, Passion Fruit, and Jasmine)

11:23 - Internet drops out
Not a big deal - just requires a restart (this is happening quite often anymore, I really need to buy a new computer.

11:46am - Input #1 done
I'm through all the pages I've already got edited in this book. I've got four chapters input and an extra 625 words into book 3 of the Flynn universe.
That means it's time to switch back to the red pen and tear apart the pages that are waiting to be revised. ... but instead, I think I'm going to go back to write or die and get in the 528 words I was short from yesterday's count.

12:04pm - Writing done
I put in another 552 words with Write or Die. Now for a lunch break, I'll likely start editing while I eat my pasta salad.

(12:00 pm Tea - Fresh and Easy Lemon Herbal Tea)

12:33pm - Lunch break over
I ate my pasta salad (penne, feta, cucumber, grape tomatoes and pesto) while talking about cucumbers with a beta reader, dried the hand wash dishes and am now going to dive back into edits. Oh, and I'm still waiting on the maintenance guys who were supposed to show up between 10:30 and Noon.....

2:24pm - Two Chapters Down, and a Break.
I took a break after getting through two more chapters of redlines - and starting the defrost for dinner - to call the office to see why I still hadn't seen hide nor tail of a maintenance person. After a brief hold, I was informed I'm next on the list, so I'm going to go make another cup of tea and wait for Lu to go crazy because someone's knocking on the door. It's just a toss up whether it will be maintenance of FedEx first.

(2:30pm Tea - Oolong [I don't know the brand, we get it at the Chinese cultural center - so I can't read it - but it comes in a fancy tin])

2:40pm - Maintenance shows up!
Apparently an emergency came up, so it's all good. He came in and dealt with the Aircon issue (the drain pipe from the compressor was completely clogged) the kitchen faucet (tightened it up so it doesn't leak anymore), the slowly filling fridge (removed the sheet of ice beneath the freezer's "floor") and replaced the air filter. Little editing was achieved because Lu does not make for a great armrest - she is wiggly!

3:55pm - That's over with
Now that he's gone, I can throw out the tea that I started steeping... and never quite stopped. And get back to things.

4:40pm - Run the dog out, etc
Took Lu out for an afternoon visit to ye old grass area. Stopped int at the office and picked up my two packages (after a brief mix up the second one was found!) grabbed the mail and came back up stairs. unboxed all the goodies. 

5:00pm - Start making Dinner
Shrimp cooked in coconut oil with stir fried mushrooms and snap peas... I'm pushing for a viewing of "The Phantom" (Gotta love Billy Zane in purple spandex) with dinner, but we shall see.

7:32pm - Begin prep for tomorrow/end of the week.
Watched the Phantom. Love all the awfulness mixed in with an actually entertaining film. Now to premake breakfasts and get ready for the next few days.

On A New Schedule

For the last week and a half, we've been on a weird schedule. It means we get to work an hour earlier.... and leave at the exact same time. 

It means less time with this adorable face.

(Seriously, I don't know how she's managed not to chew my face off in the middle of the night for some of the stuff I put her through.)

Technically, I don't have to be here any earlier, but... because we carpool, I do. I can't see any point to taking two cars for one hour's difference.

So my mornings now  look like this

Tea, breakfast smoothie, and pages to edit while I hide at an unused cube in the back. 

Honeslty, it's not terrible. The only complaint I have is the waking up an hour earlier part - I'm soooo not a morning person. And it's thankfully not permanent. So I'm going to just be thankful for the extra work I'm getting done for the book stuff, and hope that it's over soon.

Now, I'm going to go attack some pages with bleary eyes and a red pen. Have a great day!

So.... I went Silver.

First, my hair looked like this:

(Circa my junior year of high school)

For a while, I dyed my hair black - not because I was into the goth thing, but just because I really liked the way super dark hair played off my very pale skin. But that got old and boring, so I went back to the natural dark brown for a long while.

Then, last may, I decided to go drastically different and went red!

(At the Grand Canyon May 2012)

But the upkeep on that got to be a little to much and there was the fact of getting my color lock shampoo on a plane - in a quantity to last me two weeks of a vacation....

So I went back to the dark brown

(My twitter avatar for the last.... however many months.)

But the plain ol' dark hair and I didn't last for long... So yesterday I went to the girl who does my hair, and said make me go prematurely grey. It is my favorite color!

So for the next while, I'm Silver, and I love it! especially the way the shades and variations of the color come through....

And on the plus side, I match Lu now!

It’s a Lucy Loo Day!!!

If I ever said I didn’t love this little fur face to death, it’s be a grievous lie. 

Shadow dog just got done doing yoga.

This is the way she sits for optimum belly rubz

Such a rough life...

She's staring at food. It's probably one of those pizzas.

I swear I'm not teasing her, that's my knee in the bottom corner. She's just begging at breakfast.

I love the dark stripe down her spine.

Car rides make her even more of a wiggly butt as she tries to see EVERYTHNG

A Note on Saturday Mornings

Some Saturday Mornings, Earl works a four hour shift. Its a rotating thing, so it only comes up every once in a while unless he voluntarily takes one.

Those mornings, like today, are always a little weird. We get up together rather early, and he leaves when I take the dog out for her morning constitutional. And then, the rest of the morning is mine.

For the most part, it's taken up by cleaning (the stuff that's easier to do by myself - and quicker when done that way) and placating a puppy who REALLLLLLY wants to play with her moose.

This morning, as an example, I've already gotten through a load of laundry and one of dishes as well as getting the hand washing done... Next is a quick jaunt to the trash room and general tidying.

And after I get through with my cleaning, then I get to settle in with my book and a nice cup of tea.

Some Random Thoughts for a Monday Morning:

1. We went to see Warm Bodies and Gangster Squad this weekend. (The Latter doesn't have a review up yet, but soon) And I have to tell you, the previews had me either really excited or really underwhelmed.... with the exception of The Call. I don't know how I feel about that one, or if I'll end up seeing it.

2. After a month of living in the apartment, it is certainly looking lived in. I think my work is cut out for me when it comes to getting everything perfectly in order before the end of this month. But everything is fitting well. Dropping 300 sqft was a bit of a worry, especially since we have more furniture now than we did before....

3. I'm not a Superbowl person. I don't even care about the commercials. In fact, all I can tell you about it this year was how annoying it was to have it extend past 8pm and mess with watching Elementary.

4. I had the most incredible headaches this weekend... I'm pretty sure they were all neck tension related, but still.

5. It rained a little this weekend. a small favor I'm always happy for. I love rain. I miss it. I want to sit by a rain pattered window snuggled up in a warm blanket with a cup of tea and a good book. However, it's already getting warm again.

6. Lu got a haircut Friday night and looks like a completely different dog. She goes from ewok to falcor in about an hour.

7. I think Ripper Street on BBC is a keeper. I'll probably be talking more about that later....

Lucy Day: Couch Edition

My little fur-ball is becoming just that! Somebody needs to call and make that dog a groomer's appointment!

 

GPOMD

(Gratuitous pictures of my dog)

Sock Monkay

This sock monkey is one of little Lu's favorite toys.

Freaking-A

Where have I been?

The answer to that is here... but silent.

I've been working on a ton of things, still posting at two of my other blogs. But I plan to get out of this sporadic funk! (Hopefully anyway).

In the mean time, here's a picture of the doggerel to pass the time...

(She's thinking, "Dear Lord, woman, get me a hair cut!")

Wordless Wednesday.... A Little Bit From The Beginning Of This Week...

And of course, you had to get in your weekly dose of Lucy!

WW: A Study in Black & White

Golly, this weekend was strange.

Mostly, because we didn’t really do anything… but we did a lot.

 Well... some of us did. One of us took lots of naps and played with her sock monkey.

On Tuesday night we had a crazy thunderstorm and woke up Wednesday to a large puddle in the living room and a very wet wall. I think there’s a drainage issue on our upstairs neighbor’s balcony, which is what is right above that wall. So we’re still waiting on maintenance to come deal with that… and it might take a while, as it’s been stormy and they want to make sure it’s dry first.

 A picture of what our post-apocalyptic storms have been looking like.

Saturday… I don’t really remember doing much, we re-watched Tucker and Dale vs. Evil, and a few episodes of Luther, and Earl had me watch Basic. We went grocery shopping at some point and we made some awesome juices (a peach, kiwi, apple juice, and a Melon juice.) So that was Tastey!

  Melon Juice (Cantaloup, Honeydew, and Watermelon)

Sunday was a stranger day though. I don’t feel like we did anything, but I think that’s because we didn’t leave the house. We did a whole lot of cleaning. We fixed the dining room table chair that’s been broken for an age, and I finally got around to re organizing the top of the fridge. I had a long list of things I wanted to get done and sure enough, they’re all done!

Also, I’ve decided I’m going to get in gear on finishing the decor for the master bedroom and bathroom, so there will be posts about that soon!

Did everyone else have a good weekend?

Sleepy

Lucy: Soo-de su ka?

(Don'y you just love when people post super fuzzy pictures?)

Here's Lucy, perched on her favorite spot on the couch - I think she likes it because she can see out the windows better, or more importantly, it puts her at a direct line of sight to the table top which is where our dinner was while this picture was bein taken.  Her left paw is touching my 1951 hard back of  "Japanese in 30 days." I think she feels that since I'm making the effort to pretend to learn an Asian language, she sould make an effort to stand on the book. (We still won't be able to understand eachother, since everyone knows she only speaks Korean - I've got three things under my belt: Kimchi, Anyang [thank you Arrested Development], and Quigh Quigh![I spelled that phonetically, but took it from The good, The Bad, The Weird] So basically, the pooch is out of luck.   

The picture above this one is Lucy's favorite place to sit/lie, however, this is her favorite way to lay. She does this flat dog "I'm-a-pancake" impression all the time. It's super cute when she does this, but also wags her tail.

(Okay, so that's the cute dog pictures for the week - I'll try to make sure I have better quality ones for next time.)

Where's Lucy?

Last weekend, Lucy got a haircut. And now she can more accurately model her second new sweater (accurately meaning: she doesn’t have tufts of hair poking out at all angles underneath it).

I put it on her, looked at Earl and said, “But where’s Waldo?”

Here you can see that she's trying to blend in with the stripes on the duvet - obviously the whole dogs being color blind is true.

So, she’s my dog, and thereby I often find myself saying: “OMG, YOU ARE TOO CUTE” as I fluff up her face and she gives me a look akin to wondering why those nice men haven’t carted me off to the nice hospital off Vanburen that has two fences surrounding the grounds (yes, the loony bin).

One of those things that just makes me want to hug her until she squishes is how much she loves the Yoga mat. I think it’s because it’s squishy under her feet, but I can’t be sure. What’s awesome is when she stretches on it and Earl or I catch it and accuse her of doing downward or upward dog. She just shakes it off, hops on the couch and looks at us as though she’s trying to decide if it shouldn’t warrant a treat.

Thanks on Thanksgiving

We aren’t doing much today. We’ll be heading to Earl’s Grandmother’s house in a few hours, and probably stop by his mother’s house, but other than that I think we’re going to try to take these next few days and just chill and work through the last of the stuff that needs to get sorted in the apartment.

But, because today’s thanksgiving, I thought I’d tell you some of the things I’m thankful for this year:

My family – The vast majority of my family lives rather far away – my stepbrother and his family are the only ones who don’t live two states away – and sometimes that makes life hectic. A lot of that is my fault. I forget to call when I mean to, and let’s face it. Getting up to see them for any substantial length of time is difficult to schedule with work and is seemingly more costly every month.  And while parts of my family don’t necessarily always agree with certain life choices (read: Tattoos, living with Earl), they love me enough to look past that.  I love them all dearly and am so thankful they’re in my life.

My friends – I’ll be honest. I’m not a big people person. I have a few really close friends (who I at least talk to on an extremely regular basis) and a lot of friends I see once in a blue moon, and that’s okay.  I’m thankful for them all.  I’m thankful for the ones who get me through rough work days on g-chat, the ones who come over almost weekly for game nights, the one that I rarely get the chance to talk to, but when I do, it feels like there’s been no break at all between “now” and the time we last spoke. I’m thankful for the ones we drive 40 minutes– and then are jumped on by boxers – to see, and the ones who had a four hour layover when they came to visit. I’m thankful for the ones who make us scrumptious food and have found me wines I love, and for the ones that join me for tea. I’m thankful for every person who’s touched our lives and whom we can call friends.

Moving – This might sound strange, but as much as I hate moving, I’m thankful that we were able to move as quickly and as easily as we did. I’m thankful for those who helped us move and for the apartment office for being utterly fantastic about getting us out of one place and into the other. I’m thankful to Mr. Clean and Kaboom – because I’m not sure we would have gotten our full deposit back, were it not for them. I’m thankful that we work in a place that has carts we were able to borrow – or else I never would have been able to move half of the stuff I did on Friday, with or without Earl’s mom helping!

Health – With the exception of this year’s bought of eczema a small case of laryngitis, and the occasional sniffles.  I’ve had a pretty good year, health wise. I do have to find a new doctor, but those things happen. I’m thankful for the marginal amount of weight I’ve been able to loose and I’m thankful for all of the health resources I’ve found online and through friends. I can only hope that 2012 will be an even better, even healthier year than this one!

The Cutest Dog in the World – While her perpetual “paw you to wake up if you’re not up by 7am” can be a little irritating, Lucy’s cuteness knocks the pants off any complaints I could ever truly have about her and sends them running into the bathroom red-faced with embarrassment. My little ball of gray fluff provides so many smiles and laughs I can’t help but be thankful for her. She is the best.

Budgeting – I know I have the DTAMP and frankly, I’ve come very close to breaking that, because in August we finally had a “come to Jesus” moment with our finances and I will forever be grateful for that day – though I was not pleased about it when I was living it. That fateful day got us on a path with a budget that has been more helpful than I could ever express. Budgeting is why we could move into a new (Bigger and better) apartment and buy a sectional in the same month. We’ve never been reliant on credit cards, but we’ve also never really worried about savings accounts. And now, we are doing the latter and it is an incredible feeling – when you’re on the low end of the middle class – to be able to look at your accounts and realize that you’re no longer living paycheck to paycheck, and yes, that second account is real. Couponing fits into this bullet point. Couponing allows us to save about $440 a month that we were spending before. When you’re in that lower middle class bracket… that’s a life saver.

And, last but certainly not Least, Earl – But you’ll have to come back tomorrow for the dish on that ;)

Ah moving….

So, there’s no couponing post today, because we didn’t go grocery shopping… Crazy, I know. But this weekend was so swamped, Sunday morning came around, the new apartment looked like a hoarder’s home and we just couldn’t bring ourselves to do something that required so much structure and planning… so we didn’t.

Let me give you a rundown of this weekend, or, as I’m calling it: Exhaustion Fest 2011.

Friday morning, I woke up with Earl (he had to work), made breakfast, and saw Earl off, and then sat down to wait (Luckily Connie was there to talk with as I ate my breakfast and sat, biding my time). At 9 am, both the apartment office and the State Farm office in the building opened, so I headed downstairs and stopped in to pick up the new Rental Insurance Policy info, and then headed to the office.  Signing the transfer paperwork went like a breeze, and the assistant manager gave me the keys  as we talked about the(now former) gun-toting neighbor.  Neither he nor I can really get our head around what he was doing.

I took down two loads of stuff on these nifty carts we got to borrow from work – they are a life saver when you’re moving lots of stuff a rather short distance – and then Earl’s mom got there to help. And over the next 2 hours, we got the entire bathroom moved, most of the kitchen, all of our paintings and a large number of miscellaneous boxes taken down (Including my four huge boxes of books).

And I took Lucy down to get acclimated. (She seems to like the place so far…)

She's turned into a grey smudge that will match the floor!

Then, we went to lunch at Centurion, where we both had flat breads and shared a saffron shrimp risotto. When all was said and done, Eric gave us both a truffle… which was delicious. (He made them for the wine dinner they were having on Sunday night).

Then it was time for her to leave and go take care of her mother.

At this point I used a piece of EMT we had left over from our curtain rods. I attached some feet to the ends and became a walking wardrobe. It is nice to be able to move clothes without taking them off the hanger.

Natalie and Dave came up and helped me for an hour after that, but their weeks had been so stress full, they both looked like they were ready to pass out.

And then, Earl came home and stuff got done!

At this point I was pretty close to the point of exhaustion, my knees were trying to start a coup, and while my calves were considering joining up, they were trying their hardest to oppose anything my feet were for.  But Earl was there to do all the heavy lifting for the night and we got a lot moved down. 

One of the couches, All of our rugs, the bar, and 4 of the 7 bookshelves.

And if you know me… you know that my priorities, this was the first thing up:



Sorry about the bluzzy Cellphone Picture



And then, Saturday morning came around and we had three helpers, Natalie and Dave and Morgan. By the time everything was said and done… the down stairs looked like a hoarder had taken up residence, and the upstairs looked like… well, I’m not quite sure, but it was a mess.

So we went down stairs to Portland’s for dinner and a few beers (I drank pear cider – because I cannot stand the taste of actual beer) and I went upstairs and promptly passed out.

Sunday morning, we went up stairs, loaded up the last of the stuff we needed to get out (leaving only the cleaning and painting supplies behind.

With everything spackled and sanded and most things swept and dusted, we took a break to refuel.



Yes, that is covered in hollendaise sauce



Earl had an andouille, Irish cheddar, caramelized onion omelet, and I had a goat cheese waffle (not pictured – sorry, I saw it and just dove in).

After breakfast, we went to the office picked up the paint and got to covering up the spacklage and finishing the cleaning.

And then, we went down stairs, spend some time with our dog…. And went to look at a couch, but that’s a story for another day….

And the good news is... the only thing broken were my nails!

Lucy doing her "sad dog on pillow" face

What about you? What did you do while I was moving?