Off Track

One week of good productivity and that was it. Out of soreness and laziness, mostly the latter, I allowed myself to waste a week or more. Eeps. I mean not to say I did NOTHING, but nothing towards the ultimate goal got done. At least right now I'm doing some laundry of the non-regular variety, blankets, throws and things from the living room. When I wake up today, I'll finish the tidying and then hopefully Monday I'll start the sorting I had really wanted to do. If I can just sort one little pile/corner/closet a day, I'll be okay. :-P Monday will be the big tub and two mini tubs on top of it that have been there since the day we moved in. Oy. Also, maybe the end table drawers. Stuff's been in there since like Long Beach apartment and Lord only knows what's still in there. :-P

While I may not have been super active on the productive stuff, I have managed to clear up recording tapes for later usage. AND I started writing again for my RP stuffs, though I haven't posted it yet. Rough draft of something that makes little sense now. :-P And with that thought I shall dash off to go see if I can revise that now and maybe add to the story...if it is a story. :-P

Not Bad

Woohoo... Made some progress on the whole cleaning house thing. :-) Still have to mop the bathroom and finish the dusting and vacuuming, but I'm happy. In two nights I did six loads of laundry....SIX.... There's only TWO of us! Geesh. :-P Okay, okay, so mostly it was sheets and towels and stuff, but still! I figure I'll finish up cleaning tomorrow or Monday. Wednesday I plan to tackle my room. That one will take a while as I need to go through stuff and toss stuff and my room hasn't been dusted fully for ages. I know, shame on me.

Anywho, tonight I think I will take it easy. The heavy box and bottle shifting to and fro the other day and the tub scrubbing (which is set really low so ya step down into the tub) did a number on my back and arms so I'm still a lil sore. :-P And gotta catch up on tape watching as Mom's gaining on me!

Alas... My FB game addiction is getting kinda out of hand. :-P So I'll probably spend tonight doing Garden of Time stuff. :-P

Plan A, Plan B, Plan A again?

The Good: One of the strays we feed was taken to the shelter or wherever by another neighbor who's been feeding her. Poor Tundra could barely see and her ear and head always looked scabbed and bloody and generally chewed up. She occasionally showed up to our doorstep bleeding all over the place. Our front steps look like a freaking crime scene with blood splatters cuz poor Tundra would shake her head so much. But I guess this neighbor didn't like the crime scene that was left on their patio today and so they took her in. I imagine they're the ones who occasionally clean up Tundra when she got too bloody. I'm relieved. We wanted to take her in, but I don't think Mom's car ready yet.

The Bad: We still feed two to three strays (three VERY rarely), two of which we want to take to the shelter before winter (or California's version of it) comes. So far we're just getting the odd cool day in the midst of decent weather and once in a while a little rain. Apparently tomorrow's supposed to rain and be COLD (anything below 60 F is COLD in Cali :-P ). Maybe Praline and Snickers' owners will keep/let them in tonight and for the day, but the downside is they show up on our doorstep the next day STARVING. Seriously, if I were a truly violent person and not just all bark, I'd beat that stupid woman for "rescuing" those cats and then expecting her idiot child to be responsible for them.

ANYWHO!

The Good: I was productive today-yesterday....in the hours after waking up and before going to bed (which I still haven't done yet).

The Bad: I didn't clean what I'd planned to, well not all of it.

Woke up two hours later than planned. Now if I'd woken up and hopped in shower and got to work, it wouldn't have been a problem. But I woke up to a phone call, and was on that call for a lil while. Okay, it was Dad and he and I don't do little chats. quarter to eight and I was like, "okay, hop in shower, make bed (clean sheets), start laundry, toss trash out, make food, and sit down for shows." Reading all that now makes me think that was kind of an unrealistic goal to begin with. :-P But anywho, I figured after shows I'd go back to work and clean the bathroom (something I can do without waking Mom), I even swept the bathroom floor (it gets practically covered in powder cuz we love our Shower to Shower powder) before I hopped in shower so it wouldn't be yucky to clean later after the steam mixed with the powder.

Sweeping took slightly longer than I liked cuz I was thorough and lots of little nooks to sweep around. :-P Shower took longer than I liked cuz I started planning out the night and my autopilot slows down when I think too much. :-P Got out and made my bed, which took longer cuz I was watching one of my shows while making it and had to keep both the cats off while I changed the sheets. :-P They're not as helpful as they think they are. Laundry sorting and starting takes longer when you only do it during commercial breaks. :-P All said and done the plan to eat while watching shows was thrown out the window. Ah well... Called Dad (since our last call was ended due to dead blue tooth and he called while I was bed making or something and missed his call). Shame on me. I mean I KNOW he and I would end up talking too long. I could have and should have said I'd make it quick and let Dad go early. By the time I got off with him, it was too late to start the bathroom cleaning as Mom would be up and needing in to get ready (she wakes up at like 3a.m. or a little later).

New, new plan or was it new old plan. I would dust the dining and living room before she woke, then the second she was up and around I'd vacuum the whole house before she started work at 5a.m. ... If I moved fast I could do it. I wonder if houses that get cleaned daily or even just weekly require less time to clean. :-P So, I went to the kitchen and did the usual "she's in the shower so rush to get her stuff ready" stuff done real quick. I was quick but she woke early. Hmmm... Fine, I'll dust now, vacuum later (after I wake today).

Started dusting but kept coming across stuff I HAD to put away. So some of that proper sorting and organizing got done, but it made what was gonna be a quickie dusting job take longer. :-P You know what else slows ya down? Breaking a glass/crystal candy jar lid. Yep. Fun. So now I HAVE to sweep to make sure there's no glass. Then cuz I'm not sure that's enough I HAVE to swiffer sweep with floor cleaner to make sure I pick EVERYTHING. So at least the dining room/area floor got completely cleaned.

So.... Good, I did a more thorough cleaning job on the dining room area than planned. Bad, I still have to dust the living room and vacuum the house AND my back's sore from all the heavy lifting I did (boxes of books and four 5-gallon water bottles). But I was most definitely productive! As it's 11:30ish a.m. now and I've got a few lil things to do before I can go to bed to "nap"/sleep for the day, I dunno how productive I'll be tonight as I imagine I'll be waking up super late. But we'll see. Maybe I'll find another late night task I can do to be productive.

The November Plan

So what with the whole lack of motivation and general laziness, my house has gotten sort of out of control. Tubes and boxes never got emptied and or sorted from when we moved here. For shame, I know. And then we got lots more stuff over the last three years we've been here that never found proper homes. Then there's the usual dust and what not that's gone unchecked for a while longer than I like, not that I was ever a superb housekeeper. Not to mention kitty toys (big and small) and trash (Pixie loves cardboard boxes and Oreo likes caps) all over the place. But next month's December and that means decorating! And I always clean before that, so I decided to clean up and clean out my house over the month. Plus, I'm kinda thinking I want a tree and IF I do get one, it'd be nice to have the place cleaned up to reorganize furniture and stuff to fit it in. :-P

So I've got a plan. Basic cleaning and maybe even somewhat half-assed just so we can see what a semi-clean house looks like again. :-P Then room by room (or pile or closet) start the joyful sorting out of giveaways, trash, or proper organizing. Given my general lack of motivation and laziness I figure this will take a while. Then when that's all done, do a super jobber on the house cleaning. That's the plan anyway. We'll see how well I keep to it. Tomorrow (er, today after I wake up) I'll start with simple dusting and vacuuming, which should make Mom super happy.

It's kinda funny, the other day I was like, OMG that's so much work! .... I packed just about all of our stuff (which was a room less than what we have no) and unpacked it all inside of a month for our last move. That's WAY more work and I still managed goofing off time on the comp. I dunno why I can't get back my time management skills. Stupid FB is killing what remains of my brain cell!

Anywho... Here goes nothing! Pictures to come of the end result, hopefully!

Bad Bedside Manner

I don't have patience. Not sure if it's something that was always there or something that got worse over time. But here it is. I don't have patience for dealing with kids, with nagging relatives, with constant calls for help. It sounds terrible, I know it does. When I used to work at the bookstore, which I loved, I still had to ask God to help me deal with the lazier customers.

But man this week has been trying.... Mom's back went out last Friday. It wasn't super bad like in past years where she'd be out for weeks or even several days. But she worked the following day and so tweaked it even worse. She had to call out Monday as she tweaked it again Sunday. Tuesday she worked half day. Saturday and Wednesday her sup gave her early go which they do when work is light but she favored Mom knowing the sitch. So Basically, Mom spent most of the week in pain and I had to help her pick up stuff which for some reason she dropped A LOT this week AND take her grumpy attitude as she took the pain and turned it into a foul mood which I was the only one to receive.

I of course prayed for easing of her pain and tried to be helpful, but sometimes ya just get frustrated being called upon repeatedly for stupid or silly stuff over and over again. Or most annoying was her getting mad at me cuz I didn't cater to the kids the way she would have. Acting like I was starving them because I wouldn't give them the food or treats they preferred the seconded they wanted it rather than on the schedule I try to keep them on.

And then there's Dad. I love him but sometimes I just want to shake him and force him to do what he should do. His toe was hurting this week. Okay maybe he hurt it and forgot blah blah, we all do that. But when the pain didn't go away or wasn't in a spot that added up, I as usual suggested he go to a doctor. But as much as I love him, he is king of refusing to go to a doctor. Whether it's plain stubbornness or fear of what they'll tell him or annoyance with treatment in the past, he refuses to go. Joy. He's no spring chicken, but he's no old man either. I just wish he'd take care of himself so I can have him around longer rather than telling me he's afraid he's not gonna be around longer. "Well do something!!! Cuz I'm not ready to lose you and I'm running out of patience to ignore your refusals and complaints that ya won't do anything about anyway." Le sigh. I pray for him too.

I should be a good daughter and smile through it all. To help either without complaint and continue to be soothing... But that lack of patience seems to get worse and my bedside manner suffers. So if they ever read this, I'm sorry in advance.

Seriously, if neither of them is going to get better or do something about getting better, then I pray our Lord returns soon before I lose either of them or they get so bad they need constant care and suffer at my hands for it. Le sigh.

The Almost Pet

Today turned out to be a sucktastic day. Weeks of talking about taking in a couple of strays. Finally setting aside money for vet costs (a.k.a. pulling from future financial relief). An appointment is set. Even managed to go to bed EARLY to wake up EARLY so I could be able to go out and catch one of the strays. And then for it all to come to such a disappointing and for me at least (probably Mom too) heartbreaking end.

Now that I think about it, we probably should have known. Mom felt an urgency to getting Licorice inside. She said she had a feeling he was sad or depressed. He didn't seem to have the same spirit he used to have when he would meow (endlessly) outside our door. Someone MUST have talked to him A LOT because he is a HUGE talker. Since he always talked to me, I didn't notice anything off about him but she had a gut feeling about it. It just turned out to be the wrong warning.

With Mom's feelings of urgency we started turning talks into actions. Money was withdrawn in advance to be set aside for the appointment. The laundry room was mostly cleaned out in case we had to quarantine him due to minor stuff like parasites or lil infections. I MADE myself go to bed super early (for me, so like before 2a.m.) so I could wake up and shower before it was time to feed the strays when it was light out (6:30a.m. usually). Okay so I got up a smidgeon later than planned but I was out of the shower before it got light anyway. I stayed outside after kitty feedings to wait for Tundra to leave and so Licorice wouldn't have to spend ALL morning in the carrier. Well I stayed out as long as I could and since I can't stand or crouch outside forever and it was kinda nippy it wasn't too too long.

The easy part was getting Licorice in the carrier. I put a lil dish of treats  in the back and since he already lets me grab him, I just scooped, guided, and let him walk into the carrier. He was so distracted with the treats he didn't even care that I closed the door behind him. That was the easy part.

The moment the treats were gone, he started crying....for the next two and a half hours! He paused for breath or when I reached in to pet him (which was every so often or when he got super loud while Mom was working). In between shush/pet sessions, I ate breakfast, packed snackage (for both of us), a book, and the paper I'm writing the draft of this on, and got ready to go. Mom's break was at 10:15a.m., so she dropped Licorice and I off for what we thought would be a longish visit. Oh and wow, I thought Oreo hated car rides! Maybe he still does, but Licorice was louder than Oreo ever was! Or maybe it just seemed that way. Poor traumatized Licorice.

Licorice is a 10lb, neutered, 4-5 year old male that did surprisingly well in the vet's office apart from the crying while in the carrier. But it still wasn't meant to be...

....

Friday, October 14, 2011

AND that's where I left off. I don't remember why I stopped. Maybe texting too much with Mom and Dad about how she was almost off work or maybe just too upset to continue.

Licorice was tested positive for Feline Aids which isn't as bad as Feline Leukemia but would still lead to regular medical care and costs we weren't able to deal with or afford, not to mention the testing and vaccinating we'd need to keep up with our own cats. I spent a couple hours at some tables outside the nearby Starbucks writing that and crying that we couldn't keep Licorice. After an hour of continued cry-meowing, Licorice finally settled and tried to sleep. When Mom picked me up, we took him straight to the shelter. If someone adopted him who could afford to, great. If not, at least he wouldn't suffer outside anymore or unloved for too long. I meant to call back and see if someone had adopted him, but I was too afraid of the answer. And they'd told us no black cats were allowed to be adopted during October (to prevent sickos from taking him to be cruel or something for Halloween) if he was still around then. The fact that he was infected is means Snickers is likely infected too. We will eventually take them all straight to the shelter now....

Cooking? Baking? What's that?

Okay, so pretty much since we left Anaheim, I've done more of the cooking than Mom and that was never super often. But like now? This past year alone it's become almost nonexistent. And by cooking I mean simple meals, pasta, chicken and some simple rice or pasta, easy skillets, pre-made lasagna, etc,... All super easy meals with little to no prep required. Once in a while Mom'll cook something. And baking? Well, that's been a no go for like years now. :-(

Anywho... Now that we've survived the heat of summer, maybe I'll look into cooking again even if it is just simple stuff. But more importantly, this holiday season, I'll take up the mantle and bake one of Mom's traditional cookies. Well maybe. I still may chicken out of it for fear of screwing it up. :-P But every Christmas I MISS her variety of unique cookies. I may not make a lot, but I'll make enough to enjoy and if I'm successful, I may even make more to share with Nana.

Cookie of choice: Chocolate-pecan Acorn Cookies

(hopefully mine look like this)

"Remind me of this feeling"

Mom's words to me yesterday as we discussed for the millionth time how much our hearts hurt seeing strays or former pets at our door, crying for more.....everything. Remind her of how awful we feel at not being able to do anything for next time so we don't start up with a new batch of strays (that is if we move). "Can't we just adopt them, we're already feeding them?" I swear if we were well off we'd probably adopt them all. If it weren't for vet costs, I'd probably give in to her and say yes.

We'd take them to the shelter to be adopted or put down, except the one who needs help the most I'm afraid to touch or try and catch.. Tundra, who's been here since we got here, is so messed up looking now and I don't think she can see well anymore so she's so defensive of anything approaching her. Every now and then someone cleans her up though (her ears get all chewed up looking and bloody), so she must trust someone. Wish that person would take her into the shelter if they can't adopt her completely. She used to be such a beautiful white and fluffy and friendly kitty. Now? She's so thin and always looks depressed and her ears and eyes are bad... I know it's terrible, but Mom and I actually pray for God to put an end to her suffering.

Snickers is friendly but so skiddish again lately. Don't know why she's so scared again. So she'd be difficult to put in a carrier. Which sucks, cuz I think fleas are like eating her alive. That or she's got what feels like scabs for other reasons. And now she's all thin. Not that I expect strays to be plump, but we are feeding them regular meals almost every day so they should at least not be losing weight. Wish we'd adopted her when we first saw her. Now I'd be too worried of the parasites she'd inflict on my own babies.

Praline is not friendly, but he's thin and I wish we could at least take him in so maybe someone could be taking care of him. Praline and Snickers supposedly belong to a neighbor down the street (not sure where exactly). "Rescued" from the shelter for the daughter so she could have "a kitty". But the stupid mother relies on her daughter to be the sole person responsible for taking care of them. o.O Yeah, cuz kids make super judgement calls without parental supervision. Sharing in the responsibility is one thing, but she was so flippant about even taking advice from me about pet care. "Oh well tell my daughter." o.O Excuse me? YOU tell your fracking daughter! So yeah, they let their cats wander the streets, which I get some people do, but they also apparently don't feed them enough (if at all....). They're covered in fleas and carrying who knows what else.

Licorice... He/she's a beautiful black cat who talks A LOT. Mom says, he had to have had a loving owner once who talked to him/her a lot cuz he/she learned it from someone. Licorice still has a collar on (albeit a very dirty one). But he/she's thin. And now something's wrong with an eye. Infection or something? :-( Yet another baby, I wish we could adopt. We want to believe he/she somehow got out...that there's a concerned owner looking for their lost pet or waiting for Licorice to return....

Tundra was probably fed or cared for by the previous renter (the owner said her son had a cat?) since she was here practically from day one. Praline and Snickers were adopted by morons. Licorice is lost maybe.... Why do people take in pets if they don't intend to care for them? If it's too much, take them back! Maybe someone else can do better. Or even if no one else adopts, they'll be humanely put down and suffering will be prevented....

Soon as we're more on our feet to afford vet costs, we'll try and bring them to a vet or shelter depending on if we think we can adopt or if we think we can't handle long term vet costs... Pray with us that they either get rescued, end suffering, or are granted health and strength long enough for us to get financially better equipped. And pray their cries don't break our hearts anymore than they already do. Oy, and that no more strays find us! Ugh... Next time, when I tell her I don't want to feed strays, maybe she'll listen.... I'll shut up now....

Movie Adventure....Two Years in the Making....

Trips to the movies for Mom and I weren't frequent, but now and then she and I would see a movie or two by ourselves. That kinda stopped to a dead halt when we moved here though. Everything kinda stopped when we moved here. Like moving to her home town kinda just reinforced the sadness and depression of losing her Dad. I figured she come out of it in time.... It only got worse when we lost him though.

We finally made it out of the house for a fun non-appointment/errand related occasion. It's been more than two years since Mom went to a movie and the last time was the day before so I knew it might be hard. I woke up and half expected her to cancel on me like she'd done before. She was napping (the crazy lady wakes at like 4a.m.!) so I hopped in the shower to get ready. She musta heard me cuz while in the shower, I heard her taking stuff outta the bathroom. She was even gonna do her hair (as opposed to just clipping it up)! Cautiously optimistic...

After making her bed (clean sheet day) and finishing getting ready, we left with what we thought would be plenty of time to get tickets, pick up some Juice it Up smoothies, and some mini pizzas from the food court. Cautiously optimistic turned to cautiously excited.... We talked light heartily on the way while she was mainly focused on reading directions. No apparent freak outs was a good sign.

We got there ridiculously early (norm for us) but it seemed we were made even MORE ridiculously early as the theater no longer allowed outside food inside! Gasp! How can they have that rule? I mean Starbucks is a mere few feet away from the theater! Bleh. Anywho, as it was a Friday the lil shop stands/carts weren't open to help kill time. Ah well... And we'd left our books in the car cuz we admitted whenever we brought them before we never read them from lack of time or too much goofing. D'oh!

Got a large soda and medium popcorn to share and planned to visit the Juice it Up and pizza place as a take home treat after the movie. But alas we were too full-ish after to even bother and really enjoy it. Ah well. Next time. :-D

There was sooooo much action in that movie! I love all the Transformers movies. :-D The action. The music. The funnies.  :-D Love 'em all! And this one did not disappoint. I wanna see it again, cuz man there was just so much going on we like feel as if we missed stuff. Mom was like what no mention of the last girl? She musted blinked and missed the quickie mention the bots made. :-P Some very cool scenes in there! :-D

And then we came home having survived her first fun outing in over two years. I think I almost cried when I ran out of the theater to go get something after we had gotten our seats. Praise God for giving her the strength to make it out. :-) She says the next outing she wants to be with me and Dad. If Dad doesn't mind, I would like the three of us to go out for a meal or something. :-) It'd be kinda nice. We'll see. All in time... Hurray for now and ta ta!

The Long Day

Okay so the intent to blog sorta fizzled last night. I started it. But, me being me, I was easily distracted and then forgot where I was going. So here I am starting anew....

Last week I had my eye exam. Fun stuff. But I was prepared. That is, I went to bed early (for me) and didn't read before bed or during the car ride (which was a half hour ride at least with no reading!!!). When we got there we had to find how to even get in as apparently they'd moved buildings since our last visit (too many years ago to even remember). Looks like the optometry school's doing good, cuz it was a nice lobby and the exam rooms look nicer too (well slightly but with good comps. in all the rooms now). I didn't see the kids play area they used to have, which is a GOOD thing cuz those kids got noisy. Geesh!

The exam itself would have normally been 90 minutes plus a second visit to finish. But thankfully, it didn't feel that long and they didn't need to schedule a return trip AND most importantly they did NOT have to dilate my eyes! Man I HATE when they have to put any drops in my eyes. Heh. The intern or whatever was even gonna get me some eye drops to take home as they seemed dry to her? I never noticed a problem. But I smiled at her and told her not to bother as I'll never use them. :-P They showed me some filter glasses/shades in a hideous yellow tint but I was surprised to see the yellow tint helped reading certain texts better. May have to take a trip to Home Depot/Lowes type places to see if I can get a sheet of it (small-like, maybe bookmark size) cuz they said it'd be cheaper than buying the clip on lenses and I only wanted it for reading. I got a new and slightly better magnifier since I told them I use it to read a lot right now when it's too hot to wear glasses.

Then the fun part and the primary reason for going. New glasses. The new lenses should be slightly better than my last, and let's face it, not much changes there. And miracle of miracles! They helped me pick out some frames I actually love! Not just "oh these are prettier than the rest" or "these don't suck", but frames I actually think looked awesome and Mom was in agreement. :-D

All the "fun" was over and it was time to tally the bill. Eeesh. All I can say is.... Thank you, Dad, for coming to our rescue again! I was shocked. I mean I knew the exam alone was $$$, but the rest? And okay I could have made do with the magnifier I had... But man, I've left there with more gadgets and stuff before. No wonder the government dropped eye care for its SSI people. Probably saving a fortune right there! Not that it's fair or right, but wow. How much did I cost the government with my annual eye exams and almost yearly new pair of glasses and toys? Anywho. I will most definitely take better care of glasses and magnifier from this point on.

The shock wore off some on the ride home, and we mentally prepared for more fun.... Oreo needed a vet trip and since Mom was already off, we took advantage. We actually wanted to take them both in. Figuring if it were ear mites (which it was) Pixie might have them too and if not she needs a shot to open up her nasal passage (something she will probably need every few months for the rest of her life but something we haven't done in a while). The carrier was prepped before we left for the eye doc. I tried to catch Pixie first, as she's more difficult to catch. But the little witch must have read our minds or something cuz she was hiding and would NOT come out even for treats. Brat. Time was running out as we had an appointment so we had to settle for leaving her home. Just as well as he was expensive enough. ~.~

The car ride sucked. I rode in back passenger seats with Oreo in the carrier while he CRIED the entire way with big bug eyes and weird panting mouth open. Breaks our hearts every time.

Mom finally met Pixie's vet at the goooood vet clinic. Mom says it was like night and day compared to the other place with the completely unfriendly vet witch they had. As the two places were in the same parking lot, we joked that our place must pick up a lot of their old business. Anywho... It was ear mites. The vet thought it was weird cuz we said Pixie hadn't exhibited any symptoms. We figured it must have been some (however brief) contact with the strays. Paws under doors touching? Mites or blood shaken off onto the door and Oreo soon after rubbing his face onto it? Ugh. Vet gave us heavy duty Advantage for them both and enough drops for both Oreo and Pixie (so she didn't escape any torturing). The visit. The Advantage (and this is where it sucks, we usually give them stuff but hadn't due to poor budgeting, so we could have prevented this!). The ear drops. Lots of $$$ and my stupid CareCredit card didn't work cuz the year of no interest apparently ended last month so yeah that sucked. Mom wrote a check.

Car ride home sucked too.

Soon as we were able, we gave Oreo AND Pixie Advantage for parasities and then ear drops. Mom says today or tomorrow's the last day of the cold (yep it's refrigerated stuff) ear drops. Good cuz the daily torture session's no fun. :-P For them. :-P Mom and I make fun of the sound of the stuff being rubbed into their ears or their fat bellies cuz of the way I hold them still. :-P

After the torturing was over, I got busy decontaminating our screen door. Yep smelled strongly of bleach for hours.

All in all it was a totally exhausting day. Mom and I were worn out.

Financially it was a sucktastic day. But it did not put a damper on the plans to go to the movies. If all goes well, more on that later.... For now, I have dishes to do and if I'm a good girl I'll go to bed, but if not I'll probably come back for a bit more net fun. :-P

Maybe Ready....

So Friday, I was looking up bus schedules for the theater (or trying to as MTA couldn't find the address I gave it) and Mom heard me grumbling. She questioned where I was going and I told her to the movies. She asked when and I told her I was thinking about Monday or Wednesday (which now that I think about it, I couldn't have done cuz of the dumb eye appointment :-P ). She asked if it could wait til like Friday cuz she had it off and....cuz SHE WANTS TO GO. Really? She says she's been thinking about it for a while. And that's why she'd like to start walking (only we're both knuckleheads who keep forgetting to go before it gets dark) and she wants to get out some. So... I didn't ask her this time. She said she wasn't ready last time we tried. So maybe this time? We'll see. If not I guess Transformers 3 can wait until the following Monday. And if we do make it, she even suggested seeing the last Harry Potter movie. That we really will have to see... Movie tickets ain't cheap and we always want popcorn and soda. As is this time, I have that free ticket. :-D

Slept at night and woke at 10am for the second time today...yesterday. Mom and I watched the first three Indiana Jones movies. We'll have to watch the newest one Monday after work. Going to go mimi even earlier tonight (aka in a couple hours at the latest). Like after I finish blogging then go wash dishes and other pre-bed chores. Shoulda started them sooner actually, but I do so love to procrastinate and I was kinda sluggish. :-P Ah well... Anywho, off I go or else I'll be up in time to feed the kids and I dun wanna be.

Insanity?

I've stayed up ALL day and night at least three times in the past week and a half. Why? No reason. Day just got later and later as I was too busy goofing off online or watching TV or whatever and some days I just don't feel like going to bed at 2-3pm and waking up at actual night time. I can't say I'm really proud of myself for doing it. I dunno what happened. I always stay up way too late. But it's gotten way worse. And you'd think after a weekend of waking early due to outings or whatnot that it should be easy to maintain a reasonable sleep schedule, but I muck it up every single time. Le sigh. Anywho, I'm still up today, and while I "napped" yesterday before So You Think You Can Dance was on (which I still overslept for), I will chance it for tonight's episode. I do have to try hard to go to bed before dawn at the latest, I mean geesh. My excuse used to be to feed the kids so Mom didn't have to bend over to put their bowls down and hurt her back more, but they eat at 430am now. We'll see how it goes. I'm going to really try though. And I do have some incentives... Since Dad's working Saturday, I was gonna see if Mom was game for a movie marathon. Sunday's a possible Daddy Day IF he will cooperate!!! :-P And I still want to try and catch Transformers 3 before it leaves the theater. Now that means bussing to and fro and that has to be during daylight hours. So I figured I'd aim for Monday or Wednesday for that since it's too late this week... So NOT doing movies during busier times like weekends. Yick.

Friend of mine showed me a site to write articles online for money. Not a lot of money, but it's not a lot of writing either with two days to do it in. But while I signed up, I didn't do the test article to see if my writing's good enough. I looked at the assignment as if I were looking at some foreign language. It's been almost a decade since I last looked at HOMEWORK and that's exactly what it looked like. I felt so incredibly stupid. Like what the heck was I supposed to write about? Did I have to do research for this? Cuz $5-6 is so not enough to cover research time and writing. Maybe if the topics were interesting. I'll give it a shot. Incoming funds is incoming funds. Stupid sleeping schedule aside, I wish I had a regular job already. I wish I had that motivation I had when I was working. I wish I could make my lazy ass DO something about that. But until I stop being crazy lazy stupid, I'll have to give this content current thing a serious try.

Finally made an eye appointment after YEARS of putting it off. I go to this low vision clinic at an optometry school. Now cuz of my legally blind status, I got the eye care for free.... I really should not have put off that appointment. But I used to go yearly due to the excessive eye strain while in school or the need to replace glasses or the combo of the two. And as that wasn't the case until recently, I put it off. Also, they gave me REALLY long exams and thorough evaluations or whatever as I was apparently a good learning case for the students. Anywho, hours of eye exams is sooo exhausting and eye straining that I dread it every time. But I finally need new glasses (mostly cuz mine are fairly scratched to the point of distraction now) and can no longer put it off. I should not have waited though because California's budget has gotten crappier and crappier. I survived the monthly income checks being shaved off here and there over the past few years. But I had no idea they cut my eye care. Now I only have basic medical coverage I guess.... How do you cut eye care for a legally blind person???? I shudder to think how seriously blind people are coping! Anyway.... to go to the same eye clinic (and cuz they always gave me GREAT glasses and stuff I need to) it'll cost $165 just for a basic eye exam! Geesh. Of course I have no idea how much those things go for normally and what all that'll entail. But we'll see. Gotta do what I gotta do I guess... Appointment's next Wednesday, wish me luck.

On a not so insane note... Daddy sent me flowers!!!! :-D Okay he sent them two weeks ago (wow time flies!) and I meant to blog it then, but I did Facebook it... Anywho, after two weeks they still look pretty good! :-D Not gonna take a new pic now tho to prove it, cuz I'm lazy and tired and so here's a pic I took like a day after I got them (not that anyone hasn't seen them by now cuz you all are mostly on fb and see the pic as my profile pic :-P ):

Anywho... Time to go wake myself up with a shower... I'll take a nap (though not laying down on super comfy bed cuz I won't wake in time) later I'm sure...or nod while vegging in front of TV or comp. But anywho! Toodles doodles!

That didn't take long...

Not that I thought I'd ACTUALLY post daily, but two days in a row was sorta impressive for me considering the several months off. :-P ANYWHO!

Let's see... Spent just about the entire weekend with Dad. :-D In fact if either of us could stand sleeping at the other's place, it probably woulda been smarter to do that, but we can't so that's that. :-P We're used to sleeping and showering in our own messy houses and he's got this device thingie he has to sleep with and probably not wise to let him sleep where cats might crawl all over him and leave their cat hairs on him. Oh and of course there's the issue of sharing comp time. :-P But as Sunday was Father's Day,I would've had to be sneaky about making the lil things I did for him if he had stayed here. But anyway, I'm rambling. What else is new?

It was a relatively quiet and relaxing weekend. Played our fb games before getting ready and after he got to my house...went to breakfast at our usual place (well actually, Friday was a lunch and it was a yummy Greek Salad)...depending on the day, stopped at a store or two for shopping and silliness...hung out at his place (turns at the comp, reading, napping, TV watching, general chillaxing!).. .then dinner picking up and eating at my place! It was nice. And I finished the other book I was reading by the end of Sunday night! Though I had hoped to have finished before Sunday and even packed the next book in the series in my book bag, but oh well...carried the other book for nothing.

Woke up late for Target Tuesday, but luckily, Dad got off work late...so whew! Dad teased me about not having a book to read (from off the shelves, since he bought the last one and I finished it). So while he was fiddling with something on his phone, I started reading The Fallen series by Thomas Sniegoski about nephilim. I saw the Family Channel's mini series based on the books, so thought I'd take a look. It's kinda funny...  The kid cast as the half angel boy is the same one cast as a vampire in CW's Vampire Diaries. :-P From fallen angel's kid to vampire, wow... hehehe... I may have to borrow Dad's copies of the books ifn I like it. Page 7 (really it was like 3 pages but they included acknowledgements and title pages) is too soon to tell.

Eeeps! I should be voting before my time expires! So You Think You Can Dance finally opened up online voting! Did I mention that before? No more stalling. Gotta narrow down my favorites... Toodles!

This is why.....

I just finished the book about Nujood last night (er this morning). There's a saying in Yemen or the region that goes something like "to ensure a happy life, marry a nine year old girl." I think it's based on the Islamic prophet's having had a nine year old wife, although the custom was around for a long time and not exclusive to Islamic peoples so who knows. But ick. Seriously? In Yahoo! Answers someone asked why the prophet married a child and one answer implied people grew up (matured) faster back then. And you know, it's true... But NOT THAT FAST! And certainly not physically or mentally mature for marriage! SOME men (then and now) will agree to wait til puberty before consummating the marriage, but in the book's notes it said that is SOOOO vague. I mean some girls hit puberty at nine (poor poor girls!). I'm glad Nujood got her divorce and that it's inspired other Yemeni and even Saudi girls to seek help too!

See, it's things like this that prove I would have made a terrible anthropologist. No way I could have been an unbiased observer. And here I thought it would have been my spirit wanting everyone to find God that would have been hindrance.

Anywho... Dad's here!

Tuesday's Tomfoolery

As Dad's got the week off for vacation, he made a special trip into San Pedro just so I could still take part in his usual trip to Target and we could still do out Fantastic Cafe dinner afterwards. :-D We got an early start...well for a Target Tuesday outing anyway. :-P After robbing a couple banks, and goofing at Target, and picking up food, AND eating said food, Dad was still able to leave while it was still a little light out!

I'm currently reading two books: one of the House of Night books (a vampire series) and I am Nujood, Age 10 and Divorced (a book I stumbled on at Target weeks ago). On both, I'm like 60-75 pages away from finishing. HoN book, I have shamefully been reading for ages now. Bad me. Gotta set aside time each day for reading. Nujood I read 30 pages over the course of weeks (I'd read a few pages each Target trip) until Dad finally just bought it for me. It's a shocking story. I mean not one I've never heard of unfortunately. But it's still sad to hear it from this girl's point of view. I hope to finish both books by the end of the week.

I'm waiting on the edge of my seat for a friend to post a reply to an RP thread. But alas, she's got two or three summer college classes and volunteer work and an apparent absentee muse. Le sigh. Gonna have to focus my creative efforts elsewhere to pass the time.

I got my first charge for Netflix today. The first month was free. I figure I'll keep it at least one month and get a few more old Doctor Who DVD rentals out of it, the forth disc is due tomorrow. We'd have seen more of them, except we (Mom and I) tended to forget we had them. Gotta do better and get the most out of my buck. Debating on finishing the series I started on the watch instantly options or move on to another show. Hmmm.. I wonder if they have So You Think You Can Dance on instant play. Hmm...

Anywho... That's the scatterbrained mind for today. Off to watch some shows and eat some left over KFC!

I Have a Blog?

I know. I've been terrible. And as someone else just started up blogging again, I think I'll give it a go. Actually, I was thinking of giving it a try the other day, but got distracted. I'm good at that lately. Stupid Facebook games. For as much as I tease my dad about being an addict, I must confess I am at least as much of an addict as he is. But it's not even that. Some weeks I can't even sit still long enough to watch an hour TV show. Other weeks I forget about all else but whatever show I am obsessed with at the moment. Recently, it was Blood+, an anime I was watching on Netflix. I was going to write up a blog shortly after my birthday. Even got as far as writing a draft in Word. But I forgot about it, and now I don't feel like putting it up cuz I'd have to edit all the "yesterday" and "last week" type references.

So here goes.... Short sum up of the past two months. Oh geez, has it been that long already? I of course had a birthday. And I got a lot of birthday greetings on Facebook, texts, e-cards (Mom went nuts), international mail with special little gifts, and I got balloons from the outing with my dad (which BTW are still up, well 2 of the 3 anyway). Speaking of international mail, Issi sent me awesome Doctor Who cards! Special gifts from my friends: a hieroglyphic edition of Peter Rabbit :-D and an fabulous anime movie. My friends know me so well and I love them for it!

Around the same time (details are soo fuzzy now), Pixie had another case of UTI and we took her to a new vet in hopes of getting a particular shot our usual vet was out of. Big mistake we will never repeat. Waste of our money and the vet was so cold and unfriendly. And as usual, tried to scare us into getting tests that we could so not afford to pay. But with the antibiotic drops we had to torture her with twice a day and prayer, she has recovered from that. And we've once more altered her diet again, cutting back on certain stuffs or trying to. We're gonna have to take her in to get another shot for her breathing soon though. But the usual vet said some pets are like that, needing to come in every few months for shots to open up her nasal passage. Poor runt was born with a small head and I guess a perma swollen nasal passage way. Le sigh.

Yesterday was Dad's birthday, so we went and hung out. He's on vacation for the week, so we'll probably play again sometime this week. :-D

Since getting the computer fixed, I fell out of the routine of doing my vampire and or RP related stuffs and I think it's time for that hiatus to end. So I am going to TRY and ease up on the FB games even if it means Dad may actually catch up to or pass my levels. :-P But I liked RP way before FB games and I miss the days when I used to RP almost everyday. So, time to wake up the brain. I've started some. A few posts here and there. Now if only I can keep it up this time.

Anywho.. As usual, I'm babbling. I'm sleepy and I have dishes to wash before bed. Yes, gonna try bed before sunrise.

This Week's Babble...

Surprisingly, this week wasn’t so bad. Of course, the two days Mom had off I did sleep like in the noon to six or seven in the evening, only really catching her in the mornings and for a lil bit on Wednesday evening (Thursday, she was asleep when I woke, le whoops or not). Wednesday, had its ups and downs for me, but thanks to words from friends, I wasn’t allowed to succumb to full on sadness and more remembered happier memories of my brother. Thank you Issi and Sarah.


Mom mentioned she heard him call out for her. I don’t know (and she doesn’t either) if she dreamed it or what. If it was more than a dream, I wish he’d tell her to live her life again. Actually, no. I pray he tells her, cuz she doesn’t listen to me. Maybe she did hear him though. Why not? When I get sad about him and close my eyes, I see his smiling face or can hear (as in remember hearing) him saying his Mooom’s or Daaaad’s while making that face of his. Maybe that’s him. Maybe that’s God trying to cheer me up. And of course I’m blessed with dreams of him looking happy more often than bad dreams. I pray both my parents are blessed with those happy moments I have with him and any unhappy ones swept away from them.


Anywho… I’m sure there are more ups and downs to be had this month as his birthday approaches. I will still have to be careful not to crack those eggshells and remember not to mention his name in her company. More on that later I guess…


Mom got a package from work. Her new phone system, which she was looking forward to since Pixie chewed through her old headset wires and forced her to use the phone handset. FYI, in case no one knew, holding the phone between head and shoulder hurts…worse for the woman with many slipped disks up and down her back and neck and who has to do so for most of eight hours a day. But alas, even though I set up the wires correctly (according to the diagrams they sent), the phone or the power box doesn’t work. Two separate days they’ve tried to fix it. Today (a.k.a. yesterday cuz it’s still today for me but technically a new day), a younger or less experienced tech guy even tried messing with settings on our router… Genius… Got both of us disconnected… Well no. Our computers said we were connected but internet couldn’t be access… Moron… And he kept like forgetting what he was saying. Seriously, if the head tech guy who tried on Tuesday failed and said he’d send new wires, why on earth did this guy think he could do better?? I kept whispering to Mom (as she had me listen on speaker cuz I speak better tech than she does not that I’m an expert) that if he broke our router he is sooooo buying us a new one. Anywho, he put it all back the way he found it.


As a result of his meddling tho, I had to restart the laptop along with hers several times and so I finally gave up on turning on Y!M…. HAD I had it on, I would have gotten the e-mail from Geek Squad this morning (a.k.a. Friday morning). But ah well, now that I think of it, it would have done no good anyway... But here’s the e-mail I’ve been waiting for! :-D

With plans of picking up my baby this weekend, this week should have ended on a high note. But noooo. Our toaster oven died. It’s Friday and since I can’t order pizza I like to enjoy my French bread pizzas, which we throw in the toaster oven rather than the big oven. Mom had had one earlier in the afternoon with no problems…. But alas that was the last to be toasted. I smelled something funny like chemical or plastic but couldn’t find the source while the pizzas were in… I even checked the lil oven too! But after the timer dinged and I went to get my grub, which I was already waaay too hungry for. And I was bummed to see they were still mostly cold and far from cooked. Again WAAAY too hungry to wait for the oven to heat up, so I had to resort to microwaving them. I don’t recommend it. Had I not been hungry and already tossed the wrappers I’da saved them for another day. Bleh, most unsatisfying. So this weekend has two errands now…. Gotta find an inexpensive toaster oven now. Microwave needs replacing but still works and is too expensive, but surely I can find a cheap toaster oven, right?


Since I’m updating files I copied to here to move back to the fixed desktop I found the pic of my Angels Mickey. Well it’s not a pic I took, but it’s just to show ya what he looks like. :-D

Also came across the screenshots I took of my fb addiction… CSI: Crime City. :-P I made the main one look as close as I could to look like me. The second one I made (yes I made an alt) look like the vampire agent Sarah and I joked about. :-P Dad jokes he’ll have to make one, but he’s already spending more time on it than I ever thought he would. Le whoops! Sorry for giving you an addiction Daddy!!! But to be fair, you gave Mom and I way more addictions. Hehehe…

(I'm at level 56 now thanks to a game adjustment)

And cuz this blog isn't long enough... Here's something I saw on someone else's blog that I had meant to share long time ago:

“Date a girl who reads. Date a girl who spends her money on books instead of clothes. She has problems with closet space because she has too many books. Date a girl who has a list of books she wants to read, who has had a library card since she was twelve.


Find a girl who reads. You’ll know that she does because she will always have an unread book in her bag. She’s the one lovingly looking over the shelves in the bookstore, the one who quietly cries out when she finds the book she wants. You see the weird chick sniffing the pages of an old book in a second hand book shop? That’s the reader. They can never resist smelling the pages, especially when they are yellow.


She’s the girl reading while waiting in that coffee shop down the street. If you take a peek at her mug, the non-dairy creamer is floating on top because she’s kind of engrossed already. Lost in a world of the author’s making. Sit down. She might give you a glare, as most girls who read do not like to be interrupted. Ask her if she likes the book.


Buy her another cup of coffee.


Let her know what you really think of Murakami. See if she got through the first chapter of Fellowship. Understand that if she says she understood James Joyce’s Ulysses she’s just saying that to sound intelligent. Ask her if she loves Alice or she would like to be Alice.


It’s easy to date a girl who reads. Give her books for her birthday, for Christmas and for anniversaries. Give her the gift of words, in poetry, in song. Give her Neruda, Pound, Sexton, Cummings. Let her know that you understand that words are love. Understand that she knows the difference between books and reality but by god, she’s going to try to make her life a little like her favorite book. It will never be your fault if she does.


She has to give it a shot somehow.


Lie to her. If she understands syntax, she will understand your need to lie. Behind words are other things: motivation, value, nuance, dialogue. It will not be the end of the world.


Fail her. Because a girl who reads knows that failure always leads up to the climax. Because girls who understand that all things will come to end. That you can always write a sequel. That you can begin again and again and still be the hero. That life is meant to have a villain or two.


Why be frightened of everything that you are not? Girls who read understand that people, like characters, develop. Except in the Twilight series.


If you find a girl who reads, keep her close. When you find her up at 2 AM clutching a book to her chest and weeping, make her a cup of tea and hold her. You may lose her for a couple of hours but she will always come back to you. She’ll talk as if the characters in the book are real, because for a while, they always are.


You will propose on a hot air balloon. Or during a rock concert. Or very casually next time she’s sick. Over Skype.


You will smile so hard you will wonder why your heart hasn’t burst and bled out all over your chest yet. You will write the story of your lives, have kids with strange names and even stranger tastes. She will introduce your children to the Cat in the Hat and Aslan, maybe in the same day. You will walk the winters of your old age together and she will recite Keats under her breath while you shake the snow off your boots.


Date a girl who reads because you deserve it. You deserve a girl who can give you the most colorful life imaginable. If you can only give her monotony, and stale hours and half-baked proposals, then you’re better off alone. If you want the world and the worlds beyond it, date a girl who reads.


Or better yet, date a girl who writes.”


- Rosemary Urquico

Eggshell Season…

Nope. I’m not talking about Easter baskets and plastic eggshells stuffed with hidden treasures. Today marks two years. I knew his birthday would be a sad one as Tata’s birthdays were always full of sadness or general foul moods. But I guess I kinda hoped we wouldn’t be that family that annually marked the day we lost him.

…

Mom took off today and tomorrow but I’m sure she would have taken the entire week if she could have. I’m pretty sure she will be taking off the Friday before his birthday and possibly the Monday after again if she has the hours. Dad too is taking time off, but then he was planning on taking off the end of the week anyway I thought cuz he worked straight through the weekend.

…

I mean it’s not a nothing day. It’s still too fresh in our memories for that. But in giving it more attention than the passing sad reminder it would have been if life continued normally just seems like taking a step backwards. His birthday will probably always be sad, like Tata’s is for Mom. But I don’t want to think about THE day. It brings up WAY too sad memories of THE day and the days that followed other than just being sad for the loss, like forcing me to relive a car wreck or something.

…

So while I’ll try and live this week as normal as possible, I have to walk on eggshells. Can’t bring up him. Heck, I’m even afraid to mention the name even when it’s not in reference to him. Part of me thinks now would be a really good time to go off on a solo adventure. Yeah right. Today I’ll sleep most of the day, which will do the same thing….reduce the hours I’m around her while she’s awake. Tomorrow, we’ll see. But there’s no movies I’m willing to blow cash (okay movie pass) on and unless I wake early enough, doubtful I’ll go to Dis to take pictures. I’ll try to be the good daughter when we’re both awake and do as she asks without delays or complaint, but mostly I think I’ll spend this week hiding (even more so than usual) in the computer and in my movies. Maybe if I don’t see her obsessing, I won’t be reminded of what she’s obsessing over.

Too Late for March

Eeeks!!! I can’t believe it’s been over a month since my last blog! For shame!!! My poor neglected blogger and my poor deprived followers. The sad part is I put up more facebook statuses now and I thought I wouldn’t be all into that cuz like what would I post? If I had anything to say, I used to put it here…. So, bad me…

…

I know there was stuff I was gonna share, but it escapes me now. So, alas, highlights are all you’ll get if I remember that much. It was more than likely nonsensical filler anyway (not that there still won’t be some of that)…

…

Okay, so what’s been up with me? Issi and I had our last Dis day a couple days before she moved to way far away England. That night while helping with some packing, I saw those spiffy space saver bag things in action. Seriously gotta get us some of those! Left her house with another load of books, an Angels Mickey (which I’d show ya but the pic’s on the other comp) from Issi, and a couple Mickey hair clips I bought. What I didn’t leave with was the laptop she was giving me. Le whoops! But hey, we were tired and it was late.

…

The details of Daddy Days and Target Tuesdays are mostly blurred together in lots of fun and silliness. We did work on our records for getting home (either to his place on DDs or my place on TTs or DDs) super late! Last weekend we hit the all time high of not even getting to his place until what 6:30pm? That used to be the time we’d be getting ready to leave to head back to my place! :-P TEEHEE!

…

I did eventually restore my computer all by myself. And it was a successful failure. It was done successfully but failed to fix the problems. But at least now I won’t be so scared if I should ever have to do it again next time. After a week of more crapping out, I gave in to taking the thing back to Best Buy’s Geek Squad to fix it. So last weekend, we took it in and after an overnight analysis they said the hard drive was bad. Joy. So my baby will be gone for weeks. Same weekend, Dad took me to Issi’s to pick up the laptop (and it’s blue! :-D ). After adding memory and virus protection, here I am again. :-D So thank you Issi!!! Thank you Dad!!!

…

As laptops run hotter than desktops or at least the ones I’ve ever used (old one and this one), I won’t be leaving it on so much. Which means I’ll be doing…gasp…non compy related stuff like….reading!!! :-o I’ve already read 40-50 odd pages or so in the past few days (not counting what I read over the weekend, Dad). And I’m catching up on tapes and movies. Weee…

…

Have I mentioned I love snail mail? And international mail seems more fun for some weird reason. I am happy to hear Sarah got her card in time (especially since I didn’t send it out as early as I had planned). And I got an awesome postcard from Issi! Snail mail in general is fun, so I may have to break out the stationary again. :-D

…

An interesting lil event took place just the other day (Tuesday morning). My old neighbor from our last place needed security clearance for his job so he put down references and I was among them since we knew him for a couple years. So the lady from whatever official defense place she came from came to my house for like a ten-minute interview on him. Seems like an awful waste of gas to go driving around for a couple of answers, but whatever. It was interesting and I was glad I could help. He’s a super nice guy so I hope all goes well with his job.

…

Anywho…. Meant to get this up before the month was up so March wouldn’t be all bare, but ah well… More blogs to come later. Hello April!

Open Sesame

I. Hate. Writer’s. Block.

I have soooo many things I want to write for RPs and for stories and when I sit down to write, all that happens is me staring at a blank Word doc for hours. And as it took me a good bit of time to come up with that first line here, I guess it affects my blogging too. It, among other things, has been kinda bringing me down. Wanting so much to write and yet being seemingly stuck. I know before when I was stuck on one RP I’d just switch gears and work on another, but then I feel guilty for working on the one that’s been overdue the longest. Heck, I feel super bad I just left all Kila’s friends hanging for like ever. But those folks make me cringe with their super short posts and lack of basic spell/grammar check and…. -shudders- their use of first person writing. I can read books in first person, but then authors who have professional editors tend to do a pretty good job of writing in that format. Your average RPer….not so much. >.< It’s almost as painful as reading a RP post in text/chat-speak.

Okay, done with that bit of babbling….

End of last month, Dad and I took my computer to Best Buy to have the Geek Squad take a look at my computer. It’s been acting up off and on since just before New Year’s Day. The occasional blue screen of death and all that happy jazz. After all standard diagnostic tests (that I could find on my computer already) found nothing, I finally called GS and they told me it might be hardware and to bring it in. Le bummer. But when we got there and they ran their super duper tests, they told me it wasn’t hardware (which was good cuz that’d require sending for parts and a two week wait! :-o ) and more than likely virus related or even software. For $200 they could take it and a) try to find the virus, b) try to remove the virus, and failing those c) restore the computer. >.< BUT they warned that sometimes the removal process sometimes removed bits of software data for Windows making it messed up. So wtf??? Yeah, I said frack that and took it home. I would just restore it myself… Er… at least, I would attempt. ( :-< I miss him.) But like, I’m kinda chicken to attempt it now. Thanks to Dad, I now have an external hard drive which I used to back up my stuff all easy peasy like (using Windows back up tool). So I’m set there. I’d just have to MAYBE call Microsoft and maybe my virus software ppl to ask for permission to put the software meant for x number of computers (all used up) back on the same computer. But I’m kinda scared of screwing up something. A friend of mine tried to help me work around it to avoid restoring as he said it wasn’t perfect either. But I am plagued still with the infrequent and random blue screens. Ah well. I’ll eventually suck it up and do it…I guess.

ANYWHO….

On one of those facebook posts that tells the world (or friends of that person at least) that they’re playing such-n-such game, I saw a name that piqued my interest. I normally just block them automatically, but I was curious. CSI is a show my parents like. I mean I’ll watch it if it’s on and I’m in their rooms or whatever, but it’s not my show. But I was curious how they’d make it into an fb game….and now I’m hooked. >.< On days when I’m positively bored all day, I confess I am guilty of checking in on the game half a dozen times throughout the day. Help! I’ve become one of those fb gamer freaks! But the game does make me kinda want a proper version for say the computer or something. It’s fun. Oh, and since like half if not more of my friends play Bejeweled Blitz, I took a peak. That’s a fun lil game too. But then I always like those types of games (Tetris, Columns, etc,…).

…

I tagged along on a Disneyland trip with Issi, her mom, and her cousin weekend before last (just one of the two days they went as I wasn’t sure how much kid time I could take). Apart from the hiccups in the rides breaking down in the first hour there, it was a fun day! The kid was well behaved, complaining only when the lines were long (who doesn’t) and grumped only after rides broke down (can't blame him there, that sucked! And all the pep talking and getting himself ready for the big roller coaster and everything was almost wasted!). Issi said he was more talkative the day before, but after a LONG day of Dis fun the day before and lack of enough sleep, I can see why he might not have been as chatty. When he was, he was fun to listen to. So, gasp, it’s a miracle, there are some kids I actually like. :-P After Dis, we went to drop him off with his mother and we all went to dinner near her work. I can't remember having met her at the wedding, but I met so many people there. But it was a lot of fun just laughing and talking (okay I mostly listened).

My new Valentine's Day Mickey in cute heart boxer-like shorts. Tehe!

My little leprichaun Mickey :-D

While there, just in case I didn’t go back, I picked up a couple new Mickey’s for my collection. Yes, I know I have so many already, but that won’t stop me from collecting more. :-P This trip I brought home a Valentine’s Mickey and a St. Patrick’s Day Mickey. I’m only missing one for Thanksgiving, Easter, and Fourth of July now. :-P I kinda regret not getting the Steamboat Willie Mickey (online, they only have the bigger ones now). Not sure why I want a black and white Mickey, but I thought the idea was cute. And they had some neon colored Mickeys which are weird and yet I kinda want one of those, too. :-P Perhaps when I’m desperate for a Dis fix before my pass expires I’ll go alone and snag ‘em if they have ‘em.

In black and white! :-P

…

Mom’s left the house twice in the past five days! :-o And neither trip was to a dentist or doctor! Okay, the last one was just a quickie run to the pharmacy, but still! It was an errand she left the house for herself, well I was with her too. But Friday, that was an errand we made together and she even got out of the car! It was a Wal-Mart run that began with a quick stop off at Nana’s. I’m happy to report that the two are again talking to each other. :-D Then we drove for ages cuz of traffic. Fine by me, I had plenty of reading time. :-P And while there, we picked up a few supplies along with the main reason we went, her hand sanitizer (I won’t go into her addiction now >.< ). We also got her a pair of shoes so she can attempt going out for walks and we both got some bummers as ours were worn out. On the way back we hit more traffic (gasp!) but eventually made it back here where we stopped at our old friend’s place….Larry’s burgers. Num.

…

Only a couple more weeks now. I’m excited for her. I’ll miss her, but we’ll still talk online. I think I’ll be missing the OPTION to go see her whenever (never mind the fact that we didn’t take as much advantage as we could before :-P ). Cuz I learned after Sarah moved away from Cali, that it just makes the one or two visits a year all the more special. And again, Issi and I talk more online now anyway, so that’s not really gonna change. We’re gonna hang out at least one more time, a Dis trip that I hope will just be her and I without her mom. I don’t usually mind her mom joining, but this next trip will be my last Dis trip with her and I’d like it to be awesome without worrying about censoring conversations or keeping pace for her.

…

Now that at least for the moment the writer’s block is unblocked, maybe I can try writing those RP posts…. Maybe, it is kinda late and I did just nod off mid writing this. :-P

Haha! Mickeys in technicolor! From the ebay seller (where Issi found the first pic), there's a third option, but it was just TOO colorful for me. :-P They're weird in all their neon colorness, but still cute to me. :-P But then, when don't I think that about Mickey?

The Year of Awesomeness Begins….

While we didn’t go out on our crazy cravings run to celebrate New Year’s (not that I was holding my breath :-P ), I think the year got kicked off great anyway. The old tradition of visiting with Nana on New Year’s morning to grab some menudo (which has been neglected for a couple years now at least) has been replaced with spending the first day of the year with Dad (and apparently visiting Best Buy, hehe). :-D We still got our menudo! Nana dropped some off a few days later. Num! It didn’t last long. :-P

Awesomeness of the month:
-Target Tuesdays all this month with their usual fun, shopping, and dinner from Fantastic Café to be shared with Mom at home…

-While there were fewer Daddy Days (entire weekend days spent with Dad), there were a couple evenings when he came over with dinner and laughter. :-D Amazing how much fun can be had by just being silly around the dining table!

-Birthdays! Nana on the 7th said “it made my day” because she received a funny card from Mom (even though they’re not really talking), a computer made card from me, and flowers from my uncle. I’m glad. She usually says otherwise. Mom was on the 17th and was happy to get love in the form of work IMs and cards from me and Nana. So it was just a nice lil day. :-D And! As the Saturday prior Dad had picked up pizza and cakes, she got her mother load like chocolate cake fix! The 21st was Uncle David’s birthday. I sent him a card and Mom signed it (progress to making up hopefully).

-Had a fun couple of outings with Issi! Actually one of them was half a Daddy Day with breakfast and shopping with Dad and then Issi and I spent the afternoon/evening at Disneyland. :-D AWESOMENESS x2! And this past Sunday, Issi, her parents, and I watched Dad’s borrowed copy of Tron (I still can’t believe $115 on eBay for that!), then went out to dinner and Tron: Legacy in theatres! Good movies!

-As if all that weren’t enough to make it an awesome start to the Year of Awesomeness, Issi found out this week her visa was approved! Yay for Issi! I can’t tell you how happy I am for her. Yes, I will miss her. And now that she’s got tickets, and it’s even more official, I miss her even more. BUT! I am more happy than sad! :-D She deserves to be really happy and I have faith she will be able to finally have that when she’s moved. So, hurray for Issi!!!!! You can start storing your stuff here any day now!

Signs of Awesomeness to come:
-Nana dropped off belated Christmas gift money. Most of which, I’ve decided to save for travel! And I’ve already talked to Mom to sort of get the okay to set aside money each month. My passport expires March 2012 and I fully intend on getting a couple more stamps in it! So wish me luck!

-I think Mom may eventually come around to rejoining the living. Comments here and there. Like talking about all her bummers (casual house/pj type clothes) being worn out being a sign. There’s guilt there for her, but I told her not to make it worse by adding to it with regrets of not spending time with those still living. We’ll see. Prayers for her healing would be appreciated. Also, she (at my urgings) texted her friends. Hopefully she’ll start communicating with them more. Not since we were in high school or maybe even up until we left Anaheim was Mom really a go out person (I mean more than just the once in a while movie). But the odd outings here and there I think kept her sane. Baby steps are all I can hope for.

All in all not a bad way to start off this year. :-D I hope everyone enjoys the Year of Awesomeness!