Q's blues

trying to stay optimistic...

2009-08-26T04:51:00Z

things that made me happy today:
--making key lime pistachio biscotti
--the fact that the lucero shirt i bought at the thrift store a few weeks ago fits
--shopping at the int'l food store w/L
--realizing chef prob doesn't know abt said store, and looking fwd to telling him abt it
--finding mamey (sp?) at said store
--L taking me to dinner at a vietnamese restaurant near my house
--seeing L in general, even if only for a few hours

things that made me cranky today:
--dozing off when i should've been making shortbread or banana cake
--dozing off when i should've been catching up on RE work
--dozing off, making tonight's sleep screwy
--not hearing back from the claims adjuster re my flooded car!

water, water, everywhere...

2009-08-22T23:35:41Z

the highlight of my day today: a flash flood just as i was supposed to be leaving for work. insurance company's recommended shop is closed til monday. wanted to work tonight, restaurant is surely wall to wall people right now because the beaches are closed... and now obviously i need the $$! fortunately i have comprehensive coverage, unfortunately i do not have rental reimbursement coverage. ugh.

edit: roomie got an even better pic. i was still in work clothes, optimistic that the water would stop rising and i'd be able to go to work, so i didn't want to wade into the water that was lapping up into the yard, but she was off today...

jeff lives!

2009-06-26T04:27:02Z

truth be told, i know my very first record ever was a 45 of joan jett & the blackhearts, but my first album was definitely either thriller or rio. they came out the same year, and my memory has been blunted by time and wear & tear, but let's just say it was thriller... what does it say about me that after i heard the news about mj, i thought, hm, there's #3... and thus when i heard that jeff goldblum was also dead, i was completely kerfluffered. knew it wasn't a full moon, and damn, i'd just recently developed a little crush on him-- they say some men get sexier with age, and he for sure proves that point. ed, farrah, michael, only one was a specific icon in *my* lifetime, yet there i was at work bummed that goldblum was gone. and so happy, when i got home and googled him, to find that he is still alive and kicking.

just sayin.

boring? not here.

2009-04-07T18:56:01Z

Just when I was thinking “damn, my life has gotten boring…” A few nights ago, there was a shooting RIGHT outside the house. Somewhere between 9:30 and 10pm, landlady/roomie and I were outside smoking, with the dog in tow, when two guys came walking up the street (out of the pedestrian alley actually—I don’t know what those are properly called, having never lived in an area of townhouses before, but it’s a walkway between rows of houses that gives access to backyards). They were talking a little too loudly and not moving in any particular direction in any sort of hurry, and they gave me a bad vibe. I finished my smoke, waited for roomie to finish hers, and then went inside. Odd thing was, the dog saw the guys too, and paid attention, but did not bark. Mind you, this dog barks at just about everything—if a paper towel falls loose on trash day and comes to rest anywhere in her sight line, she goes nuts. I closed the curtain behind us and started making some dinner. Meanwhile I could hear the guys getting a little louder, even through the closed windows, and I said to roomie, it’s rather odd that the dog is not barking at those loud guys, no? and she said, true to her (IMO misguided) notion that her dog is smart, “she must just know that they’re ok guys,” at which point, on cue, five or six shots rang out. Other roomie had been upstairs in his room, and when the guys got loud, he turned off the lights and started watching, & saw the whole thing go down. Apparently, after roomie & I went inside, someone appeared in a car who was pissed at these guys, and vice versa—the theory we’re going with is that the guys on foot ripped off the guy in the car earlier, then wandered into our neighborhood to hide, but were tracked down. words were exchanged, the guys on foot shot at the guy in the car, & everyone scattered. my car, parked mere yards away, emerged unscathed, miraculously. (I just today learned that the neighbors diagonally across the corner were not so lucky.) the cops came, looked for shell casings & apparently couldn’t find any, we answered their questions as best we could, the end. Other than the dog not barking, I also found it rather disturbing that we were the only people outside once the cops got there. I mean, of course, I don’t expect people to move toward gunfire, and there aren’t usually many people out that late around here—I think there are a few 2nd & 3rd shift workers in the immediate vicinity, and certainly early bird workers who might’ve been asleep already-- but still, the little paranoid part of my brain paused for a bit on the nightmare retaliation scenarios you hear about.

So, of course I started looking on craigslist for a new place, but really, the neighborhood has been quiet up til then, and this kind of shit can happen anywhere. I’d really rather wait to move until I can afford to get my own place, where I can get my crap out of storage and settle in for a while, but I’m taking a wait-and-see attitude. As it stands, notice-wise, I’m here til the end of may—paying to be here, anyway, per my lease agreement, and I’m not in a position to pay rent on two places at once—having a hard enough time just paying for the one. So, here’s a little shout-out to the universe: hook me up with a damn job already!

staying on it

2009-01-13T22:02:45Z

Continued the school research last night—looks like the entire IT AAS I started at JSR can be done online here-- score! Was thinking I should finish the AA first, but I’ll find an advisor at some point and get some advice. Need to ask whether I’m eligible to do CLEP for math & science—apparently some schools won’t let you CLEP if you’ve already attempted to take a similar class. I have, but not at a VCCS school, so gotta find out if that counts. If so, this semester while I’m out of school, I could study up for those & then be ready for the tests whenever. Figure I should study up for them regardless—worst case, I’ll be more prepared for an actual class, and it’ll get me back in the habit of studying. Fingers crossed for CLEP though—3 cr of math plus 8 cr of science = abt $175 for tests versus $1100 for classes. Did some poking around on (awesome!) OpenCourseWare sites for a suitable prep class—haven’t found anything quite right yet but I’m still looking... plenty of other fun stuff there to keep me occupied in the interim.

school drama part 659847

2009-01-12T18:38:06Z

High on the must-do list for 2009 is to get back into school. The only real barrier to that is money. TCC seems to offer more distance learning classes than JSR did, so the time/schedule/transportation issues that I ran into in the past shouldn’t be an issue. I ran out of financial aid eligibility a long time ago, unfortunately… spring classes start tomorrow, so no dice there, but I figured I’d get the ball rolling, fill out the paperwork, etc… so I went to the website to fill out the application online, and naturally, given my loooong history of ridiculous paperwork problems w/colleges, after filling out basically just my name & campus selection, I got an error message. Of course. “Information conflicts with existing records, sorry, you can’t do this.” OF COURSE. This kind of thing has happened pretty much EVERY SINGLE TIME I have tried to sign up for classes. Every time, I think, maybe the universe is putting these barriers in my way to let me know this is the wrong path… but screw that. I suppose this means a campus visit is in my future, where I will undoubtedly be sent from office to office, “oh, you need to talk to X person,” who will say the same about someone else. Woo hoo, I can’t wait! Actually, I WILL wait—no sense fighting the masses the first week of the semester for a problem that doesn’t need to be solved for a few months. Sigh…

In the meantime I should get cracking on having my zillion transcripts sent over (again, after this week), since that too will surely be drama-filled. Last I checked, VCU can’t seem to get it through their heads that I do NOT owe them two grand anymore. I have sent them the requested paperwork to prove it via mail and again via fax—at some point I will probably have to physically take it there in person (and document it with a video camera: “here’s a close-up of the piece of paper… here’s me handing said piece of paper to the person in charge of this whole department… here’s me delivering duplicates to every single other person who ever worked in this office..”). ODU’s website links to check status/transcripts don’t even work (again, might be b/c of busy week)—but at least that’s in town, not as much of a pain to do in person. TCC and JSR already screwed up my school ID #s once, so I have to keep an eye out for that—I’m guessing that’s the source of the online app problem. (That was fun—after 2 years or so at JSR, suddenly my school ID# didn’t work, and their answer was that *I* screwed up by accidentally using my old TCC ID#. Problem with that theory was, this particular ID# system didn’t even exist when I went to TCC, so I wasn’t aware that # existed, making it awfully difficult for me to use it at JSR.)

Next up, I’m sure TCC will lose my previous records from there—although that trick has already happened: One summer I decided to take a writing class at ODU, just for kicks, with Sheri Reynolds, and they had lost all evidence that I had ever previously attended there. Which was no big deal, really, except that I truthfully checked “yes” on the app when they asked if I’d ever attended, so I guess it got flagged as a lie. I probably won’t ever need the credits from that class (I’ve taken essentially the same class several times elsewhere), and the economics class I took there a million years ago will probably be too old to use for any gened reqs, so I don’t particularly care whether they ever get my transcripts straight or not, EXCEPT that I don’t want to get screwed for not “claiming” everything.

Perhaps if I start pushing this rock back up the hill now, this month at least, I might, just might, have it straightened out in time to enroll in summer classes. Did I say the only barrier is money? That and the lifelong paperwork curse hanging over me. Wonder which one is going to prove easier to overcome?

2nd half of 2008 (abridged version)

2008-12-21T19:05:03Z

Since my last post:

June: forever vacated the beloved Richmond apartment, loaded the honda to the brim, put everything else in storage, moseyed down to daytona beach.
July: missed the tom waits show, don’t wanna talk about it, except to say: GRR! To make myself feel better, took a wacky side trip to the northeast that won’t be detailed here. (shame, really.)
Jul/Aug/Sept: chilled in florida, did a whole lot of nothing, in a good way. Decided nonetheless that I don’t want to move there just yet.
October: came back up the coast via the slow roads, stopping here and there—carriage ride in Charleston, roadside barbecue joint in Georgia, such like. Arrived back in VA in time for bro’s lovely Halloween wedding. folks & grandmother up from texas, spent a week w/them as planned, nice.
November: just before their planned departure, mom got scary sick, pneumonia and meningitis, strapped to a bed in ICU for days. Miraculously got thru it despite her beat-up immune system, but required a few extra weeks in wmsburg.
December: catching my breath, renting a room in Virginia beach while I decide if maybe this is where I wanna live for a while. job hunting, ugh.

What’s next??

sleepy suze sez...

2008-05-16T19:40:12Z

who got tom waits tickets? I GOT TOM WAITS TICKETS!!!!!

2008

2008-05-08T07:59:09Z

why, hello there, 2008! when did you get here? and what exactly is it i'm supposed to do with you?!?

seems i should relocate, for starters. and maybe rethink my life, and get off my arse. didn't i hear that same nonsense from 2007? hmph. perhaps this year i shall listen.

crash bang

2007-12-15T05:54:19Z

well. despite beginning the day on hold, waiting for the fedex guy, i miraculously managed to get my open house lists done, unpack the new surround system and get it halfway put together (need another set of hands to finish, to be sure i don't drop a second tv this year), AND made serious headway on my bake-sale baking. i had one or two recipes left in mind for tonight, then off to bed so as to wake up in time to get the goodies to the actual bake sale. and then... ugh.

already done: brownies, oatmeal butterscotch cookies, pumpkin bread, toffee biscotti...

brownie cupcakes (alright, i confess-- these came from a mix)...

and then, the key lime squares i've been so excited to try. i swear i followed the recipe to a T up til this point-- i adapted the streusel topping to add coconut, but that part hadn't made it to the oven yet. i was waiting for the first two layers to cook, sitting in the living room taking a smoke break, when i heard a disturbing crash coming from the kitchen. i tiptoed in, saw nothing out of the ordinary, and then i slowly opened the oven to find this:

looks like it's time for a drink.

pie, dude

2007-12-12T08:34:04Z

so much i should've done today, yet all i accomplished, aside from wandering to the corner for smokes, was this apple pie w/crumb topping... not for the bake sale, but for me and my fruit-lacking diet. better than nada, no? maybe more tomorrow... maybe not so much.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2303/2104624021_03e2d05873.jpg?v=0

snow!

2007-12-06T03:57:17Z

dude-- it's snowing! (er, it was earlier when i wrote this and forgot to post it, anyway.) guess it's time to accept the fact that it's that time of year... not my favorite. me & my wacky circadians don't do well with the short sun days, and i'm not a fan of chapped skin, and i hate hate hate driving in potentially icy precipitation... but i'll get over it. i do love *looking* at the snow, as long as i don't have to be anywhere & thus go out and drive in it. yeah, it's time to move farther south.

the apartment is shaping up-- been working on it in preparation for new roomie, moving in next week. got a rod from the landlady yesterday for a curtain to cover the broken pane, which will also help keep out the chill that comes in the still-unrenovated french doors. would be nice not to have to wear a sweater when the heat's set on 72-- even nicer not to have to crank it that high in the first place, of course. shame that the place will finally look its best six months before i'm moving out, but better late than never. given all the work i'm putting into it, i really should find an identical apartment wherever i move, so i can recreate it. (not really, but i sure am digging it. have to be careful not to allow that to let me fall back on inertia and thus end up signing another lease here.)

somehow got on a super-early wakeup schedule, which has my body confused. would like to stay on it, tho, given the lack of daylight. i've never been able to keep it up for more than a week, but perhaps this will be the week that 35 years of history finally change. not likely, though.

got an absolutely unexpected gift in the mail this week-- a $50 kroger gift card, woo hoo! spent it tonight on ingredients... next week is the cafe's annual charity bake sale. i usually take a trip this time of year-- great travel deals, half-empty planes between the holidays, etc-- but since it's not in the cards this year, i'm diving full steam into stocking the bake sale. planned so far: "my" yummy pumpkin spice bread, cashew biscotti, a banana bread to be determined, toffee biscotti, key lime squares (if i can find key lime juice anywhere this time of year), and i've decided to take a foray into the world of cupcakes. not exactly sure when or why cupcakes became so trendy, but the point is to raise $ for charity (the boys & girls club of richmond), which seems like a good enough reason to jump on a baking bandwagon. suggestions and/or recipes welcome! i'm in love with the idea of "faux hos," i.e. vegan versions of ho-hos, but, (a) whoa, labor intensive, and (b), do i really want to spend even more money stocking my kitchen with soy milk and pseudo butter? i'd much rather spend the time and money on bacon brittle!

boring belated update

2007-11-16T22:47:47Z

man, i've been working too much. better than not at all, i guess. didn't even pretend to do nano this year, tho the desire was there. having a hard enough time keeping up with the laundry.

i've reached 97% sure i'm not signing another lease here. been leaning in that direction-- haven't even hung my pictures back up since the reno, they're just leaning against walls-- but all the cafe-working has made me realize how bad the parking situation has gotten at night. i finally realized that part of the reason for my anti-social behavior is that i'm not willing to drive around in circles afterward for anything other than work. pathetic, perhaps, but there's a safety issue there, too. if i think too hard about it, my lifetime crime stats say that i'm not "due" for another year or so, but if that's the case, i should knock off the walking alone at night with waitress cash before too long.

in my whole life, even as a child, i've never called one address "home" as long as i have this apartment. i do love it, and if i could pick it up, move it elsewhere, add a parking spot, and drop the rent by half, i'd *never* give it up. but alas... point being, this will be a significant move, not just geographically, but emotionally.

i have a theoretical "plan B" that involves moving to norfolk, which has been on the short list for a while, but i haven't decided what "plan A" is just yet. story of my life: endless options, can't make a decision. still considering florida, but i don't think i'm quite ready for that just yet.

to that end, i'm considering not taking my usual december trip, though i'm not sure sanity will allow for that particular budget cut. more likely i'll just reduce it from a week in florida to a few days at any coast reachable by car. i need the sand and the tide desperately. gas prices will surely be outrageous by then, but still cheaper than a flight. finally convinced myself that a roommate is the answer to maintaining a non-depressing lifestyle while still saving for the move... started writing a "roomie wanted" ad for craigslist a few days ago, and just then a co-worker approached me about moving in. not entirely sure i believe that she's a homebody, but we'll have a sit-down in the next week & figure out if we can make it work.

over the past month, i've "randomly" run into several of my favorites of the people i've met during my time in richmond, some from the very beginning, just over a decade ago... people i've lost touch with of my own accord but wish i hadn't... and not one of those times did i think "hey, maybe i should stay here, there really are people i adore in this town." there's not even a small subconscious part of me that wants to stay here, not even a lame, destructive reason. no reason at all other than inertia, which even MY lazy ass is bored of.

"the prettier the flower, the farther from the path..."

funny quote overheard at work: a gal who is sweet and cute, but a few cards short of a deck, was attempting to deflect a flirtatious comment from a coworker, and instead of saying "don't flatter yourself," she said "don't try to pleasure yourself." it's the little chuckles that get me through the nights.

same night i came home and heard a commercial for the new beowulf movie: "if you think angelina jolie is hot in real life, wait til you see her in 3-D." um... am i the last one on earth to learn that she's not a real person, but instead a cardboard, two-dimensional fake, created by hollywood to sell movie tickets and gossip mags? or, perhaps, is that just the most idiotic commercial ever?

some nights i think perhaps i work with some of the dumbest people on the planet*, and then i come home and realize there are people who get paid 100 times as much to be just as moronic. which is ironic, because an original life plan of mine, made before everything changed drastically in 1989, involved me being an advertising exec by now, and being the boss of people who make such stupid commericals. oy.

(*i do actually like and respect some of my coworkers, which is one of many reasons i'll miss this job when i move. but let's face it-- it's the restaurant business. generously, it's 15% people who could do whatever they want but haven't figured out what that is or how to make it happen, 10% people who ARE doing what they want but that thing only pays part of the bills, 25% people who WILL do whatever they want shortly and are just subsidizing the path to that goal, and 50% people who can't do much of anything else. misery loves company.)

dreamwriter

2007-10-07T04:34:04Z

had an odd dream last night... not odd as in bizarro things that would never happen in waking life, but odd in as in it was literal to the point of being pushy in its lesson-giving. in it, i shared a semi-ordinary but touching moment with a beloved friend (who is now dead IRL), and when the moment was over, he said "later, i will write about this moment, as i have all the others we've shared." damn. fine, i'll start writing again. my subconscious could've at least given me a pretty metaphor or some such.

someone must've put an animal-magnet hex on my honda. my ownership of said car was delayed because a deer hit it-- wait, let me be clear: the driver stopped to successfully avoid a deer standing in the road, and then another deer came out of the dark and smashed into the side, causing thousands of dollars in damage. that was 6 months ago, almost to the day. yesterday, i was minding my own business driving down the road, and a bird slammed into my car. wtf?!? fortunately it hit at the best possible spot-- the mere few inches between hitting the windshield and coming through my open window-- and didn't do any damage-- but seriously. i've known many people who've hit an animal, or who've been hit by one. as a child i experienced an unusual sequence of events in which my folks' giant steel-bumpered blazer hit an almost equally giant buck at a dangerous curve, just seconds before a tiny car came around the corner-- had the other car hit the deer, the passengers would not likely have fared well, if they'd even lived-- so it's not as if i have some delusion that animals and cars don't occasionally come together in tragic ways. but how many cars have animals hurling towards them twice in the span of six months?

shopping

2007-08-08T04:24:09Z

looks like it's time to buy a new computer... and what a miserable time to do so. on top of the financial factor (just paid tuition), there's the vista issue. i will NOT buy a computer with vista on it, and as much as comps cost, i don't feel i should have to wipe a drive and install an OS. most everything online that still has XP is refurbed, which is probably what i'll end up getting-- not my choice, but options seem to be slim. dell still offers builds with XP (as well as open source-- sweet), but they take too freakin long to put them together & ship 'em, and given this laptop's shenanigans of late, and school about to start, i don't think i have time to wait.

yet again, i have the best coworkers a gal could want-- i mentioned that i needed a new comp & would probably have to go with a desktop price-wise because of tuition, and voila, they decided to give me a $1000 expense check. took quite the load off, stress-wise. since i'll probably go refurb anyway, i'm thinking i'll add that to what i was already going to spend and get a desktop AND a laptop. that way, i can do all my multimedia stuff on one & keep some of the bulky, problematic software off of the other, & thus hopefully extend the life of the work/school comp, and still be able to haul the latter around. it's a theory, anyway.

another advantage: i've been saying for a few years that i want to try going completely open source but not til i have an "extra" computer, so i can learn and experiment without compromising work or school (in case i screw something up). best case, this one will last a little while longer once i wipe it. not particularly optimistic about that, though... i thought this one was two years old, but two years ago i'd just dumped P and gone to florida, and i got this one when he dumped a drink on the old dell, so it must be three years. not too bad, i suppose, considering the heavy use, hundreds of random downloads, and loads of relatively unknown software i've put on the thing.

meanwhile, i've been hoping to get out of town any day now, but the last thing i want is to haul a bunch of new computer boxes up the stairs and then leave & have someone steal them while i'm gone (or try to, a la the aformentioned fla trip), nor do i want to order them & then not be here when they're delivered. more annoying scheduling "problems" (read: excuses) to keep me from getting off my ass and into the car-- just what i needed.

good school news, for once

2007-07-12T23:28:58Z

today started off quite well... i woke up to a call from a coworker with a fast & straightforward assignment, which is good because i've been lazy this week & a solid deadline will do me good. plus, it's a previous client who is serious about buying in the next two months, which best-case would put another possibility in line to pay for spring semester.

the next call was even better. i spent two days this week calling various vcu offices trying to figure out who i should talk to you about my sloppy pile of transcripts, to find out not only what i'll need when i get back there, but also what i should take at the comm college to prepare. (funny-- i'm forced to see an advisor at JSR, but i can't find one at VCU.) finally got a name & number yesterday, along with a warning that the woman i need is teaching two summer classes, which means she'll be hard to get in touch with for a couple weeks. lo and behold, she called me today. dealing with vcu over the past 13 years has involved a great deal of maddening phone tag & miscommunication & bad advice, so the mere fact that *she* called *me* makes me optimistic. she was even willing to deal with all this over phone & email, which is even better. the fact that she actually seemed to know what she was talking about? priceless.

bottom line looks like i have to take my last 30 hours at vcu (which i expected, in fact was worried that number might be higher). on top of the one pre-1700 english class i knew i'd still need (because of the nutjob who gave me an I years ago instead of "letting" me get less than an A), turns out there are 3 new english requirements since i left, so that's 12 hours... then there's the new "urban environment" gen-ed req, which they don't allow you to take elsewhere. apparently i also need a statistics class, and the one i was planning on taking this fall for the IT degree won't transfer, so i'll have to see if one that will transfer will also work for the IT. and there's still the one science. the woman made a good point: if i do the science at the CC, i'll have to take a lab (they wrap lecture/lab into one class), whereas if i wait and take it at vcu, and i can do lecture only, and use it to make up the 30 hours, since i don't *need* 30 hours otherwise. she also pointed out that astronomy is now an option, which has the added bonus of being a topic i'm actually interested in, making the prospect of paying $750 for a science class as opposed to $250 a tad easier to swallow.

more lovely news from that call: vcu has a "grade exclusion" policy for returning students (after at least 5 years), which means all those semesters i started & then blew off will disappear, and my gpa will shoot up. (the policy requires a 2.0 in the first 12 hours back, which won't be a problem, since i now have a reason to care whether i pass or not.) the only possible catch is, the one science lecture i already took ended in a D, so i might have to retake it. not the end of the world-- at least my lab credit is safe, and the new reqs only require one. ultimately, i'm looking at 2 more years in richmond, unless the "last 30 hours" rule will allow me to take classes at JSR and VCU at the same time-- and, more importantly, that my budget will allow same. the budget's still a question mark, but it's nice to finally know what i'm up against.

ah, and she verified that the stupid english class i'm taking now is all i'll need on that front. guess i'd better go write the paper that's due today so i don't have to repeat the damn class...

more school fun

2007-07-10T13:08:49Z

my really-for-real plan to finish my degree(s) has not subsided, and i've decided to take full time classes this fall, even if i have to eat ramen to do it. (or-- egads-- get a roommate.) to that end, i shushed my procrastination long enough to remember to register on time. only one more class that i need for the AA is available online, which means i'll actually have to go to campus regularly, so i need all my options open lest i otherwise get stuck with daytime classes. reg started yesterday, & i had already picked out a nice balance between boring gen-ed crap and hopefully-interesting crap. i confirmed with C that a commission check i've been expecting is indeed in the pipeline & should arrive within the month, & will be equal to or greater than what i need to cover tuition-- & sweetheart that he is, he offered to advance me the dough if the closing goes awry.

so, class numbers in hand, online i went. after twenty minutes of going around in circles with the not-at-all intuitive software, i finally had four classes in my "basket." (gee, when you call it a basket, i feel less like i'm giving up four nights a week for several months, and more like i'm buying something fun on amazon, or going on a picnic!), after verifying that i have 2 more weeks to pay, i clicked "enroll." anyone who knows anything about my history of educational issues knows what the next screen said:

"sorry, you can't do that-- you have a hold on your account."

yes, i hurled an object across the room. no, it was not my laptop.

but i REALLY mean it this time, so after i calmed down, i went right back to the site (instead of waiting six months and hoping the imaginary hold would just go away) and clicked through to the "holds" page. lo and behold, "there are no holds."

it's incredibly difficult not to assume that the universe just doesn't want me to go back to school, but i won't be defeated. at least not until this happens at least three dozen times. (mind you, that number is not far off.)

smartypants

2007-06-24T08:35:35Z

this week, the NYT tells of a study which reinforces that i'm smarter than my kid brother. none of our high school teachers would argue: he was one of those unfortunate 2nd kids with a memorable last name who got the "wow, you're nothing like your smart big sis" comments... as it happened, i sorta cared about my grades & transcripts (thought they would get me scholarships & help me get the fuck out of dodge) and he didn't. so yeah, i went to a top-rated college (and dropped out, and went back elsewhere, and dropped out again: lather, rinse, repeat) and frankly, the classes i'm taking right now? my brother could teach them in his sleep.

real-world facts: my brother not only makes more money than i do, but he's also my personal help desk-- if he can't fix it over the phone, i've been known to drive a laptop 90 miles to have him diagnose it. # of times in the last decade that i've called him for help of any variety? a zillion. number of times in that same decade he's asked me for help re the intelligent topics i'm so good at, with my supposedly higher IQ? zero.

who's smarter now?

catching up (again)

2007-06-20T06:29:45Z

this week i got my first financial scam email asking me to help get $58 million out of a bank by pretending to belong to some dead guy's family. all these years, and i've still never gotten one to my primary account-- this one was via school-regulated email. my spam filter ROCKS.

about a week & a half ago, i finally went to NY and picked up the honda i bought, oh, six months ago. (and started talking about buying over a year ago.) i named it immediately, which is a good sign-- after two years, the mazda never did get a name. this one is neko. or possibly nico. or, if i decide it's a boy car, it'll be niko, short for nikolai, which was, many moons ago, fchornik's code name for the guy behind the whole car-getting. (maybe later i'll link to the post explaining that, too tired now.) i've never had a car act male before, tho, so perhaps it's irrelevant. at any rate, the car is now titled and registered in VA to moi. holding my breath now while i wait for someone from city hall to call me back about paying my property taxes. you'd think they'd find someone to talk to me if i want to GIVE them money voluntarily, but you'd be wrong.

good news is, the zippy little thing got home from 2 hrs north of manhattan on ONE tank of gas. 40mpg, baby! doesn't get that around town, mind you-- yesterday, running the AC because it was 100 degrees outside, i swear i could see the gas indicator falling, but whatever. C even paid for the CD player that i absolutely had to add (to replace the 1997 factory installed AM/FM radio) before leaving NY. my stupid car anxieties are quelled only by distracting myself by singing at the top of my lungs. rear speakers suck, but there's a pair still in the package floating around in the trunk, so no problem.

it's going to take a while to get used to having manual locks & windows, especially since i smoke a lot when i drive. reaching over to crack the passenger side window when i'm smoking and close it when i want to stop the wind to light up isn't the safest maneuver. had them in my first couple of cars, of course, but i wasn't a smoker then.

apartment renovation has made it so i haven't gotten a decent night's sleep in about 5 weeks. i'm moving back in to the new and improved old apartment tomorrow, despite the fact that it's not quite done. after i listen to a few more weeks of banging while they reno this one, i guess they'll get around to finishing mine. pain in the ass, yes, but the two classes i paid for with what would otherwise have been rent money make up for that. i sold the mazda on sunday, so if i keep working this month, i should be able to afford to get the hell out of here for at least a few days during the wall demolition. if anyone wants to offer me a bed, now's the time! (i'll be able to reciprocate in a few days, with CAC no less.)

the english class drama keeps getting worse. nevermind the peer reviewed essays, for which i have to find something positive to say about a paper that lacks basic structure and doesn't even answer the question posed in the assignment (and oh yeah, posits that men who hit their kids should be put to death)... while up in NY, i went on a road trip with C to pick up his new dobie pup, and i took the textbook & my notes along, to work on some assignments in the car. long story short, i left said books in the truck, and didn't realize it til i got back to RVA, at which point he'd loaned the truck to another friend, who had parked it in the NY garage, not very near anything. she was nice enough to fetch it and scan the pages i'd need for the coming 2 weeks, but the damage was already done, and i fear my grade will suffer. i really don't care as long as i pass, but given what this class represents, there's no real reason i shouldn't get an A. i mean, except for this whole dumbassery i pulled.

around the same time, i learned that i'd been working from the wrong edition of the HTML textbook for my web design class. found this out after completing the 1st 3 weeks of work for the 5 week class-- doh. so there went more $$ on a book that looks identical to the one i already owned, not to mention the hours i spent re-doing those tedious projects, and more hours error correcting HTML code. despite my usual love of all things detailed, finding the one little capitalization mistake in hundreds of lines of code that causes the whole page to go haywire is NOT fun.

that's enough catching up for now... should've been asleep hours ago. comcast and my moving help are both scheduled to arrive in about six hours. if anyone reading this has my # and is up early, i'd appreciate some wake-up call action anytime after 6:30am! ugh, that's four hours from now...

today, yesterday, whatever.

2007-05-25T06:57:51Z

yesterday, i suppose, was a big day here at the temporary casa. i enrolled in summer classes, woo hoo! first i had to drive out to campus and deal with the mystery hold on my account, which oddly enough may have netted me a future real estate prospect... but nevermind that. one of classes is the 2nd half of the intro-english class that i should've taken, oh, 15 years ago. actually, i shouldn't have, because i put in my time in AP english, took the stupid test, scored high enough that i would be exempt, which was the whole point... but alas. william & mary was happy with that, but my latter choice of college doesn't think that was enough. so i found a semi-loophole which allows me to take the damn thing at the comm college, where i was working on another thing anyway, at $86 a credit hour as opposed to however many times that... we shall see. sometime in the next few months i'll go see an advisor at VCU and find out whether i have to also take the first half. in the meantime i'll be re-reading "hills like white elephants" and "the yellow wallpaper" and suchlike, and paying for the privilege. gee, haven't i done this somewhere before? yeah.

after, i actually got out into the world & had dinner with an old friend, who gently reminded me that i'm working too hard to be so broke. he's right. more on that later.

this afternoon, i wandered next door to check on the reno, when the former tenant of my temporary apartment stopped by for her mail. happened to walk in on an argument about whether the ceiling fan had been properly grounded, and after i returned, i took a nap. had a dream... in such, i was sitting here minding my own business when some commotion happened and i was alerted that the building was afire, and i needed to get the hell out. in the dream, i was dressed as i was in real life-- naked but my favorite robe-- so here's what i grabbed: a pair of sweatpants drying on the bathroom door, my laptop (duh), my keys, the proverbial "box full of letters" (which sits right now next to the DVD player and contains correspondence from TAFKAMH and SLL), and then... i was torn. should i grab the CD book full of CW shows, or the pictures and ticket stubs? in the dream i then grabbed my favorite suitcase, turned it upside down to empty it of whatever i packed in it for the move, and... i couldn't decide.

hmph.

i don't hate everyone... really!

2007-05-20T05:51:23Z

last week i moved across the hall to my temporary digs while "my" apartment is being renovated. this place is a dump, but it's free for now, so it's hard to complain. also, in the process i scored two free (nice, old) wardrobes, a couch that's actually long enough for me to fall asleep on without waking up in pain, and an entertainment center that i'll be giving to my brother for helping me move. main drawbacks are living next door to constant construction noise, living beneath the loudest people in the building (i don't complain because -a- it makes me feel old, and -b- their loud music is actually good stuff; today they were blaring the neil young massey hall disc), and not having an end date (i.e. not knowing when i'll suddenly need to pull the new rent out of my ass). bright side is, the money i would otherwise be paying on rent can instead go toward taking classes so that someday i'll allow myself to leave this town that i've been done with for years.

one of these days i'll even go pick up that car i bought months ago. thought it would be this week, but alas, there's a hold on my JSR account that i need to deal with in person. if i go to NY this week, i won't be here to do that unless i only spend a day up there, which is no fun. so that will happen after memorial day, because i will NOT drive I-95 on a holiday weekend unless jimi hendrix rises from the dead to play a show at the knitting factory. even then, really, i'd take the train home & go back for the car later. screw holiday weekend traffic.

meanwhile, i've been working at the cafe. last weekend, i moved furniture saturday, then: mother's day, one of the busiest restaurant days of the year, but alas... people suck. for once, i stayed in an early section, because there were a crapload of reservations & i figured i'd make just as much money. had a 15-top at 4:30... didn't show up. two-top at 4:45? no show. finally dropped the 15 for a ten-top at 5 o'clock? also didn't show. so i spent the first 90 minutes of my shift twiddling my thumbs and left a scant few hours later with $100 less than i expected to make, after taking the week "off" thinking i'd be fine for money... oops. monday was inexplicably more of the same... and then there was tonight.

proms, VCU graduation, all manner of family-in-town, big parties, total chaos waiting to happen. such weekends are no fun partly because a lot of the people out & about are those who eat out only a few times a year, and it's always easier to wait on people who *know* how to go out to eat, as opposed to those who don't understand that they need to put down their cell phone when their waitress approaches the table-- especially when it's so busy they had to wait an hour for said table & will wait another hour if they insist on ignoring their server when she approaches. (ahem.)

i'm not one of those servers who predicts tips based on random expectations-- "oh, they're black, they're foreign, they're redneck, they're not drinkers"-- whatever-- i absolutely hate servers who base their service on what they think people are going to tip. it's unprofessional, it's rude, it's just wrong. having said that, i do sometimes predict tips based on how a table is going-- whether they're in a good mood, whether they enjoy the food, how long they wait for a table, etc.

tonight my first large party was all the things that bad servers think will get them a good tip-- drinkers, professionally dressed, blah blah-- and yet they didn't spend much & left me about 16%. fine, no big, plenty of others waiting. (tho they did tip in cash after paying with a credit card-- if you're reading this and don't already know, cash tips are always better than writing it in on the credit card!!) i went to the hostess stand to help brainstorm about where we could possibly fit all the reservations, and scored myself a later 8-top with some creative table rearrangement.

when said table showed up, we had a problem-- first off, we'd squeezed them into a table that was too small for them (skinny people who really like each other are easier to seat, but they're also very rare), and further, they had one more person than they'd reserved for. as it happened, my original 10 top had just left, so we could accommodate them in my section within a few minutes. rather than ignore them while the hosts did their magic, i took their drink order, carefully looking everyone in the eye so i could recognize them & match them up once they moved. once they were at the new table, i got the drinks right but i accidentally tripped over the grandmother's cane that was propped against the wall where i needed to stand to take the order (oops #2), and frankly, they didn't really seem to want to engage me in any banter-- which is fine, i enjoy waiting on people who are just there to eat as much or even more than people who want to have a good time and include their server, but less talkative tables are less likely to overtip. no big deal-- given the reservation list, i didn't expect to make more than $75 or so for the night-- large reservations require us to block off tables at least half an hour prior, which means less money. (if only management understood this!) mother's day was recent enough to remind me of this.

the food came out relatively promptly (and correct-- the kitchen was on point) but one of the desserts they ordered turned out to be unavailable, which is never good-- i'd rather a dinner ran out, because the closer the "oops" to the check drop, the more likely people are to take it out of the tip... but all was well otherwise. i didn't pay the table as much attention overall as i would've liked, because i had three other new tables about the same time, but all in all, i figured i'd get at least 15%. boy, was i wrong.

i'd kept the party on separate seats just in case they needed separate checks later-- too hard to predict that on "family" weekends. on graduation weekend, it's customary that a grandparent or other family "elder" pays for the whole check, and as a result, it's more likely that you'll see 15%. (other times, you get family members together who really don't like each other but are obligated to see each other for this event, and as such you have people who refuse to pay for each other-- i get that.) this particular table asked for one check, and i dropped it after coffee without really knowing who was paying. when i went back to pick it up, i got the "thank you" & nod that means it's cash, and the change is my tip. i have a rule about checking books on the floor-- i don't do it, ever, because we all reveal with our faces, and i think it's unprofessional to show emotion about tips in front of other customers, so i took it in the back to take a look.

and then i counted, and recounted. ordinarily, if i get an unusually good cash tip, i'll hang in the back for an extra minute, til i think the table is ready to leave, so that i can thank them on the way out. in this case, contrary to some of my crappy rude server cohorts, i immediately went back to the table-- i was sure they'd miscounted. the check was $220, and there was $360 in the book. $40 is a completely respectable tip on $220, about what i'm after on graduation weekend... but they were all $20's, so it's not as if two hundreds were stuck together. stilll... i'm good at my job, but damn. i went back and asked "who was in charge of the bill?" and addressed the answer with my theory of miscounting, but he refused to take a second look at the cash inside, instead saying "i counted twice-- you did a great job, thank you" and the woman next to him actually gave me a little clap.

on their way out, the bartender happened to overhear the guy who paid thank me very sincerely again, and the bartender said "ouch, you just got a verbal tip!" and oddly enough, it is indeed my experience that the more sincere the out-loud "thank you," the lower the tip percentage, but in this case i told him he should be thanking them too... because i am a true believer in karma. since the tip was in cash, i could've easily kept it to myself & tipped out on the "expected" amount, given the fact that due to reservation holds, my sales were pretty low, but instead the bartender ended up making $10 more from me than he would've otherwise, as did the dishwashers. everyone wins! i also have a rule that if i walk with more than $200, i buy the kitchen staff their first drinks, but alas... my few other tables tonight were mostly once-a-year folks & only left in the vicinity of 12%, so the kitchen, while they did a fantastic job, is out of luck. ;-)

so i'd just like to send a thank you out to the universe to those very sweet people who completely made my month. :-) they would automatically be my favorite table of may, but i have to say they're tied with the table who, last weekend, very sincerely thanked me for working on mother's day so she could take her own mom out to eat. i don't remember how much their check was or what they tipped-- on very rare occasions, an "oral tip" means as much or even more than a financial one. (very rare! pls don't think your compliment will somehow magically pay your server's rent!)

and one that note, my sleepy pill is kicking in-- fingers crossed that it doesn't do as tylenol PM & give me the knee-jerks. i know the construction noise will wake me up, gotta get to sleep so i can do it all again tomorrow... tho i'm smart enough to expect a much less lucrative night then.

memeee

2007-04-06T05:18:19Z

i inexplicably have to be up early tomorrow, but i feel compelled to do this funny meme i've seen here & there. the image results are mostly... huh?? just barely lucid enough to remember to

1. Your age on your next birthday: (hey, that's today!)

2. Your favorite color:

3. Your middle name:

4. The last meal you ate:

5. Your bad habit (i swear i typed in my brand of cigs, i don't know where this shite came from but i love it):

6. Your favorite fruit or vegetable:

7. Your favorite animal:

8. The town you live in:

9. The name of your pet or last pet:

10. Your SO or best friend's nickname:

12. Your crush's name:

13. Your occupation:

14. Your birth city:

15. Your favorite song:

car bizarre

2007-03-21T04:31:48Z

so i bought that honda, finally, though i haven't physically picked it up & titled it etc, because i want to sell the mazda first. no sense paying insurance on two cars when i only drive 3x times a week. this afternoon i took photos of the mazda for my ad, and while i was cropping them in photoshop, i noticed something odd... my front license plate does not match my rear plate! wtf? i vaguely remember having a hard time with one of the bolts on the front, but surely i wouldn't have given up and gone driving around with one old expired plate and one new, right? nope, checked the renewal notice i just got in the mail, and neither of those plates is mine. whoever stole them was "nice" enough to replace them with other plates (likely stolen?) so i didn't even notice.

weird thing is, it probably happened quite some time ago... back in november of '05, i got a letter from a gas station way on the southside (where i never go) saying i had driven off without paying for gas. i called the cops then, not wanting any trouble (VA promotes that they'll take away your license if you get busted for a drive-off), and they said not to worry about, figured it was probably a blurry security camera, or perhaps they were just off a digit and pulled my info by accident. i'm embarrassed to report that i didn't walk down the street that day & check my plates closely-- doh.

thought about ignoring the whole deal, since i'm about to sell the thing (and apparently i've gotten away with it this long), but i figured i'd better at least file a police report just in case. plus, my luck with DMV is notoriously abysmal-- with my luck, i'll get pulled over tomorrow while i'm running errands & accused of stealing the plates-- since i just reported them suspicious myself.

the other weird thing? the front plate is easy as pie to steal, but to get the back plate off (and replace the inside nuts, as was done), you have to get into the trunk. which means whoever it was either broke into the car without me noticing, or they had keys.

to be a woman and to be turned down...

2007-03-15T06:32:18Z

reasons to work more often: one of the first things i found out tonight while at the cafe was that patti freakin smith has a new album coming out. an album of covers! and, as it turns out: an album of covers of some of my favorite songs ever!! i had an obnoxious out-loud moment of "wtf? how do i not know about this?" but whatever-- thank goodness one of my occasional co-workers listens to NPR. (funny that it came up after she revealed that some off friend had talked her into going with him to a justin timberlake show... whatever.)

so i came home and fumbled around online looking for said patti CD, found out it comes out in late april... ok, but i wonder what else i've missed? got the new lucinda last week, but haven't otherwise been paying attention, since chris died... and that's how i came across live at massey hall. holy... holy all things holy. i don't know whether i want to hug (um, etc) or smack the smack out of whomever has been hiding this in their vault since 1971. the acoustic version of cowgirl in the sand? excuse me while i put that on half a dozen mix tapes-- er, CDs...

damn, turns out there's a new maria mckee coming out the same day as the new patti...

random media

2007-03-14T15:20:51Z

somehow, years ago, i missed the fact that dear gabo not only bought a litmag but also wrote an article on bill clinton for said mag. best line: "puritanism is insatiable and feeds on its own excrement." i was planning on rereading 'cities of the plain' this week, but i believe i just changed my mind.

speaking of cormac... had a weird multi-day, dream-induced, dark train of thought going last week, and one of my random musings was that it was a shame that surely no one would dare take on the task of making a movie of 'the road.' so depressed by this thought was i that i've watched the lame movie version of 'all the pretty horses' more than once of late. (ooh ooh, the coen's 'no country for last things' is in the can!) but whaddya know, someone has. apparently john hillcoat plans to direct-- i know nothing of him except that he directed the nick cave-penned 'the proposition,' which is sitting in the stacks waiting to be watched. just got pushed to the top of the list, natch.