Про Грінча який украв Різдво

I meant to post this entry yesterday. Whoops.

Oh, for fuck’s sake.

There’s a key on the MacBook’s keyboard that lets me switch between the keyboards for different languages… I’ve got a switching shortcut programmed for my bluetooth keyboard, but I always manage to go from italics to Ukrainian when I don’t mean to. Since I’ve changed my computer usage and mainly work glued to two monitors, I can get rid of the shortcut and just press the button on the Mac.

ЦРН вшв ерфе ефлу ищ дщтп ещ аштв? Um, WHY did that take so long to find?

Exactly.

 

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For Christmas, my husband gave me an early “present”. He’s not going to Marathon Weekend with me.

I had talked about skipping out, true, but in the end, I want to see how far I could go.

I mean, it might be for the best, but…

When he’s around, I feel bad going to the meetups. I missed hanging out with the RTI crew during Wine and Dine because of him. But… it’s like that every time we go somewhere. One of us is always awkward and it is uncomfortable as fuck for the other one. That’s why he didn’t go to Homecoming with me. It’s why I don’t go to Ohio with him.

Also, I’m a complete shit during the Disney races. I’m tired. I’m cranky. I’m a petulant brat.

Also, also, I don’t like going to the Disney parks. They’re overcrowded and I’m just not a Disney fan, but I’m too tired and cranky to go to Universal.

He’s using the excuse that he doesn’t want to go to the parks because they suck.

Which, OK, fair… but when I told him it wasn’t about going to the fucking parks, it was about supporting me, I got an “I know. I’m sorry.”

He’s also paranoid about the dog.

Guinness is getting old and it’s starting to show. His right leg doesn’t really work the way it’s supposed to anymore. He doesn’t freak out when the doorbell rings. He can’t get up on the couch anymore.

And now, he’s starting to lose control of his bowels. He’s taken 4 or 5 craps in my car on the way to day care. This last time, we were at the light right before the parking lot and he got up and… well. Yeah. And then he sat in it. Because it wasn’t enough to crap, he had to rub it into the blanket. You try cleaning out a car with some wet paper towels and then having to drive to work with the windows open and hope that airs it out. (I should really start carrying that special cleaner we bought for this specific purpose.)

Last night, he woke the husband up and didn’t even make it out of the bedroom.

So, Guinness is his other reason… in addition to all that, there’s a distinct change in the dog’s personality after he’s been boarded for several days (not a good one.) And, let’s be honest, the husband doesn’t deal with death well. Which puts me in the awkward position of hoping that the dog has the kindness to kick the bucket once I’m home (assuming that his expiration date is in the next few weeks as the husband seems to believe.) Personally, I think that the dog will live forever because I hate paying for day care and, on a good day, Guinness is nothing if not pure, unadulterated, evil.

I’m afraid to tell him that I had a dream last night where Guinness got hit by a car and died. I also thought at one point this morning that he stopped breathing.

I’m not saying a damn word because it will make everything worse, but I knew when it was time to let go of both Arsey and Apache. I’m not saying it’s his time… I’m just saying I’m on high alert. My dreams aren’t always harbingers, but sometimes they are.

I mean, fuck, I’m nervous, too, but he’s an eleven year old German Shepherd. Our Aussies both made it to thirteen, so I pray he’ll make it to that age.

Even with that all taken into consideration, I’m pissed off, disappointed, and hurt beyond belief that the husband doesn’t want to be there for me.

So… long story short, I’m more miserable than ever. I’m scraping rock bottom and it’s beginning to show.

It also doesn’t help that this is my first year-end at the new job and I have a fuck ton of stuff to do by January 10th (according to the old Controller’s schedule.) I’ll be at Disney from the 4th to the 9th. I have a feeling I’m taking my laptop… since I’ll be alone any way, I don’t feel too bad. BUT… it also makes me want to revert to my original decision of just eating the $600 for the Dopey bib and staying home.

I don’t fucking know any more.

 

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In happier news, I’m working on making some significant changes in my life. Are they still New Year’s resolutions if I decide to do them before Christmas?

I haven’t really embraced the three words concept for a few years. I’ve just gotten lazy, but I think it’s time to bring them back. (Disclaimer: the three words idea is from my beloved friend CC’s book, “Amazing Things Will Happen”. You should really read it.)

SO.

For this year, my three words are:

PHYSICAL: A little too encompassing, maybe, but all the things that fit under this are related. I want to get past this roadblock with my running. I want to lose weight. I want to finally kick Dopey’s ass in 2024 since it’s a given that it probably won’t happen this year. I want to feel better / get into a shape that isn’t rotund. (Although, I still don’t get anything positive out of running. I want a runner’s high, damnit! I demand the ability to consistently have a runner’s high for Christmas. You hear that, fat man?)

MENTAL: Also a little too broad, but again, when I put together my list of things I wanted to manifest this year, I kept finding things that are related. I want to read more. I want to engage in hobbies I used to love. I want to learn Ukrainian. And Polish.(Apparently, I’m a glutton for punishment. Polish is supposedly a very difficult language to learn.) I want to do the things that make me feel whole and since my brain is my superpower… I want to keep it active. Zoning out to the Sims every night isn’t doing it and I can feel a difference in the way the depression affects me. Sometimes, being as self-aware as I am is a motherfucker.

SOCIAL: I want to make friends. It’s as simple as that. I lost my high school and college friends when I moved to Ohio. I fought hard to get some of them back when we moved to New Hampshire, but some of that was short-lived. Then we moved to Florida and the tenuous grasp I had on any of those friendships continues to lessen as the distance gets in the way. I have two friends in Florida - both from Facebook groups - and neither friendship has really taken off IRL, even though we live relatively close to each other.

And, related to word number three - what the holy fuck have I done?!? I signed up for a learn to play D&D session through the FRC.

ME!

Playing Dungeons & Fucking Dragons.

(I’m laughing my ass off at how that came out, btw.)

I have never been interested in D&D. NEVER.

But.

It’s a way to connect with more people. It’s a way to maybe take some of those random online names and make them friends.

There’s a few more ideas that I’ve had, but signing up for an online learn to play D&D class is a big enough jump for this weekend.

On that note, I’m going to grab my copy of Beginner’s Ukrainian and fight my way through the first chapter.

Бо я тащусь від тебе давно

What? You asked.

The year my mother died, I was taking a drama class. I was friends with all the theatre geeks and I liked the drama club teacher, so why the fuck not?

(Long time readers will recognise the fuck it factor at work…)

The homework assignment was to describe an emotional day you had - the day you got your driver’s license, for example. You know. Emotional shit.

My essay might have started by grabbing you by the short hairs and didn’t let go for two pages.

On Wednesday, March 18th, I walked into the condo to see my father crying at the kitchen table.

My father never cries.

When he finally looked at me, I knew.

“Ding dong, the witch is dead,” I asked.

“Ding dong,” he answered.

Have I said how absolutely fucking thrilled I am to be cleaning out 40+ years of memories I’d rather forget? (STILL!)

Do you know, I couldn’t remember what grade I got? I couldn’t just flip to the end and look. No! That would have been the sensible thing to do. The easy thing.

When the fuck have I ever done the easy thing?

I read the entire fucking thing. Cried through all of it. Wondered how it would end.

(Spoiler alert: it ends with my mother six feet under.)

And the grade? As if there were any doubt: A+  The relationship between mother and child can be difficult and you captured that.

Can. Be. Difficult.

Oh, Doc L., you have no idea.

BBQ sauce on my titties would have been a much better story.

 

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I ran last night.

Willingly got on the treadmill with my puffer in hand.

2 miles - intervals for all of it: 30 seconds (13mm) / 2 minutes (20mm).

Not speedy. Not balloon lady safe.

I did two beginner iFit workouts because I wanted to zone out and let the treadmill tell me what to do.

(The girl who drives a stick and refuses to use cruise control because she drives the car put the treadmill in charge. Yeah.)

I didn’t enjoy it.

But, I didn’t hate it, either.

I have a Turkey Trot coming up on the 24th. In fucking Miami.

I wasn’t really looking forward to the race, but… I’ve always done well at 10Ks. Especially there.

It’s not enough to salvage my Dopey training, but it’s a start.

My new shoes and socks don’t cause blisters, so maybe I can get father in the marathon than mile four.

I have no idea and I don’t really care.

I’ll do what I can and then I’m hanging up the sneakers.

I no make words go good. English hard.

I’m running out of icons and pretty colours on my little sidebar.

I’ve decided to scrap the third draft and start over again…

Welcome to draft 4, which is already filled with random notes like this one.

TBH, I don’t know which one of us was completely shitty when that was written, but my money’s on me. Beka seems like he’d be straight-edge. (When he’s not statutory raping a fucking 15 year old, that is. KEEP IT IN YOUR PANTS, BEKA.)

Yeah.

So much shit on my mind and instead, I’m tearing apart a story that I’ve already written three drafts of to play with new point of views and - hopefully - get them to keep it in their pants. I DO NOT WRITE KIDDY PORN, GODDAMNIT.

At this rate, I’m going to have to age them up… and I hate that. I like AUs, but that’s totally not the story I wanted to tell.

Yearning. Slow burn. A love story spread over three years.

That’s the story I want to tell.

And the one I am completely incapable of telling.

Oh well. The 4th time’s the charm, right?

 

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I’m trying to keep myself distracted.

The pending war in Ukraine. The new job. Life in general.

I’m a big ball of stress right now.

So, of course, the Sims released a new game pack today.

By all accounts, it is buggy as fuck, even despite being held back by a week. (And wasn’t that a week - the short version is, EA self-censored and refused to release the game in Russia. All hell broke loose. EA backed off and held the release a week to ensure that the game would launch globally at the same time. A whole lot of stupidity ensued.)

Still bought it. Haven’t even bothered playing yet.

I probably won’t get a chance until the weekend.

Maybe EA will patch it by then. (Or not. We still have bugs in the game that are several years old and well known by everybody. Like, there’s no way the SimGurus don’t know about them. Why they aren’t being fixed is anyone’s guess at this point.)

Also not helping is the fact that the 2023 NHL All Star game is being held in my backyard. At that place. That I used to work at. Before I got fired for being bipolar.

I’m torn between wanting to go and staying home. I don’t know which option is healthier.

I’m just glad that life is starting to become closer to normal again… I have a half marathon towards the end of March and I just signed up to run a 5K in early March. I have a Boombox concert to go to, and I might head to Universal on my birthday to see Gavin DeGraw.

Who the fuck knows.

All I know is that I’m stressed to the gills….

I need a nap, a cookie, and a hug.

Every mile is magic

I love this so much

I need to vent about this…

My old AR person, at the other company, kept 6 spreadsheets that all had the same information. AND NONE OF IT MATCHED. She had collection notes spread across them and none of them were the same. If you opened spreadsheet A, it had a note that on [date] she talked to the insured and they said blah, blah, blah. If you opened spreadsheet B, it had a note that on [same date] she called and the number was disconnected. The amounts she was trying to collect on were different. The adjuster’s name, phone number. email were all different. Her replacement and I didn’t know which one was right, so we nuked it all and started from scratch.

That was such a miserable experience.

At the new job (a printing company), the woman I’m replacing is just as bad. I plan on consolidating a few of her spreadsheets because I just can’t deal with it.

Maybe it’s my background in construction, or my interest in becoming a CMA, or just the way I’m wired, but work-in-progress schedules turn me on. Why do you need to keep a pending and a sales spreadsheet with you can combine both? I mean, once you have the billed amount on the spreadsheet, you can see if it’s pending or sold. Why not track the costs? There’s so much this simple schedule can do and so many ways you can tweak it… I mean, this is a portion of the final report I built. IT’S SO USEFUL!

 

(Yes, it’s blurry on purpose. Yes, those numbers aren’t real. I’m not THAT stupid.)

So… yeah. They don’t track their inventory. They don’t have any means to compare estimates to actuals except by looking at several different reports. They barely know if something’s been billed. (The Controller doesn’t sit in on the Production Meetings!?! She’s too busy - no doubt, because she’s managing a BILLION spreadsheets. Gah.)

OH! And I am SALTY about something that went down yesterday. I accidentally calculated the sales tax on a job that was tax-exempt. The spreadsheet was deleted and redone, without the tax calculation. Supposedly because I didn’t have the time to do needless work, habits be damned. THEN, I find out that I did need that sales tax number after all (to go on yet another spreadsheet). So I had to redo that. I TOUCHED THE SAME SPREADSHEET THREE TIMES TO GET ONE NUMBER.

How do I always find these places?

I don’t know… she’s retiring in March so I just have to hold on until then.

Gotta run. (HA!) I have a hot date with the treadmill. I’m getting a jump start on Dopey training because I refuse to let the dwarf beat me two years in a row. Now that I know exactly what to expect, I have a better idea of how I (personally) need to train. Most training plans are one size fits all, and well, I don’t fit that mold.

She’s Running the Distance

that is what a half marathon pr looks like

Let’s get the ugly bit out of the way: I did not complete the marathon and therefore, did not complete the Dopey Challenge.

Instead of coming home with six medals, I received four. The marathon’s medal was given to me after I got off the party bus, but I didn’t receive the Goofy or Dopey Challenge medals. I’m not nearly as upset as I could be about getting swept during the marathon. In all honesty, I made it farther than I thought I would.

But…

I PR’d the half marathon.

Shaved 13 minutes off my previous best race.

I got stronger as the race got longer, too. I walked most of the first half and then I started doing intervals -  run the chorus, walk the lyrics - when a good song came on.

The balloon ladies passed me, but I finished a whopping 30 seconds behind them this time.

I may have gotten pulled at mile 4 of the marathon, but at the end of the day, I completed a 5K, a 10K, and a half marathon.

Maybe I was crazy to attempt a Dopey without getting an IRL marathon under my belt first, but I don’t care.

I PR’D A HALF MARATHON.

Woo!!!!!!