Monday, June 10, 2013

Gonna do it

I can’t put it off any more… it’s time to start rucking with a fully loaded ruck. Four bricks, 3 litres of water, and a yoga block to keep the bricks in place. It is fucking heavy and if I don’t get used to doing some serious miles with it on, I will die in July. Die, I tell you!

I’ve been putting it off and putting it off because I HATE being on a treadmill. I don’t need to do it on a treadmill. I live in a relatively safe neighborhood, I’m home during the afternoon when the sun is shining bright… there is absolutely no reason I haven’t started yet.

Except for a stupid fear:

I’m afraid to go for a walk by myself - what if I go too far, get too tired and can’t make it back home?

I know, I know, I know.

Today’s big plan includes looking for a job, logging some serious time on the treadmill, going to the Apple store to fix my baby, and going to my work out.

No interviews today, but I have one tomorrow. It’s a second so there’s really nothing more I can do except show up. Besides, they don’t have a website or anything.

I hate this… I really hate this… and it’s been going on over a month.

*sigh*

Sunday, June 09, 2013

I’m in John Finnemore’s sandbox!

I’ve decided that my next foray into fan fiction would be “Cabin Pressure”.  The pilots like to play a lot of word games, and coming up with my own has been a right bitch.

I’ve decided to steal an idea from CP and have the pilots do cabin addresses using Stephen King’s works instead of Hitchcock’s.

Here’s the original:
DOUGLAS: Hello, my name is First Officer Douglas Richardson. On behalf of the captain and myself, a warm welcome aboard this MJN flight to Qikiqtarjuaq. Just to let you know, we will be flying out from Toronto today, roughly “North by Northwest,” at the “Vertigo”-inducing height of twenty thousand feet, way above “The Birds.” You will already have met your purser today, Carolyn “Rebecca” “Topaz,” but now, as “The Lady Vanishes” behind the “Torn Curtain” into the galley, the steward will hold you “Spellbound” with his “Notorious” demonstration of “The Thirty-Nine Steps” to a safe evacuation, though these basically boil down to three: pull the “Rope,” inflate the “Lifeboat,” and escape through the “Rear Window.” (Huge thanks to the folks at The Cabin Pressure Livejournal Community for posting the transcripts, including this one from Qikiqtarjuaq. In case you haven’t noticed, I have an unhealthy fascination with this episode.)

Here’s my attempt:
DOUGLAS: Good morning to our favourite passengers, Arthur ‘Cujo’ Shappey, and Ms. ‘Dolores Claiborne’. My name is First Officer Douglas Richardson, and I’ve just come off ‘The Night Shift’ where I flew over ‘The Green Mile’ with my co-pilot, your Captain and ‘The Apt Pupil’ himself, Martin Crieff. Today, our ‘Skeleton Crew’ will be flying in the direction of ‘The Shining’ sun en route to the lovely city of Gay Paris. Whilst in Paris, we will be parking the aeroplane ‘Under the Dome’ near ‘The Dark Tower’ of Orly Airport. As it is a daytime flight, we will unfortunately be landing at half noon instead of ‘Four Past Midnight’. I do hope the unending boredom of a cargo flight doesn’t create a sense of ‘Desperation’ and turn you into a ‘Firestarter’.

Dude, this shit is hard work, even with the characters handed to you on a silver platter. Plus, you know… the whole having to write English pilots as English pilots thing. At least I got some practice writing “It Was Always There”, and I can choose a UK English dictionary so my spelling isn’t completely atrocious. My Google searches have become ridiculous… For a country that started out speaking British English, we’ve gone ahead and made a fucking mess of it. (Of course, in changing my Mac to accept the UK dictionary as the default, I’ve managed to change the American pound (hashtag) symbol to the symbol for the British pound (currency) as well. *sigh* It’s not worth looking to see if I can fix it, but it is a bit annoying.)

HOWEVER, I am impressed as fuck with myself for not needing to look up any of Stephen King’s works to do that cabin address. So there’s that in my favor.

(My little Johnlock - while not breaking any hits/comments/kudos/favorites records - has received nothing but positive feedback. w00t!!!!! I don’t want to post the link here out of shyness/stupidity, but I suppose if you search fanfiction.net or AO3 for “wendellgee” you’ll stumble upon it.)

*And again… I don’t own “Cabin Pressure”. I just like playing in Mr. Finnemore’s sandbox and should he choose to steal my little Stephen King cabin address… well, let’s just say I’d be too busy jumping up and down shouting “BRILLIANT!” to hire a solicitor.*

Saturday, June 08, 2013

Intimidating boobs!

Oh my motherfucking dog…

I can’t remember the last time I laughed that hard. EVER. (And I have had some awesome times in my life.)

Nine hours round trip to spend four hours in a haunted castle.

But what an amazing four hours they were.

Annie’s bridal shower was today, and while I’m not into the whole bridal shower scene, I couldn’t miss this. I wouldn’t miss this.

Seriously, I love that girl sumptin’ fierce, and I am (STILL!) beyond humbled that she wanted me there.

Anyhoo, I sat at the troublemakers’ table with my friend Mike’s wife D (I finally met his wife! WOO!), C, Annie’s mom (L) and her friend DD. Holy crap. We were loud, rude, and generally crazy. Then we went outside and talked shit while we (well, they) smoked. Dog bless the smoke breaks.

I don’t even know where to start. 

Let’s start with the “Bad Word” game, since that’s where the intimidating boobs came from. (I’m SO naming my band that!)

We all got five clothespins to attach to our clothing and you had to surrender a clothespin every time you said a word on the list. (Wedding, dress/gown, Charlie, band, honeymoon, and something I’m blanking on now…) C, L and DD start attaching the clothespins to their shirts… well, I say attaching to their SHIRTS. DD decided a few of them were better off hiding in her cleavage or attached to her bra straps. The comment was made that people would be afraid to take the pins from the Chesty Morgans at the table because it would be so hard to take the pins off and not cop a feel.

Of course, I met Annie through the band, and when D tried to trip me up, I told her that I knew a guy who knew a guy who introduced me to Annie. Of course, that wasn’t good enough, so it became I met this guy in college who was part of a group of people who played instruments who played in a bar in Albany with Annie’s friends. Since we weren’t sure (and couldn’t ask at that point) if they were referring to BMS (the band) or a wedding band, I had to get really creative. REALLY creative… and everything I tried sounded worse.

So then, we were talking about the castle. My little brother got married at a castle and when I was trying to tell D that I called it their ‘heterosexual joining ceremony.’ I don’t know which one of us laughed harder.

AND THE INCENSE! I was trying to describe the smell inside of the castle and I was drawing a blank. It smelled churchy and not at all pot smoky. Yep. D, DD and I were in tears at my stupidity.

AND! AND! THE CRAZY WOMAN! I don’t know who she belonged to, but there was the most insane woman I’ve ever met (and that’s saying a lot) wandering around. She kept saying she wasn’t going to talk about a baby shower, or her 5 week old granddaughter, but that’s all she talked about. Then, she came around with PICTURES. PICTURES!!!

She’s telling us about how her granddaughter has a full head of hair, but her daughters didn’t and they were 32 now. C looks at her, straight faced, and says, “Oh, did your daughters’ hair ever grow in?” Then, when the woman passed her photos around, C grabbed her phone and handed it to the woman, telling her to look at HER baby. I’m not quite sure that the woman expected to see a dog, but she took it in stride. Meanwhile, the rest of us were just pissing ourselves. The next smoke break was taken as soon as we could get away from her, and the tears, man, I couldn’t get them to stop.

When it was time to leave, I wanted to pack DD up and take her home with me. She was a non-stop laugh riot. Especially when she was afraid to use the restroom in the haunted bar because she didn’t want a ghost to touch her butt while she peed.

I can’t WAIT for the wedding… chaos and anarchy and good friends… this girl couldn’t ask for anything more!

Friday, June 07, 2013

Like father, like daughter?

Job interview today for a cost accountant position.

Dad was a cost accountant. I want to be a cost accountant.

I know.

It’s weird, huh? Especially when he told me NOT to become an accountant.

Movin’ on because I don’t want to make myself cry…

It’s hard to find entry level cost jobs that will pay me what I need.

Actually, that’s a lie.

Right now it’s fucking IMPOSSIBLE to find an entry level cost job… so I’ve lucked out big time.

I’ve pushed aside my morning of job searching to research the hell out of this company, so it better pay off.

I need it to pay off.

Out of the five interviews that have been scheduled, here’s the new breakdown:

1) That company in the industry - 2nd interview (good hours, good dress code, room for growth, fun bosses)
2) Widget makers - passed on 2nd
3) Hotel - waiting to hear (great title, decent hours, suits, no room for growth)
4) Retirement place - waiting to hear (suits, room for growth, fun boss)
5) Cost job - today…

——

In other news, while not spreading like wildfire, there’s been a lot of decent interest in response to my little Johnlock fic. I wonder if I’m turning people off because it’s neither fluff nor slash?

There have to be others like me out there who like their bromance with a side of non-fluffy cuddles.

Right?

Thursday, June 06, 2013

Nice to have choices

Got a call back for a second interview at the widget makers.

Turned it down.

As I told the recruiter from the very beginning, I didn’t think I was a good fit. I thought I’d be bored.

The interview didn’t make me feel any better about the boredom, but I wasn’t going to make any decision until I had to.

Since I have a second with a company I like, an interview for a job I’d really like, and the possibility of a second with a company I really like, I’m not going to waste anyone’s time going through a second interview when I’m really not interested in the company.

For the first time during this round of staycation fun, I feel like I have hope.

The sun keeps shining brighter through the clouds…