August 2007

My life could not be more complicated.

Um. It could - but I’m already feeling overwhelmed, so, like, it can just stay the way it is and not get worse, okay?

Tuesday night, I got very little sleep. My neighbor with whom I share a single wall has an alarm clock that went off at about 3 AM or so, and stayed on for hours. WHEEP WHEEP WHEEP WHEEP WHEEP for five hours straight. (It was my day to go in an hour later than everyone else.) I noticed about ten minutes after I finally struggled out of bed that the alarm was now silent and they were watching the news on TV.

HOW DO YOU SLEEP THROUGH FIVE HOURS OF AN ALARM CLOCK GOING OFF! I couldn’t even tune it out when it was muffled by a wall!

AND THEN. On top of all the stuff I won’t mention here because it could lead to various personages tracking me down and wreaking havoc on my life, I got a call at work the other day that nearly traumatized me.

“Hi, this is (name) at (property management place handling my rent check each month). I’m just calling to see if you’ve moved out yet? We have the 19th as your move-out date.”

The back of my mind: GUH. AAAAAAHHHHHHH! NYARRRRRRGH!

My mouth: WHAT? AM I BEING EVICTED?

Voice over the phone, muffled: “She sounds shocked.”

Various crashing rustling crinkling noises.

New voice on phone: “HI THERE, this is (name of a lady I actually remember), um, I’m so sorry, we’ve managed to cross up your apartment with (other address that’s COMPLETELY DIFFERENT except for the unit number) AGAIN, heh, I’m sooooo sorry.”

Me: So I don’t need a Uhaul and a bunch of therapy to get over the trauma?

Lady: “Oh, no, *chuckle*, no no no, I’m so sorry.”

And then my phone went berserk for the rest of the day and would not let me get voicemail. You do not know how crazy it made me thinking people in crisis might have left me voicemail I could not get. And then, I would leave my office and come back wondering if the impassioned voicemail I left for the help desk had resulted in a return call that got sent to voicemail. Maybe there was a voicemail about how to get into my voicemail? So I send an email about my voicemail. It righted itself eventually and the only voicemail I got… was nothing more than someone confused about an appointment time, which I’d already settled with them. Whew.

That was just yesterday.

This morning, I stumbled into the kitchen to find the first roach I have seen since the Bug Guy sprayed around.

HIDING UNDER THE ROACH MOTEL.

Reader, I squished him.

DEAR UNIVERSE, PLEASE STOP TRAUMATIZING ME, KTHXBYE.

CYNICAL CAT WOULD LIKE TO BE LEFT ALONE NAOW.

Amazon.com: Lio: Happiness Is a Squishy Cephalopod: Books: Mark Tatulli

I read it finally.

It could have been better. I would have done things differently, not that it matters, and despite being thoroughly spoiled I enjoyed parts of it more than I expected, but I was not surprised often. I wonder how long she spent trying to figure some of it out?

I have to wonder too why it was not important to list what the adult versions of various people were doing for a living, but it was necessary to name all the various progeny. Hmm. Sequel series setup?

House elves - deus ex machina or valid plot device? or: how much plot was excised by using up Dobby?

And on that note: Kreacher’s sudden turn to the light side of the Force = religious conversion?

Hermione and Ron - rounded characters who end a series as peripheral.

Snape - see that man in the distance? he did things we approve of, after all.

One thing I appreciated - Voldemort had previously been a typical bad guy, hovering around in the distance cackling and wringing his hands about the nefarious plans he had. The last few books showed the politics he was influencing. In other words, he grew up and became an evil villain you’d expect in an adult book, rather than the sort of bad guy you’d expect to defeat in a kid’s book.

The trouble with this is, all that text about what’s printed in the papers and so on was pretty boring and not much of it had a lot to do with the rest of what happened - she could have had Harry read it in the background and point out the pertinent bits. She had so much happening off camera that would have been interesting to see, why not tuck away the bits that weren’t really completely necessary? In other words, I didn’t like her choices of what she told vs. what she described. I suppose that the fact that it’s still supposed to be a kid’s book governed this, but it’s still annoying. Especially when I didn’t think it was really a kid’s book any more. When you have an enemy hollowing out a body and sticking his pet snake in, even off camera, do you really have a kid’s book any more?

Federal ID plan raises privacy concerns - CNN.com

I tried to raise the alarm about RealID, but alas, the bill passed.

I wonder if I’m in a state that passed some of that legislation to ban it?

1. Why I have been silent and distant with the blog
2. Why I updated my resume
3. Why I thought of an attorney, grievances, union action and/or walking out and not coming back
4. Why I am kicking myself for not getting out while the storm clouds were still on the horizon instead of waiting for them to loom overhead rumbling ominously.
5. Why I have been surfing job ads

I may get my mojo back. It may take time. I just can’t talk about it right now, and I’m afraid if I start typing on another subject things will leak into the text. Stress is bleeding across the edges into everything.

This too shall pass.

Didn’t even know I was gone, did you?

I spent three days covering a lot of miles up and down the California coast. I went to Pismo, Avila Beach, San Luis Obispo, Cayucos, Morro Bay, San Simeon, Carmel and Monterey - this was not terribly difficult as the first six are all about 10 - 30 miles apart, and it really doesn’t take much time to go from one to the other as everyone on Route 1 (or 101 in some stretches) drives like a bat outta. Avila is where you take your motorhome to park, open the door, plant deck chairs just outside and sit there. It’s what everyone else was doing. I went to Sycamore Springs instead and sat in a hot tub for an hour. Then I went outlet shopping in Pismo, people watched at the beach, and buzzed up the coast again.

I saw two whales (spouting, not up close), a pod of dolphins leaping, lots of birds, seals and sea lions, lots of buzzards eating dead seals, but no exotics; the zebras at Hearst Castle must have been out in the vast acreage surrounding the castle rather than at the road this time. The castle itself is something to see, if you haven’t been.

Driving up highway 1 is an attraction in itself. I did it in the morning fog. I actually had to buy a sweater in Pismo. And now I am home in central Cali, and only want to drive back over there and stay - it’s so hot here! I could while away the hours sitting on a rock overlooking the Pacific if only I could find someone to bring me sandwiches and lotion (for wind burn). If only there were experiments being done on how long people could sit on a beach - I’m game.