Scraps (n. ,fem., singular)

What better way to spend a hot, sweltering weekend than in my meat-locker of an office? Well, I could think of better ways, but it wouldn’t have mattered because I chose to be responsible, for at least 6 hours of the 48.

You see, Friday did not go exactly as planned. It turned out that they fix we thought we’d acheived was merely a false sense of security. It took a few more hours and lot of restarts to find the missing link. A small funtion of a greater function has ceased to cooperate but there is a way around it that isn’t too terribly inconvenient, but it’s still not good: it’s the difference between a data error and a system error, the latter being the worst case scenario. Now we are left to wonder what will be next (hey, I’m not tempting fate any more than usual)?

Basically Friday became a wash as it took all day to resolve the problem and then get my new (to me) computer installed, set up and running (yay OS X!). While I went to run an errand at lunch I decided that it was better to use the Monday (not Tuesday in yesterday’s post) version of the data and start the week over instead of just wiping the AR for those days. Even though it meant a little more work overall, it really was easier this way since I didn’t have to worry about reversing files and making sure the replaced AR didn’t post a second time to the GL. I made the call on my cell to the office, and when I hung up I had this strange feeling of ‘wow, that felt awfully professional, like the way it seems in the movies.”

Just the night before I was noticing that everything in my life felt very temporary: my apartment, my job, school, etc. Friday, though, I came to a bit of a realization: I need to stop waiting to start my life, I am living it now. Work is not just my job for now, I’ve been at the company 11 years, it’s my career, I just need to accept it. Yes, my apartment being a lease is by nature temporary, but I should really finish unboxing and hang things on the wall, make it my home for as long as I’m here. And, I need to start doing those projects I think about doing and collect the parts and pieces for.

School is a bit more complicated. After this semester I will be completely finished with my AA degree (finally!). If I continue to pursue the art degree it’s going to mean taking time away from work to go to school. If I take time off of work I won’t be able to afford to go to school without adding to my student loans (already high enough from Culinary School). So I’m in a catch-22. Unless…

I could go back to the theory of an accounting degree, and maybe be able to continue my education online this way. Of course, FSU doesn’t have an undergrad accounting deree online, but they do offer their masters online. What I suppose I could get is my bachelor’s (online) in ISS (Interdisciplinary Social Sciences) and then do my Masters in accounting online. I’m not entirely keen on the Economics courses, but I’m sure I could manage, and I have the pre-reqs from years ago! The Sociology course could be pretty interesting, and I can deal with a few Geography courses tossed in to round it out. The fly in the ointment is that FSU charges more for their online credit hours than they do in-class credit hours, almost prohibitively more. It has, of course, just occurred to me that other Florida Universities might have online programs that are more specific to what I want and maybe even better priced (in-state is in-state people!). Something else to research this week.

Okay, enough of the introspection. In other activities I helped draft a pattern for a 16th century Flemish bodice for L, went to lunch with Mom and then painted a non-handled cup-vase-thing at Waddle Pots. Also, really loving the Publix brand Sherbet in Tropical Swirl: Cherry, Lime & Pineapple-Coconut.

The more I continue to learn about a certain former co-worker, the more angry I become at him/her. Granted, the fact that s/he is a former co-worker makes his/her conniving and treachery a tad easier to bear…but not much!

See, today, a certain ticking time bomb (read as: outdated and unsupported computer program from 1999) had a minor meltdown (read as: major glitch which hampered certain necessary functions), which caused me a minor meltdown (read as: Oh F!), which is now (thanks to the efforts of the replacement coworker) only going to take me tomorrow (instead of all next week) to re-do the work that was lost thanks to the major computer crap-age.

Office politics can be a bit of a bugger sometimes, you know? You think that everyone is on the same page, your supervisors know what’s going on, and then you find out that not only was your supervisor *not* communicating your needs to the higher-ups, he/she was playing one department against the other, each thinking that the other was the favored pet getting all of the attention, funds and championing. It about blew my socks off when I finally went directly to my boss with my concerns and he said, and I quote, “There’s a problem?”

But things seem to be going well, now. The new Sys.Admin. is a straight-shooter, willing to tackle the bearish problems (like my outdated software) and manages to laugh even when our collective towers are falling down around our ears. Thank goodness that he’d made a “lets make a copy to the server and see what we can do about upgrading your OS” copy on Tuesday, that’s the only reason I’m not stuck replacing more than just the last few days (unfortunately productive days) of AR data.

…STAYS in Munchkin

heh heh heh

I had such the good time this weekend! Saturday was yet another SCA party and I’ve come to realize that I’ll never know exactly what to expect with these…except rain, that is pretty much a given I think.

So, anyway, Munchkin? Totally fun cardgame that makes fun of D&D and other RPGs. I suppose it makes a difference who is playing, and we had about 10 or so people (It was the regular game plus two expansion packs apparently) with three of us (of which I was one) who had never played before. After the first go round I/we mostly had a good idea of what was going on. Lots of very horrible puns and, let me just say, that the sex change card came with house rules that whomever gets the sex-change card must do everything they can to emulate the opposite sex. There were cups and pointy dice used. Yes there are pictures, no they will not be shown lol

Next time, I’m told, we might get to play SPANC .

I actually debated about calling this post “these dreams” or “I dreamed I was in a Hollywood movie” but neither really worked. And that has nothing to do with anything anyway.

So, last night, goooood dream. What sucked was waking up happy only to realize that NONE of it actually happened. And once sentient not only did I really get that it made little to no sense to have thought, even for a sleepy second, that it did happen but what it might really mean.

See, in the dream, I was interviewing (strange because I have never nor ever wanted to be a reporter or journalist) this guy and he was, I think, an artist, but the details are a little fuzzy there. Anyway, so I’m sitting on a couch in his studio (?) and asking him questions that I cannot remember, all I remember is the general feel that we had a bit of witty repartee going back and forth and that he had a wonderfully wicked sense of humor. He was working on something the entire time and I recall that Mr.Dream was tall, dark hair, medium to slight build, with blue or green eyes…been awake too long…dressed in white t-shirt and black jeans, neither of which were tight, and the t-shirt had some sort of logo on it but I don’t remember what. (See, even my dream guys aren’t hotties, and that doesn’t bother me.)

Continuing on, we got to the end of the questions and were laughing about something and there it was: sustained eye contact. Yeah, I know, big deal, but it WAS. It was the kind of eye contact that sends sparks through a room, like anything could happen, that said ‘wow, your funny and smart and I really like you’. It was the kind of connection that you know, if you made just the slightess move–say even a lift of an eyebrow–the entire situation would change (for the good I mean). And then I left.

Wha? No, I didn’t wake up then, I left. I said goodbye (I don’t even thing we like shook hands or anything) and got in my car (incidentally my dream car, so not my current conveyance) and went off to do other things. From there it gets very fuzzy and I’m convinced slightly complicated (V was there, some connection still existed, there was even a bed, though nothing happened in it…), which also comes into the analysis.

Okay, so many people would say: Jenn, you’re lonely, you need to get laid and be done with it. Uh, no. Not it people. Don’t even WANT that…it’s too complicated. Being in this grey area of “separated” is weird. Technically V is still my husband, but he’s also my ex-, just not legally yet. Then there’s the matter of time. It hasn’t even been quite a month yet, I so totally don’t want to become even casually involved again for quite some time.

But really, I’ve never been good at this whole ‘alone’ thing. I mean, I’ve been single before, just not for long. And living alone seems to accentuate that, there’s not even the buffer of a roommate, even one whose hardly around. Weekends are, presumably, the worst, last weekend being particularly sideways just because…well, I don’t know why, it just was.

Back when I was doing a lot of blind/first dates between serious boyfriends, etc. I always tried to be upfront about being High Maintenance. See, I don’t require lots of money being spent on me, it’s not that, it a time issue. I require attention, kinda like plants but without the chlorofyl thing. And yes, I do demand a pedestal…it doesn’t have to be a tall one (I am afraid of heights after all), it just has to be there.

Another thing, I am so not looking forward to the time when (and it will come, it’s inevitable) that I have to start “promoting” myself again. Its such a pain, having to explain your existence in 3 to 5 sentences each time you meet someone of interest. I really thought I was done with all of that, and I suppose I COULD be, but that would mean never meeting anyone. ever. And I am a realist enough to see that’s not a possibility.

So have I gotten far enough off track? Let’s see if I can follow the rabbit trail back a bit and get to my point…. Oh! Right! I think my dream was merely emphasizing that I crave the attention of a man (obvious) without the entanglements of a committment (unusual for me, but the leaving sort of said that) but am hindered by the other stuff going on and insecure about where I actually am in life (the fuzzy rest of the dream).

And for the record. Since the actually decision to separate I have been hit on twice and both time, my word but it just made me so very tired…

A minor victory but a victory nonetheless: I am writing this from my kitchen!

Which means that I got my wireless router and (more importantly) my notebook card to cooperate so I don’t have to string wires all over the apartment to use email, etc.

Why was this such a big deal? Well, here’s the thing. In the past I would have thought nothing of asking one of the very technical guys I knew to do this for me. Now, however, I refuse. Why? Am I just stubborn? Yes, but that’s not all of it. See, in my previous living situation there was a woman who did this all the time: anything she needed done she had this harem of men to do it. Now, some were family members but most common were the men she’d known for years, most (if not all) of whom had wives or girlfriends they would leave to go do her odd jobs. V was one of them.

Now, I’m not even saying she’s the reason for our breakup but I do believe that V’s continuing and escalating appearances at her home versus ours, even to the point of going there first after work each day just because it was more convenient and whether she had a chore for him or not, contributed to the lack of attention I received from V. I could have asked that he not go over as often, but to me it seemed pointless, since he obviously preferred to be there rather than with me (and I told him that a few times when he would ask if I minded if he went over…even if I did mind what good would it do was my thinking).

So, back on track, when I ordered my components for a wireless network in the new apartment, I emailed an old friend (an old boyfriend in truth, who is happily married, and who I’ve kept in sporadic contact with since our breakup in 2000) to have him look at the list of my order and see if there was anything obvious that I’d left out. That was it. His answer was to ask that I let him know when it all came in and he’d help me set it up. For a split second I almost let him.

Then it hit me, if I did that I would be Her. I would be asking a man to leave his home to come to mine and do something I was otherwise capable of doing. Sure it would be easier, and no I would never get into the habit of asking him to do things for me, but even doing it once was too much for me. I couldn’t bear the thought of his wife (whom I’ve actually never met and don’t know enough about to make any expectation of a reaction, but she’s female and what female wants her husband going over to his newly single ex-girlfriend’s home for any reason?) rolling her eyes and saying, ‘can’t she manage it herself?’ or ‘doesn’t she have other friends to bother?’ I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t be that girl.

So, sure, it took two calls to tech support to get the one device straightened out. And I still have the desktop adapter to go. And I still need to address the issue of securing the network. But I’ve gotten this far virtually on my own, and I’ll get the rest of the way as well. On my own. Without calling some guy away from his mate. That is why I’m celebrating.

So good.

(6/25) The move went relatively well, all things considered. Even though U-Haul put a major kink in my original plans by not having a truck for me until 3:30pm, but my moving-force was up for the challenge. Can I just say Thank Heavens for the SCA! The five people who comprised my volunteer moving force were all new friends/acquaintances that I’d made just in the last few months. I cannot say enough about the karma or fate that set up this support system, but I was really touched that near-strangers would be so willing to help me. It took us about an hour and a half to load the U-Haul, trucks and cars; maybe 20 minutes to unload the bulk of it once we got to the apartment. The rain tried to intrude but the bottom didn’t drop out until we were all inside waiting on the pizza to arrive. I stayed at Mom’s one final night.

(6/26) I just couldn’t sleep in on Sunday; the image of the towers of boxes waiting in my new apartment would not leave my mind, so I was up and gone before 10am. Mom called my cell-phone at about half-past wondering where I was. Having tackled most of the kitchen boxes and rearranged the ones in the bedroom I headed back over to Mom’s around noon to meet Jason (who was going to move my mattress and box-spring for me). Back at the apartment, more boxes emptied and flattened, at 4 o’clock I reached my limit and went back to Mom’s. Watched an old movie, ate dinner, and gathered my clothes and laptop. The offer was made for me to stay on the couch that night, but I knew I had to leave at some point. The second I closed Mom’s door I started to cry (hey, I admit it, I can be a wuss sometimes) and that lasted pretty much the entire drive (all five minutes). Once I got the suitcases inside I called it a night. I took a shower, had a beer, and watched something on TV (NBC to be exact, since I got exactly two and a half channels on my little 13″ tv).

(6/27) Monday I had the day off from work and started in pretty early unpacking more boxes. I was bringing Abigail home later and I needed things to be somewhat organized enough to keep her out of trouble. Just as I was about to call V to see when it would be safe for me the go over there, he called for the same reason. Having already said his good-byes to Abigail that morning, he agreed not to go home during lunch so I could go over around that time. Mostly what I needed to get from V’s was food. I had a fair amount of dry and freezer goods still over there and I really needed to NOT start from absolute scratch. Anything I knew thatV wouldn’t eat or take the time to fix I claimed as mine. Between that and the dog and her things we filled my poor little car to the very brim, then we were off. I left the keys and some cash (for the digital camera, sofa, and dresser I bought from him) by the coffee pot and was officially gone.

Abbie was a but skitish at the new place, but she recognized the sofa and stayed pretty much put while I put away the groceries. Then we both went and took a nap for a bit before I went to dance practice (deparately needed the human contact and to get AWAY from the boxes).

There, that about covers the first weekend in the new place. Some interesting things I realized, those little bits of unrealized freedoms, included that I could put whatever I wanted in the medicine cabinet: it was ALL MINE. It was a strange feeling.