The Musings of a Fool

Had a good Thanksgiving. I had to work Wednesday and Friday, but it wasn't too bad. Sarah came down from Maryland for the holiday Wednesday night and stayed 'till this morning (she has some huge project she's working on). It was good to see her, and it was short enough that we didn't start to fall into the sister squabbling. :P We had Thanksgiving dinner with the family of a friend of my mom's from high school who has helped me and Jeremy get settled in the area. Mom's got some big project at work so she couldn't come up, and Dad just finished moving out to Oklahoma (he got laid off early this year and hasn't been able to find work yet, so he sold the house and is staying with his parents while he looks for a job in the midwest, where there's a better job market).

Had a mole removed off my leg on Wednesday, which has been annoying as hell. It's a 4.5cm long incision with 9 stitches (external; I have no clue how many they used on the inside). Doesn't really hurt, but I can't use regular bandaids or anything because the adhesives make my skin break out and the ace bandage I'm using to hold the bandage on keeps sliding down. And I've got two weeks of the stitches that I have to keep covered. :(

I've died a little inside. Neil Gaiman is coming to Atlanta. Now that I've left.

*cries*

Also, I hurt like hell. "One size fits all" is a dirty, dirty LIE. But I didn't fall down. (training at work on putting on monkey suits)

The waters are going down and our internet has been restored. My understanding is that most areas have power again, and it looks like most of the areas that aren't supposed to be underwater are not underwater now.

But holy crap. I spent two days changing towels in the windows and the door to the balcony. They're sealed fine most of the time, but two days of it raining upward (so much wind, gravity wasn't really an issue) and sideways manage to work around seals.

Not drowning yet. Talked to one of the supervisors (don't have a cell phone for my boss, but I have one for the next guy up), going to try to go in about an hour late and see how deep the roads are. I'm not going in if I can't get to work without drowning my car. We've stuffed washcloths in a few of the windows (normally there should be some foam blocks in them to help with water leakage, but the cats eat them, so we don't keep them) because the wind is working the water through the window. But they're good; the wind doesn't make it through at all.

At least one tunnel is closed, others are on very limited access. Lots of roads are too deep to drive on (including our local interstate access).

I have now evidently experienced a "nor'easter". Can I give it back?

Brilliant t-shirt. Neil Gaiman + cats = love. :D

And some days, Dear Abby cracks me the hell up. (Yes, I read Dear Abby. I also read Dear Prudence on slate.com occasionally and listen to Dan Savage all the time. The last being entirely meggygurl's fault.) Today, she is delightfully snarky in her response to where you should wear a name tag:
"According to Emily Post, the tags are usually worn on the right side because that's where most people look when they first greet each other with a handshake. (Using this logic, some women should paste the tag just above the middle of their chests.)"

1. Jeremy keeps watching footage from the tea parties (both the recent one and April). I want to strangle these people. When someone asks you "Why don't you trust Obama?", "Because I don't trust him" is not a valid answer. Also, if you're on Veteran's benefits and disability, THE GOVERNMENT IS PAYING FOR THAT. With taxes. Also, socialism, communism, and fascism are NOT interchangeable.

2. I found new pens at a stationary store in Norfolk and stickers at a Michael's in Chesapeake. My journal is being pimped out. :D Also, in the Michael's scrapbooking section, there was actually a section labeled "Bling"

3. It's been interesting, realizing that my health is doing better than it has been in years. It's actually been kind of hard to adjust to. I'm hyper-sensitive to any pain or weird feeling, and overreact a bit. And it's weird to realize that I can continue to function on a daily basis, even when I'm waking up and leaving to go to work at 0630. Yeah, I get some help getting out of bed in the morning, and I don't have to take care of the apartment or make dinner, but I'm still functioning better than I'd ever hoped.

4. I read the book Rooftops of Tehran. It is really, really good. And my understanding is that it's a pretty accurate portrayal of Iran in the '70s before the Shah was overthrown.

5. I've been going back through the archives of A Girl and Her Fed to get caught back up. That's what I pulled this user icon from. It's a really good strip. There's a super intelligent, super conservative, super horny talking koala. :)

Jeremy and I just went down and wandered through the Seawall Art Show - kind of like the stuff that would happen on the Marietta Square, where they close a street or two (in this case, most of it was on just the seawall along the river) and put up a bunch of tents, and have artists show up. A few of the ones I saw and really liked, so got cards and such to buy things when I have money:

Laura Gibbs - We actually got a magnet of the "Draco" watercolor. I LOVED the colors in this stuff.

Ann Marie - This lady had some very cool earrings, so I made sure to get her card for later when I need to get Christmas/birthday/Mother's Day stuff for Mom.

Suzanne Ayala - She had the MOST ADORABLE penguin glass sculptures. There was one with a top hat, and another with a bunch of penguins on an ice floe (rock).

Joyce McAdams - Her stuff was very, very colorful (which I like a lot). Lots of Asian influence (there are koi or goldfish in most/all of it), and they've got gold leaf in bits to give it a different texture and to be shiny.

So, glad Jeremy dragged me out of the apartment to go (my sinuses are out of control, and I'm off the zyrtec for a while, since I discovered I've accidentally been taking twice the dose I should have been for quite some time now...). Very awesome stuff.

So, it's been a while since I've posted a real update.

The Move
At the beginning of July, Jeremy and I moved to Portsmouth, VA. The move didn't go quite as smoothly as I hoped - the stuff in Marietta had been packed and picked up by one company, and then another was supposed to get it from Co. 1's warehouse and bring it here. They had a range in which to get it to us. I called on the last day of that delivery window - they hadn't even picked the stuff up from the warehouse yet. It wasn't as bad as it could have been, though; Co. 2 had to pay for a hotel room for us (which we actually just ended up getting a furnished apartment in our building for a short period) and food until our stuff got here. So we checked out some of the more expensive restaurants in the area that we wouldn't have wanted to eat at if we were paying ourselves. My little Ikea dresser was broken beyond use (the top broke in half), but they paid for it (the driver was responsible for that) and I didn't have a real attachment to it anyway. Jeremy's table was also damaged a bit - evidently Co. 1 had rolled it (it's round and heavy) without adequate protection and scratched the sides. The driver made sure to note it when he picked everything up so that he wouldn't have to pay for it, so we're still working on getting reimbursed for that. My travel contact says that they should pay full replacement value (whoo!), although we're definitely not replacing it; first, that particular table's not in production any more, and second, it's not damaged badly enough we wouldn't rather just have the money.

The Job
I started work at the Norfolk Naval Shipyard in late mid-July. I like it a lot, although I'm still in a training group. When they bring in new people to the nuclear engineering group (most of which aren't nuclear engineers; they're mechanical, or electrical, or civil, or something like that), they go through a basic intro to the systems and such, as much as they can since half or more of us don't have the full clearances yet to see the real stuff. I've got another 4 weeks of that, and then more training, depending on what group (they're actually called codes) I end up working for. I'm kinda leaning toward the code responsible for safety and restarting the reactors after work's been done. It would mean 2 years of training, but it sounds interesting. Only catch is that I think I'd end up having to go with the sub certification instead of carriers (which I think are cooler), because for carriers I'd have to go live in San Diego for about 5 or 6 months. A month, maybe two, would be cool. But not that long.

Brandon's Wedding
I went to meggygurl's brother's wedding a couple of weeks ago. It was a beautiful ceremony (wonderfully short and sweet and to the point) at one of the Atlanta UU churches, and an also amazing reception at Maggiano's. The only downside was that when Brandon was negotiating for good weather, he only got Saturday afternoon/early evening. It took me forever to fly out of Newport News Friday, due to bad weather in the New England area and in Atlanta. I actually got to Hartsfield and then had to sit on the tarmac for an hour or so waiting for a gate to open up so they could let us out. Didn't get to Jeremy's cousin's (where we were staying - Jeremy had been in town for a week already) until about 2:30 in the morning. The next day, after the wedding, I was driving us back (since Jeremy had been drinking), and of course the sky opened up in one of those storms where you can barely see the road. And then the next day, after spending some time with my dad (who cooked an utterly amazing lunch and sent some salmon that he'd smoked himself with us, YUM), we couldn't get out of Atlanta. We got out on the tarmac, finally, and then waited out there for an hour, then they had to bring us back to a gate because our first officer had expired (they can only work for so long without going to sleep) and we had to swap him out. So we ended up getting home around 3am. And I had to be at work at 7:20 the next morning. >.<

( A pic of me and Jeremy at the wedding )

Random Life
Jeremy's looking for jobs all over the place. Fingers crossed for that - we can live off my salary, but it's tight until he can cover his house in Marietta, either through his job or through getting renters for the house (if anyone is looking for a rental house, 3 bed/2 full bath, near the Marietta square, let me know!).

The kittens are doing well. Took a while for them to adjust, especially with no furniture for Tilly to hide under, but all is well now. We just gave them some catnip earlier, so we got to watch the wrestling match.

I like the area, but I'm kinda paranoid now about the rain. I hadn't realized it would flood like that in heavy rain. My poor car did very well, but I still feel bad for it (no, my car doesn't have a name yet, I tend to wait until something presents itself, which may take a while). It smelled a little musty for a few days, but I think it's mostly dried out by now. The engine didn't have any problems, I think it was just a combination of a little water getting in when we went through the high water and all the water Jeremy and I brought in with us when we got in at the grocery store (where we were when it started raining).

Honestly, I would have expected better storm drainage from a riverside (almost beachside) area. Seriously. Not far above sea level, so when it rains, you need to pay attention.

Instead, it took us an hour to get home. The GOOD route had us in water I could feel through the floorboards (although I always watched to make sure another CAR, not SUV, could make it through first). But at least we have enough food to last a while if we get flooded in.

Unfortunately, based on the flooding patterns, I think I could actually get to /work/ ok. Just not the Food Lion...

A more substantial post in a day or two. Maybe today, but after I shower to get the river off me.

Almost done with the semester. I'm so glad to be done with design and such.

Starting to look forward a bit more. I just sat down this weekend and took care of insurance issues - I need temporary health insurance in case of craziness between when Dad's insurance boots me Friday (they hate me, so I'm not even looking into getting a grace period with them) and when the insurance through the new job picks up in July or early August (went with one through mid-August, so I should be covered whenever needed). And I need car insurance because it's about time I got off Dad's policy for that, as well. And Jeremy and I are about to sit down in the next few days and figure out some of our schedule for the summer; at some point, I need to visit all my family, we're going to be in Utah for the University Rover Challenge (I'm doing engineering support, and they're going to let me bring him as my assistant) in late May, and at some point, we have to make it up to Norfolk to actually find a place for us to live.

The kitties are doing well. We've been bringing them over to Jeremy's to get them to panic less about being in new places and being in the car and such. Shadow's pretty entertaining on the hardwoods, since he's got fur growing all through the pads on his feet so he has no traction. And Tilly looks like she treats it as enemy territory. They're both losing a bit of weight since Jeremy's put a halt to the free feeding. Now they get a cup of dry food in the morning and, if it's gone in the evening, they get another half cup or so. The idea being that eventually, they'll just eat when it's given and we can have them eating out of separate bowls, so Tilly's not eating as much as Shadow (since there's a 5+ lb size difference there).

I've also started looking more into some of the ideas and such of Buddhism, especially the writings/teachings of the current Dalai Lama. I didn't know much about either, but I've been picking information up just by being around Jeremy, and it's really interesting. Definitely stuff that could be useful toward being a better, and less stressed person. And the current Dalai Lama is big on tying everything together with science. One of the most interesting quotes I saw was about how if science should happen to show any of their beliefs to be wrong, they would just have to change their belief. He draws a lot of parallels between how he thinks spiritual/philosophical learning should be approached with the scientific method (ie, ask lots of questions, accept nothing at face value, etc). Now I just need to learn to meditate...

Yes, I'm going completely crazy. I'm still alive. But more crazy than I was.

I am graduating May 1st, with my master's.

Moving up to Norfolk, VA with Jeremy sometime either late June or early July (probably the July) for work (which I'm going with the traditional not-posting-work-stuff-to-the-internet and saying that if you want more info, get ahold of me through a more private mode of communication).

OK, going to resume panicking over my design project.

Internet at home is flakey, so I'll be even less around online than I have been, until I can fix it. I got to yell at AT&T last night, and someone's supposed to come out on Sunday afternoon. In the mean time, Jeremy and I went to get chocolate at a coffee house on the square and use their wireless. :)

Stolen from mmejavert. In celebration of the 81st Academy Awards (Oscars), here's a list of the "Best Picture" nominees since 1967. Put an (X) next to the ones you've seen, and a (+) next to the ones you've seen more than once.

( The list! I've seen 47! )

I'm alive, just crazy-busy (and easily distracted, as the presence of a new boyfriend is wont to do). And instead of writing an actual post, you're getting this list of 239 movies where I mark the ones I've seen.

( The list (113) )

From the webcomic A Girl and Her Fed.

It has a talking, smart-ass koala. Lots of hilarity. And the ghost of Ben Franklin.

OK, now I need to go get in the shower and get to campus, since I haven't been to class in a week, courtesy of whatever plague I picked up. I'm feeling much better now, apart from the headaches (which I don't think are actually related to the plague), so I'm frantically trying to catch up on all the crap I missed. >.

I'm dying. I dunno if it's a cold, or strep throat, or what. But ugh. I thought I was starting to get over it yesterday. I was wrong. Woke up this morning contemplating removing my tonsils myself. Doctor this afternoon. Hopefully they can figure it out.

Is inauguration. Evidently my mom volunteered to host a party, so my house will be invaded tonight. At least I have my basement lair to escape to.

Uh oh. I'm having a band geek moment. The band at the inauguration? Is playing Holst. It's always mildly disturbing to be listening to something like that and think "I've played that".

001. Time Enough for Love by R.A.Heinlein, 589 pages
Finished 1/2/09
This book was very amazing and very long. Normally, I would have been able to read a book that size in a couple of days. Instead, it took me over a week. There's just so much he says that is so amazing and makes you actually think about it. This presents an entirely different way of life, but still very much within the boundaries of 'humanity'. I'm going to have to take a break, though, before I read another Heinlein book. I have several waiting for me in different stacks. But I've always found that Heinlein is worth reading. Not only is it a really amazing sci-fi story, it's got a lot of the exploration of what it is that makes us human, how we interact, and how things could be different. And the meaning of love. He's big on that one. And the social constraints placed on love.

Up next?
--Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris
--Confessions of a Pagan Nun by Kate Horsley
--Dragon Bones by Patricia Briggs
--Against Depression by Peter D. Kramer
--The Cat Who Walks Through Walls by R.A.Heinlein
--The Moon is a Harsh Mistress by R.A.Heinlein
--Friday by R.A.Heinlein
--The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen; Volume One by Alan Moore, Kevin O'Neill, Ben Dimagmaliw, Bill Oakley

R.A. Heinlein is an infuriating man. My mom got me The Cat Who Walks Through Walls a year or two ago, since I wanted to read it since that's where Pixel (the cat who lived at MDRS for a while) got his name. But then I discovered that it wasn't the first book of the series, so I decided to hold off until I found the others, and then got distracted.

My dad got me a pile of books (and a couple of DVDs - Wall-e and From the Earth to the Moon - it was a very sci-fi birthday :D ) for my birthday and was running late, so I just got them a couple of weeks ago. And I was making it through to the Heinlein books he got, since he liked Heinlein when he read it (I got Time Enough for Love and The Number of the Beast). So I went to look at wikipedia to make sure I was reading in the right order, finally. And I realized that the guy from both Time Enough and The Cat was introduced in ANOTHER book before them, Methuselah's Children. And so I reserved that at the library and picked it up.

I checked one last time, just to get an overall feel for what order to read everything in. Turns out, all of his books jump all over the timeline, and have lots of characters in common. >.< So, really, it's not that important. I'm going to read the Lazarus Long books (Methuselah, Time, and Cat) in that order, the order they were published, and then just do whatever. I mean, hell, even characters from Stranger in a Strange Land (which I LOVED) and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress (which I've been having a hard time getting through because of the weird dialect he made up for the narration) show up. Along with the 'historic' events portrayed in those books (the Martian religion mess and the lunar revolution).

So I've waited, and confused myself. And it turns out that none of them are actually chronological and there IS no real order. YARGH.

Haven't posted in a while...the semester's over. I don't think I did as well as I should have, but at least it's over with. And then I just have to get through spring, and I'm graduated! And then I have to find a real job. :P

In the health realm, I've been doing mostly ok, except for the damage to my face. I think there may be some real nerve damage, since I've been having pain radiating out from my cheek, and up that nerve. Stupid sidewalk. Gonna go see my neurologist, since it's starting to be a problem.

Shadow's been sick, so we've had the extra-fun adventure of trying to medicate him. The first dose was ok, with Jeremy giving it at the vet. The next evening, I ended up with a long scratch and Mom got bitten, but we think he got most of the meds with what ended up in his mouth, what he licked off his fur, and what we got him to lick off some chicken. Last night, I got Jeremy to help again, which meant no injuries, but it still took two tries, in which we ended up with lots of cat medicine everywhere. Stupid cat. I think he's getting wrapped in a towel tonight. It won't help with how he throws his head around, but at least the claws will be contained. He's been sulking on and off since he went to the vet. But he's always careful to make sure I know he's sulking. And Tilly looks at him like he's an idiot. :P

I've recently rediscovered the wonder of life that is the library. I've reread all but the newest of R. A. Salvatore's Dark Elf books (which is up to several series now, like 15+ books). They were good, but not great. They end up in different situations, but the characters never seem to change. It's a LOT of "woe is me, people judge me 'cause I'm a drow even though I'm a good guy". We could do with quite a bit less of that, but then we'd lose like half the books...

Finished the sequels to Libba Bray's A Great and Terrible Beauty - Rebel Angels and The Sweet Far Thing. I'm of mixed feelings about that series. The main characters are whiny and never take responsibility for stuff. And any time they don't like something, they use magic to fix it (including peoples' minds), with no real repercussions later. But the story's really engaging. So I read it, and just hate the main character. :P The principal villain's pretty cool, though. :P

And I'm midway through season six of Buffy, which is fun. I missed a bunch of stuff here and there when it was airing, and it's been a long time anyway. And I already borrowed season seven from Dan, so I don't have to wait for him to find it. :D

Evidently the kitties are cold. Shadow's curled up in his bed and Tilly's loafed right next to the space heater. It's not particularly cold down here, either. You'd think the fur would help keep them warmer...

Ready for the semester to be over. So much craziness. Except not quite busy enough to practice good time management. Evidently there's a threshold of busy-ness that I have to hit in order to actually get stuff done.

I can't WAIT for the Watchmen movie to come out. March 2009. I'm looking forward to it. I saw the preview when I went to see the latest Bond with Dad for his birthday (good action movie, but less suave than usual for Bond. Lots and lots of destruction and property theft...), and then I found the book at the bookstore. SO AMAZINGLY GOOD. Dark stuff, but really good. Yay for DC comics movies. And Marvel, actually. Both have been doing great things with the newer movie adaptations. Spiderman, Batman, V for Vendetta, Hulk, Iron Man...is very exciting. And they're making an effort to stay true to the comics, which is cool. Although the latest Batman movies have been more along the lines of the Frank Miller and Alan Moore than the early Batman. They went with the darker set of storylines. Which I like. :D