Corner of Bourbon & Division

 Nothing terrible, mind you. One of my coworkers called in sick and we couldn't get anyone in to replace her, so I ended up not getting a lunch break, which sucked. Luckily my day wasn't terribly busy, so I wasn't run off my feet, but the tip line went bonkers today, mostly with mentally ill callers and racists, and sometimes mentally ill racists. It's a little draining to have to explain to multiple people that, actually, their muslim neighbours are totally allowed to have lives, to own their own cell phone and computer, and EVEN are allowed to watch videos in Arabic on them! Shocking, I know.

I was also quite bored by the end of the day, which made for a bad combination. I made it out without incident, though, and treated myself to pizza for dinner, and am continuing my re-watch of Orphan Black before bed.

I promise to post at least one entry with lengthier content this week (I can't guarantee it will be more interesting, though). I just need my brain to not be mush at least one day out of the seven. ;)

Oooh, before I forget, I should note that today was a pretty big day in feminist/political circles, when Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell decided it would be a good idea to try to silence Senator Elizabeth Warren when she tried to read a letter written by Coretta Scott King (the widow of Martin Luther King Jr.) criticizing Senator Jeff Sessions' terrible track record with black voting rights. Rather than allowing the quote, McConnell invoked what I've understood to be a fairly obscure rule (Rule 19) forbidding any Senator from "[impugning] the motives or integrity of any senator" lest they be be called to order. Warren was called to order, and prevented from speaking at all for the remainder of the session. The extra galling thing is that two other male Democratic senators were subsequently allowed to read the same letter without being rebuked.

McConnell later doubled down on this, with words that were soon to come and bite him in the ass: "She was warned. She was given an explanation. Nonetheless, she persisted."

The media and the internet latched onto those words like the seagulls in Finding Nemo. It was beautiful and inspiring and at times hilarious to watch. People began posting images of all the women pioneers (real and fictitious and all of them inspirational) captioned with the words, and it sounds like more than a few people are taking it up as a personal mantra. #shepersisted and #letliztalk was all anyone could talk about today, and with good reason.


Anyway, that part of today kept me going. It was a bright spark in a day otherwise filled with racist phone calls.

Sleep has decided that it is not for me. Between the literal pain in my neck and some other factors, I am looking at another three hours of waiting until Bean and pdaughter get up for the day. So I'm using the time to catch up on Orphan Black, which is getting better with each passing episode. I can't express how much I love this show, and Tatiana Maslany is phenomenal. She basically carries this whole show, and plays anywhere from three to five characters per episode, which just makes my head spin. She always manages to make me forget that it's always her playing these people, because she makes them so different from each other, hair and makeup aside. Granted, she has great writing to work with, but still, even great writing needs a great actress to make it come to life, and this show delivers on both.

The vet decided it would be awesome to send me a card with some of George's fur taped inside it and his paw prints in ink alongside their condolences. I wasn't expecting to see that when I opened the envelope (honestly, I was expecting a reminder for Sergent's surgery), and I almost burst into tears. It might be a nice gesture if your cat died peacefully, but really all it did was stir up the horrific trauma of watching him get his head bashed in by a car and then bleeding to death in my arms. Thanks, vet. That was so thoughtful. >_< Also, it means they must have taken the prints off his corpse. Who even does that? It's gruesome. Christ.

This morning the guys are supposed to show up to build the fence. I really hope they get it done today in spite of what appears to be a suspicious lack of garden gate included with the delivery of the materials in my absence. It sounds like before they start they're going to expect me to saw off several branches of my lilac tree, which is going to be interesting given how much my neck and shoulder hurt. :P Once they're set up and busy building, my plan is to go to Réno Dépot and give them an earful about how rude their subcontractor was with me. This whole situation has been a bit of a shambles ever since I left for Moncton, and I am very displeased with the level of service I received. While I'm there I guess I'll pick up the remaining paving slab I need for the yard. Also, does anyone have any tips on splitting a paving slab diagonally? I have a weirdly shaped empty spot in my arrangement of paving slabs, and if I split one right down the middle it would likely fit almost perfectly, but I have no idea how to do that.  I should pick up a couple of bags of soil and some grass seed for the area around the slabs, too, to make it look a little better.

If they get here early enough I'm also going to take part of the afternoon to take myself clothes shopping (blech). It's a necessary evil, I suppose. My summer wardrobe is no longer appropriate for work at all. It's shabby and worn and most of it has holes in it now. *sigh* If not, I guess the clothes will have to wait until Wednesday, since everything will be closed on Tuesday.

I also have to chase down the guy for the basement floor, because I damned well need to get this house sold and he's been ignoring my calls for two weeks. As it is, my real estate agent tells me that the market dips right after St. Jean Baptiste, so that ship has sailed. At this point I'm wondering if I'm going to need to resign myself to the notion of losing my damned shirt on this house and continuing to haemorrhage money for the foreseeable future. All I can do is hope that I can make it through the next eleven and a half months without going bankrupt or ruining my credit permanently, or both. Although going bankrupt would ruin my credit permanently, I suppose. I don't know, I'm tired and my brain is fried. :P

I am feeling guilty about not using the time I'm awake to get some creative writing done, but honestly I don't have the focus for it right now. The best I can manage is this really disjointed LJ entry. So, uh, lucky you guys, you get to read my 3am ramblings! Isn't that exciting?

That's it for now, I suppose. I can't think of anything else to say.

:::ETA:::

I just remembered I need to go to U-Haul and buy boxes today so I can start packing, too. Tomorrow it'll be closed, and I want to pack then anyway as well as Wednesday, so the longer I wait the less time I'll have for that this week.

Also, laundry. I am in desperate need of a shower, so once everyone is awake I'll take a shower and then do all the laundry. If I can get everything on my list for today done, it will free up the next couple of days for the things that can't be moved around, like birthday parties and vet appointments and dinner with my parents on Wednesday.

So, yeah. Busy busy busy.