Corner of Bourbon & Division

I haven't thought of a good title for this post yet. With any luck one will come to me before I have to hit "post" at the end. I don't think I've ever posted an untitled entry here, though doubtless many of my titles have been unimaginative or along the lines of "I can't think of a title." The more things change, I guess...

I was awake for half the night, mostly just worrying about everything. Hadn't done that in a few months, but I guess there's no time like the present. :P

So, yeah, I am even more tired than usual today. One day, I might not be tired. Today is not that day.

I've hit a rough patch with my writing. ( Long-winded explanation behind the cut )

Anyway, on to even more depressing stuff. Québec is having elections! Again! Whee! /o\

I am so glad I no longer have to vote in this province, but I'm still going to get the brunt of all the election nonsense anyway. I still live here part of the time, after all, and Ottawa is close enough that we get all of the Québec news. We have to monitor the news at work anyway, so instead of the Commission Charbonneau all the time (which was so depressing it made me want to slit my wrists), now it'll be Québec elections all the time. *sigh* At least it's only three weeks. I don't understand how Americans do it, it must be like being in a constant state of siege, constantly having elections going on. I'd be exhausted.

My main beef with the political parties in Québec is that it truly feels like there are no good leftist options anymore. The PQ is theoretically to the left, but as my favourite joke goes: "Ils clignotent à gauche, mais ils virent à droite." (They signal left, but turn right instead. It's funnier before translation, trust me.) They're also racist and bigoted and hate the anglo community and insist on being fucking separatists. I can't. I won't vote Liberal, because they're corrupt and on top of that I don't agree with 95% of their economic policies, not to mention that they're basically Conservatives who've taken on the Liberal title. That leaves the CAQ, who are so far to the right (by local standards) that it makes me a little sick, and Québec Solidaire, who are leftists but also separatists and who don't appear to have viable economic policies anyway.

*throws up hands*

Bah.

Politics make me hate everything.

In better news, luvenditti is coming for a visit today, which means that pdaughter has made chocolate chip cookies! That was after the Banoffee Pie that she made on Monday. Nothing beats coming home to extraordinary baked goods, let me tell you. Delicious.

I'm not sure it's worth updating if I feel as though I have nothing to say, but then that's the kind of thinking that made me stop posting to LiveJournal completely, so maybe I will blather on witlessly for a while.

Tomorrow I shall make a quick Christmas recap post. For some reason, on the computer at work, the LiveJournal interface is absolute crap no matter which browser I use. I get weird overlapping white windows that prevent me from seeing drop-down menus (like for selecting a mood or a userpic) and the tag selection box, and whenever I try to add in pictures it doesn't show me the code at all. So I'm at once perplexed and annoyed and have no idea how to fix it. At least on my own computer these things don't happen. So tomorrow there will be a more picture-ful entry with details about Christmas.

Overall we had a great day yesterday. I was up first at 7:00 in order to take a shower, and pdaughter got up at the same time. Bean was up 15 minutes later, so she was able to capture his reaction to the Christmas tree and all the presents on film. The morning was spent very pleasantly opening presents, and pdaughter's father showed up around 9:30 or 10:00 to make the gathering complete. Unfortunately I had to leave for work by 1pm, but the morning made it well worth it. I'm just sad I wasn't able to stay longer to watch Bean play with his new toys.

Work, thankfully enough, has been pretty quiet. I've been finishing up the Soopar Seekrit Prodgikt, which, as some of you know, was the 4th Doctor's scarf, which I was making for pdaughter for Christmas. I'm busily weaving in ends, and once that's done I need to attach the tassels. This has to be by far the longest project I've ever worked on, including the Baby Blanket of Doom of 2009. Thus far, because I am a slow knitter, I think I've put about 70 hours of work into this thing.

( Boring planning stuff behind the cut )

Work looks to be busy today, so this is a fly-by post.

I am very, very tired. Spent the night before last up with a sick Bean for about an hour, and slept very poorly the rest of the time. Ended up getting up at 6am to work on the Soopar Seekrit Prodgikt, then made breakfast, got dressed and went outside to shovel. Finished shovelling, came back in to pack and have lunch, then left for Ottawa for work in the sleet and snow and slush, which added an extra hour or so to my travel time. Good thing the neighbour bailed me out with his snowblower--the snow removal company came about five hours after I called to tell them I needed to leave at noon (they came around 4pm, I was told). I am not overly impressed, given that the girl I talked to gave me the impression she would be sending someone quite soon. I guess our definitions of "soon" differ considerably.

Got the rest of my shopping done (groceries and a couple of last-minute Christmas additions) in spite of holiday crowds and very cranky people. I went out of my way to be extra nice to the cashiers and other store employees because this must be the very worst time of the year for them, and I figured they could use at least one customer who wasn't being a tool, even though I was feeling quite out of sorts.

Got home, had a quick dinner, then realised I had forgotten the power cable to the laptop in Montreal, as previously stated. So I decided "fuck it" and went to bed at eight. Since I get up at 4am to go to work, that gets me eight hours of sleep. I slept badly again, though not as badly as the night before. Apparently the days when I used to be able to sleep well are gone, vanished practically overnight. I am sad about this, because I never get enough sleep as it is (due to the nature of my work), so the only thing saving me was the fact that when I did sleep, I got really good quality sleep. I figure now it's only a matter of time before this new facet of sleep deprivation catches up to me and I'll either get really really sick or I'll have some sort of horrible accident because my brain was too fogged to react in time. *sigh*

Yesterday's time-suck of a day meant almost no work on the Soopar Seekrit Prodgikt. I am behind as all hell, and if I have to gift it still on the needles I will cry.

Working doubles is No Fun At All. Go to work in the morning before the sun rises, go home after the sun sets, go directly to bed. Get up before the sun rises, go to work, go home after the sun sets, go directly to bed.

Is my life exciting, or what?

I am behind in my photo project. I will rectify this this weekend.

I am on target for Beyond the Pale, which now has nine new chapters up since the beginning of the year (if this were NaNo I'd be behind, but it's not NaNo, so there). I am almost at ten percent of my goal. Yay! The writing itself is a little uneven. I'm back where I was in 2004 in terms of ease of writing: I can do it, but I'm struggling with a lot of the phrasing, expressing my ideas in a way that's both clear and pleasant to read. I suspect that one day I will have to go back and polish the whole thing with a vengeance.

I am still struggling with tomorrow's script, but many of you have already listened to me whine about that enough. It's coming along, and will be ready in time. I am less enthusiastic about Capricornucopia this year for the simple reason that I'm exhausted and it crept up on me almost unawares. I've had a kick-ass idea for next year, too, and it's hard for me not to get all excited about the new shiny and focus on the task at hand, which right now feels as though I'm vastly underprepared.

*sigh*

I'm not being very up-beat these days, am I? I'm sorry about that. I don't really have a good reason to whine so much. I promise I'll try to keep on the sunny side of life a bit more. :)

What I really want is a one-month vacation.

One week to sleep. Two weeks to go off gallivanting to exciting places, or possibly do exciting home-renovation projects. One week to settle back in, cook, clean, do laundry, and get back into a go-to-work mindspace.

Mostly I want the week of sleep, but in order to have it I need the other three weeks to get everything else done and still be rested enough to go back to work refreshed and not feeling like death warmed over.

I'm moving in seventeen days, on the 30th. I'm on "vacation" as of the morning of the 25th. I'll likely be spending at least part of that day asleep. That gives me four days to finish packing/cleaning, one afternoon to move (the 30th, once ai731 and t! are moved out), and six days to unpack/move in/clean up and re-do the upstairs floor. Then I go back to work.

I'm not sure if I've whined enough about this yet. I can't wait to see what I'll sound like after I've finished my nine consecutive nights (96 hours in total) of night shift. None of which is considered overtime, I might add, which is irksome in the extreme. Doubtless I shall whine even more. I've developed a talent for it.

:::Only whingeing in this post. Nothing to see here. Move along.:::

Maybe it's because I spent the whole weekend lounging in the sun (with friends and beer), but I'm feeling a little fresh air and sunlight deprived these past two days.

Right now that homestead (with a pond with ducks and frogs and maybe fish and turtles) is seeming awfully far away. The whole oversleeping thing this morning made me miss out on groceries and a little time I wanted to spend out in the garden weeding and/or puttering.

I want a pond.

Right now I want to be in the middle of my garden with a bunch of goats and chickens and to not be concerned with arrest warrants and taking calls and being stuck in a windowless room for eight to twelve hours a day. I love this job, I do, but it's in the city and there's no daylight, ever.

Maybe I'll go and research heritage chickens some more.

I'm not in a good mood, for the record, so doubtless the tone of this post will reflect that. That's all the warning you get.


Haven't updated LJ properly in a while. Today will be no exception. Have been busy running around exhausting myself trying to keep up with my life.

Have had a frustrating few days lately. Nothing huge by itself, but an accumulation of little things. Band practice was, unlike everyone else's experience, an exercise in frustration. I've read other accounts of the practice and wondered if I wasn't practicing with another band without realising it. Mostly the three hours felt like "the songs aren't working because you can't keep the tempo consistent." Not a good thing if, say, you're the drummer. I got out of practice mostly wondering why the hell I'm doing this.

No, I don't need reassurance/bolstering/whatever. I am perfectly capable of getting over myself, I do it all the time.


Spent Saturday evening and most of Sunday in Alexandria with fearsclave and kinokid, and I guess some of the anxiety/frustration of Saturday morning carried over, because I don't think I was very good company. I snapped at fearsclave's uncle at one point, mostly because he pushed a large red psychological button moments after I had had a miscommunication with someone else, and basically it sucked and I felt terrible for snapping at him. It's not his fault I'm oversensitive, and I need to watch my tongue.

I was very late for my parents' dinner party. I had wanted to leave at 4:45 and we didn't end up leaving until nearly 5:30. It turned out okay for the most part, since I arrived as the guests were sitting down, but they had pretty much given up on waiting for me.

I had to sit on my hands not to punch several people at work today. Well, maybe not punch, but I have a feeling I might have tried it if I'd thought I could get away with it. I did get a lot of work done, since after the first hour or so people mostly left me alone. Maybe they could feel the waves of hostility rolling off me. :P



In short, I have a sneaking suspicion that I have been absolutely awful to be around lately. I tapped out my resources of cheefulness and tolerance and good humour, and I have nothing left to give anyone, let alone myself. So my apologies if I've managed to offend or piss anyone off in the last week or so. Let's just say I haven't been myself and leave it at that.


Oh, and happy birthday to djs_specs and terredancer, only forty-five minutes late! At least, in my time zone.