Corner of Bourbon & Division

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.

Commute days are the worst. I lose two days a week this way, wherein nothing gets done except packing and travelling and maybe an errand or two. The worst are the days when I go home to Montreal, because I'm coming off a night shift. So I get back to my room at 6:00 or so (sometimes 6:30), and get some sleep. I've tried not sleeping on these days, and all it does is make me nearly fall asleep at the wheel of my car on my drive home. I know lots of people can manage on little to no sleep, but I simply don't have the constitution for that, given that I have to commute roughly 600km a week and generally don't get much sleep during night shifts.

So I have to sleep after a night shift. I usually get 5-7 hours of very broken sleep, because it's the middle of the day and the room is quite bright in spite of all the measures I've taken to darken it (light-blocking curtains & an eye mask).

Then I get up, have food, do some tidying, pack up my bags, and drive home. On the days like today when I have errands to run, it means I get home well after 19:00, usually closer to 20:00, and then an hour or two later, it's bedtime. It's not much better on the days when I go to Ottawa. I get up with the household, do laundry, try to get some chores done, maybe run an errand if I can, then drive to Ottawa, invariably hit rush hour traffic, buy groceries, go to my room, unpack, and by then it's nearly 20:00 which is bedtime before a day shift. As it is, I'm taking time out of that schedule to meet my commitment of writing a post for today, because it's not like I'll be able to do it when I get home, but it also means I'll be getting home later, as usual.

So that's two of my days off basically wasted for work, when I'm not getting paid for it. It's frustrating and demoralising if I let myself think about it too hard. All that time is spent doing basically nothing, when before I would have used it for other pursuits. Spending time with the family, writing, doing proper chores, running errands, seeing people, taking the dog for a walk, whatever. I know that my time at home is already not spent productively enough as it is, so having this time taken away from me is so frustrating.

All righty. On that note, I have bags to pack. I'm heading to Michael's after I leave, and to Shopper's because I'm pretty sure we need more milk at home. (Small child = we always need more milk, it's a rule) That means a late(r) night for me. Again.

I am having a morning that is filled with "Woe, I am failing at everything in life!"

This is probably due to the fact that I've had less than four hours of sleep. Combined with the bad sleep from yesterday and the almost no sleep from the night before, I'm guessing the cumulative effects are being hard on my psyche.

Yes, I know, cry moar, Phnee.

The project isn't finished. Still going to try to finish it in time. I'll probably end up working on it tonight after everyone is in bed, given the rate at which it's been going. I'm only going to get home around 8:00pm anyway, since I finish work at 6:00pm and have to drive back to Montreal. That'll give me just enough time to put away my things, put tags on the presents, and get back to work on the project.

I need a time-turner. Hermione was totally off-base with how she used hers. The proper use for a time-turner is to get infinite amounts of sleep. :P

I've kind of spent the last year coasting along. I'm not especially pleased with myself for this.

So I'm working on a plan to be a more active participant in my own life next year. A little less, or maybe a whole lot less, passive when it comes to the important things in life: family, friends, and my home and professional life too.

I'm actually foreseeing a pretty major overhaul in a lot of ways. I hope I can make it work.

With the exception of last year, December/January is usually when the nesting/revamp my life bug hits me the hardest. It's partly to do with the New Year, but it also coincides with my birthday, which generally makes me want to re-evaluate things.

In only slightly-related news, the permanent positions at work are tentatively meant to open up on January 5th, which, coincidentally, is also my birthday. Sounds auspicious enough to me.

Apparently I lie really well to myself. Wish I could use this talent on other people. I can't lie to other people for beans.

I'm disabling comments on this because it's a self-serving whine, and I know it is, and I'm not proud of it. However, maybe writing it down here will get it out of my system.




( Whining behind the tag )