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Entry the Three Hundred and Sixty First01 October 2001 Caffeine/Cat 01/10/1 8:37 a.m. Have to figure out what I'm doing now with caffeine. I've seen the negative reactions again and I really can't afford them; my body doesn't need that. I suppose I need to gradually decaffeinate over the course of the week then swear the stuff off once more. That would avoid the withdrawal headaches but still allow me to come down from the stuff. We'll see. I may leave work early to come home and nap today. It would help fight off this low-level cold I've been (successfully) fighting the last several days. And given the alternative of getting even sicker later in the week, I'd rather have the afternoon off. There are the usual early fall sniffles on the bus this morning, as well as the coughs and what not. It's never as bad as, say, living in a dorm, but public transit is definitely a germ trading facility. ... The shelter called late this afternoon and after a single round of phone tag we did the interview. It went very well and she was extremely helpful on where to get food and what not. She actually lives in my neighborhood, so knew the closer places. We chatted about the virtues of cat trees and decent cat food and left the whole thing on a very positive note. He's going to get fixed tomorrow, and pending a home visit, I'll pick him up on Thursday after work. A slight acceleration of my expected time frame, but not a problem. It does solve the dilemma of whether to go to Omega or not (not), so no public humiliation this year (aw, shucks). So, I'll pick the little bugger up soon. I'm actually quite excited and very much looking forward to the whole cat hair-laden adventure. I've missed having beasties around the house, so it's definitely time. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Sixty Second02 October 2001 A Very Good Day 01/10/2 8:18 a.m. In an extraordinarily good mood this morning. Got up and ran, I'm meeting Doug and MAB for lunch, had a wonderful time playing last night, got a good amount of sleep. A very good start to the day. And a very good start to the week. I get my cat this week, I turn 29 tomorrow, the new Garbage album is out today. And a terribly cute young man just sat down beside me on the bus. Woo-hoo! Let's keep up the good work, shall we? Got to chat with Slide yesterday evening, post-play, and 'twas quite nice to run into him. I hadn't been sure how interested he was, but he seems to be still, so we arranged to talk later in the week. I wasn't kidding when I said I wanted to concentrate on known quantities rather than seeking out the new. Slide's a great guy, and one with whom I'd like to spend more time, if he's willing. I worry about third relationships, though, as they seem to just fizzle out. Jack was that way, LT was that way, other guys with whom I've spoken seem to fade out as well, even when we've been emailing regularly over an extended period. So, we'll see with Slide. I'd like something to work out there, but I'm afraid to get my hopes up. In the meantime, I'm actually going to get to work on time today, we have a morning-long meeting to sit through, lunch with the boys, then some problem solving in our system this afternoon. It should be a very good day. ... The good mood did last the entire day, despite work's efforts to wipe it out. :) Had a lovely lunch and dinner with Doug and MAB. The new album is good; a tad softer than their earlier stuff, but I love it. Got my laundry done this evening and heading to bed here soon (sleep!!!). Many wishes that this feeling continues and that it can spread to other folks. :-) Archives | |
Entry the Three Hundred and Sixty Third03 October 2001 29 01/10/3 8:28 a.m. "Patience, Moose," whispered the Wind this morning as I stood at the bus stop. "Let the buses pass and one will come that has been ignored and will have empty seats and yet will get you to work on time." And I listened to the Wind, and waited, and the words of the Wind came true. ... Several birthday wishes from the folks on LiveJournal. I've never made a huge to-do about my birthday, never thrown a party or had a lot of people over, preferring to have quieter times with fewer folks. I suspect that'll change next year when I hit 30, that being a bit more of a milestone than most. ... I was next to useless at work today. Oh well. :-) After work had a lovely dinner with Doug at Restaurant Nora, then home to discover a call from the DC Animal Shelter saying I could do the home visit tomorrow at lunch, then pick up the beastie tomorrow evening. Hooray! So, will have a cat again tomorrow evening. I'm psyched. :-) Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Sixty Fourth08 October 2001 Delay Whoops. Didn't realize I hadn't written in five days. Eeck! Let's see, since the last entry on my birthday, I got the cat Thursday evening. His name is Boris, he's a lovely 8 month old brown tabby (pics when I get around to it). Very affectionate, very sweet, and slightly vocal, which I like in a cat. He's getting better about the mandatory post-shelter antibiotics. Do look forward to not having to offer him those, but given the almost 100% rate of upper respiratory illnesses that cats get when they're in a shelter, it's better safe than sorry. Tried to go shopping for a new boom box for the bedroom. I want another one with a timer on it so the radio can wake me up, but no go at Best Buy - their selection was decidedly lacking (particularly in taste - some of those things are just plain hideous!). Did pick up Black & White, which I have to say is highly addicting. I've spent most of the day playing at being a god, and trying to be a good one, too. It's highly tempting to hurl fireballs at things, but the peasant tend to get scared of you that way. :-) I managed to pick up a head cold at some point this weekend, too, or perhaps the one I was fighting this past week finally got the better of me. Friday at the Eagle likely didn't help. ;-) It was fun, though. Played with Boris some Friday night, watched the Rocky and Bullwinkle movie (yet again), then hopped online, expecting to chat a bit then go to bed, and finally there were folks who wanted to go the Eagle (I've been trying to get people to go with me for ages), so of course I had to go. ;-) Met the one boy in the Metro (he'd never been), walked him over, met the other guy inside upstairs. It was darker than I remember, but that's not a bad thing, I suppose. Stood out like a sore thumb, as I'd hoped, in my red abercrombie shirt (the same one on the pics page linked above), which of course meant tons of flirting and eyes made at folks. And the best part is none of them would suspect the Prince Albert. LOL! I love going there. Did get a number at the end of the night, too, though went home alone (thankfully - needed the sleep!). So that was my holiday weekend. Spent a goodly part of today asleep when not playing Black & White, curled up with Boris on the bed under a blanket. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Sixty Fifth10 October 2001 *Yawn* Spent the last two days trying to nap and rest. I have a lovely head cold, so my life has been all about staying in bed as much as possible. Did go to work yesterday, but left early to come nap. Thank heavens I did, too, as Doug did come over per our normal Tuesday night schedule and I made dinner (after thoroughly washing my hands, of course). Actually slept pretty well, even on the cold meds, which normally screw with my sleep patterns. Today was naps, playing on the computer, chatting on the computer, playing with the cat, naps, etc. Did ride down to the grocery store and get some more herbal tea, but other than that stayed indoors the whole time. Whee. It's so thrilling to be ill. Did discover a lovely trick, which is to put 1/4 teasp. salt and 1/4 teasp. baking soda into 8 ounces of warm water and sniff it up your nose. It sounds gross, and it's not exactly the most fun thing in the world (it feels like when you inhale pool water, but with less chlorine), but it keeps the nose moist, and helps you clear the sucker out, too. Blech. So there's our biology lesson for the day - when the nasal passages are inflamed, sinuses can't drain normally, so you need to get them back down, which the saline solution helps do, allowing you to drain out some of the excess snot. :-p I shan't be putting in any applications to be the new Mr. Wizard, though. Okay, time for sleep so I can see if I feel up to going to work tomorrow. I have one last bit of junk attached to the ending of the fiscal year to do over the next two days, so hopefully I'll feel up to it. If not, I can always go in and infect my office. ;-) Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Sixty Sixth13 October 2001 Ordinary Got up this morning at Doug's place and headed out to his sister-in-law's house in the 'burbs for a Pampered Chef party she was hosting. Now, despite owning a lemon zester I was persuaded to buy two years ago, I've managed to avoid these parties when my friends at work hosted them. For family, one will do almost anything. The woman who presented the products was quite good. It's a shame the recipes they have them demonstrate are pretty high on dairy products - they all looked pretty good, but cheese and butter are verbotten to this Moose, so no tasting there. Did go ahead and order some stuff (my belated birthday gift from Doug), so we'll see how this stuff works. The chopper was intriguing. The only bad part about this thing was it kept me from making it to the shelter today to look at and possible pick up the second kitten. Yes, I'm going to get a Natasha to go with little Boris. He's playful on his own, but I think he'd be better off with some company to keep him busy when I'm not in the apartment. So I'll have a pair of little Pottsylvanian spy cats to entertain now. Other than that, I rode to the pet store to prove that I could (was a fun ride up the hill to the store, but it was a nice easy ride downhill!). Made an easy dinner of organic chili (yeah, pop the can open, heat - how much easier?) and roasted asparagus (and that bloody party made me wonder how the asparagus would taste if it were roasted on a baking stone instead of the dish I use...), plus some echinacea tea. Read some more in my library book, and just arranged to have brunch with RNJTM tomorrow, after which we'll go see the kitten. A good, steady day. Oh, and the cold is in that "it's time to let you breathe through your nose without chemicals but now we will drain the sinuses and make you sniffle unless you drug yourself" stage. Blech. At least that means it's almost gone! Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Sixty Seventh15 October 2001 Annoyed In a thoroughly foul mood this evening for some reason. I had plans, they got cancelled. Came home, had contacted someone I want to play with, but couldn't head over because my stomach started acting up. Grrrr. Hopped on gay.com and there's this asshole who hops on and stirs everyone up. Most people seem to be capable of ignoring him, but those few that react to him fuel him and he says the most assinine things just to keep the comments coming. If they'd just ignore him he'd go away because no one would play with him. So couldn't even get on there to distract myself. Natasha, the second kitten I picked up yesterday, is still adjusting and being a pain in the ass. She's cute as all hell, but I really wish the two of them would calm down, stop hissing at each other all the time, and get over it. Anyway, I'm just annoyed, and I think it's time to go to bed and try to get over it. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Sixty Eighth18 October 2001 Work/Web/Cat/Exercise I have decided I really, really like my new supervisor. She's been there for a few months, but she's now working to try and fix a bunch of things here at the beginning of the new federal fiscal year and I am very appreciative of this. There are many things we do simply because it's always been done that way, and it's just so nice to see things changing because they must. So she's been keeping me busy reviewing procedures, going over numbers, reviewing authorities, etc. Is good to be busier at work, I don't surf quite so much because I'm bored shitless, and I feel like I'm actually getting something done now. Thank heavens! That's one of the biggest complaints I have on my job - I'm frequently under-utilized, and especially underused as an attorney. I'm still not doing terribly much as an attorney, but at least my time is being filled with things to do which are troubleshooting and/or procedural stuff (I'm a big process person, just ask Doug). This evening I wandered over to slide's house and showed him the various options for doing a journal online. Showed him Blogger, Livejournal, various hosting options like Esosoft, the web templates over at Elated, etc. Was a fun evening. I know not quite enough, but still far too much, about online stuff. Played with his cat some while he surfed and looked at things, then had some dinner there before heading home to play with my own beasts. My own beasts are happier 'cause I got one of those self-feeder bowls for them so they have a constant supply of food without having to deal with me. ;-) Also discovered, more importantly, that there's a lovely bus line that heads over from Cleveland Park to Mt. Pleasant not too far where I live, so if I have to run to the pet store after work I can get back (or if I don't want to ride my bike over, I can catch a bus rather than the Metro train). This is a good thing. And one of these days I'll get rid of the last of this cold and be able to exercise again. :-p I'm reading a good book on heart rate monitors - I'm determined to actually use the thing correctly finally and perhaps get myself back on a training regimen to build up to something. I'm tired of just flopping around with no goal in site; I want to run a marathon and I need to prepare for that. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Sixty Ninth20 October 2001 Updates Fixed my links page today to add some of the other sites I read regularly, or new ones that have caught my eye of late. There are some interesting folks out there - go read 'em. Also sort-of updated the cast page. Said phooey on riding the bike to the grocery store and walked myself and the bag lady cart down there. Not because I didn't want to ride my bike, but because I wanted to stock up on stuff. Been perusing my cookbooks again, and decided I needed to stock up on canned and frozen items so I can whip up food when I need to. The cupboard has been a tad too bare of late. I also decided I don't want to maintain a totally vegan kitchen. :-( I bought eggs. I want to be able to make breads and such that require eggs and perhaps honey and not feel bad about doing so. Not going to go back to cooking meat here, though. So, still a vegetarian kitchen, but not a vegan one. So, tons of food, and I'll make something or another for dinner tonight, not quite decided on the recipe. I asked Doug to help make some humus tonight, but I don't think he realized I want him to make it from scratch. *evil grin* He's used to the "add water and stir" version that I introduced him to, so this'll be an eye-opener. We'll make some sort of cook out of him after all. :-) The cats are calming down somewhat. They got introduced to the vacuum cleaner at 9 this morning (yeah, I stayed in last night, so got up and cleaned), which, predictable, they didn't like, but the carpet and bathroom were much better after being cleaned. I certainly enjoyed the fruits of my labors, even if they didn't. I want to get a cat tree for the beasts. Having had one with The Ex for our four cats, it's just a very, very good idea to have that particular piece of furniture for them to crawl all over and scratch and generally exercise on. It allows them to take out their aggressions on the tree rather than, say, the couch (and I thank my lucky stars I still have futon couches I can see underneath, and which have no sides to scratch on!). So might shop for one of those tomorrow. The cold appears to be pretty much gone now, so I'll try and get a run in tomorrow afternoon and see how that goes. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Seventieth21 October 2001 Gloomy Sunday - NOT! Let's see, got up at 8, left Doug in bed. Started banana bread in the oven, did the dishes, was sitting and sipping tea over the paper when Doug stumbled in, all cute and sleepy looking. Sat him down (after he hauled out the hoummus he made last night to snack on while the bread baked - and he did just fine with the hoummus once he learned it would be homemade and not from a box *grin*), got him tea eventually. Read the paper together, had some banana bread (was tres yummy), checked email, watched a really cheesy sci-fi flick ("Red Planet" with the awesome woman from the Matrix and Val Kilmer - it was sooooooo predictable), watched the cats finally get to the point where they'll sit and clean each other without massive dominance battles. Altogether a lovely morning. Then this afternoon Lawrence and I rode out to Great Falls on the C&O Canal towpath, about a 33 mile round trip from his place. Gorgeous day, lovely weather, too many damned tourists on the path, but hey, they're just obstacles to get around. My first time to the Falls, it was a great view. Rode back, got cleaned up, then walked back to Lawrence's place to get some dinner. You know, this is why I love living in a city. I can bike out to a natural wonder, bike back, walk to a friend's house, walk to a fabulous dinner of middle eastern vegetarian cuisine, then walk back again. You so could not do that in the suburbs, and in fact I'd be mildly scared to ride on many of the roads out in the suburbs - no curb lanes in which to escape, no pedestrian walkways onto which you can escape if traffic gets too nuts. Blech. So, give me the city, PLEASE! ;-) I'll take it any day over the 'burbs. With all our problems, the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages, IMNSHO. So, a wonderful, sunny, lovely Sunday. Would that more of these were the norm. :-) Archives53.8 km ride to Great Falls and back |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Seventy First22 October 2001 Two things I hate about life 1. Traffic. 2. Bad training. Traffic sucked this morning, because a. There was a delay on Metro's Red Line (or so I hear) and b. the DC Beltway was backed up like there was no tomorrow. ARGH! So all these morons who don't normally bother to drive their single-occupancy "I can pretend I'm alone in here" cars into the city were suddenly flocking into the only arteries they know (the big ones, like the one on which I live). So suddenly all these NIMBY drivers who won't do a damned thing to help alleviate the traffic on the Beltway and the messes which occur when ONE BRIDGE gets shut down are ignoring the traffic signals, blocking intersections and wondering why the residents are pissed at them when we can't get to work, either. Blech. So my normal roughly 1/2 hour commute was suddenly an hour long. And I left early! I was not amused when I got to work. Second, we had "training" today on Adobe Acrobat. Good info to have. If the trainer had been there on time. And if the materials had been loaded on the computers. And if the updates had been installed into Acrobat. Blah. I have better things to do with my time than sit there for 1/2 an hour waiting for the instructor to find parking. But anyway. So that was a goodly part of my day. :-p Did get some light weights done this morning, and hopefully will run tomorrow. Whee. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Seventy Second24 October 2001 Bad Habits 01/10/24 5:48 p.m. The question I return to, again and again, is whether I want certain things enough to sacrifice for them? Am I willing to give up some comforts, or some habits, in order to reach certain goals? I suppose this is something we all ask ourselves, but I find myself returning here with increasing frequency of late, especially when my desires outpace my behavior. The typical pattern is that I start feeling good and so go out and do something foolish (i.e., go get nice and drunk), feel bad for some small amount of time, do something equally foolish (i.e., swear of alcohol), and then feel bad when I fail to live up to impossible standards. Whee. I guess partially it's an intellect/emotion disconnect. I know what I should do/not do, but I get out, get silly, and throw it away, temporarily. I go back to the good habit(s), then repeat the cycle. side note: this is a big reason why Rule #2 applies across the board, even to myself. I need to break this cycle, but I'm not sure how to do so. ... Good quiet night at home, which was what I needed. Still no set plans for the aforementioned bad habits, though. I just don't know what to do there, to make myself into the person that I want to be, rather than the person I am. I (mostly) like the person I am, but there are definite changes I want to make. I seem to say this like every other month (if not every other week), and it gets as tiring for me as I'm sure it does for any poor souls who read this. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Seventy Third25 October 2001 Stress Reactions 01/10/25 8:32 a.m. I can tell I'm about to enter one of my majorly obsessive moods, which could be good and will likely be annoying as hell for folks around me. I weighed myself for the first time in ages this morning and to say that I was less than pleased with the results would be a very large understatement. I've not been this heavy in a bit. I'm not huge by any means, but I don't feel I should weigh this much (borderline for "overweight" on the Body Mass Index scale; and no, it ain't muscle that's pushing it over). Ugh! So I'll be obsessing over this for a bit. *sigh* Time to become an anti-caffeine fascist with myself again, too. I've reintroduced that crutch to my diet and it's fucking with my sleep, which throws the whole system out of whack. Can't afford to screw with my sleep patterns (do I always sound like such a broken record?). I suppose some of this has been a reaction to the terrorist attacks here in DC. Heaven knows there have been oodles of reports on how people have slipped off the anti-whatever (alcohol, fat, tobacco, etc.) wagon and either readdicted themselves or gained tons of weight back. And honestly, no matter how stoically one sits and takes this constant bombardment of news about everything that's happening, it's still stressful to watch, especially when a large concentration of the post 9-11 attacks are centered where you live. And if the things that are happening aren't enough, you get speculative pundits spewing out even more fear-mongering hatred. It's enough to make one seriously reconsider the idea that it is a citizen's responsibility to remain well-informed in a democracy. ... Not enough time to write a whole heck of a lot more this evening 'cause I'm headed over to Doug's place shortly for dinner and what not. Will try to obsess, er, ruminate on this later on the Palm. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Seventy Fourth28 October 2001 Decorating/Eleanor I need a new job so I can redecorate my apartment. ;-) This is what I get for looking at the IKEA web site and for visiting the Apartment Zero store here in DC this week as well - too many neat designs, too little cash. *grin* Actually, I can get away with re-arranging a lot of the junk I have at the moment and just making it look better, which is what I've spent the majority of today doing. Put up nails to hang utensils and what not in the kitchen. Freed up a lot of counter space and other storage space. Put a bunch of junk away in the bathroom (things you don't need every day, like peroxide, which can go in the linen closet instead - there is no cabinet space in my bathroom, only counter space, the medicine cabinet and a small set of shelves I put in). Have to attack the bedroom soon as well (need DC storage space!), but it's a start. Doug says I'm nesting now that I have the cats. Perhaps that's the case. I just started looking around and just not liking what I saw as far as how things looked. Too junky, not neat enough, too much stuff out and about, making the place look too cluttered. Also, as usual, tossed a whole bunch of "I've not used this in ages, I'm not going to use it, ever" kinds of things. Not quite sure how I accumulate so much in so little time, but it happens somehow. Blah. ... Eleanor, with Jean Stapleton (think Edith from All in the Family), was wonderful. There were so many excellent quotes from this one (and forgive me if I don't get them all 100%):
It really was a wonderful play. One act, one actress, minimal props. It handles the years from 1918-1922, roughly, so WWI and the beginning of FDR's political career, in remembrances from 1945, right after he died. Jean's portrayals of the different voices was marvelous (Mama was hysterical - she's the one with the Vanderbilt quote above), and she managed to get just the right tone, I think. There was no mention of Eleanor's lesbian lover, though there was the line at the beginning, "I love many people" which was an interesting way of alluding to things without stating them. The theater was packed, much better than the last dismal play we saw there. Hopefully the rest of the season will be as good. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Seventy Fifth30 October 2001 Sleep/Blogger 01/10/30 8:55 a.m. A wonderful night's sleep last night. Chatted til 9-something, in bed by 10 or so, up at 6:20 (after the cats decided the bed was fair game since the alarm was going off anyway). A good run this morning as well. Running late but who cares? I'll go to the bank on the way in to take care of that finally and just work through lunch. I never posted an entry I started the other day on here about moving the site over to a Blogger format. I'm still thinking that would be a good idea, despite the minor formatting changes that would entail (loss of numbered entries, etc.). It would make posting a tad easier and open up the opportunities to post from multiple locations. Will still use the LiveJournal for little posts, but I prefer the ability to post multiple times per day, for which this journal's current format isn't terribly conducive. side note: people on mass transit need to learn to remove backpacks while standing in the aisles so as to avoid smacking other passengers with them ... Another "I don't have enough time to write more than I wrote on the Palm" kind of entry. Archives |
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Entry the Three Hundred and Seventy Sixth31 October 2001 Blue Moon 01/10/31 8:44 a.m. Not running late, just couldn't get a seat until now - very crowded this morning and traffic on 16th was hellacious in Mt. Pleasant. So, an actual blue moon tonight - defined as the second full moon in a calendar month. It won't actually look blue, it's going to look orange (how fitting for the holiday), but how neat. So all those things you swore would only happen once in a blue moon... I'm meeting someone for dinner tomorrow, just a low-key thing, a chance to meet someone from online originally, but in conversing with him over email there is definitely the possibility of more there. He emails pretty frequently, which is a huge plus (one of the hallmarks of success for my primary relationship), and talks about a variety of things. One result of this has been a discussion of some aspects of polyamory and our relative positions on the matter. It's also meant a self-examination of my own expectations for anything at the moment. I am, for the most part, pretty content with my dating life. I have two wonderful men that I see on a regular basis, as well as the occasional play partner. What has been frustrating, though, is my consistent failure to maintain any other emotional relationships of any depth (not counting good friendships there). ... 01/10/31 5:48 p.m. Plans for this evening were canceled, so I'll have a tad more time to ruminate on the above in more detail. side note: Doug passed the bar, as we knew he would. Please drop him a line and congratulate him on a job well done. As if we doubted he would pass. :-p ... I guess I'm not quite sure what, if anything, I want to or should do about any other relationship(s) that may come up. I know it probably looks incredibly greedy that here I have two boyfriends and I'm contemplating what others might come along as well. I guess I look on the other relationships that have not worked as a failure of mine, that I have somehow driven these men off by being who I am. It is not an easy thing to contemplate that some personality trait of yours would drive someone to drop off the face of the planet, at least in terms of contact with you. :-( ... Heading out now to a different bar than the one I was originally headed to (different group of friends, too), so will write later. Archives |
