Rancid-Tea

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Well, I found out that DHL tried to deliver our phones to the POST OFFICE yesterday. Normally this wouldn’t be that bad, but the post office usually isn’t open on national holidays, so I have to say it was decidedly dumb. Had they driven several blocks further and just tried to deliver it here, we would have had our Vonage line up and running for almost a full day by now. They should be attempting to deliver it again today. If they bring it to the post office, we should have our new phones this afternoon.

– I’ve been playing around with a very large database of zip codes recently and enjoying the hell out of it. I even had a long discussion with Brad at work about how to get zip codes in an approximate distance of each other to return, and other random things. All of this is in preparation for a new site which I don’t want to let out of the bag just yet, lest I grow lazy and never finish it…

– Today is the first day of the last semester of classes for me. All my classes are early this semester so I’ll at least have some afternoons to myself, and, if the management at work ever figure out how to hire new people, I might not have to work almost every day. Wouldn’t that be nice. At least this semester I don’t have to work every single Friday, so I don’t have to wait until 6 to embark on a 3 hour drive to the cities.

– MetaSteph moved in yesterday. This is sort of a long, long story, and I have to keep getting ready, but she seems like she’s a pretty cool roommate, and she actually eats some of the same food as Ethan and I! This may be the first time that has happened with a room mate ever for us. For some reason it makes me all excited and I want to cook up a bunch of food and have her try it. I’ll try to resist going overboard.

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Hmm… I was hoping our new phones would arrive today, but it looks like that won’t happen until Monday. There’s still a little hope, but it’s getting rather late in the day for package arrivals. Oh well. Wait! Monday is a holiday! Grrr… they better deliver it anyway…

– I did manage to buy my books on Friday, so at least I’ve accomplished something. I’m kind of sad that school starts again on Tuesday, but it will be my LAST semester, and then I graduate and get to move on to bigger and better things. Namely, I won’t have homework ever again. Also, I get to work somewhere else, which will be a nice change. Ethan and I have sort of started searching for apartments. It’s a little strange because a lot of places don’t seem to expect tenants to start their search several months ahead of time. I’m hoping that we’ll get a shoe in on several apartments we’re looking at, though, so the advanced notice should be helpful.

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Hmm… Break is almost over. I feel so incredibly lazy, having had many plans for my long, vacant days, and really I didn’t do anything at all. Today is my last day to go buy books before the bookstore on campus becomes infested with students. I don’t mind the students so much as how unhelpful and slow the staff is. When almost every student is there to buy books, you would think they would try to be organized, but no. No, instead they refuse to help you unless you are checking out (despite the fact that all semester there are three full time employees but only two registers…) and then they screw up and think it’s funny. Ha ha, we accidentally charged you $7000! Isn’t that funny! No, it’s not. (sigh)

– I decided that we were paying too much for the limited phone service we were getting, so I finally caved and ordered vonage, so soon we will have a twin cities number and not have to worry about paying for long distance, or even finding calling cards. For those of you who need the new number, it will be on my answering machine for a month or so and after that you can email me.

– I should probably get away from the computer and get ready to go to the bookstore before I start griddling and then all hope will be lost. Maybe if I start my day away from the computer I might actually finish my quilt. Anything is possible, right?

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Hmm… I’m back from my parents’ which was a whirlwind weekend as usual. The trouble with not going to the cities very often is that you have a million things you need to do there that sort of build up over time, and then you only get to do half of them, so you start saving up for the next time you visit… I did get to see my friend Roxie for the first time since Summer. She is doing really well with her new job, which is great. She actually bought a painting when we went shopping. Other than our grand day of shopping yesterday, not much else got done. I’m not sure how that happens. I’m glad to be back though, and I have a new idea for a website. I’ll have to work on it a bit before I show anyone, so if I become motivated, there may be something new here soon.

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Oh my, it’s been awhile since I posted last… Well I had a fun (if a bit boring) time at my parents’ house. I got a lot of cool things and I intended to take a bunch of pictures, but only got a few. While there I found this website, griddlers.net where you can do these puzzles… I have become utterly obsessed. That’s actually part of the reason I haven’t posted. How sad is that?

– I was able to tear myself away long enough for new years and then lots of hanging out after new years. Jessi Gurr invited us over to bring in the new year, and we had a good time, though apparently no one among us was fit to stay up very late anymore. The following day, we were invited back to share a southern/vegan new year dinner/lunch. It was really tasty and filling. Later we played several games and found out that Ethan is a terrible liar… and that Ethan and I together don’t know much trivia from the early eighties. It was really fun to just hang out all evening though.

– Yesterday I went to the doctor to have someone look at one of my moles (or so I thought) and ended up having four of them removed. I don’t have a problem with that, except that I was sort of in the middle of my work day, not to mention I’m not allowed to remove my bandages for 24 hours, and until then I can’t get them wet. It is very difficult to avoid getting your back and sides wet in the shower, so I had to wash my hair in the sink this morning. Hopefully the rest of me will simply smell nice until this evening. Strangely, the doctor gave me painkillers with codeine in them… I took one last night because it is uncomfortable to lay down and I thought I might have trouble sleeping, but really, I haven’t felt anything more than discomfort since the Novocaine (which was actually much more painful than the holes in my sides and back). For now I’ll just take tylenol and see what happens.

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Well, I didn’t get the job (suck). It really only takes one little email for someone to crush your dreams I guess. Anyway, our solstice gathering went quite well. Jessi, Chris and Liz all showed up and they brought food and presents. Jessi apparently has been making soap and she gave me some, which all smells really nice and is rather pretty. Now my interest is piqued and I’d like to try making some myself. I do have a million and one other projects to finish first, like my quilt I started…. in high school? Wow. The sad part is that it has been nearly finished for years. I just haven’t taken the final steps. Silly me.

– I’m back at my parents’ place and I keep remembering I don’t have a car because Ethan drove it to Madison. I was going to go grocery shopping and suddenly realized that it would be a bit more difficult than I first thought. Wren said she would give me a ride though, so as soon as she is done getting ready, off we’ll go to buy food stuffs.

– There’s not much else to report on as not much happens around here.

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(sigh) Just one final to go and I’m done with this semester. Then just one more semester to go… At any rate, I’m almost done.

– I just found a listing for a local job that would be much better than what I’m doing now. I submitted an application this morning and hopefully I’ll hear back soon. It’s a position for making web pages, which is exactly what I want to do. Even though the company I work for supposedly does do web hosting and web design, they don’t actually. If I get this job it would mean a rather drastic pay cut, but honestly, the extra $30/week probably aren’t worth what I have to put up with right now. Even better, I won’t have to answer the phone and talk to people who don’t know anything about their computer and put up a fight when you try to help them… It certainly would be nice to have a job that didn’t make me want to poke my eyes out with my thumbs.

– This weekend was rather traumatic. A girl from school is looking for a new home for her cat and I thought I would have her cat meet my cats and see if everyone got along. In short, they did not. In fact, Peeve was so beside himself that he became rather aggressive with Pester, who was then freaked out by that and they both were unhappy about Taver, the visiting cat… After one night of listening to Peeve and Pester growl at each other from across the room while Taver hid under the basement stairs, I decided our little experiment in cat-meeting was over, and asked his owner if she could come pick him up. It took another day and a half before my cats were acting with some semblance of normality. I was kind of freaked out because they’re usually so lovey with each other. I think Peeve actually has post traumatic stress syndrome, because even after Taver left, and when Pester wasn’t in the room, he would slink around and wouldn’t finish his food. That’s so not like him. Poor kitty.

– Angie, Matt, Ethan and I went bowling on Saturday, and it would have been fun, except they stuck us on a lane next to the bumper lane… and then little kids showed up. (shudder) I really don’t like kids. They make me nervous. Also, they bother me and I usually want to smack them. These kids weren’t doing anything overtly annoying but still, they were there. We did go to Don’s afterward and that was fun. We actually finished our fries and each had sandwiches and shakes. Yum.

– Bleah, I should go to work… and then try to come up with a grocery list, so we can actually make food for our little solstice get together on Wednesday. I found a few yummy meals that we should be able to make, and they’re all vegan too, so Jessi and Chris can enjoy everything.

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This weekend I gave my presentation, which apparently went well, in spite of the fact that I had a nagging headache since I woke up on Saturday. Unfortunately I have to make a final revision to my paper, mostly because my last revision didn’t quite make it to the table (I blame duplicating services, which takes about 5 days to churn out some copies… I could have made the copies for the seminar in a hour or less using my printer at home…). I’m starting to really see this class as a final vaccination I need before being released into the real world. I just want to get it over with and not linger over it anymore. Bleah.

– In very different news, I got almost all of my holiday shopping done. There are a few more things I should grab, but nothing major. Oh, and also I still haven’t received my first shipment from Amazon. I ordered it November 8th… it hasn’t shipped yet. I ordered several other things on the 30th, and I’ve gotten all of them. If they don’t come by the 23rd, I will be extremely disappointed, especially since they say it should ship by the 14th. If not, I’m telling them I want free shipping and a discount if they ever want my business again. Much frustration.

– I might be adding to my zoo. A girl from my school apparently has a cat that she just can’t devote enough time to. In his best interest, she is trying to find him a home. I’m going to introduce the cats on Friday and sort of baby-sit this weekend. If everything goes well, he may become a permanent part of the family. I’m excited to meet him and see how he gets along with Pester and Peeve.

– The final week of classes is upon me, and after that I have my finals. I’m going to be so relieved to be able to sleep in and have some time to myself when I’m not worrying about homework. I need a few good days curled up in bed with Ethan and a movie or a book. We can eat leftovers and do nothing all day. That’s my idea of a vacation. Just two more weeks and I can enjoy it.

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I just stumbled upon something very neat, paper tessellations. If I had time to do anything not related to school or work right now, I’d try to figure out how it’s done, but I have to save it for another day.

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I looked it up and found that the Winter solstice for 2005 will occur at 12:35 pm CST on December 21. Ethan and I have been thinking about it and we decided we want to have a small celebration for the solstice. Since both of us will be at our respective family’s houses for christmas, we thought it would be nice to have a small celebration beforehand. Also, we only really celebrate the pagan aspects of christmas (the tree, lighting candles and gift giving have nothing to do with religion), so why not celebrate it on the day it’s meant for? I also found this neat little fact – the reason people light candles on christmas which then burn all day is because it is considered unlucky for a candle or fire to go out on christmas, this traces back to the solstice holiday which exists because people feared that daylight would continue to wane if they did not heartily celebrate. To bring more light to the darkest day of the year, candles were lit for the duration of the day.

– Speaking of the solstice, Winter was really rearing its ugly head today. Ethan couldn’t get into his car because his locks and doors keep freezing shut. We were finally able to string together several extension cords and he thawed his frozen lock with a hair dryer. Later, when I got out of class, I wasn’t able to drive home because the inside of my windshield and front windows had completely frosted over. Instead I got to sit for a bit with the car running until a large enough patch was cleared so that I could see in front of the car… I decided to leave it running until I had to leave again.

– I started a new blender project this weekend. I’m not entirely sure what it will be when I’m done, but if I render the entire thing right now, it takes around two and a half hours. Thankfully it can be sort of broken down and I can render just the bits I’m working on. I am having a strange problem though, and I’m not sure if there is anyplace I can find help. One of my textures just isn’t wrapping the way it should, and I can’t figure out why. Grrr. I’m sure I’ll figure it out eventually, or find some nifty work around. Anyway, it’s time to close up shop and head home.