Then, it took FOUR calls to Sears to get a human being to confirm delivery of my new fridge tomorrow. While their voice automated system happily parroted back everything I said, it had an unfortunate tendency to disconnect halfway through the call. Once I got to a REAL lady on the other end of the line, I found that they had not finalized the delivery schedule for 8/18/2010. Yippee… However, to their credit, their “tomorrow’s delivery announcement” call did arrive and in theory my fridge will be here between 11:15 and 1:15 tomorrow. (Donald says 4:00PM. But I have faith.)

Last night, my awesome little brother noticed a burned-out taillight on my car. It’s inspection month anyway, so – problem solved by getting the car inspected! I even told them about the light when I dropped it off for the inspection & oil change. I missed the “Your car is ready!” voicemail by TWO HOURS, but the message didn’t say “respond or we torch your car” so I think they were OK with my tardy response. I then picked up the car with the the same burned out taillight that I left at the shop. Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. Bonus: got the light fixed for free. Oh, and the “recommended ‘mini’ tune-up – yeah, they didn’t have the “right” spark plugs for my Jeep.

Missed the alarm on my phone to send my friend M a reminder text. I am quite certain the alarm went off, but I either missed it or was so distracted by everything else going sideways that it didn’t register.

I’ve also spent more than a few minutes sanding down my bamboo knitting needles, cause Carmen thought they were SPECTACULAR chew toys. (She doesn’t understand that the spectacularly wonderful binkie she had in the shelter came off MY knitting needles.)

Then I saw the weather report for tomorrow: I can condense it to: Monsoon. During which time my fridge will be delivered. Said fridge which has to go through the side yard and backyard to the back door to fit inside my house. The delivery men are going to HATE me. Oh, and Lily decided it would be great to explore the Great Outdoors while I attempted to measure the front (not quite wide enough) door!

All I ask is for tomorrow to be really, really quiet and uneventful.

I cannot relax. Seriously. My companions are great, the food is spectacular and the water is awesome, but I *cannot* relax.

If this were a one week stay and we were leaving on Friday, I’d go ahead and pack it in now, because I can be this tense at home. I can only guess it is a confluence of many small things because I can’t put my finger on any one big thing, and I’m finding it very difficult to enjoy myself because I just can’t shake this underlying, unidentifiable stress.

Friday morning Carmen had a (quite literal) massive hissy fit upon being dropped off at the kennel. (What idiot doesn’t know to leave the cat in the crate until the cat is ready to come out of the crate on its own? Oh – that would be me. I don’t know WHAT I was thinking.) However, her scaling the front of the 6′ bank of “suites” and installing herself in a kitty cube at the top was tactically impressive. Always go for the high ground. I did speak to the kennel later and they said she’d calmed down and both had eaten dinner enthisiastically and they were both fine if “a bit reserved” – reserved still being better than hissing at everyone that comes within 2 feet.

No cell reception for anyone in the house. Last year we were on the cusp, and this year the trees have grown just enough to knock it out altogether. Purchased internet seems to be working for others, but very slow & sketchy at best for me – I am not one that needs to be connected 24/7, but some level of access to the rest of the world is nice, and there are some internet based services I will need to use over the course of two weeks. (And it seems to work best when I enable wi-fi on my phone and then tether that to the laptop – I really don’t think that should work better, but it does.) This after my laptop decided to puke all over itself on Saturday and simply decide to not work properly. I got it going again, but I still have no idea what went wrong in the first place.

Massive insomnia 2 out of 4 nights, that I cannot ascribe to anything other than an inability to turn my brain off.

Thunderstorms Saturday and today, which is leaving the dog decidedly unimpressed with beach life.

I guess the phone ringing off the hook 24/7 the last two years down here just blocked out all the other little annoyances. Or maybe I have just never really mastered the art of relaxing – it never was one of my strong points. But I can’t say I really relish the idea of always being tense until I die…

1. Mini Mag Lites. Every July I go and buy 4 Mini Mag Lites for the beach trip. It’s the middle of summer, thunderstorms and power outages happen, and if you’re in an unfamiliar house, it’s nice to have a little flashlight on the nightstand should you wake in the middle of the night and have to make your way to the bathroom without breaking an ankle. (I do try to be the hostess with the mostest.) We go to the beach with 4 little flashlights and come home with 4 flashlights in the Beach Equipment Box. By Christmas, I am lucky if there are still two of these flashlights in the box or the pencil holder on the kitchen desk. By March I am usually down to one flashlight and both bulbs have burned out on it…

This begs the question – where the hell did the other 3 flashlights go? In theory, they should turn up in various places about the house as I go about my day to day business. Except that they don’t. If I ever move out of here, I am quite certain I am going to find some sort of packrat nest that has about 20 Mini Mag Lites in it.

2. Hex keys. Given all the various and sundry things I have purchased from Ikea over the years, I should have at least 3 of every size and shape of hex key available. And yet, I have none. (And right now, I need some.)

3. Hair clips. These do a disappearing and reappearing act. As soon as I am down to one of these spring loaded barrettes, I go snag another 3 pack of them at the drug store. And a week later, I find I have a dozen of them.

4. Fluffy black socks. A few weeks into the fall, it’s always the same thing. I find I have 4 pairs of fluffy black socks to wear with my Timberlands. I check the pending laundry – no fluffy black socks. I hit Kohls, get a six pack of socks, and three days later, I will do a load of laundry and there are 10 pairs of fluffy black socks in it… The upside is that I won’t run out of socks for near three weeks, but seriously – WHERE WERE MY SOCKS????

I’d blame the cats, but this has been going on for too long, and even during the year I was catless. (I can’t blame the dog, he’s not much into the ‘taking stuff and hiding it’ games.)

Part of the reason I’m not feeling particularly optimistic about the sweet escape to dreamland is that my brain has been going about 150MPH all day today, and it’s only gotten worse as the day has progressed into the evening. It’s been a day where every self-doubt, every question of choices made, and the rest of my mental flotsam and jetsam has decided to come bubbling up to the surface.

I was talking with a friend earlier about a mutual friend who had gone off and tried something new and potentially terrifying. Granted, it was a no-lose situation, but he went outside his comfort zone to do it. And we were both proud of him for the attempt, regardless of the outcome.

There was a time where I told The Universe, “Bring it on!!” Which she did, in spades. (Yeah, tempting Fate in the first place ain’t the greatest idea.)

But she’s winged about as much as she could at my head, and I’ve managed to survive it.

However, it’s left me ridiculously gun-shy. And I really hate that I’ve become a rather timid person for it – for no other reason that I’m tired of the fact that the Fates decided to have a psychotic break while cutting my strings.

But I just don’t want to discover that The Universe has more fun and games in store for me. I’ve had enough at this point, thankyouverymuch.

When you can’t convince yourself that anything new won’t end in spectacular disaster, it’s hard to psych yourself up for anything new and outside your comfort zone.

It’s quite an annoying spot to find yourself in.

And then that bitch of insomnia shows up last night.  I had a great plan – I was going to go to bed early, get a great night’s sleep, get up and conquer the world today.  The fact that I am talking about it likely indicates that it didn’t work out.

First, I stayed up WAY too late being a couch potato and watching TV.  Which in and of itself isn’t the worst thing in the world, but I was mildly annoyed with the fact that I’d not been paying a whit of attention to the time and turned off the TV at 3AM.

Went to bed, nice and tired, and could NOT fall asleep.  I’d start to drift off, and then I’d hear a noise.  Or some random thought would pop in my head.  Or Lily would be jumping up on the high boy again (which she knows she isn’t allowed to do) and I’d be awake again.  Then it was 4AM.  Then 5AM.  Then the Metrobuses started coming through.  The last look I got at the clock was 6AM, and I was briefly contemplating just getting up and going out for breakfast.  Apparently I finally fell asleep before I could attempt to follow through on that idea.

What sleep I did get was total crap as it was filled with odd dreams and when I woke up, I felt a bit like I’d been hit by a truck and with a mental state I’d graciously describe as cranky.  On top of it?  Craptastic weather!

It’s not a confluence of events that is particularly conducive to productivity.  I think the trip to the store should wait until there is a smaller chance of my bitch slapping a clerk.

There used to be a time when I could walk into the Gap and grab any style of size 4-Long jeans, try them on to make sure they weren’t mismarked, and off I went. Then the designers and sizing people all started doing some serious drugs. My size now could be anything depending on the day of the week. But despite the fact that I need to drop 5 pounds, my size is now a zero. 0-Regular. From a 4-Long. Today I tried on the same size, same style as the jeans I am attempting to replace only to discover that apparently my legs are now two inches shorter than they were the last time I bought these jeans, so I don’t even need a 0-Regular now, I need a 0-Ankle. And according to the saleslady the ankle length is only available online. (Except that it’s not – they don’t even make an ankle length version in size 0.)

So, according to the folks who determing sizes at the Gap, in the past 10 years I’ve gotten shorter and skinnier. Except that I haven’t.

And I still need another pair of jeans.

If I’m just heading up to the pub – well, hells bells, I’m there to check in on the chickadees and catch the late showing of SportsCenter and/or a West Coast game. I certainly don’t give a crap about anything other than snagging a Guinness and some sports, and how I look ain’t gonna enter the equation.

Tonight I headed up to wish a friend a Happy Birthday and catch some playoff hockey. Little did I know that my inattention to making myself look appealing to the opposite sex would make me a lesbian.

No makeup, not just because of laziness, but also because I don’t want to put anything on my face that would make the pollen stick to it any faster than it would already. (It’s killing me this year – I’ve found the only solution is washing my face multiple times a day.) My trusty 501 button-fly jeans – cause they fit and are comfy and they worked better w/the shirt I was wearing – a kickass long sleeved tie dye t-shirt, made even more fun by the fact that the DynCorp name is embroidered on it. It’s fun to have a hippie shirt that was provided by the military industrial complex. That and you’re not going to wear a long sleeved t-shirt with a pair of flair leg jeans – you wear it with straight cut jeans. I do have an eye for what goes together, dammit. Oh, and my Teva sandals – because it’s warm enough to not wear my Timberlands anymore.

In talking w/ an (very distant) acquaintance this evening, he said something about being a lesbian, and I started howling with laughter. It then went something like this:
“Wait, you are a lesbian, aren’t you?”
“No, not at all. I dig the guys.” (I chose not to go into the studies I have heard indicating latent or overt bisexual tendencies of 60% to 80% of all women. I didn’t have the cash on hand to pull the cool Han Solo tossing money on the bar and saying “Sorry ’bout the mess” move when his head exploded. And no, I can’t find the citation at the moment.)

But according to him, I gave off a big time lesbian vibe. He claimed it was attitude and the outfit – I can only assume he’s not used to women forgetting to fawn over his pretty face & empty head. (His lady friends did soundly lambaste him over the idea that no makeup = lesbian.)

But yes, I’m sure a little more eye makeup will fix that. Then I’ll just be that bitchy girl with makeup who isn’t into him.

It would seem that someone stole their brand damn new snowblower.  That is pretty brazen to say the least and quite the definition of a dick move.

The best I could do was to give my neighbor a flyer from some plumbing contractors that were coming around during the day – maybe one of them saw something.  (Or yes, they would have a truck that could have hauled it off – I don’t know where on the block they might have been doing work.)  I am keeping an eye on Craigslist to see if anything pops up – people are stupid and do try to sell stolen stuff there, so it may very well show up.

To my local friends – should you hear of someone getting a great deal on a kickass snowblower out of nowhere today – please let me know – it could belong to my neighbor.

I am SO mad about this – not just that it happened, but that I didn’t even SEE it.

The back window in my car has decided that it doesn’t want to work anymore, which would normally be something that I’d simply leave alone for another time, but unfortunately, the window is open about an inch and a half, and as such, actually needs to be tended to. So, I’m looking at being carless for a couple days and that annoys me, too.

There was a 6.1 magnitude aftershock in Haiti today. WTF, Mother Nature, didn’t have enough fun with the first one?

It’s sounding more and more like the health care legislation may be dead, so yay, I can look forward to my premiums continuing to rise unabated, despite my decent health and fabulous looks, and then being cancelled if I ever have to actually use it.

I have taken to turning off the ringer on the phone in my bedroom and leaving my cell phone downstairs at night because I’m done with answering tax question calls from my grandmother at 3AM. (She has a little problem with boundaries and bothering to look at clocks.) I’m pretty sure this makes me a bad person, but I need sleep to effectively be the CEO of “Keep Grandma out of a Nursing Home, Inc.” and she certainly has no problems picking up the phone during the day.

On the upside, the animals are all quite well. Carmen decided to have herself a good old fashioned feline crazy this morning and was chasing me, the dog, invisible bugs, and anything else that caught her eye. However, the Christmas tree is a little worse for the wear for her fun this morning. She is happily sleeping on my lap as I type this, which thrills Moxley to no end, because it means she is not in his crate. He was not having a super awesome time this afternoon as he couldn’t sleep in his crate because Carmen was in it (why he won’t just walk in and sit on her is beyond me) and Lily kept trying to sleep on his tail and feet. (She LOVES him and is also just a little obsessed with his feet.)

So yeah 2010 – I’m just not impressed so far. We’re stuck with each other for 11+ more months, so let’s get it together, shall we?

Why couldn’t you have said something like this?

“First, what a terrible tragedy to befall the Haitians.  They are in our prayers.

Second, given that I can marshal some pretty impressive resources with a snap of my fingers, here’s what we’re gonna do.  First,we’re gonna charter some bigassed airplanes.  The biggest that can land at the Port Au Prince airport.  The first one we’re gonna load up with doctors and medical supplies.  The second one will have MRE’s, bottled water and water purification kits.  Third one will be new, clean clothes.  (No Tennessee Lane Kiffin shirts, either.)  The fourth one, we’re gonna go clear out the entire stock of tents and camping equipment at REI, cause a tent is still better than nothing.  And generators.  And we’ll grab some of those kids that work at REI so we’ve got people who know how to put the tents together.

Once we’ve got everyone fed, safe and in clean socks and underwear, we’re gonna start sending planes filled with building equipment and as many retired Seabees as we can get our hands on and start fixing things.”

But no, you decided to go with the, “It’s your own damn fault for making a pact with Satan” approach.  Yeah, I guess you could have easily gone either way.