12/10/03: So yeah, Thanksgiving sucks.

Not so good news: got a call today that I was not chosen for the AmeriCorps position. Oh well. It would have been fabulous, but I'll just find something else! And really, who wants to live in Dallas anyway?

Good news--I came straight home from work and cleaned my bathroom! Bad news for the mold colonies that were making a valiant attempt to take over the shower stall, though.

Even better news that I can't believe I almost forgot to share: I am going to Paris! Thirty days from today, as a matter of fact! I will be there for nine days, a Saturday to a Monday, and oh, I cannot wait. It's been two and a half years since I've seen Paris. They've eliminated the franc and who knows what else in that length of time. And I've only been there in the summertime, so it will be a new experience to see it in the winter. I imagine it will be gray and dreary weather, but empty of tourists. Also hoping to catch some after-Christmas sales. A first for me--I will be staying in a hostel NOT in the outlying areas--I've just put in a reservation to a hostel in the 5th (Saint-Germain/student district)...woo! I'm trying to think of the last time I had a real vacation, like on a plane...and I'm pretty sure it was my 2001 Eurotrip. Egads.

11/29/03: So Thanksgiving is over, thank goodness. Thanksgiving has got to be my least favorite holiday; none of the meal appeals to my strict tastes, so I dine on rolls and salad, the smell of turkey cooking grosses me out, and I do NOT like being obligated to be with my family. Plus, as I told my roommate recently, I have issues with the ideological underpinnings of the entire holiday. Yes, I am evil and extremely un-American. Get over it.

All that said, I do of course love having a day off of work (for once!), and our bosses let us go early on Wednesday AND on Friday (we get either the day after Thanksgiving or the day after Christmas off; I am planning for a long weekend over Christmas).

Wednesday was even better because I had an interview! I can't remember if I mentioned the AmeriCorps jobs that I found last month and applied for. Well, since it had been a month, I had given up on it, no big deal. But I got a call at work on Monday to set up a phone interview. It seemed to go pretty well, and it got me all excited and happy

11/12/03: After I finished Live from New York, I read My Antonia. which I understand to be rather a standard in educational reading. My other foray into this field (Catcher in the Rye, which I did not like at all, as it had no discernable plot) made me skeptical, but I quite liked it. The story reminded me of Giants in the Earth, with the whole breaking of virgin land thing. It's thrilling to imagine all the toil and struggle they endured, and to imagine if you, the reader, would have been capable. And it's one of those books, like Prayer for Owen Meany, where the narrator, though ostensibly the center of the story, has no real personality, nothing to draw you to them. Their existence is to acquaint you with the titular character, who is often unforgettable and epic in their own way. You only remember them as being in love with or being friends with or just generally admiring of the real lead character. Anyway. I liked the book.

Well, it's happened at long last, I have a forty-hour work week! I like it. I am still busy, of course, but things have worked out so that I am no longer just barely keeping up, it's the reverse now; my processors can hardly keep up with me. Plus, my phone is almost silent. I clear my desk constantly. Which is nice, to not be drowning in files, but it makes me want a big, busy project.
Outside of work, I have enough time to work out in the evenings, eat some green beans, watch tv, AND relax a little. I need to work on weekends, because I tend to polarize--I go, go, go, nonstop, or I do nothing at all. Must work on more of a compromise of the two. But I am feeling more about my life, because I feel more in control of it.

10/31/03: Happy Halloween! It is COLD. I am sitting in my apartment and my fingers are literally going numb. I cranked the heat but it is taking its sweet damn time. It turned seasons in the blink of an eye...all the fall colors are out, and it is decidedly frosty in the mornings. Brr.
So at this momentous occasion, I must think back to all the previous Halloweens/birthdays in my short but jampacked life. I remember the party I had at the Gymnastics place, everyone wore Halloween costumes and we had a pinata, and then possibly we stayed the night at the gym. I remember lots of trick or treating in downtown Issaquah. I remember a party and trick or treating with a big group of girls in high school. Then of course, last year, when I, along with my teammates, spent Halloween packing to go back to Perry Point, and deep-cleaning the Bridgeport Habitat house. What an interesting array of history.

It's the end of yet another month. Crazy. Time is flying like nobody's business. I am reading another big book, which makes me a little impatient. Instant gratification, man.

10/21/03: Our local chapter of Mother Nature is manic depressive. This summer was a record-setting one, for lack of rainfall; the entire state got an average of less than two inches. ALL SUMMER. Then fall hit. I fully expected the weather to turn gray and crappy right on cue. However, it stayed really warm and sunny. A couple lightly-rainy days here and there, but lovely for the most part.

Eventually, last week or maybe even the one before, it got seriously gray, cloudy, Northwest-fall-like. Then, yesterday, it broke. Five inches of rain in one day. Torrents and sheets of rain all day long. It set an all-time record for rainfall in a single day.

10/19/03: So Friday night I stayed up til 12:45AM, practically propping up my eyelids to read. Imagine my surprise when I groggily awakened at 12:45PM on Saturday. Ah, sleep, that most sly and elusive nighttime activity.

The rest of the day I spent in a fatigued stupor, watching movies (Slackers and The Recruit) and TV (the Travel Channel and Queer Eye).

It is already Sunday evening. I went in to work for a couple hours (all hail the overtime!), plus ran to Costco and put up some decoration-type things in the living room. Still need to make my room homey. And clean it. And finish cleaning the bathroom. All in good time, grasshopper.

Something random popped into my head this afternoon while driving. I'm not sure why, but I was suddenly overcome with that sensation of travel. Hostels, airports, dragging bags around unfamiliar yet wonderfully foreign streets...how I long to travel again. I love to discover new things, or to discover ancient things all for myself. The thrill of crisp, new maps and memorizing another underground system. The secret, naughty pleasure of eating American fastfood in another country, and the way it somehow tastes different. Trying to shop for souvenirs without looking like a cheesy tourist. Never knowing who you'll meet, who you'll find yourself avoiding, what sense or smell or activity will become synonomous with that place in your memories. Ah, travel. Where shall I go next?

10/17/03: Wow, a whole week passed already. It went rather quickly. Monday I was feeling weak and tired, and Tuesday I stayed home. My limbs felt heavy, and tingly and trembly. I was in bed half the day, and laying down watching tv the rest of the day. It was good to relax.

I didn't really follow up on the job thing, though I did beef up my statements for the second application. I figure it also won't lead to a response, but it made me feel proactive and practicing, or something. Maybe I will work on keeping my eye open for opportunities. And by the time I'm really ready for something, I'll, you know, be ready. Hm, I wonder if that made sense.

I don't think much else happened this week. I haven't worked out at all, but I did start working overtime again. Making up for lost time, and for lost fundage in the bank account...I can't wait for November, when I'll be getting a bonus. Ten months later, but better late than never, is what I keep reminding myself.

So I spent three weeks reading that one book, right? I have made up for lost time, reading four books this week alone. I will be starting the fifth tonight. It's the last of the five I got from the library, the lot of which are due on Tuesday. Impressive, eh? One of them was The Alchemist. I loved it. I probably should have read it much sooner, but this was a perfect time to think about dreams and destinies. I can keep myself going, because I decided this is just my year in the crystal shop. I am saving up money for a future journey that will lead me to my true life.

Have you ever noticed that life goes by awfully fast? I am old. I mean, I know I'm still young, but it honestly feels like I'm still an awkward teenager, just pretending to be a "grown-up." The scary thing is that many other people feel this way, a good number of whom are significantly older than me. I don't want to go through the years, always feeling like I can't quite catch up. I mean, really, someone who is twenty-four is an adult, a go-getter, a social swagster, laughing in swanky, funky bars with their many eclectic friends, someone who has a unique, interesting and promising job, and a kitschy apartment in the city. Whereas I, rapidly approaching that twenty-fourth milestone, feel impossibly young, imposterly uninteresting, drab, lazy and antisocial. It's like I'm waiting for some sign, some privilege, some telltale symbol of true adulthood. And I don't mean voting, imbibing alcohol, or parenthood.

10/12/03: So another weekend is about to wrap up. This one was pretty quiet and relaxing, I suppose. I spent almost all of yesterday holed up at home, reading and watching tv. But I did get my ass out "on the town" for a little bit...I went to kinko's to use their paper cutter, and then found a consignment store (Lucky jeans for twenty bucks!). Back home, then right back out to the movie theatre. Yay for cherry icees. My tongue stays red for hours after finishing one.

I was planning on volunteering this weekend, but I didn't get the information on where and when...and I suppose I could have been more proactive and/or found another opportunity, but I got lazy and excited about a whole day to do nothing. I was not exactly pleased to be awake by 8.30, but oh well. I had already promised myself I wasn't going to work this weekend; in fact, I've only worked twenty-five minutes of overtime all week! It feels weird, like I'm cheating or something. But I'm a freaking assistant, there is no reason that I need to do tons of overtime; I should be able to do most of my work during my normal eight hours a day. As much as I love the money, I would rather have a little more time to myself, as well as a more fixed schedule. I really need to get off my ass and into the gym more. This week I went three times, last week once, the week before, twice. I'm just so tired...and I feel like I'm getting sick. That's been going on for a good four or five days now, though, so I'm anxious to just get sick already, or not be. Weirdly, I kind of want to get sick. I have to look forward to a time when I can justifiably and legally not work. I'm not sure if it's laziness or lack of responsibility...I suspect it's more a yearning for a change of pace, something new and different to interrupt the routine. I love taking field trips, or having meetings, or doing anything that means I'm not just sitting at my desk.

So so much for adventure. This weekend my only adventure was staying up to watch SNL with Justin Timberlake (it was quite a show) and finishing that damn 865-page book. Although, a good portion of yesterday evening was spent organizing my newish file cabinet (a two-drawer plastic number from Target)...it was good thing, too. The clutter was irking me; since the files weren't really organized, I hadn't put anything away for a good three months. Thus I had two large piles of random papers that needed organizing and filing. I am happy with my success in that endeavor. And this morning, again awake by 8.30, I finished tidying my room and the kitchen, did laundry, AND cleaned the bathroom (well, halfway). Hurrah for me.

There was some excitement this week. I was talking to Stacey about jobs, and she mentioned the government, and that reminded me of the job listings page at the CNCS (Corp for National and Community Service). I took a look and found TWO postings for an AmeriCorps Recruiting Program Specialist! It got me all worked up; the job description and requirements are made for me. One had a deadline of the next day, so I fumbled together some stuff to submit the application. Just so that I knew I did something. I was fully set to hunker down and put together better stuff for the other one, which ends this week sometime, but I keep forgetting. Eek. And, I never got confirmation or any word at all on the one I did submit, so I need to find out what to do next to get a response

09/28/03: This crazy month is almost over. I shall be glad.

Last weekend I volunteered with Habitat for Humanity, at their Snoqualmie Ridge site. The task for the day was bringing some houses up to code. Most of the things that needed to be done were in attics and crawl spaces. I worked in both, and worked up quite a sweat. I LOVED it. I loved doing something with my hands, I loved doing something that got tangible results, I loved doing something that really physically mattered. There was a brand-new team of AmeriCorps people there, a couple of whom had already done NCCC. It was fabulous to talk to them, but I was sad to not have time to get all their stories. That's my favorite thing about AmeriCorps, talking to the members, finding out where they come from, what they've done, what their general experience of life has been. People are cool.

I am planning to continue volunteering, with Seattle Works and now with Habitat. There is a site in Redmond where I hope to work in October.

I just re-read Succulent Wild Woman by Sark. I really enjoy her work, it inspires me. I have been feeling spiritually empty, so it was wonderful to read that. Because of that, I decided to use this afternoon for a mini adventure. I headed out on the freeway, thinking about going to Mount St Helens. Then I saw the exit for Aberdeen and Ocean Beaches, and I haven't ever been there, so I decided to go that way instead. It was so pretty, just driving on the highway, there were evergreen trees everywhere and a big blue sky overhead. I got into Aberdeen, took some turns, drove around, and then I ended up going to Ocean Shores. I parked by a little mall and ate at a diner. The chocolate milk shake was yummy. Then I went to the beachfront. It was populated with clam-diggers and kite-flyers. It was cloudy and windy and loud and wonderful. Being there reminded me of previous good times at Lincoln City and at Cape Cod. I walked down the beach, relaxed on some driftwood, watched a baby seagull scurry across the sand. It really wasn't an objectively exciting trip, but I enjoyed it all the same. Then I got back in the car to drive home, in plenty of time to catch the premiere of Alias.

Yesterday Stacey and I finally hosted a get-together at our apartment. We had drinks and games, and Jaime Doll joined us, who most of us hadn't seen since the early college years. It was a good time. The mojitos were the unofficial stars of the evening!

Also, happy birthday to the September Fire 4 babies, Ashley, Jep, and Brodie, and best of luck to Lesley, who is off to a big ol' adventure in Tanzania with the Peace Corps.

09/06/03: The faucet has turned off in the mortgage industry. The light at the end of the tunnel is close; no one's sure if it means we're all clear or we're in danger from that stupid oncoming train (which this time means that no one knows how long we'll all have jobs). The repercussions are apparent everywhere. Appraisals used to take 3-4 weeks to complete because the appraisers were so back-logged with orders...just in the past week a good number of orders were finished in less than seven days. Our office is still really busy catching up, but the boss made it clear that things will change from now on. My little life as an assistant blew up this week; the teams were rearranged a little, and now I have huge pile of files to work on. The week was kind of tough, because of all the changes, but next week I better get it together.

Another boring weekend. Last night I played Bunko and it was a lot of fun. I'll go in to work on Sunday afternoon. I have an hour's worth of files to build at home. Some more laundry to do at my mom's house. I might pass out from all this excitement.

08/25/03: Hubris strikes again! I was all proud of myself because last week I processed two files, then, unexpectedly, it looked like both of them were going to fund this month (instead of sit on my desk for a couple weeks waiting for subordinations). I was really excited about adding my little productivity to the team. However, today I learned that one of them is cancelling (out of the gosh darn blue) and the other one didn't sign the final papers (which means it won't fund in August). BOO FOR ME. 100% fallout--is that incredible or what?

In other news: on Sunday, after working a few hours, I went shopping. It turned into a shopping spree of sorts--a spree at Target and a free spree at B&N. I'll explain. I went to the former for just a couple things--a cheap file storage thing, inexpensive picture frames for my cool Euro photos. I got those plus a couple other random things, then I decided to check out the clothes. See, I've never really had any luck with stores like Target for clothes shopping, and clothes in general (especially pants) just don't fit me well. I have actually come to loathe clothes shopping because it just depresses me--either my ass and hips are too big, or my waist isn't small enough. Shirts are usually too tight for work or boxy and unflattering. Imagine how pleased I was to find two pairs of nice slacks that fit nicely and were not breath-inhibitive, plus two grown-up shirts, and this awesome burgundy corduroy pea coat. It was like school shopping, which I've never done properly. I figure that spending that amount of money was good for several reasons: it was like all my shopping attempts for the past two or three years were finally 'avenged' so to speak; each item was relatively cheap--all under or right near $20 and the most expensive item (the coat) was only $30. In trying to overcome my extreme frugality, that seems like a pretty damn good deal, don't you think?

08/18/03: So yesterday I took a practice GRE exam online. Oh my gosh. Let me preface all of this by saying that I took this completely cold. I did take a GRE math course, in MAY, that I could hardly understand back then. Don't forget that it's been ten years since I've done this kind of math, and a good five years since I've done ANY math at all. Suffice to say, I am not a math person. To quote Barbie, "Math is hard."

So here goes. First of all, I didn't even finish the math section, I ran out of time. There were only 28 questions, and I think I got through 20 or maybe 22 of them. One was a graph I couldn't read at all, so that was a random guess. Several others I thought I had figured out an answer on paper but none of the choices matched, so I had to educated-guess those too...it was pretty pathetic.

The verbal section went much better, thank goodness. The sentence completions were okay, and in general I thought I did fairly well. There were a crapload of words I didn't know. In fact, I wrote them down. Please let me know if you have ever even seen any of these words before: jejune, vitiate, saturnine, temerity, mawkish, diluvial. Then the ones that seemed like I should know them but I guess I didn't: intransigent, expurgate, quixotic, pedantic, malediction. Phew!

Here's the black and white results: 350 on the math section. 590 on the verbal section. Both out of a possible 800, just like the SAT. That's 43% and 73%. A mere total of 940! That's 59%. Holy crap, it just was terrible. Moral of the story: I NEED TO STUDY IF I EVER WANT TO PASS THE DAMN THING.

After that completely personal humiliation, of course I then had to contemplate the meaning of my life and where my future shall lead me. I thought about all the things I want to do in the next year or few (for dreams/aspirations and real life), and here are my current thoughts on them.

a. Graduate School. I think I already mentioned how a couple months ago I realized that I was completely unmotivated to really try hard at preparing for the exam. Every once in awhile I got all fired up and vowed to study and take the thing soon. But I could never follow through on it. Possibly I am afraid of failing (see above for proof of this theory!), and frankly, even studying the math scared me--I just don't remember it. Then, aside from the exam, I don't even know what to think about graduate school, as a whole. I don't think I'm ready yet to decide what type of program to choose. Yes, all this time I've thought about Public Health/Community Health Education. Unfortunately, I just don't know yet...nothing really excites me. I can't see myself really doing grad school. Right now I like making money and it is nice to have a break from the everyday stress of homework and all that. Plus, based on what I know from my senior year of college, graduate school will kill me with paper-writing.

My final decision, based on not yet making any decision about ANYTHING, is that I shall put off graduate school indefinitely, and wait until I feel a deep void in my life that could only be filled by higher education.

b. Performing. I wish I could be an actor. I wish I could be a public speaker. I love being in front of people. However, I don't think I really ever can or will do that. Boo. Henceforth I shall cease harboring any notions of fame in the entertainment and otherwise performing world.

c. Travel. Everyone knows the cliche American soul-searching backpacker. How awesome would that be, to take a whole year of life and just bum around, doing whatever, on other continents? The travel in my life is most likely going to be limited to just a couple continents, plus, when will I ever have enough money and willpower to just up and leave my whole life behind for a year? Come on, I already did AmeriCorps. Ha ha, I just realized that, that is fabulous. :)

Seriously though. I had been thinking this year about taking a trip to Europe. I was so homesick for Paris that I really thought about taking a long weekend to just jaunt over there and hang out. But really, Paris on my own, with nothing to do? Not sure if that would be cool. Obviously, Paris is always great, but maybe I should go somewhere new. I don't really feel any great pull towards any other great European city, and, remembering my Rome experience, I might get bored. Who wants to be bored in Rome?

Final decision: maybe take a long weekend in December to do something closer to home--I have no idea what--and save a big month long trip to Europe for next summer.

d. Work. Am I whoring myself out? Am I selling out for corporate America, that most evil capitalist empire? Pretty much. In my own silly defense, can I just reiterate for you all that money is cool?

No, really. I want to pay off my car, and it feels so good to not have to scrape by paycheck to paycheck. I am honestly living on my own for the first time in my life (yes, I know that shows just how sheltered I am, since I'm 23 years old), but even so, I am proud of myself. Having only one job, with standardized hours, for an extended period of time, still feels like a new thing for me. Sometimes it's a challenge because I feel bored or frustrated or overwhelmed by the notion that I am doing nothing to help greater humanity. But I try to buck up and always do the best that I can, and keep learning. So far I've been able to learn so much about the grown-up work world, and I think it will be very useful for whatever future I decide on. Assuming I decide on one.

My rational for all of this is to give it a year (from my permanent employment date of July 1). I figure that one year is a good time to test the waters of the whole demanding adult world, and that in this crazy market I may not even keep the job for that year. I look at it as a kind of experiment, proof to myself of my abilities, and that at the end of one year I will be allowed to evaluate my life (again, and for real). I have said to myself that after a year of working hard and trying my damndest to pay off my own car, I can go play and do something for me. Which leads me to my next and hopefully last piece.

e. Service, ie, Working for the Greater Good. What a difference a year makes! Once again, I shall briefly discuss how rewarding it was to know that whatever I did that day had some kind of positive, tangible effect on at least one person, if not an entire community. Yes, even something as mundane and boring as raking leaves. Somehow, chatting with people on the phone about their mortgages just doesn't quite live up, you know? Here are my thoughts. If, after a year, I decide that service is indeed that important, and I am financially stable enough, I shall devote another year to serving a community. Somewhere. Ooh, and I would love to move somewhere! What an adventure. Maybe I'll try for Team Leader in the Western or Southern Region of NCCC, maybe I'll try to work for a local AmeriCorps program in some different area, maybe I'll just go be a service bum. Who knows.

f. Spare time. I have way too much, and for the most part, I don't use it for anything remotely productive. So, beginning this weekend, I shall volunteer more/again. I'm thinking about taking a class at BCC or somewhere--maybe photography, maybe math or art history or something random. I am also in desperate need of expanding my social world. Is it me, or are the 20s a terrible time for social development? It's like everyone gets into a rut with their few friends and doesn't meet or hang out with too many new folks. I am totally guilty of that, but I love knowing lots of people in different capacities, so I got to get started getting out there.

Final decision: lots of talk about reinventing Julie's social sphere. But honestly, sitting around my own place reading all day long sounds pretty damn good, too.

Moral of this drawn-out piece of whatever: I think too much and do much too little. I hope that, probably in baby steps, I can change that.Thanks, y'all.

08/12/03: So seriously, this past weekend was all about the annoying people. I kept almost running into all these terrible drivers. Yucky. Another thing about the weekend that was only a little annoying/yucky, and ultimately "about damn time," was the cleaning of my bedroom and bathroom. It was the first real clean since we moved in over a month ago. I love that feeling of looking around and being able to see the great difference after a nice effort to make it all pretty.
Now it's Tuesday. I am not quite fully rested of late, so here's to hoping for some early bedtimes. Hurrah for no social life!

However, now with more time on my hands and more disposable income, I am finally getting started on the decorating "projects" I've been meaning to start. Plus, my dad brought over some extra furniture, so now there are a whole bunch of places for people to sit, plus a coffee table. And over the weekend I got a toaster. The table and toaster are very exciting updates for us. I finally got enlargements for all my beautiful travel pictures and I am going to put those up in an exhibit type thing. And we're going to put up calendar pictures (of Greece and of sunsets) and a world map on some of the living room walls Wish me luck completing it all. After that I want to stain our wood table and storage thing--fun with paintbrushes!

Oh! I know. I hereby, formally apologize and beg forgiveness from everyone I've ever had to spend extended time with for any whining/bitching/complaining/general moodiness I have ever done. I know it's not pretty and not nice and completely unpleasant, and I heartily thank everyone who still talkes to me. I will be better. :)

08/09/03: So. It has been a long, lonely, single week. I have worked a lot of overtime, so at least I can feel productive. By the end of the week, boy was I struggling. I had a serious case of the Friday fidgets most of yesterday. Got through it, though. I even "processed" a file this week (I put it in quotation marks because I sat and did whatever my colleague told me to do. In any case, it was sort of exciting). Picked up my new set of contacts, it only took two months to figure that all out. My knees got to twinging a little too much, about halfway through the week, and so I haven't been walking or working out. I do feel sluggish, but I like having more time to sit and read. I've been zipping through all kinds of books lately. Got to talk with several of my former teammates this week, that was great. Sometimes I can picture things from last year so perfectly in my head, and it just blows my mind that it's over. It's funny though, because I've been reading my journals from last year, and there were so many low times! It was a really tough experience and sometimes I wasn't sure I could make it. Now, though, it seems all rosy and pretty and friendly. I think it's a good thing to not stay bitter (or at least not about everything :). Plus, despite the fact that our team was not usually a cohesive whole last year, and I didn't know all of them perhaps as well as I should have, it now seems like we all belong to each other. We all want to know what happening with the others. It's a nice, family-ish feeling.
Today I cleaned and went out to town, running exciting errands to start decorating our empty-walled apartment. I was also fortunate to find all the world's most annoying people, in the Tukwila Kinko's. Who knew? Let's hope I have the energy to finish the effort. Good luck.

08/03/03: Today I watched an Italian film called Pane e Tulipani (Bread and Tulips). I loved it. I want to be that movie. There's something magical about foreign films, no extreme camera shots, the way the music is so different--no top 40 hits in the soundtrack; simpler sounds that convey more emotion or something--and I love how the actors in any foreign film are just everyday people. Other cultures clearly don't need to see gorgeous people in every role of every movie. It's wonderful.

08/01/03: So July is over now. It has been a real summer lately, warm and dry and restless. Work is crazy still, my patience is tried at least once a day with difficult phone calls, but we still have fun. I have money right now and I want to shop. I don't really know how or when or where, but I'm just in that mood to spend. This past week passed in a blur. Since Thursday was the end of the month, and usually it falls at the end of a week, it feels like today was a Monday. So I keep forgetting that now it's a weekend again. Somehow the weekend is pretty packed, without my doing. That is odd. Last Sunday, save for the brunch with Dan, I spent the day doing absolutely nothing. Watching television, movies, napping on the sofa, it felt wonderful. I didn't even work last weekend. So of course this weekend I need to buckle down and work a lot. I really should, and I will love the overtime. I'm just so...lazy and tired and boring. I don't really know what to do enough to actually do anything, if that makes sense.

I've been walking, and beginning to slowly get back into working out. I wish I could have more time for it but not spend any time doing it. I feel like I don't have time for doing anything, or doing nothing. I've been reading a lot, trying to stay away from the evil box, and trying to get more sleep. Haven't decided if it's working or not, though. In fact, it's only 9.30 right now, but I find myself kind of sleepy. I shall lie down and read now. Good night.

07/19/03: Late last week I decided to take a walk on my lunch hour. And then I decided to do it every day. Two days into it I discovered a creek and trail directly behind my office complex. It has been absolutely beautiful weather, what a wonderful summer. Even though the creek itself is small, cloudy and runs next to the sewage treatment plant, the greenery surrounding the water is literally a breath of fresh air. I have been amazed to find that during that 30 or 40 minutes, my mind just is free. Nothing is weighing on me, I don't feel stress about work or life or whatever, I'm just there in the moment, listening to whatever CD is in the walkman. (Norah Jones' record is fabulous, by the way.) Yesterday I had my best walk yet--it was all I could do to bring myself back inside, back to work. I just got in the groove, loving the sunshine on my shoulders, listening to Alanis, walking hard and fast like there was no tomorrow.

Yesterday I remembered the time I did a read-aloud for the team. It was at TrailBlazers, after I had started working on the library and going on reading binges. I read them The Giving Tree, because I always loved that book. I got to nearing the end, and I said, okay I have to stop because I'm going to start crying. The team laughed, but I said, no, I'm serious! as a couple tears escaped. Then someone else finished it up for me. There's some kind of deep statement there about friendships and teamwork. Or maybe I'm just too darn mushy. Ha.

07/09/03: So I've been official now for about a week, have email and voice mail all set up...very neat. Somehow, though, work got exponentially tougher; I have more piles, bigger piles, and I get all flustered more. The past week or so I've been sick, with my summertime strep/cold thing (made for an excellent holiday weekend, let me tell you), and of course my gravelly voice and coughing fits make phone calls a real treat. I'm doing my best not to take it all too personally, to not get caught up and over-stressed, although it's awfully frustrating to have such a messy desk. I just can't seem to get caught up and organized. But it's fine! Really, it will be fine. Yeah.

So. Welcome to Complacency Land. I am now the official Resident Couch Potato. I don't do anything. Since I bought the tv over the weekend (and got my mom's extra VCR--she's using mine back at her place), I have spent altogether WAY too many hours slumped in Stacey's leather chair, slack-jawed and spaced out in front of that evil box. Sigh.

In other news, I got an email through the AmeriCorps Association about the danger that AmeriCorps is facing in Congress right now. It makes me sick to think about what might happen...but I have put off doing anything about it. I actually started a letter to Email My Elected Representatives, but man...I am so bad at that kind of stuff. It feels to trite and cheesy to say "AmeriCorps changed my life, please do everything you can to keep it running so it can change more lives," but damn, it's the truth. I want to write something profound, provocative, memorable, something that will catch the attention of whatever poor aide has been assigned to read the messages from the masses. You know? More likely, however, I will ramble on, disparately, desparately, trying to get my point across in way too many words.

Speaking of words, I'm working my way through Made in America, by Bill Bryson, and it's freaking awesome. It's like a history of America with a linguistic eye. Truly fascinating. For instance, did you know "Idaho" is a made-up word? They needed a name for the state and someone thought it up to be sort of Indian-sounding. Very weird. And Abner Doubleday had absolutely nothing to do with baseball, that uber-American (but in reality, completely not) pastime. It's exactly the type of book I wish I could have researched or written. I love obscure facts about random stuff that everyone takes for granted.

Hm.

06/29/03: Well. It's been a week that Stacey and I have been in the new place. It's coming along nicely. We have the kitchen, with real groceries and implements, set up properly, and had a cable modem installed yesterday. My room is not exactly clean but most of the junk is in boxes in the gargantuan wall closet. We have a couple new lamps and small tables; next will be a sofa of some kind, proper coffee table, more lamps, and of course a television and VCR. I'm finding myself grateful that my expenses of late have been so minimal that I can afford to do all this.

The week has been very busy with work and stuff. I finished up my physical therapy prescription for the ol' knees...woo. At some point I fully intend to begin a slow return to regular workouts. Honestly, these weeks of nothing have really made a difference, and now the effort to get back into shape will be difficult all over again. Sigh. Not to whine, or anything. I know it's my fault. And that's my downfall, because for the most part I don't really care.

So yeah, the fifth installment of Harry Potter was excellent, as anticipated. I was really excited to get a copy on the day it came out in stores, and had to start reading as soon as I possibly could. Frankly, I'm disappointed it took a whole week to read it...but I have had very little free time this week. Another thing I fully intend to do is reread the previous four to remind myself of everything, then maybe read number five again. Stupid waiting a long time between new ones!! .... A couple weeks ago I went on a spree at the Bellevue library...I got seven books or something obscene like that. Rarr. I'm nearly done with the third of those. Yay books. A couple weeks ago I tried to start reading Schindler's List, but the writing/grammar was poor enough to distract me from the story. I guess that means I'll just have to watch the movie.

06/13/03: Ooh, Friday the Thirteenth...wait, it's past midnight, so it's over. Phew. The worst thing that happened to me was a headache and ongoing sleepiness.

I have gone shopping a lot lately, but at inexpensive places, so I have gotten lots of return on my effort. Oh, and it has been an effort.

It's been nearly two weeks that I've been out of commission, so to speak, because of knee pain. A week ago something twisted funny in my left knee and I could hardly walk for two days. Then, of course, the strain on my right knee from limping on it made that one hurt even more. I went to an orthopedist and was diagnosed with patellar tendonitis, for which I received prescriptions for anti-inflammatory and physical therapy (the other PT). During the last week and a half, the former has not relieved any pain or discomfort, and the latter has seemed to increase it. Hmm. Anyway, the rest definitely helps (I have been working out three to four times a week for three months now, and apparently it was tough on my li'l ol' joints), and the extra time is wonderful. Somehow I squander it though, so I still feel like I don't get anything done. Oh well. Unfortunately, the rest has also necessitated some of that aforementioned shopping...I gained about seven pounds in the first few days of not working out. What a week it was.

A week from today, Stacey and I will be able to officially move into our new apartment in Renton! I am totally unprepared...my stuff is once again scattered across several zip codes. Sigh, I must face the challenge of packing everything I own and at long last (attempting to, anyway) having it all in the same place with me. Actually, that's never happened before, so wish me luck. It will require quite a lot of effort and energy, not to mention boxes and packing tape. Dammit, more shopping. Ah, the shopping. There's so much I'll need, now that I'll actually be moving out on my own.