WHERE

[pre-meme disclaimer: in light of the past several days of gloom and despair and utter misery, i selected this meme, randomly stolen from some random chick's blog that i'd clicked thru about three other blogs to find, to lighten the mood. or at least change the subject.]

is your cell phone? my purse. probably on silent. at least i know where it is now, tho...

is your significant other? sitting right next to me on the sofa. studying greek. being very stressed out. and boring.

is your hair? what's left of it is on my head :) still liking the haircut....

is your mother? presumably in the town where she lives. probably stalking me at this very moment. tee hee, hi mom

is your father? probably at home. or maybe china...

is one of your favorite things? homemade pasta!

was your dream last night? no idea

can you get your favorite drink? anywhere with running water

are you right now? at the house, on the sofa

is your ex? STILL living at home. this is perhaps wildly indicative of why we broke up.

is your fear? umm...where is my fear? in nature, i guess...

do you want to be in 6 years? ireland. with a kid or two. holy crap.

were you last night? same place i am every night, pinky... the sofa, working and/or "working"

was the last place you drove? haha i can't even remember, but it was probably work-related

did you grow up? charlotte, nc

was the last place you ate? sofa...no access to the table right now. long miserable story.

is (are) your TV(s)? in the living room. there's an unplugged one in the guest room too.

are your pets? probably sleeping in his crate. cute little antisocial guy...

is your computer? on my lap. on the sofa.

is your mood? sleepy...and excited but nervous about my new project at work ...wait, where is my mood? grumpyville i guess...

is your oldest friend? phila

is your car? outside

is your wedding ring? on its finger!

is your favorite store? probably at the mall.

is your favorite place to be in the summer? in the air conditioning

was the last place you laughed? also on my sofa. oh lord i have no life.

was the last place you cried? RIGHT HERE ON MY SOFA

are five places you go on the internet on a regular basis? gmail, msn, blogger (duh), etsy, and my workplace's website

no dreamz is good dreamz

In keeping with the slumber-ish posts of late, I hereby present to you, dear reader, Last Night's Dream Report.

No dreams that I can remember. Slept through the night. Might, in fact, STILL be sleeping, thank you very much Benadryl.

I did have a hard time getting to sleep cus I was in a drug-induced scared haze...I guess I was scared I'd dream about tornadoes all night again. So I made Brian assure me that we are safe and that I could bring Eli, and that we'd hide in the bathroom, blah blah blah. That helped, apparently.

When I have nightmares, they tend to involve natural disasters or hiding out from Big Brother. And the biggest scariest thing in them is having to save Eli, over and over and over. This little tiny dog infiltrates every bad dream I have and causes all kinds of imaginary terror and heartache. Burning houses, submerged cars, excessive gunfire... I don't know what I would do if something happened such that I had to decide that I couldn't/shouldn't try to save him. I have a feeling I'd get pretty reckless to try to rescue him from anything... the goal is to prevent that decision from ever having to be made.

Are there any pet owners out there who deal with the same thing? Do you ever wonder what you would do in various disastrous situations? If your house is on fire and you have to get out immediately because of the danger, but your dog is in its crate in the back room, would you go try to get it, or would you keep away for your own safety? (Me, I would wrap up in the nearest wool blanket and charge in there, nothing to stop me. Am I crazy?)

tornadoes and other emergencies

I had nightmares...really active, strong, terrible nightmares all night. They involved tornadoes and lots of being scared, seeing dead people, running for my life...getting yelled at because I wasn't running fast enough....

I would wake up, calm down, and go back to sleep, only to go back to the chaos, only things would be even worse. More destruction, more tornadoes, more panic. More time running for my life. All night long.

Apparently I turned my alarm off sometime between 645 and 715, and went back to sleep. That was a rock solid sleep that I didn't come out of until 8am. Sidenote, I had to be downtown at 8:30 for CPR/first aid certification. No worries, we got it done. My husband's a rock star.

And, in weird news, apparently Virginia had a bunch of tornadoes last night. My mother-in-law called this morning to check on us cus she'd heard it on the news.

For those of you wondering, I am now certified in CPR and First Aid. Thank you, American Red Cross. There is now a real chance that I might not panic in an emergency situation. Excellent.

no rest for this weary one

I. have not slept. more than 3 hours. the past 3 days.

list of ailments:
- running droning headache.
- extreme lethargy. i feel like i'm underwater.
- no memory retention whatsoever. this leads to thousands of 'helpful reminder notes' that aren't so helpful when in droves.
- reduced productivity. this leads to EVEN MORE WORK TO DO.
- extreme annoyance at everything. and everyone. especially me.

why do i stare at the ceiling? i'm not anxious about money anymore, and those days were gone for a whole month! why do i wake up 6 times through the night? there are no noises...there is no distracting light...i am no longer buried under a thousand blankets...

the house is a mess. my to-do list is getting longer by the second. i have to read and re-read things way too many times. i am about twenty steps behind. and i can't stop yawning.

tonite, the benadryl shall be MINE.


also, happy birthday mom!

maybe i can sleeeeeeep

Today is Friday! And it's been super-quiet so far, almost no phone calls. Fantastic.

We're all really tired at work. And apparenty I'm a slacker because I don't stay up til 2 or 3 or 4am to get my work done? Maybe not. Part of the reason I'm not completley overworked right now is because I haven't been here long enough to have enormous projects pile up. I've got plenty to do...but I still get some sleep.

Where is the line between work ethic - getting it done, whatever it takes, doing it well and right and on time - and not having a healthy work/life balance?

To me, staying up all hours doesn't seem like a good balance. But then again, I'm a part of Generation Me (I think) and we don't really have a very good perception of what it means to be dedicated, loyal, hard-working, etc.

Extenuating circumstances, big projects, someone's sick and we've got to pull together .... I dig the overtime in that. But when I get paid, am I getting paid so that work is my priority? Should work trump everything?

In my mind, no, it shouldn't. To me, it's God, family, my health, then work. I don't think it's ok to ditch my husband so that I can finish a report or a project or a spreadsheet as soon as possible. I don't want to work much more than the standard 40 hours a week. I would get so pissed if Brian had to stop spending as much time with me because of work, on a regular basis.

Like I said, right now I'm ok because a lot of what I do at home is small scale stuff - searching through the shared drive, reading all kinds of things, doing some brainstorming. Nothing I can't work into a normal after-work life without getting behind.

I like my job, a lot. I love the people I work with. But I love my husband, and myself, more, and I fully intend on not ever letting work compromise my health or my relationships. Is that bad?

my computer ate my blog work

Just noticed that yesterday's entry isn't up. I think it got lost in the weird time warp internet lapse bumgle.

I have always had impeccable timing.


ETA: It's up now.

manic tuesday

I had a particularly long weekend and looooong Monday. And I learned a few disturbing things.

1. My husband and I, as a 2-person family, make somewhere between 60 and 70% of the area median income. This means we're poor. Not super poor, but definitely kinda poor. But apparently we're getting a good deal on rent, for our income (though not so much on the utilities. HELLO $2000 in unexpected heating bills, Winter of 2007! HELLO space heater and heated blankets, Winter of 2008!)

2. I am obese. As determined by the standards of 'average.' I maintain that I have bigger, heavier bones than average (runs in the family, seriously) so my target weight is higher than the average person of my height, so technically I might just be overweight. Imagine how disheartening it was to be me as a teenager when my first boyfriend tried to pick me up when he hugged me...and he couldn't, because I looked like I weight about 125 but actually weighed about 140. IT RUNS IN THE FAMILY.

3. I am high maintenance. At least a little bit. Apparently I'm worse when I'm stressed out...which is NOW. Knowledge is half the battle, and I think I've been a little better this week about shutting up and dealing.

4. I am self-absorbed and also a letdown. According to a particular family member (who by the way has reduced me to tears on multiple occassions already this year). He/she wants me to do something that work is preventing me from being available to do. I can't help it. The short notice isn't exactly working in my favor either. This is deserving of a big guilt trip and then stone cold silence, apparently. When people do/say/expect ridiculous things it's easy to brush it off. When it's the people you are forever bound to, come hell or high water, who cast you aside and blame YOU for being the problem, it's a little tougher not to ball up and cry for days.