Milestone

Well, here it is. For those of you that haven’t been counting, which I assume is all of you, this is my 100th posting. Woo! Who knew I could have that much to say? Ok, that might be all of you for that one. Anyway, I thought about maybe having something special for this occasion. How does nothing special sound? Cause that’s what I’ve got.

Actually, I am getting ready to leave town for a long weekend, which I am very excited about, so tonight begins the packing ritual. I’m sure I’ll have fun stuff to write about when I get back. I miss traveling a lot now that I don’t really do it for work any more.

Other news this week has to do with family. My brother-in-law is in town this week working at a corporate event for an international cosmetics company. I’ve been able to squeeze in some face time when he wasn’t busy putting out last minute fires. The really cool thing is being able to waltz right in to the large arena at the hotel without having anyone stop me or ask me what I was doing. It’s been fun. Chances are I wouldn’t be able to do that if some celebrity was there, but it’s cool going behind the scenes anyway.

Steve and I are continuing to experience scheduling conflicts. At this point, we have given up on the remainder of this month and are looking toward May. It’s discouraging, but not totally insurmountable. Phone calls and text messages have to do for now. Now for a profound observation: dating someone you don’t get to see is lonelier than dating no one. At least if you are alone, what you’re missing doesn’t have a face or personality associated to it. Knowing what you’re missing makes it worse. It’s odd to me that I would forget something as simple as that, but it’s been a while. Ah well, time will tell the tale on this one.

Coming up next is Keane on Mother’s Day weekend. Heidi had something come up, so she’s out. That means I have an extra ticket. I know all of you probably want to go with me. Looks like I may be on my own for this show. No big deal. It keeps the dream alive that Tom and I are going to meet up and then I would just have to ditch you anyway. Right now the band has been touring South America and they have been keeping the fan site updated with blogs of their own.

I have also been working on one of my yearly projects for my sister and brother-in-law. Each year they host a scavenger hunt for their friends. I provide the music. I put together a CD with songs they have to identify with song, artist, and other random bits of trivia. I have done this for a couple of years and I love it. I love making it as hard and annoying as I can. Last year I did popular songs covered by other artists. To get full credit they had to name the original artist, the covering artist, as well as the song title. I was struggling with a theme for this year. I had thought about using songs that sample other songs in them, but I didn’t have much of a list for that. Inspiration struck this week and the CD is done.

I don’t think anyone that is playing is reading this, but you never know. I don’t think it is going to hurt if I tell what the theme is for this year. I decided to go with songs that have repetitive lyrics. I mean really repetitive lyrics. These are the songs you will leap across furniture and small children just to get to the radio to change the station so the song doesn’t get stuck in your head. Naturally, I’ve also made sure they are going to have to listen to each song more than once. If they aren’t counting, then they are listening for an answer to a trivia question. I also made sure that they couldn’t cheat by looking up the song lyrics online. Most sites I found don’t go the distance when it comes to putting in repeating lyrics.

The downside of course is that in order to get the correct answers to the questions, I had to go through the same painful process I am making them go through. Then after I burned the CD I had to listen to it again to make sure it didn’t skip anywhere. It is going to be a long time before I listen to any of those songs again. Still, it will be fun to get the feedback from the players on how much they hated it. Makes it all worth it in the end.

That’s it for now. I’ll check back in next week with an update on this concert weekend.

Saturday Chores

Here it is another Saturday. The cleaning bug has hit and I’m trying to go with it. My latest project is boxing stuff up for Goodwill. Dishes, glasses, VHS movies that I have replaced with DVDs, CDs I will never listen to, and so forth. I just want all this stuff out of here. I think part of this cleansing ritual is because it’s spring, and that’s what you are supposed to do, and part of it is because I don’t want to move extra stuff when I finally leave this place.

When I moved here, I ended up taking a lot of crap with me which I later got rid of after I paid to have it hauled across the country. I’d like to avoid that this time around if I can. I have been online looking at some different places and I know I need to get in touch with a realtor pretty soon before I get stuck here another 6 months or longer. My friends here have been great about making recommendations for friends and or family in the business, so I don’t really know why I seem to be dragging my feet. Maybe it’s the daunting task of packing up my whole life again, even if it is only to move a few blocks away.

One thing I also want to avoid is being surrounded by boxes of my stuff while I try to live around them. Part of that is unavoidable toward the end, but I just can’t let it go on like I did before I moved here. The last place I lived before making the big move was a townhouse that I really hated. I thought of it as temporary housing rather than an actually living space and I never unpacked the boxes for the 8 months I stayed there until I moved. It was awful.

Still, I suppose I have a good start on the packing process at this point. My winter stuff is already packed away, and that’s saying something. My multitasking goes into overdrive and I want to do too many things at once. As I am packing I am also trying to separate out stuff I don’t want to keep. It always seems that my spring cleaning efforts mean I spend weeks living in what looks like the aftermath of a hurricane. The fact that I have to work surrounded by it makes me a little antsy too. It would be different if I had an office to escape to for a bit so I wouldn’t be forced to see my “in progress” disaster every time I ventured outside my home office.

It also means more packing supplies. I need to go get more tape, probably some additional boxes, and I now should start keeping all the annoying flyers I get in the mail so I can use them to put in the boxes. Then there are the itemized lists to Goodwill for my taxes and hauling that stuff across town. I know I sound cranky about it all, but that’s just because I am at the beginning of this task rather than the end. Once I get more involved, it won’t be so bad.

I am actually supposed to be working today. I got roped in to some extra work that needed to get done before Monday. I worked late last night to get my part of it done, and now I am just waiting for it to be reviewed before I can finally call it finished. So, since I had to be online anyway, it seemed like a good time to give an update. I look at the blog every day and I ask myself if I have anything worth writing about. Granted, my packing habits aren’t exactly riveting material, but compared to the last week of work, TV, and sleep, it was the best I could do.

No real update on Steve either. He was sick last week, so no golf. I haven’t seen him in a couple of weeks. I finally called him this week to see how he was feeling and he has been working a lot of extra hours. He keeps joking with me that he is just going to pop over one night after work. I keep failing to see the humor in it. Popovers are never a good idea for me. I think everyone appreciates a little notice before someone drops in on your personal space.

Hmm. Well, nothing going on with work still, so let me wrap this up so I can back to my cleaning. I got a fun postcard in the mail today from ThreeL. It was a postcard picture of Cary Grant. I love it! I love him. I have a bunch of pictures of him that I want to have framed. But, framing is expensive, so it remains near the bottom of a very long list of things I would like to do. Anyway, it was very sweet of her to send it and it is definitely going into the collage.

And finally, to get myself into my cleaning mood, I have to have the right music. So here is short sampling of songs I like to hear while cleaning. In my mind, the cheesier the better!

1. The Time Warp- The Rocky Horror Picture Show soundtrack
2. I think I love You- The Partridge Family
3. Crazy Train- Ozzy Osbourne
4. Walking on Sunshine- Katrina and the Waves
5. Flawless- George Michael
6. She Bangs- Ricky Martin
7. Astronaut- Duran Duran
8. Dead Man’s Party- Oingo Boingo
9. You’re In Love- Ratt
10. Brand new Lover- Dead or Alive

Recess

So today feels a bit like a vacation. One of the sites at work is going through some repairs. Since it’s one that I need, I suddenly feel as if I have been sent out to recess for a while. It’s a nice post-Easter treat for me. Naturally, my mind is swirling with all the possibilities I could be taking advantage of right now. At the moment, it’s working on this entry. Of course, I am also waiting for iTunes to come up on my other laptop so I can grab more music and update Peanut (my shuffle) with some new tunes.

I haven’t done a Top 5 list in a while, so here are my top5 things to do while I’m waiting for work to start up again.

1. Update iTunes (thanks April for the reminder on Jim Reeves, I downloaded it today!!)
2. Pay my taxes. BOO!!!!
3. Organize my paperwork (I see file folders and my 3-hole punch in my near future)
4. Drop off my dry cleaning
5. Make hotel arrangements for my LA trip
   

I got an update today on my concert tickets for my upcoming Keane concert. Kind of a drag the way they do things for the Greek Theatre. When I bought the tickets, they don’t automatically give you the seat information. I don’t know how they do it, but today I got an update on where my seats are. Don’t get me wrong, they are good seats, but I am not up front which is irritating. Ah well, I’m sure it won’t matter at all once I’m there. At least this way, I won’t have to pick a fight with some little girl and her boyfriend trying to get in front of me. And Heidi can relax about me wanting to get there several hours early to stand in line. No need now.

Speaking of concerts, I am also excited about going to see Crowded House in a few weeks. I think the last time I saw them was somewhere in the early 90’s. How fun to go and see them again. Plus, I get to see a good friend and spend the weekend in a fun location. I do find that I miss my travel days a bit. It’s nice to plan these little weekend getaways, especially since I don’t have to bring my laptop.

What else can I tell you about? Hmm. Well, this past weekend was another birthday party. It was fun. I met this really interesting couple: Magic and Phil. Yeah, I swear her given name is Magic. And I thought mine was annoying with all the weird stuff people ask me. Anyway, this couple was really fun. They were covered in tattoos and apparently love the 80’s Big Hair bands and spend a lot of time going to see them and hang out with them. Forget “Where are they now?” these two had the scoop on everyone. Needless to say, I spent a lot of time with them talking about Motley Crue, Ratt, Van Halen, and pretty much anyone else I could think of to ask them. They are super nice people and apparently Phil is a drummer in a band. So maybe I’ll get the chance to go and see him play. Steve had something come up and ended up not coming to the party, so no new scoop there.

Ok, well I’d better get started on my list.

Speaking of Lions...

So this entry is going to be a collection of random thoughts. It may not be pretty, but do you want an update or not?

Ok, so first let’s get you all caught up on the birthday party circuit. Last weekend I went to another birthday party for one of the girls at the spa. She was turning 26. And if that didn’t make me feel old then the fact that we didn’t even start the party until 10:30 really made me feel old. I had to take a nap during the day just so I would be awake.

We went to the New York, New York casino to an Irish pub there called Nine Fine Irishmen. I’d been there once before and it left me feeling a bit claustrophobic. Turns out they have a patio outside. Yay! So we ended up moving out there and it was awesome. It was a nice night and we could actually have a conversation rather than try to yell over the band that was playing.

So, I know what you’re waiting for, you want the details about Steve. Yeah, yeah, I’m getting to that. Steve and I went to the party together. At this point, I think we were both thinking it was probably a date and yet reluctant to be the first to label it as such. Some drinks later and over omelets at around 3 am, we decided to go ahead and call it what it was. Again, Yay! We had a really nice time. Since I don’t want to go all “schmoopy” on you people, that’s all you get for now. I will say that we are going to yet another birthday party this weekend and once again we are going together. So, another party and then another update. All good things to those who wait, right?

In other news, I had to send the “I’m fed up” email to a few people at work. I have a coworker who is getting ready to leave the company and he has a bad case of “short-timers” disease. I’ve had it. I escalated my email to a couple of key people and we’ll see what happens. It will probably turn out to be nothing more than a venting exercise on my part, but I needed to get it out of my system.

Alright, I have one more “schmoopy” moment and then I’m done for tonight. The title of the blog for today is in reference to Steve’s birthday. Somehow I have managed to find another Leo. I must be a magnet for them. And, an obscure bit of news which may only make sense to my family: at the Irish pub, the band started to play a Kingston Trio song. I can’t remember which one now, but it might have been MTA. Anyway, I made a comment that it was the Kingston Trio, to which Steve replied “Yeah, I know them.” I told him about the song that always reminds me of Dad (Scotch and Soda) and he replied “Yeah, that’s a great song.” Speechless, I was. One last time….YAY!!!!!