Flippy - I Rant, You Read
Saturday, December 18, 2010
the wee hours
What’s Worse Than Waking Up With a Black Eye?
Waking up with a flat tire. And, a forecast of rain all week. Oh, and running out of toilet paper. The black eye was a surprise because I tripped over the cords next to the bed a week or so ago and hit my head on the little mobile desk where I put my laptop, my iPod, and my new little Dell Axim PDA (that doesn’t work as a PDA - all its functions are shut off, except for the clinical trial diary that only allows me to click yes or no and send), so I figured the black eye wouldn’t show up. It’s funny, because I always worry about one of the dogs tripping on the cords and yanking my laptop off the desk and breaking it. Instead, I did it, but because I was so worried about not tripping and falling on the dogs or breaking my laptop, my forehead took the biggest blow. Better me than the laptop. When I woke up this morning, my eye was red and swollen halfway shut. I thought it was allergies or pink eye or something, but the swelling went down right away, but my eyelid stayed purple. It was like magenta eyeshadow. My forehead has a nice little lump, but it was so far above my eye that I had no idea that I’d get a black eye from it. Er, a purple eye. My forehead doesn’t even really hurt much anymore - I figured a black eye would show up when the original injury still hurt.
The tire that I had to fill up a week or two ago in the freezing freezing night air apparently decided that it had had enough. It just went completely flat. I got to figure out how to get the teeny spare out from under the car, get the jack out of its cute little hiding place, then use up all the energy and strength I had to get the lug nuts off the flat. It’s time they invented a better way of putting a tire on a car. I was just barely strong enough to get the lug nuts off, and if they’d been even a tiny smidgen tighter, I would’ve had to ask one of the manly neighbors for help. I shouldn’t have to ask for help when changing a tire. There should be some little lock that when undone, makes the lug nuts fly off the wheel. Okay, not fly off, but come off easily. I’m going to be sore for at least a week from just changing one tire, and it’s just a temporary fix since it’s one of those crappy little half tires. Fun. Oh yeah, and I had to rush to change the tire in between bursts of rain. I miss my AAA membership. I miss having decent tires more though, I guess.
The silver lining in all this is…at least I have my pain meds back, so my tire changing pain will be kept to a dull roar. No, wait, the silver lining was that I was able to change the tire without any help from anyone. Sure, I’m going to pay for it physically, but psychologically, it was nice to be able to do it. I think I’ve only changed (or attempted to change) one tire before and I had a AAA membership, so when I couldn’t get all the lug nuts off, the nice man with the tow truck did it for me. I like knowing that I can do it, if I have to, but I’d rather watch someone else change my tires…especially when it’s cold and damp outside.
Now, to get some sleep, because the toilet paper isn’t going to buy itself. You know one thing I miss about Vegas? Grocery stores that deliver. That was handy. Also, stores within a block of the house, which was also handy. If I had car problems in Vegas, I could walk to the store easily. Here, not only isn’t here any public transportation (there wasn’t near the house in Vegas either), but there’s nothing within walking distance. The closest “convenience” store is 3.5 miles away, and if I’m going that far, I may as well go the 5 miles to Walmart or Smith’s and pay a quarter of the price. I know that 5 miles doesn’t seem all that far away, but when you’re used to less than half a mile to a grocery store, 7-Eleven, Walgreen’s, a gas station, two Starbucks, etc., 5 miles seems kind of far. Then again, I sure do like the peace and quiet here w/ the twinkling stars in the night sky. That’s worth a five mile drive, to not have to hear sirens and traffic all day, every day. We’ve heard sirens exactly once since we moved here. Once! And the people across the street with the ten yapping dogs…they moved. Yay! So, quiet replaces convenience. Okay. Now, if the tires could stop going flat…
Sunday, November 28, 2010
evening
Insomnia
Make it go away. I’ve learned that sleeping is a very important life function. If you don’t sleep, it messes up your brain and your body, and you feel awful. I’ve always been able to sleep whenever I wanted. If I wanted to take a nap, I could just lay down and snooze. Now, it takes me hours and hours and hours of actively working at it, just to get a few hours of sleep. It’s soooooo frustrating. Nothing over the counter works - not Benadryl, not night-time sleepy meds, nothing. Arrrggghhh. Although, I’ve gotten lots of middle of the night movie watching in. Just finished watching “Ae Fond Kiss”, about a British Pakistani Muslim guy dating a non-Pakistani woman. Oh, the Muslim family drama, because he’s supposed to marry his, ICK!, cousin. The guy is really cute. The woman is from the cute romantic comedy, “Imagine Me and You”, with Piper Perabo, Lena Headey, and Matthew Goode. I loved that movie. I’ve always loved the Turtles song, “Happy Together”, so it was nice to have it be the theme song of the movie. So, I now have three official recommendations for you - “Ae Fond Kiss”, “Imagine Me and You”, and “Inception”. The first two are on dvd now and “Inception” will be out in a week or so. You know what would be nice, though, if I could sleep AND enjoy movies. I don’t want to pick between them.
Saturday, November 27, 2010
terribly early in the morning
Ow, my toof…ick, the weather
At first, the broken tooth didn’t hurt much. But, I think the more I eat with that big hole in my tooth, the more gunk gets into the hole and makes Flippy say, “Ow!” Hopefully, I can get some of that temporary filling stuff soon. Maybe that can put off the expensive dentist, um, forever. That said, the weather here has been very, very, very, very cold. It got down to 14F yesterday on the patio (so the yard must be like 10) and it’s working on that for today - my last check in the kitchen said 17F, but this isn’t our coldest part of the day yet. The weather in the house is variable, depending on what room you’re in. The teeny bedroom that we’re in (10x10) w/ the door closed and three dogs breathing heavily, plus one or more cats and sometimes with the door shut, gets to 80. (The cats currently have the master bedroom - that will change someday, but it works for us right now) The hallway is 75, the kitchen right now is 63. You can go from shorts to sweatshirt weather in just a few steps. The non-insulated garden window doesn’t help much with the kitchen temp. I’m hoping that after this week, we can have some more moderate temps outside, like we’re supposed to have. Updated - no, we’re not going to get a break from the cold temps. Damn. This makes me very sad.
I still don’t know what I did to the calendar.
Friday, November 26, 2010
the wee hours
Dammit!
While cleaning out spam from my pending comments, I was trying to also figure out why I wasn’t getting email notifications of comments like I used to, so I changed a few settings here and there. NONE of them said “Do you want your calendar to disappear?” My calendar is now gone. I didn’t touch anything that mentioned the word “calendar”, so it’s gonna take me a bit of time to figure this one out. I didn’t touch my template either, so I couldn’t have deleted the calendar. Damn, I hate nitpicky tech stuff like this. I’ve never been the kind of computer geek that likes to tinker with computers or files or anything that requires reading directions. I’m more internet geeky, although I may not even qualify for that anymore. Calendar, please come back. I miss you. All is forgiven.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
early evening
Thanksgiving
Things I’m grateful for this year: Leigh-Ann, my parents, various family members (1.5 siblings, nieces, nephews, great-nieces & great-nephew, cousins, Auntie Edith, Leigh-Ann’s family); a roof over my head; cold AND hot water; 88 cent meals that actually taste good; ramen; Dyphenhydramine; Ibuprofen; Red Hots; Good ‘n Plenty; Smith’s cake slices; “Chuck”; books; “Raising Hope”; “Outsourced”; “Inception”; “Imagine Me and You”; the soon return of SYTYCD; a new love of DWTS (I <3 Jennifer Grey); tv in general; tap water that tastes good (Vegas water tastes like crap, but our well water tastes like…water); SuperZoo!!!; The Animal House in Pahrump; really awesome friends; social media that has helped me find long-lost friends, teammates, and classmates; the ability to type better than when I took typing in high school; a really awesome childhood that makes adulthood bumps in the road easier to accept; tweezers w/ handles; unintentional weight loss that gives me more pairs of pants to wear; recently found ear warmers from The North Face (must've been a long ago freebie); nice neighbors; the ability to see stars, planets and galaxies from the new house, earbuds that fit inside my ears (I hate Apple earbuds - can't even use them, they hurt so much), my iTouch, El Monterey burritos; good customer svc from Boulder Canyon Kettle Chips; Hunt4Freebies.com; the invention of instant coffee that tastes good; Starbucks Earl Grey Tea Lattes; Wal-Mart grape drink powder; celebs who actually tweet regularly and informally; and that's it for now.
