Dog Heaven

Well, we picked up the keys to the new place this morning. The rooms in the house itself are smaller than we thought, but the floorplan is great and the garage/laundry room is ideal for my soaping needs.

The best part of the whole thing, though, is the yard. The wonderful yard. The front yard has this huge amazing beautiful tree:

Best part?

Dozens of squirrels live in the trees. As far as the Bander-Boo is concerned, this is winning the canine lottery. He was the happiest he's been since we loaded up the car a week ago.

I love the climate here, even rainy and foggy like it's been. We'll see how the summer goes, of course, but so far I'm really feeling good about things. This has been a long roll of the dice, but I think we did well. Change was upon us no matter what we did, so there was nothing to do but embrace it.

We'll see how we feel once hurricane season arrives.....

I think I may have run out of Zen.

I was being all calm and stress-free and stuff, when things took a sudden turn and I started having to hack my way through a briar patch of stupidity.

So that I don’t give too much detail, here are a few notes to the guilty parties.

And if you decide that the shuttle is going to start waiting an extra ten minutes for late trains, I should find out some way OTHER than hearing two drivers gossip. I wouldn’t have noticed that, had I not been wondering why we were so effin’ late.

Of course, you don’t want it to impact you in any way except for the warm fuzzy feeling. However, I am taking public transportation, which is run by morons (see above), and glaring at me as I rush in the door from the bus stop will not make it any earlier. It’s only a two block walk; I promise I’m not stopping off to go shopping or anything on the way in. And since I ran part of the way, I am only three minutes late, so you should GET A GRIP.

And I warn you now, if you increase my interest rates on my credit card, I’m going to stop using it. I’m also going to move my money market account, wee though it may be, to elsewhere. Now you don’t have my interest income AND your cash reserves have gone down. I wonder if anyone there can do math? I suspect that the answer is NO, and therein lies your problem. I look forward to your demise.

However, I must mention your cupcakes. They are hella cute, I have to admit. I know you got a big book all about cupcake decorating, and you put a lot of effort into them. It really shows. You have them decorated like flowers, with little red M&M’s that you’ve drawn on with frosting so they look like ladybugs. They are adorable, and it must have taken hours.

I wish you’d stop bringing them into the office and hovering to make sure that everyone is eating one, though. Or, alternatively, that you would put even one quarter the effort into learning how to bake, because your damn cupcakes taste like Spackle with frosting on top. If I have to choke down one more of these vile lumps I’m going to lose it. I am all out of polite, so back off and take your adorable crapcakes with you.

It’s not even lunch time.

This is going to be a long day.

Which Road?

I ran across an interesting article today – Weekday Misery, Weekend Pleasure,
in a blog called The Simple Dollar. It’s an interesting read, and ties in with some other stuff I’ve been seeing about people who are using the recession as a time to reinvent themselves.

I find this dangerously enticing.

Many of us out there – heck, most of us, I’m sure – have things that we do to pay the bills that are less than pleasant. This is because things that more fun than a barrel of monkeys get done for free or next to nothing, and you’re unlikely to get big bucks for it. However, that doesn’t mean that you need to spend your life doing something that’s sucking the life out of you, draining your soul bit by bit.

The first step to take is glaringly obvious, especially in the current economy. Which bills are you paying, and can you get rid of them? Is there something you can do without, if it means doing without that job you hate? In my case, getting rid of the day job would get rid of a horrible commute – several hundred dollars and at least four hours a day, gone! That’s a pretty big incentive.

Then there’s this part – what do you DO all day?

Do you shuffle paper?









Do you dye poodles pink to match their owner’s handbags?









Do you save lives?









Do you file the serial numbers off mysteriously acquired valuable property?





Do you scrape gum off the underside of restaurant tables?








Do you write fortunes for a cookie company?






And when you do whatever it is that you do – how do you FEEL at the end of the day?

I’ve had a job that included gum-scraping, and whoo did it SUCK. And at the end of the day I felt dirty and abused. I’m not sure what school one attends to become a poodle stylist or an author of cookies, but doesn’t it sound like a wonderful idea; to re-invent yourself?

I know the economy is a mess, but what better time to decide what you’re going to be when you grow up? I mean, I know we all decided once, but look how that turned out. It seems reasonable to get a do-over.

When I was VERY young I was convinced that I would grow up to be Aquaman. While I could probably buy the spiffy waterproof hero suit, and gender reassignment surgery has come a long way, I don’t have any idea how to have gills installed. So I’m going to assume that Aquaman is out as a career option.

I suppose I could become an underwater welder, but that just isn’t the same, somehow. I wonder if this is where the whole Seamonkey obsession started?

Anyway – point, and I do have one, is that when you come out of this period of vast national upheaval, do you want to be on the same path? Or would you like to travel a different road? I’m going to be doing some heavy thinking.

I bet a lot of you are, too.

Stress Fractures

I don’t know if anyone else has noticed this lately, but people are stressed out right now. I don’t think I’ve had a phone call in the past week that wasn’t an argument, someone hoping to get something they weren’t entitled to, or to get out of something they’d committed to.

There’s one gentleman who calls me at work, at least once a week, to complain about a real estate transaction that took place in 1974. Nothing I’ve said (“Dude, I don’t know what happened, I was in sixth grade at the time”) has convinced him that his calls are misplaced. I’ve gotten phone calls asking me for money I don’t have, to pay debts that I don’t owe. I get honked at every time I’m in the crosswalk, because although I have the little green “walk” guy telling me to go, I seem to be preventing some douchebag in a Beemer from running a red light.

All in all, there are a lot more riders on the crazy train lately.

As much as the crazy was starting to rub off, I decided I wasn’t going to rent it head space. Just because I’m dealing with lunatics doesn’t mean I have to be one, ya know?

So.

Here are some ways to keep from taking somebody else’s problems home with you, and ways to decompress after those encounters. I can’t take full credit for these ideas – they come from a super-cool blog called Zen Habits (http://zenhabits.net/).

First of all, you have to be Teflon. If somebody has an incorrect idea, or a desperate need to lay blame, that doesn’t mean you have to accept it. You don’t need to fight or argue, because that drags you down, but you don’t need to passively carry their problems around with you, either. Let it roll off and drift away. Someone else’s feelings of resentment, anger, sadness, or fear all have one thing in common. They belong to someone else.

Mind you, I’m not saying you shouldn’t care about people. Absolutely you should! And of course, you have responsibility for your actions. But you don’t have to be the owner of every crazy idea that gets tossed your way. Kids automatically know this – I’m rubber, and you’re glue.

Next, try disconnecting for a while. If the office is where things are tough, carry your lunch outside and relax under a tree while you munch. Or take a short walk to get away. Heck, lock yourself in the ladies room if you have to, but get some time to stop and breathe without being hounded. The negative stuff is in a forum or chat room? Close that browser window! Distressing phone calls? I know this is heresy, but ----- turn off the cell phone. Shut off the Crackberry. Very few of us on earth are so important that we need to be available at every minute of every day. If you’re not the Pope or the leader of a world power, we can get by without you for ten minutes.

And you know, without me even mentioning it, that I think a hot bath is a great hiding and destressing place. Get into a hot tub, with your favorite soap or bath bombs or loofah or what have you, and do absolutely nothing until you’re all pruney and relaxed.

Get some unconditional love. Pet a dog, or skritch a cat. They don’t care what you weigh, or what your credit score is, or whether your mother said you were a failure. My dog loves me even when I have horrible bed head and morning breath – it just doesn’t matter to him. Even a cranky, early-morning not-awake mama is aces in his book. Fur therapy works wonders!

And be good to yourself and the people around you. Things are tough all over.

PS – As soon as I finished writing this, I realized that I could do something nice for you guys, and that would help make my little corner of the world nicer, too. So if you’re ordering anything from me for the next ten days, just say “blog post” in your comments to me, and I’ll give you a free bar of soap, your choice of scents. You can use this on my website or on Etsy. Just promise you’ll use it to relax and unwind.