January 2004 Archives

i'm killing time while i do laundry. boredom brings out the meme-fiend in me. You have just won one million dollars: 1. Who do you call first? mom! 2. What is the first thing you buy for yourself? it's a toss-up. do i buy the digital slr camera so i can take pictures of the experience or just go ahead and buy that sexy mazda protege3 sport? i'll flip a coin. 3. What is the first thing you buy for someone else? i'd buy mom a condo. 4. Do you give any away? If yes, to whom? mom, dad, meghan, heather, jeremy (although, the latter three will probably get spoiled with stuff, rather than just cash), spca, disease charities (ms, diabetes, cancer). 5. Do you invest any? If so, how? half of it goes into investments to provide a lifetime income. that way i won't ever have to work again if i don't want to. i won't be living high on the hog, but i won't have housing/debt expenses, either.

i cut off most of my hair.

i'm sore in very strange places today. but it's a good sore, so i'm not complaining too much. i'm glad to know i'll be able to attend at least four more lunch-time pilates classes over the next two weeks. whee! strong abs! oh, and i joined weight watchers online today. there was a free 7-day trial and after seeing how well several women here at work and an online friend have done, i figured i would give it a shot. i chose the online version for a couple of reasons: 1. i think group meetings are hokey and embarrassing. 2. i like all the online gadgets. 3. it's cheaper than regular meetings and i'm poor. this will probably be the last time i mention this development here, unless i get really thin and i'm posting naked photos of myself all the time. i don't like to talk about trying to lose weight because i'm embarrassed when i fail. and, yeah, i'm really not interested in being interesting. go read some of those people i've got over on the left. they're much more entertaining than me.

monday night, i stay up doing homework. tuesday night, i stay up doing homework. wednesday night, i stay up late to go to class. thursday morning, i hate getting out of bed. dear gawd, i'm exhausted. you're reading the website of the girl who got 100% on her first assignment. too bad they're not really worth anything at all in this course, but that's a rant for another day. another pilates class today at lunch. my hamstrings are still sore from the first one. i've no idea why my hamstrings of all body parts are sore, but they are. yeah. they are. what are you looking at? so what if my hamstrings are sore, huh? what are YOU going to DO about it? c'mon, punk. show me what you've got. c'mon! let's rumble! ahem, sorry. i warned you i was tired.

i'm oddly disappointed that i haven't received any emails containing the mydoom virus. well, okay, i did get eight or so in my work email yesterday, but that gets everything. my personal mail is a little more exclusive. i guess this means that my friends are all very smart and not opening infected missives. yay smart friends! but still there's a part of me which could be in on the fun. pilates was fun yesterday. my hamstrings, of all body parts, are the sore bits today. good thing there's another class tomorrow so i can work it some more. i'm trying desperately to not get too confident about school. homework seemed almost too easy this week. it's tough trying to finish a second assignment when you haven't seen how they graded the first. you have no idea how the teacher marks things, what their idiosyncracies are. i guess i'll find out tonight! birthday sushi and cake today. oh, by the way, remind me never to buy chewy chocolate chip & marshmallow granola bars ever again.

taking a pilates class at lunch. finished three out of four homework parts. love my shoes, not so fond of my socks. got viruses at work. think it's wednesday. need more sleep. pretty good hair day. planning minnesota. waiting for more documents. want to file taxes now. need more coffee.

joe lieberman is spamming my referral logs. i find that amusing after spending far too much time watching cnbc's new hampshire primary ramp-up yesterday. i don't understand a lot about the electoral process in the states, it all seems way too funky to me, but it does make for some interesting alternatives to soap opera watching. my uninformed canadian guide to the u.s. democratic candidates: howard dean - you know, i liked that he got all emotional and showed some passion in iowa. c'mon, aren't you tired of all these boring, grey, one-dimensional politicians who are too afraid of alienating any potential votes to do anything even remotely real? good for you, howie. nice forearms, by the way. wesley clark - okay, at first glance i really didn't like him. he looked too pasty and wimpy to be a serious contender. after listening to him on meet the press yesterday, i'm glad to report i was wrong. although, he is one of those boring, grey, slick-talking politicians, he's got some good plans. it's too bad about that general thing, though. john kerry - in all fairness, i haven't heard much from the man himself, but, uh... jfk? are you sure you want to go by that? and what's with everyone saying he looks french? i've always pictured the french as much more attractive than the honourable senator from massachusetts. sorry, john. john edwards - haven't heard a damn thing. are you sure he's real? joe lieberman - stop spamming my referral logs! grr.

this is mostly just to archive really bad poetry i found while cleaning up. proceed at your own risk. i'm so embarrassed.

so far, while cleaning out the closet & dresser i've found: - 1993 reveal joystick (it even has suction cups on the bottom to keep it in place during really active game play) - 2x reveal cd-rom - the instructions for King's Quest VI - t-shirts from almost every place on this list - trojan condoms, size large, with an expiry date of march 2004 (i better use 'em up. hah!) - sony walkman, classic yellow - plastic combat boots bought on ebay - two bandanas circa 1987

so, i went out to buy tea and i came home with new shoes. really, how can one resist soft leather uppers with chunky soles for only $39.92? the only correct answer is "one cannot". if you answered anything else, you are sadly delusional and your medication must be increased in order for you to cease posing a danger to yourself and others. my Big Plan™ for the weekend is to spend saturday out looking for an apartment. i'm going to put on my new shoes, charge up the cell phone and wander around the area i want to live in and phone every apartment building i like the look of which has a for rent sign in front. i'm freakishly motivated to get this show on the road and i'm not going to let myself succumb to my normal procrastination. i may have fluked out in finding my current place in the paper, but i don't think that's the best way to find a place to live anymore. i'm excited, but a little daunted by the process. last time (the first time, really), i was living with my dad, so there was no having to give notice and once i got the apartment i could move at any time once it was vacant. now it's this stressful race to find a place before the end of the month so that i can give notice and then there's the stress of trying to move out and clean all on one day when there's someone chomping at the bit to move in on your heels. if i find a place this weekend (cross your fingers) that's available the first of february, i'm just going to go ahead and take it. that way i can give a full month's notice and have four whole weeks to move things as i feel like it. it may cost me double the rent, but i figure it's a small price to pay for less stress.

blah, blah, meme, meme. blame mikey and the thrill of unexpected new shoes.

gah. i was going to make some pithy soundbite about the return of my sense of humour indicating the return of my health, but it seems that my sense of prose is still absent. i just can't string together any interesting words. shall we blame it on the lack of sleep? okay, sounds good to me.

on the mend, but the begging of the universe for two more hours of sleep is getting to be a habit in the morning. you'd think there would be some sort of allowance for tardiness the morning after school when you're recovering from a flu-like illness. i think i'll treat myself and only work a half day tomorrow. i'm boring. move along, douglas.

well, okay, maybe jim didn't really give me his cold. that's kind of hard to do when you've never actually shared the same breathing space as someone. but, he was the snotty one last week, and we do spend a lot of time on icq together. i thought it was a good try. it's actually more likely that i got it from meghan, but she doesn't have a site for me to link to (yet). i'm back at work for the mean time. if it wasn't for some web stuff that Must Be Done by friday, i'd still be in bed. i'm a little less snotty and a lot less headachy today, but i can't keep a body temperature for more than five minutes. hot. cold. hot. cold. although, i may have spoken too soon. i thoroughly expect the noise and expected conversation to bring out the worst in my symptoms by lunch time. i think i'll put up a sign on my desk that says: SICK AND CRANKY. APPROACH AT OWN RISK. i'm not even kidding about that. there's not a lot else to say, really. i wanted to tell you about the screaming grocery store child, but then i realized the cashier ripped me off by $1.80 and the screaming suddenly seemed warranted. i also wanted to wax poetic about my search for an apartment where i can put the bed i need so desperately, but there's very little progress on that front. i haven't even figured out how much more i can afford to pay in rent, so that makes serious looking kind of difficult. all i really want to do is buy that camera and take pictures. i guess that means i better buy a lottery ticket this week. $25million could buy a lot of free time. don't forget, valentines if you want 'em. just email your address to bemyvalentine@fubsy.net. and, to answer a common question: no, i'm not a stalker. sheesh, you people are a suspicious lot.

jim gave me his cold. i'm dying.

my mother, of all people, sent me an email last night to tell me about a story she saw on the cbc yesterday about a type of photography based upon meditation and the relinquishing of one's preconceptions about the world called miksang photography. in the story, the photographer who is educating people in the art of miksang, which is the tibetan word for "good eye", said that, as a classically trained, technical photographer, if he had seen his miksang photographs he would have thought they were interesting, but that they broke all the traditional rules of composition. he confessed that he probably wouldn't have understood them on many levels. the story struck a chord with me in two distinct aspects. the first made me realize that i do a lot of photographing and then thinking later. most of the photos i love best are the ones i just made, without judgement of whether they were technically perfect. i don't often follow any the rule of thirds and i've been known to deliberately chop the heads of people. the second, was to realize that many times my photos are not understood by people. specifically when i do something unusual, like chop the heads off the bride and groom. watching the clip, seeing his photographs, learning more about the exercises he teaches his students to let go and just see the world, compounded by my recent desire for a new camera and seeing the movie the photographer have made me realize, and remember, that one of the things i love to do, more than anything else, is make photographs. i've been taking pictures all my life. i may not remember everything i used to know about f-stops, apertures and depth of field, nor may i ever be famous or even considered adequate by anyone other than a small few, but i love taking pictures. it may actually be that one thing that i love to do, that i could learn to do very well. just imagine!

i may have skipped last year, but i did it the year before. so, 2004 brings the return of the happy heather valentine send-off! if you would like to receive a valentine from me, heather, the girl who writes and posts photos here, please email your postal mailing address to me at bemyvalentine@fubsy.net. let's make the quasi-official cut off date for request friday, february 6th. that should give me enough time to get the stragglers in the mail before the big, red day. don't hesitate, there's more than enough of me to go around. ;)

let the procrastination begin! i really meant to start the homework last night, but i came home to all the dishes i didn't do tuesday or wednesday and, well, you know how freaky i get if i let my apartment gets too out of control. so, i did the dishes, ate some soup (and i didn't enjoy it one little bit), made burrito filling for lunch today, did those dishes, knitted while watching angel (can you believe my scarf is taller than i am now and i'm *still* not finished?), re-made a cd for hugo to replace the one i messed up, tried to make a cd for marie only to discover that nero can totally suck ass sometimes, started to feel really sleepy so i went to bed only to be kept awake for another forty-five minutes or so by the evil upstairs neighbour bitch's goddamn awful music. so, i laid there, menstrual cramps keeping me in a fetal position, muttering under my breath: "fucking whore. fucking whore. fucking whore." i can't wait until i move. you really have no idea. today is all about the cramps and the wanting to be somewhere else. while driving to work, i was overwhelmed with morgan memories and a sinking feeling in my chest that i'd never find anyone who was so enamoured with me ever agan. then i realized that i don't give myself much of a chance to meet anyone who might be that enamoured of me. they're not going to just show up at my door and they're not going to happily go along with my blowing off dates because of my apathy and fear. it sounds like i'm obsessing, but i'm not. i've just been trying to work my way through the last couple of male-female encounters i've had in hopes of seeing where things didn't work out how they might have. they did stuff which bugged me and i did stuff which bugged them. maybe if i can figure out what went wrong, i can hope to avoid repeating my mistakes in future, if i ever go outside and find someone to be enamoured of me ever again, that is.

there's something wrong with my left breast. it feels like my nipple is about to pop off and the creature from alien is going to burst forth into the world. yes, boys and girls, hormones are more fun than a sackful of angry weasels! my prediction: this semester is going to kick my ass. the instructor and teaching assistant both seem very knowledgable, personable and helpful, which is good. the amount of work there is to be done is overwhelming. again, 65% of the final grade is based on exams. we even had a pre-test for the instructor to get a "feeling" for each student's knowledge/understanding. i think i did okay. considering i haven't even thought about C in seven weeks, i don't believe i broke my algorithm too badly. the best part, and the bit which just might save my sanity this term, is that shane (not cute guy from class shane who came over and i kissed & stuff with -- shane from php & xml who is really good at logical problem solving) is in this class with me! i was sitting there, looking at all the people i recognized from last term, futzing about on the computer and i heard this soft "hi heather" from my left. i looked up, saw shane and i just beamed. that was one of the worst things about last term, not having anyone to talk to. shane made a point about the instructor (who he'd had last year) overwhelming the class with his big voice and lively manner. it made a lot of sense. already, i've talked to more people in this class than i did in last semester's entirety. things are looking up! now if we could only do something about those exams. by the way, in case you're new to the program or haven't quite gotten around to it, i'll remind you all that my site (and pretty much everything else) looks so much better if you have your fonts set to cleartype. of course, this only applies if you're using windows xp. if you're on a mac, things already look great and if you're using *nix, well, you'll have to ask jeremy how to make that shit pretty. because i'm such a helpful soul, i'll even give you the directions again: things might look a little fuzzy for the first couple of hours, but once you get used to it, you'll wonder why you didn't switch sooner! trust me.

sometimes your hormones take over and make you do things you'd not normally do. like bake chocolate chip cookies in the middle of january. like dream that you have a new kitten and your hastily tossed from a moving vehicle cigarette starts a forest fire you're too busy to put out. like decide that a certain blog boy is the best person for me to have an unrequited crush on for 2004. like seriously consider a two-thousand dollar investment in a new camera. that being said, the cookies turned out wonderfully, i didn't wake with a numb arm this morning, the blog boy is just a happy fantasy and i'm much better off spending that two grand on a new bed in the new apartment i'm bound and determined to move into this year. so much so that i've already started the thining of the possessions in preparation of packing. now if only i could fight the "moving panic" i feel every time i see an ad for a suitably-priced apartment in the paper. tonight ends my seven-week educational sabbatical. yup, back to classes on the dreaded wednesday nights. tonight also marks the downslope of my certification requirements. this course is number six of ten and means i'm officially more done than undone. i feel smarter already!

my best friend found my weblog. when i found out i scrambled through the last month or so of archives to see if i'd written anything incriminating. i might even have sworn. actually, i'm quite sure i swore. i told another best, albeit online, friend about this trauma. he asked me what the problem was. he also said that to have real relationships with people you have to be willing to be open about everything. i hate it when he's right. now my best friend reads my weblog. she even comments (hi MLP!) here. she told me that she loves being able to read about my daily life and likes the pictures i post, especially the ones of her cats, i assume. the other day, she asked me if i was upset about her knowing about my "other life" as she put it. i never quite got to answer her properly. i wanted to explain to her that yes, i'd had a little bit of a panic when it first happened, but that now i'm used to it and, yes, even like it. i'm proud of a small majority of what i publish here. i've spent a lot of time over the years making this place and it's been sometimes frustrating not being able to talk about a really clever post or showing her an awesome photo or talk about all the people who come and comment. now, i don't have to withhold anything from her. it's been kind of liberating. of course, now she'll know what a dirty, angry, mean, cranky, poly-syllabic, snobby, whiny, pedantic, boring, horrible person i really am... but i have faith. there's a bunch of you out there that know all that already and, for some ungodly reason, still love me just the same. just don't tell my mother the URL, okay?

you really should try eating a handful or two of honey roasted peanuts before bed. if my erotic, sensual, vivid beyond reason dreams were a result, i highly recommend it. this dream, yeah, it was so tactile. it wasn't overly sexual, but there was a lot of touching and flirting with a fellow blogger. the only thing i didn't enjoy about it was that it's brought some longing to be touching and touched in that manner just when i'd convinced myself that it was the last thing i needed, especially from a stinky boy. oh well. the weekend was productive in a way. dinner with my daddy on friday. knitting, chili-making and card-playing on saturday. housecleaning, hockey and shopping on sunday. i don't feel like i got very much accomplished, but i did manage to go through my closets, make a big pot of soup and take the trash out. that's pretty good, right? unfortunately, i didn't even take my camera out of my purse, so i doubt there will be pictures this week. it's hard when it gets dark so early and i'm stuck inside all day and my camera takes shitty shots in low light. but i'll see what i can do.

before anything else, the entire world needs to know that my friend heather turns THIRTY today. yippee! i can't wait until all my friends are in their thirties with me. happiest birthday, eop. i love you! in other-people-related news, the second half of the gift-sending from the too-generous-by-far mkh was waiting for me at the post office yesterday. inside the lovely amazon box was monty python and the holy grail AND and now for something completely different. bad, bad, naughty zoot! that man is single-handedly responsible for fleshing out both my book and video collections quite nicely over the years. thank you, kevin. you're much too good to me. now, about me. um. i'm having dinner with my daddy tonight. i'm making chili tomorrow. i've found a home for my old vacuum. i'm almost finished my current book. i've been really enjoying sleeping well the past few nights. i dreamt about kittens. at this moment, i'm happy i'm single. i'm out of photos and need to make some more. i'm not especially looking forward to the start of school on wednesday. i'm boring.

there's very little to say, so you should just pet the kitty. he likes that.

my morning commute: walk to bus stop, nearly falling on my ass several times. miss bus by two minutes. stand in rain waiting for next bus to arrive in thirty minutes. realize waiting for next bus will make me forty-five minutes late. look at almost-clear main roads. walk back home, nearly falling on my ass several times and saying hello to dapper man with the nice umbrella. get in car. drive to work. nearly die. walk across slurpy, slushy parking lot, soaking sneakers and socks. just because you all care, i'll advise you that i had a much better sleep last night. i'm attributing it to all the fresh air (read: gasping for) i got yesterday. methinks i might get the same benefit from all my morning trudging. at least i hope so. of course, in a sick and twisted turn of events, i find my legs all antsy to be moving. sitting here at my desk is just not cutting it. they want to walk. this isn't a real problem other than the fact my brain absolutely hates walking without purpose. if i have a definitive destination, i can walk much longer than if i'm just walking for the sake of exercise. to this end, i need to find destinations to walk to. we'll see how that goes. heh.

it's snowing in the pacific northwest today and, true to form, it's all we want to talk about. i was going to go in search of proper snowboots last night, but i realized that was a stupid thing to do unless i wanted to pay twice the price for half the selection. i can wear my sneakers and deal with wet feet for the rest of this season. then, come spring, i shall invest in a skookum pair of sorels or somesuch über-boot. something that will last me many unpredictable lower mainland winters. the far-too-generous mkh of hidden city fame made a box du amazon appear on my doorstep yesterday in which was snuggled a copy of the elegant universe: superstrings, hidden dimensions and the search for the ultimate theory, which is probably the most beautifully jacketed book i have seen in years. it's so beautiful, i'm almost afraid to start reading it for fear i may marr it. almost afraid. there's too much in there i'm aching to learn to not. you know, for telling people not to get me gifts this holiday season, i sure have gotten a lot of presents. i wonder if this'll work again next year... okay, you know what? i'm going to start charging people who come over to my desk to look out the window a the snow. a dollar a view or five bucks for an all-day pass. it's totally distracting! not that i'm doing all that much other than staring out the window myself, but they're forcing me to make small talk my their presence. i hate making small talk. grr.

maybe i should have resolved to sleep better, too. so far, january has been the month of crappy sleep. i realize it's only the fifth day of the month and it's probably too early to condemn the entire month to this sentence, but four nights with a complete lack of proper slumber is four nights too many if you ask me. especially if you ask me. i love sleeping. sleeping is a haven, a refuge, from all the toils of reality. i love my pillows and my über-blankie. curling up with them is like being enveloped by a dear old friend/lover/protector. i feel warm and safe and content. but not lately. lately, getting into bed has been frustrating and uncomfortable and just plain disappointing. wow, i just realized that's not unlike sex with... but i'm digressing. i lay myself down and arrange the blanket just so and then i wait. i toss. i turn. eventually, i drift off into something that is technically sleep, but can you really call waking up every hour, excessive movement to get comfortable and vibrant dreams sleep? i think not. sleep is supposed to be this dark, warm, soft, comforting place you slowly sink into as your mind quietly throttles down in the darkness of your room. sleep is not supposed to be exercise for either your body or your brain. sleep is not supposed to leave you pleading with the gods for the alarm to be wrong and there be two more hours until you have to get up. sleep is not supposed to leave you more tired when the sun rises in the morning than you were the night before. maybe i just need a new bed.

ay carumba! not a very auspicious start to the blogging year, is it? let's just chalk it up to being far too busy taking care of things in the physical world in preparation of a brand new year full of band new experiences. my new year started off the way i mean it to continue, including all the cleaning, tidying and purging i've been doing for the last two days. i just wish it would stop being so fucking cold and snowy. resolutions? year in review? seems they're both in heavy rotation around the interweb this week. does anyone really care what i thought about 2003 or what i mean to change in 2004? too bad, i'm telling you regardless. twenty-oh-three was a crazy year for this girl. found a boy, lost a boy, found a boy, lost a boy, found a boy, lost a boy, possibly found a boy. i suppose that means i can't say i'm yucky and nobody will ever want me anymore. i spent a lot of time doing (or worrying about doing) homework, and officially registered for accreditation once i'm finished with all the homework in, um, eighteen months time. i took a plane ride for the first time in three or so years. saw family members i haven't seen in as many as twenty-five years. broke a heart. had my heart broken. started a savings account. started buying dvds. started carrying a purse. finally succumbed to windows xp. broke my vow to never own a cell phone. discovered i look good in brown. all in all, it was a pretty good year for me. i know it's been really shitty for a lot of folks around, but, honestly, i think it's been one of the better ones. historically, i tend to do better in odd-numbered years. here's to hoping i break that trend for this twelve-month coming up. for twenty-oh-four, i'm resolving to eat to live, not live to eat, walk more, take more photographs and be less shy about people seeing me take photographs, spend more time with people i like to spend time with, go outside more, stop goofing off at work, procrastinate less, stop worrying about what i did and care more about what i'm doing, talk to my parents every two weeks, get a haircut, get a one bedroom apartment, watch less tv, learn to increase/decrease stitches, floss every day and remember to say "thank you" more often. i've also made a list of fifty-two movies i want to see this year, the goal being to see one of them every week and hopefully post a short review of each of them here. i'm not sure how that'll work, but here's to positive thinking!