Day 2. October 14, 2009

Look at me. Blogging for the second day in a row. I’m proud of myself for this.

Lately I have regained some focus at my job. For the longest time, I have been struggling to make it through the day. I assume it is true boredom. It has been over 9 years since I have started at the company I work for. At least 6 years doing most of the tasks I do. Of course I am bored. Ravelry at work doesn’t help either because I just look at project after project and desperately wish I was at home knitting. I have finally learned not to stay logged into Ravelry all day and be tempted.

The regaining of focus I think stems from finally committing to the not getting involved and staying above all of the hate and bitter. It is difficult being involved in that for so long. Co workers want to chat about it all the time. I try to change the subject but it always comes back around. I am worried that my commitment to this may change since we have a staff meeting tomorrow and the consensus is that it will not be a happy,  pleasant or tolerable one. 

I am now attempting to come up with ideas on how to maintain my newfound attitude. Knitting will not be allowed during this meeting at all, although it would benefit not just me.  I think I just need to walk in with my attitude firm and let snideness roll right off, remembering that this job is not my life and does not define me. My hobbies, my family, my friends, my loves and passions define who I am, not being a pretend accountant amongst a bunch of bitter angry people.  I think the best way is to have a sense of humor about the insanity of what goes on in the office. When I relate some stories, it always seems worse at the time but is actually really funny how people act and are extremely predictable.

If anyone has any ideas on how to maintain a positive attitude, how to let remarks roll off of you etc please let me know. It would be wonderful to get some perspective on this.

After work tomorrow, I plan on checking out my house and maybe getting some pictures. I decided recently that I need to get more pictures to remind me of life and times and places and living in the moment. Maybe I will join a 365 project or just start tomorrow instead of making plans to start something and just do it. 

This has been another blah blah blah entry. Must be more interesting.

Current Listening: silence and the ringing of my ears

For reals this time… October 13, 2009

So it’s been a while…like two months. I am finally going to start keeping up and keeping this blog as a real life journal like it’s supposed to be.

I turned 29 the other day and feel mostly fine about it. In my 28th year, I quit drinking alcohol and caffeine. There are several times a week/month where I feel the need to splurge on one or both but I am too crazy to give in because that means I lose. So, alcohol free for almost a year and caffeine free for almost 8 months. Also, it has been 4 months since my last mental breakdown. Meds seem to be working and I am mostly putting one foot in front of the other. Some days are better than others. I seem to be becoming more well adjusted in public and have made a couple of day road trips. Hopefully this time next year, most of my anxiety will be banished and I will have a hard time calling myself the girl that never goes out.

The most exciting/stressful thing lately is that I have bought a house. It’s being built and will be ready in January. I am completely bent out of shape and stressed and feel this intense pressure all the time about it until I walk through the partially framed house alone and I feel at peace and very happy. I have a feeling once it is completely framed that I will be spending quality time there alone on Sundays during the building process (kinda like on Scrubs when JD hangs out on his empty lot on the porch). Some light packing has occurred around my apartment which is nice too. There is still a long way to go and so much I want to do. My sister is going to help me pick out colors for the rooms and such.

One of the major things I am jazzed about is knowing that 30 years ago it wouldn’t have been possible for me to buy a home as a single woman and just be me on the title. It is extremely satisfying. Although there were/are times during the process (at least 6 weeks of looking at houses) where I wish I did have a partner to lean on when it got to be too much. I have an amazing realtor so the process hasn’t been too bad.

My goal is still to hopefully get a new job by the time I am 30. I am not happy with my job but I am lucky to have a seemingly stable job and with a mortgage payment coming soon I need it. The plan may have to be put off. But finally after 9 years, I have finally learned to be above all the hate and bitter and anger that seems to flood all around. My department is all women so it seems worse. I hate when women tear other women or keep them down to make themselves look better to male superiors. I don’t get it and refuse to participate.

Do I have any goals for the last year of my 20s? I think it is a safe bet not to set any and see what happens. Hopefully my mental health will progress and things will fall favorably. Although I am hoping most of my posts will not be so introspective and blah blah blah. I hope to document funny and interesting stuff too. I am also going to start blogging more on the three other blogs I have going with my friend Daniella Marie. The links should be on the side, Mouthy Maries, Socks Debunked and Indie As. I have a post going up tomorrow on Indie As about what song I cannot stop in my head.

Current Listening: NPR Live Concert-Jason Lytle

I’m Alone. That’s Okay. July 20, 2009

I am now 4 down on the big 1001 albums before I die project, 997 to go. I scribbled notes about everything under the moon while listening to those 4 records. I will hopefully get them in a coherent order and blog about it. After all the scribbling of the notes, I was mentally spent. It was like I opened my head and shook out all of my thoughts, which was fairly good.

What I figured out early on was that there are so many things I have always wanted to learn and know and research about music in general and the role it plays in our lives, I am especially interested in the gender politics in music, of fans and artists. I hope it will make an interesting read for the two people that read my blog and maybe make some sort of step towards school and maybe researching this topic in depth.

Meanwhile, my yarn stash has gotten a bit more out of control since the last time I attempted the stashbust. So I have gotten way more serious about it and am trying to crank out easy, quick projects. My favorite so far is my Malabrigo Morrissey button hat (thanks Dani for the pic! I take horrible pictures).

I made another one like it and will attach my peppermint White Stripes button. When I get pics of the other stuff I have made in the last week, I will post and probably create a separate page for all of it since I am journaling what I am knitting while listening to the 1001 albums of doom.

Current Listening: Elliott Smith (It’s gloomy outside and I am gloomy on the inside. Thanks last night’s dream. That was cool of you.)

A Plan July 19, 2009

I have a plan. I have loved music so much since I was a young child and me and my dad would watch MTV. Last year I got the insane idea that I would go album by album through the book 1001 Records You Must Hear Before You Die. I listened to a couple I already had (see repost below) and kind of got too intimidated by it. I AM GOING TO COMMIT TO DOING THIS IN THE SHORTEST AMOUNT OF TIME POSSIBLE. I have been in a rut lately music wise. I listen but haven’t really felt much and it’s upsetting. The one record this year that I absolutely adore above any other is the Dead Weather’s “Horehound.” It kicked the cobwebs out of the part of my brain that hearts the music and shook it alive. I want to figure out why I love the music I love and discover some music I may have missed out on.

The way I am going to slowly walk into the water (instead of jumping off the high diving board) is by going backwards, starting with the 2000s. I have plenty of the albums listed but am missing quite a few too. It will give me a chance to revisit some of those albums and find the reasons why I love them/hate them/nothing them.

I am going to let the experiment begin and detail it between here and probably Indie As. Plus it will give me something to really focus on while I am knitting mindless projects with stash yarn. More on that later since I actually am starting to make progress.

First album up on the EXPERIMENT: The White Stripes “Get Behind Me Satan”

New Page/Leaf/Start Over June 25, 2009

Okay. I haven’t been posting and have had a hard time coming up with things to say. Now that I have two joint blogs with Daniella Marie Indie As F*** (music blog) and Mouthy Maries (feminist rant blog) I can just focus on my knitting projects and overall “gracefully stumbling towards 30″ here.

I saw Wilco last Friday night at the new Joint here in Las Vegas and it was amazing. It really made me quite happy and inspired to try to live life again. It is really cool what a good rock show can do for me. All I can say is that if Jeff Tweedy says clap, you best clap.

That’s all for now. More tomorrow for sure.

Current Listening: Wilco “I am Trying to Break Your Heart”

Knitting for good, Not evil. February 24, 2009

Post title says it all. The Mouthy Maries (me and Daniella Marie) have decided that we need to take some time and work from our stash and knit for charity. Since Friday, I have so far made 6 baby hats and the beginnings of a baby blanket (I had a solid 16 hours at the yarn store on Friday and Saturday hanging out with Dani) that we are going to donate to our local foster care center and women’s shelters.  I plan to make a redonk amount of hats (not just baby), scarves and blankets.

The project will do the following things for me: a) keep me off the street and spending money I do not have, b)bust my stash, c) keep me entertained with quickie projects and other long term projects, d) gives me a real excuse to knit constantly instead of doing housework, laundry and other boring stuff and the biggest plus is that it helps out a few organizations that are close to my heart and don’t get nearly enough donations and funding.

Baby Hats Pattern I found via Ravelry: Preemie Hats for Charity

Baby Blanket Pattern (knit in the round=awesome) I found via Ravelry: Round or Pinwheel Baby Blanket

Destashed so far for this project:
2 skeins of Bernat Soy Natural Blends (5 baby hats)
.40 skein of Vanna’s Choice Baby (1 baby hat)
and much much more yarn to go!

If I was an internets wizard, I would get some sort of progress bar for my blog. (hmmm something to look into)

Current Listening: The Long Blondes-Someone to Drive You Home

In my own sick way… February 17, 2009

My favorite song in the world is “There is a Light that Never Goes Out” by The Smiths. There is no doubt about it and if I never heard another song ever, I would be happy. It is the song I stole my alias from and it is the song I cry to when I see Morrissey perform it live. The first time I saw him sing it live was the week my grandfather died. It was such a long, hard week and I had tickets to see Morrissey two nights in a row. When he sang that song as an encore, I couldn’t move except to wipe the tears from my eyes.

It is a happy song for me and always can turn a day around even just for those 4ish minutes. It is a dark song about dying next to someone in a car accident and being ecstatic about it.  Morrissey’s vocals get me every time. The best part is when he sings “to die by your side” with such joy and energy. It punches me in the heart and makes my wrists hurt.  The song is perfection and I don’t care if this entry makes any sense. I just had to babble and it’s still Morrissey day.

Are we ready to rant and rave? February 17, 2009

Morrissey day is upon us again. The new record “Years of Refusal” is out and I will be picking it up on my lunch break. For some reason, I haven’t been too excited about it. Maybe because there is no tour coming to Vegas in the immediate future? I am getting older and have bigger priorities than my Morrissey fandom? Maybe it’s such a one sided relationship that I just have finally put distance? Did the last batch of fans I encountered kill it for me?

I will be thinking about that while I listen to the record today and probably blog all about it tonight.

Anyway, Happy Morrissey Day. Listen to some good music (not necessarily Morrissey or the Smiths) but something that puts a smile on your face and your heart burst with happiness. I believe that’s what music is about: to make you feel something.

I can always be found. February 13, 2009

The week is finally over. Every work week seems to get longer and longer. Anyway, I have no plans this weekend so this weekend I am going to disappear from the world and do some reorganizing and thinking. The only exception is my robot’s 6th birthday party at the rollerskating rink where me and her mom will be trying out our best late 80s/early 90s rollerskating moves and no doubt fall on our asses (more than once).

My apartment is completely out of control. I feel if I can finally get it and the yarn stash under control, my life will follow? At least I hope so. I think I am going to go through all of my yarn ball by ball and determine it’s project. I have a feeling a lot of it will be used for charity projects and I will want to do those NOW. Also I need to go through the closets and see if there is more stuff I can trade online or sell and do that too. Spring Cleaning is going to rule. I just need more storage ideas for stuff. Also it will be an awesome excuse to listen to a ton of music I haven’t heard in a while or have a Henry Rollins spoken word marathon. I haven’t decided yet.

Current Listening: Liars-”The Other Side of Mt. Heart Attack”

January=Lesson in Terror; February=Awesome. February 3, 2009

Yesterday was an excellent day. For the past six weeks, I have been stressed to the bone about the growths on my thyroid that was found on my MRI on my spine from my car accident in August. 2008 was a terrible year that included a redonk amount of visits to doctors, specialists and the physical therapy offices. I was hoping 2009 would not be a repeat. Long story short, the growths aren’t cancer and I was hoping to sleep better last night (didn’t but there is hope). Anyway, I have projects and such to babble about…

I foolishly joined the 100 day SAL group on Ravelry, to make as many socks I can out of my stash in the first 100 days of President Obama’s term (wow. that still feels really good to think and type and say). I have so far finished one pair of socks in Fibernatura’s Yummy and half way through a pair using Noro’s Kureyon sock yarn.

Since I am totally obsessed about stashbusting the sock yarn, I finally got around to making the first of the Endpaper Mitts using Brown Knit Picks Palette and bestie Dyed by Danido “Modern Romance” wool sock yarn. I think it’s beautiful and need to make the sister mitt as soon as I finish those Noro socks.

So between knitting like crazy and watching everything on my dvr before I return it and cancel cable (to save money boo) and ranting and raving on Mouthy Maries with Dani and working, I am pretty occupied. I did manage to finally get through “A Dull Roar” by Henry Rollins. It was good but I need to be in a certain headspace when reading his journals because it always does a number on my head. More on that later.

To recap: no wammies, knitting from sock yarn stash and keeping busy. Also since I have not really played tetris in the past few weeks, I now suck again.

Current Listening: Jeff Buckley “You & I”