The raindrops as they're falling tell a story looks like it might (maybe) rain tonight. But... by the time it does, it will probably be dark, and running + rain + dark + scary construction = not allowed. Which is a shame... I've been threatening to go running for like, two and a half weeks or something. Eventually, I'll do it...
Anyway. In other Deedee News... I got a new (used) car. A 2003 Suzuki Areio. It's awesome. There might eventually be pictures, but yeah... haven't been so good on getting pictures online lately (hence the not having corset pictures up yet. The exist.. they just aren't on the intarweb).
Sickness, school, car, archives, and other ranodm stuff. Blah. Still sick. Sitting in my office at school, freezing, wearing a shirt, a sweater that is like, 11 sizes to big for me, and eating Chicken & Stars soup. And I'm fixin to take more Tussin.
But at least I'm at school today, which is better than yesterday. And I'll be in school tomorrow, and at work, barring any weird relapse thingy.
My neck hurts. Like, it hurts to hold my head erect while moving. Or in a car. Or on the train. Or sitting in class. Didn't dawn on me until I was in the car this morning that it was probably whiplash. blah.
My archives are no longer broken. just in case you wondered.
And I have absolutely no concentration left to work on stuff today... So I'm basically killing time in between seminars. Which is, you know, great.
Down with the sickness... Oh yes. I am down with the sickness. And the NyQuil. And the Tussin. It is awesome (and by awesome, I mean it really sucks, and I missed work, class, and karate tonday).
But in other news, yay for toher people's insurance companies renting me a car for the next... week or so. My car isn't dead or anything... but it's missing a couple of pieces. And it totally wasn't my fault. But they might total out my car anyway. Which would be the suck, since I can't afford to buy a new one right now. (Long and short, I was rearended this morning... after the sickness, but before the NyQuil and Tussin).
And I should so never blog while on drugs. I blame Em.
I'm in love with my mobility... But I'm not in love with my car. *sigh*. My car is old and busted, and long past the point of repairing it... so I'm stuck with an oil leack until I can buy another (January, methinks). So if you hear of a cheap car for sale... point me in that direction. The requirementas are as follows:
It has to be low maintanece. Not like me :-)
It probably should be low mileage. See #1.
It has to have a driver-accessible cup holder that will easily hold a 24 oz bottle. Two cupholders is a bonus.
It has to have a cigarette lighter port that isn't blocked by the ashtray, so I can actually use the damn thing.
It has to be a manual. I'm serious. No automatics.
If it happened to be sleek and sexy, or cute, or would make me look hot, that would be an added bonus
Yeah. In other news, I rode the Metro rail for the first time evar today. Yay for public transportation! (Not that it goes to my house.... but I had a ride into downtown, and the rail stops right next to Rice). This may become a much more regular occurence. Which is awesome. Somehow, carpooling and then riding the Metro makes me fell like a "city girl". Which is funny, as I've never really been a city girl.
PS... 10 cool points (would have used blog points, but those were taken) to whoever can name the song that my last three post titles (excluding the RenFest one) came from. I predict David will be the only one to guess it... but I know that at least one more person out there has access to a copy of this song. :-)
Everything is fine... Nothing is broken. Actually, lots of shit is still broken. The images and style sheets, however, are fixed for the moment. Now, on to what I was really supposed to be doing today. Unpacking. And waiting for the cable guy. And waiting for companies to get back to me, and tell me if I have another interview (already had one phone interview this morning, and an online screening test thing last night).
Update on life: In Memphis, at least for a few hours yet. Chad's truck is in Starkville, at the transmission shop, which has been the source of much drama. My car is here (hence the fact that we managed to get here). Embarking on a road trip tomorrow, with what's left of our spring break. Me, Brian and Chad... in Chad's mom's car. To Tampa, more specifically Busch Gardens. And we're camping, which is awesome. And we're not storm chasing in the midwest, which made my mommy happy. Maybe we'll make it to the beach.
Held Krys and Manda's baby, Toby, today. Decided that babies are way way way too much work. At least after they're born... :-)
Anyway... must run away now.... T minus 6 hours till we need to be on the road (and we're not done packing).
look. I am a computer science major. not a marketing major. not a communications major. not a business major. I chose a major where I wouldn't have to fake enthusiasm, or deal with people. Thus, I have no cause to paste a dumb expression on my face in an attempt to make people think I am having a good day when I'm really not. I hate doing that.
I'm not having a good day. My head hurts. It's hurt for most of three days. I broke my project this morning... and I'm supposed to demo to my boss this afternoon. Chad's car is in the shop (which will be free), and mine is acting up (which will at least cost me whatever a bottle of fuel cleaner costs, and maybe more). I haven't had enough sleep, and the vending machines in Butler... nevermind.
I have smiled several times today. I smiled when I called and woke Chad up this morning (he's funny when he's mostly asleep)... Joe said something stupid and made me smile... Dr. Bridges butchered the tale of Hansel and Gretel, and that was funny... William got an onsite interview ing Huntsville, which was worth smiling for. But having someone shout over IM or over the phone that I need to smile... no. That realy won't make me smile. Sorry. But I really don't see the point. And I know I've said that more than once.
Not a whole lot to say though. Stuff happened this weekened... Chad got a car (SUV) to replace the dying Intrepid... Some crackho/stupid kid stole my gameboy... we played games with friends and family in the Memphis area (when we weren't car shopping)... we did lots of stuff. but for some reason, I don't feel like saying much.
I need to go write papers and stuff. Because lots of it is due this week. And more of it is due next week. And I will be gone most of the weekend enjoying the sights of North Carolina while Chad enjoys the sights of the end of the World (the White Wolf world, of course. Don't worry... it restarts in January. As if you were worried. Ha). I will have my computer... but I'm not sure how much internet access I will have, as I refuse to pay some outrageous per hour fee for wireless like the last couple of hotels I have stayed in charged. Maybe ours will be more reasonable. Or maybe I'll have to find the library, or an internet cafe or something.
But yeah. If I'm quiet, that's why.
Oh yeah... a key fell off of my keyboard today. One day. After. I was in a town with a Best Buy where they could fix it. Stupid thing will have to wait until Christmas break. Grr.
I really am going to go do more work now (my first paper of the night, due tomorrow, is about 75 words from being finished. Then I have to write a bunch of software engineering stuff, and an abstract for a paper on user interfaces... and something else that I can't remeber right now).
Great. The last thing I need while driving is a mechanical version of my mom sitting in the seat next to me. I wonder if they equip the thing to grab on to the door and gasp if it thinks you're going around a curve to fast...
Today is a bad day. Capital BAD. Capital DAY. Everyone from the Coast is stressed out about Ivan. The brochure that I am (was) supposed to do for the church isn't going so well (the printer says it got messed up between the Macs on campus and her Mac... go figure). On the way to get my paycheck, my car stopped working (as I was in the ERC parking lot, this wasn't as catastophic as it could have been). And they don't have my paycheck, even though I've worked for a month and they haven't paid me yet... somehow, they lost my paperwork or something. So... I'm now at school (not at work, where I should be)... sans working car, sans paycheck (aka, money to fix car). Hopefully, Chad and I can get it working tonight... (I think it's the starter).
And Dr. Bridges said she's going ot take points off of my paper because I didn't follow all the formatting rules (i.e., I single spaced where she took off points for double spaceing last time).
Plans have changed, yet again. We will be extending our tour of Huntsville this week in order to replace / do repairs on parts of Chad's Intrepid's cooling system. Which failed today, though not spectacularly (like, nothing acutally blew up or melted, thank goodness). Car + repairs = -$$$. Sucks. But, it might not be too much, we hope, if the problem is what we think it is, which it might not be.
So. No spiffy cool setting up Linux boxes or rearranging the apartment for me tomorrow. Chillin in Huntsville. Not at the Holiday Inn, either. *sigh*. So, if you happen to be in Huntsville and are bored, call/e-mail and we might can hook something up. If you're in Starkville and you're bored... sorry? I'll be back in a few days :-)
On to local news: there are some cool new things apearing in Starkville this year... among them Lowes (where the old Wal-mart was... they leveled it... left Penny's and Kroger there, though)... and Zaxby's Chicken (which I might could convince Chad to try, although I'm sure it won't replace Abner's). And Mississippi has new driver's licenses. They are green. And I have one, with my new name and everything. And... um... that's about everything going on in the world of Starkville. School starts the 18th, which should be cool and all... I still need a job, but I might have something lined up the the ERC (engineering research center, not the teacher thing) :-) We'll see. I should know by the time school starts.
Chad's rejoining the band this year, which means a couple of cool things and a couple of "eh" things (but over all cool)... I get to go on the band trips and stuff, as it is mean to seperate married people and such... I've been offered some work down at the band hall if I really need it... I have an excuse to go to all the games (now if I have time....)... and we're spending Thanksgiving Day in Oxford. But... that doubles for a good excuse not to spend it with either family, and for me to cook a turkey and lots of other food on Wednesday. Yay!
Honeymoon. It was great. We spent a couple days in New Orleans, and ate lots of cool places... walked down Burbon Street a few times... hung out and enjoyed the creepyness of the town... and needed about another month to do everything we wanted to. I have pictures, and since I've got some down time, they may make it online pretty soon... we'll see. Then we got on a boat (read: ship), and had a great time there, too. We boarded at like, 1pm, and started eating, and finished eating about 9am the day we had to get off the boat. We ate a wonderful five course meal every night, shared a bottle of champange with our table the last night, ate breakfast and lunch at least twice every day, and drank so much diet coke and sprite it's a wonder we didn't float away. We spent a day in Cozumel, Mexico, which was awesome. We went snorkeling (cool), and scuba diving (really awesome!). Scuba diving pictures may be online, too, if I can get my new super spiffy scanner (bought with Best Buy gift cards from my Aunt Dorinne and the NASAexplores team) set up and scan them... then we went shopping, and brought home two bottle of Kahlua, a bottle of Bailey's Irish Cream, a huge block of Cadbury chocolate, various souvenier things for our siblings, color change nail polish (it really does change color in the sunlight, too!), shot glasses for Chad's collection, and a stone pig for mine. The alcohol was really the best deal, which is why Chad agreed to bring it home. :-) All in all, we had a wonderful time. And we were exhausted by the time we got back (because we weren't allowed to bring out LiveWire on the boat!), except we ended up driving up to Southaven, as they were still heming and hawing about painting the apartment. I think it's all done now, though...
And I have been drinking lots and lots of LiveWire, due to the four boxes of it in the office :-) Unfortunately, it's in the office in Starkville... and I'm not. No LiveWire for me. *sigh*
Anyway. I guess since I'm here for another day, I should go socialize with my family or something. ;-)
ok ok... I promise a more substantial blog later... maybe tomorrow. For now, suffice it to say I had a wonderful time this past weekend, and my car runs great. And I'm at work, and i have class tonight (which sucks). But for now, here's a good laugh:
OK, we all know that 666 is the Number of the Beast.
But did you know that:
$665.95 - Retail price of the Beast
$699.25 - Price of the Beast plus 5% sales tax
$769.95 - Price of the Beast with all accessories and
replacement soul
$656.66 - Walmart price of the Beast
6, uh... what
was that number
again? - Number of the Blonde Beast
00666 - Zip code of the Beast
1-900-666-0666 - Live Beasts! One-on-one pacts! Call Now!
Only $6.66/minute. Over 18 only please.
Route 666 - Highway of the Beast
666 F - Oven temperature for roast Beast
666k - Retirement plan of the Beast
6.66 % - 5 year CD interest rate at First Beast National
Bank, $666 minimum deposit.
i66686 - CPU of the Beast
666i - BMW of the Beast
DSM-666 - Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the Beast
668 - Next-door neighbor of the Beast
a+rw - File permissions of the Beast
grrr. I will never get to sleep. But, I'm not taking Linear this summer, which should help. let me explain... no, there is to much. Let me sum up. :-)
I wil never get any sleep becasue I am to dadgum busy for my own good. I have to leave the house at 7am every morning to get to work, which means getting up around 6am... And starting the 28th, I'll be in class until 9:45pm every night except Friday, which puts me home around 10:15pm, if I get out on time. Between those times I have to work 8+ hours, eat, do homework, and clean house... and of course, visit with my family (that's why I came home, right?). My weekends will mostly be spent traveling, or Chad will be in town, so I won't want to sleep the entire weekend away. And even when I don't have class, I have enough stuff to do for three people. Take, for instance, this weeks schedule.
Yesterday: Worked (or did random crap at work) from 8am-4pm. Went to leave, car stalled, had to get pushed back into the parking lot. *funny car/guy story* I tried to tell the guys that came to help me that the engine was turing over, but it wasn't getting gas. They were like, oh, yeah, whatever, you have no clue. So after 15 minutes of fiddling with the spark plugs, they were like, you know, I think the engine is turnging over, but it's not getting any gas. *Doh* (real problem: The emergancy cut-off for the fuel pump is flakey, something Daddy *forgot* to mention). *end of story* So, after getting my car fixed, I drove to church, my parents picked me up, we ate dinner, went to church, and got home around 9pm. But then I had to eat, and put dinner away, and get ready for bed, and talk to people, and.... I finally got in bed after 10pm, but couldn't sleep.
Today: Got up at 6am, browned hamburger meat, put stuff in crockpot for spagetti sauce. Talked to Mom for a minute, left 15 minutes late to go to work. I'm here until 4pm or so, then go home and cook spagetti and stuff to go with the sauce... and I will probably end up going out with Mom to Walmart or something.
Tomorrow: Work 7am-3pm (which means leaving the house by 6:30am). Get off Work, go help Aunt Dorinne With yardwork/housework at her house, eat with her, get home sometime around 9pm. Clean *my* house until I fall into bed exausted.
Saturday: Get up at 6am to go yard saleing with Mom... Yard sale until 1pm or so, then (if Henry has found the title to the bug) go meet Dad to get my car (an all-afternoon process). If Henry has not found the title, I might go swimming, but I think it may be to cold. If I go home, I'll end up doing housework. Oh yeah, I also need to go to Cingular and price a cellphone plan... sometime Saturday. And if I get my bug, I might try and find time to go to the VW parts shop and see about a floor pan. And mirrors.
If this is my life without class... how am I going to get everything done? I think I may spend a week between work and school recovering... from life! Oh well.... I'll get ever it. Plenty of time to sleep when I'm dead, right?
On a more interesting note, I get to go to a family reunion Sunday... My Dad's Father's family, or, more specificly, my Dad's Father's Mother's family :-) The Duncans. And they are all getting together at Anne's house (not sure if she's an Aunt or a cousin... never have figured that one out). So I get to go and see lots of people that share my blood, but I have no clue how or why or even who the hell they are. And lots of them will say things like, "I knew you when youe were *this* big", or "Are you Ray's Grandaughter? My you've grown up!", or "What's your major?", or "Are you dating/engaged/married?". But I've been promised good food... One can never pass up good food :-)
school is finally over. But somehow, I'm still behind. Blah. Ok, so this was my week last week:
Monday: I have no clue what I did, but I think it involved finals. Two, If I'm not mistaken. Oh yeah, i attempted to start packing and cleaning... and I have a vauge rememberance of being extremely busy, but i have no clue exactly why. hmmm.... Oh yeah, I went to Wal-mart, too.
Tuesday: Spent the morning coooking spagetti sauce. took a karate final (made an A) :-) Went to William's, made lasagna with the spagetti sauce i had made that morning (Yep, that's me... June Cleaver). Ate dinner, hung out with William, watched office space, stayed out late.
Wednesday: Took a final, and then packed and cleaned until I was (literally) sick. Went to dinner with Ian and ELisa, watched Ocean's 11. Went to bed. Elisa ran a red light :-)
Thursday: Got up early, Mom and mandie picked me up at school. We loaded all my crap into the van, went to lunch at Oby's, did some shopping, and headed home. As soon as I got home, turned around and left again to go to a baby shower for one of mom's friends.
Friday: Got up, organized dad's dvd collection. Woke the kids up, started unpacking my stuff out of the van, into the living room (because my sister took over my half of everything... the room, the closet, the dresser. grr). Mom and I went shopping... Then I did some laundry (after I dug my way into the laundry room... I swear, no one does it while I'm gone). Then it was time to get ready for Robbie's Varsity Banquet. So I showered, dressed, and we left for the banquet. Brag time: Rob completed his manuel and four electives... about 2 1/2 years work... all this year. :-) I ran into Joseph Bearden... Hadn't seen him in ages. College seems to have done him good... he doens't seem nearly as shy and frail as he used to. anyway... we had a good chat. Everyone told me I looked good, and how much they had missed me, and asked me how school was, yada yada. And I didn't even have to make a speech :-)
Saturday: More shopping, more laundry, and more Awards banquet. This time it was Mandie's Junior Varsity Banquet. Brag time: Mandie finished the requirements for her Meritorious Award this year... That means she's completed more than six years worth of handbooks. :-) Nothing terribly interesting happened that night...
Sunday: Mother's Day. Went to church, went to dinner with Mom and Granny and Grandmother, smiled till my face hurt. Came home, cleaned out closets, did *more* laundry, moved a second dresser into my room, so i would have a place to put my clothes... folded laundry while watching Fifth Element... contemplated hammering things into the wall, decided to go to be bed instead.
Today: Got up early for work... had to put water in the radiator of dad's car... it leaks. Again. grr. Had to stop by the hospital and pick up my lisence plate, which dad forgot to put on the car. Parked in the tower, only to find out that I couldn't get out without a validation or an employee badge... couldn't find daddy... had to go upstairs and get mom, who was just getting off a 12 hour shift and was pretty tried and a little short tempered... so she helped me get a screwdriver from dad's office, and let me out of the tower... but not before yelling at me and dad (when he showed up) for awhile. So I finally made it out, got to work, got caught up with what's happening here. My cube is in the back corner of the office now (yes, I still have a cube) and it's really quiet. They may move me again in a couple of days. And I htink someone took my stapler. :-) I've been working on a reading list all day long. Hopefully I'll finish the reasearch part of it tomorrow, and can start formatting and coding it.
FYI -- I'm putting a link to William's blog on my page for my benifit... but his page requires a user name and password. If you really want to read his blog, you can e-mail him and ask him for access. :-)
And on that note, I'm going to get back to work. Or something like that.
Oh yeah, for those enquiring minds: I actually did manage to pass everything this semester. Even my evil physics class. :-) Yay for me.
This is my brain..... in part, at least.
