Category Archives: Life

ET phone home! And buy me some clothes!

Geek, Health, , , ,

In which there are both aliens and my ass in the same entry, but I totally wasn’t abducted or anything.

SETI@home sent me a lovely email today reminding me that I’ve been a member since 1999 (!!!)… and that I haven’t returned a work unit in 153 days. The last unit I returned was from my work machine, but my employer made me remove BOINC about a week after I installed it – the bastards – and I just never got around to installing it on my laptop.

Until now! Let the data crunching begin!

New topic. Ready for the segue? Too bad, ’cause there isn’t one! Dieting is, in its fifth week, suddenly getting difficult. My caloric intake has been inching up steadily for the past week, and now I’m closer to 1500 calories – on a typical day – than 1200. I’ve just been hungry lately. (It’s probably the damned curse messing with my hormones.) I seem to have my hideous water retention problem under control though; restricting calories and exercising (well, a little) has the unintended benefit of reducing my overall sodium intake and keeping me from bloating up like a waterlogged corpse.

After losing 8 pounds right off the bat my weight has remained the same for the past two weekly weigh-ins, but I’m still losing inches: there’s just no reason for someone of my height to be walking around with 40″ hips, just none at all, and I’m safely back into the 30’s now and boy does my ass look better. Yay! (Note: If you know me IRL and tell me I don’t need to lose any weight, I’ll smack you, swear to God, right in your face.) (I mean, the whole weight-loss process and the necessity of it just irritates me, but one does what one must.) Long story short, both my dog and myself should be utterly svelte by late summer.

Speaking of summer (ta-dah! a segue!), I’ve got gigs coming up all over the place. (RB is a gig-booking fiend, especially considering that the band he’s booking has never done a show before and is therefore entirely imaginary thus far.) What I don’t have is gig clothes. I have got to go shopping, but I keep giving my money to dentists and veterinarians instead. Maybe I’ll get Becca to use some of her second-hand store fu to help me find a few cool pieces of clothing, before I start showing up to paying gigs in my fucking pajamas. Or maybe I can just get a t-shirt with an alien on it, and wear it to every single gig we ever do, and become known as “that singer with the one alien shirt she always wears.” A gimmick’s a gimmick, right?

I ate too much.

Blurbs

In which my luncheon over at El Sombrero has left me overfull and sleepy.

Work: My employer publishes an online newsletter each month, and all the employees write little articles for it. I chose to write my article for May on blacklists. Did you know that during the last quarter of 2007, an estimated 95% of email traffic was spam? Ninety-five percent!

Someone’s paying for all that stolen bandwidth, and I bet they’re pissed.

Food: I just had a cheese & onion enchilada with rice and beans for lunch. So good. So high-calorie. So awesome.

That has nothing to do with anything, really… except maybe deliciousness.

Dog: Bindu’s appointment has been rescheduled for Monday. I wrote it down wrong and went yesterday morning but there was no vet available to see us. I hope she’s just old and fat, and not truly sick.

Band: I went to open mic last night, and outside in the beer garden had the obligatory “How much do you really care about this band?” discussion with the guitar player.

I’ve had this conversation with at least one member of every single solitary band I’ve ever been in. I’m not sure how my showing up at practice, sitting in at gigs, and being totally gung-ho in general causes other musicians to wonder if I’m committed or not. I’ve been playing for twenty years and never made a living at it, but I’m still doing it: does that fact not speak for itself?

He was nice enough about it, and I suppose considering how much work he does booking gigs he deserves to feel proprietary, but through no fault of his own I’ve just had that talk too many times and it bugged me. (I mean, would it be terribly bitchy to point out that despite the earnestness of The Talk, none of those other bands still exist?)

Books: I finished this last night. Brilliant, transcendent, gorgeous. I love Kay.

Movies: I’ve had a Netflix vid that I haven’t watched in a month. I think it’s three episodes of Doctor Who.

Weather: See this? ‘Nuff said.

Seeing Mother

Music, Spiritual, , ,

In which my plans are quite suddenly changed.

Saturday night my entire band had a long practice. After, Curtis and I went out and Becca showed up. We met a wine writer from Seattle and hung out with her all night, even dragged her to after hours for a bit. I got drunk. Around three in the morning, Curtis and I finished up the curry and rice I had stashed in the fridge and he crashed in the front bedroom.

Sunday, the weather was GLORIOUS! Clear and breezy, and had to be at least seventy degrees out! We went to brunch at 26 brix (and let me tell you, the bloody mary was awesome) and then wandered aimlessly around town until Curtis had to go record with RB. We even stopped at the miniature airport and watched the enthusiasts fly their little planes around for awhile.

Monday, I did – among other tedious but necessary online things – my taxes. I’m getting a refund! (I was so poor last year that I actually qualified for EIC. Go me.) Apparently I’ll be getting $300 for my rebate, too, which is exiting because I’ll TOTALLY need it to see Amma this summer.

I was going to try to see Her in New York in July, but not only has the ticket for the dates I wanted doubled in price in the past 6 days, but it turns out that one of the other techs at work has already gotten those dates off for vacation – so there’s no way I’ll get them off, too.

Now I’m scrambling madly to get organized to see Mother in Seattle, since people are taking vacation days during all the other tour stops I’d like to go to (not only New York, but Fairfield and Chicago too). The Seattle programs are complex because there’s a day of public programs followed by a two-day retreat and then a public Devi Bhava. If I’m going at all, I either register for the retreat or I only see Mother for one day. Since it costs just about $200 to fly to Seattle I’d rather go for more than a single day… so now I need to sign up for a retreat with no on-site housing in a town where I know no Amma devotees. Gah!

(You know, I should have known this would happen. I contacted the Seattle satsang by email and am doing seva remotely – placing notices on various online boards about Mother’s visit – but of course it’s going to work out that I have to go meet the Seattle satsang properly, and probably work like crazy at the programs and the retreat too.)

In other news, Bindu’s going to the vet for blood work tomorrow. She’s gotten fat since we’ve been here (because grandmas are indulgent and feed dogs table scraps, and give them milk and lunch meat every single night before bed) and now she drinks and pees so much that I’m worried about diabetes. She’s exhibiting some other behavioral changes too, which is why I’m actually worried: she can’t walk the 12 blocks to work with me on Saturdays without a rest at the halfway point, and she seems sleepy and cuddly more than tired or overheated.

Send the good blue dog your non-diabetic thoughts, if you would, and I’ll let you know what we learn when the results come back.

Shameful Admission #1

Admissions

In which I use Google as a spell-checker.

There are several words I have never bothered to learn to spell. When I want to use them, I type them into Google and then when it says, “Did you mean: amenable?” I copy the correct spelling and paste it into my email/blog post/trouble ticket.

Spring is sprung!

Blurbs

In which I’m still boring, but the weather’s gorgeous.

Main StreetSpring is truly here. Flowers are in bloom, the days are sunny and breezy with big fluffy white clouds in an achingly blue sky. My morning walk to work is becoming more and more pleasant each day.

To balance out all this goodness, I have a third damned cold. (Started two days ago. Sneezing, stuffy head, a tickle in my throat, and a scratchy voice.) I feel juuuuust a little fuzzy and a little tired, but mostly I’m just pissed off because three colds in a row is just stupid and I’m tired of having one. I had better be well and in good voice by the time gig season starts, that’s all I have to say – three colds in a row, one with an annoyingly lingering cough, have wreaked havoc on my voice.

My band’s drummer’s coming to town this weekend, so we’ll have an actual full band rehearsal Saturday night. I’m pretty excited about it, really, because it’ll be nice to be putting final polish on the songs we’ve been working on. (And by ‘pretty excited,’ I mean ‘mildly interested,’ because band practice is, in actual fact, fairly dull. Sitting and learning songs is not the fun part of being a rockstar.)

Work’s been crazy this week because one of the techs is out on vacation. There have been unresolved tickets in the queue every night when I leave, and I hate that. (I like to have everything cleared when I clock out. Everything.) Then there was a 4-state DSL outage yesterday so it was freakin’ NUTS for about three hours. Then the day before yesterday was International Pissed Off Asshole Caller Day, so 90% of the people I talked to said ignorant shit like, “You’ve screwed up my email again and I expect you to fix it before I go to another company!” when the problem was actually that they didn’t have their phone line plugged into their computers so they couldn’t dial up. (We have a LOT of dial-up customers.)

All that said, there is something terribly satisfying about getting a DSL customer connected after an hour-long call.

It’s Friday. I may stop for a drink on the way home.

Go, me. Yay. No, srsly.

Health, Music,

In which I’m so fucking healthy you would not even believe it.

I woke up before my alarm went off this morning. I did isometric exercises on the floor in my room. I took a shower. I made breakfast and ate it. I walked briskly to work. When I stopped for an iced latte, I even got soy milk. (Don’t worry, even though I’m a vegetarian I don’t eat enough soy for it to be dangerous. I have enough problems with my hormones as it is without introducing a bunch of phytoestrogens or a thyroid dysfunction into the mix!)

Last night at open mic, I did not order cheese fries. (I did have a few cocktails, though.) (I’m developing self-discipline, not spending a year dead for tax purposes.) Mmm, cheese fries!

I have no idea where all this motivation has come from, but I’m willing to admit that it might just be plain old vanity. I’ve noticed a trend that will, if left unchecked, have me waking up one morning shaped like a goddamned chicken (read: ball-shaped object on sticks) and I’m simply not into it. I’ve never really had a waist to speak of, but enough is enough.

In other news, RB is booking all sorts of gigs. Here’s what’s cookin’ so far:

(The boys’ gig calendar is here. I’m not necessarily doing all of the gigs listed.)

RB told me last night that he’s decided to bill me as ‘The New Queen of Blue-eyed Soul,’ which totally cracks me up. One rarely thinks of marketing oneself in such a way, but I suppose it’s just that sort of tagline that gets a girl gigs. And I like gigs. Now, if only the band members weren’t spread out all over two states it might be easier to actually practice together once in awhile.

Ouch! I need insurance!

Health

In which it sucked WAY more than usual.

This morning I rolled out of bed feeling all groggy and logy. I showered, put a bunch of product in my hair and then dried it stupid in spite of the effort, got dressed, and hiked to the dentist’s office. The hygienist gave me a bunch of topical and then three excruciatingly looong, slooow shots of local, and then proceeded to vibrate my brains right out of my ears with her handy-dandy little screeching ultrasonic.

When I left, half my face – and half my tongue – were still completely, utterly numb.

An hour and a half later, when the local wore off? Freakin’ OUCH! I actually had to take an ibuprofen, and I’ve never taken one after a planing & scaling before. (And this is my fourth time for this. I have a filthy mouth in more ways than one!) My gums felt like they’d been shredded to tatters and my jaw bone ached like I’d been punched.

This pisses me off because I’m the ideal dental patient. I’m calm, never nervous or twitchy, I’m pleasant, and I’ve even been known to drift off during cleanings. I’ve never had any aftercare issues, not even after the extraction of my wisdom teeth. But today? My mouth hurt. It’s not fair! I call foul! And the worst part is that I dropped over three hundred clams for the experience (because apparently my dentist thinks he’s in fucking LA).

In other news, I am officially rescinding my (never observed!) declaration that I was done talking about my uterus. The thing is healing itself with supernatural speed, and at the rate it’s going I’ll be having full-on insane life-threatening periods again in another ten months. I kid you not. The freakishly rapid regeneration of my uterine lining displeases me immensely, not only because it’s weirdly unnatural but also because there’s no way in hell I’ll be able to afford another ablation a year after the first one.

I totally need health insurance because I’m freakin’ falling apart here. Gums! Uterus! I need new contacts, too! At this rate, next year I’ll need a hip replaced. Srsly.

The New Five Year Plan!

Decisions

In which I think aloud, as it were. Even though it’s actually typing. (Writing. Whatever.)

Let me admit first that I’ve never had a five-year plan. I’m the kind of creature who takes things as they come, and at any job interview where I’ve been asked, “Where do you see yourself in five years, Michelle?” I’ve always answered, “I really have no idea. I never think that far ahead.”

(I manage to get hired anyway because in spite of my blatantly wrong interview answers I give fantastic interview, you SO would not believe how articulate and friendly I can be under fire.) (Actually, I often answer interview questions totally wrong, like, “I know what I’m supposed to say here, but you seem like you’d appreciate honesty more” so blah blah blah. That way they know I know how to play the game but am choosing not to.) (Or something. ) (It works for me more often than not, at any rate.) (Moving on.)

So we’ve established that I don’t have any idea what I’ll be doing in five years. I’m more attached to a state of change than one of stability, and if I’m brutally honest, I am – or at least have been – more afraid to make statements that would later prove to make a liar of me than to have no plan at all.

So while I’ve never had a five year plan, I do have a new two year plan! This is a work in progress, of course, and these are just the basics I’ve been tossing around, but hey: it’s something. Continue reading The New Five Year Plan! →

I don't even care if she was lying.

Blurbs, ,

In which it was totally flattering.

I walked over to the Chevron on my lunch break and bought cigarettes. The lady behind the counter asked to see my ID. I handed it over and she looked at my birth date.

“Wow!” she exclaimed, grinning at me. “You really don’t look your age!”

It was awesome. Although it could be the fact that I dress like a kid, I’m blaming it on the good haircut and the diet. (Yes, I’m dieting. It freakin’ sucks, but I’ve gained weight since having surgery last fall – apparently bleeding to death was using a lot of calories! – and I simply cannot stand this gut any longer omgwtfbbq.)

Energy Levels

Health

In which I’m not talkin’ about OPEC.

This morning I was walking to work and I realized that I have for the past few weeks felt physically better than I have felt for a similar length of time in years. I was walking along thinking, “I feel like me. Wow. How long has it been since I felt like this for more than a few days in a row?” I used to have such a high-energy physiology (it’s a little like being caffeinated, but without the caffeine. It’s awesome) but for years I’ve just been fatigued most of the damn time.

I think most of my general malaise and fatigue for the past many years has been cycle-related [for the past year, for instance, it’s been two weeks of feeling mostly normal followed by two weeks of near-exhaustion] and this month I just happen to be getting a break, but it sure is nice to feel motivated for more than ten days in a row.

It doesn’t hurt that I got to travel (I love traveling!) and that spring is here (I love warmth!), either.