Never Say Never

A girl can be motivated by many things.
One of my motivations in life, apparently, is a cute pair shoes.
At one point, and probably more than once, I have mentioned that I don't understand how or why the 'skinny jean' has made it's way back into fashion. And who on earth buys and wears them?
Well . . . I know a few people, but they're pretty fashion-savvy.
I knew I wasn't cut out for these silly, tight pants.
Until I bought these boots.

And wanted to wear them all the time.
So I sucked it up, and tried on a pair of skinny jeans to go with them.
I might now own no less than 3 or 4 . . . or 5 pairs.
Never say never.
You never know when it's going to be really comfortable, and the only thing to go with your cute, and very comfortable, new boots.

One is the loneliest number . . .

Other post titles I debated?
'Living alone is hard.'
'Being single sucks.'

Sometimes, I hate asking other people for help. Not always, but sometimes.
Mostly when I want to do something NOW, and I need another human being to make it happen (and there isn't one around).
Case-in-point.
Now.
I splurged and bought myself a new tv - the first I've purchased for myself. Yay, me!
But it's too big to get out of the box and put up by myself. So I've had to put out a call for help.
In reality, this is not a big deal. Someone will come to my rescue, and soon I'll no-doubt be ordering the HD-cable to go with the new flat screen.
For now I'll just stare at the damn box.

See . ..  it doesn't always suck to be single. Mostly, I get to do what I want, when I want.
Like wait to do the dishes until I'm down to the last spoon, make the bed when I feel like it, go to the grocery store 14 times in one week, eat meals at odd times, you get the picture.
But when I have to have another human being around to accomplish a task, it can get frustrating.
And then I start thinking about my married and partnered friends and family who (I feel) take having another person around for granted.
Like when they say "I don't know, partner #2" pays the bills", or "Parter #1 does all the grocery shopping" or "I do the cooking, person X does the cleaning."
Us singletons? We do it all. The cooking, cleaning, bill-paying, re-organizing our furniture, making our own soup when we're sick, etcetera, etcetera, ad nauseum.
Not withstanding the actual human companionship that another person offers.
It's just helpful to have someone spread the wealth in the chore department.

I promise I'm done whining about this now. I just needed to get it out. Now I need to vacuum, dust and clean two bathrooms, while waiting for another human to help me move some tv's around.

So Many Options, So Little Time

I might have some form of craft-ADD.
Or I come up with too many great ideas.
I regulary think about, and often start, great projects. It's finding the time to finish them that I apparently have a hard time with.

For example, the following are some of the crafty projects that are currently taunting me:
 - a blog to sell my crafty creations
 - cards and calendars, to sell on aforementioned blog
- scrapbook from recent trip to South Africa, not-so-recent trip to '09 presidential inauguration and any general scrapping from the last time I worked on something - I think that was back in '04.
- sewing pajama pants
-knitting a blanket for my bed
- take photos of said cards and put them on blog

Here are some recent ideas I've contemplated [but have been able to hold off on actually doing anything but ponder them]
- new bedspread
- scarfs from funky old t-shirts
- knit scarlet & gray scarf
- more cards and calendars to sell
- V-day cards for friends and family

The list could go on and on. I feel like I come up with something new every day. And then I try to remember that perhaps I should work on the stuff that's already started.
Or? Do some lame household task like washing dishes or doing laundry.
Or finish unpacking my junk that's still in boxes.

Or perhaps I could find some minions to work on the great ideas I come up with. I wonder where I could find some minions, as I think I like this option an awful lot. They could start with unpacking the remaining boxes and cleaning my apartment . . .

Have you ever thought

"Who thinks this shite up?"
Because I wonder this all the time.
Most recently, i.e., tonight, when I got sucked into the show "Minute-to-Win-it."
I didn't mean to. I was getting ready to settle down into my couch and warm blanket, with a new library book, when the show came on and caught my attention.
And then I kept getting drawn back to the television, and finally gave up on the book.
Partly because I had to know if Mark was going to win the challenge.
And partly because I wondered:
1. Who thinks this stuff up?
2. No really - who thought this would make a great game show?
3. And then who put it on tv? Contestants pull tissue out of a box. For a game. And people watch it on television.
4. So who keeps thinking up these games? And people actually practice them? Like at home . . . games such as stacking 5 washington apples, and trying to get a gumball to land on the exact middle of a tennis racket, or roll an egg around on the bottom of a pizza pan to try and pick up four stickers.
5. For real?
Clearly, this is a stroke of genius, because I just got sucked in to this damn show, and couldn't turn it off - because I needed to know how far boy-wonder/hair salon owner/father of two cute girls with no college fund/nor retirement for his wife or himself would go. And so I watched the whole darn thing. Ridiculous. And kinda hated every minute of it. Yet I couldn't shut it off.
Perhaps it was created by the same people who write lifetime movies - those things are also impossible to look away from.

You know you've moved to Wisconsin when . . .

1. The weatherman projects the wind will be "bone-chilling". Neat. Thanks, Fox News. [For those of you wondering why I was watching fox last night, please note that it was because they are on at 9pm, and I wanted to go to bed early. Yep, I was that tired.] (Side note #498 - it was TOTALLY bone-chilling wind, especially near the lake!)
2. Recent news stories have been about Frost Bite and Frost Nip symptoms, and how to describe said-symptoms to your children (so they know what to look for when they're outside for too long - apparently anything over 15 minutes), as well as how shoveling snow can be bad for your health, and how to combat this (drink plenty of water before your "work-out", use a snow-blower, and start shovelling as soon as the snow stops falling, because that's when it weighs less. Hilarious? Sad? I'm not sure. Perhaps both.
3. You stock-up on supplies like the aformentioned long-underwear, chapstick and hand lotion.
4. You wonder if you should google solutions to static-y hair.
5. Your car says -3*on the way to work in the morning.
6. Schools are on a 2-hour delay because it's too cold with the windchill for kids to be outside. (see #2).

Officially gross and kinda unacceptable.
But? At least I moved here from Ohio, where winter does, in fact, happen. Yesterday I met a guy at a training session, who moved here 3 weeks ago. From Florida. Sorry, dude.

Priorities

Yesterday I did a little Nancy Drew work to figure out how to get two things:
1. A Library Card
2. A Driver's License

To get a library card all you need is a driver's license with your current (local) address. So, in theory, I should have gotten that first. And probably because there are laws and stuff that say I should have one, since I live here now.**

But I like to read more.

And? The library is open until 9pm, and the DMV closes early. Nor does it require a decent hair-day.

Now I feel like a real resident - I finally have a Madison Library card [that will help me feed my James Patterson addiction]. Hooray!

**In case you're curious how I got the card without this, you can use your old license/picture ID and a utility bill or lease with your current address on it. Apparently this was easier. For now. ;)

Cuteness defined.

Today was a little crazy. On paper - slash- my outlook calendar, it shouldn't have been. But apparently the shite hit the fan in every part of my world.
Oh well.
It really is, and will be, fine. We'll figure it all out, and maybe I'll figure out how to blog about it appropriately.
Until then, I'll share something else I realized today.

I've always been a sucker for little girls in pigtails. I heart them. All shapes/sizes/colors/lengths - love them.
And apparently I also love (and have been able to find) the winter-version:

Winter hats with ears on them.
So freaking cute.
And? One of my offices is in a childcare, so I get to see quite a few.
Makes me really happy.

A couple of my colleagues suggested that I get one for myself.
I'm not sure if I'm there yet.
Mostly because I would most certainly look 12 if I wore one.
But since this high for this week was on Monday, at midnight, (it was 22*, in case you're wondering), I might just change my mind.
I'll keep you posted.

Pun intended. :)
***************************************************************
Side notes: I thought I would look up some examples for you. Steal a trend from my friend K-Savvy, originator of the blog. ;) So I googled animal winter hats. And found this website. Which is at punk.com. Which, of course, I find to be an amazing website-name. And so then I really had to share two things.
1. There are apparently a LOT of animal hat options. Some clearly cuter than others. Por ejemple, these.
2. I'd like to make this for my buddy Anth - who was the cutest chicken ever back-in-the-day for Halloween.

A Whole New Perspective on Snow

I'm pretty sure the last time I enjoyed the snow I wore snowpants and owned mittens with a string attached to them (as well as those little suspendery-things) and we couldn't wait to get on the snow hills that my dad made after plowing our driveway.
That was a long time ago.
Now I have a whole different view, beyond just not liking it for the plain-old-irritations that it brings to life - traffic, slippery sidewalks, and the general, freezing-cold that it brings with it.
I have to think about what it means for my staff, because it's our job to clear it.
So new things I now think about when it's snowing (like it is now):
Shite. Larry's gonna hate this.
And then . ..
1. How long is it going to snow?
2. How much snow is going to fall?
3. What time will the snow end? And begin again?
4. Will I need to be sure someone is on staff right now? Can it wait until morning?
5. Is it going to snow over a weekend?
5a. How much?
5b. For how long?
5c. Will it be during a Packer play-off game?
5d. Will people come in to work during said game?
6. How cold will it be?
7. Will salt work? Do we have enough salt?
8. If it won't work (as in, it's too cold), do we have enough of the other stuff we use (that I don't remember the name of).
9. Will the guys stay warm enough in the bobcat? Should I bring them some hot chocolate and cookies?
10. Is it a furlough day?
11. If it is a furlough day, when will the grounds crew reschedule said furlough day?
12. Gross.
You get the picture. Like everything else, this is a whole new world to learn, and a new lens with which to look at snowflakes. Though, I will say that at least we are prepared for this - unlike our friends in Atlanta, who had their 4th snow day today, or the peeps in Boston who totally got dumped on. We're not there - knock on wood.

Just a plain-old update on life . . .

So . . . I said I wanted a job where I could use more of my brain.
I got what I asked for.
I am learning a ton, and have a ridiculously busy schedule, like any new employee who's trying to learn on-the-go and get the daily stuff done at the same time.
So by the end of the day I don't have a ton of energy.
Or any good stories for the blog.
But a post was requested, and I'm trying to oblige.
So this will just be a boring update.
The last two weeks have been filled with interviews and working on my labor budget. Out of all of the budgets that I've had to work on (capitol projects, supplies and revenue), this is by far the worst to do. The math is hateful.
For example: Number of student custodians times weeks in the summer times forty hours per week. Oh but wait . . . they might want to take a week off, so subtract one person. For a week. So that means forty hours. Times how many student employees we need.
I clearly can't even bring myself to write out any more numbers using Actual Numbers.
Because then we get into philosophical discussions about how turning over apartments can affect the vacancy loss and if we can decrease that then we can hire more people to get a lower number of vacancies. And in the end, renting more apartments and making more money to pay for the rest of the stuff we want to do.
Or something like that.
:)
Yep. Learning a lot, and using math skills that have been buried since tenth grade.
My brain hurts.

A Random SHOUT OUT . . .

To my buddy Benny.

Who went poopy on the potty at school yesterday for the first time. THREE times, in fact! He is awesome and talented.

He's such a big boy now. And while it makes me sad that he is growing up this fast, I am SO VERY PROUD OF HIM.

And truly honored that I was a mandated phone call for this very imporant life update.
[You all know I can be a little sarcastic at times, and as I re-read this last statement, I don't want it to be mistaken for such. It really is important. Mostly because it makes me still feel like the boys, and hopefully their amazing parents, feel like I'm a part of their family. Which is pretty damn cool. And a little sad because I miss them a whole boatload - but mostly very cool.]

Now my friends can stop buying diapers and put that money into a plane ticket to come and visit.
:) Yep - had to put a little sarcasm in there for good measure.  I can't help it. And you know you were looking for it. ;)

I've decided

Unpacking is like a bad game of tetris.
And I like tetris. But this version is not as fun as the original.

I've instituted a new house rule - no changing into comfy clothes after work until I unpack some boxes.
I've only broken it once - yesterday - and that was because I brought work home so I could watch the sugar bowl. Which was a great, and stress-filled game, as any good football  match-up should be. And my team won. Hooray! and Go Bucks!
:)
So for the two-whole-other days this week since the new policy has been in place, I've been able to get a lot unpacked, but tonight there was an obnoxious amount of moving shite around the room - from one already-filled tabletop/bookshelf/chair/empty space to another. And in between trying to collapse empty boxes, herd the crazy amounts of loose paper, and figure out what's in the boxes, I was also quickly trying to discern what junk should go to the office, and what should stay in a box, given a place in my new home or pitched. Kinda hateful.
But - on the bright side - it's snowing outside.
And I get to park my car in an underground heated garage.

I can't believe it . .. .

I forgot a really, really important change that has Greatly increased my quality of life here in the frozen tundra.
Heated, underground parking.

It's freaking amazing. Especially in the dark, cold of the morning hours. And evening, for that matter. Really, any time of day, it's nice to be able to get into my car without having to scrape it off, dig it out, or warm it up before moving. Quite nicely cuts down on my getting-ready time in the morning. And we all know how much I need more time in the morning.

Probably inappropriate, but too funny not to share

So, I work with students. Which makes my life automatically filled with funny people and stories. Seriously? You can't make this shit up. I don't feel comfortable Totally making fun of someone who doesn't deserve it, and who, I am sure, has legitimate issues to deal with in life.  So instead I will share some information that I have recently learned, and found a bit hilarious. You can infer the rest, and judge me on my way to Hades.

Apparently, the most common service animals are dogs and . . . . any guesses?
Monkey? No.
Good guess. It was mine, too.
Horses.
Yep - horses. But not full size ones. And? They are not recommended for indoor use.
They are, however, commonly used for the blind, especially those with hypoallergenic issues.
Learn something new every day.
Now off I go . . . to find a space for a new resident who needs a quiet exercise area for her three felines.

Yep. Going straight to hell.
The thing is - not everyone could do our job. It's not rocket science, or even brain surgery. It's a whole lot of common sense. I also think a healthy sense of humor is integral to surviving and thriving in this lovely world of quirks and hilarity that revolves around college students.

Quality of Life

Recently a friend suggested that I make a decision because it was better for my Quality of Life. I don't remember what it was exactly - since it was a whole two weeks ago - but since then I've tried to keep this concept in mind. And since the few of you who actually read this have requested a post, I thought I'd try and give you the skinny on what's been happening over the last couple of weeks, via a list.

Things that have Greatly Enhanced my Quality of Life (over the last two weeks):
1. Having an address. That I can put on checks and a driver's license, and isn't also my office.
2. Sleeping in my own bed, under my own blankets.
3. DVR. 'Nuff said.
4. Visiting my family over the holidays.
5. Eating my dad's food. Lots of it.
6. Seeing progress in my unpacking.
7. Catching up with some friends over the holidays. Excited to continue that progress.
8. Christmas cards - especially the ones with the cute family photos - and extra-especially those that have new additions to their family this year. Very cute.
9. 75% off Christmas sales.
10. New lamps.
11. New songs from iTunes.
12. Rollerskating with my cousins and aunts. Who knew kids still did that?
13. Despicable Me. Freaking hilarious.
14. Curling up on my own couch. With my blanket.
15. A washer and dryer in my apartment. It's amazing to not have to lug dirty (and then clean) laundry back and forth anywhere beyond my closet.
16. A staff that actually appeared to miss me while I was gone. And is glad I'm back. [Cute side note: one of the guys told me to "drive safe - we want you back."]
17. Manicurist of Seville OPI.
18. Great football. Oh wait. Yeah . .. the big ten hasn't actually been able to get any wins in any of these bowl games - but I have high hopes for the Buckeyes tomorrow night.
19. Good James Patterson novels. And Half Price Books who is keeping me fully stocked.
20. Friends who miss the kelarious blog. Hope this gave you a quick taste of life here in 'Sconnie. [that's a shout-out for you, BV!] I'll try to be better about writing in the new year. That whole move-holiday-thing kinda got me off track. Here's to a fabulous 2011!