i'm looking for something that would be a unique room divider -- something beyond just an open-back book shelf, but the only thing i've found that i like would cost $1k...and i'm not that desperate. i'm starting to wonder if i should just make something myself. i mean, i've been assembling, unassembling, and refinishing furniture now for a few years; i have the ability to think spatially...why not put it to use?
the real question becomes, do i look for a plan or venture out on my own? ;)
guess i wasn't paying too close of attention when i ordered my pictures of key west from snapfish.com in november. or maybe it's just because i was ordering so darn many it was next to impossible to absorb all that i was ordering. at any rate, i just discovered tonight that i have duplicates of most pictures and triplicates of some. not quite sure how that happened...if maybe i added them several times or, who knows. i could swear that i added the whole album at once, though.
anyway, i've emailed them to see if i can return the duplicates for a refund or a credit. $80 is a lot of money to pay for getting pictures developed, and i knew i'd taken around 700, but i didn't develop them all, and really, you should have seen the box of pictures that i got! you can believe i'll be a lifetime customer if they do something for me.
i just finished sorting them out at least. now they're close to ready to go in the scrapbook (and half back to snapfish!). i just need to put them back in order.
still moving
just a week and a few days until moving day. i'm not even close to ready, but somehow it's not as pressing when you don't have to be out of a place by a certain time. if i can just remember to bring home boxes, i should be okay. after that, it's just putting stuff in boxes and toting them to storage so they can go on the truck. i've got quite a stack in my room already - it's definitely time for a trip to storage since there's just little pathways to and from the door.
mental obsession + craving
(definition per melanie)
i think i'm addicted to a lot of things...dancing being one of them. but there are worse things.
second annual hall family summer reunion...first annual hall family talent show.
i'm sure our neighbors up in idyllwild were so happy with us, but it was hysterical. between that and the snipe hunting with the kids that night... :) it was supposed to be put on by the kids, and the kids would talk about their parents' talents, but then some of the adults decided that they wanted to perform too. in the end, everyone had an act. had i known ahead of time, i would have brought up an instrument, but celeste and i decided to do a charleston routine that we made up in about an hour. thank goodness i'd taken a 20's charleston workshop!
i hadn't seen most of the extended family in several years, so it was fun to get together with them. shocking how old they are now. i remember one of them being around 8 last time i saw him - he's now 18 and about to go to college! another is 5 - he was a baby last time i saw him.
aside from the slight fire scare (thankfully it was contained within a few hours, though the smoke covered the sky for the afternoon), it was nice to get away from everything and relax. i also got more genealogy info for my research. i have to get as much as i can because it seems like there aren't many people left who know everything about everyone!
while sitting at a signal, a fire engine pulled out of the firehouse with its sirens on. i saw the firefighter in the front passenger seat rustle some papers, and it made me wonder...how do they find all the places they need to go? a gps unit? a thomas brother's guide? mapquest? or do you have to know a town like the back of your hand to drive a fire truck?
{later note: i consulted with someone else and discovered they use gps units. i wouldn't expect anything less, naturally. makes me feel better too! i definitely appreciate all that they do.}
today's theme. i feel like forgetful jones -- a sesame street character from long ago, who's probably since moved on. or was it mr. rogers? i don't remember...
anyway, i'll be heading home tonight before dancing to pick up my socks, knee brace, rings and necklace. maybe then i'll feel like i'm facing the world frontwards again...
seems that's the theme right now. but it's alright.
i really should be packing, but I haven't done much beyond gather stuff up in a pile in my room. granted, most of what i have in my room could fit in my car plus the couch in my sister's truck, so i'm not too worried if i have to just throw stuff in my car and move it. that's one of the beauties of moving in-town and not having to be out by a certain date.
i found out the steven and virginie workshop is the same weekend that i plan to move. i think i may have found a way to do both, though i'll probably (1) have to make sure i move everything in one day and (2) have to skip saturday's workshops. this doesn't bother me too much as i've taken virginie's movement class before and the class i really want to go to is steven mitchell's musicality class -- and that's not until sunday night. at least i should be able to make it to the two dances in the evenings. i'm going to be exhausted, i think. but it's oh so worth it. it will definitely be weird to be so close to work and school and stuff.
and with the way that the new manager at the curves in escondido is behaving, i think i might be glad to be moving to a new location. i'm not positive about that, but it's looking that way. the new manager has become almost militant about stuff. i mean, they were doing fun things with "curves bucks" - play money you could earn for working out three days a week or losing weight - and they'd set up the number that you would need to get things like a t-shirt. last week she decided to quadruple the prices that you would need with the reasoning that we'd have more opportunities to earn them. like when? if anything, they've stopped doing stuff that allowed us to earn them. if this is supposed to be motivation, it's not working. if anything, i'm to the point where i could care less. in addition, the lady who opened in the mornings on weekdays used to show up early just to be nice to the people who had to get to work. it was one of the reasons that we signed up. well, the new manager went off on the morning people and said we were "taking advantage" of the lady. hello? she was doing it before we signed up. we didn't ask her to. it was her choice. but that's stopped now, and this woman was whining about how she was so tired and overworked and taken advantage of. gee. that wasn't how you felt before - you seemed to be happy about being there. supposedly they're all about customer service. i've seriously seen it go downhill in the two months i've been there. since i'm looking at transferring anyway, i'm tempted to write the owner a letter and let her know exactly how i feel. she should know.
i guess the whole thing has changed for me. i went from being encouraged to work out as much as i wanted to being told that they only wanted us to work out three times a week - no more - so that we could do other forms of exercise on our days off. sheesh! what about the people who don't have the opportunity to do other things during the rest of the week? what about those for whom this is their only opportunity to get away from kids and family and spend some time for themselves? somehow, i don't think they should be encouraging people to be spending less time at the gym. perhaps encouraging them to add additional ways of moving their body on top of their daily workout...but oh well. i'll stop ranting now. compared to what's going on in other areas of the world, this isn't all that important.
i don't remember where i read or heard about it orginally, but this phrase popped into my mind this morning while i was getting ready. sure, nothing's about me or my life's totally perfect, but i'm starting to be more and more content with how things are lately. perhaps i'm feeling that things are how they are supposed to be at this point in time. perhaps i've stopped worrying so much about what others think.
from a quick search on the internet:
"The French call it bien dans sa peau: being at ease with who you are instead of twisting to fit into some external fashion diktat. It takes half a lifetime to achieve this comfort: to dress as you want, behave as you want. Some may call you odd. Good, be odd. Revel in your eccentricities-and leave others to their own reactions." --Simran Bhargava
exactly.
a thinking people
it amazes me how many americans take things at face value and don't question what they hear. sure, i'm guilty of it as i'm sure we all are, but really...if you hear something that sounds like it's questionable, why not question it? no progress is made if people stop searching for answers and explanations. "because i said so" is not an answer. there's always another side to every story. it just makes me nervous that the people who talk the loudest are the ones who sway the nation's opinion. we're not a bunch of sheep, people. God gave us brains and the capacity to reason for a purpose. use them.
there aren't many things in life that you have to take completely on faith alone.
looking back, it's interesting how the things you think about and wish for come true. or maybe i just have a magical blog.
case in point #1:
bizarre how i wrote this almost exactly a year ago. while a cat and one of my best friends were present, it wasn't quite sunset, and it wasn't an exact description of the house, the feeling was very much the same this past wednesday. tea and scones completed the scene to make it idyllic, and it's been filed away now as one of my favorite memories. you know how people tell you to go to a happy place? this is mine.
http://innamorare.crimsonkite.com/mt/archives/000247.htm
case in point #2:
november 2003 i blogged about being restless, wanting to be out of where i was. about two weeks later, i had a job offer.
i've talked before about the law of attraction, and even marvelled a bit at the coincidences. but now i'm starting to think i ought to be more up front about what i want. i might just actually find it.
on the other hand, these might all be the rantings of a sleep-deprived individual. two late-night, out-of-town trips dancing in a row leave me sleep starved and apt to start rambling. the last f2 is tonight though, so i'm going to try for a nap and press onward. though i might give up a nap for dinner with friends...