Sabbatical day three: Tired!

[textualdeviance]

The desk (and the 18 tons of stuff on/in it) is finally moved! I'm posting this from my spiffy new digs! It took a while to get everything hooked up, since I have three thousand accessories plugged into the Big Silver Penis, and the back of my desk looks like electronic spaghetti, but it's in a better position than it was before. No more having poor mekle crawl under the desk to change anything.

Still lots to do before everything's truly done, though. Lots of figuring out where to put stuff, lots of sorting through and unloading the "fuck it, I have no idea what I'm doing with this" boxes, lots of filing, shredding and other office-y type stuff. Will post pics when it's all finally settled into place.

I also need to clean up the old room. Gads. I seriously left scars on that room. It's downright scary. There were new lifeforms behind my desk. Something made of cat hair, fingernail clippings, crumbs, paper clips and stray tic-tacs that became sentient. There are still boxes to go through in there (from when we moved the first time. Shut up. I'm a pack rat and a procrastinator with ADD. I consider it an accomplishment if I get dressed every day.) Then I get to move the cat box to the closet in there, move the baker's rack to the hall where the cat box is now, vacuum, scrub and otherwise fumigate the place, and then put up bookshelves and a futon to turn it into the library/guest room, as planned.

Then on to

• Catching up on reading: about a dozen Alan Dean Foster books; the Redwall series, the latest additions to the Phule series; the Narnia series; the various political/queer stuff I've been collecting. I may also dig into HP, finally, since I have yet to do that.


• Getting caught up on CSI, since Mike got me addicted to the damned show (okay, Eric and Jorja definitely contribute to the addiction, too. Yum. :) ), and watching Battlestar Galactica when it starts up again.


• Planting the retaining wall in the back yard, finally.


• Getting steps built for the hot tub, so we don't have to step off the deck onto that ratty old plastic step stool any more.


• Getting a/c installed, so I'm actually functional in August this year.


• Cleaning out the downstairs Closet Where Things Go To Die.


• Buying some furniture: an armoire for the bedroom to put the tv on and bedding in; a sectional for the family room; a new curio; a prep cart for the kitchen; a table for the deck and maybe a grill


• House repairs/maintenance: fixing two broken windows; a house-wide professional steam clean; furnace service/air duct cleaning; roof/gutter cleaning


• Cleaning out the garage (this is a month-long project in itself)


• Re-finishing the vanity I got from my grandmother, and putting it upstairs where it belongs.


• Working on a couple of personal project pages: one for all my travel pics, and one for my domestic architecture fetish.


• Finishing getting my hard drive cleared and sorted properly. Gigs of video and pics that need to be put in their proper places and burned off.


• Refinancing the house to pay for much of the above, plus school, since my student loan situation is weird for the near future.


• Getting caught up on a lot of video games I've been meaning to play. I have a Sims 2 game ongoing, which has been fun, but I still need to get through Exile and Alice, and maybe pop back into AC for a while. I've also been enjoying Zoo Tycoon 2, and I need to start kicking mekle's ass on Rise of Nations again.

If I get the time/feel up to it, I may also start practicing my piano skills again, and maybe do a bit of composing, if I get a bug and get the software I've been wanting. The new office has space for me to hook up my keyboard, finally, so that might be fun to dig into. I've also been considering studying Algebra again. Not because I need it, since WWU doesn't require it, but I feel like I should finally get the fuck past that roadblock and just do it. I also have a few things to do to get prepared to start classes, too, like getting a measles shot.

We're also thinking about a short vacation in August. Haven't decided where, although the Canadian Rockies have been calling me for some time.

I'm also hoping to fit in quite a bit of socializing, too. mrdorbin's parties have been reminding me that I need to catch up with a lot of people. mekle and I are already planning an end-of-summer/labor day/his birthday/sending me off to school party somewhere in early September. Details on that when we get closer.

This is all, of course, assuming that my sabbatical isn't subject to jurus interruptus. I report to the courthouse in Everett on the 5th. I hope my naturally opinionated nature gets me out of it. Or, if I do have to do something, it's just quick and easy. Some guy cooking meth in his apartment with a buttload of evidence or something. I dread the idea of getting something really ugly and intense like domestic violence or something gory. I can handle watching that stuff on CSI when I know it's fake, but for real... bleh.

Random: Am I the only one unimpressed by X&Y? It lacks fire.

I'm enjoying the hell out of this sabbatical so far, even though I'm tired. This is the first time I've had so much time off in ages. I'm so glad I ditched the sites. They were fun, but also a lot of work, and I'm just glad to not have to be thinking about it anymore, except on a purely observational level. I didn't realize how much time I really was spending on them until I stopped. I still have some cleanup work to do on them, but it's so nice to not be wondering what I have to do next.

Comments

[thefirstalicat.livejournal.com]

Good luck on getting out of jury duty! I was called 4 times while living in CA, but never served: the first time I was a student and only got paid for the days I worked, so had a hardship exemption; the second time was something like a week before I moved to Seattle; the fourth time was someone caught with several pounds of pot and I noted that I disagreed with the drugs-are-illegal laws; and the fourth (this was the best one!), it took a whole week of waiting in the jury pool room before I was called for a civil case - involving my department at UCSF, and people I knew. Even so, I was called to the jury box and questioned by the lawyers; only when I pointed out that I worked in the department and knew the sexist, old boy's network situation at play there (this was a discrimination-on-the-basis-of-gender case) did they dismiss me.

I always wondered how that one turned out, though....