Baby Finances

That plans for Christmas before Thanksgiving. Today instead of doing the little work I did have to do - I spent it Christmas shopping. It was very productive though. I got a lot done in that sense. I just want to get some things settled. I'm feeling so unsettled and ungrounded because of the upcoming move. I can't finalize any moving details until I find a place. Which is actually really hard to do when you don't live there (surprise... not.) Hopefully I'm make a Boston house hunting trip soon - and then I can figure something out. I never thought life could be so complicated. Can't I just have fun and not have to think about these things all day?

So today has been pretty cool so far. I went to work, got a free massage after work, went to the grocery store and got stuff to make an Apple Gadette - and picked up some delicious scallops too! Made the gadette - and now I'm waiting for it to cool to see how tasty it will be. The weird part about today is that I'm watching a Nova episode or something on PBS about funeral homes. I've never really thought much about them and they lifestyle that you would have doing that type of thing. I've experienced my fair share of death in my life. But not on a daily basis. I've always been a little creeped out by dead bodies. I always think back to zombie movies - and think that they are going to jump up and grab me. Every time at a funeral home I'm always watching the dead person's chest to check to make sure that it's not moving. They never really look "right" like when they were living either. I don't think that there is any way to capture ...

I've totally been thinking about what I want out of life lately. Not only b/c of the new job and needing to move (thought I admit that that has been the major motivating factor in this train of thought) - really it comes down to me second guessing my choice. I always second guess myself (I mean - what happens if I was wrong... it happens ... though I won't admit it in an argument - b/c I am always right!) After some serious (read: 20 seconds) of thought - I've realized that being in your 20's is the time to decide what is right for your life. There are many roads to reach the same destination. Some are more direct - but much harder. Some are long and winding and scenic; while others are long boring and then all of a sudden you are there. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that I feel like I should be having fun, trying to figure out what I want to do with my life, not just trying to reach a goal. The goal should be the journey not the destination. So I nee...

So I read an article about average things with lots of germs on them - and they said that laundry was up there and that the average pair of used underwear had 1gram of fecal matter on them (gross - I know.) That just makes me think - does no one wipe their ass? Is this incomplete ass wiping. I wonder what A) how they came up with the stats B) is there a disparity between mens and women's underwear? C) does this mean that everyone should wear white underwear so that we can bleach and sanitize them D) that old adage saying that you would never want to go to the hospital in dirty underwear is soooo true E) I'm totally grossed out by this F) I'm so glad I don't do laundry for a living The other odd place I hadn't thought of was the kitchen sink. That there were tons of germs per square inch. After thinking about this one I totally concur. I don't know about anyone else but I mainly use my sink for washing fruits and veggies - IE all the germies on the grocery ...

To answer Josh's question... the guy has two good laptops, and he does some computer stuff for a living (I don't really know what...) A windows one and a mac that he just bought and apparently is obsessed with. I know the mac one is a personal laptop.... I'm not sure about the windows one. I'm guessing it's a work laptop. I'm all about my solution for a work computer... have mine laptop at home and just remote desktop in. Then I don't have to screw around with the stupid VPN and then I don't have to have work files on my personal computer. I don't want the possibilities of my work and personal files to get mixed up. I don't want any possibility of impropriety or possibility of even an image of stealing work secrets or proprietary information. I just don't want that possibility to exist both for my own protection and for the protection of my company. None the less, my argument stands. If they guy wants two laptops - no matter why he w...

So for some reason I picked up corn tortillas at the grocery store instead of the normal flour ones. I have to say that corn tortillas are the most terrible thing that has ever been invented. They're horrible. I think that the rest of them are going to go in the trash. Terrible terrible hateful things. So in all my glory of nothing to do at work today I found an article on Digg about a woman who had so screwed up her families finances that they were $135K in credit card debit. Let me repeat that $135K in credit card debit. Their house was another $685K or something ridiculous - and she didn't work and spent over $400/month just on Starbucks. Her husband - made 60-70K a year. Holy shit. How do people let things get that bad? That's just freaking crazy. I can't even imagine. I know that things can get expensive but geeze - live within your means. Her kids didn't even have health insurance. I guess I've never felt like I had to "keep up with the ...

I started writing about the nicknames I've given people at work (oh there are a lot of them) - but I realized that the internet is probably not the most discrete place to write them. So I've erased it all and been forced to write about something less incriminating. Can we talk about the fact that I've been having huge sugar cravings and just want to sit around and watch TV? I think I've watched more TV in the last few weeks that I have in the last year. I think I need some more hobbies. I might sign up for an ice skating class. I thought that might be something to do. Who wouldn't like to actually be able to ice skate around the rink? There's a 6 week class at a local ice rink that I might sign up to. It's only $100 - why not? I'll be done before I move to Boston. I've never really learned how to skate - so it could be fun. Or unbearably hideous. If so - I'll never have to do it again. If it's fun - then I had some fun and learn...

OMG I should totally be a spy instead of an engineer! (Or I could make designer hand bags...) I got this from an article about a spy bar in Milwaukee (Josh take note - a REAL SPY BAR!!! with passwords to get in, secret entrances, spy tests!) so I thought "I wonder what it takes to be a spy?" So, being the curious mind that I am - I quickly established that I knew nothing about spies or how to become one. Then I used my analytical thinking skills to come up with a solution ... CIA.GOV! and looked it up. Apparently Biological Engineering is a needed skill in the CIA. Who knew? I guess all those biological weapons and stuff ... people need to know how they work and how to stop them. Maybe I should become a biological weapons expert, or a field agent, or just wear cool spy clothing and have cool spy gadgets. I wanna be like inspector gadget! Go Go Gadget arms! Or I could have cool James Bond style gadgets - like a Blackberry! Rock! Who needs stuff like cars that can automa...

It's delicious trying to eat the stuff up in my cupboards and freezer. I forgot that I had some of my mom's tasty homemade rolls (frozen of course - like everything else in a good midwest family home.) DELICIOUS! I could eat those things all day. I've totally forgotten about half the stuff that I've bought. Since I have to start eating it up it's a time to explore the cabinets and come up with meal ideas that actually use up some of these rarely used items. Makes the grocery bill a lot slimmer - and makes for some interesting dinner combinations. There have definitely been success and failures in this quest so far. The greatest failure was a Thai red curry made from this mix that I bought a while ago and haven't used (mainly b/c every time I looked at it I couldn't really figure out why I had bought the damn thing in the first place.) I have to say - it ended up being a complete and total failure. The sauce was not spicy enough - and it was not hot e...

The great part about clean up my apartment really means that all those buttons that you get when you buy a new pair or pants or a suit jacket or whatever - YOU FIND THEM! All those little buggers have been hiding from me for months. MONTHS! Now the little fuckers are all together in a little box where I can actually find them. This is HUGE! Now I can put the right button on the right pair of pants... now if only I could find my thread and needles to do that... Guess I have a lot of work ahead of me. I wish you could pay someone else to organize you.

Finalized everything today... now I just have to move to Boston at the end of the year. So now I have something new to obsess over. I obsess. A lot. I like obsessing over stuff. It's kind of fun. My obsessing has lots of stages. Stage 1: Beginning of obsessing. This typically includes getting lots of information "just in case." Trying to get basic information and a general idea about the lay of the land. In the case of moving this includes but is not limited to getting initial moving quotes, researching different areas that I could live in, finding out what the drive to work/airport would be, and writing out extensive "to do lists" that I have no intention of fully following. Finally doing some "spring cleaning," again, "just in case." Stage 2: Semi-Hard core obsessing. (Current stage.) Includes freaking out and thinking "I'll never find anywhere to live," "I won't be able to afford any of this," and ...

Baking... not eating. In the name of trying to start eating up all my food in my cabinets for the move ... I've started trying to get rid of the baking supplies. Which means making cookies and bringing them in to work for everyone else to eat. I don't want to get fat off of all these cookies! So tonight will be the second night this week spent baking cookies. The problem comes in the proportions. You always need to buy butter - and I don't have enough flour - but I've got too much brown sugar (I thought I had ran out - two shopping trips in a row.) Now I've got enough brown sugar to last me about a normal year and a half. I need other people to live with so that I can pawn my cookies off on more people. Job negotiations are going pretty well. I need to call and ask a few final questions - then do the formal acceptance thing and have them send me the paper work. I'm looking at moving at the end of the year. Anyone wanna do New Years in Boston? I read th...

I totally made cookies - and they are tasty. Like mad tasty. Mmmm cookies. Chocolate chip oatmeal cookies with pecans! I accomplished quite a bit this weekend and am freaking out just slightly less than I was on friday night. I've still got a ton to do... but it always seems a bit more manageable after you get a few things done. It's amazing how a few experiences can really make a person give up the fight at work. Another employee has started to "drink the koolaid" and is now just as bitter as the rest of us. Congrads! Welcome to the show! Sit down, kick back, have a drink, and just try to get through the day. The Dilbert on Sunday really is what happens at my job. It's whicked funny. I do try to warn people - but they don't believe me. So then they try it - and fail - and then I laugh at them. They are not amused.

One of my co-workers started talking about the Emmy's or some other stupid Hollywood award show that they were watching - and how the award recipents were completely horrible in person. They didn't know what to say - couldn't ad lib. Just poor speakers. They contrasted this with the Tony Awards were they thought the actors were better spoken - could ad lib. Noting that stage actors and movie/TV actors were very different in that regard. Without cue cards or a script they didn't know what to say or do. I'd like to contrast the current disparity between the stage and hollywood with movies from back in the day. Like 1950 and previous. I would argue that these actors had very similar styles to the stage actors of their time; that they could easily move between the stage and the sound stage. The movies of that era were completely different as well. I can't say if the actor was better or worse than today - just different. People have different expectations of...

Good news! In the process of getting everything settled. Very hard to be at work and not say anything to anyone. I will probably have hard news to report by the end of next week. Unless I'm too busy doing more important things wink wink* This week was absolutely exhausting. I've been at work or hanging out with the out of town employees from like 8am-10pm everyday. I haven't had much time to myself over the last few days. This weekend is not going to be filled with anything really interesting. I'll be doing some "spring cleaning" to prepare for a move. Cleaning up in general. I figure that the more time and effort I spend now getting everything organized and together - the easier it will be to move and unpack. I don't want to be running around the night before a move trying to deal with stuff I should have done weeks ago. It's amazing the stuff that you find when you are cleaning up to. Stuff you forgot that you had. Or everything is so spre...

I really hate being an adult sometimes. It's not the bills and responsibilities so much as the really tough choices. But then when you take a step back and really think about what I want out of life and who I want to be - the choices aren't so tough anymore. *Sigh* Waiting really sucks. Good thing though; all this waiting has made my try to distract myself with household chores I should have done ages ago. So I'm really getting my place organized and together if nothing else. It's a nice feeling to have things together and organized and know where to find things. I could really use a spa day and a day of no responsibilities and not having to think/deal with all this crap. It's kind of bad that I'm so frustrated so early in the week. This waiting has got me on edge. Everyone else isn't on pins and needles as to what is going to happen. I need some distractions. Please anyone - I need something to do instead of sitting around thinking about it and ...

I finally got mufasa's muffler fixed today. But I think that Mufasa is going to keep his name. I like having a nickname for my car - it makes it a little more personal. It's really weird getting in and starting theI car and it's silent. I can't even tell that the car had started. It's a weird feeling. It doesn't feel like my car - it feels like a whole new experience. It's like I got a whole new car! I'm amazed how long this car has lasted. Hopefully it will keep lasting for a while. I like not having a car payment. It may look like a pile of rust - but it does pretty well for me. I went to the eye doctor yesterday b/c I need more contacts. They dialated my eyes which is always an 'amazing' experience. I should have taken pictures of the freak eyes.... then I work up this morning with either a horrible attack of allergies or an incredibly bad sinus infection. I think that they are related. Along with the horrible stomach ache. Bas...

I came up with a corny - yet potential amazing business idea today. Now I just have to figure out how to accomplish the task - and then how to sell it to the business that would really want it... just give me time my friends. Just give me time.

So yesterday I confessed to my not-so-secret love of bad reality TV. I was mistaken. The Office is the best thing EVER. It's absolutely hilarious in its ability to make fun of situations by blowing them out of proportions (think Seinfeld funny.) I'm so happy that I can now stream it for FREE! Today someone at work said that I should be an animation. When I asked why - I was compared to a "real-life Dilbert." I don't think I make up the ridiculous rules/regulations/officeness - but rather I make fun of them. I don't see how other people can actually refrain from making fun of them. It is just so apparent to me - it's like I'm constantly being Captain Obvious. I think I have a good humor about all the crap that goes on. I don't have a lot of patience - but good humor about mistakes as long as people don't repeat them a million times. The only thing that makes me really mad is when people aren't trying. Just try SOMETHING. I get re...

So I have a confession: I love horrible "reality" tv. I know, I know, I'm horrible. I can't help but watch shows like "The Bachelor." It's the most amazing and most horrible parts of the US in one show. There are girls who drink way too much and take off their tops and run around half naked, then there are "christians" that want to stick to their "morales" and must tell everyone around them about it. It's like the range of humanity that you are able to watch... in one hour a week. Or if you're lazy like me - and only watch TV shows online - then it's really only about 43 minutes. Its like people watching at the mall or on the beach or at a cafe in Paris. It's all the amazing fun-ness of eves dropping. You feel really guilty doing it - but it's so much fun. It's my dirty not-so-secret. I hate waiting. I have another week until I hear from Boston. It's hard to wait. I really just wish I would kno...