Moving: Day Million

I would just like to state, loud and clear, that moving sucks ass and I'm never doing it again. We're going to live in 41 Pleasant St. until the day we die.

HUGE thank yous go out to:
John, for his never-ending patience with me
Heather, Assistant Packer, Chief Direction Giver and Bringer of Sushi
Roommate Michelle, Chief State St. Dog Comforter
"Grandpa" Dave, Friday Dog Watcher
Chris and Mara, Saturday Dog Watchers
John, for not killing me yet (I am NOT the easiest person to deal with when moving)
Heather and Mara (again) for potentially not making me look at boxes for a couple of hours on Sunday while we eat delicious dimsum and possibly go get manicures. The mere possibility is making me giddy with delight.

Now, it is time to (finally) go to sleep so that we can do MORE packing and moving and sweating and cursing tomorrow. UGH.

New Project: Bottles on a Budget!

As if I don't have enough to do these days, we're starting a new blog. (Well, hopefully "we." I'm trying to convince Roommate Michelle and Le Boyfriend to pitch in.)

I am proud to introduce... Bottles on a Budget! A blog about wines under $20 and beers under $10. We're going to focus on laymen's reviews of wine and beer, and less on the "there were oak undertones, with a hint of lavender and citrus." I'm more of a "Did it taste good? Yes/No." and "Was it affordable?" person, so that's what we're gonna do. We'll probably throw some stuff about New Haven, Connecticut vineyards, food, Connecticut breweries, and local merchants in there, too.

So mosey on over and check out Bottles on a Budget. "Magical beer, magical wine...tasty, delicious and best when it's mine!"

Material Girl?

In the process of packing, I have once again come to an uncomfortable conclusion:

I have way too much crap.

Now, I could rationalize it by saying that I am the one bringing a bedroom set, the majority of the kitchen stuff, and the majority of the entertainment system, which of course means that I have a lot of stuff.

But let's face it, I don't need 16 kinds of bowls and 3 teapots.

I could also attempt to excuse myself from the situation with the concept that a lot of this stuff is childhood/college/art projects/whatever, and that they aren't living at my parent's house because my parents live 800 miles away. And that I'm saving my parents some space in their basement. And saving them work when they someday move.

But let's face it, am I ever going to actually display the giant painted ostrich egg from some high school project that I don't even remember the purpose of? (I do remember the class, teacher, and how much goofing off we all did in that class, though.) And what the heck am I actually going to do with all of my notes and papers from college?

Then there's the excuse that I buy things in bulk and on sale, because it's better to have 6 boxes of pasta when they're on sale than buy them one at a time at full price.

But let's face it, that's such a Midwestern mentality: stock up and wait the bad times out. And I a) no longer live in the Midwest and b) have a pretty solid knowledge that my job isn't going anywhere (though I did move departments, but they can't run the Bass Media program without me).

Oh wait! I have all of these collectibles and vintage things and antiques! And I have family heirlooms! And stuff from those years that my grandparents lived in Africa/Turkey/Europe! And it must be kept safe and cherished and maybe some of it is special enough to be displayed!

But let's face it, that's just a socially acceptable form of hoarding.

And don't get me started on the sheer number of books that I have...

I don't know how to deal with the art and the artifacts and the antiques and the pasta and the books and the 16 bowls and 3 teapots at this time. Actually, thinking about reducing my number of possessions is sort of scary. We're programmed to show our worth and personality through the amount and type of stuff that we have. I'm an educated, cultured, 20-something female with many talents, my stuff says. I can put together a kick-ass entertainment system just as easily as I can do some crazy 16th note runs in Bach, but don't forget that I'm a cook and a book worm, too. I can build a Hackintosh and I can sew buttons back on shirts. (I...am...Renaissance Woman!)

So let's face what I can deal with. After the dust settles from the move, I am going to digitize all of the college notes. Scan it in, label it, file it, recycle the paper. That should get rid of some of the stuff I have, without getting rid of the thoughts and ideas and millions of hours I spent agonizing over the lives of dead people in 17th century Italy. Maybe I'll convince Le Boyfriend to do the same, and we'll both get rid of some dead weight.

If Walls Could Talk...

If my walls could talk, right now the new ones would be exclaiming about how much of my vocabulary is uncouth and downright awful.

Right now, I'm working on moving from one apartment in New Haven to another. Nothing's wrong with the current apartment; I've spent 16 great months here. I'm moving in with Le Boyfriend, an event which I think my parents are pretending isn't happening and the rest of my social circle wishes was just done already, so I'd stop bitching talking about it.

But in my defense, this is turning into a Nightmare. That's right, with a capital N. We were told that the kitchen would be done before we moved in. Well, we technically move in Aug. 1, but they still haven't laid tile in the kitchen. Which means that there's no cabinetry and no appliances in there, either. In fact, the wooden padding that goes between the tile and the old linoleum isn't finished yet. I know this because I have a key to the apartment already, so that we can move some stuff in before this weekend.

Now, I normally wouldn't be so concerned, but for two issues:
1: The bathroom renovation in my current apartment that was supposed to take 2 weeks to complete took 3.5
2: R, the new tenant taking my room, has a move date of Saturday, that we're trying really hard to accommodate. If the kitchen isn't done, I can't finish moving in. I'm not "living" in a place that I can't even safely store my breakfast cereal and soy milk.
Experience tells me that it may very well take longer than the original estimate, and then I've got a concerned R in the other ear.

R and I had the conversation about how long it would take me to move out my stuff while the landlord was standing there with us in my kitchen. So it's not like he doesn't know of all the concerns/issues. I'm beginning to think that moving in with my grandmother might be a simpler solution. The fact that she lives in Indiana? Minor detail. We'll invent teleportation to get around that problem.

I may have neglected to mention the annoyance of a heat wave. Packing while breathing in what feels like soup is painful. Seriously. Le Boyfriend almost gave himself a case of heat exhaustion on Sunday when we moved the first truckload of stuff over. (I made him sit his ass down and drink half a Gatorade. "You can't 'power through' in this heat. Mostly because I can't 'power through' getting you to the hospital because you're being a stubborn dumb ass," I told him. Guilt: perfect for all those time you need to "help" someone make a decision!)

Moving apartments during the last week of July during a heat wave? Not the best idea ever. Le Boyfriend has been informed that we are never ever ever moving again because I can't deal with the thought of it (he laughed, but agreed).

I'm moving some more stuff tomorrow, with a friend that I helped move several weeks ago. I'm desperately hoping that maybe, maybe the tile will be down on the kitchen floor when I walk in the door?

Well, a girl can dream, right?

You drive me crazy

It's time for another sporadic update by yours truly, The SMiChick. Today we shall talk about something near and dear to my own heart, because it's been a rough couple of days/weeks/months and I have things that I finally know how to deal with.

In other words...

Erin's List of Things That Drive Her Bat Shit Crazy*

1. Inefficiency
   
   There are 24 hours in the day. I spend roughly 8 of them sleeping, 2-3 of them eating or preparing food to eat, another ~7.5 at work, 1 hour of travel/outdoor time and 1.5 hours in transition between the states of sleep and work. That leaves me with around 2 hours of time for movies, books, cleaning, ParkerPuppy cuddle time, and whatever else I want or need to do. I do not want to spend any more time than I have to on Requirements (cleaning, food prep, daily duties, etc.). Less time with Requirements means more Erin Time. And I think we can all agree that personal time is awesome, and deserves to be hoarded.
   
   So when I find ways to spend less money, less time, less resources on Requirements, I tend to make them part of my habits. I use retailmenot.com. I stack the wet, clean dishes in the rack for maximum drying ability while being able to easily take the stack apart so that everything can be put away in moments (hint: put like things together in the rack). I have the shower stuff organized in the order I use it so that I don't have to think about what I'm grabbing, I just go to the same spot every day and use it (shampoo, conditioner, face wash, body wash - you have to use the shampoo first because it comes before conditioner, everything else comes after conditioner so that you can leave it in for a little while to get everything nice and soft and smooth and shiny). I buy things on clearance ($1.50 bag of whole meal flour at Target, SCORE!). Make up is in a drawer organizer, grouped by item and color. All of this means that I can spend what's leftover from my resources, whether it be time or money or less stress on things that I actually like to do. Like sleep. Or read. Or attempt new complicated recipes of deliciousness. If you don't waste effort in the first place, you can do a lot of amazing things that you like with it later on. (Yes, sleep is wholly in the amazing category.)
   
   
2. Bad Drivers, and People Who React Poorly to Bad Drivers
   
   Yes, Johnny Appleseed, I am totally looking at you. And yes, New England, am I totally staring you down about this issue. First of all, being a jackass driver puts you, the people in your car, and every other person on the road at risk. So contemplate the fact that jackassery has gotten people killed, and other people sued through the years, and that yes, Tiny Voices, it could happen to you, too. Both the death and the suing.
   
   I could quote statistics at y'all until I'm blue in the face, but there's no point in that. I can't control the fact that not many people care about statistics because they don't have a personal connection to a set of numbers and a bell curve. But I CAN control how I react to the jackassery on the highway. And so can you.
   
   Tell me, what does flipping someone off do for you? It certainly doesn't make you a nicer person, 'cause as Grandma Lucy would say "You are how you act and if that's the gesture or language that you're going to use, you are not a very nice person and you can leave." (Grandma Lucy is fully of nuggety wisdom.) What does honking your horn achieve? Alerting them to the fact that you have one? Congrats, I'm so glad that you have a working horn installed!! That's mega-awesome, dude. And obnoxious as hell.
   
   Actually, I'll make the pop quiz super easy for y'all: it accomplishes nothing productive. Nothing good happened because someone flipped someone else the bird. Nothing wonderful occurred when you draped yourself over the horn for three very long minutes. You know what did happen? You reacted. To a jerk. And then you became an extension of that jerk. You have the self-control of a jerk. And a three year old. Actually, I'm pretty sure ParkerPuppy has more self-control than you in that jerk-moment, and he ain't the brightest bulb in the box.
   
   So now we have a jerk, an extension of the jerk reacting to the jerk, and my dumb-ass dog being a better human being than you are. Ain't this a pretty sight. (If you can't hear my sarcasm, let me make it easy for you: this part is dripping with it.) Grow up. Be patient. Be polite. Use your turn signal; it's included for a reason. And stop making illegal U-turns in the middle of the street like a dumbass. Yes, I'm still looking at you, Johnny Appleseed.
   
   
3. People With Poor Planning/Communication Skills
   
   Just email me the night before if we need to play Car Tetris. Seriously. We have a one lane driveway and I am not at your beck and call.
   
   As far as those skills are related to everything else - if I think you are rude and/or stupid I won't take you seriously. Or I might take you seriously and try to ruin everything you do. Or I might wholly ignore your existence. Or any combination of those things, really. Making me think you are inconsequential (or a potential enemy) is probably really, really bad, because then I don't give a fig what you do or say or want or think. Eh, I'll just do it my way. Or I'll get super passive aggressive. I'm not proud of those moments, but if it gets me what I want or need, I'll live with it. (I'm surprisingly able to live with a lot of moral compromises. Comes with being a godless heathen and all, I'm sure.)
   
   
4. Religious Hypocrisy
   
   I'ma let that one stew in your head for a while. Just know that I hate it. Lots.
   

*Bat Shit Crazy is a term I often use to denote levels of extreme craziness. See most references to my family for further examples.

Try a little harder

I'm really bad at this.

First of all, I don't think that I have lots of random interesting things to say all the time. There's enough OTHER people blathering on the Internet without me helping say a whole lot of nothing.

Then there's the time component. I have a full time job, a budding photography hobby, a choir, a choir board, a holiday ensemble, a dog, volunteer work on weekends at the Peabody, a period music ensemble, occasional pet sitting, normal everyday chores (dishes, laundry, etc) and have recently acquired the Johnny Awesomesauce, my boyfriend (sort of like Johnny Appleseed, only...awesomesauce. You can blame "How I Met Your Mother."). So between social obligations, music obligations, work, dog poop patrol and sleep, I'm sort of BUSY.

Thirdly, I can't figure out how personal to make this blog. I used to write, near-daily in fact, on LiveJournal. It was theraputic. It was dramatic. It definitely helped me chronicle my writing style as it changed, and improved my typing speed like crazy. I was all over that bitch in high school, and the first half of college, but then it sort of died after I got back from Ireland (end of Fall 2006). I started this particular blog for an internship at Saint Mary's, and I'd sort of like to remain true that original purpose - semi-academic, well-crafted thoughtful postings on women, technology, feminism, and education. Yeaaaaaahhhhh. That sort of died.

So now I have no idea what to do. I don't want to chit chat about Johnny Awesomesauce all day long, because we're just dating and starting out. It's not like we're getting married or popping out babies. I don't want to talk about insanely personal parts of my life like I used to on LJ. DUDE you do not need to know about my periods. Or why I have issues with my parents. (What 20-something doesn't?) But I do want the freedom to brag about just how much fun J.A. and I have, or something goofy ParkerPuppy does, or shamelessly promote my fledgling photography skills.

So maybe I just say to hell with my inhibitions and make this blog exactly what I want to be despite these weird loyalties to The Original Purpose of this thing. Or maybe I go take a nap and think on it. Actually I rather like that last idea...

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...

Totally not tech related. Read at your own risk/boredom.

I sort of want a tattoo.

Problem is, the tattoo that I want would require a lot of time, ink, pain, money and skin. When I described the concept to a friend of mine who has several tattoos, she laughed at me and said that while it would be neat, I would probably never do it. My Cousin of Awesome in Nashville also thought that it would be "damn cool" but advised that I might want to start with a small part of it and "grow it out."

Her phrasing being completely apt, we laughed and smiled on the car ride home from the airport when we were talking about it (albeit quietly so as not to wake the sleeping angel in the backseat). In short, I want a vine-and-flower tattoo. And I'm not talking about some pretty little pink rose and a curly bit of stem around it: my body would be the growing stake for the vine. It would start at my left ankle, curl around my calf and thigh, wrap around my stomach and chest, and flow across my upper back to my right shoulder and then down my right arm with a final flower ending across the back of my hand.

I know, I know (shut UP Tiny Voices). That would be some serious ink. For a girl that has NONE. So let's examine why Erin the Fearless hasn't yet done this.

1) I don't know anything about tattoos. Like, how to design them or where to go or how much they cost or how to take care of them. Everyone in my life who does have them, lives in Indiana. Fat lot of good that does me here in New Haven.

2) Money. Actually, that's a cop out answer. Scratch that. I'm not telling you, Internet, how much I make ('cause that ain't yo' bizniz and all), but I assure you, if I can afford to buy plane tickets like mad all summer long, I can afford some ink.

3) Needles. I don't like 'em. At all. I am told that the sensation of tattoo needles is not the same as the needles that the YHP shoves in my arm when it's time for a flu shot or the anti-cervical cancer thingy, but I've got a healthy fear respect for shiny, pointy things that I can feel in my arm/ass/gumline/where ever it's being put. I had to deal a lot with needles as a kid because of my food allergies, and while I've conquered my fear loathing utter and complete horror issues with needles on an everyday basis, I'm a little scared to find out what happens when I purposefully lay myself out on a table so that some guy/gal/certified creature can poke tiny, rapid, ink-filled holes in my pale Irish skin.

(The Tiny Voices would like to me address the fact that I have a nose piercing. "That required a needle! One that you could actually see light through, if you held it up and looked through it!" Yes, yes, I had that done. But that was one needle and it was fast and despite the fact that it bled, it wasn't that scary because I knew it would be over damn quick. Also, the dude doing it was cute and had the best Irish accent ever.)(SHUT UP!)

4) Professionalism. While IT is not particularly known for being overly strict about how you look, and the media does a damn good job of stereotyping portraying geeks as people who should be free to dress, pierce, tattoo, etc. themselves however they'd like (a la Abby from NCIS, assorted characters from Bones, and some other assorted forensic science shows that are filled with kick ass female characters that I watch), I have had it beat into my pretty little Midwestern head that Mature People do not get tattoos, Tattoo'd People do not get Good Jobs, and all of that other elitist BS that exists.

Problem is that it's still justified in said pretty little head because I still don't know what I'm doing with my life. Yeah, I'm never gonna be the CEO of Chase (ew) or an elementary school teacher in the Midwest (or anything in the Midwest if I can help it) or anything else that requires you to be God Fearing and Conservative, but what if I want to be a CIO or the head of a dept. or something else that requires you to be Professional and Mature? I don't see the CIOs of either school I've worked for hosting tattoos.

(Granted, I interviewed successfully at last summer's internship and Yale while forgetting to remove wearing a nose ring, so it's quite possible that the stereotyping work force is getting looser on the whole Conservative Conformity thing.)

5) My Mother. She's still pretending that the nose jewelry is a sticker. Though I gleefully look for ways to push her buttons, the sheer DRAMA that would occur when I came home sporting a giant vine crawling up my leg and down an arm is not something with which I wish to deal. In fact, I'm fairly certain that I would not wish that "discussion" upon all but the worst of my (mostly fictional) enemies.

Although it might just prove to be so shocking that no one says a damn thing, which would be awfully awesome. But unlikely.

6) Permanency. Yeah, that shit's forever. I like how I look without tattoos. Would I like how I look with them? I don't know. I guess I could Sharpie myself for a month and find out, but that's a lot of work. And while I'm not really lazy, per say, I don't have that much dedication for a project that has a 50% chance of not happening.


It doesn't help that half the time I ease into things and the other I go for the all-or-nothing approach. (Hey, I never said I was rational!) For this, I have no idea which would be best, because the ink IS permanent, so you might as well go for the complete Body Vine as the Pretty Little Rosebud, because neither one of those suckers is leaving without some serious time with Mr. Laser and Dr. Dermatologist.

So am I insane, or do I just need to sort of direct my desires/curiosities? Thoughts on how to do the latter?