(Upon proofreading, I think I might have already blogged about this)

People often ask me why I've never married. As much as I embrace the spinster situation I've got going for myself, sometimes I wonder myself why there are people out there who have married not once, but several times. I kind of don't get it. I hold out on even talking to interested boys, let alone go on a date with them. Let alone flipping marry them. Who are these women who marry the first man they come across? Do they just fear being alone? I like being alone, frankly. I like being able to leave my shoes where they land and having the option of not showering or vacuuming. Sure it would be nice to have someone to contribute to my income, take out the trash or kill a bug, but I've put up with it this long, what the hell. Easy trade-off, I guess.

My answer to the question is basically that I never wanted to drop the hammer. I've shacked up a few times, sure, and even have a ring from a long-ago engagement, but that's where I think it ends for me. I start envisioning permanence and it sort of freaks me out (or I should say "started" - options haven't come up much lately). Some people were meant to be alone, I think. I guess.

I didn't date a ton when I was younger, either. I did, but not a ton. I made out with scores of men, for sure, but that was mostly drunken fumbling and largely for my own entertainment. Nothing that would ever have been construed as potential relationship material - I think I might have been considered a good way to end up the evening. Thanks again to the magic of social networking, however, I'm finding that perhaps that wasn't necessarily always the case, and it kind of amuses me to find that there are boys out there who would have wanted more (lately they've been coming out of the woodwork). Why they wait twenty-plus years to let me know this is somewhat baffling, but whatever. My life has been a good one as a single gal.

Had I married when the opportunity arose, I wouldn't have been able to move to different states and countries (okay, country, but moving back to the US would be considered at the time moving to another country, so I'll leave it plural). I might have had kids, and, well, my theory has always been that children age you (on second thought, I probably wouldn't have kids). I wouldn't have had nearly the adventures, big and small, that I have had over the years and thusly would have been just another boring member of society, worried about stupid things and having nothing to contribute at the water cooler. That's not me.

I know what people are thinking when the subject arises and I tell them I've never married. The little half-cocked head and tiniest squint in the eyes says it all - Are you a lesbian? You don't LOOK like a lesbian. What's a lesbian look like? No, I'm not a lesbian (not that there's anything WRONG with that), and there's nothing kooky or off about me, either. The opportunity arose, but I opted out. Sometimes it's a better idea.

I'm not lonely (often), I don't feel like a part of me is not whole, I don't have a biological clock and I don't dream away my down time wondering where the man of my dreams is. I like that there are boys out there that wonder "what if". I like that I can come home from work and wear horrendous house clothes and have cheese and crackers for dinner. I like that I can (when financially plausible) take off to Mexico and blow somebody in the back of a taxi (you know, hypothetically speaking...), get really tan, come back to work and be completely competent at my chosen career - all the while not worrying about anybody else but ME.

So don't feel sorry for me, or wonder where I went wrong, or think if I made some changes I'd finally find someone and be happy. I'm perfectly happy. Envy my freedom, and respect my choice. I was never the girl who felt like she had to do something just because everyone else did.

Frizzless?

How often do I sit down on a Saturday morning or Friday night after an horrific work week and blog about what an horrific work week it's been? Probably a lot. And though this was a fun work week, it was also pretty brutal. I like this desk a lot, and of course this office. But holy man when I have to switch from thinking sporadically to thinking constantly it takes the stuffing right out of me.

I pretty much spent my life in Hillsboro this week. Twelve and thirteen hour days, too much coffee, not enough sustenance, WAY too many cigarettes. Lots of yelling at the computer/phone. Lots of self-doubt. Compliments, too, but I don't ever retain that stuff. The good news is that this particular branch knows how to have a good time in the midst of chaos, and they don't mind my spontaneous outbursts. And they had to hear a lot of them this week.

So I get up not as early as every other day but still pretty early. It confuses the cats. Lava thinks I'm oversleeping so she sits on my shoulder and meows into my ear as a gentle reminder that kibble is lacking and the litter box is not. At least she allowed me that extra half hour.

If it's month end, that means color, so I drove the 214 miles from Hillsboro to Portland for my fix. It's worth it, I love the salon and my colorist is a flipping rock star. Lately they've been hyping this new procedure having to do with keratin and smooth hair. It's really expensive, though, and the process sounds a little frightening, so I've pretty much written it off. QTip Girl lives.

Except my stylist, Star, just got it done. And her hair looks fantastic.

So basically, you sit in a chair for like three hours while they pretty much bake this keratin into your hair. The result is straighter hair, lots of body and shine, and no frizz. I mean none. For like four months. Like you could go out in humidity and have it not frizz up. Or stand in the rain and when it dries it dries straight, with no fuzz and no crazy bang formations or curls taking the wrong turn. My whole life I've never experienced that. Remember those girls at high school parties who could stand there, drinking a beer in the rain with no hood and just look completely fabulous? Yeah, I was so never that girl. I'd walk under a wet tree branch and come out the other end looking like a cotton ball. So, you know, I've always been intrigued.

I chatted with Starr before Taunja was ready for me, and I think what has had me really thinking about this procedure is how she leaned in and confided "It's probably the best thing that's ever happened to me." Pretty dramatic, right? And this from the girl who told me prior to her doing it that it was probably not up to the hype and people with hair like ours just learn at an early age to deal with it. But I totally get it. Starr may have less hair than me, but it's fine (like mine) and curly-but-not-in-an-easy-breezy-way (like mine), and rain and humidity is just not her/my friend. I totally understand that. Now, she says, she doesn't even think of what might be coming out of her head and what direction it's decided to go on any given occasion. I admit I'm pretty envious.

And am going to entertain the idea of it, huge cost and all. I know it's kind of crazy. It's only a matter of time before I become slightly obsessed with it.

But meanwhile, it's the end of a long and horrific week, with just ridiculous rain storms for a) May and b) me, and as much as I just want to lay on the couch all weekend, there is stuff to do. So I will hose off soon, dry my hair before it takes the shape of topiary, and get on with it.

And let the obsessing creep in.

History repeats itself (or, Buying that crock pot probably wasn't the best idea for me)

My dad did all the grocery shopping and cooking when I was growing up. I remember two carts and weekly receipts in the $100 range, when I got to the age where I paid attention to this stuff. He was the kind of shopper that would buy maple pecan ice cream (which nobody would eat) and then say, "Don't say I never buy ice cream". Or buy cookies and then hide them. Not for himself. I think he liked the power of saying he bought cookies that no one could find to eat.

Since he got home from work earlier than my mother, he was the cook. He did well, when you consider how much fun it has to be cooking for so many flipping people (I don't ever recall being made to eat vegetables, but I do remember having to finish my meat, and I've never been a big fan). I remember one time he tried to make stew in the crock pot. I'm not really sure what went wrong, but it did, and no one ever forgot it.

Whatever the hell it was just never thickened, and dinner that night was sort of a beef and vegetable soup more than anything else. Frozen mixed vegetables, some stew meat, and the sauce part that never thickened. It wasn't bad the first night, I don't think. But the second night I think he added water to the broth to make more of it. He didn't add anything else to it, so the potatoes that had originally been in it were growing scarce. By night three (more water), it became a challenge to actually find a potato. There might have been a carrot or two and some really overly cooked celery in there, and meat of course, but there were plenty of pearl onions (another unpopular vegetable in our house). We started calling it "Floating Onion Surprise" - the surprise was finding out the hard way that what you thought was a potato was actually a pearl onion. Bad surprise.

We didn't have a garbage disposal so after dinner that night my mom put the leftovers in a plastic baggie and had Tom try to sneak it down to the trash. He got caught. Dad made him bring it back upstairs and put it in the fridge. By night four all that water turned it into some kind of watery grey gruel with a tough sliver of meat occasionally floating by and innumerable pearl onions, but by then we were just filling up on bread and butter to survive. I think it lasted one more night and then even he wouldn't eat it.

So the other day I'm thumbing through the crock pot cookbook Jodi loaned me, and since it's May and has been raining since December, I was thinking something stew-like sounded good. I had a little bit of roast beef and a package of frozen stew vegetables, so I threw it together without actually consulting the cookbook. Put it on low and did my errands.

Eight hours later I took the lid off the crock pot and was stunned to see that history had repeated itself: thirty-five years later and I had unwittingly recreated Floating Onion Surprise.

Of course it tasted okay, there were a few potatoes and carrots in there and the broth was tasty. But when I'd finished my bowl and poked around to see what was left I discovered that all the potatoes ended up in my one bowl and all that was left were pearl onions.

I'm not eight years old anymore. I threw it away.

I've decided to stop writing about the weather.

I spend most of November through March anticipating Spring - you know Spring - April, May, beginning of June? Perhaps I've been spoiled by the last decade or so with Spring-like weather in those actual months of Spring: sunshine, breezes, puffy white clouds with no threat of anything ominous, showers here and there... Growing up here we'd always say it starts raining at the end of September and doesn't stop until the 5th of July, because that was pretty much the way it was. One day in roughly 2003 I found myself giving this explanation to someone, when a friend of mine who had not grown up here but had been living here for about eight years at that point corrected me. To her recollection, that was not the case. Perhaps in that short period of time it WAS the case. But all that doesn't matter anymore. It's been raining nonstop the entire months of April and May (so far) and frankly I'm not sure how much more I can take.

I won't continue to bitch about it, but it's only fair to warn you that the rain is no good for me. Yes it makes the flowers grow, blah blah blah, but Jesus Christ do the flowers really need buckets and buckets of never-ending rain every flipping day? Isn't that too much ever for them? Plus it's flipping freezing out. In the 40s. In May. Fuck.

So yeah, I think by yesterday I needed a break. Not just from the rain but also from Wednesday and Thursday, two days that nearly broke me. The desk I have been cleaning up isn't busy, per se, but there were some files on it that seriously took some razzle dazzle to close. Working eleven- and twelve-hour days didn't help either. After contemplating the things that NEEDED to get done around here yesterday, I showered, dried my hair, and took a nap. And then, when I woke up at about 12:30, I decided I wasn't done, and went back to the sofa for another three hours. So yeah, I didn't start running my half-assed errands until around 5:30pm. You know, I'm okay with that. I don't sleep away full days very often, but when I need it, I don't deny myself. Besides, seriously, it was POURING the entire day and who wants to be out in that? I'd rather be inside, doing nothing with the heat on (MAY).

So my cousin Dan won his election. I probably didn't even blog about that. But my cousin is a judge in Malheur County (most of you do not know where that is. It's a good thing we have Google, in case you really want to know) and he was re-elected by a landslide. Some people in the fam were a little apprehensive about this whole thing, due to the religious persuasion of his opponent and the growing number of residents in the county who are of the same persuasion. They hang out in packs, that group. It's not very Christian, if you ask me, but then again, I've never been asked to join a cult so I'm not sure how that works. Anyway, apparently there are more Irish Catholics that vote out that way (and plus, you know, he's been really good for the county), so Dan is the man again. He phoned Thursday night mid-celebration to tell me he was sitting with a guy I (and my friend Becky T much more than me) knew 20 years ago. Because that's the theme of 2010, my friends. People from the past just keep popping up. We chatted; next time I'm in Ontario we'll have beers. Who needs social networking when you're related to half of Malheur County?

My train of thought has just been broken because I had to go turn on the heat AND the light in this room. Because the clouds are growing darker and thicker and though sun usually comes in this room at like 6am this time of year, it's just not today. And because I'm not kidding you it's freezing in here.

But I'm not going to bitch about it anymore. By God we'll have the greenest grass and most vibrant colored flowers in all the land come July.

Fuck.

All I really want to do is sit in my living room and scream.

I can't believe it's Wednesday.
I can't believe it's only Wednesday.
I can't believe it's already Wednesday.

Night, no less.

I've pretty much had three work weeks in the last three days. Busy and a little bit nuts. And it's not like there's THAT much going on on the desk. I mean, I'm sort of typing up loose ends from the escrow officer that just left our company, so that can be mildly challenging, but in the middle of it all she's had a few files that are just ridiculous. Today's challenge was answering a thirty four page condition sheet - clearly this lender did not want to give this guy any money*. But we made it happen, and it's files like today's file that make me glad to do what I do and be somewhat good at it.

In the midst of all of this, the desk I've been working on finally caved in (it had been dropping screws out of the middle part of it for the past couple of months, and today it just sort of gave up just as we were starting a meeting on what to do with the ex-employee's files). It took two boys and Points At Lights II to finally get it straightened out, but it also took about two hours out of my work day. I've been getting to work in the 6-6:30am range, and though I was hoping I wouldn't have to tomorrow, I probably will. There's just shit to do.

Because next week I go west instead of east. I've been downtown for what seems like flipping ages, and though I do like being in the thick of things, the drive is starting to get to me. Seriously, today it was like roller derby trying to get from Columbia to Naito in one piece. People just suck. They suck. They will attempt to cut you off, or slow way the f down, or make sudden lane changes, all in a one block area. I battled for about five blocks with a Tri Met bus driver this evening, and let me tell you that bastard was NOT going to win. My car is already all beat to shit anyway, what's one more ding I can blame on that broad from the Safeway parking lot?

And SPEAKING of which, STILL NOTHING. I complained last week to my own claims person, who ended up being on vacation, per her out-of-office thing, and THEN I find out she's not even my claims person anymore. What the motherfuck? I know, Becky, I am totally going to call the other insurance company tomorrow and yell "I'm turning you bastards in", I just don't have the time or the memory to do it at work. New Claims Person listened to my bitch on Monday and swore she'd have an answer by today. Well thanks. Because I didn't get one. I only remember when I see the gaping hole on the side of my car but I'm sure all the other assholes driving home next to me just think I'm some scrub with no insurance. So wouldn't you think they would just stay away from me?

Okay. So I'm all over the map. My cats are staring at the ceiling and flipping out more than usual so maybe that means we're due for some sort of natural disaster (I just knocked on wood, relax), my emotions have been all over the grid today thanks to crazy weather, my Harvey, and imploding office furniture, and I think I need to go to bed and watch mindless drivel until I lapse into my bizarre dreamland. You may not hear from me for a few days, but I assure you I will be quite vocal and animated.
______________________
*He's one of those guys they should be THROWING cash at: wage-earner management position at a Fortune 500 company making six digits, pots of liquid assets, family firmly planted in the Pacific Northwest, putting about 65% down on a million + dollar house. Come on, lender. If not him, then who?

Maybe she was turned off by your overuse of commas.

By the end of last week I realized I was out of everything. EV RY THING. Contact lens solution, QTips, body wash, razors, coffee (COFFEE!), milk, vitamins, lotion, conditioner, perfume, clean chonies (how? I have like 150 pair), rice, cat food, antiperspirant, toilet paper. Seriously. How does it all run out at the same time? Rather, how do I let it?

This of course led to a costly visit to the Winco (so Cece has a woman that acts as her assistant, doing anything except housecleaning for a very reasonable fee, such as running errands, grocery shopping, walking her dog, arranging yesterday's garage sale, etc., and while I was at said garage sale we asked her where the cheapest place to get that kind of crap, toiletries, etc., is, since it seems to me even Target is raising their prices.. she said she buys most of that stuff at the Winco. I never do, always reserving it for a Target run, but I took her professional opinion and ran with it. The result? $25 more at the Winco, as opposed to the inevitable $80 at the Target. Item-to-item comparison? Not happening. But the Winco doesn't have costly distractions, either), and though I did not get EVERYthing on my list, I made a pretty solid dent. Can you believe that technically that paragraph was only one sentence?

It's getting worse, this constant pissing and moaning about how expensive things are getting. I keep thinking that I won't be flush to do flipping anything until I pay off my car, and then I can work on the rest of the crap, and then maybe, just maybe, I'll be happy to live off what I make, which, though it hasn't increased in six years, is really not that bad. Bah. I hate talking about money. I just want to be in a place where I don't constantly worry about it.

So yeah, yesterday rounded out a very interesting and off-kilter week. I ran a ton of errands and got much done, but will continue on today because I didn't get a minute to get the facial waxing done and plus I need some other stuff. Or want. Whatever. Work is busy as a result of some changes going on in the market, but hey, I love a challenge, and we're getting great feedback from clients and on top of that we're just a really strong group (some of us) in this branch. So that's good. And frankly it has me actually looking forward to work tomorrow, which is always a plus. Until I wake up and it's raining (which it might). Saturday felt like summer, and even two days of that kind of weather makes me all used to it and happy and then when it goes back to rainy/dreary, well, it's harder to take and the mood swings are a little bit more dramatic. You'd think my anticipation of it would give me more control over the whole thing, wouldn't you? Hm. No. Not really.

AND on Thursday I met up with the original Jan-o! Jan-o and I worked at Mitsubishi way back in the day in southern California - I started in '88 and she in '89 (she's still flipping there - I've had like four career changes and twenty-seven jobs and lived in three states and two countries since then. Or something.). She had some business here in the area and we met up for drinks and to catch up. I haven't seen her in something like 17 years, though we're friends on FB. She looks phenomenal. It was great catching up. She was truly a bright star at that joint and clearly remains so. I love that shit, catching up with your past. But dang if those Mitsu people aren't sort of starting to come out of the woodwork...

So that sums up what's up. Barbie's in Ontario (coming home today) and that sort of makes me jealous just because I do like being there, but we'll see what the summer brings. I don't have much in the way of plans for even the immediate future, short of showering after this post and going to work tomorrow, but maybe something will crop up. Something's in the air. I can feel it. Maybe it's just pollen, but that never bothered me. Neither does constant drama and off-kilter work-weeks.

Keep it coming, that's what I say.
________________________________________
By the way, here's a link to Cece's assistant - if you're in the greater Portland area or even not, check out her website - she's fantastic and you probably could come up with a thousand things she can do for you if you thought about it for a minute. Oregon Assistant

Power

Today's lesson is about power. I could make it a really short lesson (and I should, since I need to motor soon) and sum it up by saying Power is only as strong as the people that give it to you.

So there's a new game in town, title-wise, and because it is being run by a very well-respected man, it's got the industry a little bit rattled. The big guns in the area have suffered a few casualties as a result of this new company, some WAY more than others (we've lost I think three people, pretty much nothing), and as of today, which I think is something like Day Eight or something, the new kid on the block is feeling pretty confident. Marketing-wise, they are doing all the things the other companies have been doing, only in a much more in-your-face way. Which isn't a bad thing, I mean, do what you gotta do. I just think it's kind of funny.

In the last few years, when the industry started to fall a little bit apart, two new-to-the-market companies came in and did their little dance, and then after two years or less promptly left. It's hard to compete. And I think they just maybe weren't doing it right. I don't know. I don't think anyone thought of them as any kind of threat, and they weren't. I do know that I spent a lot of time with one of the companies' marketing manager, and he was a cocky typical salesguy type - I loved him for that, though, because I like to be amused and also because I kind of think you need that - something to make you stand out. Camp worked for the guy.

We have an employee who was sort of manipulated into going to this most recent gig, but at the last minute she pulled back and stayed with us (which is awesome, because she rocks). She had an opportunity to be introduced to the staff, though, and reported back that things were maybe just a little TOO enthusiastic. Like forced. And even a little fake. And they can't do title work yet here in Oregon, and less than a week ago they still didn't have their escrow system developed. So, you know, there are issues. Which will happen anywhere, to anyone, and is pretty inconsequential in the grand scheme of things - they WILL get their stuff developed, and their letters written, and their systems in place. It will be rocky, but it always is at first. Clients will follow their favorite escrow personnel and we'll all lose a little business. But clients might be frustrated and come back, or they might be patient and stick it out. But the bottom line is this is just business, and it's nothing new.

And nothing to be really afraid of. Power is only as strong as the people who give it to you. If we worry and fret and think they are going to be somehow better, they will be. But if we act accordingly, get the word out that we are a strong, stable, consistent company, with integrity and phenomenal staff, with services far greater than what anyone else can offer, then we're fine. Never underestimate your competition, but at the same time, never give it so much power that it breaks you down.

In the meantime, good luck to my own ex-coworkers who have moved on to their own greener pasture. My green looks different. In this market, I'm sticking with a sure thing.

Checking in again

Wow. I am just not doing so well at keeping up. I don't know anything and so therefore have nothing to report. Really.

I know this much - it's cold. It's flipping May and when I drove home from tanning tonight it was raining like a big fat bitch and seriously from the time I walked from the car to my front door (maybe 15 seconds) I was drenched. Stupid. I don't know why I can't remember if it was this cold last May. Maybe I'll go back and look.

So how much of a trainwreck is Jerseylicious? I have to say I kinda like it. Because it stuns me to know that people are actually like this, now, and not just in 1986. This show is just... something else. If you don't already watch it, you should.

There has been no shortage of shakeups at the office the last few days - I won't go into details, but if there's one thing I know it's that change is good. It really is. I used to love to just hurl myself into it because everybody needs a little action now and then(but I haven't in a while because I don't have any money and I'm not getting any younger. That's not the way it's supposed to be, by the way, but what can you do..), and right now it's sort of hurling itself right at us. Which is fine. Bring it on. Nothing we can't handle. Change like this just proves who the strong ones are, and we have a pretty dang strong group of people at my company. So whatever, another day, another opportunity to show others what we're made of.

Soooo yeah. That's it. It's probably better sometimes that I don't post anything, but then readership drops dramatically and people forget I exist and I get angry emails from people and, well, this is what you get. Since things have been so ridiculously boring in my world, feel free to dream up a scenario that I might have recently experienced, and I'll tell you about it.

It might be good for both of us.

If you think this is about you, you're going about it all wrong.

Dear Angry Caller:

I know you're calling because you're fired up for some perceived misdeed that has been done to you, some wrong that you feel must be righted. But did you know that when you phone with a problem that needs solving, yelling at your escrow professional is not going to help solve that problem?

The transaction that you are involved in, either as a buyer or seller, agent or lender, is the most important transaction in the world to you. Every one of us is aware of this. Every one of us believes the same thing as you. We just believe the same thing of every file on our desks. We're pretty good at what we do for a living; heck, these days the only people left in our industry are the really good ones. And it might surprise you that despite the fact that you complain about our (regulated) fee structure and remind us that we were not your first choice of escrow teams, we're actually human beings. Human beings make mistakes from time to time. Some human beings TRY to make mistakes, but this particular group of human beings does not fall in to that category. So really, if and when a mistake is made, it's probably something that we have discovered already, feel pretty badly about, and are in the process of fixing when you decide to pick up the phone and start screaming at us for being the idiots you think we are.

Did you know, Angry Caller, that most of the time the mistakes we encounter are a result of things that you did not provide for us? Did you know that when we send you a packet of forms that require your review and signature that we're doing that not to kill time or get some cheap advertising, but because there is information only you can provide us in order for us to process and close your transaction? Did you also know that as soon as we see what direction the call is heading we pretty much tune you out and start working on something else until you're finished screaming?

The majority of escrow folks are pretty helpful individuals who can see around a problem or inadequacy and make it work anyway. We're pretty resourceful when we have to be. And we do a lot for you and your transaction. Most of us either come early, leave late, skip lunch, or all of the above. That's for you, you know. It's not because we don't like our homes, or don't have anything better to do. It's because we are doing our best to make sure that you get the smoothest transaction you could hope for. And if one of us takes an additional half-day to get your commission/fee check/proceeds to you, it's most likely a fluke, and most likely we're thinking about that half-day delay all evening, all night, and the next morning on our way in to the office. Because we care. You might think we don't, but you insist on calling us every name in the book to make sure we know YOU do.

Angry Caller, these are difficult times in our industry. Deals are harder to come by for everyone, loans take longer to underwrite, short sale negotiators demand unheard of documentation to approve an offer. Our staff has been reduced, but we plug along and work longer and harder to ensure a seamless close. When we make a mistake, we do not do it to anger you, screw you over, or spite you. We do it because we're human and sometimes shit like that happens.

Might I suggest you take a lesson from some of your peers? Address the issue calmly and allow us time to research and find a solution. Do not begin the call with "YOU PEOPLE", do not accuse us of doing this on purpose, do not call us names and do not swill a bottle of scotch before calling. Every one of these things causes us to tune you out. Every one of these things inspires us to NOT help you. Every one of these things makes us answer your demands with dreamy hums and one word sentences. To piss you off. Because you're kind of a dick.

Please let me know if you take any offense to the content of this letter. Because we, your faithful escrow personnel, will never be able to tell you this to your face, or over the phone, or via real live letter. We will continue to smile while we fix the problem, credit your account for no reason other than to shut you up, and go on to the next thirty five files that will be problem-free. And never expect a thank you.

Very truly yours.

TtheD

Greener grass and silver linings?

The sun has been out more and longer than a few months ago, and yet I find myself completely unable to blog. If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all?

I'm not doing much, just working (kind of a bitch) and the usual errand stuff. Dinner out here and there, coffee out here and there, nothing spectacular. Just hanging out. The more I think about it the more I think something is going to happen. Or maybe it's just that I HOPE something is going to happen.

Teeny tiny inklings of something give me grand ideas and send me off to the internets to research neighborhoods and living spaces. I think maybe I expect too much from life. But I also don't think a person should be done until they SAY they are done. And I haven't said that yet.

Who knows. I get itchy feet. Had them all my life. Sometimes it means something and sometimes it doesn't. I was never one for a boring adventure-free existence and I have a pretty healthy imagination, so sitting around waiting for something to happen is not one of my strong suits. Plus working as an assistant for the last two weeks makes me question my abilities at work (seriously, it's HARD) and whenever that happens I start thinking maybe I should consider broadening my horizons. It may pass. Or it may not. It might be the beginning of something. Nobody knows but the ones that watch it from somewhere else.

It's been mildly rough these past couple of weeks, with no real expected improvement in this coming week, so maybe I'm just looking for the bright side. That's a good thing, right?