Oh right, I have a blog!

Okay so that’s kind of a lie.  I never forgot that I have this blog.  Instead it has sat here mocking me for weeks as I have tried to find the time and energy to sit down and write about everything that I want to write about.  Like W00tstock.  Like Finales-a-go-go.  Like how I’m staring down the barrel of the month ending and having to pay my rent and trying to get enough work together to do that.

By the way? I LOVE it when clients change their payment schedules without telling me.  Love.  Big fluffy LOVE.

So that’s where I am.  Mired in work.  Gazing at all of the more fun things I’d like to be doing.  And hoping that you all will still be here when I get a free minute or two to really work on what I want to work on.

This has been a complainy post.

But, on a brighter note: Have I mentioned that I was quoted in The New York Times??  (I’m going to ride that train until I crash it)

ME!

I am still working on my W00tstock post.  I think that after this much time and this much self-hyping of it I have built up expectation (in myself especially) so much so that nothing I write is really going to live up to it.  Pretty soon I’m just going to hit publish on it and let that be that.  But!  I keep thinking of things I want to add! And take out! Because I do not want that post to be a zillion years long.  It’s a balancing act folks.  It really is.  But still, pretty soon I’m just going to have to hit publish and let it go.

I woke up at 4 in the morning yesterday and could not get back to sleep.  Last night I took some Benadryl for allergy sinus stuff which usually guarantees me about eight hours of sleep.  We went to sleep after midnight.  I was up at 6:30 so that I could come into town with Will and pay for parking (which is a really long story).  I have a wicked Benadryl hangover.  And I am kind of eyeballing the Sudafed in my backpack because I’m tired of dripping sinuses. But somehow I am thinking that taking Sudafed while still nursing a Benadryl hangover after only getting ten hours of sleep over two days might not be the best idea.  Forget operating heavy machinery, I’d probably lose the ability to walk upright!

Signs of Abbott are everywhere lately.  This will not make any sense at all to you if you have just started reading me.  If you’ve known me for a while, though you will understand why this is a big deal.  The most recent one happened just a few minutes ago when the song we played at his wake came over the speakers at Starbucks.  I am very proud (and a little surprised) that I did not have a colossal freak out in the middle of the coffee shop.  I just sat here and kept breathing until it was over.  After six and a half years the song doesn’t pack the same gut punch that it once did which is comforting but it still makes me wonder what the universe is trying to tell me.

In addition to working on my W00tstock post I need to get to work on my Blog Share post because it is due today.  I kind of like having all of this personal blogging work to do.  It is kind of like what my daydream life would be like: all personal blogging and writing projects all the time.

Oh, and: welcome people who found me because of a certain Twitter reply from last night!

I was all “oooh, my W00tstock post is going to be up super soon!” “I’m totally getting to it!” and, um, more than a week has passed.

In my defense, I did write somewhere in the neighborhood of 30,000 words last week (no kidding, it was at least that much).  I just didn’t write them here.  And? Those 30,000 words kind of killed my brain’s will to create.  E-gad.  So I took a few days off to rest my brain…and to take pretty pretty pictures!

I photo stalked the Portland State University Farmer’s Market AND the Portland Saturday Market on Saturday.  See, Will gave “us” a fancy Canon camera for my birthday/our engagement almost two years ago now.  It has since been used to take photos of our wedding (thanks Amber!), of some of our honeymoon (thanks us!) and many many many pictures of the cat (who is not so thankful).  So, on a whim on Saturday afternoon I packed up that camera and hit downtown with an “I will use this to take pretty pictures” vengeance.

And I did!  I took some really really awesome photos.  Unfortunately I cannot show you my very favorite photos because they are of people I don’t know and who, um, did not exactly give me permission to take their pictures (it is amazing what you can catch when you hide behind a rack of tie dye).  I’m pretty sure I can’t just slap them up here or on Flickr without tempting some sort of legal God to smite me.  Unless I can–does anybody know how the law works with that?  Still, I got some pretty decent shots of things like flowers and wigs and plants and wigs.  Here are a few that I’m pretty sure I can show without getting in trouble:

And yes, that is my Wootstock t-shirt.  I was letting my Geek Flag fly.

Also?  I learned that people are really friendly and like to talk about their cameras.  I had a few different conversations with Sony users and Nikon users about what they like and don’t and learned a few tips and techniques that I’m going to have to try on my next outing into the world.

My Mom has been called.  Much tweeting has been done.  Many new followers have been greeted (Hi new Wootstock people who found me just now!).  Iron Man 2 has been watched.

My Wootstock post has been started. And started over.  And started over.  And started over.  And is halfway done with the first draft and is sitting in the drafts folder because I need to go to sleep!

As I said on Twitter earlier this evening: “Arrrrrrrghhhh. Perfect Post Writing is Harrrrrrggghd” (which will make far more sense and be far more funny if you were at W00tstock).

So I am going to write my whole W00tstock! OMG Wil Wheaton! OMG super cool geekiness in surround sound and enraputredness! post.  But first I should probably call my Mom.  Because if I blog before I call my Mom the conversation will start thusly: “YOU BLOGGED BEFORE YOU CALLED ME ON MOTHER’S DAY?!?”

You know how it goes.  Pffft.  Moms.  It’s like they think today is THEIR day or something.

Oh wait.

Stay tuned!

This morning I battled heavily with myself about whether or not to join Will in downtown today (me=Starbucks, Panda Kitchen, Library, him=class).  I must have flip flopped at least a dozen times between staying home to work and do chores and coming into town where my desire to get any work done whatsoever would fly right out the window (when you’re an adult these decisions are actually hard!).  And even though 90% of me was leaning toward “stay home!” The other 10% won when Will said that if I came in with him today we could check out a new (to us) doughnut place in South East.

Apparently I’m a sucker for pastry because here I sit.  So far I have done no real work that will pay me but I have had three very irritating live chats with various cable/internet provider customer service agents.  It looks like Verizon is selling its Oregonian Fios service to Frontier.  This disturbs me greatly because I! Love! Fios! and have yet to hear anything remotely positive about the service from Frontier.  So in a couple of months, if we stay here, we might have to switch back to Comcast and I! Hate! Comcast!  And here’s the bigger issue: what if Will ends up getting a job somewhere that is not here? I am not a fan of early contract termination fees, which we would probably face with Comcast.  At the same time, ya know, there is no guarantee that our current awesometastic service will continue under Frontier.  So. Dilemma.

I know that this is a very first world problem to have but seriously? I love my Fios service. Love. Heart. Want to Hug.  Love my Fios service. And I will be sad to not be allowed to have it anymore.

In other, happier, news, I read through Jen Lancaster’s My Fair Lazy on Tuesday (yes I sat down with it as soon as UPS delivered it and did not stop reading until I had finished, why do you ask?) and it was so much fun!  It’s no secret that Jen Lancaster has become my #1 favorite author so you’ll have to excuse me for a minute if I get gushy but seriously? Every time I read something written by her, no matter what it is, it makes me want to hop on this blog and start writing funny things.  Only, you know, better than I’m doing right now.  In her book she writes about how people call her work a “guilty pleasure” and I take arms with that.  I find her work, simply, a pleasure.  I admire the journey she takes in this book.  Perhaps I’ll have my own Erinnaissance someday.  For now, though, I’m still kind of recovering from all of the culture shoved at me as a Theatre and English double major in college.

The book is great and there were many many times that I laughed out loud.  I loved that she devoted several pages to her last tour stop in Portland (though allow me to take a moment to officially apologize for our apparently violent pedicurists).  I loved the tale of her accidentally setting her curtains on fire at the Four Seasons and my favorite sentence in the whole book was “holy shit, she’s going to try to sell me a Mogwai!”  (or whatever the actual sentence was.  The book is at home on a shelf so I can’t exactly look it up)

So, yeah, as always I give this book a hearty two thumbs up and say: go buy it! It’s fun!

What else?

I have no idea. Except: New Grey’s Anatomy tonight!

Happy Thursday!

I’m thinking of doing NaBloPoMo again this month.  In case I decide to do it, this post is my insurance to make sure I don’t miss a day.  If I decide not to do it, this post is just to post for a just because kind of reason.