life

Monday

25 March 2013 / life, miscellany monday, pictures, ronni, to do

Every time I write an entry like I did last night, I get a bit apprehensive. I immediately want to take it back and apologize for being such a basket case. It’s taking everything in my power not to go and hide it right now. I can’t promise I won’t still do it.

I was just going through my photos on Flickr, and there is one from November 11, 2012, where I’m talking about how the weather feels like Spring. I remember that day. It was in the 70s and I got my last mani/pedi of the year. So, I’ll try not to complain about the cold lingering so much since the warmth obviously lingered for a while last fall. Not making any promises, mind you, but I’ll try.

I didn’t sleep very well last night. I went to bed about 1:30am, and I read until I fell asleep. But then I was up at 5:30am. The “non-working” medication I was complaining about last night finally kicked in apparently!

I do feel a lot better today.

Had an awesome phone call this morning with one of the freelance clients I’m working for. I really like this company and the work and the people I work with a lot. One of the reasons is that I get to use Track Changes in the things I’m editing, and guys…I really like using Track Changes. She asked if I’d be interested and available to take on more work as they go into their busy season. Um… YES and YES. I feel blessed when I get to do work I enjoy and get paid for it too.

So, it’s Monday, and here’s what’s on my plate this week:

01. projects for DSA 🙂
02. Moksha newsletter
03. babysit tomorrow morning
04. clean Aidan’s room (this is mostly Adam’s job but I’ll do the fiddly-diddly things that he misses)
05. buy “filler” and gifts for Aidan’s Easter basket
06. put away laundry and clean my side of the room
07. teacher training homework
08. possible onsite project for VSA Thursday morning
09. get Aidan from airport Thursday night (this means dinner at Pop’s beforehand. yummy!)
10. make Aidan’s Easter basket
11. buy a few Aidan-specific groceries

It’s a quiet week, so I should be able to do all of this without any trouble. Adam just went off to Ikea to get a new mattress. 🙂 That’s some good stuff. I’ve had the mattress we use now since 2006. I guess it’s time to replace it. We’re getting one with the individually wrapped springs so that when he tosses and turns, I don’t get thrown up to the ceiling.

Oh my God. Am I becoming boring? I just wrote a paragraph about mattresses. That means it’s time to sign off.

Till next time.

10 Comments

Lately.

24 March 2013 / life, pictures, ronni, yoga

warning: this entry is not all sunshine and bubbles…i did a backbends workshop yesterday and the results of that are coming up now. cue emotional mess!

Lately, I’ve been feeling….

{overwhelmed}
I’m working on a big freelance project, and even though it’s not very HARD nor particularly time-consuming, it is tricky. And also tedious. And also seems to be never ending. But hey, more money is always good so….

AND I like the company a lot.

I haven’t even STARTED on the April newsletter for Moksha. I need to get on that soon–I have a week to work on it and get it approved. I mean, I can and will DO it, but it would’ve been easier if I’d started on it sooner. Cropping pictures without Photoshop is going to be interesting. I have Gimp but Gimp and I FIGHT. So God help me. I guess I can always use “Preview”.

And I have GOT to get this teacher training non-contact stuff done:

1. thesis (2–3 pages)
2. write up for private lessons (finally had my last one Friday night) (3 short paragraphs, 1 page)
3. book reviews (2)
4. study guide questions (1)

It’s not even that hard. I’m just a self-sabatoger. I seriously could have had most of this stuff done months ago. I suck.

But not for long. I’m going to sit down and knock it all out this–probably Tuesday and/or Wednesday. Then I’m just going to submit everything in a big zip file. And then April 26, I’ll be done with teacher training. And I’m going to make sure I tell them I’m celebrating that at Disney World!

{satisfied}
The place was a terrible mess, but it’s much better now. I still need to put my laundry away, but the good news is that it’s clean. I also need to clean my room a bit. The snacks and books have taken over my side again.

We redid the living room. We got rid of the blue couch that Helena attacked (read: pissed on) with full force within the first week we had it, and replaced it with two chairs. We also got a new rug. The chairs are super comfortable, and so far, Helena hasn’t done anything to the chairs but sleep on them or get her toys from under them to play with. Crookshanks is sleeping on one in this picture, though. See him? Now can you spot Fi? hint: Fi is not on a chair!

{worried}
Tax time is coming really fast. Enough said.
Also, I haven’t heard from one of my biggest clients on whether they’re going to use me this year. That is very nervous making. Without them, I will have to find another big client before summer ends.

{frustrated}
Because I’m a self-sabotager who self-sabotages. It sucks. I suck. 🙁

{insecure & dumb}
I go through this a lot. Those moments when I am convinced that everything I say is stupid, wrong, pointless, and no one cares so I should just take a seat and shut the hell up. I can barely get a sentence out without getting interrupted, but GOD FORBID I interrupt anyone. I feel like I’m constantly pissing people off and making them mad at me. I think people just put up with me because they haven’t anything better to do, that no one really likes me at all. Well, I think Adam likes me, but I know I get on his nerves, too. Hell, *I* get on my nerves. Here’s a sample of the self-talk that goes through my head:

1. Shut up, just shut up. You’re so stupid and NO ONE CARES.
2. I bet none of them really like you. They only put up with you because they have to.
3. OH MY GOD you are so dumb. Seriously, shut the hell up.
4. Look at your fat stomach. You’re disgusting. (This one usually happens when I’m trying on clothes in a fitting room at a store. It gets worse than that if I’m in a particular Victoria’s Secret fitting room with the video monitors that show the models strutting their stuff down the runway. I cannot and will not shop in that store anymore because of that. Other reasons too, but mainly that.)
5. Wow. You’re not good at anything, are you? I mean, you’re OK at some stuff, but you’re not extraordinary at anything. Pathetic.

And then I want to lock myself in the house and hide under the covers and spare the world from my presence. Except Twitter and Tumblr and my blog, apparently.

{sore}
I didn’t even take all of Jason Crandell’s workshop sessions, but the two I did take (one on back bending, one on forward folding, twisting, and side bends) were quite enough. I did do some poses I’ve never done before, and some I never want to do again! I even did Eka Pada Rajakapotasana II and Dwi Pada Viparita Dandasana. I wasn’t even going to try Dwi Pada Viparita Dandasana, but I did it and it was awesome. Way easier than Urdhva Dhanurasana… but we did do that one about ten times before Dwi Pada Viparita Dandasana. Maybe ANYTHING seems easy after that. Anyway, I would love to soak in a steaming hot tub but the thought of driving out to King Spa tonight is not appealing. Because it’s freaking snowing and given the choice, I’d rather not drive in the snow. So I plan to go tomorrow night instead, after rush hour theoretically dies down. I’m sure I’ll still be sore enough to appreciate the spa pools.

{melancholy}
And it sucks when the medication that is supposed to be helping this doesn’t seem to be working.

{grateful}
I LOVE my babysitting gig. The little boy I get to watch is so super cute. I watched him for the first time last Tuesday afternoon. He slept for most of the time, but then he woke up and I went to get him. At first, he looked at me like WTF. But then I picked him up and held him and he just cuddled and cuddled and cuddled. I LIKE that. I miss the weight of a little one cuddling against me. I cuddle with Aidan, but Aidan’s all bones now. It hurts sometimes![1. Oh don’t get me wrong. I’ll still cuddle the hell out of some Aidan. As long as he’ll let me, at least!] One-year-old babies are soft and squishy. I can’t believe I get paid to cuddle a squishy little boy!

{excited}
Aidan is going to be here in a few days! I completely cleared my calendar so I can spend the entire Spring Break with him, despite the best efforts of the universe. I swear, every time I try to just… make space, a million people/clients/jobs suddenly need me for this or that. Most of the time, I go ahead and take it because well, money! But, this time, I’m setting some boundaries. It is always nice to make money, but I need to spend time with my boy.[2. I’ll work from home, of course. And if the babysitter calls, I’ll help her out. I can bring Aidan with me, which is AWESOME. Double the cuddles!!!!]

{tired}
I should head to bed soon. See if I can sleep away some of these blues.

Till next time….

6 Comments

Back to Life, Back to Reality!

4 March 2013 / life, pictures, shenanigans, to do

On this lovely first Monday of March 2013, I am getting back to reality. I spent a magical five days in Florida at Disney World and loved it. I came home and spent the weekend taking it very easy. Reading, playing on the computer, talking to Aidan on the phone. It was nice.

But now that it is Monday, it’s really time to get back to reality. And here is the list of things I need to do:

1. Unpack my bags from my Disney trip
2. Take a shower
3. Freelance work
4. Mail off important paperwork and bills
5. Put things back in their places

The rest of the week, I need to do the following:

1. Finish and turn in thesis
2. At least one yoga class (preferably 3)
3. Attend a thesis
4. Get a massage
5. Work 2 workshops
6. More freelance work
7. Edit and upload Disney pictures
8. Blog about Disney World! 🙂

I also have 4 King Spa vouchers I need to use before the month is out. I suspect two of them might already be expired, which sucks, but oh well. I know I have 2 I can still use. Once I have my car back. It’s in the shop now. Thanks for that, Mercury Retrograde.

Just… let me vent a bit about the havoc Mercury Retrograde has brought upon me. It hasn’t been anything I couldn’t handle, thank goodness, and somehow, things are still working out. But there have been some nervous-making moments, that’s for sure!

1. The big project I was working on for Nancy? Remember how it kept crashing and I finally sent it to her? Well, something was seriously wrong with the Word docs I was using to create the manual (which I turned into a PDF at the end). Those docs crashed my entire hard drive. Yup. Guess who was up until 3am doing computer surgery and then trying to transfer files over? THIS GIRL! Fortunately, I got the hard drive into an enclosure and was able to get all my important stuff on the new computer. WHEW.

2. Had decent luck all week at Disney until our last day. We had to catch the Magical Express at 6:10pm. We got to the bus stop from the Magic Kingdom at about 5:35pm. It takes about 15 minutes to get back to our hotel from Magic Kingdom. Now, this was partially my fault because I underestimated the time it would take for all of this to go down, but normally, a bus back to the resort shows up within 5-10 minutes. WE DIDN’T GET A BUS UNTIL 6:13PM. And it had someone in a wheelchair, so further delays to get him all loaded up. We got back to our resort around 6:30pm. I was for sure thinking we were going to miss everything and be late to the airport and miss our flight, etc. Fortunately, a 6:40pm Magical Express bus was coming, and it wasn’t full so he let us on. We got to the airport in plenty of time and all was well. The security line was smooth. We’d checked in at the resort, so we already had our boarding passes, and our bags were already at the airport. Our flight was delayed five minutes, but I never care about delays on the return flight.

3. On the plane, a man sat next to us who was clearly very sick. He had a really nasty sounding cough and it was relentless. Of course, once we were in Chicago, he wanted to shake Adam’s hand. (I gave Adam hand sanitizer when the guy wasn’t looking.) Adam is susceptible enough to getting sick. He does not need airplane germs to make it worse.

4. Adam went out to start the car yesterday to find that the battery is completely drained. He went to the mechanic (they are close by) and they gave him a portable charging kit to borrow. EXCEPT SOMETHING IS WRONG WITH THE HOOD LATCH and Adam couldn’t get the hood open. He called for a tow (the guys only charged us $5), and now my car is sitting at the shop until we figure out how to get the hood open and the battery charged again. I guess they’ll work on it tomorrow.

5. I was working on my domain when all of a sudden, NOTHING WOULD WORK RIGHT. And I checked my control panel to find that somehow I’d gone over my quota of space when just a few minutes earlier it was fine! I freaked out because I’d been with this company forever and couldn’t understand why I was out of space. I put in a support ticket to get some answers and looked into upgrading. I got an email back within 20 minutes. Because I’d been with this company since 2004, they doubled my space for free, and told me where the high usage was. I fixed that and now everything is working smoothly again. I also cleared off a bunch of files that I’d put there to access in other places. I have PLENTY of space now.

So all things considered, I’m OK. And I can look back on it and giggle. Kinda. 🙂 But I’ll be glad when Retrograde is over on March 17. That’s two weeks. I can make it.

‘Til next time….

P.S. I must be running out of original title ideas. I apparently used this one a few years ago.

4 Comments

Just One of Those Weeks

23 February 2013 / life, pictures, ronni, shenanigans, yoga

It was just one of those weeks. You know the type where it seems like you’re doing ALL THE THINGS ALL DAY LONG but you only check one or two things off the to do list. Or when you get so far in a big project on the computer only for the software you’re using to crash, not only once, but at least five times.

Yes. That really happened.

BUT I eventually got the project done and my recipient is very happy. 🙂 And now, another yoga teacher training milestone is out of the way. Customized yoga is done. Here I am with my student:

nancy is awesome

Not much more to go. I need to attend two thesis presentations, write up my book reviews, write up my private lessons, and turn in my thesis. And my final exam, which hasn’t been announced yet. Closing circle is April 26. That gives me about two months to tie up all the loose ends and finally have that certificate in my hands.

Earlier this week, I got to see a truly disgusting side of humanity but in the next instant, I saw things that were heartwarming and beautiful. It was a week where I felt like I could not get enough to sleep, and a week where a cold decided to come along and make me feel slightly off-kilter and very cranky.

I realized I like Slim Jims.

I got to work at Trisect, which I love. And because I was working on a special project, the proofreader I usually cover for was there. It was awesome to finally meet her. She was really nice, and she has big hair like me. 🙂

Went back to Mysore Tuesday night. I like the evening Mysore and I am thrilled that a Thursday evening Mysore is going to start in a few weeks. At least, that’s the word out on the street. I never expected to like Mysore as much as I do. Believe me, NO ONE is more surprised than I am that I like Mysore as much as I do. I got four more poses on Tuesday, and I think I’ll be here for a while. I’m up to Uttitha Eka Padasana. Yea. I’ll be there for a while. Heh. Funnily enough, I am great at that one. It’s the two before that I suck at. It’s Utthita Hasta Padangusthasana and Utthita Parsvasahita that’s gonna keep kicking my butt, and those come BEFORE Uttitha Eka Padasana. And then once I get those, the next big move is handstand, but before that is Utkatasana, where I’ll be stuck for about 95 years because I cannot do handstand (yet?). It scares the poo out of me. (But I like Utkatasana so I’m OK with that.)

I got to watch the pilot for Golden Boy, which made me happy. I thought that I would miss it because the television premiere is February 26 (you know where I’ll be!) but CBS.com is nice enough to have it streaming now. I am not a huge “cop show” girl but this one is intriguing. I like it and will continue to watch it for the time being.

Yesterday, snow came and that, coupled with usual Chicago Friday rush hour that starts at freaking 1pm, made running errands annoying and frustrating. I’ve gotten spoiled by the new Target in town. Yesterday, we went to a more crowded one and I wanted to smack everyone who kept getting in my way. And that really was almost EVERYONE. It seemed like as soon as I’d go to an empty aisle to look at something, 90,000 other people would need the exact thing I wanted. OR I’d go to an aisle and there would be one person standing right front of the item I needed, and standing SO CLOSE TO THE SHELVES there was no way I could go up and look myself without being a creeper.

I worked the Tantric Restorative workshop last night. Doing the workshops at the West Bucktown location is 99x less stressful than doing them at River West. Except for always worrying about running out of props, but we were actually OK. There were fewer people there, and although the lobby got a little crazy with one class ending, the workshop starting and *another* workshop starting, it was still OK. And the actual workshop itself was great. I almost fell asleep in some of the poses. I know some people DID fall asleep. I might have been one of them.

I was glad to get home, eat some pasta, and read. I’d planned on cleaning the apartment today, but they dropped the bomb yesterday that the manuals were due to our students this coming Thursday. And well, Thursday, I’m going to be playing in Animal Kingdom or something. So I had to get it done today. Which brought on the histrionics when Word kept crashing. And crashing. And crashing. So I used Pages and managed to get it working–although Pages has its own issues. But no matter. It’s done, and I think it looks OK. And Adam ended up doing all the cleaning.

Mercury went into retrograde today, which makes me a little bit nervous, considering I had the computer issue, and I had an issue with one of the games I play causing me to possibly inadvertently spam non-playing FB friends. Folks, I love some of the games on Facebook. They’re mindless and cute and they just help me calm the eff down. But I don’t want to be subjecting people to all of that if they don’t want to be, so I am very careful about filtering my game posts so only fellow players see them, and only sending requests to people I KNOW are active players (and I know this because they send active requests to ME). So when I’m clicking through my requests and realize that the game company has thrown in someone I KNOW doesn’t play but I’ve already clicked it (and didn’t realize it until after the fact), I get really angry. Because that’s bullshit. It’s deceitful and greedy and I can guarantee they’re not getting a dime of my “real money” for doing underhanded crap like that.

OH and also, they recommend that Sagittarius people don’t travel during Mercury retrogrades. This is what the Farmer’s Almanac says:

In Sagittarius: It is not a time to travel, so reschedule or just expect delays, lines, and lost directions. Instead, take care of local affairs. Patience and a sense of humor are needed.

WELL ISN’T THAT JUST FREAKING GREAT. But I’m not going to buy so much into this because I don’t want to be blaming every little silly thing on retrograde and making a big deal out of something that’s probably nothing or just typical annoying things that happen any time one travels.

Anyway, I expected long lines. For some reason, this February has been insane with lines in Magic Kingdom, so *Kanye shrug.* And yeah, we’ll probably get lost in Magic Kingdom, but it’s happened before and we got through it. It’s the delays that have me worried. Well, you know what? I will throw my own retrograde energy into a March 1 Friday night flight delay. That flight back to Chicago can be delayed as long as it freaking wants and I won’t care one happy little bit. And if I have to stay an extra night in Orlando… OH DARN.

I forgot to mention: a couple of weeks ago, someone told me that someone told her that I had a singing voice like an angel. Which is nice to hear but really CANNOT BE RIGHT. She has to be mistaken or have gotten me mixed up with someone else. My voice changed when I was about 12 and hasn’t been that good since. I get lazy and don’t hold keys right or I just get out of my head and sing everything completely WRONG (i.e. 9000 octaves above what it’s supposed to be and off key). Now, when I am paying attention and working hard, I sound OK. But I mean just OK as in, it’s OK to listen to me when I’m in the shower and the water’s running really hard. I can OM like a mofo. But sing? Nah, dude. She had to have been mistaken.

Something else I forgot to mention: One of the 50¢ CDs I got from Half-Price Books was Karsh Kale. I first heard his music by accident, browsing around on emusic.com, and I really liked it! So THAT was a treasure find for sure.

And now I’m calming down by blogging, listening to music, and neurotically arranging folders and files on my computer. Because that’s how people like me feel some sense of order and control in the world.

Oh my God. I think I need to go to bed. I’ve got to sleep off the rest of this cold. Maybe I should go to King Spa and sit in that really hot sauna. That’ll burn the rest of this crap out of my head. And they ARE open 24/7….. yea right. Like I’m going anywhere NOW.

Anyway, tomorrow I’ll be packing and charging various devices. Gonna TRY to make a yoga class too. I need one that’ll kick my ass. There is a vinyasa 2-3 at 11:30am and also one at 5:30pm. I’m going to try to make the 11:30am class. I will be able to do exactly 0% arm balances, but it’ll be fun to try.

OK, OK. TL;DR. Whatever. Night!

4 Comments

A Million Things To Do, And Yet I Sit Here Blogging….

19 February 2013 / life, pictures, ronni

Because sometimes a girl just has to write, you know?

After weeks of kinda feeling listless and unmotivated, I got busy again. This is what I’ve been up to:

one

Last Tuesday, Aidan flew into town to spend the week with me. We had so much fun together, you guys. We stayed up late almost every night. We went to Fuddrucker’s and Half-Price Books (they have 50¢ CDs you guys!), watched funny YouTube videos, cuddled a lot, and really had a blast. He went back last night. I’m missing him so much. He’ll be back for his spring break, though, and I cannot wait!

two

While he was here, Aidan and I played LOTS of LEGO Harry Potter on the Wii. Remember when I said that Years 1-4 was glitched out? Well somehow it started working right, so Aidan and I played that file and got 100%! The first time I have EVER completely finished a game. We also got 97.7% in Years 5-7 and finished all the freeplay levels. I just need to finish finding all the cool stuff in Hogwarts!

three

I got a new computer. My precious little silver MacBook didn’t die exactly, but she was just not powerful enough for me anymore. I had 4 gigs of memory in her. I’d open up Chrome and email and it would immediately USE ALL THE RAM, and I’d still need to open Word, Adobe, and maybe Photoshop. And oh, don’t forget iTunes and last.fm. Gotta have music when I’m working. It was constantly crawling, and needing to be restarted “because of a problem”.

Seeing as my livelihood is pretty wrapped up in my computer, I knew it was time to get a new one. We ventured out to Microcenter because they sell Macs just a little bit cheaper than Apple does. I knew I needed a machine with more RAM, so I was looking at the 13.3-in. MacBook Pro with 750 gig HD and 8 gigs of RAM. Adam suggested I go for the lower model and we’d just upgrade the RAM ourselves, and I could switch the hard drives in the computers. It’d save me $350. I’d have less HD space, but that’s OK. Once I get this machine cleaned off (I’ve got a LOT of music and Sims stuff, movies, and images that need to be processed and moved), I’ll be fine the the 500 gigs I already have.

At Microcenter, they told me a little secret. The guy encouraged me to upgrade my computer to 16 gigs of RAM. It was only $45 more, and still cheaper than getting the next level up. Mac says the computer is upgradable only to 8 gigs. And I think that’s all they officially support, but apparently, they can all take double what Apple says. So I went for it. Adam did the “surgery” when I got home. I powered up the new machine and I NOTICED A DIFFERENT RIGHT AWAY. The processor is only slightly faster (2.5 GHz compared to 2.4 GHz on my old machine) but the RAM upgrade…it was a GOOD decision. I can have all the programs I need to be opened open, and no crawling or constantly opening and closing programs to free up memory. Happy Ronni is Happy.

(When Aidan heard the total at the register, his eyes bugged out of his head. It was hilarious.)

four

I got a new freelance client! 🙂 I was approached by a company in October (somehow I don’t remember this) about a potential freelance position. They contacted me again a few weeks ago to follow up. I had two interviews/three phone calls. And they offered me the job. I am really excited to work with them because the organizations they work with are doing good things.

five

Tomorrow, I’m doing my third day this week working at Tris3ct. I’m doing a special project for them. I feel like I’ve been there the last 439857498 weeks for a least one day. I’m OK with that. As I said, I love going into that office. Good vibes in there, and free foods and drinks, and nice people.

Thursday is the last day of my Customized Yoga apprenticeship. We’re going to have a pizza party after. I’ll have to remember to take pictures! Friday, I am managing Mia‘s Tantric Restorative workshop. That should be a lot of fun. I haven’t seen Mia in forever; she’s been traveling. It will be so nice to see her again and to take the workshop!

Saturday I will likely being running last minute errands, and Sunday I will be packing because I’M GOING TO DISNEY WORLD NEXT WEEK!

And DUDE. LOOK at Orlando’s weather forecast for next week:

Y’all. Here in Chicago it is 14F outside. I am so looking forward to next week’s weather, among a million other things.

I’M GOING TO HAVE TO GET OUT MY SUMMER CLOTHES! 🙂
(at least the tees and tanks!)

But before I take off on a jet plane at Oh God Why O’Clock in the morning (our flight leaves at 6am), I have a crapload of stuff to do here. SO I should stop blogging and get to it.

Here’s a Crookshanks for your viewing pleasure.

‘Til next time….

4 Comments