Last day of February

What a horrendous month, and I don't think very many people would disagree with me on that point.

It is fact, and it is true.

I think the brightest moments were those of elation as survivors from the Haitian earthquake were pulled from rubble weeks after the initial quake and devastation.

Those moments were true miracles, not to be triffled with, dismissed off-handedly or trivialized. Think of the things that had to be lined up for those people to survive so long in dire circumstances, under less than deplorable conditions and against all odds. God orchestrated something wonderful time after time in order to give us all hope.

There were some low moments, and stressful situations at home (regarding the nation, not as an individual) and abroad.

My own personal low points aren't even a hill of beans or grains of sand compared to the tribulations around the world.

No complaints today. None.

Sure, I would love for things to improve regarding work (or the lack thereof), but this will happen over time, and as I apply myself in broader directions and begin searching again in earnest. I need to shake the dust of disappointment and trepidation off and move forward. I have been slow moving and ineffectual lately on my own behalf, thinking I am supposed to be where I am in order to learn something or appreciate something more than I have been.

I have learned more about myself - especially lately - and that has made me open my eyes to greater possibilities and a desire to reach further knowing I am not as limited or inadequate as I had lead myself to believe.

I am ready for a new month. I am ready for a new me and a fresh road to travel.

It may be the last day of February, but it is the newness of what lies ahead that keeps me from looking back and wondering how it passed so quickly. I won't miss it and neither should you.

I FOUND IT!

It took me the better part of three days...but I found it.

I remember looking at the thing; sorting through days and making adjustments where necessary. I even remember putting it down and telling myself where it was so I could pick it up again in order to take it with me to the meeting for Karl at MRS...but do you think I could locate it? NnnOOOOoooOOoOOo, I could not!

I had to resort to writing down notes about new and changing calendar dates on slips of paper, and in notebooks, so that I would have it all correct and in front of me to transfer to my calendar when I finally did find it.

But, I have it by my side again, and I am happy and somewhat back on track. Let's see how long this lasts. :>)

It's been two days

Two days since I last got online. Oh! and two days since I last touched a PC. I went to the workshop, returned to Gram's and checked email, then that was it. I vegetated for two days, and did it without a computer.

It was actually sort of liberating, but I am back today.

Yesterday was a "snow day" - it turns out all schools in Oakland County were closed - and in other counties as well, but since we live in Oakland Co...

Karl had to be at a meeting by ten o'clock to sign forms for a new program to take part in, and the driving was sheer crap! Even Karl was white-knuckling it at times. It improved only slightly after we had returned to town and exited the grocery store. We stocked up and then some, expecting a full day of snow, with more on the way today.

Hey, if we don't need to go out, then why not hunker down? And we sure don't need to get out of the house for any reason.

I made beef stew last night, and it was received by my fine young cannibals with a good deal of gusto. Made dumplings, too, which were greedily scooped up - good thing I doubled the recipe. LOL Should've doubled the stew recipe as well, but I didn't think the old cast iron Dutch oven was large enough to accommodate that much of anything.

Next time, I will start with two pounds of stew meat, plain and simple.

We picked up lunch meat and deli cheese, too, and Karl grabbed a long loaf of French bread for a supersized sub sandwich. We will make that today for lunch, or maybe dinner, with plans for a homemade pizza and a large yummy salad.

Yes, I had them thinly slice about half-a-pound of a large pepperoni, and Karl was drooling as the woman piled it on the scale for weighing.

He relly began to get into the whole shopping thing when we rounded the corner and I told him to pick out a few donuts! Besides crowds, he dislikes making decisions, and being overwhelmed with choices (even with something as simple as picking out donuts) can be a hard and frustrating thing for him. But he did it with some effort, and we moved on to the next few things on our list.

We made it up the hill to the house without incident (happily), but the driveway proved to be a hurdle for Brian's car. After negotiating our way over the snow ruts at the street, we finally backed up to the front door and quickly unloaded the groceries into the house (I know - I need to get room for at least one car again inside the garage).

Once indoors, I refused to don my boots and sweater for another forray into the new winter wonderland yesterday. Today, however, is another story, and in a little while, I do intend to go outside with a son or two and have at the snow, which is about 7" deep. And it's the heavy stuff, too, so the intent is to clear enough to get in and out of the driveway (should the plows ever make it down our street), with a little wiggle room to go around the car for getting in and out of the doors. The rest can be done little by little. Since we are still seeing snowfall, I am not in any big hurry to get the whole driveway done at once.

I'm not crazy (I just act that way). Besides, I have stuff to get done which is FAR more important than snow distribution and removal, and I have already lost two days out here on the internet!

Before I go

I managed to finish the breakdown sheets last night, late last night, (the stay at Gram's has been a bumpy ride, to say the least), and round about 3:16A.M she entered my room and turned on the light to tell me she is having pains...same as when she went to bed.

Mind you her constant pain is from brittle bones breaking (or having broken before) or disintegrating, and the discomfort of things rubbing and being out of place and just being old.

I am not discounting her discomfort or dismissing it away - it is real and no doubt not easy to live with. She didn't take care of herself earlier on, and extreme old age is not being kind.

But she knows I must get up early enough to get out the door for Ann Arbor to attend the second part of a workshop I began last week. Her frequent nocturnal trips - and the noises that accompany the journey - are somewhat easier to sleep through, but a deliberate wake-up call could not be ignored.

She wanted to call a daughter-in-law to ask what should be done. Maybe I should have let her. She asked questions and couldn't hear my answers because she hadn't "put her ears in". She continued to ask questions all the while walking back to her room to retrieve her hearing aides. This was not fun, and was really unnecessary. Sorry, but it is what it is.

After ascertaining that her pain was not a heart attack - as Gram suggested - and after walking out to the kitchen and getting her water and another pain pill, she then began to regale me with her from-outta-left-field trips to the bathroom to "only have water come out."

Was she expecting party balloons and clowns? I don't know.

"Am I sure we shouldn't call Val?" and then back to how her pad wasn't wet, but all there is is "water, water."

"What should we do?" she asked, and I said "go back to bed."

Which is what I did.

She reluctantly toddled back to her room a few moments later and that was that.

Brian will be here around nine, and I will take his car to 'A Squared' for the few hours of the workshop. I will return to the apartment and relieve Bud so that he can then drive to a friend's wedding in Howell. What a day.

I will let you know the outcome of the class. Will it be a recommendation, or a cookie?

Alrighty, then

It's just about ten o'clock, and I am tired of writing out scene breakdown pages. LOL

No, seriously. Stop laughing! Hey, I mean it. LOL HAhahaha hee hee.

I am getting punch drunk just looking at them. Just when I think "wow, I have made a lot of good progress." Then, I look ahead and count the the number of scenes yet to do, and then at the page number of the script. I should never look at the page number. Never, never, never. It is never close enough to the end of the script to look like I really have made any headway at all, so I will not count the page numbers any more.

On the positive side, I am up to scene 104, so it ain't all bad. I'm a whole lot closer to being finished in time for Saturday morning, and that is all that matters, oui?!

78 down, 78 to go!

Stopped at the office supply store on the way down to Gram's yesterday, to get those copies for the work I need to get done (Production Management workshop), and I managed to get through a good number of pages/scenes last night. This morning I got up bright and early and got right to work where I left off.

Yea me!

I stopped to make breakfast for us, then lunch rolled around.

I have taken a break and looked at email for the first time in twenty-four hours, and have searched my regular sights for new jobs and opportunities, so now I am ready to get back to the pile of undone scene breakdowns.

Let's see how far I can get before dinner. I have it figured that if I get another 38 done today/tonight, I won't have much to do tomorrow and can relax a little. I will update you all later with my progress.

Have a great afternoon and enjoy the glorious sunshine! It is the only thing keeping me alert and energetic at this time.

In process

Everything seems to be in process. Even events and markers in time concerning future employment, possible $ aide for classes from the [cough cough] state agencies, SSI for Karl, and on and on, are all "in process."

That's their fancy way of not saying "no" but not having to admit things are FUBAR, and useless, and stalemated - not to mention helplessly knotted in their unique paperwork-choked system. [Oh, well, that last little bit seems to be more regarding the agencies assisting Karl - riiiiight. NOT!] I swear, the size of their broom is enormous, and they could sweep a semi under a carpet...if you get my meaning.

Even at home, things I want to do - to accomplish around the house (improvements-wise) - are in such a state of incompleteness. Always in process. Not in flux - flux would mean progress...and I haven't seen much of that around my home. I know...it's my home, so the complaints are against myself. :^P

Everything is so topsy-turvy and just wrong, and it feels like I can never get anything to run the right direction. I have too many projects in too many states of whatever, and it is chaos when things are at odds.

All the smaller things that need doing I have promised myself I will tackle, one by one until they are done. Like the lower level floor and the repairs to the library walls. The insulation holes in the boys' rooms and then the painting and replacing of their doors. Even their closets need work, and the bathroom needs some patching and painting. The jobs are growing in scale, and i haven't even mentioned the necessary gardening, yet. Argh!

Shamefully, I haven't managed to even carve out the time to re-caulk - as I promised myself I would do the beginning of this month. So, when I get home, that will be the first thing I do, and then...who knows. Oh wait, nope, I need to get things together for that baby shower on the following Saturday. And then there are the two Karl meetings to get to. Everything in the middle of everything else.

How did I manage to get this stuff done when I had a full time job?

Maybe I didn't.

For now, another project in process is the "homework" assigned Saturday during the first part of the Production Management workshop I am attending in Ann Arbor. I still have to get 137 scene breakdown sheets completed before returning to A2 on the 20th. Yes! 156 pages of written work...yea! So far, I am doing very well, but my perfectionism is getting in the way. I am finding so many inconsistencies in the dialogue and the descriptions, and the settings...that i have made up a whole other page with questions for Kathryn, in order to find out how to deal with such things when I have this job and they come up. Oh, these errors will come up...writers are so haphazard with consistent behavior. Maybe a more positive way to say it is: writers are so consistently incomplete and haphazard.

There you go, was that better?

Got to get back to the grind, my sitting at the keyboard is holding up my process.

No enthusiasm, no desire to move

I got home from Gram's yesterday late in the afternoon, and lolly gagged in getting anything started/done.

I would like to get out and go to the office supply store so that I can make 140 or so copies of the scene breakdown sheet for the work I must get done, but I do not feel like getting started.

And I really need to grocery shop so the place is filled with stuff the boys will need while I am gone AGAIN beginning tomorrow, but what's the point?

I really want to run to the bank and to the PO while I am out, too, but since neither of those are open today (another fricking bank holiday), I will not waste the gas leaving the driveway for one or two errands, when I can wait until tomorrow and get them all done.

Will I?

Good question, because right now, I have absolutely no enthusiasm for anything and no desire to move if I do not have to.

W.I.2.

2/14 - 221.6

In this case - and this case alone - down is an acceptable direction.

About yesterday

I spent the mid part of the day in Ann Arbor.

I know, I know. I spend so much of my time eschewing that place (because of the whole "school" connection/rivalry. For those of you not in the know, I am a die-hard MSU supporter), and here I am, finding that I have to swallow it and go there for either work or workshops.

Yesterday was one such trip.

Part one of two days of a Production Management workshop took place in the back end loft of a coffeehouse storefront. A small group of film wannabes and film students and displaced people starting over, and some with lots of stuff behind them, and me. But it was good, and the woman leading the series is a real credentialed PM - so right there, I am geeked. And, she's connected, so I am putting the toe of my shoe on her coattail, doggone it!

Remember, in this forum, it IS who you know, and then what you can do...until you become someone to know and your work is known.

The dude who put it together is also somebody to know and impress and work with - he has several iron in the fire right now....so I am going to take advantage and ingratiate myself next Saturday.

We broke down a script - Erin Brakovich - lined it, and received instructions on how to create a scene breakdown page, and then were set to work. While there, we had to have it lined and the scenes numbered...and I DID IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME!!! No numbering errors or omissions!

I so can do that job.

I now have to finish a breakdown sheet for each scene. 156 pages worth of homework for Saturday. Wahoo!

What's next, Kathryn?

Hmmmm...Valentine's day, eh

Not really a celebrator of this particular faux holiday. I applaud those who have achieved that couple status and have a 'body to get trinkets and cards from, and have a 'body to get that sort of thing for. How nice.

I used to want that for myself, but after having survived dry spells during my elementary school years (and all through junior and senior high, come to that), two marriages without the hullabaloo and trappings, and subsequent years sans dating, you sort of grow immune, cynical, un-expectant, bitter, lackadaisical.

One develops a 'could-give-a-shit attitude'.

I hate it, but there it is. What am I going to do about it?

Here, have a chocolate.

So, they say.....

Scientists are now revealing the results of a new study. There are 4 new healthy reasons for eating chocolate!

Can you imagine?!?!

Like [we] need "healthy" reasons.

Hahahahahaha

Just read a whole Sunday paper!

That never happens as early as Tuesday. Never! For as much time as you would think I have to accomplish such a feat each and every week....yeah, not-so-much.

I got through the entire thing, and put aside the comics to take back home for Karl, and paged through each of the sale inserts for the most pertinent stuff...AND finished the first of two Sudoku puzzles!

When I get home at the end of the weekend, I will have three new papers to read stacked up and ready for me to try and find the time.

Of course, those will be stacked on top of the pile from the last time...because I can't get rid of them before they have been read. I just can't!

I paid for them. They were left for me (sometimes in puddles or in snow drifts along the driveway; sometimes flattened by Brian's car before being rescued from their landing spot in my yard), and I am duty-bound to read them.

So, read them I will! Wish me luck.

Enjoy your Sunday paper...I'll see you in the funny papers.

W.I.1.

1/24 - 225.4

As of 2/6 - 223.2

You must begin somewhere.

So, yesterday

Yesterday was sort of a lost day. I began it at home; Jean had come to spend the night Thursday so we could leave from here and head to East lansing and collect Barbazon early in the afternoon. A couple of stops later we were sitting in the Harrison Roadhouse having a sandwich and enjoying the vanity licence plates that line the beams along the ceiling. OK, I was enjoying the ambience part - I love vanity plates! Sometimes those plates are pretty darned clever.

Thank you, girls, for including me.

Anywho, we headed east for home about 7pm - they dropped me off and we visited a while (even Brian), then they left for Clio around 10pm or so. It was fun, to say the least, but now I need to collect myself and get busy accomplishing something before my return to Gram's in the coming week.

The last few days I have tried to get the boys on the same page so that I could have the tub clean and dry in order to recaulk the darned thing. Every time I get the tub dry and residue free, one of them decides he needs to take that inexplicable shower, just as I ready myself to strip off the old caulking - argh! Today is the day!

And another thing...

I have contacted the "Rollin' On" people a number of times about what was happening with their decision-making following the November interviews for crew call, and always got one excuse or another. It turns out they have been stalling the process (for whatever reason) just so they can glorify it by sending out blah blah blah announcements about their updated web site, and/or their need to have us fill them in AGAIN on exactly the same things they asked Qs and got As on during the TAPED interview! If you ask me, I think they are looking for a crafty way to edit homestyle video to the interview footage they shot, in order to make it their trailer look cutting edge and chic and well thought out - in advance [sgnort!] - and as though that was their plan all along. They won't have to hire any of us just to make their goals. We do all of their work for them and give them film they are too lazy to shoot themselves, too full of their own arrogance to admit that they need, and are too cheap to pay for - all to glorify themselves in the end.

How badly do I want this job?

And I will never get any credit for my own work. I understand the nature of this particular beast all too well, but I wish they would be a little more forthcoming and say something the least bit encouraging instead of running around every damn bush and leading folks on.

So, I have a fast decision to make - do I follow their request with a video interview of my own, or do I call and question why they are asking for this? Are they asking ALL the applicants of that November day, or just those whom they are interested in hiring? By not simply complying, am I knocking myself out of contention, or making their lives easier (and their 'product' juicier)? Should I submit what they're asking for without question and expect nothing to come of it, or should I submit and tell them they cannot use it on their web site? Too many ways to mess this up....or maybe not.

Time to make the donuts

Mmmmm.....doesn't that sound good? The smell of any sort of bread object freshly made in your home.

"Sound", "smell"? Hello?!

You can't hear how good something smells.

Maybe today isn't a good day for me to be typing.

February, already

It's been snowing all day - since sun-up - and our mid-morning visitors said it was slick. The snow that began the day's accumulation was that stinging, icey, wet sort. You have to really look to see it. You know, the type that can create black ice situations on the roadways...so I was very happy to not have anywhere to go any time soon today.

In fact, nowhere, and that was the perfect destination.

I took stew meat out of the freezer to use for dinner and got to work on the foundling dishes that didn't get done while I was away. Made Karl wrangle the garbage out to the garage, and then the mountain of bottles and cans out to Brian's car - there was no way Bud was going to avoid getting those things returned to the store any longer.

It was a very lazy sort of day, but I got some cleaning done, and that was cool. Tomorrow I will attack that bathtub caulking job bright and early, then give myself permission to quilt for a while. I am trying to squeeze overdue, needful chores into the short decompression time between stints in Livonia - and I am losing track of time and appointments in the meanwhile. Not good.

Brian has just left to return the returnables, but mostly because he was becoming stir crazy and needed to get out of the house for a while. I wish he would do that sort of thing earlier, during daylight hours.

There I go thinking like a mom, again.

I had my first OBGYN appointment in more than 3 years (I think it was more like 4+) yesterday. Man! Guess what I didn't miss.

I adore my doctor, she is without par as far as I am concerned, and she is always so genuine and caring - but she always makes me cry! Barbara Walters, watch out!

She gave me some samples for my OAB, and told me to get my weight back under control now that Harvey is a non-issue any longer. My BP was too high (for the first time in my life), but it will be better once I can apply myself to more strenuous exercising and weight loss. My waistline is a concern and the little red spot under my right eye has her bothered. She suggested I try to find a doctor to look it over and biopsy it, thinking it could be cancerous.

Truthfully, I have been wondering about it for 2 years or so myself, but hearing the words said aloud by your physician really makes your brain reel and your heart race. So, to a dermatologist or an oncologist I must soon journey.

Brian has been waiting for a response from the comic book folks in Detroit - the bunch he interviewed with over two weeks ago. He sent them his rough of a scene they emailed him to work from and illustrate, and a character impression for one of the characters (they had exacting ideas of how this girl should appear) well within the prescribed deadline they imposed, but have since dragged their feet in giving him a thumb's up or thumb's down about whether he is hired or not. I feel badly for him, it is tough not getting word after having jumped through hoops and met somebody's deadlines to simply never hear from them again.

My fear is that he caught the look of the girl they wanted, but that they will have one of their already existing illustrators use his character drawing to go forward with. Wouldn't surprise me, but how do you stop them? And, there is no further word from his former manager about his plans to open another glow in the dark golf space in the mall. The idea was that Brian would be there to work with Leon when the month was over, or early in February. I was hoping those plans wouldn't fall through, but it isn't looking any more hopeful than the comic book gig.

Ah well.

The soup is smelling delicious, and I still need to mix up some dumpling batter, so I will end this for the time being.

Until next time, be well, be safe, be good.