rushed home through friday traffic to take meghan to the eye doctor. poor girl. she was traumatized by his diagnosis. she was convinced her eyes were perfect, but it seems her left eye is rather poor. i kept trying to reassure her that at least her right eye is perfect. she wasn’t buying it.
it was funny to watch her try to function with her pupils dilated. besides the fact it was weird to look at her with those huge pupils, she nearly walked into a pillar and off of some steps when we came out into the sunshine. she refused to wear the sunglasses i’d brought for her because she said she looked bad in them. sheesh. i should be nice, since she’s taking me to the same optometrist in two weeks and i’ll be at her mercy.
afterwards, we spent a great evening at the black bear playing cards, smoking and laughing, a lot. seems a guy meg & i worked with at mcdonald’s in highschool is bartending at the pub we were at. he came and cleaned off our table at one point and meg and i both said “thanks, ken!” even though there was no name tag in sight. he probably didn’t remember me, though. i should fish out an incriminating photo of him and send it to his work. why? uh, because!
today, meg and i are going shopping for something for her to wear to a wedding and me to wear to the space needle. i don’t know why i have it in my head i have to buy something new and fancy. i have stuff i can wear, but even though rick’s never seen it, i have and i want something new. so i’m going to get it. i hope. because i’m looking for something, i’m sure not to find it. at least that’s how my shopping experiences always turn out.

lots of work to be accomplished before i go home. julie got the scheduling job, so i bought her lunch and flowers. she almost cried. it will be weird without her here (she’ll be working in the field office now). sat outside eating lunch; i think i got a little too much sun. i bake quickly. having a great hair day and feeling rather cute despite the “condition”. i love calling it that. i actually don’t mind that my voice is cracking like peter brady’s. at least it’s proof i’m ill.
okay, work to do.

i recently recalled one of the sweetest and most touching things anyone has ever said to me. i was talking to rick about this and that and subject of someone i used to be involved with came up and he said he didn’t like him. i asked why and rick replied that it was because this other person hurt me and he couldn’t forgive that.
it just made me feel so… verklempt.

i tried to send a birthday email to paul tonight. i did a search for a working email address for him, the most recent i had had been inactive for quite a while. i found one dating from november, but it bounced back.
sometimes forces greater than me save me from myself.

this is my “condition“.
i had a nap this afternoon. my dad phoned to check up on me. julie phoned to check up on me. icq-boy wanted to bring me lozenges. i ate popcorn & half a protein bar because i knew i had to eat something. i’d love to smoke, but, well…
i asked the doctor at the clinic i went to if she would be my regular physician. she smiled and said sure. so now i can shut all those people up when they start to get mad at me for not having a regular doctor.
haven’t decided if i’m going to work tomorrow. strep is kinda contagious and i don’t want to infect anyone. i don’t feel bad enough to stay home, but i know it’s not really polite to spread bacteria around the office. if i manage to sleep tonight, i probably will. i’m a heather. we don’t take well to shirking work responsibilities.

i’m going to the doctor. i woke up at midnight last night and i could barely swallow and when i did, it hurt like hades. from that point on i was consumed with visions of the emergency ward, who i would phone, suffocating in my sleep as my throat swelled shut. i didn’t sleep more than half an hour at a stretch. each time i opened my eyes, i’d beg for it to be nine a.m. and the doctor’s office to be open.
at least i won’t be bored at work today. ah, the irony.

i can’t believe it’s barely ten a.m. yesterday and today are going very slowly. it’s a dreadful combination of the sudden heat/humidity and the lack of work resources (read: the server is still not up 100%). i’d go home, but there’s nothing for me to do there either, except dishes. so i’m working on my redesign and otherwise wasting time. go me.
i phoned tyler last night. he was so suprised and pleased that i’d phoned him instead of the other way around. makes me feel guilty for being grumpy when he calls and wakes me up. i also made his day when i had to spill the beans about the surprise gift i’d ordered for him. he mentioned he’d ordered one for himself and i told him i’d ordered him one, too. in this case, having two is perfect for him, so it wasn’t a bad thing. i just wish it could have still been a surprise.
friday, before dinner & cards, i’m taking meghan to the optometrist. she’s never had a full eye exam with the dilation drops, the puff of air or the zillions of lenses (“is this clearer or fuzzier?”). since i’m overdue, i’ll make an appointment for the following friday and she’ll take me. i used to always want glasses. i’d go to the eye doctor and wish that he’d give me a prescription. now, i’d prefer not to need them, but with all the computer work i do, i’m fairly sure i’ll require some lenses for working/reading. if so, i’m going for the whole ani look, dammit. i need all the help i can get to look smart.

i have a habit of half-consciously rating places based solely on their bathrooms. points are scored for decor, cleanliness, odour (preferrably, a lack thereof), stalls, taps, toilets, hand dryers vs paper towels and, most importantly, toilet paper.
so far, the most enjoyable washroom experience i’ve encountered was in chicago’s o’hare airport. ten-foot brushed steel stalls whose walls reached to within an inch of the tiled floor (eliminating peekers or small children crawling under — as once happened to me in a chinese restaurant). two-ply toilet tissue (the true measure of quality) on a roll which dispensed with generous ease. automated plastic seat-covers which refreshed themselves in concert with the motion sensor flush. i think that airport ruined me for all but the most decadent lavatories constructed.
then there is whole subject of bidets, which i will save for a later time.

paige made me take this test:
hessie, your inner rock star is Sade
Ooooh lady, you’ve got it going on. The rock star part of you is all Sade. Sleek, sexy, and untouchable, you are the ultimate smooth operator. People tune in to you whenever they want to unwind and get into that sexy mood. You know how to keep cool and keep a low profile. And you’re never one to unveil your mystique by making too many appearances. By staying true to your talent and staying out of the spotlight, you’ve become as rare and welcome as love’s first blush at sunset. The fans are totally fascinated, so go ahead and use it. Strut your inner Sade.
i have issues with her hairline, but i like to think i’m fascinating.

i really want to get a proper, sleeveless dress for space needle dinner, but i don’t do naked arms and i found out that a shrug was called a shrug but i can’t think of where to begin looking for one. i found some shrugs online, but i think they’re for skinny women with skinny arms and i daren’t buy one just to discover i was right and then have to return it. i hate returning stuff.
i should leave early and make up the time instead of just sitting here bored. i could go do my shopping or something not more exciting, but at least productuve.
i’ve had monkey-on-the-brain all weekend. oddly enough, that’s a good thing.

– fun and educational way to pass time
– thinking of a re-design
– want to go home
– ate m&m’s
– have to go shopping
– dire need of clean clothes
– wearing white t-shirt for first time in years
– white bras do not go well under white t-shirts, but still better than black
– cannot form complete sentences
– need hair cut
– back sore
– forgot notebook with tuesday entry, must suffer with list
– covet camera still
– consider tanning before seattle (32 days – nervous!)
– need posh frock for space needle dinner
– busted rhonda for cat hoax email in a.m.
– drinking chocolate soy milk smoothies
– oblivious to account balance and rather apathetic about possibility of overdraft
– bored by listmaking
– commence search for online shrug sellers

i thought this would be a traumatic aquatic commute. fortunately, i was mistaken. it’s a brilliant, sunny day and the choppy seas are making the boat pitch and roll in a rather soothing manner. a plethora of white sails are interspersed with the white caps on the strait today. the gales have blown away most of the urban haze (smog is just too crass a name), leaving the city bare to any lascivious gaze. after optically caressing her, i feel a vague need for nicotine. i can’t tell if our partner in this nautical drag race is a populated ship. staring at it has only left me more in doubt and a green hue to anything else i look upon.

* * *

i overheard two women talking on the ferry about that cat. you know, the hoax.
“the cat was *this big*,” woman one said. “it ate raccoons!”
i love the internet.
* * *

i’m reading “the satanic verses”. it’s not quite what i expected. salman writes oddly, almost gaiman/pratchett-esque, but the language, the phonetics, are challenging. i feel like a foreigner. as if i’ve been dropped into a conversation in latin, not understanding a syllable.
* * *

movies i’ve seen in the last 60 hours:
knight’s tale
best of show
anti-trust
bring out the dead

movies i want to see this summer:
AI
moulin rouge
tomb raider
final fantasy

* * *

while driving to the ferry, i had a sudden, painful memory. i don’t recall the details of it now, two hours later, but i do indeed recall the feelings it evoked. god how i miss him some moments.
i always seem to be in the midst of missing something or someone.
i need to start appreciating what i have, not what i’ve lost.

first off, sorry for the outage earlier today. the physical machine this is hosted on decided to take a little vacation today. of course, this happened just as i’d finished all that Work From Hell and was itching to blog. i’m just glad it’s back and i didn’t lose any files. i think i need to do a back up some time soon, just in case.
so, yeah. all that backlog is completed. i’m the hero and everyone loves me for working my fingers and ass off so they can get paid next week. when i announced that i was finished, my boss stood up and shook my hand.
the server is still kaput and as of the time i left work today it was looking like it will still be down come tuesday. mike had to send the actual hard drive to california to a data recovery company to see if they can retrieve anything of use off it… for an $18,000 fee. gee, what a way to make money off other’s suffering.
i will indeed be going to the island to deliver mom’s mother’s day present. i’m glad of that. i could use a couple days away after this week. thank god it’s a long weekend.
other than that, my brain’s a little too fried to think of anything remotely interesting to parlay so i’m going to go eat some lay’s and watch dawson’s creek. have a lurvely weekend!

i have to re-do nine days work. plus, for every day that i’m doing that, my daily work is piling up waiting for me to do that. all this has to be completed by tuesday morning. i don’t think i’m going away this weekend.

but, who knows… it may be just the start. i’m totally pissed that i may not be able to go visit mom this weekend in order to stay here and re-do all that bloody work. it’s not fair. i was thinking that maybe i’d sacrifice and come on monday (victoria day holiday) to do it. that way i can still go to the island for at least a couple of days. i was already considering coming home sunday regardless. and, the one upside of working on the stat is i get double time and another day off in lieu of the holiday. we’ll see. because i’m planning that, of course they’ll get all the data back and rob me of some extras.
found out that one of my favourite managers got fired today. totally out of the blue, too. i had been talking to him in the morning and he was upbeat even with all the computer problems. poor guy. i know that they’ve probably been trying to get rid of him for a while, but it still seems sudden. i was speculating with another manager about the timing and i wondered if maybe it was because they wanted to get him out before he unpacked his stuff into his new office.

as the construction has moved to the middle portion of this floor, so have the construction workers. there are scads of really cute, hard hat wearing men around and it is driving me to distraction. they’re *everywhere*!
but, i’m still too chickenshit to do anything other than smile shyly and flip my hair when i walk past them. *sob*