Geralin

Well, we moved to the new place over the weekend.

And now I remember why I hate moving. My body hurts in places I’d forgotten I had. I have cardboard burns on my hands from unpacking boxes. We finally got the place looking more like a dwelling and less like a disaster area yesterday. My room is set up and we’ve only got about four or five boxes left to unpack. We still have oodles of bubble-wrap and cardboard cluttering up the entry way (which we will hopefully be hauling down tonight so I can sweep the place). Still, at least now we can move through the apartment without too many problems and it is, for the most part, somewhat presentable. We still need to unpack a few things (as mentioned) and get our pictures hung up on the walls. I need to order a mattress pad from Ikea because my couchbed is rock-solid. We’ll be getting Internet at the apartment late this week.

And, we have bookshelves. Lots and lots of bookshelves.

I’m going to wind up going through them and setting up a system so we can actually FIND our books now. Raf’s going to have to take all the French language books into his room. Once we’ve done that and at least seen exactly how much space we have left, I’ll probably set up a small non-fiction section using the Dewey Decimal system and then break the rest down into alpha-by-author (screw genre because we’d be there until the cows came home with that).

Also, my commute has been cut down to a quarter of what it was. Honestly, by the time I get half-way dozed off, it’s time to get off the bus and walk into the office. It’s great. Raf’s commute is roughly the same, I think (we’ll find out today). And, wonder of wonders, we have a washing machine and drier that works (mostly). We’ve still got to get a few of the settings tweaked but we will be able to do laundry the right way instead of the “cram as much in there because we’re going to have to hang it up to dry for a week before we can wear it” way.

The kitchen is nice and mostly organized though I need to wash all of the dishes since they were packed. That’ll be something I do over the course of the next few weeks. The bathroom has a plug so I can dry my hair without having to use a shadowboxing method to see what I’m doing.

Anyhow, I’m looking forward to my long weekend this week so we can finish the few last things that need to be done and I can spend all my time reading Towers of Midnight once it gets here.

So, my new computer got here on Tuesday and I got it all set up. It’s wonderful. It’s quiet.

On top of that, I’ll be moving soon! To a new apartment where I will have (I don’t think I’ve emphasised this enough) my. own. room. Where I can shut the door. Where the TV will not bother me. Where my stbx-husband will not be yapping at me and then get pissed because I’m listening to music and trying to focus on writing or because I’m talking on Vent and raiding. Where his music will not be polluting my audial environment (the stuff he listens to sounds like rabid cats clawing sheets of metal while being tortured). Where I will have a balcony so that my smoke breaks (nasty habit, I know) take only three minutes instead of ten.

In anticipation of these things, I’m setting up all of my files so I can do some serious editing on Alayne’s Story. I’m also working on a revamp of this website and of another that I’m running. I’m also drafting plans for yet another web site and am considering retaining legal services to see if I could make some t-shirts or even print out copies of my stories and sell them for cost and shipping without getting smacked with a lawsuit if I do it for Alayne’s Story (hey, the guys at LFG got away with this).

Why am I considering these things? Well, I’d like to be able to actually contemplate quitting my job and doing something fun (or at least something that involves using more than 1% of my brain). Over the last several years, decisions have been made where I work that have the end result of me sitting on my hands a lot, copypasting things others have written, having no ability to voice feedback, no ability to actually edit things that are either flat out incorrect or could be done so much better, and pretty much being told-by-action that I will do this and like it or I will find another line of work. To be fair, my boss has been arguing for my skills, knowledge, and talent to be used better but the guys calling the shots seem to think (again, actions shouting while words whisper) that I’m either a moron, completely unskilled, not worth working with, or some combination of the above.

I’m also considering going with my original life plan and returning to the US, getting my teaching license, teaching high school students, and then doing whatever-I-want during my spare time. And, if that doesn’t work out…well, there are other places I can go and I am exploring those options.

Now, I’ve been damned loyal to the place I work at and I’ve made a lot of sacrifices of my personal time for them. However, over the last three years or so, it’s become clearer and clearer that said loyalty is not reciprocated and so I’m staying mostly for the benefits and the off-chance that something will change for the better (and because the economy sucks). However, lately I’ve spent more and more time thinking of ways to earn a living doing what I love versus earning a living by disengaging my brain at 8 am and not turning it back on until 6 pm because my employer wants my ability to do mindless copypasting versus my ability to actually give them something cool and worthwhile.

Anyhow, enough moaning. Back to work on Alayne’s Story!