[ endless dream ]

[ Friday, August 29, 2003 ]

Today is payday, and as a direct result of this minor blessing, I might take myself out shopping at some point tomorrow. I have a new shirt and tie to pick up for a certain Big Date in October, where we'll be going to the wonderfully opulent Chef Pierre Restaurant on Montreal Road. Incidentally, this is the same beautifully lavish Chef Pierre Restaurant where my family started a sugar packet fight in the middle of dinner. I'll find out if I've been banned from the place when I call to make the reservations. I'm sure there are other superbly expensive French restaurants we can go to if the Chef decides he doesn't want to have his establishment tarnished by my family name ever again, but odds are no one even remembers the incident. I'm not important enough to be banned!

Although the Big Date is still a couple of months away, I feel like making my clothing purchases sometime in the near future. I would also like to pick up a copy of The Two Towers, but I might just let that one slide and wait to buy the Special Edition when it comes out. That way, I'll have a little extra money to splurge on the new Neverwhere DVD when that becomes available on September 9th. Hopefully HMV will be carrying it, otherwise I'll end up muttering about their lack of selection before trying to hit other stores that might have it in stock. But according to HMV's website -- which is, for reasons unknown, under Amazon.ca's website -- they'll be carrying it, so it's just a matter of waiting.

I finished listening to the original BBC tapes of The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy last night, and now I seriously need to pick up the omnibus edition of the book. But that's another item I can wait to purchase; I still have Poppy Z. Brite's Drawing Blood to finish, and I'm only a little more than halfway through that one. I also have another book Murmur lent me, increasing my backlog of reading material by a few. I'll get to it eventually, though; a collection of short stories is always good to have handy.

I made a second copy of my "Summer Mix" CD yesterday, since my original copy is now in the CD changer of a little red car in Kentucky. I also left my collar in the passenger side drink holder of said little red car, mostly because I completely forgot about having taken it off somewhere between Shelbyville and the State Fair.

By the way, I still think it's fairly amusing that we had dinner at a Cracker Barrel in Shelbyville, even if that resulted in me losing a point on the Online Snob Test.

But hey, 74% snob is still fine by me!

[ Maleficia 8:24 PM [+] ]
...

There's a war going on. It isn't taking place across the ocean in some desolate part of the world, and people aren't being shot or mutilated in it. No one is dying a horrible, fiery death... or at least, not yet. There's a war in progress, and it's a war of wits: a Cheezy Gift Giving War. It began almost a year ago, in the month of October, when the first few bombings consisted of a giant, over-sized novelty comb, and a Canada poker-style visor. Months later, only last week, the other side retaliated with a blitzkrieg of silliness, the atomic bomb of which has to be a finger puppet fashioned as a farmer. And we can't forget the other items I can't yet mention due to their intended targets not having been struck yet, because the intelligence agents of those same targets could very well be reading this to assimilate information to use in battle. But when they are struck, when these weapons of mass distraction have been delivered, I will be here to report the carnage that ensues.

Both parties have sworn the most viscious of vengeance, and though they may scoff at each other's threats, I'm taking them quite seriously. The casualties will number in the single digits, and the damage to the psyches of everyone involved will be to the utmost minimum. A Geneva convention of sorts must be established by a neutral third party, the United Nations Security Council of Silliness, if you will. Unfortunately, I'm not playing the side of Switzerland in this war, and my support may or may not be given to a certain faction involved in the battles, so I cannot be part of the Security Council. I can only hope that I will not become a target, that I won't end up wailing in agonizing laughter by an unannounced Silly Missile Strike. I'll be ready should that happen; my forces of cheeziness, my army of Dollar Store merchandise will be ready to be called into action, to fulfill their purpose of striking down the opposition by inducing fits of uncontrolable laughter that will bring them to their knees.

Or I could fail miserably and not be able to come up with any silliness whatsoever, forcing me to capitulate into fits of laughter myself.

Maybe I should play the part of Switzerland and not get involved afterall.

Of course, we all know where my loyalties lie.

Onward, silly soldiers!

[ Maleficia 8:37 PM [+] ]
...

The shining form of Mars winked at me from within the velvet darkness of the heavens last night while I walked home from the bus stop after work, and I took a few extra minutes to stand at the end of my driveway and gaze up at the night sky. There was a time last week when I watched the Red Planet somewhere else, the memory of which will be with me forever. It was wonderful to sit outside on the damp grass of the backyard, the only illumination coming from nearby lights, a couple of candles, and Mars herself, smiling down at us betwixt the other stars. Last night was supposed to be the closest the planet will have gotten to Earth in around sixty-thousand years, so seeing it glowing like a tiny second moon was definately a unique experience.

But maybe I'll come back in another sixty-thousand years to see it again.

Tonight has been pretty hectic at work. Between lending "my" office to another supervisor so she could demonstrate to a handful of newbies how we monitor them, and the need to import more numbers in here by another supervisor, I've been running around a lot. But now I have my brief moment to write a little, so I'm taking full advantage of it.

I have to run a training session on Tuesday, the day after the long weekend, and I foresee much suckitude in that regard. I really don't enjoy doing these freakin' things, mainly because I haven't had much of a chance to do them in the past, and when I did, I was always with someone else in case I didn't know what to do. But I'll be on my own on Tuesday, so the thought of having fifteen people hanging on my every word has me a little nervous. It's kind of like being a teacher, though I'm stuck teaching a subject I don't particularly enjoy, or have a real passion for. Now, if I somehow managed to squeeze in some English lessons into this training session, I might feel a little better about the whole thing. Maybe there's a way for me to do that. hmm..

On a completely unrelated -- but somewhat more interesting -- matter, I finally got the link to The Atheist's blog, and you might notice the new link to said blog on the appropriate menu to the left. Give it a read; it's pretty cool. While you're at it, why not take a look at The Atheist's Virtual Pub, containing his reviews of different beers. Go on, you know you want to.

And on that note, I should get back to work.

Less than two bloody hours until I can go home.

This shift is going on forever!

[ Maleficia 8:45 PM [+] ]
...

I've settled back into the flow of things back here at home after being in Heaven for a week. Though the events leading up to my departure had me severely worried that I would be grounded here, everything worked out as planned, and I have a handful of new memories to add to the myriad others I already have, and the plethora of ones I know are coming.

So, let's start with the blackout.

I got to work on Thursday, thinking everything would proceed as it normally does. I was expecting to continue my temporary Human Resource duties, calling people who had submitted resumes to set up interviews with them for the slew of training sessions that would be forthcoming. I was even told that my plans to take Friday off wouldn't be feasible, since I was needed for those same duties. But as I began to leaf through the overbearing HR Book to select which resumes I'd be looking at, the office was bathed in darkness, and the boss came running out of his little cubby-hole in mock panic, flailing his arms in the air and screaming in an undertone. We stepped out onto the balcony to see if our building was the only one without power, and noticed people milling about the sidewalk across the street, thus leading us to believe the block was down. After a little while, the day shift people were dismissed, and the rest of the supervisors and I were instructed to wait until 6:00 before packing up and leaving. A few minutes later, the security guard came upstairs and informed us to leave: they were closing down the building because all of downtown was without power. I went to catch my bus, thinking there wouldn't be that many problems, and noticed gridlock everywhere I looked. People were speaking of Biblical disaster, that the power was down throughout all of North America.

I scoffed and kept walking.

It was then I came upon a hot-dog vendor with a battery powered radio, and the news reporter was saying how power was out all the way to North Carolina. This made me begin my downward spiral into severe anxiety. More walking brought me to a police officer who confirmed the rumour that this wasn't a localized thing: power was indeed down across most of the Eastern Seaboard.

My bus wasn't going anywhere, so I walked home... for three hours until I finally caught up with it again. Once inside my house, I told my parents what I'd heard, since I assumed they weren't aware of the severity of the blackout. Grudgingly, I settled down to read the rest of the new Harry Potter book until the sun set, robbing me of reading light. I called Murmur to let her know about the situation, and to get a little bit of moral support about my flight on Saturday. She assured me everything would be fine, and she was quite right.

As it turns out, I did actually get Friday off thanks to the Province-wide state of emergency, so I had time to pack everything I needed for my trip, though I wasn't able to purchase the birthday presents I wanted to get. Come Saturday -- and after about three calls to the airlines to be sure the flight was actually running -- I arrived at the airport and was on my way to Kentucky, with a brief stop-over in Detroit.

A week of eating out, jaunts to book stores and comic shops, drag pageants, lovely red wine, Mars watching, staring at royal horse-related exhibits at the museum, omlettes, late nights in the basement, naps on the couch, movies, and other things left me with a sense of happiness and contentment that will continue to linger with me until the next time.

October isn't that far away.

And spending Christmas down there won't be too far away after that.

For now, though, I'll smile at the memories made, and those yet to come.

[ Maleficia 8:46 PM [+] ]
...

I have a new term... well, two new terms, actually. And those would be "fantacular", and "spectastic". Both these new words obviously mean something excellent or sensational. So I can say, "My trip to Kentucky next week will be fantacular!" or, "The meatball sub I had for dinner was simply spectastic". Okay, so maybe the sub wasn't entirely spectastic, but it was pretty good, considering it was only some cheap fast food. Either way, thanks go out to Mathieu for providing me with new and rediculous expressions to write about.

That's really about the only fantacular thing I have to say at the moment; today hasn't been all that eventful. I'm sitting at work right now, and that's far from spectastic. But at least things aren't all that busy tonight, so that's something I should be grateful for. The shift will be ending somewhere around 9:00 again, just as it did last night, and while this means I won't be getting as much money as I would like to, it also means I get to go home a little bit earlier. Whoo! I can only take so much of this office, even if I haven't been in all that much over the past few weeks. I'm knocking on wood now when I say that at least I was able to work every day this week, excluding Monday, which was a holiday, but I got paid for that, so I'm counting it as a work day.

But enough about that.

I really need to get some writing done sometime in the near future. I was only able to write one paragraph of a short story that's been sitting around for quite some time last week, so I might try to finish that one up at some point this weekend. All I really have planned is getting my hair cut, which leaves me quite a bit of time to sit down at my computer and try to get these ideas typed out. I know where I want the story to go, but my constant writer's block is preventing me from advancing from where I am now to that ultimate goal. I have a handful of other stories that need to be finished, as well as my new play and the beginning of a novel. I don't know if I'll be able to tackle all of that over the course of this weekend, but at the very least, I want to finish up one short story out of many.

I've been doing some magickal work again lately; it feels good to get back into the flow of things in that regard. It's been too long since I actually cast a circle, and I'd almost forgotten how refreshing that kind of energy can be. I may just end up casting another one this weekend to get back in touch with my Goddess, whom I haven't spoken to in too long. We have some catching up to do.

For now, though, I need to catch up on work.

Only an hour left before I can go home. The last hour is always the longest.

[ Maleficia 8:03 PM [+] ]
...

I nearly managed to completely screw up my blog layout by moving the Archive section beneath the Links, so I had to sit here and do some creative debugging. I finally got everything sorted through, though, so it's all back to normal, but I don't think I'll be screwing around with my templates again any time in the near future. I nearly gave myself an aneurysm when what I thought was going to be a minor adjustment turned into a giant ball of crap. But in the end, I fixed it, and the Archive menu no longer has that annoying grey background that came as a default for some reason. Hoorah for freakin' coding.

It's raining right now, the thunder booming off in the distance, the forks of lightning illuminating my room with a blueish-white light every so often. It's nice to sit here and listen to the storm; it gives me a sense of calm, while at the same time filling me with a kind of energy that only comes with a thunderstorm. It's been threatening to rain all day, but I managed to squeeze in two walks before it hit. And now, after my bath and a little bit of Family Guy, I'm content to lounge around and bask in the sound of the pattering raindrops against my window.

This concludes our broadcast day.

Static, flicker, fade...

[ Maleficia 10:52 PM [+] ]
...

Looks like I was wrong about the release day for The Two Towers DVD. For some reason, I was under the impression that it was coming out today, so before I made a rash decision to run down to Future Shop to see if they had it, I checked the Lord of the Rings website and discovered -- much to my horror -- that it doesn't come out until the 26th. I don't know why I thought it was going to hit the shelves today, but I'm somewhat glad it did so I didn't have to drop a handful of cash for it. I need to save my money for another two weeks when I step on that plane, get off after about an hour and a half, wait around, get on another plane, and get off again at my final destination. Whee, travel. And I need a little bit of money to get my hair cut next weekend; I want to be looking good for the week after. I think I'll hit some stores to see if I can find a good shade of purple hair dye while I'm at it so I can retouch my streak. Also, my phone bill should be getting here in a few days, so that's one other expense I need to consider And I also need to pick up a couple of birthday presents. So that's my shopping list.

After a week off work, I finally managed to go into the office on Thursday night and had to suffer through four hours of working on the phones again. I'd gotten used to doing virtually nothing during my evening shifts, so it was a little bit difficult to get back into the groove of calling people. Once I did, though, it went pretty smoothly, and the shift didn't seem to be too terribly unbearable. I worked 9:00 to 5:00 yesterday, and after a couple of hours of going through ancient resumes that have been sitting around for months, I was left to other "make-work" for the rest of the day. I didn't do much of anything, but at least I got eight hours to sit around and get paid. Monday's a holiday, so I get another free eight hours. The suckitude of my next paycheck may not be too annihilating after all.

A handful of the photos from last week's little adventure downtown were finally uploaded, and they look pretty good. Someone is supposed to be emailing the rest of them to me sometime in the near future because I asked for them. I'm eager to see how those ones turned out, because I can't really remember what they are. Hopefully they'll arrive shortly.

I'm already on the fourth Harry Potter book, so I really need to stagger my reading a little bit; there's only one more book after this one before I have to start waiting for the next one to be published. Damn these things for being so addictive! I have half a mind to take a trip down to the candy store downtown to pick up some Every Flavour Beans, but the thought of the vomit-flavoured ones is keeping me in check. I could always set those aside and give them to someone I don't like, but I that requires effort, and we all know how I feel about effort.

Speaking of, it's time I made the effort to get out of this chair so I can get something to eat; I'm damn hungry as a result of this afternoon's walk.

This is where a matter transporter would come in handy.

[ Maleficia 4:45 PM [+] ]
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