Domestic Geek

My body and brain are going into panic mode. This knowing I'm going to be unemployed really sucks. I've gained almost 10 pounds since I found out I'm going to be unemployed soon. I haven't changed what I'm eating (I'm actually eating less), but the stress is just making me hang onto every calorie. *sigh* I can't think straight. I'm chewing my nails to the point of bleeding. I had a panic attack a couple of hours ago to boot. I had a horrible urge to flee. I ended up going out for a drive during lunch to try to calm down. I just wanted to get on the highway and go home. I only have to do this 7 more days.

I had such a nice, peaceful day here on Monday. I closed the whole office out--blocked the air conditioning vent, closed the door, opened the window. Today, my office mate is doing everything he can to push my buttons. Grrr. He's got headphones--I wish he'd use them. I swear, it's almost like he is trying to get me to go off on him. I'll remain calm and I will prevail.

I discovered something really sucky last night. Twenty-five of my iTunes songs are gone. They're ones that I purchased with Pepsi caps last year. Apple doesn't let you redownload them, either. It's like I lost a couple of CDs. I drank Pepsi just to get those darned caps...I don't even like Pepsi. I went to play O-Zone's Dragostea Din Tei and it is nowhere to be found. Looking at my past purchases on iTunes and with the help of Marcus, I discoverd many songs disappeared around May of last year. I have no idea what happened to them. I guess if I win more Blingo certificates, I'll replace them. Otherwise, I'll have to wait until I get more moolah coming in. Here's what I lost for future reference:

I Know You're Out There Somewhere	The Moody Blues
Imaginary Lover	Atlanta Rhythm Section
Time	The Alan Parsons Project
Baby Come Back	Player
Rollin'	Limp Bizkit
Break Stuff	Limp Bizkit
Theme from Shaft	Isaac Hayes
Killing in the Name	Rage Against the Machine
Closer	Nine Inch Nails
Dreams	The Cranberries
It's My Life	No Doubt
Falling Away From Me	Korn
Make Me Bad	Korn
Got the Life	Korn
Self Control	Laura Brannigan
Your Wildest Dreams	The Moody Blues
Woo Hoo	The 5.6.7.8's
Supermodel	RuPaul
Just Lose It	Eminem
Rich Girl	Gwen Stephani
Tennessee	Arrested Development
Times Like These	Foo Fighters
The Ketchup Song (Asereje)	Las Ketchup
My Favorite Game	The Cardigans
Dragostea Din Tei (Original Romanian Version)	O-Zone
What Are You Waiting For?	Gwen Stefani

Two weeks from today I won't have to be psyching myself up to face the drive to a job in Larkspur anymore. Yay for that. Boo for still not having another job lined up yet. I did have an interview on Friday, but the job is only part time. I'd really like to work there, though. I'm contemplating applying at the Apple Store part time and freelancing if they offer me that job. The place does trade show stuff. Large format, beautiful stuff. She really liked me, but has several interviews to do yet. We'll see. I'll know by the 14th one way or the other. She kept alluding to the the fact that they want me. She really liked the fact that I had built my portfolio case from scratch. Maybe if I get in there, I'll wow them so much that they will eventually offer full time. Who knows? I'm still looking, though.

I really don't want to go down there today. The stupid owner took a 4-5 day weekend (I think he gets back on Wednesday), yet we all still have to go in to work today. The only bright spot is my office mate is out of town, so I can close the door and be alone to work on this stupid Filemaker database I'm working on. At least the drive today should've be too bad.

I'm so tired. My old dog pants alot. Not because he's hot, but because of some weird psychological thing going on in his old dog brain. His internal clock starts him doing this at 5am every morning, no matter what time he goes to sleep. Last night, he kept doing it until he went to sleep (around midnight, finally). *sigh* Some have told us to put him down, but I don't think he's ready. He's still got energy. He still controls his bodily funcitons. He just can't see well, he's lost his sense of smell and he gets a little confused. He's just old. I just wish he'd knock off this weird panting thing.

I finally decided to start watch the tv series 24. I never bothered with it on television because I really didn't have room to record it and I don't watch live television if I can help it. I noticed it on Netflix, so I decided to give it a shot. I didn't realize there were 5 seasons of it! Oi Vey, this is going to take awhile! I watched the first disk yesterday. Not too bad.

I really had something else to post about, but danged if I can remember what it is right at the moment. I guess It'll have to wait until I get to work.

Why does it seem that everything breaks or falls apart when you have no money?

My poor old iPod is toast. I plugged it in at work the other day and it wouldn't mount. Here at home, I got it to mount a couple of times to start transferring data off of it, but it kept crashing my Finder. I managed to get all but the music off of it. *sigh* It's the same problem I had before. The firewire port comes loose from the motherboard. Since Marcus no longer works at his old place of employment, there is nobody to fix it this time. Oh, well. I did get almost three more years' use out of it. I just wish I could've backed up my iTunes library first. There seem to be IDE adapters on the market for these 1.8" ipod drives. Maybe when I have some money again, I'll try one.

UPDATE: Well, I held the firewire cable just right to transfer the music folder. I couldn't move my hand for over 10 minutes. OW! At least I can rest easy that I got all of my stuff off the ipod.

I am finding it increasingly difficult to care about my current workplace. They should've just let me go with a severence, y'know? Like you're going to get my full attention for the next three weeks. It's hard enough to finish out a two week notice period when you're the one that initiated it. Try doing a month when your employer is letting you go and there are too many designers working here. It's a good thing Independence Day is next week and I get that day off. It's so tempting to call in, but I can't afford to have them dock my pay, y'know?

I made it over to the Tattered Cover on Saturday. It wasn't any more busy than ususal. The sad thing was that all of the comfy reading chairs had already been taken out. They had some folding chairs set around, but not really conducive to sitting back to enjoy the atmosphere. I was talking to one of the employees about their move and he had said that everything was going to be moved in one day. According to a piece on saw on WB2 news this morning, they did it. I'll go check out the new digs later this week.

Marcus and I went to Finn McCool's for dinner last night. I had a gift certificate that expires on 6/30, so that was the last opportunity we had to use it. It's in a really bad spot, though. It's up on Arapahoe & I-25 and unless you know it's there, you'd never see it. I had a Buttermilk Fried Chicken breast. Not too bad. The broccoli was really tasty. I'd go again if it was closer. The pool is free, so Marcus and I played a couple of games. Man, I am so out of practice. I used to be really good, but now, not so good. It was good to do something a little different for once.

Well, I thought I had lots to say, but can't really think of anything else.

I read a Sneaky Sugars article on Discovery Health earlier this week that talked about the incredible amounts of sugar in our diets. It said that 7 grams of sugar (on the nutrition label) is approximately 1 Tablespoon! Not small t teaspoon, but large T Tablespoon. I was appalled. Out of curiosity, I looked at the label of the Dannon Frusion I've been buying for breakfast lately (thinking it was healthy). One little 10 oz. bottle of mixed berry flavor had 48 grams of sugar—almost 7 tablespoons! Don't even get me started that part of that sugar was High Fructose Corn Syrup. No wonder I don't lose weight. Then people have the audacity to wonder why our society is so overweight. I'm making a concerted effort to rid my diet of as much processed sugars as possible. I'll still have an occasional Starbucks or a coke for a treat, but no more white sugar in my tea, no more processed beverages daily, no more!

Today is the last day that The Tattered Cover Bookstore will be open in Cherry Creek. I'm heading over there to have one last wander around. It's kind of sad since it's been there so long, but at the same time, maybe i'll go more often now that it will be somewhere that has close free parking. Now I have to park in the Cherry Creek mall's parking garage or park in one of the neighborhoods several blocks away and walk over. I hope it's not overly busy, but I'm afraid it will be. I'll kick myself if I don't at least give it a try, though.