Well, I haven't been fishing since I was ....maybe 12 years old, but I've always enjoyed it. It's always been fishing in lakes, that's what we had available. Friday I got to try out stream fishing, and boy is it different! Instead of dropping a line and watching the little bobber for hours on end, you first have to search out a fishing hole, then you drop the line in carefully upstream and see if you can get it to slide into the chosen hole...and you do this for a bit until you either get a bite, or get bored and decide to find a new hole. I had the fun of catching the very first fish of the day, and then eventually caught 2 more. One was really tiny though, and I threw him back. Here's a picture of the triumphant fishing crew.




I also got to learn how to clean a fish...you'd think I'd know this by now, but this was my first time. I did clean the two I caught though, and then Matt, (one of my roommates) fried them all up for dinner.

Saturday I decided to take on a little gardening project. There was an herb garden out behind the house that ...looked like it hadn't been used in several years...So I decided to clean it out so I'd have a place to garden. It took two solid days of weeding...and one spectacular sunburn, but it looks fantastic now, and I'll go and buy some new plants for it sometime next week.

Here's a before picture...Though I think this was halfway through the day on Saturday.




A mid-way photo from Sunday.



And a Done! shot.



All those flagstones...I had to dig them all up and re-set them. They were under at least an inch of dirt, and I didn't even know they were there when I started. Project well done! I can't wait to get some new plants to put in there.

The band just left for Wyoming, for the Scottish games there this weekend. This means I've got the house entirely to myself after having no fewer than 4 people here on any one day for the past several weeks. Suddenly the house is very quiet with just me, the dog and the two cats.

Took Bejorn on a walk, there's a very pretty trail that goes up through the forest and up to a little meadow, then down an old mining road. He seemed pretty frisky today, so I'm glad I kept him on the leash... Something must have smelled interesting.

Booking is going well, and I'm working on getting a website set up for the new agency. I'm hoping to get that done this weekend, or at least make a good start on it. It's been a while since I tried to build a website. Also on the agenda is going through some of my boxes. I'm still trying to find stuff (like my fuzzy slippers) and so I'm finally going to make some time.

Yesterday I went out with the band and took a bunch of footage so that we can hopefully put together a music video for them. Regardless of if the footage turned out, it was a heck of a lot of fun and I got to see what an old mine looks like. If it turns out well, I'll link it so everyone can see.

Things with selling the house aren't going well unfortunately. I'm working on working things out with Oelier so that things actually get taken care of. We'll see how it goes.

Well, exciting week so far....woke up to no water on Tuesday. Thankfully it had been restored by early afternoon so I could take a desperately needed shower. I spent a good deal of time on Tuesday organizing myself and how I wanted things to work for my new job, and setting up a system. I think what I've got will work well, but I could wish that my address book and my calendar would sync better to make things a tad easier.

Today has been mostly calling people and discovering that really I need voicemail instead of call waiting, and getting that all set up, so that everything will look more professional.

Yesterday I walked down to get the mail by myself. Now..to most folks walking down to get the mail doesn't sound like much. But here, it's a decent distance, made more problematic by loose dogs along the route. For those of you that don't know...I -really- don't like dogs. So my trek to the box yesterday was somewhat complicated by an unfamiliar loose dog that insisted on barking at me and refusing to go away. I ended up backtracking and going an alternate route, which probably doubled the length of the walk..which is fine since I need the exercise...but annoying due to the cause.

Today so far has been..wet...and cold....really it's the perfect day to curl up and watch movies with hot chocolate. I think the temperature this morning read 43 degrees, and wet. It looks like it's stopped raining for the moment though. Luckily I have a huge window in my "office" that lets me look out over the mountains and see all the pine trees (and the occasional, very bedraggled, dove)

Well..I figured with my precipitous move that I should try and keep my blog more updated for folks...so I'll try, but no guarantees.

We got in on Wednesday last week, and since then have been moving and cleaning and re-arranging and making room. We cleaned out their storage trailer and re-packed it and then added all of my stuff to it...I still have to go through everything and find stuff. Lindsey very kindly packed my entire room on Monday and labeled everything for me...but I still need to find where things are. That will be a project for next week I think.

I will start my new job tomorrow...part of that is just going to be getting organized and figuring out how I want to get stuff set up and meeting with various folks to see how we want to handle everything.

Here are a few photos of the new place :)



Sweeping out the furniture trailer...this is -before- my stuff got put in.


My new office...who needs windows ;)





Can you tell I hate dogs?

So..in a wild fit of impulse...and various other factors ...I have moved to Colorado. On Saturday The Muses played a house concert at my house, we had about 12 folks show up, and everyone enjoyed the show. On Sunday the four of us went out to Scarborough Faire in Waxahachi TX and enjoyed the day out there, mostly just catching up with our various faire friends and hanging out. I was a bit too worn out with the heat to drive home on Sunday night, so ended up staying with the band with the intention of driving home on Monday.

When Monday came round...I still didn't want to drive home. Being heartily fed up with my living situation the thought of returning by myself to go back to it was just about making me sick. So...the band suggested that they come back with me, help me pack up and move me up to their place...and that's what we did.

I guess it took about 5 hours to pack up the house and the truck, stayed at a hotel that night, I went in to work the next morning and quit my job (with no notice unfortunately, but that's just how it worked out) Said good by to my co-workers and headed out to Colorado.

We got in yesterday afternoon...it's really gorgeous up here. I'll post pictures once i've found my camera and had a chance to take some. The drive up was really nice, but we're going to have a lot of work to do in the next few days unpacking my truck and finding places to store everything.

My cell phone number will stay the same, but it doesn't work while i'm up at the house. I'll be able to check messages whenever I go into town though. My email address will be the same. If you need other contact information for me, send me an email and I'll send it to you.

Yesterday I was at work..as normal...enjoying my day as much as possible in a state job, nothing exciting at all, and I got a call from a real estate agent...she wanted to show my house. Great!  and it was nearly lunchtime, so I thought I'd run home and make sure the place was picked up. I seemed to recall some dirty dishes and a few things that could use straigtening. 

So this is when the "fun" begins. I get out to my car..and there's a boot on it, and a large angry notice glued to my winshield, and a $150 parking ticket. Well...ok..I naturally wasn't pleased. (understatement to be sure) I -was- using someone else's parking permit though, and techincally that's not allowed. But normally...if you have a valid looking permit, the rent a cops don't scan it. So I called Parking and Transportation Services (after walking to the wrong parking garage) to find out what I need to do to get the boot off, and WHY did they scan my permit anyway hmm?

Response: "That permit was reported as lost"
Me: "Well who reported it as lost?" 
Them: "The owner reported it as lost"
Me: "I am 100% certain the -owner- did not report it as lost, WHO reported it as lost?"
Them: "Ma'am, you will have to speak to a manager for that information"

Does this not make it sound like perhaps someone ratted on me? So, by the time I reach PTS I am -fuming- I almost actually threw my phone against a wall. (I didn't, my phone is still safe lol..but it was a near thing) When I get there, the woman is just as non-helpful as before, and is demanding that I surrender my (borrowed) permit before I can speak to the manager...this woman...I KNOW she puts up with a lot of crap...but seriously..some customer service skills might be in order. And she -still- won't tell me who reported it as lost.

So she goes back and talks to a manger, and brings me back...the manager predictably keeps me waiting for a good 10 minutes, and then comes out demanding all sorts of personal (i.e. my work employee number type thing) information and then leaves again. When she comes back, I ask her the same question...and -finally- a response...and a perfectly reasonable one at that...when a permit is payed by payroll deduction, when the deduction is stopped, then the permit is listed as "lost". While this totally sucks for me, it IS reasonable.  So I was like ok...that's fine, where do I pay. (I needed to get the boot off you see) And she told me very politely that I should pay up front at the cashiere's station. 

THEN...she came up, and I saw her writing down some numbers on my little ticket...apparently she was calculating how much the permit would have cost for me to have it for those months that I used it...so she tacked on ANOTHER $150. To say I was not pleased...is an understatement. The fact that she didn't TELL me she was going to do this...and just made the little clerk tell me...or no..not even tell me, just charge my card...ooooh...very angry...(I'm getting all angry again just typing this up lol)

Yah..I took the rest of the day off...I didn't throw anything (though I wanted to...badly) But yah..yesterday ick. 

On a brighter note though..I DID get the house cleaned up before the showing, and I think the woman really liked it, and might bring her fiancee back today or tomorrow to look at it. So everyone keep your fingers crossed that they actually decide to BUY it.

So last night was the graduation banquet for all of our students. Everyone gets dressed up, comes out in suits, wined and dined and generally has a good time. It was a -lot- of fun seeing all the students ready be on their way. Well...of course..free booze + students = some drunk students.

One of the drunker students ended up hitting on me for a while, and definitely had some innapropriate suggestions (NO I will NOT take you back up to my private office at 10:00pm so we can "just talk") -geeze-

Aaaanyway....got an email from him inviting me to lunch....

So the rejection letter writing commences *grin*

I told one of my guy friends about the situation...HE wrote the letter and I edited appropriately...then did a complete re-write due to a slight mis-communication....then sent it off to -another- one of my guy friends for his take on it, suggestions etc...THEN sent it to the guy in question. 

Now..the reason my guy friends are writing this for me...is because I'm terrible about saying what I actually mean in this sort of situation.  Normally I would have responded with something like..."Oh, I can't do lunch today, I already have plans" which would of course have elicited MORE emails from him trying to get me to go somewhere with him.  So all my guy friends suggested that I just say what I meant.

It might have been a bit harsh ..but Ladies..I totally suggest this method...the guy totally got the point, I got an apology and I'm sure he won't be bothering me again...:) AND ..my guy friends had fun doing the writing.

Actually...here's the txt...you tell -me- if it was a bit harsh...or...give me a sample of what you might write :)

I have to admit, I had to go look you up in the face book this morning to remember your name. I didn’t expect to actually hear from you after last night, but I have done a bit of thinking since then. On the drive home it occurred to me that I had spent much of our conversation telling you that you were not a jerk, but you –were- acting like one last night.

If you are really looking for advice, try not kissing the girls you’re asking, or asking them to lunch dates. I have one final piece of relationship advice, and that would be to not hit on "taken" women, and to slow down all the way around. There's no way I would have gone somewhere more "private" with you last night, and no way I would see you again socially, for lunch or otherwise.

I really just don't want to see you again. Good luck with everything, sorry if this sounds harsh... I just wanted to be open and honest and candid with you. I do hope your situation improves.

(some of this relates directly to conversation that I had with the guy, but you get the idea) 

Five hours sleep...plus the fact that I'm now moved into a private office...plus the fact that it's a Friday....I just don't see much work happening today....I should have stayed in bed.

So..this summer they're re-modeling all of the office space for the MBA Program. Naturally we have to move out while they do this, so they have moved us all up to individual offices in the recruiter's suites. I am not pleased with this development *sigh* Here's the old vs. new (temp) office.

Old Office minus one desk that they had already torn down (there are two large desks off to the left side of the picture that I somehow didn't get in the photo.)


New office + the 5 boxes of stuff I was allowed to bring with me for the summer



Note the end table sized desk. But at least it has a door that closes and locks :)

What a beautiful weekend. I got up early on Saturday..someone was supposed to be coming to show the house, so there was much frantic cleaning and straightening. After everything got picked up, well it wasn't even 9:30 am yet, so I decided to get a jump on yard work. (The coolest part of the day in TX is usually before 10am, and is therefore the -ideal- time to work outside)

...I had not counted on the weather remaining perfect all day ;) I ended up working out in the yard until 3:30...then realizing that I had never put on sunscreen (oops!) Luckily ..for once...I was actually wearing jeans and a T-shirt instead of shorts and a tank top...Put on some sunscreen, then went back to it for another hour. The yard looks MUCH better. I of course...got sunburned. Thankfully it's only in that little place, where my jeans and T-shirt gaped...but still..Owwie!

Sunday was errands and grocery shopping and working on an art project most of the day.. I tried a new kind of tea...peach passion I think it was called. (very tasty with sugar) I was still all energetic from Saturday's yard work, so I actually finished a whole new art piece. I'm hoping that I can actually keep up with my art for once. I just haven't been nearly enthused enough about it recently.

Originally I hadn't even planned on going to I-Con this year, but at the last minute decided that I needed a vacation from real life and wanted to get away...and low and behold, I-Con was two weeks away and plane ticket prices had dropped by almost $200...so off I went!

Flew in to Islip on Thursday in the hopes of actually getting some sleep before the Con..though I had forgotten that I-Con doesn't really start until late Friday afternoon, so I had -plenty- of time to rest. (YAY)

Friday started on a bit of a sour note..I got a call from the real estate agent right before we were leaving to go to the con to tell me that the house deal had fallen through. So I was a bit of a mess, though I managed to pull it together before we got there. The Friday bard show went fairly well and I got to say hello to some of my friends from last year and make new friends with the folks at the other tables around us.

Friend Rober Quill from Last year Check out his website at www.robertquill.com


Also, the show on Friday went fairly well :) Here's the one photo I managed to get of some of the bard fans. These guys were there last year too, in an awsome Gimli costume..



Saturday started out better :) We got to con on-time, thanks to one of the organizers..I feel terrible that I can't remember her name...Carrie maybe? She was wonderful and gave us rides everywhere and took really good care of us! (Thank you!!)

I did manage to get a couple of pictures on Saturday of the folks in the booths next to us

Frank of the 501st



Scott and Martin of the NY Jedi



Andrew and Kate (our other table babe! Yay Kate!)



The Kung Fu folks from across the Asile



Saturday night's caberet was ....interesting. It started out great, we hung out with Boogie Knights for most of the show..(there were 14 acts and we were the last two) But Marc had an awful nosebleed right before he was supposed to go onstage, and so -many- thanks to Boogie Knights for saving the day and adding a few songs to their set until he was recovered enough to go on. After the show we packed it in and headed back to the hote...I ended up going to a room party with the NY Jedi..the temptation of a hot tub to soak my feet in was overwhelming lol. And they totally had a hot tub -in their room-. I'm going to have to try that one of these days.

Sunday...well..Saturday we all crashed at between 3 and 5 am lol...soooo we were late getting to con. Got there just in time for the show as a matter of fact. About the time the boys got on stage I was about ready to pass out from lack of food or caffine (did I mention we were running late...yeah, no breakfast for me...) So again..Boogie Knights to the rescue! Many thanks to Keith and Teri for searching out coffee for me and tea for Andrew (yes we asked Marc, no he didn't want any) This was also about the time Marc's nose started bleeding again...onstage...in the middle of a show. The show went surprisingly well considering.

After the show, with a bloody Marc, we headed back to the sports complex (where the table was) and spent the next hour trying to get Marc's nose to behave...in the end he went to the local ER, and did not come back to the con. (He's fine, they stuck something in his nose to stop the bleeding and it will be taken out ....um...today actually I think)The rest of the day was sort of a blur of working table, flirting with folks and checking on Marc. I DID manage to finally catch a Boogie Knights show, then broke down the table and headed back to the hotel to relax and sleep some before a 6:45 am flight back to Austin.

Other Random Photos From Con:
Cool Costume on Sunday:


Pouty Andrew...I can't for the life of me remember why...

Swiped from Ladystarblade...looks kind of interesting.

http://kevan.org/johari?name=bard_wench

Note to self 1: Not everyone appreciates bubbly and perky at 7:30am....perhaps tone back the happy perk for later on in the morning so as not to annoy the co-workers.

The past few days I have been -very- tired...completely out of it at work, not able to focus, nothing. I actually had the thought yesterday on my way to work that I was so tired that maybe I should pull over and take a nap instead of finishing my drive in to the office. Well, last night I was good. I ate a good dinner, went to bed early, slept in a bit, and didn't come in to the office until 10am.....and discovered that I get to leave early today for a dentist appointment...guess it's a good thing that it's not too busy right now.

In other news, my voice lessons are going well, and I am improving and still having fun with it. My instructor and I get along very well, and have a good time :)

The house still isn't sold yet - anyone want to buy a house? I am more than ready to be gone from the house and the situation, and my patience is...wearing thin. Hopefully we'll get a buyer soon. At least folks are looking at it now...we usually get at least one or two people a week...if this goes on for much longer I may be looking for a new real estate agent..our current agent's contract is up in May....I hate to do it, but maybe with a bigger firm we'll get more exposure.

I'm still trying to make up my mind about what I'm going to do after the house sells, but I have a couple of different options that I'm looking into, so at least I'm not stuck, and opportunities do exist.

Annnd..that's about it :) We now return you to your regularly scheduled program.

Lunch today....$9




Benifits of knowing the chef.....









Priceless....

Sooo Very Tired. I went to the SXSW Austin Music Awards last night with Marc and Andrew. Congratulations to them! The Brobdingnagian Bards took Best Folk Band this year :)

I had a great time, though I'm not particularly a fan of any of the acts that we saw perform at the awards. It's always fun getting to go to these events with the band....got to go in the back way, didn't have to wait in line, got to go to the VIP party lol (It was great, lol all these folks crammed into this tiny area where you could hardly move, and you certainly couldn't hear anything the person next to you was saying. *rolls eyes* But the appetizers were tasty at least.) Also, I got to see a Sting look alike...didn't get a picture unfortunately, but I actually overheard someone go up and ask him if he -was- Sting.

Here's a couple of pictures I did get, though most of them are at Fado's where we went to dinner afterwards.

Apparently it was a bad engine coil. Apparently if I had a car that was one year older..the engine coil would have been cheaper :( ....parts and labor...$374 *sigh* Maybe it's fixed this time....

My parting comment to the mechanic was...so...see you next week, same time? He was not amused. We'll see lol...

Car in shop again. For the check engine light...again. And this time..not only did the light come on...it started flashing...and the car started making -horrible- noises. Had to actually get it towed to the shop. Luckily my insurance covers roadside assistance, so I didn't actually have to -pay- for the tow. We'll see what the monetary damages are this time :(