In that post about the Papermate pen I misused commas. I did it on purpose, because I wanted to write it exactly how I was feeling it, and at the time I was feeling like a person who misused commas.
Now the misusages are seriously annoying me.
Category: Diary
My head is not in the game
You know “the zone”? I’m not there. :>
I’ve been having trouble concentrating all day. I’d much rather be at home (and by “home” now I mean Cheryl and Reid’s house–the place where what little stuff I own currently resides). I’d like to be doing fun stuff, like watching TV. Or maybe messing around online, since the laptops arrived Wednesday and the Internet should be working tonight. I’d like to get started working on house hunting–that house I mentioned before is okay in many ways, but ultimately the location is far from my friends and the front of the house is just butt-ugly, and I’m not going to get over those things, even if I can deal with only having two bedrooms. And I’d like to start working on listing all the anime I lost–while there were a few files on hard drives that might possibly maybe be recovered (though who knows–we haven’t heard a thing about hard drives yet), the majority of my anime was burned to DVD, so that’s gone. (And I had finally almost finished d/ling Tenshi na Konamaiki, too…)
I guess I’m distracted because there are things I’d rather be doing, which is annoying. I want to put my life in order, and that’s taking precedence in my head over silly things like work that puts food on the table (and possessions in our…possession). I want to be able to shut that off and focus on the things I need to do now.
You know, I lost my favorite pen
Papermate used to make these blue pens, they were perfect. The body was kind of rubbery and slender, and the ink just rolled right out of the ball point. Comfortable and easy to use. I loved those pens and I always bought them.
Well, they don’t make those pens anymore, and out of all the ones I’d bought, I only had one left. It was my prized pen, I used it all the time.
It was sitting in my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles tin with the rest of my pens and pencils.
Late
Had to replace the battery in my car this morning, so I’m just now rolling into work.
Woo.
At least the problem wasn’t something more serious…
Monica Lewinsky I am not
It’s my first day back at the internship since the fire; I skipped last week. Things have been going okay. I’ve been offered condolences by everyone…and a king size wrought iron canopy bed by the vice president. She’s moving and doesn’t have the space for it anymore. If we end up getting that cute little two bedroom with the horrible thrusting garage, the bed would definitely fit in the master bedroom…
At any rate, I’ve had actual work to do today, which has been fun and challenging and interesting and all that. For the first half hour or so, I read a book called The Complete 35mm Sourcebook, which was quite interesting. I got through about half of the history of the format. Then I ran an errand to the Augusta Chronicle and helped prepare some items for an advertisers meeting.
After that, the real work began. I attended a meeting wherein the account manager told the art director and myself what was needed for three upcoming ads. I was asked to write slogans/headlines and create mockups for two of the ads.
I nailed down my headlines pretty quickly, and I’ve done two mockups for one ad, so I’m pretty satisfied with my work so far today. (Of course, I still need to mock up the other ad, for which a rough draft is actually due today. I’m actually waiting on some information in that regard…) I suppose I should admit that a lot of my work has been “cheating”; that is, I’ve lifted quite a bit from the company’s existing ads. However, that’s what they want…so there you go.
It’s really cool that the company is using me more now. I’m definitely getting some good experience.
More exploring
Here are some pics I took around J. Strom Thurmond Lake at the Georgia/South Carolina border. I found a boat ramp and had lunch there.
There were all kinds of caterpillars there…
It was a really beautiful place to eat lunch, even if I did get swarmed by ants.
Hi!
Not even vignettes
I don’t have time to write full stories about everything that’s been happening to me, but there have been a few moments that have left impressions, and I wanted to document them.
So here are a few random scenes.
Suddenly he swung the massive truck into a parking lot. “Wait here,” he said. “I’ve gotta see my friend for a minute.”
He got out and headed to a storefront. I sat in the truck and waited. A few minutes later, he returned with a brown paper bag, which he deposited in the floor of the backseat.
“There was a girl from North Carolina and a woman from Ve-neh-zoo-ay-luh, and they saw my churn and asked, ‘Is that an ice cream maker?’ I couldn’t believe it. You know what a butter churn is, don’t you dear? And the molds you put the butter in when it’s done? That woman from Ve-neh-zoo-ay-luh, she was 45 years old.”
“This young lady has never seen a real hardware store before.”
After work yesterday I went to the mall to get a manicure. Ever since working at GRW, the nail on my left pointer finger has been flawed. A line runs up the length of it, causing it to split and break at the tip. I was hoping the manicurist would be able to do something about it, or at least that the procedure would strengthen the nail.
The place I went to, Nail Something in the mall, was run by a group of Vietnamese women who chattered away in their own language as they attended to their customers. A teenage girl took particular interest in my hands, which needed a lot of work. The middle-aged woman taking care of me filed my nails down, then scraped back the cuticles, and then hacked the skin off all the way around. It smarted, and one nail started to bleed.
She applied lotion all up my arms, giving my forearms and hands and fingers a rough but pleasant massage. Then, after I washed my hands, she buffed the nails and painted them clear. I was impatient and didn’t let my hands dry long enough before digging in my purse, so she had to touch up the polish on my thumbnails.
The manicure cost $12, and I gave her a $3 tip.
Superman II was on, and I was watching it more out of a sense of curiosity than out of any actual desire to see it.
“I’d rather watch something else, if you don’t mind,” Sean said. I shrugged and started flipping. “Here,” he said, and took the remote. A few clicks later and there was Lenny Briscoe, making some comment about how parking rates in New York City will kill you, which was funny because there was a dead body in the parking lot.
“Are you addicted to this show?”
“Yes.”
So we watched three episodes.
Water is so rejuvenating to me. I know I’ve said this before. But every time I drive over the lake to get to work, I feel so refreshed. Today I was filled with emotion to the point that it brought tears to my eyes. And they were happy tears, for a change.
What it is, yo
Sean says our laptops shipped, so hopefully we’ll get them soon. I’m going a little stir-crazy without internet access at home.
Yesterday we looked at a house, and (somehow) I didn’t take any pictures of it. It is actually quite a nice house. The downsides: it’s one of those horrible “let’s jut the garage out front so it’s all you see from the road” styles, it only has two bedrooms, and it’s pretty far out in Columbia County, meaning it’s not convenient to lots of the places I like to go, including shopping and friends’ houses. The upsides: it’s very convenient to our jobs, the backyard is beautiful, it’s on a pond with a walking trail around it, the deck is spacious and multi-level, there’s a lovely sunroom, the kitchen has all-new appliances, the house itself is only 2 years old, there are actual stairs to the attic instead of a pull-down ladder, the great room is of a very nice size, the master bedroom is huge, and the master bath is spacious and has a jacuzzi tub.
The two bedrooms thing really is a problem, though, because we’d like to have a place for guests to sleep. There has been talk of using the sunroom for one of the purposes (either a guest bedroom or the office), but we’re still not sure what we think of that.
Off to the in-laws’.
Coping
I had the best dream last night.
We went back into the apartment to see if we could salvage anything, and it turned out that all our stuff was fine. The fire had just eaten the apartment around it, leaving rafters overhead that looked like a beautiful arbor. Vines had grown up all around everything (kudzu probably, but it was pretty), and somehow a river had sprung up and was running through the apartment. I was busy taking pictures of everything when my alarm went off.
People keep saying that I’m dealing with it really well, that I have a good attitude, that I’m in good spirits, etc. I think I’m pretty cheerful when I’m not thinking about it, but some days I’m very strongly reminded that I don’t have a home, I don’t have my own space, I don’t have my own things, and I’m not in control of anything, and that feeling overwhelms me.
Exploring
As I’ve mentioned, my new job is in Lincolnton, which is “40 minutes from Augusta” if the job ad is to be believed (but it’s really 40 minutes from Martinez). I can get to work faster from Cheryl and Reid’s house than I could from our apartment, which is nice, sort of. Either way, leaving at 8 am gets me here on time, usually with a little time to spare to get settled in.
Since I’m so far from “home”, I can’t just go back to the house for lunch. I’ve been packing a sandwich and some yogurt, but today I decided that was boring, so I didn’t pack anything and instead went to Hardee’s. (They got my order totally wrong–I ordered the 1/2 pound sourdough burger, and I came out with a small patty on a regular bun with no condiments except a huge amount of ketchup. They also gave me the large size drink and fries. They did get the type of drink and fries correct, so I didn’t really mind. I’m not extraordinarily picky, in general.)
After picking up my food at the drive-thru, I decided to drive “the other way” down Washington Street here in Lincolnton. Is that confusing, or what? You take Washington Road out of Augusta and it ends up stopping at Washington Street in Lincolnton. If you turn right at that point (the Hardee’s is on the corner there), you head towards my workplace. I’d never tried going left, so today I did that.
Apparently that’s the way you go if you want to go to Washington, Georgia (the street names make sense!). There was a BBQ place and a hair salon out that way, but not much else. I finally found a place to stop at a church across the street from a graveyard. The graveyard had a nice gazebo, so after I’d eaten most of my food I crossed the street and took some pictures (which I would have uploaded if I’d thought to bring the USB cable with me).
Oh, that’s right, I didn’t mention–the camera Mom bought for me arrived yesterday. It’s like new. I think it must have been washed up with industrial cleaner, but even so it’s in impeccable condition. It also came with a telephoto lens(!) and one of those cover thingies you can use to block light (someday I’ll know all these terms). Pretty sweet all in all. The lens cap is a little different from the one I had–it doesn’t have a hole for looping a string into, so the previous owner attached it to the camera with a string ending in a sticky circle thing. That will take getting used to, especially since the plastic part with the string on it keeps pulling off of the sticky part. I may just look to replace the lens cap with one that has that convenient hole.
In any case, I took some pictures, and it worked great. It’s almost exactly like having my old camera back. It was a wonderful feeling to be able to take pictures again. First priority: getting some 128 meg memory cards!
After I satisfied my photography craving, I finished eating and headed back. My phone doesn’t get service out in Lincolnton (d’oh), and for some reason this phone doesn’t keep track of what time it is for me when it’s out of its service area (double d’oh) so I never know how much time I have left when I head back to the office. It turned out that I had 25 minutes to spare (wh00t), so that’s why I’m writing a long post this time.
There isn’t much to Lincolnton. So far I’ve found a state park (that you have to pay to enter, so I didn’t), a local park with a playground, swimming pool, and various sports pitches, and a historical area with old houses. Now that I finally have a camera again I’ll be able to take pictures of all the neat stuff here! I’m hoping that I haven’t found everything yet. I’m also looking forward to trying out the various mom and pop restaurants in town :)
Speaking of exploring, I’m told that “the dam” is very impressive. I’m not exactly sure where it is, but I’m eager to check it out! (It looks like I can just take Fury’s Ferry Road out of Martinez to get there.) Some general info:
Thurmond Dam is a concrete-gravity structure flanked on both sides by embankments of compacted earth some 5,680 feet (over 1 mile), crossing the Savannah River. The concrete section is 2,282 feet long and rises 200′ above the riverbed at its highest point. Highway 221 crosses over the top of the dam connecting Georgia and South Carolina. The spillway contains 23 large gates, each 40 feet wide by 35 feet high, for the quick release of water from the lake.
Pretty neat.
Just found a font called Sudbury!
I keep thinking of things I’ve lost
I really, really hope that my hard drive is salvageable. I’m looking for fabulous fonts right now, and it occurred to me that I used to have so many fonts…what a pain to have to go out and find them all again :/
(Whine, whine, whine…)
I just realized, I totally missed BlogDay.
Stupid fire.
I wanna go home
Or, you know, to Cheryl and Reid’s house.