And away I go

Tomorrow I am going on a trip. A road trip, all the way around Lake Erie. I will be able to check off all the great lakes in Great Lake Bingo, go to Niagara Falls, spend real time in Canada, and actually go on a trip that isn't to see family. A trip just to go on a trip! (Not that I don't love my family). And right when I can use a break from everything. It's gonna be a great weekend.

A bad case of the meh's

I've had a bad case of the mehs lately. Work has been incredibly stressful, which is unfortunate because it has usually been such a pleasant place that it offsets the meh-ness of the rest of life. So now there is the meh and the stress, which isn't really an improvement.

I knew it was bad when I had an incredibly productive Saturday (yesterday's productivity was up by at least 300% compared to the average) and at the end of the day didn't feel really good about it. I just felt meh. And by golly, I should have felt good! (I was pleased with what I got done, it's just the feeling didn't match up. Life's like that sometimes).

But today, I made an effort to learn people's names at church and to talk to people. Which, when you are feeling meh isn't always easy, but I did it. And I talked to my family, and had dinner with a friend, and got some emails sent to people I needed to get in touch with, and did some indexing. And I feel a little less meh now.

This week, my roommate (that's such a clunky and connotated word, I don't like it one bit) will be coming, so there will be company in the house. I sent my nephew a care package, since he is getting his tonsils out. (Hmmmm. I wonder if I should see an ENT about my tonsils/sinuses/e, n, and t. Put that insurance I pay for to good use and all...) And this weekend, I'm going to Canada. So, there are some very non-meh things coming up. This is good. Good timing, good things, and hopefully good-bye mehs. I could totally go for that.

Mi casa es su casa

I had someone come today and fix the internet* today. It was a little awkward, because I had to be here, but the guy was working and I was just muddling around trying to occupy myself while he worked.

Anyway, at some point in the process, I looked around my apartment and wondered what impression this guy got. I had scriptures sitting on my nightstand, a church magazine on the bed, a figureine of Christ on the dresser. My bookshelves have a ton of fantasy, World War II, and church books (more fantasy/sci-fi than the others, I feel obligated to disclose). And the place isn't what you'd call spic and span. Not that it's filthy, it just looks lived in. (How is it that one person who is only in the apartment for about 13 hours of the day and only awake for half of those, and hardly doing anything for the waking ones can need to tidy things up so frequently?) 

So I wonder what his impression was, if he even noticed. (He's probably been in so many houses, he tunes it out. I will say, he was very amiable, happy in his work). I wondered if he thought, "Oh boy, a religious nut." Which, if he did, is fine with me, because I can't remove that part of myself and have no problem letting it show, but I realize in my current geographic location, that may not be common. Or it may be. I can't say. At any rate, I think, looking around my apartment, that it is probably a pretty good reflection of me: Christian, a bit bookish, and somehow never quite on top of things. Amazing what walls can say about a person.

*And by fix, I mean get it to work, which it hasn't since I moved in. They did fix some wires, but I feel like 'fixing' implies that it once functioned and has broken, which maybe it has, but not since I got here. 

Shower Ideas

Generally speaking, I have a love-hate relationship with showers. I don't mind the shower part so much as the fact that it requires getting ready after the shower. And the fact that at that time of day (6:00 am), I just want to be asleep, not washing my hair. The person who invents a shower that will do all the work and let me emerge with hair done, face washed, etc., is going to be my hero. But I will say, I get a lot of good ideas in the shower. Little lightning bolts, zapping into my brain out of nowhere.

For example, the other day we found out that the exhibit we've been planning at work has been kiboshed (well, put on hold indefinitely). But while I was in the shower, I was thinking about all the things I've done at work that I need to put on my evaluation and remembered going to an enriching scholarship workshop on Story Maps, and I had this fantastic brainstorm about using some of the material for the exhibit in a Story Map. Which, granted, isn't going to change the world but it is a really good idea if I can pull it off.

And I get lots of other good ideas in the shower. If I didn't take them, not only would I reek, but I wouldn't be nearly as productive. So, to my brother-in-law who is trying to get his teenager to take faster showers: Don't rush her! Who knows what Nobel Prize Ideas she might be having!