~A Bitter Swallow~

So, here it is, day 2 of my month long journey into self-help ( or at least getting the house cleaned up ), and so far I've killed myself. Including this post here, I will have accomplished 3 items of my weekly to-do list.
Yesterday, I had to go down to the library, empty out and process the book drop. By the time I got there - I think it was about 1:30 or 2 in the afternoon - books were already falling out into the box around the bin that sits inside the bookdrops. So we had walked down to the library, I got my work done, and then we headed up over to the movie place. Now, I know that means nothing to you people who don't know the area, but it is quite a walk. Then we hit Wendy's and walked the back way home. It was a long walk that took us about 2&1/2 to 3 hours (not including the stop at the library or to eat). My legs were sore but with some stretching out they felt almost new again.
Today, we had to go out to the kids' school to see what classroom they were in. Me and my big mouth jokingly said "Want to walk?". Well, the kids decided sure, so out we went again, this time kids in tow. We walked up to their school, which is probably a good 2-3 mile hike in and of itself, then out to McDonald's (another mileish) down over to Walmart to get them their backpacks and lunchboxes (another mile or two) and then back around to home (another mile or twoish). Wow! My butt hurts so bad! Of all the places on my body- it's my butt that is screaming at me. And my feet. But we stretched out again, and while not as productive this time, I shudder to think what they would feel like had I not!

And now I am doing one of my posts for the week.

So, tomorrow is the start of school. We'll see how things go with keeping me going. I think that with them being out of the house, it will help me with getting the deep down cleaning and organizing done, since I won't have the constant interruption that children bring into life (not a bad statement!!). I think I will take the day off from walking. Heck, I don't know that I will be able to walk tomorrow!! I am thinking that maybe I will go through the donation stuff we have already blown up all over the hall upstairs and get that all settled, and then go through my clothes.

That's it for today.

So.. I've decided that I'm deliriously lazy, and that is something that just has to stop. It is showing in my weight, my skin, my mood, and my health. With this summer, it has been just too easy for me to sip a cup of coffee, and play Internet games all day long. I'm hopelessly addicted to Everquest 2. Not in the sense that I don't go to work and all that jazz, but it gives me such a "good" excuse to not get my housework done, get my exercise in... It's the greatest procrastination tool. Granted, it is a fabulously fun and interactive game. It is not it's fault that I'm lazy.. it is my own.

To battle this flaw of mine, I've decided that I am going to give myself a "to-do" list for the month of September. Every day I must do something from the list in order for me to be able to battle onward in my conquest for level 80... or whatever I may be doing on the Internet that day. I will still allow myself to check my email and such while waking up and drinking my cup of coffee... but nothing else until a duty is done. If I do not comply with these demands I have made upon myself.. I have twisted my boyfriend's arm and requested that he cancel the payment on my account. I have every confidence that he will do so if the situation calls for it.

Let me reiterate that I am not one of those crazy people who never moves from the game and is completely immersed into it. You may have been able to say that a few years ago, when I was in an insane race to escape my reality.. and it was "better" than drinking my way there. However, I have never ignored my children over it. I have never called in (or not) to work because of it. I still know what real life is, and that it supersedes any game. That is what it still is, after all. A game. However, many of my real life friends play it, so it is a way for us all to "hang out" when we otherwise cannot due to whatever reason. So, in taking away my gaming privileges, it is pretty much like putting myself on restriction, where I cannot hang out with my friends. Jeeze.. perhaps I am still a teenager!

So onward to the list. Below is a compilation of all the chores I would like to accomplish. At least one of the activities below must be accomplished daily in order for my privileges to remain intact. This list will not only help my house become cleaner and more organized, but the hope is that in my house becoming organized and decluttered, so will my head. Plus, the exercise it provides will help with my overall health, and in hopes give me new found energy and revitalize my zest for actual living.

1. I must obtain at least 3 days of some sort of physical exercise activity per week. This may be going for a real walk (with or without the dog), participating in a workout video, etc. This one must be done every week.

2. I need to clean out the Tupperware cupboards.

3. I need to pull out all the pantry items and reorganize the pantry goods.

4. Go through my closet and and drawers and really go through my clothes being realistic this time. If I do wind up losing weight enough (hopefully with this demand schedule!), it will give me a wonderful reason to go shopping!

5. Clean out my closet - the bottom, and top, and clear out and reorganize (are you sensing a theme here yet?)

6. Go through Daemian's room and clear and organize.

7. Go through Rhiannon's room and clear and organize.

8. Clean out the laundry area and reorganize.

9. Clear out the "hall" closet

10. Clean out underneath the coffee table.

11. Clean up outside deck and downstairs.

12. Borrow my sister's little green machine or rent a carpet shampooer and shampoo the area around the tv/ slider door.

13. Clean up and organize bathroom in my room.


14. Gather up all castaway items and take them all down to the Goodwill.


15. In addition to the items listed above, I need to do some writing at least 5 days out of the week. At least 3 of those days should be writing pertaining to my stories.


Ok, that's all I've got. That gives me a full weekload of stuff throughout the month I think! They should keep me properly occupied, and perhaps you all equally entertained!

Lately I've noticed that I have been having quite a number of dreams of my father and his wife. This is odd for me, since I have had no contact with my father since my daughter was about 3 months old. I am not going to get into details about my history with him in this post, but I wanted to put this down on "paper" in order to capture what is going on at this time.

Most of the dreams have been arguing, and all have concerned moving. I cannot remember what most of the arguments have been about, although I think most have to do with moving. When I left my father's home in California, it was a HUGE argument between us. I think that is why every dream I have of him involves moving and fighting. His wife is always just there putting her two cents in where they are unwanted.

I also have frequent dreams about the house I lived in down there in Lancaster. Usually he is not there when I am there.. which was not abnormal in reality either. In one dream I remember coming back and the house was completely trashed. I was trying to get it cleaned up.

I am intrigued as to why these subjects have suddenly popped up so often in my dreams. What is in my subconcious that is trying to break free? Or is the universe trying to tell me something? There are so many things that have changed in my recent past that could contribute to strange and new dreaming. I just cannot figure out what specifically is bringing on thoughts of my father, and my old house.

So, in my attempt to write at least a little every day (an attempt that I have not been altogether successful at ), I decided to look up writing prompts. Google led me to this little site here: http://creativewritingprompts.com/ . I find it fantastic. It is from this little niche that I am going to do today's writing, albeit a bit cheating.. since it is more a list than actual writing. But hey.. I'm here, aren't I?

I chose to list 10 things you can do with no power. Since I live in the Pacific Northwest, and that is a rather frequent occurrence, I thought it would be not only appropriate and informative, but also relatively easy! Let us see if I am correct in that assumption!

1. Well, since I work at a library, I figured it rather obvious that I will list READ A BOOK! first. Not to mention, it is something I do with no power. Candlelight can be somewhat hard on the eyes sometimes, but a good book will make that inconvenience unnoticeable anyways.

2. Break out those board games! What could be better than playing a game of Clue during a blackout by candlelight!? When you decide to chance a guess, be sure to hold the flame beneathe your face, attach an ominous look to yourself, and state your guess in an evil, threatening voice.

3. A game of hide and seek in the dark. Oh yeah!

4. Go outside and see how many stars you can see now! It's amazing how much of the night sky is hidden by the glow of the city lights.

5. Have a campout in your front yard. Grab some sleeping bags, build a campfire, and roast marshmellows and tell ghost stories.

6. Grab a pencil and paper, and write a good old fashioned letter to some pals. Get creative, and post their address in an old time script, and seal the envelope with a dab of wax.

7. Teach yourself how to do something, be it play guitar, crochet, knit, etc.. That way you always have an activity for power outages.

8. Find a bunch of no-cook recipies that can be whipped together over a fireplace or woodstove. Call all your friends over for an old fashioned dinner, and play some of the games listed here.

9. Charades in the dark. Now that could be interesting.

10. Go to the local hardware store and purchase a generator. We live in Washington people.. you should have one!!!


There.. I did it. And it wasn't all that bad to come up with stuff. Now, the funny part is that next time the power goes out, and I want to refer to this list.. it will be conveniently stored on my computer- you know..that thing that requires POWER to turn on and look at...

/sigh....

That's how it goes in this technologically "advanced" age...

Ok... so I keep hearing that if you truly want to be a writer, you need to write a little each and every day. So, I guess I should do that. I figured I don't blog enough anyways, so that will be a good place for me to start.

I've been slowly working on a story. If you visit my personal website (link to it is on the right, under "my other little place...") then you might have already read a bit of it. But it is a work in progress, and I keep adding and changing it. I am writing the pieces that come to me, so there will be various snippets of the story on there. Some are public, and some are still private, as I tweek them to where I am happy enough with them to share.

I have been finding plenty of writing ideas, but some of them just don't have the story to back them. So those I file away under my idea folder, and hold on to them until a fitting storyline comes along that fits it. I am trying not to get carried away with having too many going on at once, since I already have 3 that I've been working with, and they are so slow in moving along. Most of that is my own fault though, because I just don't sit down and DO it. Much of that has to do with the fact that I now have to use the desktop to write, and my eyes are horrible. I cannot read half of what I've written. So, if there are any misspellings or grammatical/ puncuation errors... please forgive my blind eyesight... Thank the techy gods who developed spell-check. Now if I could only remember to acutally use it!

One of my co-workers- Leah- turned me on to a website for writers and aspiring writers. It's Writer's Digest . It's a neat little site that gives you tips, suggestions, and even little competitions where you can write little stories and submit them. I think it's a neat little spot, and will have to add it to my favorites, as I see myself frequenting it quite a bit. :)

Anyways, that is all I have for now. I am going to make it a goal to write at least something on one of my blogs each and every day. So wish me luck!

It's once again been awhile since I posted. Since it is a slow day at work today, I figured I'd pop in and say hello. It's a good thing it is slow today, too, since I am acutely tired. I don't know why, other than I didn't get a very good night's sleep last night. Quite a bit of tossing and turning. Luckily, Dustin slept like the dead, so my restlessness did not keep him up as well. My nerves are also shot today. Most likely due to the fact of my lack of sleep. I have all this nervous energy coursing through me- which seems like a contradiction in terms, considering I want to do little other than just curl up on the couch and become best friends with my television and blankey.

But anyways, (yes, I started a sentence with the word "but". I had a sentence fragment earlier as well. So shoot me. ), onto more glorious things, like the stuff that has been going on in my life lately. Nothing exciting really with ME, but my kids had some fun.

My son got to go camping with his Boy Scout troop. REAL camping. They went up to camp, and have been gone since Sunday. He will be back some time tomorrow, and although it is his dad's weekend with him, I am itching to find out how it went! He was so excited to get going. When it was time to load up, he went running to the truck without even giving me a hug goodbye! I asked if I was going to get one, and he ran up, gave me one of those lean-into half hugs, and ran back to the truck. It was awesome.

My daughter thought she was going to be in hog heaven when he left for the weekend. Her best friend had come back into town, and was coming over the day he left. However, it only took until the end of the first night for her to comment that she missed her brother. It was touching. Her friend got to stay the night for two nights, and then she went and spent the night at their place on the boat. That was a unique experience for her. I think she had fun. She also discovered this week that she is a huge Taco Bell fan. I think it brought a tear to Dustin's eye when she requested Taco Bell for lunch. He is a Taco Bell fanatic.

So- yeah. That's about all I've got going on at this time. If I think of anything else, I'll let ya know. However, I'm getting sick of typing, and want my nap! I don't get my nap, but I CAN stop typing. At least on this!

So, the Fathoms Of Fun Parade was this past Saturday, June 28th here in Port Orchard. Of course, the Port Orchard Library had a spot in it, and of course I got bullied into participating. Okay, okay, so I wasn't bullied. I volunteered. I got to be a book- the letter "R", to be exact. The kids got to wear their "Catch the Reading Bug" tshirts and ride their scooters behind our banner. Dustin walked alongside us, and took pictures as well as helping to hand out water when needed. Our branch manager, Kathleen dressed up as an old-schoolhouse librarian, and looked hilarious! Not to mention hot!

It was loads of fun. The walk up the hill to our starting point was worse than the route of the parade itself. The weather was absolutely gorgeous, and the crowd was great. My entire entourage of family and friends showed up, and cheered generously at our complete lack of real practice, and our flubbing of spellings. It all added to the atmosphere and fun and worked out really well for us. So well, in fact, that we won the "best" title in the public service portion of the parade!

My coworker Wally did an incredible job of dreaming up the act, as well as preparing the costumes. They were excellent! I'm sure we'll keep them for future fun!

I'll have pictures posted soon. Dustin has to upload them and get them resized for me. Then you all can see the hilarity!

I finally got my kitty cat!!! I got her this past Saturday. She is a little 10ish week old Bombay girlie. She's the runt of the litter. She's got some huge bear paws. When we got her, she was grimy, and had bugs. But she looked healthy otherwise. We took her home, gave her a flea bath, put a flea collar on her, and wallah! She's as good as new! She's black, but you can see the lightening up marks where it looks like she may be getting some stripes.

The first night, she would not leave my side. Yesterday, (Sunday), she crawled underneath a table and would not move until I got home from work. Muttley, our dog, doesn't quite know what to think of this little thing running around his domain. Luckily, he's rather accepting of her, and looks like he really wants to play, but is a bit timid.

Boo is getting more adventuresome. She's been touring the house today. She's learned to crawl up every one's legs, and the couch. And my massage chair. She's got some demon claws on her, which we need to get trimmed. The kids are thrilled with her. I'm thrilled with her. And even Dustin is thrilled with her, though you won't get him to admit it.

I'm hoping to get pictures up soon!

It occured to me the other day that I haven't blogged on here in awhile. I'm sure there are dozens of millions of you out there just dying to know what in the world I've been up to! Ok.. so maybe I'm letting my head get a bit out of kilter, but I hope there is at least someone out there who looks at this. hehe...

Anyways.. to answer that begging question.. well, not a whole hell of alot. I've been doing a little bit of writing, albeit most of it is still in my head. I've got a snippet of it on my thaydra.com website, but be advised that the entire thing there is probably already rewritten... at least in a different context. But I think it's a pretty interesting storyline, and it's gone round in my head enough for me to think I may just get something done with this one.

We had our Ants in your Pants dance party at the library here last evening. I had to work it, but I brought the kids down, and they had a blast. I didn't even know my daughter could hula hoop! She won second place in their contest! LOL. She didn't stop from the moment we got here until the moment we left. Even when the music was not playing, she was still moving. My coworkers got a kick out of it. My son enjoyed himself too, but maybe not to the extent his sister did. But I saw him out there dancing and jumping around as well.

I'm going to be in our annual 4th of July parade this year with my coworkers. I get to be the letter "E". And I'm a book. Figure that one out. Or just come down and watch. It's going to be on June 28th, in Port Orchard. What fun it will be! And the fair will be in town, so I'm sure we'll end up there.

Ok.. that's about all the excitement I can type for right now. I have to actually go work before I go home!