Musings of a marginally sane feline-appreciating female.

I don’t have anything particularly profound to say on this Martin Luther King Jr day, except that he was far more than just one speech.

If you don’t have the spoons to volunteer, or it feels too much like voluntourism – support a black owned business, give to a bail fund or mutual aid society.

Be angry about racism. Vote for representatives that are angry about it too, and serious about racial justice and equity.

Do what you can.

And I am NOT being sarcastic, it was just a super lovely Sunday.

Got all my stuff done around the house. Did the liquor store run and picked up some supplies for my buddy with a broken ankle. Renewed my library card. Got the car washed. Did a bunch of yoga! (The app has added a dozen more beginner sessions!)

Feasted on leftover roasted potatoes and sausage and there is still a bunch left, so no cooking tonight! Or tomorrow!

And made a nice amount of progress on my Lego Bonsai! It’s been a while, but damn, those bricks to not stick together the way I remember them. My brother says it’s just depending on what you want them to do – need to separate them, they’ll stick like they’re glued, need them to stick, they’ll come apart when you look at them.)

But we have a stand, a vase, and a trunk!

And I still have one more day off, YAY!

Her name is Hilly and her person was putting things in the car and she decided to take a walk down the sidewalk all by herself! And me being me, as I drove by on the way to get coffee, I had to stop and ask this adorable English Setter pupper where her people were. And bless her, she ran right to me going, OMG NEW BEST FRIEND!!

And we quickly found her person and had a nice chat, and why are people always kind of surprised when I bring a dog back to them? Like, there is no way in hell I’m gonna just go by a dog that is out on its own and not stop and try to get it back home.

All in all, a great start to the day, on the heels of getting everything done yesterday and getting ALL THE SLEEPS last night.

And somehow already today I’ve gotten just about everything knocked off the Sunday to-do list! All that is left is swing by the gas station and see if the car wash is open (bought the ticket when I put gas in the car yesterday and then discovered it was not open, BAH!) and do some yoga and play with legos.

Oh, and renew my library card and hit up the liquor store. So, almost everything done, LOL.

The good news is that it may be cold out, but there is a ton of sunshine today, so time to get out and about and get all that knocked out.

You have a lovely day!!

It’s a grey and ick day around here, but I have every curtain open and every damn light on in the house, and the Christmas tree lights, which helps a tiny bit.

I have a substantial, but not completely overwhelming to-do list around the house, but I have my comfy pants on and my headphones are charged up, so I am ready!

And on the subject of the comfy pants – it was a fail that accidentally turned into a success. When I realized “oh the comfy pants are why I am getting things done” I couldn’t pin down why I’d been just putting them on vs jeans in the morning to start with. Then I remembered – I’d been trying to get in a yoga session before work – total fail there, never happened – but it made everything else easier. Fail to success doesn’t happen often, LOL. I WILL TAKE IT.

One item on the list today is changing the bedlinens which means I will get ALL the damn Fitbit points today. I will be trying the burrito method for getting the duvet cover swapped out – we shall see if it works!

And I will need those Fitbit points because I made the mistake of stepping on the scale today out of some utterly misguided curiosity. Yeahhhh, there are some holiday pounds there, LOL.

And it’s time to pry myself off the couch and go be amazing around the house, cause I have big Not Housework plans this afternoon of playing with legos and putting together a sheet pan dinner of garlic-herb roasted potatoes with chicken sausage. (She says in the same breath as “oh, where did that weight come from” LMAO.)

You have a fantastic day!

Is being awake at 5-5:30AM just my life now??!? Wednesday was a very weird dream, but yesterday and today? No reason, just, awake! Even Lily is very “Uh, this is not my fault” – and it is definitely not.

And it’s a half day Friday. I could have slept in a bit, but noooooooooo. But, it should be a relatively chill morning – I have one thing I have to test today because the hi-viz client is probably gonna want an early version of the fix, but that’s the only critical thing.

Account manager came to me yesterday telling me support was probably gonna flip the case to us – I just went straight to support, took a look at the case, replicated it, hit up my developer and she recognized the problem and checked in the fix straightaway. But support hadn’t even tried to replicate it, despite having it for 2 1/2 days, and when I told them “get X and check Y” – they passed that task to the client. NO – YOU get the data and check it. And if you don’t understand what you’re checking – ASK ME.

I know I am hard on support, but I did that job for 6 years and the shit they’re getting away with compared to when I was in that department… Hooboy. I am not asking them to burn themselves out, but please at least try to replicate the problem. To be clear – I always try to help whenever I can, it’s just internally that I am very WHAT THE FUCK – because this could have been replicated the day the ticket came in and we wouldn’t be sitting here the morning before a holiday weekend going, “Hope the fix works!”

Despite this, I will be doing my level best to get offline ON TIME today and enjoy my long weekend.

You have a great Friday!

Two days running, awake at 5:30 AM. Why? Fuck if I know.

Yesterday, I hit a WALL about 15 minutes before quitting time and damn it was not pretty. Sorry company, you didn’t shit out of me that last bit of the day. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And the first week officially in my promoted position, no less, LOL.

But, I got paid today, and tomorrow is a half day, so I’ve got that going for me.

We’re in “cleanup all the bugs” phase for our next big release at work and once again, my team lead is being faaaaaaar too optimistic in how long these things will take and how much we can combine in testing. We went through the same garbage this time last year and every time I spoke up, I got a shrug and a “Well….” in response – so I’m not even gonna worry myself with it this time around.

It will take as long as it takes to do it right, and I’m not gonna stress myself out over it and I’m not gonna kill myself to get things done in an unreasonably short time.

2023 is gonna be the year of my job NOT killing me.

And on that note, time to go gently grind some gears for capitalism.

You have a great day!

So, sometimes you don’t realize how relatively chilled out you were until you’re stressed out, and you don’t realize how stressed out you are until you say Fuck It and let it go.

So, stupid non-compete I have to sign. Turns out our EAP program no longer has any access to legal services. The one firm I’ve used before doesn’t do employment law, and company wants the doc back by the end of the week and I doubt even with a referral I could find someone.

So I said Fuck It, sent my two questions to HR, if they lie, I have the lie in writing.

And fact is, they have me by the short hairs here – I either sign it, or turn down the promotion, or quit.

But damn, as soon as I said Fuck It, a whole ass weight was gone.

I don’t know about you, but I didn’t sleep for shit last night. My brain decided to go all pinball machine as I was trying to fall asleep – all I can think is it was triggered by the realization yesterday that I’m gonna need an employment lawyer to look over the non-compete agreement that came with my promotion, and I don’t know any employment lawyers. And of course it was sent to me on Friday with “oh do this quick, please!”

I am clear on 95% of it, but I need someone to clarify that last 5% and honestly, I don’t (and I suppose I shouldn’t) trust the company to clarify for me…

Gonna try our EAP first since they provide access to legal services, and if that doesn’t pan out, I guess I’ll call the firm that did my divorce & Mom’s probate and see if they can take a look or can refer me to someone who can.

So, yeah, fun way to get the week going!

You have a great day that doesn’t involve any lawyers! :-D

The side door now has a lovely new deadbolt and doorknob and is up to fire code to boot! Only took about a half hour and there was shockingly very little swearing throughout. It’s a very nice brushed nickel/silver/whatever, much nicer than the flaking gold tone before, AND THE DOORKNOB TURNS EASILY! (And not a moment too soon, cause when I got back from the hardware store yesterday, the doorknob really did NOT want to turn.)

And I have been on a SOLID roll this week and it is all thanks to SOFT PANTS!

Stay with me – one of my blocks to exercise and cleaning is having to change into not-jeans. (Too hot for cleaning & not good for exercise.) During the week, I have been in the habit of wearing jeans when I work, because…IDK, I guess I got it into my head I “shouldn’t” wear PJ pants/joggers/yoga pants unless I wasn’t feeling 100% or it was snowing. But wearing jeans doesn’t get my brain to “work mode” – opening the work laptop is what gets my brain there.

So, this past week, I’ve been getting up and getting straight into whatever joggers I have at the ready – and then when I am not working, I have found that I can transition WITH SPECTACULAR EASE to either getting things done around the house and/or going for a walk or doing yoga. (Totally happened by accident, but I am so glad I made the connection!)

And as such, this past week – EVERY DAY – I have knocked out the to-do list, gotten exercise in, and had plenty of time to chill out and do the crossword and today I got started on my Lego bonsai tree!

I’d still like one more weekend day, but it has been an excellent weekend.

Hope yours was, too.

No, I don’t know why I am so chipper this morning, but here we are.

Exciting project on tap for the day – replace the doorknob and deadbolt lockset on the side door! Over the past couple weeks, the doorknob has been exceptionally cranky and I need to fix that before it just stops opening altogether.

I’ve already been on the Ace hardware site, I’ve found the replacement (these things appear to be very standardized, whew) and I think I should be able to do this, though I’ve warned little bro that he may be enlisted to hold things still on one side of the door while I work on the other side. My other thought was to just grab a roll of painters tape to secure things while I work if he wasn’t available.

Then the fun of finding all the old keys for that door, toss them out, and see if I can find a key cutter open today to make extras of the new key, or hit up one of the key cutting kiosks. (There are lots of the kiosks nearby, but I don’t particularly trust them for reasons I cannot explain.)

Time to go be handy – you have a great day!!