nothing, nothingness, nothininity

so the dance was lame. to be entirely and absolutely honest, I didn’t give it much of a chance; but there was hardly anyone there, and I pulled a quick mika-judgment of the people who were there. I determined that I didn’t want to stay for very long. so I didn’t. I headed off to see brian and amy, went home around 11. hey, the point is, I got out of the house. (I even got all dressed up, and I’d like to add that I looked really nice.) granted, I ended up at brian’s, which means that of the 3 weekends this year that I’ve gone out to do something, it’s been to visit one of my brothers. pathetic, I know. well, at least at the moment I’m fine with being pathetic. I’ll just be a recluse for the next year or so. that’ll be fun, right?

next weekend will be fun. ryan is in vegas for a volleyball tournament right now, and I talked to him on my drive home last night. we’re definitely excited about my visit. olive garden in logan! I haven’t had olive garden in ages, and I miss it. mmm those delicious foods. I already know what I want: zuppa tuscana, breadsticks, strawberry daiquiri, three-meat ravioli, and black tie mousse cheesecake. please let me splurge? I can’t wait.

not much else to say. not much happened today. ryan and I read some of ender’s game this morning — well, I had my copy out and was following along while he read aloud. for once we were even in the same time zone. I read for a while after we got off the phone. but it isn’t the book I feel like continuing for now.

and that, I believe, is all for today…

there is good in the world

work was so frustrating until today. why did it all change at once? I’m not sure. but diana brought back the drive I gave her on monday — before, she was indexing at 550/hr; I told her that we expected her to be able to do 800/hr. she averaged 968/hr. I’m so impressed! setting high standards does work sometimes.

plus, I’ve made good progress on pscu. bins 1-6 are completely ready for final qc, allowing that there’s already a list of rescans to be done. the list is short, though. hallelujah! the renaming and control copy are running overnight, and I can pass that off to qc tomorrow. an end in sight… it’s a miracle…

the best thing, though, and the reason I say there’s good in the world: mick asked me to come chat with him in his office when I had a chance. I know I’ve been looking mopey these past few days, and he’s an awfully caring person, like a grandfather who happens to pay you for being brilliant at your job. anyhow, we talked about the different projects I’m working on, and then he asked how my life is going. what I need. what he can do for me. I said life is alright, I’m getting through; and I didn’t need anything. I’m fine. he kept asking what I wanted, though, almost daring me to throw out a wild request.

“what do you need?” he repeated.

“a plane ticket to utah and back,” I finally said jokingly. I do want that, rather badly; but the jokingly part was that I never expected he would open up a cabinet drawer by his desk, pull out a certificate for a free round-trip flight, and hand it to me.

“it’s yours,” he said.

when I realized he was serious I almost started crying. people don’t do nice things like that. the nicest thing I’ve done recently is give a guy $10 outside of target ’cause he had run out of gas over by mcdonald’s. but now I have a flight booked for next weekend, and I’m going to see ryan.

it’s absolutely marvelous! my day went wonderfully after that. I talked to carole about picking me up from the airport, and ryan should be in the salt lake area that evening (the 2nd) so he can take me up to logan with him. then I made a reservation for a shuttle from logan to salt lake when I’m coming back home. I don’t know if ryan and I will do anything exciting (or illegal, or that we just generally oughtn’t do), but it will be so good to see him.

plus, I promised myself I would go to the dance in sacramento tomorrow. by now I half want to go. earlier I had no desire whatsoever, but the boredom (and more particularly, the loneliness) got to me. at least I get to dress up.

the long day is over

as my good friend ryan says, “take me home norah, take me home.”

at long last, the week is over. it was a hectic one. I worked overtime almost every day — not that ot is bad at all, but I was on a crazy deadline. I told mick that I’d have pec ready to bill by tuesday morning, then pushed it back to wednesday, finally thursday because of having to redo heather’s stuff. what a mess. wednesday night I was up till 12:30 trying to finish the indexing, which meant not much sleep.

but I did have a doctor’s appointment on thursday. a miracle, considering all the hassle I went through to get insurance. it was a good appointment — translation: I got drugs. right now I’m trying skelaxin, a mild muscle relaxer. the dr said my headaches are most likely caused by muscle tension in my back, shoulder, and skull muscles. I believe it so far. he told me that if the skelaxin helps — not necessarily makes the headaches stop, but helps — I’ll start doing physical therapy to relax those muscles. and learn to eliminate the causes of my knots, etc.

thursday morning I also met with liz and lauren to discuss our procedures for pscu, once production is finished. it will be a nightmare, but I’ll survive. hopefully. I know mick keeps telling me that it’s ok if I fail this project. but I’ve never been told that before in my life — “if you don’t do really well, no one will think less of you, and it will be a learning experience” — and I can’t get my brain to wrap around the concept. it’s great, I know, but I’ve developed my personality so that I always plan to exceed expectations. this idea of not being a failure as a person if I fail in one aspect of my life is new. it changes my perception of… well, of me. I’ve been so adamant and harsh with myself that failure is not an option, not acceptable; and anything that falls even a drop short of expectations is failure. I haven’t allowed any room for learning or for experience. no wonder I went crazy at byu.

yesterday I drove up to brian and amy’s. that was an adventure. I had just gotten on i-80 at the travis onramp when my car started spazzing. clever me, I had forgotten I was out of gas. the engine cut out — luckily I was able to pull over to the side of the road first. at the time I was on the phone with ryan , who kept me calm and sane. I called my dad to come rescue me, and he brought a few gallons of gas with him. so I made it to the arco on north texas. that station is stupid, can I say? they only take atm and debit, no credit, and the card reader at the register wasn’t working. of course you can only pay inside. so I had to use the atm and pay an extra $2 because it wasn’t my bank’s machine. dorks. oh well, at least my poor car got better, and I made it up to carmichael.

sort of.

the traffic was pretty bad, and even though I had directions from yahoo!, it doesn’t tell you that i-80 branches off right after the causeway. so I stayed in the fast lane, which turns into highway 50. there was still a watt ave. exit, but it put me at the far end of watt ave., and I got incredibly frustrated trying to find my way back to brian’s.

I finally got there about 6:15, but wasn’t hungry. I didn’t actually get hungry until we had all gone to bed. about 8:30 I remember taking skelaxin, but my headache continued to get worse and worse as the night went on. every time I woke up it was throbbing. weird, because I almost never wake up with a headache. even in the morning it was killing me — after a full 10 hours of sleep with few interruptions. I think it was because of not eating, though.

today I’m exhausted. the drive back down here killed me. my headache went away after I ate breakfast (thus confirming my suspicions), but I was driving into the sun and my eyes went crazy. it was so hard to see and I was afraid for a while I might not be able to make it without pulling over for a while. here I am, though, safe and sound. my semisonic cd came, as did my usb drive. I talked to ryan about what music he wants me to send him and I’ll get that done tomorrow or monday.

I’ve got to send jarom’s card, but I can’t find it t the moment. oops. it needs to be there by the 21st, or rather by the 20th by my time. since south korea is a day ahead and all.

do you know, I haven’t let myself process the fact that he’ll be home in 3 months? I keep pushing it to the back of my mind. at least I’m aware of that, and not saying “oh yeah, jarom is coming home in 3 months, can you believe it” and thinking that saying it means I understand. no, I know it hasn’t sunk in yet. I’m scared to think about it. maybe next week. maybe next month. ha.