Life is Crazy!

So I put starter in the freezer, as I won't have time for her until next week.

I nearly have all of the slippers crocheted (one last slipper to go) and then I have to assemble them.

I still have to buy my mother's present, but that's for tomorrow.

I have to bake fruitcake.

I have to make fudge.

I have to pass my Russian test tomorrow (8AM wtf), so am currently studying like mad.

I have to wrap all of the presents. (This will be the year that I don't wrap anything at my mother's please please please.)

I have to figure out if I'm going to make little hair flowers for my cousins (probably should). So four little hair flowers (they take ~30 minutes to make -- and people charge exorbitant amounts for them!).

Um... that's it?

Life Changes!

So things have been different in my house these past couple of days, and are bound to get even more so this week. My good friend from high school, L, has just moved to the area and is crashing with us until she finds a place. I love her dearly, and she's been great fun to have around.

One thing that makes me sad to do, but is important, is we're charging her to stay. Nominally, it's $100/week, but she's at $50/week and she's helping us clean (her point was that it de-stresses her, and she's gonna do it anyways). The reason why we have the bar set fairly high is this: another friend from high school, C, has rather irresponsibly decided that she's ALSO moving out here, and is apparently under the delusion that either a) I'm finding her an apartment or b) she's living with me and Mister. Neither of these are happening (esp. as Mister can't stand C and she bugs the ever-loving crap out of me after about 20 mins) so we're charging an amount that we're sure she cannot attain as she does not have a job in the area. :-D Sneaky and underhanded yes, but so is getting a phone call from your mother asking why you didn't tell her that C was going to be your new roommate (apparently my mother heard it from C's dad that C was moving in). It is not an issue with L, as L DOES have a job that starts tomorrow, L is actively searching for an apartment, and L is not obnoxious.

The other thing that starts tomorrow is school. Due to the unemployed aspect of my life, I am going to be a full-time student (yippee kiyay). I'm looking forward to classes, I really am, but the thought of being surrounded by teenagers is really disheartening. Luckily, quite a few of my classes should NOT be populated by young'uns, as I'm taking Theory 3 and Ear Training 3 (my old school called it Aural Skills and I keep finding it difficult to not call it that), as well as Russian and I feel that's a less common one. :-P

Gah, it may not be TMI Tuesday, but TMI ahead: I had an IUD put in about a month ago, and although it will be fabulous in the long run, it means that I have 6 months of cramping and intermittent spotting. I've been in two straight weeks of cramping every single day and not enjoying it. Usually by the SECOND dose of drugs it goes away. I want to remove my organs with a fork and knife and feed it to wild cats.

My New Schedule

As the hours at my work are being cut, I now only work 3-4 times a week, I put all my work days in a row (unless I'm covering for someone), and I have evenings and mornings free. Take today for an example.

For some reason, there are an ungodly amount of alarms for Mister. He had one set for 8 am (that I think he forgot about), the two that I set for him at 8:30 and 8:45 (when he did get up), and one for 9:30 (when he wanted to be at work, and when he actually hopped into the shower after running it for freaking 20 mins). After he left just before 10, I got up and went to the comp.



I leisurely read my emails, webcomics and blogs, then put two pots of water on the stove. One for oatmeal (with some rose hips in the water), and one for tea (there isn't a kettle in this apartment). I then hopped in the shower. After using all of the lovely care products that I love (and haven't been using lately due to lack of time), I went and fixed tea, and threw oatmeal into the other pot to cook.



I then came over to the comp again, and wrote my posts, while cooking and then eating my oatmeal and tea. It is now time to get dressed and head to work to be there by 11:30.

I feel so rich in time! I have never had this! I am absolutely in love with this leisurely wake up and get ready. Hopefully I'll continue to use it instead of just sleeping in :-P.

Making plans

So trying to get Cards Night back up and running (we've only had one successful day... :-\), and running into difficulties scheduling. How can three people have non-compatible schedules? That should be easier to coordinate than four or five, and it's seeming well-nigh impossible.

J and I are planning on doing canning some time this week -- after we get Cards Night scheduled. It'll probably wind up being Friday or so. Yay pickles!

Mister and I need to be going to the gym -- I'm not sure when I'll be able to, but gosh darn it we'll try to get three days in (at least).

I need to send out engagement notices, now that I have the ring. This involves a pic of the ring, a pic of Mister and I, printing said pics, and figuring out what the hell I'm going to say in the notice that doesn't make people want to send me stuff.

And lastly, my next day off is Saturday, August 21st. The joys of management.

A Moment to Breathe

I had been costuming an opera that had it's opening night tonight. Finally. I thought that I'd never be done.

First off, the music director has the belief that big body = big voice. It doesn't always work that way, but there is never a shortage of large opera singers. Let us just say that our leading ladies had 45" waists. One of them was 5'2". Yeah. The music director liked to refer to them as "larger than life". Did I mention that the time period was the 1930s? There are very few large women in that time period. Ergo, clothing doesn't look right, nor is there anything that large already made.

The grand total of all that I made (and in just over 7 days to boot!):

-- 5 dresses (2 styles, one for each lady and one for the understudy before I realized I could shaft her)
-- 2 men's button dress shirts (and had to draft a pattern)
-- 3 little girl dresses
-- 2 choir robes (under and over-robes for 2 characters)

... y'know, looking at the list doesn't seem particularly large. Lemme tell you, when all my assistant created was 4 A-line skirts (and it took her a week to make them!), it makes a girl frustrated.

Also, the damnable machine in shop had a computer in it -- it knew I never had a button-hole foot to put on it. So it refused to make button-holes. So guess who had to handstitch all the button-holes? Yep. Did I mention that I didn't have any zippers? Just buttons? Yep.

All of the LL's dresses were based upon one of two patterns that we bought, the choir robes had NO pattern (who needs a pattern for a T-tunic?), the little girl dresses I made up (and had fun doing so), but the men's dress shirts I had to draft the pattern based upon measurements that I had, and some that I didn't and had to guess. :-P Joy. Also, the book I was using DIDN'T actually have a template for shirts -- just jackets -- so I had to modify it from that as well.

I am weary and happy that the show is pretty much done. I'll stick with it for the rest of the run, to see if anything destroys itself (the vintage clothing for the chorus keeps disintegrating...) but other than that I'm done. There was to be a black-tie affair apres the show, but I have zero energy for gussying up and being NICE to people. Gah. I should be there, but the amount of prep work that would have required... and it's raining as well. Not my idea of a fun time, although free food would have been involved. Le sigh.

Hopefully I'll be able to get back to regular postings within the week.