lesson learned

colorado is one of the sunniest places in the country. boulder, in fact, has over 300 sunny days a year. not only is it sunny more often, because we're a whole mile closer to the sun, it's sunnier when it's sunnier.

therefore, it's a bad idea to leave any kind of melty food, like maybe a milk chocolate and almond toffee bar, in the front seat of your car all day, especially if you were thinking of how yummy it would be to eat that milk chocolate and almond toffee bar at the end of the day.

Classic or Classic Plus?

I guess it’s been a while since I moved to a new apartment and it’s interesting to think of everything that’s changed since then like… the internet. (Or really, I should say Internet with a big, loud, “I.”) Back in the late 90’s (the lat time that I moved), you had to actually call people (the cable company, the phone company, etc) to get your service started. But these days, you can do it all on line. And that means you’re free to spend an hour, switching back and forth between the channel line-ups for Digital Classic or Digital Classic Plus and agonizing over the decision. (Has digital cable really been around long enough to be called “classic”?)

In the old days, when you took a long time to decide, the person on the other end of the phone would start to sigh and get impatient and you knew you had to make up your mind or you’d run the risk of getting “disconnected.” But the old days are gone and this could go on all day. The difference between the two packages is only $5 a month and about 20 movie channels that I may, or may not watch but for some reason, the decision seems so large to me right now.

So if you’re planning to visit me, you may want to help me out with this one because when you east coast people wake up at 6:00 am, I’ll still be sleeping for the next two or three hours and what else are you going to do besides watch TV?

I'm in love

with the breakfast burritos from the cafeteria.

not so bad

I signed the lease for my new place last night and while I was there, I took a look at the apartment again. you know what? it wasn't so bad. it doesn't have the same charm as my pgh. apartment but it has this whole 1950's retro thing going on that might work, so long as I'm willing to embrace my betty crockerness. and well, maybe I am. milkshakes and meatloaf for dinner tomorrow.

actually, I'll be back in pittsburgh tomorrow so chances are I'll be eating something that's been fried. it's going to be a busy weekend but I'd love to see you if you'd love to see me.

abby is staying with a woman named Viva for the weekend. my manager @ IBM told me about her. she's this little woman who lives with her husband in some home at the end of a dirt road about 5 miles from IBM. it's not a kennel. they just watch dogs for people. as far as I could tell, there were at least seven dogs of all shapes and sizes (and all barkers) staying there this weekend. abby gave me that "what the hell are you doing ot me look" as I drove away. sorry abby.

like owner, like dog

right now, Sue, my officemate is participating in a conference call and she has it on speakerphone. it's semi-distracting but wouldn't be so bad except that the woman running the call is named LeeAnn (or I think she's actually Lee Anne) and so I keep hearing people say, "Um, LeeAnn," or "Hey LeeAnn?". I don't know about you but any time I hear my name, I can't help but perk up and turn my head in that direction. this only further supports my theory that the only real difference between dogs and people is all the fur (and that difference is only sometimes).

New Lease on Life

Tonight I’m going to sign the lease for my new apartment in Boulder. For at least the next six months, I’m going to be living in North Boulder on the corner of 9th and Alpine. For those of you who don’t know Boulder I’ll tell you that the corner of 9th and Alpine is a great location. I’m two blocks away from the Ideal Market and Vic’s, my favorite coffee shop in Boulder. I’m also walking distance from Pearl Street (which is the big shopping/restaurant area around here).

But, well, nothing’s perfect I guess so this apartment, especially when compared to my apartment in Pittsburgh, is kind of a dump (and more expensive!). Or at least not all that nice (and it’s more expensive!). But the bathroom’s new and so is the carpet so at least I won’t get all grossed out walking around in my bare feet. And my lease is only six months long so I’ll have time to reevaluate and start the process all over again in six months if I want to. Oh goodie.

Anyway, don’t be scared off by the dumpiness of my apartment. Come visit me anyway! There’s a great little pub called the hungry toad only two blocks away. We can hang out there and then walk home hang out on my gigantic porch (once the weather gets warmer) so we really won’t need to be in the apartment at all, okay? Okay.

Back to it all

Just so you know, I made it back alive from Norm Fest (so you can call off the search party) and I had a great time. I’ll fill you in on the details later but yes, there are supposedly pictures of me in the fuchsia velvet and knee socks, dancing with the rest of the crazy people that were there. I'll pass the photos along as soon as they’re passed along to me.

Getting away from it all.

I know it seems strange to be going on vacation already, when I've only been out here for about three weeks. But let's face it, life's been rough on me lately. So to counteract all the bad stuff and to try to get in the flow of the outgoing, adventurous spirit of Boulder, I’ll be spending the weekend skiing in Breckenridge with twenty people I don’t know.

I was invited to join in on the annual festivities known as Norm-Fest. Norm-Fest is hosted by a guy named Norm (but I think his real name is Brian) and each year, he rents a house for the weekend and invites tons of friends to ski with him. This year they invited me too. I met these guys my first weekend in town at a surprise birthday party for someone I didn’t know. The party started out normal but soon erupted into what can best be described as “Dance Party U.S.A.” I think the same will hold for Norm-Fest. I’ve been told to bring “dancing clothes” and there’s also talk of having a big piece of cardboard so people can show off their break-dancing moves. Since I don't have "dancing clothes" in Colorado yet (or maybe I don't even own "dancing clothes") I bought some last night. I don't want to give too much of my outfit away but let's just say it involves some fuchsia velvet and a pair of striped knee socks.

Anyway, I guess the famously beautiful spring ski season hasn’t started yet because it’s supposed to be cloudy and about 20 degrees in the mountains this weekend. I suppose the good stuff doesn’t get here until March so until then, I’ll be freezing my butt off. But at least my butt won't be sitting around in that crazy house.

Today I discovered...

dried blood on the glass door to the crazy house I'm living in. I also noticed drops of blood on the porch and the cement walkway...

tour de force

I really like the phrase "tour de force" and I think we should definitely use it more often. it's power packed and gets the point across. therefore, I am going to make a conscious effort over the next few months (or maybe weeks, or okay, just today) to use this phrase. so here goes...

two people that I work with (and the one guy's girlfriend) are now sick with whatever I had. it's obviously my fault because I was a veritable "tour de force" of germs last week.

something's missing from my life...

okay, so a LOT of things are missing from my life right now but what's interesting is that I haven't had coffee about a week, ever since I got sick. coffee is a pretty important part of my life (one of the main criteria in my apartment search has been whether or not the apartment is within walking distance of a good coffee shop) so it's strange that it's gone. is it gone forever? I don't know. but it hasn't seemed appealing to me these past few days.

my god, what's next?

Hot date for Valentine's Day

This Tuesday (Valentine's Day), I have a date with Kyle.

You're probably wondering about this new man in my life but, well, he's not a man. He's my car. And after fourteen long days apart, we will be reunited in Boulder on Valentine's Day!

The way I see it, he's the perfect Valentine's date: we've been together for a while now, since late '99 and though our long relationship has often been troubled, the two of us have gotten to a point where we really understand and know how to take care of one another. That's what love's really about, isn't it?

I'm starting to think I need more hours in my day (just kidding).

When I was about five, my dad tried to teach me how to play chess. It didn’t work out so well, mostly because my dad’s idea of teaching was to beat me in three moves. I put up with this for about five minutes before I gave up and ran away from the chessboard in tears. Since that incident, I’ve refused to play chess. Hate the game, in fact.

But… while cooped up inside the Victorian house, with nothing much to do, I discovered that one of the few games on my computer happens to be chess (The other is some Tony Hawk skateboarding game). And so I started to play.

For the first few games, the computer, like my dad, beat me in about three moves. But now, I’m happy to say that it takes at least seven moves for the computer to beat me. Yeah, that’s right. Seven.

My bad...

Okay, I changed the settings so that you can now publish comments. So go for it!

HomeSick

I think it’s an interesting coincidence that at the moment, I’m both homesick and home sick. (Though it's hard not to get homesick when you're home sick in a place that doesn't really have furniture or any of your things.) Technically, I’m not home at the moment but I’m definitely sick. I’m hanging out at Vic’s Espresso and News, my favorite coffee shop in Boulder, because without TV/radio/internet access in my “home,” I was starting to go a little crazy.

I’m on day number 2.5 of being home from work (I left early on Wednesday) and so I haven’t really had human contact for a few days. I went out briefly yesterday afternoon but since I was visibly oozing sickness from every pore in my body, people were doing there best to stay away from me.

I’m still probably oozing sickness today but it’s not quite as visible so I didn’t feel to bad about being out in public. (Plus I was going crazy!) I rationalized my being out by saying this is a young, healthy town and the people here will be able to handle whatever I might give them, right?

Well, as luck would have it, the only four senior citizens in Boulder have sat themselves down at a table right next to me. Given my luck as of late, I can’t help but think one of these woman is going to catch whatever it is that I have and then die. And that’s bad juju.

But really, what’s wrong with my karma these days? I had a bad run of luck at the end of December (I'm sure most of you recall the bus rear-ending, the broken furnace, the strep throat, and the sprained ankle) but I though I left that all behind with the new year. Guess not. My friend Mike insists that I need some sort of karmic cleansing and you’d think that if you could get one of those anywhere, you’d be able to get one in Boulder. I’m honestly considering acupuncture to realign my chi. But I dunno... Maybe I should just start with a smoothie and then go from there…