Settling In (& Getting Out)

Last week was a big week for me. I turned the big 24, I started a new job, and I started to really search for a place to live. My birthday was great, lots of fun. Ann and Suzy came in to Madison and we went out for dinner and drinks, then to the Glass Nickel where Danielle was working. Justin and some other friends met up with us there. It ended up being a pretty late night, and unfortunately I couldn't call in to work Tuesday morning. (Not really cool to do the day before your last day at a job). Oh well, I survived. I even got a nap in when I got home from work. Jordan is so cooperative - sometimes.

My new job is going well so far. Usually I'm panicking my first week of a new job and hating everything, but so far, I feel I will adjust alright. Maybe this is a bad sign? I hope I'm not being over-confident and setting myself up for a big freak out later on. Oh well, not much I can do about it. Of course, a lot of the stuff I'm doing now is stuff that I have a little bit of experience with - scanning, cleaning up and cropping photos, copying and pasting and reformatting text, that kind of thing. I created my first ad on Thursday, that was kind of exciting. It was a classified ad for a trailer. Woo-hoo :)
 
Now the big project is finding a new place to live.  Once our lease is up (end of August) Eve is moving out, and that means we need to find a smaller place that charges less for rent.  Really not looking forward to moving.  I think the amount of stuff we have has tripled since Jordan was born.  I spent almost all of this last weekend going through the classifieds and calling places to get info. and set up viewing appts.  Of course, being me, I had to create a little form and put each ad into that so that I'd be organized.  I think it saves time in the long run, because that way I don't call the same place three times or forget to ask if they have air conditioning or something really important like that.

Packing & Cleaning Are Natural Enemies

Justin and I decided to take advantage of his week off of work to refinish our dining room chairs to match the table. So far, it's going alright. We've got two seats and backs off and recovered, and one layer of stain on the frames. Now we've just got to dismantle, sand, and condition the other two chairs, and hope that we have time to get all three coats of stain and three coats of clear finish on before we have people over tomorrow for a cook out. I don't know what my problem is, but I seem to like to cram as many things in to a few days as possible. Last time we went camping, I had people over the night before, and, naturally, we're going camping on Friday, so we've got to clean for tomorrow night and pack for Friday morning all at the same time. Not to mention the fact that I've got to coordinate two grocery lists, and figure out who's coming Thursday, what they're bringing, and who needs directions to the campsite, etc. etc. etc. Good thing I'm organized :) (in other words, I make lists, and sometimes, I even manage not to lose them).

Randomly

There's nothing like only having a week left at a job to lower one's already non-exsistant desire to accomplish anything work-related while at work.

Could I Please Have Some Mail To Sort?

This has to be the most boring day ever. I can't even scan anything because I've scanned so much in the last week that the memory is full and we have to buy a new hard drive. So I'm reduced to numbering pages of the documents I will be scanning once the new hard drive arrives. On top of that, I'm the only one in the office right now. I'm like a human voice mail transfer system - that's my only function. Funny, we have a phone system that does that too. Why am I here? One good thing, I have so much time to play online that I finally found Lori's online journal, after having lost the address several months ago for the 10th time in a row. Goody gumdrops!

Recycle Or Else

Living in Fitchburg has forced me to recycle. If you put out more than one container of trash you have to pay for it, but you can put out all the recycling you want for free. This used to annoy me, particularly when there were four adults and three children in diapers living in our house. Now that it's just usually the three of us, I've found it's not hard at all to keep the trash level down and the recycling level up. Sometimes we even put out two weeks of trash in our one container. (Since the trash man has been coming earlier and earlier and Justin still insists on setting out the trash Monday morning instead of Sunday night). Recently, I got a free subscription to Organic Style. Now, I've always had interest in wasting less, reusing more, and doing everything possible the natural way, but since I've been reading OS, I've been thinking about it more and more. Did you know that if you take your used print cartridges in to Office Depot to be recycled they'll give you a free ream of recycled paper? I've been taking in cartridges from work as well as from home, and I have enough free printer paper to last me for years. Some companies recycle used cell phones, and Nike recycles used tennis shoes. I've been buying all my clothes from Goodwill lately, mostly because I can't afford new clothes, but I also feel good about reusing what I can. Lydia and I have actually decided to start a business selling handmade stuff made from recycled materials. That way we can keep our prices down and still make a profit, and conserve resources and cut down on waste at the same time. We'll see if we actually make any money :). I have one thing to say to all of you - recycle or else! Here's a list of many places to recycle many things.