choco_frosh: (Default)
o g-d i just can't all these texts between my neighbors about home improvement

...
I am also not at all ok about the fact that we elected a president whose strategy throughout life, but ESPECIALLY in politics, has been "Do so many outrageously shitty things that everyone gets too exhausted to keep track of them all."
choco_frosh: (Default)
I will repeat the cry, coming up from the throats of myriads:

Could this meeting not have been an email?!?


FML, I'm going running.
(Okay, I guess I shouldn't bitch too much. Socially, the past month has been pretty great. Work, not so much, though.)
choco_frosh: (Default)
This is the third straight day that the high temperature has been over 80.
choco_frosh: (Default)
So apparently today I need to
- Call JP Morgan and tell him that my online sign-in isn't working and make them fix that, so that I can
- Download a detailed annual statement, armed with which I can
- Call the S'ville Office of the Tax Collector to persuade them that Mr. Morgan, as my mortgage holder, has in fact been paying the property taxes for which I've just received a gigantic bill.
(Guldangit, if it turns out that this is because I list my address as "Apt. 3" instead of "Apt. 2" I am going to be SO MAD at everyone.)

I also need to go running, and ideally pick up a library book.

And, y'know, work.

The odds of my actually making it to Tenebrae tonight as planned are not looking good.

ETA: My online account with JP Morgan Chase appears to have decided to let me log on again. WTH. Unfortunately, finding a statement that says "Yes, we paid your property taxes" is, at the very least, less easy than I'd hoped.
Guess we call the Office of the Tax Collector tomorrow...
choco_frosh: (Default)
There is nothing like being on hold for fifteen minutes while your insurance company's claims representative talks to the hospital's claims representative to convince you that socialized medicine would be a good idea.
choco_frosh: (Default)
Things I am tempted to put as my out-of-office message:

The Office of Sponsored Programs* will be closed on Friday, July 15, in observance of National Research Administrators' Day.** So forget about getting anything done that day, 'cause we're all going to be at the beach.*** Footnotes )
(We're not ACTUALLY going to be closed, but at least half of us are going to be on vacation, so it's going to feel that way.)

Month of P: Day 1 of 31
choco_frosh: (Default)
^$%^(&*&O&^%$^*($&%*^$%^ Monday.

Time to drink too much coffee & cue up "The Best of Sonata Arctica"
choco_frosh: (Default)
Woke up at about 3:45 AM, and couldn't get back to sleep for worrying about the election, the USPS, and the state of the atmosphere. Taedet animam meam vitae meae. Taedet animam meam huius aetatis.
choco_frosh: (Default)
I think I am doing a really good job of not totally losing my shit at someone this morning.
choco_frosh: Konstanz, imaginary depiction in a map of the Swabian War, 1500 (Costenitz)
Uggghhhh.
Monday: The day you com back from vacation and have to spend the whole day getting up to speed.
Tuesday: The day you spend getting through the rest of the backlog. (urgent bits only)
Wednesday: The day you spend dealing with everything that came in Monday and Tuesday.
Thursday: More of the same.
Thursday PM: Time to start dealing with all the slightly-less urgent stuff that you've had to put off for the last four days.
Friday: will probably feature something that will prevent you actually getting caught up.

Monday: Finally finish shoveling up the $#17 from your vacation.
Tuesday-Thursday: MIGHT be normal. I can dream, anyway.
Thursday evening: leave on another vacation.
choco_frosh: (Default)
So - I don't know if I've mentioned this before - I apparently need to resubmit my 2014 AMENDED tax return. wtff.
Which means trying to find my W-2s from back then (and so far I've failed in that), OR getting my employers of four years ago - and there are *seven* of those - to send me new ones.

Meantime, have definitely told friends in Waltham I'm not moving in with them, but while I thought I was going to be touring an apartment (that was going to be expensive but excellent) this weekend, I haven't heard jack about that. SO now I'm a tad worried.

To conclude, fml.

UPDATE: Having downloaded a 1040X, it *looks* like I don't have to include W-2s. (Which makes sense: they presumably already have the things.) Of course, I wish I'd realized that BEFORE I wasted an hour and turned my room upside down in a fruitless quest for them, but...
Now I just have to call them on Monday and figure out what the IRS *does* want...
choco_frosh: (Default)
I am - reluctantly - back to thinking about moving out of Somerville.

Basically, the landlady crunched the numbers and found out that the new solar panels aren't paying for as much of the electricity bill as she'd expected, and so she's gotten nervous about finances. (I guess?) So she'd going to talk - next month, which for reasons that I'll explain, is inconvenient - to a financial advisor; if the financial advisor is remotely worth his fee, he's gonna tell her to hike the rent.

Now, we're planning to negotiate this: we can go back to paying our own electricity, say; and then there's the aforementioned fact that this apartment hasn't been properly redone in like twenty years, and the plumbing's getting dodgy as well; and she may just decide to continue in her policy of not wanting anything to do with the ridiculousness that is Boston-area rental prices. But if this doesn't work out...

< Additional details to be added when I have more time >
_________
The key issue is leaving Somerville. Hey Somervillians! What do you think? Should I move out to Waltham, or should I actually stay in the same town as you guys? 'Cause that's really the deciding factor.
choco_frosh: (Default)
Had less-than-ideal afternoon (medical/gastro-intestinal thing that I don't want to get into right now), and finished up by having oatmeal for dinner.
So, not the best Sunday.
choco_frosh: (Default)
grrr bagbiting mechanics are booked up til WEDNESDAY, so the car is out of commission til then.

So no Census work for me til then either... and since Wednesday is, err, "problematic"...that really means Thursday.

(No, before you ask I can't take it to another mechanic. I mean, technically I could, but if--as may be the case--the problem is that the oxygen sensor they replaced last time is acting up, I want a free replacement.)

...I guess I can get some job applications done?

----
Later: Related to that last: Someone please explain to me why "Because I want you to pay me," isn't an adequate response to the question "Why do you want to work at [Name of company]?".
choco_frosh: (Default)
Well, fuck.

BRCF just dropped me. (And the rest of their freelance editors, so it's PRESUMABLY not that I screwed up, but still.)

Fuck.
choco_frosh: Konstanz, imaginary depiction in a map of the Swabian War, 1500 (Costenitz)
Various work-related $#!7:

Fustest: So my boss, after I'd told him I was leaving at some point in the near future, asked me to write out a letter of resignation, because the higher-ups had been asking for one; and so I did, but didn't specify an end date.
Allegedly, since that was the case, they are simply going to PICK my end date, based on when we get my replacement adequately trained. So I could be out of a job as early as next Friday.

The fact that I find it plausible either that my supervisor is screwing me over OR that the upper management of MRE are being a bunch of callous, shooting-themselves-in-the-foot cheese-parers is one more reason why I need to get out of this job.

As D. at bellringing last night put it: "I mean, it's good that you're finally getting out of there! But money is good too."
(Everyone at practice expressed congratulations that I was finally leaving this job. I guess I may have been bitching about it a bit. I guess they thought the bitching was deserved.)

But yeah. Unemployed in the near future. And...


2. I thought I was being hired by the Census. They're not replying to my emails, though.


3. On the other hand, it's a three-day weekend. Or, well, 3+ days, since [University]'s closing at 2 tomorrow.* And nothing planned on Saturday, 'cause practice got cancelled due to practically every ringer in the area road-tripping to Quebec. Anybody want to do a thing?

(Friday afternoon is going to be catch up on chores and make a strawberry-rhubarb crumble, unless somebody talks me into doing something more exciting. Sunday, of course, is choir followed by more choir followed by ringing followed by more ringing followed by Fall Over. Followed by contradancing. Monday, who knows?


More Later.

PS: Everyone remind me that I need to check twiddle pins!

* 3a. Supervisor, in one of his many questionable moves, is actually giving several people the ENTIRE day off; I volunteered to be the one to come in so as to have some leverage for taking half a day off NEXT week, to meet a friend of [personal profile] sovay's at his (ridiculously well-funded research-based) place of employment, in the hopes that having some of the people there actually know my face will increase my odds of getting hired there at some point...
choco_frosh: (Default)
(Some of you already know about this, and I think I've alluded to my recent health issues on here but...well, $#!7's happened, and I figured I'd better explain it, or my next post or two isn't going to make any sense at all to most of you.)

Back in...yeesh, December, I suppose...I had a recurrence of my old knee problems. Soreness, swelling, vague feelings of unsteadiness, pain when I tried to run on it. I'd had this back in August, but on that occasion it was partly because my shoes were ridonculously worn out, and this didn't appear to be the case this time around. So I hoped it would get better.
It didn't.
Eventually, sovay--and everyone else I'd talked to about this--browbeat me into seeing a doctor. Trouble was, I'd called my GP, and they'd told me to go to the physical therapist I'd seen last time.
I'd never told them I'd never gotten around to calling the therapist the last time. (Look, it was hell week at work, and I have little enough free time even under normal circumstances.)

I eventually called the physical therapist they'd referred me to anyway. And I got an appointment and went in, and they poked and prodded and massaged and made me do a whole bunch of weird exercises (both there and in my copious spare time), and for most of a week things were going better. I actually canceled my appointment last Thursday, in part* because I wasn't sure it was absolutely necessary.
Perhaps inevitably, it was on Thursday that I got up and realized that while my knee was continuing to feel better, my ankle felt like I'd sprained it the week before and was now on the mend. Slowly.

And equally inevitably, it has gotten worse since. Today I'm in enough pain that I'm skipping the last day of Arisia. No volunteer t-shirt for me. Fuck.

What's going on? Well, presumably I've been favoring that leg, or else holding it funny to compensate for the whole business with the knee, and that's compromised the ankle somehow. And possibly footware's played some roll, and certainly attempting various things yesterday that I shouldn't have tried** has contributed to why it feels so much worse today.

But it all feels so unfair. For my last six sprained ankles, I've done something dumb that put immediate stress on the ligament concerned. And that hurts, but at least you can tell yourself that you'll try not to do that again.
But what the ^%&%* was I supposed to do to prevent this?

----------

This computer's about out of power. And I've got too many things on my plate--even apart from a busted leg. I guess I'm going to try to drive out to the old-school shoe store sovay and family recommended. "Try" because I'm not at all sure either my car or my leg is going to be up to this. Wish me luck.


* The more important considerations being the very real question of whether my $£%^&* insurance is going to pay for any of this, and secondarily the fact that I was hoping to be doing setup for Arisia, of which more later.

** Contradancing and hitting people with plastic swords, for two. Y'know, the normal things people do at Cons.
choco_frosh: (Default)
Meantime, just to make life still MORE fun: on the way back from practice on Wednesday, I got a voicemail from my landlady. The driveway was being repaved the next day: I'd have to move my car.

Well, that's annoying, but not a MAJOR problem. Since we have a driveway, I've never gotten a parking permit for my car, but we have a 2-day visitor pass. I moved it (in the rain), and stuck the parking pass in the window.

Yesterday, I got ANOTHER voicemail. The driveway's done, but it can't be parked on until the asphalt hardens. Which will take a week.
1) WTF?
2) That's...a lot longer than two days.*

%$^&*(. I guess the best solution--and it's not a GOOD solution, but I think it'll work--is just to hope that the parking inspectors don't notice over the weekend. Then next week, I'll drive to work every day. (Groan.)** That'll mean I leave at 7:30 AM, and get back around 6:30 PM: Presumably parking inspectors don't work at night.
$£%*&^(.

Hell with it. I should go to bed. Have some amusing British tweets to cheer you up.


* But not NEARLY as long as it takes to get a Resident parking pass!
I've ordered one, but that's a two-week process, IF they even accept my iPhone photo of my RCN bill as proof of residency.

** Oh ^%$(*&, Wednesday. Choir practice.
It says something about Boston that there is no WAY that I can get there in time by car, although it's relatively simple by public transit.
Welp, I'll see if I can leave it somewhere at Brandeis overnight. Or maybe in Waltham? Failing that, pay for overnight parking at the Brandeis railroad station.

Meantime, my roommates are watching Star Trek: Enterprise. Why does Data want to have sex with the Borg chick. That doesn't seem remotely psychologically plausible.
choco_frosh: (Default)
Today started with me slamming one of my fingers in the door while leaving my house.

It actually got worse from there.


(No, before someone panics, no further physical injuries, but work went insane again today. And trying to work with a throbbing finger hasn't helped.)
choco_frosh: (Default)
Argh.

So there's this dichotomy:
μέν: This morning I processed a couple of letters* addressed to "Herrn X,** Department of Y, Z University". And something inside me wondered, Why don't I get letters to Herrn Schreiber anymore? Why don't I have a REAL job, doing something prestigious, corresponding internationally? Why, basically, am I eating these husks?

δε: On Friday, as some of you know, I left my credit card at a Friendly's. Sunday night, I was attempting to remove the air conditioner that my roommate had lent me from my window...
You know those scenes - in movies, in dreams - where something drops into the bottomless pit, while the protagonist scrambles frantically to hold onto it? Well, I recreated that with the AC.

Fortunately, there wasn't anything underneath it other than my landlady's lawn, so only the AC got totaled.
But now, thanks to my klutzhood, I am temporarily without a credit card, and out the cost of a replacement air conditioner, and it's times like these - note I say LIKE these - that I wonder why I'm even allowed to go on existing at all.

I want to be able to forgive myself, so that I can enjoy this week*** ...but that's going to be hard. And unfortunately, I could call up my parents, but ... ...actually, let's not get into that.

σύνθεσις: 1. Either way, thinking about these things makes me feel terrible.
2. On a partly unrelated note, Maybe I should go back on antidepressants. I stopped because μέν they weren't making me happy per se, δε so I possibly needed some other combination of drugs, but for THAT I really want an actual qualified psychiatrist prescribing 'em, and I don't really have the time to do all those appointments, δε I could manage without the drugs, wasn't suffering from anhedonia or anything. But I'm having trouble...humaning, as I think of the verb.
More about this later, maybe.
3. ...I should finish this up, and try to get my smart phone activated before my lunch break is up.


* among 2000+.

** For non-linguists: Herrn is the accusative form of the German Herr: letters in the German-speaking world are usually addressed "Herrn [or Frau] X".
μέν and δε are Greek particles: both have multiple meanings, but the important thing is that they are used to set up sentences in the form of "On the one hand...but on the other hand..." My Greek textbook REALLY liked this construction, so it got used a LOT, and consequently it's one of the things I actually remember.

*** The non-work parts are going to be pretty awesome! Work, not so much, but...

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