Doesn’t everyone decide to research remodelling options at 2am? May 22, 2008

I’m not sleeping tonight, apparently, despite taking a pill. When I don’t fall asleep, those pills do weird things to me. They make me want to write, which is a feeling I don’t get very often anymore. (Watch out, there might be bad poetry coming someday!)

Anyway, I didn’t want to write about sleep, I wanted to write about the crazy train of thought that brought me out of bed. I’m in the process of redecorating my living room. I’m going from the post-college, first furniture purchases look to… whatever comes after that. I’m also doing this at a snail’s pace. I spent *years* picking a couch. It was delivered right around this time last year. As you saw a couple of months ago, I bought curtains. Back in January, I bought two new lighting fixtures, but they are still in boxes in the room. Pretty soon their boxes will become furniture, and I’ll have to find a replacement table or two when they’re gone.

Tonight I saw a picture of a rug I liked. I have carpet, but the carpet isn’t great. I guess it was installed wrong or something, so it has stretched and has wrinkles. Since my living and dining room is just one big room, I thought a rug might be a nice way to break it up. I don’t know how I feel about rugs on rugs, though, so I thought “I need to know more about bamboo flooring.” So I finally got up. New flooring didn’t hold my attention long, but then I started looking at counter tops. It’s kind of overwhelming to need (want?) to do all this stuff. I need kitchen floors, and a microwave-hood. And new lighting, and the aforementioned counter tops. I have a lot of counter space, so I think that the fanciest surfaces are impractical. Even if I could afford the really pricey stuff, I think I would price my house out of the neighborhood. Or is it that I would just never recoup that cost on sale? Then someone steals the freaking rims off a car down the street, and I think “I live in the ghetto, and should move.”

I need to hire a project manager to manage this stuff. Really I need to hire a project manager to manage my entire life. Do they make those?

I should be sleeping. April 29, 2008

I have sleep issues. I don’t even know how to classify them, really. I sleep at all the wrong times, and then can’t sleep when I should. I’m tired, pretty much all the time. It’s very frustrating.

I actually had a sleep study scheduled for tonight, but I postponed it. I’ve done that so many times that I can’t even count, and I decided I didn’t want to spend the money on it. (I actually have no idea how much it cost, I haven’t done it since my insurance changed.) The doctor took some blood, I want to wait and hear the results of that before I do something else.

In the meantime, I’m trying not to nap, and to be in the bed, trying to fall asleep, by midnight. (You’ll notice that it’s 1:30am and I’m on the couch. I start out poorly and get better as the week goes on.)

I have sleeping pills, which are a blessing and a curse. My insurance will only pay for 15 a month, in some strange (expensive!) attempt to keep you from getting addicted. Is sleeping every other day worth $50 a month? I don’t know. So confusing. Also, these are supposedly “four hour pills”, meaning that they’re completely out of your system in four hours. (They help you get to sleep, not necessarily stay there.) I think I might still feel slightly zombie-esque in the mornings, though.

Do you think there will be warnings on the pills about blogging while taking them, kind of like the warnings about how you might eat or drive your car?

Edit, 5/22/08: I wrote this a month ago, and then I wasn’t sure I wanted to post it. Reading it tonight, I decided it could go.

Curtains! April 12, 2008

I bought curtains today! Well, sort of. They didn’t have enough at the Pier 1 closest to my house, so I decided to buy the one set and bring them home to check them out. They look surprisingly better than I expected! Tomorrow I will be venturing to Raleigh, I think, to find the required remaining panels. I almost had curtains made back at Christmas, so this cheaper alternative is nice. The pictures will happen when I actually have them up, I promise. I have to find curtain rods first.

Besides buying curtains, I spent the day shopping w/ Mom and Grandma. How exhausting! I am beat, and I seriously don’t know how my 86 year old grandma kept up. She’s amazing, I hope I have her genes.

I also bought some cute brown espadrilles that seem to be just a tiny, tiny bit too big, maybe. I might have to return them, I need to try them on again when my feet aren’t so tired.

Ah, Danville April 3, 2008

The Danville newspaper entered the 21st century this week with a new website.  It even has semi-working RSS feeds, which is more than I can say for The Breeze.

While browsing this new site, I read some of the letters to the editor.  My favorite, in that way you have favorites of things that make you want to pull your hair out and deny that you were born in a place, is a letter titled “Just send them all back home“:

Why are so many legislators in favor of immigration! Why don’t they do a study on the percentage of crime that is currently done by Mexicans in general, and foreigners in particular? How many of those criminals are absorbing our welfare funds?

Really?  All I can think is “I hope I’m not related to this guy.”

Taxes Complete! April 2, 2008

I filed my taxes tonight. My $32 refund is probably rushing towards me as I write this.

I always want to break even at tax time, and I think $32 definitely counts. Still, I’m a little sad that I’m not getting piles of money back. The difference is that I wasn’t really charitable enough this year, and so my tax-season resolution* is to do better this year.

*I like to make resolutions often. I definitely make them not just for the New Year, but also my birthday, and pretty much any other occasion I can think of. I find myself much less let down when I fail several times a year instead of all at once!

First Post!!1!(one) April 1, 2008

I decided to take the plunge and start a blog. Of course, that means I’m drawing a total blank on what to write about. I’m a little nervous about putting all my hopes and dreams on the interwebz for all the world to see, so be gentle.