OakMonster’s Den

Well, I’m nearing my usual goal of getting all Christmas shopping and gift picking done by the end of November. Technically, we’ve shopped for this year in Thailand last year for most people.

(Demi-Boss, if you’re reading, that’s MY time/money saving tip!)

And I’ve decided this year that I will bake. Or make homemade mixed nuts. Bought this big ol’ pack of plain white Chinese take-out cartons from Smarts & Final for $7 that I can pack my baked goodies in for people for every occasion. Now I just have to decide on the menu…

Oh crap! I still have to bake for Celeste and Nancy for AIDS Walk. EEEEK!

Anyways. I also have to make the kratong for Loy Kratong Day on Wednesday night. AND do my Flash homework. AND all sorts of other things.

Just not enough hours in a day, I tell you. Not enough.

And someone asked me when do I have time to do all that and blog. Well, you guys are lucky I procrastinate on my other duties.

You lied. You cheated. And you stole the hearts of wrestling fans everywhere. You finally can now have peace.

RIP Eddy. We’ll miss you.

And yes, I watched the WWE occasionally. Sue me.

The Football

Truely, this year USC Trojan Football is IT! It’s a little scary how we’d go up against Texas at the Rose Bowl next year. (Hehe. Nope. Not cocky at all.)

But here’s a few random Trojan things.

You know you’re in deep in the Trojans spirit when…

1. You keep going back to an ophthalmologist outside of your health plan network because he’s a Trojan. Well, that’s not all there is. He’s also the doctor I trust with my sight.
2. Your boss is willing to hand over to you the much covetted Matt Leinart signed football helmet if USC gets the 3-peat. In exchange, I’ll bring Thai food for a department lunch.
3. Your fellow alum/coworker texted you at 10:30 to ask you about the game time.
4. You plan your errand route which started right at the moment the teams left the field for half time, and come home to turn the TV back on 5 minutes before they start back up. I walked to the Toyota dealership 2 blocks down to pick up my car, got grocery, unloaded the car, took out grocery, and picked up the mail. All under 30 minutes.
5. Amy Silver Girl called me from her vacation in the Caribbean on her cell phone to ask for the score. (It’s 35-10 USC kicked Cal Bear’s ass, by the way.) Now THAT’s dedication.

The Car

Merlin, my blue 1996 Toyota Corolla (aka Thai taxi cabbie’s choice) is about 2,000 miles shy of turning 90K. And I had a day off yesterday so I took him in for the oil change and the major work.

Other than replacing the timing belt, which we knew was coming because it was long overdue, there was the brakes. It all came down to just under $700. But this also means Merlin is going live for another 10 years. No problem. Not too bad for a car that has been banged up all over the place.

The Room

I’ve recently sold the full-size guest bed. Formerly my bed from the old LA apartment. Since Brandon and I will be moving in February when our lease is up, we decided to get rid of it. We’re planning to get rid of the couch as well. (Anyone want a queen-size sofa bed–the bed part doesn’t function very well, but it is fine as a couch–let me know.) I bought a camping air mattress as a back up today. Along with a small, plastic file cabinet.

So my room/office has been redecorated in a way. Instead of the bed, I threw down a blanket and all the pillows left from the bed as a lounge area, where I can sit and play my guitar if I want to. Everything else gets redistributed around the room. The computer desk stays where it is, at the opposite corner to the piano.

This room starts to look at LOT like my studio apartment. LOL.

The Package

The care package to Air Force Amy is finished. I’m waiting for some letters to be included in the pack and will ship it off by Tuesday. Do you have any message for our brave soldiers in Iraq? Leave a post here and I’ll include your message into the package as well.

And THAT will be my charity contribution for the holidays.

It’s Veterans’ Day, y’all, and I’m home with my Marine.
Ah. The joy of working for a non-profit company on county holiday calendar.

Also the joy of not having to deal with the newsletter any more.

I missed my girls night out dinner because of the damn newsletter. The Kinko’s type place dropped the ball. BIG TIME. It’s so unlike them. I don’t know what’s going on over there. The manager said yes to Quark when they actually don’t have the program. Then the promise to deliver proof by 5:30 got turned into “We’ll be there in 15 minutes” at 5:30, and then turned into 6:45 when the guy showed up. How can someone managed to get lost for an hour to get from a building 3 blocks away I don’t quite understand.

And not to mention getting unreasonably yelled at about this goddamn newsletter for someone else’s lack of instructions. I guess being the “problem child” of the department also comes with an honorary whipping girl title.

Then again, it’s nothing that a quiet 15 minutes of finger painting with glitter glue can’t cure. And I did just that after I turned the file in with the printer.

But yesterday no longer matters.

I slept late. I slept in. I chat with my parents for an hour. I’m about to get my eyes checked out hopefully for the last time. Hopefully get to take my car in for an early 90K mile check up. And redecorate my office now that I’ve sold the guest bed.

Thank you all the men and women who’ve served, and who are serving now. (And as Gary suggested, I should also mentioned the soldiers whose lives were lost.) Not only for giving me this much needed holiday, but for protecting our ways of lives, defending our freedom, and ridding the world of evil so that I can enjoy such holiday. I am truly grateful.

Oooh…that reminds me of a Costco run I need to do for Air Force Amy. Better hustle!

Talking about a Senior VP’s going away to his father in law’s 90th birthday, and how being that old you’d probably have seen it all. The SVP told us about being in his homecoming parade during his high school sophomore year when JFK got shot. And me saying that we talked about Wham! and 16-year-old Lauren has no idea what that is.

Then he said…

SVP: I was telling this cute girl about having seen the Beatles live in 1965. And she said, “Who’s the Beatles?”

Celeste: (laughing) Well that ended that real quick, didn’t it?

SVP: Oh yeah. (starting to walk away) And then I ask her, so, how about that Ten Inch Nails?

Celeste + Me: It’s NINE Inch Nails!

We’ve been at Terri’s office since 8:30. I’ve finished my XHTML exercise for my Dreamweaver class in 30 minutes. But Brandon’s still working on Terri’s systems. Oy!

Long day at work continues. By tomorrow lunch time I should be done with all of this. The Big Boss walked his article over to me at 5:28. And that was the last piece of the puzzle. Still, I have that and another article from the demi-boss to adjust. Then, off to the local copy/print place by noon. Laser proof gets back a few hours. Once we okay that, I’m off the hook.

And what a weekend to be off the hook. We’re closed on Friday for Veterans’ day. And to start that weekend off right, my girls and I are dining at a Mexican restaurant. Margaritaville for meeeee!

It’s 11:32 p.m. now. And yep. We’re still here. Dear lawd. I’ll be napping on the way into town tomorrow.

My demi boss said that there haven’t been anything funny on here in a while. It’s been quite a downer, she said, to come by and not see any of the quirky OakMonster’s random thoughts.

So, demi-boss. This one’s for you!

Just because I just have no energy to be original right now, I’d have to steal this from Rude Cactus.

This blog entry is now officially the
De-lurking + Rant + Startling Admission Entry
that require YOUR participating.

What’s a de-lurking? That’s YOU, lurkers! The casual and/or accidental readers of my blog who visit often/for the first time but have never shown yourself. This blog entry kindly requests that you show yourself, even as Anonymous, by posting a comment.

I’ll go first.

The De-Lurking: I don’t have to de-lurk. This is my frelling blog! I can do whatever the hell I want here. YOU de-lurk! Say a few words about you. Or why you’re here. Or whatever. Just de-lurk, okay?

The Rant: Do I even have to talk about the crazy deadline thing at work again? Of course I do! I can’t frelling stop myself. Thank god for enough sense of self censorship! By the way, we’ve missed the actual deadline and going with the secondary deadline for that newsletter of mine. Uh-huh! Although this gives me, my new boss, and my demi-boss time to dissect the newsletter, it’s not going to be a pretty invoice for our non-profit budget. What the hell, you ask? Well, we’re printing a handful at the Kinko’s type place to meet distribution of next Wednesday. So that deadline for local place–read: more expensive print job– is Thursday noon. Then we send the same file over to our usual printer to have the larger quantity printed and delivered later next week for us to mail. Get it? So yeah, my Stress Phase 1 is extended to Thursday which will be rewarded by dinner with my girls that very same evening. Margaritas for everbody! Stress Phase 2 comes right after we return on Monday to crank out the brand spanking new website. (Oh yeah, Veteran’s Day off, baby!) God. I. Need. To. Cook. So. Bad. Yes. I’m a stress cook. I stress and I cook. Or bake. Can we PLEASE talk about our mountain of debts after I make this chicken in marsala-mascarpone sauce? As long as I can get home by 7 p.m. with all the groceries ready to go, I’ll cook until I go to bed. Please refer to last Thursday night. My coworkers benefit from that little stress cooking fit I had. They all had lemon cupcakes. Ah crap! Talk about stress! I forgot to do my Dreamweaver homework tonight! Now I’d have to try to do that at Terri’s office while Brandon works on her network tomorrow night. Arggh!

The Admission: I have several purple personal massagers. In the office.

No. Really. We have cases of them from FedEx, leftover swag from our gala event a few weeks ago. They are really those handheld personal massagers. Purple obnoxious vibrating pieces of plastic. Seriously. These monsters ain’t covert enough to double as pocket rockets. Not unless you want to wake up the neighbors. And I have a box of them under my desk.

Okay. For a real admission. It actually is purple…

Ever had a day when you just check out emotionally?

I guess that’s what I’ve felt today. Been so crazy at work lately–deadline TUESDAY!–and still felt pressure to get school work done on a timely matter.

Something in my head today just snap.

First, I had to peel myself off the couch after watching 3 hours straight between VH1 Top 20 countdown and Food Network In the Kitchen.

Then, I sat myself in front of the computer with the Flash book in my lap and tried to do homework a few times in the afternoon, but couldn’t wrap my brain around it or keep my attention on the project.

By 3 p.m. I said screw it. Let’s call Shane and Serena over for dinner, and watch USC-stanford game.

That was it. I can do no more serious work. I’m done. It makes me physically ill to think about doing any more “work” of any kind. Cooking, now that’s fun for me. Tiring, but fun. Homework? Not so much.

Brandon also went over to pick up Lee to join us in the fun. Shane and I clued her in to the whole football thing, and then we played some serious Donkey Konga and Katamari Damaci.

And by the way, we kicked serious ass on that. Watched the first quarter and the rest of the game was flipping back and forth between the game and the video games.

Toooo…morrow. Tomorrow. Do homework. Tomorrow. It’s only a day away. ./~

I have a few friends abroad right now who are doing great things for this country, and probably the world.

First, Shan from My Own Story. Shan went straight rom USC into the Peace Corps. She’s now in Turkmanistan. I just wrote her a letter yesterday as she doesn’t have frequent contact with the email technology. At this point she’s still in training, but once she’s out in the field it would probably be a little bit more difficult.

And then there’s Amy, a friend from high school, who has just landed in Iraq. She’s an Air Force officer, but now in the army. She wants to be out there and does her part. Brandon and I are picking up some stuff from Costco this weekend to send her and her mates some items she has requested. We’re planning on sending all sorts of things plus other holiday stuff.

So, there you go with the 2 women who bravely go out into the world to REALLY make a difference. All I can do from this end is to send my support the Oakley way. After all, like my friend Erin called me, a personal cheerleader.

When I was here back in 1993, away from my friends and family, the only way to get in touch was through snail mail. No email back then. Joy was in a boarding school on the East Coast at the same time, so the two of us corresponded like crazy via mail. It was such a joy to come home to a letter with “VIA AIRMAIL” stamp on the envelope.

Being alone out there in on foreign soil makes you somewhate lonely, doesn’t matter if you have people surrounding you or not. And all the little things from home helps.

So I make a commitment to write a letter to Shan every few weeks, and continue to correspond with Amy via email since she can access it quite readily.

You too can help.

I’m sure fellow Peace Corps volunteers and military personnel wouldn’t mind getting the letters either. Write something up, and send it to lesserweevils [at] borenconsulting.com. I will print them out and send them along with the letter to Shan and the care package to Amy accordingly.

Just checking in.

Hey, some of my Halloween photos are in. Check my Flickr album. I can’t post now. Tired. Made dinner. Baked cake. So stressed today. Needed a break. Ditched my Flash class homework which I MUST catch up tomorrow night.

As for now. Must go to sleep.

Also quickly. I’m starting to write my journal on the train. Yes, writing as in with pen and paper. It’s a tough act in a crowded train with people reading over your elbow. Not much for privacy, but if I got lucky I have a not so nosy person next to me, or have the seats to myself. We’ll see if I can extract anything from that later on.

As for now. It’s sleep. Warm bed. Warm Brandon.