A Heart's a Heavy Burden

I just wanted to say how grateful I am of this winter so far. It's what I imagine my much-envied west coast friends experience. There have been so few days below freezing since November, it ridiculous! Today was 56 degrees. IN JANUARY. Okay, last year, and most years, it is significantly colder this time of year. It was ridiculous last year, but it was even worse in 2008-2009 when for a month it was consistently in the range of -20* to -37* F. And yet, oh my god, here we are this year in the FIFTIES! I would be ONE HUNDRED PERCENT pleased if every winter for the rest of my life was like this. The other day I kept building it up with Steve, hyping how amazing it is, and then I was all, "SEE WHY I WANT TO MOVE?! THIS COULD BE OUR WINTERS!!! WOULD YOU MISS THIS?!!!!" and he was all quiet-like, "...I'd miss Nick." ahahaha. Yeah, that's his biggest fear: losing his AMAZING friends and not being able to make new ones of a similar nature elsewhere. I get it, really. But I still covet this amazing weather.

Interestingly, Martin's stupid "eat more calories" bit seems to be working, at least for the past few days. While for the past few weeks I would consistently see 136 to 138 on the scale (n00d), I've been between 134 and 136 over the weekend to now. Today I was 134 ^_^ It's really sad when a number I would majorly frowny face about a year ago, makes me feel elated. -_- I just need to keep reminding myself how much muscle I've gained. I talked to my mom about it last night and she was all, "Yeah but you know you're probably going to gain awhile when you first start becoming stronger and more fit!" and I was like, "YEAH BUT I STARTED IN AUGUST THAT IS NOT 'AT FIRST' ;A;" and she replied, "Ahem, I have been doing this TWO YEARS and I only started to really feel good after I became a runner." *sighhhh* :) My mom works out at least 4 days a week, doing various classes (yoga and Zumba most I think), and she runs with various groups too. She and my little brother are gonna run a 5k this weekend. I can't even keep track of how many 5k's she's run since August! I laughed so hard inside when I asked if I need to be training for the Warrior Dash in June, and she said there are varying levels of training, but that our old coworker from days long gone "apparently thinks it's the Olympics" and is training super hard XD My mom turns 44 in a week and a half!!! I'm excited for her birthday dinner.

Today I am working with my trainer Martin, then after that Steve and I are planning a bike ride since it's so FREAKIN' nice out, and then dinner or whatever with Jorden after that.

I don't feel like doing my 30-day thingy today. Will resume tomorrow

I've been in a rut lately, and it's the annoying kind of rut. Not the kind where I just sleep all the time, but the kind where things irritate me more easily than normal, and I'm snappish. I don't like it. I'm also back to 130 pounds D: I feel gross and all my pants are tight and everything is just frowny.

But! Good news? I GOT THAT JOBBBBB. Woo. I'd be far more ZOMG YES SQUEE BEST THING EVAR if I wasn't so pants-shitting nervous about all the responsibility I accepted, and my selfish crybabying about Steve and I going back to opposite schedules. That means only two more weeks of cleaning and sitting around doing nothing though! I really can't wait. Mom was very insistent on letting me know how Paul was all gushing to her about it, which was cute. My auntie Connie also sent me a bunch of kind words and good vibes via Facebook because her phone won't text me (lol, or her daughter. Two of the people she texts most!). I love her to death! She's the best.

The job has 18 days of vacation time, 9 holidays off, I'm salaried (at least they gave me the impression that I am), and they offered me the highest pay they could. Looking at statistics online, it would appear that I make around the 77th percentile for a Case Manager. Which is likely true, because I passed up a LOT of great-looking jobs based on the fact that they pay equal to or even often LESS than what I make as a glorified janitor. Sooo... woo! A few thousand more dollars per year won't hurt me, and I think I got lucky because I have a variety of experience but very little targeted experience, and basically NO experience in making connections with resources (ahhhhh!). Like I said, 9 times out of 10, if I get the interview, I get the job.

INTERJECTION RANT: Skateville hasn't returned my calls and I haven't gotten my amended tax form (it's been a month), so I STILL can't file for my tax return yet  >:[

/rant

This weekend we went to my sister's new place. It's really nice. Three-bedroom, shared with her best friend (and her boyfriend and her son) and her own family. The boys share a room, Sarah and Chris get a room, and Bethany and Tony get the biggest room. Sarah and Chris's bed is exactly what Steve and I are probably going to get (framewise, I already have the bed itself).  Here's kinda what we're looking for, but much less swanky. I LOVE the style of bed where the mattress is recessed into the frame. It's cute and compact, and prevents the cats from climbing under the bed. Sarah said they got theirs from Ikea (and that it was pretty cheap), but Ikea's website is complete crap so I can't show you.

It was Sarah's boy Tristan's birthday, so it was a good excuse to check out the new digs and get free homemade egg rolls from Chris's mom, Summai. XD She makes like a billion egg rolls for every huge occasion and they are YUMMY. Tony said he was interested in seeing OUR place. I assured him we went the money-saving route and our apartment is not nearly as nice-looking as theirs. Because it's not. It's gonna be cute!

At 10am Steve and I are signing our lease!!! SOOOO excited for that. I have all these plans for food and spices and jars to store things in instead of plastic baggies and painting and book shelves and game shelves and the cat tower! Oh, so excited. Speaking of the cats, I've switched them AGAIN foodwise. I discovered that Nero just licks the juice from the wet food and leaves the rest to get crumbly and dry, and Grim still prefers the dry food overall. So! I spent like a half hour at the store, reading ALL the labels on the dry food, and finally selected a food that had gross things like corn meal or brewer's rice as far down in the ingredients as I could get without breaking the bank. I can't remember what brand it was, probably PurinaOne, but it was a special type that only comes in smaller bags and has turkey as its first ingredient, and some other meat as the second. I was going to completely wean them over a week, but Grim went crazy immediately for it and is actually AVOIDING the food he's been so set on for the last... his whole life! Yay!

I opened an ArtFire account. Only the basic account until I see if my items sell. I only have two things up on there right now, just experiments I made yesterday. You can check them out here. They're not anything great, but I wanted to at least get SOMETHING up on there. I'm starting a pillow tonight, my first attempt at double knitting (not to be confused with duplicate stitch)! Yayyyy knitting! Yay being crafty!

Okay, must stop futzing on computer. O_O

New LJ theme! Ahhhh, it feels so fresh and good! I also got a new mood theme, soooo cute! I barely even wanted to kill myself when trying to make the style work the way I wanted!

This weekend was pretty busy. On Saturday I went with Bethany and Cayden to our dad's house to hang out. His birthday party's next week and Bethany REALLY doesn't want to have two parties, but she doesn't know how to say that to Pam without offending her. She's adorable because she's getting her first apartment with Chris, Sarah, and Tony, and she's super nervous.

She's also continuing to have a lot of issues with our parents. She very vehemently wants them to be more involved with their grandson, but they're soooo not having any of it. They ask her to bring Cayden over but then don't really actively participate in entertaining him or otherwise taking care of him, and it really frustrates her. Bethany wants them to take Cayden overnight as he's one years old on Friday, but Cayden is so needy and apparently Mom's going through this selfish, attention-craving phase and can't manage it. Cayden is kinda scary because he needs to be held all the time basically or he cries. Bethany went for a cigarette when we were at Dad's and Cayden cried the entire time. He's afraid of pretty much everyone but his parents.

But I know he'd get over it eventually. I tried to make it clear to her that once Steve and I move into the apartment, I truly want to help her out by taking Cayden every so often. I think my parents have taken him overnight MAYBE twice. Once for sure. In the entire last YEAR. Otherwise I KNOW that I can count on my one hand the number of times they've watched him without her. I feel really bad, but I am also really proud of her and Tony for having the patience and strength to take care of such a needy kid, so much. They're very different than all the other young parents I know. James got Brittany pregnant again (this will be child #3) and they've left Aiyana and Lilly with Pam and Dad for many days at a time, fairly often, and James is almost 30 (Brittany's 21). I also want to just SEE him and not have him cry when I hold him, and I want my sister to be able to still be something of a kid.

Anyway, otherwise, I spent time with Steve playing games. I played a good chunk of FFVI and leveled a couple times in WoW to 66 :)