what the hell man?

Tags

building a life worth living, goals, health, life, limits, mental health, mental illness, moods, motivation, projects, random shit that falls out of my brain, recipes, school, stress, stress management

So evidently I went and blew off my own damn drawing challenge. And no one noticed. Or gave a fuck. Hard to tell.

I’m also not making the progress that I had hoped on my 28 day challenge. I’ve made some progress, just not the kind I know I’m actually capable of. Additionally I have apparently blown off most, if not all, of my weekly goals.

In summation, I suck.

However, in my defense, Josh started back to school this week and is in class 3 nights. Like out of the house from 5pm until 10:30pm. It’s sort of glorious but it’ll take some getting used to again. Last night I drove home planning to get all kinds of shit done and when I got there the only thing that really happened was an amazing impersonation of a slug.

I’ve been trying to be a good kid, really I have. And I’ll keep trying. I get that the only person imposing any sort of strict anything on me is, well, me. And, while I haven’t necessarily completed the things I had originally set out to do, I have done some other really interesting things. Like I tried using coconut oil as an overnight conditioner on my hair. (it’s awesome) I used it to cook some shrimp to accompany an Asian coleslaw. (the oil and a little soy sauce made delicious shrimp) And I made fudge with coconut oil. (totally not sharing it, get your own, bitches)

I’ve been taking better care of my skin, and I walked 4 of the 5 days so far, and I’ve eaten mostly reasonable most of the time.

So really, not too fucking shabby.

On an only slightly unrelated note, if anyone is interested in any of the recipes I’ve mentioned or in the recipe I use for my special salt scrub to deal with rough heels, just holler.

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super / suck

Tags

bipolar disorder, getting creative, mental health, mental illness, motivation, projects, random shit that falls out of my brain, school, stress, work

Last night was good. I got home, took care of my usual “prep for the next day” garbage, started cleaning up some of my boards on Pinterest, and printed some ideas for projects I wanted to make. I did that because I figured I could still be working on things past my self-imposed “no computer” curfew. I’m smart every now and then.

That is a pair of earrings I made. Not exactly what I was going for, but they worked. I also got the outline for an interesting new drawing done and I finished another knit washcloth I had started over the week. Much progress, me likey.

This morning I got to work and started in on my normal ass-kicking routine. Things were going fine until one of the large muscles in my back decided to spasm. I do travel with extra drugs including some muscle relaxers. I took one, asked one of my pals for some Biofreeze, and then channeled my inner sloth. Damn near nothing was done the remainder of the day.

So now the drugs have worn off and it’s time to get back to doing stuff. I made myself a new banner with one of the tulip pics from the trip, I’ve done the “prep for tomorrow” stuff, and I’m getting ready to start working on some sort of project. I think.

Anyway, shit is pretty random around here right now. There’s still a ton to get done at work but I refuse to bring it home with me. I’ve earned the right to my evenings off and by christ I’m going to take them.

life worth living weekly update – April 27th

Tags

building a life worth living, DBT, getting creative, goals, health, school, stress management, taking charge of my finances

If you’re just joining me for the first time, I’ve got a list of 10 Major Goals I want to accomplish before I turn 40 in 2016. That’s what I refer to as my Life Worth Living; it’s a DBT thing. If you don’t want to stay stuck where you’ve been in life, you have to figure out where you want to go and what it would take to truly make your life worth living.

Every week I do a Creative, Stress Management, Health, Financial, and School goal that tie back to my Building a Life Worth Living project. I’ve also added a Simplifying goal that ties into my plan to declutter my life this year. Bit by bit I’m reaching for the stars.

Update from last week:

Apparently I haven’t done this since April 13th. Hmm, I kind of suck. In my defense, life has been hella busy lately. School is just about done (THANK YOU CEILING CAT!!!), I’m still working to get ready for a presentation at work, plus 5 new classes that need to be developed and delivered this summer, plus I took the trip with Mom this last weekend… Yeah, little busy. So this is an update from the 13th I guess.

Creative:  I really would like to get back to drawing this week. I have plenty of room to do it and my supplies are very easy to get to. I had to check dates on files on the computer. There were 4 things from the 16th, but I know not all of those were done on that date. I’d say I got at least one done during that time span, so good enough. I have been knitting a lot.

Stress Management:  I am going to get back on the treadmill this week. I need to do it at least twice. *sigh* Nope.

Health:  All my pills INCLUDING VITAMINS, on time, every day. I did really good for awhile and then I sucked again.

Financial:  We need to get Josh’s taxes finished up and post marked. Done!

School:  Double check to make sure there’s nothing else I need to do and then just show up and play along. Tomorrow night is the last class, YAY!

Simplifying:  I honestly don’t think there’s a whole hell of a lot left to do, so I’m going to take a week off on this and contemplate. I hardly think it counts, but I’ll say “done” anyway.

Goals for this week:

I am hereby throwing out the School goal since I won’t be in school for a good long while. YAY!

Creative:  Something, really anything, creative this week. Could be drawing, knitting, some other random craft thing.

Stress Management:  I’ve been looking into various ideas for improving productivity and organization so that life runs a little smoother. I’m going to try to find something this week that I’ll implement no later than next week.

Health:  Pills on time every day, all of them, and full oral hygiene routine twice every day.

Financial:  Payday is Friday, for both of us, so I need to figure out the budget for the coming month. I’m thinking I’ll start applying the money that used to go towards the Honda to one of my other sort of small bills.

Simplicity:  I got a new pair of shoes on the Pella trip and I’ve picked up a few pieces of clothing so I’m kind of itching to do a small purge again. I’d also really like to go through my jewelry box again.

 

 

 

I got nothin’

Tags

getting creative, goals, life, motivation, projects, school, work

By way of a very small update, I did it. I’ve satisfied all of the requirements for my certificate. Yesterday I got word from my adviser that my portfolio exceeded her expectations and I passed that requirement with “flying colors.” Today I finished my last assignment for class and handed in a whole stack of shit. I told the prof that I was giving her everything I had left for the rest of the semester, she said no you don’t because I haven’t given the last assignment. But she had. It was in this big ass manual thing we had to purchase at the start of the semester. So not only did I know about it but I knew what was required to complete it. And I did.

Now I can concentrate on relaxing in the evenings. Ceiling cat knows I’ll need it. Work is picking up again and I still have to finish my shit for the symposium which is on May 14. Wow, that is exactly a month from today.

Anyway, I’m finding ways to be more productive at work and that’s helping immensely. My boss made mention today about how much I’m getting done and how much she appreciates it, which was super nice to hear. Yes, I will indeed work for compliments.

I’m going to shut off a little earlier than usual tonight so that I can hopefully get a drawing started. YAY!

life worth living weekly update – April 13th

Tags

building a life worth living, DBT, getting creative, goals, health, school, stress management, taking charge of my finances

If you’re just joining me for the first time, I’ve got a list of 10 Major Goals I want to accomplish before I turn 40 in 2016. That’s what I refer to as my Life Worth Living; it’s a DBT thing. If you don’t want to stay stuck where you’ve been in life, you have to figure out where you want to go and what it would take to truly make your life worth living.

Every week I do a Creative, Stress Management, Health, Financial, and School goal that tie back to my Building a Life Worth Living project. I’ve also added a Simplifying goal that ties into my plan to declutter my life this year. Bit by bit I’m reaching for the stars.

Update from last week:

Creative:  I need to keep working on the knitting projects I have going. Doing a little drawing would also be good. I worked on some more wash cloths and yesterday I made a Nanoblock sheep, a koala, and I finished an electric guitar Josh had started. This all totally counts.

Stress Management:  I am going to get back on the treadmill this week. I need to do it at least twice. My leg is pretty well healed so there’s no excuse. Nope, nope, nope. I was tired (I think because the weather was awful) and I just could not bring myself to do it. Trying again.

Health:  I need to start paying attention again to what and how I’m eating. Shrinky-poo had said I’ve lost 5lbs and I don’t want to put that back on through mindless munching. I also need to get back to eating more fresh fruits and veggies. Can’t really quantify this one but I feel like it went pretty well.

Financial:  I need to pay attention to what I’m spending money on again so that all of my hard work to get stuff paid off isn’t for nothing. $8 for a new desk and a chair, yeah, that sums it up.

School:  I need to get my manual and my portfolio done this week, by Friday actually. I only have ONE LOUSY FUCKING ASSIGNMENT to finish and it’s nearly done. It will be done by tomorrow.

Simplifying:  Because of the need to move my craft supplies out of the utility room it really feels too tight in our space now. I’m trying to find some ideas for how to help with that. So if I can’t get something done about it this week (because of the homework) then I need to at least have a plan. Done, done, and done and I have to say I couldn’t be happier about it.

Goals for this week:

Creative:  I really would like to get back to drawing this week. I have plenty of room to do it and my supplies are very easy to get to.

Stress Management:  I am going to get back on the treadmill this week. I need to do it at least twice.

Health:  All my pills INCLUDING VITAMINS, on time, every day.

Financial:  We need to get Josh’s taxes finished up and post marked.

School:  Double check to make sure there’s nothing else I need to do and then just show up and play along.

Simplifying:  I honestly don’t think there’s a whole hell of a lot left to do, so I’m going to take a week off on this and contemplate.

 

 

 

digging my way out

Tags

getting creative, goals, life, motivation, projects, random shit that falls out of my brain, school, work

Almost done, almost done, almost done…

You’ll be happy to know that my portfolio is just fine. (more likely you don’t give a rat’s ass, but play along) There was a minor technical glitch that the always lovely Wendy sorted out for me. Love her. Now I just need a little time to finish making the last of the edits so I can send it off to my adviser. YAY!

I’m not entirely sure why but I have well and truly been kicking ass and taking names at work lately. We use Microsoft Outlook as our email client and our team has recently started using the Tasks feature to keep track of the mountains of shit we’re trying to get done. It’s really an electronic to-do list that’s easy to edit, can be assigned to a group of people at once, AND can be shown in with your calendar so you can see when shit is due. It so appeals to my need for order in the universe. So anyway, not sure if it’s because of that or what but I’ve been getting Mass Quantities of shit done.

I can’t remember if I had mentioned to y’all about feeling all claustrophobic down here again or not, but I was. Too much shit, not enough room to work, things like that. I went to my good buddy Pinterest and started looking for ideas.  I was inspired by this one…

But I knew my setup didn’t need to be quite that polished. I wanted to do this cheap because I wanted the top to be something I wouldn’t care about potentially destroying with an epic craft project. More space, to work on top and for storage below, were really my prime concerns.

One of the coolest things about working for the university is access to Surplus. Any time a department gets rid of old furniture or office equipment type stuff they call the guy who runs Surplus and he goes and gets it and stashes it. Other departments can check out what’s available and grab it to use in their offices OR individuals can purchase pieces for personal use. The prices are ridiculously reasonable and really don’t even compare to going to a thrift store. Dirt Cheap.

The guy who runs it is super nice and if you let him know that you’re looking for something in particular he’ll keep an eye out and let you know when he finds it. Earlier this week I put a bug in his hear to be on the look-out for a new desk chair for Josh and 2 little file cabinets for me. I wasn’t really ready for any of that to arrive but you never know when someone is going to get rid of something good so I figured it was best to hedge my bets.

Yesterday when I arrived at work there was an extra chair waiting in my office, the one for Josh.

When I went to pay for it I told him what I was going to be doing with the file cabinets. He took me to one of the back rooms and showed me a table top they had that would be perfect. Sold. He said he was pretty sure he had a couple of file cabinets at the warehouse and that if he could get in touch with one of the guys there he could have them on campus later in the day. Perfect.

It all went way faster than I thought it would, and that necessitated tearing a good chunk of the basement apart, but the timing wasn’t terrible, it only took about 3 hours total, and the price… Well, the price was beyond right. This is the finished desk…

I kept the hutch off my old desk to add even more storage. And because the top is so deep there’s room underneath to store a few things without getting in the way of my feet. Anyone care to guess how much I spent on all of that? The chair, table top, and two file cabinets? Anyone? Bueller?

EIGHT MOTHERFUCKING DOLLARS

Now today I really need to haul ass and get some stuff done. There are errands to run, chores to do, homework to finish, and Josh’s birthday/our anniversary to possibly celebrate. A mama’s work is never done.

teeny tiny

Tags

anxiety, school, stress, work

I got a fuck-ton of stuff done at work today. Like LOADS. And I finished my manual. Total score. However, now it appears that I have blown my portfolio to kingdom come. Can.Not.Win.

the random, it burns!!!

Tags

bipolar disorder, getting creative, life, limits, mental illness, moods, motivation, projects, random shit that falls out of my brain, school, simplifying, stress

My brain is like jello, or oatmeal, or something else squishy that isn’t good for a whole lot. I’ve spent most of the last two days just bouncing from one idea to the next, though bouncing implies energy and I have none of that shit. Maybe more like if you were mean and stuck a match under a snail’s ass.

Anyway, here are some random tidbits I’ve come up with…

Now that I’m about to be done with school, it is essential that I completely redo my entire at-home working area. My desk, which has served me quite admirably for more than 20 years, has got to GTFO, like now. Getting a new desk is going to require completely rearranging everything in the southern half of the basement and quite likely the utility room. Hey, I don’t make the rules here.

While I’m at it, I should really probably do a massive purge of damn near everything. The clothes, shoes, nick-knacks, file drawer, random shit stuck in the cupboards – all of it. I know I’ve done all of that within the last 6 months or so, but I need to do it again, like now. Seriously, not my rules.

My friend Wendy came up with this idea for “5 Anythings” that I think is just fab. The idea is that on a regular basis you write down a list of 5 things you would do if time/money/space/etc. were no object. It kind of gets you thinking more creatively about possibilities and it should be interesting to see how the list changes over time. I’m trying to decide if I should make this a regular post/feature thingy here or what.

And then on the FB today I saw this picture and that kind of tied into something I had said to her a few days ago about if you’re carrying too much crap around you won’t have strength when something comes along that you really need.

Yeah, that’s more eloquent.

The good news is that my big project for class is almost done and actually should be done tomorrow. I’ve also got the rest of the assignments pulled out of our manual so that I can get working on them. I want to turn in as much of this shit as possible by next Tuesday. My portfolio has to be done by Friday. YEA!!!

life worth living weekly update – April 6th

Tags

building a life worth living, DBT, getting creative, goals, health, school, stress management, taking charge of my finances

If you’re just joining me for the first time, I’ve got a list of 10 Major Goals I want to accomplish before I turn 40 in 2016. That’s what I refer to as my Life Worth Living; it’s a DBT thing. If you don’t want to stay stuck where you’ve been in life, you have to figure out where you want to go and what it would take to truly make your life worth living.

Every week I do a Creative, Stress Management, Health, Financial, and School goal that tie back to my Building a Life Worth Living project. I’ve also added a Simplifying goal that ties into my plan to declutter my life this year. Bit by bit I’m reaching for the stars.

Update from last week:

The nicest thing I can say about last week is that it’s OVER.

Creative:  Draw something, anything. And keep knitting. Did both. The drawing was good enough to upload to both stores, which I did, and I knit a fair amount. I feel good about this one.

Stress Management:  I’ve got to get back on top of my nighttime routines. Lately I’ve been staying up too late and then sleeping too late in the mornings and it’s not doing me any good. Mostly, sort of, good enough.

Health:  I’ve got to get back on top of taking care of my skin. Yes, I pulled this one off pretty damn well.

Financial:  The last payment on the Honda will be made this week. I am so fucking excited about this I can hardly stand it. Last payment made, all of the bills paid, and I’ve started making plans to how to reallocate money.

School:  I need to finish prepping the materials for my presentation and get the last pieces of my manual done. There are a few more assignments left, but nothing major. Mostly all I have to do is show up and participate. The presentation did get done and it went well. I’m still working on finishing the last bits of my manual and the other few assignments. I also got the nod that I will indeed be finished by May 9th at the latest.

Simplifying:  Somehow I’ve let it get to feeling claustrophobic in here again, and that’s not good. I need to try to go through and thin out the herd again. I actually made this worse, not better. I suck.

Goals for this week:

Creative:  I need to keep working on the knitting projects I have going. Doing a little drawing would also be good.

Stress Management:  I am going to get back on the treadmill this week. I need to do it at least twice. My leg is pretty well healed so there’s no excuse.

Health:  I need to start paying attention again to what and how I’m eating. Shrinky-poo had said I’ve lost 5lbs and I don’t want to put that back on through mindless munching. I also need to get back to eating more fresh fruits and veggies.

Financial:  I need to pay attention to what I’m spending money on again so that all of my hard work to get stuff paid off isn’t for nothing.

School:  I need to get my manual and my portfolio done this week, by Friday actually.

Simplifying:  Because of the need to move my craft supplies out of the utility room it really feels too tight in our space now. I’m trying to find some ideas for how to help with that. So if I can’t get something done about it this week (because of the homework) then I need to at least have a plan.

 

 

 

let’s never ever do that again

Tags

bipolar disorder, family, kids, knitting, life, limits, mental health, mental illness, school, stress, work

Holy fucking hell, are we done yet? Hey Universe, answer me already, are we done yet? You know, DONE????

Back to the beginning I guess…

On Friday at work I had non-stop stuff. If I remember right I got one pee break. ONE. I got home and thought I’d get some time to start doing house stuff before the weekend really started and the kid got here. Yeah, then the basement flooded. Again. Fortunately it wasn’t as bad this time, but still, not what I had anticipated. So we went out to the hardware store and got a set of shelves to put my craft bins on so that they won’t get soaked again if this happens again. We also hit the craft store for Easter bits for the kid and then the grocery store for some last minute (or so I thought) supplies.

Yesterday morning we got up and Mom called the plumber to come clear out the pipes. In order for that to happen I had to pretty well demolish the closet. Fortunately he was here by about 9 and it didn’t take that long. Josh and I got the mess cleaned up while Mom went and got my grandma. We also got the shelves put up, my jewelry armoire moved, and shit moved around in general. It actually looks pretty good AND now all of my craft supplies are next to the fridge where I’ll see them more often.

Anyway, we finished everything up and flew out to my sister’s house to dye eggs with the girls. We came home, stopped at the nursery so I could get another violet, hit another grocery store for the truly last minute bits, had dinner, and pretty well crashed.

Today was pleasant, though a bit loud. We went to Josh’s dad’s house since we had the kid and there is always way more noise there than I’m used to. But I did take a washcloth with to work on and actually got about halfway done, so that was good. I’ve been helping Josh try to get some of his homework done while working on my portfolio. If I’m not mistaken I smell Totino’s frozen pizza in the oven. Nothing like a gourmet dinner after a long weekend.

I’m going to try to post a little more often, but no promises. And I seriously need to catch up on reading. If I can just get through the next 4 weeks I’ll be golden.