Better to Buy an MP3 Player than Curse the Office

I thought my to-do list looked a little short when I posted the earlier entry. I forgot the pan of roasted veggies and about six loads of laundry and cleaning the pond filter and paying bills and organizing the cluttered mess that is my bedroom and changing my own sheets.

I'm having a cup of coffee to try to keep going, which is very unusual for me. I drink coffee in the morning and that's generally my caffeine for the day. The guest room is tidy, it just needs sheets on the bed. They are in the wash even as I type. Probably three loads of laundry to go yet. How do I generate so much laundry living ALONE?

The closet doors are down, they were very easy to remove. Now that they are down I am considering painting them on sawhorses in the yard, where I can see what I'm doing. I think it would be much easier to do them when they are horizontal, in good lighting. I have sawhorses. I have a yard. Hmmm.

I realized that the mediation from hell last week generated enough mileage and overtime to buy myself a present. I've ordered a Dell Pocket DJ, and upgraded earphones, and a cute little pink jacket for it.

I believe I have ranted about life in the cube farm before. At my previous employer I had an office with both a window and a door. I don't care about the window, but damn, I miss the door. I miss closing the door most of all. I have been a cube-dweller for over a year now, and I cannot get used to it. My office is too damn loud and too damn social, and of course there is Holly Homemaker across the room and her twenty-seven long boring personal calls a day, interspersed with in-office seminars on soccer, school, vacation plans, and interior decor.

I have tried to adjust, really I have. I have tried to be social enough with these people to keep them from hating me. But I'm losing my mind from the endless drone of inanity. Headphones. That's the answer. Boss said he was going to get me one of those Bose noise-canceling headsets, but I think that's a bit too obvious. I'm going for something more petite and discreet - some nice Sony "clip over the ear" earphones. Then I will load my little MP3 player with meditation music, John Michael Talbot instrumentals, anything soft and soothing. Maybe then I will be able to read a contract and retain what the hell I read five minutes later.

The Pocket DJ is so popular (no doubt because The Oprah Herself called it one of her favorite things) that it won't ship until January 20th. If I'd ordered it last night, when I first considered it, the ship date was January 8th. That's just amazing. So I have to endure one more month of listening to a law school grad ask how to spell privilege, but after that, I will shut out the world. I don't care if they think it's rude, it's not half as rude as it would be for me to lose it entirely and start shrieking "SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP, I can't believe how FUCKING STUPID you are!" out loud. Right now it's just an internal shriek, but I'm not sure how much longer I can control it.

There will be no Christmas baking this year. The Girlchild and I are going to do something radical - we will spend the week before Christmas on a diet, to help us enjoy after-Christmas clothing shopping without anguished shrieks/tears in the dressing room. We are going to do the 3-day Perricone Promise diet - though we will do it for five days. Lack of sleep and stress and an office full of sweets has been very bad for me this month. My skin looks like hell, I'm very bloated and tired. She has no need of a nutritional facelift but is also bloated and Feeling Fat, and that sucks all the joy out of clothing shopping. Time for a mini-boot camp. Five days of salmon and fresh fruit and veggies and water is just what the doctor ordered. Heh.

I also bought a yogurt maker from Williams-Sonoma online. I was so glad to see it in their catalog, apparently yogurt makers have gone out of style, or something. I had one, oh, probably 20 years ago. Homemade yogurt really is vastly superior to store-bought. Yes, I know you can make it without a yogurt maker, but I'm lazy.

My friend L's father passed away yesterday. He'd been very sick for a long time, in a slow decline from cancer. She's feeling that exhaustion mixed with relief when the nightmare is finally over.

And now it's almost 4 p.m. - I have a policy that a "day off" should involve no more than 8 hours of heavy labor, so I am officially off duty. I am going to watch a movie and knit. Oh, and finish the laundry.