So, 15 minutes on the timer and here I am -- in between my every weekday chores and my weekend chores that were neglected. I know that if I don't do the floors today, I'll get caught up in this week's busyness and it won't get done until next weekend. And since next weekend already looks busy that would be a bad idea.

I went with my Mom to Doors Open this past Saturday. I drove. I'm loving how fuel efficient Mephostophilis has been. We drove out to Guelph then to the various sites within Guelph and home again on about an eighth of a tank. It puts a lot more options for things to do and places to go there for us. I fully intend to get a GRCA pass for this summer and use it as often as I can.

I took a little while this morning to check out the other Doors Open sites through the summer. Many don't appear to be really appealing to me. But then again some of the sites we went to yesterday I wouldn't have chosen, but I enjoyed nonetheless.

Heh, I just drifted off thinking about random stuff and typing none of it.

One of the things I really really need to do this week is prepare my garden for planting. It's 2 weeks to last frost and I should have started my radishes and carrots by now. Not to mention the watermelon that I planned on starting indoors 2 weeks ago. I'm trying out growing veggies on the porch this year instead of my normal flowering vines. If it doesn't work out I may try to find myself a community plot next summer. I'm actually still debating renting a plot anyways this summer.

I think it would be a good idea to get out of the house and garden somewhere else. I could keep my tried and true flowering vines on the railing and then harvest from the plot. It would also force me to interact with other people. Maybe. I don't know. Sounds like a good idea but there's part of me that wants to stay at home, safe and sound. Hah.

Maybe I'll email the contact the woman that coordinates the Kitchener gardens gave me. Apparently there are over 40 community gardens in the region. There has to be one that doesn't require volunteering. I'd much rather pay for the plot and go from there.

And that's 15.

So a 30 minute free write. I'd probably be better served by getting back into the habit via short, sweet 15 minute ones, but oh well.

It's been really hard trying to figure out what my new routines will be, how they will serve me best. Having Mephostophilis changes so much. It's so easy to just get in the car and drive Sara to school in the mornings or to take Mike to work. The nice part of that is my hips have been incredibly sore in the mornings lately. I suspect it's just a bit of moving pain from my back (I've been very bad about doing my exercises)
but I'll have to ask Liz when I see her next. It's bad enough that my willingness to walk for 30 minutes is gone. So Miss Sara got a ride to school this morning. I fully intend to walk to pick her up though. It's beautiful out.

It's almost as if with the car I've given up even the appearance of work. All the running around I've been doing has been for persona stuff and honestly the business hasn't suffered at all. Actually, I can't remember if I've even had one sale this month at all. Well that sucks. But in other ways I don't mind anymore. I don't think I'm willing to do the professional socializing that my business required anymore. Heh, I don't think I was ever willing and I think that why I stopped chatting once I realized that my sales were directly linked to how much time I spent in a chat room.

It wasn't even the chatting really. It was the constant awareness that with every word I typed I was representing my business. There was no such thing as time off, or just Linda chatting. It was always through this filter of being the "soap lady". Which is fine, if I wanted to be in a chat room for 8 hours a day being the soap lady. I don't. So I quit and so have my sales. *shrugs*

I do need to work on my wholesale pricing some more. I think that's the only way I'll really stay in business. Not that I'm going anywhere, it takes very little effort on my part to keep this maintenance level going. I have to make a batch or two of soap every month and answer the occasional email and... rarely fill an order! Hah.

I keep looking at these various storefronts that are up for rent and think about getting out of the apartment. There's a part of me that wants a place to go during the day now. I toy with the idea of getting a desk job somewhere the same as I toy with the idea of getting a storefront for SkyWorks. I guess I'm coming to realize just how isolated my life is now that I have all these new options opening because of the mobility Mephostophilis gives me. Maybe I should look at saving my pennies to get into a watercolour course.

I know I had already decided to focus on my painting a few months ago. But there just isn't the money anymore. I don't resent the car, but I do find it funny ironic that now we have the mobility to go do these various things and we can't afford to anymore. I've been working away on a long-term budget so we can save for these various items that come up; like Sara's dance & swimming lessons, maintenance on Mephostophilis, the vet for the kittens, etc. They're broken down into their monthly amounts and I'll set aside the total when I do the bills. Within a couple months we should have a nice pad there.

This is really something we should've had going for years now but we never really needed to. We were comfy. If something came up, we'd just pay it and tighten our belts for the rest of the month -- but never too tight. You know, I'm really grateful for my life. I'm glad I know what that knot of pure terror of poverty feels like. The memory of a woman at Bell telling me that they'd need a $100 deposit to give me a phone line and feeling like I was going to faint at the very idea of trying to find that kind of cash. And the flipside of now, the knowing that finding a hundred is a piece of cake. I've never been stinking rich, but I've seen comfy and I like it.

Ok, I'm written out now. I have to remember to write about finally giving myself permission to lose it all over an asshole driver. Tomorrow.

That's not 30, but I'll pretend that it is.

I just finished the first 30 minute tidy I've done in its entirety in 2 weeks. And god, it feels good. My kitchen is ready to prep dinner in and our public spaces are no longer untidy and frustrating. I also got groceries for the week done this morning after I dropped Mike off at work. I seem to remember last year around this time when I was starting to develop routines as a way to stave off the depressions that Monday mornings became my ideal time to grocery shop.

Something new that's becoming a routine is going swimming once a week with R. So far it's been more of a giggle/chat fest than a real workout, but I figure anything that gets me moving in any way is good for me. Plus I love being able to get out of the house and my sometimes-stifling routines.

And because my sister phoned to chat, that's more than 30 minutes. :)

I just got back from a feeding frenzy of a book sale. It's the (apparently, I've never gone before) annual used book sale at a local church. There were thousands of books -- and almost everyone there was busy shoving any and all books they could get their hands on into boxes and bags. I was thinking that maybe I could find something interesting in the way of SF/Fantasy for a buck but there was no way I could manage to browse in the middle of the chaos. I ended up getting a chance to look at the CDs and bought two; a set of Yo Yo Ma's Cello stuff (I like the Cello and at $3 for a double disc set it hurts nothing to get it.) and the Enigma 3.

What was interesting was when I was in the paperback room I heard a really familiar voice, looked up and there's the guy that owns/runs Casablanca Books. So I started looking around and noticed several more familiar faces. It makes sense I guess that a used books sale with thousands of books would be a place to stock up for your store. I finally left deciding that if there was any good SF/Fantasy one of my favourite bookstores would grab it and I'll get it through them later.

~*~

So I've been gone lately. I managed one journal entry this week and I'm not sure how many photoblog entries. The apartment shows my absence in many ways as well. Not as much as it would if I was home but not maintaining, so I guess Mike has a point that part of the mess is created from me working from home.

The place I notice my lack of home time the most is my inner self. I'm feeling very off-balance and transient. I'm not getting the daily routines done, I'm not spending any time on the business, I'm off doing this or that and somehow not getting much done at all.

Take yesterday, for example. I gave Mike a ride to work and because I want to get at least a half and hour a day of driving practice in I decided to hop over to my Mom's place to drop of some stuff. I ended up back home a little before 3pm, with just enough time to putter and get Miss Sara from school. I don't begrudge or resent the time I spend outside of home -- after all I am the one deciding that things can wait, I'll get to it later, nobody is getting hurt if I don't do my photoblog / 30 min tidy / journal routine.

But I'm starting to suspect I am getting hurt because I'm not doing these little morning routines I've developed over the past year. I am more stable now than I have been in my entire life and I think in many ways it is because of my routines and habits I have created for myself. And I've ignored them or passed them up in favour of running around. So now I'm exhausted at the end of the day and there's still the dishes to be washed, dinner to be cooked, Sara to be taken to whatever lesson it is that night.

I guess I've never really paid attention to how much I do and get done in the daytime. I've noticed it not getting done before when I've been sick or depressed, but I've never taken weeks off and disappeared. I've never had the ability to leave before. Running away used to take a lot of work. Now it's a matter of "going for a drive" and losing a day.

I think maybe I should take today off too, but in a different way. Stay home, cocoon in my bed with my book and read and sleep until it's time to pick up Sara. Take some time for me that doesn't revolve around the car (as pretty as he is) to regroup and slow down. Then maybe over the weekend decide on how next week is going to move and work. I do think I need to stop with the "you sure you don't want a ride to work, honey?" after I get home from walking Sara to school. Mike doesn't care either way and it's become this springboard into losing my morning. If I don't get into the car in the morning, I'll be better able to flow into my home-based routines.

Plus we can't keep putting this kind of mileage on the car. Ahh well.

Last Monday we picked up our car from the dealership at 6pm. Since then we've put on just over 600 km, filled the tank once and I'm now regaining my confidence as a driver.

I've been learning how to drive manual with poor Mephostophilis for at least an hour each day since we picked him up. The worst day was Tuesday. I finally stopped driving and just parked for an hour so I could calm down and de-stress a little after I found myself screaming fuck at the top of my lungs after stalling once again -- this time turning left after the light had changed. I stalled it 3 times in a row with it green in the other direction.

The hardest part about learning manual after driving for over a decade on automatic cars is how my normal defensive driving habits have lost focus. I'm paying too much attention to how the engine sounds, what gear should I be in, easing into the clutch, "please god don't let me roll back into this asshole that is a foot away from my bumper on a hill", and so forth. I know that as my confidence increases I'll get back into my habits. I just hate it. I feel like an accident waiting to happen.

What I really appreciate is the lessons R gave me in our teens. The evenings he let me drive the Fox around getting an understanding of how a manual car works. I still have a body memory of how to drive manual from those lessons so many years ago. It has made my life so many ways easier. I can't imagine trying to learn from scratch on a new car.

And that's 15 minutes.

Question: Who gets the reference of our car's name? It's a rare thing that anyone does. I think my Mom did and so did Mike when I suggested it. Who else? Without google! ;)