Showing posts with label personal life. Show all posts
Showing posts with label personal life. Show all posts

Monday, December 22, 2014

Horoscopes

From the Toronto Star (can't find an online link, typos are my own):
This year your creativity soars. You also seem to develop your intuitive ability. The unexpected occurs within your domestic life. With so much going on, you'll want to simplify your life where you can. if you are single, someone you meet in your daily routine could come to mean a lot more to you. You are likely to meet a special person after spring 2015. If you are attached, the two of you might opt to try out a different lifestyle. A fellow Capricorn will be less flexible than you are.
From the Globe & Mail:

A new moon on your birthday indicates that the coming 12 months will be extra special. Wherever you go and whatever you do you will attract the right people at the right time to get the right things done. How can you lose? You can’t – so enjoy it
The Toronto Star one makes me nervous.  It's the sort of thing that sounds good on the surface (like it's pointing to  productivity and good luck and marriage!) but it upon closer reading it sounds more like the "unexpected [occuring in my] domestic life" would be something bad that leads to upheaval, and the creativity, intuitive ability and desire to simplify are born out of necessity during a period of upheaval.  A person meaning a lot more to me also doesn't sound necessarily positive. That would also be true if I had a stalker or an unwanted pregnancy.

The last time my birthday horoscopes made me nervous was in 2009, and 2010 (the year to which that horoscope applied) ended up being the year I developed Entitlement.

Saturday, December 20, 2014

BIOS sometimes (but not always) doesn't recognize the operating system on my hard drive

The computer: Dell XPS 15 running Windows 7

In early December, one of the built-in diagnostics found that the hard drive failed a "SMART short self test" and a "targeted read test", which meant that failure was imminent. 

I'm still under warranty, so I got it promptly replaced by in-home service, successfully reimaged, and life proceeded as normal.  I cheerfully chalked this up to my standard "Dell saves my ass with a major repair just before the warranty expires" narrative that's happened with every computer I've owned, and carried on with life.

Two days later, I booted up and it said it couldn't find the operating system.  I freaked out and called tech support, and during one of the reboots that happened while they were running me through diagnostics, Windows suddenly booted up normally.

Over the next several days, this happened every time I booted up.  BIOS wouldn't find the operating system on the hard drive the first time or two (or three or six), but then it would find it for no discernable reason.  And after it did find it and boot up Windows, everything would proceed beautifully.

Over the course of several days, on the phone with a Dell rep whom I've spoken to more than any other human being this month, we ran every diagnostic in the book, repaired the boot sector, reinstalled Windows a couple of times, and manipulated all the potentially-relevant BIOS settings.  The problem still persisted.  Boot-up failed more often than not, but once it succeeded everything worked normally.

From a technological standpoint, this problem would occur somewhere in the connection between the hard drive and the motherboard. So, finally, they had a tech come in (with the beautiful in-home warranty service I paid a premium for when I bought my computer) and replace my motherboard and my hard drive.  I reinstalled Windows, booted up successfully a couple of times, reimaged, and got on with life.

But then, the next morning, the problem reoccurred again!  BIOS didn't recognize that there was an operating system on the hard drive, despite the fact that literally everything that might be contributing to this problem had been replaced!

So now they tell me that the only choice is to send it in to the depot, which would leave me without a computer for a total of 7 to 10 business days.  This makes me very sad.  My computer is central to my social life, play and creativity (fortunately I have another for my work), and is the absolute core of my happy place and self-care. The idea of being without a computer for 2 weeks is a grey cloud lurking over my head. I literally feel like there's something ominous standing behind me.  I told the tech (and he agreed) that I don't want to send it out before January so it doesn't incur further delays what with all the statutory holidays this time of year, but even though I get to enjoy my computer during this difficult holiday period, I'm still feeling impending dread about the prospect of 2 weeks without it.

I understand from a diagnostic perspective why they'd want to look at it in person in a depot (I found myself thinking during this process that it would be faster if I could just take it in somewhere and sit down with a tech at a workbench who had a lot of different tools and components and just try stuff out), but it's just disheartening to have to be without a computer for so long when I've already paid a premium for a warranty that includes on-site service.

There's one factor in all this that we haven't been able to test or rule out: the brand of the hard drive.  Both replacement hard drives that the BIOS doesn't reliably recognize have been Western Digital (which was also the brand of the external hard drive I used to own that was giving me problems.)  The previous drive (which never once had this problem) was Samsung.  When I googled around the problem of the BIOS sometimes not recognizing that the hard drive has an operating system, I found Western Digital hard drives were disproportionately represented.  But it seems like Dell, like most large companies, buys equipment in bulk, so they have no mechanism for providing me with a different brand of hard drive.  I don't know if the depot would be able to do this either.

So that's my current emotional crisis.  If you've ever successfully solved this problem of BIOS sporadically not recognizing the operating system on a hard drive, I'd love to hear in the comments how you solved it!  If your answer is going to be to buy a different type of computer, please save it for my upcoming post contemplating the purchase of my next computer.

Update: After two attempts at depot repair, Dell finally installed a Samsung brand drive, which, just as I suspected, made the problem go away. 

Tuesday, November 18, 2014

The time I accidentally meditated

I've been carrying around a lot of stress and worry and general disproportionate bad feelings about the latest round of condo drama for about the last week and a half. (I think it's almost over...)

So on Saturday evening I went to bed early, then woke up at 8 a.m. on Sunday, which is uncharacteristically early for me.  I went to the bathroom as usual, and realized that I was physiologically done sleeping, but I still really wanted to be in bed under the covers.  I couldn't explain why, I just wanted to snuggle up in bed more than anything else.

Well, I figured, it's only 8:00, I'm usually still asleep now, it's a Sunday, I'm getting back under the covers!

So I snuggled up in my usual fetal position, surrounded by my nest of pillows, cocooned in my big fluffy duvet, with my sentries in position...and didn't fall asleep.  I just lay there. My eyes didn't close.  I just lay there.

But my brain didn't do anything.  Normally if I return to bed after waking up to pee, I either drift in and out of dreamland, or start thinking through things that need to be thought through, or start mentally writing fiction.  But none of that happened.  I just lay there.  Not sleeping, not thinking.  Just lying there.  For two hours.  With my mind blank.

It was nice, very peaceful.

I think that's what meditation is supposed to be, and I've never done it before.  I tried later to duplicate it on demand, and I couldn't turn my brain off.  But this one time it happened organically, without my even trying, and I enjoyed it.

Interestingly, the only time I've ever done visualization was also during a round of condo drama.  Maybe this endeavour will prove to be mind-expanding...

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

The negatives of having a system

As I've blogged about before, I have a system and I find it beneficial.  But there are two consequences of this that sometimes seem a bit negative.

1. I don't feel like I have spare time.

If you were to ask me what I do in my spare time, my first answer would be that I don't have spare time.  I don't feel like any time spent doing something I'm "supposed to" be doing is spare, or any time that is scheduled is spare.  I've been surprised to hear other people say that they do yoga in their spare time, because to me it's a chore. Time spent on things that are objectively recreational but my system requires me to do, like reading books and newspapers, doesn't feel like spare time either, because I'm just doing what I'm supposed to be doing at that moment. Even something that's pure fun like going to see Eddie Izzard or going out to dinner doesn't feel like spare time, because it's an appointment - I have to be in a specific place at a specific time, so the time isn't spare.  (For this reason, appointment television doesn't feel like spare time either, and I haven't idly channel-surfed since I transitioned to idly internetting.)

2. Tasks that aren't part of the system are disruptive

When something unexpected comes up, it disrupts the system.  Having to go to a place and do a thing gets in the way of completing the day's system.  Even if it's seeing Eddie Izzard - something welcome, enjoyable, anticipated, unquestionably worth doing - it still interferes with the day's system.  I can't do all the things I'm "supposed"  to do because I have to do the exceptional thing.  I haven't yet figured out how to make the system flexible enough to seamlessly incorporate exceptional circumstances.  I have a few measures I do take, but I'm not there yet.


Despite these problems, I still think having a system has enormous value in the long term. It lets me get shit done without even trying.  And it gives me a point where I can rightfully stop doing stuff (even if I don't reach that point many days), so I don't get overwhelmed by everything I ever have to accomplish in my entire life and feel guilty for not having paid off the mortgage and finished saving for retirement.

I also think it will be useful to have the system as an ingrained habit when I reach my declining years. When I look at my grandparents in long-term care, it seems like the difference between peace and despair is a sense of "this is what I'm going to do today" rather than sitting around waiting for something interesting to happen. If I can automate the system well enough that it survives the loss of my faculties, hopefully my elderly self will just keep going through her daily routine by rote.  Wake up, go to the bathroom, collect the newspapers (maybe not print newspapers any more when I'm elderly), boot up the computer (maybe not a computer any more when I'm elderly), open the blinds, sun salutation, etc. etc. Keep moving forward, no room for despair.  (Which is why I invented the system during a period of unemployment in the first place!)

And if I need a break from it, hey, spare time!

Bad condo finish selection setup

A few days ago I got a call saying I have to make an appointment to choose my condo finishes.  But there are a lot of problems with how it's set up:

1. They don't provide you with a list of the decisions you have to make ahead of time.  I'm not just choosing colours, I'm also choosing materials.  And I don't know anything about materials.  And it's certainly not feasible to research every single possible material in the world!

2. You have to do it in-person.  It's the 21st century, you'd think they'd have a website where you can log on and put the different finishes on a simulation of your suite and see how they look together.  (Sims mods have been able to do that for at least 10 years!)

3. The office where you go to do this is only open weekdays during regular business hours.  A lot of people are at work during those hours!  I have to use my vacation time to do this! (And not everyone has the luxury of vacation time!)

4. You have to make the appointment within two weeks of when they call you.  On top of the problem of getting time off myself, this means I also have to find someone to help me who's can get some free time on a weekday at the same time as I can *and* at the same time as the office has an appointment slot available.  One of my closest friends (who is the mother of my fairy goddaughter) is very enthusiastic about this whole condo finish thing so I was quite happy to hand all the decision-making over to her, but she couldn't get childcare on a weekday within such short notice, so she couldn't do this thing we were both looking forward to.  Ultimately I ended up going crying to my mommy, who is knowledgeable about such things and fortunate enough to be retired so she can come and help me.


I've been happy with my builder so far and felt they're taking my needs as a regular person (as opposed to some posh investor who picks out condo units like they're choosing wine for a party) and a first-time buyer into consideration, but this condo finish selection setup makes me worried.  It feels like they're not taking into account that these are actual homes for actual human beings, not a game of monopoly where everyone's just trying to shuffle property around to make money.  It feels like they're trying to pressure me into making bad decisions.  I just feel so much less safe with this arrangement.

So I'm going to go in with my mother (in a total adulthood fail moment) and look at the stuff, and I'm totally prepared if necessary to walk out with no decisions made and a list of stuff to research. But that would still mean more vacation time to go back and make another appointment.

Really what they should have is a website where I can log in to see my unit and put different finishes on it, design and save different combinations, and let other people log in to look at it too.  Quite a few people I've talked to during this time think choosing condo finishes would be fun, but the vast majority of these people can't take time off on a weekday on such short notice. So I'd love to have it online and open it up and crowdsource the whole thing - let everyone who's interested put together a look and let people vote on them.  My friend could put together a look for me from the comfort of her own home after my fairy goddaughter is asleep, and maybe my fairy goddaughter could even put together a look herself! 

This would be good advertising for the builder, especially if they made it sharable on social media so everyone could crowdsource. It would be far easier for the end users, and it would probably save the builder some money on setting up and staffing a design centre.  If they found that people still wanted to look at stuff in person they could still have a design centre, but there wouldn't be as much traffic through it because a lot of the work could be done online.  It would be a win-win situation!

But, barring that, the very very very least they could do is send you a list of the decisions you're going to have to make ahead of time!

Current status (aka First World Problems)

I've been having some stress about having to choose my condo finishes. Then I've been feeling incompetent because I find this stressful.  Then I've been feeling stressed about feeling incompetent about finding this stressful.  Then I've been feeling guilty about feeling stressed about feeling incompetent about finding this stressful.

So, since I'm blogathoning today, some of my posts might be me working through this.  If you're a person with real problems, you might prefer to skip these posts.

I might also decide to stop wallowing in my head and post other stuff instead.  Not sure yet what's going to happen.

Tuesday, August 19, 2014

The pros and cons of having a system

The other day, I had a day where I felt like I got nothing done.  I kept falling down the internet rabbit hole and getting caught up in gaming and dawdling and procrastinating, and shit just didn't get done.  (Yes, I realize the irony of blogging this not long after a post about how I get shit done.)

As it happened, as part of the internet rabbit hole I fell into, I read no more zero days.  And I realized that, despite feeling like I hadn't gotten anything done, it wasn't a zero day.  I'd done a bit of yoga, showered and done my scheduled beauty routine, read two newspapers, flipped my mattress, taken care of a couple of minor errands, and prepared myself a hot dinner that happened to be reasonably healthy (and ate an assortment of other food that  didn't require preparation, much of which also happened to be reasonably healthy).  Oh, and I worked a full eight-hour workday where I exceeded my quota and promptly responded to all my emails.  Definitely not a zero day!

So why did it feel like I got nothing done?

At the root of all this is my last period of unemployment. I woke up one morning realizing I was teetering on the brink of depression.  My job search thus far had been disheartening, I didn't know how long this period of unemployment would last for, I didn't have the fact of being in school to fall back upon as I had in other periods of unemployment, and I knew that I could very easily fall into despair or inadvertently become fully nocturnal or waste days and days playing computer games without achieving anything.

So I made a system.  I had to spend certain amounts of time each day on certain tasks, or do certain tasks until they got done and/or I accomplished a certain amount.  Many of the tasks were related to my job search, but others were things like exercising, cooking, reading newspapers, reading books, blogging - things that are objectively productive and that I either want to do or I like the idea of being a person who does. (e.g. I don't actually like exercising, but when I tried to think of all the things that an ideal person does, it was on the list.)   Then, once I finished every daily task in my system, I was fully entitled to veg out and game and internet and indulge in all the other sloth I'm naturally inclined towards.

But, in a plot twist that led me to stop and check that this is in fact real life, as I was lying in bed that morning inventing my system, I was interrupted by a phone call offering me my current job!  But I went with the system anyway, adapting it to employment rather than job search, and I've been using it (with some tweaks) ever since.

But, because the system was originally designed for unemployment, it's rather ambitious for a workday. I don't always finish everything, and if I get dawdley I only finish a small fraction.

So the advantage of having a system is that I don't have zero days.  I just mindlessly work  through the system.

But the disadvantage of having a system is that sometimes perfectly adequate days feel like a zero day, because I haven't completed the whole system.

Saturday, August 02, 2014

Why working from home makes me blog less

I have an excellent productivity system when I'm working at home: after producing a certain quantity of work (the quantity depends on the nature of the work) I take a break.  I use these breaks to do things on my non-work to-do list for the day, like reading the newspaper or cleaning the bathtub or putting on makeup. Because the things I do in my break are closed-ended (e.g. I read the newspaper until I'm done reading the newspaper, and I know I'm done because there are no more pages of newspaper) I don't end up procrastinating.  I do my designated quantity of work, I do my defined break task, and then I go straight back to the next designated quantity of work so I can get to my next break.

I respond really well to quantitative objectives tied to rewards like that (i.e. "When you finish X you get to Y"), so I most often stay absolutely on task, briskly and efficiently knocking off my work to-do list and my personal to-do list with no stress.

But, as you've probably noticed, it affects my blogging.

When I was working in the office, I couldn't take productive breaks like that, so I often found myself at my computer trying to get myself to focus again. I'd allow myself a break, but I'd fall down an internet rabbit hole and read something and think of ideas and then my mind would be spinning through all these ideas and they'd produce blog entries.  I'd be trying to buckle down and get myself back to work, but the ideas would just keep spinning through my head so I'd end up having to write them down to copy into my blog when I get home, just to get them out of my head so I'd have room for my work.

Now that I'm working at home and I can effortlessly stay focused and on task, these ideas are no longer in the way.  They're still present (often in the form of bookmarks in my "to blog" folder and half-written notes to self in my blogger drafts), but they sit quietly in the background while I'm working rather than getting in the way and forcing me to get them out of my brain when I really should be doing something else.

Tuesday, January 21, 2014

What I learned from my 2009 New Year's resolution

My 2009 New Year's resolution was "shut up and buy it".

I did this because in the year or so leading up to my making that resolution, I found myself wanting various things that were significantly more expensive than I was accustomed to spending, and this wanting kept sitting in my brain and yelling at me.  I felt so guilty and conflicted about it - I can't just spend money!  Then I'm going to want to keep spending money! - but it kept sitting there in my brain nagging me.  So I decided that for a year I'd permit myself to buy whatever I wanted as long as I didn't have to go into debt or tap into my condo fund, and I'd use it as a learning experience.  If it started to hurt or I regretted it, then that's where the dividing line is.  If buying things didn't make me satisfied and instead just upgraded my wants, then I'd learn that that's how I operate.  In any case, instead of sitting there feeling deprived and guilty, I'd be doing something about it.

That was three years ago, and I didn't end up stopping the "shut up and buy it" at the end of the year.  But, I just realized, my wants didn't upgrade.  I bought the things I was wanting at the beginning of the year, they made me feel happy, and no new wants came in to replace them.

This did still increase my ongoing spending.  One of the things I wanted was better hair, and now I spent far more than I care to admit on natural shampoo and conditioner that achieve significantly better results than what you get at the drugstore. I started wearing more expensive bras (to fantastic effect!), and, while they don't need to be replaced quite as often as hair products, they still do need to be replaced from time to time.

But I bought the things I was originally wishing for when I started my resolution, and then didn't feel the need to buy any other things that I didn't have in mind going in.  I didn't get caught up in some endless treadmill of materialism, it turned out I just wanted some nicer things.

Which supports my ongoing theses that I know my shit better than I think I do and I can buy happiness.

Sunday, December 22, 2013

Horoscopes

From the Toronto Star, although I can't find a direct link to the online version. Typos are my own:
This year you often need to spend extra time at work, with an older relative or perhaps at school. Demands on you are heavy, yet meeting responsibilities opens an important door. If you are single, you could meet someone at work or out running errands. Avoid being critical and fussy. You could cause a problem in your relationships this way, which will create distance and hard feelings. If you are attached, take that special trip the two of you often talk about. The good vibes between you will help bypass a hassle or two. Virgo can get picky about details.

Globe and Mail
You must define your goals clearly. You must also keep them within realistic bounds. If you can do those two simple things then what you achieve over the next 12 months will overshadow what you achieved in the previous 12 years. It’s your time to shine.

Last year was the first year when my birthday horoscopes didn't turn out to be true by any remote interpretation (they didn't turn out to be outright wrong either, they were just irrelevant), so it will be interesting to see what happens next. I'm definitely not going to meet anyone at work given demographics and hiring patterns.  I don't (to my knowledge) know any Virgos, but I don't think it's fair that they get to be picky and I don't!  And I can't imagine any clear yet realistic goals that could result in achievements that overshadow the past 12 years.

Thursday, December 05, 2013

What I learned from Eddie Izzard

I've mentioned many, many, many times that Eddie Izzard is an inspiration and a role model to me.  I've previously described it as he made me brave, insofar as I am brave, but that doesn't articulate it as well as I'd like.


Then I found the perfect articulation in this article about the Setlist Show:
BR: Another one is Eddie Izzard who we work with a lot; he's a friend. We approached him a long time ago about doing the show, and he kept saying that he just didn't work that way. But then we were doing the Altitude Festival in Austria, and he gave in and did the show...

PP: Half way through his set he just turned to the audience and went, "This is f***ing hard!" and then went back into the set. He just owned the moment. He stepped outside it for a second, but that just gave him what he needed to go back in in an even richer way.

This absolutely encapsulates what I've learned from Eddie Izzard.  Own it.  Whatever the "it" of the moment is, own it. That's what he does when he goes on stage in clothes of any or all genders.  That's what he does when he messes up or gets knocked off track.  And that's what I did the first time I had to supervise a practicum student and had never had a student intern before. "Congratulations, you're my first student! So if I'm going too fast or too slow, skipping over stuff you don't understand or belabouring the glaringly obvious, it's not intentional. Please do let me know and I'll adapt to your needs."  And that's what I did when I bought my condo. "I've never bought real estate before and I'm mildly terrified.  Please answer my giant list of questions, and then I'll probably come back in a few days with another giant list of questions, and then once all my questions are answered I'll stop being terrified and cheerfully hand over all my money."  And that's the basis of my policy of making it clear how confident I am or am not in any statement I make.

It's given me a massive improvement in confidence, credibility, and quality of life.  I'm able to have more pleasant interpersonal interactions and get what I want more often simply by owning whatever is making me feel awkward or nervous or uncomfortable than by being a poseur pretending to be confident in the way that I imagine the people in the situation expect me to.

Monday, November 11, 2013

The best thing about having bought a condo

So it was just over a year ago that I bought my condo.  It's currently under construction, and my strongest feeling about the whole thing is relief that I don't have to buy a condo!

I've never felt it's strictly necessary to buy a condo, but I have felt that it's strictly necessary for my decision to rent to be the best choice, which meant that I needed to keep running numbers and researching prices and basically working on buying a condo even when I wasn't buying one.

But the numbers and the situation turned last year, and I managed to buy the exact unit I wanted, which means that for the past year this omnipresent chores has been off my to-do list!

Condo people are always asking me if I'm excited about the new place, and I'm not.  I have no negative feelings about it, but my positive feelings aren't as strong as excitement.  However, I have been incredibly relaxed and stress-free for the past year because it's no longer up in the air. The complex multivariable equation of what/when/where/if has been turned into something simple: hoard money and throw it at the mortgage.

That I can do.

Monday, September 02, 2013

The lunch money mystery

Conventional wisdom is that you should pack your lunch from home to save money. I've never done this.  There are enough lunch options near my office that I've always just gone out and bought whatever I happened to be craving every particular day.

However, I've been working from home since April, so I'm not buying lunches, and I think I'm spending slightly more money.

I don't keep track of money super closely, but I know that I typically use cash for groceries, household and personal care items, and buying my lunch when I'm at work.  I always withdraw the same amount when I go to an ATM, and I find I'm going to an ATM an average of one more time a month since I started working at home, which means I'm going through cash faster.

I have a certain core set of groceries that I always keep my kitchen stocked with, and a few other core items that I keep in stock under specific conditions.  I'm still doing this the same.  I have a system to determine what my "main" meal will be most days, to be purchased either in the form of groceries or take-out, and I still follow the same system.  I'm actually impulse purchasing less now that I'm working at home, because I'm never hungry or cranky when I do my grocery shopping.

When I worked in the office, I had a standard breakfast at home before I left for work, bought whatever I wanted for lunch, had my main meal when I got home from work, and grazed from the other food I had on hand if I was still hungry.

Now I start my day with the standard breakfast (which I end up eating later in the morning), don't eat a lunch per se, eat my main meal in the early evening (earlier than when I worked in the office), and grace from the other food I have on hand if I'm still hungry. As far as I can tell, I'm eating either less food or the same amount of food depending. And yet I'm spending a bit more on food.

Apart from the fact that I like eating exactly what I'm craving that particular day, I also theorized that I wouldn't save any significant amount of money
by packing my lunch, because I spent so little on lunches.  It was very rare for my lunch bill to exceed $5 and often it was under $3, and I figured that even if I packed my lunch at home, I'd still have to pay for that food.  (Not to mention that it's not worth it under a time=money calculation.)  I guess that turned out to be right.

Friday, December 28, 2012

My childhood home

One of the fantastic characteristics of my friendship with Poodle is that it withstands neglect.  From time to time, one or both of us will get caught up in our careers or projects or fandoms or the business of everyday life, and fail to do the normal everyday friend stuff that sustains a friendship.

But the friendship is still always there.  If, after a period of neglect, one of us needs a ride or tech support or fashion advice or non-English proofreading or to be wingmanned to Eddie Izzard, the other's response is always "Of course! Let's make that happen!  And how have you been, anyway?"  Then we address the issue at hand and catch up on everything else without any resentment or animosity about the period of neglect.

I have a similar relationship with the house where I grew up.   I don't go there often, but, when I do, it's always right there for me.  My room is still my room.  Everything is right where I can find it.  It's a constant that has been present for literally my entire life, and I've always been able to rely on it, even when I don't have any immediate need for it.

My parents are planning to sell their house at some point in the next year, and it breaks my heart.  This place that has always been there for me will no longer be there for me.  The room that has always been mine will no longer be mine. They bought this house for me, in a way.  They were living in a very small house and were pregnant with me, so they bought a bigger one to raise kids in.  We were the first ones to live there.  It hasn't just always been ours, it's only ever been ours. My room has only ever been my mine.  It's been a place of safety and refuge forever, and soon it won't be.

***

At this point, you're probably thinking "So why not make an offer when it goes up for sale?" The irony is, objectively speaking, I don't even like it.  It's a house.  It has a basement and an attic and a roof and a yard.  There's probably a spider somewhere in it right this minute.  It's inconveniently located.  Basically, I don't want it for the exact same reasons my parents don't, so I can't even blame them.

I stayed over there over xmas, and I found myself getting irritated by it.  You have to time having a shower around laundry and dishes and other showers, and the hot water is easily depleted.  My bed there has no redeeming qualities.  The wind rattles the windows. The air blowing out of the furnace vents has a magical ability to blow directly into my mouth when I'm trying to sleep.  From the creaks of the floorboards, you can tell exactly where everyone else in the house is and what they're doing.

When I returned to Toronto, a sense of contentment and belonging came over me as I walked home from the subway, through my own neighbourhood, and turned onto my own street.  My face lit up as I walked into my own apartment, as it hasn't done for my childhood home since before I moved out for the first time.

And yet, I still mourn for the loss of my childhood home.  My eyes still well up with tears as I write this. In an attempt to comfort myself, I considered the possibility that I might not miss it when it's gone.  But that only breaks my heart more.

Saturday, December 22, 2012

Horoscopes

From the Star:
 
IF TODAY IS YOUR BIRTHDAY: This year you often will go to extremes. In the process of doing so, you couldn’t care less. It is how you feel after the fact that will cause you to employ some self-discipline. You have a vision for what your life could be and what you want out of it. You ambitiously will start to create just that. If you are single, your desirability speaks for itself. Commit only when you are good and ready. If you are attached, the two of you blend together well. You can count on your sweetie. TAURUS can be seductive yet difficult.

From the G&M:

Neptune, planet of dreams and imagination, is strong on your birthday this year, so if there is something of an artistic or creative nature you would like to do now is the time to get on with it. Seize the future and make it your own.

Interesting, I'm not entirely sure what to make of these.  I hope I can avoid Tauruses though - seductive yet difficult is the last thing I need.

Saturday, December 08, 2012

Monogamy as sexual orientation

I was rather surprised and disconcerted to see Dan Savage, in both last week's column and the week before's (last letter both times), insist that polygamous and monogamous aren't sexual orientations.  This was bizarre to me, because I've been coming to realize over the course of my life that my sexual orientation is most accurately described as "monogamous".

In this week's column, he has some testimonials from people who identify as orientationally poly, but there's nothing firsthand from people who identify as orientationally monogamous.  So I thought I'd share what I can currently articulate about how it works for me.

- "Why do you describe it as an orientation rather than a practice?" Sexual orientation is the primary factor in defining who you are capable of being sexually attracted to.  If you're heterosexual, for example, the fact that someone is of the opposite sex is the primary factor in determining whether you can be sexually attracted to them.  People talk about "meeting men" or "meeting women" - the gender is so intrinsic to defining who we're capable of being attracted to that people use it as a shorthand for "people I am capable of being attracted to."  For me, the primary factor is whether I love them.  That's the one factor that absolutely must be present to switch on sexual attraction.  Yes, this means that I'm not sexually attracted to people before I love them.  I've never once in my life looked at a random passer-by and thought "I'd hit that!"  I have to have a reason to fall in love with them first.  I can be sexually attracted to someone for whom I have unrequited love as long as there's no requited love going on in my life, but it can only be that one person.

- "But can't you be in love with more than one person?"  No.  I don't have room.  Analogy: I have two breasts, each of which has one nipple.  Therefore, I could nurse a maximum of two babies simultaneously.  There is no possible way to do more, because there simply aren't more nipples.  There's no expansion pack, there's no extension cord, it's a hard and fast limit.  Similarly, I only have one slot in my brain for being in love with a person.  There simply isn't any more room and no way to expand it. Yes, I've heard that some people can, and I'm not going to be so presumptuous as to question their self-knowledge.  But the fact remains that I can't.

- "It's illogical."  I totally agree.  I always assumed that a monogamous relationship was just for fairy tales and old-fashioned people to whom it didn't occur to do otherwise.  How presumptuous would it be for me to think anyone could possibly find me sufficient!  But then, one day, my boyfriend raised the idea that we could be monogamous.  I was shocked that such a thing would be suggested in real life, but I noticed that since we'd gotten together I hadn't had even the slightest glimmer of interest in anyone else, so I agreed.  And HOLY SHIT WAS IT SEXY!!!  It was so sexy that everything I'd previously thought was sexy was relegated to "unremarkable".  It was the emotional equivalent of discovering the clitoris. It' s so sexy that the (physical or psychological) involvement of someone with whom I'm not in a monogamous committed relationship in any sort of sexual experience cannot possibly contribute to the sexiness of the situation - even if the situation is one where I would otherwise be alone.  The best possible outcome is neutral; the worst, and most likely, outcome is total turn-off.  Much like, I'd imagine, Dan Savage would feel if I turned up in his bed.  Analogy: the clitoris is illogical.  It would be far more logical if everyone's primary source of orgasms were vaginal stimulation, because that would facilitate procreation and provide primary stimulation to both partners in an opposite-sex coupling simultaneously.  However, this does not negate the fact that the clitoris exists and is the primary source of orgasms for many people.

- "So how do you transition from one relationship to another?"  As I've mentioned in other blog posts, my feelings - all feelings, not just romantic - don't go away.  They pile up like the stuff in the "miscellaneous" pile on your desk - the ones at the bottom might be hidden from view by the ones added more recently, but they still exist, perfectly whole and in their original state.  What this means for romantic feelings is that new feelings must be so strong that they completely envelop and overwhelm the old feelings.  The old feelings don't go away, they just become insignificant in the face of the exponential superiority of the new feelings. I can't go from one relationship to another equal relationship; I can only transition to a significantly better relationship.  (This also applies for platonic relationships, BTW.  I've blogged before about how my Grade 8 friends abandoned me before high school started.  My feelings for those people are still exactly the same as they were when they were still being friends with me, it's just the friends I've made since are so much more awesome that the feeling I was defining as "friendship" in Grade 8 no longer counts as such.  My current close friends found me when we were in our mid/late teens, and I haven't felt the need to seek out new friends since.)

- "What about fantasy?" When my love is requited, I don't fantasize about anyone else.  I can't explain why, it just doesn't happen.  When my love is not requited, I'm like Marshall in How I Met Your Mother.  Marshall, as you may recall, can only fantasize about someone other than his wife Lily if he constructs a scenario where Lily has died but, on her deathbed, gave him her blessing to be with whomever is the subject of the fantasy.  Similarly, the premise of my fantasy has to be that my previous love thinks it's for the best that I'm with the subject of the fantasy. When my 13-year-old self transitioned from crushing on Wil Wheaton as Wesley Crusher to crushing on Dean Cain as Clark Kent, she constructed a scenario where Wesley had to go off and join the Traveller, and therefore introduced her to the most powerful man on earth to ensure she'd have a worthy partner.  (Did I mention this was fantasy?)  It sounds complex when I write it up like this, but all fantasy actually involves a lot of premise.  You're constructing a scenario where the subject of your fantasy likes you and enjoys spending time with you and doesn't smell and is into all the same sex acts as you and can do that thing with their tongue and isn't creeped out by the fact that you have a poster of them over your bed, all on top of the fact that the two of you were in the same place at the same time and managed to talk and they found you interesting enough that they didn't just pass you over for the next fangirl.

- "But is poly something anyone can do or something some people are? I come down on the "do" side" - Dan Savage, Nov. 28. You could do it without being it, and you could (with much more incentive and self-discipline) be it without doing it.  I could, I suppose, have more than one lover, as in I could physically carry out the motions.  But I don't want to, and am in fact repulsed by the idea.  Just like I'm sure Dan Savage could engage in a rousing session of cunnilingus (and, being a sex advice columnist, would probably even know a trick or two), but I suspect he'd rather be in bed alone with a book.  Polyamory is something anyone can do just like having sex with a woman is something anyone can do.  That doesn't mean it isn't an orientation factor.

- "But I'm monogamous as a result of a deliberate choice to be so - it has nothing to do with my sexual orientation!"  I have no doubt that's true.  Many people make a conscious decision to be monogamous.  However, it is still my orientation.  Analogy: It is perfectly possible for someone who is bisexual to make a conscious decision to only have relationships with members of the opposite sex, perhaps for procreation, religious, or convenience purposes.  However, this does not negate the fact that many people are heterosexual by orientation and are actually turned off by the idea of sex with a member of the same sex.

Sunday, November 11, 2012

False ego boosting

As you've probably figured out from reading my blog, the most effective way to stroke my ego is to target intelligence.  The people I was working with while buying my condo, being experienced professionals who work with people making major life decisions every day, were savvy enough to spot this.  So they tried to flatter my intelligence by telling me, at various points during the course of our two hours together, that I was asking all the right questions and that I was really good and together compared with other clients they have and that the fact that I know exactly what I want is impressive.

But I know full well that I wasn't being especially smart or together or impressive, I was just muddling through and asking every stupid question that popped into my head (thank you Entitlement!).  They were also laughing at every quasi-humorous statement I made as though it were laugh-worthy, which I know full well it isn't.

I hate it when people do that!

It's irritating because I know that they're faking, but I can't call them out on it ("Stop laughing at my jokes!") and pretty much have to go along because they're using it as a social lubricant and I want the interpersonal aspect of the situation to go smoothly too.  But after I'm exposed to this enough, even with my awareness of what they're doing, it starts working on me and I become increasingly manipulable.

It wasn't terribly relevant for this condo purchase because I already knew exactly what I wanted and just needed to be walked through the process and have my questions answered, but normally in nervous major purchase/major life decision situations, there's some room for salesmanship, so I need to avoid being manipulated but still keep the interpersonal aspect of the situation working smoothly.

News and such

So the big news, and the reason why I've been quiet lately, is that I bought a condo yesterday.  It was the same one I was interested in here - turns out I can afford it now. And, despite the fact that seven months have passed, I still got the unit I wanted. So it seems like their inconsiderate presale strategy had the unexpected advantage of letting me keep a large portion of my life's savings in my own accounts for a few months longer.

This kind of good luck makes me nervous. The other shoe will have to drop sometime.

In my typical way, I was more nervous about having to go to the place and talk to the people than I was about a massive decades-long financial commitment.  So I'm less nervous now that I've met the people and they're working for me now.  But I'm still in the internalized and self-obsessed place.  I allowed myself a completely indulgent day yesterday.  And, honestly, I don't want to be blogathoning today, I want to keep obsessing and eating comfort food.  So I'm making myself blogathon in an attempt to forcibly externalize.  This is probably going to end up being a poor-quality blogathon.

Saturday, November 03, 2012

The moment I realized I was an adult

There's been a meme circulating the internet lately where you describe the moment when you first realized you're an adult.

I've had a number of these in my life.  There was the time my 19-year-old self missed the entrance exam for the translation program, called them up and talked them into letting me retake it, and travelled to Toronto by myself for the first time in my life to do so.  There was the time, early in my current job, when I successfully did serious and hardcore research to translate a text in a field I knew nothing about and my reviser didn't even comment on it, leading me to realize that I now inhabited a milieu where we are simply expected to be competent.  But the most recent time when I realized I'm an adult was just after I bought my Bruce Springsteen tickets.

I asked around to find out who wanted to go with me and I had a number of non-committal expressions of interest, but, as of the day when tickets went on sale, I had no firm commitments.  But I wanted to go, and I didn't want to go alone.  So I bought two tickets.

At that point, I realized, I could do whatever I wanted and no one would ever know.  I could go with a friend. I could go with a casual acquaintance.  I could go with a co-worker or family member or friend of a friend.  If I was reduced to trying to find some random person to go with, I could tell them that a friend had agreed to go and then had to back out at the last minute.  If I was desperate, I could eat the cost and tell them my friend had already paid for it.  I could sell the extra ticket and sit next to some random stranger.  I could sell both tickets and probably turn a profit.  I could even chicken out completely, eat the cost of both tickets, and just not go, leaving two mysterious empty seats on the 100 level.  And no one would ever know that I bought tickets without a friend to go with, or even that I bought tickets at all, unless I chose to tell them.

When I was a kid, this wasn't an option.  If I wanted to go to something, I had to get parental permission for where I was going and who I was going with.  If I didn't have a friend to go with, my parents would know, which meant my sister would know (and make fun of me for it), which meant my peers would know (and make fun of me for it).  If I asked around trying to find someone to go with, people would know that I didn't have someone to go with, which my peers might make fun of me for.  If I chickened out at the last minute, I'd get lectured by my parents for chickening out (and possibly forced to go anyway, to my humiliation) and possibly made fun of by my sister for not having friends.  Because our house has unforgiving acoustics, sneaking out wasn't possible, and staying home without my family knowing wasn't possible.

But here in true adulthood, I can buy tickets without having to go, I can go without having to prearrange a friend to go with, and I can keep whatever aspects I want private from whomever I want, all without at any point being shamed for not having plans fall perfectly into place.

And, best of all, after all this angst I ended up being able to share the experience of my very first Bruce Springsteen concert with a true friend!

Monday, September 03, 2012

What I wish I could include in my complaint to Rogers Centre

I just emailed Rogers Centre about how their bottle lid confiscation policy hurt my Bruce Springsteen experience. I told them about how having an open bottle made it difficult to dance, wave, clap, and otherwise fully immerse myself in the concert experience. I told them about how my ticket was ruined and my ipod had to be replaced a cost of nearly $200.

But the part I couldn't explain to them in my email is that getting my ipod wrecked also messed up my emotional arc.

My major fandom experiences come with a clear emotional arc: a period of anticipation, the experience itself, and a sort of emotional come-down phase that happens in the hours and days afterwards. I never know going in what's going to happen in the come-down phase. After Eddie Izzard, I cried like a Beatles fangirl and wrote epic theoretical translation strategies. After each Harry Potter book, I drank a lot of tea and walked down the street utterly baffled that people were going about their lives normally after [universe-changing plot point] had just happened.

During the come-down phase, I have particularly interesting dreams and a period of high creativity. Sometimes other areas of life are affected, like my daily routines or my speech patterns, and occasionally these changes are permanent. I'm less emotionally involved with Bruce Springsteen than with my other fandoms but the concert experience is also more physical than my other fannish experiences, so I was very interested to see how this would affect the come-down stage. What would happen to me? What would I do? What would I make? What would I become?

But instead of getting to enjoy the ride, I instead had to solve the very practical problem of a wrecked ipod. I had troubleshoot and research and budget and comparison shop, all while dealing with the fact that life is overstimulating without my music in my ears. I was supposed to be in prime self-actualization territory, but I was stuck on a lower level of Maslow's pyramid by niggling practical problems that could have been easily avoided.

All of which is disappointing, but not quite something you can put in a complaint letter.