Stupid O'Clock

I have officially been up since Stupid O'Clock. Stupid O'Clock, otherwise known as Gawdawful In The Morning.

I got up so early that I decided to go to work at 9 am (I usually go in about 10:30 to help cover lunch break, amongst other things) because I'd already run out of things to do with my morning.

I got up so early that I made myself a sandwich at 7 am because there just didn't seem to be any point in looking at breakfast foods.

That's way too early, if anyone was wondering.

Why did I get up so early? Well, apparently it's because I was done sleeping. That's what my brain decided, anyway. I'm not sure what the criteria are for TIME TO BE DONE SLEEPING!!!, but my brain was pretty sure of itself so I just went along with it.

Not that I had much choice in the matter, of course.

I've seen Stupid O'Clock far too many times in my life, to be honest, and it always ticks me off. It also ticks me off that I can function at all on the days when I get up at Stupid O'Clock, because the ability to function at Stupid O'Clock indicates the hell of being a morning person, and I really really really really don't want to be a morning person.

Even if I am.

Now.

I never used to be, you know. For a very long time I was the epitome of a night person, and I loved it. In my off-season from work (and I used to work very seasonally, so there was a fair amount of off-season) my body clock would gravitate naturally towards getting up around 10 am and going to bed at 2 am. It was great. I was at my most productive and creative (as much as I get creative) in the evening, when no one was likely to interrupt me. I had a fondness for late-night infomercials in all their ridiculous over-the-top-edness. There was nothing weird about deciding to bake cookies at midnight.

Now, though? Now it's alllll gone.

I miss it.

I lost my nights a number of years ago when I went through a prolonged bout of insomnia. Yes, I know that you probably think I'm an insomniac now -- and I am -- but back then it was serious, frustrating stuff. The reasons behind it... well, I know what they were but had a very hard time trying to fix them. In the end, my body did the fixing for me.

By changing its own internal clock.

And making me an *insert favourite expletive here* morning person.

There's a mental slap in the face for a person, eh? Your own body saying, "fine. You can't get things worked out on your own? Well, I'm going to solve this problem, but in a way that will drive you completely nucking futs. That's for being such an idiot in the first place, woman."

And ever since then Stupid O'Clock and I have been regular, if indifferent, acquaintances. And if I don't get to bed by 11 pm I'm completely useless.

Man, do I miss nights.

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Bit of a weird weekend for me this time around, so don't be terribly surprised if I'm MIA from the blogosphere for a day or two. I promise I'll try not to pass another stone or catch another cold in the meantime.

Or if I do, I promise that you'll all hear about it.

Ad nauseum.

Um... nothing?

I've been kind of wordy the past few days, have you noticed?

I've noticed.

Maybe it's the excitement of finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel, as far as my megacold is concerned. Maybe it's the thrill of no longer having a crippling pain on my right side, I don't know. Either way, I seem to have been yammering away quite nicely.

Was yammering away quite nicely.

I don't think I have anything today.

I have thoughts... oh yes, I have thoughts. Thoughts that on occasion can become an entire, lengthy, pointless post. Today, though, they seem to be stopping at the partial sentence stage. Example? Well, I was wondering why milk chocolate even bothers to exist when there's such a thing as dark chocolate in the world. Dark chocolate has so much more flavour and is apparently even somewhat good for you (or so I hear), so why turn it into a poor, sugary, watered-down imitation of itself that is so pathetic it has to legally be labelled chocolate-flavoured candy?

Sounds like a good start for a pointless rant, right? Yeah, but then my brain went but some people LIKE milk chocolate. Hell, YOU like milk chocolate when there's nothing more chocolatey around. Yes, yes I do. Thanks a lot, brain. Now I have no blog post.

I hate it when the voices get in the way of a good blather.

I don't want to mention any of my other pointless blatherable thoughts just at the moment, because on another day my brain may actually let me develop them. Heaven knows that I'm short enough on topic as it is most days; there's no point in wasting possibles simply because I happen to not be in the right mood.

I... just now stopped typing for a second to stretch, and looking up I realise that I probably could have made up a full post just by trying to explain why there's currently a glow-in-the-dark plastic skeleton dressed as a leprechaun dangling from the ceiling just above my office chair.

Maybe that should be tomorrow, then?

Well, we'll see.




The skeleton will likely still be there tomorrow, at any rate.

Pyjamas

Yeah, I don't have any pictures of my pyjamas (you're welcome). Have a dead leaf instead.

Anyway, let's talk pyjamas.

No, I'm not kidding.

I love my pyjamas. Not because they're anything special -- in fact, the vast majority of my pyjamas can trace their ancestry back to decidedly unpremium stores -- but simply because they're my pyjamas.

I spend a fair amount of time in my pyjamas. They go on pretty much the moment I get home from work, and if I'm already in them it takes a lot of convincing to get me dressed again. Say you call me up on the spur of the moment and ask me if I feel like catching a movie or something. My answer, nine times out of ten and even if I really like you, is most likely going to be "but I'm in my pyjamas...".

There is nothing wrong with that.

Seriously.

You see, my pyjamas aren't so much pyjamas as they are my personal signal that I'm done with the world for the day. I come home, I get into my pyjamas, and my time belongs to me. I don't have to do anything I don't want to do because I'm in my pyjamas. It all makes sense when you think of it that way.

At least it does to me.

I'll admit, there are times when I don't really even want to leave the house. I like being by myself, I like not having to put up with the world's noise, and frankly sometimes it takes a lot of effort for me to want to be around people. It's not to the point where I'm in danger of being that weird old eccentric who never goes outside, has everything delivered, and lives with stacks of old magazines and twenty-eight cats (maybe someday, if I'm lucky...), but I do like my me time. I'm beginning to think that maybe my pyjamas and their rich symbolistic life of LEAVE ME ALONE are kind of like my reward for getting through the day. Go to work, talk to your friends, be nice to the visitors, and after you're done with all of that your pyjamas will be waiting for you!

Ok, maybe that last bit sounded weirder than it needed to.

We all have our coping retreats though, right? Some people paint. Some people play video games. Some people immerse themselves in books or music. Some people, on the more extreme end of things, do drugs or become alcoholics. When you look at how far things could go, spending time in pyjamas is a pretty harmless way to help maintain one's sanity.

Well, I think so.

And after all: my house, my rules. And according to my rules, we're all allowed to wear our pyjamas at my house.

Not out of it, though. As much as I like my pyjamas, my pyjamas will never be streetwear. After all, if my pyjamas are my symbol of alone-time away from the world, then wearing pyjamas out in the world is kind of like giving the entire world a big gigantic finger. I'm here but I'm not here, if you know what I mean. There may be a time in my life when I decide to do just that, I guess, but for now I choose to remain a part of the world and keep my pyjamas to themselves. Safely at home, waiting for me to finish the work day...




This is a slightly strange post, isn't it? Ah well. You get what you pay for. And if I want to continue to have money to pay for anything I need to get back to work now.

So I can see my pyjamas later, I guess.

Coffee

Today's photo is pointless. I know that they usually are, but since yesterday's was almost very nearly suggested by the topic I thought I'd state outright that today's photo is indeed as pointless as it looks.

Anyway.

As a start to today's blather, I'd invite everyone to sing a round of the Coffee Song, or Kaffeelied. I'm posting the German version just because that's how I originally learned it (and no, not because I know any German. That's just what comes of years and years of choirs and private voice lessons. You tend to pick up a few songs in languages that you couldn't speak if your life depended on it. Ask me to sing to you in Slovak sometime. I can do it...), but if you hit the "englischer text" link you'll find a not-entirely-faithful English translation. And there's a melody link to the left, I see, but I haven't tried it out since I'm at work.

Anyway.

Oh, sorry. I already said that.

So, I had a cup of coffee this morning. Yes, that's worth reporting. I don't normally drink coffee. In fact, I think I could count the number of times I've had coffee on the fingers of one hand... or at least I wouldn't use very many fingers on the other if I had to. I don't drink coffee, I don't like coffee, but I had a cup of coffee this morning. Long story, but the short version is that an old friend was passing through on her way to somewhere else (my friends seem to do that a lot. Sometimes I feel like a stopping house of sorts) and asked if she could buy me a coffee.

Why I didn't just tell her to buy me a tea instead is all a bit of a blur now, but somehow before I got the thought formed I was sitting there with a coffee in front of me. So I drank it.

Why exactly do people do that to themselves?

I went to work shortly after that, and by the time I got here I was feeling unpleasantly jittery and and the same time kind of draggy. People like that feeling, right? They must, or this country wouldn't be suffering such a Tim's addiction.

Now, I'll admit that this morning's coffee didn't taste as awful as some of the coffee I've had in the past. I'm guessing that it's because the coffee was hiding in amongst the sugar and cream and some-nut-or-other flavouring, though. I suppose it could be that I'm finally developing adult-beverage taste buds (maybe I'll have to buy a lager and find out), but I very much doubt that. Coffee still tastes like coffee as far as I'm concerned, and I've never been terribly fond of coffee in any form.

The fastest way to ruin good chocolate, for example, is to put coffee in it.

Back... oh, way too many years ago... and how sad is that... when I was moving up to Edmonton to start university everyone warned me that it would only take a week or two before I absolutely needed my morning cup of caffeine. That's fine to say, I suppose, except for one thing. If you never start drinking coffee, you don't need coffee. And if you don't need coffee, you don't drink coffee.

At least I don't.

And I have a little trouble comprehending the fact that there are people -- many, many people -- who drink coffee not just because they need it, but because they like it.

They like coffee.

They honestly like coffee.

That's like telling me that people honestly like green peppers. I just can't fathom it. It's not in my personal universe.





Ah well. I suppose I should have a neat little wrap-up now so that I can get back to work, but in the end I just plain have to get back to work.








And drink my TEA.

The sore in the stone

Ok, here's a question. What do you give the woman who's been dragging her way through every cold to be found in Alberta in the last couple of months but was finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel?

How about a pain?

How about a very specific, recognisable pain somewhat above the right hip?

How about a pain that will indicate to that particular woman that the next few days are NOT going to be fun?

Let's set the stage here. I've only been whining about being sick for how long now? Thursday I woke up with a bit of a cough but a clearer head than I'd had in a while. It seemed like it was going to be a decent day. Cough, yes, and a sore muscle on my right side but I probably just slept crooked and... oh. Wait. That's not a sore muscle. And it's getting worse. And I remember that pain from the last time I was... wait for it... in the emergency room passing a kidney stone.

Yep.

Just when you think it's safe to go back in the water.

Erm, so to speak.

Now, if I'd been typing this a couple of days ago you would have got MASSIVE detail about the fun of kidney stones, but I've decided not to venture that far into TMI-land after all. Let's just say that they hurt, weird things happen to your body, and I'm glad I only have to go through this about once every decade or so.

If anyone out there who hasn't been through the fun of passing a stone seriously wants more details, e-mail me. I'm more than happy to go on and on and on about it.

So my Thursday was... not a good day. In a fit of I'm-not-sure-whatitude I decided not to go to the hospital because they would have done a battery of tests to tell me what I already knew, and the last time I went through this I was told that if it happened again and I knew for sure that it was a stone (and trust me. You know.) that I didn't have to go to the hospital unless things didn't seem to be moving. Fair enough. Except that hospitals have one thing that my apartment doesn't.

Pain killers stronger than aspirin, I mean.

Holy cow (and boy, is that an edited euphemism) was Thursday not a good day.

Anyway. I lived. I still occasionally feel like my insides are being prodded with a fork so things aren't quite done with yet, but they're getting there.

My cold, on the other hand, currently seems to be intent on making my body produce enough mucous to fit the needs of every single person in Western Canada...





At some point someone's just GOT to offer to put me out of my misery once and for all, right? I'm the first to admit that this is all getting a little too ridiculous.

Boy, do I have a story to tell you

But... it's going to have to wait. Maybe for a couple of days, since I don't know what the status of my father's computer is yet.

Let's just say that this one fall under the category of COULD MY LIFE SUCK ANY MORE???






I mean, I'm sure it could. I don't want to make any suggestions to the universe or anything, you know. However, yesterday was certainly a moment of I can't bloody believe this. Um, except take out the bloody and substitute a few other, juicier expletives.

Sigh.





Sometimes you've just got to wonder. Or bang your head against a wall or something.

Ow

My head hurts. And I'm grumpy. And there's been altogether too much ABBA in my brain today, for whatever reason.

None of this is leading to any likelihood of a blather, you know.

And yes, I do realise that this place has been more than a little light on content lately. What can I say besides I'm getting tired of the Worst. Cold. Ever.

Honestly? I'm really too tired to do much besides be tired and complain about it. The other people in the office who have managed to get this one are saying pretty much the same thing, so it's got to be this particular cold rather than the fact that I went from one cold practically straight into another.

Sigh.

Anyway. No recycled photo today because I'm just not in the mood. Oh, and for anyone who actually looks at the doodles on the other blog (and if so, why?), this whole tired thing has managed to keep me from being artsy lately. I haven't given it up, don't worry.

Not that you would have worried, of course. Or at least I hope you wouldn't. I call them doodles because that's all they are, and that's fine with me.

When I have the energy to doodle, that is.




Right now I just about have the energy to put my head down on my desk...

Oh, I have nothing. Bet you could have guessed that.

Well, I do have a cough. That's something, I guess. I also have a strand of hair that's come out of my very lazy ponytail. That's something that's annoying. And I suppose that it's not so much the ponytail that's lazy as it is the ponytail's owner.

I don't have any new photos yet, obviously. And I don't have much sleep on the brain just now.

And I do have work to do...

I guess I should do that, then.




Thank you for sharing this moment of enlightenment with me.

Epic

Ok, I'm at work and need to get back to work, so I'll try to keep this less than epic. Which, I suppose, makes the post title pretty stupid. Ah well.

The epic in the title would refer to the epic attempt of VANOC to stage an epic opening to their epic winter games, complete with epic music (which I kind of hate) and epic silliness weirdness artistic merit.

I did end up watching pretty much all of the opening, surprisingly enough. I wasn't intending to, but then the not-Toronto office started watching it with me and it got a lot more entertaining via running text-commentary. We're very good at amusing ourselves, I guess.

Anyway, my verdict? Ok, overall. And educational. I learned that Canadian identity involves First Nations dance marathons (seriously. Did they all manage to keep it up for the entire march of nations as well as their own segment?), tree-jellyfish-UFOs, lost and amazed people wandering around in indoor snowstorms, a fiddling Devil Elvis in a canoe, and Ashley MacIsaac in an off-kilter (the not-Toronto office takes credit for that one). I also learned that otherwise intelligent people can make INCREDIBLY INAPPROPRIATE SONG CHOICES in the name of Canadian content, and that Canada can now lay claim to the world's most embarrassing torch-lighting ceremony.

And yes, I'm including Whining Wayne's truck ride in that last statement.

What else? Well, the one time that I absolutely had to turn the channel was during my own national anthem, which is kind of sad. That poor song. It's a decent song, as anthems go, and yet it gets butchered sooo badly at sporting events. Sometimes it's a pop giggle. Sometimes it's opera bombast. Sometimes it's country twang. And last night it somehow became a ballad.

It takes talent to turn a march into a ballad. Unfortunately. If they had thought about it with a bit less talent it would have been a lot easier to stomach.

Ah well.

Back to work for me now. Will there be much more Olympic commentary/blather on the blog? Oh, probably. It's a topic, if nothing else.

----------

Wasn't going to bring this up in a post full of snark, but I thought that last night's crowd showed class in their response to the Georgian team, and that the team showed a lot of class and respect for their teammate. And I'm going to show my respect by not making any other comment about the whole thing, I think.

Go run repeatedly into a tree

No, not you. You. Oh wait, I have to mention something before I clarify this.

Today's photo? Off of my other nerdstick, which doesn't get daily use. Or weekly use. Or... blog use, usually, since it mostly has family photos on it and (you might have noticed) I don't generally blog family photos. This particular squirrel action shot (which I don't think I've blogged before, but sorry if I have) is in a folder marked "round file". Obviously things I cherish highly.

And that's what you're going to be seeing on the blog until I get my act together and take some new photos.

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Now then. Today's post title -- which, admittedly, is highly influenced by the fact that I STILL FEEL LIKE CRAP -- is addressed to the protesters who, no doubt, are currently celebrating their "success" in disrupting the frigging torch relay just before the cenotaph.

Yeah, a lot of class there. And you know what? No matter what you were protesting, I'm officially not on your side.

There's a reason for this, and it might not be the one that you're thinking of. It's not that I'm in favour of the Olympics, or where the Olympics are being held, or how much the Olympics are costing, or... anything, really. At best, as I've said before, I'm ambivalent about the Olympics. I don't understand why any country wants the expense and trouble, I don't care much about most sports, I can find many other things to be more genuinely patriotic about, and (let's face it) until the Men's Eights starts ice rowing I'm always going to prefer the Summer Games. No, it's not any of the predictable reasons that has me a bit pissed off right now.

It's the hypocrisy.

You see, these people who are supposedly protesting on behalf of the little/forgotten people of the area (who disrupted things just before a recovered drug addict was meant to be taking his part in the relay, apparently) or the environmental cost (and did you travel by foot to get to Vancouver, then?) or whatever else are as much a corporation as the evil corporations that they think they're protecting us from. They have an umbrella organisation, for Whomever's sake. They have an entire structure that they take from place to place to get their banners on television in whatever situation they think will get the most face time (or banner time), and when the Olympics are done they'll move on to the next summit or wherever else they can find something to scream about.

And the worst thing about it? Wherever these professional protesters go, they'll create another whole group of people who don't give a flying rat's bum about their causes.

Ah yes. There we have it. This is what ticks me off. Big shows of pro protesting don't get average joes involved in causes, no matter how good the causes may be. They get people thinking that anyone involved in the any of the causes must be a nut job, they make people stop listening to any good points that might be made, and they make sure that people only remember that they were inconvenienced by the hippie army.

And, obviously, it's not just the big event protests that get people feeling that way.

Have I mentioned in the past few weeks how much I loathe PETA and other organisations of its ilk? I do. I mean, look. I work in natural history interpretation. I'm an environmental educator. I'm trying to get people to care about the planet they live on; to recognise that their actions make a difference. Occasionally I even share opinions (dammit) with some of the more activist groups out there. BUT. Every time some jackass (and it's even worse if it's a famous jackass) throws paint at someone wearing a fur coat, for example, I lose a chance to talk to someone else about why fur might not be the best option. Or, maybe more surprisingly, to talk to someone about why sustainable trapping may be an important way to protect a resource.

Screaming in groups prevents reasonable discourse.

And it pisses me off besides.

So to all you idiots out there who live to protest: Know your causes. Know your facts. Know that things may not be as black and white as you'd like them to be. And above all, know that continued loud noise only creates hearing loss.

And...

Geez this was a lot of typing brought on by an event that I don't really care much about. Thanks a lot, stupid protesters.






Now I'll have to hope for some pointlessly pointless games coverage to get my snit to go in a different direction.

Yeah, yeah, I know

Drumroll for the excuses, please:

• Computer trouble at my father's place on the weekend.
• Lack of pointless photography until I either take some new stuff or can be sure that it's safe to plug my nerdstick in after the aforementioned computer trouble.
• I've been feeling LIKE CRAP.
  

Yay me.

Shall I see if there's anything in my work files to add some pictorial interest to this lack of post? Let's look, shall we?...

Ok, there you go. It's a chewed-on antler. Or, rather, the chewed-on tip of an antler.

Chewed on by what?

Probably mice. Nature likes to recycle its minerals.

And that, boys and girls, is all that you're getting for the moment. I have so, so much to catch up on.

Now, if only I could make my head work enough to catch up on anything...

Ok, seriously?

I'm so not in blogging rhythm right now. I've just uploaded a random pointless photo without even looking at it (yes, I usually at least check the pointless photo before I shrug and upload it anyway), I'm still not feeling all that fantastic even though I finally had a half-decent sleep last night (eventually the brain does figure out that the body's exhausted, yes), and I just now put on a bra that was still damp from the washing machine and find myself decidedly uncomfortable because of it.

Um, that last was a bit TMI, wasn't it.

Yeah, sorry. Or whatever. I just didn't want to go braless for the rest of the day, that's all. And since bras + dryer = buying new bras altogether too often, the only option available was the wet bra one.

Anyway. The whole laundry issue plus a bit of background computer annoyance has made me forget what I was going to blather about. Or if I was going to blather about anything, come to it. That's the problem when a person (well, this person) goes a few days without blogging, you know. You tend to have a slight issue with getting your thoughts (or lack of same) back in any sort of blatherable order.

And then you find yourself complaining about wet bras.




Um, yeah. I gave this blog its name for a reason...

Pointless post of the day:

Honestly? Pretty much just because I haven't posted for a few days.

Because of?

One appointment, two days spent offsite and therefore internetless, and somewhere in between there I managed to pick up the office crud that's been going around and have been feeling pretty... well, cruddy. And this before I fully got over that cold, of course.

It had to be an of course.

Anyway, we'll (me 'n' alllll of the voices) try for an actual posty-type post tomorrow.




Or at least a damned good whinge.








Business as usual, in other words.

Trust

You know, there are a lot of things in life that we just have to trust. Trust that the person in the pick-up knows the rules of the road and won't turn left in front of you, for example. Trust that the photos on this blog are, for the most part, pointless and don't have any hidden meanings (it's true, actually. And no picture-taking happened this weekend at all, so we're well into the nerdstick archives this week). Trust that the person working as a stylist in a hair salon really does know how to cut hair...

Ah yes. The annual haircut has occurred and therefore must be blogged and/or complained about.

I should say, first of all, that the annual haircut wasn't exactly an annual haircut this time around. For those new to the program, I have a habit of letting my hair grow for about a year and then getting it hacked back quite a bit. It means that for about a month or so I have a hairstyle, and then for the rest of the time I have what could be termed a get-this-hair-out-of-my-face style. In other words, it gets tied back (or clipped back or whatever) and that's about it. Then about once a year I get sick of tying it back and we start all over again. This year? Well, I've been in the sick-of-it phase for about five months. Just never got around to the haircut part of the routine.

Until last Friday.

Now, I'm not really going to whinge about the cut I got. It's pretty good, all things considered. What things? Well, the fact that she didn't know me from Adam, didn't know what I like (other than "please don't give me bangs"), and didn't have any shape to work from. My hair was long this time, folks. Long and stringy and fine. What every woman wants, I'm sure. And that's what she had to work with. Given that, she did a fine job.

No, all I wanted to say is that it just struck me this time that it's a fair amount of trust to put in a person who doesn't know me from Adam &c &c. Obviously I don't obsess about my appearance (Obviously? Yep. Did you catch the part about the once a year haircut?) but I do still like to keep myself neat, tidy, and reasonably professional-looking. Um, the reasonably part comes in only because I work at a nature centre. Professional here is a fair bit different from professional at, say, an office building. So... given that I don't especially want to look like holy hell, isn't it a bit amazing that I can walk into a salon and trust that a stranger who has no stake in me at all besides a possible referral will still manage to make me look as little horrifying as possible to the general population? And isn't it even more amazing that for the most part I do it without even a second thought?

Except for today, I guess.

But then, I needed some blog-fodder. Especially since I'm going to be MIA an awful lot this week.

Anyway, the cut's fine even if it's a little longer than I might have liked (she didn't believe me when I told her that it grows so quickly that I'd sooner have her err on the short side of things, it seems), and the hair's out of the clips for the first time in ages.

Which, as my two fans know, drives me absolutely bats. Still, it's a rule with me that I should at least attempt to wear my hair loose for the short time that I have an honest-to-Whomever style going on. It'll be back to the hair toys soon enough.

And no doubt I'll be complaining about something else by then, anyway.





See you in a couple of days, folks.