Snow, Sanity and Sales

The word of the week is aimless.

 Nov 15 – Interesting Love Ages

Falling in love has been on my mind of late( unsurprisingly )as has the vagaries of the relationships that we sometimes take for granted that form the fabric of our lives. Friends, family, co-workers... if not for these varied social webs that weave our lives, where would we be but ships passing each other in aimless circles on the sea of life? I remember visiting my great-grandmother at her care home in her last years when I was in high school, and being stuck by the aimlessness of age. Most of one’s accomplishments( and failures )are behind you, your children( if you had any )are grown, and a fair number of your peers have already passed on. Are you marking time, or making the most of it? Similar to a mid-life crisis, when one realizes that younger folks are able to perform better in sports, rise faster in a career path or other such troubling things. A healthy body AND a healthy mind are the twin pillars to support oneself throughout life – have a look at  Longevity-And-Antiaging-Secrets.com’s emotional health section for some interesting points on the subject.

How interesting are you? How do you measure such things, anyway? I found a quiz on BlogThings.com that was somewhat informative, and a different one over at OKCupid.com, but there doesn’t seem to be any consensus out there. Being a nice person isn’t the same as being Interesting; quiet people and extroverts can both be dull in different ways to different people. I suppose you can use the idiom ‘Like Finds Like’  ( which Googles some random results, by the by )in that people of similar interests, attitudes and personalities tend to gravitate towards one another. Opposites attract too, but I can’t think of anyone I know who is so unlike myself in several ways as to be grating on each other’s nerves. Not a one. Can you?

Nov 16 – Wind and Houses

What a windstorm! The winds were howling all day, but in the evening they really picked up – I could hear the howl through the armoured glass inside, so it was real nasty out there for sure. Not being able to see much after dark didn’t help, but the few folks who ventured in said it was terrible. I finished my shift around dinner time, got in my car and drove out of the lot... just as the power for the entire area failed. Perfect timing. So I turned around and went back into the store to help my new CSR close things up, as I’ve done this sort of thing before. Made my shift 10.5 hours thereabouts, but we managed to get everything important done and closed off for the day, thanks to my creative use of a UPS battery backup and flashlights – the emergency lights failed at 3mins and the second at 30 mins, respectively. Overall we worked over an hour and a half in the dark, to ensure that the morning staffer didn’t have a hairy trying to take care of things – also we didn’t know if the power would be on by then, either. A meh day all in all.

I don’t know what it is, but I just can’t get the idea of tiny houses out of my head. Which is odd, as I still have a moderate amount of Stuff that I consider Good For My Lifestyle( apart from a bed, tv, bookshelves, clothes, etc ). A bachelor apartment might be just the ticket for me, if I can’t find a good spot to build a small house – one guy in Japan just built his new tiny home on a lot the size of a parking spot. Cost him a cool half-million dollars, and he still lives with his mom... neither of them good options for me. I’m thinking something in a corner of a city somewhere, away from noise, most people and close to Quiet Places To Write, Ponder and Just Be. Not too much to ask, really.

Nov 17 – New Cell and New COD Game!

Lots of phone calls today, to hither and yon and back again – what else are days off for? The main thing I did was to call Telus and confirm the rate plan I was getting a deal on was actually a deal, point by point. I did this by comparing it to a corporate rate plan through work that I found out about yesterday( it pays to ask! )and as it stood, the deal directly from Telus was better in that I get 1gb of data download per month( trackable on the Telus website so I don’t go over )and 300 minutes a month, on top of a Fave Five listing. Seeing as I don’t make all that many local calls beyond about 5 numbers, this makes more than the usual amount of sense, especially for $50.00 a month, even on a contract. Add a work phone to the mix for all my work-related calls and my cell costs are well under control, even given all the new features that the LG IQ has to offer. Now if I can just get the email program to stop copying me on everything I send, I’ll be much less confused... good ol’ Microsoft Windows at work again.

Oh, and I bought Call Of Duty: Black Ops today for the Xbox 360 – the game uses the Cold War over the period of several decades as a setting for guns-blazing goodness. I wasn’t thrilled with the $70 price tag after taxes, but if that’s the price one has to pay for gaming with one’s friends, then that’s what I pay. Lucas showed me a few Easter Eggs in the game, consisting of several mini-games within the game that are accessible from the main menu – cool and thanks! The game itself took me a few hours to get used to, getting my butt handed to me for a few games until I adjusted to the ‘new’ weapons. After that I started to hold my own, but faded again as I tired... seems to be happening to me more lately, so I need more exercise and more light therapy to cancel out the cloudy gloom that has hovered here in BC for the last few weeks. Definitely affecting my mood, maybe a mild case of SAD... bleh.

Nov 18 – Fbook Friends And Cars

Yesterday was National Unfriend Day, as posited by Jimmy Kimmel – I’m happy to say that it doesn’t look like anyone on my Friends List noticed, as I’ve gained a few friends this week. Always good. For those folks who have hundreds and hundreds of friends on their FBook lists, perhaps a little pruning would help. A recent study found that the average person has about 150 people in their social circle – the entire circle, including family. That may not seem like a lot, but have a look at the study. I recall reading years ago in the Toronto Star a study that said on average, a person will meet thousands of people( depending on their profession, etc )and about 1,000 of those people will become friends of some sort. Which means that, according to the ‘150 study’ that out of every ten people you become friends with, you’ll only keep one... no mention of how long a friendship lasts, or other data that is essentially unrelated between individuals. Makes you think about People You Know vs. Friends You Know and the difference between the two. Myself, I prefer Friends – definitely.

Out of habit, I’ve worked on a new budget to see what things would be affordable when I’m out on my own again... as well as figuring out when that will best be made to happen. Right now, if I went out on my own, I’d be without a car but otherwise... decent, financially. No frills, no major purchases and no weekly trips to Vancouver, but it’s within the realm of possibility. However, the budget doesn’t allow for any major repayment of debts... so I’m forced to concede that if I want to be on my own with minimal financial stress, I’ll still have to wait a while, or find a much better-paying job. The latter sounds like the better option, so I’ll be actively looking for the foreseeable future as work is annoying me more each week. Not having a vehicle to myself complicates things some days, but still doable – I managed while I was in the city of Victoria proper, and I can do so again if need be.

Nov 19 – Traffic Jams and Starbucks Solo

Ergh... an early, early day today: up at 6am and on the road for a 7am doctor’s appointment( flu shot, among other things ). Even at this ungodly hour, the volume on the TransCanada southbound was packed; it was just light enough to keep flowing smoothly but I’d hate to be on it again in less than an hour. Coming back, it was indeed a ribbon of headlights stretching for 15 km all the way back to where I started onto the highway an hour previous – why do people do that to themselves every day? I’d go bonkers after a week of sitting in my car, inching along at 15km / hr knowing that in a few hours time the highway would be wide open again. Almost all single-passenger vehicles too; car pool, people!

Anyway... due to my own car constraints, I was dropped off 3 hours early for work at a Starbuck’s down the road( there’s no transit on Bear Mountain, as I’ve said ). I sat and shopped online, looking at inexpensive things that I’ve sort of wanted and sort of needed for a while now; my budgetary constraints have meant that I now continuously think of the cheapest way to get something. If I can’t get it for a great( not even good )price, I do without – wait for a sale, keep checking prices weekly, check on eBay. Keeps me busy... yet my bargaining skills are not on the same level of my co-worker, who managed to talk a FutureShop manager into selling an $800.00 open-box camera for ... $80.00. Yes, 90% off – I have YET to discover how he pulled THAT one off, as he doesn’t know the guy and isn’t a psychic.

Nov 20 – Snow and Bacon Seltzer

Snow, snow and more snow... living on a mountain north of Victoria has its downsides sometimes, and today was an example. It started snowing last night: big wet flakes that kept on coming, turning the roads into rinks – Victoria itself simply got chunky rain, no white stuff, per usual. I barely made it up the mountain, edging past a dozen other cars that had given up to wait in hope for a sander – my tire cables ordered weeks ago failed to arrive as promised today. My winter experience in ON got me home, but I stayed in this morning until things were properly cleared by noon. My dad had to get a hotel in Victoria last night, as it was too dangerous to even try to get down the mountain to pick him up from work.

Over the last few months, you may have noticed a dearth of bacony goodness: this has been intentional. I’ve mentioned quite a few Things Bacon over the years in the blog( go ahead, search for them! )so I’ve cut back a little. However, every once in a while something really new and cool rears its Bacon-related head and I toss it into the blog. This time, it’s Effervescent Bacon Tablets that let you add bacon flavour to ANY drink. Good for times when plain water just isn’t enough, or when milk needs a bacony kick!

Nov 21 – COD, Sucks and Sales

You guessed it: hours of Call Of Duty today until the early afternoon, when I just slumped onto a bed to try and rid myself of a sudden-onset migraine. I managed to work it down to a mild head-pounding ache by dinnertime, thanks to the miracle of ibuprofen tablets and earplugs. Before I went over to the Mountain Bean for a before-dinner tea and cookie( yum! )I picked up my parent’s Christmas gift to themselves: a new vacuum cleaner from Future Shop. My dad’s been having problems using the inexpensive-thus-very-heavy Dirt Devil we’ve had for a few years, so I soused out a $100-off deal online last night, did a new budget and concluded they could afford it. It was incredibly easy to assemble, extremely lightweight and it sucked big time – I think the Dirt Devil will be crying in the closet corner from now on.

Instead of ending the blog this week with another diatribe on my emotional yo-yo-ness of late, I thought I’d mention that I managed to resist purchasing a Very Cool Gadget, on SALE no less! I’ve mentioned before that I’d really like to get an Android tablet like the Samsung Galaxy, but that I want to wait until the market stabilizes AND the prices drop to reasonable levels. Well, there’s an alternative in the meantime: take an e-book reader like the PanDigital Tablet( colour display and WiFi )and hack it into an Android tablet. Considering that FutureShop had one on sale tonight for $150 before taxes, I was sorely tempted... but I still can’t think of a GOOD reason to have a non-phone-capable tablet right now apart from that it’s Very Cool. So tempting though... but I have enough to do without spending hours on trying to figure out how to hack the thing. *sigh* I spent a happy few hours after dinner gaming on the Primordia Nordock NWN server... just like old times.

The new cell phone is cool, lots of features... but it’s slippery; I’ve dropped it three times now, fortunately in each case not far. Cases are apparently rather rare for it, so the hunt is on. An early night Sunday for me too – my head is killing me.