Retrospective of 2009

It's not a real vanity blog until I apologize for an extended absence at least once. I've been meaning to restart Flying Tiger for a few months, but couldn't figure out the proper way to do so. (Just write the damned post, you may exclaim!) So here's what I came up with: a retrospective of the past year.

January:

My car's radio stopped working, but I got my old laptop to boot in ubuntu, doubling my computer power. It was a month of insomnia, culminating in a horrible work week where Stacy came and got me from work because I was too exhausted to drive.

February:

Matt and I split up and I moved in with Beth, Jeff, and Kevin, stranding my cat at Stacy's house. Living with friends was really great; living without Zhenya was really hard.

March:

Then unexpectedly, Stacy's house was being sold and I needed to move Zhenya very quickly! I finally settled on moving her in with me at Beth's and then went to visit my folks in Cleveland. A good time was had by most.

April:

I had started seeing my friend Jason in Seattle, but before it got terrible serious, I started dating Paul in Portland. We're still dating. I'm still friends with Jason. :)

May:

I went to Renn Fayre in my scrubs! I sang in a small concert, too. And then the rest of the month was basically devoted to moving out of Beth's house and into my new apartment, Sanctuary. Stacy moved in to Beth's when I moved out. At the very end of the month, there was some drama at work that affected my employment (I got many more hours) and free time (I got very fewer hours of that).

June:

I took on more hours at work and took home a day old kitten who needed constant care and supervision. I also started my first term at Portland Community College. What was I thinking?! I got next to no sleep.

July:

Still wrangling extra hours at work, clashes with coworkers, school, tiny kitten, and a heat wave. I don't remember much of that month because I was constantly rushing from one place to another.

August:

Mom came to visit! She met Paul and they got along great. I picked up yet more responsibility at work and the kitten kept growing.

September:

I went to the Penny Arcade Expo with Paul and Amariah! I hadn't been to a convention in a long time and it was great. I had a party to celebrate the five year anniversary of leaving Crossroads. It was called the "Get to know Vera better party," though we spent most of the evening talking about cults. I finally got around to writing an essay about what happened five years ago. And then I joined a chorus!

October:

New term at PCC coincided with me suddenly getting half a promotion at work and picking up more hours permanently. Somehow I thought I could juggle these, but it didn't go as well as I would have liked. I declared social bankruptcy and didn't do anything fun until I was done with all of the homework and work work I needed to do for the month.

November:

I turned 26! And slogged around in schoolwork until I hated myself. Somehow I pulled through and got a 4.0, but that's really next month.

December:

Is still happening for a few more days! So far I've decided to take a term off of PCC and gotten a new attitude about my new responsibilities at work. Overall, my plan for this year (which was for it to be RAD) was a success. My plan for next year: be RADDER and carry less stress than 2009 did.

Welcome back, Flying Tiger.

dream processing

On Tuesday I mentioned to Stacy a fantasy I've been having about going back to Crossroads and getting some closure by seeing what the arboretum has done with the property. So last night I dreamed I did that. I was with Beth and Jeff on a road trip when we passed the driveway for Crossroads, so I decided to go in.

The place had been replaced with a 5-star hotel complete with uniformed bellhops and crowds of well-dressed people. I pushed past people to the front desk and asked the lady there if I could look around, because I used to live there. She looked relieved and said, "Oh, good! We've got a stack of mail for you!" I tried to explain that it was many years ago and that mail wasn't for me, but she wouldn't listen. Another person offered to show me to where the old buildings had been. Beth and Jeff were replaced by Matt and we followed the bellhop down into the basement and past all kinds of weird things to where the highway was behind the hotel. We had to frogger across to get to where he was taking us and it no longer even remotely resembled Crossroads. There was a cabin that was clearly inhabited, but we didn't get a good look at who lived there before I woke up.

I remember having a panic attack in the lobby of the hotel when I realized that everything had been replaced, but for the most part, I don't know how I feel about this dream.

Tuesday and Thursday

Tuesday was one of the best days of my life. It had been planning to go over to Beth's to watch the inauguration, but I didn't really make it all the way to the door and ended up on the couch asleep. Stacy stopped by to see what we were up to and we ended up listening to the event on NPR together, squeeing and giggling a lot.

After all of the hubub died down, we decided to go to the coast together and took Baldr with us. It was a fabulous day, full of good conversation, giggling, and running around on the sand.

From Beauty

Matt and I went to dinner on Broadway and during dinner a spontaneous parade of people carrying flags and cheering walked past.

Then we went to Stacy's birthday party and that was all kinds of fun. All kinds. That includes friends, cuddling, tickling, cats, fire, cheesecake, surprises, and many other kinds that I won't list here.

And I realized that the long winter that Master Chi'ang warned us about is finally coming to an end and that makes me so very, very happy.

This morning I had breakfast with Beth and then biked to Paul's to sing with Beth and Paul. Today isn't over and it's still pretty damn awesome. Why haven't I been biking or singing for the past few years?