OCTOBER

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The Explanations:

Week 1
Wed., October 1: Spent some time while at work reading Brisingr because my fan base requires my input. 😀 Made a nifty cover for my boss’s report. Got the news that my Web page, Budgiland, is closing because AOL is shutting down the whole Web page service. They gave me thirty days before a deadline to kill it. Ended up working on Negative One until hit by Epic Snooze.
Thurs., October 2: Had a dream that my computer was on fire. Printed covers at work. Worked on the comic, listened to the new Dar Williams CD, and dealt with comments about Brisingr on the anti-shurtugal LJ group.
Fri., October 3: Chatted with Victor on the phone as per usual Friday morning. Went to work, spent tons of time on a proposal, and got it done in time. Whew. Finished the comic and worked on the Web page. Got a sweet tooth but had nothing sweet in the house, which forced me to eat my baking chocolate.
Sat., October 4: Did some Web page crap. Went shopping with The Mikey while wearing my new outfit that I got in Tarpon Springs. Did more Web page crap.
Week 2
Sun., October 5: Worked on my Web page ALL day (amidst doing household chores like laundry), and managed to finish my Doodles Page.
Mon., October 6: Had a meeting at work and other than that was not very productive. Argued with the maintenance guys over the water dripping out of my ceiling. Drew the rest of my comic, played on comic forums, and puzzled over the receipt of an empty Copics case that I didn’t order. Turned out the company accidentally sent mine in a cracked case and knew about it, so they replaced it. ::shrug::
Tues., October 7: Answered e-mail and scrambled around to get my office prepared for my vacation. Went out with Jeaux and saw the movie Religulous, which wasn’t very good even though I agree with what Bill Maher says sometimes. (Just don’t like his technique much.) After Jeaux left I worked on my site and got too tired to do anything worth doing.
Wed., October 8: Continued preparing office for my vacation and finished. Chatted with my dad and called Kari but she didn’t answer. Packed for Jacksonville. Had a little time left over to work on my page.
Thurs., October 9: Victor called today instead of Friday because I wasn’t going to be able to talk to him the next day. Jeaux took me to First Watch for breakfast and then to the airport. I had a short flight to Jacksonville and Meg and Bren picked me up. They had a sign that said “Smeghead.” We ate at Golden Corral and I consumed much dessert. Got to see some of today’s children’s programming (argh, what’s wrong with good ol’ Sesame Street?), went to the mall with Meg and Katelyn and Ben for shoe shopping. Ate pizza with the MegFamily, shared drawings with Katie, and watched Howl’s Moving Castle. Played on the Internet.
Fri., October 10: Got up and ate an extra hash brown that the fast food restaurant mistakenly gave Brendon. Went to the Farmer’s Market with Meg and Ben. Hung out at Meg’s, where I attacked her table in an effort to clear off a surface for our use. Woo, obnoxious Organizing Girl! Went with the family to meet with the DJ for the wedding and some other shopping crap. Ben got chocolate all over him. Then we watched part of Totoro but I got too tired to keep watching and went to bed.
Sat., October 11: Day before the wedding! Got dressed up for the rehearsal and went to practice what to do during the ceremony, and then we went to lunch at a buffet place. I got to meet many of Brendon’s relatives. 🙂 Went back to the apartment, played on YouTube, and ordered food for the night-before party. Went to our karaoke room and had a blast with a bunch of friends, and we pigged out on all the food. Some of us reconvened at the apartment to watch some game–I wasn’t interested–and I helped with drinks and drew some of my comic.
Week 3
Sun., October 12: Wedding day! The bride and bridesmaids (hey, that’s me!) went to the hair place to get our hair done. $55 later I had weird curls in an updo, sorta. Got ready at the wedding place and had the lovely little ceremony, and I watched Meghan and Brendon become a married couple. ::wipes a tear:: Then we had the reception, where we ate lots of food and cake, and Meg and Brendon had to do this “money dance” thing. Also, I got to give a speech and I managed to make people laugh. 🙂 We had our picture taken a ton of times. And then IT WAS OVER and we could all breathe a sigh of relief. We went back to the apartment, where I turned into a weird hostess or something and helped everyone with drinks again while helping Meg and Bren go through their cards and gifts. Finally I took a shower and retired.
Mon., October 13: Once midnight came and it was officially October 13, I called Victor ’cause it was his birthday, and told him all about the wedding. Then I went to bed for real. When I got up in the morning I puttered around trying to help with this and that, and Fred visited us and Jenny (the other bridesmaid) left. Once everyone was gone I called my mom and chatted with her because I haven’t seen her in forever, and I drew pictures. I cleaned up the kitchen a bit and waited for Katie, and when she came home from school we watched Totoro, she did her homework, we made pasta, and then we watched Whisper of the Heart and played the card game War. After she went to bed I played online, then napped a bit before getting up and drawing the outline for an anime picture for one of my friends.
Tues., October 14: After Katelyn went to school, I drew pictures, answered e-mail, and emptied the refrigerator of bad food. I took a walk to the big dumpster and ended up breaking a sweat for the first time since this trip started (yeah, I’m always cold). Katie came home, and I drew while she did homework. We fixed some pizza dough and watched Pom Poko (which she called “Raccoon Balls”), and ate our pizza. Then we watched an episode of MST3K and ate fruit. I did more drawing after she went to bed.
Wed., October 15: It’s official: I’d be a shitty parent. I didn’t make sure Katelyn got up on time and we got woken up when her friend knocked on the door. (Heh, she assured me “that happens all the time,” though. Oh well.) Of course, I also let her eat chocolate for dinner. Hmm. Anyway, I cleaned up the house and made some food, spent the day answering mail and reading an old journal of mine, and I made some peanut butter cookie dough. When Katie got home we watched Cars and she did her homework, and then I made some kind of biscuit thing that Katelyn didn’t like. So she ate a hot dog and the aforementioned chocolate. And potato chips. We saw more MST3K and tried to finish our card game of War but it just kept going. She went to bed and I IMed with Dash a bit.
Thurs., October 16: Got Katie off to school, did a little housework/laundry, and ate the rest of the food my friends were so kind as to provide for me. Meg and Bren returned, took me to the airport, and I was returned to my home by Jeaux after eating at IHOP. It felt good to be back. I unpacked, then got pissed because my computer’s mouse was giving me LOTS of shit and I had to find my old one and switch it out. Then I updated all my changed files from my trip and squared away my life again. Sent text messages back and forth to Mike.
Fri., October 17: My lip randomly started bothering me and I don’t know why. It got very chapped while I was gone. I think it’s stress because I also got a couple weird mouth ulcer things and that happens when I am overwhelmed. I think it was the travel. I bought medicated lip stuff to put on it. Had to go back to work and do timesheets, and catch up on stuff that had been left for me. There wasn’t much. Managed to get my comic up after much procrastination, and put the photos from the Dalí museum trip up also. Tweaked my books page and went to sleep.
Sat., October 18: Did very little besides have a trip to the grocery store with Mikey and work on my books page all day long.
Week 4
Sun., October 19: Awesome day! Spent the whole day in my jim-jams! Got up early and talked on the phone with Jessie for hours, and then I spent the day working on the books site and took an itty nap. Did laundry, finished a major part of the books page, missed calls from Kevin and Rob, and chatted with Mike when he called. I bought a bus ticket to Gainesville and got too tired to keep working on the site.
Mon., October 20: Way too soon to go back to work. Did tweaking on the books page. Made a dumb mistake where I saved an old version instead of a new version and lost all my work. What a dummy. Who wants to spank me? Luckily I had a copy of the file in the recycle bin at work but . . . I had to bike back to work and get it. Bummer. I worked on other parts of the site too, and that’s it.
Tues., October 21: Had to clean out an office at work so we could make room for A NEW EMPLOYEE! Went through lots of info on political candidates so I’d figure out who to vote for in all the elections, and made my marks on my ballot. E-mailed my thoughts on politics to my mom. Went to Jeaux’s and ate at Ledo’s. Hit Publix and Target (where I bought too much jewelry because it was cute). Jeaux left and I only got one frame done on the comic.
Wed., October 22: Mom and I were supposed to go to the movies but she cancelled. Worked really hard at work cleaning out the office and sitting in on the project reviews and helping people with their aged accounts. And of course I got my period (but I had anticipated that, so it wasn’t a disaster). Couldn’t focus very well. Finished my comic drawings and wrote in my LJ.
Thurs., October 23: Mommy cancelled again so I went about getting other stuff done and took a nap. I prepared Negative One for its trip onto the Internet, but that’s about all the productive stuff I did because I kept napping.
Fri., October 24: V called in the morning and I got a lot done while chatting. Packed for Gainesville and then went to work–met the new guy. Did timesheets and left. Jeaux took me to the bus station and I hung out drawing next week’s comic. The bus, predictably, was rather smelly. I felt depressed while riding it. I don’t know why. Did some reading, then met Mike at the station. We ate at the Clock and took a cab home, where we chilled and talked into the night.
Sat., October 25: Woke up nice and late at Mike’s and refused his (kinda weird) offer of pasta for breakfast. Ate a granola bar. We went to the mall and Center Stage (the costume shop), and I visited my old bookstore where I worked. Then we took the bus back to his place and just hung out. Then we watched some anime and The Guild on YouTube. We ordered Five Star Pizza (my old favorite). He got tired and went to bed early, so I worked on my books page from his computer.
Week 5
Sun., October 26: B.S.ed with Mike in the morning while eating leftover pizza and coffee, then had to get in a cab and go to the bus station again. The ride back was also depressing but not as much so. I finished a book and got my next comic planned after finishing the last one, and even drew a frame of it. Dumb men made idiotic comments to me at the bus station, and in the cab ride home the driver tried to give me his number and only charged me $15 for the like half-hour cab ride. Got home, unpacked, and tried to work on my page but I got interrupted by non-working FTP and . . . the hiccups. So I took a nap and hoped they’d both go away.
Mon., October 27: Had to deal with utility conflict letters and the New Guy Stuff at work. Spent nearly the whole day WORKING. Travesty! Threw some food in my face when I got home and went off to stand in line for EARLY VOTING. Brought a book and some sunblock. I rule. When I got home I did some organization for my party and worked on my page. Even did some fansite stuff when I was moving the pages–got the Neil Gaiman fansite on my domain, but didn’t bother with updating the others. Took a shower, too.
Tues., October 28: I get too much e-mail. Meh. Worked on work stuff, but also managed to do Web page stuff. Went to Jeaux’s, and he took me grocery shopping and I bought $140 worth of stuff for the party. Processed my comic, took a nap, processed more, and got Jeaux to help me with my molasses-ginger cookie dough. Did some cleaning up, then organized a schedule of what I was going to do in what order to prepare for the Halloween party.
Wed., October 29: Had to help with a proposal on short notice at work. It got VERY busy and I had no down time. When I got home, I cleaned my porch, cleaned the whole apartment, vaccuumed, and napped. Then I got up, decorated, and made pumpkin pie, a pumpkin roll, and pumpkin muffins. Also played with music.
Thurs., October 30: Busy with the proposal literally all day at work. Had to fix a proposal cover that was giving me trouble, then update files, print and edit résumés, and type in hand-written edits that were hard to read. Then I went home and continued the quest for party readiness. Jeaux interrupted me because he needed help with his Captain Hammer costume. I chatted with Rob and Kari on the phone while making nine billion foodz–pre-made my macaroni, then made cranberry muffins, vegan coffeecake, and pan de muertos. After that, I cleaned the apartment more, took a shower, and started putting out plates and serving utensils to make the next day easier. Went to sleep at 1 AM.
Fri., October 31: Got up at 3 AM with Victor’s call. While chatting with him I posted the comic, made a CD for Mike’s mom, took the pictures off my camera, and planned my costume. Went to work, dealt with some work-related crap like getting the new guy’s engineering license started in Florida and, of course, timesheets. When I got home I set up my lights, plugged in the music, put up menus, cut up some apples and prepared the appetizers. I did my hair, put drinks in the cooler, and prepared some cider in the crockpot. I wanted to take a nap but just didn’t get time. My first guests (Avi and Claire) arrived so I didn’t get to snooze. Then Mikey arrived, followed by Jeaux, Jef, Kit, and Anita. Soon I had a houseful–Steve and Jessica cancelled, but Mike and his mom came, and then Meg, Bren, Katie, and Ben arrived. We all ate lots of food (including Avi’s vegan pizza!) and went trick-or-treating, and we had three people there dressed as fairies! When we got back we ate dessert. And Heather and Matt visited after almost everyone was gone. After I had an empty house, my obsessive-compulsiveness wouldn’t let me go to bed until I’d cleaned, so I did, and then I went to sleep.