Hot in the city tonight

So I continue to amaze my HVAC technician with how long I am willing to go without replacing my system. I think right now its about 22 years old. they usually have a life of about 15 yrs. I grew up in a house w/out AC... which OK happened to be in upstate NY so we didn't need AC in the house. Now living in northern virginia, ye ol' AC is often times needed. and by often, I mean the average person in NOVA turns their AC on around April and has it running full blast until November. But I try not to use it too often. I prefer to keep my place in a birkham yoga studio environment of 105 degrees. you never know when you might want to break out in the lotus pose.
OK fine, do you know how much money a new HVAC unit is? yeah, trying throwing that cost on your credit cards Hah! so instead i added about 200 bucks of frion to keep the bad boy running and I'll just plan on ya know, doing lots of birkham yoga this summer. ya know, get all zen and stuff. it'll be good. fabulous. really. sweat out the anxiety! ..um er anyone know anyone who can help me install some ceiling fans? anyone?...

Signs you work in the "overhead" department of a "not for profit"
1) your annual "team building" event is being held in the parking lot
2) which you have to use either vacation time or make up the time thorughout the week to attend this event
3) its a bbq (you're a vegetarian...) and you're still required to bring a side dish
4) no alcohol. the only activity aside from eating is a volleyball net overrun by weeds and ticks.
5) your 'all hands" meeting consisted of an hour long powerpoint presentation where no sustance was provided. byo...everything. whereas the other "techincal staff" departments got either pizza with cookies or 3 course meal with brownies catered. not from costco.
6) ppl who are in these "technical staff departments" argue about not getting married bc then they would have to pay 46k more a year in taxes...sigh. if only i had that problem. with my 3 jobs i worked last year...I prob make how much they currenlty get taken out of their taxes...

Speaking of money....
So if you ever want to randomly cry, you are more than welcome to look at my 403b statement from 08. the good news is that this past quarter in 09 i have gained .7%! so now i just need to gain 39.1% more to break even to what my balance was in 07! sigh. i'll be working FOREVER just like all you lovely folsk. we'll be wal-mart greeters together. work at bingo halls. it'll be awesomer than a golden girls rerun!

I was going to write a post yesterday about taxes and the whole tea parties - and make lots of bad jokes about tea bagging and the gov't. but yeah i was too busy doing my taxes...shadup

My latest money saving idea: growing my own garden from SEEDS! ok granted, instead of going to rite aide and buying those 5 for a buck packets of seeds i went online to a specaility seed site and spent well, a little too much money. c'mon, you can't grow just ANY type of eggplant on a balcony. yes, balcony. I'm atempting to grow over 30 varieties of plant life on my balcony. it can be done. it will be done. just you see. in ya know 3 months after they all germinate and stuff.

Metro Taking shape! yes virginia, it's true. all that clear cutting around the tysons area is to make room for the metro. by the time it gets here i'll prob have moved to DC or something. the island of capri, maybe. leave it to vdot and other folks to simutaneously have costruction of the HOT lanes as well as the metro in the tysons area. apparantly me taking mass trans to work would actually cost 8k more a year than driving. so its tough hippies. maybe i'll use my tax moolah to buy a used road bike on craigslist and bike to work. ya know, go full blown eco-gal, with my balcony veggie garden and biking to work.

my new diet plan:
well, let's look at the old one for a sec... measure everything, eat healthy, count calories, workout...and the scale no budges.
new plan: become so godamn stressed at work you live off of the fun size chocolate and candies in the admins basket, wine and whatever else your family forces upon you. the scale stays the same, but pants feel loser. meh. on the downside, the taste of stomach acid is pretty gross. so yeah...um, me thinks its time to start puttin ye old resume and portfolio together. on the plus side, the stomach acid has not damaged my teeth yet! that's according to my new dnetal hygenist who says they are beautiful! though she encourages me to start sleeping with someone to see if i night grind. totally my new pick up line.

So enough about me...
upcoming things to do!
Filmfest DC!
Earth day fest headined by the flaming lips! volunteer activities galore too!

Staurday from 2-4 art reception opening for fairfax city in old town hall.
moe to come and stuff...netx time..less on me..more for you! i'll sotp usign this as therapy soon. i promise, really. shadup

finding a happy place

As if it wasn't hard enough to try not to strangle myself with my cat5 cable at work, now my mornings became more bleak. the radio station which my alram clock is set to wake me up in the morning has changed formats. now instead of waking up to the sounds of my fantasy boyfriends mick jagger and robert plant, i woke up this morning to...god, i think it was taylor swift. i couldn't listen too long b/c i started dry heaving and had to head to the bathroom and do shots of pepto.

And i went to their website and holy ...wtf. who the hell designed this shit?! I mean not only is their new name wicked lame 94.7 Fresh!..holy god. it looks like the graphic and web designers have a sick addiction to golden girls laying bathroom tiles circa 1978. I mean god, i know money is tight, but who the hell did they hire to do their new branding? some hack who got his degree online? maybe one of the DJs they laid off got a copy of frontpage or something.

And its not like the other "classic rock" station is any better- I turned to it and not only were they playing a COVER of the beatles, it transitioned into some sort of kenny loggins or rogers crap- you know one of those songs on those 20 disc CD sets which they try to sell with some washed up 70s song writer on some pre fab set where the background looks like they raided the housewares department at TJ Maxx.

this is what happens when I wake up before my alloted 4 snoozes. I become irate about stufff like..radio station formats and graphic design...and yeah.

anyhoo so yeah. work is. sigh ... i tried to write a blog entry the other day about it, but every other word was hate filled and basically the F bomb. I know things could be worse. listening to NPR this morning really humbled me as I hear about folks in Detriot being out of work for over 7 months. so my mantra lately has been " i have a job i have a job i have a job i have a job"

I also have a voodoo doll... given as a gift. more to use as a desk trinket. The first time i used it, it worked! ok, it could have been mere coincidence that the night i stuck a torn up note from my manager to the doll was the same night she got a wicked bad flat tire and had to call AAA. coincidence, kharma, voodoo whatevs.

oh p.s. if someone asks you what color you hair is- strawberry blonde or blonde, the correct answer is NOT "8w". eh, whatevs. ..i used to be a natural straw blonde. then i dunno. it started turning icky auburn and bleah. and so 8 bucks a 20 minutes will get you back to your roots.

Now if I could only get back to my happy place....