2 1/2 months later

I'm not good at doing much lately except for drinking Miller 64 and enjoying summer.  I have spent the usual amount of time surfing the net and stalking my favorite bloggers and managed to keep myself amused.  Since regaining my vision, I read all three of the book in the Hunger Games trilogy.  I am still nursing a book hangover having just completed Mockingjay about six hours ago.  There has been an abundance of yard work, gardening and beer drinking bocce ball.  A few parties here and there and the usual douchebaggery that goes on living with three males.  The testosterone levels increased for the last month with the visit of my husband's almost-12-year-old son (that would equal 11 but this is the age he presents himself).  Needless to say there has also been an increase in horror movie watching, WWE, video games and outings to stock car races. 

I also feel like I just woke up the inner-Nikki.  By that, I mean the me that used to be me prior to being 30-somethingish.  The me who was more wanton and spontaneous.   I feel so frustrated with life events that are outside of my control that I have just had to start accepting them for what they are and move on in spite of what that may mean.  Changes are coming.  Not sure when but they are.  It's rather like forecasting a storm by the feelings in your bones.  Mine is more like a storm in my head and heart that has been brewing for way too long.  Grab an umbrella and hold on tight.  

Eye of the Beholder

The last few months have a been a blur - literally.  After experiencing iritis in February, things still aren't back to normal.  I experienced another flare up and my eyesight got worse.  The eye drops were finally stopped two weeks ago.  My eye has scarring around the pupil which has caused my pupil to remain enlarged even after the dilating drops were stopped a month prior to the other drops.  While it is not as pronounced as it was, I still feel a bit like a freak.  One pupil still makes me look like I am half on drugs.  I still can't focus well and I am rather light-sensitive although not to the point of being a vampire (any more, thank goodness!).  I have taken this time to reorganize and purge all kinds of crap lingering around the house.  I am proud to say that I would no longer qualify to be featured on the show "Hoarders".


All this lack of vision, has affected my reading ability and it also attacked my sense of doing anything.  Perhaps that is also called depression or boredom, unsure which it was.  This weekend I was so happy to have a three day weekend that I spent Saturday being completely selfish of my time.  I spent the day doing something mindless and rather odd (according to my children).  I was feeling crafty yet I just purged many of my "found" objects and sources of inspiration in my earlier cleaning frenzies.  Luckily, I had a porcelain doll that happened to catch my good eye.  Really.  That just wasn't meant to be a stupid pun.  


My neighbor just had a yard sale and she piled up the leftovers on the sidewalk with a "free" sign.  While supervising my 10 year old son mow her lawn, I took the opportunity to dig through the discards.  I rescued two strands of net lights for bushes (score!), two metal boxes which I have already began to alter into memento holders and a Victorian-style bride doll.  She had seen better days.  Her hair was in good shape but her stockings were yellowed; her face was dirty; and she seemed as if she had been played with instead of put on the shelf and left alone to collect dust as most dolls of this nature.  Perfect for transforming into something more modern!  I dyed her hair, added body jewelry and art, and completely overhauled her dress.  I cut off the lace top and high collar -  removed the long and puffy parts of the sleeves - added some color and fanciful decorations utilizing other found items from previous scavenging adventures.


Much like Cinderella morphing from an ember-tinged housecleaning slave this poor little bride has become the envy of all dolls stuck in the much fascinated about but ultimately boring and female-oppressed era.  She now resembles more of a rockabilly chick.  I was going for The Cigarette Girls Burlesque-inspired look.  I think it was almost achieved.  I am stoked.  Now, I just have to figure out what to do with her.  I don't think my husband appreciates having a tattooed and pierced doll on the mantle above the fireplace.

This is obviously the before picture.
My camera battery died before I could take a picture of her horrible up-do.
I think you can get the idea of what she looked like - rather conservative.

In this one you can see her nose piercing and multiple earrings.

If you look hard you can see the butterfly tattoo on her leg and tattoos on her forearm.

I made the corset-style ties out of eye-hooks and latches that were in a sewing kit I purchased at an  estate sale.  I know they were old.  The price tag was still on the card they were sewn onto - 19¢

This tattoo is my favorite since it goes against everything Victorian and prude.
Too bad it doesn't show up well in this picture.

English is my first language, dork is my second

I have not been able to learn to speak in a foreign language.  I have tried Spanish, French and Russian.  Didn't take.  Programming languages - a different story.  I seem to understand code like it was the dominant language of my youth.  I pick it up quickly.  If it is something I am unfamiliar with all I need to do is read a source code and I can figure it out.  

I had a Commodore 64 when I was 11.  I was able to figure out the code to make the creepy voice speak phonetically to pronounce curse words until my dad caught me.  After that, the computer moved locations and I had to use it in his presence.  Blah!  I was off to a good start though.

My early foundations were on DOS.  It really blows me away that no one seems to use DOS anymore.  If more people understood it they wouldn't need computer repair technicians as often.  Many of my computer problems have been solved at home by using what is now called “Command Prompt.” When I was on the phone with tech support for a networking problem, they actually tried to walk me through it. It was hard not to laugh.

When I first started a geocities web page (1997ish), I had windows 3.1.  It was not Java enabled.  I couldn't use the cool features to drag and drop text and images.  I checked out a HTML book from the library and typed the whole page in longhand.  I was dedicated and bored.  I can still program in HTML and the things I don't know I just look up on the internet. 

In college, I spent at least one class a semester programming and coding which was later used for GIS.  I know there was basic, python, visual basic, C, Pascal, and java (which I studied on my own).  I can produce queries like no other in Access and link them through other applications.  I also learned how to import data from other programs and geographically represent them on maps.  Oh, good times... 

The new web page at works allows widgets for text and images but not solid coding.  You can't upload scripts--only images to the host site.   I have found how to circumnavigate this to produce flash slideshows.  I researched flash enabled slideshows using flickr.  The slideshows that are created through flickr are boring.  They can't continually run.  They automatically stop when the last picture is reached and you can't edit information around them to say what the picture is showing.  

I found a slideshow I liked and embedded the link into the new work website.  I edited the source code to reference our flickr account and the set of pictures I wanted.  Because I copied a section of code, I could modify the background colors, text colors and image size.  The best part is the source code file is located on another site so no extra storage space is used on the hosting site.  Quite ingenious.  The new web page has two different galleries: one of promotional items and one that shows the screen prints we have produced.  I am now starting to learn CSS3.  I would like to modify the site to be more personalized and professional.  Just because we have a basic template doesn't mean I can't jazz it up.  I have also signed up with Code Academy (if it is good enough for Mayor Michael Bloomberg, it is good enough for me).  The best way to learn is by doing and for free!  

My years of coding in html, basic and C++ are finally coming in handy.  It is nice to have a job that uses some of my former abilities and encourages me to learn more.  Now, if I can convince them to let me me take the online class for Illustrator...

What's the Plan, Stan?

"Always have a plan, even for the little things.  Don't just go out and say you are going out for a Coke.  Decide ahead of time - if they don't have a Coke, then have a Pepsi.  If no Pepsi, then a Fanta.  Don't ever get caught by surprise, learn to always think ahead, be prepared."  Carlos Fonseca.  

Sandinista: Carlos Fonseca and the Nicaraguan Revolution; Matilde Zimmerman

I have always been one to have a plan and goals.  I remember my earliest ones starting in high school. Get the hell out of there.  So I doubled up on classes and graduated a year and a half early.  It then moved into getting a job that pays at least $8 an hour (in the early '90's that was a decent pay and gas was still under $1 a gallon).  Then my goal morphed into getting a promotion.  Did it.  I floundered a bit because I did somethings backwards and got married and had a baby.  Got divorced at 20 so I moved to Idaho to begin again.  Started the job thing all over.  My goal changed from getting a promotion (although I did get raises) to going to college.  After three (3) years of working, I was finally in a place where I could work part-time and go to school full-time.  While I was in school my goals were educationally attainable.  Get a 4.0.  Done.  Dean's List.  Done.  Scholarships.  Done.  Go to Oxford.  Done.  

After college, I just had my part-time job become a full-time job.  I then advanced a few times from that position.  I got bored with Idaho.  I changed my goal to moving and finding a job at the same time.  Done.  Then it was the regular milestones of monotony:  make more money.  Government jobs are good like that.  My goals meshed with moving up so I became a certified floodplain manager; certified residential building inspector; and finally a certified planner.  I think I was also certifiably stupid because even with all the credentials I didn't foresee the economic downtown in construction.  I wasn't prepared to lose my job.  Metaphorically speaking it was as much of a shock as taking your dog for a walk and a car jumps the curb and runs over your dog - killing it in front of you while the leash is still in your hand.  (That is a real scenario too.  My friend, Bad Luck Amanda, had it happen to her).

Had I prepared, I would have had a plan in place rather than flailing around and collecting a pitiful amount of compensation in the form of unemployment benefits.  I would have been able to walk out of the planning department, breathed a sigh of relief and jumped into my next adventure.  I never would have ended up at the assisted living facility wiping asses for almost a year.  I wouldn't have ended up in the comfortable position I am in now and thoroughly enjoy, even though it does nothing to promote my job interests resume-wise.  

I am so frustrated with it all right now.  I could wish for a break that lets me use my strengths (e.g., typing, writing, customer service, analytic thinking and research) or I could actually do something about it.  And that's what I'm going to do, dammit.  

Right now I have a part-time position on the horizon. It is back in the planning field.  I can work it around my existing job.  It would allow me to use my brain again and I would be continually learning.  Honestly, that is what I miss the most about my former line of work.  I was learning every day.  I had to research trends and apply them to a local community level.  I had to memorize them so I didn't look like a bumbling idiot answering questions on the public access channel that replayed the videos of the city council meetings.  It was as if I was still in school.  

I am also applying for a part-time position as a research assistant.  It won't require ever meeting my boss.  It would involve researching material for that person to write a book and communicating online.  And typing, loads of it.  Transcription.  Tons of it.  F-U-N!  Plus, it would be something that would allow me to feel like I am contributing something by no longer being idle and just preparing paperwork.  If wishes were fishes, the sea would be full.  Keep your fingers crossed for me.

*Note:  I am afraid I have lost my sense of humor.  I still love to smile but not much is funny.  I am beginning to think it is the winter.  Maybe I have S.A.D. or maybe I am bored from not thinking.  Either way it needs to stop.  I will have to figure it out.  Lately my only source of enjoyment has been pinterest and trying out new hairstyles including fish-bone braids and no heat curls.  For Christ's Sake!  Somethings gotta give*

Summer Dreamin'

I am a dreamer.  I daydream.  Often.  Some may call me spacey or off-focus but I'm not.  I am really just living another life out inside my head.  In fact, I am the mayor of my own little village of idiots in Nikki-land.  It is a really rockin' coastal community somewhere warm.  The sun always shines and the wind never blows.  I can't tell you how to get there unless you climb into that little door that will also take you into John Malkovich's head.  You should stop by sometime.  We can have umbrella drinks.

Mostly I just go to Nikki-land to escape.  Honestly, life just seems so demanding and overwhelming at times.  I wish I could just sit down and veg out like my kids can but I can't--too much to do.  The school year is always a blur.  This past year working the job from Hell took a toll also.  I couldn't count on anything like making plans with friends or going to a movie.  Twice I went to funerals and actually got calls from my work while I was paying my respect to the deceased. (Note: I turned off the frickin' cell phone when I was at them so they didn't actually ring when I was in the funeral but as soon as I left and turned on the damned phone, I had messages calling me into work).  We made plans with friends and we had to cancel because I got called in because someone was sick or didn't show up so I had to go in and work the floor.  Blah!  I couldn't even get my drink on without the fear someone would call.  That combined with the hell of being unemployed for so long, catching up on bills, juggling the boys' needs and then Alan being out of work when we closed the pizza place left me longing for more.  Hence, Nikki-land sprouted forth.

This summer is a bit different.  The boys both left.  One is at Grandma's and one is traversing the Pacific Northwest visiting other family.  Alan has a decent job with regular hours and I have a job that I am currently Lah-ov-ing!  I cleaned the house the first week the boys left and the bathroom has stayed clean.  The trash only goes out every few days and the dishwasher is crying because it rarely gets used.  We stopped grocery shopping.  The nights Alan works we get dinner there for free.  The days he has off we defrost something from the freezer.  The only thing we really buy is beer.  That is the only store run I make now.  Every 2 weeks I also buy a 1/2 gallon of milk for coffee and maybe cereal if I want some.  Complete 180 from the usual life.

The sad part: I don't know what to do with myself!!!  Like I said, the house is clean, there is nothing to cook, the yard looks great.  Once a week I spend about 2 hours mowing or weeding and then it is done for another week.  I have been outside often but I get a sun rash because I am a freak of nature so I really only go out after the hottest part of the day.  I don't want to get the rash on my face!!!!!  I have gone through my clothes. Organized pictures and had a yard sale for three days.  Finally, that heap of crap from the storage unit is gone (Thank you Jesus!).  And again, not sure what to do.  I can't focus for long periods of time because I am so used to being interrupted with calls of "MOOOOOOOMMMMMMM!!!" every 5 minutes.  That means books are out of the question right now and I have read all my magazines cover to cover.  

Alan and I don't go to bars because we are old.  We don't eat out together because he works at a restaurant in the evenings and plus, I covered that already.  I have been trying to convince him to start walking with me but it makes us seem like old people.  :)  He is going to put my exercise equipment out for me so I can work out.  That is about all I have to do.  B-O-R-I-N-G!!!

I will be excited to have the kids come back.  I really miss them.  I guess I miss the hectic life more than I thought I would.  

This is how my summer has really been without the kids and that treasured work-life balance....