Traffic for 2005 October

(5) Sun Oct 02 2005 09:40 PST Guzzle a gallon of alcohol and call me in the morning: Susie and I both have fall allergies (well, I've had them since high school but Susie has now developed them). So we dry cough all night long. It's miserable to both be afflicted at the same time. Though I must confess, my symptoms are less severe here than in UT, which is nice. But the cure to sleep is that syrup-based alcohol OTC wonder otherwise known as Nyquil. Whenever I am sick I try only to use it sparingly so as not to create a sleeping crutch. I hope we get better soon.

This weekend is general conference, but I was still expected to work on Saturday. So I got creative and did PA state return at home that morning while listening, went to work between sessions, and finished it up at home during the afternoon session. I got the best of both worlds out of it.

Speaking of the best of both worlds, we still don't have tv, and "The Amazing Race" has started again. So Susie had the brilliant idea that if I come home early on Tuesdays then we can go watch it in the workout room while we run in place for an hour.

We watched the sun set at the beach last night. It was pretty. Susie told me that if we watch closely, we'll see a green light at the exact moment the sun exits our view. She says mom told her that, but I'm afraid that she may have confused it with "The Great Gatsby." Nevertheless, we did not see any green light.

(3) Mon Oct 03 2005 11:32 PST Loose the Noose: Instead of subjecting myself to five years of financial pain, I decided to be poor right now and pay off all my student loans at once, as they start becoming due in November. Though writing the check was painful, and did require some financial rearranging, it will be nice to have one less bill a month, not to mention skipping out on the interest.

Of course, it's always more fun to write checks when they are "Peanuts" checks!

When I can finally afford to buy a home, I hope to pay more than the minimum balance at least several times per year. Especially early on, as most loan agencies have caught on and won't let you do it in the last 5 years or so.

(12) Sun Oct 09 2005 13:30 PST Tick Tock: I cannot believe it is mid-October. I can't possibly have been in the work field for three months already. It just doesn't seem possible. But I think I may have worked my last Saturday for a while, which is good, since my next CPA exam is coming up in just under four weeks now. People keep telling me that things will slow down at work; I'm not so sure.

Today was our first day in the barracks: Nursery. And, as fate would have it, we also had three new additions to the ward today as well. One of the new kids, Ethan, acclimated fine; he couldn't care less that his parents ditched him for two hours. The other new boy, also Ethan, cried the whole time unless I held him. Good thing he was so darn cute, cuz he droolled all over my tie. I guess I need to buy some cheaper church clothes until this calling comes to an end. The nursery is very excited to have a boy help out, though.

When they gave us the call, they decided to set us apart as Primary workers, so that, in a year or two, we can be moved into Sunbeams or something. Or pianist, since they know we can play the piano.

I started exercising again, and it's been nice. I figure, my head hurts at the end of every day from thinking, I might as well let my body ache as well. I feel so much better when I work out regularly. And the best part is that the gym is free and I can catch up on my show.

My family is coming down in two weeks and I am very excited to take my Labor Day holidays two months late to hang out with them!

(3) Sun Oct 16 2005 20:36 PST Calling All Angels: I hope the Angels can pull out a win tonight against the White Sox. If they can beat Chicago, they'll easily clinch the World Series title, as the National league struggles of late.

Feeling in a rut of always going to Disneyland or the Beach, Susie and I got adventurous and went for a walk around UC-Irvine. Beautiful campus. Why do they always build campuses on hilltops? The Y, the U, etc. It's rather annoying, not to mention exhausting. There are a lot of people from Asia at this school, and I heard a fair share of Cantonese at the little Vietnames sandwich shop where we ate dinner. We've toyed with going to the huge IKEA by our house for our next walk. How sad when you only go shopping to get exercise. After all, I'm 25, not 75.

Busy season is over. Back to my normal workload for a while, and am very glad about it, considering that my next CPA test is in just three weeks.

Today in nursery I added a new child to my Pied Piper list--Jake. Because Ethan refuses to leave my lap, Jake was mostly content to just stand next to me and put his head on my shoulder. Jake is nice though because he understands me and can say yes and/or no when I show him various toys to play with.

The Primary music lady was busy today, so we had to do our own circle time. It went ok, though. The lesson was on reverence, so we had two of the three year-olds give little prayers and we all folded our arms. It was a moment.

FYI to all those with nursery age children: please don't check up on them in the middle of nursery. If they see you, it causes all sorts of problems. And don't linger when dropping them off. If possible, have an older sibling drop them off. Give them a chance to learn independence at a young age, and give the poor nursery workers' ears a break. The screaming gets worse if they see you again later.

Tyler made me watch his Wallace & Grommitt DVD today. I don't get it. The penguin was pure evil; that just seems wrong to me.

(6) Wed Oct 19 2005 08:09 PST Finally: I can leave work before the sun goes down!

Susie and I had a little shopping spree last night: bought new cell phones with CA area codes, bought book 12 of A Series of Unfortunate Events, of which Susie has most likely finished reading by now, and went to eat at Boudin. We split the roasted corn soup and a chicken pesto pizza.

What drives me crazy about all of this, is that last night was a Tuesday night. But we still had to scrounge for a parking stall at the South Coast. I guess shopping is always in fashion here in SoCal; I just thought it was only like that on the weekends. Always reminds me why I avoid the mall.

Next week they're shipping me to Cleveland for three days. The only way these trainings could be more boring is if they held them in some really lame place, like Utah....

(6) Fri Oct 28 2005 10:30 PST Jerks are People too: I just don't get people. On my flight back home last night, I had the aisle seat and there was a man next to the window. We lucked out in that the seat inbetween us was empty. So I set a small reading book in the seat for a few minutes and this guy plops down thirty pounds of luggage onto the seat. On top of my book. And goes to sleep. And his luggage was really practically falling down on top of me. Why does he get the seat, anyway? Who does he think he is?

Then there's the guy in front of me. This man has all three seats to himself in the row. So where does he sit? In front of me, naturally. And he reclines his chair, even though I am trying to study for my CPA on the little desk. Why couldn't he sit in the middle seat where nobody was behind him? I was going to recline my seat to give me more room, but there was a woman sitting behind me reading and I didn't want to do the same thing to her that was being done to me--bad karma and all.

So it's a dilemma for me. Am I being too nice? Do I look at stuff like that and think it's rude but really it's not, and I'm just overly-cognizant of my world? And who sets the social rules on this? Seinfeld?

But this trip did add two more states to my repertoire, thanks to layovers in Minneapolis and Detroit. While in Detroit, I even had a Philly Cheese Steak that was way yum. But it was my third trip to OH, so that was a bummer. Why have I even been to OH three times? Bizarre.

The training they put me through was hideous. I had to get up at 4 am SoCal time, for starters. And half of the people there were from NY office and started one week ago. Counting my internship, I've been here 6 months now. So, obviously, this training was a complete waste of time to me. And the food sucked too. I will never eat at Dave N Busters again; all that place does is serve stuff straight from Costco's frozen food section.

But, though it was freezing, it was nice to see the fall colors for a few days. Now it's back to sunshine and green.