Insomnia Blog 2.0

Now this is getting tedious. Up at 3:33am this morning. I was awake for a bit before I got up and I know I was conscious for at least 10-15 minutes. Bah. My biorythm is obviously off in a big way. I guess I can view this as a positive, since it gives me some uninterrupted and free blogging time, but truly I’d prefer to be sleeping right now.

Some might have noticed that I posted the game which consisted of answering seven questions and then tagging others. I left it up for a while, as it was fun to think of strange and little-known facts about myself, but eventually I realized that I wasn’t so sure I wanted to share some of those things. Now this might seem ironic, given that I’m usually blatantly honest in what I write on my blogs, it’s just that I’m in a state of change right now. This means that I’m editing myself much more heavily than I normally do, something that is definitely necessary.

But I do have something a bit more interesting to share this morning. I’ve been invited, along with three other English graduates, to speak to my favorite professor’s senior seminar. She’s given us two simple questions to answer about our post-BA work and plans. I’m thrilled because I’m hoping that perhaps even just one person who was waffling on graduate school will tip over into the “Yes!” category after hearing us talk. I know… It might not happen. It would make my day though.

From the look of the panel she has assembled, I’d say that we are a nice diverse group. It appears that I’m the only one who is heading off to graduate school now, but the others are doing incredible things and it looks like they are actually making USE of those English degrees. One could say that I am as well, editing items for my department and ensuring that my boss doesn’t sound awful. (that last is a particularly funny one… he’s an economist, not a writer… but that’s why he has me)

Truly though, I am not working in my degree area. Sometimes that is frustrating, but my options were limited. I don’t want to write for a publication – I think my writing skills are questionable at best. I am dry. I am not particularly witty. I tend to be overly analytical and get caught up in the research, rather than the production of pages. Worst of all, I need feedback and I love to work with other people – bouncing ideas back and forth. Much of this is why I chose to become a librarian. If I were more of a grammarian, I would actively and aggressively pursue a career in editing. One of my chief loves is working with other students on their papers. I’ll address this in my “What I want to be when I grow up” blog that is currently a saved work in progress, but my goal is to be an academic librarian. I want to help others do the research… help bring them and the sources together.

Perhaps I’ll even get to do some freelance editing for a few undergraduates. That would be the cream on top of the cake.

Yes, it’s with joy that I’ll be able to chat about my choice to go to school for Library and Information Science (boy! big title, eh?)… Even more, I’m looking forward to being able to give some input on the GRE (not as bad as you’d think) and the application and interviewing process. It’ll be brief – we only have 5 minutes for that piece, but I think I can be effective.

One last thought on that note. I’m a ridiculously poor public speaker. I get flushed. I talk too fast. Have I mentioned that I get flushed? Not just a tinge of pink, but truly bright red – cheeks, neck…. ugh.

I have to learn though. I’ll be doing much more of this, both in my graduate schooling and in my career. So practice will be welcome.

That’s it. I need to begin winding down. Maybe I can get another hour or so of sleep before the alarm goes off.

Hope you’re sleeping snug in your beds,
moonfire

My first WordPress Insomnia Blog

I’ve been up since 3am. It’s going to be a very long day… The problem is that I’ve got too much on my mind and too much to do. So here I sit, having done my taxes, sent off some messages, and having applied for the loan to pay those taxes. What a morning. And it’s only 5:30am. I need to get in the shower, continue doing the laundry, and I need to eat something that will keep me going. I expect, and I believe this is completely reasonable, that I will fade around 10 or 11am.

We have dinner with my mum tonight. We’re finally doing the birthday dinner. I’m going to be an exhausted wreck. On the upside, I did get about 6 hours sleep… ok, not quite 6 hours. So perhaps it won’t be as bad as I expect.

And pigs might fly.

I’d love to go back to bed for 2 hours. I could probably survive on that much sleep. Alternately, it might make things worse. If I do go back to bed, I’ll have to walk to work. I’m trying to decide if this is a bad thing or not. It’s slippery and cold out there.

Oh hell. I don’t know. I’m tired, finally, and my neck hurts. This is too much thinking for this early in the morning.

grumpily submitted,
moonfire.

A little bit of subversive baby humor…

On the trip to Portland my mum and I found this little shop, nothing more than a hole in the wall really, and it contained some truly funny stuff. What caught my eye, mum that I am myself, were the humorous onesies. I wish I’d found a few of these when my oldest was a baby, maybe he’d have a better sense of humor! (ooh, I’m going to mommy hell for that comment, aren’t I?)

Well, with my second baby – and last by the way – I am much better at finding the humor in things. It started when he was born and perhaps it’s less about me and more about his nature. When Aidan was born he almost immediately took on an expression that told us he knew the great cosmic joke and we didn’t. Since that time, that impression has only been reinforced. He is the funniest child, always ready with a gummy smile and an infectious laugh. I used to wonder at that phrase, “infectious laugh,” and now I completely understand it. Sometimes it’s a full belly-laugh and other times it’s a giggle. I dare anyone to listen to it without at least sharing a smile with him.

Yes, I’m digressing.

Anyway, in this shop we found some great onesies… two of which had to come home with us. The one with “iPoop” was in honor of his dad, who hates the poopy diapers (good grief! Who doesn’t?) and who is also a serious iPod junkie. The second was for all of us: “Already smarter than the President.”

Now, I don’t normally get into politics. I usually avoid writing about it as there are so many others who are truly talented when it comes to skewering the political scene. Our dear friend, Jordan, is one of those brilliant writers, the kind who can nail it with words in a way I just can’t begin to approach. This is one instance when I will stray into that area… dip my toes, and then retreat to write on more mundane topics.

The current President makes me nuts. His voice makes my teeth come together in a grinding fashion. His smirking grin is my trigger to tromp off through the house, ranting about everything that has ever come out of his mouth.

When I found this onesie for my sweet, smiling baby, I laughed until I cried. I am mercilessly using my cute boy to further my agenda. I admit it. He’ll wear it with his lovely, smiling face and even the most hardened Republican will have to smile in return. What I wonder is this: Will they only be smiling because of my boy? Or will there, perhaps, be some shared sentiment there?

I can only hope.

Finding the humor,
moonfire

Lunch (?) break and celebration!

I’m really horrible about taking lunch breaks. Part of the problem is that I like my day to be as short as possible. Yes, taking a break is important, but my sanity is equally important. Shortening a 9 hour day to 8 may not sound like much, but it does make a difference.

Today it took me almost 2 full hours to get to work because of the snow that dumped on us. It wasn’t a huge amount, in the greater scheme of things, but the fluffy snow combined with the ice from the frozen rain made it treacherous. And I was driving my kids to the grandparents house, so I was being as cautious as possible. Add the commute to my day and I’m looking at almost 12 hours today…

Is it any wonder that I don’t want to prolong the time with that pesky lunch hour? A counterpoint to this argument is the fact that I need to eat. I also need to stretch my legs and see some other environment for a bit. So I bought my boss coffee this morning. It was a good excuse to get away, plus I was celebrating. Yes. I was celebrating the fact that my formal acceptance into my graduate program came into my email this morning. What a lovely way to start off my day!

I know the hard work is coming when I start in August, but for now I can bask in the happiness that I made it through. I was so worried. It’s nothing new for me to be worried about how I do in academic areas, but in this instance I had a lot of my heart wrapped up in it. I’ve spent the better part of the last two years interviewing professionals and researching the field. I’ve looked at my interests, both academic and personal, and library and information science is a great match for me. Knowing this, it’s been hard to sit back and wait for the acceptance letter.

I even went so far as to plan my backup strategy, but truthfully, my heart wasn’t in it.

Now I have reason to smile.

The back side of this happy news is the thought that we will have some major coordinating to do starting this fall. Todd will be working (hopefully) and so will I. We’ll both be in school and Brennan will be in Kindergarten for half days. The baby will have to go to gramma’s house and that means two trips taking kids out there, each day. Then the big pick up at the end of the day. We’ll have to fit in workouts, homework, family time, AND time for ourselves…

I’m actually thinking that I need to consider finding a part-time position here on campus in order to make this work. I don’t know any other way to do it.

For now there is nothing I can do about it. Until we know more – Bren’s schedule (and which school he’ll be attending), Todd’s schedule for classes, and our financial aid awards…

Well. Let’s just say there are a lot of unknowns to be factored in. We’ll know more by April or May.

Other people do it and survive. I’m sure we will too.

Cross your fingers for us.

Cheers,
moonfire

Sunday morning ramble

I just looked at the time and realized I have to get on the road to retrieve my oldest from his first sleep-over birthday party. Time has flown since I dropped him off last night. It’s not so much the location, as he’s spent the night over there before, it’s just that there were a bunch of kids he didn’t know and I worried that he might be uncomfortable. From the message I got last night (his friend’s mom is my dear friend), I’d say my worries were unfounded.

So now I need to pull myself together and go get him. It’s a funny thing. I thought I’d have a lot of time this morning. Instead, I’m feeling rushed. I suppose staying up late getting things done was good last night, but it left me fatigued this morning. This is curious as I’m normally a morning person… not necessarily bright and cheerful, but motivated and productive.

Oh well. A strong, hot cup of tea and a steamy shower should perk me up. The combination is a good cure (or at least balm) for a ridiculous winter cold like the one I have. I hope he had fun. I hope he got enough sleep so he won’t be a bear today.

Other than these few morning bits, there is the usual Sunday grind…. laundry, dishes, cooking (well, with the microwave… easy stuff), and prepping myself for the coming week. It’d be nice to have some time away from the office, but it’s not in the cards so I need to make the most of today.

Shower time.

Cheers on a icy Sunday morning,
moonfire.

and if that wasn’t weird enough…

Todd called me at work on Wednesday to report on the kids. Aidan had been sleeping in his crib, but woke up fretting and crying. Todd went into the kitchen to make a bottle, leaving the baby to cry his little heart out.

And the story went something like this…

“I could hear the crying in the distance, but then, gradually, it got closer and closer, until it stopped. I looked out into the living room in time to see Brennan carrying [um, sure – he’s only got about 10 inches and 15 lbs on the baby] Aidan into the living room. I asked Bren how he got Aidan out of the crib and he told me this:

‘I floated over the crib and got him.'”

What do you say to something like that? I was sitting at work, stunned and speechless. Apparently Todd laughed but told him not to do it again. When I asked Bren about it, he replied simply with a small smile – “I floated over the crib.”

Will we walk into his bedroom one day, only to find him hovering four feet off the floor?

I would not be surprised.

The crew is sick

I’m down with a winter cold and so are the boys. Looks like Todd is headed in the same direction. It’s important to understand this because the impact hits everything in our household. Our interactions with each other more easily drift into “testy” and less is done around the house. The latter is significant because we are still sort of moving in. I know that technically we moved the day before Thanksgiving, but school, work, the holidays, and two small children effectively destroyed our ability to get totally settled.

But that’s just the beginning of the issues. Really, the bigger one is the lack of space and storage. And the only reason the lack of space is critical is because we’ve accumulated too much “stuff” over the course of the years we’ve been together. Nobody needs this much. I’m serious.

So why is this coming up when we are sick? Well, for starters I should be sleeping so I can get over this bug – so I can have the energy to get things sorted, discarded, donated, sold or put away – so I can have a clean house – so the germs won’t continue to accumulate – so I can stay healthy – so I can rest when I get home and so the kids will stay healthy as well. There’s this snowballing pattern to it all.

Instead, I’m sitting up because the drainage (don’t need to list details, we all know what I mean…) is making me sick to my stomach. When I lie down, I feel hot and that rolling, queasy feeling that signals an impending run to the bathroom. If I sit up, drinking a bit of soda (which I hate intensely, but that’s a topic for another blog) to ease my tummy, I seem to be fine. The only issue is that I can’t sleep sitting up out here.

Choice then: try to sleep and risk the evacuation of my stomach or stay sitting up, blogging, to pass the time until things settle, but ultimately get more tired and possibly prolong said illness.

Damned if I do, damned if I do something else.

Options? Well, we have the wonderful new chairs. Rocker/recliners that are big, squishy club chairs. I may end up snoozing there. It beats the hell out of being flat. And it’s colder down here in the living room.

I might do it, even though bed sounds so much better.

Oh. There was a point to this though… With all of us sick, the likelihood of my finding interesting blog topics floating around in my brain has descended to odds approaching zero. I have a hard time conversing on any topic right now, let alone something requiring true creative thought.

And on that note, I believe there is a chair calling my name. Either that or the hard, white goddess is getting tribute. We’ll see who wins.

Stay healthy,
moonfire.

Taxes and Student Loans

I haven’t received everything I need to finish up our taxes, but I’ve got the big items in. Ouch. That’s all I have to say. We knew it was coming and frankly, I’m glad it’s not as bad as our worst-case scenario that I projected last summer. It’s actually about 2/3’s of that amount. So I suppose that I should count my blessings and get on with working out the details of how to pay it off.

Here’s the thing – in order for Todd to go back to school, something he desperately needed to do, he had to cash out retirement to pay off the debts. This was a must because my income is woeful and small, with no likelihood of drastic increases until I get through my graduate program. It would have been great to leave the money there, accumulating interest and acting as a solid guarantee for a retirement income. At the same time, school wouldn’t have been possible with the debt load in place. I don’t make enough to cover everything and Todd’s part-time job is a necessity to our budget, so the debt payoff had to be done.

We knew about the tax consequences of the cash-out. The federal government took a healthy chunk off the top, but sadly, the state government didn’t take a swipe at it back then. To top things off, the 10% penalty wasn’t done at the time of the pay out, which I thought was odd.

Well, here we are and I’ve done the numbers through Turbo Tax. It’s not as bad as it could have been and still it’s a goodly sized amount. The thing of it is this: I don’t want to max out our credit cards to pay it off. It would kill our credit ratings and the payments would be too high.

So I get to go looking for a loan to take out against our paid-in-full van and then I can pay it off in August when our next piece of financial aid comes in. Weird isn’t it? All this squirming and shifting of debt? I’d pay it in installment payments to the government, particularly as we’ll be getting a refund next year thanks to no huge retirement cashouts, but the installment thing is expensive.

I keep hoping that perhaps the donations that I haven’t yet entered will make a huge difference, but the fact is that they probably won’t. Maybe it’ll drop by $10-20 dollars, maybe not. I’ve resigned myself to paying it. After all, it was pre-tax money so it’s necessary. I could argue that the government is getting the taxes it is due so the 10% penalty is just mean-spirited, but they want some kind of incentive to get people to leave the money alone… so I try to understand.

Ask me if his leaving that long-time job was necessary and if all this hassle was worth it. Well it was. His health (and his future health outlook) are better. His future is much brighter and he may actually live longer.

Yes. It was worth it.

Student loans. They are a necessary evil for us right now. Todd recently got a part-time job, one that pays almost as much as my hourly wage at my office. It has put us into the black on our monthly expenses. That wasn’t the case before. Once I begin my graduate program in August, we will once again be functioning without the means to cover everything. Monthly travel to the program… tuition and fees… books…. housing… you name it, it will be necessary to come up with the funds to cover it all.

And that’s where student loans come in. Thanks to this grotesque distortion on our taxes for 2007, it appears that we made a ton of money. Ok, so in a way it was a good year from that aspect. But it isn’t a continuous thing. The way the financial aid application system is set up, they don’t allow for anomalies like that odd year. We’ll do the change in circumstances form for Todd this coming fall, but that won’t happen until October. Until then, it will appear that we have monthly resources that don’t exist.

I find that interesting. Luckily, I know the system and we’ll just squeak through. I’m hoping that we can make up for this year and next with scholarships and grants for Todd in his later school years. That’s the plan…

As for me? I’ve already calculated that I will be in school so long that it is highly likely I will die before my student loans pay off fully. This brings a slight smile to my face for two reasons. First, the remaining balance after I croak off will be forgiven. Second, I like school. I’m institutionalized. It’s really that basic.

I know this is all dry as mud, but it’s life. I guess I could say it’s the joys of being a grown-up. When I was a kid, I never had to think too hard about all the financial crap my mother had to deal with. She put up with paying bills on a too-small salary, erratic childsupport, and trying to earn a bit of money while finishing up school and raising two kids on her own.

I have it easy. I think I need to keep that in mind.

And if it really comes to it, I can set up that stupid installment plan with the feds and suffer paying them extra until we can pay it off. The move was worth it… the cashout was worth it…. and the long hours Todd is putting in for school will definitely be worth it, down the road.

Cheers,
moonfire.

Blogging, Midgets, and Zombies

This is my first day in this new and lovely environment. Excuse the formulaic page layout, but right now it will have to suffice. It was time to move on from the limitations of Myspace. Yes. I admit it. I was blogging and hanging out in Myspace. From a social standpoint, it was fun and I met some people that are now treasured real world friends, but from a blogging point of view, it wasn’t quite so good.

The format sucked. There is no other way to put it. It was kind of like having a bike with training wheels. I could pedal my way around and get things done, but I was a preschooler.

So now I’m graduating to a new format and a better view of things. Well, I hope anyway.

First, I’d like to make a comment on my topics. I’m all over the place. I talk family, money, books, movies, politics (rarely) and often the work place. I’m a mom, so my focus is often going to be on my family and how life is for a mom of two, with a husband in college.

I’m also in my late 30’s and that has a lot do with my perspective on things. I’m a grown-up. I’m often tired… frequently cranky…. and quite certainly not a merry beam of sunshine about many things going on in the world. That said, I’m also a pessimistic optimist and a lover of good food and good writing. I write as I talk and it may not be correct from a grammar-standpoint. My urge is to have my voice out here, heard, if even by only a small few readers.

I’m here to blog life from my perspective. Maybe someday, a social historian will peruse my ramblings and gain some insight. Maybe not.

On to the next bit: the midgets. My oldest eats like a bird. My youngest eats more than my oldest. Doesn’t this sound like the set-up for a joke? No. Seriously. The baby eats an incredible amount, promptly converting it into ever-expanding child. The older one just fights about food, all in an effort to find something in his world that he can control. I sympathize. I’d like to find something, anything really, that I have control over.

I watch Brennan, my oldest son, fight to keep things the way he wants them. It’s hard to burst a five year-old’s bubble, but life isn’t like that. I’m trying to help him stay a kid as long as possible, but sometimes my grown-up angst threatens to take over. I want to tell him that life isn’t fair and we don’t always get what we want. Ok. So maybe I do tell him that last bit. We DON’T get what we want, frequently. I risk him becoming a completely spoiled brat if I don’t get that message through.

But he doesn’t need to know right now that life can be crummy and unfair. Instead, he has the magic of the tooth fairy and Santa Claus. He’s got his imaginary friend, ET. He’s got his huggy toys and his vivid, complex imagination, where no one has told him that aliens don’t really exist or that little boys can’t play baseball on Mars.

The truth will come up all too soon. I just hope he keeps a bit of that magic, that storyteller spirit, alive and well. I guess that is my assignment as General Mom, to act as protector of childhood.

My last piece of this title is Zombies. Why? Simple. I just read: World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, by Max Brooks.

It falls into the category of horror, but I’d be more tempted to call it sociological fiction… military fiction…. I don’t know. It’s a mix. Realistic, but pushing the boundaries. Scary, but couched in terms that make it easier to accept the events as the author lays them out.

I truly didn’t think it was a horror read. At least, I didn’t until the inability to sleep accelerated the last two nights. I’d love to blame it on the food I ate just before bed, but I’m more certain that it was the insidious fear that the book built up, one realistic layer at a time.

What is it? The book is a collection of “interviews” with people who went through a specific period of time, known as the Zombie Wars. I don’t want to give away more than this, but the interviews are done in a convincing way, giving vivid differing perspectives on what “happened.” I was drawn in to it. It was worse than that…. I was pulled in and held captive. Max Brooks maintained a consistency to his intensity that was amazing. Military, leaders, average people…. They were all included.

Check it out. If you’re one of my local friends, I’ve got my copy and I’m willing to loan it out. I won’t say it’s a fast read, but it will be hard to put down.

Just beware… I wasn’t scared reading it, but 3am, when the world is quiet and noises in the night are a bit more startling? That’s when it creeps into your mind. Try not to ask yourself, what would I do? Where would I go? How would I protect my family?

And that’s it for my first foray into the world of WordPress…

Moonfire.