Hemlock B Bootsalotta

This year for NYE I decided what I most wanted to do was a quiet night at home with a few beers and a couple of old movies. 2017 was a year of long hard slog for me, and although the work is getting me where I need to go it has left me pretty tapped out.

So that's what I did. BC and D joined me on the couch and we ate nachos and watched Casablanca and Arsenic and Old Lace until shortly before midnight.

If I have a resolution for 2018 it's to get off my ass more. Writing is a hobby that has helped me tap into the need to be creative, but I think I need a hobby that helps me blow off steam as well. I spent almost all of the last year sitting at a desk and I'm really starting to feel the physical impact of that. So more movement would be a good resolution to keep.

Other than that, I know better than to try and make plans. Because who the fuck knows what's going to happen next.

I keep meaning to post an update and then I never do. In part I think because not much seems to change week-to-week. Work kicks my ass, I go home exhausted, I try to deal with house & bills on the weekends. Lather, rinse, repeat.

This round of house-purging is almost done, fi-fucking-nally. It would be a lot faster and neater if I were capable of just looking at something and saying, "Nope, we don't need it" and throwing/giving it away. Instead it's like peeling an onion, getting rid of objects in gradual stages. Only in real life when I am confronted by an onion I just cut it in half and rip off the whole outer layer in two goes, and in the metaphor I'm restricted to taking off one skin at a time and I need recuperation periods in between. So never mind, it's nothing at all like actually peeling an onion.

Don't mind me. I have a particularly exhausting version of a cold virus and my Evil Overlords insisted everybody come start work at 8AM today so they can close the office early. There's some kind of big holiday coming up or something. Joke's on them; I'm so tired already that even that minor sleep disruption has left me so fogged and scattered I'm practically useless.

So far the living arrangements look like they might work out okay, given that we are going through the inevitable amount of knocking against each others' rough edges in such a small house. D's cats are happy with all the extra space and attention, and we all know that's the outcome that really counts. one of them in particular has decided that Axel is his second-favourite human in the world and has taken to following him around and sleeping on his desk. This makes Axel very happy because he is officially a Big Goober around animals.

Another 70 minutes and I can get the hell out of here.

See you on the flip side.

The Environment Canada site says it's currently -33 C with the wind chill. That's up five degrees from where it was this morning, but once you get below -20 I'm not sure it makes any difference.

I can usually deal pretty well with cold, but I'm running into problems with getting around because every surface is covered in ice. Getting into work requires inching along the sidewalk for the three-block walk from the bus stop. Which of course means I'm outside for ten times as long, and not able to move fast enough to keep warm. Bitching about the winter for me means bitching about the fact that apparently nobody in Toronto believes people ever walk anywhere.

Last week I finally got my vestibular testing done. Which apparently meant moving my head around with electrodes all over my face and inside my ears while various noises and substances were piped into my head. Not the most unpleasant medical test I've ever had, but right up there on the odd scale. I think I may have been thrown a bit by the fact that the ENT called it a "balance" test and I was never required at any point to do any actual balancing.

I looked back at my old entries to see if I had made any resolutions last year and the post I made a year ago just broke my heart. I was so optimistic. And what a shitbomb of a year it turned out to be.

I'm not making any fucking resolutions this year, so whatever. It's January. Moving on.

1 The goal is to drink while you write and write while you’re drunk. Drink as much as you want, write as much as you want, but be responsible and be safe.

2 NaDruWriNi is not just for bloggers. Use this as a writing exercise to free yourself of inhibitions. Write in a Moleskin. Write in a spiral notebook. Write on a bar napkin if you must. Just write.

3 If you do have a blog, post to your site. Encourage others to participate.

4 Gatherings of participants are encouraged. Post gathering info in the comments below.

5 You must tell us what you are drinking.

6 You must NOT edit anything you have written. Part of the fun of NaDruWriNi is the Freudian slips. Also, if you write by paper, post a picture of your writing to your site or to Flickr using the tag “nadruwrini2011″ so we can see your awful penmanship.

7 Make a button or steal this one.

8. Have fun.

I started writing a big long post about how my resolutions worked out but sod it. Suffice to say that parts of 2011 were hard but that life is getting better all the time.

Here's to 2012. May it bring you all the things you need and more than a fair share of the things you want.

Finished the year coughing my lungs up but in the company of some truly awesome people.

That pretty much sums up my 2009 in one sentence.

( grading my resolutions )

I'd give myself a 7.5.

On my way out of work yesterday afternoon, one of the women there called out to me, "Don't drink too much!"

I barked back at her, "Are you nuts? This is the first New Year's Eve I've had off since I started working here! Of course I'm going to drink too much!"

Mission successful, I'd say.

Woke up without a headache, but my farging back is killing me. Go fig. Chiro appointment on Monday, and since taking time off from the gym obviously isn't helping matters any, I'm going to go back to flogging myself this week. I should probably dig through my boxes and find my beginners yoga book too, since I'm getting to the point of being almost too stiff to tie my own shoes.

2005 will be the year of Change. I know this because the end of 2004 has consisted mostly of Getting Ready For Change - quit one job, getting my shit ready to quit the other one. Spent some time moving things around in my house. Spent some time moving things around in my head.

I remember reading once about a language in which the passage of time was referred in terms of walking backwards. Because we can only see where we've been. That image always sticks in my head.

At certain times, I think I can sneak a peek over my shoulder.