Category Archives: Rants

Morning — The “Good” Is Debatable

I have been awake since 3:55 AM, when the volume of the radio belonging to the crazy lady downstairs suddenly leapt to the level of Intrusively Loud (Even Had It Been Daytime). I am Not Pleased.

Since then, I have read/examined a new tarot set and drafted a point-form review of it for the next issue of WynterGreene, handled some correspondence, surfed the internet, and thought up many scenarios in which I confront the crazy lady and tell her exactly what living in an apartment means (i.e., regular living noise during the day is not “a lot of noise”, and loud noises between ten-ish and seven-ish are Not Allowed and Very Inconsiderate). In all of these scenarios she sees the error of her ways, apologises in tears for her behaviour, and moves immediately.

Sigh. I am going to be one very cranky girl later today, what with the truncated sleep and annoyance with the cause. This is bad, as Liam is home today and there is a ritual here tonight (yay, Spring!). (The aforementioned ritual is thankfully not led by me, which is a good thing because I will be in no state to do something like that by tonight.)

Because Today Is All About One Step Forward, Many Steps Back

I nailed the damn bouree last night. Twice, in fact. Then I blundered in the hornpipe, which is attacca directly after it. Sigh.

Most of my Haydn is better. The trouble passages aren’t as troublesome, except when they are. (No, there’s actually meaning to that. I’ve improved to the point that the really hardest bits sound worse because everything around them isn’t a complete disaster.) And if I could just get past the damn mental block about playing A flats things would be very much better.

This has been a very trying day so far. The boy is off the rails, I woke up on the wrong side of the bed, and things just keep going wrong (the cats weren’t fed before HRH came to bed last night so they woke Liam and I up early, Liam didn’t want breakfast, he was dressed and put in the car without having a diaper change before we left so we had to turn around and come back, and so forth). I got to deposit my latest cheque from the publisher (and yay for that), but the grocery store was crowded beyond belief. Also, that grocery store has taken to locking the gate that allows wheelchairs and strollers through, because people were walking out with carts. This left another woman with a stroller and I standing outside in frustration. We flagged down a store employee as he left and he told us to go ask at the front desk. “We can’t get in to do that,” I said, “because we can’t leave our children out here.” He went back inside to fetch someone with a key, looking mildly annoyed because it wasn’t his job. Time to rethink the brilliant client-defeating strategy, people. If it had taken any longer I would have turned around and gone to another store, one that I know I can get into with a stroller, except I couldn’t face the thought of wrestling the boy in/out/into the car again.

It took the boy forty-five minutes to fall asleep for this afternoon’s nap. I’m ready to… I don’t know what I’m ready to do. I should try to squeeze work into the next hour, but I think I may practice instead, except that will frustrate me too. I wish I could just play something pretty without working at it. My computer refuses to recognise any blank CD I put into it to record a practice CD to listen to in the car, so that project I’ve been working on for the past hour is on hold too. It’s just that kind of day, you know? Nibbled to death by ducks.

Prayer of Thanks

Dear God/dess/all aspects of the Divine:

Thank you for bringing Janice into my life. If you hadn’t, she wouldn’t be talking me down from a metaphorical ledge where I’m currently standing with an equally metaphorical semi-automatic, and there would be a lot of unhappy people dealing with fallout. Someone just broke one of my cardinal professional rules, you see, and I’m livid.

Patience. I must have patience. I have to, in order to maintain sanity until the person I must speak with about this Issue is back in the office next Monday.

So I just thought I’d say thanks.

Love,

Me.

From Argh to Grr

The day has officially passed Argh and is well into Grr now.

I left my purse at daycare, and only realised it when I got home. And now no one is there to open it for me.

So, just in case that’s not clear: No wallet, no glasses. This means no driving. Ergo, no orchestra tonight.

*tears hair*

After all my psyching up for it, too.

I am such an idiot. The good thing is that having done it I won’t do it again soon, because I’ll be hyper-aware of my bag now. It’s just so small and light that I don’t notice it when I’m loaded with boy and gear.

Gnash, gnash.

Argh!

Oh, bloody hell —

There’s a fairy-tale Swan Sister book already. Not my story, thank goodness, but the title. Bah. (Also a non-fairy tale book, but this disturbs me less.)

Yes, yes, I know there are hundreds of books that share similar or identical titles with one another out there. But when one believes one has come up with a perfect title, and discovers that someone else already did, it somewhat takes the wind out of one’s sails. And I know perfectly well that a working title has nothing to do with the final title, more often than not. Still: argh.

Grant Me Patience

For the second day in a row our water has been turned off. I couldn’t give Liam a bath again. I have piles of today’s dishes by the sink. I’d planned to do Liam’s laundry tonight. If we need to go to the bathroom we’ll have to knock on the neighbours’ door. Why? Because the downstairs neighbour tried to use her washing machine last night, knowing that the connection was jerry-rigged yesterday to temporarily stop the leak that had been going on for some time. (But whenever a puddle would appear in our garage, it was, “No, nothing’s wrong in my apartment”. Why she chose New Year’s Eve to call the landlord and tell him about this ongoing problem, I will never know.) The jerry-rigged plug was jarred loose, and there’s water all over the garage floor again. HRH checked it, and sure enough, using the washer had broken the temporary seal and water was leaking once more. The only way to stop it was to turn off the main water. The landlord’s back and trying to fix it now.

She also left the washing machine on all night. It was jammed, and the humming was so loud it was vibrating our floor. It’s a miracle that she didn’t burn out the motor. (If she had, it might have solved a lot of problems.)

I know she’s not all there, and I have had great tolerance. But my patience is really, really running out.

On the other hand, I had a lovely day out, having lunch with Roo and tea with Prospero’s Daughter. Also, the microphone for my minidisc player arrived, so I can experiment with that now.

LATER: We have water again. The leak has been fixed. Her washer has been unplugged and she has been explicitly forbidden to use it until a repairperson has looked at it.