Birthday! Also writing retreat!

Paul's parents took us out to dinner on Friday night at a Japanese steakhouse in Greensburg. It was a good time. We went to their house afterwards for cake, and Rob gave Paul and I our presents. Paul got a White Wolf book, I got a musical dvd set including The Music Man, Meet me in St. Lois, and Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. We also got cards with checks inside from Paul's parents.

After dinner, we went to Keystone State Park for the WorD writing retreat. I edited two stories that I'd put through the group, and finished two new stories. I feel like I did pretty well. We had a cabin to ourselves, which was nice. On Saturday night Paul ran a Savage Worlds game, and that was a lot of fun for everyone involved, I think. Mom, Dad, Ian, Betsy, and Lance called to wish me a Happy Birthday. Matt called on Sunday.

Tomorrow is my first day at my new job. I'm a little nervous.

It's Paul's Birthday!!

Happy birthday, honey!

In other news, I learned a new massage modality this weekend. Lomi Lomi is very cool. I also ordered some Hawaiian music to play while I work.

I'm going to be Betsy's maid of honor! I tried to wait for her to post about the getting married, but I got impatient.

Trail of Indiscretion #8 is out! And it features me! Check it out! Their website is new and a work in progress, but at least you can see the cover. They're going to be at the Pittsburgh Comicon this weekend selling copies. If you are in the area and don't have any other plans, you should check it out. It's out in Monroeville.

Paul and I watched Juno last night. It's very cute, and the soundtrack is cool. I bought it in mp3 format from amazon. Yay instant gratification! We also picked up Cloverfield at Borders, along with the first season of This American Life and Maverick.

My wallet is missing. I'm pretty sure I lost it and it might turn up when I stop looking. It's very frustrating.

But hey, it's Paul's birthday! We're meeting my grandma for dinner tonight at Smokey Bones and we're meeting Paul's parents on Friday night at a Japanese steak house in Greensburg on our way to the writing retreat.

Eli Stone

The last episode of the first season of Eli Stone aired last night. I don't know if the show has been picked up for another season or not, so it might be the last episode ever. You can watch the whole season on abc.com.

I think everyone should do that. I mean it. I love this show, and if your taste is anything like mine, you'll love it too. There are only thirteen episodes, and the end is pretty damn amazing. It is satisfying as a final note to the show, but it leaves the possibility for more to come.

Eli Stone is a lawyer with a brain aneurysm. He has visions. They often come in the form of a musical number. I love musical numbers. This show makes me laugh and cry and want to sing along. They cast George Michael as God. What more do you want? Go watch it.

New job!!!!!!

Anxiety disorder signs?? WTF? The wedding link made sense. This one is mildly insulting. =P

Anyway... I GOT THE JOB!!!!!!!!

I have to go in tomorrow morning and fill out paperwork for my new job at the Pittsburgh Athletic Association. Here are the awesome things about it. 1. Hourly wage, even if I'm not doing massage. 2. Additional money as commission if I am doing massage. 3. Tips if they're given. 4. BENEFITS 5. 40 hours a week, and time and a half if I work overtime (I think, anyway). 6. Two meals a day provided free. 7. Free access to all of their facilities. They have a pool, a hot tub, and a weight room. 8. Did I mention the hot tub? 9. They provide the cream and the linens. 10. I don't have to answer phones or do laundry. 11. I'll be a member of the union they have there. 12. If I'm not doing massage they won't have busy work for me, so I'll be free to read or take my laptop and write. And get paid for it. 13. Everyone there seems really nice. 14. They won't book me more than 5.5 hours of massage per day, and I will get at least a fifteen minute break between appointments. 15. They are flexible with their scheduling, so getting time off for workshops, GenCon, or my honeymoon won't be a problem.

There is one bad thing--parking in Oakland. The meter will cost me about $4.00 a day, but that's more than balanced out by the free food. And hopefully I'll be starting early enough that finding a spot won't be a hideous nightmare. Anyone with experience parking in Oakland? Advise? I'd be happy to hear it.

Overall, I'm excited.

Presents!!

Paul and I went to the game store in Squirrel Hill today after I got home from school, and he got me some early birthday presents. The big gift he ordered and it should be coming in the mail soon. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles & Other Strangeness--the core book will soon be mine. I also got the Game Shield and Mutants of the Yucatan.

My final present is a Changeling:the Dreaming supplement called Isle of the Mighty. Yay, old game books!

Hindu baby goddess!

She has two faces.

Ad things.

Blogger was all like "Try this out!" so I figured I would. I hope having the word "fuck" in my page title doesn't count as excess profanity. I wasn't sure I wanted to finish signing up for it, but I saw I had a little ad thing on my page already so I figured what the heck. At worst they can reject my application thing, and at best I could make a little money. Probably very little to none at all since there's like three people who read this, but what the heck. The first thing even looked somewhat interesting, but I'm not allowed to click on them.

We'll see what happens. I can always make them go away if I decide I hateses them.

Killer squirrels!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4489792.stm

First Day at Massage Envy

It went pretty well, but it was exhausting. I figure once every two weeks sounds about right for the job.

I got there and had three massages before my orientation. O_o A little shaky of a start, but everyone was nice and helpful and I had five massages that all went well. Really, as first days go, this one was pretty painless.

Of course I forgot my lunch at home and didn't eat anything all day and when I did finally get dinner I ate too much and now feel dreadful. Two nights in a row. I need to learn a lesson, here. -_- Stupid hunger making me eat too much and then feel sick.

Communication gaps

I got home last night and wanted to fire off an angry blog post. I didn't, and I'm glad of it. I went to bed and I woke up feeling pretty damn good. At least a quarter of my grar last night was probably caused by going from not having eaten any real food for 12 hours to eating too much food and feeling pretty physically crappy both ways.

Even though I'm past being pissed of, though, I still wanted to talk something out.

I have no idea how to politely tell people when they've crossed a line and stopped being funny and started being offensive. I tried last night, and obviously I failed because I came home feeling very hurt, offended, and angry. And I know that my friends didn't mean to make me feel that way.

Maybe I'm too thin skinned. Maybe I my sense of humor is lacking. I don't know. What I do know is that I don't appreciate sex jokes about massage. Maybe it's because my friends know me more as a writer and don't know how important massage is to me.

Well, it's important. I've spent more than 1000 hours in class over the past year and a half studying massage. And I think it is a very sacred, very wonderful thing. It's not sexual, and implying it is plays into a horrible stereotype that massage therapists have been working for years to counter. Between masseuse being a synonym for prostitute in the phone book to terms like erotic massage, body shampooing, and happy endings, it's hard to get respect as a massage therapist. In my work I make people's lives better. If you want a list of all of the positive medical benefits of massage, google it.

If you think I'm pretentious for wanting respect for a career that I have worked my ass off for... well, you can fuck off. Last night I tried to stop people from crossing lines, and it didn't work. When the lines were crossed, I backed down. I was too tired to shout or defend myself and I didn't know how to say "You're offending me now," without it sounding pretentious and defensive. Maybe I should have just said it. I might have gotten honest apologies. But then, I might not have, too, and I don't know if I could have dealt with that last night. So maybe I did the right thing after all.

I'm not sure if posting this is the right thing to do, but I do feel better with that off my chest.

Tax panic update

When my mother faxed my W2s and missed one, at first I thought that was a pretty bad thing. However, it is in fact a fucking tax miracle. I don't know how well it's going to work out, but I just emailed the tax people the business expenses that I incurred in 2007 and have ready receipts saved in my email that I can send them if necessary. If they even manage to deduct half of the stuff I sent them it cuts my taxes in half. If they deduct all of it, the government might actually owe me a little bit. Even if it doesn't work, at least I feel better because I did SOMETHING about it. Helpless and impotent isn't a happy way to be.

Also, yesterday in class my teacher noticed how terrible I looked and excused me from working on anyone. So I got to watch the side lying techniques and then get a very much needed massage from Nicole, who is awesome. Julia, the teacher, is awesome as well.

In more cheerful news (at least for me)

Paul's workplace has been invaded by geese. Nothing can be done to remove the feathered menaces because they're protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. Just in case anyone out there needs to know, here are the tips they gave him should he be confronted by an aggressive goose.

1. Maintain direct eye contact with the animal and face toward it.

2. If the goose acts aggressively, calmly and slowly back away.

3. Maintain a neutral demeanor, do not act hostile or show fear.

4. Never turn your back on an aggressive goose.

5. If a goose flies toward your face duck and move at a right angle to the direction of flight while maintaining your front toward the goose.

It made me laugh, which was a bit of a feat considering how I was feeling for most of today. Eli Stone was on tonight, that helped too.

Damn, damn, damn.

I really don't feel like being alone right now. I'm upset about my taxes. I owe more than I make in a month. Between the trust and the fact that I'm "self-employed" as an independent contractor and Veronica not taking taxes out of my paycheck, it just fucking sucks. I mean, I was expecting it to be bad. But not this bad. And it's going to end up being even worse because my mom missed one of my W2s when she was faxing stuff to the tax people so they have to redo them with me earning almost $5,000 more over the course of the year which will probably drive my amount due up even higher.

I really don't know what I'm going to do.

I need a hug.

PodCastle!

PodCastle had their debut today. The first story is by Peter S. Beagle. I love him. I mean, he wrote The Last Unicorn. He wins. It's an older story, but I hadn't read it and listening it to it was quite nice.

Subscribe! It's easy and you can find it on iTunes. Speculative fiction podcasts are awesome.