Mired in mundanity

So some people have been asking me what I have been doing, keeping myself busy while not at work these days. I wish I could say "I've had projects out the proverbial wazoo," but such is not the case.

Instead, having spent the majority of October visiting family, friends, and then updating my portfolio and resume for job prospects, I spent most of November getting normal life under control, while also helping my wife slam through the final vestiges of the semester, since I had the time to lend a helping hand. We had a lovely Thanksgiving dinner (American, thank you very much), which also became our dinners and/or lunches for the next four days. Enough so that if I don't see another turkey dinner for a while, well, I'm okay with that.

But during the downtime of the holiday weekend, and the last bits and bobs of November, I've started combing through my paper "files" to begin a task I have been dreading since, well, Spring 2003. You see, moving almost always involves some very well-structured packing for the first 13 days, and then the last 48 hours, stuff gets dumped into whatever container you can find, to hopefully be "sorted out" on the other end. The problem with this is that is it VERY similar to the technique used to evacuate from an imminent natural disaster, except with Ivan and Katrina, instead of 13 days, I had 13 hours. Hence, the file situation of the various moves and evacs (at least one EVERY YEAR since 2003, mind you), ended up creating, in this last move, SIX boxes labeled "Rock's Unfiled Papers." Lots of creative stuff, notes to myself, contact info from people to be entered someday into something a bit more electronic, users manuals, receipts, etc., etc.

But there's always that unsettling feeling you get that, instinctively, you at least recall which PILE you left something in, and disturbing those piles may introduce imbalance to The Force. Now, my office is nothing BUT piles, but I finally came to a point where I could not remember WHICH pile I had placed something in. Not having any excuses anymore, and the outside weather not exactly presenting the most inviting place lately, I'm hip-deep in sushi receipts from 2004 and user's manuals from 2001. Groan...

In the meantime, you may notice that I don't have comments enabled. This is intentional, as usually, the comments were always stuck at "0," but still required me to cast an executive, moderating eye towards them from time to time to keep the spambots away. Plus, I'm pretty sure if you are reading this blog, you know of at least a half-dozen ways to get in touch with me to comment, compliment or complain about something I post, so feel free to use those. Some might say "well, that isn't an appropriate way to handle a blog." Okay, then it's not a blog. Let's call it more "notes to myself, of which I'm okay with you reading... as long as you don't hold them against me later." If that happens, I start talking about 100%-safe-yet-grating-on-nerves-BORING stuff like the weather and what I'm eating for lunch, and NO ONE wants that.

On that closing note, have you SEEN the weather forecast for Ottawa in the next 48 hours?!?! ;-)