Home Plans

I have a bit of an odd stress reliever. When I'm bored or frustrated or stressed, I look at home plans or home listings. I come by it honestly. My mother, although she's never dreamed of building a home, continually brings home blueprints books. You see them in the grocery store or hardware box store. They contain blueprint after blueprint which are available for sale. Neither of us will ever buy a blueprint. But I love to look at those plans.

Jeff used to get frustrated with me that I always took home an Iowa Realty listing from the store. I'd even grab apartment guides. When we finally bought the house I think he assumed that it would be over. That I'd stop looking. What he didn't understand was that it wasn't the buying I was interested in. It was the looking.

Perhaps it is the possibility that I love. I enjoy looking at sites like Realtor.com which offer pictures of houses for sale. I can imagine all the possible ways to make the house my own. This is of course funny because I've done very little to customize our own house. But I'll imagine laying new floors in this one, putting a pool in that backyard, or even just picture my library in one of the rooms. Or I look at the blueprints and imagine what the house would have to look like. What configuration is right for us. Again I'm not really in the market, I just find it soothing.

This week's been a bit odd. I'm just starting to get used to my new nine hour days. Strange that I was easily working 8.5 to 9 hour days before. But now that it's mandatory it's much more draining. So on my lunch hours I've been staying in and looking at houses. I've found a couple in Des Moines that I wouldn't mind owning. I've glanced at homes in Asheville, a city I've become fascinated with. I looked for houses in San Antonio for no reason whatsoever. And in between I've been checking out blueprints on HousePlans.com. I'm much more relaxed and suddenly I'm thinking of fixing up my place. After all, these homes for sale have some good design ideas.

Stressed

{Warning: I'm incredibly whiny and neurotic today. Proceed with caution}

Have you ever had one of those weeks where you wake up with a feeling of impending doom? That's this week for me. Just thinking about the week makes me nervous. This morning I honestly wondered if going back to bed would make it go away. It's not Christmas, although that's stressful enough for some people. It's just the wrong combination of things.

As most of you know I'm not a huge fan of winter. In fact I hate it. I hate the ice and the snow and the cold. I'm starting to get over my fear of driving but I'm still terrified of ice. So of course they are planning for freezing rain all week. Literally starting tonight we are supposed to have freezing rain and snow, pretty much nonstop, until Friday afternoon. I'd be upset about that normally but even more so considering we will be traveling this weekend. I'm supposed to head to St. Louis this coming Friday. Heading out of town in freezing rain and sheet ice is the stuff of nightmares for me. Trigger my weather nerves.

Add to that the fact that I'm helping a friend out with some pet-sitting. I told her I would check in on her puppies each day this week. She has someone coming to take care of them but I need to check in daily. Now I love her dogs but I'm not always good with pet sitting. Much like baby-sitting, taking care of someone else's pet or child is pretty stressful on me. It instantly moves me into stress and worry mode. I am constantly worried that something will happen to them on my watch. After watching me babysit one afternoon, Jeff just smiled and told me it's a good thing we didn't have kids. I'd never sleep. Add that worry to the mix.

Last night I came home to find that my upstairs window sills were wet. Well not just wet, soaked and damaged. Apparently my windows are leaking under all the stress of the snow. There is still well over a foot of snow on some sections of the roof and the gutters are filled with ice. So it is now leaking into the house, either through the attic or through the window seals. I'm hoping it's the seals, less worry for mold. The sills are destroyed and now I'm worried that it has moved into the walls. Repair is going to be costly. I'm hoping the association will cover some of it, but I'm worried that it might cause other problems.

Oh and add the fact that I have three people I haven't bought for, a Secret Santa I just picked up on Friday, and you can consider me one walking pile of nerves. I'm a worrier to begin with but I think things are starting to stack up on me. Weather, pet-sitting, home repairs, shopping, and slippery travel. Should be a fun week.

{Sorry all. I probably shouldn't be writing this today. I know I've got it pretty good and that I'm whining needlessly. It was just weighing on my mind.}

Hiking, Beauty, and Shock

This weekend has been a rollercoaster of emotions. Stress was the name of the game on Friday. I had a project for work that I had been working on slowly for an outside client. Outside requests always end up being back-burner requests to staff requests and I hadn't had a lot of time for this one. So I was shocked when Friday morning I got an email from the requester saying that they needed an answer that day. I bought myself a pop upstairs and buckled down. I have to admit I was sweating it. But I was able to get it done. Just in time to go home and set up for my bridge party. The party at least went well. But the last minute cleaning was stressful. 

Saturday was perfect. One of those days in October that you can't believe aren't early September. The weather was beautiful and I decided that we simply couldn't stay inside. I conned Jeff into going hiking with me. Right before we were heading out the door my older sister called to see if we wanted to go hiking. We ended up meeting at Saylorville Reservoir, after some mild road issues, and walked through the mud and woods in what turned out to be one of the more enjoyable hiking treks I've taken in a while. We crossed brush filled ravines, sinking sands, and scaled bluffs. We topped it all off with margaritas and mexican food for lunch. A perfect day. 

Sunday was a great day until about half an hour ago. We had a late breakfast at IHOP, and then settled into some serious World of Warcraft playing. The wind howled outside, gusting to up to 50 miles and hour. It even took out some power lines. But we played, for most of the afternoon and I finally hit 70. The magical level that is as high as I can go. I can now start instancing with the rest of the guild. 

After I reached eye strain I did laundry, cleaned the house, and went through the forty or so magazines that I needed to weed through. I looked through travel magazines and pulled out pages of places I wanted to go. I pulled out pictures that intrigued me. And I pulled out articles that I will (at some point) read. And as I was going through I noticed a strange humming sound coming from outside my window. I looked outside to find an ambulance parked at my neighbor's house down the way. I thought about going out and then figured I would just be in the way. But my neighbor Jeanne called me, shortly after. 

I guess one of my neighbors killed herself this weekend. I'm in utter shock. Now the woman had been unemployed for a long time, she had suffered an injury that caused her constant pain, and she was dealing with a frustrating lawsuit that she filed. So I'm not sure why I'm shocked but I am. And now I can't help but think that I could have done something. This is not a neighbor I was friendly with but perhaps something would have helped. I've been blessed in my life with a feeling that nothing (that I've encountered so far) could make me want to commit suicide. It seems like such a permanent solution to temporary problems. But then again I've been blessed. And I don't really know how to deal with this. I'm shocked and saddened and in some ways a little guilty. I just can't shake the feeling that I had this great weekend (even with the news that I didn't get two of the jobs I applied for) but she had a terrible one. One that caused her to take a step that can't be undone. I'm blessed is all that I can think. I'm blessed with an incredible husband, a wonderful family, great friends, and my health. This is a reminder for me, and  hopefully for others, to remember how lucky we can be. Any day alive is far better than....well I don't even want to imagine that. 

Forgetting to breath and handmade pages

This is two blog posts in one because it has been a rough two day stretch for me. I've been forgetting to breath. Not literally but I've been so stressed recently that I have been at people's throats. I also haven't been sleeping which is odd. Normally I close my eyes and am out like a light. Although I used to think I was a deep sleeper until I met Jeff. He literally slept through our smoke alarm one night. 

I finally finished my application for the Minneapolis job but that had been weighing on my mind a lot. I know that it is not due until the beginning of October but I hate job applications enough that they severely stress me out. I have a project at work that is half a month overdue (bad Cat) and a presentation to write that I have to deliver at the end of the month. That is the one that is stressing me out the most. I hate public speaking. When they called asking me if I would do these hour-long sessions I was so flattered that I said yes. Then I actually thought about what they were asking. Now I'm terrified. My least favorite part is that my hands sweat and the moment I am done speaking I will have no idea what I just said. Bleh. 

So to make up for all this negative energy I decided to post some of my favorite pages. The British Library has a segment of their website called Turning the Pages. This beautiful area includes a number of books that have been scanned into the system and allow readers to turn the pages of their favorite books to see the wonderful illustrations or handwritten notes. These are the original works created by the author. My favorite has to be the Alice in Wonderland that is handwritten with little images of Alice and the characters. 

The main site is http://www.bl.uk/onlinegallery/ttp/ttpbooks.html. Be warned, to see the pages you will need to have Shockwave installed on your computer. But the images are worth it. Here is an example of a page, written in Lewis Carroll's handwriting with one of his drawings. I love this kind of thing. Alice in Wonderland is one of my favorite books and it is wonderful to get to see it as Carroll wrote it. 

I have also added a screenshot of the Elizabeth Blackwell's Herbal. This beautiful book includes hand-drawn illustration of plants along with their medicinal uses. The book was published in 1737 and was written to pay off Blackwell's husbands debts and free him from debtors prison. It was unheard of for a woman at that time to write, particularly something of a serious natural text. These are just two examples of the books available for your perusal. I would easily recommend checking out the site. It includes images from Leonardo Di Vinci's notebooks, The Diamond Sutra (the oldest book in the world A.D. 868), the first full atlas (done in the 1500s), and many others. Shockwave is free so that shouldn't stop you. 

Stress

This will be a short post. I have about three or four hours of take-home work that I have been putting off this weekend. So tonight will have to be the night. My brother and his children where in town this weekend so I spent a lot of time playing and relaxing. The younger two and I mountain climbed my parent's hill at their house, the older and I put together an 800+ piece lego set, and we all ate more than I care to admit. We watched olympics and played video games and generally forgot about work. 

Jeff and I got a ton of things done at the house which felt really good. Our towel bar upstairs had ripped out of the wall so we replaced it with two. We put in a new bathroom faucet, replaced both toilet seats, and fixed the upstairs toilet. We also put a new headlight on my car. It felt really good and again I didn't think about work once. 

And now I am a whiny little girl complaining about having left my work for the end of the weekend and how I have hours of things to do. Bear with me. The last four weeks at work have been really tough. I have been staying late most nights and still not catching up. I have two long-term projects that are not getting done and are coming due soon. Add to that the stress of job hunting and then throw in a party I am throwing next weekend that I haven't started and you see why I'm a bit stressed. 

But the worst part of stress for me is what it does to my body. I herniated a disc last May and still have the occasional flair-up. Like when I'm stressed. Right now it feels like my arm is on fire. I wake up stiff and sore each morning with pain radiating down my arm and a hand that's asleep. Not my favorite thing. So I stretch and go to work and pretend that I'm okay. I just have to get through the next couple of weeks. Things will slow down. They have to slow down. Okay whining done. Sorry about that. I'll post something more interesting before the night is over.