yuuago | Entries tagged with driving

+ Washed my car. I really should do it more often. It doesn't take that much time to do, and honestly, even just spraying it down makes it come out pretty good. It's kind of a rustbucket, so I guess there is a part of me that thinks "Eh, what's the point?" when it comes to washing it, but... thee dirt was getting pretty ridiculous, and I should at least make sure the windows are clean. We've got a couple of muddy months to go.

+ Took some extra books to the nearest Little Library. Two of the books that I took there last time, over a month ago, are still there. Disappointing; it's much nicer when someone picks them up. Oh, well. Maybe once more of the snow is gone things will circulate more.

+ Took myself out for sushi because I was craving sushi. It's not something that I would want to make a habit of, but I'm glad I indulged it. I had wanted nigiri for some reason, even though it's not my usual choice, so I got one of their variety deals. Now I've probably had enough of it to satisfy myself for a while.

+ Worked on Norwegian a little. And by that I mean I tried to do some reading. It's... challenging, like walking through knee-high snow. I have this one novel in Norwegian, and I tried reading the first page. It was kind of challenging; I got the gist but there were a lot of words I don't know. I think I might start a project where I read through just a page, and write down the words that I don't know in a notebook. That might help.

+ There have been times when I thought that my interest in Norwegian was primarily fuelled by my fondness for the Hetalia character, but I think now I can safely say that this isn't the case. I just really like it. The sentence structure, the way the words sound. It's nice. It's really nice.

+ I spent some time today not feeling great. I think the depression is getting to me again. I'm just not feeling very good. Kind of listless and, like, it's hard to find motivation to do anything. All the things that I have to do still get done, but it's hard to find, like, joy. Spark. That kind of thing.

+ Yesterday it snowed. I was slipping and sliding all over the place in the slush. Today was my tire change appointment, of course. I dropped the car off at quarter to 9, was told that my work would be done by 12:30, but it wasn't actually done until 4. It's good that I didn't have any thing pressing scheduled for today, but I will admit that I'm kind of annoyed. They also charged me an arm and a leg, but I went through the invoice and it seems like they did everything that I asked for, so I guess prices have just gone up. Bummer, but nothing to be done about it.

+ Met up with Bea for coffee. That was nice. She mentioned that the Pride YMM general meeting is coming up. The more I think about it, the more I think I won't be able to make it. Like, it'll be my third day of work at my new job, and then the AGM at 6, and then judo after the AGM. I can't do all of that. ...So I sent in a proxy vote and will be skipping the meeting. I really wish I could make it, but uh, no.

+ ...Anyway, Bea is doing good. She's writing and stuff and it sounds like she's having a good time with it. I was kind of tempted to ask if she wants to do some writing meetups (like, NaNo but not NaNo) but I think I'm better off not scheduling anything in November. Ah, well.

+ I bought some new winter boots and am having buyer's remorse. Or rather, I'm not sure if these will be good enough for what I plan to use them for. If I were driving to work, they would be fine, but I'll have to take the bus, and I think these might not be grippy enough (nor sturdy enough) for the job in a Fort Mac winter. Luckily, I can take them back I think, but urgh. Will have to take a look at the receipt and see what the policy is. I'm somewhat disappointed that I won't be able to drive to work, but considering the location, it makes a lot of sense. I'm not looking forward to spending so much time in the cold, but at least I don't have any transfers.

+ I've been really busy. I need to slow down, but it's hard. There's so much to do, and so much that I want to do, and not enough time in the day to do all of it.

+ I kind of want to try using a planner next year. There are so many pretty ones out there. But I don't know if it would fit into my workflow. I guess I could always pick one up and see. I remember that when I was in university, I used one for a while, and it worked out all right. I think... it didn't have set calendar dates; you wrote them in. So even if I forgot to write things out for a week, I could still use it. Maybe I should try to find something like that.

+ Washed my car the other day. I really should do it more often. They salt the roads here, and the salt isn't good for the paint. It isn't a chore that I enjoy, but it's something that I should do, and it doesn't really take that much time to do it... I guess I should get into the habit. Maybe if I get one of those spray thingies - the one where the soap goes into a container attached to the hose - it'll be easier to motivate myself to do it than it is when I have to hand-wash it.

+ Went for coffee with Bea yesterday. She was up in my part of town, so, why not. It went well enough. I was super tired, though; not sure how good I was at the conversation. We might get together some time in the next week or so to watch AMC's Interview with the Vampire.

+ I thought the time change hadn't affected me, but damn, am I ever tired.

+ Was sick last week; had to skip Wednesday's judo. I'm feeling pretty okay now though, so it'll be judo tonight I think. Kind of sniffly, but I think that's because I was talking with mom about jobsearching - feeling kind of stressed.

+ Worked on a fic a little on Saturday. I feel so goddamn rusty. I really should just pencil in a specific time to write and then just do it; this fic won't get finished otherwise. I do want to get it done, even if I decide not to post it anywhere.

I had to take my car in for service. It's been making some weird noise; we suspect it's a minor thing, but I wanted to get it checked out for sure, since it doesn't seem like something I can fix myself. Mom says I should consider getting a newer vehicle some time soon (ish), but honestly, I don't have the time or the patience to shop around, ugh.

Last night, I smacked my foot while getting into the tub, and now one of my toes is very purple. So, I'm going to try not to aggravate it too much for a few days; it hurts pretty bad. That means not taking my daily walk, which is an absolute piss-off. I might be able to do some other exercises, but frankly I don't like those much, and I'd rather just... be able to walk without being in pain. Fuck me.

[Edit]
It looked even worse later on. I'm starting to wonder if that toe might be broken. But there's not much you can do in that kind of situation, so the current plan of action is to tape it, ice it, and try to stay off it as much as possible. UGH, this is so annoying.
[/Edit]

And also work is still busy, and I feel very tired.

This entry is just one big whine, but that's pretty much how I feel right now.

So, the day of my appointment to get my snow tires switched for regular, we get a bunch of snow dumped on us. Ahhhh, northern Alberta. Business as usual.

Sigh, I'll keep that appointment - probably all this stuff will melt pretty quick, we won't need to deal with ice - but I really wish that this particular trivial problem wasn't one I had to deal with. It would be nice to not have snow in May.

☆ Wishing a blessed solstice to everyone, etc etc etc. I forgot all about it until this evening, per usual. (I'd probably remember these dates better if I were more plugged in to the pagan community, but that is... a subject for another day.) Anyway, I'm very much looking forward to the return of the sun, even if it's going to be rather, uh, incremental.

☆ My car was experiencing some issues, so I took it in. Surprise, it's going to require some costly repair! And another battery change. I wish I could say I'm shocked, but my car is ~~a hunk of junk~~ the kind of vehicle that would probably do perfectly fine somewhere warm like, I dunno, Calgary, but really doesn't handle our extreme weather very well.

☆ No response from my beta reader on that FTH fic. Starting to wonder if they haven't been checking that particular email. I'm beginning to feel the desire to just throw the thing on Ao3 and then edit it later if they ever do respond.

☆ I feel like my tumblr dash is conspiring to make me watch Columbo. Except it's just Tik posting a lot of it, so it's a one-man plot. If I had more time, he would have succeeded. ;V

☆ Just saw the trailer for The Tragedy of Macbeth. I had not heard about this until now! I'm super interested! It looks really artsy.

[/pinches the bridge of his nose]

Received my car insurance renewal notice. It did go up by quite a bit - but not as much as I feared, so there is that. Going to have to make a note to pay it on Saturday so I can put all this BS behind me.

Have to work this weekend again. I'd really rather not, but it's not like I don't need the money (ugh), and I do have things that I need to do that I don't want to fall behind on, so... there is that.

Plus, it's supposed to rain this weekend, and - well, what with not being able to go to the library due to the restrictions, and bad weather keeping me indoors, there's no point in not working, really.

+ Finally took my car downtown to get the summer tires put on, but... we're predicted to get snow? Ah, well, you know what they say - until Victoria Day is over, anything can happen. ;p (Well, maybe "they" don't say that, but my family makes sure to never plant anything until after that date, since we can still get frost at the very least.)

+ Eurovision first semifinal! Hooray! I was able to watch/listen to it while I worked. Happy that Lithuania and Ukraine made it through; disappointed that Croatia didn't make it. Said "I kind of hope that Norway goes to the final - for the lols", and huzzah, they did! I suspect that the people who voted for them were thinking the same thing. xD

+ Did canon review for my Multifandom Drabble assignment. Very excited about this! Now if I could just... get my brain to settle down long enough to sit and write something.... (Oh no.)

I got a call from the police last night. Since the person whose car I dented is making a claim over $2000, I needed to fill out a police report.

I'd been kind of dreading this, but the officer I spoke to was very polite and straightforward, and she sent me a form to fill out digitally, so I didn't have to go to the station.

Today I told my mom about the whole thing, because it was eating away at me and I needed to talk to somebody about it. Honestly, I was more scared about telling my parents than I was about getting a call from the cops. Which probably says something about my relationship with my parents. But she was very understanding about this, and reassured me that this kind of stuff happens all the time. This kind of stuff has happened to her, and my dad, and my brother, and yeah it's a bummer that my insurance is going to go up but that's how it goes, and "No, you're not going to lose your license and have to get a bicycle so you can get around".

Anyway, I feel a lot better now. I mean, I still feel kind of unsettled and stressed, not to mention incredibly embarrassed, but I don't feel like I'm going to have a heart attack or like I'll keel over and die or anything.

I'm definitely going to make sure to not park anywhere near anybody else for quite a while, though....

Got into a fender bender in the dollar store parking lot on the 21st. Or not even. We were both parked, I opened my car door, it left a dent in the car next to me.

We exchanged insurance etc but man, it wasn't a good day. The lady whose car I dented was pretty mad.

Now [April 26] I got a call about the insurance claim. And my brain is catastrophizing over this. Oh, anxiety, oh you.

This kind of thing happens all the time, and it's frustrating and embarrassing and yeah, my insurance is going to go up. But it isn't the end of the world.

Mind you, I personally wouldn't have filed for something like a dent in a car door, but I guess it takes all kinds....

Regardless of what happens here, I'll manage. It'll be fine! In the meantime, I just feel kind of like there's someone over my shoulder freaking out (my malfunctioning brain), while I'm sitting here feeling weirdly zen about it.

Three things make a post:

☆ Snapped off one of the prongs on my block heater's plug this evening while I was unplugging it from the extension cord. Oh boy. And it's probably going to be close to -30C tomorrow, too. Again. Dad says it'll be easy to fix/replace this, which... I hope so, because when it's this damn cold, I really would rather not have to replace the block heater. And I rather like being able to start my car, and all that. ;V

☆

cookbook_challenge is a neat little comm. If you have a recipe that you bookmarked ages ago and never got around to trying out, the goal is to... get around to trying it out. I have a ton that have been on the backburner, so maybe this'll give me incentive to actually get around to trying them.

☆ First impression of Gideon the Ninth: 50 pages in, I'm still not sure if I'll love it or hate it, but I find it engrossing so far, so there is that. It's gloomy and flippant at the same time, and I'm not sure how to feel about it! Mad props to whoever designed the physical hardcover book - the pages are black-edged and it's incredibly striking.

The flood water has gone down, and most of the areas that were under evac order aren't any more. We're still under boil-water order. Post delivery is temporarily suspended, partly because our main post office was under water.

I really should get the snow tires taken off my car. But, y'know, pandemic. And the place that I usually go to for that was downtown, so of course it's closed, though I think it wasn't directly in the flood zone. ...Maybe I should see if my brother can help me do it.

My workplace called me and said that those who want to come in to collect their personal belongings can do that tomorrow. A lot of it is going to need to be thrown out; apparently the water was desk-height in there. Looks like I'm going to need to buy new office shoes when I'm back at work (whenever that will be). But I had some things in cabinets that will probably be fine to bring home.

My parents went to their cabin in Athabasca for the weekend. I can't say I feel like this is a good idea, but I can also say that it was nice to have some peace and quiet for a change.

Stuff I did over the last few days:
+ Scrubbed inside the dishwasher and cleaned the dishwasher filter. It was absolutely disgusting. Consider this your reminder to do it monthly if you have one.
+ Vacuumed and cleaned the inside of my car, and washed the car mats.
+ Hosed down my car. We don't have any car soap, so I decided just a rinse would have to do, and even that made it look way better, so I'm satisfied.
+ Touched up the paint on my car and fixed some nasty rust spots.
+ Rinsed the patio table and chairs so I can sit out on the deck.
+ Misc chores, cleaning, etc.
+ Started some indoor seedlings for vegetables and flowers for mom's garden. We're doing beets, tomatoes, marigolds, and cosmos. Also have a pack of beans, but those will be able to go straight into the ground later on. It's still too cold to plant anything directly outside yet.
+ Finished my fic for Nordipalooza and did a round of revs. Will still need tweaking, but if I had to post it today, I wouldn't be embarrassed by it.
+ Worked on an auction fic.
+ Blocked a pair of fingerless gloves.
+ Made pancakes for breakfast.

And that's all for now.

Maybe I'll make some muffins after I pick up my stuff tomorrow.

So, my car wouldn't start this morning, and I had to walk to the bus stop.

20 minute walk, it snowed last night, and the morning windchill brought things down to -40C.

Needless to say, I felt pretty murderous. I bought a car specifically so I wouldn't have to do this any more! Argh.

Dad's out of town right now, but he'll be able to look at it tomorrow. The battery is just over a year old, so there shouldn't be anything wrong with it - and yet, this is the second time this winter that it's died. Maybe it's a dud? Or maybe the block heater isn't working properly. Or... something.

Ah, well. I do have a ride for tomorrow (which is going to be just as cold as today), so I'm not worried about it for the moment. Just very, very annoyed. Ugh. In the meantime, I'm going to make myself some hot chocolate and try to warm up.

- My car wouldn't start this morning. Dad had to drive me to work, because it was too cold for me to take the bus (well, I COULD have done it, but it was -40 and we had an extreme cold warning, so...). We managed to boost the car, and it seems to be working now, but crapping out twice in the span of just over a week suggests I might need to replace the battery soon.

+ On the upside, it's supposed to warm up a bit on the weekend!

- I keep looking at my schedule and everything is so busy, I just don't want to do anything at all.

+ I have a ticket to see Frozen II on Sunday, so at least I'm going to do something fun. :D I've seen some vague mixed reviews, but since I've calibrated my expectations pretty well, I don't think I'll be disappointed.

- But if my car craps out again, I might need to walk down to the cinema (which takes about 60 minutes....)

So, that's that.

I'm just very tired in general lately. So, sorry if I haven't been very social. I do read every entry that you all post; I just don't have the brain power to respond most of the time.

Current status on writing projects:
+ SSSS advent calendar: Drafted. Need to fill it in/smooth it out.
+ Hetalia rarepair secret santa: About 60% drafted. A little bit unsure about it. The requests were very broad, but hopefully recip will like it.
+ Everything else: I have 2 things I'm actively working on, 1 thing I haven't touched for a while but do want to work on, and a very old wip that I re-read recently and was like WOW THIS IS GOOD, I SHOULD FINISH IT. All of them will have to be on hold for now. ;p ;p

+ All of the trees for

in_a_peartree have been posted. I'm looking forward to going through them and seeing if I can fill anything. My tree is here.

+ There are 9 more business days until I am on holiday time off. :)

+ I finished drafting my entry for the SSSSForum advent calendar. Not anywhere finished, mind you - I scribbled it in a notebook over the course of a couple of lunch breaks - but at least I have something to work with now. It was a lot easier after I reminded myself that it doesn't need to be the best thing in the world; it just needs to be cute + at least 300 words.

- It was ridiculously cold this morning. And it's been ridiculously dry for days. I want to scratch all of my skin right off, thank you.

- I have to drive my mom around to do a bunch of errands tomorrow, and I really would rather not.

- My car would not start this evening, and the only person who knows where the battery charger is and how to use it will be out of the house until late. :| I can use my mom's vehicle to drive her around tomorrow, but I hate driving it because it's very wide and hard to fit into parking spaces. ...And I really would rather my own vehicle worked. Ugh.

Oh boy, was today ever exhausting.

( Cut for boring RL stuff )

Tl;dr: Today started out crappily, and I had to do a whole lot of calling around and far more running around town than I would have liked, in order to fix something that wasn't my fault. It turned out fine, but I was very annoyed.

This has been far too much Being Responsible for one day. ;) I treated myself to a chai latte, and I am going to do NOTHING for what remains of the day.

☆ Is anybody planning to do Camp NaNo in July? I have some outstanding writing assignments that need work, so I'm definitely doing it. Probably going to aim for a low goal - 5K or so - since that's all that I really need to do. Maybe if others are doing it we could put together a cabin or something.

☆ My scroll wheel is broken and it's the MOST ANNOYING THING EVER.

☆ Whoops, somehow I completely forgot about Solstice, even with people on my tumblr dash posting so much about Kupala Night. WELL... just going to move the celebration to the weekend, then. xD Since I'm so solitary, everything is very low-key, anyhow. (Sometimes I feel like such a fake-ass pagan, but... well. It isn't really a big deal.)

☆ I caved and signed up for

fandomgiftbox. WELL, WHY NOT. Can't bring myself to do exchanges right now, but this event is very low-key, even more so than Multifandom Drabble, so I think I'll be all right.

☆ Keep getting notifications in my car that one of my signal lights will need to be replaced soon. Oh boy. It's still working so far, but obviously I'm going to want to change it before it actually needs to be changed. I've looked up videos of how to do it, and it looks relatively straightforward, just a matter of setting aside time to do it....

☆ Man, the library is so quiet on Friday mornings. It's nice. Cozy. I got SO MUCH writing done today! Very satisfied with that. :)

☆ Looks like we'll probably have another thunderstorm tonight. It sounds like a good time to chill out, listen to classical music, and bake peanut butter cookies. I've been having trouble making myself just relax lately; even my "fun time" has to be scheduled. (It's an ongoing issue.) But if I can't go anywhere, well....

Man, there's nothing quite like the feeling of horror you get when you turn onto the highway and suddenly realize that you forgot to scrape the frost from your side mirrors. Oh boy.

See also: the motherfucker beside you passing at 55KPH when on a 35KPH offramp. Brrrrr.

I can hardly wait until it's warm enough for me to take the bus to work again. :V

☆ It was all drizzly and cold today, ew.

☆ Spent money that I didn't want to spend, couldn't get around it... Who knew that car mats could be so expensive? The dealership sold my car to me without mats in it, and I've been making do with cardboard inserts until now. Won't be able to get away with that soon. But, at least I was able to get this done with minimal fuss - driving downtown is always a pain, but it's not so bad at 9 AM on a Saturday. ;p

☆ Ahh, last night I took the time to run a hot bath, and man, am I ever glad I did. It's been a while since I've been able to do that. Usually I end up having to turn in late and can't indulge in that kind of thing. Or people are bothering me about something-or-other and I can't take the time for it. So, it was nice to just relax with some bubble bath and the radio and think about nothing much.

☆ Inko posted the Ger/Nor drawing that she did for me on her Fanbox~ Voila (You might need to scroll a bit to see the full view version). Not on tumblr yet, but we'll see. Ahh man, I love this drawing so much. :) Need more of this rarepair in my life.

☆ Wrote 2k today, bringing the fic I was working on up to 6k. That's far longer than my fics typically are, so I'm pleased. It's 6k of filth, mind you, but at least it's romantic filth.

☆ Long weekend coming up soon. :) Looking forward to that. I am going to do absolute, glorious nothing.

✿ I've driven my car a grand total of 4 times, and the paint already has chips in it. Fucking hell. AND ALSO a big scrape on the front bumper, but that was entirely my own fault because I pulled up too far and scratched the front of it on the rear of my dad's truck... sigh. Going to have to see about getting touchup paint for that particular bit, at least.

✿ Reading: I finished Part 1 of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and now I've put in an ILL for Part 2. Looking forward to it, though it'll take quite a while for it to get here. The relationship between certain characters was not what I had expected based on my impressions formed from the Red Cliff film, and now I find myself wondering if the full version of the film keeps something closer to the book's dynamic... I had to watch the slice-and-diced version because that was all the library had. Hmm. :Va

✿ Note to self: Get working on that Parallels exchange fic. I have plenty of notes, and I know where the story should go; I just need to write it. (Ideally with plenty of time to throw it at somebody to beta.)

✿ Multifandom Drabble Exchange was lovely! And I received several lovely fics! I'll do a separate post about that later. I think that once Parallels is over, I'll be done with exchanges for the rest of the year, but we'll see.

✿ Received a mail from someone I thought I'd lost contact with... It's nice. :) I'm happy about this. <3 Sometimes people just drop off the map and I find myself wondering whether or not they're doing okay. I feel like if somebody wanted to get hold of me, it'd be pretty easy, but when I'm contacting other people... It's not quite as much. Sometimes.

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yuuago

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Yuu. Fic writer & book lover. M/Canada.
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