I’ve been cycling for three to seven miles nearly every day this week. I’ve also been cleaning my house like a possessed creature [probably just obsessed actually]. Things I’ve done so far:
organised our CDs and books
sorted through my clothes and I have a big bag to give away
dusted everything and vacuumed
cleaned off our dressing table
gone through my knitting stash
done three loads of laundry
changed the sheets and turned a mattress
cleaned and tidied my desk
cleaned my bike lock
cleaned off the piano and glossed it up [and played a bit]
put the table cloth back on the table and tidied up the plants [including relocated the fern to the bathroom where I hope it'll appreciate the steam]
organised the bags of bag [cloth ones for shopping, ones for recycling and ones for reuse]
the mirrors will be polished once Weasel does it, I bargained with her so I could repair her trousers
My house feels so much better! I’ve been so gloomy while winter hung on and now I feel like I have 10x the energy I had before. I’m even thinking I’m ready to decrease my antidepressant this week. I’d been waiting for the time change and then decided to wait for it to warm up a bit.
Weasel, Horatio and Sven are all doing well. Weasel’s energy levels are much improved following a medication adjustment. She got to go out to the a computer museum with a group of friends yesterday and it didn’t seem to affect her very much. Notably, she was telling me about this museum a few weeks ago and during her dialogue she paused so I said, ‘penis’ like a usually do and she continued with her story and said they were going to visit the Museum of Cock Beating. We took it and ran. Its full name is The British Museum of Cock Beating or BMCB. I’ve got Sven lined up to curate the WWI and WWII exhibitions since he is my expert. Horatio’s work is trying to kill him, I get to go and see him next week so hopefully I’ll distract him for a while.
Sven is coming over later today and spending the night! It’ll be our first overnight visit, I’m very excited. I’ve got a lovely dinner planned, salmon marinated in teriyaki, black garlic and spring onion [for Sven and Weasel, not for me]. I’m going to use the marinade as the sauce for a stir-fry [which will have prawns, broccoli florets, more spring onion and shitaki mushrooms].
My birthday was on the 11th, it was awesome. My new monitor is fabulous and I love having two. It has made life much more fun. Weasel’s family were very generous, they gave me a pile of books, a couple of CDs and a Simpsons boxset. My parents surprised me and got me The Complete Calvin & Hobbes. They are very beautiful books. I had a lovely day and meal out with a group of friends up north, I had a lovely evening with my wife on the day [seeing Noises Off it was brilliant and so well done] and I had a wonderful party with my family at the weekend. My 30s continue to be really, really amazing!
My back has finally calmed down from my steroid experiment and I’m steady on 2mg again. I’ll leave it a couple of weeks or so and then I’ll try dropping one day a week.
Library volunteering is still awesome, so is book club, Scrabble club and SimCity. I finally got the photo of Horatio and I from the Gala:
Oh, and I’ve been very obsessed with Radioactive by Imagine Dragons, have a listen:
I am so incredibly happy at the moment. I hope it sticks around.
In other news! My sewing class was wonderful. I managed to finish my shirt in the last class [bar two buttons], I’ve signed up for next term. I have definitely improved and I’m excited to do more. It is so interesting to look over my shirt, I can literally see my skill level increasing as I move through the stages. My teacher said the best thing to do would be another shirt straight away to keep my skills sharp. Since neither Weasel or I wear shirts, I asked Mal if I could make one for her. She said yes; then said she even had a pattern and fabric I could use! So I measured her, got the materials and when class starts again I’ll do that. Meanwhile, I have a pair of trousers I’ve started.
One of the amazing things that happened from this class is that I’ve made friends! We were talking about knitting one day and I asked Rose if she was in a knitting group. She has ME and so struggles to get out of the house, I said I’d come to her and we could knit together. I’ve been once, but then she had a holiday, hopefully I’ll go again this week. We sat, knitted and chatted for three hours and it was brilliant. There’s another woman in our class, Lacy, she is hoping to join us as some point, but she only has two days off each week and it can be a challenging in scheduling. Meanwhile, I’m hoping to have her over to mine to help make me a duct tape dressmakers dummy! I cannot buy one, my top half needs a plus size dummy and my bottom half needs a normal size; the adjustable ones don’t adjust enough. This seems like the perfect solution.
My health has been stable, I dropped to 2mg of steroids on January 18. I’ve been to see my various specialists and everyone is happy with me. So with great confidence, I decided to taper using an alternate 1mg and 2mg dose. Didn’t work. My body freaked out. My ears, nose, teeth, back, hands; everything. I took a 5mg boost twice, resumed 2mg and almost everything calmed down again. My back is still angry. I’m not going any higher though. I really was overly ambitious with that taper schedule, I’ve got to do 1mg per week again [i.e. 1mg on Mondays, 2mg every other day for a month, then drop another day in the week]. This means that even though I thought I might be off the steroids by now, it is more likely to be two years. This has made me question whether getting off steroids really should be a requirement for returning to work, I’ve been using it to keep me in check, I’ll push too hard if I don’t have a limit.
I’ve been at the library fairly constantly as well, not only are the book club and Scrabble club going strong my volunteer gig has started too. I go for two hours every other Thursday. I’m really enjoying it! I get to put away books and organise things. It is awesome. I’ve got to help a few people with things too [using the computers, using the self-check out, finding a book etc.]. I’ve got my book club co-ordinator looking into getting me access to manage the book clubs for our branch too. Really hope that comes to fruition!
SimCity has finally come out, Horatio and I immediately set up a region to play together. We each have two cities, when Weasel saw its awesomeness, she got a copy and she has the fifth city in our region. It had a terrible launch, it buggy as fuck and has some other foibles, but it really is fun! I love the data maps. Playing with my people is really awesome too. If you play at all and fancy playing with me, come find me on Origin, I’m amyezekiel.
All this playing though has made me want a second monitor. Weasel has had two for ages and Horatio recently got one when he bought a new PC. My cities are fairly self-sufficient now, but you have to actually be in a playing for time to pass, so I spend a lot of time just watching. It would be great if I could play on one monitor and browse the internet, watch TV/film or chat with people [Sven!] on the other. So when people wondered what I might like for my birthday, the answer was clear. Weasel has ordered it and a new holder [one pole with two arms] so I can play in style.
I have loads of wonderful things happening for my birthday overall. I’ve visiting Horatio this weekend, he has arranged for a birthday dinner for me, our friend Matt [his birthday is the day before mine] and several friends. It’ll be very fun! On my birthday itself, Weasel and I have tickets to see a Noises Off, I love that play and I’m so excited to see it in person! Then, on the 13th, we’ll have a family celebration too. I’m very spoiled!
Last time I visited Horatio, I got to go with him to a gala! I got to wear my beautiful posh frock and he wore his dinner suit [tuxedo] and we looked so pretty! We asked one of the photographers to take our photo, he obliged and amazing, we ended up in the society pages of the Yorkshire Evening Post! I’m waiting for them to update their website so I can buy a copy of the print. There was a magician, food, a band, speeches and best of all a faux casino! If one donated £10 to WaterAid [the charity of the evening], one was given £300 in funny money to gamble. I really enjoyed roulette. I’d never played before so one of Horatio’s colleagues had to explain it to me. I don’t think I would have played with real money, but it really was good fun.
So, I have rather a long story to share. I’m not sure where to begin really. So perhaps I’ll do a J.J. Abrams on you all and say that I have another boyfriend! 72 hours earlier…
Three months earlier…
As you know, I’d joined OKCupid to meet local people. I had some success. I met one young man who it turned out wanted to explore having a domme. I’ve always danced on the edge of BDSM and I’ve been curious about it for years. It didn’t work out with him, but I tried my hand at meeting some others. I met a very beautiful man and had a wonderful evening with him. It was his first go though and he decided it wasn’t for him. It made me realise though, that I really wanted to have more sex than I was having.
So in mid-January, I joined a no strings attached find-local-sex-partners website. It was fantastic. I met 19 men, I’ve had sex with 15 of them. I feel so much better. Everyone I talk to tells me I have a glow.
Anyway, at the beginning of February, I met a lovely man we’ll call Sven. He made me laugh, a lot. We had our rocks off and went on our marry ways. Except that we kept texting each other. For no real reason. And then decided Skype would be easier. Then I discovered he loved pancakes and I happen to make phenomenal pancakes so I said I’d make him some when he visited.
I did, on his third visit. A few days after that, I realised I was falling in love. I told Weasel and she said she already knew after seeing us together once. I told Sven and he said I was infatuated, in lust. I said I knew myself and I knew love, but there was no pressure from me. By the beginning of March he realised he shared my feelings. Now he visits and helps Weasel and I with some house things, I cook for him and we exchange books/DVDs.
Now I am in the unexpected position of having three partners. I so wish my 16-year-old self could have known how wonderful life would eventually be, but then if I had, I may not be in this place now.
Sven wasn’t overly delighted with the other men, so one-by-one they’ve been falling by the way side [they stood me up, I told them I didn't want to see them again, they got a girlfriend!]. I have three others that I will keep seeing.
I’ve been having a lot of fun.
I have loads of other news, I’m going to do my best to update everything, but I’ll leave off here for now. I’ve missed writing.
Yesterday was Weasel’s 33rd birthday! She is great. We had a lovely trip into town, bit of nosing round January sales. Weasel got a lovely necklace and cookies to celebrate. We watched two more episodes of My Little Pony over dinner.
I edited 30 pages of a document for Horatio. He is hoping to be chartered in the next few months and this is the supporting evidence. I hope to finish it off today.
I’m still meeting loads of new local people. I had a wonderful evening on 30th December. I met Paul in September and John in December. It turned out that they knew each other. John has recently moved house and decided to host a small games evening. John, his wife, Paul, me, another couple and their three children all showed up! I learnt to play Bridge finally [although not how to keep score yet]. I had a go at Dominion [very good fun]. I got to talk with people who were new to me and I think I did okay! I played fetch with the 4-year-old for a good 30 minutes, highly entertaining. The baby crawled everywhere and charmed everyone. I ended up staying until 1am. I really hope John does something similar again, it was really fun.
We had more socialising on New Years Eve. Weasel and I always have a Doodle over, we get pizza, watch movies and watch the London fireworks on TV. Tree [Weasel's paramour] had their plans fall through so they came to ours and Paul came round for a couple of films too. I had a glass of Bucks Fizz! It had literally been a year since I had a drink. I’m hoping one glass after food won’t have too much impact on my liver. We played a game of Pandemic [it was only okay] and I fell into bed at 1:45.
The next day Doodle and I met at the cinema early to collect tickets and ensure good seats for watching The Hobbit. Weasel and her parents arrived closer to the start time. I really enjoyed the film, the 3D was used to fun effect. I am definitely going to see the next two!
I’m totally calling this in. Hope everyone has a lovely new year.
1. What did you do in 2012 that you’d never done before?
Actively sought out new friendships. In person ones with real people.
2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don’t make them, so no and no.
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Yes, Ellie [ex-work colleague, now friend] had a little girl in January.
4. Did anyone close to you die?
Yes, Weasel’s Nan died in January.
5. What countries did you visit?
France in August.
6. What would you like to have in 2013 that you didn’t have in 2012?
A close circle of real-life friends.
7. What dates from 2012 will be etched upon your memory, and why?
January 5th because that’s when Ellie’s baby was born and Weasel’s Nan died.
The usual birthdays and anniversaries still apply, but they are not unique to 2012.
8. What was your biggest achievement of this year?
Weasel and I paid off all our debts! Starting the web design course and the sewing classes.
9. What was your biggest failure?
I tend to be forgiving of my failures and work to correct them as best I can, so I can’t think of any.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
I broke my foot in February. Otherwise, more of the same.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
SAD lamp and mid-calf boots. I’m waiting for my knee high ones to arrive, they might be another one.
12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Doodle’s; he is having a horribly stressful time at work [staff cuts] and still managed to get a university degree. We’re all really proud of him.
13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
My government’s; they keep chiselling away at social programmes and it scares me.
14. Where did most of your money go?
Bills and paying off debts.
15. What did you get really excited about?
Seeing improvements in my health. Paying down [and ultimately getting out of] debt.
16. What song will always remind you of 2012?
‘Snow Cherries from France’ by Tori Amos, hearing the re-worked orchestra version gave me new appreciation and ‘Somebody that I used to know’ by Gotye.
17. Compared to this time last year, are you: a) happier or sadder? b) thinner or fatter? c) richer or poorer?
Happier, thinner, richer.
18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Cycling while the weather was good. I went several times, but I would have liked to have gone more.
19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Nothing, I’m happy with the way I spent my time.
20. How did you spend Christmas?
With Weasel’s family.
21. Did you fall in love in 2012?
Not a new love, but deepened the ones I already have.
22. What was your favorite TV program? Fringe, Breaking Bad and Castle. Diary of a Call Girl has been interesting.
23. What was the best book you read?
Probably ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ by Dickens and ‘Let’s Pretend this Never Happened’ by The Bloggess.
24. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Melissa Giges and Meg Chin Lee.
25. What did you want and get?
Dresses and boots!
26. What did you want and not get?
PS3 and an overlocker [but my parents have given me the money for the latter for a Christmas present and the former will be had with our first lot of savings now that we're out of debt].
27. What was your favorite film of 2012?
Hunger Games was awesome. Also The Hobbit.
28. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I turned 31 and it was low-key. Everyone pooled their pennies and I got a lovely tablet. We had a lovely family dinner.
29. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
If I’d been able to see my parents and sisters.
30. How would you describe your personal fashion concept of 2012?
Empire line tops/dresses – in summer with cropped leggings and sandals, in winter leggings and boots.
31. What kept you sane?
Fergus as always.
32. What political issue stirred you the most?
Saving the NHS.
33. Who did you miss?
My family and my boyfriend. Nan.
34. Valuable life lesson you learned in 2012.
When things are going well, it is okay to let go and just enjoy the moment. Waiting for the other shoe to drop isn’t productive, isn’t fun and doesn’t help anything.
35. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
‘pretty good year’, Tori Amos. The rest of the song doesn’t fit, but the line is perfect.
I’ve been a sponge for the last month absorbing ideas, thinking them over, comparing anecdotes and thinking some more.
The trip to Norfolk went splendidly. We had a lovely time and all of us got a much needed break. I walked by the sea every day, I sat in a tiny cinema with four of my favourite people, I drank strawberry milk that should have been a milkshake. I had too many desserts [everyone with a candle for Doodle's birthday!]. We met unexpected poppies near the sea and talked of Nan.
I’ve seen my new friend three times now, I don’t think this is new best friend, but this is a friend. I’m pleased. We had a Bourne marathon on Sunday and I made the best brownies I’ve ever made for the occasion. He made us a mushroom risotto. He worked on a cross stitch pattern and I worked on my knitting. I can’t remember if I’ve made a pseudonym for him or not, but we’ll go with Paul.
Sewing class is awesome. I’m learning a lot. My teacher is very clever and realising me and another lady in the class, we’ll call her Rosie, were of a similar level has paired us up to each make a shirt. We’re doing everything step-by-step in tandem so we’ll have support and be able to learn as we go.
I’ve been in and had my lungs worked on again, it was the same as before, right intermediate bronchi. I’ve seen vasculitis doctors , they’re happy. I’m on 3mg of steroids as of today. I’m a little nervous, but optimistic.
I had two huge [for me] social events when I visited Horatio last time. A friend’s 30th birthday and an old school anime group meet-up. The Leeds Film Festival was on, so we saw Wolf’s Children and went for a Chinese. Both events were loads of fun, it surprised me how much I enjoyed it.
Horatio and I played chess. I haven’t played in years and he used to be the captain of the chess club at school. He is very good at it, and he kindly answers my questions about theory and when I ask his opinion on a move he’ll help. It was so much fun. We’ve since got an app on our phones so we can keep playing.
We had a lovely family Halloween party. I managed to scare both dogs with my epic ghost costume, so I’m counting it a success. We had two monsters, two witches, a ghost, a Conservative MP, a kitty, a zombie schoolgirl, two deaths and two zombie pirates. Oh and one dog was dressed as a devil. Highly entertaining day with loads of yummy food and company.
Weasel is grand, she’s bumbling along and I’m not so worried about her. She has been stable for several months and seems to be tolerating her medications well.
Horatio has had infection of doom and has been fairly miserable. Two courses of antibiotics has seemed to have sorted it now.
He referred to visiting Weasel and I as ‘seeing his girls’ which was all kinds of awesome.
A collection of us are off to see Depeche Mode again in May, it’ll be so very good. The tickets were bought incredibly quickly, so I only managed to get all the tickets if they weren’t together.
My web design course isn’t going as quickly as I like, but I’m enjoying it, so I’m letting that be good enough.
The contentment with my life is almost overwhelming. I don’t know what I did to get things to be so stable and happy right now, but I’m so grateful to have it.
Oh! My parents have put in an offer for a second home in southern Utah. I think the plan is to let it out for the next three years, then sell their house in Idaho and move there to retire. They should be signing the contracts this week. Very exciting!
