Happy Birthday to Me

Tomorrow is my birthday. First one without a significant other in 20 years.  I thought I would feel more sad about it than I do.  But I accomplished something and that feels pretty good. I put together a barbecue grill all by myself.  I know that probably sounds really lame, but it’s a huge deal since I always depended on my ex to do things like that.  The only thing I haven’t done is connected the propane, which scares me a little.  Other than that, I have no plans.  I guess at 39 it just becomes another day. And that’s okay.

 

Dooce.com

This woman is hilarious.  I am in awe.

Another wasted Saturday….thanks Time Warner

Another Saturday spent waiting for the cable guy.  Saturday appointments are a window of 8 a.m.! to 8:30 p.m.!  Unbelievable.  The guy shows up at 5:30.  At least he showed up.  And he was kind of cute, albeit about 10+ years too young for me.  Darn.

Turns out either my wiring was screwed up to begin with, or the last subcontractor I had out really f**cked things up.  He tells me none of my lines (the one that were cut by the last guy) were live. He can’t find any live lines, even though there are at least 4 of them laying up in my attic.  Unbelievable.  So now I need yet ANOTHER Cable guy to come out to put in a whole new wire into my house because the sub’s aren’t equipped to do that.

I can’t believe how stupid this has become. 

A Happy Divorce?

Is it possible to have a happy divorce? 

I went to a pro hockey game tonight with my ex and the kids.  Got free tickets from my mailman because he works for the hockey team and knew that my son has the same name (first and last) as one of the players. It was pretty cool. Got to meet the player with the same name and get a pic of my kid with him. 

My ex had the kids and I was kind of nervous about driving down to the arena since I’d never done that before. So I invited him to go with us. It was strangely okay.  Obviously, it’s pretty comfortable going with the person I was married to for 15 years, but on the other hand I wondered how freaking wierd we are that we would do this.  Isn’t it better this way though, instead of some horrible Alec Baldwin/Kim Basinger nightmare where you absolutely hate eachother? I guess I think yes.  But it does kind of blur the lines a bit. 

I’m glad to be separated from him. But I miss being married. Miss the “couple” thing. Looking around at all the couples and families at the game made me realize how sad the whole thing is.  So maybe “happy” divorce is an anomoly.  Maybe it’s just an amiable divorce. 

Sleeping alone

I really enjoy sleeping without someone in my bed.  I finally felt that way last night. Finally, after 5 months of sleeping in “our” bed alone, with him on the couch. Now it’s my own bed, a different bed, different sheets, different mattress. And it really feels good.

I cried alot in bed by myself when we were just separated in the house. The rejection I felt from him staying on the couch night after night was hard.  Being out of that house and somewhere new is the best thing I could have done.  And having the bed to myself is really pretty nice. 

Indecisive – Will I ever grow up?

I’ve changed my theme for this blog 4 times since I created it this weekend.  Can’t make up my mind for anything.  Kind of a long standing theme in my life.

My boss told me he had me figured out. Said I was the type of person who either put everything I had into something, or I put nothing at all into it.  And I thought I was just a Gemini.  I guess I’m just contrary, or wishy-washy.  hmmmmm.

Speaking of my boss, I have developed an unbearable crush on him. And I really hate it.  He’s my boss. He’s married. It’s horrible, I know.  But it is what it is I suppose.  I think it’s my protective rebound thing.  I’m deathly afraid of actually “dating” someone, so having the crush gives me something to do in my head without actually having to go through the inevitable rebound relationship with someone real.  I think having the safety of knowing I won’t have to relate to him on any level deeper than employee is good–I haven’t done so well at the intimacy thing, so it kind of fills the need for attraction and fantasy and all that, without actually having to deal with potential rejection.

I’m sure I’ll get over it, because as with everything else, I’m either all in, or not at all. And usually the not in follows the all in after a time.  It’ll pass.

Cable TV, not what I expected

I’ve had Time Warner cable tv before. I’m not new to it. So when I called to have my tv, phone & internet set up with them, I never thought there would be a problem. Hah!

First of all, they sent out a subcontractor. I showed the guy where I thought the cable was coming in–in the attic. There’s all these coax cables attached to a little box, I figured that was where the cable was.  So he sets about setting up the internet.  Turns out that no, the cable comes in at the base of the house then goes up to the attic and back down.  And the signal isn’t strong enough where I wanted the modem to get a direct connection, so I’m forced to get wireless–which I didn’t want (don’t trust it–sorry–I know I’m paranoid).  Then he tells me his work order only has me getting 1 tv hookup and the internet. Well I asked for 2 tv’s. He can’t do anything about it since his work order says 2 lines.  That was my 1st frustration because I’m going to have to call Time Warner to have someone come back out I guess.  But before he leaves he says, “After I go you can splice the lines and do whatever you want, after I leave you can do what you want.”  So I figure that’s what I’ll do–make my ex come over and splice them.    Anyway, cable guy leaves, internet works, tv probably works (didn’t have a tv yet so I couldn’t try it out).  

So I go up to the attic to look at my wires because my ex says if the wires are already live, I should have cable at every outlet, he didn’t know why I’d need to splice them if there were already wires going to every room.  Yeah, well I know why–because the bastard subcontractor snipped each one of those lines.  Like a dead octopus on the floor, big black wires sliced clean through.  I was so pissed.

The cable company will not explain why the guy cut my lines.  They “just don’t know why he’d do that”.  Maybe so I’d have to pay a service call for someone to come back out is my guess.  AARGH!  I scheduled an appointment to have someone come out last Saturday.  No one showed. They said they called. I have caller ID, call waiting, answering machine–I was there. No one showed.  So I threatened to cancel.  Apparantly they can disconnect me remotely when I bring in my modem.  THEY DON’T CARE!!!   But I called around and satellite is more expensive, and dammit I don’t want to switch–I feel like the devil I know is better than the one I don’t know.  So I called Time Warner again today.  Still no explanation for why the guy cut the lines. But I got another Saturday appt, which is what I wanted, and they’ll address the split lines (yeah, because they’re going to reconnect all of them).  And I won’t get charged. I’d better not get charged. But I’m sure I probably will because I’ll have to have some new reason to call Time Warner and want to kill them. 

In the meantime, my phone was dead for a day because of some hub problem in the area. Then I had to call them to reset my modem because my phone still didn’t work.  And the problems I’ve had with wireless are constant. Have to hit the “repair connection” button everyday because I lose my connection at pretty regular intervals while online.  

I just thought it would be easier than this.  With all the competition between cable & satellite companies I thought they’d have this stuff down to an art form.  Guess I was wrong.

But maybe the cable guy will be cute.