My dad took almost 2100 pictures when my parents were in Israel. At three weeks, that makes around 100 pictures a day… and knowing my dad, we’re going to get to see all of them.

Now this would be OK if there weren’t a) multiple shots of the same thing, b) multiple shots of his thumb obscuring the camera and c) shots of the signs of the places they were at (so he didn’t have to write it down you see). Mmhmm… oh the joy that slideshow is going to be.

He was telling me all about this the other night as I fussed and mumbled over an Excel spreadsheet that told me I need a job in two months, or I’d have to forego vodka—the sacrilege—and other necessities, like sushi. I came to this realization after I priced how much it’s going to cost me to hire movers (do. not. ask.), how much gas is going to cost me if I move more than 1000 miles from here (gas prices STILL rising) and how much I’ll need in the bank for snafus.

Then my mom got on the line and reminded me of my most important problem—health insurance. I have to convince whoever hires me to put me on insurance ASAP so that I don’t have a break in coverage. There’s a very slim (in my head, nonexistent) chance I might get sick again, so a “preexisting condition” would screw me royally. I love healthcare. 😛

On a brighter note, I have an interview in NYC for a very interesting position. (Which of course made me realize I’d have to get rid of my Jeep—ugh). And tomorrow I leave for the midwest for a few days.

Which, oddly enough, is experiencing 80 degree weather while ours is in the 60s.

So I got home at 7 this morning… 🙂 There was drinking… there was dancing… there was all sorts of good times. 😉

After we all slept off the evening this afternoon, we went to dinner.

As we were finishing up, a mumble went around the restaurant about something going on outside. It had been raining a bit and now the sun was shining and lo and behold, two complete rainbows were stretching across the sky.

It was really an interesting sight… people were walking out of restaurants, pulling their cars over and pointing up at the sky. I felt like I was in the middle of Independence Day and the aliens had just flown their ship above the city.

The one difference was that everyone was smiling—real smiles, ones that reached their eyes—and camera phones were clicking away.

It was a nice end to a really relaxing weekend. 🙂

Does the title say enough? Mmhmm, probably not.

A couple of months ago my landlord bought herself a new HP Pavilion.

Last night, their cat threw up on the keyboard.

This morning, the hard drive.. well, I don’t have a clue what the hell happened to it, lol.

She called me this afternoon and I went downstairs. The screen looked like DOS—black, blinking cursor, etc. I kept getting a “Reboot disk failure” message and a “Symantec needs to run a such and such.”

After hitting F1 and F10 and getting no response, I called the 1 800 number. Fat lot of good that did. An hour with tech support in India and not only is the hard drive still kaput, but now there are people in India who hate me. Why? Well… OK, seriously, if you think you can understand a heavily-accented person who’s speed talking you through running a Self-Test on an unfamiliar computer, while the landlord’s husband is talking in heavily-accented English about stupid outsourcing, then FEEL FREE to come on over.

So yeah, long day.

I’m going drinking now. 🙂

What the hell is going on with the mass spam?

I think I’ve deleted around 150 spam comments in the past two days and I swear I’m about to knock some damn heads.

I’m working on adding some plugins to make it stop, but shit if it isn’t annoying as hell.

Mom: Morning honey.
Me: Erm.. whassat now?
Mom: I just wanted to call and let you know we’re in New York. The flight was awful and your father is being strip searched—again.
Me: Uh huh.. hmm. Um, OK good, good.
Mom: Are you still in bed?
Me: Kinda sorta.
Mom: Don’t you have to go to work?
Me: In about two hours, yes, yes I do. How was the trip?
Mom: It was unreal! And blah blah blah…

I basically zoned out at that point, because my mother said “unreal.” Dear god, lol.

So they made it back alive and they had a fantastic time. 🙂

I pulled a muscle in my thigh and holy shit it hurts like a son of a bitch. Walking, moving, sitting.. it’s just excruciating.

I don’t remember how I did it, either. ::cough:: There’s a chance that last night when I was completely and utterly smashed with my friend E, I might’ve stumbled off the curb… yeah. Don’t ask. The insider had a very shitty day and capped it off with five vodkas. Brilliant, I know.

I was told earlier today that I should update the blog because someone was bored, lol. Unfortunately, life right now is rather lacking in the entertainment department. Aside from getting smashed, all I do is work, look for a new job and look for a new apartment… it’s not exactly stellar blog material.

Anybody got anything better going on? Do share.

It’s been raining in this part of the country for the past five days or so… and it’s not supposed to let up until Friday. It really brings back the memories of living in WA, where it rained all the damn day. Except that it’s been sunny there for about a week—and hot, according to my sister. Changing weather patterns really irritate me.

Anyway, I realized this morning that logically, I’m actually going to have to move. And I’m sad, quite simply because I have a fantastic landlord. All I have to do is exist and pay rent and everything else gets taken care of—they even feed me occasionally. They shovel, they decorate, they handled everything when I was sick… and now I’m going to have to leave.

This all hit me this morning because I locked myself out of my house. 😀

As I firmly pulled the door shut, the lack of keys jingling in my hand made me frown. And then curse. And then sigh.

So I traipsed up the back stairs and knocked on the door of the third floor—my landlord’s brother lives there. He answered the door in a towel (let’s not talk about seeing a man in his 60s in a towel—I closed my eyes) and said he’d toss on some clothes and go and get the spare from his sister’s apartment on the bottom floor.

Five minutes later I’m back in my apartment.

It’s sad to know that there’s a really good chance it won’t be that easy when I lock myself out if I move.

And yeah, I do that about once a year, give or take.

I’m going to need one of those fake rocks…

If you’re thinking about moving somewhere, and you know a blogger from there, email them.

They are a TREASURE TROVE of information.

Thanks Moo!

I’ve now Skyped with my parents several times while they’ve been in Israel, and it’s been entertaining every time.

I mean, aside from the fact that my parents are only semi-Internet literate, there’s also the fact that my dad is using his brand new PDA to Skype while he’s there (this is the one my sister and I showed him how to use in NYC) and neither of my parents have truly grasped the time difference (i.e., I get phone calls around 1AM asking me why I’m not online… :P).

They are loving their trip and the food—although my mom is now sick of buffets (which have, according to my dad, over 30 dishes) and hummus and would really love some guacamole or Thai food. They’ll be home on Thursday and my sister and I are quite pleased that they’ve survived.

On the other hand, I have to bloody move. I know, I know, I’ve complained about this before… cry me a river and all that shit. Anyway, so I’ve been using Rent.com and Craigslist to look at apartments/condos etc. in this city I’m thinking of moving to—and mother of god, there are 1000 places to rent there and I can’t seem to narrow it down to a rational number. By price? Still 1000. By covered parking (the insider does not remove snow)? Still 900. By cats allowed, w/d in unit, walk-in closets? Still 300.

I’m planning to go to said city for four days, the last weekend in May. Four days is not enough time to look at 300 bloody places to live. Especially considering a) I have no idea what’s a good/bad part of town, b) I have no idea what the traffic is like, c) I’m really going to miss the ocean (I know, it doesn’t fit here—shut it) and d) wherever I live needs to be less than one mile from a liquor store, a sushi place, a Thai restaurant, a coffee shop and a cute bar. Oddly enough, Rent.com does not use those parameters when one is searching for an apartment.

Dumb, if you ask me.

Dumb week.

Job hunting, planning interviews, trying to figure out if I have to move… all things that stress me out. 🙁

Spent the day at the main office.. mmm, my favorite thing to do.

Argh.

(Now you see why I haven’t been posting… grouchy insider is no fun at all.)