Iesus Non Amat Me

Today's focus was on clearing out the airing cupboard and the small cupboard above it. The latter was absolutely crammed full of old fabrics, most of which have been in there for decades, and now that they're out I can see all the holes in the ceiling. I don't know why I'm still surprised to find things like this. I've known for ages that this house is falling apart.

I'm feeling overwhelmed again. There's so much wrong with this place I don't know if I'm ever going to be able to sort it all out. Sometimes I genuinely think it would be best to tear it all down and rebuilt from scratch, but I know that's not practical. At least not without winning a load of money on the lottery. Maybe we should just sell it and move, but it's not like that's easy to do either. Between the state of the house and all the clutter we still have that never seems to end no matter how much I throw away, I just can't see it happening.

I feel trapped. Trapped and miserable and I hate it.

Central Heating Update: The valve is completely knackered, the pump isn't working properly, there's a build up of sludge in the pipes, and the boiler should probably be condemned.

I suppose that last one isn't too surprising considering it must be 40 or 50 years old now.

So it's a bigger job than I'd hoped it would be, but maybe it's for the best since we probably should have replaced that boiler years ago. And, if I understand correctly, getting a combi boiler means that the old valve and pump won't be needed any more, so they won't need replacing. It also means we won't need the hot water tank. I don't know if removing that is part of the job when the new boiler is installed but I hope so. Otherwise we're just going to end up with an old hot water tank sitting in the cupboard for the next 20 or 30 years because we never get around to getting rid of it.

This has also motivated me to do better with decluttering. I thought I'd been doing quite well, but seeing someone else try to navigate the house made it clear how very far I still have to go. I think the problem is that once I'd cleared the main living areas I'd allowed myself to not worry so much about the rest. An 'out of sight out of mind' situation, which combined with my clutter blindness makes it very difficult to keep on track.

I do need to be harsher with myself though. I have so much stuff I haven't used in years but feel sentimental about as soon as I see it or delude myself into thinking will be useful in the future somehow. But all that happens is the never ending cycle of failure: Item sits there for ages -> I go to throw it away -> I decide to keep it -> Item sits there for ages -> Repeat.

I know I keep saying I need to be better. Maybe one day I actually will be.

But I'm also still holding out hope for Euromillions this evening. That would solve a whole lot of problems.

Happy Friday the 13th everyone!

Lately I've been feeling particularly stressed and unhappy, especially at work, and worrying about pretty much everything, which is not fun. So in this entry I'm going to try and be positive and focus on things that have made me happy recently:

1. Tormund. He's just such a sweetheart and I love him so much! He seems to have settled in well and looks happy here with us, which is wonderful. He still sleeps by the side of my bed. He loves going out in the car. We take him for walks up the woods nearby and he is so well behaved. He's so well behaved in lots of ways, really. We've discovered that he knows his name and will come when called. He knows 'sit' and 'wait' too. He barks when people come to the door, which is actually quite reassuring, but doesn't make noise for no reason. So far he hasn't chewed up anything or made a mess in the house, which to be honest we were kinda expecting due to nervousness and being in a new place.

2. Star Trek: Lower Decks. I've been meaning to watch this series for ages and finally got around to it the other day and I absolutely love it! It's so much fun! It's a great series in its own right with its own characters and storylines, but I do really love all the references to previous Star Treks. It's like a love letter to Trekkies and part of me does wonder how much it will appeal to newcomers, but then it's not really intended for them. That's one of the things I particularly like about it too. They don't explain the references they make, they just expect us to get them. And I love, love, love Beckett Mariner. I mean I love pretty much all of them, but especially Mariner.

3. Sims 4: Seasons. I've been considering buying the Seasons expansion pack for a while now but wasn't sure it was worth the money. So I decided to buy it on a bundle deal along with the Realm of Magic game pack and Spooky Stuff stuff pack. I haven't really done much with the latter two yet, although I am looking forward to delving into the magical realm, but I'm really enjoying Seasons so far. I love how pretty the weather is. And I do like how the different weather affects my Sims, even if it does make some tasks harder. Previously I could stick an easel in the garden and have my Sims practice any time of day, but now they get upset if I make them paint in the rain. And gardening is more challenging cos the plants only grow when they're in season, rather than all the time like before. I also absolutely love the thunderstorms. I know people say they get old quickly cos of how scared your Sims get, but I just love the atmosphere they give. It makes me feel like I'm safe and warm inside while a storm rages on outside.

Ok, first of all I just want to say that I am still working on my Ships of the 2010s list. I've completely missed my self-imposed end of January deadline but I am making progress. I have next week off work so I should have more time for it then, although not the whole week cos Monday will be taken up with watching the Oscars (I've given in to the fact that I'm too old to stay up until 5am to watch it live any more) and then on Tuesday I'm going to London to see Hamilton a second time (Yay!) and am planning to stay for the quiz on Wednesday and come back on Thursday.

I am so ready for this week off cos I feel completely worn out by work. And just in general. I've spent the last few days feeling really tired and heavy and like I just want to curl up and cry for a while.

Also, I've been having thoughts about The Good Place finale and I wanted to put them in writing, so here we go:

( Goodbye to The Good Place )

I have returned from Wales! I had a lovely time and the weather wasn't too bad. Some days were lovely and sunny, some days were grey and rainy, and a couple of times we had proper downpours but it definitely could have been worse!

I do plan to make proper posts with pictures when I feel up to it. Which may be next week or next month. Who knows with me and my procrastination? Hopefully before next year though!

In other news, Photobucket reduced their monthly rates to a reasonable amount and while I didn't really want to give any money to such a terrible site, I am incredibly lazy and still haven't moved my screencaps over to another image host and this way I wouldn't have to, so I decided to bite the bullet and pay the subscription. But despite them taking my money Photobucket haven't actually upgraded my account and so far haven't replied to my emails so I'm really not happy with them at all.

I'd been preparing myself for something to be seriously wrong with Tilly and I knew it was a likely possibility that she was going to die soon. I just didn't realise how soon it was going to be. She seemed fine yesterday morning but lost energy as the day went on. I was worried when she ate her dinner without her usual enthusiasm, but the fact that she ate it at all felt like a good sign. Then a bit later she flopped on the floor and didn't want to move. As I was wondering whether to take her to the vet right then or wait and see if she perked up a bit tomorrow, she died.

I told her she was a very good dog and I loved her very much. I take comfort in the fact that we gave her a good life for nine years. Right from the start she was my dog, coming straight up to me at the rescue centre and happily going along with me despite the staff at the centre saying that we'll need help cos she doesn't like strangers. It was like she knew who I was and had been waiting for me to arrive.

I'm really going to miss her.

( Darling Dog )

Once again I've been away from LJ for a while, mostly because I've been busy with Probate stuff and tidying the house and when I do go online I want something mindless like reblogging stuff on Tumblr or reading endless Buzzfeed posts. But I also need somewhere to write and get my thoughts down properly, so here we go:

Probate stuff is coming along. Rob and I are joint executors of Dad's estate and we're contacting various banks and organisations to get all the information together in order to apply for Probate. It's mostly going all right, although I did get a letter back from someone saying that they'd checked their records and had found no accounts under that name and I'm just like "Oh really? Then why do I have this letter from your very department, dated February this year, addressed to my dad and talking about his account?" Ugh.

The tidying the house thing is a bit weird too. I think it must be a reaction to the grief because I've always been a pretty messy person and a bit of a hoarder. (I'm the kind of person who watches the show Hoarders in order to feel better about myself because at least I'm not that bad!) But now I'm in CLEAN ALL THE THINGS mode, as well as THROW AWAY ALL THE THINGS YOU KEPT BECAUSE YOU TOLD YOURSELF THEY'D BE USEFUL IN THE FUTURE BUT IT'S TIME TO ADMIT THEY WON'T BE AND JUST GET RID OF THEM mode. I quite like it actually and hope that I can keep it up because it would be great to have a house where things are actually tidy and I can get to what I want easily.

So mostly I feel like things are going ok and I'm not doing too badly. Or at least I did until earlier today when I had a bit of a breakdown at work and now I feel stupid and embarrassed about it.

One of my managers was having a go at me for not fully explaining the feedback cards when I hand them out and I got upset and argued back, which then made him get even more annoyed and started threatening me with a disciplinary and whatever. I wish I could have remained rational, because I do have actual reasons why I think he was being unfair, but it just upset me so much because the managers were going on about these stupid feedback cards back in March when Dad was dying and bringing them up again felt like bringing everything about that time up again. Maybe that's silly and probably doesn't make sense to a lot of people, but it's how I feel and I genuinely was really, seriously upset.

But I do also think it was unfair, because back in March my main manager specifically said I just had to hand out the cards. That was it. He didn't say start with just handing out the cards for now. He said just hand out the cards, that's all that's required. And so, I took him at his word and believed that that was all that was required. But now apparently that's not enough. I really hate moving goalposts. You can't tell me I have to do x and then get mad at me for not doing x and y. And if you are going to change the rules, you have to then explain that to me. Not aggressively moan at me for not doing something that I had been told wasn't required.

So yeah, I don't think he was being fair but I know that by reacting the way I did I've lost a lot of credibility and that really annoys me. (But, tbh, I also feel like it's not unreasonable for me to expect a bit of leeway? He went on about how this is the same for everyone and I kinda feel like I shouldn't be held to the same expectations as everyone else right now. Is that wrong? I mean it's been less than two months since Dad died and I kinda feel like the message here is that I should be over it already.)

I'm not looking forward to going in tomorrow but I'm going to try and smooth things over. My initial urge was just to quit and find something else, but I know this is the wrong time to be making decisions like that. And I have no confidence in myself and my ability to find a new job anyway.

Today did not start well. I realised last night that I've lost my FitBit. I've tried retracing my steps, assuming that it fell off at some point, but I haven't found it and I'm not sure where else it could be. It's annoying because I can't afford to replace it any time soon and I'd been interested in seeing how many steps I take over the Christmas period when we get really busy. If I do have to get another one I'll probably go for a higher model, one which tracks floors as well as steps, and maybe has a heart rate monitor too. Also one that attaches like a watch and not just clips together, so hopefully this won't happen again. But that probably won't be till after Christmas.

It's also annoying because it means I'm going to fall behind on my badges and ruin all my stats. And these things matter to me, dammit!

My day didn't get much better at work when the very first customer I had was snippy and rude. Always a lovely way to start the day. I spent most of my shift feeling tired and sad and just wanting to go home.

But it's ok! Because I made it through and now I'm home and I have wine. And tomorrow I'm going to watch fireworks. Yay.

Now, onto topic three for November: Favourite movie.

I'm not a huge movie-watcher, I much prefer TV shows, which makes it difficult to chose a favourite, but some films I absolutely love are:

1. Beauty and the Beast
2. Moulin Rouge
3. The Mummy
4. The Princess Bride
5. Muppet Christmas Carol

And yes, if you pushed me for an absolute favourite I would probably say Beauty and the Beast. I've watched that film so many times and it never loses its magic.

So apparently I was premature with my Castle love yesterday.

( In which I rant about the latest episode )

Well, he made it through the night and died this morning while I was at work. He was on the sofa when it happened, which is nice. It was another one of his favourite spots and there were people around so he wasn't alone.

It'll be strange without him though. I'll miss how he would jump on my lap and curl up there, making me stay for longer than I intended to cos I didn't have the heart to move him. And sometimes when he knew I was coming in he would sit by the sofa and look at me, waiting for me to sit down before he jumped up. I'll miss how affectionate he could be (when he wanted to, of course), a marked change from how he was when the neighbours first moved here and he would run at the very sight of us. I'll miss the way he would steal my chair after I got up for just a second. I'll even miss the way he would refuse to let me use my iPad or laptop sometimes, insisting that he should have all my attention and that pointless device was just in the way. I can't say I'll miss him meowing at 5am, but it will be strange not to hear it any more.

We buried him under the bush at the side of the garden, one with lovely purple flowers. Now I'll always think of it as the McGee bush.