Fri Nov 18 - I totally forgot to mention in yesterday's entry that the reason I got to sit still and spin all morning was that the shower-door guy finally came out to see if why my shower seemed to be leaking. Turns out that the nice-young-man was the same guy who installed my new shower doors in the first place, and he had nice things to say about why it's installed on a weird angle, where all the caulking was placed, the angles of the rubber stoppers that keep the water *in* and a whole load of other shower-guy things.... And I confess, my eyes glazed over, a smile became permanently affixed, I nodded a lot, and I hope I made the appropriate noncommittal monosyllabic noises in the right places in the conversation. All I know is that he says it's fine and I shouldn't try to shoot water out from under the door of the shower, because although it's a lovely shower and well installed, quote "It's not an aquarium."

Now I don't remember ever *trying* to shoot water under the shower door with the long shower nozzle, or even trying to treat my shower like an aquarium. But I'm sure he wasn't implying that I try abuse my shower in any way, but it was kind of funny that he felt the need to mention it. Are there hordes of unmannered oafs out there trying to emerse themselves in a standing shower like it was a vertical hot tub?

Sat Nov 19 - Had a lovely boring morning, getting all my laundry done. And then we had an early afternoon rehearsal in the studio for band. I'm really looking forward to our show on Sunday December 3.

But the big event of the afternoon and evening was the Black Rose Ball, another SCA event locally. The main theme was to host a fancy, indoor, dancing event. The costuming theme was "Capulet's Ball" with Romeo & Juliet as the guiding theme: either Italian Renn as one of the players or Elizabethan as one of the audience. Several months ago someone asked me to host my coffee bar as part of the event, so I spent the early afternoon after band packing and shopping.

The event was lovely, and the coffee bar was greatly appreciated. I meant to take photos of the event, but I completely forgot since I was busy serving coffee, tea, hot chocolate, and spiced apple cider all evening. But you can see someone else's photos here (although I'm not in any of the photos).

I do have to tell you my silly embarassing moment: At one point when I was chatting with Aliskye, I actually asked her if she'd been to Coronation last weekend. Um, I *drove* her to and from the event, assigned myself to be her personal lackey for the event, and sat next to her at dinner, and even shared dessert with her. I have *no* idea where I put my brain! *laughs*

Sun Nov 20 - I got up a little too late on Sunday to make it to church on time, but it dawned on me while I was driving that I could get my oil changed and have the funny rough idle checked in my car. So I lounged around the mall for several hours while I got an oil change and the fuel system cleaned? changed? flushed? ...whatever, and then headed out for the rest of my afternoon in town.

I had a brief moment of "What Would Dayle Say?" when I remembered that I'd left some things at home that I was supposed to bring to her. [I'm not saying because it might spoil a surprise she has in store for folks.] I thought briefly about spending my afternoon driving home, getting the forgotten items, and bringing them to her before my choir rehearsal. Then it dawned on me not only would she be upset at me for driving there and back again for this errand, but I'm going to be spending Thursday (and most of the weekend) at her house anyways. I called to make sure Thursday was going to work for her, and shared my silly thoughts with her. WWDS... hee hee!

I dropped by the fighter practice, where the Kingdom Rapier practice was being hosted this time by our shire. I'd known about the regional practice, but it never really dawned on me that this meant all my friends would be in town. So I had the pleasant surprise of getting to hang out for a little bit with Raphael, Diego, Marcos, say hi to Lot, see my roomie, as well as hang out with the ladies of the Shire for a while.

Then it was off to the church to get ready for choir rehearsal. I figured out how to record on my new digital recorder, how to sync the files to my laptop, how to convert the files to WAV format, how to create an audio CD that would play on the CD player in my car, and how to convert the WAV files to MP3 format. Yay me!

Rehearsal went well, and we even recorded a few songs with all the singers. And afterwards I spent another hour finishing all the practice tracks, singing and/or playing each part [Soprano, Alto, Tenor, Bass] for all the songs for the concert in December.

And I was grateful that Erika, Ben, and Saul weren't completely asleep as I came through town, past their place, so I got to drop in and spend an hour hanging out with them on my way home. Erika had baked a pie (Mmm, pie!). And the three of them had run a successful event at a comic convention on Saturday, so I got to hear the run down on all their fun.

The world is a really small place, though, because I found out that *the* event they were running (and have been running for the past three years) was the *same* event in which my friends Bill, Lynn, and D.W. had been participating. The world is a VERY small place.

Mon Nov 21 - Monday was completely all about work-work. I never left for lunch NOR dinner, but just snacked from the kitchen food that our company provides for us: oatmeal and bananas, soda, water, V8 juice (gotta have veggies, right?), snack mixes, left-over muffins and baklava. I know, a terrible lunch/dinner menu, but it got me through my nastiest chapter revision. I didn't get home until 11, but at least it was before midnight.

Tues Nov 22 - And today was much better. My instructor/subject-matter-expert (SME) was okay with my major revisions and had very few markups for me. Yay! So I actually *used* my lunch hour to get my desk and bags organized again, and feel much better.

The best little achievement of the day though had to be the personal excitement that my credit is finally good enough that I was able to get another credit card today. I got an offer from Triple A, to have 0% on any balance transfers through the end of January 2007. I decided to risk applying for the card, with the hopes of getting my financial charges wiped out for a year. I've also been working on getting my debt-to-credit-limit ratio down, and adding a new card would raise the credit limit, lowering the ratio. I'm happy to say they awarded me the card (and the guy on the phone was confused about why I would have been nervous... apparently my credit rating is *much* higher than I thought it was).

Doing a little math in my head, my credit limit total just doubled today, meaning I just cut my debt-to-credit-limit ratio in half. Yippee! So now I finally have space on one card for actual emergencies, having taken my highest limit card down to a zero balance. And my car-repairs card is almost at a zero balance, meaning scary car repairs are not so scary any more. Now for the next year, as I keep paying down my cards aggressively, I'll get to do so with about 3/4 of all my dept at 0% financing. Dude, this so totally rocks!

Finally, I got all the practice CDs for the choir created, and two of them into the overnight mail. The other members of the choir will be in town on Thursday, so I'll swing by and drop off their CDs on Thanksgiving. And now I'm headed to the studio for rehearsal tonight, and to Aliskye's for "project night" tomorrow evening.

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Today's Achievements: Music: Finished learning how to work with my new digital recorder, a necessary task to be able to continue composing music anywhere/anytime. Now my recorder lives in my purse (can you believe it fits in my coin purse?!) so I always have it with me. Improving Myself: Saved myself money on my credit cards for the next year. Fiber Artisan: Finished the 2nd half of a bobbin of wheel spun yarn. Web Designer: Set up meeting with Bjo for her business site.

Today's Blessing That I'm Thankful For: Craigor, for being such a fun co-worker, listening to my silly stories, swapping photos, and generally hanging out together [working late, grabbing lunch, walking to get coffee].