Category Archives: Complaining about something*

When it rains, it pours*

Posted on January 31, 2013 by Shop Girl| 1 Comment

Move over Tom Hanks, there’s a new money pit in town.

I have always, always loved Tom Hanks. He is my favourite actor, hands down. I have always felt this way for one simple reason: his movies always make me feel good. I know there’s the odd one that is just… off (Joe vs. The Volcano… really?), but for the most part, if Tom Hanks is in a movie, I love it.

I particularly love his comedies from the 80s and 90s, and my favourite of all is The Money Pit. If you haven’t seen it, go. Go now. It’s hilarious.

For the past couple of years, we’ve lovingly teased Doodle that he bought a “money pit” when he purchased his home. For a while it seemed like he encountered major repair after major repair as he settled into his new house. We didn’t have anywhere near the issues that he did when we moved in here, so we thought we were golden.

Until now.

Remember how I mentioned that I thought that this year would be a challenge for me? Well, I didn’t know that my house was also in on the game.

A few days before Christmas our main bathroom sink broke. And I mean broke. It was an original fixture and the drain completely rusted through. We ended up replacing the entire countertop as we tried to get our bathroom back in working order.

That should have been my first clue.

Last week the plumbing for our kitchen sink basically fell apart. I opened the cupboards to reach for something and discovered a puddle of water. When the Hubster took a closer look, he realized that the pipe had completely disconnected from the sink.

Awesome.

It took a late night and early morning trip to Home Depot, but luckily my Husbter is amazing and he was able to fix it on his own and it wasn’t a huge issue.

And then after dinner last night, I noticed that the “element on” light was still shining on our stove. I was a little perplexed I had turned the stove off over an hour earlier, but the elements on one side of the stove still felt warm. The Hubster was out until nearly 9:30, and he tinkered with it a little when he got home… only to come to the conclusion that there is a short somewhere in the panel.

*sigh*

So, in short (pun intended), my stove is now sitting unplugged and unusable in my kitchen.

Even though it seems like everything is falling down around us, I can’t help but laugh. I mean, really. Really? The stove too? At least we caught it before it really got warm, there was nothing on it and luckily, there was no fire. I just now feel like I’m walking on egg shells around my house, just waiting for the next issue to pop up and shout, “Gotcha, sucka!!”

Oy evay.

I will say one thing though… if my bath tub falls through the ceiling, I’m out.

Posted in Complaining about something*, House Projects*

Looking In*

Posted on August 30, 2012 by Shop Girl| 3 Comments

Hi dears.

I know I’ve been… quiet this month. It’s been a hard couple of weeks for me, and I knew that my writing would reflect a lot of the emotions I was feeling, and I just didn’t want to pour that all here.

I’m not quite sure how to begin what I want to write without making it sound like I’m being incredibly insecure and sorry for myself.

In a way, I know that I am.

But August was certainly a month of highs and lows for me, and I found myself on a roller coaster with too many dips. Let me explain:

A few weeks ago I confessed my fear of having people over, and how I’m taking steps to conquer it. For a while there, I felt like I was finally overcoming this irrational fear. I hosted both “big” parties, as well as casual dinners with friends and I felt like each was successful.

At the root of everything: I felt confident and comfortable in my group(s) of friends.

It’s no secret that I’ve always had trouble making / keeping girl friends, and I know I’m not alone. The response I had to my initial post about it was overwhelming, so I know many of you feel the same way I did.

I finally felt like I was overcoming it.

…then this month happened. It began kind of slowly: friends cancelling lunch plans at the last minute. Then an invitation I extended to another friend to come over one night was completely ignored. Then 75% of the guests who had confirmed they were coming to a get together I hosted either bailed at the last minute, or just didn’t show up at all.

I get that people are busy, but really? Not even a word to let me know?

And then lastly, my beloved little book club kind of… fell apart. It’s been on the rocks for a few months as each of us has gone through changes in our lives, but this month they officially decided that it was time to space out our get togethers. I’m trying to be realistic, but I am so sad about it. I counted on that one evening every month, even more so now that the wee-bean occupies so much of my day.

I know it sounds like I’m being a bit dramatic–I blame the hormones. But I suddenly found myself feeling a little like a leper.

I realized more than ever just how much I count on these get togethers and outings, as casual as they may seem.

Because I sometimes find that being a mom is really lonely.

How is that even possible, you ask? Don’t I have a small, perfect, cute wee-bean to spend my whole day with? Of course. And I love her with every fiber of my being.

But sometimes I need to go out to connect with the other parts of my self–the parts that don’t revolve around naps, poop, and the mountain of housework that I feel like I fail at every day.

I need to talk about books, the news, celebrity gossip and TV shows to carry me through the next stressful parts of motherhood.

I need those nights to look forward to, so that in those stressful, hard moments I don’t feel so completely alone.

And that’s really what August has been for me: lonely.

With all the changes that I’ve been through in the last year, it feels like things have shifted somehow. I’m not quite sure how to fix things, to be honest: I’m a bit burnt out. I feel like I’ve been pushing and trying too hard, and which is why everything that happened this month felt like such a personal blow to me.

So, I’m not entirely sure where to go from here.

Again I find myself in the same place I was three years ago. I know some seriously incredible people… yet I still feel a bit like I’m standing on the outside looking in.

It’s just… hard.

Posted in Complaining about something*

Who Needs Sleep?

Posted on June 7, 2012 by Shop Girl| 4 Comments

It’s official: I have reached a new level of exhaustion.

I mentioned yesterday that Ruby doesn’t really nap. Well, apparently she doesn’t need to sleep at night either.

For the past month, my little wee-bean has exhibited some… interesting… sleeping habits. I know babies are often inconsistent, but she’s all over the map. One night she’ll sleep for a 5 hours stretch, one night it’ll be 3, but more often than not she is up every hour and a half to two hours.

All. Night. Long.

Let’s examine last night, shall we? I began her little bedtime routine shortly after 8pm, same as every night: warm bath, jammies, stories, then I usually sing/hum to her as she eats and falls asleep. For a while there it was taking me nearly two hours to settle her, but for the past 4 nights this routine has her asleep in 45 minutes. Sounds lovely, no? She seems to enjoy it.

…so much that she woke up at 11:30, then at 1:45, then at 3:30, then at 5:30, before waking up for the day at 6:15. Each time she woke up I left her in her bed to see if she could settle herself back to sleep, but when she began trying to eat / inhale her blankets I picked her up and just tried rocking her back to sleep.

Ohhh no. She was ravenous! She ate for 10 – 15 minutes before finally settling down again and falling back to sleep.

Repeat. Again, and again.

I don’t know what to do. I have a wonderful circle of friends and family who have offered me a million suggestions, but half of them conflict with one another and I have no idea where to begin. Until now I have strictly breastfed Ruby. The Hubster has all kinds of food allergies and sensitivities that run in his family, and I’ve read that breastfeeding may help Ruby miss out on some of the things her dad struggles with. So, I’ve tried really hard not to supplement her at all… but maybe it’s not working.

It’s so hard not to feel like I’m doing something wrong… everything changed when she had her nursing strike and her 3 month growth spurt. A while back Ruby went through a two-day period where feeding her was impossible. She would scream and arch her back when I tried, and cry because she was hungry when I stopped. The nurse I spoke with that day told me to stop using a bottle or pacifier for a while, so that she would form a reattachment to me.

She hasn’t really taken a bottle or soother since. She was never great with it–she often pushed it out of her mouth–but if I rocked her and gently held it in place she could fall asleep. I don’t know if there is another kind of soother that she can hold in place better, but the only pacifier she’ll take lately is me.

Despite that, she was sleeping fairly well. Until three weeks ago she was only waking up once, maybe twice a night. Then she hit her never-ending 3 month growth spurt and she hasn’t really slept or napped much since.

The thing is, she doesn’t seem… unhappy. She is often a little fussy after dinner until bedtime, but throughout the day she is the sweetest, happiest baby. More often than not I’m the grump because I haven’t had enough sleep. I do realize that some babies just don’t nap. I get that. But not sleeping at night too?

*sigh*

I’m just… tired. Tomorrow’s another day. :)

Posted in Complaining about something*, Le Bebe*

Stolen: A Story of Plagiarism*

Posted on November 21, 2011 by Shop Girl| 4 Comments

I don’t consider myself to be a great writer.

I think I’m a good writer, but I know that I still have so many things I could improve on. I think that I sometimes have great ideas, but that it’s not always consistant.

That’s why I was shocked when I found out that another website had blatantly stolen ten posts that I had recently written.

But let’s start at the beginning, shall we?

WordPress has this neat little feature on the dashboard that lets me sort out comments as they come in. Most are approved automatically, while ones that seem a little “spammy” are flagged for me to have a look at.

It also has a “ping back” feature that tells me when another website links to my blog or one of my posts. I love the feature as it lets me block out spammy comments and I can see who is “talking” about my blog. It looks like this:

(Click to enlarge)

Last Friday I got a ping back. As I was reading through the blurb WordPress gives me, I thought:

“Gee, that writing sounds a lot like mine…”

So, I clicked it. The link sent me to this website:

(Click to enlarge)

As I scrolled down, I realized that every title on the landing page were from posts that I had written recently.

(Click to enlarge)

I still wasn’t terribly concerned as I thought that maybe this person had written on the same topics that I had and was using me as a reference post. I fully expected to see my work credited inside her posts.

Nothing.

It was my work, word for word. She had simply added “Fashion Shoes:” in front of each title, removed my pictures and deleted my signature. There was absolutely no indication on any of “her” posts that she hadn’t written them.

(Click to enlarge)

I couldn’t believe it. I showed the Hubster as soon as he came home, and he began investigating how to report her website.

Upon further investigation I realized that she had taken 10 of my most recent posts, and that every post had been added on the same day… which leads me to believe that they were stolen en masse. It doesn’t even feel like a real blog, it just seems to have that appearance.

I began ranting and posting about the plagiarizer on my Facebook page, and tried to figure out what my options were. I knew I could just leave it and ignore it as her website doesn’t appear to get a lot of traffic, but I was just so… offended. I try so hard to make sure I credit anyone whose work I may be referring to in a post, and I just expected that others would extend the same courtesy.

Even if my writing is not perfect, it is mine. It’s personal, and it’s part of me.

So, I decided to do something about it.

I found that the author had listed an email address on her “contact me” page, and I drafted an email outlining my disgust at her blatant plagiarism and demanded that she remove my posts from her website.

(I also included a definition of plagiarism for her own personal reference. ha.)

A few hours later I received the following reply:

“I am sorry, please let me know the URL of the posts which are your content, so i can remove them.”

…seriously?

Have you copied so much material from others that you can’t even identify which ones are mine?!? I responded immediately and included the titles and links for each post she stole.

It’s been nearly 24 hours, and I’m still waiting for her to remove them.

I’m just so… disgusted by this. I know they say that imitation is the highest form of flattery, but I’m not quite sure what this person’s motives are. The website doesn’t even look real, and really now–are you also 28 weeks along in your pregnancy and worried that you killed your curly hair?

Ugh.

I’ll keep you posted… fingers crossed that she removes them soon!

(If you really want to see the website, the link is posted on my Facebook page.)

Posted in Complaining about something*

A Hard Day*

Posted on November 4, 2011 by Shop Girl| 5 Comments

I cried today.

Actually, I cried twice today.

And if you want to get really technical, I cried twice at work today. Before the first bell even rang. *sigh*

It was one of those days.

I didn’t get a call for work last night, so I assumed that I’d be off today. I always get up and get ready for work anyway, but today my heart was only half in it. My back was still bothering me, and I really wanted a day to veg and go thrift shopping–basically just have a “me” day.

As the Hubster and I were sitting eating breakfast at 7:20 this morning, my phone rang. Dispatch was calling to give me a full day assignment at a school I rarely go to. As much as I really didn’t want it, I never say no to work… so I began to get ready in earnest.

Everything about this morning just seemed to go wrong. There was absolutely nothing that interested me as far as a lunch was concerned, and it hurt my heart to have to discard my lovely yoga pants for work wear. I left my house only to find a frost-covered car, even though the Hubster had lovingly scraped my windshield for me before he left for work.

So, I sat and shivered in my freezing car while I waited for the rest of the windows to clear and again tried to psych myself up for a day of work I didn’t want at a school I don’t know well.

My usually hilarious radio show was only mediocre this morning, so by the time I reached the school my mood hadn’t improved. I parked, and opened the rear door to grab my teacher bag…

…and smacked my head against the door frame as I bent in to retrieve it.

Somehow this bump, complied with all the other emotions I had been feeling all morning, was enough to send me into a fit of tears. I had to get back into my car, dab my eyes and take several deep breaths just to be able to calm myself enough to make it to the front doors of the school.

I went in, and the secretary was professional, but not warm. She handed me my lesson plans and materials, and off I went in search of my classroom. I entered, closed the door behind me, and finally took a peek at what I’d be teaching today.

When I saw that I had lunch duty and a Grade 9 Applied English as my first period class, I dissolved again. I turned my chair away from the hallway windows and had a moment.

Well, several moments actually.

(I seriously had to start replaying this week’s episode of Modern Family in my mind to make myself stop crying. Luckily Cam is magical and always makes me smile.)

And then I pulled myself together and switched into business mode. I wasn’t the cheerful, witty/sarcastic teacher I like to be, but I survived the day.

As I sat in the staff room on my prep, I started thinking about why this day felt so difficult. Despite rarely being called there, I’ve never had a bad experience at this school. While the kids were a bit wired, they weren’t bad. While I hate getting morning calls, they do happen and it’s a part of my job.

So why the tears?

I think the things I’m craving most throughout this pregnancy are consistency and familiarity. I find being in familiar environments very comforting, and the idea of going to a school I didn’t know well was very stressful. I didn’t know where the washrooms were, what the school policies were, what the kids would be like, etc. Essentially, I had no idea what the day would hold.

Not knowing where the bathrooms are sounds like such a silly thing… but for a pregnant woman who can barely make it through two periods before needing a break, not knowing how to get there and how long it would take from my class was hard.

For the last two months I’ve worked almost exclusively at my two favourite schools. The kids know me. The staff knows me. I know the schools inside and out. I know what to expect when I’m there.

And being in a situation where I didn’t was somehow incredibly stressful this morning.

And I’ve realized that these feelings are extending beyond my work life. I was just given a new responsibility at church and the whole idea of it has been stressing me out to no end. I don’t know what I’m doing, and I don’t know the women I’ll be working with terribly well.

Normally, that wouldn’t phase me. Right now I feel like I want to shut down whenever I even think about it.

Even the foods I’m craving are familiar comfort foods: chicken stew & dumplings, shepherd’s pie, meatloaf, etc… all the things we had for family dinners as kids.

I know that it’s likely being triggered by the fact that in just three months our lives are about to change completely. The wee-bean will bring a wonderful, amazing change, but it will potentially transform every aspect of our lives for some time.

And keeping things simple, familiar and comfortable right now makes the idea of change in the future much less… scary.

So, it wasn’t my best day.

I hate that I cried (twice) at work, but I just couldn’t help it.

I’m pregnant. Crazy crying before work is allowed, right?