For the handful of you who aren't already aware, I'm currently 20 weeks pregnant. No offense meant to anyone who was filtered out - I didn't feel like having it be general UCD knowledge in case I found a job I wanted to apply for or something. But at this point it doesn't really matter, and I expect people know anyways :)

The filter in question is gone, and pregnancy-related posts are plain old friends-only if anyone cares to look, which I don't really expect you do.

I feel the need to simplify my filter structure in general. I tend to make a new filter every time I post about something I don't feel comfortable with some specific person or group seeing. But I'm exhibitionist enought that I still want it to be seen by the largest audience I feel comfortable with. This leads, as you might expect, to a few too many filters (10 at the moment, most of which are barely used).

I wish there was a way to view posts by security level. That'd make it much easier to go back through and change security levels as I restructured.

Of course, the true long-term answer is to trust you all more and compartamentalize less.

Thinking about worky type stuff...

For the past 5 years or so, my primary interest has been pregnancy/birth/parenting related stuff, especially for "crisis" groups (young parents, single parents, anyone who doesn't fit into the 30 year old in a heterosexual marriage with a middle to high income job ideal).

If I could get some nice reasonably challenging computer work as part of it, all the better. The two fields tend to attract such different people that both in one job would be unlikely. But on the other hand, small NPO doesn't necessarily need the added cost of a computer consultant...

I don't have any particular interest in being a homebirth midwife. Not that I don't believe in homebirth, but it's a level of responsibility and legal risk I'm not comfortable with, and I'm not sure it's where I can do the most good.

I've considered the Certified Nurse Midwife thing, and it's quite possibly that would be the most versatile and useful option (I've even seen recruitment ads from New Zealand for CNMs), but that would probably take at least 3 years of full-time school for my BA (I haven't done enough science-related for my previous work to count for much) plus the graduate work. I'm not sure that's something we can manage.

Becoming a certified doula would be pretty quick and easy, but that's not really a survivable job, especially since my primary interest is not working with nice stable upper-middle income familes who are willing and able to pay the higher rates. It's more of a supplemental income type thing.

It's possible I can find something related given my current degrees and experience. It likely would pay less than $10 an hour.

I can probably find some computer-related job that is reasonably enjoyable and pays well enough to get by, but isn't going to make me feel particularly good in the long run. And I don't think I can manage any sort of serious school at the same time.

This is all speculation at this point - while I can still probably hide the bump enough to get hired, it's really not what I want to do right now. Except that working somewhere air conditioned over the summer would be really nice.

My mom, stepfather, and brother visited from Friday until this morning. For the most part, it was a nice visit. It's amazing how much better my brother and I get along now that we're adults and not seeing eachother on a regular basis :)

I'm effectively done with work. I'm working 10% time telecommuting for the next month, but I never *have* to go back to the office. Except I'm going to, because I forgot to return my keys, and I think I left something there, and it's the only access I currently have to a printer.

This is relieving, largely because I no longer have to worry about getting enough sleep at night. I can wake and sleep when I need to. Well, except that I have a bunch of stuff that needs to be done during business hours on Tuesday. Oh well. Hopefully the lack of things that need to be done before then will let me rest up for it.

At this point, I'm going back and forth between physically feeling great, and feeling run over by a truck, with little in between. As long as I get enough rest and don't try to do too much, I'm fine. Unfortunately, when I'm feeling fine, I tend to overestimate what "too much" is :)

I'm feeling lonely. I don't have any particularly close friends in Davis anymore, a lack which I don't typically feel when koyote is around.

I think maybe I'll throw a "take away my unneeded stuff and help me clean" party on Tuesday evening.

The monstrosity desk is no more. Well, that isn't entirely true. It's simply been converted to a makeshift coffee table. When I moved in, the people helping me move took the door off the hinges and the molding off the door in order to get it into the bedroom. I decided to have my brother saw the legs off rather than go through all that again. It worked quite well, and I now have a legless desk sitting in my living room, waiting for transport to the trashcan.

I apparently have 1040 mp3s/ogg files on my hard drive, taking up 3.9GB of space. I just put them all in a playlist. Now I need to figure out how to get StarCalc to open it as a spreadsheet or something so that I can effectively edit and sort it. I think that will be a job for the plane, along with resizing/reorienting/sorting the babyshower pictures, some of which are, amazingly enough, not hideous.

I need to pack and figure out what bag everything needs to go in. I can't pack everything now, because I need to do laundry first, and I'd prefer to wait until Monday to do that. Actually, I'd prefer to wait till Tuesday, but I have enough else to do on Tuesday that it isn't really practical.

I need to figure out the best way to ship the disk array and the cheese wheel. Do I mail them, or pack them in my luggage? I think the cheese will be packed (not quite as bulky, not as sensitive to harsh treatment, and less likely to scare security people) and the disk array mailed.

This is getting silly. I'll go ahead and post now.

Picnic Day, the most obnoxious day/weekend of the year in Davis, has officially started. I ran into someone from high school that I didn't have any particular interest in seeing (Bo what's his name, who was in my class, for those who went to CHS). (This seems to happen every year)

I've been kind of annoyed since Wednesday, when the teacher of my self-hypnosis class, after asking how far along I was, stated "Wow, but you don't look pregnant!" And then on the bus yesterday, I was one person away from not being able to get a seat, and really afraid that I'd either have to stand or try to explain to one of the seated people that I really am entitled to one of the handicapped seats. I'm ready to look pregnant.

Except suddenly now I'm glad I don't. I don't particularly feel like looking pregnant around random excessivly popular people from high school. Go figure.

(Why does their opinion bother me in the slightest at this point?)

The downside of not showing yet is that I undoubtedly just look fat.

Speaking of baby, lemurbaby update will be posted today, if it hasn't been already.

Another odd thing about that particular encounter - I actually recognized him. This is terribly odd. I'm bad at facial recognition - I sometimes don't recognize people I see on a regular basis. Bo is a very generic looking Southern California guy who I have not seen in 5 years or so. Yet I recognized him. I didn't say anything, since he was so far out of context that I just figured it was someone who looked similar to him. But then his dad (his parents were with him) recognized me somehow. Odd.

A similar thing happened last weekend. I recognized Oz from Buffy (aka Seth Green) in a preview for a new movie, even though he was on screen for about a quarter of a second total. My facial recognition problems must be selective somehow.

The weather is confused. Right now, it's sunny and warm. Tomorrow another storm is coming through, and it's supposedly going to be chilly and rainy all next week. Yuck. However, I am happy that it is supposed to rain tomorrow. Haha to the Picnic Day people!

Matilda the rattie is doing better, after a lice treatment, antibiotics for an upper respiratory infection, and several injections of water for dehydration. She's still pretty sick, but is now grumpy instead of apathetic, and she seems to be regaining some motor control. This is good - my main worry was that she'd get over the acute sickness, but remain too motor-dysfunctional to really have any sort of life quality. It could still happen - she still can't really eat on her own - but improvement is a good sign.

I had entirely too much fun this afternoon manipulating data in an excel spreadsheet. This disturbs me - it's not something I'd imagine being fun, but it was. I'm sure that this points to some sort of potential career possibility that I've never considered before.

Bah. Some people are dumb. A person in my online class just claimed that since the people we were studying weren't citizens, it was sad that they could not get proper medical care, but that we can't provide medical care for everyone. The people in question were a second generation immigrant and her daughter.

Yes, because they're migrant workers and live in deplorable conditions, they can't be citizens, can they?

I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed right now. I've been exhausted the past few days, falling asleep by 9:30 or so, with no energy after work. The apartment needs to be in some state of higher cleanliness by Friday. Not perfect, but some parts are pretty awful right now. I have a midterm tomorrow, and a website review due at the beginning of the class (which should be pretty simple - no more than a half hour or so, but it still has to be done). I just finished my discussion board participation for the week by replying to Ms. Children Of Immigrants Aren't Citizens.

I took a nap after work, which I needed in order to function. This means that I won't be able to sleep for at least another two hours or so, which means that I'll be non-functional if I have to get to work tomorrow. So I'm not going to. There's not a whole heck of a lot of point in going anyways, since I'll only be there for about 3 hours total. I'm still debating whether or not to go to my first class, which would require leaving the house at about 10. There's no real reason not to go, assuming I get the website review done tonight, except that it takes a big chunk out of my day. I guess I'll see how I feel in the morning.

When I get paid, I want to get boxes to put baby stuff in. Currently, it's all in a suitcase on the bedroom floor, which is not really the most efficient storage place, as there is not nearly enough stuff to fill the whole suitcase, and the floor does not really have enough room for it.

I'm glad Buffy is ending this season. This is purely selfish, and doesn't have anything to do with declining quality or anything like that. I simply want to stop watching TV (and may actually not have access to a TV with decent reception on any sort of regular basis after we move), but I don't want to miss any Buffy.

Update: Website review is done. I may do another tomorrow if I feel like it. Looks like I'll go to my first class unless I actually do get sick. I printed out all the stuff I need to study, but I think I forgot it at work. Erk. Broken brain.

LemurBaby's first doctor's appointment was today. Sorta, anyways. Kaiser has this group "first prenatal appointment" thing, where they herd us all in to a room, tell us about diet and symptoms we might be experiencing, have us fill out paperwork (why can't they ask for our contact info ONCE and use it on all the forms? Or better yet, just make sure our patient records are up to date?), and give us books and stuff.

I actually already had this particular book, as there were about 50 copies of it used at the local baby thrift shop. Now I know why.

After informing us, they called us out one by one to give urine and blood samples. Fun fun fun.

The main problem with this appointment was that they told me it started at 10. It actually started at 9. The other main problem is that it didn't take place until now, when I'm already 8 weeks along. I haven't received one word of advice about diet/drinking/etc. from Kaiser before today, even though they've known I'm pregnant for a month (and I've known for a week longer than that). For all they know, I'm an alcoholic and I've been out drinking every night. They should provide some sort of information as soon as you come in to take a pregnancy test.

(Have I ranted about this before? If so, sorry. I'm just rather pissed at Kaiser. I'm glad I'm changing insurance in January, and not just because Sutter Davis has a really neato birthing center.)

Ok, I promise to stop ranting about Kaiser unless some new stupidity comes up.

At work, we had a holiday party. I showed up late (as expected) because of the appointment. I'd been told not to worry about the food, that I didn't need to worry about them running out before I arrived. This turned out not to be true - all the main courses except the chicken were gone, and chicken is not really high on my list of things I can eat right now. Had I known this would be the case, I wouldn't have paid the $10 for the meal (yes, we had to pay for our Christmas party! Grrr.).

I did win a little photo album thingy in the raffle. And my infamous ex-coworker (who is male and very much NOT the piercings type) won a pair of earrings :)

Bah. I'm irritable today. This week is just awful, and doesn't look like it will get any better before Friday.

I'm listening to Christmas music. It's October. I'm pathetic.

Yes, I realize I was listening to this same CD all last August or so, so I'm improving. It's still messed up.

Olivia, have you heard anything by Trans-Siberian Orchestra? For some reason I think you might like it.

I'm writing an essay. I have about 500 words left. This shouldn't be all that hard, except that I've just about run out of things to say. The first 800 words went very fast - I just brain dumped and got it all written within half an hour or so (though it still needs serious editing). The next 200 took a lot longer. This essay was actually due last Saturday, but I was terribly sick all that week and wasn't able to work on it. Then it was due Thursday, but I was a lazy ass and didn't get it done. So I just hope she accepts it tomorrow.

During high school, essays were no problem for me. I prefered them to everyday assignments. In college, it flip-flopped. I had no problem doing the silly everyday busywork, but every essay turns into a long, drawn out exercise in drama and angst. I don't remember how I wrote essays in high school. I just did. An 8 page essay would just pop out of my pen in a few hours. Now I can either brain dump, in which case everything comes out sounding horrible and wrong and in need of severe editing, or I can write something that sounds halfway decent, but it's like pulling teeth to get a sentence out of my brain.

I think I'm suffering from some genetic disease that causes me to gradually losing IQ points. By the time I reach 30 I'll be a complete imbecile in need of institutional care.

It disturbs me that I'll need to take a classload at least as bad as this semester in the spring if I want to graduate. I'll need to take three classes that require actual work. Perhaps I'll get lucky and either koyote will get a good job so I won't have to worry about working, or we'll decide not to move yet so I won't have to worry about getting everything done in one semester.

I'm sick of school. I'm sick of work. I want some time to sleep as much as I want and to do what I want. Preferably time when I'm not puking my guts out and suffering from random attacks of severe abdominal pain, as that doesn't really count as restful, and makes it rather hard to actually do anything except stare up at the ceiling and try to see shapes in the asbestos.

I feel hesitant to whine here, as I'm afraid of driving people away. But it's my journal, so I can write what I want. So there.

(The really depressing part is that this entry, including the mood and music, is exactly 500 words. Go figure)

Next year, someone remind me that the first day of classes is not the best day to eat lunch on campus, especially when short on time and/or impatient with waiting in lines.

I ended up with two blueberry muffins and an apple, as the bakery line was significantly shorter than anything else (30 seconds, rather than 10 minutes).

I got to the library, and the power was out. It came back on shortly after I arrived, which is good since I work in a tiny windowless office. It's also good because the return of power caused my computer to start up, so it was ready and waiting for me when I came in.

Someone pointed out this job to me. It sounds interesting, but kind of throws all variations of koyote and my plans for a loop. Not that this hasn't happened before.

I'm not really sure it's what I'd like to do. I'm getting rather burnt out on the technical thing. Then again, I'm barely doing technical work as it is now, so perhaps it's the BS I'm getting burnt out on, and not the work.

Perhaps I'll go ahead and apply, just for the hell of it.

Today is slow and boring. Perhaps this is life's way of encouraging me to get some classwork done. Such as the survey for my Human Sexuality class, which I'm probably not going to do, as it is only worth 5 points (out of 300), which is really not enough to incline me to spend an hour on self-psychotherapy.
( The Survey )

My infamous former co-worker just sent a message to an email list for campus technical staff essentially stating that linux is now secure out of the box. And simultaneously being rather rude to one of the most respected and outspoken technical people on campus.

Is he *trying* to be forced into early retirement?

Of course, I wondered the same thing back a few years ago, but he's still around.

It appears that I have convinced my boss that ditching the previously discussed linux/sparc monstrosity is a necessity. Yay.

Now I must decide what should take its place. Linux on Intel or Solaris on Sparc would be the two obvious choices.
( Geeky stuff. Input welcome )