It's been a busy week and a half.  Finally things are settling down.  So...my last post was on the 11th at 10:20 in the morning.  At about noon, my friend Adam, my friend Jackie, and my father arrived at my apartment to load up all my stuff to move in with Chris in Chippewa.  We loaded things up until about 5 or 6...It might have even been later than that.  I think it was 6:00ish.  It took around 4 hours or so to drive there, and it was a little scary.  My dad almost had a major accident.  The uhaul trailer started swaying and my dad had to compensate, which resulted in swerving all over the interstate.  It was a windy day.  We took it slow after that.  We got up there around 10:00 and unloaded very quickly.  It probably took an hour to unload...maybe an hour and a half.

I spent the next few days unpacking and getting everything set.  I unpack quickly.  I don't like being stuck living out of boxes for long.  So I quickly got most of my stuff where it needed to be, my clothes up in the closet, and things organized.  It's nice to feel like you actually live somewhere.  The only annoyance is that I didn't have everything yet.  I was constantly doing the whole..."Where is the...oh it's in my old apartment...crap..."  thing.  That gets old quickly, but to be honest...I wasn't excited about the drive.  It's a long drive and gets old.

During that time I found myself watching a lot of Mythbusters on netflix.  We also got Charter cable set up with the same 10 mbps up / 1 mbps down speed as I had with Time Warner's Road Runner in Milwaukee.  I can easily say this right now.  Time Warner Cable's Road Runner beats Charter High Speed in performance, customer service, and quality hands down.  Road Runner is consistently faster, has a much more solid DNS, drops out very rarely, and has no ports blocked at all.  Charter is exactly the opposite.  I had to figure out how to get my personal ftp server up and running on an alternate data port because of it.  Tip of the hat to you, Time Warner Cable.

I also was dealing with the worry about paying my bills.  I hadn't heard anything from unemployment yet about whether I'd get benefits or not.  I also had not received anything from COBRA yet.  So I was having worry fits that were causing me to lose sleep.  I'll talk a little more on those issues later.

At the end of the week, it was time to head back to Milwaukee again to get the rest of my stuff, clean up the apartment, check out, and go to a birthday party.  I was looking forward to the latter much more than the former stuff.  The party was on Saturday.  It was a surprise 60th for my Aunt.  It went off without a hitch and was a lot of fun.  She really wasn't expecting it at all.  I took a lot of photos.

Sunday came around, and it was time to clean and pack things up.  We got to my apartment around noon and got started.  There wasn't a whole ton left, namely a bunch of boxes and a bit of loose stuff.  I suppose I did have my pots and pans in the kitchen and my bedroom closet too.  Still it went pretty smoothly packing the rest of it in the car.  Since we had all the big stuff already moved, it wasn't so bad.  However...

Have you ever had your mother tell you: "You live in my house, you live by my rules.  When you move out, you can live like you want."  Yeah, turns out that's not true.  My mother is anal retentive about cleanliness.  It runs in our family actually.  My grandmother had a house so clean it was practically sterile.  My mom's house wasn't quite that clean, but still pretty sparkly.  Personally, I tend to live with a more lived in feel.  I want things in their place, but I don't run around with a feather duster all the time.  Sometimes there are dishes in the sink.  Sometimes I leave my bed unmade.  That's my perogative...it's my apartment, right?  Nope.  My mother started yelling like crazy at me for not coming down earlier in the week, packing everything up nicely and neatly for things to be very easy for her.  She started calling me selfish and basically told me I needed to live differently.  I was really shocked.  It seemed like it randomly came out of nowhere.  She was fine, and then suddenly she was angry...and it surely seemed misplaced.  She had no idea how much work we put into moving a week ago, how much I had packed up before then, or how much effort I put into unpacking.  On top of that, it didn't make sense for me to come down earlier due to the party...I just didn't see where she was coming from.  I said a few things back that were, to be honest, rude.  I acknowledge that.  When I get frustrated, angry, and defensive, sometimes I say stupid things.  We all do it.  Anyway...regardless, it was drama none of us needed that day.

I talked to my dad about it later, and he informed me that he didn't understand why she was yelling at me either.  He felt that her argument was unfounded and said nothing because he didn't want to get into it.  I guess later she chastised him for not standing up for her.  As far as I know...she's still mad at me for it.  She was still mad as of Wednesday.  I just don't get it.  She knew I had to move.  She knew why I was moving.  It wasn't a choice.  I had to get out of my apartment and get someplace cheaper asap.  I've had a lot going on in my head too.  This past few months with the job and such has been really hard to manage emotionally without drama like this.  My mother may be right or wrong about my being selfish.  I'll leave that up to the rest of you to decide.  Still I think she was being the selfish one in being upset that I didn't drive back earlier, miss appointments here, leave the house a mess for Chris...just so I could make my old apartment clean up easier for her.  Ugh...I hope this blows over quickly.

Anyway, the apartment was cleaner when we finished than it was when I moved in.  My landlord came in to look and she was blown away.  If my apartment is rented for June, I will get my security deposit back.  She has been so understanding of everything, which I so very much appreciate.  I would be happy to rent from them again, and she said she'd rent to me any time.  That's good news.

The hard part was that we had two vehicles filled.  I was going to have to drive to Chippewa with my parents' van, unload, drive back to my hometown near Milwaukee, swap to get my car again, and then drive back...all in all it totalled about 10.5 hours in the car over three days.  I wasn't looking forward to it.  Surprisingly, it went by pretty quickly.  When you have a lot to do, time flies.  So, Monday came, and I drove up to Chippewa.  I unloaded...got as unpacked as I could by Tuesday evening.  Then I drove back to Milwaukee.  I stayed overnight.  Turns out at my favorite bakery, Kaiser's Six Point Bakery in West Allis, I had won the weekly business card drawing for a dozen free donuts.  I also had to pick up some tapes for some freelance work.  So I made the last trip with a lot of sugar on hand.

Here we are now...it's Thursday evening, or Friday morning depending on how you look at it, and I'm as unpacked as I'll ever be.  There are a bunch of empty boxes in the garage.  I feel like that's pretty good all things considered. There's a little bit of junk lying around I need to put in places, and I haven't yet hung artwork.  But otherwise, things are good.

The cat situation is interesting.  We've got four cats here now...my two and Chris' two.  They are doing just fine with a couple exceptions.  Scarlet, Kitty (aka Meat), and Vincent are getting along  just fine.  Serenity is Chris' female cat, and she's a bit of a priss.  She's not taking well to anybody.  So she's been hissing and growling all the time.  She just wants to be left alone.  Kitty / Meat is a problem sometimes too because he's a bit of a pervert cat.  He likes to lick girl kitties in the no-no spot.  Scarlet is kinda used to it.  I stop him whenever I see that, but Serenity, rightfully so, gets very upset.  So...we need to figure out how to stem that behavior.

On Monday, I went to what's called "Business After Hours".  It's the Chippewa Chamber of Commerce meeting essentially.  I went with Chris to get connected to the community of business owners for freelance and so forth.  I met some great people there.  Unfortunately I also saw someone I have no interest in ever seeing again.  Mike Olsen, owner of Micon cinemas and former manager at Carmike cinemas in Eau Claire....also the man that severely sexually harassed me back in about 2003.  I'm the reason he got fired from his job.  I saw the back of his head there, and knew it was him right away.  I never made eye contact.  If he ever makes an attempt to talk to me, he will get a very short response and me walking away.

On the positive side, I ran into a lot of wonderful people including someone from a local business that's hiring.  She asked me what I do and upon my response, she suggested I drop my resume with them.  Sounds like they are looking for someone with just my type of skills.  I will be sending it to them Friday.  That's awesome.  At first I wasn't sure I wanted a full time job, but the more I think about it, it's probably better for me to have one at this point in my career.  I'll get the non-profit going as a side project.

Thursday night, Chris and I went to help the local Lions Club out with feeding needy people at a local church.  It was a feel good experience helping people who need food get it.  I know I could be very close to that even right now.  I may qualify for food stamps at the moment.  So, it's a humbling experience.  I'm a giving person.  So I would have done it anyway, but still.

While there, one of the lions asked me what I do, and I explained that I'm funemployed.  I did tell him what I do freelance and what I want in a job.  He told me to come pick up an application at his printing company.  He could use a web designer.  I was pretty surprised.  Two job leads in a matter of days.  People have said that things happen for a reason.  This job change and move seem like they definitely were supposed to happen the way they are.  That's good and makes me feel a lot better.

Speaking of feeling a lot better, I finally got word from the unemployment office.  I am officially getting unemployment.  What a relief!  That means I can survive while things get figured out as to where I'm going next.  I can easily say I'll sleep better tonight knowing my bills will be covered.  I also finally received COBRA paperwork.  So I'll be fine with health insurance too.  Both are great news.  To top that all off, I saw a Bald Eagle flying over the Chippewa River today as we drove through town.  What a stunning sight!  I'll be sure to have my camera out a lot this summer to try to catch them in action.

In the meantime, I'll be working on getting the new site live over the course of the coming week.  Now that I've gotten settled in, I should have plenty of time to do so.  Keep watching for that change.  As usual, thanks for reading!