This morning's Ideal Bite reminded me about something we decided to do a few months ago -- throw away our garbage can. I'd had enough with breaking bags and leaking bags and just the general mess and space. Our kitchen closet now just has our recycling bag in it.

When we go grocery shopping we always ask for paper now, and use paper bags for trash. It's just easier, cheaper, and seems more ecologically sound. It's also made it pretty clear to me how little trash we produce these days. We always have just enough bags before we need to go shopping again - about 2 bags a week. Most of our waste seems to be recycled - we end up taking recycling at least once a week.

This will work out even better when we have a house, as there are slidey thingies for paper bags to fit under the sink instead of it being on the floor, just barely out of the way.

Life has been rushing by so fast.

Last Friday we went to see the Goo Goo Dolls and Counting Crows at the Ford Amphitheatre. Woot for free tickets. Adam Duritz has a very preacher-like quality live. It was fun, even though we got soaked with the wet grass getting our blanket wet. At least the lawn wasn't mud this time around.

Then Sunday and Monday my aunt drove across the state to spend a couple days with us. She's so much fun to be around, and I learn so much with her. I love how she can pick up a map and tell me about so many places on it. Her love for travel is really inspiring. We went to see The Illusionist, which we all enjoyed. We're discussing going on a train trip together next spring.

Shawn and I are looking at houses in St. Petersburg. I'm pretty sure we can find a house with mortgage payments that are the same, or not much more than what we're looking at for rent next year.

There's just so much going on - work, health stuff, housing issues. It's good that we've been able to balance fun in there, too.

Things here may be fast paced, but they're generally calm and positive. It's nice.

The sucky part about starting to house hunt early is when you find one that you fall in love with, that will likely be long gone by the time you're actually going to be ready to buy.

Bah.

When Sue was here we took her to our little specialty foods store, and I bought a tub of the almond/vanilla granola I usually buy from the bulk bins at our health food store. Only... it smells like Play-Doh. It doesn't taste like Play-Doh (and yes, I know what Play-Doh tastes like), it tastes just the same as the stuff I usually buy. But the smell weirds me every time I open the lid.

Six Feet Under is coming to Bravo.

More reruns for me to waste my life on - woot! It'll be fun to see what they cut.

When things are important to me (a relationship, an idea, the physical and emotional well being of myself and my family) I'm not shy about getting into a confrontation. There's been a lot of conflict in my life where there was no resolution, or things were left with this horrible dark feeling, so each time I engage in conflict it's very stressful. It's a sort of twisted circle where I always thought conflict resolution was a very weak point of mine, so it caused stress, and the stress made me think it was a weak point. Shawn and I sort things out, but we know each other so well (intuitively as well as because of the amount of time we've been together) that conflict is relatively simple.

But lately I've had a lot of experiences of getting into very passionate, emotional arguments, and yet them ending in very positive ways (even to the point of being complimented for the way things went by observers). The more this happens the more I see that I'm actually quite good at conflict resolution when the person(s) on the other side of the fence is(are) actually interested in it rather than just viciously acting out or having some other ulterior motive.

There are always going to be times when there's just a communication block - I even have these with Shawn and my best friend from time to time, but I'm learning a lot these days about my strengths and weaknesses that I just never would've figured, and getting less and less upset by necessary conflict as it goes along.

Tomorrow when I go in for my beta I get to drive our new 2003 Mitsubishi Galant, stereo blasting to calm me. Buying it was such an unexpected but organic process. I was pre-qualifying us for a home loan and decided to look at one for a car as well. We were approved for a no money down, moderate interest loan for well over the amount we were looking for. We found one car we liked, but it was sold, and then two more popped up at Clearwater Toyota. David Whitehead was our salesman and he was very low key and made the whole process pretty easy (even if it did take almost-3 hours).

Anyway, we don't have to worry about reliability so much anymore, so now he can put in for the next level training program at work and perhaps get a promotion (and 10%+ raise). And when/if we have kids the baby seat won't have to be strapped to the roof for lack of anywhere else to put it.

I wanna get a WoW sticker for it for sure (though it'll wait until I'm buying a tshirt or something to go with it since shipping is $6.25). Not sure what other stickers. But I'll be looking the next couple days. I'll have to try to not overdo it.

Pictures to come as soon as I get off my lazy butt and take some.

Update: Pictures are up!

It's funny how calm things have been. Everything seems to flow so smoothly, almost effortlessly, no matter how complicated or painful. And things have been extremely complicated - between fertility treatments, buying a car, looking for a house, my surgery, my work, Shawn's work, last-minute guests, sorting out vacation for my birthday, etc, etc. It's such a bizarre, unexpected gift. My latest project has just flown out of me, without a thought, almost, and was finalized on the first client review (awaiting printer review at the moment). I may have picked up another client when we were buying our car as well. I need to print up some business cards and eventually get wingsong going.

The only thing I'm hung up on at the moment is what to get Winter for her birthday. I'll figure it out.

The blessing of a calm life is one I've never taken for granted when it's been given to me.

I did a lot of eeking and groaning when we added the Mitsubishi (and requisite Comp & Collision options) to our Progressive policy. Basically, they had us paying over $200/month for insurance with $250 deductibles, and no fancy extras like GAP or rental reimbursement. Ick, ick, ick.

So we've been looking around at other companies, and so far, everything's been about the same. Until we got some spam smail yesterday from 21st. I've been snickering at their commercials but hadn't checked them yet.

Basically, by going with them, we're saving about $600 a term - or $1,200 a year. Plus they pay for roadside assistance up to $50 and we added rental reimbursement and no deductible for comprehensive on both cars. $500 for collision on the Mitsubishi.

I set it up for 2 payments, so things will be really tight this month and next month, but after that, we'll be fine - unlike before where we were looking at things being tight for the next 5 months.

I love saving money.

I've been studying NVC for years, though never formally (and when my meds are off all thought of it flies out the window). I'd like to one day. But I did pick up a new trick from Elizabeth (one of my favorite people on the planet) this week: using "how come?" in place of "why". Where both indicate the same thing, "why" tends to trigger defense mechanisms (I remember it doing this in me when I was younger, not so much now). "How come" is much more casual and nonthreatening. My endless curiosity prompts me to question a lot, so we'll see how well I remember it in practice, and what the results are.

My body fatigue is pretty pervasive these days. The other day I was shaking and having to hold on to the counter to stay upright while making cereal. I've not been swimming in a while, first because of rain, then because of the sore on my back. So today I picked up T'ai Chi, with a modification - sitting on my exercise ball.

It worked out really well, and I feel amazing now - renewed, physically and emotionally. It wasn't too light, or too heavy, and I think it worked my core muscles more than doing it standing. I'm hoping this helps combat the weakness some, even though swimming didn't. There are so many things coming up that I want to do that require walking (ZooBoo, Melbourne Fall Art Fest, etc.), and I want to be up for it. Once I get it perfected, I may post instructions here and elsewhere for others who deal with fatigue. I'm so excited! I wish I'd thought of this earlier.

Today I felt guilt for the first time in a very long time. To me, guilt is generally a wasted emotion (remorse is another story). When I mess up I want to rectify it, not wallow in self-pity. But today I was confronted with an issue I can change, but I won't. Hence the guilt.

I drink a lot of bottled water. Not in the gallon bottles - but the personal-sized ones. This creates a lot of waste I could reduce.

Now, the most eco-friendly thing I could do would to buy a water filter for the tap. The second-most to refill the same gallon jug. But I won't do either. I'll keep drinking my Zephyrhills and Glacéau Vitamin & Fruit Waters. And I'll feel guilty, despite the fact that I reuse and recycle. Especially about the Vitamin Water as there's rumors that they'd only hire Kelly Clarkson as a sponsor after she lost weight. Ick.

But I do have a bottled water trick that I didn't think much of until Sue was here and noticed it. I put a half bottle of water in the freezer, and then when I'm thirsty I fill it with half of another bottle, and then put the second one in the freezer. That way my water stays cold the hours it generally takes me to drink it.

I also have a recycling tip - rinse your recycling with hot water over your dirty dishes - you rinse your dishes and your recycling at the same time.

I put a new link in the sidebar under subscriptions - "The Daily Motivator". I haven't gone through the archives yet, but the past few days I've been reading it I've really enjoyed the gentle reminders and things to ponder.

With having a second car to go where I want when I want, I was thinking a lot about the knitting classes I've wanted to take for ages. But with the cost of a new car, we really can't afford that right now. So I figured I'd try to learn on my own. I've learned most things in my life that way, but I thought knitting would be in the same category as typing - something to do with my hands that I just can't get without a little instruction. But it was worth a shot.

So on Shawn's day off we went to the library and checked out two books (one on knitting, one on crochet), then to K-Mart to look at yarn and needles. Unfortunately, K-Mart's craft section these days consists of two endcaps. So we tried Wal-Mart. Which is undergoing renovation and most of their craft section is in shambles. But we found two giant balls of (crappy) yarn for cheap for me to practice with. We eventually ended up at Jo-Ann's for needles, and I got a couple cheaper sets - 3 knitting, 5 crochet.

I sat down with needles and yarn and book that night, and found the book wasn't what I hoped - and found a really good tutorial on the Lion Brand site. Within a couple hours I had a general hang of casting on and the garter stitch. My stitches were way too tight and I kept having to rip out after 4 rows or so, but I think I've got that sorted.

I'm still crap, obviously - I've got purl stitch and ribbing and a million other things to learn, but I'm pleased with myself and what I've gotten done so far. I just gave up on the mess that was my first square, taught myself binding off, realized I need to buy a yarn needle, and decided to use it as a cat toy or potholder rather than toss it.

Next I start making another square (several of them, actually), that will hopefully be better, to send to Warm Up America. If anyone would like to begin a WUA group, local or long-distance, just email at the link on the sidebar. Until then, I'll just be sending in individual pieces.

We're finalizing vacation plans. I'm hoping Shawn'll open on the 20th so we can leave that evening. If not, the morning of the 21st. Spend the day with Sue, then on the 22nd I get to meet Lin and she'll join us for the Art Fest. I'm nervous but happy. The 23rd - 25th are wide open if anyone's got a suggestion. The only other things on our agenda are the beach, Wagon Wheel, and Frankie's. We nixed plans to go to Kennedy as there's no launches during that period, and it'd be more than we wanted to spend right now to see everything we want to see. We'll drive back the 25th sometime. I don't want to leave the cats alone longer than that.

We tried the chocolate one of these tonight.

Ew. Just... ew.

Pfffffffft. What is this, Albion?

I can't sleep tonight, but sleep is on my mind. The other night I came to bed late and the second my head hit the pillow, Shawn wrapped himself around me and just started whispering "I love you" over and over, along with "my sweet Alix" and almost purring. He clung on tight and nuzzled. It was so cute. When I come to bed and he's already asleep I always whisper that I love him, and he always says it back, usually between snores, and always still asleep.

He's been having to work a lot lately. It's nice to have these moments that let him rest but keep us connected.

I have a deep love for breakfast foods. Probably because most of them involve bread. One of my favorite deserts is cereal. I've been craving cinnamon like crazy lately, so I decided to try Zoe's Cinnamon O's. They're very dense, unlike normal O's, but very filling, very nutritious, and yummy, but only with milk. They're just too hard for me to eat as a snack. I know I have a minor obsession with flax seeds, but they're just so freaking good for you.

Yeserday I switched to Opera as my main browser for a while. Firefox constantly updating and screwing up my extensions was driving me crazy. I'm still having to use Firefox for a lot of things. Opera doesn't seem to like Neopets much, and it didn't like me trying to buy a crapload of samples from Alima yesterday. So far my favorite Opera features are the notification of updated feeds when you open and the SimAquarium widget. Priorities, you know?

I finished knitting my first square last night. After I post this, I'll do my T'ai Chi then learn to purl! I'd run out for a yarn needle (and maybe some prettier yarn), but things are tight financially right now and I blew my extra (and then some) on the make-up samples. Pffft. It'll pass.

I'm really looking forward to the start of this season's green market. Less than two weeks to go!

My brain's a bit random lately. So much going on.