I should write about my life

[sillygoosegirl]

As much as I like to complain about LJ these days, since relatively few of us are still posting anything of substance, I should probably do my part and try to do a real update that isn't just complaining about work. I challenge the rest of you to do the same.

Travel-front:

Aside from our 7-night backpack in the Emigrants that I need to post about, travel has kind of sucked lately. I really want to go on a big trip (like 1-2 weeks international), but I'm overwhelmed when it comes to getting the ball rolling. Considering the travel we've done already, it seems like this shouldn't be so hard. But if there's one thing I've learned about myself and travel, it's that I want to see it all and just can't make decisions very well.

Also, well, that other trip is going to be kind of a hard act to follow in so so many ways. The one currently rearing it's head at me is how damn expensive flights are. Going to Peru for 2 weeks should not cost 25% of what traveling the world for 5.5 months cost, but it looks like it will. It makes me think, "Maybe we should just save our money for another big trip down the road. Perhaps a Southern Hemisphere RTW trip." But I don't want to wait. And we probably just aren't going to do another trip like that before retirement. After all, we're going to have kids and a mortgage at some point, probably sooner rather than later. We're probably not going to be ballsy enough to quit our jobs to travel at that point, we were barely ballsy enough to do it before.

Speaking of mortgages and kids...

Home-front:

I find myself struggling with what I even want. On a day-to-day basis, I'm struggling with being gone all the time and worrying about leaving again whenever I am home. But that's a work thing for later.

Lately been getting together for board games most Sundays with jianantonic and a few people she introduced us to. Didn't this weekend as I was tired from work. Gawd. I'm a basket case aren't I? Everything comes back to work. Not talking about it until later. Really. Anyway, the regular socialization and new friends are great.

We've also been looking at houses a little bit, but it seems like the right house just isn't on the market. I really want to buy a house because interest rates are so low. And because I want to put down roots. And because someone plays music late at night right by our bed. And because I just went to the Restore to window shop today (speaking of window shopping, they had this gorgeous bay window with window seat for only $300, all I need is a house to put it in!). And because I want to fix up a cool old house before we have a baby. And because I want to know we are staying in Beaverton. But... I also want to take another big trip someday... I also want to be free to move for contracts... I also really like living so close to the lightrail and my parents... and nobody is selling the house I want to buy in this neighborhood where I want to live.

We have also been talking about babies lately. I could say much the same things about them as the houses. Well, not so much with the interest rates or for sale aspect, plus some other ones like the whole part of promising to care for and love forever a person you haven't even met yet (it was hard enough to promise that to someone I'd already known for almost 5 years, was already in love with, and who was a grown up capable of partnership), but you get the idea. I'm 29 years old. I'm supposed to be done feeling this way. Or at least getting there. Instead, the list of things I want to do first has gotten longer since I was 22 years old, not shorter. What's up with that? Oh, right, all the things I've already done and WANT TO DO AGAIN! Maybe it would have been better to not know what I'd be missing.

Both of the above are complicated with questions of what I want to do as far as working after having children. I could write several long posts about this and probably will at some point, but in brief: I always planned that I wouldn't, but now I am less sure. If I keep working we could, for example, retire about 13 years earlier. Or buy that super-cute house in down town Beaverton. Or travel more. Or, more likely, split the difference. I try not to worry about this too much since, you know, so many women change their minds once they have the baby anyway. But at the same time, I don't want to buy a little house and decide to work, or buy a big house and want to stay home. Especially with home prices still falling, whatever house we buy, I want it to be one we are going to be happy to stay in for a long time. This says, clearly, that the house should come after a baby. On the other hand, if I am to fix up a house, that would be nice to start on before a baby. Of course, knowing my luck, indecisiveness, perfectionism, and complete lack of maternal instincts, I will probably be the first mother in the history of time who still doesn't know if she wants to work or stay home after the baby comes.

Goals-front:

Normally I don't really set goals for myself. If you don't understand why I consider goals a bad idea for myself, read the previous topic. I especially normally don't set goals for myself at New Years. But last year I did. I've been meaning to say so for the past 10 months or so. My goal was to read 50 books in 2011. Now that's not really that many compared to a lot of people on my friends page, but it's a lot for most people, including me. I'm unlikely to make that goal as I am only at 39 books so far, and the year is almost gone. But 40-odd books in a year is still quite an accomplishment for me, and I read a lot of good books and a lot of books I've been meaning to read for years, so I feel good about it and am proud of myself. I will try again for 50 next year.

Another good thing that has come out of it is that I've memorized my library card number and learned how to use Overdrive to get both audio and print e-books from the library over the internet.

Work-front:

Now that I have gotten tired of writing, I will allow myself to talk about work. Because I write entirely way too much about work. Of course, you already knew that, but you don't know the extent of it because I only actually post on the internet about 10% of what I write about work. And of that, only about 10% is public. I write way too much about work.

Anyway, last Wednesday we had our wave 3 go-live. I started right at the wave 2 go-live, so this is basically all my work since starting this job getting put into action. It was pretty exciting and I worked a lot of hours. On Monday and Tuesday I worked a few hours getting my stuff completely done, and a lot of hours supporting other members of my team who weren't as responsible as I was probably had a lot more stuff they were responsible for than I did. Then on Wednesday and Thursday I worked a lot of hours in the Command Center fixing problems as they came up. And on Friday continued working issues from home, although I woke up feeling sick and therefore made it a short day so I could get some extra sleep. So far, everything is going well, but the Command Center is open through 12/2, so it's not like we are out of the woods yet. In fact, there were so many problems with ancillary systems and users being able to log in (not my job or even my team's job) that it's really too soon to say yet if the stuff I built is working out. Also, throughout the week, I lost a lot of sleep worrying about stuff.

Comments

[quartzpebble.livejournal.com]

Oof. Good luck about the not thinking about work all the time. I'm getting some of that with grad school and it sucks--I hope that gets better for you.

[paperclippy.livejournal.com]

I don't want to buy a little house and decide to work, or buy a big house and want to stay home.

Here is my perspective as someone who owns a big house (well, technically Ben owns it, but whatever). If you don't *need* a big house, don't buy one. We have often thought about downgrading to a smaller house for several reasons. The most obvious is that we are pretty much incapable of keeping this big house clean. Another is that the bigger your house, the more things that can go wrong. Also, why spend the money if you don't need the space?

That said, we bought a big house because we hate moving, never wanted to move again, and wanted to have enough space for potentially a couple teenage kids at some point down the line. Now that we've been here a few years, we think about moving anyway regardless. So IMO buy the small house, have your kid(s), then if it's too small upgrade. That resolves your issue of worrying about staying home in a big house. :)

As for working after having a kid, I always thought I would work part-time like my mom did. Well, she didn't work when I was little, then she worked part-time when I went to school, then went back to full-time when I was in high school. Now I'm thinking maybe I would just work full-time. I suppose I won't really know until I have a kid, but I hope that I would be able to work out something with my employers in any case.

[zwilichkl.livejournal.com]

Awesome about your book reading!

I like owning a small space, and I'm not sure if we would move even if we did have kids.