All Operators are Busy

At least, I'm busy.

I woke up at 8:00 a.m., startling Major Tom, who stared at me groggily and grumbled at me for waking him up (he's a grumpy old man). I dressed, and drove to Dallas, swinging by Starbucks for a cup of coffee and an apple fritter en route. And I filled up my car with gas. And got it washed.

All before 9:30 a.m., baby. That's right: I'm productive!

I got to my apartment and began straightening up, putting things away. I ironed some pants (I loathe this chore, above all others), reupholstered an ottoman, the usual.

Yup, I now have an ottoman - okay, it's a repurposed vanity stool - that was once upholstered in goldenrod cotton damask, and is now covered in lovely saffron silk. It is currently in my living room, where it holds a metal tray, upon which I can rest a drink when I'm lying on the sofa, watching a movie.

I picked up my lampshades - the ones my mother bought me for my birthday - and squealed with delight when I removed their cellophane wrappers.

The carpet cleaning guys returned my rug, unrolled it, and put my furniture back where it belongs. I then put my lamps on their beautiful chinoiserie tables, with their pretty new lampshades, and oohed and aahed at the results. And decided I need to rehang some pictures, but that can wait until my mother returns from her vacation.

I washed clothes. I washed miniscule loads of clothes. As in, two pairs of jeans, or the equivalent of two pairs of jeans in underwear and T-shirts.

Guess what? There's something wrong with my washing machine. It is still jumping and rotating like a teeny-bopper at a sock-hop, so I emailed my apartment complex about it. And asked them to please tack my carpet back down in my bedroom and replace the porch lightbulb, while they're at it.

I updated my apartment inventory (the spreadsheet of everything I own) and documented the contents of my humble abode with a camera, then printed out the pictures and put them in my firesafe.

And then, I went shopping.

It's been a rough couple of weeks for Ms. Strainedconsciousness, and my oh-so-generous mother left me a little cash gift tucked inside a Halloween card before she hightailed it to Santa Fe for her birthday. The card read "Do something fun!"

There hasn't been enough fun for me, lately.

So I went to Northpark and bought a couple of shirts - within the defined color spectrum - and some new jewelry. The shirts set me back $20 each, and the jewelry was $45 for both a necklace and a cocktail ring.

The cocktail ring has an enormous cognac-colored gemstone, and it will look ravishing with my steel-toed boots.

Ha. Haha.

I've discovered that, in addition to not being able to carry heavy purses, wearing heavy necklaces gives me a headache. So I bought a lightweight necklace in matte gold (I don't look all that great in super shiny gold).

I filed some more paperwork. I paid my rent. I put stuff away.

I calculated the taxes I will either owe or be refunded, depending on how the IRS calculator works. I'll either owe $415, or get back $2,000. I'm hoping it's the latter. I can't tell if their calculator defines "federal income tax" as including the social security and medicare taxes, or if it's just the federal income tax. I guess I'll find out in January.

I was productive. It felt good to be productive.