Roses and Thorns Nov. 8 - 27

Since there's three weeks (!) of roses n' thorns to catch up on, I won't limit how many I write about, but I'll do my best to keep them brief-ish.

Rose
The Stone Temple Pilots concert. I needn't say more, since I think I've already said enough .

Thorn
Friday, November 13th - Friday, November 20th. Heavy. Sad. Unproductive.

Rose
Jim's Christmas gift finally came in the mail. I was starting to get a little worried because it took a week longer than what I was told, but it arrived safe n' sound, so that's a relief. Even though the seller had a great rating, you're always taking a bit of a gamble with eBay.

Thorn
CiC. What a friggin' headache!! And I do mean that literally. I never get headaches, and all week I've had a splitting one that keeps coming back. I totally blame them. I guess there's some consolation in knowing that I'm not the only person this client has managed to completely piss off. I just keep reminding myself that at least I'm getting paid by the hour to deal with their b.s., which includes:

• Totally last minute changes forcing me to redo all my work
  
• Poor instructions that leave me pestering everyone at the office with a million questions
  
• Revised deadlines that slide the scale from pretty difficult to pretty impossible. Fortunately, I managed to get a two day extension (a.k.a this weekend).
  

Gawd, I'm actually looking forward to the no-brainer contract work I have slated for next week. I can't wait to get CiC off my plate.

Rose
I don't know if I should even bother including this rose, but what the hell... We got our latest revised script outline done... AGAIN! One of the main issues was that one of our characters disappeared for over 20 minutes, so we wanted to find ways to bring him back into the story. There was also a small handful of other tweaks. But no matter how small the handful, once you start shuffling scenes around or adding new ones, it impacts everything!

We have a meeting with les producers on Monday. I hope to gawd we can start writing soon. Christmas is a comin' and the funds are growin' thin. (On that note, thank goodness for stupid CiC consuming an excessive amount of my time.) We don't get paid the other 75% of our development funding until we finish this draft.  TC & AS are super cool, and told us several times that we could always ask for an advance if we ever needed it, but we'd rather not look that desperate. ;)

Thorn
Dramarama. Big time. And not the high school variety, but instead it's more of the very serious, unavoidable kind. Not for me, but for those I love... and there is nothing I can do except listen. Fortunately, I'm a good listener. Don't bother emailing or calling to ask me who, because it's natcho bid'ness.

Rose
Good times at Ray's birthday party last weekend. I originally wasn't planning on going, because it had been such a blegh week with the funeral the day before n' everything, but I'm happy I went. I had a lot of fun... well, for the most part. The carpet (fortunately, not ours) got well-watered when a couple of the boys became a little sloppy. And the peer-pressure from one individual to get absolutely shit-faced was amped higher than at a college frat party, so I could've done without that as well. I don't like when people keep tabs as though drinking is a competition. (Umm... How old are we?) But otherwise, it really was a lot of fun.

Thorn
We finally heard back from Hyundai's head office (who our local dealership suggested we contact) and as it turns out, they won't cover our towing bill.  Long story short(ish), our road-side coverage through Hyundai ran out 45 days before the break-down. (Although we never received any notification of this.) We felt that we had a strong argument - the manufacturing defect was covered under warrantee, therefore, shouldn't the towing to their dealership be covered as well, since the defect was no fault of our own?

Unfortunately, Jim's endless calling around and (polite) arguing heeded no results. Customer service at head office just kept repeating the same line over and over again that our road-side coverage had expired. "Well, that's very convenient!" Jim finally said right before telling them that we will never buy a Hyundai again, and let all our friends know not to either, and that we will also post comments about their poor customer service policies all over the internet. Ha. He felt a little bad after he got off the phone, but I thought he sounded good. No f-bombs were dropped. His tone remained calm.

So yeah, looks like we're out $660. Ouch. Could've been worse, I suppose. We could've had to pay for the repairs as well.

BTW, what happened to my idea of keeping these roses n' thorns brief? I promise to try harder. 

Rose
We just learned this week that we'll be spending Christmas in Kelowna!!! Not that I haven't enjoyed some lovely Christmases at Chez Cliffes in Sorrento, but there's really something wonderful about waking up in your own bed on Christmas morn. I have more to say about why I'm so thrilled to enjoy Christmas at home this year, but in the effort of staying brief, I'll save that story for another post.

Thorn
Just as I type this, the headline on our muted TV is about fast food customers calling 911 when they don't get what they order. What the hell is this world coming to?

Speaking of what the hell is this world coming to, my real thorn is the recent news story about the Toronto Humane Society. I've been following as it unfolds and it's un-effing-believable. It's truly a sad state of affairs when those who belong to an organization that's actually called "Humane" "Society" are anything but humane and certainly do not belong in our society. Disgusting. :(

Rose
All week Jim has been singing the Frosted Flakes jingle from the 80's in a raspy voice that is a cross between a Californian and an Irish accent. It's hilarious.

Prior to this, for the last month he's been having a lot of fun imitating this little kid using a Foghorn Leghorn impression, "I needs ma bacon! She thinks she's a smart little girl, but she don't know I neeeeds ma bacon!"  Ha ha.



Alright, clearly I'm running low on roses and thorns ova here. 

Thorn
The zipper on my favourite pair of boots broke, so I had to get it fixed. I figured it was cheaper than buying another pair of boots, (which I recently did). Plus, now I'll have those boot for at least another year or two... so I guess that is a rose.

Rose
I bought a couple new pairs of jeans and went to the extra effort of taking them in to a seamstress to get them hemmed. Owning new jeans that actually FIT is a big deal for a shorty like moi.

Good lord, these roses and thorns are getting pathetic, aren't they?

Thorn
People who use their FB status to trash talk good, kind people who totally don't deserve it. Grow the hell up. You're embarrassing yourself.

Rose
Big Fish. Probably my second favourite movie of all time. We only watch it once a year, in order to "keep it special". So we finally put it on a couple weeks ago, and it was as wonderful as always. You'd think that after watching it over half a dozen times that the ending wouldn't choke me up, but I'm always surprised to find a little tear welling in the corner of my eye as they go down to the river. (I hope that wasn't a spoiler for anyone? I don't think by saying "the river" I'm giving anything away.) Anyhow, it's such a fun n' magical n' beautiful movie. Love it, love it!

Thorn
I think I'm all out of thorns. But most of my thorns were pretty big ones this week, so I'm glad I have nothing else to complain about. Instead, maybe I'll just write one more rose and then call it a day.

Rose
My cousin'd Jodie received the painting in the mail that I did for her birthday. It's always a bit scary to give someone something that is homemade. I mean, what if they don't like it and you spent all that time on it? So just in case, I bought her a nice pair of earrings as well. ;) Fortunately, she LOVED the painting and said that it matches their newly renovated bathroom PERFECTLY -- even though she only described it to me. I haven't seen any pictures yet. She also said that she hasn't been able to find anything that would look good on their freshly painted walls, but because my painting was such a perfect fit, she put it up right away. Needless to say, this made me feel really nice in the heart. :)

So on that warm n' fuzzy note, I'll end my roses n' thorns right here...