Signs of stress

     This past week was a bit stressful, with several major deadlines coming due at once. One of my coworkers doesn't handle that sort of stress well, and would ask me - quite literally - every fifteen minutes if I'd had updates on any of them. While I'm fairly stable under stress, that was a little much for me; rather than bring in my nerf guns and teach him the folly of his ways, I simply decorated a desk plant I have and placed it where he'd see it when he wheeled his chair back to ask me questions:

Stories

     As mentioned in my previous post, I've gotten away from telling stories about myself. Telling stories in general, however, continues. Here's the first part of one I've been working on lately:

Sylvia Bishop, Chapter 1

Fewer words

     As I try to be a calmer, more patient and forgiving person, I find that I have less that I'm willing to say, and less to talk about on the blog. Not that I don't still have opinions, I just don't feel they need to be shared as much. So rather than a wordy post, here are two photos taken at one of our construction sites at work that I felt were quietly pretty. There's a lot of clamour for people's attention lately; I appreciate the quiet moments more.

Dormancy

     Been a bit quiet of late. Some of that is that I've been busy getting things done, and some of it is that I'm simply becoming quieter. My opinion does not need to be given on every issue that comes my way, especially since I'm not completely informed on many of them. Unfortunately, since sketches are usually my opinion on things, that does mean I've done less drawing lately. It's not gone, though, no worries there.

     Anyway, as things are slowing down with the season change, thought I'd catch up here. In no particular order, here are things that I've worked on recently:

Sewing: Halloween outfit (Slytherin student from Hogwarts, and apparently this was the most people who've ever dressed up for Halloween at work), and work pants.

Exercise: Still doing boot camp two nights a week, and running twice a week at home. The Kenpo Karate class is on break until December; I'm enjoying that quite a bit.

Financially comfortable

     One of my goals when I was young was to be "financially comfortable." I knew being filthy rich was probably out of my league, but I was happy with the idea of having enough money so that, when emergencies arise, they don't completely derail finances.Maybe not an exciting goal, but hopefully a realistic one.

     Recently, I took my car in for scheduled service, and they told me all four of my tires had low tread, and would need replaced before winter. I had noticed some slipping on rainy days, or when trying to take off too fast, so I believed them. I shopped around a bit, and found a deal on some decent tires - not super high end, but not settling, either - for about $450, and just... got them. Made an appointment, got them done, paid it off as soon as the charges hit my card. Yeah, it wasn't a big emergency, but I remember many times in life when that would have put a serious crimp in things. It was a pretty good feeling to know I'd hit a goal. Maybe it's time to raise the bar on that one.