Rainy days, Mondays, and moldy shoes

It is raining today. A long, hard, cold (relatively), drenching, soaking, I want to be in bed with a hot toddy and maybe even something to drink kind of day.

The Facebook posts cover the usual: it's raining and it's Monday, and the inevitable (at least here) "We need the rain." What I want to know is when does "we need the rain" become, ohmygod my shoes are moldy? When will I be trading in my car for a canoe? When do the ants drag off the baby with the tail? (One Hundred Year's of Solitude reference --- this kind of rain does that to me.)

Although all I want to do is cozy up with my personal hot toddy, I am working very hard. Income tax extensions are up on Thursday. Payroll tax deposits are due then, too. Quarterly reports are due at the end of the month. And then there is the regular stuff.

Tomorrow I go to see my doctor for a follow-up of my (relatively) recent non-heart event. I'm hoping for something simple, definitive, and non-life threatening. If the cure for this non-heart event pain will also increase my energy, enable me to lose weight, make me a cheerier person, and get rid of wrinkles, I won't complain. I'm sure my whole family will be happier, at least with my increased energy and cheerier personality. I don't think they care about my weight or wrinkles.

I am still trying to figure out what to do with my 1000 hours that I am not spending on the CSI board. The process has been slowed by the fact that some people are crappy winners and have continued to make my life miserable. I am focusing on happy thoughts (not the happy thoughts where they get hit by lightening, but the happy thoughts where I live a good life, the school survives, and our children continue to love learning.)

In the short term, I am cleaning my house, taking the enrolled agent exam (eventually), and thinking about crocheting Christmas presents. In the long term, I think I want to commit to writing. Not full time, because I need to work, but in those 1000 hours I used to spend at the school or on the phone, and in the other 1000 hours I used to spend planning and worrying about the school.

Right now, I'm watching at the rain, wishing I had dry socks, and keeping an eye out for ants carrying a baby with a tail.

What will come

In the past two weeks... and more... I have been struggling with a lot of things. I am no longer on the board of the Carolina School for Inquiry & after over five years of giving the school many hours of my time, I have a small void. The void didn't come quickly enough, because even after the selfish twits won the board election, they continued to harass me and the rest of the now former board members. They will continue to harass the wonderful director, but I'm hoping that some people on the board will come to understand that Victoria is one of the greatest resources the school has. At the very least, I hope they understand that they haven't been elected to the PTA and that they are legally and financially responsible for the well-being of the school. While they may whine to the authorizer, the authorizer can do nothing but shut the school down if they think it's being poorly run. I am praying that there is enough sense on the board that they won't destroy the school.

I will never understand the employees hired by Victoria to work in an inquiry based multi-age charter school have decided to mutiny (they don't like lesson plans, they don't like multi-age, the parents aren't good enough, whine, whine, whine), with the probable end result being that they will destroy the school and make it so no other school district would ever hire them. Do they know how foolish they seem to other people? I guess not.

And so I continue to be concerned for my son's school, a school I had hoped would last longer than his school days, but I am not bound to spend 10 or more hours a week (unpaid, of course) taking care of school business.

So what am I going to do?

Well, I probably want to start eating better again. I have been on a real deep-fried carbathon the past month or so. It's time for autumn and winter vegetables, soups and stews, chili with corn bread... yum yum. Maybe I'll have time to cook and the heart to eat well. (Notice that while some people lose weight when stressed, I gain weight. Drats.)

I am also going to do the work I am paid to do. Those who pay me will be glad to hear this. I'll start tomorrow, I promise.

On a side note, I have almost quit one of my part-time jobs. I'd returned to bookkeeping at St. Michael's when the person hired to replace me had a family crisis. It worked then, but now it's getting to be tax season again, and I won't have the time. Her crisis is passed and she is available, what could be better?

I am taking things fairly slowly... maybe too slowly. I've read a lot and leveled up in Farm Town, Farmville, YoVille, AND my new Cafe on Facebook. (Sad.) I know I will find another project that will take a lot of my time, but I'm not ready to commit. Somethings have happened that push me in one way or another. I'm concerned about medical care, county jails, my professional status, middle school, my house... something will come to the front.

But for now, I am here. I am not really happy, but I am not anywhere near dead. And for right now, that's all I can ask for.