Ayn's Multiple World

Whoops we forgot April 16th I think ... might be more

Good morning this is me. We’re at work already and we are sitting in Group 2. I think this is a combination group though for Group 2 and 3. I met Sr. Theresa on the way in. She said something about 5 staff being gone today. I’m thinking that is Theresa, Maria, Margarita, and then 2 people from the list of Holly, Kathy, Rosa, Imelda, and/or Kim. I think that’s pretty much the list.

I’m hoping against anything that I don’t have a group, but I think she’s going to need using me. If Holly were coming in it might be me in the morning and Holly in the afternoon, but then sometimes she’ll just take me for the entire day. I don’t know if there is another choice, but I really hope that there is. I noticed that Stephanie, Robin and Karla are in. I’m not sure if Sr. would split down that far, but she knows that I’m working on CARF.

We’ll have to see.

I’ve got about 5 people so far – three people are working on writing/copying, one person is sorting out chips and the last person is working with screws and bolts. It’s standard to ask the group to get out something to work on.

I’m trying to think ahead now. I went through all the drawers and then most of the cupboards looking for the lesson planning book. I finally found it. So far it states that they are working with days of the week, food preparation, computers, current events, housekeeping, and then Town Hall at 1, which means that I have staff training. I also am supposed to have CIRCLES with this group today so that will probably take the time of current events and housekeeping.

There’s a problem though in that she was supposed to make Italian potato salad today and I
know nothing about that. I don’t how to cook it or if they have gotten the materials ordered.

I’m not a real big fan of cooking although it’s probably the clients favorite. I think they like mostly the eating part. I’m hoping still I don’t have to watch the group. I know plan ahead.

Sister will be back in about a half hour. If I were to have them, I could do what with days of the week? She has down that they will make up sentences with the days of the week in it. I can do something like that, but with the lower group added too, I’ve got to make it something relatively easy. I’d like to start out with a group where they are working on something together.

The next time slot – not sure of time exactly, because she doesn’t have the time recorded, but they are supposed to write something with the day of the week. Maybe we could make them do a calendar? I’d have to have them make a calendar for May. I’m not sure what I would use or what angle. I could do something during their chapel time.

Hmm, a thought’s come to me. I could give them strips of some kind of paper and then at the top I could have them write the weekdays and then I could have them decorate them and then put them in order. That would be good. Now as to paper? I would have to use some kind of scrap paper I think. I am guessing that Rosa has a stack still. I’ll look there. As …

As I speak … Imelda came into the room. WooHOO. That means the problem is solved and I won’t have to have the group. That’s good. I was looking around for resources to decorate the months and I’d found pieces of ribbon they could have cut, but I didn’t find any glue. It could have been a full room. You really need a lot of glue. Pshwoo. Maybe sister would have had some in the closet if I couldn’t find anything, but it would have taken a lot of roaming around.

My stomach is kinda achy though so that wouldn’t be any good.

Rich is here at work today. I think he’s going to be here until about 1 pm. Then he’s going to go lay down for a bit, and then I think he’s got a ball game. He’s still having problems with his back. We played around a little last night, but we were careful and he got a full massage.

Rich was being patient with us he listened to the whole story of how to play pirates. I appreciated his attention, but I don’t know why we got it. I’m pretty sure Pirates aren’t real important in his life, except that he knows they are interesting to us. It was a nice thing for him to listen to.

He was funny this morning. He asked and I DID have a heating pad, so he’s brought it to work with him and he’s using it now. Thatta boy. We are worried, because he has a trip scheduled this weekend with me and Bob and Marsha to go fishing. We’re supposed to work tomorrow, but then we are going to leave Friday night after work, so we can be up fishing right away. We’re going to Lake Vermillion and it’s about 2 ½ hours south of here. Rich says that you really can’t fish in WI until about June. I guess it’s still colder up that direction.

Hmm, it says low 70s on Saturday, but on Sunday it’s only supposed to get up to 61 and there’s a 50% chance of precipitation. What’s up with that!?? I asked Rich and he said that if it rains then we have to come home. There’s no fun in that! Maybe we could at least go to a movie? I don’t know.

One way or another though it’s going to be fun going out. I’m really looking forward to it.

Ok, then on to the next thing. We started out writing yesterday too and then we were able to go over to CARF. We set up a new order of things that should work out though it will be slower soon. We are pulling together four lines of copy as to answering directly the survey questions.

We are still using as a resource the material that we gathered from the Paper Tiger work.

I had that organized, but I didn’t have much of it organized so sometime today when we’re working on it we’re going to need going through it one at a time according to search words.

We’re not being so much a perfectionist so that should help. I actually am looking forward to some work being done. Yesterday I did 58% of the chapter. I might want to pull together some more resources from the back of the list, but I don’t want it to slow me down.

I have to decide too on procedure. If something isn’t written, basically do I stop to take care of it, or do I just leave a marker and go on. There’s a lot of work I’m sure that needs to be done including those general 11 reports. We’re trying to be calm though. Just need to be productive with our time.

Yesterday to get us to the part we were concentrating, we figured that we could combine the work and the pirates as a trade-off or an incentive to work. We figured by not saying no to it altogether that we could reward ourselves periodically and leave it up so that we don’t feel the panic parts of when it’s not there and we feel compulsive to check on it. We’re getting better at letting it build up before we jump into it over our other priorities.

Hmm, we just got something to the printer for Rich – that was a little distracting, but pretty much because we stopped to check the rest of the mail.

Ok, so now what goes next. Let’s say a half an hour of writing and then we start at 10 am. I wish I could say I was better at it than this, but I’m not at least not lately.

I talked to Rich this morning about the subpoena again. We didn’t get the subpoena either here or at home, so I don’t know if he’s just not blowing his horn or something. It’s supposed to be in 8 days, but last time the attorney for Rich said that until he delivers it there’s nothing that can be done. I hope that I’m covering in my blog the times that he says he’s going to do something and then changes their mind or changes the date.

It’s had one cancelation and 3 date changes and since this thing has started there hasn’t been one piece of paper that’s come through the mail. I’m not sure of what’s happening there, but it feels harassing. It’s hard to concentrate on anything else in any great depth. I know my effort to work has been dwindling.

I also got something in the mail for a jury summons. We got it this morning. I should have brought it with me and asked if Dr. Marvin could write something to them. It says that if I’m not responsive then I could get something bad happening to me … I forget the term, but it’s doing something against the court and they could put you in jail for it.

I think then that’s pretty much all of the big news. I had gotten back before Rich last night. He had a game and then he got half way to his mother’s place before he finally got a message through that everything was alright. I think he’s talking to Jillian more frequently too, because she said she’d call back today after making sure her Grandparents were alright. Rich was doing a good Rich by checking in on them. Apparently, the phone was knocked off the hook, and his step-sister had taken them out to dinner. Things worked through ok though.

I talked to my sister yesterday again on the way home from work. She is pretty quick on picking up stuff that is going on. We talked for a bit about our work and her old work. Usually people don’t give me that much chance to talk about CARF or my groups. But, it was nice that someone had.

I saw on Facebook that Uncle Marky has started to walk the dogs again. That was a good thing.

Between that and how terrific my sister looks, it should be encouragement to get to the gym again. Shoot, little plan … bit plan is that we’ve got Dr. Marvin’s tonight so we won’t be going today. I would have had to work on it harder.

Ever since we’ve been home, I’ve been dealing with the conflict between what my house looks like and CS. We talked about being competitive. But, things like household she’s got me hands-down. There might have been a little dust, but nothing like mine, plus at my place you’ve got so much stuff out of place. Things aren’t making it to where they are supposed to be and in general the whole place looks cramped and cluttered. I think we’re really going to need doing something with the back room. If we start back there then we have a place to move around the clutter until we can throw it out.

I really appreciated in CS house that besides the collections which all had their own place out of the general flow of things there wasn’t stuff sitting around. It was very clearly thought out. She had appliances on the counter, but they were really nice looking. All her appliances and many pans are deep red so they look very decorative. Her things like dishes and silverware looked in better condition too – not so haphazard.

I tried to talk to Rich about it, but he said that he liked the way my place looked and that I’d made certain decisions that led it to looking a little more cramped. I don’t think I’ve made much of the decisions I had to work with. Things like the couple of antiques from my grandmothers and old dressers that were all passed down from living in one house or another. I don’t have any bedroom set like ever that I bought because I liked it.

I did by the bed and I’m very happy with that – but not with the headboard. It was a free one that came with the bed and it doesn’t seem to really attach well to the frame. I think it wobbles and is the kind you can’t sit back on.

I don’t see any new bedroom sets coming anytime soon. There are too many other priorities.

I haven’t talked to Rich about renting out space at CS’s lately, but I would like to. I need to know what possibilities I have available to us. I know nothing will happen until after the divorce. I’m probably working on another pipe dream though.

Rich just came in to talk a minute when we printed out another document for him. He was talking about doing 3-4 games a week like M, T, W & Sun and then that would pay for all of his fishing. He’s always been very conscientious about doing something else for the fun stuff so that it wouldn’t come out of the family budget.

I’m thinking from his point of view, what would be the draw in spending $4-500 a month, when you use the place only once or twice a month. I think though that I could be using it more. But, then even that would be a lot of extra expenditure that I’m not contributing to. Just like Rich paying toward his fishing I have to think of a way I can pay toward spending time up north with my sister and Mark and Nathan.

I know the time is ripe in that both of us seem to be looking for company past ourselves. Each of us spends a lot of time on our own. Getting together would really break things up.

I think that CS will be checking the mortgage situation today. She said Wednesday or later in the week – it would be a good deal. If she got the cost down then she wouldn’t be so worried about losing the place. I’d really hate to see her lose it. It’s kind of funny, but as soon as I walked in her place and started to understand it, it became more important to help her keep her place than for me to get my own place.

I’m not sure that I understand this. There’s some reward in not only the company, but the thought I could carve out my own niche there where Rich and us could go, but it’s more than that. Some part of it is like a bird in hand is worth two in the bush. My dreams are just dreams and they are further out. CS worked through her dreams to make them a reality. She’s got in her world, what I wanted in mine. This seems like a critical thing to support.

She says they were doing fine until Mark was laid off of his permanent job. That would take anyone back. I think they have enough for this month’s rent, but I think they are behind in that they are paying late in the month. I’m not sure, but they might get some help from Mark’s mother and they might be able to take something out of their retirement funds. I’m not saying that either of those options are good, but if there is a way to have them keep the place then that would be the way to go. I think if she hadn’t had that workspace in the front bedroom my thoughts might have been different, but I look at that space and it’s one of the most ideal for the money I’ve ever seen. It’s got her sitting in the middle of a Nirvana type work environment.

Maybe the deal is that we’re going to need convincing her that she make some money with the quilts, hmm, I’m not sure though, if she makes money with them would she still get her disability benefits. She needs them a lot. She couldn’t get through the day without laying down several times and yesterday was supposed to have been a bad day relatively speaking.

She didn’t tell me that when we talked. I’m going to need learning the cues.

Hmm, more printing for Rich – I think that’s the last of it.

We’re back to thinking about how to publish the book. The representatives that I had talked about earlier in the week were told that I don’t have that kind of money to publish something for $18,000. They then said something about an $1800 deal. I haven’t seen that one yet. I’m thinking if they are selling for 10% of the original cost – that what you are getting would be very small. Maybe if you got like 100 books out of it might be something?

posted by Ann Marie @ 4/25/2009 10:58:00 AM Comments: 0