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Relaxed...
Oct. 13th, 2001 11:27 pm(watching a gnat walk across the monitor)
More rest, some socializing, enough food... that helps a lot. This past week has been hectic, focussed on work. The infamous automated Mars drilling report, which will be distributed in 5 days at JPL. This week we finished the first draft, completed the requirements analysis, played around with architectures, and wrote all of the necessary text and figures. It is in the hands of reviewers now...
Lots of late nights, almost Rose's hours. There really are rats at night at NASA... one can see them scurry across in one's headlights. Lots by the 40x80 wind tunnel.
Like being a grad student again... averaging 3 hours sleep per night, too much coffee, too much *bad* vending-machine coffee, skipping meals and barely seeing my kids except to get them breakfast and off to school in the morning. David had a rough week... few checkmarks :-(.
Barbara had to cancel our date for last night, as business in Oregon kept her from leaving before today. This afternoon, I bought tickets to Atlanta over Christmas/New Year's (fare sale, <$200 each) and sanded, masked and painted (with grey speckled Zolatone) a 6' tall bookshelf/cabinet that we are planning to eventualy use as a china cabinet.
Recent social events have been church-related rather than poly... last weekend's wedding, tonight's lobster-dinner fundraiser for Santa Maria Urban Mission. It was good to get out, even among folks with whom my ties have been strained in the past. As Pat and I settle back together, I'm feeling less like I might have to leave St. Tim's, so it becomes safer for me to open or maintain ties there. I'm not ready to run again for vestry, but I may resume taking communion with the kids and Pat in the near future...
Speaking of which, she had entirely too much wine with her lobster (4-1/2 glasses!) and tipsily has crashed. Not before getting mournful "I'm so high maintenance, why does anyone find me worthwhile?" Sigh.
On the other hand, ex-friend is no longer ex, sort of... things will never be the same, but after several days of tears and anger and long e-mails, we've agreed to be non-hostile, see each other occasionally, and cautiously explore. She dropped her complaining on the local sfbay-poly mailing list (otherwise, I was going to eventually throw restraint aside and rebut-in-kind). Neither of us are completely comfortable with our "special friendship" as it would be construed, but both of us love each other (in our respective fashions) and are willing to work at it. Despite our very different values and communication styles. For me, the whole two weeks of trauma (apart from being a huge distraction from work... staring at walls and moping hardly gets reports written) has caused me to realize more about my own relationship patterns... what attracts me, how I act on those feelings, emotional vs. physical vs. mental ties, jealousy-provoking situations, score-keeping, and that yes, I really do keep a dynamically-updated map in my head of the relationship strengths of those around me... who seems to be growing closer, who seems to be further apart, and so on. And I constantly compare, albeit at a low level in the background.
So I feel pretty good at the moment... work is caught up after lots of effort, a friendship is reborn, the cabinet's painted, sleep and nourishment and social interactions are all caught up. Granted, the A's lost tonight to the Yankees, but I can't have everything...
More rest, some socializing, enough food... that helps a lot. This past week has been hectic, focussed on work. The infamous automated Mars drilling report, which will be distributed in 5 days at JPL. This week we finished the first draft, completed the requirements analysis, played around with architectures, and wrote all of the necessary text and figures. It is in the hands of reviewers now...
Lots of late nights, almost Rose's hours. There really are rats at night at NASA... one can see them scurry across in one's headlights. Lots by the 40x80 wind tunnel.
Like being a grad student again... averaging 3 hours sleep per night, too much coffee, too much *bad* vending-machine coffee, skipping meals and barely seeing my kids except to get them breakfast and off to school in the morning. David had a rough week... few checkmarks :-(.
Barbara had to cancel our date for last night, as business in Oregon kept her from leaving before today. This afternoon, I bought tickets to Atlanta over Christmas/New Year's (fare sale, <$200 each) and sanded, masked and painted (with grey speckled Zolatone) a 6' tall bookshelf/cabinet that we are planning to eventualy use as a china cabinet.
Recent social events have been church-related rather than poly... last weekend's wedding, tonight's lobster-dinner fundraiser for Santa Maria Urban Mission. It was good to get out, even among folks with whom my ties have been strained in the past. As Pat and I settle back together, I'm feeling less like I might have to leave St. Tim's, so it becomes safer for me to open or maintain ties there. I'm not ready to run again for vestry, but I may resume taking communion with the kids and Pat in the near future...
Speaking of which, she had entirely too much wine with her lobster (4-1/2 glasses!) and tipsily has crashed. Not before getting mournful "I'm so high maintenance, why does anyone find me worthwhile?" Sigh.
On the other hand, ex-friend is no longer ex, sort of... things will never be the same, but after several days of tears and anger and long e-mails, we've agreed to be non-hostile, see each other occasionally, and cautiously explore. She dropped her complaining on the local sfbay-poly mailing list (otherwise, I was going to eventually throw restraint aside and rebut-in-kind). Neither of us are completely comfortable with our "special friendship" as it would be construed, but both of us love each other (in our respective fashions) and are willing to work at it. Despite our very different values and communication styles. For me, the whole two weeks of trauma (apart from being a huge distraction from work... staring at walls and moping hardly gets reports written) has caused me to realize more about my own relationship patterns... what attracts me, how I act on those feelings, emotional vs. physical vs. mental ties, jealousy-provoking situations, score-keeping, and that yes, I really do keep a dynamically-updated map in my head of the relationship strengths of those around me... who seems to be growing closer, who seems to be further apart, and so on. And I constantly compare, albeit at a low level in the background.
So I feel pretty good at the moment... work is caught up after lots of effort, a friendship is reborn, the cabinet's painted, sleep and nourishment and social interactions are all caught up. Granted, the A's lost tonight to the Yankees, but I can't have everything...
