i am still here!

Wow, so okay, I have been absent from my own internet for Quite A While. This has not been my intention! My not-so-new-anymore job is more time-consuming than my old job, and more significantly it blocks DW almost all the time. (Plus we got a slightly-subtle-for-now nastygram a few weeks ago about not using work computers for personal purposes; I feel fine accessing my e-mail and the Washington Post, but am just no longer taking the risk that someone's assignment might be keeping track of me to see if I'm on social media.) And for a while the evenings have been a series of rehearsals and performances and wedding plans and traveling to my mom's house and jewelry-making classes, no fooling, so I haven't really done a lot of unwinding with my laptop. Which, in its own turn, is gasping. So I don't know, maybe for the next wee while my visits may be a little more occasional. I'm reading every day and commenting sometimes! Just not posting a whole hell of a lot at the moment.

• Wedding dress is purchased and the estimated delivery date is a little closer to the firm wedding date than any of us (self, friend who helped me shop, staff at the dress shop) would like. Fortunately, the sample fit perfectly, so all the real one should need is hemming and bustling, which they assure me takes no time at all. That's unless I manage to lose fifty pounds between now and then and they say "Girl, we sold you a dress that fit, and now it needs all this taking in" - I don't think this is a serious danger. (I'm also not gaining weight, so at least there's that.)
  
• Wedding rings are made. With our own hands. We didn't do the mining or the smelting or the refining, but we bought some gold and hammered it into rings of the proper sizes and soldered and polished it ourselves, and that's kind of the most awesome thing I've ever been a part of. He made mine, and I made his. Awesome.
  
• Marriage license is procured. (Holy crap, we're getting married!) Now, if at any time between now and the date we've invited people for, we decide we've bloody well had enough of this, we can go to the courthouse and sign a thing and turn up on the day already married with the pressure off. We will not do this!, but having the backup option is oddly comforting. :-)
  
• Progress has also been made in the areas of music, officiant, catering, cake, flowers, photography, and centerpieces.
  
• There's even a gift registry, because people kept pestering our mothers and not taking "They really have all the things they need" for an answer. Some of our friends have suggested we register for a down payment on a house, but we feel like - it's not that money is a bad gift, but we really aren't comfortable asking for it. We're not even comfortable asking for objects, I mean to say. So. So far the registry has a dozen items on it. We may have to look into expanding it. It's really hard.
  
  
  
  
• In non-wedding-related news, I have this job, and I don't hate it, but if that isn't damning with faint praise I don't know what is. I'm good at it and it's not a great fit. So the good news is, I had a good performance review - I'm everyone's favorite, which means they want me to be happy - so when this contract is up, in a matter of a few more months, they want to help me find another gig (presumably with the same company) where I can work from home at least some of the time. I'm still looking many other elsewheres, but for a job I don't like very much, this one is mostly bearable for now. Oof.
  
• We are also in the beginning stages of thinking about buying a house. The very, very beginning - like, the stage where we say Once the wedding plans are in the bag, we'll begin actually thinking about this. But we know it's there.
  
• I see from looking back over my "recent" entries that I had some issues with my shoulder and with bewildering maybe-anxiety. I'm pleased to report that the shoulder thing is under control - it's still stiff a lot of the time, but the doctor said to hit it with anti-inflammatories before leaping to any other conclusions, and those seem to do the trick, so yay - and I had forgotten all about the anxiety thing, which is really the best way for that sort of issue to resolve.
  
• My computer really is running out of steam. A few times a day it tells me there's no more room on the startup disk to run applications. This with only two or three applications running (sometimes just Thunderbird and Firefox). I know I'm going to have to replace it soon. I'm just hoping I can hold out until we move and I'll know what kind of home office arrangement I'll be able to set up. (Ever the optimist.)