Influential Weather and Friends

I’ve been battling a foul mood lately and think I may have figured out why. It has nothing to do with the fact that I discovered my convertible roof got slashed again the night it decides to release 6 months worth of pent-up rain. It wasn’t stoked by anxious thoughts wondering if the shipping tape I had would be able to keep the ever-constant rain from pouring in and soaking my seats. I parked under a tree y’know and that would deter a raindrop or two. Sure it’s a good reason to be in a pissy mood, but it hasn’t gone away yet even though I was able to bring it in and get it patched for free at the body shop that installed the new top.

I’m happy to be working, even with my worried undertones. (If you are thinking that you’ll try to reassure me, hold that thought for about this for about a year. I’ll be off of probation then and am likely to be more consolable. ) I’m feeling useful and starting to find my place. I’m going to start making appointments next week to meet business partners. It allows me to get some first hand experience learning what they really want from IT and not what we think they need. This is the sort of stuff I enjoy and I want people to feel like I might actually make a difference. I took a bunch of calls today during these bizarre power outages. I still need to learn how the various systems work, but no one noticed today. They were just happy to get someone to tell them what was going on.

So what’s responsible for these up and down moods? Okay I’ll just cut to the chase, the weather seems to be linked directly to my moods. Seriously. This isn’t like the time I thought that the A’s would win if I watched their games. Even though I had an 8 game streak. On the rainy days I lean toward surly and bitter. When it stops I start to brighten up and joke with co-workers or housemates. When the sun is out, things are brighter and lighter in my attitude.

But another outside influence is the company that I keep. I was thinking about my ex the other day and missing how she would be able to distract me from my own worries enough to realize that things weren’t so bad. But I’m really happy that I have some good friends in my life right now. It doesn’t seem to matter if we are just hanging out or doing something special, I feel like I can just be myself around them. This past week, Betty had Di and I over for a Buffy night. I cooked dinner in someone else’s kitchen as if it were my own, which is very cool. Last weekend Di and I made waffles and chatted on Saturday morning and the weekend before last, Esther brought me down to south city for a real philipino breakfast. I don’t know how I lived life before garlic rice and chopsilog. Of course I will be passing this neat bit of fun eating along to any other adventurous friends. I totally love the neat diversity of this city. I still think about how thankful I am that Cabala and Shavon were there to help me move. And I’m pleasantly surprised how cool my housemate Pablito is. I had gone into the kitchen to get some water from the fridge and he was cooking some food to bring to the big game last weekend. We got to chatting and next thing I know I was helping him chop up some veggies. He seems more easy going than our other housemate which seems to be what I need right now. The other day we got a note on the fridge asking us to finish up our monthly chores. My first reaction was not pretty, especially because I had planned on doing that night. Now I wanted to be rebellious (how dare she tell me what to do like we were children) and annoyed because I really wanted to clean that evening. I ended up cleaning because I suspected that I was making a big deal out of nothing and have every intention of sitting down with the offending housemate to tell her how I felt about the note.

If I was still living with the ex, I know that it would have bothered me more. Friends seem to diffuse things for me and help me keep life in proper perspective. They rock. I went to a political issues party to figure out what the hell I should be voting for. Granted we all seemed to bring sweet snacks to share and I blame the sugar, the visiting puppies and the extra long propositions list for some of the light-hearted wackiness that transpired that afternoon. I did feel more prepared for the 8 page ballot and knew what people were running and which issues were important to me.

Even the friends I hardly ever see are good for me. You are the ones who send me email or call me telling me what’s going on in your life or sharing your insight with me. I know we’ll be friends for a long while even though we are too busy or far away to do much more than regular email. This isn’t a cheap ploy to get you to write me, It’s a well thought-out scheme that should work. Plus I’ve got the added benefit of birthday guilt that should be hitting you soon. Don’t worry I’m sure that I’ll have birthday thoughts to post. I’ve been avoiding thinking about my birthday. Not that I dread getting older. I just tend to get a case of birthday blues and unless the weather shifts this could get bad. But we aren’t going there today.

Where did you go today and how’s your weather?