the flying squirrel

Darcy Casselman's weblog. Just like old times.

shorn

I finally got myself a haircut. I've been trying for over a month, but ended up finding excuses to put it off or, more recently, CLOSED signs everytime I overcame inertia enough to get out there and sit in the big ol' chair.

I don't like getting a haircut. I'd always figured that was because I just didn't like the idea of making small talk with somebody holding a sharp metal instrument (or whirring blades!) to my head. I think I realized that that's not it entirely. For some reason barbers or hairdressers are very good at making me feel stupid. Like always asking "are you sure?" and looking at me in horror the instant I tell them what I want, or looking at me like I'm dumb when I don't. Or when they have a long and involved conversation with the person in front of me, but my feeble attempts at small talk ( when I actually don't feel like shutting down the conversation right away) fall absolutely flat. I know I'm socially inept, but they're supposed to be the professionals here.

It's done now. I can put it off another 3-4 months.

There was an astrologer on CBC's Toronto morning program today who helpfully pointed out that Uranus has just entered Pisces, a once-in-a-lifetime event, we're told (a bit pessimistic... It's not outside the realm of possibility I'd live to see 110, but we'll see...). The main thrust of her analysis, though, focused on the chart for the amagamated city of Toronto (mostly air, she says), and how beneficial it will be to get a bit more of a water influence. Which is where she lost me.

She didn't really bother to talk about Uranus at all (except to mispronounce it, which is forgivable enough, I suppose, given the jokes). That would have been nice.

So Uranus is transiting into a water sign. Great. Planets transit into water signs all the time. Uranus is important in that it's big and slow-moving, meaning it has generational influences, but given that Toronto is mostly all air, it's not likely to be having any direct impact on its chart. Not a greatly postitive one, anyway. I guess they were searching for an angle.

A quiz on a friend's journal the other day asked the question "Is astrology shite?" I don't think so. I mean, it's a matter of faith, right? More like most astrologers are full of shite.

What the transit means for me is that Uranus just finished a trine of its natal position in my chart. Which means I'm a third of the way to 84, Uranus' full orbit. Which means... I'm not sure, really. My book doesn't cover that. Change, I suppose. Striking out on one's own. If I'd had any restrictions holding me back, I suppose I would have been in a good position to break them down. Fortunately, I haven't really. Or maybe I just didn't notice. Trines are nice that way.

My chart is looking pretty good right now. I've got lots of lovely rectange transits going on. No wonder I'm so complacent.

that wasn't so bad

I tried on some leather jackets a couple hours ago, and I still smell like leather. Weird.

The leather jackets are a nice freebie gift at work for finally breaking even again after three years in the red. We also got a little metal cubic paperweight with little motivational words stamped in the sides. I'm thinking of interesting dice games I can play with it. It's probably not a fair die, though.

My review went pretty well. My value to the company was reaffirmed, and the one area of development noted was that I'm not terribly good at planning projects. Not that I don't manage to get the projects done and done well, mind you, just that I don't really care about process. I knew that already. I promised I'd make more of an effort.

I picked up a couple more PS2 games last night when I was in Roger's Video, obstensibly to pay a cable bill. Skygunner at $30 and Ico at $15. Skygunner's easy to play but hard to play well, I'm finding. It's kind of a fun distraction. I haven't loaded up Ico yet. I picked it up because I'd heard Disaster Report compared to it. I finished one ending in Disaster Report, but I haven't gone back and picked up from some of the other story branches. As for .hack, I'm stuck at the end boss. I hate RPG end bosses. It doesn't help that everytime he kills you, you have to work your way to the bottom of an annoying (and, as usual, boring and repetitive) dungeon to have another go. I'd like to see the end, but I don't know if I can be bothered to go to the trouble.

I'd planned on putting the controller away for a while. And then I go out and get four new games in less than three weeks. What am I thinking?

ick. more headaches.

I was up at four in the morning with a migraine. Just what I need. Can you take more pain killers if you've thrown up the ones you've just taken? I'll have to ask my dad.

It didn't last too long, though, and, surprisingly, I was fine in the morning. That was a blessing and a curse. I could use a day off.

I'm kind of nervous at work right now. We did our year-end (fiscal years make no sense to me) employee self-evaluation thing last week. Frustrated with staring at a blank page, I decided to be honest. That's not entire a bad thing. It basically came down to "I'm in a rut," which is entirely true. I'm worried, though, that now that I've said something my boss will be all over himself to try to fix things. I don't like to put people out. I got a plain old "satisfactory" from my quarter-end bonus review. That's down a bit from last quarter. It's not like he doesn't know I've pretty much been punching the clock lately. I'm pinning most of the blame on this crappy winter that never ends. I'd be happy with a little fresh air. Fewer headaches that way.

I'd like to be doing spectacular things so that I'm loved and respected by all. And so I can come away with that glowing "I made that!" feeling. Right now, I'm just doing maintenance work—dusting up cobwebs, but only when somebody's complained about them. Maybe it'd be good to talk it out with the boss. On the other hand, I don't know that I have the energy to do fantastic things right now.

I've had a few clever ideas lately. We shall see if I get the time or energy to pull them off...