I gave it a yeoman's effort. I spent all day indoors today, and the thermometer didn't budge more than 2 degrees from my a.m. reading of 20.

One of my 08 goals is at least 30 minutes of daily exercise, usually through walking this time of year.

So fighting lethargy, i began layering my clothes for a walk. The long underwear and sweat pants. 3 layers of sweatshirts and turtlenecks. Mittens, a coat, hat and hood plus scarf. The abominable, adorable snow-woman is ready for a walk.

It was the dry, brittle kind of cold that makes it hard to breathe. I waddled down my street, swaddled as i was in 5" of cotton and polyester. I made it to the end, then turned back toward my house. A grand total of: 7 minutes of walking. Yippeeeeee.

What else i accomplished today:

* Made a rice/apple/raisin salad for weekday lunches, & boiled some eggs for egg salad sandwich.

(I am determined to continue eating healthy despite loss of time....when i had an even longer commute to a stressful job in 1999, i rationalized eating lunch out every single day by saying i'd earned it and was making good money. Problem was, i put on weight, and i see now my weight has crept up to within 4 pounds of my heaviest weight ever, which was 139. It may not sound like a lot to you, but i'm petite and not that tall, so that's too much for me. When i was dating T., i was down to a low of 119 and i have to admit i looked and felt GREAT. However, it was very hard to attain that weight and i would be happy to remain at 125, a weight i stayed at for many years.)

* Read parts of the Sunday paper and Money magazine

* Wasted time online...not here, of course!

* Topped off the sunflower seed in the bird feeders, refreshed the birdbath water (the one with a water heater) and put out 2 more suet cakes. Birds are ravenous today. Chickadees careening into juncos who are sparring with white throated sparrows and titmice zooming in to steal a seed whenever they can. The house wrens, which aren't seed eaters, were out eating the suet (rendered fat) which to them tastes like big, fat, yum-o-licious BUGS. And it gives them the energy they need to make it thru these nights without freezing to their roosts.

* Logged my bird count entries online for Ornithology Lab

* Contemplated darning a hole in a very good sock i bought 14 years ago in preparation for a trip to Alaska. They're very warm and i think it's worth doing. Did i do it? Uh, no.

* Clipped kitty's toenails. 2 of them. She doth protest.

* "Tidied up"

* Long talk with mom

I saw with relief that my $18K 401k rollover has arrived and is now parked in my money market fund. I'll be moving $4K of it tomorrow into small cap stock funds to take advantage of bargain basement prices. I should have been able to do this online, but inexplicably, one of the 2 funds i wanted to move the $ to wasn't listed there as it should've been.

My dad called Friday night to see how the new job's been going. We had a good talk. Apparently his SO hadn't passed on my email comments about the job i'd sent her a week ago in response to a phone message she left me telling me she's a grandmother now for the 2nd time. (She was very excited.) She's visiting her daughter and son in law where they live in Britian for 3 weeks in February.

Since i have President's Day off, i'm contemplating another trip down to keep my dad company while she's away. It would save me driving time to leave straight from work on Friday night, but i imagine the traffic would be hell. I don't know.

Thanks, dear friends, for the concern you expressed about our snowy weather last Monday. Luckily, my part of the state escaped relatively unscathed, with just a few inches.

I used my new snow thrower and it worked really well. Course, the real test will be when we get 6 inches or more. I was so concerned about getting to work on time that day, especially with it being a new job, that i woke up at 5:30 a.m., left at 6:30 a.m. and ended up getting to work an hour earlier than i needed to. In the future, i think it'll be possible to work from home on very snowy days. And i now know how to connect with our email from another location, so there'd be no problem there.

So i wrapped up week 2 at the new job. Everything's going well. I am definitely working harder and being more productive than at my old 'cush' job, but of course i knew that would be the case. My days go by faster now. I'm averaging about 1 story daily, or 1 story every 1.5 days.

What i like most about the job is that i have an opportunity to write about a fairly wide range of topics, though still mainly sticking to personal finance. When i'm given an assignment, it's pretty general, expressed in a single sentence, which is what i like cus i can go down whatever path my research takes me. But generally, of course, the stories are meant to provide consumer-oriented, educational tips and guidelines on all sorts of stuff, and personal finance has always been interesting to me. Plus, the stories are fairly short, about 600 words, so you never get bored working for days on end on something. And each time i research a story, i learn a little something, too.

Luckily, I'm not banging out the stories on this old relic...


I bought this typewriter at a yard sale in New Hampshire over 20 years ago. I don't remember what i paid for it then, but i sold it last summer at my own garage sale for $20 to a man who sought out old typewriters and used the old keys to make typewriter jewelry. (I really like my necklace with my initial on it, tho i didn't buy it from him.)

Anyway, it can be tiring toward the end of the week, because this is a pure writing job, and you tend to get brain-dead after a while. At my last job, becus we were such a small office (2 of us), i spent 1/2 my time doing administrative type chores, which i really didn't mind as it gave me a break from using my noggin.

I've managed to walk at lunchtime for at least a 1/2 hour a few times again this week. As i walked by the Xerox building yeterday, i saw a helicopter take off from the roof.Not sure i'll want to continue that this week as it's supposed to be much colder.

On the downside, i've definitely noticed the lack of free time outside of work. So becus there's not much time for anything else on my weekday nights (just fix my dinner, read the mail, make lunch for the next day, lay out my clothes and an hour or so of TV, then hit the sack early), i'm finding that i'm mostly playing 'catch up' on the weekends, something i've done before with long commute jobs.

Except that this a.m. i really didn't feel like getting out of bed. Not that i slept more, my cat saw to that. But i did loll around til 11 a.m., padding about and not really getting going til then. I grabbed a few groceries, made a bank deposit with what will likely be the last income from my freelance work for a while, stopped at Walmart to get earphones to play CDs at work (got 'em home and they're the same length...3 feet, as what i have now, which is too short due to the way the laptop which i plug into is positioned toward the back of my desk on a shelf.) Picked up a DVD at the library for tonight or tomorrow, did a load of laundry, washed a bunch of dishes and baked a pineapple yogurt bread to snack on next week. Also got some nitrite-free cold cuts for lunch sandwiches, and also eggs for egg salad sandwiches, which I LOVE.

My social life is suffering a little. With my new commute, i really don't want to drive anywhere on the weekends, which poses a problem since most of my friendds don't live in my town. And to be honeste, i feel bad about my cat being alone for so much longer these days, so on the weekends i like to mostly stay in and hang out with her. She doesn't go outside, so i'm all her entertainment.

I thought i was getting together this weekend with R., for instance, but he never called so don't know what's going on. (He's going thru a divorce right now, and he's been very prickly to talk to and deal with.) Spoke to friend M. on the phone during the week at lunchtime; he was home sick, and is also settling in to a new (4 months) job that for him was long in coming. His daily commute, by train to NYC, is 3 hours, so my 1.75 hours daily is much better in comparison.

Anyway, i truly count my blessings. There's so much economic uncertainty these days and the price of everything is going up. I am very much aware that i am fortunate to have a good job with good benefits and hopefully a long future.

I've looked at my numbers again and i don't really see why i can't save 25% of my income this year. Unfortunately, i'm not eligible to start contributing to the 401k for 3 months, so that means i'll get used to a much higer net income until May 1, when i open the 401k, and suddenly i'll have to get used to less money in the paycheck.

Don't see how i could even consider dating someone again. I relish my weekend downtime now and, selfishly, prefer to do what I want to do on the weekend rather than have to get into all the compromises and obligatory stuff that can fill one's time when you're part of a couple.

I started a weekend-only subscription to the New York Times, and really, tomorrow i'm looking forward to more lolling around spending half the day reading the paper.

Big snowstorm coming overnight, just in time for the a.m. commute. I hate snow, but only when i have to drive in it, which is most of the time. Otherwise, it's lovely.

Now at my old job, just 1/2 mile away, my boss was so good to me HE would call me and say don't bother coming in. It was always a relief when he did that. That way, i didn't feel guilty.

I don't think that will happen now. I was really plannng on calling my new boss and asking if i could work from home tomorrow (can't think of a job that lends itself better to work at home more than a writer, but anyway) or, if not, if he could pick me up on his way in. I don't know if he has 4 wheel drive, but it'd be preferable than having to negotiate the roads myself. However, i realized i don't have his number and couldn't find it online.

There are 3 different 'local' TV stations here. One says 8 to 14" of snow and the other says 4 to 8". I can drive in the latter, not sure about the former. I had some terrible times trying to get home during blizzards in years of past with a similarly long commute. That probably explains my fear of winter driving.

So, umm, just as soon as i got feeling comfortable that my wake up routine was reasonable, looks like i'm getting up earlier than 6:20 a.m. tomorrow. Guess i'll shoot for 5:30 a.m., which won't be enough time to clear my driveway AND get to work on time, but it'll be a yeoman's effort.

The weekend was nice, but uneventful. Did some walking today with friend H., who told me she has just $8 left of her SS money to last the rest of the month. After the walk, we stopped at local diner for hot cocoa and split a piece of pie, my treat.

Other than that, i did my own 20-minute walk before meeting her becus she walks real slow and it doesn't seem like real exercise to me. It was so warm today i also swept the driveway, as leaves seem to have deposited themselves all over the place when i didn't remember them being there before.

One of the bluestone pieces on the step on my front stoop busted apart (the concrete, which i had done myself over the summer). I guess there's some trick to getting this to last, but i don't know. Now it'll remain broken and a hazard until spring, at the earliest.

Spent the a.m. preparing two salads that should last me most of the week for lunch at work and dinner at home. The at work salad consists of pasta, imitation crabmeat, or pollock, peas, green onion and red pepper, with a little Paul Newman's balsamic vinegarette.

The dinner salad, which i had tonight, was a mixture of chick peas, wheat berries, goat cheese, green onion and pistachio nuts tossed with balsamic vinegar and honey over spinach and arugula. I had a huge bowlful.

I was going to get the NYT, but never got around to it. Instead, i put away all the Xmas decorations, watched a movie (Monsuer Ibrahim, very good, with Omar Shariff, 2003) and vacuumed both floors.

Yesterday, i was definitely fighting the spending bug. Mea culpa, i bought 2 garnet pieces on TV last night, a pendant on a necklace and a ring. The prices they offer on TV are so much better than what you get elsewhere, i guess becus they can buy in bulk. I remember 20 years ago a friend of mine took me to St. Thomas and went on and on about how we had to buy jewelry there cus their prices were great, etc. I remember somewhat reluctantly spending $150 hard-earned money on am emerald ring, which i still have today, but the size of that emerald is miniscule compared to what the same $$ could get me on QVC.

I also did yet more grocery shopping to get some fresh produce items needed for my salad recipes. Seems like i'm constantly spending money on groceries, so much for just 1 person. I try very hard not to waste anything, but still, it can be hard not to.

Right now, i'm eating 3 clementines at a time to make sure they don't start going bad on me. I bought a box for $2.99, which was a great price, so now i'm making sure they're eaten!

Also went to the dump yesterday. Alas, i hope all my weekends aren't used up on chores and errands.

Bummer Disclaimer: Looks like due to lack of time my blogging here will be limited to the weekends for the foreseeable future, my friends.

The new job's going really GREAT. I'm really excited about it. I wrote 4 stories already (!) and i think they're happy with me. The people in my group have been super-nice and very helpful in helping me to acclimate.

I work with mostly men (a novelty, but who's complaining?) in my particular group, which is Creative Services.

By taking backroads to work, i've cut my 60-minute commute down to 43 minutes, but i think i'll stick to the longer route at night and also in snowy weather, as those back roads get very slippery. Still, i'm thrilled to have another route that i should be driving exclusively once the days get a little longer.

There are so many differences between this company and my former employer. Size, for one. (new one has 300 employees in my location vs. 45 total for my old one, and just 4 in my old office).

My new employer is a much bigger company (offices elsewhere) with a great deal more resources than my old employer, which is evident in that they have the best of everything (everyone gets a laptop) and the benefits are superior in every way. We even have a completely paperless payroll system, so i got paid yesterday (I think) but don't know yet the software system to view my pay and deductions. Will call my bank to see if it's been deposited.

Another big difference...my old boss, much as i liked him and as much as he was a great human being who treated me well, well, he never was a good 'teacher.' Everything i learned during my 3.5 years there was hard-won knowledge, becus i was really on my own. Being isolated from our HQ meant i had no one else to turn to with questions or for vital background info, and my boss was just too busy and not inclined to spend much time on that. So that really hampered my learning curve. But that's one of the reasons he liked me so much, becus i could work independently.

At my new employer, it's not like that at all. There's been one guy in particular who has gone out of his way to help teach me various things on the computer, proprietary software and so on. I've learned more from him in one week than i learned from my old boss in a year. Seriously. What a world of difference. Makes me feel like i just woke up from a very long snooze (the guy in the fable, what's his name?) and found that everything's changed.

Been taking walks on my lunch hour for exercise, something i've been doing for more than 20 years, weather permitting. Unfortunately, there's really just a single option of where to go on foot. The whole area is very built up with large corporate offices and is quite congested, so driving anywhere is something i'd do with reluctance. There's the one very busy road i commute in on, but walking there would not be as relaxing as i'd like. So the other road is a back road sandwiched in between said busy road and an interstate type highway connector you can see through the trees. There's a short side road off that as well, with a number of condo complexes wedged in a very tight space. Doing just the 1 road round trip takes about 30 minutes, and i can stretch it out longer if i also did the condo street at the same time.

So, funny thing is, i'm getting just as much exercise as i did when i was walking to work in my hometown, 30 minutes or so.

In bad weather, there's always the stairwell. One woman in my group tells me she goes up and down the 4 flights daily. Seems a little dull to me, but in a pinch...

Our offices are so expansive that i'm finding i'm definitely getting more exercise just walking around there. At my former office, it was about 4 steps to the copy machine, 3 steps to the fax machine, 5 steps to our airplane-sized bathroom, etc. It was VERY small.

The new company won an architectural award for the design of the office space, which is ultra contemporary. There are NO private offices, not even for the top execs, and no cubicles, either. Everything is open, with the desks spaced probably 5 feet apart, but there are portable file cabinets that go with each work station which you can position as you like to form a type of square.

I was concerned about the noise level and my ability to write. It's not really too bad. A co-worker suggested that some people, when they need to concentrate on something, use earphones and an MP3 player, a great suggestion i think.

Truth be told, my old office of 4 people was noisier than this, as friends and neighbors of my boss who lived in town would often stop in to visit and just jabber away right in front of you. (No offices there, either.) The 2 people who worked upstairs would have to clop down the stairs daily to use the bathroom, the copy machine or the fax machine, and of course there was the daily parade of the mailman, FedEx man, DHL man and oh, let's not forget the UPS man, all of whom wanted to say hello and sometimes more. So writing in my old job was often a feat of concentration.

At the new job, there are plenty of small and large conference rooms for meetings or if you want to make a private phone call. The arrangement is supposed to encourage a collaborative atmosphere. All the work stations have all the computer and phone wiring going up to outlets in the ceilings, and they're wrapped with brightly colored wiring as part of the design statement. There are plenty of abstract type pieces of art adorning the walls, and i guess this art rotates periodically. My mother's art, which is also contemporary, would go quite well here; eventually i may inquire more about it. They hire another company who is in charge of doing the exhibits and procuring artists. Altho the work is simply loaned, i think, not purchased, and they don't even put the artist's name by the work, so it's hard to see what benefit it offers the artist.

My new work days end up being much longer when you factor in the commmute. Get up at 6:20 a.m., leave the house around 7:40 am and arrive by 8:30 a.m. Leave office between 5:30 and 6 p.m. and get home between 6:30 and 7 p.m., with barely time to catch the end of the evening news with Katie Couric.

The schedule is forcing me to be super-organized about my personal life and chores, as during the week there's not much time for anything. And i go to sleep early.

I enjoyed my visit to see dad and K. in NJ. Oh, and of course, I got plenty of playtime in with the newest addition to the household, Bailey the dachsund.



Bailey gets along well with the 2 cats in the house, but he is very jealous if you pay attention to anyone else! He's still just a puppy, but he has learned some impressive things, like when he needs to go pee or poop outside, he rings the bell on the front door knob. Very cool! He is a ball of energy.

My dad was getting the countertops in the kitchen replaced, so the whole time i was there 3 workmen were in there doing theier thing. The whole kitchen was in disarray, so we eat out breakfast, lunch and dinner. It was dad's treat, he'll never let me pay.

It was so bitterly cold there, and we wanted to make ourselves scarce while the work guys were there, so K. and I went to the mall to kill some time. We also went to her jeweler, where she is getting my grandmother's engagement ring put in a new setting. (My dad gave it to her.) My dad and i also did breakfast together, just the 2 of us, so i got some good quality time with both him and K., who i consider a good friend. She's not actually a step-mother, cus they're not married, but they've been together 12 years, so it's almost the same thing.

The ride there and back was traffic-free, something i always appreciate.

I still don't have my insulated tab curtains from Plow & Hearth, which i ordered back in November. They were out of stock at the time, but they indicated i'd have them at a certain date, well before Xmas. Well, Xmas came and went, and each time i called to find out what was going on, i got a new ship date. Each time, that ship date has passed. One rep actually told me that other customer service reps will assure you you'll have it by such and such a date becus they don't want to get berated by a customer, so they promise something that isn't true. Grrr. The latest ship date of January 1 has now been pushed back to January 15. By the time i get the curtains, it'll be spring. I wrote an angry letter to Plow & Hearth online.

I was supposed to get an oil delivery yesterday, and had spoken with a supplier who gave me a priceof $3.15 a gallon. Then he called me the day before and said the price had jumped to $3.25. I was not happy. I remember other suppliers i've bought from who honored the price they gave you, even if the price rose in the few days lapse between the time you ask for a delivery and the day you get it. I mean, how would i ever know if this guy was just trying to make an extra buck off me? So i told him I didn't want it anymore. He said, well, if you're gonna cop an attitude.... I was quite surprised he said that and i just said I'm not copping an atittude, i just don't want the oil at that price anymore.

So i called another supplier and got it at close to the same price that this one had originally quoted, $3.19 a gallon. I won't be getting it til Tuesday, so don't know if the same thing's gonna happen with this supplier, but at this point, i'll just have to suck it up and pay regardless.

When i returned from dad's, had a phone message from the accounting department of a freelance client i've been trying to get to pay me $270 for some very old projects i did in October. (Obviously, these are 2 jobs that fell thru the cracks there.) But i couldn't believe it when she said, umm, would you mind either faxing or emailing me the invoices for the jobs in question? I've emailed these to the sales managera total of 4 times and i don't think they should be putting this back on me becus of their own ineptness. Besides, she didn't leave me her email address and i don't have a fax machine. So i emailed the sales manager who gives me the work. Good riddance.

Just a few of my periodic frustrations. Trying to tie up loose ends this weekend.

I've enjoyed reading everyone's new year's resolutions, and i've expanded a bit on mine in my profile.

This morning, the first of 2008, is a murky, drizzly, chilly one.

I was fiddling with 2 different clock radios i have to set the alarm and ensure it works. I don't think i've used an alarm clock in at least 6 years, but if i awaken, gently, to classical music on public radio, getting up at 6:30 a.m. might not seem so bad.

I really like my Sony Dream Machine CD 823 (no longer manufactured), but i couldn't find the user manual and for the life of me couldn't figure out how to set the alarm. I finally found the user manual online at sony's site, but by that time i decided i'd use the backup clock radio i got for free at Staples (rewards program) and keep the sony in my office.

I should bake a quick bread today to use up the leftover cream cheese, which always goes bad on me, and/or the opened applesauce jar.

It's quite chilly in here as i've already reformatted my heat thermostat for my new upcoming schedule, and daytime is supposed to be my 'away' time. It only really gets to me when i'm sitting still, like at the computer. (I'm already wearing long underwear, cotton sweatpants, a turtleneck and a pullover sweatshirts and socks and slippers....STILL COLD!)

I'm happy to say i've read 11 books in 2007; i passed up the descending ball in favor of finishing up the latest book last night. It had been a general goal of mine to read more, and i did, and i was helped along by participating in one of my town's book clubs....did you know my town has THREE book clubs? Here's a list of them:

1. The Other Boleyn Girl, my book club selection, and a historicallly-based fictional account of Anne Boleyn's sister. Very good and an easy read.

2. The History of Love (fiction), another book club selection.

3. Healthy Aging, Andrew Weil.

4. Intuition (fiction), a book club selection. Inside the world of the lab rat.

5. Howard's End (fiction) a book club selection.

6. The New Medicines: How Drugs are Created, Marketed and Sold. Informative, about how pharmacetical processes and FDA approvals work.

7. The Best American Travel Writing of 2004, finally got thru this collection of short stories given to me as a Xmas gift by a friend 3 years ago!

8. Hamlet's Dresser (autobiographical by a local author) and a book club selection. Very thought-provoking; i found myself thinking about this book for weeks afterwards.

9. You Can Do It, a Boomer's Guide to Retirement by Joanathan Pond. A book given to me by my old boss. Mostly regurgitates all the basics that i've read elsewhere.

10. Nickel & Dimed, On (Not) Getting by in America. bought this used at our library. XCELLENT and highly recommended. About a writer who goes undercover to work as a waitress, chambermaid and at other low income jobs to see if it's possible to survive on minimum-wage.

11. Garbage Land, On the Secret Trail of Trash. Very good. A Brooklyn writer tracks where her trash and recycling goes. Eye-opening.

Kitty likes to bathe in the relative warmth of my halogen lamp here at my computer desk. Cats are always good at seeking out warmth.

Leaving for my dad's tomorrow a.m. I will enjoy my visit and am always happy for any time i get to spend with him. His health is not the best, but he's hanging in there.