Vacation

So, spent about a week doing something vaguely resembling a vacation. Didn't travel out of town, so the term I kinda hate, "staycation," fits I guess.

Mainly, I didn't have to do the Dayjob. Which was very good. My dayjob makes me intensely unhappy after 17 years doing the same thing for two different companies. I shouldn't have tried being clever starting with my current employers. Got out of media studies & production school and these nice folks were catching calls for a public radio fundraiser, and I thought it'd be a good place to start for a little while. Twelve years later...

Anyway, whining-about-dayjob isn't terribly interesting, so, moving on.

Did get to do some things I like. The week started out looking very bad. Saturday morning the weather thing on my phone was claiming it was going to rain basically all week. Boy was I down at that point. By a couple days out, though, started getting a few sunny days, with occasional rain. Even had a couple days at 80 degrees F or higher a little excessive but for northern Minnesota, the sort of problem you want to have. It's not snowing, it's great weather. ;-)

I take great enjoyment from going to rummage sales. I don't feel compelled to buy more Rummage, our house is plenty full of Rummage already. But rummage sales give me a place to go, and when I get there, generally speaking, is still out in the sun. Might well buy nothing at all. But from time to time I find that one small thing that is unique-ish and serves a purpose for me -- even if the purpose is me staring at the thing while it sits on a shelf and I do nothing with it.

I use an app on my phone called Garage Sales Everywhere. It filters through the appropriate listings in Craigslist, and sends them through Google Maps giving me a map that (usually) shows where those events are relative to where I live. Sometimes I walk to the sale, sometimes I might ride my bike, and very rarely I might take a bus. The busses now have bike racks on the front so I could bus near and bike around an area. I get a bit of exercise and maybe I actually buy something, maybe not.

Last couple days I walked up the hill to Piedmont Heights. It's up a pretty steep hill, way to steep to bike up or down for me, and not easy to walk for that matter. But I feel like I've accomplished something when I get there, even if I don't end up buying stuff.

(Why yes, this is the exciting part of my RL life...)

Far as SL goes, I've done a bit of that, too. In fact, I picked this particular week off because it's also the time of SL16B, the Second Life 16th Birthday event. I originally intended to do what I'd done in the past, a couple of events DJing and a couple singing. Yes I do sing in Second Life. There's significant tech involved, but bottom line it's still me in front of a microphone.

Just did the DJing so far this year. I've been an SL DJ for 10 years, so I'm pretty good. I'm always a bit anxious about singing in comparison. Got in touch with a friend who'd been in charge of some of that stuff at previous SLBs. Turns out Linden Labs, our Glorious Leaders, may their tribe increase, decided to run the event themselves this year instead of having user volunteers manage it. This may be perfectly fine. But without the comfort of working with someone I know, I didn't feel up for singing this year.

So the main vacation thing I did was not work, but I also did some Non-Work Stuff. A small vacation, but adequate to its purpose. Couldn't get the week of Independence Day off, but the week after I'm out again for a few days couldn't get that Monday off, those are busy on the Dayjob.

I think I'm going to be unhappy having to go back to day after day of Dayjob. (sigh)