Preparations

I have joined A Gym.

No, that is not a typo.

And, no, this is not the typical Bride To Be fighting the Battle of The Dress.

I like my body.  I like my shape.   I really like the way I look in the Dress I found.

It's something else.  I have been amazingly stressed lately - as if you haven't noticed...  Moving to a city I'd previously spent a grand total of 6 hours in.  Moving into an apartment in abysmal condition, with landlords who don't care.  Finding a job in that city, then figuring out how to do that job.  Hardly seeing my fiance at all, since he's at school 12 hours most days.  Trying to plan my Wedding from across the state. Trying to deal with being 6 hours away from my family and most of my friends.

I've been feeling seriously lonely and isolated of late.  I go to work and then I come home and sit with the cat (when she deigns to sit with me) and watch dvds of old tv shows.  There's been a lot of crying.  Crying with no real reason behind it, no explanation, no specific thing to point to and know why.  Crying like I cried a few winters ago when I ended up seeing a psychiatrist and going on an antidepressant.  And it's scary.  I'm scared.

But this time, I want to fight it differently.  At least I'm feeling it and seeing it and realizing it now, and not in the middle of January when I can't even get myself out of bed or look at myself in a mirror. 

For a while now,  I've been trying to take a B vitamin complex on a fairly regular basis, but lately I can really feel a difference if I miss a few days, so I'm trying to be more dilligent.  I'm making sure to talk it out with Jake if I'm having a blue day.  He reminds me to take those vitamins, and that everything is going to be ok. 

And I've gotten that gym membership.  Just the basic membership at that famous $10/month chain, but if it gets me moving a little bit, gets those endorphins flowing a couple of times a week, maybe that will help.  Today was my first day.  I took it easy; don't want to beat myself up the first day and then never want to go back.  I plan on going back tomorrow.  Maybe I'll try to add another 10 minutes on that elliptical machine. 

Because I want to be happy.  I want to enjoy my life and my fiance and the excitement of planning my wedding to my favorite person in the world.  I want to be happy for me, and for him, and for us. 

Home Improvement Solutions

Since the laundry facilities (read: one washer and two dryers) have been made functioning, I have been handling our laundry needs in house.  It's slightly cheaper, and I can easily do one or two loads as I need to, when I need to, without having to plan on an afternoon at the laundromat.

All's well, right?

Sure... except that the basement is still ragingly disgusting, having never been swept or cleaned out, and is full of the "maintenance" supplies that the highschool dropouts who have been hired by our rental agency have been using.

"Using for what?" you might be asking.... for some of the repairs we had reported to them over two weeks ago?

No. 

For painting the outside of the building.  yep.  the outside.  While there are still holes in my floors, doors that don't shut, and who knows what else.

Fine.

Except that I saw a Cockroach in the basement.  A dead Cockroach, but still, a Cockroach.  The size of my thumb.  On it's back, legs all splayed in lifeless reach.  Ew.

Fine.

Except that where there is one Cockroach, I am utterly convinced that there are always MORE Cockroaches.  There is never just ONE Cockroach.  They are not solitary creatures.  Part of what makes Cockroaches so ominous is the that there are always armies of Cockroaches.

Scads.  Hordes. Throngs. Oodles. 

And we still have holeS (plural) in our floors.  In our Bedroom Floor.  And behind the fridge.  Holes!  That our landlords have decided are not necessary to repair, at least not before painting the entire outside of the building.

So, we are taking matters into our own hands.  Jake has plans to jigsaw the holes square and cut pieces of plywood or other scrap to fit, or use spray foam insulation, or some other legitimate means and actually Repair the Holes.

I wish to take a more immediate, if passive aggressive approach.

Packing tape.

Brilliant, right?  Sure, if I could find it.  Somehow in our unpacking and putting things away, we have lost the roll of packing tape.  My Brilliant Solution for my Fear of Cockroaches is lost somewhere in our disordered apartment.  My OCD nature won't allow me to use masking tape, of which I somehow have rolls and rolls of. No, it must be clear packing tape.  Less invasive and eye-catching. 

If I can't find it by tomorrow, I'm going out after work with whatever meager tip money I have earned and buying some, damnit.