I’m going through old posts in this blog, adding categorization, and I just came to the one from 10/20/08 when I said I was learning Spanish. Um, yea. I think I made it to lesson 3 or 4. Guess I just wasn’t that motivated… maybe someday I’ll get back to it.

Portland doesn’t get much snow, and is woefully unprepared for it when it does happen. Today’s storm was unpredicted, as far as I know; we were only supposed to get “showers” today. Instead we got snow, and lots of it by local standards (maybe 4″ by my estimate).
It started snowing as I was heading for a nail appointment at a different shop than I usually go to, about 30 minutes away. I arrived 45 minutes late, but that was nothing compared to the trip home – 3 hours, plus an extra hour hanging out at Burgerville hoping that the traffic would clear (it didn’t).
We took the dogs for a walk after I got home, and broke the rules (shh! :) by letting them run off-leash in one of our neighborhood parks. Snow is so rare around here, we just couldn’t pass up an opportunity to give them a good romp!

Yea, so I haven't posted anything personal since July 1st.  What can I say but "Sorry, been busy"?  Both the personal and professional sides of my life have been bursting at the seams lately.  So let's catch up, shall we?

Personal

Most important – yes, Wayne and I are still together and going strong.  We haven't had a fight yet – sure, we get annoyed with each other from time to time, but that's life.  I have no significant complaints, and he doesn't have any either (that he's willing to admit to, anyway :).  It embarrasses him to no end when I say this but I still feel like a knight in shining armor rode up on his white steed and swept me away…

A fair amount of time (and money) has gone into our RV.  Mike had gotten it in the divorce, but he hasn't been working and couldn't afford it anymore, so now it's mine.  Wayne and I have gone on a few trips with the dogs and a good time has been had by all.  We've done a bit of traveling around Oregon, to the beach and the mountains, and we'll be taking it to Nevada to spend Christmas with his dad.

Wayne's 40th birthday was October 21st, and I made sure that was a Big Deal.  Originally all I had planned was a big party with all of our friends, but then fate intervened – the guy I do contract iPhone work for called us all to New York for a week of training and it happened to be Wayne's birthday week.  So we spent the week staying at Alex's place in Manhattan, three blocks from Central Park and one block from a subway station.  We had dinner on the 21st at an awesome restaurant , and then came back just in time for the original party, complete with limo ride.  I'm guessing he'll be remembering this birthday for a good long while! :)

Pet-wise, we still have the two dogs, and are now up to four cats.  Mike had found a new home for Angel;  she likes to pee in inappropriate places, which makes her somewhat unsuitable as a house pet.  We had hoped she would stop doing it if she was the only cat in the home but no, she continued until they finally gave her back, which meant she came straight back to me (don't ask).  She now lives in a decent-sized kitty cage in my office.  I don't like confining her like this, especially since she's getting *really* fat, but I don't know what else to do with her.  In the past the only option vets have had was to give her kitty Valium, which works but makes her groggy all the time.  At this point I'm not exactly sure I know which is worse, sleeping all day due to a medication, or due to being stuck in a cage with nothing to do…

Professional

Speaking of my office (how's that for a segue?), a few months ago I upgraded a bit.  I had been in the back bedroom since we moved here in 2005 and I decided it was time for a change.  So I got a new, much larger desk from Ikea and a super-duper powerful Mac Pro computer with dual monitors.  It's an awesome work space.  In order to fit all this, I moved my office up front, into the living room, which we never used for anything else.  It's a bit odd to walk in the front door and have my office be right there, but I've always been one to arrange things around how I use them more than how they look (though being able to accommodate both is nice when it works out).  

It's a bit odd at night, when I have the lights on and I know that everyone walking by can see me through the front windows, but I've learned to adjust.  The next challenge will be figuring out what to do with the Christmas tree;  it's usually in the front window, but that's not necessarily going to work this year.  Although having the tree there blinking colorfully in front of me could be very festive…. or it could drive me nuts, I'm not sure.

I won't get into too much work detail – I'd lose most of you.  The short summary is that I've lost a bunch of old clients this year, but have picked up new ones.  It remains to be seen if I will be able to completely replace what was lost, but we're doing fine at the moment.  Subject to change… the big difference is that my previous income came mostly from hosting websites, which is free money most of the time, punctuated by the occasional total panic requiring 24/7 effort until things are fixed.  My new work is mostly hourly, or fixed-price contract.  It's going to require me working a lot more hours to make the same amount of money in the new world order.  I can't say I like that, but it's not exactly unreasonable.  I've had kind of a free ride for a long time, and I always knew it would not last forever.

The main thing to know is that I'm now building iPhone applications, which is fun, though hard, work, and is about as cocktail-party buzzword compliant as you can get right now in this industry. :)  Right now I do all my work as a subcontractor for Codefab, run by my friend and colleague Alex Cone, but eventually I plan to pick up some clients of my own, and I also have a few ideas up my own sleeve that I would like to build and sell myself.  It's an exciting time to be a programmer who likes Apple products, that's for sure.

I think that's it for me – how are *you* all doing???

Wow, has it really been almost 3 months since my last post? I’ve been busy and all, but there’s no excuse for that. Once again I resolve to do better, though I know I probably won’t. So much to do, so little time…

Details below the fold.

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The new boyfriend…

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I’m still here, just have been crazy busy. All sorts of new things to report, most of them good (some of them *very* good :). I just need to take the time to write it all down.

In the meantime, Happy 2009 to all!

Sorry I’m a bit late posting this – it’s been a busy week (and it’s only Tuesday!).

I went for my mammogram and ultrasound on Monday, and they didn’t find anything wrong. The best guess is that the spot has been there all along, and my having lost weight over the past year just brought it to the surface.

*whew*!!!

Sorry about the silence; I’ve been a bit busy lately. A quick overview of the last 10 days:

• I spent the weekend up in Washington visiting my friends Hollie and Greg. A great time was had by all, and Hollie got a new desk! I bet she is still in storage cubby heaven.
• Mike got married. Not much to say about that, but it’s a milestone worth noting.
• I went back to the orthopedic surgeon and got told I have to suffer through another month of physical therapy before he’ll even order an MRI of my problem knee. This is getting very old… I don’t think I’ve written much about my impressions of PT, guess I should do that.
• Mark left for Iraq. He’ll be working there for at least a year, and possibly as much as three years. I’m going to miss him… we had a lot of fun together, and it was nice to have someone around to do date-like things with even though we weren’t actually dating.
• This is potentially a little scary – I went for my annual exam on Friday, and the nurse who did the breast exam said she felt a spot that’s a bit firmer than anywhere else. She’s “not worried about it”, but I’ve been sent to get a mammogram with extra views of that side. This is *just* what I need, with health insurance uncertainty coming up and potentially moving and all… so everyone cross your fingers that it’s really no big deal.
• Moving planning continues, but slowly. I’ve been researching all kinds of things, but no conclusions reached yet.
• November is going to be a busy month! I’m already booked for all of the following, and Thanksgiving plans are still to be made:

San Francisco – Celebrating Men, Satisfying Women (I know this sounds a bit hype-y, but I know people who say this workshop changed their lives)

Denver – iPhone Development Studio

San Jose – iPhoneLive

The pet sitter is going to have a good month…

I think that’s all the news that’s fit to print for the moment.

No, not in that way… :)

You may not want to read on if you have a vivid imagination and/or are easily grossed out…

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Well, so far I’ve talked to a rental broker in New York, and a real estate agent and mortgage broker here. Next step on that front will be figuring out if I should try to refi now or wait and see what happens; it’s a pretty sucky time to sell (no surprise there) so that’s probably not a good option any time soon.

Right now I’m thinking of keeping the house and renting it out. If I stay in New York, home/apartment prices are so high that I’m not likely to ever be able to purchase one, so it’s not like I need to sell this one in order to buy one there. So my next stop on this train is probably to talk to one of those services that will manage your rental for you.

I think the next big task to tackle is changing my last name. I should get that completed before I start signing things in my new life, I suppose. So one of these days soon I will be Janine Anne Rivas once more!

Technically my name is already changed, because it’s in the divorce decree, but it’s not real until I start using it and have everything changed to reflect it. Which means not only the basics like Social Security and the DMV, but all the credit cards, utilities, and everything else. What a pain in the behind! I don’t think I’ll ever change my name again, unless it’s really important to the guy. But if he’s the right guy for me, he probably won’t care.