The Marci Rating System

*Good news! I made it safely there (the car spa) and back again, and now my car has snow tires!

*Less fantastic news! I'm definitely going to need the snow tires, because I'm supposed to go to the office today, and the plowing situation in the parking lot here is currently 'the driving lane was cleared at some point, everything else we'll do later.' Which is fine! It's just that I'm gonna need to drive through that 'everything else' to get to the driving lane. (lol so many memories of the apartment parking lot after a snowstorm...)

*Anyway, work is work. Our team just got moved to a different team (temporarily?!? I guess?!?) for reasons unknown. The reasons we've been given make very little sense, and it's hard to know if that's because they're untruthful or just, you know, corporate.

*We're supposed to be doing our year-end "self-evaluations" immediately, which means I've been sorting all the stuff I planned to catch up on in December into two piles: 'hurry up and do it before the evaluation so I can say it's done,' and 'safe to say it's on track to meet the 2025 goal.'

*Yeah.

*But coffee!

*Yay!

Stuff I'm looking forward to today:

*I have (probably?) three-ish border rows left to do on my current blanket project, and I'm very excited to work on it! (Was planning to make more progress last night, but the cat was sleeping on the blanket.)

*The sun is out for real after a few cloudy days, and I get to go outside for a walk! (just need to brush my teeth first!)

*I get to drink delicious home coffee instead of work coffee, which means it's AUTUMN SPICE BLEND time, heck yeah!

This is one of those weather days when we should all be allowed to lounge around inside and take lots of naps. Since I am headed to the office instead...

THINGS TO LOOK FORWARD TO AT THE OFFICE

*free coffee (it's not as delicious as my Home Coffee, but I also don't need to wash the coffeemaker afterwards)

*free lunch (everyone is in agreement that this promised perk won't last long, so we might as well eat as much free food as possible while it lasts)

*audiobook time (my current audiobook has not been as engaging as I expected, probably through no fault of the book itself -- I couldn't even focus on reading the cat distribution system, by ScarlettStorm last night, a fic so aligned with Things I Like that I made actual grabby hand motions at the screen when I saw it)

So: drive, eat, be seen, drive home again. It's a plan!

Why is the BEST season starting today (for me)? Because my AUTUMNAL COFFEE HAS ARRIVED!!! (Very worthy of all caps and as many exclamation points as the heart desires.)

And there were a lot of autumnal flavors to choose from (I did not choose, I got the sampler pack so I could try ALL of them), so I have a LOT of coffee to drink before the Christmas flavors come out. I am up for the challenge!!! (I'm locked in? Is that what people say now?)

Apple Pie Spice coffee? Bourbon Pecan? Autumn Harvest? Maple??? Yes, please! I'll try all of them! (Maybe not all today. Probably going to start out with the apple pie one, because APPLE PIE.)

After my adventures with the coffee advent calendar last year, I decided to try the same company's 'spring and summer' options. (They offer a set of 'single-pot' bags with the various flavors. Since I'm making one cup at a time, and mixing the flavored coffee with regular coffee, they last a WHILE.)

So far I've tried:

*Blackberry Crumble: unexpectedly delicious, wow! I was wary of all the fruit flavors, but this one was great.

*S'Mores: YUM

*Blueberry Cobbler: ...I'm not sure

See, the thing is, MANY years ago, I took a bunch of powdered blueberry-flavored Crystal Light on a trip I didn't really want to go on, and the blueberry smell of the ground coffee is EXACTLY the same. (Okay, I have no idea if it's exactly the same. It reminds me of how that smelled. So the mental association is there.)

BUT once the coffee is brewed, the blueberry smell is much less, and the taste isn't bad. As long as the ratio is Very Little Blueberry Coffee : Much More Regular Coffee, I'm enjoying it quite a bit. I'm not sure I'm enjoying it enough to KEEP enjoying it through the entire packet, let alone the SECOND one, though. (Why two blueberry, and not two delicious, delicious blackberry???)

::deep breaths::

::resolves to ACTUALLY go to sleep earlier tonight::

OKAY! LET'S DO THIS!

Despite my reservations about everything the fact that it's still only Thursday, I recognize that many of those reservations would probably be resolved with 1) a few more hours of sleep tonight; 2) a walk outside in the sunshine; and 3) eating some food.

Ooh, and coffee! It's time for a new flavor from my coffee advent calendar -- each 'day' has actually been lasting me about four days, since I only drink one* cup a day.

(*LOL "one cup" in a 20-ounce mug, which I do realize is Not Exactly One Cup, but is sort of close enough for the purposes of this post.)

*In happy news, I am well-stocked with coffee and chocolate, two things I am very much looking forward to consuming today.

*In less fantastic news, I'm battling with a sense of 'I'm falling apart and falling behind in every way.' That this feeling is objectively untrue does not seem to make it less unpleasant to experience.

*Current word count: help, I can't do math. the goal is 23,333 today, and I hit yesterday's goal of 21667, I think, so... somewhere between those two? idk there are now three files and that's so many numbers

*A sentence I wrote today: "Why are you up so early?"

*Sometimes my computer tries to offer helpful suggestions like 'this sentence would be more grammatically correct if you took out this word,' and I'm always like 'I think you fundamentally misunderstand the purpose of this exercise.' Sometimes I add more words instead.

Today my coffee delivery AND my yarn delivery are both supposed to arrive... what a combo! Sorry boss, it is coffee and crochet hours for the foreseeable future!

With June comes plants!

Other big plans for the day:

*take some more allergy medication

*drink coffee in my new rainbow heart mug

*pat the cat

*Work continues to be work

*But I turned on my diffuser this morning and I can *almost* smell it even with my sinus congestion, so that's one good thing

*And I decided to make the cat a lil' crochet blanket for her bed, so I have a fun project for downtime, which is another good thing (this is maaaaaaybe a ploy for me to reclaim her current blanket, but if she's insistent, I'm sure she'll wind up with both)

*Also this day has coffee for drinking and leftover pizza for eating, and those are even more good things

*OH! And it's monthly budget day, which means after I do that, it's officially next month (financially, lol) -- time to start daydreaming about March purchases!