Last year was very, very busy so I never got around to it, but this year I’d like to send out Christmas cards again.

Drop me an email with your address if you’d like one: lyz@princessleia.com (Please put “Christmas card” in the subject so I can filter it appropriately).

Typical disclaimer: Nope, I’m not a Christian, and the cards will non-religious in theme even if they happen to use the word “Christmas” – not going to bother restricting myself to just the “Happy Holidays” ones.

I’m trying to think of what I’m going to do for Christmas. This will be my first Christmas alone, but I don’t want that to mean I’m not going to bother doing anything. Seriously considering even getting a small real tree, I love having a real Christmas tree in the house, and so does Caligula :)

A while back I joked about trying to find dinosaurs in Philadelphia. At some point I was clued into the fact that there ARE dinosaurs in Philadelphia, they’re at the Academy of Natural Sciences! So I went a couple weeks ago.

jadoba was in town for the weekend so I dragged him along too.

..and he took one for the team.

I got to hold a live giant cockroach, which really wasn’t that horrifying, it was kind of cute. Even so, if I ever see anything like that anywhere in my living space I’m going to flip.

It wasn’t the most spectacular nature museum I’ve been to, but it wasn’t crowded (like when I went to the Smithsonian to see the dinosaurs) and their dinosaur exhibit was quite nice.

I also got to go to Reading Terminal Market for the first time, where I got some seriously nommy cookies and peaches.

So that makes two more Philadelphia touristy things down, how many more to go? I’ve still never been to Pat’s or Geno’s…

I’m getting all settled in to the new place. Comcast came through and installed internet on Wednesday morning, and by Friday I had reverse DNS working and was all geared up to start work again Monday. I took Wednesday through Friday off from work last week for some much needed R&R and adjustment to the new place. I was able to hit Target for all the basics I needed, so I’m doing pretty well on that front. it took ages to finally bring over all my stuff from the house, but I’m just about done now.

Some photos of the place:

A cute kitchen. I was able to squeeze my stuff in it thus far, and have been able to do a bit of cooking. I’ll probably be sad about lack of a dish washer at some point, but I’m just one person, washing dishes for one person isn’t that bad.

I couldn’t resist, I needed a shower curtain for my shower, and when I saw this one it was love at first sight. If i can’t live in a pink castle, I’ll have one in my bathroom! ;)

I set up my desk near my front door, near the cable outlet. I’m not sure how pleased I am with this so far, but I needed to put it in this room and I wasn’t impressed with my other options.

A TV?! Lyz has a TV? My friend Mike from NJ helped me move and had that spare TV and VCR sitting in his dining room, so he brought it along on moving day. I wasn’t going to accept it, but I do have a bunch of movies (VHS and DVD), and I could use something to hook my PS2 up to (and maybe a Wii at some point!). So yes, I have a TV, but no channels – I have no reception and didn’t pay for cable TV.

Bedroom! And I have a big (not too deep, but the length of the whole room) closet which was behind me when I took this picture. And as I describe below, my bed is now a bit different…

When I moved in I didn’t have a couch. I ended up moving my bed/couch futon into the living room to use that as a couch, as seen in the pictures – and bought a mattress and box spring. I didn’t actually intend to buy a mattress when I walked into Sleepy’s in Limerick (27 West Ridge Pike, next to the new Acme), I was just going to browse. Upon entering the store I was greeted by Chris Brown, one of their great sales people (friendly, well-dressed, very good at their job), who showed me around and had me try out a bunch of mattresses. Within a half hour I found myself getting a credit check to apply for financing. I started to panic at that point, should I really make such a purchase right now? So much change! So many financial responsibilities suddenly upon me! Noticing my panicking and figurative edging near the door, Chris gave his manager a call to see if he could get me a deal. That’s when when his manger mentioned a floor model of Kingsdown Body Blend Red/Blue (a mattress they sell for $1699 new) up at the Pottstown store he was trying to get rid of for $350, so rather than going with the lower end new, I went with that floor model. It was delivered yesterday and I slept on it the first time last night and it is, by far, the best mattress I’ve ever owned.

Updated bedroom photo w/ new mattress:

Woo a grown-up bed!! So now I have a couch too, which is easily changed into a comfy guest bed.

As I mentioned in my last post, I moved into an apartment this weekend. I took Nita’s recommendation of Highland Manor Apartments in North Coventry, where she lived several years ago. The price was right (I’m able to keep all living expenses – rent, internet, electric, basic food to less than half of my total net income), the location was desirable (nice area, less than 5 minutes from route 422), and for a one bedroom, the 725 square feet of room really is perfect – enough for me to live and work in, not too much so that I’ll get oppressively lonely.

Lonely… I’ve never lived alone before. Caligula came with me (Simcoe is staying with Michael, assuming they can handle the separation without too much drama), and I think that will help a lot. But I don’t think this will be easy to adjust to. It’s important though, I need to be alone for a while, no roommates or otherwise.

I’m hoping internet will be put in this week, dealing with Comcast right now to get a solid date for installation (they said they’d contact me before 11:30 tomorrow to give me a status update on the order, said there are some issues, grumble). I’ll be commuting to the house until it’s installed, and then will be taking a few days off from work to relax and adjust. So I’ll have a few evenings without internet (and right now I’m having a weekend without internet – am at Sly Fox on their free WiFi writing this…), but it should be good for me, will force me into getting my apartment in order since I’ll have nothing better to do. Oh, and spending some time with just myself is probably healthy right now too. My Inbox is a mess, I’m going to ignore it for now, will catch up when I’ve got things sorted out.

I had a cold earlier this week, and I don’t think I let it recover enough before exhausting myself with moving yesterday. I don’t feel well today and had to cancel going to a concert with my friend Mike all the way in Jersey this evening. So I think I’m going to leave the ‘Fox soon and go chill out with Caligula.

Yesterday I moved into my own apartment.

I’m not going to say much about it, but things haven’t worked out between Michael and I. We’re still friendly and I’ll be commuting up to the house for work until I get internet at the new place.

I’m completely heartbroken and recovery from this will take some time, but it’s time to work toward moving forward.

I was excited to get the call earlier in the week to say my bike had arrived. I got the bike rack that goes with my car from the friend who sold me the car last night, and this morning headed up to Wheel Write Bike Shop to pick it up.

They really hooked me up there at Wheel Write Bike Shop (as expected, it’s owned by Constance and Cyron‘s brother!). And it’s a fantastic bike, got it sized, and they even helped me position it properly on the bike rack for the ride home! I have other plans this afternoon, but you better bet that tomorrow morning I’ll be dragging myself out of bed bright and early to hit some trails.

Oh, and she managed to get herself a name already. I was standing in the shop and thought: “She’s an awesome mt bike, a monster! A green monster! Green monsters…. Loch Ness monster! Nessy!”

Today I celebrate the 2nd anniversary of my 25th birthday.

I’ll be skipping out of work early to head down to Philly with friends :)

Given the impending storms I decided I needed to get Blinker handled today, otherwise I’d either be stuck at home with Blinker in the garage all weekend or risk rain water in the light causing electrical damage. It turns out she lost a fog light too – oops! But that was the only other damage. The shop had the headlights in stock and was able to hook me up with a used fog light that they only charged me the labor to install (score!). It cost about half of what my deducible would have cost, so that’s positive.

Shiny!

But quite a bit more shiny than the passenger’s side light. The guy at the shop recommended replacing the passenger’s side eventually too because of the fogging, but it wasn’t bad enough to be an inspection issue yet.

Phew, I am glad I was able to take care of this within 24 hours. No more worries.