I'm starting to wonder if my friend Denise is psychic. She apparently had a dream where I dyed my hair red, got a perm, and told her I was engaged. Well, my hair got redyed red again recently, I'm thinking about a perm, and you know the third part. She also had a dream that I eloped. It's making me wonder...

So there is now a BIG performing arts theater on campus now. I'm not sure why this was a priority when we already have 3-4 theaters on campus and the vet school needs a major overhaul so they can get accredited again, but the big wine bigwigs wanted a wine center and their name slapped on the theater, so the theater is what we got. I got to go in it (for the first and last time, most likely) yesterday so I got an hour off from work, and it is nice, enormous, and lovely... but shoot, what student's going to be able to afford to go to that? Apparently the drama students this year, who are normally required to go to a few plays each quarter, are now specfically being told that they have to attend the center performances, not just "go to any play on campus" any more. The students are pissed that they can't afford that, the teachers claim it's in lieu of textbooks. Hello, I took drama, I've seen the textbooks they use, and they're about $5 at the most.

Did I wake up mildly cranky this morning or what? 'Cause I sure as hell feel like complaining today...

Dave is having big old insomnia issues. He's gone completely nocturnal- can't sleep all night long, spends the entire night playing Fallout, goes to bed right when I leave for work, sleeps all day long until it's about time for me to get off work. Not to mention that he now sleeps through all phone calls (missed his unemployment interview because he slept through the ringing) and alarms. I'm wondering how he's going to manage on Sunday around my relatives if he can't sleep all day. Thank god for online applications or he'd get nothing done. Now he's all "I need to start working graveyard again."

He's claiming the insomnia thing is due to my tiny bed and how he doesn't sleep well if we're both in it. Every day he keeps going on about how he wants a new bed, like, NOW. It is driving me crazy. I don't want a futon very much, but sizewize and pricewise it's the cheapest thing to get right NOW. But I'm not that thrilled about shelling out for a new futon, futon covers, frame, etc. this year all by myself and then having to go buy an actual bed again next year, especially since due to his size it'd be better to go bigger(queen or king) for the long run. I know we want space for friends to crash, but still... if I have to get a bigger bed, I'd rather wait another year and get an actual bed and use this one for guest space. Plus I'm not looking forward to having my room rearranged again and trying to fit something big into it. But he's going nuts about it- said he asked for a new bed for his birthday next month, and now wants to see if his dad's willing to haul his old futon (which is way too big to use in the tiny hole he lives in now) out of the backyard and up here or not. I feel evil for delaying on it, but dammit, I don't want two big bed-ish pieces of furniture around without the space to keep them in. And there's other things I want my money to go to right now.

And um, dare I say it, but I'm really tired of hearing about Fallout. All. the. time. All. night. long. he's playing that game. Why do I always end up with gamers, or maybe it's just that all 20ish guys are gamers these days. Maybe I have a short attention span, but I just cannot stay interested in one single game for 10 hours straight, which is about what he did last night, no matter how good it is. Nor, in all honesty, can I stay that interested in constant conversation about Fallout. Nor have I worked up the interest to try the game yet, no matter how much fun he tells me it is and how I'd like it if I'd just give it a chance. Since only one person can play it at a time, what the heck is he going to do if I get addicted to the game and want to play it all the time anyway? Hell, he was sitting around bored when I checked e-mail for an hour. Admittedly, there really just isn't that much to do to keep entertained all night long in this town and I'm off reading Dune prequels lately and am not being all that entertaining on my own, but still, it's getting old. No wonder he now wants me to get a second monitor and keyboard (though there isn't space for that anywhere, either). I could ask him to spend time with me not involving that game, and he'd do it, but I don't like interrupting doing something he's crazy about.

It's all a big distraction, of course. He wants to get into computers and get some job in that field, which of course requires... schooling. UCD offers extension courses in what he wants to take, only it turns out they cost an ENORMOUS amount of money. Shocked the hell out of me. Boy, did that bum him out. I saw this book last week about getting free money for education and job training and had him look at it, but he didn't find much he was eligible for, i.e. "I'm over 21 and have a home, this is useless to me." Yikes. I found some JC programs in computers he could do- not the Big Shot program he wants to take, but seems serviceable- but he can't really do anything on that until January anyway.

It's all quite frustrating, isn't it? Ah, the joys of your 20's. Shoot me now.

In the meantime, I have decided to turn over a new leaf when it comes to spending. I found this GREAT financial book for 20somethings (I think it's called "Please Send Money," hah) and have been poring through it. I am trying to write down everything I spend money on this month so I can have a more accurate picture of how my budget should be going. I usually have several estimates of things in my head and make sure i don't spend the amount of money for each, then just buy whatever, but perhaps this isn't the most efficient thing to do. And I really need to start an official savings account instead of just not spending beyond a certain point in my checking. Just as soon as I have enough money I can spare from checking to put in said account, I guess.

And much as I really don't want to, I should get a credit card. Though my mother shredded(!) the last application I got from the alumni association, and I'm not eligible for the college accounts any more, so I'm not really sure *how* I'm going to get one of the damn things. But one of us has to at least have some decent credit.

I'm so obsessed with money now, it's getting creepy. I need to start saving up for things, like Dave's engagement ring (we're thinking of doing more major ring purchase for Christmas presents, and since he's got the bigger fingers, his actually costs a lot more than mine, yikes), but all I keep thinking is "I wanna Palm! Waaah!"

You see, much to my possible stupidity, I signed up again for NaNoWriMo this year. I was going to hold off on signing up for that, but I started reading their new forums (check the link or last year's November entries if you don't nkow what I'm talking about) and found myself signing up before I knew what I'd done. Hey, at least I could write the other half of my novel from last year!

Though this year will be a lot harder to do it in. Last year my friends were drifting off, I had no boyfriend and had no life. (I seem to recall actually telling people that since I had no boyfriend, this was the perfect time to do it in.) This year, hell, I not only have a boyfriend, but one who's (for now) actually here and hogging my computer! I let him do it since he doesn't have one and I spend all day already on one, but still, unless (God forbid) I handwrite, it's gonna make it hard to write a novel without one. Plus there's the times I'm out of town- I may have to spend 4-6 hours per weekend on various forms of transport, so why waste that prime writing time?

So that leads me to the portable computer issue. I have a Jornada minilaptop that I do like, and which I bought my last year of college *specifically* so I could use Word and Excel on it and sync them to my big computer. Only, well... the syncing capacity for Word doesn't work. According to Dave, it's missing a file in the machine itself and he just cannot come up with any way to fix it, and tech support just didn't respond back to him at all. Anything I write on my baby can't be printed out or used anywhere else, nor can I download my old novel into it. DAMMIT.

And I was looking around costwise at Palms yesterday, now that I've been paid for the month and have money again. Buying the Palm itself isn't too bad, but a keyboard for it costs *choke* $80 (ripoff, ripoff!), and a Word/Excel-compatible program for it costs $50. I am not thrilled about THAT, let me tell you.

I don't really know what to do about that. I could probably afford the whole Palm/keyboard/program thing, but I could use that money for other things too, like the ring, or if we don't do rings for Christmas, buying him a matching Palm. And I've only got one more paycheck coming in between now and Christmas (I HATE monthly pay. Hate it, hate it, hate it, even if I get paid at the start/end of the time now instead of a week later than that). Maybe starting a savings account isn't the best thing to do right now. After the holidays, perhaps?

I've got a month before NaNoWriMo starts to figure out this problem, at least...

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