chimesblog

So here I am on a normal hermiting Saturday afternoon. Elbow deep in crafting. Getting ready to put it all away and go work out.

I’ve been making shrink jewelry all day and I went outside to spray acrylic coating on the pieces to seal them.  For all who don’t know, I have a huge porch that’s enclosed with 8-10 ft. walls.  I chose this apartment for that reason because I was concerned about my safety living alone (I used to get stalkers — but that’s a really long and scary story).

ANYWHO, who would have thought that I would get stuck outside on the hottest day of the year?  Go figure.

The big sliding door’s lock latched apparently when I shut it. Normally I would have just kept the screen door open, but I was spraying fume-y stuff and — oh — by the way — my screen door has been broken since I moved in. So that wasn’t an option anyway.

I finished spraying. Turned around. Pulled on the door. What the HELL?  Locked.

Poop.

Okay, wellll I seem to remember one of my windows not wanting to shut all the way (which I noticed earlier today because it annoyed me that I was running the air with the window cracked).  So, Ms. MacGuyver took the grill cleaning utensil brush and pried the window open a bit more.  But then the window slammed all the way shut when I took out the utensil to put a tree branch in it to hold it open to pull with my body weight.

CRAP.

So, what is my next option?  Well, just in case, I try the door again. Not so much.

So I have this little tree in my porch that I have always been afraid that some robber/stalker/burglar/rapist was going to climb down and get me (yea, paranoid much??). Well, thank GOD for the tree because that’s what saved me.

There isn’t any branches low enough to where I could climb up from the bottom of the tree, so I grabbed my bike that was parked on my porch and used that to boost me high enough to where I could start climbing.  All the while, all I could think about was OH MY GOD I’M IN MY PJS AND IT’S 3 PM AND I’M GROSS I HOPE NOBODY SEES ME CLIMBING THIS TREE!!!

So I get high enough to where I can see over the walls.  At this point I’m trying to figure out how to get over the wall and grab onto the light pole (which was how I suspected burglars/rapists/robbers/stalkers could get to the tree) and slide down.  I was looking around a bit for more options and I noticed a guy in the parking lot walking towards my door (my apartment is next to the entrance).

AND, not to mention, this guy is the ONE neighbor I ever talked to here and he’s saved my ass once before already (not as dire last time — couldn’t get the door open because the lock on the door was broken (yay).

Okay, so here I am. In the tree. In my jammies.  Hollering out this kid’s name.

He sees me. HALLELUJAH.  ”So… this might look a little weird, but my sliding door locked and I’m stuck out here. Can you call the property management?”

SURE!

Yes.  Most random, awesome thing ever.

This kid is my hero.  I’m seriously bringing him cookies later. He tossed me water over the wall and everything.

So I sat and waited about a half hour for the maintenance guy to let me in my apartment (ridiculous) — and yes, the kid I knew could have let me in himself had my door to the apartment not been locked.

Anyway, that was pretty intense. It is ridiculously hot out (heat index of 106°) and if I hadn’t caught my neighbor, I’d probably still be sitting out there or have 2 broken legs from climbing over a wall and jumping down.

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Yes.. yes… I bought a spot.. not the same as being featured. And they randomly rotate them out… but still, when I clicked the front page of the ceramics feature on Etsy today, I saw this:

Um yeah… top right hand corner? Yeah. that’s me.

I thought I was being featured…then hit refresh… and realized that everybody gets a fair chance since we paid for a spot.

OH well! 

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FYI I started writing this yesterday afternoon (4/6/09).

So to keep myself busy for 12 minutes on this bike I’m bloggig from my iPod.

Read: yay! A short entry!

So now that i’m well on my way to recovery, I finally made myself go out and buy swimming gear and go for a dip.

Got a pink (what else?) swim cap and goggles and a plain black one piece. I was ready to go.

Problem: how do I put on a swim cap?
Solution: ask a random girl with wet hair in the locker room — she’s a swimmer.

Apparently putting on a swim cap is harder than it looks. She showed me and 15 minutes later I was ready to figure out my goggles.

So 20 minutes later I made it in the pool. And, sadly, I had iPod withdrawl.

And lo and behold, swimming isn’t as easy as I remember. My stroke: breast stroke. Can’t do it. No frog kicking allowed during my rehab. Ok well um what else can I kinda do? Side stroke… Check. Freestyle… Check. Dog paddle? Mega check.

I alternated those few “strokes” for a half hour and went to the deep end to water jog and tread water for a while.

Then I went into the locker room to shower off — the guys’ locker room! Oh boy. Sadly I didn’t realize it right away. Only after I discovered my clothes weren’t where I left them did I realize there were men walking around.

Sooo I bolted. Into the right locker room his time. Shoot. Forgot my towel. Ran back out to get that and reminded the lifeguards that I’m not a swimmer… just a poor injured runner that has no business in the pool.

I snagged my towel, went into the LADIES locker room, showered off and started changing. The naked older lady next to me started talking to me (or maybe I started talking to her? I don’t know). We had a convo while we changed (and yes, I got naked in the locker room).  THEN I realized my underwear were missing. Which wouldn’t be a big deal except I JUST CAME FROM WORK!  

Frantically, I dumped my bag fearing that my underwear were somewhere on the 3rd floor of Old Main … or even worse … on the 2nd floor (that’s where the president’s office is!).  

FOUND ‘em!  That was kinda scary.

Anyway, after a very interesting experience… I went off and started biking. Wet hair and all.

Swimming=fun, but awkward … my body=tired.  This morning I felt like I ran 10 miles…except without the “my appendages are going to break off at any moment” feeling.

yay.  Hoping to swim tomorrow. I dunno tho.  I stayed home from work today because I felt reallly…. off.  I guess. I felt like crap when I woke up and continued to feel like crap all day. So here I am. in sweatpants. 6 PM and no shower today. I rule.

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