2024 - Week 7

I've felt quite out of sorts this week. My home is upside down and I'm hating it.

Arts & Crafts

I planned to move my stream to Sunday, but after a busy week, I was too tired and spent much of Sunday napping.

On Thursday, I went to the first meeting of a queer needle crafts group. I'm pretty close on my PWHL Scarf, but I'm losing steam. There's an event I want it ready for coming up two Mondays from now, so I really need to rally and finish it.

Decluttering & Minimalism

I was so distracted this week. I've made a bunch of plans to reorganize some things and I really just wanted to get going on them all, so that I could be done with this decluttering effort. Yes, I know that I'm limited with budget, time, and such, but I just want to be done with it all so badly. I pulled a glute somewhere along the way though, so that has been problematic. It was my left butt cheek in case you really want to know ;)

I have a lot of plans, but I couldn't get to any of them this week as work was heavy and I had a lot going on outside of that. We had a repeat pest control visit complete with emptying all the cupboards again, so that's why my condo is extra messed up right now and I'm so tired of it. It's so bad, I couldn't be streaming this week

Finances

So, my bathroom loan repayment is ongoing. This is mostly due to stupidity on the part of the loaner. Let me explain.

When I got Bathfitter to do the part of the bathroom that was too much for me given the complexity of the plumbing and wanting to be sure it would be covered by home insurance in case of issues, they signed me up for a loan with Snap Financial. I was told once the loan was due, the full amount would go to my line of credit that I supplied.

Well, the loan came due and nothing happened for several months. Then a $56 monthly payment began. Then it changed amounts to around $37 and recently $41. I wasn't able to find anything out until they decided they would not be taking credit card payments going forward. I finally got the loan number in the mail. They began emailing people telling us we had to sign up for pre-authorized payments via a link in email.

Which goes against every financial security recommendation ever, so I guess not a lot of people signed up, myself included. Last week, they sent an email saying they extended the dealine for this to late March. On Thursday, I recieved an email stating that a new company would be taking over my loan and they would be reaching out at some point to set up repayment.

All of this has taught me to never use a company to do work for you that doesn't use a proper financing option. But also, I'm glad I didn't jump to do anything about it because it's not even being reported on my credit score currently. It's almost like it doesn't really exist, which seems odd. Anyway, we'll see how this goes in the coming months, I suppose. My plan is to get it moved to my line of credit, which is where it should have always ended up in the first place. I don't see the point in rushing on it given how disorganized they seem to be. I'd like to be sure that when it is done, it's really done.

They should have mailed us all the full details of our loans with the number and all the terms and conditions as soon as it was coming due. That's what real financial companies do. Actually, you usually get that as soon as you sign up for a loan.

Fitness & Budo

I felt quite broken this week. My arm was bothering me some from when I tripped up the stairs at TD Place. Also, the whole hurt-my-butt thing. On that, it felt a bit better by the late evening on Tuesday, but given that I wouldn't be able to walk about on the ice to learn anything, I opted to stay home. I was going to go watch people play, but it had grown quite cold compared to the weather we had been having recently. I had a number of library rentals to watch anyway.

On Pancake Tuesday, I attempted broccoli and cheese pancakes fried in roasted garlic olive oil. They were almost good. I guess I had the heat too high, so some didn't cook in the middle. I decided that next time the broccoli would be a side dish. What I did have was tasty. I think it would be a healthier pancake than the traditional sweet ones. Especially with the spinach my neighbour suggested. Too bad I had run into her as I was leaving the grocery store.

Gaming & Streaming

I cancelled my gaming stream on Monday as I had some things left to prep for the pest control thing.

Something terrible happened in Stardew Valley. Kent sent me a bomb in the mail and I accidentally blew up both of my furnaces, my charcoal stove, and two lightning rods. I'm not happy. Who the f**k mails a bomb?! I don't think I'm going to rush to be friends with Kent. My cow and my chicken are far more important to be friends with given the community centre bundles.

PWHL

Ottawa played Minnesota twice this week. The first was in Minnesota on Valentine's Day. Unfortunately, though Ottawa was the first to score, they didn't win even with Heise out of the game due to an injury. Minnesota had a pharmaceutical student, Abbey Boreen, in her place who delivered one of the two goals that led to Minnesota winning the game.

Saturday's game in Ottawa against Minnesota, I watched on YouTube as I was doublebooked that day. It was another loss to Minnesota. I think they need to put different lines up against them or something. They've gotten good at watching some key players like Zumwinkle, but then they aren't watching others.

Writing

On my recent trip to the library, I found some interesting documentaries on DVD. Several were on topics relevant to the current novel I'm working on, so I took them out and I watched two of the five this week. I made lots of notes and there are things I want to dig deeper into. Doing this research in the mornings before work has felt really good. Perhaps I'll make it a more regular habit. I tend to write short and need to length my novels, so research breaks help me figure out my next scenes.