Praise then darkness, and creation unfinished

I have found a cat sitter for the weekend the three of us will be away.

First I talked to people I knew, but nobody local either has a cat-sitter, or does that work themselves. Looking for someone bonded/insured got me to the American Kennel Club's website; their search engine found exactly one listing for my zip code. I contacted that person yesterday, and have now made arrangements.

She told me to reach out 10-14 days before we're leaving to arrange for someone to come meet the cats and a get a key to the apartment. I have put a reminder in my calendar. (That timing is because the company has several pet-sitters, and she doesn't know yet which one she'll be sending to our apartment.)

In an optimistic moment, I went to my hairdresser's website and booked an appointment for April 16th. A couple of hours after I did that, they sent an email to all current customers, saying they will be closed from March 16th-31st.

I was expecting something like that, and even if they were still open was expecting to cancel my March 26th appointment. I will get a bit shaggy by mid-April. If it's still not reasonable to go get a haircut a month from now, I will consider the DIY possibilities, given that we have a buzz-cutter but no other haircut tools.

Today has been quite productive, which doesn't fit with my original intentions of making this a rest day. My joints and muscles are rested, yes, but I started the day by renewing the purple dye in my hair. It had gotten pretty pale, and I had a feeling that if I didn't do it today, I wouldn't get to it until several days after the move.

I then did a few hours worth of copyediting/proofreading, spread out over twice as much time. (Since I'm not charging by the hour for this job, I haven't bothered to track the time, because it's one less thing to deal with right now.)

Meanwhile, cattitude spent more time working on the diagrams of our new apartment, enabling us to get out the little furniture models* from last time and starting deciding what goes where. The current solution is labeled "tentative," but it's workable, and is most of what we'll need to be able to tell the movers Tuesday: we have designated one bedroom as our bedroom and the other as a study, figured out where the bed and dressers go, and decided where we probably want our desks. (There turns out to be one reasonable answer to the bedroom question, given a queen-size bed, our two dressers, and two bedside tables.)

At that point I was running low on executive function, so we decided that the rest can wait until tomorrow or Friday. We need to figure out where the couch goes, and approximately where we want the dining table and my recliner. The table and recliner are less urgent than the couch because we can rearrange them ourselves; the couch and desks are too heavy and/or awkward for us to move.

Last night I emailed a cleaning company that gingicat recommended; they wrote back today, saying they have availability, and asked some questions so they can give me a price estimate.

Maybe I can make Saturday a rest day.

*"Models" sounds impressive and 3D. We have rectangles, circles, and a couple of odd shapes cut out of graph paper, with labels like "V chair" and "red rug."

Question for other people who are going to Scintillation: how long are you planning to be in Montreal?

I'm thinking of arriving Thursday afternoon or evening, just so I don't fret about missing things on Friday (even though the many of the things are trips to places I've already seen), and staying over until either Monday morning or Tuesday morning.

Being there longer has the advantage of more social time, if other people also arrive early and/or stay late. The disadvantages are that it will probably cost more (although Airfares Are Weird) and might wear me out.

(I have addressed this to people who will be there, in terms of possibly coordinating schedules, but other relevant thoughts are also welcome.)

ETA: This having been asked in the comments, Scintillation will be a small science fiction convention in Montreal, in October. (For reasons to do with hotel space, Kickstarter, and the person who is organizing, there are no more memberships available.) I sometimes lose track of who has what context.

Cattitude and I need to decide soon whether we're going to Boskone. At this point we have memberships, a hotel reservation starting the Tuesday night before the convention, and tickets from Seattle to Boston on that Tuesday. (This was done with the idea of combining a con with some apartment-hunting or at least research, which is now moot since we have a signed lease.)

If we decide to go, we need to buy return tickets and confirm with the cat-sitter. If not, we cancel the hotel reservation, tell the cat-sitter we won't need her, and probably throw away the BOS-SEA tickets. But that's a sunk cost, it would just be polite to let Jet Blue know if we won't be flying that day.

In favor: the con would be fun; Cattitude (and secondarily I) could do some exploring in Boston, a city I know better than he does but neither of us knows well; and I'd get some time with Adrian.

Against: Staying home would be significantly cheaper, and it would be a week in a hotel instead of our own apartment. We would be without cats and kitchen, and if I have freelance work I'd be doing it without my nice big monitor and keyboard, just the laptop and mouse.

Anyone reading this who is planning to be at Boskone, please speak up. Ditto any fannish Boston-area friends who are sure you won't be, please. Also anyone else who has thoughts or suggestions on this.

I offered to be a moderator on up to two panels that needed moderators. I'm not sure if I forgot to say "but not consecutive" or if that got lost. So, should I accept "Outside the Hero's Journey," "We're All Mad Here: Madness in Fiction," or both? (In either case, I'd be moderating one person I know and like, one I know of but don't know personally, and two I know nothing about, so that's not a basis for deciding.)

I'm mostly thinking aloud, but suggestions are welcome.

That's the end of May. In a couple of weeks, I, cattitude, and adrian_turtle are invited to a seder at my aunt's house. It's tempting, but the timing is a little tight: I'm going to Montreal April 15-18, and the seder is the afternoon of Tuesday the 19th. (Adrian would come down the 19th, stay over with us Tuesday night, and go home Wednesday morning.) It would be a bit tight, but not ridiculously so: I have tickets that should get me home from Montreal before dinnertime on the 18th.

Again, the issue isn't "do I want to do this?" but "these things are closer together than would be ideal for me."

ETA: I have spoken to my aunt, confirmed the timing, and told her I will let her know by Thursday whether we'll be there.

I got another progress report in the mail today, and among other things it reminded me that there are some nice restaurants near the hotel, but that it would probably be useful if not necessary to reserve ahead of time. I don't mind eating alone, but I don't feel like going someplace fancy and new to me alone, especially when I'm likely to have more friends I want to see than time to see them in. If someone would be interested in planning ahead for a bit of a splurge, let me know. Thursday or Saturday look good; Friday might work, because my panel isn't until 9 p.m.

That said, I'm also more generally interested in touching base ahead of time.

I don't remember if I've already posted this, but I am flying in Thursday night (if all goes well, I may be in time for the ROOO reception/reading [modulo crowd issues there] and should definitely be in time to meet people for dinner either at the bookstore or somewhere else handy, at a reasonable hour for dinner. I'll be in Madison through Monday lunchtime. My only specific commitment is that one panel at 9:00 Friday evening.

I'm traveling alone this time, which may mean added flexibillity, but also means I'm more likely to be looking for meal companions, since I can't just say "sushi?" or "I'm wiped, can we just go off by ourselves?" to my partner. Not that Noodles and Company won't serve someone by herself, but that's a different shape of thing than going off with one person I'm close to, and is more likely to lead to me spotting a friend and asking if they want company.