I had such a lovely day yesterday once the residual migraine had cleared. That is, until I went down to Heretic where I was greeted with very sad news. It seems that August 15th, 2002 will mark the store's final day. That's right, the store will be closing. The climate (both weather and financial) has been very bad for business, and the last few months particularly so. Rather than making small gains and holding its own, the store has been slipping behind. Both Nicole and Sandra are burnt out, though Nicole, I think, moreso. Super sad. There is talk that Heretic will remain open as an internet boutique, but I'm not sure.

If I can't get another job before August, I'm taking the store's closing to be the basis for a long and much needed holiday. I'd very much like to go to the cottage for a full three weeks, as in the past, however; if I end up with a new job, I will probably have to be more pragmatic and bargain for a week, unpaid, or something.

On a different, but still work-related, note, I'll be helping Nicole work her booth at Toronto Trek 16 on the weekend of July 6th. This was supposed to be the weekend we (being Tanya, Carrie, Carrie's sister, and myself) were going to be girly down at Tanya's, but, frankly, I'm not going to pass up the opportunity to go to T-Trek - especially for free. Also, Nicole and I will be going to the Sci-Fi Expo at the end of August where I will hawk some art and she her clothes (and costumes !). I'm going to put in to the space we get, based on what I'll be selling and what I hope to earn. I would like to have some cards, prints and miniatures for sale. I've never done anything like this before, though. Hopefully, I will have the time at my cottage, so that I can get more art done.

Anyway, tonight I'm going to Red Rose with Rick for delicious Indian food and then he's spending the night. Yay ! Now I'm going home.

So, yes, it was a migraine. Big freakin' surprise. I left work at one o'clock in the afternoon. I just packed up my things and told Debbie that I had to go because of my head. She understands, she gets them too. I came home and lay down. I slept intermitantly from 1:30pm to 8pm. I missed going to Derek's for mod work, but he understands, too. I had the typical wacky dreams I have when I'm suffering, including one about Stacey at work, probably because she was the last person that I clearly laid eyes on. When I woke up, I wasn't well enough to clean my room or deal with the remaining boxes of shite, so, I thumbed through a book on the painter, Turner, which I bought for a ridiculously low price at City Books yesterday (also one on Art Deco, a book for Rick, and a Mercedes Lackey novel for me). I read about his early life and then got up to have some cereal. Nick's milk isn't exactly fresh, but it's not exactly sour yet, so I figured I wouldn't die from it. I didn't. It was that or chicken broth. I have no food. Following that, I listened to the radio and played with Willi, and then I turned on Natasha to play Dungeon Siege. I also called Rick to let him know I was okay.

Tanya took my challenge to heart and really only succeeded in proving that grad students have too much time on their hands by listing the whole Hi-Ho commercial in story order and with translations for various words. Okay, Tanya, you're nuts. But not as nuts as these guys. And, if you just need to see it again, without the figleaves, here you go.

Nick is away in Philadelphia, and I'm not sure when he comes home, but this weekend, I think. The house is bizarrely quiet. Well, usually it's bizarrely soundly. He left me his drawing palette to play with, but I haven't had the gumption (and tonight I couldn't drag about on the floor on my hands and knees thanks to my head) to hook it up. Maybe if I don't end up going to the movie with Ryan tomorrow, I'll do it after the ROM. I really want to play with it. It's exciting. It's also very pretty in warm grey and red. Uhg. I should go back to bed, I feel like I've been licking fuzzy caterpillars, partially because I'm woozy and they're toxic, and partially because my mouth feels like it's full of fluff. Bad tasting fluff. If I feel this way in the morning, I'm going to phone my boss. Hopefully I won't have to. I really need the money.

Today I have a headache. I have a bad feeling about it, as though it will evolve into a migraine. It's in my right temple and my eyes are getting sensitive. Damn. Oh well, on a positive note, I might get to leave work early. *frown* Oh, this is funny: I got a letter from HR today announcing that I was no longer on probation and would therefore be getting a 38 cent raise. Hello? Off probation? I worked my 420 hours or six months (whichever comes first) AGES ago. I might have to look into this, but in the mean time, 38 more cents an hour will add up over the course of a day. I might be able to afford a medium icecream with sprinkles instead of a small.

I went home to the Petes because Mom was running a garage sale, for which Suzanne had specifically flown up from New York. Suzanne is a garage sale maven. Anyway, it was very nice to see Suzanne, whom I had not seen since my trip to NY with Megan in May 1998. It's hard to believe that we went over four years ago. Surely time doesn't elapse so quickly, does it? Anyway, the garage sale went very well, the object of it not one of money, but one of getting rid of all the crap. At the end, there was very little left to throw away, so, that goal was met and the money made was pretty good too. It was amazing, though. The garage sale was scheduled to begin at 9am ("No earlybirds" it said in the ad), but we'd sold about half of the items by 9:30am because people turned up at a quarter past eight in the morning while we were still setting up. People are insane.

We watched a wonderful film called Smoke Signals. It's hard to express how it made me feel. It was tragic, but very funny, and the story resolves beautifully. I liked it very much and am happy that Suzanne recommended it.

Yesterday, I had to leave the Petes before 10am in order to get Willi back to the appartment and then me to Heretic. It was a quick and painless drive except for Willi who insisted on vocalising her discomfort for almost the entire trip. Work was pretty slow, and though Derek's friend, Badur dropped in and was his charming self, and some woman came in and told me about an interesting sounding event at Fort York in January (Queen Charlotte's Birthday Ball), overall, nothing much happened. I did a very queer drawing of a clown, perhaps he'll be the clown in the mod Derek and I are doing. He's in a thong. And you thought regular clowns were scary.

Oh man, does my head ever ache. My break is over and I think I'll get back to work. I hope to manage to last until 2pm, but frankly, it's not looking good.