Sorry I haven't updated in almost a week. The truth is, there hasn't been much to say. Everything has been going really well; I've been spending time with friends that I didn't see much all summer and I managed to finish that writing project I was working on which makes me really happy and over the weekend my dad was in town helping Shane move back into the dorms so I got to spend some time with my family (minus Mom) on Sunday night. I also met a couple of interesting guys at my apartment complex pool this weekend, guys that offered to give me beer and take me skydiving. I said yes to the beer, no to the skydiving. [And lest you think this is actually a turn of events to get excited about, it's really not. They were both nice guys, but that's the extent of it for now and probably forever].
So yeah, it has been a good start to the semester, I'm just already so busy. I spent the entire weekend (Thursday night through Sunday morning) either at the restaurant working or at the theater helping out with Rocky Horror auditions. Auditions went well, incidentally, and I think the cast is awesome. Concepts are starting to come together and I'm actually starting to have real work to do. I spent tonight at the first read-thru doing my dramaturg thing. Apparently I can't half-ass this project any longer. Within the next few weeks I'm going to start having weekly meetings with my advisor and so I really need to get on the ball and actually get some real work done on this thesis of mine.
I've also been busy getting stuff organized in the box office and getting the reading material together for my Backgrounds of Modern Theatre class and reading the play that I'm helping Mandi with this semester (so far we're just calling me her assitant, although eventually I'll make myself something official like stage manager or dramaturg, we haven't decided what my actual job should be yet) and trying in vain to get the brakes on my car fixed and buying school supplies and nailing down a semi-set work schedule at the restaurant and suddenly in the past week I went from having an average of two things on my mind to having an average of ten things on my mind and I'm not quite in school mode yet. So the blog has been neglected. I'll try not to be so neglectful in the immediate future, but I make no promises. Plus it's hard to type when there's a basset hound resting his big ol' barrel chest on top of me. I'm just sayin'.
The upside to being this busy is that I no longer have time to freak myself out thinking about relationships or lack thereof and about my career future in general. Of course, I guess this will also be the downside when it's February and I'm still totally single and realizing "Oh fuck, I totally missed every single deadline to even be considered for a doctoral program, and I also haven't even started looking for jobs!"
But I'll deal with February in February I guess. Right now I really am just gonna deal with one day at a time.
Monday, August 28, 2006
Wednesday, August 23, 2006
Back to School
So, today was the first day of school. Believe it or not, today was my 19th first day of class. That's pretty ridiculous. Several people came up to me today and joyously proclaimed, "This is your last year! It's your last first day of school as a student ever!! Aren't you excited?" And I don't know how to feel about that, mostly because I'm hoping it's actually NOT my last first day of school ever. I really do want that doctorate one of these days, even though I constantly doubt that it's actually going to happen and in the moments when I believe I might actually be lucky enough to get into a doctoral program next year I question whether I really want to spend three to five more years in school anyway.
Of course, because I've been in school for 18 years straight now I also don't know what the hell else I even want to do at this point. I'm comfortable with academia. I enjoy the lifestyle and I know I'm good at it, so why do anything else unless I have to? Then again, I suppose there's something to be said for a total change of pace. I just don't know at this point. But that's what the next few months are for, hopefully developing some sort of plan for What Comes Next.
Anyway, I spent most of today thinking about how the first day of school as a second-year student is so much better than the first day of school as a first year. It's wonderful to walk into the lobby and hear someone happily shout, "Ashley!" as someone else holds her arms out for a hug with an admonishing, "Where the hell have you been?!" (Um, right here, actually.) It's great to be able to comment on the professor's new haircut and talk to Amanda about her move and get excited about the gift Kelly brought me from Thailand and know that I belong to the group instead of wondering if I'll ever fit in. Mostly it's just nice to know that I'm smart enough, because last year I spent the first couple weeks having mild panic attacks in every class as I realized that everybody already knew SO MUCH MORE than I did. (Turns out everybody else was having the exact same panic attack, of course.) Of course, the downside to all this first-day-of-class fun is realizing that all this fun happy togetherness is only going to last until May and then I have to start all over AGAIN. And I know enough about myself now to know that no matter what it takes me a good six months to a year to really get comfortable somewhere, so I'm already sort of dreading leaving.
But in the meantime I have about eight and a half months of work to do here, and I'm already jumping right into it. It actually feels good to be busy and have lots of things to accomplish again, although I'm already worrying a lot about how I'm going to make waitressing and school mesh. I've decided I'm going to try two or three weeks just letting my boss schedule me as he wants (around my classes and any meetings/events I knew about far enough in advance to request off). Then if I find that too overwhelming I'll request a set schedule, because I definitely think I can handle it all and manage my time fine if I have a set schedule. And if he won't give me a set schedule then I'll quit, extra cash be damned. Yes.
Anyway, I got a lot done today. I e-mailed my director for Rocky and my supervisor for my box office job to set up meetings I want to have, I started getting everything organized and set up in the box office and plan to finish that job tomorrow, and I went to my Wednesday "class". I say "class" because it's really not much of a class. Apparently the university decided this year that all graduate assistants have to take this mandatory course as part of our job. At least we don't pay to take it, or get graded. We just have to show up or we don't get paychecks, apparently. Dr. C is teaching our department's section of it, and she describes it as a "pedagogy class", which basically means it's going to be another pointless education class, because apparently I haven't already had enough of those in my life. (I'm a certified teacher. Believe me, I've almost stabbed myself in the eye with my pen out of sheer frustration in far too many education classes already.) So yeah. We'll meet every Wednesday until the middle of October and talk about how to teach college students and then after that we each have to give a lecture in someone's class. Considering I manage the box office and my TA position doesn't actually involve teaching or grading, this whole class is a complete waste of my time. The only reason I'm remotely okay with it is because I do actually plan to teach college someday, and I suppose the fact that I'll have taken an entire class on Teaching College Students will make my resume slightly more appealing. I guess. However, in yet another instance of my presumed intelligence and responsible personality screwing me over instead of working in my favor, Dr. C has requested that I give my lecture in her Dramatic Theory class. Pretty much everyone else gets to lecture in the Intro to Fine Arts classes they actually TA, and the other two girls that aren't actual TAs (one is the assistant in the costume shop and the other does publicity) will be lecturing in an Intro class as well. But while everyone else gets to do a lesson on like, the definition of musical theatre to a bunch of freshmen who probably won't pay attention or give a shit no matter what they do, I'll probably end up lecturing on like, Hegel's dialectic to 40 people who are in their third or fourth year of studying theatre and will actually know if I'm making stuff up as I go along. Great. (Okay, I'll admit it...I'm bitching about it, but deep down I'm pleased that Dr. C trusts me enough to actually want to hand over her class to me for a day. Plus I really honestly do think I want to make a living getting people excited about dramatic theory, so this will be good practice for me)
Speaking of attempts to make my resume more appealing, today I submitted the paper I wrote in England to be considered for a conference. I really want to get a paper accepted for a conference or journal this year. I need it to happen if I want even a remote shot at this doctorate stuff. I got close a few months ago. My paper on product placement was chosen as the alternate for the graduate panel at the ATHE conference. Had either of the chosen presenters not been able to go to Chicago, I would have gone in their place. Unfortunately they were fine and healthy and happy to go to Chicago in August, so I didn't get to go. Still, being chosen as the alternate is somewhat validating. However, the same paper got rejected from another conference last year, and the paper I submitted for consideration at the Texas Educational Theatre Association conference wasn't accepted, either. But here's the thing: I submitted that product placement paper to be considered for the graduate panel of two pretty major conferences. So I didn't feel too bad about a rejection and an alternate position. As for the TETA paper, I sent them what I consider one of my second-rate papers. My best paper was still in consideration for the other conference at the time, and it's bad form to send the same paper for consideration to two different places at the same time ('cause if it happens to get accepted by both places you're totally screwed). In retrospect I should have sent the product placement paper to TETA, where I think I would have had a much better shot. But whatever.
The point is, this current paper that I sent off today is my best paper to date, I think. It's the one I like best, anyway. I don't know how much of a shot I have at it getting accepted at this conference, though. For one thing, there's not a specific panel for grad students, so my abstract is up against the abstracts of people like Dr. C, known Shakespeare scholars who actually know what the hell they're doing. That doesn't give me a lot of hope. The only thing that might be working in my favor is that the conference is in Ohio in November and I don't think many people want to be in Ohio at that time of year (or possibly ever...actually, I shouldn't bash Ohio, I know absolutely nothing about Ohio) so maybe the conference won't get a lot of submissions in the first place. I don't know. The timing of the conference really is terrible for me, since it takes place during the run of Rocky and not only am I managing the box office for that show, I'm dramaturging it (in case you somehow didn't already know that from reading this blog) and I'd also have to miss my second night class of the semester if I went and missing two night classes is not a good idea since that's a pretty large percentage of the class. So part of me is hoping that I don't get it. And if I don't get it, I think I'll send this paper off to TETA this year. So all hope won't be lost.
Wow, I am rambling on and on and on. I'm gonna shut the hell up and watch Project Runway.
Of course, because I've been in school for 18 years straight now I also don't know what the hell else I even want to do at this point. I'm comfortable with academia. I enjoy the lifestyle and I know I'm good at it, so why do anything else unless I have to? Then again, I suppose there's something to be said for a total change of pace. I just don't know at this point. But that's what the next few months are for, hopefully developing some sort of plan for What Comes Next.
Anyway, I spent most of today thinking about how the first day of school as a second-year student is so much better than the first day of school as a first year. It's wonderful to walk into the lobby and hear someone happily shout, "Ashley!" as someone else holds her arms out for a hug with an admonishing, "Where the hell have you been?!" (Um, right here, actually.) It's great to be able to comment on the professor's new haircut and talk to Amanda about her move and get excited about the gift Kelly brought me from Thailand and know that I belong to the group instead of wondering if I'll ever fit in. Mostly it's just nice to know that I'm smart enough, because last year I spent the first couple weeks having mild panic attacks in every class as I realized that everybody already knew SO MUCH MORE than I did. (Turns out everybody else was having the exact same panic attack, of course.) Of course, the downside to all this first-day-of-class fun is realizing that all this fun happy togetherness is only going to last until May and then I have to start all over AGAIN. And I know enough about myself now to know that no matter what it takes me a good six months to a year to really get comfortable somewhere, so I'm already sort of dreading leaving.
But in the meantime I have about eight and a half months of work to do here, and I'm already jumping right into it. It actually feels good to be busy and have lots of things to accomplish again, although I'm already worrying a lot about how I'm going to make waitressing and school mesh. I've decided I'm going to try two or three weeks just letting my boss schedule me as he wants (around my classes and any meetings/events I knew about far enough in advance to request off). Then if I find that too overwhelming I'll request a set schedule, because I definitely think I can handle it all and manage my time fine if I have a set schedule. And if he won't give me a set schedule then I'll quit, extra cash be damned. Yes.
Anyway, I got a lot done today. I e-mailed my director for Rocky and my supervisor for my box office job to set up meetings I want to have, I started getting everything organized and set up in the box office and plan to finish that job tomorrow, and I went to my Wednesday "class". I say "class" because it's really not much of a class. Apparently the university decided this year that all graduate assistants have to take this mandatory course as part of our job. At least we don't pay to take it, or get graded. We just have to show up or we don't get paychecks, apparently. Dr. C is teaching our department's section of it, and she describes it as a "pedagogy class", which basically means it's going to be another pointless education class, because apparently I haven't already had enough of those in my life. (I'm a certified teacher. Believe me, I've almost stabbed myself in the eye with my pen out of sheer frustration in far too many education classes already.) So yeah. We'll meet every Wednesday until the middle of October and talk about how to teach college students and then after that we each have to give a lecture in someone's class. Considering I manage the box office and my TA position doesn't actually involve teaching or grading, this whole class is a complete waste of my time. The only reason I'm remotely okay with it is because I do actually plan to teach college someday, and I suppose the fact that I'll have taken an entire class on Teaching College Students will make my resume slightly more appealing. I guess. However, in yet another instance of my presumed intelligence and responsible personality screwing me over instead of working in my favor, Dr. C has requested that I give my lecture in her Dramatic Theory class. Pretty much everyone else gets to lecture in the Intro to Fine Arts classes they actually TA, and the other two girls that aren't actual TAs (one is the assistant in the costume shop and the other does publicity) will be lecturing in an Intro class as well. But while everyone else gets to do a lesson on like, the definition of musical theatre to a bunch of freshmen who probably won't pay attention or give a shit no matter what they do, I'll probably end up lecturing on like, Hegel's dialectic to 40 people who are in their third or fourth year of studying theatre and will actually know if I'm making stuff up as I go along. Great. (Okay, I'll admit it...I'm bitching about it, but deep down I'm pleased that Dr. C trusts me enough to actually want to hand over her class to me for a day. Plus I really honestly do think I want to make a living getting people excited about dramatic theory, so this will be good practice for me)
Speaking of attempts to make my resume more appealing, today I submitted the paper I wrote in England to be considered for a conference. I really want to get a paper accepted for a conference or journal this year. I need it to happen if I want even a remote shot at this doctorate stuff. I got close a few months ago. My paper on product placement was chosen as the alternate for the graduate panel at the ATHE conference. Had either of the chosen presenters not been able to go to Chicago, I would have gone in their place. Unfortunately they were fine and healthy and happy to go to Chicago in August, so I didn't get to go. Still, being chosen as the alternate is somewhat validating. However, the same paper got rejected from another conference last year, and the paper I submitted for consideration at the Texas Educational Theatre Association conference wasn't accepted, either. But here's the thing: I submitted that product placement paper to be considered for the graduate panel of two pretty major conferences. So I didn't feel too bad about a rejection and an alternate position. As for the TETA paper, I sent them what I consider one of my second-rate papers. My best paper was still in consideration for the other conference at the time, and it's bad form to send the same paper for consideration to two different places at the same time ('cause if it happens to get accepted by both places you're totally screwed). In retrospect I should have sent the product placement paper to TETA, where I think I would have had a much better shot. But whatever.
The point is, this current paper that I sent off today is my best paper to date, I think. It's the one I like best, anyway. I don't know how much of a shot I have at it getting accepted at this conference, though. For one thing, there's not a specific panel for grad students, so my abstract is up against the abstracts of people like Dr. C, known Shakespeare scholars who actually know what the hell they're doing. That doesn't give me a lot of hope. The only thing that might be working in my favor is that the conference is in Ohio in November and I don't think many people want to be in Ohio at that time of year (or possibly ever...actually, I shouldn't bash Ohio, I know absolutely nothing about Ohio) so maybe the conference won't get a lot of submissions in the first place. I don't know. The timing of the conference really is terrible for me, since it takes place during the run of Rocky and not only am I managing the box office for that show, I'm dramaturging it (in case you somehow didn't already know that from reading this blog) and I'd also have to miss my second night class of the semester if I went and missing two night classes is not a good idea since that's a pretty large percentage of the class. So part of me is hoping that I don't get it. And if I don't get it, I think I'll send this paper off to TETA this year. So all hope won't be lost.
Wow, I am rambling on and on and on. I'm gonna shut the hell up and watch Project Runway.
Monday, August 21, 2006
You Love When I Talk About the Mundane
I went to the grocery store the other day since I had a refrigerator full of condiments and a couple of bottles of beer and not much else. Anyway, my cart was piled sky-high (since I'd been out of pretty much everything) and it wasn't until I got home that I realized I'd bought five different types of cheese. That's kind of ridiculous.
I sort of did it on purpose. I bought one of those variety packs of lunch meat so then I bought two types of cheese just to shake things up a bit since nobody wants ham and cheddar to be the only sandwich option (and, um, by "nobody", I mean me). Then I ended up buying two different types of cheese in blocks instead of slices so that I can eat it on crackers. I tend to go through food phases and I'm in a big cracker phase right now. I keep making entire meals out of crackers, hummus and cheese, which maybe isn't the healthiest thing in the world to do since I think I'm consuming way more cheese than a person should in one sitting every time I do this. So I already had provolone, muenster, baby swiss and garlic-cheddar cheese when I remembered that I also needed a block of fontina to make these Italian-style tuna melts I'd read about in a magazine.
I suppose at the time all the cheese purchases were prompted by logic, but now every time I open my fridge I look at all that cheese and wonder what the hell I was thinking. Incidentally, the Italian-style tuna melts came out awesome. I had to use the broiler. Somehow prior to this I'd managed to live almost 24 years without ever broiling anything, but I was so freakin' pleased with the melted cheesy goodness that now I'm wondering what other awesome things I can broil.
Hey, want to hear more about my neighbors? I know you do! The guy who the cops were looking for is apparently still living across the hall, and apparently he's still having legal troubles as people keep coming by to try to deliver registered mail. But since he still seems to live there only two or three days out of the week they're not having much luck tracking him down. And I'm thinking of posting a note on my door that says "I Am Not My Neighbor's Keeper" because I'm getting tired of people knocking on my door and asking if I know him or have seen him lately. Ambiguous Sexual Preference Guy also still apparently lives next door, although I haven't actually seen him for a couple of weeks now. The only reason I'm relatively sure he still lives next door is the fact that he has three pairs of sneakers lying outside his front door and I can't figure out why you'd move and take everything with you but leave three pairs of Nikes behind. In-n-Out burger guy has moved out of one of the upstairs apartments and been replaced by a young guy who, unlike Ambiguous Sexual Preference Guy, is almost definitely gay. My favorite neighbors, the ones that live sort of caddy-corner above me (does that make sense?) moved out, too, but they just moved into the building next door. The apartment actually belonged to a red-headed guy named Jake, but his girlfriend basically lived with him and now they've moved into a bigger apartment. I like them. I like them because they have a bull terrier puppy who Cohen loves and also because the girlfriend has the same scholarship I do so she's usually the only person I know at stupid scholarship functions (like the one I have to go to tomorrow afternoon; ugh). Anyway, I'm glad they're still here in the complex at least. And apparently that apartment is only leased to red-headed guys because another young red-headed guy moved in over the weekend. What are the odds? Finally, the girl who lives above me moved out, too, and has been replaced by a really nice girl who also happens to be from El Paso! It was funny how we figured that out. The other day I ran into her in the laundry room and we were making neighborly small talk about the weather and how miserable and hot and dry it has been, and I said, "I wish it would rain. I just want it to rain for days," and she said, "Me too," and at the exact same moment we both opened our mouths and said, "I'm from El Paso-" and the continuation of that sentence would have been "and it's flooding there right now," but we didn't get to that point because we laughed too hard and then got off on the, "Really?! What high school did you go to/what do you miss most?" tangent.
Seriously, though, El Paso and southern New Mexico, what the hell? Send that rain this way, bitches. You're obviously done with it.
There were a few other things I meant to write about today but they've all slipped my mind. Plus I need to take a shower and watch more Alton Brown, so I'm out.
I sort of did it on purpose. I bought one of those variety packs of lunch meat so then I bought two types of cheese just to shake things up a bit since nobody wants ham and cheddar to be the only sandwich option (and, um, by "nobody", I mean me). Then I ended up buying two different types of cheese in blocks instead of slices so that I can eat it on crackers. I tend to go through food phases and I'm in a big cracker phase right now. I keep making entire meals out of crackers, hummus and cheese, which maybe isn't the healthiest thing in the world to do since I think I'm consuming way more cheese than a person should in one sitting every time I do this. So I already had provolone, muenster, baby swiss and garlic-cheddar cheese when I remembered that I also needed a block of fontina to make these Italian-style tuna melts I'd read about in a magazine.
I suppose at the time all the cheese purchases were prompted by logic, but now every time I open my fridge I look at all that cheese and wonder what the hell I was thinking. Incidentally, the Italian-style tuna melts came out awesome. I had to use the broiler. Somehow prior to this I'd managed to live almost 24 years without ever broiling anything, but I was so freakin' pleased with the melted cheesy goodness that now I'm wondering what other awesome things I can broil.
Hey, want to hear more about my neighbors? I know you do! The guy who the cops were looking for is apparently still living across the hall, and apparently he's still having legal troubles as people keep coming by to try to deliver registered mail. But since he still seems to live there only two or three days out of the week they're not having much luck tracking him down. And I'm thinking of posting a note on my door that says "I Am Not My Neighbor's Keeper" because I'm getting tired of people knocking on my door and asking if I know him or have seen him lately. Ambiguous Sexual Preference Guy also still apparently lives next door, although I haven't actually seen him for a couple of weeks now. The only reason I'm relatively sure he still lives next door is the fact that he has three pairs of sneakers lying outside his front door and I can't figure out why you'd move and take everything with you but leave three pairs of Nikes behind. In-n-Out burger guy has moved out of one of the upstairs apartments and been replaced by a young guy who, unlike Ambiguous Sexual Preference Guy, is almost definitely gay. My favorite neighbors, the ones that live sort of caddy-corner above me (does that make sense?) moved out, too, but they just moved into the building next door. The apartment actually belonged to a red-headed guy named Jake, but his girlfriend basically lived with him and now they've moved into a bigger apartment. I like them. I like them because they have a bull terrier puppy who Cohen loves and also because the girlfriend has the same scholarship I do so she's usually the only person I know at stupid scholarship functions (like the one I have to go to tomorrow afternoon; ugh). Anyway, I'm glad they're still here in the complex at least. And apparently that apartment is only leased to red-headed guys because another young red-headed guy moved in over the weekend. What are the odds? Finally, the girl who lives above me moved out, too, and has been replaced by a really nice girl who also happens to be from El Paso! It was funny how we figured that out. The other day I ran into her in the laundry room and we were making neighborly small talk about the weather and how miserable and hot and dry it has been, and I said, "I wish it would rain. I just want it to rain for days," and she said, "Me too," and at the exact same moment we both opened our mouths and said, "I'm from El Paso-" and the continuation of that sentence would have been "and it's flooding there right now," but we didn't get to that point because we laughed too hard and then got off on the, "Really?! What high school did you go to/what do you miss most?" tangent.
Seriously, though, El Paso and southern New Mexico, what the hell? Send that rain this way, bitches. You're obviously done with it.
There were a few other things I meant to write about today but they've all slipped my mind. Plus I need to take a shower and watch more Alton Brown, so I'm out.
Saturday, August 19, 2006
Houston and Otherwise
- My basset hound got a package in the mail today from one of his basset friends in Chicago. Yes, he has a basset friend in Chicago. Actually, we have basset friends all over the country because I belong to an internet basset hound group. I think I've mentioned it here before and how it's one of the nerdiest things I do, but it's also fun to talk to other people who love their dogs as much as I do and I've "met" some really nice people. I've yet to actually meet any of the basset people in real life, which is weird 'cause I never thought I'd be one of those people to chat with strangers on the internet, but I do, almost every day. There's a whole basset hound subculture complete with jargon and special events. Who knew?! I suppose there's a subculture for just about everything in the world when you get right down to it. Anyway, Cohen got a package of treats in the mail. Taking that into consideration along with his twin "girlfriends" in Houston, I guess I now need to acknowledge that a) my basset hound gets more interesting mail than I do and b) my basset hound currently has a more exciting love life than I do.
- Spending four days with my family in Houston has made me realize that they currently have an unnatural obsession with The Pussycat Dolls and the movie Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle. Or at any rate, Mom, Chelsea, and Shane seem to have an unnatural obsession with these things. Dad seems to be sticking to his usual obsession with beer and sports, and all of us seem to be continuing our lifelong obsession with saying we're getting up/leaving at [given hour] but actually getting up/leaving [at least one hour later than planned].
- Speaking of Houston, I spent pretty much the entire week training to be some wealthy guy's trophy wife. I lounged by the pool, got an aromatherapy massage, enjoyed dinner at a couple of nice restaurants, drank vodka martinis, gorged myself on the complimentary cheese and cookies that were sent up to our hotel room but then worked out in the workout room the next morning like a hot trophy wife should, and spent someone else's money (Dad's in this case) on a new bag and pretty dresses. Oh, and I did go to the Cubs/Astros game, but only to eat Cracker Jacks and drink margaritas in those giant plastic yard glasses (and no, I wasn't at the game that lasted 18 freakin' innings. We girls missed that one by one day, thank the lord).
- Matthew, Chelsea and I each sampled pretty much the entire martini menu at Guava Lamp on Tuesday night. Do you know if you drink five martinis in a couple of hours you'll be comfortable giving total strangers a poll where the only question is "Spit or swallow"? Ask Chelsea, it's true. [Incidentally, this is something I actually am curious about. What is the actual breakdown on this? And is preference on this--and whether or not it is even done at all--highly determined by generation? I have a very strong preference toward swallowing and can't imagine how spitting could possibly be preferable (You actually have to hold it in your mouth to do that! And then what do you do with it? The mess! I guess the other option is just not to let the guy actually cum-hate that word-in your mouth at all, but then where does it go? Everywhere! The mess, I say again!), Anyway, does my preference put me in the majority? And if the majority of people do swallow, as I think is probably the case, why do people still like to act like that's a big deal? I'd do some research on this but I don't think it's something I should type into Google.]
- I got my scholarship check in the mail yesterday and because I'm taking and therefore paying for less hours this semester and because my scholarship amount actually increased slightly, my check is $1000 more than it was last year. This makes me incredibly happy. I'd love to be able to save some money this year for the looming Months Of Potential Unemployment Following Grad School, and I may actually be able to do it, especially if I keep this waitressing job for a while.
- I love shows where people decorate cakes, and there's a new one on the Food Network! Watching cake decorating shows relaxes me, which is funny because I think actually decorating a cake like that would drive me insane. [My high school physics teacher liked to try to predict our futures and the best he could ever do for me was once telling me I reminded him of a woman on a show he watched that took her aggression out through cake decorating and so I would probably just blow up someday in a really bizarre way. While the emotional breakdown he predicted has yet to happen, I suppose his comments were at least somewhat prophetic. And actually, predicting that I'm going to have a mental breakdown wasn't very nice of him, now that I think about it. Potentially true, but not very nice. ]
- I also love Alton Brown. Seriously. Or I love his TV personality, at any rate. Like most men I've eventually come to love he sort of annoyed me at first but then he really, really grew on me. He cooks. He's smart and scientific and sorta nerdy. He loves trivial facts and talks way too much! He's very detail-oriented and almost anal retentive. He seems like he'd be a good travel companion. He's not scared to try strange new things! He's funny. He's attractive in a strange, less-than-perfect way. He's somewhat effeminate...actually, maybe too effeminate as he verges on ambiguous and Matthew swears he seems gay in person although the Internet tells me he's married and has a daughter (My past dating habits would prove that I do indeed like my men slightly effeminate. I seem to prefer the scholarly and/or stylish and trendy types to the beer-and-baseball fratty types...but there's a big difference between metrosexual and questionably homosexual). Anyway, I've decided that Alton Brown is very close to being the perfect man for me. Judge away.
- I don't think that a small lunchbox-size bag of Kids Munchies and a quesadilla from Taco Cabana constitute enough nourishment in one 24 hour period, but my work schedule was so weird today that I missed all regular meal times and now it's already getting late and I just don't feel like eating anything else. But I think I probably should, I guess. And Pepperidge Farm cookies probably wouldn't be the smart choice, huh?
Friday, August 18, 2006
The Not-A-Post
So I had a decent-length, possibly semi-humorous post planned about my trip to Houston with my family this week. But now that I'm actually home I'm feeling too overwhelmed with other things to do and I don't feel like I have time to really blog tonight.
Part of the problem is that Chelsea and I drove home from Houston today, got to her house in Austin so that I could pick up my cat (I'd left Jose at her house so he'd have her cat Cedric for company; he gets bored and starts shredding my carpet if I leave him alone for more than one night in my apartment) and then drove down here. It's normally about a half hour drive to my house from hers but it took us more than an hour today because traffic was a nightmare. Then I picked up Cohen at the boarding kennel, got settled here at home, and then got a phone call from Chelsea saying I'd left my makeup bag at her house. I was in her house for three freakin' minutes! I only carried my makeup bag in so that I could give her back the lipsticks I'd borrowed from her. And I left the damn thing sitting on her dresser. So I immediately had to make the trip up to Austin and back. I'm an idiot. And I'm angry that I'm not comfortable enough to just live without my makeup until I see my sister again, but honestly, I'm not. I do go out without makeup, often. But I don't want to not have it at all for days and days and days. So yeah. There's that.
Then it just really hit me that class starts on Wednesday, and I'm freaking out. There's so much more that I wanted to accomplish this summer that I never got around to doing. It's just frustrating. I wanted to really start researching doctoral programs, I wanted to finish some personal writing projects, I wanted to really start on my thesis instead of just doing the bare minimum that I've had to do so far. But no, none of that really got done. If I push myself I may finish one personal writing project. I'd like to do that, at least. I just suddenly feel annoyed with myself for basically wasting the months of July and August.
Anyway, I want to get up early tomorrow and climb the stupid hill to the campus bookstore and the scholarship office before it gets so hot I die of heat stroke on the way up so I need to go to bed.
I really did have a lot of fun in Houston, though. Maybe I'll do a real update about it eventually. But in the meantime, there are pictures on my Photobucket page. I think if you're reading this you probably know how to get there. If not, the link is in my AIM profile. And if you don't have my AIM name either, well, you're out of luck for now unless you want to e-mail me or comment. I don't mind giving the link, I just don't really want to post the pictures right here on the blog right now.
P.S.-I think Mike and I are talking again. I say "think" because it's not like I made an official declaration that we should be speaking again, but we basically are. I feel good about it, I think. But it could also be an enormous mistake. I don't know anything anymore.
Part of the problem is that Chelsea and I drove home from Houston today, got to her house in Austin so that I could pick up my cat (I'd left Jose at her house so he'd have her cat Cedric for company; he gets bored and starts shredding my carpet if I leave him alone for more than one night in my apartment) and then drove down here. It's normally about a half hour drive to my house from hers but it took us more than an hour today because traffic was a nightmare. Then I picked up Cohen at the boarding kennel, got settled here at home, and then got a phone call from Chelsea saying I'd left my makeup bag at her house. I was in her house for three freakin' minutes! I only carried my makeup bag in so that I could give her back the lipsticks I'd borrowed from her. And I left the damn thing sitting on her dresser. So I immediately had to make the trip up to Austin and back. I'm an idiot. And I'm angry that I'm not comfortable enough to just live without my makeup until I see my sister again, but honestly, I'm not. I do go out without makeup, often. But I don't want to not have it at all for days and days and days. So yeah. There's that.
Then it just really hit me that class starts on Wednesday, and I'm freaking out. There's so much more that I wanted to accomplish this summer that I never got around to doing. It's just frustrating. I wanted to really start researching doctoral programs, I wanted to finish some personal writing projects, I wanted to really start on my thesis instead of just doing the bare minimum that I've had to do so far. But no, none of that really got done. If I push myself I may finish one personal writing project. I'd like to do that, at least. I just suddenly feel annoyed with myself for basically wasting the months of July and August.
Anyway, I want to get up early tomorrow and climb the stupid hill to the campus bookstore and the scholarship office before it gets so hot I die of heat stroke on the way up so I need to go to bed.
I really did have a lot of fun in Houston, though. Maybe I'll do a real update about it eventually. But in the meantime, there are pictures on my Photobucket page. I think if you're reading this you probably know how to get there. If not, the link is in my AIM profile. And if you don't have my AIM name either, well, you're out of luck for now unless you want to e-mail me or comment. I don't mind giving the link, I just don't really want to post the pictures right here on the blog right now.
P.S.-I think Mike and I are talking again. I say "think" because it's not like I made an official declaration that we should be speaking again, but we basically are. I feel good about it, I think. But it could also be an enormous mistake. I don't know anything anymore.
Sunday, August 13, 2006
Make it One for my Baby, and One More for the Road
I've been at work pretty much non-stop the past few days. I worked Thursday morning, Friday night, and then all day yesterday. I was so tired by the time yesterday was over since by that point I'd worked three shifts in a row and working a double would have been tiring even if I hadn't already worked seven hours the night before. I work out a lot and I'm in pretty good shape right now, but I really just can't handle what ended up being about twelve straight hours of standing and hustling around the restaurant. It took me over half an hour to fall asleep last night because I couldn't get into a position where my legs weren't aching.
But I did end up making a pretty good amount of money in the past three days, which is good 'cause my bank account was down to less than $200 and that was stressing me out. (Incidentally, I'm kind of weird about money and always start panicking that I'm about to run out of money even though I a) have a steady income and have yet to actually ever go over my monthly budget b) have a credit card with a $1400 limit that has only $40 charged on it at the moment and c) have a decent amount of money in stocks that I could always tap into if I needed to. I don't know why the hell I'm like this, but I try to curb my money-worrying side as much as possible). As soon as I deposit this weekends' money my bank account will be back in a range I'm comfortable with, and since the status on my scholarship check is currently "in process" I should be getting that check any day now, which will make me feel even better.
There were a couple of notable events concerning the men in my life (or not in my life, as is the case lately) this weekend. First, I got an actual phone call from the Ex-Who's-Not-Mike. We ended up talking for an hour, and it was kind of nice, actually. Having been so close with Mike again this past year makes me realize fully exactly how un-close me and the Ex are. It's hard to explain what I mean, exactly, other than what I've already explained in this blog before. Conversation with him is decent and fun but it's just not the same. Part of it is that he's just so cryptic all the time, even when it's not necessary at all. I remember when we were dating-but-not-dating he'd sometimes be all worked up about "a friend" and "a certain situation" and it would take half an hour of questions on my part before I finally got the who/where/what happened details and sometimes even then it still remained mostly a mystery. It was sort of like dating Tony Soprano. So yeah, part of the issue is that he's just kind of vague a lot of the time, but there's something else lacking that I can't quite put my finger on. Still, it was good catching up tonight.
The thing is, he said he wants to come down and visit me, and I just don't know. I can see how spending the weekend together would be kind of fun. We could have a nice dinner somewhere, go tear it up on 6th Street...but from there it gets vague. I can't wrap my mind around the idea of anything beyond just dinner and drinks. Because honestly, that part does sound fun. We really do have a good time together. But I just can't even envision myself sleeping with him at this point and if he came down here I think that could possibly end up happening. Because I can't imagine sleeping with him, but I also can't imagine a scenario in which I was like, "Here's a blanket, there's the couch, see you in the morning." As much as I want to believe he's just wanting to make an effort at staying in my life and staying friends with me--and there was certainly nothing in tonight's conversation that was remotely sexual--I have a feeling he wouldn't be wanting to come all the way to Austin just for dinner and drinks. Plus so much of our friendship and relationship has always been based on physical chemistry and even though I really do think that has faded significantly if not completely on my end, I can't honestly say what would happen if both of us started drinking together. So yeah. I really thought all of this was over completely, and now I'm just not sure that this is a can of worms I want to open again. I need to give it some thought. Still, it's nice to know he honestly does miss me, I suppose. As happy as I get when I think I've finally found closure on a relationship, I guess deep down I also kind of like it when I know a guy is carrying a torch for me. Who wouldn't like that?
More importantly, I heard from Mike this weekend. He sent me an instant message saying that he's respecting my decision not to talk but that he misses talking to me a lot. And then he added, "You don't have to respond to this, I'm just letting you know." And my reaction to that one little message was so visceral. I didn't realize exactly until that moment just how desperately I was wanting the validation that he misses me just as much as I miss him, and how scared I was that this entire month I've been missing him in the back of my mind and he hasn't been thinking of me at all. But now I know that he does miss me, that he says he couldn't possibly NOT miss me. We talked briefly. I could say so much about our tiny little conversation, but I'm not going to do it here. It's too complicated, and I need to leave a few things just for myself, I guess. I told him I still need a little more time, but I really do want to start talking to him again. I need to, and I will. I just need to keep replaying worst case scenarios in my head over and over again for a few more days just so I am positive that I know for sure what I might be getting myself in for if we start talking regularly again. And then I guess I'll just hope for one of the better possible scenarios and jump back into our friendship again. It's all I can really do at this point.
But for now I'm off to Houston for four days of family fun. I'm looking forward to the beds and the huge bathtub at the Four Seasons (assuming it's anything like the one I've stayed at here in Austin, which it should be), a massage, working out at the spa, wearing my new bathing suit at the hotel pool, shopping at the Galleria, hopefully hanging out with Matthew, going to a nice restaurant or two, watching the Cubbies play some baseball, hanging out in the hotel lobby and whoring myself out to said Cubbies (if my brother has his way, that is). It should be a fun week. I'm taking my laptop with me so if there's internet access at the hotel I may update at some point. Otherwise, have a good week everybody!
But I did end up making a pretty good amount of money in the past three days, which is good 'cause my bank account was down to less than $200 and that was stressing me out. (Incidentally, I'm kind of weird about money and always start panicking that I'm about to run out of money even though I a) have a steady income and have yet to actually ever go over my monthly budget b) have a credit card with a $1400 limit that has only $40 charged on it at the moment and c) have a decent amount of money in stocks that I could always tap into if I needed to. I don't know why the hell I'm like this, but I try to curb my money-worrying side as much as possible). As soon as I deposit this weekends' money my bank account will be back in a range I'm comfortable with, and since the status on my scholarship check is currently "in process" I should be getting that check any day now, which will make me feel even better.
There were a couple of notable events concerning the men in my life (or not in my life, as is the case lately) this weekend. First, I got an actual phone call from the Ex-Who's-Not-Mike. We ended up talking for an hour, and it was kind of nice, actually. Having been so close with Mike again this past year makes me realize fully exactly how un-close me and the Ex are. It's hard to explain what I mean, exactly, other than what I've already explained in this blog before. Conversation with him is decent and fun but it's just not the same. Part of it is that he's just so cryptic all the time, even when it's not necessary at all. I remember when we were dating-but-not-dating he'd sometimes be all worked up about "a friend" and "a certain situation" and it would take half an hour of questions on my part before I finally got the who/where/what happened details and sometimes even then it still remained mostly a mystery. It was sort of like dating Tony Soprano. So yeah, part of the issue is that he's just kind of vague a lot of the time, but there's something else lacking that I can't quite put my finger on. Still, it was good catching up tonight.
The thing is, he said he wants to come down and visit me, and I just don't know. I can see how spending the weekend together would be kind of fun. We could have a nice dinner somewhere, go tear it up on 6th Street...but from there it gets vague. I can't wrap my mind around the idea of anything beyond just dinner and drinks. Because honestly, that part does sound fun. We really do have a good time together. But I just can't even envision myself sleeping with him at this point and if he came down here I think that could possibly end up happening. Because I can't imagine sleeping with him, but I also can't imagine a scenario in which I was like, "Here's a blanket, there's the couch, see you in the morning." As much as I want to believe he's just wanting to make an effort at staying in my life and staying friends with me--and there was certainly nothing in tonight's conversation that was remotely sexual--I have a feeling he wouldn't be wanting to come all the way to Austin just for dinner and drinks. Plus so much of our friendship and relationship has always been based on physical chemistry and even though I really do think that has faded significantly if not completely on my end, I can't honestly say what would happen if both of us started drinking together. So yeah. I really thought all of this was over completely, and now I'm just not sure that this is a can of worms I want to open again. I need to give it some thought. Still, it's nice to know he honestly does miss me, I suppose. As happy as I get when I think I've finally found closure on a relationship, I guess deep down I also kind of like it when I know a guy is carrying a torch for me. Who wouldn't like that?
More importantly, I heard from Mike this weekend. He sent me an instant message saying that he's respecting my decision not to talk but that he misses talking to me a lot. And then he added, "You don't have to respond to this, I'm just letting you know." And my reaction to that one little message was so visceral. I didn't realize exactly until that moment just how desperately I was wanting the validation that he misses me just as much as I miss him, and how scared I was that this entire month I've been missing him in the back of my mind and he hasn't been thinking of me at all. But now I know that he does miss me, that he says he couldn't possibly NOT miss me. We talked briefly. I could say so much about our tiny little conversation, but I'm not going to do it here. It's too complicated, and I need to leave a few things just for myself, I guess. I told him I still need a little more time, but I really do want to start talking to him again. I need to, and I will. I just need to keep replaying worst case scenarios in my head over and over again for a few more days just so I am positive that I know for sure what I might be getting myself in for if we start talking regularly again. And then I guess I'll just hope for one of the better possible scenarios and jump back into our friendship again. It's all I can really do at this point.
But for now I'm off to Houston for four days of family fun. I'm looking forward to the beds and the huge bathtub at the Four Seasons (assuming it's anything like the one I've stayed at here in Austin, which it should be), a massage, working out at the spa, wearing my new bathing suit at the hotel pool, shopping at the Galleria, hopefully hanging out with Matthew, going to a nice restaurant or two, watching the Cubbies play some baseball, hanging out in the hotel lobby and whoring myself out to said Cubbies (if my brother has his way, that is). It should be a fun week. I'm taking my laptop with me so if there's internet access at the hotel I may update at some point. Otherwise, have a good week everybody!
Thursday, August 10, 2006
River Ranch sucks! (And other things)
[There's another new post below this one. Two in one day. Word.]
Guess what I got today?! Tickets to see The Rolling Stones and Dave Matthews Band in concert!! Dave is opening for the Stones in El Paso on October 20th. My parents have seen the Stones about a million times because each time they do a farewell tour my parents go to it in case it actually is their last tour (I swear they've been on their farewell tour since 1992). They'd never taken us kids with them, though, I guess mostly because the majority of these concerts happened when we were too young to care. But I've realized within the past few years that I not only like the Rolling Stones, I sort of love them (who knew?!) and Chels likes them a lot, too, so when she saw on the El Paso Times website that they were going to be playing in El Paso she told me and then we ganged up on my parents and demanded they use the Uncle Keith connection to get us tickets. Because have I mentioned here that Keith Richards is my pastor's brother-in-law? I told that to a guy in England and he called me a "lying Yank", but I swear this is the truth. The pastor of my church back home is Patti Hansen's older brother and therefore Keith Richards' brother-in-law. And ever since we found that out my family has privately referred to him as "Uncle Keith" just because there's something really hilarious about imagining Keith Richards at a family reunion with my fairly straight-laced pastor and his wife and their three kids. But that actually does happen, apparently.
Anyway, I'm pretty sure Dad didn't actually use the Uncle Keith connection to get tickets. But he did pull some sort of strings somehow and got the tickets today even though they don't actually go on sale until Saturday and now me, my family, and about a dozen of my parents' closest friends are going to the concert in October!
A dozen of my parents' closest friends are going, too, because my parents have conveniently decided to throw their joint 5oth birthday party on the Wednesday before the concert. My parents are both turning 50 in October and so they're going to close down dad's bar for the night and throw themselves a big party. Initial rumors included mention of a live band and karaoke, but who knows what will actually end up happening. I do know for certain that there will be lots and lots and lots of free-flowing alcohol, though. This is my parents we're talking about, and they don't call my family the Crunk Duncs for nothing. When my parents decide to party, they party, to say the least.
Anyway, I'm pretty jazzed about all this. The only problem is that I'll have to be in El Paso Wednesday through Saturday morning. I'll have to miss my Thursday class for sure and possibly my Wednesday class, I'll have to take three days off from my dramaturgical duties less than three weeks before the show is about to start which is probably not a wise idea, and I'll have to get someone else to keep an eye on everything in the box office while I'm gone since there's a show going on that week. But you know what? I'm going to make this work. I've never once skipped a night class or skipped working a performance. And I know about this two months in advance. Surely if I tell all affected parties two months in advance we can work something out. I'm just trying to decide if I should tell the truth or if, "It's my parents' fiftieth birthday and I have Stones tickets" isn't a good enough excuse and I should pretend I have to go to a wedding or something like that instead.
In other news, only six more episodes to go and I'll be all caught up with The Sopranos. Well, as caught up as I can be, anyway, since they haven't released the first half of the sixth season on DVD yet. And I guess at this point since I've watched all the other seasons I'd be okay with reading myself through plot synopses of the first half of the sixth season before the final episodes air. Although I'm hoping HBO will do what they did with Sex and the City and release the first half of the season as its own DVD set around the holidays so I can catch up before they finish it all up. So yes, that's one summer project I'm actually going to complete. As for the worthwhile projects, like my own personal writing projects and my initial thesis research...well, talk to me about that some other time.
Next on my agenda is watching the first two seasons of Lost. I guess the last thing I really need is another television show to care about, but I think my sister will kill me if she has to go another season sending me text messages every Wednesday that say, "Why does nobody I know watch Lost?! I HAVE to talk about this with somebody!" Plus the only things I really desperately feel the need to watch every week are Grey's Anatomy and Project Runway. Desperate Housewives is entertaining but I don't love it enough to obsess about seeing it, my HBO shows won't start up again until the spring, and The O.C. went so far downhill last season that I don't particularly care about it anymore. So I guess I can add one more show.
Finally, how is this for annoying? I got a phone call from the apartment complex I lived in A YEAR AGO-like, literally a year ago, we moved out July 31st of last year-telling me that Katy and I still have a "small outstanding balance" and we need to pay it immediately before they have to send our account to a collections agency. Turns out said balance is $44 so it's not that big a deal and I just put a check in the mail to them because I want to stop dealing with the idiots entirely but, seriously, a year?! An entire year went by before someone could be bothered to tell me we still owed them money from our move-out charges? And don't even get me started on the damn move out charges in the first place. They completely fucked us over on several levels and if I get into it all again right now I'll get so angry I might give myself a stroke. But let's just say it was a lovely apartment complex until we moved out and got screwed, and ever since then I've been writing bad things about them on every Rate Your Apartment Complex thing I can and complaining about them to anyone that is searching for apartments in the area. I just can't believe it. I was incredibly bitchy to the woman I talked to, but do you blame me?! Amongst other things, I told her "Don't you dare threaten to call a collection agency on me when this is the first time I have ever heard of this charge and YOU had AN ENTIRE GODDAMN YEAR to tell me about it. And you're lucky it's only a forty dollar charge and I just don't care enough about forty bucks to fight you about paying it. I hope you realize how ridiculous this is." And she spluttered and babbled and I just cut her off and said, "No, really. It is ridiculous. It is absolutely ridiculous that you are so unorganized over there that it took you an entire year to realize the checks my roommate and I sent you didn't add up to the correct amount, and it's even more ridiculous that you are still insisting I pay you such a pathetically small amount of money when we already paid you almost a thousand dollars last year when we moved out and you've been just fine without that extra forty bucks for AN ENTIRE YEAR." Then she tried to insist that maybe I'd just never gotten the notice about the forty four dollars because she didn't have the correct forwarding information for me, but I just said, "Well, that's funny because, you see, I got the initial bill you sent at my new address, and we paid that. Plus you obviously have my phone number since you're on the phone with me RIGHT NOW. So no, that's not a valid excuse."
Is there any way to lodge a legitimate complaint about this? The thing is, I don't know if what they've done is actually wrong or if it's perfectly legal but just fucking annoying. I don't care about paying them the money, but I'd love to do more than just say "River Ranch sucks! Don't be fooled!" all over the internet.
Guess what I got today?! Tickets to see The Rolling Stones and Dave Matthews Band in concert!! Dave is opening for the Stones in El Paso on October 20th. My parents have seen the Stones about a million times because each time they do a farewell tour my parents go to it in case it actually is their last tour (I swear they've been on their farewell tour since 1992). They'd never taken us kids with them, though, I guess mostly because the majority of these concerts happened when we were too young to care. But I've realized within the past few years that I not only like the Rolling Stones, I sort of love them (who knew?!) and Chels likes them a lot, too, so when she saw on the El Paso Times website that they were going to be playing in El Paso she told me and then we ganged up on my parents and demanded they use the Uncle Keith connection to get us tickets. Because have I mentioned here that Keith Richards is my pastor's brother-in-law? I told that to a guy in England and he called me a "lying Yank", but I swear this is the truth. The pastor of my church back home is Patti Hansen's older brother and therefore Keith Richards' brother-in-law. And ever since we found that out my family has privately referred to him as "Uncle Keith" just because there's something really hilarious about imagining Keith Richards at a family reunion with my fairly straight-laced pastor and his wife and their three kids. But that actually does happen, apparently.
Anyway, I'm pretty sure Dad didn't actually use the Uncle Keith connection to get tickets. But he did pull some sort of strings somehow and got the tickets today even though they don't actually go on sale until Saturday and now me, my family, and about a dozen of my parents' closest friends are going to the concert in October!
A dozen of my parents' closest friends are going, too, because my parents have conveniently decided to throw their joint 5oth birthday party on the Wednesday before the concert. My parents are both turning 50 in October and so they're going to close down dad's bar for the night and throw themselves a big party. Initial rumors included mention of a live band and karaoke, but who knows what will actually end up happening. I do know for certain that there will be lots and lots and lots of free-flowing alcohol, though. This is my parents we're talking about, and they don't call my family the Crunk Duncs for nothing. When my parents decide to party, they party, to say the least.
Anyway, I'm pretty jazzed about all this. The only problem is that I'll have to be in El Paso Wednesday through Saturday morning. I'll have to miss my Thursday class for sure and possibly my Wednesday class, I'll have to take three days off from my dramaturgical duties less than three weeks before the show is about to start which is probably not a wise idea, and I'll have to get someone else to keep an eye on everything in the box office while I'm gone since there's a show going on that week. But you know what? I'm going to make this work. I've never once skipped a night class or skipped working a performance. And I know about this two months in advance. Surely if I tell all affected parties two months in advance we can work something out. I'm just trying to decide if I should tell the truth or if, "It's my parents' fiftieth birthday and I have Stones tickets" isn't a good enough excuse and I should pretend I have to go to a wedding or something like that instead.
In other news, only six more episodes to go and I'll be all caught up with The Sopranos. Well, as caught up as I can be, anyway, since they haven't released the first half of the sixth season on DVD yet. And I guess at this point since I've watched all the other seasons I'd be okay with reading myself through plot synopses of the first half of the sixth season before the final episodes air. Although I'm hoping HBO will do what they did with Sex and the City and release the first half of the season as its own DVD set around the holidays so I can catch up before they finish it all up. So yes, that's one summer project I'm actually going to complete. As for the worthwhile projects, like my own personal writing projects and my initial thesis research...well, talk to me about that some other time.
Next on my agenda is watching the first two seasons of Lost. I guess the last thing I really need is another television show to care about, but I think my sister will kill me if she has to go another season sending me text messages every Wednesday that say, "Why does nobody I know watch Lost?! I HAVE to talk about this with somebody!" Plus the only things I really desperately feel the need to watch every week are Grey's Anatomy and Project Runway. Desperate Housewives is entertaining but I don't love it enough to obsess about seeing it, my HBO shows won't start up again until the spring, and The O.C. went so far downhill last season that I don't particularly care about it anymore. So I guess I can add one more show.
Finally, how is this for annoying? I got a phone call from the apartment complex I lived in A YEAR AGO-like, literally a year ago, we moved out July 31st of last year-telling me that Katy and I still have a "small outstanding balance" and we need to pay it immediately before they have to send our account to a collections agency. Turns out said balance is $44 so it's not that big a deal and I just put a check in the mail to them because I want to stop dealing with the idiots entirely but, seriously, a year?! An entire year went by before someone could be bothered to tell me we still owed them money from our move-out charges? And don't even get me started on the damn move out charges in the first place. They completely fucked us over on several levels and if I get into it all again right now I'll get so angry I might give myself a stroke. But let's just say it was a lovely apartment complex until we moved out and got screwed, and ever since then I've been writing bad things about them on every Rate Your Apartment Complex thing I can and complaining about them to anyone that is searching for apartments in the area. I just can't believe it. I was incredibly bitchy to the woman I talked to, but do you blame me?! Amongst other things, I told her "Don't you dare threaten to call a collection agency on me when this is the first time I have ever heard of this charge and YOU had AN ENTIRE GODDAMN YEAR to tell me about it. And you're lucky it's only a forty dollar charge and I just don't care enough about forty bucks to fight you about paying it. I hope you realize how ridiculous this is." And she spluttered and babbled and I just cut her off and said, "No, really. It is ridiculous. It is absolutely ridiculous that you are so unorganized over there that it took you an entire year to realize the checks my roommate and I sent you didn't add up to the correct amount, and it's even more ridiculous that you are still insisting I pay you such a pathetically small amount of money when we already paid you almost a thousand dollars last year when we moved out and you've been just fine without that extra forty bucks for AN ENTIRE YEAR." Then she tried to insist that maybe I'd just never gotten the notice about the forty four dollars because she didn't have the correct forwarding information for me, but I just said, "Well, that's funny because, you see, I got the initial bill you sent at my new address, and we paid that. Plus you obviously have my phone number since you're on the phone with me RIGHT NOW. So no, that's not a valid excuse."
Is there any way to lodge a legitimate complaint about this? The thing is, I don't know if what they've done is actually wrong or if it's perfectly legal but just fucking annoying. I don't care about paying them the money, but I'd love to do more than just say "River Ranch sucks! Don't be fooled!" all over the internet.
East Texas
So I did end up going to visit Kymberli. Turns out it was only a five hour drive each way, and it was totally worth it. It wasn't even a bad drive. Once I got outside of Waco it was all new territory for me so it was actually kind of interesting. Plus it was country roads pretty much the whole way so it was nice and scenic. And there's a little town between here and Longview called Tool, so twice I got to see police cruisers labeled "Tool Police" and just seeing that made driving worthwhile. (It originally made me smile because I thought about the band, but then I started imagining a little hammer and a screwdriver in police hats cruising around in the cop cars and that made it even funnier)
Cohen got to meet Kymberli's family dog, Mox. Mox is a fluffy white Maltese, and have I mentioned here before that one of Cohen's favorite things in the world is white fluffy dogs? Well, it is. So Cohen and Mox had a great time running around the house and the yard and trying to sneak into the long grass and between the barbed wire fence and down into the open fields when we weren't paying attention. (Oh, and about those open fields, did I mention that Kymberli comes from a tiny little town so we were out in the country? Well, we were, and it's really pretty and forest-y.) Kymbo's mom took a bunch of pictures so hopefully she'll send them to me eventually once she gets Kymberli all settled up in NYC and then I'll be able to post pictures of how cute the dogs were together. Cohen also met his first tiny toddler. Tessa, the daughter of one of Kymberli's family friends, is only 11 months old and has only been walking for three weeks and at first I was afraid to let Cohen near her for fear he'd get excited and leap on her and knock her to the ground, but he ended up being so gentle with her! It's like he just knew he had to be careful and he spent a good half hour following her patiently around the patio as she toddled around, slobbering lovingly all over her face every time she fell down and then standing perfectly still and letting her grab onto his back to hoist herself back up to standing. My basset is so awesome. I really hope he's still around when I hopefully have a kid of my own one of these days...
So, enough about the dog. Kymberli is awesome. It was so good to see her. She's incredibly excited about moving to New York and for a while her enthusiasm was contagious. I found myself thinking, "I want to move! I want to decorate a new place! I want a convenient chance to reorganize everything and streamline my life! And I want to discover a new city!" And then I reminded myself that packing is a huge hassle and I hate not knowing where the post office and the bank and the cheapest grocery store are and I hate that transitional period where you're sleeping on the floor and there's no internet access and you can't find the box with the towels and...yeah, it may be exciting, but I hate pretty much everything about it. That, and I'm pretty positive I'll be moving within ten months anyway so it'll be my turn for the frantic excited packing soon enough.
Anyway, Kymberli and I mostly just hung out around her house, although we did go into Longview (the nearest decent-sized town) on Tuesday. We had lunch and then went to Target where I got a skirt, a black long-sleeved sheer dress shirt that will be perfect for working in the box office on show nights, a cute halter top, and a new bathing suit, all for just $32 total! When did Target start carrying such cute clothes?! And when did those clothes start costing only $3.74 on the clearance rack?! At that price it doesn't even matter if they only last through once cycle in the washing machine. And if they actually last longer than that, wow, what a deal! (Incidentally, I don't want to know what terrible, bizarre sweat shop practices are allowing me to get such a deal, so please don't even tell me)
On Tuesday night there was a little going away party for Kymberli. It was her family, some of her parents' friends, some friends of hers from high school, and some of her extended family members, including her cousin Jacob who is one of those guys that's so East Texas he can make a word like "realization" have only one syllable. I think my favorite thing he said all night was, "Girlfriend whomalikeaheckoudda". (He likes the heck out of his girlfriend, in case you're having trouble parsing that. I sure did.)
I think my favorite moment of the trip was on Monday night as Kymberli and I were getting ready for bed. We were standing in the bathroom together and I was telling her about the weird, sorta sappy and serious text messages I've been getting from my ex-that's-not-Mike lately, when she interrupted me laughing and said, "Look at us!" and I realized that we were both simultaneously flossing our teeth with those little disposable floss picks as we talked. Who in the world even uses those things other than Kymberli and (very recently) me? And the fact that we were doing it at the exact same time was just too much. I'm pretty sure stuff like that is the reason Kymberli is like, totally my BFF.
Oh, and guess what! I was hanging out in the pool at Kymberli's going away party with her and her friends Luke and Owen and we were all laughing and having a good time and Kymberli said, "I'm so glad you guys are already friends, because now when you see each other in the future at my hypothetical wedding you'll already be friends!" So I laughed about that because I like that that's the reason she's glad we get along, and then Luke said, "I'm sure I'll be the first in this group to get married." I asked him why and said, "Do you even have a serious girlfriend right now?" and he said, "No, not at all, but I'm ready." And then Owen said that he was thinking a lot lately about settling down, too, and how just the other day he and Luke were camping out with their dogs wishing they had girlfriends to just hang out with and spend time with. You know, girls for sex AND companionship. What a novel idea! Then we started talking about how they don't want to get married until they're making a little more money (they both just graduated a year ago and are just starting out in the, uh "real world", too) but other than the money factor they'd want to get married right now if they found the right girl.
And you know, that was really refreshing. Nice, attractive, funny guys who are both starting out in promising careers and are handsome and charming enough that they could easily be total players, and yet they're actually looking forward to settling down and starting families one of these days. And just like me, they're not in any big rush for it to happen immediately, but they do want it to happen sometime in the next, oh, decade.
So hey! Marrying guys are out there! Maybe I won't need to resign myself to a life of celibacy and nothing but a stinky hound dog in my bed after all!
Cohen got to meet Kymberli's family dog, Mox. Mox is a fluffy white Maltese, and have I mentioned here before that one of Cohen's favorite things in the world is white fluffy dogs? Well, it is. So Cohen and Mox had a great time running around the house and the yard and trying to sneak into the long grass and between the barbed wire fence and down into the open fields when we weren't paying attention. (Oh, and about those open fields, did I mention that Kymberli comes from a tiny little town so we were out in the country? Well, we were, and it's really pretty and forest-y.) Kymbo's mom took a bunch of pictures so hopefully she'll send them to me eventually once she gets Kymberli all settled up in NYC and then I'll be able to post pictures of how cute the dogs were together. Cohen also met his first tiny toddler. Tessa, the daughter of one of Kymberli's family friends, is only 11 months old and has only been walking for three weeks and at first I was afraid to let Cohen near her for fear he'd get excited and leap on her and knock her to the ground, but he ended up being so gentle with her! It's like he just knew he had to be careful and he spent a good half hour following her patiently around the patio as she toddled around, slobbering lovingly all over her face every time she fell down and then standing perfectly still and letting her grab onto his back to hoist herself back up to standing. My basset is so awesome. I really hope he's still around when I hopefully have a kid of my own one of these days...
So, enough about the dog. Kymberli is awesome. It was so good to see her. She's incredibly excited about moving to New York and for a while her enthusiasm was contagious. I found myself thinking, "I want to move! I want to decorate a new place! I want a convenient chance to reorganize everything and streamline my life! And I want to discover a new city!" And then I reminded myself that packing is a huge hassle and I hate not knowing where the post office and the bank and the cheapest grocery store are and I hate that transitional period where you're sleeping on the floor and there's no internet access and you can't find the box with the towels and...yeah, it may be exciting, but I hate pretty much everything about it. That, and I'm pretty positive I'll be moving within ten months anyway so it'll be my turn for the frantic excited packing soon enough.
Anyway, Kymberli and I mostly just hung out around her house, although we did go into Longview (the nearest decent-sized town) on Tuesday. We had lunch and then went to Target where I got a skirt, a black long-sleeved sheer dress shirt that will be perfect for working in the box office on show nights, a cute halter top, and a new bathing suit, all for just $32 total! When did Target start carrying such cute clothes?! And when did those clothes start costing only $3.74 on the clearance rack?! At that price it doesn't even matter if they only last through once cycle in the washing machine. And if they actually last longer than that, wow, what a deal! (Incidentally, I don't want to know what terrible, bizarre sweat shop practices are allowing me to get such a deal, so please don't even tell me)
On Tuesday night there was a little going away party for Kymberli. It was her family, some of her parents' friends, some friends of hers from high school, and some of her extended family members, including her cousin Jacob who is one of those guys that's so East Texas he can make a word like "realization" have only one syllable. I think my favorite thing he said all night was, "Girlfriend whomalikeaheckoudda". (He likes the heck out of his girlfriend, in case you're having trouble parsing that. I sure did.)
I think my favorite moment of the trip was on Monday night as Kymberli and I were getting ready for bed. We were standing in the bathroom together and I was telling her about the weird, sorta sappy and serious text messages I've been getting from my ex-that's-not-Mike lately, when she interrupted me laughing and said, "Look at us!" and I realized that we were both simultaneously flossing our teeth with those little disposable floss picks as we talked. Who in the world even uses those things other than Kymberli and (very recently) me? And the fact that we were doing it at the exact same time was just too much. I'm pretty sure stuff like that is the reason Kymberli is like, totally my BFF.
Oh, and guess what! I was hanging out in the pool at Kymberli's going away party with her and her friends Luke and Owen and we were all laughing and having a good time and Kymberli said, "I'm so glad you guys are already friends, because now when you see each other in the future at my hypothetical wedding you'll already be friends!" So I laughed about that because I like that that's the reason she's glad we get along, and then Luke said, "I'm sure I'll be the first in this group to get married." I asked him why and said, "Do you even have a serious girlfriend right now?" and he said, "No, not at all, but I'm ready." And then Owen said that he was thinking a lot lately about settling down, too, and how just the other day he and Luke were camping out with their dogs wishing they had girlfriends to just hang out with and spend time with. You know, girls for sex AND companionship. What a novel idea! Then we started talking about how they don't want to get married until they're making a little more money (they both just graduated a year ago and are just starting out in the, uh "real world", too) but other than the money factor they'd want to get married right now if they found the right girl.
And you know, that was really refreshing. Nice, attractive, funny guys who are both starting out in promising careers and are handsome and charming enough that they could easily be total players, and yet they're actually looking forward to settling down and starting families one of these days. And just like me, they're not in any big rush for it to happen immediately, but they do want it to happen sometime in the next, oh, decade.
So hey! Marrying guys are out there! Maybe I won't need to resign myself to a life of celibacy and nothing but a stinky hound dog in my bed after all!
Saturday, August 05, 2006
Progress?
So, it has been three weeks since I was in El Paso.
That means it has been three whole weeks since I communicated with Mike in any way. I'm proud of myself. I'm proud of myself for saying I was going to do something in terms of a relationship and then actually following through, even though I have to admit that I still question my decision every day. The thing is, I've had a lot of time to think about it all over the past three weeks, and the ability to just think about it without any interference from ongoing events as far as he is concerned has been really healthy for me. I know for certain now that I can have a fairly happy life without Mike in it at all. That's really good to know. However, I'm also fairly certain that I'll be happier with him in my life in any aspect. One of the reasons for this is that I feel intensely guilty for trying to cut him out of my life. I was expecting a lot of conflicting emotions when I made this decision, but guilt was not honestly something I anticipated. So that has been...interesting. I know some of you would say that he doesn't deserve my guilt, and I don't know, maybe you're right. But the feeling is there anyway. At any rate, I know that I do want him in my life and I do want to attempt just a friendship. It's just a matter of when I want to try this new step, and that's something I still don't quite know.
On a lighter note, it has also been three weeks since I went to the dentist, and that means I have now been flossing my teeth every night (well, almost every night) for three weeks! This is a major step for me, people. I am a notoriously poor flosser. I usually floss really well for about the first week after I've been to the dentist and then after that I turn into a flossing slacker and before long I'm back to just flossing once a month or so when I happen to remember or when my teeth feel gross. But this time I promised myself I'd actually make an effort, and so far so good! It finally feels like a part of my nightly routine, something I just do automatically like brushing my teeth or taking my pill. So I'm proud of myself for flossing, too, I guess.
And it has also been almost three weeks since I started my new job, and last night I finally actually went out with work people. By "out" I mean that I went over to the home of a couple of guys I work with who were throwing a small keg party. The keg really was pretty unnecessary, actually, since the most people that were ever there at one time was about fifteen to twenty. But hey, that's just more beer for us! It was mostly my co-workers, and we had a good time. There were videogames and drinking games and one of the roommates has a pet chameleon, which I thought was pretty awesome. It wasn't a night to rave about, but I definitely didn't have a bad time, either. I had fun. And I feel like I've broken the ice with everyone now, so that's a good feeling. I was getting there slowly but surely at work, but it's amazing how a mutual love of beer can form deep and lasting bonds.
Anyway, I'm off to bed. I'm trying to decide whether I should drive to Kymberli's hometown and see her before she moves to New York City on Thursday. I really want to see her, but it is kind of hard to justify driving almost 6 hours each way and spending all that money on gas to really only be there one full day (since I'm only off work Monday through Wednesday this week). Then again, it is Kymberli and I really would love to see her one more time while she's not an entire plane flight away. I don't know. Either way I need to grocery shop and do laundry and work out before work tomorrow just in case I do decide to pack up Cohen and take a last-minute road trip on Monday.
That means it has been three whole weeks since I communicated with Mike in any way. I'm proud of myself. I'm proud of myself for saying I was going to do something in terms of a relationship and then actually following through, even though I have to admit that I still question my decision every day. The thing is, I've had a lot of time to think about it all over the past three weeks, and the ability to just think about it without any interference from ongoing events as far as he is concerned has been really healthy for me. I know for certain now that I can have a fairly happy life without Mike in it at all. That's really good to know. However, I'm also fairly certain that I'll be happier with him in my life in any aspect. One of the reasons for this is that I feel intensely guilty for trying to cut him out of my life. I was expecting a lot of conflicting emotions when I made this decision, but guilt was not honestly something I anticipated. So that has been...interesting. I know some of you would say that he doesn't deserve my guilt, and I don't know, maybe you're right. But the feeling is there anyway. At any rate, I know that I do want him in my life and I do want to attempt just a friendship. It's just a matter of when I want to try this new step, and that's something I still don't quite know.
On a lighter note, it has also been three weeks since I went to the dentist, and that means I have now been flossing my teeth every night (well, almost every night) for three weeks! This is a major step for me, people. I am a notoriously poor flosser. I usually floss really well for about the first week after I've been to the dentist and then after that I turn into a flossing slacker and before long I'm back to just flossing once a month or so when I happen to remember or when my teeth feel gross. But this time I promised myself I'd actually make an effort, and so far so good! It finally feels like a part of my nightly routine, something I just do automatically like brushing my teeth or taking my pill. So I'm proud of myself for flossing, too, I guess.
And it has also been almost three weeks since I started my new job, and last night I finally actually went out with work people. By "out" I mean that I went over to the home of a couple of guys I work with who were throwing a small keg party. The keg really was pretty unnecessary, actually, since the most people that were ever there at one time was about fifteen to twenty. But hey, that's just more beer for us! It was mostly my co-workers, and we had a good time. There were videogames and drinking games and one of the roommates has a pet chameleon, which I thought was pretty awesome. It wasn't a night to rave about, but I definitely didn't have a bad time, either. I had fun. And I feel like I've broken the ice with everyone now, so that's a good feeling. I was getting there slowly but surely at work, but it's amazing how a mutual love of beer can form deep and lasting bonds.
Anyway, I'm off to bed. I'm trying to decide whether I should drive to Kymberli's hometown and see her before she moves to New York City on Thursday. I really want to see her, but it is kind of hard to justify driving almost 6 hours each way and spending all that money on gas to really only be there one full day (since I'm only off work Monday through Wednesday this week). Then again, it is Kymberli and I really would love to see her one more time while she's not an entire plane flight away. I don't know. Either way I need to grocery shop and do laundry and work out before work tomorrow just in case I do decide to pack up Cohen and take a last-minute road trip on Monday.
Thursday, August 03, 2006
Five Things and More Crazy
So I met another crazy today. What's the deal? I'm thinking it must be worse than usual because of the heat. Surely the fact that the heat index has been hovering around 105 degrees for most of the past month can't be helping with the general craziness factor of the population.
I met today's crazy at the wrap shop, where I really just wanted to get my sandwich and go home 'cause I'd just gotten off work and I was tired and starving. Instead I had to listen to a long and involved rant about Lebanon and Israel and how Crazy wants to join the Israeli army and if he ever finds out that he's dying of some terminal disease he's just going to say goodbye to his friends right away and then join the army (any army, apparently) so he can go out fighting, and how he's too scared to travel anywhere outside the US in case something happens and he gets stuck in a foreign country for life, and how if Syria gets involved in this current conflict then so will Russia and then I believe he actually used the phrases, "a battle between good and evil" and "we'll meet our Maker." Oh, and he also told me that he heard that anytime 20% of a country becomes Muslim ("And not good Muslims, those crazy bad kind of Muslims" was his exact phrasing, I believe) then they are required by some mandate to overthrow the government of said country and take over. He claims that this is on the verge of happening in France and told me, "So when France goes under in the next five years, just remember you heard it here first!" Got that, people? You heard it here first.
Where do these people come from? Seriously.
While we're on the topic of crazy (again) they're repairing the roof on my apartment building. They started on my building yesterday and should be done tomorrow, hopefully. I was worried that the hammering would be really annoying, but it actually isn't bad at all as long as I'm inside. I suppose it helps that I live on the first floor and we have really high ceilings in these apartments so there's quite a bit of space between me and where all the actual hammering is going on. The crazy part is that the workers just chuck things off the roof. It seems as though they're at least moving the old shingles off the roof in big piles and using a crane-type thing to do it instead of just throwing them off the roof. But the packaging for the new shingles? That just gets tossed off the roof. As does the tar paper-y stuff they're using (I know nothing about roofing materials, obviously), as do soda cans and water bottles. Every time I take Cohen outside now I'm afraid I'm about to get clunked in the head. I don't think the stuff being thrown off my roof is anything that's going to kill me, but if I get hit in the head by a soda can you can bet someone's gonna hear about it anyway.
Since I haven't killed quite enough time yet, I leave you with this:
5 Things always in my purse:
1. Wallet
2. Keys
3. Cell phone
4. Lip gloss
That's it, actually. Those are the only four things I always have to have with me. Which is why I don't even carry a purse half the time since that's all just pocketable (especially if I just carry cash and my ID and ditch the wallet).
5 Things always in my wallet:
1. Debit card.
2. Drivers license.
3. PetsMart PetPerks card
4. Student ID (in case of discount opportunities, not because I've ever once had to show anyone my ID the entire year I've been going to school here)
5. Miniature copy of the U.S. Constitution ('cause you just never know when that might come in very handy...actually, I have no idea why I even have this, I just now noticed it's in my wallet)
5 Things always in my refrigerator:
1. Milk
2. Polish dill pickles (it is absolutely imperative that they be Polish-style)
3. Pitcher of Crystal Light (any flavor)
4. Coke (usually the little 100-calorie cans nowadays)
5. Bread
5 Things always in my closet:
1. Pop-up laundry hamper
2. Black pants
3. Flip-flops
4. Jeans
5. Sewing kit
5 Things always in my car:
1. The little thingamajiggy that lets me dock my mp3 player and listen to it through my car stereo
2. Paper clip (in case of an mp3 player malfunction-the paper clip resets it)
3. Sunshade
4. Ice scraper (which has been used all of three times in my whole driving life so far, but my dad insists)
5. Cohen's seat belt (Yes, the dog wears a seat belt when he's riding in the car. Be quiet.)
5 Things always on my desk:
1. Desk lamp
2. Horned frog paperweight
3. Cup full of an insane amount of pens and pencils
4. Picture frame with "artistic" black and white pictures of Cohen and Jose
5. Laptop (unless I'm on the couch and it's on my lap, which is often the case)
5 people I wish I still hung out with:
1. Matt from the Bass
2. Kirby-licious
3. Mariana
4. Dave
5. Leah
And way too many others to list here...
5 pieces of clothing I can't live without:
1. The huge blue cashmere sweater I got from Shane when he decided it was "too gay"
2. My little black dress (which will now forever be known as the "Snake Dance dress". Haha)
3. Soft jeans
4. My green suede blazer
5. The "pirate" shirt I got at H&M (that actually looks nothing like a pirate shirt at all)
5 sentimental things I'll never throw away:
1. Every single journal I've ever kept (realize that from 8th grade on these journals consist of an entry for every. single. day. That's some incredibly valuable totally humiliating stuff!)
2. The document in my closet entitled The Quotes Pages, Theatre TCU, Fall 2001-Spring 2005: Four Years of Friendship Summarized in Thirty Pages of Sometimes Witty and Always Ridiculous Quotes
3. Certain letters and drawings from Mike
4. The book Kymberli gave me detailing the 500 reasons why we're best friends
5. All the ridiculous notes Cassie and I wrote to each other in middle and high school because if the past ten years are any indication, those will never, ever stop being funny.
5 phone numbers I have memorized:
1. My home in El Paso
2. My dad's cell phone
3. The eastside Hudson's
4. Mike's cell phone
5. Kymberli's cell phone
Sadly, I think these are literally the ONLY five phone numbers I have memorized. Oh, wait, I do know Katy's cell phone number. And that's literally it. If I ever lost the numbers in my cell phone I'd be screwed. I don't even know my own sister's phone number!
5 songs I'll love forever:
1. Dave Matthew's Band-Crash. The entire album.
2. Pure Prairie League-Amie
3. Usher, Ludacris, Lil' John-Yeah
4. Madonna-Like A Prayer
5. Rent-La Vie Boheme
5 places I have fond memories of:
1. "The hump" back at good ol' Hanks High
2. The University Pub
3. The cabin in Ruidoso
4. The flats we shared on Hatton Garden in London
5. Rome
5 terrible things I've done:
1. Let Mike fool around with me with the full knowledge that he had a girlfriend at the time.
2. Spent the spring semester of 2005 focusing much, MUCH more on drinking than on student teaching (I still maintain that this was actually a very, very fun thing to do, and I definitely don't regret it, but it definitely wasn't the right thing to do)
3. Let a friend drive his own car knowing full well that he was way too drunk to be driving (I'm still very grateful he's not dead and I still think that his DUI was partially my fault)
4. Forced way, way too many guys to "lose interest" in me by never returning their phone calls instead of just being brave and politely explaining that I wasn't really interested.
5. Attempted to convince myself that I need a boyfriend to be completely happy.
5 scents that bring back the memories:
1. Coconut Lime Verbena shower gel
2. Moonlit Path body splash
3. Polo Sport
4. That indescribable "Grandma's house" smell that I just know whenever I happen to catch it somewhere else
5. That dusty smell when the AC is turned on for the first time after being off all winter
5 things I have hanging on the wall:
1. A painting of Times Square on a rainy night that I got at the Main Street Arts Festival in Fort Worth
2. Album covers from South Pacific, My Fair Lady, A Chorus Line, and Anything Goes
3. My signed Jane's Addiction poster
4. My Pope Innocent III action figure
5. A package of sidewalk chalk in the shape of various vegetables with googly eyes
5 things I'll never regret:
1. Dating and loving Mike
2. Moving to Fort Worth anyway
3. Everything that a person with stricter morals would say I SHOULD regret about college
4. Choosing to study theatre (Even if for some reason I ultimately end up having a career in something completely different, I'll never regret that I studied theatre in college. I can't imagine that any other subject could have been as interesting as this one has been, and I absolutely wouldn't have met such fun, funny, beautiful, and fascinating people in any other field)
5. Begging for a basset hound.
I met today's crazy at the wrap shop, where I really just wanted to get my sandwich and go home 'cause I'd just gotten off work and I was tired and starving. Instead I had to listen to a long and involved rant about Lebanon and Israel and how Crazy wants to join the Israeli army and if he ever finds out that he's dying of some terminal disease he's just going to say goodbye to his friends right away and then join the army (any army, apparently) so he can go out fighting, and how he's too scared to travel anywhere outside the US in case something happens and he gets stuck in a foreign country for life, and how if Syria gets involved in this current conflict then so will Russia and then I believe he actually used the phrases, "a battle between good and evil" and "we'll meet our Maker." Oh, and he also told me that he heard that anytime 20% of a country becomes Muslim ("And not good Muslims, those crazy bad kind of Muslims" was his exact phrasing, I believe) then they are required by some mandate to overthrow the government of said country and take over. He claims that this is on the verge of happening in France and told me, "So when France goes under in the next five years, just remember you heard it here first!" Got that, people? You heard it here first.
Where do these people come from? Seriously.
While we're on the topic of crazy (again) they're repairing the roof on my apartment building. They started on my building yesterday and should be done tomorrow, hopefully. I was worried that the hammering would be really annoying, but it actually isn't bad at all as long as I'm inside. I suppose it helps that I live on the first floor and we have really high ceilings in these apartments so there's quite a bit of space between me and where all the actual hammering is going on. The crazy part is that the workers just chuck things off the roof. It seems as though they're at least moving the old shingles off the roof in big piles and using a crane-type thing to do it instead of just throwing them off the roof. But the packaging for the new shingles? That just gets tossed off the roof. As does the tar paper-y stuff they're using (I know nothing about roofing materials, obviously), as do soda cans and water bottles. Every time I take Cohen outside now I'm afraid I'm about to get clunked in the head. I don't think the stuff being thrown off my roof is anything that's going to kill me, but if I get hit in the head by a soda can you can bet someone's gonna hear about it anyway.
Since I haven't killed quite enough time yet, I leave you with this:
5 Things always in my purse:
1. Wallet
2. Keys
3. Cell phone
4. Lip gloss
That's it, actually. Those are the only four things I always have to have with me. Which is why I don't even carry a purse half the time since that's all just pocketable (especially if I just carry cash and my ID and ditch the wallet).
5 Things always in my wallet:
1. Debit card.
2. Drivers license.
3. PetsMart PetPerks card
4. Student ID (in case of discount opportunities, not because I've ever once had to show anyone my ID the entire year I've been going to school here)
5. Miniature copy of the U.S. Constitution ('cause you just never know when that might come in very handy...actually, I have no idea why I even have this, I just now noticed it's in my wallet)
5 Things always in my refrigerator:
1. Milk
2. Polish dill pickles (it is absolutely imperative that they be Polish-style)
3. Pitcher of Crystal Light (any flavor)
4. Coke (usually the little 100-calorie cans nowadays)
5. Bread
5 Things always in my closet:
1. Pop-up laundry hamper
2. Black pants
3. Flip-flops
4. Jeans
5. Sewing kit
5 Things always in my car:
1. The little thingamajiggy that lets me dock my mp3 player and listen to it through my car stereo
2. Paper clip (in case of an mp3 player malfunction-the paper clip resets it)
3. Sunshade
4. Ice scraper (which has been used all of three times in my whole driving life so far, but my dad insists)
5. Cohen's seat belt (Yes, the dog wears a seat belt when he's riding in the car. Be quiet.)
5 Things always on my desk:
1. Desk lamp
2. Horned frog paperweight
3. Cup full of an insane amount of pens and pencils
4. Picture frame with "artistic" black and white pictures of Cohen and Jose
5. Laptop (unless I'm on the couch and it's on my lap, which is often the case)
5 people I wish I still hung out with:
1. Matt from the Bass
2. Kirby-licious
3. Mariana
4. Dave
5. Leah
And way too many others to list here...
5 pieces of clothing I can't live without:
1. The huge blue cashmere sweater I got from Shane when he decided it was "too gay"
2. My little black dress (which will now forever be known as the "Snake Dance dress". Haha)
3. Soft jeans
4. My green suede blazer
5. The "pirate" shirt I got at H&M (that actually looks nothing like a pirate shirt at all)
5 sentimental things I'll never throw away:
1. Every single journal I've ever kept (realize that from 8th grade on these journals consist of an entry for every. single. day. That's some incredibly valuable totally humiliating stuff!)
2. The document in my closet entitled The Quotes Pages, Theatre TCU, Fall 2001-Spring 2005: Four Years of Friendship Summarized in Thirty Pages of Sometimes Witty and Always Ridiculous Quotes
3. Certain letters and drawings from Mike
4. The book Kymberli gave me detailing the 500 reasons why we're best friends
5. All the ridiculous notes Cassie and I wrote to each other in middle and high school because if the past ten years are any indication, those will never, ever stop being funny.
5 phone numbers I have memorized:
1. My home in El Paso
2. My dad's cell phone
3. The eastside Hudson's
4. Mike's cell phone
5. Kymberli's cell phone
Sadly, I think these are literally the ONLY five phone numbers I have memorized. Oh, wait, I do know Katy's cell phone number. And that's literally it. If I ever lost the numbers in my cell phone I'd be screwed. I don't even know my own sister's phone number!
5 songs I'll love forever:
1. Dave Matthew's Band-Crash. The entire album.
2. Pure Prairie League-Amie
3. Usher, Ludacris, Lil' John-Yeah
4. Madonna-Like A Prayer
5. Rent-La Vie Boheme
5 places I have fond memories of:
1. "The hump" back at good ol' Hanks High
2. The University Pub
3. The cabin in Ruidoso
4. The flats we shared on Hatton Garden in London
5. Rome
5 terrible things I've done:
1. Let Mike fool around with me with the full knowledge that he had a girlfriend at the time.
2. Spent the spring semester of 2005 focusing much, MUCH more on drinking than on student teaching (I still maintain that this was actually a very, very fun thing to do, and I definitely don't regret it, but it definitely wasn't the right thing to do)
3. Let a friend drive his own car knowing full well that he was way too drunk to be driving (I'm still very grateful he's not dead and I still think that his DUI was partially my fault)
4. Forced way, way too many guys to "lose interest" in me by never returning their phone calls instead of just being brave and politely explaining that I wasn't really interested.
5. Attempted to convince myself that I need a boyfriend to be completely happy.
5 scents that bring back the memories:
1. Coconut Lime Verbena shower gel
2. Moonlit Path body splash
3. Polo Sport
4. That indescribable "Grandma's house" smell that I just know whenever I happen to catch it somewhere else
5. That dusty smell when the AC is turned on for the first time after being off all winter
5 things I have hanging on the wall:
1. A painting of Times Square on a rainy night that I got at the Main Street Arts Festival in Fort Worth
2. Album covers from South Pacific, My Fair Lady, A Chorus Line, and Anything Goes
3. My signed Jane's Addiction poster
4. My Pope Innocent III action figure
5. A package of sidewalk chalk in the shape of various vegetables with googly eyes
5 things I'll never regret:
1. Dating and loving Mike
2. Moving to Fort Worth anyway
3. Everything that a person with stricter morals would say I SHOULD regret about college
4. Choosing to study theatre (Even if for some reason I ultimately end up having a career in something completely different, I'll never regret that I studied theatre in college. I can't imagine that any other subject could have been as interesting as this one has been, and I absolutely wouldn't have met such fun, funny, beautiful, and fascinating people in any other field)
5. Begging for a basset hound.
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Fore!
So, I met a crazy man at the river today. It was the middle of the day and it was about a million degrees outside so after we finished our walk/jog around the park (significantly shorter than usual 'cause it's a million degrees outside), I had Cohen down in the river. He and I were both wading and I was trying to convince him to actually swim out to me when Crazy Guy rode up on his bicycle. Crazy Guy proceeded to lie his bicycle down right by the bend in the river where Cohen and I were wading, and he pulled out a cigarette and began to smoke. Clearly, Crazy Guy was not biking for exercise. Crazy Guy was missing most of his front teeth and was wearing a stained shirt but otherwise seemed fairly clean and had obviously recently had a haircut. Crazy Guy had several yards of barbed wire (a spool of barbed wire? A lasso of barbed wire? A circle of barbed wire?) hanging over his shoulder.
Crazy Guy: He doesn't like the water?
Me: He likes wading, he just doesn't like to swim. And he only goes in when it's really hot out.
Crazy Guy: I'm pretty much the same way. This is a pretty good place to come swim. At night. You just have to watch out for the water mocassins. Especially at night.
Me: Oh, yeah. Those water mocassins are bad news.
[I turn my back to Crazy Guy and focus on Cohen, hoping that now that we've exchanged friendly neighborly pleasantries he'll go on his way.]
Crazy Guy: I make barbed wire crosses.
Me: Oh, so you're out here collecting barbed wire. [Still just sort of smiling and nodding absently, hoping he'll get the hint and go on his way but not wanting to be rude about giving him the hint.]
Crazy Guy: Oh no. I got this at the consignment shop. The lady lets me keep my barbed wire there, 'cause I made her some barbed wire crosses to sell. I'm actually looking for some people I know who are supposed to be here at the river today. They wanted some crosses and I said I'd make one in front of them 'cause they want to see how I do it. It only takes me a few minutes, and then I charge between five and fifteen dollars. Whatever you can afford, really. 'Cause it's not about the money. It's just about keeping myself afloat until I can get out on the oil rig again.
Me: Well, that's good...
Crazy Guy: Yup, I'm next in line to go out to the oil fields in [someplace I couldn't understand]. So that's what I'm waiting for. I go see my sponsor every day!
Me: That's good.
Crazy Guy: He helps me out a lot. And my church has been very helpful. The First Baptist Church? They always help me find people that want to buy my crosses. I'm just keeping my head above water 'til I can get back to the oil field. All I need is a pack of cigarettes and the three dollar buffet at Valentino's. That's pretty good.
Me: Well, good luck.
Crazy Guy: I guess I'll go find those people now?
Me: Yeah.
I couldn't decide what he wanted. I couldn't decide if he was wanting me to buy a cross, or wanting me to try his church, or just wanting to have a conversation. I suppose in writing it doesn't seem all that crazy. But a) his manner of speaking was just sort of strange, b) are these things a normal person would tell a total stranger who clearly isn't all that interested in having a conversation in the first place? and c) can we agree that making barbed wire crosses is kind of a creepy hobby?
So there's that. This evening I went to the driving range with Mandi and Jason. Mandi sent me a text this morning that said, "Let's go to the driving range this afternoon and then go get beer and wings." I was a bit confused by the fact that my younger brother and Mandi apparently switched brains and personalities in the middle of the night, but I'm always down with doing different things and the driving range is definitely not one of our usual spots. Mandi is gonna go golfing with Jason and a couple of his friends tomorrow so she wanted to practice (considering she's only ever been to the driving range once before) and since I haven't touched a golf club in about 9 years we figured we could go out there and make fools of ourselves together. And actually, it was a lot of fun! After about half an hour of hitting balls I finally managed to start actually hitting some of them into the air. Well, okay, first I started hitting the ball, period. Then I started hitting them into the air, and then finally I actually started getting some decent drives. Mandi got a few good drives in there, too. Other than the fact that it was a million degrees outside (still) it was a really enjoyable afternoon. The beer and wings afterward helped, of course.
While we were hanging out drinking and having our wings after Golf Fest 2006, Mandi turned to Jason and said, "Ashley says words in everyday conversation that I don't even use in my papers." And I know she was saying it in a good-natured way and not even to tease me, but it got me thinking. Am I that really obnoxious person that seems all pretentious because I use "SAT words" in everyday conversation? I REALLY don't want to be that person. Because I've had conversations with that person, and that person sucks. Honestly, I don't do it on purpose. I don't even notice that I do it until someone points it out to me (and Mandi is not the first person to point it out; Kymberli has said the same thing, as have others). I do have a bigger vocabulary than most, I suppose. Considering my only real hobby is reading (and writing, but mostly reading), it makes sense that I have a pretty large vocabulary.
But I don't talk any differently than I write in this blog, and I don't think this blog makes me sound particularly intelligent. I don't even use proper sentence structure 70% of the time. And yet Mandi is a fellow grad student. She's a "smart kid". And here she is telling me that I sometimes use words in everyday conversation that she'd never think to use. So I can't help but worry that I must come across as really pretentious to a lot of the people I come into contact with on a daily basis. And that makes me sad, because I swear it's not intentional. I can't help it, that's just how I talk! Now I'm suddenly thinking that I should be more forgiving of all those people that I accuse of using big words just to seem impressive. Maybe they're not doing it on purpose, either.
Then again, I refuse to dumb myself down. The truth is, if you can't keep up with me I'd rather not have you as a friend. That may sound harsh, but it's true. I'm ultimately looking for friendships and relationships with people that I feel can carry on funny, interesting, and intelligent conversations. If my manner of speaking automatically weeds out certain people, well, maybe that's for the best. And that's certainly not to say you have to understand every single thing that comes out of my mouth the first time I say it, or talk like I do. I may say, "and then the conversation progressed" instead of "the conversation went on", but YOU don't have to say that. (In fact, don't say that. It's kind of retarded. But yeah, that is in fact something that came out of my mouth tonight, for example). Sure, some of my friends regularly say things far more brilliant than anything that would ever come out of my mouth. And yet some of my best friends in the world are the people that will say to me, "Hey, that word you just used? What the hell does that even mean?" And I love all of them equally. It's fine either way.
Crazy Guy: He doesn't like the water?
Me: He likes wading, he just doesn't like to swim. And he only goes in when it's really hot out.
Crazy Guy: I'm pretty much the same way. This is a pretty good place to come swim. At night. You just have to watch out for the water mocassins. Especially at night.
Me: Oh, yeah. Those water mocassins are bad news.
[I turn my back to Crazy Guy and focus on Cohen, hoping that now that we've exchanged friendly neighborly pleasantries he'll go on his way.]
Crazy Guy: I make barbed wire crosses.
Me: Oh, so you're out here collecting barbed wire. [Still just sort of smiling and nodding absently, hoping he'll get the hint and go on his way but not wanting to be rude about giving him the hint.]
Crazy Guy: Oh no. I got this at the consignment shop. The lady lets me keep my barbed wire there, 'cause I made her some barbed wire crosses to sell. I'm actually looking for some people I know who are supposed to be here at the river today. They wanted some crosses and I said I'd make one in front of them 'cause they want to see how I do it. It only takes me a few minutes, and then I charge between five and fifteen dollars. Whatever you can afford, really. 'Cause it's not about the money. It's just about keeping myself afloat until I can get out on the oil rig again.
Me: Well, that's good...
Crazy Guy: Yup, I'm next in line to go out to the oil fields in [someplace I couldn't understand]. So that's what I'm waiting for. I go see my sponsor every day!
Me: That's good.
Crazy Guy: He helps me out a lot. And my church has been very helpful. The First Baptist Church? They always help me find people that want to buy my crosses. I'm just keeping my head above water 'til I can get back to the oil field. All I need is a pack of cigarettes and the three dollar buffet at Valentino's. That's pretty good.
Me: Well, good luck.
Crazy Guy: I guess I'll go find those people now?
Me: Yeah.
I couldn't decide what he wanted. I couldn't decide if he was wanting me to buy a cross, or wanting me to try his church, or just wanting to have a conversation. I suppose in writing it doesn't seem all that crazy. But a) his manner of speaking was just sort of strange, b) are these things a normal person would tell a total stranger who clearly isn't all that interested in having a conversation in the first place? and c) can we agree that making barbed wire crosses is kind of a creepy hobby?
So there's that. This evening I went to the driving range with Mandi and Jason. Mandi sent me a text this morning that said, "Let's go to the driving range this afternoon and then go get beer and wings." I was a bit confused by the fact that my younger brother and Mandi apparently switched brains and personalities in the middle of the night, but I'm always down with doing different things and the driving range is definitely not one of our usual spots. Mandi is gonna go golfing with Jason and a couple of his friends tomorrow so she wanted to practice (considering she's only ever been to the driving range once before) and since I haven't touched a golf club in about 9 years we figured we could go out there and make fools of ourselves together. And actually, it was a lot of fun! After about half an hour of hitting balls I finally managed to start actually hitting some of them into the air. Well, okay, first I started hitting the ball, period. Then I started hitting them into the air, and then finally I actually started getting some decent drives. Mandi got a few good drives in there, too. Other than the fact that it was a million degrees outside (still) it was a really enjoyable afternoon. The beer and wings afterward helped, of course.
While we were hanging out drinking and having our wings after Golf Fest 2006, Mandi turned to Jason and said, "Ashley says words in everyday conversation that I don't even use in my papers." And I know she was saying it in a good-natured way and not even to tease me, but it got me thinking. Am I that really obnoxious person that seems all pretentious because I use "SAT words" in everyday conversation? I REALLY don't want to be that person. Because I've had conversations with that person, and that person sucks. Honestly, I don't do it on purpose. I don't even notice that I do it until someone points it out to me (and Mandi is not the first person to point it out; Kymberli has said the same thing, as have others). I do have a bigger vocabulary than most, I suppose. Considering my only real hobby is reading (and writing, but mostly reading), it makes sense that I have a pretty large vocabulary.
But I don't talk any differently than I write in this blog, and I don't think this blog makes me sound particularly intelligent. I don't even use proper sentence structure 70% of the time. And yet Mandi is a fellow grad student. She's a "smart kid". And here she is telling me that I sometimes use words in everyday conversation that she'd never think to use. So I can't help but worry that I must come across as really pretentious to a lot of the people I come into contact with on a daily basis. And that makes me sad, because I swear it's not intentional. I can't help it, that's just how I talk! Now I'm suddenly thinking that I should be more forgiving of all those people that I accuse of using big words just to seem impressive. Maybe they're not doing it on purpose, either.
Then again, I refuse to dumb myself down. The truth is, if you can't keep up with me I'd rather not have you as a friend. That may sound harsh, but it's true. I'm ultimately looking for friendships and relationships with people that I feel can carry on funny, interesting, and intelligent conversations. If my manner of speaking automatically weeds out certain people, well, maybe that's for the best. And that's certainly not to say you have to understand every single thing that comes out of my mouth the first time I say it, or talk like I do. I may say, "and then the conversation progressed" instead of "the conversation went on", but YOU don't have to say that. (In fact, don't say that. It's kind of retarded. But yeah, that is in fact something that came out of my mouth tonight, for example). Sure, some of my friends regularly say things far more brilliant than anything that would ever come out of my mouth. And yet some of my best friends in the world are the people that will say to me, "Hey, that word you just used? What the hell does that even mean?" And I love all of them equally. It's fine either way.
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