Some silver harmony that makes its way back now...

A week that began with more promise than I’ve felt in a while has run out of gas and plummeted back to earth and with it brought the crash of reality.

I misplaced a gas bill, only to find it this morning, along with the notice that I will be disconnected tomorrow. This really isn’t THAT big of a deal since I use gas only for my furnace, but it looks horrible on a credit report and just adds to an already sickening feeling I have regarding my finances. I keep telling myself (and others) that it’s just money and that I’ll be fine; my savings isn’t gone yet. But the reality is that when it is, that’s all I got and then I have no other choice but to leave.

The reunion was short-lived. On Thursday, it’s all hugs and flirting and saying all the shit you used to say and mean (brought on by the drinks you drank all that day, apparently). On Friday, it’s a short hello and saying everything that negates what you had previously said. On Sunday, it was another blow-off. And that was it until about 10 minutes ago, when I missed your call. Called right back, got no answer.

Other, smaller things that just add to the pile. Kindling.

I went to bed last night sitting on the news of Andrea King’s passing. At that point, I had no detail, just the fact that she had died. A life cut short is always tragic and a bit of a shock, and I tend to immediately think ’car accident’ when it happens. I slept fitfully and uncomfortably, toohotoocoldtoohot, and upon waking up this morning, started my day with a gushing nosebleed. The kind you get when you get punched in the face. Finally talked to Martha and found out it wasn’t a car accident. Not that her death would be any less sad had it been through some misfortunate circumstance, but knowing that she felt she had no other escape from her pain adds a different sort of ache to it all.


Andrea. Age 24. I met her through Martha a couple years ago. We weren’t super-close friends, but we were friends. Since I started school again I became scarce around town, only going out for certain pre-ordained events like trivia or shows I didn’t want to miss. I quit calling people to see if they wanted to hang out (partially due to having things to do, but also partially due to the fact that it seems every time I do call people they are busy anyway- most of the people I know have very one-sided availability, and in turn I became the same way, only hanging out when someone called me). So it turned into we only saw each other when we ran into each other downtown. Always with promises on both sides of "Yeah, let’s hang out!" "We’ll get dinner, etc." "Give me a call!/I’ll call you!"... and I kept meaning to. But I didn’t. And now I really wish I had because I’ve lost that chance. I know that those little things do have the ability to either break a person or keep them afloat, and I can’t help but think that by just calling her up once in a while I could have helped to prevent this. I didn’t know she was hurting. And I know everyone always says they didn’t see it coming, but maybe I didn’t see it because I wasn’t around enough to notice. Which makes me really really sad.

To Andrea: You are such a great lady! I’m going to miss seeing you around town and getting updates on your newest tattoos. I’ll miss drinking beers and talking about hair dye and animals. I’m sorry you weren’t happy, and I hope that you have found peace. You will be missed by many.

This guy cracks me up

Georgia needs more fans like this. Maybe it would have helped them get further than one game. (let it play through a couple times to get the streaming down; it’s better at real speed)



Kinda chilly outside today.

I’m on ’spring break’ right now. Though without a job, I have nothing to do and am too broke to go anywhere. So I guess I’ll devote this time to trying to FIND a job. If I don’t find something soon (or find a cool roommate with few belongings willing to live in a little bedroom in a little house with 3 cats...), well, I have about 2 or 3 months of reserves and after that, adios Athens. I will do what I can to make it to the end of the next quarter in school though, so that if I take off for a while I can come back and finish next year, because I really want to finish this program.

Why do you keep reentering my life (and not just simply reentering which is fine, but reentering and saything the things you do) when I am ready to just get on with it? Do you have radar or something? I’m not doing things that way again. If you really mean half the shit you (pussyfoot around and vaguely) say, you should be able to tell me to my face and act that way too. "Why does it have to be called something? Why does it have to have labels?"? Because if you can’t even say it to me, you’ll never acknowledge anything to the outside world, which is a little bit important to me. And as I’ve said before, if you can’t actually say it to me, then it’s not what you want.

I had already written all this crap once- Myspace ate it.

My tragus piercing is revolting against me out of nowhere. I guess it got snagged on something last week and tore a little... I didn’t notice until it was a little inflammed on Friday. I woke up yesterday morning, and the thing was so swollen it looked like someone had snuck into my house and implanted a red marble on the side of my head. And it hurts. After doing everything you aren’t supposed to do to a piercing (hydrogen peroxide and antibiotic ointment), the swelling has gone down considerably. It’s still gross though. I’m considering taking it out, but don’t want any wierd scar tissue, so I’ll probably see if it’ll heal up.

Yeah. That’s about all.

What not to do with your facial hair.

The full beard? Sure. Five o’clock shadow/day-old scruff? Can be pretty hot on the right guy. Goatee? Go for it. Just a moustache? Doable. Soul patch? Eh... I can deal I guess.

But the Face Pube Landing Strip? NO.

Thank God For Dead-Brained Extremist Whackos!

Ok, I know I’ve gone blog-happy this week, and I wasn’t going to post another one for a few days to give you all a break, but I saw this and it really pissed me off. I guess they ran out of dead soldiers and actors to picket.
Now I’m the kind of person that even if I don’t like you, I’m not usually going to wish bad things upon you, other than maybe a mild case of dysentery or chronic acne. But I would not be sad in the least if something were to happen to obliterate these people from Earth. And send their self-righteous, hatemongering, narrow-minded, probably-inbred, neon-sign-loving, bullshit-spewing, and plain ugly asses straight to Hell.

Westboro Baptist Church
Seriously. These people suck.


Edit: I wonder what they’d have to say about the ad that was on my homepage:

And so we disconnect, the room grows quiet around us.

Background:    about 6 weeks ago, some shit went down where I behaved poorly and said some not-nice things I didn’t mean to someone, leading to a complete falling out. Subsequently, over the following weeks it gnawed at me, and I felt more awful about it each day, and though fully realizing that it most likely wouldn’t change the outcome, I decided to clear the air a bit. Seeing as how calling was not an option anymore (plus my words work better in writing), I sent a sincere and well-thought-out email containing an acknowledgement of and apology for my bad behavior. I then sent a text message requesting that this particular email be read.

Fast Forward to Now:    Yesterday I received a text which started a small dialogue, beginning with an attack on why I was "trying to send [them] messages". I repeated my request for that email to be read- basically a do-this-last-thing-for-me-and-then-I’ll-be-on-my-way response. This was met with an inquiry on if I just wanted to meet up and talk. I said ’read the email first, please’, gave my reasons why, and said I’d meet up if requested to after. The next text said "just fucken meet me".
   Up to now, it’s not really a negative dialogue; not a postive one really and a little redundant, but nothing to even really think about later. At this point, it’s around 12:40am, and I am at a friend’s house in Watkinsville studying with a group of girls for a lab final we had today. We left to go to Waffle House for a bit, and when we got back to her house, I checked my phone and saw that last ’meet me’ text. Though it was about 2 hours later (around 2:50am), texts are not usually invasive, so I replied that I’d meet if they wanted but after they read the email. I got an immediate response saying "one of us is gonna hafta budge...", so naturally I responded by saying that I always budged and once again asking that they do me this favor just this once and just read my email, considering they sent me their fair share of them and I didn’t ignore them. I accidentally sent it early, so I sent another directly following saying that technically no one has to budge, but I’ve already made the first move so it’s your turn. While writing these, I receive two texts that I don’t look at until later. This is where something happened.
    I don’t believe that I’ve said anything wrong or mean or shady up to this point. The two texts I got ended the ’conversation’ because I abandoned my phone and didn’t see them until close to 4:30am, and wasn’t going to bother responding then since the other party would by now for sure be asleep. When I first read them, they didn’t seem to make much sense, probably because I really wanted to sleep, but I didn’t take them in a negative manner, though the last one seemed a little like I was being challenged. At this point, I actually felt a little more positive about the situation since there was at least a dialogue in place that didn’t include name-calling or mud-slinging.
    So today:   I go to school. I take two exams. I come home. I send a general text just in response to the last two I got last night, so it wouldn’t look like I was ignoring them. Commented on the tone of the last text, then just said I didn’t respond since I didn’t see the messages until so late, blah blah, took some tests now for a nap.
   Three hours later, I get this: "Considering that I have barely said a word to you in over two months, you sure have been trying to talk to me lately." (first off, it hasn’t been over 2 months since this happened, except that the reason for the blowup was me getting pissed at being blown off so I suppose it’s true in that respect) What??? Get off your high horse. I just responded to the texts sent to me. Yes, I sent that email along with a request that it actually be read, but it wasn’t me "trying to talk to" them, it was an apology for being a raging bitch six weeks back. That’s pretty much it.
   So now I think about it, because this statement is a bit of a slap for more than one reason, and go back to the last 2 texts from the night before that I’d only glanced at and realize that maybe I misinterpreted them and they are not positive in the least but are accusatory and even a little threatening. I just don’t see where the switchover came from ’just meet me’ to these.
   1) "Every time my phone goes off and it is your name, it makes me want to come over there and see what is up. Because this is not working. Whatever ’this’ is." 
   This came 15 minutes after ’someones gotta budge’. Every time your phone goes off? It’s going off because I’m RESPONDING to your last text. WTF? I didn’t just send random texts all damn night for no reason- I had better shit to do, like learning for my anatomy test. And I’m not ’up to’ anything, nor did I think that ’this’ would work to acheive my non-existant plan. I don’t know what ’this’ is either. Even if I was up to something, it’d be a waste of time. I know that nothing works on you anyway because you are selfish, which you said yourself.
    2) 20 minutes later (with no response by me to 1): "I hope not to keep you up(?), but I have ignored you enough tonight. Next time my phone wakes me, I am bangin’ on your door. Your call."
     Smart-ass. You knew you weren’t keeping me up because I had already mentioned the all-night study session. And you weren’t ignoring me because you responded to my messages, which is also why I assumed you were awake. To keep me from waking you with an answer to your last message, all you had to do was A) not respond or B) say you were sleeping. I wasn’t trying to keep waking you up. And what if I’d sent a message back? You’re going to come banging on my door? And do what?
    Now maybe the text I got today just got me all defensive and I’m still misreading those statements. But still. All of this because I wanted to be a decent human being, and sent an email basically saying that I did not want to be the person I briefly became, I was ashamed for treating someone I cared about so horribly, and that I was truly sorry for what I said, along with a goodwill offer of "you wanna talk again, cool, give me a call- I’ll be around; or if not, I understand and have a good life".
   This is the type of thing that makes me want to not even bother with people anymore. Even when trying to do something right or good, everything gets all screwy.

To round out my day:
  -My head is killing me from lack of sleep.
  -I didn’t do as well on the exams as I wanted to or should have: I kept second-guessing myself and know of at least three answers I changed when my first gut-answer was actually correct.
  -I left my calculator in my old backpack, which on a chemistry test made up entirely of using gas law formulas/equations to solve volume, pressure, moles, or temperature of gases really comes in handy.
  -Joe puked on my pillow.

Time for bed. Sorry for the length.

Things I Would Rather Be Doing.

-Housework. Even folding my clothes, which is my least liked chore.
-Bowling, as was mentioned in a text earlier today.
-Drinking beer. That’s a no-brainer...
-Reading the book I borrowed from Matt back in December so I can give it back sometime soon.
-Finishing copying the Looney Toons dvds (I’m a pirate, arrrr!) I borrowed from Matt in early February so I can give them back sometime soon.
-Eating dinner. That isn’t made up by broken cookies given to me by the cafeteria lady at Athens Tech.
-Going to see Built to Spill in Atlanta tonight. This should be number 1 on this list.
-Sleeping. Also a no-brainer.
-Any other myriad of things...

But instead I’m studying for a lab practical and a chemistry exam I have tomorrow. Chem test should be easy as pie, as long as I can remember the equations. Lab practical has me a little apprehensive, but I think I’ll get at least a B. I just sort of slacked on learning the GI and urinary and reproductive tracts so I’m afriad they’ll want me to identify something I can’t remember.

Which reminds me- on Tuesday we had our last anatomy lab, and it was a necropsy lab. Autopsy for animals, really. It was definitely something I’d never seen, and I wouldn’t recommend it for those who have a weak stomach. The blood-and-guts don’t bother me much, but man, innards (or rather their contents) REEK. Digging around looking for kidneys and vas deferens in a tom cat with a full bladder doesn’t smell like roses. Nor does the gallbladder. Also, seeing how easy it is to disarticulate an animal’s head was a little weird. The dog we watched being necropsied was an older spayed female. She had all sorts of problems including a grossly bulging eye, tapeworms, a malformed liver, a very enlarged kidney, and an adrenal gland that was all tumor. Pretty neat. If I could get past the smell, I might be interested in this area.

count your blemishes, you can't, they're all gone

Being so used to getting up early these days, I find I can't sleep past 10am no matter how badly I want to (unless I'm really hungover...). Today not being the case, I just wanted to lounge in bed for a while since it's all cold and overcast and windy and sort of snowing outside. I had kitties to cuddle with, but my eyes were not going to cooperate. So if it gets even marginally nicer outside, meaning without precipitation, I'll probably go get a haircut even though I can't afford it. I've been participating in other things I can't afford recently too that I don't need, so since I've lost all patience with the mop on my head I feel I can justify it just a little bit.
How to interpret a blank piece of paper? On one hand, it is a tangible response. On the other, it is a non-response because it's a response that says nothing. Is it "It's cool" or "It's not cool, I have nothing to say to you?". I'll play it safe and go with answer B.

Grrrr. I tried to open my iTunes on my laptop the other day, but I forgot to plug in my little portable external hard drive, which is where I keep the music files. It messed up the database file, so now when I open iTunes it's blank. Which means I lost all my trivia playlists too. I have to reimport everything (luckily just the song info/location, not the actual songs), which takes 10 years. Ok, that's an exaggeration, but it does take about 45 minutes. And then I'll have to rebuild the trivia shit because those songs have to be specific in length... Boo, hiss.

Even though it's really strange and I never thought about it working out this way, I'm an aunt now. I figured I'd have kids before my brother did, considering he's 10 years younger than me. But oops. I know most people offer a "Congrats!" upon the birth of a child, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't fit in this situation what with that they're both kids themselves (she's 15), and it's been nothing but non-stop drama and angst for my mother. I hadn't talked to her since Christmas, so I called the other night. The baby was born in mid-February, and this was the first I'd heard of it. I think she's partially in denial that this baby is in fact her grandchild, because when I asked her what it was named she responded, "Oh, Mallory something...".

Ok, the weather is freaking me out a bit. It's windy as hell, and right now it's super sunny at my house. But I'm looking out the window and the darkest grey clouds EVER are moving this way. As long as it doesn't rain lizards or anvils I'll be ok.

I read in the Athens Banner Herald- such a fine newspaper it is- that Mark Richt received an $800,000 per year salary increase, bringing his annual pay to $2.8 million. I know he's done good things for the program, and I did spend enough time at UGA (in the Redcoats no less) to like college football and all, but it blows my mind that just his pay raise equals the median yearly income for 26 Athens residents combined (The 2006 estimate being 30,500 per year). Which 'median' isn't really representative when you're talking about a city in which 14% of families and 30% of individuals have earnings that fall below the poverty line. As I said before, I'm not saying he doesn't deserve a raise and I'm not getting all advocate and that, but comparing his income to mine, well, I could probably find my yearly income in his couch cushions.

Anyone going to see either Man Man or the Effie's show tonight? I want to do both, but that requires cover charges for both which ain't happening... so if cool people are going to one or the other than that's the one I'll pick. I'm not opposed to going to shows alone, but it is just more fun with others (and will help me make up my mind).

Proof that college is worth nothing these days

So, I've been really trying to avoid working in a restaurant again. I've applied for lots and lots of job-jobs, and have been depressingly unsuccessful thus far. But, this one really kills me. To the point that I'm giving up. This is the job I applied for:
Title: HIM I - 2ND/3RD SHIFT

Summary: reconciles and assembles all discharged records against his discharge report. scans emergency department and outpatient records. prepares charts for scanning, matching batch header sheets. ensures that all chart requests are processed as requested. all next day surgeries are pulled timely and the chart locator report is accurate. (18918) (15-Feb-2008)

Hours: friday and saturday, 10:30p-7a.m 16 hours

Skills: basic computer skills.

Experience: none

Education: high school diploma or ged

Licensure:

Classification: tech-pro
And this is the result:
The following actions have been taken regarding your application(s) for employment.

HIM I - 2ND 3RD SHIFT

03-Mar-2008 Your application has been reviewed and you do not meet the minimum qualifications for this position.

02-Mar-2008 Your application is being reviewed by HR personnel.

 

 

 

I do not meet the minimum qualifications, which are 1) Be partially literate; 2) Be human; and 3) Be breathing. Let's see... I have a college degree, at least a slightly above-average IQ, and it's obvious I have basic computer skills because I managed to submit an online application. AND I spelled everything correctly and used proper punctuation, which is more than I can say for whoever it was that wrote the application and job description blurbs.

 

So there we are. Watch now as I decend into Minimun Wage Hell once more.

 

 

P.S. Now that I'm broke, I'm selling some shit on Craigslist. If you, or someone you know, might want a Tascam 4-track recorder, a Roland D-5 synthesizer, or a Yamaha digital sequencer, hit me up.

Just because it works doesn't mean it's not broken

Dear neighbors with that Rock Band video game:
   Please refrain from playing said game at full volume at 3:30 am. I know it was a Saturday night, but I'm a dork now (?) and go to bed early. Usually I would have been able to ignore it and go back to sleep, but your rendition of "Roxanne" was really just too much to handle. Not to mention that you followed that up with promptly getting "booed off stage" with your versions of "My Sharona", "Blitzkrieg Bop", "Four Dead in Ohio" and "Creep". I hope you aren't planning on auditioning for American Idol any time soon, because that Simon guy will have an absolute heyday with you, and I don't want to listen to you cry either. Thanks.

Other things I can't get my mind off of. Some I should. Some that would be best for me to forget about. It seems what with everything else sort of sucking right now, it makes it harder to move on in other aspects. Too much at once, maybe. Tends to make everything stop. Sigh.

Another being struck with the paranoia that I'd possibly walked on past a dead woman. Pretty irrational when you think of it. I left ERC last night a little before 9 pm, and on my way out, I almost hit a woman in the head with the door. She had been sitting on the steps, and now was laying back and appeared to be sleeping. Upon passing her, I thought "Oh, she's taking a nap. Glad I didn't hit her with the door". I guess this is because I've seen lots of people nap in unconventional places downtown (usually during the day in nice weather, bums excluded). It didn't strike me as odd until I got home when I started thinking maybe I should have checked on her. I just hope I'm being a worrier and nothing more. I thought about a time when a classmate of mine 'fell asleep' at a recital, and everyone left him there after. I nudged him and he didn't budge, and mentioned it to a worker in the lobby. Turned out he had slipped into unconsciousness due to a diabetic complication and wasn't far from a full-fledged coma. Paramedics were called, he was fine... but if someone hadn't gone back to check, he'd be dead. Once I was awake from the neighbors, this woman was one of the things tumbling through my head. It took me 2 hours to go back to sleep...

Why are people so hell-bent on hurting each other? Particularly women... they seem to always have it out for other women. Spoke with a friend about this today. She was recently the victim of a mutiny at her place of employment. She had done nothing wrong... it was simply other women being evil backstabbing bitches. All I know is I could use all the friends I can get, and I don't really understand the hidden hatred some women possess. I'm not saying I haven't fallen into a bit of it myself, but I will say that when I have there were outside factors contributing to my bad behavior, and I never felt good about it later. Same with grudges. I just don't see the point, or rather they don't work for me. Sometimes as much as I think someone may be worth me really disliking or holding a grudge, with time it just makes me sadder.

My newest source of entertainment: Craigslist. The shit people post there is insane. Particularly in the personals section. Do people actually respond to that crap??

Well, since I have no food here, and I must study for a test I have tomorrow, I think it's off to Transmet for me. Leaving the house is the only thing that will make me get off the computer or stop doing laundry or leave my cats alone or not read that other non-school book or not watch those movies... you get the point.

The moments that make up a dull day

Theme for this past week: Liver destruction. It regenerates, right?

In an attempt to somwhow make myself feel better about my current place in life, I've reverted to some old self-destructive/self-satisfying tendencies. Nothing too bad, but hollow just the same. There will be no lasting connections, if anything because I will purposely drift off or make myself completely unavailable whether I really want to do so or not. Partially because that is just how I am, and partially because I really just don't want to go there right now.

Kind of going along with the above, what I keep thinking will help me move on isn't. At the end of the day, after everything else, my thoughts always return to one person. Pointless, I know, for many reasons. It's just too late. Out of sight, out of mind... not true. I'm sure at this point, and under the circumstances of the parting, it's a one-sided problem.

I was supposed to have registered and paid for next quarter by 3:30 pm yesterday. I didn't. I'll have to do late registration if I can get my ducks in a row. If not...

Finally a nice day that's not just nice looking from the inside. That cold snap earlier this week was no fun. My little Weatherbug tells me the forecast for Monday is highs in the lower 70s. Yay!

I really want to go to Six Flags this year. Every year, there will be a group of people who are all about it, but then it never happens. I need a roller coaster fix. It's been way too long! Also some trips down the Broad River are in order. I didn't go once last year, though I bet it wasn't great with water levels being so low. I'm thinking that listening to your boat scrape the river bed for 4 hours is not tons of fun.

This morning Joe decided to get creative and pee in my tub, right over the drain. If they're going to go where they're not supposed to, I'd say that's the best place. If only I had more than one toilet in this house, I'd totally potty-train the cats. With enough thought, I may be able to rig up something removeable... Also, whenever I stretch out on my couch, like I am now, Oliver becomes a permanent fixture on my feet.

We were given an extra freebie get-things-done day this year, and I wasted it by hanging around my house, lying on my couch napping and watching movies. Go me.

Every time I decide to change my song on my profile, I can never find the song I want. Apparently no matter which artist I choose, my favorite songs are not the same ones as everyone else. I also can't understand why there are so many artists' pages with the same songs on them. I know people make 'fan' pages so they can upload their favorite song to put on their profile, but then why do all the fan pages have the same two choices?? Why go to the trouble to make the fan page for a particular song when nine other people have already done so? Of course, when I do find the song I'm looking for, it's either a live/demo/acoustic version, or the 'add' function is disabled. Which is why now you get to listen to Gene Pitney instead of what I was originally looking for.

I have two tests this week. I really need to study for them, and would like to go downtown today to do so. It's funny, but I actually get more done away from home because I get less distracted by things like this. However, I don't know if I'm up for coffee right now what with the return of some issues pertaining to a minor-but-ever-present health condition. Stress has brought some symptoms back on that I'd been free of for a couple years, and I no longer have a prescription for the beta blockers I used to take to help with them. If not the coffee shop, I can't think of anywhere that's really appropriate downtown to sit and study for a few hours. There's always decaf, I guess.

Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure I was told a long time ago that I should get said condition checked out every few years by the proper specialist. That would have been in 2002, maybe. I have yet to do so, because that also means an echocardiogram, which the first time around cost about $1400. As an uninsured individual, that took me a couple years to pay off. Damn expensive healthcare...

Damn expensive everything. We should go back to the barter system. However, I don't have any goats. Only cats.