People Watching. Its a Sport.

So I have had the chance to view some interesting personalities lately. Meh, lets not beat around the bush here, I'm going to make fun of them. So if you're reading this and its you're great aunt Gert or something, sorry.

Scenario A: Have you ever seen those mini-vans or SUVs with the little stickers on the back? They say the kids name and have a little graphic for their sport. Maybe its a Florida thing. For example, there will be one of those cheerleading bullhorn graphics and the name Amber. Well, I was going to pick up a perscription and pulled up next to an enormous utlity vehicle that boasted said stickers proudly on the back. One for each of the three kids.
Shannon had a ballerina silohuette. Evan had gymnastics.... O-kay. Let's face it. Evan's going to be a fashion designer when he grows up. Last but not least, Jackson had some sticker that had a horse on it and I wasn't really sure what it was. Turns out, Jackson is into polo! Polo?! What kid plays polo?! What family has ballerinas, gymnasts and polo--...ists. It just seems like too much joy for one household. Can you imagine the conversations around the dinner table?

Scenario B: Pet lovers? I love my dogs-- probably more than the average person loves their pet. I have pictures of them littered all over my website. They are endlessly spoiled and as far as I am concerned, well deserving! I got up early today and dragged my husband along for a trip to Pawmosa Park where they were having a "pug meetup." It was really boring. A bunch of middle aged people akwardly standing about while their pugs played with other roly poly pugs. So do I spoil my dogs? Yes. Today however, I saw the most disgusting people on earth. They rolled up to this pug meetup in their convertible... dropped the top and then the show began. The man of the outfit got out of the car with slicked hair and sunglasses. He was wearing long dress pants and a polo and even dress shoes (um, dog park? Hello?) and was proceeding to pull a nauseatingly pink stroller out of the back of the car. But it was no regular stroller. It was for the dog!... Who was also dressed to the nines by the way. They put together the stroller/cart and placed the pug carefully into the bed and unzipped his window. They wheeled their dog the whole two feet from the car to the gate. I'm serious. They put together a pink doggie carriage to wheel their dog TWO FEET. But the gut renching doesn't stop there. As they entered the park they were each carrying large sports bottles as if they were going to jog, but you already know what the gentleman was wearing...
... his lady friend? She was wearing a black wash cloth that appeared to have been washed thousands of times stretched across her enormous stumpy, cottage cheese legs. It was uncomfortably short... as in I'm going to have nightmares tonight. It was really gross.
I think the dog was the most likeable character in the family...

Cheese Pants.

It must be a Monday because here I am at my desk smelling like a big hunk of Gouda. What other day of the week would suck as much as a Monday? Well. I got in from swimming last night and threw my wet towel on the back of a chair, because it would have been so hard for me to actually go and put it in the laundry. Anyway, on this chair was my work clothes for today.
When I got in the car is when I noticed the foul, moldy cheese stench. You don't notice it when you're standing because your nose isn't as close to your femur.
So the whole ride to work, I was gagging over the nasty cheese smell. So far the whole day at work the cheese smell is even worse. Its only 11am.
I finally confided to a co-worker that I was nauseated because I smell like a Gorgonzola. So she found some perfume and I sprayed it all over my legs.
It didn't get rid of the moldy dairy, but it added to the stink on a whole new level.

Matters of the Heart

I go through periods of time where I cling desperately to anything from the past. Friends lost, places, sounds, smells that are no longer a part of my life. I always attributed this smallish compulsion that sprang up occassionaly, to the amount of times I moved as a kid. It feels like I have lived several small lives. Lately, I have been thinking about times spent with my grandparents. My grandma used to take care of my sister and I during summers and sometimes I feel like I took those times for granted. I know I did as I was a teenager and I hated when they would come to stay with us while my parents were house hunting in other states. I would challenge everything they said or did and I can't imagine how they put up with me.
This past November when I was home, my grandpa was excited to take us to the casino. He had been looking forward to it for almost a year and we were finally all there. We hadn't been there for too long when he collapsed.
He's fine now, but that was a real turning point for me. Aside from the heartbreak of going home in yearly intervals and seeing people you love get older in fast forward, this was a real sign that the life I always knew and the things I always expect are coming to an end and things are going away. Morbid as it sounds, I probably don't have too long left with my grandparents and I simply can't imagine not seeing them at holidays... not ever going to grandma's house. I can't explain what a loss it would be to lose one of them.
Such is life, though. I have been trying to come to terms with the fact that my grandfather may not have too much longer with us. I have made every effort to come home and see him when I can... not an easy feat when the airlines are in the wallet raping business... I know I'll never be prepared if something happens, but I was really caught off guard when I found out that my grandma was hospitalized this week with a yet to be determined condition.
It struck me that it wasn't until the past few years that I have really, REALLY been thankful for my family- for who they were and what I am to them. Wiser with age, I suppose. Its just a shame that I was so ignorant as a kid that it never occured to me to value the people I love as they should be. As a kid you never imagine that you won't see them whenever you want. It makes me feel so old... when did I get old?
As I write this, my grandma is having a test done on her heart so your prayers for her safe return to health would be greatly appreciated.
I hope to lift the somber tone of these latest entries, hopefully this weekend will bring back some laughs.

W.W.R.D.

What Would Ronald Do? THAT is the question of the hour. What would Ronald McDonald do if I actually remembered to pack myself a healthy lunch. I think the entire operation would pretty much shut down.
They just hired someone new at work and as I was coming back from my McDonald's run with my Doublechinburger, I noticed him out walking on the path that I had diligently done for all of three days. He had headphones on. Now there's an idea. Yet another wave of guilt washed over me for my terrible eating habbits. I had forgotten my cereal and granola bar today so I replaced it with an extra 500 calories of grease and crap. This whole week, I haven't really cared, to be honest. I am slowly coming out of my life-hating slump, though, so maybe there is hope for me yet.
I have something to look forward to, as I am hoping to drive home to Michigan with my husband and two dogs for my birthday. I also have next Wednesday to dread and love at the same time. Its the weigh in. You see, people where I work are pretty health concious. Its really nice. It seems a lot of people have had success playing "biggest loser" here at Element, so I am going to give it a try this next go around. You can win money, however, I'm thinking for me, the motivation will be saving "face" in front of my co-workers. At least, I hope. When I signed up, I thought that I would put my nose to the grindstone and try to lose as much weight as possible before next week but I haven't at all. I'm pretty much facing the facts that someone at work is going to see what I won't even let my husband see-- the ominous numbers on the scale.

Despite all this, I think that my biggest problem in life has to be that I can NOT get up in the morning. I am completely and totally a night person. If my bedroom was on fire I'm almost certain that I would roll over and try to face away from the flames-- but that's about as far as I would go. Imagine, if I could seriously GET UP at 6:00/6:30am, I could get in some exercise in the morning, eliminating the trouble of not making it to the gym at night if I am in a state of sheer exhaustion. Having worked out in the morning, I would at least have something to fall back on. Hell, if I didn't feel like going to the gym, I could take the dogs for a walk, even. At the very minimum, it would help me spend more time on myself before work so I don't go in looking like three shades of haggard death, like I do most days.

That said, I found this article about an alarm clock that shoots off this little piece of propelled plastic. You have to catch it and replace it on the base to shut off the alarm. As soon as that happened the dogs would go crazy. I'm pretty sure that I would be awake at that point. My husband is all for it. Who wants to take bets on how fast I would find alternate ways of shutting it off (unplugging, breaking, sleeping through....)

A Species Lost...

If you have ever watched a nature show or attended an elementary school, you're probably aware that there are certain animals out there who go to extreme lengths to protect and provide for their young. The kangaroo carries her baby joey around in a pouch, birds regurgitate food into their babies mouths-- come on, if I had to regurgitate anything, it wouldn't be pretty. Where I'm going with this is that it seems to me that sometimes the animal world has surpassed our human integrity....

Mike and I were leaving Borders last night and it had just begun to rain. A mother had blocked the entire door with her stroller and didn't mind in the least that we had to squeeze in and step over it to get out the doorway, which was entirely blocked. She didn't volunteer an apology or make the slightest effort to move it. More disturbing was the fact that her baby was IN the stroller IN the rain! As she waited for someone to pull the car up for her, the baby was getting wet. "Make way for mother of the year!" She definately has the mom who casually sipped her drink while her children did flips on the metal railing beat. Those kids got rewarded with balloons for their potentially lawsuit inflicting acrobatics. Maybe it was my parents who were crazy lunatics, but my sister and I didn't act out in public and I'm fairly certain that we were never used as a doorstop.

It makes me feel old that I seem to be the only one bothered by society's allowance of manners and basic decency to fall by the wayside. I'm seriously in the minority that it bothers me that people act so self-centered. Most other people I know, don't even notice it, but I just can't believe that I'm being too uptight. Eating at a small Chinese restaurant during my lunch hour today, I got to be a silent observer of the other people who shared this small space with me and I made a mental laundry list of things that I was surprised by or considered rude. I'm open to the possibility that my standards for manners are high and involve old-fashioned language such as "May I please have," instead of "gimme a," or thanking a waiter rather than ignoring them and continuing a conversation.
As I arrived at this great little restaurant there was only one other group of people there, a mother and her two daughters. As I was seated and the waiter was taking my order, the mother called out to him that she was ready to order now as well. To me, this is taboo for a few reasons. The first of which, the man was already talking to someone, there was no one else in the restaurant. Waiting her turn wouldn't have taken more than 15 seconds. Secondly, even if the waiter wasn't already engaged, I would probably wait for him to return to me since I had made him wait in the first place. Obviously, she couldn't have been in a dire hurry.
As he took their order, another woman came into the restaurant and was seated a few booths behind me. She immediately whipped out her cell phone and had an extremely loud conversation in Italian that lasted the entire duration of my time there. Again, I know I am in the minority in thinking that cell phone use in public earshot is rude and annoying, not to mention she was practically shouting. The fact that you are speaking in another language doesn't make it okay and if you ask me, it probably makes it a little worse.
Within moments, a second woman arrived and was seated across the room from us. She proceeded to speed dial someone on her cell and it became absolute conversational warfare in there. I literally couldn't concentrate on the book that I was reading, which didn't matter because my food arrived so quickly.
As I began my meal, I was actually impressed that the two little girls and the mom were able to hold a normal "restaurant-style" conversation that wasn't overly loud or screaming for the attention of the other patrons. We both had our meals delivered and only moments later another mother and child arrived and joined the other family. They brought bags of food from Subway. Call me crazy, but bringing your own food to a restaurant is a little over the top. When they got up to leave, they left their Subway wrappers all over the table. Disgusting.

I know I am no angel either, but at least when I get up to leave, I stack my plates and silverware, leave a large tip, and say "thank you." If only we could be more like those stupid animals...

There's Always Tomorrow

Garfield taught me at a young age to never trust a Monday... so as far as Mondays go, today wasn't too bad. My logo was selected for one of our accounts, which is always a good feeling. I accidently worked a half hour of over time so I have a half hour of extra time for the week if I want to leave early. Even the traffic on the way home was the thing candy-coated dreams are made of. Despite an all around decent day, however, I haven't managed to break out of my funk just yet. A rather out of character move, I had a screaming war with a helpless victim who dared to talk down to me on the phone regarding a late payment to Visa. It took me awhile to cool off from that one. I decided that I wasn't going to go to the gym. I've eaten lousy... why not just make it a lost cause and try to go to bed earlier to go tomorrow.
How often do you say: "I'll start tomorrow," when trying to lose weight or stop swearing or anything else. I've always believed it is a pathetic excuse and that if I'm really going to "start" it will be now. Despite this, I still hope to start tomorrow and carve out a healthy pattern of eating smart and excercising. Wish me luck.

It was the best of blogs, it was the blurst of blogs...

To answer the question of the only person who ever reads my page (Gosh darn it, I love you, Amanda!)

Why do you blog?
Give five answers for why I blog?

1. I love to write. When I was in third grade, I wrote what was probably the worst thing to ever see a printed page, but it was 27 pages long and included a whiz kid computer and four pages naming everyone in my class and where they sat in relation to each other. When I was in seventh grade, I wrote a 97 page and unfinished science fiction epic, detailing the misadventures of a scientist, Dr. Boxooker and his faithful assistant, Edward (to be played by Keanu Reeves when made into a movie.) I was the first female in my middle school to make the newspaper staff in 6th-8th grade, ending my career as an editor and did an encore performance in high school where my school paper won several prestigious and state-level awards while I was Editor-In-Chief. Half way to a degree in journalism, I realized I would never be happy detailing the drunken adventures of Paris Hilton or the local 4H's risky idea for fundraising involving barn animals.... I was left without an outlet.
2. I write as a way to laugh at the things that would otherwise upset me or make me angry. A lot of people think that I'm complaining, but I love to find the humor in it and hope that others can enjoy things from this perspective as well.
3. I sat down to sketch a design the other day and realized my finely tuned drawing hand was leaning the way of stick figures and scribbles again-- rusty from misuse... or unuse. I feel my grammar and language may be slipping in the same direction. I was smartest when I made the time to read for fun. Use it or lose it.
4. I love to make people laugh. You may never know this about me if you don't get to know me as I tend to be quiet, but writing is my secret confidence. I have received, and am thankful for, much support for what I write. It makes me happy to think that I made someone smile at some point in the day.
5. As of late, I am writing more about my flaws and faults. Its not as interesting as writing about the man dressed as a cow running down the road that I happened to see today, but its important. I have a hard time letting go of my pride to put in black and white the reasons why I struggle where I do in life, so this blog is more private. Few people were invited to read it and fewer do-- therefore the people who read it, I either trust enough to be myself or are strangers. Its theraputic to be so thankful for the gifts and blessings I have been given in life that it makes me want to try harder to be a better person. Seeing where I fail in my goals and dreams written down will hopefully bring me close to succeeding the next time around.

Thanks for reading!

Aortic Massacre

Have you ever seen the movie Kill Bill? Imagine the most gory, gruesome, brutal scene and that's how any part of my body striving for health and well-being was brought to an untimely death. Capillaries carrying anti-oxidants, vitamins, and minerals had their heads violently lobbed off by three cheese pasta given free reign while I slept and held the endorphins at bay. Why would anyone release such an attack on their body? Why would anyone want to make themselves a victim and treat the very vessels that carry us from place to place, day to day, making life worth living, as if it was a flesh colored hefty bag of crap?
I haven't figured out the answer to that question. Maybe that's why Lindsay Lohan is a cutter and Johny Knoxville plays with poisonous snakes.
I had a pretty good week of walking a mile during my lunches, swimming laps or walking on the treadmill and eating fairly decent food. By the time the weekend rolled around, I was actually feeling pretty good. The slip up started slowly and I'm not sure which is sitting heavier on my heart right now, the guilt, or the glut.
I had known Friday was going to be a "free day" of sorts for me as that is the day that we officially ran out of all edible food in our apartment so it would become dinner and a movie night.
I could have left it at that.

It started when I didn't eat the cereal I had measured and packed for my lunch. Instead, I went out to Chik-Fil-A to celebrate the end of a photo shoot in which I walked back and forth with a clothing rack. The shoot was a blast and lunch was fun. It wasn't completely horrible that I did that. I could have done better elsewhere, but when dinner rolled around, I was "gnaw off my own arm" starving. We arrived at Roadhouse and my recent love of peanuts was satiated, but then we also got an appetizer... loaded with cheese. My meal of choice? The Rattlesnake Pasta, a certain creamy death with a dash of jalapeno spice. It was excellent, of course, but we still got a large soda and popcorn at the movie theater. In my defense, we didn't really eat any popcorn. Still.The plan was that the next day, we would replenish our fridge and I would cook a meal that didn't land quite as close to an early grave. After taking the dogs to the dog park, making a lunch of soup and grilled cheese sandwiches (are we seeing a trend here?) we ended up doing a whole lot of shopping that had nothing to do with groceries. SO. Pizza for dinner. In a vane attempt to not be a glutton, I got a thin crust mushroom pizza- small. But I polished that off with a few buffalo wings.

My only saving grace for Saturday was my dedication to going to the gym. I spent 35 minutes swimming laps and an hour on the treadmill- burning over 500 calories and obliterating my fried cheese lunch sandwich and soup. I ended up feeling that Saturday had actually been fairly successful...

Sunday, bloody Sunday. If I could just go back to that morning and redo the mess that I made, I would be so happy. First of all, I didn't work out at all. We didn't even take the dogs to the park. We got up and both polished off the remaining pizza, which we didn't even enjoy to begin with, and headed out for more shopping. We finally had food and supplies and all the other things we had been needing for way too long now and after a late night Saturday, we got in fairly late Sunday. We swung by the Wendy's that's practically an extension of our apartment on the way home. That alone was all I really needed to eat for the rest of the night.... but we ended up going out to "dinner" (squared?) at Applebees around 10:15 at night. I haven' t been to an Applebees in a long time and I wasn't sure what I wanted, but the waitress was ready to take our order so I spit out the first thing that I would have chosen if I didn't need to worry about my food slowly killing me and sucking out my will to live--
Wait--would have chosen? That's what I did choose.
Sigh.
Then I went to bed.

I started my week this week no better. I actually thought that I wasn't doing too bad. I got up earlier than usual. Not early enough to work out, but early enough not to go to work looking completely haggard. I walked a mile at lunch-- but I didn't eat my cereal. I waited too long to eat and was too hungry so I went to Subway.
I entered all of my dinner information into the computer to calculate how much I needed to eat to save myself from that mistake. But I just ate whatever I wanted from our tostada platter, anyway. I polished off almost two small bags of cookies while answering emails and writing to friends and ate way too much of the bad stuff (aka sour cream) during dinner. I topped the night off by skipping the gym and watching "Hell's Kitchen" on the Food Network. Seems fitting somehow, doesn't it? I told myself that at least I would do better tomorrow. I would go to bed earlier, get up earlier-- tomorrow is fresh with no mistakes in it...
Except now its 10:53 and I won't be making it into bed until 11:30.

Oh heart and arteries, I am so sorry. Veins and bones and organs, forgive me! I need to stop the madness. I'm not in school anymore, I'm not working two jobs-- and even those were shabby excuses for not allowing myself to live healthy and enjoy the fruits of what I worked so hard to achieve.

I suppose all we can do is try harder tomorrow and thank God if its not too late.
Sombering thought.

Don't Quit Now, I Still Need You!

My feet have put in their two weeks notice. How sad is it that your feet decide that they will no longer support your body weight? I have noticed for the past two days that when I get up, my feet have hurt like crazy-- and it wasn't from walking the earthy terrain with one shoe. I don't know what it is. Then, when I got up from my desk today, the stiffness was back. It was like my feet simply couldn't bear the thought of hauling my fat ass into the breakroom for some water. They probably thought I was going for some pie or something. Anyway, I figure that once again, its time to reaffirm my commitment to a healthier lifestyle. Hooray for small steps. I haven't had any fast food in a pretty long time. That is my biggest down fall. I have made myself cook each night, no matter how tired I was or how my feet protested. Infact, even tonight, after arriving home at 7pm (it was raining so that triples my commute time.) I managed to whip up something I like to call Sloppy Joes. Sure, its garbage in a can, but its actually not too bad for you. I had wheat hamburger buns and since they don't taste good- one is plenty satisfying!
I returned to the gym today for my half hour swimming, concentrating more on my legs than usual, and a few minutes in the sauna always makes me happy. The gym sauna is so much different than the sweat sauna I get from my 20 minute walks at lunch.
This sounds all fine and good, but the reason my feet have decided to retire early would probably be the brownie I shoved in my mouth this morning for breakfast. I have to eat something to take the rest of my kidney meds, but I'm not sure brownies are it. I also did an encore presentation of the brownie gorging while the sloppy crap was cooking since I was damn starving. I was picking at them, but if I had to guess, I would say I polished off about two and a half of those suckers. So I've won no victories. I wonder if its too late to convince my feet that it will be worth it to stick around. I really don't want to be a motorized cart troll.

At What Point do you Say, "Hey... Somethin's Missin'"

Does anyone else notice that there seems to be an abundance of mateless shoes discarded along the road? I find them all the time. I first noticed this when I was going to Michigan State and thought to myself, "I can probably haul my bike up three floors of stairs on my own." During one of my many breaks, I noticed that someone had lost a shoe, right there in the stairwell on the second floor. I didn't really think much of it because, well, it was MSU and we had the riots just around the corner at Cedar Village anyway. Seeing weird shit was pretty normal. Now that I live in Florida, I still continue to see soulmateless shoes pretty often. Today there was actually a pair of white strappy sandals on I-4. I find sneakers, boots, etc. I wonder if this is some kind of sign from God and I should start trying to analyze its deeper meaning or whether people are retarded and just lose freaking shoes.

I think I would notice if my shoe came off.

Just wow. "AH DANG! My footsa hurtin' somethin' fierce. Now whare in Tarnation is my right kicks?"

OH THAT'S RIGHT. I LEFT IT ON THE CORNER OF MAIN AND SUMMIT.

What the hell, people. There are shoeless people in Africa who would kill to pay better attention to their orthapedic belongings.

In other news. I didn't swim today. As far as food goes, so far I have eaten pretty good, but I was bored so I made brownies and I know I'll eat one. If I wasn't so damn tired today, I would like to believe that I would have worked out. I did walk for 20 minutes at work and since it was about 90 degrees out and I was wearing jeans and two shirts, I consider that to be a workout in its own right. I felt pretty bad about the probability that I didn't smell very good after lunch, but there's always tomorrow to make more friends.

Water Buffalo

I slipped a dainty hoof into the water for the second time this week, particularly aware of my reflection in the surrounding windows. I realized that as I took my place in one of the swim lanes, I looked like a glistening ham flailing about helplessly in the water. Not that I can't swim. I can swim just fine, but when it comes to doing laps, I'm not someone who diligently pushes forth using a butterfly or breast stroke... I flail. I just move my arms and legs and hope it gets me to the other side of the pool.
For the second time this week and more importantly, the second day in a row, I swam laps for a half hour. It wasn't earth shattering, but it was a start. It was something to get my heart rate going that didn't have the words extra cheese in it and my blood flowing that didn't have the word "accident" in it anywhere.
This is my new idea to get me motivated because I actually like swimming and the thought of it is much easier to bear than an hour on a treadmill where I always feel like I'm walking at a brisk pace and accomplishing a goal-- until I look in a mirror and see that it infact appears that I am barely moving at all.
It doesn't take Einstein (the genius, not the bagel brother) to point out that its only getting harder for me to have good, functional workouts since my health is on a rapid decline and my gut is trying to swallow the rest of me away.
Getting back into a routine is more than just working my way up to actually completing a workout session that will make me feel proud. For me, as a female, it is also about remembering to bring everything you NEED. This is a frightening concept for anyone who wants to work out in the mornings.
Work clothes. Shoes. Clean Underwear. Make up. Brushes. A decent hairdryer. Socks. A towel bigger than the ones they provide because, well. You know. Anything you need to bring to work that day. Cleaning products that include deodorant, shampoo, conditioner, body soap, a loofa, a toothbrush and toothpaste. I'm probably even forgetting something else.
Well, this evening, without even needing work clothes or makeup, etc. I forgot to bring a bra to change into after I was through swimming. Super. I put on my workout clothes anyway, since they were dry and looked in the mirror hoping that you couldn't tell. Unfortunately, my left boob had entered itself into a wet T-shirt contest and I knew that no hard-working, decent human being needed to see that.
Thusly ended my Monday evening workout. 30 minutes of swimming followed by 10 minutes in the sauna and a wet boob.

Now so far, this has been a boring story, so I wouldn't dare end it there. My fun at the gym continues. I flung my wet bathing suit onto a hook in the locker to keep it from getting my gym bag wet. Why that seemed like a good idea, I don't know. When it came time for me to get it down, I realized short people shouldn't hang things on hooks.

I couldn't get it to flip off the hook. I tried and tried. Panic started to ensue. After all, where else would I get a swimsuit that looked like it was trying to be a prom dress? Finally, I realized the benches weren't cemented to the floor so I was able to drag one over to the locker. My locker was in the corner, so when I stood up on the bench to reach over and detatch the wet cow frock from the hook, I had to reach as far as I could. So what do you suppose happens next? Well. My 800 pound body apparently was able to counteract the weight of the entire bench and so I went down... the bench went up... and surprisingly enough, I didn't end up in the hospital.

So. Narrowly escaping bruises and broken bones, I took my swimsuit, my wet boob, and went home.

I suppose I'll try again tomorrow.

The convenience of being fat

My poor mom. If she only knew my greatest shame...

Never one to eat lunch meat, for reasons that go much deeper than this story cares to delve, I was subject to either peanut butter and jelly or cheese sandwiches during my elementary school days. My mom would lovingly pack me a lunch with a sandwich, grapes, and a treat. Then I would usually trade the good stuff to Becky Cox for her potato chips. Frankly, I just wasn't a fan of sandwiches, plain and simple. I'm sure every kid did that kind of crap, but I can remember that even at such a young age, I was eating lousy despite my mom's healthy efforts.
She rarely took us to McDonald's or any other fast food establishment. She always cooked healthy meals and we didn't keep too many fattening treats in the house. My grandma also helped derail this by giving us bagels and cream cheese during those early summer mornings that we were dropped off there while my parents worked. We would always hit the area McDonald's before heading out for days of shopping and spoiling as grandmothers do. So I got my share of shit food there too.I don't even know how I was such a skinny kid. I guess its because of all the running around outside and swimming we used to do, but every time my mom's back was turned it seemed like I was eating horribly.

Enter phase II.

After moving to Illinois, I was now old enough to babysit myself and my sister. The trouble here is, I wasn't allowed to leave the house, basically. I was stuck inside, bored out of my mind until my mom came home from work. I learned to love the Price is Right and Small Wonder and devoured more potato chips than I care to recall. I even remember having guilt about it even way back then. This was three years worth of summer vacations. Ages 11-13. Finally a teenager, and a rebelious bitch, I took silent stabs at my mother's authority and dragged my poor ten year old sister with me. I made her ride bikes with me for what had to be several miles (I'm thinking about four total, two there, two back) into town or to my boyfriend's house. I got the idea when he and a friend rode their bike all the way to see me and it had never occured to me that I could actually leave the safety of my little neighborhood. That meant doing the unthinkable and crossing over the expressway-- something my mom would have had an absolute heart attack over. I did it anyway. The reward for my sister keeping her mouth shut about these little trips is that we would spend our change on candy. Tons of freaking candy. We could get whole candy bars at this place called White Hen for 10 cents. Down the street was Ben Franklin where it was dimes and quarters for Fun Dips, and Atomic Fireballs, and God knows whatever other junk food. Fortunately, there was no convenience here. I had to work for my flab and I maintained a very skinny figure, even still, leading me to believe that at this point in my life, I still had a metabolism.

Enter Phase III.

I would say that gaining weight slowly began around high school. Another move and a home in the sticks didn't help. I couldn't ride my bike here, there was no where to go. The roads were dirt and potholed. There was no one to hang out with. There was nothing to do. I got my license and became very involved in the school newspaper instead of my old basketball and softball teams. I didn't bother with breakfast or lunch during the day but with my new found freedom and a haven of fast food fortresses of every imagineable kind just across the street from school... I went there everyday. I would get some kind of "value meal" and go back to school to work on the paper. I'd get home late, eat whatever dinner there was and enjoy cookies or chips while doing my homework. And 'den...

A job. This was the straw that broke the elastic waistband on the pants. I made my career and second home of four years the Fenton Cinema. Free pop. Free popcorn. Candy you had to pay for. But we did. Our meals, twice a day, 6 days a week came from fast food places. There did not exist a salad in those walls the entire time I lived there. I did become more rounded in my ordering style, however. I learned Chinese culture from Moy Kong's extensive lunch menu-- and Taco Bell Sunday taught me that there was more to the Bell than just plain tacos. The last meal of the day there was generally around 6:00, so when I got home at 11:30, I would eat again-- left overs or junk food. Then off to bed...

Welcome to the jungle.

The final rite to my passage was here in Florida. I had lost almost 50 pounds, though I wasn't terribly overweight at that point and came to Florida to go to school just under 100 pounds and suddenly aware of bad foods and the unhappiness that being unhealthy and overweight could bring. I don't even know what brought about the change, but I had lost the weight with the help of diet pills, excercise, and extreme portion cutting. After only a year at the Ringling School of Art and Design, I had fallen back into an old trap, with an old crutch to bear. I worked two jobs through school. I was unhappy almost all of the time. This wasn't a place you could study and get an A, it was a rough and tumble competitve jungle and I wasn't at the top of the food chain. My meal schedules were disgusting. I would usually take a break between classes and buy some sort of bag of chex mix or even an ice cream cone at the gas station to take away the hunger pains. That way, I could just walk there and I didn't have to waste time driving anywhere. Sometimes I had a long break and could have an actual lunch at home, but not often. Most of the time, whatever 300-600 calorie snack I had would last until dinner, which I would have on my 10-30 minute break at whichever job. Sometimes I would walk down to the sub shop and get a healthy sandwich. Sometimes I would hurry to McDonald's and back, but mostly, I got the cheese flavored crackers out of the vending machine and washed it down with a coke.
The only time of day that I would actually eat a "meal" was after work. I would meet my soon-to-be husband at his job around 11:00pm and we would head to Taco Bell (sometimes eating a bag of cookies IN THE DRIVE THRU and order the largest things on the menu. The healthiest late night eating we did came in the form of a home-cooked version of slop called "mash." We had no money and no time, so we would fry up some hamburger, add some noodles and salsa and call it food. Soon, even that took too much time.

Despite all this, I tried to make time to excercise. I know I did more than the average person, going a few times a week to the gym until my senior year. The weight just kept packing on, though. It was like my metabolism had laid down and died.

I am now overweight. Infact, I don't even think I look as bad as I should to be honest. I carry most of my weight in the face and in my midsection. I live in a mecca of convenience eating as I have still not mastered the ability to plan healthy meals into my lifestyle. My apartment complex is pretty much in a Wendy's parking lot and the Domino's pizza man sells $5 pizzas outside my door. I'm completely serious. I work out on occassion but can't make it stick. The best I have done for my health has been to make juices so that I can be sure to get a proper vegetable serving. The only time I have lost weight since the sharp and steady increase, beginning 6 years ago was when I cut my caloric intake to less than 800 for all of three weeks and when I had a kidney stone. My health has deteriorated. I'm always tired. When I do work out, I'm in pain and misery within minutes.

Each day, I vow to be better. It can't that hard to cook healthy meals and work 8 hours a day with an hour and a half comute... So if you took the time to read all this, I vow to you, I will make it better... but the pizza just got here, so right now, I have to go.

Born of a jealous rage.

Okay, a jealous rage may be too strong a front for this, but what made me decide to do an actual "blog" outside of the world of myspace was an old friend. Not out of her support, but of her lack of it... or of anything. I've realized a lot that people don't try as hard to be nice as they get older. I don't know whether or not to be thankful for the honesty or mournful for the loss of decency. Either way, the situation is a former friend, a very close or even best friend who has "moved on." This is probably my fault but I can still think of all the times I was a good friend to her. I hadn't known her for too long but we had so much in common. We met while working the same job and going to rival high schools, found that we were both Editor-in-Chief of our award winning newspapers. We were both going to college for journalism, loved design, and movies and had similiar personalities. When she left to be a camp counselor over the summers, I made sure she had plenty of mail and gift packages with her name on it. When she left for college and I was still living at home, I made her a scrap book of all our friends. Without getting too detailed, I can say that I was most likely the one who messed up a good friendship, though the details are hazy now. I became so desperate not to lose this boy that I was seeing and ridiculously hooked on, that I didn't care who got in my way. I eventually moved to Florida and we lost touch for years. I found out through friends of friends that she was engaged to a mutual friend and co-worker. I was thrilled for her but when I tried to contact her through myspace she ignored me for a long time before telling me that we had outgrown a friendship that wasn't worth rekindling. I accepted this, hurtful as it was and watched as all of our former friends who had meant much less to her than I at one time made it into her circle of friends. Some of which even got invites to the wedding. It was really kind of a slap in the face and whatever I had done, I can't imagine it was worth this kind of pain. I've always been fairly sensitive to the feelings of others. From there, I noticed a comment regarding a column she was writing for the paper. Sure enough, I looked it up and there it was. She had a column writing about preparations for her wedding. It wasn't badly written, but it could have been done more humorously and good natured. After all, don't you choose to bear the burden of planning for a wedding? I purposely chose not to. Anyhow, it got me thinking that I had always wanted to have a column and I knew I could do better than that. I knew I could do better than her. It sounds terrible and it was even hard to type that sentence. We are in similiar fields and have similiar loves and interests so the fact that I feel so stepped on by her is the only reason I can even bring myself to feel a competitve streak in the matter. I have no intention of competing with her, contacting her, or anything again. I have gone out of my way to tell her how happy I am for her and offer my support despite her cold shoulder. I hope I can just forget it-- and with her, I would have to forget that portion of my life. Its all connected. So maybe its good that I want to make a "blog." Something for me. Probably few will read it, but at least I'll have an outlet. Hell, it feels good to get that off my chest- an ex-friend out of my head and heart. The reason I thought of doing this in the first place and the guilt behind it. This is my first post here, though I plan to repost several older blogs that I enjoyed writing and hope serve as a laugh or an insight into what I feel would be interesting stories to tell. Then maybe my degree that's only halfway finished in the journalism field won't go to a total waste. P.S. We're both professional graphic designers now, not journalists.

It's a BOY!... and a GIRL!.... and 2007 is the new 666.

I just have so much to say. Where to begin? Okay, let me start by going back in time to when I started at Florida Imaging. Literally, it was the first day there and I woke up with a scratchy throat and cough. I have weathered worse, so I went in and made sure to be very concious of my breathing area and should a cough escape, it was immediately contained and the entrails properly eliminated. By the time I got home that night (aka, my FIRST DAY) I was so sick I ended up going to the hospital and being out of work for a week with the flu.
I decided to keep this tradition alive, so now that I had started at Element, my white blood cells took a vacation and I was once again sick within the first few weeks. I'll never forget what happened next.
I was driving to my new job one morning with the strangest sensation in my stomach. Almost like hunger pains, but not quite... and I don't usually eat in the morning. So I stopped at a nearby Burger King because we all know that greasy, fried, grade E meat mixed with cheese cures what ails ya'. I ate my $2.00 cholesterol sandwich at my desk at work and literally as I swallowed the last bite, I got a pain so horrible and so blinding that tears were welling up in my eyes and I was pretty sure the temperature had risen a good 15 degrees. It was HORRIBLE. I immediatly went to webmd.com which didn't help at all. I didn't want to leave and look like a total slacker so I figured I would just gut it out for awhile. I sat there at my desk pretending like I wasn't seeing a bright light and tasting the bitterness of death for almost three hours before I emailed the boss to say I would be taking a long lunch. I went to the walk in clinic and was promptly told that I "probably had a kidney infection" and was given an antibiotic.
Several days passed. I was feeling okay... not good. Pains came and went and I was now at a day before my trip to Michigan to see one of my oldest and best friends get married. It was about 10:30 at night when the blinding pain drove me to the hospital where I met the most wonderful woman to roam the planet earth.
She put me on an IV and filled it with two vials of medicine. It could have been crack, it could have been antifreeze, I really didn't care. She was an angel because for the next two hours, I felt GREAT.
I went home with the news that I had a kidney stone. One little kidney stone. I was free to travel, given medicine for the pain and nausea and sent on my merry way.
By the time I had made it back home to Michigan (aka my mommy) the blinding, searing pain had changed and moved into my stomach. I would now say it was more of a gnawing, aching, hell. Since this had nothing to do with kidney stones, back to the hospital I went. It turns out that the antibiotics given to me by the walk-in clinic lady had created excess acid in my stomach. YEAH!!!!
To make a long story short (ha, you wish,) I spent my entire vacation sleeping and missed the wedding. I gave birth to a baby boy kidney stone and then was surprised to see his twin sister later in the day. The stomach pain lasted another week.So what does all this really mean? Really?
It means that 2007 freaking sucks. IT SUCKS! Instead of having a ball drop in Times Square for this year, it should have been a giant hairy testicle. I seriously detest this horrid, rotten year and all it stands for. Since it is June 1st and officially the halfway point OUT of this miserable shit-stew of a year, I think I should start an official tally of all the CRAP that has spewed forth from the bowels of this millenium + 7 hell.
List O' 2007 Follies and Fallacies.1. This year started with our Wayne moving away to Virginia. The last official member of our clan to take off and leave us cold and lonely in Whorelando, we miss Wayne and Mike and Julie each weekend- more than the last. There is no longer anyone to help me pick lunch meat out of my hair at parties or make me cheese dip when I'm down. I knew it was going to suck this year.2. The flu. Not one who is usually sick, I got the flu this year. I had forgotten how it feels like when your soul is being smothered by a giant mucus membrane. It was pretty awful. Dear 2008, remind me to get a flu shot.3. Then came good ol' February. As a Valentine's Gift, Florida Imaging informed me that since there was no work for me to do, I was no longer an employee there. I really appreciate that since I left a job that had a great benefits package to go there. Not to mention a crazy lady who cared for cats with STDs.4. Jenny goes on unemployment. I never, NEVER thought that would be me. Usually I am one of the top employees because I like to work. I like to be all that I can be. I would have gone to the army if the food was better. I then spent several weeks in a state of depression you could never truly understand. I felt like a drain on society and my family. All this time did for me was teach the dogs to howl like I was killing them whenever I slothed my way out of the house. I also discovered ABC daytime television and relived Full House, the younger years. Ehhhhhh. If it hadn't been for Michelle helping me to get through this time, I probably would have been become a fan of Sabrina the Teenage Witch.5. Adventures in Maya's Cornea. Maya had an eye infection that was being treated for about 3 weeks before I said "screw it" and took her to a specialist. She was immediately set up for surgery to remove a rogue eyelash causing her to get recurring eye ulcers. She has since had multiple problems with that eye. I blame 2007.6. The Great Roomate Divide of '07. Some people have terrible relationships with their roomates. Not the case for us. We liked our roomate, she liked us... but it didn't work out. That is all.7. It's Kidney Stoooonnnnnes. Nuff said.8. I missed Ryan's wedding. This is the kind of thing that will bother me until the day I die.9. Yep. We're still in Florida.10. What's next? What kind of festering boil awaits us for the month of June... I'll keep you updated.

Mother's Day and Underpants.

With my mother in Michigan, and Mike's in Texas, we spent this Mother's Day as we do any other Sunday. At the Dog Park. We really don't have any other choice since if we don't take them immediatly upon waking up on our Saturdays and Sundays, then we will pay. Pay dearly.
Anyway, so we ran into another lady there who was spending the balmy, smoky morning with her daughter, and pug, Nemo. I don't know how they know, but pugs find each other. So of course we all stood around while they ran and played and we had mildly interesting conversation that consisted of questions like: "Oh, they're so cute, how old are they?" "Where did you get your pug?" and things like that.
We were joking about the shocking ability for pugs to shed (or reorganize their molecular structure into...) a whole other pug when the little girl became very excited. She asked Mike: "Do you know what my dogs favorite food in the WHOLE WORLD is?!"
Mike said: "What?"
Little girl: "MOMMY'S DIRTY UNDERPANTS!!!"
Now, both of us being socially inept kind of laughed and offered up that our pug enjoys the occassional laundry buffet as well, but it was too late. The obviously humiliated mother grabbed her chatty daughter and laughed saying: "ahhh, ha. ha. Well... it was nice meeting you!"
It really wasn't that embarrassing, but her face was about as red as it could get. What a mother's day. hahaha.
For all you mothers out there, I hope it was magical and no one ate your panties. Without your permission...

Crab Stabbing 101

Its amazing how your attitude really changes your view of the world- and of yourself. Its amazing how things can start out so great and then you get bamboozled by a Vietnamese hooker and it just all goes down the crapper.
I am, of course, referring to my day today. It started well and good despite the florida smoke burning my eyeballs and choking my soul... I was outside massaging strips of paper mache onto a balloon, like everyone workin' for a living when I noticed two men from the neighboring suite outside nearby, adding to the already smoky atmosphere. They were watching me paper mache my balloon and I thought to myself, its not every job that you get to make balloon planets and pirate maps. Sucks to be them going back to their boring computer monitors and staring at numbers all day. As Nelson from the Simpsons would say: "Ha Ha."My attitude began to slowly shift downhill as the day progressed. I went from feeling pretty positive to pretty damn worthless. My new mission was to locate three round paper lanterns of various sizes to replace the vetoed paper mache balloon idea. I visited about five random stores all of whom: "had them in stock... but they are out now." and I made a few calls via 411 to places like Pier One and Target and nothing panned out. Fortunately, I got the brilliant idea to go downtown to the Vietnamese section of, well, downtown. I got pretty much the same story at the handful of little shops I visited, until I went to Phat Ho. I mean... Ho Phat.
The store was hot and smelly, but it had a lot of cool things... I asked about the paper lanterns which were hanging all over and a very nice man assured me that he had some in the back. He told me to wait a minute and scurried off to a back room, leaving me standing next to an old woman stabbing live crabs in a wooden crate with a little spear. Seriously. As I tried not to watch this, I noticed the enormous metal "tongs" hanging on the edge of the fishtank, where large fish swam back and forth. For the life of me, I can't imagine picking one of those things up with "tongs" and carrying it to the checkout counter! Several dead fish were staring up at me from an ice chest. Five minutes went by. Then ten. I felt bad just leaving because I worried that this kindly, little old man was in the back room tearing through boxes of merchandise. I imagined him finally finding them and coming back out only to find me gone and an old lady stabbing his crabs. I waited. And waited. Fifteen minutes. Before the clock ticked over to twenty minutes I went to the counter and tried to describe the man that went to look for me. After about a minute of trying to explain who I was looking for and why, I was informed that he was in the bathroom.
I left.
At this point, it was getting ridiculous. I had been gone from work for almost two hours and had nothing to show for it. I figured I would try one more store and then go back.
There they were. In a box right there in the front window were the damn, freaking paper lanterns that I was looking for. I wanted to find them so bad, I couldn't bear to go back empty handed... especially after I had been gone for what felt like a million years. I pulled the door handle and it was locked. This freaking store was open everyday of the week. Except Thursday.
It began to rain a little and I looked up in the sky and imagined that I was screaming obscenities at the top of my lungs. It actually made me feel a little better. I decided to check ONE LAST store. Again. I stepped into a Vietnamese Anime shop, not expecting to find anything. They had porcelain cats and mini plates and TWO paper lanterns! Holy crap. They were both the same size, but I didn't care! I practically ran to the counter with them. It was great. Not exactly what I was looking for, but it was something.
I was feeling much better as I opened the door. The rain had already stopped. I looked back down the road in the direction where I had parked my car. That's when I realized that I had walked like three thousand miles. I couldn't even see the store where I parked. So I began my long trek back and only got side tracked once. As I passed a restaurant supply shop, I saw a giant budha and it occured to me that maybe THEY had paper lanterns. I walked in and spotted them immediately. They were in a big pile on the left side of the room. I glanced through them, admittedly, quickly. I didn't see a price anywhere. I grabbed a small one and a very large one and took them to the front to be rang up. This is where I met the Vietnamese hooker. Okay, she wasn't really a hooker. Infact, she was actually pretty nice. When she handed me the receipt, I looked at it as I shoved it into the bag and noticed that I had just forked over $80 for a stupid paper lamp. I asked her if I could return it and she starkly said no and offered to "follow me to my car" which I finally figured out meant: "Help you to your car," which I also didn't need. $80 back in my bank account would have been better.
So now, I had to go back to work with our entire budget plus some blown on a paper lamp. I wasn't expecting a hero's welcome. Everyone was nice about it, but I have to say that I can't remember the last time I have felt more like a giant baked ass. Fortunately someone suggested I look over the reciept again, and when I did, I realized that they infact DO allow returns if the package is unopened and if the return is within seven days. That's when I decided that the lady that rang me up was a Vietnamese hooker. She totally fucked me. So I'm going to go get my money back tomorrow!
Hopefully.As I finished up the day, still feeling pretty low, I went outside to finish cleaning up after our paper mache project. I was scraping the water and flour off the side of the bucket when I saw the Smokersteins from the neighboring suite again. This time I felt like they were laughing at me. Truth be told they probably didn't give two shits what I was doing, or even give it a second thought. Its just funny how quickly your outlook on life and on yourself changes. So I had a bad day. At least I got to see a good ol' fashioned crab stabbin'.

Its so dark here, with my head up my ass and all.

Ladies and Gentleman. I implore you. If you simply MUST distract yourself from the boredom of driving, then talk on the ol' cell phone. Pick yourself up a drive through baked potato or something that requires finesse to eat while steering. Hell, maybe even do a crossword or paint your toenails. Just don't drive with your head up your freaking ass anymore.
It took me 35 minutes to make it to I-4 today FROM THE ON-RAMP. Why? Well, because the four lanes of merging traffic behind me had fought long and hard to get to where they were because of an accident on Sand Lake Road that had the left lane blocked. This actually prepared them for the accident just down the road where the 3 left lanes were blocked and we had to squeeze all the merging and through traffic into the exit only lane for the turnpike. This seemed to be going relatively smooth. Slowly... but smoothly. People were in orderly lines, kindly letting others in and making the process of switching from lane to lane, almost a joy. A damn, freaking, joy. Damn it. But then came the fire fucks. I mean, the fire trucks. Undoubtedly coming from accident #1 to accident #2, they blared their sirens, flashed their lights and split the already constipated lines of traffic down the middle.
That's when it got ugly. Cars were everywhere. Honking. Finger flipping. Screaming. People in two lanes, the shoulder, driving around in the grass, merging left, merging right, merging back. No one was quite facing forward anymore. I imagine that it looked like God picked up a stack of micro minis and threw them into a pile on I-4. It was that shit-faced confusing. As if this weren't enough, some guy's car decides to die. Right fucking here. So now there's people going around him, around the fire trucks, around the ambulances, around each other, around the exit only lane for the turnpike and basically around in circles. It was freaking madness.
Anyway, needless to say, I finally got through it. Only to find that one car had rolled itself all over the damn place andk someone probably is in the hospital right now. The camera crew was there and two of the three lanes were blocked completely without reason. The retarded girl in front of me merging back onto the open road stopped (in the ONLY lane that you could manuever through, by the way) to take a picture on her cell phone and then proceeded to cause me and everyone behind me to once again slam on the breaks.Past that, I saw only one more accident sans-scene. It was a little fender bender off on the shoulder and normally Floridians would be lining up to linger at the smell of burnt rubber and fuming housewife, but we had had our fill of accidents. The last accident of the day was on the other side of the road. The west-bound side. Why does that concern me? Well, because one of the fire trucks that had been headed home after its long afternoon of prying people's heads out of their asses cut across two lanes and THEN turned on its lights and sirens blocking the ENTIRE left lane and causing traffic to once again come to a grinding hault, forcing everyone over to the middle lane. FOR NOTHING. As far as I can tell, this freaking fire truck pulled over to aid a busty blonde talking to Michael Moore's long lost twin in a Geo Metro that looked like it had been covered in caked on bacon grease. There wasn't a damn thing wrong with either car and certainly no reason to shut down yet another lane on the death track.
Its been awhile since I've had a nice long rant about the traffic so hopefully you enjoyed it. I must go now, as I've discovered that there is a bag of broccoli on my counter that I believe to be the cause of a mysterious odor...

Florida Chainsaw Massacre.

I was headed out to where I used to live, Lake Mary, to run some errands today. Since my roomate had just gotten back from visiting family over the holiday in Sarasota and had an errand to run, we went together. It turns out that, her mom's landlord had purchased an item on ebay and had asked Tasha to pick it up for him and just bring it back the next time that she came to Sarasota since the item was heavy and shipping it would have been stupid. Well, going to a stranger's house alone is never a good idea, so we went as a team. Probably also not a good idea. We were told it was just past Sanford, which is just past Lake Mary. HOWEVER, it turned out to be WAAAAAY past Sanford, and hell, Toto, way past freaking Kansas. We drove down lots of roads with no stop lights. No gas stations. No people. Every once in awhile we would pass a gorgeous plantation home on several billion acres-- cows... horses... and apparently bears since there were bear warning signs all over. We even passed a blinking sign that said: "CAUTION: SMOKE." Well, just when we thought that there was no way this place actually existed, we saw the turnoff. It was a dirt road (are you shocked?) We were in the middle of nowhere and there were 3 trailers out here. They all had the same address (the address we were going too) but different lot numbers (which we didn't know.) So we just headed over to lot one and knocked on the... "door." To get to the "door" we had to step over plastic lawn chairs and be careful of the bowls full of cigarette butts and pieces of wind chimes and sprinklers. There were rusty nails hanging out of the sides of the house-- mostly attatched to pieces of wood that were just nailed there... what purpose, I don't know. We waited about a second and a half for an answer. There wasn't one so we ran back to the car... regained our nerves and knocked on the second door. This place was a slight step up from the first since my immediate impression wasn't that whoever lived there was carving up a hitchiker while we were standing on the "porch." We knocked on the door and you can imagine my surprise and delight when Leather Face's mom opened it. She was an old lady in a quilted moo moo with some kind of saucy looking muffin smeared all over her face, lips, cheeks and teeth. I said a prayer that she wasn't going to yell: "Bruno Ray Jr... thare's some visitors... can you bring out our special guest chairs?!" Fortunately Tasha asked if "Doug" was there and she just said; "Doug who?"
"I don't know his last name, we're just supposed to pick something up.""I don't know a Doug.""Okay, Thanks anyway."We started to walk away and she came out onto the porch.
"You mean that Doug that live thare in that thate traila'?""Ummm... sure.""Well, he ain't here.""Oh.... okay... Thanks."
So we get back into the car and Tasha gets out her cell phone and good lordy, this is where we realize we ain't go no signal. None whatsoever. And oh, yeah! Leather Face's mom is waving too us on the porch!
"I can call Doug's wife on da cell, if you'all want."
(Wait a minute, didn't she JUST SAY "Doug who? She didn't know a Doug?")
"That would be great!"
Wouldn't that be great? Maybe we can all have a Barbeque. and the guy in Lot one can serve the mail man as the main course.
Anyway. The guy was supposed to be there anytime after 4pm for us to pick this thing up. It was 5:10. He finally showed up and now I have a 100 pound chunk of Welding equipment complete with creepy dirty mask in the back of my car. Thank Goodness for Leather Face's mom because I wasn't going to be coming back here to backcountry again anytime soon. I pretty much saw my life flash before my eyes.... my pink barbie bike... watching Dirty Dancing and eating bagels at my Grandma's... liberating tadpoles with Michelle....my favorite pair of shoes.....
Yeah for life! Yeeeeah for life.

You're Basically Asking for it if you Dress Like That.

In an effort to make up the fact that I left Midas alone for five days, I took the dogs to the dog park yesterday. Little did I know that it would have me rethinking life in its entirety.So anyway, things are going great. The dogs are having fun running around in the water, so I was just standing on the beach watching to make sure they didn't become gator nuggets when Midas comes running up on shore. Just running. (He does that. No reason.) And as he's tearing through the sand he comes to a screeching halt at this older woman who is also watching her dog play in the water. She's wearing jeans and a t-shirt sans bra, but I think what made Midas go into his crazed barking rage was the sandal/sock combo on her feet. It was really uncalled for.
The whole scene really wasn't a big deal.... aside from the foot fashion disaster... Midas was a good ten feet from her, barking his balls off. I picked him up and took him away and the lady called after me that it was probably time I took Midas home. I didn't say anything, but really... Midas barks sometimes, but he loves other dogs and never causes any problems. I was just thinking how no one would ever dare say anything like that to my husband. Never a chance. I just have the classic doormat look, I guess... and that's WAY worse than socks and sandals. Well, I have to go shave my hair into a mohawk, dye it green and get a lip ring.
Peace out homeslices.

The Day Satan Smiled.

The day Satan smiled? Well, that was today. TODAY! He smiled and his evil minions slapped each other on the ass in a gesture of victory over the poor miserable girl without a job in the greater central Florida area.Now before you go back to reading all those Myspace bulletins that arrange the letters of your name to form some kind of kooky saying involving alien sex and granparents, remember, its much more interesting to read about someone's lousy and possibly hillarious day, than it would be to read about someone who had a boring wonderful day filled with pink ribbons, puppies and shiny princess wands.
So anyway. It all started when the third glass belonging to my roomate imploded upon contact with water. So I had to go to the store and get some new PLASTIC cups to make up for it. On the way I had to swing by the video store because when I returned a movie yesterday, it had the wrong disc in it. That should have been a sign right there that things were going to SUCK from here on out. After feeling like a giant tard, I got the DVD thing sorted out and was ready to head over to target. Its an abnormally busy intersection but I had a slight break in traffic to pull in to the center median. There was a white truck coming in the lane closest to me, but it was one of those situations where I could hurry up and pull into the lane on the other side of him and we'd all be fine. Assuming there's no blue golf car behind him, of course. So I almost caused a major accident. I think...Now that I think back, no one ever honked at me and there were no squealing of tires, just a blue golf car on my ass. Eitherway, whatever happened or "could have" happened was undoubtedly my fault. In a rush of complete humiliation, I floored it and turned at the next green light, making sure in my rearview that I left everyone witness to my near-disaster causing mess far in the dust. I turned again into the first shopping center and weaved my way out to Target where I parked near the back of the lot and got out my phone to call Mike and cry about what just happened. I was in the middle of leaving a message when the white truck pulled up next to me and the man in it signaled me to hang up the phone-- which I did. He got out of the car and was stomping over to my driverside door so I threw it into reverse and drove the HELL out of there the whole time freaking out as to why and how I was followed! I mean, I understand why- despite how horribly messed up that is... but how he found me, I will never know.
So in a new state of shock and frustration, I went to the Target across town where I found some plastic cups and marvelled over the loss of the good ol' days when someone could buy a pair of sweatpants to work out in that weren't water repellent, thermal anything, capris, rainbow colored or spandex before heading back onto the road to kill more fellow motorists.

A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes.

I'm sorry, did someone slip some crack into the Orlando water supply?
Last night I had a dream that some really kind of crusty and hobbity real-estate agent was showing us this house. She said that it needed some work but would be really nice when it was done. So I was trying to see the potential in this really horrible broken down house when we go out to the back and the roof, floors and walls just kind of stop and there is a pile of bricks and rubble leading up to the enormous sink hole leading to nowhere. So I told the hobbit woman that it wasn't really what we were looking for and we escaped before the rest of the driveway in which the house was sitting crumbled into the oblivion hole that was kind of in the backyard and kind of just in the living room. Anyway, as I'm trying to escape this neighborhood/town with the real estate agent, I notice that everyone living there is a little deformed. Like weird humps and eyeballs out of place and shit like that and everything smells like ham sandwiches and of course I can't find Mike any freaking where. When I do finally find him talking to the obviously most deformed and most crafty of the townspeople, they are trying to convince him to buy the terrible house and because he's the kind of guy that is very nonconfronational he's kind of agreeing with them. So I tell him we have to get out of here but it turns out that we're in the middle of some kind of horror movie where the deformy town has trapped us and we can't hide because I somehow cut my arm and wherever we go there is a trail of blood. And did I mention that their leader is Marge Simpson-- but that's not a good thing because they have to sacrifice her. Yes, the deformies are seriously going to kill Marge Simpson, but apparently this is okay because its actually been worked into the plot of future Simpson episodes. So instead of escaping from deformy town, I tried to get them to replace Marge with the crazy real estate hobbit. Which seemed to be working and they didn't notice. I woke up still not knowing how to get home or where Marge even went because she sure as shit didn't say good-bye to me.

Me and My Monday.

Ahhh, last week. Its just evidence that sometimes life kicks the dust off its sneakers, spits, and then kicks you in the balls. I think I've kept pretty positive considering I didn't wake up a different, better natured person... so I bid you farewell, week of February 11-18. On to Monday, again...
I know that I won't always feel like a moldy toilet overflowing with murky shit, so I'm trying to think about things that make life great and are unexpected little smiles. Its cheesy, but its true. We all have some story of an amazing moment... or even a very plain one that makes you think that all is right with the world. Here are some of those moments:
1. When "Houston" finally hears your morse code signals and can bring your mislaunched space-shuttle back for re-entry. 2. When you're playing Oregon Trail and your family of five doesn't die of diarreah.3. When no one runs over your trailer during a 12 hour road trip.4. When your pug doesn't eat cat poop.5. When your shoe doesn't come flying off during your acrobatic steam rolling finale.
Have a SUPER week full of moments that make you happy to be alive and not wishing you wore a metaphorical "cup."

This is the Rhythm of My Life. My Life. Oh Yeah.

This was kind of fun if you want to kill some time:
This is your life's soundtrack, chose a song for each scene that fits you.
Opening Credits
Coffee and TV- Blur
Waking Up Scene
Good Morning Baby- Dan Wilson/Bic Runga
Getting Ready Scene
Happy Face- Destiny's Child
Car Driving Scene
Cosmic Girl- Jamiroquai
High School Flashback Scene
Mad World- Gary Jules
Nostalgic Scene
Everything Changes- Matthew Sweet or In My Life-Beatles
Angry Scene
The Kids Aren't Alright- The Offspring or Coming up From Behind- Macy Playground
Agony, Painful Scene
Try Not to Breathe- R.E.M.
Break-up Scene
China- Tori Amos
Sad, Breakdown Scene
Putting the Damage On- Tori Amos
Nightclub/Dance Scene
Wild Night- John Mellencamp or Stripper Song- Wyclef Jean
Buddy/Sidekick Scene
Every Me, Every You- Placebo
Dreaming of Someone Scene
I Want You to Want Me- Letters to Cleo
Contemplation Scene
Carry Me Ohio- Sun Kil Moon
Love Scene
Colorblind- Counting Crows
Kissing Scene
Sway- Bic Runga
Relaxing Scene
1979- Smashing Pumpkins
Action/Fight Scene
Everybody Was Kung-Fu Fighting-
Victory Scene
Bittersweet Symphony- The Verve
Closing Credits
Don't Get Lost in the Crowd- Ashley Ballard

Feeling Bad for the Thumb.

I am sitting here having this deep philosophical moment. I'm listening to this InDesign tutorial that I got my hands on, to see if there is anything that I don't already know to expand my knowledge and power.... and I just can't sit still. So I'm always taking my wedding ring and moving it from one finger to the other and back again. I don't know why. If I wasn't doing that, I would be messing with my hair or biting my nails or something else fidgety and unattractive. Anyway, I noticed that the ring fits just about the same on my thumb as it does on my ring finger. That's weird because my thumb is like the DUFF of the finger family, you know, the designated fat, ugly friend. Its shorter than the others and therefore looks chubbier. Now, how is that fair? Its actually the same circumfrence as my ring finger which looks soooo much better in the ring. Its a metaphor for my life. Being short SUCKS! Tall people always look good when they're at a healthy weight. But us short people always look chubbier than we really are. I can remember this one time going to get work pants with all my friends and I was buying size 3 to their 8s but there was NO WAY I looked the skinny one. So, I'm sittting here right now really feeling bad for the thumb. It has to really put up with a lot of crap and heartache for being the one that seperates us from the animals... Infact, come to think of it... I guess all of our fingers have personalities. And most of them aren't good. We already know that the thumb is the beautiful on the inside, misunderstood on the outside, fat friend. The index finger is kind of the sloth. The dirty finger. Its used for pointing blame, pushing buttons and lets not kid ourselves, people... nose picking. We all know the middle finger is the rebel. How many times has that one gotten us into trouble in traffic? The ring finger is the princess. I know that for me, that's always the finger that looks best in the pink nail polish and feels complete when wearing diamonds. For this one, its all about looks. And the pinky finger is kind of the outsider. Its really only good for hitting "a" and ";" on the keyboard. It shys away from the other fingers and doesn't get along all that well. Its like this angry little anorexic finger that doesn't play nice and avoids all the other fingers. I just realized that its probably a really good thing that we only have five fingers instead of seven, because we almost have a finger that has the personality for each of the seven deadly sins.Clearly, the thumb is representative of gluttony with its slow metabolism and chubby physique.The index finger? Well, lets face it. That filthy bastard is all that sloth stands for.The middle finger is most definately rageThe ring finger is pride and vanity and that bastard pinky is envy. Don't believe me? Just hold your hand out in front of you and look how it leans away from the other sinners.... err.... fingers.Something to ponder.

Look Out Rachel Ray

Cooking is something new to me. My mom stopped letting me even chop vegetables in her kitchen after a certain incident where I tried to melt pink crayons into wax and ended up burying a sauce pan in the backyard....But that is neither here nor there.Anyhow, I am getting better, and I have been trying to cook meals 5-6 days a week. Its been going really well, I think. New things, however, always make me nervous. A good example of this was when my sister came to live with me and made popcorn, the kind popped in oil over the stove. I was actually really nervous to attempt such a feat myself, because, quite frankly, I don't have a backyard to bury a charred saucepan in anymore. I took the plunge, though and it all came out okay. It turns out that you don't have to buy popcorn in prepackaged little microwave bags! The difference is actually pretty amazing. So I mastered the whole popcorn thing.Then, my roomate Tasha, was trying to school me on how to make my own smoothies. She makes them and they are fabulous. Well, I took what she told me and decided to try it on my own while she was at work yesterday. I warned her that the kitchen and its cuisinart minions hate me, but she was so convinced that I could pull off this little task, that my confidence was renewed.I put in two tablespoons of yogurt. I added the pineapple juice and that's when I started to get nervous. She told me to fill it to the silver line and that it wasn't even a half a cup. But I had poured a whole cup and it was barely at the silver line. Looking closer I saw that it wasn't even half a LITER... maybe that's what she meant. So I added a cup and almost a half. Then the fruit. Frozen fruit. I have a blender that crushes ice, but this fruit would not crush. I tried to be patient, but then I decided screw patience and started mashing it with a spoon. I figured as long as I was careful, poking it with a spoon whilst blending would be safe enough.WRONG.I totally ground up a plastic spoon into the smoothie. AND the damn thing wasn't even that smooth.So, I am thinking I'm going to make my own cook-book. Cooking with shards of plastic and other unexplained lumpy phenomon that will give you indigestion.Maybe I'll get my own show. Why not? Tim Allen had one.

One Small Step for Me.

Okay, well I took the crack about Liz Pulliam Weston off my heros. NOT because I changed my mind but because I never meant to make anyone feel bad. Its easier to say Britney Spears is a drunken slut when you're sitting around with your friends than it probably would be if she was all in your face and pantiless. I suppose it brings a certain reality to things. Well, I don't like her articles, but I'm not the kind of person who would ever intentionally hurt somoene else, so I have no problem with taking it off and letting bygones be bygones. The only way that I can comprehend someone wanting to hurt my dogs or put a foot in my ass for me not liking something their aunt writes in a column each week is that I must have really hurt someone. If not, then who the hell would care anyway? So I'll do the right thing. I do have to say this, though. What a weird freaking week.... I wonder if anyone else who says on Myspace that they don't like Bob Seger or something gets this kind of grief!....

I Got My Very First Hate Mail!

Back when I was working two jobs and going to college full time, I read an article by Liz Pulliam Weston. It was about how to get what you want by complaining to the manager. I guess I can be convinced to look in the farthest corners of my mind to say that there could possibly be a time when you do actually need to speak to the manager for assistance, but I can say with confidence that the majority of people reading that article are using it to calculate ways to get things for free or discounted and basically cheat the system by way of subtle blackmail. It is because of this article, because of people like her, that I had to battle with people in between classes who wanted me to move "Star Trek 35" to a bigger auditorium. They felt that paying $4.50 to see a movie in anything less than the biggest auditorium was a waste of their money. It didn't matter to this guy that all other 19 auditoriums were occupied with movies that actually were making money he was ready to have me fired for not jumping at his command. Not to mention, if he had the slightest clue what it would take to move a movie like that, he didn't care.
So lets by all means continue to perpetuate the "I want, gimme, gimme, me, me" syndrome of today's society. Its these people costing everyone else time, money and for God's sake uneeded grief. Is it really putting a dent in your existence that you "believe" Denny's only gave you two eggs when you were supposed to get three? Really?
That aside, since then, Ms. Pulliam Weston's articles have crossed my path several times a week in which I am often lured in by headlines such as: "How to save money on things you wouldn't think of" and "why not to buy a house" and I am always, ALWAYS disappointed at the lack of character and RESEARCH or even insight in her regurgitated crap. Tips such as: "If you want to save money, try not to spend as much" and "buying a house can be expensive, that's one reason why you might not want to do it" always have me rolling my eyes. It must be nice to have a national column and not actually have to have any kind of dedication to the topics you bring your audience. I may be exaggerating a little, but everytime I look at one of her articles and get nothing out of it but the contempt of wasted moments and brain cells, I hate her a little more.
I say just that under "heroes" on myspace. I said that my hero would be anyone who could bring down the editorial career of Liz Pulliam Weston and see her behind a ticket counter or cash register for all eternity. It sounds to me like she's a liberal nutcase and could use some hardworking common sense knocked into her by the first customer who DEMANDS to speak to a manager because you won't take their coupon that expired in 1985. But back to my hatemail. So anyway, I have that written there and apparently her son decided to look her up or something (??) and sent me a somewhat anonymous hate message in which he did not state his name (I had to do my RESEARCH to find out who he was) and declared he was going to stick his foot in my ass or something. Sorry dude, I'm not that kind of girl.

I've Never Been the Target of and Ice Cream Related Sexual Incident Before...

The title pretty much says it all. Words can't really describe what I went through, though I'll try in my best adult trashy romance way.
It all started when Tasha and Wayne and I decided that we HAD to get ice cream. So we drove all the way down to the Lake Mary Brusters. For those of you who know the area, Lake Mary is a pretty nice place. Its the kind of place where you laugh because 16 year old girls are driving lexus' and begging for change on the side of the road so that their softball team can go to state (because really, THIS is a good cause) and you just know that it doesn't matter how many perverted old men give them a twenty dollar bill while oggling their teenage nubbin boobies because mom and dad will pay for it anyway. What was I saying? Oh yeah, its a well off area.
So, we're in line and Wayne is laughing his ass off in the backseat about about Bruster's salted Dixie Nuts and Wet Walnuts and other strange concoctions that no one probably ever buys. When Tasha asks what's in the "Black Forest" that doesn't help. So I'm guessing the lurking pervert heard this and figured we'd be into his little show.
When we get up to the window and pay there is a middle aged man with streaky hi-lites in his hair (the kind that meant to be blonde tips but during the do-it-yourself process something went horribly awry) sitting on the park bench STARING at us. I was probably the first to notice and was immediately very uncomfortable. As I pointed it out to the rest of the car Wayne told me not to worry because the guy was obviously gay.... and then he started eating out his ice cream cone. Oh yes, he was licking it in a very suggestive manor and just as I was ready to gag on my own tongue, his group came and joined him at the bench, laughing at our misfortune of being stuck in a drive through getting visual oral gratification from the scary perv. Scarier still was his "group" consisted of two 12-13 year old boys! I tried to focus my attention on the ceiling of the car and hoped that my powers of telepathy would will the little ice cream scooper girl to scoop faster, but I had no luck. When Tasha gasped I looked back over in his general direction, and boy, was that a mistake. I'm going to try to slowly explain what he was doing to give you the best possible visual, as I know that's why you're reading this anyway:
He was standing on the bench bent over with his hand on his ass and his index finger pointing straight down. His other hand was reached around and holding the ice cream which he proceeded to have finger sex with... just under his ass. It was like watching a car accident. I think this is quite possible the nastiest thing I have ever seen. Oh, until he pulled his finger out and licked it "like a lollipop."
This weekend has been no better in restoring my faith in humanity, either. I got up this morning and noticed that there was a Uhaul parked in front of my first floor apartment. Lucky me, I have a sliding glass door that looks RIGHT into the parking lot. Where everyone has to walk to get their cars The dogs just love it. Anyway, I didn't think anything of it. When I got back from picking my car up at the shop and taking the dogs to the dogpark, there is a whole new set of hideous, cheap, dirty lawn furniture on my porch. Despite the fact that Mike was on the phone I was like: "What the hell kind of nasty shit is this!" and I knew immediately that it wouldn't be Tasha's because she has taste. I took just a minute to double check with her and confirm that she hadn't been rummaging through the trash for new ways to make us look like total rednecks and I marched the damn things back upstairs and left them right in the stairwell with a note that read: ""Dear Assholes,Thanks for the gesture, but I won't be needing any of your trash on my porch, so here it is."As we speak, the chairs are still in the stairwell and the note has been removed. I wanted to go put a new one on there that said: ""Dear Arbors,We won't be needing our cheap, crappy, Dollar General furniture anymore, so we'll just be leaving it here. Sincerely, the douchebags on the second floor moving out on 1/19/06"But Mike didn't think that was a good idea. Seriously, is it just me or is that really nervy? How do all these mental patients find me? Did someone plant a homing device on me when I wasn't looking? Do I smell like cheese or something? What the hell. I'm going to go take a shower and wipe the retardedness off of me. Thanks for reading.

Its a beautiful day in the neighborhood, Mr. Federline.

Its a little after one in the morning on Saturday and I'm already asleep after my long day of shuffleboard and complaining about teenagers to cashiers at the grocery store. I say asleep, but I really mean TRYING to sleep since the neighbors upstairs are involved in the Ultimate Fighting Championship. It sounds like they are overturning dressers up there with all the yelling. Its been going on since around 6 in the evening. Finally, everyone in my whole apartment is up as we try to figure out how to locate the local sheriff's number as it is not available online and or in the phonebook... way to go Sanlando area.... and then it finally stops. Tasha and I went to take the dogs out and there they are sitting on their balcony smokin' it up. We just glared at them and took the dogs back in. These are the days when I wish I was one of those enormous middle aged black women in movies that no one messes with. I'd heave my fat ass right up those stairs and get in their faces and maybe even toss someone over the balcony into the lawn before heading back off to bed. But alas, I like to veil my chicken-shittiness in a cloak of maturity and try to forget about the precious hours shaved off of my happy sleepy time.Well, this morning, as I'm leaving for work, I got a better look at this douchebag who was again sitting out on the balcony in his boxers smoking a cigarette (hopefully not planning to rob my apartment when I leave) and he looks exactly like Kevin Federline. Same disgusting, dirty, only a middle-class white, rebellious, 14 year old who hates their parents, could love him kind of guy. I almost choked on my Nature's Valley Granola Bar. But what can you do? So I just put on some Britney and drove away to work, hoping the crackheads stay away long enough for me to get the HELL out of apartment complexes forever.Amen.

My Name is Jenny and I have an Addiction

I know that everyone has their vice. For my mom, its smoking, for my dad... its ice cream. People have drinkinig problems, eating problems, and heroin addictions and even Midas can't help but to pee on every blade of grass that comes across his path during our walks.My addiction is a little different. I am a glutton for punishment and my eye is drawn to "now hiring" signs like a pugs face is drawn to another dogs ass. Not that I don't have a good job, because I do. I make plenty of money and I like what I do... but I'm always on the look out for something else that could keep me busier than the average person. Its true. I've never worked fast food and have no desire to work in the cellular phone industry, but I could probably tell you which stores and local chains are hiring and how long the sign has been up. Its just something that I notice.Well, it seems that its finally gotten the best of me. I applied for a second job at Bed Bath and Beyond. Why? I'm not really sure. It seemed like the logical next step, somehow. First, my school lost my transcripts from Ringling (you know that place where I got my DEGREE!!!) and so before I could take classes there this semester, I had to have them replaced. Which I didn't do. Ordering transcripts to me runs on the same level as mailing bills. I just can't do it. Getting it to the mail box is just too much for me. Same here. So, the deadline came and went and now I have no classes to take.So am I bored?Hell no. I have to work out. I have to learn new programs. I have to work on my portfolio. I have to train my dogs to be less demonic.But without a major obligation staring me down, threatening to suck me into an endless vaccuum of fatigue, I just can't be settled. So I applied yesterday and I may soon be the proud owner of a second job.I should probably seek help.

Wow. Just... Wow.

Okay, so my lunch break rolls around and today I decide to go to this grocery store that's right across the street from where I work. I was going to buy some cereal and maybe some sort of side dish for dinner tonight. Now, I know that I don't exactly work in the greatest neighborhood anyway, but the name: "Save Alot" (one word for "a lot") should have given it away. As you enter the store, you come to metal gates that have a sign saying you have to surrender any bags or personnel items due to theft problems. There is no way I'm handing over a coach purse.... the only "nice" thing I have besides my wedding ring to a crusty one eyed sales lady with a skin rash. So I just went through the gates-- thankfully hassle free.I went down most of the aisles and really, they had NOTHING that could be a good side-- except for rice (which we have already had this week) and mac and cheese. (I am a firm believer in mac and cheese as a side dish and NOT the main course) and so that's what I grabbed and went to look for my cereal. They didn't have Cheerios... okay. So I decided to just skip this part altogether. Too much stress. I do want to take a moment to mention their impressive selection of flavors, sizes, and assortment of honey buns and wrapped muffin pastries. Anyway, so I took my lone box of Mac and Cheese to the skin rash woman to check out and she says to me:"Reckon by the looks of it, the kids is hungry."What do you say to that? "I don't have kids?""If I had kids I would feed them.""The proper way to say that sentence doesn't have the word "is" in it?"In the end I decided that it was best not to turn this into a conversation and simply said:"Chompin' at the bit they is."She looked at me a little funny, so I don't know if I got my redneck crossed with my Brit accent a little or something, but I just took my artery clogging crap and my coach bag and got the hell out of there before I developed some kind of rash myself.

Resolustion Dissillusion

I was listening to the conversation around the office yesterday about New Years Resolutions. Is it sad that each of the resolutions that everyone had made could totally apply to me? Literally, all of them. I could adopt any of them and it would make me a better person. I can't say: "Well, I already have this goal covered..."Holy crap, I'm a mess! Lets run down the list here:1. Isn't it always everyone's goal to lose weight? I am certainly no exception to this. I could stand to have a goal that would have me blend in less with say, a herd of cattle. I say this, but only moments ago I found myself IMing away with one of my closest friends about all of the great restaurants that we're going to eat at when we move to Texas. I know, somehow, that on both ends of that conversation, drooling Homer Simpson noises were being made at the mention of Cheddars, Chuys, and the Texas Land and Cattle restauarant.To make the goal of weight loss a little less painful or less intimidating, there are two resolution offshoots that come from this common crusade.a.) To work out more. Well, I MAY have this one covered because at my last job, the printer was on my desk. Here, I have to actually WALK to the printer. I figure I burn an average of 7 more calories a day, that way. GO ME! But seriously. I don't remember what the inside of my gym looks like, and worse.... Its going to take some serious self-motivation to get me back into work out mode like I was previously. Infact, this would lead me right into a WHOLE OTHER resolution. See resolution 4.b.) Eat better. If there is any resolution in the world that was handwritten for me, its this one. I have been eating so much fast food for convenience sake, that when I sweat, it smells like onion rings. I haven't made this a New Year's resolution, but out of sheer luck, I have actually had time to cook all of twice this week. INFACT, I ate a salad yesterday and I didn't die. This is exciting news! Now if I could just work fruits and vegetables back into my diet, my food guide pyramid might start returning to normal. As it is, there are four main levels: Chicken nuggets, fries, soda, and taco bell. I don't even love the taste of this stuff! Its just so eeeasy. 2. To get out of debt. This one can apply to me too. Infact, just today, I figured out that if I pay a little over $550 dollars a month in school loans, I can have them paid off in just two years~! Ehhhhhhhhh.3. To save more money. Its a nice thought, but see Resolution number 2.4. To get up earlier. Okay, well, the one I heard was to get on a more regimented sleep schedule, but to me this translates as "get ass out of bed when alarm goes off. NOT 45 minutes later." This would have to be the one that I would go for. I think that waking up late each day is the root to all my problems. If I got up early, I would have time to work out, to make myself a healthy lunch and still not have to rush getting ready. I could take the dogs for a walk before work, I would be at work earlier, get home earlier, I would have MORE TIME IN MY DAY. Its not like I'm asking THAT much of myself. I get my 8 hours. I'm just saying if I could get my fat ass out of bed at 6 or 6:30, my whole life would be better.That said, I think I'll take the advice of yet another friend who has decided to opt for low expectations. After all, I don't really know anyone who is still working on their new years resolution in september. Maybe if I made a New Years resolution to gain weight, eat badly, be more slothly, squander money, develop a gambling addiction, and sleep in everyday I will actually end up being a better person than if I plan to do the opposite. Does that make sense? Well. In the worlds of an old friend...Da dunno.