The Inner Rantings of a Disillusioned Never-Been

Hemorraging Money. . .

Why do I feel like I'm always losing money?

OK, here goes:

No more spending AT ALL, unless it's rent, food or bills, from today until I build up a better cushion in my checking account.

Among other things, this means no new Halloween costume.

Found in an article. . .about the Rock flick. . .

Of late, the Rock has not been wrestling much, but it's hard to find fault with that decision. You too would try to broaden your horizons if your signature tag line was: "Do you smell what the Rock is cooking?!"

To read the article, go here.

Another Freebie Test Taken. . .

As if I didn't already know. . .:



Yes, I am extremely messy.

*EDIT: p.s. - I snagged this from Matt's blog, and also saw it on TJ's Blog and then again on Gwen's blog, so I guess we can all thank Gwen's friend Peter for the test. *

Why the Office Internet Sucks. . . reason #101 . . .

OK, if I had read his blog BEFORE I sent him the IM I did, perhaps I wouldn't have made his long day worse. BUT, as it is, I sent him the following message:

"It's Friday. Time to smile. :)"

Only I didn't know that some serious shit had gone down today, because I hadn't read his blog all day. . . mainly because, at work, even if I dump the cache, I can't read fresh-blog, it gives me an archived site from JULY.

In the event you lost your calendar, it's September.

*sigh* I wanted desperately to hug him after reading the blog, but, that wouldn't have helped things either.

I feel very insensitive right now.

TODAY'S FANTASY

I want to go to the beach where that photo was taken. And take the boy to build sandcastles and collect seashells.

And drink daiquiris.

ENOUGH ALREADY!

I need a makeover.

Badly.

My clothes and I no longer have the same style. I'm starting to wear makeup, or at least tinted moisturizer, almost every day. I still look like I'm in college. . . but I work 40-45 hours a week, and have been for the past 2.5 years.

I'm losing my sense of adventure and fantasy, starting with my clothes. It's seeping all the way down into my brain.

According to The Good Girl's Guide to Bad Girl Sex, by sex-therapist Barbara Keesling, a makeover is a step on the way to rediscovering your "bad girl" side. You start the clothes-part of it by going through your closet and getting rid of all the stuff that doesn't make you feel good or sexy when you put it on. You then supplement your remaining wardrobe with new pieces that do make you feel good and sexy.

I also need to redecorate my room. Having my stuffed panda on my dresser doesn't exactly make me think of sex. . . it makes me think of flannel pj's and hot cocoa. And bunny slippers.

I saw a Matisse poster, in the style of "Dance" and "Icarus", that made me feel a twinge of something, but I didn't buy it. I'll have to make a trip to the college bookstore down the street to see if I can find it, but I think it'll be worth it.

Here's part of it:


Plus, it'll put some DESPERATELY needed color into my bedroom. The other errand I need to run is to the gift shop downtown, for the "Greek Isles" calendar I saw in the window the other day. . . nothing screams "sexy, romantic getaway" more than a Mediterranean cruise, and Greece is one of the most wonderfully romantic places on the planet.

Forget Paris and the French. It's the Greeks who invented the art of romance.

Tuesday. . .

Tuesday is slowly becoming the longest day in my work-week. But this is actually a good thing, believe it or not, since longer days mean OVERTIME hours.

Yes, it's icky while it's happening, but there's a nice cushion in the old paycheck so I can buy more stuff I want but don't actually need. . . and more cushion in the paycheck to buy more stuff I need. Like new socks.

Sink Gunk

OK, as if I weren't sick enough today, I decided to un-clog my bathroom sink with the plunger that was purchased for that purpose.

If anyone has seen Star Trek III: The Search for Spock recently, remember the part where the bacteria growing on Spock's casket have been observed to be affected by the "Genesis effect"? That's kinda like what was clogging my drain. . . it was rather disgusting, to say the least.

Of course, if I had a microscope, I probably would have collected some for a slide, just to see what was going on in there.

Noise

I don't want to rant so I will just say that between the noise from the neighbors down the block and the noise from the neighbors downstairs, I am starting to realize that I'm getting too old to live here anymore.

I'm also really cranky because I have, for lack of a better term, "company", this week, so maybe I'm just being hypercritical.

Matthew says it's a way to get out of my lease in January. We'll have to see about that.

FRIDAY!

OK, so the Hurricane was downgraded to a Tropical Storm by the time its more direct effects could reach us, but I was still hoping, like a little kid in the middle of winter, that the office would be closed today.

It wasn't, so I schlepped on in. . . and was surprisingly cheerful until about 9am when my hand started really cramping up. So I went to the drug store and bought painkillers. Two kinds. And a Milky Way Midnight. . .mmmmm. . . chocolate. . .

I have taken naproxen sodium (the stuff that's in the brand-name drug Aleve) once before, and it did knock my pain out, but it also made me really dizzy and kinda spacey.

Remembering that Aleve is recommended for arthritis pain, I gave it a whirl again for my hand. Yes, it helped a great deal, but it also made me really spacey. I'll take the awake-ness trade-off for the pain relief, though.

Work passed quite quickly today. This is a good thing.

Thank you.

I would like to sincerely thank each of you (you know who you are) who allowed my rants to remain rhetorical instead of tapping into the unadulterated rage I've been posting on-and-off. I know it's boring and tedious to read through, but I appreciate the e-mails and IM's I've received from you. It gave me some extra venting time before I got to the shrink today.

I now have a new plan on how to not get caught up in the mess that got worse last week with my step-mom's decision to leave the house - aside: doesn't that phrase "leave the house" make you think of MTV's The Real World? /aside - and it involves easy things to do when I get hit with yet another typhoon of anger.

ANYWAY, on an up-note, I'm currently baking banana bread. Muchas gracias to my Matthew for the recipe. It's tres yummy. Especially with chocolate chips!

I Know the Weather's Gonna Be Bad When. . .

. . . I can pick up the stations from Philly on my radio in the morning. That only happens when the weather's bad.

As we all await Hurricane Isabel, despite her reduced intensity and projected hit of 50-100 miles to the south, she's still causing some problems. Of course, the NJ surfing scene hasn't been this wet-and-wild since the '50's so maybe it balances itself out.

I'm just getting antsy about flooding. I have both a tropical storm wind advisory and a flood watch in my area, so I'm a little skittish about this whole thing. Hurricane Floyd isn't a distant memory for me, you know.

'Splain Something For Me. . .

Could someone explain to me exactly why my father feels the need to bully, insult, belittle and otherwise treat me with contempt at all times?

Or why he feels the need to blame me and my siblings for his past, present and future misery?

Or how love can be unconditional when it's got strings attached? Doesn't that make it conditional?

Being Busy is Fun This Week

After having 3 weeks of doing nothing but playing solitaire at my desk. . . with real cards, no less . . . I have volunteered to work on a few more projects that will give me some much-needed overtime hours and more experience in challenging myself.

When I am challenged and busy, I'm a happy girl. When I am pandered to and bored, I am miserable and I make others around me miserable.

I feel pretty good this week, although I'm a little cranky, but I'll blame that on the pending arrival of Hurricane Isabel.

Why Last Week Was UGLY

#1 - I found my high school yearbook.
Ordinarily, and for anyone else, this would not be an issue. I mean, wandering down memory lane can be a good thing sometimes. Even laughing over the way you looked in your yearbook photo is good for the soul.

I can't even see my high school yearbook without having a sick feeling in my stomach. During the week of September 11th, this feeling elevates itself to a panic attack, for the simple reason that one of the kids I graduated with didn't come home from the Trade Center that night. Another of the kids I graduated with lost his elder brother that day. So my high school yearbook is kind of shadowed now. And in light of that, it seems silly to have pasted construction paper over my ex-boyfriend.

#2 - My step-mom is moving out.

This is sad. What's sadder still is that she picked the absolute WORST week to announce it AND (drum roll please) she and my dad are both blaming my siblings and I for her departure.

Perhaps we were a factor, but I don't think that it's fair to place all the blame on us. Nobody defined their expectations or clearly prepared any of the residents of that house for the conditions they met with upon move-in. Ugh. I have done all that I can and I have to learn how to let them dig their own hole.

#3 - Second Anniversaries are tough enough without heavy-handed docudramas all day.

I watched Star Trek and TLC all day, except for the 10 minutes I caught of an A&E documentary about the week surrounding September 11, 2001.

I started to go into hysterics. Then I changed the channel. Next year, it's a Saturday. I can go outside and play instead of sitting at home in fear.

Because the thing that's the worst about that day is how afraid and angry and shaken I feel all over again. I wouldn't exactly call it reliving the day, but last Thursday was so eerily similar to that Tuesday two years ago, that it was very easy to get caught up in the mourning when I was alone. But, it came and went, and I am OK now.

Once the weekend hit, everything looked much better, though. I got to do laundry, have some grilled burgers and an appletini, cuddle with my Matthew, and relax. I'd like to have another weekend like that. . . so relaxing, so nice. . . and I learned a lot more about football, too. =)

Housecleaning is Therapeutic. . . sorta

I just (mostly)finished my "big cleaning" for my apartment. This means that the kitchen floor was hand-scrubbed, the stove was cleaned (I have to do that again today because I forgot to put a lid on my sauce pot the other night), the bed was made, the couch was straightened, things I'd been saving have now been sorted through for things I could throw away, old sheet sets have been boxed up and are ready for ousting from my living room, the rugs have been vacuumed and the bathroom sink has been sterilized with bleach.

This week has seen me in a rather manic mood. . . much of it due to residual panic surrounding tomorrow, some of it due to the way things have changed since last year. . . leaving me in the best energy situation for cleaning.

Of course, I'm not saying I did this without some SEVERE prodding, which, eventually, made a difference. I managed to get motivated and stay motivated enough to finish the job. It was ugly but not disgusting, so it went fairly quickly.

Now I have to construct a maintenance schedule so that it doesn't get to the icky point again, as it seems if I don't write each and every little thing down, I don't do it. Ugh.

Cars . . .

OK, call me white trash, but I loved the Neon I rented over the weekend.

In case you don't know what they look like, here's a pic I found on Google:



You may continue to mock and ridicule me because I'm also in love with the Saturn L-Series:



And, of course, the Mitsubishi Gallant:



Not to mention the Pontiac Grand Am:



Of course, while I'm still taking the train to work and I have no shot at a parking spot, a car isn't in the near future for me. *growl* This is really rotten, considering the fact that in NJ, you can get to the mall or to the City if you're using public transit, but if you try to get anywhere else, you're on your own. Fortunately, I can tell myself that I'm in training for next year's Avon Walk for Breast Cancer, so I guess it's less of a big deal. . . but during that walk, I won't be toting my groceries along for the ride.

This is why the job hunt must continue. . . I desperately need a car.

New Links. . . GO! Visit Them!

OK, in the event that nobody really noticed, the links section has expanded to include some really cool people, places, things and e-zines.

Among them are my two latest:
- The Oracle of Bacon at the University of VA Computer Science Department
- Alice S. Fuzzybutt

They're good reads, so go read them.

I am SO glad I didn't "File-Share". . .

EDITED at 11am (EDT):

No, that's not entirely true. I used Napster for a couple of weeks just before Metallica and the RIAA shut them down. I didn't use Kazaa to "file-share" but without it, I probably wouldn't have had exposure to quite a lot of interesting music. For example, the My Gay Uncle cover of "(Hit Me) Baby One More Time", that I thought was so funny. Or the folk-cover of Snoop Dogg's "Gin and Juice". . . among others. . . because whether they were put on top-40 or not, most of the top-40 stations make me feel old. This is sad. I'm not old. I'm only 25.

I am among the few, the proud, the non-Kazaa users, who more likely than not won't be sued by the Recording Industry Association of America in their latest quest to quash the fight against rising CD costs.

When all is said and done, whether enforceable or not, I'll bet you anything that CD prices will hit a new high and sales will drop off anyway. . . most reasoning runs thus: "why should someone with little to no disposeable income pay for an entire album for only one or two songs that have been played to death on the radio?"

Maybe because I'm older, I find that there are a few albums worth the purchase price and have become heavy rotation listens in my beat-up boombox.

Slate has an interesting article about the case. . . linked here.

I do NOT have two left feet!

I drove myself to Dittles's wedding yesterday and made it there in about 35-40 minutes. . .ahhh, the open road. . . and, surprisingly, the lack of road rage.

OK, I had a couple of moments over the 2 days of rental car-dom where I was semi-chanting "I'm in no rush to get there", and one screaming fit because some girl was in the process of running a stop sign and sounded her horn at me. . .but I didn't use profanity at the time, which I felt was a sign of my adulthood.

At the wedding, I got all misted up, because of the beautiful speech the officiating rabbi made - he made the obnservation, as I had, that although Dittles and Dave come from two very different cultures and traditions, the blending of the traditions and families was a thing of beauty, brought about by the Almighty for a reason, and it was cause for great joy, rather than making it a sticking point as to why one tradition was better than another (ask Juno, she knows why this would make me angry). . . something I was looking forward to from the time they had begun to seriously talk about marriage, to their engagement . . . and to each of the events leading up to the wedding.

Even the lead-in to the wedding itself was a blending of their families' expectations and traditions - there was a "cocktail hour" (referred to by her friends as the "schmorg") beforehand which served both traditional "European" foods in addition to foods from Dave's family traditions . . . he's Syrian. . . so we had Europe and the Middle East served at the same time. . . I thought it was really cool.

At the reception, I danced and danced and danced. . . my legs are sore to prove it! But I helped my Dittles smile and laugh and be happy on her wedding day. . . which was the best type of present/presence I could give to her. She and Dave looked so wonderful together and so happy. . . I know they'll continue to be happy and grow together in the coming years. I love and admire them so much together, that now I am so honored to have been able to call them my friends for the past 5 or 6 years, and, I hope, to be involved in the way their relationship will continue to grow. . . awww.

As for everything else, it was wonderful. Music, friends, dancing, food. . . I forgot half the steps Dittles had taught me, but I stopped caring and started dancing. . . and as soon as I did that, my feet remembered what to do.

This week, they're doing their "shevra brochot". That's Hebrew for "seven blessings". . . it's a week of celebrations for the bride and groom, to celebrate the simcha (joy) of their marriage. . . these are like housewarming and congratulations parties, given by the bride's parents, groom's parents and their friends. . . I have to make sure I call her and let her know I'd like to have lunch with her sometime. =)

THINK FAST!

I almost panicked today when all 3 of my possible rides to Dittles's wedding on Sunday fell through.

Fortunately, I remembered that I am 25 before I started to have a fit. Being 25 means I can rent a car without an underage driver surcharge.

So I'll be renting a car and driving about . . . I miss driving. I think I've managed not to scare Matt shitless with my skills (or lack thereof) on the roads of Jersey - where the weak are killed and eaten, I might add - so he'll be an amicable passenger.

I can get a couple errands done, too, I think. Hooray!

Yet another reason why telecommuting rules. . .

- I got to sleep in today and ensure that I didn't fall asleep during my lack of projects.
- I didn't have to shower.
- I didn't have to take the train.

I feel relaxed and recharged. . . and after my bubble bath, I'll probably feel even better.

Today I also spoke with my sister. She told me all about her first day at school and how not having a car sucks. . .I told her about how she's growing up to be a pretty cool chick and how thankful I am that she's given me the opportunity to get to know her. She said that was sweet.

We also ranted about our family, which was very therapeutic for both of us. I think she's just biding her time until college so she can get OUT-OUT-OUT of the house. She'll be much happier that way. And, as for the family, well, if they change it'll be a miracle. But they don't see that there's anything wrong, so they won't change. And that's that.

So, telecommuting allows me to recharge my batteries. =) I feel less crappy today than I did yesterday and I also feel that I've done more work today than yesterday.

Strange but true. . . oh well.

In other news, also "strange but true", the train that portrays the Hogwarts Express was vandalized today. I don't know how sick you have to be to do that, but, evidently someone was.

The Great Job Hunt

OK, OK, OK, yes, the economy is shitty. But, surprisingly, there are places hiring.

I have just applied to 2 new jobs in completely different fields from the one in which I'm presently working. I hate every minute I have to spend travelling to my job, sitting and doing nothing for my job and travelling home from my job. I hate every aspect of my job's duties and requirements. The only part that I don't hate is the people.

I don't hate the people I work with. For me, this makes the difference between rushing out of the office in tears every five minutes and actually staying there and (gasp!) offering to help my coworkers out of their jams.

If I leave, they'll be left in the lurch, but if I'm unhappy and I don't feel like I'm being used to my fullest potential, well, I'm not going to be doing much good.

Fortunately for anyone who picks up any of my future projects, I keep detailed, almost anal-retentive publication history notes for my own reference and for the inevitability of my leaving the company, whether amicably or not.

Anyway, as for these two jobs, they are both technically within walking distance, the pay is better and the tasks and responsibilities are challenging and varied from one day to the next. . . making both a perfect fit with my personality and abilities. I am determined to find more opportunities, so if this means buying a paper on Sundays, so be it. I need to learn how to kick my job hunt into a higher gear, fully utilize all my networking resources and stop limiting myself to the job titles and what I think they mean.

I'll find a better job in no time. . . and, who knows, it just might become a career!

P.S. -

Cincinnati-style chili is like the Hormel hot-dog chili.

That's what it was missing. Hot dogs. Not onions, but hot dogs.

Anyway, I feel sick because I came home to the veggies I threw out yesterday. . . no good. I have to remember that Tuesday is garbage night, not Monday.

Weekends Rule

I love 3-day weekends. . .mostly. I love the extra, non-vacation, time-off. . . but, I hate going back to work.

I got to feel rested and relaxed for 3 whole days. Plus, I got White Castle for dinner last night (thank you, Matt).

But now, I'm back in Newark, realizing that I really need to see the eye doctor because my glasses just aren't doing it for me and they're the cause of my headache right now. And my dizziness.

Anyway, we spent Saturday blissfully doing nothing. . . OK, OK, I went to the gym. But we spent the rest of the day blissfully lazy and unproductive. . . except for the part wheere Matt put up the remaining shelves in my kitchen. Just before we went to his parents' house and the diner. And the grocery store, where Matt proved that he's incredibly indulgent and bought me a stuffed elephant.

On Sunday, he woke me up with a kiss and breakfast in bed. . . and we went back to sleep until I got fidgety. So he sent me to do my laundry, which saved me from making a nuisance of myself for a little while. After showering, we went to the mall, even though Matt wasn't particularly keen on the idea.

We had a long talk on Sunday afternoon about how I can make things better for myself during the time until my next job. . . which will help me stop taking Matt for granted. We decided to start with my commute.

I hate my commute because I have no control over it. The train doesn't run on my schedule, it runs on NJ Transit's schedule. I also hate the people who ride the train because they all stink. Literally. My nose goes on hyperdrive and my allergies react badly to the perfume/cologne/makeup smells wafting from each and every passenger. On occasion, of course, it's plain old B.O. that gets me. Sometimes, on holiday weekends especially, it's the airport stop that gets me all riled up.

The bottom line is, I let everything get to me. Matt feels, and I've begun to agree with him, that if I had another distraction, like a CD player or something, it wouldn't get to me as badly. He's right. So I'm going walkman-shopping between work projects. . . so I have all week, the way things are running.

OK, so, we talked it out and things were much better. And then, late at night, I watched The Blues Brothers. Now, many people find it remarkable that I hadn't ever seen this movie before. But, my family was in the habit of watching films that I wanted to see while I wasn't at "home" and then refusing to allow me the time to watch them because they'd "already seen it". So, despite the fact that they OWN the movie, I was never able to watch it. Nor would I ever be permitted to borrow it, which made no sense to me whatsoever, but who am I to argue with illogical people? Anyway. . . GREAT F-ING MOVIE. I'm pissed that I've only seen it once.

This only proves what I'd always known: if John Landis had something to do with it, I will like it.

Yesterday, we made "Cincinnati-style" chili. It would've been good if. . . we hadn't had to triple the spices because they evidently don't sell Cincinnati-style chili spice packets in New Jersey . . . and if. . . we had tasted it before we added the hot sauce. OK, so it was a bust.

But, it'll mellow out in a couple days. And it needs onions.

All-in-all, I had a fun-filled weekend. . . let's hope this week doesn't suck.