Thursday, June 30, 2011

2nd to Last Day! And I'm Still Alive!

Whew.  Made it.  Finished that stupid paper.  It was NOT GOOD.  I will be extra surprised if I get an A in the class.  I never talked to the instructor, but I know that she knows that I was very much into the class.  Now I just have to make it through the group presentation tomorrow and I'll be home free.  Until August 22nd.

I really, really, really procrastinated on that paper.  I worked on it literally the entire time I was at work today.  By the time I finished it, I couldn't really even remember what it was about.  But it's done, it's over with, and there's not much I can do about it at this point.

It's all rainy and thundery and lightningy tonight, and I just got out of the shower, and I have my puppy back (he was with my mom the last two nights) and so I just want to lie down and watch Conan for awhile and maybe pass out in the middle of it.  I feel like I'm pretty much done.  I've already done some work on my part of the presentation and I trust my group members to get done what they need to get done.  I was actually really surprised by how well the other group presentations went today (there were only two) (there are a whopping 14 people in the class).  The presentations weren't spectacular, but they got the job done.  So I plan to work on it at work tomorrow, and get to school, meet with my group and get it put into sequence.  We're the last group to go.

This time tomorrow night, I better be drunk.

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Stupid Day: Part 1

I already don't like today.  It's just after 9am.  I woke up in the middle of the night after having a really vivid dream about Brian and Bryn.  I am SO SICK of having dreams about these people.  I don't know these people!!  I know the dreams aren't real, but they seem so real that I wake up and have trouble because it feels like what I dreamed about really happened.  It affects me!  In this dream, I was in some auditorium, and Brian was performing.  In the dream, things were as they are - I mean, I'd dated Brian years and years ago, he'd broken up with me and was with Bryn.  But this dream seemed to include information from other dreams I've had.  Bryn had a note that I'd written Brian and I'd told him not to give to her.  In other dreams I've had, he's with her but I'm trying to convince him to leave her for me.  So anyway, in this dream, Bryn and I went out to the hallway and talked.  She wasn't mean, she wasn't condescending, but she wasn't like overly nice and compassionate towards me, either.  She just made it clear that she and Brian were staying together.

I woke up frustrated - but frustrated because I realized that I'd dreamed what I'd dreamed, not because of what happened in the dream.  I want - pretty much more than anything else at this time - to stop dreaming about these people.  I understand that the dreams are an expression of the idea of what I had with Brian and what I want to have with another man and not that I want Brian in particular.  But I wish my brain would transpose Brian with someone else - someone I don't know.  Because it makes it really hard to want something else - someone else - when I have this image of this person in my mind who seems to have all the qualities I want in a companion.  When it's really not that person I want.  It's the idea of that person.

My tummy hurts, too.  For whatever reason, my body is like maintaining all the air that goes into it or something.  When I wake up in the morning, I get what feel like spasms in my torso, like all the muscles are tensing up all at once, and it goes away and comes back and goes away and comes back.  I'm pretty sure there's just air trapped in there, because it stops once I get to work and have a drink.  But it's uncomfortable, that's for sure.

So right now I'm just trying to get done with all the crap I need to get done with.  I need to get my paper finished today, so that's what I'm going to work on the rest of the time I'm at work.  I have the last regular Criminology test today, which I wish I could do earlier, but I won't have time to do it until after I get home. And it's going to be hot as shit.  Maybe I'll move my computer and screen down to the basement for that.

I'm just stressed.  I'm upset about the test yesterday, and I am worried that I won't have enough information or the right kind of information or come to the right conclusion with my paper.  And I'm worried that my group's presentation isn't going to be long enough, and that we're not going to be able to put it all together well enough.  There's no way I can fail right now, but I've put so much work into getting an A in both classes that if I give up now and just try to get through the next few days it will all have been for nothing.  I need to up my GPA and I need to prove to myself that I'm capable of doing well in school.

As soon as I finish this dumb film I'm supposed to watch for Criminology, I'm going to get this damn paper done.  If it kills me.  I know I'll have all morning tomorrow to work on it, but I want to get it done today so that I'm not trying to include information at the last minute.  Three pages is nothing.  I write more than that every single day.  I just have to put substantial information into the damn thing.  It's just too bad I can't write on what I want to write about.

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Yikes

At this point, I think I probably look like I have the chicken pox.  Between the breakout of zits on my face, chest, and shoulders and the like 15 mosquito bites I got tonight, I am covered in lovely red spots.  Half of them are itchy, and the other half are sort of painful.  I put some witch hazel on the mosquito bites since I don't have any itch cream or anything and so they're still super itchy.

Okay, so today went decently.  I spent the last two and a half hours of work re-reading and studying my notes for SGS.  I felt pretty prepared for the test, much moreso than the last test.  I met with my group straight after work, and we got things set up for how we're going to do our presentation and how we're going to make it cohesive, and we're sharing a google docs presentation (which is a way cool to work on a project like this), and we're meeting again on Thursday to put the finishing touches on it.  So I feel better about that.

Then I took the test.  And I don't feel like I did well.  The problem with the social sciences classes is that the answers to the questions on a test like this are kind of subjective.  I felt like a lot of the questions could have had more than one right answer because of the spectrum of what we discussed in class.  I hate when instructors throw in a trick question here or there by wording it a certain way or throwing in a double negative or a confusing or repetitive answer.  So I'm not going to put all my chickens in a row in terms of hoping I got a good enough grade to put me over the A line.  I'll probably end up with a fucking B simply because the tests fucked me.  This test was a lot harder than the last test, and I did everything correctly.  I read everything.  I attended every single class.  I participated in every discussion.  I took copious notes.  I re-read the readings.  I studied my notes.  The problem is that the information we were supposed to have gotten out of the readings was really vast.  I'm not real thrilled with the way this class has sort of turned out.  50% of our grade is going to be on the paper and presentation, but if I don't do as well as I want to do, my grade is going to suffer, even though I did everything right.   In the past,  I could totally blame a crappy grade on my skipping class, or not reading - I could blame myself and rightly so.  But this time, I feel like I'm getting screwed by the content.  Maybe I'll stop and talk to my teacher after class in the next couple of days...

So tonight, I dropped Phoenix off with my mom to stay for the next couple of days while it's ridiculously hot and I'm busy.  I spent some time over there just chatting with her and sitting outside, and then I came home.  Linda had called me earlier in the day to tell me that she and Meredi were going to be BBQing tonight and I was welcome to join them if I wanted.  I swear, if it weren't the last few days of class I would have gladly planned to join.  I wanted to do some reading tonight, watch the video I'm supposed to watch for the second to last discussion and get caught up and ready for the end of the class.  I showered, and planned to get some reading done, but Meredi and Linda begged me to come down and join them for Vietnamese spring rolls, so I did.  Which is how I got the mosquito bites - we ate outside at dusk.  I came back up and it was already 9!!  I feel like I've wasted the night.  Oh well.  I don't have anything DUE tomorrow, really.  I need to watch that film and get caught up on the readings for my Criminology test tomorrow evening, and hopefully I can do that at work tomorrow.  I'd really, really like to get an A in this class.  Hell, I'd like to get an A in both classes but I don't see that happening.

So I'm going to finish doing my responses for the discussion thread for the day and hop into bed.  It's bloody hot in here right now but there's not a damn thing I can do about it.  Thank GOD tomorrow is Wednesday.

Monday, June 27, 2011

Pressure's On

Ugh.  Today is over.  So at least there's that.  It went by pretty quickly.  I'm still totally dreading the rest of the week though.  I have my SGS test tomorrow, and that's going to be kind of tough.  She writes the test almost entirely on the readings we had to do, and even though I haven't missed a single moment of any class, and I've done all the readings, I don't have the best memory of all the details of the readings, which are where some of the questions are going to come from.  So I need to go back over each and every one.  That's two (sometimes three) readings a day, for 5 days a week, and over the course of two weeks and a day.  So, somewhere around 25 readings?  Freaking yuck.  But at least once that's over with, I don't have to study anymore for that class.

I started writing my paper today, got about half a page punched out, and got my works cited done.  So I have all the research I need to have, and I'm sure I'll come up with more.  I'm meeting with my group before class tomorrow to get the presentation all worked out (hopefully I can do my bit of the powerpoint presentation and pass it off to someone else to put it together since I still have the rest of Criminology to finish).  But at least I'm making a little progress, both with the paper and with my group.  We should have the presentation ready to go by Friday with no problem, and I don't think I'll have any trouble getting the paper done by Thursday.

So, after class today, I stopped and got a pizza, and got home and ate half the thing.  It was good.  I'm going to have at least two more slices tonight.  And the season premieres of Weeds and The Big C start in about 40 minutes, so I have until then to do some work on whatever homework I want to work on.  I'm definitely feeling the pressure but it's a good kind of pressure.  It's the kind of pressure that will motivate me when the time is right.  I like.

Sunday, June 26, 2011

4 Down, 1 To Go

Well.  That didn't happen.  I didn't do anything I had planned to do today.  I don't feel guilty or upset about it at all, though.  My sister called me late last night to tell me that I might not have to watch the kids today, because their dad's mom and sister were going to go to the zoo in the morning so the kids might be going with them.  She was supposed to call me this morning to verify if I'd need to go over, but my alarm went off and I ended up calling over there to see if they needed me, which they didn't.  So I went back to sleep.

I wrestled all day with going to the library to do research for my paper, and decided to forego it.  I was awakened at 4am to Rainey barking outside the back door.  God only knows how long she'd been out there, but I know for a fact that all three dogs were up and about most of the night because Nali was in my room until her mommy came home, and she made a point of lying there yipping and barking at Phoenix and me for a reason that I am not privy to.  I finally got to sleep when she was downstairs and started barking at something, which got the other two dogs going.  It seemed like every time I fell asleep, the barking would start up again.  So I was really grateful not to have to get up this morning.  Anyway, I couldn't get right back to sleep when I got up at 4am to let Rainey in, because my brain was ruminating on the paper I have due this week, so I got up and started doing some research online.  The paper requires at least 7 scholarly sources, and I can definitely get them via Google Scholar, but I wanted to cover my bases just in case I can't, so that's where the library came into the picture.  But it looks like I won't have a problem finding enough sources online.  I even wrote the first line of the paper while I was up, but I didn't want to get all into it.

I seem to work a lot better under pressure.  There's something about the stress of having a deadline looming over my head that gets my creative juices flowing.  Which is probably why I write a lot of my blog posts at night.  Anyway, because I have less reading and discussion and theory applications this week, I am pretty sure I will be able to get most of the paper written while I'm at work, or do it at night.  It's only 5-6 pages, double spaced, and I am pretty sure I can pound that out without even scratching the surface of my topic.  I was also able to work out, in my head, how we're going to structure the presentation so that it is cohesive and makes sense, even though my group seems intent upon NOT doing any work on it.  I know I'll get an A, anyway.

So instead of worrying about it and fretting over it, I decided to just relax a bit.  I napped on and off throughout the day, but it got really hard to sleep around 3pm because it got so hot in my room, so I filled a water bottle with ice water and curled up next to it and watched TV.  I finally got up and going around 7pm.  I went to the store to get my stock of soda for the week, along with some more ice cream.  You know, just the essentials.  Then I came home and popped in Despicable Me and painted my toenails.  It's cooling off now, with a nice cool breeze coming in the window, but it's not really staying in the room.  One of my favorite movies, The Ghost and the Darkness is going to be on HBO in about a half an hour, so I am going to stay up to at least watch the beginning of it.  I figure I got enough sleep during the day to allow for me to stay up a little late tonight.

I feel like I'm starting to wind down from the last 4 weeks of class.  I know that if I can just get through this week, I have a three-day weekend ahead of me, and then only two days of work next week.  So I'm going to do the best I can but not beat myself up for not hitting my usual mark of perfectionism.  I emailed the professor who is running the online Zombies class during July to see if he'd give me special permission to get into the class, but I haven't heard back and don't really expect to, so it looks like I'll have all of July and most of August to relax.  And if I don't get to graduate at the end of the fall, it will kind of suck, but it will also be just fine.  It's not like I'm in a big ol' hurry for anything since I don't even know what the hell I'm going to do after I graduate (aside from maybe demand a big raise at work or look for a different job).  I worked on my Peace Corps application a little around 5am this morning, too, got some dates added to it that I'd been procrastinating on, and sent out two of my three requests for recommendations.  All I need to do is whittle down my essays a little (maybe rewrite them) and figure out who my third recommendation is going to be, and then I'm done.  I've been getting all sorts of reminders from the Peace Corps to get my application in by July 1st to be considered for deployment by July of 2012, so that's kind of the date I'd like to get it in by, but I may have to wait until I'm done with all the craziness of this week.  It'll depend on how much progress I make on my paper and presentation, I guess.

So now it's time to crawl back onto (not into - too hot) my bed and get as much relaxing done as I can before tomorrow begins.  As much as I hate feeling flustered and over-busy, I seem to be rising to the occasion quite nicely.  I'd like to hope that I can continue down that path...

Saturday, June 25, 2011

Hot and Sunny, Just the Way I Like It

Good grief.  I'm just as exhausted today as I was at the end of the day yesterday!  I finally got up and going at 12:30.  Got Phoenix ready and went to my parents house to pick up Lucky for the dog park.  I really wanted to take Duke, too, but he's broken and I didn't want to make it any worse.  It was HOT.  I threw the ball for Lucky what felt like a few hundred times, Phoenix sniffed and chased and jumped into the water a few times.  The dog park is definitely one of my favorite places on Earth.  We stayed for about an hour and left.  When we got back to our neighborhood, I saw that one of the neighbors down the street had a big pile of wood out front with a FREE sign, so I told my parents about it (they're always looking for ways not to have to pay for firewood in the winter - and they have lots of fires in the winter), and they were going to go down and get it, but I volunteered to take the truck down and load it all up, so I did that.  I felt like that was my good deed for the day, sort of made up for being a lazy-ass last weekend.  When I got back, I hopped into the kiddie pool with Z and S, and let them splash me until I was totally drenched, then I made myself a whiskey sour and laid down on the deck to dry off.  For the rest of the afternoon, I just hung out with the kids and my parents.  We had a delicious steak dinner where I ate WAY too much, helped get the baby ready for bed and then we left.

The kiddos are just about always a lot of fun.  When we got back from the dog park, H was still sleeping and needed to be woke up, so I went in there and tried to get him up but he is easily the grumpiest and most unpleasant person when he wakes up and it is SO cute.  I sort of nibbled on his arm, and he yells at me "Your sister is going to wash your mouth out with soap!!" because that's the rule when they bite.  I told him I was just nibbling on him because he's yummy, and he yelled, "I'M NOT YUMMY!!"  But he really is.  He's such a cute little guy.  When we were watching Jeopardy during dinner, there was a category about Bob, from SNL, and H and my dad were just cracking up watching it.  It was glorious to see how similar they are to each other.  So I feel pretty good from getting to hang out with them.  It's getting easier.

I'm pretty tired, though, from the dog park and the sun and playing and drinking.  And I have to get up tomorrow and go over and babysit while my sister works and my mom takes my dad to the airport.  Then I plan to spend a few hours at the library doing research for my paper for SGS.  I'm a little worried about it, but I'm going to try to calm down by just getting it done and out of the way.  The only issue I can foresee is that I don't have a laptop to take to the library with me, so I'm not sure how I'm going to make it work.  But hopefully I'll get it figured out.  So it's good night for now.  Hopefully I can get to sleep in this heat.

The Next Morning

I feel better now.  Not 100% but close.  I awoke to a disquieted brain.  I'm not sure how I could have been asleep and still been working out whatever it is that my brain deems important enough not to let alone.

This morning my brain is working on my future, yet again.  After learning last night that the state of New York has voted to legalize same-sex marriage, I was overjoyed. In my SGS class we watched a film about the stigma attached to same-sex marriage and the issues that are being debated in the argument over whether two people of the same sex should be allowed to marry.  In my opinion, marriage is an institution that celebrates the love between two people, at least in this age.  Long ago, it was a matter of the exchange of property, but now it's about love.

Anyway, after watching the film, I feel the need to fully support same-sex marriage.  And my godmother lives in Buffalo, NY, and is gay.  If she wants to marry her partner, she can do so.  And what could possibly be better than that?

Now I'm watching You Don't Know Jack on HBO which is a movie about Jack Kevorkian and the issue of assisted suicide.  That's another something I'm in support of.  The combination of two very hot-button issues that I have knowledge of and have decided to support make me wonder what my future has in store for me.  Will I be an activist?  Will I at some point be in a position of power that I can use to my advantage?  What an exciting prospect.

So, today, I am going to go to my parents house and spend some time in the sunshine, getting tan.  Then I'm going to take some pups to the dog park to run around and cool off.  And then a steak dinner and some relaxation time.  Tomorrow, it's supposed to be even hotter, but I need to get this paper punched out, so I am going to spend some time at the library doing some research on the gender implications of the female pharaohs of Ancient Egypt.  It doesn't really mesh with the rest of my group's topics, but I am hoping we can make it work.

So now it's time to get ready for the day.  Yuck.  I wish I could sleep for about 10 more hours, but the guilt I'd feel in doing that is not worth the satisfaction I'll feel in getting that much rest.  Next weekend, perhaps.

Friday, June 24, 2011

Thursday, June 23, 2011

The Addict's Mantra

Same as yesterday. I'm so exhausted. I gotta get through tomorrow and then I've got one week left. Next week I have two tests, a final, a paper due and a group presentation. That. Is going to suck. Not looking forward to it. In order to make my life easier, I'm going to get the paper done over the weekend. But I've been trying to use the weekend to give myself a break, so it's going to be hard to get motivated to keep working. I'm really proud of myself because at any time during the last month, I could have chosen not to do a discussion or an assignment for Criminology - and the thought has crossed my mind - but I know that the moment I start slacking will be the moment it all goes down the tubes. I felt a little overwhelmed yesterday when I was looking at the rest of the week's assignments. I've been doing really well at sort of taking it all one day at a time so as not to overwhelm myself and that's been tough because I'm such a future-oriented person. It's been kind of refreshing to do it this way, though.

And now it's sleepytime. It's frigging hot up here tonight but I feel like my eyes are crossing from exhaustion. Here's hoping I use the next three days to my advantage.

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Quickie

OOOOkay.  So I'm not writing much tonight.  I just finished my Criminology homework for the day and I want to try to get ahead on my SGS reading for tomorrow so that I can sit and do nothing between work and school tomorrow.  I need to get over to the English department to beg for placement into the Zombie online class for July, but I'd like it if I could get all my Criminology done at work tomorrow, and not have to worry about it tomorrow night.

There's also not much to write about today, anyway.  And I'm okay with that.

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

I Can See the Light...

I am the queen of multi-tasking.  Right now, I am watching Conan and writing a discussion post for Criminology on the Developmental/Life Course theory of crime, and writing this post and also trying not to die from the pain in my uterus.  I wrote yesterday's post while I was still at work - so prior to 1:30pm - and I went to the lady doc to get my second round of Lupron yesterday after school.  Apparently it was too late, because I am bleeding like a stuck pig and I have cramps to beat the band.  Not that that is an actual expression.  But ow.  I'm pissed.  I think my emotional issues yesterday were the result of massive PMS and hormonal shifts.  Because seriously I am in the middle of full-fledged menstruation.  Which is NOT GOOD for my reproductive system.

I felt a whole lot better today, emotionally.  I definitely felt really compassionate this morning, but in a good way. Going to class helps my mood a lot.

I had to get my first prescriptions filled since dropping my insurance.  Again, ow.  It totaled $130.  Which is as much as I was paying for insurance PLUS an extra $50 in prescription costs.  So, really, it's cheaper this way.  Plus, I have patient assistance for the Lupron and Norithendrone (hormone add-back therapy) and I switched my Effexor to Effexor XR so I could get patient assistance - although I forgot I had the damn card for $50 off today and paid full price.  I wonder if I can go back tomorrow with the card and ask for money back...

And I got a 98% on my Criminology test yesterday.  That's more like what I should be getting in that class.  My newest existential problem is choosing whether to try and double/triple major in Sociology and Integrative Physiology, or one or the other, and minoring in one or the other, or throwing it all out the window and going into the Peace Corps.  I'm leaning towards a second major in Soc because a Criminology major will open the doors for me that I want opened for the FBI, CIA or US Marshals.  But IPHY will open doors for me for the possibilities of nursing and forensic pathology or forensic anthropology.  So I've got some serious thinking to do.  Either way, when I've graduated, I either need to demand a raise at work to $15/hour or comparable or find a different, higher-paying part-time job so I can keep going to school.  We shall see about that.

But somehow it's 10:30pm and I am having trouble keeping my eyes open.  And tomorrow's going to be just as busy as today and yesterday because I've made an appointment to speak to a health insurance agent and get a quote at 1:30 tomorrow, so I won't have time to read in between class and work.

PS - I like both my classes a lot.  I'm learning so much, and learning about the social pressures that are built into the society in which we live is helping me cope with the things that I view as personal shortcomings.  And the kids I'm supposed to do the presentation with next week are all actually very cool and I'm looking forward to working with them more.  

Monday, June 20, 2011

Swinging Low, So Low

Oh, I am reeeeeeally struggling today.  I'm pretty sure a lot of how I feel today has to do with the fact that I didn't really even get out of bed yesterday.  I'm feeling tremendous guilt for not hanging out with my dad, or getting him anything for Father's Day.  I probably shouldn't, but I do.  I did not want to wake up this morning, although it wasn't as bad as it has been.  I didn't want to leave Phoenix, who looked both super-snuggly and upset at my leaving him.  I worry so much that I am not a good doggy-mommy, because I don't take him on walks every single day, and that's most of a dog's life, isn't it?  Getting to go out and experience the world and all it's smells and sounds?  I do the best I can, which at this point is taking him to the park most days after I get home from work and school, and let him run around and sniff and stuff.  I feed him both dry and wet dog food, and I try to give him a little variety because I sure as hell wouldn't want to eat the same damn thing day after day.  He gets rawhides to chew on just about every day, and I got him these duck tenders that look like beef jerky that he really likes, plus he has toys and friends to play with every day.  So I guess he's got it pretty good.  I just worry that he's not as happy as he might be with someone else, someone more active.  And I know how upset he gets when I leave him, and I hate being away from him all day every day.  I know I've only got two more weeks of it being like this, and he won't even remember it was like this after I've broken him of the I-get-up-every-day-at-6am-and-get-ready-and-leave-and-am-gone-all-day routine, but I just want to be with him all the time.  I'm really hoping that he's settled down and is used to where we live and who we live with and how things are.  I think he's gotten the point that I'm not going to take him somewhere and leave him and never come back.

Since last week I've been feeling odd.  I know that this feeling is coming from doing a bit of cyber-stalking of my ex's, both Brian and Aaron.  I have learned my lesson about trying to find out what is going on in both of their lives because I've been doing this for years, literally, and it always feels the same.  It's like I momentarily travel back in time to when I was with either of them and things were good and I was happy.  And then I'm transported back to the present, and it's this very sudden realization that things are not as they were and that I have nothing right now to fill the voids that these people left in me.  But the problem is that I am pretty sure that I don't want a relationship to fill those voids, either.  I am pretty happy (maybe not happy, but satisfied) with being a single person and having the independence that comes with it.  I don't think I have the energy to try to start something new with someone.  My heart just aches to go back to the times when I had already established something with Brian or Aaron and it was easy.

I feel this really intense scrutiny from all those known and unknown to me because I am a 26 year-old single woman, and because there is no one in the bullpen to "save" me from this perpetual singlehood I seem to be stuck in.  I want to hand something out, or wear a sign around my neck that says, "It's not for lack of trying.  I like being single, and I don't want to give my heart away right now," so that everyone will stop looking at me and trying to figure out what might be wrong with me that I am not in a relationship or actively trying to be in one.  I bring this up because last week, we found out that another of my cousins on my dad's side of the family is getting married, and in September.  The girl cousin that is closest in age to me (we're the same age, but I'm like 7 months older) is engaged to be married in October of this year.  The family has some kind of phenomena that each of the grandchildren on that side, including my sister, has gotten married in order of age, excepting only my autistic cousin, and now me.  I said to my girl cousin when I saw her last year that she was next, because I certainly wouldn't be getting married anytime soon.  And then she got engaged.

I wish, to the deepest depths of my heart, that I understood what my preoccupation with relationships and marriage is.  From the time I've spent in my Sociology classes, I'm learning that in American society, there is a lot of pressure on genders to act in the predictable ways, and that for all females, marriage should be the end-point goal in mind.  If a woman is in her 30's or so and is not or has not ever been married, it's because she has chosen to have a career instead, but I am really beginning to worry that I might be an exception to this "rule," and here's why:

My cumulative GPA at CU is 2.18(ish).  I have 6 F's and one D on my record, along with countless C's and B's and the fewest of A's.  I've been looking into graduate school for Forensic Anthropology and the ones that I would like to apply to require a GPA of 3.25 at the lowest, usually with a 3.5 in the major.  I haven't done the math, but I would venture to guess that my GPA in Anthropology is around 2.5.  So I'm nowhere close.  Now, I could still apply, and try to plead extenuating circumstances for the reason that my GPA is so low, and explain that I've been living with Depression and that doing well in class was not at the top of my list when I was really in the worst parts of it, but that I've learned to manage it and that I think I could do really well in school from this point forward...but that's basically begging someone I don't know to trust me with some precious commodity with no proof of my trustworthiness.  I used to be naive enough to think that I really had a shot, but I know now that the world isn't really a fair place and that it doesn't matter how good of a person you think you are, it's your accomplishments that others will judge you by.  And if you haven't got much to show on paper, that's about how much they'll take you for.  I'm really concerned.  I don't really know what I will do with myself after I graduate.  A lot of people start looking for jobs within their fields, but my field doesn't exist outside of academia.  I'd really like to take more classes and do well in the Sociology and Integrative Physiology areas, but I don't want to take the classes if they're not going to actually do something for me.

This is my persistent issue - the future and not knowing what to do with it.  I can theoretically make it whatever I want it to be, but that requires making the right decisions now and I am terrible at that.  By right decisions, I mean things like paying attention and doing well in school, applying myself in the places that need application.  Not lying in bed all fucking day long when I should be out getting my dad a damn gift to say thank you for all the stuff he's done for me.  GOD I am obviously quite bothered by my terrible decision to stay in bed all day yesterday.  FUCK.

I haven't felt this down in awhile.  As I write this, I am on the verge of tears, and I can't cry because there are assholes sitting in the lobby waiting to be shown office space.  I had a dream on Friday night that I was at some sort of family gathering, with all my married cousins, and I was in someone's kitchen, and I burst into tears and cried and cried because I am so sad that my life hasn't turned out the way I thought it would and because I am afraid I am disappointing so many different people all the time and I'm so sick of it.  The crying felt really good, calming and cleansing.  I'm afraid that I'm going to have to sit down and have a good cry before the day is over (and hopefully after class so I don't cry all my mascara off).

I should wrap up here because I need to get some stuff done before class today, and I have a test in my Criminology class that I can't actually take until after I get home today.  I hate these days.  I hate when I hate life.  I have so many days when my satisfaction level is really high, but when it dips low, it goes really low.  Today is a low, low day, and I don't know how to bring myself out of this funk, aside from just going about life and pretending I'm fine.  What choice do I have?  I can't take a break right now.  I can take one in two weeks, but not right now.

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Lazy, Lazy

Deliberately, I did nothing today.  No, that's not an exaggeration.  I got up at 6:30 and got donuts, came home, ate three, and went back to bed.  I have periodically woken back up during the day to eat more donuts.  I didn't have anything for my dad for Father's Day, and I see him pretty much every day anyway, so I called him to say Happy Father's Day and let him know I wasn't planning to come over.  I will do something nice for he and my mom next weekend.  I'm hoping it's not a huge deal that I didn't go over.  He was flying out to Edmonton today, anyway.

So, that's that.  I dreamed a whole hell of a lot during the day, which I love.  The last dream was that my family went over to George Lucas's house for dinner.  He has an enormous house in my dreams.

I'm kind of nervous for this week.  I have a test tomorrow in my online class, which I think I'm better prepared for this time, but I need to get my group organized for the group presentations we're doing the last week of class.  No one in my group seems to get that this is important and that we need to be working together on it, and I don't want to be working on it at the last minute since I have another class I'll be needing to focus on at that point.

I need to go take a shower and then it's back to bed with me.  Phoenix has been so snuggly with me all day and that is the best!  I wish I could take him everywhere with me.

Saturday, June 18, 2011

Getting Caught Up

Blah.  I don't feel like writing.  For the bajillionth time.  It might be because I didn't have to do any kind of writing for school today.  I got up around 11:30 and got going pretty much right away.  My only real goal for today was to do some cleaning in my room so it wasn't so totally filthy anymore.  I felt like there was a thick layer of dust on everything and a thin layer of sand from when I took Phoenix to the dog park last weekend and he was covered in sand and then laid on my bed.  So I cleaned and vacuumed.  It felt better.

Then I took Phoenix and Nali to the dog park.  I bought a couple of toys yesterday that I wanted to get Phoenix interested in at home so if I took them to the dog park and threw them in the pond he would go in after them.  Yeah.  That didn't work.  Nali went after them, but she got about halfway back to the shore with one and then left it.  I could not, for the life of me, get her to go back out and get it.  So I basically just threw $5 into that pond today.  I'm a little bitter about it.

Phoenix and I went to my parents house after that, and played with the kids, had some beers and talked with my sisters and my parents.  It was really fun.  My parents are starting to get the rhythm of things, starting to understand all the kids' personalities and having an easier time with them, not getting so fried.  I think it helped that my little sister was there, but I've noticed a change in both my parents' attitudes about being with the kids.  I don't know if it's a conscious change or what, but it helps a lot.

And that's about it for today.  I made a point of having three beers over there because I felt like my mood was pretty crappy.  I think it's still kind of crappy, especially because I don't feel like writing, but I know it will improve.

I'm going to go to bed now.  I'm definitely tired, and I kind of want to get up extra early, go get donuts, and then go back to bed.  We'll see if that actually happens.  I put this as a facebook status, and it's certainly true. As hard as it is, and as tired as I am, I love being a student.  But I sure wish I was done with these classes already.

Friday, June 17, 2011

Thankful for The 2nd Love of My Life

I really, really want to write a substantial post.  But I am unbelievably tired.  Despite my standards for what constitutes "tired."  I didn't get much sleep last night, I'd guess 4 hours, tops, because for one, I couldn't seem to turn my brain off for whatever reason.  It just kept going.  And Phoenix was up and about so much during the night.  He kept going in and out of the dog doors.  At 4am I finally got up to see what the hell was going on, and I found him and Nali just sort of hanging out in the backyard in the moonlight.  It was actually kind of cool.  And cute.  Even though I was annoyed, the novelty of it was not lost on me.  Anyway, 6am came really fast.  And getting up was extremely painful.  But I pushed through.

So that's my excuse for not writing a whole hell of a lot today, even though I've experienced a myriad of feelings today that I haven't felt in awhile.  I want to work them all out and file them away, but not tonight.  Also, I was hanging out at my parents house with my sisters and the kids, and my mom was picking my dad up from the airport, so I called them to find out how much longer until they got home so I knew how much longer I needed to stay, and my dad thought I was my older sister and was a total asshole to me.  That really upset me.  On the car ride home, I started thinking about the possibility that my mental illness and self-esteem issues maybe are not so much a result of mental illness and genetics as they are due to daddy issues.  I've long refused to give credence to the possibility that how I was raised is responsible for all my issues, but after being completely immersed in these Sociology classes, I am beginning to wonder how much of my parents choices in raising me continues to affect me to this day.

I do want to make a note of this - today, I feel alone, empty and incomplete.  I know why, and I'm trying to work through it, but I have been so strong and stoic about staying focused that I kind of want to allow myself to have a meltdown, just tonight.  I probably won't; I'm too tired to put the necessary energy into wanting to feel better after falling apart.  So maybe tomorrow when I'm a little stronger

And today is Phoenix's 3rd birthday (or as close as I can pinpoint to it.  I got him on July 24th and they told me he was 1 year, 1 month and 1 week old, and I've had him almost two years).  I think I have never been so grateful for the birth of a creature.  In the words of the immortal Rose DeWitt-Bukater from Titanic (and a cheesier reference was never made, but I so loved that movie in it's time), "He saved me.  In every way a person can be saved."

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Over Halfway Done

I, of course have a bajillion things I could write about tonight, but I'm so tired that I couldn't think of a word in class today to fit my thought and my teacher looked at me with pity and said, "Are you tired, too?" I answered in the affirmative. I have a bit of reading still to do tonight so I'm not all flustered at work tomorrow. I definitely want to write about how well I feel like I'm doing with being in school and under that stress along with working what feels like all the goddamn time, and beige criticized and alone and not altogether certain about my romantic (un)situation. But I have bigger things to worry about. Like reading about how people who lack self-control commit crime...sounds familiar...

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Halfway Through the Week Already?

Today went pretty well.  I really have no complaints.  Work went well - I made a point of finding out who it was that complained about me, and it was the person I suspected.  The woman is a financial adviser, and when she comes in, she has this air about her that just says to me that I'm not worth her time.  She comes in the doors all huffy and practically runs past me.  I have several times attempted to give her her mail (as per my job description), and before I can even say anything, she's gone.  And the few times I have attempted to give her her mail, she tells me she doesn't want it then, or that she can't take it right then because her hands are full.  So I've sort of made a point of treating her how she treats me.  So why should she expect me to be any nicer to her?  Why should I give her any of my time or attention when she doesn't give me any of hers?  I read the two emails that she sent my boss, and they were really short, but she said that I'm not very attentive or friendly, that I don't give her her mail and that I won't send her calls to her on her cell phone as she's requested (there's something in there too, about my dropping a transfer on her or something, but I honestly have no fucking idea what she's talking about). She once requested, when I first started the job, that if she's not in the office, that I transfer calls to her cell phone.  She's one of like three of our tenants with this request (because she's so important that she can't miss phone calls even though she's rarely in the office), but if I've transferred two or more calls to her cell and she doesn't answer, I just tell people she's unavailable.  She must be if she's not picking up the calls.  Then I put the calls to her office voicemail.  Well she called today and I told her that I'd been dropping calls into her office voicemail if she doesn't pick up her cell because that's what I do with the other tenants who request calls to be transferred to their cell phones, because she never specified otherwise.  I was syrupy, sickly sweet to her on the phone and I will be furthermore paying her WAY too much attention.  I just want to show her that she's wrong about me, and that the golden rule is not just an abstract thought.  I truly believe that you should treat others the way you want to be treated, and per that adage, I treat her as she treats me.  Like I'm unimportant.

So that's that.  I'm putting it in my past as best I can while still making a point of giving her exaggerated amounts of attention.  That's the only way I'm going to be able to feel better about the whole thing.

I left the office and rode up to campus (the Hill is not getting any easier on the bike) and I brought a beach towel with me today, and I laid out in the sun while I finished the readings for class.  It was HOT.  I was pouring sweat.  I really wanted to go jump into Boulder Creek after class, but the classroom is air-conditioned and I was perfectly comfortable after class so I didn't; tomorrow I'll jump in and then ride up the hill and dry off in the sun.  That sounds perfect.

After class I zipped home to grab Phoenix and we went to my parents house.  The kids had just gotten there and so we played and hung out for a little while and then ate dinner.  I stayed and played for just a little while after that and then left.  Phoenix was so hot in the car on the way home that I decided upon pulling up to my house that I was going to take him and Nali to the dog park to cool off.  They had a blast.  Nali even chased some tennis balls.  They're both passed out in my room right now.

Overall, I'm in a pretty decent mood today.  Having beautiful weather and some freedom between work and class seems to really make a difference in my day.  I'm going to try to get ahead on some of my homework  now while I watch Conan so that I'm not all flustered trying to get it done at work tomorrow while I'm answering phones and being asked inane questions and kissing asses of people with overly inflated egos.  Or else I'll just go to bed because I'm really fricking tired.

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Choices

Today was about choices.  I am someone who is really good at making not the best choice, but the easiest choice.   The easiest choice tends to be the one that involves me not having to do anything at all.  Not socializing, not cooking dinner, not taking Phoenix for a run, nothing.  The "do nothing" choice feels the best at the time, but it has lasting effects and that part doesn't feel good later.  I made the better choices today.  I did all my reading for today.  I did all the stupid leasing shit I had to do at work, without putting it off.  I made a choice to think on my Criminology homework assignment so that I would get a better grade instead of just writing to get it done and risking a less-than-perfect grade.  I still have to do it tonight, but I've let my brain work it out since before I left work.  I got home from school and took Phoenix and Nali down to the park and let them run their energy out.  I did my grocery shopping.  I cooked myself dinner instead of stopping to get it somewhere.  I sat and talked to Meredi for awhile while we ate.  And now here I am.  I didn't have a great day.  I was called into Barbara's office and was disciplined.  I really, really don't do well when I am given negative information pertaining to my performance.  I can hear positive things about myself all the live-long day, bask in the glory of my awesomeness, and feel mediocre.  But the moment I hear something that reflects on me negatively, I shut down.

I so want to go further with this post but I am so flipping tired I can hardly see straight.  I just finished my homework for tonight and I put extra effort into it after getting a shitty grade on the last assignment (which I half-assed, so I deserve it).  Maybe I'll be able to write a bit at work tomorrow (although I don't know how I'm going to have time with all the attention I'm supposed to be paying to the tenants who complained about me).

Monday, June 13, 2011

Energy?

Today, I didn't feel tired all day.  I was about halfway through class when I realized I hadn't thought about taking a nap.  It was great.  I actually want to go to sleep now just because I don't want to feel tired tomorrow.

Let's see.  Where to go with this...?  The first thing that comes to mind that I want to address is my confrontation with Anna today.  I sent her and Barb an email telling them about my school schedule plans, which include dropping the early morning class I want to take (which I already did), and taking an online writing class this fall (which I've enrolled in)(I think it's Food & Culture).  It puts me one credit short of the amount my degree audit calculated that I needed in order to graduate.  Anyway, I had put all this in an email to Barb and Anna and I requested some days off to go to Kate's wedding, and Anna came up to talk to me about it.  She is a visual learner from what I gather, and she needs to get everything laid out in front of her to understand it.  She brought up a calendar to mark off the days she'd be working and I'd be working.  I told her that I needed Fridays off for the class I've yet to actually enroll in, but even if I don't take any other classes, that's the one I want to take.  It's Advanced Osteology.  I had originally wanted to be at work on the days I am scheduled to be in my Anatomy lab, but after thinking about it, I decided I want to be home at least one of those days so that Phoenix isn't at home all alone for 12 hours two days a week.  So I ended up just telling them that I didn't really care which days I was working as long as I had Fridays off.  When she came up, Anna told me she wanted Wednesdays and Thursdays at the desk, but that would put me there on Mondays and Fridays, which I'd rather have just one or the other, not both.  I told Anna I'd have to think about it because I have been helping my parents out with the kids and it's going to depend on that.  And she kind of lost it on me.  She said something along the lines of, "I think I deserve priority here because I think I've been bending over backwards to accommodate your schedule this summer.  I understand you've got stuff going on outside of work, but so do I..." and I just sort of looked at her.  I'm not sure if I just shut down or if I simply have dismissed her in my mind to the point that I don't actually hear the crap that comes out of her mouth, but I found that I was not even the least bit upset by her sudden outburst.  And it was an outburst.  I don't know if it was just how she phrased things, or if it was because I eventually found my tongue and told her that I agreed that she was bending over backwards and that I understood where she was coming from, but I didn't get flustered, I didn't turn red, and my mind didn't go blank trying to come up with a retort.  It was as though I really didn't care.  I'm not sure what to think of this.  I'm a really easily upsettable person.  It doesn't take much for me to take something personally when it's not meant that way.  I've been offended by something Anna's said or done more than once, and I've been put in my place over my complaints about her, which would normally just make me that much easier to upset.  So I'm not sure what happened today.  I really feel like maybe I just shut down and stopped caring altogether.  But it was wonderful!  I hope that is how I react to other situations of confrontation in the future because it was so much easier on me to handle it that way.

I had some panicky moments while I was at work this morning, trying to work out my school schedule.  I realized that I might be one credit short of graduation (thanks to the Anatomy lab being only 2 credits instead of 3) if I don't take any classes during the month of July.  If I can figure out how the hell to get into that English class about Zombies and Popular Culture, I'll be just fine, because it's online and I can go back to my regular three on-two off schedule.  If not, then I need to figure out how to take another class this fall besides the Anatomy lab, Advanced Osteology and the online writing class.  While it will help me to be in school full time, there's a chance I won't get enough financial aid to cover all that plus books and then I still need to figure out what the hell I'm doing about insurance.  I'd really rather not extend my graduation to the Spring of next year, although I am still planning to be in school, taking classes working on my Integrative Physiology and Sociology additional degrees.  Anyway, I started thinking about how unhappy I am with my job, and the fact that I don't get benefits through it and how much of a pain in the ass that is.  And then I thought about how I don't want to work a 40-hour-a-week job, and that I won't get benefits if I don't work 40 hours a week, and how I want to work in a career-type job where I am potentially making $30,000 a year or more, and how it's going to probably have to be an administrative-type job if I want to keep taking classes, I'm going to have to work part-time, and there are very few part-time jobs out there that are remotely interesting, in my fields of interest, and how am I going to find a part-time job that pays $30,000 a year?  The thought cycle was thus and it made it really difficult for me to concentrate on the fact that I was just trying to plan out through the end of the year, not the rest of my life, and it's at that point that I get frustrated, upset, and panicky.  I don't like not knowing what's going to happen.  I was totally able to shake it off and move on with my day without any lasting effects, but now it's got me thinking and that's not a good thing.  I need to try to focus on the fact that I've still got quite a ways to go and that I have plenty of time to make decisions about what to do.

So that's about how my day went.  Riding the bike up the hill damn near killed me again.  It was hard!!  But I am already noticing differences in my physique.  Or else I am just happier with my body.  I think it's the latter. I sat in the sun for a few minutes but I was sweating like a field-worker so I went inside.  I chose a totally different seat in class today, which threw some people off, I think.  I wanted to sit by the window!  No one said anything, but I feel the anxiety over it.  Even though in college you don't get assigned seats, people generally sit in the same seat or the same area every single class.  If your seat is taken, it throws you off.  I hadn't absconded with anyone's seat, but I was in a different area with a different group of people.  I liked it.  Also, there's a guy in my class who seems just about as smart as me and he talks just about as much as me, and he's a 4+ year senior like me, and I keep catching him looking at me, and when it happens, I look him in the eyes and he doesn't look away.  It's strange.  I keep getting the idea that he likes me or wants to ask me out or something, but I might be way off and it's really nothing.  But it's nice that I feel like I sort of have that air of mystery about me.

That's enough for now.  I didn't plan on writing that much and I need to get my shit together so that I am not frantically trying to read my assignments at the last minute like I was today, and not feeling all frustrated that I can't concentrate at work because some stupid tenants are standing by my desk talking about inane shit.  Oh, and Conan's on in three minutes.

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Pre-Exhaustion

It was just a couple of days ago that I wrote about how I longed to be asleep so I could escape to the dream worlds my subconscious creates for me because I feel so safe and so happy in that place.  Well I woke up today feeling unhappy and confused.  But that's because I had dreamed about Brian.  Again.  And I always wake up feeling weird after that.  It was the usual - Brian and I had gotten back together, and were pretty happy, but in the back of my mind, I wondered if he had really left Bryn for me, and if he was going to go back to her.  That's a newer development in my dreams, this super-consciousness I have of my knowledge of real life.  I have been trying really hard in the last few months to not give these dreams credence, and I try to just forget about them after they happen, because the more I think about Brian in my waking life, the better the chance of my dreaming about him, and I don't like dreaming about him.  I try really hard to not think about him at all if I can, because he is not a part of my life anymore, and I want to move on with my life and forget about him altogether.  Yesterday, I was driving to my parents house and I saw a guy in a truck that looked marginally similar to Brian and I think that got my neurons going, and the memory of that event is what brought the dream about.

There is much about my thoughts of this person that I understand, but there is also much about these thoughts that I don't understand.  I have worked through the thoughts over and over and over again, and sometimes I think I've gotten them resolved, but then more dreams pop up and I'm left wondering yet again.  I wish, with all my heart, that I could just wipe away my memories of Brian 100%, the good and the bad.  I don't want to think about him anymore.  I don't want to compare every guy I date to him.  I don't want to wonder about his happiness, or if he and Bryn fight, or what they might even have to fight about.  I just wish I could walk away from that part of my life forever and never look back.

I have had dreams about Aaron more often lately than I have about Brian, and I don't wake up feeling nearly as confused and unhappy from those dreams.  I think it's because I know that I have no future with Aaron, and that it wasn't really a real relationship to begin with, even though I let it go on for three (+) years.  There must be a part of me that wonders if I'd have a future with Brian, even now.  If he and Bryn broke up (which they won't - they're perfect for each other as far as I can see), or if she died, if he would allow me back into his life.  But even if there is that tiny possibility, I don't think I would even want to investigate that because I know that there's a big world out there with plenty of other people and there is someone out there for me who will make me as happy as or happier than Brian made me.  And there were times where he made me quite miserable, too.  I just never focus on those times.

I wanted to get a lot more done today than I actually did get done.  I think when I wake up feeling confused like that, it sets the tone for my whole day.  I woke up around 10:00am and just laid around for awhile.  I dozed off, and woke up again at 1:00.  I put a load of laundry in, and sorted out the clothes that were overflowing out of my laundry baskets so that I could just hang up the clothes that needed hanging up.  But I stopped there, and laid down and dozed off again.  I got back up at 3:00 and took Phoenix to the dog park after throwing in another load of laundry.  Phoenix wasn't feeling particularly social, and I wasn't feeling all that great, so we only stayed for about a half an hour.  He got some exercise, did a ton of sniffing and peeing and went in the water a few times.  We came back home and I made myself tater tots and queso for dinner (SO GOOD!) and then dozed again.  I woke up around 8:15 and got up and got the laundry out of the dryer and got in the shower, and I've been up ever since.  I just want to lie around and not do anything today.  Both Meredi and Linda spent all day hiking, and it makes me feel so lazy and like there's something wrong with me that I don't like to go hiking.  Linda asked me yesterday to take Rainey outside if she wasn't home by about 5, so I did that, and took her cone off and sat with her icing her knee and scratching her shaved leg.  The poor thing must be bored out of her mind.  She can't do much with the cone on her head, she isn't supposed to go up and down the stairs, I can't take the cone off her or she'll lick her staples, and I worry that Phoenix and Nali will run her over or knock her down if I'm not watching them all the time.  So I can't really do anything for her but keep her in Linda's room.  It breaks my heart a little bit.  Linda says she's had surgery before, and that she did just fine and that she'll take her out hiking and stuff again when she's all healed up.  So I know she's got some fun in her future, it just really sucks for her right now.

The absolute highlight of my day was when Kate asked me to be in her wedding.  I had been thinking and thinking and wondering and wondering if she wanted me to be in it, but I wasn't going to say anything because that's how I ruined my friendship with Gorman (one of my best friends from high school - she didn't ask me to be in her wedding and I was really hurt) years and years ago.  And I was trying to accept that it was totally fine if Kate didn't want me to be in her wedding, because I was in the first one, and because I was so unsupportive and because I said some really mean things back in November.  I think I would have been completely fine if she'd never asked me because I deserve that, but to have her ask me was a big surprise and I am totally honored.  I did a number on our friendship, and I feel pretty much completely horrible about that, but I love that Kate seems to have been able to put that behind her, and I'm putting it behind me, too.

I'm such an unreasonably judgmental person.  I hold my friends to incredibly high standards, just a smidge lower than the standards to which I hold myself, and if they don't meet those standards, I'll call them out on it. And that's what I did with Kate.  Instead of just accepting that she was making some big life changes, and that she was going in a really positive direction, I told her that I didn't want to be friends with her anymore.  And I'm still struggling with some of the things I see her do, but instead of being judgmental, I'm just looking at those things as Kate doing whatever she needs to do to make herself happy.  Which works for the kind of friendship she and I have.  I am still pretty judgmental, but I try to be less so, and come up with reasons for why I'm having a problem with whatever it is, and instead of calling her out on whatever it is, I attempt to work out the problem I am having with it.

I do wonder, though, why I am so possessive and judgmental of Kate.  I don't do the same things with Tiffany or Kara.  I just sort of accept them the way they are, and accept the decisions they make and that's it.  With Kate, it's like I just want her to be the same Kate she was when she and I met, and I want her life and my life to move along parallel lines and I think I get upset when they don't.  And that's just stupid.  I am me, and she is her, and we are two different people.  We can still be friends and still be supportive of one another without having everything be the same as it's always been.

That's just something I wanted to address.  I think she and I are just about back to where we were in November, and I have no intention of doing anything to screw it up again.  I've slept probably a total of four hours during the day today so I'm not really tired, but I should go to bed so that I can get up tomorrow and not feel totally awful.  It's going to be a long week and I have to get through it.  I've been feeling pretty great and I'd like to keep it that way.  It's just a lot of work to do it like this.

Saturday, June 11, 2011

...le sigh...

I felt quite seriously happy and contented today.  I kind of want to just leave it at that.  But we all know I'm not going to.

I didn't sleep well at all, I didn't fall asleep until after 1am, and then woke up at 9 this morning to a male voice in our house.  It was neighbor Braden, he just came to see Meredi for a little while.  But I was wide awake at that point.  So I got myself some ice cream and watched some TV for an hour.  I fell asleep again around 10:30 and made a point to wake up around 1pm at the latest because I knew my sister wanted me to re-dye her hair today.  That was all I absolutely HAD to do today, but I also went to TJ Maxx (finally) to get a pair of shoes for work - which are way cute - and a new pair of sunglasses.

I visited with my parents and the kiddos for awhile, and ran to the liquor store for my dad.  My dad is a funny guy.  He really likes the neighbor across the street and his wife. Their names are Charlie and Kathy, and Vanessa, their daughter has been friends with my little sister for years and years.  Since they were teeny tiny kiddos.  They're still friends now, and planning to live together this fall up in Greeley (which I love.  Everyone should have a best friend like that for that long).  Anyway, we forewent the steak tonight, which was okay with me because I sort of just wanted to not have to do much this afternoon.  So after TJ Maxx, and hanging out with the kiddos and the run to the liquor store, my sister and I came back to my house and I redid her hair.  It came out pretty good, although all I saw was it wet, so I don't know how it will look dried.  After she left, I sat and talked with Linda for awhile, while mooking Rainey, and then came upstairs and dozed off.

I've never seen One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, but it's on TV right now.  It's on the AFI's top 100 movies list so I'm making a point of watching it.  So far, so good.  I'm going to go wash my face and get ready for bed.  I love feeling this relaxed and tranquil.  I haven't really given any thought to my life's circumstances today, and I quite like it that way.  I'm making the most of this off time I have this weekend, because this next week is going to be equally as tough as the last one, and I still have three more just like it.  I'm not going to waste my time being upset or worried or whatever.  It's not worth it.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Back in College, Week 2: Complete

I am so motherf-ing tired right now I can hardly think straight.  I can think.  It's just in all sociological terms, since both of my classes are in Sociology and I had tests in both classes today.  In fact, I just finished my first online exam.  I got an 80/90, which is not good considering it was an open-book, open-note exam.  I had some trouble with detailed information on the last few theories we read about since I didn't have the correct materials to be able to read the exact information we were being tested on in the last few days.  I broke down and took a third trip to the bookstore and REBOUGHT copies of the big book and the correct book for this class.  I'm sending back what I got in the mail yesterday, keeping the abridged version of the big book AND keeping the big book because I found it incredibly useful for the test.  I'm just going to cut my losses and have to sell the books when I'm done with the class.  I've thought about going, returning the books once a week for the full price, then buying them back again in a few days just like I did this time.  But that sounds like a lot of work, and there's the risk of accidentally returning the books to the same cashier twice and according to the Rational Choice Theory of criminology, if I do the cost/benefit analysis, my getting caught and possibly sanctioned is not worth the money I'll save trying to do it that way.  I wish my prof could read this so she'd know that I'm not as stupid as I seem.

I think I did okay on the other test I took earlier.  It was definitely more difficult than I thought it would be, and although I pretty much memorized the notes, and the information from the discussions we had in class, a lot of the questions were on the content of the readings we were assigned, and while I did read all of them, I apparently didn't retain the details I needed to have retained.  I'm hoping that my paper and presentation and attendance/reading scores will help to neutralize the bad test scores I will have gotten (as you can see, I'm not anticipating doing any better on subsequent tests).

And so my weekend begins.  I got a bit sunburned today, but the weather is supposed to be equally as nice this weekend as it was today so I hope I get to spend some more time outside.  I need to get all my laundry done and get it all put away because this disorganization of having it all piled up in front of my closet is killing me.  But that's really all the expectation I have for myself for the weekend.  Two days go by really fast when you want them to go slow.  It won't help that I want to sleep and sleep and sleep, but I can't.

I'll take Phoenix and Nali to the dog park tomorrow or Sunday.  I can't take poor Lucky and Duke because Duke is officially broken.  He needs to have surgery on his knee(s), especially the one he hasn't been putting weight on since last weekend.  I wouldn't be surprised if he needs to have the same surgery Rainey had.  The problem is that getting him back and forth from house to house would be really hard, and no one can afford surgery like that for him (ex-husband's family could, but they're far too selfish to pay for that since it would benefit my sister and the rest of us in some way).  I'd gladly take out a loan for it if I could, but I don't think my credit is up to par yet.

With my not getting the amount of sleep I'm used to, or at least having a day in between to sort of recoup, I've been thinking about sleeping and dreaming a lot.  My dreams give me this strange sense of peace, tranquility, safety and security that I can't really explain.  I have this whole separate dream-persona, except that I'm almost exactly the same as I really am, I'm just not suffering from any of the psychological problems that plague me when I'm conscious.  I dream about having boyfriends and perfect relationships, I dream about moving into gorgeous apartments, I dream about needing surgery (and you totally can feel pain in dreams - I had one where I was convinced I had appendicitis earlier this week and I can vividly remember the pain), I dream about traveling and being outside...and I always feel truly wonderful.  Even when the dreams are distressing in some way, it's a different type of distress that I experience in my waking life and it's far more tolerable.

I like me when I'm busy and when I'm forced to do things and be somebody and be present.  Although I'm totally exhausted from waking up at the ass-crack of dawn 5 days a week, working, then riding my fat ass up the damn Hill to school and then requiring my brain to put forth more effort than it's been forced to put forth since at least EMT school, then either going home and reading or going to my parents house and helping with the kids, I am a part of the world and I'm responsible for the decisions that I make that get me up and out of bed and from place to place, and that's something  I can take pride in.  There's nothing driving me to do what I have to do other than the fear of losing my job and the desire I have to do as well as I am capable of doing. Having depression and being depressed for so long gave me every excuse to be lazy and to be absent in my own life, but I feel like I'm past that and I can reach my potential with some kind of pizzazz.  

Okay, my eyeballs are drying out from staring at a computer for the last few hours and my brain is pretty much fried.  Also, I replaced the screen on my bedroom window (which was ripped and kept letting moths into my room) and it's perfect in every way.  Hopefully I can remember to jot down some of the gendered stereotypes that we've discussed in class that I have never let interfere with my intention to do or be something, tomorrow, because I think it would be interesting to take a look at that from the perspective of having the knowledge I've attained in the last two short weeks.

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Missing Content

No time to write tonight.  Working on homework and wanting to get to bed in a decent amount of time (within the next half hour).  Nothing much to write about today anyway, aside from being in a crappy mood right now, even though my mood was pretty good all day.  I just want to go to bed.  I'm tired.  Really tired.

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

Mood Swings, What?

I (again) don't feel much like writing so I'm going to attempt to bang this out in the next 14 minutes.  I went to bed last night around 10, but had the worst trouble trying to fall asleep.  I probably fell asleep around 12 or 1 or something but I had a hell of a time waking up today.  I let myself sleep in until 6:30 and didn't really do much with my hair or anything.  I feel like I didn't fully wake up until about 3:45 this afternoon in class.

Went to the parents house after picking up Phoenix, and stayed for dinner.  Took the boys to Petsmart and then came home.  Not much to note.

The little stinker Rainey isn't here tonight, she had knee surgery today I guess.  Poor thing.  She's going to be such a gimp for the next couple of months.

So, I feel like I'm having some mood swings, which isn't unusual at all for menopause.  Yesterday on my drive home from work, I drove past an accident, and an older gentleman - I'd guess late 60's - early 70's was standing on the median, next to a clobbered vehicle, and he was on the phone.  I drove by pretty quickly, but this was at a stoplight so I sat at the red light for a moment observing and wondering what could have happened.  As I was driving through the intersection, I saw him wipe his eyes.  Now, he could have been wiping sweat out of his eyes because it was HOT yesterday, but I immediately assumed he was crying because I knew he was distressed, and I almost burst into tears.  I wanted to pull over and get out and give him a big hug and ask him if there was anything I could do to help.  He could have been the one who hit the other vehicle, he could have been drunk, I don't know anything about the accident, but I felt so terribly for him.  It's not too uncommon for me to feel sorry for people I see walking places, especially older people who are carrying groceries, because I automatically assume they have some circumstance in their life that is preventing them from driving wherever they need to go, and I shouldn't assume that.  When I'm walking somewhere, it's not because I have no car or other means of transport, it's because I am walking somewhere on purpose.  So maybe the people I see walking are walking on purpose, too.  Anyway, I really did almost burst into tears when I saw this man, and I had to work really hard not to bawl my eyes out the rest of the way home.  I don't know why I felt so strongly.

Then, today I was reading one of my assignments for class before class, and for whatever reason - and I truly have no idea why - I wanted to start crying then, too.  The article I was reading was about the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty, and that always tugs at my heartstrings because it's made to provoke an emotional response, but for whatever reason I felt like crying while I was reading this.

I'm chalking this all up to simple hormonal overload or massive hormonal withdrawal or whatever my body is experiencing right now.  I am not one to just feel sad at once.  If I feel sad, it's a long time coming and a long time going, and crying often helps, but it never solves whatever I'm feeling sad about.  So these two instances of major emotional response are a little puzzling for me.  They went as quickly as they came and I was just fine afterwards aside from being minorly perplexed as to where the hell they came from.

I have three minutes left, so it's time to wrap up.  I am just about at my breaking point today with exhaustion and feelings of overload from keeping up with my classes.  I am lacking a book and that's making my life even more difficult and I am having thoughts about giving up, but I won't.  The end is so close I can taste it, and I have to stick with it for three more weeks after this one.  It's not that long.  I can do this.

Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Common Theme: We'll See

I don't usually post this early in the day because I generally don't have much to write about at 10am, given that my day has just barely started.  But today I'm making an exception because I am unusually tired.  I had the hardest time waking up this morning - apparently I was in a very deep sleep when my alarm went off.  There could be two reasons for this: 1.) I've been feeling overly phlegm-y for the last few days, and I rarely have breathing problems.  I'm guessing it's a reaction to the smoke in the air from the fires in Arizona or whatever, and so I took a Zyrtec to see if that wouldn't help clear me up.  Zyrtec made it's initial fortune on claiming to be the first non-drowsy allergy medication, and it is supposed to last for 24 hours, so of course I felt fine about taking it last night.  I rarely take allergy medication anyway because I don't really suffer from allergies aside from maybe a couple of days a year at most. 2.) Phoenix was up around 3:45am and moving around the house.  I take his collar off when I'm at home with him, but I always wake up when he wakes up in the middle of the night because of his history of digestive problems and I'm fearful of him having massive diarrhea in the house during the night.  Because we have a doggy-door, I'm not as vigilant about getting up with him, but it was weird when I heard him go outside and not come in within a few minutes.  So I walked downstairs and he was just sort of standing at the back door.  Then he left the door and walked towards the side of the house that has the doggy-door and so I stopped and listened for him to come in, but he didn't.  So I opened the back door to see what was going on and he came in, licked me, and followed me upstairs and back into bed.  It was rather strange.  I was never fully awake for all this, but I suppose that it may have messed with my REM sleep schedule and thrown it off by an hour or so.  Anyway, I feel like a zombie today.  Not really awake at all.  I wanted SO BADLY to be able to call in sick to work and then just get up later for school, but I don't have that option and I cannot afford to pull a dumb stunt like that since I need my job like trees need sunshine.  So I'm on coffee #2 (I only drink about half a cup at a time) and not feeling much different.  I'll get some schoolwork done while I'm here today, but I'm already just a smidgen ahead of assignments and lacking the books to read for Criminology so I'm not going to stress out too much about schoolwork after work and school today.  I'll take Phoenix and Nali down to the park and let them run around for a few minutes, feed Phoenix and crawl right back into bed.  I'll probably sleep for a few hours and wake up and move around for a couple hours and go back to bed, but at least when I wake up tomorrow I'll feel normal.  Or more normal than I feel today.

Aside from extraordinarily sleepy, I'm beginning to rethink the Peace Corps idea.  I am still planning to submit my application (if I ever get it finished), but I'm all amped up on school right now, and the possibility of staying in school and furthering my academic career and moving towards a real, every day career in Forensic Anthropology (or the like) is really exciting.  Obviously this may change when my school schedule changes, and when I take Anatomy in the fall and presumably almost fail it, but right now I'm excited.  I want to keep working on the Sociology classes to get that Soc degree with the emphasis on Criminology.  That's about as far as I want to go in that particular direction, but if I have that in addition to my Anth degree, I have a better shot at getting into a decent grad school and that is a way cool thought.  I don't know how far I really want to go in school, but right now the path is towards a PhD in Forensic Anthropology.  I think.  I don't think I could handle med school for a Doctorate in Forensic Pathology, but you never know.  Either way, the thought of staying in school for the next 10 years makes me feel like I have some purpose or some drive to keep on waking up each day and going through the motions.  When I go to bed each night, I go to bed with a sense of satisfaction - that I got through the day, did what I needed to do, did it well (I'm an exceeds expectations kind of person when it comes to school), and can do it again.  I haven't felt that way in almost 10 years.  When I got my first couple of quizzes back in class yesterday and I'd gotten 5/5 points (that's not saying much - it's a 1000 level course), I felt the same sense of pride I used to feel in myself when I got the highest grade in my class on a test (which I did several times in EMT school, but that feels like eons ago and I'm not sure it counts) in high school.  I am working hard, and I am studying, which I could probably get by without doing (and have in the past), and I like seeing the results.  It's a much more positive feeling than the disappointment I feel in myself when I don't do as well, or I don't study like I should have, or I put off the studying to the point where it doesn't get done at all.  I'm not entirely sure the exhaustion and the lack of relaxing time is worth it, but I'm going to keep doing it as long as I can because I would rather feel good about myself and have a sense of self-worth than be out there proving to the world and to myself that I'm not able to meet my own expectations.

When I got in to work this morning (with bike) I had an email from my boss saying that now that summer's here we need to review the dress code, with the dress code attached.  I'm pretty good about following dress code but I'm getting lazy since I'm going to school after work and I don't have enough clothes to sufficiently mix and match for 5 days straight each week, plus I haven't put away my last bajillion loads of laundry, and it's all piled on top of two laundry baskets so it's extra hard to come up with outfits since most of my clothes are all wrinkled.  But the big one is that I've been wearing flip-flops every day (they're not my crappy ones, they're nice-ish.  With sequins) because I've been meaning to get over to TJ Maxx and get some decent work-appropriate shoes that I can wear all the damn time but I keep making excuses for not going and getting them.  I feel so crunched for time what with my body's expectation of like 10 hours of sleep each night for me to function correctly, and I want to be at home with Phoenix as much as possible.  But I'll figure out how to make it work.  Since tomorrow's the halfway point of my week and I need to get canned dog food anyway, maybe I will just bite the bullet and go shoe shopping too.

I feel like I'm not doing a very good job writing how I'm feeling, at least not lately.  I find that school is draining most of what little extra energy I had to write with, and school is my priority, so I'll try to do better about balancing my time so that I have something of substance written every day, and not just an account of my day.  Although, when I write about the things that happen to me each day, I do write a little about how I felt when things happened, so maybe I'm not doing as horribly as I think.

Okay, time to get some Criminology work done.  So far, I've got an A and I'd like to keep it that way.  I may write more later tonight when I get home and have slept a little, but we'll see.

Monday, June 6, 2011

From White to Black

This is going to be a quick one because it's damn hot in here (room is upstairs, 2nd floor of house; chemistry and physics dictate that heat rises), I'm tired and I have pretty much finished all the homework I can even do tonight as I returned my Criminology books today for a full refund and won't be getting new ones until tomorrow and Wednesday or Thursday.  So it's going to be tight, although from what I can tell it looks like I won't need the one I only ordered this evening until Thursday night at the latest.  I can probably get by without it for now.

Anyway, it was a pretty good day today.  The only thing of note was that I didn't sleep well last night and I had a little trouble staying awake in class again.

Since I got the cash back from the bookstore, I grabbed Phoenix after work and went straight to the bank, except that only 3 of the 5 lanes were open and there were long lines of cars so I didn't wait.  I went to my parents house, except there was no one there.  I called my parents, and my dad had to pick my mom up from work because they're sharing a vehicle and he had a doctor's appointment today.  I suggested that we get chinese food for dinner - which went over very well - so I went and picked that up.  I ate so much that I can hardly move right now.  There is a ton left over, too, so I'll eat well all week.  I actually even paid for my own food.  Before I left, I needed to get my bike rack on my car, and grab a bike (my choices were my little sister's old one, which is old and too short for me, or my dad's expensive one, which he has never let me borrow for school), so I got my dad's bike out and started detailing it a little.  I washed it off since it was dusty and grungy and covered in cobwebs and all kinds of crap in the deepest corners of the garage.  But just as I was hosing it off, my dad came outside and made a fuss about my not even asking him if I could use it, to which I replied, "Because I knew you'd say no," and I was mostly joking, even though I was planning to take it anyway, but he got all pissed off and said something about how people just do whatever the fuck they want without asking him.  He and my mom were on their way to the store anyway, so he just got in the car and slammed the door shut and they left.  So I finished cleaning the bike, put it on my car, and left, too.  I knew he was pissed because when he's legitimately angry, it doesn't sort of rise up and bubble over, it appears out of nowhere, and that's exactly what happened.  I was in a joking and jovial mood, and he went from the same to instantly enraged.

My justification for taking his expensive bike over my sister's shitty old one is that I am going to be doing some hard-core riding (up The Hill in Boulder and that's painful) and it's going to be 5 days a week from now until August, and he hasn't ridden that bike in years!  He fell off of it and was hurt badly enough that he had to have wrist surgery back in 2004 and hasn't really even touched it since, with the exception of maybe one bike ride a year, and that's not an exaggeration.  I have asked him numerous times over the years if I could use his bike for school and he's always said no, although the only reason he's ever given me is that it's a really expensive bike.  I had my own bike stolen from my backyard when I was living in Boulder in like 2006, and bike theft is rampant in Boulder, so I can completely sympathize with his fear of it being stolen.  However, it will be in my office with me while I'm at work, and then it will be locked up for the 1.5-2.5 hours I'm on campus, then it's straight back home and in the garage.  I know he thinks I'm irresponsible with big, expensive things because of the scratches I've left on my car and his truck over the years, but I've learned from those mistakes and I'm extra careful about taking extremely good care of the vehicle I'm driving now.

Anyway, I'm kind of worked up over the fact that he got so mad so quickly - and why I'm surprised about this is a mystery, because I know his anger well.  I'm worried about going back over there anytime soon, because I'll either get the silent treatment or he'll yell and me and insist that I bring the bike back, and I don't want to have to endure either of those possibilities.  So for now I'll just have to pretend nothing happened and move on with my life because it will eat me alive if I let it.

Oh!  And this is fun.  My older sister was supposed to start her domestic violence classes today, and she's been court-ordered to take the classes for like 18 months, stemming from the DV charge from everything that happened back in August last year.  Apparently, when she went in today, she was also told that she needs to take drug and alcohol classes, too, and with that goes random UA's and breathalyzers to make sure that she's clean, and she absolutely refuses to take part in this racket.  That basically means, "I'll go to jail or have to do community service or anything that doesn't require me to stop drinking like a fish and being high every single second of every single day."  Because that's what she does.  When she doesn't have the kids, she drinks.  A lot.  And even when she does have the kids, she gets high first thing in the morning and continues to toke up all day long.  So she's standing there telling our parents about how stupid this place is, and how they're trying to make her sign her life away and they told her that they could keep her in the program longer than the 18-month court mandate if they feel that she needs to be in the program longer, and blah, blah, blah.  My parents both had looks on their faces that said that they were skeptical that this was all true and that she was probably making a bigger deal out of it than it was, and that they knew they couldn't argue with her over the decision she made.  I stood there looking at them like they were crazy.  This is what she needs!!  She is a mother, first and foremost and if it takes 18 months of drug, alcohol and domestic violence counseling in which she needs to be totally clean, then so be it!!  But she's far too content with her lifestyle to give it up and she would rather face more harsh consequences than have to stop smoking pot 24/7.  I said, "Yeah, because GOD FORBID you have to stay clean for 18 months and be a responsible adult and..." and she cut me off, telling me to shut up.  I knew that if I didn't want to really get into it with her (and I'm talking full-on physical violence style), I had better just keep my mouth shut.  She's unbelievable.  She's going in to see her probation officer tomorrow to tell her that she's not going to do the program, and I'd love to know what the probation officer says.  I want, more than anything, to hear that the officer tells her that it's either the program or jail.  She needs to hear that and she needs to be made aware that she really does have a problem, even if she doesn't think she does. Fucking bitch.

Okay.  I have just drank an entire soda (12oz) and 16oz of water in the last 20 minutes and I feel like I'm about to explode.  I'm going to lie down for a little while, then get ready for bed and watch Conan, who hasn't had a new show in a week and I feel like I'm going into withdrawal.

Sunday, June 5, 2011

I'm Having Trouble Titling This Post

So I kind of took it easy today.  I didn't do all the stuff I had planned to do, but I still feel like I accomplished some stuff.  I got up at 9 this morning (amazingly, without my phone) and grabbed some donuts.  I don't know what my obsession is lately, but I can't seem to get enough of them.  Anyway, I got home and went back to sleep for a little while.  I did grab my sister's dogs from my parents house and took them to the dog park.  It was just as awesome as yesterday.  Phoenix swam a little today, too.  Because my sister dropped her kids off with their dad early today - on her way to work - I just dropped the dogs off at her ex's house since it's close to my house.  It was kind of awkward because Phoenix and Lucky and Duke got out of the car and ran off (the house is on a bit of land) and I couldn't call them back to me, and they were put in the backyard with the other dog that lives there, DC.  So I had to stay a few minutes longer than I wanted to.

Phoenix and I went home and relaxed for awhile.  I decided that I needed to get going so I ran to the store to get some soda for the week and got a little bit of food (best time to go to the store is when you're not hungry) and when I came home I finished the reading for class (Sex, Gender & Society, heretofore abbreviated as SGS).  When I couldn't fall asleep right away last night I got online and looked at what kind of work I have to do this week for Criminology and it turns out that the one of the two books I picked up for class at the CU Bookstore (which were shrink-wrapped together)(by the publisher, apparently) is actually the wrong book.  The one I'm supposed to have is a sort of abridged version of the book I got (and most of my classmates got, I guess), so I have sort of stopped reading just because I don't want to have read like 50 of the wrong pages. I'm not too worried about getting caught up because I really enjoy the Criminology reading.  So I'll check the bookstore tomorrow to see if they'll refund me since it was the bookstore's mistake and try to get the book I'm supposed to have.

Anyway, I feel pretty good about where I am, considering that I didn't really spend a ton of time on homework this weekend.  I got my paper back from Friday, and I got an 80% on it.  I am just a smidge worried about the grading for Criminology because the TA is actually a person that I know and have known for awhile.  We're not "friends," so much as acquaintances, but I worry a little about her grading my papers.  I knew she was a Sociology/Criminology grad student at CU but I had no idea she'd be the TA for this class.  I just don't want her reading my stuff and going, "Wow, she's a lot dumber than she looks!"  Or, conversely, "She really is as dumb as she looks!"

Wow, I just looked in the mirror and my hair is a lot shorter than I wanted.  Oh well.  I'm fine with it, I guess. There's not much I can do about it now.  We'll see how it looks when I actually do it tomorrow.

I'm watching I Love You, Man, which is definitely on my list of most favorite movies of all time, and I'm waiting for some tater-tots to come out of the oven.  This might be my most favorite weekend ever.  Hopefully this week goes equally as well.