If You Want Something A Little More Explicit

Ok, let's post a nice list of neurotic things I have to remember in the next 3.5 hours.

*Finish packing.
*Decide which Harry Pottser book to take with me
*Go buy cold medicine at rite aid. Yes, still sniffling miserably. Fucking planes.
*Take shower
*Pack last minute things like razor, toothbrush
*Finish charging various electronic gadgets
*tidy house
*say bye to the cat
*dont' forget cell phone. Don't forget cell phone. Do Not Forget Cell Phone.

There's other stuff. Updating blog was one, though now I can't see why I felt this was necessary. So, see you all in a bit.

A Koala Crapped A Rainbow In My Brain

AHEM: No one needs to take any drastic action in the driving to Louisville thing. I hit about eighteen of you up separately for rides and enough people have been like, "yeah I can drive you" that no one needs further volunteer. I think I'll stop freaking out about it and just wait until A couple days before I need to go and then figure out who it's most convenient for to drive me. So thank you thank you thank you everybody and don't ask off work or anything, it's taken care of.

Hmm, what else? Oh on Passions just now TC made a jab at how outlandish Passions is by saying, to Eve's Evil Aunt Erma, who is revealing lots of sordid secrets about Eve to TC, her clueless husband, "Oh Aunt Erma, you jus' been watching your soap operas too much, that's all, you just watch those crazy soap operas, they're so outlandish, especially the one that comes on right after Days of Our Lives."

Nice writing. Hahahahah. It's always nice to see that these actors don't take their careers too seriously. That would be really sad if they did.

I am trying to pack. I am trying to fit enough stuff for two weeks into one backpack. Hahahahahahaha. I need a book to read on the plane, or something, and I'm really pissed off that I've read all the Harry Pottser books because there's nothing (available) about them that I haven't already read and I want to read that kind of book but not have read it already. Right?

Raedy, I tried to call your ass last night and you were apparently screening me and I will email you the details but would still appreciate a return call when it's convenient for you. Thannnnxxxx

Ho ho ho I got my sis a birthday present to end all birthday presents yesterday in honor of her 21st b-day on the 10th


OH BTW Happy One Year Anniversary Sisface and Leviticus!!!

Anyway so I again rule and am the supreme birthday present giver. Someone put another tally mark next to my name. It doesn't fit in my ambitious backpack, but that's not stopping me from cramming it in just yet

I have to go to LA tomorrow. I thought we were going today but luckily we weren't but unluckiliy we have to go Wednesday instead. So this morning I went to the beach. Unfortunately I didn't have time to go to the beach enough to fend off what I will inevitably get from some of you that sounds like accusatory, "Gee, you sure don't LOOK like you live in California," bullshit. I'll show you my damn tan lines if you want to see how many shades paler I USED to be. It's scary.

Anyway so today I'm packing and making copies for tomorrow and trying hard to not let myself talk myself out of doing schoolwork while I'm in the midwest by noticing that I can't fit it in my bag....and I'm going to clean the house and cut JD's hair and love on the cat because I am going to reaaaaaaalllly miss the cat, and of course Jadles. I decided "Jadles" is a cool name for my boyfriend.

Tomorrow night we're having intensive hangout time and probably going to Disneyland and stuff.
I would say we'd go to my favorite indian place but last week I found, vomitously, some random bit of meat in my bhangan bartok whatever. And they started covertly subbing in tofu for the panir in my other favorite dish. I love tofu, but COME THE FUCK ON. I buy it for the cheese, and when you're going to fucking try to save a buck by not having it all be cheese I fucking hate your guts. So I'm boycotting it.

Uhh, let's see, what else...

Oh I had a series of meetings yesterday in which I was informed very matter-of-factly (again, actually) that I am widely considered the top student in my cohort because "word just gets around" and everyone can "just tell" that I'm going to be successful and that I should be extremely proud of myself, blah blah. Too bad I feel guilty all the time about how much I feel like I should be doing MORE even though I'm doing a lot.

Ugh. Clearly my attempt to distract myself from packing has been successful. But I better get back to it. Suck. See you guys soon.

PS Stacey you owe me a freaking phone call too!!

I Can See Myself In Your Eyes

Important Request That Requires Your Immediate Attention!!!!!!

I am, in a radical last-minute change of plans, going to be getting back to Chicago to fly to CA at the end of my trip via a plane from Louisville instead of Chris Daniels.

CAN ANYONE PLEASE DRIVE ME TO LOUISVILLE (from Eville) ON OR ABOUT THE 12TH OF AUGUST? You will not only get to hang out with me for an extra couple hours, you get to hang out with stacey too!!! WHEEEEEE!!!!

Thankfully, there is a really cheap ass ticket online that gets me to the airport on time on Black Friday. So I'll be doing that. No harm done, but I need those of you who have ever volunteered to give me a ride to or from anywhere at any point in the next couple weeks to maybe put something in my comments section saying that you're still interested in driving me around....in fact Melissa I remember you saying once you would be willing to drive me to Louisville....is that maybe still an option? It would be so much fun:):):):)

Also, thank you bunches to all those of you who are going out of your ways for me. I want to see everyone but it really sucks that I won't have access to a car while I'm within a few hundred miles of you

That concludes our frantic update for this evening. I have to have to have to get some work done. Raedy I'm calling you tomorrow. Anyone else who I need to talk to email me or call me anytime. I'm in LA on Tuesday. So don't call then. I'll update more before I leave, undoubtedly, but I'm running out of time to sort out these "minor" details like how I'm getting my ass to the airport to get home. Fuck, I'm retarded.

No, Don't Insist, I'm Already Hurt

So JD went out last night to get some food and hopefully the 1st Harry Pottser dvd, which we've both been dying to see, and came back with delicious Taco Bell and I came out into the living room and the dvd was sitting on the table and he was all, "go ahead and put the movie in" so I pick it up and there's a Sealab 2021 dvd underneath!!! YAAAAAAAYYY!!!!!

That was really too exciting.

Today I'm feeling much better, thanks for all your concern. I might go birthday present shopping, I might catch up on some work I have to do before I leave for the Midwest, who knows. But I can occasionally breathe through both nostrils and I consider that a giant improvement over the last few days.

I need to clean this pigsty. I also need to really sit down and work on stuff. But it's such a nice day and my muscles are all atrophied from lying in bed for the last few days. I'd rather go outside. The beach'll be too crowded. Hmmm. If I were a good person I would call my friend who has friends in town visiting with whom I was supposed to go to Disneyland yesterday but crapped out on because I still felt pretty shitty, and see if she and her friends want to go do something. Problem is, though, I don't want to call her. I'd rather blast music on iTunes and dance around the apartment cleaning and pretending to be getting stuff done. God, I am such a procrastinating dork. that sounds like a Conan character.

Hey, does anyone still watch Passions? I saw it yesterday and something actually happened. They're losing their edge. Ugh, I am so far behind on so much stuff. Why am I updating this stupid ass blog? You guys never fucking update. Except Raedy, and sometimes Jenny. It sucks!!

BAHH

You Can't Say "Nuclear," That Really Scares Me

This day sucks. I am sick in bed falling in and out of feverish nightmarish sleep. I've slept about 20 of the last 24 hours, and I'm wishing that we had the first Harry Pottser movie on dvd so I wouldn't have to keep watching the second one. Yesterday up at ct. my nose was running continually and I kept having to blow my nose and after a couple hours it turned into some kind of sinus thing, which is probably the worst thing in the world when it's summer and it's kind hot. So driving back from LA in the backseat of a land rover in the carpool lane with a bad driver and ungodly traffic yesterday afternoon made me feel so sick that I thought I was going to barf in her car. And then thought I was going to pass out and puke myself to death in my sleep once I got home. I feel like death. I'll get one nostril clear enough to breathe through for about twenty seconds and then the sinus pressure in my head builds up and it's back to being miserable.

Ugh. So. I'm not feeling like having phone conversations right today. I'll try you guys tomorrow and stuff. You know who you are. Same goes for emails. Hopefully a couple days of hardcore sleeping will get me over this asap. Can't wait to see a lot of you next week and stuff.

Glad those of you who actually received comp cds liked them well enough.

Actually, This Is My House

Back from Utah. Yep. fast fucking little weekend. I have to go to a meeting in a little bit for which I am wholly unprepared. I hate myself sometimes. I have been working on this particular manuscript for many months now and have progressed surprisingly little in that time. I am working out different excuses to try on the professor that include, "don't you remember me telling you my boyfriend's car got stolen?" then looking blankly at her when she asks for the paper sections I haven't yet begun. Or something like, "ohhhh, you wanted the INTRO today? well, I thought you meant you wanted the method revised by today. whoopsie!"

Yeah yeah shut up, I am a lazy bitch

So Utah:

very very pretty area. salt lake, that is. very cool mountains. Very nice to see/be driving around in mountains again. Very nice also to see JD's mom, dad, and sis. Mostly nice to meet/hang out with his extended maternal family, with the exception of the aunt and uncle who cockblocked us when we needed a cosigner on this apartment last August. Not that they weren't nice too, I just had to fight down indignant rage every so often.

The cousins are awesome, I had met the oldest boy (the family black sheep, so automatically the coolest...he and JD were inseparable when they were little and all the moms have thousands of stories about how cruel they were to little Jessa that are hilarious...like digging a snow tunnel in a blizzard and shoving her in it and collapsing the entrances and leaving her until her mom found her later that day). Jer, the fuckup, and his finance, Nikki, were also forced into the family portrait icebreaker and we were all made to look retarded by a lame ass photog who, attempting to be humorous, kept telling us to say, "this sucks" and looking like he wanted to kill hmiself. JD's immediate fam, which I am included in all the time BY said fam, but not by the grandparents (because I am not yet "official," they said quickly as they loudly insisted on getting pictures of "just" the family, leaving me and the finance to commiserate in our awkwardness) refuse to sit still or behave or not crack jokes or not make fun of the photog or whatever the entire time they were being 'graphed to the point where I was tearing up laughing off to the side, mostly because his aunt's family (8 people in that thing) were primly grimacing at Jd's dad and the off-color remarks he is so fond of making. See, JD's dad and JD's mom's sister's husband don't get along so well, and it's actually quite hysterical to watch.

Anyway so we had photos we had to sit for and then i got dragged around with the women folk to go look at the proofs later on and jd mentioned upon arrival at the airport to his mom that we're getting married in nawlins in 2006 in october so she would think it was her own idea to give us the timeshare for our honeymoon btu she ended up telling the grandparents and probably the rest of the relatives there as well in a matter of moments. so now, years in advance with no signs of an engagement, we are locked into that month and year like I had wanted to avoid doing IN TWO THOUSAND FOUR.

Jd's youngest cousin is a sweetie and she's so unlike the rest of her siblings that she was instantly my favorite and kept saying things about how JD is a teddy bear and he is lucky that he gets to marry a girl as pretty as me and (hmm, maybe that's why she's my favorite) and how she was glad she got to meet me (and she'd never met JD before either, these families don't often converge) and let me use her little glass horse as a goodluck charm while she was teaching me to play crazy rummy or whatever that game was called

and saturday jd and jessa and i went "out" with jer and nikki and since everyone else was doing shots of vodka in the timeshare before we left i was the desginated driver and we played pool and got totally hustled by jer and nikki and it was a lame little bar with a lame little dj girl all by herself and no one was there and it took awhile to even FIND a bar that was open and it was rad hanging out with Jeremy and the finance and i suck at pool

then yesterday we went outlet shopping and as usual I was sorely disappointed overall and went back to the aunt's to hang out and then went to the airport and flew here. so that, my friends, is my weekend of family time (the little cousin kept saying shit about how we were "fams" now so she could eat off my plate and kiss me and it wasn't gross) minus some of the more highly amusing stories about specific relatives that i will save for myself or something

in other news, the car's back and running, though that was the biggest hassle ever, i almost killed myself driving back by hallucinating other drivers in my lane, etc. it's fine. it worked out. we're grateful, what else can you say? we have to replace the cd player again but i'm trying to figure out a way to eitehr have it shock to death the next person who tries to steal it or have it shriek obscenities whenever someone touches it. and jd is never allowed to fill up his gas tank again. i am pretty sure that's what saved it from the chop shop.

they also took the sticks and the hapukiduo bag of tricks so that blows. But whatever.

busy busy week. I'll be emailing some of you to nail down plans for the end of the month, please be commenting or writing back so i can be sure we're all on the same page.

LA tomorrow. Blast.

Urge To Kill Rising

So, uh, I'm supposed to be on my way to LA this morning, but JD left for work only to return a few moments later because HIS CAR HAS BEEN STOLEN. From the covered spot where we are both sure he left it, his car has been stolen. His CAR. GOT STOLEN.

I have never even KNOWN someone whose car got stolen. Or their bike. Or their car getting broken into (mine got shit stolen out of it but the doors were unlocked). Or all three happening in a span of like three months. I'm sorry, did Erik move out here and find out where he parks and not tell anyone? There aren't any other enemies. Especially not out here.

I'm not going to LA. I'm alternating between laughing hysterically (why the fuck would you want to steal THAT car?) and shaking/otherwise freaking out. Holy god dammit.

Once the CSI people arrive we're going to go looking around for it. I hope the criminals find the embroidered black belt in the trunk with his name on it and feel a little retarded. I hope we find them/it. Motherfucker.

Life Goes Easy On Me

You guys should be receiving those mix cds today. Hopefully.

The cat is being a terror. He pretends to be a nice lovey cat and wants to sit with me and purr while I pet him and then suddenly he's biting and kicking at me as hard as he can. And then we have our little fight that's actually scary for me where he gets the crazy cat face on and pounces at my face, even if I'm standing, me swatting him out of the air every time, until I swat him hard enough that he gives up. It's quite unnerving that he does that. He almost always tears skin and

oh look he just got his head stuck in a plastic aver's cup. hahahaha. he had to shake it around furiously and bang it on the side of the bed to get the cup to let go of him. Serves you right, Jyushin Bastard Cat.

Now he's licking my toes.

I'm hungry. We don't bother buying groceries anymore. Sigh. Yesterday for lunch I had an apple and a block of cheese and I felt very european. Whether Europeans eat that kind of thing or it's just a stereotype in my mind has yet to be determined.

went to La yesterday. Ugh. am going tomorrow, ugh. Am going to Utah on friday.

Have lots to do but my friend mentioned pointedly to me that she has the 5th harry pottser book that I can borrow if I want. Am sorely tempted to read it for the next two days and do nothing else.

I am getting extremely behind in the way of papers and other manuscripts and projects I am supposed to be working on.
Whoops. I keep telling myself I need to get shit done before we go to Utah but then I also tell myself there's not enough time so I can put it off. My brain works like a retarded child. But I agree with Reedy, and have actually always agreed, that there's no sense killing yourself for this, or any career. And i have never been in any serious danger of killing myself, but yay.

So. don't have much to say. Need to paint my toenails, take a shower, catsit for my friend who's out of town, think about jenny's birthday present, work on these ridiculous amounts of work I've procrastinated, etc.

A lame update is better than no update at all. Hint.

Avada Kadavera

What did I do with the weekend? Why, I read the first 4 Harry Potter books, finally, all in one sitting that was interrupted only by sleeping and peeing. Goodness, those are hard to put down. I am really shocked at how much they really do get exponentially better with each installment, like I had heard. I am going to restrain myself from reading/getting the 5th one until it's out in paperback. But man. I wish I had read those a long time ago.

That being said, I wish to dispell any privately-held beliefs that "summer break" for grad students is anything like "summer break" for college undergraduates. It is not, and I am growing ever-annoyed by the bitter, jeering inquiries into how my "summer vacation" is progressing. As Reedy can vouch, we are not on a holiday and we will never have another holiday that's really free of obligation again, so please stop lamenting the fact that you don't have one, when instead of 60 hours a week of school-related activities, we are now maybe only doing 50, since there are no classes to attend. True, my schedule is more flexible than yours, and can accomodate 50 straight hours of reading for pleasure, but that doesn't mean it's any less demanding or that I won't be paying dearly for the last two days in the rest of this week.

I'm really only scolding one of you here. The same one of you who said to me on the phone yesterday something about particularly liking euphimisms (or in your words, "colloquialisms") for pooping that have a distinctly racist undertone. So that narrows out most of you.

Anyway, I am just as busy as I was this year. So shut up.

The loan went through. Credit-debt freedom, I can taste you now. Pure bliss of not owing my mother any money, here I come.

She called me today and seemed a bit off-kilter. I told her about the fellowship and I don't think she heard me. But there were at least 25 female ducks crowding onto her patio just then, so that was taking precedence.

I need some food. Damn that 4th book was good. Damn.

Love Is The Key

Holy. Fucking. Shit.

Yesterday after I posted that snivelfest I sat around feeling sorry for my damn self for another ten minutes or so and then decided to do something a little more proactive. So I got online and looked into private loans. Via a bank or something. And my bank has some, and the ones that don't run it by your financial aid department need a cosigner. So I wrote my mom. Dammit. And asked her about her mom cosigning. Dammit. And the wheels are/were in motion almost immediately and everyone's glad to help and all I have to trade for a signature is a healthy swallow of familial guilt and "we all love you so much and are so proud of what you're doing"

That for most people wouldn't be a hard thing to swallow, but I don't like asking for things, I don't like that I've asked for more and taken more from these two people than I ever dreamed I would in my entire life, inheritances included, and it makes me sick. But deperate times...

There's somethign hard about hearing how proud people are of what you're doing when half the time I lose sight of what I'm doing and why and can't honestly say sometimes I like this. Something in that or this feels cheap and I can't put my finger on the specific irritant

So I'm bypassing the federal gov't, the school, everyone else who's always thrown money my way before, out of sheer desperation and anxiety about the next couple summers, the no-funding dilemma, having to TA or otherwise work myself into the ground, etc.

And I was feeling much better, though I know the school could get wind of it and cockblock me again, so there wouldn't be any loan at all.

And then today, we took JD's car to get an oil change and paid upwards of $125 for transmission fluid bullshit, oil, etc, and nothing in the way of his faulty electrical shit got taken care of (when he brakes, the cd played shuts off and comes back on, always surprised, always with that stupid "hello" that car cds players do). So tomorrow we'll try that. Rather, he'll try that, I'll be in LA

But I'm expecting whatever's wrong with his car to be fairly major. We both need tires. We're both completely out of gas. Fuck fuck fuck

Then this afternoon, just a little while ago, I get this email. From one of the professors in my dept I like but haven't ever really talked to. I think he went to IU as an undergrad. I talked to him about IU when I interviewed here.
Anyway. He sends me an email that has a title that makes my heart skip a beat, but I tell myself it's been sent to the whole grad mailing list. And then I open it and the first thing I see is "Hi Liz:"

And I about die of excitement right there, before I can read the stupid thing. This is why I can't stand applying for grants or anything they inform you of via email. I die all the time.

But this email, this out-of-fucking-nowhere email. There are these things called trayning grants. And my dept has one that this guy is in charge of. And they give out fellowships to the predoktorul grad students who are the most awesome. very prestigious stuff. Anyway, he offered me a spot on one for the next year or two. Probably two years, he says, but at least one, definitely one. And that means I'm funded. Including the summers. Until I get married. Until I pass comps. Until I'm starting to be eligible for dissertation fellowships. I dont' have to TA. I don't have to TA anytime in the near future. I don't have to TA, I get a stipend, I get funded in the summers, I get a "modest" amount for travel, research supplies.

I DONT HAVE TO TA. I HAVE SUMMER FUNDING. I HAVE FUNDING FOR THE NEXT TWO YEARS.

I am retardedly happy right now. I wrote him back and said I accepted the offer. i dont' think i'll quit school.

and the coolest part to jd, and some of you, is who funds this grant. do you remember the secret of nymh? yeah. intentional misspellings because i now work for the government. sorry Stacie

The Colder Water

Let's play call and response with transparent "anonymous" pseudonyms some more. I heart playing games.

So this day is whatever the opposite of Tits would be. I am hating it as hard as I can. Literally, I am raging against this bullshit day with every cell in my body and it's to no avail.

I had to go to La this morning. Worse is that JD had to drive me to meet at the Starbux we left from at 6:15 because I didn't want to drive my car. Especially not after making an email-stink about how it was death rattling to B so she would drive. So we were home by 10 because there was nothing for us to do there. This whole process, this whole not knowing what there is to do until you get there and check six different places for what's real and what's leftover inaccuracy, is highly irritating. Especially because I honestly think that B and I work better as a team than having five people running all over (annoying the atturneys in the process) but our prof likes to insinuate that maybe we a. don't know what we're doing and that's why there aren't kids or b. aren't aggressive enough with forcing these poor little kids to do this entirely boring interview.

I have many issues with many aspects of this marginally-in-line-with-my-real-interests-study and I am nearing a breaking point with it. If my dangled RAship is really yanked for the fall, I will likely combust on the spot.

B and I bitched the whole 3.5 hours we hung out early this morning, and then came to the inevitable conclusions that We Need External Funding. In fact, that would solve 90% of the problems in our lives. And honestly, if I quit school it's not going to be because I don't feel comfortable or I don't like it or it's hard. It's going to be, at this point, because we cannot financially make the ends meet. And I feel nauseous enough knowing I have bills in my name that I'm not paying, that I have car insurance I can't pay, that we have all this stuff and in exchange I have all this anxiety about money all the time.

Then I took my car in and they scolded me once they figured the problem out for not changing my oil enough. And if Levi and Jenny hadn't done it while they were in town for me, it wouldn't have been changed since I lived in Indiana. And they gave me the grand heart-stopping total and I was sure they were pulling a fast one on the naive-looking little girl until another friend in this meeting i was at (who, inexplicably, ALSO drives a saturn, making official my suspicion that Everyone I Am Friends With Here Drives A Saturn) reassured me that she'd had the same thing happen and that was what it cost her too, perfectly reasonable.

So then after this extensive meeting B takes me to get it and we can't find stickers or colored pencils at rite-aid, which we need for tomorrow, and I am now in charge of illustrating this stupid thing, I am always put in charge of illustrating this stupid thing, but I have no blank paper and no colored things other than sharpies with which to illustrate. F-word.

And I pick up my car and the guy lectures me on how completely, totally, absolutely shot my brakes were. Wagging his finger in my face, then saying, with great malice, "Who DOES your brakes, anyway," as though I have a brake specialist on call and I just brought my car to him today instead. And I looked appropriately shamed and told him that I vaguely remembered someone telling me a year or two ago that my brakes were about gone and making a mental note to immediately forget that (it was definitely before i drove my ass out here over the rocky mountains) and not get it taken care of. he THEN scolded me for needing new tires, and almost made me pinky swear that I will do that sometime soon.

And I come home and open some mail and there's a notice from one of my credit cards that they tried to up the limit but can't because my available-to-total credit ratio on my other cards isn't big enough. I tried to close this acct. the other day but the manager promised me a huge line and no apr on balance transfers, so I was going to play my little balance transfer no interest game that's worked so well for the last year. But that option's shot and I'm running out of time with the remaining intro rates and I'm starting to think about the next few years and the bullshit with the funding here and how if I tutored for $20/hour 20 hours/week instead of TAing which would get me a LOT more money I would be in violation of my little agreement with them that says they get to have their way with me forever unless I get external funding and they would stop paying my tuition, fees, health insurance, etc.

so that's not an option. B said she is never TAing again, she will prostitute herself instead, and it's so overwhelmingly bullshit that i have a bad taste in my mouth from all the security people here keep (kept) promising me and then yanking away.

you know what, jd and I can't afford this if i don't get summer funding next year. jd and i can't afford to regularly maintain our cars or bodies. we can't afford a rent increase in august. we can't afford any kind of emergency whatsoever. we can't afford anything that's not planned. And that's really scary. we can't afford to start paying my mom back the giant ass loan her mom had to cosign on to move us out here. we cant' pay the bills of ours that our parents are still paying. we can't put anything aside for savings like I desperately want to do. we can't afford to come home in december. we can't afford to pay parents back for all these plane tickets.

and him already having 2 jobs that eat all his time and don't pay well enough to eat all that time means our options are student loans, which they won't give me because my department tells them I am "fully funded" even though what i get a month won't pay half of our rent and utilities in the fall, or me working beyond that, which I am going to do, thanks again to B, but will get me in trouble if I get caught AND is completely infuriating because I feel extremely betrayed by the fact that I will have to get a job while I am working for the university and being a grad student and i wouldn't have to at any of the other schools I got accepted to. I am sometimes happy here sometimes wishing i would've just sucked it up and gone to u of chicago and been well-educated and somewhat mistreated but never financially and with cozy little lab group trips to jackson's hole wyoming every winter.

i feel today like the bottom's dropped out of this whole design and i'm just falling like a rock

i feel like too much hope and breath holding and weight and meaning is going to start being attached to grants that I won't get next year and i'll be literally crushed when nothing pans out. i cant' start thinking about how one little fucking federal award would save both our lives and make everything easier for the next four years. because then i feel extremely anxious about it and start freaking out when it's not due until december. or whatever.

i'm starting to feel like i can't breathe. and it's only going to get worse, because this year i am/was more thoroughly covered than i will be again. and there aren't any options. i'll apply for everything there is to apply for but it might not do anything and it's so frustrating and

i feel abandoned with this. i shouldnt' be panicking about funding. they should take care of me. but they won't, and i hate this ridiculous situation i've gotten us into.

fuck, i think i am going to go cry for a few hours. and then get back to work.

Am I Asleep Or Awake

I took my car into the shop today. Total cost for the repairs that I'll be paying? Four hundred seventy three
I must now attend a meeting in which I am going to pout ceaselessly because of my car. I already ate an entire package of oatmeal chocolate chip cookie dough. Because I was pouting, because of the $473 price tag. And we went all the way to LA today in order to run zero children in our study. Not good, Brilliant!



MOTHER FUCKER I HATE BLOGGER. It just ate most of this post. I dont' have time to retype it. I'm pissed, this day is shit, I will be selling all my wordly possessions if anyone has anything in mind they might want for themselves, let me know. I'm not really kidding. Sorry there's random words all over. Fucking bullshit piece of ass crack

I'll Buy You A Scone

Today I woke up with the latest Hoobastank song in my head (I didn't even realize I knew that song well enough to get it stuck in my head), then got "hey mickey" stuck in my head, then got the Notre Dame fight song stuck in my head.

JD is cooking dinner and is dancing around in the kitchen with a knife singing a song about making dinner and just now he stopped and said, "Now let's take it to 95 promenade style" (that would be our neighbors, for those keeping score) and started rapping the same song about making dinner and air-stabbing his crotch with the knife while he "rapped." Did I ever tell you blog readers about the neighbor who raps all the time and accompanies himself as he does it with his bongos? No? Hmmm, that's strange

we got JD a bike replacement bike today and rode over to our beloved little park that I had missed so dearly, and we sat around on this swingset we always sit around on, and then we noticed how lush and thick the grass is in this park, and we realized we could throw each other (martial arts throw, not confuse throw) without hurting anyone. So we started horsing around with hapukiduo ooh stuff that we haven't really touched in a year. And damn, it was fun. Fucking really fucking fun. And dammit, I'm done being a black belt in honorific titling only. I'm going to chip off the rust and get my ass back up to speed because I feel like a badass when I know I can kick asses if I need to. And right now, I don't feel like I could kick much ass. Maybe Keith's ass. But that's about it. And that ass-kickable list needs to be a little longer. So we decided that we'll ride over there with our gi tops in a bag (the bag that also, conveniently, holds all the training weapons and sticks and canes we use) and the belts and maybe the pants and ride around, then set up ninja camp and beat the shit out of each other on a more regular basis. I am so fucking excited. And I know it's going to take a long time to get back in to it but I have infinite time and I love horsing around with JD, so bring it.

Hoorah.

Cds probably going out tomorrow. My car started making a death rattle so whether they get mailed is determined by whether I walk my ass home from campus tomorrow after my meeting I have to go to after I go to LA in the morning. If I do, they get mailed. If not, it'll be Wednesday unless I go to LA then too and my car's in the shop. We'll see. Probably you guys don't give a shit anyway so that's not a big deal.

I'm going to go take a nice relaxing calming bedtime-wanting-inducing bath to try to get enough sleep to be alert at
4:30am tomorrow. Piss. Night Night

In A World Of Pure Imagination

hahahaha, Jenny, your camping story on your blog seriously made me laugh for like ten minutes all by myself. Wow. Funny stuff. Nicely done. Hahahahaha.

What's new? Mom's gone, she flew back to whence she came yesterday morning. here's the conversation we had about when she needed to be at the airport:

Me: So, your flight leaves at 9? Let's leave for the airport at 7:40
Mom: Do you think that's enough time?
Me: Yes, it's plenty
Mom: But that's not even 90 minutes, I'm supposed to be there 2 hours early
Me: For INTERNATIONAL flights, yes
Mom: But I don't want to be rushed
Me: Fine, we'll leave at 7:30
Mom: Well, I think earlier than that...
Me: IT ONLY TAKES 5 MINUTES TO GET THERE
Mom: but when I called to confirm my flight this morning she recommended being there 90 minutes early
Me: The airport is two gates and a line for security, you're not going to get lost.
Mom: (whining) well, I just think I need to be there at 7:30
Me: So we can't leave at 7:30, you have to be there at 7:30 because that's going to make sucha big difference?
Mom: Yes, Honey it's too bad, we have to leave to get there at 7:30
Me; You can take a taxi then, I'm not leaving until 7:30

of course i was kidding. but this little airport doesn't take more than ten minutes, no matter how busy, to get through all the shit and to your gate. and Who CALLS the airline to confirm their flight the day before they leave? I had to explain e-tickets to her about 98 times. And she had done it on the wayout and was still very concerned that these e-ticket machines in the OC would be somehow harder to operate and take up all her time. (rolls eyes)

That being said, she just likes to have little arguments about nothing (like the difference between 7:25 and 7:30 as an appropriate departure time) for no reason to assert herself. She just weewly wikes to eat wiwwy GOOD shwimp. That's all.
Sigh.

So the three of us pseudo-family went to the San Diehgo Zoo on Friday, as JD had a whole day off from both jobs which is almost unheard of in these parts, and we drove down there through Laguna so she could see the pretty coast and jd could eat at this little mexican restaurant that's really a stand on the side of the road but I admit, it's fucking delicious. And she kept commenting on how many "mexicans" there seemed to be as though as we drove further south they multiplied and were deliberately more apparent to the three of us. newsflash: mexico is right the fuck there.

Anyway. The zoo is one of those things that would be fun with Jenny and Levi, or Ashleigh, or someone else who comes to visit, but not so much fun with mom. Mom who almost cries when she leans back too fast on a bench and bumps her spine on the wrought iron back of it. Mom whose heel slips off her shoe walking down a hill and she almost cries. Mom who has to scour the gift shop for the absolute least-cool souvenir to take my cousin in chicago. Mom who gets tired after a couple hours and sits smoking on a bench that is immediately taken over by a family with a stroller that she can't glare at more while waving us on to go check out the galapagos tortoises without her. mom who seems like she might demand a refund because all the big cats are sleeping in their shady caves in the middle of the day, and she can't see them. Mom who watches a big old monkey start porking a little monkey and runs, shreiking with giggles, out of the crowd because she saw a mom pull her child away from the free porn show and say, "look, honey, there are BABY monkies over here" like any parent in their right mind would be like, "well, I guess since this giant monkey appears to be raping this small monkey I could take this opportunity to explain to you that when a giant monkey loves a small monkey very very much..."

Oh, mom. And what doesn't help? Oh, the throngs of people, the freeway traffic, the constant nagging in my ear. at least I at one point got her to admit that she wouldn't ever want to live here. I told her as much. Nice weather and things to do can't quite make up for the price, the people, the crowding, the barrel-chested and extremely tan mid-life crisis aged man who came up to me and her and the beach with no shirt on and, in a distinctive surfer dilect, said, "excuse me! I think it would be entirely appropriate for me to snap a photo of the two of you together right in front of this view!" that creeped her out.

Socal doesn't quite sit right with me all the time, and I don't have the overwhelming hatred of people just for existing that she has. i have it, but it'snot overwhelming.

I don't mean to bitch. We had a lot of fun too, and I'm glad we got to see the zoo and she seemed genuinely happy a few times while she was here. But mostly she just seems sad all the time to me. and when I ask her what's wrong she realizes she's staring sadly into space and smiles fakely and says nothing in this about-to-cry voice. I don't think it's because she knew her time with us was limited out here. I think she's just sad all the time. I don't know what to do about it.

It was really good to see her. And we did have a lot of fun. She honestly seemed to have the most fun (though in a creepy desperate kind of way) when she was buying stuff for us. That we protested. Trust me, we protested.

Jenny, I accidentally revealed to her that you quit smoking. Like the first thing she said when she walked in to the apartment was "how can I smoke? what did you do before?" and I was genuinely confused and was all, "Huh? Before?" and she's like, "When Jenny was here, what did you do about smoking?" and I go, "Oh, she quit" without realizing it. And I swear, sis, she almost cried. And she was wanting to know how long ago and how, and I told her it'd been months and you just up and quit. And I couldn't tell if she was really happy for you or a little annoyed that you guys had made some kind of pact to always smoke and always be each other's enablers, or something. It seemed very real emotion but I don't know what spawned it. I think she may have been proud. I really couldn't tell. but sorry, I don't know if you care that I let it slip but whatever. That's what comments sections are for.

Anyway, what else. She left yesterday, we have since painted the living room and dining room and there's dining equipment in the dining room and we painted an ugly old dresser black and it's all very very awesome looking. And we saw fahrenheit 9/11 and honestly I liked it and am glad someone made the movie but I wish it had more to say. If that makes sense. And tonight we're going to disneyland for the fireworks for the4th and i love this apartment and I'm catching up on the emails I owe people and the cds haven't been mailed yet, I'll get to that maybe Tuesday, and I am busting my as for a deadline this week and the power went out last night as we were painting and there's so much light in this apartment. And I have to go.

Lovels

***Edit: I Meant to say on here earlier that JD said, "Does one forget the address of Shan-Gri-La?" in a very funny voice when I was asking him if he remembered how to get to that mexican stand, and it made me laugh extremely hard. Also, Jennny Jenny Sis Face, Auntie Doctor is under the impression that you and Levi blew her off by not going to Bean Blossom because you never found her. I told mom I thought you went, and that Auntie had instructed you to seek her out since she'd be "jamming all day out of the back of the car" and couldn't be bothered to meet you at a certian place/time. Then, I was telling JD about that this afternoon at lunch and I said, "She just wanted them to come across her, jamming to folk music, in her element"

then I laughed uproariously because my auntie just bought an Element. the kind you drive. I'm hilarious.
And I needed to amend my blog to let you guys know I'm hilarious.

Thanks.

In My Dreams, I See You Asleep On A Twin Bed

I have been dreaming like a motherfather lately. All obscene. All fantastic. Hahaha. No, I'm not sharing.

My mom's still here, yes. She's lost her ever-lovin' mind and has spent more money than I can shake a stick at in the last three days. Part of me tastes bile thinking about it and doesn't want to talk about it because I feel so guilty. The other part of me is jumping up and down, Melissa-style, for three days now.

Let's see, wanna know what all crap she got us?

I will just list stuff:
*a dining room table
*4 dining room chairs, which have a very unamusing and annoying story that go along with them now that involves me and the surly eye keeah customer service phone representative screaming at each other
*a dining room "man servant" as she calls it (it's actually called a sideboard or a buffet. i don't know why she calls it a man servant, or why mashed potatoes are "mashed tatties," or any number of other things)
*a bathroom rug that still has traction on the bottom so she won't slide across the bathroom and break her hip while she's here.
*a patio table with two chairs that is adorable
*a rug for the patio
*a bedside lamp for jd
*five ceramic plant pots
*four impatien flowers
*three other plants
*two hanging baskets with "dark eyes" flowers in them
* a watering can
*plant soil
*a frappuccino
*baja fresh
*cheesecake factory
*gina's
*ruby's
*plastic gloves
*rags for staining
*cashews

and tomorrow we're all going to the san diego zoo and she's planning on paying for that too. and she wants to buy me gas and groceries before she leaves. And we'll have to eat in san diego. And she keeps insisting that we need rugs all over the apartment. and it's 8:15 right now and she's snoozing on the couch. teehee. She's crazy. I love her. we were going to drive down to a certain beach this afternoon but she went hog wild in the gardening store and we potted plants instead. And they're gorgeous, I'll take pictures and stick them up sometime. Once the freaking table and stuff are done being stained and finsihed and dry out there.

uhh there's other stuff to write about but I can't think of it now. i'm sleepy and i have to go research what all we can do in san diego tomorrow. Wheeee!!! lovels