I Dreamed You Were Carried Away On The Crest Of A Wave

I have been excessively productive in a spring-break sort of way today. I woke up around 11 and then ran a bunch of errands and then, ladies and gentlemen, I went to the gym. And discovered that going to the gym before 3:30pm is the best thing ever because it's deserted except for me and the dozen or so senior citizens who are reading the paper on the recumbent bikes. I will be doing that a lot more in the future.

On the way to and from the gym I noticed, to my great amusement, that the grass on the median looked a little brown. Landscaping here in sunny SoCal is usually not allowed to "brown" to this extent. Immediately thereafter, I noticed signs stuck in the grass that read "Grass under Renovation"

Grass Under Renovation. Are you kidding me, Irvine? That's a little more ridiculous than even I could have hoped for. These people have too much money. Too much fricking money and free time. How could you ever need that much money and free time that you would have browning grass on a median in the middle of a four-lane (each way) road and you would hire someone not only to fix it but to put signs out letting motorists know that, indeed, the problem has been addressed. Good gravy. This fucking town.

I smell great right now. Not only am I shower-fresh, I bought lotion and AND in-shower lotion today and I smell great. I thought, maybe, this in-shower lotion thing would be a scam (You body wash yourself off and then you rub it on like lotion and then you rinse it off like conditioner and WHAM you're deliciously smellish) but that shit seemed to actually work. And if it works on MY dry-ass skin, it totally works on your normal skin. Ahem, I'm making a recommendation here.

JD and I are going to see Handsome Boy Modeling School tomorrow at House of Blues. The one or two of you who know who that group is will surely be quite jealous upon hearing that.

Sometimes I see celebrities on tv and I am really really glad that it is not my JOB to be skinny and have my picture taken.

Here is a brief list of embarrassing things I have been doing lately:

Watching Gilmore Girls religiously
Flat-ironing my hair
Obsessing over this massive zit on my face
Being too lazy to call my gyno and complain about the patch, and instead refilling my prescription for another month
Going to bookstores and reading the newest Sylvia book in its entirety and not buying it
After having bought/read the Davinchee Code last weekend, going to bookstores and reading those "debunking the science behind the Davinchee code" books and getting visibly pissed off at them, because the book is goddamn sold as fiction, people.
Crying at the end of each of two episodes of Scrubs yesterday because the heart-warming message is so touching.
Having nightmares about very lame things that I am stressed out about relating to school.

I'm cold. I'm going to get up and do something work-related now.

Disarm You With A Smile

I was thinking the other night about Smashing Pumpkins. This doesn't happen every day, so I thought I would go with it and see what my brain came up with. I had the following stream-of-consciousness thoughts:

*My favorite SP song ever is Disarm. My next favorite song is Bodies. No one else likes Bodies. After that, they're all the same to me.

*I remember what Melancholy and the I.S., the box set was like when it came out. How excited Stacey and Melissa Shockeleyey were in Mr. Weir's freshman year algebra class and how I thought it was cool and I better start liking them too if I wanted to be cool

*that I was in that algebra class despite having taken algebra in 8th grade because my dad had died halfway through 8th grade, and I should have failed the class but the kindly teacher took some kind of pity on me and gave me a C- instead (the lowest grade I've ever ever gotten) and I just had to retake what was essentially the same class in high school. After this I went on to test out of math entirely in college (that was a flukish accident).

*that mr. weir used to call ME "elizabeth" while calling all other students in the class "mr" or "miss" blank. He was WEIRd. Get it? hahahahahah

*That I should dig out the SP box set, and see if I still have that "aeroplane flies high" set and listen to all my favorite songs.

*Oh, and they also make me think of corinne. Corrinne? I don't remember how to spell her name. Baby James' big sister.

*********

Anyway. I didn't get around to listening to that stuff yet.

Celeste: I was going to bitch about taxes and stipends anyway. They do NOT take taxes out. Therefore, when you are finally not being claimed by your mother and she doesn't think you should have her accountant in Indiana do your Cali taxes anymore, you will have the nasty realization that you have to pay all the taxes you didn't contribute to over the year. For example, I currently owe the government about three thousand dollars. Not kidding. So I am going to have to file an extension, put that on a credit card this summer, and MAKE PAYMENTS on my taxes. Then, I'm going to have to be saving more money to pay off NEXT year's taxes. So tell your friend that she must certainly account for that when moving to California. Though it is expensive, however, it is fucking nice to live here. So I would still say she should go. that's also a good school.

In other news:

*I have a massive zit right by my nose on the left side of my face. It's not pretty. It's kind of funny, though. I don't know why I thought it was a good idea to not wash makeup off my face before I fell asleep all weekend. Even the world's driest skin can't handle that shit. Whoops.

*I bought those pre-cut cheese shapes that are moons and stars the other day and I am, quite frankly, shocked at how much fun I have eating those. I can't believe I ever made fun of anyone for buying pre-made chocolate milk before. Sorry.

*I have been looking into leasing a car. That's scary. Oh, no, I definitely can't afford that right now. But that's when cars die, you know. That sucks.

*Jessica (JD's sister) is for certain moving out here and is going to be my roommate sometime in May. That's exciting. I'm really running out of money fast. It will be nice to have SOME kind of break.

*I am on spring break right now. Therefore, I am doing very very little actual moving around or getting dressed. i slept until noon today. It's delicious.

*I'm boring. Call me or something.

I Won't Forget, I Won't Forget The Way You Said Move On

Hahahahaha, DOOL, nice plot twist. Philip, played by that TOOL from Real whirled Chicago ( the blond guy who was yanking the blond girl around the whole season), a "marine" on the show, was recently sent off to "the middle east" and is now being held hostage by irakki insurgents and making impassioned pleas about dying for his country, blah blah. What. A. Tool.

Fuck. That. Guy.

I have very nearly started on that paper that was due yesterday. I have every intention of doing so soon, don't worry. I might also get dressed here in a few minutes. But I am not going to guarantee anything.

I got an email from one of my professirs saying that (the whole class got this email) my fake grahnt (that we "critiqued" in a "mock review session" on monday) would have received "funding." In fact, my fake grahnt was the best in the class. Tee hee. See, kids, it's not hard to write a successful ahhr oh one, it's just SO easy not to. heh

Last night I went out to dinner with my friends. And it was delicious. And I came home and felt extremely nauseous, thanks to somebody's driving. And then I laid around and then I had that awful moment where I realized I would feel much better if I were sitting riiiiight in front of the toilet just in case. So I did that and totally puked. Eeew. Then I had the spins and was freezing and shaking all night. And I slept for about 12 hours and now I'm fine. So fine, in fact, that I ate my leftovers for lunch. And I don't feel like I'm going to hurl. Woot!

JD suggested that the Italian dressing I had on my salad (the only options were italian and blue cheese) may have contained anchovies. THAT is a narsty thought. Just so you all know, Olive Garden's italian dressing has that going on too.

GODDAMMIT SELF GO WRITE YOUR PAPER.

Erp, laters.

Breathe In The Air, If You Care You Compare, Don't Say Farewell

I can't decide if that's lyrical genius or pure unadulterated retardation. Maybe a dash of both? Hmmm.

If I were a good friend right now I'd be out shopping for a birthday present for J. However, I can't think of a single fucking thing to get her, and that sucks bad. I think I will probably resort to a gift card from a bookstore, which makes me feel unoriginal, but hopefully she'd appreciate that kind of thing as much as I would (I would crap my pants with delight if I were given a gift card to someplace right about now).

But since I am a badfriend, I am watching Passions and fidgeting and checking my email every thirty seconds, which is making me more fidgety.

I have a headache. I think it's because I doubled my time on the elliptical machine last night. I've been inspired by Raedy's triathlon running (but you won't catch me swimming for exercise, not after freshman year gym class in high school) as well as an ill-fated decision to weigh myself the other day that resulted in me having to face the fact that I am chubbing up nicely. So now I am going to work out for longer (since right now me going more often is unrealistic, I am way too lazy) and eat less. I realized after a closer examination of what I was eating that I was mindlessly eating about 2,800 calories a day. Which, you may or may not know, is a LOT and a lot more than a moderately active person needs to eat. Anyway, I'm not trying to whine that I'm fat, I'm just saying I had to face up to my recent drowing-anxiety-in-snacking behavior and it's only been a couple days that I've been conscious of this, but I feel a lot better and this coffee I'm drinking will cure this headache, so no harm no foul in general.

Attention Everyone: If you were considering using "the patch" as your primary form of birth control, I strongly recommend not doing so. I am currently on week 3 of using this, and it is more hassle than it is worth. Of course, it's counterintuitive that something you stick on your ass for a week at a time would be "easier" than ingesting a pill, but I stupidly fell for the gynechiatrist's glowing review. It's annoying. It's like having a super-sticky band-aid on your ass all the time. It wrinkles in the shower and then I freak out constantly that it's going to come off (which is SO not a big deal right now, there are no pending pregnancy scares or even ones on the horizon) and the instant you put it on your ass it's got that Dirty band-aid circle of gunk around it. And that's there all week. And when you put a new sticker on your other ass cheek the next week, the remaining sticky from the prior week is impossible to get off. I scrub with rubbing alcohol and it won't budge. So you look like the unhygenic six year old from down the street who's always got that nasty band-aid gunk all over his knee, but now it's on your ass. Oh, and I have yet to put it on my ass in a place where it doesn't get "bothered" by my undies every time I have to raise or lower them. (avoiding graphic mental imagery of me using the bathroom?)

So the point is that I think this patch is so stupid, I am going to call my vaginacologist and demand that she call me in a different prescrip, and that it be a PILL with a GENERIC so that I can NOT pay $30 for it. Don't fall for the cute "oh, it's the best-selling birth control right now" schpiel they might try to give you.

I went to LA today. Specifically, we drove to LA and took the freeway exit for the cort haus and took the immediate entry back onto the freeway, heading south. This was the highlight of the morning for all three of us. We agreed that, since we are crapping out on our wahrk, we would all do something productive concerning the study once we got home. So, I have yet to do my bit. I am going to crunch some fancy numbers and figure out the exact number of kids we need to still get. And then we are going to present this to the professor, and she is going to agree (relent) that we can stop at that point.

So then I took a nap. And I need to be working on this paper that's due today, but I got an extension until Friday, so I am guessing I will do absolutely nothing about the paper today. Harumph, that's so very lazy of me. But fuck it, I need to find a present for my friend. We're all going out to dinner later. Hoo-Ray.

Thanks for all the nice comments. Love you guys

I'm Glad I Didn't Die Before I Met You

I'm Glad I Didn't Die Before I Met You

I got bored with not updating this thing. I thought about it, and basically, decided that this is My Goddamn Blog and I'm going to say whatever I want. Cause fuck it, that's why.

But I feel like some explanation is in order for those of you who aren't related to my mother.

1. She is crazy. The fact that she is crazy never surprises me, but the fact that she finds new and innovative ways of expressing it, and of reminding me and Jenny that she is, indeed, crazy, never ceases to amaze either of us.

2. Although she is crazy and quite a "handful" at times, she is still my mother.

Now, these two things have caused me and my sister immeasurable grief in the last couple decades. On one hand, I have this personal aversion to crazy people, because I am not myself crazy, and I can't see why anyone else would choose to be crazy. The academic part of my brain is screaming right now that mental illness is a disease too and crazy people don't choose to be crazy. But. Aside from the 90% of the craziness that is excuseable due to Things That Are Actually Out Of Her Control, I think the remaining 10%, which is explained only by Willful Crazy-Promoting Behaviors and Cognitions, are things that I have every right to feel angry and let down about.

On the other hand, she is my mother, and I know she has had a hard life, and I know that All Things Considered, she deserves to have some slack cut for her.

The problem comes in reconciling these two things in a way that doesn't not cause me mental anguish (to the forehead, ladies) every day and also does not result in me booting my mother entirely out of my life to spare my own sanity. Jenny also wrestles with this, though she and I have taken different tacks over the years.

Anyway. My mother is Crazy. I seriously considered listing the ways/diagnoses that I think illustrate this more fully for those of you who never had to parent a parent and don't/won't understand, but then I realized that I don't have enough time to list everything.

So she and I have had a "tense" relationship for a long time. I'm not actively angry with her, and I think she seems to be doing better for herself every time I see her. She seems like she has her shit together and can live by herself, which I am learning to respect (I am still not totally thrilled with being alone in an apartment at night sometimes). She likes teaching piano students and she really likes watching LIfetime movies, and she has her music and she has her cat and she's quite honestly one of the only people in the world who is probably Better Off By Herself. She really is a hermit, and if she could finagle it I think she would move to Scotland and live on a moor by herself until she dies in her sleep one night fifty years from now. She's never going to get sick, like everyone she's ever cared about (except me and Jenny), she's somehow destined to be the one who survives, which is poetic and should be meaningful but hard to stomach when she seems to be oblivious to that and wasting it. Her grandmother is still alive and is doing quite well for being 95 fucking years old. Her mother is going to live well past 100. She'll live that long too, and sometimes I think that's a good thing and sometimes I think that's punishment for her.

But the point is, she's fine to be by herself and she's fine in general.

The rub comes in when you figure me and Jenny into the mix. Basically, mom is alone in Eville and has her friends and acquaintances and job and students and those of you who adore her because she's cute and sweet to you (and you totally should, she's not faking you out when she's nice and pleasant and able-to-converse with you. She really likes you guys). Then there are her daughters.

First, if you want to understand my parents' relationship, go rent What Dreams May Come and watch it closely and pay attention to how she's crazy and dependent on her husband and how she loses it when he dies. Now, after you've done that, think back to whatever you can remember about junior high and high school. All the crap we got away with thanks to my mom's negligence. He died, she checked out, but unlilke the movie, there were still 2 kids hanging around. And honestly, we were both made to feel very much like we were cramping her style over the next few years.

**I don't feel like I should be censoring this. You don't want to read about my opinion of my mom? Don't read this post. You think my blog is negative and whiny and bitchy? Don't read this post OR my blog. Seriously, I don't give a crap. I just don't want to hear complaints about it.**

In addition to feeling like we were in the way, we were also told that we were her Only reasons for living. That too was hard to reconcile, especially at 13 years old. So she said that but chose Other People over the two of us at every possible chance. She, as I've said on here before, missed performances, indiscriminately praised report cards that were good or bad, avoided "crowds" at all costs, even if there was something importnat to one of us going on that would have required her to weather the indignity of being touched or looked at by other people, etc. She ran the family finances into the ground, had to file bankruptcy, gave away our pets, sold our furniture, gave away everything that reminded her of my father, etc. When she sold our house I was already in college but I packed up all the stuff from my old bedroom and she said she'd put it in "storage" and neither of us have ever seen that stuff since. Anytime we ask about some token item from our childhoods it's in "storage."

Things are not important to me. However, I don't have any positive memories either. The things that stand out were the really really bad things. I know that, somehow, there was food in the pantry (not on the table, she didn't feel like cooking...ever), there was heat and on my 16th birthday there was a car (that was totally unexpected, btw), so some people might think that was enough, that was good enough, or that obviously we were adequately brought up since we're both high functioning and successful.

But she checked out, we had to clean up after her (literally, she would drink until she fell asleep/passed out with a wine glass/box still in her hand and it would spill everywhere), and since the day I realized my father was going to die I have been continually terrified of her because She Is Crazy. And once he died I knew she would be ours to deal with.

Things have been better in the last few years (since the day I moved out for good, thank you JD), but I never thought I would have the type of friendship with her that many of my friends have with their moms. It's really sad, but everytime I think she and I are working toward that she yanks the rug out from under me at the first sign of honesty. In my opinion, there's no point in our trying to be friends until she can hear me say things I've needed to say for ten years that she hasn't wanted to hear. And the last time I tried that, she wasnt' ready to hear it. (that was last June, she freaked out and tried to burn the oldest daughter bridge but I "stopped" her by saying we would pretend that I'd never brought it up. On NO ONE else in the whole world would that work. There have been lots of times where I've said something and want to take it back or "start over" but No Rational Person would ever be ok with that. But she eagerly agreed, and for the last year we've pretended we are chummy friends who talk about once a month on the phone and it has been "working" just fine). But by reading this blog, she, in my opinion,

A. violated SOMETHING, not exactly trust because I realize, this is posted on the Internet and i would be unreasonable if I thought I could regulate who was reading it. But she has known the url for over a year, apparently, but claimed that before a couple weeks ago had never read it, and only did so because she "needed to know what was going on with me" because I hadn't been chatty on the phone the weekend before she went hunting for answers.

that is so ridiculous, and of course I don't believe her.

Open letter to anyone who thought it would be a good idea to dig around and try to get inside my head through non-sanctioned (by liz) means:

Dear Asshole,

Stop it. Don't read things that aren't written for you. If you want to know about what I'm thinking, ask me. If you think you need to consult someone else about my thoughts and feelings, because you're not sure if I'm being upfront, call Jenny. If she doesn't answer your questions, ask me again but differently. If even then you can't determine what's wrong with me, give me a week and then ask me again. I guarantee you'll get a satisfactory response.

Don't ever read my journal again, Keith. I'll rip your balls off next time.

Don't ever consult my website for details about what's wrong with me, mom. This is written for my friends who held my hand through it, not for you. I wasn't complaining or bitching in the hopes that things would magically change for me. I can't believe you said that. That's so far from what I was doing. Way to read selectively. You didn't even try to talk to me. You just went snooping around in places you knew weren't for you. Just like your mom did when she read your journal. Remember how pissed you were about that? That's how pissed I am about this. Oh, also, way to leave COMMENTS about how you felt instead of writing me an email.

Stop reading things that are not meant for you.

Thank You,
Teresita

B. Invited Honest Discourse and, with the only alternative being that we are not part of each other's lives anymore, a frank discussion about what I do and do not like about our relationship. To that end, we are having a phone call on Friday. I still haven't figured out exactly what I want to say to her.

So, in short, that's where she and I are now. no, I'm not kicked out of her life. But she makes it a habit to never retain or remember anything that Jenny or I say to her when we're having these chats, and then renigs on them and takes three steps backwards asap, and neither of us has the energy for it, etc.

She makes me really tired. I have a lot of issues with her, but I don't hate or dislike her. She's just a lot to deal with. I wasn't complaining on here about her. Those are actual things that happened and are facts. I can't change them. She's frustrating. That's not unwarranted.

anyway. I'm obviously back to posting again.

Highly Unethical

For those of you who didn't catch it, my mom

A. Reads this
B. Left some incredibly scathing comments
C. Kicked me out of her life for the shitty things I've been saying on my blog VIA MY BLOG COMMENTS SECTION.

I am starting to think that this forum for my own actual thoughts and feelings is not such a good idea. For now, the comments section is down. I don't know how the rest of this blog will fare. I'm pretty confused right now. I had no idea she knew about this blog, let alone used it to keep tabs on me. I feel pretty fucking shitty right now. Rightly so. Uhmm. Yeah. Later.

I Think I Was Blind Before I Met You

91. I have a creepy psychic connection with all my favorite people. Example: Raedy posting about Bright Eyes when I just bought two Bright Eyes albums this weekend. There are millions of these examples. I like being in sync with people who are thousands of miles and several hours away. It makes me feel connected to the Big Picture and helps me feel like I can deal with things. Not totally sure why it's so comforting, but it is. More so than ice cream or mashed tatties or grilled cheese sandwiches. I'd rather sit around finishing sentences with someone else than just about anything else.

92. I can't dance (either). One time Raedy tried to teach me and Melissa and Chris Sinclair and Ryoko the Running Man. I was the only one who couldn't, at the end of the lesson, do a decent approximation. I am not coordinated enough. I would gladly, though, have thrown myself into it if I ever thought I could make a career of it. Not like, Wade Robson Project career, but something modern-dancey. Yeah, I know. Missed opportunities. Stupid parents not stupid enrolling me in a stupid dance class. Stupid me not taking hip hop dance in college when I had the chance. I'm soooo flexible but can do nothing productive with it.

93. I have better than 20/20 vision. Give it a few more years, of reading articles in dim light and squinting all the time, to kiss that goodbye. I never had braces. I never broke any bones. I can hear pretty well. Like I just said, I'm flexible. I am almost immune to half turns and chicken wings and goose necks. However, I am sometimes clumsy (I walk into walls), my brain is often times full and I forget things really easily, and a simple punnet square would indicate that I have loads of undesirable genes that no one in his right mind should choose to propagate. Sigh.

94. I have been experiencing bouts of irrational depression for the last couple years where I get hopelessly despondant about the future and about myself and the pointlessness of everything overwhelms me. These bouts aren't, I think, frequent enough to warrant a psychiatric diagnosis, but sometimes I try to determine whether they're a product of a disorder, fatigue, my personality, grad school, or dissatisfaction with my life, and I can't tell. And it worries me, because i think I have done a fairly good job of staving it off ("It" being the pure, unfiltered Crazy that makes up 50% of my DNA) until this point, and the last thing I need is to sucuumb to that NOW. Sheesh.

95. I have ridiculously fat, disproportionately fat, obscenely fat upper arms. I hate this.

96. I also hate:

Bad grammar
Boob jobs, and boys who are entranced by obvious boob jobs
Snaggleteeth
Non-Blonde roots
Spitting
Willful Ignorance
Hypocrisy
High Pitched Noises
Talentless Hacks
Weakness (perceived and objective, mine included)
Being drooled or spat on
Rebel Flags
Farting/Bathroom Talk (unless it's me and Jenny talking about it, then it's funny)
Ashlee Simpson

97. I'm Welsh, Cherokee, Portugese, and Irish.

98. Words I think are gross include:

semen
spooge
jizz
any variation of words for boy ejaculate
colonic
flabby
flaccid
halfie
chubby
any variation of words for boy partial-erection
pooper hole
pork
nincompoop
sequelae
ferret
mucus
menses
hootnanny
bladder
canker
lesion
fester

99. I could read when I was 2 and a half

100. On a road trip to california once when I was little, we were driving through the mountains and I happened to watch the car in front of us hit an animal. Gruesome as this was, I vengefully swore to alert the authorities to this travesty, so I memorized the car's license plate so i could someday either call the police or just look them up myself and punch them in the face. It's a wyoming plate, WB6943. I'll never forget it.

FUCK YEAH, that's a hunnert. That was exhausting and seems pretty lame now. Hmmm.

Then We Usually Bash The Cadillac Upside A Dairy Queen

Hahahah, Stacey, you were so totally right about Shirley Q. Liquor being HEEElarious. Thank you for that stellar recommendation.

81. I am not scared of giving talks. I was scared to have to give my FIRST talk. But I am good at talks. Well, I am ok, and considering it was my first talk and it was vastly more "well-attended" than I expected it to be, I rocked it to pieces. My advisor almost cried she was so proud of me. But she always almost cries she's so proud of all her students. Then after it was all over and no one had any difficult questions for me, she bought me a big ass mai tai and then I got tipsy and drove back to OC. Yeah. I sounded really fucking smartificated right about then. No, I tease, I was fine. The talk went as well as it could possibly have gone. I know what to fix for next month. I know what about the process scares me the most, and I can tackle it. So thanks to everyone who well-wished and supported me, you guys helped a shit ton! And now I'm not a talk-virgin anymore, which is so awesome.

82. Nothing makes me feel lamer than being by myself all weekend with nothing to do. Last night I passed out when I got home (after I ate a whole pizza) but I was up fairly early this morning, have yet to accomplish anything at all, and am just sitting around feeling lame. I have so much shit I could be doing. But I'm bored. If I just started working I wouldn't be bored anymore. But I keep choosing to reflect on how lame I am not to be doing anything on Saturday night. It's not a great habit to get into. Poop.

83. I used to be "able" to read tarot cards and runes and all that shit, in high school. I still remember that my card was Strength and had a picture of a girl with a lion on it. If you tell me your birthday I can tell you your card. I found my deck of tarot cards a few months ago and I have it here now. I haven't looked at it, but I used to like drawing one card and trying to predict my whole fucking day off it. Supposedly, that's a viable way to do it. Anyway, I used to know all these fancy layouts and what the positioning and directional orientation of the cards meant and now all I can think is how naive that was. But I don't mind it. And I still kind of like the idea of things like horoscopes and tarot cards and Stacey used to be able to read palms and I'd always be like, "ooh, stacey read my palm" and she'd roll her eyes and remind me that she'd done it a billion times and palms don't really change all that much. But then she'd do it anyway. I liked being the person you guys and my more drug-related friends would come to for shit like that. It gave me an identity above and beyond Shara's Less Crazy Friend With No Boobs.

84. I don't have any boobs, to speak of. I'm actually, seriously ok with it. In fact, I think my boobs are great, and I love them. And everyone who's ever seen them says they're awesome. Because, really, think about it, they'll never get all saggy and weird shaped, and they're the perfect boob shape. Also, my ass is killer. I've always known this about myself, but I keep remembering it lately and being like, "oh how fucking great, that I always had such an ass." I started realizing my ass was logic-defyingly great when Adam Kinnie developed a fixation on it. Hahahahahahahaa.

85. Just so we're all on the same page, I've never done anal. I never will do anal. With anyone. No matter what. I would sooner stick shards of glass in my vagina. Which, coincidentally, is also pretty low on the list of things I like doing. If you were thinking, "hmm, liz is pretty cool, and now she's single, so maybe she'd like to do anal with me," you, sir or madam, have another think coming.

86. I'm sorry that so many people I know had such shitty childhood experiences with alcohol/ics/ism. All I can say is Look at you all now. You're incredibly awesome, functioning people. I'm sorry you had to go through it but it's part of making you who you are. And you wouldn't have been given it to deal with if you couldn't handle it. Err, you wouldn't have written it into your chart a few years ago if you didn't think you needed to learn something from it. To wax extremely fucking spiritualistic on your asses. It's a lot easier to think about things happening to make you stronger or to help you learn something than to think about them happening to you or being things you have to get through or endure. I think that, essentially, is the criterion with which to divide all people into two groups. Two ways of looking at the world and two ways of coping and I think that is why my mother and I don't always get along. She had a rough time of it her whole life. It destroyed her. She gave up years ago and thinking about it makes me taste bile, so I'm not going to talk about that anymore.

87. One of my favorite things about high school was how when any of us would pass one another in the halls, we would low-five-slap-brush each other's hands. Or we would run and hug each other all the time. No one hugs enough for my liking any more. I loved going to school because I knew I would get about sixty five hugs per day, and I would need every single one of them. I also really liked carpooling to school, and how fucking freed I felt when I got my license and my mom randomly got me a car. I really really like driving, and I think I like it so much because it always took me away from my house and to my friend's houses.

88. When my dad was around, I remember every night there would be some kind of background noise, like the piano (that was the best) or the tv in my parents' room downstairs, or adult professor-types chatting in the dining room, that I could hear from my bedroom when I was trying to sleep. When he died, there was never any sound at all. I'm trying really hard not to retroactively be angry with my mother. But things keep coming to mind that aren't pleasant. She's not coming to visit me this year because I'm going to come there in august again. She's not calling me because she doesn't want to intrude. She burned every bridge my father had ever made or given her. She alienated me and Jenny in her immediate quest to find herself a new man. She never came to football games. She didn't come to state my senior year. She didnt' come to see me in the all-state honor band. JD came, to Indianapolis, by himself. She left my graduation early. Jenny had to force her to sit through my whole college graduation. She stumbled around in a drunken, idiot haze for years. She took pills and left notes and I had to sit up with her all night so she wouldn't die. She painted the house the darkest colors she could find. She sold everything dad had told her not to sell. She replaced our thick gray carpet with the shittiest, thinnest carpet she could find. She frittered away thousands of dollars until she eventually had to get a fucking job and stop living off life insurance. She did so many things that utterly disgusted me while she did them, and I feel like if we went through each decision she made in the last ten years, she would have made zero correct decisions. I don't know what to do with her. I can't abandon her. She's my mother, but I'm not even sure I love her. I feel like I'm obligated to her. And she's my albatross. I can't stnad her but no one but Jenny is ever allowed to say one negative thing about her. I don't get it. She baffles me. I can't see any part of her in myself. Sometimes I like to pretend I was my dad's kid from his first marriage. That's terrible. I just don't understand her.

89. I cleaned my entire house today and it's spotless and I felt very productive while I was doing it. Now I feel lame and lazy and boring and desperate. i think I need to get out of the house. But I don't know where I'd want to go. Man. Sometimes I manage to make such a mess of my life that it's ridiculous. But funny. If not funny, I'm slitting my wrists now. So, funny.

90. I decided the other day that Pinback sounds like oral sex feels. Get some pinback and listen to it, loud, and see what you think. My memory's bad and I'll be alone and miserable the rest of my fool life, so i figured I'd toss that out while I can still remember what 'oral sex' means.

To Think of Cinnamon and Long For You

61. More than anything, i am surprised and annoyed at how poor a singer I am and have always been. I just wish I could fucking sing. Jenny and I have discussed this at great lengths. We're both terrible and we both hate it. One time Jarrod told me that if I just tried to sing more through my nose I would sound less nasally. I slapped his stupid face.

62. Jarrod and I haven't really been "close" in years, but one time a few years after we broke up I was hanging out with him and he gets his wallet out and shows me how he's still carrying around my senior picture, and also he has one of his then-girlfriend Huth Rartke. He tells me, excitedly, how he gets these two pictures of girlfriends out, lays them side-by-side on a table, and asks friends/random people to pick who is prettier. Apparently Huth and I were neck and neck. I think I was supposed to be really complimented, but I almost barfed right on poor Jarrod. Huth had a face that made me want to hit her upside the head all the time. Oh wait, no, I think I hated her because she could sing pretty flipping well. And if you refer to #61, I cannot sing.

63. JD is the only person I can spend unlimited amounts of time with and not be annoyed by.

64. I am giving a talk in The Pretty tomorrow. I am going to try to eat a lot of beans tonight and tomorrow, so that I can cut a fart during the talk and then use that thing Raedy came up with where I say, "Now that we've heard what my BUTT has to say, here's what our data show." I would expect thta to go down in Awesome Lore for all times if I really did that.

65. I look really good in gray, blue, and mauve. I had always been told mauve would look good on me but I never totally knew what "mauve" was so I ignored those people. And then a few months ago I got this Mauve sweater and people can't keep their hands off me when I wear it. Also, I look bad in yellow. One day in elementary school, the teacher was saying how people who have blue-tinted skin look nice in yellow, but people with yellow-tinted skin (sallow, jaundiced, lizish) should never ever wear yellow. Then the teacher looked pointedly at this "popular" girl who was clad that day in a bright yellow track suit. Hilarious. I actually remembered that lesson.

66. I am becoming adept at what my career is going to require of me. I had to co-lead a discussion yesterday for three hours and I not only rocked it's socks off, I was comfortable and rocked it hard enough to make up for (I did about 90% of the total time) my friend J's total fucking inadequacy when it comes to any kind of public speaking, even when it is in a seminar with nice people youve known for years and who are nice and not scary. I swear, sometimes I don't get it. That being said, I will likely fall (SPLAT!) on my face during my talk tomorrow. My talk that's now in less than 24 hours. Yeah, I should get working on that.

67. Jenny and I used to drink IBC root beer, make popcorn, and watch mystery science theater 3000 together. Those were the nights that we got along better than all others when we had to live together, in my psycho mom's house. I miss that. I wish that was still a show.

68. I believe in things like Apple computer, reiki, sylvia browne, vegetarianism, solipsism, karma, fate, and above all things self-efficacy. But if you question me on any of these things I get definsive and can't explain why I like/believe them to anyone's satisfaction. And I used to get really pissed off at Amy when she would argue faith as an explanation for faith. I have faith in things that are probably the same things as she does, but I feel morally smug about it because I have a much more active sense of personal control, and I bypass that whole fucking religion-as-institution bullshit. I still can't believe that anyone could buy into a cult that said Kyle would go to hell for being gay.

69. My dad used to say that there are no mistakes in your life that are so bad that you can't learn from them. I learned a hell of a lot in the last 10 years. i miss my dad all the time.

70. I have the world's shortest tongue. I can only stick it out far enough to touch the spot right below my lower lip. That's not very far, or useful.

71. I am incredibly good at being someone's uke in martial arts, if I know I am acting as one and you dont' just sneak up behind me, pick me up, and throw me down on the kitchen floor. I am a really good faller, throw-taker, dive-roller, and technique allower. JD is too. We were talking about no-hand leg takedowns, and I couldn't remember if I'd attempted one of those on the black belt test, and he said I had and he had totally sold it. He was really good at selling things that would have been physically impossible due to his tree trunk legs had I tried them otherwise. I am not one of those girls who whines every time she takes a throw. I'm a warrior, dammit. I'm a ninja. I'm also a badass in my own right, but there are some techniques that someone my size/strength cannot use on someone like JD. This scissor leg throw happens to be one of them. Only because of his legs, though, not because I am not adept enough. Just so we're clear.

72. I have a really poor sense of smell, compared to most people.

73. If Keanu doesnt' stop doing incredibly stupid movies, I may stop wanting to sleep with him.

74. I had to correct the word "corrobate" to "corroborate" yesterday to a roomful of academics.

75. I am a terrible gardener, cook, cat parental unit, etc. I am fastidiously clean and tidy and stuff when I have time. Right now, my house is a wreck. There is no chance of it improvin before tomorrow.

76. The most fun I ever had for a whole continuous week was at Beau's house over spring break when a dozen of us just lived there the whole fricking week. I dont' think I went home once. I thought college would be just like that, with everyone all together in a house being awesome. I still wish it was like that.

77. I started writing this ridiculous "screenplay" about all of us in high school. It was on my old shitty computer, but I think I printed it out when I got rid of that thing. So, There may be a copy of it somewhere, in "storage." I will look for that next time I am home, and then I will post it on the internet. You will all laugh uproariously if I find it. We will all have a hearty chuckle. If you're not in it already I'll write you in as I'm posting it.

78. If you ever want to get tested for STDs, see if they write something like, "Seriously questionable sexual partners" or "Probable exposure to STDs" on the slip ordering the HIV bloodwork. Apparently in grad school, this is how your doctor tricks your insurance into paying for it. I was alarmed a few weeks ago when I noticed this inscribed on the paperwork I toted down to the lab, but then my fellow sexually active lab members informed me they do this so insurance doesn't raise a fuss. By the way, I am STD free. Hoo-ray. It would have been more than a little shocking to some of us if I had not turned out that way.

79. I have weird-ass skin. It has a name, but I don't know it, as I don't have a dermatologist. It's really dry and nowhere near as bad as my dad's was, but it's weird and creeps people out sometimes. On the plus side, I never had a problem with acne, and I can rub gobs of any kind of lotion on my face whenever I feel like it and not break out.

80. I think I have gained about ten pounds in the last few weeks. I am not thrilled about this, but I don't have time to deal with it. It just better not affect what size suit I have to buy (I'm getting myself a suit tonight) because then I'll be double pissed off. I will be able to breathe/exercise/eat normally again after next week. Well, after this quarter. Ok, after this school year is over I will be able to recover. Whatev. Wish me luck on the talk.

I Think That's Sexist and the Word for "Mean To Gay People"

51. Sometimes, after a year of silence, people update their blogs.

52. I have an unsightly cowlick that my sister has always referred to as "a bald spot" on the back right side of my head. My hair always looks retarded, at all times, because of this.

53. I have unsightly scars all over the my inner thighs, right by my Vajayjay, from one time in band where I decided to try to climb a twelve-foot chain link fence (over by the baseball fields where the sabres were practicing) to get inside for a water break and at the tippy top of the fence I hesitated for a split second and almost fell off but instead just effectively raped myself on the prongy spikes. No internal damage, mind you, but I have some really interesting puncture wound gash scars that you don't see naturally-occurring in babies and such. In fact, most of you will never see these scars. Heh.

54. One time Jarrod spent the night in my room in hgih school and my mom came in the next morning and she wasn't supposed to know jarrod was there and he hid, literally, under the covers in the bed (it was a waterbed) and she didn't notice him there. I found this incredibly hilarious because it basically meant my mom was retarded. Lots of times I stayed at jarrod's on saturday night and hid in his closet until his family went to church the next day. plenty of times people hid in my closet when they weren't supposed to be at my house too.

55. One time, and this is the most embarrassing story of my entire life, so laugh it up, jarrod and I were at his parents house, probably on a sunday morning, and *ahem* used a condom and then stuck it in a brown paper bag intending to take it out to the dumpster when we left. Instead, we accidentally left the paper bag on the kitchen table in his parents' house. They totally found it and then I was unwilling to show my face around there ever again. I'm blushing right now thinking about how fucking mortifying that was to realize, hours later.

56. I haven't skinny dipped one-tenth as much as I did my sophomore/junior years of high school in the rest of my life combined. man, was it ever hard to get stacey naked and in a pool.

57. The most pain I've ever been in was when I had appendicitis and had no idea what was happening and got put in the hospital and if I hadnt' been hanging out with adam kinnnnnie at the time (illicitly, of course) I may have died because I kept passing out from how bad it hurt and my negligent mother was in spain trying to nab herself a man. In the end, it took a herculean effort from people who only marginally should have to be responsible for my health (adam, kate's dad, this random boyfriend whose name i cant' recall but who made me this creepy keyboard with lizards glued on it) to get me to a doctor where I was immediately operated on.

58. I really, really, really, not kidding, thought Stacey was going to drown when she and me and Chris were stuck in the fucking Atlantic in low tide. She wasn't taking in water or anything, but I was convinced none of us were going to make it, and that Chris and I would have to watch Stacey die first. I don't think I have ever been so scared of anything in my life as of thinking I was going to watch Stacey drown. I love you, Stacey. I'm really glad you didn't drown. I'm glad those eye-rolling lifeguards appeared out of nowhere. I'm glad Chris had the balls (chivalry?) to stay out there with me when I realized I was stuck. Chris, what the fuck were you thinking?

59. If a door is closed, karate chop it open

60. I hate talking on the phone. I'm bad at it. I don't have anything to say even though I like talking to you guys. I'm just bad at phone calls. I sound phony and disinterested and bored and my sister is always mad at my placating laugh that I developed for seminar classes. Sorry about that.