Winter is Coming

My brilliant, amazing, fun, and eccentric AP US History teacher (probably my favorite teacher of all-time) from junior year in high school had this clock on the wall of his classroom that made loon sounds every hour (no, not the crazy-people kind, the bird kind), and each time it went off, he would stop whatever he was doing and say "winter is coming," and then resume class like nothing happened. I have no clue why this occurred or what it meant, but I laughed every time. Sometimes I think I may have been the only one laughing. That happens to me a lot. Um... yeah.


"Winter is coming..."

Anyways, I'm not laughing now, cuz it's freakin' COLD OUTSIDE. And you know what that means: Winter is indeed coming. I had an interview today (!) that was three blocks from my current office, so I walked, in heels and a skirt and stockings (ew). I have been dragging my heels (the other kind) on wearing my big winter coat this year, so today was another day that I brought my light, fall jacket (which looks so good on me that I never want to take it off). And, of course, I froze on the walk over to the interview. I get very grumpy when I'm cold. I also have poor circulation and lose feeling in my fingers and toes very easily. My fingers routinely turn white and then purple and then almost blackish if I don't get the blood moving again, so you'll often find me walking around shaking my hands as hard as I can, and I look like I'm being very un-PC about someone with a disability or something. I remember being in New York City on my 16th birthday waiting outside (where it was about 20 degrees) in line for Les Miserables desperately trying to shake the blood back into my hands and having all these very well-dressed, posh city-dwellers give each other looks like "what is WRONG with that girl?" And the point of all that is to say that I HATE WINTER AND COLD AND BADNESS. I can't even enjoy fall because I know it's just going to turn into winter.

I want flipflops! And tank tops! And shorts! And sun! And the beach! I want the days to be light until MIDNIGHT! I want the heat AND the humidity! I want to skip winter and have Christmas in July (I'm happy to decorate a palm tree, sing island-themed Christmas carols, and sip an iced eggnog...)! And why does my boss have the damn AC on in the office? I'm FREEZING here, people!

I'm not even 25 and I'm ready to retire to Florida...

The Hunt

Hello all. It's been quite the beginning of the week. Being at work after giving notice is tough... it's a weird combination of feeling ultra-responsible to get things done and feeling totally unmotivated. But I'm still very happy with my decision to leave, so that's good. On Monday morning, the Chief Operations Officer (COO!) in the office asked me if I slept ok... obviously trying to guage whether or not I felt ok with my decision... which I do! Woo!

I've been scouring the internet for job postings since I quit my job, and, I must say, I have come across some WEIRD things. For instance, I came across an ad on craigslist looking for a  "Model/Receptionist (part-time)." Um? Why does it matter what someone looks like when their job is to answer the phone? After the ad goes on to talk about wanting someone with good people skills, an outgoing personality, basic computer skills, and, oh yeah, good looks, it says "no resumes please. Simply a photo." Skeaze to the max. It might as well say "seeks a blonde, bubbly, bimbo with breasts the size of Buick. Must have low self-esteem and do anything for little-to-no-pay." Ew.

Then there are things like "18th-Century Costumed Reenactors Needed," or "Do You Drink?" or "Zombies Needed," or "Part-time Dietary Aides." Sounds to me like that last one is looking for human fiber. It is actually looking for people to work at a retirement community to help with meal planning, etc. But definitely sounds like they want people who have some kind of innate ability to soften other people's stool.

Sigh. Where's the person who wants to give me thousands of dollars to write for them? Or, maybe just give me $25,000 in advance to write a book. About whatever I want. Like bunnies, or Italy, or singing, or about strange crap that happens on a daily basis. Or about how freakin' weird people can be.

Anyways, I am in the process of scheduling an interview for a part-time admin thing that I'm actually excited about (more detail later), and I'm in the running for a part-time blogging position. So fingers crossed. Wish me luck! Or hire me!

Bunstruction

The Destruction.



The Destructor.

 Chris and I got home from Deltaville a couple hours ago, and Coltrane had gotten out of his pen at some point when we were gone. I hate leaving him, but I also need to be able to go places. When I only go for two days, I just leave enough food to feed a bunny army. If I'm gone for more than a couple days, I hire a bun-sitter. Anyways, he proceded to chew through a bunch of our stuff, including Chris's XBox 360 power cable (Papa Bear ain't too happy), our 100-foot ethernet cable, and our TV's power cable. It's like he chose the week I quit my job to chew through the expensive stuff. Oy. And yes, I picked a picture of Coltrane with red-eye on purpose... he was quite the little demon-bun.

In truth, I feel completely responsible. I haven't been able to give him the kind of attention he needs and deserves lately. Plus, leaving him for the weekend is pretty crappy. Unfortunately, buns don't travel well. Anyways, thank goodness this night is over. I'm tired. Beddy-bye.

Homecoming

We headed to Williamsburg Friday night because this weekend was homecoming weekend. Our band was hired to play a short gig at the Alumni House, and we had to get up at the crack of dawn to get there on time. We played a very mediocre show. But, we ran in to lots of old friends, which was nice. Though homecoming day was fun, many of us were more excited about the fact that we were heading to Deltaville, where my friend Darby (percussionist in the band) has a house on the Bay. Well, I should say his parents have the house on the Bay. And we were fortunate enough to be able to stay there.

Anyways, this place is amazing, so I thought I'd show off how I got to spend my weekend:

I hope your weekend was just as good!

2 Weeks

So, my life has been in a bit of upheaval of late. I made a HUGE decision recently, which was to quit my current desk job. There are all sorts of reasons why I decided to do so, and I don't want to bore you with all of them, but let's just say that I'm ready for a new chapter of my life. Yesterday I gave my two weeks notice, and I am so excited about my new possibilties! I could do ANYTHING! I could flip burgers by day (as is the English Major way) and write a novel by night! I could work in a book store part-time and in an office part-time. I could work in a wine-tasting room and start a wine blog. I could do ANYTHING! I could get a job at a newspaper. I could do admin work at a counseling center and do my small part helping depressed people. I could start a business. I could be a personal assistant and an executive AT THE SAME TIME (I could be my own personal assistant). ANYTHING!

Best-case scenario (at least, in my head) would be to get a part-time admin job that pays well that enables me to spend the rest of the time writing from home (or from a coffee shop... wouldn't want to crowd Chris during his sacred Xbox time!) either for a paper, a blog, a magazine, or any combination thereof.

SO, if you're hiring, I'm your girl. I'm a fast learner, I'm organized, I have years of experience (bow chicka wow!), I have good written and verbal communication skills, and, most importantly, I make a mean cup of coffee.

Cookie Monster

Today so thoroughly kicked my ass, that, after crying (ok, fine, shrieking and screaming) into the phone for as long as Chris could handle, I proceded to eat almost an entire bag of Milano cookies (the double chocolate kind, naturally). Now, the saddest part, I think, was that we didn't even have Milanos in the house; I walked into the night wearing my pajama pants, moccasins, and puffy face and drove to the grocery store expressly to purchase said self-medication. My face resembled that of a bee-sting victim's, so I left my glasses on (I only wear my glasses to drive) thinking it might mask my puff-i-tude. But, after I got back to the car with my over-the-counter sandwich-cookie meds, I glanced in the mirror only to find that the glasses sort of magnified the puffiness. Great day, really.

Anyways, I feel better getting that out. Now to face the judgement of several of my very in-shape, disciplined friends.

And now to pass out with exhaustion.

Actually, just a quick note: The Ryan's Recommendations section has been updated.

Goodnight folks. I'm out. I need this day to be over.

Easy to Please

All alone in the house with nowhere to be= me having time to make coffee and breakfast= me feeling relaxed. If you've been reading for even a little bit, you know how hard a time I have relaxing. Examples here, here, and here. But man, I got to sleep in until 11:30 today and then I leisurely made a pot of coffee, which I got to drink in a leisurely manner. Then, while leisurely drinking coffee, I leisurely cooked pancakes and an egg. And then I got to sit and eat it! In a leisurely manner! And then I got to sit some more! Then I decided to make another cup of coffee! Cuz I'm crazy like that! And because I could! And then I drank it while sitting and sitting some more! On my butt! With NOWHERE to be.

Now, I absolutely love living with Chris. There is no one I'd rather come home to. He's my best friend, and I love hearing about his day and telling him about mine. He makes me smile, he makes me laugh, he is a pleasure to be around. But sometimes I just need a day to myself. That's all. I ususally have to go to work or have a gig or have to write something or have to do a million zillion things. And on occasion, a day in my own house all to myself is necessary. Seriously, this morning when I was eating my breakfast, I felt more peaceful and relaxed then I have in months. Because of our schedules, Chris gets to be alone in the house all the time, while I only get an hour or two here and there (which is usually during the time of the day where I'm working out, showering, and eating dinner). So, I'm just happy to be obligation-free for a second.

I think women often have this idea that they have to be doing something at all times. I think women often feel guilty about doing "nothing." But you know what? Screw that. Men (now, of course, I'm generalizing) relax in a guilt-free way all the damn time. Everyday! More than one time a day. I can't even imagine what that feels like!

Anyways, this is my way of telling all of you to take a chill pill. Relax. Enjoy doing NOTHING. Watch your favorite TV show, read a book, watch a movie, take a nap, order takeout, drink a glass of wine, do whatever it is you feel like. Not what you think you should be doing, what you feel like doing.

And you know what? Now that I've gotten my time to myself, I'm ready for Chris to come home.

Cowabunga!

Whelp, there's nobody here but us mice (ten points if you know where that's from). That is, Chris is headed out of town and I'm all by me onesie. See this post for my I'm-all-by-myself behavior.

Chris gave me a call from the road, and he excitedly told me that all the cows were out. Now, you're probably wondering why he (or me) would care about the cows being out. Well, if you're wondering that, then you haven't played The Cow Game. The Cow Game is my new favorite car game. My good friend and bandmate taught us ("us" being the band) how to play, so now I'm going to teach you.

Every time you pass a herd of cows, the first person to say "my cows!" is awarded 1 (one) herd. When you pass a church, the first person to say "marry my cows!" doubles their herds. When you pass a cemetery, the first person to say "kill your cows!" manages to halve everyone else's herds. Obviously, the object of the game is to get the most cows. The game starts when you get in the car, and ends each time you stop the car and get out (including pee breaks). Also, a rule we made up is that, when you pass a steakhouse, you say "eat your cow!" and you can choose one (1) person's cow to eat. Yummy. If you have one herd and someone kills your cows, you can't go back to zero (you keep your one). The only way to get someone's cows down to zero is to eat their cow.

My bandmates and I played this game all the way to Florida when we drove down for a couple gigs early in the summer. That's 14 hours of cow searching. FOURTEEN. And, once you get a little farther south, there are more churches than you can shake a stick at, so, as we got farther into Dixie, the cow herds started to grow exponentially. And, it got so heated that we were yelling: "MY COWS!" "MARRY MY COWS!" "KILL YOUR MOTHER F-&*^%-IN COWS!" I did not sleep for one minute of the ride down. I was way too busy looking for cows, churches, and cemeteries. In fact, I'm now so programmed to scan the countryside for bovine life that I find myself thinking "my cows" even when I'm alone in the car. Yup. That's right. Playing the cow game by myself (I always win). Go me.

So, I'm sure Chris was doing the same thing when he called me to let me know the cows were out.

If you start playing this game, I guarantee you will become addicted and crazed competitors.

Anyways, so right now I'm changing my guitar strings while watching a documentary about Joni Mitchell and drinking Pinot Noir. Not too bad.

My cows!

Festivalgoers

The reason I haven't posted in too long is that I spent the whole weekend at a music festival. One of my very dear friends drove down from Delware (Dela-where?) and she, Chris, and I camped out and got to hear some truly phenomenal artists. One such artist, whom I've mentioned before in the Ryan's Recommendations section (remember that? It's down and to the right, folks), is Josh Ritter. His performance blew me away, and I immediately found his website upon returning to the world of connected people. He writes this blog about being a musician that is eloquent and beautiful, just like his songs. You can check it out here if you're interested. Also, if you click on the "pictures" tab on his webpage (http://www.joshritter.com/) and then click on the "Josh + Love Canon @ Festy 10/10/10" you can see pics from the performance I attended. And, in the 9th picture (with gorgeous mountains in the background), you can see me with some friends front row and center (I have a baseball cap on if that helps!). Very cool.

Anyways, music festivals always attract the strangest people. It seriously never fails. Of course there are the hula hoopers, the fire-swingers (I don't know what they're actually called, obviously), and the middle-aged tie-dye wearers. But then there are always the people that surprise me. Like the guy walking around with a wooden staff with a giant, fake bird duct-taped to it. Or the guy walking around with glow sticks attached all over his body. Or the middle-aged woman who accepts pyschadelics from a stranger and then barks at the performers while trying to rub her scalp on other people's scalps in a feeble attempt to "do an experiment to grow hair" after pissing herself. Like I've said before, you just can't make this stuff up. People are so very strange.

Then there are the drug people. And when I say "drug people," I mean the people who go to festivals just to do drugs; these are the people who don't even leave the campsite at all to listen to the music. They just know festivals are places where they can get away with openly doing illegal things, so they frequent them. I realize some people use drugs to "enhance" their listening experience, but these other "drug people" just want to do drugs, that's it. You can find them walking around with balloons full of Nitrous at all hours to make some money to buy MORE DRUGS.

And then there are always people who are easily swept away by that mob-mentality thing; they just want to use their power in numbers to do something, anything. For instance, an artist is sound-checking. Mob-mentality people try to get the crowd to start yelling "we want music, we want music," even though there is nothing they can do about making things start sooner. Sometimes mob mentality people accomplish cool things like encores, other times they accomplish bad things like yelling, screaming, and pushing.

Then there are boring people like me who want to be close enough to the artists to see their hands, and who want other people to give them some space so they can enjoy the music. Simple. I'm not one of those people who feels the need to chuck glowsticks at unsuspecting spectators (you. know. who. you. are.).

We came back with some war wounds: mainly sunburns, chapped lips, and my friend got a hole burned into her fleece by someone's cigarette. But, we also had a great time, heard some great music, and, obviously, saw some very interesting people!

If I Ruled the World

If I ruled the world, the work day wouldn't start until 11:00 AM. Seriously though? Whose dumbass idea was it to start the work day so freakin' early? And why does EVERYONE adhere to this social construct? For no good reason. Harumph!

I just got back from a gig, and all my bandmates and friends are at "the band house" hanging out and having a good time. I, however, am home in bed, writing a blog post (no shit Sherlock!) to help me wind down from the excitement so I can go to sleep. My bandmates and friends all managed to get jobs that don't start until much later in the day than mine. I have a "real" job with "regular" hours, and therefore have to be at the office by 8:30 AM. As in soon. As if that isn't hard enough to deal with (that is, the part where I am the only person I know who has to get up early), every time I have to say "goodnight" when everyone is hanging out I am dealt a guilt-trip from hell. People seem to think me not wanting to stay up all night means I don't like spending time with them or something. Sheesh. Really, I just don't want to be miserable the next day is all. And staying up all night completely wrecks me.

I think I spent all of my alotted staying up late and all night time my freshman year of college. I seriously adhered to the "Sleep is for the Dead" philosophy. I was so excited about the people I met and music I was playing and all that. My friend (and later roommate) and I would pull all-nighters for fun, not for school, and make playlists, play guitar, talk, etc. It was awesome. I so wish I still had that capacity. Well, also, college life is conducive to such behavior; like the first semester of my freshman year my first class of the day on Tuesday/Thursday was at 2:00 PM. So, I regularly stayed up all night, crashed in the morning, and the got out of bed at 1:30. In the PM!

 But alas, I up and spent all my extra waking hours in that one year! Now I'm an 8-hour-a-night-or-holy-crap-she's-grumpy type. And it also makes me grumpy to miss all the fun that I'm sure is going on RIGHT NOW across town without me. Sigh. I feel like the kid on the playground who can't join the game because my mom won't let me or something.

And so, on that note, I'm going to bid you all a goodnight (well, technically morning) so I can get some much-needed Zzzzzzs. Goodnight! And think about that workday starting at 11 thing. I'm going to write a letter to my congressman to let him know what I expect from Capitol Hill this year: Mandatory workday start time of 11 AM or else.

New Netbook!

Just a quick post to let you know how excited I am to be posting from my new Dell Netbook. It's so tiny and lovely! I can take this thing anywhere! The possibilities! Plus now I get to go get all the accesories I need (ok, fine, and want). You can tell I failed Girl 101, yes? I'd rather shop for computer accesories than people accesories. That's all for now. I will post a picture of its tiny loveliness soon for you (probably will just add it to this post). You can find it on my Ryan's Recommendations section as well.

I Want Candy

Well, last weekend was fun-filled with gigs, food, and friends. I again apologize for the relative infrequency of my posts; I will have my new Netbook by Thursday, which means access to internet all over the house once again. Huzzah!

Anyways, on one of my weekend days (they're sort of blurred together in my mind because of how much I crammed into them), a friend of mine held up a roll of Sprees (remember those?) and said something to the effect of "hey, remember these?" and I offhandedly reminisced about how I used to eat those (and Shocktarts and Sweetarts) until my tongue bled.

If you're cringing in absolute shock and disgust, you're reacting exactly as the room full of my friends did.

But I feel obligated to give you some background on how candy played a role in my childhood so that you will better understand the phenomenon of Young Me eating candy until I bled. So, here goes. First disclaimer: A lot of my memories of this were around when my parents got divorced, so some details are hazy. Anyways, when my sister and I were little, we didn't really get dessert. I do, however, have memories of my dad letting us have four Skittles on Fridays after dinner. Yes, you read that right: FOUR SKITTLES. Not four bags of Skittles...mmmk? Four Skittles. We had this tin that sat on the corner of the bookshelf in the living room that had Skittles in it. And we would get three or four after dinner. Only on Fridays. So, you can imagine, I tried to make those four delectable morsels last as long as humanly possible. I sucked those things (yes, laugh all you want) over the course of an hour or more. Chewing= candy being gone sooner. Sucking= longest lasting. Did I mention that we only got four of them?

When my Stepmom came into the picture, she pointed out (rightly) to my dad that giving us four Skittles was completely and totally insane, and, all of a sudden, after years of deprivation, I got to have LOTS of candy (at least, what was "lots" to me at the time). I won't say she was trying to win our hearts with sweets (although that would have worked), but you can see how that might occasionally have worked in her favor. Anyways, whenever I did get any kind of candy, I ate any and all of it. And, I still had the habit of trying to make the candy last forever. So, when I got to have a whole roll of Shocktarts or Sweetarts or Sprees, I would suck on every single piece of candy until it was gone (and, please remember, those rolls of candy were pretty big). So, on multiple occasions, I would suck on the candy until my tongue or the roof of my mouth bled. But the Young Me still remembered that awful deprivation and those four Skittles, so I was unable to eat candy in any other way and I had to eat it all and eat it all slowly.

And to this day I have an insane sweet tooth. Ok, I'm going to go eat a WHOLE BAG of Skittles now. Cuz I'm a grownup now (Hi Dad!)!

Check out my Recommendations section if you have time... you'll see the new Netbook I ordered!

1 in Whosit-Now?

Today I came across an article on CNN.com that published the results from the CDC's recent nationwide poll about clinical depression. The results were that "Nearly 1 in 10 US adults [are] depressed." Here's a link to the article if you're interested: http://pagingdrgupta.blogs.cnn.com/2010/10/01/cdc-nearly-1-in-10-u-s-adults-depressed/?hpt=T2. The article wasn't particularly surprising to me, but still got me thinking about a couple things. What I really want to know is how many of those people are actually being treated for depression.

Next thing I thought about was how the Student Health Center at my college gave me a survey with like 8 questions to "diagnose" my depression. Surely it was similar to the poll the people in the CDC study participated in. What happened with me was this: I went to the Counseling Center after having a really hard time for too long (ok, understatement of the century), met with a counselor one time, cried uncontrollably, got sent over to Student Health, met with a doctor one time, cried uncontrollably, took a survey, got a prescription for antidepressants that day. But really, people. I can't believe 8 questions is all it takes for a doctor to whip out the Rx pad. The problem is, I only find this very surprsing because hindsight is 20-20. I had no clue then just how incredibly powerful antidepressants are. And the doc didn't tell me either. And you know what? I don't think doctors even really understand them fully yet.

Not to like, freak you guys out or anything. It actually turned out ok for me: I was on meds for two years and got myself into a much healthier place. But, I can't help but wonder if I would have been able to do that without drugs. I guess I'll never know. And I had no clue how powerful the drugs really were until I stopped taking them. I tapered down my dosage 5mg at a time for over 6 months, and still, the week after I finally totally stopped was pretty much hell. I had cold sweats, nausea, anxiety, rapid heart rate, the works. And one hellish day saw me throw up 3 times while in total agony from the worst headache I've ever had (apparently this is something called "SSRI Discontinuation Syndrome," which many doctors don't even acknowledge as a real thing. Yeah, ok, tell that to Chris's van and the toilet in the Japanese restaurant north of town). So, my point, is, meds should be prescribed with care. I feel like I probably should have gone to counseling multiple times before being sent to the doctor, and then I should have tried a few things before resorting to meds.

Now that I'm off the meds, I use exercise as my main depression-deterrent. I've heard more than once that at least half-an-hour of exercise per day can keep mild depression totally at bay. If you read the article I posted above, you know that depression is most common in The South (which they mentioned might correlate to the fact that so many people there are overweight, suffer from diabetes, etc). To me, that's like "duh." Gotta get moving to get endorphins flowing. Endorphins= happy! Now, that's not to say that everyone who doesn't exercise will become depressed. But, those people (like me) who have certain tendencies present, really should to help keep themselves mentally (and physically, again, "duh"), healthy. But, I also have to admit, the meds also kept me from being totally insane, which allowed me to train myself to employ different kinds of thought patterns (and I have no clue if exercise alone could have done this for me).

I'd also like to say that I'm not trying to stand on any kind of soapbox here. I'm also not trying to say that meds are evil and should never be considered. What I am saying is that maybe doctors need to put greater thought and care into the problem of clinical depression. Maybe they should tell their patients about how intense antidepressants are (and about how the first one they prescribe is not necessarily a fit). Maybe more research should be conducted so that we can truly understand what depression is and what SSRIs are, and why some people react differently to them than others.

And also, why are SO MANY people depressed???

Not enough vacation. That must be it.