The poor fluffy has broken his arm :( Good news, they didn't have to do surgery. Poor fluffy! :( :( :(

and nobody called me! i didn't even know until i got home. . .

Probably better, cause the ride home was traumatic as was. I tried an e-brake start on the exit ramp, cause there was someone right behind me, and the gas was on and the clutch was fully engaged. . . and the car rolled backwards. PANIC! ensued. Clutch, gas, lots of gas, releasing of brake, more rolling backwards!

Fortunately, the person behind had figured out that I didn't know WHAT THE HECK I WAS DOING!!! and had backed up.

So yes, neutral is not conducive to moving forward. I got it the third time, squealed the tires, and got out of there.

It was, however, the first time in many days that I made a gaffe like that. Now at least I have one good stick story. That and the time I stalled out three times in a row cause i was trying to start in second (which i did, eventually) but that's not too bad. I've heard way worse.

So the car is better, and now it's just a matter of figuring out which program I'm going into, and how im going to pay for it, and where else im going to work until x-y-z . The plan, atm, is to do the CNA thing and get into Howard's accelerated RN program come next summer. Now if I can stay on top of registration dates, pre-recs, tuition help, and everything else.

 Friday come soon. . .

I am writing. Hurray! I've set an impossible deadline of next weekend. The prolouge has been redone, a few chapters have been marked, but there's a new first chapter, old chapters 2, 5, 8-12 completely rewritten, and tons of other rewrites besides.

it will /never/ be done.

but Peter Fox and cohorts are _amazing_

oh God- release
pressure and pain make me freeze
give me some sunshine and peace
just a little break, please
from that dreadful disease
nowadays pressure increase
 

Here is what I want:

1.) A job
-That is useful to other people. That in some small way betters humanity
-One that I only have to work fourty or so hours a week, preferably in eight or ten hour increments, to pay the bills.
-Let's me work with people I like
-That I look forward to at least some of the time
-Does not involve swimsuits or teenage coworkers (well, they're not actually so bad. . . most of the time)

2.) Enough money
-To pay the bills (Rent/Real Health Insurance/Cell Phone/Student Loans/Car Repair)
-To afford new clothes/shoes
-To go out to the movies every two weeks / or the theater / or the ballet
-To buy nice food (Like pepper jack cheese, and salad dressing, and gourmet peanut butter)
-To go on vacation / visit far away friends
-To afford a gym membership
-To collect all my favorite books

3.) A place
-That no one can kick me out of
-including my own, uncluttered room, with enough space for all my things and a lock to keep out the world
-with friends who watch Lost or the Dish with me, and have roommate dinners and bonding time, people who will be sitting at the kitchen table when I walk in and throw down my things and say "You will NEVER believe what happened to me today. . ."

4.) Time
-to go to Mass and Vespers and Adoration
-to write
-to read (Go to the library)

So you're familar with the hierarchy of values? Well, I'm stuck at the food/shelter/basic necessities stage, so don't expect much else out of me until that's addressed. I really don't know why anyone who already has all those things worries about anything.

I suppose, as I have supposed before, that I ought to be greatful to have the sort of problems which are so easily fixed with money. It's just that it's all at least two years away, and that thought is almost unbearable. Seriously, how do people do this?

I would like to take this moment to be REALLY WHINY and say that absoultely everyone else in the world has:
A.) A really great relationship (IE: getting married, engaged, dating "the one")
B.) A job that pays the bills
C.) Admission
D.) A car that does not compound the "no-way out" feeling

Of course, I keep trying to think of something soon / quick miraculous / deus ex machina to POOF! troubles fixed. Only I haven't ever bought lottery tickets, and there's not much else besides that. (Short of getting hit by a bus and awarded millions of dollars in settlement. . . I'm told this is a BAD IDEA because a bus would probably kill me. I should be so lucky.) When you start hoping that monster in your closet really will eat you, then it's time to make some serious tea.

It will get better as I get more comfortable with the Fury. I haven't stalled out in traffic in probably a week (so every red light tomorrow, right?) and i only chirped the tires once today. Yay! I get to learn parallel parking again!

Today I was writing, and it was horrible, and I wonder why I ever thought I could do this. :sniff:

I'm giving up when I hit thirty. Done.

All I want is a brand new truck
One eyed jacks and beginner's luck
The doctor's script for the perfect drug
Get it all while I can

Actually, Transformers was pretty awful. I did go see it with curt and maureen, so it wasn't a total waste. I feel that Michael Bay has /personally/ let me down.

In other news, Tuesday was pretty awful. Not because anything bad happened, (Did not stall out the car, had good lessons with the girls, etc), but that didn't stop me from having panic attacks. At work. I recommend avoiding this at all costs. (But then curt came over afterwards and explained that mom and dad distancing themselves is a style of parenting.)

But I got to have a good, long heart-to-heart with mischa last night, and it was good to know that I'm not alone (So long overdue, and so very, very needed.) And even though she's going away, it was good to see kristen one last time before she goes abroad.

Mostly, I'm ready to be comfortable with the car and to enjoy life again, both those both seem really far away right now.

Good news is that I am writing again, finally, finally, finally, (but that only reminds me of HOW MUCH needs to be done before the book is even ready to be read without inducing eye-scratching-out, much less agent/editor. however, if R. R. Martin and McKinley have moments of "everything i write is crap" then of course I'm entitled to them to I just wish I occasionally had half a brain cell to devote to the problem.) Also, I calculated how much money I'm going to make this year versus expenses and, after taxes, i would make enough to /just/ break even (if I never bought food, or clothes, or christmas presents, or went out to eat). Which means that a second job would help, and all that doesn't include going back to school. . .

It's all so far away, though. It will be at least a year before I'm doing anything worthwhile with my life. I'm trying to find something to fix sooner, but nothing so far. There's nothing to do but keep going, keep writing, keep driving, and keep praying.

The driving is better. I was pretty sick about it this morning, but it ended up going well. After a twelve hour day, I was pretty tired so I did chirp a little and stall once, (and had the girl next to me tell me i needed to learn to regulate while im stopped. which was nice of her, and i definetely prefer it to honking and cursing.) I am hoping someday soon to not worry so much. . .

Work is crazy, mostly because there's so much of it (50+ hours) and it's a stressful commute, and I'm not going to have an honest-to-god day off until august. seriously. see, I teach lessons for a couple hours monday, tuesday, wednesday, thursday and saturday. since I can't open any of those days, I'm going to end up opening friday and sunday. thus, work every day of the week until august. of course, some of those days will be only a few hours, and then some of those days will be 12 hours.

I'm angling for the fourth off, when christen is in town so we can both collapse and take a huge nap, and maybe will be able to swing a friday or two off.

The worst part is that there doesn't seem to really be an end in sight. I mean, I'm not looking at actually starting the LPN program until /next/ fall. Two years or more of too much work trying to make ends meet, plus the fact that Kristen is going away (and I don't even want to think about it). . . and Mischa has been gone to school. . . and Ronnie and Laura and Amber are west coast. But, I mean, two years? of stress and not enough sleep and hard work going no where fast.

On the positive side, I've survived so far. (Is that positive? I'm going to be really emo and morose, but I've been having this fantasy of getting in a bus accident that totals the car and puts me in the hospital for a few weeks. Isn't that awful?? But a few days of people fussing over me, reading books, and getting /rest/ sounds unBELIEVEabley amazing right now.) It's an act of God that I've lived through it, and not just lived through it, but kept going and didn't let it slow me down too much.

I have always believed in redemptive suffering, and making up for what is lacking in the suffering of Christ. If I can ransom just one of his tears, isn't it all worth it? Every morning puking my guts out? every dragging afternoon when I couldn't eat? every sleepless night? Yeah, it is.

So I'm going to start writing again. I'm going to finish the stupid book before the summer's out and find out if that's what this is all about. Sometimes though I keep thinking about flat noses and can't help but wonder. . .

Hurray for Transformers!!!

I'm holding onto you
I'll never let go
I need you with me
as I enter the shadows

The good news is that I'm no longer worrying about the credit card (which has been replaced), or the job/s (one is better and the other is starting to show /some/ promise, even though it did look like it was totally gonna tank for a little bit), or anything else. The car people even gave me 100 percent of my money back.

The bad news is that my new new car is a manual. I had it for three days, spent two hours total learning about clutches and shifting, and then was forbidden to drive anything else. So I've been driving back and forth to work, wondering why all the traffic lights are at the tops of hills, stalling and screeching, and pretty much making myself sick. Why is the contact point only two centimeters across? What sadist thought it would be a good idea to make manual cars? Why why why did i complain about buses? I could have walked, I could have waited, it would have all worked out.

But the car's mine now. It's a yaris, storm cloud grey, and I named her Megaera (and that's what I get for naming her Megaera) and she even has a budlet named Alecto. So I guess that makes me Tisiphone. Actually, I think it would be better if I was Alecto, but Tisiphone is definetley more of a girl's name. Maybe just Tis. . . Anyway, I'm just fine when there's nobody behind me or if curt's riding shotgun, but when I'm by myself in rush-hour traffic. . . ugh.

I think I've figured out the problem. Basically, I can find the contact point when I go slowly, but I don't have the muscle memory to find it when I try really fast. It will come, I know, and I'm sure that I will eventually love driving manual. Soon, I hope. Right now, though, it's just.  . . terrifying. I will say this for myself, though. I am being really, incredibly brave. Like, taking the car even when the thought makes me throw up. There have been several times in the past week when I really and truly thought I couldn't take it anymore. Like the only thought that honestly cheered me up was that the car could get totalled or a bus could hit me.

It's a unique problem: one that I have total control over correcting (which seems like a bad thing right now, cause there's no one else to shunt blame off on), and one that is not going away (cause this is my car for the next 5-10 years)

The other good news is that I'm pretty much back to the same weight I was when I was sixteen. Ugh. I'm trying, really I am.

Dear God, can you hear me?
I need to talk to you
I'm afraid I'm losing hold
and I don't know what to do
can you break into this fear?
can you help me wait it out?

I'm already ready for summer to be over. Ugh.

I want my stomach to stop hurting. I want to feel better about the job/s, about the car, about school, about my direction in life and life in general. Right now, it all blows chunks.

The keys were found, though, and I can get around by bus even if it takes four or five times as long. And I'm not having panic attacks. No astronaut doing repair work on hubble only to have the lifeline snap and suddenly I'm floating away, completely out of control of a situation with no possible way of getting back into control. Which is a pretty good thing, I guess. Pretty monumental thing, actually. If only someone other than me could really appreciate it.

hm

I'm just so uncertain how much, if any, sympathy I'm entitled to. Should I just be happy that no one is throwing stuff at me? (At least, not yet) Does the parental sympathy only last twenty-one years.

Yes, yes, I know. I'm too old to be complaining about any of this. If I weren't a complete idiot and didn't totally suck at life, I should have moved out and already have my own car, my own place, and a real job.

I hate summer. And birthdays. And Christmas. And everything.

Well, I'm getting nearer to the weight I was when I was sixteen, so i figured I'd turn back into a whiny, emo teenager. I know it's very different than the mature 23 I've been affecting.

No one's here to light the candle
No one's here to light the way
Something I will have to handle my way

No one ever updates their LJ anymore, including me. Come on people! Life is busy, I wonder if it will ever slow down.
 
No? Okay.

Ridiculous tenish days. The first three days of last week were pretty awful, the kind I didn't want to write about because I would just end up whining. . . But maybe I feel like whining.

I showed up to the seven hour inservice all nervous because I didn't know anyone except the one guy and I'm not a big-crowds kind of person anyway. (Big crowds, in this case, would be more than five people. I'm a wimp, I know, but I still showed up.) As I was signing in, I handed over my CPR certs to P. Now, these are the ones from the first responder course (taught by a paramedic who has been riding ambulances for fifteen years), the ones that would be good enough to get a job with as a first responder (not in MC, cause they don't hire first responders, but in other counties), only to be told that they were not good enough for lifeguarding.

huh?

Now, they weren't red cross certs, and I'd had a brief thought that "what if these aren't the right kind?" but then I thought, more advanced is better, right? Apparently not.

I spend the two hours of the first inservice sitting very quietly and very quietly freaking out, then drove twenty mintues home to spend fifteen frantic mintues calling this person and that person to see if there was a class or if I could bribe them to do it (with less than no sucess), then drove twenty mintues back to spend the remaining four hours of the second inservice sitting quietly and freaking out. Like, stomach hurting, lips buzzing, slightly shaky freaking out. Not quite astronaut with a snapped lifeline, but close.

After the inservice, and being reminded that I couldn't work without the right certs, I drove down to babysit, only to discover that the people weren't there yet. So I drive home, and back again an hour later.

Monday, (the final morning I worked at GISC until the fall), got the cert thing straightened out, which only made me feel silly for freaking out about it. It was a big deal though, and I'm still bitter! ::grumblegrumble:: Then i head over to NC to help clean up, only to discover that not only am I working with my assistant manager from last year (the one who made me miserable and eventually got fired), but my manager from five years ago (an INCREDIBLE jerk and one of those people who you think about and go "MAN am I glad I never have to see that persn again. I'd rather have tapeworms extracted without anesthesia") worked as a superviser at MV last year and is friends with some of the people still working there.

Joy!

Monday night, my dad and I head down to check out a car in VA, and my father decides that the directions are stupid and that he is going to go his own way. We get lost, of course, and end up getting to the dealership an hour or so late. After we park, as we walk down the path towards the office, i see a blue yaris going the other direction, pulling past us up the street. We walk into the office and, sure enough, the guy says he sold it five mintues ago, (Cue head to desk.) At this point, I start looking for falling pianos.

The only really good point of the day, besides getting the certs worked out, was that I got to see Kristen who told me she got into Med school. Not surprising, except that it sure took them a long time to get around to it. I've been flabbergasted in every sense of the word that it took so long. Like, have you met Kristen? Hello! (I think she was much more suprised, though. It's so sad that she's going away! . . . but on the other hand, if I got my LPN, I could move out there and work in the hosptial with her! We could be like Joanna and Viella, only without the getting stabbed in the ER thing!) So we got chocolate cake and tried on dresses and discussed the wonderful craziness of orchestrating a move to Missouri.

Something awful happened on Tuesday too, but I can't remember what it was. Hm.

Things got much better on Wednesday, including getting the certs really fixed, turning in paperwork(maybe that was the awful tuesday thing, cause I think I might have been more than a week late turning in an important piece of paper for lessons. it would be /really/ bad if I couldn't teach...), going to the doctors, wreaking havoc with a sledgehammer in the backyard, tetherball, delicious and good-for-you frozen yogurt, and finally seeing maureen again.

Then it was onto Texas, which was lovely, if slightly fattening and hectic. I got to see my grandparents and my mother's side of the family for the first time since '04! I really felt like I barely knew them anymore. . . There was a GREAT deal of mexican food, (for which there is no northern substitue), making of cupcakes, meeting and baptizing of godchild, eating of squash, getting primped for the wedding, actual wedding(those shoes hurt!), outdoor reception, and then back on the plane home. All in about 60 hours.

Since then, it's been work, and car shopping, and discovering that I'll be paying student loans until I'm 41. 

ugh.

you can hang yourself
with your heartstrings
cause I know you won't use them
to hold yourself up anymore

UGH

an unexpected day off. I have the impending-doom-life-is-going-to-get-SO-busy feeling. Busyness isn't bad, but it feels out of control at the moment. It will be better once the pool is cleaned and opened, inservices have been gone to and schedules have been made, or so I'm hoping. I've been assigned to work with someone from indoor and, if I'm not going to be managing, that's really what I wanted. Someone I already know, who knows that I'm competent and won't ask me if I know what skimmers and weirs are. (I've been helping out a little bit with other pools, and it has not made me real excited about working with these people. Well, I liked some of them.) So, who knows, it might even be fun.

otherwise, I'm making a summer to-do list. Things like a big Sinks trip, a water park day, lots of fruit picking, boating, and TF on an Imax screen.

hm, I had so much else to say. This is what happens when I don't write for a week. Alot is going on, including canoeing, and cookie baking, and car buying, and napping in hammocks(wrapped up in my down comforter. I also sat down and wrote like, two whole paragraphs. I need to write more, but things are so BUSY.)

ugh, but such is life. I guess.

with our hopes and fears we come
empty hands held out, lord
draw us near, heal these broken hearts

and then there are those days when I wonder why I ever got of bed.

There were a few bright spots, such as I will get more hours this week than I thought I would, I don't have to take a prereq I thought I would, and I did get to see mischa. The rest was one bad pitch after another.

Strike one: learned i will be staying an assist. It's the same story as grad school. A position that, last year, would have gone to me with few questions asked is now going to someone older and over-qualified who is out of work due to hard economic times. It sucks, basically meaning that I'll be making 1500 less this summer than I would have. It does mean that my schedule will be a little free-er and I probably won't have to work weekends (giving me more time for teaching more lessons), but yeah, it still sucks.

Strike two: not as bad as i thought. There are three bio courses i need if i'm follwing the LPN course of study, and I thought that they were prereqs for each other: like, it would take me three semesters to get through them, plus I would have study hard to meet a math prereq. Turns out I've already met the math prereq, and although the first bio course will probably be impossible to work in over the summer, the second two can be taken concurrently. . . So I'm still looking at a summer or winter '10 graduation date.

Strike three: apparently the book is so terrible that it does not bear any comment at all. I know that college is busyness, but nothing? I realize that it was a favor, but it was /not/ frivilous. This is so important to me. If it really does suck that much, you should just TELL me.

Must say, though, that it makes me appreciate certain people all the more.

I am not an angry girl
but it seems like I've got everyone fooled
 

Today I:

-Got up at 4:45am to get Dr. Pepper slurpees (oh, the slurpee angels smile down upon us) with Josh before going to work at 5:30am
-Decided that the watering can had been left in the office because they wanted us to water the fake palm trees (the can was labeled as ours, but why does an indoor swimming pool need a green watercan with roses on it?) and proceded to water said fake palm trees
-Found out that a certain situation would be dealt with properly
-Had an amazing run in the fresh air and sunshine (one of those things where you just feel like shouting "IT'S SO GOOD TO BE ALIVE!")
-Got caught in a flash thunder/hail storm on the run back home, which stung a little bit, but was kind of awesome anyway. I love the sunshine right after a downpour, and standing in the sunshine as the black clouds move on.
-Picked up my bridesmaid dress and shoes
-Made amazing garlic/red pepper green beans (which i could live on)
-Talked to Maureen, who doesn't think the LPN (LNP? NLP?) program at her college has a waiting list. (Also, monday, talked to Gus, who is going to arrage the much anticipated ridealong and also hospital shadowing) It's a one year program, which is amazing and incredible and exciting to me. I'm really hoping that I'll be able to figure out if it's what I want. Hey God, I could use a frying pan on this one. It really is a vocation, certainly not to be taken lightly at all. Then again, no vocations are. It's an option, but I still feel slight adrift. Is that just a symptom of being a twenty-something?
-Read comic books underneath my down comforter
-Am currently typing by candlelight, with hopes to work hard on the BOOK and possibly chat up some people tonight.

Maybe it's just that Dr. Pepper really does make the world taste better, but I spent the whole day going "and this is wonderful! and THIS is wonderful! AND THIS is WONDERFUL!" I also kept wondering what horrible thing was going to happen, like spending a few anxious moments looking for funnel clouds, and wondering if that smell was something really wrong with the car. However, I also thought as those tiny bits of ice were stinging my arms and face, is there anything that can really go so wrong that it can't be fixed? Lately, I've been feeling more supported and more loved than at pretty much any other time in my life. It's new and different, and altogether wonderful.

I feel it in my fingers
Feel it rushing down my spine
 

Ready to save the world, but  that' might be a little ambitious

I'm trying to find time is what I'm trying to do, but somehow the harder i try. . .

I took Friday as a "me day," which basically meant that i did not go for my four mile run between the morning and afternoon/evening shift of my twelve hour day. Today I spent eight hours doing YAM stuff, and then ed decided to help me car shop, and i'm looking at the TO-DO list on my wall and wondering when/HOW all of it is going to happen.

My life is work (going to and finding more of), exercise, and trying to get writing done. I've never been good at the whole "balance" thing. Usually, i just beat my head against the wall trying to get something done, and end up too tired and put out to do anything even vaguely productive.

But I'm trying, readjusting, and not giving up. I've made changes this past year, physical and otherwise, that I thought were impossible for me to make. Difficult changes. Good changes. I haven't had an honest-to-god panic attack since last fall, and I credit that to taking more control in my life, planning ahead, and understanding more about what sets me off. I'm more even-keeled, and have managed for the most part to keep from reacting in extremes towards other people. Towards myself? Well, it could be a lot worse. I'm not in the psych ward, right?

The key to the whole "getting stuff done" thing, (or so I'm convinced, until I try it and it doesn't work), is first, to schedule better (including down time and getting out with people. I don't want to look back in a few years like I'm looking back at college, saying "I wish I'd done more"), and then to stick closer to it. I do this thing where I don't really do whatever-it-is I'm supposed to, but I'm thinking that I should be doing it, and feeling guilty that I'm not, which is completely counter-productive.

Trying, finding out how far from perfect I am EVEN when I'm trying, and pressing on.

I'm also really hoping that at least one copy of the book makes it's way back to me soon. I'm kicking myself because I sent out the wrong copy. I should have waited, rewritten it into a rough draft that did not induce bleeding of the eyeballs, and then sent it. The changes I know I'll be making will change (greatly improve) the read and feel of it, but they'll be on every page and practically every sentence. Some chapters will be /completely/ different. Probably not starting the program at MC until next fall is still bothering me, and now I'm hearing that things are hard up for teachers in the county. Ugh, it's just a mess. Big, fat, hulking mess.

But the room is cleaner, and I can sleep in tomorrow.

Bye bye, I gotta get out of here
the walls are getting closer
The world is covered in dust
but I want to see where things are headed
Climb the mountain of dirt
because at the top there's a fresh wind

I'm cleaning my room tomorrow, getting down all my boxes, and getting rid of half the crap I own. I have so much stuff, and it's starting to really crowd me. The mess and the clutter didn't used to bother me, but lately I've been embracing my inner neatfreak. If my life can't be organized, then at least my room can be.
'
This morning, I went to the christian bookstore to get a card for my newly catholic cousin and to pick up the new veggie tales. Got the card, but the saleslady said that all their veggietales had been stolen.  (Who steals veggietales?? What is the world coming to?) Anyway, I might have gone to the dollar store afterwards, but I definetely did not pick up anymore budlets.

Nobody tell my mom, okay? she'd kill me. . .

you never want to see the places i've been
you never want to see the things I've become

I'm still waiting for something to go really, truly, solidly my way.

Great past three days. Friday did include some problems at work, but I got to leave early. Then there was soup, chipotle sweet potato soup for which I need the recipe, and an awesome fantasy movie with great people.

Saturday was spent wandering around the zoo and cherry blossom festival with two new friends. I found out that I actually like DC as a city, not just as museum hot spot. (Found the best homemade ice cream, and must go back that way sometime to eat those cookies:)

Today was all at church taking orders for SHARE, and mass.

So why do I feel like refried crap? I wonder if it ever ends. I don't think this is fixable, but learning to live with it just sucks.

Well is it dark enough
Can you see me
Do you want me
Can you reach me?
Oh, I'm leaving