Everyone is out to get me

And, as it turns out, you. Though you probably aren't yet aware of it.

I got up at like flipping 6 this morning because I had to pee and frankly another 30 minutes of sleep wasn't worth battling the kittens over. So I did my thing for a while, chatted some with that Mexico Way and spoke with my sister Barbie seriously 5 times before 9am. Anyway, it means I got a decent start on my morning errands.

I want to know where the people in the city of Beaverton got their drivers licenses. I'm not kidding you no less than four people either cut me off, drove STRAIGHT AT ME, or came barrelling out of a store parking lot mere feet from my 40-mph-driving self, and this was prior to me even STARTING to shop. I left the house at 9:30, got through the drive-thru at Starbucks at 9:55, and was finally done gassing up my car by 10:15. Please keep in mind these places are all a total of 3 miles from my house, and I drive fast. People are so fucking SLOW.

And while I'm on that subject, can I just ask all of you in the Starbucks drive-thru for one small courtesy? If you have an order that requires so much instruction that you have to repeat it at least twice at the little speaker thingie and then AGAIN at the window, would you just forego the drive-thru and go do all that shit inside, please? Seriously. Drive-thrus are supposed to be for those of us on the fly, not for you jackasses who are too lazy to walk across the parking lot and stand in line. If you want to know what kind of specialty pastries are available today, seriously, do not ask the drive-thru person to recite them for you. Go the fuck inside. And does it bother any of you readers that I am not spelling out the "through" in "drive-through"? Because it is kind of me.

Anyway, I had some recent conversations about the state of our country, and I have decided that nobody should watch the news anymore. Just boycott it. It's only about just like anything else TV-related, from American Idol to Brittany Spears on "How I Met Your Mother" - ratings. More people watch, more advertisers will pay more money to advertise during your show. So what do the people of the USA want to see when they turn on the TV? Sensationalism. Rice is like 70% more expensive than it was, I don't know, last week or something, says TV, so now Costco is limiting your rice purchasing and I think yesterday the Hillsboro Costco RAN OUT OF RICE. Have you SEEN the size of the bags of rice in the Costco? Good CHRIST. I imagine that consumers were making a run on rice at all supermarkets big and small because good Lord there is a rice shortage. And the beauty of all this? Most of these people don't know anything about rice beyond the directions on the back of a box of Minute Rice. It's flipping crazy. And it really shows you the power of the media in this country. I am not kidding you if there was suddenly a newsstory about a shortage of black shoe polish these same people would be fighting over cans of it in the supermarket the next morning. And WHO SHINES THEIR SHOES ANYMORE??

Also in this conversation was the fact that grocery prices in our area are increasing. Well no shit, and for two reasons: one, food prices go up all the time, they are always going up, they rarely go down, this is just the way the world works. And b), in this particular market (greater Portland), there are more "high end" or "gourmet" supermarkets than there were, say, five years ago. The Zupans, the Haggens, the Whole Foods, the Lambs chain, the New Seasons, even the Fred Meyers is trying to go upscale in the grocery world. I was in the Fred Meyers just this morning, and I bought a couple of items in the natural foods section, a thing of soup and a thing of crackers. The prices were jacked, and way more than their "not so natural" counterparts in the regular grocery sections. The Zupans will cause bankruptcy if you allow yourself to do "big" shopping there, and forget about the Haggens. Seriously everything I buy there is TWICE as much as when I buy it at the Fred Meyers. So here's my point. Food is more expensive because people are spending their money at more expensive grocery stores. Your bills won't be as high if you watch a budget. I don't watch a budget so much simply because it's just me and the kits, but for those of you that insist on procreating and driving minivans and spending your money on stupid needless shit for your snivelling offspring and buying into this CRAP, take a look at your specific situation and then the situation of, say, your grandparents, and figure out that it is YOU, it is not THEM, YOU are to blame for the fact that you are broke, because you are stupidly spending your money on anything the media tells you to, and not the stuff you need. You should be ashamed of yourselves. You're probably even in my way in the supermarket, which pisses me off even more.

AND I KNOW THAT'S YOU IN THE STARBUCKS DRIVE-THRU, MAKING SPECIAL ORDERS, ASKING STUPID QUESTIONS AND MAKING ME WAIT FOR MY COFFEE.

I need to go lie down now.

To Market, To Market!

So I have spent the last week and a half in our Tanasbourne branch which will be consolidating with some other branches in early June. It's a great branch because everyone is very close and helpful to one another and just very nice. Lincoln Tower on the other hand is a bit more cynical, though I bet each and every one of them would take a bullet for another person in that branch if put in the right circumstances.

So anyway, today the new Whole Foods Market opened in the Tanasbourne area. Me loving a good supermarket, I agreed to accompany Maryann at lunch to check out the digs. Portland has two (at least, I don't know) other WFM, but I have never been to any of them, so I was kind of excited. You know, fresh new stuff, fun lunch options, neato brands and exciting new meatless options. That Vicki S., who is on loan to the Tanasbourne branch (thank God by the way because with three people out in a 7 person office it is next to impossible to have to drop everything and cover reception for an hour or two), had gone for lunch there herself an hour earlier, and as Maryann and I were leaving she was just returning. She brought us a fabulous fruit tart so of course we were all excited for dessert.

The fun really began in the parking lot. I'll say this about Maryann - Beaver or no Beaver, that gal has some parking karma. There were lines around the lot, people waiting for departing shoppers, men with those orange baton thingies waving the crowd around, and our Maryann just scooted on into a spot roughly 10 spaces from the door. Had it been just me checking it out alone, I'd still be walking back to my car right now (my parking karma is not what it should be, not sure how to fix that). It was awesome because people were laying on their horns and cutting each other off, and some woman on foot confronted a driver and words were exchanged and it was great fun because come on, we were in a SUPERMARKET PARKING LOT. I love Beaverton!

So yeah, the WFM has some fun stuff - samples of fruits and cookies and teas and juices.. the food court area was vast and colorful and full of wonderful smells and big fun. Maryann got a great looking salad bar conglomeration and I opted for the chicken katsu, while we oohed and aahed over the bakery items. They sell Dave's Killer Bread there, too, so that was a bonus for me. Love that Rockin' Rye!

Check out was a little slow but there were roughly 9000 people there so it was doable, and when we got back to the office we raved about it to all of our coworkers and they were suitably jealous. Well, maybe not THAT jealous, because it was, after all, a supermarket, but it was still great fun.

At three we all had tart and even though I had a pissy little payout with issues and 5 sets of docs to work up, along with a ton of problems on files older than crap that suddenly had to be resolved RIGHT NOW, it was a fun and festive day in Tanasbourne. I'd owe it all to the WFM and that tart. I barely noticed the sideways rain and driving wind in late April.

Baby Boom and I Thought I took a Left on I-80...

So this week was the week of baby showers. And snow showers but I'll get to that. I spent the week in Tanasbourne, one of the branches we are consolidating. I was supposed to have a "cake" week, taking direction from the branch manager while I covered for her ghost closer, but unfortunately for the branch manager AND me, she got this horrific flu and was out all week. Well thank God there was already a float in the branch! Judy's desk can be described as busy even in the midst of this slow down, and when you are SICK, as opposed to on a PLANNED VACATION, you don't like write little notes for the float so she knows what the fuck is going on. Instead, you get the float scrambling 9 hours a day for 5 full days trying to make your customers feel like nothing is wrong. Yay! It's a good God damned thing I'm flexible.

Thursday was the pinnacle, though. I had signing in Lake Oswego at 8:15 so I went there directly in the morning - Lake Oswego is about 20 miles give or take from the Tanasbourne branch and maybe 12 from my apartment. Turns out the customer was the mother (with a different last name so I didn't realize it til we hit the AKA statement) of a guy I went on maybe 2 "dates" with in high school, and I put that in quotes because I suppose you can't really call rolling around someone's dining room floor making out for 5 hours one New Year's Eve a date. I can't remember what we did on the other date, except I remember him picking me up, then driving back to his home so he could take his dip out and run inside and brush his teeth so we could make out again. Aahh youth!

After that I had to run to Lincoln Tower to take a meeting with some suits from Corporate (Lincoln Tower is about, I don't know, 4 or 5 miles from the LO branch?), and then after THAT I had to get back to Tanasbourne for a 1pm signing. I had a 3 as well, but it cancelled, which was kind of good because I had a lot of crap to do, having been away from Judy's desk for 5 hours. It's not a desk you can just leave by itself. Then at 4:25 I raced BACK over to Lincoln Tower (no small feat in the traffic) to attend Brianna's baby shower. I think I put like 50 something miles on my car.

Anyway, our little Bri is pregnant with her little Bunchie, and she got quite a little haul from the First Am gals. There were nice little snacks and a very fun cake and some people won prizes (which sort of irritates me - if I KNEW it was a game when I grabbed the little party favor I would have chosen wisely - I ALWAYS win those shower games), and seeing all the fabulous loot Bri pulled in inspired me for my next shower...

Heather's shower was Saturday at noon at her sister's house in Beaverton, so I shopped for it Friday after work (don't be bitter Bri, you are far more practical so I figured the gift cards would be better use for you to fill in any blanks) but wrapped it out of the trunk of my car in the Bales Thriftway parking lot at 11:45 on Saturday morning. The place was PACKED. It was her formal shower as she is due in May, and seriously, it was packed. SRO, baby. There were games and stuff but you couldn't really play them because there were so many flipping people. Tracy didn't have to work for once and was able to attend, and she and I hung out and chatted most of the time. I lasted until 3 and she still wasn't through half of the presents, but even still she got a butt load of stuff and I think there has got to be something to this "shower" thing, because I want free stuff.

Meanwhile, the weather turned cold and yesterday it snowed. It was supposedly sticking in some places in the morning, but any way you slice it it is NOT supposed to snow in Portland in the middle of April. Portland MAINE, maybe, but I am pretty sure when I left Cleveland I was driving WEST. I think what I really just want is to be warm for longer than 2 days in a row.

So in the end, I'm thinking I will invent some sort of shower for people like me: something like a Spinster Shower, where people give you skeins of yarn and needlepoint patterns and big mugs for your cocoa and slippers and ornate cat food bowls and cookbooks specializing in meals-for-one and lots of Tupperware. I wonder if that would take off. I'm sick of buying my own shit.

Arrr

I was intrigued by this over at What do I do all day?, one of the many blogs I frequent. What kind of pirate AM I, anyway?

My pirate name is:

Dirty Grace Rackham

You're the pirate everyone else wants to throw in the ocean -- not to get rid of you, you understand; just to get rid of the smell. You have the good fortune of having a good name, since Rackham (pronounced RACKem, not rack-ham) is one of the coolest sounding surnames for a pirate. Arr!

Get your own pirate name from piratequiz.com.
part of the fidius.org network

It's lined up really weird, sorry about that.

What I find really funny is that the question it asked about bathing I actually answered as "daily", and yet still I must smell.

And also the fact that even as a pirate I am graceful. They used to call me Grace years ago when all I did was fall down. Hm. Maybe it's true.

They never called me a housekeeper...

When I don't like a place I live in, like this one, I tend to be a little, shall we say, lackadaisical in my cleaning efforts. Sure I keep the bathroom clean, and the kitchen clean, and with two pre-teens in residence the living room tends to have mice and shoelaces and little plastic balls with bells inside of them strewn about (you DO know they're cats, right?), and let's not even TALK about my bedroom, but there are areas that could use a little more attention. Like, for instance, the top of the fridge. It's dusty, but unless I'm on my tippy-toes I can't really SEE it. And the burners on my stove could use some scrubbing. But this morning's little fiasco was a sure lesson in how important it is to keep the blades on the ceiling fan clean.

You know how you have that little switch that makes the blades turn in the opposite direction? One for "winter" and one for "summer"? So I have been on "winter" since, well, last summer, and I have it on from time to time to keep the air circulating. Yesterday it was like 75 out, and though I do not find that to be warm, this apartment was like a flipping sauna. I had done some routine cleaning earlier in the day, then read for a really long time, played with the kitlets and then took a shower around 4:30 as Marsha suggested we go to Bridgeport to check out DSW and other stuff. Just the hot water from the shower and the lights in there made the bathroom next to unbearable. I mean, it wasn't hot out, but I bet if there were a thermometer in here somewhere it would have read like 90 degrees, and I'm not kidding. Before I left the house at 5:20 I started the dishwasher, but I had a window open and the fan going, so I figured by the time I got back it would be fine.

Wrong. I got home at like 9 and seriously I don't know how the kittens survived it. Hot. And like, steamy. So I put a little ice cube in their water and settled into getting used to it myself.

So this morning, I got up around 7, it was nice and cool and the temps are only supposed to be in the 60s again, and I went to the supermarket and got home and thought, hey, why don't I switch the fan?

I'm not gonna lie to you - I have seen the thick dust on the blades. But they don't bother me and I don't bother them, and there is a little part of the absolutely-terrified-of-bugs-wasps-and-spiders girl that was thinking, hm, maybe something is living up there... So though I have considered wiping the blades, I never really got around to it.

And now I don't have to.

I switched the fan to "summer" and suddenly, it was snowing! Not white fluffy snow, but brown fluffy dust clumps showering down upon the living room. Being skittish by nature, I naturally ran for cover, and the kittens thought I had brought home some sort of new toy (which was briefly amusing to watch but in the end not good, not good at all). So I whipped out the dreaded big vacuum cleaner and sucked it up. The fan is still on full blast and the last little holders on are still falling here and there, but I left the vacuum out and will get them later, when I am sure it's completely clean.

Those kits however will NEVER get used to the big vacuum (they have come to respect the dust buster since they see it more often), and after I was done with phase one I found them huddled together in the laundry basket on top of the dryer, wondering WHY IN THE HELL MUST SHE TORTURE US LIKE THIS?? Poor kits.

But you know, one less chore for me to do, I guess...

I just have to get it off my chest

I know it sounds like all I do is complain about my coworkers, but there really isn't any other place to do this and if I have to say "It's MY blog and I'll write what I want" one more time I am afraid my head just might pop off.

So. There's this chick. You know the type, I bet everyone has one in their office. She's mildly white trash, but is trying hard not to be. She doesn't have me fooled, because I'm really smart, but I am not sure the rest of the staff is on to her. She has sort of a Roseanne-esque air to her (well, not as much as her mom does, and I know her mom, as she was once my client) (and that's the only hint you get) that makes me think there probably was a time when she sent the phone bill check to the electric company and the electric bill check to the phone company in a weak attempt to not have to pay either bill for another week or two. EVERYthing bad happens to her, and by cracky it's never her fault.

Today we were having a not-at-all-heated discussion about families and God and religion sort of, and after two people in the discussion said we were raised Catholic, she pipes up with: I hate Catholics. Well. Okay, to each his or her own. I don't think she meant that she hated me and the other Catholic in the room (and after all, I'm a recovering Catholic so I wonder if I still count), but it was an odd thing to say and you just knew you were less than two seconds away from finding out WHY she hates Catholics. Apparently when (one of? I don't even know)her kid(s?) was born she went to her local Catholic church and told the priest she wanted to baptize him there. The priest asked if she was a practicing Catholic and she said no. She hadn't been to any church (and I think, though I often don't listen, that she might have gone to Catholic church as a kid with her mom, Roseanne) in years but SHE didn't want to get baptized, she wanted the kid to be baptized. The priest told her, okay, we'll baptize the kid but you have to go to church. Apparently the question also came up about Godparents, and she said that the two people she chose to be Godparents to the kid also were neither a) practicing nor b) Catholics. She said, He told me I have to have two strangers be the Godparents! Turns out he was just suggesting that Godparents are supposed to commit to raise the kid, in the untimely death of their single parent, IN THE CHURCH. So it would stand to reason that he would want said Godparents to be practicing Catholics. I can only imagine that what happened next in real life was that the priest looked at her like she was crazy and either just turned around and walked away or asked her politely to leave. That would make perfect sense to me.

So I asked her, after she was done explaining the story and looking at us incredulously, Why did you want the baby baptized if you don't go to church and it doesn't sound like you have any intention of going to church? Least of all the Catholic church? She said it was because the kid's father's family was "real live Catholic" from Puerto Rico, and they demanded the kid be baptized. Not the father of the kid, but the family. I tried to calmly reason with her that of course the priest wouldn't baptize the kid - in the Catholic church they kinda want you to commit a little. I told her she should have just gone Christian - most of those places will take anyone they can get. She said she went to the Catholic church the next town over and they refused to baptize the kid too. I told her she should have just agreed to everything the priest said and promised to take the kid to church if she was so hell-bent on baptizing a kid into a religion she had no interest in, and her answer was Well, then I went to five OTHER Catholic churches and THEY wouldn't do it either! Well of course you did. Therefore the Catholic church is bad. I told her, Hey, man, I'm in recovery, so I don't need to defend the church, but rules are rules in most organized religions. So if you don't believe in it, then why be a hypocrite and baptize the baby in the first place? No answer and the conversation died, but not before the rest of the people in the discussion slowly slunk back to their offices to get away from the absurdity. I went out and smoked.

So it's a long example, but in the course of my time here, chick has called in sick five days in 2 1/2 weeks. That ALONE annoys the piss out of me. And her kid (now a teenager) is a troublemaker (but it's the school's fault) and goes to bed at all hours of the early morning (I know this because she comes in and tells us all about how she was in bed sick and sleeping at 1am and the kid storms into her bedroom and turns on the TV because his broke or something) and has no discipline and is on all sorts of crazy meds and she probably "raised" him to be a complete wreck of a non-contributing-to-society-in-ANY-productive-way-EVER human being and it's EVERYone else's fault but hers. Plus she hangs out with people who just AREN'T NORMAL - one good friend of hers was living with some chick who decided one day to be pregnant with triplets but never let him come to the doctor with her and got like 9 months into this triplet pregnancy, had the baby shower and got a fuck-load of baby-related gifts, and even WENT TO THE HOSPITAL IN "LABOR" and when the doctor came out he said, Um, your girlfriend isn't pregnant and never was. WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?? I mean, this is the kind of crazy shit that is NORMAL in this chick's life! What in the holy hell are they DOING over there in Scappoose??

It's frustrating because you can't have a normal conversation about your colorist and stylist or where you bought your handbag because she always pipes in with some white-trash comment about knitting her last pair of shoes or something fucked up like that. She's a nice enough girl but for God's sake.

So this reads like a really snobby rant but I had to get it off my chest and it's MY blog and I'll write what I want.

Woops, there went my head.

Sad breaking news

I just read on EOnline that Charleton Heston has died. I'm actually pretty sad. I don't care to remember him for his work with the NRA because I'm not a political person. I want to remember him as the star he was.



Rest in peace, Chuck.

Review time

I forgot to mention that finally, FINALLY, after what felt like MONTHS of waiting, "American Gangster" came on Comcast On Demand. Seriously I saw that it came out on DVD like a while ago, like a year ago or something (okay not really but you know what I mean) and I have been scanning new releases on On Demand for weeks and nothing. Until yesterday. So I parked my ass on the sofa and prepped for the long haul three hours that it is.

All I can say is, wow. Not Wow! Or even wow! Just wow.

Isn't it just the way when you get yourself all psyched out for something and when it finally happens it's a let down? I mean, it was okay. It was Denzel after all. And Bad-Guy Denzel no less, who I like. But I just didn't feel it. I was never really drawn into it. I mean, by the end I was SORT of vested in some characters, after all I had just spent the last three hours with them, but not very much. Like when someone gets shot I didn't do a "Oh!", I did more of a "Eh." You know. Not quite INTO it.

It just could have been done better. Me not being a director, I can't say exactly HOW, but it just could have. I felt like I could really tell what were movie sets and what were location shots. That bothered me. And I never warmed up to the Russell Crowe character. I just didn't believe him. Or the "bad" cops. I kept getting them confused with the mafiosos. And what the hell was Armand Assante in there for? I mean they barely touched on his role (and I even got the unedited version). It was no "The Departed", I'll tell you that much. And the happy ending. Why a happy ending? I guess I just don't feel like it should have been so HAPPY, so BUDDY-MOVIE all of a sudden.

I really don't have anyone to blame but myself. I let myself be disappointed. I'll know better next time.

On another quick side note - I just went in to change out the laundry and remembered to say something that has been on my mind since I moved in here: the chick upstairs does laundry TWENTY-FOUR HOURS A DAY. That, or she has a rock polisher up there. Seriously, the dryer or the washer is running constantly. CONSTANTLY. I've seen her, and she doesn't strike me as the kind of gal that would have THAT many clothes. Or towels. I mean, seriously, it is NEVER ENDING. So you can only hear it from the bathroom/laundry room, and it gives me serious vertigo in there most of the time. It's like making my heart beat irregularly (hey I wonder if I can use that as a ploy to break my lease... hmmmm). But mostly it just drives me insane because it is KILLING me to know what in the Sam Hill she is launderingup there, day in and day out. I really have never been overly bothered by apartment living, but this girl might be pushing me over the edge. I am pretty adaptable. I can barely smell the curry anymore.

Marking an occasion of sorts

So a year ago yesterday I moved back to Cancun to work at My Place. I'm thinking the week leading up to that day was pretty brutal, packing my stuff away again and throwing/giving away a ton of stuff. Well, you live and learn. People from work still ask me when I am moving away again. Apparently the look of abject horror on my face is not convincing enough. They keep asking. Nobody says I am not moving AWAY again, just not back to Cancun. Unless I had an umlimited supply of money and bought a condo to supplement my other destination homes, and then I could just divvy up my time between spots.

On the home front, it's not too early to look for a new place to live! I have been looking at the usual suspects and I have it narrowed down to about three, but there is one place over in Raleigh Hills that has undergone/is undergoing a huge remodel. The place itself has been there since I was 3 so the location is good, but when I went to go check out a unit there were some... um... undesirables all over the place. The place is old (almost as old as me) so the rents are lower, which is why, I guess. But it has some potential and seriously you can't beat the location. Plus all new appliances and a washer/dryer in each unit, which for me is an absolutel MUST. We'll see, I don't have to move until July, but I really want to be sure this time. I really don't like living in this place. And the kitties need more room to stretch their legs (as if soaring like little furry eagles from the window sill to the sofa isn't enough).

So I had the opportunity to meet the Senior Regional VP that has been firing all my friends, and frankly, he's not THAT bad of a guy. Of course you don't get to be a Senior VP of anything with out the ability to blow a little smoke, so some things you gotta take with the appropriate grains of salt. I guess here is the bottom line - make yourself indispensible. Blow a little smoke right back. Play the game. Most importantly, remember that it IS a game. And if the worst happens, well, dust yourself off and do something else. I guess looking back, I've had to do it before. I guess I can do it again if I have to.

I woke up insanely early today and just stayed up, so since I am showered already I might as well get this day rolling. Hillary Clinton is in Hillsboro today, which is the exact opposite of the direction I am going, so with any luck I will be out of Secret Service range. You know how I feel about crowds.

Happy Saturday to all ~

Every where I'm not

I just thought of the title because our head-head honcho from Seattle (regional guy) is in town for the first time and he is visiting the branches and having meetings and such, and I have been all over the map lately but still haven't had the opportunity to listen to what he has to say. I thought I'd be in Orenco all week, and he was supposed to pop in some time today. I had to leave early to pick Barbie up (she had a little procedure) so I was thinking it would figure that he showed up right around 4pm. Turns out, he scheduled a 9am TOMORROW, and I am actually going to be Annette/Christine/Robyn in Lincoln Tower tomorrow. Figures. Friday I am in Uptown and the only thing saving me from the dread is that I can pick up a tote at Restoration Hardware. Seriously, it gives me hope for the ENTIRE DAY. But enough about work.

So I got to thinking about things. My friend K is going through a tough time, and it's a bummer, but she has much greater friends much closer to her to help her through, even if she probably isn't wanting much company right now. But it sort of got me thinking about friends and where they are and where I am and all that. So like, I do have friends here, but I am thinking that I am sort of starting to not have that much in common with them anymore. Truth be told, I probably haven't had that much in common with them for a while now, but because they are my friends I try to be around. You know how things go - people are constantly evolving and sometimes we just go in different directions. My thing right now is I am really trying hard not to drink and spend the ridiculous amounts of money that I do when I do drink. Not to mention the rather blase attitude I have had about driving... we all know even ONE drink can get you a DUI, and nobody needs that. The drinking thing, maybe it's a phase, I don't know, but I kind of feel like I would like to just save it for special occasions, like being out of town and stuff. But who knows, Friday it will probably be sunny and I might just feel like it. I guess perhaps it is just not wanting to drink for the sake of not having anything else to do. That could be it.

Anyway, what I am finding is that I tend to converse more with the friends that I have that are far away. I think I have more in common with them these days. In all the places I have lived (here, Southern California, Cleveland, Cancun)I have always had the greatest of friends - friends I thought would be forever. I still consider them my friends, but the thing is that sometimes no matter how hard you try, you just can't seem to keep the relationship up once you have moved on to another destination. I would love to know how Kelly D is doing, or Mari, even Maria, who comes and goes. Brad, and Richard, Ed, Andy, you know, you just want to know how they are.

I have had people pop back up, and I love that, and I love that some people can come in and out of your life and it's no big deal if months pass before talking to them again, because we all understand that our lives are different now, and full, and, well, just different. But wouldn't you like to just scoop up all your old, dear friends and just say Hi! Here's what's up with me, tell me what YOU'RE doing! And then go on your merry way content in knowing that they are fine and though life has thrown them some curves perhaps, they are still going strong and being those great people you remember from so long ago. Sometimes I really miss those people and all I really want to know is that they're okay.

So though right now I haven't been super social and I am sure I can attribute it to the winter, and though it may seem like the friends that I have right here, right now are being neglected perhaps, I do know that I count them in that same group of great friends that I have had along the way. And I hope they understand that it's not personal. And that once I move out of this stupid wasp's nest of an apartment and the sun is actually consistant and warm, I might get out of my little anti-social funk. Maybe my "here" friends will still want to chill, or maybe they will have moved on. Either way, it's okay.