thurs aug 30th 2012

"my coworker's throwing this tattoo party type thing for me, september 8th."

"like you're tattooing people there?"

"yea."

"that's cool."

"yea. i wish i could invite more people and schedule more people for tattoos. so far only three are scheduled. three little ones. i wanna do more but i don't know if i'll have the time or engergy. ...know what would be so awesome? if i had like a partner-type figure, someone else who did tattoos, who could do these tattoo party things with me."

"i couldn't do it. i mean i'd want to but i suck at drawing, so i'd suck at it. i'm not a good choice."

"there's several people who have expressed interest in letting me teach them things but i don't know if i should. there's this one guy tim, and then there's this guy ed but he's really young. he's only like a teenager. then there's michelle...."

"michelle? she wants to do tattoos?"

"yea. she mentioned something about it."

"she's probably not a good choice. she has too much other stuff goin' on. she has other stupid stuff going on that she's always doing. she won't put the time into it that's needed. she won't take it seriously enough. she's not a good choice."

"ok. ...then again maybe i shouldn't be thinking about finding someone to teach; maybe i should be thinking about finding another apprenticeship and continuing my education. i already know there's still a lot more i could learn. i already know i could still be so much better. ....but whenever i think of the idea of looking around in shops around here for a new apprenticeship, i get afraid that the people i ask are going to know the people i used to work with. then they're going to ask those people about me and then those people are going to badmouth me."

"they would badmouth you?"

"maybe."

"why? what happened at the shops you used to work at?"

"my boss did me, so then i stopped respecting him so then i stopped listening to him so then that pissed him off and he fired me."

"did, like, sex?"

"yea."

"oh. haha. it's just funny the way you said it. you said it so like nonchalant. 'he did me.' ...well, you let him."

"well i said no the first time, and then he just kept trying. if someone keeps trying over and over again doesn't that kinda just make you think, 'oh, maybe there's a reason i should just give in' ?"

"yea. as in like, if i just give in then they're finally gonna stop bugging me?"

"yea. exactly."

twiztid

in the movie "waiting," in the end where the quiet kid mitch is finally talking for the first time in the whole movie, and he's making fun of justin long's character and saying "'boohoo i don't know what i want to do when i grow up.' join the f*cking army!" ...when he says that does he mean like, join the army of people that don't know what they want to do when they grow up? or does he literally mean join the army?

i have this new obsession: the album "man's myth vol.1" by twiztid. it's all i listen to in my car whenever i drive now, for the past couple weeks. i love the song "entity" sooo much, and the song "the argument." those are my two favorites. after them i guess are the songs "so high" and "story of our lives."

i don't know why but i still have dreams about my old neighbors ingrid & deter semi-frequently. they were always very nice but they were really private people. i think in all the time i've known them i've only been in their house once. i have these dreams where i somehow accidentally end up overstepping the line between my property and theirs, and then i get all worried and start thinking, "they didn't notice did they? they weren't looking out their windows were they?"

am i going to be one of those women that stops wearing makeup in her middle ages? am i going to be one of those women that gains weight in her middle ages? it happened to both my biological parents. that doesn't seem like a good sign. is it going to just start to get harder and harder to stay thin as the years go by? ...only if i worry about it. stop worrying about it liz. just snap out of it.

hi, arlene

the new district leader thinks i don't make enough eye contact with people. i had to go to another SAU to try to "re-impress" him, as stef puts it. i tried to look him in the eye a lot. i was the only employee who wasn't new who had to go to that thing. it seemed like he was looking at me more than anyone else. creepy.

the other morning i woke myself up by yelling, "i'm late!" in my sleep.

over the past few months i've been reminded of the fact that i usually never forget a face. people have come into payless that i haven't seen or talked to in like ten years but i still remember who they are. they clearly don't know who i am. the idea of saying "hi, arlene" or "hi, amy" to them and having them say "how do you know my name?" and me telling them i'm psychic....the idea appeals to me. not enough to actually do it, though.

a few months ago i read a book by jo nesbo that told me the part of the brain that's responsible for remembering faces. if you're really good at it then that part of your brain is abnormally big. i can't remember what it's called though.

lawsuits, fights, and immune system compatibility

that day when i thought i was having a psychic moment about peter, i texted mom "how's everything going?" when she didn't answer after an hour or so i texted dad, "how's everything going?" he answered "awesome!" it seems like since then he's been texting me more. i think he thinks i just texted him that day to try to bond with him. he and i don't really talk that much. i guess we're too alike. we're both just really passive people that like to be bossed around, therefore we don't have much to say to each other. haha.

his boss was legally forced to remove himself from the business. the banks took him to court or something because he was in so much debt but not even trying to pay it back, still spending money like an imbecile. now it's dad's busines. him and one other guy, that is, run it now. mom has been just soooo happy. she can't stand dad's old boss.

today at work a customer tripped and fell. i had to rush around trying to figure out what forms i had to fill out, call the boss, call corporate, and try to get information out of the woman so i could report the incident to corporate. she refused to give any, and she said something about hearing from her lawyer. my coworker and boss both think it was probably staged.

my boss slept over at my house the other night because she broke up with her boyfriend and she didn't want to be in the same apartment as him that night. they'd gotten in a big fight that involved her calling him out on being on drugs, him calling her crazy, and her saying "wanna see crazy? i'll give you crazy," and then slitting her wrist in front of his face.

my boss has a lot of issues.

i think in a way i'm attracted to people that have a lot of problems. i like to try to fix their problems. i think that's partly why, if not totally why, i started talking to Tori less and less after i got a job. i used to enjoy trying to fix her problems but then i didn't have time to anymore after i got a job where i have a boss with so many problems.

but it was also partly just because Tori was just getting bitchier and bitchier as the months went by. either that or i just started minding her bitchiness more and more as the months went by. she was starting to seem more and more to me like she's just a user. sometimes she seems like a really high maintenance friend too. i swear, being her friend is like being in a relationship but just with all the responsibility and none of the benefits.

but she brought me a tattoo client a couple weeks ago. the three of us spent some time hanging out too and Tori was just being really sweet and really fun that day. did she change, or had i just been remembering her in an unreasonably negative light? ...suddenly i missed her. i missed seeing her more often. now lately i've been trying harder to be back in her life and it's almost like she's the one blowing me off now. is it her revenge? ...who knows?

and now i'm friends with this girl laurel and this guy pat and this girl michelle and this guy matt and this guy mike....it's all been a ridiculous mind-bending adventure trying to figure these people out.

i hooked up with mike but then found out he has a girlfriend. shit head.

michelle i just talk to now and then. not too much. she's a mooch. she's very spoiled. i've worked on, and greatly improved, her crappy tattoo that was done by an amateur and so far she's given me nothing for it, always saying she's gonna get around to it and never doing so.

matt is a cool dude. he's too cool, actually. i'm attracted to him but he's off-limits. he has a girlfriend. i think he's attracted to me, too.

i usually see all three of these people every week at trivia night at a local bar. mike and michelle don't like each other but matt is friends with both of them. all night he goes back and forth between them and listens to each one talk shit on the other. it's so weird. matt, especially when he's around mike, will talk all this shit on michelle and call her hoe and whatnot, but at the same time he's her friend to the degree that he goes out of his way to spend time with her. it's so weird.

there's another trivia night (kinky quizzo, more specifically) tomorrow night. will i go? ...only if one or more of the three of them calls me and reminds me. i only wanna go if i'm welcome. michelle might not call or text cuz she's pissed off that i won't work on her tattoo for free anymore. mike might not call or text cuz he's pissed off that i won't be his "other girl" anymore. matt might not call or text cuz he feels weird around me cuz he knows i like him and he has a girlfriend.

have i talked about mike? the night that i officially realized i was attracted to him was the first night i ever got close enough to him to smell him. matt was telling me i smell good and i was like "really? i don't know why. i don't have perfume on or anything. maybe it's mike." mike was like "wanna smell me?" and he stretched out his shirt sleeve so i could stick my nose in and get a whiff of him. i did, and then suddenly i was hit in the face with his essence and his appeal. smelling him was like drinking love potion number nine. what the hell did he put on himself that night? ...maybe nothing. maybe it's just that whole scientific explanation about different humans smelling different based on the kinds of immune systems they have.

psychics and bees

there is a memory that comes back to me every now and then, a memory about ben and peter when they were babies. they both needed attention at the same time. that morning it was my job to take care of them. i was feeding ben--i think i had just started feeding him, henceforth, getting him to stop crying--and peter started crying. i knew for a fact that peter didn't need anything. i had just changed his diaper and i think i had just fed him, but he was looking at me and crawling towards me as i was sitting on the armchair feeding ben. he was stretching one of his arms towards me. i knew what he wanted. he just wanted to be held. right then i was frustrated by that because being held is not a need. being fed is a need. i was frustrated at him. all that was on my mind at the moment was, "i'm doing my job. i'm doing what is required. i'm tending to the physical needs of these babies. peter is being too demanding." i was being selfish. maybe i could have leaned ben's head against one of the arms of the armchair, put the bottle down, picked up peter, then transferred him to one arm and used the other hand to feed ben. but then, if i did that, for a few seconds there i would have had to listen to crying from BOTH babies at once as opposed to just one. again, i was being selfish. i just sat feeding ben as i looked at peter who was on his hands and knees on the floor in front of the armchair, crying, crawling towards me, stopping and lifting one arm to reach it out towards me. after doing that for a minute or so, he just sort of collapsed and laid on the floor, still crying.

every now and then this memory comes back to me and i'm filled with a horrible feeling of guilt until i somehow manage to push the memory out of my head and occupy my mind with something else. today was one of the days that this memory came back to me. i was at work. i was finding it surprisingly hard to push the memory out of my head today. also i was remembering that last night my boss and i were discussing the subject of psychics. also i was remembering that last night i had bad dreams about children getting hurt.

all these thoughts and realizations led me to this thought: "could i be having a psychic moment right now? is something bad happening to peter right now?"

then later i found out that peter stepped on a bee today.

it's probably all coincidental, because the degree of worry that was present in me today isn't exactly equivalent to the degree of worry that is evoked from learning that he stepped on a bee.

the first touch-up

ever get in one of those moods where you just desperately want to apologize to anyone you've ever wronged in your whole life?

there are glowing firefly larvae on the ground outside.

if an unfixed female ferret doesn't find a male to mate with within a certain period of time, a buildup of estrogen in her body will eventually kill her.

i'm having all these suspicions about tori talking to dopie about me, and cello talking to dopie about me and dopie talking to tori about me.

man, fuck, i love my mom but sometimes she aggravates the fucking living shit outta me.  as far as tattoos go, this was basically the first time i ever did a touch-up. the girl didn't pay me yet. i don't really care right now. i care about getting to put the before and after pictures on facebook. this is exciting. mom has to be a debbie downer and dwell on the fact that the girl hasn't paid me. way to steal my sunshine and ruin the mood. can't she just be happy for me? ugh, god. fuck off, mom.

5/7

Now there's been at least two people who have told me I remind them of Tommy Chong and/or his character on That 70's Show.

old father william

woke up the other morning with this in my head (for whatever reason):

"You are old, Father William," the young man said, "And your hair has become very white; And yet you incessantly stand on your head - Do you think, at your age, it is right, is right? Do you think, at your age, it is right?"

4/26

what is the evolutionary reason for the coloration of appaloosas?

i'm not questioning your honor, lord slynt. i'm denying its existence.


mmmmmmmmmm robb stark. mmmmmmmmmm tyrion lannister.


it just occurred to me that that night i punched my old boss i was wearing a hoodie that said "peace" and "love" on the back.


nana says gram's been acting even more and more funny.
"they're all dead," said gram one day, out of nowhere, smiling.
"who?" said nana.
"everyone's dead but me," said gram.



then one day out of nowhere gram said,
"that's not right, her saying that. that lady saying those things, it's not right."
"who?" said nana. "saying what things?"
"well, you should know, maryann!" said gram, sounding fed up and frustrated. "you were there with me for the monologue!" nana still has no clue what she's referring to.



she's also said gram's been seeing and hearing things that aren't there. there's some guy always watching her from her old bedroom. nana has to just make sure she always keeps the door to her bedroom shut and then gram doesn't think about it. i dunno if she stops thinking there's a guy in there or she just forgets that she thought he was there or she just doesn't want to have to look at him. she also thinks people are watching her change and use the bathroom. she thinks they're watching her from her skylight. she's seen sneakers hanging from the ceiling. she's said, pointing to pop-pop, 
"who's that lady?" she's said, when there's no one home but her and nana,
"who are all these people here?" she's said, 
"whose dog is that that's barking?" when there was no dog anywhere. she's shouted out,
"teacher! teacher!" raising her hand.
"does she mean us?" nana said to pop-pop.
"i don't know anymore," said pop-pop. she also supposedly calls out her dead brothers' names, and that's not even talking about any of the things she yells out in her sleep.



the boys seem to be having trouble understanding the concept of "privacy" and when people are supposed to need it or want it. they insist on having "privacy" to take their clothes off in the bathroom/laundry room and then proceed to stroll out of the room naked. one of them has even requested "privacy" just to take off his coat once.



the human brain isn't done developing until age 24.



i get the feeling that song "if i die young" wouldnt be as popular as it is if we weren't in a recession. maybe "S & M" wouldn't be either.



i'd like to take this moment to hereby recognize that i'm continuously blown away by the breathtaking incendiary extraordinary seemingly neverending talent of rihanna.



the boys were walking through franklin mills mall with mom where there was 90% black people and ben kept saying over and over every few minutes, as he pointed at various people, "i think i see barack obama!"

4/17

"if i'd known jim and pam were going to use this as an excuse to abuse a magician...i never would have let them do this."

4/16

this weather is insane. what's it going to be like in july if it's this hot now?

LJ was acting really funny today. he kept wanting to be held and cuddled.

stink bugs

i can't believe how ridicoulous Peter is. he keeps "pet" stink bugs in a little wire bug cage. is that more ridiculous, or the fact that he's afraid of stink bugs when they're not in a cage? if there's ever one in his room at night, he wants me to come and take it out of his room. the last time he did that i just refused to. i showed him how to remove them from his room using a tissue to pick them up so he doesn't have to touch them. that should be good enough. he shouldn't need to come downstairs at night crying because there's "scary" stink bugs in his room. and why are they scary? because those ones aren't his pets?

4/13

"Lizzy can you go get a knife or a chainsaw and cut that stuff for me? Please may you do that?"

like an artist

i keep remembering this one time i was talking to chelsea about tug. i forget what i was saying. maybe i was just telling her about the fact that i used to be so infatuated with him, and then over the years the infatuation and attraction faded away to the point where i just don't think of him like that anymore. i think of him as a really good friend. whatever i was saying to her about him, i just remember her saying (and the look on her face as she said it),

"well have you seen what he looks like?!" hahaha. she finds him not to be attractive at all. not in the least. ...i just think he looks like an artist.

4/4/12

i'm currently feeling blown away by the dramatic transformation of my feelings towards my mother that's happened over the last week or two.

not that i should be feeling blown away by it. this has happened before. i've gone through phases of being overcome with--not hatred, but deep resentment--towards her (practically wanting to stab her in the eyeballs with a fork), followed by phases of being overwhelmed with feelings of love, attachment, affection and sentimentality towards her.

i guess this is how love is.

synesthesia

Synesthesia: basically when your mind will take data from one form of sensory perception and activates another one in a sympathetic manner, or associate letters/numbers with varying colors. It can happen to anyone, but is arguably most famous in its occurrence while a person uses LSD, and in its occurrence in aspies and autistics

3/15

please?

3/4

uh huh, you know what it is. everything i do, i do it big. black & yellow, black & yellow, black & yellow, black & yellow.

2/29

even the people in the world who are so rich and powerful and prestigious and looked up to, even those people have to work hard sometimes. sometimes to me that fact seems counter-intuitive. is there no point in someone's life when he/she has proven to the world that his/her brain is so powerful that he/she deserves to just sit back and never be bothered with anything for the rest of his/her life except maybe sometimes giving people advice about their lives? ...does no one in the world ever reach that point?

"fifty years ago you could get the sunday paper and there would be over a hundred pages of classified ads, help wanted ads. and practically all you had to do to keep a job was to show up. ...it was so easy to get a job back then." -tom

"i love nana. she's such a nice lady. i love going to her house. ...how did you two meet?" --peter (to mom)

"well, they're artists. those are the people who......those were the kids that got picked on in school for not paying attention." that's what tori's boss nancy said after seeing the music video for "little talks" by of monsters and men. we watched it all together and observed how trippy and wonderfully creative it was.

scored a job interview with payless but not an actual job as far as i can tell cuz i didn't get a call today. tori thinks i should call them tomorrow. i don't know what i think. maybe just not call and leave it at that. after all, answering all those questions on the application about how much of a people person i am, telling them the same thing in the interview, i felt like i was just lying my head off the whole time.

mom's been telling me she thinks i should apply for social security cuz now i'm eligible for it cuz i have a formal diagnosis and i'm technically 'disabled.' whenever she brings it up i just want to say 'fuck you, mom.' i don't, though, of course. and i know my hostility/defensiveness is irrational.

if a woman rapes a man and she gets pregnant, does he have to pay child support?

i took my tattoo equipment back from that guy a couple days after i gave it to him. i just thought, "on second thought.....no i should keep it just in case."

i had an awesome weekend. i saw tug and lindsay and mark and caitlin.

alex is supposedly dating lindsay now.

nancy apparently thinks i should go to the intergroom with her and tori in april. ...sometimes i wonder if she thinks i could be a groomer. i think i would love to be one.

caitlin thinks we can sell our cartoon to cartoon network.

lately i've been reminding myself of edith from ghost world.

tori's been needing me to pick her up from work these past few days.

"i wanna lick it off the knife like lizzy does." oops.

the other night i had dreams about mice attacking bats and latching onto their wings with their teeth.

"ramble on" by led zeppelin is about "lord of the rings."

caitlin's brother gordon was telling me the other night about how there's like some kind of formula, or rhythm, to comedy/jokes/sitcoms. it's like, one funny thing happens, then another funny thing happens, then a third funny thing happens that somehow combines the funniness from the first two things and is the funniest thing of all.

haha. he and caitlin dared me to pretend to be a bouncer and ask people for their IDs. haha.

...how many people do i know who have seen "the girl with the dragon tattoo," and did they learn anything from watching it? and can they tell lisbeth has asperger syndrome? they never actually say it in the movie.

2/24

how could i have stayed in denial for so long? i stayed in denial for four years. i do not like tattooing. i wanted to like tattooing. i thought it would make sense that i would be good at it because it's technically an art form, and i'm artistic. i wanted to like it because it's a cool job, but let's face it, i'm not a touchy-feely person. i'm simply not suited to a job that requires me to touch strangers all day.

so today tori and mike broke up again. i drove her from work to his house to get all her stuff out and take it to her dad's apartment. i dropped her back off at work. while i was there it occurred to me that i still have a bunch of tattooing equipment in my trunk that i'm probably never going to use again, and i was parked right outside of the tattoo place where i used to work because it's right next door to where tori works. i figured i should give the equipment to someone who will use it. i would've just gone in the tattoo place and said,

"could anyone use any of this stuff?" but if i did that, dopie might have thought i was just using that as an excuse to see him again. i didn't want that. i resolved to leave the box of equipment on the bench outside the tattoo place with a note. i put it there and walked back to the car, then thought,

"ok, that's kind of a creeper thing to do, isn't it? they're going to find it there and think, 'why didn't she just come in?' ...well, shit, now what do i do? go back there and pick up the box and bring it back to the car and look like a total weirdo (i might have been seen putting it there, i don't know)?" at that moment tori's boss nancy, who i know and am friends with, came outside to say something to someone she knew who was in a car next to mine or a couple cars down.

"nancy!" i said, and i caught up with her as she was walking back into the grooming salon. i explained the situation to her. i asked her to pick up the box of stuff that was on the bench in front of the tattoo place and hand it to me (in case anyone was looking out the window at the moment; only she would be seen and not me). she did so. i thanked her, took the box back to my car and left.

i ended up taking the box of stuff to another tattoo place that's relatively close--the place where i got the bird on my arm shaded in about a month ago. i dropped it off for the guy who did my arm and who i'm now facebook friends with.

2/22

was late to the victoria's secret interview and so just didn't go in.

had an interview at payless that i think went ok. they do a few interviews with someone before they hire them though. the second one is later today.

the woman from the animal rescue called me back. she said for the next couple months they'll probably need someone for "fill-in work," in other words someone who just fills in for people when they call out, in other words it won't be that often. that is, until the summer time, when it gets a lot busier. also at payless they told me at first i would be part time and then i could be full time later on as it gets busier. so....if everything goes well, i'm going to have two jobs soon. plus i still have to see how everything goes with trying to be a muralist.

also at payless they told me you can become a manager in less than a year and they make forty grand a year. so, if i don't make enough money to have an apartment by being a muralist and having the (entry level) payless job and the animal rescue job....then i can make enough by being a manager at payless (if i could do something like that).

we'll see how it goes.

2/20

haha. i was just thinking about my Nana telling me about "Bonzai Buddy" a few years ago. it was when she was first learning how to use computers and the internet, so it had to be at least ten years ago. some advertisement online persuaded her that she needed to download this "bonzai buddy" character, a little cartoon monkey that swings from one corner of your computer down to another and talks to you while you're on the computer, whatever you're doing.

hahaha she was relating to me the creeped-out feeling she got when, if she was ever using her computer at a later time than usual, the monkey would say to her (in words in a little cartoon speech bubble), "oh, you're up late, Maryann."

2/19

the other night, for some reason, i had a dream about a bunch of animals being dropped into a giant grinding-type machine, kind of like a wood-chipper, that chopped them up, ground up their body parts and mixed them all together. and i was forced to watch

2/18

"When a bear loves a bear it gives a slap." --Fun Fancy Free, Walt Disney

2/17

so Tori thinks it's "not realistic" that i'll ever be able to move out of here. we'll just see about that. i filled out at least like seven job applications in the last few days and gave a resume to four different people.

the place i least expected to get a call from, called me. victoria's secret. i remember filling out that application; they wanted to know of any type of rewards or certificates for anything i've ever attained in the last few years. i was honest. i put down that i became blood-borne-pathogen certified as a tattooist's apprentice. but then, just as i was finishing writing it, i thought, "maybe they meant that i should put down any certifications that are RELEVANT. maybe i shouldn't have put that down because it has nothing to do with selling lingerie. i can't scribble it out, though. that makes the application look bad. i can't ask for a new one--that shows that i'm careless and make mistakes." so, after the sentence about being blood pathogen certified, i put in parentheses, "i don't know how relevant that is though." then as soon as i wrote it i thought, "ok, that just makes it even worse. way to fuck up an application." then i just finished filling it out, handed it in and didn't expect that it was very likely i'd hear back from them.

well, the interview is monday.

and the owner of an animal rescue in chalfont said that she'll call me sometime soon. she made it sound like she wanted to hire me. people say things all the time though. people are a lot of talk. that's why i'm not going to back out of the victoria's secret interview. or am i? should i even attempt having a job that has anything to do with anything that's not art or animals? selling lingerie. selling lingerie. selling lingerie. hmmm. think think think. could i ever be good at that? possibly. not nearly as likely as being good at the job at the animal rescue place. but i'm still not positive she's going to call me AND i don't know what the pay is AND it's only going to be part time, at least up until summer time when it gets more busy.

i had this realization about tattooing. i'm only good at it if i'm doing it to people i know because i get nervous about touching strangers.

oh yeah, the other thing. sherri said she wanted me to do a painting of her dogs. she said she was going to give me pictures of them to work from. that was almost a week ago. i should check with her about that, see if she still wants it done, see if she has the pictures picked out that she wants me to use....

the other night i had a dream that i was erin from the office and i hooked up with jim. pam didn't mind cuz i hooked up with her too. towards the end of the dream, though, she was starting to feel some sort of animosity or jealousy or resentment and i could tell i was going to have to stop hooking up with jim.

i had to stop hooking up with joe because he has a girlfriend. who's pregnant.

what a loser. fucking idiot joe.

last night i had a dream about being in a fight with mom and we were at a relative's house and she wanted us to go back home and i didn't want to go home yet, i think just because i didn't want to be in such an enclosed small space, such as a car, with her. she made me get in the car and started to drive it and i opened my door and kind of just threw myself out of the moving car and went back to the relative's house. the dream ended soon after that.

2/14

yeah well, you know, that's just like, your opinion, man.

2/13

but please don't tell me perhaps, perhaps, perhaps.

2/12

somewhere somehow somebody must have kicked you around some.

1/24

Why do some of the chickens have balding butts?  

tomorrow you can't stay up late and party. you have to be home early because you have to be up early the next morning. 
Ok, i won't stay up late. 
you have to be up at like 6 the next morning because you have to leave around 7. 
Ok, i will. I'm not gonna stay out late. 
you have to be well-rested wednesday. you can't be hung over. If you're gonna party one night this week make it wednesday night. 
Tori said tomorrow night's the only night she can. 
Ok then, well, you can't stay up late. you have to be home early.
**at this point he had repeated himself so many times i was starting to wonder how many times i was going to have to say i would be home early. I gave in to the temptation to be a smart ass.** 
So, by "be home early," you really mean, "either be home early or be home late with some speed for the next day." 
that's not funny. 
**i don't know why but for some reason, a lot of times when someone says, "that's not funny," it makes me crack up uncontrollably** 
this is not a laughing matter. This is serious. This is about the rest of your life. It's not something to laugh about. 
**i contained myself**
Ok. Yeah, no. It's not. It's not.
i want to make sure you understand how serious this is.
ok. yes, i do. 
.....it's probably actually a good thing that he was repetitive. When people are talking to me, so much of the time my mind is focused on processing what they're saying and therefore can't be 
focused on memorization at the same time. Consequently i often find myself forgetting things people told me less than a minute ago. Henceforth, it often helps me to remember something if someone is repetitive
remember this band: plastic birchron 
about it (as much as i hate to admit it).

spinning

sometimes i just try to be friendly and then i take it too far and people think i'm hitting on them and then i don't realize it till later and then i feel stupid.

sometimes i'll be hanging out with one of my (female) friends and her boyfriend will be there too and i'm secretly resenting his presence and wishing it was just me and her. if it was just me and her alone, there would be more different things we could talk about. as i'm secretly resenting his presence i'm trying extra hard to make sure this resentment is never discovered. i try extra hard to be nice to him. i overcompensate. then later it occurs to me that maybe i was acting a little too nice, inappropriately nice, verging on flirty, and my female friend was getting annoyed.

a lot of times i can't really tell where you draw the line between friendly and flirtatious.

it's these kinds of things that make me insecure. it's reasons like this that socialization drains me.

sometimes i'll be in a social situation where i can't really tell what's expected of me, or i'm suspecting that two different people are expecting two different things of me. i won't know what to do. i consider each option one by one, oscillating between the two things. my mind oscillating between two things makes my body want to oscillate between two things. i sway to the right. i sway to the left. i turn my body away from the people i'm attempting to socialize with, to take their staring expectant eyes out of my eyesight and ease the pressure. oscillating and turning at the same time makes me want to start spinning. henceforth i start spinning. this is even more likely to happen if i'm drunk.

it's happened a couple times in the past week. once at jack & trish's house and once while i was out at the morrisville tavern with my friend lan. we were talking to some girl and she was telling us about the restaurant she works at. she got yelled at by the manager/bouncer for promoting another place in his place of business. she walked back to the place she'd been sitting. lan and i had been getting ready to leave anyway. we started to leave. as we were leaving, we were passing that girl who'd been talking to us. lan stopped to talk to her. he wanted to keep chatting it up with her i guess. as the person who had gone in with lan, i felt obligated to stick by him, but at the same time didn't want to keep talking to that girl. the bar was about to close. the staff were urging the patrons of the bar to finish their drinks, and not dilly dally and chat, so that they could close up. plus if i talked to that girl again it might look like she was talking about her restaurant again and then that bouncer would yell at us again. plus i knew that lan was very capable of going off on tangents, in other words intending to just give a passing greeting to someone and then having it turn into a five-hour heart-to-heart. i didn't join him in continuing to chat it up with her. i stood a little ways away from them, between them and the door. i stood there not knowing whether i should just continue standing there waiting for him, whether i should join him in talking to her, whether i should just go wait out by the car, whether it was rude of me to be standing there and therefore silently pressuring him into hurrying up........i didn't know what i was supposed to do and i didn't want to think about it anymore. out of nervousness (or was it out of boredom from waiting for him?) i started spinning.

"got the spins?" the bouncer said, and i stopped.

"i just do that when i don't know what else to do," i said, and lan ushered me out the door and we left.

then last night i was at jack & trish's. our family is friends with them because their son L.J. goes to school with peter. jack and trish's relationship is very reminiscent of relationships present between couples all throughout america's trailer parks. most of the time they are yelling and cursing at each other, name-calling, verbally abusing, threatening, and doing other unpleasant things to each other. when i first started hanging out with them, this behavior made me uneasy. i would start to wonder if i should leave, if they were having a personal moment right now and they wanted to settle it privately and might be embarrassed about someone being there to witness it. then as time passed i grew to learn that this behavior was typical everyday life for them, and nothing to be embarrassed about.

not only is jack verbally abusive to his wife. he can be very inappropriate in other ways. when he drinks oftentimes he seems scarcely able to keep his eyes off me. he seems so amused, charmed and tickled by every little thing i say and do. he has a stupid grin on his face. he offers me drink after drink. he offers to let me sleep over.

last night it was starting to get a bit out of hand.

"maybe i should go home..." i started to say.

"maybe," trish said.

"i just got the vodka out and now you're leaving?" jack said. "that's gay."

"yeah, i'm gay," i said.

i started to move towards the door but he was still trying to talk to me at the same time. i didn't know what to do. it was like she was expecting me to go and he was expecting me to stay. they seemed to both be looking expectantly at me. what's a person to do? i started to spin a little.

"oh, she's spinning again," jack said.

on a side note: a week or two previously i'd been drinking with them and, as they told me the next day, i'd been spinning. i didn't remember it but i easily believed it.

"yeah i don't-- i just-- yea if you-- i don't-- just-- yeah good night," i said, and started moving more quickly towards the door as jack laughed at me. he invited me over to dinner the following night as i walked out to my car and i yelled,

"yeah i don't know yet but thanks," and he said good night as i got in and slammed the door and drove home.

1/15/12

last night i had a dream that me & my parents & the boys all had this plan to go to this big fun exciting carnival thing together. i was to drive in my car and meet them there. i got there but i didn't see anywhere to park. i was driving my car in areas where people are supposed to be walking and cars aren't supposed to be driving, until i found my family. i asked them where i was supposed to park. i don't remember word for word what was said but they tried to describe to me the place i was supposed to park and how to get there. i was thinking, "either i'm not correctly comprehending what they're telling me or....i don't know, i just know i already checked the place they're telling me about and there's no parking there." i said as much to them. then they said something to the effect of, "i've already tried to tell you where to park. i'm done trying to tell you. if you still don't understand where to park, that's your problem." then after that, they were too distracted by socializing with all the other people all around them, to be able to pay any attention to me. i got fed up, gave up on the idea of going to this carnival thing with them, and drove away. later on in the day i saw them back at home. dad was complaining and saying, "the whole reason we went to that carnival was cuz liz wanted to go, and then she didn't even go with us! she has no regard for the feelings of others." then the dream ended.

1/11/12

so many times i look at other people and their bad situations and it leads me to think, "if that was me i would do that this way instead of that way and then it wouldn't happen like that." and then later i realize that maybe i wouldn't do things that smarter way. maybe i would be impulsive like them and let my emotions run me and then get stuck in bad situations because of it.

so many times...things happen that make me think, "if someone cared enough to make sure this didn't happen, it wouldn't happen." then eventually i realize that there are enough caring people but not enough time, not enough energy, not enough resources.

the hack horses aren't properly cared for, whereas the boarded horses are. it's because, of course, that the boarded horses are all people's pets and they pay good money so that they're taken care of. the hack horses, on the other hand, are not pets but money-makers. they are the tools that keep a business running. at first i think, "i have the extra time, i'll pick their feet, i'll make sure their stalls are properly cleaned, i'll do this this and that..." and then i realize that i barely have enough time to get all the work done that i Have to get done, done.

and so many times i just feel like an unproductive person or a failure at life. first of all i need more sleep than most people. that takes away from my productivity and usefulness as a human being. second of all it takes me longer than it should to do everyday tasks that everyday people have to do. that takes away from my usefulness and productivity as a human being. then when i remember about all that, i feel foolish for having thought those thoughts. i mean those thoughts like, "if someone cared enough to make sure stuff like this didn't happen, it wouldn't happen. if someone would just take a little extra time. but no, nobody wants to take a little extra time. everybody's just so selfish. well, i can pick up some of their slack. i have the time and energy and motivation and resources. so i have to do a little extra work that i'm not getting paid for. so what? someone is benefitting from it, and that's all the payment i need." i think those thoughts and then a minute later i find out that i'm already behind with the work that i'm supposed to be doing, the work that i'm being paid to do; and, no, i'm not going to have time to do that little extra thing that nobody else cares to take a little extra time to do. i'm not going to have time for it if i want to get home in time to put my brothers to bed and therefore be saved from the wrath of my mom and therefore stay on good terms with her and therefore still have a place to live.

at times like this, i just get reminded that there is a finite amount of time and energy in the world. it has a very sobering effect. it makes me want to rip down all those posters in grade school guidance counselors' offices that say things a motivational speaker would say. "reach for the sky." "the sky's the limit." "shoot for the stars. even if you miss you'll still end up shooting pretty high." "a journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step." "teamwork," with a picture of people working on something together. "motivation" and "determination" with pictures of things like a whole bunch of people skydiving in a big circle or something.

i feel foolish for having ever thought, "i'm going to make sure i go skydiving before i die." "i'm going to make sure i go scuba diving before i die." "i'm going to make sure i go in a hot air balloon someday before i die." "i'm going to make sure i get to swim with dolphins someday before i die." "i'm going to make sure i learn how to surf someday before i die." no, i'm not going to make sure i do all those things. it costs a hundred dollars to go skydiving one time. how much does it cost to rent scuba gear or a hot air balloon or a surf board or take surfing or scuba diving lessons? all these things require money, and money translates into time which then again translates into money. these things also take time, which, again, translates into money. if i had my own business i could never be guaranteed that i'm always going to get enough business to keep my business running. i could never be guaranteed that i'm not going to run into some kind of legal troubles that require me hire an expensive-ass lawyer. i could never be guaranteed that i'm not going to get in some kind of car accident that's going to kill me in hospital bills. i could never be guaranteed that any kind of accident or injury won't happen to me that will require me to spend all my money on hospital bills. i can never be guaranteed that someday i'm going to be able to retire. i can never be guaranteed that anyone's going to have the money to put me in a nursing home someday when i'm too old to take care of myself. i can never be guaranteed all these things i want to be guaranteed of. therefore........that makes me think that any extra money i happen to have, that i haven't spent on gas to drive to and from work, or that i haven't spent on prescriptions.......i should just be saving. i should be saving it into a big comfy cushion of monetary security. therefore i shouldn't be spending it on anything. therefore i shouldn't ever be carefree or happy-go-lucky. i shouldn't ever go out drinking with friends. i shouldn't even ever have sex because then i have to spend money on whatever method of birth control we happen to use. i shouldn't ever spend any gas/money on going places i don't absolutely need to go. i shouldn't ever be making any art, not if i have to spend money on art supplies. i shouldn't go jogging enough times to ever wear out my sneakers so i have to buy new ones. i shouldn't even go jogging at all unless i'm going to do it in the same shoes i wear in my everyday life. and i can't do that. those shoes weren't made for that. therefore i should never go jogging. i should never go wading in the creek. i would need water shoes for that. i should never go rafting. i would need to buy a raft for that. i could go on and on with things i should never do. therefore i should be leading a very dull, boring and dreary life if i want to feel secure. therefore, in this life we are trapped. life is a trap.

but, whatever, i guess i'm just being negative right now cuz my day wasn't that great.

psssh

this one night last week joe wasn't that careful about making sure he pulled out in time. i got a little anxious. "abortions are like a few hundred dollars," i said. "you can't get an abortion..." he started to say. "why would you say that instead of saying 'there's no way you would need to get one because there's no way i just knocked you up'?!" i said. then he said something to reassure me (i forget what, i was a little drunk), and we just continued with whatever we were doing or the subject changed or something.

not get an abortion. psssh. yeah, ok. if i ever got pregnant, you're damn straight i'm getting an abortion. before the piss even dries on the pregnancy test i'll be behind the wheel on the way to planned parenthood. damn straight. i've seen what parenthood does to people. why would i put myself through that? he's some kind of fucked in the head.