past my bedtime

went to the gf's house last night. watched the l word. am interested to see what happens between bette and the deaf girl, i think i will use it for signs of my relationship. made patterns today. for 10 hours. came home, googled my erands for friday. i have a plan. i am going to bed now.

the resolutions

so i had all these new years resolutions, and i continued to make them throughout january. and now that i'm working on some of them (i did a house blessing tonight) i really wanted a comprehensive list to chart my progress. and so i can add to it. maybe 27 goals for 2007? or is that too krista-esque?

media:
1. spend less than 1 hr online daily
2. watch 4 movies a month
3. go to figure drawing once a month
4. do a patternless crossword every week
5. write a letter every week
6. take a photo every day
7. do a sketch every day
8. drink the flylady kool-aid (eg shine my sink everyday)
9. complete plus level square dance class
10. take violin lessons
11. paint more
12. read more
13. knit more
14. travel more
15. write more
16. go to bed on time, get enough sleep
17. celebrate seasonally (eg. ice skating in the winter, sending out valentines, decorating easter eggs, etc)
18. floss.
19. make my arms strong

add at will!

gay prom

d and i went to the lccp's coming out against cancer ball last night. fun was had by all. especially fun for me was the theme flappers and fedoras. it's always a blast to dress up, esp. historically, esp. when you have ideal body type for said decade, and then also to see all the other dykes in their ball gowns, too. and there were chocolate fountains. and a beautiful ice storm. a plus, i say.









also, i'd like to mention- last weekend i went to d's square dance class, then we took her sis out to big chicks dancing, then i had my class monday. this weekend, we went to d's class sat, danced at the ball that night, i had a square dance today, and class tomorrow. pretty good for someone who can't dance.

since last posting i have:

tasted- apple ravioli with raisin walnut alfredo sauce
smelled- those huge stargazers at work
called- my girlfriend my ex's name on her voicemail
felt- my cat's claws in my arms- why is she always fighting?
heard- patty griffin on morning becomes eclectic. i love that trapeeze song.
saw- a perfect flapper dress for the gay prom at the costume shop
sewed- yeah right. i did do some measuring and cutting, though.
puzzled- mon's patternless crossword. got the boxes filled in, but only 1/2 the letters.
read- another gish jen book. really need to update my booklist.
shopped- for 20s shoes. unsuccessfully.
contemplated- my 365 portrait. no wisdom yet.

public service announcement

and another thing- anyone who (like me) runs out of checks every 3 years ago and so never things of reordering them until there is only one left (and the only reason why one lets one's checkbook get to this state is because one never uses those deposit slips in the back of the book and concequently the book feels much thicker, like there is still a month's worth of bills that can be paid from said book, when such is actually not the case) and therefore tries to order online due to not needing to actually USE last check....

well, my advice is, don't. use the little cut-out form from the sunday newspaper coupon suplement. really. you can check out the different designs online, but don't buy them there, cause they cost twice as much. AND the sunday suplement method can now automatically debit your account, so you don't need to have TWO checks left, one to void and one to pay for it.

isn't that amazing?

compassionate and full of pity

i KNOW one should pick the healthiest, most beautiful produce at the grocery store. but i can't possibly be the only person in the world who feels sorry for the twisted roots and limp greens and buys them out of pity. everyone should find someone to love them, and vegetables are revered and worshiped here in my home.

overwhelming

liz's last comment was so right on about the suburbs. it was said so nicely in such an understanding way, and i'm glad someone could present it sensibly, because i can't, i am so violently opposed to the suburbs. it's all about the sameness to me. i guess i should look at it as merely underwhelming. but i want to live my life in a state of overwhelm, i guess. no, it's not overwhelm as much as hyperexposure. i want to experience it all, do everything, make all the choices, in color. i want to see the details in the shadows when the sunlight glows so bright it bleeds into the dark areas of the photograph.

i really think all the choices i have are a blessing, not something to be taken for granted. as a rich american, i have so many options, and one of the things i hate most about walmart is how they take options away from people. why do so many people feel they have to go to walmart? why is there no where else in all of small town america to shop? why are we so focused on shopping, anyway?

but when i shop, i want to be able to buy my produce at devon market, buy my clothes at ragstock, buy my camera parts at central camera. the idea of texting my sister in north carolina about what to eat at ruby tuesdays in illinois because she worked at one in new york... it's novel for me, but it's less fun when i realize people live their whole lives like this. i need to remember that simple is comfortable for most of the country, that fewer choices is calming, healthy, that neutral colored wall treatments feel cozy.

actually, another insult that sticks with me was from a member of my old church who came into my wonderful homey apartment and very politely said, "you LIVE here? i couldn't do it, it's too much, i'd be overstimulated." i guess if i expect her to understand how my barrage of color makes me soothed, happy and content, i should understand how her blandness does the same to her.

i'm not changing, though. and you still shouldn't shop at walmart.

family filled weekend

not my family, d's. they almost came into town for the weekend. (they stayed at a hotel out in the suburbs. why, i don't understand. it makes sense to them. friday after work she picked me up and took me out there and we all went to ruby tuesdays for dinner, and i met her parents and another sister. jr stayed out there with them, so d brought me home and spent the night. the next day we had to pick up the cake and 4 kids and drive back out to the suburbs to go to chuck e cheeses for jr's birthday. it was kind of a nightmare- it took us 2 hours. but once we got there i had lots of fun crawling around in the tubes and playing skee-ball. i turned in my tickets for all kinds of fun. then we went to d's square dancing class, and d sister had dinner while i made the bag that was due. d helped me glue in that bag, and then i took a nap while they went BACK out to the suburbs to get ready to go out. they came back and woke me up and i put on my skanky clothes and we went out to big chicks. it was so hard to decide where to go, and i knew that d's sister is such a pessamist she'd have complaints no matter where i chose, but i knew we wanted to dance and not pay a cover, and big chicks is a garanteed good time. and it was true again! we had a great time on the dance floor. and they played such good music. the best was kirsty mccoll's in these shoes. it rocked. i spent the night at d's, and then she brought me home this morning.

where i discovered all your kind pterodactyl comments! thank you, thank you all! on flickr you can find a picture of my pterodactlyl impersonation, btw.

so while it was nice, i feel drained, and STILL in need of a weekend. i have so much to do today- cook, clean my house, work on bags etc. but i think i may not do any of it. i may just take a few hours to be uberlazy. doesn't that sound nice?

ps. i hate the suburbs. with a vengeance. just being there makes me uncomfortable. a stranger in a strange land.

how can it be past my bedtime already?

damn you, internet! damn you!

ch has to go get his wound inspected tomorrow morning. i'm opening the shop. ugh. today was hard. tired. as ch said, we came in to prop each other up.

i do need to tell you the pterodactyl story, though.

so on valentine's day i was mostly in the back, tagging deliveries, routing deliveries for the walkers, and making will-call arrangements. but michael had gone to lunch or the bathroom or something, and i was keeping an eye on the front. i hear this group of 3 stupid straight men come in and mary's on the phone with a customer and i hear her say to the new guys, "um, all that's already been sold!" i let mary stick to her customer on the phone while i take on the guys by the cooler, who have opened it up and are fondling all my will calls, poking at the plastic of delivery orders. i dive between them and the cooler, and am like this stuff's already been sold, let me show you what you can buy, you have options. and the guys are all offended, like dude, i was just looking at it! calm down!

it's valentines day. in a flower shop. you want to see calm, go to the health club or something.

so as i'm walking to the available tulips and boxed dozens, one of them says to the other, dude, she came flying in here, shreeking like one of those, what is it, like a pterodactyl or something. at which point i said, you know, i don't think i'm going to be able to help you. you're going to have to wait to have someone else help you. and i walked to the back.

now granted, it's a great insult. much better than something uncreative, like screaming harpy or something. but it still made me feel bad. (BADLY, it's an adverb.)

with any job, you're going to have bad customer service moments. another winner of yesterday was when a customer was giving michael a hard time, she brought in balloons for him to blow up. and i said, no, you can't, the rule is 3 hr. turn around. she was NOT happy to hear that and stormed out. less than an hour later, she stormed back in, with inflated balloons and a paper wrap of flowers. can we help you? we asked. no, i want to speak to HIM! she said, pointing her boquet at michael, who was on the phone. "THIS IS THREE HOUR TURN-AROUND!" she proudly announced, shaking her balloons at him. then she stomped out again.

so today, a woman comes in, and says to ch and i, you have an employee who works here who helped my boyfriend yesterday- she has short jet-black hair, she's short, not really skinny or large.... ch and i look at each other. mary and i are the only women, we both have brown hair, and she's large and i'm definately skinny. dennis, perhaps? i ask. she's like, well, maybe it was a guy, but i want you to know that that employee lost you three customers. at this point i knew. i said to the woman, who was continuing with how rude the employee was, and how she's gonna tell everyone she can not to shop here, "oh yes. that was me helping them. they were trying to buy my deliveries." i turned to ch and said, "they were the ones who called me a pterodactyl." and i again retreated to the back of the shop, leaving ch to defend me. he did an excellent job, saying, "ma'am, it's valentines day." which she found to be no excuse. then her BOYFRIEND came in, and ch ended it with i'm sorry if my employees behavior offended you, but it's a very stressful time, and i know she thought about their comments for the rest of the day. it's not very classy to call people pterodactyls. i don't think i want those sort of people as customers anyway.

so i felt loved, yet guilty. cause you know, i love my job. i believe it is my job to bring joy to peoples lives, to create a physical embodyment of their emotions. i believe in my company ( i told someone the other night at square dancing, when we were talking about working for the man, that your life's pretty good if ch is the man) and i want everyone to love us as a buisness as well as me personally. i was shaking i was so upset by the whole incident. then we watched them through the glass wall go over to the hair salon where the girlfriend was getting a manicure and pedicure. and then. the boyfriend. comes back into the flower shop. he wants to apologize. he says to me, he wants me to know he never called me a pterodactyl. it was the guys behind him. i apologized for being rude and screeching. he then asks ch sheepishly, what we have for sale. ch negotiates a short rose vase, bargaining calls it a peace offering. so within 15 minutes of girlfriend saying she was going to make sure no one she knows ever buys anything from us again, who's buying flowers from us but her boyfriend. oh, sweet, sweet justice. we watched him go back over, i saw him with the flowers standing over her, with her feet in the basin. we couldn't imagine she'd do anything but use the vase to knock his front teeth in. but we saw no more drama. it was 2 and we had to eat lunch.

really, i have nothing more to say. i just want to set a record of some sort with the huge number of occourances of the word pterodactyl in this entry.

quick post vday wrapup

when was the last time i posted? ch cut off the tip of his thumb monday and had to go to urgent care. there was a huge snowstorm all day tuesday. one of our drivers didn't show up. wah wah. we took and delivered over 100 orders. d came through at the end, she and i delivered 9 after she was done with work. now it's over. i'm exhausted. i'm going to eat dinner and go to bed.

loving me is very complicated

how can i feel like no one understands v-day enough to send me love or greetings, yet there are others in my life who won't give me enough space to just be alone when i'm not working? it's this terrible oxymoron- i want to be with people and feel their love and sympathy... but i don't want to spend any time doing it.

i prepared emotionally very poorly for this v-day. but i'm learning things, and next year will be better.

i am also ready for my weekend. still another week before i get to sleep in though. why i'm not whining: ch was doing payroll today and i'm already getting overtime. i guess it sounds like i am whining, though. oh well. a's advice was to suck it up and stop answering the phone unless i'm emotionally prepared to deal with whatever's on the other end. maybe i should take it.

wear and tear

i'm going out to the valentines day square dance tonight. what am i, crazy? why yes, i am.

our 2300 roses came in today. we proccessed them all in record time, but my hands have started the skummy/poked/cut up/hives thing that just comes with a v-day. d joked that no one would want to dance with her tonight.

why is it so hard to sleep more and eat more? i wish i had more control sometimes.

v-day activities

last night i went to ch's after work for dinner, haircuts and petshopboys videos. tonight after work d picked me up and we went to dinner at encore liquid lounge and to the art institute. she just left, and i was asleep in bed, but i was suddenly all awake once the door clicked shut behind her.

or i'm just an addict, and couldn't bear the thought of not checkign my email for such a long time. cause right after work tomorrow i'm going to her place for her party. poor mitzi. she must miss me. i wish she would at least cuddle at night.

hunkering

ch mentioned monday that he's in vday mode, deleting all but the essentials from his life. he wasn't going to go to square dancing,e ven, this week. but i persuaded him. i ended up going to his house after work. this had the mutually benificial strategy of a. me getting him moving so he wouldn't just go to bed, but instead go dance, and b. him feeding me a particularly delicious dinner (toast cubes, cheese, broccoli and zucchini, and eggs)

was so tired after dancing. it'd been a crazy day after work. but did the right thing, and called my friends back. or was it the right thing? a's terribly depressed, scarily depressed. what do you all do about me? i don't know what to do about her. i said something that made her just furious and hang up on me. so i called her back and aplogized and listened for awhile. also talked to d, before and after that. it's been tough. i don't know what will happen with us. her side of the story is that she'd had a horrible day, her mom's in the hospital, her son's sick, her boss wouldn't let her leave to get him from school, etc. all she wanted to do was tell her girlfriend all about it at the end of a long day. and she felt her girlfriend was totally blowing her off. my side is: it's v-day. we're at v minus 9. i've spent all day racing around at the flowershop then square dancing. all i want to do is go to bed. i thought i did the RIGHT thing by calling her. but apparently i didn't listen enough. i was too tired to fight, so i called her back and sucked it up and listened. and i DO care about her and i DO want to know. but i'm in holiday mode. i too am deletign essentials from my life. the care and feeding of a relationship is NOT essential. sleep is. i'll let you know how it goes.

but now, i'm going to bed. another long day today. they're all long days, i know. came home and cooked my rainbow chard, which is delcious but unfortunately WAY too salty. i saved it, though. i'll probably be desprate enough to eat it again. instead, i'm having half a grapefruit for desert. it is making me very happy. goodnight.

post square dancing

so as usual, posting after square dancing. however, a short post. because i should be in bed NOW. because i have to WORK tomorrow. what a surprise. my body's not used to it. first, however, i'm going to take a hot bath. it's very very cold in chicago. i was waiting on the train platform in my warmest-es last night on my way to d's, and i realized how unvegan i am from head to toe- vintage fur hat, wool scarf, wool felt coat, sheepskin mittens, silk long johns, wool socks, leather shoes. whatever, i love animal fibers. eating vegan= makes sense. dressing veagan doesn't seem in line with trying to live closer to the earth for me. after all, what are sheep FOR?

but it was only 0F last night. and it should be 20F by thursday. and NEXT friday we'll get above freezing, 34F. so see, the cold spell isn't so bad.

wish i never saw the sunshine

just finished my valentines. want to take pictures before i mail them, but i'm worried about glitter and the flash. so i thought i'd wait until i have daylight again... but then i realized- i won't be seeing daylight again until the 17th. woe is me.

wah, wah. looking at my calendar to get the exact date, i realised that i'll be home early enough next saturday. i need to stop my whining.

in the blogosphere

did i mention d started blogging? if you'd like to read her version of events, you can find them here.

no more from me today- i have to Get Stuff Done before going to d's house. today is my last day off for the next 2 weeks and i need to make the best of it!

crazy hippie

i don't find this derogatory. it's true. and i'm proud of it. christopher was asking if i believe in paper products last night when he was frying the perogies, then ch asked for a napkin and i put a stack of cloth ones on the table and christopher said, "crazy hippie" but it wasn't to put me down, it was just teasing. square dancing was tough today, it seemed like we were doing the same 5 calls over and over again. but there were still people who weren't getting it. i guess my class was that confused too, once. but the story tie-in is we were trying to decide where to go eat dinner afterwards. i didn't wanna go to indie cafe cause it's so cold here i didn't want sushi. and i didn't know if alice & friends was north or south or what their hours were... so i said lets' just go north on clark and see what we find... and there was a parking spot right in front of the kopi cafe! and the window was empty. so we sat at the little tables on the floor in the window of kopi, but we couldn't watch the people go by because the windows were fogged up and frosted over. we did cuddle, though. i had a lentil-vegetable soup and hot cherry cider and it was so warm and hearty and made me feel like such a crazy hippie. it was such good homey food! it reminded me of snacks at le leche league from when i was a kid. no sneaky carob chip cookies, though.

365 days

i feel like my online presence has been stronger recently, but not here, unfortunately- i've become obsessed with flickr's 365days project in the past week. so i guess if you want new info from me, you can find it at my flickr page.

so if you'll excuse me, i'm going to upload more pics of myself now. also, going to the electronics recycling center with my girlfriend, to her square dancing class, and hopefully getting some serious crafting time in. still trying to decide if i want to go to the UofC folk fest tomorow, or stay in where it's warm. recomendations?

successful party

..but now i'm all tired. but the dishes are done! my room is kinda cute set up in its movie watching phase. i may keep it similar to this, or something... def. time for a change of furnature, that's for sure!

but now it's so late, and d and i are going recycling tomorrow. but i did wanna post and thank y'all for the comments. i do apprieciate them. it's good to be read, and i hope you aren't mad at me for bullying you into it. really, you do have good excuses!

getting bitter

um, hello? anyone out there? could i have a comment, please? am i really so boring? do i have no readers left? i've written about daily activities, i've made lists, i've had musings. i've been happy, i've been sad, i've ignored you and i've asked direct questions. soon i may move off line, to a little diary with a pink sparkly cover and a little gold lock i can keep under my mattress.

PTSD redeux

yep, the time's right on the bottom. 7am. why would i be up blogging then? but then you may notice the date- feb. 1st. which always invokes a "huh? so? oh, yeah, right, that's right" sort of response in me.

for those who don't know, it's the anniversary of the fire.

this year, as usual, i'd given absolutely no thought to it at all. then, very early this morning, i had a dream about ch and hugo being over. i was talking about my computer and flickr (since i just started 365 days) and plugging grounders into the outlets and there was a spark. and so i started to pull them out and there was a little flame. and i got them all out, and was staring at it, and hugo was like dude what's up, and i told him. and he tried to assure me it was all fine. and then a little curl of smoke came up from the outlet, and i knew it was in the walls, and there was nothing we could do. we were done for.

i woke up terrified. i tried to go back in, and imagined me going out into the hallway, getting the fire extinguisher. unplugging and everything being fine. but i couldn't make it work. i tried ignoring it and thinking nice thoughts, and so i imagined my girlfriend, and going out for indian food, and her driving me down devon, and that whole block of burn-out buildings from the 5 alarm fire that ruined at least three businesses and i can just imagine the blaze and STOP! not. really. working. very. well.

ended up calling the girlfriend, waking her up and making her listen to my stories, cause that's the whole POINT of girlfriends, isn't it? so when she got up i wasn't going to fall back asleep, so i decided to just get up too. and i decided to post instead of just read my novel. aren't you lucky?

i HATE this about myself. first, it seems all contrived and made up. i work myself into a frenzy every january 31st. but i swear it's subconsious. it's never something i think about. it's just something that happens. sometimes it takes me a few minutes, or looking at a calandar, to realize why it's happening. second, i like to think of myself as fearless and impermiable. trauma makes me stronger, not fearful. but it's not true. third, i don't like the unendingness of it. i want to greive and freak and MOVE ON. it was scary enough when i happened big time a month after the fire. but years later (how many? i don't even rememember. three years? four?) you would think i'd be over it. am i going to wake up terrified at the end of january every year for the rest of my life?