I've been freaking out lately. My friend is having a birthday party in three weeks, and Ex-Friend (EF) is going to be there. I don't care so much about seeing EF; it's mostly that I wish I were looking better, that I hadn't gained so much weight over the last two years, and that I wish I had a hot boyfriend to drag along to this party as a sort of status symbol -- y'know, so that all of the people that used to comprise my Circle of Friends but that essentially dropped me when EF and I ceased communication will know that I don't need them ANYWAY!
*sigh*
I wish I were more grown-up, or at the very least more mature. Turns out I'm neither.
I also wish I didn't have to go to this party, but it's kind of required, from a personal ethics kind of place. Y'see, my friend who's throwing the party recently almost died while in the hospital, and she's got this renewed sense of living and celebrating life. How could I possibly turn away from her? Being an insecure idiot is not a good enough reason.
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Friday, June 22, 2007
Yesterday was a Day -- capital "D"! It was one of those days when every single customer was just a little too whiny and implacable, where every copy you try to make gets a paper jam, where every step you take in your cute platform loafers feels like you're about to fall on your ass.
Yeah. One of those Days.
So, when I went to Target after work to buy toothpaste and window cleaner, and some guy tried to steal my parking space, I turned into one of those confrontational, insistent types.
Here's how it happened:
I pulled into the South Marketplace Shopping Center. I drove to the row right in front of the Target, and while I was coming around the corner, I noticed a guy loading stuff into the back seat of his car. Perfect, I tho't, finally a break on this hellacious day! The spot was only, like, five spaces away from the front door, and since my feet were not cooperating that day, I figured it'd be best to not have to walk very far.
Plus, I was tired and already cranky from my Day.
So, I stopped and turned on my blinker, indicating that I was waiting for this guy to leave so I could take his spot. And, as is the natural way of things, he left, and just as I began to move forward to turn into the space, this car zooms out from behind me, swings around my car, and pulls into the space.
WHAT????
I began to honk like a mad woman, as though I was having a diabetic fit and the horn was a needle full of insulin.
The guy decided to ignore me, probably figuring that, in such a polite little country town, the Crazy Lady will be too embarrassed to press the issue.
He had no idea.
I put my car in "Park," removed my key from the ignition, and jumped -- yes, literally jumped! -- out of my car, yelling, "Excuse me! Ex-cuse me! That's my space!"
The man stared at me in dumb silence.
"I had my blinker on. I was waiting for that guy to leave. That's my space."
More stunned silence.
Then, finally he said:
"Look, you were only there a minute. I've been looking for a spot for a lot longer than that."
To which I replied, "Well, I'm sorry you left to try to find a better spot, but that one's mine. Thank you! That's my space."
One more round of stunned silence.
So I said, in a slightly higher-pitched and more desperate tone, "I'm gonna have to insist. Thank you. That's my spot. I don't care. Thank you."
Yeah.
He got in his car and left...to park in the spot that, in the course of our little encounter, had opened up two spots down. Now, I know some of you may be thinking that I probably should have let it go and taken the other spot. To this I answer:
HELL NO!
The whole point is that I had my blinker on, and I had been waiting for that particular spot. He needed to be taught some manners, and I was just the Crazy Lady to oblige.
ROAR!!!!
Yeah. One of those Days.
So, when I went to Target after work to buy toothpaste and window cleaner, and some guy tried to steal my parking space, I turned into one of those confrontational, insistent types.
Here's how it happened:
I pulled into the South Marketplace Shopping Center. I drove to the row right in front of the Target, and while I was coming around the corner, I noticed a guy loading stuff into the back seat of his car. Perfect, I tho't, finally a break on this hellacious day! The spot was only, like, five spaces away from the front door, and since my feet were not cooperating that day, I figured it'd be best to not have to walk very far.
Plus, I was tired and already cranky from my Day.
So, I stopped and turned on my blinker, indicating that I was waiting for this guy to leave so I could take his spot. And, as is the natural way of things, he left, and just as I began to move forward to turn into the space, this car zooms out from behind me, swings around my car, and pulls into the space.
WHAT????
I began to honk like a mad woman, as though I was having a diabetic fit and the horn was a needle full of insulin.
The guy decided to ignore me, probably figuring that, in such a polite little country town, the Crazy Lady will be too embarrassed to press the issue.
He had no idea.
I put my car in "Park," removed my key from the ignition, and jumped -- yes, literally jumped! -- out of my car, yelling, "Excuse me! Ex-cuse me! That's my space!"
The man stared at me in dumb silence.
"I had my blinker on. I was waiting for that guy to leave. That's my space."
More stunned silence.
Then, finally he said:
"Look, you were only there a minute. I've been looking for a spot for a lot longer than that."
To which I replied, "Well, I'm sorry you left to try to find a better spot, but that one's mine. Thank you! That's my space."
One more round of stunned silence.
So I said, in a slightly higher-pitched and more desperate tone, "I'm gonna have to insist. Thank you. That's my spot. I don't care. Thank you."
Yeah.
He got in his car and left...to park in the spot that, in the course of our little encounter, had opened up two spots down. Now, I know some of you may be thinking that I probably should have let it go and taken the other spot. To this I answer:
HELL NO!
The whole point is that I had my blinker on, and I had been waiting for that particular spot. He needed to be taught some manners, and I was just the Crazy Lady to oblige.
ROAR!!!!
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
Y'wanna know why Friendster sucks? Because they don't have a customer service e-mail address. Oh, no, that'd be too much work for them! Instead you have to sift through their 13 pages of FAQs and hope that one of them addresses your issue -- which, by the way, has never been the case for me!
I hate Friendster!
So, here's the scoop:
When I used to have a Friendster account, I also had a blog, and since I wanted to be able to format my blog and do some reasonably cool stuff, I had a blog for which I paid $8.95/mo. When I followed the online process to cancel my account, I tho't that would also cancel my blog.
I tho't wrongly.
Turns out the blog aspect of the whole Friendster thing is actually run by a company called Six Apart Ltd. (SAL). For some reason, you have to contact them separately to cancel your blog.
I wrote to Friendster's suggestions e-mail address ('cause, as I already said, they don't have a customer service one) saying they should probably let customers know this at some point during the whole canceling-the-account process. Friendster's suggestions team wrote back saying, yeah, y'know what, you're right! We probably should! Weird that we don't. Huh. Head-scratcher, that!
So I went to SAL's site to ask them to stop charging me for my Friendster blog, as the account had been canceled.
A couple of months went by, and I saw that I was still being charged $8.95 every month by SAL. I finally had enough and contacted my bank to dispute the most current charge and any future charges. As a result, my debit card has been canceled and my bank is issuing me a new one, which means that, for the time being, I HAVE to either write checks or carry cash; otherwise I can't buy anything.
Convenient, no?
HELL NO!
And to top it all off, SAL is insisting that the account still exists, and therefore the blog still exists. I went around and around with them, saying, look, if you Google my site, it comes up with a, "No, it ain't there!" screen. IT DOES NOT EXIST!
SAL responded, well, sure, the blog itself doesn't exist, but the corresponding photo pages still exist, so we therefore get to keep charging you. If you want us to stop, you have to go back and cancel your Friendster account using their online process.
Anyone else beating their head against the wall yet? Damn!
So I went back and contacted Friendster -- which, if you'll recall, does not have a customer service e-mail address; I keep having to contact them through their suggestions e-mail address -- and explained the issue. I got a formulaic response saying that the suggestions department doesn't handle these kinds of questions, and I needed to go back and contact customer service.
And, yes, say it with me now, there is no customer service e-mail address to contact!!!
*sigh*
I seriously could cry.
I hate Friendster!
So, here's the scoop:
When I used to have a Friendster account, I also had a blog, and since I wanted to be able to format my blog and do some reasonably cool stuff, I had a blog for which I paid $8.95/mo. When I followed the online process to cancel my account, I tho't that would also cancel my blog.
I tho't wrongly.
Turns out the blog aspect of the whole Friendster thing is actually run by a company called Six Apart Ltd. (SAL). For some reason, you have to contact them separately to cancel your blog.
I wrote to Friendster's suggestions e-mail address ('cause, as I already said, they don't have a customer service one) saying they should probably let customers know this at some point during the whole canceling-the-account process. Friendster's suggestions team wrote back saying, yeah, y'know what, you're right! We probably should! Weird that we don't. Huh. Head-scratcher, that!
So I went to SAL's site to ask them to stop charging me for my Friendster blog, as the account had been canceled.
A couple of months went by, and I saw that I was still being charged $8.95 every month by SAL. I finally had enough and contacted my bank to dispute the most current charge and any future charges. As a result, my debit card has been canceled and my bank is issuing me a new one, which means that, for the time being, I HAVE to either write checks or carry cash; otherwise I can't buy anything.
Convenient, no?
HELL NO!
And to top it all off, SAL is insisting that the account still exists, and therefore the blog still exists. I went around and around with them, saying, look, if you Google my site, it comes up with a, "No, it ain't there!" screen. IT DOES NOT EXIST!
SAL responded, well, sure, the blog itself doesn't exist, but the corresponding photo pages still exist, so we therefore get to keep charging you. If you want us to stop, you have to go back and cancel your Friendster account using their online process.
Anyone else beating their head against the wall yet? Damn!
So I went back and contacted Friendster -- which, if you'll recall, does not have a customer service e-mail address; I keep having to contact them through their suggestions e-mail address -- and explained the issue. I got a formulaic response saying that the suggestions department doesn't handle these kinds of questions, and I needed to go back and contact customer service.
And, yes, say it with me now, there is no customer service e-mail address to contact!!!
*sigh*
I seriously could cry.
Thursday, May 10, 2007
Ex-Friend texted me last night.
...
AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
...
I'm having a little freak-out over it.
So, here's what happened.
About two or three or four months ago -- I don't remember how long; I'm horrible with sensing the passage of time -- I got a friend request on MySpace from Danny Kaye. Of course, it wasn't the actual Danny Kaye, but still, I LOVE Danny Kaye! And so I went to check out the profile for this Danny Kaye.
On the MySpace profile, there was a video of Danny Kaye and Harry Belafonte doing a little ditty on The Danny Kaye Show. It made me laugh out loud, it was so campy and playful! It just made me happy to watch it, and I had an undeniable urge to share the joy with someone.
Enter EF.
Danny Kaye is EF's favorite, from childhood. EF LOVES Danny Kaye, and introduced me to a lot of Danny Kaye stuff that I never even knew existed. It was one of the many things that the two of us shared between just us. It was loving and special, like we were part of some secret club that no one else really got.
So, it was completely natural, if a little unfortunate, that the person with whom I wanted to share the Danny Kaye video most in the world was EF.
And then, I thought about it some more, and realized, hey, what's the big deal? So you send EF a video! That doesn't mean that you have to be friends with EF! It's totally safe; there's no way EF will ever try to talk to you again, anyway. And if you use your new e-mail address, who knows? Maybe the video link will get put in EF's junk mail box instead of the inbox, and EF will never, ever, ever know you sent the dadgum thing in the first place! This is totally fine!
I sent the video to EF.
I believe my e-mail said something to the effect of, "I saw this and it made me laugh, and I just had to share it with someone. Naturally, you came to mind, and I figured, eh, what the hell."
Months passed. And then I got this text last night:
"thanks for the danny kaye video. i hope you've been well you have been in my thoughts."
My immediate reaction:
RUN FOR THE HILLS!
My actual, carefully crafted response:
"Glad u enjoyed it kid. Hope ur good too."
Calm and cool, right? Right! In my text message. I'm calm and cool. Right.
God help me.
...
AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
...
I'm having a little freak-out over it.
So, here's what happened.
About two or three or four months ago -- I don't remember how long; I'm horrible with sensing the passage of time -- I got a friend request on MySpace from Danny Kaye. Of course, it wasn't the actual Danny Kaye, but still, I LOVE Danny Kaye! And so I went to check out the profile for this Danny Kaye.
On the MySpace profile, there was a video of Danny Kaye and Harry Belafonte doing a little ditty on The Danny Kaye Show. It made me laugh out loud, it was so campy and playful! It just made me happy to watch it, and I had an undeniable urge to share the joy with someone.
Enter EF.
Danny Kaye is EF's favorite, from childhood. EF LOVES Danny Kaye, and introduced me to a lot of Danny Kaye stuff that I never even knew existed. It was one of the many things that the two of us shared between just us. It was loving and special, like we were part of some secret club that no one else really got.
So, it was completely natural, if a little unfortunate, that the person with whom I wanted to share the Danny Kaye video most in the world was EF.
And then, I thought about it some more, and realized, hey, what's the big deal? So you send EF a video! That doesn't mean that you have to be friends with EF! It's totally safe; there's no way EF will ever try to talk to you again, anyway. And if you use your new e-mail address, who knows? Maybe the video link will get put in EF's junk mail box instead of the inbox, and EF will never, ever, ever know you sent the dadgum thing in the first place! This is totally fine!
I sent the video to EF.
I believe my e-mail said something to the effect of, "I saw this and it made me laugh, and I just had to share it with someone. Naturally, you came to mind, and I figured, eh, what the hell."
Months passed. And then I got this text last night:
"thanks for the danny kaye video. i hope you've been well you have been in my thoughts."
My immediate reaction:
RUN FOR THE HILLS!
My actual, carefully crafted response:
"Glad u enjoyed it kid. Hope ur good too."
Calm and cool, right? Right! In my text message. I'm calm and cool. Right.
God help me.
Thursday, April 26, 2007
This morning I had a dream about Ex-Friend. We were in some sort of cafeteria-style restaurant/open market place getting lunch together and we were in line for the cash register.
Throughout the dream EF had been standing behind me, and every once in a while he'd accidentally -- and I really mean accidentally, not one of those oops! did I do that? kind of accidentallys -- brush the back of my knee as we were walking around. But somehow, when we got in line to pay for our food, he'd gotten in front of me, and it was me who accidentally brushed the back of his knee with my bag (or something; I don't remember exactly what).
The worst part? I could smell him. When he was standing in front of me, I could breathe him in. The scent was so real and so familiar. And although I was nowhere near ready to wake up (as far as how many hours of sleep a girl of a certain age may require on any given night), in my dream I was aware enough of how dangerous it could be to become comfortable and familiar again with EF that I literally dragged myself out of my dream to wakefulness -- almost an hour before my alarm was set to go off!
O.K., so, damn for that! And double-damn for the fact that I had this dream in the first place! And triple damn that I couldn't shake the dream afterwards and so lay in bed panicked for the next forty two minutes!
I blame this week's episode of Gilmore girls. It set me up to have this dream. (If you watch the show, you'll know what I'm talking about. And just in case you taped the show and haven't watched it yet, I'm not gonna explain further here.)
Throughout the dream EF had been standing behind me, and every once in a while he'd accidentally -- and I really mean accidentally, not one of those oops! did I do that? kind of accidentallys -- brush the back of my knee as we were walking around. But somehow, when we got in line to pay for our food, he'd gotten in front of me, and it was me who accidentally brushed the back of his knee with my bag (or something; I don't remember exactly what).
The worst part? I could smell him. When he was standing in front of me, I could breathe him in. The scent was so real and so familiar. And although I was nowhere near ready to wake up (as far as how many hours of sleep a girl of a certain age may require on any given night), in my dream I was aware enough of how dangerous it could be to become comfortable and familiar again with EF that I literally dragged myself out of my dream to wakefulness -- almost an hour before my alarm was set to go off!
O.K., so, damn for that! And double-damn for the fact that I had this dream in the first place! And triple damn that I couldn't shake the dream afterwards and so lay in bed panicked for the next forty two minutes!
I blame this week's episode of Gilmore girls. It set me up to have this dream. (If you watch the show, you'll know what I'm talking about. And just in case you taped the show and haven't watched it yet, I'm not gonna explain further here.)
Thursday, April 12, 2007
I've been smoking lately...a lot...DAMN.
See, here's the thing: My current roommate has a boyfriend who lives in this lovely little coastal town in California. My roommate is a smoker. Her boyfriend is a smoker. And while I'm in total denial as to whether I'm a smoker or not, generally I only smoke when I'm hanging out with them, which is about once a week.
For instance, this past week I didn't have a single, solitary puff of anything remotely cigarette-esque. I'm sure I was exposed to myriad other carcinogens 'cause, well, hey, let's face it, everything causes cancer these days. Even so, I go down on Saturday night to Roommate's Boyfriend's house, and on my way feel obligated to buy two packs of cigarettes. Two! Two, I tell ya!
Why two, you may ask? Because, silly rabbit! For those of us who are "social smokers," half the fun is trying out different kinds of flavored cigarettes, even though they're generally stronger, and the next morning you feel like you've been living in a coal mine for the past twenty years. (Not that I would have any idea what that would actually feel like, but I have a fairly vivid imagination.) So I had to buy the cherry flavored pack -- which, by the way, are totally YUM! -- and then I had to get the Export A Extra Lights for my cool, unflavored pack.
And guess what? Between the three of us, we managed to polish off the entire pack of cherry cigarettes, and I smoked half a pack of my Extra Lights on top of that! DAMN!
And, yes, this morning I woke up feeling like I'd spent the last twenty years living in a coal mine. I even noticed that I was wheezing a bit all day today. There's this little whistle thing that's really fucking annoying and makes me feel like I'm the sad, sick character on a bad reality TV show that everyone's supposed to start out making fun of but later rediscovers their own humanity through witnessing my own personal, tortured journey.
And did I mention DAMN? I mean, seriously, DAMN! That's a lot of fucking smoking in about a seven and a half hour period!
*sigh*
I have to quit giving into peer pressure.
See, here's the thing: My current roommate has a boyfriend who lives in this lovely little coastal town in California. My roommate is a smoker. Her boyfriend is a smoker. And while I'm in total denial as to whether I'm a smoker or not, generally I only smoke when I'm hanging out with them, which is about once a week.
For instance, this past week I didn't have a single, solitary puff of anything remotely cigarette-esque. I'm sure I was exposed to myriad other carcinogens 'cause, well, hey, let's face it, everything causes cancer these days. Even so, I go down on Saturday night to Roommate's Boyfriend's house, and on my way feel obligated to buy two packs of cigarettes. Two! Two, I tell ya!
Why two, you may ask? Because, silly rabbit! For those of us who are "social smokers," half the fun is trying out different kinds of flavored cigarettes, even though they're generally stronger, and the next morning you feel like you've been living in a coal mine for the past twenty years. (Not that I would have any idea what that would actually feel like, but I have a fairly vivid imagination.) So I had to buy the cherry flavored pack -- which, by the way, are totally YUM! -- and then I had to get the Export A Extra Lights for my cool, unflavored pack.
And guess what? Between the three of us, we managed to polish off the entire pack of cherry cigarettes, and I smoked half a pack of my Extra Lights on top of that! DAMN!
And, yes, this morning I woke up feeling like I'd spent the last twenty years living in a coal mine. I even noticed that I was wheezing a bit all day today. There's this little whistle thing that's really fucking annoying and makes me feel like I'm the sad, sick character on a bad reality TV show that everyone's supposed to start out making fun of but later rediscovers their own humanity through witnessing my own personal, tortured journey.
And did I mention DAMN? I mean, seriously, DAMN! That's a lot of fucking smoking in about a seven and a half hour period!
*sigh*
I have to quit giving into peer pressure.
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