Pickles, Sprite, Talking to Dad, People's Park, and the New Term.

I can't remember who did this illustration, I am sure it came from deviant art... or not, I don't know. I just need something pretty and happy after the weird-ass day I've had. Yes, it's 2:30 am. Yes, I should be in bed. No, I can't sleep. Yes, I wish I could because my damn eyes are bothering me- it is time for new glasses. But since I can't and don't just want to sit and veg out in front of the TV (although the Poldark reboot marathon I had recently was really nice), I am trying to do something constructive. Yes, it should probably be homework, but I'll get to that in a few. For now, I am sipping a can of Sprite and eating a pickle, because why not?

Today was nuts! I do mean nuts! Amanda had a meeting at work (on her day off of course) and then later she was supposed to donate blood. Why she didn't, I'll get into later. Anyway, the plan was to take her to work, then find some place down town to have lunch and maybe go ride the Looff Carousel since we still have tokens. So I got up, took her to work, and to keep from paying for parking while I sat in the car, I drive over to People's park just passed Brown's Addition. I've gone there before to sit while waiting for Amanda, so no big deal right? Uh, no. Today wacky, scary, and crazy were out. 

First, I pull in and get comfortable, crack the window, and happily watched the birds and the river pass. Shortly this car pulls up near my car and as always, I happen to look over to see this mostly attractive guy smiling at me. Like really smiling... and starting. So I smile back and pick up the book I brought to read and I can feel this guys eyes still on me. Sure enough, when I look over he's just sitting there watching me. So I decided that I would put the book down and call my Dad. As soon as my Dad answers, the guy gets out of his car. So I lock my doors just to be safe, knowing that Amanda will have to get me out because her stupid door is still broken. I asked my Dad if he had time to be on the phone with while a weird person stares at me. He said he did, so we start up on of many conversations. The weird guy actually walks in front of my car, looking in like he's looking for something or waiting for me to get out and when I don't he walks up this path a little bit, stops, stands there, looks back at me, and then goes back to his car and leave. I have no idea what he was there for or what he thought I was there for, but that's just strange.

So my Dad and I are still talking about 45 mins later, about the new Star Wars movie that I still haven't seen and his thoughts on it when another strange person appears. I'm not really a person who judges other people based on what they look like. I generally try give people two interactions before deciding whether or not I want to get to know them more or not, and I'm certainly not one of those "Oh he/she is black/Hispanic/whatever so they are up to something or no good" kind of people. You simply can't judge people by looks or color or race. However, this new guy really just put me off. He was middle eastern looking, no big deal, dressed really nice, looked to be mid 20s. He was carrying what looked to be a wadded up jacket. So despite my instincts saying, "um, he seems kind of odd", I pretty much just focused on the conversation I was having with my Dad. Except I see this guy walk to the bridge, get on it, stop in the middle and stand there. I wouldn't have thought anything of it because I had thought of getting out to do the same earlier, until the guy dropped the wadded up jacket into the river. That got my attention. I watched him walk back to his car, and drive away and told my Dad. It didn't look like he had anything big enough to be say a baby or even kittens or puppies, so I am hoping it was just drugs or something like that. Needless to say I was kind of freaked and really stayed in my car. Thankfully, though, Amanda called shortly after and I had to hang up with Dad and go get her.

Really quick, I mentioned Grad school to my Dad and I told him that I knew he and Mom wouldn't approve, but I am still seriously considering it. He said he didn't care if I went to grad school, but he thinks I should take some time off between graduation and going on to Grad school to just write and really set up a routine. He said it was because I am enough like him that I can think of 97 million reasons why I need to be doing something else. It's true.

Also, my very OCD mother is driving him bonkers. He was telling me about what's going on at home and he said he wasn't trying to dump on me, he was just trying to explain what's going on and see if I had any ideas of how to handle my Mom. LOL. My poor Dad. One my Mom is very OCD, two she suffers from chronic pain and has for as long as I can remember in one form or another, and three, she's stubborn as hell. So she's miserable, her knees are have gotten bad, and she wants to exercise to get the weight off because she's gained some because her thyroid is apparently off and so on and can't do too much because of some other issues. So she gets a sharp pain and jumps which aggrivates something else and she fusses. But that's not an issue, the issue is she's in the house all day, every day. My parents are broke most of the time so they can't go to the movies like she likes, and she doesn't really like going to the park because she's a hermit and so on so she's sitting at home and everything that's wrong is cycling in her head and she's a little bored so she's pestering my Dad about this or that and generally bitchy because of the pain. I know what my Dad's frustrated with because I had to deal with it for several years before I moved away from home. It's obnoxious, it draining sometimes, and sometimes you just want to tell her to shut up and go away but you can't because her feelings get hurt. Sigh. My Mom needs a friend. Or they need to move up here because I will drag her ass out of the house whether or not she feels up to it. I'd do the same to my Dad too. Basically she needs something else to obsess over, something positive. 

Okay so the rest of the day.

Amanda and I went to Tandy Leather to check out the store and see if we'd run into a friend who works there. Our friend wasn't there but we got some really good information on a project we are thinking about taking on.
We went to Long John Silver's for lunch because very rarely eat there and was having a horrible craving for their chicken and hush puppies (a deep fried cornmeal type of thing). Amanda's only eaten there once and didn't remember it but when she tried some of my chicken she was really loving it and I told her that was why I pretty much only go there once a year. I think everything on the menu is deep fried yummy goodness. However, there is another reason why I on'y go there about once a year and that is because it gives my stomach issues at night when I want to be sleeping. I just can't do a lot of grease any more. 

After we ate, we ran over to Lane Bryant so Amanda could use her members reward. She fond a dress on clearance, yay! It looks awful on the hanger, like old granny lady looking but on her it looks super cute! She decided after that, that she didn't want to donate blood at work, she just didn't feel up to it, so we went on to Post Falls where we would visit her parents and my friend Felicia and the kids. Only to find out when we arrived and the landlord was changing her parent's lock, that her mother's purse had been stolen at Good Will in Coeur d'Alene earlier that day. On top of that the employees were less than helpful in helping her look for and were apparently kind of rude. Amanda's Mom said whoever did it, had to do it quick and had to have been watching her, because she set her purse down in her cart, turned around to look at something and when she turned back her purse was gone. It really sucked. She was out doing a little shopping and paying bills and there went 200 in cash, her cell phone, some cards. It's bad. Amanda's Mom basically came home, ate some dinner, and went to bed. I can't blame her.

On a good note, I had a really nice visit with Felicia. I miss her so much. We only had a short visit, and the boys and the dog were all over me, but it was still nice. Well the boys were interested in me until Felicia sent them to play in their room so we could actually talk but that didn't last too long because they started bickering and fighting.

Lastly the new term. Its only week one, but I think I like it. The Wellness class is meh and so far, from what I have done of this week's homework going to annoy me with the whole "smoking is bad and being fat is bad" yeah yeah yeah, blow it out your ass. No, I'm not smoking, but I really really want to. My neighbors congregate in the stairwell and it comes in my house via the draft at the front door. So that certainly doesn't help. Anyway, that aside, the other class, the Advanced Creative Writing class, looks really obnoxiously challenging in a good way.  Obnoxious in that I can already see myself growing over the more difficult aspects of the class, like grammar and spelling, challenging in that I get to write more than 10 pages this time, and also, challenging in that I now have to sit down and try to figure out what the hell I want to write about. I'm thinking paranormal or Scifi/fantasy, definitely romance, and I don't know what else. Its going to be word vomit to start that's for sure, but in the end it will be a publishable piece, which is amazing!

No no no no no...er yes. Brain farts, smokes, late nights outside, and a book series...

We've been watching The Vicar of Dibley, starring Dawn French, for the past week or so. Its really funny and I just plain love it. My favorite of the male characters is Jim Trott because he says "no no no no no no..." and then gets on with whatever he's saying. 

I finished last term of school with a B grade in both of my classes. YAY! But while I was finishing them up, I was helping my next door neighbor with her homework. We are still helping her out with stuff here and there while she tries to finish up her school's term. Honestly, after being sick, having two rambunctious little boys- neither of which listen very well- and having homework that's so stupidly worded and doesn't really make much sense, I am surprised she got as far as she did. It takes all three of us to break it all down and try to figure out what is being asked or said.

Since we started hanging out and doing homework together at night, we've become friends. The down side is that I started smoking again but that's going to stop pretty quick. The upside is that I managed to get my neighbor sucked into a book series that I got sucked into. While I read the 5 book series in a week and a half (I pretty much told Amanda to go away and leave me alone- yes the series was that intense), she's almost finished with it as well. That series is called the Fever Series by Karen Marie Moning. There are two other books that follow the 1st 5 books with another character, a graphic novel, and I guess one more book. The author, Karen Marie Moning, has announced that she will be returning to the core story of the series soon. I am excited! Needless to say, I've been back and forth between my house and the neighbors. We've been smoking, laughing, farting, and fan-girl-ing over books. It's been really nice. There may or may not have been some unladylike spitting and burping involved too. 

Because I read 5 books in a week and a half, of my choosing, I have been inspired to not only push on and read more books of my choosing instead of just my text books, but also to start writing again. I spent 3 hours yesterday imputing notes and character descriptions and bios into YWriter, a free software for writers. I am glad that I got that part finished, finally. I still have a lot more to do, but I took a break today to read a book on writing young adult novels, and also to read and started working on the class I want to teach for the IEPG. 

This morning I started season 2 of the Vikings. I have had it for quite some time and just never got around to watching it. Since I was feeling kind of down, I stuck it in the DVD player. It was nice to actually watch something I wanted to watch and not hear anyone whine or bitch about it. I am going to finish season 2. Then somehow, even if I lose some sleep because of it, I am going to make a dent in the things that I have been wanting to watch. 

There's been a lot of other stuff going on, but I am a bit too tired to really go into it. I just remembered that I hadn't blogged in a little while, so I thought I would throw one out there. I still haven't finished editing the photos from our Seattle trip... damn, I really just kind of checked out from things the last month or so. Meh, I'll get to it all. 

A semi quiet start to the new year.

Rum Geisha © Hannah Richardson

First, I think I need to change and update all of my passwords again. It could be nothing but it could be something. I just opened up blogger and started a new blog where I got a message stating that I just logged out of another location and would I like to log back in. Grrrrr! 

My New Year started quietly with a few games of Rummikub and me coaxing Skoora's mom into drinking a whole bottle of wine. She's not really a drinker. The 1st was spent taking my time in doing almost nothing. I didn't go to the family new year's party, instead I went to Skoora's work and kept her and her assistant manager company for an hour or so. After we got home her parents came in along with a friend from their church and we visited with him meanwhile a Monster High movie was playing in the background. Skoora was kind of nervous about getting ready for her residency. 

Skoora worked the 2nd which made things more difficult for her in terms of being ready to go. Still, we got her packed, last minute errands run, and off to the airport in time for her flight. I was a bit worried since the North East was getting slammed with a winter storm but her plane landed safely, the only down side was that she had to spend the night in the airport last night until the bus could take her to the T (subway) in Boston this morning. I stayed up until about 3 am worried even though we sent text to each other and I spoke to her on the phone a couple of times. And despite not getting but a few hours of sleep the night before and being very tired, I just couldn't go to sleep until I knew she was out of the airport and on her way to the college campus. Then it was a matter of her not being next to me in bed. But exhaustion finally won and I fell asleep. 

I actually slept until a little after 1 in the afternoon. I really hate sleeping that late but didn't let myself get too upset about considering the circumstances. I haven't really done a lot today either. I've mostly played Game of Thrones Ascent on facebook. I saw the ad for it last night and decided to try it out and off and on today I've played. It's a time waster but it is interesting and fun. 

I did manage to get out of the house today and aggravate my back while doing it. I placed a hold on a few jewelry making books and went to go pick them up. After we had dinner, I took Skoora's mom, and Skoora's visiting cousin Amber to Hasting's. I was going to pay for the coffee and Amber's coco but Skoora's mom decided that she would. Then we parted ways in the store, they went to look at some things and I went to look for other things. Skoora's mom kind of rushed me when we met back up again despite me telling her that I was still looking. She wanted to get a book and then I guess decided that she didn't want to wait in line and put it back. In finagling my wallet and my purse, I managed to turn wrong and that's how I managed to make my back hurt worse this time. 

Back at home, Skoora's mom and dad watched Monster's University with Amber and I went out to watch for awhile. I stayed until the end of the movie but couldn't sit through another one. Since then I have been holed up in my room editing some photos, looking at what I have on my deviant art page, and yeah, that's about it. I should have logged on to play Guild Wars but I just didn't feel like it. I wanted to read but I didn't feel like doing that either. Writing was on my mind but again, I didn't feel like much of that. 

So here I am again, it's the middle of the night. I'm by myself, the cats want to go in and out, and I can't sleep but this time, I really wish I could! I don't think I will sleep very well until Skoora comes home.

Oh and my friend Christine B is coming to visit on Sunday. I'm not sure how long she's going to stay, but I don't care. I don't know if she will buy any fabric or not but she's asked me to make some pillow cases for her.   

Adult Swim is tripping out!

I don't know what the hell is going on with Adult Swim. For the last 10-15 mins they've shown nothing but psychedelic animal/nature stuff and now they are just showing strange nature stuff with some random people. It's very strange and I wouldn't mind if except there doesn't seem to be a point. Perhaps that is the point. Of course I wouldn't know about this if I was sleeping.

For some reason tonight, I am just wired in a weird insomniac way. I don't even feel tired. I've done my laundry, run the dishwasher, folded laundry, and watched two movies. I have one more left to watch before I return it to Redbox. I've even wiped down the kitchen counters. On top of that, I think I was bit by an earwig. Or maybe I was stung? I am so grossed out about them in general that I don't really want to go look that information up for fear of seeing a picture of one. And this, of course, happened while I was finishing up a movie. I flicked it off of me but I don't know where it went.

I know that these disgusting little things are a naturally occurring... thing, but that doesn't mean that I have to like them. They creep in through cracks in the front door and in through the dryer exhaust vent. Eww! Dare I say it, I think I like the occasional jumping spider over them.

Oh well, in half an hour I will be dressed and heading out to Starbucks. Apparently they open at 5 am and since the sun is coming up and it's currently 4:27 am, I figure a cup of coffee won't hurt. I'll probably read until the caffeine wears off and then happily crash for a couple of hours.  

Middle of the night ramblings

A lot has happened in the near month since I have last posted. I have been caught up in a whirlwind of life and things to do and events and getting ready for the upcoming holidays.

My back has been an issue as always. I've had ups and downs with it and some days have been better than others. I've done my best to push through the pain and stay positive. There has been a lot of emotional stress not only with myself but in things outside my own personal struggles. My Grandmother broke her leg and she and my Grandpa have recently left the nursing home they were staying in while Grandma was recovering. They are home now and trying to get things back to normal with the help of my parents. Grandma recently celebrated her 85th birthday. For my part, being so far away, I can only talk to them over the phone and thanks to my Dad, I've been able to video chat with them over the computer. He sets it up for them and it's very nice to not only hear them but see them.

My Christmas present from my parents this year was an eye exam and a new pair of glasses. Hooray for being able to see without squinting! At first I wasn't sure if I liked the frames I picked out but now I really do think I like them. I simply had to get used to them. And with that I feel exceptionally spoiled. Skoora's parents gave me the money to order two pairs of jeans. They are on back order and won't be in until February but that suits me just fine. The two pairs I have can hold out until then especially since I wear my clothes until they give out completely. Also, I have friends who are spoiling me by sending/ giving gifts. Sometimes I feel out of place knowing I am getting things. It seems so strange in a way I can't really explain. I am so used to trying to make others happy or make sure everyone else has gifts during the Christmas season that I don't really stop to think that others are trying to do the same for me. Then again, and don't think that I am or have been ungrateful or that there will ever be a time where I am not grateful or very appreciative of what others do for me, but I have never really taken gifts or compliments very well. It's like I don't know what to do with myself or something. I am always so thrilled, excited, and tickled but feel like I need to do more to repay all the nice things that I sometimes forget to say thank you or stumble all over myself saying it too much. Or maybe I just express myself awkwardly.

That said, I think I startled Skoora a little when we took two ornaments off the giving tree at Wal-mart. The little girl we choose really likes Monster High. Skoora and I had picked up Monster High dolls on Black Friday for each other and since we really don't have a lot of money ourselves, I unwrapped mine and put it in the gift bag for the girl. I don't think that's really all that extraordinary considering that I know Skoora is getting me another of the Monster High dolls that I like. It kind of reminded me of when I was little and I gave the Ewok toy my parents had gotten me to the Goodwill so someone else could play with it. It's not exactly the same thing and really a 28 year old probably shouldn't be playing with dolls anyway, it's not a necessity or even practical but it is a fun thing.

I don't know maybe I am just worried about collecting too many thing that I don't have places for at the moment, things I may have to put in the garage until Skoora and I have a place of our own. I dream about a place of more permanency, literally. I want it so much and even have ideas of how I want each room to look, themes and furniture. I've made plans for plans and some how that seems a little excessive.   

I'm not sure I am making much sense. It is after 5 in the morning and I can't sleep but I am really tired. With all of that, I have been feeling kind of odd lately. I don't know whether it is the depression playing around with me or what exactly but I've been feeling kind of off about Christmas. Of course there is a lot I am dealing with as far as the holiday season goes. We have been going going going since when I can't really remember. Skoora's Mom is going to Kansas and she left me in charge of Christmas but can't seem to make up her mind about how we should handle which presents to open and when. We have every weekend filled with something. We've been scrambling around trying to get all the presents complied, made, and ordered and wrapped to be sent. I've been wrapping presents here and there. I finally finished the quilt for my Grandparents and had to have help toward the end. And I am trying to scratch out some alone time with Skoora before she leaves for her first residency at the beginning of January. There has been lots of worry on my end with all of it and I have been so tired. I've felt more drained and worn out than ever before. The back pain doesn't help but I've done all I can do to make that tolerable.

The good news is that I have probably annoyed half the librarians in the area with the amount of books I've placed holds on. I'm doing a ton of research on the Victorian period and have even tried playing with hair styles.

Okay I think that's enough for now. It's 6 am and I am finally sleepy enough to try and sleep so I think I will.