Under the Arch

I've tried several times to write an entry about my music taste, you will soon see why this is so difficult. ;)

I've spent the last two days deathly ill....ok, not really, but I tend to get overly-dramatic about such things. I've had the flu and missed 2 days of work, which I HATE. I'm the dependable one, who always shows up and always gets things done, but I'm sure there will be a discussion about why I don't have a doctor's note. I've never gone to the doctor for the flu, ever. I mean, come on, it's the flu, not scarlet fever. It's not like they can do anything other than waste their time telling me to drink plenty of fluids and get some rest. Done and done. Sorry, that just irritates me. As soon as someone would like to pay for me to see a doctor for an everyday illness just so I can hand them a piece of paper verifying said illness, I would be happy to go. Until then, I'd be happy to let you come over and take my temperature. ;) I need to get out of retail. le sigh

You know I don't get political here, I save that for comments and support for others braver than I, but I have to say something about this 'cause I'm hormonal and in tears over Prop 8 in California. My blogging friend, Jason, recently got married to his husband after being together for 14 years. Their happiness was short-lived, however, because of this ridiculous attempt to overturn the rights of same sex couples to get married. If you live in California, and I know that I have a few regular readers there, please, please, please vote NO on Prop 8! Don't let the religious nutjobs win. Ok, rant over, thank you. ;)

The Queen of Spain says it more eloquently than I do. :)

I made a little trip to the east side (Illinois for all of those following along at home) Tuesday night to meet some friends for dinner and trade cars with my parents who were about to go on a trip and needed their minivan back. After crossing the Mississippi into Illinois you have to pick a highway to follow, either I64 or I55/I70. Since my normal route to Edwardsville, IL to hang out with friends means I take the I55/I70 way, I wasn't paying as close of attention as I should have and automatically went that way, even though I needed to take I64 to Fairview Heights. (I know this is terribly boring, but there is a point to this, I promise.) Realizing immediately that I was going the wrong direction, I got off the highway at the next available exit and followed signs to get me to the right highway...which of course took me through East St. Louis (duh duh duuuuh!). Now, I'm not scerred and, frankly, I've spent time hanging out in East St. Louis back when I was living with a photographer who paid the bills working at the Casino Queen, but this was a detour I'll never forget cause what I saw there will be burned into my mind for all time and not in a good way. I was coming up on a stop sign and I could see the truck in front of me swerve to avoid hitting what looked like a woman running down the middle of the road. I was of course concerned until I got a little closer and could see her more clearly...."Oh my god, is she NAKED?!" Yep. Wearing shoes and a bright white bra and NOTHING else!! Other than making sure I didn't hit her I tried very hard not to see anything else because OH MY GOD THERE IS A NAKED WOMAN RUNNING!! RUNNING DOWN THE ROAD AND SHE IS NAKED!! AND WHAT I CAN SEE IS JIGGLING ABOUT AND MY EYES!! I have no idea what she was doing or why she was naked and I DON'T WANT TO KNOW. Whew! But Then!!!
Last night at work, a girl walked up the cash counter and asked for an application. This is a regular occurance, and I thought nothing of it until I realized that though I thought she was wearing a tube top over jeans or some other bottoms, she was in fact wearing a tube top as a dress and her bare ass cheeks were hanging out the bottom. Yes. she. DID! I watched in horror as she walked out of the store and hitched up the toddler on her hip at which point I saw entirely too much of her anatomy. I'm telling you, I'm scarred for life. FOR LIFE. She couldn't feel a draft? Did she just forget about pants, or you know, underwear? REALLY? AND THEN YOU ASK FOR AN APPLICATION FOR EMPLOYMENT? I've seen everything now and it just boggles the mind, seriously.

Updated below!

(Title is stolen from inspired by something Heather B. said and I think Susan quoted. It's been stuck in my head ever since.)

You may remember my previous rant about this, what I haven't told you is that it happened again...and again...and again. Over and over and over....

It's enough to make anyone lose their shit, seriously. One night, while waiting at the bus stop with a friend from work, a guy on a motorcycle went by THREE TIMES to look me over. At the BUS STOP with OTHER PEOPLE STANDING ABOUT!! Luckily, he didn't say anything, because I've lost all patience with this nonsense and...well, hold on, we'll get to that. My work friend asked me what I was so upset about and so I told her that when I am out walking about, guys assume I'm a hooker and I don't understand why or what to do about it! She looked at me and shook her head sadly, "Oh, sweetie, it's cuz you're white." Wha? "In the city, the only white women walking are hookers or crackheads" "Well that's. just. great!" Wait!! It gets better!!

On another night, we were both standing at the same bus stop again, but near the corner so we could watch for our separate buses. I had my back to traffic and we were talking about something when she said, "Uh, oh. Here we go again." "Don't tell me, they're checking me out" "Uh, huh." And then I heard it. "Hey, baby, need a ride?" Fuck. Boy, were they surprised when I whipped around and said, "NO, I DON'T need a RIDE!!" And then, of course, the guy in the passenger seat tossed out, "Well it's looks like you need a ride since you're waiting for the bus!!" Brilliant come back, buddy. As the light turned green, and they started to pull away, though, my friend had a much better one, "She doesn't need a ride from your ugly ass in the PASSENGER SEAT!!"** I laughed so hard, I was crying. Wait!! It still gets better!!

A couple of nights ago, I was waiting at the bus stop alone and in the 45 minutes I had to sit there, one guy honked at me, another stopped WAY before the intersection so that he could leer at me, another guy walking on the opposite side of the street made kissy noises at me and then not one, but two cars pulled over to the curb where I was sitting, on a bench, in the inclosure that was clearly a bus stop. The first one was a little car with 2 hispanic guys in it. They pulled right up to the curb, stared at me and then HONKED THE HORN!!! Yeah. I was talking on my cell phone, but paused long enough to tell them that I was waiting for a bus and made the shoo motion with my hand, then as they pulled away I shouted, "BY THE WAY I'M NOT A FUCKING WHORE!!!" At this point, I'm thinking, please, enough, I can't take much more of this. But no, the second vehicle, a truck this time pulled up, once again, right to the curb and the hispanic guy inside grinned at me. Once again, I had to tell him I'm waiting for the bus and he grinned some more and chirped, "Ok!" (Yes, chirped.) Yeah, yeah, yeah, go away!! I could tell you more, but really, the whole thing is exhausting and I can't get a car fast enough. Really. My life, ladies and gentlemen. I couldn't make this shit up. ((le sigh))

**Remember that song "No Scrubs" by TLC? I totally get that song now! It's always the asshole in the passenger seat with the worst nonsense to say.

Update: It doesn't seem to have anything to do with me, it doesn't matter what I'm wearing, it just seems to have to do with the part of the city I live in. I look around and see a great mix of people, but maybe I'm the only one, I don't know. There's just something about alone+white+female in my part of the city that says hooker to those that patron that sort of thing. My mom told me a few days ago that I'll be able to borrow a family car soon, so my public transportation days are numbered.

I was in a car accident this morning. Some idiot in a borrowed car without a license or the English to communicate ran a red light, and though I tried to stop, I hit him. I'm fine, bruised but fine. My car, though, she is fucked. Of course, all this happens 4 days before getting on a plane. Fuck. Just fuck. I'm completely exhausted and uncomfortable and fully expect to be wearing nasty bruises from my seat belt to BlogHer. More later, I'm going back to bed.

Hee. Shud up.

My friend Dan is back in Kandahar from his first mission. He sent me a message on Myspace telling he was back, so I could stop hyperventilating. Sad, but true. I was so happy to be able to talk to him again, even if it was only by Yahoo messenger that I freaked him out a little bit. He said I was being all lovey dovey. (basically I wasn't calling him an ass every other minute) He couldn't figure out what was going on with me, so he asked if I'd gotten laid. No. I have not. Thanks for rubbing it in. ASS. There we go, back to normal.

My friend A from work and I are going to get all dressed up and go see Sex and the City. She is super excited and frankly, so am I. (Wheee! Socializing! With other people!)

Small rant: I get it that many women's self esteem is connected to their body and self image, I get that, but please for the love of god, Please! DO NOT FOOL YOURSELF ABOUT WHAT YOU CAN WEAR! I'm not talking about style, here. In my opinion, style is almost completely about attitude. With the right attitude, you can sell just about anything. BUT. The rest of your body may be a size small, but your boobs are double D's. Double D's will NOT fit in a small anything. They are not small. Accept it! They're not going anywhere. I don't mind getting you another size, but COME ON. Self delusion much? Ok, rant over.

Best comment overheard at work today:
"I just got new boobs and they won't fit in this. How awesome is that?!" (if you could have seen her, SO funny, she was adorable and REALLY excited about those boobs) (this was not the woman I was talking about in my rant)

Best comment overheard at work yesterday:
"I know, but I didn't get to sleep 'til like 5." "Why?" "Well I was lying there and just about to nod off, when you rolled over on me. Like, completely on top of me, and I don't know if you've noticed, but you're not exactly small, are you?" (my eyes were watering, it was all I could do to hold the laughter in until they left the store)

I will be away this weekend, visiting the family and I don't know what sort of internet access I'll have so if you don't hear from me for a couple of days, that' s what happened. I'll try to remember to twitter from my cell phone, but being inherently lazy and scatterbrained, who knows if that will happen. On the agenda for the weekend is a LOT of photography. The whole family (mom, dad, brother, sister and nephew) is having a portrait done as a complete family. The last time we had a family portrait done was when my brother was little bitty. He's 21. Yeah, it's been a while. My mom HATES having her picture taken, I have a total of three photos of my parents together in my apartment. One is their wedding picture....yeah. So, my sister, queen of the guilt trips conned my mom into this, for Mother's day. She used our grandma, my mom's mom against her. My sister is a genius. THEN, after all that "fun", I agreed to do a portrait session of my nephew in his tuxedo. My adorable little nephew was asked to be the ring bearer in my brother's friend Mark's wedding. After the photo session and before the wedding, we are going to a local museum which has beautiful grounds for an outdoor photo session with my monkey boy. Sunday is my grandma's birthday and my cousin's baby shower. It's a jam packed weekend, but I'll be back for Naked Monday and as soon as I get the nephew shots edited, I'll post the best ones here. (I'm going have to figure out the watermark thing.)

One last thing. My friend MP is moving and I'm thinking about following her. It's a decision I've been heading to for a while now, but I still need to work out some details, first. I'll keep you posted!

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Step one: Notice your manager calling your name from the register.

Step Two: Use your woman powers to read her facial movements pointing you in the direction of potential shoplifters.

Step Three: Ask potential shoplifters if they are finding everything okay and if they need any help.

Step Four: Smile pleasantly at their, "No, thank yous" and busy yourself straightening messy clothes racks nearby.

Step Five: When they stare at you, seeming more interested in your presence than the clothes in front of them, continue to smile blankly and attempt to look busy and overwhelmed. (This should not be difficult.)

Step Six: As they wander aimlessly about the front section of the store, growing more and more uncomfortable, pull mislaid items from clothes racks and mutter to yourself about "filthy customers" and "not your fucking mother". Stay within 5-10 feet of suspected shoplifters at all times, mostly for your own amusement.

Step Seven: Listen as one of the women answers her phone and tells person on the other end about the "fucking bitch" who is following her around the store and all she wants is a long sleeved t-shirt, but she can't find one and the "fucking bitch" won't leave her alone.

Step Eight: Start to feel embarrassed, but realize that backing off won't do any good at this point and refuse to give her the satisfaction.

Step Nine: Watch as woman goes to register and throws tantrum that would shame a three year old, alerting entire store to drama.

Step Ten: Smile pleasantly as woman approaches you and demands your name. Give it to her and try not to laugh in her face.

Step Eleven: Watch as she stomps dramatically from the store in self-righteous rage, raise arms in the air and say, "That's right, I rawk!!"

Before anyone reads this and gets huffy, she and her friend were caught last week trying to forcibly remove a security tag from a shirt. After her dramatic exit, we were informed that she has actually been banned from the mall altogether. Had we known, we could have charged her with trespassing. She was not legally supposed to even be there. But, yeah, I'm the bad guy. Meanwhile, if she were to be stupid enough to call corporate and complain about me or "file a comment" as she put it, I would probably get a bonus for a job well done.

So...my female issues this week have given me a sense of unreasonable anger that I have been taking out on everyone around me. (I apologized to my co-workers ahead of time just in case, it was that. bad.)

I decided to take a walk to return a movie to the redbox tonight and I asked my friend if she would stay on the phone with me as I walked since, well, I don't live in the best neighborhood.

The walk was uneventful until I was almost back to my building and I walked past a truck idling on the curb. I was trying to avoid eye contact, cuz that what I do, when the guy sitting in the truck said, "Hey", so to be polite I said, "Hey" back.

NO GOOD DEED GOES UNPUNISHED PEOPLE!!!!

I kept walking and heard him say, "You working tonight?", but since that didn't make any sense to be said to me, I figured he was talking to someone else. But he repeated himself. "You working tonight?" I literally looked down at myself to make sure I was still wearing the outfit I put on earlier. "Uh, no. I just walked to the grocery store and back." He couldn't hear me over the truck and I had to repeat myself a couple of times until he said, "Oh, well I thought you were working." "Well, I'm not." And I hurried a little faster, incensed and muttering to my friend. What the fuck? Who says that? How could you possibly look at what I'm wearing and think hooker? Was that a come on? What was I supposed to do, simper and assure him that I may look expensive, but I'm just easy? (Are you seeing why I had to apologize to co-workers?) I told my friend that it was a good thing I had been on the phone with her, I probably would have shot my mouth off and gotten kidnapped or worse. I took a picture. Oh YES I DID! So be brutally honest...do I look like a hooker to you?



This was almost immediately after getting back to my apartment. Sorry it's a little blurry, but I was still pissed.

If you missed it on the twitter, I called my landlord yesterday to tell him about the ghetto neighbors who have caused me never-ending grief. At 4:30am I was woken up from a dead sleep to hear "You Fucking Bitch!!!" and a thump. Terrified, I laid in my bed, waiting for my heart to stop racing so that I could go back to sleep. It took a while.

I was exhausted all day at work and it took me 3 tries to count down my cash drawer. I was so frustrated, I was nearly in tears. By the time I left, I was done. I wasn't going to just take it anymore. They shouldn't be able to pull this crap without consequences.

I called my landlord before I even started the car and told him how frustrated I was, how often I had been woken up by their nonsense, how I had contemplated calling the police, and why I hadn't. He promised to talk to her and that he would tell her it was next door who had complained about noise. He also said that if it ever happened again, I should call him and if it ever seemed like the fighting was getting out of hand, I should definitely call the police.

When I got home, I talked to the woman who lives in the end apartment (she shares a wall with them) and told her what I had done. Turns out, she called the landlord, too, the very same day! Here's hoping they get kicked out, or at least aren't allowed to renew their lease.

To hear about the crap that they've been pulling, you can read here, and here.

• Teenagers annoy the crap out of me. I didn't like them when I WAS one. This is why I will never teach high school, I'm afraid I would kill them.
• The new job is going very well. It would go even better if customers would stop messing up my shit. I love helping people find something that makes them feel fabulous. Now if they would just stop touching everything when I get it just so. Hee.
• A girl came up to me tonight and said, no joke, "I need a dress that hugs every curve of my body. You have anything like that?" (She ran her hands down her body as she said it, too.) My first thought was, are you sure? Have you looked in the mirror lately? I don't think that's the best plan. What I said was, "I'm sorry, I'm afraid that the fashion right now is high waisted and flowing." Her friend agreed with me and they moved on. Lord.
• I'm still laughing about embarrassing Mason at Denny's...and I'm going to leave it at that.
• My hair. I really want a new hairstyle, but I can't decide for the life of me and Whoorl has a really long waiting list. Poo.
• I had to buy a new a new router/modem thingy for my DSL. It was more money than I wanted to spend. I almost cried. But, everything works now and I can chat with my friend Dan again.
  
• My Grandma sent me a card for my birthday and it made me cry. Here, I'll show you.....
  
• My Mom and Dad sent me a card that made me laugh.....It's funny because it's true.
  

That's it. I'm tired.

If you are following my twitter, you may have noticed that I went out to my car this afternoon to run some errands, only to discover that my battery was dead. I was at a complete loss to figure out what had happened and was mentally planning how to get to class the next day, when I looked down and saw that my headlights were still on, and had been on for several hours. It's unbelievable the stupid shit I will do when half asleep. (don't even get me started on the day I couldn't find my keys and finally found them in the deadbolt on the OUTSIDE of my front door, where that had been all day)

Well that explains things......

I tried Amy, the girl with the giant dog, and though she didn't have any jumper cables, she suggested we try Kelly, who lives in the apartment beneath her. I'll spare you the details of how we got my car going again, but I will tell you that the logistics of doing so on a one way street is pretty interesting. I just have to say that I'm glad that I have such friendly and helpful women living in my building.

After we got it going and I drove it around a bit to give it time to charge up, I came back to find them still on the porch, talking. Amy had heard her clothes washer going this afternoon and assumed that Kelly was using it. (they had a sort of agreement that Kelly was free to use it when Amy wasn't) But, when Amy asked if she was almost done, Kelly thought Amy was doing laundry. The ghetto neighbors strike again! After I got wise to their nonsense, I made sure that something was always in my washer so that they couldn't use it. Rather than being adults about it and, I don't know, going to a laundrymat (or ASKING my permission to use the appliances I had paid for), they started using Amy's. We started discussing all the crap they have done lately, (including leaving the back door unlocked!) and debating what to do about it. We didn't make any decisions, but at least now we all have a better idea about what's going on.

I love my apartment, and the girls are awesome, but all it takes is one idiot to ruin it for everyone. Fuckers.

So, I've been trying to get my apartment in order this past week, a little at a time and today was the day I carried things down the back stairs to the basement. It's about two and a half floors down to where my laundry and storage area resides. I made a multitude of trips up and down and up and down...talked to the girl who lives across the hall from me...pet her giant dog...and bashed the crap out of my knee. If you've seen my Naked Monday posts, you know that I regularly sport bruises on my legs, most of the time I couldn't even tell you what I did, but tonight I managed to hit my knee on a filing cabinet in such a way that pain shot up my leg and exploded in my brain. It still hurts like a son of a bitch and what should have turned my whole leg black and blue left one teeny tiny bruise on my kneecap. Bloody hell. We have progress, though. Soon my apartment will look like someone actually lives here, rather than someone is just storing stuff here. le sigh. As I finish, I'll try to post pictures...I found the pictures I took of my empty apartment the other day...we can do a little comparison...it'll be fun....or something. Gah, I'm going to bed.

I've been wearing glasses or contacts since I was 10, and, boy, are they a pain in the ass. I've started to realize recently that my contacts aren't cutting it anymore and my prescription has probably changed. I hate going to the eye doctor, it's always the same...you're wearing your contacts too long, you should be more concerned with your eye health...blah, blah, blah. When you are a poor college student with no health insurance, you make things last as long as humanly possible...and then some. Not the smartest, I know, but you do what you gotta do. Ugh, enough of my bitching, here's the pics to go with this Naked Monday......



Ok, ignore the fact that I need an eyebrow wax, please. So, there I am, naked, at least a small part of me.

• DON'T walk around putting all your weight in each step. If anything rattles when you move about, try not walking like a sasquatch, k?
• DON'T start an argument at 5am before leaving for work. Just because you are up that early, doesn't mean anyone else is.
• DON'T use a washing machine if you don't own it. Nuf' said.
• If you are going to use other people's appliances, DON'T use their soap and then make it really obvious that you are doing so by buying new soap when you have used all of theirs and leaving it there for them to find!!!!
• DON'T have screaming fights that require domestic disturbance calls to the police.
• DON'T taunt your crying baby. I can barely hear him/her, but you, imitating her only more loudly, I hear loud and clear. You ghetto fucktard. I hate you. Please die. Thanks.

Note: I haven't actually had to call the police, but I've thought about it several times. And they really do use my washing machine. At least I don't pay for water, could be worse.

This photo was taken this past saturday....


I wasn't trying to be cool here (or fierce), I was trying not to fall out of my chair. ;) I had an entry planned about all the weight I've lost recently, but I can't find photos that make the changes really clear. I'm about 5'8" tall. Currently, I weigh only 10 more pounds than I did in high school. This is not a good thing. The winter blues have really knocked me on my ass this year and food hasn't held any interest for me lately, which makes me all weak and sickly feeling. Basically, I feel like crap and none of my pants fit. I am incredibly annoyed with it all. To top it all off, my boobs are smaller, dammit.

p.s. I am not sharing this in any way to brag. I have been happier with my body at 150 pounds than I ever was at 115. I am taller than average and need the padding or I have no curves AT ALL. My boobs! Are shrinking! Gah! I'm just sharing and letting it all hang out.

I'm losing my brain. Seriously. You just go along, singing a song, a boring one at that and BAM!! Something happens and it just throws your whole world off its axis. And you're like "Wait a minute! Yeah, life sucked, but I understood the suckage in all its monotony and sludge. What you're doing here? It's confusing and I just don't have the time to figure you out right now. I've got my own stuff, and if your stuff isn't going to enhance, improve, make me happy in my pants, I don't really want to deal with it. Make it worth my while, my friend, I'm tired and cranky and yearning for spring. Seriously."
Is that clear? No?


* I'm hoping for happy in my pants, but I'm not gonna hold my breath.

I was leaving to....well I don't really remember why I went out to my car, but I was about to put the key in the door when I saw the glass in the passenger seat.

"No, no, no. Please tell me I'm imagining things!"

The passenger window was gone, and so was my cheap ass stereo.

"Fuck!!"

I would have been in better shape if the car had been stolen. Seriously. Some idiot broke my window, which is going to cost me $265 to get fixed so that they could get away with a 8 year old stereo that originally cost me $100. So, what, they could get $5-$10 from a pawn shop for it? Will that even buy half a crack rock? I'm so livid right now, I can't stop tearing up, which is my go to reaction for strong emotion.

Also, when I called my Dad to tell him about it I dropped the f-bomb at least twice. I doubt he was upset, but I don't curse in front of my parents.

My parents are being kind enough to pay for the repair since I am in my last semester of school and don't exactly have $265 lying around. (Did I mention that my job at school is no more because they decided to close the office earlier this semester?) So, I'm broke, I have a broken window and no stereo in my car. This. sucks.

p.s. Anyone have any suggestions for having a stereo in a crappy car that doesn't shout, "STEAL ME!"