Everything came up milhouse!

Today was kickass good. here are some excerpts and photos as needed.

I didn't go to bed until 5:30am (at least), but managed to wake up at 11:30am. This is a serious accomplishment. AND I didn't nap. I was tempted to, and I was laying with Floof for a bit, but no sleeping occurred.

Around 1pm or so I remembered that I needed to move my car. I had parked it illegally in a "permit only" zone. I feared the worst - ticket? A big yellow boot on my tire? Towed to the impound lot? I got to my car to see...nothing. The lovely Boston area ticket-issuing community looked over my car, but gave tickets to others. I swiftly moved my car back into the driveway, where it is safe from the wicked hand of the Boston Parking Devil.

I watched a few episodes of Kate & Allie on Netflix, and decided being without a TV is probably for the best right now. In between episodes, I cleaned the kitchen, ran the dishwasher twice and made myself some lunch. Everyone knows that I love fast food more than I love...well, something. But I really need to utilize the food I have in-house.

I showered (yay me!) and met my TV-purchasing buddy at my storage unit. While waiting, I chatted with my dad, who seemed happy to talk but got on my case about job hunting... meh. He said I seem to be able to come up with a reason to not apply to anything. I shot him down and told him I applied to a bunch of places yesterday - namely New Balance, WGBH (local PBS station) and Sam Adams (yay!). Hopefully someone gets back to me next week.

The new owner of my Sony giganta-screen TV met me and loaded her prize into a van. I decided to poke around in my storage space to see if I could find my jewelry (see earlier entry on this one. Bring kleenex.), and low and behold I found a box that wasn't taped up! Anyone who has seen me pack knows that I wrap, tape and label EVERY SINGLE BOX and to find one sitting wide open was a great sign. I peeked inside and saw a few VHS tapes which could only mean one thing - BEDROOM ITEMS! A little deeper, I found my jewelry boxes, as well as a huge collection of toys that had gone MIA. I called Jen to update her on this amazing find and was on my jolly way to the grocery store.

Aaah...the grocery store. I think Lissa knows better than anyone else what it's like to shop with me. I always start in the paper goods/cat food area, work my way through the middle aisles, then produce then frozen. Trust me, this makes sense. If you start where the entrances are (produce, frozen food, bakery and dairy), everything will get warm/squished/melty/gross by the time you are ready to check out. So I stuck to my list (another Laura quirk) and picked up cat food, sammich-makings, milk, a box of on-sale pasta, trash bags, gloves (you'll see why in a bit), and some cheapy one-serving ice creams. Portion control is so under-rated. The sales that I came across knocked me over. My favorite cookies were 50% off! Rice crisps were $1.49 !! A HEAD of romaine lettuce was 99 cents!! I walked out of there with 5 bags of groceries for $40. I'm still amazed with myself.

After three trips up and down the stairs I managed to unload the groceries, a bag of dry cleaning that needs to be added to before I drop it, some clothes and the box of goodies from storage. The night has been spent in shifts of Kate & Allie, putting things (sort of) away, cleaning the kitchen, reading, and plotting the downfall of those who try and stop me.

Cleaning the kitchen was...interesting. I was in CT for 5 nights, and came home to a dishwasher half-full of dirty dishes and a sink so overflowing with filth that I couldn't even fit a little cat dish to fill with water. I decided to leave if for a day to see if anything was done...but no such luck. So today I took care of the dishes, scrubbed most of the counters (COVERED in random spills), emptied out the fridge (minus a few things that were questionable and I don't want to step on toes), took an ice pick to the three inches of water growing in the freezer (FUN!!! I may offer it as something for guests to play with) and eventually I knew I had to face the trash can.

Before I left, we had run out of contractor trash bags for our gigantic 50-gallon trash barrel we use for all the kitchen garbage (read: stinky). As it is, the trash can smelled like frat vomit, so the last thing it needed was direct exposure to the cause of stink. I can't figure out who started it, but by the time I got home, there was a pile at least up to my chest of trash, and lots over over-spill all around. There were bugs. It was a bad scene. So I put on my gloves, grabbed some smaller draw string bags, and went to work. Six bags later, I had come across the following:
-banana peels
-onions
-stuffed peppers, rotting away
-blood dripping from meat packages
-tomatoes
-rotting burgers or chicken patties or something similar
-enough soda cans to fill my gas tank if cashed in for $.05 deposits

After completely emptying the trash barrel, I put it on the porch to air out (and maybe to hide it so nobody will fill it up again for a few days until it is stink free).

Now that my life is cleaner, I can eat my rotini with mushroom & green pepper sauce and pecorino without a care in the world. sigh.


Oh and some photos from the day:

The aftermath of my trash-bagging. There was some that I couldn't reach without falling down the stairs, I will conquer it in daylight.





One of the finds in the box I took back from storage. Ohhhhh yeah....

when she called my sneakers tennis shoes, I knew she was from the west coast.

I'm trying to get all the neediness out of my system by listening to songs just up to the brink of the 24 hour rule. I Am The Avalanche is playing across the street from me and I am dumbfounded by the luck of this show.
1. location. I can sit on my porch and drink during the first three bands, then wander down to the show, look for a spot to watch the band but not get clobbered by sobbing 18 year olds, and then head to the Model or back to the porch to enjoy the rest of the evening.
2. date. As One Fest is also this weekend. Sure, I would love to see Underdog etc., but I am definitely feeling socially awkward and outnumbered at this event.
3. cost. One of my most steady reliables can guarantee that I won't have to spend 50% of my current life savings to get in to this show. (it I was to attend As One, it would cost me gas, liquor, entrance fee, food, etc.)
4. others in attendance. Anyone who would have made my night a bumout and motivated me to go back home will be in CT. I can relax and be myself.


Also, it's raining today. Who wants to drive to CT in the rain? Not this kid.

CNN is whack.

Dear Chinese earthquake,

Please sit down. You're blocking my view of the cyclone in Myanmar.

Love,
me.

nothing. really.

Things going on:

-I was laid off 5 weeks ago due to "trust issues". Still not sure what that means. The guy who lives next door to me took my job within 8 hours. No exaggerating. Being best friends with the boss definitely has its perks. My stuff from my desk has been sitting in my car since April 9th...I just don't want to take it out yet.

-Newbury Comics is also fighting my unemployment claim. The didn't give me any severance or form of income, so minus cleaning out my savings accounts and the $600 tax stimulus, I have had no income for 5 weeks. I'm down to ehh...$100. Let's see how I pay rent in 2 weeks. Should be interesting...I'm open to any suggestions. Scratch-offs aren't working, Jefferson was dead on when he called them my ticket to perpetual poverty.

-I have 12 separate credit card collection companies calling me for money that I don't have. You read that right. TWELVE. So if you've been calling me and I don't answer, that's why. It's become so annoying that I am now at the point of turning my phone off all day, then checking my texts and voice mails at 4am.

-In addition to these credit cards, I have the following bills: storage unit full of all my furniture that I can't fit into my current apartment, car payment, car insurance that doesn't exist right now (so please don't deface my car or I'm fucked and you will be too) - once I pay the balance of $3200 I am back on the road, parking tickets (if I park on a city street, I will get a big yellow boot on my tire), Northeastern tuition (they call me 2x a day too)...a few others that are slipping my mind too.

-My TV is broken. When moving into a different room, I dropped it and somehow severed the cord and now it sits in my room as a prop. I watch DVDs on my lappy and go into Matt's room to watch Lost. I suppose this could be considered a +, but I just don't see it.

-I am single. I have jealousy issues. Don't ask. Sit on it.

-I have no health insurance as of Friday, which means I am breaking some uber queer MA state law. I will be spending tomorrow getting my drugs, because I haven't had them since Thursday.

-Lissa is giving me the silent treatment because I blew her off a few weeks ago. Understandable, but sucks nonetheless. More to say on this but I really don't want to dwell and get sad.

-I lost my jewelry boxes when I moved in the winter and I just realized it at 2am. generations of my family's jewelry is now MIA. (this is what finally drove me to cry for the first time since I got fired.)

I am struggling to think of positive things I've got going on right now, but so far it's this:
+Floof sits next to me all day long in my fortress of solitude
+I have been making a lot of crafty things
-the boys (and my friends) all call me the best second grade artist in town. Ouch.
side note: maybe I will make a tribute to Jor-el and Lara that I can hang in here. totally fitting. If you get that reference, get at me. We will drink beer. You will probably have to buy.

ok back to business:
+Jammy is a little less wild, and doesn't bite nearly as much
+my IKEA plants are starting to blossom in the window, when Jam doesn't knock them over
+I have been minimizing the clothes/crap in my life and am trying to thin everything out. I drop things at clothing/shoe/book/etc drop boxes and it makes me feel better to know someone else it going to be excited to get some never-worn apple bottoms.

Tomorrow I'm going to put up the photos of my mommy, I'm really hoping that will help me pull myself together and stop being sososoooo sad and miserable.

Or I will just make a tribute to Kryptonians. That seems much more likely.

an open letter to alcohol...

Dear booze,

This morning I woke up with the worst sour stomach I've had in ages. I don't get it - when did we get to this point in our relationship? I realize and will acknowledge that I haven't always been faithful. I prefer to think of it as variety, but I never consider the "quality over quantity" factor. Lately you make my sick to my stomach. I can't say that I haven't had these feelings in the past, but when they revisit me it just stays as a constant reminder of how blatantly cruel you can be.

Does it amuse you to make me into a social Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? I invite people over, then sneak away from them and go to bed...who wants to be friends with a person who does that? I just took a long shower to try to wash away the memory of you. Unfortunately, I had a glass of milk before my shower, forcing a lovely vomit-induced reminder of how you really feel about dairy products.

I think it may be time for us to take a break from each other. We both know that I've said this before, and it may only last for a few months, weeks, days or hours, but I really need to re-evaluate our relationship and approach this from a new angle, with a clear mind and a full belly.

Now if you don't mind I am going to try to sleep this one off and hopefully not be reminded of things I broke - including promises.