my body is at war.

So, hey.

There is such a thing as having zero dignity left, and I've been there. Recently.

It's called a 24 hour 'bug', and it always wins. You see, even the strongest of intestinal fortitude can't stand up to such a formidable foe.

This little virus proclaims "I will fuck with all of your plans, and there is nothing you can do about it until I'm finished!" And it's right and it's serious and it makes even seeing a picture of any sort of food item make you scamper to the bathroom to kneel to the porcelain god.

Without going into all the details, I've been expelling bile from every viable hole in my body for the past 36 or so hours. Neon yellow.

It's ugly.


ANYWAY.

Since I actually have less than a second of spare time this week to deal with illness, I'm back at work today. Partially because I discovered yesterday that daytime television is teeming with commericials for the elderly, unemployed, uneducated, and those in need for personal injury lawyers- None of which is my own personal demographic. And partially because if I didn't come to work today, I'd be burning ALL the PTO time I've managed to accrue. ALL OF IT.

Nothing bums me out more than realizing that I actually give one good goddamn about accruing PTO. Ok, well maybe a couple of things, like when someone eats the last granola bar and leaves the box in the pantry. But, nothing about my own character.

But, um, no way I'm wasting my precious few hours of paid escape on being ill.

So, yeah. Awesome.


Also,


I'm taking the GRE in the morning.

I should definitely be freaking out about that right now, but it turns out that slipping while you get out of the shower because your center of gravity is out of whack and falling on your ass, causing you to puke all over your soaking wet, naked, miserable self is sort of distracting.

Here's hoping I make it to the exam.

XO Sare

my latest tawdry affair.... and The Superdouche

Oh, Monday.

Lovely little weekend we just had, eh?

Actually, Sunday was pretty lovely. Manfriend and I spent the majority of the day lying in bed, drinking mango mimosas and watching season two of Veronica Mars in our unmentionables. And just so you know, when I say 'the majority of the day,' I mean from three in the afternoon until we went to bed around eleven. That's eight hours. 

However, before the little bed soiree, we ended up at B-Dubs around noon, day drinking, which gets me SO excited, and watching hockey. I've recently discovered how fucking much I enjoy watching hockey.

The reasoning for this adoration is two-fold:

First of all, the way these men skate, weaving in and out and creating plays is downright beautiful. They just glide back and forth so quickly, and it leads me to think about how much trouble I have just standing up on skates, while they're taking all these awesome risks with it, and I absolutely love watching it.

WAYYY more importantly, the fights. I get a legitimate kick out of watching grown-ass men force one another into the glass at full speed and then throw their gloves down and start beating the ever-loving shit out of each other. Yesterday, my favorite player Dan Carcillo got into an altercation and I'm pretty sure he fucking spit out a tooth after he beat the piss out of some guy on the other team. His jersey was covered in blood. And no one broke it up until someone fell down. I'm personally nonviolent, but watching others duke it out in the heat of the moment? Yes, please.

So, we were meeting up with a friend of Manfriend's from his old job, who is painfully underage, but really, at this point anyone I meet who is underage is painfully so. This friend brought a person along whom I can only describe as The Superdouche.

I've never actually met anyone like The Superdouche in real space in time, though I've always heard rumors that people like him existed. He comes in, sauntering like he just had a threesome with the Oleson Twins, introduces himself as "Zach's best friend" without bothering to mention his given name and immediately makes it clear he'll be sitting with us, taking up space at a restaurant, watching a game he "doesn't give a shit about," while ordering nothing but water.

Without. Ordering. Anything. But. Water.

Ok, whatever, I'm often without fundage, I understand wanting to hang out with your friends but not being able to afford a single beer, even a Miller High Life; I've been there. But to fucking complain about your water being empty for fifteen minutes to a waitress that doesn't stand to make a dime off of you? Get a quarter and call someone who cares, dude. She's not fucking obligated to you at all. AT ALL. I speak for all members of the service industry who have ever had to deal with a fucking broke ass loser who acts entitled to being waited on hand and foot when I say:

 

DUDE, GO FUCK YOURSELF.

The Superdouche kept bringing up rugby and how awesome he is at it and how he plays "Pro" rugby. Right. I just wanted to be all "Oh really, why don't you move to New Goddamn Zealand where people actually watch/play/care about that sport?" No offense to rugby players, I know it's intense and brutal and challenging and all that shit, but seriously, don't talk my ear off about it when I'm trying to watch a bunch of guys slam into each other on purpose on ICE while chasing a little black disc around, because I'm a little busy, here.

Anyway, The Superdouche also had the double diamond studs going on in this ears and a shitty arm tattoo. In all honestly as soon as I saw the earrings I probably didn't even give him a chance, and that was before a solid stream of bullshit was directed at me for the next three hours. 

At one point, in an attempt to look important the Superdouche pointed out all the people he knew in the restaurant, including a blonde hostess he went to high school with, whom he described as "fat." Which, one more Woodchuck and I probably would have stumbled over the whole "Isn't that the pot calling the kettle black?" saying. Because friends, The Superdouche DEFINITELY isn't hitting the gym on the daily. Although he'd like everyone to believe he does. The Superdouche is unemployed and lives with his mother because, obviously. Oh, and by the way, blonde hostess, you are NOT fat.

The Superdouche must be incredibly popular despite my assessment, because he couldn't manage to put his phone down the entire three hours that he was sharing my air. Sharing. My. Air.

Anyway. it was an educational experience for me, which I got through partially because of this prior purchase, waiting in the car for me:

Um, if you've never smelled this scent, then you've never experienced real lust. I think Manfriend is just waiting to walk in on me making sweet, sweet love to a candle, realize it completely meets all my physical and emotional needs, and kick him to the curb.

Don't worry Manfriend, you probably give better backrubs. Although, Candle may be a better listener, he never interrupts. Have I mentioned that he smells like everything I've ever wanted in life, COMBINED?

XO Sare.

better late than never?

Happy New Year!

(the better-late-than-never addition)

Welp, in true Sara form, I've put off my new years resolutions until now. In case you didn't know, goal is the preferred term for those who are too cool to make resolutions, but actually are making resolutions while labeling it with the new title to disguise what they're up to. A GOAL made during the first month of the year is just a thinly veiled, to the point of being utterly ridiculous, RESOLUTION.

But before I get to that,  I'd like to say that I'm seriously losing hope in adult literacy. Maybe it's just the Midwest? The shit I see on Facebook is astounding. Typing the word 'ridiculous' reminded me of just how many of my 'friends' have been claiming things are 'rediculous' lately. What the fucking fuck is REDiculous?!" Is something red? Is someone bleeding? PLEASE, STOP THE MADNESS. SAVE THE WHALES. Fucking learn how to spell so you don't look like a damn fool all over the interwebz. Thanks. 

Ok, I'm ready to bring it down a few notches now.

So, without further ado, here's what I'd like to do in 2011. (Aside from eating more bacon, which is always a given.)

1.  Take Hally to the park at least 3 days a week.

The vague way that I intentionally wrote this leaves me to be able to load her into the car, drive her all the way to the park, say "We're here!" cheerfully, and then drive home if it's pouring rain and/or freezing. It says nothing about actually walking her while there. I'm basically a loophole genius. Law degree, please?

2.  Save fifty dollars a paycheck.

 Not to be touched until 2012.

To pay off my credit card. Hopefully.

...Defintely?

3.  Manage my time better.

Stop over-booking myself because I can't be bothered to keep track when I tell people I'll do things with them. Actually write it down. I'm not even popular, I just seem to have friends that like to plan things three months in advance on the same weekend. Then I'm all "OH, that's all the way in the future, I'll worry about it when it comes closer to time." For about three different things. And then I'm screwed and can't make everyone happy. I hate not being able to make everyone happy.

ALSO- Use time I set aside for things on THAT TASK, instead of coming out of a fog two hours behind schedule with toothbrush in hand and an alarmingly clean bathtub in front of me, half high from inadvertantly inhaling various cleaning agents, when I'm supposed to be going for a run.

3.  Read WAY more books.

I am not a supporter of moderation. Shocking, I know.

I consume the things that I find favorable voraciously and deal with the consequences when they're upon me. And those consequences, the little bastards, always find the exact least awesome time to flood on in.

But, I like it.

For instance, I get swept away by books. I'll start a book to read before bed for a little while every night like a normal person and then I'll look over at the clock and it's five in the morning and oh shit, I've been reading for six hours and I have to get ready for work in an hour and a half. But at least I've only got 100 more pages to go? Maybe I should just stay up and finish it? I'll drink a lot of coffee. I'll be fine.

It's always been this way, since I was a little girl. I'd hide out somewhere while the dog days of summer were languidly gleaning by with sprinklers to frolick through and ice cream trucks to chase and I'd be somewhere else completely. Don't get me wrong, I was still finding time to be a bossy-ass little tyrant, eat copious amounts of frozen juice products, and get lost in the woods, but somehow a book always accompanied me.

It's crossed my mind before that reading has become somewhat of a drug for me, and maybe it is. In the throughs of a good read, I'm  somewhere else, in a different state of mind, anyone I want to be, really. I'm feeling the spectrum, I'm laughing, I'm lost, and I'm always found. It's the same sensation as getting drunk or high, maybe, but without the risks or hangover. It's still just an escape from everyday reality. When I'm mid-novel, I don't worry about the $.68 in my bank account, or completely incompetent people at work, or even my fear of the future. It's incredible to just let your own life take a backseat to the lives of nonexisent beings.

When I'm reading, I turn off my mind completely to the truths of the life I'm actually living. If I'm heartbroken, it's because the protagonist is heartbroken, not because I'm heavy, so heavy with stress from my own world. I feel everything, and everything actually feels good, better than the everything I force myself to push to the side in the living breathing world of which I'm actually an active player. Often the characters in books are as real to me as the paper and binding I'm turning in my hands. And it helps. It's therapy. I know I like a book if I don't even have primary needs like eating or drinking, I know I love a book if I don't notice that I need to pee, or my legs are asleep, or my neck has gone completely stiff while I'm reading it.

It's always worth it and I'm usually emotionally exhausted at the end. Which is what I really needed anyway. Perhaps I'm emotionally inept, but at least I get my realease from reading.

Sometimes it's shocking for me to realize that not everyone feels the way that I do about reading. Not everyone uses literary escape as a coping mechanism for the aches and pains of everyday living. But, I do, and shit do I need an escape this winter, for my own sanity.

The spans of time in my life that I do the least reading can be divided into two, true to form, very polar explanations.


1. I'm in the lowest of lows.
2. I'm in the highest of highs.

I haven't been reading very much as of late, and I NEED to get back into it. So I'd say a book a week is a fair goal.

4. Pay bills on time. 

Why am I in my mid-twenties and STILL struggling with this? uhhhh.... ??? Seriously, I almost always have the money... I just.... forget to get online/mail in the payment? No. I seriously bet my credit score is terrible. It's got to be. UGH, all those fucking free credit report! commercials bombarding the media outlets just make me panic about it more. I need to do this.

5. Join a group

I really don't think I'm busy enough, and that's me being completely serious. I have waaaaaay too much time on my hands. I don't even care what kind of group I join, so long as it's not a cult. And even then, I'll consider it. 

Manfriend wants to join a boxing gym. Since I'm pretty much completely passive aside from verbal sparing, I'm not sure how I feel about this. We didn't even see The Boxer, but I'm not opposed to it, I guess- maybe just to see the spectacle of Christian Bale as a junkie. I swear that man changes his look more than Lady Gaga, except instead of outfits, it's his entire body.

Anyway, Manfriend apparently has lots of bottled aggression to take out physically on people with his fists,  which gives me some free time in the evenings that I will  probably shouldn't spend drinking wine by myself. So why not join a group that drinks wine together? Or a political group, or a volunteer group, or, book club that drinks wine!? I'm accepting suggestions. And wine.

6. Write more.

You know, I think this is pretty self-explanatory. I'd like to do some freelance, some blogging, some spirit journaling, all the basics. I never realized how much I rely on writing to air my concerns with the world, even if it's  just to myself, until this year. So, 2011, lets get literary all OVA DIS BIZNITCH.

7. Let people know how they make me feel/ what I expect from them.

I have feelings. It's pretty annoying most of the time. I have a lot of feelings toward my mother, specifically. I'm sure I'll write A LOT about how this little resolution is going regarding my mother. 

8. Take time for myself when I need it so I don't freak out later.

I will honestly flip a shit if I don't take enough time to just chill out and be by myself. I'm social, I love people, but seriously, I need to be by myself sometimes. Like, more than a normal person. This doesn't even include things like driving to and from work, reading, and watching shitty sitcoms because I'm too lazy to google random shit on the internet until I find something that entertains me. I. JUST. ENJOY. MY. OWN. COMPANY. 

Weird, eh? 

Cheers to less freaks outs this year!!!!!!

XO Sare

the end of an era.

Sometimes, I am the worst.

Or, as I prefer to look at it, sometimes the winter harrasses me to the point of near workplace panic attacks and complete seasonal bitchiness. To cope, I get wine-drunk on a Monday night, thanks to Lucky Duck reisling and forgetting to eat anything other than a Marie Calender frozen mac'n cheese all day, with my friends when I'm supposed to be studying for the GRE test that happens in less than two weeks and cost a cool $160.

This NEVER would have happened in the summer.

So yeah, that's what's up with me.

I'm wearing a silky shirt right now, begrudingly pulled in desperation this morning from the dwindling supply of clean shirts in my closet. It's at bare minimum two sizes too large for me and a ghastly shade of dark greenish blue. Slim pickings.  It's making me feel like a cross between a circus tent and a goddamn douglas fir. Not pretty.

Pretty much the only truly productive thing I've done today is doodle these creepy little faces into the corner of the schedule I made for myself regarding all things work related this week. 

If you look really hard, you'll find that I'm not very ambitious about my time management skills.

Meh.

However, if today's a bad day due to a hangover riddled with guilt, then yesterday was even worse due to trying to process too much neurotic thinking about the past at once, coming out of an intense fight with Manfriend on Sunday evening, and trying futiley to rationalize to myself why it's perfectly fine that I'm such an asshole and everyone else can fuck right off. I felt dizzy and disoriented all day. Yeahhhhhhh, one of those.

Settle in and let me tell you a little tale of my woes.  

When I was 21 years old I started smoking cigarettes to look cool. I was/am a fucking idiot. I was a bartender living on a white-trash island of drunks in Lake Erie and I wanted to be a part of that community sooooo bad.. because, well, it was fun, really, really fun. I also needed an excuse to spend more time with a boy I thought was cute, and he smoked cigarettes, Camel wides, which is just so fitting. 

I started puffing away when I was drunk and could bum one off of someone. Or when I needed a break at work, I'd go sit out back on the steps and puff away by myself for a blessed few moments of peace. And then I started buying my own packs before too long, and it was allllllll downhill from there. I didn't even know how to inhale for probably three months after this whole ordeal started and I definitely didn't realize what an ass-hat I was about it until I was actually already inhaling and hooked....On the boy, Terry, and the cancer sticks, which are probably honestly the two most unhealthy things I've ever done to myself in my life.  He's a story for another time, or more aptly, never.

What kind of intelligent, relatively healthy, active 21 year old just ::picks up:: smoking like a goddamn hobby? The kind that apparently also likes to tolerate being treated like shit and made to feel worthless!

Whatever, like I said earlier,  I'm an idiot. Chugging forward:

Three years later, Summer of 2010. Now those were times.

At this point, I've matured,  I've moved on, I'm in an alarmingly healthy relationship with my best friend, but yup, you guessed it, I'm still fucking puffing away on those cancer sticks. Which Manfriend despises, causing some serious dissent in otherwise the most blissful of times.

So I was basically on a cigarette diet, I'd shaved it down to about one pack a week. I mostly never smoked around Manfriend- I was half-assedly trying, I'd go two or three days without a smoke break, no big deal.

And then the bottom dropped out.

The way I remember it, I made a few drunken allusions towards trying to inxnay the abithay. Then one day I got an email from Manfriend, saying he was quitting chewing tobacco, hence, I would be expected to stop smoking. Like I mentioned I was going to do anyway... multiple times... without doing so whatsoever.

'FUCK,' I thought to myself, 'I'm not ready!" But I decided despite feeling pushed into this, I would try. For manfriend. Certainly not for my own health, or the way people percieve me, or financial reasons. I was doing it for him and everything was GREAT and it was hearts, stars, and horseshoes, clovers, and blue moons, pots of gold and rainbows, and the red balloon. Peachy fucking keen. For about three weeks.  

And then I got drunk. It was wasn't that big of a deal if one of my friends gave me a cigarette. I wasn't buying them. It was harmless, just one. It's never really just one.

I started slipping up more and more and feeling kind of deceptive and sneaky, but not in the cool Sydney Bristow, spy sense, in the guilty, I'm-a-fucking-liar, letting-my-manfriend-down sense.

And then I started to feel really resentful, which is kind of a scary feeling because it's like a hybrid of feeling angry and guilty and entitled at the same time. I started thinking along the lines of, "Manfriend is trying to change me, and I'm making all these sacrifices like, like smoking! Which is a part of me, OMG I"M LOSING MYSELF!"

This was my thought stream:

OMG I NEED A CIGARETTE-> I can't have one because of Manfriend->  ahhh, smoking-> part of me-> manfriend wants to change me-> OMG I'M LOSING MYSELF-> AW HELL NAW.

And then in my mind I'd have the GIRL POWER head-bob going and dust off the rhetoric from my women's stuides degree and get all  "Ain't no man gonna change me," empowerment shit.

This went on for several months.

And on Sunday, it so happens, I got caught. Without a shadow of a doubt, busted. I rolled home from following my friend Erin to the car dealership to drop off her car and driving her home, and apparently guilt wasn't the only thing I reeked of.

Erin and I had parked in the parking lot of a Japanese Hibachi Grill, GOTTEN OUT OF MY CAR and sat on the curb IN THE MIDDLE OF WINTER so that we wouldn't smell like smoke.

It didn't work because Manfriend is a detective.

Anyway, without going into all the details of our fight in which I honest-to-god started to pack a bag to drive to my house for the night, I've come to one conclusion.

I think I really have to quit now.

HEAVY sigh.

BUTTTTTTTT... I think I've finally figured out a way to justify it to myself. Maybe Manfriend wanted to quit together because we both had/have habits that are going to kill us, make us smell nasty, make us look ugly, and just generally bring our demise. I'm not even being dramatic people, DEMISE. I love Manfriend and he loves me and why shouldn't we try to be our best selves for each other? If you think about it, the prospect of wanting to be around for the person you love for the duration really isn't too much to ask. 

PLUS, Manfriend isn't some The Hamburglar character in a weird striped jumpsuit trying to steal me from myself, Terry was.  And I will be damned if I spend another day doing something that was his in the first place.

So, fine, I'll stop trying to make my lungs look skinnier by filling them with tar until they turn black, even if it's every now and then, on the sly, and maybe I'll get addicted to something healthier, like exercise*. After all, I do need some coping mechanism, I've got an incredibly addictive personality. It's why I don't gamble.

*(but let's not push it, I feel I've made enough leaps in the health and wellness portion of my life for one week).

Cheers to my renewed interest in my own health!

XO Sare