Foolishly Inconsistent

Crap.

Crap crap crapcrapcrapcrap crappity crap crap.

This adulthood thing really kind of sucks, y'know.

( Don't *make* me throw this hummus! It's spicy. )

I am about to be introspective. As such, I am going to put my introspections under a fake cut: Not because they are particularly personal, but because I don't want to clog up people's friends pages with a lot of my nonsense.

If you're having one of those days, where everything is rather shitty and you're questioning your decision-making abilities, I strongly suggest you read this article. My best friend for at least the last decade posted it to Facebook, and while there's a whole lot of stuff about god and religion and stuff that I generally don't hold with *personally*, the points it makes are still valid and interesting and, I hope, useful.

( Thar be thoughts ahead. )

What are the things that are (mostly) worth it? My family. My awesome friends. Working at a job I loathe until I find a job I'm excited to do. Figuring out how to help people, if I can. Staying up till 2 a.m. to write, if that's when the mood strikes me and that's when I have time.

Yep. Priorities: I have them.

OK. Reality kinds of sucks. I had a dream that left me happy and peaceful last weekend - but I have no idea what happened. My boss is a complete lunatic. (Who? Who decides on a whim that she wants to reissue her cookbook? More to the point, who doesn't request a final e-file copy of the manuscript for safekeeping? She honestly has no idea how to run her business.)

And perhaps, more than anything else, there's the fact that I've felt off nearly all week because the dream that made me happy also made me think there was something wrong with me. What normal person wakes up happy and then convinces herself that feeling happy can't be trusted? Who doesn't trust feeling happy and thinks it's more normal to be frustrated?

I hate that my boss puts me in positions where I can't give my best effort, that I let her put me in those positions and that I then put up with her complaints when she decides that - where she's put up with less than my best every other time - my not giving her my best is a personal insult from me to her.

So, more than a month after I was all, "Oh, I'm going to finish at least two books before Christmas," I finally have progress. I forgot how working 9 to 5 is completely draining, even more so than working 4 p.m. to midnight, like I did when I was on the copy desk. :::is nostalgic:::

Anyways, books I've finished, books I'm reading and books I haven't started under the cut.
( No mobiles! No Walkmans! None of this! Or any of the others! )
But I have in the last month or so, I've watched all of SPACED, which was awesome for a variety of reasons, including a) Simon Pegg, b) Jessica (Stevenson) Hynes, c) Nick Frost, d) Edgar Wright, e) unapologetic hate of 'Phantom Menace', f) Manny from Black Books, g) Jaffa Cakes, and h) how Dan Harmon clearly had this in mind when he developed Community. I've also watched through S3 of The I.T. Crowd, which is unmitigatedly silly and absurd. I have S2 of the original Life on Mars waiting atop the telly, as well as S5 of the new Who, with Matt Smith, so I can watch that. I'll be a busy, busy girl.

I think my Epic Community fic has another three, maybe, four chapters, plus the epilogue. I want to finish it by Christmas.

The epilogue won't be a problem: I've had the idea since August, the format since September and the major story points I want to address since the middle of October.

The problem is that to meet my deadline, I basically need to go back to writing a chapter a night, which is good because I sleep better when I've written a chapter and posted it, but it's bad because I usually stay up will 3 a.m. And I have to be up by 7:15, 7:30 at the latest to be at work at something approaching the time I'm supposed to be there.

So, i either need to suck it up, or find a TARDIS.

P.S. I also want to write a fic idea that's been growing for the last two months and post it Christmas Day, but then I'll probably spend most of Christmas writing it. I'm not 100 percent sure, but I'm fairly certain that officially makes me a sad sack with no life and negative social skills.

Today kind of sucked, despite the awesome and absurd episode of Community tonight.
***Rant begins***
First, I woke up late. Then I bought coffee, which I really shouldn't have done because caffeine is bad for my kidneys, and I'll be paying for a single shot of espresso in about a week.

Next, I still haven't gotten my second (last) paycheck from the place I was working, and I'm beginning to wonder if a) they're going to actually send it to me, and b) if it's worth pushing for about $250, especially when I'd just have to pay social security tax on it myself as I was considered an independent contractor. (And they should've sent me the check a week ago.)

Next, I kind of want to kill both one of my best friends and my brother & sister-in-law.
                I kind of want to throttle my friend - let's call her Raviv - because I feel she's treating me the way she did seven years ago, when we were still in school: Raviv was my friend, but she was also friends with a group of girls with whom I was friendly but not friends. When Raviv and those girls would have a disagreement, she'd come running to me for a sympathetic ear; I'd listen to her problem and offer my advice (which was usually of the 'Fuck them, they're being stupid' variety because those girls were usually being stupid); and Raviv would agree with me. Then those other girls would come round and "apologize" and Raviv would run off with them, forgetting whatever we'd talked about doing. I know Raviv appreciates my friendship and I understand that with both of us working (finally), we can't spend hours talking on the phone or hanging on the couch, but it'd be nice to feel like she doesn't talk to me only when she needs something. It's particularly frustrating as she chose me to be Maid of Honor at her wedding two years ago - with no prompting from me, as I think weddings are silly and I have issues with marriage. She could've picked her sister, or a cousin, or a friend from college, but she chose me, and I feel I owe her the benefit of the doubt in light of that judgment.
                 I kind of want to bludgeon my brother & sister-in-law because they have chosen, as their one major pre-delivery trip - I guess it's called the 'Baby-moon' or something - to go to Hawaii. Last year when my sister was pregnant, she came here for a week (my brother-in-law couldn't get time off from work). It was awesome, and I really valued having that time with my sister because I knew once she had her baby, she wouldn't be able to travel much and that she would have someone new to take care of and wouldn't have time to just hang out with me. (Disclaimer: I love my nephew more than I thought I would, and after a difficult delivery, I'm simply happy that they're both healthy.) But, my brother & s-i-l - let's call them Rob & Erin - have made it clear they don't think my parents and I visit often enough (sorry for having a life here), and Erin has given this bullshit excuse the last few years that 'It's cheaper to fly to Hawaii or Paris or London than it is to fly to Cleveland.' (Yet, Rob & Erin expect one or all three of us to up and fly to Seattle, which is considerably more expensive than flying to Cleveland, regularly.) I admit part of this is me missing them, but I also think it wouldn't have killed either of them to fly here for a week in November or early December and spend a little time with us, as we won't see them until May or June, once Erin has the baby.

Next, I kind of screwed up badly at work today: I misunderstood my boss, and send an email to the wrong person asking them to teach some classes my boss later informed me this person was unqualified to teach. I emailed the person back and was able to gracefully back out of the job offer, but I still felt like a moron. (Added to yesterday's dumb moment, when I asked a woman I talk to everyday if we'd met because I didn't recognize her dressed in chef's garb, including hat.) And, actually, that the wrong person is flattered because she thinks my boss thought enough of her to offer her the chance to teach these classes is a happy, if completely unexpected outcome. It's the first real fuck up I've made in nearly two weeks of working there, but I still felt like I'd managed to erase all the good impressions I'd made so far.

Then, the guy who sits at the next desk is kinda creepy, and makes me uncomfortable, but I don't know if this is just the way he is or if he's turned on the creeper charm just for me. Either way, it's the first time I've ever seriously considered faking having a boyfriend just to get someone to leave me alone, even though I'm pretty sure he's not actually flirting with me and he's maybe 25 or 30 years my senior. But he keeps asking these bizarre questions ('What are the first three presets of your car radio?' 'What school did you go to?' 'Who do you think is more badass: Dracula or Edward?' [I kid you not: That was today's discussion.]), and I don't really talk that much about myself when I first start working someplace.

Finally, there's the fact that I'm sick of this stupid fanfiction I'm writing. I want to wrap it up in the next six chapters or so, but I can't get the characters in my head to shut up long enough for me to actually get anything written. I hate that I've let it take up my free time, and if I didn't think I'd be disappointing/pissing off people, I'd drop it. At the same time, I still like the general story I've come up with, I still like the characters, and I'm proud of myself for having written something this long, which is longer than anything I've ever written before. If nothing else, I now know I am actually capable of writing the novel I've always wanted to write once I figure out the idea.
***Rant over***

My apologies for taking up your friend's page space.

When a great adventure is offered, you don't refuse it. ( Nothing wise, nothing new. )

A year after graduating from university, I've realized the only reason I used to like September was because it was the first month of school. As a non-school-attending adult, September kind of sucks.

( You take the good, you take the bad... )