frustrated.

i found out today that loki the outdoor cat has to come back indoors because he has a plethora of health problems caused by being outside (insects, things attacking his eye, depression, etc.). last night he stayed indoors and this morning there was a puddle on the stove. and the counter; he hit both! shannon's picking him up from the vet now. she has to work all weekend and isn't going to be around much until tuesday night. i don't know how we and the cat are all going to survive under the same roof for the three weeks he has to be inside though i suspect this will not end well. she's going broke because of the cat and should she have any leftover funds after today's visit, the vet suggested kitty antidepressants. i think the vet has it backwards: screw the cat drugs, the people in this house should be on antidepressants so we can forget all the day-to-day cat-related problems we have to deal with. why does the cat get to have all the fun? really.

also, i can't get any work done because i am burned out and in serious need of some fun, but i'm caught in this stupid cycle of feeling guilty and anxious if i'm not doing school work, then not being able to really get any work done when i do try because i need a freaking break. it sucks.

also also, my lovely new reef flip flops are missing. they were in the living room last weekend, and now they're gone. i'm thinking someone took them because really, i've looked everywhere for them over the past week and this house isn't that big. shoes shouldn't just disappear, especially ones that belong to moi.

ETA: found my flip flops in the pile of shoes in my closet. why the hell did i put them there? i never do that.

airbrushing, wow.

recently:


















and more recently:

skool.

so i am now moved out/moved in and sitting among piles of boxes that need to be unpacked. i should have some time for that in august. until then all my time is devoted to skool, otherwise known as My New Life. i can't remember the last time i did anything that was fun! actually, yes i can. june 7. seems like so long ago.

the class that i was just lukewarm about a couple weeks ago, i'm now completely hostile about since it continues to be an unorganized, unstructured mess that i'm not learning anything from, except how to be really pissed off for five hours a week. several of us from class are going to talk to the instructor on wednesday, the dude who so far isn't listening to our concerns, to see if we can get him to hear what we're saying when we very clearly state that every last one of us is completely overwhelmed and about to revolt unless he makes some changes, and soon.

i still love my other class. i'm quite grateful for that. if i didn't, this summer would be a soul-sucking disaster of a semester and i would spend even more time than i already do complaining about it.

dear bad austin drivers:

unless you have a death wish, which at least a few of you appear to, or have never had the pleasure of driving a uhaul (i guess that's possible), it is completely stupid of you to think it's okay to cut off someone who is driving a uhaul in the rain just because you need to make a turn at the next street and waited too late to change lanes. uhauls are pieces of crap with v. bad breaks and you're lucky we didn't all die. you people almost made the $14 i spent on insurance worthwhile. glad you didn't. just sayin'.

i talk about britney too much as it is, but this is totally worthwhile.

today i learned that lexis nexis has a feature i've so far overlooked that allows you to search transcripts of interviews from reputable news sources, so tonight after class i searched for the transcript of the britney spears interview with matt lauer that aired this week, the interview accompanied by this picture. how could i resist checking out an interview with someone who used to look (relatively) attractive and now looks like that? because she was allowed to do her own hair and makeup and dress herself before appearing on television with no help from anyone at all including the help of a mirror? exactly.

lexis nexis wasn't as helpful as i had hoped in producing the text of the entire interview, but that was fine because after reading sections of it my interest was piqued enough that i really just wanted to watch it. i found it online in a three part series and so far have watched part one, otherwise known as the part where britney invents new words and shows off her cleavage, all while chewing gum. it's awesome. i'll save part two, where matt makes her angry and she cries so much her fake eyelashes fall off all while chewing gum, for the next time i'm, say, feeling bad about myself.

(matt, incidentally, looks strangely like trent these days. i think it's the mutual near-baldness.)

one of my roommates gave me way too much crap, in the form of many sideways looks that implied i must be crazy, during my hour-long britney interview transcript search and subsequent interview watching spree. i wanted to defend myself by saying i'd had a hard day, that mondays and wednesdays are the days that i spend all day in class talking about things that matter and come home exhausted so, really, i'm entitled to watch mindless, trashy tv if that's what makes me feel better. then i thought better of it because there's no way i'm justifying myself to someone who plays xbox almost as much as he plays his three girlfriends and is showing no signs of slowing down, or remorse.

my wife is an adolescent and other randomness.

the allergens (or cats, whatever) have taken over my room. munchie sneaks in here every chance he gets to sit on my lap--or on my laptop--and last night i found loki, who shannon let into the house and then neglected to watch to make sure he wasn't being his usual self, curled up asleep on my bed. he didn't pee on it (or the stove, or my piles of clothes, or any of the roommates) and he looked so happy that i let him sleep for awhile. by the time i kicked him out my sinsues were revolting, but i consider that my good deed for the day (see, i'm not completely heartless). and the munchie litter box problem either has been resolved since shannon changed his food last week, or my allergies are so bad that i can't smell anything. perhaps he's being a good cat and has quit peeing altogether. that would be ideal.

yesterday during class #2, also known as the most frustrating class in the world because the instructor is not providing any sort of instruction at all, instructor dude started talking about his wife. he said: "my wife is an adolescent..." and then he trailed off. he eventually finished the sentence with the word "counselor," thank god, but meanwhile he was quiet for so long that the entire class started laughing until many of us were crying, and he didn't get what was so funny. these professor types are seriously not understanding our particular brand of humor, and we frequently have to explain jokes to them. for some reason this makes us laugh more. we (and i speak for the class here) are mature like that. but at least we have a sense of humor.

i'm v. proud of myself: i have spent the past five days doing nothing but homework and reading and paper writing and working on projects, and this means that i'm not falling behind. school has become my life. go me.

not that i actually own anything really besides many pairs of shoes, but i get to move my stuff from my old house to my new house this weekend. i'm so looking forward to finally feeling like i have a place that is mine, like i'm not living in between houses and lives.

finally someone understands.

last week i attended a lecture on business practices and social work, and, long story short, i was barely successful at not laughing at this bullet point on page 11 under "management mistakes that lead to business failure":

• Insufficient/ineffective HRMS*

that's what i'm talking about.

*so i guess here it stands for human resource managment systems, not hot raunchy monkey sex. though really? insufficient amounts of either one will totally lead to failure.

noise.

favorite coffee shop no. 1:

it's fun to listen to anti-establishment people talk about the evilness that is time w@rner.

also amusing to watch people come here to update their myspace accounts and then leave.

but having the "are you sure we can't work this out?" conversation with alvin? not so much fun. he sent me an email this morning, asking if we could try again, that completely caught me off guard. i thought we had made that decision, but he wanted to ensure we made the decision when we weren't angry with each other. i appreciate that...but i can't do it, even when i'm not angry and have had a good night's sleep.

have wasted three hours not reading so far. should get back to that.

ETA: for those of you concerned with the rabbit antics of two nights ago--there was no further torture last night (if only because david went to bed early and i didn't have rabbit access). besides, rabbits need some excitement every so often.

hasta mañana.

this evening david and i had the bright idea to introduce one of shannon's cats (munchie, the lone indoor cat) to our friend ian's rabbit (fred, the misnamed female rabbit) that has taken up residence in david's closet while ian is out of town. this closet is the size of your average new york apartment, so lest it sound like the rabbit is trapped in some small, dark space, really it's not. david's closet is nicer than my bedroom.

we've made an effort to keep the cat and the rabbit away from each other so far, just because we didn't want to have to explain that oops, munchie clawed fred to death and ate her, so sorry. tonight's introduction didn't go very well--munchie was freaked out and while i was holding him mere inches away from his prey i could feel his little kitty heart start to pound. the rabbit was not amused; first it hid and then it started thumping. i don't have any rabbit experience aside from with my friend crystal's rabbits when i was in second grade, and the only thing i took away from that experience though i don't remember why: rabbits are mean, i should stay away from them.

but apparently rabbits thump when everything is not okay in their little rabbit world. like thumper in bambi. i don't remember why thumper thumped his foot, but fred did this a couple of times while the cat was staring at her (or stalking, perhaps) and it was hilarious. fred was obviously unhappy. she was like, THUMP...wtf...THUMP...is that thing? and what is wrong with you people?!

we took munchie out of the room after the thumping started, with the expectation that we'll reunite them tomorrow and maybe they'll like each other then. now he's running around the house, doing the thing he does where he makes loud screamy cat noises and acts like he's possessed, ricocheting off furniture and whoever happens to be in his path. i think he's angry we denied him a rabbit.

getting divorced.

that's it.

roller derby, i think.

so i'm at favorite coffee shop #2 writing a(nother) paper--still on the topic of oppression--and the v. loud group of women across the room from me is discussing what types of outfits they should all wear: hot pants? mini skirts (leather of vinyl)? tank tops with the bottom part cut off? fishnets? corsets? spandex? and should they call themselves the domestic divas? and wear aprons?

they're trying to figure out how to make their outfits more s&m without offending their children (gotta have priorities), and how to coordinate their clothing with their helmets. i can only hope they're a roller derby team. the weirdness, it's following me today.

is this considered success?

i'm sitting at favorite coffee shop #1 writing a paper about the oppression of women, and there is a woman sitting at a table near me talking about a friend of hers whose pre-nup included a clause stating that she would get X amount of money if, during the first year of her marriage, she didn't gain any weight.

she got the money.

oh.my.god.

i've decided to come out of hiding, briefly.

*school is kicking my ass this summer. i love love love one of my classes and am lukewarm about the other so far, but even so this semester is starting off so much better than last. talking in class has become easier now that i'm in class with primarily my own cohort. this semester is tons more engaging and there's plenty of eye candy, which i know is not why i'm in skool (or is it...?) but it's still a nice perk.

*the cat situation has been only partially resolved. bad cat is permanently exiled to the outdoors, and cute and cuddly cat whose pee smells like death is still inside, which is still problematic. i think he's eventually going outside since shannon sort of promised, even though that kind of means close to nothing. in the meantime we'll all have died from asphyxiation.

*i realized today i have become that roommate, the one i always disliked beacuse they eat everyone else's food. i don't have any good reason to do this since i buy my own food (mostly), it's just that the food that is not mine looks so much tastier. like the strawberries my sister bought. oh my god. these strawberries are gigantic, and pretty, and most of all they were calling to me. they were, i think, the best strawberries i've ever eaten. also, her avocados. i think she's becoming annoyed that food keeps disappearing, but i can't let this food go to waste. i can't not eat avocados. she needs not to buy such good food if she doesn't want it to disappear. obviously.

*i continue to feel like i'm living in this strange, bad dream-like state, where my life is not my own. i mean, it is my own, but it's more like a blurry, watered down rendition of the life i used to have. i feel like i'm living two lives: the one i'm currently in that involves school and friends, which strangely overlaps with my old life that i step into when i see alvin. it's a life i don't have anymore, one that i'm trying to figure out if i want back and whether or not i can resume. it's bizarre and complicated and, most of all, confusing, very much like a bad dream that i desperately want to wake up from.

perpetually blocked.

hope i'll eventually have something to say.

for those times when i can't think of anything original to say.

• Give a man a match, and he'll be warm for a minute, but set him on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
• Sarcasm helps keep you from telling people what you really think of them.
• If you think things can't get worse it's probably only because you lack sufficient imagination.
• You can't be late until you show up.
• Going to church doesn't make you a Christian any more than standing in a garage makes you a car.
• The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.
• Expecting the world to treat you fairly because you are good is like expecting the bull not to charge because you are a vegetarian.