i sense a "year end reflection" post brewing about in my head...

in before seven?

i don't really like the fact that i have a number set to speed-dial number 99, but at the same time, i am very grateful to have a number set to speed-dial 99... i am glad last week is over, and anxious for next semester to begin.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS

today...

~exaggerated impatience annoys me

~cold tuna fish does not satisfy my appetite

~i feel my height

~i write on my body in ink to make myself do something

~intentions will be forgotten

~again, i procastinate going to the post office

~new running shoes are to be bought

~the level of chocolate-covered carmel corn bought from a boy scout steadily decreases

~i wear my winter jacket, even though it's not needed

~i worked out my biceps

~my back aches

~i drank 3L of water

~my eyelids struggled to stay open during a meeting

~i snoozed my alarm for 70 minutes

~had two separate conversations about andre 3000's performance on television last night

it's such a paradox, i know, but i hate myself when i hate myself. then the hating myself for hating myself takes over the hating myself for other, silly reasons, and i get pissed (as opposed to depressed). who ever said having ovaries was fun?

don't tell my mom... but i just found myself bee-boping to a STYX song in the car. 0-: )

oh! and i heard an AC/DC song "back in black"... yeah! realized that third eye blind lifts guitar rifts and melodies. :( didn't know that.

I’m sure you all know what I’m talking about, the little paper-clip animated guy that pops up in any mainstream Microsoft product you may use (Word, Excel, Outlook, Access, etc) whenever you have a question. He sits on a little note-pad and is annoying when you do something like click File, Save… he pops up to tell you the short-cut to save your work is Ctrl+S. So you guys know who I’m talking about, right? Well that little fucker annoyed me every single say, with it’s metallic pearls of wisdom. Who wants pointers from a paperclip? Certainly not me, and I’m guessing not you either. Well, my friends, did you know that you can change the paperclip into EINSTEIN??? Yup, as I gladly found out, you can have a personal Einstein assistant give you advice (albeit Word Processor advice, or e-mail advice), and what’s more: he’s left handed! Get this – when you send an email, a little ATM vacuum chute thing appears and he puts your email in the chute and sends it on its way! How precious is that? Needless to say, I now have my very own alter-ego right on my desk-top. Things have never been this good.

You know, I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: It’s the little things that count. Yes, the little things.

“I’ve said too much.
I haven’t said enough.”

thing's? since when do i apostrophe "things"?

have... biggest... headache. cannot think straight.

i loved this quote from the OC, (yes i'll freely admit i watch a teenager drama on the fox network): "he looks at her and sees lips, and hair, and boobs. he looks at me and sees... a lab partner." that pretty much sums up how i felt (and still do a little) for a majority of my post-puberty days. not that i was any good in science... or went to a co-ed high school for that matter. so "lab partner" can be exchanged with "friend" or "someone who listens to his girl problems and gives advice 'from a girl's perspective'" or something of the likes. it's funny how the insecurities from our 14-year-old days can still linger sometimes. who would have thought? i guess it's good if i can surprise even myself these days... : P

back to this headache... yeah. still have it. in case you were concerned.

i'm listening to some really old mixed CD's, and it's hilarious to think that at one point, i considered these songs to be "the best songs ever created." i was sure that i could pop this CD in at any point in my life, and things would feel great. music has that affect over me, but in a relative manner. i no longer internally rock-out when i hear "that's what i like about you" by the ramones or quiver when i hear "in your eyes" by peter gabriel. listening to this music makes me realize how much i've grown up over the past few years, although it's hard to see when that transition really started because i have trouble looking at my life from that point of view. "glycerine" by bush. oh, how i loved gavin rossdale. i even vowed to name one of my sons gavin. oh, those were the days, naming my yet-to-be-born-or-conceived children... now instead of naming them, i wonder if they will even exist, a spin-off of the whole "will-i-ever-get-married" question, an obvious answer to the "will-i-ever-meet-someone-where-there-is-a-mutual-interest" debacle. see, people: cause and effect. this IS my life.

although, "crazy game of poker" does give me this deja-vu feeling of sitting in melisa's akers dorm room downloading our favorite new underground band we discovered the first week of college: OAR. we called them the word oar, not O-A-R. we went and saw them in toledo, driving in the relentless rain into a city we didn't know, because we loved them. now you can see them on MTV sometimes and they are a college staple. oh, how thing's have changed.

there is a Lindsay Smith who works for NBC, in the rockefeller building. i think i'd rather work for NBC (that too owned by GE). then i'd get cool pens and maybe meet the cast of friends or something exciting like that.

: P

i fully intend to take a 3-4 hour nap after i get home from work today, and look forward to it with every cell in my body. seven more weeks in my co-op position, i had my mid-term evaluation today, needless to say i was rambling on about how much i liked this position, but i was finding myself telling the truth this time around.
went to philly for the weekend, and i saw paul! my crush from 2 summers ago. (although he didn't know it then... or now, i should say...) i'm just sitting in starbucks with jane, people-watching, and there he walks by, right in front of my window. i start banging on the window and he didn't hear, so i run outside and attack him. not really though. i was so tripped out, it was so random. he was in philly because that's the meeting point for the people in peace corps going to madagascar. needless to say, he's an awesome guy. needless to say, i'm a little obsessed with the phrase "needless to say."

It feels good to not care about silly things that would usually embarrass me. At lunch today, I see a hot waiter that we had seen before at the same restaurant, and while I had his eye contact, I nonchalantly pressed my arm against Cora’s. She looked up, followed the trail of my eyes, and saw what I was looking at (a fine specimen of human being, I must say). Naturally, he saw the one-second transaction that had just occurred, and I looked away, not quickly or anything, just slightly red in the cheeks. I started laughing once he passed, and Cora just said, “Eh, who the fuck cares?” and the second she said it, I knew I didn’t. That was the best Friday feeling ever! If it were someone else sitting there and they had looked at him obviously, I probably would have felt like a fool for a good five minutes, and secretly resent the fact that they hadn’t been careful to make it unobvious. Then when I think about it, that’s the dumbest thing in the world! I’m embarassed to admit that I’ve felt like that, all over something as stupid as checking out a waiter!! If I can add correctly, my thirteenth birthday was something like eleven years ago, maybe it’s a good thing I’ve started to act my age…

So this really is just a reiteration of my away message, but you know you need to just go back to sleep when you get in the shower, and start washing your face with shampoo.

I’ve decided that I want one (well, that had already been decided… re-affirmed is a better choice of word) all the while remembering that I want to wait. Second-hand Buddha Pat’s and my mom’s advice still rings in my ears loudly on that subject. Baby steps.

Newsflash: it’s rude to stare.

It’s funny how some people are really good at squeezing things into conversations. I don’t think I’m one of them, hence me thinking it’s funny. You know what I mean… like when you’re making plans to hang out, and you ask what they want to do, and they casually say “oh, I don’t know, we can get some pizza, watch tv, have sex” and they just slipped that last bit in there so naturally that you’re taken by surprise and don’t have time to calculate an equally smooth retort. Then you just continue the conversation as normal, only really realizing afterwards that they just got away with saying that, and you wonder how.

I have a meeting with the technology leader here at GE motors, soon to be ______motors. I should probably get going and, I don’t know, prepare for the meeting so as to not sit there mute with confusion. LOL can you so picture me sitting there not saying a word!? I love it!

And don’t you worry, attentive blog readers… I really can add. Just seeing if you were paying attention. Trying to keep y’all on your toes!!!


ps. see post below. i'm not feelin' the last-line email-me plead lovin'. it took me like five minutes to figure out how to do the email link thing. i know it's annoying cuz if you don't use Outlook it will open in Outlook and that can be annoying as hell, but humor me! i need some humor!!

so those of you who have counters and spyers on your blogs, you know that i read your blog say, :::ahem::: four times a day or so. (excuse me while i blush with embarassment) so i figure i might as well post some too. so, today i baked. and cleaned my room. and opened my Absolut Kurant. went to the chiropractor. made dinner with my roommate. came home for lunch and watched TLC. load of dishes andlaundry. went to sleep feeling fairly satisfied (although, that is just my prediction).

what did you do?

i feel like my whole world has just been flipped upside down. everything i know as truth before this moment is made void, i don't know what to trust and what to throw away in the garbage. as i sit here at work, screwing around as usual, i play with the date/calender function of my computer and learn I WAS BORN ON A MONDAY!!! all along, i thought i was a child of the day of wednes. . . tragedy ensues.

kare's on the bed, feeling like a piece of shit run over twice. i have a hangover, but don't really feel like death. i just regret saying "detroit what?!" to the guy in the bar with the detroit hoodie and then getting stuck in the same shuttle (aka drunk mobile) with him on the ride back, where he supposedly thought we were best friends and he could harass us. we saw a true, all-out bitch fight early in the night... people stepped back, guys tried to get in a break things up, but that just intensified the whole ordeal. kare, with the attitude of "we're in fucking indiana" made us go up on stage three times and dance, usually staying in the back but not being completely shy and going right up to the front of the stage so all thousand people could see us. good times, good times.

i love fall. the changing colors, the pumpkins and leaves, wool and boots and boa scarves, realizing i'm just repeating the blog i wrote 2 years ago... hmm change of direction.
as i drove down my street last night, the lone driver on the mile-long stretch of slim road, i turned the radio off and opened my windows all the way. the wind gushed and caused fresh air to circulate and swirl my hair around, and leaves fell on my car. i gasped inwardly at the beauty of fall, and at that moment realized that the beauty we all talk about, really, is the beauty of death.

franklin cider mill seems so far away today... :_(
walmart cider doesn't even come close to theirs.
i hate walmart to begin with.

October is 25% over?
That's just not right.

You are the person you choose to be.
Lather, rinse, repeat.

i have only lied while playing truth-or-dare (which, since i've been around 15 or so, has been really just "truth") twice. the one time was the summer of my study abroad, and i was hanging out with a different crowd than i usually did. we were at a sweet-ass bar in galway, playing a drinking/tell-all game (called "i never"... i'm sure some of you have played it). i had only known these people on a superficial basis for about 4 weeks, and i think that night was the first time i even talked to a few of them. needless to say, i wasn't about to get too personal with them, cuz that's just how i am. some call it a weakness, i call it... not wanting to divulge while drinking with strangers. anyway, the second time was tonight. my roommate is 'having trouble' with her boyfriend, so she stayed here in fort wayne this weekend. you'd have to know her to understand that this never happens. i rarely talk to her for extended periods of time because she's either a) on the phone with her boyfriend b) at Purdue (2 hrs. away, and yes she will go there for the night mid-week and return the next morning for work...) or c) he's here, and they're in her room 'being anti-social' as i will put it. so tonight, she wanted to get some drinks and play cards. which really turned into "lindsay, you lost that hand, truth or dare?" and hence, the lying part. i don't really know why i lied... i don't even know why i am blogging about it, really. guilt maybe. i don't like to lie. but i guess she did get me talking about some things that were true, and that self-reflection i owe to her. which, i guess, makes me feel a little bit more guilty about not being 100% truthful with my answers. oh well, i guess sometimes, you just do what you gotta do...

ahhhhahahahahahahaha. hahahahaaahhhahaha. ahahahaaahhahahahaahaha. i want to just open my window and scream, "you are a fucking liiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiarrrrrrrrrrrrr!" but there's a cold draft outside. plus, my neighbors have small children.

friday, i got home from work. my roommate wanted to get a fifth of tequila and drink and just chill and have a girls night. i laid down at 6 to take a little nap before the nights' festivities and woke up at 8... AM... THE NEXT DAY...!

20030717 post. ditto.

coming to realizations sucks. first, it sucks to realize that college will soon be over. sucks so much, i try not to think about it a lot, actually i forget sometimes. "but you haven't really been in college for like 9 months now" you may say. but it's the knowledge that i'll be back in East Lansing soon that keeps me going.
second on the list is realizing that your roommate has sex on your couch when she thinks you're sleeping, but we'll leave that for another day... (or not...)
also sucks when you realize that someone no longer cares about you. you can't hold it against them, you know, cuz you can't make someone like you... but then again, yes you can. sometimes you can. so then you think, "okay, so i couldn't make this one like me for good... what's wrong with me?" and all sorts of negative and depressing thoughts go through your head, which are only amplified by seeing your aforementioned roommated's boyfriend drive 2 1/2 hours EACH WAY to see her for a few hours at least twice a week. (so what if they're nymphos too... just as long as it's not on the couch...) not to MENTION the other roommate discussing marriage with her boyfriend. i mean, cora and jeremy just make me wanna puke they're so cute. she didn't go out for like a week because she stayed home to make a book for him entitled "365 reasons I love you" for their 1-year anniversary. now let's TALK about realizations.
fourthly, which, i might add, i first spelled "4thly" is realizing you're a dumbass. no, just kidding. (i already KNOW that, thus cannot 'realize' something you already know. : P) fourthly it is unfortunate to realize, especially when you're down, (warning, cliches!) that your life is your choice. life doesn't just happen to people. when you look down at where you're standing and realize that you don't like it, you are looking at the feet that got you there.
< /whiney post>

i always feel nervous blogging from work. you know, they monitor my internet usage and such... but then again, my friend (shall remain nameless to protect his identity) ordered his girlfriend a "gift" on-line from work, and nothing was ever said about it. makes me wonder how he even got to a website like that, seeing as how i can't even access MSU e-mail from here. anyway.
haven't had a hangover in a while. forgot how much they suuuuuucked. my joints hurt, i'm hunched over like a little lady - er - big lady. ah, such is life.
i bought a membership to a gym - GOLDS! - and it's open 24 hours. hot-tub, steam room, sauna, the works. like my friend said, "you go there to get a hot body." i go there for the cable television and eye candy. : P

oh i love it! i walk by 2 engineer's offices and one is playing solitare and the other is playing in internet word jumble game.

i have a 1-hour massage today, for only 25 bucks. hell yeah.

i look forward to wednesday's the most. i know john will write his 3-paragraph e-mail to us, reminding us (as if we could forget) of poker night. there's always the re-cap of last week, and notes about boones farm and raking the pot and packing up your balls and walking away. that will be the highlight of my day. then wednesday night will roll around, and though i show up a bit late, in true lindsay fashion, it's all good. these people are my friends. we play a few rounds, i'm down 5-10 bucks in the first 10 minutes, guaranteed. 8:30, 9 o'clock rolls around, and people start to disappear. "gotta call jeremy, it's after nine, and i have free minutes." cora will return from the porch about 20 minutes later. sometime soon after, jason bows out for a few... but not too long, cuz jen's gotta work in the morning, and cincinatti is an hour later than us here anyway. john, being the host and poker aficionado, already took care of his business before we came, maybe not even at all. maybe she knows better. doug, now doug's a different story. his girlfriend, robin, is high maintenance. if he promises her a call at 9:00, she's mad at 9:02 and pissed at 9:05. so when 10:30 rolls around and he hasn't talked to her at all today, he's sweating nervous. whipped, for sure, but he's a good guy so we'll let it slide. i see how nervous he is, and start conniving. "doug," i say. "here's the story: your boss takes you to the bar after work, which is true, you know... couple beers, you're talking, you're asking advice on OMLP... he's chatty, you look at the clock but can't cut the night short. too much at stake. that's your story." he agrees, however nervous, and knows this will work. because he's graduating and looking for a job come may, it's now or never to put himself out there. who better than to knowingly ditch a call to his girlfriend than for a very important network. foil-proof lie. i'm such a good liar, even if it is for doug. robin'll be for that anyway cuz she's a teacher and is counting on doug to bank. "anyway, it's not unreasonable for you to be out at 10:30 anyways... i don't know what her deal is," i say. that too is a lie. you want great guys to call you. you want them to reassure you that they are yours. you don't want doubts and scenarios going through your head as to what they are doing tonight, who they are with. you want them to be waiting at their phone, watching for 8:59 to flip. even better than lying for people, though, i am the best liar to myself. what you don't know (can't see) can't hurt you. i keep telling myself that. again and again. day after month after year (or so it shall be). then why do i wait for the prompt box to disappear from the arrival of words? usually i can reply a lie, even to my own questions, but this one is like paying for the last card up, after 3 antes, and getting the black mariah. unexplainable, freak of nature, out of your control.

i'm a hop, skip, and a jump away from boarding the next train to midnightsville and bringing my baby boy with me. i'm really gonna do it this time, i swear to jesus h. christ. i don't need no cowboy running my life and telling me what to do: i'm my own boss. here, there, anywhere, i call the shots, i hold the purse, i turn the head. i will make things different this time. but you try tellin' that to your baby boy when he's looking up at you with those blue, oh those true blue like the ocean, eyes and he don't have to be sayin something with his mouth of his, but those eyes can speak just as loud, you hear? he's telling me to pack my bags and his bags too, just don't forget his twirly top, and get the hell out of here, for my own good. for our own good. no red-necked rodeo cowboy can give us a chance. he ain't ever gonna change, them never do. so i's packing our bags, me and my boy's, and i'm gettin' the hell outta here.

could this week possibly get any shittier? no, i'm not asking for that to happen, but if it could happen. for real! guys, just cuz i'm in IN doesnt' mean i'm not thinking about you! xoxoxoxo

roxanne, in the ambulance: i know this is gonna sound really vain, but i have a wedding on saturday, so you better not tell me something is wrong with my arm

roxanne, after hearing she broke her arm: well, can i have a black cast?
doctor: uhhh, we'll discuss that after surgery.
roxanne: well, i'm telling you right now, i want a black cast.

roxanne, after surgery: i don't care! i still hate her!

roxanne, on pain: usually, i'd say 'i want my arm to hurt for a long time' cuz i would like the attention, but now i just want it to not hurt anymore because i have this wedding on saturday.

rox, i took the best drugged up quotes i could think of! hope you are feeling better. xo

i drive in, get out of my car, and start fueling up. only in fort wayne will you get picked up at a gas station. it's friday, and still hot, so i stand with my hands on my hips impatiently, waiting until i can get back into my car and blast the air conditioning. it's only a mile away from my apartment, but it's friday, and i'm tired, and i just got back into the 40-hour-week routine. the guy across the pump from me blatantly peeks his head around and checks me out. "how you doin?" hi. i open my door and pretend to fiddle with something in my purse. after a few seconds of that, i return to the pump, and out of the sight of this guy. he looked decent enough, but don't do that. again, without caution, he moves down towards the back of his car, so he can see me again. the way he leans up against his car and folds his hands over his chest makes me want to puke. "looking forward to the weekend?" yeah, i say passively. fucking a, i think. could my car fill any slower? he averts his eyes downward, pausing at my chest, then towards my badge. he tried to make pathetic small-talk, effectively creeping me out at the same time. our pumps click off at the exact same instant. he thinks this is some cosmic sign, probably that we should end up at the same bar tonight so he can try to pick me up some more. no, i tell him telepathically, i think it's more like a race to see who can start their car and drive away the quickest, so i never have to see your creepy smile and perverted glances ever again. only in fort fucking wayne.

blackout's generally don't bother me, unless it takes 8 hours to drive up to east lansing and back, having the $100 worth of groceries you just bought from schwann go bad in your fridge, and wondering how you're going to make it to indianapolis to pick up your roommate from ecuador with half a tank of gas in the next 36 hours. : P

"music is the only thing in the world, with exception to sneezing and looking at the sunset, that is above the mundane. everything else is just bullshit." -s.j.

the chaos and destruction of the universe cannot be reversed. in other words, you can never go back." dr. lloyd, speaking on thermodynamics, and possibly, probably, much more.

as heartwarming and encouraging it is to hear a story about someone who's done a 180 and completely put their life together and straighten out, it's far more often i hear stories --or even witness them myself-- of people changing for the worse. whether it's treating people as if they are sub-human, showing friends how little respect they hold for them, accusing people of unimaginable things, giving people big news via IM/text message/e-mail (and even worse... dropping it into the conversation as if the other party already knew the information... ie "my girlfriend and i are going ..." which makes the person look stupid for trying to pull that one off), or just the selfishness of being self-involved and too busy to ask how someone else is doing. it really gets me going.

i don't think i wrote in my blog about how awesome guster was at tastefest. first of all, it's summer. summer concerts rule bar none. second, it was outside... kind of goes hand in hand with 1) because summer concerts tend to mean outdoor concerts. three: enjoying a few brew to your tunes with friends is the best thing to do on a saturday night. it was also awesome that it was downtown, i haven't been downtown in a while, and it was cool to see everyone walking around and enjoying detroit like they should. i even got a rad D bag from real detroit and ran into some people from high school. good times.

i got an email today from the HR coop coordinator at GE. she asked me if i had ever worked at any other GE location ever... because while she was doing payroll business, she found there's another person with my name AND my birthday. the catch is that she works in Asia. i wonder if my identity is being stolen here... call me crazy, but it seems a little weird that there's a Lindsay Smith with my birthday living in Asia. BUT* crazier things have happened, i guess.

i can honestly say i haven't done much with myself this summer -- and not in a "this feels good" way. i feel like a bump on a log, like a lazy-ass, good-for-nothing couch potato. i don't even know why i bother to go home on the weekends anymore, i just do the same loafing around there but end up putting 125 miles on my car and paying 30 bucks in gas to do so. hmm, but my parents have been keen on dining out lately, i take that back. definately worth it.

oh! how could i forget to write about the ann arbor art fair? ok, the art fair wasn't the most spectacular thing ever, but just chilling with my mom was so much fun. she got some cool art and we eventually made our way to a restaurant for dinner. awesome food and an amazing band -- get this, a chaldean guy doing blues. shit, he was good. we sat out on the patio and were right in front, so that was cool. we made our way back home and stopped for starbucks - my mom must keep starbucks in business, i swear - and i just had a really fun time with her.

counting crows concert is coming up -- i'm counting the days for that foe show. opening (or co-headlining?) is john mayer, not too shabby himself. i've never seen CC in concert so i'm stoked about that, and need to brush up on them. john mayer, i'm pretty confident i've stalked all of his music already, the concert should just be all around kick ass. hmm, i wonder where i put those tickets...

roxanne and i, a little bored at the bar the other night, played a little prank on some guys we met there. basically, for like an hour or so, roxanne was "valeria" and was from iraq and spoke no english. i was her family friend, who knew a little arabic, so i kind of "translated" and what not. these guys must have been super drunk, very gullible, or maybe rox and i are (gasp) good actresses, but they bought it. who knew making up arabic on the fly was so easy? so we were getting dropped off by them, they get out of the car to say goodbye or what not, and roxanne goes "corey, ben, aaron, thanks for a great night. see you later" or something like that. they all dropped their jaws and smacked themselves on the forehead, and roxanne proceeded to go make-out in my laundry room (for the 2nd time, mind you) but that's besides the point. it was great, we had a hearty laugh about it for a good twenty minutes while recounting it to ryan, my next door neighbor who always is up for listening to stories.

other than that, i have been lounging around, scrounging for something to do... i may or may not have a bar date tomorrow... we'll see how that goes. i will be less connected today on out. both tv and internet privileges are being revoked. this will be a good thing, i think. i also have an exam tomorrow, much to my chagrin.
i also have shin splints, which hurt like a MF. i have been icing them and such, and now you know the mundane details of my so-called life. great show! alright, on that note, i am outta here. my blogging has been sparse this summer, and i only anticipate it to be even more spaced out, with not having cable internet and all. oh well, what can you do? i will catch you all on the flip side, or maybe even on the un-flip side. you never know.

"wow," i thought as i put down the phone. "that was a sobering thought."

go to www.google.com

type in Weapons of mass destruction

Click "i'm feeling lucky" (instead of Google Search)

Read what looks like a normal error message. pretty funny.

i hate that foggy time in the morning or afternoon after you've awoken from a bad dream. you're still trying to figure out if everything really happened, even though the details seem absurd, as they always do in dreams, and it turns out that those details are in fact what help us to realize that your bad dream was just that, a dream. but still, for the first 90 seconds or so, you're torn between feeling confused, scared, remorse, and/or fear. that has to be on my top five worst feelings.

next, i want to say that there are ten things i hate about you. and no, the last one is NOT "i hate how i don't really hate you at all" or something like that. on an unrelated note, heath ledger is much hotter as a blond.

five weeks minus a day and i'm back to my 8-5 job. hmmm. many ways to look at this... for one, my job location can only improve, i think. yeah it was cool to work building 18, with all the "top players" (omg, i am beside myself) but at the same time, i was the only co-op. no fun. : ( wait, there was a guy named fabio who was in a post-graduate program, he had a certain appeal to him that is just undescribable... which is good because i'm off on a tangent. so, this time around, i will hopefully be around more co-ops and stuff. and now i know a little more about how a coop should conduct herself and hopefully i can dazzle them with my wits. (ha, did you get it??? -- can you tell i've been watching teen movies or what) i now realize none of this is interesting, and will move on.

on august ninth, my family is running through hell. michigan. that's their slogan "run through hell." kinda catchy in that obvious, annoying way. we've done a few runs like that (turkey trot, race for the cure, jingle bell run, etc. etc.) and i *always* come in last place. even my little brother beats the shit out of me. this time around, i'm going for second-to-last. hey, gotta start somewhere.

hmm what else? got a 4.0 in my summer class, and even got honors credit for it. go me. i'm going for another 4.0 in my new class (thermodynamics, good luck) cuz it's been a while since i've had one of those. let alone two.

oh darnit, i wanted to tell a story right now, but i can't. it was funny, in a self-depreciating way, but i still can't publish it. my illusory audience might mad or incriminated if quoted. oh well, you'll have to conjure something in that little (or big, whatever) head of yours.

alright, i'm out yo. peace.

if you sell a man a fish, he'll eat for a day. if you teach a man how to fish, you've ruined a good business opportunity."

now if only i had something to post... hrmm

ohhhhh there you go! nice!

blogger has been hungry lately, eating up my posts like it's their last meal!

why don't you work anymore?

i hate you blogger! blog my shit!

i'm scared to post. it's going to erase my blogs i think!

i really wish i did have something to blog about. i will just type like i do, because i dont even IM anymore really, and i miss the sound and feeling of typing what i think is lightning fast. i think all i have to say now is that i am in big trouble when i graduate from college. i won't say why, but i am in big trouble. fortunately, i have bumped it back six months, so i have a little extra time.
i have IMed some people and they never returned my messages... what is the proper IM ettiquette? to me, even though it's informal and stuff, i consider it like a phone call. (considering the people [people = 2] i'm talking about, i dont even have their telephone numbers...) ah whatever, who am i kidding.
bevin bought us work-out journals and we're gonna keep track of what we do at the gym and iii'm gonna make a little graph of my progress and stuff. and no, i'm not kidding either. i don't think i have enough balls to bring the work-out journal with me while i'm actually working out, but nonetheless i will use it.
see, this is why i'm not writing blogs lately... what the fuck am i talking about?
i'm in more of a journal-writing mood than a blog-writing mood... i have the urge to reconnect with some old friends after rob told me he hung out with someone he hadn't seen in three years. that got me to thinking about my different friends that i stopped being friends with for whatever reason... i dont know, i just get the feeling that it's not a mutual wanting to see each other, so i just let it go. like one of my friends from high school, i emailed her a question about her college for my sister, and she emailed it back very formally and i just got the vibe that she didn't want to reconnect or something. i think i get to be a stale friend after a point. yeah, need to work on that.
you know that show extreme makeover? they like take some self-described plain-looking person and give them breast implants, face lifts, capped teeth, and a nosejob. i want to go on extreme makeover, but instead of a tummy tuck or a nose job, i want a personality makeover. they should figure out a way to do that. yeah.
i have homework due tomorrow. i better get started on that. it's sad this is the way i have to end my blog... something needs to happen soon or i don't know what i'm going to do.

the sight of the red carnation on my dashboard almost made me shed a tear, literally. later on in the coffeeshop, i really did shed a couple tears, but for a different reason. i just realized that... the impending tear on the same day i actually teared up. hmm. feigning a cryptic message, although still telling the truth. story of my life.

coffeeshop conversations... it's too easy to eavsdrop in coffeeshops. actually it's impossible not to. whether it's that of an amateur porn "actress" (java hutt, last summer), two girls graduating from highschool (beaners, this summer), or just some college co-eds talking about mutual friends (anywhere, anytime) there's no way to turn off your ears. listening to such conversations makes me super-aware of my own coffeeshop chats.
there are those where you talk slightly louder than needed, with a surge of confidence, knowing that that kid studying by himself two tables over can and probably is listening to you. you laugh frequently, throwing back your head and looking around every once in a while to check out your audience. the topic of conversation is usually superficial, about "friends" who are probably really aquaintances, or something that happened the last time you got drunk. it always seems funnier when you recount it to your friend.
then there are those converstions when you notice no one, because the topic of conversation actually matters and you are too engrossed in the dialog to pay attention to the different gruops of people who filter in and out of the coffeeshop over those two hours. these converstaions are pretty rare, and you really only have them with your best friends. usually it's at the coffeeshop because the phone isn't appropriate, and it's an easy place to meet.
most of the time, coffeeship excursions are betwen half an hour and an hour long, catching up on what's happened since you last met. occasionally, you glance around to check out the crowd, and say hi to a friend from class, or from high school. talk revolves around future plans, current crushes, and gossip about friends that aren't there. the usual. these are the most frequent type of conversations and usually the best ones if you enjoy eavsdropping on coffeehouse chatter. the serious ones are too somber and usually it's too hard to follow along, and the ones who are loud and obnoxious annoy you for those reasons. at any rate, there's nothing like sitting there with your friends and talking... sometimes listening too. ; )

i just realized that that's how you are with everyone... nothing is different about me, never will be. just another person.

such. a. fucking. loser.

lindsay's take on...

summer lovin'
roxanne was going to hook me up with one of her frat brothers (meaning, introduce), but then decided she wasn't. so that was one wasted opportunity (for me... wink). too bad cuz he was cute (another wink). another prospect actually has a long-term girlfriend. not so much a good idea, nor a feasible one. cuz, well, attraction is a one-way street for me. i always like people but they rarely like me back. then another crush that i've had for like 7 years is going to be my fantasy crush once again, considering i never talk to him anyway. funny how that works.

summer job
yeah, i don't think that's going to happen so much. i like the flexibility of not having a schedule, and i already have my rent saved up for the next two months. so it is possible to not get a job, but at the same time, i do enjoy the social aspect of working. you know what i want to do? be a lab-rat (and by lab, i mean bar/pool/mall) for some psychology grad student who wants to study the effects of beer and other mild drugs, sunbathing, shopping, etc. on certain species. for instance red-heads... left handers... girls... shorties... and then get paid for it. that would be the best.

summer crib
burcham woods it is. got the front room, bed right next to the window. how great is it to be woken up (awaken??) by the sun? i love it. gets a little hot (but only cuz i'm there : P) but i love it all the same. its a little annoying being a tad off campus, but i'll deal. have the feeling the summer is going to fly by anyway, so it's all good.

summer goals
i'm not telling!

summer vacation
hmm not so much. although the obligatory week(/end) up at my cottage is a must. i wish there was more "life" up there, so i could just stay up all summer, but the lack of life would drive me crazy. hi, i cannot live in a city without a target, starbucks, and panera. or within 20 miles for that matter.

other
everything should be under "other" cuz thats how i feel my summer will be. kind of layin' low... not much of the social life... chillin and watching tv and movies... getting a little sun... probably driving home frequently for lack of anything else to do... takin' a couple classes... working out (ha) at powerhouse (no comment)... music and concerts... beer and kramit... and etc etc etc.
i hope for a little drama in my own life, that would be nice, but i'm kinda the blackhole for anything that is drama. wait, i dont know if that makes sense... i am the anti-drama, but not by choice, by design.

anyway, gotta clean the room. + apt. it took quite a beating this weekend with my homes up. i will write later, i promise.

friday: ft wayne to EL ~2.5 hrs
saturday: EL to bhills ~ 1 hr
sunday bhills to grosse ile to toledo and back: ~4 hours
monday: bhills to EL ~ 1.5 hrs
monday: EL to ft wayne and back ~ 5 hrs
tuesday: EL to bhills and back ~3 hrs
(forecast)
wednesday: EL to bhills ~1 hr
thursday: bhills to EL ~ 1 hr
GRAND TOTAL: over 19 hours of driving in less than a week. sickening! (no, sicketating!)

in other news, i have decided that we (' we' to remain nameless) are plain looking with cute personalities, which puts "us" at around a 2.5 on the GPA scale of life. that's rounding down, just to be practical. i no longer wonder why i'm single; i just accept it as fact.

i have not seen a movie in ages. i think the last one i saw was "how to lose a guy in 10 days" which was alright. i have not seen a good movie in even longer a time. which is a shame, cuz i love good movies. i'm also kinda having this memory problem, where i cannot remember anything. : P captain obvious. seriously, though, it's not fun. i feel like an old fogey (sp?). i need to figure out how to put comments back in my blog, so someone can tell me how to spell fogey (foh-gee). but i would like to take the time to show you all that i know how to use tilde-n's on my computer: ñ. and Ü for Über. ╗╜ƒçÑ⌐δÜSxܪï»╣!6║╦╨ i think these are all pretty neat. cue: get life.

what else is new with me? i am getting contact lenses. i am freeing myself from my prescriptive lenses and going for the whole lens-on-the-eyeball thing. hopefully my squeamish thing won't get in the way. i doubt it though.

allllllrighty then. i am going to go study now. someone email me with how to put comments on my blog. it was a fluke before when i had them. i can't un-fluke... errr, re-fluke. ?? whatever. also, what is the html script for strikethrough. and i'm outta here. peace.

i just went roller-skating. phew, what a workout.

ruuuuuuuuuben!

sometime this summer, i will invest in audioblogger, because that would be sweet as hell. for now, i keep my roommate awake with the sound of my extra-loud keyboard. (paper-thin walls, not literal room-mate) four days left of the internship. one more paycheck, that i'm hoping i can stretch throughout the entire summer. do you think it's possible? i've tried to budget before, but credit cards always screw things up. it's just so EASY to use them. which defeats the whole purpose of a budget.

here are the things i would need cash money for: food, gasoline, concerts, man whore(s), cell phone bill, slutty clothes, gym membership. i think it should add up just fine... i just need to get it in writing and give my credit cards to my mom to ensure i won't use them. man whores don't take nothin' but the cash money, anyhow.

so, fingers crossed and i'm probably jinxing it by talking about it, but bridget told me we might have a puppy this summer! oh geez, i said it, now we won't... it's just that... puppy! oh! how. much. fun. would that be?

this whole college athletic coaches turned nasty perv-o's is really disturbing. iowa state guy partying with college girls, letting them kiss him and such? alabama coach going to a topless bar, bringing one back with him, and letting her order $1000 worth of room service? what the fuck can you order for a thousand bucks? "hi, i'll have 17 steak dinners, 4 bottles of wine, 9 appetizers, and how about a diamond tennis bracelet too?" ok, i know there are plenty of old pervs out there who go to strip clubs, but ones who get paid millions of dollars by college students tuition? sick.

so. i've been "fibbed" to recently. (haha, no, not pointing a finger at you.) i dont' like it, but at the same time, do not try and point it out. it only makes me uncomfortable when i can tell that i'm being lied to. that is all about the matter.

okay, how BAD do i feel for going to a concert of mothers day!?! i swear, i had no clue that may 11 was mothers day when i bought the tickets... it was only after i devoted an entire half of one hour at work to precisely inking it into my planner that i saw written in tiny 8-point font at the bottom of that day "mothers' day - USA"... you wouldn't believe the holidays in my planner... for instance:
feast of the epiphany (jan.06)
coming of age day (jan.13)
human rights day (mar.21)
mothering sunday (mar.30)
buddah's birthday (may.08)
orangeman's day (jul.12)
friendship day (aug.03)
international indigenous day (aug.09)
respect for the aged day (sep.15)
nobel day (dec.10)
boxing day (dec.26)
ok, so i'm sure you're so enlightened right now. i'll call may.05 enlightenment day.
oh, i forgot... mar.29: national feast of she who is lov-ed and respected and graces us with her presence and she whom all cherishes and honors and will never forget day. how did i let that slide by? ; )

i have fallen into the reality-type show trap. i now currently am guilty of viewing 4 such shows on a semi-regular basis (and yes, watching like 6 episodes in a row counts, hello mtv marathons): frat/sorority show, american idol, and road rules challenge. why, oh why?
haha, i was re-reading my journal from a while back, and i wrote this PATHETIC line, which i will share with you for your own pleasure, and please, kindly laugh behind my back, and not to my face... "i am being punished for a crime that i didn't commit." the context? i had overslept my alarm and missed going out with some new friends. we were supposed to meet up at like 8 pm or something, and i took a nap but overslept, woke up at 11pm, and was stuck with nothing to do. cell phones weren't in the picture, so i was literally stuck. isn't that funny though, why so dramatic? i think i was crying at the time.

anyway, why am i skipping the two hour finale of the practice to blog? wtf? but i've missed too much of it now to go and watch the end, i'll have to wait 35 minutes until it stops recording, then rewind and watch. such is my life.

don't take people for granted, especially not your friends. and definately not your family. but that is just a given. goodnight loves.

if he, like, didn't wear tapered jeans that like hugged his nuts..." -roxanne

i have this little black crate thing, and it has 3 books in it that i have read, and 19 books in it that i have not read. i just ordered 2 books from barnes and noble.com, why do i keep buying books when i have 19 to read already! stuuuuupid lindsay.

i like attacked my gums with dental floss today. now my teeth are killing me. you know how they say, like, the ocean is moving 2 cm into california every year or some weird statistic like that? well that's how i feel about my teeth. like every year i think they move like .5 mm... but i dont know WHERE they go. they shift around, i guess. so that's what i did on a saturday in fort wayne. flossed.

john mayer and counting crows? did i die and go to heaven?? i think so!

i kind of need a job for the summer... any ideas? i want to baby-sit, cuz that's like the most perfect job, but i dont think that's going to happen. i want to work at pf changs again, cuz where else do you get half-off the best chinese food on the planet? but i dont know... i left that place crying a few times, and that's not really something that draws me back to prospective employers. clarify: employers did not make me cry, but mean customers ('guests') who yelled in my face and threw things at me did. sheesh

i got this RIDICULOUS sunburn last sunday, and i still have it. i tried to take a picture of it in the mirror, but i like totally missed when i aimed at the mirror. i'm a dumbASS. i always wondered why people put stickers on their bodies while they tan... is that supposed to be cool or something? if so, i totally was sleeping when that became fashionable.

gums, still hurt! i. want. a. drink.

feeling nostalgic, i decided to check up on my hometown news. what i came across was an obituary, one of my mom's friends' son, brian, who "died peacefully at home after a courageous battle with cancer." he was 20. went to brother rice, but i didn't even know him. my mom kept me up to date on him every once in a while, but i didn't think he'd die. i guess, you never think they'll die.
i generally don't cry at the drop of a hat, but the tears just came. not because i felt the loss, because that would be untrue. i don't feel the loss of him, because i didn't know him. but i guess because i feel guilty, that i'm alive and not living like i should. i carry too much negativity, and it's like i can hear him saying to his friends, "man, just live. don't carry around all that hate, it's just not worth it. what i would give to have another day..."
but he did not say that... or if he did, i do not know for sure. i never met him, i don't even know what he looks like. but i know how it made me feel when i read his obituary, sitting in my dark room, alone. i did not like it.

i have no shame

linds1982smith: hahah wanna know something funny.... so i am just out of the shower and walking around in my underwear... well little did i remember that my living room blinds are open, and i go walking in there to get my bag and some guy is leaving in his car.... pointing right into my living room
Rox419: hahahahahaha
Rox419: <-------dying
linds1982smith: ok, not only that, but i have a towel turban on... and a thong
linds1982smith: cuz how sick is my ass?!?!
Rox419: hahahahahaha

wanna hear a gross story? so i dig down into my big bag that i bring to work every day, and at the very bottom is my mini-me nalgene. i went to the bathroom to clean it out, and squirted some soap into it, swished it around with hot water, the whole schebang. so i just now finished the approx 16 oz or whatever, and i notice a little area where mold had grown on the inside of the bottle. i have been drinking moldy water! so when you call me tonight (HA) and i don't answer, i'm not screening your call: i am dead on the couch in my apartment. dead from mold overdose. : P

oooooooh, i had a foreboding feeling about blogging from my laptop at work, b/c it's a pentium II and always does weird things, so i CTRL + C'ed it before hitting post & publish (for the blog below), and what do you know! it kicks me off. you may now call me lindsay "miss cleo" smith. and yes, i now have permission to embezzle money from you too. just comes with the job, what can i say.

yessssssssss i dont get points for my speeding ticket! (booooo i have to pay 140 bucks though) so i started training my co-op replacement yesterday... i took him down to introduce him to my boss and everyone else on our team. i was kind of nervous, cuz i still don't speak "business" and didn't know what was considered proper and business-like. anyway. so i go down there, and gene and john are making small talk, then it was clear gene had to get back to his work, so he ended with "well, you have some big shoes to fill... but i'm confident you'll do fine." i was like BOO-YA he's talking about me! annnnnnnnnd i'm a dork. newsflash.
so how jealous am i of my mom and sister in mexico right now!? it's like freezing right now, i have goosebumps and they have turned our heat off once again. i would love to be the person who controls the heat-box-thing. think of all the power you have. peoples' misery is at your fingertips. you are the deciding factor as to the happiness of hundreds. it would be like ruling the world, except it would be nothing like that at all. : P
i need to see a movie. in a theater i mean. i haven't seen a movie since "bringing down the house" and before that "chicago." i used to be a movie freak, seeing at least 2 movies a month, but i've only seen 2 movies year to date. anyway, clearly over that now.
shit, nothing else is going on. 2 1/2 more weeks until summer classes start. i dropped 2 of them (so now i only have 2 classes total) and decided to graduate dec 04 instead of taking 4 classes this summer and graduating may 04. so that should be sweet, only 2 classes, hopefully 4-pointing both. alright, i'm takin off. see ya later.

what i want now more than anything is some mini powdered donuts. mmmmm. and a big stereo so i can listen to music. and a full body massage. and some chocolate cream pie. oh, and a whole new wardrobe, yeah. and then an iced chi tea latte, a late afternoon movie at the theaters, and then hire someone to work out for me.

i'm fed up with annoying people. that is all i have to say about that.

do you remember that one kid who would show up to school in shorts and flip-flops the day after it was a smoldering 80 degrees... only to find out that michigan's mother nature had decided it wasn't quite time for summer yet, and handed us another 45 degree day? yeah, it turns out, i'm that kid. tuesday, it was 82. wednesday, 77. thursday? i show up in a skirt, it is 39 (although it "feels like 28"). yes, i am that jack-ass. i thought only michigan had such craziness!! i just want to move to a place with a consistent climate!!!! is that too much to ask!?!?!?!

There’s the old story about the two workmen on a construction site, both doing the same thing. Asked what he’s doing, the first man says “I’m laying bricks.” Asked the same question, the second man says “I’m building a cathedral.”

I lifted that from http://scottraymond.net. I like the idea of the story, that everyone will go through life with this great sense of doing something. taking pride in his or her work. that sort of thing. i can't say i'm building a cathedral, or saving lives, or fighting fires, or healing the sick, or creating beauty, or teaching others. what can i say? i'm helping the company i work for grow. make money. get more customers. make customers happy so they dont go elsewhere. that is essentially what i do. or the end result of what i do, either or. (and of course, not really, only pretending for a few months before i go back to school.) in the end, it is all about making more money. i've seen enough episodes of oprah to know that i won't find happiness that way. and i know that even without watching oprah. i know it first-hand.

i volunteer for Junior achievements (no, not on any high horse, thankyouverymuch) which is an organization that teaches business and economics to students. i teach/taught 7th and 8th graders. over 5 weeks, i had to follow this guideline that was called "the economics of staying in school" where i basically had to share my experiences with the students and try to show them why to stay in school, encourage them to go to college, etc. every damn lesson boiled down to this: if you participate in extra curricular activities NOW, you'll be accepted into a good college. then if you do an internship, you'll get offered better jobs and will most likely land said jobs. in the end, you'll make more money than the next guy. i'm not kidding. that's what the end of every lesson came down to: how are you actions today going to affect your wallet in 8 years.

i feel like these kids think it's all a joke, cuz it kind of is. kids are smarter than "adults" anyway (quotations because i'm not sure if i fit into that category yet, although for this example, i do) so i feel like they're looking at me saying "yeah right lady, you're such a liar." and i kind of am. i know that what i tell them is false. i know that even though after i pay my bills and i still have money left over, that doesn't make me happy. money does not buy contentment, that is FOE SHOW.

ok this blog has taken such a boring turn, i'm yawning. the whole point i so blatantly missed is that... i wish i could say i was building a cathedral.

i was just told that i need to get off my high horse. : \ why do i feel like shit right now?

i got pulled over today for the very first time, and got a ticket >:o

last weekend, i went out to dinner with my family to celebrate my birthday. we went to larco's, where we were seated next to the mob. my dad, being somewhat of a red wine fanatic, was leafing through (yes, leafing, we're talking binder full of wine selections) the wine list. because of said large numbers of wines they had to offer, you have to order by number. he chose a modest bottle of wine for the 3 of us, around 30, 35 dollars or so. the wine arrived, no big deal, and i had a few glasses, cuz, well, i could. i like red wine alright, but this was pretty good red wine. "nice selection dad!" i complemented as i poured another glass. the rest of the meal was delicious as well, but that should be a given when you're paying 25 dollars for a little chunk of meat. we were stuffed silly by the end of the 5-course meal, and asked for a check instead of desserts. my dad almost up-chucked his veal all over himself when he saw the bill was $375. turns out, when he ordered our "modest" bottle of wine, number 455, our 70-year old waiter (actually he was 69 and 364 days, minor details) wrote down 445, which was not, in fact, a 30 dollar bottle of wine, but a $150 bottle. haha you should have SEEN the look on their faces when they realized their mistake. of course, we got away with paying 30 bucks for the "most expensive bottle of wine they stock" and i even got to see my mom tipsy, which is a once-every-five-years thing. all in all, it was a great time. hehe.

"... i write everything down except what's on my mind..."

i liked how today's episode of that 70s show was like an episode of my life. except i didnt get high and eat my entire kitchen tonight. kind of wish i had though.

"you don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows."

blah, so many sentances i have just written and then erased. i cant quite put my finger on whatever it is i'm trying to say. i think it has to do with the weather, which has thrown us all for a loop. pamela and i took a nice 2 1/2 hour lunch break, but it was pouring the whole time and most of it was spent in a skanky auto body shop. i just came back to my desk and thought it was the least desirable place to be at that moment. of course, it really isn't, but my reality is out of whack.

i have been thinking about old friend recently, it's kinda weird. there's a girl at work who reminds me of one of my old friends. i dont know her really, but i will always ask if she wants to go out to lunch with a group of us because she reminds me of that friend. not that i dont like her for who she is, but sometimes i feel like i'm hanging out with that friend again, and i like that. i dont think that's a horrible thing either, because i guess we are drawn to people who have certain characteristics, and i guess they both have those. whatever. it's sad to lose friends, especially if it's not even for a specific reason. it's so easy to kind of lose touch over time, and i think those are some of my biggest regrets in life.

i had a fun birthday weekend. friday night, i drove up to kalamazoo (i turned 21 at the stroke of midnight that night). en route, i just happened to glance at a car stalled at the side of I-69, just as i would ordinarily do, without thought. so it happens, i see an MSU sticker on the back of the truck and realize it's doug's truck. so i called him up, sure enough he says "turn around, i am broke down here!" so i made it to the nearest "authorized vehicles only" turn-around (yeah i'm badass). he broke some ring or another... so i drove him back to the nearest big exit and we got the new parts and stuff. never really thought doug was the car type, but sure enough he got that mofo back on his car, and i followed him until we split at I-94. let's not forget it was raining and about 40 degrees when this happened. i was freezing cold, starving, anxious to get to kzoo. and every time a truck passed up (I-69 is like truck heavy galore) we'd get a fine nice mist of skanky water... i just pretended it was a beauty treatment of some sort, beauty treatment of the soul for doing a good deed. yeah, hopefully my karma is now evened out...

so got to the zoo finally. jack kare and i went to gallaghers for the official stroke of midnight, and just chilled and caught up. had a guiness for my first offical drink of my 21st year. and we watched the spartans win, but i just wasnt feelin' it in that kzoo bar. i got over it soon enough, and to tell you the truth, i have no idea what we did for the rest of the night. : P

saturday we went shopping , i got a jean jacket, because i have no fashion sense and wear things like jean jackets. the best was when kare and i were trying on clothes... priceless, our attitudes. i guess that's all i'll say about that... yeaaaaaah. my birthday lunch included a drive-by of the chicken coop, but we settled down at taco bell, where i was supposed to receive a complimentary taco, but that never happened ; )_ then it's really cool when i overhear some guy say to his friend how he gave up pop for lent, but he never drank pop anyways, and i feel the need to call him a cheater or something. cuz that's cool. why am i such a dork? don't answer that...

i thought it would be so neat and creative to make kare's away message say "wasted at wayside" (not alliteration, but what?....) well thats what we did. ok, i was like *nervous* going to wayside, i thought for some reason they wouldn't accept my ID or think it was my older sister's or something. hahaha. it was cool though, i got in :o) <-----sick that looks like a pig. anyway. we had a lot of fun there, and sandra even got in with her older sister's ID! it was way fun. i like being the big 2-1.

sunday was random, we drove to MSU for like 2 hours, then i drove kare back to kzoo, hung out w/jack for a bit more, and then drove back to the fort. random for sure. kind of weird too. it snowed, no, blizzarded on the drive back down. i had to stop on the side of the road. i guess it wasn't so much the volume of snow (cuz i dont think it snowed for very long) but it was coming right at me, so it reflected off of my headlights and i couldn't see more than 6 inches off of my windshield. i dont think i was ever that scared driving, so i pulled over for like 1/2 hour. it suuuuucked. cuz it was like midnight (which is late for me anyway) and it was right after my hectic birthday weekend, so i was tired as a mo. didn't get back til like 2:30 in the a-m, so needless to say on monday i was pooped. i really havent caught up on my sleep at all this week, but whatever, i'm over it.

its like 3pm on a friday, and 1/4 of my bosses are here. i am soooo tempted to leave, no one would know the difference, but at the same time i feel guilty because i feel like i have slacked off for the last day and a half. i really dont think i deserve anything i have, i wouldnt be surprised if one day big important people came and whisked me away and off the premisis, saying that i was no longer employed here. shit, how bad does that sound? it's kind of like for you guys who are in school right now... you are no doubt slacking (save for a select few who are not, in fact, slackers) and not doing your work. in a few weeks, classes will be over, finals behind you, and you will get your grades. they will probably not be horrible, but you could have done better. and you'll say to yourself, shit! i knew i should have tried harder, yet i b.s.'ed instead of studying. trust me, i've been there over and over and over again. i'm there right now. i know i should be acting all ambitious and taking initiative and stuff, but i just dont feel like it. i will still get a good review, but i doubt it will be "great." i will get a 3.0 instead of a 4-point, type of thing. you know? i'm sure you do...

ah, what else. i'm going to chicago with the coops next weekend. we're going to a cubs game, which should be cool. i doubt i will ever be in the position to go to a cubs game ever in my life, so i decided to just go (to the game i mean) and i hear wrigley field is just an experience in itself. i hopefully will do some shopping, get some new clothes or jewelry or something. i havent decided if i'm going to go out to the bars with the guys, or hang back with the girls (who are all under 21) i dont know. whatever.

i feel like going to concerts. ben harper and jack johnson are touring together this summer. how kick ass is that?!?! i want to see dave matthews again (for the 4th or 5th time) and jason mraz again too. 3eb is supposed to come out with a new album, so maybe they'll tour that too, how fun. i'd like to see CSNY, bob dylan, and billy joel. i dont even remember the last real concert i was at... i think it was last summer, third eye blind, vanessa carlton, and ... who was the headliner even? matchbox twenty? shows how much i liked whoever it was. oh, i take that back, rusted root at breslin. that was kick ass. i'd like to see them again, too, but under the influence. ; )

i cant wait for my moms tulips to come up. i hope i see them when they do. they are kind of short lived, those tulips. thats a shame. i always think of amsterdams airport when i think of tulips, cuz they always have them there. like, who buys tulips from an airport though? apparently, lots of people. i like amsterdam's airport... it's like a mall, except, you know... with big jets and shit.

"lindsay's weekend wrap up" will end with... a joke. why did the rat cross the road?

(nekcihc eht ot delepats saw ti esuaceb). and i'm out... like myself in a beauty contest!

(haha, 'out like a ______' joke compliments of cora

i'd rather be a half-ass than a quarter-ass, or an eight-of-an-ass

i demand a refund. my apartment complex LIED to me. they lured me in, with promises of a country club, a golf course, balconies for every apartments, built in washer and dryers... all of those were right, except for the last one! built in washers and dryers they are not!! instead, they gave us clothes shrinkers!!! welcome to my club, it's called i'm in denial of my weight gain : P

One winter night last year, my friend J. was talking to me about his roommates, and how their socialization styles varied wildly. "Roommate One goes to bed at like 10 every night so he gets his 11 hours," said J., "Two is always with his girlfriend, and Three never comes home on the weekend until 5:30 in the morning." I know for a fact Three is what we'd call a player. Why? Eh, the grapevine. He plays a lot. We've played together (until way later than 5:30 in the morning, thank you very much). But this does not make me a player too. According to his buddies, it makes me a lot of things, but it certainly does not make me a player.

So what makes Three a player, a title that conveys a certain amount of respect, and perhaps awe, while I (or any girl who hooks up more than rarely) cannot attain that status? I think it's a combination of things. For one, lay-biology holds that women are supposed to be motherly and nurturing by nature, looking for that special someone to be a father for their child. We're supposed to be the ninnies who worry about things like love and commitment. We're the ones who apparently mistake sexual attention for genuine emotional affection. I'm no biology major, but I think, (ladies you'll agree) that the special feeling you get when you see a fine male specimen at a fraternity's after hours is not your body telling you that you want a long lasting emotional commitment. It's your body's way of telling you, "Ooh yeah, I want that one!"

Nonetheless, guys are players, girls are sluts. Can you think of a male equivalent of slut? Or a female equivalent of player? Sure, you can cross label people, for example, call someone a "male slut" (ya catch how I had to specify that the slut was male?), but somehow, it doesn't quite ring true. When I tell people why I reject the label "slut," I always have to qualify it: "I'm a party girl, sure. But I'm picky, and I have respect for myself. And I'm not expecting any sort of commitment." I don't pretend that the person with whom I hook up is going to be saying to his buddies the next morning, "Oh yeah, that Kate. What a great personality. She's really cool. I'm so glad I got the opportunity to spend the night with such a great person." If I hook up with someone, I'm just in it for the night.

Do I think there is such a thing as a slut? Yes. When I think of a slut, I think of someone who needs sex to make themselves feel better about who they are, and I feel sorry for them. Sluts are people who don't care what the package looks like, as long as they get to unwrap it. A slut to me is someone who needs to somehow downplay what they've done (you know, the girl half a frat has seen naked, but who still titters "I don't usually do this" as her bra is unhooked for the 3,407th time). A slut thinks she has to be pretend friends with every guy she's hooked up with. This to me is silly. Why be nice? Be friendly if you want to past hookups, but honey, they're not talking to you because of your great personality, so don't fool yourself. And if you're maintaining good relations in hopes of future, uh, business, trust me, they'll come back if they dig your style.

This brings me to what my boy had to say when I whined to him about the double standard that prevents women from achieving player status. He says, "you have to give guys more props than girls when it comes to 'playing,' because for guys it requires some level of, I guess, talent to get a girl into bed. The guy has to employ some kind of salesmanship to seal the deal whereas a girl just has to be attractive and say, 'Hey, you.' If she wants to get laid she needs only to show up and sit back and let him do all the work. If he wants to get laid he has to have the looks then prove his worth through his wit. See, girls get to deal with horny idiots. A girl on a scam is like door-to-door elevator shoe salesman in munchkin land -- it's hardly a challenge." Now, my boy is, I'd say, pretty average in his representation of male thought, and this is also a sentiment echoed by many of my guy friends. As my friend S. said, "Did a guy say hello to you today? Then you were offered sex."

Basically, I guess it all comes down to that: it's no challenge to bed your average guy, so why should the ladies get any respect for doing so? Granted, there are those of us who choose not to participate in this scene, and that's fine. Congrats for not choosing the path of least resistance. But for those of us who do, why should we suffer? If we're being safe and respecting our bodies, why are we labeled sluts and ho's? Can we help it if guys are easy? Let the women play too!


**********ARTICLE REPRINT, KATIE MCDOWELL**********

what should i do? a) take classes next spring, walk in graduation, then take the last 2 or 3 classes i have in the summer orrrrr b) take classes next spring, go back to fort wayne like i'm supposed to and finish my coop, then go back to EL fall 2004 and take a super-light semester and graduate in december. i'm leeeeeeaning towards... well i wont tell you. i want your advice. i just enrolled for next spring, it feels to weird to be thinking that far in advance... well maybe its not that, but maybe its weird to be thinking its going to be my 2nd to last semester, or my last REAL semester at michigan state. how the time flies by, its sick. anyway, drop me a line if you read my blog on friday the 28th before 5 pm, i'll be here at work... tangerine-erine-erine... i want a tangerine.

ok, and this is why war is not totally in vain... although i don't know if bush administration reads this and goes 'yah, lets' go get em!' sports illustrated/cnn article

fuck! this is why i hate war:
In his four-minute announcement from the Oval Office, Bush said the military campaign, supported by 35 nations, would make efforts to spare Iraqi civilians. But he made it clear the U.S. military planned to use its full might in the war.
it's like "well, we will try our hardest not to kill the innocent, but you know, it's a small country and we gotta blast the hell out of it to make sure we get 'em all" okay, so maybe we're not blasting the whole country out of the desert, but i still didn't like that comment.
i was tutoring delquan today, and he's a very aware 10 year old... he started talking about the war against afghanistan (no, i didn't correct him) and stuff. i didn't know what was appropriate to say to him, because, you know, he's 10. so i asked him if they talked about the war in school or anything, and he said no. this led me to believe his parents have the t.v. on and/or talk to him about it... so he or i brought up george dubbya, i dont remember who it was... and delquan goes "he's just another man, in another suit." i was just amazed that came out of a 10-year-old's mouth.
well that's all for tonight. buenos noches.

and i believe that's now the fourth time i've turned onto a one-way street, the wrong way. ouch.

why so "god bless america"? whats wrong with blessing the world??

it was warm today. now it is cold. brrrrr.

whenever i write a blog, i read it after i post, ya know, just to see how it sounds. after reading this one, i think i've decided to start reading them BEFORE i post, cuz i sure as hell sound like a dumbass in this last one. that is all.

you know what i hate? hmmm, how do i say this... ok it used to annoy me when i was out with my mom or dad, and they would run into someone they knew, a neighbor or friend or something, and they would talk about me while i was standing right there, an awkward, sightly being just wasting air. (we all had an ugly phase, don't try and pretend like you didn't.) hmm, now that doesnt quite connect with what i'm trying to say, but kinda. it's like, hi, dad, why are you telling mrs. brown about my violin recital while i'm in clear, obvious earshot. not like i was a bad kid and they were talking about why i was in juvie this time, but ya know. principle. bah. whatever. i gave up pop for lent, not that i am a practicing catholic at all or anything. lent for me is basically a diet. always around my birthday (when my new years resolutions expire) and right as spring is about to start, perfect time to diet. and fuck, do i need it. blah. i went running though yesterday. no, i did not just go running, i woke up at 8:30 in the morning and went running. who does that? oh yeah, motivated, athletic, fit people. but certainly not me. but, i did! can you believe it. shit, i was proud of myself for being up before 11. also partook (partaked??!!) in the obligatory spring cleaning, but certainly am not finished. DID do my car, however, which was waaaaay overdue. now, i wont' be embarassed if i have to drive people anywhere. i'm always the person who, when it comes to be lunch time, says "alright (insert name here), you wanna drive?" or just keep my mouth shut until someone offers. that, and i drive a saturn. hell, even I don't fit in the back-seat of a saturn. 'nough said. today i sat out on my cute little patio (and by cute, i mean ugly concrete with twenty or so dried up worms, which looked like something you would find on an asian salad or something) and re-beaded my necklace and read my book. the sun was just awesome, and whatever vitamin or whatever the suns lets you absorb, i got my daily intake time ten. felt good indeed. that's it for now. i seem to be more interested in other people's lives at the moment to consider having one of my own. not a bad thing at all really. i'll write more later, should something merit a blog.

sometimes i write letters to myself. well, not quite to myself, but for myself. they are to people, but i never ever actually give them to the person. hence, they are for myself. POINT of my story, i wrote one of these letters a couple of months ago, i wrote it at work actually. it's folded up and sitting in my paper-organizer thingy. you know, looks like 5 magazine holders glued together, made of metal? its got all these papers in it, and then at the very far left, a little folded rectangle of lined paper with some silly words from what seems like a lonnnnng time ago. it's things like that, that make me laugh. more so than other people, i laugh at myself.

craaaaazy
in the news...
if they're lying to me...
my boyfriend... if i were cool enough, i'd learn how to post pictures directly to my blog, but alas
and i'll leave you with some purple : P

ohhhh i forgot to post about my indian friend i drive to work, that will have to wait til later.

i am half done with my coop session. craaazy. i havent updated in a while, so i will try to recap: my parents went to florida last week, those lucky ducks. but i didnt' complain when they came home and said "we bought a time share" no i did not complain one bit. you know what that means? christmas in cancun. heeellllls yeah. christmas in cancun was the original idea, though, and i think it's being changed to thanksgiving in cancun, but still. vacation! haven't been on one of those since senior spring break. oh wait, if you dont count the 6 week vacation in europe this summer. : P oh shit, i sound like a brat. onward. so last saturday we had a coop party (when i say we, i really mean some guys threw the party and i attended...) don made hurricanes with like 3 shots in each one. i showed up late (10pm=late in FW) and had a hurricane to catch up. needless-to-say i was tipsy once i finished my hurricane. i ran into someone i knew there who kinda made me feel awkward, so i had another drink and by then was drunk. we ended up playing flip cups, (hello, now full fledged drunk). my friend graciously walked me home, all the while maintaining my composure. it was funny, he was drunk too, so he came in to use my bathroom, and the whole time he's in there, i'm like thinking to myself "hurry the fuck up, take a piss and leave so i can throw up." yeah, it was one of those nights. i had a lot of fun though, i got to know some of the coops better. geez, i would hate to read this blog, all i talk about is coops or work, but you dont understand (or you may, i like to just say that for effect) that's all i do. anyway. i havent felt good since last weekend, but i'm not sick. i wish i would've either gotten sick for a few days, or just felt like fine ya know. like right now, my head aches, but only dully. (dull-ly) not that i want a full fledge headache, but i'd trade one for 7 days of dull headache. whaaaat am i taaaalking about. it's 4:22 on a friday afternoon, that's what i'm talking about. spring couldn't wait any longer to get here, could it? i'm also having issues about classes and graduation and stuff. decisions decisions. the only decision i really feel like making is what kind of topping i want on my TCBY yogurt, and really, i wish i could just have them all and not decide on any one. yes, i'll have a small cup, with 1 tablespoon of chocolate yogurt, and 1 tablespoon of every single topping you own. thank you very much.

my last blog was one week ago, and i havent really had anything to say between now and then. i am feeling really disconnected here in fort wayne, so i think anything i would write would seem stupid. some funny things did happen though, but i would feel like a ... brat (?) writing about them. ah, maybe tomorrow. i am sensing a boring day at work tomorrow. wednesdays are always so great, that thursdays get a bad rap by default of following wednesdays. hmm. feeling bored and trite, and very tired. i wont want to wake up in the morning, i will feel so good and warm and comfy in my bed, i can just tell. but alas, i still retreat to the nest that is the pillows and blankets of my bed. buenos noches.

oh, i must just chuckle and laugh when my internet radio (complement of launch.yahoo.com, ie my savior at work) shuffles to "pony" by ginuwine. its times like that when i have a smile on my face, cuz who else listens to pony while at work?? oh, time for cheap b-dubs impersonating restaurant for lunch. mmm.

i feel like a shitty friend : \ its like, i know what i should be doing right now, but i fear that if i do, i will only irritate. i try and think what i would want someone to do in my place, and then i think, am i blowing everything out of proportion? i feel so in the dark, like i have no idea what is going on. and i think its my fault, unless someone turned out the light on their way out. in that case, i can really only stumble my way to the door, and feel around for the light switch. i'm thinking chances are slim.

ohhhhh my gosssssh. today is going so SLOWLY. i am just about dying over here. no one is updating their blogs. there is no new news in the last 15 minutes. i dont want to check the weather, as it will only depress me. i dont have anything to say in any email, so i just wont write them. hmmm. i want to bust out my book and read, or my journal, which is severly outdated, but i am scared i'll get "caught" like one of my bosses will come upstairs and see me "slacking off" and i don't know, not get mad at me, but think poorly of me. i already emailed one boss to see if he had anything for me to do, i guess you could consider that taking initiative, right? ahhhh, fuck this shit. i am so bored. i *almost*, just almost wish i were in a class right now. at least i could like look around the classroom and try and figure people out, or i dont know, pay attention or something. you know what i want to do right now? crank up my speakers, and play southpark TIMMY doing his little song. that would crack me up right about now. iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii aaaaaaammmmmmmmmmm sooooooooooooooo booooooooooooorrrrrred.

i keep getting missed calls from "unavailable" so if it's yoooooooou who's calling me (chances, slim) please dont think i'm being a brat by not calling yooooou back, it's just that i dont know who yoooooou are! : D

i think i only have a few minutes before blogger shuts down for maintance, so i will try and think of what i want to say, instead of saying a bunch of shit that just peeks around the bushes and barely shows its face. 1) as much as i value this internship i am doing (first and foremost, paying off credit card debt, but also learning valuable work blah blah blllaaaaaahhhhhh), i think i'm missing out. i know it doesnt make sense, cuz i'm not SKIPPING semesters or anything. i mean, i have 2 semester until i graduate, so ultimately i'm delaying graduation by doing this, but i still feel like i'm missing out. i never really felt like i had a life, [i'm being sarcastic here, but we all know sarcasm is ultimately truth ; ) ] but here, i feel like i especially dont have a life. i dont know, i have friends here, but we're not friends. iiiiiii dont know. i am enjoying my time here, to an extent, dont get me wrong, but i just feel like i'm missing out. ahhhhhh, yet i still feel like i'm withholding. onward.
2) so my mom calls me with this weird story about how our phone service got shut off, and to call her on her cell phone if i needed to get ahold of my family. she called to investigate, and they told her "well, it seems your husband called to get your service shut off while you are on vacation." odd, cuz my parents ARE on vacation right now, but my dad never in his 48 years has done that. who DOES do that anyway? so ultimately, my mom was like, uhhhhh listen, turn our phone back on. well, then a few days later, actually the DAY they left for vacation, my mom opens the mail, and there is a copy of a credit card they already have. but with lionel smith's name on it. okaaaaaaay, this is strange. call up the credit card company. "ohhh, about that, lionel asked to be put on your account mr. smith" yeah, except we dont know any lionel's, except the richie kind that sings all night long but that's besides the point. "let me just open your account and take a look... okay it looks like he charged four thousand dollars and this store on this day blah blah"... okay can you imagine how fuming don is, especially since he would NEVER name his child lionel. (they're figuring 'lionel' pretended to be my dad's son or brother or something). so my dad asks "ok???? how did this happen, dont you like, i dont know, ask for identification?? orrrrrrrr perhaps require the cardholder to be present or something?!?!?!" i dont know how it happened, but it turns out it was "lionel" who called and pretended to be my dad to shut off our phone, in case the credit card company called our house asking for verification. isnt that fuuuuuucked up??!! ugh it pisssses me off like no other. especially because the phone company is supposed to ask for social security verification (i guess lionel could have my dad's SSN, which means even more trouble...) but more than likely they didn't. so these lame people arent doing their job and shit like this happens. arg.
3.) ok, how come i didn't know eminem was coming to detroit this summer until AFTER tickets are sold out! boooo
4) four is a good number to end on... ii'm just grasping for something to say. hmmmm. i enlarged this really cool picture this week in the dark room, it has a really old feel to it. it was fun, we were only supposed to make contact sheets, but i had taken a photo class before, so i knew how to use the enlarger and stuff, and this mom-lady i'm friends with reeeeally wanted to enlarge this picture, so i like whispered to her "hey, i know how to use this... you wanna make one?" like we were doing something we weren't supposed to. her eyes got all big and she was like "you know how to use it?!" so we started enlarging. well everyone came over and was like oooooooo what are you doooooing and jan and i (how cute is that, can you picture this kind of ... motherly looking 40-something named jan?!) kind of showed them how to use the enlarger and by the end of the night, like 10 out of the 12 of us had printed. poor old bill, our instructor, was like kind of sad that we had jumped ahead, and was like "what are we gonna do next week?" i felt sooooo bad, cuz he's just so excited about teaching us and stuff, and here i go, egging people on to jump ahead. okay, what started off as a positive 4) (printing something cool) ended up making me feel kind of guilty :::insert red-faced AIM smiley::: but oh well. it was still cool. ok thats it. good night folks, i bid you adieu.

audblog audio post

ok, over the past 3 days, i have spent a grand total of 32 hours at work, that's almost 11 hours a day. i soooooo want to put one of those aol faces, with the foot in the mouth. not that i have my foot in my mouth, or ever did have my foot in my mouth, but i think it adequately displays my mood and attitude right now. kind of dazed and confused. ahhhhh, time for film class! actually, if i think about it, this has been the best day i've had in fort wayne yet. i taught a 7th grade class this morning (about finance and shit, another story completely), tutored delquan and darious (my favorite 5th grade twins), and now i have my b&w class which i just love. shit, i sound so positive. what the? anyway, i must jet.

p.s. wait, it is tied for favorite fort wayne day, tied with the day i set a personal guinness record. ooooooh for what, you are probably wondering?

ohhhhhh myyyyyyy gosh, i am sooooooo weirded out right now!!! read this: this was me being totally random and taking a chance at IMing someone i never DREAMED would remember me:

linds1982smith: this is a totally random IM, but i am looking thru the Munich Intl School website where they have little paragraphs about people... and i thought it was so funny to see you, cuz i can distinctl remember you from when i went there in 6th grade, you were on my hour-long bus ride home ( i think you were a year older). i thought that was just way too random to pass up IMing you
Desty Nova79: uhmm and who might u be dear?
linds1982smith: my name is my screen name
linds1982smith: i only went there for a year, and i only knew you from the bus
Desty Nova79: did u have a brother?
linds1982smith: yeah
linds1982smith: Eric Smith
Desty Nova79: i think i remember you
Desty Nova79: blonde girl right?
linds1982smith: redhead actually
Desty Nova79: readhead.....
Desty Nova79: did u live outside of herrsching?
linds1982smith: you were maybe 7th or 8th grade
linds1982smith: yeah
Desty Nova79: now i remember
Desty Nova79: you had that ring with the hands holding the heart
linds1982smith: i didn't expect you to remember me, i just thought it was funny to see someone i recognized
linds1982smith: okay, i'm spooked right now, cuz i have that ring on!!!
Desty Nova79: u actually explained to be wich way it points
Desty Nova79: hahaha
Desty Nova79: sure i remember you
linds1982smith: whoaaaaa thats weird as hell
Desty Nova79: hahah


ok, isn't that weeeeeird. first of all, no one ever remembers me!!! i am not even kidding... and this random guy named jerome (cher-rrrrrome... oh shit, didn't even do it justice. the way he said it was pure beauty) who was on my hour-long bus ride from our wee village into the city where our school was... he not only rememberd me, but rememberd my ring (i didn't even know i had it in 6th grade) AND i am wearing the same freaking ring at this exact moment. the stars must be aligned today, this is trippin me out. i think i need a joint. : P j/k maybe a beer. haha later folks.

i have been steadfast in reading my friends blogs (all of you who stalk your stalkers would probably realize this...) but haven't even been keeping up my own! i feel like last week was crazy, but in hindsight, i cant' really remember what about it made me feel so overwhelmed. i remember wednesday... i was out of my apartment from like 7 am til 10 pm. wednesdays i tutor a 5th grader (this is during work though) named delquan. we're supposed to do math and whatnot, but delquan isn't such a fan of the numbers, for he is a poet. really, he's such a sweet kid, a romantic at such a young age. he wrote me a poem (well, i find out, more like dedicated to me...) that started out something like "love is like a dove" and went on, so made my heart stop for a second before i realized it was a 10 year old reading to me. : P anyway, the poem went on and was saying how this man, he saw this young girl, "so fair" and essentially dumped the girl he was with for this beauty. then, she got all lazy and stuff, and the last line was "and then his wife turned into a slob." i was like "delquan!?!? thaaaaaanks" and he just laughed and said it wasn't about me, but just for me. oh, it's the thought that counts, right? always. then, (ugh) i was conned into going to the mall to interview people about what they thought an engineer was, and stupid questions like that, for this engineer's week dinner we're having at GE this week. sooo not fun. the last thing i want to do is go up to complete strangers and ask them boring questions about engineers, considering i don't even like engineering. then, i had my film class, which was the highlight of my mid-week. i found out 3 of the 12 people in the class are spartans, which for whatever reason made me feel all warm inside (joke) but really, it excited me for some weird (non-sexual) reason. i loooooove being back in the darkroom. it feels so good to be somewhat creative, although i don't know if i could do it for a living or anything. i think i have a creative cap, something like 12 minutes or so. whatever, it gives me something to look forward to, thank goodness. thursday we had a co-op bbq. it wasn't too bad, i mean, for a co-op bbq. since i am on the "social committee" (what a joke) i had to run around going grocery shopping with the other "committee memebers" and tally up people and all that other not-fun stuff. blah. friday, i had a valentine! he was a little late getting up here, and i fell asleep on the couch while watching harry and sally, then i woke up and like thought it was the next day and that i had missed valentines day. hahaha. like it is an event or something. we went out for dinner, and the restaurant had these random fan things circling around the ceiling. okay, that doesn't do justice to the weirdness of whatever was going on up there, but anyway. it was nice to have a valentine for once. especially a valentine who would drive for almost 3 hours to see me! saturday... lazy day. i watched movies and ate pizza and fell asleep at like 10:30. looking back on it, i should have gone out... oh well, over it. i bought "my big fat greek wedding", which i plan on watching every day for the next 2 weeks. just kidding. but i do think it is an especially cute movie. i wish i had an aunt voula. so, joe millionairre (i never know how to spell millionairre!!) finale tonight! who-hoo! last week i was so freaking mad they left us hanging like that. there was even an article on cnn.com about how people are boycotting watching the last episode and stuff, but i'm like "give me my joe millionairre!!" ahhh, to lead a boring life, there's nothing like it. i do have tons of other stories to tell, but you'd die if i went through all of them, they paint too sad a picture of my too sad a life. (i.e. my joy of finding a new grocery store, orrrrrrrr how funny it strikes me when i wake up and there are people on my buddly list who still haven't gone to bed, orrrrrrrr how getting personal mail makes me jump up and down -- see these all make me seem like some kind of 2-legged freak. oh wait, i am a 2-legged freak! ahhhh). alright. this officially concludes my blog for today, i think i've said too much. i haven't said enough.

you know you need to get out more when.... you call someone out on IM at work, and he responds with "oh hush" which just sends you in a frenzy laughing your ass off, until you realize this is no normal IM conversation, and in fact, you are at work, and probably should not be laughing out loud. but you know what, to hell with them (still not quite sure who "they" are considering i work practically out of earshot of anyone), if i wanna laugh at work, i will laugh at work. ESPECIALLY when a grown man (19 yr old grown man) tells me to hush. i dont think i've ever in my whole life told someone to hush. annnnnnnd i'm done, now that i realize this sounds very stupid.

I am scared of the things upcoming
And I want for the things I don't have
Cannot stand to be one of many
I'm not what they are

-guster

i probably, no definately, shouldn't be blogging at work. i'd fire me if i could.

friday come sooner.

i see her from afar at first; she is in the parking lot of the amoco at the intersection of maple and telegraph. the big streetlights are shining down on her, not even casting light on any other thing in sight. she holds on her shoulder a bag, made of cheap and fake leather, and struggles to make her way across the lot. i approach the gas station on my right in my car. the hot air is coming out of the floor vents and face vents, and i, from the comfort of the car, see her shiver and readjust her hood.
i pull into the parking lot across the street from the amoco she's leaving; she heads across maple in my path. i try to avoid staring, but can't help it as i try to figure out if she's homeless. i carefully and slowly climb out of my mercury mountaineer, clicking the automatic lock button twice. the horn sounds once loudly, breaking the silence, alerting me i've armed my car. she is now travelling down the sidewalk, and i hear her talk. she's about fifty feet away, but her voice sounds and echoes against the brick walls of the strip of stores before us. she is babbling, rambling, words spin out of her mouth: nothing she says makes sense, and i cannot even comprehend a word. she continues to talk and clutch her bag as she treks down the walk.
just as i approach the double doors of the store i'm about to enter, she stops walking and talking. she and i are the only ones around; i'm aware of our existence, and wonder if she is too. my warm hand trembles at the touch of the cold, expensive-looking brass door handle, but i rest it there for a moment before entering. we lock eyes and hold a gaze for a long moment; maybe a mere second, but that second seems to stretch on and on, forever.
i feel a sense of responsibility for that woman at that very moment. though i've never met her, i feel a sense of duty towards her. i naively wonder what her story is. what is she doing roaming down telegraph, with a dirty purse on her shoulder? what could possibly fill that bag? doesn't she have a family to go to, to support her? what'll happen when i break the trance we seem to be in?
a sudden gust of winter wind overcomes me and i am suddenly brought back to reality. she adjusts the hood of her dirty coat once more and starts walking. all i can think of is to offer her a smile, a hopeful offering of peace. she smiles a half-smile back, sort of a remorseful acknowledgement of her situation. her eyes warm up and for a moment, she is free. i stand still as she slowly trudges by me. my head stays cocked to where she stood a few seconds ago. she has already walked off of the sidewalk of the small stripmall and is making her way into the snowy parking lot of J & J Associates law firm next door. i finally walk into the bookstore, and the warm air fills me with a false sense of security.

i constantly have to remind myself not to believe what other people tell me about myself... for if i do, i will only become what they say of me, and not who i think i really am. sometimes its hard, though, and i find myself being that person because it's what's expected of me. does this make me weak?

the top of the white hutch held by the white desk holds knickknacks and trinkets. on the left, back in the dusty corner shadowed by a dutch doll and a red mexican maraca, stands a purple wax hand. it's slightly bigger than my own; the fingers are chunky and bulky, and the creases in the knuckles are visible. the index and pinky fingers are erected, the forefinger faintly skewed. it's premature arthritis, i guess. the thumb is slightly cocked, but in a relaxed position, just sitting there. the middle and ring fingers are bent at the middle knuckle, yet not so much as to be touching the palm of the hand. with all fingers in place, the hand forms the sign language phrase "i love you." from my queen-sized bed, when i'm sitting in the perfect position, i can see its waxy surface and slight shine from the muted, dull overhead lights and wonder whom the cryptic message is from.