Love My Life

Today has been spectacular.

There's really no other word to describe it. Well, magnificent could work. I guess. But you're just being nitpicky now.

Wednesday night, a coworker asked to switch a shift with me. My 9-1 Saturday morning for her 1-5 Saturday afternoon. Meaning, I didn't have to wake up until ten thirty and could lounge around. Which is exactly what I did.

My stomach finally demanded I get up, continuing this wonderful morning. Suddenly, out of nowhere, I remembered that we had Thin Mints in the freezer. Yeah, they're gone now. So is the Spongebob Easy Mac that made my lunch so marvelous.

Still, the best had yet to come. I went to work, immediately logging on to Twitter. Laura, Kelly and I started to chat about Sean Griswold's Head by Lindsey Leavitt. We'd all just gotten signed bookmarks in the mail from her, so we were discussing potential uses and how awesome her book is. That's when the best thing happened: Lindsey tweeted us back. She started by telling Kelly and I that she liked us. Then followed it up by offering more bookmarks if needed to Laura and I, who work in libraries. I couldn't keep the smile off of my face. I love it when author's tweet back.

After that, I remembered that March is Accio Books and went to scan through our book sale materials. I was glancing through a mystery novel, making sure there was no sex scenes because I'm sending this to a primary school, and found 35 forever stamps. As a college kid far away from home, that is gold. I printed out letters to all of the Writer Girls Cause Chaos and mailed them out, along with a letter to my guy.

Some days just make the rest easier to live with.

Want a Bertie Botts Every Flavored Bean? It Tastes Like Failure

I was always raised to pay for things myself.

Don't take that wrong, I didn't have to pay rent at 14 or buy my own Christmas gifts. But extraneous bills for stuff that I wanted were to be my responsibility.

So, at age 13, I bought my first pay-per-minute cell phone and paid with babysitting money every month.

At 16, I got a job and was able to support my social life, cell phone, and anything luxurious that I wanted.

Last semester, I tacked on 600 bucks every six months for car insurance, and 60 bucks a month for loan payments.

This semester, I have 45 bucks a month for cell phone, 400 every six months for car insurance, and 120 for loan payments. Add in having to pay for transportation from Illinois to New York, and my bank account is nil.

My parents took off a major cut of my loan payment this semester. It was 400 naturally, they knocked off 100 after I lost ten hours at work due to snow days. Then Dad knocked off another 50 today. I should feel lucky. I should, and am, thankful. But mostly, I feel like a failure.

I hate not being able to support myself. I cried when Dave paid for my cell phone this month. It makes me feel worthless. It makes me want to stop attending college and go to technical school to get a high paying job immediately. It just sucks.

So, I'm probably being ridiculous, but this is how I feel. Bills have become the bane of my life, as many others. I'm so happy I'm transferring to a cheaper school. One that won't rape my wallet.

Lowered Expectations are the Easiest Way to Contentment

Things in my life seem to be getting easier and harder at the same time.

My expectations have gone down considerably, but I really can't see that as a bad thing. My stress levels are no longer off the charts. I'd rather have that than unreachable standards any day.

My Political Science professor handed back our first assignment yesterday. One page, double spaced. He didn't bother to explain it to us, so it seemed like we were to summarize a news article and hand it in. Those who did just that received C's. As a Lit. major, I analyzed why the article was important and how it related to our class. I received a B and the comments: 'Decent analysis, but hated your writing style.'

Oh, really, now? C'mon, I know I'm not Dickins, but this is a Political Science class. I didn't have any spelling or grammatical errors. I don't care if you personally hate my writing style. That is not what this class is about.

I'll talk to him about it tomorrow. I'm hoping it will be on the fact that my paragraphs were shorter than they could have been. If it's anything else, I'm going above his head. It's ridiculous to scam me out of a grade just because you dislike the way I express my writing. I don't appreciate e.e. cummings as I should, but I don't refuse to do my assignments concerning him.

I have my first essay due in my Writ 102 course tomorrow. I have to clarify my thesis, add in my citations, and I'm set. I can analyze. Grasse seems set on giving us personal time to talk to her about our papers. I loved that with Kauth last semester and I'm extremely grateful that Grasse chooses to do the same.

My test in Biology today was riddled with errors in the questions. About a 1/5 of the answers were wrong for the questions. I'm hoping the professor cancels that grade. It's not fair if he doesn't, considering the amount of leeway he'll have to give if he doesn't.

Beyond school, I'm working twenty eight hours this week. Work actually relieves me of stress. I can yell at people for being loud without getting yelled at myself. It's great.

Dave and I are fantastico. I'm working on a box full of gifts for him this March. The friends who have heard what's going in the box think it's marvelous, so that's great.

Things with my friends have settled down. Benca are dating now. They're utterly adorable. Sam is getting her life set before she moves on to another guy. I'm dealing with my roommate the best I can considering that she's Debbie Downer.

Life is good. I couldn't ask for better. Well, I could, but who would listen?

February: The Month of Evil

Many things have happened in the last few weeks. Most importantly, I lost my Google password and had to get a new one. I didn't abandon you. My password abandoned you.

So, life hasn't been absolutely rainbow and puppy dogs like last semester. Somehow I'm already a third through my second semester and I feel like I have no grades. That being said, I feel like I'm doing worse because I have nothing to base my achievement on.

Beyond that, I've been falling into a depression. I don't want to be here and it's obvious to everyone around me. Well, except for my roommate who keeps insisting that she "shares my pain", despite her living only forty minutes away. But everyone else sees it. My parents, my friends, my professors, my employers, and my poor pair of sweatpants know that I'm utterly despondent.

Mostly it is to be blamed on the month of February. February is a terrible month, you see. It hold Valentine's Day, Dave's birthday, and our anniversary all within two weeks. Along with that, it's the month that I have to pay my car insurance, cell phone, and loan payments. I'm confronted with two huge problems: Money is extremely tight, totally robbing me of my sanity. I'm lonely to the point where I write random lines in my journal.

The latest: My wire DNA is rusting. I feel like that should be analyzed. As someone afraid of death, I like to pretend I'm made up of machinery and gears, so that I don't feel so fragile. So, the worst thing that could potentially happen to me is rusting. Kind of emo. Very emo. Oh, Gosh, do you see what February is doing to my brain?

Please leave, February. I dislike you.