My butt's been exceptionally sore from the trip + my period so I haven't really felt up to sitting down at the computer and regaling everyone with details and pictures from my adventures in FL and bridesmaid dress shopping, but rest assured, I will.

I just felt like recording some of the bizarre dreams I've had lately quickly, because I know I will forget them otherwise, and they are hilarious.

Item 1: In FL I had a dream where Josh and I were poisoning stranger's food and killing them a la Last Supper or Arsenic & Old Lace. We didn't have actual poison, so we were putting shampoo in people's food.... somehow, they didn't notice. The first time, Josh just wanted to see if it would work. The second time, we just had so much fun the first time we wanted to try it again. The third time, Josh wasn't around and I did it myself. My mom somehow caught wind of this, and asked me if we'd been killing people. I think, "Man, I'm bad at lying. What the hell, I might as well tell her." When I tell her, she gets really upset and I can't understand why.

"You murdered people!?!? I don't want you hanging out with that Josh anymore! Oh Amy, now that you've killed people, you can never go to heaven!" she says.

"Mom, why are you making such a big deal?? Besides, I killed that one guy on my own. We didn't shoot anyone, it was just shampoo."

We argue quite awhile, but she never gets me to understand what the big deal is about killing people.

Item 2: I had a dream where I was absolutely wailing on Jason from Friday the 13th. He wouldn't die, which was what my aim was, so I just kept having to beat on him. There were a bunch of people I went to grade school with in this dream too, randomly milling around. I think during this whole thing I was trying to also exchange lockers with Kimberly Edgecomb because Chad Krueger was stealing stuff out of mine.

Item 3: I had a dream last night where I got in a conversation with a stranger about this wrestler called "The Boogie Woogie Man." Josh loves this guy because he's crazy, even for a wrestler. He says "baby" over and over only he pronounces it "Beh-bay," and steals children from bystanders. He has a crazy ZZ top beard as well, and a crazed look in his eye. I think the elevator thing started out because the woman said "baby" in that way, and I started telling her about Boogie Woogie. This pretty much played out like it would in real life, and she looked at me like I was a weirdo.

woo

So I'm off to FL tomorrow morning, so if you communicate with me in some way and I am sluggish at getting back to you, that would be the reason.

An awesome thing that happened to me today: Tina's belated Christmas gift got here. It's an adorable teapot & two cups that look like frogs. Now, I'm usually not a big fan of "cute" but they ARE so cute. And also mitigating the cuteness is the awesome fact that the frogs look pretty surprised and disturbed by the fact that they are now serving as teaware.

Plus.... frogs! I heart frogs.

Today was pretty good. I don't know why, but yesterday I started thinking of the one bit from the Simpsons where Bart has hid something of Lisa's and tells her to find it, she will have to follow a series of clues, each more fiendish than the last. Of course, it being Bart & Lisa, she finds it before he finishes the sentence. And I was thinking it would be fun to do something like that in a nice way.

Yesterday Connie from work was upset, her father has something akin to Alzheimer's disease, and she's been slowly losing him for a long time now. I can't even imagine how horrible that must be, though I worry about it pretty often for my own dad (Alzheimer's runs very strong in his family). Her mom died of cancer a few years ago. Anyway, she had a doctor's appointment with him yesterday, which made her upset, and on top of that she was late to work and wanted to use her paid time for it. Our supervisor would let her, but she's gone so Connie got some random supervisor on the phone, who said she would need to run it by our supervisor to get approved, only our supervisor's not back until after the paycheck for that period is issued. And Connie's already got financial difficulties thanks to caring for her father, so not getting her full paycheck because of some bureaucratic BS is a serious problem.

I feel bad... there's nothing I can really do. Doctors are the only ones who can do anything, and of course they can't even always help enough. I feel stupid being like, "If there's ever anything you need," or any of the stuff people usually say. But when I was thinking of the above Simpsons-related project, I figured I could at least give her a minor cheer-up today.

So anyway I made this puzzle where I had several questions, and then certain letters from the answers spelled out a message, "look inside your candy jar," because she has a candy jar on her desk. Then in the candy jar was a rhyming note which pointed to another note which pointed to another note, etc. I actually had a lot of fun coming up with the clues, and incorporating them with things in the office such as a coworker with middle name Lamont or a mysterious pile of generic mac & cheese that's been sitting in this one area for months now.

I went to the office earlier today, and someone was like, "Earning overtime?" My response, "no, doing this scavenger hunt thing for a friend," and I earned a weird look from the lady. It was great, though. I worried that one of the notes would be found at the wrong time or by the wrong person, but everything went according to plan.

At the end was a gift card to Hobby Lobby, where she shops at sometimes. I had orig. thought of maybe making one of my weird homemade cards or coupon book, but I figured on the off chance that she didn't find the treasure hunting process as amusing as I did, I should reward her.

I guess I didn't need to worry about that, I got an email from her saying she found it and had a blast doing it, so woo! I win at life.

Damn. I feel so old tonight. Not old in the sense of actually old, old in the sense of having used up so much of my life and still not really knowing what I want to do with it. I feel like I've been waiting, all my life, holding my breath, getting ready for what I'm going to do with my life. And I still don't know. I don't want to waste my entire life waiting, I want to do some doing. But I don't know what I want to do.

Which is actually somewhat of a lie.... I know things I'd like to do.

So I guess I mean I don't know anything "I want to do" that intersects in the venn diagram with anything that "it is practical and I would have an actual shot at doing it."

I just know that I don't want to do what I do now, but sadly it's the one lone entry in "things someone would actually pay me to do." I get so frustrated sometimes... I really don't feel like I'm any better or more qualified to do anything than anyone without a degree, but at the same time I feel like why did I waste all that fucking money and time getting a degree when it just isn't getting me anywhere. And I wonder how I got this far in life without any real, marketable skills. I'm not even qualified to be a secretary, or even other things within my company that are far easier than what I already do, because people actually want that job, and no one wants to do what I do. And I'm tired of working with people 9 years younger than me, because it basically points out to me that if I weren't such a piece of useless shit, I'd be 9 years ahead of what I am now.

I just wish I found the thing I like doing, that maybe I don't love to do, but I at least don't hate it, and can remember individual days instead of having it blur into one boring angry blur. I feel like once I have that, I could be like a kid again, and stop constantly worrying about what I'm going to do with my life the way I have since the last couple years of High School. I dunno... the worry's not that bad, thank you anti-depressants, but it's there and I'm tired of it all the time.

This weekend was nice. It was Josh's fake birthday* and we had good food, good fun, good times. I got him a gift card from Schnucks, one from Amazon, and 3 surprisingly cheap games from Dragon Talon Games. Balloon Cup, which we immediately "broke" in one game by accidently using up all of one type of card and forcing play to a standstill. Next was Pick and Pack. I think the jury's out on that one. Last was Carcassonne: The Castle. Now, I've never played regular Carcassonne, I primarily picked this one up because it was a 2 player, which Josh and I have been having success with lately. Anyway: we both really like it, so I guess I did well on at least one out of three.

We also played Party Playoff which is a really fun game that reminds me of Apples to Apples. Unlike Apples, this is somewhat doable with 2 players, but it makes for great conversations/funny arguments.

It was a fun time, esp. since Josh and I haven't had a chance to hang out in a long while.
____
* Every time we celebrate a special occasion when we can be together but not on the actual day, "fake" is appended to the name.

Suibrom (3:38:07 PM): crap that reminds me.. have you ever seen the comedian mike birbiglia?
phoemeister (3:38:17 PM): yeah a little bit
Suibrom (3:38:29 PM): he totally reminds me of what you would be like if you were a boy
phoemeister (3:38:40 PM): hahaha how so?
Suibrom (3:38:56 PM): dunno.. the sense of humor, the way he dresses, talks, mannersisms, etc
Suibrom (3:38:59 PM): mannerisms
phoemeister (3:39:04 PM): hunh
phoemeister (3:39:36 PM): I get that apparently.... Andi thinks this other stand up comedian, Eugene Mirman, thinks like me

So I should be a standup comedian.

My State Farm agent just gave me the most bizarre "free gift" imaginable.

It's a personalized calendar. Which is... creepy.

January's picture is a car with snow on the windshield and some of the snow has been scraped off to spell my first and last name. Feb has hot chocolate and the cinnamon on the froth spells my last name, the steam coming off of it is my first name. March is a field of buttercups that spell out my name. April, it's three baseballs with A, M, and Y. May is the earth from above with clouds spelling out Amy. June, lilypads on a lake, July fireworks, august birds against a sunset, sept fridge magnets, Oct jack o lanterns, Nov some sort of embossed book, Dec a present with a gift tag. All with my first, last or both names on them.

I realize that I'm probably not the only one who got something similar, my agent wasn't up all night with photo shop doing this for me, State Farm must have a deal with people who mass produce this sort of thing. But it just seems weird that someone would think people are narcissistic enough to want to look at their name all year.

It reminds me of this other offer I was getting in the mail awhile ago, where you could get '"your last name" University' printed on a shirt. Which... is doubly weird because I don't know if I want everyone on the street having my info. As Josh remarked whilst mocking it, "Yeah, I'm also going to get my home address printed on the ass of my pants, and my social security number tattooed on my el-bee-bow." (elbow).

That said, I think I'm going to keep it, because it is hilarious.

This was orig. a funny conversation, but it is quite possibly the worst comic I've ever made....



The orig. person I was talking to did not call me an idiot, but I put it in the comic as my way of apologizing for making this comic.

Today my dad and I saw Clint Eastwood in, "You goddamn kids stay off my lawn!"

It. Was. AWESOME. Seriously, the best movie I've seen in a long time.

There's obviously funny bits in the trailer, but before you see it you have no idea how hilarious Gran Torino is. Like... there's some "serious" dark stuff in there, but if you cut out like three scenes it would be a straight up comedy, and a good one too. But since it also has emotional depth, it is more meaty and sticks with you longer. Sooo good. I recommend it to anyone who is not offended by a constant stream of racial slurs emitted from the mouth of an elderly thespian trying to make young people stay off his lawn.

I repeat: I should not be allowed to use WebMd. This morning I woke up with a headache and decided I had glaucoma. And shingles.

Good for me I realize I'm an idiot. And that Paxil mitigates anxiety.

I'm beginning to wonder if I'm a sleep camel or something, the past couple days I have woken up early when the past few days before that I slept all day. Though, I guess today I blame it on the headache. Sometimes laying down makes me feel better when I have a headache, but sometimes laying screws me up more. That was the case this time, so I had to get up. Still DO have the headache, but it's not as bad as when I first woke up.

No one person should have as much wrong with them (real & imagined) as I do this young. 80% of it is probably my own damn fault in terms of my shitty diet, though. Eat your greens, kids! Don't get glaucoma like me!

Meh... I went to bed two hours earlier than usual last night (12) thinking, if I sleep a lot, at least I'll sleep through two of my least productive hours and wake up earlier during more productive times. So I woke up at 2 again.

Yes, that makes 14 hours of sleep, ladies and gentlemen.

So... I may have anemia or whatever, but given that I didn't do this before the Paxil, I'm guessing it's mostly paxil. However, I do still find sleeping to be preferable to crying, so I'm sticking it out. I wish I could have normal sleep and not crying, but I dunno if it's possible.

Another day wasted

I got up at 9 am for an appointment I had. When I got back, it was 10. I called a friend, who didn't answer. I decided to lay on my bed for a little while and try again. I fell asleep until 3 p.m., and got ready for work.

Though... work was better than usual, I had a few meetings including my Toastmasters where the theme I selected for the meeting was the 80's, and it was a lot of fun. I love how Connie always goes all out with her outfits.

I'm sadly falling behind on my exercise.... Part of it is, I am tired all the time, but the other part is I am lazy. It's pretty pathetic that I won't do it, especially given that I can FEEL the good results, ie dramatically less colitis pain.

One awesome thing that happened lately is I got to go to a party. I have a feeling they forgot about me and I wouldn't have been invited otherwise, but basically Julie and I had plans on Sat, which was apparently when her friends were planning a surprise party for her. Her boyfriend, or should I say fiancee, found out at the last minute, told me about it, and all was saved. I feel like sort of a chode, I didn't get her anything except some of my coupons that I made up at the last minute (especially since I also forgot to get her anything for Christmas and she gave me an awesome belated Christmas gift at the party), but I did help pay for decorations and food etc. I actually had a lot of fun, even doing the set up, and running around buying things with Deanna.

I'm also going to Florida soon. To be honest, I'm looking forward to not working more than the actual vacation. My dad and I are going down there to see my Grandpa, and for whatever reason, I think he's gotten less keen on me over the years. He never returns phone calls or calls me, though he apparently calls my dad all the time. When I call him, we sort of run out of conversation pretty fast. So anyway my dad asked if I was ever going to visit him since I have all the money from mom, and I told him I'd like to, but I don't think I could keep up a conversation with Grandpa and his girlfriend for a week without a fourth person there. So my dad is coming too, and that's what's going on with that.

Bleh... my digestive system hurts. I've not been exercising as much as I should, so it's gone back to sucking. The weird thing is, the abdominal stuff which is the most unpleasant to do, is the easiest to prod myself into doing, because it only takes 6 minutes. The aerobics, however, take over an hour. Plus they take energy I just don't have, it seems like I just get tireder and tireder.

I am now 99% sure I have anemia, though... I hung out with my friend Wendi for like the first time in over a year. Which was sweet. She's not really one of those people who was too busy for me, she just literally had like every calamity possible fall on her when we had scheduled something in the past. I'm not kidding, people died, she fell down some stairs and broke her face, other things too. And I saw her face after the stair incident. Woman was NOT lying. Anyway, I asked Wendi about the anemia cause she's had it a long time, and it sounds like I have it (though the pee issues are probably something else, possibly some of the chronic dry throat as well), because her and I have a lot of similar things going on. Plus, colitis makes it difficult to absorb iron, plus I have been bleeding intermittently the last year when I poo (I plan to see my poo doctor about it, but he didn't seem that concerned the last few times I saw him, so I figured it could just wait till my yearly colitis check up). I should see a doctor about the anemia (Wendi said sometimes it's good to get even more high powered iron supplements than even over the counter stuff) but it just seems annoying considering I can probably just keep taking the iron I am taking and be fine eventually. But I probably should. And I should probably see if I can sort out my pee issues. And I should probably try the wart freezing again, it hasn't taken.

Oh, but anyway Wendi was awesome. One of my favorite Wendi quotes is "Try transforming all of those fuckers!" RE: her son's love of transformers a few years ago. She told me this time he was older and it was legos. Then we started talking about how much it sucks to step on a lego and she came up with this precious gem. "The worst part is if it sticks to your foot, and then you step on it again. It hurts so bad that you want to piss yourself! Well, that's legos for you."

So... I should not be allowed to use webmd, but once I start it's hard to stop for awhile. I'm convinced I have all of these, and probably have none.

--Anemia due to an iron and/or B12 deficiency (Symptoms I have: difficulty sleeping, fatigue, pale skin, tires quickly, leg cramps, upward curving of nails, cracks at corner of mouth, cold all the time, headaches, pins & needle sensation in hand or foot)

--some sort of sodium deficiency, it can be caused by a lot of diahrea, apparently, and I'm the king of that. It's just, my eyes and throat and skin are so dry sometimes, and I pee all the time. So I think if I have a sodium (or potassium) deficiency, I might be getting rid of water in my body before I'm supposed to, leaving me chronically dehydrated no matter how much I drink.

--Sjogren's syndrom... an autoimmune disease. It is not specifically stated that colitis & sjogren's are related, but it seems to be that a lot of autoimmune diseases are related, and if you have one you might have another. Symptoms I have: dry eyes, dry nose/throat/mouth, dry skin, dry vag, frequent urination.

--Fibromyalga... ditto what I said about Sjogren's. Symptoms I have: dry eyes,body aches and pains, dry eyes, difficulty falling asleep, depression, fatigue, headache, frequent urination

--Hypopituitarism, something glandular. Symptoms I have: anxiety, cold, digestive issues(inconclusive because I clearly have something that already gives me digestive issues), depression, fatigue, tires quickly, frequent urination

Stupid hypochondria.

So I didn't clean my whole house, but I'm pretty happy with the bed, kitchen, bath, and living room. So all I have left is the one extra room, plus some miscellaneous stuff (CDs I need to put back in their cases, mostly) which I'm hoping I can gradually clean over time instead of having to do a huge purge like with the rest of them. So all I have to do now is keep it clean... which is easier said than done, but I'm going to make a conscious effort. I mean... the vacuuming or whatever isn't even that hard, it's spending the time picking up all my shit so I CAN vacuum.

In other news, I talked to Mike last night for the first time in ages, like over a year probably, so he didn't really know what's been going on with me. We had a nice light conversation (he and I were never that close anyway). But anyway, the reason I'm mentioning this is he said thought I might be anemic because I'm cold all the time. Which... I've never heard as a symptom of anemia, and I looked it up and still didn't see that symptom, but in the course of looking it up I noticed a lot of other issues I do have that could pertain to iron deficiency. Dunno if this will really help me all that much, but I'm going to load up on iron & vitamin c (vit c helps you absorb iron easier) for a couple of weeks to see if it does anything.

Marsupials are fucked up

Don't ask me why I'm reading about marsupials on wikipedia on a Sunday morning, because I don't know. Anyway, I knew about the pouch, but this other part seems even weirder, actually.

"Marsupials' reproductive systems differ markedly from those of their placental mammal cousins (Placentalia). Females have two vaginas, both of which open externally through one orifice but lead to different compartments within the uterus. Males generally have a two-pronged penis, which corresponds to the females' two vaginae.[4] The penis is used only for discharging semen into females, and is separate from the urinary tract.[citation needed] Both sexes possess a cloaca,[4] which is connected to a urogenital sac used to store waste before expulsion."

Double genitals! If this isn't fake (wikipedia, after all) this is even weirder than the fish with wangs that only go left or right who have to find women fish who's vags go the opposite direction.

Well, maybe it's a tie.

I never used to think I was obsessed with animal genitalia, but at 26 I now have a surprisingly large cache of facts in my brain devoted to that subject.

I'm having trouble sleeping tonight, for perhaps the first time since I went on the antidepressants. It's weird, always gauging how well you've been doing this or that since you've been on something. I guess I have practice, though.

Anyway, I think it's because I went to bed earlier than usual, though now that I look at the clock it's a little past when I usually do, so maybe I should try again.

I gave myself a minor freak out, I was listening to Red Hot Chili Peppers to help me go to bed, and there's this one song, Slow Cheetah that reminds me of this song by 22-Pistepirkko. As you can tell, I eventually recalled the band name, but for awhile I thought it'd never come, and upset me. You see, I actually dislike 22-Pistepirkko. But Rebecca & Charlie from Borders loved them and played the song with the song like Slow Cheetah on the overhead constantly. I used to complain about it (good naturedly, not the way I complain about other coworkers who would bring in Linkin Park). Then like a year later Stadium Arcadium comes out, and RHCP has a song that's a rip off of 22-Pistepirkko, and I actually like it (the prob I had with 22-Pistepirkko is the dude's annoying voice, not the quality of their songs). I could've kept it to myself, but I did tell Rebecca about it, who did get amusement (Charlie had been fired by that time for the unforgivable crime of having diabetes, but that's another story).

I guess this is a long boring way of saying that it freaks me out when I forget certain things, or even almost forget certain things. It's been worse this last year... I think I'm afraid if I forget the name 22-Pistepirkko, I'll forget the incident related to it, and if I forget that incident and a few others, I will have forgotten Rebecca. If she forgets them too, it's like they never happened. Thinking about it makes me sad. I think about this in relation to even people I still talk to, but it's even more worrisome to me when it's someone I haven't seen in a long time and probably won't again. Have people forgot about me? I think of so many people, and I wonder if they ever think about me. Probably not, or they would've kept in better touch.

I of course also think about my mom. She obviously can't think of me anymore, unless there actually is an afterlife. What if I forget things about her? What about when I die? Then it's like they never happened....

I don't know. Maybe this stupid blog will out live me and some anthropologist a million years from now will read it. Here's something I thought of the other day that I hadn't thought about for years:

I had an even worse time sleeping as a kid than as an adult. I don't know why, but I felt lonely all alone in my room, though during the day I could play alone for hours and be happy as a clam. On top of that, I had an overactive imagination and every shadow was a monster. Sometimes, I would fake having stomach problems just so I could come out to the family room and be with my mom. I guess I got colitis cause I cried wolf too much. Anyway, those were probably some of our best times. She sang me weird little songs she made up on the spot. One of them involved Scooby Doo, and I liked it so much I would try to make her do it all the time. After that for awhile, I called her Scooby and she called me Scrappy. It's weird what nicknames come and go, a few years after that we didn't really call each other that anymore. I stopped faking stomach problems, and started reading at night instead (which also included a certain amount of deception, and is what ruined my eyesight). Then, when I got older and went to college and got cable, I saw Scooby Doo for the first time since I was really, really little, and realized what an awful show it is. True story.

So I've d/led google chrome. I trust the google name enough that I am usually pretty sure whatever their newest thing is, it'll probably be awesome.

Anyway, I've only used it tonight, and it seems alright. I plan to use it more to see if I like it > or = IE, supposedly, like most non IE browsers, it's supposed to have better security. This will actually be the 4th browser I now have on my computer. IE, of course. Opera, because I like one of its "widgets" a game where you raise fish (yes, I'm a nerd), but which I never use for browsing. Firefox, which I hate the shit out of and plan to delete, which I d/led during my recent virus attack to see if I could use it to get around some of the virus effects.

This comes to you in the middle of a large block of no work. I always get Weds & Sat off, I got Thurs off because of New Year, I decided to take Fri & Sun off to make it a larger block of free time, and then I took Mon off because I screwed up and made plans with someone Monday night because I got Monday and Sunday confused. One goal of this time has been cleaning, though I'm sadly behind. Anyone who reads this sees my house will go, "It took you six days to do that? WTF, man?" But I never have time when I work, cause I'm sleeping all the time, and I guess it started when I was depressed, but I got into a horrible habit of not picking things up, doing my dishes, or my laundry. In the last couple days I've done countless loads of laundry, dishes, and taken out a LOT of garbage. But yeah, I have not really been using my time effectively, I've sort of loafed as well. But that feels good too.

Anyway, Of my 5 rooms, I have two pretty much set. My bathroom, which wasn't really dirty anyway, and my bedroom. Now I just have to do the kitchen, living room, and I dunno what I call the other room, all while not re-messing up the stuff I've already done. How did I let it get this bad?

I had a crazy dream last night. I used to not dream that often, but since the antidepressants I have. Usually I forget to record them, but I remembered this time considering how funny part of it is, I guess.

So my mom, dad, sister, grandparents, 'Phew two (though he was younger than he is now in the dream), this one random guy from work I don't even know that well, and I were hanging out at my parents house on the porch. Oh, also my dad has a mustache in this dream, which he never has had in real life. Then we all decided to pile into my Dad's Honda Civic to go shopping, except for my grandpa who stayed with 'Phew two to watch him, and because grandpa has breathing problems. So my mom, sister, and the guy from work are in my dad's car, and I ask them the question that's been bothering me this entire dream.

"I know this seems like an insensitive question," I say, "But isn't grandma dead? Like... hasn't she been dead for years now? Am I crazy? Is that really her with us today?"

"Dude, what's your problem?" my sister asks, "That's his girlfriend up there."*

My mom, who is also dead in the real world, does not look amused. Then I wake up.

The other odd thing about these dreams is how a lot of times they involve the death of my mom, grandma, or both. Like, I get why I'm dreaming about my mom, but grandma's been dead for years and even though this makes me a douchebag, I admit that I didn't care that much because she was old, mean, and actually wanted to die at that point. I don't really recall dreaming about her since it happened until after my mom died too.
___
* In real life I can tell my grandpa's girlfriend from my grandma

My new years was pretty tame, I was up at midnight but not particularly paying attention to the time. I had dinner and a rented movie with the fam. I called the 'Phew a liar in front of god and everyone for the second time at a family gathering I can remember. I actually don't think he's a liar so much as he has the compulsive need to disagree with me. I don't know if he's sensed I dislike him more than I used to, or that I just don't hang around him enough for him to like me, but I'm beginning to get the idea he dislikes me. But he's fickle... sometimes he seems to like me. I don't know. It's pointless to examine the brains of small children, they don't have the same thought processes as grown ups.

Phew two seemed to take a shine to me, he's always been fairly shy but actually high fived me a couple of times and the like.

Today my dad and I hung out again, we saw Tom Cruise in the smash hit, "Tom Cruise wears an eyepatch." Valkyrie was fairly predictable, the sort of movie that's not bad enough to be bad but not good enough to be memorable. I dunno why, but I don't really hate Tom Cruise like normal people, and a lot of the other cast are people I love: Terrance Stamp, Bill Nighy, Eddie Izzard (sort of weird to see him in a totally serious role but he did well), and Kenneth Branaugh (I don't actually like him but everyone else seems to think he's awesome). And I did like the eyepatch, I dunno. Eyepatches are just cool. The last downfall is probably the fact that you know how it ends before you even get in there, and you really wish it didn't, because even if you hate Tom Cruise you generally want him to win vs Der Fuhrer.

Oh, the other movie I saw was Eagle Eye, which again fits into the not particularly memorable category, but it was okay. One, every movie with Shia Lebeouf in, I think "the beef the beef the beef" over and over, cause that's what his name is in french. Two, I had fun thinking of which stories I thought it plagiarized from. Like... technically, I don't blame Eagle Eye, because at least it stole from several different places and sort of mixed them into something new, as opposed to just stealing wholesale like most movies nowadays. But anyway, as everyone realizes, it's one part enemy of the state, one part I robot, and then like one part new stuff. But the really intriguing thing is it reminded me of this hitchcock movie, The Man Who Knew Too Much. Which, maybe I just want things to be Hitchcockesque, I was comparing The Happening to The Birds not that long ago, but anyway, several parallels: 1) normal people being coerced to help terrorists 2) the woman has to decide whether or not to save her child by helping the terrorists vs letting other innocent people die 3) the assasination being planned to happen exactly when one part of a piece of music is played, 4) the sort of ending where the person basically stops the assasination by yelling and making everyone stop what they're doing instead of actually really jumping in front of a bullet or engaging in any physical heroics (at least at the end).

So I guess the new bits were okay, and sort of jamming the three other things together is creative, but it seemed like parts taken from Enemy of the State and The Man Who Knew Too Much were done a lot more elegantly, believably and suspensefully in the orig. movies. It's not bad, but I would tell people to go see those other two movies first, and if they were still really bored watch this and skip I robot (which also has a small part with the Beef in it).

Oh, also today I read some short stories by Neil Gaiman. I actually bought the book back in my Borders days, and never read it until now, but I stumbled upon a hilarious note from Todd who worked there inside, which was totally awesome. As for the stories themselves--they're all pretty good but he ends every damned one of them on a mysterious note, nothing ever gets resolved. Plus he has some poems in there and I don't really care for that sort of thing.

I was kind of depressed a lot of the day. Not depressed like I was pre-paxil, but more depressed than I'd been since then. It started out with me sleeping too much, again, and getting mad at myself for wasting my day yet again.

Then at work I get this email from my boss basically saying that this guy complained to his agent that I was rude to him, did not let him speak to a supervisor when he wanted to, and hung up on him.

Okay, rude can be sort of subjective. I know people who think I'm being rude when I don't think I'm not. But the other things he said are a baldfaced lie. I was really upset about it, even though I knew my boss would believe me (and sort of glad that I had my old boss still here for this as opposed to the new guy we're getting soon who wouldn't know me). But it was upsetting, and I was still nervous even if my boss did back me up, sometimes those things go on your record.

Anyway later I pepped up a bit when I was talking to Josh on my break. Which, I'm glad it pepped me up but I feel slightly guilty as the conversation was basically about bad stuff that happened to him. But its not like the bad stuff cheered me up, just talking to him cheered me up, it happened to be about bad stuff.

Then now I'm feeling a lot better, because my boss and I talked about it and apparently this guy complaining about me is crazy, and made about the same accusations of another rep in our Florida office, and is making weird crazy accusations of the other driver involved in the accident. It's not going to go on my record or anything like that at all.

Every day I mean to get things done (which is pretty much every day, since I don't ever actually get them done) I sleep instead. I don't know if it goes in cycles or what, I was sleeping all the time when I first got on the antidepressants, then it sort of got better, but now I'm doing it again.

I think both of those guys are me.

The most memorable part of my christmas? Almost getting mowed down by my dad's car. The "almost" is what makes me think it's hilarious, rather than being angry about it.

But basically everything around here is still covered with ice from a storm we had a little while ago, including my sister's super-sloped driveway. I attempted to park on it, but couldn't get up on it all the way, and so parked across the street. My dad, however, had more persistance and after 3 times managed to get up far enough to park. Meanwhile, I make it across the street and am walking up the driveway. I can't even walk up the damn thing, I start sliding. My brother in law advises the other side is a little less slippery, so I start to walk behind my dad's car to get over there. Of course, that's when the car, even parked, can no longer stay on the driveway, and slides down the driveway and into the road. I got out of the way in time, his car didn't hit anything else either, but it was funny. That driveway was insane, though. My sister's little miniature snauzer started jumping on me and almost knocked me over because it was so tilted and slippery, I can't imagine how fun it would be to have a huge car knock me over and try to slide over me. But, like I said, more funny than scary in general.

So we ate good food, I got frustrated at my nephew not following the rules at games, watched some movies, opened gifts.

I got: a tree planted in my name in one of our national forests, giftcards to Meijer, Noodles, & potbelly, mounds of chocolate, one of those reed air freshner thingys, 7th season scrubs & a couple excercise DVDs, a couple of books, a cd.

I guess it's the antidepressants or whatever, but work had been feeling better for a long time. Yeah, I got the occaisonal asshole, but I was able to shrug it off. Anyway, this is me working up to the fact that today I felt like I was being shat on constantly, like at least half the people who called me today were jerks. I really get tired of people who make me repeat things over and over because they don't want to believe my orig. answer, and then act like I'm the useless one just because I am not magic and don't have the capabilities to meet their impossible expectations. Anyway, I'm not about to shuffle off into a depression spiral again or anything, I was just good and ready to leave for the day like half an hour into my shift.

I am still kind of freaked out by deciding what I should do with myself... I thought maybe since work has been better lately I should stick it out until I can get promoted to something I want to do rather than just applying for everything there is. But I am pretty sure it's impossible to get promoted anywhere worthwhile at this point. It seems like the only way to get anywhere is by spending years of unpleasantness in the auto claims dept, which I can't get into anyway. I often wonder where I went wrong, to end up in this position where I don't enjoy what I do, there's no way to get promoted, and quitting would only screw me worse. But again... I'm not completely depressed, I don't dwell on this. I just think about it sometimes. It's good to have any job with this economy, and I do respect the actual company and my direct leadership.

I'm pretty happy that it's Christmas time, that is one nice thing about not working in retail anymore, I can actually enjoy it again. I loved hanging out with Josh and exchanging presents, and have Weds & Thurs this week to look forward to doing the same with my family.

1) MY COMPUTER IS FIXED, YAAAAAY!!! Thank you, thank you, thank you, Josh, for letting me reap the rewards of your tireless efforts.

2) I got christmas gifts from Josh as well! He got me a good game (Infernal Contraption, expansion for Infernal Contraption), massive amounts of candy, massive amounts of chapstick, a poop a day calendar, and a poop log (where I can record the details of my bowel movements). The coup de grace: a tee shirt that says, "Day man, fighter of the night man, champion of the sun, you're a master of karate and friendship for everyone." If you don't get that, it's okay, it's a reference to a TV show you probably don't watch. But trust me, it's hilarious. I gave him two frisbee golf discs, two games (Lost Cities, Caesar & Cleopatra) and some stocking stuffers.

3) I am a bad friend:

Ryan: and still trying to get all the madness going for the wedding
me: have you guys set a date?
Ryan: uh yeah like.. three days from now
Had I not mentioned that?
me: WHAT
no
congratulations
Ryan: wow we really need to talk more
me: apparently

This is a nasty, nasty virus. I've tried a bunch of antiviruses and spyware removers, and some of them don't find it and some of them won't even start. Someone made it so the virus can protect itself, I guess. My friend Ryan the IT guy is almost out of ideas. I think I might, as much as this pains me, pay money for someone to fix it somewhere, and let THEM tear out their highly paid hair over it.

I guess I just have poor luck with computers... My first computer ALWAYS had something or other wrong with it (apparently Windows ME breaks computers even before you buy them), my second one is the one I had to say goodbye to recently when it was fried by a powersurge even though there had been no thunderstorm. And now this fucking thing, the computer's less than a year old. I'm tired, I just want things to work the way they're supposed to.

Dunno if it actually is myspace or not, but I'm pretty pissed. This fucking virus will not load any antivirus-related website I type in the url for, and if I go to google and click on the link I'm totally redirected to something non-related. Even in safemode. Even in safemode in firefox.

So I got a computer virus. I'm pretty sure it's from fuckin' myspace, as I was doing nothing else at the time it happened.

I scanned and found some trojan files, but I am pretty sure I still have it because it won't let me update my antivirus or go to windows update. Anyone have any ideas on how to fix it?

So I'm kind of bummed, my supervisor got promoted and so is moving to California. So I'm happy for him, but sad for me and my teammates. The thing is, I'd be annoyed at anyone new anyway, because he sort of knows what I've been going through the last year and cuts me a little slack. Plus, he's very big on helping with career development, and I don't know if the new person would be. It sort of reminds me of the school bus when I was little... the old driver LOVED me and knew I was a good kid. She quit and we got a new one, some mean kids started something with me the first day, we got in trouble, and she had me pegged as a troublemaker for the rest of her tenure as bus driver, just because we got off to a bad start. Lastly, I'm tired of explaining my colitis every time I get a supervisor change. I wish it was just on my file somewhere.

Secondly, it's not even going to be one of the other supervisors around, necessarily (there is talk that it could end up being this one coordinator who subbed once when our supervisor was on vacation). It's going to be a person new to the job. So... they're going to be too busy actually learning the job to help with career development or anything, that's how I got off to a bad start in the first place (when I orig. started I had another person subbing who didn't know what she was doing and she was always too busy to give me advice). Also, new people tend to come down harder on employees, just cause they don't know where the line is yet and they want to show they can hack it.

I don't know... maybe I am just nervous. I have the best call handle time on the team, so I can't look that bad to a new sup? I'm just nervous because I don't think I have procedure 100%. Our supervisor sort of never actually did the job, so sometimes had things wrong or told us the wrong thing to do. Sometimes I caught it, but I don't know if I could catch it every time. Plus, a lot of supervisors have different things they like to focus on, I've had a couple of other people listen to my calls and look for totally different things than my supervisor used to look for.

So last night, I had a dream that I bought a baby and shoes from an online shoe store.

Considering I hate babies AND shoes....

Bleh. I really, really need to get into the habit of cleaning up after myself again. When I was in the depths of depression I really let it slide, but now that I'm not, it just seems to never actually happen. Now part of it is I've been crunched for time, as I seem to sleep a lot more lately, but I've had all day, and have really gotten not much done but the dishes (admittedly - 3 loads, with about half a load left). Part of it is I did have to do some Christmas shopping (It is really, really hard to shop for my nephews since they already have 12 of everything) and grocery shopping. And when I got home I was tired from shopping and hauling everything up my stairs.

I guess the big problem is that I've always been someone who cleans more when they have company, and I just haven't lately, except for Josh, who is super nice and always tells me he doesn't mind if my place is dirty. So I let it build up and build up until it's a monumental chore and I just don't feel like doing it. For instance: I'm probably only even cleaning now (though it severely needs done) because Josh is visiting soon, and however nice he is, I don't want it to be a TOTAL filth-hole when he arrives. And when was the last time I cleaned? 3 weeks ago when Josh visited me. I really need to get more done gradually instead of trying to do it all at once at the 11th hour, or fucking learn to put things in the trash or away immediately after I am done with them. On the bright side, I am almost done with Christmas shopping, all I have left is my sister and her husband and they both have wishlists on Amazon.

You know what? Antidepressants are fucking AWESOME. When they work properly and all that.

The first week, I was like, WHEEEEE YAY NOT CRYING ALL THE TIME ANYMORE.

Then the couple weeks after that the novelty wore off and I was bummed out about my job and whatever all my existing worries are. Not to the point of crying or the amount of upset that I was before, but yeah, I was bummed. And it made me mad. My attitude was, "stupid antidepressants!" It also makes me mad that I still don't want to clean my house. I mean I don't really like cleaning (which not that many people do) and this place has gotten to be a shithole since I've been depressed. Because I didn't feel like I had the energy to do it. And I thought once I was happier I could keep this place clean again. But I never feel like I have the oomph to do it. I've also been sleeping a lot... not sure why. Not like more drowsy or tired or anything, I just try to get up in the morning and I fall right back to sleep. So it made me mad that the antidepressants didn't just instantly fix that.

But yeah the last couple of days I've been thinking, and I really think I have noticed an improvement in my life. Like.... I hadn't even noticed it, but the last year or so I've been hanging with my dad because I HAVE to, as opposed to because I WANT to. And I mean, part of that is probably him, because he's been upset too. But the last few times I've hung out with him, I've really had fun and enjoyed myself. I actually found myself trying to draw out visits to make them longer so I can hang with him more even when we weren't particularly doing anything.

And work... work! Drugs make my job like 100% better. I'm not saying it's like my favorite thing of all time to be there, or to do the work, but it's tolerable. Horrible people don't make me freak out and cry, I don't have to talk myself into not quitting 20 minutes every day before my shift starts.

And another thing lately that's made me happy at work (which the drugs didn't do this, but I think they might've prompted me to make this change) is I've started sitting in a different area. Now... my job doesn't really give you time for a lot of talking, or at least it hasn't in the past, but the past couple months we've been out of queue and you actually CAN talk to people. I used to sort of sit around people from my orig. training class that I sort of knew, about my age or younger. And I am actually sort of friends with one or two of them, but they get into these conversations amongst themselves and I get boxed out and have nothing to jump in with. However, I started to sit by these older people (not old old, but not in my age group) lately who are AWESOME, which I'd never thought to do when I was fatalistic and depressed, even though I've known them for some time now. It's basically Todd who I know from being on my team, Sally from Toastmasters, and Connie from both. I don't know why I typically get along better with people older than me, but I do, this isn't the first example. But yeah, people my age are boring and only talk about fashion and celebrities if they're girls, sports if they're boys, or bars if they'r either, which I definitely don't give a shit about. But Todd talks about this cool screenplay he's writing. Sally talks about her bizarre children who do things like telling her that vicks vaporub tissues are not good to use on one's genitals. Connie talks about her awesome parrots, and is one of the few people I was able to talk to at work about my mom being sick. And they all enjoy my random non sequiturs and strangeness for what it is instead of being too typical to get it.

But yeah, since the anti depressants I really, really enjoy being around people more. Like.... I missed being around people because I didn't get that much interaction, and it would be fun when I was with people, but now I have just gone into another gear where I even enjoy people I don't know too well. I think maybe it's because I've been more pleasant & extroverted to be around. I actually mentioned the antidepressants to Connie today (we were talking about what a shitty year it has been for both of us, and I confessed that this year was so bad I had to go on antidepressants) and she said she and a few other people had actually noticed I was coming out of my shell more the last few weeks and they think it's awesome. The only thing I do have to make sure I do is to not talk more than work, that was something I had to struggle with at my old job.

Anyway, I had a good day. I had 2 hours of working on this random-ass wreath decorating project (our supervisor was away and no one else told us until late) with Connie, which was fun. I made paper snowflakes, because that is my specialty, and she made a bow and little State Farm ornaments. It doesn't look the best of any wreath, but it at least looks like we put some effort into it. Plus, 2 hours off the phone, man! Then I had 2 hours of refresher training, which is boring but easy. Then I had an hour of Toastmasters, which always makes me happy. Toastmasters people are my favorite, I think we somehow manage to get all the nerds in one room those days, and nerds are my peeps.

So I guess all I got to do is stop procrastinating about cleaning.

So today, my Dad and I were at Meineke (yeah, we've been hanging out a lot lately, I'm beginning to think of us as buddy cops) and I saw, I kid you not, a laminated Peoria Journal Star from when Kennedy was assasinated. It confused me a lot at first because I didn't realize it was old, and it said, "Chief is Slain." And forgive me for being racist, but I went right to, "What indian was it?" I know that the prez is our commander in chief, but who would put it that way? But then I saw a picture of LBJ under it saying something like, "Vice president reluctantly takes the reins." Don't you mean "vice chief," crappy writer from Peoria Journal Star from the 60's?

But that top half is just a digression. The bizarre bit is: why does an auto repair place have a newspaper from when JFK was assasinated up in their window right next to their disturbing cartoon version of George Foreman extolling the virtues of their shop? I asked my dad and he said he thought it was probably just decoration. But it's not a TGIF or a Chili's, man. They have no other historical memorabilia, and they didn't even have it up last time I was at Meineke. I dunno. The weird world makes me laugh.

This was inspired by a conversation I had with my dad trying to convince him to buy a jerky maker whilst conducting other business at Farm & Fleet. He thought it was funny, and the cashier did as well. Yes, that's right, at Farm and Fleet, they don't put gum or candy up at the registers, they put ginormous expensive jerky makers by the registers, cause by god, they know an impulse buy when they see one.

Dunno if the downstairs neighbor has friends/family in town that are horrible, or if he's just finally displaying his asshole colors (he's related to the previous horrible downstairs neighbor) but Weds, yesterday, and today he's been loud as hell, including obnoxious music, and of course, the loud fighting including both yelling and the sounds of things being loudly thrown around downstairs. I guess I'm still ahead, there's no baby or car vandalism from this guy, but after months of calm I was kind of hoping he'd be not annoying.

Awesome. There are rats or birds or something in my ceiling, freaking out and making noise. I'm guessing it's not a rat, based on the fact that if there were rats in my building, they'd probabably be hanging out in my place since I live like an animal. What the hell would a rat do in my ceiling?

But apparently it's only over my ceiling, because the condo prez, my neighbor, hasn't been hearing this.

This makes me kind of worried it's in the line going from my clothes dryer to the outside. Which means if it dies there, I'm going to have a smell unless we can extricate it somehow (which I don't know how, I'm like 3 stories up and we don't have a ladder that tall, and the line itself is really long). And if it somehow finds its way into my dryer, I'm going to have a wild animal freaking out inside my house.

meh

Man, I thought once I threw off the depression, I would have more energy and actually clean up after myself and get groceries, other things I've been putting off. But I am just as energyless as before, I'm just not crying all the time. So, there is something to be said for that, at least.

I've also been sleeping way more. I've been going to bed earlier and earlier and I'm still waking up really late. Not sure whether that's a side effect of the meds or not, I've always been able to sleep for really long stretches of time, just not consistantly all in a row like this. Even if it is, your body's supposedly able to adjust after about four weeks, and the side effects mostly go away. Plus sleeping all day is def. preferable to crying all day.

I also have an interview on Tues. We'll see how it goes.

I have ninjas on my gmail now!

Yes, yes, and also an email from an elderly woman that says "through a rapist's eyes" in all caps. Don't get me started on that.

ninjas!

meh

So today at work I got into a conversation with a manager about how to get promoted. It sucked pretty hard, it was all about networking and that stuff I just don't really want to do. I guess I'm pretty glad I'm on antidepressants, because this is the sort of conversation that usually makes me want to get away as fast as I can so that I can cry in private. As it was, I was still a little bummed.

woozle wuzzle

So, even though they said it would probably take a little while for the Paxil to kick in, I think I am already feeling the effects. Sometimes I think of something that, a week ago, would have me in tears, and I'm only just lightly bummed. This is a good thing, because I didn't like crying all the time, but it makes me wonder if being more content through chemical intervention will make me fight less for the things I want in life. Also, I've always been a worrier, it's part of my character. Will I be different if I don't worry all the time?

I dunno, I used to think these sorts of things about ritalin back when I needed it, but I did ultimately keep taking it until I didn't need it anymore, because it did help me a lot. And it looks like this will help me a lot, so I will probably keep taking it unless I start getting bad side effects or something.

I hung out with Josh this weekend, and he said he noticed I was peppier too, so it's not just my imagination. He & I had a great time playing monopoly (his wheelbarrow skooled my shoe ass in the ways of capitalism), this game I got him for Christmas called Caesar & Cleopatra (pretty fun, involves gigalos), and phase 10 twist which he got me as a just because gift along with Always Sunny in Philadelphia seasons 1 & 2 cause Target had the mad sales going on, apparently. He picked up a couple of seasons of the Simpsons for himself at an insanely low price like $15 or something each. He also made me breakfast(yum!), cleaned my toilet, and we watched some new Always Sunny's and Sarah Silverman Program together. And I just have to say, while Sarah is always good, this latest one was INSANELY good. So weird & freaky but great. It had a lot of good guest stars too, though most of them didn't get very much screen time. He also bought me some blue christmas lights to replace the ones he got me last year that broke already for whatever reason. We also enjoyed home made chocolate chip cookies (tasty!) that I had made.

Work today was so so. Most of it was alright, but I did get a caller that called me a stupid bitch. It made me mad more than anything, because all the instances he got exasperated with me were either because he expected me to just psychicly know something, or were as a result of his own stupidity (do you have a claim number? no. do you have your policy number? I already told you no, you stupid bitch! Uh, those are two separate things, dude. When did it happen? 4 months ago. Do you know a date? It happened in september. That's one month ago. I KNOW! Well you said it was four months ago. It happened in august. Are you sure, you just said it was september? I TOLD YOU IT WAS AUGUST. And so on.) I did get early dismissal though, so I got to leave early.

Man, I don't know what it is the last couple days.... I start out all happy and full of energy and I'm like, "Yeah, I am beating depression!" then I start feeling down again.

phoemeister (3:58:17 PM): you know, today is awesome
phoemeister (3:58:19 PM): I took off work
phoemeister (3:58:23 PM): I'm listening to good music
phoemeister (3:58:25 PM): I get to talk to tina
phoemeister (3:58:29 PM): I have good tea
phoemeister (3:58:36 PM): my digestive system is feeling good
Tina (3:58:42 PM): whoohoo!
phoemeister (3:58:48 PM): and I get to make/eat chocolate chip cookies!
phoemeister (3:59:02 PM): oh and I have this lilac candle that smells so good burning
phoemeister (3:59:29 PM): I don't know if it's the happy pills or the excercise, but this is the best day I've had in a long time
Tina (4:00:12 PM): sweet

phoemeister (5:00:17 PM): I mean poo in general smells bad
phoemeister (5:00:22 PM): but this was above and beyond
Suibrom (5:01:13 PM): setting afire a skunk made of rotten eggs?
phoemeister (5:02:13 PM): like bigfoot's dick, more
Suibrom (5:02:16 PM): haha
Suibrom (5:02:20 PM): pure gasoline?
phoemeister (5:02:21 PM): or a diaper full of indian food
phoemeister (5:02:31 PM): yep, now you know where they get sex panther
Suibrom (5:03:16 PM): your butt?
phoemeister (5:04:09 PM): yep
Suibrom (5:04:27 PM): I'm kind of a freak, but I have to be honest.. I wouldn't rub that on me
Suibrom (5:04:31 PM): even if it promised to get me chicks
phoemeister (5:04:41 PM): oh come on
Suibrom (5:05:06 PM): okay maybe a little bit
phoemeister (5:05:15 PM): liquid distilled sexy from the sexiest butt on earth?
Suibrom (5:05:40 PM): Hey, old men said it was nice.. it has to be good

Baaaaaaaaaah. My day started pretty well, I've been in a good mood since I saw the doctor about the happy pills. I don't think I've been on them long enough to have any actual reaction (he said it takes 4 weeks for them to hit their peak effectiveness, about one week to notice any reaction), but I think the placebo effect + knowing there's at least some change happening has made me peppy. We'll see how it lasts.

Esp. since the Baaaah means my day just got worse, i.e. instead of doing thanksgiving with just my dad like I had hoped, it seems I'm going to have to go to one of my stupid brother in law's familys like I had pretty much suspected was going to happen. See, after she got married, my sister would drop by on us at Thanksgiving, but she had 3 to go to in one day and so didn't eat that much at ours. So basically thanksgiving would be with just me and my dad, and everyone always acts like it's too much work to do for two people, even if I'll do the work and am freely willing to. But I floated the idea of us doing thanksgiving together and he said yes and I was surprised and happy.

But now, of course, we got the invite from brother in law's family (they're nice people, I'm not surprised at the invitation) and of course it makes my sister's thanksgiving less of a hassle cause she doesn't have to come to see us, it is the logical thing to do. Dad wants to do it that way.

The only thing is I don't want to fucking be logical. I want to spend thanksgiving with just my dad (and my sister if she wants to stop by). I don't want to be nice to people I don't know that well, even if they are nice people. I don't want to eat weird food not prepared exactly how I like it. I want my own damned thanksgiving, not to be some pathetic charity case at some other person's thanksgiving full of strangers.

I got my teapot the other day, it is super cool! I like how I can now make several cups at once, and if I want I can keep them warm until I drink them, instead of having to make a cup every time I want one. It is also better than the things I had to make it cup by cup because the infuser is finer so no grit (yay).

Dunno if it's just a fad or anything, but I've basically gotten into loose leaf tea because green & white tea supposedly have a lot of immune system & anti cancer benefits, and those are diminished if you don't have it loose leaf. Also, the cool part about loose leaf tea is, since I don't really love the flavor of the actual tea, I can pop in however much herbal tea I want with it to make it taste better. (For non tea nerds--herbal tea, despite the name, is not tea. Real tea comes from tea plants. Herbal tea is most other plants that taste good when you crunch them up and pour hot water on them. So basically peppermint, spearmint, anything fruity, chamomile--though chamomile is disgusting, the others are delightful). And a lot of the loose leaf herbal tea I've been getting tastes really good and more intense than bag tea and all that.

Despite some digestive issues, I've actually had a decent week. There were some people who are in training to be agents who visited our office the other day, and the guy who sat and watched me was amazed at all the great things we do and very complimentary about it. It's sort of nice to get that for a change. And I had my yearly evaluation the other day, and it sounds like I did well. I don't get the accompanying raise or bonus (or even know what they are) until Feb, but it gives me something to look forward to.

Today was sort of weird--I started crying again for no real reason. That was definitely not the highlight of my day. But it went away again and I had a fairly decent day otherwise. Saw the doctor and got the happy pills, they say I should know within a week whether they are doing anything, but I won't see the full effects for a month.

I hate my colon! Things were just finally settling down, and now I'm fucked up again. What terrible food-sin have I committed? I had fucking BREAD for dinner last night. And the meal before that was spaghetti-o's. No dairy, no veggies, I am forced to ask: what the fuck?

I woke up at 2pm today. I always feel so horribly guity when I do that. And I can't 100% remember when I went to bed last night, but I'm thinking that's over 12 hours of sleep. Which I guess wouldn't have happened without sleeping pills.

I guess I did partly make a resolution to sleep away as much time as possible until I could see the doctor, but now I feel I went overboard. I'm also probably never going to get onto a normal sleep sched ever again, which is a bummer. The later I sleep, the harder it is to get to bed at a decent hour, the more likely I will be up in the middle of the night another night crying.

Yes, folks, I hate my whiny bitchiness as much as you do.

I am a horrible person.

Of all my friendship comics, I never did one for Tina! And I've known her the longest! What is up with that? I am a bad person.

Anyway, without further ado:

GAH. I've had extremely chapped lips for a number of winters now, but I guess it just gets worse. Lately, the corners of my mouth get cracked. They were extremely bad for awhile, but by obsessively slathering them with chapstick, I got them to go away. Now they're back, and I don't even know why, because I have continued the slathering, with the same chapstick as before, even. Fucking.... world. Don't I have enough shit to deal with already?

stuff

Colon has continued to be a bastard. I am tired of feeling like shit all the time. Sometimes I tell myself I am never going to eat again, but just like clockwork, I do. And then feel shitty again.

Hung out with my dad today, which was alright. The weather was nice. I broached the subject of Thanksgiving with him. I thought he would be all, "no thanksgiving!" like last year, but he seemed cool with me making stuff. I couldn't really get a read on him, as to whether or not he wanted to do it or if he's just humoring me (he doesn't seem to be overly happy or sad about it), but I guess even if he is humoring me, I'd rather be humored than not have a thanksgiving.

Awesome. My stupid fucking colon made me miss another day's work. Nowhere, here I come.

Emotional rollercoaster. Me. Sucks.

So yesterday Josh & I went up to Ikea, which was fun. I felt bad because some of the stuff he liked wasn't in stock and he was a little sad about it.



He ended up with placemats and a stuffed rat.

I, on the other hand, came back with no toys though I'd looked on behalf of the 'phews. The thing is, it's very easy for me to convince myself not to get things for them because they already have so much. I look at a cool toy, and ask myself if they'd really play with it, and usually the answer is no, so I don't waste my money.

I did end up with the same placemats, though. Because they are fucking awesome.



I also got some christmas lights, which makes me think I am obsessed with christmas lights. I got a bunch last year too. It still makes me mad that the blue ones from last year are already busted, but I guess that's what I get for having them on all year. The blue ones just have nice memories attached to them... Anyway, the new ones:




I got this medicine cabinet:



It doesn't really go with anything in my bathroom, but it was 15 bucks. Plus the other one I was looking at was out of stock.

I got an apron, and a little lamp, too.

Then today I cried a bunch because I don't know what I'm going to do for thanksgiving.

Then I bought a teapot.

The end.

See

This is why I fucking want the doctor to see me sooner. So I'm not up at 4:45 a.m. crying my eyes out and wanting to crawl in a hole somewhere and die.

Ugh

Got the blood taken today. The lady was pretty good, got it in one try.

My follow up appointment? Nov 12th. What the fuck, man? I feel like I'm going crazy and will finally crack at any second. And the soonest I can see someone is Nov 12th? When I scheduled the 1st appt. with Dr. Crow they got me in in less than a week, but now I have to wait over 2 for a follow up?

They orig. wanted me to wait till the 22nd to see Kaminski, who is nominally "my doctor." But I haven't seen her since '05 and I don't like her anyway. I complained until they finally scheduled me with Dr. Vales, who actually was my doctor back when I was a little kid (he left for an HMO years ago and then came back, I guess). I still hate waiting, but at least I have confidence in this guy. 1) my mom LOVED him, and she normally hates doctors. He was like the only doctor out of a gazillion doctors who knew what was going on with this lung problem my sister had when she was little. 2) As far as I remember him, he actually knows his shit and is NICE, unlike most of the doctors I see who seem to hate life and their patients. Unless he was just nice to me because I was a kid, or the last 15 years has made him as bitter as the rest of them. I'm thinking of asking him to change me to being his patient when I'm there, unless his load is too full.

PS it is also getting to be that wonderful time of year when the skin from my lips is constantly disgustingly molting as if I am a snake or bird.

What's been going on with me this week

The main thing:

I take it from your lack of response to anything I've emailed you since that one AIM conversation that you never want to talk to me again. I guess this email is basically to confirm if that's true or not so that I stop any stupid stupid hoping that just hurts more in the long run.

I've just worked 11 days straight, and 4 of those days were working 2 jobs, sometimes for 15 hours. I can't give this email the attention it deserves or deal with it rationally right now because I am just stretched too thin, and I still have to work tomorrow. But I didn't want to not respond.

Give me some time to sleep and recuperate and I'll be able to put together a coherent response.

While I'm doing that, I'm going to ask you to please think about what you want from me. I've asked you several times, and you've never been able to give me a real response. Think about it, and possibly tell me about it so that I can truly answer you to the best of my ability.

What I want from you is to be friends again. I know it's unrealistic to want to be as close as we were when we worked together and lived near each other, but I wish we could still be friends like we were the first few months after you moved.

I'm sorry, I do know I was crappy the last time we talked. I was being passive agressive. I didn't want to let you know that I was mad at you, because I thought that would drive you even farther away. But I couldn't let it go either.

And there, I said it, I was angry at you. I mean, I'm angry at the entire world right now, I don't even think I'm right in the head, I have a doctor's appointment next week to see if I should go on antidpressants or something. At least twice a week I'll end up sobbing nonstop for an hour, usually out of nowhere. Nearly every day I cry a little. And it's not just about my mom. And it was in that state of mind that I emailed you the other night, though I did truly believe you decided you had written me off for good and at least wanted a sense of finality about it.

But yeah, I am angry at you specifically too, because I really genuinely tried to stay in touch with you, and you didn't seem to care. And then when I asked if you were angry at me or something, you got so defensive about it that I didn't want to go into detail about why I thought you were avoiding me or not trying to keep in touch and make you actually angry at me.

You don't seem to think I logically deserve to be angry about this, because you're very busy and had your own problems for part of this period. And I guess I didn't think I logically deserved to be angry about this, because I didn't come out and actually say it to you.

I guess that is kind of abrupt but I couldn't really think of any good ending for this.

ok, I read this and am thinking about it, but I just got home from day 12 and I will be sleeping a lot for the next few days.

I know you want to be friends "again" but what I specifically meant is: what do you expect from me as your friend who lives 50 miles away?

the only thing I know, and the only way I've felt about all of our interactions since going to see TMBG is that you feel like I'm not doing/trying/being enough for you. And I don't know what will make you happy as far as being your friend goes. So tell me what you want from me, and I'll be better able to understand if I'm able to provide that at this point in my life.

I'm sorry you're feeling horrible. I wish I could be more helpful right now. It sounds like going to see someone to get help is a good idea.

I owe you an apology. My behavior to you lately has not been the best, and though my motivation was to not cause you any undue harm, apparently I've hurt you, and for that I'm sorry.
You're right; I have been avoiding you lately, for a multitude of reasons. The honest fact is that I've been trying to distance myself from you for quite a while. So many difficult things have come into your life recently that I couldn't bear the thought of kicking you while you were down. Since I saw first hand how you reacted to first Nicole, then Drew, Tom & Scott's moves from the area, I figured that
you would eventually let me go, the way you did them, once I followed in their footsteps. I wasn't trying to be hurtful or uncaring; in fact, I thought it would be the least painful way to do this. I'm sorry that my handling of the situation actually caused you more pain. From your email, it sounds as though you wish things could go back to the way they were, and I understand that. But in my life, I can only go forward, and I don't think we can be to each other again what we were before. From your behavior towards me, it seems as if I can't move backwards, you'll only continue to be unhappy and dissatisfied with our friendship. It seems from my perspective that there is no way I can be the friend you want and need right now.

Yeah, I guess I just don't really get why you had to draw it out a year and a half, you could've just made it a clean break and said "I'm too busy for you," right after you moved instead of first giving me the impression we could stay friends for a few months, then purposefully doing the painful slow drift off. And the reason I'm more upset with you than them is 1) I was way closer to you than them (I thought I was, anyway) and 2) obviously I am way more fucked up and sad than I was. But it's not like I can make you do something you don't want to (continue to be any sort of friend to me), and even if I could it would be fake and not what I wanted anyway.

Well it wasn't a forgone decision that just because I was moving we wouldn't be friends anymore. I was interested in trying to stay friends, and hoped we could. But some things happened to me, and other things happened to you, and our interactions weren't as enjoyable anymore. Once I realized that, I thought that by drifting off, I'd save us both the harsh pain of a direct slap, and that maybe we could stay friendly at a distance. I wish that had been possible, but apparently it isn't.

I am glad to hear you're seeking help, and I really do hope for the best for you.

I guess what bothers me most is that I don't even know what I did to make you despise me enough to systematically cut me out of your life like that. I've been racking my brain over and over, and it's driving me crazy. If you tell me, I swear to god I will let it drop and stop bothering you even if it is something I'd normally argue over.

it's not any one thing that you did or didn't do. Moving away geographically always puts relationships under strain, and what's more, it gave me a different perspective on things than what I had in B-N. I'm glad we met and knew each other, and I had a lot of good times with you... but life has changed us both as people, and at this
point in time, from this distance, it's clear to me that I can't be what you need in a friend, and I'm not willing to keep trying only to fail.

I'm sorry that I can't give you any more help or reason than that.

So yeah, I've been crying a lot this week. She really was a close friend, and I still don't understand it. She freely admits that she has purposefully cut me out of her life, and won't tell me why. She turns it around at the end and tries to act like she is too busy to be a good friend, but 1) that completely contridicts an earlier bit, and 2) I've had people do the accidental drift off to me enough times in my life (sadness) to know when it is natural or on purpose. I wish I knew what I did. Well what I really wish is she was still my friend (in any capacity, I don't get this all or nothing stuff). What I really really wish was that I wasn't crazy or that this last fucking six months hadn't happened. But the wanting an explanation part seems to be the most sane of those wishes.

Today was my visit with the doctor. It took about 2 hours of which only maybe 10 minutes was spent actually getting diagnosed or anything. 20 minutes was spent naked in a freezing cold room freaking out. I felt trapped.... being naked, I couldn't really stick my head out into the hall and find out why no one was coming to look at me. And I felt like I couldn't try to put my clothes on or anything to get warm, because that's when they'd finally come in, and they'd insist on leaving again for 20 min while I took them off and the cycle would begin anew.

The doctor says he thinks it's depression but he is concerned about my slow reflexes, slow talking, and limp hair. Don't ask me what the hell that's supposed to mean. Anyway there's a possibility it could be something with my thyroid, which can cause serious depression among other things (such as slow talking and limp hair?) So he needs to get some bloodwork. And of course I didn't drink anything so my already hellish veins were dehydrated so they couldn't get any blood. So I have to go back tomorrow for them to take blood. And I have to go back again in like a week or two after they've looked at it and spend a bunch more money and another fucking two hours to tell me if I have thyroid disease or depression.

I also sort of hope I have depression instead of thyroid disease, because my mom was treated for thyroid disease for years and years and it was a pain in the ass. She needed blood taken every three months. Plus, the things treating it was supposed to help her with (having more energy, being less depressed) never got any better.

Tina's take on my dr's appointment:
"you could have seen a whore, paid less, had more fun and actually had a reason to get some blood work done"

Earlier in the week, I hung out with Josh, which was nice. He's been Tivoing shows so we can watch them together. We watched some new Sarah Silverman and chilled most of a day, and also went to an overpriced (but fun) game shop in Peoria and he bought me some Taco Bell.

I hung out at casa de Lothar with the aforementioned Lothar and Julie for the first time since July or August, and had fun. We had an interesting conversation RE: testes, and had some good food, but we mostly played rock band.

I created an albino dude with hair and a bandana a la rambo, we've decided he's a crazy vietnam vet with "night terrors." I picked the pants that most effectively show off his package, and gave him homeless man shoes. He has pink star dangly earings, no shirt, and a chest with a huge tattoo of a bird or llama or something. The best part is the new rock band has masks, and I was able to give him a pig mask. I matched it to his skin tone so it looks like his face, and I covered the bottom half of his face with the flag of the USSR. The best part is watching him while Fortunate Son is playing, because he acts very sassy. Also, when we played that song there was a stand in (there was no 4th player in the band so the game substitutes a random char I guess) who looked like Freddie Mercury and stared into the "camera" with hilarious cold dead eyes while singing back up to the sassy pig man.

That day I hung out with Josh/Julie & Lothar (Saturday) is probably the only good day I've had this week. The weds before that I was kind of happy I passed a test, but it quickly went away in favor of wallowing in my sadness as I spend most of my days.

Dedicated to my friend Ryan who has leprosy in his finger but is not actually a redneck. He has a tricorn hat.



Dedicated to my friend Tina who came up with the concept of "leper whores" and people who look like fingerers.

wow...

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I should proof my emails that zip is 60601-5099. Sorry about that! (can't spell administer either I see). Love-Dad

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meh

Today: good & bad.

From a physical pain standpoint, today was hell. I woke up, and ignorred, a headache which decided to turn into a migraine. I ended up having to lay down in my bathroom (in the darkest area of house) and take some drugs to banish it.

Then, right before work, of course, my colon decided to hurt really badly, and it kept doing so until.... well, it still hurts. I mean... I can't compare it to a lot of types of injury, but colon pain hurts so bad. I feel like my whole body hurts when it's that intense, even up to my face and down to my toes. And in the center is a black hole trying to kill me. Now obviously I haven't felt THAT bad this whole time, but I've felt that bad in bursts this whole time, and in lesser pain in between. I guess it serves me right--I can't skip work because of it... cause I skipped work yesterday for no reason. I think it's also a reaction to overeating (esp. cheese) last night.

The goodness: I actually did not have to take a single call today. This is the first (and probably last) time, but it is what enabled me to cope with work while in pain. 2 hours of it were a team meeting we actually held at Buffalo Wild Wings. Because of the digestive issues, I obviously couldn't eat much (why do these things always happen when I am about to have free food?) but I did manage to suck down a nonalcoholic margarita and about half an order of fries without making anything worse. And of course--two hours of not being at work but still being paid is always swell.

Then, the pivot report normally takes 1/3 to 1/2 of a shift. They've been behind in giving me the numbers by 1 week lately, but they finally caught up so I had 2 to do. I didn't even finish the 2nd one so I have more time off the phone tomorrow! So it was a really awesome workday, though I wish my colon would've let up so I could enjoy it even more.

In non work news, I submitted a resume for a job at a library (I will probably not get it, but trying is something, right?) and stopped at Meijer for some orange juice, advil, and a flu shot. I feel like I got out of the house and actually did something (however minor) for once. So that's good too.

Time to poop.

This is lame... I'm only even sharing it because it's the first I've made in months. What I really wanted to do is have a picture of a pile of dead babies with a sign saying "Pottersville" next to it, but I did not have the drawing expertise. When I stupidly looked up photos to try to see if there was anything to use (I was thinking dolls piled up in a comical manner) I found actual dead babies and felt bad for joking about it all the time.

Anyway, here you go:

dammit

I hate my job so, so much. But yet I continually sabotage my chances of getting the hell out of there.

Seriously: I missed work today. Because I was crying. Some of it was stuff I mentioned in the previous post, and the other bit was I kept thinking, "I can't stand it if someone is mean to me today. I will just totally flip and go crazy." Which... there are 100% odds someone will be mean to me at work. I have better and worse days, but there is always someone. And I just kept thinking of it and couldn't make myself do it. I already have too many absences...

I couldn't really calm down again until A) I called in and told them I couldn't come to work and B) I talked to Tina on the phone for awhile. So yep, that's my awesome story today.

I probably need to just quit and go back to retail or something. But the economy's poop... even if I get a job now it would likely evaporate after the Christmas rush, given this economy. Every time I calm down from a freakout like this (yes, I have them all the time about my stupid fucking job but usually not as bad) I try to convince myself that I'm going to get promoted, and it's a colossal waste if I quit now. But then I freak out again later.

So...

The water in my place is fixed, I guess some gunk got clogged in that little screen over the end of the faucet. After seeing it, I questioned my usual habit of drinking tap water instead of bottled water most of the time. Dunno.

I can't seem to rouse myself into doing anything lately other than going to work, studying insurance education (bleh) and the occaisional outing with Dad or Josh. I feel like time is slipping through the hourglass and I'm totally wasting it. I can't remember what I did today, or the day before, or the day before that. Ten years from now I'm going to look back on my life and wonder what I did with that time and the answer's going to be "lying on the couch." I mean... already I've wasted so much of my life, so I guess I'm just adding to it. But I don't know what I SHOULD be doing, career-wise, and in my free time I just don't have the energy for twisting people's arms into hanging out with me or even figuring out something interesting to do on my own.

I dunno why I decided to post this, I don't want people to pity me or anything. I just can't figure out what it is.

So I got my second obscene call ever tonight. The first one was someone calling and instantly getting into the pervy stuff, whereupon I hung up on him. This guy actually conducted business, and then randomly at the end tacked on, "You sound like you have a good mouth. I bet you you would be great at sucking my dick."

You know, with the last one I tried to make fun of it. I try to be a tough "nothing gets to me," sort of person about this sort of thing. But seriously--not cool. I know this guy doesn't know me and could never find me, but it's creepy as fucking hell. Cause you get to thinking: if this person is fucked up enough to SAY that sort of thing to a person, couldn't he be fucked up enough to be a rapist, or worse? And it gets you to thinking that even if he can't find you, there have to be others like him, and then you're creeped out about rapists and serial killers at every turn. And yeah--thankfully he didn't use the word in reference to me, but he did use the word "rape," during the course of the call, i.e. "I'm going to rape your company for all it's worth." People are horrible, horrible, horrible.

In not horrible news, here is some pumpkin action. I am torn as to whether or not mine (the Joker) is the best. Like... some of our stuff looks really cruddy up close compared to other people's stuff, but on the other hand you could tell we didn't take shortcuts like other people (they pasted on pictures of faces, used little cars and trucks, etc, whereas we made the faces and cars and houses ourselves). Still... there are probably some similar to ours that are better, we had to take some shortcuts at the end (such as that weird bright purple arm), and less of our team really cared than some of the other teams. But overall, I'm proud of our work. As you can probably tell, I did the sign. I also did the torso. I helped out with a lot of other stuff. I particularly like the bat signal as well. It was my idea, but Jared executed it a helluva lot better than I would've.

Oh and this makes more sense when you realize they pushed us to have them be somewhat work related and have our company's logo somewhere on there, and randomly include a toy they gave us (ours is a phone). It bums me out because I think there was more creativity last year, but this year a lot of them are stupid work-related things. I DO love the hamburger helper's reference to the intersections campaign, though. It is brilliant. (though, to date, my favorite mocking of that is my own saying, "Where jerking off meets your downstairs window... yeah, I'm there.") These aren't all of them, just the best ones.

Anyway, here are the pumpkins:















Close ups of joker:

I wonder if I really do need to be on antidepressants. Lately I've taken up crying for no reason. I mean it, absolutey no reason. I find it a disturbing departure from previously, when I was crying a lot but I did have a reason. I don't know. Maybe it's because I'm PMSing or something, but I've never really been a mood-swinging menstruater in the past. I think my periods are actually getting worse lately though, so I don't know.

Work is alright the last couple days, we've been working hard core on the pumpkin, I'll get pictures soon and post them on here. I'm pretty proud of the parts that I did, and feel I've bonded with some of my team mates. As a whole, I think it kicks ass, though there are probably a few things I would've done differently in retrospect. For instance: we started on a lot of the less-important things first, then had to really rush on the more important things. Second, I wish my team members had pitched in a little more, supplies-wise, because 90% of our supplies were things we had to scrounge from around the office. It was lean pickin's, I'll tell you that. I mean, I paid about $6 for cloth and green hairspray and brought in paintbrushes, Connie spent $5 on a wig and had a lot of paint laying around she wasn't using (long story). We stole construction paper. But we had no glue to put any of this together, and no modeling clay (which is what we orig. were going to use for the face). Still, I think ours is the best of the ones out so far! We put in a lot more detail and things we didn't really need to have in there.

I'm kind of bummed: a string of christmas lights I keep in the living room is half out. They're the blue ones Josh gave me last year as a "just because" present, which makes me really sad they're already broken. Why couldn't it be one of the strings I bought myself? I tried replacing a bulb or two but it didn't help. I tried to replace the fuses, but I couldn't get the old ones out. Bleh.

Lastly, but not leastly, I bring you a movie I stumbled upon on Netflix, though I can lift my head up high and say I did manage to resist watching it. Doggy Poo, an actual children's movie that, I kid you not, has an anthromorphic piece of dog shit as the protagonist.

Spam

So today I had spam, thus satisfying the weird white trash part of me that craves it like once a year. It reminds me of Julie's saying that most cravings are because the body is trying to tell you it needs something in that food. So apparently once a year I need a buttload of salt, because that is basically what Spam tastes like and is primarily made up of. Spam is short for "spiced ham" but I don't know where they get that, it should be Sasa, "salt salt."

today

90% of work was boringness as usual, though there were two extra bad ones.

One of them was not even my call, the girl next to me got it. Apparently this guy was a bastard. Now, I guess I think most people who call in are bastards, but this guy takes the cake. He started cursing at her, and saying misogynist things like saying she must be blonde, and, after he got her crying, saying "oh, I made you cry like a little girl? Well I'm glad! I want to make you cry more!" And he was insane and retarded, he'd ask for something and then not let her actually do it. I.E. he originally called in for a quote, but he wouldn't give her his zip code so she could find an agent in the area to give him the quote. He eventually asked her to get him a manager, but wouldn't let her put him on hold so she could get a manager.

She did finally hang up on him, but it was after a good long while of abuse. People kept telling her afterwards, "if I got the call..." and saying things they would've said or did to the man. Which... I dunno, it's great if you're able to think on your feet like that or aren't worried you'll get in trouble, but they were all unrealistic solutions. What I personally would've done was hung up on him, because they have told us we can hang up on people like that. It wouldn't teach him a lesson or keep him from calling back, but it would save me a little grief. I told her that, not in the "if it were me" format like everyone else, but just told her to remember we have the right to hang up on assholes like that.

My own problem is I get assholes not quite far enough over the line that I could hang up on them, which is a pity. As for all sorts of mean people who call in: I really wish I knew what your problem is, that you can just yell at someone for no reason and still feel good about yourselves so that I can go to your house and see if I can fix that problem with a sledgehammer to your face.

My bad call of the day was this crazy asshole. He called up wanting the corporate address. Now.... that address is useless, if I wanted to help this guy I would probably ask probing questions to find out dept he really needs, but I could tell right away he was a dipshit. So anyway I try to give it to him, but he gets angry that my voice is loud and hangs up on me. Which, btw, my voice IS loud in person. But I've taken thousands of calls, many of them with people who feel completely free criticizing my voice to me, and no one else has said that before, and some have even said I'm not loud enough. So I know this guy is just retarded and has his phone on too loud.

Well... lucky me: the 1/200 chance of getting someone the second time they call in happened, and I got him again. So I give him the address, and the name of our CEO which he asked for. I hope he'll go away but then he starts wanting to tell me about his situation. Which, it was claims related and I tried to get him to let me send a message to claims, but he wants to tell me this info personally because he already spoke with claims. Again, I don't act like I normally do, I BLUNTLY tell him (usually I'd say the same thing but with more finesse but I know this guy won't understand finesse) that telling me doesn't do anything, I'm not related in any way to his claim and the information he gives me personally will go nowhere. But he still keeps trying to tell me. His story is liberally peppered with, "You know what I'm sayin'" so finally every time he says it I start saying, "No, I told you, I DON'T know what you're saying, I have no training in claims, I would have no idea why they made a specific judgement, to find out you would actually need to speak to THEM." Finally, he busts out the word "fraud," which anyone who says fraud is immediately given to a supervisor and he's finally off my hands. What a great way to end the night.