oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree

How lovely are your branches, especially the day after Christmas when I see you on the side of the road barely inside the largest trash bag that family owned.

What did these evergreens ever do to you?

I don't get real Christmas trees now. I get them back before artificial trees, I guess. (Not really, but I'm going to pretend I do for simplicity's sake.)

Here's what I don't get about Americans choosing real trees over artificial trees (which are more green, contribute less to global warming and CO2 levels, provide habitat for all sorts of critters and look real nice in a forest).

Xmas is supposedly all about love and and light and life, unless I misunderstood that part. So...let's everyone go cut down a tree (it wasn't doing anything to you, by the way) shake out all the things that lived in it, bring it into your house and plant it in a modified vase like a really, really big flower ridiculous looking flower. Then, you will put all sorts of decorations on it, because naked trees are shameful and disgraceful. Once you open all the presents under the tree (you can't open presents unless there is a real tree who died for your sins), then we take it out, even if it still looks good, and throw it like rubbish on the curb.

Sounds like a bum deal to me. Cold and heartless. Good thing trees don't have feelings or emotions. Cause if they did...well, let's just most people would enjoy Christmas a little less than they do now, with the trees begging for their lives to be spared and the constant low level hum of despair as our real trees count down the days as they slowly die in our house. Or even better, the screams and cries of agony as they await their doom on the curb. Or in a fire.

You are all monsters.

I wanna be the girl with the most cake

I just discovered yesterday that you aren't supposed to put two spaces after a period when you are writing. I have been doing it my whole life and I have to stop and think so that I don't do it automatically now. When did this become a thing? How did I never know about this my whole life?

Why didn't anyone correct me?

Apparently it's been a thing since 2003 or something. Now I just feel stupid. I write. A lot. I have a whole lot of sentences to go back and correct. Even now, I keep double spacing after my sentences, then backspacing to fix my mistake.

Grammar girl says it's easy to stop doing. She is a liar.

That's all. I just wanted to say, how did I not know this was a thing? Shook my whole world. Like, one day, I realize that I thought I saw all these beautiful colors, but really there are like fifteen instead of just the 9 in the rainbow, and everyone can see them except for me, but now I can, but only if I squint just right and think about it really hard.

Just makes me want to only write really long, really convoluted run-on sentences like the last one there.

Again, how did I not know this!? I really feel like everyone was just snickering at me behind my back. 'Oh, you know Penny. The one whose sentences really need to be separated. Her parents must have divorced, you know, for her to need all that extra space. Really is a sign of a bad upbringing.' Snicker, snicker.
'Poor Penny, some ones should really tell her her character limits would be less excessive if she just single spaced after her periods.'
'Did anyone tell her that she is making a social fopaux with every sentence she writes?'
 'I'm not telling her! You tell her!'
'Goddammit, now it's too late to tell her. She's been doing it for too long, we missed the opportunity and now it will just be awkward.'

At least, that's how it went inside my head just now. Just saying, from now on...just one space after a period. Period.

*Edit...Also just discovered ctrl-H, find and replace. Not so bad to go back now and fix my mistakes in my writing. People who program this stuff are so awesome. Thank you, unsung programmer who made ctrl-H a thing*

I don't care I don't care if I'm losing my way

Good morning, good evening, and if I don't see ya, goodnight.

I'm wondering about putting my book up on a blog.  Chapter by chapter.  I'd love to have some feedback.  Maybe a tublr or something.  I dunno.  I'm open to suggestions.  I don't want to self publish, but I also long for someone else to give me feedback on it.

I miss the traffic I get from facebook on here.  I wonder if I got ryan to post my blog posts if people would come talk to me.  I miss facebook a little, it's been about six weeks of no facebook at all.  I don't miss facebook, let me clarify.  I miss seeing people i care about and their posts.  I don't miss the bullshit.  I also don't miss feeling like a slave to my phone with need to check it all the time.

Our work xmas party was yesterday.  My employees, surrounded by a ton of other people, even when they were playing cards, had to check their phones constantly.  If there was even a second of free time, they were thumbing their phones.  I don't want to be like that, and I don't want my kids to be like that.

Just booked tickets to Atlanta for Dude's bday.  Should be fun.  We are going to a dungeon.

Maybe I think too much, but something's wrong

Hello, it's me.

Why, yes, I do only come here when I'm feeling a little self depreciate-y.  I'm glad you noticed.  That will make this much easier for both of us.

I'm hoping that when I'm forty or something that I'll look back at myself and be all like, oh, it was worth it, the self discovery that brought us here.  Cause, woman, you da man.  Or something like that, which does not imply that being a man is better than being a woman.  I'm not turning forty anytime soon, I've got time to work on it.

Oh, look, it's a report...

I had a draft of my first book printed today.  It's 212 pages compiled into a clear covered, 8x11 report by the wonderful UPS store.  Thanks UPS!  Hope I didn't scar you.  Yeah, like you read what I sent you.  That would be a violation of customer confidentiality.  (I know you didn't read it but what did you think? *wink wink nudge nudge*)  Oh, yeah, you totally didn't read it.  Oh, okay.  No, I get it.  It's all good.  I just..well...nevermind.

Um, I guess that last part is a lie.  The book itself is 212 pages total, but there's that whole, practically blank cover page and a table of contents as well.  So...210 pages.  Don't let me get too big of a head.  It's the shortest of all my books, too.  Some places say that formatting is a big deal to figure out how many pages your book would be as a novel.  What I'm seeing pretty consistently is an average of 250 words per page.  If that's the case, then my book has 121,156 words, divided by 250 words per page...means 484.6 pages.  So, like 485 pages rounding up for a cover page.  I know I did this kind of stuff in my stats post a few weeks ago, but I revised it a few times so it's a little longer.  

So...it's really big (that's what she said).  Bigger than I thought it was.  I, apparently, am verbose.  It's a surprise to us all, I know.  I was just so excited to have a book, you know?  I know that self publishing such a niche book will probably never happen, and I can't handle the stress of trying to do that as well as doing my other two jobs, too, but it's a dream.  Honestly, I don't care to make money from it (though it would be nice, you know?), I would just like people who are interested in that kind of stuff to read it and tell me what they think.

Also, seeing it printed, while making it kinda real to me, also made me feel like it's probably not very good.

So...maybe I don't want to know what people honestly think of it, I have practically no self confidence.  But I want it to be good.  :/

Did I mention I finished the third book over the weekend?  And started the fourth, and last, one.  I promise, this one will end the "Promise" series, which I don't know if I'm calling it that or not.  I will finish this story line. I really will.

Mother of light, give me my heart

Wow.  That last post.  That girl should see someone, amirite?

Anyway.

It's snowing today for the first time in a while.  Like since March or something.  Our weather has been really weird, and it's made me uncomfortable.  Guess I'm getting old, cause you know, back in my day, nature knew well enough to have already been snowing intermittently by now.

I tried to appreciate the good weather but it was difficult for me.  It almost felt how you feel when you know that one dude at work, you know the one, the one that always seems to do the fucking stupid shit that defies logic and messes up all your best laid plans?  That guy.  It's like when he is unexpectedly nice to you for a while and you are just waiting for it to come back on you (it did, by the way.  It always does eventually).

Anyway, this post is about nothing.  It's why you come here.  For the quality content.

Our eyes were like the sky

I feel as if the world has stayed sane and I've lost my mind.  If you are in the minority, perhaps you are wrong, right.  At work, politically, well, shit.

I'm so tired of stuff, of work, of our country, of people.  I've been having a hard time with the death of a friend, I'll feel fine, then shit really gets to me super easily and I break down really easily.  I don't know.  I don't want to blame it on that, like I'm using it as a crutch.  Maybe it's just me being me.  Being the selfish, needy kind of person I am.

Ran into a random mother over the weekend.  We bonded over the fact that our children make us want to be reclusive because going out is more punishment than staying in the jails we have made ourselves that we call home.

I dunno.  It's a dark place inside my head today.  I am feeling adrift and directionless.  The worst part, I know lots of people have it much worse than me and I should be thankful for the shit I have.  I'm horrible for even feeling like I do.  

That thought just makes it worse, makes me feel even more like a pathetic, whiny loser.  Some days I feel like an empty vessel that just fits whatever gets put inside, if it's what I'm supposed to be at work, or personally, or whatever.  I feel like a big lie sometimes.  I don't deserve emotions, I just ruin them.

Please don't worry about me, this will pass.

Don't mind me, just listening to metal, black as my mood.

WTF just happened 'Merica?

I think there are a lot of us who are left thinking, what the fuck just happened?  How did that lying, misogynistic, racist, money loving, narcissistic failed tycoon end up in charge of the country.

I don't have an answer.  I do know that I am so sad about our country.  I worry for all of us, the hate and the derision that brought us to this point.  How are we such a country divided?  Where did we go wrong?

Shortsightedness is Dude's excuse.  That, and the electoral collage once again failing to represent the popular sentiment of the American people.  We need to move past this.  We need to eliminate the electoral collage so our vote counts again.

Some of the things our new pres elect has promised in the first 100 days:
Things I think are bad:

• -De-fund climate change research and reallocate that money into water and infrastructure 
• Initially I want to say 'because climate change is bullshit, as all republicans know' which is kinda unfair.  but, it's not so simple.  Really, this one is tricky.  So, water and infrastructure are incredibly CRITICAL.  But not at the expense of not being prepared for climate change (losing florida into the sea, the sinking of NYC, loss of costal shorelines and millions upon millions of people impacted by droughts, hurricanes, floods and other severe weather events).  Don't shortchange climate change because of water.  Find help for water and bridges elsewhere (perhaps where you are spending all that money trying to get the keystone pipeline active again...)
• Spend a ton of money revitalizing coal, gas and oil, including overturning the Keystone pipeline 'roadblocks'  
• because, you know, fuck the environment and renewable energy
• Freeze federal hiring to reduce government by attrition 
• because you know, those people aren't actively doing jobs for the American public.  one day...shit's gonna fall apart even worse than it is already
• Build a wall around Mexico and bill the Mexican Govt.  
• Because, you know, they will totally pay for it.  As a land manager, I know how much fencing costs.  This is NOT financially responsible first and foremost, without even taking in the other fifty reasons it is a bad idea. Just an idea, for a quarter of a mile of green fencing with barbed wire topping...cost us $75,000.  
• Imposing 2 year mandatory minimum sentences for illegal immigrants for entering after deportation. 
• Because, you know, let's kick them out the first time but give them room and board I have to pay for the second time.  Ehhhhhh.....I don't think this one was thought through.  Are we going to charge the Mexican govt for this, too? 
• Requirement that for every new federal regulation two existing regulations must be eliminated. 
• How is that going to work?  Water treatment is federally regulated.  So, if we decide to regulate the algal toxin Microcystin, do we get to get rid of regulations on arsenic and selenium?  Seems like we are going to have a problem here really quickly. 

So, stuff I kinda am waiting to see how it works out: 

• Repealing obamacare
• So...if this is done well, and we get a health savings program instead, this might work.  There's solid proof elsewhere in the world that it does work.  But...i just can't see Trump making it work. 
• Affordable Childcare and Eldercare Act.  
• in theory it sounds great.  Since we aren't hiring more federal employees...who's going to run this shiny new program?
• School Choice and Educational Opportunity Act
• Let's see how this goes, too.  Lots of ways for it to be another 'no child left behind' program
• End Offshoring Act
• Again...it seems like a really cool program.  Who's gonna run it when the employees are all gone and how are you going to enforce and keep it from fraud? 
• Lifetime ban on white house officials being foreign lobbyists, ban on foreign lobbyists raising money for American elections, and White House officials having to wait 5 years to be lobbyists in America
• This all makes sense to me. 

So....efff...I have no idea.  Also, i feel like I'm a minority now, buried under a country of crazy, horrible, selfish human beings.  Not a proud moment.  Hang tough, friends.  It's only four  years.  

-

Painting with the Soul

I haven't been sleeping well the last few nights, and what sleep I do get, it is riddled with half remembered nightmares that are terrifying when I wake up but for reasons I can't remember.

So, of course, tonight I find myself elbow deep, metaphorical hand blindly feeling around down the rabbit hole that is creepypasta.  Surprisingly, I just discovered that this is a thing.  And of course, I can't stop myself.  I can't stop myself from reading on and on, despite how it's making me nearly cry with how unsettled I am with it.

Don't judge me.  I know what slender man is.  I understand what kind of fucked up stuff the internet is capable of.  I can't help it that I also love horror movies and scary stories, even when they mess me up.

Creepypasta has messed with me in a way that horror stuff has not in a very, very long time, and I'm not sure I like it anymore.  Congratulations, internet and creepypasta, you win.  The worst thing, I can't stop myself from going back and reading more, reading comments and links to other articles and little snippets on reddit until I fall deeper into the worse, more backwater, basement dwelling corners of the internet.

The one that is currently fucking me up the most is Mr. Bear 1999.  Fuck that shit.  I'm not even gonna link that.  You can look it up yourself.  That rabbit hole will suck me right in again, and then DudeWhoSleepsNextToMe will be mad at me because I promised not to read anymore...tonight.

I guess the reason that shit creeps us out, especially urban legends, is that they are fucked up in all the right ways to make it seem like they could legitimately happen.  I live in the greater Cleveland area.  We have had some pretty fucked up shit happen around here, like the psycho who kept those poor women locked in his basement for 18 fucking years, and the Torso killer.  So, when shit like that happens in real life, it is very easy to see how Mr. Bear could totally have been a real thing.  Add to it the fact that Canadians are stereotypically super awesome people in general, and it makes the whole Mr. Bear story seem even more fucked up.  And yet, there is something that is close enough to the truth to make it believable that Mr. Bear was a real person and that he was never caught.

And that, is why it fucks up my christmas.  I have kids.  When you have kids, every single little thing is a terrible and horrible threat to your children and the world can hurt/maim/kill them in so many ways it's nearly uncountable.  And that is before you add things to the equation that mess with our general understandings and perceptions of how the world works.

When everyone in your life is predictable, life is good.  Hey, George is an asshole, but you knew that.  He is just George.  If he isn't an asshole, you worry about him.  Oh, hey, George was super nice today.  I wonder if he's feeling well.  Maybe something bad happened at home.  Poor George.

Now, when you are forced to watch videos of George dismembering children and wearing their still pulsating entrails as a boa while he prepares to do the same to you, well, that has probably shaken your whole perception of reality.  You won't have to worry about it for too much longer, though, not in that scenario.

See, I'm in a dark place tonight.

It doesn't help that I was nearly kidnapped when I was either six or seven, from right in front of my own house.  It was the whole, Hey little girl, your dad told me to pick you up.  Get in the car kinda attempted kidnapping.  Obviously, I was not kidnapped, but it still terrifies me.  I had nightmares about it for a long time.  It terrifies me now because I have children of my own, and I know how close I had been to potentially being a random set of unidentified mangled and mutilated child bones in the middle of an old rubber factory's rubble.

It makes me never want to leave my kids by themselves ever in their whole existences.  To think of someone intentionally hurting my children, I can't stand it.  But they must grow into well rounded, good people one day, and I must teach them how to survive on their own.

You know, sometimes I wonder how any of us survive into adulthood.

Anyway, the thing about horror, good horror, is that it is crazy and shakes your faith in the way things are.  The way this is done is by changing something normal just enough that you can't stand it.  That it makes it so wrong, but believably wrong, that you can totally wrap your head around it, just not all the way.  It brings tears to your eyes and images in your head that haunt you when the lights go out. Too much crazy or overthetop-ed-ness and you've lost that surrealness which had made it terrifying.  Now it's just campy.

I was telling my seven year old son tonight about almost being kidnapped and he didn't get why anyone would want to take a kid they didn't know.  I know it was a joke, that he was implying that the kids you do know are annoying enough, which is true.  It wasn't real to him.  He has never met anyone who was just kinda off in that way that makes you uncomfortable to be around them.  He doesn't know yet how horrible and broken people can be.  I love his innocence.

I told him that some people are just broken.  They just are.  Not a lot of people, but some are, and some can't be understood, they are so broken.  And sometimes, those people who are broken, whether they were born like that or whether they were broken by others, sometimes those people want to break others.  They want to break other people in the same ways that they are broken, or worse.  They want to break people because they can't fix themselves, so they want to break others so that they are even worse.  And some people, they don't think like people, not even in that way.  Those ones are the scariest and most alien of all.

Don't leave, I know we are dreaming

So, some statistics because Dude who sleeps next to me was asking for them.

Since September of last year I have written:
292,447 words (estimated from averaged word count per random page sampling)
640 pages (standard word document sized)
53 chapters
2 1/3 books

So, I internet-ed a bit and found that if it were to go into print format (5.5x8.5 format) that my books would be:

Book 1 Anri and Seth: Bloodbound 408 pages
Book 2 Anri and Seth: Demonbound 583 pages
Book 3 Anri and Seth: Feywilds  179 pages (so far at chapter 9)

Now...what to do...what to do. I am seriously considering trying to publish, even if no one buys it.  I wonder how many books are written every year that are in exactly the same place as mine...authors with no confidence wondering if they should or shouldn't just put out into the world what they have created.  I would hate to publish something if it was horrible, but I don't think mine is.  But it's mine, so I wouldn't right?  Wait, I know my self esteem.  I always think my stuff is horrible.  So if I actually think my stuff is good...

I think my head just exploded.  I will tell you this.  I'm no Brandon Sanderson or Neil Gaiman, so don't think I'm getting a big head.  But...maybe it's not so bad, right?  And, I totally recognize that I have a very limited audience.  But if even a few people like my story, well, then that's all good, right?

Now...editing.  Not for me, I just keep on writing.  I'm hoping to finish up this series by the end of the third book.

I'm a little afraid to end it, I love writing and I don't want to lapse.  I'm afraid I'd fall out of it if I went too long, you know?

My hands are shaky and I don't feel right, again, my friend. I'm just waiting on a wild sun.

So....

At some point, if a lot of people seem to think that the problem lies with you...what point do you have to concede to that, even if you only partially believe it.  I mean, sometimes I totally agree.  Most things are somehow my fault, just for being around.  My being there influences things or something.  Like, things are better if I'm not there.  But sometimes, well, I think that it's not me but everyone else that is crazy.

Is it that hard to be around me?  My boss made a joke about how I seem to be not on speaking terms with a lot of people around work lately.

I find it hard to be around me, but I can't change that.  I can limit my exposure to others, I suppose.

Man, this post is a bummer.  It's good no one really reads this, I'd hate to be the person to bring you down.  Because I have it on good authority that I am indeed that person.

I don't know how to change the me that bothers others.  I don't know how to be a person to make everyone happy.  I try hard, but it doesn't happen.  I know I can't make everyone happy, but I try still.
*Edit...How selfish of me, to think I can make people happy*

Something that bothered me the other day, Mexico was shaming one of its Olympians, a gymnast who doesn't look like a twig.  Fuck Mexico.  But, you know, Fuck America, too, because we are just as much horrible, hateful humans.

We also have nice people.  Like these firemen who saved a bunch of ducklings from dying a horrible death inside a storm drain on a highway.  Or the guy who does nice things for people for no reason, and people are left confused and worried about something bad happening because no one is nice anymore.

It's all mine, and your woman, too...probably NSFW or anywhere else, either.

So...I wrote my first m/f scene the other day, and I think it came out really well.  It was harder to do, I think, because I was really worried about messing it up.

One of the things I noticed in writing it...there are a ton of words for male genitalia that are sexy or hot or whatever.  There are a million that are gross or degrading, too, don't get me wrong.  But there are a lot of ways to say 'penis' without repeating yourself. Cock, member, manhood, hard on, shaft, rod, even dick if used correctly.  Boner...not so much.  No one wants to read about your main character's raging boner when you call it that.  They definitely want to read about your main character's boner, though.

Not so much variety with female parts.  Let's start with the top part.  Breasts.  That's fine.  Boobs?  That sounds puerile.  Tits? Even more so.  Mammories?  Too technical?  Chesticals...you get my drift. Sweater puppies?  Gah.

Lower parts are even worse.  Using the correct terminology was the easiest.  Vagina, vulva, clitoris, labia.  Or, what about pussy, cunt, ham wallet, cum dumpster, it just gets worse.  Pussy isn't so bad but it seems to imply something dirty, which if you aren't writing a 'dirty' piece, seems a bit harsh.

Better yet, what a lot of erotica writers seem to do is refer to the shape, color and location, insinuating that you are talking about lady parts without saying those clinical terms or using the 'vulgar' ones either.  Core, folds, pink intimacy, soft opening, yadda yadda with words that flirt.  Maybe I just don't have the vocabulary for it, but I have read a whole lot of smut in my time.

I'm open to suggestions.

She asked me how we got here, I told her I don't know,

And if you keep on asking I'll just keep saying so, this isn't what I wanted, it isn't what I mean, just let them keep on talking, don't you pay them any mind.

That's the full title of this blog.
Back to work.  I got to go canoeing yesterday, and I will get to go again tomorrow.  So far, so good on algae, too.

I should be writing, you know, real stuff like the novels I will never release, not a blog post.  I am about 2/3 done with my second one, and have plans for a third already because too much stuff happened in the second one to try to wrap up in a rush.  It's not like I'm gonna do anything with these anyway, so who cares, right?  I understand how these turn into crazy several part novels now.  It's weird, I'll thinking about what I want to write, and then when i sit down to write it, somehow the characters are like, 'nah, we don't like that idea, how about we do this instead, and you need to figure out how to get us out of this later, k? thanks!'.  Sometimes I feel like I plan events and then they go all askew without my permission.  I'm not even sure what that's all about but it happens a lot.

Anyway, life is kind of back to normal, which is nice.  Somehow there is never enough time in the day and that's nothing new to anyone ever anywhere.

This whole thing with the gorilla in Cincinnati, well, I met that gorilla kinda sorta a few weeks ago during the May major water circuit.  We were on an environmental sustainability tour of Cincy Zoo and he was super aggressive at the time.  We stayed too long by his enclosure and he started running back and forth, then splashed water at us across the moat.   The whole thing saddens me, and I'm really really tired of all of the shame-blame culture that we have around events like this.  You know, sometimes shit happens.  Sometimes people do dumb things.  Sometimes kids slip away in a blink of an eye and then bad things happen.  And sometimes people are just lucky it wasn't them, you know?

Also, as much as I like taking my kids to the zoo, zoos are horrible places.

So much distraction from real issues, from things that matter.  We should all prepare for our new American CEO, Mr. Trump.

We will see how the Republican National Convention goes next month.  I wanted to go see Ministry and Helmet but it's during the RNC and I worry that the city will be impossible to traverse.  They are having an anarchist national convention, you know, because.

But it's half as much as it was before

There is something to be said about just being responsible for yourself.  I just escaped for two days, just me and the old man, no kids, no work, just us and island time.  And bicycles.

Did I mention Island time?

Kelley's Island.  It was wonderful for two days.  We biked the whole island more than once.  Made us wish that we could bike our neighborhood to get places.  Made us real sad that our neighborhood is not bike friendly for living.

Things we did:  had no kids.  So...anything we wanted, pretty much. Which consisted mostly of riding bikes around the island and eating food.  No complaints.  And feel like real people.

I love my kids, but it is just nice to love my husband and love myself every now and again.  It didn't even matter that it was overcast, cold and sometimes rainy.  It was wonderful.  This may be a 'duh' statement but my element is water.  Obviously, I hear you snicker, of course it is, we all knew that.  But, I truly feel so much calmer when I'm surrounded by water.  It's a good fun fact to know.

I had more I wanted to write.  But...I just got off of the water conference circuit, and back from a major mental reset.  I'm pretty blank. And I have one more day of vacation left, part of the back home stay-cation. I'll leave you with a half-ass written blog and some pretty pictures.

We never checked the price tag, when the cost comes in it's gonna be high

There's a song by Matt and Kim where they wonder what they might have been.  What they could have become.

I wonder that a lot lately.  I don't regret where I am in my life.  But I wonder, what if...what if I went to Japan when I wanted to, to teach english?  What if I stayed in education and taught high school biology?  What if i had stayed in college and gotten my PhD and became a professor.  What if I had joined the army and not backed out last minute? What if ....

Somehow, I still thing I might have ended up where I am.  Sometimes I think that is the truth of the matter.  But I don't know that I believe in a force more than just me.  Lots of music influencing me tonight apparently but I am who you say I am.  Yeah, I know I used Eminem in the last blog, too.  I'm apparently lazy.  I mean, there are already three different song references, Sleater-kinney , Matt and Kim and Eminem.  What more do you want from me?

I feel old. I know I have time and I'm young enough to still do stuff, change my life and all that, it just seems so hard.  It's not supposed to be easy. that's why it feels fucking so good.  (See, now we are up to four song references, awolnation, you're welcome).  Or that's what I'm told.  Does anyone ever really know what they want to be when they grow up?

Apparently I want to write smutty m/m vampire novels when I grow up.

The computer screen is bright and I'm sitting in the dark in my bedroom.  I keep seeing shit out of the corner of my eyes and it distracts me.  Enough so that I just wrote it.  And you read it.  Who's worse?

Sometimes I wish I would just shut up.  I hear myself talking and internally I'm just like, jesus christ, why doesn't anyone just tell me to shut up?  I feel like I am almost completely the most annoying person on the planet.  Sometimes.  I need to work on being fluent in another language.  At least if I'm unable to stop talking, as happens occasionally, you wouldn't know what stupid shit I was unable to stop myself from saying.

Once, in high school, i took a bet from a teacher of mine, that I couldn't go a week without talking.  I'm so annoying.  That annoying.  I won that bet but it wasn't worth it in the long run.  I got grounded because my mom was so annoyed with me at home, and I got in trouble in school when I used a small hand held chalk board for 'class participation'.  Some people just can't win.  And I just can't shut up.

I am who ever you say I am

Because if I wasn't, why would you say I am?

Having one of those nights.  So, eminem is a good rapper.  How does he sound like he's just talking shit but actually have great and complex lyrics AND they all rhyme?  Fuck him.

So, i'm feeling melancholy and a little self depreciating today.  I made a list of things I know about myself in the shower.  And then I wondered why I am how I am.  And why I am how I am.  And if I should want to change?  Sometimes my tea bag tells me that it's okay to be myself.  Then my fortune cookie informs me that it's never to late to take another path.  And then the internet says that I can change career in just 18 months.  And then that helpful podcast tells me that to be happy I should change what I don't like about myself.

What things should I like?  What things about myself should I not like? What things should I keep?  What things deserve to be trimmed away?

It's hard to tell.

Things I know about myself.  I am manic.  Like, nearly almost always.  I can't stop and I can't slow down.  No tea bag or fortune cookie or podcast about being happy has advice on how.  Sure, they tell me to slow down, smell roses and shit alike.  But they don't tell me HOW. How do you stop being you? Does being manic define me?  A little.

I was meeting with a guy at work who does not like me.  We are peers, and have had a very rough go of it.  We are on good terms lately, which makes me worry about the next fight on the horizon.  How sad and jaded.  I like to think I see the good in people but those previous statements prove I don't.  Anyway, I was talking to him and I could feel myself spiraling quickly into manictown, population me.  And I couldn't stop it.  Afterwards, I wonder how anyone can be around me and I understand why he has a hard time working with me.

So, maybe the problem is mine, a little.

Should I embrace my maniacal nature?   Just own it and be the crazy cat lady with the aomebas in her brain making her like cats a whole lot and also sometimes walks down the street with her skirt tucked into her pantyhose? (I'd have to start regularly wearing pantyhose...)  Or should I follow the advice of my fortune cookie and calm the fuck down?

PS...It would be totally awesome if I ever found a fortune cookie that literally said "you need to just calm the fuck down every now and again".  I would take it as a message from the powers that be.

You just take my breath away, I don't know what else to say

My boss from my first over-the-table job recognized me in my car, from his car, at the bank yesterday.  He rolled his window down and asked me if I had ever worked for him.  I recognized him and I told him that I did.  He made fun of my hair and told me he still had the restaurants.  It was weird.

But...he remembered me after, I did the math, 17 years. First, I'm old.  Second, that's a long time to remember some random high school student who worked for you for a few years.  I didn't even have the style of hair he made fun of at the time.  I must have made an impression? I tend to do that.  I hope it was good.

Thanks to everyone who was really nice about me finishing a book.  I was really stressed to even post it on here, or publicize that I wrote one.  Afraid of criticism.  That's me. I need to find a forum or something on line where I can post it and get some stranger feedback now.  I wonder....

Anyway.  I can't blame my kids.  I'm the reason we can't have nice things.

Love & peace, y'all.

Till there was little feeling, please work with what is left

Yo.  What's up.  You know what I did?  I wrote a whole book.  I did.  It took me six months of some writing here and some writing there.  But I finished it.  The whole thing.

But...now what?  I have no idea.  I'd like some other people to read it but I'm afraid to know what they think.

Also, it will have a pretty limited audience.  It's m/m urban romance.  I made dude who sleeps next to me read it.  He said he likes it, but he loves me, so he would say that, wouldn't he?

But..I think it's pretty good, and I hate myself on good days.  So, that has to mean something, right?  (Actually, I don't hate myself anymore.  Not really.  But...I'm still pretty not awesome.  Just, not hating.  Little teeny tiny baby steps.  Maybe I won't sound like the rest of the internet by the time the internet is in our brain stems or something.)

But you know what?  I wrote a freaking book.  23 chapters.  Isn't that crazy?  It seems like it to me.  Also, I'm three chapters deep into the second book.  Which is weird because the first one isn't really a book, just twenty three chapters sitting on my google drive.

But...fuck.  I did something.  I finished something.