life officially sucks. Lemme get up to date:

In march i got fired from my very good paying job. at this point i figure, i'm leaving town for new orleans in a couple weeks, no big.

Me and Timber don't leave florida til the end of may, and when we do, it's for maryland, so we can live with my dad. somewhere in there we get screwed over on a gig and a place to stay and timber's best friend, to the point they refer to each other as brothers, decides he doesn't like me, but never tells me about it.

within two weeks of reaching maryland (and some how pissing off my uncle, i still don't know what that's about) timber get's an email from his best friend basicly saying 'i hate you, you're despicable, your fiance's a bitch and a layabout, I never want to see your face again.' Suffice to say I cried for the first time in 6 years.

We've been here for almost 2 months now and we've yet to get a job (i don't count the one timber got and got fired from in less than 2 hours for not knowing his way around the state.)

I hate being dependant on anyone and all this bs is driving me crazy. It'd be easier if it weren't for the fact that me and Timber are getting tired of looking at eachother  and are constantly snapping at eachother for no real reason. I feel like i'm trapped in a net and the more I panic and try to get out of it, the further trapped I get...

I went to work this morning and checked my email (which is always full of fun and interesting things when I come in after my 3-day weekends) and found out that I had a meeting at 3 in the afternoon with my supervisors supervisor about the project they were discussing to combine the two sides of our business with a new team. Now, I only just heard about this new idea on Thursday before my weekend, and I had hardly expected to be picked for this new project in the first place, so I assumed it was a preliminary 'here's the idea, what do you think?' type meeting. and went on with my day.
At 1:30, an hour before my lunch hour and 2 hours before my meeting, I checked my schedule to see when they wanted me to take lunch, seeing as this thing was smack dab in the middle of it.. (I was hoping it would be early, Monday is not our 'light' day of the week.) Not only was my lunch not move to be early, the meeting wasn't scheduled at all, and when I spoke with out scheduling team, they didn't even know what the hell was going on.
Half an hour before the meeting, just as I'm going to clock out and sit down with a good book, four people come screaming through the isle "nobody go to lunch, all the lunches are gonna be set for after the meeting!"
Thanks guys, coulda told me that earlier.
So I wait, whatever, and go to the meeting.

At the meeting we're told all those attending are on the short list for the project. Woo hoo for me!
We are also told, because we need to be trained for our other department, we will be pulled from the phones for two weeks. Woooot!
Starting Monday, the 23rd. Wtf?
We would also be rebidding for our schedules. Hey, wait a minute!
And we would also be moved to a whole new supervisor. A girl who's desk is festooned with pink hearts and Hello Kitty paraphernalia. Permanently.

At this point I was ready to quit the project altogether. 

Except for the fact that they were implying that, though a pay raise was not inherent in the new project, it may be coming, should it succeed.

Suffice to say, when we got out of the meeting I and the group of friends and allies I had volunteered for this project with bombarded our sup with questions.

They hadn't even told her they were going to be rolling it out yet, or that they had made the final choice in reps.


I've had better days at my job, far, far better.
 

Now, when you walk into my room, one of the biggest things you notice (other than the usual state of barely controlled chaos) is this giant tv I got as a present from my father and the xbox 360 I spent far too much of my own money on as a present to myself for moving up in this dismal little world of ours. I'm very proud of that tv and the xbox connected to them because they are the only real items of true materialistic value I own (and because it takes an advanced degree in electronics to set up everything I own to channel through that machine).

But they aren't there anymore. Neither is the playstation 2 that I promised my siblings would be best placed in my room with the larger, hd tv, or the laptop I was given as a gift by my best friends and former house-mates or my step-father's laptop, which, while not brand spanking new, was only bought a couple years ago. Every movie and video game I own is sitting in the middle of my floor, jammed into yarn bags, yarn bags that the burglars had to rummage through my whole closet to find and use, a kind of violation that I can neither comprehend nor explain.

I'm angry. Very very very angry. And sleep-deprived. And, overall, not a very pleasant person to be around. What I want, more than anything in the world, is to have 20 minutes in a room with each of the slimy bastards that walked into my house and took from me all the stuff I and my parents and my friends worked so hard for. Many of those things were gifts, very expensive gifts, things we have no way of replacing. Things around which my identity is based. 'I can afford to buy myself a new game system as a gift to myself.' 'I can watch movies with my siblings whenever I want.' 'I can set up my life to allow my family to share what I've come into by the grace of the sun and stars and shear unadulterated luck.' And because some assholes wanted a fix, I'm out all of that.

I'm very very very angry.

i love florida.

midday. it's nice outside, i'm surrounded by palm trees and nice wee houses, so i went out for a smoke.

it was only 52 degrees outside.

wtf is wrong with this state?

Disorder	Rating
Paranoid Disorder:	Low
Schizoid Disorder:	Low
Schizotypal Disorder:	Moderate
Antisocial Disorder:	Moderate
Borderline Disorder:	Low
Histrionic Disorder:	Moderate
Narcissistic Disorder:	Low
Avoidant Disorder:	Moderate
Dependent Disorder:	Low
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder:	Low
-- Personality Disorder Test - Take It! -- -- Personality Disorders --

I took this test back in 2005 and I just came back across it while looking over my posts in the last several years. I found that, looking back, despite what I obviously thought of myself at the time, I'm a lot better off now, and far more comfortable with myself than I used to be. And despite my usual instinct on seeing my older writings, especially as they get farther and farther back, I find that, with only a few exceptions, there's really not much for me to be ashamed of here...

Lol. Would only that I could have the clarity of late night musings all the time. 'Night all, and I hope that your rest is better than mine.

Anyone who's ever been raised in a primarily liberal town knows certain facts to be true, the main of which regards 'other places' (which translates to 'anyplace not here', by the way). For example, one of the strongest traditions of teaching in the neighborhood I spent eleven of the most formative years of my life in was that it wasn't safe to be gay outside of the confines of our town. Other place bad things happened to people if they came out to the public. They got teased. They were shunned. They were actively persecuted and even murdered.

I swallowed this bullshit whole.

And you know what was the most remarkable thing? When I moved to Orlando in my sophomore year (a place that oh-so-most-definitely qualifies as 'other places'), none of that happened. I had every expectation of finding gangs here (and I did), of seeing drugs (which I did), and not meeting a single out gay within a thousand miles.

What I found was that Orlando's gay community was not only almost insanely vocal, compared to the community back home, but they weren't afraid of anyone. At all. I also met my first girlfriend down here, this is were I 'discovered myself,' as it were. I realized, later, that I had only met two people back home who were out, everyone else was so deathly afraid that to come out was certain death, social, if not literal. And, amazingly to me, I realized that it would have been. Why? Because every single time a teacher related to us the innate evil of discriminating against someone, for whatever reason, it that secured that much more firmly the idea that there was something to discriminate. Teachers in Orlando don't bother. You get the one goofy lecture at the beginning of the year and only the foolish uber-liberals bother with pointing it out for the rest of the year.

In all my time living in Orlando, I've had a grand whopping total of two, count 'em, two 'bad' experiences as a gay person. The first was being giggled at by a bunch of cheerleaders in the hallway and stumblingly being told to be 'less friendly' with my girlfriend by a teacher. The second was having call a drunk football player a moron when he called me a 'bull-dyke' (not a particularly bothersome term, mind you, just when it's coming from a drunk football player). That's it.

Suffice to say, in all the years I spent in my home town, I grew and learned far more about myself and the world in only my first year in Florida, and that learning curve has yet to flatten out.

I love work. I really love work. Every time I get off a call with somebody that really need help and I was able to give them everything they needed and more I get all fluffy and warm inside (especially if that person happens to live in Western Massachusetts, on top of everything else...)
I also loathe work. With the powerful hate of a thousand burning suns. Everytime I have to sit at my desk for an hour with a patient who won't listen to anything I say, no matter how many times I have to explain the situation to them and all the numerable ways we have of getting around it and on with thier lives (and mine), and acts as though I'm wasting their precious time when I know, for a fact, that there are five other people waiting eagerly to speak with a real human being because they are *dying* the slow and painful way and the only way the keep from committing sucide via pencil is because they can trust us to be there on the phone for them when they need thier medication, ready to smooth over any and every little problem they might have, and if only there isn't some moron with a selective hearing problem who doesn't want to be helped, even if the ceo picks up the phone and grovels nicely for them.

All of that said, work is really suiting me fine: the pay is the awesome, the breaks, though ever and always short, are enough to get a breather, and the folks I work with are actually really fun to talk to and really nice, too boot. After tomarrow I'll have a (semi-)perminant desk and after monday I'll have my regular schedual, hour lunches and all, after the 1st I'll also have real, honest to goodness health benifits, not just the 'don't get sick' plan, which means I can set up real, honest to goodness doctors visits, with a real, honest to goodness doctor. And optometrist. And dentist. All of which will be really nice. And, on top of all that good stuff, I'll have my vespa on friday night, before I get on the plane, ready and waiting for me for when I get home sunday night. I can't wait! I just wanna putt around the block in it, just for starters. And then maybe see if I can't figure out some of the more interesting limits of it's design, like speed...

Anyway, that's enough from me for now...

Well, work went really well today. I learned a lot about the company I work for (namely that they couldn't care less if I have tattoos or odd earrings so long as it doesn't interfere with the way I communicate with the patients (no tongue rings, like I care). A remarkably large number of people came up to me during breaks and the like to ask me about being an artist, tattoos and drawing, which I found really odd, since it's not exactly odd to be an artist, have tattoos, draw them, or any combination thereof. I was more interested in talking to the people who had been working in call centers before at other places and getting their input on what they thought of CuraScript.

Otherwise, I'm scheduling classes tonight: Gen. Psychology, US Government, and Drawing, and maybe Anatomy for Drawing if I can get it on the weekends. I really need to work something out with scheduling to get Dec. 21 off, maybe trade a day with somebody or something. My dad's brother is holding this big get-together type thing in North Carolina and I really wanna make an appearance, it'll be only the second time I've seen my uncle and his sons since I first met them almost 6 months ago and they're really good people, if somewhat dis-connected from reality... And I need to find a drivers ed course that teaches on the weekends, too, so my parents can stop driving me every place and I can maybe take advantage of my days off instead of sitting in my house and staring at the walls...

'Nyway, that's about all that's new with me.

I'm sure I must have had a better day at some point, but I'm really having trouble remembering any such occasion right now.
For starters, I actually managed to get to sleep at a reasonable hour last night, long before even my naturally daiurnal siblings finally shipped away. If it's hard to understand why this is so wonderful, let me explain: I leave for a week trip to Chicago with my father in a week, during which, I'd like to be awake and having fun, not still transfering to the normal daytime hours of, well, the rest of america. And then I got to sleep in, a pleasure now that my siblings are in school and leaving the house at 6 in the morning, waking me up from sound sleep in the process.
This bit of fluff is then followed by an extended shopping trip, the focal point of which is primarily myself. Because the Chicago trip is going to include a lot of visiting nice places where my usual sort of attire is less than acceptable, I needed to buy at least a few bits and pieces to keep from embaressing myself and my dad in public. I came out with almost a quarter again my wardrobe in clothing I wouldn't, for once, shy away from wearing in public without any dress requirements. (ie. I wasn't required to buy any skirts or unsettlingly frilly blouses.) And I finally found Ravenclaw color yarn at JoAnn's, something I've been looking for for ages. All of these things coming out to less than $80, which made me wicked happy.
We finished off the day with a highly unusual, but really halarious couple rounds of SceneIt, with the entire family involved, which had all of us laughing out loud, since I and my sister knew nothing about James Bond or TCM whatsoever, Ian kept guessing the same exact thing over and over again and, incomprehensibly, getting it right, and the parents making a variety of jokes over our heads or under our noses that had us looking at them quizzicly and them trying not to start rolling on the floor. Each of us disowned the others numerous times, made a wide variety of bizzare guesses, and generally had a fantastically good time.
And, to everyone's surprise, our new cat Peter Lorre, actually came out of hiding a few times to stare at us in complete confusion, after which everybody pretty much went to bed in a pleasant, if mostly defeated, mood.

Maybe I've had a better day before, but I really don't remember it.

I'm a genius.

"As a top-scorer on Tickle's IQ Test, the
in-depth analysis of your IQ score is FREE"

I actually trust this site and this test, surprisingly enough.

"136 You scored 136 on Tickle's IQ test. Most people's IQs are between 70 and 130. In fact, 95% of all people have IQs within that range."

95% of people are between 70 and 130. 95% Which puts me, I add for emphisis, in the top 2.5% of people in the United States.

This is a thought that scares me, deeply. Either this site is very very warped or most of the rest of the world is even stupider than I am, which, as my mother will surely remind me, is quite unsettling indeed.

To check, I took 2 other 'certified' IQ tests. Both of them came out within 2 points one way or the other of 136.

*cowers in a corner* This is frightening information.

I love my tattoo. I really do. I firmly believe that every last electric impulse of pain is worth it for the shear awesomeness (and beauty) of having this piece of my artwork permenantly a part of my body.
But I will never try to do *anything* the day of and after getting a tattoo ever again. Ever.
1. Taking a good solid shower hurts, even normally. When you're rushed from waking up 45 minutes after you ment to for your flight to Baltimore for a week, it hurts more.

2. You can't wear the usual open-backed shirt on a plane with a tattoo. I don't know what might be on the backs of all the chairs I've sat in today, but I know that if a single viral cell makes it's way into my tattoo while it's still vulnerable this way, Iwill regret it forever.

3. When wearing said closed shirt, the newly washed tattoo, who's scabs and other protective tissues have disinegrated in the excess warm water that you unintentionally doused it with because you were later for your flight, sticks to your shirt. Whenever you shift your shirt in any way, the new scabs embedded in your shirt are ripped off and start afresh.

4. Airplane turbulance bumps you against your tattoo. Over. And over.

5. When you do get to your destination, everybody seems to want to touch your back, even if they've been told many times not to, that it causes you intense physical pain and torture.


I peeled off my shirt just now, with understandable reluctancy, and the inside of the back was both crusty and light blue (the color of the work I got done). I am less than pleased by this. And yet, for all these things, I would still rather repeat the whole experiance, start to finish, over again than even consider not doing it.

I just hope Paul's cats don't step on it if they come by to say hi, and that my cousins won't try to touch it tomarrow when they come.

*makes faces of universal frustration* Okay, think about it: the best way to distract oneself online is to go do geeky fan-type things, yes? For this is the purpose of the internet: geeky fan-type things, shopping, and porn, or any combination thereof that you feel like indulging in. So my frustration is understandable when, no matter what fandom or site I go to, there is not a single sign of anyone having been there in months? Years? Have all the fan-folk simply died overnight and I got skipped over? 'Cause that's most definately what it looks like. It seems highly counter-intuitive to set up large fan sites and then compleately ignore as though you somehow think that that somehow means you no longer have a part in it. Am I mistaken in my belief that fans are generally very vocal and opinionated people, prone to expressing thier opinions in loud, highly excitable clumps whenever they get together? Are they not the pioneers of online conversation, long before average folk began to use it for their own purposes?

Suffice to say I am very disappointed in my fellow fans.

What are your favorite and least favorite words? Any reasons why?

Favorite words? Would have to be 'light', 'glow', and 'warmth', excluding things that invoved speaking like an absolute idiot or automatic responses. I like being in places that are warm, sunny, you know? Like in front of a window or outside in the Park. Things that glow or shed light have a special quality to them, and not in the 'look! Shiny!' kinda way either. The things that least matter, don't shed light: clothing, and such. But people glow, or reflect, so does the moon, eyes, leaves, earth, the sun, stars. Words glow, when you try to remember them, so do numbers. And when you see someone's face in your mind, it's surrounded by a sort of glow. You remember the person, the way they stand or move, not how the particular surrouding or set of clothes. Just a person.

In english: things that matter are bright.

I really don't like cold. Or venom. Or bitter. Or hurt. They sound just as hard and uncomfortable as the things they describe. Anyone who uses them gets a full blast of what they say in it's connotation. All of those words are very strong, full of themselves. There is no way to make 'venom' sound passing or trifling. You can't use 'bitter' without feeling that sort of alkali flavor.

Yeah. I'm bored. And opinionated.

Eating taco meat, moshing to Three Days Grace, Downloading music, Surfing the Web....

Life is good where I stand, kids. Life is good indeed.

Chav-
[] Hang out at McDonadls?
[] Less then 5 GCSE's?
[] Wear Big Hoop Earrings and/or Sideways Caps?
[] Do all your shopping at a sports outlet (JJB, JD Sports, etc)
[] Listen to R'n'B Music all the time
[] Use the word Blazin'?
[x] Like to start fights?
[] Had Sex before legal age?
[] Wear alot of 'Bling'?
[] Do you know the "Hardest person" in your local area
Total: 1

Emo-
[] Cry alot?
[] Wear tight t-shirts?
[x] Write poetry?
[x] Ever been in love?
[x] Only to be smashed to the ground?
[x] Dyed your hair recently?
[x] Black?
[] Arn't stars like, so rad? blate
[] You didn't pay for that haircut
[x] Like wearing ties?
Total: 6

Gamer-
[x] Play more then 20 hours a week?
[] More then 40?
[] Own more then 4 consoles?
[] More then 7?
[x] Own any cosplay items?
[x] Do you know what All Your Base Are Belong To Us means?
[] Do you know what Bolden means?
[] Own one of the latest releases (Nintendo DS, PSP, XBOX 360)
[] Got emulation?
[] More then 1GB?
Total: 3

Geek-
[] (4|..| j00 u|..||)3r574|..||) 7|-|15?
[]Good Grades?
[x] Look forward to school?
[x] Play Chess?
[x] By Choice?
[] With yourself?
[] Wear suspenders?
[] Ever worn a pocket protector?
[] Ever had a pen leak and regreted not having a pocket protector?
[x] Wear glasses?
Total: 4

Goth-
[] Wear Makeup?
[x] Black?
[] Like your soul?
[] Do you own any cross pendants?
[x] And your not christian?
[] Wear Black, all the time?
[] Lace?
[x] Boots?
[] Dom boots?
[x] Know what Dom Boots are?
Total: 4

Mosher-
[x] Any piercings?
[x] Constantly do the "Rock Hands"?
[] Like bands like Dragonforce and Lamb of God?
[x] Wear wallet chains?
[x] Even when you havent got a wallet?
[x] Baggy trousers?
[] Band hoodies?
[x] Long hair?
[] Been to any gigs lately?
[] More then 5 in the last month?
Total: 6

Trendie-
[x] Concerned about your looks?
[] Always wear the latest fashion?
[] Wear Sunglasses?
[] In winter?
[] Ripped shirts?
[] Ripped Coats?
[] Dog Tags?
[x] Rings?
[] Those shoes cost more then 70?
[x] And they're NOT trainers?
Total - 3

....
Which makes me an emo mosher? Isn't that supposed to be an oxymoron? I think this test is biased for some reason...


I am not emo, dammit!

1. The phone rings. Who do you want it to be?
-- One of my friends, to talk, or my boss, to give me a few more hours to work this week.
2. When shopping at the grocery store, do you return your cart?
-- Almost always, and bring a bunch of others back along with.
3. In a social setting, are you more of a talker or a listener?
-- Depends on the topic under discussion and who I'm talking to.
4. Do you take compliments well?
-- They always make me nervous, but I think so...
5. Do you play Sudoku?
-- I love Sudoku!
6. If abandoned alone in the wilderness, would you survive?
-- For a little while, atleast.
7. Do you like to ride horses?
-- Yep! Though haven't gotten the chance to in a long time...
8. Did you ever go to camp as a kid?
-- Yeah....0.o It was some of the wierdest spans of my life.
9. What was your favorite game as a kid?
-- Races. Of all kinds.
12. Could you date someone with different religious beliefs than you?
-- Easily.
13. Do you like to pursue or be pursued?
-- Pursued, though I tend to be the one pursueing anyway...
14. Use three words to describe yourself?
-- bipolar lost silly
15. Do any songs make you cry?
-- I haven't really cried in over a year and more, no.
16. Are you continuing your education?
-- Not right now, but I will be.
17. Do you know how to shoot a gun?
-- In theory.
18. If your house was on fire, what would be the first thing you grabbed?
-- My guitar and the laptop, if at all possible.
19. How often do you read books?
-- I usually finish one a day when I'm in the mood.
20. Do you think more about the past, present or future?
-- Mostly in tiny tiny little scenes of what I'd like to happen, or to have happened.
21. What is your favorite children's book?
-- Where the monsters are!
22. What color are your eyes?
-- Green with brown veins.
23. How tall are you?
-- 5'8"
24. Where is your dream house located?
-- Somewhere WARM!
27. Have you ever taken pictures in a photo booth?
-- No. Why should I?
28. When was the last time you were at Olive Garden?
-- Oh, years ago...
30. Where was the furthest place you traveled today?
-- School, so far.
32. Do you like mustard?
-- Not really, in moderation.
33. Do you prefer to sleep or eat?
-- Umm... Umm... Both?
34. Do you look like your mom or dad?
-- I think I look more like my Mom, but there's no way of knowing, is there?...
35. How long does it take you in the shower?
-- About twenty minutes, though usually shorter.
36. Are you the best person ever?
-- No such creature exists.
37. What movie do you want to see right now?
-- Hannible Rising.
39. What did you do for Christmas?
-- (Finally) Visit my grandparents. As a most wonderful surprise.
40. Do you think The Grudge was scary?
-- No! That movie was a peice of crap little gore-fest film! *grrrr* Don't get me started...
42. Do you own a camera phone?
-- No, a fact which dogs me every day.
44. Was your mom a cheerleader?
-- I think she would rather have hung herself from the ceiling of the gym in high school.
45. What's the last letter of your middle name?
-- N.
47. How many hours of sleep do you get a night?
-- Usually less than 7 and more than 4. If I'm lucky.
48. Do you like care bears?
-- *Searches for lighter* NO.
49. What do you buy at the movies?
-- Big bag of popcorn and a soda.
50. Do you know how to play poker?
-- Poker? There's a poker game around? Deal me in!
51. Do you wear your seatbelt?
-- I don't think I could not wear a seatbelt, I'd feel too uncomfortable.
52. What do you wear to sleep?
-- The clothes I wore during the day. 'Cause I'm lazy.
53. Anything big ever happen in your hometown?
-- Only sad stuff, like people dying in car crashes.
54. How many meals do you eat in a day?
-- Usually one and a half.
55. Is your tongue pierced?
-- No. Way. In. Hell.
56. Do you always read MySpace bulletins?
-- Only when I'm crazy bored.
58. Do you like funny or serious people better?
-- Too funny is annoying at times and too seriou is a major downer. A little bit of both is best.
59. Ever been to L.A.?
-- No. And I never want to.
60. Did you eat a cookie today?
-- Yep! Hearts the cookie.
61. Do you use cuss words in other languages?
-- Only a few, and only on really strict occassions.
62. Do you steal or pay for your music downloads?
-- Steal, I think. Most of my music is ripped off my parents's computer, so I niether know or care.
63. Do you hate chocolate?
-- Tell me you're kidding...
64. What do you and your parents fight about the most?
-- Whatever I happen to be being pigheaded about at the moment.
65. Are you a gullible person?
-- I'm too cynical to be that stupid.
66. Do you need a boyfriend/girlfriend to be happy?
-- No, not really.
67. If you could have any job (assuming you have the skills) what would it be?
-- Proffessional slack-ass!
68. Are you easy to get along with?
-- I try to be, but some people are freakishly annoying....
69. What is your favorite time of day?
-- Sun up and sun down, especially when you can see both the sun and the moon.
70. Do you like Pineapple?
-- Um... yeah. I suppose.

Ooo... Money....

I'm staring at my paycheck as I speak. (yes, Ma, I'm done with my homework, so don't give me that look) It's pretty. There's these numbers and things on it and, well, it's shiny to look at indeed.
If I didn't need it it I think I'd frame it. Even if they shorted me four hours and twenty dollars-some.

Other than that, life's pretty good. My job is shiny, my grades are shiny, and nobody's been a huge ass. Or, at least, not where I have to deal with them. My guitar is in the mail, all my friends are pretty much done fueding fo rthe time being, and even my ex is talking to me again, it's quite good, actually...

Now I'm just waiting for the other shoe to drop.