rena_librarian | Entries tagged with grandma

I wore a shirt yesterday that made me completely self-conscious the last time I wore it, around Christmas. And I was fine.

Not that I looked that much different (I've lost some weight, yes, but not THAT much since then). I just...feel more confident, I guess.

First time I've worn it since I moved out. Hmm.

Went out to my parents' house for dinner last night, and I'm 98% sure that it's the first time I'd been out there since January. Expected it to feel weirder, but it was surprisingly familiar--almost like I've been driving that way every night for the last five months. O_o It DID feel really confining--all the trees are in full foliage right now, so going down the last bit of road and the driveway felt like driving in a tunnel.

I don't know, I guess I was expecting them to make more of a fuss over me. Felt kind of like it did when I lived there. I didn't like that feeling.

I also went over to my grandpa's and finally got my orange dishes. ^_^

(Thanks to google images for the pics--I don't have my own pics yet. ^_^) Most of the plates are plain, but I have those exact cups and about six of those flower plates--I think the color in the second pic is a better representative of their actual color. I also have a few soup bowls and a platter. ^_^

Did a little research last night online (though it was kind of difficult--most sites were more geared toward selling the stuff rather than having helpful info), and they were given away with Dreft detergent in the 1950's. ^_^ Manufactured by the Fire King division of the Anchor Hocking Glass company (which is still in existence, though they no longer manufacture my dishes). The particular line is called Peach Lustre (how creative, lol). And you can bet that whenever I go into an antique/junk store, I'll be looking for more. ^_^

I found them in my Grandma's house one day when I was fourteen--she had been through all the cabinets and washed all the dishes, and was showing off, and I made such a fuss about how pretty that set was that she said I could have them when I got married. I kind of sighed and told her that would probably be a really long time, if ever, so she amended herself and said I could have them when I moved out. ^_^ I think she was just starting to get the idea that I'd be like Jennifer--probably marry late, if at all. At fourteen I wasn't sure I wanted to get married, lol.

Lots of things were different at fourteen. Thoughts of college weren't even beginning to float through my head, and I thought I'd be out on my own a lot sooner than I actually was.

We had no idea that Grandma would get sick and never live to see me move out, or get married, if I ever do. *is in a funk about that*

Gah. That's depressing. The point is I finally have the dishes. ^_^ I'm probably not going to unpack them right now, what with having to move out of my apartment soon, and move back again. If I unpack them I'll want to wash them before I put them away, and there's not much point in doing that twice.

Gas was $2.86 in Flippin (at WalMart, if you used a gift card)! Sooooo filled up there! That's the cheapest I've seen in a few weeks.

Current Mood: tired
Current Location: home
Current Music: Rurouni Kenshin on YouTube

Funeral. Shock shock, pretty much as typical as you can get. Didn't cry until we were all getting up to walk by the casket. Teared up. Didn't sob. Other than that, typical, typical, typical.

Maddy doesn't get it. At the gravesite she asked if she could see down the hole. She asked why Great-Grandma wasn't there. Gah.

Another big family gathering where I only knew half the people. I finally cried when I was BORED to tears. (No, just kidding. But almost.) Finally Maddy came in from playing all whiny and tired so I asked Alicia if she wanted me to bring her back to the house and put her down for a nap. Alicia said to give her a drink and read her a story and she'd go right down. So I gave her some lemonade in a "big-girl" cup and we read "101 Dalmatians" and then she settled right down. I checked on her about five minutes ago and she wasn't SLEEPING yet, and the clock just rung, so she may not be asleep yet. But she's laying down and being quiet and she hasn't whined for me, so she's okay. ^_^ She knows where I am if she needs me.

Today they were making a big to-do of divvying up the excess flowers. They're keeping the biggest ones and they gave some away (like my cousin Brad's company sent a bouquet so they sent that bouquet home with his family). There was one all purple-and-white silk arrangement that looked like a normal spring spray, not funeral flowers, and they were in a purple glass vase, so I told Mom to claim it for me if they decided to give it away, and if not, oh well. I'm not big on flowers but I really liked the vase. Whatever.

It's such a stupid tradition, really, sending flowers to the grieving family. Clearly we don't need them if we;re trying to give them all away. Now if it would have been Grandpa it would have made sense because Grandma would have kept and appreciated all the plants. And when they tried to get other people to take plants and they're all, "Oh, no, I kill plants..." (That's the other reason I liked the arrangement I did, 'tis silk. I can keep silk alive, lol. I figure if I get it I'll put the arrangement over my window and use the vase for...something. My bamboo, maybe. It's in a borrowed jar currently.)

Anyway.

If I write more later it'll be an attempt to cut my list down. I'm going to work on chapter titles for SID now. No. I'm going to check on Maddy first and THEN work on chapter titles. (I'd go back but of course I have to stay with Maddy.)

Hehe. She's OUT. What a cutie. ^_^

Current Mood: blaaaah
Current Music: I'm Sensitive--Jewel (Pieces of You album)

That was a bumper sticker I saw the other day working drive-through. Seemed to fit.

I have a whole freaking list of things to journal about, if I get to 'em, I get to 'em, if not, oh well. Right now I'm going to run through the day-by-day account of what's happened since Wednesday night.

After work Wednesday, I went and saw Grandma, but the majority of my time was spent entertaining Gabriel to keep him out of everyone else's hair. (He'd my cousin's son. He's thirteen. 'Nuff said.) He'd been visiting Aunt Diane/Uncle Norman/Grandma/Grandpa for a few days.

The next morning, he got sent home early--they were saying Grandma had hit the final stretch and had maybe TWO WEEKS, so he didn't need to be around anymore. I drove him home, dropped him off at his dad's shop--my cousin Rodney runs a mechanic shop--on my way to school. (Homeschool their kids, they do, makes it nice, lol.)

At World Lit, I asked Becky if she was free, she was, and we conspired to get the Acting class to go to lunch. After class I had to run to Wal*Mart so she tagged along, and then we did whatever we could to kill time until Acting, and we did ask everyone to go. (We swung by the youth center where Paul and Cameron hang out, actually, but they weren't there.) We got our parts for the one-acts (actaully they'd been on blackboard, but I HATE blackboard, remind me to rant on that one of these days). (I'm playing Mrs. Hale in Trifles. I kind of wanted Mrs. Peters because that would've made me Tim's wife, teehee, but I play a better Mrs. Hale, granted. She's kind of a rule-breaker, lol.)

They read through Aria Da Capo, and then a bunch of us went to lunch at Fox's Pizza (yes, Kade, makes me think of you), a place where I'd not been. (It opened since the start of this semester.) Let me think, after everyone got there, going around the table, it was Paul, Becky, Kira and her boyfriend, Greg, his mom, Dr. Dilday, Mrs. Dilday, Anna's fiancé, Anna, me, Tim, and Cameron. (Yes. I sat by Tim. Quite deliberately. Though in retrospect I wish I'd sat across from him, would've made it easier to talk to him. Whatever.)

It was fun, I laughed a lot, just like I do in Acting class. There's a lot of stuff that I'm not going to bother mentioning simply because you had to be there. You'd have to know completely about all the plays we're doing and stuff. But I had a blast, let that be said.

Stupid Kira told me that she and her boyfriend would come if they didn't have to contribute because they were broke, and Becky kind of let it slide so they came along. Kira also told me that neither one of them had eaten in three days because they had so little money. Gah. Well, hon, that's what you get for moving in with your boyfriend when you're nineteen. Or twenty. Whatever. I don't want to be mean but I just don't have a lot of sympathy for that kind of thing. Finish school, get real jobs, and THEN get married and live together. (And for pity's sake don't ignore the "get married" part!)

So anyway, about quarter to four my cell phone starts ringing and it's Dad. Grandma died. Eish. Talk about guilt trip. Here I was, having myself a grand old time, and my grandma's freaking DYING.

But I didn't cry. I told Dad that I couldn't miss my remaining class (algebra) and I'd be home at the normal time. Then I called Mom and told her the same because I KNEW that Dad had misunderstood me. (The man is DEAF. Really.) I kind of mouthed to Becky what was going on, and she nodded, and we caught Anna's attention, so I got a hug from Anna. Anna's nothing if not caring. ^_^ And then the conversation moved on, which was fine with me.

The people there kind of trickled away after that, people had to go and stuff. When I left at 4:20 it was Anna, her fiancé, Becky (who had left and brought two of her kids back), Greg, and his mom. Greg, of course. (He was also the only one there before me. Hmmm. Gah.)

Survived algebra, asked Dr. Bendler about The Numbers. (All the Lost fans just perked up, methinks.) 'Twas kind of funny, there was only one other lady there in the room, and she was all, "I bet I know what show you watch!" Lol. So we were discussing Lost and Dr. Bendler was checking out the sequence.

His official verdict: He couldn't come up with anything on the spot, but he'd work on it and get back to me. Hehehe.

Got online, stayed until the library closed. Some people close down bars, I close down libraries. Hehe. Told Shelly and Kat specifically about Grandma and posted here.

Kade called me on my way home. I told her, and told her I felt like I should be more sad (more on that later), and she made me feel heaps better about THAT. She got me to laugh.

Got home, dumped my bookbag, went to Aunt Diane's (which is where Grandma and Grandpa have been staying since she'd gotten really bad). I got there and hugged Grandpa and when I asked how he was all he said was, "I'm all right. I miss my Grandma."

My stupid family. I swear, to hear them talk, it's more like they're planning a WEDDING than a FUNERAL. Nobody's upset. I mean, I knew I wasn't going to be upset, really, but I figured THEY would all be falling to pieces. (So is it good or bad that they're not?) The funeral is Monday, tomorrow.

Anyway. Friday, classes, work, yadda yadda yadda. I didn't tell anyone about Grandma, just talked even less than usual and asked Ken for Monday off, which was no big deal. (He had me scheduled for a ten-hour shift on Friday anyway. God, I hope Sandee's not the manager that day.) Found out that Jerry and Sherri and the kids and Jason and Alicia and the kids and Jennifer were coming. Whee. And Jerry and Sherri were just here last weekend for Easter, to see Grandma. But I hadn't seen Maddy and the boys since Christmas, so that's cool. (If I'm confusing anyone by randomly mentioning names in my family, tell me, I'll post a family tree or something, lol.)

Saturday I worked five to close (midnight). Sandee was the only manager, but she was really nice (for her, anyway). Erika (who's my age but half my height, lol) told me that her mom called and talked to Sandee ("You don't need to talk to my daughter like that," that kind of thing) and ever since then Sandee's been really nice to her. Hmm. Maybe she's trying to get out of being written up or something. Anyway. I slept in and accomplished nothing before work, lol. Jason and Alicia and Jennifer got here while I was at work.

On my way in I had country radio on (I was going to be making a phone call and so didn't want to waste my CD batteries for half a trip...not that that makes any sense to anyone but me, but whatever), and they played that new song, "You Didn't Even Know My Name," I think it's called. I don't know. It's about a baby who's born dead and it's something along the lines of "You loved me just the same, and you didn't even know my name." It's actually really catchy and perky for being about such sad stuff, I like the song. But I was thinking of Grandma and then I thought of my cousin Brenda's baby that was born dead (named Timothy, oddly enough--if he would have survived he'd be what they call a "special needs" child--handicapped. He literally had two left feet and stuff), and how Grandma is finally getting to see him, him and my brother that was killed. (Yes. 'Twas before I was born. I never knew him.) I finally broke down and cried a little, but it didn't last long. I spilled and had to pull over and clean it up and by the time I could pull back onto the road, the song was done and my tears were gone.

BIG SECRET: I got pulled over on my way home. I was fiddling with my CD player (the batteries were dying and I was trying to change them), and I went over the yellow line a few times. So he pulled me over to make sure I wasn't drunk, but no ticket. *GI-NORMOUS sigh of relief* (There was one time that there was freaking DEER in the road so I came to a dead halt and honked the horn before it got out of the way, I wonder if he saw that it was a deer? I didn't think of it until after he let me go.)

Anyway. When I got up this morning Jason, Alicia, Jennifer, and the kids were here. They had Madison's birthday party yesterday (her birthday was March 8, but they were trying to wait for us), but Maddy wanted to open the presents from US down here, so when I got up we did that. Then Alicia gave me the present from them (the Garfield movie! SQUEE!). The card is hilarious. It's shaped like a big half-oval, and it's kinda yellow. On the front it says, "Don't think of this as a mere birthday card!" Then you open it up and it says, "When filled with meat, cheese, and salsa, you've got yourself a paper taco!" *sniggle* (Obviously, with me working at Taco Bell, lol...)

Then the visitation. Gah. I spent my time in the foyer making sure none of the kids caused property damage and talking with my friend LynnDee, shaking hands, smiling and nodding. I think I knew about 10% of the people I saw today. Gah.

I WAS going to go into the actual room, but I got to the door and kind of glanced in, looked up front, and saw just enough to see the casket, didn't see Grandma in it. I pulled back, Uncle Norman asked if I was okay, I must have looked sick or something. I told him I was fine and went and sat on this bench in the foyer. Later LynnDee tried to get me to go into the other room and I flat-out refused.

NO ONE TOLD ME THE CASKET WAS GOING TO BE OPEN.

It's not that I'm squeamish about dead bodies. I've been to other funerals and seen other people's relatives. (I think I was at someone's visitation when I was all of five, I don't know who, and I think I touched the dead lady's hand, even, not knowing any better. I didn't know she was dead, lol. It's not a really clear memory, maybe someone stopped me, but I remember being fascinated by the woman who could sleep with all the other people around, and her weird bed, lol.) But anyway, that's DIFFERENT. This is OUR dead body.

I think maybe I'm scared that seeing her is going to make me freak out. Part of me is upset at myself for not being emotional, berating myself for continuing to have a good time with the Acting class five minutes after I got the call. Another part of me is screaming that no one can see me cry, that everyone else needs my shoulders to cry on and no one's going to let me cry on theirs because there isn't going to be a free one. (And it's like Kade said, "It's not like you're all, 'Hallelujah, the b**** is gone!' You're sad, but you're okay because she's in a better place and all that.") I tried to get a hug from Dad at the visitation but he was so freaking busy he didn't even notice. Gah.

So then we finally came home and got changed or whatever and headed to Aunt Diane's to eat. I ate before we went because I knew I wasn't going to like the food there, and once we got there I just couldn't take it. I still knew only about half the people, and no one was being--sad. Properly funeral-sad. (Which I know is weird coming from me because I'm all "There's no use crying over spilled milk, we knew it was coming," but I figured everyone ELSE would be all weepy.) I left after about twenty minutes, and it would have been half that if the twins weren't being so darn cute.

I played video games for a while, then finished the book I was reading (Richard Matheson's "Somewhere In Time," another book that was way better than an already-fantastic movie--if you look for it, "Bid Time Return" is the same book, they republished it with the movie title), then fell asleep. Alicia woke me up around nine and was all, "Aren't you going to come out?" Jerry and Sherri and the kids had showed up, lol.

So we've all been talking and then they all went to bed and I've been writing this pretty much ever since. It's 2:45 now.

The funeral's tomorrow. Whee. I got the day off work but I'm still going to school since I get out at eleven and I can be home by noon and the funeral's not 'til two. I need to sleep before school, lol, so I'm stopping now.

Wait. One last thing, while I'm on the subject, since the stuff on my list is all totally unrelated--I feel rotten about this, too. Supremely MERCENARY. Grandma promised, probably four years ago, to give me a set of plates when I moved out. (They're pretty. Orange, lol, that's why I liked them, it shocked me that she'd have a dish set that color.) And it has totally crossed my mind to wonder if I'll get them now. And I feel AWFUL for thinking of it. I mean, it's not like I've been waiting for her to die to get them or anything, but I just feel really heartless for thinking of it.

So there it is. Am I mean? Heartless? Rotten? I usually only cry when I'm angry, but you'd think THIS would be the exception, not the end of RotK, you know? Maybe Shelly's right, maybe I just don't grieve like other people. (She quoted "Finding Neverland" to me. I need to see that movie.) But still. I feel worse about not feeling bad about Grandma than I do about Grandma in the first place. Gah.

Current Mood: blank
Current Music: Carry On Dancing--Savage Garden

Don't feel like writing.

Grandma died today.

Will write about the day tonight, most likely. Won't feel like doing much else.

Does not having cried about it yet make me a horrible person? So far I haven't done a single thing differently because of it. Am I...I don't know, bad, somehow? Or really strong or what? *confused*

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Music: Giant Slug--Aaron G (DDR radio)

Before it becomes irrelevant: The Lost hiatus has been shortened! The next new ep, "Deus Ex Machina," a Locke ep, will air MARCH 30! YAY!

ELIJAH IS ON ELLEN TOMORROW! My mom's going to tape it for me! SQUEE! More on that after I watch it!

Grandma--I think I announced that they brought her home to die. Well, now she's down to one medication, something that keeps her calm (it's called Adavan, but I don't know what it's really for), and as long as she takes that ever so often, she's FINE. Getting better. Eating more. It really seems like she could rally and come back. But one of the home health nurses said not to get our hopes up, sometimes that just happens and people die anyway. So, me being the cynic I am, I'm not really trying to expect anything either way. Whatever happens, happens, not like there's anything I can do about it anyway.

I went to church Sunday. I was soooo not paying attention. I wrote the better part of a Charlie/Claire fic. I DID catch the pastor messing up. He was trying to say "miserable person" and said "piserable merson." ^_^

Current Mood: random
Current Music: library noise

I'm 19 today! Yay me! ^_^ More on that tomorrow after I open my presents, lol...

Sunday, fiveish--

Yeah. So I'm back. Yay.

Whatta weekend. My birthday's tomorrow, and people have been telling me Happy Birthday, but the only one who's done anything is Jennifer. (Which, to be fair, my parents still have tomorrow, but still...) Which, BTW, Jennifer--one of my sisters, the cool one, my fellow black sheep--was here this weekend. She came down on Saturday morning and left a few hours ago. But she took me out last night, we saw a movie and went shopping. We had...fun. Wow. That thing I don't seem to have a lot of anymore, not really. (I laugh a lot, but that's not quite the same.) She came to see Grandma.

The doctors have decided they've helped Grandma as much as they can, so "we" (her hubby and kids, really) have decided to bring her home to, basically, die. But she's been home almost a week and seems to be EXACTLY the same. No worse, which is good, but no better, either. I really wish she would get better or die. Really. Because the way she is now, she's not really Grandma. She's someone inhabiting a body that looks like a really deteriorated version of Grandma and she's out of it most of the time. I mean, if you get in her face and say hello, she can smile at you and say hello back, and she's usually aware of who is in the room, but she just sits there. Says nothing, does less. And we're all just kind of stuck counting a countdown that kind of keeps going up and down and never approaches zero, and we're not sure if we really want it to or not.

Okay. Enough depression...my weekend, from Friday on, in order...

Proof that being into Lost and LotR makes you smarter! I got a test back in World Civ, and my score (all told, after tallying up the questions she threw out and all) was an 87. Then she said she was going to add anywhere from 3 to 5 points to everyone's grade, so I am guaranteed an A. YA-HOOOO! I needed it in that class. So anyway, obviously if I had missed any more questions than I did, I would be in jeopardy, and I can directly relate some questions to mental connections made because of Lost and LotR. The Lost one--the Boer Wars, it's pronounced just like boar, so I imagined Locke (the boar-hunter) being the one fighting and then I remembered all the rest of the stuff. (That it was Dutch people in Africa fighting the natives.) So I got that question. Then the whole thing was WWI and Mrs. Richardson was talking about how horrible trench warfare was, and I totally remembered it all because the whole time she was talking I kept in mind the mental image of the Dead Marshes, which everyone says Tolkien based on his experiences in WWI. And now that I've studied the time period, I can easily see how he got that, the trenches really did flood and look like that, soldiers under water. So chalk up at least five points for being a Tolkien fan! ^_^

Then on my way to work Friday, I saw a car that had "Just Married" painted on the back, and there were three people in the car, the couple, and a woman in the backseat. At first I was kind of weirded out, wondering if the "three" of them had gotten "married," but then I passed the car and the woman in the back turned out to be way older, probably one of their mothers, and I was giggling, maybe the mother-in-law was so controlling that she was coming on the honeymoon. ^_^ Lol.

I got to thinking, when I get married, I want to paint up my own car, and on the driver and passenger side I'm going to paint "Faramir" and "Eowyn," and then below that, "I found him!" ^_^

Nico (the gayish guy, who I'm now starting to think really IS just very, very metrosexual...sooner or later I'm going to just ASK him, for pity's sake) hired a deaf girl at work. Her name is Misty. Apparently she reads lips, but Nico's asking everyone if they can sign. I can fingerspell...SLOWLY. I'm looking forward to practicing on her, lol, maybe getting faster. And I really admire her for getting a job and everything, overcoming her disability.

I fell down at work. The floor was wet and I tried to turn a corner and KABOOM! Yeah. So then the rest of the day, every time I would try to round the same corner, no matter how fast or slow I was going, Nico was all, "Slow down! There's a right turn there! Be careful!" It was funny. After about the fifth time, I was all, "I'm slowing down, don't worry!" ^_^ So anyway, when it happened, everyone was all, "Are you okay?" and I said, "Yeah, or at least I will be once I recover my dignity." My headset went flying, I had to redo my hair (I have to have it pulled back, it can't touch my collar). Yeah. That was fun. I was sore but I wasn't bleeding so I figured I was okay.

That morning when I'd left they were grading our dirt road again. I was irritated at that, because, yeah, the potholes were already reforming, but I was just thinking, "You know, the obvious solution is to PAVE the road instead of wasting all this time and effort..." And then on my way home I found out that they had, in fact, put down the pretty white gravel. ^_^ Uncle Norman knows a guy who works for the county road department and he says they're going to put down another layer and steamroll it, which A) stays in place pretty well, and B) is the foundation for a paved road. They're supposed to pave it sooner or later, they paved the road above us and supposedly when that gets finished they're going to start on our road. So we'll see.

Then, when I got home and changed, I discovered that I had, in fact, injured myself when I fell. I had gotten a cut in a very sensitive place that remained sore, but it never bled through my shirt so I didn't notice. (I'd tell you where, but that could get me arrested, lol. Let's just say if it had bled more, all the way through a certain undergarment, it's my shirt that would have suffered and I'll let you calculate for yourself.) Apparently when I fell I slammed into the cabinet, I attributed the soreness to the sheer force of my body falling, but no, there was a cut there. I showed Mom and what we did is used bandaids to tape a gauze pad over it (we didn't have the medical tape stuff), to keep the disinfectant goo on and to keep my clothes from rubbing me wrong.

Then we went to Aunt Diane's and I got on the computer for a moment and I sent an email to the whole acting class detailing what Becky and I were discussing about us going out. I said anyone could email me, then said if they didn't want to wait, they could call me and gave them my cell number. The upside to that is that Tim has my phone number. The downside is that Kira has it, too. The so-so side is that Greg has it. Hmm. This could get interesting.

Then Saturday morning Mom went to town and bought more gauze and some medical tape. I TOLD her what I would do with it if she did that, but she forgot that morning and bought it anyway. So next Tuesday, once school's back in, I am SO Charlie-izing my fingers!!! ^_^ When I found it out on the ledge (there's a window between our living room and kitchen, and we put stuff on it to move things from one to the other, she brings the groceries into the kitchen and then puts stuff on the ledge if it goes in the living room or bathroom) I just grinned at her evilly and she was all, "Oh, I forgot about THAT!" And I just smiled more. So HAHA. I rock.

So then Jennifer came around two. We visited, and then she went to see Grandma and I cleaned my room. Rodney and Debbie (my cousin) and their four kids were out, so I talked to them, rode the four-wheeler with Gabriel, then we had dinner and then me and Jennifer went out--in a display of being the only one who CARES that I'm having a birthday at all. I'm not holding my breath on having a party tomorrow, and I'm really p***ed off at my parents for not going to St. Louis this weekend, because A) I took a big risk by asking for a day off of work and B) we were here for BOTH Thanksgiving and Christmas, usually we're there for one, and Mom consoled me about that by assuring me we'd go to St. Louis for my birthday. I was so desperate to go to St. Louis I offered--no, BEGGED--to pay for the gas to go BY MYSELF. It's not like Grandma is any different for our being here, not a bit better or worse.

And you know, if they had told me that they were going to let me down, at least I could have taken off Friday night instead and gone to the concert with Shelly and the other LITs. I could have at least taken off Monday instead and not worked on my actual birthday. I could have done so many other things, but I was counting on my parents NOT TO LET ME DOWN and I took off Saturday. Shows how worthless they really are.

Anyway, as soon as we left the house, Jennifer and I were having fun. She listens to a lot of the same music as me and she's the only person besides Kat that I can have with me and still have the music at my preferred volume. We saw "Robots." (It was that or "Hitch" and she didn't want to see "Hitch," and unfortunately "The Ring Two" isn't out 'til NEXT Friday.) Let me tell you now: SEE IT. It was FREAKING HILARIOUS. (Hello, Robin Williams, 'nuff said!) And if you're really into Billy's singing you're in for a double laugh. NO, he's not in it, but there is one moment where you will THINK of him. Muchly. I was all, "That is so wrong!" but it was the good kind of "so wrong." ^_^ And I laughed a lot. (Even just in the opening scene...I never realized that so many mechanical jokes could be made in connection with the birth of a baby, lol...)

After the movie, we went shopping. Jennifer bought me a comic book and a Legolas bookmark at Hastings. We also went to Goody's and bought nothing, and then we went to Wal*Mart and I bought two--TWO!!--Elijah Wood movies!!!!! "The War" and "Ash Wednesday." (AW was in the $5.50 sale bin, and The War was also $5.50, but it wasn't in the bin.) I think I'm going to watch "The War" first (he's younger, and if the trailer is right, he's got a Southern accent on there! Lol!) and then AW and then "Deep Impact." *hides from Shelly and Hobbity for not having watched it already*

OFFICIAL ELIJAH TALLY:
Movies he's made: 33
Movies I have on video: 5
Movies I have on DVD: 10
Movies I have total: 15
Movies I've seen but don't own: 2
Movies I've seen total: 17

That's just over half, 16.5 is half. ^_^ And that total that he's made is counting the four that haven't been released yet, "The Yank," "Sin City," "Everything Is Illuminated," and "Happy Feet." If you don't count those four, I've seen almost 60% of his movies. ^_^

Aunt Diane's doing a fundaser for her church, they're selling Avon, so Mom bought me three things of body wash. Yay. They smell like (best to worst) vanilla, cucumber melon, and mango & passion fruit. The mango & passion fruit does not smell like I thought it would, and I don't like it. It's icky. So I'm using it first, lol.

We have a broken pipe. I put some laundry in the washer and discovered a puddle on the basement floor. Mom said it looked like the drain from my shower. Yay. Thrills. I'm not stressing, wouldn't be the first time Dad fixed 'em...after all, he built 'em. But yay. I'll probably get blamed for it, as I'm pretty much the only one who uses the shower. Dad doesn't understand the principle that "things wear out." He reads books about how the world is coming to and end because it just can't last much longer, but cannot understand that the reason that I have to replace my headphones every six months or so is not because I misuse them, but because I use them normally, and they're not built to last forever. Now, maybe if I spent $50 on them he would have a point, but when I spend $5, I dont' expect them to last forever. He's all, "Well, I've had this one pair for five years!" and won't hear it when I point out that my headphones would last five years, too, if I only used them once every six months. Gah.

Dad had a tick on him earlier today! NOOO! It's WAY TOO EARLY to have to worry about that! NOOOOO! I hate bugs, and now every time I think I feel something crawl on me I'll have to LOOK and make sure it's not a tick. Eww, eww, eww. Everyone knows what a tick is, right? A little parasitic bug that attaches itself and sucks your blood and can spread lyme disease. (You know. The word "politics" comes from the Greek "poly," meaning many, and "tics," meaning little bloodsucking creatures. ^_^)

Okay, done with my weekend in review, now for the randomness...I'm reading a novelization of "Dead Poet's Society." ^_^ The DLBE's should be happy. I really wanna see the movie now, I'll hold off on a review of hte book until I finish it.

When I was shopping for Maddy's birthday presents (I sent them back up with Jennifer), I found a book for the boys. They're going to be nine months old on the 20th. It's one of those board books, and it's called "Bite Me! I'm a book!" ^_^ The text (yes, the whole book) goes:
Red books, blue books,
I like to chew books!
Morning books, night books,
I like to bite books!
Books--not peaches!
Books--not peas!
Munchable, crunchable,
More books, please!
Haha. Not just because the whole text is kind of funny (I was cracking up in the store), but of course the word "crunchable" made me think of Gollum. "No, no birds...no crunchable birdses to eat..." Lol. And it was only a dollar...

So anyway. I'm going to shut up now, I have more on my list, but they're things that don't have to go in chronological order, so I'll have another long rant tomorrow morning! Yay me!

Current Mood: birthday!
Current Music: library noise

Sunday afternoon--

"Conservatives have a reputation for being humorless and unhip, but I want people to know that we're not that scary." --Julia Gorin, Fox News Channel pundit
Haha. I found that in a magazine last Sunday while I was at the hospital, waiting around to visit Grandma. I love it.

Weeeeellllllllll...I think it's been like, a WEEK since I seriously wrote anything besides comments. Gah. I've been busy. (Sadly I can't say I've been productive, really, but busy.)

You know what? I just realized that there's not really much profanity in this song, just G**d*** and one f***. Hmm. Go Eminem. *shrug*

Lessee...I made a list in my notebook of things to journal about. ^_^ First off: about that last long entry, like I said in the notice at the top of it, that was just the catharsis I needed. I've had my normal daily ups and downs, but I haven't hit low like that since, I've leveled off at fine/okay/all right. Sorry 'bout my hormonal rant.

Grandma...over the week she's bounced up and down, better and worse...gah. But everyone has pretty much realized that she's never going to get better *enough* to come home and live her old life. Bedridden in a nursing home, maybe. So the family got together today (meaning Dad and my three aunts and Grandpa) and they talked to Grandma and all, and they've pretty much decided to pull her off all her medicine, save painkillers if she needs them, and let her come home and live out her last days. *long deep sigh* It'll probably be Tuesday before she gets out of the hospital, and then it's just a matter of time. And her birthday and me and Maddy's are all coming up, too. Maddy's is Tuesday, mine is the next Monday, and Grandma's 84th is on the 27th.

I said I wanted this Saturday off of work so we could go up to St. Louis on Friday night and come home Sunday, but now that's all in jeopardy. AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRGHHHH! *bangs head against wall*

But now on to the good stuff!

Last TUESDAY I came to Acting II early (I'd been shopping with Mom, I dragged Becky out to meet her when she picekd me up, lol) and the only person in the room waaaaas...TIM! Squee! So I choked out conversation (why does he make me so nervous? Teehee), asked "How's it going?" and all, and he said he was auditioning for a solo. Of course, that confused me, so I asked what he meant--turns out he's in the Ozark Choral Society! That's this independent local choir, they have two big concerts every year, one for spring and one for Christmas. (I've known several different people who were in it at different times, including Karen, also from Acting class, and two of Dad's boss's children.) Anyway. So I was all, "I didn't even know you could sing!" And he said, "Yeah, most peolpe don't, I'm usually so quiet." Which is so true, lol, it's quite endearing... Anyway. We were having a real, decent conversation, and FREAKING KIRA walked in and RUINED the moment. Gah. She's so clueless. I cannot stand her anymore but she STILL talks to me. Her ONLY redeeming quality is that she bought me my Orli poster. Anyway, she was ranting on and on about some guy who was backig out and ALMOST hit her car, the kind of things that ALMOST happens ALL THE FREAKING TIME, that NORMAL people can just shrug off and go on and not even think about, but she was all kicking the door closed and going "That mother-f***er!" and just being a drama queen. It was disgusting and I probably would have made a restroom dash, but I didn't want to leave Tim subject to her wrath. And I wanted to write "she's being a BIT dramatic, don't you think?" on a piece of paper and slide it over to Tim and see if I could get him to crack up, but we weren't situated right, I couldn't. To quote Cody in the "Rhoda" skit from camp, "Stupid woman!!!" And the b**** KNOWS that I like Tim. Gah.

So anyway, on THURSDAY, as soon as Tim walked in, I was all, "So how did it go? Your audition?" And he smiled real big and said, "I got it!" And I had a fangirl moment worthy of Lij or Dom, "Really? That's SO GREAT!" ^_^ So I'm going to keep up with that, I've told him I'm coming to the concert--I will take off work for it if I have to, but I shouldn't have to--and maybe, hopefully, he'll get the clue.

Also on Thursday, we filmed our monologues. We're supposed to watch them up in McMullin Lecture Hall on the BIG screen on Tuesday. Gah. I didn't mind being FILMED at all, but I'm going to HATE watching myself on the HUGE screen. I would say I hope we can't have the hall (outside people wanting to use it get priority over classes wanting to use it), but I want to see everyone ELSE'S on the big screen, lol. Especially Tim's, prejudices aside, I really do think his monologue is one of the best. He plays this Catholic boy having a crisis of faith and he does it REALLY well. I think the only one that's better is Ken, who's doing a monologue from "King Lear," talking about how it's stupid that men blame the stars (astrology) for their mistakes.

"I wish that I was with anywhere, with anyone, making out..." Lol. The song I'm listening to now says that. *nort* "Screaming Infidelities" by Dashboard Confessional, thanks to Kade. I'm listening to a mix she burned me.

They've instituted a policy in the library--no more incoming or outgoing calls on cellphones. They don't care if you put it on silent and step out when it goes off, but not INSIDE the library. Yeah. Like I'm going to leave my email account open on a computer and my bag with my $109 calculator on the floor to answer my phone. Ha. They'e funny, really. So now my cellphoen is virtually useless, I can only be reached while I'm driving or at home for the evening or if I call out. Nobody can call me at all while I'm at school, whether I'm in a class or not. (I get turning off cell phones in class, but in the library??? NOBODY that I know has ever complained about it.) And I get "No, you can't call your significant other and have a mushy conversation," but I don't get "No, your mom cannot call you and tell you she's waiting in the parking lot for you." GAH! I hate stupid people.

We just read some poetry by Wordsworth for World Lit. And I just have to think--with the name Wordsworth, how could you be anything BUT a poet or writer? ^_^ I love that.

I've had good days all this week at work. I've done nothing but back drive and dishes and evil b****-monster Sandee hasn't really spoken to me since last Saturday. (Not yesterday. Saturday before.) YAY! Oh, and there's this system called "CHAMPS cards." Each letter of "champs" stands for something like cleanliness, attitude, speed, you get the idea. (I don't know what they all stand for.) Anyway. Any employee can fill one out for another employee, and at the end of the week they draw one and the winner is Champ of the Week and gets a $10 gift certificate. Nico informed me on Friday that he was giving me one for my positive attitude! ^_^ And then when they were counting them out last night I saw that I actually had THREE! Yay! I think this job is going better than Subway.

Speaking of that...I worked 'til 2 in the morning last night. Whee. At midnight (when I was scheduled to get off) they asked who wanted to stay, and they said it shouldn't be more than an hour more. Turned out to be two hours. But hey, it made up for the times I got sent home early because there were too many people working. And we're allowed free soda while we work, but we can't just fill a cup before we leave and take it with us, but Steve (the manager on duty at the time) said that me and Wesley (the other guy working) were allowed to do that, because there weren't many people that would stay until 2 AM and not complain. So YAY! Everyone thinks I have a great attitude! What I REALLY have is dollar signs in my eyes, but whatever works, lol. Ken said I should be able to get a raise as soon as my second paycheck, and I don't see why I shouldn't be getting one. ^_^ YAY! I don't LOVE my job, (like I said to Becky, it's not exactly like I want to go out and write a Broadway muscial abotu how wonderful my job is, lol) but I'm REALLY happy with how it's going. ^_^
, from ten to midnight, Robert was helping me with dishes. I kinda know him from school. I recognized him, anyway. He used to come to SubWay every day and we were making small talk about how I used to work there and school and all. Anyway. Turns out he's a PHYSICS major!!! Wants to work at NASA. How cool is THAT? ^_^ And he's way younger than I thought, he's nineteen, my age. I would have guessed, like, twenty-three or something. And it makes me feel smart working around him because he's only been there a week so I actually know more than him. Lol. So now I have two friends at work, Robert and Nico (the gay"ish" guy, still not sure about that...).

I had my midterm in college algebra. The good news is I only missed five questions. The bad news is that makes my grade 75%, because there were only 20 questions. Gah. And sadly I still feel like I did well.

I finished reading "The Bumblebee Flies Anyway," by Robert Cormier. The book was better than the movie for the most part (because as far as I'm concerned Elijah was in both, lol), but the movie ended so much better. But no one can bring Cormier's words to the screen, not really. Does anyone want the full dish on both, spoilers included? 'Cause I can ruin the ending of both if anyone wants to understand the differences, lol.

My black-and-silver pen from the insurance lady just died, lol. Don't you hate it when you get a pen that writes the way you like it to and it dies? Especially when it's not, like, a $10 pen so you feel stupid refilling it...and even if you DO refill it it's not the same point so it's not the same anyway... I may poke around and see if I have a cartridge like that in a c****y-looking pen, though. And while I'm on that, have you ever had a pen with a bad point that you just wanted to use up so you could throw it away? I have a few of those...it really does influence what you write, it's just like Anne of Green Gables. In the fourth book (Anne of Windy Poplars) she wrote letters to Gilbert every night at twilight, but she only wrote love letters if her pen wasn't scratchy. Lol. And sadly, I keep pens in three different spots in my roon 'cause I'm always writing stuff down. My desk, my TV chair, and my bed. And the all-time best pens (they even come in about eight different pretty colors--at least if you count black and blue) are the RSVP's by Pentel, medium tip. They're clear so you can see how much ink is in them, and they have a cushion, and the ball in the lid and the back tip are both the color of the ink. *nods wisely* And now back to our regularly scheduled journal entry...

I was going to talk about Lost parings and the imminent death, but since I have SIX WEEKS to think about it, and this is getting rather lengthy, I think I'll put that off. Let me post the schedule, though:
-April 13: "Deus Ex Machina" (Locke)
-April 20: "Do No Harm" (Jack)
-April 27: "The Greater Good" (Sayid)
After that, the 22nd episode is to be about Kate. I think there's 23 or 24 altogether. Shelyl confirmed it but I've forgotten which she said. That Sayid title is full of foreboding fo rme, because when do you talk about the greater good? When someone has to SACRIFICE something for it. Gah. (Unless, of course, he sacrifices SHANNON, lol...)

Shelly emailed me the screencap of Shannon's dead body (from Boone's vision quest) the other day. Lol. Like her subject line said, "Cracked ME up..."

Oh! One last thing. I sold my copy of PotC back to the store and bought the Lost Disc Edition. I just noticed that the skull that's on all the promos is wearing the red band adn baubles like Jack, lol...Anyway, review of stuff on the Lost Disc:
-"Becoming Captain Jack" Makes it worth the price to any Johnny Depp fan. He explains how he decided to play Jack as drunk and yet intelligent and how they came to the costume and all that. Highly amusing. It's put me on a Johnny Depp kick for the moment.
-"Becoming Barbossa" Intriguing. He was talking about the freaking apples, lol, that was kinda funny.
-"Thar She Blows!" Meh. Whatever. Interesting to see the ship out of its movie element but nothing to shout about.
-"The Monkey's Name Is Jack" I hate monkeys and I thought this was cute. basically it talks about training the monkeys. Geoffrey Rush's imitation of the monkey was hilarious!
-More "Fly On the Set" featurettes
-"The Dock" Funny stuff with Johnny, he's in costume minus his wig, lol.
-"The Tavern" ORLI! *drool* Shelly, we're screencapping from this when I see you, okay? Does Johnny wear that huge hat to disguise the fact that he's a bit shorter than the other people? Never noticed that before...
-"The Plank" A few Orli shots, too much Keira.
-"Pirates Around the World" They show two clips dubbed into different languages, and if you can sit through the Elizabeth-threatens-to-drop-the-coin-in-the-water clip, the Will-breaking-Jack-out-of-jail clip is HILARIOUS. (They cover French Canadian, Thai, Castilian, Russian, and Portuguese on the first clip, then Italian, Latin Spanish, German, French, and Japanese in the second. Orli in Japanese! Teehee! Though none of the voice actors had a voice half so sexy as his, not even the Italian one...)
-"Spirit of the Ride" Johnny's pretty cute on here, talking about how he loved the ride as a kid. Other people doing the same. Kind of interesting, not the best, but worth watching.
-"Dead Men Tell No Tales" The History of the Attraction This was on the original DVD, but you could only watch it in a computer DVD-ROM drive, which I don't have. So yay me! It was cool, seeing Walt Disney himself talking about it on Walt Disney Presents, and there were interviews with the designers and all. Pretty cool.
-"Sneak Attack Animatic" As interesting as any pre-viz/animatic on LotR...and it had THE WOODEN EYE! *norting fit*

Bottom line...don't spend your bottom dollar on it, but if you have a wad of cash rolling around, get it. Failing that, give it a rent, anyway. It's an amusing hour and ten minutes. And that reminds me, if I ever mention a movie I've seen/book I've read and you want to know more about it, don't hesitate to ask me to post a review, just let me know whether you want spoilers or not.

Now...I'm going to go write some stuff for Shelly. I have to look up something on TTT DVD first, though. Where, exactly does Aragorn lay his head on the ground? It's not when they think Merry and Pip are dead, it's when they first show the Three Hunters, right?...

Current Mood: mellow
Current Music: Lose Yourself--Eminem (personal mix CD)

PLEASE BE AWARE THAT THIS WAS WRITTEN SUNDAY NIGHT AT HOME AND NONE OF IT IS REALLY TRUE ANYMORE. Well, the stories are true, but the rest has faded. Apparently writing this was exactly the catharsis I needed. Hence the subject line. But since then, work's going great, school is all right, I feel fine again. So nobody call 911 on me, okay? I'll write more later about the good stuff. I'd do it now but D2D's a-waitin'! ^_^

I don't think I'm suicidal.

I do not in any way, shape, or form want my life to END. I just want it to go back to how it WAS.

I think it started changing near the end of last semester. I never turned in the last section of homework for Beginning Algebra. It's all gone downhill from there. I've forgotten one assignment, showed up I don't know how many times for World Lit STILL READING the assignment that we were supposed to have finished before that class period, had to write a paper in forty minutes and turn it in, and put off a monologue. (And even though Dr. Dilday was WAY sympathetic about that and all, I still can't help but think that as an ACTOR you're supposed to be able to leave your problems at the door, the show must go on and all that, and that if I was any good I could have done my monologue for him without him ever knowing that I'd been crying twenty minutes before.)

My job sucks. Or at least, it's full of paradoxes. The first day Nico told me not to worry, that I wouldn't be doing dishes forever, that the only people that kept doing dishes were the ones with no drive and ambition. Well, that first day I was thinking how much that SO wasn't me, but now that I've done some of the other jobs there, I WANT to do nothing but back drive and dishes--because I know I CAN do them. What is it that Mia says on the Princess Diaries movie? "All I want out of life is to stay invisible--and I'm GOOD at it." Something like that.

And I finally really met the b****-monster-from-h*** manager at work. I'm going to talk to Ken (the nice manager who's married to my friend Becky) about her, actually. Not about how she's not very nice, but about how she's sent me home early TWICE in the four days I've worked. Apparently she has to send people home sometimes because there's too many people there, but she always picks ME, and I don't WANT to go (though, granted, it is for purely monetary reasons), and when people find out I'm going they tell me how lucky I am and how they wish it was them. And for all the s*** I give about it, it COULD be them. I WANT it to f***ing be them.

And then--geez, every time she talks to me I hold my breath waiting for her to tell me I'm fired. I asked Nico, "Is Sandee ALWAYS like that, or does she just not like me?" and he was very reassuring. He was all about how she has that job because she has a very good mind for business, but that she has--and I quote--"zero interpersonal skills." ...There's this poster at work, in the break room (which I prefer to think of as the break cubicle, it couldn't be more than five by five feet), and it's about sexual harassment, and it blathers abuot how you have the right to not have a hostile work environment. So my question is this: WHY does it only apply to sexual hostility? Why can't managers be required, by law, to be nice? Nico also mentioned--before that, actually, he was talking about someone who had said something slightly rude--that they had just had a meeting, not too long before I started, about "please and thank you." But how can people expect their fellow workers to be nice if the MANAGER is not nice???

And there's Nico himself. I love it when he's around me because I laugh a lot, makes MY day go much better. He's just nice and nuts and tries to make things pleasant. (I don't have a crush on him, even though he's a redhead. I don't think he's a Christian. And I'm pretty sure he said he smokes, a fault I can tolerate only in Elijah, and only then because of my odds of actually ending up with him, lol.) But the thing is, I highly suspect that he's gay. I hesitate to say that, because I hate stereotyping people, but...it just kind of all adds up. (Trust me on this one.) But honestly, it wouldn't BOTHER me if he was. I don't APPROVE of the lifestyle, but I can't stop people from believing what they will, and it's not like he's trying to convert me to HIS way of thinking. It's his business. (And, after all, I could be wrong, and he could just be really, REALLY metrosexual.) But the thing is, if I get close to anyone at work, it's likely to be him, and I can just imagine what would happen if we DID get kind of buddy-buddy and then my parents found out he was gay. I would SO be dead. I would get yelled at for NOT--well, no, my parents wouldn't expect me to PREACH to him as in yelling and screaming at him, but they would want me to maintain my distance--and I don't WANT to. He's, like, my one ally at work.

Grandma's dying. I honestly have my doubts as to whether she'll make it to her birthday--March 27th. On Friday they took her to the psych ward at the hospital (Dad insists that that's not REALLY what it is, and even the hospital has named it the "behavioral health" wing, but all the names I heard for it were euphamisms for psych ward) because she was just going on and on, "Oh God what am I supposed to do I don't know what's going on I can't think oh my God--" That kind of thing. Running her hands through her hair. (And she was raised to think that "Oh my God" was one of the worst swear words. I heard her say "Oh, God," the other day and nearly died to hear it coming from her.) They only do psychiatric EVALUATIONS at our hospital, so she was supposed to be there two weeks, and then probably a nursing home after that. On Saturday evening I went there to see her--nearly died seeing her in PANTS, I think maybe ONCE before she had worn pants, and that was under a dress and only because it was so cold--but she seemed to be doing better, though she still wasn't eating nearly enough. Then this (Sunday) morning they called Dad asking what she wanted as far as being kept alive on machines. THAT was comforting. So anyway, long story short, now she's back in the normal hospital because she's got congestive heart failure. (I thought it was only heart "failure" if it actually killed you, but whatever.) They're trying to get the fluid off of her, but they've but her on major diuretics and they're not working as well as they should, they think she's built up a tolerance to the major one.

I just realized--today or yesterday, they've kind of blurred--that I haven't seriously DRAWN anything since before New Year's. No s***. The last thing I was working on was a D2D illustration, Mike doing the Moron Dance. (Wait, that's posted, right...? Yeah. Someone mentioned it in a review.) I told Shelly about it at New Year's and haven't picked up a pencil since. (I've doodled in margins, but that's not the same, my pen-and-ink-on-notebook-paper is never as good--except maybe in the case of my Claire/Charlie pic that I put up on DLBE.) Honestly, I don't think I've done anything creative except work on D2D since my laptop died. I have all these ideas--constantly--but I don't get to work on them except maybe five-ten minutes at a time. There's art class, but honestly, I feel so restrained there anymore, it's not much comfort. I was clinging to that, but now I'm ready to NOT have that anymore. I hope I finish my painting this week or next just so I have ONE LESS THING TO WORRY ABOUT. Gah. (Plus with my work hours, if I don't have art, I can get online after work on Mondays.)

I'm just not...happy, anymore. Not like I used to be. I mean--I enjoy myself when I'm doing certain things. If I'm online. If I'm collaborating with Shelly. If I'm on the phone with one of four certain people and they're not distracted, if they're actually talking to me. If I'm in acting class and Kira's not making me pay attention to her. If I am in the presence of Tim, if he's smiling at me and all that jazz.

But then, who am I kidding? I'm complaining about how I can't even draw anymore because I have no time, and I want a boyfriend to keep up with? God. I can't help but think that all I would do to a boyfriend now is whine to him, and thinking of how long a relationship would last if all someone did to me was whine about their sucky life--yeah. (Hello, how could their life suck anymore if *I* was in it? Obviously they don't appreciate me! Or at least that's how I reason.)

And then...my mood up there is angry, not sad. I think I feel sad, but I know it honestly has to be anger because all I feel like doing right now is crying. I only cry in anger. (That was one of those deep realizations I had about myself one day. I was ticked off at someone and was crying and figured that out.)

I wish to God I knew who I was so p***ed at. The doctors for not healing Grandma? Sandee, for making work so horrible the other day? Myself, for taking on so much?

And then I keep thinking about how little I really have--just school and a job. Zillions of other people do the same thing and they're not this upset. So that really makes me question my worth, wonder if I'm really capable of surviving in the real world. Part of me says that if I had the kind of job I WANTED, it would be better, and someday I won't have school and papers and all that, and I'll be fine. Another part of me says that things will never improve.

I can't live at home forever. I cannot deal with my parents much longer even now. So if I can't fend for myself, where does that leave me? Getting married and depending on my husband. And I can't do that. Sure, it's like...romantic. But you can't depend on another person, because you never know what's going through their minds. You never know that you'll definitely be together forever. I know all that. And besides the practical reasons why you CAN'T do that, I would be ashamed of myself if I did. (And besides that, my prospects of getting married are pretty slim. I can't even get a boyfriend.)

My point is, like I said, I'm not happy anymore. I have happy moments, but I used to be constantly happy. Now I have to be doing a certain thing or be in a certain place to be happy.

My mother would, if she read this, say that it's because I'm depending on those happenings, that I'm letting my circumstances dictate my mood, and that if I truly had God's joy then it wouldn't matter what was going on. I don't think that's true, not completely. I think that no matter how joyful you are, your circumstances can affect you.

But God. I want out of this funk. I've been blaming lack of sleep, but when you go to bed in the eleven (ha, I typoed that as "elven"--at least I still have my sense of humor) o'clock hour and wake up in the six o'clock hour without an alarm, I think it's safe to say that you have had enough sleep. (I do tend to wake up two hours early when I have to set my own alarm, but the last two days, I had trouble going BACK to sleep even after I'd reassured myself that I had not overslept and that my alarm was still on.)

My stomach hurts. I'm not sure if it's being overfull--that's what it was earlier, and it may not have faded yet--or if it's all this emotional stuff.

And I really have no purge to speak of, no way to induce a catharsis. (Ha. That's a word I picked up from Dr. Dilday's classes. I feel smart. Not really.) I don't know what I used to do, but apparently I'm not doing it anymore because I can tell that this has all built up.

That's another thing. I don't feel smart anymore. I used to think--no, KNOW--how intelligent I was. You don't score 30 on the ACT by being an idiot. Granted, I think that a lot of my math score was luck, but I KNOW that the English/reading/social studies stuff was all by my own merit. But lately every time I turn around I do something that makes me feel like a complete idiot. The one thing that made me stand out in a crowd is slipping away. I have a funny feeling that if I took the ACT again I'd score much lower. My intelligence is a major part of who I am, I've always been a brainiac, and now to see my cumulative GPA slide away from a 4.0--even though it's only down to a 3.8!--is just earth-shattering for me. If I'm not smart, how am I going to get/stay ahead?

Okay. I have a paper to write now. It's due tomorrow, I'm unhappy with my research, but I can't do anything about it. I'm dreading the grade. I will probably get a B but that is not good enough for me.

I would love nothing more than to just stay home tomorrow. No work, no class. Just wake up when I feel like, pull some clothes on, and get online long enough to update D2D and check my two boards. Clean my room, maybe. It looks like s***, but I've been so busy I haven't been able to keep THAT up, either.

All right. I could go on for days but nobody would read it. Warning: Any and all comments that are mean-spirited or unsympathetic will be deleted. I know I sound whiny, but if it isn't crystal-clear to you that I have enough s*** going on my life right now, then I don't really care what you think. Good night.

Aside to Shelly: do you see now why I make D2D a priority? It's one of the few ever-pleasant things I have left.

SEE NOTE AT TOP BEFORE COMMENTING, PLEASE.

Current Mood: enraged
Current Music: The Steward of Gondor--Billy Boyd (on repeat!)

RANT ONE:

Oooh. I'm irritated. Hobbity just informed me that the Grey Panthers have reopened. What the frick is up with that???

Okay. Long story coming:

I was a member of an LotR-humor board called Elijah's Grey Panthers. (GP's, the GP, whatever. You get the idea.) All was happy and sunny there, jokes abounded, great source for new Lij pictures. It was a good thing.

And then sometime in, like...October, I think...yes. The last days of September, I think it may've been the 30th or 29th, the admins there declared that with 400+ members, the board had lost its close-knit family feeling like it had had originally, so they were scaling back--membership was no longer open and they were cutting back to their original dozen or so members. That was a sad day.

I applied to be let back in, kept checking back to see if they'd heard my plea. One day I found an ezinbox message from HobbityShoeSupply (aka Waffles/Waffley/Hobbity/HSS/she of many names) that basically said she wanted to keep in contact with some of the other "rejects." I ezinboxed her back and was all "OH! YAY! Human contact!" Lol. I reminded her that somewhere on one of the Official GP Messages, we were given permission to go start a new board for ourselves, and making my long story not quite so long, DLBE was born. On October 5th, we co-founded DomLijBilEans: Lord of the Onion Rings, our own spinoff board. It was basically the same board with open membership and only about five members. (We started with, like, five, and have grown to thirteen.)

It's been great! After about a month I didn't even miss GP anymore because we did just as much on our own. I dearly love the DLBE board.

And then today Hobbity emails me and tells me that GP has opened up free membership again.

That leaves us in a quandary--do we leave DLBE open? Do we let people go to both? Do we inquire about maybe moving our threads to the GP board? I mean, when you start something to counteract being thrown out, and then you're let back in...gah.

And we have our own in-jokes at DLBE that the GP crowd won't get. (I ate Waffles!) It's just--I'm very frustrated and confused and I have my email open in another window, debating what to tell Hobbity. Gah. And here back in October I would have rejoiced at this news.

So anyway. I just emailed Hobbity and told her that closing DLBE is NOT an option as far as I'm concerned. But what to do? It's not so much a matter of us being in any kind of danger or whatever, but it's just a matter of ettiquette as anything else.

RANT TWO (mostly copied from one of my posts on the plaza):

You know what irritates me? People who talk/act like they're huge fans (of Lij or Orli or whoever) and then DON'T HAVE THEIR FACTS STRAIGHT. I was talking to a girl at church yesterday and we were all happy because Orli broke up with Kate Bosworth, but then she insisted that the two of them had been engaged (which they never were, that was just a rumor that went around). And she was wearing an "I Love Orlando" ring. That just annoyed the heck out of me.

Now, see, I either look things up for myself or ask for a confirmation, or I pass it on as "I HEARD this, I don't know if it's right." If it's not one of my main guys (like, say, if it's about Viggo or Sean Bean) I'll admit that the bigger fan is more likely to know than I am. It's why I don't like to hang around my acquaintance Kira so much anymore, she talks like she's a huge fan of Orli's but then doesn't know simple things. (She has a pic of Orli where he had some temporary tattoos on, and she insists that they're real and that he covers them with makeup at all his public appearances. Shelly--you know the pic I mean, the B&W one with the skeleton tattoos.)

A true fan gets the story straight, and anyone who won't go to that much effort is just a casual fan--and there's NOTHING WRONG WITH THAT. I admit I don't care as much about, say, Karl Urban as I do my precious Lij, even though I think he's really cute--but I don't try to act like I know all that much about Karl. Bascially, I feel *I* have the right to wear a "Mrs. Wood" t-shirt (if I could find one, anyway) because I know stuff about Elijah. (I've seen almost half the movies he's made and I'm tracking down the rest, I know what the rest are, I know where he was born, I know what films he's currently working on, so on and so forth...) I also feel that wearing something that said "I love Karl Urban" would make me a poser, because yeah, I DO think he's cute, but I don't care enough about him to research him. Not exactly adoration, now is it?

And it applies to people who pose as LotR fans (instead of an actor's fan). Like, say, Kade--she LIKES the LotR movies and she'll talk about them, but she ADMITS that she's not the hugest fan and doesn't try to act like she knows all about it. THAT is a good fan. I hate it when people who know what she knows about LotR try to act like they're loving adorers of all things Tolkien. ("Spell Silmarillion, b****!" Lol.) (Not that Kate hates Tolkien, mind you, she's tried reading the books and hopefull she'll finish them someday, but it's not #1 on her priority list--and that's cool with me.)

Anyway. Enough ranting.

I saw Grandma yesterday, we came over while Aunt Diane and Uncle Norman went to church, ended up bringing our dinner over and eating there. She's doing about the same as last time. (But that's better than a turn for the worse!) Apparently the seizures were what was causing the dry heaves that were plaguing her all the time. They've told her that they won't take her to the hospital anymore because the hospital doesn't know what to do with her, that if they take her anywhere it'll be a nursing home. I know it sounds really cruel, but at the same time, I really think it's making her fight to get better. (And of course if she was suddenly taken up with symptoms we WOULD take her to the hospital, we're not torturers or anything.)

I went to Carissa's for the weekend. (She's the one who picks me up for church.) On Saturday she called and asked if I wanted to come over, since she was having a birthday party and she said I could just stay overnight and they'd take me to church in the morning per usual. And I had nothing to do, and I was gonna get cake, so I went. (You have to understand. Me and Carissa are not close. But I'm nice to her because she drives me to church, and she's nice to everyone because she's sugary. I'd call her a friend. But not a GOOD friend.)

It was all right. It was mostly her family and all, the only people I knew were her and her parents and boyfriend. (Lucky girl. But I'll get to that in a minute.) Not what I'd call a party in the strictest sense (in the strictest sense I've only had like four birthday parties in my life, lol), but not a bad time.

Most of the family left around ten or so, and me and Carissa and Justin watched a movie (She's All That, I'd seen it), and then just talked for, like, forever. He didn't leave until 2 AM. (Which was okay because I was with them the whole time and they were totally kosher.) They don't even kiss. They're THAT kind of couple, which is irritating, sort of. I don't go in for that whole 'courtship' movement.

But anyway. I don't know what it is with Justin, but it's really hard for me to be around him. Not that I can't stand him. I don't have a crush on him, but I keep accidentally saying things and I'm paranoid he or Carissa will misinterpret them as me having a crush on him. I totally don't. I mean, he's cute, but he wants to be a youth pastor and I SO swore that off. I'm not being my mother or putting up with what she puts up with. Not happening.

But I AM jealous of Carissa. Not because of Justin, I don't want Justin. (He's cute enough, but the youth-pastor thing killed any possibilities of me even remotely liking him that way.) I'm jealous because she has a BOYFRIEND. They're so cute together! But it drives me nuts to see him hugging on her because THAT'S what I want--a boy that'll let me hug him and be in love with him and all that jazz. (Yes. I know I'm in love with the idea of being in love. I don't care.) Gah. Anyway.

Happy Single Awareness Day. I'll talk more about that tomorrow when I find out if I'm still Valentine-less or not.

Current Mood: irate
Current Music: What I Like About You--Lillix (13 Going On 30 soundtrack!!!)

Let me start out with Grandma, before I forget again like I have all this week. She came back from Little Rock on...Friday night, I think. We visited her and the drugs were still kind of affecting her, but she'd perked up by the time we left. They took her off all her meds and started a new one--SEIZURE medicine. In LR they decided that she was having small seizures and that's why she was having all the problems. As of last night she seems to be doing much better.

HOWEVER, all these problems have turned my cynical--I'm waiting for her to take a turn for the worse. That's a rotten attitude for me to have, I know, but I can't help it. She's gotten "better" before, you know?

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, World Civ II. Ms. Richardson rocks. She's just...entertaining, lol. Like one day she was talking about the main crops of the new continent (AKA the US), and she was writing them on the board. She wrote "corn," and then said, "And the other one was potatoes!" So she writes "Pot." on the board, then pauses, and says, "No, I better not leave that like that..." and writes out the rest of the word.

At noon I'm going up for the Christmas in China presentation. The BCM organizes a yearly mission trip to China, and Jon (the BCM leader) and they're speaking on the experience today. I know Jon'll talk, and Busby. (I'm trying not to give first and last names on here so nobody I talk about can get stalked, and it's his last name that sticks in my mind. I know a few other people with his first name.) OOH! Hobbity posted a link to a British slang dictionary! LOOKY! Now I know what a ponce is!!!

Speaking of which, LOST IS ON TONIGHT AND IT'S CHARLIE'S NEW EPPY! (Hence the mood!) Anyway. Gotta jet.

Current Mood: chipper
Current Music: Half Fling--Elijah Wood and Dominic Monaghan (foochie Dom!)

See my music there? THANKS, MERIAGRIN! That's the song from which Dom got the quote for his tattoo! Does it--yes, I'm looking at the lyrics--it says "Nothing to get hungabout." Is that a British thing? Still, I'm hearing that and cracking up a bit at the irony there. Hung. Charlie. Hung. Lol...

Found out Kat has a cellphone and text messaging. Lol. That's going to get interesting. (Wait, there comes another one...)

Grandma--they think that maybe back when she had temporal arteritis (inflammation of the arteries, I think), that it may have caused nerve damage and that's what's making her almost constantly nautious. They're testing that today.

Talked to Tim's cousin, she didnt have much info for me, but she's on my side, said she'd keep her eyes open and help how she could without letting him know what she was doing. ^_-

OH! Guess what! (I shouldn't be happy about this, technically, but I am!) ORLANDO BLOOM BROKE UP WITH KATE BOSWORTH! He's FREE! That rocks. (And would you believe he's only #3 on my list?)

See, it's true!

Anyway. Yeah. That's about all.

Current Mood: calm
Current Music: Strawberry Fields Forever--The Beatles

Why is there no "mood" icon for the mood where you feel like lecturing? ^_^

Okay. I'm putting this as a new entry instead of a reply to a comment because I want everyone to read it.

Kade, I'm not trying to yell at you, this is just my defense. Don't complain about my liking Avril Lavigne. Yes, you've taught me plenty. You've taught me that hating something that's trendy JUST because it's trendy is just as bad as LIKING it just because it's trendy. So I like Avril Lavigne, it has nothing to do with where she is on the charts (I don't know or care where that is, actually), it's because I like her lyrical content and her melodies/beats/whatever you want to call it since I'm not really musically gifted. And may I point out that the first time I HEARD of her was when YOU quoted "Sk8er Boi" to me? And if it helps any, I finally heard Pink Floyd's "Another Brick in the Wall" (part one, I think, but I'm not sure) and I love that song, too. (As a matter of fact they're on the same CD.)

Oh, and BTW, HI KAT!!! At least I'm assuming that's you, lol.

Yesh. My family is stupid. The ONLY people on Dad's side of the family that I like are my immediate family. (We're the smart branch, at least he passed the smarts he stole from his sisters on to us, lol.) Our branch is the black sheep branch, and me and Jennifer are even more particularly black, lol. (Maybe I should say we're the gray branch and me and Jennifer are actually black? Lol.)

One of my acting classmates, Greg, said that his part of the family are the WHITE sheep of their family, lol. That cracked me up. (Especially seeing as he's kind of weird himself. Cool, though, and a Ringer!)

I bought this week's TV Guide because it was about Lost, and I bought the Charlie cover, of course. Go me! I also found some shirts that were $5 on clearance and I got three. Yay! Two sweaters and a funny shirt, though I'm not saying what it says right now, because I want to hear Shelly laugh insanely when I tell her. I'll post it later.

And while I'm thinking of Shelly, I had to get a new notebook today, so I got one with smiley faces on the cover. (Anyone who's closely followed D2D should pick up on why smiley faces ALWAYS make us giggle...)

In acting class today we had free time and were told to work on our monologues, so a few of us sat and read them to each other. That was great. Got to see Tim read through his. ^_^ Gah. Why can I not just drop some kind of freaking HINT to the boy?

They're doing this thing at school called Candygrams, basically you order one, then the recipient is asked to go pick it up. You leave a note on it for them. (I assume it's chocolate. They're doing it for Valentine's Day.) I'm thinking of sending one to Tim and signing it "Secret Admirer." So here's my question...if he gets all worked up about a Secret Admirer, and then finds out it's me, will he be disappointed? Gah. And the friend-of-mine-who-turned-out-to-be-his-cousin hasn't been around since I found out!!! So she's not much help at the moment. Gaaaaah.

Current Mood: productive
Current Music: High of 75--Relient K (again, yes)

Saturday night--

This feels like Sunday night for some reason, even though I know perfectly well that tomorrow morning is Sunday morning.

My dad is playing the piano, because he's playing somewhere tomorrow and therefore needs to practice. Please. It sounds perfect now, it'll sound perfect tomorrow. In the meantime, it's driving me nuts, because I was going to watch "The Cooler" and I can't, because no matter where in this blessed house you go you can hear every danged note. So I've got my headphones on a bit on the loud side, listening to Avril Lavigne. (Things I'll Never Say, My Happy Ending, Nobody's Fool, and Anything But Ordinary. On repeat.)

I tried to make myself tea. It's cooling now. I sat around waiting for the kettle to whistle, and my mom pointed out that it does not, in fact, have to come to full boil and whistle. It just has to get hot. And so I poured some out in my cup, put sugar and a teabag in it, let it steep, and it's STILL cooling. And people ask me if I like to cook, lol.

I'm trying to figure out "Things I'll Never Say." Is EVERYTHING in the song things she'd never say, or just the chorus? And then is it things she's honestly thinking but would never admit to, or things she thinks are stupid to say or think at all? "I'm a little bit nervous, trying to be so perfect, because I know you're worth it..." "I want to see you go down on me, marry me today, yes, I'm wishing my life away..." It all makes sense. I relate to it in the sense of thinking but refusing to say.

I can't relate to "My Happy Ending" but I adore it anyway. No clue why, other than I like Avril's outlook on life in general.

Grandma went to the big hospital down in Little Rock on Friday night. (Was that just yesterday? Youch.) There's such a long story there. THe local hospital was going to release her and so Dad called to complain since Aunt Diane (Gma's primary caregiver at this point) apparently has no backbone. He got the doctor to agree to sign an order for Gma to go to the big hospital so that Medicare would pay for it. But then the nurse came in and said Gma didn't need it, whatever, and started releasing her. She said that if Gma felt bad again later they could bring her back to the emergency room and THEN go to the big hospital. Dad complained more, but got nowhere. So they decided to just take her to the big hospital anyway. Okay. Then Uncle Norman (Aunt Diane's husband, who apparently has all the intellignece God gave to a fruit bat) decided to stop back by the house on the way to the hospital to have a family conference. Whatever. That just made the trip AT LEAST thirty minutes longer, plus whatever time they sat here.

I went over there while they were stopped, to help pack the car and stuff. They left Grandma sitting in the garage (to be fair, Uncle Norman has an office in there and it was quicker to let her sit in there with the space heater on than to take her through the rain/sleet to the house). I sat in there for a few minutes and she was moaning and whimpering and saying stuff like "Oh please..." and "Hurry..." and I'm always going to wonder whether she meant death or my relatives.

So they finally get packed up and everyone's loaded, Grandma, Grandpa, Aunt Diane and Aunt Betty in one car, and then Uncle Norman in his car in case anyone needs to come home. I s*** you not, they spent TEN FREAKING MINUTES in the garage wroking out where in Little Rock the hospital is. HELLO. There are at LEAST three cellphones between the two vehicles. Grandma is suffering. LEAVE and then figure it out on the PHONE. THAT is why you have the danged things in the first place!!! Really. I wanted to shoot the lot of them and drive her myself. We probably would have been there a lot sooner, too! I could have talked my way out of any ticket in THAT situation--nobody messes with my grandma.
My dad is the oldest, and then he has three younger sisters. I think when he was born, he sucked every ounce of possible intelligence out of Grandma and Grandpa, and didn't leave any at all for his sisters. Then they all married men of equal intelligence to themselves.

Anyway. The latest on Grandma is that now they STILL have no idea what to do for her, so they've got her on morphine. Apparently that's making her all happy and cheerful and chipper, like her old self, but of course that's not naturally her. Stupid people.

Oh, WHOOO-HOOOO! I don't hear the piano any more! I'm going to stop for the moment and come back later.

An afterthoguht, on looking at certain pics--

Oh. Something me and Shelly figured out: A guy that's gotten high is, sickly enough, a turnon. Between Elijah being all giggly on "The Faculty" (for the record he was not just randomly getting high, it was a major plot point, because drugs killed the aliens and they had to know who they could trust) and Charlie spacing out on Lost (there were some spoiler pics for the next ep and he was in a suit and looked kinda spazzed)...yeah. Not the idea that they're ruining their mind/health/life, but the way they act...it's hilarious, cute, and slightly sexy. Gah.

Yeah. Going back to the aforementioned pics now.

Sunday morning--

Oh yeah! I forgot to mention that I FINALLY (after having the tape lying around for over a week) got to watch "Blue Crush." Didn't really love it or hate it--it made me think muchly of "Our Lips Are Sealed" with the Olson twins, more than anything. (Pretty people in skimpy clothes hanging out on a beach, your main blonde girl trying to win a surfing contest...yeah, really not all that much plot. There was this thing, she was scared to do the maor waves because she'd almost drowned, but my idea of that being a plot point would be if it turned out that that was a result of someone had been trying to murder her or something.) There was one funny moment when the girls, who are all maids at a big hotel, are cleaning the room of this, like, supermodel, and they try on her clothes. And Billabong is a fun word to say.

But anyway, I think it's safe to say that we know why Orli likes Kate Bosworth. Gah. So Shelly, take comfort in the fact that sooner or later he's going to wake up one morning, say he's been reading this great book, and she's going to be all, "Book? You waste your time with those things? Come on back to bed," and he's going to realize that they have nothing to talk about, they just...yeah. This may not bother him at first, but then a few months later, he'll get bothered and break up with her. ^_-

We bought "I, Robot" on pay-per-view last night! It was fantastic. The effects were just stupendous, IMHO, I'm still trying to figure out how they got the robots looking so lifelike. And Will Smith, no matter how serious his role is, somehow makes it amusing, lol. (Though this was nothing like Men In Black.) His car was so cool, I want a car like his car in that movie. (He's driving along and he presses a button and a steering wheel pops out. His passenger's all, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" "Driving..." "BY HAND?!!?") Lol. So see that one. Definitely.

I'm beginning to think that I only dream when I've had the proper amounts of sleep, because I had a dream this morning for hte first time in...weeks. Months. The last dream I *remember* having was in St. Louis, back when the boys were born. (My twin nephews, I mean.) That was a good dream, Billy and Elijah were in it. But now, wait, I've had dreams at camp, so that can't be right...oh, whatever. I don't care that much. ANYWAY, in my dream this morning--well, a lot of stuff happened and it was long and weird and stupid and somehow my evil World Civ teacher sneaked his way in there, so there's a lot of it that I don't WANT to remember. But the one thing that WILL go into my dream journal (yes, I write down the good ones) is that *I got a kiss from Tim!* I'm trying to remember what was going on--I want to say it was half on a dare (we were in the Acting classroom and everyone was there, so no doubt he was being goaded by Paul and Cameron and maybe even Karen), but he didn't seem all too upset about it, either. He smiled at me. And granted, it WAS just a quick little peck, but it was on the lips, so that counts, right?

Yeah. Anyway. I have no life AND I have stalker tendencies. Go me!

Dad's practicing again. WHY, oh WHY, can't he practice on his keyboard, where he can plug in HEADPHONES??? Does anybody have a cinderblock I can bang my head against?

But anyway. Back to Tim for a moment. Watched "Monty Python and the Holy Grail," and "Tim the Enchanter" meant something entirely different to me, lol. Yes. He is.

Mom said that "they" called from Little Rock this morning and Grandma's "not doing well again." H*** if I know what that means.

I've noticed something about math people. (Ie, both of my algebra professors.) If anyone has any further evidence of this, let me know. It seems that people that are good with math like to get up early and go to sleep early. Now, maybe this has more to do with the fact that both my professors are 60+ men, but still. Dr. Dilday qualifies for that and he's not one to rise early. Anyway, random thoguht. Moving on.

Hobbity mentioned a new shipping name. People who think Charlie and Claire from Lost should get together are PB&J's. Besides the obvious connection to peanut butter, lol, it stands for Pregnant Broad & Junkie. *nort* How hilarious is that? I love it!

Sunday night--

Pretty much all packed for school tomorrow, except for the CD I'm listening to and stuff. On to write Shelly's chapter! ^_^

I saw "The Cooler," finally. Other than the icky sex scenes (did anyone *want* to think about William H. Macy naked? Yeah, didn't think so!) it was great. Had a lot more plot twists than I was expecting. Beautifully done, came SO close to ending wrong but didn't. (I love that kind of thing, when you think a main character has died and they come back, a lot of my favorite books/movies do that.) The ending was just whoo, extreme high, extreme low, extreme high...a very roller-coaster ending. ^_^ So if you see that, be ready to fast-foward a few times. I do really admire William H. Macy's acting, though. That was one of the main reasons I wanted to see it. He just comes across so realistically. You buy into his characters. (Wow, can you TELL I've been in acting classes? Gah.)

Anyway. I need to go write the chapter. Buenos noches.

Current Mood: blah
Current Music: Avril Lavigne, Relient K, and other stuff...

I should clarify. If I mention anything/anyone, and you're all, "What the heck is she talking about?" just leave a comment, I'll go into more detail in a future post. ^_-

Lol, I have LJ friends now. Go me! In poking around, I found this on gamgeefest's lj:

How many Lost characters does it take to change a lightbulb?
http://www.sf-fandom.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=229988

Can anyone give me a crash course in the proper HTML so that I can like, fix it where the title IS the link?

I adore Lost. Stupid ABC, two weeks of reruns before my precious Charlie is on again...

You know what? Right after I posted that I called Mom to tell her I was on the way to the hospital and she was going on and on about how much better Grandma was! YAY! When I got there she DID look much better, she'd gotten her color back--she didn't look ashen and sick like she had the night before. But they've taken her off the different medicines and stuff, so I don't know if that's a good or bad sign. (They may be just letting her live out her life without the harsh side effects, you know?)

It's so confusing. I'm taking that moment by moment, there's no anticipating anything on that front.

I stayed there for like an hour and a half last night, didn't get home until ten. (And yes, Shelly, that's why you have no chapter. I did homework and the review responses for D2D and crashed. Which reminds me, I need to post at FFN.) There were other people there when I got there, people I hadn't seen in forever. The dad and stepmother of the girl who was my best friend when I was five and six, before I met Kat. I hadn't seen them in a LONG time, they commented on how grown-up I was. That was cool.

After they left, their dad was still there. I stood at the side of the bed and held Grandma's hand for a long time, while Grandpa talked to him. Grandma seemed kind of out of it, she asked me three times if I'd worked or just gotten off work and stuff. And danged if I didn't remind myself of the Frodo/Bilbo wagon scene from RotK, except we weren't going anywhere.

But then he left and my brother/sister/niece called and Grandma talked to them and really perked up. Then Tammy, one of my cousins, came with her two little ones, that made Grandma really happy.

Her younger one, Andrea, is allergic to eggs. She was sniffling and her face was really red, and all she'd done was eat a cupcake, which had egg in it, of course. Poor thing. My cousin Debbie's third has the same thing. Poor kids.

Anyway. Grandma was looking really well by the time I left.

I feel sorry for my friend Becky. (She was in Comp II with me my second semester at college, World Lit I with me last semester, and now we have World Lit II and Acting II together.) Today we all had to hunt down stuff in the library for Acting II, long story, don't want to get into it. Well, me and Megan and Tim (who will be mentioned muchly in here, methinks) walked back to the classroom together, and Becky, the only person in the room, had her head laid down on her desk. I tried to crack a joke, thinking she was frustrated at not being able to find what she needed, but she looked up at me and she was crying. Turned out she had just been on the phone arranging for their family cat to be put to sleep. (She's a older than me, 35-ish, married with kids.) Apparently it had eaten some thread, which got wrapped around its intestines and lacerated them pretty bad, and there was no saving it. She was really upset about how she was going to tell her kids, since they won't even be able to see the poor kitty before the deed is done. The young one is only five, too, I feel sorry for him. The girls are teenager so they'll get that they couldn't let the cat suffer and all, but five...wow. That's rough.

I made a 92 on my World Civ test--ten points more than I thought! According to Ms. Richardson that was the highest grade in the class. (I didn't think I had missed that many, but then that just shows that my math is faulty at best...plus she scores complicatedly!)

OOH! Kat'll wanna know this--I BOUGHT A DDR PAD YESTERDAY! I rock. Now all I need is a PS2 and a memory card and I'm good to go, for a while anyway...

I ordered the book of "The Bumblebee Flies Anyway." Should be here in about two weeks. I bought the book of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory! YES! I love used bookstores!

Anyway. I've rambled quite long enough, I can think of nothing else to say, I have to leave in about half an hour. (For algrebra. Shout for joy.) I think I shall leave early enough to grab a cookie on my way by my work. That's the perk of working at SubWay--I get free food each day I work, and since I work every day that pretty much means I can eat whatever I want, whenever I want. (The irony is that if I want soda from the fountain they take $2.50 out of my check each week. But yeah, I signed up for that!) Anyway. More later.

Current Mood: pensive
Current Music: My Happy Ending--Avril Lavigne

I've been meaning to make this for a long time. For the record, except for this post, I'll likely type my entries at home, save them in notepad, and post them the next day.

And I will customize it someday when I have time to kill. Today is not that day.

One thing...I know some of my friends are okay with "swearing" (that's a rant in and of itself, lol, I'll save that for some other day) and others are not. I don't do it all that often, just when I get really teed off, and I don't want anyone to NOT read this because of that, so I will censor myself to the extent of putting just the first letter and stars instead of questionable words. I think it's a reasonable compromise, it's not like I'm "f-ing" this or that, it's usually just "d*** it" or s*** or whatever.

I think what's finally driving me to this is that the Dear Abby thread on DLBE only does me so much good. That and I get tired of telling three or four different people the exact same thing. If I post everything here maybe I'll save myself some work.

My grandma's in the hospital--AGAIN. She's been in and out for, like, two years, ever since she had that major heart surgery. (It was right before the family reunion, though, so maybe that was just last summer? No. Wait. A year-and-a-half-ish, I think. I forget.) The thing is, Dad said that the doctors are saying she probably won't make it out this time, that it's just a matter of time.

I'm not really upset about that. I'm old enough to deal with this, I think if this had happened back when I was ten or thirteen or whatever, it really would have rocked my world, but now I understand that she's old and she's sick and she's ready to go. I just saw her last night and she looked *okay*, but that's not nearly the same as *feeling great*, you know? She's not the Grandma I remember from when I was a kid. Or heck, even from three years ago.

I think she knows it's coming, too. She gave away a bunch of pillows at Christmas--let me explain. She does embroidery, makes quilts and stuff. Pretty much every one of her grandkids has at least one quilt and pillow, the married ones have two. So after everyone got one she made a bunch just to pass the time, but she gave a lot away this year. I got one. My two sisters each got one. And she's not making them any more, she really can't, arthritis, I guess.

And now I feel really guilty because I had my new Christmas pillow, crisp, white Christmas pillow, sitting in my chair, and I set a pizza pocket down on it and got grease on it.

But anyway. I was saying it's not that big a deal for me, I'm old enough to accept that she's ready to go and that she'd want me to be happy and all that. I really don't want to cling to her if she's just going to suffer. What worries me is Grandpa. They've been married over sixty years, and I'm afraid that no matter how good of health he's in, he's not going to last long without her. THAT is what bugs me about it.

And you know what? I am on my way to go see her (and likely Grandpa too, I can't imagine him not being there) now. I'll ramble more later.

Current Mood: contemplative
Current Music: "Po-tay, po-tay-toes" --Sean Astin remixed

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rena_librarian

The Librarian's Nook

February 2012

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Until the Stars Are All Alight

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Entries tagged with grandma

dishes ^_^

blaaaah...

Crap, you're going to try and cheer me up, aren't you?

(no subject)

randomness

MY BIRTHDAY!

my week and weekend...

MAJOR HORMONE INFLUX

RANTS frustration

(no subject)

ranDOMness abounds...

Avril Lavigne, among other things...

my weekend...

Friendses!

First post...