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My heart is aching a bit right now for two of my best friends, both of whom are suffering through some massive losses. Neither is my story to tell, but right now the world seems pretty cruel and unfair.
If I had to come up with one bad thing about love, it would be this feeling here: the feeling of utter helplessness when someone you love is hurting, and you wish so badly that you could take away their pain, give them what they needed to be whole, and make it all better. Instead, all you can do is be there for them. I know it counts for a lot–hell, when these people, and everyone else, were there for me throughout all the last two years, it meant the world to me–but at the same time it feels like so little in the face of so much pain.
I’ll try to be back tomorrow with happier thoughts.
It’s been two weeks since I’ve made it to the gym, which is out of the ordinary for me the last couple months.
Mostly it had to do with the massive cold I’ve been nursing the last week and a half.
Today, other than a slightly stuff nose, I finally felt well enough to head to the gym.
Which closes at 7:30pm.
I left work at 8pm.
Gah.
And now I’m heading out of town until Friday, so there goes another week!
Hope you all had a better, less hectic Monday.
Yesterday, I can home to a wonderful thing:
No neighbor.
Huzzah!
Two years ago, a new guy moved into the apartment that we share a bedroom wall with. We had several problems with this.
The first came from sharing a bedroom wall. His girlfriend was… rather much. I’m sure you get the picture (or, you know, the sound track for it). Ick! I’m sorry, no one is that good for that long. She’s overly loud, or she fakes it. I’m betting on the second.
The second was that he (and she) were just super loud in general. When they’d talk, we’d be part of their conversation, like eavesdropping, only we could never avoid it. He’d spend a lot of time on his cell phone in the backyard having random conversations, all of it drifting over into our yard and into our house and into my peace and quiet.
This was especially super bad when they would come home drunk from the bars around 2:15, with absolutely no sound control whatsoever. And bring friends. And stay up and continue partying until 3 or 4 or 5am. On weeknights.
The third was he smoked. All the time. And while I think it’s unhealthy, I’ll admit he can do whatever he wants to his body. I just didn’t appreciate all that smoke drifting over into our apartment and house, especially our bedroom when I was trying to fall asleep.
We complained to our apartment manager about the noise level, since the city here is nice enough to have sound ordinances and curfews after 10pm. We never mentioned the smoking, since it was his life.
But now?
He’s gone, and our lives are blessedly quiet and smoke-free.
Maybe we can once again reclaim our backyard. Having been avoiding close(r) proximity to him, and therefore using our backyard at all for about two years, it’d be really nice to get back into the habit of sitting on the porch in the evenings, or grilling for dinner and eating out there.
Or just enjoying the peace and quiet.
*contented sigh*
Ever see some jackass driver, weaving in and out of traffic? Or going straight from a left-turn lane? Or turning left out of a go-straight lane next to a left-turn lane? Or anything?
And think to yoursef, now where’s a cop when I need one!?!?!
(By the way, those are all things that make me which I had weapons mounted on my car while I drive to and from work.)
But today!
Today!
A car was turning left from a no left-turn lane. Not just the wrong lane, but at an intersection that doesn’t allow left turns! And there’s a cop car coming towards them from the other direction.
The cop goes through the intersection, and the car goes ahead and turns left.
I think to myself, WTF? But at this point, I’ve turned right and am driving away.
Until I glance in my rearview mirror and what do I see?
Another cop car, coming from the same direction that the first one came from, turn right after the car that illegally turned left and pull them over.
I hope the cop gave that sucker a big fat ticket. 🙂
Hi. My name is Sarah. I like to wear jeans. They’re comfy, and work for most occasions.
You make jeans. You’d think we’d have no problem then with the whole supply-demand thing, right?
Well, we do. Here’s the thing: I’m short (space-efficient, if you prefer). And my widest point, as it were, is not my hips but my thighs.
And you? Well, you make jeans for skinny people, and assume that merely sizing them up works for all other people. But if your jeans fit me in the waist, they tend to be a bit snug in the thighs. And if they fit in the thighs, I tend to be constantly pulling them up as they slide down my waist.
I realize not everyone is built the same, but I also realize…NOT EVERYONE IS BUILT THE SAME WITH JUST INCREASED PROPORTIONS. So maybe you could try making just a few versions of jeans that fit people like me? Basically, to be comfortable in the thigh and hip without being too big in the waist. And while we’re at it, my waist is at my waist, not higher!
Also while we’re at it, make them in petite. Again, just because I’m short doesn’t mean I’m super skinny. It also doesn’t mean that I like to wear my jeans hiked up to my rib cage, or have my shins revealed every time I sit down. (Basically like you see on most 80 year old women. But I’m not 80. I’m just short.)
No, I prefer jeans that are just long enough to be stylish without dragging on the ground, and to still cover my socks/shins when I’m sitting. Yet you make petite jeans as if I’m 5′ instead of 5’2” and regular jeans as if I’m 5’8”. What about those of us in the middle there?
Or, if you do manage to make jeans that fit me, you only manage to make them fit in one area–either in length, or in shape. Do both!
So, jean-makers, I’ve been everywhere, to all sorts of stores, and you managed to close the only one that worked. Nice going. And now, once again, I’m on a desperate search for the right jeans.
This, this is why I hate shopping. And while I’m not threatening to become a nudist, I’m putting you on warning: Think of us “short, curvy” people once in awhile, mmkay?
Thanks!
(Political-related rant, sorry.)
For my status on F*ceb**k last Friday, I put up something to the tune of:
“Congratulations Iowa! Way to lead the way for California and the rest of the states!”
This was in reference, to those of you living under a rock, that the Iowa Supreme Court upheld the rights of gay couples to marry. This was based on the decision that a state law limiting marriage to a “man and a woman” violted the constitutional rights of equal protection to all.
I like to see people open up, to go against discrimination, to stand up for what is right. And to have Iowa do it? Pretty cool. This is a state that is fairly liberal in the cities, but not so much in the rural areas. And it’s got a fair share of haters, I’m sure.
Many of my friends from high school and college were putting up similar messages, with one exception.
A kid from high school had put up how this was wrong and un-Christian and horrible, etc, etc, etc.
I disagreed, strongly, but I moved on. No use in trying to change his views on F*ceb**k, I’m sure, nor in starting a pointless argument. And really, I use it more as a social site, less as a way to enforce what I believe on others.
But within minutes of changing my status, guess who commented on mine?
Guess who told me it was wrong? That God didn’t ordain it or recognize it? That if you lived by those morals, then you didn’t live by God’s?
Despite a number of approvals from many friends, this comment rankled me. After all, I didn’t go after his status, did I? Why couldn’t we just live and let live?
Or why couldn’t he have agreed more with another friend who, although he didn’t like the ruling and didn’t approve of gay marriage, pointed out that he was not casting stones, as it (a) made people dislike Christianity when it was used as such and also (b) that it was wrong to pick and chose when to take the Bible verbatim.
I can live with that. Agree to disagree, and not cast aspersions on the opposite side.
John likes to point out that Leviticus says that we shouldn’t wear clothes of mixed fibers, women should sacrifice turtle doves after menstruating, and rabbits are wrong to eat because they chew cud. None of which people follow, for the most part, I’m sure. (Oh, and rabbits don’t chew cud. I’m just sayin’…) So again, why pick and choose? I appreciated the sentiment of the second person.
My response to the comment was to say that any God who believed in discrimination wasn’t a God worth believing in, and to politely ask him to refrain from commenting on the subject on my page. In more words, of course, but very polite and straightforward.
I got a large number of agreement comments and “congratulations” comments, but among them, I got another rebuttal from him, saying that what I considered intolerance was what he considered the right thing.
Apparently I should have asked him how a marriage between two people who love each other but happen to have the same equipment threatens the sanctity of my marriage to John. Because, really, I don’t think it changes what we have at all. So why should I deny what we have to anyone else?
With absolutely no amount of sadness or remorse, I unfriended someone, him, for the first time.
Alas, alack.
Why can’t we all just get along? And when will we learn that discrimination in ANY form is wrong?
C’mon, world!
As equally annoyed as I am with the fashion trend of ridiculously baggy pants, the opposite almost annoys me more.
The too-short suit pant.
Men: A pair of pants, suit or otherwise, should be long enough that the bottom of your cuffs hit the tops of the soles of your shoes.
There’s a reason we measure pant length to the ground when you’re standing bare-foot!
Seriously!
I worked in the men’s department at a clothing store for three years. There is a reason I know these random facts. Perhaps also a reason why it annoys me when it’s not done right! Bah.
I know the last thing you all want to read about (or, you know, ignore and mark ‘read’) late on a Friday afternoon is how I’m tired of this cold. But I am. Two and a half weeks of it is quite enough. The cough and sore throat are mostly gone, but the congested sinuses and runny nose (how the hell is that combination possible?) are still here. I’m feeling more energetic and ‘alive’, so that may be a good sign, but the symptoms remain. Bah. I do not have high hopes for diving tomorrow–sinus pressure generally eliminates the ability to equalize ear air spaces–think the squeeze feeling you get on planes that are ascending or descending, but worse. This makes the 4am wake-up-call even less bearable. I’ll most likely spend the day standing in the surf hauling students in and out of the waves. Bah again.
So some fun thoughts…..
I may be completely out of those. Alas, alack.
Some crap went down over the holidays and I’m waiting to see how it’s going to sort itself out. It involves some people I care a great deal about, and some people I could and would cheerfully throttle were it not for laws against that sort of thing. It’s not my story to tell, though, so I’m sort of wondering how much of it to make public. That said, I’m here to unburden myself, so I’m guessing you’ll get an earful one of these days.
And this big elephant in the room, combined with a cold and being back at work after two weeks off, just sucks. I’ve been sleeping a lot, and reading a lot, and working a lot, and not much else.
However, there’s diving tomorrow, and then a wedding on Sunday! Happy day! I will smile through all this and take my victories where I can. Hope you all are off to have a great weekend!
There should only be so many logical places to store superglue in our apartment.
Where ever we did so, it’s well hidden.
I’m having trouble getting into the holiday spirit this year. Not that I’m not excited, but I’m not. Not really. And I think I used up all my useless posting ideas with NaBloPoMo. Ba humbug.
I think it has a lot to do with the fact that my parents just left for the distant reaches of the planet, shepherding a bunch of college students, and won’t be back until the 30th. Christmas is just going to have to wait.
They’ve done this several times in the past, and this is the second time they’ve missed Christmas, but it’s a bit depressing.
Yes, we’re going home. Yes, Amy will be there. Yes, we’ll be with John’s family until my parents get back into town.
Right up until we fly home on the 2nd. Thus, I effectively get two full days with my parents. And of course Northwest wanted an exorbitant sum to change my ticket after my parent’s tickets got changed to come back later.
Ba humbug.
It's all in my head 