how do you live so happily while i am sad and broken down?

I've been meaning to come on here for days, but I never seem to manage it. I've been a bit sick, not sure if it's something I caught flying or sinus crud from the storm that just blew through. I'm feeling better today, except that I didn't get enough sleep last night because I am an idiot. This is not news. :)

Anyway, I thought I'd come on earlier to post links to my Hawaii and Alaska pics on facebook, but since I haven't gotten around to posting the Alaska ones yet, that would be a bit of a waste.

It's a quiet week though - we played our last game of summer ALTA tennis on Sunday, and I had my first loss of the season. I knew it was coming though, and they were just better than us, so I didn't mind as much. I was supposed to go to the movies with J & S, but S's car blew up (not literally) so that got cancelled. I slept for like, 36 hours over two days. I'm trying to get everything cleaned up from being gone for two weeks: laundry, mail (I got another jury summons, whee!), the giant pile of dishes in the kitchen (need to get on that one...)

Anyway, still here, always reading, just not much post-worthy going on in my life these days.

Today was not a good day. I don't even want to go into why - it's mostly a general mood thing, with some extra family stuff on top. I keep watching movies tonight that make me cry, and I think it's more me than the movies. I wish... I wish I was happier right now.

Ah, well:

One of the reasons I haven't really updated my journal lately is because I've been feeling pretty overwhelmed by life lately. It's silly, because this is a great outlet for frustrations, but I haven't felt up to using it. I'm going to try to be better about that.

Some of the reasons I am feeling overwhelmed:

My family:
This has not been a great year for my family. My mom had a stroke. My aunt had a lumpectomy, which led to a mastectomy, which then led - I'm still not sure how - to a ruptured colon. My oldest brother had a bicycle accident that collapsed his lung. My other brother has had some unknown virus that caused him to lose 25 pounds (which he didn't have to lose; I asked how I could get this virus, as I could stand to lose it easily.) Everyone is healing from their calamities nicely, but it's been one thing after another, with a lot of worrying and feeling helpless. And I've spent a lot on flowers.

My job:
I've had a lot of problem sites, with challenging installations, lots of overtime. It's been a rough summer.

My weight:
I've gained about 25 pounds in the last year. I am super unhappy about this - I feel fat and gross and ugly. I know these things aren't true when I look in the mirror, but it doesn't stop from me from feeling them. Luckily I'm not carrying it the way I did last time I was this heavy, because I am a more active person now, but I do not want to stay this way. I'm trying to diet, but I'll do good for a few days then blow it (usually on the weekends.) I play tennis two or three times a week, but I need to supplement that with the Wii and with the treadmill, and I haven't been able to motivate myself to do so.

My house:
Well, really the yard. After I had that horrid bout of poison ivy, I got kind of scared to go out there. It turned into a jungle. This is one area where I've made some progress recently. I had let the house get dirty, and I've been cleaning. I finally got the yard mowed today - I was going to give up and call someone to do it, but the weather was under 90 today with a breeze, so I sucked it up and spent about 4 hours mowing, weed-eating, and leaf-blowing. I still need to spray for the poison ivy and weeds. I want to buy some sort of sprayer that will be easier to use than the Round Up I've been buying - the squeezy thing hurts my hand.

So these are my woes. They're not the worst in the world, and trust me, I know there's a lot of people that have it worse than me. But they are mine, and they have been making me sad. I'm still getting out, playing tennis, meeting up with friends, etc, but I don't feel like myself.

K & I broke up tonight. It wasn't a fight or anything melodramatic; he's moving back to California because he can't find a job here, and neither of us are interested in a long distance relationship. I've always known this was a possibility when he got his MBA, which he finishes up next week, and in the last month or so it's looked more and more likely, so it's not a shock. It still sucks, and I'm still sad about it, but I'm not devastated. He did say the hardest part about making the decision was knowing it meant we'd break up, so that's something to hold onto, I guess. He's a good guy, and I hope he finds happiness. And I hope I do too.

So I figured out why I've been so grouchy! I'm getting sick! Or rather, I think I'm fighting something off. I woke up this morning with a slight fever. It totally makes sense, because whenever I'm getting sick but don't realize it, I'm totally mean to everyone around me.

Day 25: Your day, in great detail

I woke up with the cat on top of me, as per usual. Then I hit snooze three times. Then I reset my alarm to get up an hour later, but only made it half an hour before the guilt (and the sound of my cell phone ringing) got me up. I had my usual breakfast of oatmeal and chocolate milk while watching an episode of Supernatural on TNT (Heart, one of my favorites).

Then I made my way down to my office to start up my laptop and do my one assigned task of the day, an interface preparation call for a client that I'd prepped last week but then figured out we hadn't done everything needed. Afterward, I chatted with my team lead on IM, then my cat decided to chat with him, then I yelled at her to get off my keyboard.

I came back upstairs and had lunch, two mango & black bean quesadillas, yummy! I watched a little bit of the Olympics - women's curling, Switzerland vs China I think. Back to work, I started watching our support queue to help them out, and grabbed a couple of cases. One I emailed the instructions to, the other I called and left a message. He never called back. Odds he will call on Monday when I'm actually busy, 100%. Gave up on pretending to work around 4pm.

Went into my craft room and worked on my photo album from my month in Toulouse. I have it all lined out, but wasn't happy with the paper I'm using. It's lovely, almost too pretty to use! But there are too many patterns too close together. I tried to find some neutral papers in my overly large paper selection, but everything was either too busy or the wrong shade. :(

Began the Friday night texting marathon of 'what are you/we doing' between K and my tennis friends. Discovered that my tennis partner for tomorrow had called to cancel; arranged another match in its place. Took shower (you thought I'd left that out? No, I'm just a lazy slob.) Then I put on my tennis clothes, checked my work email one more time before shutting the computer down for the weekend, gave the cat a treat, and then headed into town to go to tennis drills.

Chatted with my tennis coach for twenty minutes before he decided that really, no one else was coming to drills and so they were cancelled. Texted my friend who was planning to come, and we made plans to meet later for dinner instead. Headed back to the house, changed clothes, took another look at the photo album. Realized I had time, so I headed to Michaels Craft store. Picked out a nice neutral beige that will be an offset to the pattern frenzy, 25 sheets for $6. Lusted over a beautiful set of textured neutral paper, but since it was $20 I decided not to. My hobby, it is expensive. Also, on the way to the checkout, saw a two pack of Reeses Easter eggs. Cannot resist! They are the perfect ratio of peanut butter to chocolate!

Drove back into town, headed for Wahoo Grill. Ate 1 of the Easter eggs on the way. Arrived to discover that there was no parking and an hour wait. We went to Figo instead, an Atlanta chain of Italian restaurants. Had bruschetta, a spinach salad, and a really lovely ravioli with marscapone (sp) and Vidalia onions. And a glass of Sauvignon Blanc, yay!

Came home, toyed briefly with the idea of working more on the photo album but abandoned it after clearing off my work area. Fed the cat, scooped the litter box. Poured myself a glass of milk and set down to watch the Olympics and eat the second Reeses Egg. Started sorting songs on my ipod into playlists. Watched Apollo Ohno get disqualified and be kind of pissy about it.

And now, I'm thinking bed time.

( Future Days )

So today I seem to be doing.... naaaaaaaaaathing.

I am ok with this. So far I have slept in til noon (for certain values of sleeping in. Thanks, cat.), caught up on facebook and LJ, tried to reload my customized mood theme only to realize I didn't save the files, downloaded a ton of mood themes from frostianmoods, and now I'm trying to figure out how to host them on photobucket.

My plans for later in the day include:

*possibly going to Pike's to try to find a plant that isn't toxic to cats. I keep buying them, then bringing them home and finding out they could kill Cinnamon if she eats it. I am growing some herbs from seeds though; we'll see how that goes. It was a kit with chives, basil and parsley. I am most excited about the parsley, and of course that's the one that isn't growing so far.

*get a salad from the Mexican place I like.

*grocery shopping. I'm planning to go late in the day, so that everyone else will be watching the Super Bowl.

Aaaaaaand that's about it. I have to figure out how many moodthemes I can have on my hosting site for free.

So today I quit the online Weight Watchers program and re-joined Netflix. I wonder what that says about me :)

I watched my first episode of Dexter tonight. Intriguing, and I'm definitely going to catch up on it. I'm going to start watching streaming video while I work instead of the usual 8 episodes of Law & Order SVU I normally watch. The streaming video feature on Netflix was new when I quit, but it seems like there's a lot on there now. And I have the second laptop, so I can hook it up to the tv. Hard to pause though. Short cords ftl.

Anyway, my Thanksgiving was nice. My parents and my sister came down; it's becoming a tradition. We watched my cousin finish a marathon, then we all went to lunch after. Then the next day we did the art museum all-day event as per usual - the exhibit was great, but their activities were a bit lame. Last year was so awesome, so this was a disappointment. On Saturday, I took them on the CNN tour and to the Aquarium. And we played board games. So it was a fun visit, but I'm a bit worn out from it. I wasn't as over my sickness from earlier in the week as I thought, and I had a bit of a relapse while they were here. I'm better now, but I'm still taking it pretty easy.

I've also been working to organize a tournament for my tennis team, so that's been both fun and stressful, but it's all put together now. It actually worked out really well on paper, so we'll see how far the execution strays from that.

Otherwise, I'm just working on finishing the craft project for my mom's xmas gift (almost done! freaked out that I'll mess it up at the last minute!), hanging out with K, and working when they make me.

This icon brought to you by the fact that I am sad I could not convince K that Little Britain is awesome.

Today I have:

• aired out the house.


• assembled my new TV stand, even though they forgot to drill two of the holes at the factory.


• mopped the entire downstairs (except my office, which is still a disaster zone.)


• had a heart attack when I realized Cinnamon managed to get outside during the airing out process. EEEP. I am a bad cat mommy.


• made broccoli raisin salad & regular salad for lunch & dinner this week. I am going to get back on track.


• tried on all the hiking shoes I ordered and realized that the ones I ordered first that I thought didn't fit, really do.


• vacuumed.


• took the trash out.

And now I'm waiting on K to get here (he had to work today, poor guy) so we can go to a movie. \o/ Yay, productive day! Which makes up for yesterday, during which I did nothing.

Yes it's four in the morning. Yes, I may have told a friend I'd be up at 9 am tomorrow to go to yoga. Yes, I may be a little bit drunk. But I digress...

Point the first: Last weekend was my all concert, all the time weekend. I went to see the American Idols concert on Friday. My indie soul died a little, but fuck that, it was a ton of fun. Or I was really intoxicated. Possibly both. The majority of the show was like a really good night out at a karaoke bar, and then Adam Lambert came on and it was a real rock show. Also, credit where it's due, the winner, Kris Allen, put on a hell of a show. Then on Saturday, you guys, on Saturday, I saw GREEN DAY. OMG, my soul was restored :D They were completely, completely awesome. I think that may have been the best concert I've ever been to. And they did everything, all the new stuff, all the American Idiot stuff, King for a Day, Minority, Good Riddance. The only thing they could have done to make it more awesome would have been if Tre got up and sang Dominated Love Slave, and I'm willing to bet that that will never happen. They did three encores, and they let some random kid from the audience play guitar for Jesus of Suburbia. Let me repeat that. Some random kid who was about 18 got to play Billie Joe Armstrong's guitar on stage with Green Day.

Point the second: My aunt is doing well. They ended up not doing surgery or traction, she's just doing rehab and apparently it's going really well. She's out of the hospital and in a nursing home? or some sort of care facility. I'm not sure. But thanks everyone for your good thoughts.

Point the third: Cinnamon is over her pink eye. That sucked.

Point the fourth: You know how you know you like a boy? You start questioning the content of your underwear drawer. Anybody got a favorite source of pretty underthings for the more well-endowed girl? I hate, hate, hate Victoria and all her secrets. Her secret is she's a skinny, flat-chested bitch and that just doesn't work out for me.

Ugh, ok. Bed. I'm so going to be napping during corpse pose tomorrow.