Happy Independence Day!

http://www.mamarocks.com/fireworks.htm

Fuck the 10 Minutes...

Going back to the shrink in the morning. I can't believe it's already been a week or so since the last visit.

I started the grapefruit diet today. Mainly to see if I could do it. I did it once as a teenager, living w/my aunt Liz, and it actually does work. I omit the eggs, tho, because most of the time, to me, eggs are disgusting. Went out, bought a bunch of fresh vegetables... Rob was looking at me in the grocery store like I was nuts. But he enjoyed the salad for lunch.

90% of the time, I just don't care about anything anymore. I'm on auto-pilot. Watched The Boston Pops' fireworks display. It was pretty awe inspiring. Rob & I thought it was Disney's for about a half hour, til they actually did the program ID before the commercial break.

I think it's kind of funny - I'm actually fulfilling two of my New Year's resolutions... I'm learning how to download movies from the VCR onto my computer & burning them onto DVD. And I've been listening a lot more than talking. I've been finding that I don't have to talk because people talk to me, whether I want them to or not. I've also found that I just don't have much to say about anything. I've joined a couple of online depression support groups, and it's been fruitless, mainly because I have nothing supportive or helpful to tell anyone else - I can commiserate, but that's fruitless for someone who needs an uplifting word or two... and I don't feel the need to get a bunch of emoticoned hugs & smilies thrown my way. This last week at work, people were even saying, "You've been very quiet lately. What's going on?" They look at me funny when I tell them I'm actively fulfilling a New Year's resolution by listening more than speaking. Then I get the, "But you always say things worth listening to - why hide in silence?" kind of responses. I'm not hiding - I do vent, here, anyway... and I have so much dirt on my coworkers... they talk & talk & talk & talk. I don't have to fill up the quiet room because someone's always there to do it for me. Rob's driving me nuts, tho - the less I talk, the more he does.

So many times, things are truly better left unsaid.

Yoinked this from a blog I saw...

100 Things You Probably Already Know About Me.

1) I am the youngest of my mom’s kids, and possibly my dad’s only kid… possibly.
2) I was born in Fontana, CA
3) My dad was a trucker & my mom was a cocktail waitress here in Vegas when they met.
4) Places where I have lived include California, Washington, Tennessee, Nevada, Oregon & Louisiana
5) I attended 5 different elementary schools.
6) I attended 6th, 7th & 8th grade at three different schools.
7) I attended (well, sort of) 4 different high schools.
8) I got my G.E.D. here in Vegas… there was a Buddhist monk from Tibet & a Hare Krishna taking the exam at the same time.
9) I really suck at math. Add, subtract, multiply, divide – that’s it.
10) I almost got a full boat scholarship to Krelsheim College of the Performing Arts (for Music) in Seattle – but I moved.
10) In high school bands, I played percussion, the sax, the clarinet, the flute & the trumpet… and I played guitar for shits ‘n giggles.
11) I met my husband at the hotel where I now work in 1993.
12) I am child-free by choice.
13) I am twice-wed – once spiritually, once legally.
14) The most common phrase heard at my handfasting ceremony was ‘over, under’…
15) My husband has a Bachelor’s Degree in Criminal Justice… and is a security guard (when he works at all).
16) I’m a high school drop-out who sucks at math … and I work as a night auditor.
17) We have two ball pythons as pets.
18) I am a dog person.
19) I can read music, and play music, but I can’t compose.
20) Snails ate all my plants this past year.
21) I am currently experimenting with the ‘Grapefruit Diet’
22) I am already bored with grapefruit.
23) I collect Tarot card decks.
24) My five (o.k., six) favorite authors: Stephen King, Clive Barker, Richard Adams, Poppy Z. Brite, Wade Davis & Dale Pendell
25) My mom’s family is French Canadien (although now they are just Tennessee hillbilly ridge-runners)
26) My dad lied a lot – but he claimed his family was ‘Prussian German’ under service to Kaiser Wilhelm, which is why they had to come to the U.S. (The Kaiser was losing).
27) When compared to other French Canadiens I know, I look a lot more French Canadien than I realized.
28) All my aunts look like my mom.
29) I got my mom’s height & my dad’s build.
30) My eyes are hazel – my mom’s were deep brown, my dad’s were slate blue.
31) I don’t resemble either half-sister.
32) My dad spent most of his youth in the bayous of Louisiana & grew up Cajun.
33) My mom handed me ‘Watership Down’ to read when I was 7… when I finished that, I got ‘Cujo’. Thanks, mom.
34) My parents were never married.
35) I was never baptized…
36) I’m not a virgin, which means I am no longer eligible for sacrifice. Hah!
37) My mom died in 1984 of complications from chemotherapy.
38) My dad died in 1993 from heart disease and generally poor living conditions.
39) The last time I saw my father was in 1990 – I was 16 & getting on a train bound for Los Angeles, CA.
40) I enjoyed my train ride to L.A. immensely, and I’d love to be able to take a long train ride again sometime.
41) I flew a lot as a teenager – California to Tennessee, Tennessee to California, California to Nevada, Nevada to California…
42) When I was 10, I got to fly from California to Washington D.C. on a gifted-class trip.
43) We had a 10-hour layover at the O’Hare airport in Chicago during that trip. I never want to see O’Hare airport again.
44) I have nothing left from my childhood – no photos, no toys, no baby shoes, no kindergarten plaster handprint.
45) I am most definitely not a packrat & I keep very few material possessions for ‘sentimental’ value.
46) My husband’s packrattery drives me up a fucking wall.
47) I don’t like having my picture taken.
48) I still have one of them.
49) I’ve taken two high school Spanish courses and have Spanish-speaking co-workers, but I only know dirty words in Spanish.
50) In first grade, they put me in an English-as-Second-Language class because I spoke more Spanish than English at the time.
51) I used to be ambidextrous until a second-grade teacher made me sit on my left hand because ‘it belonged to the Devil’.
52) My left hand is incredibly stupid, even when it comes to typing.
53) I can type an average of 55wpm
54) I can use a 10-key by touch, but I still look at the read-out because I hate to make mistakes.
55) I am a meat eater, and proud of it (but not as proud as Ted Nugent).
56) I like foods I can eat with my fingers, or pick apart, like sunflower seeds & crab legs.
57) I really hate militant vegetarians…
58) I also really hate militant animal rights activists.
59) I hate militant people, period. Support what you want to support, but stop foaming at the mouth about it, already!
60) I love sushi & sashimi, but I don’t know which is which.
61) My five favorite musical artists (right now, anyway): The Afro Celt Sound System, Led Zeppelin, Train, the Dave Matthews Band & U2
62) I don’t have a musical genre that I prefer over another, but I hate polka.
63) I love language.
64) I still watch Sesame Street on occasion, & sing along w/the Ladybug Picnic song.
65) I took almost a semester of Japanese, & realized I have crappy penmanship in Japanese.
66) I’ve withdrawn from college three times.
67) In 10 years, I’ve worked at 20 different employers.
68) I’ve got four years experience in billing for phone sex.
69) I’ve worked for the Dept. of Family Svcs. twice.
70) I’ve always quit, I’ve never been fired.
71) I worked for 3 days at a Macadamia Nut Processing Plant just to be able to say I got paid to play with nuts all day.
72) I know many Latin names of plants.
73) I am not a perky person.
74) I wanted to be a paleontologist when I was five.
75) I want to grow up to be a mortician.
76) I moved to Louisiana for the sole purpose of going to school for a Mortuary Science degree.
77) I am currently going to a psychologist because I have the feeling that I am already dead.
78) I don’t like kids, especially large groups of them.
79) I am afraid of mentally & developmentally disabled people.
80) I cannot give directions to hearing-impaired people. I have to face the area that I’m giving directions to, and then the deaf person can’t see my lips to read them… it can be socially awkward.
81) I have a hard time telling my left from my right.
82) I still watch cartoons.
83) I still like to color.
84) I feel sorry for Michael Jackson – but I still hate his music.
85) I like Rob Zombie’s music – but I’m not going to see another one of his movies.
86) I need to redirect myself from mortuary science to … something more attainable.
87) I really enjoy Magic Mountain in California.
88) Drinking tequila & playing ‘Need for Speed’ on the PS2 makes me feel like I’m momentarily weightless or pulling G’s.
89) I like fast cars with big engines.
90) I don’t drive because my lack of depth perception makes me worry about hitting people.
91) I like to mosh.
92) I enjoy physical pain, as long as it’s not a chronic, aching kind of pain. More like sharp blows to the body or being bitten fiercely.
93) When Andy bit my thigh accidentally, I almost had an orgasm.
94) I honestly like Brussels sprouts.
95) My allergy shots actually have been helping – I’ve only had to take 3 Benadryl over the past 6 months, and once was just for entertainment purposes while I was at work.
96) I like my brewed iced tea unsweetened.
97) I prefer masturbation to sex with another person.
98) I am terrified that trans-dimensional beings or aliens may actually exist.
99) I enjoy crossword puzzles, but can’t solve logic problems.
100) I have always been more self-conscious about my skin than my weight.