The above lyric from the Dance Hall Crashers. :) Got to listen to that while driving home from jennifaerie's last night. Had a great time, Jen, thanks for having me up! :) Hope the Aqua Teen movie was okay.. We could have shut it off after the singing snacks at the beginning, that was really the only part I thought needed to be watched. :) Too funny. "Indecent exposure is a class two feeeloooonyyy!!!" *lol*

So My brother in-law in-law (does that work? Dan's sister's hubby) posted a pic of the two of us from when we were in Disney up on his Facebook page, and it's a good one. Click here to see it! :) I'm not sure exactly where we are, but I know we were in the Magic Kingdom, given what shirt I have on. I got a high five from a dude at It's a Small World for wearing that shirt, and another positive feedback from somebody else at the Jungle Cruise. :) I have to say it was definitely a better trip than our honeymoon was. There were no tears. There were blisters on the feet, but no craziness like last time. Not on my part, anyway. *lol*

And we found out that Dan can just join the Masons! His Grampy was a Mason, and his Grammy was in the Eastern Star(s?). He thought you had to be approached by them, because they're all about being a secret society and whatnot. But they had an ad on TV a few days ago, and it was all, "Wanna be a Mason? Ask a Mason!" So that's cool. He's been talking about this for years. Good for him! :)

I haven't heard anything from the chocolatier place. Mom says I ought to call them. I put in an online application for Retail Data LLC, which Dan works with some people who work with them as a secondary job. It's basically price checking for different stores. If one store is selling vacuum A at a certain price, I'd go around with my scanner and hit a bunch of other stores selling the same vacuum and see what other prices it might be going for, see if they're being competitive, send them the info so they can decide if they need to lower or raise the price. I put in for that on Thursday. Haven't heard anything there, either. It would be cool. Shopping, but not really.

I think I may really be getting it now. All those years of fighting, going against the grain, being weird for weird's sake, rebelling, rebelling, rebelling... That was from the brainwashing. Rebelling against it.

I'm finally working on creating the real me. Deciding from the core of me who I am and what really resonates with what I believe and feel to be true and right. If that's as simple as "Yes, my earlobes must be stretched to 12 gauge!" then dammit, that's what I'm gonna do. If it's as complicated as remembering childhood crap and seeing it from an outside view and reintegrating the information from it in a new and more helpful way, then damn skippy I'm going to do it. If it'll help my marriage, if it'll make me more normal.

And now. Because when adults join cults, they have their pre-cult identity to fall back on. But us cult kids, we've got nothing. Me? I was seven. I'm not light or limber enough to go back to wanting to be a ballerina again. I do love books still, so. I go back to that point in time. I attempt to ignore the intervening years, and apply for jobs at local bookstores, at the libraries. I may not make piles of money, but I would be so happy.

I remember how empowered I was when I stretched my earlobe that time, all by myself. And when I bought the blue Niobium horseshoe to replace the stupid one I had in from when Dave had his nipple done. So I may have to save for it, but I would get my earlobes stretched. All the more empowering if it cost more, eh? Then I looked and saw all the pretty earrings I could get at 12 gauge. Surprise! It's a girl! *lol*

And then the day came, after all the fighting with Dan over the housesitting $300, after the trip to Disney, when I had like $80 left in my pocket and we happened to be at this head shop in Wakefield and I asked the guy behind the counter how much he wanted for a couple of straight barbells. 12 gauge. And this guy is awesome, he said normally they're $8, but he'd only charge me $15 for the pair, and when he broke out the tacklebox they were stored in, the stickerprice on the box said he should have been charging $14.95 each. Duude. :)

And so I brought them home and stretched my earlobes that night and the next day! And then found a pair of nice hangers on ebay and willed myself to not feel guilty about buying them, and made sure with Dan first, and got them in just in time for my cousin's wedding!

I'm doing so much better lately. I feel better. I've been wearing my work tops paired with jeans, and this green corduroy jacket my sister had given me for xmas like two years ago. I had looked in my shirt drawer and just saw plain tshirt, plain tshirt, plain tshirt and got so sick of it, day after day after day after day...

So yes, there are things changing with me. Also, until now, I haven't actually had much of a political view, it was pretty anemic and mainly steered by my peers. I didn't pay attention to anything, let alone vote until the Bush/Gore election. I felt that my vote didn't count. :(

Now, I'm paying attention. You may scoff because of my stance or where I get my info from or because I'm with the Oathkeepers and want to defend the Constitution, but I'm informed of something, at least! You can't, can't, can't say that of the me a year, two years ago.

I'm trying to make more benign, happy-clappy posts here. I'm actually making some kind of effort with my appearance. Hell, I even broke out the Oatmeal & Avocado face masque tonight. Of course, it *does* still have the price tag on it from a store that went out of business in 1998... But I'm sick of just letting my skin go all the time. I'm tired of dressing as depressed as I feel. I'm tired of being tired. Dan said to me that I look happier, that I'm glowing lately. (no comments from the peanut gallery, I just got done bleeding, TYVM) I can feel it, like the clouds are finally lifting.

It's a crazy feeling. And really kills me when stuff like today happens.

So there were about 40 people who had said they were coming to the class 15-year reunion. Of them, only 9 sent in the money that was needed to rent the KofC hall, the DJ, and the "carter". I'm sure Christie meant caterer.

But so I posted on my Facebook that we were having a cookout on Friday, everyone come on down- that means you! So Christie responds by saying, "this should be our reunion lol". Then responds again saying "Make it Saturday?????"

And at first, I was like no way. Eff that. I started responding to her, saying that we live out in the boonies, and that people's GPSes get them lost, trying to come visit us. It's true- it has happened! And then my mind changed. My house full of people *I* know? I mean, if Dan's friends can make it, too, then sure, cool. But (now I learn that it's) 50 people, that I knew from grade school, in my freaking house?!?! In my yard?!?! Homg. How cool would that be. I gotta talk to Dan about this! He has the night off anyway! We can make it a BYOB, and bring your own whatever.. We'd supply the burgers and dogs and buns and basic things, and people can bring their own salads and desserts and things.. This would be so AWESOME! And Brytne can come, because it would be free!

And then I start thinking.. I was "the poor kid" in high school. Or one of them, anyways. I had some friends, but I'm sure the majority of the kids looked down on me and my family. And now.. I really don't look like the poor kid anymore. I'm not flouncing around in Chanel and Louis Vuitton and Burberry (), of course, but I'm like Virginia Slims. I've come a long way, Baby. It would be kinda boastful to bring them all here and be like, "Yes, this is *my* lovely house..."

Bah! Bah, I say! We still have that whole monstrosity on the side of the yard where the Geothermal trench was dug, and filled back in, where it's just bare dirt right now, where I went out to get Jack a couple weeks ago, and wound up ankle-deep in the mud in my nice good new sandals. If we get any rain at all, that section of the yard is going to be all gooey and we'd have to cordon it off. And that would suck.

But Oh! How effing cool would it have been? To have all these people at my house!?!?!?

Because I had to log onto our bank account yesterday, when I was doing FAFSA crap, and had a bit of a shock as far as what was in the checking account. I should have been expecting what I saw. If I've expected X amount to be in there on any given week, and now that there's no more Y amount being direct deposited for my severance, why should I expect X amount to be there still? Of *course* it's going to be at Z amount now.

The good thing is, our savings is looking pretty good. We have a small CD that we originally set up to help fund the trip to England, but Lance and Penny made it so affordable that we didn't need to crack into it at all. So there's that plus a decent regular savings account, but the checking is just looking..

Well, ok. Honestly? It's looking fucking fantastic. Compared to when *I* was doing the bills? It's a dream!

But. But. The reality of my severance being gone, and the scare we already got when my Unemployment was first up and I had to reapply and cross my toes that that was going to be ok... If we do end up having to rely on just Dan's salary.. Will we be able to make it? Can I afford to do college?

And on that note, we brought the smart car up to be upgraded today. They did something to bring the OS up to speed with the '09s, make the transmission smoother, something, and they swapped out the battery with a higher-capacity battery.

So Dan says while they're doing that, why don't we head over to CCRI to talk to somebody about medical transcription, see what it would cost to do this through a community college instead of through Kaplan for $31K. And we get there, and the Knight Campus is just such an industrial eyesore, it makes me ill to look at, let alone walk up to and enter. And we're walking in, and Dan looks back at me and asks if I'm ok. And I can feel my throat closing up and my eyelids starting to prickle...

And instead of freaking out, or throwing a fit, or anything else, he pulled me out a chair at a table in the lobby, and we sat down for a few minutes. I told him I just wasn't prepared to talk to anybody today. I think I need to take another half a Zoloft for that. I don't know if it's the whole college is a scary thing thing, or if it's that damn building, but there is no way I could talk to anyone today. So we leave.

He just asks me not to go with Kaplan, if I can talk to someone at CCRI and maybe do this for a tenth the cost. Yes, absolutely! If I don't have to talk to them today? Absolutely! Especially since medical transcription is kind of a throwaway "hey, what about this?" idea for me to try out as far as getting a job doing.. And if I'm not really *feeling* it, then what the hell am I doing, picking Kaplan over CCRI?

But so I was happy because I didn't feel pressured to just go and talk anyways, and he was happy because I didn't force myself to go because I thought he wanted me to, and a good time was had by all. :) Thank yous from both parties.

And then we went to the mall and found out what time Wolverine was playing, stopped in at the Cox Cable store and picked up a new remote because ours was not working well anymore, hit the food court quick before the movie, went and saw the movie, picked up the smart car, and came home. :D

And then I tried to decide whether to go out to Knit Wits' free knitting night, where my cousin Susan and Gordy go, and have been asking me to go there... But I didn't. And I don't know why. I mean, I know why, it was because Dan was still awake. And I wanted to spend time with him. That's gotten to be a bad habit lately. I can't remember the last time I went out anywhere social without him.. Except to Brytne's that last time.. Am I just being lazy? Is that all it is? Or is there something more actually wrong with me?

Come this September, we will have been married and lived in this house for ten years. Ten Years! And I'm looking around me, thinking about the junk we have squirreled away, some that I haven't touched in all those ten ears, some for even longer.

Turning the Computer Room into the UnComputer Room was just the tip of the iceberg. This is a purge, this is a defrag. I'm going into this, imagining that either we're going to have to pack it all up and move, or that we die and some poor sap has to go through all our shit. They would have been dumbfounded by the multitude of Cosby sweaters, packed away neatly in a box at the bottom of the closet upstairs, labeled, "Dan's sweaters that he never wears but keeps in his drawers anyways!" (No, seriously, one box really *was* labeled that!)

But then I start going through my desk in the Spare Oom, and asking myself, no really, *why* am I keeping the jagged lid from a Sesame Street-themed can of Chef Boyardee? Why? I mean, sure, it's supercool that it has Oscar and Grover and Big Bird and Ernie in a ring around it, but what the hell am I ever going to do with it? I've had it what, 15, 18, 20 years??? What the fuck? It's a jagged can lid! Get a grip, woman!

So I get going, and man, the trash. No more sympathy. No more, "Oh, but we could do something with it.." We haven't. We won't. It's gone. One way or another. Unless there's serious reason to keep it, like Pepere's clothes, that Dan would kill me if I just got rid of, then it's outta here.

But anyways. With all the moving stuff from one room to another, getting ideas for moving stuff around, I've declared this not Spring Cleaning or anything so mild-mannered. This is a damn defrag. *lol*

Oh! As part of the Defrag, I came upon a certain Port-a-Potty box, which had inside it none other than my first wedding dress, veil, ring-bearing pillow, fancy pen, cake topper, and shoes.
When brytne came over, we went to Classy Closet Consignments and I opened an account so I could sell my wedding crap. The store and I split the consignment 50/50, and as it's being listed for $100, then I'd get $50. :D Hey, better than nothing, and Mom bought it for $200 back in 1994, so that's not too bad, I think.

Brytne picked up a fashionable Burberry purse, and a jacket to take over for a big poufy white one that she has, and some other stuff, and a groovy beret. I found a pair of Merrell shoes for like $3! And they fit! And don't hurt! And a couple of shirts. There was this one blue shirt that I so wished it fit. It was so awesome. But I'd need to drop two or three sizes just to keep the buttons from popping right off, first. Ah well.

Ooh, Dan broke out cheese and crackers.

So yeah. When I get done with the Defrag, this house isn't going to know what hit it.

Oh, and I got a Thank You card in the mail from Gramma yesterday. It had nothing in it. :D Nothing but her signature. I feel like I win! I don't know if that makes sense to anybody else.

Bill Kudelchuk friended me on facebook. And then IM'ed me. And continued to. And it was a pleasant conversation. It was weird.

He was a popular, "cool" kid in school, somewhat of a bully. So this was really weird. But he admitted to being an immature punk back in the day, and I took that as an apology of sorts, and that's cool. :)

Just really... weird.

So hey, hi! I've been keeping busy, helping my mom clean the church that she cleans, helping my folks fix up the trailer they acquired to make it horse-stall-worthy, knitting my mom a hat to replace the one she had that was falling apart, xmas shopping for my sister in Korea and her kids, hitting the Goodwill... It's been a good two weeks.

Except FedEx sucks. I ordered two prints from my Flickr England account, to be sent here. One for Cora, one for Mom. They arrived in town today, but FedEx decided that the address was incorrect. My ass. So now we have to go all the way to Lawton to pick them up tomorrow, as an added pain in my ass. Mom and I already have to clean the place where Cora works (which shouldn't take long), try to finish xmas shopping, wrap, and get all this done by a decent time so we can do an anniversary thing for my folks, and so Cora and I can go drive up to OKC and pick up Dan and my folks can go out to dinner and see a Christmas Carol instead of a movie because the movies were all sucky. *sigh* And now this. Lawton's kinda close, but not close enough. Ugh.

But we've made some serious progress on Grampa Jake's writings, at least. We have two cigar boxes full of legible ones, now they just need to be scanned in, translated, and separated into their different categories. From the somewhat nonsensical (My cow's been gone three days: Yesterday, today, and tomorrow) to the racist (Coon says to his boss I need new shoes these ones so thin I can step on a dime and tell if it's heads or tails) to the somewhat wise (Used to be a fool and his money was soon parted. Now it happens to all of us.) to the anti-feminist (They say a woman's brain weighs the same as a human's) to the "Do what now?" (sex twice a week)... It's interesting. *lol*

And I'm sitting here with SatanShadow next to me, waiting for me to go to bed, so she can try to sneak up onto the pillow I'm sleeping on. Kept me up most of last night, just not settling down. Frakking cat. I hope when Dan sleeps here tomorrow that she'll behave a little better..

Because Dan's flying in tomorrow. To drive home with medrive me home. I'm sure he won't let me do much, if any, driving. Everyone he works with thinks he's so cool, such a hero, for doing so. And it's nice, it really is, but Jeez. Mom says that she used to do that all the time when Dad was on the road, and nobody thought any awesomer of her...

Crap, I have such a knot in my back, right under my right shoulderblade... I had Rayne pound on my back tonight, but she was being gentle... I think it needs a good stiff whack. Oh well.

So I spoke to my mom last night, about visiting them in OK. It's going to work out fine, I'll head out there on Sunday the 9th, spend 2 weeks, and head for home Sunday the 23rd. Mom asked if I'd be taking the Northern route or the Southern route, and I'm not sure- I was going to see what way the Garmin told me to go. *lol* Hopefully it doesn't tell me some idiot way.

Hoping the timing works out as far as KY goes. I don't want to be fully awake and driving thru in the middle of the night.. I suppose I could contact my aunt who lives out there, too, and stop to visit her as well. I hope the highways connect up to make it easy.

I also hope I can find a way to stay awake as I drive.. And not bored.. Since soda's out, no Mountain Dew.. Maybe I should stock up on No-Doz or pick up some of those little energy shot drinks. Ah well.

Anyways. On Friday, Brytne and I went to Rocky Horror!! It was awesome. :D Well, it could have been awesomer, but we had a lot of fun. The poor woman next to us must have thought she was going to watch a normal movie film, because when it was over, she was sitting with her arms folded and was all cranky-looking. Not enjoying our yelling at the screen and people throwing things and the profanities... *lol*

After the show, we tried to find a bar to get a drink at. The first one was packed and we couldn't see how we could even get to the bar to order. The next one was a dive, and just had townies and was just.. not right. The third place was juuuust right. :D There was plenty of room, places to sit, and the bar was approachable. And they had Mexican Hump Days on Wednesdays. *lol* Where you can hump Mexicans. :D It was freaking loud in there, though.

Since SiN didn't have to work on Saturday, Brytne got to spend the night at my house, YAY! We stayed up super late talking, and then she woke up early because I forgot the Spare Oom doesn't have room-darkening shades like my bedroom does. But Robert was in with her and kept her company. And then I got up, and we hung out, and went out for breakfast, and came back and disassembled the computer, and ransacked the rest of the computer parts. And then eventually I had to return her. Brought the computer and parts, and played the new Guitar Hero game for a little bit, which I totally trashed my voice on "No Sleep Til Brooklyn" first thing. Ow.

And then nothing happened Sunday, and today I got my Vacation pay check in the mail from Foxwoods, so that's good. I need to go to the post office and mail birthday and anniversary cards to my grandmother. Tomorrow we vote, and Dan will pay the guy $200 for that bet because Obama will win the election. *lol* And Wednesday we go to Brytne's to help with Big Trash Day and getting stuff out of her house. :D Maybe we should bring some of our crap up with us. This would be a good time to still have the pickup truck... :P

Yeah, doing laundry. :P We had a Rock Band night last night, and Dan had picked up Rock Band 2 (just the game), so we had some new songs to play. So that was cool. Plus we imported over the songs from the first game as well. I had checked out some of the songs before people came over, and of the ones I did on Medium, I didn't get less than 98%, and got 5 stars on all of them. *blink* So yeah.

We did fairly well, unlocked some new songs, and my throat was fried by the end of the night, as usual. *lol* And Maija! She was playing on easy, but she was doing really well!!

Got an email from Cherise today. She was canned before I was. She says that we were let go because the executive director didn't want to let go of some of his cronies, and he had to make cuts somewhere, so he decided to cut us. What the hell was he thinking. Typical, though. She also said that the Friday that I got canned, he had a meeting with the remaining people, telling them that they were going to call us back and ask us if we wanted our jobs back. WHA? As he's kicking me out the door, he's telling them that? I mean, literally, He took my keys and badge and I peeked into the conference room and said goodbye to them before he walked in and started that meeting. WTF?

Eh, back to the laundry.

I knew my cousin's wedding was coming up, sometime in October. I figured there was plenty of time to put in a Vacation form. We're supposed to put them in two weeks in advance.

I checked the invitation this morning. It's next Saturday. SHIT!!! So I have two options. Or maybe three. Put in an Emergency Vacation form, and hope that it gets OK'ed. Call out sick that day and just hustle the day before and the day after. Or go in that day and take an EO, like I've been doing all the time. It's at 4pm, so that would be feasible.

It's also in Webster Mass. So it's not like it's close. Maybe an hour and a half away. Dan will be screwed. I don't know if he'll be able to go at all. I don't know if he can get the day off on such short notice, or if he has *any* sick time left right now. At least we'd know my side of the family, that will be good. Especially if I have to go alone. Fuck.

Oh, speaking of weddings? When we went to Jay's wedding and were his only friends there? Dan spoke to Kevin, one of Jay's good friends yesterday. Who he didn't even invite. Yeah. He gave him a ration of shit when he found out. Good. We don't know what's going on there. Dan had Jay over a week or so ago, and Jay said that he thinks Mandy is Bipolar, or Manic Depressive, or something. Nice. They're fighting all the time. He really jumped into this way too fast, and we all knew it, except for him.. Oh well.

Which was in New Hampshire, which was why we were driving home from there on Sunday.

It was for jennifaerie and her sweetie, Rob! Aww! So on Saturday, they had a get-together at their place, and we went for a walk out at Mine Falls Park, to see the falls. They live like right around the corner from it, which is AWESOME.

( Here's a few pics I took at the park. )

So after our walk in the park, we played Apples to Apples, which Paige won. (Hi, Paige!) Dan and I stayed at the Red Roof Inn for the night, which wasn't as bad as it could have been. But there was no iron, which we could have used, and no kleenex. WTF? And there was only one packet of shampoo, even though there were two beds. Go figure. But it was relatively clean, and that was good enough.

And then there was the wedding! And I took pics. ( Which are back here. )

I tell you, it was probably the most fun, most non-traditional "traditional" wedding I've ever been to, and I loved it. :) I wish we could have stayed later, but Dan needed to get home so he could be a cranky person and bitch bitch bitch go to bed before going to work that night. Ah well.

I also wish we lived closer, because I would love to be able to hang out with my friends more often. I should stop putting off going to Brytne's after work. Dammit. Sucks that Maize is coming over tomorrow, or I would go over to Brytne's tomorrow. Oh well. Anyway!

I hope Jen and Rob had a wonderful day, that she didn't end up getting a migraine after all, and that they're having an awesome honeymoon!!!