cindy's world

After work yesterday I spent perhaps 45 minutes chatting with a coworker in the parking structure. We talked about my perspective on relationships, his current situation, gave each other feedback, etc. I realized that I have these mature conversations all the time with people who may suggest a criticism and I’ll think about it and either agree or dispute it and give my perspective on it, and they’ll take it and work with that, and it’s fine. No one takes things personally, no one gets defensive and yells “I ALREADY told you,” etc. I think with one guy I dated, he took a lot of things personally which shouldn’t have been taken thus; he’d make a blanket statement such as “If a girl got close with my parents, that’d be grounds for breaking up with her already.” I’d get into the discussion by trying to see what the borders of this statement, if any, are, and I’d say, “Why do you feel that way?” or “Would you feel that way if this were your wife?” and he’d get all annoyed and raise his voice and say, “I ALREADY told you, if it’s just a girl I’d feel that way. WHY would I have a problem with my WIFE being close to the family?!” I’d have to back off because for some reason, statements he makes are apparently not up for discussion and if it seems vague to me, then I’d just have to live with it and not question him. So the coworker and I wrapped up the conversation and said our goodbyes, with him throwing this gem at me as he walked away: “Your legs look amazing, by the way.” I thanked him appreciatively. It’s nice to have my efforts at the gym acknowledged.

On my drive home, I spontaneously decided…and people who know me well will know how shocking this is…to go grocery shopping! Yes, $71 on raw edible nutriments. English muffins, milk, eggs, healthy cereal, nectarines, potatoes, carrots, some canned goods. Here’s the second gem. As I was turning from one aisle to the other, an elderly woman stopped me with an “Excuse me, miss… would you like some coupons?” I had just finished telling my coworker how I never get approached by strangers because apparently, as I’m told quite frequently my whole life, I tend to look angry and intimidating. “Excuse me?” I asked her. She walked toward me and showed me a handful of coupons. “I have these coupons that I’m not using, would you like some? Here’s a dollar off of Juicy Juice…” I ended up taking a coupon for $0.75 off 2 gallons of Dreyers ice cream, which Ralphs doubles for $1.50 off, and got Vanilla Black Cherry Swirl frozen yogurt and Churn Style Mint n Chip Lite. THIS IS FOR YOU NORTHERN CALI ICE CREAM FREAKS!

I just read 6 verdicts on a two-defendant case in Department R. One of the bailiffs who was backing up the regular bailiff was hanging out after the verdicts, and the regular bailiff had already put on his radio, which was then playing the theme song from Romeo & Juliet, “A Time for Us.” I said in passing that I keep hearing songs that I used to play on the piano and it makes me miss playing. The bailiff hanging out said, “Would you like to have a free upright?” Turns out the piano in his daughter’s room at his ex-wife’s house (really close to the courthouse) is now unneeded and they don’t care to sell it, they’ll just give it away. That would totally fit in my living room! YAAAAAY! Now I gotta find someone with a truck who’s willing to help me out…

Not as bad as I thought, actually. I thought I’d be at a 1K surplus, and I only burned 474 calories on the elliptical at the gym this lunch.

Breakfast Jack sandwich: 290.4 cal
Hash brown: 147.8 cal (prob less for me b/c I drained about 1 lb of grease from it before eating)
Orange juice: 140.0 cal
___________
478.2 calories

I know, how many leaves are around me already?! It’s not autumn! I need to buy a rake already!

Well, this one’s work-related. I’ve been inspired to shape up and do some maintenance on the occupational pillar. I’ve been neglecting it for awhile because it’s such an auto-pilot thing for me. I’m gonna put in more effort now.

And in order to shape up work, I need to shape up home and structure my free time better. I started yesterday. Altho I didn’t finish cleaning up the house until 10pm and I didn’t want to start laundry I’d fall asleep in the middle of and have wrinkled or shrunken clothes, I did vacuum the entire house including the stairs itself (pain in the arse!), brushed Dodo until he looked much thinner and happier, did an hour of yoga (my body’s off because certain poses hurt me), had chicken soup, then fell asleep early. I fell short there, too… ideally I’d have gone upstairs and showered and gone to bed, but I just knocked out and had to shower this morning before work. I’ll try again tonite.

This morning I was up at 6:30am 😮 and showered and was on my way to work at 7:20am. Because I was in the work neighborhood so darn early, I decided to go to Starbucks for a treat. “Grande caffe mocha with soy, please.” The lady said, “I’m sorry, we just ran out of soy.” Who runs out of ingredients at 7:30 in the morning?! I walked dejectedly out of there and treated myself instead to a Jack in the Box breakfast. Actually, I’m gonna check and see how many calories that meal set me back by. The important thing is, however, that I was AT WORK BEFORE 8AM!!!!!!!!

Let’s have some perspective, shall we? You just sentenced a guy to 34-years-to-life and stayed another sentence of 31-years-to-life on his other count. This guy is 39. You, at the end of the day, know you’re gonna grab your purse and go home. You’re gonna finally vacuum your two-story house which you’re able to romp around naked in since you have no roommate, you’re gonna sort your laundry and get a load started, and you’re gonna do an hour of yoga to unwind while laundry’s going. Then you’re gonna have some of your mother’s homemade chicken soup that she gave you this past weekend. Then Dodo is going to tell you he loves you and talk to you while “Friends” or any of the many DVDs you’ve purchased that are still in their wrapper plays on your big screen TV. After that, why not have a bubble bath? Hey, that reminds me, that’s what your 3rd Dove wrapper said yesterday. That it’s a good day to have a bubble bath. It is a privilege to have your house go to hell while you mope over your pittily emotional problems. It is a privilege that there are no children to feed, diapers to change, third jobs to go to in order to make rent on a dingy apartment. There is nothing wrong with your life. Nothing.

I also feel a little bad over writing this reply in an email this morning (the recipient of the email doesn’t have the address for this blog):
it’s not about love. I had to learn that the hard way. loving someone is NOT enough. my sitting there loving and loving didn’t do SHIT for me. stop disturbing my peace. my life is fucked up enough without your constant guilt trips and putting the responsibility of the destruction of the relationship on me. I just got in major trouble downstairs because I am failing in my ability to function, I don’t need to come up and read about “Gee, if you don’t love me enough to get over this, then I guess you just never loved me enough.” What a load of bullshit! How about thinking about how strong YOUR wrong actions are that it could destroy my love and the conviction I had for the relationship?! What about THAT?

The Universe, or the Powers that Be, Azna, Jesus, Buddha, the Other Side, whomever you’d like to attribute to our superior forces, is talking to me again. It’s not thru music this time. It’s cuter. It’s through Dove Chocolates.

Yesterday, it was “You know what? You look good in red.” That’s been a sort of discovery within the last couple of years and every time I wear red, I get a ton of compliments from surprised people. Then, it was “Discover yourself.” Well, that’s what I’m trying to do. Just now, in the midst of overanalyzing myself, newly acquired information and how it applies to me, what it all means, how I should prepare or not prepare, and why, I unwrap “Don’t think about it so much.”

The Dove wrapper from years ago is still pinned up at my desk: “The heart has reasons which reason does not know.” It will be joined by “Don’t think about it so much.”

After I wrote the previous post I put up an away message on AIM that says I’m in the shower (“I’m standing in a vertical column of water. I’ll get back to you after I dry off. Or something.“), and fully intended to jump in the shower, get ready for bed, and knock out. However, as it was a few minutes into 11pm, I decided to watch the remainder of “Friends” first. The next thing I knew, it was way late in the morning, the TV was still on, and I was laying half over my covers, contacts in and everything. Of course I got into trouble at work. I deserve it, I need to manage my life better than I have been. However, I’d like to know who these clerks are that get off on going to my supervisor to bitch about why he “lets” me go in late so frequently. I don’t go in to his office and demand why he “lets” other clerks leave at 3:30pm regularly.

(no, I’m not talking about a piece of furniture from Ikea.)

I had a huge craving for MolcaSalsa rolled tacos as I drove home, so I stopped by their drive-thru and bought 5 guacamole-smothered ones. I was probably done gorging myself around 5:45 pm, and fell asleep in front of the bigscreen. The phone rang and woke me up when it was pitch black, and I assumed it was like 3am and that I had knocked out so completely that I didn’t wake back up to shower and do my nightly bedtime routine. I was kinda pissed that someone was rude enough to call me in the wee hours of the morning. I went back to sleep anyway. The next time I woke up, I struggled to read my watch. It was only 9pm! How off is my internal clock?! I’m gonna blame the food cravings, the mood swings, and the physical exhaustion on PMS. I barely made it thru my lunchtime workout today, too. I hope the body doesn’t burn less calories or make the workout less effective just because the mind is not into it. I still went thru the motions.

BTW, I talked to the person who called; the initial phone call was about 6:30pm, not 3am.

My friend gave me an inch-tall plastic Pooh-bear in a rubbery elephant costume on a string. You can bend the elephant head back and the tiny harder-plastic Pooh pops out.

As I was in the backseat of my parents’ car last nite going to dinner, my inner Chinawoman decided that it’d be a great idea to hang this Pooh toy from the top of my cell phone. I struggled but could not get the string thru the plastic hole on top of the phone. My mother offered me a partially unraveled paperclip to act as plunger. The string was unrelenting. Mom offered to try, so I passed up Elephant Pooh, cell phone, and paperclip. As she struggled, my dad gave helpful advice tips from the driver’s seat. I had a flash of brilliance and used a strand of my hair (I know, ew) to loop thru the string so that I could pull the string thru w/my hair. I attempted to push the hair thru the phone. I couldn’t get the other hair end into the phone. Mom offered to try this technique, too, so I passed up Elephant Pooh, cell phone, and hair. She struggled, also could not get the other end of the hair thru. We gave up. After dinner, when the whole party went to my parents’ house for tea and chatting, my dad used his fishing line in lieu of my hair and completed the project for me. I now have a Pooh in an elephant costume hanging from my cell phone.

As my godbrother would say sarcastically, “That’s sexy.”