This One is Cursed

...

Makes me lol every time.

...

I'm still having trouble acclimating, honestly. About a great many things.

...

I finally went and got myself off on the vacation I've been needing to take for so very long now. I've been back to work for almost two weeks now. In reality, it took about 32 minutes on my first day back for the familiar feeling to descend... "Oh, yeah... I have to work for a living. In this place. This is how work is."

Right where I left it, I suppose... Not that this is an admonishment that I dislike my job. No. No. No. I greatly appreciate the company I work for, and the work I do. It gets a little crazy there, like any job, and its not a utopian society, by any means. But I do appreciate where I'm at. I'm in a good place.

I guess, its just over the last week and a half of being back, I'm not particularly feeling it anymore. Mainly, the whole "I have to work for a living" thing, which of course we all (lucky few aside) have to do.

No. Its more the routine. I read a zine once, in which the writer remarked how they were stuck in the rut of self-improvement. They were doing things "better" (eating healthier, exercising, not swearing so much, etc- the things we always tell ourselves we're going to start doing to 'get our shit together' but never really do.) The point was that the rut of self-improvement was still a rut, and they were still stuck...

I'm partly going through with that, trying to eat healthier, and take better care of my body, eventually quitting smoking very, very soon (see above parentheses), not drinking so much (<---). And I'm making progress. Sort of.

But its deeper than that, the routine of work. How quickly my mind jumped back into its "work mode," which is all I can really call it. Just the way my thought process happens while I'm work.

Like, what do you think about at work all day? What do you daydream? What fantasies do you have while on the job?

...

Some days I have entire conversations in my head. Sometimes with the girl I like at the moment. Or conversations with girls in my past that should happened, or happened a different way than I would have liked. Or conversations with someone in my life, non-girl related, that I might be in some sort of drama with. Maybe my boss, or some idiot coworker that said something completely stupid. Sometimes its scenarios that I play out over and over again that never happen.

One of my favorites, is the "I win the super jackpot lottery!!!" and think of all the shit I'd spend limitless money on. Which honestly isn't much, I guess... But who knows? I think of myself as meek and humble. I don't ask for a whole lot... Money is a great tool, and necessary, but damn, I'm not that into it honestly. But I daydream about the house I want to buy (I know exactly which one, the one I lived in before moving in with the ex-f, I don't know why. Living there just made complete sense for three years, and was awesome. I miss it dearly. People I know in town live there, and I get real weird when I go to parties there. Oh, snap. Earlier blog entries will explain it), the additions I'd make to it, shit I would buy...

And I rarely, rarely play the lottery. If at all. But I still have that day dream...

...

Heh. I didn't even begin to talk about vacation...

Which was awesome in so many regards. Thank you, Chicago. Though you and I disagreed about a great many things when I lived in you, you're still there for me when I want to come visit.

...

Anyways, I've kind of stumbled away from my point, which I kind of forgot what I was really trying to get to, here.

Oh, basically, all of the problems I left behind to go on vacation to get away from, are still kind of hanging around...

I mean, yeah. no. Of course.

I'm just not dealing with them, as I should be, or shouldn't be. Either trying to resolve them, or let them go (like, really let them go).

...

Which really is most of life I suppose.

...

I guess what I'm realizing these days is that no matter how much you think you've got your life "together" or no matter how much your life is in shambles, figuring it all out, figuring out your life, is something you're going to be doing for the rest of it. At all times. No matter what happens.

I guess I'm trying to figure out what's next...

Red Socks Pugie

...

Yes. Yes it is.

...

It happened a week ago tonight. I was about half-way through the bottle of sake I bought after work, one of my new and improved ways of enabling alcohol to get me through the winter, an experiment if you will, when I realized that the booze wasn't helping anything anymore.

Perhaps it was the combination: loss of appetite lately, recent breakup, troubles with the band I'm in, unrelenting work stress, stress from the b company and our very important string of shows coming up, family issues, and getting sick again, on top of pretty much being sick in some form or another, (even getting food poisoning or a nasty stomach bug (still reluctant about Chinese food to this day)), since Christmas. Oh, and my usual vices, of which I have been so fond of for so very long. And that I haven't had a proper vacation in a very long time.

And the fact that its February, and I hate motha' fucking February.

Michigan winters are completely brutal to my psyche, and pretty much everyone else's as well.

...

I remember a week ago checking the Cr@gslist missed connections, of which I am also fond of doing, and finding a record 7 posts in one day, that were all breakup oriented/not actual missed connections. Just lots of confused, angry souls screaming into the void to figure out what just happened.

I laughed at it, even though I was left feeling the same way...

...

I was rather enjoying the sake. I have this hot plate coffee mug warmer that literally doubled as a sake warmer. I will sing its praises eternally, and is currently one of my favorite pieces of technology that has actually benefited my life. Also had a thought: mild mannered coffee warmer by day, seedy, dubious sake warmer by night.

Though I had to resort to hot water from the faucet to heat up the bottle initially, by the time you're 2/3 down to the end, the sake gets fantastically hot. Not too mention the buzz is pretty potent. Bubbly and fun, but look out. Throws a nasty drunk left hook out of nowhere, and at that point its probably best to stop drinking.

...

I suppose it was the sinking realization, the gnawing in the pit of my stomach.

The booze wasn't helping. I wasn't enjoying it. Things were seriously messed in my life, all hitting me at once, almost, and there I sat, staring at the bottle, staring at the little hearts that adorn the hot plate (I found it in a thrift store. Not exactly my style of decor, but hey, it cost 2 bucks), realizing it wasn't working anymore.

I finished the bottle and tried best I could to pass out as per usual, but the recent sickness had decided to go full blown again. I hacked up goo all night, coughing non-stop, and upon waking found that my problems hadn't gone away, of course.

...

Let's just say that's the closest I've come to a full on mental break-down in a long time.

And I will say this again and again, that I have some amazing friends.

And some amazing friends that I let down that day, calling off on a very important show almost entirely last minute, which screwed up some stuff...

I did manage to pull my shit together for the following show, the next day, which went awesomely, and I performed in front of a sold out show, of maybe almost a thousand people? probably less, but damn, lots of people got to see my junk.

...

And there's even a coworker, I'd like to thank, who time and time again has given me sage advice in my desperate times of need.

She mentioned something a week or so ago, about quitting drinking in February, at which I scoffed, half jokingly, but yeah, more like, "are you insane? The most bone crushing, depressing month in all of Michigan, and you're quitting drinking?" I asked her that three times, just to stress the half serious part.

She simply nodded three times, each time, and said, "Yep. Best decision I've made in a while."

...

Mmmmm. Sake. I can't say I enjoy the flavor at first. Sort of resembles really cheap vodka in taste at first. But something about the heat element. That last third of the bottle, so warm and steamy, the buzz inside my body, so warm on these dark and lonesome winter nights, whooo. Was really just starting to enjoy that.

...

I'm off booze for a bit. Haven't drank since Monday, and even then that was 3 beers. Definitely avoiding the The Bar for a while, perhaps even longer. Let's just say dating in this small town can be quite difficult. There's a reason to be quiet about dating around here. Its a small enough, readily available dating pool, and incestuous (i.e. dating someone that someone you know has dated - basically, everybody has pretty much had sex with everybody else). and people can be quite overly dramatic about it, once they find out you're seeing someone new. Ah...

...

Though at the moment I'm not too sure about the future of this blog. Its comforting to write again, to scream all my personal problems into the void again. Honestly I'm not sure how many people even read it. I've only told a few of my close friends about it, which is odd, I know, how I'll let total strangers in on some personal shit, but won't tell anyone I know about the fact I keep a blog.

In some ways I started this blog to poke fun at my current career move, (Yes, I'm still a lowly prep cook) but also started out to celebrate the fact that I had taken a serious step in a relationship, moving in with someone, getting engaged, what was supposed to be joy, cataloging our new life together... I guess I've always been somewhat uncomfortable about that, in regards to writing in this one. Psychic weight, I suppose, a term I'm borrowing from an old writing instructor of mine.

(Some days I really miss Di@ryland.)

I've also had an idea for a couple different blogs I may want to try out, not just another me ranting personal crap on the internet. But one requires I enter the technological year beyond 2000 and buy a digital camera.

We'll see.
...