Two months...

AHHHHHH!!!!!!!!

I am two months away from moving back to Pittsburgh and I am quite the swirl of emotions. I'm nervous, scared, excited, sad, etc etc etc.

We did some interviews for folks to take my position. One or two were quite good. The others I'm not so sure. I ended up working a 12 hour day with my regular work day, plus interviews, plus the supervised visit that I do on the side for extra money.

Not much has changed since I wrote last. I'm still working at the local Boys & Girls Club. I'm still single and having a love/hate relationship with that. I still hang out with the same people. I like my job most days. Sometimes I feel completely overwhelmed, but at the end of the day, it's a good job.

In 8 days, I'm going home for a week. I'm taking the kitties with me so they have time to adjust to the new house before I move home. They'll get to stay with Dad for six weeks as Mom is coming back home with me to keep me company and just to help me out. It'll be nice to have another person in the house. It can get pretty lonely here. I talk to the cats like some crazy person, but at least I'm not talking to myself...yet.

I find myself longing for a relationship or at least a date that doesn't suck. I've had a few dates here and there, but nothing has worked out. I'm both glad and sad about it. I like it because there's no reason to hold me here, like there has been in the past couple of years (cough...cough...Andrew...cough...cough...). It also makes me feel like I'm not attractive or something. I get that feeling like I'm going to be alone forever and that I'm never going to be the mom I want to be. It's scary. I know I shouldn't worry about it, but I'm 25 and there's no prospects.

I'm hoping the next 8 days go by fast. They should. I have to work a 12 hour day on Friday (maybe more since it's an event). Then on Saturday, I'm working the Father Daughter Dance at work. It should be cute. I get to dress up and schmooze. I'm good at that. Maybe I'll get some of those dads to donate $$.

I can't wait for my week off. I'm starting to burn out and I need to just sit back and not check my work email and all that stuff. Definitely not taking any calls or emails while I'm gone. The building won't fall down if I'm not there.

Wish me luck. These next couple of months are going to be crazy.

The Secret is Out...

I have spent the past two months trying to decide what direction my life needs to go. I've spent hours upon hours contemplating, weighing options, etc.

My decision is as follows:
1. I will be moving to Pittsburgh in June when my Bloomington lease runs out.
2. I will work for one year while I establish Pennsylvania residency.
3. I will go to Univ. of Pittsburgh to get my graduate degrees in Public Health, specifically Epidemiology.

I haven't written in so long because I wanted to wait until I had informed my coworkers so they wouldn't have to find out via this blog. I know some of you read it!

Reasons for my decision:
1. If I don't go to grad school now, I'm going to end up never going.
2. I need to get the heck out of Bloomington. Although I adore it, I don't have very many friends here anymore due to the mobile nature of this town. I think it's also in my gypsy blood to never stay in one place too long (thanks to mom's side of the family).
3. Bloomington holds a lot of memories that need to be put in the past. I've found myself dwelling a lot in the past lately, so much so that sometimes I forget that I need to keep looking forward.
4. I need an adventure.
5. To work for the CDC, UNAIDS, UNICEF, etc, it is best to have a graduate degree.
6. Although I joke about it, and my parents certainly couldn't care less, it's difficult to be the daughter of Dr. & Dr. Such and Such. I know the pressure is my own and I want to succeed, but I feel like I NEED to be just as successful as they are.
7. I don't want to be an admin assistant the rest of my life. I enjoy what I do most of the time and I love my co-workers, but the truth is: it's not what I want to do with my life.
8. I want a job that I feel like I'm making a difference in.
9. I need to get away from exes. As petty as that is, it's true.
10. I'm broke. Property prices are too high here for a single girl making what I make to live here on her own and save any money for later in life.

So I'll be moving in June. My lease is up on June 15. I plan on the Friday before Memorial Day being my last day. I'll be moving my kitties to my mom's about a month before I move. I think I'll be lonely without them, but I want them to get used to Mom's place and be able to move my stuff without them trying to escape and the like.

This new path that I've decided to take is, to be brutally honest, scary as fuck. Excuse my language, but that's the best way to describe what I'm feeling right now. I've lived in Bloomington for almost 14 years. I moved 5 times before the age of 12, but I've been in this town for over half my life now. I think from the time we moved here, I knew I'd move on eventually. It's still scary. I hate moving. I hate learning to drive in a new town. I hate making new friends. BUT....I love the adventure. I love making new friends too, because you never know who you will meet. I love having a new place to live. I love finding out everything about the town I'm moving too.

So AHHHHHHHH! I've told my coworkers that I'll be leaving. I wanted to give them as much time as possible to find the right person to replace me and for me to have enough time to train that person. I don't want the next person to be in the same place as I was when I started, which was jumping in two feet first with no idea about what I was supposed to be doing. I'm reluctant to leave as I really like my coworkers and the kids that come to our programming. I'll miss them all very much, but hey...maybe when I'm rich and famous, I'll be able to give them lots of money. :)

I've read a lot of books lately, so I won't critique them all. But some books to check out are:

Carrier: Finding the Danger in My DNA
What the Dog Saw
Any David Sedaris book

All of the above are thought-provoking, interesting books. Another couple of amazing books are The Price of Stones and The Love We Share Without Knowing. CHECK THEM OUT!

Another aspect of moving is all the STUFF one accumulates over time. You never realize how much crap you own until you decide to move. However, I'm proud of myself. It is easy for me to purge myself of stuff. I currently have an enormous pile of stuff in my second bedroom that I need to take to Goodwill. I also gave a lot of my books away to the public library and to the library at the place where I work. I still have a ton of books. I took some of them home when I went home for Thanksgiving, but I still have a lot. And DVDs....I own a lot of those too. Other than that, I really don't have a lot of clothes or anything like that. I'm going to be selling my recliner and coffee table and maybe a couple of other things, so if you are interested, let me know.

Finally, Thanksgiving was wonderful. I went to a magazine premiere for Jenny, a magazine published online by students at Youngstown State University. Check it out at www.jennymag.org. I met a lot of people. Hopefully, I'll be able to make some friends with some of them. We had Thanksgiving at my aunt's house, as usual. Everyone is doing great. I really liked that I was able to just do nothing for a few days. I had almost a week off and it was fantastic. I also got to see my Great Aunt Marlene and her new kitten, Odie. I don't like driving the 7 hours there and back. It kills my lower back, but seeing my family is worth it. I can't wait until I'm less that an hour from all of them.

Sorry for the strange construction and thought process of this blog entry. I basically just let my thoughts pour out on the page, which just means that they're just as mixed up as my thought process right now.

I hope to get to writing in my blog more now. Enjoy and I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!

One Week

It's been a week since I last wrote. I feel like all I have done is work. I worked Monday through Friday and then spent 4 hours in a parade yesterday for one of our units. The parade was a blast, but I must say, I cannot control my stress level.

It's one thing to put on a mask at work and try my best not to show that I'm stressed. I know it shows the most in the morning when I'm tired and it's hard to put my game face on. There are three special events coming up at work and everyone is stressed out. I have a stress migraine coming on right now and have taken some advil and caffeine to hopefully keep it at bay. I don't have a free weekend until November. I've got something for work just about every weekend. Next weekend, I'm helping out at the Farmers Market to spread the word about one of our events. The weekend after that, I'll be recovering from surgery. The weekend after that we have an event. The weekend after that, I'm free and then we have the oh so fun board retreat the weekend after that. Last year's retreat, I think maybe an hour was worth the staff being there.

I really want to get out of here. I'm sick of being stressed all the time. I hate feeling like the world is going to end if I take a day off. I've tried all the stress relieving techniques I used with the mentally ill kids I worked with, but I have to say, nothing is working. I feel like I spent a lot of the weekend sleeping and reading which are my usual stress relievers with no result. Stress triggers my fibromyalgia which causes immense pain, which stresses me more, which causes more pain. Today I feel like I'm 80.

I don't eat when I'm stressed, but I always feel like I could sleep forever. One good thing is that the cats have been behaving themselves the past couple of days. Sleeping with the fan on keeps them from waking me up too many times in the middle of the night.

Book Reviews:

Booking Passage by Thomas Lynch. I cannot rate this book. I didn't get past chapter three. The author is so incredibly long winded, I couldn't take it anymore. How many times can the author tell you the names of the families that live in the town he writes about? Really. I could probably tell you all the families if you asked me because he tells you at least one a chapter if not three or four times. He continually repeats himself and it feels like he's filling the pages with fluff. It's like a high schooler trying to fill the pages of an essay. He's just blabbing.

Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs. 4.5/5 What a well-written and ODD novel. It's a memoir and the man has truly had one (excuse my language) fucked up life. Every chapter leaves you with your mouth open in shock. It also leaves you feeling sorry, or laughing, or any other variety of feelings you can have while reading a book. Tremendously written. The characters are well written and it's easy to imagine them in your head while you read.

Speaking of reading, I saw another Kindle in person yesterday. I think they're neat, but I cannot imagine reading a book without being able to smell what I call "book smell" and being able to feel the pages. Maybe someday, but I don't think I'd like it right now.

Men: My love life hasn't been what I'd like to call successful. The guy I wrote about earlier ended up not being as great as he seemed. I did go on another date which was nice, but the second time we hung out he wanted to clip his toenails in front of me and thought I'd play video games or at least watch him play. Sorry, I'm not looking to date another Andrew. I've had a couple other dates which have been fine, but I cannot imagine being serious with anyone right now. I've got too many things going on.

I'll take any suggestions on stress relievers. Pittsburgh is looking pretty great right now. I miss my family.

Book FINISHED

Last night, I finished Green City in the Sun. I'd give it a 4.5/5. The author certainly did her homework. I felt as though she had truly researched the time period and the Kikuyu people she writes about. There are some books that feel like they are so well researched, they could have happened. This is one of those books. It is also an amazing read. I read 647 pages in about 3 days. It may have been two days. It was a fast read, however long it took me.

Current Book Count: 499
Current Page Count: 160, 511

I've kept track since March of 2000. Let's see how far I can go!

Sick Sick Sick

It has been quite a while since I've actually been sick. I admit it, though. I am sick. Pretty sure I have a flu bug too. I missed work Friday and spent all day the past two days in bed/reading. If anything, I've gotten a lot of reading done, which I feel is good for the soul.

I'm currently reading Green City in the Sun about colonial Kenya. It is a very well written historical fiction novel. The author certainly did her homework. She took some liberties, of course, but that is why it is fiction. I'm enjoying the book and have read most of the six hundred pages in the past two days. I'm past page 500 now. I might actually finish it tonight.

I hate being sick as my to-do list gets longer and longer. I really need to do laundry, but the thought of dragging my laundry to the laundromat seems like carrying a boulder 100 miles since I'm sick. I actually don't mind laundry most of the time, but I feel pretty weak right now and there's no way I'm carrying my huge laundry basket. I am never getting an apartment without a washer/dryer again. I've had enough of this the past 2 years.

I watched a very interesting documentary on my instant queue called "Born into Brothels". It follows the stories of several young kiddos in the red light district in Calcutta. They are taking photography classes and have taken some amazing pictures of their lives. The woman teaching the photography classes attempts to enroll them in school and give them a boost in life, but this ends up failing for most of them. The stories are very interesting, heart-breaking, and inspiring all at the same time. I'd recommend it. Then I attempted to watch "Tarnation" about a man dealing with his mother's schizophrenia, but it was so dramatic and bizarre (not a documentary style film, but more of a drama queen style video diary), I ended up turning it off.

I'm going to attempt to finish my book tonight and write my review tomorrow. Good night.

Back from Mom's...

Whew. I drove a total of AT LEAST 20 hours this weekend. It takes 7 hours normally to get from where I live to my parents' house in Pennsylvania. However, there was an hour and a half back up on I-71 due to gawking at a rear-end crash. By the time I got to the accident, I was thinking that somebody better be dead or in critical condition...but NO...it was a very minimal accident. Three lanes of highway backed up for an hour and a half. Ridiculous.

I had a great couple of days with my family. My grandma is convinced that something is wrong with me because I am not married and I don't have kids yet. I told her I think it is the guys around here, not me. She's still convinced it's my problem. I have to admit, it makes me feel like utter crap when my grandma tells me that there must be something wrong with me. It's not like I'm not trying. It's also not like I never want to get married and have children. I just haven't met the guy for me yet, I guess. I hope it happens eventually, but we'll see.

I have made the decision that I want to go to grad school in Pittsburgh. Soon. I need a year in Pennsylvania to gain in-state residency. The sooner I go, the better. I'm ready for a change.

I just finished The Masque of the Black Tulip by Lauren Willig. This is the second in the series. The first one is the one I wrote about in my last blog. Again, good story, some nice action. Again, too many sex scenes, unconvincing action scenes. I think the author really wanted to make this a book that would be both adventurous and sexy. It's both, but not in a way I like. It's like a romance novel on action steroids. The idea is a good idea; it's just not done well. Too bad. It could have been really great.

Again, I say:

Go buy The Price of Stones and The Love We Share Without Knowing if you want to read a couple of AMAZING books. These will not be a waste of your time. I want to read them both again very soon.

Labor Day....

Let's just say....TGILDW. Aka Thank God it's Labor Day Weekend!

I'm done with The Secret History of the Pink Carnation. I'd give it a 3.5. It's a decent read, but I could tell what was going to happen 50 pages into the book. Lame. Especially when it is supposed to be a thriller. WAY too many sex scenes. Jesus...no one needs to have that much GRAPHIC sex. Ridiculous. No one is going to have sex behind a curtain while they're trying to hide and be spies. Ridiculous.

I bought the book because it was on sale on Amazon. I'm reading the second book in the series just because I bought it at the same time. Again, I'm not that impressed. Oh well..

I have gotten rid of over 50 books. I donated some to work and a bunch to the library. It's amazing how it feels to PURGE things. I'm the total opposite of a pack rat. If I could get away with owning nothing, I'd certainly try.

Side note: My cat, Oliver, is giving me quite the look right now. I think I must have woken him up from his precious nap. We call this the "stink eye" where I'm from.

Work has been incredibly stressful for me lately and I'll be very grateful to go visit my family this weekend. It is really hard to live so far away from them. I just need to get the hell out of this town. I'm so sick of this town. This weekend: mom's house. Next weekend: Darryn's house for the Renaissance Festival. Rock on!

In regards to work, some times I wonder if people realize how freaking hard I work and whether I'm appreciated or not. Yes, I may sit at a desk all day, but I get a TON done. Give me a list of things to get done in two weeks, I get them done in a week and then four times as many things. I suppose every one wonders whether or not they're appreciated, but I guess I'm pretty sensitive to it. I just wish I had a window and a decent chair/keyboard/computer mouse. I feel like I'm in a box most of the time and I savor the times I get to go someplace like the bank or the post office. The keyboard and mouse are just crappy. LOVE the monitor...but the keyboard and mouse drive me CRAZY.

Go buy The Price of Stones. Seriously. You'll never find a book more moving or more enjoyable.

Go buy The Love We Share Without Knowing. You'll never find a book better written.

DO IT.