Seizure today. No loss of bladder control, but goddammit, my tongue hurts like hell.

And my mom and sister got to witness it. Apparently I was rocking on my bed and rolling around and making noise. Nothing too dramatic.

Just found out that I'm pretty much not going to get the most recent full-time job I applied for. Still with the not-ness. Scheduled for a whole seven hours this week. Birthday next week, so let's hope family can be generous, as that's the only chance I have of not ending up in jail.

Still trying to figure out the best way to kill myself. But I don't have a car and garage.

Trying not to worry my mom. Or wifand. Or the two and a half friends I still have. My dad won't notice if I'm depressed or not, and my sister couldn't give even half a shit.

Seriously.

What the hell's the point?

Much with the hotness at work this morning, that girl.

And I am, as always, much with the not-ness.

And that's all there is to say.

Watching reruns of _Will and Grace_ on Lifetime (hey, I'm horny and depressed and lonely, and Megan Mullally, especially as Karen Walker, cures the latter two [while exacerbating the first]) and remembering just how much I didn't like Grace's husband. Seriously. She should have just slept with Karen and been happy. Leo was a loser. And it's one of those things where I want to yell at the TV, "He's going to cheat on you!"

Anywho...

Actually talked to Belle Sunday night. Weirdness. A little awkward. I told her how fat I've gotten and she tried to pretend like she didn't think it was fat. I tried to avoid talking too much about her romantical life, since I can't even get myself to have sex with me anymore. It's fun being ugly, man. But it was nice to talk to her. Nice that she called me out of nowhere. She doesn't think I should worry about rec letters. But I'd be surprised if the Latin Teacher think of me fondly, if she remembers me at all.

My internet sucks right now. Sadness.

Another crazy dream last night.  But at least I know where this one came from.

I was reading some Devil Wears Prada fic last night, because it is teh awesome, and then in my dream, I was Miranda's assistant (which is even more absurd than Andy getting the job) along with Andy.  No Emily in sight, sadly.  I was madly in love with Miranda, who was sleeping with Andy, and once, Miranda decided to sleep with me.  Then there was some trip and we were all in a hotel (with oddly tiny rooms), and I was hoping against hope that Miranda would want to be with me again, and she just glared at me, said, "That's all," and kicked me out so that she and Andy could get down.

I'm beginning to think I'm lonely or something.

So I was watching the Simpsons Halloween show from 1996 (I assume), the one where Kang and Kodos disguise themselves as Clinton and Dole to take over the world.  And just before the election, Homer reveals them to be one-eyed tentacled space monsters, and they say, "It's a two-party system!  You have to vote for one of us!"  Cut to Ross Perot getting pissed, and then Kang wins.

But neither of them is a natural-born citizen.  They couldn't win.  Nader or Perot should have taken it.

These are the things I think about.

Okay, wow... massively crazy dream last night.

There's a series of stories I read online ages ago, and a couple weeks ago, I thought of them and went back and reread them.  So they're not exactly fresh in my mind, but... meh.

The tales involve an untrained psychic who acts as a private investigator, and a two-thousand-year-old woman from Ireland who can shapeshift into a wolf (but she's not a werewolf).  The two of them meet during a demon's attempt to kill the psychic and take over the world, and when all is said and done, the two gals become lovers (because that's what makes it fun, right?)

Okay.  So last night, I dreamt I was in that universe in place of the psychic, so I was Miss Ireland's lover, and we had just had an uber-fight, and I was very depressed.  I was just sort of crying and wandering around an outdoor mall/shopping center, when my cell phone started ringing, but I didn't recognize the number, so I didn't answer it.  Then my old cell phone appeared in my other pocket, ringing, but it was an 800 number, so I didn't answer it.  Then there was a page over the intercom asking me to come to security, and I knew that it had to be Miss Ireland looking for me, so I went to security.  There were three black women there in the security outfits that the folks on the MetroLink wear, and they told me that I was supposed to meet Miss Ireland at Roosevelt Bank.

I didn't know where Roosevelt Bank was, but one of the women said she could help me find it, so we left and started walking, but the bank wasn't where she swore it was supposed to be-- there was an unmarked, very tall, office building there instead, and she pointed and said (very dramatically in retrospect), "There is where you need to be."

So I went to the office building, but there was no directory or receptionist in the lobby, so I just ended up wandering around the floors.  I stumbled upon three guys I went to high school with, and they were talking about Argentina.  One of them made a comment about Hugo Chavez, and I pointed out that Hugo Chavez isn't from or leader of Argentina, and the other two guys laughed.

I wandered some more, and I cried some more, as I looked for Miss Ireland, and I ended up stumbling into a real dick of a guy who yelled at me and told me I wasn't supposed to be there, and then a woman came out and yelled at him for being mean, and... it was Rachael Ray.  Seriously.  And I recognized her right away and kind of groaned to myself, because she just annoys the hell out of me.

She was very nice to me in my dream, though-- I remember thinking that she's much better in person than she is on TV-- and when I explained to her what was going on, she seemed to know exactly what I was talking about and exactly what to do.  She disappeared a moment and then came back with some clothes and took me to the bathroom and told me to change.  And... well, they were cute clothes, I guess, though she didn't give me any pants-- just a bra, panties, and some sort of bustier-type top that was hard to get into-- but I was self-conscious about my excess of fatness (see last post), and she told me not to worry, that she would make everything work out.

And then I woke up.  I never did find Miss Ireland.  But I think I was going to.

So... yeah.  Crazy-ass dream.

Happy Halloween, all (though technically it isn't anymore).  If the dead came back to life today, no matter-- I'm just dead.  Seven and a half hours on my feet (it's not the working part-- it's just that my po' li'l feetsies ain't used to bein' used so much) selling people wine in oddly shaped bottles with oddly shaped labels and giving out free samples of gummy eyeballs.  And I was wearing new jeans which, when I started sweating around seven-thirty-ish, chafed the oh-so-tender skin of my upper inner thighs.  Much with the agony when I rub my legs together, but the sore spots are toward the back, so with my lack of flexibility and excess of general fatness, I can't see how bad it is.  (It really was the pants that chafed, not just the aforementioned excess of general fatness, I swear.)  I shall be taking a super-duper-can't-stand-it hot bath tomorrow when I'm alive again.

On the plus side, I've figured out mostly how to work the damned cash register, and I've figured out how to page people for assistance when I don't know what I'm doing.  On the minus side, the two people I closed with tonight (not counting the manager, who is awesome) were very... well, they weren't mean, and they weren't necessarily rude, but they weren't nice.  I tried to engage in conversation while we were all folding tablecloths and whatnot, and they kind of mostly ignored me.  I get the impression they think I'm annoying and/or stupid.  Most of the people I've worked with have been pretty nice, though, so that's a plus.

Even the customers were mostly nice today.

And my sisters are coming by to visit tomorrow and show off their Halloween costumes.

And I get to probably talk to my wifand tomorrow.

And it is now bedtime.

Managed to get in touch with the wifand via email.  Huzzah!  Her roommate seems to be taking care of her, at least.

Work at five.  I really don't want to go, but hopefully I'll enjoy it more once I feel more confident in what I'm doing.  I really need to develop some self-esteem.

My mom offered on Tuesday to drop me at work today so that I wouldn't have to take the bus/train (and spend the three bucks on the bus/train), but my sister works at six, and she, though she can afford to take the bus, refuses to employ such a plebeian mode of transport (she is just too good, you see, and, I suspect, more than a little terrified).  She will be incredibly peeved if my mother does not chauffeur her to work (this is the same girl who will call my mom out of nowhere to pick her up at work and say, "Be here in fifteen minutes," without so much as a "please," "thank you," or any other pleasantry-- it's as if she just assumes that my mother is obligated to ferry her to and from any given place on earth), so I told my mom, "Oh, don't worry, I'll just take the bus," but my mom, I think, wants to take me, both so and don't have to ride the bus and because she's always taking my sister everywhere, so there will be some time crunching.  And peevishness on my sister's part, no doubt.

Though her job would take her maybe five-ten minutes to get to on the bus, depending on how many times it had to stop.  She'd have to walk two minutes to the gas station at the corner to catch it.  Crossing only our not-at-all-busy street.  I, on the other hand, have to cross one of the busiest intersections in the county to get to the bus stop, ride thirty-forty minutes to the train station, hop the train in one direction, get off and wait ten-fifteen minutes at Forest Park to transfer to the other line, hop the train in the other direction, and then walk through an under-construction area without sidewalks and with very busy streets and very careless drivers to get to work.  My sister would say that's what I deserve for choosing to work so far from home.  I say she's a bitch.

I don't mind the transport-- I knew, when I decided many years ago not to drive, that I would have to take a lot more time to get anywhere.  But when my mom offers me a ride, I don't think I should have to give it up just because my sister is a selfish cunt.

And speaking of selfish, she's been singing, if you can call it that, practically at the top of her lungs for the past hour or so now.  It doesn't matter that she can't hit a note to save her soul (Lucy was more tuneful), though that doesn't help; what's really irritating is that she doesn't even care that other people might not enjoy listening to her, that I might want to listen to something else, or enjoy the silence.  I can't even be free of her caterwauling (from the Middle English for the screeching yowls a cat makes while in heat) in my bedroom in the basement, because the basement is unfinished, our house is hardly soundproof, and she is so goddamned loud that you can probably hear her wherever the fuck you are right now.

I'm not sure I've ever met anyone less considerate of those around her.

And now I'm done ranting.

So... still haven't been able to get in touch with the wifand.  I don't know if she's got a new phone, or she's in a coma, or she just doesn't like me anymore, or...  Probably the last one, knowing me.  I am the great destroyer of friendships.  Unsurpassed at screwing up my relationships with people.  I'm not sure I'm even going to bother calling Belle anymore.  She can't be bothered to return my calls or talk to me for more than about ten minutes any time I do get in touch with her, so... moving on, I guess.  She's got better friends than me anyhow.

I'm sure my wifand does, too.  But I'm not sure I've had any better friends than her in the past few years.  I'm not sure when or if I'll find a better one.  I want my goddamned wifand back.  I at least want to know why she doesn't talk to me.  I know she's busy, but... hell, I'd even take an email, just to say hello.

I was hoping to be able to get down to Oxford one of these days, if I ever have the money, but there's no point in going if no one wants to see me.  Dr. T would just yell at me.

If I did something wrong, I wish I knew what it was.

In other news... second day of the stupid retail job tomorrow.  I really don't like people.  And I really don't like having to be nice to rude or obnoxious people.  Retail is not for me.

I still think I ought to just kill myself and be done with it all.  Then I could be reincarnated and try, try again.

I've been watching Halloween Simpsons all day.  I love Kang and Kodos.  I don't know how many years it took me to figure out they sounded just like Principal Skinner and Homer.

My cat's going nuts.  Rather, my mom's cat's going nuts.

I wish Wash U would call me.

I'm going to try and buy a little teapot tomorrow.  See if I can get my thirty percent off.

See if I can even remember how to use the cash register.

I'm really no good with people.  I'm very awkward.  And my sister says I'm pompous.  And it seems counterproductive to train me on Monday and then not schedule me again until Friday.  Like I'm supposed to remember shit.  I have a crappy memory anyway since the seizures.  I don't remember shit without stress or necessity, much less with it.

I need to induce a stroke or something.  I hate sticking myself with needles, though, oddly enough.  Whodathunk, right?

Ho-hum.  First day at le new job.  Hooray for retail, right?  (Though I've applied for a position at Wash U that's essentially the same kind of work I was doing before I went to Canada, so... fingers crossed.  Thirteen bucks an hour plus bennies beats hell out of eight bucks without.)

Learned how to use a cash register that's probably older than I am, though I won't remember by Friday, when I go back.  Desperately need to learn all about wine, and fast, because they sell lots, but the yuppies who shop there don't know shit-- they're just pretentious.  And bitchy, I saw today.

I got to ring up a fake transaction of a pound and a half of coffee beans and 110 Pez dispensers.  Over two hundred bucks, man.

I made chocolate cake today.  Even though I'm supposed to be losing weight.  But I found a workout video for fat lazy slobs like me, so... I'm going to give that a try tomorrow morning when I get up.  Squats and lunges and free weights and whatnot.  Now I just have to make myself get up.

I also get to take out the trash and clean the bathroom and make tacos and clean out the fridge.

But right now, I'm jamming to all the old Simpsons Treehouses of Horror.  Monkey's paw!  Monkey's paw!

At work, they want to train me to use a forklift.  Except... the whole seizures thing.  The neurologist told me I should avoid operating motor vehicles and heavy machinery.  So... how should I spring that on them?

Thinking about Bernadette Peters earlier got me thinking about Into the Woods, and I then ended up listening to her big London concert from several years ago (like, fifteen), and in that concert, she sings "No One Is Alone," which is in Into the Woods but which was not her song in the show.  Still, I think her rendition is the best I've ever heard (it makes me cry), and it's lending a melancholy sort of hope to the chapter I'm writing right now, and...

It's Sondheim, so of course it's a beautiful song, but it's one of his best, in my opinion.

I just wish I could make myself believe it's true.

I want to.

I pretend it is.

It is in the story I'm writing.

I just don't think it's really all that true in my life in any meaningful sense.  The only people on my side-- mother, father, grandparents, sisters-- are the people I can't open up to and probably never will.  I mean, how do you tell your mother that you've genuinely been contemplating suicide?  How do you tell your father that you've never felt more alone in your life than you do right now?  How could I explain to the twins that I genuinely feel that it would not be selfish of me to die tomorrow?  How do you explain death to them at all?  My dad would tell them, "Erin's sleeping in the ground," just like with my grandfather, which wouldn't be true, because I told my mother to have me cremated after donating everything they could get out of me, but that's what he'd say.  And my evil sister-- the one who pretends she hates me-- would probably end up being devastated; after all, she didn't let go of my hand at the hospital until the drugs knocked her out.  She'd call me a coward and a selfish bitch and demand to take anything of mine that's worth anything-- TV, iPod, laptop, DVD player-- and pretend she didn't care and tell people she thought everyone who was sad should just get over it, but I don't think she'd ever forgive me.

All that being said, the only people I can open up to right now are the people who won't or can't or don't talk to me.  It just sort of makes you feel... expendable.  And you try not to fault them, not when you know they have better and more pressing and more important things to do with their time, but... you're left with the depressing notion that they don't need you nearly as much as you need them, if at all.  Of course, why would they?

Still, when I listen to that song, I almost have hope again.

I was just humming along to some tunes from Annie, Get Your Gun, and it just occurred to me that Bernadette Peters is over sixty now.  Yeah.  Wow.  I should look so good now, never mind when I'm her age.

And then it just now occurred to me as I'm typing that I haven't spoken to anyone who isn't a blood relative in at least two weeks, with the exception of my soon-to-be boss and the guy at the bowling alley who got me my shoes.  Trying not to get peeved... Everyone's busy except me, so it's A-OK, right?  Must be understanding.

Must be patient and sympathetic.

Must be goddamned realistic.

Must not pay any attention.

On the plus side, last night I spent an hour or so transcribing an entire episode of Law & Order for a story idea I've got.  I doubt I'll ever finish it-- I've got at least four big projects I'm working on right now-- but at least I can say I tried.

Can you say, "Goodbye, cruel world"?

I got a notice today from the people that handled my last student loan of undergrad, telling me that since I haven't responded to their repeated entreaties, I owe them the whole nut by the first of November.  Except I haven't gotten any entreaties or messages or anything.  So tomorrow morning I have to call them and convince them that I really can't pay them $9,023.03.  Do you think saying, "You can't get blood from a turnip," will be convincing enough?  Maybe I'll get lucky and they'll get me thrown in jail and I'll get shanked and...

Problems solved.

Seriously.  If I could just bring myself to kill myself, there'd be no troubles, and those in my immediate family would instantly have brighter, happier lives.  My sister would have no one to share the inheritance with when my mom dies.  My mom wouldn't have to pay my medical bills anymore.  My dad wouldn't have to think about me anymore.  No one would ever have to worry about not calling me anymore.  I could go merrily to hell for all eternity for my unforgivable sin.

It feels right now like I'm not ever going to get caught up on all my shit, and that, of course, in addition to my current actual uselessness, makes me feel as though there's no point in even trying.  Like I should just give up.  Just get hit by a bus.

My luck, the bus wouldn't kill me, and I'd be stuck with hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of medical bills for the rest of my life.  Call me Job.  Except, wait-- Job was blessed at the end of his life, wasn't he?  Never mind.  Call me Oedipus.  I'll be ripping my eyes out any day now.  Then I'll be able to collect disability and never have to look at beautiful women again.  Or myself.  Every cloud has a silver lining.

Maybe I'll just fall down a lot of stairs.

I'm getting my seizure medicine refilled today.  I wonder if I could OD with that.  Or if it'd just make me sick and brain-damaged.  I don't think it's one of those deadly-type drugs, unfortunately.  Although I do recall reading when I first started taking it that it can cause thoughts of suicide in some people.

That's a good question-- is it the medicine's fault, or is it my own fault for being a complete and utter failure?

Remember that spiteful, vicious cunt of a sister I was talking about?

Yeah, she said just this afternoon that, basically, I should be doing the bulk of the work around the house (or rather, she shouldn't have to do much of it) because I "choose not to work."  Yes, I choose-- or so she thinks, because I choose not to work in jobs that would require me to compromise my ethics greatly.  Apparently, to her, in a choice between money and morality, money wins hands-down every time.  She didn't understand why it upset me that she pretty much implied that I'm a lazy leech living high off my government assistance (or in her words, "my tax dollars," as if my tax dollars didn't pay for her Stafford loan last year).  Two hundred dollars a month in food stamps, bay-bay!

At this point, I kind of wish she'd go fuck herself off a cliff.  She says something spiteful and intentionally hurtful, she acts shocked when I am hurt, she tells me I shouldn't be hurt, she tells me I'm overreacting, when I explain why I'm hurt she looks at me like I'm a complete idiot, and then she proceeds to insult me in other ways.  Today she said I'm crazy for believing that animals have the right not to be killed for no good reason.  I told her I think it's crazy to believe in mythical sky wizards who want to send me to hell, but... tomato, tomahto, right?  We can have differences of opinion and of morality, and it's not necessarily a bad thing.  At one point, she told me I should move out.  I said, homelessness, here I come, and she didn't seem to think that was too bad an idea.  After speculating that I might try to blow her up and well, at least I'd go to jail, I said that I'd like to think that if I tried to blow her up I'd put some thought into it, and she then basically wished that I would get raped and knocked up in a loony bin.  At which point my mother told us both to shut the hell up.

So yes, here's to cuntface fucking herself off a cliff.  Metaphorically speaking.

After this discussion, I spent fifteen-twenty minutes in the bathroom crying (which my mother didn't seem to notice or care about), and when I regained my composure, I went out and cut the front yard.  Because I cut the back yard yesterday and did a good portion of the trimming along the fence that needed to be done.  Because I am a lazy fucking welfare queen who chooses not to work and instead to live off of the hard-earned tax dollars of malicious trolls like my sister.

Apparently, the only thing that makes you worthwhile in this world is having a (menial) job (or two).

So not talking to cuntface again.  That'll make this weight loss thing go well.

Maybe in her next life, she'll be reborn as something higher than a cockroach.

Sometimes I wish my mother had a set.

In theory, she, my sister, and I should all help with basic things like housecleaning and unloading the dishwasher and taking out the trash.  My sister wasn't helping so much-- didn't even think she should have to-- so my mom made a little chore chart to put on the fridge.  There are only four things on it-- unload the dishwasher, take out the trash, take the trash to the curb on Thursdays, and clean the bathroom on Sundays.  Whenever my sister's turn rolls around, though... well, she seems to take so long to get to the dishwasher that by the time she does it, it's mostly been unloaded already by people seeking forks and bowls and whatnot.  The sink and counter have thus become full of dirty dishes, and where my mother and I would then reload the dishwasher or handwash the dirty dishes, my sister just leaves them.  So we've amended the chore chart to include reloading the dishwasher along with unloading the dishwasher, but today will be the first time she's confronted with the reloading.  We'll see whether she does.

My problem is that she does nothing in any sort of timely manner, and she does nothing well-- when she gets around the cleaning the bathroom (usually not on Sunday), she does a half-assed job, and when she puts the dishes away, she puts them in the wrong places and carelessly so.  And my mother doesn't want to say anything to her ever because she (sister) is an absolute bitch when anyone asks her to do anything or criticizes her, and my mother is not what you would call a strong or aggressive person.  Thus my sister does pretty much any goddamned thing she wants.

She must have eaten a Caesar salad last night, because there's a bowl with some nasty slimy lettuce on the stove, and she's managed to strew a few pieces of nasty slimy lettuce on the stove and countertop.  I told my mom how gross it is (the flies are loving it, though), and my mom told me to just throw it away, but goddammit, I am sick of cleaning up after my spoiled, selfish, and entitled sister.

And I know she works a lot, and she sleeps most of the day, but she always manages to find time to spend with her friends and post stupid pictures of herself on Facebook and screech bad music at the top of her lungs.  I don't see why she can't find time to clean up her dishes or her room or the nine hundred pounds of dirty laundry she's tossed all over the floor in front of the washer and dryer (so much so that we can't hardly move down there).  I don't see why she never has time to help us with the yard work.  It might mean that she'd have to get up a little earlier than usual, but isn't that what people do when they have responsibilities?

Sigh.

And when I mention anything to my mom, even just the mildest, "Has she taken the trash out yet?", all she can say is, "I wish you and your sister would get along."

Seriously.  My mom seems content to let lazy, selfish people walk all over her.  Asshole ex, my sister... and when she does say that she wishes my sister would do something, and I encourage her to just set down some goddamned rules and maybe give my sister a deadline, she backs off and says, "Oh, no, it'll just start a fight."

What to do... 

Howdy-ho, folks.

My feet hurt.  And my left arm hurts.  And I'm rather sleepy.  And my nose is congested and runny at the same time.

The weight-loss contest is going okay thus far (four whole days in); I've been paying attention to what I eat, actually measuring things like I always mean to, and my calorie intake for the past few days has been 1400-1600 or so.  I've also dragged out my mini-trampoline-- Friday, I did eight minutes; Sunday, ten; Monday, twelve; and today, fifteen.  I think I'll stay at fifteen for a couple days, but my goal, of course, is to get up to thirty or forty minutes, twice a day.  I think I probably could have gone longer today, but baby steps, right?  And I cut the grass tonight and hacked down tree branches and bamboo from along our fence for about twenty minutes, and that hacking was great exercise for my upper arms.  And despite all this, I don't think I'm going to have any recordable weight loss this week, because I should be starting my period soon, and I think I'm beginning to bloat.

I really don't want my sister to win, if only because when she wins things, she is the smarmiest, most arrogant, most condescending bitch on earth.  She's been exercising with her best friend, and she mentioned going to the community center to get a pass for the weight room, but she doesn't seem to have changed her eating habits much thus far, and I think that's the one place where I have a leg up on her-- I like vegetables.  Seriously.  Even brussels sprouts.  So if I keep exercising, and she keeps exercising, and I keep adding more vegetables and avoiding more processed and sugary things (like the Cookie Crisp I had for breakfast today), I think I can beat her.  Especially since I've been tracking my vitamin/mineral/protein/fat/carb intakes on Nutrition Data to ensure my diet is semi-balanced and not just low-cal.  Now if I can only give up Pepsi, life will be terrific.

The best part of it is, the trampoline jogging hasn't been a real strain on my breathing (though I'm sure trying to jog on a track would be, at this point), and I haven't felt strained or gotten any cramps or anything.  My calves and feet feel tight, and my feet hurt, for maybe ten minutes after I finish, and then I just feel like I need to shower and change.  So I ought to be up to thirty minutes reasonably soon.  Root for me, people.

It'd totally be nice to be a size five again some day, too.

Also under self-improvement, my mom's teaching me how to knit.  I can only knit thus far-- no purling or anything fancy-- and only in a straight line, and every few rows I manage to add an extra stitch, though neither of us knows how, which I call looping-de-loop, and I really can't remove the extra stitch, but I can stitch it into the previous one in the next row, so that my rows are the same size again.  My left arm gets tired pretty quickly when I'm knitting, so I can't do it too long, and my movements are awkward and my form terrible, but I enjoy it.  I never really wanted to knit before, but my mom's been working on a baby afghan for someone she works with (she might be crocheting it, actually, I can't remember), and as I've been (slowly) cleaning up my room, I found the too-small iPod case knitted for me by an ex-girlfriend-- it's bright pink with a little yellow sun and a row of green grass, and when you button it closed, the button, which is a sheep, looks like it's chilling on the grass-- in which I keep my pitchpipe, and I thought it'd be kind of neat to be able to make little things like that.  So... learning slowly.  And I can't even ask my grandmother for help, because apparently, she doesn't know how.  And I thought she knew how to do everything.

Speaking of grandmothers, my grandma and grandpa are coming over this weekend (it's my grandpa's birthday), so it ought to be a pretty enjoyable few days.  I probably won't put in time on the trampoline, but I'll be able to control my eating, since nobody else wants to eat what I'll be eating.  My mom's thinking of making pot roast, so I may roast my mini-butternut squash to go with, and that way no one will feel guilty for eating without me.  Some fingerling potatoes, some peas and carrots, some spinach or kale, and maybe some homemade rolls, if I feel ambitious, and it'll be a great meal.  My sister may even spend time with us, instead of working all weekend.  Emphasis on the may.

And speaking of rolls, I spent, like, an hour yesterday grinding about a tablespoon of rice flour out of a couple dozen grains of rice in my tiny mortar, just to see if I could do it.  I'd like to be able to grind fresh flour when I need it (not in my tiny mortar, obviously), but I can't get a grain mill right now.  I thought about a coffee grinder, but looking online, I've seen about 50-50 raves and rants about the quality of flour it gives you, so I may see if I can get my hands on a used one from my grandparents or someone I used to work with, just to see how well it'll really work.

I think I'm done now, and I think it's just about bedtime.

I love Top Chef.  Love love love it.  I watch religiously.  I fawned over Top Chef Masters.  I yell at the television and fight with the judges.  My mother laughs at me.  I have sex fantasies about Gail Simmons.  It's a wonderful show.

That said...

I am a vegan, goddammit.  And I could not be on Top Chef.  And that's bullshit.  I don't think I should have to revel in having the guts and menstrual secretions and bits and pieces of dead animals strewn across my plate-- that shouldn't be a requirement for being considered a chef.  I just watched the first episode from Season 4, and the challenge was to make your own version of a classic dish: Souffle; Chicken Piccata; Steak au Poivre; Eggs Benedict; Duck a l'Orange; Lasagna; Crab Cakes; and Shrimp Scampi.  Hmm... well, the only one I'd have a shot at making would be the lasagna, and I could replicate some decent not-ricotta with silken tofu, but with Anthony Bourdain sitting there bitching that I didn't use real cheese?  I'd be gone before you could blink.

It's bullshit.  The same bullshit carries over to The Next Food Network Star (which I would never want to be or go on except that I might get to meet and have sex with Ellie Krieger and Giada deLaurentiis OR I'd get to punch Rachel Ray, strangle Sandra Lee, kick Guy Fieri in the balls, and set Michael Chiarello on fire).  There was one challenge where they gave the contestants a box of ingredients that allegedly represented a state/region, and you're supposed to use them all, and every box had dead animals in it.  What's a peace-loving vegan to do?  I can cook tasty food without using animal ingredients, and anyone who's had the pleasure of dining with me will confirm that.  I won't claim to be Daniel Boulud, but I can cook well.  And, say, Isa Chandra Moskowitz ought to be able to go on Top Chef with the assurance that she wouldn't have to compromise her ethical beliefs to be crowned the best chef in the galaxy.  If I want to go on, compete, and win money to start a happenin' new vegan restaurant, I ought to be able to compete without be asked to kill ducks and chickens and cows and shrimp and slurp down chickens' menstrual waste or fermented cows' lactations.  Seriously.

I know Anthony Bourdain has a bias against veg*ns, but why does Top Chef have to have one, too?  And even if I did get on, I could make something delicious with tofu or seitan or TVP or tempeh or, hell, beans, and they'd all go, "Well, it was tasty, but what I really wanted was a steak."

Assholes.

Oh, and oh my motherfucking god is my psoriasis itching like fucking crazy and I just want to scratch and scratch and scratch until my skin is gone and my ulna is sticking out and I bet that happy little bone doesn't itch.

The interview at the library today (well, yesterday) went well, I think-- one of the managers has family from Oxford, so we chatted about Ole Miss, and I explained my field of specialty (former) to her, in general terms, so as not to offend any Christian sensibilities.  They sounded particularly impressed by some of the things I said, though I did have to lie a bit (because, since the seizures began, I don't remember most of my time in Mississippi in any detail, or my time at my other jobs), and I may have overstated my authority a bit in my last position at Washington University.

My interview on Friday at World Market went well, too, and today the manager called me and said that I have the job but I won't be able to start until mid-October, because there won't be anyone to train me, since she's been called out of town for something (training a manager in another town, I believe).  But I'm pretty certain that this guarantees I have the job.  Now, it's technically part time, but it could-- and as the holidays get closer, probably will-- be up to forty hours a week, and if I work out well through the holiday season, I could stay after January, probably.

So here's the problem-- the World Market job starts at $8.00 an hour; the library job is $9.60 an hour.  But the World Market job offers potentially more hours, where the library job would be around fifteen hours a week, which includes two evenings and every Saturday.  Now, to get in good at World Market, it won't look good if I can't work Saturdays, right?  And now that I've got the World Market job, after having told them I was available any time, I don't want to have to change that, not if I potentially have semi-long-term employment already.  So if I get offered the library job, I may turn it down.  Especially since I've already made the commitment to World Market and told them I'd work any hours they'd give me.  I hate to go back on a commitment.

But, regardless, both interviews went well.  I came out today telling my mother that I have all the charm of my father (who, despite appearances, is goddamned charming-- my mother always said he could sell ice to Eskimos), which made both parents laugh.  And it's good to practice interviewing, no matter if I get the job.

This Sunday my old pal Hi-Mee and I are tentatively planning to go to the zoo.  Now, I don't like the zoo, but it's free, we'll both enjoy it, and we can chat and laugh at ape genitalia.  She's also offered to help me with the big story I'm planning, and since she's an editor by training, she offered to edit whatever I finish.  So I picked out a few very short pieces that I've written in the last couple years, and since she hasn't read anything I've written in a while, I'm going to give them to her to let her see what she's getting into.  Dangling preposition.  She will be nothing but helpful, though, and we wrote an (unfinished) forty chapter epic in middle school about the two of us trapped in the woods fighting a war against a dictator in the form of our English teacher (I lost the notebook containing our epic, sadly, and I'm surprised she ever forgave me).

This Saturday my dad was planning to take the twins down to the fountains in CityGarden, but it looks like rain now, so... I may try and talk him into taking them bowling.  I mean, five-year-olds bowling... what could be better?

My Lester needs a good cage-cleaning, but he does seem to like the new tropical food we got him.  And when I opened the bag, it smelled so good I wanted to eat it myself.  Like super bananas.

Speaking of eating, my mother, sister, and I are beginning an eight-week weight loss competition on Friday.  The winner, chosen by percentage of body weight lost, will get thirty dollars.  My mom weighs about ten pounds more than me, and I weigh about ten pounds more than my sister, so it's not too uneven a playing field.  I think I may have an advantage, slight though it may be, because I am vegan, and when I am motivated to cook, I eat pretty damned healthily.  So wish me luck, folks.

Just wrote my senator an email.  Go, me.

Job interview today.  If my references say nice things and my background check comes back all right, I can has job.

My shoes-ies gaved me blisters today.

Hot cashier at Walgreens last night.  Way hotter than my sister claims to be, even.  Much taller than me, but very friendly.

I saw my first non-white Mormon in person today.  I think he was some sort of Polynesian/Pacific-y ethnicity, but I say this based only on his eyes and nose.  But for those, he could have been Latino.  But he wasn't white, is the important thing.

I must get my pig water.