Balance and the Girl In the Mirror

Man, trying to maintain sanity in a relationship is WEIRD.

I spent all weekend--literally, from Friday evening until Monday morning--with AZ, and it was...good, yes. Definitely good. But definitely a lot of time.

It never felt like TOO MUCH time. Nor did I want him to leave. (I would have just said so.) In fact, it was surprisingly comfortable. But it was definitely...odd.

I'm having a hard time pinning down what, exactly, was so odd about it. Maybe it's just that it's been awhile since I had a boyfriend--almost a year, to be exact--and I'm not used to having someone else in my space. But it didn't bother me. Maybe THAT was what was odd--I expected to feel more smothered and didn't. Maybe it's that having a boy in my space constantly would normally send me down a twisted pathway of "OMG THIS IS SO SERIOUS DOES HE LOVE ME? HOW ABOUT NOW? WHAT IF I FARTED? DAMMIT, I JUST DID--DID HE HEAR THAT? DOES HE NOT LOVE ME ANYMORE?"

But not this weekend. That might have been because we had some time apart--through accident, he went to see a movie without me one night, and I ran some errands by myself the next night--or it might have been because we're comfortable with each other, which is true, or it might have been because I'm working hard on keeping myself in an optimistic and self-confident headspace.

BARF. I'm sorry for that last sentence. That was terrible. But it's true. I can get wound around my own axle very quickly if I'm not constantly told by those around me how awesome I am. And even though they SHOULD be, because I AM, it's unfair to expect my friends and loved ones to spend an hour every day telling me how great I am.

Although obviously there's no better use of their time.

But seriously, they could probably be using that hour for other things, like surfing the internet, matching their socks, watching water evaporate from the sink, whatever. Until I become rich and famous enough to have an entourage, I'll have to have actual friends instead of yes-men, and my actual friends have their own lives and needs, which don't include only meeting MY needs. So I've been working on reminding myself that really, I don't need cheerleaders all the time. I can remind myself that I'm pretty or a catch or smart or an exercising machine. Having a great boyfriend or a great circle of friends only goes so far. If I can't conquer the girl in the mirror, I'll never be comfortable in my own skin.

Stupid BITCHY girl in the mirror.

ANYWAY. Some more thoughts about balance in a relationship:



Up until this weekend, I'd say I would normally agree with Maggie Mason and NOT with the other ladies in the video. After this weekend, I'm thinking that a few outside interests can be helpful for blowing off steam. The kicker: I always want to know that I'm number one. AZ wants to email other girls, fine. When he starts ignoring me to answer his email, THEN we have a problem. And this could change depending on the relationship--at six months, sure, keep those outside interests going. At engagement time, I'd better be the only one.

Thoughts?

On Two Wheels

Aarwenn: I'm standing next to the elevator and a guy in a wheelchair comes up.

Aarwenn: And I'm having an internal complaint-fest about why The Office doesn't put in more obvious stairs.

Tri-Tip: In your own head.

Aarwenn: Yes. So I’m completely distracted when he says, "So, who do you think gets more stares at The Office? A guy in a wheelchair or a cute girl?"

Tri-Tip: Woah.

Aarwenn: The funny part is that was I HEARD was, "So, who do you think gets more STAIRS at The Office?”, because I was thinking about stairs. So it took me a hot minute to process what he actually said, because how could a guy in a wheelchair go up stairs?

Tri-Tip: And you start looking at him funny, because you’re trying to process, "But dude, you don't use stairs!"

Aarwenn: Yes! Fortunately I snapped out of it.

Tri-Tip: Because then you realized he was being quasi-creepy.

Aarwenn: EXACTLY. But this distraction prevented me from reacting very strongly to the creepy. Which is probably better for all involved.

Tri-Tip: Probably.

Aarwenn: Still, I was impressed. It takes balls to call attention to your physical handicap and use that as a reason to be inappropriate.

Tri-Tip: True. Handicapped people get a creepy pass, I say.

Aarwenn: Maybe. If I see him again and he asks if I want a ride somewhere, I'm yanking the pass back.

Published in spite of my mother.

Um, not TO spite my mother. Just IN spite of my mother's advice.

Sniffle Sniffle SNONK

Hello! I have allergies. They suck. No, I would not like any Benadryl, thank you. I feel fine, I'm just sneezing all the time, and since allergies aren't contagious, I can at least go to work. (Woo.) It's just a pain in the rear. Or in the nose, in this case. No sinus infection yet, thank Blog. (At least I'm not flying to Japan.)

I am applying coffee.

What I am NOT applying: cupcakes. No, it's not that random. Surely you've heard that cupcakes are taking over the world? That there's now two competing cupcake chains in Seattle and they're opening up stores faster than Molly Moon?

Am I the only one who doesn't grasp the appeal of the cupcakes? I'm just not a fan of that much sugar and flour. Ice cream, definitely--Molly Moon's has a loyal customer in me. Frozen Custard? SIGN ME UP. I've already been twice.

Come to Mama.

But I am so over cupcakes. I was over cupcakes twenty years ago. MOVE ON, EVERYONE. Please. I am beginning to HATE cupcakes.

Other things I am over: Facebook.

Things I am NOT over: Robyn's new album. Yes, THAT Robyn, the one who put out two hits in the nineties. She's back and her new album is seriously AMAZING from start to finish.



Other things I am not over: Dancing! Sadly, no hip-hop for me this week--my allergies kept me home--but I CAN'T GET OVER this choreography:



I thought at first they were high school students, given the venue, and I was about to throw in the towel and never dance again if sixteen-year-olds were this freakin' good.

Then I realized they were all professionals. Whew.

Happy Tuesday! Also, I changed my mind. Please send Benadryl.

Never Mind

Forget that post from yesterday. It was funny and entertaining, but not PC. I'm still deciding if I will post it. If you want to read it and give your opinion, email me!

Moving on: the weather here is absolutely GORGEOUS and I can't get over it. I have all sorts of plans that involve actually BIKING to work and starting a garden, and yesterday I rearranged my entire apartment. The Dawg was very confused.

While I'm rearranging my apartment, I'm having design schizophrenia. Last weekend I tried to buy a TV cabinet; today I'm pretty sure I'm getting rid of my TV altogether. Two days ago I was sure I was buying a real sofa; today I'm thinking about recovering my current one. I'm organizing my entire apartment around a big pink exercise ball that I don't really use and hesitant about making any real changes, like removing a big door that only gets in the way.

However, I HAVE cleaned out my back landing area, so that's something.

Forget me and my design schizophrenia and listen to this song, one of the most romantic songs ever, according to me, and this new update is AWESOME. I didn't include the video link because the video takes the song in a much different direction than the original Toto version. (By the way: song is Africa, written by Toto, updated here by Karl Wolf--who appears to be too poor to afford a shirt on his album cover--and featuring a rapper named Culture.)

Break From Serious

It's a Saturday--watch a fun YouTube video!



I hope alex, especially, appreciates this, since we had an interesting conversation about music forever ago that I still remember. I like Massive Attack, and I like Ratatat and Wired All Wrong. I like Zeppelin and The Turtles and Buddy Holly. I like Beirut and The Duke and the Duchess. What I'm saying is, I like my share of GOOD music, independent music, old music, music with real guitars behind it and real lyrics.

But I also like to dance, and so I have a soft spot in my heart for pop music, even though I know it's terribly manufactured. And videos like this are a good reminder of that.

Here Comes The Rage

I was sitting eating sushi with my mother in the middle of a work day, and although the lunch was going okay, it wasn't our normal happiness level of pink champagne bubbles and newborn kitten fluff. My mom was way stressed out, which I didn't fully comprehend at the time, and I had a different problem: my head was so full of stuff THAT I CAN'T TALK ABOUT that I couldn't, for the life of me, make conversation about ANYTHING else.

You know the feeling, I'm sure. Someone tells you a secret like "I'm proposing to my boyfriend, please don't tell him" or "Sally's parents are getting a divorce because her dad's sleeping with the babysitter", or something equally absorbing and awful, and then you go to a nice party where everyone knows Sally AND Sally's parents AND the couple about to get engaged, unbeknownst to the would-be fiance, and some nice acquaintance asks you a difficult question like,

"Awfully hot weather we're having for May, isn't it?"

And you say, "....Mmmm." Thinking, Don'tsayanythingaboutsally. Don'tsayanythingaboutengagementorweddings.

And then the nice person makes a complicated follow-up statement like, "And I hear it's supposed to be 90 this weekend."

And you SNAP and say, "I DON'T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT MIKE PROPOSING TO JIM AND I NEVER MET SALLY IN MY LIFE PLEASE LEAVE ME ALONE." And then your life is ruined. Boy, some people get so upset about a few secrets.

ANYWAY. That's how this lunch was. My mom was silent, picking at her food, since I had taken her to eat sushi, which she doesn't really like, and the rice was sticking in her braces, and I could barely eat since my head was so full of sex and violence and secrets.

She said something very prying and nosy, like, "Pass the soy sauce," and you can guess what happened next.

"OH MY GOD MY VIOLENT ALCOHOLIC EX DROPPED BY MY HOUSE AND KICKED OUT SOME WINDOWS AND THE COPS WERE CALLED AND THEN I HAD A GREAT WEEKEND WITH MY AWESOME BOYFRIEND WHICH INVOLVED A TRIP TO URGENT CARE AND A PHARMACY TRIP AND THEN I DROPPED MY BIKE AND BY THE WAY I OWN LEATHER PANTS."

She was a little startled, as you may imagine. She rallied, though, and spent the next ten minutes yelling at me for ever letting someone that could be described as a violent alcoholic into my life in the first place. Understandable. I said I had told T-Town, she of Insight and Intrigue, and mom said, "Did she say 'I told you so'?"

And I nodded, just keeping the conversation going.

But the really interesting thing is, T-Town never said I told you so. She told me plenty of times while I was DATING the loser that he was a huge loser who frightened her. But the minute the excrement really hit the cooling device, she was nothing but understanding. The Blonde Squad, too, was nothing but understanding when I told them later that night. No one ever said I Told You So except my mother. Which is only proper, as she does an excellent job.

YAWN

My brain hasn't really turned on yet and I'm having a hard time focusing. I'm at least an hour behind my first cup of coffee and it might be two hours before my current cup sinks in. This is always the difficult time of the work morning in which a meeting might happen and I would have to attend said meeting and I would leave said meeting an hour later with no idea of what had happened or why.

As a side note, totally unrelated, the Office has decided, for some reason, to stock PINK PENS in our supplies closet and they make me so happy. PINK! Now my notebook is covered with pink cursive, like I'm on my way to third grade or something, and it's wonderful. The pink wakes me up. A little.

Anyway. I've been silent for a little while, you may have noticed. A lot has happened in my life and most of it I can't talk about, or rather, THOUGHT I couldn't talk about. I mean, there's been some violence. There's been some bike rides. There's been some dropping of the bike. I bought leather pants and they look great. There's been some talk ABOUT looks. There's been some clubbing and dancing and some of my friends have made out with other friends. It's been unseasonably warm here and there's been a lot of beach-going.

In general, a very full life, but it's been full of the things that my parents wouldn't want to read about.

HOWEVER. I'm going to attempt to shake that off, because I'm tired of the parental gag order that I've placed on myself. My life is pretty interesting and if I can't talk about it here, where CAN I talk about it?