Starting Over

 
Alright, so apparently I have no self-control and need to stay away from The Simple Dollar and other such sites until after I finish doing everything else that I need to get done in a day. 

Are there any websites that you find yourself spending hours at?  Which ones? (I may be setting myself up for disaster here)
 
Sorry about that.  Yes, I know I didn't post pics of my zentangle.  I was distracted by my messy room and by reading blog posts. 

I'm a bad person.  Can you ever forgive me?

I also wasted a lot of time watching different people's versions of the "Single Ladies" dance.  Many were hilarious. Many were pretty sad.  Some were both. Very few were excellent, but those few were EXCELLENT. If you follow me.

I then progressed to watching Blue Man Group clips on YouTube and I think I might die from impatience.  I want it to be October NOW, darn it!
 
Am still slugging through The Simple Dollar.  Lots of great articles there! 

Downside:  Feeling more than slightly overwhelmed.

I've started thieving the grocery receipts from my Dad so I can get some idea of how much I will be spending per month on food when I'm living on my own... it's looking pretty scary already!  How much do you spend per month on groceries?

Going to visit my Aunt this upcoming weekend - she is going to help me with my resumé and I am going to cook her some food.  Plus there's that cool aunt-niece bonding time. Yippee!

Pigged out on pizza today - feel pretty gross.  Why do I do this to myself?

Also tidied up my deskspace - feel much less stressed now! 

Finished my first zentangle, pictures will be added to "Hobbies" section of the site at some point this evening.
 

Literally spent all day reading articles at The Simple Dollar - some really interesting stuff there!  Will post more when/if I get through everything. :P

 

I had fantastic plans for today.

I was going to wake up, make a delicious breakfast, have a shower in which I shaved my legs, pack a bag with a lunch, a sketchbook, a notebook, and some other various things, and go to the zoo.  After the zoo, I was going to go swimming.  It was set up to be a wonderful day.

Yeah, that didn't happen.

I didn't fall asleep last night until after 3:00am.  I was woken up at 4:30am by the chipmunks outside my bedroom window.

I didn't get out of bed and start the day until noonish.

Today was full of fail. 

and I forgot to shave my legs.

 

Just stumbled across an interesting tidbit of information - did you know that the voice of adult Nala in The Lion King was provided by Moira Kelly, who played Mandy in the first season of The West Wing? 

I love discovering connections like this between shows/movies that I enjoy.

 

Well that was certainly unexpected!  As you may or may not have noticed, I disappeared off the face of this website for a little while there.   So sorry!

"But why, Jenn?  Why would you abandon us?!" you cry.  "Surely we mean more to you than that!"

Well, dearest reader, you do.  You mean more to me than you will ever know, and it was not my intention to abandon you for so long!  Unfortunately, my vasculitis does not care about you as much as I do, and it decided to be a jackass and knock me flat on my back for a month and a half. Then there was the obligatory "Holy shit I can finally move again" stage, where I avoided the computer entirely... and now things are getting back to normal. 

At least, as normal as things can get around here. 

So, briefly, let's cover what has happened over the past couple of months, shall we? 

One of my cats died - Bailey.  The really fat, grey one?  Yeah.  She had been breathing heavily for a couple of days, so we made an appointment at the vet.  Dad took her up there, got her out of the carrier and on the examining table, where she promptly had a heart attack and died.  Not really shocking, because she was quite scared and obese, but she was only eight years old. 

Now, you would think that after an event such as this, my mother would stop feeding the cats human food.  But, no.  She is still giving them bowls full of milk and huge chunks of the processed deli meats and spoonfuls of yoghurt and ice cream or whatever else she has laying around. 

It makes me so furious. 

You know what else makes me furious about my mother?  Her cigarettes. I don't even care anymore that she's smoking them.  Fine, whatever, kill yourself with your cancer sticks if that's what you really want - but don't make me breathe your nasty second-hand smoke.  Especially when my vasculitis is making it difficult enough for me to breathe as it is. 

Anyway.  I am trying to avoid my mother as much as possible, because I am so furious with her that I know I won't be able to hold my tongue if I have to talk to her.  And I am trying to avoid a fight, but I can't help but feel like a petulant teenager.  What do "real" adults do in situations where they know they cannot keep control of themselves if they are forced to interact with a certain individual

On a happier note - hello, healthier lifestyle!  I recently joined SparkPeople (link opens in new window), and have radically changed my diet and exercise habits.  Not seeing any astounding results yet, but that isn't going to stop me.  I've been feeling so much better that it doesn't even matter if I lose the weight - though I'm not saying it wouldn't be nice!  My main problem at the moment is that I seem to be retaining water like crazy.  The doctor has me on Furosemide, which took off 10lbs right off the bat but now seems to be plateauing, and my feet are still swollen to the point where they haven't been able to fit in shoes for about a month now.  We upped my dosage the other day, though, so perhaps I will see some progress!

I have set a goal for myself of moving into an apartment in the city by this time next year.  This means that I will have to obtain some sort of job fairly soon - I'm going to keep an eye out now and if I don't happen to stumble on to something I will start seriously hunting at the end of August/beginning of September, when everyone else at my age and skill level is going back to school and ditching their summer jobs.  Also, I might take an Intro to Business course starting in February to get some useful skills, so that I can get a higher-paying job and actually afford to pay rent on an apartment. 

This vasculitis is really going to screw me over in the long run - CellCept is expensive!  I'm going to talk to my doctor at my next appointment about that.  It isn't an issue right now, because I'm covered under my Dad's medical plan for work, but that runs out when I hit 21 or am no longer his dependant.  Pharmacare is GREAT, but working full time at $9, my deductible would be somewhere in the region of $600 annually, which is money I would have to pull from elsewhere. 

I don't care what I have to do, though - I just can't live with my mother much longer.  I'm not even sure how I'll survive this winter.  If I were to somehow luck on to a decent job this fall, I think I would try to move out even sooner. 

Anyway, in the meantime I am focused on making myself healthy (or at least healthier!), and on getting myself out and about in the community as much as possible.  I am sick of being a hermit, and I find that I have less and less in common with high school friends as the days go by.   I want to cultivate my interests, I want to meet like-minded people... I want to sit in a park and watch the world go by.

I do not want to update my resume, but I suppose that should go on my to-do list. Blargh.

Have a fantastic day, and remember to smile!