January 2004 in 2000s

FRIDAY, JANUARY 30, 2004
Got 2 numbers this time around. The stupid idiots are so screwed up! The box that displays the numbers I chose for the next drawing wouldn’t display the numbers this time around, so again I won’t know if I got anything in tomorrow’s draw. Still, I’ve been getting something nearly every day and that’s hopeful.

They haven’t taken my points away, but they took that offer out. Now I supposedly have 5 surveys, but when I went and looked, there was only 1 survey. 10 points just to tell them which gender I am! Anyway, I could only stand to click up to 1925 points, but that’s about 1140 more points in just one day!

Someone’s been playing email games with Tom. We’re pretty sure it’s just scammers looking for money, but they claim that it’s got to do with someone who knows him. I just hope that if anyone has any shit in mind to pull on us that they don’t do it till we leave, for both our sakes. I also hope we get out of here before anything breaks like the appliances. I know they’re under warranty and that all we’d have to do is call GE out, but who needs the hassle?

Anyway, due to the move being as inevitable as it is, I no longer see this house as home but as a nice place we’re staying in till we move.

Fortunately, today’s rumbles were mild, according to Tom, so I slept just fine. Some weird sound woke me up the day before yesterday, though, for a few minutes. I think the not sleeping as well in this house is connected to both the evil that resides here as well as the openness. We can hear big trucks miles away. This is why I want woods. I want it for the privacy and to block sound.

I don’t trust any of my moving vibes. Meaning that we might actually be out of here before April, and I don’t know about the $135,000 or moving to the other side of Casa Grande either. In fact, both my logic and vibes are saying more and more that we’re not going to end up there, though we still may be somewhere in AZ. Still, I don’t trust my vibes that much when it comes to this because it’s not something I have a whole lot of experience with. As it is, Tom never got a job on the 29th, though that was the day we began making incense.

I’m just really glad that cock didn’t fire him shortly after we moved here cuz we’d have been totally, totally screwed with no money with which to move. Thank God that God doesn’t hate us that much!

Still, I have always felt that something didn’t want us here and I just hope to hell that wherever we go is a much better place. Something obviously wants a radical change for us. A change of job and a change of residence, so all I can do is just hope that something’s simply guiding us to better things/places and not out to screw us in the end.

I asked Tom if he’d go to a doctor or just live with it if he couldn’t lose weight and he said he didn’t know since that’s such a hard thing for him to imagine happening to him. That’s exactly what I would’ve said till it happened to me. I’m still not sure whether or not to give up food forever and just live on liquids and vitamin supplements to try to stay the same, let myself gain like crazy which seems to be what my body would prefer, or see some quack about it when we’re insured. I doubt I’ll go for the quack, though, and I still say I’m not going to get any thinner anymore than I’m going to get any younger.

Got a letter and drafts from Mary. She says she’s looking forward to the story where I bring the pictures to life, which was nice to hear. Yes, I still do plan to do this story after I finish the whodunit story I’m currently working on. It’s going to be a very hard story to construct as it’ll be quite sci-fi compared to anything I’ve ever written before, so be patient, I told her. Between its complexity and the upcoming move, it could take me the rest of the year to complete. I’m going to do a lot of reality-turned-bullshit throughout the story. I’ll have met her in jail, for example, just like in real life, but she’ll already be out and will be a famous writer. I used to want 1 kid, so why not make it lots of kids and have them, too? I don’t know if I’ll use Tom in the story because he’s too real, in a sense. It’s not that she’s any less real, but look how long I’ve known him compared to her and what our relationship is as opposed to hers and mine. Still, I think it’ll be a fun story to write. The next few months might be quite hectic what with the move and all, but I’ll get it done eventually.

She says she’s so different and that she likes different which I was glad to hear. To tell you the truth, though, she seems quite normal compared to me! I always thought I was quite a unique one, though I know there are certainly others out there who are even more unique than I am. Either way, this is why I always felt so comfortable with her; she doesn’t condemn or ridicule me for my ways.

Stamped on the front of her envelope it said “23¢ postage due,” yet it was in our box. Still, she might want to be careful, as I told her, and keep it to an 8-sheet limit per envelope.

I was also glad to hear she was over her cold and that I could help speed it along for her. I regularly concentrate on her hernia too, hoping to get her to avoid surgery.

The water pump is due to arrive via UPS on Monday which means I’ll have to sleep with the fan on high that day. Their trucks are super loud. It still might wake me up anyway but will be worth it if it does. They haven’t taken the money for it yet, so we’re hoping they swipe the satellite money first so we can run and close out the account, which we plan to do anyway and save ourselves $50.

I was surprised to wake up to find the leaves were already starting to unfurl on my big leaf plant. I thought the shoots were going to get a lot taller before they opened. Every time I think I’ve got this plant figured out, it surprises me.

We’re still trying various experiments with the incense. We got a few weird ones going right now. We’re soaking an uncut butter rum, a stick dipped in imitation vanilla extract and even my butter pecan coffee creamer! We’re hoping to find an easier way to make half-breeds as it would really set us apart from the rest! Tom thought we might use the kind of wax I used when I had braces to keep the two scents from mixing while we stood it up to air dry.

I emailed Bob at Incense Galore and asked his method, but he said it’s a secret he doesn’t divulge and that he’s even refused companies who have offered to pay him for his incense-making secret. Instead, he said that the most common way is a 50/50 ratio with a 24-hour soak and a 24-hour air dry. Nothing we didn’t already know.

He also said the angel oil is $12 a pound, but that he just hadn’t gotten around to getting it on the site yet.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 29, 2004
Got one of my double-scented sticks burning now, and now it smells of butter rum! Can’t wait till it gets down to the brown sugar part. I let it sit on the vent for a couple of hours to help dry it faster. So now we know that when it’s not yet ready, it’ll be all smoke and no scent and will burn too fast.

I guess I could soak these half-breeds, as I call them, by placing one end in one scent that goes halfway up the stick, then doing the same in another scent for the other side of the stick.

Later…

The transition of scents was cool! I ran and lit one of their brown sugars in the other room and went back and forth to compare. I think theirs is a little stronger. Same with the butter rum.

I’m now sampling the vanilla musk and it too, seems a little weak. Perhaps the way to get them stronger isn’t to add more fragrance, but to soak them longer like we are with the black pearl. This is probably why Incense Galore says it takes at least 5 days to process orders.

We still don’t know if it’s a ratio issue or about how long we soak it, but we’ll find out. Meanwhile, I’ve settled on my top 40 favorites which are: angel, baby powder, black cherry, black Henry, black magic, black narcissus, booty call, brown sugar, bump & grind, butt naked, butter rum, carnation, cedar, cherry vanilla, chocolate, Choctaws mono, cranberry, escape, fast cash, fruit, gardenia, grape, hibiscus, honey, honey musk, hot love, jasmine, love supreme, magnolia, majmua, pear, puddy cat, pussy, rose geranium, sexy, sun moon stars, vanilla musk, watermelon, white diamond & white linen.

Later…

Well, I haven’t psyched out the lottery, though I got 1 number, but Tom and I sure have been stealing points like crazy! It appears they’ve got a problem with one of their site offers. See, Memolink has a handful of offers every day, most of which earn you 1 point for checking out. After you’ve clicked on a particular offer, it disappears from the list of offers. However, there’s this jewelry site that’s not going away, so we’ve just been clicking and clicking away and racking up the points! Fortunately, he already had well over 1000 points and could get his to open in a separate window so as not to have to go through as many clicks as I do to quickly climb to 3000 and order a $15 Walmart card. I, on the other hand, have several more clicks and started from just under 1000. It takes like 2-3 minutes for me to accumulate 10 points, so who knows if I’ll hit 3000 tonight which is what it takes to get the prize. The prize is only worth 2400 points, but they won’t let you cash in on anything without a minimum of 3000 points.

I wonder – is it me who accidentally rigged the site psychically, or is it an error on their part? I’d guess it’s their mistake because we can do it on both computers, which means thousands of people must’ve spent hours getting point-happy as well, in which case they’ll probably take the points away.

Tom says we don’t have to worry about getting in any trouble as they’re responsible for their own site. It’d be one thing to hack in and alter the points, but if I’m psychically influencing it or it’s their mistake, we’re not going to get in trouble. I know they have had problems, though, because it says there are 3 surveys available, yet when I click on that link it says there are no surveys.

I wonder how long it’ll be before they either catch on or the offer goes away. They don’t stay there forever if you ignore them or, as in this case, they won’t go away after you’ve been there once.

One thing I know and that’s that I couldn’t kill my uterus, though my period is quite light. Still, it hardly seems fair for a woman who chooses life over kids (though it was never really my choice to make) to have to get periods. I mean what a waste! I wish I could go to a doctor, as much as I’m sick of them and don’t trust them, and say, “I don’t need my plumbing. Take it out.”

We’re soaking the half-breeds in a bag for 24 hours to make them stronger, though we can only do one scent this way, and we took the weak vanilla musks and are soaking those in bags for that long, too. Meanwhile, the black pearl is hanging to dry. As for the White Shoulders, we bagged half of them and left out the other half to see if they weaken or dry up faster when left out.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 28, 2004
Just when I decided to call Ricki if I still hadn’t heard from her come the 1st, she emailed me. She said she could do Bailey’s dress up with no problem when I order her, but isn’t sure about Alexa’s. She says she’ll talk to her seamstress. Meanwhile, because her mother-in-law just had to die now of all times, Haiku will be delayed yet another couple of weeks, but oh well. At least I’ll get her eventually. Then I’ll just have to hope that her father-in-law doesn’t decide to go belly-up the instant I make my next order.

I got up just in time today as not long afterward there were a series of booms. Most were mild except for one.

Got one number today. It’s good that I’m getting something nearly every day, but I’d like to get a lot more than just one or two numbers!

We lit another stick and got the same results – it burned too fast and smelled too smoky. So this prompted us to try another experiment. What we did was we took the black pearl, which we haven’t used yet, and put some into one of their 2x12 zip-top bags and threw 5 sticks in it to soak overnight. Some sites even recommend a 24-hour soak.

Later…

Now we’re burning a stick of White Shoulders to see how long it burns, but it doesn’t smell anything like White Shoulders. It smells more like joy which is a flowery scent. At least it smells of something other than smoke and isn’t burning too fast. When it’s done I’m going to try one of my double-scented sticks.

We looked at more land for sale on eBay and discussed the pros and cons of being someplace as far from a city as we are now or even farther, and as I told him, no place is perfect. There are always going to be pros and cons wherever we go. Besides, look at my track record. There’s been a problem of one kind or another in all the places I’ve lived, so we just have to go for the place that seems like it’ll have fewer problems. You know, like the difference between trash-dumping neighbors hundreds of feet away, sprinkled with dogs running rampant and sonic booms, versus bass-banging, ball-thumping freeloaders a few feet away, sprinkled with a chorus of barking dogs. So no matter where we go, there’ll always be something.

I’m still hoping to head north. I want the privacy and sound-muffling of trees, and I want to be where there are fewer freeloaders.

At least we know that if worse came to ultimate worst, we could always grab an acre of land for about $500 and pitch a tent on it, and believe me, this is exactly what we’d do before we returned to the city!

What’s really scary is how a person can simply seize our house from us, which in a sense, is exactly what the cock that fired Tom is doing. It’s as scary as knowing a person can don a black robe and decide the fate of a perfect stranger. How is it that this one here can have so much power over what happens to us, while this one there can have so much influence in other areas of our lives? And people we barely know, too. I hate having so much of our lives dictated, molded and shaped by others! Others whose intentions aren’t usually good. It’s just really very unnerving to know that others can do that to us so easily and impact our lives in such horrible ways. Just how do others get such a hold on us even at our ages, while we ourselves could never affect anyone’s life a fraction of the degree they’ve affected ours even if we tried our damnedest? I’ve wished the cock that fired him the biggest, most fatal heart attack ever, and at least I know I can fight back by way of spells. That’s somewhat comforting to know, so I guess I can’t say we’re completely defenseless. I mean, we can’t necessarily stop others from doing whatever they’re going to do to us, but this black-nailed witch can make them deathly ill for it or worse!

Later…

My double-scented sticks aren’t ready yet. Just like with the White Shoulders we tried yesterday, it’s barely smoking, and what little smoke there is, smells of just that and not of butter rum. I think we’re just going to have to soak them longer, in which case double-scented sticks would be impossible. Whatever it is we’re doing wrong, I hope we figure it out! If not, we could always buy dipped wholesale incense. Their 100-packs are $2.25, and if we sold 10 for a buck, that’d still be a good profit.

Later…

We talked about it some more and decided that it may be easier and better if I got the incense that I intend to use for myself ready-dipped. That way I’ll know it’s going to smell exactly like theirs and we won’t have to worry about having to keep too many dipped sticks inventoried. If we do get any orders, they’re going to want theirs fresh too, and not to be told they have to wait a couple of weeks, so we’ll make theirs ourselves.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 27, 2004
Got one number today and yesterday I don’t know what I got because I accidentally lost the numbers I picked. I’ve been doing a copy/paste job lately before closing the window that displays them.

Amazingly I haven’t heard any flying for a few days, but they did wake me up a few days ago. I pretty much wake up once or twice every time I sleep, be it for a reason or not. I just don’t seem to always sleep so well in this place.

Like Mary said, it’s a shame to lose the house, but we’re ready to go so we won’t be so tight. I’m also sick of all the damn dogs and the foul odors. I just hope the new people are as nose deaf to them as Tom is! It seems to be worse at certain times and I know it’s somehow connected to the heat pump. Either way, I’m just glad it’s not going to be my problem for much longer unless the same thing happens where we’re going.

I’m just tired of other people deciding our fate for us. Because that cock had to go and fuck Tom over at the bank, we’re forced to move now. Again, we’re ready to go, but we should’ve been allowed to go when we say so and not when someone else’s vindictiveness says so. This is one of the many reasons I disagree with Mary when she says we control our own fate. As I told her, sure we do if we’re dumb enough to stand in the middle of a freeway and get struck by a car in which case we have no one to blame but ourselves, but sometimes, like it or not, other people or God really do make up our minds for us. They really do. If someone gets and dies of cancer, is that them deciding their own fate? If someone gets murdered by some madman, did they reap what they sowed? Did a poor innocent victim like Gretchen ask for what she got? Absolutely not, in my opinion! So this is why I was shocked when Mary wrote in her book that we give what we get and reap what we sow and decide our own fates. To a degree, we do decide our own fates, but not entirely. Also, if we get what we give, then why did Justin return her love with slaps, kicks, punches and rapings? Well, I’m sorry, but I didn’t “ask for” the kind of parents I had or for what the freeloaders did to me and I don’t think Mary asked for what Justin did to her! That would just be totally unfair to say. She should’ve broken away from him sooner than she did just like I should’ve cut off my family sooner than I did what with the way they were such a negative influence on me, but to say we asked for what we got seems a bit ludicrous.

She also says we’re responsible for the things that happen to us and that to me is utterly ridiculous. Again, were Gretchen and all the other innocent children in the world who were murdered responsible for what happened to them?

The biggest thing I disagree with is how she said that the more we disconnect from God, the more we invite chaos and pain. Then why did she go through more chaos and pain than anyone else I know all the while being very connected to God, and how come my life improves the more I turn away from him? Especially since I feel I’m turning away from an enemy. My life may not be perfect and I know I can’t “hide” from God, but I still feel a lot happier and much more at peace by not going out of my way to acknowledge him. I have no faith or trust in him and could never forgive him for allowing me to experience just one of the horrendous experiences I’ve had, let alone all of them. I could never again pray to him and would be very nervous if someone else did on my behalf.

I love Mary dearly and would never try to change her way of thinking or condemn her for her beliefs in any way shape or form, but you just can’t group everyone together and apply the same rules to everyone. It just doesn’t work that way.

I don’t think there is a right or a wrong way to think, feel and believe as long as we’re not hurting others. I don’t think it’s wrong, for example, to be a racist any more than I think it’s wrong not to be one. I say to each their own. Non-racists can call racists “misguided,” but it’s just as easy for racists to say, “Hey, until you’ve been screwed over like crazy by a certain group, don’t judge me.” So this is why I believe in individuality as far as beliefs go. If someone hates my kind, and believe me, the world is filled with tons of Jew-haters and gay-haters – fine. I don’t care as long as they don’t go to harm me in any way or set out to try to change me.

Anyway, I did some drafts for Mary last night which was cool cuz it broke up the monotony of the same old, same old, and I didn’t feel like working on my own book at the time.

Her latest favor was to translate a letter she wrote for Maria, José’s mom, as well as teach her more Spanish, and at first I was like, shit, another favor? But then I realized it’d be good practice for me so I translated the letter, and pretty fast, too. Not bad at all for a girl who grew up in an all-white Jewish town.

As for teaching her more Spanish, I told her that’d be rather difficult to do by mail and to just use the basic vocabulary and pronunciation guide I typed up for her for now.

I guess the appetite suppressants work better than I gave them credit for. After all, I’m not hungry all the time and I haven’t been overeating. I can even skip days and still be ok.

The water pump people say they screwed up and are still planning to send the damn thing via UPS, but of course we couldn’t get a discount. And profit from someone else’s mistake? That’ll be the day!

Although Little Buddy didn’t win anything, they sent mail saying he is going to be in their coffee table book which is due to be out in June. I also permitted them to give others permission to license his picture if they want to, though, I can’t imagine anyone would. If they did, I’d get royalties.

Tom did our taxes online and was pleased to learn that we’ll be getting back almost $800 from the government and will only owe the state $9. We’re thinking of setting it aside to put money down on land somewhere while we’re selling the house so that we won’t have to be holed up in a hotel as long. We both agree that we’re tired of living in a wide-open oven and would prefer to go to a place with more mountains and trees, so it looks like the moving vibes I knew I couldn’t trust in the first place, may be wrong. We may end up in northern AZ, but I can’t yet say for sure. The only drawback to a place like that would be that we couldn’t have a phone because the cell phones wouldn’t work there and we’d be too far from any phone lines. This is a little unnerving in case of a medical emergency, but as Tom pointed out, you could have an emergency two blocks from a hospital and still not get there in time to be helped, so it doesn’t really matter. I already made up my mind a long time ago; when it’s my time to go, it’s my time to go, and if he goes first, I’m just gonna hop on into the enclosed garage I hope we’ll have, jump in the car, fire it up, and fall into an endless sleep that not even the sonic boomers can wake me from. Hey, it’d be better than hanging or shooting myself.

Anyway, we’ll probably purchase the land on eBay and get the realtor out here next month. I definitely don’t want to stay here and watch him work 2 jobs at 60 or more hours a week to barely make ends meet and to have no life while he’s at it. So I’m both sad and excited about us moving on. If you ask me, there are both pros and cons to leaving/staying in AZ. I’m all for leaving, I’m all for staying. As long as Tom and I are together, I don’t care where we live as long as it isn’t in the Arctic!

I can’t lie and say it wouldn’t make me happy to be further away from Phoenix which is where I assume Mary will live when she gets out.

Tom left a message on his mom’s machine asking if she needs her taxes done cuz that’ll get us a few extra bucks right there, even if it’s not much.

Now for the best news and that’s my supplies arrived! They might’ve come in yesterday, but he got to the PO too early. I’m not even going to tell Paula about this cuz then I’ll have to deal with the gimme, gimme, gimme shit and that gets old. There’s a time to do for others without expecting in return, then there’s a time to ask ourselves if we’re being taken advantage of.

Anyway, it was so cool to finally have the stuff, and sure enough, blank sticks look just like tan-colored sticks. They turned brown the instant we doused them with fragrance/cutter. We experimented by trying different ratio mixtures, like 1 eyedropper full of fragrance and 1 eyedropper full of cutter, then we’d do 2 fragrances/1 cutter, and 1 fragrance/2 cutters. We did this with the vanilla musk. With the White Shoulders, however, we simply dipped a bundle. Then, we did a really neat experiment and coated half of 5 different sticks with brown sugar and let them sit for a few hours. Then we doused the other half in butter rum. That ought to be so cool! I can see why they don’t sell mixed sticks, though, as it was quite a bit of work.

I lit a blank and it burned the way scented sticks do, only it smelled of smoke. So somebody can expect a prank blank real soon!

We really are slow at times, though. Here we were, trying to drain them in the pan we dipped them in, yet they’d continue to soak up what would drain to the bottom. So then Tom started to put together a rather intricate way to hang them, till I suggested we run a string along the little hooks under the cabinets and clip the bundles to that and then let them drip into the pan. After we went through all that was when we realized that all we needed to do was just stand them on the stick end that you handle them by. At least we figured that one out early on!

After several hours of air drying, we decided to try and light one to see what happened. It definitely wasn’t ready as it was burning too fast and too smoky.

We also agree it probably won’t be good to use anything alcohol based because that’d make it burn too fast too, but we’d still like to try to make our own scents out of some kind of plants.

I’m going to end up with about 50 favorites, but until we move and are doing better financially, we’re not going to get them all at once. At an average of $4 for a ¼ lb. bottle, they’d all cost $200. We also don’t want to start selling too many different ones until and if the people demand more and it looks like we’ll be more successful with it than anticipated. For now we’re going to start with 3 basic variety packs that I’ve tentatively decided shall consist of 4 or 5 sticks of 5 fragrances each. Variety pack #1 will be vanilla musk, fruit, butter rum, brown sugar and chocolate. Variety pack #2 will be jasmine, carnation, cedar, magnolia and gardenia. Variety pack #3 will be angel, hot love, black magic, Puddy Cat, and fast cash. We decided that 10 sticks for $1.50 is too high, so we’ll probably set the variety packs, which will include burners, at $5 each. Then, if they like a particular scent, they can get 10-packs for a buck. Technically, Tom did the math and found we could profit as low as 50¢.

The stuff comes in plastic bottles and we figure each one can do approximately 1000 or more sticks. Not bad for a few bucks. Fragrances can also be bought in ½ lb. and 1 lb. bottles as well.

I never would’ve believed it if someone had told me I’d get really into this stuff. Those who say life isn’t what we plan are right for the most part, and life really is one big accident. Especially since I stumbled upon their site quite by accident!

My weight has dropped again, though I still don’t expect it to drop significantly.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 25, 2004
Tom’s half-dollars ended up selling for $38 to someone in New York, and I’m a little worried over the fact that out of the 20 or so feedbacks they have, they have one negative one. They took their sweet time in paying for something they won, and with our shit luck, this may happen to us, too.

We ended up going to Walmart at around midnight. I got another sleeper shirt with black dots, only this one’s blue.

We also got those pasta pots with holes in their covers for draining spaghetti when you lock the cover in place.

I did get Fairytopia, but they didn’t have the pink or blue one so I got the lavender one. It’s really beautiful and the lavender hair is way cool looking. She has a touch of lavender body glitter and even her skin has a faint lavender hue to it. I’d like to get the other colors someday and put them on matching stands.

Despite my 1500-calorie intake yesterday and my 2-hour workout, I’m up 2 pounds to 129. I always jump up when I hit 127. I guess those who say exercising doesn’t really burn calories and that the only way to avoid extra calories is to not have them in the first place are right. I still don’t think anything’s wrong, because what about the millions of other middle-aged people who can’t lose weight? They don’t all have something wrong. Besides, if I did, I wouldn’t want to know. After all the years of dealing with quack doctors, I wouldn’t want to have to deal with it. As long as I don’t get sick or end up gaining hundreds of pounds, I’m fine with staying where I’m at, even if it means I’m pretty chunked out. I’m still going to bounce too, as it keeps me fit. I am in totally awesome shape. I have great strength, and stamina and am fairly flexible for my age. Because I have a lot of fat, though, it’s hard to tell how muscular I really am.

Just when I thought there’d never be any more, there were 16 downloads within my Barbie and fashion doll album.

Later…

Just finished workout 3 of 4. I’m doing a total of 2 hours a day. Since the mini sticks burn for half an hour I bounce to one of those to keep my time while I play MP3s. I know it’s a lot of exercise to maintain the same overweight weight, but if I sit on my ass and do nothing, I’ll be an inch wider each month.

At least I’ve sorted through the facts and myths throughout both my experience and research. I know for one that it’s bullshit to say you can do or take things to speed up your metabolism any more than you can change your shape. If we could change our shapes, we could change our heights. We can make slight alterations, but that’s about it. Boyish figures simply don’t become curvy and curvy figures don’t suddenly become lanky. Once we’re full-grown, we’ve pretty much developed whatever shape we’re going to be.

Paula’s off probation next month, but knowing her, it’ll just be a matter of time before she’s right back on it. Paula’s crimes of violence are anything but framed or trumped up. She’s the genuine article, I’m afraid. Massachusetts may be mild compared to Arizona, but still, the system doesn’t get it. It just doesn’t get it. You can’t force help on those who don’t want to be helped and you can’t make people change their ways. It’s human nature to rebel against dictatorship, so the more you try to boss people around, the more they’re going to rebel. It’s not mostly about change and rehabilitation as far as the system goes anyway; it’s about power and control.

If all goes well I’ll have my supplies tomorrow and will hear from Ricki some time during the week, too.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 24, 2004
Only 1 number this time. Meanwhile, the baseball cards sold for $54 to a guy in Illinois.

Tom’s making real progress as far as programming games for the website goes and even came up with the wacky idea of having an online pet cemetery. As we both agreed, if we’re going to get punished just for existing, why not make it for a reason? So why not take advantage of people’s grief and ask $15 to put their dead pet’s pictures in our little cemetery?

It’s now been 4 weeks without the inhalers, and I still haven’t needed the snot spray and can handle roughage just fine, on top of the fact that this may be the first winter I’ve known Tom where he didn’t get any colds.

It was funny how last night he said he was stuck and I offered to put a spell on him. He said not to worry if I couldn’t because he’d go when he got up since he had potatoes. I knew it would work, though, and was in the bedroom sipping coffee when I heard the other bathroom door open and the sound of his footsteps approaching to say goodnight. I called out “You’re welcome,” and he laughed, then said goodnight and hit the sack.

He’s napping right now because we plan to go to Walmart late tonight when there are fewer people. We felt that even 11:00 was too early being a Saturday night, so we’ll probably go at 2:00. Before we get groceries, he’ll do his application and I’ll spend a little money on fun stuff now that we’re doing a little better thanks to his eBay sales. The half-dollars end tomorrow, then up goes the mixed coins and the plates.

I like going out in the middle of the night so much better. Not just because there are fewer people, but also because there are fewer people creeping along the roads to hold us up, and especially at times when we can’t pass them. Such control freaks we’ve got in this world! I mean, a lot of idiots will pass us, then slow down once they get in front of us and hold us up just so they can feel they’ve controlled someone else’s actions. The last time we went there we passed this creep, then the little cock was right on top of us.

Everyone’s ignoring us and it really irritates the shit out of me. Tom emailed the water pump people and hasn’t gotten a response back. At least they haven’t taken any money. Even so, he’s going to email them once again tomorrow if he hasn’t heard from them by then and tell them to forget it, then he’ll buy the damn thing locally. Incense Galore hasn’t answered my question as to why Angel’s not on their wholesale list and Ricki hasn’t responded to the two messages I’ve left her.

Why do people always have to die at my expense? Some cock was killed on a motorcycle, delaying the installation of the carpet here cuz the carpet layer was best buddies with the person. A death delayed the overpriced fairy I got from that doll place where Mary is. I could go on with other deaths that have interfered with our lives, but I won’t bother. It just really annoys me when the events in other people’s lives put me out, and I don’t care how selfish or insensitive I sound.

There’s a lot of dirt-cheap land by the Mexican border, but that’s cuz no one wants to live there and deal with the illegals that want to come over and get paid to sit on their lazy asses. This country needs to put up a 40’ wall around it with a super high-voltage wire on top of it. That’ll keep the trashholes out.

I wonder if we’ll have a for-sale sign up at this place. I kind of hope we don’t because people will be knocking on the door like crazy. They do that out here. We’ll just have to deal with it if they do, though, because we’re going to need to sell the house fast. So fast that we’ll probably have to use a realtor, though Tom did consider selling it himself and maybe using eBay. I’m both amazed and impressed at how fast realtors respond. If you call them at 1:00, they’ll probably be at your place by 3:00. That’s how they make money, though, so I’d come running at people’s beck and call too if I were an agent.

I just hope Tom’s right when Mr. Optimistic says we’re being led to bigger and better things and not straight to hell by the fact that it’s still obvious that we’re destined to lose this house, despite how rocky the road will be between now and the jackpot if there really is one waiting for us. Yeah, but just how rocky will those roads be and how long are those bumpy roads? I’m not going to jail for our next dream house; that’s all I know.

I’ve been thinking of the pros and cons of leaving Arizona if my vibes end up wrong. I miss the woods and the ocean, but I also do love the desert. I get sick of the intense heat, but I’d get a hell of a lot sicker of cold and snow and much faster, too. Even so, if it turns out that when we’re ready to make a move there’s a damn good deal on a huge chunk of land that happens to be in Wyoming, then we’re going to Wyoming. At least I won’t have to play bus in whatever cold and snow we may have to deal with!

The weather here has been cloudy and rainy. I haven’t had to water the palm we potted for a few days now. I laid in bed last night listening to the sound of the rain. It’s a soothing sound as most steady sounds are as opposed to staccato-like ones.

I really hope my supplies come Monday! I’m amazed at the burn time on some of these sticks. One stick burned for nearly two hours.

Two hours of working out? No problem. That’s just what I did both today and yesterday. As Tom and I both agree, more is better with this type of exercise, versus weight-lifting. I awoke at 127, the lowest I’ve been able to go in over a year. I still don’t think I can bounce myself skinny or at least bounce down to 120, but I think I can maintain my weight for sure. Something really would have to be wrong if I couldn’t with this amount of exercise, which is just so easy, fun and totally great. I never would’ve thought to do something like this. I would’ve thought it wasn’t enough, but Tom’s heart rate monitor proved that it is. I know I said I didn’t care if I kept gaining, but that’s easy to say until you think of the cost of buying bigger clothes and not being able to get around as easily, not to mention how shitty you’d look. If I can’t lose I’ll at least try to stay where I am. Two hours a day is about a 600-calorie burn which means that if I had 2000 calories in a day, my body would think it was only having 1400. I’d have lost weight on that in my 20s, but it should hold me at this age. Besides, I don’t always have 2000. Yesterday I had about 1600 while my body thought it had 1000. My ass and thighs feel firmer, though they still look terrible. I mean, I still have more craters than the moon. It’s one of those things where my legs look like shit in themselves, yet wonderful compared to most others around my age.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 23, 2004
Now I’m 128. Oh well. I mean, I’m sure I’ll return to 130 in a day or two like always.

Incense Galore emailed me saying my supplies were shipped yesterday which I was glad to hear as I was getting a little worried there. I sent them an email back asking why Angel isn’t on their wholesale list. Perhaps it’s got to be mixed specially to get that scent. Maybe they all do. Anyway, unless they were out of stock, why else would these supplies be taking so long to get to me since they didn’t need to be dipped? Because something up there likes to interfere with things I like and especially those I want to try to sell?

Now I don’t know what to think as far as my moving vibes go. Not after all the wonderful land deals we found online all over the western US. These are places that are so incredibly remote, too. They had an awesome deal on a 20-acre parcel between Kingman and Laughlin, and even a really good deal on a 100-acre parcel.

I tried, unsuccessfully, to win a scratch ticket so I’d have extra money at Walmart which we’re going to go to either late Sunday night or early in the morning so Tom can finally get to finish putting in his application on their computer which is always tied up. I told him I saw it losing, though. Especially since I planned to do a little shopping. So, we decided to set the grocery budget at $90, including food and extras. We’ll probably get $60 - $70 in food which will leave the rest for fun. I may even get Fairytopia since she really won’t take up much packing space. She’s just a Barbie after all.

Tom says each story I write gets better as there’s more story to it, so that’s cool.

Later…

This time I managed to get 2 numbers. Tom said that while more is merrier, he’d be impressed if I got 2 numbers regularly.

I just wish he wasn’t home so much! We’re getting along just fine, but even so, I need my solitude and I’m only getting that lately when I’m up while he’s asleep. When he’s out, it isn’t for more than a few hours at a time if even that. If he were someone I lusted for that lust for me in return, that’d be different. This is one of the reasons I’d go insane with a kid; it’d always be there save for when it was in school.

We checked other incense sites out just to compare and found some neat tips and pointers. A really convenient way to do it would be to pour the cut oils into a 1-gallon zip-top bag and soak them in that. Then we could lean the bag up against a tilted cookie sheet, clip the sticks to its edge, and let it drain and air dry for a couple of days.

What was really cool was that this one site in particular had kits for making your own lotions and shower gels/bubble baths with the scents of your choice! I’d love some Angel lotion and butter rum bubble bath.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 22, 2004
For 3 days I didn’t hear them flying and thought, good, I at least backed them off, but then I heard them a little while ago. I’ll try to back them off as my schedule shifts more towards days as once again I decided not to bother worrying about my schedule till it’s absolutely necessary.

I had a vibe saying that whenever the hell Tom gets a job, it’ll be for 10-something an hour. His age is really making it hard because the idiots think that at his age he’ll want more money. Why they don’t just say, “This is the pay and so be it,” beats me. They should because then they’d know that those they get putting in applications are ok with the pay whether it’s fair or not.

He says he’s not worried about not finding a job in a hurry since we have quite a few months left where we can get unemployment, and when we move, there’ll be no house payments or electric bills. All we’ll need money for will be food, vehicle expenses, generator expenses, phone and satellite, so his pay won’t matter, though the more the merrier and the quicker we can build our dream castle.

I’m just afraid God’s going to tear down whatever we do build. It’s like with this great new exercising method I’ve found, thanks to Miss Perfect, who finally did something right. Well, I had just gotten hot and heavy into the Bowflex (which we decided to keep) when he sent the black bums to take me away from it, so I’m always afraid to get into new things because someone or something is always waiting to tear it all apart. The same with when I get new rats. The freeloading assholes stole the last 6 months of Houdini’s life from me.

I’m also afraid he’ll do things like escalate the vehicle repairs when we move just because we’ll have extra money, and force us to put money towards things other than what we’d like to put it towards. As it is, I’ve already made up my mind that trying to sell incense and trying to make a go of the website won’t be successful. I haven’t succeeded yet, so why should I now? At least I’ll still have fun making my own incense and ordering wholesale from now on.

When we move, I’m going to be fearful of the freeloaders popping back into my life for yet the fourth time just like they did after we moved here. I’m truly amazed that they haven’t pulled anything else on me thus far. Especially after showing me for nearly 7 years that they don’t give up so easily. It was like I was their obsession. Tom thinks they’ve finally backed off for good, but he’s always been a very trusting, optimistic person when it comes to things like that. Either way, I certainly hope so! I don’t have any bad vibes, and one thing I do know is that if they did remind me of their sorry existence, they’ll never get me in the position they had me in before. It’ll be total doomsday for them if they ever fuck with me again and not even God could protect them like he always has. Anyway, I need a good year off from them in order to relax 100% where they’re concerned and to fully believe that they are just a horrendous memory and nothing more. May 30th was the last time I was forced to either do anything on account of them or hear from anyone connected to them, so if I can get to May 30th of this year without having to hear from him via Arizona’s little piggies, then I’ll be way relieved.

I still also fear being stuck in bad places I can’t get out of, but I suppose that with my history that’s to be expected. It’s really scary to know that even in my 30s that can happen. Well, unless someone frames me or tries to kill me and I kill them instead in self-defense, there’s no reason I should go to jail, though there wasn’t any reason I should’ve in the first place.

They say there’s a reason for everything, so all I can do is hope that we’re not being forced out of here to be set up for something worse that we can’t get out of so easily.

I had to laugh when I thought of how the spiders will return to show up in here regularly once I’m no longer here to put my hate spells on them.

We haven’t been doing well with the tickets lately. Partly out of compensation for the $30 winner we had and partly because I’ve slacked off on putting spells on them in order to concentrate on the big bucks. Although I don’t think I’ll ever be allowed the power, we’d rather a million bucks than $20 here, $30 there and $10 in between. Memolink makes their daily million-dollar draws at 3 PM PT, so at 4 PM I’m going to be concentrating really hard on the numbers the auto-pick drew for me, trying to get their numbers to match mine.

Later…

Well, I did my best as far as trying to win the Memolink lotto and now the rest is up to fate. If God doesn’t want us having that kind of money, he won’t let me hit the numbers. In fact, I still think something doesn’t want us ever having that much money. Especially if UPS doesn’t bring the truck’s water pump today and I don’t get my supplies tomorrow so we can get the swap meet going. Something always interferes whenever we try to make money. Plus, it isn’t just about us not being allowed to make enough money from home, it’s about me not being allowed to do what I want to do with my life which is something that’s always been a no-no. Still, I instinctively rebel against God’s controlling hold on me and I grab hold of the wheel of the car that drives my life whenever I get the slightest opportunity to do so.

Nonetheless, I tried my best to concentrate really hard on the lotto until the renters drove by with 3 huge dogs chasing them. It’s a wonder they weren’t barking up a storm while they were at it.

Later…

It was a bust. According to the results of the last draw, I only got 1 number. Now the question is, do I figure it’s not meant to be and give up? Or do I keep plugging away at it and hope that I hit it over time?

I’m just glad, as much as I hated being poor and struggling like I did back east, that I didn’t strike it rich then. Too many people, Tammy in particular, would’ve swindled it away from me and I would’ve been kind enough and naïve enough to let them do it, too. Most people are natural beggars who won’t hesitate to simply go up to a person, even a total stranger, and ask for whatever. As it was, the first thing out of Tammy’s mouth when I started dancing and we thought I’d make really good money was, “I’ll take $500 a month.”

The hell if I’ll be anyone’s slave or whipping boy again! Some might ask why I’m Mary’s secretary since she can’t pay me regularly for it, and I guess the answer is simple – because I know she would if she could and that she will when she’s released. She would also do me any favors I needed that were within her means.

Paula, on the other hand, is never getting another package from me again, and she’ll get very few letters from now on, too. I mean, I could never, for example, trust her to mail a letter for me like Mary did with Teddy Bear, which reminds me - Paula did get the envelope I sent her addressed to Incense Galore for her free sample. And did she mail it out? Of course she did. She never has a problem doing for herself. If it was for someone else, then why bother?

I can understand that it’s human nature for a lot of us to be selfish. The main reason I don’t want kids, for example, is so that I can have a life. It’s been hard enough for me to have that at times as a childless person that I’d hate to try it as a parent. We all want things for ourselves with little or no cost, and that’s only natural. In fact, if I had a New Year’s resolution it would probably be to be as selfish as I can and to make as much money as I can, despite my doubts about that. It’s just when you spend so many years getting ripped off and being used, it makes you want money and freedom even more. It has that effect on me, at least, though some people may just go with it.

I decided that if Paula’s worst crime is being a little stingy, then I won’t bother dumping her. I mean, she’s hardly done anything wrong as opposed to Doe, Art, Tammy and Larry.

I took some pictures of the dark gray storm cloud out front. Yes, there’s been some rain, lightning and thunder the last couple of days. It’s the first picture with the new houses too, although one of them is hiding behind a big tree. I heard cows and sheep not too far from here. In fact, every time I’d meow for Shiny, I got a meow for a reply.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 21, 2004
Just thought I’d do some writing while I wait for Tom to return from the PO. Hopefully, he’ll have my supplies.

My coffee, mugs and coffeemaker came yesterday. The coffeemaker got added to the stuff for sale since I don’t need it.

It’s a good thing I quit watching my weight cuz these appetite suppressants are worthless. You gotta pay the big bucks to get results. Anyway, I slipped down a couple of pounds because I bounced for an hour yesterday and had around 2000 instead of an outrageous 2500, though 2000 is still a little overkill for someone my height and age.

One thing I do know and that’s that I’m sick of shitting! Sometimes I do it twice a day and it hasn’t had any effect on my weight whatsoever, so I think I’m going to cut down on the fiber.

In Mary’s latest draft that I received yesterday, she talks about how she blames Justin’s parents for having a major hand in making him the monster he is, but why doesn’t she open her eyes and blame the one who should really be blamed right along with the sick cock himself – God! Why does she worship him so? It’s like kissing the hand that slaps you and it makes no sense! Just no sense.

She really fucked herself over during her interrogation and made the same mistake I did by not exercising her right to remain silent. When I read the parts leading up to and after the murder, my first thought was, oh no! I hope she didn’t tell this to the pigs. When the pigs asked why she didn’t call them, she said she was scared. That was bad. She should’ve kept her mouth shut. Especially in regard to that one. Pigs and judges find that a poor excuse. Just the fact that she boarded two buses with the sicko and still didn’t turn his ass in is probably about the worst thing she could’ve told them. I can’t stress it enough to her or to anyone that the pigs are never our friends. It’s one thing to call a pig when you come home to find your house broken into or to call a pig cuz someone stole your car, but when they go to you, people should never trust a pig. Never. Not even if they claim it’s pertaining to someone else. Pigs are professional liars and bluffers and so people should keep their mouths shut, even if they threaten to book them out of spite for exercising their right to keep quiet which I’d say - let them. If anything, spite arrests just may make a person a little richer in the end. Nonetheless, I’m sure they did empathize with Mary and certainly with Gretchen, but still, all the pigs are out to do is “get a person’s ass.” They kiss up to you and butter you up till they get what they want, then they squash you in the palm of their hand as if you were nothing more than a piece of bread. They’re never on a defendant’s side no matter how much sympathy they may feel for the person’s situation and circumstances. It’s their job. It’s their job to try to get a defendant to sink themselves on tape as much as it’s a defense attorney’s job to try to get their clients off.

And that was really low of the pigs to call her family too, to tell them of what happened. That should’ve been up to her to do so, and when she was ready to.

I can also understand her desire to hang onto the childhood that was taken from her. Perhaps that’s why I’m as childish as I am mature!

To add insult to injury, Mary was threatened right after Gretchen died. She was locked in a bathroom in some whorehouse the sicko dragged her to when some cock threatened to slit her throat through the door while she was trying to take a shower. I can see getting all terrified like she did at her age, but me? I’d have flung that door open so fast and in such a rage, the cock wouldn’t be threatening me no more! Then, after it recovered from the shock of my reaction, if I let it live, it wouldn’t find me very fun anymore. Only those who are terrified are fun for sick cocks like that.

I take it Little Buddy’s picture didn’t win anything after all or else they’d have contacted me by now. This might be a good thing, though, if all they were going to give me for it was a medal.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 20, 2004
I’ve started gaining the weight I knew I’d gain if I ate whatever whenever. I’m 131 and for the first time in my life, I said, “I don’t care. I’m going to accept and live with whatever I gain, be it 10 pounds or 50.” For a minute there, now that I’ve found a way of working out for an hour a day that I can stick to, I was tempted to cut my calories to see what would happen, but then I lectured myself and said, “Don’t do this to yourself again. You know it won’t make a difference. You’ve been obsessed with this for years. It’s time to move on now and let your body do what it wants to do naturally. Not even 5 hours of exercise and a measly 500 calories could drop your weight by more than a few pounds. You’re 38 years old, so move on and live with it!” And so I eat when my stomach says it’s time to eat.

I decided that since I don’t have the power to control my weight or improve my vision I would focus on my allergies. So far so good. It’s been over a week now since I’ve used the spray.

MONDAY, JANUARY 19, 2004
A guy in Texas won the dimes. A few hours before the auction ended I saw that it’d come to $43 and it did. I’m vibing $36 on the half-dollars.

They’re now on us about the two house payments we’ve missed. Around mid-February is when we’ll get a real estate agent, preferably a female this time and one who isn’t out to scam anyone in the midst of things. Again, doing our own work should cut down the chances of getting screwed over dramatically, even though people still find a way.

I had an idea, though I don’t know if it’ll work. If it doesn’t, it’s ok, since it’s no loss to us. The idea was to dig up and replant the palm tree into the pot the indoor palm was in. We’ll then leave it outdoors on the top step where the rabbits can’t get it and take it with us if it survives. We won’t bother with the 5 or so surviving olies as they have deeper roots.

I was laughing at how Tom insisted he does it so I wouldn’t “mess anything up.” I was like, “What could I do? Damage some of the dirt? Maybe kill a few scorpions along the way?”

Yet he insisted I’d find something so I’ll gladly let him do it. It’s a job I’d rather not have anyway.

Later…

And he got yet another ticket I told him would lose that lost.

Tom got the palm into the pot, so now we’ll just hope for the best. I put a spell on it and hopefully that’ll help it. I still don’t know, though, if I can influence our sonic boomers due to lack of anger. They irritate me, but they don’t enrage me. The more enraged I am at someone or something, the more likely I am to be able to curse it.

Meanwhile, I am determined to one day have a house that’ll put this 2100-square-foot beauty to shame and I’m going to correct everything they fucked up on, too. I specifically ordered, for example, light blue carpet when they didn’t have pink, and what did I get? Denim blue carpet. So, I’ll not only install light blue carpet with my own two hands along with Tom’s, but I’ll install pink carpet too, and hey, why not throw in lavender as well?

We both agree that while this is a beautiful house with a really cool layout, it’s too open in certain areas. The living room’s the worst because it’s so hard to set up what with the way it’s laid out. We like rooms that are more separate and off by themselves, whereas here you got the living room which opens into the dining room which opens into the kitchen which opens into the den.

Anyway, I’m still sad and a bit teary-eyed. We still would’ve preferred to go at our own leisure than be forced out of here. All I can do is hope that something’s only trying to give us a nudge towards better things and not punishing us. As it is, we could easily be losing out on a fortune with the way this place is building up.

Because it’d be such a bitch to move and because we probably won’t have room for it right away anyway, we may sell most of the furniture and take only the airbed, computer desks, folding tables and maybe the bedroom furniture which consists of just one long dresser and a nightstand.

Of course we won’t tell anyone that the front and back doors leak or that the place is haunted. I’m sure they’ll try to sucker a last-minute buck or two out of us anyway cuz people are greedy and they like to do that kind of shit to us, but we won’t fall for it this time around. They’ll just have to fuck off or take us to court, but of course, we won’t be showing up if they do subpoena us. We know better than to walk into an Arizona courtroom. People tend not to go home when they do that, though civil cases are different from criminal cases as Tom pointed out.

Working out with the ball is great. You sit on it and bounce as high as possible. It’s such an easy way to keep my muscles toned and elevate my heartbeat in a way that’s not nearly as boring as walking, jogging, and rowing. I’m willing and ready to sell both the treadmill and the Bowflex at this point. The ball works my legs and abs just fine, and the dumbbells take care of my arms. I still think I’ll get 5-10 pounds heavier with each passing decade, but I’ll still be fit, strong and healthy.

I thought that maybe the ball was more fun because it was a lot like when I rock to my music, then I got a little worried for a minute there and tested my heart rate while I rocked. Fortunately, it didn’t quite make it up to the target zone. If it had I’d think there was something wrong with me for damn sure. Like I said, though, I really like the ball a lot and how I can move it around so easily as opposed to the Bowflex and treadmill.

I swear I will never again scoff at those over 30 who say they can’t lose weight! These are the people I used to call lazy pigs who let themselves get fat, who could lose weight if they simply put effort into it, but now I know better. And now I know why they’re like, “Well, if I’m going to be fat anyway no matter what I do, why feel like I’m starving by cutting my calories? Why not just eat normally?”

They put up the same kind of patio at the front of the second house that they did with the first house, but that’s okay. By the time they’re all hanging out front gabbing and barking we should be out of here or at least well on our way out of here.

I’ve had very little tightness over the last few days. It really pisses me off to think that the medicine the doctors were prescribing me since quitting smoking was actually causing a lot of the tightness and congestion I’ve experienced after quitting. It’s like, fucking doctors! I hate them almost as much as I hate pigs, lawyers and judges. They simply cannot be trusted, and again, money and power are more important to them than what’s right. I swear I’ll never go to a doctor again till I’m old and dying. Even if I broke a bone, I’d set the damn thing myself and have Tom make a cast out of plaster of Paris. I’ll see a dentist, but to hell with the not-so-good docs!

Who knows, though? Perhaps it’s my powers that’s made me better. Maybe if I weren’t psychic I really would be worse off not taking the inhalers. I’ll still skip the dishonest quacks if I can help it, though, who don’t tell you the side effects of the meds they prescribe, make false diagnoses, and so on.

Since quitting the inhalers I’ve been more tired. Maybe this will help me stay on days if I tire down early since I usually need so much sleep. It isn’t just the constant flying that’s got me wanting to stay on days, but instinct is telling me to do so as well, so I figure it’s because things are going to be picking up soon enough in the way of swap meets, yard sales, moving, and who knows what else? Just as long as the freeloaders aren’t in the picture, it’ll be ok!

I just wish, if we were destined to lose this house as we are, that this could’ve happened once I got out of jail cuz then we could’ve run, but like God would’ve set things up to give me that big of a break? Yeah, right! He wanted me to suffer on account of those freeloaders, and suffer bad, so what would’ve been the point of setting things up to make things easier for me?

It might be a while, during the move, before I can get to a computer for Mary’s drafts, but she’s a very patient, understanding person. It’ll be no prob. At least we’ll be able to keep in touch with no problem because of the cell phones which are going with us. Also, if we change PO boxes before I can get the new one’s address to her, they’ll forward it. I’ll tell her, when the time comes, not to send drafts till we get settled unless she thinks they’ll get stolen. If she thinks they’re at risk there, by all means, she should send them.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 18, 2004
And again Tom got a ticket I told him was doomed to lose.

The coins, which have 10 hours to go, are up to $32 and he had had only a goal of $15 on those. Tom’s all excited about it. He didn’t expect to get that much. Maybe the money-making curse is more on me than on both of us. Today he’s also going to put up his baseball cards, half-dollars, and mixed coins in 3 separate auctions. He hopes to get $15 for the mixed coins, $20 for the half-dollars, and $20 for the baseball cards.

He decided to keep the newly minted pennies, saying they’re not that valuable yet. We’re also going to put up some of the plates I don’t want. There are 6 in all, 3 of which his mom gave us.

We’re putting up these things starting at next to nothing and with no reserve. He’s starting the coins off at face value, but everything else will start at like a buck if even that. It’s basically stuff we don’t want that we’re willing to give away for very little so others can enjoy it. If not, the stuff will just get dumped.

We’re probably going to ditch the RV idea. I mean, sure it’s nice to be able to test the waters and check out various areas, but things can change. An area can seem pleasant enough at first, then in comes trouble.

If we’d known we’d be moving so soon after getting this place, we’d never have bothered getting a back door in place of a window. It’s just one more leak source and besides, people rarely go out their back doors and hang out behind their houses in Arizona anyway. At least the prep work won’t be a fraction of what it was in the old dive, but still, it could be practically nothing if the evil entity here hadn’t cracked Tom’s window, and if I hadn’t been dumb enough to bother with the wall art, and if the dumb Mexican hadn’t have punctured the shower pipe. Instead, we have to replace a window and paint 3 rooms, along with the wall the mural was on.

Later…

Someone bid on the half-dollars right after he put them up!

He’s watching football right now. Boring! A bunch of cocks ramming into one another never did anything for me.

I decided to keep 4 of the 7 dolls I had considered selling - Ciara, Samantha, Amelia and Maria. I’ll still sell, or try to sell, Meagan, Autumn and Valentine.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 17, 2004
The dimes have gone from an $8 bid to a $20 bid. Good. That way we make a little profit. See, Tom would be willing to hand them over for nothing so they wouldn’t sit in the closet and take up space like they have, but it’s nice to get a little something for them. We give and do enough for free or at a price of some kind.

He got another Slingo ticket I told him would lose that did lose.

How nice of Incense Galore. See, wholesale orders get charged a $5 service fee for not meeting the $50 minimum as well as shipping. They charged me the shipping fee, but not the $5 service fee, so that was nice. Hopefully, I’ll get the supplies next week, along with the coffee, seeing that they took the money for that, too.

Tom stopped in the little consignment shop here in town, but they were pretty much selling southwestern things. He said they had my big leaf plant which was over his head and that it was in a pot even smaller than mine, so I guess they don’t need much root space after all. What I wonder, though, is will bigger pots allow the plant to get bigger.

I’m so glad we’re not going to be the renter’s neighbors for too much longer, even if they’re sweethearts compared to what we were neighbored up with in Phoenix. They have at least 4 dogs running around loose and they’re making a mess of our place again. I hope they won’t hinder us from selling the house and that my vibes are right. Well, I don’t know about my vibes, but my guess is that they won’t be a problem. Especially when you consider the fact that there’s a 90% chance the buyers are going to be slobs themselves and have their own dogs roaming around the neighborhood.

I wonder if the renter’s dogs have ever killed next door’s chickens like those strays did that they thought were ours when we first moved in.

Tom dumped some stuff off at the recycling center and spoke with Gina. When she asked if I ever found a home-based job, he mentioned the incense and said she said she was really into the stuff. Also, the swap meet would probably be a good place to sell some like we were talking about. I don’t think I’d want to do swap meets regularly, though, and deal with all the people, the schedules and the heat we have most of the year here.

I’ve already begun designing the label. We decided to call it Desert Scents. I also decided that using clipart or illustrated designs of some kind would be better than actual graphics for the bag. Something catchy, but that wouldn’t use much ink. First I tried a rose, then decided a rose wouldn’t be all that appropriate for the desert, so then I tried their cactus. Because it was a rather boring-looking cactus, I then settled on red hot chili peppers. Once we get the website established we’ll add its address to the label.

Tom came up with a really cool idea to maybe grind some of the plants up out here and see if we can make incense from the more fragrant ones like the mesquites.

We discussed other possibilities as to how to sell the incense, like maybe at a dollar store, if they’d be willing to sell it for us, even though they’d want a percentage.

Tom’s really excited about it and he really seems to believe it’ll work out. I hope he’s right, cuz I still can’t imagine why God would suddenly allow me to do something I want to do for a change. I mean, I’m not too surprised he wouldn’t let me be a singer, but when you can’t do something as natural and ordinary as have a kid, it really shoots your hope and makes you think you wouldn’t be allowed to do anything no matter how ordinary or extraordinary it may be. Tom says it’s just a matter of us choosing the right thing. Perhaps he has a point. There’s no doubt that being a singer or a mother would’ve been the wrong thing for me. I truly believe I wouldn’t have been happy with either one. The singing would’ve entailed too much traveling and people that would’ve driven me crazy. As for the kid, as soon as the initial joy of holding that child for the first time wore off, I’d have been left with nothing but expenses up the ass, a never-ending symphony of noise, smelly diapers up to my neck, 40 more pounds that I couldn’t lose, and no time or freedom for myself. Like I always said – kids are sweet, but they’re just not for me. I don’t have the desire or patience it takes to deal with them, though this doesn’t mean I’d have abused them like my parents abused me. I don’t believe we always turn out to be like our parents. Sometimes we do, sometimes we don’t. My sister was a carbon copy of my mother, unfortunately, but Larry was not.

Someone like Mary, on the other hand, is 100% mother material as long as she doesn’t expose them to the wrong cocks.

I think my psychic abilities may go back further than I ever realized because I always knew a kid wasn’t meant to be. Even when I was just a kid myself, I knew it wasn’t in my cards. I guess God knew I would be such a freedom freak and a freedom freak I am! Being locked up and stuck in various places and circumstances you don’t want to be in has a way of doing that to you. I have been controlled to the extreme from the day I was born. All kids get told what to do, but you see, there’s a difference between telling your kid, “You gotta wear clothes to school,” versus, “You gotta wear the green shirt and the brown pants to school.”

Not all things are understandable, though. It’s easy for me to see why I wasn’t meant to be a singer or a mother, but why was I meant to be with a man, for example, and not a woman unless I was willing to settle for second best or less? Not that I regret Tom, but why not a Kate Jackson or a Gloria Estefan or a Linda Ronstadt? Why not a Norah M or a Mary C or someone like Palma and Teddy Bear? Is lust, other than in my imagination, a sin for me?

Nonetheless, I do have children – my rats! Anything that’s dependent on an adult, to me, is like kids.

When I start with the why-would-God-let-me-succeed-now bit, I try to remind myself that some things have changed. I couldn’t put sick spells on people before, vibe/influence tickets, etc. Just maybe God will put his animosity aside and be like, yeah, yeah, do what you want. I don’t care.

I should be just a couple of weeks away from Haiku, assuming there aren’t many more hold-ups. Now she, along with the other dolls, makes great children. That’s because they never cost anymore after you’ve bought them and they stay where you put them.

Once again we may be put out by blacks. Their little holiday may delay the check a day or two.

I’m going to try like hell to stay on days, even if it means sleeping only 8 hours a night because they’re flying like crazy. They’re at it almost every day now! The only way they’d take a break would be if one of their planes went down, and believe me, if I could will one of them to drop from the sky, I would! Maybe I should try. I figure that the only way a psychic of my kind is going to get telekinetic would be to work on it, and what better place to start than with the United States Air Force? So fall from the sky they will as soon as I can hopefully get them to. The pilots jump from the plane with parachutes before the plane crashes. Or at least they try to. As it is, though, I don’t give a damn if someone gets killed. Tom will know about it if I succeed because he keeps tabs on the news. I highly doubt I could do it. I can’t even move an object like a barrette that’s sitting on the table.

I was right in suspecting that putting chicken wire around the palm to protect it from the rabbits would help it. It’s starting to grow back. Of course it’s growing back now that we’re moving! Either way, you really gotta either protect or get older plants in a place like this.

Later…

Tom and I were discussing more pricing and package ideas we may sell. Maybe we’ll get a roadside stand of our own, though I’d prefer to do business from home.

Anyway, when I checked the incense site to see if anything new was amiss, I found that they’re now having monthly giveaways. This month they’ll be giving someone a smoking bottle, then someone else an 11” coffin burner, and another person a 19” ash catcher. I’d really like that 19” ash catcher, so as a means of hopefully encouraging them to choose me for that, unless they have a random drawing, I told them I was considering trying their 19” sticks (this isn’t a lie, either) and asked how long they burn for, though I know it’s about 3 hours. I’m sure I’ll get some eventually either way, though an ash catcher would be more encouraging.

Tom liked my idea of creating a burner for cars, like maybe something you hang from the mirror, but that can’t fall out. It’d be really hard, though, to start a fire with an incense stick as opposed to a cigarette. Incense sticks usually go out when the head of it touches something. That’s why I wouldn’t bother with getting smoking bottles.

Tom read a cute little joke online that goes like this: Once upon a time, a little old lady went to see her doctor complaining about gas. She said, “Doctor, I can’t seem to stop passing gas. No matter what I do, I’m constantly passing gas. Why I must’ve done it 20 times since I’ve been in this room talking to you. It’s just that oddly enough, it doesn’t smell or make any noise when it happens.”

“Don’t worry,” said the doctor. “I’ve got just the right remedy for you.”

He wrote her a prescription and sent her home.

Not long afterward, she was back at the doctor’s office. “Doctor!” she exclaimed. “I still can’t seem to stop passing gas like crazy. The only difference is that while it still can’t be heard, it now smells horrible! Just horrible.”

“Good,” the doctor said. “Now that we’ve cleared up your sinuses, let’s work on your hearing.”

FRIDAY, JANUARY 16, 2004
The last draft I typed for Mary was sickening! So much so that it’s so hard to believe it wasn’t part of a fictitious book and that it was actually the real-life events of someone I personally know. I can see how it’d be a horribly painful draft for her to write like she said it was. In the draft, the sick cock kills Gretchen while she’s working at McDonald’s. He calls her there and says she has to hurry home because Gretchen’s not breathing. She gets home thinking Sicko’s called the paramedics, not realizing right away that she’s dead. When she does realize it, she cries and screams in anguish and picks up a knife, wanting to kill herself till she feels Andrew move inside her. Then Sicko tosses Gretchen in a bag with shovels and they end up on a public bus. Mary’s in shock muttering Gretchen’s name while Sicko convinces the driver she’s in labor and the driver goes off route to Sicko’s parents’ house. In a wooded area there is where Sicko buries Gretchen before he gets a grand or two from his father and they board a Greyhound bus for Seattle with Mary threatening to get away from him somehow and expose him. She also promises to give up the baby she was carrying for adoption to save him from the sick fuck. Fortunately, she did do this too, not that she was a bad mother (when she wasn’t exposing her kids to cocks like Justin), but because she was broke and mentally unstable. Besides, I don’t think she had much of a choice. She was captured right around the time he was born anyway.

Despite all that happened that was beyond her control, shame on her for not killing the sicko right then and there! I mean, I can’t imagine the kind of rage she must’ve felt towards him upon realizing he’d killed her not giving even the smallest, frailest of women the strength to claw the biggest, meanest cock to death and that’s just what he deserved that night. I just don’t see how anyone could have their child killed by someone and not put their hands on them. She should’ve done him with the knife she was going to do herself with or done something. God knows she had enough rage and adrenaline to do it. It’s like, why take the time, money and space to lock these kinds of hopeless, unchangeable people up forever when it’d be so much easier to just take out the garbage and be done with them forever? Our joke of a system doesn’t do the right thing, so that leaves the responsibility, unfortunately, to fall upon those of us cursed with the likes of the Justin Gs of the world. Somebody’s got to do it, and sometimes, regardless of what the screwy laws say, two wrongs do make a right. Gretchen had every right to live which means that Mary had every right to kill Justin as far as I’m concerned because doing so would’ve meant saving her life if she wasn’t going to break away from him first, like she wishes she did. It makes my blood boil so bad to think of what he did that I know I’d be fully capable of killing him myself and she wasn’t even my child! I could snap a sick fuck like that over my knee as if I were the one weighing hundreds of pounds and he was just a little chunky. Rage does that to you. It gives you inhuman strength. That’s why I don’t see how she didn’t snap that night and simply kill him. I mean, as it was I could ever so barely control myself from going after the inmates who threatened me in order to keep my visits and commissary that I can’t imagine there being any way I could keep myself glued together if someone killed someone I loved that was within my reach. Do you know how badly I wished, just for the moment Nancy threatened me, for example, that I had just been given a life sentence so I could clobber her with nothing to lose? It was sheer frustration not being able to jump those who made their little threats and I know that one more threat, just one more, and there’d be no holding back. I’ll be like a dam bursting, and trust me, I won’t be thinking of any consequences cuz I won’t give a damn. Besides, you know how screwy the laws are. You go down for months if you’re convicted of writing threats, but you can kick the crap out of someone and get barely 5 minutes for that, so I’ll take the 5 minutes if I have to.

I also can’t imagine how she can love God or have any faith in him. He let this happen. In fact, he had more of a part in it than Sicko had, in a sense, but I suppose there’s no sense in wasting our time wishing we could change the past. I know how crazy it can drive one to wish they could. A zillion times I’ve wished I’d said or done this differently, wished I’d handled this one differently or that one differently, and it just drives you crazy!

Meanwhile, we were surprised by just how easy it’s going to be to pull the mural off. Most of it just peeled right off. All he has to do is scrape a few pieces with a putty knife, then it’ll be ready to paint. We decided to paint it light blue, then add white clouds! It’ll be good practice for when we build our dream castle.

I told Tom of my vibes pertaining to moving and he said that 2 months holed up somewhere seems a bit long since we’re going to be doing 99% of the work ourselves. True. Especially with a single-wide. However, if something can go wrong with our little excursions, it usually does, so we’ll see. I sure as hell hope we’re not renting someplace or in hotels for 2 months, seeing how rough 4 months were when we came here.

We talked more about our website and agreed that if we can make our own incense without any problems, we should sell 10-packs for $1.50. We don’t want to use the same units and prices Incense Galore does because we don’t want to seem like we’re competing with them or trying to be an incense business. Meanwhile, if we get a lot of incense orders and that ends up happening, fine. He also pointed out that sometimes it’s easier to sell an idea than a product, so if someone wants to know how I make mine, we could maybe sell them an e-book on how it’s done or something.

I’ve been eating like a pig. I’ve always been one to be fully aware of my ways. I know when I’m overeating and I know when I’m not. What shocks the shit out of me is that I’m still 129!

Because I was finishing up a book and still haven’t received the books I ordered, we decided to be spontaneous and have a little fun by going to Walmart. I was going to get a few things while he filled out an application on their computer, but people were tying it up, so he didn’t get to do that.

We could only spend a little money, but I got a pink shirt/gown for bumming around the house in with black dots, a couple of new sports bras and a book to tide me over till my order arrives.

I brought along a couple of mini incense sticks to cover the cow shit smell on the way to and fro, and we stopped at Circle K on the way back to get a treat. He got vanilla soda and cakes while I got cold honey tea and chocolate mini muffins. I also got this really cool little toy with bright, colorful flashing strobe lights. It’s a pink clear rubber star and in the center is the light that runs for 4 seconds when you squeeze it. It has a bright, multi-colored string attached to it so kids can wear it around their necks. I was playing with it during the 3-hour power outage we had last evening.

For just $10, Walmart now has “Fairytopia” which is part of the ’04 line. I didn’t get it since we need to save money and would only have to pack it to move, but it’s pretty cool looking. Barbie wears a pink glittery outfit and she even has pink glittery hair, too. Mary would like it. They also have one in purple and blue, too. I’ll at least get the pink one after we move.

Later…

Got my books today. They enclosed a coupon for a dollar off my next order. They also say they’ll buy back the books after they’ve been read, but I don’t know. I sent an email asking about it. If the store credit or cash payment they say they’ll give doesn’t cover the cost of the shipping it’ll take for me to get the books back to them, then I won’t do it because then I’d literally be paying to give my books back. I do enough stuff for free or at my expense as it is.

Tom got a ticket and I told him it would lose and that it was a waste of time till February. He said it’d win because he had a winning vibe. I told him it wouldn’t because he wasn’t the psychic one here, and sure enough, it was a loser.

There goes the renters. Fortunately, they’ve been driving quiet vehicles lately, but their dogs are pretty damn obnoxious at night. That’s okay. We won’t be here much longer.

Someone there might work nights. I was star-gazing at around 6 AM the other morning when I saw them come in.

Later…

I spoke with Paula and let her know that one by one she’ll get 4 small packages over the next several weeks. The second of three incense packages will have the one stick that just doesn’t seem to smell of anything at all. Hee, hee! That’ll be in the empty Sun Moon & Star bag, but of course, I didn’t tell her that.

She’s lavishing her abusive cock with gift after gift yet she can’t send me a lousy $10 for all the time and money I’ve so foolishly cared enough to spend on her. Never again, though. These packages are it. And the thing of it is, is that she’s too out of it to even know she’s so selfish.

She’s as high as ever on beating up on Miguel and being beat up in return. She was laughing about it, as usual. How can a human being enjoy being hit and enjoy hitting like she does? It’s just totally beyond me.

It was my turn to laugh when she told me it was -20° there. In fact, I was laughing so hard that she had to wait a minute before she could ramble on once again because I couldn’t stop laughing.

I used newspaper as a filler in two of the incense boxes, but in one of them, I’m using 4 little stuffed bears I have no use for, an old camera case and some pieces of foam. I also lined the walls of the box with an old 20x16 kitten picture I’ve had for years that I’m sick of. I’m pretty sure I got it back east in like ’90 or ’91.

Tom’s been slaving away writing programs to create games for our site. He’s making really good progress, too.

He’s got his mercury wheat straw dimes up on eBay. He already got a bid on them, too.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 14, 2004
Why do people always have to die on my time? Someone always dies who knew someone who’s doing a job of some kind for me or for us, not that I don’t sympathize with Ricki. I decided to email her to ask how Haiku’s coming along, knowing how cursed I am with getting dolls to me. I knew there had to be some other delay and that things could be running that smoothly. Sure enough, she replied from Chicago saying her mother-in-law died and that it would set Haiku back a bit, and that she’d be in touch when she returned to North Carolina. She said Haiku should be shipped the week after next which is when I was expecting or at least hoping she’d be shipped so maybe there won’t be another delay. Not until the UPS truck breaks down anyway.

I decided I’d be okay with selling Ciara, my big 38” doll. If I can’t sell her I’ll at least keep her gown. Tom’s going to look into consignment shops which may be a better place to try to sell dolls.

Tom now has some coins and some baseball cards up for sale on eBay. He’s positive they’ll sell, saying that’s the kind of thing that sells successfully on eBay, versus porcelain dolls.

When I glanced out the bedroom window yesterday afternoon, I was delighted to see 4 p-dogs! Yes, they’re up now for the year. I gave them some old bread and lettuce.

Although I miss woods and oceans, I’m kind of glad we’ll be staying in Arizona. I mean, yes, the laws make me a bit uncomfortable, and yes, it makes me uncomfortable to be a white Jew in this state, but I really do like Arizona and I definitely prefer hot over cold.

Since we don’t have $50 extra right now, we’re just going to make a small wholesale order and pay the $5 service fee for not meeting the $50 minimum just so we can get started with learning to make our own. We’ll probably order the smallest quantities they have, like 500 punks, 250 bags, and a quarter pound of the cutting agent, plus the oils of my top 5 favorites which are pretty much Angel, Jasmine, Chocolate, Butter Rum and Vanilla Musk. These are the. Paula just may get her prank blank after all!

Then again, I may get White Shoulders rather than Jasmine, and Brown Sugar rather than Chocolate. The idea is to create my own scents. If I’m going to try to sell any I may not have as much luck if my scents are the same as other people’s. With Brown Sugar, I can maybe make Vanilla Sugar Musk, by combining the Brown Sugar and Vanilla Musk oils.

With the White Shoulders, I want to see if I can adjust it so I can smell it better. Their White Shoulders ever so barely smelled like White Shoulders.

Later…

The supplies have been ordered. I had to substitute Angel for Black Pearl as Angel wasn’t on their list, to my surprise. Black Pearl is a lot like Angel. We’re getting a ¼ pound of that, Butter Rum, Brown Sugar, Vanilla Musk and White Shoulders. The White Shoulders was a little more expensive because it’s a designer perfume that they had to pay the company with the rights to the scent a fee in order for them to use it, so it was $4.50 while the others were $3.50. We also got 100 2x12 zip-top bags for $2.50, a ½ pound of cutting agent for $1.50, and 500 natural 11” punk sticks for $3.00.

I wonder if I can take my Love Story perfume and make it into incense. We’ll find out soon enough.

If God will ever let me sell any of this stuff, I’ll stay away from the trademark names and use name variations on their scents. In other words, if I sell Angel, I’ll call it something like Heavenly Angel. If I sell Vanilla, I’ll call it Vanillalicious.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 13, 2004
Today’s the day I finally saw in clear detail what was to come. So unless my visions are all wrong, we’re moving in April, but probably won’t get settled in till June which means we’ll probably have to rent someplace in Casa Grande just like we did in Scottsdale when we left Phoenix. We are moving to the other side of Casa Grande where the land is cheaper and there are fewer people because it’s even further away from Phoenix. We’ll have 10 or more acres and sell this house at $135,000. Tom will get a job in Casa Grande between now and February 10th (probably closer to late January), but I don’t know what it’ll be. I also don’t know how long we’ll be holed up in the single-wide shitbox we’re going to get, but that’s what we’ll have initially and we will generate our own electricity as Tom said we would. So we’ll be in a place like Dan’s old place. The shitbox or the land will cost $8,000, but I don’t know which one. I just see $8,000 somewhere and can only guess it’s connected to one of those two things.

Either way, right or wrong, I just wonder – is what’s going on and what’s coming in the future some kind of punishment, or are we being led to bigger and better things? I’m still angry that God allowed Tom to be fucked over at the bank and that we’re being forced out of this house and stripped of our free will to go when we choose to go, but I also know we’re both ready to go and give up the huge house payments as much as I’ll miss this house so much till we build our dream house! I was also never really impressed with this land and don’t like the way it’s building up. Speaking of that, I still wonder if God’s having us forced out now to prevent us from raking in the dough in 5-10 years. If that’s the case, then it may seem logical enough to assume we’ll never have money. Not serious money anyway. God can prevent people from making donations to our site and he can stop them from buying any incense I may make, but he can’t stop us from trying! So I kind of have this love/hate relationship with God. I hate it when he has people turn our lives upside down like he has, but I love the fact that he blessed me with the ability to see ahead in times of doubt and apprehension. The unknown can be rather stressful, but now that I have a sense of what’s coming, it makes it easier even if I always knew we’d survive somehow.

Tom checked online to see what it’d cost to send Paula the package I put together for her and was shocked to learn it’d be $27! I said no way and then I decided to take Tom’s suggestion and break it up into smaller packages that’d be a few bucks each. There’ll be 4, one with the CDs and the others with the incense. That way we’ll keep the packages around a pound or two. After this, I’ve got to stop being so giving and worry more about us. I can’t keep losing and putting myself out to those who won’t give me shit in return and I don’t give a damn how selfish others perceive me to be. All I asked her for was a measly $10 and I can’t even get that. Even without her accident money, the bitch gets $1250 a month and has C8, but no, she’d rather spend it on her abusive cock! Anyway, she won’t be hearing from me as much anymore. You give, you get taken advantage of. That’s all I know. I never should’ve told her we can burn our own CDs, but that’s okay because I know how to say no, so if she ever asks for more, the answer’s no unless she wants to pay for them. She’s gotten enough freebies at my expense.

It’s been warmer lately. Yesterday the heat didn’t come on till 6:30 AM.

I now have just 585 Memolink points. I hope they send the certificate!

Webshots had this really cool picture of Mars this thing called the Spirit Rover took that just landed on it the other day. The picture of vast expanses of rocky dirt looks like it could be a place on Earth.

SUNDAY, JANUARY 11, 2004
Although I’m noticeably smaller in the lower gut, lower back, and outer thighs, I’m still a heavy 129 pounds. My measurements are a horrendous 38-30-38. Ridiculous for my height. Especially the waist. No one should have a 30” waist no matter what their height is, but oh well. It’s me and I am what I am and I’m not going to deprive myself when I get hungry. From now on I have 1500-2000 calories a day and if that’s too much for a middle-aged 5-footer – tough!

Using the heart rate monitor, I found that bouncing rigorously on the ball does get my heart rate up to my target heart rate zone, so I think I’ll alternate between that and walking. I’ll walk 3 days a week and I’ll bounce 3 days a week, but I’m only doing 20 minutes of each. If I could get results and lose weight from my workouts, then I’d do more, but as long as it’s going to do nothing more than just keep me fit and strong, then that’s all I’m going to do.

I considered another prank for Paula, then said, nah. It’s still a funny one to think of. I poured my KY into an empty rose lotion bottle because the flip-top cap of the bottle it came in broke. I don’t need the KY anymore what with the new tampons I switched to. Well, wouldn’t it just be oh so funny if she thought she was smearing rose lotion all over herself that was really KY? Ha, ha, ha! Mayonnaise would be best, though, because that’d look more like lotion. All the while she was smearing herself with Mayonnaise she’d be trying to figure out why the “jasmine” incense didn’t smell like anything at all.

Speaking of incense, I’m giving her the entire bag of those I don’t like at all and one stick of those I feel are boring and keeping the rest in an empty bag I marked “mixed.” If we have the money for it, her package should ship this week along with my last two stories for Mary. I’ll call and let her know it’s coming, then call back in a week.

I pretty much put the incense into 4 different groups. There’s the outstanding group, the good group, the boring group and the shitty group. I kept the boring ones because we still do get foul odors in here occasionally and I want to have something for when the good stuff runs out and I’m between orders. I still intend to try making my own and mixing and creating my own unique scents, too. But to sell it and get a decent cash flow from it? Uh-uh. God would never let me, though I thought of a clever name for it if we incorporate it into the site we’re setting up: Jodi’s ComIncense.

I decided not to trust Memolink any longer than necessary, so I went and requested the highest Walmart card I’m eligible for and that was the $15 one. It cost 2600 points and I’m at 3162. They “say” they’ll ship it to me in 12-16 weeks, but after not receiving 3 other certificates from various places, plus my $23 check from Netflip, I don’t want to accumulate any more points when it may very well be all for nothing.

I still worry that he’s not only not going to find a decent job, but that we’re going to end up stuck in an 800-square-foot dump on barely an acre of land with people/dogs much too close for my comfort. I still think we’re going to ultimately end up losing this house as much as we’re ready to give it up willingly to get out of the $1000 payments. I’ll miss this house so much, though! Especially when I’m trying to scrub the kitchen floor wherever we are with its pealing, grimy linoleum that I just can’t get the 30 years’ worth of dirt out of, and when I’m scrubbing the oven and missing the self-cleaning one here and having to defrost old freezers. I won’t even begin to mention all the leaks we’ll have to deal with and going back to washing dishes by hand!

Again I have to wonder – did I really get Teddy Bear fired and is that why God let Tom be fired? Did I really cause the black bitch to lose her house and is that why we’re going to lose ours even if we’re ready to go?

But why should I be punished for their mistakes if that’s the case? Shouldn’t they be held accountable for their own actions? God has always punished me for other people’s wrongdoings and protected them when they’ve trampled on me, so I don’t see why he’d stop now.

It’s now been two inhalerless weeks! I’m less tight, too. Makes me wonder if I was unknowingly causing my own tightness as well as congestion by using these inhalers which were supposed to help with that.

Now if only I could cure my allergies, make my uterus shrivel up and go away, refocus my vision, replenish my older skin’s moisture, tighten my skin and melt my fat! For an added touch I’d widen my lips and make them fuller. Oh, and why not add a normal ear on my left side while I’m at it, too?

I’m both surprised and not surprised when Mary wrote that Justin sought her out to marry him and have kids with him because she was naïve to the ways of the world. I’m not surprised he sought her out for being naive, but to have kids with him is a bit shocking. Especially when the sick cock’s always hated kids. In fact, I can’t believe Mary got 3 different guys to impregnate her! I say this because I’m far from the only one with a man who doesn’t want kids. Zillions of guys out there are anti-kid. All you hear from them is how they don’t want the responsibility, they don’t want the expense, they don’t want anything taking their woman’s attention from them that they feel they have to compete with, kids are for the women, etc. The only difference is that most guys don’t go to the extremes Tom has to keep their women from conceiving. Meaning, they still allow themselves to get off. I know Tom has always insisted he did want a kid and that he had no control over his problem, but still, women and men have always fought like crazy over the issue of having kids and they always will. Women and men really do have different tastes for the most part.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 10, 2004
I was playing around with and experimenting with the heart rate monitor. It seems my resting heart rate is about 88 and my active heart rate is 122.

Tom won another $15 on a Slingo ticket. I’ve been putting spells on them like crazy. So much so that he doesn’t like to cash in too many tickets at a time as it might look funny.

I’m still enjoying my incense. I have 40 favorites now. I studied their wholesale catalog and found that even if I don’t make my own, be it to sell or to use just for myself, I can buy 20-packs for $1, rather than $1.75. We’re still not sure if there’d be much of a savings if I made my own. The only way we’ll know is to try it.

We were laughing at the thought of playing a joke on Paula by sending her a scent she likes only to have it be a blank if I do end up making it. You can’t necessarily tell if the “punk” as they call them, is scented or not. If you just dip it in unscented cutting agent oil and skip the fragrance oil, you can really prank someone into thinking they’re losing their mind when they fail to smell a damn thing!

Some of them are similar. I mean, I don’t know what the difference is between Cherry and Black Cherry. Nor do I know the difference between Grape and Black Grape. If there’s any I don’t like, it’s usually because it either smells too soapy or of burnt plastic.

I asked Tom if they grow jasmine here and he said no. The reason I asked is that Andy used to insist it was the orange trees that smelled so good which I thought was rather strange, considering the fact that they didn’t smell anything like oranges. Neither did the Orange Blossom incense I got. In fact, it smelled more like raspberries. Then, when I lit the Jasmine, I not only thought it was wonderful, but that there was something familiar about it as well. After I thought about it a while I realized that that was the wonderful smell I’d smell back in Phoenix. It sure seems to be, anyway.

I read that Mojo’s said to keep away evil spirits. Well, I always thought that the foul odor was some kind of source of an evil entity. So, to find out if it was true or just a silly superstition, I lit some last night before the air came on which seems to circulate it, and could barely detect it.

I still can’t believe it’s been nearly two weeks since I’ve used the inhalers! And that I can prevent my tummy from gassing out when I have veggies! Maybe I can keep my stomach from reacting poorly to dairy foods like it always did. It’s a Jewish thing. It’s in our genetics like it is for blacks to have big lips and noses, not to mention be loud, rude and obnoxious.

Got about 40 draft pages from Mary so I’m working on those. I’ll get those out in Monday’s mail along with a letter to Paula to let her know her package should be sent out by the end of this month.

Later…

I’ve finished sampling. For the most part, I only had to have them lit for a minute or two in order to judge them. My top 50 favorites are African Queen, Angel, Baby Powder, Black Cherry, Black Henry, Black Magic, Black Narcissus, Black Pearl, Brown Sugar, Bump & Grind, Butter Rum, Cedar, Chocolate, Choctaws Mono, Cranberry, Escape, Fast Cash, Fruit, Grape, Hawaiian Garden, Hibiscus, Honey, Honey Almond, Honeysuckle, Hot Love, Hyacinth, Hyssop, Jasmine, Joe Blow, Jojoba, Joy, Licorice, Love, Mojo, Morning Mist, Opium, Pear, Puddy Cat, Pussy, Relaxation, Rose, Sexy, Sun Moon Star, Tunisian Honey, Vanilla Musk, Watermelon, Whisper, White Diamond, White Linen, & White Love.

I figured there’d be about 30 new favorites as well as 30 shitty ones and was pretty much right about that.

The last two tickets lost, so I did my spells on various things before bed like I usually do and what did we get for it? A $30 winner! So Tom used the money to sign up for this thing where you find people who are owed money. After a certain amount of time, you get your money back if you can’t find anyone who’s owed money. He thinks I’m a prime candidate from when I was on disability which wouldn’t surprise me with the way people like to rip me off.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 8, 2004
Just thought I’d jot down a few things while I sample the Nag Champa. This one’s boring, but not bad. Of the 35 or so I’ve sampled, there are 6 that are great and 5 that are going to Paula. The Vanilla Musk is heaven. Tom likes it, too. Again I’m surprised by some of them. I thought Lauren would have a nice feminine scent, but it’s got a weird scent that’s not all that great. Meanwhile, the Pear is way cool and I’ve never been into pears yet it’s got a really nice refreshing scent. They gypped me a stick in one bag and gave me extras in other bags. The Cut Grass smells so lemony that I wonder if they didn’t screw up and give me their Lemongrass instead.

They’re getting flight-happy on me again so I’m in a race to get back on days as they’re obviously going to keep at it for a while.

Tom brought up a rather unique idea. At first I told him he was crazy and to forget it, but it might have some potential if some of the negatives could be ironed out. He suggested we sell our furniture, and maybe even our computers too, and trade them in for laptops. Then we’ll store most of our stuff or get rid of it, then we’d live in an RV with a built-in generator. Then we’d buy about 3 small chunks of land in various states and get a cabin kit that we’d build for each place. The cabins are really small and would only take a couple of weekends to build. Between the RV and the cabin, we wouldn’t even have 1000 square feet of living space. Then we’d sell the places and build our “dream home” on a huge piece of land somewhere. They have these really cool circular house kits you can buy where everything’s precut. All you really need to do is bolt them together. You can get a basic kit for only around $15,000 and add as many rooms as you want to stem from the basic round great room. You can even get 2-story houses.

I definitely don’t like the idea of being cramped in a cabin and an RV for any length of time, but I like the variety we could have till we settle down somewhere, whereas if we move to wherever, we’re stuck there whether we like it or not. In the RV, however, if we get stuck with blacks, Hispanics or stormin’ Mormons who have to make their every move known to us, we can just get the hell out. Anyway, Tom’s checking into it further. We just want to make sure we explore each and every option available to us so we can make the right choice, or at least have a much better chance of doing so.

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 7, 2004
I finally got my incense! They made one little boo-boo, though, by giving me two Cashmeres and omitting the Tea Rose, but it’s no biggie. They listed Muddy Waters on the invoice twice, but I don’t have two of them. They enclosed a wholesale catalog. Yes, I can go through them for supplies to make my own! We’re thinking of taking a 5-pack bag to the swap meet just to see if I can get a nickel or a dime’s profit on it. Anyway, they didn’t ship the stuff till the 3rd, so why they told me the 31st, I don’t know. It cost them $11 to ship it all! By the time I got it all unwrapped, I had nearly a garbage bag full of the newspaper they used to wrap them in. They wrap 3 bags in each bundle. We even got to check out the land deals they’ve got going in Idaho!

I also got a letter and drafts from Mary. Mary surprised me the same as Tom did by saying she likes Nocturnal Obsession the best, even though she admits it scared the pants off of her. Well, this next one that I’m currently proofreading is going to do the same! It’s a similar kind of story. I’m going to mail her both this story and the last one when I mail Paula’s package.

Anyway, what happens in my last book, Imprisoned Love, is that this girl Tiffany goes to jail for writing bad checks. She has two kids and their father’s a deadbeat dad. They all live with her parents. Tiffany meets Vicki, a guard who likes her. They have sex late at night when Tiffany’s out cleaning and everyone else is locked down in their cells. When Tiffany starts feeling uncomfortable around Vicki, who thinks she told others at the jail about their liaisons, she tries to break away but fails. Vicki threatens to have her framed if she doesn’t continue to let her have her way with her sexually. After 3 months, Tiffany’s released and Vicki shows up a while later and weasels her way back into Tiffany’s life. Meanwhile, Vicki kills Tiffany’s ex, best friend and father to punish her for getting her written up at work. When Tiffany realizes Vicki killed them, she then kills her, knowing the police, if they could prove Vicki’s guilt, wouldn’t do much to punish her as she’s one of their own.

My next book, College Romance, is the dream-inspired story of Katelyn and Ashley who live in the same house as they study art and criminal law. They fall in love in the midst of a series of murders that occur on campus, and later end up solving the case and discovering who the killer is.

Anyway, Mary said some chick traumatized her by spreading vicious rumors and telling her she’ll rot in hell and shit like that, so if all goes well, she should be getting pretty sick.

I was really glad to read how much she likes my stories. I don’t know if I can keep cranking them out like I have been forever, but they’re fun to write when I do get ideas, even if they’re not quite marketable and I won’t be getting paid for my work.

The book people said that 5 of the books I ordered are unavailable. I guess they sold right before I ordered them. Oh well. At least they do the work of gathering the books from the various stores around the country so I can save on shipping costs.

The constant whirring of the tractor at the new house gets old, but I’d rather that than the inevitable barking I’m going to have to deal with before we leave this place.

I was also a little bummed to hear them booming about up in the sky earlier. I had hoped they’d take more than a few weeks off. I also hope they don’t go making a regular habit of booming by like they did in December!

For just $15, we’re going to take advantage of an introductory coffee deal similar to the last one I tried, then we’ll cancel out after getting the intro shipment. I’m going to get 2 coffee samples (I chose mocha regular and hazelnut decaf), a programmable coffeemaker which I’ll try to sell, and 2 mugs.

TUESDAY, JANUARY 6, 2004
Today hasn’t been a good day for either of us. First, he went to the PO and again the incense as well as the check wasn’t there. Then he got hung up in construction and stuck behind a house they were hauling to wherever, so by the time he got to Casa Grande he was in such a bad mood that all he did was the grocery shopping. Meanwhile, he’ll try again tomorrow to go to the temp agencies but has been putting in applications online regularly.

He’s still sure I’ll get the incense and that they didn’t give it away to someone else. I hope so! Why is it, though, that the more I look forward to a package I’m expecting, the more delays there are? I’m no doubt going to have to fight like hell to get Haiku here! Tomorrow, assuming I don’t get the incense, I’ll email them about it. They’ll either have to make up another order or refund our money. If I get a second order made up, though, I’m going to have them use UPS.

Tom also thinks it could’ve gotten delayed because it smells good, saying that postal workers often set things aside for a day or two like pretty or funny postcards, and because of how good this package no doubt smells, they could’ve very well left it out for the day. Yeah, well I’d kind of like to smell it now, too. I’m the one that paid for the fucking thing in the first place. Another classic example of someone getting something good from me at my expense. I asked him if they’d steal it and he said that’d be very hard for them to do with all the cameras they’ve got going.

In just 5 days, I’ve won a total of 50 Memolink lotto points!

He took his Slingo winnings and bought a heartbeat monitor. You do the math to determine your target heartbeat, then you wear this thing around you just below the breastbone along with a special wristwatch and that way you can monitor your heart throughout your workout.

I am so, so fed up with these hopeless diets! I am so, so ready to just eat normally and let myself gain whatever I’m destined to gain. I don’t know if that’ll be 20 more pounds, 50 or 100, but I’m so sick of doing all this work for nothing. I’m sick of being hungry most of the time just to never lose weight. I’ll keep fit by continuing on with the exercising, but from now on I need to have the standard 2000 calories a day. I can’t take this 1000-1500-calorie bullshit anymore. I’m sick of the confusion and conflicting reports on what to eat, how much of each thing, as well as the contradictory statements about exercise. Half the reports say you can break up your daily exercise routine and the results will still be the same. Then you got others saying, no, it has to be 20-60 minutes of continual exercise, and I’m just sick to death of it! If I go gaining a ton of weight from eating reasonably, then I was simply meant to gain it in the first place and there’s no use in forever trying to avoid the inevitable and continuing to drive myself crazy over something that can’t be helped anyway. If I don’t spend my time driving myself crazy by trying to change my height, then why should I with the weight? It’s the same losing battle. I should just let my body be itself for once. Besides, not many people would be so apt to threaten a 200-pound person. Some might, though, because people are stupid and they tend to feel more intimidated by height rather than weight.

I thought of maintaining my weight through starvation, but again, that’s just no way to live. Sometimes the best way to deal with an ongoing problem you can’t solve is to stop trying to solve it and just let it be. It’ll work itself out the way it was meant to, even if it’s not exactly in the way we’d prefer.

I cured my need for inhalers and my stomach from gassing out after having veggies, but I cannot control my weight whatsoever. I can make the numbers go up, but try as I might, I sure as hell can’t make them go down. I can’t seem to control my rapidly deteriorating eyesight either.

Meanwhile, I’m going to finish up my current book and hope that the PO will let me have my package tomorrow.

MONDAY, JANUARY 5, 2004
I copied the above dates/events from my desktop calendar. It doesn’t cover all the major or important events in my life, but it covers a lot of them.

Yesterday I got up at 5 PM and was able to take a Benadryl and get myself to sleep from 3:30 AM-9:30 AM so I could be up when Tom returned from the PO which was supposed to be with my incense. Sure enough, though, it wasn’t there. Tom says he’s 99% sure it’ll come tomorrow. I don’t know if I’ll be up when he gets home with it and I don’t care anymore either. I get it when I get it. Just so long as I do get it and it wasn’t misdelivered! As tired as I was when I got up, I managed to clean and work out before falling asleep from 1 PM-6 PM.

Ever since I quit the inhalers, I’ve had this mysterious circular rash on my forearm. I keep putting hydrocortisone on it, but it doesn’t seem to want to go away. If this is going to be my only form of compensation, though, for getting off the inhalers, it sure beats the problem I traded in my cigarettes for!

Within the next week, I should know if I can get below 127. Those who think it’s mostly diet and exercise say I can and those who say it’s age and genetics say I can’t and that I’m just wasting my time.

The big leaf plant has a new shoot coming up on each of its two sections, so that’s cool.

Tom’s getting ready to sell coins and baseball cards on eBay and says there’ll be no problem getting them sold.

Another thing that seems to be magically cured is my ability to tolerate roughage without getting tons of gas. I had a huge salad the other day with just a touch of light mayo so I could snack without lots of calories and never once did I get all gassed out. Thinking it might be just an odd coincidence, I had another one and was still okay afterward.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 3, 2004
Why oh why do I work so hard for so little? All this effort just to lose 3 measly pounds! Still, it’s good to do it to keep in shape, even if it’s boring and I’ll always be fat. I’ve been breaking it up to keep me from getting so bored that I throw in the towel. I walk for 5 minutes, then I run and play a computer game, and I go back and forth till I’ve walked 30 minutes. Since it takes a few minutes for my heart to slow down after each walking segment, it’s actually elevated for a total of 48 minutes, excluding when I work with the ball and dumbbells. Once again, if this doesn’t drop me under 127, nothing will and it will be a case of genetics, age, thyroid, diabetes or a curse for damn sure.

It’s been a week now without inhalers! It’s hard to believe I could suddenly have the power to do this after needing inhalers on and off, though mostly on since I was 8 years old.

10/27/87 – began journals.
3/24/89 – moved back to Woodside Terr.
12/10/89 – had 1-nighter with Diana.
12/28/89 – met Kacey.
7/1/90 – met Brenda.
1/7/91 – met Kim.
4/4/91 – moved to S Dfld.
6/17/91 - met Bob.
1/4/92 – met Anne Marie.
2/8/92 – moved to Norwich.
6/9/92 – moved to Phoenix.
1/6/93 – danced for 8 mos.
4/4/93 – moved to Crystal Creek.
4/9/93 – met Tom.
5/8/93 – 1-nighter with Julia.
9/1/93 – moved in with Tom.
12/5/93 – reunited with Larry.
6/15/94 – married.
12/6/94 – 1st ear canal operation.
5/21/95 – 2nd ear canal operation.
9/20/95 – next door Mormons move.
2/23/96 – black welfare bums arrive.
7/25/96 – Tom’s dad dies.
1/16/97 – Larry Jr. dies.
5/8/97 – last visit with parents.
10/4/97 – quit smoking.
1/8/98 – got into mice.
3/10/98 – upper braces put on.
7/22/98 – got into rats.
7/24/98 – done with parents/Larry.
10/6/98 – begin doll collecting.
12/8/98 – lower braces put on.
4/4/99 – blacks move.
6/1/99 – Mexicans arrive.
7/1/99 – done with Tammy.
8/23/99 – both braces come off.
9/24/99 – we leave Phoenix.
1/4/2000 – move into Maricopa house.
1/5/2000 – pig shows up with BS story.
1/6/2000 – pig kidnaps me for interrogation.
7/17/2000 – 17 hours in Florence.
8/2/2000 – arraigned.
9/7/2000 – court.
10/30/2000 – sentence begins.
1/1/2001 – met Mary.
4/29/2001 – released.
5/7/2001 – meet with Scott.
5/29/2001 – Dan moves.
9/2/2001 – 3rd rental arrives.
9/24/2001 – permanent retainers put in.
2/20/2002 – renters arrive.
3/9/2003 – new house a mile in front.
4/30/2003 – off probation.
5/6/2003 – got 3 houseplants.
6/3/2003 – Tom fired.
6/25/2003 – 1st house in front of next door arrives.
8/11/2003 – Tom begins work with Nissan.
10/5/2003 – haircut.
10/17/2003 – 2nd house in front of next door arrives.
11/21/2003 – Tom quits Nissan.
12/3/2003 – got ratty rat Brownie.
12/28/2003 – quit inhalers.

FRIDAY, JANUARY 2, 2004
Because I slept so long yesterday, I only slept 5 hours last night.

I did one of my walks already and managed to get half a mile in just over 8 minutes.

Again we saw a worker walk onto the land in front of us. They appeared to be searching for property markers. I still get the feeling that whoever bought the lot across from next door has bought the one in front of us too, but it doesn’t really matter anymore since we’ll be gone soon enough. Another reason I think this is because of what I don’t see. I don’t “see” anything outside. No changes of any kind or additions like more plants, fences, porches, etc.

Got two things in the mail I’d forgotten all about or assumed I wasn’t going to get. First was the Black Sandalwood incense sample I requested right before I decided to make my first order. I was surprised to get 3 sticks, too! It actually wasn’t half bad. I didn’t think I’d like it because I didn’t like their plain sandalwood or Walmart sandalwood, but it was ok. Not good enough to buy, but not bad enough to sic on Paula and toss in her box.

Meanwhile, my giant order was actually shipped on the 31st, so it’ll be here on the 5th as I originally guessed. It could come tomorrow, but I hope not as that’d be quite frustrating since you can’t pick up packages on Saturdays.

The other thing I got was the Cosmetique intro pack which is all going to Paula except for the Love Story perfume which is quite nice. Other than that, the eyeshadow was too dark, the nail polish too dull, the mascara was cheap shit, and the lipstick was like peanut butter.

I’m really glad I got that Dove shampoo sample. It’s just as good as Physique but at a fraction of the cost.

Later…

I was walking while Tom had the TV on. The man has the shittiest taste in shows! He was watching this series with macho men building motorcycles. Macho cocks like that only fuel my fury and make my blood boil. Unlike most people who find them intimidating, they only make me feel all the more challenged and determined to hold my ground and take them down a peg or two. Or at least try my damndest to do so. I’ve warned Deanna and Nancy-type characters about that, letting them know that sooner or later they’re going to egg on and challenge the wrong person that’s going to really give them the ultimate surprise of their lives, but they don’t get it. These people think they’re invincible till they actually are beaten down.

Anyway, although I’m not as stressed out over the unknown as I was earlier, I still wish we could just hurry up and get on with whatever’s destined for us, so to speak. If we’re as meant to move as I think we are, it’s like, let’s just get it over with already! But there’s a time and a place for everything. I truly believe that. It makes sense, for example, for Mary and I to have met when we did, seeing that we were meant to be friends. It would’ve been really hard for me to be friends with her had we met a decade or so ago. Not that I’d personally blame her, of course, but with her pregnant at just 15 years of age, being around her would’ve only made me feel even more singled out and cursed by God. I’d have been like, hey this isn’t fair! Why is it that a teenager with a shitty life and an abusive guy - which she fully admits was the case back then - gets to have a kid while me and my husband, who are stable, if not as close to it as we can get, are denied that right? Again, though, I would never have blamed her for her own destiny which God planned out for her just like he does with us all. It was never her fault she grew up with abusive people setting poor examples for her, telling her things like abortion is wrong when in fact it’s not or else God would never have allowed us to figure out how to do such a procedure (besides, it’s her life/body), and telling her things are right that aren’t right. It’s like the poor girl was brainwashed! I would’ve felt just as bad for her then as I do now. I try to encourage her to have a mind of her own, so to speak, and not let others tell her what’s right or wrong, because what’s right for one person may not be right for someone else. You just can’t put everybody in one big group. I’m sure she knows this, though. She’s as big on individuality as I am and avoiding those we dislike rather than trying to change them.

Speaking of destiny, I know damn well I’m never going to get more than a few pounds off (especially if genetics are as much a part of it as they say it is), so I’ve cut my walk to a half-hour a day, plus my toning exercises. I’m not going to put myself out like crazy over 3 lousy pounds which is all I can lose.

I’m still inhaler-free, but I do have waves of tightness and probably always will. I don’t know, I guess God never felt I was worthy of a decent pair of lungs.

THURSDAY, JANUARY 1, 2004
Age 38

Being that it was my favorite holiday of the year, I only wrote one paragraph in my current story tonight. I watched the ball go down in Times Square as usual. How I wished I could be there just for the countdown, then be right back here a minute or two after the New Year, since I hate crowds. Anyway, I do love New Year’s Eve. I guess because it’s just so informal and it’s non-religious. Plus, as I said before, it was the only time I was “free” as a kid and got to stay up really late. Also, the start of a new year, especially when the previous one was rather shitty, was a time for hope, even if it was usually false.

Just when I was amazed at how quiet it was with no music or gunshots, I heard music for a couple of minutes right after midnight, but of course, to me, the real New Year begins at Eastern time.

It’s hard to believe I’ve been friends with Paula for nearly 20 years, even if we lost touch a couple of times over the years, and even if she’s not exactly what I’d describe as a true friend, in a sense. With all my other long-term “friends,” either I dumped them or they dumped me. It’s life, I guess.

I don’t have any significant vibes for ’04 other than that it’s to be a year of change. This is more of an obvious, common sense thing, though, then a psychic thing. We do, after all, plan to move so we can stop struggling. I’m going to miss this big beautiful modern house, though!

I packed more of my dolls away. I only have 7 that aren’t packed yet. All that’s out is Joy, Jade, Bailey, Colette, Patrice, Ciara and Chris, who’ll get thrown in the moving bin loose because she’s so big and she’s vinyl. Of course, soon Haiku will join the crew! I’m going to be smart enough to save her box too, so I can put her back in it when we move. I’ll miss the ones that are packed till whenever we do move, which I’m almost positive will be this year, but I’ll just appreciate them all the more after not seeing them for a while. I’m also going to appreciate how much easier dusting is till we do move, too!

It’s in the low 50s now. The cloud coverage is keeping it from getting too cold.

Tom went to Walgreens’ site and found an appetite suppressant that might be suitable for me for $20. There are 90 pills and you take 2 before each meal. I hope it works as well as Trimlife. Trimlife has not only suppressed my appetite, but it did a good job of conditioning me so that I could skip days and still not be hungry all the time.

Tom said a report he read says it’s all genetics. I think genetics is part of it, but the bulk of it is age. Why else would 80% of those under 30 be thin while 80% of those over it aren’t? I think it’s 60% age, 20% diet/exercise and 20% genetics.

Tom likes my medical romance story so far. I didn’t think he would. Like I said, I just couldn’t seem to go anywhere with it.

My next story’s going to be really weird. It’s the one where I’ll take Tom’s advice and blow real-life events I’ve experienced out of proportion or into pure BS. I can’t include Tom in it, though, as he’s “too real.” I’m talking about things like the pictures I communicated with for really coming to life, the rats being even smarter than they actually are, Teddy Bear and I getting it on and not just liking each other and thinking about it.

Later…

What on earth possessed me to need 13 hours of sleep is beyond me, but it was fun nonetheless, as one of the many dreams I had brought me a new story idea. In the dream, I was single and in a college dorm. The “dorm” was just a regular house with something like 5 other girls in it. Well, Kate was one of them, but Kate wasn’t Kate. Meaning, she was just a regular person and not a famous actress. I don’t know what she and I were studying, but it gave me the idea of having us be in a dorm where we get to like each other, and maybe throw in a few murders here and there for added excitement that we solve, too.

I’m back to where I started at 130 pounds. At least I’m not in the 140s like I feared I’d be by now. I guess that’s because I did watch what I ate at least some of the time over the last couple of weeks, I did exercise like every other day and I’m regular as well. Regularity will help tremendously with the diet. If I don’t get under 127 with this diet and exercise regimen, then it is a medical problem or a curse.

Trying to rig yesterday’s two non-scratch tickets was a bust so I think I’ll just stick to the scratchers. I know I’ll eventually win us a large sum of money. Perhaps not millions, but probably thousands. As Tom said, though, it happens whenever it happens. It’s ok if it takes me a decade. Good things are worth waiting for. Meanwhile, I also want to keep concentrating on non-money and non-material things as well like keeping off the inhalers and maybe stopping my periods. My period’s due tomorrow and I’m rarely late. Sometimes I’m early, but I’m almost never late and if I am, it’s only by a day or two.

Later…

I was just playing with Brownie. I really like this rat a lot and am glad that if one of the newcomers had to go it wasn’t him. He’s both dry and mellow. Meanwhile, I’m handling Little Fella less and less as I’m sick of the constant pissing. Every time I go to pick him up he’s wet and it just gets old.

I’m thinking up more and more ideas for the dream-inspired story. Instead of it being known from the get-go who the bad guy is, perhaps I’ll make this one more of a whodunit story. I just wish I could get paid for my work! That’s okay, though. I’ll just have to win us thousands of dollars. Besides, writing is fun no matter what.

Later…

I decided to cut my walk to 3 15-minute walks, rather than do an hour’s worth of walking. The other 15 minutes are going to be spent using the exercise ball and dumbbells, so it’ll come to a total of one hour anyway.

I also decided to stop backing stuff up on floppies since I have two hard drives. I condensed my files a bit, too.

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Last updated July 16, 2024