July 2010 in 2010s

SATURDAY, JULY 31, 2010
Maliheh checked me out at 2am her time last night. I’m flattered! And oh, how I wonder about her, too. I’m not only curious about what she’s thinking where I’m concerned, but what is her life like? What does she do? Does she live alone? What does she like and dislike?

All the “at” animals come out at night – rats, cats, bats, gnats… Just a casual observation.

Jesse was down yesterday to finish up with the cooler, and sure enough, now he wants to redo our roof. Ugh! There’s always one project after another! I don’t miss renting from a management company, but I miss the days of seeing the landlord just once or twice a year instead of every 2-6 weeks. I guess there’s some kind of thing you just roll onto the roof or that you paint on as a protective coating. He said it shouldn’t leak, but he should do it this winter. Yeah, I figured he’d think of something else to do down here soon enough. I should just be glad it’s summer. He doesn’t work nearly as much on the land at this time of year.

Anyway, Tom helped him out. They communicated with walkie-talkies while Tom worked up here and Jesse worked at the back of the land where the well is located. Between us helping him out and tending to some of the land so he has less to do, I think it’s pretty safe to say he would rather not lose us and risk getting renters in here like what he had before us.

We didn’t know this, but he apparently has a daughter as well. She’s leaving for college down in Long Beach.

Even so, we looked online at land in California, Nevada and Florida, Whiskey chased a fawn, and I did some writing.

I got up around 3am to find a message from Tom saying that the connection had been really bad all night, he was on the phone with our provider 3 times, and each time they gave him a different story. In other words, they don’t care and they’re not going to do anything about it, knowing we have no choice but to continue using them if we want to go online at all since they’re the only providers out in the boonies here. So thanks to whatever’s cursing us financially, he was unable to list anything on eBay, and of course the people who interviewed him wouldn’t dare call to say he’d been hired. So we starve to death in another few months and God gets another damn good laugh at our expense. No biggie, right?

I had house dreams galore last night and a dream about Maliheh supposedly hunting me down to try to kill me. Some of the houses were rural, some weren’t. One I remember in detail was both good and bad. It was bad because it was old and ugly, but good because it was a good size two-story house. Nothing overly big, but sufficient enough.

Later…

Hahahaha, just 12 hours later Maliheh visited my blog again. Wow, that’s 4 times in less than a week!

And now it looks like a friend of hers is visiting since they not only came in from Facebook but are in Lenexa, Kansas. I swear she’s got connections in Iowa, Missouri and Kansas.

Damn, I wish I could see/hear what she says when she talks about me to others!

FRIDAY, JULY 30, 2010
Right before 6am, I noticed the water pressure was low – AGAIN – and then shortly afterward I could hear Jesse on the ATV. The dogs came and sought us out before Jesse got to doing our cooler around noon. We heard them race across the porch and so we went out to say hi. Sure enough, they alternated between playing with us as well as wrestling with each other.

Later on, Jesse called – yes, he actually called – to say that we’d have water in about an hour and that he was re-wiring the well. This should help a lot of the pressure problems we’ve been having. He said he was up at 6:00 shaving when he went to rinse his razor and realized there was no water, and so he had to go outside and hose it off. I got to laugh at him too, though we all laughed at that one.

He’s going to be back this morning to make sure nothing’s leaking. I’m glad I’m on days!

I finally remembered to ask him what these palm-like trees are called and they’re Trees of Heaven. Palms and cactuses aren’t native to this area, and they’re pretty much the only trees around here that I like.

THURSDAY, JULY 29, 2010
Well, this is interesting. I check Maliheh’s profile out every now and then to see if anything’s changed, and she’s now showing our mutual friends (I didn’t even know we had any, though we do have one), and her photos. But the one showing her face isn’t there.

The question is, does she realize these things are visible or is it a glitch on Facebook’s part? If it was her that set them to be visible, is she slowly “opening up” to me? It will be interesting to see if there’s any kind of reaction on her part when I finish her story, though I’m not counting on it.

I’m afraid to get my hopes up, but nonetheless, I wonder if this could be a turning point in our lives. As I’ve learned – expect the best and you’ll be more disappointed if things don’t go your way. Expect the worst and you’ll be all the more delighted if they do go your way. But Tom thinks that if the company that interviewed him yesterday gets the contract they’re after, they will hire him. I guess they repair broken electronic parts like cell phones. They were actually interviewing tons of people every 15 minutes. The only problem is that it could very well be just a one-month assignment if he does get the job. It’s better than nothing, but we need something permanent and some real security, goddamnit! Why are the basic, simple everyday things so out of reach for us and so damn much to ask for??? All we can do is hope they hire him and that it leads to something permanent, but this is rather unlikely. Either way, they said they’d call today or tomorrow if they want him.

We’re scrambling to save all we can to buy us extra time because if we don’t beat the clock, and if they do add more unemployment extensions, I know they’re going to wait until after this one runs out. They already said that if they do anything it won’t be until November. Like I said before, I’m so sick of being teased about our survival and struggling like we have that I don’t care anymore if we don’t make it. Don’t care if we do either.

In other good news, they paid me for the work that was auto-rejected, and they even restored my approval rate back to the 99.4% it was, so that’s nice.

Jesse was all excited to get his money, Tom told me after he called to let him know it was in the box, and he’s coming down today to “ditch” the cooler. That way the main well pump doesn’t have to work so hard with it hooked up to the shallow well.

So I will get to see the dogs I love as much as I hate. I especially love Whiskey and I hate him more than Brandy too, LOL. He barks way more than Brandy. But I love how they run up to me for hugs.

Once again, even though it’s summer, we had some spring-like weather. It got chilly in here in the early mornings two days in a row. I worry that while everywhere else is warming up, this area is going to cool down. I hope not!

Later…

Maliheh just checked out my blog again, LOL! Once again…is she curious about me? The story? Or does she just want to get me?

WEDNESDAY, JULY 28, 2010
With over 2K coming to us between yesterday and next Friday, a job interview for Tom this afternoon, and a finished story for me, I’d say things are much, much better than they have been for the girl who’s had death on her mind a little too much lately. Now if we can just survive the next 700 days, we’ll be cashing in his pension and “going home,” wherever that may be.

The interview is just a low-paying temp job in a warehouse, and they’ll probably turn him down when they see his age and color, but at least they want to see him. Worst case scenario, we’re back to having to beat the clock.

Anyway, once we pay the cock up the hill for the last part of July and all of August, I will be eating like a pig for a couple of days, then it’s back to my timer diet where I eat 6 times each day every two hours beginning when I’ve been up for two hours. My calories can’t exceed 1200 a day and I also have to run a mile a day. It’s no fun, but you do get used to it, and it does work.

I emailed Marie to let her know my book was done. She’s been busy with OT and has decided not to move to New Hampshire. I can understand this. She may not always get along with her roommates, but very few people don’t have to pay rent, and if she moved, she may get along even worse with her new roommate, and there’s no guarantee she could get a job, either. So it’s not always wise to leap if you might not land on solid ground.

TUESDAY, JULY 27, 2010
I’ve been restless lately. I want to just up and leave and run off to someplace new. But at the same time, I want to stay put and never budge an inch.

Digital Confessions is now done! Woot! Now it’s in the editing phase which could take a week or two.

That’s the good news. The bad news is that I still wonder if the only escape from this curse is death. I really don’t think we’re going to get any more money and we’re just about out of what little we have, so this may be it. I may not even have time to do all the editing I want to do. Well, whatever happens, it’s like I said before; there’s just as much good in dying as there is in living. If I don’t make it, yeah, I’ll miss people and my hobbies and things like that, but there’ll be no more stress, no more struggling, no more barking, no more cold, etc, and it is still predominantly cold here being 1000’ up and with such wet winters. If it was as dry as Arizona, it would be mostly warm, at least during the daytime. But all the rain we get from the fall to the spring keeps the temperature down.

As most people know, you get followers on Twitter based on what you tweet about. Someone with this really cool language site started following me and tweeting famous love quotes every half hour in Italian. I translate it first in my mind and then I click the link to get anything I missed or to see if I’m correct. I can now understand a good 75% of the Italian I read – yes! Italian grammar is a killer, though! Worst grammar I ever dealt with! All romance languages have psycho grammar, but Italian’s definitely the worst and in many ways harder than English.

MONDAY, JULY 26, 2010
Does everyone have dreams where they’re naked in public? I have these types of dreams every now and then myself. Last night Tom and I were at a store when I suddenly realized that all I was wearing was a pair of black panties. I quickly wrapped my arms around my chest to cover my boobies. Then I realized that Tom didn’t seem to notice my nakedness, and so I hoped that this meant that others wouldn’t either.

I also dreamt that Jesse told me a woman named (he said my sister’s full name) called complaining about all the barking, and right away I feared the drama queen was about to try to pull something on me because there’s no way she could hear the barking all the way in Connecticunt, of course.

In real life, the fucker never came home last night. If he did it was after 1am, and so it sounded like a winter day with all the barking that went on for at least 6 hours. I had to put the sound machines on all throughout the place just to concentrate on my writing. It’s fucking ridiculous that this has to follow us every single fucking place we go in the west, although Andy said it wasn’t a regular problem for him. Then he must not have lived close to other people’s yards. For us, where there are yards there are dogs and so there is barking. Not every single yard within the immediate area of every place we’ve lived at has had dogs, but there’s always at least one that has.

I’m in a better mood than I was last night, even though the Beanie Baby didn’t sell. Next we move on to plan #2 and that’s seeing what we can get from a company that buys Beanie Babies. If they won’t give me at least $200, I’m not interested. And if that’s the case, then it’s off to plan #3 which is to group them into lots and do shorter listings.

Tom’s now down from over 270 pounds to 243 – yay! And I’m just ever so slightly under the 130-marker myself. Almost put 230. I don’t think I could even walk at 230 as short as I am!

I don’t know why I would do that since Halloween is an ugly holiday. Witches aren’t my thing, psychic or not, and black and orange aren’t my favorite colors. They’re not as ugly as gray and olive, but they don’t do anything for me either. I remember Halloween was Andy’s favorite holiday, though, while mine was always New Year’s Eve, though lately the thought of a new year doesn’t bring the kind of hope and excitement it once did. Gee, I wonder why?! Like maybe somebody finally realizes – even if she’s a little slow at times – that her future was obvious all along. Yeah, it’s sad to know that my answer would be the same if someone asked me where I saw myself a year from now, 5 years from now, or even 10 years from now.

Poor, poor and poor.

SUNDAY, JULY 25, 2010
We’ve been in California for exactly 3 years today. Financially we’ve gotten absolutely nowhere. Personally, intellectually and material-wise we’ve come a long way.

Jesse goes out on Friday and Saturday nights, so the dogs are going crazy. It’s times like this I don’t feel the least bit guilty about being late with the rent. We specifically told Maryann up front we wanted a quiet place.

I have been depressed, frustrated, stressed and pissed, but mostly pissed. My job as an artificial intelligence worker prohibits me from discussing much in the way of details, but I will say that one of the requestors had a huge glitch in their system last night and I ended up working all night for free when I could’ve been working on my story and studying languages. They obviously got a lot of complaints and people stopped doing their jobs once they realized that they too, were automatically getting rejected, because they still have a million HITs listed, and these usually go fast. I thought it was weird at first since I’ve worked for these people before and have always had all my work approved and paid.

All workers have an approval rate, depending on how well they do. My approval rate had been 99.4%, but the fuckers threw me down to 98.7% after their fucked up system rejected 196 HITs, as they call the jobs. They’re aware of the problem now and have approved a dollar’s worth of the $9 I’m owed. We’re pretty sure they’ll compensate people somehow with a bonus of some kind, but as MT themselves said, they can’t un-reject rejected HITs, so I’m stuck with a lower approval rate, even though anything over 95% is outstanding. I cashed out immediately because until I realized it was a glitch in the system, I was afraid I’d get kicked off and basically fired. I couldn’t just open a new account in a different name/email if I did because my SS# is still the same either way. I’m tempted to take Tom’s advice and just do educational surveys, translation and transcription jobs, and leave it at that. We’re still going to be poor anyway so what the hell.

Yeah, speaking of that, God’s blessed us so much that He’s seen to it that we won’t be eating much this week. Isn’t He wonderful, folks? Well, that’s ok. I hate Him as much as He hates my husband and I. See, we were supposed to get our money last week. But now the new earliest/latest scenario is on for between next Monday and Wednesday. Tom, who keeps up to date at their site as to what they’re doing and when they’re doing it, says there’s no way the money won’t get to us next week, everything’s fine, etc., but I’m so sick of being teased and beaten over the head with money that if I could reach up, yank God down out of the sky long enough to shove a dollar bill in his mouth and make him choke on it, I probably would! And I don’t care who I piss off by saying so! We all have our own ways of venting and this is mine. I’m just so fucking fed up! It’s a never-ending cycle of bullshit that just won’t quit no matter what we do! Every day I’m thinking of suicide. Every day now. If you knew someone or something put a curse on you for reasons you’ll probably never know, that could never be undone, and if you knew you were destined to be dirt poor and have all your dreams in life denied to you, wouldn’t you think about it? The older I get, the more I realize things will never ever change. If I were still in my 20s, even my 30s, I would probably have some hope that we could turn things around. But not at 44 and 53. As I told Tom, who’s been begging me to “hang on,” I can only live for him so much. Sometimes a person’s gotta do what they gotta do and live for themselves. And I just don’t know that I could go on like this another 30 or 40 years if we survive this recession. He insisted he not only doesn’t want to lose me, but that he would be blamed for my suicide and doesn’t want to go to prison. Of course I had to laugh at that one. If God protects those who have really actually wronged me for real, why would He see that Tom got punished for something he didn’t do and that I did to myself all by myself? Anyway, I’m not saying I’m going to kill myself. I’m just saying that I’m getting awfully sick of life and am losing my will to go on. Nothing excites me anymore and I just feel like I have nothing to live for at times.

I try to just take solace in and be grateful for the fact that Tom and I are healthy, though I still have scattered chest pains, palpations and feelings of being smothered. Not tight-chested like I’d get down in Arizona, but I sometimes feel like I can’t take in a full breath of air, and yawning doesn’t always help either. These are all said to be classic heart failure symptoms, but the longer I have this, the more obvious it is that my heart is ok because I would probably be dead by now if it was my heart, or the symptoms would have worsened by now. My next guess is nerves, but I’ve been under a lot more stress than this before but didn’t have these symptoms. IDK, maybe it’s my body’s new way of reacting to stress. sighs A part of me wishes I did have something deadly. Then I wouldn’t have to worry about being poor or killing myself, would I?

I’ve also got hobbies I enjoy, though I can’t do some of them, like studying languages, when it’s noisy.

What the hell? My keyboard stopped working and I got so pissed that I punched the shit out of it and now it’s working again! Jesus, it never ends! Leaky pipes, computer problems, money problems… it never fucking ends! What’s next, God? Huh? What’s next? Aaaarrrggghhh!!!!!!!

Before my foul mood gets any more fucked up or my keyboard quits for good no matter how viciously I beat the snot out of it, we have baby birds nesting just outside the kitchen door in the corner of the porch. Their little chirps are cute to hear, and we hate to have to scare Mama Bird when we go in and out. She’s getting used to us, though.

I think my fucking hand is broken – aaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrggggghhhhhh!!!!!!!!

Almost forgot - I remember 4 dreams I had last night, for those of you who don’t find that sort of thing boring.

In one dream I was going through my MIL’s dresser, though I don’t know how or why I would be at her place of all places. I was rummaging through the top drawer. There was an Italian coin that said “Italia” on it, but instead of swiping that I swiped a couple of bucks of American change, feeling no guilt at all, and bought myself some junk food with it from a vending machine.

Then we were stuck in a tooth house again, as I call houses that are just a few feet apart, that was tiny and laid out like the Oregon house. I didn’t know it, but we were stuck living next to the crazy black bitch all over again that we lived with in Phoenix. We both stepped out of our houses at the same time. She spotted me and began screaming, “She’s going to kill me! She’s going to kill me!”

I immediately ran back inside and hid as she and someone else kicked at the door, knowing that once the cops got there, she would be the one to automatically be believed because I’m white, and even though there’s no one left alive who had a hand in slavery, we whites of today are the ones paying for it.

Next I was visiting some woman in a very big and old house. The living room was huge and nearly empty. Then I realized the woman was crazy when she kept insisting I was her dead daughter come back to life. I went to leave, but the door was locked.

The last dream wasn’t too bad, though. I actually liked it and was kind of sorry to wake up from it because Tom and I both seemed so excited. We seemed to have all the freedom and money in the world to be able to do what we were going to do. We were driving through the woods, though the woods looked more Oregonish than down here. “I’m sick of this climate,” I said, and Tom said, “Me too.” I was surprised cuz I thought he liked it. Then I said, “Now’s the time. Now’s the time before you turn 55 to check out Florida where most dogs are household pets in the east. You said it yourself - we don’t want to settle in a place and then have to move a few years later. If we don’t like it we can always head back out west.”

Tom agreed and the dream ended with me saying we’d get as close to my folks as we could. How wonderful it would be to be able to shop around for our forever home like that! But I wouldn’t have the guts to move long-distance after what happened the last time, and we definitely wouldn’t have the money. I still don’t think there’s even going to be a temporary home in our cards. Oh, I don’t want to think about it. I’ll only start crying!

Oh, God, why oh why won’t you be a little bit nicer to us????? If I could suddenly know for sure that I was wrong, man, what a blubbering fool I’d be! I’d totally go ballistic with joy!

Someone in Concord, NH searched for “Valleyhead Lenox, school and girls” and hit my blog. I wonder if it was Tammie?

Still nothing from the sick bitch, not surprisingly. I won’t let her ignore me, though. I can’t make her read my messages, but I’ll be sure to remind her of my existence every so often. I think she is reading them, though, cuz just like Maliheh, she’s hoping I’ll say the wrong thing.

SATURDAY, JULY 24, 2010
I had a ridiculous house dream, LOL. The house was huge and must’ve been like 4 or 5 stories. On the ground floor, we had a horse. I said to Tom, “Horses can tell temperature differences, right?” He said yes and I said that I didn’t see any point in heating that part of the house during the winter.

When I told Tom about it I said, “The message in that dream was simple. In other words, keep dreaming the impossible, because the impossible is all we’re going to get.”

He said, “No, it’s a sign that the horses are going to help get us a house, but you don’t see it.”

Yeah, right! I sure wish that was the case!

I also wrote a poem in my dreams for that hot Italian guard who escorted Amanda Knox to and from the court, but I don’t remember what I wrote, much less how I thought I was going to get it to her since I don’t even know her name, LOL.

I was reading about the Knox case, which is rather interesting, but what really stands out in my mind, besides how hot some of the guards were that were escorting her, was how her family defended her. Never once did I hear them express any doubt as to her innocence (though I think she’s guilty). Had that been me in her shoes, my family would never have defended me like that! They’d pay for lawyers if they had the money and send me things I may need that were allowed, but I can totally picture them in interviews, saying things like, “While we’re here to support her and help try to get her freed as soon as possible, Jodi needs to take responsibility for her own actions. We’re aware of the fact that she has problems and well, we all gotta do what we gotta do, but we’re here for her.”

Even my own husband made me sound guilty as hell in court when he said, “I just want her to get help.” It’s like I have a magnet for attracting a serious lack of defense when it comes to getting or needing people on my side, guilty or not. Tom later explained the reason he said that which wasn’t because he really thought I needed help. He knew I was the victim all the way in that case. He was actually trying one last-ditch effort to remind the judge that it was only a letter, and therapy was an alternative to punishment. But it was obvious that the judge had already made up his mind about me before he ever even laid eyes on me. Tom later regretted saying this since it obviously didn’t do me any good. We’d have done many things differently had we known then what we know now, but we were naïve to the law and that’s why they took advantage of me. But still, when I do things like bitch about Jesse’s racket when he’s out gunning engines or refusing to call before coming down here with non-emergencies, he’s quick to make excuses for the guy and, it bothers me.

I was remembering – and I definitely couldn’t forget this one – one of the funniest memories Andy and I always used to laugh about. I was so rude, but it was so funny at the same time. Sort of like the garage thing. He used to have me tell him this story over and over again it was just so fucking funny!

Back in Springfield when I was still wasting my time with what obviously wasn’t meant to be, I would meet women on dating lines. Or try to anyway. Back then I liked them super feminine whereas these days I like them in the middle. So I called this girl in Rhode Island and told her up front I wanted a feminine woman. We ended up talking for quite a while. At one point she made the comment about her sister’s dresser in her bedroom having all kinds of makeup, perfume and jewelry all over it, while hers just had a bottle of deodorant.

“Wait a minute, wait a minute,” I suddenly exclaimed, “I smell dyke here!”

Damn! Springfield’s going to be 76º and only fall to 71º at night. But up in K-Falls, they’re going to go from 90º to 55º. That’s one of the sucky things to dry climates; the extreme hi/lo fluctuations. We’ll drop 30º too, but we’ll be dropping from 100º.

FRIDAY, JULY 23, 2010
According to Andy, I didn’t quite get the garage door story right in my last entry. He asked me why my memory is so shot when I write things down, yet he remembers things and he doesn’t write things down. But I didn’t write it down. I was a vague and shitty writer back in the late 80s. I was just going by my rapidly declining memory. It used to be that I’d remember a new sign or Spanish word the first time I saw/heard it. But now it takes me a few times around to remember new Italian, Portuguese or German words. Argh! It took two shots to remember that snail in Italian is lumaca. Well, la lumaca, since they put the word “the” in front of everything.

Anyway, he told me what really happened and it’s still pretty funny to me, even though I do feel sorry for the patient and how they’d freak out over the sound of the garage door opening and closing. I can’t imagine how someone like that could survive the car stereos once they hit the scene. And thank God they don’t live in the West where there are tons of barking dogs just about everywhere you go. That is unless there are only certain sounds that drive them crazy, like with me. I don’t mind the frogs croaking up a storm in the rainy season like they do. They’re just as loud as the dogs, yet the dogs drive me absolutely crazy. They’re already back to going off in the mornings (at least I know Jesse’s working), but I’m not surprised. They started barking earlier last fall and stopped later last spring, so why not start earlier this fall, too? Then by next summer, we won’t get any peace at all, not even when it’s 100º.

The Beanie Baby’s up to 28 views, but still no bids. We figure that if it’s going to sell, someone will swoop in at the last minute and grab it.

I wonder how Marie’s been doing. I know she’s busy working tons of OT and gearing up for the move to New Hampshire. And perhaps she is still bedazzled by that girl she met online, but either way, she’s been in my thoughts. I really did love her, I was attracted to her, and probably always will be. With all we’ve been through it’s hard not to care about her, and hey, I am attracted to tall, dark ladies, particularly Italians, LOL.

I guess he wouldn’t mind my saying this, but Andy had a time when he looked Hispanic and he liked it, too. I wouldn’t mind looking Italian or Asian. I love straight dark brown or black hair and really dark eyes. The Asians don’t get fat very easily either.

Back to Marie. I had a wet dream last night that kind of dried up fast, LOL. I don’t know where we were but we’d just gotten it on and I was standing in the kitchen trying to cook us something when she kept grabbing me from behind and pulling me back against her. She wanted another round between the sheets, but I was hungry. For food, that is. Then we got in a fight and I called my dad, of all people, to come and pick me up, LOL, cuz she wouldn’t drive me home.

Lots of work at the job site tonight, so off I go!

THURSDAY, JULY 22, 2010
I wasn’t so sure MyOpera would appreciate my political rant in one of my previous entries, so I deleted it. I’m going to really enjoy being my own boss once I get my own site going. Could still be a while, though, what with everything else we got going on. It says in their TOS that anything vulgar, hateful or sexual isn’t allowed, and while plenty of others seem to be able to get away with it, I’m not usually good at getting away with things, so I toned that entry down.

The good news is that I’m really racing toward the finish line with my book! Just maybe I will get it done before the month is out, but if I don’t, I should have it done by mid-August. I’m excited!

I was remembering when Andy and I would go to the beach – he would always do the driving, of course, since I don’t drive – we had this point in the drive where I would start writing in my journal. Of course I did that all by hand back then as this was in the late 80s. There was this certain bend in the road on our way to the beach in Old Slyme, CT, as we’d call it, where I would start writing and for some reason, he really liked that. The trip usually took a little over an hour and this “writing point” was about 20 minutes from the beach. At least I think it was.

I was also remembering how we stayed at Ho Jo’s for one or two nights with a friend of his named Juliet. She had long dark hair. I think they were neighbors as kids. It was mean of us to laugh, but we couldn’t help but crack up with laughter when she was telling us about a mean prank she pulled as a kid. I guess her mother was a shrink or some kind of counselor who saw patients at her home. One of the patients would freak out over the sound of electric garage doors opening and closing, for some reason, and Juliet and what I think may’ve been her siblings would sneak into the garage and open and close the door just to get the person going, LOL.

I forgot to mention that he told me he took in Quinn’s cat after he killed himself. Quinn had her for 4 years and Andy had her for 9 years. It was their child, in a sense, and he loved her very much. But by the time he knew he was leaving Arizona, she’d gotten really old, and he prayed to God to please take her before he left, knowing she’d never survive the cross-country trip, and He did.

Leave it to God to grant Andy’s request to take a cat while He ignores my request to take the queen. I prayed so many times back in Phoenix that He take her! Alive she was nothing but a burden to others, yet dead there were people that really could’ve used her money. Healthy people with years of life ahead of them and many more expenses than she had to deal with. She will be 87 this month! I vibed she’d die at 86 or 87 of a stroke, but with everyone’s shit luck, not that we’ll be getting a damn thing from her when she finally does croak, she’ll make it to 100. That’s just more punishment for Miss Perfect, though.

Wonder how long it will take Maliheh to return to my blog on her own with no prompting from me.

Or the sicko that victimized me in Arizona? Yeah, I finally found her on Facebook. I was doing this job on the Turk where you look up profile links by email addresses. I didn’t know you could do that, so I decided to see if I could find her by her email addy since I could never find her by name. So I ran her addy and up came that pitifully ugly face of hers framed by a clownish hairstyle that makes her look as if she’d been electrocuted. I don’t just say she’s ugly because of all I suffered on account of her, but because it’s so true. Damn, is she hideous! And her thick, black-framed glasses only add to her ugliness.

But the real ugliness is inside. Deep inside that soul lies a very hateful, vindictive, vengeful person who got away with an awful lot of shit, and who helped get my own self a sentence fit for someone who’d kicked the crap out of someone pretty bad.

Okay, I don’t want to waste any more time on this pitiful excuse for a human being. I’ve got work to do.

Oh, wait! I called Stacey, too. I thought of who I may want to call now that I have free long-distance and her name popped into mind. No, I’m not making pranks, of course, but I just wanted to call once just to rattle Stacey’s nerves. Maybe God doesn’t “karmatize” those that have wronged me, but I sure sometimes do, even if it’s in a very small way. I could never have the kind of power over my abusers like they had over me. That’s why they screwed me in the first place; because they were the ones that could, not that I wanted to screw them if I’d been the one with the power.

I got an answering machine with whom I assume was James speaking, saying he was leaving an outgoing message with the help of “Sparky,” a dog I could hear barking in the background. I simply said, “I’m not sure if Stacey lives here, but this is Jodi. I got an urgent message to call this number right away. Something about needing my permission for a book deal. Well, if your caller ID is working, you know my number.”

Hahahahaha!!!

None of the Laurie numbers panned out, and I decided not to bother with Michelle. Although she might be able to give me some clues that may help me find Laurie.

I doubt I’ll get the right Jan, but maybe I’ll try to reach her, though I’ll try her at a decent hour, unlike Stacey, LOL.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 21, 2010
Although I’m in the mood to write, I don’t have much to say at the moment. No meaningful dreams that I can recall to write about, no nothing. I pretty much slept the day away, LOL, and didn’t get up till around 3:00.

Tom finished weeding. It took him 3 hours, but he said it was a great workout for him so he didn’t mind. All the cords we have can reach 250’ so he managed to get all the way to the top of the drive where it forks. Picture the letter Y. The bottom part is the drive that stems off the main road. It’s not straight, though. It’s actually a very hilly drive. The left side of the Y drops down to our place, the right side goes uphill to his. It would be the perfect piece of land if only – if only – it was ours and Jesse and his damn dogs were out of the picture! If this land and a retirement community were our only choices, I’d go with this in a heartbeat as much as I hate wells and the headaches they bring. It’s private as hell and would be dead quiet all the time if it were just us. All we’d hear were gunshots, but fortunately we don’t hear them too often.

They finally voted, but the Republicunts were being assholes, doing their best to delay it till the very last minute since enough is never enough for the greedy bastards. They’re rich enough to buy all the cars and houses they could ever want, but that’s still not enough. It’s been nothing but a chilling display of how many heartless SOBs are in this world that are supposed to be running this country for the better and taking care of the people in it. Not seeing that they starve off as many as they can for the sake of saving money. It’s really scary to know such sick twists are representing the people of this country, but that’s the way it’s always been. Why would it change now? I hate all politicians! All they are is a bunch of money-hungry control freaks who care about money and power, not the welfare of the citizens of the country. But where I hate Dems I really hate those fucking Republicunts! I can’t believe these people don’t get assassinated with the way they play with so many people’s lives.

So we’re looking at getting our money next week, and if it weren’t for my online job, we’d be so totally beyond screwed. Totally! There’s no way we could’ve made it without it. Maybe something does want us to survive after all if only to tease us with our existence and make us miserable at times.

Speaking of work, I gotta get back to it. Then it’s on with my story so I can finally start the one I’m doing for Maliheh. Well, I’m doing it for me, too. Believe me, I wouldn’t take on any writing project I didn’t think would be fun unless I was getting paid for it. Writing articles for pay isn’t fun, so that’s why I do it – because they pay me to.

I joked to Andy about not talking for 6 months since I hate phones, but I’m sure I’ll call him in a month or two. It was so nice touching base by phone! I’ve wondered for so long just what he’s been up to.

I checked our eBay listing. Only 25 views, no watchers, no bids, no good.

TUESDAY, JULY 20, 2010
They explained how the hits chart works after I asked them. The reason it could say I have 5 page views with just 1 hit on the list is that if someone visits me once, but views 5 pages while they’re at it, then it will say I have 5 views.

Well, I don’t know if Marie’s lack of emails is really due to this person she met in Texas, her busyness or something else, but I like it. I hate to say it as much as I still love her, but I really like it. I could get very used to this cut-down in messages.

For those of you who don’t know me well, I sometimes have dream premonitions. Sometimes the events mimic the dream to a T, other times it’s along the same basic idea, but doesn’t play out exactly like in the dream. I am also an “influencer” of sorts, in which the outcome of things depends highly on my mood in a more extreme way than usual. I also seem to have an occasional, but often enough to know it’s not a coincidence, knack for jinx-writing life into imitating art. I can’t tell you what you had for dinner last night, what color you’re currently thinking of, or if you’ll get rich, but for some reason, these other abilities seem to be a regular part of my life. I just don’t know why. Some people say we’re all psychic in different ways and to different degrees and that it’s much like with singing. We can all sing. It’s just that some of us do it better than others.

Not always, but usually, when something good is going to happen I have really good dreams beforehand. But I almost always have bad dreams when something bad is about to happen.

Without getting into our financial situation, I was afraid to go to bed last night (well, it was really this morning) for fear of having bad money dreams. I finally convinced myself to go to sleep, knowing that whatever was going to be would be no matter what I may or may not dream.

So I dreamt I was walking along the shore of a beach in China. I was all alone when I spotted a Chinese couple that was perhaps in their 50s. They were walking along the shore not too far from me when the guy looked at me and said with a smile, “nǐ ǎi,” which means “you are short.” I was reluctant to hang with them at first because I only know a few words in Chinese right now. They motioned me towards them, seeming to understand that I was all alone and unfamiliar with Chinese. So I followed them and they started pointing at various things and telling me what to call them in Chinese. I wanted to ask them what the word was for the color pink, my favorite color, but I couldn’t even ask that. I spoke in Spanish and Italian to see if they understood any, but they didn’t. And so I just shrugged, smiled weakly, and followed this couple like a lost stray dog.

As soon as I woke up, the first thing I asked Tom was if everything was alright, and yup. So far so good. I told him of the dream, and he said, “That must’ve been fun for you since you love learning languages.” And then he had me laughing by saying it would be quite a nightmare for him. He’s as bad with words as he is good with numbers, LOL! He often has me check out anything important he has to write. I still tease him about the time we sold this sequined hat right before we left Arizona and he listed it as “Sequenced Hat.”

I later commented on how much I missed the beach and he said that maybe the dream was a sign, and I said, “Of what, that I’m going to be stranded in China?” Of course he meant that we’d go to the beach, but if we do, it’s way in the future.

MONDAY, JULY 19, 2010
Oh great. Now my Formspring account is being spammed, and when I went to leave some smart-ass reply, they’ve got it set up somehow so it doesn’t show on the list of questions. Could just be delayed, though, so we’ll see if it shows up later.

In case anyone is confused, my saying Andy gave me bad advice about the hydrogen tooth rinse was just me being sarcastic. It actually turned out to be great advice! My teeth are already noticeably whiter. Tom said that’s what they use in whitening treatments, so it’s no surprise.

If there’s any good to Andy no longer living in Arizona it’s that I’ll never have to worry about him pressuring me to visit him there, since we can’t tell him all the reasons why we could never return to that gorgeous but fucked up state.

Tom picked up a letter from Rosa and the adapter we ordered in the mail today. Poor Rosa. This is the saddest letter I’ve gotten from her so far. She hurt her arm, lost her job, and has been depressed and sleeping a lot, but has been thinking of me and is glad she has a friend in me. The poor girl doesn’t have much other than family down in Mexico she never sees, so I don’t mind sending letters every other month or so.

I’m now using a Dell keyboard which is much nicer than Tom’s Crapple shitboard, but the left-shift key likes to stick a bit. It should loosen up the more I use it. The swamp cooler’s making it kind of humid in here so that’s probably part of why the keys are a bit stiff. We’ve got the dehumidifier on now.

Jesse’s still not working, from what Tom saw. He didn’t see him, but he saw the kid on the ATV.

I feel like I’m forgetting something, so if I remember it I’ll add it to my next entry.

SUNDAY, JULY 18, 2010
I hacked off my fingernails and now my nails are Crapple keyboard ready (even though this is my last day of having to use this damn keyboard). The cooler’s thermostat stopped working yesterday, but Tom managed to fix it. Now if our shit could stop breaking, we can maybe get on with our lives.

We launched our first Beanie Baby listing on eBay.

I realized that there’s no urgency in weekly MD backups between now and when we launch our own site because I can just back up from Word if I get banned from MyOpera.

I was taking melatonin supplements and doing well there for a while by getting up between 8am-9am, but then my fucking allergies had to go and wake me up at 2:30 and fuck up my schedule. This is because I couldn’t get back to sleep right away and had to take a Benadryl to settle my nose down. So it was close to noon when I got up today. Oh well, more alone time for me since I should be up well past Tom’s bedtime. Then again, I’m PMSing, sluggish and out of vitamins, so maybe not.

The worst thing is the disturbing dream I had last night. I wish I could believe it was just a dream and not a warning of bad things to come, but for someone who’s prone to dream premonitions, it makes me rather nervous. Tom and I obviously ran out of money and hit the streets. We were in a large room at one point where rows and rows of cots were laid out. Of course we had to be next to a bunch of loud Mexicans, but I at least enjoyed being able to understand most of what they were saying. “How long can we be here?” I asked Tom. “A week? A month?”

Tom shook his head unfortunately and said, “You have to be on the streets for a week before you can get another ticket.”

Then in another scene from the same dream, we were somewhere else and I was trying to discourage Tom from trying to get us an apartment, saying that while I missed my stereo and wished I could take a shower, I liked our newfound freedom, pointing out that we no longer had to worry about losing what we no longer had to lose. So let’s get another ticket.

In reality, while it’s true that you can’t worry about losing what you don’t have to lose, there’s no way I would choose the streets over a place to live, even if it was a tiny, rundown apartment surrounded by nothing but freeloaders who feel the best way to show their gratitude for their welfare checks is by driving their neighbors crazy. We could only be faced with homelessness due to circumstances totally out of our control, and even then we still wouldn’t choose the streets if it was our only choice, but death instead.

Tom said it sounded like a disaster dream instead and not a homeless dream. But what difference would it make whether we lost the place due to a disaster like a forest fire or to lack of money?

In the end, if God wants us dead, then if He doesn’t have us killed in a car accident or something like that, I guess He could pile much more than we could handle onto our shoulders to get us to off ourselves, but I hope He could never hate us that much. That’s just the thing, though. He’s hated others worse than us, so why not? I still totally believe without a doubt that He loves some of us, He likes some of us, and He hates some of us. And we’re probably a 7 on His hate scale with 10 being the most hated.

Later…

Much to my utter amazement, my teeth are noticeably whiter after just 3 peroxide rinses. Sure tastes like shit, though. Even after rinsing it with this bleachy water. Yeah, Jesse put bleach in the tanks to purify the water and keep things from growing in the tanks. Tom noticed the difference too.

So anyway, Andy and I had an awesome two-hour talk!!! Wouldn’t want to make a habit of it since, as we both agree, we’ve come to hate phones, but it was great to catch up on what he’s been doing over the last decade. I’m all the more glad to have an online blog so he would already know what’s been going on with me and we didn’t have to make it a four-hour talk just to get caught up.

I felt both a pinch of guilt for walking away all those years ago like I did, as well as very glad to be talking to him and having him back in my life again. I wanted so badly to reach through the phone and hug him!

I will admit that a part of me did wonder if he may be out to simply try to push God on me and annoy me in any way he could by chewing in my ear, nagging me and whatever, but he didn’t do this at all. And I didn’t get the impression his ultimate goal was to dump me as a punishment. He seemed genuinely glad to talk to me and to be a part of my life again.

There were two things he told me that can’t go online, and I keep all my friends’ secrets, even if they piss me off.

He told me of the different places he lived in back in Arizona, before leaving Arizona for good in the spring of 2007. Yeah, I was both shocked and not shocked to learn this because I know how much he loved it there. He misses it, but he just can’t take that kind of heat anymore, so he let his mother talk him into returning back east, promising to give him his inheritance then if he did. That was the condo. They’re actually apartments turned condos, and his mother lives next door. She cooks him dinner every night, and once a month Andy takes her out to dinner and picks up the tab himself. The payments are only $436 a month and all utilities are included. He’s super lucky! Though I myself would hate to be back east or anywhere else that gets snow. He has a two-story condo with two bedrooms.

So now I know the Tempe hit wasn’t his. If it wasn’t someone I don’t know, that leaves Evie or the black bitch as a possibility. Probably Evie since I know she lives in Tempe but never saw a Tempe listing for the other one.

As he said, he’s not rich, but he’s been getting by comfortably.

After enjoying swimming in Stevie’s mom’s pool, and after 3½ years with Laura as a roommate which he eventually tossed out, he’s lived alone ever since and prefers it that way. He won the fondness of Stevie by providing her with copies of demos she’d lost over the years and she was very grateful to him for that.

Ah, the beauty of having ADHD. I’m really buzzing with joy over my chat with Andy that I’m having trouble focusing. ADHD makes focusing on things hard no matter what, but when I’m very happy or pissed, it makes it harder.

So where was I? Oh, yeah. Andy wanted out of the restaurant business, saying he felt he became a shitty waiter and just hated the shit that went with it. I know what it’s like. Those few months we worked graves at Denny’s in Chicopee, MA in 1990 was no fun. I liked the extra money, but that’s where the fun stopped other than the free food we got and getting to pull pranks like the time we put the container of Russian salad dressing inside the bigger container of blue cheese dressing. What a mess that would have been to clean! No wonder my life was so shitty then with all the shit I was pulling on people, cuz as Andy and I agree, what goes around comes around. He assured me that karma really does apply to my perps. That’s a comforting thought to know for someone who’s always felt her perps got full protection from above and were never made to pay for a damn thing they did to me. I hope he’s right and that it’s not just wishful thinking since we can never know what’s going on in their lives. Bad things also happen to good people who are behaving and not bothering a soul, so when Tom first got laid off I had to wonder why. What had we done to deserve that when my worst “crime” at the time was bitching about Jesse letting the dogs bark?

Back to Andy, who asked that I call him by his first name whenever we talk from now on, though I can keep calling him Andy here. It’ll take some getting used to, but I promised to do my best to remember to call him by his real name. He feels Andy sounds too faggy and too little boyish. He has no problems with his gayhood, but well, you know how some people are.

Andy worked for various temp agencies, got sick of that, then finally went into business on his own, fed up with working for others. I didn’t know this, but my dad sold his dad a restroom cleaning service business that I was too young to remember. I guess this was around the time he was first diagnosed with heart problems.

I just got up to check my teeth again and to see if I saw them with a different perspective this time around, but nope. They really do look whiter! hugs Andy But I don’t have periodontal disease (at least I don’t think I do) like he does. My gums are ok. It’s my enamel that’s no good. It’s very soft and that’s why I just think the word “cavity” and I get one. It runs in the family. Everybody ends up needing dentures, and I sure could use them myself.

So his father left one of his brothers (I forgot which one) the restroom cleaning business he bought from my dad before he died of Parkinson’s disease. Fed up with one dead-end job after another, he asked his brother what he needed to do to launch his own business. It took him 3 years to start making money, but he did it! Both in Arizona and Massachusetts. He didn’t need a license for his business, but he does have to pay taxes. He basically went around to various companies and made them a bid low enough that they couldn’t pass up in order to get started, then asked for a $5 raise in a year. He cleans private bathrooms at various businesses. Mechanics are his favorites, cuz then he can barter for service for himself when his car acts up. He doesn’t have to have a set schedule either. He just shows up during business hours on the day he’s scheduled to hit a certain business. He said be prepared for a lot of rejection if we try to do this ourselves, but eventually we’ll succeed.

I discussed it with Tom and it does sound like something we may consider someday depending on what happens over the next few months. California is way worse off than Massachusetts, and remember, we’re way out in the boonies. So it wouldn’t be very convenient for us or worth the effort until the economy picks up. It’s really, really bad here, and the area is laid out much differently than where he lives. Like I said, though, it’s definitely something to keep in mind, depending on what Tom gets for a job if he can ever get one. If they want to throw a $15 job at him or his program works out – the one I can’t talk about – then we’re not going to want to throw that away.

He read about my sleep disorder and believes he has the same thing. I’m not so sure, though, only because he can keep a schedule. He’s just keeping one that’s not quite what he wants it to be. He said he can’t bring himself to get up early and doesn’t get out to work until noon. But what this particular disorder is all about is that my schedule creeps forward 1-3 hours every day or so until it’s completed a 24-hour rotation which usually takes 2-3 weeks. Then again, who says there can’t be varying degrees of the disorder? Mine didn’t become what it is today overnight. It was a gradual thing. It started becoming a problem around 1990 but didn’t really start getting out of hand till the late 90s. It’s not something that happens overnight. Hopefully, he’s not heading this way himself, or else he’s going to have to apply for disability because he will not be able to keep a schedule and work outside of the house if he is. Believe me, it’s not about laziness, it’s not a crutch, it’s not a lame excuse. It’s a genuine problem, and as soon as I’m insured again a million years from now, I do intend to go to a sleep clinic, get it officially diagnosed, then fight to have my disability benefits reinstated. If I got all the back payments owed me, Tom and I would be buying a house for damn sure!

Oh, and his newest hobby is gathering cans and bottles from public trashcans and recycling them for deposit money. He said it’s also become an exercise regimen for him. He’ll park his car, then spend a couple of hours walking as he collects the cans and bottles. He’s losing weight and is now under 230 pounds.

He also sold weed for 4 years in Arizona to supplement his income during the times the temp agencies had no work for him, and thank God he didn’t get caught! He agreed, saying that Arizona has a mandatory sentence that’s just insane.

Massachusetts, along with a few other states, has universal healthcare. I didn’t know this either. He had to have hemorrhoid surgery and because he’s low-income he didn’t have to pay for the really good doctors he had, and some people who have to pay for their healthcare may resent that, he said.

Then he really shocked the hell out of me. Well, he did and didn’t. As I learned firsthand, these things do happen. I just didn’t think it would happen to him. Since it did, I’m surprised he wasn’t more understanding of my past plight with the freeloaders because of his experience. I mean why would he defend the sickos, saying that when he read my story it was all “what they did to me.” But as I always said, if what happened to me can happen to me, it can happen to anyone. It’s definitely not something that only happens on TV.

Well, he went to jail for one day and then did one year on probation for sexual assault and assault and battery. Actually, they dropped the sexual part of it since they couldn’t prove it, and even though they couldn’t prove the assault part either, he still got screwed by this 22-year-old who didn’t like having his advances rejected.

They met in some bible class. The guy thought Andy was 25, but Andy assured him he was 47 at the time. The guy asked if he could join Andy in his car and make out a bit and so they did. Then when the guy’s hand started to head towards his dick, he stopped him and said, “No, let’s not go there. Let’s get to know each other first. How about we go for coffee or something?”

But the guy refused.

Three or four more times over the next few months, he would call Andy begging to come to his place for sex, but Andy would tell him the same thing; that they should get to know each other first. Now, as Andy said, he was very angry at this time. He hadn’t been clean for long and so he wasn’t used to not having a vice on which to vent his anger. I don’t remember exactly what it was that pissed him off. Something about going to the guy’s place and saying something to some other guy there who was mowing the lawn about him being with the guy, then the guy informed him that that was actually his uncle. I guess the guy got mad at him for whatever it was he said, and then Andy got mad as well, saying, “Well, how was I supposed to know he was your uncle?”

Then later on on the phone, still pissed off, he threatened to kick the guy’s ass and said, “See that blue car over there?” He didn’t know there was really a blue car near the guy’s place. The guy nervously asked how he knew there was a blue car near his place and Andy screamed, “Cuz I’m in it and I’m watching you!”

Three days later - he has no idea how they got in as the lock was never tampered with - three cops are in his bedroom at 7am sharp ready to haul his ass to jail. So they take him to the Pearl St. jail, then into court. Andy now has sleep apnea and he needs to sleep with this machine so he was terrified of having to spend the night in jail without the machine.

So he got bonded out on $40 after being assigned a public defender. Then some lawyer from Boston contacted him, saying he wanted to take his case. He said he’d normally want 4K but would accept 2K. In no time, he would become just as sorry as I did that he trusted this lawyer and didn’t go to trial. Just like with me, they talked him out of a trial, assuring him that he would go to prison if convicted and have to register as a sex offender. His lawyer ended up doing nothing he promised he would do, and he didn’t realize at the time that the system is all about money, not justice. The more people who don’t go to trial but end up on probation, the more the state makes. He’s just very lucky it didn’t happen in Arizona! He’d have gone to prison for years if it had.

But the year of probation was bad enough since all he did was threaten the guy and not actually harm him. As he himself pointed out, people make threats every day. So we both understand his frustration. He also said the judge never gave him a chance to explain his side of the story, believing every lie the other guy told, and looking at him like he was a disgusting, dirty old man while the guy lied and said he grabbed his crotch and beat him up. So between probation and other fees, he lost $2200. This is how we hit upon the subject of karma, saying he’s sure that someday the guy that screwed him will be out 6K. I hope he’s right!

I’m getting pretty tired and that’s all I can remember right now as far as what we talked about. Andy was right in saying my entries have gotten longer and more interesting lately, LOL.

SATURDAY, JULY 17, 2010
Been having major connection issues, but our provider won’t do anything about it. They just tell us everything appears to be working ok. In truth, they don’t give a shit or care to do regular maintenance cuz they know they’re the only providers in the area and so people have no choice but to put up with their shit. Hopefully, the complaints will add up that they’ll get sick enough of hearing about it to actually do something about it. The service was once pretty reliable so there’s no reason it can’t be reliable again.

Tom’s also been getting tons of text and voice messages, but he just ignores them because that way we don’t have to pay for them. It’s just sales calls, thanks to my days of sweeping. I suppose some could be wrong numbers, but he doesn’t actually read or listen to anything he isn’t expecting from a particular person.

So I guess Andy will be calling any minute?

Later…

Well, the fact that Andy didn’t even have the decency to email me to let me know he couldn’t call today makes me wonder something. Like maybe he’s playing with me? I know he at least took the time to check out my blog, though he’ll never know it. grins devilishly

I know this is going to sound awfully funny – even paranoid – and it’s not something I’ll put online. But I wonder if now that I can journal for the world to see if that means nothing good will ever happen to me again for sure just so whatever’s up there can keep me from having a fun and easy way of bragging about it. I mean good jobs, promotions, big wins – that sort of thing. I’ve often thought that too, how it was too bad I wasn’t winning like I used to since it would make for such great blogging material and things like that. But I don’t want to lie to give my blog more excitement either.

Later…

Andy just emailed me, so he didn’t forget me after all. He said he was busy exercising and making money at his newest hobby. Not surprisingly, he wouldn’t say what that was, but that’s ok. He doesn’t have to tell me anything he doesn’t want to. Anyway, he has a birthday party to attend tomorrow, so we’re going to talk tomorrow at 6:30 my time.

FRIDAY, JULY 16, 2010
Andy’s to be calling around 3pm my time. I think. I’m not sure if he was talking about today or tomorrow, but as I told him, just try to be punctual, cuz unlike him, I have to work as often as I can. So if he calls when I’m on a job, I can’t take his call.

I asked why he wanted to call in the first place since we can just email each other, and he said he had a lot to say that was easier to say than write, and while we’d be on the phone for a bit of a stretch, he promises not to make a habit of it. And it has been a decade, too. He also added that the number would show up as him with a 413 area code. So I guess he’s still back east.

I don’t mind talking every now and then, but I really have to wonder if we’re going to have to talk about how wonderful God is and how horrible I was for reacting against the freeloader’s abuse, and how wrong Tom is for not going out in person to try to get a job. I really hope he doesn’t end up making me sorry I contacted him nearly two years ago! If he does, then he ends up with two phone numbers, one email address, plus other sites I frequent to harass me at. None of them could hurt me as long as he didn’t go leaving messages on Tom’s phone, but it could be a real pain in the ass for me having to dodge his calls and messages if he decides to harass me if I decide to re-dump him. But I’m not going to be friends with anyone that bothers me that much either.

I’m sure I’ll have to listen to him rudely and obnoxiously chew in my ear too, which will cause him to talk in slow, broken sentences I can’t keep up with very well and that frustrates the hell out of me.

Marie had to irritate me with half a dozen messages today. She was trying to get a hold of me via chat before I got up, saying she was all excited to share some good news. I thought it was about moving and a new job, but instead it was to tell me that she met this wonderful person online who lives in Texas and how they’ve been emailing and texting each other like crazy, so now she’ll leave me alone.

That’s it? That’s what she was so excited to tell me? That some stranger is preoccupying her time with emails and text messages? Well, if it makes her happy, then great! But half a dozen messages aren’t quite leaving me alone.

Later…

Andy and I didn’t talk today because I misunderstood when he said he’d be calling in his email to me. He’s going to call over the weekend at 3pm my time, which works out better for me since work is usually slower then.

He also said his boyfriend Javier gave him a two-hour full body massage, ate his ass out and sucked his dick, and he just thought he’d share that with me. Well, the ass and dick-sucking are pretty gross, but I’ll take the massage.

I hope Marie is being well entertained by “Miss Texas” and that she is happy. She sent a couple of pics from her visit with Tammie. I’d never know that was Tammie in the picture! She didn’t wear glasses in school. How the hell come Marie gets to have good eyes when she’s only a year younger while we have to be blind? No fair!

I asked Sharyn if she thought the ‘s’ belonged at the end of the word toward or not in the following sentence from my current book

“To her utter horror, a silvery blue SUV much like Lissi’s came looming towards her.”

She agreed with me in that she thought it did, whereas Tom would have excluded it.

I guess that’s it for now. There shouldn’t be much work available, so I’ll probably work on proofreading chapter 21 which I just finished up. The book now has around 60K words!

THURSDAY, JULY 15, 2010
Last night I watched a girl get murdered in my dreams in which I seemed to take incredible delight. She must’ve done something pretty horrible in order for me to cheer on her death like I did.

Typing this up is a bit challenging because I’m using Tom’s Crapple keyboard that came with the iMacs. We simply couldn’t get mine to work. Not even after Tom took the thing apart. It’s history. So using the Swagbuck money he’s accumulated, we’re getting an adapter so I can temporarily hook up an old keyboard to it and he can have this one back. This one’s too hard to type on with long nails because the keys are almost even with the board. So if I hit the edge of the key it doesn’t strike. With no nails, it’s a great keyboard. Just set up a little differently than I’m used to. When we go from poor to semi-poor I’ll get a new keyboard.

I did some more troubleshooting for the guy here. Some people are getting fed up enough with the tech issues that they’re leaving. I’ve thought of that too, but I always end up staying because of how simple the site is to use when it’s functioning properly. If I do leave it’s going to be to go to my own site where I have just as much writing freedom as I do here. I hate those sites that tell you to feel “free” to express yourself, then give you a long list of no-nos that you can’t write about. Wouldn’t it be easier for people to simply not read anything they weren’t interested in? If I do leave, though, it’s going to have to be really worth it in order for me to go changing all the links. Because MD is my main journal I have links on Facebook, MySpace and a zillion other places.

Eileen gave me a damn good idea for when we launch our site. She suggested offering to sell other people’s stories and keeping a percentage. This is definitely something worth considering.

Well, there’s nothing wrong with the motorcycle after all because we heard Jesse come and go on it a couple of times. I’m surprised he didn’t come down when Tom was out weeding. He worked until he ran out of line. We also ordered new line along with the adapter.

There’s actually some good news in the news today. Holy cow, right?! They’re not only going to vote on Tuesday so we can get our money next week, but they stopped the oil leak in the gulf, and Argentina legalized same-sex marriage. At least they can’t ban it like they do here. Religion and politics are the reasons the world is so messed up. Sure, you might have some druggie go on a shooting rampage that’s tripping on LSD, or some psycho that murders his whole family because he didn’t get his way that day, but religion and politics are very obviously the root cause of 80% of the world’s problems. Until people can live and let live, it will continue to be that way. That doesn’t mean that one should be allowed to shoot a person in the grocery store that they might think has a lousy hairstyle, but they shouldn’t be allowed to tell others how to live their lives either.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 14, 2010
Another day of God blessing us with poverty and not one single job call. Aren’t we just so damn lucky? I suppose health problems will be our next blessing in life. As it is it’s a miracle all the stress hasn’t gotten me sick. I am really losing my will to go on. I’m losing motivation in almost everything. I have to push myself to do things like cleaning. I haven’t dieted, exercised, studied languages or worked on my stories, and what dieting I have done is only to stretch what money we have left. The only thing I have been doing consistently is working online, but again, that only makes so much money so fast.

Every time I hear Jesse buzzing about on the ATV my heart starts tripping with worry. I’m in a rather fragile state right now and I’m worried he will say the wrong thing and push me over the edge. The shit Congress is pulling on us isn’t our fault, and I don’t want to beat the cock up, for God’s sake either. So hopefully no one will push my buttons while I’m not very stable.

I wonder if his motorcycle is broken. I haven’t heard it for days, not that I’m complaining.

As if we don’t have enough to deal with, we’ve been having computer problems. Something’s been interfering with the reception and causing my keyboard not to function correctly, and now Tom’s mouse is dead. We are just so, so cursed! I just hope that if we don’t make it God will tell us why He hated us so much and will at least consider sending us to a better place if there can’t be simple nothingness when we die, whenever that may be, which is what I would prefer most. Just plain old nothing. No awareness, no nothing.

Tom just got his mouse working again and says it’s happened before.

Back to the shit going on with us. Eileen says she has an extra room in her place if we ever needed it and while I thanked her wholeheartedly for caring, it really wouldn’t do us much good. If things got bad enough to need her room, then we wouldn’t have the money to get to it in the first place. But just the fact that she offered it means a lot to me. Most people don’t give a damn about the hardships of others. Especially if they themselves are doing well and can’t relate. So it was very kind of her to make the offer even if we could never take her up on it.

I sure miss the days when my worst problems were about not being able to have things I wanted and not whether I would survive or not. Like I said, if God’s going to do nothing but continue to tease me with my survival, I WILL end up trashing my life. I’m not going to be belittled by being teased with my existence. If my life can never belong to me, then I don’t want it. I just wish I knew what I did to earn such a high ranking on His hate list. I hate oranges, but if for some crazy reason eating them would get Him to leave us alone, I would. Yet something is so damn determined to hold us back, and the older we get, the less opportunity there is for change.

While our lives may be pretty shitty, the good news is that things are looking up for Marie. I am so, so happy for her! She called me earlier because she hasn’t been able to be online, hasn’t had time to shit, and is working another 12-hour shift. She’s moving near Tammie in NH and is going to be living with someone they know. Getting a really great job too, working on machinery like she prefers to. Like I said, it’s hopeless for us, so to see her succeed is really nice, and I know she’s been miserable living where she has been living. She just doesn’t get along with one of them at all.

I offered Eileen first dibs on the Beanie Babies. I told her not to worry if she isn’t interested because they’re going to get sold either way. She thanked me for thinking of her and asked if I thought she should consider starting a collection for her granddaughter, and as I told her, that has to be up to her, but they won’t go up in value over the years, just so she knows. She’s going to research them and get back to me.

Later…

Good news, believe it or not. They are going to vote Friday or Monday and if all goes well and no one else dies, we’ll have our back payments by next Friday. At this time we’ll not only be able to pay Jesse the rest of what we owe him for this month but all of next month as well, which will be way early since it will only be the 23rd.

Someone asked about my sleep schedule disorder and I started to think, hey, I ain’t gonna defend myself! But then I told myself, calm down, will you! They’re just curious. No one’s asking you to defend yourself. So just Google non-24-hour sleep-wake syndrome, not that I expect many people to get it. It’s one of those things that’s very hard to understand without actually experiencing it firsthand. There’s an even worse disorder than mine where people fall asleep at any given moment when they least expect it. The mother of a guy Tom once worked with in Oregon fell asleep behind the wheel after a doctor assured her that the medication he gave her would prevent her from falling asleep at random, and her car went off the road and she was killed.

Tom said he noticed my schedule isn’t rotating as fiercely lately, and it would almost be too bad if we could ever be insured and get it diagnosed, then be told it’s not bad enough to have my disability reinstated. That’s a problem I’d kind of like having. I love extra money, but I’d rather be able to keep a damn schedule. Yet the combination of wacky melatonin levels, the inability to fall asleep after being up for a normal amount of time, and sometimes being more sleep-needy than usual, makes it impossible to keep one.

Later…

My day will definitely be ending a lot better than it started. It started with much anxiety and little hope.

Jesse’s turned out to be as cool as he is uncool. He may be uncool with the way he lets the dogs bark during the seasons they bark through and since he doesn’t get the meaning of the words “Please call instead of come down for non-emergencies,” but he’s also been patient and understanding. I was worried he’d get fed up and really piss me off, not that we have any control over what Congress does. We’d never have made it with a management company or without MT, that’s for sure!

He came down to get some wood that he has by the propane tank and Tom went out and filled him in on the latest with the money situation. He started off by asking if a $25 late fee was ok, and he answered by saying that it’d be ok if we could just weed more of the area down here. No problem. But we only had 150’ of cord, so Jesse came back and dropped us an additional 100’ so we could cover more distance. He said that next week he’ll take care of whatever we can’t reach. He’s working tomorrow, though.

I didn’t see Brandy, but Whiskey ran right up to me for a hug. He may be a noisy little bastard during the colder months, but he sure is an affectionate one. The poor thing had weeds embedded in his fur, but somehow I doubt Jesse cares about the cleanliness of his dogs.

Anyway, although we still have a full plate to contend with, it’s nice not to have to be so worried. I don’t know if he’ll get a job before October or what, but for now, I will be able to concentrate on things better like my story and my exercising. Doesn’t look like I’m going to get my story done this month, but oh well. I had been ahead of schedule, but if I don’t finish the chapter I’m working on until Monday, then I’ll be on time.

It would help if life would quit throwing unexpected curveballs at us, too. My keyboard continued to act up and so Tom and I swapped. It acts up for him too, but we decided to swap because I type more than he does. We could get a new one really cheap at Walmart, but we really don’t need these delays and distractions while we’re trying to work, sell stuff, and do other things.

TUESDAY, JULY 13, 2010
I have been on quite an emotional rollercoaster today! And busy, too. Let me try to go in order of events.

I had a semi-scary dream, but it wasn’t God/life beating us over the head with money. In the dream, I was standing by a road somewhere with Tom and a few others. I don’t know who the others were, but we were to wait for my parents to drive by – each in their own vehicle – then we were to all jump in a car and meet them a short distance away. So my dad drove by first followed by my mom. Then we piled into the car and entered some highway where we encountered a few scattered cars on the road. I said something about being careful getting around them in case there’d been an accident. Tom, who was driving, managed to squeeze through them ok. Then we turned onto a curving off-ramp in which there was an overturned car, but I woke up before I could see if my parents could be one of the ones in it. I was really scared in the dream too, right before I woke up.

I wonder if the strange dream I had with Charlotte was really about her son dying, though I didn’t even know he was ill till Andy told me he died.

Because of the dream, I decided to go to the mail place with Tom. Not just to get out and to help carry the packages, which the lady at the place called to say had arrived, but because I figured that if the dream was a warning for Tom and his car was destined to end up upside down, I was going upside down with him. But we got to and from the mail place without incident.

Besides all the Beanie Babies from my parents, Paula sent $10 to make up a CD for her. I emailed her to let her know we got the money and would make it up and send it as soon as we could, but that it may be a few weeks. I’ll also be enclosing some other goodies for her.

On the way back we saw the cutest, smallest deer ever. They were barely bigger than a cat!

Then it was on to stress all about Congress and their damn voting while I enjoyed – or at least tried to enjoy – checking out the Beanie Babies.

I started to say, “I’m sorry for saying this…” but why should I be sorry? It’s my journal. But damn that Bryd senator for dying when he did! He sure picked the right time to go belly-up, that’s for sure. God, I hate it when people die on our time or our expense and end up being more trouble dead than they did alive! And no, I don’t care how selfish this sounds. I’m sorry for his family and all that, but those of the living and who are struggling just to survive need their lives to go on. And his death put a real kink in millions of people’s lives, including our own. Meanwhile, I guess the compassionless bastards are going to vote as early as tomorrow or as late as next week. Then we can go back to worrying about beating the clock. Or at least I can. I wish I could be as stressless and as optimistic as Tom, but I can’t be. Seeing is believing for me. So until he gets a job I’m not going to believe shit. Right now all I can believe is that we have a 50/50 chance of making it through this. And sometimes I’m not sure that I want to. The longer this goes on, the more I lose my will and desire to go on. For what? Just to keep struggling? For now, if you’ve got any kind of a hold on us, even if it’s indirectly, don’t croak, ok?

Anyway, the Beanie Babies will help tremendously and we really appreciate them. We’re still guessing we’ll be able to get a few hundred for them, but it’s going to take time. We’ve been doing our homework (in between other things and playing fix-it) to find out where would be the best place to sell which items. Tom created a spreadsheet in Word to make them easier to keep track of.

I’m keeping a couple for myself, even though I have enough dust collectors hanging around and in too small of a space. I’m keeping Neon, a colorful seahorse with soft pastel colors, and Ty 2K, a color-speckled bear. It has squares of green, red, blue, yellow and purple against a white background.

I called to let them know, as promised, that the packages had arrived. Dad answered and then he went and got mom in case I had any questions. I didn’t, though, since we could research whatever we need to know. We didn’t talk long because she was planting bushes, a storm was coming, and so she wanted to hurry up and get them planted.

Tom thinks they may be testing us, whether they realize it or not. Meaning, they’re planning to distribute things before they die, and they want to see how good we are as sellers. This way they may be tempted to give us more stuff to sell later on.

Eileen turned 59 and I sent her a birthday email. She assured me my stories didn’t “scare” her off and that she’s just been limiting her computer time, saying it had gotten to be a real time sucker. She’s spending time with her granddaughter and reading.

It was cool to be able to read and understand a lot of the German I read on someone’s profile page on the language learning site, though I couldn’t have pulled the words out of thin air on my own. Not yet anyway. There’s a difference between being able to speak a language versus being able to understand it. I can understand lots of languages, but can only speak 3 right now. If I absolutely had to speak Italian I could probably do it, but my sentences would be slow, broken and sometimes incorrect.

Today’s fix-it game was all about the shower faucet leaking. It’s been dripping, actually. We set up a large bucket under it the other day to see how much. In a day it amounted to about enough water for one toilet flush. Then today we noticed the hot water tank fired up in the middle of a hot afternoon when we weren’t even running any water. The problem was obviously caused by rust and calcium trapped in the faucet, so Tom unscrewed the hot one and cleaned it. Of course we’re not going to tell Jesse about it, knowing he’d be quick to blame the well problems on that when there’s clearly not enough water leaking to cause it. Wells are simply problematic and unpredictable. We’ve had one before, so we know. It’s the biggest turn-off to the idea of us getting a place in a rural setting, should a miracle grant us the option to choose in the first place. Rural may be more fun, but it has the potential for a lot more problems. I would think the only problems with a senior community, though, would be barking and car doors slamming since we’d be back to being just a few feet away from neighbors, and everyone in the world but us has company 5 times a day.

MONDAY, JULY 12, 2010
As usual, life didn’t go as planned today and we still have close to zero ownership of our own lives in general. Instead of picking up Beanie Babies to sell, we got water problems instead. AGAIN. Thanks, God, you’re really kind to us. This is exactly what we need on top of everything else that’s going on. Or not going on, I should say. Nothing’s happening. Absolutely nothing. No packages, no jobs, no voting, no nothing. Meanwhile, Jesse hooked us back up to the ditch after we called him at work to let him know that the water pressure was low. He also asked Tom about the money, no doubt more out of concern for himself than for us, knowing how compassionless and selfish most people are.

Hey, we can’t give him what we don’t have, he’s obviously not hard up for bucks, so he’ll just have to wait till the twisted, heartless members of Congress happen to feel like getting around to voting so we can get our money. Our lives are 100% up to Congress, the government, the state, God, society and everyone and everything but us. So as long as we’re a slave to these things, we’re not going to be in the driver’s seat of our lives. For years I’ve been wanting to take ownership of our lives and start living them at least somewhat in the way that we see fit with the normal ups and downs in life, but God and life just won’t let us. All I know is that I am sooo sorry we came to this state. So sorry! I’m not sorry we left Oregon, but I am totally sorry we came to California. California was just a dream and I should’ve learned my lesson a long time ago about trying to make dreams come true. Maybe some people can do it, but for me, dreams are dreams and reality is reality, and I’ve never been able to mix the two.

Tom is so sure things will work out and that we would’ve been way worse off had we stayed in Oregon or gone anywhere else. I wish I could be as optimistic as he is, even if it were just false hope and I was just kidding myself in the end, but more so I wish I could be as selfish and as compassionless as most people seem to be. I would just think it would make life easier and I wouldn’t get so sad or mad if I lacked the ability to feel emotions much like the members of Congress or those who kill people for the thrill of it. I would love to be able to witness a woman abuse her kid and not feel a damn thing so I wouldn’t have to spend the following days depressed, angry, wondering if the kid was still alive, and perhaps having nightmares.

Andy – understandably – said he didn’t want to invest much time in me after a friend of his took his life if I thought I was going to have to off myself. As I told him, though, I have no idea what the future holds. I just don’t know. But I do see how it could go either way. If we don’t get our money, then yeah, I’ll be dead soon. People are like cars. Without gas, they can’t go anywhere. But I didn’t want to lie to him and give him a yes or a no because I just don’t know. The phone could ring right now with a $13 job for Tom. But I know nothing would be that kind to us. I’m not kidding when I say something up there is totally against us. I don’t say that just to vent. It does NOT want us happy and it does NOT want us to succeed. All I do know is that if we do end up dead it will be the greedy bankers and the government’s fault for failing to put their own ahead of foreigners. It will also be our fault for not staying in Phoenix despite how unhappy we were there. My allergies and asthma were a nightmare, the neighbors were a nightmare, I did not like the house except for the pool, the laws are not only insane but favor minorities, it is very conservative, the constant construction is maddening, it is very anti-gay/Jew, but the house would’ve been paid for years ago and we would have had all the security in the world.

I just wish God would finally see to it that life either makes us or breaks us, but as many of you have been saying in your feedback to me, you agree that if there even is a God at all, He sure doesn’t seem to care about people, and so I know better than to waste time praying. But really, I am so, so tired of this not knowing for sure. I want to either just run out of money with no hopes of any more coming in for a long time or just be allowed to get on with our lives. Which do I want more? I don’t know. I guess I want to live more than to die, but it also seems to depend on my mood at the moment. Even if we can manage to break steady and hold our own, I still don’t think life will ever be what we want it to be and that alone can take the fun out of living to know there’s no chance of any real advancement. I feel I have nothing to hope for or to anticipate. If poverty and little dumpy rentals are really what’s in our cards for as long as we live, then that doesn’t leave me much else to look forward to other than spending time with my husband and my hobbies.

How the hell did my life get to be one big survival game anyway? Why am I constantly being teased with my existence? See, this is why I sometimes think of killing myself. I can’t be teased with my survival and be denied the right to have my life belong to me if I’m dead, can I?

Andy also had a point in asking why I would assume he dumped me if I didn’t hear from him for a month. After all, I myself said keeping in touch just once in a while would be fine. Daily email from Marie keeps me busy enough. As I told her, I don’t see why we have to email each other every single day of our lives, but I guess it’s important to her and I don’t want her to think I care any less about her. Besides, it’s not her fault if I can’t keep out of my inbox when I’m busy and should be doing other things. Swapping a message or two a day with her doesn’t hurt anything either and she is a friend in a different way than Andy is a friend.

SUNDAY, JULY 11, 2010
By accident, I came across this horrible video of a sadistic murder of a 17-year-old girl who was stoned to death in Iraq simply because of who she loved. All I can say is that I am both ashamed and embarrassed that I could have even thought of turning to God for a while there. Over 1000 onlookers sat back and did absolutely nothing. Still believe in God, folks? Still think He’s not to blame for failing to step in and save some of these innocent lives? Don’t worry, though. I’m just as devoted to Him as any devoted churchgoer is. Only I’m devoted to absolutely loathing Him for the atrocities He has sat back and allowed to happen. And don’t tell me only He can understand His ways and that He has his reasons for the things that happen in this world. There is no “reason” to throw stones at a child until they are dead. I was so sickened after I saw this horrifying murder of this girl being pulled, dragged, kicked, stripped naked and then slammed over the head with a block that I nearly puked. They beat her as if she were a man who’d raped and killed tons of kids.

Yeah, God, you’re just wonderful. You’ve done a fine job with the world that you’ve created.

Almost didn’t get to this entry because I’m so busy. I’m in the process of formatting my stories for our site. Some of my older ones don’t even have chapters or scene breaks. I’m going to be deleting the stories I have here and have marked them as private on Blogger. From now on, you want to read them, you pay unless you’re a friend. Obviously, I’ll have to give some free samples of my writing once we set up the site because most people aren’t going to buy stories from people they don’t know. But I’m going to limit what I post elsewhere.

I thought I’d seen it all and nothing fazed me anymore, but that sick, twisted video of that teenage girl being murdered got me down. Not just mad at God and the world, but down. Yet as scary as it is there will always be heartless people walking around in this world with zero conscience. Even our government is like that in a sense, denying so many people the unemployment benefits they’re entitled to without a care as to who goes hungry and who may lose their homes. Someone could kill a child in front of most of these rich, spoiled, compassionless politicians and it wouldn’t be any different to them than watching someone step on a bug.

But the Middle East is clearly so backward and twisted when it comes to “honor death” and other things that it makes states like Arizona and Texas seem like nothing. I would demolish the entire Middle East in a heartbeat if I had the power to do so, not just to make the world a safer and better place in general, but to spare other innocent victims of this so-called honor death. And why is it only women and girls have the “honor” of being brutally beaten to death? Somehow I doubt everything walking around with a dick over there is a saint. If there is any good news it’s that they avenged the girl’s murder. Well, that’s what I heard anyway. I’m all for the eye-for-an-eye attitude in most cases. Maybe that’ll slow these sick rituals down; if the killers knew they were killing themselves as well.

I’m still struggling with my feelings for Andy. I love the guy. Don’t get me wrong. I meant it when I said I’d take him in in a heartbeat if he needed a place to go. We’ve had tons of good times together and I have lots of fond and funny memories to cherish (if I could just stop forgetting things in the first place since my memory isn’t what it used to be).

But it really bothered me how he said “it was all what THEY did to me” when he was reading the part of my bio about the crazy neighbors we had who sought revenge against me through the law for complaining on them. That’d be like someone seeing this woman crying somewhere and asking her why she was crying. Then suppose she said it was because of her boyfriend. Then suppose the person was quick to defend the boyfriend after he’d just beaten her and they didn’t know about it or a fraction of what went on between them. Really, folks, don’t judge until and if you know the whole story. And don’t call your friend a friend if you’re going to make excuses for or defend the other party. He did, however, give me his word that he would keep his two cents to himself unless I ask him for it and that’s exactly what he’s done since then.

To sum it all up, I’m sure that’s how it would be if you asked the sickos themselves how it was and that they would insist it was ALL me. I’d bet my life no one ever questioned THEM and asked them if they were sure THEY hadn’t done anything to me or if they were perhaps lying about anything.

Although I know I don’t need to prove or explain myself to anyone, it would be kind of neat if there was such a thing as a lie detector test in which the results could be posted online. Know why? Because the results would say I was lying if I said yes after the tester said, “You picked on them for no reason other than that they were black, right?”

I’ve also got some person(s) insisting Andy’s going to dump me and so I ought to not bother with him, but I like to make my own judgments as to who I associate with. If a month goes by that I don’t hear from him, then I’ll assume they may be right, but even if he does dump me, that’s his right. No one is obligated to stay in my life.

Anyway, if I don’t get to messages over the next few days, don’t panic, I’m just busy. Between work and assessing/listing the Beanie Babies my folks have on the way to us, and preparing our site, I have my work cut out for me.

Marie asked Tom a computer question which he answered, and today she’s spending the day 30’ up in the air trimming tree branches – ugh! That girl is fearless! Well, except for when it comes to mannequins, LOL.

SATURDAY, JULY 10, 2010
So my mom called yesterday but I had to call her back because I was on a job. And that way no one paid for the call. She pretty much told me stuff about the Beanie Babies which Dad already told us and that we can find out ourselves. The collection cost her 4K over the years. But since everybody expects you to practically give things to them I still don’t expect more than a few hundred for them, but that’s just a few hundred more we’ll have to live on before the money runs out and our time is up. Like I said, it’s more than obvious that no one’s going to give my husband a job, but that’s ok. I don’t mind checking out of Hotel Earth a little earlier than planned. But if I’m going to be forced into something that’s only destined to kill me in the end anyway, it’s going to be on my terms. Meaning that I’m going the faster more comfortable way. I’m NOT going to slowly starve on the streets. Like I said, God can hate us enough to lead us to the streets, but He can’t make us live on them and I won’t! I couldn’t even if I wanted to. There’s just no way I could handle such torture.

Other than being on what may very well be my last few months of life, things are going ok. The Beanie Babies should arrive on Monday, the day Charlotte should get my letter. Or whoever’s at the cottage to get it for her. I’m no longer going to be writing letters to my parents other than when I’ve got pictures to send them. As she herself pointed out, why write when I can call for free?

For the second day in a row, I took another two-hour nap. Totally not like me. I probably haven’t napped two days in a row since I was a kid.

Marie got me hooked on this awesome site yesterday called jango.com where you can personalize your own radio station. It’s a lot like the old Yahoo! station, but since all good things eventually come to an end, I don’t expect it to be around forever. It’s great, though, compared to AOL’s radio and other sites which simply let you access playlists. Most free radio stations are riddled with commercials and will only let you skip 6 songs an hour, but not this place. I had to disable Robo, though, cuz it wanted to save a login passcard every single time I’d skip a song. It’s ok, though, since I don’t sweep anymore. I also love how the player starts right away. It took me 3 tries before I could launch the other radios. I can also ban songs I dislike.

Tom hurt his back a few days ago and once it’s fully recovered he’s going to unscrew the shower faucet and replace the washer cuz it’s been dripping.

Why are people so quick to blame others for their actions? I wonder. These days, people are blamed for influencing those who commit suicide or who commit crimes, and I have to wonder if this is really the right thing to do. For years I blamed others right along with me for helping to make my life so miserable that at age 17 I would throw myself out a window and break my upper arm in half like I did at Valleyhead. Many others feel others are just as responsible for what I did, but is that really fair? Aren’t we all supposed to be responsible for our own actions? Well, I think I was/am responsible for mine. Both as a child and an adult. No one opened the window and threw me out of it. Some of the people and Valleyhead itself were making me miserable, yes, but I’m still the one who jumped. I didn’t care at the time what the consequences would be when I hit the ground. I didn’t care if I lived or died. But I knew right from wrong and while it was ok to be sad, mad, frustrated and scared, I didn’t have to do what I did.

FRIDAY, JULY 9, 2010
Alison sent me an email explaining what happened a couple of years ago with Molly. Her obsession isn’t sexual. As Alison said, Molly has strong feelings about gays that vastly differ from her own. She’s just an obsessive nut who can’t accept rejection very well and feels the need to stalk and harass Alison and those she’s friendly with.

I had 4 numbers to try for Laurie and 4 for Michele, the staff member I had a mild crush on, and the teacher I liked at Valleyhead. I got an answer at two of the Laurie numbers, but they were the wrong Laurie. I got answering machines on the other two Laurie’s, both of which sounded like older women that could possibly be her. I’ll call back some other time. I only called one of the Michele numbers and got an automated message, but never left any messages on any of the machines.

Marie apologized, again, for going off on me. And again I know she can’t help herself at times, but don’t always understand why it’s so hard for her to keep in mind that I can’t spend hours and hours doing email. But I also don’t have her disorder and so I can’t fully understand it and how it works. Because she hasn’t harmed me and has never given a shit that I can’t keep a schedule and that I have the driving phobia from hell, something that many people seem to have a problem with, I haven’t dumped her or anything like that. I just hope she’ll one day stop taking things personally and stop taking my having other things to do as rejection. My having to work doesn’t mean I love or care about her any less. That’d be like saying I no longer love Tom because someone in town had blueberry pancakes for breakfast. What’s one thing got to do with the other?

I slept from 4pm to midnight, got up and went about my usual routine. I answered emails, checked my work account, showered, ate, etc. Then oddly enough I ended up napping from 5am - 7am. Naps are something I very rarely take. I dreamt I inspired someone to learn Spanish during this time after explaining the basic rules of the language to them.

THURSDAY, JULY 8, 2010
A loser with a life. That’s what I feel like. I have a life, contrary to Marie’s belief and comprehension, but I feel like a total loser. Before I get into all about how helpless and hopeless I feel, it’s been really cool swapping messages with Andy. It doesn’t seem like there’s a 10-year gap there. Guess that’s what I mean by saying he seems like family. I have known him, after all, all my life and he’s been like a big brother to me as much as a friend.

I have a feeling this is going to be one of those entries where I ramble on and on about things good and bad, so if you want an entry that’s mostly quick and cheery, this entry’s not for you, LOL.

Sometimes I close my eyes and I picture my family, both immediate and extended, as well as friends, all getting along and chatting happily in one big room together. This would be after everyone laid their cards out on the table, much like Andy and I did, and said, “Hey, this is why I was upset with you.” It’s a sweet scene, but an unrealistic one as well and I know that. But I wouldn’t be much of a writer if I didn’t have somewhat of an imagination, would I? Like it or not, there are always going to be those we just don’t get along with and so it’s best to just keep to ourselves.

Andy also doesn’t bug me with a million messages every day like Marie sometimes does. Marie and I started emailing each other earlier. I guess she was at work since she seems to sleep at night when she’s off, and I didn’t expect more than a message or two, figuring she had work to do. After 5 or 6 messages I told her, hey, this is too many messages! I have other things I need to be doing, but please don’t take it personally.

Sure enough, though, that’s exactly how she took it. Not about to be made to feel guilty for having a life, since the rat’s cage and bathroom certainly weren’t going to clean itself any more than the grocery list was going to write itself, I let her know she was free to go fuck herself. I have told her a million times I hate excessive email and that I hate it when she gets pushy and overbearing like she sometimes does, but she doesn’t always get it. It isn’t that I don’t love and care about her. I understand a lot of what she’s going through. But I really do have a life beyond email. I should’ve figured she’d get off on my going off on her, too. After all, she “loves my fire.” I really let her have it too, though she’s not the only one to blame. I should know to keep out of my inbox when I’m busy. In fact, I didn’t get caught up on all the questions and comments I’m amazed to be getting till well after midnight, though in some ways that’s more fun than email. Especially not always knowing who’s asking what. Andy surprised me with one of my old lyric screw-ups because I didn’t think he’d bother going there since we do email.

Molly started bugging me again too, so I blocked her again on her other account. Why do people insist on befriending those that don’t want to be befriended? Is it some kind of contest or game to them? Do they just like that kind of challenge?

Andy and I joke about our prankster days and the lyrics we’d misunderstand. I was listening to Big Yellow Taxi by The Counting Crows and even though I know he’s saying “put up a parkin’ lot,” I swear it sounds like “put up a fucking lot.”

I’m surprised Andy doesn’t set up a Formspring account of his own. I almost shut mine down once I realized it was him playing with me there, but it’s actually kind of fun. I would identify myself, though, if he set up an account.

I hear him when he said he had no use for Facebook and MySpace. Neither do I, except for looking people up, and this isn’t something I do every day. I also like to be where people can find me if anyone’s looking for me, but so far the only one to find me was the drama queen, I’m sorry to say. Yeah, leave your door open and sometimes an intruder will waltz on in and not your friends.

As funny as it may sound, I had hoped to hear the dogs go off at 5am when Jesse usually leaves for work, letting me know that he is in fact working. From the impression I get, I’d still bet he’s never struggled a day in his life and isn’t hard up for bucks. But still, the more he works, the less I have to worry that he might be and that he’ll get fed up with us having to split the rent, even though we don’t do it every month and we give him at least half of it within the first 3 days of the month. And he has said he understands that times are tough, too. Still, I worry about him, even though I’d rather have good renters that eventually do pay him, if I were him, as opposed to what he had in here before us, breaking into his house, stealing his gun, stealing his motorcycle, etc. He kind of deserves the rent-splitting since we have to listen to non-stop barking for what started off as 5 and then became 9 months out of the year. It’s only been quiet since it got really hot. I’m loving it, too. When the weather’s at its hottest it’s quieter than any other place I’ve ever lived in my entire life. The good news is that the guy isn’t legally set up for renters (which his sister admitted) and we could screw him as bad as he could screw us, though I agree with Tom; he’s ok with us and he understands that it’s not our fault and that the rent-splitting isn’t our choice.

Our internet provider’s been fucking with our connection between midnight at 6am. When are they gonna quit this shit, when I’m getting up at 6am? Anyway, I guess they’re adding new stuff and so that’s when I’m concentrating more on writing since I can’t do much work without getting kicked off.

I was down and out yesterday feeling like a complete failure like I have been lately, destined to never get ahead in life and have the things she wants, no matter how reasonable they may be. Tom insists we’ve had more money than most people, but because we had so much to throw away, we did just that, and so we can’t blame anyone for not saving money like we should have. He’s got a point there. Sleep disorder or not, I never had to work outside of the house.

He also pointed out that things have turned around for us before when the carpet’s been yanked from underneath us (when AMEX laid him off, getting started in Oregon, etc.). Yeah, but these things took months, not years. I wasn’t even in jail this long! Nor were we in the Sacramento motels this long. By November we’ll have been going through this shit for as long as I was in Valleyhead.

Change. Everything changes. Sometimes it’s for the better, sometimes for the worse. But change is a constant everyday happening. I bitch about it all the time – website changes, rules changing, service changing, etc. Yet this economy bullshit seems to be the one thing that just won’t fucking change – argh!!!

Paul sent me some additional and highly disturbing links on PublishAmerica. There’s no sugar-coating, denying, or playing down the scammers that they truly are. So yes, I will eventually launch my own website and publish my own books and sell them myself, and no, I will definitely not release Digital Confessions to these leeches and sign their 7-year contract. I can’t believe they can legally get away with the shit they’ve been pulling! Google them and you’ll see what I mean. I’m not really all that surprised, though. After all, nothing comes that easy to me. Even the best authors out there don’t usually get published after just 3 tries. It usually takes 50-100 to pull it off the old-fashioned way. This is why I’m going to publish/sell my books myself, even if I don’t make more than just a few bucks. Besides, I know what I’m talking about when I say that while it certainly isn’t fair, I was meant to be poor and unsuccessful. The definite family loser.

As fucked up as it is, I couldn’t even succeed in fucking up by puking my dinner up so I can lose weight the easy way because it is just too damn gross. So I can’t succeed, and I can’t fuck up. Meanwhile, some couple in their 80s who already have a decent home won the 2010 HGTV dream home. beats head Ain’t life grand?

Later…

I didn’t bother to upload my pictures there in any kind of orderly fashion MyOpera, which I was checking out earlier. I didn’t realize it had a view counter for each picture. I’m surprised by how many have been viewed. Like maybe half or even more than half, and they have anywhere from 1-4 views each. I really shot some awesome desert scenery when we lived in Maricopa of some really gorgeous sunsets and storms. Looks so professional and like something you’d see on a postcard or a calendar.

I hate this time of my day. I’m not tired enough to sleep yet, but I’m also not awake enough to do anything constructive. I’m actually in the mood to write, but not my story. I don’t want to do anything that requires too much thinking right now like working on my book or studying languages. Maybe I’ll go look for something to watch on Hulu.

Molly’s apparently following me closely on Formspring and probably my journal, too. Anyone who’s a friend of Alison’s gets stalked by this whack job, but at least she’s not sending me a zillion messages a day.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 7, 2010
Got a long update, both good and bad. As I said before, I had no idea that my journal/stories would become what they are today and that they would end up sort of famous in a crazy and funny kind of way. So many people I know and have known read this journal. And while it’s important to me that I be myself, say what I want in my own journal, and let those who don’t like it take a hike, I also want to make it clear up front that the last thing I want to do is turn this thing into a gossip fest.

I don’t always like my mother, for example, but I do love her. Maybe I shouldn’t, but in some ways, I really do love her. And let me also make it known up front that I don’t care if one loves my dad, likes my brother, and hates my sister. They have a right to their own feelings, beliefs and opinions. But this isn’t high school either, and the last thing I want to do is pit people against others, take sides, or tell people what they should do. Especially if I’m not asked for my advice or opinion. To me, it isn’t who you were in the past that matters as much as who you are today. Understandably, though, some people are pretty set in their ways and so I prefer to just avoid those whose ways I don’t agree with rather than stick around and try to change them.

Anyway, Andy’s still vacationing back east. He said he decided not to tell his family we’re back in touch again, knowing how judgmental they can be, and I can understand this. Sometimes it’s best not to say anything at all than to tell it like it is. He gets along with his mother, David and Eric, even though Eric’s still a pothead, but not with Gary and his sisters.

The saddest news is that Charlotte lost her oldest of 3 kids to cancer last week. I intend to send a letter of condolence to her soon and have been thinking of writing her for a long time now anyway. But I’m not going to tell my folks about it because my hunches were right; she’s no longer close to my mom, she told Andy many years ago. Andy said she didn’t say why, but he got the impression my mom dumped her. Hey, if you can dump your kids on various institutions, why not your friend, huh?

Her other son, the only one with 3 daughters, runs the cottage. Andy’s family’s is up for sale.

I looked up the obit on Legacy and saw that Sharyn, now that I know how to spell her name, signed the condolence registry as did I. I guess she is kind of famous, but not for singing. She’s published 5 self-help books and has appeared on tons of talk shows, including Oprah. She also sells jewelry.

I looked her up on Facebook. She is now living in New York, also very liberal, and I swear she looks gayer than gay, LOL. I know she’s been married before, though she has no kids. Perhaps she’s bi. So I said, what the hell, and I sent a friend request with a brief note attached, giving her the highlights of my life/interests, and assuring her, for whatever it may be worth, that I absolutely did not prank call her mother years ago, despite all the pranks I made in my prankster days. I don’t know who did, but I do know that her mother was always a very nice lady and I never cared to harass her in any way.

To my surprise, she accepted, though we haven’t talked. Not yet anyway. She is a distant cousin and I’ll admit that I not only haven’t read her books but that we only saw each other a few times. I was only around 10 when I last saw her. It was at the JCC where she was directing a musical that I had participated in. Unfortunately, this was back when I was a lousy singer. I really didn’t start getting good till my 20s, then I improved a lot more in my 30s after quitting smoking. My voice and knack for learning languages are like a blessing that helps make up for any curses I may have on me, even though I haven’t desired a singing career in ages and don’t really sing as much as I used to since I’m busy with work and writing.

It’s cool that she’s a fellow author, though certainly more published than I am, and very liberal as well. I almost didn’t send her the friend invite because I didn’t want her to get the wrong idea and think I wanted help with publishing. I can always publish my own books myself if I want them published that badly. This is 2010. People can do that these days.

Marie’s looking for a job in New Hampshire now, saying that even if it’s always platonic, she’d like to be closer to Tammie. This is understandable; to want to be close to those you care about, and I know she’s not happy with her current roommates. So along with telling me about all those x-rated dreams she had of me (that’s ok, Tom won’t mind. He’s a very open-minded, easygoing individual!), she’s hoping to make a change for the better soon.

As for me, I still feel the same: I’ve gone so far in life, but absolutely nowhere, LOL. And I’ll probably always be the family’s most strange, nutty and eccentric outcast as well as the poorest. And while I still don’t know if we’ll survive this recession, I do know that PublishAmerica really wants to know what’s up with my College Romance manuscript they accepted a while back. They have messaged me from time to time, saying to let them know if I have any questions, and I kept ignoring them. Finally, I decided it wouldn’t hurt to tell them why I was hesitant to use them, and mentioned the dirt I dug up on them on Google, and that I didn’t want to bother with any publisher that was simply out to try to sell me something. In their defense, they said that if I Google other companies, as well, I’d find the same complaints and that it’s a whiner city out there. In the end, they assured me that they would publish my book at NO cost to me.

I had decided that once I built up a bigger library I would launch a website and have my books available as clickable downloads for a small fee much like many writers have these days. And while I still may do this, I’ll have to think about PA some more. If I do give them a chance I’d rather submit the manuscript I’m working on now as I feel it is longer and better written. The more we do something, the better we tend to get at it, and the other book was written when I wasn’t as experienced with these types of stories. If I do give them the one I’m working on now, then it will not be posted on Blogger. I’m going to talk to Tom about it and see what he thinks. IDK, maybe they were a little shady in the past but have since cleaned up their act.

Other than the internet cutting in and out like crazy, I told Maliheh on FB that she didn’t have to reply, but that I just wanted her to know that I had to temporarily “unshare” her, saying that a relative was coming to check out my page and I didn’t want her profile link to be the first thing she saw, so I’ll share her again later, LOL, and will send her the story when it’s done. Sure enough, she didn’t reply, but she didn’t block me either. Guess she’s really looking forward to the story!

TUESDAY, JULY 6, 2010
Been trying to figure out why I’ve been having this pain in my right hip that shoots down toward my knee, but nothing I do seems to help it. It still comes and goes. I sometimes wake up in pain if I sleep on it too long.

Anyway, I can’t think of much else to say as far as real life goes, so I guess I’ll write about the strange dreams I had last night. Tom almost never remembers his dreams but I have such vivid, detailed dreams.

In one dream I was back in the Phoenix house. I don’t know where Tom was, but I was putting food into a giant rat cage and also a giant tank that housed several guinea pigs. My cousin Philip was there. The sun was setting and we were about to go on a long drive and be gone somewhere for a week. “Let me run and pee and then we’ll get going,” I told him. I have no idea where we were really going, though.

In another dream, I was in a bedroom that was of average size with large windows on two walls. I was writing on my computer about how much I loved the new place we moved to, saying I never closed the blinds. Only I would never say that for real because I love to sleep in pitch darkness. I hate sleeping when the moon is full and would especially hate to have the sun shining in on me. Another problem was that there were a bunch of tall buildings outside one of the windows which made me think it was in some city that I would never “love.”

In the last dream, we got temporary use of our Maricopa house, and Jesse got to stay in a trailer in back of it. Other than his dogs going off when he’d take off, I bawled my eyes out over how much I missed having such a nice new spacious home, though I certainly didn’t miss my old life that went with the place when our old neighbors were obsessively stalking me through the law and then some. The house still smelled new.

Tom and I picked out an outfit for me to enter some beauty pageant for older women they were to have in Phoenix, but even though I searched through all the drawers and closets (I guess the new owners left their furniture in the place) I couldn’t find it.

Then I saw a garbage truck approaching and saw that trash day was still Wednesday. That was all wrong, though, cuz there were no trash or mail services there. By now there might be because the town had been growing really fast.

Next I was out jogging on the land as the sun was setting when I remembered where the outfit was. But by the time I ran into the house to get it, I saw that Tom had fallen asleep on the couch, so I decided to forget it, figuring we wouldn’t get to Phoenix on time anyway.

Guess that’s it other than that Marie, whom I’ve been swapping messages with for the last few hours, said she heard a rumor about Laurie M being gay. I didn’t think she was gay, but what was I to know as a 16-year-old walking pharmacy? I mean, sure, a few of the staffers were obvious like Lisa, Ellen, Mary and Jennifer, but Laurie? Hmm…

MONDAY, JULY 5, 2010
“I’m dead serious, Tom. I want to rob a bank. We’re never going to have money the right way, so unless we think of how to get it the wrong way, we’ll be dirt poor all our lives if we survive this recession. I know you can’t fight fate and win. Meaning, if we’re meant to be as poor as I think we are, nothing we can do can change that, but we’ve at least got to try. Now how about I do the robbing while you drive the getaway car? The mannequins won’t mind my borrowing one of their wigs.”

Tom laughed and said, “Because you won’t get that much.”

“Yeah, most of the money’s in the safe, isn’t it?”

“Yes, and if you stay long enough for them to empty out the safe, you’re done. They trip the silent alarms as soon as they know they’re being robbed. But because they don’t usually have cops at the bank, you’ve got a few minutes before they get there. But you probably won’t get more than a grand from a teller.”

So since I realized that we can’t very well rob a bank twice a month for the rest of our lives, or get into the safe when the bank is closed and no dye packs are present to explode on us like in armored vehicles, we’ve got to come up with some other way to survive.

But how?

No one’s going to give my husband a job. Period. That became obvious months ago. And if they do give him a job it will be years from now. So that means we’re basically on our own. Our online job won’t do it, and his program – the one I can’t talk about – won’t do it. They’ll help, but they won’t give us enough to live on when we run out of money. All they’ll do is just buy us another month or two of life. To say I feel both hopeless and helpless is an understatement!

They told Tom to call the temp company every week to see if they had anything for him, but what that really means is, “We’re not going to hire you.”

I guess our time on earth just might not be meant to go on much longer, though we can probably stretch things out to the end of the year.

For the millionth time, I’ve had to ask myself, just what is this thing that’s so bound and determined to hold us back in life and keep us from ever getting ahead??? And why??? What did we do to deserve this? We’ve got to have done something to ask for it, right? But if we did, then so did some newborn infant whose mother smothered it for crying too much. So I don’t know if we did something in this life or a previous one to deserve what we’re getting. I only know we’re getting it, like it or not, right or wrong, and that being ready, willing and able to work hard won’t always get you ahead in life. Some of the hardest, smartest workers are dirt poor.

Tom’s Google email account got hacked last night, by what appears to be a spam BOT. Google’s been terrible lately as far as security goes. Fortunately, though, none of our money-related accounts are connected to this account and Google automatically shut it down as soon as they suspected suspicious activity. Tom reset the PW and when he told me what the old PW had been it was no wonder. I had a Hotmail account hijacked and my Yahoo account almost got taken over with a PW similar to it. I always use long PWs with both letters and numbers that have nothing you’d associate me with like rats, languages, singing, etc.

Time will tell if it’s just Tom they hacked or Google that’s been hacked. If it’s Google, the same accounts will probably get hit tonight as well.

Hotmail was the worst. Maybe they’ve changed since 2007, but they didn’t even have the decency to respond to any of my messages asking them to help me try to recover the account when it first got jacked after we first moved to Cali. So I never got back into it and I’ll never use Hotmail again either.

I forgot to say earlier that Andy said that Michelle found a site with our Tempe PO box address and that’s how he got the address. I asked Tom if that sounded possible and he said yeah, it could be. I just didn’t think they kept good records back then. If the letter was sent after we closed that PO Box and opened the Maricopa one, it wouldn’t have been forwarded or returned. In order to have mail from a PO Box forwarded to another PO Box, you have to pay a fee. We learned this when we left Arizona for Oregon. But we only had the Tempe box for a few months so we didn’t forward anything. It’s fucked up, but that’s the way it is.

Some people have asked why he would defend someone I had problems with if he were my friend. Well, this isn’t to bash, condemn or pick on Tom or Andy, but for some reason, that’s just the way they’ve always been. Meaning, no matter who I may bitch about to them, they tend to automatically side with or make excuses for whoever I’m upset with. That’s at least how it comes off to me. But since they are who they are and I don’t want to change that, I just try not to go to them when someone upsets me. The best one to go to is Marie. She always listens with a non-judgmental ear. The last thing an upset person needs to hear is a friend or a family member taking the other person’s side. I was always taught that the correct way to be supportive is to simply be a good listener. But if you’ve got to defend someone, it should always automatically be your friend/family, even if you think they’re wrong. Maybe this is just me but if I can’t defend my friend/family, then I won’t say anything at all. I’ll just keep my mouth shut, cuz I know I’d only be making them feel worse for defending anyone that hurt or angered them, and why would I want to? Wouldn’t that be rather backward? And mean?

I noticed another pattern - the less we like where we live, the more money we have. The best places we’ve lived were Maricopa and here, yet we were the poorest in both places. Well, we weren’t exactly poor in Maricopa, but the house sucked up almost every last dime that we sure felt that way. So does that mean the only way to be compensated with money is to take some dumpy, rocking $500 apartment? The costs would probably come close to what this is, though, once you factor the utilities in. I wonder if we could even get into anything run by a management company to begin with, not having the greatest credit. Well, I don’t like it here at all in the winter when it’s nothing but non-stop barking for 10-12 hours a day, so maybe we’ll have a little more money then, though I doubt it. We struggled in the duplex, yes, but only for the first few months, and while the place may’ve been noisy, it was pretty nice. Yet we sure did have good money in that old, ugly, microscopic rocking house up there that we lived in next! And had we stuck around, we’d have had the MOST money in Phoenix where it was the noisiest. Hmm… interesting. We just can’t get a 3-in-1 deal (money, peace and a decent place). Funny, ain’t it?

My allergies have been bothering me for the last few days. Because I was so groggy on Benadryl last night, I did nothing but laze around in bed when I should have been working on my story. It was the perfect time for it, too. Work was slow, Tom and my friends were in bed, so it was the ideal time to write. Maybe tonight I’ll catch up, though I’m actually a week ahead of schedule.

SUNDAY, JULY 4, 2010
I dropped the Catalan course because it was not only too easy being so similar to Spanish and Italian but also because the audio files were HORRIBLE! It seems only the major languages have decent audio files. So I tried Russian, but it was way too hard because I would first have to take the time to learn their lettering system and didn’t want to bother. So after getting just a 63% on the first lesson, I enrolled in Mandarin as goofy as it sounds being a tonal language and got a 93%! That’s because they at least spell things out phonetically. I’m learning about what seems to be 3 basic tones. I still have to finish up with my German first, though, and always review my other languages. I’ll probably always be best with Spanish and Italian. Well, besides English and ASL, of course.

I think the reason I’m such a language junkie is that it’s like a fun game to me. Like a memory word game. I could not imagine life without 4 things – Tom, my MP3 collection, my journal, and languages. Anything else after that that’s good is just a bonus!

Dreamland was good to me for a change. No hanky panky with Marie, but other interesting things happened. For some reason, I don’t always know Tom in some of my dreams, but Andy was in one of the ones he wasn’t in. I like it when I dream of Andy. It’s like visiting each other without the hassles of really visiting.

I don’t know what state we were supposed to be in, but I was with Laurie M, the Valleyhead staffer I had a crush on. In the first part of the dream, we were in a car. She was driving of course, and even though she was coming up on 70, she still looked like she was in her early 40s like she was when I last knew her. She was worried about her dying soon and leaving me alone.

“Come on, Laurie,” I said. “The average woman dies at 85. We’ve got a good 15 years or so together to look forward to.”

She laughed at that point.

In the next scene which was part of the same dream, we were in our living room and Andy was visiting. He and I were sitting on a couch and Laurie was in a plush rocking chair. Talk of the age difference came up again (though I assure you that in real life I would never get with someone pushing 70 if I were single no matter how young they looked) and one of them asked what I planned to do after Laurie was gone.

“I’ll have to get a small apartment somewhere,” I said.

“Why would you do that?” asked Andy. “You hate living attached to others.”

“Yeah, but I won’t have a choice with her gone because the money will be limited and I couldn’t stand to be here and know she wasn’t coming home,” I said, and then Laurie came out and told me she had a lot of money and I wouldn’t have to settle for an apartment.

I said something like, “Oh, ok,” and Andy told Laurie that at least I didn’t marry her for her money.

So after being married to Laurie M for a few minutes in my dreams, it was off to dream about waking up from a nap in what I knew was mine and Tom’s two-story house. I was in the master bedroom and could hear him rustling around in another bedroom doing a computer project or something. I got out of bed. My hair was longer than it really is.

Tom asked me why good dreams can’t be a sign of good things to come and not just bad dreams being a sign of bad things to come. I don’t know why I have more premonitions warning me of bad things ahead as opposed to good things ahead, but that dream made no sense premonition-wise. Even if we do manage to get a place of our own, why would it have two floors? My parents have two floors, but that’s because it’s a condo. We would never buy a condo so that much made no sense, even though not everything that happens to me happens just the way it did in my dreams. Like the dream, I had in Oregon where I fell from a shower stall that was 20’ high and stood in the middle of a warehouse. I knew trouble was ahead when I had that dream, though I certainly never fell 20’. Not since I was 17 anyway.

Another thing that makes no sense is that my hair seemed to be down to my waist. In reality, it’s to the middle of my back right now, but in two years when he gets the pension, it will be just to the crack of my ass.

SATURDAY, JULY 3, 2010
Swapped emails with Marie and Andy. Marie is having trouble sending the pics from her trip. She’s now using Windows 7 so she’s still learning the ropes. Tom tried its beta version and says she’ll figure it out, and that it’s not that complicated.

So early yesterday morning as I was lying in bed getting ready to fall asleep, I thought of Andy and found myself wondering if I’d made a mistake in initiating the first round of contact over a year ago. I questioned whether or not what once was between us could ever be again, and wondered if perhaps we just weren’t meant to be friends again. I thought of how he basically chewed me out for so many things that had absolutely nothing to do with him over the last couple of weeks, and wondered if his goal was to simply take his anger out on me by lashing out at me with anything and everything he could possibly think of – how I handled my MIL, the crazy neighbors, my nieces, how Tom went about job hunting, etc.

Who the hell is he to tell me how to live my life and how I should handle things? I thought to myself. How would he like it if I told him I was appalled by the way he’s still living in Arizona and that I thought it was a dumb idea? How could he want to live there as crazy as that state and its laws are? After all, you gotta be crazy – and definitely brave – to live in a state that will practically execute someone for stealing a newspaper. Just what kind of human being would want to live in Arizona? Huh?

But I never said any such thing to him. Just because I wouldn’t want to live there again doesn’t mean he shouldn’t, and who the hell would I be to tell him otherwise, right?

So I wasn’t sure what to do just yet. I didn’t want to dump him, but associating with someone who likes to judge and condemn me on issues they either don’t know all the facts about or that aren’t their business isn’t my idea of a friendship either. When he defended our neighbors when the only victim, in that case, was me and my husband, I said to myself, “This is what a rape victim must feel like who’s made to feel like she’s the one to blame for getting raped.” Had she just worn a skirt that was just a little longer… Had her shirt been just a little less lower-cut… Had she worn just a little less makeup… Had she not been where she was at the time…

I vowed to continue to have the self-respect I always try to have for myself by not associating with those who bring me down, but wanted to give things a little more time before I made any decisions I knew I might later regret.

But then later I awoke to a message that put a smile on my face and that I appreciated very much. VERY much. He basically told me in his own words he would mind his own business unless I asked for his advice. And I probably will ask his advice at times too, though not so much his advice but rather his opinion. Like does he think a retirement community would have just as much barking as the mainstream? I figured it would, being in a culture where dogs aren’t pets, but instead of most people having 2-3 large dogs that were outside 24/7, they’d probably have just one small dog that was only out during the daytime.

He promised Stevie’s mother he would never post the pics of her and him online, but hopes I believe that he really does have these pictures.

I do. If he could become friends with her mother, why not her? I always figured it was just a matter of time before they met. And as I’m sure he knows, he has nothing to gain by lying to me to try to impress me.

He asked that I be patient about his living situation and I assured him he doesn’t have to tell me anything he doesn’t want to. Ever.

Anyway, he’s back east right now. I wonder if Charlotte still has a cottage there (Jim is dead). I asked him, so he’ll probably let me know later.

So do I think he only came back into my life to get even with me for dumping him and to “punish” me for it? No, I don’t. I think he was hurt and he was angry and he had every right to be, but I don’t think he’s out to even the score. I started to think that, and if he was still critiquing me for hanging our toilet paper so it flows away from the wall instead of toward it, then yeah, I would think that was the name of the game.

In the meantime, if he can stick to what pertains to us unless one of us asks the other for advice or opinions, I see no reason we can’t resume our friendship. It will just basically be a cyber one instead of a phone and an in-person one. We may never see each other again, but like I said, if we can get along and respect each other’s wishes as to what we discuss, why not keep in touch? I just wouldn’t want to do email every day as busy as I am, but he knows that if I can’t get to email right away, I do still eventually get to it.

FRIDAY, JULY 2, 2010
I was sitting here thinking about some of the things Andy mentioned in his messages to me. But I’m confused about a couple of things. He complained that I complained about the neighbor’s noise, saying that’s just typical daytime noise and I shouldn’t have taken it personally (he obviously didn’t know the extent of it) but isn’t that what he did when he complained about his neighbor cop’s dog? Dogs are a regular part of daytime noise too, particularly in the west where they’re not considered household pets. I don’t have a problem with his complaining about that or anything else. That’s his business and not my place to judge or say how he should handle situations like that. He can’t help what bothers him and he’s welcome to complain about whatever he wants. But the point is, didn’t he basically do the same thing? Maybe I’m just as in the dark about that situation as he was about my past situation. He’s just lucky that pig didn’t spite him into jail.

Something else also hit me. I don’t know why it took nearly 24 hours to – duh – but he said he sent a letter to our Tempe box which I never received. But I thought I hadn’t given him that address. I know he sent me something else by sending it to the Phoenix house knowing it would be forwarded to me, but I can’t remember for the life of me ever giving him the Tempe box address. I didn’t give anyone that address, for that matter. Absolutely no one at all. I knew we’d only have that box for just a few months and I didn’t want to confuse anyone I planned to keep in touch with, so I just waited till we got the Maricopa box.

I suppose I should be asking him this and not just my journal. But he reads this thing, so I’m doing both in the end.

I also wonder about the person(s) responsible for leaving me “warnings” about Andy’s true intentions on Formspring. If they really know one of us, why don’t they just say so?

Our rat’s tumor is now the size of a tennis ball, but he STILL shows no signs of slowing down as big as it is and as old as he is. I can’t believe it’s July and he’s still hanging on. Have we got the world’s first immortal rat, or what?

THURSDAY, JULY 1, 2010
I couldn’t sleep so I thought I would write what might very well be my last public entry.

When I started public journaling about two years ago the last thing I had in mind was pissing people off with my thoughts, opinions, beliefs and experiences. It just seemed like a fun thing to do. I thought maybe someone would find some of it interesting or maybe even helpful and inspiring in some way. Maybe someone would learn something from it, or maybe it would put a smile on someone’s face to read something funny after they’d had a bad day. I didn’t expect everyone to agree with everything I wrote. But I figured people would have sense enough not to read my journal if they didn’t like what I might have to say.

Some people have said that I beat myself up too much for my past mistakes and that I have shouldered too much blame. Others feel I need to take even more responsibility by accepting even more blame. But this shouldn’t be a matter of public debate and up to others to decide what I should and should not blame myself for. It should be up to ME.

The absolute last thing I ever intended to do with public writing was piss people off. Yet I seem to have done a fine job of doing just that with people I know. Very seldom has anyone I never met had a problem with anything I’ve written. They’ve disagreed, but they haven’t taken things personally or jumped down my throat because they either misunderstood where I was coming from or didn’t have enough information to be judging the situation. Yet I have been accused of rejecting those who never reached out to me. I have been accused of never accepting fault for anything even though I’ve clearly written about my part in the Maliheh saga and taken full responsibility for my share of what happened with her, amongst many other things with other people and other issues.

No one has to like me or agree with everything I say, but I should have a right to be myself and express myself freely in my own journal without being condemned for my emotions/actions or accused of false intentions/motivations. Inviting people to leave my journal if it bothers them has done me no good. And so I am trying to consider the feelings of those more sensitive readers as well as my own. I don’t want to upset people because I may handle a certain situation a certain way or believe certain things. But I also have a right to be who I am.

Somebody actually called me selfish for being unwilling to take the blame for something I didn’t feel I was guilty of simply because it would make some of my readers happy. They said so what if I wasn’t being true to myself if it would make those I’m supposed to care about happy? But that would be like telling a woman to just let her man beat her if it makes him happy and insisting she’d be selfish not to let him do so. I’m sorry, but I’m nobody’s liar, and if that’s being selfish, then yeah, I’m a selfish bitch. If making others happy means being untrue to myself, then I’d rather let others down.

So now I’m trying to decide if I should stop public journaling so I can be myself privately and not upset others while I’m at it. A part of me regrets letting those I know know about my journal, but that was part of the fun; to share my life with those I know. It was my way of letting them know what was up with me. It was supposed to be anyway. Instead, I’ve succeeded in pissing people off when I do something like blame God for my problems. Not something I planned on doing. Do I blame myself for it? Well, let’s just say that I’m sorry I upset anyone, but not sorry I said what I honestly felt. Normally I don’t give a shit what others think, but these are people I care about. As I said before, the more I care about you, the more I want to please you as long as I’m not being unfair to myself in any way. As for what some stranger in Texas may think about what I have to say or some stranger in Australia – I don’t give a shit. Maybe that’s wrong of me and maybe I should give a shit about them as well, but I just don’t.

I suppose I have a few options. I could keep going as I have been and continue to piss people off. I could start another journal elsewhere and not tell anyone I know about it. Or I could stop public journaling altogether and just go back to writing in Word only. If I did the latter I probably wouldn’t delete or mark private my public journals, but just abandon them instead. It’s a tough dilemma. I love public writing and I don’t want to give it up, but I sure am considering it more than ever before. I guess I’ll take some time to think about it. I really do want to be able to write in a way that suits me and that I see fit, but I really don’t want to upset anyone. Really, I don’t. So over the next day or so, I’ll decide whether or not to stop public journaling, tweeting, Formspring, etc. Just what is it with Formspring lately anyway? I was gonna shut it down cuz it was so dead, but now it’s totally come to life.

Anyway, I probably will drop at least the journal. It’s been a fun two years and I’ve gotten lots of interesting feedback and insight and I’m sorry it has to end this way, but I had no idea it would become what it has become for me. I had no idea my journal would become so popular on every single site I write at and that so many people would be touched – in both good and bad ways – by my writing. I’m flattered for the most part, but I’m tired of hearing that I’m too damn nice one minute, then an evil bitch the next. And I’m tired of being told the so-called “right” way to do things. Like I said, my decision isn’t official yet. I will take a day or two to think about it.

Later…

“A question, not a criticism: Does what these people think really mean that much? If you believe you’re being treated unfairly by a certain person or a group of people, is it constructive take on their unfairness as your burden?”

This was just one of many responses I got in regard to my last entry where I talk about considering stopping online journaling because I didn’t want to keep hurting people’s feelings or pissing them off. Hmm…does what they think REALLY matter to me? Does it REALLY, REALLY matter? Perhaps not enough to stop online journaling after all, and so I guess once again I will give into my selfish side and just accept the fact that like any other writer out there who likes to post online, not everyone’s going to like or agree with every single thing I say. And as someone else said, it’s not my responsibility to dry their tears. I can’t control or predict how people are going to respond to something I write any more than I can control or predict how they’ll respond to something I may wear in public. So as I’ve said about a million and one times before, you’re invited to leave my journal if it bothers you or bores you in any way. Otherwise, read at your own risk!

We only paid half the rent and left a note in the box briefly explaining what was going on. Jesse came down when he got in and my first concern was that Mr. Little Rich Boy was getting fed up with us having to split the rent, even though we don’t do it every month and we’re always all paid up by around the 10th at the latest. Even with a kid, I doubt this guy has ever known a day in his life of struggling. Instead, he just wanted to know more about what was going on. I guess he had heard about all the cut-offs and all that was going on in the news.

If the members of Congress can stop dying, (yeah, that really pisses me off that millions of people, including myself, have to suffer because of the death of someone most of us never even met) a new one will be sworn in in a couple of weeks that is expected to give that single vote needed for them to proceed with doing the right thing and sending the damn checks out. Really, I can’t believe these things are even a matter of debate. It’s like finding a bleeding man in the street and stopping to take a vote as to whether or not we should try to save him. That’s ridiculous! Just ridiculous. Politics, politicians – it all makes me sick. They want to let so many people suffer because of the national debt which is THEIR OWN damn fault for wasting money in the first place! Maybe if they’d stop giving so many millions of our dollars to other countries, we wouldn’t be in this mess! I’m just so sick of having to suffer for other people’s stupidity! I’m ashamed and embarrassed by my fellow human beings at times. Meanwhile, how come it is that when I screw up something I’M the only one to suffer?! I’m just so fed up with people I don’t even know basically dictating our lives and how we live and what we can do, etc. And they call this the land of the free?

They sent the forms in the mail saying to keep on sending them in. This eases a lot of the stress since they obviously know they’re going to be sending checks soon enough and don’t want to get backed up in forms. My new worry (yeah, it’s just one worry after another) is how soon the checks will get to us. Again, I only make so much online so fast, though my latest idea still shows some promise. Not as much as I’d like, but enough for now.

Like I said, I’m not as stressed out as I was and things may not look as hopeless, but it’s still bad enough. And I can’t believe anything anyone says until we actually receive the money.

But then what? Say we got the money right now. The question of whether or not the jobs can beat the extension is still an issue.

sighs Poverty is such a rough life. Might as well quit complaining and learn to live with it, though, cuz nothing’s going to change where that’s concerned. It’s just what was meant to be for us. And I thought it was basically only those with kids who struggled!

In other news, the weather has been hot and dry and keeping the dogs quiet. They probably still go off early in the morning when he takes off, but they’re not going on 10-hour fits in this heat. They will as soon as it cools down, though.

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Last updated August 07, 2024