age ain't nothin' but a number

Ughhh... I am too old to audition for the short season of America's Next Top Model. Forget about the fact that I am not thin enough and don't really know how to pose in front of a camera. Those are just details. I'm too old. The ages are from 18-27 and I am looking down the barrel of the big ol' 2-8. This is way more depressing than it should be, as I'm reasonably certain I had no real intention of auditioning. But still... don't tell me what I can't do!

I wonder if I could lie... although, of course, if I went in there saying I was 18 or 19, they would probably accuse me of looking too young. So really, I can't win. In a few years, I'm just going to look like a 16-year-old girl with graying hair and wrinkles. I'm Benjamin Button.

The new apartment is great so far. I got my first taste of the parking situation at 11:30 Monday night and it's pretty bad. But no worse than my parents' house AND I parked slightly in a crosswalk and didn't get a ticket. Other than the parking, I really love the place. It's not done yet; we still don't have DVR (curses!) and my father has to put up the door between my brother and my bedrooms and I have to figure out where I'm putting the two garbage bags of stuffed animals and at least two boxes of other things I have no room to store. Thank God my room is big. Even with all the boxes still sitting around, it's at least double the size of any other room I've ever had. I can do a dance routine in the middle of the floor, which is, of course, what every little girl dreams of in a bedroom. Right? It wasn't just me, was it?

My brother is going to be cooking dinner every night, which is AWESOME, but also means I have to eat whatever he makes and shut up about it, which is putting my diet somewhat in the shitter. Last night, we had cheeseburgers and Key Food brand shells and cheese. I guess it could be worse and, seriously, I am not complaining about having dinner on the table for me when I get home from work. For the past year, I have been eating leftovers or ramen noodles/Ellio's pizza for dinner, alone. I'll just have to be extra healthy during the day to make up for it.

my flag boy and your flag boy, sittin' by the fire...

Sunday is the official move in date. I may possibly be asking for volunteers to help out on Sunday afternoon, which I will decide upon tonight after I talk to my father about how many people he thinks we'll need to help. This would involve moving my couch out of the house, which- as much as my father thinks it won't- is going to be difficult. The hallway and doorway of my apartment are very narrow and the movers who brought it in three years ago ripped the back of it on the top of the banister. I probably should have demanded a new couch but no one except Nancy and I ever knew it was ripped and the headache it would have been to get the old one out and the new one in would have been more trouble than it was worth. So, in conclusion, if you're reading this and you're male (so, everyone but Michelle... as far as I know), stay tuned.

I started a new diet on Sunday. So far, it's going well, but the first week of any diet I start always goes well, so I'm not claiming victory yet. I have this idea that once I get into the new place, I am going to buy a Wii Fit and that will be the way I lose weight. Don't tell me marketing doesn't work...

Also, for all the people (you know who you are) who complain about the lack of updates and having nothing to read, go to my other blog and read the first issue of the comic I have posted there. (Yes, I have been reduced to begging people to read things.) Rereading "Watchmen" has made me want to write more of it but I feel sort of stupid to keep doing so when Brendan and I are the only two people reading it... okay, I think Tom read some, too. Anyway, make a poor, old woman happy and read the goddamn thing, so I can feel loved and important. Go on. Your country needs you.

oh little ol' me...

My brother and I (and my father... and possibly my mother... and maybe the ashes of my dead dog, if we can fit them in the car) are going to pay the first month's rent and the security deposit on our new apartment tomorrow. Apparently, we are getting the keys on Saturday and then... that's it. I officially live in two separate homes; three, if you want to count the place I eat crap food and watch movies on Sundays and really, until I get married, I can't stop referring to my parents' house as "home." I might have just sort of stolen that idea from Garden State but there you go. I could pick a worse movie to steal ideas from.

I had an awesome and exciting dream on Sunday night that involved me and the rest of the DnD gang in some house running around and experiencing some type of crazy adventure. I specifically remember Dan and Joe being there but I know the rest were, too. The problem is, I cannot remember any of it and it's really making me mad. In the dream, I knew I would forget it, so I had a second dream wherein I told all my friends about the first dream, since I knew talking about it would make it stick. Then, I woke up and promptly forgot it. I think it may be time for a dream journal.

I miss having someone. Is that pessimism? I'm going with no. Also, does it make me a terrible person to like having a guy take care of me? Like is that such a step backward for feminists? Would my fellow women be ashamed of me? I sometimes think that there is a women somewhere trapped inside of me who would absolutely love living in the 1950s... but then I remember that I can't cook and hate cleaning so I don't think I'd last very long back then. Do you think Dick Van Dyke would've been okay with eating mac and cheese for dinner?

I started this journal with the idea that each post would be one separate narrative but turns out, not that many exciting things happen to me on a daily basis. I thought a guy might have been coming over to hit on me Saturday night, but he was just asking me to do an interview for the band. Then later on, when I apologized for not being able to hear him, he said it was probably because of his accent. Because I still couldn't hear him, I had no idea what kind of accent he had, so it's possible I let my one chance for chatting up a British guy slip through my fingers. That, my friends, would have been one hell of a story. I imagine the story of accomplishing one of my life goals could have gotten pretty long-winded.

i'm moving out!

I found two songs with pretty much the same lyric. I should probably have saved this when for when I'm actually moving out but whatever. I have faith in my creativity; I'll find a new one.

Anyway, yes, I am moving out, between March 1st and April 1st. The apartment I mentioned in the last entry will be mine and Ricky's new home. I am really excited about it, but also sad about leaving Nancy. I've come to really love the apartment I live in now, but really, I feel like the love is slowly beginning to drop and pretty soon I may end up hating it. My neighbor is a big part of the reason why I will be pleased as punch to get out, but there are other reasons, too, which I won't document here.

My new apartment is on the first floor, so this will be the first time I don't have to climb a flight of stairs (other than the front stoop) to get to my house. The people who live above me are a young couple with a really adorable baby girl and they seem very nice, so I don't think we'll have any problems in that department. This is also the first time I've lived in a non-brownstone-style house. I am no longer connected on one or both sides. I am really moving up in the world, aren't I?

I had a crazy dream last night involving Randall Flagg somehow but I can't remember what it was. All I remember is waking up to my brother Alex calling my name and feeling very creeped out, since it had sounded as if him calling me was what had woken me up. See what reading comic books is doing to me? This didn't happen when I read the actual books... although almost being hit with flying pieces of wood and seeing hidden messages on balloons might be a little bit worse. Seriously. The Dark Tower made me a little bit crazy.

move out, don't mess around...

In the last month or so (pretend I'm writing this blog Monday), two of my friends have moved away from New York. Both had very good reasons for doing so and one, at least (I hope both) seems to be happy with his decision thus far. I myself cannot imagine packing up my life and moving anywhere farther from where I am now than New Jersey. Even that would be a stretch. I honestly believe that I both a) talk too fast and b) am too impatient to live anywhere but New York. I understand there are other big cities out there where people are often rude and lose their tempers with those who don't belong. In fact, I'm sure there are others right here on the east coast (see: Boston), but New York is too much "my home" for me to ever consider leaving it. Not that I think my friends are crazy for moving on; far from it. I think it takes a certain strength of character to start over, a strength that I do not have. I rely on my friends and family so much. I can't decide if that's a good or bad thing... maybe it's just a neutral thing and there's nothing good or bad about it. It's just different.

I will however be moving in the next few months, although to where is still a mystery. I may possibly be looking at an aprtment tomorrow. My brother's friend offered us a spot in his duplex for $425 a piece... but we'd have to share a bedroom. For two full seconds, I actually debated the possibility, because $425 a month in rent was such a nice number to roll around my brain, but in the end I realized I am a twenty-seven year old woman, my brother is a twenty-four year old man and- even if we were seven and four again- I am a spoiled brat who has never shared a room with anyone and desparately enjoys her privacy once in a while. So yeah. Sorry, $425. Maybe next time.

i believe i can fly

There was a bird in my apartment yesterday. The idea that I might have been in the same closed-in area with a bird while at my most vulnerable (i.e. straight out of the shower... I don't know why I feel that way, but I do. I guess it's the thought of running out of my house naked in blind fear. The bird would only be the beginning of my problems.) is both thrilling and terrifying. Let me explain: apparently, Sunday night, my cousin, while letting her dog out to do its business in our backyard through the basement back door, accidentally allowed a black bird to fly into the house. I will blame this entire thing on that dog, although it is very nice, because it is extremely badly behaved and almost tore my finger off in its choke chain once when I was trying to walk it... but that's another story. Anyway, she did what any typical woman would do (me included) and ran back to her apartment, slamming the door shut behind her. Monday afternoon, she went back to the basement and couldn't find the bird. She had happened to call her father (our landlord) to come fix a heating issue in the house. In doing so, they both went upstairs to my apartment to check the thermostat. All three occupants were at work, but my cousin heard a rustling noise in the living room and slowly went to investigate, at which point, she found the bird trapped in the curtains behind my couch. My uncle somehow grabbed it in a towel and set it free off my back porch. I'm sure my neighbor will have some reason to complain about this incident, too. The bird was probably making so much noise, he couldn't hear his television.

When I got home yesterday evening, all that remained of the bird were some wrinkled curtains and a few droplets on my couch that resembled white out. But the scariest part of this is that there was no contact with this bird from Sunday night, till Monday afternoon, which means that it could very well have been in my living room, sitting in the dark, while I was getting ready for work. I just can't even imagine how terrified I would have been had I heard a noise, gone to check it out, and been hit in the face with a camouflaged and panicked bird. I'd probably still be crying.

I wonder if I'd be this afraid of birds if a seagull hadn't tried to steal my turkey sandwich out of my hands when I was eleven. I mean, I got the sandwich back, but ultimately the seagull won, as my parents wouldn't let me eat it after the bird's claws had been sunk into the roll. I can still see that bird flapping in my face and my cousin, Michael, then sixteen, sitting on a beach chair nearby, laughing.

Don't tell me I'm not scarred.

i'm a loser, baby...

Seven days in and I think the New Year's resolution is coming along pretty well. I am actively trying to stay positive but I hope that, eventually, I won't have to think about it anymore and it'll just happen. Like breathing.

I'm also part of a Biggest Loser competition with some of my family members. I was asked by my cousin if I wanted to take part in it, and her question was prefaced with, "I don't want to insult you by asking this, but..." I'm glad she thinks I am fit enough to be insulted by being asked if I want to lose weight. Anyway, I have to kick in $20 at the beginning and then, for every week I gain, I have to throw in another $5. I believe we're doing this until some time around Easter. I usually hover around the same weight anyway, so as long as I don't gain, I won't lose all that much money. I've tried before to switch my diet over to healthy foods, which for me, mostly means grilled chicken instead of fried. But this time, I think I'll try a little harder, being that there's money involved. I also did a 22 minute Exercise-on-Demand in my living room last night, ignoring the fact that I actually belong to a gym to which I NEVER GO. I swear, if I ever try to pay money to a gym again, someone direct me to this post. Unless I am doing Fenix Down full-time and have free mornings and afternoons in which to make myself attractive to our millions of fans. Then, it's all right.

I'm also trying to do some other good things for myself in this new year. I cooked myself an actual dinner last night (grilled chicken... see?... and rice) as opposed to eating ramen noodles or a grilled cheese. I've also been wearing my glasses at work, like I'm supposed to. I'm taking care of myself this year. All I have to do is actually fill out that 401K paperwork and I'll really be on the ball. I've only been sitting on that for over a year... I'm sure I'll get to it any day now.