even the best laid plans...

[brightbluegirl]

Today, all plans were cancelled.

We WERE going to bike to the foothills and have a little hike and all the rest of it.

But instead, the stupid fucking pager of doom took it upon itself to fucking ACCEPT A PAGE at 1:20am last night. And another at 1:40.

Ok, so the problem here is the person who paged, not the pager.

But I hate that fucking thing. I've taken 14 pages so far this week. And 12 of those pages kept me from sleep I was sleeping.

I've decided to take some time off the pager. I'm going especially into work tomorrow (yes, on my day off) to give in the pager and tell the guys I'm off the pager for the while.

You know, ask me to do technical support, I'm fine with that. Ask me stupid questions, I'm fine with that.

Interrupt my sleep, I am NOT so fine with that.

So this morning we woke up around 9am, ate yummy yummy oatmeal with soy milk, raisins, cinnamon, and allspice, did a couple of things, and biked over to my chiropractor, then went to walmart to buy me another bike helmet (mine got lost out of a coworkers trunk last week), and then to Hollywood Video, where we found a great B grade Sci Fi movie to watch tomorrow while we work out.

Then, on our hunt for fast food that our snobbish organic-loving tastebuds will still enjoy, we went to Wendys.

I know, I know. Wendys!!

We got bacon cheeseburgers and fries, no biggie, thankyouverymuch.

It was all right. Best fast food we've had yet, but still under the all right category.

So far, since we've gotten here, we've tried:

• Carls Jr (cheap, not so tasty, wierd sauce we didn't enjoy on the burgers, super trashy clientele that mistreated their children, and now a rumour from pfloide that they're owned by the Klan)



• Long John Silvers (The cashier tried to charge us $15 for a meal that cost $4 and a meal that cost $5, and the fish, fries, hushpuppies, iced tea and shrimp all had one flavour - stale socks)



• Fudruckers (really good burgers and fries. really good. Slightly more expensive - I would call it pub expensive, you know, $7-10 a meal sort of thing - but my favorite burgers to date. However, they jumped on the Freedom Fries bandwagon, so I will NEVER EAT THERE AGAIN. Motherfuckers.)



• Wendys (Good price, $11 for two combos, clean dining room, fresh FRENCH fries, they even asked if we wanted lemon in our iced tea)

So Wendys was fun. We sat near the window and did a bit of people watching while we chatted and ate. This woman drove up in her car with a licence plate that said "We Pray" (I kid you not) and Andrew made me laugh so hard I almost fell out of my chair, by pretending to be the voice in her head. It was too good.

We talked about lots of things at lunch. I don't even remember it all, but it was a good conversation.

The important thing was this:

I have been extremely bitchy this past while (I already knew that), but it's because I'm in this constant state of irritation. And it's not him that's irritating me, it's like - I go home, I go to work, whatever, and I am constantly irritated. And it's true that when you are in a calm state of mind, we let things pass us by, but when we're irritated or upset, even the smallest thing gets our goat.

I never wanted that goat, anyway.

But the point is that I don't WANT to be irritated all the time. I don't enjoy it. And yes, this job isn't the best, but I've worked in more stressful jobs. Andrew insists that the irritation coincides with the diet. He thinks it's because I'm hungry all the time, and tired from all the working out. I guess that could be true.

All I know is that I don't want to be like this. I don't want to drive him away because every second thing he does I yell at him for. I don't want to be this person that I don't like.

I haven't got an answer yet. I'm working on it. I try to get enough sleep - 8 hours on worknights, more on weekends if possible, naps when I need them... I give myself treats when I absolutely can't stand it. I get orgasms, I eat well, I exercise to reduce stress...

I don't know what other thing I need, but I'll figure it out. The fact that he is so THERE for me, so present, so ready to be accountable and so alive and steady, makes a difference too.

But the person I strive to be, although assertive, is not a bitch.

Man, I'm writing a lot tonight. Wierd, for a non-work day. But I don't think I'd be able to sleep without getting it all out. It's just a manic headspace day, I guess.

So anyway. The ambience of Wendys got a little stale after awhile, so we went home.

I sat on the couch and ate phish food frozen yogurt, and out of nowhere came this outpouring of irrational "why me".

And not about anything trivial like my weight or my haircolour or my debt or anything, but about society.

Why do we have to live in a dysfunctional dystopian society like this one? Why does OUR generation have to be the one that sees this? Why are we living in a world full of people who don't want to take responsibility for their actions, who want to be told what to do, who don't think things through? Why?

And of course he didn't have any answers for that, nothing that could reach me on that emotional, irrational, childish level, but he did say some fascinating things.

He pointed out the similarities between this society and the Roman society before it fell. The arenas and their gladiators and their fights to the death compared to reality tv. Things like fear factor and survivor and even American Idol. Make it more shocking, more visceral, more mind-numbing, so the public forgets about what's going on around them, so they don't see their society fall apart around them. Things like that.

He drew all these comparisons between this civilization where it stands now and other civilizations before they fell. Czarist Russia, for example.

My boy is SMART.

So I don't have any answers, but I do have some neat things to think about.

Then we had a nap. A freeking 2 1/2 hour nap. It was wonderful. Just what I needed to clear up the lack of sleep from the pager.

Afterwards we walked down to Nob Hill and talked more, more delightful conversation with my smart sexy wonderful boy, and we decided to go to a pub down there we hadn't tried before - Kellys. We'd heard good things about the beer and the burgers, although neither one of us tried the beer.

I tried a chicken philly cheesesteak thingie. I discovered that I do not enjoy them. Their fries are super good though - they mix potato fries and yam fries. I LOVE yam fries. Haven't had any since we moved away from Toronto.

I don't remember our specific conversation, but I remember again that it was stimulating. We sat out on the patio and I stared at the mountains and we watched a little girl with her mama and a puppy with her people, and it was glorious.

And I decided to focus on the fact that I have lost 11 lbs, and dammit, that is SUCCESS. I didn't stay the same weight, I didn't go up, dammit, I lost. focus focus.

Before we left we got to play with the puppy. Lovely puppy.

The walk home, much like the walk there, was perfect.

I am meant to live in a warm climate. I'm happier in a warm climate, and I'm healthier, dammit.... I just belong in a warm climate.

I don't know how you endure my ramblings.

I think it's time for bed.

Comments

[hukuma.livejournal.com]

My gf often remarks on how I transform from being relatively well-mannered to irritable and impatient when I'm hungry. I wish I had some advice about dieting without being constantly hungry, but you know much more about these matters than I. Perhaps being off the pager for a bit will put you in a better mood...

[plinko.livejournal.com]

Dude! Now I want a damn goat.

Goats are so much fun....when they are not eating your pants.

[caric.livejournal.com]

Now, THAT depends entirely on how you feel about having your pants eaten by goats.

[pfloide.livejournal.com]

I never heard anything about Carl's Jr. being owned by the Klan, so you can't have heard that rumor from me (which isn't to say it's false)... You may be thinking of the statement I made to the effect that the In-n-Out Burger is owned by fundamentalist Christians.

I agree with yer boy about our society being in a decadent phase... Heck, even John Ralston Saul has drawn parallels to the modern west to French aristos in the 1780's and Tsarist Russia in the late 19th century. Imperial elites tend to get more and more insulated and more and more self-confident and assertive right up until the Revolution.

How distressing. Can we at least hope for a non-violent Revolution? Probably not, when the other side is what it is. Maybe we can hope for "learn from history" instead of "repeat it"...

The world lives on hope.

[a-narchist.livejournal.com]

As much as "Maybe we can hope for "learn from history" instead of "repeat it"..." is great to hope for, the evidence begins to build in favor of ignorance.

Things like cancelling world history classes. I can say from experience that American students have vast amounts of education withheld from them when it comes to the rest of the world.

Given that a co-worker of mine, (who is by no means ignorant) was under the impression that Canada was still a British colony and other commonly held, false Amercian beliefs, combined with a drastic and concentrated effort to draw the majority of people away from even thinking about the rest of the world, (I mean, who wants to study history when you can watch people throw dead rats into a barrel with their teeth!) the chances of enough people seeing where this is leading seems to be frighteningly small.

The best chance I see of people seeing these things would be if the major change started in another country. One that does educate kids to some degree and might be able to learn from history. It would give Americans enough of a heads up that they might just make it.

One can only hope.

[freakykitten.livejournal.com]

Dammit. Well, I didn't dream this one. So somebody else told me that, and I attributed it to you...

Or maybe I just made it up. Also possible. Dayum.