Through the Looking Glass

I'm always so tired but I never want to sleep. I suppose it's just a symptom of my contrary nature.

I got the brakes fixed on my car today. Not having them fail is definitely a good thing.

I always feel like I should update this thing more regularly, but I very rarely have anything interesting to say.

My cat is really adorable, curled up on my bed and fast asleep. I love him so much, even if he takes the bigger half of the bed and cries to break my heart if I try to move him so I can have some bed, too.

My room is shockingly clean, by my standards. I wonder how long it will stay that way.

I'm taking this Wednesday off, I think, from my internship. I have to write an annotated bibliography for my abnormal psych class, and I'll have zero time to work on it next week, and it's due that Friday. I'm still not 100% married to a topic, but I think I've mostly settled on the placebo effect. It's something that's always fascinated with me, and my professor feels the same way, and even though he already adores me I can't resist the chance to do a little extra sucking up.

I really need to do laundry tomorrow.

I'm trying to cut down on the complaining, because it annoys people and just reinforces the negative thought patterns I'm trying to eliminate, but there's one thing that just sucks and I feel like indulging in a little pouting here. I have to work at 9 in the morning on Black Friday. Not only will getting up at 8am kill me, as I am rarely asleep before 5, but this means that I have to stay in Jersey for Thanksgiving. I won't be abandoned, I'm going with my ex and his family to his sister's boyfriend's house, but at least he and Jackie will be there so I have people I know to ceaselessly pester. But the plan had been to go to Massachusetts to visit my sister, and I was really looking forward to that. Unfortunately Black Friday is a blackout date, I cannot request off, and calling out would, I'm quite sure, be grounds for getting my ass fired. Not that I care one whit about a shitty mall job, but after a great deal of applications and a number of interviews, they were the only ones who would hire me. And since I have less than $40 in the bank and have been living on my mother's gas card for the last two months, the sad reality is that I need this shitty mall job. Gah, it's depressing in a number of ways to find myself, with cause, bemoaning the state of the economy. When did I get old?

But on a much lighter note, I saw a restaurant yesterday called Wang Sushi, and this amused me endlessly for a multitude of reasons.

I'm registered for two classes for next semester, Personality Theory and Anat/Phys. There was a psychology of gender class I really wanted to take, but there was only one section offered, and it was internet and had only 20 seats, and was taken before I got there. I'm hoping that they decide to open another section, or someone drops and I can sneak in and poach the seat. If not, I'll wait until they post the professor's information and beg. I don't need it by any means, I just think it would be an incredibly interesting class to take.

I also have a list of schools within about 500 miles of here that offer a PsyD program, and I need to spend some time looking into them so I can narrow down which ones I most want to apply to. Then the summer will be spent on prepping for and taking the GREs. I'm nervous as all get-out, but I'm really excited too. I still have no real idea what I want to do with this degree, if I think counseling would be good for me (and me for it), or if there's some other direction I'd like to take it, but that's what the program is for- exposing myself (*childish snickering*) to all manner of possibilities and seeing where my talents and interests lie. I love being a student more than anything else, and the opportunity to indulge in learning and put off joining the real workforce for another six years or so with legitimate reason is enough to make me near giddy with glee, if I leave off worrying about passing the GREs and getting into school and actually making it through all five-odd years of the program for long enough to feel the gleeness of it all. Which, I'm working on, with a fair amount of success. It's nice to have a direction, even if it's still a fairly vague one.

I hope you all are doing well. I really like you guys. ♥

For, oh, months at least, if not longer, every day I woke up I felt...wrong. Sleep didn't make a difference, whether I got two hours or ten, when I opened my eyes, I felt foggy. Dissociative. A weight on my chest from the (thank you Rocky Horror for giving me the words) feeling of unnameable dread. And it would take me hours to fight it off, if I could get rid of it at all. I would do whatever I needed to do- read for school, shower, make food, go to class, but all of it like I was moving through a heavy mist while standing outside of myself, never quite able to believe it was real. This on top of the panic attacks, the anhedonia, the uncontrollable crying, I could keep going here but it would take too long. -_- Long story short- I have not been having a good time of it lately. I haven't been for as long as I can remember, really, but it's been getting successively worse. Thanks to my abnormal psych class, I had the realization that schools offer free counseling services for students, so I went and started seeing one. After a few particularly painful sessions, I finally conceded that temporary medication might not be such a horrible idea, something to just even me out enough that I could start making real cognitive behavioral gains.

Of course, now that I'm working, I don't have time to see her anymore. *headdesk*

But I did finally go to the doctor on Monday, and I talked to him about all my symptoms, which are classic indications of a serotonin deficiency, just like the kind that runs in my family. (Oh, genetics, my continuing bane.) I knew that already, though I've always maintained (and still do really) that it's not the same as, say, having low thyroid levels. Because I have 0 control over my thyroid, but I have the ability to control my emotions at least somewhat. I just need to break my bad habits and learn to restructure the way I think. But I'm willing, at this point, to admit that I may need some chemical help in that department. So he gave me a prescription for 10mg of Paxil (with the addition that we'd probably have to raise it to 20), tossed in one for my increasingly unpleasant skin problems, told me to go get blood work done (which was horrible), and sent me on my way. I picked up the pills from the pharmacy, came home, and proceeded to have a mild panic attack over the four pages of side-effects and warnings. *SIGH* But I took one anyway.

I woke up this morning, grumbled at the time, pawed for my Abnormal Psych text, opened the curtains to let some light in, and started reading.

And then stopped.

Because it hit me like a fucking brick wall that I felt normal.

I've felt normal all day.

I had pretty much forgotten what feeling normal felt like.

I didn't expect this shit to kick in so fast. And it's possible that it's at least partially placebo effect (which wouldn't be a bad thing anyway), though I'm not entirely sure that's the case because I wasn't at all thinking about it, it took me totally by surprise.

I still want this to be a temporary thing, 6 months tops, before I strike back out on my own, hopefully better prepared cognitively to deal with my messed up body chemistry. There's no way I'm going to concede to being medicated for the rest of my life. But for a little while at least, I'm gonna roll with it. It's a marvelous reprieve. When someone asks me how I am, I can say, "Good," and actually mean it. Which is a tiny, simple thing, but a goddamn miracle when you haven't been able to do it in so long.

Movie meme stolen from fangirl1981

( If you've seen more than 85 movies, you have no life. )

Total: 120. And I have seen many, many more movies that are not on this list. I'm betting I'm well into the thousands. But then, I knew I had no life. X3

So, I drove two and a half hours into Pennsylvania and I didn't die. It was the first time I ever drove out of state, and the farthest by a good hour I've ever driven before. And I made it to Philly from there, and drove around the city, and didn't die, and even made it home in one piece despite not having real directions. Driving down route 70 at 3 am is creepy as fuck, especially when it's misting rain really hard, so the air around you is thick but there are no real drops falling. It's a straight, dark road through the woods, no lights, no other cars at that time of night, so it's just black behind you and black in front of you. Once I got into Manchester I got pulled over for speeding. XP 71 in a 55. The officer was really nice though, he asked where I was coming from and if I was going home, if I had any points on my license and I told him no, I've never been pulled over before. (This is a half-truth, I did get pulled over once about four or so years ago, but I consider it entrapment because it was late, there were no other cars on the road, and the only reason I was speeding is because the car behind me (I had no idea it was a cop) was riding my ass and it was freaking me out, so I sped up to put some distance between us, and he ended up letting me go with a warning.) But he let me go without giving me a ticket, nice man that he was, and I hope wonderful things happen to him in the future.

The only reason I came home at all is because my job told me I was "on call" tomorrow, and that they'd have absolutely no way of knowing if they would need me until they "figured out what kind of day it's gonna be". I'm not a medical professional, for fuck's sake- I work at Lane Bryant at the goddamn mall. Whoever heard of retail people being on call? From 1 to 4, even. So they'll call me at 11 and look in their crystal ball to see if they think they're gonna need me. I could've crashed at Doug's and shot back out if they did need me, but I would've been late, and as shitty a job as it is, it's still slightly better than nothing. I think I am gonna listen to Jackie though and start applying to some temp agencies as well, cause she's making $11 an hour as a greeter for Verizon, and I'm stuck at minimum wage in a hell-hole.

I'm so wired and so exhausted and it's been such a crazy fucking up and down week, I wanna just go fall into bed but I don't know if I'll be able to sleep.

I need a few days with my good sense. (If only I had some good sense.)

I'd probably hate it.

I'm a drama queen. XD I get stressed easily, and this often manifests itself with me making vague little emo posts here on my journal as an outlet. If anything actually serious were to happen, I'd either not post at all, or give details. I absolutely love you all for being so sweet and concerned and wonderful, it really makes me feel a lot better. But please, for the love of the gods, don't worry about me. X3 I'm fine, just a big dork. <3 You guys, however, are the greatest. :D

My life is a dark pit of darkness. Somebody pass the black eyeliner and the velvet-bound poetry book.

Taken from grown_fairytale

One little compliment can make you feel amazing. So give me a compliment--anything in the entire world, even that my nose is exceptionally well-formed. Then, put this in your journal. And once you get some warm-fuzzy comments, put that entry in a memory or tag and when you're feeling down, just go to that entry and it will remind you of how great you really are.

To stop those monsters one two three!
Here's a fresh new way that's trouble-free!
It's got Paul Anka's guaranteeeeee!
(Guarantee void in Tennessee.)

Just don't look!
Just don't look!








Everything I need to know, I learned from watching The Simpsons. X3


ETA: So I start my crappy mall job today, and they won't let me wear my lip piercing. Which is really bullshit, because the rules allow nose studs only, but there's a girl who works there who has a nose stud and a Monroe and they don't make her take the Monroe out. And she wore jeans even though you're not supposed to. But whatever. So I got a clear retainer to put in while I work so it won't close up on me. I just put it in now, since I leave in 45 minutes and I wanted to allow time just in case it got tricky.

Man, is it obvious. It probably doesn't help that the angle I was pierced at was a weird high one so it doesn't sit right, but now instead of a cute green horseshoe ring in my lip, there's a weird clear stud that, because it's clear, looks like it has a black center cause you can see the hole through it and sits funny under my lip. *sigh* I'm really, really hoping they let it go, because if they say that's not good enough and I have to let it close, I'm going to cry. A lot. ;_;

kitsunesan: Oh god if I don't have sex soon I'm going to die.

jmie: If I could find you someone to love and ... (insert verb with) I would. :\

jmie: Some non-diseased wonderful soul.

Okay, I really wasn't going to post these because they're not very flattering, but what the hell. There is one more, but it's never going to see the light of day. XD

( Click! )

I have never wanted to fuck Jon Stewart as badly as I do right now. And that's saying a lot.

Most of you have probably seen this already on rahmbamarama, but I felt the need to re-post it here, just for anyone who hasn't seen it yet, and because I found it extremely cathartic.

Really? Really? That's how this is going to be? I just... I. There are no... Fuck.

Philly people on my flist- What's the state of your state?

AAAAAAAAAAAAAA
HHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!









*deeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep breath*









AAAAAAAAAAAAAA
HHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!









*pant pant pant*







OMFG YOU GUYS!








*spaz*









I kissed Stephen motherfucking Colbert!











*ten more minutes of screaming*












Okay so, we got to the cocktail thingie, and it was all mingling and shit, and we tried to be nice but we realized finally that if we wanted to actually meet him we were gonna have to elbow our way up, so anais_rhys, who is quite possibly the only reason I am still even remotely sane right now, helped me work my way through the crowd, only it turned into, as she put it, a bad sketch show, where EVERY TIME we got up close, he would turn around and walk the other way. There was one point where he literally shook hands with the people immediately on either side of me, then did an about-face. So then he went into the corner into an alcove to grab a drink and a bite to eat, and there were all these staff people waiting to get a picture with him, and we just hung around there. (Oh, my camera totally died, but we met this really nice couple who took some pictures for us, didn't get the kiss unfortunately, but they're gonna email them to us later.) The pictures finish and he turns around and I'm like, okay, this is now or never, so I walk up with this horrifying manic grin plastered on my face and he makes eye contact and says hi and me being me I just start babbling like an idiot, like I do. I vaguely remember vehemently insisting that I was his biggest fan in the whole wide world (yes, thank you, I do feel really dumb about that), and I think that was one of the things we got a picture of because I look like a victim of the Joker toxin with my fucking crazy-ass wide-eyed smile and he's making the same face like he's either mocking me or fearing for his life. I think that was when he put both hands on my shoulders (probably more to either try and calm me down or to keep me at bay than to be friendly, but whatever, I'll take what I can get) and said it was very lovely to meet me. Which was when I had to throw it all in and I, again babbling, said I had a request and I was really sorry if it was totally inappropriate and feel free to say no but could I maybe give him a kiss on the cheek. Without batting an eyelash the man says, "Okay sure," and leans down.






*20 more minutes of spastic screaming*





Okay, I'm a bad person, I admit it. I took shameful advantage and reached up and put my hand on his left cheek and kissed the right. Honestly, I have no memory of what happened after that, if I said thank you or he said goodbye or what, you'll have to ask Monica and see if she remembers, because it was all fucking white noise after that. I have no idea how, but I managed to hold it all in until really about half an hour ago, when I was turning my car onto my street and I just started screaming. I don't care. That was the highlight of my last 26 years of life, and I don't care if that's sad.





Did I mention that he didn't have gel in his hair? It looked really soft. And I kissed him on the cheek.






I'm going to go....go. Eep. Wow.






*dazed*

Okay, I won't go into details here, but I got woken up at 8 this morning by the person I was supposed to go with canceling on me, and I refuse to go into the city by myself, so I panicked and started contacting everyone I could trying desperately to find someone to go with. The unsung hero of this story is my friend Steve, who although we only hung out outside of work a grand total of 3 times, and I'd only seen him once since I moved back to the US, called out of work to come with me. He is amazing, and I love him. Anyway, now on to the report.

We were first in line, getting there around 3:10. We waited. And waited. And waited. One of the interns was new, it was her first day. It was her, a dude, and this cute little blonde girl who looked a little like Amy Smart, not an intern but a free-lancer from what she said. I chatted with her a lot, she was awesome, and said that I have beautiful eyes. Despite my awesome place in line I ended up in the third row back, next to the center aisle on the right side. Stand-by people got front row seats. Seriously, WTF? Though on the plus side this did mean that I got to chat with the ladies and this other dude who I swear was gay even though he was wearing a wedding ring and I heard him mention his wife. But yeah. Waiting waiting waiting. They were having some technical difficulties and we didn't even get into the studio until about seven. Pete came on and did his thing, though he was a lot funnier tonight than he was the last time I was there. Still douchebaggy, but he actually made me laugh. Knowing now that he's into audience participation stuff, me being the attention whore that I am made something of a spectacle of myself when he said something about it being gay night, since I was wearing my LGBTerrific! shirt. Whatever, all that stuff is boring. The one good thing about where I was sitting, though, was that when Stephen was ready to come out, I could look back over the railing and catch a sneak peek of him psyching himself up for the show, shaking hands with all the crew members and interns (what an awesome fucking job), and finally dashing out to take his laps and leap about the set like he does. Adorable. Then he came up and asked if anyone had any questions to humanize him before they got started, and of course my hand was up before he even finished saying it. He looked right at me and said-

"I saw you first."

And my heart went all a-flutter.

Not- "Over here," or, "Okay, you," or, "Yes?" or, "You first." No.

I. saw. you. first.

Miracle of miracles, though, I neither stuttered nor made a complete idiot out of myself. Instead, I just asked him a question.

And then tried way too hard to use it to forge a connection that really wasn't there, but whatever. So I'm a sad pathetic fangirl, I know this about me and I'm surprisingly okay with it.

My question was really lame though. I'd considered a few and had thrown them out for various reasons, and in my fluttery state fell back on an old stand-by. "If you were a jellybean, what flavor would you be and why." His answer was nearly verbatim the same as the one I always give, which of course I felt the need to tell him excitedly. *headdesk* I'll relate it to you the best that I can. Sadly, we all know my short-term memory is terrible even under normal circumstances, let alone when I'm all a-buzz with this kind of excessive excitement, so the evening is very much a blur. He said, "Buttered popcorn. Because so few people can stomach it. Not because it doesn't taste like buttered popcorn- but because it does. Only without the right texture. I'm really... I'm a chore to stomach." I wanted to say Bitchplz! and tell him that the only thing that's hard to stomach is the three days we have to spend without him, but I was too busy squealing with internal glee that I found something tenuous in common and also that buttered popcorn is my favorite jellybean, and all the requisite jokes about eating that could be made going through my mind, and in the mean time he moved on. XD I can't remember all the questions, there were none that particularly stood out, but I'll relate what I can remember.

Someone asked if he'd seen whatever that Michael Jackson tribute movie is, and he said no, then she asked him if he could moonwalk. He said of course, and attempted to do so, and got stuck on a strip of tape on the floor. Then said as much, moved and tried to do it again, and didn't quite accomplish it and conceded that he really couldn't.

Someone asked which guest he'd most like to have, and they were obviously not a real Colbert fan because we all know the answer to that one don't we ladies and gentlemen? "J.D. Salinger. I'd call him a phony."

When asked what he was going to be for Halloween, first he said, "A loving father," and melted my ovaries. Then he said he dresses up like a vampire every year. He was a vampire before vampires were cool. Everyone else was like, "Werewolves!" and he was like, "Vampires!"

Someone mentioned that they'd been at a thingie (writing class, I can't remember) with Lauren Someone (again, terrible memory) from The Daily Show, and she asked why Stephen was so good at keeping a straight face and Lauren said, "Because he has no soul." He got adorably mock evil and said something like, "I'll tell you what Lauren (Someone) doesn't have."

He was asked if he'd shave his head again if he went to the war zone again, and he said he would, but that he probably wouldn't be going again. Definitely not Iraq, maybe Afghanistan. Then he asked the stage manager if he'd want to go and he said sure, and Stephen said, "No you don't."

Another person asked if he'd be doing another Christmas special (which had been a contender for one of my questions actually), and he said they would be, they'd be remaking last year's special, redoing it shot for shot, using all the same camera angles and editing it together the same way so it would look exactly the same, but it would still be a different show and we should watch it.

That was all I can remember. XP

The makeup girls came out and touched him up, and he teased them same as I wrote about last time, hamming it up for the audience. I feel like he was extra cheerful today, really beaming and smiling, I couldn't look away, not that I ever would have wanted to.

He made a tiny mistake in one of the first segments, so he had to go back and reshoot like 5 seconds of something, and it was something that we remembered we'd laughed and applauded at originally, so when he redid it we (the audience of course) all burst into wild applause and laughter, and when he was done he looked at us all surprised and happy and said, "...Wow, you are the greatest audience ever! Are you all professional actors or something? *conspiratory grin* Is this a casting call? Where's the camera?" SO CUTE. He said something again at the end of the taping, about what an unbelievably great audience we were. I fluttered. A lot.

It was really weird not to see Allison there. I overheard the interns/wranglers (they stand in the middle and add to the laugh track) talking about who I thought was her, missing someone female who interacted really well with Stephen, so I leaned over the rail and asked, "Who, Allison?" and I don't think they had been talking about her but the cool girl said, "Oh we all really miss Allison." Gay?Dude asked if I knew her and I was like, "OMG no, not as a person, but from the show. She was amazing. I actually welled up when he did the tribute to her on her last show." Cool girl immediately commiserated with me and held her hands up to her heart, it was sweet. Allison is well loved, and incredibly missed.

Ooh, I almost forgot about the WRISTSTRONGS! He flung a bunch out at the audience (one came RIGHT NEAR ME but the guy in front of me got it. :P), only two of them in a row snapped and fell on the desk, and he also just failed completely a few other times, it was hilarious. <3

Our guest was really fun, even though I had no idea who he was, and he made Stephen crack up a lot, which is always amazing. Then right before he did the night's send off, he told us to watch on the monitors so we could see the AMAZING special effects. I was like, "Not on your life, pal." But once he-

( Cut for spoilers, in case you haven't seen it yet. )

Finally, though, he had to say goodbye and left back down the aisle. Not reaching out to touch him was the most difficult thing I have ever done in my entire life.

So yeah. That was my second taping, AKA the taping that very nearly wasn't. Oh, there was no pen chewing tonight, which was a little sad, but the pen that he had did light up when he clicked it. His smile, I maintain, is dangerous, with how it cuts right to the heart of you. My love for this man knows no bounds.

Also, on a totally random note, I had the craziest out of the blue fantasy smack me fully formed in the face while I was in the waiting room. Totally G-rated, but just...really weird. I've been under an extreme amount of stress lately and my depression's been getting more and more severe and blah blah blah thanatos and the unconscious desire for death, but I think that had the biggest impact on why this particular JD-style fantasy popped into my head. I've been debating whether or not to post it here, but I've never been one not to divulge every detail whether you want it or not, so I'm just gonna slap it up under a cut, read it or not, at your discretion.

( I really do wonder about me sometimes. )

Anyway, I am exhausted, sore, and on the verge of collapse. And I have a show to do tomorrow even though I destroyed my voice screaming my lungs out for Stephen tonight. So I'm gonna go hop in the shower, maybe read just a bit, and go to bed. See all you lovely people in the morning.

<3

I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT TO ASK STEPHEN TOMORROW! *fret fret fret* I mean, chances are I'm not gonna get picked to ask a question, but I can't go and not raise my hand, that would be MADNESS! And in the off-chance that I do get picked, I have to have something prepared because I am not about to stutter nonsense again, no siree! So I'm leaving here tomorrow at 11:30 in the morning to head up to Cranford to catch a train, but anyone who reads this before then, feel free to leave any suggestions. And look forward to my Report ReporT v2.0 in the evening, whee~! *dances then goes back to fretting*