Tonight is our last night in South Bend.

The past two days have been a complete mess of packing and stuffing and cleaning and AAAAA.

I am exhausted and useless and tomorrow I have to drive 550+ miles, over 9 hours, to Pennsylvania. WHEE.

I wanted to stay something...but I don't know what. And I'm too tired to think.

It's good, though. I can't wait to get home, and I love the people I've met and things I've experienced and learned and...everything.

Bah. Hopefully I'll be able to speak better when I'm home and less hurried and...yeah.

Love.

BusyBusyBusy (with a dose of ARGH)

WELL.

I double-booked last-big-hang-out plans with both Aurelie and the rest of Apt 131 for tomorrow. I had forgotten that the apartment had planned a Lord of the Rings marathon (BJ has never seen, we finally own all three, we love them, etc etc) and told Aurelie we could go to Lake Michigan. Figured out my big mistake at the beginning of the week and began the mad scramble to fix it.

Tuesday, That One said that even better than trading his Thursday for my Saturday, he would just takemy Saturday, since he needed the hours. He just needed to talk to his friend who he'd made kinda-sorta-plans with, but he'd call the store that night to let me know!

...yeah, he never called back. Texting him on Wednesday got no response. Fortunately, Diana agreed to trade, so I still got Saturday off! Yay! All I had to do was work her 7:30 shift today!

...UGH.

[o] I closed last night. Left about quarter to 11 (not the best close, whole different ball of WTH).
[o] My sleep was craptastic. I don't think I got a whole hour the entire night. Just awful.
[o] Got up at 6:30, worked 7:30 to 1:30, was a moron the entire time due to sleep deprivation and unhappy stomach not allowing me much caffeine intake.
[o] Get home, get in the shower, have just enough time to get lunch at 933...and not really do anything else.
[o] On the way to Goshen to meet Aurelie, get a text from That One's girlfriend (who I'm friends with) relaying a message from him: he can totally take my Saturday shift! ...yeah, about that. Gave up on that after zero response. Go ask Diana if she wants the shift that is now hers, thanks for letting me know I worked today for nothing, JERKFACE. (I was nicer than that to his girlfriend, obviously).
[o] Hang out with Aurelie at the Goshen Starbucks, good times, good times...hey, why are these ladies setting up candles? Oh, they're hosting a Party Lites event, okay...some of their friends are here, okay...some more friends...now kids....now we're surrounded by a large crowd of loud and excited women getting way too happy about candles and completely ruining our attempts to study/write. FUN.
[o] Get home, open the door to get hit in the face with the smell of cat urine. Horace went in today to get fixed, Ryan picked him up, he pissed in the box on the way home. While he's cleaned himself off (mostly) (he's also adorably drugged), both he and the carrier still reek, making the living area completely inhospitable. So much for watching TV.

Honestly, the only person I'm annoyed with is That One, for obvious reasons. My co-workers today were nice, it was awesome to spend some more time with Aurelie, and I'm hella looking forward to tomorrow's Lord of the Rings-a-thon.

...but MAN. TODAY. BE DONE NOW.

The next week (and then some):
[o] Friday: Lord of the Rings-a-thon, hanging out/baking/drinking with Aurelie and friends in Goshen in the evening, sleeping over to make Saturday an easier start
[o] Saturday: Lake Michigan! WOO! Plus packing in the evening.
[o] Sunday: Last day at Ireland, off at 5:30, may try for another night out with co-workers, but definitely lots of packing after work.
[o] Monday: All-day-come-over-any-time-mostly-933-people party as we continue packing & cleaning.
[o] Tuesday: Scramble to finish shoving everything into the trailer and call to have it picked up that night so we don't have to wait around for it on Wednesday. Bed will be completely packed, so we're spending the night at the hotel next to 933.
[o] Wednesday: Grab breakfast at 933, say good-bye, start driving. End night in Pennsylvania.
[o] Thursday: Continue driving, arrive in Connecticut.
[o] Friday-Sunday: Say hi to everyone, visit my new store, figure out flooring and possibly new furniture, get as settled as we can without 99% of our stuff.
[o] Monday: Trailer arrives, start unpacking.

Meanwhile, my Etsy store is on vacation since (a) we're moving, (b) the listings expired yesterday, and (c) I haven't decided what to list (or re-list) and plan on polling my fanbase (ha) for ideas.

Finally, on a ridiculously sappy note, today is what only I am calling our pre-anniversary. One year from today is Ryan's and my wedding date. :)

Now, back to trying to unkink the stress from my back...

It Hath Begun!

Saturday was Ryan's last day at Target. He had considered calling out, then decided against it...and good thing, too, since almost everyone else working that night called out instead! He ended up being a cart attendant for most of the night.

Sunday was spent recovering.

Yesterday, after I left for work at 5:30, he went to work. By the time I got home, about half of our stuff was packed--that is, most of the bookshelf and our bedroom closet. Most of what's left basically has to wait until a couple days before we actually move--our desks, our clothing, etc.

We have a route mapped out (Ryan knows the details, I just know it goes through Pennsylvania), we have our hotels booked (for the night before (since we'll  have packed our mattress) and the halfway point), we've bought our driving supplies (snacks, drinks, wet wipes, sunscreen). Soon we'll start picking which CDs we'll want handy in the car, and planning which clothes and belongings we'll want for the almost-week before our trailer arrives.

Today I'm ripping physical CDs into my computer, moving important things from PC to thumbdrive to Mac to iPad to Google whatever and on and on, and changing the address for my magazines and credit cards. Whee!

I'm trying not to think about all the things I wish I could have done that there just isn't time for, or all the money issues (delays while paychecks are mailed, insurance coming out of a half-paycheck, tolls, etc), the fact that my most of my last week I have to work with That One...just getting things done and enjoying the time I have left with my friends here.

....let's pretend that's working, shall we?

Whups...

I've been bad again with the updates...sorry about that.

I've also been bad with calling anybody, making or keeping plans to hang out with people, and basically anything that doesn't involve sticking my head in the sand.

I am...so stressed out. A lot of it is from guilt, from the aforementioned lack of calls or socializing. I also end up feeling guilty whenever money is tight, despite the fact that I'm not running out spending it on stupid things, or sitting back while Ryan does, or anything like that.

-We move in two weeks in a day. We were originally leaving on Tuesday, the 27th, but the U-Pack trailer won't be picked up until Wednesday, and we sure as hell aren't driving away with our stuff still sitting in the Park Jefferson parking lot. Oh, and our stuff probably won't get there until Monday the 3rd, almost a week later. We COULD guarantee its delivery by Friday, but that's $600 extra. EFF THAT.
-Ryan's last day at Target is either Thursday, Friday, or Saturday, depending on if he gets one or both of the last two covered. It's going to be a relief for both of us, that place has not been kind to him in the least, but it's also means I'll be the only paycheck from then until he gets a job in Connecticut.
-Ry plans on spending his time between quitting and moving packing, since I'm still working up until the 25th. Then he'll be doing most of the loading when the trailer arrives on the 23rd since, again, I'm working that weekend. He's fine with this, and I have full confidence in him, but I still feel guilty that he'll be doing the majority of the labor for this.
-I have two weeks before I leave Indiana, not to visit for who knows how long. I feel this intense pressure to get in as much awesome hanging out as possible before then, especially with Aurelie, my best friend who will most likely be going to Africa in January, and our roommates, who we've become very close to. However, as I mentioned, stress makes me withdraw, which is not conducive to socializing. Ergh.
-Money is tight. Tighttighttight. Our parents are helping, which we can't thank them for enough, but it all has to go to the move itself, so until then we're sucking it in and holding our breath. Fun.
-Work is stressful and frustrating. That One keeps getting written up but not fired, we had our health & sanitation inspection and didn't do very well, I keep hoping to throw together one last hang out with the co-workers I like but scheduling it sucks, etc etc. On the other hand, I have a hard time thinking about anything other than work when I'm there, so I'm not piling stress on top of stress?
-I have to get together a party for 933, it's a requirement, but I've put off planning until the last minute, and it's not going well. The going plan right now is the Monday before we leave, since we'll both be free, the apartment will be mostly empty with lots of room for people, it might even be cleaned up, and it can be an all-day drop-in-a-thon, for openers or closers or whatevers. Not sure if it's going to work out, though. Argh.

On a more positive note, Ryan and I have been talking about other future stuff, when we have to not talk about the move. We've been working on schematics for a future dream house, which has also been a great way to talk about the future and what we want our lives to be like, both in grand schemes and daily details. There's wedding talk, of course, but it still doesn't feel concrete to me, and won't until we're settled in Connecticut and have a way to figure out budget and everything that follows.

Finally, we've been talking about diet and exercise. I've mentioned in past entries that Ryan has been putting together a plan for when we back, starting with seeing a doctor and a nutritionist, moving on to cleanses and major diet changes and exercise routines, and ending with a happy, healthy lifestyle. We had a long talk about it yesterday, I found out more of his plans, and we're getting pretty excited about it.

...well, that's the update for now. I'm about to print off something, then go to work a bit early to see if anything less than three hours isn't enough to get some writing done.

Oh yeah, the print--I made my first sale! Not on Etsy, but when a co-worker followed a link from Facebook to Tumblr and asked about a photo that she loved that wasn't in the shop. Funnily enough, it's the same print that Kitty and Alex picked out for their wedding present. Meanwhile, Fibonacci's Flower has been growing more and more popular. I plan on putting it in the shop when I reopen it after the move. That's another whole post in itself!

Off I go!

Ten years ago, the particular day's schedule at E. O Smith High School had students in a double-A block. I had two English classes in a row. We were on break between them when a friend of mine came up and said they just watched a plane fly into a building. He was in U.S. History at the time, so I thought he was talking about footage from some old war. I went back to English class, and the television was on, and I saw that it had just happened. We watched the footage of the first plane flying into the first tower, and the aftermath, and wondered what made the pilot make such a huge mistake. Then we turned off the television and went back to class. It wasn't until we next changed classes that we learned that another plane had hit.

I went to Human Behavior, and we sat and watched the news. I was allowed to call my mother from the classroom phone, to make sure our family members who live outside D.C. were okay. I watched classmates hold each other, eyes filled with years, staring at the screen, and I still couldn't really understand what was happening. I just knew it was...awful.

I don't remember why I didn't see the first tower fall, but I'll never forget watching the second tower go down. It was...breathtaking. Like being in a vacuum. It was inconceivable. It lasted forever. It was soundless, through the television, when it should have been deafening. It was unreal.

I remember school being let out, most of my group of friends automatically, mindlessly congregating to the alcove we all hung around after school, until Michael came up and said "What are you doing? Get on your busses! Go home!" I remember that all the Mansfield students were wearing flag pins that day, although I can't remember why. I remember listening to the radio when I got home, every show turned into a call-in to talk about what had happened, peoples' thoughts and theories.

I remember that tower falling for what seemed like forever.

I hate that it's become the "cool thing" to not care about what happened on 2001, an anti-sheep-mentality movement to differ oneself from those who bark about the tragedy and wave around American flags without really understanding either one.

I know that worse things have happened. I know that more people have died in this country in previous wars, that "we" have killed people in the Middle East in numbers that make 9/11 pale in comparison, that that majority of those killed were innocent civilians slaughtered in the name of answering for the tragedy.

I also know that my generation--and even the one before it--had never seen such devastation on our home soil in its lifetime. We had heard stories and watched movies and read lessons about Pearl Harbor, the closest comparison I can think of, but it was history. Something that had happened before our time. Something we couldn't fully comprehend.

Then, in the middle of a school day, we were given our own piece of history.

I don't care about the numbers thrown at me if I dare to show any sadness over the tragedy. I mean, of course I care, but it doesn't change how I feel about that day. A hydrogen bomb may be bigger than an atomic bomb, but does that make the destruction from an A-bomb any less horrific?

I don't use that day as a reason to blindly follow certain political parties or causes who shook their fists the best or made the most touching speeches. I don't condone the actions supposedly based on this tragedy that led to more mindless deaths. The sadness in my heart isn't because it's fashionable right now. My pride in the heroes of my country and my fellow human beings--not just the firefighters and policemen who did their duty, but the civilians in the stairwells and on Flight 93 who sacrificed to try and save others--didn't come to me after I watched some television special.

I'm proud because they were brave. I'm sad because it's terrible.

To make a long story short: innocent people died for no good damned reason. Thousands died, millions were devastated and terrified, so many families were forever torn into irreparable pieces. I refuse to be made to feel stupid for mourning that loss, for feeling anger toward the terrorists who flew the plane, for feeling sadness for the families forever affected more deeply than I can ever comprehend.

Save your numbers, save your attempts to belittle a horrible event by painting it with political facts and figures, liberal or conservative or whatever, save your apathy--in fact, fuck your apathy. I don't give a damn about politics, I don't give a damn about comparing this event to others that came before or after, I don't give a damn about trends or agendas or anydamnedthing besides human life.

Innocent lives were lost. And they deserve to be remembered. They deserve to be mourned.

Autumn is here.

Put your head outside, and take a deep, big breath.

Do you smell that?
The leaves are changing.

I know it's been September for less than a week, I know it was suffocatingly hot and humid just three days ago, I know everything is still green....but I can still smell it.

I smell the leaves changing. I smell the new paper--notebooks, textbooks, test books, work books, the new pens and pencils and erasers to go with them. I smell the resolutions that this year will be different, this year will be the one where every test is studied for and every paper is aced. I smell hot spiced apple cider, I smell ripe pumpkins, I smell hay bales and melting caramel. I smell changing leaves.

I smell Fall.

Fall will always be my favorite time of year. Spring is second favorite, the fresh breezes and sunshine after Winter make me feel awakened and alive, makes me want to run through the woods, lie in the grass and stare up at the clouds. Summer bakes and warms me down to my bones and brings out my inner sun-worshipper. Winter is crisp, it's cozy, it invites you to come inside by the fire and cuddle up with your loved ones.

But Fall...Like Spring, Fall is a transitional season, a few short months between one extreme and another. Spring may be waking up, but Fall is coming home. It feels simultaneously eternal and momentary, the blue skies and fluffy clouds going on forever as the leaves change and the air starts feeling crisp and snow-laden. It's not too hot or too cold, but it's better than not-too-anything, it's Just Right, it's perfect.

I drove to 933 today with the windows down, wearing corduroys and a thick, long-sleeved hoodie, and it was perfect.

Fall is relief from the oven that is Summer, the deep, calm breath before the chill of Winter. Fall is hope, it's preparation, it's new chances, it's purposeful transition, it's nostalgia, it's an eternal moment.

It's perfect.

I love fall. That's all for now. :)

Oh Yeah.

I forgot the "best" part of yesterday.

So, I was exhausted, right? And all I wanted to do after work was go home, eat dinner, watch Project Runway, and go to sleep.

I got a text from Ryan an hour before I got off saying there was smoke in the kitchen, but he couldn't find the source. Everything was off and cold, there was no heat or fire anywhere, no smoke anywhere else in the house. Just the kitchen.

I got home, saw it for myself, and called Park Jefferson. They said they'd call maintenance and hung up. Then they called back 5 minutes later to say they were sending out the Fire Department.

Some back story: Park Jefferson is famous for the near-monthly visits from the Fire Department. To the point where they always send out a bunch of engines, and when I say where I live, people respond with "Oh, the place with the fires."

It was finally our turn.

They came, sirens blaring. Looked around the apartment, found nothing. Banged on doors. Were about to go into the hallway crawlspace when someone downstairs answered their door: they had fallen asleep with the oven on. I'm still unclear whether we only got the smoke after they woke up and were airing out, or they only woke up when the firemen banged on their doors, but Ryan's going with the story that means we saved lives. Okay.

They aired out the downstairs apartment, our kitchen still smells like burnt toast, we had drive-thru for dinner, and are now in the annals of Park Jefferson's Fire Department History. The End.

This Past Week.

Saturday, I was supposed to work 12 to 6. I got a call at 8 that morning asking if I could come in at 10 and work until 6:30 for a full eight-hour shift, so someone could go home early. I did.

Sunday, I was supposed to work 12 to 6. I got a call, as I was driving to work, asking if I could come in at 2 instead. "Two until when?" "Close." Someone had called out. I covered.

Monday was a normal eight-hour shift.

Tuesday, BJ, Sam and I left the house at 7 in the morning, picked up our friend Raequan at 7:30, grabbed some breakfast, and headed to Chicago.

Oh my goodness, Chicago.

We went to the Brookfield Zoo first, and were there for four or five hours. We saw almost everything, and I took a million pictures of almost everything. The three best things, that had HUGE impacts on me, were the three things we paid extra for: the dolphin show, petting (de-barbed) stingrays, and the butterfly house. I was exhausted and in pain by the time we left, but I was also excited the entire time, like little-kid excited, it was AWESOME. The dolphin show almost made me cry from pure kid joy, the stingrays were so adorable and wonderful and calming, the butterfly house was a photographic dream, MAN...it was fantastic.

Next was The Chicago Diner, a vegan/vegetarian restaurant recommended to Rae by a co-worker. I want to make this co-worker cookies for suggesting it, because OH. MY. GOD. Some of the best food I have ever had. The milkshake was to die for. The atmosphere was fun and cozy. The waitress was amazing--she helped explain the menu without being pretentious or condescending, answered our questions about the food and Chicago, and even drew us a map of cool places to go within walking distance. The whole experience was...awesome.

Next was Navy Pier, which was basically just shops and restaurants that we enjoyed toodling around in. After that was Mitsuwa Marketplace, a Japanese store BJ and Sam are fond of visiting, and Woodfield Mall.

We didn't get home until past one in the morning, although that was mostly the fault of the GPS on my phone, which is, in a word, moronic. Honestly, the best parts of the trip were outside the car, because being in the car meant following directions from a phone who didn't understand the real world we were currently driving in.

But yeah. That was Tuesday, in Chicago.

Wednesday was Aurelie's birthday. The original plan had been to go to Lake Michigan, chill for most of the day, then go back to Goshen for dinner and drinking. I met up with Aurelie and Allie at Quincy's, gave her her presents, had breakfast, hung out for a bit. She changed her mind about the lake--as was her birthday girl prerogative--and decided on a movie instead.

I was fading quickly at this point, having only gotten about five hours of sleep after 14 hours in Chicago after five hours of sleep, and realized that it was either go to the movies and hang out, or go to dinner and the bar later. I chose the latter, Aurelie said it was fine, and I went home and crashed for a few hours. Sadly, crashing didn't mean sleep so much as not-moving-or-thinking, so it was only half as restful as hoped, but still.

I picked Aurelie up and took her to Buffalo Wild Wings, where a bunch of people came out for her birthday dinner. After that was The Constant Spring, which was full of a different birthday party, all of which were drunk and doing karaoke. Beatles's karaoke. While drunk. I was displeased.

Still, it was good people, good time, Aurelie had a blast. Mission accomplished. :)

Still didn't get a whole lot of sleep that night, either.

Yesterday, Thursday, was an eight-hour pre-closing shift. I started out fairly upbeat and able, went downhill to exhausted and hungry, ate, and became just plain exhausted. I was basically pathetic and whiny from four o'clock on to the end of the night.

Today, I don't go in until 4:30, and I close. I got a text from the Morning Shift asking if I could come in at 2. I might fall have if I didn't have a To Do list that literally can't be done the rest of the weekend.

And then it's four more days of my six-day work week after that. Then three days off. Whee!

There, now we're all caught up. Now if I could just get a couple of hours of time where I'm awake and don't have shit to do so I can call all my parents and not be a terrible daughter...