#I'm on PTO this week and my only plans are getting my house to be less of a disaster

[walkawaytall]

pretty much all comments on my fics are precious and I love them, but the ones that make me go, "Oh...you noticed." are the best ones I think.

[thespaceace124]

I got broken up with recently and I'm feeling messy so we're going to compare how I drove 8 hours to visit my girlfriend in college 6 times in the span we were dating (including her final return trip where all of their shit was in my car) and she went to another country and all she brought me was a jar of fucking sand. And not like, a nice jar of sand. It's a sample tube that has the name of the country written on the top. Is it possible for this to be a nice and thoughtful gift? Yes. However here are some circumstances. (picture at the end)

I was super sick the week they went. So, some extra consideration would have been nice

They got herself a very nice bag and 1 o r 2 other items

She waited 2 months to even tell me they got me a gift.

Between the trip and when I received the gift, I got into a major car accident that totaled my car and has left emotional scars I am still dealing with

I do not collect sand, or other items like sand. On occasion I will pick up a Cool Rock™

I take pride in getting gifts that are thoughtful and relevant to a person's interests. For their college graduation I got them an American girl doll (one that she had been expressing interest in) but because I also wanted to make sure the gift was good, I also found some Taylor Swift merch and bought it in 2 colors to cover my bases. This is all in addition to the cost of me traveling 8 HOURS by myself a month and a half after getting into my car accident and the emotional work of DRIVING FOR 8 FUCKING HOURS BY MYSELF with car trauma.

But I got a jar of sand. Not to mention this was right before my birthday but I knew that this was going to be a weekend about her so I put my feelings aside and graciously accepted this jar of sand. And I'm regretting it because I... A jar of sand?

This is on top of the fact that the previous summer, they had decided to stay up at the college. Fine, cool, stay there enjoy the vibes do you. I had to BEG her to visit me, one time. Beg! Because they couldn't drive and "didn't want to inconvenience anyone" and then after I said 'please plan for and get yourself down here for one week at some point during the entire summer' she tried to guilt me into changing the dates (the ones they decided) after I had gotten my pto approved and then was mad when I wasn't willing to do that, then shamed me for being upset that during I this week I had to BEG for that they were all moody about not spending enough time with her dad.

Like... Ok, you want to see your family cool I get that, but would you have come down if I hadn't begged you to?

Idk. I'm processing a lot of things and realizing that for a long time I was prioritizing them but she wasn't prioritizing me and how much of that I excused with "oh theyre in college" and "oh they don't make the same kind of money that I do" and how when we were together when I was visiting it was awesome but how when they moved back something was different.

I dont want to make this seem like I only care about gifts but they kinda highlight a bigger issue. Some other imbalances:

Outside of the college travel, I was the primary driver. She lives 20 minutes across town and so we either had to spend time at her house OR I had to make a 40 minute round trip to get us to my place. Their mom gave me gas money once or twice but this was not a regular occurrence and she wasn't giving me any.

All of the push for intimacy was from me because they asked for more. I was trying the whole time but it was NEVER reciprocal. I would try to cuddle, put my arm around them, on valentines day I really tried to dress sexy for her (a huge thing for me is that I am asexual and have 0 interest in sex) and after being asked for more I gave her a foot massage because I thought it was an easy, non-sexual way to get used to more touching. They couldn't even undress in front of me.

I was told that the way I text tends to shut down conversation so I varied it up. The biggest complaint is that I wouldn't ask questions in return like if they asked how I was, I was really bad about asking how she was. So I made a conscious effort to start texting first, to make sure I was returning questions and to make sure I was checking in throughout the day. Sending work anecdotes, pictures of random stuff, videos about things they were interested in and... Nothing. I didn't get the same consideration in return.

So again, the jar of sand is emblematic of the fact that I got very little consideration, particularly from March to September of this year.

I'm... Tired. I was really trying. This was only my second serious relationship and my first physical one (my previous long term relationship was online with someone I am still friends with) and I'm breaking a lot of things down I think. It also doesn't help that after processing the breakup for a week I sent a message saying essentially 'hey, just recognizing that you've been shitty isn't enough and until you can apologize and support me how I supported you we won't be talking" and I still haven't received an apology is immensely frustrating especially after she said "I want to stay friends because you are my best friend" like mm. Girly you haven't texted me since the end of September. You didn't respond to me when I told you I made it home. (after I drove us to dinner, my house then back to her house) and you want to stay friends? Where is the effort from you? Hmm? The only time you said "oh I want to take you to dinner" is the night you broke up with me!

So that's it, that's the post.

[thedarkqueenmara-blog]

I don't really have anywhere to talk about this, so I'm just gonna treat this like my journal for a minute.

I work in a dental office, and getting vacation time is generally a pain in the ass because you have to find people to cover your schedule, but we all work generally the same schedules, so it's hard to get a week at a time. My dentist is getting married this month, and is taking 2 weeks off for her honeymoon. This means my schedule is empty for 2 weeks and I have a free pass to take vacation.

I have a week of vacation at the end of this month for the week of my husband's birthday. I began trying to plan a vacation with him late last year when I realized I had the availability to do so without finding coverage. He was out of work for the winter, and started working again in March of this year. I kept reminding him that I had scheduled my vacation for the week of his birthday, and that he would need to let work know in a timely manner to ensure he had some of the week off. He didn't want to take a full week unpaid, as he doesn't have PTO, which I was fine with, but I wanted at least a few days for a family vacation this summer.

My in-laws have a shore house, which we can stay at for free, as long as we let them know what weekend we're going. I have not been quiet about wanting to go down for part of the week of hubby's birthday, and every time I heard him talking to his mom, it was "maybe we'll go down to the shore" or "we're thinking about it, but I don't think I'll get to go". I kept telling him that with our financial position, the shore house was the cheapest vacation we could afford, and I wanted to go on vacation that week as a family.

He never let work know he wanted to take a long weekend trip. He never told his family we were going. He found out his brother had booked the weekend we had available to go down, and just told me to forget about a vacation this year, maybe next year. He told me that because he's not consistently working, he doesn't deserve to take unpaid time off, and I should just do a staycation and get over it.

I feel so unheard. I feel like he doesn't consider the fact that I practically begged for months for him to cement plans for vacation. I feel like he doesn't value my feelings or my wants.

And the thing that breaks my heart is I hate the fucking beach. I planned my vacation completely with him in mind, because I know that's his happy place. Because I knew it was financially the only option he would agree to. Because I know he doesn't like long trips, and the shore is only a two hour drive away. If I had known he was just going to tell me he wasn't going to go on vacation with me, I would have tried to plan a trip I would have enjoyed more. Now it just feels like it's all too late, and I'm so disappointed.

Anyway, thanks if you read through all that whining. I just needed to vent before I exploded, and I don't have therapy again until Wednesday.

[celestialpotat0]

july begins

When i last wrote in here, i was sad having had to leave the tahoe area knowing that it might possibly be my last trip into the mountains this summer. last chance to experience beautiful wilderness in all of summer's glory. and i ended my reflection with how i needed to turn to appreciating small, everyday occurrences.

so in the spirit of cherishing the ordinary life on the peninsula, away from my friends and family in socal, away from the frequent fun adventures of my 20s, and not being able to travel bc of working more than 40hrs a week lol, wanted to jot down favorite moments from last few weeks:

thinh's fourth of july bbq party at her house on 7/3. woke up the next day after the party with a headache from not drinking enough water the night before, i fail. it's been a cold summer, like why is it freezing outside at night in july. but i enjoyed meeting nice people, karaokeing was a blast, and am really happy to have such a wonderful person as a friend. we work at different hospitals but can relate in many ways. i've always considered summer to be full of events that break up the monotony of the rest of the year, and i'm happy this felt like that. instead of the new normal adulting summer when im no longer graduating anything or celebrating the end of one chapter and the beginning of the next

on 7/4 we went to a college campus on a hill and were able to see fireworks from foster city, redwood city, shoreline amphitheater, and more

dinner and drinks with lauren, doris, and chloe. it hasnt been easy leaving behind my friends in socal and moving to a new area; during the first part of my time here, there were occasions when i cried feeling lonely. ive really made an effort to use dance as a means to feel connected to others. you cant just expect friends to happen, you have to put in the work to build a community of support. i'm grateful to have found some ladies who share a love of dance. i like that we all come from different occupations and grew up in different parts of the world but can bond over participating in this art.

swam outdoors on a hot day in a 25-meter pool. free of electronics for an hour, just focused on each breath and motion to propel me through the water

moved into a new apartment. the novelty in and of itself is enough to make me happy, which says questionable things about me such as to what extent have i fallen victim to consumerism. at my previous apartment i never fully unpacked. i had plastic bags of stuff strewn haphazardly in bathroom cabinets. i kept prioritizing other things in my life over organizing my bathroom, closet, and pantry. but now everything in the bathroom is exactly where i want it to be. my small victory is so satisfying: unpacked and organized the bathroom completely. im not going to allow myself to travel until i fully organize the apartment this time.

I feel like it's the beginning of a new phase in the bay area. im getting more accustomed to work, and my commute is short now. i have a good amount of PTO planned. now have a list of activities that have been discussed to do with friends and the only problem is lack of free time--and lack of time is a better problem to have than lack of people who are willing to do them with you. im currently on a hiatus from scheduled dance, and for the time being im dancing only on a drop-in basis, which has actually been a huge sigh of relief; it's been good for my mental health to have less commitments on my plate. now my days off are actually days off where i can choose to dance if i want. while it's extremely rewarding to dance, not having any true days off (bc i would always have dance scheduled and mandatory on my days off from work) was detrimental and making me burnt out. in this new phase, i want to expect to travel less and say no more often and reserve time on my days off to be truly off.

[certainempatheticturkeymuffin]

I'm one of the fortunate ones in this whole situation. My mom had a friend that had power when ours went out. We lived in Kentucky for a few years so my mom knew to keep the faucets dripping. When the friend's water went out, our power came back on. My mom stocks up on water bottles religiously because she doesn't like the taste of the tap water here. She gave the friend some water and we went back home. Our pipes are fine, our car is fine, and now all we have to deal with is the Boil Order and our water coming on and going off again.

The first day (Sunday) wasn't too bad. My mom had planned ahead and all was good. She saw the forecast and refused to let me outside to touch the snow. She figured we'd be snowed in for a while and bought a bunch of food so we wouldn't have to leave. The car was completely iced over and it was so cool. I hadn't seen so much snow since I lived in Kentucky, and I was about four or five at the time. My mom had wanted to do some last minute errands to get some more water and an ice scraper. We broke ice off the windows and mirrors, and we got to play in the snow. I found great joy in punching the ice to see it crack, though it was super cool when it just slid off in a large sheet. The doors were completely frozen shut, so we had to let the car heat up a bit. Then we did all except the left back window (because no one sits there) and left. We bought a glass tile remover and used that because they don't sell ice scrapers here, and we went back home, car mostly free of ice. That night, the power flickered, but we figured it would be fine in the morning.

It wasn't.

The next day (Monday) was pretty bad. The power didn't come on, and it was freezing. We all ate a freezing bowl of cereal and took a look at the situation. We had two flashlights, and my mom knew she wouldn't be able to handle the darkness. The only problem was....our fireplace is wood burning. So, she had us bundle up and break the ice off the car (again) and use a dust pan (from a broom) to shovel a path to the car so we wouldn't track any in the house. The snow was about half an inch deeper than it was on Sunday. It was much colder on Monday than it was on Sunday too. My fingers couldn't handle the cold, and my sister and I rotating to shovel the path was horribly inefficient, so we only got about half way before my mom told us to stop because we were going too slow. Initially, I had wanted to scrape ice on the windows, but, since we don't have gloves, my hands were having a hard time gripping the scraper, eventually I begged to switch places with my mom because I hadn't even managed to pluck a single piece of ice off after a minute or so of fumbling. It didn't help. My hands were red and freezing and I'd spent only five minutes outside. I couldn't handle the dust pan very well either, and I wanted to break down and cry in frustration. I rotated with my sister, running hot water over my hands so I could feel them every time we did so. My mom saw how slow I was going and asked if I wanted to freeze, my response was "I'm going this slow because I am freezing." She had finished surprisingly quickly and we all got into the car, giving up on making a path. The roads were more dangerous than they were on Sunday, simply because there was more snow. Eventually, we managed to make it to Walmart. They had no logs. No cold food. No flashlights. So my mom bought about twelve candles. Walmart's gas station was closed, so we went to the Sam's gas station and got stuck. We struggled for about five minutes before a family came over and helped push us out of the snow. My mom was irritated that they wouldn't let her pump gas at the pump she was already at, ignoring the fact that the snow was too deep in that area to even move, and I was the only one that said thank you, but at least we were out. When we got home, my mom placed two candles in each bathroom and placed the rest around the living room/kitchen/dining room area (yes they are all one single room). We used the flames to warm our hands, and I passed out for a good four and a half hours, only waking up because I was overheating in my hoodie. I woke up at about six and my mom asked me to start the car so we could have somewhere warm to sit and eat. Thirty-ish minutes later we were in the car, warm, munching on chips and lunch meat. We were having issues with the internet, so entertainment was hard to come by and it was extremely boring, but at least we were warm. We stayed in the car from seven to eleven and went to sleep cold. The internet was very choppy, so all i have are these tweets, all made on the same day, even if two of them didn't post until the next day. I don't have tweets from any other days, except today, sorry.

The next day (Tuesday) was bad. We were freezing, and my mom had booked us a hotel, knowing that we couldn't stay without heat for too long, especially considering the fact that we didn't have wood and candles could only supply so much heat. We packed up immediately after waking up, leaving around noon to go to the hotel, even though check in wasn't until three. My dad was nagging us, trying to get us to make the two hour drive to San Antonio to stay with him, which was definitely a "No" considering the state of the roads. We told him we were staying at a hotel, I told him which one, and he called them for us. They were overbooked. My mom was not pleased, and, after double checking, tried to find a solution that wouldn't force her to drive two hours to my dad's apartment. All the hotels in the nearest cities were booked. So my mom called her friends and luckily one of them had power and water, and two extra rooms, and she lived five minutes away from the hotel parking lot (though the actual trip was about double that because of the snow). We all decided to stay in one room, because it kept that one room warmer and we didn't want to impose. We went back to the apartment to get a cot, because Miss Sabina had an air mattress, and we got all settled in. The room had carpets, but the pets weren't allowed in, so we were fine. I have a severe allergy to most animals that aren't reptiles or amphibians, fur and feathers are real bad, and Miss Sabina had two cats and a dog. It was fine though. Maybe half an hour after settling in, my mom got a call, the hotel had a booking canceled and offered us the room. We didn't want to go through the trouble of getting everything back in the car, so we declined it. My mom set up her computer to do school work (even though she works from home, the set up is so convoluted that she'd rather use her PTO than have to try taking it apart and setting it up again), and we were all set. The cage thing we put the cot on was really uncomfortable, so I ended up putting the thin cot on the floor, because even though my hips jutting into the ground was uncomfortable, being able to feel all the metal supports of the other thing was way worse. We went to sleep, warm.

The next day (Wednesday), my mom got an email that the apartment complex had shut off the water, but all was fine in Miss Sabina's house. I did learn that we only own one salt truck and only the bridges were salted. We don't own any plows, and the people on the budget committee(i think that's what it's called) don't want to allocate any money to plows or salt trucks because this storm was apparently just a fluke. Miss Sabina works with the city btw.

The next day (Thursday), Miss Sabina's power started flickering, but it was fine. I was apparently on my period, I didn't realize it because I always get a brownish discharge after it ends and theoughout most of the year, even though it's usually in lesser amounts and usually doesn't have drops of red. I definitely noticed when my pants and underwear were stained a dark red the morning of Thursday. It was inconvenient. That would've put me on my period for a straight eleven days. It was annoying.

The next day (Friday), the water was shut off in Miss Sabina's house. We checked our apartment, because finally the roads weren't completely covered in snow, and the water was still off, but the power was back. Twelfth day on my period.

Today (Saturday), we packed up and left Miss Sabina's house. Our water comes and goes, but my mom managed to buy a pack of bottled water that'll last us a while if I control how much water I drink (I usually drink a lot). I took advantage of the water being back and managed to finally take a poo, because one does not poop in another persons house, not when you're me, anyway. My stomach feels better now, and maybe I'll actually manage to eat something more than half a serving. I'm glad the heat's back, even if the boil order is going to be annoying, and the lack of water, but we're doing fine compared to many other people. My dad's fine, my brother and grandparents haven't called, and my best friend lives in Nevada and is unaffected. Thirteenth day on my period.

I'm so happy I was this lucky, but I'm definitely not getting caught dead in this situation again. When I graduate, I don't care if the northern states are better prepared for this, I'm going to hoard everything to make sure I'm not blindsided by this again. And maybe I'll invest in mittens.

I would like to say "fuck you" to both Ted Cruz and my period, because I was so happy to have a lighter period than usual, and it went and fucked up by extending to two weeks (at least) instead of lasting the normal miserably heavy four days.