Attention world

Attention World-I would like to make an announcement and clarify something that I am tired of hearing and experiencing. If you are taking out your issues, your problems and your drama out on me, yet I did not cause said issues, problems or drama do NOT under any circumstances tell me it's not personal. You've just made it personal. You have unnerved "my person" and when I retaliate, bite your head off and make you deal with my issues, problems and drama which you have caused to exist-remember: don't take it personal.

Drowning in the downpour...

Disclaimer: This is a long post with lots of depressing/sad information. There is no sarcasm, wit, or sillyness. I am sorry for this but that's just not where I am right now.

I haven't wanted to talk about all of this because it's a lot of downers (and that's really not what my blog is about) and it's a little too personal to put out there, except that I have no other options. On Sunday morning I got a call from my mom that I was dreading. As soon as I saw her name pop up I knew why she was calling and burst into tears. My grandma was on a ventilator in the hospital and passed away that morning. She was fine a week ago and even took the grandkids and great-grandkids into the city for a day trip. She was a amazing woman with more courage, love, compassion and strength than anyone else I've known. What's even more is that she didn't have to be my grandma, she was my god-father's wife's mother. (follow that train?) When I was a little girl my dad's mother said some very hateful things to me and essentially banished me from her life (all are her issues that I worked out in years of therapy but that is a WHOLE different topic that I am totally over). When my grandma found out about what happened she pulled me aside and said, "I will always love you. I will always be your grandma. Don't let anyone ever try to tell you differently." She didn't have to be my grandparent, but chose that role for her and her husband. She attended every grandparent celebration at school, and treated me just like all the other grandkids, punishing my god-brothers' cousin who said I wasn't family. When my god-father was killed in an accident she kept the family together and running. When I got sick several years ago she sat with my parents in the hospital waiting room after everyone else left. She was an amazing woman and today is her funeral. I am 525 miles away. It's not that I don't want to be there, logistically I simply can't. I can't afford a plane ticket, I wouldn't have been able to drive there in time, and it just was not possible to go. Needless to say I am a wreck this week.

Add to that that Girlfriend and I are in a rough place right now. We're both struggling with things right now (different issues for each of us) and it's really hard right now. We've been together for almost a year and she's having some financial problems that I've recently learned a lot more about. Her dad is going to pay off her debt and she is going to pay him interest free which is awesome. He wants her to move back in with him so he can help her out. Now before I go further, her dad and I are cordial. We're polite to each other and can keep a conversation going for a little bit, but please don't leave us to ourselves for more than thirty minutes as awkward silence will be inevitable. With that said, let's be real-he is an overbearing, I'm-always-right, do-it-my-way-or-you'll-never-hear-the-end-of-it man who has more than once thought she was "being gay to get back at him." He even lied to her grandparents about Thanksgiving and said she was with other relatives and not me (they all know she's gay) but that is a totally different issue too. She lived with him for a little while and hated every moment of it because he controlled everything and she always felt like she was doing something wrong and had no freedom. I being me, tried to fix this and I offered her an alternative: move in with me. Guess what she picked? Here's a hint, it's not living with me. I'm trying to be understanding (there is a lot more to it than her just saying no-in a nutshell her partner of six years left one morning for work and never came back, leaving her a "Dear John" letter on the kitchen counter so she has fears of moving in) but it's really hard. I feel like I need to be careful about what I say to her right now because I don't want to make her feel guilty or bad about choosing to move back in with her dad, which is putting me in a hard spot. Clearly I can't talk to her about it right now and my best friend (former roommate) is away visiting her and her boyfriend's family for the holidays.

Top it all off with the fact that I am having some health problems that I'm now starting to get really worried about. Way back in October I got the flu, remember that? Well at the same time as I got the flu my period started and was really really bad for a couple of hours then was gone. Since it stopped abruptly I went to the doctor because that was not normal. They told me that I was fine and it was probably just because of the flu and not to worry. So I didn't. It's essentially January-I still have not had my period again yet I get all the symptoms and pain. I didn't go back to the doctor because I just kept assuming that it would come and I would get back on my schedule. It's going on almost four months now and I'm going to go to a different doctor to hopefully get some answers.

So if we put it all together this makes me one gigantic mess of a person who feels like crap all around. To make it worse I can't really talk to anyone about it because my family is obviously a mess, my best friend is away and Girlfriend is dealing with her own issues. B is tired of listening to me but has been very loving while I've been crying on the couch since Sunday. If you made it this far, thank you for listening. I promise to get back to my sarcastic, witty, silly self as soon a possible but right now I'm just drowning in the downpour...

Hot Blubbering Mess

I am a hot blubbering mess y'all. This week is not starting out well and I just need to vent it out a little. On Sunday my roommate (and best friend) moved out and into her own place. I thought I was ready. I thought I could handle it. I thought I was a big girl. I thought wrong.

I knew I couldn't handle being here when it happened, so I spent the whole weekend at Girlfriend's place and came back later Sunday evening. I came home to a much emptier home that echoed when I walked, was WAY too quiet and I just lost it in a mess of tears. I know that I don't like to be alone, and now here I am sitting on the couch by myself blogging while my dog is happily sleeping on the floor. To make things worse, my mom called to see how I was and since I know my mom, I told her I was fine. If I had been honest and told her that I had already gone through half a box of tissues she would have called my former roommate (that's weird to type) who would have come to make sure I was okay. I can't tell her that I'm a mess because she wanted to move out. She wanted her own place. She wanted to be independent. I did not want any of these things. Then I went to watch TV only to find out that the TV I've had in storage for the last seven years no longer works. No tv, no roommate, no girlfriend, silent house, oh I lost it crying again. Just around this time Girlfriend texted me to make sure I was okay and I told her I was, then later I left her a message that I wasn't. She offered to come but by the time she would have gotten here I was hoping to be asleep to be able to be up and ready for work on time. As sweet as she was being on the phone, I could tell she was a little weirded out. She thinks our friendship/relationship is not normal and here I was sobbing about how I'm all alone and the house is echoing and it's scary. Her response: You're by yourself right now, but you're not alone. I realized that as much as I wanted to talk it out to her, I just couldn't. She already feels like she has to compete with my former roommate for a specific place in my heart and I wasn't making it better. I told her I was okay, that I loved her and that I was going to bed. I fell asleep in a soggy pillow and a puppy licking my tears.

Then today started awful. My car was making terrible rattling sounds and shaking on the way to work. I brought it to the shop after work and it's still there. It was $89 to do the computer diagnostic test which showed nothing. Then it was $200 to take the front of it off and figure out that the power steering pump is broken..that's another $400 in parts and labor once it comes in. The poor man who had to tell me that it was going to cost $200 to take the front of my car off just stood there as I burst into tears explaining that I'm a teacher, it's the end of the month and I have no money. They then sent this poor man back to tell me I was going to have to pay for a rental car because mine was not safe to drive. I finally got myself back together and stopped crying...that is until I got to the rental car place. At the dealership they told me it was going to be $30 a day for a car. At the rental car place it was almost $70. I burst into hysterical sobbing because I don't have enough money in my bank account to pay for the rental car for a week, let alone the rental car and fixing my car. The man standing on the other side of the counter just kept looking around like, "I swear this isn't my fault that she's crying!" They changed the price to $30 which is the body shop price for a rental.

Now I'm off to have "Friend time" which we have done every Monday for the last five years and act like I'm okay. That I'm not sporadically bursting into uncontrollable sobs, that I'm happy she's in her own place and that I don't miss having her around. I know it's been one day and I know it will get better. It's just very very very hard to see that right now when everything feels like it's happening at once and spiraling out of control.

Thank you for listening to my sob story. I promise to be back to my sarcastic and witty self soon.

I need advice ASAP!

Ok readers, my roommate is moving out this weekend and her parents are coming to help her move. I will not be here and they will be staying in my room. I have no problem with this, but now I'm stuck with an awkward decision: to de-gay or not de-gay the pictures in my room. I have some pictures sitting on the dressers/nightstand of Girlfriend and me on trips to various places. Part of me wants to leave them up because well, it's my room, my house, my Gay-ass life. The other part of me thinks I should put them in a drawer because she comes from a very (I mean VERY) conservative family and while they would NEVER EVER say anything, I think it might make them uncomfortable. I'm not one to usually shy away from the uncomfortable, but these are her parents who I love dearly and I want them to feel comfortable in my home. I need some advice here and I need it ASAP as they will be here tomorrow night. What do you think I should do?!?!

Changes

Well it has finally happened. My roommate is moving out towards the end of September and the house in is shambles as she is in the process of packing what is going with her, what is going to Goodwill and what is going in the trash. She and I had been talking about this for a while, and she was considering buying a house but has decided to move to a one bedroom apartment in a complex about 10 minutes away. No, we didn't have a fight or anything but after seven years (don't judge us) it just seems like time. Even though I knew it was coming it's still sad.

Ok, I'm going to level with you-I'm super super sad...about the washer and dryer. They belong to her and will be leaving along with the microwave, all the glasses in the house, and random other things. It's all the the little things that we have each bought over the last seven years that have created an admittedly awkward dynamic (Girlfriend thinks it's weird but whatever) that has worked for us but now we are dividing things as if we are going through some strange and genuinely amicable divorce. Honestly the hardest part really is the washer and dryer...do you know how expensive those things are?!?!

Ugh.

*Disclaimer-this post is very depressing. If you want to skip to the bottom where I make up for it with two happy/fun stories I will not be offended.*

It's been a couple of emotional weeks over here which caused me to run away from blogging for a little while in order to take care of some things. 1) Girlfriend's childhood dog (we shall call her Feisty Ankle Biter) has had a large mass in her abdomen for about 7 months. They had drained it several times, but Feisty Ankle Biter was turning 15 years old, and clearly suffering. Girlfriend's mom made the decision to put her down on Wednesday. I went with them and seriously, it was one of the saddest things I've seen. Everyone was waiting on the vet to get there (who normally doesn't work on that day) and Feisty Ankle Biter was not doing well. It should come as no shock to you that I am a rock. A rock people. A. rock. I was not a rock. The vet got there about 5 minutes after Feisty Ankle Biter passed, and all four of us sat there and cried. Everyone is doing better, but it was a rough time. 2) My grandpa who I love (and am SHOCKINGLY just like) had to have a double hip replacement. The doctors were waiting on doing the surgery because he had an infection that wouldn't clear up, leading them to believe that it might be bone cancer. He is currently undergoing treatment for stomach cancer and about 10 years ago battled colon cancer...twice. Thankfully the tests came back that it wasn't bone cancer, but in the process of replacing both his hips they broke his leg. Yes, you read correctly. They broke the man's leg. Which SOMEHOW they didn't notice until after they were looking at x-rays of his completed surgery, thus sending him back to the OR to fix their f*ck up. When I was taking with him on the phone he said, "Those G*d damned doctors broke my G*d damn leg and are making ME pay for it. What kind of bullsh*t is this!?!?" I love my grandpa, he makes me laugh. 3) Grandpa was doing better and had moved to a rehabilitation center when his blood pressure went through the roof and wouldn't come down. The doctors finally got it down a little but everyone is shocked that he didn't stroke out. I'm not. The man is made of chemicals and is essentially radioactive after so many treatments after all these years, compounded by the fact that he drove an 18 wheeler delivering hazardous chemicals to different companies for all of his working days. He's going to outlive us all and bitch the entire time. I love it :-) SOOO, hopefully this helps explain where I've been and why I haven't posted in a little while.

Ugh, it's too depressing to end a post this way...now for two happy/fun things!

1) Girlfriend and I were driving and talking about who knows what when the conversation made its way to her talking about how she's "knocking at thirty's door"...here is a paraphrase of what followed:

Me: You have two years.

Girlfriend: 1 year, 8 months.

Me: Whatever. Are you really freaked out about turning thirty or are you just messing around? (if she was seriously freaked I wasn't going to pick at it)

Girlfriend: Nah, it doesn't bother me but you should know something.

Me: Ok.

Girlfriend: My biological clock is ticking. Seriously.

Me: How fast is it ticking? Did this just start?

Girlfriend: No, it's been ticking but it's gotten loud and now I can hear it.

Me: [insert awkward silence here] Um, baby....I love you but there is nothing that I can do. You're the scientist. I'm just saying...

She makes me laugh. I'm not sure what she wants me to do about her biological clock ticking. I think she just likes making awkward and mildly uncomfortable situations when I have nowhere to go (a.k.a. in a car) and hide.

2) We are heading to Charlotte Pride tomorrow with some of our friends which should lend itself to some fun stories and maybe (gasp!) pictures. Down side: it's supposed to be in the 90s. I'm from Jersey...I don't do 90s...I do air conditioning. If you are at Charlotte Pride tomorrow and see a puddle of cargo shorts sluggishly moving, it's me-come by and say hi!

Haircut Issues (again)

As those of you who have been avid readers already know, I have had some haircut drama in the past. It's that time for a haircut again and I am reaching out to you readers for some suggestions. Currently my hair is shoulder-length with long layers. It's too f*cking hot to blow dry and flat iron it every day, too unruly to let it just air dry, which means that on most days it is up in a messy ponytail/bun. I need some homo (and homo-friendly) help. Suggestions, links, opinions would be greatly appreciated in the comment section before I snap and shave it all off!!!