Class Pet

A couple weeks ago, I licked a gecko on a whim, which reminded me of this story. While I'm still obviously impulsive and often have a hard time focusing, I was textbook ADHD when I was little.

In 4th grade, I was overflowing with distraction and awkwardness. I had a teacher that was... Tolerant of me, but definitely not fond. I had one friend who would run across the playground with me pretending we were power rangers instead of playing soccer like the other normal children. Looking back, she was so kind to look past my social retardation and still play with me. 


In the classroom, we had two guinea pigs as the class pets. We took turns bringing them home for the weekend and taking care of them. The whole class absolutely adored the guinea pigs. There was a male and a female, and the female had recently become pregnant. Every chance we got, we would touch the them, pet them, hold them, baby talk to them, etc. They were like family to us.

On one spectacular show and tell day, a classmate had brought in his iguana.
While show and tell was a normal embarrassment for me, (as the only thing I ever had to show off were my X-Men collectible cards and vegetables that had grown in our garden) an iguana was a sure way to achieve cool kid status. I was jealous, but revered him for having such an exotic pet and great parents for letting him have  it. 


He brought it to the back of the classroom, where each of us could get a chance to pet it if we wanted to. Of course, most girls didn't really want much to do with it, but everyone else (myself included) couldn't pass up the chance to get up close to the lizard. Our teacher told us that we could all pet it if we wanted to, but we mustn't pet it and then touch the guinea pigs under any circumstances without washing our hands first, as the iguana carried Salmonella. 


I was so excited to be able to pet the lizard - I had always really enjoyed watching them in their cages at the pet store, wishing that I could have one. I waited my turn in line as patiently as I could, and was nearly bursting when it came my turn. I ran my hand down it's rough scales, noting that it wasn't slimy or gross at all. I looked at it's claws and tail, studying how different it was from normal pets. It soon came time for my turn to end - I was really happy that I had the chance to spend time with the lizard, but disappointed it was over so fast. 


Feeling the need for more animal companionship, I suddenly remembered that we had the guinea pigs too, so quickly forgotten when the more exotic pet had made an appearance. I quickly went over to their cage and took both out. I sat down with them both in my lap, gently stroking their soft fur and listening to the small, content noises they made. I was proud of myself that I had remembered them, and thought that they must have felt left out. I was being so kind to the poor guinea pigs!  


Show and tell time ended and we went back to our normal class business. The day progressed as any other day, and I went home to tell my parents about the iguana that the boy had brought into class.


The next morning was when the horror was presented to us: Our beloved guinea pigs had died overnight. The teacher said that she wasn't sure why they died, but these things happen, and it would be understandable if we were sad. I was a little upset, the thought that we didn't get much time with them and that the girl guinea pig was pregnant when she died was definitely saddening. We were all so excited about the prospect of baby guinea pigs. 

This is when the awful and shocking truth hit me: I murdered the guinea pigs. I recalled like a vivid nightmare how I  went straight to their cage after petting the lizard without washing my hands. I held them and pet them without realizing the damage I was doing at the time! I spread the disease to them, I killed the two little creatures and the unborn babies! 

My grief and shock quickly turned into paranoid anxiety. Did anyone else know it was me? Did anyone see what I did? What was going to happen to me if anyone did know? I darted my eyes around the classroom, to see if anyone might be looking in my direction.

 I didn't notice anyone, but I slinked down into my seat hoping to become invisible anyway. 

I decided to keep this revelation to myself, hoping that someone else might admit guilt to doing the same thing. No one ever did. I felt little and empty in the giant universe, I was a horrible person. I felt like there was a giant spotlight on me, and that I would surely be ousted as Kristen, the class pet killer. In the days and weeks that followed, the memory of my crime slowly faded and the class recovered from the loss of the pets.I never was able to come to terms with my horrible unintentional act, but I absolutely couldn't bring myself to tell a soul. From that moment on, I was destined to join the ranks of the bad people in the world. I was now a bad person, and no action could ever undo what I had done.

I felt terrible for a long time over the poor, poor guinea pigs. I unknowingly murdered them by being the carrier of a deadly virus. I WAS A BIOLOGICAL WEAPON!!! It's unfortunate that I hadn't remembered this story before I had licked the gecko, or else I might have remembered the repurcussions of Salmonella. 


We never got another class pet. 

NyQuil

I have recently come down with something I have affectionately named mutant zombie death virus. Try as I might to sleep without taking NyQuil, my attempts have been futile. 


NyQuil is great and terrible all at the same time. It's great because 10 to 15 minutes after you have ingested it, you are completely passed out wherever you happened to be at that moment in time (hopefully you prepared for this reaction and were laying in your bed awaiting your coma courtesy of Vicks).


It's terrible because when you do wake up, you have completely no recollection of anything that happened after you took the dose of the green monster. You get up, take your shower, eat your breakfast, brush your teeth - Not because you are actually thinking of getting ready for work, you just know your morning routine and your brain is acting solely out of habit. No, you don't actually come out of the coma until you are a few hours into your workday and realize that you have absolutely no fucking clue to what happened after you took the NyQuil and the present point in time. 


What's also not so great about it is the taste. Vicks has made absolutely no effort in making the substance even remotely palatable. No, it's taste is in fact, absolutely abhorrent and offensive. 


Regardless, after I downed my shot of legal liquid rufies last night, I decided I would open up a notepad and write down all the thoughts that came through my mind. I have not edited the below, not even for grammar. Here it is in it's full glory. Enjoy:










I have a terrible cold, but right now, I am high on Nyquil. I decided that I would document this time and share it with the world... Random thoughts are flowing through my mind... I watched Star Trek: TNG all day today, so some of my thoughts have to do with that. Picard. Yeah. Other things, bit more random, like do butterflies fart? I had this really cool bush at my old house, someone said it was a butterfly bush - it smelled really good and the butterflies were all about it. Like a moth to a flame... Or a butterfly to a butterfly bush. Everything is super slow motion. Once, long ago, in a galaxy far far away - North Carolina - I wanted  to drink, but I was not of age to go get alcohol. Instead, me and my cohort had this great idea to go buy nyquil and drink that instead. She got half the bottle down and then threw up. I managed to get the whole bottle down. I shit you not, I was high for 3 days. I probably should have gone to the hospital. I was so high that I realized that I was really high but I didn't care at all, I was just enjoying watching all the moving things with trailers. Tripping balls, as it were. 
Bad experience. Never do that again. However, every time I take nyquil, it reminds me of that time. Don't do it. 
When you're all out of your mind like this, you really start to think of the meaning of things. Objects seem foreign, words seem misspelled somehow. Toilet. That's a weird word. What if you could magically transform into a pteradactyl? Would you use your powers for good? I think that I might do not so great things, like terrorize my exes. But, only if they didn't know I was the pteradactyl. But, I would probably get shot or something if I was a pteradactyl, so I wouldn't particularly want that power anyway. I don't want to get shot. Although, I'm pretty sure you need to take down a pteradactyl with something more rudamentary, like a spear or maybe even a bow and arrow. Pteradactyls might be immune to gunshots. Actually, I'm pretty sure they are. Magical Pteradactyls. I really like the color green. I went and got a new drivers license the other day... I made sure to do my make-up really nicely, brushed my hair, even practiced my looks in front of the mirror. I was trying to decide if I wanted to do a small, closed-mouth smile, like "this is my identification, I am not happy in this picture, it is only to identify me, it has no memory of fun attached to it." But, I was also thinking about doing the nice smile, so people who looked at my license might know that I am fun to be around and want to get to know me better. I also considered doing maybe even a bit of a funny face, like one raised eyebrow and a  coy smile. Like "yeah, I'm a total badass, I don't care what you think" I'm really not a badass, but sometimes I want people to think I am. Like, make up this completely different identity for myself that's a badass. Yeah, I smoke, I drink, sometimes I climb fences because I want to. I'm the most badass chick you'll ever know. That probably wouldn't really  work out, because I would inevitably show my true colors and somehow make a fool of myself. I really embarrass myself a lot. I would probably fall climbing the fence or rip my pants or something. I woke up on the couch earlier tightly wrapped up in my blanket like a burrito. I'm not quite sure how I got that way, but I was really really hot, so I threw the blanket off of me and tried to turn over but at that point I had woken up from my nap and would not get back to sleep, even though I felt so crappy. At least there's no more fleas biting me. I have seen a couple here and there, but I imagine that they're brought in from outside and die quickly when they snack on the cats which I have sneakily and cleverly put flea treatment on, thereby poisioning their food source. While watching Star Trek today, I realized that I really really want a food replicator. I'm sure I'd have to pay some sort of monthly fee for it, or it would be really expensive outright, but on demand food sounds pretty promising. Feel like mac and cheeze? You got it. Mashed potatoes? Super easy. French fries? Hot and fresh. I would probably get really fat. On the other hand, I would also probably spend a lot of time giggling and saying "Tea. Earl grey. Hot." ... I would use up a lot of it's resources doing that. What would it use? Some crazy sci fi tech resource like palladium or nutronium or poweryourshitonium. I get really loopy on nyquil. Everthing kinda seems a bit surreal, like I'm in a dream. Sounds are like, amplified. I want a burrito. Yeah. With rice. And beans. And sour cream. 

Baywatch Sandals

When I was a child, innumerable things went wrong in my little life to produce the colorful adult personality I have today.

While I will blog about many of these stories in the days and weeks to come, I wanted to share a particularly bad experience I had one summer when I was about 10.

Baywatch was a really hot show during that time, and I absolutely dreamed of becoming a buxom beauty that saved lives and always got the good looking guys.( Mind you, I had red hair, freckles and braces.) So much for that pipe dream.

One day, I was at Walgreens with my dad, and stumbled upon official licensed baywatch sandals. It was meant to be. Wearing those sandals would surely make me into that person I wanted to be.

Soon after acquiring said sandals, my dad and I took a road trip down the Oregon coast with a friend of mine. It started out a great trip - we stopped at Tillamook Cheese Factory, watched how they made the cheese blocks, ate ice cream and bought cow plushies.

The disappointment came when we reached the beach. I was very excited to show off my Baywatch sandals to the world, as while wearing them, of course I was not the geeky-looking kid. I WAS PRETTY.

Of course, my friend had not brought sandals with her and wanted to borrow mine so she could wade in the shore (as if she didn't KNOW how magical the sandals were...). Reluctantly, I let her use them, but on the condition that she was really careful to not lose them.

Inevitably, she lost a sandal. She told me right away and I immediately started frantically searching around for it with my feet and hands. After about 5 minutes, I lost hope, figuring that my poor sandal had been swept out to ol' Davey Jones locker. But then! I felt something bump into my foot! It was my lost sandal!

I quickly snatched it up,but what was in my hand was not my lost sandal.It was a crab.

As soon as I realized, I screamed and threw the crab up in the air.

Watching the whole scene from the beach, my dad was laughing his ass off.

It was time to leave anyway, so we packed up our stuff, my pouty face and all and headed back to the car.

Friend said she was sorry again about the sandal, and I said it was ok, but I secretly hold a grudge to this day.

When we got into the car, I was so distraught about my incomplete pair of baywatch sandals I ended up shutting my bare foot in the door.

Epic Flea Battle

A couple weeks ago, I noticed that my two cats were scratching a bit more than normal.

We were having a hot streak, so I figured that they might have gotten dry skin, since they are indoor/outdoor kitties. On an evening two days later, I noticed that the scratching did not stop. I parted some fur on one of them, and realized that they had fleas.

Crap.

So, I immediately went over to the grocery store to find a solution. I scanned the shelves in the pet section for a way to rid my poor kitties of the biting pests.

These were my options:

Best flea/tick drops: $1,000,000

Other brand flea/tick drops: $40

Flea collars: $8/ea.

The flea collars being the cheapest, I opted for them. I figured that since it was going to be cool again anyway, I would just get them the collars, which would also prevent fleas from jumping on them again from outside.

I marched into the house and ripped open the packaging that contained said collars. I corralled them, and outfitted them with their new flea control devices.

Stupid fleas. I wondered why everyone made such a big deal about them, since you could just buy flea collars and be rid of the buggers. Feeling accomplished, I put on a movie and went to bed.

The collars really did not smell very good, and I could tell the cats hated them. The next couple days, they were doing things that were completely out of the ordinary for them. They were sitting on the counters instead of on the couches, and getting really grouchy when I shooed them off.

One of the nights, I got in bed, and Kitty Boy jumped up after me. He had a nasty look on his face, which was the same look he's had since I put the collars on them. I got settled in anyway, and picked up a book. A minute later, I felt something very warm on my feet - For a split second, I thought he had sat on my feet and it was nice and warm. Then, I felt the wetness. I jumped up, yelling profanities at him - Being a stubborn ass anyway and pissed off about his collar, he just sat on the bed and glared at me. I picked him up and tossed him in the litter box. I gathered up all my bedding and threw it in the wash. Luckily, I had a clean set ready to go, so I put those on and washed my feet.



Two nights after that, as I was going through my nightly routine of watching a movie before bed, I felt a small prick on my arm. I looked down, and it was a flea. That was when it hit me. The flea collars REPEL fleas, meaning that they moved on from the animals and into the house. I looked back up, and saw the fucking Trojan horse sitting on the end of my bed. Kitty. All of a sudden feeling itchy all over, I shooed the cat off my bed, threw all my bedding into the wash again, and went to go take a hot shower.

At least I had a clean set of bedding from the other night, but I did not sleep well that night. I kept feeling itchy and imagining that the nasty little things were crawling all over me.

The next day, I figured that they must not only be in my bed, but probably everywhere else the cats lay in the house. Motherfucker. Humming "Bombs Over Baghdad", I went to the drugstore for a flea fogger. A friend and I had planned on getting a couple drinks together anyway that night, so I put the cats outside and let my insecticidal fury rain down upon the unsuspecting fleas.



I was able to get a sheet and a pillowcase relatively dry in half an hour, and had a small throw blanket in one of my dresser drawers. I put the sheet down, and curled up in a ball under the small blanket. Needless to say, I did not sleep well that night. I was cold and uncomfortable. At least I had killed them, though. They were gone...




The next day, I went shopping for a new TV, as I had received a bonus from work. I got home and called ex-boyfriend to help me put together my TV stand, and get everything hooked up. I re-arranged all my furniture, we got the stand put together and TV hooked up. I was so excited to have a nice new TV, I turned on my XBOX and started up a game so we could see how it looked. I sat on my couch with my controller, completely in awe of the glowing box.

A pinch on my arm ripped me away from my beautiful HD haven. I looked down, and it was a fucking flea. I immediately went into a rage, freaking out and telling ex-boyfriend that I had let off a fogger, and that they should all be DECEASED. That was when he also found a little vampire feasting on his flesh as well. He calmed me down and told me that it won't kill all of them, but that they were pretty much incapacitated, and that I would be seeing less and less of them.

Next night: Couldn't go enjoy my TV, because my living room was infested.

Night after: Feeling forlorn and defeated because there's still fleas. My living room has been taken from me.

Next day: I got my drive back, and went shopping for flea drops. If I couldn't suffocate them, I was going to poison their food supply.

I got to the pet store and these were my options:

Best flea/tick drops: $1,000,000

Comprable to best flea/tick drops: $999,999

Next best flea/tick drops: $40

Bottom of the line flea/tick drops: $15

I went for next best.

I got home, and squeezed the little packages in between the cats shoulder blades, so they couldn't reach it and lick it off.

Of course, my girl cat, (who's a bit of a problem child) fucking immediately turns her head in a 180 and licks some of the stuff off her fur.



She starts drooling uncontrollably, which freaks me out, because I'm afraid she's just offed herself. I spent the rest of the evening anxiously researching the product on the internet, and using search strings such as "Cat licked flea treatment" and "What happens if cat licked XXX brand flea drops?". She ended up being fine.

I knew this method wasn't going to be immediate, so I gave up my TV for another night, but went to my bedroom like Boris and Natasha thinking that they've truly devised the perfect plan to kill moose and squirrel.

Next night: Tested living room area, played video games. Found one flea on me, it seemed lethargic, but still not dead. Of course, this made me feel itchy, so I turned off the TV and retreated to the bedroom.

Night after: Discovered that one couch must have less fleas, because when I sat on the other one, I seemed to have twice as many fleas jumping on me. Sat on "safe-ish" couch, and was content to have only one flea on me every 20 minutes, instead of double that.

Today, I came to the realization after sitting on the "safe-ish" couch for a couple hours playing video games, that I've become used to the fleas. This is not ok.

I went back to the pet store, to look for another option. I found "all-natural" flea spray, which is comprised of a butt-load of natural oils and no pesticides or chemicals. I bought that and brought it home. Kitty Boy is outside, so I decide to try it on problem child first. The back of the bottle made it seem so easy - simply brush the cats' fur the opposite way it lays, ensuring that the spray gets to the skin.

1. Cats don't like having their fur brushed the other way.

2. Cats also don't like getting sprayed.


So, there I was, trying to hold onto her, whilst spraying the magical natural liquid that would dispatch the fleas to the next life. Par for the course, she's being overly dramatic, trying to claw away from me, and foaming at the mouth.



I was able to get what I felt was a sufficient amount on her, and let her go.

Then, I decided to spray down my couches. The bottle states that it rids your house and pet of fleas, while "providing a fresh spice fragrance" ... My house now smells like Christmas took a big shit of scented pine cones everywhere.

I'm really hoping that the combination of vacuuming, flea drops and Christmas spray rids me of these things, but I'm battle-weary.

If anyone has any suggestions, it would be appreciated.

I have not won. I am failing America.

Spiders part II

I have come to the realization that spiders are terrorists.

The night that I posted the original blog about spiders, one decided to greet me in my bathroom. Since then, every bit of string, every dust bunny, every shadow on the wall makes me jump and do a double-take to make sure it's not one of those horribly unnerving creatures.

This goes on for a good 3-4 weeks every time I find an unnaturally large spider in my house. A complete disruption in my normal way of life.

Terrorists.

Anyway, the giant spider in my bathroom is there to assassinate me, I'm sure of it. There was a bomb strapped to it's abdomen... Ok, well, there was no bomb strapped to its' abdomen, but my heart rate had suddenly increased as if there had been.



I'm pretty sure it had been lying it wait while I took my shower. When I had entered the bathroom, nothing had seemed amiss. My shower must have proved a lot shorter than it had anticipated, because when I opened the shower curtain, it ran from the middle of the bathroom floor to behind the toilet.

At first, I had thought it was a mouse.

Then, it dawned on me that a rogue spider faction must be taking its' revenge.

Completely naked and dripping wet, I grabbed my hairspray from the counter and carefully and slowly walked over to the toilet.

This is what greeted me:



This thing was a fucking mutant beast.

I uncapped the hairspray and bravely dispatched the pressurized fluid.

Apparently, one of the benefits of being a mutant beast spider is that you're completely impervious to hairspray.

This is when it charged me.

I swear I levitated. I was suddenly on top of the toilet. At this point, I was thinking that I need to act fast before it climbs the toilet after me. (Can spiders even climb toilets?)
I did a leap across the bathroom and ran into my bedroom.

Being engaged in spider warfare is quite unnerving completely butt-ass naked, so I put on my tennis shoes. I grabbed a boot and crept back into the bathroom.

It was waiting for me. I ran at it with my boot and a war cry (ok, I just charged it in a quick fashion silently) and vigorously smashed it 5-7 times with the heel.

I killed it dead and I won.

Go America.




UPDATE:

Yes, I tried to deliver the spider to its afterlife with hairspray+lighter at first, but I couldn't get the right angle :(

Roadkill

There are many differences between having a motorcycle and having a car as your main source of transportation.

Namely, you're open to the elements and road conditions.

Being exposed to the cold or the rain is annoying, but can be thwarted by wearing proper water-resistant gear or bundling up in a couple layers. Being on a bike on a really hot day just means taking off a couple layers.

Road conditions are a little harder to overcome, however. Potholes, while they can be bad to the tires or suspension on your car, become detrimental to those things as well as your crotch on a motorcycle.

Getting stuck behind a stinky truck in your car is gross, but usually, rolling up the windows and turning off the air takes care
of most of the problem. Getting stuck behind a stinky truck in your motorcycle is like giving the tailpipe a blow job.

Now, all of these things I had expected to encounter whilst riding a motorcycle. I completely understood that I would no longer be enclosed in the protective kennel that is a car. I would get hot, I would get cold, I would get wet and I would sometimes be uncomfortable. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love riding. Feeling the wind against my body while going down a twisty road promotes a wonderful sense of joy and freedom that I had never felt before.

The one thing that I absolutely did not consider was the utter repulsiveness of roadkill.

While roadkill is awful in any case, it is especially offensive on a motorcycle.

Think about driving down the road in a car. You see a dead raccoon on the side of the road and you either think "aww." or "gross." or whatever. It's usually rolled over on its side, a little bloated, and you imagine (well I do) that it had a family or it was just trying to find some food or something and its life was abruptly ended by a Ford Bronco pummeling down the highway road.




Riding past roadkill on the bike is a little different. It's still on the side of the road, a little bloated, and as you're rolling up closer to it, you think "aww." or "gross." or whatever. When you come up on it, it's a whole different story.

You can clearly see that rigor mortis has set in. Its little limbs are stuck like a dead cartoon dog.

It's very bloated.

Blood has coagulated around its mouth, and its tongue is hanging out.

Its sharp yellow teeth are exposed.

Its eyes are bulging and filled with terror and death.





It not only stinks, it is omitting an extremely offensive odor that will fill your helmet. Once it has filled your helmet, you think "WOW, that is fucking disgusting." A moment passes, and all of a sudden, it's like the rankest fart that was ever emitted. It's thick. Not only do you smell it, it is now the horrid wet stale taste filling your mouth.

You speed past, hoping that the wind will blow the stench away. It does, but now you are left with a slight nausea, hoping that you won't paint the inside of your full face helmet with what you had for lunch.

I can't say that I regret riding the bike full time at all, but the horror that is roadkill definitely makes me wish that I had a car sometimes.

Spiders

I hate spiders. A lot.

They creep the shit out of me. Yes, I know I'm like a kagillion times bigger and stronger than them. Doesn't change the fact that they are creepy. I think it's the way they move that really gets to me -- and that when they do make an appearance, it always seems to be inches from my face. They're like gross little ninjas.

Thus, I have compiled a list.

8 ways to kill a spider:

1. Stomp



2. Swat





3. Crush






4. Spray

a. With spider killer
b. With household cleaners
c. With hairspray

5. Starve




6. Set on fire



a. Set on fire in conjuncture with hairspray





7. Point out to cat





8. Eat :(

First Impressions

I have no idea at what point I became so incredibly socially awkward, but if there was a prize for it, I would be champion.

I have this horrible habit of making the worst first impressions. I suppose it might tie in with my inability to actually think before I speak – ADHD springs up in all areas of my life, HOORAY!

Generally, the only times that someone has actually liked me after first meeting me is when I have kept my mouth shut besides saying my name and “Nice to meet you”.

More often then not, however, in trying to win new persons’ affection, I end up saying something weird or offensive. Or both.

For example:

“Hey! Nice to meet you – and whoa ho ho, your friend too!”

“Um, what friend?”

“That giant zit on your neck!! Do you have to pay extra admission for that thing in the movie theatre? I bet you could ride in the carpool lane!”

This is just strange. Why would anyone comment on something like that? I have no idea why I have so much word vomit.

Another example:

“Aaah, so nice to meet you! You’re gay? I had a gay friend in high school. He was one of my best friends… But I don’t talk to him anymore. Do you have a boyfriend? Do people say stereotypical things to you all the time, like ask you if you like shoes?”

Weird and maybe a little offensive.

Other times, in trying to identify with new person, I unconsciously try to adapt to what I know of their culture or end up slightly mirroring their accent.

Not so detrimental when new person is from, say, the Southeast.

Painfully awkward if they’re from Asia.

As I’m talking, the small, sane, rational part of my brain is watching a horror film in slow motion and is trying to stop the damage:

“Noooooooo! Doooonnnn’t ssaaaayyyy aaannnyyythiiinnnng aaaabouuuut hisss smmmmaaallll hhhannnndsss!”

And by that time, this is what’s coming out of my mouth:

“They say men with small hands have small penises!”

About 1 or 2 seconds after I’ve just dropped my nuclear bomb, that small, sane, rational part of my brain catches up with me. At this point, I try to cover up my awkardness by talking in a loud, abnormal voice:

“HA HA HA HA, JUST KIDDING, YOUR ZIT ISN’T THAT BIG”

“I HAVE GAY FRIENDS. MY FRIEND BEN IS REALLY FUNNY.”

“I LOVE YOUR ACCENT. I’VE ALWAYS WANTED TO VISIT ASIA.”

I am a social retard. 90% of people don’t really want to talk to me again after they’ve met me. Another 5% give me another chance, in which, I just may redeem myself.

The other 5% laugh at my misfortunes. I call these people my friends.

Wedding Day

I have a deep and expansive history of rushing into situations and following the irresistible urge to do things based purely on impulse. Looking back, it has rarely ever worked out to my benefit but apparently… I’m not a quitter.

We had decided that Vegas was a great mixture of a vacation and a wedding spot. We didn’t have much money, so we wanted to get the most bang for our buck.

We flew down with another couple and both of our fathers. This was my first time in Vegas - I was mesmerized by the lights, grand hotels, people watching and the hooker cards.

That first night, I won $600 on a slot machine, and I thought that gambling was super awesome and I could see how people could get addicted to it because you get lots of free money and people come by and pat you on the back when the lights and sounds go off, and your friends are really excited and jealous all at the same time.

The next day, I managed to lose $100 within an hour of getting up. Gambling had lost some of its luster, but my naïve thinking was that if I so easily won $600, surely I could win more…?

I ended up gambling away another $200, spent $100 on food, and another $100 on Vegas imprinted crap to bring back to friends and relatives. You would think that there must have been a cash factory in my ass I was spending it so fast.

That evening, the (damn frugal, stupid) ATM would not let me get any more cash out. I reached my daily draw limit. I was feigning like a crack addict for more gambling money. I was completely hypnotized by the lights and sounds of the pretty pretty slot machines, and I was sure that the NEXT ONE, that one with the fake Egyptian music and Cleopatra’s face plastered on it - I was going to WIN MORE!!

Fiancé reluctantly gave me $20, and told me to make it last the rest of the night.

…20 minutes later, I came plodding back to him with my head hung so low you would think someone called me fat and stole my puppy.

The next day was WEDDING DAY!!! I was so excited I could barely contain myself. Today was MY day, and dammit, it was going to be an awesome, amazing, glamorous wedding day in Vegas. We had opted for a late afternoon ceremony at a chapel downtown, kiddy corner from the county courthouse.

It was noon by the time we got up and got dressed, so we hurried downstairs to meet our Dads, who were accompanying us to the courthouse to get the marriage license.

After a 7-minute $25 cab ride, we arrived at the side of the courthouse, where the county clerks’ office was. It was a hot 104 degree day in Las Vegas and magically, the AC was not currently functioning inside. Not to worry. I still had plenty of time to get back to the hotel and take another shower.

Fiancé and I stood in line while Dads waited outside. After what was most likely an eternity spent in the death-filled heat trap, we finally arrived at the window.

The large woman with a floral print top and untrimmed eyebrows -- almost to the epicness of a unibrow – stared at the both of us with dull eyes that looked like a dead fish.

She suddenly smiled and stated that we must be getting married like she was a fucking psychic.

Nevertheless, we completed our paperwork and walked outside to meet our overheated fathers. We had to take the marriage license to the chapel prior to the ceremony, so we set off down the block.

We made it to the chapel and dropped off our license.

Feeling a little out of energy, we decided that lunch would be good.

Seeing the Stratosphere, we figured that we must be only 6-8 blocks from the strip, and that an afternoon walk in the sun would be pleasant.

12 blocks later, we were not any closer to the Stratosphere. It seemed as far away as when we started. I was dripping with sweat, imagining that this is what it must be like for people to be wondering the desert aimlessly, delirious from the heat. I figured that I must be over exaggerating, that I was being dramatic.

After 3 more blocks, I couldn’t stand it anymore. This was my wedding day, I was tired, grouchy and covered with sweat and dust after wandering the backstreets of Vegas for 45 minutes thinking that someone was going to jump out at any moment and cut me.

I convinced the rest of my party to hail down a cab after severely slowing my pace and dramatically panting “Water… Must have water…”

Upon arriving back at the hotel and eating lunch, it was time to start getting ready. My spirit had been uplifted, and I was still determined to have an awesome wedding day. I ran up to the hotel room to take a shower, while Fiancé went to our friends’ room to take a shower there, and hang out with his buddy.

Buddy’s wife had her own hair salon, and was going to do my hair for the wedding, while the two guys went to gamble a couple hotels down the strip. Right as I was getting out of the shower, hair friend called to say she was on her way down. I hurriedly put on a tank top and underwear and stuck my head out the door to wave her down.

I didn’t immediately see her as there was a maid cart in the way… So, I stepped out, and upon seeing her, I waved my hand for her to come down.

This is when the door shut behind me.

I immediately tried to turn and push on the handle as if by some super-cool handle-jiggling trick, I would be able to magically open the door without a key card. Hair friend made it to my end of the hall, and seeing me with my hair dripping wet, and standing there in my underwear, immediately started laughing. Still facing the door, I let out a big sigh and after a moment, did a face-palm with the door… A face-door…

Hair friend was nice enough to call hotel security so we could be let back into my room. It took the guard 15 minutes to get up to my room after the call, and by that time, I was curled up against the door crying and sobbing that I wasn’t going to make it to my wedding and that I was just in my underwear and my hair was wet and and and…

The guard must have thought I was doped-up delirious crack-addict, and refused to let me back into the room.

I would like to say at that point, that I sucked up my pride, told him to fuck off, went down to the front desk and demanded a new key card.

However, I didn’t want to be kicked out of the hotel without any pants on.

I called fiancé on friends cell phone – He was able to make it back to the hotel room in 20 minutes and by that time I had 10 minutes to get ready. After quickly curling my hair, putting on a sundress and flip flops, I ran downstairs to find that the limo to take us to the chapel was about to leave.

Wedding day wasn’t that tragic, and we were able to make it to the chapel.

We got a divorce a year and half later.

The end.

Morning

It’s 10:53, and I’m sitting at work in my grouchy pants.

I’ve had a large cup of coffee and I still hate everything. I hate the computer, I hate my desk, I hate that I will probably be filled with more hate if I have more coffee because I will still be grouchy but jacked up on caffeine.

Like being hyperactive but having to sit and listen to a seminar about conversion rates with bar graphs and stupid shit I don’t care about. I don’t like bar graphs. I don’t like graphs in general.

I hate Facebook, with happy morning people posting stupid little status updates about how the morning is filled with rainbows and love exploding out their butt, and how it was so amazing that their puppy licked their face when it was time to get out of bed and feed him and how they’re glad to be alive. I hate my job, I hate the stapler, I hate that I have “Just Dance” by Lady Gaga stuck in my head, I hate stupid coworkers that ask me how my day is going or how the ride into work was or STUPID FUCKING QUESTIONS. Everything is stupid.

I am not a morning person. Never have been, and probably never will be. When I was little, my two cousins and I would spend the weekends at my grandmas. Saturday morning, they would spring out of bed like hyper little groundhogs at 8:00. They would try to get me up, but even when I was 6, I knew 8 in the morning was too damn early. I would try to sleep in, and they would repeat what I’m sure their parents told them… “It’s not good for you to sleep in. You need to get up, make your bed, go potty and wash your face.”

1. I never washed my face in the morning… Or made my bed for that matter.

2. I might have had to go potty, but I was not ready to face that reality yet.

3. … STFU.

Finally, after trying to take off the blankets, jumping on the bed, tickling me and being generally loud and annoying, I would crawl out of bed. Of course, they had already made their bed, went potty, washed their face and brushed their teeth. WTF kind of kid does all of this in the morning? I certainly did not. I blame my hippy parents. (Ok, I really don’t have hippy parents, but I don’t know what else contributes to hating the morning with a passion and being lazy.)

Grandma had graciously made us pancakes and juice. They would slide into the chairs at the breakfast bar, pick up their forks, and anxiously wait for breakfast to be served to them. Their hunger must have consumed them every morning. I would slog my way from the bedroom, through the hall and into the kitchen. The bar stool could have been 8 stories high – I wasn’t awake enough to even consider how they had gotten up there so quickly. Must have used their happy little morning unicorns to fly up there.

Sneaky.

After climbing to the top of breakfast bar peak, I was presented with the food of the morning and juice. I was not hungry. I should have still been sleeping. I picked up my seemingly 10 lb fork and attempted to shove bits of pancake into my mouth, while feeling deeply sorry for myself. Meanwhile, the princesses of the morning were anxiously digging into breakfast, like they had been starved for days on end.

It’s now 11:54. I have had “time to wake up”, have done some work, and I still think the world is stupid.

I want to be curled up in my wonderful, wonderful bed.

Instead, I am confronted with sitting at my desk, feeling sorry for myself and stewing in my caffeine-stimulated hate-filled black hole.