Easily one of the 10 most awesome experiences in my lifetime. Carmax is greatgreatgreat! The no-haggle prices are awesome, I definitely recommend shopping there for any used cars to anyone.

I bought a 2006 Ford Five Hundred. It's dark blue, and it sits so much higher than my '93 celica did. It has a v6 engine, and it even has a fancy keypad in case I lock my keys inside. The brakes went out on my old car, so I'm selling it to a guy for $150. He rebuilds old cars and sells them, so I said it's cool as long as he sends me a picture once it's all refurbished.

But yay! New car! This is what it looks like, except the color is different:



I'll post some actual pictures of mine tomorrow. I got home after sunset so I didn't have a chance to do that today. My car payment is 300/mo over 5 years, which isn't bad IMO, even though the interest rate I got sucked balls. At least I was able to get financed :)

I feel so grown up! yay! It's fabulous to actually want to drive my car now, as opposed to dreading it. It feels AWESOME to drive, really has some kick behind the engine and moves like a dream!

unf so happeh today

Current Mood: ecstatic!

Hard Candy is wow! An awesome movie, where the protagonist and the antagonist appear to switch back and forth until the truth comes out at the end. Except I had a dream last night that I was 14 years old and breaking up a guy's marriage for sex (he looked strangely like the guy in Hard Candy). I'm sure it was related since I watched the movie right before bedtime.

I'm playing hooky today. It's been a while since I posted but I'm trying to make positive changes in my life and I am feeling better. Playing less WoW, since I left the addicting server I used to be on. Trying to get in some informal exercise through walking. I'm reading more than I have since I first went to college. College killed my desire for pleasure reading but I think it's coming back, now.

My job is going well enough. I get lots of perfect QA scores and my call times are below average, lower is better so I'm happy about that. They are outsourcing 40% of our fax production to EXL in India around August 1st, and they may need to make layoffs at that time. I hope I get through it, but my training group is the newest and last hired, first fired may hold true. I'm trying to excel at what I do so that, if layoffs are required, I'm hoping they'll get rid of someone who is terrible with QA and fax production and has been there a few years longer than me (there are many people who fit this category, who I am outperforming). Since our performance is strictly measured numerically via QA scores and call times, it's easy to see there are some lazy ass suckers who've been there for 5 or more years. If you aren't doing the job perfectly after that much experience with it, you never will be (this job is not hard, people; snap out of it).

It's truly a spring day, sunny with a cool breeze, not obnoxiously hot. It would be a sin to work on a day like today! Plus I have plenty of PTO so it will be well-used this way.

I've gone on a couple largely unsuccessful dates, and I've stopped looking for guys online in the hope that maybe I'll trip over a good one in real life. We'll see :) for now I'm contenting myself with being single.

Also making changes in my diet, which is a lot easier with peapod.com's very reasonably-priced grocery delivery. I love you, peapod!

I woke up at 2 am to go to the bathroom. Everything seemed peachy keen until I went back to lay down in bed. All of a sudden this weird pain in my lower left back spiked out the fuck from nowhere and spiraled around to my abdomen. It kept getting worse and worse and I was getting sweaty and freaked out (thought it was appendicitis or something, the pain was that acute) so I called 911. They sent an ambulance. The pain got so bad on the way to the hospital that I threw up and was crying... yeah. It was the worst pain I've ever experienced (and one I imagine is trumped only by childbirth, third degree burns, or being shivved in a dark alleyway).

They did a urinalysis in the ER (I threw up again, mostly dry heaves, while waiting for it to come back) and an x-ray... and the doctor found microscopic blood in my urine (x-ray was inconclusive, doc offered a cat scan but that's about 5 grand I'd rather save unless it's truly necessary). I've had a history of kidney related problems (hospitalized for a week when I was 9, and I went to the ER for a kidney infection almost 2 years ago). So they gave me a little strainer to pee through for the next couple days and 3 prescriptions (I only filled one of them, the one for generic vicodin, since I'm broke until Friday) and released me around 5. Thank god I have awesome insurance, I will probably have to pay something for the whole debacle ($500 blue cross deductible) but not all of it. And I'm feeling much better now.

My eyes look funny. I popped a shitload of blood vessels around them from all the puking (which was purely pain related, I wasn't nauseous because of the kidney stone, it just hurt so fuckin much that I threw up, heh). I called off work for the day and I might stay home tomorrow depending on how long it takes to pass. So right now things are feeling OK. I got some fuzzy posters from my mom and I'm staying here for the day since there are fuzzy cats to keep me company and a bed I can sleep in.

Oh I never did mention on here that I moved out of my mom's place a week ago, I'm living with a roomie in Batavia and it's going fairly well. My shit is still all over the place but I have a comfortable inflatable bed and I built a computer desk by myself (yay!). I haven't been drinking enough water, as usual, and I'm sure that contributed to the problem.

A while ago I was reading up on kidney stones out of curiosity, and there was some quote from a famous military guy (Caesar or Napoleon or someone) basically saying there is no worse pain than a kidney stone. It sucks. I figuratively would have preferred death. At least until they got the IV painkillers going.

DRINK WATER SO THIS NEVER HAPPENS TO YOU!

Current Mood: sick

I got to kill a boss (the 2nd one) in mount hyjal (anetheron), I was first on healing done and 4th on overhealing out of 7 healers, and most of them died during the fight. but not me! it was pretty great.

I had the most fucked up dream that I just need to get on paper, I feel like I should apologize to my sister irl because of what happened in it. hah. something about I was hiding sex toys from my parents in the house I grew up in, which my entire extended family was living in at the same time so it wasn't easy. then I went to work at a restaurant like shakey's or something shitty that I HATED working at, but I was 10 minutes late and this russian sounding lady told me not to do it again or I'd get shitcanned. then I found out that I had 3 babies 3 weeks ago but somehow didn't know it, and this chick was holding onto the babies for me. she gave them to me at work, and they were all about 6 inches tall (like little skipper barbie dolls). then my sister looked at them when I got sent home early from work the same day, and now somehow I had 4 baby dolls instead of 3, and said 2 of them were just dolls and only 2 of them were real people. and maybe this girl named Beth would have my other real baby. I said, wtf would Beth want with kids? she hates babies and isn't even married. then I got out this huge leather belt and started beating my sister with it. then my alarm clock thankfully woke me up.

I don't get it either, I'm not mad at my sister, I don't like dolls, I don't want kids, and I love my job which is somewhere much better than shakey's...

I had a dream about wow. I was a priest but it was all people that I knew IRL and we were all basically ourselves, dressed in normal street clothes. I only know I was a priest because I remember resurrecting somebody at one point. The only person I can explicitly remember being there was one of the guys training me at my IRL job but it was a group of people I remember knowing.

I was in a party and we kept throwing ourselves at this boss. She had a flame breath attack and when it hit me (which it did several times) I felt my whole body burning until I died. Then ran back from the graveyard and did it again and again. Eventually I found out that if I was burning, running into the locked door with bright pink beams across it would make me go numb until I died so it didn't hurt as badly. It looked like the doors in tempest keep after you start an encounter.

So yeah, I'm probably playing too much wow.

So there was a hurricane thousands of miles away, but from the looks of flooding in my old Indiana hometown, you'd think it happened there. Some pictures of the damage if you're bored, it was insane. The entire football stadium is basically ruined, the field and some bleachers (mostly concrete) were under at least 10 feet of water and school is still canceled.

http://www.nwi.com/story_tools/player/?type=slideshow&id=109&skin=slideshow2

holy fucknuts

My aunt and uncle in the neighboring town lost everything they had in their basement, including a washer and dryer, some furniture, a lot of expensive gymnastics mats for my cousin, various dvds and electronic equipment. Nobody thought it would be that bad, which is why they didn't move anything. And now it's covered in shit water.

I don't really pray for people, but I really hope they are covered under their homeowners' insurance.

I got a fortune cookie that said "This month you will see great success in business and personal life." Well, it's coming true!

I have a high-paying (for me) air-conditioned desk job that will enable me to live comfortably for the rest of my foreseeable future, with lots of opportunity for advancement if I'm good at what I do... and I am. (took my first worker's comp call today and it went without a hitch)

I live in a nice Chicago suburb which, while it's not the place I'd planned on settling down in, is pretty cool and close enough to the city that it's there if I want to visit. It's also not too far from where I grew up so I am not ungodly far from family.

I have a wonderful boyfriend named Zach, who is wonderful and also my boyfriend! Still need to take a picture with him but anyway, he's neat and sexually exciting and fat and tall and nerdy, just like me (except the tall part >.>). He's the first guy I've ever been with that doesn't make me look forward to meeting someone else down the road. /tickled

I have my 4th 70, a priest who will be holy as soon as I finish farming up my primal mooncloth set. It's a draenei, happy squidface! ^,.,^

I still have quite a bit of unsettled debt I need to work through, but that will come with time and moneh. It's nice to feel optimistic about life for a change.

Current Mood: bouncy

I made a mistake on the resume I submitted to The Hartford... I had the wrong year down for when I worked at the restaurant on my college campus. I don't think it should matter.. I mean, I did work there. I just got confused as to when. I'm not really sure HOW the mistake made it onto my application because my saved Hartford resume said 2005. But I've been thinking it was 2004 and I guess that's what I put on the application. The hiring manager called me today with the results of my background check and was talking about the discrepancy.

I hope this doesn't hurt my getting the job, which I already have and have already put notice into blockbuster for. =/ This is supposed to be my last week at Blockbuster.

Anyway I talked to her and explained the mistake (it was an honest one) so hopefully they don't rescind their official offer of employment.

;_;

Current Mood: scared

I'm so confused so much of the time. I don't know what to think or when to think it.

sigh.

Spending time with a person should clarify MORE about them, not less and less every time you see them. I feel like I'm wading in a huge fucking mud puddle.

I gave my boss notice yesterday, which was nearly a month in advance. She said I could keep on the schedule one day a week if I still wanted to rent my free movies every week XD. I can't pretend that I wouldn't like that perk, but honestly I don't want to have to keep going back there, I don't like their retarded emphasis on sales with the Rewards and Movie Passes and game presales... when we don't meet our quotas every week (oh yes, there are quotas), then the managers all get shit from their manager, and the shit is slung progressively further down to us CSRs. I also don't really want to collect a second (tiny) paycheck every 2 weeks. 40 solid hours a week is enough for me, thanks. I'll just keep downloading my movies like I always have and appreciate that I get every Saturday and Sunday to myself like a normal white-collar slave ^_^

oh and I just found out that The Hartford is a Fortune 100 company! *wolf whistle*

TO THE RACHELDAR: I got the job at The Hartford call center! It was a pretty grueling series of tests and assessments last Wednesday. Then I got a phone interview with HR later the same day. Then I had a live interview with 2 shift leads on Thursday. And today, Monday, I got the call offering employment!

Pros:
1) IT'S A DESK JOB so no more running around like a chipmunk trying to keep old people with 500 coupons happy in bullshit low-paying retail jobs.
2) $13.75/hr or approx. $28.6k/year... way more than I've ever gotten paid before for anything.
3) GOOD medical and dental beginning on day one.
4) $25k life insurance plan paid for by the company.
5) 19 days of PTO per year.
6) Since I'm working past 8 pm I get a $1.25 shift differential for every hour I'm on the clock. Which means I'm making an extra $100 per paycheck as opposed to someone who isn't working a later shift.

Cons:
1) Shift is a couple hours later than I requested so it will be difficult to raid like I was hoping to (1:30-10 PM is the shift). Though I am on a pacific server which is 2 hrs behind, so theoretically I could raid beginning around 8:30 PM, 7 nights a week :D
2) I have to wait a month before training starts :(

I'M CORPORATE NOW BITCHES!!! Putting in my notice sometime this week, I'll be leaving Blockbuster on the 10th of August (Hartford training begins on the 18th). That's over 3 weeks of notice which I'm sure my boss will appreciate, and a week of vacation which I will surely appreciate.

I've got a job interview on Tuesday, hooray! I should get the job, I always interview really well. When I interviewed with Joann's I got the job on the spot. So. New job, start saving up, and gtfo of Illinois. Take my 3 Java credits and have my associate's.

I really can't wait.

Spring has sprung. There are actually buds on the trees. hooray!

I had a great time in Nevada but he says nothing long-term can come of it. I've done my crying and I think I'm fairly well over it. Still just as tired of being lonely, but I'm planning to move in with a friend in North Carolina within a month or two. They've got room and they need someone to help pay bills. I need to get the fuck out of the midwest and away from being treated like a small deficient child. win-win, right?

I'd go out there today if I could afford it, but I need around 500 bucks to pay for my first month and the gas to get there, at which point I find a job within walking distance of the place and begin life anew. Commence begging/borrowing from parental unit #2 or possibly finding a very short term job... now!

I needed a goal and now I have one. I have motivation. Even if it is only to get the fuck out of here as fast as fucking possible. <3

Current Mood: meh

 I never want to come back to Chicago Q_Q

Current Mood: content

Wow, I am so retardedly excited (and excitedly retarded). I can't finish packing until I take my shower/do my hair/put on my makeup, but I'm very nearly done with it. I haven't slept, though I woke up at 1 PM today after a 5 hour nap (I guess it counts as sleep) and now it's 5 AM. I haven't slept much the last few days, I'm chock full of nervous anticipation and I just can't calm my mind down enough to close my eyes. Told you, I'm retarded.

I checked in online 23 hours before my flight, putting me in the A group of boarders. This means I'll be in the first group of 3 (A-B-C) to board, and we aren't assigned seats, we get to pick wherever we want to sit. Meaning, I'm getting a fsking window seat and hopefully nobody will want to sit next to me.

I'm so fucking nervous. I hope I can get a nap on the plane, it's a 4 hour flight which is more than enough time for a decent nap. My cat chewed on my headphones last night and now the right one doesn't work so my iPod won't be as effective at helping me sleep as it could be. Stupid cat.

I need hugs but am thoroughly reassured that I'll be getting hugs (and then some, hah!) in less than 12 hours. /commence hypoventilation (not hyper, I'm trying to calm down.) Almost time for my shower. Holy shit. I'M GOING TO RENO!

RENO!!!

Oh and I guess I'm officially a nonsmoker now. I've been agonizing about the trip so much that I haven't even thought about cigarettes at all lately. =)

Current Mood: scared

To say I am happy right now is like saying that the ocean is a little wet.

only Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, then Saturday = Brandonweek ^_^

jesus christ I feel happy and confident for once. HOW DID THIS HAPPEN!? <3

Current Mood: ecstatic

I've always heard that women have this "power" over men. In movies, sitcoms, romance novels, and the popular belief of both genders, this "power" is exemplified by a man lusting after a woman and her giving in or denying sex based on what she wants at the current time. It is also shown by the phrase "men are the head of the family" but "women are the necks." This inevitably ends up in the man chasing the woman like a sex-starved puppydog or acceding to her every whim while he becomes angry or resentful at himself for not being more independent.

In my experience, this power simply does not exist. Both my parents were selfish, and my father used his fists to establish the hierarchy in our household. My mom would use twisted manipulation to try to get what she wanted, and my dad tried to get what he wanted with force. And in the end, neither one of them got what they wanted. In my only long term relationship, I was the sex-starved puppydog.

Peculiar that life never seems to work the way "everyone" says it does.

smoking cheap cigars while trying to decrease your dependence on cigarettes is like exclusively inhaling helium while trying to decrease your dependence on oxygen

TIME
GO
FASTER

ugh ugh ugh haven't had a cigarette in over 36 hours. but I'm onto those little cigar things. and I don't know how the relative nicotine content/absorption is in them, but I am missing my little white sticks

ugh ugh ugh this whole quitting thing better end up making me healthier and more attractive

P.S. T-minus 12 days to Nevada and counting!