Duels Part Deux

Did you catch the word play there? Duality... dual... duels... aliteration... all the d's?

right, so back to business. There is so much paper on my desk that I fully believe files are breeding like rabbits. And instead of attacking it I am blogging. nice.

Good/Bad thus far... Coming in to my department I got smacked with a door. It was a good cartoon sounding smack too. It may have even shook the building... not to worry, I'm a bit hard headed. My retractable badge broke so I stole another from the super secret stash... and the soundtrack for today is a great one... Stevie Wonder- Sir Duke/ The Clash- Rock the Casbah/ KT Tunstall- Suddenly I See/ Bellini- Samba de Janiero/ Earth Wind and Fire- Let's Groove and September/ lots of Santana/ rounded out with remixed Hindi music. The temp from upstairs has a name for the dance I do around my office... he's just jealous. He uses my candy dish as an excuse to come by and try to catch me when I think no one is paying attention.

JD- buck up about the impending nuptuals, the best part of weddings is the retarded dancing. If you are lucky you have an 'interesting' uncle who will tie his tie on his forehead and swing his jacket over his head like a lasso. good times are about to ensue- I can just tell!

Duality of Days

Further with the wonderful month... then on to the "Bama should not speak"...

As I continue to repeat, this is the greatest month, sadly it is about to end. Outside of the milestones I have to say that literally I can tell you about something good from everyday. Now there are not-so-good things as well, but ultimately more good than bad. Case in point this morning...

Late to work (bad) it doesn't really matter because my peers send me to market when I am late- i.e. happy gourmet breakfast for me (good). The guy at one of the counters gives me the biggest pieces of Frittatas (good) today they were pre-cut and small (bad) so he warms them up and charges me less for them (good). He is so sweet I feel bad to tell him that they are not ever for me... he thinks I LOVE them.

on to Celeste's where I actually get breakfast from. Her staff used to wonderful. They close at 2 but there are people there until 4. When I got to work too late to get lunch, she or her head girl would still make me a sandwich or at least let me get ice cream on a super crappy day. Last week I stumbled in at 2:15 and a new girl was counting $. I asked if I could get ice cream and she rolls her eyes and tells me they are closed. Which for all tense and purposes I acknowledge they were, fine. But I am willing to put gloves on and scoop it myself, I would pay more for it- why would you be mean to me? A friend was with me and said something to the effect of "Now you know how everyone else gets treated." Excuse me?

But her breakfast is better than anywhere else, so I show up for a croissant with spinach, tomatoes, and mozzerlla. Same girl rolls her eyes and says she's going to charge me more for the croissant because it is not a biscuit... Celeste walks up and tells her not to- and goes to her oven to pull me a fresher one. I tell Celeste her staff is different and I don't think I will be getting food from anyone but her.

So my office and my friends have a theory that people treat me differently, and in some cases they are right. But I think their theories as to why are wrong.

1. obviously I am not sleeping with all of these strangers and all of these people cannot possibly be wanting to sleep with me
2. some people argue that most of them are not getting anything out of being nice to me, and I slightly disagree
3. the boys obviously say it is a result of how you look (i.e. more or less attractive, more or less expensively clothed, more or less intimidating) in some cases maybe but not necessarily.

I think everybody should work in some aspect of having to deal with the public constantly for a certain amount of time. It will change the way you treat people. There is a way to get better service- ask. don't demand, ask. quietly, politely, making eye contact, and most of all not backing down. I would let ice cream go because they were closed, I'd even pay more for a different type of bread. So if you owned a counter at market, why would you be nice to me? I fully accept I am not the source of your existence- you provide a service for money. I want service, I pay money. Without me, you have a line out the door of people who will give you their money. That said, if you are good to me I will tell everyone in line how great you are. If there is someone pushy and angry, I will let them skip me because I'd rather you dealt with them as fast as possible, so you are less stressed to handle me. I am always happy to see you, and most times that makes you happy to see me. If I could ever help you, rest assured I would. Too often we are not dealing with the people whose business you affect, but their minimum wage representatives. act accordingly.

That was really just too long. Talking to the director of the Big Buddy Program- she is schmucking me into being a buddy- apparently I get all of the little girls who are on the brink of having issues but still more good than bad. Chi-squared calls me a fairy- now they all call me a fairy (Honestly! what bond girl was ever called a fairy?!) and Bama bops over and weighs in- apparently I do not intimidate anybody- he called me a pacifist. in fact he says that's what most people think...me and Ghandi (yes he used the reference). and this point I have to remind myself that it would be rude to right hook him in his jaw- after all there are people around. ick.

Do you know what today is?

Today is the one year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. One year ago, I remember letting the dogs in, pulling out the hurricane box and filling all containers in the house with water. We heard it was going to be bad- but the only people who really freaked were the ones that freaked for every hurricane. Two years ago we were supposed to be hit with 2- we got off of school and everything... wanna what happpened? Hurricane parties on the parade ground!

At the end of it, we were very lucky as was my whole city. Not so for N.O. (understatement of the year) the only damage was a bit to the roof, a fence at my moms, and all of the big oak trees were uprooted (enter lumber girl- nugget and I cleared them in 2 days with one chainsaw- dragged to the street and everything). There was no one else to do it, understandably. Madigan worked for the Governor's office- see whiny crying stupidest woman alive- and we all weathered the worst of the actual storm under the covers... You don't waste your batteries when you can listen the radio or tv at your neighbors house.

When it was over, we went outside to talk to the neighbors, we had no electricity for about a week, no phone, cell phones were blocked. If our water pumps (which run off of electricity) are run off of generator for 3 days they will shut down- which means no clean water for a few miles radius. See Hurricane Andrew... no clean water for a couple of weeks- that was scary. lots of food off of a grill, i was like 11 that was great. My mommiey is an orthopedic nurse. She basically lived at the hospital with me going back and forth and running errands like bringing food for her and checking on people.Then we heard about new orleans. school was closed, work was shut down. LSU opened the field house as a triage unit to take the overflow of medical patients and our stadium was a refuge for as many evacuees as could be bussed in before they began using the River Center. My friends and I spent our spare time volunteering to help pass out food, sort close, and entertain kids. We sorted through donations and put together toiletry kits, and tried to match people's medicines. Mommiey got off of work and came to triage with me because they needed medical personell.

The part that literally knocked the wind out of me was the old people. 1. It was quiet at night, but you don't realize how small you are until you see a track field full of cots with so many older people asleep- holding teddy bears and talking to them like real people as a way to deal with being all alone and not being able to find your family. They were like large children that didn't make sense. 2. the second was those same beds during the day. they were always tidy. with everything belonging to each person folded so small and put together to take up the smallest amount of space. Nothing hidden, because there was no where to hide it and each person trusted that the person next to him just wouldn't take his soap.

People talk about "those people" and what happened at the Superdome. I don't doubt it and I don't knock it. But that wasn't what came through my city. And today more than anything I and everyone I know folds their hands in Namaste and says a silent prayer for those people- and their loss.

It's too much today. We'll start on my beef with Newsweek tomorrow.

"Beware the Jabberwock"

WARNING: Excessively rambling blog to follow...this may turn into an official blog-series.

We have an interesting Tuesday ahead of us, so we will try to stay on track.

The quote is from Lewis Carroll's "Through the Looking Glass". I love it- the whole book. As a child, it made more sense than most poetry did. As an adult I can see so many more nuances- especially from a sociological standpoint. i.e. The point of today's blog- The looking glass self. I forget whose theory is was but the basic premise is that some of the way we identify ourselves is through the eyes of others. The reflection as it were. For those of you that haven't read Carroll in a while, flop it open, any page, and try to see it with those eyes... it is quite fantastic.

We'll start with Bride-Zilla. She gets married in October. I and three others from high school are in her wedding. I can't even say she is my friend, but she has no one else- and I feel like we should all at least try to make someone's special day- special. She has a whole brunch to tell us that we are expected to lose 2 dress sizes before then because she doesn't want any fat bridesmaids. Excuse me? Later that evening I find myself in a bar with the other 3 discussing our breaking point, and the exact date each of us will be telling her what she can do with a very lovely Vera Wang.

And here is the kick in the head on that issue. I work out- not as much as I used to, or do when I'm training for something. I am a dress size 6. She is asking for me to be a 2. That hasn't happened since senior year in high school, which only happend because of Varsity Tennis, dance team, and hitting the track everyday for 2 weeks before dances. Guess what size I'm going to be in October- probably a 6. What is further sad is that Megora called me offering Aderol for help with some of the extra weight...Listen here hefers... Hard as it is to concieve... I like myself. There are times I've felt heavy and sad going shopping and coming home with no new pants, but at the end of the day I'm pretty happy with me. And a spoiled princess is not going to make me do something unhealthy because she wants her pictures to look a certain way.

Further kick in head... she expect a wedding present from Mignon Faget with matching cuff links for her new hubbie because that is what I gave Jenny Bear. She's not getting a present. I'm not buying the dress (her parents are- it's bad when your parents have to beg people you know to be in your wedding) and I may or may not show up to any of the showers or the bachelorette party. ick.

But this has certainly been the year of the weddings- we are officially up to 6 and those are only what I have attended, not all of the invites from people I'm pretty sure I don't know. At one of the last ones I went to, it was on a plantation in the slave house (dream-killer's mom and I were trying to figure out if there was some kind of discount for getting hitched in 1/2 a barn). I had a good time. A lot of people had a lot of negative things to say about it. I don't think we should so much judge someone else's wedding- after all- it's theirs.

So the next day I get a call from a friend who was there who says "Was that not the ghetto-ist (not a word!) ever?!" and I say... "umm I missed that. The cake was good." To which she enlightens me... "Awwwww K! That's why you get invited to weddings... you look nice, smell good, show up, and say something nice." wow. at least I beat Marston... he gets invited because he brings expensive presents.

jd-responded to law school ? and i have the greatest funny for you when you're having a rotten day. you don't get it until then.

Would Bond call back if he got hung up on?

I am very blessed to have the people in my life that I do. Case in point... Bond, oh yeah James Bond. He is one of my mentors and truly larger than life. He is successful, compassionate, wealthy, humble, brilliant, and very very well-bred. And he believes in me. Through the years he has supported my writing (before I was consumed by self-doubt), my charity work, and personal and professional development. He is so patient with me- my other mentor always says she is envious of how much he treats me like his daughter.

One day last summer- between work, school, and a bona fide stalker I was 2 beats away from losing my cookies. He called to check in on me and invited me to a benefit he was hosting right after work at a fine dining restaurant. I mumbled that I was not appropriately dressed and would try to schedule a coffee with him Saturday morning instead. He asked why wasn't I appropriately dressed, after all I was going to work and you always dress for the job you want, not the job you have. Then I did lose my cookies- I burst into tears like the petulant child I swore I was not. So embarrassed, I hung up on him.

15 minutes later he called me back and asked if I was finished yet. I said yes, but his expectations of me were unfair- I was dealing with a lot. He said I was given so much because I could take it. That being smarter, faster, and stronger meant that your breaks were fewer and farther between. In being the best you can be, you create a lot of jealousy from all of the people around you who see themselves as less, and would rather scratch your eyes out than truly do better for themselves. Bond girls don't get to complain.

Fast forward to every conversation with my sister. Once it was a point of contention that she lives in squalor and works in a bar, and I went to college. That her life was so hard and I just didn't understand because I am perfect. Once there would have been an exchange of words... today she knows the standard response is "I'm sorry you feel that way, it sounds like a personal problem. Whenever you decide you want to do better- do. until then, I don't have time for tantrums."

I love her make no mistake, but no one handed me anything, not this job, not the better one, not anything ever. If we are a summation of the choices we make- then most people really do deserve their pasts, and everyday we don't change it, we accept our present.

If Bond is the lesson in patience, Kris (sister) is the lesson in never apologizing for blessings one has. We have all championed her cause and carried her flag for years, at some point she has to do some of the work and it is easier to help a stranger who will do more with the blessings I provide. and though there are days I feel sad that I can not save her- I still have to remember that she can.

Yuppy- Girl

The Fray- How to save a life.

Yes the song from the Grey's Anatomy trailer... right, so i pull it up on radioblogclub.com and put it on my blog... why? because on a sleepy Monday morning it gives me chills and threatens to choke me for I don't know why. and it's just a sappy song. but not really. and I am laughing at myself- surely I am not so simple? and another thing- I hate that show. I hate it because like everyone else I have to watch it. and its wretching. double ick. all the ick. ick.

Honorable Mention

Super cool! I got honorable mention from my new favorite blogger! I don't know how to put the link up yet- that will be the afternoon task to look forward to- but it is Billable Time by Jd. His blog is stinking adorable! We totally heart Jd, and here's why. I need him to work... not like to be employed but in life... In marriage or better marriage (which ever turns out to be the better situation) because he feels so familiar to me. He's obviously super intelligent (with non-typos that seem to pepper my blogs) and has an awesome sense of humor about himself. Witty and sensitive and a swimmer to boot?! C'mon!

More than that, he is familiar because I know people like him who have been kicked in the crotch by less than deserving women. And though we all have bad potential, with the right person said potential can be fantastical. And life is too short to be unhappy. We all do the best we know how with what we have right then. I sense that Jd is so much to many more people than he realizes. I further sympathize with the frustration he knows that with his achievements comes a myriad of people who will try to take credit for it, or villify him for doing well... i.e. "You think you are better than everyone else, smarter than everyone else" that the small people spit as a billboard of their insecurities. Like I've said before- total hearts from this side, and hugs and kisses from far far away.

Had I really liked him, this could have sucked!

So birthday dinner got put on hold. Tuesday was the official start of Law School and the dream-killer would not have been able to make it till ridiculously late- it's not that big of a deal, after all this month has literally been the "YAY ME!" month. So monday BAMA stretches with me after circuit training (as he does) and asks about the weekend, and I told him about rocking out in the Z... to which he says "why?" to which I say "Birthday!" and he says "not yours, huh?"... wow was that as irritating as it looks?

anyway he begs to take me out for the big birthday and says he will e-mail me with the plans on Tuesday. and he did... at 5:30 pm to tell me he was still at work and would have to cancel, which is less disappointing than it sounds as I was at work until almost 9. the point is- he could have called it would have taken 30 seconds and now he gets no more of my time. though i am not so ill-bred that i wouldn't speak to him in public. So I see him on Wednesday and he tries to work out next to me... I run faster... so there.

He comes over to stretch with me, I smile, I stretch, I grab my bag and leave him standing there mid-apology.

Friday I see him, I was on the cell, he comes over and hugs me till I can't breath. He says I look stressed. I get off the phone and demurely lament the Tuesday blow-off in 3rd person. he is still full of apologies and i say it is not necessary...which it isn't because I'm done here. Again, my guy friends can try to defend him... but the fact of the matter is- 1. you cannot tell me anything about ambition- it comes out of my eyeballs! i fully understand you stay at work till it gets done, you do whatever you have to do to look like super-woman, and the point of all of this is to squash your compition. and yet... the call would have taken 30 seconds... less time than the email did and furthermore men behave themselves when there is something they truly want and are trying hard for. did you see that? it was a period at the end of that sentence.

*Side note* Please do not regard this as me 'male bashing'. i fully believe that everyone male and female alike have ass-hole potential. and your behavior is a result of how much you are living up to that potential. in every instance i know i have not been perfect and fully acknowledge that i am a work in progress. Plus I have really great stories about how much of my bad behavior i dished out when i was younger. with maturity comes the desire to not be that person anymore, you realize your potential and do better. thus, the threshold that we are willing to accept from other people is less as well... but i digress

how do i know that men have potential to be great and wonderful and align their behavior to appreciate the goddess they think you are? long distance relationship with japan worked for a year and a half with him calling me damn near everyday... FROM JAPAN! My water buffallo did summers in India calling every week at the same time so I would know it was him, braving monsoons to get to the only working phone in the village to hear the sound of my voice. Trust me, if a girl means that much men will move heaven and earth. and like the title says... If I was digging him this would be most unfortunate, luckily we can walk away from this one unscathed. no ick and less Bama :)

One of those things we say.

"Beautiful". You say it. You hear it. You know what it looks like to you; and it has the potential to stop you dead in your tracks for a full blush when it is directed at you. Once upon a times (and on any given day) it was easy to look in the mirror and see everything that is wrong. To hear a validation makes you want to follow the person who said it just to get a glimpse of what they see.

But it is only something we say. And if you hear it from someone who says it frequently to every female, does it make it less sweet? or me more cynical?

"You can do anything, you can go anywhere, the world is your oyster, you are going to do great things...blah blah blah"
Ok so now we have the undergrad degree and are looking for the next job. not so forthcoming at the Fortune 100 company I work for- we are in the midst of massive downsizing and people are uber-scared. I'm starting to put the resume out there and I'm getting all of no response. I will go anywhere, I will do most anything- All I'm looking for is more $. and yet my oyster-world has yet to flop open. I work hard- 40 plus and am the queen of the slaves in my dept. I take projects like it's cool, i'm all over further education and am having all of the meetings with what are supposed to be the keepers of the good life... and I am still here. and people are beginning to ask what the next plans are and I get to say that I am still in transit.

And if I am the commidity that people say, and anyone would love to hire me for the professional asset that I am... WHAT THE PROBLEM IS...

The great fall of Bama reaches it's disappointing ebb. update later this afternoon.

MY JENNY BEAR LOVES ME!

My birthday is Tuesday, so the party is today and tomorrow, the birthday dinner is officially on Tuesday. This afternoon my best friend calls me at work to say "do your hair, i'm picking you up in the Z". Her mom has the Nissan convertible thing. so we spend extra time looking cute and get to ride around with the top down. How much do I love my Jen.

How funny that this is still one of the very fun things that make us feel 16. Madigan used to do the same thing with the lovely Escalade. We would literally spend an hour and half getting dressed just to go to the grocery store in that thing. It seems (and is) a bit immature and juvenille, but nothing beats it. It's like your day can't get any better than that!

yesterday was crap, today will be better

Work is not fun, advancement is stalled, my huge company is down sizing to India -which affects me not at all except that it is harder to justify a move within since they are telling me that my new position won't be here in 3 years and I want to scream "LOOK, I JUST NEED THIS TO LAST UNTIL NEXT AUGUST WHEN I START LAW SCHOOL!" or realistically, the end of May before I quit and go back packing through Europe. I've put in 2 years of doing the b*tch work and am ready to not be poor for at least a minute. ick

I wanted to stay here because it was more comfortable than looking for a job cold- and starting over in an unknown.

In other news- have successfully avoided I.T. guy for a whole week and a half- he didn't bring up lunch and neither did I, the doc has gone home, so that was a neat backflip as well... On to Bama. I enjoy his company, he makes me laugh. He is so sweet and has beautiful manners. He is such a frat boy. There is nothing about him that make me want to put him in my pocket and carry him around with me. So we entertain him as long as it entertains us, but ultimately he is something to pass the time. It's not a relationship, it's not going to be. He's not pressing the issue, so I don't have to address it either. Guys don't so much appreciate he pre-emptive "you know this isn't going anywhere, right?". They tend to get mad. go figure.

I heart blogs!

I like reading other people's blogs. Don't get me wrong, there is a lot of crud to sift through, I think the formula is like six clicks of 'next blog' to find something worth reading (on second thought that is a bit of an understatement). But nonetheless I like it.

I like that the blog (anonymous or not) is where people are comfortable spewing all that is most important to them. It is my new guilty pleasure. But I find myself starting the bad habit of commenting on some of them- as if random people wanted to hear from me, how funny. In the middle of a Tuesday, when Sheryl Crow and I are going to meet Buddy in a bar, and I am staring down the prospect of another pointless corporate rah-rah meeting to go to, it helps me through my day to check in on someone else.

KARMA-STITION

Karma-stition is the remix of Alicia Keys' song Karma with the beat from Stevie Wonder's Very Superstitious. I believe in karma- I think most people do. Maybe almost to the point of superstition? ahhhh....

Right so Mr. PhD died 45 min into sports circuit. If you have been following the story you will know he had to make it through the entire class to earn a date. But watching him heaving with his head between his legs did earn him a pity date... so how did it go? it hasn't happened yet, I'm supposed to call him. so probably tomorrow I'll take him to play pool or something. You must be wondering how Karma has bitten me in the butt? keep reading....

This has turned into the greatest month! I officially graduate on Friday and my birthday is later this month, it's a month full of yay me! except I am not finding another job. no worries. I am employed and making great strides toward a whole career (that only has to last a year till I get to law school). In such, yesterday I get a gi-normous bouquet of flowers delivered to work. There are day lilies (which I love!) red roses, orchids, and purple stuff. awesome. they are from one of my I.T. guys... less awesome. O.k. let me clarify... every girl wants to get flowers, and especially flowers at work... the caveat being that we want them to be from the right person. i.e. someone we are dating, in wuv with, totally digging, etc. etc. not the stereo-typical sci-fi reading, ridiculously sweet, but a little strange on all cylinders.

The very true and very safe answer is and always has been that I have a standing policy not to date people I work with. And Mr. I.T. respects this. I call to say thank you, and he extends the option of congradulatory lunch. I cringe but have to say yes. After all, mommiey did raise me to be gracious. and he is not so odious that I could not have a pleasant lunch with him. right?

So lunch is set for today and I come to work mentally prepared... and the women I work with have put together a feast of lots of my favorite things, complete with a picnic blanket of my soon to be alma-mater. and I am floored and humbled by their love and generosity... and then I am so ashamed that I was relieved that lunch with Mr. I.T. will have to be pushed to next week. somehow I don't think that just a thank you card would be sufficient. I would like to say that I am not that person that avoids confrontation at all cost and is completely spineless. However I would like to be someone who does not ever hurt other people's feelings- I certainly don't want to... so the little voice inside of me says- hurry up and find another job and run away, and never have to deal with him again. but that's not right either. ick.

You'll never guess what I heard... NOTHING!

So mommiey and I spent the weekend in the land of Monito (that is an official break- but nostalgia still made me text him- damn the sentimentality! but i got no response- that was new, and kind of bruised the ego-ick) and it was uber-great.

Apparently I left one of the doors of my piece open (what piece you ask? why it's the car I drive. a piece? yes ma'am it is a piece of sh**) and the light in the car was on all weekend. I see this yesterday- the light still works- however car would not start.

Not to worry I can jump a car in 2.5 flat. and don't even get me started on the flat tires... so I am off and running to the book store when I try to turn the radio on. My CD player no longer accepts my CDs and I have refused to put more $ into this car on non-essential things. So I listen to the radio (stop laughing it's not THAT funny). So I try to turn the radio on and the screen says "CODE" and it takes a minute to figure out it wants a 4 digit code. Well, that's fun! Now I get to go through 11 billion options of what the code may be since I have no idea what it is and they didn't tell me when I bought my piece. I then surmise that you get all of 3 chances to guess and then it shuts itself off. Not like it turns its' self off andI can press a button a turn it back on... but I turn it on and the screen says "OFF". How fun. So I drive to the bookstore in deafening silence with only my thoughts to amuse me. How dangerous.

Fast forward to this morning. I am making the commute and laughing at myself that I know nothing happens when I press a button for the radio- but I still press it, in fact I press all of the buttons to absolutely no avail. I make it to the off ramp almost to work and the CD-tease/radio makes a ear piercing screech that made me throw coffee on my beautiful cashmere sweater (honestly who wears cashmere in the August?! answer? those of us that are so poor we buy it on sale and wear it the same week we bought it!) and again the screen says "CODE". and now I have 3 more tries. I wonder if it was something I did that made it reset or if it did it by its' self. At any rate it is the new project, one day at time to figure out the elusive code so I can get back to my 'en route' concerts. I can sing like Mariah Carey.... it's just that no one else can hear it quite like that :)

DOES THAT MAKE MY MOTHER A P.I.M.P.?

Ok this is a good one. I will try to give the premise a bit quicker than ususal. So, last night mom bum-rushes me into having dinner at one of the Indian Auntie's house. It was last minute, it was 9 o'clock- I'd been running errands since I got off at 530- the prospect of wroti looked good to me. She tells me before we get there that the whole purpose of going to this persons house is to meet a boy.... I'm sorry, say that again?

To be specific we are going to "look at" a 28-year old male specimen from Trinidad who is a doctor. (PhD doc not med doc) and I almost threw my car in park in the middle of the street. are you kidding me?!

I've been ducking the arranged marriage discussion for a good 3 years now, and was quite confident it was close to being squashed... apparently not. My friends are like "why are you so against this? this could be great! your parents are trying to give you a dr. on a plate- that is every girl's dream!" and to this I say really? REALLY? have at him girls I will even serve as liason.

Let me try to quantify what it is about this situation that makes me want to get tattoos all over my body so that none of these guys would look twice at me. 1. the whole thing makes me feel like a piece of meat. from the time you can talk Indian parents present this huge expectation upon you. you know how everything about your life stacks up on the scale of marriageablity and if you will get a good boy. don't understand?

people say i am pretty (that's a plus), my mom is divorced (that's a minus), aug 11th i get my degree (plus), but i also have student loans (minus), but no other debt (plus). I am smart (plus) but very vocal about what i think/feel (minus) i am independent (minus) with long hair (plus) but brown skin not yellow (minus). right so you get how this works.

and the 2nd thing is... and boy do i hate the way this looks in writing... I do believe in love. I've seen it, felt it, touched it, and after it anything less is... well, less. how do you build a life with someone you have to learn to like? someone you have nothing in common with, and learn how to deal? even if it doesn't stay that way, at least in the beginning i should like to be excited to see this person. and i explain this to my mom again, and she says..."no one is saying you HAVE to marry him, just maybe have a coffee". fine.

So having met him, he's cute but i still have reservations. so he is going to take sports circuit with me today. if he lasts the entire class then he has earned himself a date on saturday. if not, well i don't ever have to see him again. please hold- shennanagins to follow.