The 5 Finger Discount

So the last time I wrote I was in a certain café that will remain nameless. I typed and typed away, while eating a grilled chicken salad & drinking way too much coffee (more on that later). I had just moved a few weeks prior to my last update and was seriously hurting for cash. Since moving was so hectic I had started getting my coffee crack on the go and that didn’t help my budget. But the real problem was that I hadn't yet replaced the free coffee machine I had dropped and broken into a million pieces. So every time I got a coffee to go I would request or grab extra splenda. I did this for two reasons: There’s a resident coffee machine at the clubhouse of my complex but they have this stuff called “sugar”. ICK. They also have sweet & low, eeewwwwaa! Secondly, some places don’t have splenda and that way I would always have some on me “just in case”. I’ve had a habit of carrying around copious amounts of splenda in my purse for quite some time. You think that’s strange? Today a bunch of ten year olds at a birthday party could very well do a scavenger hunt exclusively within my purse. If you need it, I’ve got it. I am a traveling pharmacy. I also have the stir sticks, socks, makeup, gas-x (don't ask), earrings, a rainbow of highlighters….and well you get the point.

So back to my story...I’m at the café where I’ve been served a coffee plate (is that what that tiny plate is called?) with like 10 splenda, 4 creamers and a few other things. But I only need 1 splenda per cup. I had noticed earlier that an old guy at a table full of senior citizens had been staring at me for quite some time. So when I was just about to go, I quickly looked behind me at the waitress behind the register, grabbed the leftover splenda, shoved it in my purse and then proceeded to leave----BUT between shoving them in my purse and standing up out of my chair, I noticed that old guy’s stare. Except this time it was a different stare. It was the stare of judgement: a damning, hard, guilt-tripping stare. The kind directed at serial killers as they enter the courtroom on trial for butchering an entire family. My fashion aviators (they make me look so hot if I do say so myself), provided a small buffer between my mortified self and the “you’re going to hell” stare. But they weren’t enough to shield me completely from his eyes as he ever so slowly turned his head without blinking, following me as I walked away, my eyes too unable to look away for several steps too many.

What was I supposed to do?? Go digging through my tote looking for all of them so I could return them? I mean, hadn’t they already planned on me consuming those? Even if not all at the café? I felt like a hardened criminal, like someone just waiting on bad karma to hit me at any given second in the form of some uncalled for speeding ticket for driving 5 miles over. By a trooper. On a motorcycle. A female trooper. I couldn’t bat my eyelashes out of this one. Or help the ladies to “perk up”. I mean, COMMMEE ON! No matter how disproportionate his stare was to my minimal theft (if that can even be called a theft), his eyes had pierced through me, straight to my own personal Jiminy Cricket. Fuck.

I couldn’t shake my excessive guilt and mortification for the next week. (make that MONTH). Since then I have been doing unnecessary things in hopes of balancing out my karma: tipping $1 at a coffee shop when my only purchase is a $1.50 bottled water and keeping my mouth shut when that big booty ho cut in line in front of me at the grocery store while avoiding eye contact because she CLEARLY knows what she did and what I really wanted to say is “OH NO YOU DI-ENT!” I have continued doing unnecessary nice things all because that old fart made me feel like a hardened criminal. Normally I don’t care about what other people think of me, but this time I felt different……and I've told myself over and over that he MUST have been such a pervert for staring at me in the first place and that he too, is going to hell.

Ok, so I’m not gonna write anything about new years’ resolutions…..I’m gonna finish my breakfast and coffee in bed while reading unnecessary celebrity gossip columns, then head over to Town Lake for my former jog that has now become leisurely walking while listening to Jack Johnson and scope out today's eye candy. Happy Memorial Day!

I suck at blogging.......

So....I know it's been a long time, but I've been busy. Doing what you ask? Getting shit done. Being productive, attempting to keep my new years' resolutions, staying positive. Oh, and... the usual: the flawed & fun-lovin broke-ass energizer bunny that just won't give up. Being....ME.

Okay so I'm going to go ahead and list my excuses for not updating my blog (which technically speaking, is THE New Year's Resolution....or 2009's last-ditch effort to do one productive thing with my life within one calendar year). I know, I'm such an over achiever right?

Excuse #1: My computer crashed. No, seriously. During the holidays I discovered that my car needed a lot of maintenance because it reached 100,000. Thanksgiving week my laptop crashed. Two weeks later my chi broke because I'm such a klutz & a slob that I stepped on it and broke it in half. Christmas day my cell phone decided it no longer wanted to send text messages among other things. Then my mom replaced my phone as my birthday present since I of course couldn't afford it and that thing just plain sucks. Good luck getting ahold of me. I promise I'm not ignoring you, it's me not you. Unless you're someone I don't feel like talking to, in which case it's you. I started this thing on my roomie's spare laptop and then that dinosaur of a Toshiba crashed too. Then I took over my roomie's office until the wi-fi adapter/thingamajig broke. Technology hates me.

So I'm sure you can imagine that when I asked my cousin Jacob if I could borrow his mac to do my taxes he replied with "well if you absolutely must then....I suppooooosseeee I could part with my $3,000 mac laptop for the next 3 hours". I decided that the severity of my electronics curse made this too big of a risk to take. For months I felt completely disconnected from the world: facebook, school, family, online window shopping, etc. I couldn't even check the weather online before going to school to see what to wear for the day (and since I live in Texas, that could mean 5 necessary wardrobe changes in 1 day).

Excuse #2: In January I went back to school, HARDCORE. Ok, actually I'm only taking 12 hours but it's my first semester back so not bad eh? I'm doing pretty good, making all A's and B's. I'm shooting for a 4.0 but we'll have to wait and see how I do on my finals. So being in school now along with not having a working computer has made my life pretty difficult and therefore made blogging impossible. But being in school is great. It's just plain great. I get to actually enjoy it, and be a nerd instead of running from class to work and work to class and home to shower for the first time in 2-3 days.

What I mean by getting to actually enjoy it is...well.....I didn't get a job because I'm blessed to not have to work right now. There, I said it. Don't hate me.

Excuse #3: I've actually been doing (a lot but not all) of the things that were on my resolution list. This year I've been out LIVING my life, instead of watching it pass me by or just going through the motions and never feeling any progress, joy or improvement. This year I'm happy. For the first time in a long time. =)

I can't remember now how I managed to do my taxes, all I remember is that I got back $2,000!!!!!!!!!!! WAHHOOOO! So I did the responsible thing and paid off my Mastercard which was nearly $1,500. Two things come to mind when I think about this:

1. Yes! I paid off $1,500 of debt which is more than the goal of 20% for the year. It's 25%!!!!!
2. Shit, it's 25%. YEAH, THAT'S RIGHT.....I have $4,500 left. DAMN!

I spent the rest of the money on this lovely little new laptop I'm typing on now. Now I have a laptop so that I can function in life AND in school. YAAAYYY! It feels so nice to facebook stalk again......who knows, while you're reading this I might be stalking YOU.

So....that's it so far. I've officially accomplished two resolutions. Going back to school & Paying off 20% of my credit card debt. Actually I exceeded it. How did I do this? Well I was so po' last year that the government gave me back all my taxes. I created my own bailout. Take that banking industry!!!!! I'll include the rest of my progress in my next post (hopefully that won't take 4 months). Until next time......I'll be in paper writing hell. 8 papers due this week. 1 test. 2 quizzes. 1 lab........God bless adderal.

(oh and today my neice turned 3, HAPPY BIRTHDAY ARIAH!!!!!...as if she's reading this.....)

My New Year's Resolutions

2010 Resolution List:

1. Read one self-improvement book/month. This should save me a lot of $ on some much-needed therapy, as long as I shop at Half Price Books.
2. Keep exercise routine of cardio 3 times/wk & resistance/weights 2 times/wk. Ya ya, I know its boring, I can hear you yawning. Don't you know that shit is contagious? hmmmm...I think I'll go take a nap.
3. Embrace the single life.
Step 1: Take a shower. Step 2: Shave your legs.
4. Go back to school-HARDCORE.
This shouldn't be that hard, I should be a pro by now.......or an MD.
5. Develop a normal sleep schedule.
Being nocturnal is only good for infomercial shopping. ShamWow anyone?
6. Note to self: Get a job. Once employed, resist the urge to continue job-hopping as much as I go bar-hopping.
7. Go one month without alcohol. Should I go ahead & make this biblical?
A whole 40 days????? aahhh crap....AA here I come.
8. Go one month without coffee. Caution: Do not try this at home.
Warning: Stay the hell away from me that month.
9. Get an iPhone. YES, this is a goal. Don't laugh, you know you want one too.
10. Be on time, because I can only joke about being "fashionably late" about a million times before everyone I know is sick of it.
11. Floss every other day. I haven't flossed in weeks and I doubt you have either. Disclaimer: Those in the dental industry are not applicable.
12. Manage the ever-increasing quarter life crisis that is my life.
Plan A: Prevent panic attacks. Plan B: Get a prescription for Xanax.
13. Take more pictures. This will require learning how to use my camera.....
14. Find a church I can stand, maybe even like. This could take awhile.....
15. Reduce # of hours spent watching tv now that Dexter has ended.
Couch potato no more!!! Well, for the next 8 months that is. ;)
16. Break up the serious, long-term relationship between my butt, thighs & gravity. STOP THE THREESOME! REMOVE THE BIGH!!!
(BIGH: the area where my butt meets my thighs & the two are indistinguishable due to an overlapping layer of fat married to gravity).
17. Don't spend 1 yr from now at home on new year's eve because I have no money, nothing to wear, and no motivation to get out of my pjs.
18. Pay off 30% 20% of credit card debt....baby steps y'all, I'm still unemployed.
19. Try one new thing a month.
New food, new drinks, new boys......the possibilities are endless.
20. Limit my excessive chocolate ice cream intake to once per month. (Anything less than that could be fatal).
21. Forget my past regrets and look at the glass 1/2 full.
There's always a silver lining, even if its in the fake costume jewelry I wear.
22. Stop picking at my skin. It's gross. Enough said.
23. Stop biting my nails & bottom lip.
At the rate I'm going, I will eventually chew my lip off completely.
24. Stop popping my knuckles. If not I won't ever get engaged because there won't be a ring big enough for my fat manfingers and then no one could "PUT A RING ON IT!"
25. Get a new queen bed! Stop sleeping on the floor! GROW UP & GET A BIG-GIRL BED! Life isn't an effin slumber party with sleeping bags & a game of "truth or dare"!! Okay, okay...Truth: No I don't sleep in a sleeping bag on the floor. Truth: Yes I do sleep on a nearly 30yr old mattress & box spring set which currently reside on the floor. Dare: If you are reading this and thinking this shouldn't be a new year's resolution, I double dog dare you to try to get a good night's sleep on this thing.
26. Save up an emergency savings fund of $1,000. ($83.33/month). Prerequisite: Completion of #6.

Why 26 resolutions? Because I turn 26 this year! In 6 days to be exact.