A Different Sort of Post

This is a different sort of post.  I'm just going to write and try not to hit the backspace button, like I usually do.  I love everyone who reads this, and hopefully you all love me back, so you won't judge me for this written-word-vomit that I'm going to dish out to you all.

What is it about Thanksgiving that makes everyone all self-reflective and internal?  I'm not sure.  Maybe it's the whole 'being thankful' thing, and having to take the time to think about what we're all really thankful for?  Maybe it's the fact that we spend so much time trying to avoid what we really want, and are really happy for, and just keep going on with the lame and mundane? Who knows.

These last couple days of mine have been a whirlwind, that's for damn sure.  I can't even begin to explain all the emotions I'm feeling, but I have realized a few things about myself.  My fears are more than I even knew. My fear of intimacy.  My fear of rejection.  My fear of embarrassing myself.  For someone who always thinks she's so self-assured, I'm really fucked up.

Don't worry, I'm still awesome.  We all know it.

I know it's not resolution time yet, but there are still things I hope for.  I hope to be braver.  I hope to be more secure in myself.  I hope to be able to tell people how I feel, instead of just hoping they'll know.  I hope to be able to say exactly what I want to say without fear of consequence.  I hope to be able to control my verbal vocabulary as well as I can control my written vocabulary, and use it, instead of just looking like a goof.

Don't get me wrong, I like being a goof.  I just wish I had more confidence, I guess.

I don't know where I'm going with all this.  I'm just trying something new and filling a blank page, something else that gives me anxiety.  I need to stop pressuring myself to always have the right thing to say right off the bat, or to be perfect all the time.  I'll get it, I know I will.... I just need to allow myself to get there.

PS. This is the one year anniversary of my blog.  Yay for me :)
(I don't know the exact date; I just know that it was around Thanksgiving, because my first post was about the family asking me "What are you going to do with your life?"... to which, I still have no clue.  No pressure though.)

Thanks for listening, Peeps.

I Made That.

Ladies and gentleman, lend me your ears (or eyes, as it were), for I have the best story to tell you all!

Last night, as I was sitting in the Drive-Thru, my work computer asked me to change my password for one of the many that I am responsible for... Pretty normal.

No problem, right? Wrong.

The problem lies in the fact that in order to write down my password, I needed a pencil so that when the time comes that I have to change it again, I can just erase and be on my merry way.  Well, I found a pencil, but was lacking a pencil sharpener.  This is a serious problem, only second to "which is worse: having a cigarette with no lighter, or a lighter with no cigarette?".

I sat staring at my blunt pencil for a few minutes when it came to me... I could totally sharpen it into a point.

Well, the man that I closed with yesterday was not one of our dysfunctional family, so he isn't really used to my shenanigans.  He's very subdued, with a quirky look to him which makes me feel like he's a time-traveler from the sixties.  He had this Mad Men look about him, and wore the thickest glasses that I've ever seen.  I actually told him that I thought they were thicker than bullet proof glass, which led to an explanation about cost vs. thickness that I didn't really care for and ignored.

I think Creepy was very surprised to see my creative side.  Actually, what he said when he saw what I was up to was, "Wow, that is some of the ghetto-est shit I've ever seen.  Pardon my language."  Verbatim.  I wanted to say, well, you've never seen what I've had to do to get my car to stay together, because this is nothing.

What I did, folks, is take a knife out of our kitchen drawer and WHITTLE the pencil into a point.

How ingenious is that?

As I shared my ordeal with Arnold, who I tell all my stupid thoughts to, I felt pretty damn proud of myself.  I thought to myself, "Damn, Val.  You could totally survive in the wild.  Bear Grylls has nothing on you."  I felt like I was climbing the lesbian-ladder, because as we all know I'm terrible at fixing things properly or doing anything remotely involved with technology, so the fact that I thought this up all on my own was pleasantly surprising.

Especially after my last lesbian ordeal with the toilet seats... but that is a story for another time.

Keep laughing, keep smiling. Just go with it. <3

November Update

The last few days weeks months have kept me a busy girl.

Between Mother Nature and her PMS, both my jobs, and my malnourished and somewhat neglected social life, I haven't had a lot of time to write, and nothing, in fact, to write about.  This makes Sunshine a lame girl.

The only things I really have to report are:
*Bruises, origins unknown, are making appearances on my extremities
*I have my first Friday night off from Mystery, Inc. coming up this week and I'm goin' dancin with my peeps.
*I miss being in school.  I corrected Manda's paper today and I really missed writing papers. This makes me a dork. Also, I wish I would have planned out a NaNoWriMo project.  I feel pretty lame about that.
*I went to the Jets game not too long ago against San Diego, and Man that was some good stuff.  I love watching the Jets (even if they're losing, like they are right now to the goddamn Pats).  I made friends with the guy behind me, too.  He liked me because I screamed down at the field like they could hear me from the nosebleed section, just like he was.... He let me wear his helmet. <3

Mother Nature, thou art a heartless bitch.

2011 is definitely not the North East's year, that's for sure. 

First, Hurricane Irene came in and took out her pms on us, then the Earthquake that rocked the East from Virginia to Connecticut (which I am STILL mad that I didn't feel, but that's another story), and now the freak snow storm before Halloween.  

Mother Nature really needs to get her shit together. 

In the words of my cousin, who put a bus on our street?!

Mother Nature granted us with over a foot of snow in a freak snow storm that caused more destruction than the Hurricane back in August.  I have never seen so many trees broken, snapped in half, destroyed, in my entire life.  It looks as if God himself came down from the Heavens and snapped every single one in half like a toothpick.  

It's unreal. 

This telephone pole (with what I can assume is a transformer, though it didn't speak to me like Optimus Prime) just hung out in the middle of the street for a few days.  It was tired of standing straight up and needed a vacation.

Then, even better, as we were trying to get out of our neighborhood, we saw this gem.  Maybe it's time for the sprinklers to be shut off for the year... I'm pretty sure the snow doesn't need to be watered.

 The best part of the whole thing? I got to make this for someone :)

The Next Great Adventure

Big news, Peeps.

This week, I made a life decision, which could either turn out to be amazing, adventurous, wonderful, and life changing, or it could turn out to be monumentally disastrous and an epic fail.

For those of you that know me, or are at least familiar with me, or have at least read the “about me” on the right side of this page, you’ll see that I am a Boston Red Sox fan ‘trapped’ by life’s circumstance (and the fact that I was born and raised here) in, let’s face it, Yankee country.

Well, that is about to change, my friends.

This week I applied for a job in Boston, Massachusetts.

(One that I am likely to get, btw.  I wouldn’t put this out there without you guys thinking that it was just a whim.)

I’m not even going to lie a little, I am a scared mess right now.  Honestly, if I were a caricature, I’d be the tiny little Chihuahua teetering on the brink of a nervous break down, backed up into a corner and nervously peering from side to side.  Everyone keeps saying that I should be excited, and this is going to be an adventure, and what I’ve always dreamed of doing, and I am, don’t get me wrong, but with that excitement comes the nervous-I’m-going-to-vomit feeling and doubt.

What if I can’t do it?

What if I fail?

I’m terrified of failing, ending up homeless and living on a bench in Boston Common.  What would I even do?  I would be pitiful.  Thankfully, my friend live there and I hope hope hope that they wouldn’t let me become destitute and a bum, (how would I write the Awesome Blog?!?!?!?!?!?!) but you never know.

I would love to hear from any of you who’ve ever decided to just up and move away from everyone and everything you’ve ever known.  Do you have a success story? How about an epic fail?

Mystery, Inc.

This is really a short post that goes out to my Mystery, Inc. buddies.

Recently, I've discovered how much I despise going to work, so much so that I sit in my car before I get there, look up at the big white letters that spell out our name, and physically try to convince myself to get out of the car and go punch in.

Sometimes, though, I am surprised with small moments of deja vu, which reminds me why I really enjoyed working here in the first place.  My co-workers are a bunch of characters, and not just the cafe family:

Me - obviously.
Meggles - The socially awkward, but totally lovable, panicky dork.
Kymiah Dawson - The sheriff of these here parts, with her pink badge.  Love her guts.
SuperD*ve - Crazy Asian Pacific Islander.
Merejiah - I partially despise, and partially idolize.
Nai - My Friday Night buddy who is always rushing me out because "I need to get down to Rutgers."

Plus all the secondary characters like Music, the rest of the Managers, and the occasional comments from the cash wrap area like "Sunshine, maybe the announcements are better left to the professionals."

::shakes my head::

I hate going to work, but I love my crew.  They make it bearable.

Nia - Will Work for Beer!

Merejiah - Will commit evil deeds for $
>:-)

Thanks, guys. <3

Sunshine... Queen of India.

Well, Peeps.  Maybe my time here on the interwebs has come to an end.

The other morning I had to stop for gas before making the ardous trek to work.  I really despise getting gas in the morning because aside from the fact that I AM SO NOT A MORNING PERSON, there comes the part where I am still not in touch with my vocabulary *and* my morning coffee, so I am like half-a-Sunshine. 

I roll up to the pump and smile like I always do to the station attendant, because lets face it, most people aren't very nice to the gas station people.  They're always treated with disrespect and never told to 'have a nice day' or given a 'thank you' so I try to make sure I'm polite, gracious, and friendly.

I guess I'm too friendly.

The man at the gas station down the street from my house has lately been asking me a lot of personal questions like 'where do you live', 'are you in school', 'where do you work', etc.  Well, this most recent trip to the gas station he asked me whether I was married and/or had any children.  I told him definitely not. I am WAY too young for marriage. He laughed and asked if I had a boyfriend.

I said not really. I was hoping to just drive away and leave, but he wouldn't stop! "You don't get along very well?"

:::Gives the deadpan stare:::

Ummm. Right!  Well, call me a horrible lesbian, but I just went along with it.  It's not like its so easy to tell an older Indian man who gives my car the breath of life once a week that I think boys are icky, I mean come on!

(I am laughing as I type this right now.)

I said something like 'I'm just looking for the right one... A good one.'
He said 'I am looking for a good girl, too.' 

I'm pretty sure that was a proposition.  I immediately made my way out of there as fast as possible, and was creeped beyond belief, but on further reflection (and talking with my favorite jewrican), I have decided that we are in a recession and I should be ashamed of myself!  Maybe he's a King in India or something?! So, as of now, I will be planning my wedding and my future as royalty... maybe.

Or maybe not.