Hard Times

So it's obviously no news to anyone that the economy sucks and everyone is having hard times. I may have a job, own my home, and have a car but I, like many others, suddenly found myself accumulating credit card debt. Now for me, it was a personal decision that started the majority of what I currently owe. When Quentin, my kitty, was diagnosed with cancer there was absolutely no pause in whether or not I should treat him. I took a deep breath and handed over my little piece of plastic, same way I do every time he goes in for blood work, an ultrasound, or when I need to refill his prescriptions. On Wednesday he goes in for an ultrasound and if everything goes according to plan he'll be weaned off the chemo and be done with his treatment. But really, this blog isn't about Quentin, it's about people begging for money...

The other day I was walking through the parking lot of Fred Meyer back to my car when a guy in his early to mid-twenties approached me and said that he was really sorry to ask but he was running late to pick up his daughter but he was out of gas and did I have a couple dollars I could give him so he could get her. I said my usual "Sorry, I don't carry cash" and kept on walking. Here's the thing. Tonight I was walking through the parking lot at Target to my car - same guy, same line. I shook my head, laughed, and said "You just used the same line on me two days ago at Fred Meyer." He just mumbled something about how he was supposed to get paid and his check didn't come and blah blah blah. I work hard for my money - so hard for it honey! I work two jobs, six sometimes seven days a week. I'm sorry, I understand that jobs are hard to come by right now but asking me to *give* you my hard earned cash in what turns out to obviously be a scam is redunkulous.

Working in downtown Seattle and waiting for the bus I run into a lot of people asking for "spare change". I've been known to give my leftover lunch to someone sitting on the street, but I will almost never give money. The only exception to that is kids. I know that for kids it's different. For some of course it's just the rebelling and the drugs and the getting away from the parents...but for others it's because there really does seem like there's nowhere to turn. Whether it's abuse, having a family that doesn't accept your sexual orientation, whatever...those are times where I know often the streets seem a lot more appealing than foster care or some of the other options. I still don't like to give money, there's always the thought that it'd be used towards something along the lines of drugs, alcohol, or cigarettes, but the kids I feel a lot worse for because I know that usually it means they've been through something pretty bad.

Don't get me wrong, I know homelessness can happen to anyone. Volunteering at the United Way Community Outreach last year was heartbreaking and eyeopening. Homelessness can be unavoidable - but begging for money is always a choice.

Christmas Countdown!

In just over six weeks I will be on my way to spend a week with my mommy. I'm soooo excited to get to see her and spend Christmas with her and my step-dad. On the one hand, it was a really hard decision to make - either spend the first Christmas ever without my mom or the first Christmas without my sister. I'm still reallly sad and actually kinda upset over us not all being together for the first time in my life. Christmas is my very favorite time of year - the food, the decorations, the music...but most of all the family. The only way I could even really make my decision was knowing that I can see my sister much more often than I have chances to see my mom and my sister will have her husband, daughter, and baby 2.0 to spend Christmas with. My mom of course has my step-dad so it's not like she would be alone, but I know that she was pretty upset as well about not getting to see any of us. It'll be hard celebrating the holiday without everyone around and I know that if it was possible for them my sister's family would have traveled to Montana with me. I'm just going to try to focus on the fact that with my mom moving to the Wenatchee area in the spring that next Christmas we'll all get to be together for sure!

I don't know why I'm smiling...

Wow, so last night I slept for 16 hours pretty much straight through. Then I took a nap this afternoon for almost another 4 hours. I'm seriously going to try and call my sleep doctor this week because I should *not* be sleeping this much!

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Anyways, now for my real bloggy for today:

Don't ask me why but I'm really kinda at peace with the situation with "the boy" right now. Yesterday I caught myself just smiling kinda goofy while thinking of him... Even though he said he was going to come and see me "soon" before he left for rehab and the last time I've heard anything from him was on Halloween I'm just...calm. I know there are three basic options for what happened.

1.) He went overboard knowing he's about to go into rehab and he od'd, got in an accident, etc.

• Obviously this would be incredibly horrible but if that's what happened I will never know.

2.) He decided not to go to rehab and is still using.

• If that's the case I can't have anything to do with him anyways.

3.) He went to rehab without saying goodbye.

• While that would be sad, in a way I can understand.

The first two options of course mean never seeing him again, the last however does have some options of hope. I don't feel like I'm blindly holding on to the possibility of a relationship...I'm not going to put my own life on the back burner waiting for him, but part of this calm is a sense of knowing that I will see him again. I know that a lot of my thinking on the situation has to do with past relationships with addicts/users. Not just romantic relationships but friends and even family. I know that when someone is using they're not concerned about anyone but themselves. Promises they've made, obligations, the "right" thing to do...none of that matters to someone who's more concerned about when they'll get their next drink and how to numb the pain.

So here I am smiley and just kinda moving along with my life. Because here's the thing - while everyone thinks I've got my shit together, truth is I don't. And maybe, crazy as it all seems, I can get my shit together while whoever it is I'm meant to be with gets their shit together and then we'll come together with our nice clean shit ;)

*Zzzzzzzzz*

I've been asleep since 7:30 tonight. Just got up when my cell phone alarm went off so I could take my Rx's. Back to bed. So sleepy.

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Yes, I'm aware this barely counts as a blog for NaBloWriMo

So Disappointed!

I hate when I go shopping actually planning on spending a decent amount of $ (for me anyways) and walk out not even spending $20. I seriously need some new jeans and sweaters because I only have two pairs of jeans that fit right now and not many warm tops. I have another two pairs of "skinny" jeans but well, my skinny days are few and far between right now. I've got a couple good winter sweaters but a lot of my ones from last year are starting to look really pilly and worn. So, I went to Old Navy tonight with the plan of buying 2-3 pairs of jeans and a couple sweaters. I can usually get jeans there on clearance plus I had my 30% Stuff & Save coupon. Unfortunately the sweater situation was crap - nothing cute at all! And there were almost *no* jeans on clearance, there was only one style I thought was cute and they were still $18.99. So I grabbed them, a top that was on sale, a cutie pair of grey corduroys, and another style of jeans that were also on sale. Now normally at Old Navy I wear either an XL or XXL top depending on fit and a size 10 in jeans. In fact, the jeans I was wearing today were a size 10 and I absolutely must wear a belt with them or they're falling off halfway through the day. The top I tried on was an XL and I was swimming in it! I didn't even bother grabbing a L to try on because it was obviously just not cut to fit right. The corduroys weren't cut for my body type - the waist fit fine but since I basically have no hips and thinner thighs they were super baggy in those areas. The clearance jeans I had grabbed were actually a 12 but were so skin tight I could barely breathe. Lastly I tried on the sale jeans, the 12 was a little snug but I know how Old Navy jeans stretch out so I decided to get them. The price tag said $34.50 but they were on a rack with a sale sign for $25. When I took them to the register they rang up full price - luckily I always know to watch the register at Old Navy because half the time sale stuff doesn't actually ring up at the lower price. I said that they should be on sale and ended up even walking the clerk over to the display that clearly said "Diva Flare Cut Distressed Jeans $25 - Normally $34.50". She agreed they should be on sale and called across to her manager to do a price override. Well, this other clerk grabbed my jeans out of her hands and said "No, these are SUPER Flares. They're not on sale". I quickly pointed out that they were the *only* style of jean on that rack and so had to be the sale style. Then I had to walk the manager over and show her and finally got my stupid jeans for the sale price. And, since I'm so thrifty, I used my 30% off so got the jeans for basically half their regular price - barely worth all the trouble it took though! I definitely need a few more things to get through the winter, but at least now I have another pair of jeans!

But I waaaant it!

*sigh* it's that time of year again...the temptation of Half Yearly, Beauty Bonanza, and House Party are all before me. Now, there's not really anything here that I actually need to purchase right now but there are several things catching my eye.

I really like these Harajuku Lovers "Paley" Pumps. The heel is a little treacherous - a serious 5" - but these babies are *gorgeous* in person.

Then there's the fact that I've been searching for a new fragrance. Initially this was brought on by the fact that I wore what "the boy's" ex-wife wears...however I smelled a sample of "Very Hollywood" by Michael Kors in a magazine recently and really liked it. I started thinking about the fact that I've been wearing the same scent for nearly 10 years and maybe it really is just time for a change. I stopped by the downtown store today to smell it for real and try it on and I'm not quite decided. I do like it a lot and the bottle is beautiful but it's very different from the plain and simple Warm Vanilla Sugar that I've worn for years.

Lastly is something I'd buy just for some serious funsies. God knows where I would ever wear these Eyelashes by Shu Uemura but aren't they fabulous??

Here's me trying to justify these purchases - my extra discount expires at the end of this month. So, those fabulous shoes would only be $44. Beauty Bonanza is in two weeks and that means a much larger Beauty/Fragrance discount than normal...so that fragrance gift set is $40 and the eyelashes only $13. In a way I could buy all three items for less than the shoes originally cost!

Umm...we're counting this as Nov 3rd!

So of course this post is going to show the 4th since it's after midnight, but I'm counting this as my Nov 3rd post so I can still count it as a blog-a-day!

Anyways, today was kinda frustrating. I had a doctors appointment at 10 to try and figure out what's going on but I was running late so I called in to let them know I was going to be 10 minutes late. Luckily the Dr. actually had a 10:15 appt available so they just moved me in to that slot. Well, I got there and had to wait until 10:30 for her to see me. It's not like she could have been running behind from her 10 o'clock since that was *me*. To make it even more special she still had no idea what's wrong with me and actually went and pulled a textbook from another room and flipped through it in front of me trying to figure it out. So I wasted an hour of time just to be referred to a dermatologist that I can't even see until next week. I want to know what's going on, but obviously I hope this is all cleared up before then. Of course my step-dad is kinda freaking me out by suggesting the possibility that it's Cushing's Syndrome. Now when you look at the list of symptoms for Cushing's the majority of people could probably check off "yes" to most of them so I'm definitely not convinced that's what's going on but it still is kinda weirding me out. I guess if the dermatologist can't figure it out I'll ask if it's possible that I have Cushing's...I don't want to seem like a hypochondriac but then again maybe everyone isn't putting all the pieces together.