So all continues well here. Me and Corrie moved a great deal of her stuff yesterday (including a fun trip with half of her bed frame hanging out of my care window), and then afterwards Mike and Jacob came by to see the place. We all headed out to the Irish pub down the street (after some fun drama with Mike's trunk...poor Mike). Much fun was had by all. Aaron ended up in the area and met with us there, as well as some of Corrie's friends, so we all had a great time. So we ended up with quite a full house last night, but it was great.

Today some of Corrie's buds have been helping her with the last few items of moving, and I've just kinda been taking it easy to get over the remaining sickness. I think by Monday I'll be fine and will be ready to start painting.

In a minute I'm gonna go grab some dinner and do a bit of grocery shopping. Good times.

Surprise! You know you can't keep me away from my blog. Well, I got moved in with no difficulty. Still way too damn early to be up, but whatever. I feel right at home already here, just with the few things I brought with me. My phone's been off the hook today too...Jeremiah called and WILL be able to help me move the big stuff next weekend (Yay, I love my big brother!). Corrie called as soon as I stepped into our place, so we chatted for awhile about apartment related goodies. Then Derek called. And then John. So I feel freakin' popular today.

And then...score...someone has an unprotected wireless network in the building, so I'm soaking up the free bandwidth until we get ours set up. Which is next week, so I don't feel bad.

I've decided I'm not going to the show tonight. My head is still aching with the sinus infection, and even though today's been good, I'm not gonna push it considering how bad the rest of the week has been, heh.

Now, for the real good news of the day: I heard back from the Wolly Mammoth Theatre in DC and I'm on their electricians' list! My first gig is on the 22nd. Their ME, Sarah, seems to be really nice so far...she even told me that she forwarded my resume on to a friend at the freakin' Kennedy Center of all places, who is looking for an ME for a small traveling show. Not sure if I want to tour so soon, but hey...it's the Kennedy Center.

So now I'm just chilling here on my blanket and munching on some Terra chips. I went to the Giant next door and picked up some food for the next few days. Do you know how nice it was to fill out that little bonus card form with my new address? Daaaamn nice.

*takes a deep breath* Ok. Things seem to have settled down now. Corrie called earlier today and I think we got some mutual "ARGGHHHH!" time in, which helped lower my stress level. I also got our electric bill taken care of as well as updating my health insurance today. And Corrie's right - a lot of this other stuff doesn't have to be done right this week, so I have returned to my couch and fluffy blanket and will worry about packing later when I feel better. I've pretty much gotten together everything I need for the next week, so tomorrow morning I'll throw my futon pad and a few boxes of stuff in my car and go.

I'll spend this week doing whatever other things need to be done - change my liscense, change my voter registration, car insurance, getting the LLC set up, get a new PO box...all sorts of stuff. But most of that is relatively easy, and as long as I'm not doing physical labor for a few days, I'll be ok. :-)

I'll be coming back into town next Thursday evening. So I'll talk to you guys then.

Song of the Day: Concrete - "Topaz" www.myspace.com/concreteband

Jesus Christ can things get any worse?

Ok, I was sent three phone numbers. The first one (Gas) was a wrong number. Ok, moving on. The second one (Cable) doesn't provide service in our area. *blinks* Ok, I'll try elsewhere. The third (Telephone) does provide internet, so I start setting it up to be foiled by the fact that they accept payments in credit card format ONLY (no checks, no debit cards) and so I now have to wait on that until mine gets here next week. I at least found the gas company's website and applied for a change in billing that way, so hopefully that works.

*slams head on desk*

Oi. So plan five or so is now in effect. Since I can't move on Saturday now either, I'm now pushing it off until Monday. I guess I'll rent a truck in Ashburn early Monday morning, drive back down here, load it myself, and drive back. I should have enough time to get everything moved and drop it off in time to not be charged for two days. I guess we'll see how things go.

My sinus infection has evolved into the flu. I was up all night throwing up.

FINALLY just got the contact info to get the bills put in our name, so once my phone finishes charging I'm going to take care of that and hope they don't cut anything off on us in the meantime.

Metal allergy exploded on me this week, too, so I need to go stop my arm from bleeding now.

I hate my life.

Well, I woke up early and got a lot taken care of. Ran by the post office and got some promo packs sent off for HITL, then to the pharmacy, and then got everything situated with my new bank.

Still running into more road blocks with the move though. This is getting really old. At this rate I think I'm going to be sleeping on the floor for the next month.

Tried to pack some more but I have a terrible headache and fever now, so I give up. I guess all I really need to do now is just pack up what I absolutely need, and leave the remaining for later.

Good news is I heard from my old man today. :-) That made me happy. I miss him a lot, but hopefully I can see him soon.

So after feeling severely depressed about things, I decided to call it quits on packing for tonight after finishing with my clothes and computer stuff. Instead I've been working on some other stuff, and that's made me feel better. January is when I'll be starting the first RAM Compilation ablum. I've worked out that I'll make a little over a grand on that project, which will in turn fund larger album pressings. So it begins...

I'm also going out tomorrow to open a new bank account and get a credit card so that I have all of that ready, too. That makes me feel a bit more in control.

So, now, I'm drinking a beer, snuggled under one of my new kitty blankets, watching Love Actually, and thinking about the cute blonde boy I'm missing.

Packing continues. I woke up feeling even worse this morning, so it hasn't really been pleasant, but I've gotten a lot done. I at least feel like I've made it pass the halfway mark now. Got a lot of my "decorative" stuff put away, so that really made a lot of difference. The only really major battles left are my clothes, shoes, and some office supplies. I'm gonna bring all my clothes down tonight so I can start washing tomorrow. I'm in the middle of packing all my computers and related stuff too, so I'll try to get that done tonight as well.

The unfortunate part is I've checked and found that I can't tow a large enough trailer with my car. I'm going to have to get a truck. I desperately need someone to drive it for me, because I have to take my car with me too, obviously. So that's the next obstacle I need to figure out.

My parents are being totally unsupportive about that. So I think what I'm going to have to do is just move all I definately need on Thursday in my car, sign the lease and all that, and then head over for the show since I really can't not go. I suppose over the weekend I can come back down here, rent the truck, take everything back up with me, then drive the truck all the way back down here and turn it back in, and get my car and go. Gonna be bad with the gas mileage, but there's really not much other choice at this point.

All in all, I'm really tired and just want to sleep. This is turning out to be about the worst week I've had in a very long time.

So today wasn't too bad. Telling the extended family went ok. My mom acted like I had dropped this on her two days ok, but I clearly explained to them afterwards that this has been a long time in the making, and that I had even handed in my resignation before her damn surgery. The only one I worry about is my grandma. She offered to come live with me and cook my meals. I love my Nannie!

Apparently making felt blankets is a theme in my family, because I ended up with yet another one today from my aunt...also a cute kitten fabric. Hehe. Also got a gift card to Hot Topic. Rock.

Tonight I've just been playing around with some music stuff and trying to keep myself distracted. I'm going to start a new branch of RAM in a few months dedicated to goth/industrial specifically in the mid atlantic region. I've also been working on my own music some more. I've gotten about half of Planetary Alignment written, and most of the next album (as yet unnamed) is done, since that's really comprised mostly of songs and demos I've done throughout the years. It might even be that I finish that album first. I guess we'll see. I downloaded the new version of Audacity, and wow. I'm really impressed. A lot more features than the original. Can't believe it's a free program. Rock again.

Song of the Day: Concrete - "Planet X" www.myspace.com/concreteband

Wheeeee! So I got my LCD projector and my cd shelving, both of which are awesome. Then guess what my mom found for me? Jacob, you're gonna love this: a back massaging sqooosh pillow! You can attatch it to your computer chair. I can't wait. I also got replenished with make-up and perfume (I love those little sampler things), and also a really soft black scarf. Then my mom also made me a soft felt throw blanket with cute kittens on it. :-)

So I'm just taking a break here before we get ready to go over to my aunts house. Can't wait for the food!

Ok, Merry Christmas...for real this time:

Love you guys

Merry Fucking Christmas.

No, I'll take that back. It's not that bad, really, in the end. Today's been really stressful, but as I sit here now I'm starting to find peace again. After all, tomorrow is a day where we're reminded that there's Something bigger than all of this.

So as some of you know, the cat's out of the bag, per se. This all started yesterday, and it seems like now there's no way out or of denying it.

I stand by what I've done. Who would I be if I put love and compassion beneath fear of societal reprimand? And like I told one close friend...how the hell have we become a people who think that caring about someone could ever be wrong anyways?

I love you and I will never forget you. Besides, this topaz is the same color as your eyes. :-)

Well, I was able to get out of the house for awhile last night, which was good. I was feeling a little better, so I went over to Joe's and we watched the Family Guy movie. Camille stopped by for a few minutes, so that was cool too. Good times.

I'm kinda down about something that I can't really talk about here. I hope it gets resolved. This was a lousy time for it to happen, right before Xmas. I'm kinda scared, honestly. :-(

Have I mentioned yet that I hate this time of year? I really do. I need to get to Monday already...better yet, to Thursday.

Who wants to help me load my trailer Thursday morning? I'll feed you if you come. On that note, who in NoVA wants to help me unload Thursday afternoon? I'll feed you, too.

So today I've been completely worthless. God I hate being sick. This is the absolute worst time it could have happened. I need to get the fuck out of here. And as far as I know, we STILL don't have a move in date yet. Looks like the Birthday Massacre / This Means You / In Tenebris show is out unless I crash with someone else. Gah. I really need to be at that show. I'm tired of having to put my career on hold over and over and over again because of being in the wrong place. It also makes setting up the LLC impossible since I have to have my address first. *sigh*

My dad is sitting on the couch next to me and grinding his jaw, and it's driving me insane.

I spent the first part of the day at least attempting to be productive on work stuff. I put together some promo packs for HITL, then have been working on the new shop for RAM. It's not up yet, but it's gonna be a lot better organized than what I have now. I've split everything up into music, clothing, and equipment catagories on seperate pages. On the music page I'm gonna feature RAM exclusives at the top (like the comp cds, bands I fund, etc.) with the rest below. Then on the clothing page I've got both new merch for RAM and other bands will be selling stuff as well. Finally the equipment page features a lot of that rejected cables and cases I got from work. So...if all goes well...money will start rolling in soon.

Song of the Day: Orgy - "Social Enemies" www.punkstatikparanoia.com

Packing continues. I spent a good part of the day in the basement, repacking a lot of the things I brought home from college. Almost got through all of that today, but I was interrupted by two things: one, I have a sinus infection AGAIN (I just did this a month ago), and two, our furnace died. As if my room wasn't already a toasty 53 degrees on average with the heat on, it's now probably around freezing without it. So it looks like the next time I'll sleep in my bed is after I move, because we can't get the furnace fixed until after Christmas. Good thing for fluffy couches.

Tomorrow's goal is to finish the basement packing, pack my desktop computers and disassemble my computer desk, and to find the bolts that go to my futon.

So basically I've been going through a few boxes of school work, dating back to even high school. I'm going through and reading all of these bitchy comments from my teachers and thinking "Oh yeah...if you could see me now..." How empowering. Here's my big "F You!" to Linda, Joyce, and Fred. Oh that's right. We're on a first name basis now, bitches.

I have been living for these days for so long now.

"Welcome home," she said to me
"Let's hide away before they see.
I need so much to be alone with you
I do, I do..."
"Come with me." She took my hand
"Please try to help me understand."
So pointless when my heart has turned to stone
I know, I know...
I wish I didn't need you now
And I wish I didn't need you now
I wish I didn't need you now
I need you now, I need you now
"I wish we could," she whispered near
"Go someplace far away from here."
While hoping that small voice would disappear
That said "Welcome to the end..."

Taking a little break here while I'm working; I've been going through my stuff today and pretty much throwing half of it out...old clothes, random stuff, old books...I suppose I'll make a trip to Goodwill soon and try to get a tax write off for a lot of it. I've also started boxing up a lot of things...music stuff, theatre stuff, etc. Trying to keep everything together and organized. I'm actually finding a lot of good stuff as I clean up, things that I can use for the business. Office supplies, stamps, stuff like that. So I've definately got a lot to work with.

I had some good luck last night, too. I found a few jobs I applied for up in NoVA. One is a theatre in DC looking for overhire electricians, and the other is a production company looking for a/v technicians with experience in theatre, corporate, and music - and that's so me. So, hopefully, the overhire work will start rolling in as soon as I get up there.

So I'm feeling a lot better about that stuff in regards to the move, though I get the feeling that something important to me here is now falling apart out of the blue. It just makes me sad when I feel like I'm being avoided now...and I don't know why? :-(

Song of the Day: Celldweller - "Welcome To The End" www.celldweller.com

So I'v been spending the evening updating RAM a bit. I redid my google ads to try to make it fit in better with the site design, and to generate more clicks and therefore more revenue. Granted, I've only made about $5 over the last year through them, but I hope that will improve. Hey, that's one beer, right?

EDIT: As soon as I finished my bitching about credit ratings, Corrie called and told me we got the apartment! Yay! But I am still going to make sure I get a credit card and take out a small loan this year, just to make sure I don't freak out in the future.

In other news, my family continues to drive me nuts. To make things more difficult, my dad has to go back to work tomorrow, so I'm now stuck taking care of my mom starting tomorrow. I'm not trying to be selfish, but this is the absolute worst time for this to happen. I'm not sure they fully realize that in approximately two weeks I'm going to be gone and they're gonna have to figure out a new way to take care of things. I have a feeling that this is going to get ugly very fast, and probably right around Christmas when I have to tell the extended family that I'm leaving. As if I weren't already the black sheep of this family.

Still trying to get some work lined up for when I move. Talking about some website stuff; working on some management ideas. Then Corrie just sent me a cool ad for a new magazine for indie music in DC, so I just applied to be a writer for them...since I already write reviews it's no extra work, and it'd be extra visibility for me. Eventually they might even pay, so that would be cool.

I miss my man, too. We were supposed to hang out today but it never happened. Lousy timing for that...I really could have used some time off and a distraction. Welcome to my life, eh?

Today was great. I got a cute email from my man this morning, so we headed to the mall this afternoon for awhile. I got most of my Christmas shopping done, and me and him had a nice lunch. But really, what I really wanted to say is...

...he bought me a ring.

Yeah, a big, beautiful blue topaz (my birth stone). I'll post a pic later, because he made me promise not to wear it until Christmas, lol. So cute! He's such a sweetie...I'm going to miss him so much, but hopefully I'll still get to see him every once in awhile once I go up to NoVA. *cuddles and loves*

I've had a good day for business, too. There's a fairly large e-zine that contacted me about possibly doing an article about my site. I think that'd be really awesome. Also, a friend of mine is starting her own clothing line, so I may be doing a paid site for her. Then I may have a good in for getting HITL to play a big show in Cleveland soon. So, yeah, a very good day. :-)

First of all, I have to say this while watching the presidential address (even though it's overrunning the new episode of Family Guy) to the nation: George W Bush, I really respect you for admitting that the intelligence on the WMD's in Iraq was wrong. Never thought I would have heard that from you, and I think it takes a real man to do that. I may not agree with the war still, but I feel better about having you as my president.

In other news, last night was great. Me and Camille chilled at AA's for awhile, then headed over and met up with Joe, his cousin Matt, and Bess for awhile. After a few beers we decided to head over to Denny's for some late night snacks. Hahaha, how awesome! We ended up with this dude Marc as our waiter - Joe and Nad had had him before, and he's crazy awesome. He reminds me a lot of Mike, actually - very friendly and impulsive. If I could fall in love with someone based on a few minutes in a late night diner, it would be this guy. Hehehe...very cute.

Today's been pretty chill...my grandma and my aunt and uncle came over after lunch to visit my mom. I briefly mentioned something about packing while they were over at which point in time my mom glared at me. I don't know why she's so intent on making me wait until Christmas to tell the family I'm leaving. First of all, it's only 3.5 hours up the road, and secondly...uh...I don't think springing this on everyone on Christmas is the best idea. Well, you know my family and dramatics.

Ok, so tomorrow I'm gonna finish Christmas shopping no matter how long it takes me. Then I suppose either tomorrow or Tuesday I'll start packing, for real. I *sorta* started today by at least working out what I need to take immediately, what I need to just pack for later on, etc. I actually don't have too much to take with me overall, but I still need to box up everything for either later, or for when my parents decide to move out of here. *sigh* So much to do...

I need to get out of this house. I've been home for the last few days while my mom was in the hospital to answer the phone, receive packages, all that stuff. And now that she's home me and my dad have to take turns being around. At first I welcomed the chance to stay in my PJ's all day and play online, but I'm already restless to the point of madness. I am, however, going down to AA's in Salem in a few minutes to meet up with Camille and possibly others for some drinks, so that should calm my nerves. Later we'll probably head over to Joe's...he just quit his job, so his house has again become party central.

Christmas shopping continues on the downward spiral. Finally found something for my dad, but still need something for my mom, for a few friends, and...gah...for my old man. What do I buy a guy who has enough money to buy himself anything he wants, plus make sure it's innocent enough to not arouse suspicion if found by a certain someone else? *bangs head on keyboard*

I got my new contacts yesterday after a very uncomfortable eye doctor visit, *Warning - for any of you who have a quesy stomach concerning eye exams, scroll down to the next paragraph.* I've got a new doc whose a lot nicer than the old, but he did this new thing, which makes sense, but was awful - he basically flipped my eyelids inside out to check for wear from my contacts. Gah. Worst feeling ever. I know hate my eye appointments worse than my dentist appointments.

I really need to start packing. Like, tomorrow. I think I've been putting it off not because my room is so full of shit, but really because it's so damn cold in here. Winter was a lousy choice for me to move.

Anyways, off to AA's. Feel free to drop by.

Song of the Day: Celldweller - "Welcome To The End" www.celldweller.com

I think at about 11am the city gave up on trying to plow. I guess you can't do anything really with this much ice. Good news is that we never lost power or anything, so I spent today working on some more music stuff, and in general chilling out. Nice to have a bit of a break. Except I'm out of Dr. Pepper. I'm going into caffeine withdrawl.

My mom is still in the hospital. Even though surgery went fine...well...I'm not gonna say the rest, but she's becoming more like my grandfather everyday.

After I wrote yesterday, none other than Mike T. himself gave me a call, which was awesome because I had been wondering where he'd dropped off to. So I talked to him about my move and all sorts of other things, and we had a really nice conversation. And while we're talking about people coming back from the edge of the earth, I found Lance online, too, for the first time in about two weeks. Though I guess with how crazy everyone's lives are these days, it makes sense that we all have to fall away for awhile.

Tomorrow morning I've got my eye appointment - finally - definately need some new contacts.

Ahhh...spending my afternoon drinking some Cap'n Mo on the rocks and designing promo packs...see, this is why I quit my job. This is definately much more fun. And the promo packs are coming out even better than I thought. Right now I'm just doing a stripped down version for HITL...they have such a great sound, but really never paid enough attention to image or content. I was able to get Tom to send me a really nice bio though, and I've dressed up a good live pic to use instead of a promo shot until they get that taken care of. So that pic and bio dressed with a good use of album imagery and the band logo have given me a good start. I'm currently working on trying to get the album reviewed at a few places so that I can expand the pack in the next few months. But trying to find industrial webzines that haven't died in the last few months is like trying to find the beer at a frat party. A lot of the really reputable zines have suddenly gone out of business, literally within the last few weeks. So that's disappointing, but I'm still looking.

I guess that also means RAM is now one of the top active zines now. Allllriiiight.

I also had a nice lunch with my boy today. I'm happy I've been able to see him so much lately. He's so sweet. He's the one who treated me to my bottle of rum, lol. Definately gonna miss this one.

In other news, my mom is having her surgery today. My dad called a little while ago and said she was out of the OR now. Said everything went well, so she should be home tomorrow. I think either tomorrow or Friday I have to drive her up to Lynchburg. One of our friends' father died, so we need to go to the funeral. I have a feeling I'm going to run into some people I'd rather not see, but I guess now's as good a time as ever to put even older business behind me.

*stretch* Just got back home from Richmond. Heretics was playing up there last night, so I headed up for that (sporting my new and awesome boots for the first time)/ I had a good time, even though I was really preoccupied with so many other things going on. I sat and talked with Tom awhile about some management and general band stuff, so that was a lot of fun. I also met the lead singer from In Tenebris and chatted with her for awhile, as well as a few other cool people. The show itself was good, though I think there were some issues with the house PA. I guess you take what you can get.

Afterwards I crashed at Lee and Molly's house - wow, they have a really great place! They got a cool older place that they're fixing up...it looks really nice, and of course Lee is tripping it out with all of his electronics. Very cool.

Now I'm just eating some mint ice cream and waiting for my man to drop me a line. :-)

So the day was interesting. After sleeping in I went X-mas shopping to NO avail...didn't find ANYTHING I was looking for. I really hate that...so I guess maybe I'll go out next week and try again. I went down to Blacksburg to do some thrifting (wish I had had more time because the Y was having a bag sale, but I didn't have time to look for stuff for myself) and then went over to T-rex and X-roads for what would probably the last time in awhile. While I was there I went ahead and picked up Jacob's new album (because he's awesome like that and has them in stores), and then met the music man himself for dinner.

Much fun was had, even if our fortune cookies didn't have any fortunes in them. Creepy.

Got home to find a few messages on my new myspace profile, one of which from a cool band in the DC area wanting to talk to me about some work, so I guess the party is now started.

So now I'm just taking it easy, drinking some Rum N' Coke, watching the extended version of Harry Potter 1, and waiting for my man to get online. :-)

EDIT: Can't believe I forgot this, but look what Jake got me for my birthday:

Oh yeah, that's right. It's a reproduction of Snape's wand. Rowr.

Song of the Day: Jacob Bock - "Enough" www.firewalkingmusic.com

*contented sigh* Life continues to be good. DOM woke me up with a cute phone call, so we headed out to Olive Garden for a nice lunch. Afterwards I spent a few minutes helping him Christmas shop; he couldn't stay long, but it was nice just taking 20 minutes and being able to hold his hand while walking around the mall, or sneaking in a kiss on the escalators. Brings back my faith in the Christmas season. It was a total Love Actually moment, lol. :-)

This afternoon I've been working on more promo for my business. Really trying to reach out and get the attention of local bands in the DC area. So we'll see how that goes.

Song of the Day: Celldweller - "Stay With Me (Unlikely)" www.celldweller.com

So it's nice to chill out now, lol! I had a lot of fun up north and am still really excited. I managed to make it back here before the bad weather started; in fact my old man called me on the way home to make sure I had gotten on the road early enough, lol. He's so sweet. Me and him are going out for lunch tomorrow, so that makes me happy! I just hope the weather isn't too bad.

So I'm just catching up on RAM stuff before I risk losing power, lol.

This week has been good! Last night me and Corrie checked out a very awesome place, so that put us in good spirits...today wasn't as good, either for me and my individual endeavors (fuck Manassas and it's bassackwards roads - but thank you Jacob for the instant mapqesting!) or for the other places we checked into. Buuut...that first condo is really awesome! So we think we're gonna go with that. It's very affordable, a GREAT layout, and in a really nice area. So we're gonna go ahead and look into that, and hopefully get this ball rolling. We went out tonight (as it's her birthday) and just talked and talked about paint colors for the place (oh that's right...we got permission to repaint that apartment), furniture, room themes, stuff we're gonna do, people we're gonna meet...this is gonna be so much fun. Tonight was kinda like a preview of that...we were only at the bar for a few hours in the early evening but had more drinks bought for us than we payed for ourselves, plus had TWO guys try to buy us more as we were leaving. Haha, it's fun to be hot girls.

So home I go tomorrow. Once I get back I need to commence packing. Next week I need to go ahead and get an appointment set up with my CPA. So much stuff to do, but god I feel great doing it.

Since it snowed I stayed in today doing some much needed work - got a lot of newer photos processed, and even istalled a new photo gallery program which I'm now using for photos on RAM. It's still kind of a bare design at the moment, but it'll be much nicer soon.

And I just got my boots today! Yay! Missing my man though...was hoping he'd come over and play in the snow with me, lol. ;-)

Anyways, I guess tomorrow I'll do my errands - gotta take my car in, need to call the doctor...then up to NoVA I go! I think I've found a few places online, so I'll head over and check on those. To make things more interesting, they have an open position at a community college 9 miles away from where I'll probably be moving that's the same thing I just gave up here. So...maybe I'll go ahead and apply for that so that I can have something steady. I dunno. Corrie was asking me about that the other day, and I really want to not have to rely on another job. But I guess I may have to. Perhaps I won't make a decision until I see just how much it really is gonna cost me to do all of this.

Song of the Day: The theme song from 'Love Actually'

So B's party was good. Didn't get a chance to meet up with my old man, but such is life I guess. I ran by the post office on my way out and had a HUGE box from Collide - they sent me their new DVD and live CD, as well as about 1000 postcards to give out. So that's mega awesome.

In other new, D1 opened up their new forums. I think it's kinda insane how in such a short amount of time I forgot how rediculous things can get there at times. Only been open for about a day and already people are doing dumb things. The only thing I can think of is that if people are this emotionally vulnerable online, I'd hate to see how spastic they are in real life. I swear, I have never seen this much drama on ANY other forum.

Well, tomorrow I'm gonna go take my car in for a few things, provided it doesn't snow. Then Tuesday I'm going up north to stay with Corrie and find an apartment. It's also her birthday, so I'm sure we will have loads of fun, too. So I'm very excited about all that. So wish me luck in finding a place!

And the updates continue...

Last night continued in the awesome catagory. Got to Blacksburg and had lots of buds drop in and out of the Cellar last night. Honestly I had been a little worried because I don't know a whole hell of a lot of people left there, but so many people did come out and that made me feel really good. So, yay, and thanks to all of you who did (for all 3 nights in fact).

So we kicked around there for awhile, but it got really crowded and people had other plans, so me and Aaron ended up going over to the LGBTA Aids Awareness dance party - which was TOTALLY awesome - and hung out with some of his buds and danced for awhile. For those of you who don't know, Aaron was one of my ex's from high school - one of those cute ones that you didn't really get to spend enough time with while you had the chance. So it was really cool to hang out with him all night. We've been talking a lot lately and he knew I was a bit worried about some people that might have come by, so he especially made me feel, well, safe I guess. So I really appreciated that.

After the dance we went back out to the Underground where some people had wandered over to and shot some darts and drank some more until last call. Good times!

Today hasn't quite been as good. Not bad, just kind of disappointing. First of all, yesterday, I didn't get my cool ass boots that my man had bought me. Got delayed somehow, so I didn't get them in time for the show. But that ended up not mattering anyways, because I drove all the way up to C-ville (in the freezing rain and ice, mind you) to find that the show had been cancelled because someone threw a brick through 51 Peg's van windshield earlier today. So that blowed...I could have stayed for the other band (who I hadn't heard of) but the weather was still bad, so I just turned around and came back. The good thing is that I was back early enough to make it to Jeff's B-day party, so I ran out to the bowling alley and chilled with them for a bit. Except that everyone's a punk and had finished drinking before I got there, lol. :-)

Anyways...tomorrow is my ex-boss' big Christmas party, so I'll be going to that for awhile and will hopefully see my old man there. And that makes me happy. :-D

Pictures from all 3 nights of drunken shenanigans coming soon...

The week continues to be good...yesterday afternoon I ran some errands, including going to the bank, where apparently they will give you a scented candle on your birthday. Who would have known? I also met up with my old man for lunch, and that was really nice. I love spending time with him. :-)

Last night a bunch of us went out to AA's as planned for some good times. Our waitress was awesome and totally hooked us up...I like that bar more and more everytime I go down there. After awhile we decided not to continue to suffer through the band playing, so we all headed over to Joe's for some Family Guy. Was out waaay too late, but like I have anything better to do!

Heather called this morning so we went thrifting for awhile this afternoon. I didn't find any clothes, but I did find a very cool gothic wallmount candle holder, AND...you're gonna love this...a 5 peice Harry Potter Christmas ornament set! And yes, one of the minatures is Snape. :-)

Tonight I'll be heading down Blacksburg of course for party #3: The Cellar at 10pm. Several people have already said they'd drop by, so I'm looking forward to that.

Overall I am feeling soooo much better. I had been really stressed out lately, especially at the beginning of this week, but on Wednesday things just started to bleed away. I have this kind of closure 'ritual' I guess whenever I leave a place. There are always certain places or certain rooms that I feel like I've spent a lot of time in, poured a lot of emotional energy into. So I usually will take some time and just sit down quietly for awhile in those places and kind of reflect on the things that had passed in that room. I had two specific areas at work that held a lot of memories for me, and as I sat in each on Wednesday and thought about some of the events of the past, I felt a very welcomed sense of peace.

Like I wrote the other day, I think that I've done the best I could do in any situation that's come up along the way. I'm sad that in the end, a lot of the relationships I've had have ended less than perfectly, but I realize...you know...this is what I have. This is what I have here. It's all over now, there's nothing left to fight for and nothing left to grieve. It may not have been the best few years, but I've had some great experiences, and all of these things have made me who I am today. And they've made me ready for what I'm getting ready to do.

My old man keeps asking me if I'm ok, and how I'm doing. And I am doing just fine. I've got a new sense of energy and excitement. I've got things planned out, new things happening. I feel like I regained control of my life again yesterday.

Song of the Day: Life In Exile - "Ayn Rand" www.myspace.com/lifeinexile1

I'm FREE!

So my last day at work was pretty uneventful. Said goodbye to some folks, and then headed on over to Macado's for party #1 of the week. Had a pretty good stream of people come through and I think everyone had a lot of fun and some good drinks.

I got home kinda late but my dad was still up and gave me my birthday present early. Guess who is now the proud owner of a black iPod nano? *points to self* Allllllllriiiiiiiiight!

So today I'm meeting up with my old man for lunch, then running a few errands. Tonight's party is at Awful Arthur's in Salem at 9, though we might be getting there early to play some pool.

In other news, I'm really excited because a cool band who had originally not seemed to have been interested in RAM is now asking to be a part of the site. So that's nice to know that I'm starting to turn some heads that I hadn't before. :-)

Song of the Day: Plumb - "I Can't Do This" www.myspace.com/plumb