And so it all starts...

anicabyss' drama zone

It's starting all over again. My blogging life in the fictional world... Otherwise, I might go crazy with all those thoughts I have bounding around my brain about things I've seen and things I wonder about. Don't mind me. I live separate lives anyway and with the initial split into animanga zone two years ago, it was a matter of time before it happened again.

Just bear with me and, as with the first separate blogging life, this blog won't be mentioned again.

For more information about how this new blog came about, you can read the first article here: "and so it continues..."

A hundred and thirteen...

The weather in this city seems to be getting hotter and hotter every week. It makes for lack of motivation if you want to go grocery shopping or jogging, or even a few steps to the mail box. A few days ago, our air conditioner's fan broke and needed to be fixed, so there was some money flying out the window. I'm hoping this heat wave doesn't keep up for too long. After August, summer should be coming to an end, so maybe we'll be getting better weather soon.

In other news, I've gone and completely reorganized my room so that it doesn't look like things explode every time someone walks in. I can finally proudly tell my parents that I have a white carpeted floor and there are no obstructions trying to get to my desk. Buying a new bed and throwing out my old high school toy bunk bed helped a lot. Because along with throwing out the old bed, I also emptied a lot hidden shoe boxes full of unneeded crap and pitched all of that as well. Following, I went through my entire wardrobe and probably got rid of fifty percent of it-- you know those clothes and outfits you WISH you could still wear from a few years back, but haven't worn since the first time you tried it on?

Things are changing around here now, so hopefully I can keep up this better habit of making my bed every day after I get up and keeping things organized. My next task will be to tackle the closet full of old college notes, textbooks and a lot more random crap. I even have plans to reorganize our kitchen drawers-- but that's for a while later on.

And then, maybe I can even learn how to be more social with people I normally don't hang out with. Since my two closest friends are no longer "right down the street and around the corner", I've been spending more than enough time sitting around at home and trying to come up with things to do. Granted, I'm really, really good at finding things to do on my own, I kind of miss going out to eat and haven't even tasted expensive dining since I last visited my friend in Georgia in March. However, my work schedule is also going through some changes, so even if I wanted to go out to eat, it's not going to be an easy task.

I guess you can't always win, right? Wanting more hours just means I socialize less. Wanting to socialize more would require sacrificing hours, which means giving up the chance to make money. Decisions... Decisions...

Right now, I think my big thing is saving money. After dropping a good sum for a couple items around the house, like a new bed and fixing broken appliances, I'm starting to feel the lash of needing to have a savings account.

Anyway... happy heated weather. Maybe it'll storm sometime and bring the heat down. It'd be nice if it rained for a couple days straight and actually be cooler instead of making things more humid.

Yea, it really doesn't stop...

anicabyss' - drama zone

Yea, don't go there unless you're ABSOLUTELY interested. But it's a new chapter and well, the post says everything. Have fun! But don't say I didn't give warning.

A rather bland update

In case anyone at all (reader population unknown, but probably less than a 2-digit number) cares to know, I've been chugging along this boring and monotonous life like I'm going to live forever. Every day is another "I can do that tomorrow" day and so I spend endless hours reading books, watching movies, and listening to music.

I've recently picked up a passion for Korean drama. I had been interested in the K-drama arena for a long time, but nothing had ever really enticed me to do anything but consider watching; then my parents picked up their passion for Korean drama and it gave me more of an interest.

And then I watched a particular one called You're Beautiful and despite the extravagant and overdone costuming and make-up of the cast members, I was hooked. I'm a sucker for romantic-comedies after all, and I've always liked the old fashion "girl crossdressing as boy" plot line. Throw in a few good-looking men, some really catchy music, and the next thing you know, I'm a fan of the Korean entertainment industry.

Now I'm a follower of Korean drama and have found myself a whole new band to stalk on the internet. I've always been a follower of different Asian music artists, so this isn't too big of a surprise. Of course, I'm still a bit choosy about what I watch-- Korea has always had a trend set for tragic story lines and I'm an avid supporter of happy endings. So hopefully I don't run into anything that be too depressing.

Of course, I must say, Korean actors are seriously good at their crying scenes. You really just feel for them and can't help but to shed a few tears as well. Even IF you're a heartless soul of cold stone like myself. :D

Anyway, aside from being a lazy couch potato at home, I've been working and working and working. And then I've decided that I want to diversify myself by being adept at many different languages. Since I'm already bilingual and I have a better affinity for Asian languages anyway, I'm going to start with Korean and Japanese with a side of learning how to read and write Chinese characters (something I should have started a long, long, long time ago. Later, I'll consider something new, like maybe French or even Russian. And I'll also have to brush up on the Spanish that I had learned throughout highschool because even after five straight years of learning the language, I think the extent of my conversational Spanish is pretty much asking where I can find the bathroom.

Ten years... and counting... reluctantly

So the inevitable has happened.

A ten year reunion. Messages start to appear and everyone's planning, getting ideas, making arrangements, asking for volunteer helpers.

Ten years.

I now remind myself that I am officially in my late twenties, about to be reminded that I have been out of high school for ten years already. Of course, this isn't as bad (or maybe it is) as the little girl I work with pointing out that I am ten years older than she is. I had grunted and said, "That's not true, there are only nine years between seventeen and twenty-six."

And so let the melancholy begin.

I think I just need to convince myself that being "almost thirty" is really not that big of a deal. At least it's probably not that big of a deal for a lot of people who already have ideal careers, family and have lived.

I have two degrees and two part-time jobs, no boyfriend, and I still live with my entire family I've been living with since I was born.

Really... I think the only thing I've accomplished proudly is getting a brand new car and paying for it myself.

Terrible weather, terrible weekend, terrible me

So I had a long and agonizingly boring weekend. But yes, it was all my own fault. I should have just dismissed all the talk about storms and showers and whatnot and I should have just gone to Kansas City like I had planned. Instead, like a good little girl, I listened to my parents and chose not to make that long three hour drive to visit with my best friend.

I'm a horrible person. I made plans, I got all excited, my best friend got all excited, but as soon as Mom and Dad said, "You should reschedule because of the storm," I unhesitatingly said, "Yea, you guys are probably right."

And then what happened? Wichita was a very nice, peaceful and sunny weekend. Granted, apparently Kansas City was storming up like crazy, I don't think I would have hit any bad weather on my drive.

I'm so stupid that I amaze myself.

And so, out of spite, which no one seemed to pick up, I just moped around and stayed in my room all weekend-- just like an emo high school teenager who just got grounded by her parents.

OH. MY. GOD.

What the heck am I? I'm not a teenager anymore; I'm a grown adult who can make decisions on my own and will suffer the consequences of driving in a storm for three hours to visit my best friend.

What the hell was I thinking anyway?

I feel so embarrassed just thinking about it that I've been berating myself ever since the weekend ended and I realized that we actually had quite good weather. And my parents walked around talking about how business at work had been slow lately, probably because people were going out of town or something.

What the hell?!!

But I did it. It was all my own fault and my own doing. I should have just stuck with the plans and told Mom and Dad that everything would be just fine and I would make it there and back in one piece.

My days have been melancholic as thus.

Because no matter what it is that's going on, I have a feeling that my parents are more against me going out and having fun than they are with my brothers. I've been sitting around at home every evening and my days consist of waiting for work and then waiting for sleep. I try to help out around the house with chores and all, but that really doesn't make my day go by any faster.

And then when I decide to make plans for myself, I suddenly get this weird feeling that neither of my parents are very supportive of my actually having a social life outside of home and work. It's like, they think I shouldn't be out having fun and should be home doing chores like making dinner, doing laundry or cleaning house.

That's how I felt when I told my parents that I was going to Kansas City to visit my best friend for a few days.

"Oh... you're going to Kansas City?"

And that's the last I heard of them saying anything about it and they then kept forgetting that I had made plans to do as much for the weekend. And then when that supposed "storm" was coming into Wichita, they very gleefully told me that I needed to stay home because of the weather, "suggesting" that I reschedule for another weekend. And of course, no one, not even me, considered that the storm was coming into Wichita and not Kansas City and that the drive there would probably be just fine and nice.

I'm stupid. I know. I need to learn how to think things over.

So I disappointed my best friend and disappointed myself. And I even told my boss that I could not work that weekend because I would be out of town.

***

Trudging around the house looking like a lost soul doesn't help my case either. It's really funny how as soon as my brother looks like he's not going out and being bored at home, Mom immediately worries about him and tells me to hang out with him more and blah, blah, blah... But I've been moping around the house for months since my best friend left the city for her new job. But there has been no word about my being bored and lifeless and needing some companionship.

Mom just simply asks: "What's wrong with you?" Or something to that extent in Chinese. And when I shrug my shoulders and say that I have nothing to do, she replies with, "Well, staying home and not going out means that you spend less money."

And our conversation ends there.

And Dad's even more direct with his response to my boredom: "You can help clean house and make dinner and learn how to cook better."

I feel like I've lost my will to live a full and exciting life now. My goal is to survive my family for the rest of my life. How sad is that?

Anyway...

With this ranting gone and done, I still feel no satisfaction, but at least I know why I've been so bored lately. My parents encourage my brothers to go out and make friends. They then turn around and encourage me to stop going out because it would involve spending money.

I guess they've forgotten that, even whenever I go out, I have never spent more money than any of my brothers. I have a savings account and I have a car paid off earlier than planned. And while I ended up not going to Kansas City, I still ended up buying a few games online with a simple click of a PayPal button. I think I spent more money holing myself up at home than I would have had I gone to Kansas City.

PayPal is a very dangerous easy shopper concept...

***

In other news, my motivation to continue writing has come to a halt, but my desire to continue writing is still hanging like a haunting ghost. I've tried what I can to get things rolling, but instead of working on things that are in progress, I'm brainstorming new material for newer plots.

It's a shame I can't just come up with a plot, snap my fingers and get the story to write itself. Not to brag or anything, but I think I'm rather good at coming up with characters and back story and story plots. It's the writing process that's getting me where it hurts the most.

***

Oh yes, and a new blog layout. I thought it was time for a change.

I was not meant to fly

As the post title says, I was not meant to fly.

Last week I was sent to North Carolina for job training. While I don't mind having a bit of a vacation and time away from home, I had thoroughly decided that I cannot really tolerate going anywhere by plane. Coming home from North Carolina was the most stressful four hours I've had in a long time. Because not only was my first flight delayed to the point that I was afraid I wouldn't be able to catch my connection flight, but my second flight was also delayed and then it was "rocky" the entire flight.

I know that this is probably something that fairly normal for people who fly all the time. You get delays, you get turbulence, you spend a lot of time trying to find the correct gate, running across the entire span of Atlanta's airport while people in front of you hog the entirety of the escalator, chatting freely when you need to get by in a rush. And then when you ask if they could, maybe please let you go by because you're in a hurry, they give you dirty looks.

And the staff of the airport don't make things easy on you either. Telling me that thirty minutes is plenty of time for me to catch my connection flight was NOT something that would placate my nerves. Arriving in Atlanta at 8:25 PM and having a flight at 8:55 PM was enough to make me want to hurl something or cry. I really wanted to ask the girl whether or not she'd actually seen Atlanta's airport, because thirty minutes was not enough time to wait for your carry-on and then speed from a Gate A12 to Gate C38.

Of course, I made it in time to realize that my connection flight had been delayed by twenty minutes anyway.

Go figure. I make a big fuss about not getting to my flight on time and I find out that I had plenty of time to move slowly. And thanks to the guy who happily checked some carry-on bags so that they would be transferred from one plane to another due to lack of space in the overhead compartments for carry-on luggage, I didn't have to wait to pick up my bag and could just rush off to my next gate.

So... I guess it really wasn't that bad once I made it onto my next plane and got home.

But still... for someone who has flown for a total of three trips within the year, I think I've reached my quota and I shall gladly stay on the ground.

***

North Carolina was very green. I saw the ground from my window seat on the flight there. A very pretty place with lots of trees and grass and lots of land. The training was two days and so I was pretty much there and back and it felt like I hadn't even really been out of town. It was a nice place, but it felt much more stressful than my trip to Chicago only because I hadn't had time to adjust before I needed to readjust to my sleeping schedule. For two days, I had to make sure to wake up in the morning and actually sleep during the nighttime. And as soon as I was adjusted, I got home and needed to figure out how to switch back to staying up all night for my shift the next day... well, the next night.

This switching back and forth isn't too bad if I didn't have such a set time to be up and go to sleep. Then again, the hotel room was an actual suite with a living room, kitchen and a bedroom, so at least I slept comfortably. I watched television on the couch until I was sleepy enough to transfer myself to the bed and then watched television on the bed until I finally fell asleep. It would have been nice to stay in that suite for an extra few days instead of just two nights. And so maybe in the future, just for the heck of it, I'll take a nice road trip somewhere and stay in a hotel for the weekend or something just to relax... even if I don't go anywhere.

Sometimes, you just need to be away from home and have a hotel room all to yourself. It's actually pretty darn nice.

When I was in Chicago, it felt pretty nice to have a hotel room to myself for four nights in a row. I could spread all of my clothes out on one bed, sprawl myself out on the other and just be lazy all evening until it was time to sleep. I could call room service for dinner and just walk around like I owned the place.

***

In other news, third shift is good to me, I'm going to be seeing my best friend in a few days and I have gotten myself a new computer to replace the one that has been breaking on me. My brother is going to try to spend the summer figuring out what had happened to that computer; it's not old, but it likes to crash at random times and as I am not a very computer savvy type, I was starting to get a little annoyed that I didn't know what was wrong with it, my brothers hadn't been able to figure out what was wrong with it, and it was just being so random that I would probably end up throwing it out the window before my brothers got around to doing some more in-depth investigation.

Oh, and I think those sneaky wisdom teeth of mine have finally decided that it's time to torment.

Anyway... blogging is pretty fun. I really, really should get back into it more often. It's just that, a lot of things I want to talk about have to do with work, but where I work, I absolutely CANNOT say a lot of things as according to HIPAA. And so rather than trying to pick and choose my stories and heavily editing it so that it's appropriate, I've chose just to be safe and not talk about my job at all if I can help it. I can talk about my other job... but who wants to hear me whine and complain about the part-time food service/hospitality job I do and all the irrational people I meet regularly? :D

February snow and a few possible resolutions that may or may not occur

I promise nothing; I'm merely trying a new tact at making life a little less monotonous. But I promise nothing.

It's February and this is the first time I've found myself in a blog post since the new year started. Sadly, 2011 doesn't seem to promise anymore excitement than people would expect, but of course, 99% of my monotony is my own doing. And so with a long blog post title, I've come to try reasoning with myself that I need to switch up the monotony with a little more motivation.

The past few weeks have become rather exciting in regards to my plans for the next couple weeks. I've been spending time playing computer games with my brothers and I've been watching movies and television (the foreign kind) nonstop. I've been stealing glances at my brother's keyboard with temptations to play but with no motivation, however, I will work on that. I've been told that I will be heading out of state for some work-related training which will take place both next week and later on in March.

And then there's that trip to Georgia I'm taking to visit one of my closest friends. My best friend has been hired for a position out of town and so now I have reasons to visit Kansas City every few weekends.

Finally, I've chosen to join the YMCA in order to get my butt in shape and to at least tell myself that I've been able to do something about my obesity. Of course, not even one day after I joined a freakin' gym, Kansas froze over and I regretfully stayed away from the outdoors for the entire snow storm unless I needed to be at work. And, of course, the snow storm continues on and I have chosen to stay home. I think there's some higher force out there testing my patience and my motivation.

My motivation, unfortunately, does not out-weigh the need to stay in a nice warm house and watch television.

***

The weather has honestly not been too bad. I really like the winter season. Images of sitting around a fireplace drinking hot chocolate, eating random snacks and chit-chatting with friends comes into mind. But, of course, the reality is that we have traffic accidents, harsh, bitter winds, and school closings. I'm glad I have a nice vehicle that can handle the winter roads, otherwise, I would be adamant about going anywhere at all.

But hopefully this weather lets up soon. My goal had been to at least lose five to ten pounds by the time my trip to Georgia came around. One months should be enough, I've been telling myself, but my motivation for exercise really gets trumped too easily. Regulating my diet doesn't seem to be an answer as I have no way of making myself stop eating junk food or fast food or stop eating excessively, period. My only hope is that exercising will at least regulate my weight so that it doesn't keep getting higher, even if it doesn't go lower.

***

My manager is sending me to Illinois this coming Sunday for a four day training course. This will be a new change of pace in my monotony, and maybe after that, I can try to bring up the desire to do other things instead of just sitting at home all day long. I've never been on a "business" trip before and this will be interesting as I have always gone out of town with friends or family for leisure only and without set itineraries.

***

So with that, I'm hoping that my blogging life will also begin to see new sights. I do miss being able to just randomly spout things and then come back and read them at a later date. As much as I hate to boast, I really, really love to write and I really, really love to reread things that I've written in the past.

So the last time I blogged religously was...

I had posted a few days ago from a work computer during my "break time". But I hadn't checked that post because I can't view my own blog from any work computer. It's filed as "Entertainment" and so has been denied. Somehow, I can still get onto the "backstage" part of my blogger page and post something.

Weird...

So it seems that this year, blogging had not been my priority. I note that there are probably seven days in the entire year that I got onto my computer and said, "Hey, there's something I want to write down an share with random people on the internet who may or may not care." Including this one, it'll be the eighth and probably the only other one for this year of 2010.

Maybe my New Years resolution should be to try blogging more often...

Yeah, right.

We all know that I don't make New Year's resolutions because the likelihood of follow-up is a very low percentage and that would only make me feel more pathetic and guilty in my already feeble life. New Year's resolutions are not my way of life anyway. If there's something pressing that I want to get accomplished, I don't need to wait until the new year to make my resolve.

My mindset will be stationed at: "Well, I have all year..." And the next thing you know, the matter will be set aside and by the time I come across it again, it'll be December and so I'll probably put it off for the next year. "I will definitely get this done after the new year starts..."

To be totally honest, I'm not sure what has been keeping me from blogging.

At the beginning of the year, I was buried in study guides, student clinical rotations, exams and stress. After all of that was finished and done, I think I pretty much just lost motivation to write about anything else. A couple posts here and there about something interesting that had happened, or something that was bugging me were written, but I can't really say that I've dedicated more time to blogging now that I have more time.

As previous posts have mentioned, life holds no more excitement for me now that I've accomplished the biggest thing I need to accomplish. I finished school, I got a job. Now I sit at home everyday when I'm not at work and I really don't have the motivation to go anywhere even if I'm invited.

The past week has been the most I've left the house for reasons other than work since one of my closest friends left the state to pursue her own future and new life.

But anyway, let's not dwell on my lamentable lifestyle-- it'll only make me and everyone else more irritated.

***

The holidays are coming to an end after this week and tomorrow for the last day of 2010, I will be working at the good old hotel where dinner parties are taking place become someone wants to get married on New Year's Eve. While I understand that a lot of people have their weddings on holidays for reasons of remembering their wedding date, or just because they want to (maybe it's special to them somehow), I really think it's kind of tacky. But then again, I've never been in a serious relationship and a wedding is not in my future, so maybe getting married on a holiday is meaningful in one way or another for some.

But that only means that a crew of people will be working on a night that they would rather be somewhere else.

There are lots of nights that I would rather be somewhere else but at work, but that's only because I'm lazy. I will work no matter what because it means more hours and more money and something to do, however, because I currently have no outstanding social life to brag about. It's all good for me and my bank account.

In other news, I am currently trying my hand at piano. I've been slacking off however, because no matter how much I want to learn, I think there's this mental barrier keeping me from fully committing to playing just because my brother is already pretty good at it and the keyboard is in his general area of the house. I feel like I don't want to do the same things that my brothers do... Maybe I should pick up some other type of talent.

***

Anyway, this post has been more or less insignificant because I've dragged on about nothing in particular. Hopefully the new year holds more significance.

Happy Holidays... or something to that extent...

It's about three hours into Christmas Day and I’m running third shift lab like a zombie. Life is freezing cold and even hot chocolate does not help. So it’s a good thing that I’ve layered up with excess undershirts and whatnot.

Can we remember what it was like in the past when we actually looked forward to the Christmas season? Well, if everyone else can, then obviously I’m of the 5% who doesn't.

I can honestly say that in the past during my teenage years or childhood, there must have been a time when I was always jumping for joy because of the holidays. The idea of a white, snowy Christmas with holiday music, hot chocolate, yummy cookies and cakes, and a nice big scrumptious Christmas dinner consisting of Mom and Dad’s best fixings would always perk up my excitement by multitudes. Christmas was always something to look forward to for reasons that only childhood me could have ever understood.

This year for Christmas, I looked forward to two things: 1) one of my best friends coming back into town and 2) double pay for a worked holiday.

I feel I’ve lost my compassion for the joys of life that eight year old Ani must have enjoyed with all the vigor and energy that she could muster up. The Ani of today has absolutely no energy reserve to even consider getting excited over Christmas candies, cookies, cakes and dinner. Long ago, I lost interest in decorating or sending everyone I knew Christmas cards. If I remember correctly, the last time I even put a Christmas card in someone’s box was back in high school. The last time that I tried to surprise someone with a Christmas gift wrapped up all pretty was sometime in high school as well.

After high school, I got caught up in college and work and simply decided not to go through the trouble of sending cards or wrapping presents. My two closest friends receive gifts of their choosing, unwrapped, I receive gifts from them of my choosing, also unwrapped, we have dinner together and then Christmas is done and over with.

Oh yes, and then there are those work-related parties that I get invited to that I usually don’t attend, as well as the family dinner that sometimes doesn’t happen.

Have I really lost my sense of excitement?

I’ve always been someone who can be easily amused by the little things in life. In fact, I preach the necessity to be able to enjoy simplicity to its fullest, because if you can’t, then the big things that happen just don’t seem as great. But the holidays have become just another chaotic duration of time in which people spend money, eat lots of food and get fairly impatient because everyone else is doing the exact same thing at the exact same time and thus no one is getting immediate service like they think they should be getting.

I swear that around Christmas and Thanksgiving is when I typically see the angriest shoppers in history. People are cutting in line, people are arguing with clerks, and people are shoving each other around. Gifts are bought before Christmas and given away and then two days later everything is returned in the same typical manner as the way they were bought; with lots of shoving and yelling.

Can you see why the holidays may seem a bit depressing from an outsider’s standpoint?

On top of that, holiday bars are the worst to work since everyone’s already spent all their money on gifts and decorations and food and other goodies. And so no one is willing to tip and you leave the bar with a handful of dollars, probably not even enough to pay for the gas that you had to spend getting to work in the first place. Boy am I glad I have a nicer job aside from bartending.

Anyway, for those of you still able to enjoy the lovely Christmas cheer, have a good one and Happy Holidays.