What a way to kick off the new year...
I've been very busy. It doesn't seem very evident to you all since all you are witnessing is a complete lack of updates... but I have been busy... and very unfortunate.
December was insane at my place of work. Just to give you an idea of how busy the grooming department was, my paycheck was twice that of a usual 2-week period. I was a dog-scrubbing maniac.
December 22, I had an accident at work. I was carrying a small dog to the play area, and I managed to slam my other hand in a big, heavy door. My middle finger and index finger were both hurt, with my middle finger getting a diagonal cut just from the force of the door itself. I ended up dripping blood everywhere and bruising both nailbeds and my finger bone. Needless to say, I couldn't work for the rest of the day and the day before Christmas Eve. I lost the oppurtunity to make around $100 or so, which was extremely upsetting.
Christmas Eve, I got sick with a cold. By the 27th I was feeling pretty much better, and was back at work. Things were slow, but it felt good just to be making money again.
On the 30th I went to Delaware to visit Jon for New Year's. Every year he has a New Year's Eve party with his friends, and we end up eating lots of food, watching tons of movies, and just generally having a good time. We watched the first 3 Star Wars movies, which was great because I don't know squat about it. (I never had any friends who were into it, so I never saw any of the movies.)
Sure enough though, something had to go wrong. I GOT SICK AGAIN. This time I was coughing up a storm, and keeping poor Jon up at night.
I came home on the 3rd, worked on the 4th (all the while being dizzy and completely out of it), and then took a day off on the 5th because of my unchanging state of sickness.
Now for the kicker.
I called my local community college today to see if they got my college and highschool transcripts. I need both of them in before I can sign up for classes, which start on Jan 20th.
NEITHER PLACE HAS SENT THEIR TRANSCRIPTS.
I requested my transcripts early and mid DECEMBER.
I feel like curling up in a ball and hiding in bed.
I just want to go to college and get it out of the way so I can someday move out of my parents' house... so I can pay the rent, make more than $10/hr, have a future together with my boyfriend. Is that so much to ask?
Apparently it is too much to ask, and these damnable people with their comfortable college employee jobs are just sitting, high on life and raking in the dough while not doing what they're being paid to do.
As someone who slaves away at work, always comes in on time and tries to make an honest living, I feel so defeated and frustrated.
All I can do for now is call them and leave them messages, since nobody there ever picks up the phone... and just hope for the best... please...
h e l l o . i n t e r l o p e r
Showing posts with label worries. Show all posts
Showing posts with label worries. Show all posts
Friday, January 6, 2012
Monday, July 18, 2011
Back to School... and back to fear.
Tomorrow I'm going to visit UConn Stamford to figure out when and how I'm going to go back to college.
I'm not going to lie... I'm PETRIFIED.
I've had a bad relationship with education.
I grew up bullied in school for being creative and "different" in a snobby town full of clones, but excelled in almost everything.
That all changed when I hit my teenage years.
I started noticing that I had to wrestle with my mind to keep focused. I became easily distracted, and gained a hatred of long-term things, like projects and essays.
Short-term things, I continued to do well at... math problems, standardized tests, short answer questions, and the like.
When I turned 16, it was apparent that something was extremely wrong. Nobody goes from being a straight A student to a kid struggling with their grades without something happening.
Turned out I had two things... major depressive disorder, aka depression, and ADHD-PI.
What's ADHD-PI?
For starters, the PI stands for "predominantly inattentive."
Wikipedia can explain the rest:
When I was officially diagnosed, I was floored. It was like somebody had observed my life and behaviors, and wrote a description of it.
I tried ADD medications, and had horrible heart-related side effects, leading my psychiatrist to scrap the ADD treatment altogether, and go straight for the neck of the depression.
Two years later, I was depression free, and have been ever since.
But what of my education?
I ended up failing classes in high school, and having to take 5 years to graduate what normally takes 4 years.
And if you've been following this blog at all, you know what happened to me in college... my lack of focus and frustration led to getting tons of incompletes, and eventually it was anemia that screwed me completely over.
Like I said, I'm not going to lie...
I'm scared to death of going back to school.
I have nightmares every week about school... elementary school, middle school, high school, college, you name it.
I either am failing, can't remember my schedule, late to class, missing a test, being kicked out of school, having to escape school, being yelled at by a teacher, being tortured by classmates, or the like.
Don't get me wrong, my life is great right now. I'm not depressed at all. At night while I'm asleep, however, my mind likes to dig up crap from the past and taunt me with it. It's like school-induced PTSD.
I'm wrestling right now about going back to college.
I know I can't ever get a job better than dog-washing without a degree, and it's not fair to Jon to not finish college while he works so hard to do so.
But I haven't changed. I can't focus, I hate projects, I drive myself crazy with my forgetfulness and inability to pay attention to things.
I think I need to try medication again... but I'm scared of side-effects too.
It's one evil or another. Failure, or the discomfort of having your brain go haywire from side-effects... a tough choice.
It all scares me.
Life never gets easy, does it?
I'm not going to lie... I'm PETRIFIED.
I've had a bad relationship with education.
I grew up bullied in school for being creative and "different" in a snobby town full of clones, but excelled in almost everything.
That all changed when I hit my teenage years.
I started noticing that I had to wrestle with my mind to keep focused. I became easily distracted, and gained a hatred of long-term things, like projects and essays.
Short-term things, I continued to do well at... math problems, standardized tests, short answer questions, and the like.
When I turned 16, it was apparent that something was extremely wrong. Nobody goes from being a straight A student to a kid struggling with their grades without something happening.
Turned out I had two things... major depressive disorder, aka depression, and ADHD-PI.
What's ADHD-PI?
For starters, the PI stands for "predominantly inattentive."
Wikipedia can explain the rest:
ADHD-PI is different from the other subtypes of ADHD in that it is characterized primarily by inattention, easy distractibility, disorganization, procrastination, forgetfulness, and lethargy - fatigue, but with fewer or no symptoms of hyperactivity or impulsiveness typical of the other ADHD subtypes. In some cases, children who enjoy learning may develop a sense of fear when faced with structured or planned work, especially long or group-based that requires extended focus, even if they thoroughly understand the topic. Children with ADHD-PI may be at greater risk of academic failures and early withdrawal from school. Teachers and parents may make incorrect assumptions about the behaviours and attitudes of a child with ADHD-PI, and may provide them with frequent and erroneous negative feedback (e.g. "you're irresponsible", "you're immature", "you're lazy", "you don't care/show any effort", "you just aren't trying", etc.).And there you have it. Me in a nutshell.
The inattentive children may realize on some level that they are somehow different internally from their peers. However, they are also likely to accept and internalize the continuous negative feedback, creating a negative self-image that becomes self-reinforcing. If these children progress into adulthood undiagnosed or untreated, their inattentiveness, ongoing frustrations, and poor self-image frequently create numerous and severe problems maintaining healthy relationships, succeeding in post secondary schooling, or succeeding in the workplace. These problems can compound frustrations and low self-esteem, and will often lead to the development of secondary pathologies including anxiety disorders, sexual promiscuity, mood disorders, and substance abuse.
When I was officially diagnosed, I was floored. It was like somebody had observed my life and behaviors, and wrote a description of it.
I tried ADD medications, and had horrible heart-related side effects, leading my psychiatrist to scrap the ADD treatment altogether, and go straight for the neck of the depression.
Two years later, I was depression free, and have been ever since.
But what of my education?
I ended up failing classes in high school, and having to take 5 years to graduate what normally takes 4 years.
And if you've been following this blog at all, you know what happened to me in college... my lack of focus and frustration led to getting tons of incompletes, and eventually it was anemia that screwed me completely over.
Like I said, I'm not going to lie...
I'm scared to death of going back to school.
I have nightmares every week about school... elementary school, middle school, high school, college, you name it.
I either am failing, can't remember my schedule, late to class, missing a test, being kicked out of school, having to escape school, being yelled at by a teacher, being tortured by classmates, or the like.
Don't get me wrong, my life is great right now. I'm not depressed at all. At night while I'm asleep, however, my mind likes to dig up crap from the past and taunt me with it. It's like school-induced PTSD.
I'm wrestling right now about going back to college.
I know I can't ever get a job better than dog-washing without a degree, and it's not fair to Jon to not finish college while he works so hard to do so.
But I haven't changed. I can't focus, I hate projects, I drive myself crazy with my forgetfulness and inability to pay attention to things.
I think I need to try medication again... but I'm scared of side-effects too.
It's one evil or another. Failure, or the discomfort of having your brain go haywire from side-effects... a tough choice.
It all scares me.
Life never gets easy, does it?
Sunday, May 22, 2011
Work vs Crafting
Since I got a job, I really haven't been crafting much. I made a few clay pieces (which I really need to photograph) and started toying around with needle-felting, but really haven't produced much at all.
In fact, it isn't until I come home from work, nap, and unwind for a few hours, that I actually feel like crafting.
This is starting to annoy me like crazy.
It's 4am, and I'm just itching to continue needle-felting... which I obviously shouldn't do, because I need to sleep. I have to be at work at 4pm tomorrow, and I'll probably be there until 1am again, mopping the stupid floors.
It seems like my life now revolves around work... either I'm at work, or recovering from work. I don't have any time or motivation to be productive outside of my job.
...and that bothers me.
I can't wait until I can go visit Jon in Delaware. I miss him like mad, and I need a week off to relax and for my body to recover.
I also hope I'll gain some muscle mass soon so I can actually get through my shift without feeling like roadkill. I have never excercised, and I'm definitely paying for that... Being on my feet nonstop for 8 hours, mopping and scrubbing, and so on is painful.
In fact, it isn't until I come home from work, nap, and unwind for a few hours, that I actually feel like crafting.
This is starting to annoy me like crazy.
It's 4am, and I'm just itching to continue needle-felting... which I obviously shouldn't do, because I need to sleep. I have to be at work at 4pm tomorrow, and I'll probably be there until 1am again, mopping the stupid floors.
It seems like my life now revolves around work... either I'm at work, or recovering from work. I don't have any time or motivation to be productive outside of my job.
...and that bothers me.
I can't wait until I can go visit Jon in Delaware. I miss him like mad, and I need a week off to relax and for my body to recover.
I also hope I'll gain some muscle mass soon so I can actually get through my shift without feeling like roadkill. I have never excercised, and I'm definitely paying for that... Being on my feet nonstop for 8 hours, mopping and scrubbing, and so on is painful.
Thursday, May 19, 2011
An Update on Life and New Vegas
Things truly never get easy.
In terms of crafts, I really haven't been crafting too much lately. I've been busy with work and trying to sleep a lot to help my muscles and body to recover. I've been doing a lot of cleaning at work, and it's taken an enormous toll on my body. I don't do any physical labor, and I don't exercise either. Basically, a day at work is like a workout, and I'm a beginner.
I did receive my wool roving in the mail, and have started a small little project. I'm really not too great at it since I'm still learning. I'm going to give Jon my first creation, so I can't say anything about it... I want it to be a surprise. :) Once I'm done I'll post a photo though!
Work is not going well. I don't want to say too much because I don't want to violate any non-disclosure agreement, but basically the manager and assistant manager really don't seem to like me. I've slipped up on certain things a few times, which is entirely my own fault, but other things have happened that just don't make any sense. I've been blamed for things that even the owner said I'm not responsible for, been accused of taking days off when I haven't, (and which my timecard can attest to) and stuff like that. I don't know what I've done wrong, but I have a bad feeling that I'm going to get axed sometime soon.
I also got my new HP laptop in the mail (did I mention that already in an earlier post? I forget...) which I've been extremely thankful to have. It's so much faster, the graphics on my games are unbelievable, and hopefully will last me a lot longer than my Alienware... which I also recommend everyone NOT to buy from. In fact, don't buy anything made by DELL. The quality of their laptops is really sub-par compared to HP.
I just installed a bunch of fun, yet lore-friendly mods for Fallout: New Vegas. I'm going to make a new character and play through the game again. Some mods I got were:
FOOK - Basically an amazing pack of retextures, new items that stay true to the game, bug fixes, and other things to make the game better. I had the Fallout 3 version before and was very satisfied with it. I hate altering games dramatically, but this one stays true to the Fallout universe and improves upon certain things the game developers missed.
Existence 2.0 - A radio station run by a robot that plays strange, creepy electronic music. I had this for Fallout 3 as well.
Mr. New Vegas' Secret Stash - 100 extra tracks for Radio New Vegas, all from the same era as the original tracks.
Sunny Smiles Companion - Allows you to have Sunny as a companion, as well as her dog Cheyanne... if she survives the tutorial, that is.
Melissa Lewis Companion - Allows you to have a pre-existing Great Khan as a companion. The creator spliced sound files to build her dialogue options, wanting to make it as true to the game as possible.
ED-E Light Step - Gives ED-E the Light Step perk so he doesn't set off mines all the time.
Centered 3rd Person Camera - self explanitory
Companion Sandbox Mode - Allows you to tell you companions to chill out, so they don't just "wait" in the same spot forever, but actually sit in chairs, walk around, go to sleep, and other things like regular NPCs. No more standing around like statues.
Can't wait to test those out in-game. Probably will tonight. I'm not feeling too well, so I probably won't be able to play for too long.
That's all for now!
In terms of crafts, I really haven't been crafting too much lately. I've been busy with work and trying to sleep a lot to help my muscles and body to recover. I've been doing a lot of cleaning at work, and it's taken an enormous toll on my body. I don't do any physical labor, and I don't exercise either. Basically, a day at work is like a workout, and I'm a beginner.
I did receive my wool roving in the mail, and have started a small little project. I'm really not too great at it since I'm still learning. I'm going to give Jon my first creation, so I can't say anything about it... I want it to be a surprise. :) Once I'm done I'll post a photo though!
Work is not going well. I don't want to say too much because I don't want to violate any non-disclosure agreement, but basically the manager and assistant manager really don't seem to like me. I've slipped up on certain things a few times, which is entirely my own fault, but other things have happened that just don't make any sense. I've been blamed for things that even the owner said I'm not responsible for, been accused of taking days off when I haven't, (and which my timecard can attest to) and stuff like that. I don't know what I've done wrong, but I have a bad feeling that I'm going to get axed sometime soon.
I also got my new HP laptop in the mail (did I mention that already in an earlier post? I forget...) which I've been extremely thankful to have. It's so much faster, the graphics on my games are unbelievable, and hopefully will last me a lot longer than my Alienware... which I also recommend everyone NOT to buy from. In fact, don't buy anything made by DELL. The quality of their laptops is really sub-par compared to HP.
I just installed a bunch of fun, yet lore-friendly mods for Fallout: New Vegas. I'm going to make a new character and play through the game again. Some mods I got were:
FOOK - Basically an amazing pack of retextures, new items that stay true to the game, bug fixes, and other things to make the game better. I had the Fallout 3 version before and was very satisfied with it. I hate altering games dramatically, but this one stays true to the Fallout universe and improves upon certain things the game developers missed.
Existence 2.0 - A radio station run by a robot that plays strange, creepy electronic music. I had this for Fallout 3 as well.
Mr. New Vegas' Secret Stash - 100 extra tracks for Radio New Vegas, all from the same era as the original tracks.
Sunny Smiles Companion - Allows you to have Sunny as a companion, as well as her dog Cheyanne... if she survives the tutorial, that is.
Melissa Lewis Companion - Allows you to have a pre-existing Great Khan as a companion. The creator spliced sound files to build her dialogue options, wanting to make it as true to the game as possible.
ED-E Light Step - Gives ED-E the Light Step perk so he doesn't set off mines all the time.
Centered 3rd Person Camera - self explanitory
Companion Sandbox Mode - Allows you to tell you companions to chill out, so they don't just "wait" in the same spot forever, but actually sit in chairs, walk around, go to sleep, and other things like regular NPCs. No more standing around like statues.
Can't wait to test those out in-game. Probably will tonight. I'm not feeling too well, so I probably won't be able to play for too long.
That's all for now!
Tuesday, April 26, 2011
Productivity Week - Day 1
Well, it's REALLY been getting to me that I basically do nothing all day. Obviously complaining about it isn't going to do me any good, so I've decided to push myself to be productive this week. In a way I'm testing the waters by trying different things, and in a way I'm just trying to prevent myself from feeling any more useless.
So! Today was the first day of my Productivity Week.
I didn't do too much today, but at least I got something done.
My day started out with having to drop Jon back off at UNH, so by the time we made it home, it was about 11am.
I only got about 6 hours of sleep last night because my crazy and restless mind wouldn't stop its nonstop train of thoughts, keeping me from falling asleep for a while. As a result, I was dead tired when I got home. I tried to stay awake as long as possible, but ended up passing out until 2:30pm.
When I woke up I immediately set up my laptop to play music, and got to work on something I've been putting off for a while... glazing my latest batch of clay goodness.
Glazing seems simple, but it's really a pain in the rear.
You paint the glaze on one side of the clay piece, put it down, wait for it to dry, flip it over, glaze the other side, wait some more... and usually you have to put a second coat on, or fill in parts that you might have missed.
In other words, it's time consuming, and best to do when you have a lot of things to glaze. That way you glaze a bit of one piece, move to the next, and just continually rotate through all of them until they're finished being coated.
Unfortunately I was a bit impatient, and got myself in a few... sticky situations. (Pun totally intended.)
I flipped over pieces that weren't completely dry, had to glaze over a few fingerprints from touching wet glaze, and basically had glaze-coated thumbs by the end of it all.
Overall, everything came out okay except for my snowcone earrings.
I tried glazing the tops of the earrings and dipping them in salt for realism, but it seems that the salt and glaze had some weird chemical reaction rather than dry together.
The glaze is now cracking off and has become greasy. Definitely not good.
Unless I can get some glaze on top of the layer of glaze/salt mix and get it to dry, they're most likely not going in the shop.
At 8pm I was finally done. (I had spent some time talking to my boyfriend as well, so I really wasn't working for 6 hours straight... that would be brainmelting.)
So that's about it for today.
Some other things on my list for this week...
Things I NEED to do:
- Look at Craigslist to find some possible jobs
- Photograph new clay items and Jon's LOST DVD sets
- Post LOST DVD sets on Ebay
- Post clay items on Etsy
- Try drawing on paper again
- Hook up tablet and try drawing on the computer again
Things I WANT to do:
- Go through old notebooks to find drawings to edit on the computer
- Try to make sprites for a plant for Creatures 3
- Try making larger clay pieces
- Make something for next month's April's Army charity sale
- Post my daily progress on this blog! DERP!
That's all for now. Sleepy time for Maddie...
So! Today was the first day of my Productivity Week.
I didn't do too much today, but at least I got something done.
My day started out with having to drop Jon back off at UNH, so by the time we made it home, it was about 11am.
I only got about 6 hours of sleep last night because my crazy and restless mind wouldn't stop its nonstop train of thoughts, keeping me from falling asleep for a while. As a result, I was dead tired when I got home. I tried to stay awake as long as possible, but ended up passing out until 2:30pm.
When I woke up I immediately set up my laptop to play music, and got to work on something I've been putting off for a while... glazing my latest batch of clay goodness.
Glazing seems simple, but it's really a pain in the rear.
You paint the glaze on one side of the clay piece, put it down, wait for it to dry, flip it over, glaze the other side, wait some more... and usually you have to put a second coat on, or fill in parts that you might have missed.
In other words, it's time consuming, and best to do when you have a lot of things to glaze. That way you glaze a bit of one piece, move to the next, and just continually rotate through all of them until they're finished being coated.
Unfortunately I was a bit impatient, and got myself in a few... sticky situations. (Pun totally intended.)
I flipped over pieces that weren't completely dry, had to glaze over a few fingerprints from touching wet glaze, and basically had glaze-coated thumbs by the end of it all.
Overall, everything came out okay except for my snowcone earrings.
I tried glazing the tops of the earrings and dipping them in salt for realism, but it seems that the salt and glaze had some weird chemical reaction rather than dry together.
The glaze is now cracking off and has become greasy. Definitely not good.
Unless I can get some glaze on top of the layer of glaze/salt mix and get it to dry, they're most likely not going in the shop.
At 8pm I was finally done. (I had spent some time talking to my boyfriend as well, so I really wasn't working for 6 hours straight... that would be brainmelting.)
So that's about it for today.
Some other things on my list for this week...
Things I NEED to do:
- Look at Craigslist to find some possible jobs
- Photograph new clay items and Jon's LOST DVD sets
- Post LOST DVD sets on Ebay
- Post clay items on Etsy
- Try drawing on paper again
- Hook up tablet and try drawing on the computer again
Things I WANT to do:
- Go through old notebooks to find drawings to edit on the computer
- Try to make sprites for a plant for Creatures 3
- Try making larger clay pieces
- Make something for next month's April's Army charity sale
- Post my daily progress on this blog! DERP!
That's all for now. Sleepy time for Maddie...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)