Silly Girl

So...I was on the dating site last night for the first time in ages. I received a message from someone I wasn't interested in and, after I read it, was about to sign out...and that's when I saw him. The Labradorian's picture popped up on my screen and I threw caution to the wind and said hello. We chatted back and forth for about an hour. Just run of the mill chit chat. I carefully avoided any mention of what happened before...and I closed out by telling him if he ever makes it up here he can look me up. He said he'd like that and told me to keep in touch....and that's where I should have left it. Instead, I wrote back and told him the ball was in his court if he wanted to keep in contact, mentioned that I'd still like to read some of his writing (he'd told me previously that he was working on a novel and asked if I'd be interested in having a look), told him I might end up anywhere (including Labrador) come September as I've been applying for jobs all over the province, and wished him a good night. Complete with a smiley face. I could have bitten my fingers off at the knuckle for not leaving well enough alone. But it gets worse. Today, after opening that up fresh, I reread some of our earlier correspondence and wondered anew what had happened and where it had gone wrong...then I sent him a facebook friend request. I told myself at the time that it was harmless and it didn't count as contact, but then I obsessed about this all day. Mostly due to boredom and lack of anything else to occupy my mind, I'm sure (I've been roaming the house like a caged animal for most of the past 24 hours), but nonetheless it made me feel weak and pathetic...and perhaps a tad insane. I mean I'm calm and rational and not really expecting anything in the way of a further response, but I so want to hear from him at the same time. I'm sure I'm not the only female who has ever put herself in this position, and it's not anything serious, by far...just silly. And I thought I had outgrown that. In fact, I'm shaking my head at myself as I write. But I just felt like I had to try...and that's not something I ever do once I cut contact with someone. It's usually finito sans encore. Sigh. Back to playing the waiting game, I suppose...although, surprisingly, as I was writing this, my phone notified me that the friend request has been accepted. One less thing to wonder about. Ugh. Thank goodness I'm working again tomorrow and won't have time to think about anything other than the demands of the classroom!

Greatest Proposal Ever

Where can I get me one of these?

Vancouver Riot

I have to say, I'm royally disgusted at the images I'm seeing on the tube and in other media today (see some National Post coverage here). I find it appalling that 'fans' would react in this manner. There are so many more important things that are being fought for in this world...but you are willing to put forth this much effort for no other reason than to cause senseless destruction after a hockey game and some booze????? It's worth trashing a city for no other reason than to trash it? I fail to see the rationale here. Unfortunately, this reflects not only on Vancouver and BC, but on the country as a whole in many eyes.  I'm sure I'm not the only Canadian who is feeling angry, disappointed and embarrassed at being misrepresented to the world today. Thanks for that, brainless testosterone overdosed Neanderthals. Really.

However, it hasn't all been negative. There have apparently been a lot of citizens volunteering their time and energy to help clean up the city...and apologizing to all on behalf of the morons who are responsible for this disgracefulness. Would that it were not necessary to begin with, but at least it's somewhat of a positive counter to what went down after the game...

Shadow of the Dog

I may have spoken too soon...the shadow of The Dog has been creeping around with me all day. When I awoke, it was with thoughts of The Labradorian once again. I reasoned with myself and talked myself into and out of calling him a dozen times. Then I reminded myself that it is not a good idea to make any decisions when I'm not feeling like myself...so that will keep me from acting on any impulses today.

After lunch, feelings of despair, frustration, irritation, and loneliness overtook me and I had a cry. A friend wisely recommended that I stop waiting for my life to begin again and instead go out there, grab it, and suck everything I can from it. Yes, wise words. They filled me with hope, determination, and a renewed sense of possibility. For about a split second. Then The Dog's shadow fell over me once more. It stayed with me throughout the afternoon, while I gave intermittent half-hearted attempts at fighting back and 'acting as if,' as a fellow blogger recently referred to it.

I found myself roaming restlessly and aimlessly through my mother's house, only to wind up back on the couch hugging a pillow and gazing out the window at the leaves dancing in the breeze under a sun I have longed for days to see and could not bring myself to enjoy as tears streamed down my face.

Every ounce of effort was needed to speak in response when spoken to at supper this evening. We went to my aunt's for a barbecue and I, not myself at all, but the empty, lifeless shell that remains when his black shadow overtakes me, did my best to stay out of everyone's way and appear as normal as I could manage. At first opportunity, I escaped back to my mother's empty house to be alone again.

I hope one day soon I figure out exactly how to go out and grab life again. To finally get from it what I want and fill myself to the brim.

The Battle of Head Vs Heart

I've been thinking of him a lot today. The Labradorian. The urge to call him tonight was so strong that I went as far as to look up his number online (I had purposely deleted all his contact information along with removing him from my facebook friends list weeks ago. The intent was to obliterate all temptation to reach out to him. I wanted to erase the sick feeling seeing his name and face engendered in me after I came to the realization that things weren't as they had been between us. Who needs constant reminders of disappointment like that?). I fought it. But it was hard. And he's still on my mind.

It's a little embarrassing to admit that I kept our correspondence (along with one of the voicemail messages he left me...how pathetic is that?). I haven't been able to bring myself to delete it yet and tonight was the first time I allowed myself to reread some of the emails. Probably not a good idea, in retrospect. But I knew that before I started to read (sucker for punishment much?).

I did the math and realized that it's been 6 weeks since the last message. It was one I wrote to him...one that he didn't respond to. And that sent a message of it's own, loud and clear. It's part of the reason I didn't pick up the phone in the end. If he wanted to talk to me he could've called or emailed. He didn't. So why subject myself to further rejection and embarrassment? Why give him the ammunition to take another shot at my pride? I know what I would say to a friend if she was in my position. Somehow that is cold comfort. Yet it is also the thought of appearing weak and stupid in my friends eyes that also halted my hand in it's tracks when it was itching to reach for the receiver. I don't think any of them would actually say that to me, but I wonder if they would think it. I might.

This is relatively new territory for me. Usually if I do get the notion to contact someone like that, it goes away almost as quickly as it came or I can talk myself out of it fairly quickly, at least. Not so in this case. I keep wanting to believe he was different. And the psychic the other day didn't help. He (the psychic) said that The Labradorian was a very pleasant man and that our conversations had been good (tell me something I don't know). He said that The Labradorian might be the one and then again maybe not (vague and inconclusive, I know, but enough to replant the seed of longing somewhat). He said that it couldn't hurt to contact The Labradorian...that if he is The One, things will pan out and if he isn't then they won't go anywhere (genius, no?).

As I said before, I'm not even sure how much I buy into psychic readings and whatnot...but it was enough to up the amount The Labradorian has been on my mind again and to make me start pondering everything again...not that I ever really stopped. Is it just loneliness and lack of another interest that continually brings him to the forefront of my mind and makes me wonder how he's doing and whether he thinks of me? Is that the driving force behind this desire to hear his voice? Is it just that the silly, typical, good girl part of me is wondering whether I did something wrong to cause this and whether there is a way to fix it? Or is it more than that? Should I take a risk? Or should I just give my head a shake and reaffirm (once again) that he obviously was not the right one and isn't worth my time, thoughts, or energy anymore?

I guess I'll resort to doing what I've been doing off and on for the past 6 weeks whenever it's cropped up...sit with it for another night while simultaneously trying to shove it out of my consciousness...but I won't deny that I hope fate decides to put us in the same place sometime just to see what would happen...

There are times when I think that, in some ways, it might actually be better to be a man...

Psychics, Comedians, and Fairs

Happily, yesterday was great. My girl and I spent it together and packed it with fun stuff. We started by visiting a psychic (who was adamant I will marry once and have a child or two, among other things, so perhaps there's still an out from spinsterhood at some point, who knows...). I'm not sure if I buy into that stuff or not, but it's entertaining either way and it kind of does give you something to hang on to and look forward to (provided you are told what you wanted to hear, which I mostly was). The BFF got a good reading as well. Thankfully the guy verified what I've been telling her for months - that her ex wasn't good for her and the best thing she ever did was finally walk away from him. Hallelujah. I might have had some real trouble on my hands if he had said otherwise!

Following that, we went back to her pad to regroup and then took ourselves to Yuk Yuk's for dinner and live comedy. I had the pasta, she had the chicken, and we both topped it off with the cheesecake and a cup of tea (proper party animals, aren't we?). The food wasn't great, but it was OK. I'd recommend the chicken over the pasta I think. She joked that she's sick of looking like a lesbian out in public with me. Let's just say we spend a lot of time together and there have been a few incidents that could have been misconstrued by onlookers...comments taken out of context, tasting each other's food and whatnot. It's a huge inside joke at this point. Might as well laugh! Speaking of laughter...the Yuk Yuk's comedy lineup?...well...not exactly hilarious, but the comics (host Dave Martin and hometown girl Lisa Baker) had their moments and I did laugh quite a bit at some of the headliner, Stephen Patterson's, bits.

After a brief foray into Chapters to peruse the shelves, we decided to go for a drive. I happened to notice lights in the Zellers parking lot on Stavanger and we popped in to jump on a couple of rides at Thomas Amusements. The Catch N Air was decent (lots of laughs punctuated with bursts of screams, mostly from moi, as we realized someone was filming as the ride went by and also that we were probably overdressed for the fair and very likely the oldest customers on the premises), but the Tornado (although we got to enjoy it solo to romantic music playing - what more could you ask?) was rather underwhelming.

The one bad point is that, unfortunately, a few couples came in and sat in the seats directly below us. Why was that bad? Well, because they all (the females especially) apparently deemed it necessary to bathe in perfume and cologne before heading out for the evening. This means that, despite popping allergy pills at the first onslaught and afterwards, I suffered for the rest of the night and continue to suffer today. My nose was running, my throat got all scratchy and irritated, my skin was itching, my voice has been coming and going, I developed a headache, my sinuses are now stuffed, and I've been coughing off and on. Lovely. I just got over the flu and I'm sick again. Most pleasant. Is it that people still remain uneducated about or unaware of this stuff or just that they don't give a shit what effect it has on others? Sigh....so hard not to be bitter and harbour an intense dislike and resentment of these random perpetrators...I will say that the thought, "Thanks for making me sick assholes!" has crossed my mind....I know, I know...people have a right to wear whatever fragrances they like yadda yadda...but I have a right to go to public places as well and hopefully be able to enjoy myself in comfort, do I not? I have been in these situations before and either changed seats or left the venue, but I paid a little more than I'd like to have to up and leave without seeing the show and there weren't any other seats we could move to, so that wasn't an option. I dunno...I think a person's right to be well outweighs someones wanting to smell like a chemical factory...and at the very least, do you really need people to be able to smell you that far away??? Then again, I'm obviously biased. Either way, I seriously hope one day they find out firsthand what it's like to be bombarded by things out of your control that make you ill.

Working On It

I have been trying to take realistic positive steps to improve my mood and my life in general. I'm happy to report that I've kept the cigarette quota to 5-6 for the past week or so and I've been making a concerted effort to slug back more H2O. I've also hit mom's new treadmill for the past two nights and tried to jog for at least half the time I was on there. I am working at eating more fruits and veggies and trying to curb the emotional junk food binges. I've been renewing the job searching efforts as well, and taking more time to read and write. Sleep is still a bit of an issue, but I figure I'm not doing too badly in the grand scheme of things...provided I can keep chipping away at all those things until I get to where I want to be.

Oh, and this is noteworthy: in further attempts to shake the black dog that's been hounding me, I also went in search of some funnies today. I added a list of those sites I deemed worthy of revisiting to my blog. Check 'em out if you need a laugh.