Don't Hate Me 'Cause I'm Indie and You're Punk

Good Girls Don't Wear Sequins

Ok, now that we've gotten all that talk about FEEEELINGS out of the way, let's have some Real Talk about the awesome shit that comes with being a BiSC attendee. This (maybe not so) flattering picture of me was taken by my roommate/favorite person Dominique in our fancy Flamingo Go Room which had a MOTHEREFFING tv in our bathroom mirror. Guys, I don't have cable (YEAH, I SAID IT. LOOK, I WAS RAISED WITHOUT TV SO YOU CAN GO SIT IN THE CORNER AND JUDGE MY PRETENSION WHILE I JUDGE YOU WATCHING DANCE MOMS AND WE CAN ALL BE HAPPY WITH OUR JUDGE-Y LIFE DECISIONS). I don't even know what to do with a tv in the bathroom mirror, we turned it on once while we were doing our makeup, it was confusing. See also: comfiest beds ever and multi nozel shower.

WARNING: The Go Rooms and the regular hotel rooms at the Flamingo are really not the same. I stayed in one of the regular ones in January and it was actually kind of more like Motel 6 quality. So don't go booking hotel rooms at the Flamingo and come bitching at me because you got the cheap option.

At the bottom of the bed is my giant pile of SWAG. Missing from the giant pile of swag: the free drink by the pool coupon sponsored by GelaSkins. It's missing because that wristband means I just came back from the crazy Flamingo Go Pool. Which is the adult pool. (No, not THAT KIND of adult pool) As in the pool where the booze is. And the fancy VIP day beds. And the waterfall to swim under and then end up in a nifty grotto. Also, where we played never have I ever for toys from Babeland. Are you wondering how things could get more ridiculawesome? So was I at this point. Pool day already seemed like the best day of my life but then IT GOT BETTER.

One word: ZUMANITY. Sexy Cirque du Soleil. Hilarious and amazing and naked. Also incredibly disturbing. Well, only the crazy contortionist that kept popping things out of sockets and shit was disturbing. I actually had to cover my eyes. Then dancing, dancing, dancing. Happiest when dancing in sequins and 4 inch heels. Until I'm tired of the heels and have to switch to sandals. Whatever. Happiest when dancing in sequins.

Wait, did I say happiest when dancing in sequins? I might've meant happiest when wearing sequins and eating waffle fry pulled pork nacho... I don't even know how to describe these, but Sara and I managed to start a trend that apparently had like 40 people eating these piles of amazingness the next night. Seriously, what is happening here? Why did we each order our own plate? This is insanity. Also, this is 3am.

HI, now it's time for sleeping.

In case you are unaware, breakfast is my favorite meal. by which I mean, breakfast foods are my favorite because I almost never eat breakfast. So buffet time on Saturday where I got to eat bacon, sausage, french toast, waffles and potatoes was pretty much my idea of heaven. I may've also made it boozy thanks to mini bottles of Skyy. The only thing better than regular brunch is boozy brunch.

The next epic adventure was to the roller coaster on top of New York New York that Alberto insisted did not exist (SPOILER: it exists) but for some reason agreed to join Dominique, Kelly and me in walking to the other end of the strip to go on it. Or to prove us wrong. I 67% think he was hoping to prove us wrong. I really love roller coasters, but also am unable to keep my eyes open on roller coasters which probably defeats the purpose of going on a roller coaster on top of a hotel. BUT WHATEVER, I went on a roller coaster on top of a hotel because that's the kind of shit you do in Vegas right before you play Pac-Man battle royale and the world's biggest version of fruit ninja. Clearly I chose the right group for the afternoon. For those of you playing along at home, at this point I have gone multiple hours without booze in Vegas, a situation I find mildly intolerable because apparently I'm really easily over stimulated which doesn't mix with Vegas without alcohol. BUT DON'T WORRY.

Thankfully Minus 5 ice bar had us covered for the afternoon. Sadly we weren't allowed to take any electronics in or I'd have fifty million pictures and have tweeted so many clever things. Or just talked a lot about how one of the rooms made me feel like I was in Narnia because of the trees etched into the ice. Did I mention that everything was made of ice? And have I ever mentioned my lifelong goal of staying in an ice hotel? This did not lessen my desire to stay in an ice hotel. We had our picture taken in a giant ice throne so that we could yell "King in the North!" but it turns out most people sit in the giant ice throne to get a picture with the Vegas sign because when we came out the woman was all "oh, you have the picture in front of the Vegas sign" and we were like "what are you talking about, lady?" because we thought we took our picture on the ice throne and are possibly too nerdy AWESOME to notice Vegas signs . Oh well.

(Side note: I'm kneeling in a really short skirt in an ice room because I was sitting the same way as Alberto and Kelly and the photographer said "You need to sit in a more flattering position, can you kneel?". And I wanted to say "Whoa dude, just how badly do you think I want this photo?" but I hadn't finished my second margarita so I wasn't feeling quite that sassy yet.

Post side note: the drinks, which were served in ice cups, rocked my socks)

More buffet. More eating all the Le Bon Garçon caramels in my gift bag. Then slowly getting ready for the Mad Men party. Where, you know, NBD, we just skipped a giant line to get into Chateau, the club on the roof of the Paris hotel from which you can see the Bellagio fountains go off. It was only so awesome that we all had to take a minute to tweet/facebook/foursquare/etc about it. That's all.

I mean, how adorable is everyone in their 60s duds, on their phones? It's pretty great. Anachronism win. Cue more dancing. Have I mentioned that I like dancing? No, really, I really like dancing. I need to go dancing more (at all) in New York now that I work normal people hours. Who wants to be my dancing buddy? Let's just go ahead and assume this girl does.
Yes, this is kind of an awful picture because it was dark and we were using the front facing camera, but I don't even care. And now we've reached the point where this post is just going to devolve into pictures. You're welcome.

I don't even try

I don't know what I'm passionate about right now. I feel hollow all the time. I'm never hungry but also never full. In February I decided to stop fighting everything all the time but I guess in my case that just makes me apathetic. Or numb. I can't even tell which.

I've been trying to learn to sit with my feelings more. Or rather, just to actually feel them. To be able to say to myself things like "I am sad that this boy doesn't like me even though it's not logical to be this sad about it" or "even though I completely understand and agree with the reason I'm losing my job it's reasonable to be sad and scared and anxious". Maybe this is the way you feel feelings all the time. This is not the way I feel feelings. Look, there's a reason Spock has always been my favorite. However, you'll be shocked to know I am not a Vulcan, even though I sometimes often act like one. The problem is that by the time I actually let myself feel things I'm feeling this huge reservoir of feeling and I can't identify where each one is coming from.

So I can tell you right now that I am sad and bitter and disillusioned; that I just suspended my OkC account for the eleventybillionth time though in truth I've been on an online dating hiatus for a month now already anyways; that none of the job listings I've read make me want to send in my resume; that I made out with a boy I had no intention of ever making out with again and I honestly don't know how I feel about it, I want to say I feel nothing about it but I don't think you can actually make out and cuddle with somebody that you like and not have feelings about it and I think it's actually that the feelings are too complicated and too many things and so I'm not sitting with those ones yet* and that I'm well aware there is some major grammatical craziness going on in this post but I just don't give a fuck.

But I can also tell you I've had moments of peace and serenity lately. That walking around in Central Park with the sun on your skin and new friend is happiness. That nighttime rambles with a flask size bottle of whiskey and friend you haven't seen in a while are kind of great even if they unexpectedly kiss you later. That I do have one single job interview lined up and it looks perfect for me. That I spent yesterday at my pastry cook's friend's home out in Fresh Meadows and got to hang out with her siblings and large friend group and remember what it feels like to be part of something stable and solid. That I have a week packed full of social activities with other BiSC goers who are fast becoming my close friends.

I can tell you that I've recently realized that I'm angry at myself for letting go of and being less vocal about things I care about to make myself more palatable or to fit into groups better. That I've taken my philosophy of "pick and choose your battles" a little too far. Hi, I'm Alana and I am a feminist and I probably don't think any of your sexist/homophobic/racist jokes are funny and yeah, I'm generally ludicrously PC and I'm ok with that. JUST SO WE'RE CLEAR.

So maybe it's not that there isn't anything going on. Maybe it's that there's too much going on. Too much swirling around in my head for me to sort through it and feel any of it. Today I decided I was just going to fake it until I make it. I cleaned my room, I did some yoga, I ate an entire pineapple and also quinoa, poached chicken, black beans and avocados. Fine... also an entire bag of cadbury mini eggs.

Baby steps back to caring people, baby steps.

*This is how I feel: I feel sad and a little angry because it was nice and it was comfortable and making out and a cuddle buddy were exactly what I needed this week and it wasn't expected so it was a nice ego boost but it wasn't with somebody with whom I am actually ok with casually making out and cuddling. So, I'm sad that it's not something I get to do in a non-casual way and a little angry with both of us for doing it. And maybe a little angry at myself for not being over him even though I said earlier it was ok to be sad. God I hate feelings. THEY DON'T EVEN MAKE SENSE A LITTLE BIT, CAN I PLEASE BE A VULCAN NOW?

Bits & Pieces (the third)

I mean, THIS WEEK, y'all, this week. Or two weeks? I don't even know. I don't even know where to start. This is going to be a little brain dump-y. Ok, a lot brain dump-y. (read: hilarious/ridiculous/rambling)

I didn't finish Scintilla because I had a carpal tunnel flare up, probably from Scintilla. What I learned from Scintilla: I actually, physically cannot write every day. So there's that. That's pretty shitty. I mean, I probably could if I didn't get paid to squeeze piping bags and shape tiny pasta but I do, so writing every day is out. And no, I couldn't really hold a pen by the end of the day either. With a break from writing and "sleeping" with a wrist brace for a few days, I seem to be doing ok. This makes me really happy because a) I can stop sleeping with the motherfucking wrist brace because sleeping with a wrist brace is more like "wake up every three hours and groggily wonder why the fuck you have this uncomfortable torture device on your wrist" b) I was freaking out because I don't have health insurance and I'm ok with paying the $100 for an urgent care appointment if it's for getting antibiotics or some shit, but carpal tunnel isn't really a "here take this things and it's fixed" sort of problem and I have no money for tests or physical therapy or, god forbid, surgery and the freaking out probably didn't help with the wrist brace induced insomnia and c) now I can write again.

And I need to write again so that I can tell you about how I haven't slept longer than three hours in one stretch EVEN WHEN I DRUGGED MYSELF for like two weeks and I am really really glad I finally have two days off IN A ROW tomorrow and Monday.

Also, I need to talk about how boys are confusing.

I suffer from chronic bitch face, my mouth naturally turns down when my face is relaxed, while this doesn't seem to really bother other women, it means I get a lot of those annoying commands from men to smile. It also seems to mean that men either think I'm a bitch, or if they've gotten me to smile, that I'm flirting with them. I either apparently have "bitchface" or "flirtface" on because apparently I unintentionally flirt A LOT when I think I'm just making conversation. (Sidenote: Yes, I am also a flirt, but when I'm intentionally flirting it's usually pretty obvious, there's a lot of smirking and eyebrow raises and taking advantage of my shortness) And then I'm too nice and I give people my number EVEN THOUGH I DIDN'T THINK WE WERE FLIRTING and then I feel awful but most of the time this isn't too much of a problem because I can just be that awful girl that ignores your calls. However, it is a problem when my drunken coworker kisses me and I didn't even see it coming a little bit.

Drunken coworker.

Kissed me.

Not the one I slept with forever ago when I wasn't working there. A new one. Like, not just new to kissing me, but new to working there. Oh, and did I mention he has a girlfriend? And I've barely every spoken to him? Except for making polite getting to know you conversation at the other sous chef's going away party, I'd pretty much never said anything other than "Hey, how are you? Which breads are you low on?".

But we left the party at the same time and we were waiting for the train and he kissed me and WHAT? So I told him it was a bad idea and then he said it was a good idea and then he looked me straight in the eyes and told me I was beautiful and I was so caught off guard (see also: drunk) that I didn't dodge a second kiss. And then he fell over, taking me with him. And then he vomited.

So here I am, in the train station, with a guy I've known two weeks and have had maybe a total of thirty minutes worth of conversation with who is falling over, vomiting, black out drunk. Sober me realizes he might've hit his head when we fell and that maybe I should've taken him to a hospital. Drunk me went into crisis mode and decided to get him in a cab and get him home.

He's a foot taller than me and does not have a small build. I have a bruise over half my right ring finger from the pressure of the claddaugh I wear from trying to pull him up by his hands. I succeed in getting him up and out of the train station. With much effort I get his address out of him and get us into a cab. Not thinking about the fact that his address could be construed as Brooklyn or Manhattan and assuming that the cabbie would stay IN THE BOROUGH WE WERE IN if I didn't specify, I focused on making sure new coworker was alive and ok and not on the fact that OH HEY WE'RE IN MANHATTAN NOW, also please pull over because new coworker needs to throw up more. So then I had to go back to Brooklyn. Most expensive cab ride ever. Fuck my life. But, I mean, what the fuck else am I supposed to do?

We finally get back to his house and the effing effity eff keys keep sticking in the lock and it's freezing and it's 3am and it takes like twenty minutes of us passing the keys back and forth to each other to get in the god damn house where we proceed to go upstairs to his bedroom and then I go to the bathroom only to find he's disappeared while I was peeing. Fuck. I find him downstairs in the other bathroom sitting on the toilet with his head in the sink. I mean, hey, I usually prefer to use the toilet for vomiting and the floor for sitting on, but at least this way he can't choke on his own vomit in his sleep. He vaguely wakes up, throws up some more. I try to force some water into him, he doesn't keep it down. I consider sleeping in the bathtub because I am a crazy person that thinks that somehow by sleeping next to a black out drunk person I'll keep them from injuring themselves. I try to pull him up and get him upstairs. No luck. Finally, I give up and let him fall asleep, head in the sink. I go up to his room, curl up on the bed, completely clothed, jacket still on because it's freezing and set an alarm for twenty minutes to go check on him. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Eventually he makes it into bed.

And that, was how this week started. I left before he woke up. I know he knows I got him home because I overheard him telling my other coworkers that he blacked out and I got him home but I have no idea what else he remembers.

So I'm pretty much just pretending none of it ever happened and he hasn't said anything about any of it to me (either the kissing or the me getting him home) but he has been really friendly and look, HOW THE FUCK DO YOU DEAL WITH THIS SITUATION? Because I'm at work, I have a professional relationship with him. I barely know him. I don't want to kiss him. But I spent multiple hours wiping vomit off his face and I've slept in his bed so it's weird. It's really fucking weird. I don't know what to do, so I'll probably just keep pretending nothing ever happened except it makes me kind of feel like a bitch to be like "hey, I've seen you crazy vulnerable and in need of help but now I'm acting like I barely know you". But I barely know him.

So anyways, apparently I have no idea how to read men because I really didn't think we were flirting but he really was determined to kiss me. Also, he was really drunk so I'm assuming it has no bearing on how sober him feels about kissing me. At least I'm hoping that's true.

Boys Are Confusing Part Two:

This past Saturday I think I almost got into my first fight with Trouble. (Pro Tip: You're not supposed to get in fights with somebody with whom you're just sleeping and have no emotional involvement, because I think that's a sign of emotional involvement. Oops.) We were in a cab and he mentioned how his new subletter was a really great guy and HE SAID "not like my other roommate" so I said "who hates me?". He again clarified that his roommate hates everyone and I again stated that I didn't really care if his roommate hates me because he was kind of a jerk.

"Really? Because he's one of my really good friends, y'know we grew up together, so his opinion really matters to me"

And then I changed the subject because a) never try to reason with drunk people especially if you are also drunk and b) why does it matter what his best friend thinks of me if we're not dating?! What?

We are talking about a guy here who once pointed to the ring on my finger and said "Are you engaged? I mean, not that it would matter if you were, I don't believe in the whole marriage thing". I thought we were firmly in this is not a relationship land, not ambiguous relationship land. Ambiguous relationship land is my actual least favorite.

Why am I meeting his best friend?

Why does his best friend's opinion matter?

Why are we seeing each other (slightly) more often?

And why is he doing cute things like pushing my hair out of my eyes and telling me it's a good to see me?

And I AM A GIRL AND I NEED TO ANALYZE ALL THESE THINGS TO DEATH BECAUSE I HAVE ALL THESE FEEEEEEEEELINGS.

Unrelated to all these things, I worked 13 hours today even though it's the day my pastry cook came back from being on vacation. I don't know either. Also I had potato chips for dinner even though I'm starting a juice cleanse on Monday. The world has been muffled all week. If you understand that statement, I am glad for the company, though also sorry. If you don't, I can't explain it. My room is a mess. I misread my DIGITAL scale all week and thought I had gained back five pounds instead of losing five pounds. I will clean my room tomorrow and I will pay to have somebody else do my laundry and I will have dinner with my family and I will start drinking all the juice on Monday and life will come back in focus again. I think. I think that's how it works.

But now, it's time to go the fuck to sleep.

Letting Trouble into my Bed (Part One)

HI FAMILY! This one mentions sex, so there's that.

Saturday night I went out with a friend (the kind with benefits... yeah, apparently I lied in my last post) who we're going to call Trouble.

Here's the thing about Trouble, Trouble is cute and ludicrously charming and hilarious. He's a flirt and he always buys my drinks. Our deadpan sarcasm is so evenly matched that we have entire conversations during which I'm not sure either of us knows if we're being serious.

Trouble is another feral cat. While we can talk for hours, we rarely talk of anything of importance. Since Trouble is a childhood friend of a friend (and from comments he's made to me) I know he really doesn't do relationships. That's fine. I know where we stand. I know about once a month he'll text me, we'll spend time together, I'll head home the next morning and not think about him until at some point I'll realize it's been about a month and vaguely wonder if we're doing that whole sex thing still. Without fail, right in the midst of me going on a responding to every message on OkC binge, he'll text, we'll meet up... repeat, repeat, repeat.

I'm a little terrified the arrangement is starting to change. You see, on my birthday, I let Trouble come home with me, not the other way around. I let Trouble into my bed. I am very weird and very particular about who gets to come into my space. For the most part I avoid bringing people home with me. If you've seen pictures of my room I've posted various places then you know that it is full of photos and quotes written on chalkboard contact paper and a giant chart of my goals for the month. My yoga mat is always unrolled on the floor, my ridiculous number of shoes are on display and all my favorite books live here. In short, my room can tell somebody a lot about me that I might not tell them. Trouble's room is the opposite, his room is just as guarded as he is. But he had a friend staying with him who apparently refuses to sleep on the couch, so we went back to my house. And I made a big fucking deal out of it.

"So basically it's like you're letting me into the inner sanctum?"

"Yes"

He could tell I was a little terrified and I was drunk enough to let it show.

"Also, it's kind of a mess right now, I haven't put everything aways since getting back from California"

"I don't care, fuck, I'll help you clean it, I get to see you naked"

(Why doesn't this deal work in actual relationships? MARRY ME NOW, TROUBLE)

I woke up in the morning curled up against him, it's later than I know he was planning on leaving and he's grinning at me.

"What?"

He looks at his phone, "shit, I have to go".

I groggily watch him pull his clothes on before he kisses me and says "thanks for letting me stay over" and smiling.

For a moment, even though I should know better, my heart melts.

Bits & Pieces (the second)

Social Life/BiSC:

In the last week, I met Adam, Sara and Bob, which means, along with Rachael, Dominique and Nicole, I have met 10% of the people I'm going to Las Vegas with in May. And I have to say if everybody is both as awesome and attractive as those six in real life, it's going to be the most overwhelmingly amazing experience I've had in a long time. Also, I'm really gonna have to bring my A game.

I made some moderately stupid decisions in the last week so that I could meet those people. And by moderately stupid, I mean I went out twice in the last week once knowing I was getting sick and once knowing I was still sick and should be sleeping instead. The result was working with a fever last Sunday and feeling likc if I had to stand for one more second past ten hours of work I might die for most of the week. But you know what? That's the great thing about being an adult. I consciously made those decisions knowing they weren't the best idea and I accepted the consequences and the only asshole to blame was myself. And then I spent pretty much all of yesterday in bed, spent today at AMNH and wandering through Central Park, came home, took a nap because that's what my body said we should do and pretty much feel like a human again. So I think, overall, worth it.

CA v NY:

It turns out you can take the girl out of California, but you can't take the California out of the girl. My pastry cook is giving up cigarettes, soda and fast food for Lent and everybody tells her it's crazy while I'm like "that's awesome, it's really not that bad". And not to pat myself on the back for not having bad habits I never picked up, I just call that normal life. I think most of my friends back home do too. It still weirds me out that the chefs I work with eat fast food. In fact I'm so not used to people eating fast food (with the obvious exception of In'n'Out) that even non chefs eating fast food surprises me. I mean, this week I'm concerned that I'm eating organic yoghurt from humanely treated cows and bread made at a coop because they come all the way from California and I think that's a perfectly normal way to think about food. I guess it's all relative to what you're used to. Hella NorCal, yo.

Boy Stuff:

I really will make out with anyone when I'm drunk. Pretty sure Sara asked me if I would make out with like 5 different people the other night and I said "yes" everytime. Sober me would not have said "yes" that many times. Sober me is now back in charge of my love life. The "don't get drunk on the first date" rule that Michelle gave me is now in effect. Despite being single for a whole year my friends have been shocked the last few weeks when they've asked about my dating situation because there currently is none. At all. Haven't gone on a date in three weeks. There are no boys that I'm currently regularly sleeping with. (I know, it's weird for me too) I am however, currently writing 6 paragraph messages to a guy on OkC that I genuinely want to be friends with. Or more. But most of the time when I go on dates from OkC I'm kind of forcing myself and I feel like I'm putting myself in such a contrived situation because I don't know if I would always go on dates if I had met the guy IRL whereas this guys seems like somebody I would actually hang out with in the real world. So that's possibly exciting.

New Year's Goals:

I'm currently losing weight at a rate of approximately two pounds a month. Did you know I was trying to lose weight? Probably not. Mostly because I think it's the most boring thing ever to read about on other peoples' blogs and because I'm a small person I feel like people will want to punch me in the face if I complain about my weight. But look y'all, I'm a chef which means my weight has actually been somewhat of a constant struggle since I went through culinary school. It also means part of the reason I don't weigh a lot more with what I eat is because I am on my feet cooking for ten frakking hours a day and lifting fifty pound sacks and running up and down the GD stairs. Anyways, with some portion control and stopping to make myself eat actual food instead of just randomly putting whatever cookie is closest at hand in my mouth when I realize I'm starving, I'm slowly but surely losing weight and starting to feel a lot better about my body and not hate the way every piece of clothing I put on fits. Which is good, because I really don't have enough money to buy a whole new wardrobe.

Dairy is the devil. I've gone back to pretty much cutting it out entirely and feel so much better on a day to day basis.

I'm still obsessed with Blue Print Cleanse juices but have mostly just been incorporating them into my regular diet instead of going all out cleanse. I would like to do another three day cleanse soon though.

Random shit:

I read all three books in The Hunger Games trilogy in two days. I would've liked it better if they hadn't been written in such a way that it only took me two days to read them. This is why I don't usually read YA books. Good stories aren't enough, I want to read that sentence that rings so very true my heart aches, that expresses an emotion so perfectly I'm knocked on my ass. I will say that it was a good story and will probably make a pretty enjoyable movie.

Best for last: My new work schedule is 10 am-8ish pm which means I might get to have a social life again. I've only had it for a week, but I think I might love it. I'm still alternating between having Sunday/Monday off and Thursday/Sunday off, which is really weird but the new hours might make it manageable.

Viva Las Vegas

The first time I went to Las Vegas, I was 21. It was me, six friends and one hotel room. We spent most of the time mildly (or more than mildly) inebriated, I won a bucket of quarters (at the Tropicana, probably the last casino to give you buckets of change, I don't know whether or not they've finally upgraded to those boring paper slips) and we saw Love. We spent a three day weekend there, it was fun and at the end I was ready to go home and maybe not go back to Vegas for a few years.

The second time I went to Vegas was two years later, for a bachelorette party. There were six girls in two rooms. We flew. Moving on up in the world. We were older and less poor, so we spent less time drinking forties on the strip and more time collecting all the novelty cups. We went to the top of the Eiffel tower, walked up and down the entire strip and took advantage of every offer of free booze and wristbands for clubs. Per usual, I took advantage of every opportunity to wear clothing you will never see me wear outside of Vegas. (See: sequins and everything from Forever 21) My biggest regret was not buying a sparkly flask. I'm pretty sure if that's your biggest regret when leaving Sin City, you're doin' alright. Once again, I was there for a three day weekend, and at the end I was ready to leave.

Fast forward another two years and we get to Vegas trip three. I can't find any of the items needed to get pictures off my own camera, so here's a picture my aunt took of my little brother and me right before my mom's wedding. Yes, I'm using the term little in reference to his age obviously. I'm wearing 4" heels in this picture. True story. (Also, no, neither of us are adopted. Yes, he is my half brother. In case you just thought he was really tan which is something one of my friends actually said once. Anyways....) Vegas trip three confirmed what I already suspected, the Las Vegas strip is really overwhelming and kind of awful if you're not at least mildly inebriated and wearing sequins. But I got to spend a lot of time with my little brother, eat some good food with my family and my mom got married by Elvis looking the happiest I've ever seen her. This time I was really only there for two full days and I was ready to leave. (Oh, and I bought a sparkly flask)

You may have noticed that I like to wait two years between Vegas trips. That seems to be about the time I'm ready for the ridiculousness again. But not this year. This year, I'm going back for Bloggers in Sin City. Four days of fun and turning internet friends into real life friends.

I don't know if I've ever mentioned how thankful I am for this blog sometimes. I might not have the shiniest fonts or the largest group of followers and most of my posts don't even get comments, but I know it's made me some amazing friendships and afforded me some crazy wonderful opportunities. (Hello, being able to move to New York. Hello, all the friends I've made since moving across country)

And one of my favorite internet people turned in real life people is Nicole (ok, who am I fooling, basically all my internet people are my favorite people, but Nicole understood when I moved across country so fast I has to MAIL her her copy of the first season of Grey's Anatomy even though we only lived an hour apart in California, so you know, I don't know where I'm going with this anymore, except Nicole is great) who is the BiSC founder and organizer so I mean, obviously I've been wanting to go to this for a few years now. What makes it even better, is that Paper'd, the pretty awesome looking wallpaper app coming from Nicole and her lovely Shatterboxx partner, is refunding one person's registrationg fee! Seriously, registration fee, completely refunded and I want it. Because my tax return is probably going to be pretty great, but I'd rather spend it on sequined dressed to wear in Vegas.

So fine, yes, I just made you read an entire blog post so that I could maybe win a free spot to BiSC. But also BECAUSE OH MY GOD CAN WE TALK ABOUT HOW EXCITED I AM ABOUT GOING TO BiSC?!?!?!?!

Yep.

Don't know what I did next, all I know is I couldn't stop

So you might've noticed I've been a little depressed lately.

Or maybe a lot depressed.

It's always surprising how far you can get from normal before you realize it. And you never really realize quite how far gone you were until things start to equalize again.

Last month started off rough with my week of puppysitting that left an already drained me even more drained and exhausted and only seemed to go downhill from there.

There was A LOT of retail therapy. A LOT of drinking. A lot of poor impulse control. I almost got kicked out of a bar for the first time in my life. I almost went home with a stranger from a bar for the first time in my life. I couldn't stop crying on my commute to work. I ran off the N train to vomit on the tracks at Queensboro plaza on my way to work the morning after Halloween.

I was crashing and burning hard. And I knew it. But it's like I was outside myself watching. Every other sentence out of my mouth I was thinking "why the fuck did you just say that?". I just observed myself eat food that would make me feel like shit. I let myself down drink after drink to numb myself or relax or who the fuck knows what, knowing I would regret it the next morning.

I got to the point where I was treating my body like such crap and trying so hard to keep a smile on face that all the muscles around my right shoulder blade spasmed, my lower back was so tight that just sitting down was painful, everything I ate made me feel nauseous and my TMJ was so bad I didn't even want to eat in the first place. My insomnia was back in full swing, no doubt fueled by the alcohol and I was probably averaging about four hours of sleep a night. I seemed to be constantly be battling some sort of ear/throat infection.

I spent a fair amount of last week locking myself in bathrooms to quietly cry for a few moments before pulling myself back together. Until finally, Thursday, when I got in bed, I realized I only had to make it through one more day of work before a four day weekend, before I didn't have to keep any of it together anymore and that thought was so liberating that I just started sobbing. Sobbing like the world was ending. The big, heaving, choking sobs of a child. I made it through my short day on Friday. Again, going to bed and crying.

Saturday was my roommates' wedding and it was lovely and adorable and they looked so amazingly happy and I was so incredibly happy for them and still, there I was, stealing away to the bathroom to sob, blot my eyeliner, reapply my lipstick and then go back to the dancing.

Thankfully, Sunday rolled around and I spent the day in bed. Ordered in. Relaxed and spaced out with Hulu and Netflix instant watch knowing the next day I had a massage scheduled first thing and juice getting delivered later. I started to feel, if not happy, somewhat at peace, not bitter, not depressed, not like I was constantly at war with myself.

Monday I had my massage, came home and started my three day Blue Print Cleanse. I did the lowest level cleanse, but were I to do it again, I would probably do the intermediate because for some reason I had a really hard time getting down the Carrot, Apple, Beet juice that's in the basic cleanse even though it mostly was gingery delicious. I really wasn't hungry for most of the cleanse and I finally stopped feeling nauseous and bloated constantly. By Tuesday I was finally starting to really feel like a normal human being again. I cleaned my room, changed my sheets did a ridiculous amount of laundry and went to a yoga class that kicked my ass but in the best way possible.

Today, back at work, was ok. It was hard to resist the siren call of fresh baked bread in favor of juice, but I powered through. The day goes by a lot faster when my entire body doesn't hurt and really, right now, there's not that much to be stressed about, so work shouldn't be a big deal.

I don't think I feel like I'm at 100% yet, but I feel a lot less like I'm struggling to keep myself from a breakdown. It's good enough. For now.

I swear I'm well spoken when I'm not nervous/sick.

Untitled from Alana Margaret on Vimeo.

 

 

A reminder to practice non attachment or hyper vigilance, I'm not sure which.

So Monday (which is my Sunday) was kind of just an all around good day, a "if this isn't nice, I don't know what is" sort of day (to borrow a phrase from Mr. Vonnegut). The kind of day that makes you think, "if this is how my weeks going to go, I'm fucking golden, bitches". There was good hanging out time, there was good finding the perfect practical black purse that could also be dressed up and was on crazy sale time (I actually did not own a black purse before yesterday, crazy right?), there was buying a really cute iPhone cover time and there was good eating leftover Chinese food time.

Have I made the point that Monday was full of win yet? FULL OF MOTHERFUCKING WIN.

So obviously, the universe was like "hey, that's a little too much being satisfied with life for you" and decided that maybe it would be fun if this morning, while I was on the train to work, some asshole ran into the train, grabbed my phone from my hands and ran back out before I could even react. Yes, I'm that idiot on the train at 3:30am with their phone out. Also, so is everyone else on the train. All fucking four of them. I was just closest to the door. Or maybe because my phone was obviously the prettiest with its brand new adorable polka dot case. Yeah. I shouldn't have bought the case, that was clearly just tempting fate. Damn you polk dots and your siren call.

I suppose as far as having something stolen from you, it was fairly innocuous. No being threatened bodily harm or anything. However, I'm kind of nervous every morning on the way to work because it's 3:30am and I'm 5'2" and female and that doesn't really lead to me feeling particularly safe, so the phone thing, it kind of pushed me over the edge. Walking over the bridge, a bicyclist whistled at me, I'm pretty sure in a "I'm going to pass you" kind of way but it sounded like a catcall and I immediately felt my body go straight into flight mode before I turned around and saw it was just some harmless hipster dude on a bike. I spent the rest of the walk to work going into my ProAct training. How would group home worker Alana deal with a crisis situation? Slow breathes. Unclench my fists. Full on panic attack averted.

My hands were shaking the entire morning. Not the best for baking. When my boss came to pick up the pastry I was so frazzled I barely said two words to her, not thinking about the fact that the place I keep the menu for the week is in my email, which requires me having my phone. Of course I go to figure out my prep for the day and realize I have no idea and more importantly I'm totally freaked out that I haven't yet stopped service on my phone and reported it missing (there's no phone or computer at work, it's a production kitchen) so I went all the way back home dealt with that shit and then went back to work.

So far in this story, Tuesday is not full of win. In fact, I think it's safe to say, Tuesday is full of fail. Really full of it.

Luckily, I'm not really adult and am still on a family plan. Also luckily, I set up all of my grandparents' online accounts for frickin everything, so I went online and saw that all of the phone lines that were not mine were available for an upgrade and emailed my grandma and got permission to use one of them to make it so I could actually buy a new phone.

I headed over to my uncle's to pick up an old phone to activate in case for some reason I couldn't walk out of the store with a replacement iPhone and we went on a journey to AT&T where I had to add myself as an authorized account user using my magical I set up everything online skills before the guy would let me make account decisions, which was kind of hilarious. No, I can't sell you a phone, but you can change who the authorized users are online if you have access...

And then my uncle bought my phone.

Because my family is awesome.

Grandma's upgrade + uncle's credit card means I went less than 24 hours without an iPhone.

So while, I can't say Tuesday isn't still primarily full of fail, it's definitely got some win to it.

Anxious about getting on the train in the morning though. Attempt at sleeping didn't work out so well. Obviously.

I want snuggles.

I'm gonna drink myself to death

If everybody could just tweet me, or text me, or send me a postcard every so often that says "Don't forget to smell the roses," that would be awesome. Another option for what to write: JUST SLOW THE FUCK DOWN.

Because really, I just need to slow the fuck down. I've completely unintentionally embraced a work hard, play hard lifestyle and I kind of love it, but I'm also pretty sure that I'm gonig to crash and burn pretty hard if I don't take a second to breathe. But everything is going so well. I've got a couple of career game changer things going on that I'm not going to write about until things are a little more certain, I'm spending time with friends I've made and making new ones and I'm even, maybe, ready to get back into the dating game.

That's right, it may be time for me to revive my OkCupid profile. Primarily so I can make snarky tweets about the guys that message me, of course.

But let's recap my last couple of weeks.

I worked for twelve days straight, mostly nine or ten hour days starting at 4am. Some days I managed to make myself go to sleep early, but I also refused to be completely without a social life, this is really hard when all you really have time to do is eat, work and sleep. And hopefully fit some showers in. After those twelve days I had a three day weekend and went to Boston (don't worry, there's still more Boston recap to come in another post, I know you're fascinated by it) which was pretty low key and relaxing just because the pace of Boston is so so different from New York (Boston, it was nice while it lasted, but I don't think there's really a future for us, my heart belongs to another) but also involved waking up early (just because that's how I do now, not really intentionally), walking everywhere, brief afternoon rests and then back out for night time activities. I slept a solid eight hours each night though. Monday, the 4th, I got home around 6 and made myself get in bed promptly, but fireworks kept me up until around 10:30 so I got about four hours of sleep. I probably could have knocked out my production on Tuesday in eight hours, but I was exhausted and I was moving a little like a zombie and it took me nine. From work I went straight to my friends to help her grocery shop and cook for an engagement party she was throwing the next day. I left her house around 9:30 pm. I slept for four hours. I went to work again. Wednesday I was asleep by 7pm!!!! That means 7.5 hours of sleep which felt like fourteen. It was amazing. Thursday I worked and then came home and chilled out, blogged a bit and then realized I needed to transform myself into a person that can be seen outside of the kitchen because it was MUSEUM TWEETUP TIME! The tweetup didn't even start until my bedtime, of course, and then afterwards, since I figured I wasn't going to get much sleep anyways, I went and got drinks with people. Except then it reached a point where I realized I wasn't going to get any sleep at all because if 2:30am is your wake up time and it's already 1... So I went to work without having slept. Right?! Right?! Holy fuck, what is wrong with me? Dear me, chill out. I passed out promptly after work for 6 hours, woke up for a few, went back to sleep. Still, I probably only got ten hours of sleep in 48 hours. Doing it wrong. So yesterday I worked my normal nine hour day, went home for a couple of hours, changed myself from a cherry juice covered monster into a respectable young lady and went to visit the folks at Stellina and give them all ridiculous lobster souvenirs from Boston. I had drinks and dinner with a friend and her brother and was back home by around 10:20.

I layed down on my bed for what I thought would be five minutes. And fell asleep. In my jeans. Yeah, I passed out, fully clothed at 10:30pm on a Saturday, which is why it's now 9:30am on a Sunday and I've already gotten coffee, bought laundry detergent, painted my toe nails bright red and am about to go back to the laundromat to get my washed AND dried laundry. I feel like I have an infinite amount of time today and I don't know what to do with it. Plus, I have tomorrow off too! I really don't know what to do with myself.

And I'm pretty sure if I've reached the point where two days off with no plans seems like I have an insane amount of time, I really need to check myself before I wreck myself.