it's gone too far...

when do you say when?

when do you just give up on growing your hair out?

i'm starting to get to that point. my bangs are being all stabby and my eyes are takin' the heat.

...and, yet, i can't quite trim my bangs yet for fear of going from lash skimming mod to elementary school country bumpkin.

i'm seriously starting to question my hair-growing goals here, people.

what am i trying to prove exactly?

that i have patience?

bah.

well, i'm going to do my best to hold on for at least another week.

i've got a hair appointment on the 13th and that'll be the turning point.

do i just cut it all off again?...or do i explain my goals to my hairstylist and hope that she can shape the seemingly bowl-like structure on my head into something that doesn't make me squirmy and annoyed.

we'll see what happens. stay tuned!

goals for this weekend:

• play a lot of scrabble tonight (but no more than 3 hours for fear that i'll suffer from scrabbitis...which is a soul-sucking depression and malaise that i suffer from upon playing scrabble for too many hours)
• attend my chicago friend's birthday extravaganza
• have tea with the paramour's family
• illustrate!
• come up with a submission...or at least start...to submit for a graphic design fundamentals book...deadline: february 15th.
• work out
• sleep!

sidenote:

i had a horrifying dream last night...

i dreamt that i was bitten by a poisonous snake in a dark, cement alleyway.

i was lying on the ground, dying.

i couldn't move and i could barely speak, but i had just enough in me to dial 911.

when the operator picked up, i explained my situation...

but when she asked me where i was, i couldn't answer...

because i didn't know where i was or how i got there.

yeah. that sucked.

...

have a great weekend!

age or location?

i feel like the older i get, the hungrier i get...but, logically speaking, this shouldn't be the case. i mean, i'm done with growth spurts as far as i know (oh, please, please, please...give me three more inches. it's not asking much!) and it's not like i've been helicoptered into a subzero climate and need to layer myself with excess padding to ensure that my innards don't freeze.

so, what's going on?

i never used to be a snacker.

i was never one for mass amounts of sweets, though i do enjoy salty foods. (does that count as having a salt-tooth?...and if it does, that doesn't sound very pleasant.)

...i even grew up in a household where cookies and other such delightful sugar vehicles hid in every kitchen cabinet, every bowl and plate...everywhere you turned...and let's not get into the motherload that was planted in the basement closet. (cookies, crackers, sweets...a wall of them...as far as the eye could see! it was like we were awaiting the sucrose apocalypse.)

so, yes. never a snacker...until now.

as said earlier, i wondered if it had to do with me getting older.

...but i rule this out. there's no need for me to have extra calories in my diet...and i'm not pregnant. that joke isn't funny anymore.

in fact, it was never funny...

so, i'm starting to think that it's my place of work.

upon further reflection, i realize that my snacking started around the fall of 2008...which is when i started working at my current office.

it's 98% female, we all PMS around the same time, we all complain about that 4pm lull, and our cleaning woman always insists on purchasing boxes upon boxes of sweets for us.

people bake in this company...and they share their baking with their co-workers.

...and usually the baked goods are the type you can't say no to...

the type of baked goods that lure you in like lemmings off a cliff...

a sugary cliff of awe-inspiring carb-satisfaction.

any time of day, if there're cookies in the kitchen, you will hear one person or another popping the cookie jar lid open.

clink! clink! (it's a glass cookie jar)...

nom! nom!...

and then silence...

that guilty silence...

so silent you think that they were swallowed up by the universe the minute they finished chewing.

the kind of silence that tells you the person who's being silent is feeling bad about themselves and is considering going to the gym or not eating for the next week.

...or maybe i'm projecting.

on being responsible...

in these dark economic times, one has to be responsible, right?

right.

so, i've decided to get back on the responsibility bandwagon and take the rickety road to frugalville. it's not necessarily a mecca of joy and frivolous living. it's more of a working village where everyone wears uniqlo and packs their own lunches.

speaking of packing lunches, i've decided to take two steps in the right directions. the first is to pack lunch at least three times a week. the second is to get back on the 8 cigarette/day diet and try to schedule a quit date.

i was doing pretty well there for a while in terms of packing lunch...but a new eatery opened up two blocks away that has the most wondrous hot & cold bar you've ever seen. i was defeated by the creamy yams and wonderfully textural rices and couscous...not to mention that they sell my favorite yogurt there.

it's just a dangerous place to be.

...and, of course, i always pick up the heavy items...so, my lunches have been at least $10 a day.

my wallet is constantly crying, but when i ask what's wrong it just looks at me with that expression...you know, the "you should know what's wrong" expression.

my wallet needs to realize that i'm no mind-reader (do wallets have minds?) and that it should just tell me what its issues are.

so, anyway, i packed lunch today.

i decided to make my sandwich as angular and square as possible and pretended like the discarded crusts cancelled out the bagel i ate when i got into the office this morning.

i haven't eaten any cookies yet.

...and tonight?

tonight i get crackin' on the illustration-side of my portfolio and continue my quest to weed through my digital photographs.

wish me luck.

chez susan

if there's one place i would like to be right now, it's chez susan (preferably in the midst of what she does best...design aside...she designs pretty damn well too).

who is susan?

susan is my amazing co-worker that bakes to de-stress.

now, i'm going to ignore the irksome things that happened today and even pretend like my molar doesn't have a jaggy, horrible hole in it...

because i want to tell you about susan's baking.

this morning, i received these chocolate/sugar covered orange rinds...and they were, quite possibly, the highlight of my day.

every bite was like riding the crest of a citrus wave into a tangy-sweet bay of wonder where dreams are made of gum drops and the sun is lemon yellow...a place where vitamin c is rampant and no one ever has scurvy.

yeah. they were that good.

and i can't forget about last week...

the goodies she gifted us for our co-worker's baby shower bonanza...

for this particular celebration, susan made us chocolate covered cream puffs (both whipped cream and custard varieties), meringues, AND chocolate covered strawberries.

their tastiness was so paramount that i didn't even notice the fact that i had gotten completely full after the one cream puff...and managed a meringue, a chocolate-covered strawberry and a vanilla bar (which was made by my pregger co-worker...which were very tasty, but i didn't get a photo of them).

naturally, i felt like dying after eating all those sweets...but death by dessert never seemed like a bad way to go.

upon further reflection, i realize that i would like to master desserts to this degree at some point in my life.

perhaps it's something else to put on the resolution list...

...oh, like i don't have enough things on the list already...

give & take

ok.

so, remember that resolution list i made a while back?

well, get this. i was actually able to strike one off the list! now, it looks something like this:

• learn to develop my own black and white film (i need a film scanner!)
• rehaul my website
• work on my portraiture - i think i've had enough of objects for a little while (i took a few photos the other day...not sure if i'm getting exactly what i want here.)
• seriously work on my illustration portfolio (i drew something a few weeks ago and hated it.)
• have a solo show at an art gallery
• actually work on the children's book i've been writing up
• quit...well, cut down on...no, no...quit...i'll quit smoking
• make a genuine effort to grow my hair (my hair has become excessively floppy...i think i'll have a pageboy in a couple of months...right now, i look like a foppish mod kid.)
• write more (i will, dear readers!)
• submit writing to the new yorker
• not allow myself to be bitter for more than a few hours at a time
• try to exercise (i totally worked out yesterday)
• dress nicely (i got a leather jacket...does that count?)
• sleep more
• get back to reading at least 1 novel a month
• cook more
• go out more
• smile more
• figure out what i really want to do with my life
• not be afraid

that's right! i've managed to finally work on my website...and that's what i did...all weekend, aside from some welcome respites in the form of caffeine and motivational conversation with liam.

i haven't worked like that in a long time, but it's inspired me to re-do my portfolio as well because...well, to be honest, i kind of dislike my portfolio at this point (nope, you can't see it anymore. i took the old site down.)

so, after coming to what seems like a mood/theme/style that i'm comfortable with...now i just have to push forward with it.

along with this comes having to learn to develop my own black & white film...which is part of step two. oh, so many things to do...it's all very exciting and scary at the same time, but it's starting to feel right. i can't just sit at home and do nothing anymore.

perhaps it means that spring fast approaches.

i hope so.

what else?

a chunk of one of my molars cracked off...

and my dentist is on vacation.

yeah. that happened around the time where i was thinking today wasn't a bad day at all and that i couldn't wait to go home and work on some illustrations and photographs.

we'll see what happens with that.

...

and in closing, i'd like to leave you with this.

i find it incredibly satisfying when i'm refilling a stapler and i successfully pull an entire bar of staples out of the box without it breaking.

it's the simple things, right?

(sorry, no photo/drawing today. fail whale.)

...ok. maybe just one.