Yeah, I'm lame

Lately I’ve been mopey because the wedding stuff is finally winding down and I have much less to do. It’s made me realize, once again, how unhappy I am here without any friends. I do know one person, Ashley, but she works an opposite schedule from me so I don’t get to see her too much.

Anyway, I did some reading up on the internet on how to make friends. It’s always the same advice, and none of it works for me.

Volunteer! Yeah, I do. I teach literacy to an adult student. So I know my student, but there aren’t many other opportunities to meet other people.

Hang out with your co-workers! I live in Milwaukee, but they all live in Illinois. And to make it worse, while I commute south to work, many of them commute north. That’s a long way to drive just to get drinks.

Keep in touch with your old friends! I do, but my closest friend lives about fifty minutes away. And since she just bought a house a few months ago, you know I’m not going to be able to lure her into the city. Everyone else lives farther.

Take a class! Join a club! This is a little touchy. Between the band and his job, Mike is usually gone a couple evenings or weekend days per week. I really want to be home when he is, and his schedule varies. So any class or seminar that meets on say, Tuesdays, will eventually conflict with nights that I could be spending with Mike. And I don’t have any hobbies (though not for lack of trying!) so there aren’t really any clubs I could join.

When I get home, I don’t want to do anything, let alone drag my shy self out to some place and force myself to talk to people. Between the commute and the terrible things that are happening at work this year I’m just so, so tired. But at the same time, on the nights when Mike is gone – and even during some of the days when he’s busy working on a project – I just get so lonely.

Man. I need to get a job here in Milwaukee.

Withdrawal

Today was my first day working at the middle school. The speech therapist there had an incredibly heavy caseload, so I cleared most of my day on Friday to come out and help. When my headache started I figured it was just because the middle schoolers were more exuberant than my high schoolers.

When my headache continued after I'd left the middle school I figured it was just because it was past noon and I hadn't had my lunch yet. When it kept going even after I had gulped down some yogurt and canned peaches I figured it was because the student in front of me despite being a high schooler was one of my more annoying kids.

When it kept on growing even though I had eaten, had taken some pain reliever and was sitting alone in my office I started to get concerned. I'd never had a headache like this. I could barely walk because my head got jostled on each step. I was starting to think about how I'd phrase my request when I called up Mike to ask him, pretty please, if he'd drive an hour down to Illinois to come get me.

Then I realized...I hadn't had any caffiene that day.

I've been having two 24 oz bottles a day to make up for my lack of sleep. Today I took a bottle of carbonated water to work instead thinking that it would be better for me. Guess my body disagreed. I crept down to the soda machine in the faculty lounge and bolted down a half-bottle of Diet Pepsi.

Oh yeah. That's good stuff.

I nursed the last half of the bottle. I don't really like the fact that I'm so dependent on caffiene, but apparently my body has no such concerns.

My Brother

Recently Dykewife commented that until she read my 100 Questions meme she wasn't aware that I had a brother. I feel kind of bad that I obviously haven't written about him, but I guess it's understandable...we don't talk much. We aren't on bad terms at all, it's just that Rob is pretty bad at keeping in touch. I call my parents about once a week, and I call or email my sister every two weeks, but Rob can go months without contact. My mom once commented that if he died she wouldn't find out for weeks. It just never enters his head to pick up a phone or type out an email. I'd feel offended, but apparently he treats his friends and girlfriends with the same casualness.

Yesterday Rob got on a plane to move to Japan. He recently graduated with a degree in education, but right now the market in Wisconsin is tight for high school English teachers. So he plans to hang out in Japan and teach English until the next wave of retirements, when he will make his triumphant return. I think that this move to Japan will either make him homesick enough to want to keep in touch, or will occupy him so completely that I won't hear from him for about three years. I hope he at least sends the family mass e-mails.

Oh well

Today I had the thought that it's a good thing that I'm not getting pregnant anytime soon because I just bought two pairs of nice pants for work, and since they fit fairly snugly now there's no way they'd fit if I had a baby.

I think that this makes me the worst female ever. You'd think that all the hormones and stuff would make having a child an overriding biological imperitive, but apparently the desire not to spend another $45 at Target just steamrolls it.

I'm awesome.

Reason # 17357 that Mike is awesome

It’s been a difficult, difficult week, and so despite the fact that I was PMSing and already starting to feel lousy, I had day-old pizza and Smirnoff’s for dinner Saturday night. I think Mike was glad to see me relax because I’d been extremely cranky all day, even though he was being a trouper and relentlessly nice to me. While I stalked around snapping and snarling he merely kept saying things like, “Let me know if you want to cuddle, sweetheart,” and, “How can I help you, my goddess?”

After the usual Saturday night Law & Order episodes were done we played a fierce game of Katamari Damacy and, ah, exercised before going to bed.

Well, I guess it was all too much. My body couldn’t handle the activity, the emotions, the hormones, the competition, the booze, and the greasy food. So it did what it could do, and got rid of what it could get rid of. I soon found myself in the bathroom, throwing up.

Now, our only bathroom is connected to the bedroom, and for some reason it was missing its door when Mike first moved in. We never could find the door or get a replacement, so we hung up a curtain. Mike could hear everything I was up to, and he was concerned.

“Um…do you want me to hold your hair?” he asked me.

“No,” I replied. When I throw up I prefer to work alone.

“Do you want me to get you a glass of water?” he asked.

“No, it’s fine,” I called back. I cleaned up as best I could, brushed my teeth, and dragged myself back to bed.

Instead of complaining about having woken him up, telling me that I should have eaten better, or merely being smug that I got what I deserved after a day of bitchiness, Mike merely rubbed my back gently and said in a concerned voice, “Hey beautiful, I hope you feel better.”

He’s sweet. I married a keeper.