9 posts tagged “insanity”

Its been quite awhile since the last time I posted a blog, something that's weighed heavily on my mind probably since the last time I actually posted. I haven't forgotten you, my Dear, Dear Vox, or you, my readers, I've just been dealing with life and didn't really have the capacity or frame of mind to write about it. Don't feel too neglected, because I wasn't even capable of journalling in the past 2 months. Oh sure, I've carried my little travelling journal book with me everywhere, I've taken it out, looked at it, wished for the sense of mind to actually put pen to paper and write, but there was nothing. Too much was going on in my personal and work life. It was all swirling around and around in my head, and the solution was to get it out, on paper or on a computer screen, but I couldn't do either. Instead, I dealt by putting my head down, plowing forward, trying to keep it all together when I was coming apart at the seams.

The past few months have been incredibly busy, and incredibly difficult. June marked a year since I moved to DC, and while I thought I was going to remain stationary and continue living where I had been, I realized unexpectedly - in the eleventh hour - that for my own peace of mind and sanity, I had to get out. I ended realizing with about 10 days to spare that I needed to get out, find a new place to live that was within my price range, and somehow move all of my belongings into that space. It was frantic, stressful, overwhelming, and most of all, crippling. Among other things that were going on personally, this was the straw that broke the camel's back. It sparked a whole chain of negative self-exploration, and I started focusing on all of my flaws, all of my weaknesses, and defining myself by them, completely forgetting all of the positives. I felt like a child again, like I couldn't make it through the day without my mommy, and tears were more than a daily occurrence, they were an hourly visitor. Anxiety and sleeplessness were constant companions, and I couldn't even count on my cat for some feline love because my stress was affecting almost as drastically as it was affecting me.

June also brought about the memories of all that I had learned in the past year - the hard life lessons, the friendships earned and lost, the things surrounding the death of friendship and birth of new ones; job changes, worklife drama, personal exhaustion. But also all of the amazing things that I've learned in the past year, all of the wonderful adventures I've had and the many, many blessings that have come my way. I'm certainly not the same person who packed her life in Michigan and moved back to the east coast, brand new Master's degree in hand. I don';t think I want to be that person anymore. Change is good, and I've learned so much - I feel like I've changed so much, and in some ways, I feel like I haven't changed one bit. Its been an interesting time. But I'm in a new home - but an old house - which I love, despite all of its problems. Its been wonderful living alone again and having the peace of mind that comes with it, but its also a little nerve-wracking until you get used to it. I'm looking forward to fully unpacking and getting used to it.

I've had a lot things going on in my head that I wanted to post, but I haven't prioritized the time, or retained what exactly it was that I wanted to post. Its been a turbulent time, but I'm looking forward to the waters calming a bit. I'm looking forward to getting back to posting and journaling and trying my had at the 5 word challenge again. I just wanted to say "Hello Vox, I hope you remember me," and let my returning presence be know. I hope all is well in the world of Vox and I look forward to catching up with all of my neighbors. :)

I've got a million things swirling around in my head, and have been tossing things around to post about for the past few days. But now that I'm finally sitting in front of a computer with time to compose, its all gone out of my head. I'm hoping that a slow(er) weekend at home in PA with my farmily (yes, I meant to type that) will help a little. Or at least give me fodder to post about, lol. I've been so incredibly busy this week that even making a decision hurts. I was meeting people for lunch today, and I asked them what time they wanted to meet and gave them 3 options. Instead of naming a time, I get "Well what time do you want to go?" I literally thought my head was going to explode from the strain of it all. Its been a ridiculously busy week, especially with my allergy issues. I'm hoping that although I now have a second job, things will be a little calmer next week. Just a smidge, that's all.

And I promise to nap during the morning commute on the metro ;)

... well maybe not hell or high water, but definitely sleet and black ice. And ridiculous drivers and accidents galore. But through it all, I managed to do my civic duty and vote!

I Voted sticker

It was an interesting commute to the polls though, I must say. Weather was insane and people don't know how to drive in it. My commute home, which normally takes me 35 minutes, give or take, took me almost 2 hours. 2 hours! I passed 6 different accidents, and those were just in my normal lanes of traffic, that doesn't count accidents in the outer loop lanes, or the accidents I saw on the bridges and bypasses above me through the mixing bowl. I don't know what happened on I-95 southbound, but whatever it was, it must have been bad because the road was literally a parking lot, which created problems for the beltway traffic as well. I finally made it past the major back-ups, carnage of earlier accidents (which were pretty incredible in that "Oh my God, I'm going to be sick" sort of way) and ridiculous drivers only to hit black ice and lose control on my exit ramp from the beltway. I managed to miss the other two cars that had just minutes before collided into each other thanks to said black ice, regained control, and got onto the state road. Ka-ray-zee traffic everywhere, but at least the lights kept it moving.

I got a little lost trying to find where the polling place was - first time voting in the new hometown - but managed to make it, didn't break my ass on any of the ice, and made it home in once piece. Thank goodness. Although the driveway and parking lots around my condo building could have used some salting because I hit more black ice about 100 yards from my parking space. But I made it in the door without breaking myself or my car, so I was pretty thankful. So thankful that I decided not to push my luck and go anywhere else for the evening. I made dinner, put on my pjs and called it a night. :)

Here's hoping that the upstairs neighbors can keep their wild sex to a dull roar tonight. I'd prefer to sleep through the night instead of being woken up by the screams and bangs (no joke) and fearing that they will fall through the ceiling and continue their, uh, escapade on my bed.

Oh wow. So I had the opportunity to play Rock Band on Friday night, and I now understand what all the ruckus is about. It is seriously addicting. You have no idea. My friend's husband stood in line at midnight to get it, and he's pretty much had people over as much as possible to play it. So she invited me over to hang out, bring some more female vibes to the group. I got to her place and I wasn't going to play, (especially since it was mostly her husband's friends), I wasn't going to play, and then I played. Before I knew it, 3 hours had gone by. INSANE. It was continuous rocking out in her living room. And I was nominated to be the singer. Do you know how much power you feel when you've got a mic and a band?!?!?! Hilarity and good times were had by all ;)

I definitely liked Guitar Hero when it came out, but Rock Band is so much more incredible. More people are involved, the graphics are much better, and you don't feel like you need to vomit after two songs the way you do with GH. There's just something smoother about the way the stuff rolls out on Rock Band. Come to think of it, I'm sure the 62" television may have had something to do with that, lol.

I saw this commercial a few weeks ago, and my roommate can attest to my response. I was crying (literally, no-joke crying) it was so funny. I haven't seen it on television since, but I've been talking about it left and right. No one else has seen it, and I was beginning to think I was losing my mind. (Ok, so I might be losing my mind anyway, but at least now I can rest in peace about this little doozy.)

Too hilarious to pass up -

DC nuts

I've been staring at it for weeks wanting to photograph it, but I haven't had my camera with me. So finally last night I gave it a try with the camera on my phone, and was very impressed with the outcome ;)

And because *I'm* a nut in DC that you can trust...

I'm a dc nut

All I can say is "woah." Definitely worth the 8 minutes it will take you to watch it.

Well, so I had to get it out somehow... I'll tell you the reason I haven't been posting if you promise not to slap me ;) I've been magenta. Magenta, you ask? Well, I'll have to explain this phenomenon, so bear with my digression... I'm addicted to the Golden Girls, always have been, always will be. I watched them when they were new, I've watched them hundreds of times in syndication, and I now own all seven seasons on DVD. So what do the 'Girls have to do with magenta? Well, its a term that was used by Blanche Devereaux when she didn't know quite how she felt. She wasn't exactly blue, but she wasn't exactly happy and she wasn't necessarily green with envy, but she was a bunch of mixed up emotions at once - she was magenta. And that's how I've been feeling lately. Happy and yellow, sad and blue, green and slightly envious, anxious and orange, red and angry... you get my point. I've been all over the board, and I haven't been feeling particularly intellectual either, which also kept me from posting. I didn't want to see evidence of my malfunctioning intelligence/self-esteem, because I felt like I was witnessing enough of it already in my daily life.

I've had a lot going on with my family lately - everyone's fine, but its been a tough few weeks. The emotional overload of it was definitely getting to me. My personal life feels like its on more of a rollercoaster than it ever was (which is pretty crazy considering how bananas my life normally is). I've just been trying to get back to my normal self, do things that make me happy. I think I've just been running too much and it exhausted me. Who knows... but anyway, this is the explanation I offer for my absence. I hope you will accept it and my apology, and forgive me for ingoring you Vox. I thought about you all the time, I just didn't know what to say...  Oh how I've missed you though!

Wow. I have so much to talk about, its going to take awhile to get it out, and probably two posts. Bear with me people... you're in for a wild ride.

So, after mooching off of my family for a little over a week (hey, being the baby definitely has its perks!), the movers finally dropped my stuff off at my mom's house. Then, with only a small amount of sorting (and a BIG thanks to my mom for letting me use her basement as my personal storage facility... for free!) we deposited what needed to go with me to my new place into a 14 foot uhaul and off we went. The actual move went rather well, save for the giant storm that knocked the power in my building out for over an hour and almost trapped my mom and her best friend in the elevator. But rain is good luck, right? Hee hee...

So without too much drama, (minus the power outage and intermittent downpours) we got everything into my apartment, and thankfully my roommate was at work all day so she couldn't see the havoc we were wreaking on her beautiful condo, lol. After getting everything as organized as it was going to be, it was time to return the uhaul. This is where it gets really good...

My mom's best friend had this little portable GPS unit - its made for cars, but you can use it walking and whatnot, and its not limited to one vehicle. So she brought it with her in my mom's car to help my very traffic-paranoid mother out in the 5-lane-traffic situations around the city. When we left to return the uhaul, I took my mom's car and my aunt drove the uhaul. We had to go 13 miles, in an estimated 16 minutes - according to Google Maps. My mom's friend suggested we use the GPS thing, and being as geeked as I am about techie gadgets, especially those that talk to me, I took her up on her offer. So I programmed in the address of where we needed to go and off we went. Well, at some point very early in the trip - we hadn't even made it out of my sub-division yet - the thing decided to stop talking to me, and it actually froze. Great. So while I'm driving my mother's vehicle, in traffic, I'm fidgeting with the gadget, trying to force it into submission. I was not so lucky with this finicky little gadget. I managed to get it to say one thing to me, and I thought I was ok, but then I wasn't. So I fidgeted some more, and missed the exit I needed. The little machine realized this too and started talking again. For a second. So it tells me its recalculating my route - and thankfully not saying "make a u-turn" 800 times. It recalculates and tells me that I need to exit in 6 miles. So I drive, and drive, and drive, and check the machine and the damn thing went mute again AND I had missed my second exit. At this point, we're getting really close to getting into downtown DC in rush-hour traffic. Perfect. And then I get this fabulous little message from the machine - "No route to destination." Excuse me? You're linked to a satellite and you're supposed to have the answers! No route to destination? I DON'T THINK SO!

Now I'm getting really freaked out. I'm driving my mom's car, which is substantially larger than my own, and my aunt is piggybacking me in a 14 foot uhaul. So I take an exit which I'm pretty sure will lead us to where I can get us turned around. Nice try, Madelyn. We end up circling the Pentagon. And then I get flustered and really start to lose my head. So I take another exit, and I'm on the brink of tears when I realize, we're about to head into downtown DC, the epicenter of heavy traffic at rush hour. So I'm creeping along in traffic, and I realize that this little GPS gadget is still in my lap, so I start clicking on it and pushing the screen buttons and finally manage to reprogram it to the destination address. And it begins to work! Alleluia! EXCEPT...

It is now guiding me into the downtown traffic. Yep. And it gets EVEN richer... I'm three lanes to the left of where I need to be to get where the machine is telling me to go. So I put my blinker on and try to get over. I manage to weasel my way over successfully, but I can't say the same for my aunt in the 14 foot uhaul. I get onto the exit ramp, in which all three lanes are blessedly empty, and I slow to a crawl as I look in my rearview mirror to find the uhaul. You can't even imagine the million emotions that ran through me as I took in the scene behind me. My aunt was trapped two lanes away from where she needed to be, and no one was letting her over, so she just stopped. Stopped dead in one of the middle lanes. There was a loooooong line of traffic building up behind her, and there were cars that kept pulling around her, which obviously prohibited her from pulling across to the exit. So she FINALLY just goes for it because she's clearly bigger than all of the other cars in traffic, and catches up to me. I'm near tears at this point (sadly, NOT with laughter, and I call her cell phone to let her know the wonderful news that we're heading into downtown DC. I'm practically having a nervous breakdown because I'm so worried about my aunt, but luckily she's the calmest member of my family, and took it cool as a cucumber. So there we were, a midsize SUV and a 14 foot uhaul, rolling down Constitution Ave in afternoon rush hour traffic. It took us 20 minutes to make it one mile, through all of the lights, and back onto the highway where the GPS-lady was telling us to go. We spent the time calling each other to talk about the monuments and landmarks we were passing, reminiscing about how long it had been since we last played tourist in DC (I won't say how long ago it was, we'll just say that it was a while ago). We could even clearly see the White House, set back to the right. And we had a wonderful up-close-and-personal view of the Washington Monument. It was glorious. Absolutely glorious.

And you'd think that that was the end of it, right? Nope, not with my family :) We get onto the highway, we're going along well, following directions, GPS lady is working well, I think we're set. We're driving, see the uhaul return place on the other side of the highway, follow the lady's directions to make a u-turn (well, the u-turn was technically illegal so we pulled into a driveway and circled and then went back out onto the highway). We go to pull off of the road to get to the uhaul place, but I misjudged where it was, though that I could shortcut it, and pulled onto the wrong road. This "road" was actually the entrance to a car dealership, so we had to drive down the aisles of cars to turn around. In a midsized SUV and a 14 foot uhaul. I think my aunt actually pulled a three point turn, adding just a bit more icing to the insanity cake.

So then we get back out onto the highway, and make the correct right turn into the uhaul return place. I find a parking spot, my aunt rolls in in the uhaul and makes her own parking spot, because hey, she's driving a 14 foot uhaul, hahahaha! And SUCCESS!!! We finally rid ourselves of the uhaul and made it back to my apartment with no trouble at all. Thanks to me and NOT the GPS lady.

My family then decided they should probably get back on the road and get on their way back to PA. And Autumn came over with some cheap Meijer champagne that she bought on sale before she moved out of Michigan last year. We never actually did get to drink it, but we did go out for a nice dinner of Mexican food and checked out the (very expensive) local Safeway to get some necessities. And then I drove Autumn back to her place without any GPS help at all, because contrary to what this post implies, I actually do know my way around the District and surrounding areas fairly well. When I'm not panicking.

This, ladies and gentlemen, concludes Part 1 of holy. scheisse.