Confessions of Fangirl

So my car had some issues. It overheated on the way to work yesterday morning which I have to say was pretty scary. I had to basically idle the last few miles and turn the car off when I was sitting at stop lights because I just didn’t know what else to do. I suppose I could’ve pulled over and gotten a tow somewhere, but I was actually looking like I was going to be on time for once and because sometimes I just want to be in denial about my issues. Sometimes I have to be in denial of my issues for a little bit before I can deal with them.

I saw this thing on the internet that said something like, “I find if you put off doing anything about your problems, they either work themselves out or they explode in your face. 50/50 odds aren’t bad.”

I should see if I can find it, because it’s both hilariously true and relevant to how I live my life.

Wow, Google is a powerful thing. Okay so I’m horrendously tired right now, and I’m not sure I’m going to copy this over correctly. It’s a screenshot of a tweet so I can’t just copy paste. I have to type it out, which means there’s a good chance I’m going to miss a word or incorrecctly transcribe something. Still, I’m hoping to get close enough that you’ll get the picture.

“Something kind of neat I found out… If you ignore a problem long enough, it either goes away or ruins your life. So 50/50. Pretty good odds.”

Damnit, I’m too tired to keep going.

I read this thing that said if you type in comic sans instead of other, more traditional fonts that you’ll find it easier to write. I don’t know if that’s true, but I thought it’d be worth a try. It’s not like I can’t change the font once I’m posting a story or even when I’m editing it, etcetera. This isn’t the old days of typewriters. I guess just the fact that “comic sans” is even an option is proof of the bygone days of typewriters.

I should’ve written more yesterday. I thought about it. I really did. But I’ve just been feeling so exhausted and burned out and cranky. I started my period today so between the extreme stress of all the events I had the last few weeks and weird sleep schedule and family stuff and anxiety about everyone’s presents and school and money and money for school and presents and life--it’s all just been a lot.

And tonight I spent like two and a half hours at the doctor’s office. I scheduled an appointment, but I guess they were backed up because my appointment was for 6:45 and I was there until like 8:30 or something. It was a lot going on. It left me drained as shit. Not to mention the last three days have been bonkers and busy at work. And my foot has been feeling worse. I’m going to have to be careful with my caffeine intake tomorrow since I’ll be on a steroid, but I wanted help getting better so if this is what I need to do, then this is what I need to do. I’m just really glad no one offered me a clinic position where I had on--

I have no idea what that sentence was going to be. I honest to God fell asleep in the middle of writing it. I guess I’m just going to have to try again tomorrow.

(I bet I was going to say that I’m glad no one offered me a flu shot, but then fell asleep in the middle of typing. I can apparently type in my half sleep, it just ends up being so nonsensical it would take someone with a master’s in “Kate’s language” for someone to figure out what I meant. And we’d never really be sure.

I’ve been putting off writing since I got home. I’d wanted to work on something while I was at work, but work was so busy, so packed full that there was just no way to get around to that. I had every second so full, I didn’t have time to finish my actual work work, never mind work on a personal project. Then once I got home, I just felt so tired and daunted by my word count goal that I didn’t want to work on it at all.

I remember reading this article a while back that said that if you’re struggling to meet a goal or feeling intimated about meeting a goal or something along those lines, that you should multiply the goal by a factor of ten. Maybe it was a factor of five. I’m not sure now, but it was definitely an outrageous multiplier. The logic behind it… I remember there was logic behind it. Or supposed logic. I can’t remember now if the idea was just to pump out so much stuff that some of it had to be good or if it was to help you push back the mental blocks or some other such thing, but I do remember thinking the article was interesting.

There might have been a few articles like that, now that I’m thinking about them. I seem to remember a sort of “phase” where that was all the rage in the “self help” world. One particular article was about making lists of ideas. Ideas for stories or products or pieces of art or whatever--didn’t matter, just ten ideas every day. The guy writing the article said that if you can’t think of ten, think of twenty. He said that if you double the goal, your brain realizes that some or most of those ideas are going to be total useless garbage, and in knowing that, you’re giving yourself permission to write down and process terrible ides. Maybe you don’t keep all the ideas, but you the more ideas you come up with, the more likely it is that one of them will be good. That’s just statistics.

Once you start practicing coming up with ideas, even if most of the suck, you’ll find ideas (in all levels of quality) come more quickly and easily--at least according to the guy in the article. I don’t think he’s wrong. One of the other things I remember him talking about (well… I think it was him that brought it up, it very well could have been one of the other amny, many self help writers/gurus I’ve studied) a study on a high school art class.

In the “study” half the class was told that their grade would be based on making one “amazing” piece of art (pottery, I think , in this case) so they had to make just one great thing, and the other half of the class would be graded on sheer quantity with nothing based on how well they made the pieces.

In the end of the study, the students who were graded on quantity rather than quality were the ones who produced better quality, more creative pieces of art. Allowing yourself to be bad at something, but continuing to fight for it over and over again is the surest way to improve. That’s part of why I’ve been pushing myself to write more I figure if I can write a billion things, one of them will be good and then I can go from there.

Even knowing all that, and knowing that I’m a better writer when I’m writing all the time, it’s still hard for me not to feel daunted by the goals I’ve set for myself. If Id’ been better through the last six months of hitting my goals, I’d be in way better shape than I am now. I did fantastic in the first few months and then Summer Break happened and everything just kind of hit all at once.

It don’t feel like it’s slowed down at all. Shit, I’m sitting here now, barely awake, attempting to open my eyes and look at the keyboard or the screen so I don’t fall asleep, but I’m about to slip onto the floor. Ah well, tomorrow is another day. And a day I’m not working, so that’s a plus.

I told myself that I would write 5,000 words this work week. I didn’t say 1,000 words a day, but that’s basically the idea. It’s a bit of a stretch goal, but I really do want to make my writing goal for the month. I won’t be able to make my writing goal for the month if I don’t seriously step up my game and if I don’t make my goal for the month, I’m not going to make my goal for the year.

I told myself that I would not set a reading goal for this year, but in my head I do think I secretly wanted to beat out every other year I’ve tracked on Goodreads. I’ve done that for sure. In both page numbers and books read, I’ve beaten all the other years I’ve done on Goodreads. I am excited about that.

I did set a Goodreads goal for the year, only because I knew I’d have no trouble reaching. I set the goal to be a book a week for the year. Well, as I went along and reached that and then double that, and then tripled that, I started to wonder if maybe I could quadruple that.

The thing is, I know the reason that the idea of quadrupling my book count is a way to pour myself into reading (and avoid reality AND writing at the same time) and still feel like I’ve accomplished something amazing.

If I weren’t also watching Christmas movies and playing Pokemon Go, I would make it without question, but I am doing those things. And I love those things so I don’t want to give them up either.

I hate that I have to choose. I know life is full of tough choices and that you can’t have everything all the time, but that doesn’t stop me from wanting to whine about it.

Who knows what I’m really going to be able to pull off between now and New Year’s Eve. I sure don’t.

Sometimes I get super obsessed with a song and I’ll listen to it over and over again for hours. There is one song that I listened to on repeat all day on my work days at iTunes as well as every minute of every drive and commute I made. It's amazing how one song or piece of music can entrance and be-spell a person. Or at least me, anyway. I don’t know if other people do this. I’m sure I’m not the only one in all the world, but I’m also wondering if it’s something that a significant portion of the population does or just a small percentage of people. And I also wonder if there are correlations between this kind of obsession and things like general anxiety disorder, neuro-divergence, obsessive compulsive disorders, or other things. I’m not trying to compare, pigeonhole, or disparage any of those things. I’m just wondering if doing that sort of thing, listening to the same song over and over again, is a type of self-soothing behavior. Not that it matters I guess.

I think I’ve mentioned this in past posts, but I hate calling this piece of music a “song” because there isn’t any real “singing.” I know that “song” probably has a much less strict definition than it once did, but something about calling a piece of music that doesn’t contain any singing a “song” niggles at my brain. Go figure. However, for the sake of simplicity and time and space, I'm going to use the word "song" for this musical piece.

In case you’re thinking that everyone listen to songs on repeat (I know they do), I think I should break it down a little further. And everyone should understand that I’m not exaggerating. My supervisor could (and would) pull up my screen at any time and she would always see my listening to the same song on repeat--always. She would give me crap for it. Not in a mean way, we were friends, but in all earnestness.

The song is approximately four minutes long (plus an extra few seconds) meaning that just in the time I listened at work in a day, I would’ve listened to it approximately 105 times.

I also had a boyfriend that lived over an hour away from me and I’d listen to it on repeat for every journey to and from his house that I made. My commute to work was close to an hour each way from my home, and those drives, too, were filled with this same song.

I did this for months, maybe a year. You would think after I listened to it THAT often, through that much of my life, that I would grow sick of the song and never want to hear it again. Surely listening to the same song thousands of times, maybe even hundreds of thousands of times all said and done, would leave me sick of the thing.

That is where you would be wrong.

I still love that song. Every once in a while I will put the same damn song on repeat. It’s especially great when I’m writing or working. There aren’t any real lyrics and something about having a song on repeat is helpful at times for my focus.

In case any of you are wondering what song it is that I’m talking about, it’s “IDGAFOS” by Dillon Francis. The song is about eight years old now and I’ve been obsessed with it since I found it sometime in late 2011. There are a few other songs that I’ve gotten addicted to for a span of time, but none like that one. I don’t think it would be a fallacy for me to say that I have a somewhat obsessive personality, in general, but my love for that song may take the cake. Unlike some of my other obsessions, like Harry Potter or Avengers, I don’t dive deeply into the background or the people behind the song or anything like that. I know practically nothing about Dillon Francis. I’ve listened to a couple of his other songs, but nothing I could name off hand or that I’ve listened to over and over on repeat. I don’t know what inspired him to make that piece of music or what went into making it. I just really love listening to that song.

I’m not even kidding about still loving to listen to it either. I’ve listened to it at least twice in the last twenty four hour period, including once while writing this post.

Sometimes I wish I had the words to describe why this song speaks to me and resonates with me so deeply, but I don’t. Maybe one day something with click or unlock in my brain and I’ll be able to explain exactly why this song enraptures me. Though I think it’s more likely that I’ll go through my life loving this song and never fully understanding why. That’s okay though. I think having the song is enough.

Today went okay, I suppose. Either way, I’m very grateful it’s done. I was feeling ridiculously overwhelmed. I’m still a little stressed and overwhelmed, but the training thing today was one of the things most stressing me about my life currently. I still have a lot to get through and do and take care of. That’s life I suppose. It’s not like I haven’t put off doing real work on a number of occasions because I wanted to play or watch Hallmark movies lately. I will say preparation for today was largely not my fault. I asked for a meeting several times. I asked for information quite a few times. And what I got was vague and confusing at best. Most often I was told something along the lines of “we’ll meet up seeon beforehand to prepare.” Right up until a few days ago when they were finally like, “oh I guess we don’t have time--just figure out some activities to do with this other person you’ve never been in the same room with.” To say I was frustrated would be a gross understatement.

Listen, I’m all for winging things, but I need some sort of outline. I need some sort of context. The people who have been doing these types of classes hand never provided a training session on the topic we were doing today so even they really didn’t have anything prepared. I honestly wanted to throttle everyone involved. Then the girl who is doing the most to be helpful was sick. She didn’t call out, but she’d lost a lot of her voice so she couldn’t do all the things she’d planned. That’s obviously not her fault. But I need to know I’m not stepping on people’s toes and I’m not reinventing the wheel. And when you give me an agenda that’s supposed to be helpful, make sure it is ACTUALLY helpful.

The whole mess of circumstances around everything going on certainly wasn’t the norm. I know that already. Then we added the fact that we were trying to coordinate four people for a meeting not just two as had previously been the team. It’s not easy to pull together four people from different branches spread out over the county at the best and most convenient of times. These were not the best and most convenient of times for any of us.

We did survive. I survived.

It’s not that I didn't know that everything would be fine. Intellectually, I told myself and I knew that everything would be fine. I even have a reminder on my phone now that pops up every day to tell me that “everything is going to be okay” so that I see it in writing as well.

When I was at Scholastic and struggling like this all the time and perhaps even more so, I remember reading something that did kind of help. It said, “You’ve survived 100% of the bad days you’ve had so far.” One day I will die, but it’s not likely to be because a presentation about recommending books to customers killed me. I guess I could die under a stack of books to heavy for me to withstand. Still not particularly likely. I can withstand a lot of books. If I did die that way though, I think I’d be okay with it. I mean, what better way for a book nerd like me to go than under a giant stack of heavy books. I’m hoping that I’ll go peacefully and painlessly in my sleep many, many years--hell many decades from now--but if I have to go some other way, I think I’d like it to be book related. That seems appropriate.

But yeah, I’ve survived all the things that life has thrown at me up to this point and that’s a really great track record.

Tomorrow is another day. One that I’m hoping will be a little quieter or at least less stressful and with me in the spotlight less. I have some stuff I reallllly need to get done. Some of which I really wanted to have done already, but I was even busier than I anticipated being and that just couldn’t be helped. For once, it’s not my fault.

Still, tomorrow will be busy I want to get some sleep before I have to face it. Night all.

My shoulder has been killing me for days. I’ve got a Groupon to go see a massage therapist type person, but I need to get that setup. Everything feels so crazy right now. I know a large part of my struggle with my shoulder is stress. I’ve felt it in my shoulder whenever I’ve been tired and stressed since I had that accident eight? Nine? Years ago. The other trouble is that I’ve stopped exercising. Working out, especially my arms and shoulders, seemed to really help the issue. I still had pain, but it wasn’t nearly so much or so often. I need to start working on my arms and shoulders again at the very least, even if there is a lot I can’t do again yet because of my foot/ankle. I’ve been doing the exercises for my foot and walking more, but that’s not really working out, and it definitely doesn’t do anything to help my shoulder.

*Insert Time Lapse Here*

I took two alieve and an anti-anxiety in hopes that those would help ease the pain in my shoulder, but it’s honestly gotten worse since I’ve been sitting here. I’m working on my posture hoping that will help in the long term (I’m wondering if it’s making things worse in the short term since I’m forcing those muscles to hold a position they’re unaccustomed to holding), though who knows. I need to make an appointment to get my physical soon so I should probably bring that up. I need to make a list of things to ask about so that I don’t forget to ask while I’m there. If they charge me more, they charge me more. I don’t have the time or patience to go scheduling a shit ton of different appointments. If they need me to schedule a follow-up, I will, but I would really appreciate it if someone could just give me a good muscle relaxer to take a few times a week. I’m reasonably sure that would solve the majority of my problems.

Granted, I’d have a shit ton more time if I wasn’t playing so much gosh darned Pokemon Go. It’s getting obnoxious. Which is why I originally quit! I just got sucked in too far and got too addicted to the damn game! It’s not a habit I should be spending this kind of time and money on. I know once I start school in January that my life is going to have to change. I’m going to have homework and studies and papers and discussions and it’s going to be a lot and running around all over God’s green earth looking for Pokemon and Pokestops, just isn’t going to plausible. Not that I can’t do some of that still. I’m just saying.

I really wish my shoulder wasn’t bothering me so much. Part of me is thinking about getting a massage or one of those electro pad things I see advertised on TV sometimes. I’m thinking that might help. Really though, I need to go see a doctor and see what they tell me to do since they may be able to give me a better idea of what things are more likely to be helpful and which things I probably shouldn’t spend my money on.

I also desperately need to do my nails, but that’s another story.

I enjoyed this weekend so much. I shouldn’t really call it a weekend though. I’ve been off for four days. Last night with C was amazing. We went to see “Potted Potter” and it was fan-fucking-tastic. I left with muscles behind my ears sore from laughing and smiling so hard. If you like Harry Potter even remotely, I think it’s well worth going to see. Truly, it was a great time.

And then I saw Lizzie who I had not seen in AGES. It was nice to run into her. She was bartending the event and it was just so nice to say hi. I hadn’t seen her in person in ages.

C has made a joke about whether or not they and I are dating and don’t know it twice now and I’m not sure how to respond to it. I mean, they’re great. There was a time I thought we might date, but shortly after we met, it felt like they had put me squarely in the “friend” category of their life and I thought that was probably for the best. Ugh, and I’m such an awkward turtle that I don’t even know how to broach the whole thing.

And then there are the next two weeks at work which make me want to come down with the flu and be out sick for two weeks.

Ugh. Wish me luck. I hope you all are in better shape than me.

Title: With Lips and Tongues, A Conversation
Series: Love on the Run
Characters: Sharon Carter, Natasha Romanoff, some random OCs
Fandom: Marvel Movie Verse -- Post Captain America: Civil War, Pre Infinity War
Summary: Sharon is afraid and brave and Natasha absolutely supports her.
Rating: PG-ish, maybe PG-13
Pairings: Natasha Romanov/Sharon Carter
Warnings/Spoilers: None.
Big Damn Table Prompt: Conversation


Thanks Rebbbbb!!!!!

I’m finally watching Legends and it should absolutely not be attractive that John Constantine is running around with something that looks like it has the smoky incense stuff that the young boys swing around in the Catholic Church (at least in movies I’ve seen) which supposedly is giving off female Minotaur scent/pheromones, but honestly, just about everything Constantine does is attractive to me. I can’t think of anything he’s done that hasn’t been done in a way that I found it attractive. Even when he’s doing things like swallowing a concoction that, among other things, has the saliva of a nine fingered man in it. There are so many things that have really should’ve been more disturbing than anything else, and I always just sitting and watching and going--I would do the shit out of him.  

I think I’m coming to accept that I am just obsessed with him beyond reason. He’s such an asshole. On a side note, I’m sad that they didn’t do something more serious between him and Gary. I think they could’ve been a really sweet combo. Gary being who he is, could’ve balanced out some of John’s darkness and anger--given time of course. I suppose there’s still a chance something could happen there, but it looks like they’re going to pursue the thing between him and Mona. I’m not upset about that. I’m actually really excited about the addition of Mona. I missed Gary since he wasn’t in this week’s episode.

I am digging everything about this episode, honestly. There’s still a chance that Hank can be redeemed, and that is something I would dearly love to see. I’m loving the way that Nate’s character is growing. I’ve always loved him as a character and his story with Amaya was both beautiful and heartbreaking. I don’t normally go for the doomed to be tragic love story, but their relationship and relationship development really spoke to me. I’m still sad that they couldn’t work out long term without destroying her family.

***

I stepped away from my computer to throw something away and I decided that while I was up I would wash my face and brush my teeth. I was only gone for a few minutes, but when I came back my computer was updating and I’ve lost all ability to keep my eyes open since I had to pause so long waiting on the computer.