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All psychos eventually work at Wal-Mart
December 22, 2004

At Wal-Mart after work yesterday, I happened to see an old friend of mine from high school working the checkout counter next to the one where I was purchasing my goods. I hardly ever venture into Wal-Mart, especially during this time of year, especially during daylight hours, because I inevitably run into someone I don’t want to run into from high school who has 10 children in a shopping cart, and she feels the need to speak to me about how her life has been since high school, and I feel all gross for the rest of the day.

This woman was my BFF for several years. We were brought together by a shared love for a certain band, and though I knew this girl was very obviously anorexic and probably had many other issues, I thought that she was good friend material, all because of a patch (oh the ‘90s!) on her backpack. Through my junior and senior years, we stuck together like glue – I put up with her psychotic family, her fainting spells, her dog-shit-filled house, her aggression, addictions, and abusive houseguests until my boyfriend at the time had sex with her, and she with him.

I remember seeing her again a couple of years later, after I was well into the working world, and her informing me she was happily pregnant at 19 and was going to be married with the thing she was dragging behind her at the time. I haven’t a clue what actually panned out from that, as I was less interested in her proclamation than I was in a piece of gum stuck to the side of a dumpster, and moved on.

Seeing her yesterday just made me feel kind of… well… proud of myself, I guess. It doesn’t seem right to feel better about oneself after seeing the apparent misfortune of others. Then again, it may not be pride I feel, but appreciation. I’m happy that I didn’t end up working as a Wal-Mart cashier at this point in my life. I’m glad that I’m not dealing with psychotic family members and a horrible past echoing my thoughts at every moment. Not to say that is how she feels, I’m just imagining.

All in all, I guess I’m kind of happy for her that she’s at least working – lord knows none of her family provided for her a good example of earning an income. It’s good that she somewhat looks well – still too skinny, and still too sallow, but pretty much the same. Of course, I didn’t talk to her or anything. I avoided her with every pore in my skin.

See also: When I saw my psychotic ex-flatmate, who also happens to work at Wal-Mart! Except for, I can’t find a post about this, which I totally thought I wrote, but I guess I didn’t. Must do so later. However, not now.

PS. In the interest of my sanity, I have installed a new-and-improved system for blocking the thousands of comment spam entries I get a day: now when one comments, one must type in a number which is found in a graphic next to the type-in box. Thank you.

Comments (3)

this is the funniest thing in the entire world.
December 17, 2004

I've decided to do the laziest "blogger" thing in the world: post an email.
The info: Sos the Amy and I email each other frequently (at home, of course), like good little 21st-century kids, and she said that I should totally post the email I sent to her on the olde blog, since it is apparently the funniest thing she's ever read and she may or may not have peed just a little when she read it. Since I do everything Amy tells me to, here it is (just read in top-down order... it's been edited to make sense):

-----Original Message-----
From: Amy
Sent: Thursday, December 16, 2004
To: Devlyn
Subject: RE: rides, church, & book club,andstuffthatisentirelydifferent.


is your weekend just crazybusy because of holiday preparation stuff, or do you have other things as well (like your mom coming for dinner ...)

>>> "Devlyn" 12/16/04 >>>

both. here's an outline:
Saturday:
9am - breakfast
10am - go get washer and dryer
11am - struggle to get washer and dryer inside the house and set up
11.30am - go to hardware store, as the hoses purchased don't fit
12noon - back home - hoses fit, turn washer on - doesn't work
1pm - fark around with washer and dryer until i want to poke my own eyes out
2pm - (possibly) pick up my v. own car!
3pm - elated at the possibility of the freedom to drive around, i head to the "good" hardware store, and get mobbed by traffic at the mall
6pm - mother and her boyfriend show up to empty house, as i'm still at the hardware store waiting in line, thinking, "why are people purchasing gifts at the hardware store?"
7pm - finally get home, calling mom on the cellphone apologizing for not being there, because of being stuck in line at home depot
8pm - make self dinner, and eat directly from the oven while staring at the wall
8.15pm - start on the gift-making, but end up quitting after 15 minutes, as there isn't enough light in my house to be able to do this properly
8.30pm - do some work on the website stuff
8.45pm - search for an installation CD that i can't find because i haven't unpacked as many boxes as there should be unpacked
9pm - unpack boxes
10pm - drink coffee
10.30pm - after finally finding the CD i need, it doesn't fix the issue i'm having with the site (i need a tutorial that didn't get installed for some reason), give up
10.45pm - watch some bad anime that i downloaded for some reason
11.30pm - go to bed, feeling worthless and getting pretty much nothing done for the day

Sunday!
10.30am - wake up, mouth all cotton-y from oversleeping
11am - breakfast, then cigarette
11.30am - watch movie on the teevee with the boy, who will have gone to hawkin's for "breakfast" instead of eating something healthy. i will, of course, have had him get something for me, as well, even after eating an egg and toast.
1.30pm - decide it's time to start doing something about the gifts
2pm - cigarette break
2.30pm - take a shower
3pm - start working on gifts
4pm - do some laundry
4.30pm - work on gifts a bit more - get frustrated by not getting the correct stuff at the hardware store. determine to make it work
4.45pm - give up on "making it work"
5pm - eat some food
5.30pm - work some more on other gifts that i actually have all the parts for
7pm - finish 1 (one) gift
9pm - finish 2nd (second) gift
9.30pm - run out of juice
9.45pm - watch movie
12midnight - go to bed, remembering then that i could have been knitting the gift for my mom. curse the world.

so, yeah, i'm pretty busy.

Devlyn

-----Original Message-----
From: Amy
Sent: Friday, December 17, 2004
To: Devlyn
Subject: RE: rides, church, & bookclub,andstuffthatisentirelydifferent.


Oh my god, this is the funniest thing in the entire world. Seriously. You definitely need to post this on your blog posthaste! SO FUNNY!

xox
aim

Comments (5)

Explanations...
December 16, 2004

I was going to just write a comment back to a comment about “stove-porn,” but I realized that the explanation I have for the “stove-porn” is in fact, rather long and would be best put to use in an actual entry. Here we go.

I have a strong affinity for kitchen appliances. Since I love cooking, I tend to spend most of my time in the kitchen of my house, which is, at this point, the best kitchen I’ve personally ever had in a house for which I pay rent. However, the draw of owning a home and being able to rip out whatever lameass larry decided to put into the kitchen and design a kitchen myself and be able to use that kitchen, etc. is like a wet dream. Since I own most of the small appliances I would ever need (Cuisinart, rice cooker, blenders, etc.), less a few (Kitchen Aid mixer, mandolin, slow cooker, griddle), I tend to get my rocks off looking at larger appliances, including double-wide refrigerators with bottom-freezers, stacked in-wall ovens, and of course, stoves.

Personally, if someone gave me a Viking 8-burner range in brushed metal, I would probably fall over backwards and swallow my tongue. Then I would make sweet sweet love to it. However, I also like older stoves from the '40s and '50s that really made the best use of space and were all rounded-corner and cute. When Ms. Caitlin of Styrofoam Kitty purchased and installed her O’Keefe & Merritt stove, I was so very happy for her, I almost cried. Seriously. So, whenever I get tired of drooling over Viking stoves, (which I will not be able to afford until I’m 80) I go look at Caitlin’s stove and think good dirty thoughts about having a stove like hers.

Thus, stove-porn.

I will now leave the building.

Comments (4)

Parenthesis! Exclamation Points! The horror!
December 10, 2004

Well, the move was a monumental success (ie. We moved everything, thanks to my extremely awesome (and brawny) friends), and I am now the proud occupant of a v. schwanky (as Gabby would say) new (well, new to me!) apartment. Of course, my living room is filled with boxes still, and only the kitchen is mostly unpacked, and the dining room (dining room!!!) still has a bunch of miscellaneous crap in it, but my belongings are rightfully in place and I am ready to live.

This weekend will, of course, consist of the Great Unpacking™, in which we get everything back together so I don’t feel like such a hobo (hobo?). Also sos that we may have people over for Adult Brunch™, and look for a proper dining table on which we may do things like conduct Adult Dinner Parties™. Because, you know, I’m fucking mental like that.

Guess who has only purchased one gift for the winter holiday pigfestgiftgivingextravaganza? Me? Yeah, you’re right. But guess who purchased a Hello Kitty™ toaster last night on sale at Target ($15!) and can’t wait to burn little Hello Kitty™ faces into bread? That would be me, again. I really did need a new toaster, though. Promise.

I am in a better mood today than I have been in the last 2+ weeks, and I can’t really figure out why. I’m thinking that I should still be really stressed about not having a car (for 4 weeks now), about having not started any gifts-in-the-making, having so much to do this weekend (unpacking, grandma christmas party, 2 sites to finish, brunch sunday), and about being out of monies. But today is all about it being Friday (hello, Friday, anyone?), and the sun. is. shining. Shining! Shining! The! Sun! Is! Shining! In! The! Sky!

And I’m just about to forgive everyone of their trespasses, as they have forgiven mine.

Comments (4)

the post in which i'm too tired to complain about how tired i am
December 3, 2004

A haiku:
My eyes droop slowly
Thinking about last night
Makes me want to sleep

Life currently:
Boxes, boxes! Putting together furniture that I had better hope for. Hoping everything will be ready by the time everyone shows up tomorrow so's the moving crew (crew? wtf?) won't kill me. Listening to the Spice Girls sing about sex in their '90s pop way (condom references!).

Another haiku:
Let this be over
For soon I may/will collapse
Into exhaustion

Life a bit in the future:
Getting beer tonight for the peeps tomorrow (goes along with the pizza bribe). Getting the matresses out of storage tonight. Trying to figure out how or when we're going to rub down the floors and woodwork. Getting this site revamped. Doing work on the other sites I should be doing work on. Unpacking.

Please forgive if I don't post for another week or so... then we should return to our regularly scheduled winter posts (snow?! why?!).

Comments (1)