When God Shuts a Door

He reminds you that TMZ is just a click away and you can remind yourself that in reality, your life could be worse...much worse. So as a reminder to all of you young impressionable girls out there...use a condom.

From TMZ:

"Jamie Lynn Spears, 16, has confirmed to OK! Magazine that she is pregnant. Oh. My. God. A source tells us the interview, which hits stands tomorrow, is six pages and is on the record with Jamie Lynn and her mother. She tells the mag that the father is Casey Aldridge, who she has been dating for some time and first met at church. Brit's younger sister, star of Nick's "Zoey 101," says she's keeping the baby. Sources tell us that she has not yet told her older sister. Well, she knows now."

Best part of this story hands down is "first met at church" which proves my point that most people go to church to hook-up. W-O-W WOW. For Moma Spears I seriously hope this is a joke.

Blame It on the Rain

How is it that I can be strong at work and in academics but completely lose my shit when it comes to my personal life? I guess it is because I have been coddled my entire life. By my parents, my sister, my boyfriends…even my friends to an extent. So what am I supposed to do now that I have to be the strong one in the family…in the relationship? I feel a little like a what I imagine a fish out of water would feel like, frantically grasping for air, not knowing if it will be able to make it or not.

Maybe it is the fact that it is pouring rain outside, or maybe that it is closely approaching xmas. Perhaps it is the fact that my mom is not doing so great these days and that xtian’s dad isn’t either. Or maybe, just maybe, that I have made it a bad habit in the last 29 years of my life to totally live in fear of “what might happen” even though I am not sure what that “might” entails exactly.

Whatever the reason I feel like crap lately. I can’t sleep, I can’t focus properly, heck I can’t really finish a sentence without the sudden urge to bust into tears and my normal network of coddle enablers have bigger fish to fry with their own issues. I feel alone and scared that I have been forced to step-up to the plate, a position I have never felt comfortable being in, and be the strong guiding force I know I really can’t be…not in my personal life anyway.

I want desperately for things to go back to they way they were…to a time when I was young and naïve, when people worried for me and not the other way around. I want to be that self-absorbed little twat I used to be whose main worry in life was a broken nail. The sad harsh reality is that I know that I can’t go back to that…ever…and that at my ripe old age I have to grow up and that my friends is a scary proposition. Sigh.

Up In the Gym Working On the Fitness

Although you could never tell by looking at me I believe I am a fairly active individual. I work out with a personal trainer 2-3 times per week, take boxing classes, do a dance class and a few kickboxing sessions peppered in when I need an ‘easy’ cardio break. So tonight during a “back in the game” fitness session my trainer totally caught me by left field. She asked me what my fitness resolutions are for 2008, and “loosing weight” does not count.

Um, what? What does that even mean? I mean I think for a person of my stature (read: over-worked, under paid, continuously stressed out oh and doubles as a personal assistant to both my rents, xtian and my two nephews) I work out a whole hell of a lot. I gave her some BS about trying to make it through an abs class without looking like an idiot (okay that is a real resolution) but I needed to take some time to think about it. She said her’s was to lose 15 lbs and to totally 100% killer abs (her abs are nice but I think she was Britney abs in the Slave for You era…can’t blame her there).

Any hoot on the drive home I got to thinking about what my “2008 Fitness Resolution” would be, but before I go into that I must take a step back and give myself a pat on the back for my 2007 accomplishments. For these, I have to give MAJOR props to my trainer for being on my ass constantly and to my BFF Vicky B for her continuous support of not allowing me eat Big Macs and encouraging me to go to the gym instead…I heart you!

Accomplishments of 2007:

• After many months of working with a hottie podiatrist, I can now kinda function on my feet without excruciating pain. I no longer walk like a duck (well kinda don’t) and I can workout again…yay.
• I can do about 30-40 push-ups girl style and about 10-15 boy style. When I first started I could do 3…girl style.
• After a long losing battle in countless Pilates classes I can do a roll-up…in fact I can roll-up until the cows come home.
• Although I have always had good cardiovascular fitness, I can now run upstairs to talk to my fav. person at work and not be completely winded…comes in handy if I have gossip IM comes in handy too which is usually what I use. OOPS.
• I have lost about 8-10 lbs….heeeyyyyyy.

Goals of 2008:

• To make it through abs class without looking like an idiot.
• To start to do yoga and/or Pilates again.
• Have nice arms so I can wear beaters all summer long.
• Get the rents on some sort of fitness program.To walk upstairs to gossip with friend…although given some of the sitchus at work it may be better chatting on IM…will have to think this one over.
• To stop flexing my arms and asking if people have tickets to the gun show.

Alright enough with all this fitness talk…it is time for a quesadilla and a glass or five of wine.

The Lost Chronicles: Friday's Post

Last night was Xtian’s holiday party. Always a fabulous event with dinner at somewhere awesome and drinking at somewhere not so awesome. This year was no exception…dinner at the OMG so tasty Fleur de Lys followed by drinking binge at the douchy Slide. So below a quick recap, sports style, of the fête that was Xtian’s holiday party.

Highlight: Xtian’s holiday party
Lowlight: It was Thursday night and I have to work the next day

Highlight: The five-course dinner with wine paring.
Lowlight: I promised my trainer I would only eat half of each course and 2 glasses of wine. Well at least I did only eat half of each of my courses…the wine on the other hand not so much.

Highlight: VP’s date wearing the cocktail dress I wore to last year’s holiday party…same color and everything
Lowlight: Discovering this chick was totally nice and Canadian…I heart Canadians but I will save that for a later post

Highlight: Interesting cocktail and dinner conversations with very smart people
Lowlights: Listening to a discussion about men and how they handle their sweat followed by bedroom habits of the rich and not so famous

Highlight: A moment on the dance floor with xtian where everyone seemed to disappear
Lowlight: We were at Slide

A Little Perspective

With the holidays around the corner and most of western civilization spending themselves into oblivion, I could not help but put things into perspective and wonder what is it all for? Will that Wii really make your wildest dreams come true? Will those Choos change your life (I have several pair and my life is still pretty much the same from the shoes I wore when I did not care about labels)? I think an all-around answer is no. I understand how hypocritical this all sounds…especially since I am in the business of selling want…of selling greed…but I think that a reality check should be in order especially during the holidays.

What inspired all of this? My team lunch today and talking to my manager about her “life” if you will. While I will not go into all the details, here is a woman who lost her husband in a very tragic way, who is dealing with a sick child that no over-the-counter medicine will cure, but who seems happy. When one of my teammates asked her how she deals with all the nonsense at work, she said something I will forever remember, “because I am too busy to care about stupid stuff.” Here is a woman who is on top of her game and who lives her life as fully as she can. She tries, rather successfully, to live in the now and check off her list of “things I want to do” that most of us put off for the proverbial “later.” Someone, who in spite of everything, got it right.

I guess dealing with issues always does that doesn’t it? Put things into perspective. It is sad really, but we all do it…I know I certainly do. Nevertheless, I really am at a place where I am “too busy to care about stupid shit” and just need to focus on getting it right.

The Power of the Key Stroke

Saturday night I made a nice healthy gourmet dinner for the fam. courtesy of Self magazine that looked way more gourmet in the glossy than what I actually put on the table but whatever. I had a blast making it with my eldest nephew so there you go. After dinner, Christian (the fiancé) and I sat alone at my kitchen table and began discussing my desire to start a new blog. He has a blog, a fact I think I kinda knew about when we were first dating, but I had never dared ask to see the contents…until now.

He read to me an entry he had wrote the day after he told me he was in love with me. Listening to him read it aloud, in his own words and in his own tone, brought back so many memories of our life together so far. I remember that night, I am surprised I do since I was pretty drunk off of carpirinahs, but I remember everything about it. I remember how he told me he loved me, how I was the only one for him, how we were meant to be together forever and how goose bumps covered my entire body. I remembered how young we were then, how different everything seemed and how only a few short months later he would break my heart.

I sat there looking at him elated to recount those words to me now and wondered if he would feel the same way I did if I sat and read him my own first blog…a barrage of heartache and sorrow where he played the main star. Would he would feel the same nostalgia? Would he would feel happy that we are in a better place now? Or would he feel like I just need to get over it already since it has been years?

We sat and talked about the old days, old blogs and old memories (only the good ones) over crappy gift wine and I felt a sense of closeness to him that I always feel during conversations like these. I felt relieved that I had deleted that first blog because this is a much better place now and, yes, I need to get over it.

It is funny the paths that life takes us through and how things like blogs can take us back to a time when we were different. Maybe this is the ultimate reason why I want to start this blog…to document new memories I can look back on years later. A lot has happened since that one blog post and it would go without saying that we have both changed in various ways. The judgments have gotten better, the paychecks bigger, the clothes nicer, and the love stronger (despite the heartbreak)…but it is nice to know that he can cover me with goose bumps years later. I love you baby.

the first post of the new blog

i am highly impressionable, there is no denying that. i, quite convincingly, adored abba in high-school because my two girlfriends loved them. i sang along to their crappy ass music for years until i discovered years later that i violently despise them - abba - not the friends, i still adore them. during the whole sars scare a few years ago i convinced myself that i, after a bout with flu, had sars too…although that could be credited to my hypochondria.

blogging, for me, is no different. i started my first blog years ago because of a co-worker and his witty and brilliant online repartee. i started my second blog because i enjoyed reading other people’s blogs and i so desperately wanted to write as well as they did and express my own musings on this thing called life. lately, guilt-ridden by a old blog that i never write anymore and envious of other witty blogs, i decided to start afresh and write a new blog whose contents will be whatever comes to me during my train-ride commute to and from work.

why start again? i am not sure. maybe it is because my star-sign dictates my own self-obsession driven through some form of insecurity to put myself out there so people can see the real carefully created public me. maybe it is my hopeless quest to please everyone, that has sadly haunted me my entire life, that I feel the need to take to the pen keyboard to freely carefully express myself online. maybe it is not as deep as i make it out to seem and it truly is because i enjoy writting...however horrific my creative writting may be.

i guess only time will tell what will come of all of this. third-time is a charm they always say and I hope this will be the case with this third blog. happy readings.