Perpetual Smile

I am not doing too well.

I’ve spent the last two weeks in a fog, kind of just moving through the days. I’ve been a little better today but I can’t shake the feeling that this is only the eye of the storm.

In high school, the best parts of my days in shop (I went to a technical high school and spent my four years in Culinary Arts) were the mornings and afternoons. First thing in the morning, I would come in and fill a little bowl with chocolate chip cookie dough as it was being made by Chef I. He got so used to me snitching cookie dough that at one point he started having a bowl ready for me. (And then Chef Z and later Chef M tried to shut me down, but that’s another post for another day.)

After a day of cooking, we would eat together. If you worked on Faculty Range, in Bake Shop, or in the Dining Room, you got to eat the good stuff (as opposed to being on Cafeteria side, where you made lunch for the whole student body). My favorite thing to eat for lunch was a few slices of bread with butter and a big bowl of sauce. (And to think I stayed a size 3-5 throughout my high school career!)

I haven’t had homemade bread since.

This afternoon, while wandering around on Lifehacker at work, I found a post on making fresh-baked bread quickly and easily. I scribbled down the recipe — 6 cups of water, 3 tablespoons of salt, 3 tablespoons of yeast, and 13 cups of flour — on a Post-It and stuck it in my purse.

As soon as I got home, I set to it.

I split the recipe in half, since the Lifehacker post is for a one- to two-week supply of bread that you ideally bake a loaf every day. I dissolved 1 1/2 tbsp of yeast and 1 1/2 tbsp of salt in 3 cups of hot water (I remembered from Culinary that the hot water makes the difference).

Then I stirred in 6 1/2 cups of flour.

After the dough started to come together, I stripped off my rings and kneaded the dough with my hands. The scent of it was intoxicating.

When it reached the right consistency, I patted it into a neat little ball, scraped dough off of my fingers, and went to the sink to wash my hands. I didn’t get far before the urge to try some of the dough came over me. I pulled a little glob off of my left hand and popped it into my mouth. I knew instantly that I hadn’t fucked up the recipe; it had the perfect bread dough taste, with just the right amount of salt. I scraped as much dough off of my hands as I could and ate it before washing them, it was that good.

Then I put a towel over the bowl the way Noni always did when I watched her make dough and set it to rise.

If all goes well, I’ll have a nice hot slice of homemade bread with butter tomorrow morning before work with Noni, Popi, and Biz Noni. I might even put some grape jelly on it. My mouth just waters thinking about it, and my heart warms just a little bit.

That gaping hole is still there, but with little things like hot fresh bread and cards from my good friends online and off, it is a little less raw.

I dreamed a bunch of weird shit the night before last (and didn’t write about it until now because THE NOVEL is taking all of my writing time). I know normally dream posts are annoying, but seriously? They were so funny and weird that I think you’ll appreciate them.

In the first dream, I was getting married. I blame Jess and Sarah, because they were talking about wedding dresses on Twitter the other night. Anyway, in the dream, I wore this impossibly weird dress. It was made out of doily fabric that looked papier mached, and I have no idea how I got it on. The wedding was inside some house, and everything was ready. I walked down the aisle, and at the end, instead of Michael, was this chick.

She was pretty, I guess; the wedding veil didn’t really let me see her face. She wore the same kind of dress I wore, only quite a few sizes larger. I had no idea who she was.

We said our vows, and then everyone came to congratulate us. “Thank you,” I said. “I’m so happy. But I wish I’d married Michael.” Then people started getting ready for the honeymoon and saying that we should get ready. All I could think of was, I have to have sex with her? I don’t know her!

Just as I started to panic over that, the dream changed and I was in a kitchen with Sandy. We had to go to the hospital to go visit someone, so she and I left and started walking all over downtown. Except downtown was different, and we got lost. And chased by boys on bicycles. Who weren’t actually chasing us, you see. We ended up in an alley with these new, still drying concrete steps a few feet above our heads. Sandy jumped up to get to them, and since I’m a scaredy cat and don’t like to climb, I just stared anxiously up at her.

“Come on,” she said, and disappeared. I had no idea where she went. I grabbed a chunk of the wet concrete and the pieces of her journal from high school that she’d found, and went back to the house.

Her kids and a bunch of other kids were there, waiting for me, so I started rounding them up and brought them to a part of the house where they could play. There was this really small baby who could walk and talk, and then Sandy magically showed up.

“I went to the hospital,” she said when I asked her where she had gone.

Then suddenly I was standing outside of the house I’d gotten married in, wearing a normal dress and standing next to Mike, who wore a tuxedo.

“Your limo’s here,” someone said. “Enjoy your honeymoon!”

We got into the limo and rode off to our honeymoon, whatever that was.

And then I woke up* because I really had to pee.

I don’t know what happened to my new wife. I’m kind of worried that she might come after me for the whole $10 I’ve got to myself.

Didn’t post this last night because I totally forgot to. Whoops.

Current Word Count: 35,058
Words to Go: 14,942
Cups of Coffee: 0
Hours Spent Writing Today: Hours. Don’t remember how many.
Number of Breaks Taken: Oh hi, Twitter!
Number of Characters Killed: 0
Number of Times Writers’ Block Occurred: I got really tired of what I was writing and jumped ahead to a part I’ve been DYING to write, which made it all that more easier to rack up the words. I’ll tie it all in together later.
Number of Times I Almost Gave Up: Nope.
Number of Chapters: 13 in main doc + 2 in Kirk Chronicles (section of story I jumped ahead to) = 15
Number of Pages: 104 in main doc + 16 in Kirk Chronicles = 120
Favorite Character of the Day: Ant, Gigi’s best friend. He’s a HUGE football player who is funny and doesn’t mind buying his friend’s pregnancy tests. Well, he almost doesn’t mind. He’s a good sport about it.

I just checked Twitter and found out that Jess is about 1,000 words ahead of me at 36,221. I imagine that she’s writing now and surging even more ahead of em… I MUST CATCH UP!!

I’m halfway there, and we’re only ten days into this! I’m not even going to try not to brag; this feeling is incredible! I have to say, though, that having “word count wars” with Jess is one of the biggest reasons my word count is so high. She and I regularly BBM each other throughout the day asking for each other’s word count. We then scramble to catch up to each other. It’s working really well, and I think after November she and I are going to have to be permanent writing buddies.

Current Word Count: 26,288
Words to Go: 23,712
Cups of Coffee: Oh, man, I miss you, coffee. I will have some tomorrow!
Hours Spent Writing Today: Um. Uh. Altogether? Maybe four. I really need to start keeping track again!
Number of Breaks Taken: One to write errands. I was at about 23k then. I took a shower, went to the bank, got some McDonald’s, went to the doctor (I don’t have swine flu, yay!), and then stopped at the grocery store for some Gatorade and other sicky necessities. When I got home, I started writing again pretty much right away, then took a break for dinner. I think I wrote for a little while after that, then quit to do some website updates for some clients.
Number of Characters Killed: 0
Number of Times Writers’ Block Occurred: 0
Number of Times I Almost Gave Up: 0
Number of Chapters: I just finished Chapter 11, so I’ll be starting Chapter 12 tomorrow.
Number of Pages: 89
Favorite Character of the Day: Jay (main character’s boss and wannabe love interest). He’s part Mike (who is HOT in that picture, with those steamy blue eyes), part Mike Lobel, and part fantasy. (Just picture this guy with green eyes, a cap that says The Beanery, and a beard. Mmn…) He’s trying to run his uncle’s coffee shop while recording an album on the side, and he really, REALLY wants to date Gigi (my main character). She won’t let him come close, though, so it’s been tough for him (and me, because he’s so awesome)! Sidenote: I named him Jay after my Dad, not the Degrassi character that Mike Lobel happens to play. Just so ya know.

Doing this quick, because I need to go get in the shower so I can drive to New Britain for karaoke with Kate!

Current Word Count: 17,389
Words to Go: 32,611
Cups of Coffee: None.
Hours Spent Writing Today: About an hour.
Number of Breaks Taken: I have to stop now so I can go get in the shower and go out for karaoke!
Number of Characters Killed: None.
Number of Times Writers’ Block Occurred: It took me a few minutes to get into it again. Then I ran into writers’ block and made my main character run into her douchebag ex to liven things up a little.
Number of Times I Almost Gave Up: Pfft, please. I just wish I could beat Jess, who is forever ahead of me and probably going to hit 20,000 tonight!
Number of Chapters: 7
Number of Pages: 59
Favorite Character of the Day: Jay

Since today is Bloggy Love Sunday and Mother’s Day, I thought I’d give some Bloggy Love to a certain new mommy.

I met Sarcastica when I first left LiveJournal, bought this domain, and started blogging outside of my familiar little LJ ecosystem. I didn’t really know anyone with a real blog (I don’t believe a LiveJournal is a real blog, but that’s another post for another day). I remember stumbling upon the Bloggies while at work and seeing that someone called Sarcastica had won best teen blog.

I liked her right away. Witty, smart, and not just another dough head (as Faiqa likes to say), Sarcastica writes about everything from boyfriends to childhood to coping with MHE. I learned a lot from her, and I don’t think she even knows it. Reading her blog has helped me learn to be my own medical advocate, instead of waiting for doctors to come to me. She’s taught me to be strong even when I don’t feel strong.

She may live quite far from me — Canada! Holy COW! — but I feel that she is a relatively close friend. She’s a great listener, and she replies to comments. (We all know how big a deal that is to me!)

One of my favorite posts is the one about the honesty spell. One of the things I love about Sarcastica’s blog is that she sometimes goes back and writes about her childhood. It was cool to read about her and her friends’ creepy experiences with Ouija boards and spells, partially because I dabbled with the occult myself as a young teenager.

I couldn’t imagine the blogosphere without Sarcastica. She is truly a great friend and an awesome blogger. Sarcastica recently gave birth to a healthy, beautiful little boy, so go say hi and shower her with Mother’s Day gifts!

My life is going at the speed of a frog in a blender. It’s almost too much!

I started working two jobs a couple of weeks ago. I am not used to working all day, every day. It’s exhausting! It’s totally worth it at the end of the week, though. I’m actually catching up on things I’ve been trying to save for. Maybe I’ll even be driving the Sunfire soon, rather than my death trap Mazda. I even got the BlackBerry I’ve been dying to have (thank you to Sarcastica for being so patient and helping me get on BB Messenger)!

A couple of days ago, I also partnered my web design freelancing business with my aunt’s web design and print media business, OSC. We will be collaborating on social media websites. So basically, if one of us has a client that needs a website and social media, we will work on it together. I will be working on the social media end of it, be it setting up accounts on social networking sites (MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, etc) or building a site in WordPress. We will be offering training and hopefully will be doing seminars. We have an expo in about a month that we need to prepare for, and we’ve been doing a lot of networking. Needless to say, I’ve been working pretty much non-stop and I could use a nice, long nap.

Somehow, through all of this craziness, I’ve managed to stay smoke-free. I don’t know how the hell I’m doing it.

Of course I have another sinus infection. I have to call my physician in the morning and get some drugs! I thought that by quitting smoking, I wouldn’t get as many sinus infections each year. I guess I thought wrong. I don’t want to go back to smoking, though. I don’t even care that I quit, and I’m glad for all of the extra cash (especially now that Connecticut is hiking up the taxes on tobacco).

The only real problem with all of this working is that I’m starting to feel like I don’t ever do anything fun. I realized the other day that I’ve been much been working non-stop for the last year or so, and that sucks. It’s starting to drain me. I spent most of the day yesterday trying to stop the

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and

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from leaking out of my ears.

My only consolation is that today is Wednesday, Friday is pay day, sometime this weekend I am going to get my hair cut, and Julien-K finally released their debut album. Oh, and did I mention that Mike found me the ultra-rare translucent Dr. Manhattan figure? Cool beans.

This quitting smoking thing is seriously sucking my motivation.

I talked with Sarcastica on Facebook IM earlier and we got ourselves all riled up and motivated… and I got nothing done.

I talked with Nikki for at least forty-five minutes on the phone, and then let her go so I could get to work… and I got nothing done.

I talked to Mike for two minutes to ask him to come pick me up, then let him go and told myself I was going to get to work… and I got nothing done.

I really wanted to blog about something actually interesting or maybe even witty… but I just can’t think.

Maybe tomorrow.

Since my throat feels like it’s swollen ten times its normal size, and I know you guys don’t wanna read about how awful I feel, I thought I’d give you a list of three things that are more important than how sick I am right now. Particularly this goes out to Sarcastica, who seems to have a lot of jokes about my current condition.

1. Diary of a Palestinian Mother is a firsthand account of how it feels to have family on the war-torn Gaza Strip. Laila shows us that there is a lot more going on in our world than we know.
2. Elizabeth and Katy Hughes give homelessness a face. It’s time to stop ignoring what is happening right in front of our faces. One of our fellow bloggers is living it, but she isn’t the only one. Help Liz and Katy get off the streets, and then help the homeless in your neighborhood.
3. Ten Thousand Questions gets you to think about things you normally don’t think about. By thinking about the questions posted every day, you get to know yourself just a little better.