cxxix: candids and ctr rings.

thursday night, at my bcs championship party, one of my girls was taking pictures. i was sitting on the floor, the BFF to my left, my girl to his left.  she took a picture across the room, and all you could see of me was my arm sticking out behind him.  i saw the picture after she took it and i said, surprised, “you can’t even SEE me!”  the BFF looked at me and said “i win.”  i sort of chuckled and said “i think I win.”  understanding sort of flashed in his eyes and he said “in a big contest, i would win.”

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the BFF has made it emphatically clear that my ctr ring, which i wear on my right ring finger, is TOO BIG.

this was not news to me, but when he was able to pull it off without any resistance at all in one quick and fluid motion, he made the statement.  i didn’t argue with him.  i told him that it used to fit (and it did). he told me that i needed what he called the standard size 7 instead of what has apparently now become an uber-large 8. then, when i told him that my other ring finger was even smaller, leading him to guess that i’d wear a 6.5 on that hand, he said “you’re little.”  then he said it again, looking straight at me.  “you’re LITTLE.”

–

about a month ago, these things would have led me to deny them.  i would have been like “nah…not true.”

but pictures don’t lie and neither do pieces of metal.

and neither does the BFF.  biased as he may be, he tells the truth.  and for whatever reason, i’m starting to be able to see it.  and it’s REALLY cool.

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shred update: seriously, it works. trying on clothes since i’ve gotten back home from christmas, things are fitting differently.  the jeans i bought on new year’s eve are nearly too big.  i’m still pretty much on level 1, but it’s still kicking my trash a little and i’m sort of excited to see what happens when i add in more cardio than i have been doing this week.  and if i ever master a pushup, a side lunge, or an oblique crunch, i will count myself a winner.

murphy’s law.

why is it that when you are happily dating someone, flirting guys seem to come out of the woodwork?  what is that?  i am certain that it works in the reverse as well (i’m pretty sure i saw that in action last night, which might have brought out the teeniest bit of crazy for like two minutes, but it was more like what the heck crazy than anything else since i’m still trying to figure out how to do all of this, the boy is RIDICULOUSLY ADORABLE, and not everybody knows yet.  but it was totally fine.).

but anyways.

i swear.  it’s happening. i am pretty sure the guy i worked with this afternoon at the reading and writing center thought i was adorable and was trying to flirt with me a little bit. or impress me? or something.  and the whole time i’m like WHAT THE FLIP.  i mean, he was kind of cute, but really.  i don’t care!  leave me alone!

(i might not be so good at knowing how to deal with extra attention right now, as i am a little bit of a flirt.)

and let me tell you what an interesting combination of thought processes that is…one side of your brain is dissecting a paper and the other side is dissecting human behavior.  behold the amazing drbolte and her wonderbrain.

or maybe i’m just delusional? maybe he was just being friendly?

or is that i am just exuding awesome waves of happy that make me ultraadorable or something?

i don’t know, but it’s weird.  and annoying.  because heaven knows when you’re supersingle they’re not lining up at your door to watch you exude much of anything really.

pfft. i don’t get it.

i just don’t get it.

but if these are the problems i have this week, i’ll take them. i really, really will.

it just has to be done. i’m sorry. it just does and i can’t do it on facebook.

*ahem*

OH MY FREAKING HECK I LOVE MY LIFE!

*ahem*

you may return to what you were doing. thank you for your polite attention.

jigsaw.

i was talking to a friend the other day that i haven’t seen in AGES, and we were trying to catch up as best we could via gchat, which is harder than it may seem. she said that i seemed really happy. today, someone said that i looked like the i was sitting on top of the world.

i am happier than i have been in a long time.

but before you all go rolling your eyes and thinking that you know the reason, it’s far more complicated than that.

going home for the holidays was really good for me in lots of ways.  of course, it was WONDERFUL to see the family that i hadn’t seen in half a year. that’s the longest i’d gone before.  but before i headed home, i think i felt stuck in who i once was.  that sounds odd.  let me back up a bit.  i have talked here about how my mind couldn’t quite catch up to what my body had done. i think that was really true in many ways…like i couldn’t quite embrace who i now was.  all of the changing that i had done–the physical, i think, just serving as a symbol–hadn’t really cemented to me.

the trip home did something funny.  it was like something clicked.

or, if you will, the pieces started falling into place in the right order and at the right time.

i was talking to the BFF (do i need a new name for him? suggestions?) about this and used that metaphor for things that he was excited about, and at the moment that i did, i realized that in so many ways it was true of me as well.

when i looked in the mirror while i was at home, i saw the person that everybody kept telling me i was.

when i was faced with challenging situations, i was the person i hoped that i would be.  or in the moments that i wasn’t, i recognized it and transcended it before i made a situation worse.  in short, i abdicated my throne as the queen of passive aggressiva and just said what i wanted to say.

when i needed to be patient, i was patient–with myself and with others. when i needed faith, it was there.

so i am happy…so much happier than i have been in a long time, but much of that is the direct result of a lot of hard work that i’ve been doing on myself.  and i have to believe that the new amazing things in my life are similarly a result of who i am now…as well as who i always have been.

the pieces, which were all there before but were all wonky and out of sorts, are now all fitting together really, really well. if this makes any sense, i feel more like myself than i have in a long time.  like maybe the pieces that needed to come together were only for me–so that i could realize who i am.

weird.  odd. awesome.

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in other news, partially brought on my chickbug’s recent post about the top ten reasons it sucks to have a blog, i’m wondering how much of the good stuff going on in my life you actually want to hear. i definitely don’t want to be that girl who’s like OH HAI GUESS WHAT JUST HAPPENED TO ME DON’T YOU WISH YOU WERE ME I’M SO LUUUUCCCCKKKY? because that girl is that one you want to stifle in whatever manner is available to you or stick gum in her hair or throw things at her or…well you get the picture.  but i also don’t want to be writing about boring crap and doing memes all the time because i am avoiding the things in my life that are crazy good.

so…what’s your philosophy, y’all?  you’re the readers.  and yes, this is my space and, yes, i will ultimately do what i want with it, but…i like you guys. i’d like to keep you around and keep you commenting, if at all possible.  so…share with the good doctor.

i’m listening.

fuzzled.

i just made that up.

it’s a cross between fuzzy and muddled. i like it. i think it’s appropriate.

i’ve had about five hours of sleep. it ought to see me through, but we’ll see. i have a headache, probably because i hate crap frozen pizza last night and drove eight hours back to FL and stayed up until 5 a.m. i should be shredding, which i will probably do actually in about a few minutes, but really all i want to do is try to find words for my life.

which i can’t.

that’s frustrating, to some degree, because i know me and i know that if i don’t write about it, it will all get…fuzzled.

much like me.

why is it that i find words so easily for the bad stuff, but the good stuff comes with no words at all?

i need to find some. asap. i wish someone ELSE would write it for me…that might be fun.

on that odd note, i’m going to go get shredded. don’t want to, but jillian michaels waits for no woman. plus…i have things to do today and i need her out of the way.

ah, goals. don’t you love them?

be good, y’all.

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california dreamin’: days two and three.

day two was panel day.

i dressed up, amazing black pants and the new teal shirt i got from the cousin for christmas. i looked good, i think, but you could tell i wasn’t incredibly invested in the conference because rather than suffering for my art in my kickin’ black heels, i opted for flats.

no one to impress, you see.

the best of the panels came at 830 am…the microblogging session about using twitter and new media (i.e. text messaging, blogging, etc.) in the classroom and what it means for our way of approaching literary studies and teaching. i really, really liked it. it was interactive, fun, engaging, and involved a BOO oklahoma icon from a UT prof.

i wanted to yell GO GATORS! but i didn’t.  be impressed by my professionalism.

that was pretty much the highlight of my day. the rest of them were fairly boring, even though i had great hopes for the travel writing ones.  they were good–don’t get me wrong. the scholarship was solid and the papers were certainly intelligent and thought-provoking. but i think my general sense of detachment abou the whole process made paying attention more difficult.

it could also have been the fact that 8500 people were at the conference.  that might have had something to do with it.

day three dawned much better, though.

SIGHTSEEING DAY!

we began by visiting what was perhaps the best concierge desk in the history of the world. he checked in at southwest for us, printed our boarding passes, gave us a map, and told us how to cheaply and efficiently reach all of our desired destinations.

then, we trekked out to see the painted ladies.

lest you think that was something squirrely, these are the painted ladies:

victorian houses.  GORGEOUS.  it was a wonderful day, as you can tell from the photo–full of sunshine and not very cold at all.  unusual for san francisco, but a blessing for us.

we then went to fisherman’s wharf, where we saw these:

those are the famous sealions that hang out at pier 39.  they were pretty cute.  we ate some fish and chips, wandered in some TACKY tourist shops, and headed off to ghiradelli square. we shopped some, ate some ice cream, and then got back in line to ride the cable cars.  the interminable lines.  or at least it felt like it…

there, we were privileged to be entertained by none other than…escapeman.

yeah.  he was in a straitjacket, chained to a pole. he proceeded to gyrate and seize until he had freed himself (admittedly a nice feat) and then asked us all for money.

it was odd.  it was hilarious. it was bizarroworld personified.

then we walked through chinatown, which was awesome because i bought a t-shirt for $1.88. i didn’t do that in nyc’s chinatown and totally kicked myself for it.  no one can say i don’t learn from my mistakes.

know what i DIDN’T buy in chinatown?

food.

(are you seeing a common theme? me and food…we need to be better pals that plan our interactions more frequently.)

oh well.

it was an awesome day, though. we felt like we managed to see much of the city by the bay for relatively cheap, and i felt like our walk through chinatown and back to our hotel felt like real travel and adventure as opposed to travel provided by an all-day cable car pass.

that may or may not make sense to you, but it does to me.

california didn’t disappoint, but by the end of day three, when i was preparing to get up at 330 to go to the airport for a 645 flight, i was ready to go home.

i hope the next time i go to the mla, i actually have a REASON to go.  you know, like real interviews or presenting a paper. i will say that my foray into giant conference world taught me that i am, in fact, smart enough to present at such an occasion, so next time i won’t be so intimidated.

but i was glad to get home, tired as i was.

and that concludes my travel stories.  boring, probably, but there you go.

you’re welcome.

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shred day 9 (?) update: yeah, i tried to do level 2 again today and was pretty lame at it.  i am however (i think?) seeing muscle definition where there really wasn’t any before.  so, yay for that.  in related news, i am able to run a lot easier, except for today when my knees were not having it. i just don’t think that early morning is my time for exercise, as much as i wish it was. or at least not lately and not on a day when it’s maximum 40 degrees outside.

i’ve sort of abandoned the whole 30 times in 30 days thing since i took five days off for SF.  but i’m still committed to every day but sunday, and that’s kicking enough of my trash.

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facebook kills my self-esteem, chapter 56.

i didn’t get invited to a little shindig thing that somebody’s putting together for saturday night.

before you’re all WHOA. DR. BOLTE. CALLLMMM DOWN, please know that i don’t particularly care and probably would have other plans anyways.

but this is one of those situations where i’m like ‘hey. you invited my ROOMMATE. invite everybody.’ and taps into my pet peeves about exclusivity.

and makes me realize that facebook? awesome. but dangerous.

and maybe a little bit stupid.

california dreamin’: day one.

my saturday started at 4a.m.

if you’re horrified by that fact, think of how i felt when i had to haul my carcass out of bed having only slept for about three hours, ready to face a cross-country plane trip and the stress of a conference that was bigger and badder than anything else i’d been to.

good times, eh?

i got to the airport a bit later than i anticipated, only to find that my airline’s ticket counter was mysteriously closed.

as in NO ONE was there to check bags.  there was a line that wrapped around the terminal, but no one was there to get the process started, and i only had an hour before my flight.  so skycaps came to my rescue, and i was on my way.

what is it about smaller airports that the food choices are so abominable? what is about airports that they scalp you up one side and down the other for your money?  why does a bagel cost $40?  why do 8 bandaids cost $3?  i am fully aware of the truthfulness of the law of supply and demand when i fly.

i was hoping to eat before my flight, but i didn’t get enough time and if i had to eat a cinnabon, i would have thrown up completely. not that they’re not good–they’re great–but they’re also death in a box and who needs that before you get on a giant metal tube for four hours?

i thought you’d agree.

we landed in denver early. i was THRILLED because i was really ready to be off the plane. even if only for an hour, i needed space and time to stretch my legs.

and food.  seriously i was in massive need of food.

so we got in early and i was all YAYAYAYAYAYAY.

and then we sat.

for twenty minutes.

behind the plane that was at our gate that hadn’t left yet.

let me tell you, if there is a more frustrating situation, i really don’t know what it is.  i was not pleased.  the not pleasedness could have come from the fact that, at this point, i had been up for approximately seven hours with no food.

i don’t do well with little sleep and no food, just as an fyi.

so i ate a bagel and tried not to hate my life because i was getting back on a plane again.

but luckily, that plane ride was significantly shorter and was over very pretty snow-covered mountains, so i dealt well. and i arrived in san francisco with a degree of excitement that i didn’t really expect.  i got my bag in pretty short order and, after a quick call home to retrieve the confirmation number of the shuttle that i’d reserved, i went to find the shuttle pickup point.

which was supposed to be at the end of an arrow-filled route.

except that the arrows…they led NOWHERE.

exhausted and frustrated, i was about to cry when i finally found it.  whew.

so i made it to my hotel, only to realize that it was SWARMING with people and that everything i had ever heard about the mla–the chaos, the people, the insanity–was absolutely, 100% true.  good times.

long story short…TOO LATE!…i took a nap, ate some peanut butter crackers, waited for my mla roommate to get there, ate the most amazing crab cakes ever at an irish pub, and got ready for my foray into mla panel attendance.

it was a day.