always been crazy

I'm trying to refrain from starting every post here and every letter to my prison penpals with "sorry, things have been crazy lately," because things are always crazy and I just need to accept that it's my new normal and roll with the chaos. Not that anyone is reading these posts anyway.

( movies & TV )

I just finished reading Jay Baruchel's Born Into It (loved it) and a collection of essays about women in the bible and the church.

I was planning on doing NaNo this year - honestly just a collection of stories from my life and such, for the kids - but haven't managed to start yet. Oops.

( Kid updates )

Random thoughts from my visit to Norfolk:

+ Boys are stupid and smelly and we hate them.

+ When your wife says "you can't drink beer when you're on hydrocodone because you'll die", she doesn't mean a drug interaction. She means she's gonna kill you.

+ If I make a five-hour-drive-each-way trip to hang out with your pregnant wife so we can bitch about how you don't understand why she's upset that you've gone out with your buddies every night this week instead of coming home to her, you're not invited to dinner with us. Love you, mean it, but no.

+ Telling us yall are going out to get 21-year-old-blushing-virgin-of-your-current-"crew" laid is not an acceptable answer. You don't know that's a forgone conclusion that he's gonna get laid unless you're the one doing the laying, and if that's the case, take pictures I don't think just one of you is going to be experiencing something new.

+ The baby's name is not going to be "Phillipe Marcone", even if your buddies did promise $300 and a case of monster a month.

+ I so miss hanging out with Amy and Cliff, if you can't tell. They're so delightfully snarky to one another and everyone else.

+ I feel bad that Amy still hasn't made any actual "friends" in Norfolk. :( I feel even worse that she's 5 hours away from home and virtually friendless and pregnant. I mean, we txt all the time and she has a few other friends here that she's in regular contact with, but it's not the same thing, and she's already worried about all these things going wrong with the pregnancy and what she's gonna do after the baby is born and I'm really not sure what to say.

+ I am totally kidnapping their dog, Jedi, once we get the basement done at our house.

In other news, I'm thinking of getting my hair cut. It's currently long enough that it's all the way down my back, but I'm thinking of chopping it off to shoulder length. I was going to wait until the summer (and donate it to Locks of Love), but I kinda wanna do it now to make sure that it's not contributing to my headaches.

Here, have a song. Don't You Wanna Stay - Jason Aldean w/ Kelly Clarkson. This is my current favorite song. And yes, one day I'll musicshare something other than country, lol. When does Vices and Virtues come out again? ;)

Wow, it's already 2 days into the new year and I'm already behind! Lol. I started this on NYE? It's my 2010 in review. I'm gonna try to make another post about what I'm looking forward to / anticipating / hoping for in 2011, but I have to work 12 hrs tomorrow (later today, w/e) so I need to go to sleep now. *smooches*

JANUARY 2010

* Mom turned 50 and we planned a big surprise party for her. We had her convinced that everyone forgot her birthday, but we had relatives coming in from out of town and all this stuff - then we got a foot of snow and everything was ruined.

FEBRUARY 2010

* Kidnapped Amy and went to Atlantic City for a weekend. It was her birthday weekend & Valentine's Day & Cliff was at boot camp, so we met up with thebunnyknows and went to see The Used and Drive A (and Atreyu). Amy kinda got a crash course in fandom that weekend, lol. At the concert, we met up with valerie_z and one of her friends and sinsense. After, me and Amy and thebunnyknows were gonna hang around and get Cliff a hoodie autographed, and some drunk chick gave sinsense her meet-the-band card, so she stayed with us. And the only thing she had with her to be autographed was a draft of her thesis, which led to an interesting discussion about hemaphroditism (between her and Quinn, who, despite all evidence to the contrary, can actually string words together to make sentences) and to Bert saying "I'd love to wake up one day with a vagina; I'd probably have to take a few days off tour." (Amy says "that happens to me every day!) Also, they were super nice about giving Amy messages to pass along to Cliff (generic "tell him thanks for serving our country"-type messages, but still!). The next day we found a Zoltar machine on the boardwalk, but no one transformed into a 12-year-old. Maybe because we are all already 12 at heart?

* As another show on that same tour, I took Davey to see The Used in Charlotte. He had his shoes autographed, had a discussion with Jepha about Perry the Platapus, and is now buddies forever with Bert McCracken. Also, the band autographed a onesie for Illiana and Quinn drew a little cloud picture on it.

MARCH 2010

* ILLIANA WAS BORN! March 25. Harley was texting me (and others) up til like 7am from the hospital, and I figured I had time to drop the boys off at school and get to the hospital before the baby was born, but I got a call just around 730 saying the baby was here. She is quite possibly my favorite thing about 2010.

APRIL 2010

* I sold my van to the farm. Really, she went to a good home with some Amish family that runs some orchards in Franklin County, but I still cried because I love my van!

* accidentally captained a March of Dimes team at work and raised $5700

MAY 2010

* The official Team Gregory picnic, which was proof that we were the best team in the call center and everyone else was jealous.

* Celebration with my friends and family for my 30th birthday and my brother's 28th birthday.

* Cliff got his assignment and Amy left me, lol. They're stationed in Norfolk, which is kinda good because they're only 5 hrs away, but for Amy is also kinda bad because it means her in-laws visit a lot.

JUNE 2010

* Harley was driving me to the airport and we were in an accident. I had my bag in the floorboard and my feet on top of it, tying my shoes and talking shit with Johnathan, and the next thing I know we're under a Suburban and Harley's climbing over me to get to the baby. I ended up with a concussion and knocking out one of my front teeth, and freaking the fuck out, but I still insisted on going to the airport. I was spending the weekend of my 30th birthday with my friends, dammit! I got wendy and phaballa for my actual birthday (and phaballa's peanut butter pie!), and we saw Shrek Forever After, and I got puppy!snuggles from Max & Val. The next day I got to spend time with snarkyrainbow and talked her into staying to see Cobra with me. As with most shows, we were amused by the fashion disasters and by the parents' reactions to some of the songs. I Fight Dragons was surprisingly entertaining, and Travie and Cobra were unsurprisingly awesome. I can't stand 3oh!3 and was really wtf'ed by the huge stuffed wolves with green laser eyes that were onstage during their set. Met up with irisgirl12000 and went home with her to Houston (and my favorite guest bedroom, lol). Next day went to Hard Rock for lunch and met up with some of the other TX girls (shutyourface! eckerlilas! And other girls I know but whose LJ names I can't remember!) for more Travie and Cobra. We didn't have to suffer through 3oh!3 this time, but there were extra acts in between sets that I really wasn't feeling. (I had a concussion! And by this time I had two black eyes! I wanted to put my head down on the barrier and sleep until there was Gabe in front of me!) Oh, and we ended up with Gabe!crotch in our faces, lol. One of the previous concerts we were at together, it was Pete!crotch. Oh, bandboys. Sunday, I laid on irisgirl12000's couch and cuddled with Dante (my favorite of irisgirl12000's two kitties) and watched the first couple episodes of Generation Kill and wished I didn't have to go to the airport.

* Had to get a CT scan done to make sure I didn't have a skull fracture or internal bleeding or whatnot. (Now, I actually have experience with concussions and head injuries because Ronnie has had 4 concussions and is also a klutz, so I know it's generally a good sign if you do have a knot after a blow to the head.) The drs seemed to think I wasn't any more brain damaged than I had been to begin with. (Although you can still feel the indentation in my forehead where I hit the edge of my shoe.)

* hit up wordsalone for download links for Generation Kill so I could get sucked into that fandom, lol

* participated in Relay for Life on a family team

JULY 2010

* got a new-to-me car! A 2007 Mitsubishi Outlander which I totally love! :)

* spent a couple weekends at the lake and took the boys cliff diving for the first time

* spent a long weekend camping at Steel Bridge with the family - my brother, 4 women, and 9 kids. Haha, he says he's never doing that again. But we had a fucking blast.

* succumbed to depression, due to the effects of the concussion on my crazy meds / my bipolar and also after effects of the concussion itself. Missed half a month of work feeling suicidal and stupid.

* went to Norfolk to spend some time with Amy and Cliff, made friends with another Navy wife named Sarah who is pretty awesome, and went to Warped Tour

AUGUST 2010

* spent EVERY weekend at the lake and seriously contemplated buying a camper at the marina when it came up for sale

* Mom took the kids to the beach for a week, so I got dwnload links for True Blood (which is the ultimate trainwreck of a show) and watched all the episodes there were at that time

* got to hang out with Jessie and Holly, who I miss tremendously, when we went to see my friend Anthony in a drag show

* had a boat party for Team Gregory that was a huge success and solidified our bond right before we all got split up

* Neville was born on August 25th! Pam had a lot of complications and scared me sooooo badly, but it all worked out.

* Andrew-at-work, whose Mom had been sick with cancer for a while, told us his mom passed away - but then we found out that everything he had said was a fucking lie and his mom was alive and well and happily on her honeymoon.

SEPTEMBER 2010

* Back to feeling depressed and suicidal. Had a major breakdown at work because I was going to be moved to a Collections team, but Robbie intervened and got me moved to Correspondence instead

* had our annual end-of-summer/Kelly Marie's birthday picnic, which turned out better than expected

* Taylor won his first race of the season, lol

* missed out on seeing Drive A in Norfolk with Amy & Cliff because I didn't trust myself to make the 5 hour drive alone

* walked in the JDRF walk for possibly the last time - Chrissy goes off to college next year so I don't think we'll have a team next year

* the boys participated in the Marine Mud Run to help raise money for Toys for Tots

OCTOBER 2010

* had a blast at Heritage Day at Camp Bethel

* finally figured out the right combo of meds to feel stable again (just couldn't necessarily afford to pay for them for a while)

* had a karaoke dance party at my brother's house with all the kids for Halloween

* Walked in the American Heart Walk with a team from work

NOVEMBER 2010

* walked in the Veterans' Day Parade with a group from the Soldiers' Angels Organization

* went to see Billy Currington and Carrie Underwood in concert

* got pulled over for speeding and found out the DMV never processed my medical review for the year so my license was technically suspended

* helped my cousin move into her new Habitat House

* moved into my grandparents' old house

* took the kids ice skating for the first time - Davey literally skated circles around me and Ronnie

* the boys got promoted to the Black Belt Club at AFK

* went Black Friday shopping with my brothers on Thanksgiving night and saw a bunch of people I hadn't seen in forever

DECEMBER 2010

* got my license back

* Ronnie turned TEN

* got myself in trouble at work for standing up for my team

* worked a ridiculous amount of overtime

* lots of firsts for Christmas - first one in the new house, first Christmas for Illy and Neville

* Ronnie and Davey earned their purple belts at karate

Chilling in our room at the Showboat Casino with work!Amy & thebunnyknows. Tired but omg so happy. :) Despite the traffic & the slight freakout (yall have MET me, right? I freak out over ridiculous things), it was an awesome night. Did get to catch most of Drive A's set (baby band!), got to meet valerie_z & her friend, got to meet sinsense. Got hugs from said girls, as well as hugs passed on by them from jackiesjunkie & apiphile. Quite possibly traumatized work!Amy since I didn't even mention fandom to her before today. THE USED! Do I even need to say that they put on a kick ass show? I didn't think so. Me & Amy & thebunnyknows bought the tour download cards (yes, again!) to meet the band & have them autograph the tshirt Amy got for herself & the hoodie she got for her hubby, and some girl gave sinsense their card so she was with us. Really, we all know I shouldn't talk to people anyway and that Quinn makes me flustered, and so of course Quinn was the first one in line. Whatever. I love them. <33333

sinsense is safely on a bus back home. I hope, anyway, b/c she is supposed to be. She is made of win, btw, and I am so so so glad to have gotten to see her tonight.

We are going to get up to some sort of shenanigans tomorrow, but we're not sure what. Hope yall are having an awesome weekend! <3