hopefully this isn't an early manifestation of obsessive-compulsive disorder

I'm reading White Oleander for the third time in a row right now. I have so little free time to read that each time usually takes me about a month, and at the end I usually finish the book, sit and reflect for a couple of minutes, and then flip back to the first page and start again. I think the reason I can do this is that it is a different book every time. Nuances and lines and characters that I never noticed the time before are suddenly important and noteworthy, and stick in my head for days when I didn't even remember them being there before. Maybe this time I'll go through with a highlighter and those postit page flags.

letting the light shine in

I have been slowly clawing my way out of hell over the past couple of weeks with some previously unsolicited help, and for the first time in recent memory I can actually feel myself truly returning to a state of normalcy. On Saturday I woke up at 7 and went out for coffee with a book, just because the day looked so beautiful. Last night I came home from hanging out with friends and tried on all my shoes, something I used to do all the time but haven't cared enough to do in several months. I completed my personal statement for my school applications. But the thing that made me realize I was really on my way back was last Wednesday when I woke up, inhaled, and realized that I could breathe for the first time in nearly a year. I didn't even realize I couldn't until I suddenly could. I felt like I was drowning in air, and it made me cry with relief. The only thing I wish is that I had done something about this sooner, I feel like I've lost so much time. Still, better late than never--I'm so happy to be starting over in earnest.

100th post! how exciting for me, and probably no one else!

don't really have anything to say, i just noticed that if i were to post right now it would be a milestone, so i thought i'd go for it.

i'm drinking a coca cola classic because they were out of diet coke and coke zero AND diet mountain dew, and i have to say it is so delicious, although probably not as delicious as back in the day when they spiked it with cocaine or whatever. maybe i'll start having a coca cola classic once a week or something, as a treat. i'm hoping that my referring to it as coca cola classic is really killing someone right now. coca cola classic.

in about two hours i will begin my hour-long pilgrimage to walterboro to gather my tag and personal belongings from my now deceased toyota camry. i have to say, even though i definitely wasn't planning on buying a new car right now and had pretty much planned to drive the camry for around 200,000 more miles (or until i actually had a lucrative career where i could afford a new car, whichever came first), i'm pretty excited to have a car that's actually cute for once. not that i didn't love the lumina, that old bitch. but still--its exciting.

maybe next time I'll get high and listen to dark side of the moon while i watch the wizard of oz

My friend from work recently sliced her foot open on a broken beer bottle during what I assume was a drunken night out downtown. Because she was drunk, she wasn't thinking clearly and went to the emergency room, which everyone knows is like the last place you should go if you have an actual emergency, seeing as you are more likely to bleed to death in the lobby or be shot by a strung out crackhead than actually be treated for your ailment. But anyway, lesson learned the hard way, and around 7 hours later she was admitted and stitched up by a an unsettlingly young-looking intern. It turned out though, that his inexperience worked in her favor, because instead of advising her to stay off the foot and pop some extra strength tylenol for pain (the logical advice), he prescribed her 60 doses of Percocet.

Now, I've never been into prescription drugs (or any type of drugs for that matter), but even I was inspired by the potential in 60 unneeded doses of a common street narcotic. We went online to see what the street value of one pill was. $40. Total value of her prescription: $2,400. Wow.

However, the reality of the situation is that both of us are total squares and would never try to actually sell prescription meds to random people on the street. I wouldn't even know how to do it. I can just see myself typing "drug deal pills how" into google and then printing out the first 6 hits and filing them in a notebook to study. It wouldn't work.

Also related to me being a square however, is the fact that I have never taken any type of narcotic painkiller without actually being in need of it. And its been like ten years anyway. So I took a couple home, thinking that it might be kind of an interesting way to pass a night at the house by myself.

So around 10 or so everyone in my house went to bed (since we are all 24 going on 90, obviously) and I hopped into bed and took both of the pills, dry swallowing. I started to read, not really knowing what to expect, just thinking that I would get really relaxed and happy. Well, nothing happened for a while, and I wasn't getting tired, so I decided to put in Kill Bill since I hadn't seen it in a while and was sort of in the mood for bloodshed.

Suddenly, I think it was around the part where The Bride slaughters O-Ren Ishii's teenage bodyguard by popping her in the head with a nail-studded chair leg, I looked around my room and realized that everything around me was pleasantly hazy. At the same time, I realized that Kill Bill was the best movie I have ever seen in my entire life. I was seriously sitting bolt upright in bed, grinning like a maniac and mouthing "yeah! woo!!!! pow! bam! fwap!!!" in sync with every juno chop and roundhouse kick to the face she could dish out. Then the movie ended. So I started it over again. The beginning was equally genius.

Moral of the story, when you grow up and can make all of your own decisions, if you happen to stumble upon a couple of pain meds and have a free night, take them. Even if you are a relatively straightedge dork like me. Thank me later.