Visiting home.

Yesterday was a good day.

I got into Green Bay around 3pm and went to the mall. I ended up buying way too much but it's the mall's fault for having so many sales. Anyway... around six I endured the clusterfuck that is the Wednesday evening farmers' market on Broadway. After managing some parking somewhere(and highly questioning its legality) Ashley and I managed to find each other and we went to Titletown Brewery. If you've ever been to The Great Dane in Madison, well, that's what Titletown basically is, down to the newspaper-style menus. It was a great time catching up. From there I drove over to the casino to visit my friend Grant, who was bartending. I sipped a vodka lemonade (inexplicably my new favorite cocktail) and people-watched for a while. Let me tell ya, the casino is a depressing fucking place. I didn't let myself stay too long because I was driving and I made plans with my friend Justin, so I got the car home. Minutes after pulling in the driveway, he showed up and we went to Bentley's. It's some bar over by the airport, it looks like a TGIFridays, and the bartender was younger than me and had a messed up perm. Only seconds after sitting down, I heard someone call out my name, and it was some friends I hadn't seen in a long while, so the night ended up being a whole lot of catching up with a large number of Jager Bombs.

I'm happy to be at the parents' house. It's so comfortable here. Dad got a new TV for the living room and it may as well be a Goddamn spaceship for all I know, it's all sorts of fucking complicated.

It's on!

So I'm at the laundromat next to the Caribou Tavern, feverishly trying to finish up a marathon laundry-folding session. The normal weirdos are in there: some kid wearing house slippers who won't stop smiling, a lady with a mega-perm wearing an Alan Jackson t-shirt, and a couple of displaced frat boys who couldn't stop talking about vaginas. This is all fine with me, as I know I'm not the most normal person in the world, and thank God for a town like Madison to give you some variety - especially in the summer.

Anyway, I'm trying to fold up the last batch of clothes. I won't lie here, I hate folding clothes but I'm restricted to doing mostly this because my closet is too small to hold more than five shirts. Seriously. So yeah, I'm doing this, and in walks some college kid wearing a t-shirt sans sleeves that reads "IT'S ON!" And quickly following after him is the worst BO I've ever encountered in my life. No joke, kids, I almost fell over. At some point I thought I'd start crying and I wanted to run, but all my clothes were spead over the counter and I couldn't leave them. The smell got worse and worse until the idea hit me to breathe through a dryer sheet. Eureka!

My dryer sheet served its purpose well until I finished up and could escape in a timely manner. Thanks, Downy!

Something I realized...

I don't hate Dave Matthews, and I don't hate disc golf.


I just hate the people who like those things.

Also... there is hope...

Run, Fat Girl, Run.

I just ran four miles.

Yeah. Four miles, kids.

It's day two of the route I've been taking down John Nolan around the Lakeside and back. Yesterday, I gained this moment of clarity where I realized that life doesn't happen by wishing and hoping. I'm never going to get healthy if I sit on my ass and cry about it. I'm never going to lose weight if I whine and go scrounging through the fridge again. So I laced up my shoes and just started running. If anything hurts the most, it's my lungs, definitely. I think I've finally gained the impetus to stop smoking completely. But day two was a lot easier than day one, and hopefully it only gets better. I know I'll have my hard days, but doing this feels so much more productive than just worrying about myself. Another cool thing- I was sweating. Honestly, I haven't sweat like this in a long time, and it feels awesome.

Words from my parents.

"When you let someone make you feel bad about yourself, you are directly letting them affect your entire life"

"The smallest lie turns into a big one before you know it"

"The best revenge is to improve yourself rather than cut down your enemy"

"Don't feel sorry for yourself"

These are quotes by Mom. Always trying to up my self-esteem.

"Relationships are about give and take. You're not going to like everything your partner does. They're not going to like everything you do"

"Sometimes a parent would just rather not know what their child is up to"

"When you get married someday, never expect your husband to know what you're thinking about all the time. Men aren't mind-readers. Tell them how you're feeling, because believe me, they won't know otherwise"

My sweet Daddy. Always there to give me advice on relationships.

Putting my foot down.

I'm tired beyond belief, but I wanted to start this blog before I go on with the repetitive Groundhog Day movie that is my life and ultimately forget.

I've been taking a very thorough assessment of my life and the coping mechanisms I use on an hourly, daily, weekly basis. Even yearly, actually. Throughout the past six or seven years, I've developed a routine or "anti-routine" and a series of short-term band-aids for the situations that are continuously recurring on my own accord.

Albert Einstein said that insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. This applies to me directly. Every month I have an annual feeling as I did the previous year, and alcohol is used to connect the dots. It's filler for the monotony I create out of my apathy. And it needs to stop. The big thing here is that I don't like feeling. I used to think that my emotions were too intense, and that's why I needed to medicate somehow. It turns out, I'm magnifying all the bad emotions by proliferating this behavior. Then the consequences follow. I'm too hung over to speak to my advisor, go to class. I'm too depressed that I can't get out of bed or exercise. I'm too tired to talk to Mom, cook something healthy, clean my room.

I am insane for thinking I can drink the way I do and function (grow, develop, create, feel, appreciate) like a normal human being.