and he was like, "Hey, wanna go to Ireland for under $500 roundtrip?" And I was like, "Fuck yeah!". And that's the story of how I booked a trip to Dublin Ireland for a week this coming September.

Ahhhh I can't wait! I'm kinda nervous but when will an opportunity like this come along again? *Off to research stuffs to do in Ireland in September*

I originally logged in today to blog... and clearly I'm going through with it but I'm also changing my plan a little. I was going to put up a long blog about how I asked a guy out and got rejected and was really disappointed and hurt by it. But I don't want any responses like "his loss" or "you're so X you could have anyone" or anything like that. Bottom line is I learned some things- hurray!- and that's what I've decided to blog about instead.

Lesson 1- I dunno if I've mentioned this to many people but in the past I have suffered severely from (CPPS) Chronic People Pleasing Syndrome (disclaimer, this is not a real disease- I am making shit up for a bit of humour and to get my point across in a light way!). Anyways, this has always made me fear rejection. Seek approval and validation and avoid rejection- that was how I lived my life. Unfortunately that leads to a lot of regret which brings about its own kind of pain. So I decided to gently encourage myself to embrace, and almost seek out rejection, or at least the thought of it. I.e. operation put yourself in situations where the threat of rejection is very real, girl, had begun. I really did want him to say yes, but at least by saying no he inadvertently is assisting me in getting over my fear of rejection. Yay.

Lesson 2- Don't be a motherfucking hypocrite, Jedi. I was frustrated with his response because he went on to say that he "loves spending time with [me]" and "loves [all of the amazing things that I am: open minded, intelligent, nerdy etc]". Great! Why wouldn't that make him want to date me? Probably that he is not romantically attracted to fat people. It sucks. And almost makes me not even want to be friends with him. BUT. That might not be the case and even if it is, he is entitled to make those decisions for himself. He is my friend and I value him as my friend. So, I shouldn't be angry that my friend had the right to turn somebody (sadly, me) down, whatever his reasoning. After all, I have turned men down.

Lesson 3- It's very empowering to make the first move and to be okay with being turned down. I have asked out other men before but I either knew that they were interested or it was a complete stranger on a dating site and I wasn't as invested as I was with this friend so it didn't feel as "bold", yaknow? So what I saying is that this felt good (when I came to terms with it at least). I felt like a fearless, badass, bitch and I liked it. And then I wrote about it in my journal and got some insight- woohoo, self-awareness.

So anyway, in case anyone was wondering, I got that job that I mentioned last time. I'm not sure if I actually like the job but I like the discount on clothes that actually fit me . Yesterday was when he finally responded to me asking him out (only took him like 3 days to figure out what to say...) and it was my first non-training shift at my new job. The shift was a little stressful and I was already feeling a little down so I decided to buy a laser pointer for my cats. Best fucking decision I have made in a long time. Which leads me to ...

Lesson 4- It's okay to feel shitty and do something nice for yourself (like play with your cats instead of doing homework).

Okay, now that I have rambled on for a bit it's time for me to log back out. I have been convinced by a video of a gorgeous woman dancing that I need a dance break, not a perv break . Later, folks!

Well we’re eight days into January and unlike previous years I wasn’t feeling exceptionally great about how my year went. It wasn’t that it was a bad year or that anything significantly unsettling happened- a few family issues, sure, but nothing that greatly affected me. It’s just been very different. Well the last four months of it were, at least. Moving here has been a big change for me. This “city” is very different from the last that I lived in. I have to do a lot more planning if I want to go anywhere since I don’t have a car and this place is not very walkable (at least where I live) and the transit system is not very good- for example, buses stop running to my house after 7pm on Sundays. Getting a car at this point is not feasible since I make minimum wage now and am trying to pay for school without accruing more debt. It’s been a bit frustrating and I feel as though I’m going backwards. I had a good job, in terms of a reasonable wage (not nearly enough for the educational requirements and demands of the job but a hell of a lot better than 10.45/hour), medical benefits, pension, and regular hours. But I felt like a hypocrite there… I don’t want to work for or in a system that doesn’t jive with my personal values. So, I felt really empowered when I decided to up and quit, move away, and start going back to school for something that I hope to high hell I will feel good about doing. I think where I went wrong was that I expected it to be easier. Haha.

It hasn’t all been bad though. I did manage to get a job that I mostly enjoy, aside from the shitty wage. I did really well last semester. I’m meeting nice people, although to be honest I haven’t met anyone that I’ve really bonded with or that I would call a true friend. I’ve had several of my friends come to visit me here and I’m not so far away that I day trip back to my old city isn’t realistic. The cost of living here is much lower. I’m surrounded by more nature. I have a backyard.

Speaking of jobs, I have an interview in the morning at a clothing store- it will be super part time so if I get it, it will be in addition to my other job. It would be nice to change up my routine a little bit and meet some other people. Plus, I love clothes and it will be fun to suggest outfits for people. 50% off ain’t bad either! I have been considering some other “creative” ways of making money so that I could spend more time on schoolwork and less time actually at work. One of the things I was considering was on a paysite. Three women that I follow on social media work for this site which hosts webpages of “softcore plus size pinup models” and they all seem to make their living off of this job alone. Unfortunately, you have to show your face in the pictures and I feel like if I did choose to go into teaching that could come back to bite me in the ass big time, even though the images are only semi-nude. Le sigh, I wish we lived in a more body and sex positive world.

Anyway, now that I have that interview tomorrow I have to go do everything that I, in my procrastinator’s wisdom, decided that I would do tomorrow morning.

Probably won’t be around too much after this now that the new semester is started but I miss my NN fam! Hope everyone’s new year is going well so far. xoxox

Sometimes I want to blog my poetry or stories but it's a bit of a risk because it's potentially identifying. That's what I came here tonight to do (and to check in generally, I guess) but I thought better of it... I just wrote a poem about my favourite lipstick . I know I have a few PM's that I want to respond to and I really do intend to start working on my gallery (because I want to... it's fun to feel sexy!!) but school takes priority. As does work and meeting people and trying to get comfortable in my new town.

I have been finding it a bit challenging to meet people here aside from work. I like spending time with some of my coworkers but (and this is going to sound ageist) most of them are younger than me and I don't usually enjoy spending time with a lot of people my age or younger. There are certainly exceptions but for the most part my friends are at least a few years older than me and my best friend is actually 9 years older than me. I don't really know why it is. And for the record, I do genuinely try, I swear! It's not like I interrogate people about their age before I invite them for coffee or to hang out or whatever but inevitably age does come up (what doesn't when you're trying to get to know someone??).

Anyway, there is one person from work with whom I'd really like to spend more time. I have passively asked to hang out and he agreed- by passively I've said, "We should do X some time" and he said, "Yeah, I'm down for that" and then we never talked about it again haha. I'm making it my goal to set a concrete time to spend time with him even though I have my doubts that it would become romantic. He wants to advance in the company (and he's already my supervisor and could get in trouble for dating a lowly barista like me ) so I really don't think he would risk his career to date me.

Just to brag a little (gotta make myself feel better about being a broke ass student somehow ) I'm rocking this degree. It probably helps that I'm not on NN everyday this time around, who knew?!? I'm currently at an A+ in both of my creative writing courses and an A- in my English class. Yeah, I'm a nerd. *pushes up imaginary glasses*

Hope you're all doing well and a very sincere thank you to that special someone who gifted me premium. I'm using it well to handle my sexual frustration.

I have 21 days until classes start. Today I received an email from one of my online course facilitators and I'm not gonna lie, I'm SCARED. I literally just had tears in my eyes reading the syllabus. They may have been partially from excitement too. And the way that he described the course assignments (beautifully, in case you were wondering). I'm basically a wreck at the moment.

Course: Introduction to Writing Drama.
Format: Online Workshop (i.e I have to actually interact with people and by the sounds of it, may have to record myself reading some of my work or worse, read it out loud to my classmates in real time).

Writing intimidates me because it is something that I want to be good at. Ever since I was 11 years old, I loved writing and wanted to be a writer. I was constantly writing short stories, poetry, and even what I believed at the time were the beginnings of amazing novels. I even found my old writing binder that I've had for probably 11 or 12 years today. Inside was a notebook with thousands of ideas for character names (that I wrote and re-wrote at least a hundred times because I wanted it to be in alphabetical order and I used to find the physical act of writing very soothing), different places and settings, rules or laws that I would have in those places, handouts from my English classes about writing and grammar, and even maps that I drew of the places that I imagined. I had so much confidence when I was that age. Fuck. If only I had half the confidence in myself now as I did then.

When I opened that syllabus and read the assignments and structure, a big part of me wanted to drop the class. The only thing that stopped me from logging in and doing so was knowing that I would regret it if I didn't give the class a try.

Well I'm done my week of overnight shifts. I can't believe I used to do that full time... it does get easier once you get used to it but still *yawns*. It wasn't bad though, in fact it was actually kind of a nice break from my busy afternoon shift. I had a good laugh one early morning though.

I observed a man walking around the roof of a 3 story building and it looked like he was picking things up and putting them in his pocket and then taking things out and putting them back on the roof. Then he put something into an open window. At this point I was a little concerned for his safety and for whoever lived in the suite that he was dropping things into so I called 911. They decided to treat it as a break and enter and since I couldn't leave my work site to go check the address and didn't know the address of the building they asked me to stay on the line until I saw the officers arrive onsite. While I was waiting the man shimmied down from the roof onto the fire escape and entered the building. A few moments later I saw him through the window of the suite that he had dropped something into. I observed him moving objects around; soon after the police arrived so I was able to hang up. Some of the attending officers called me to make sure that they were at the right building/window/ etc and even entered the suite and made sure that they were at the same window I had seen the man in. While I was looking out the window I saw a cord/cable leading into the suite that I hadn't noticed at first. The officers left soon after so I'm guessing it was his suite and that he was connecting cable? I felt like such an ass but when someone is hanging out on a roof at 5am you never know what could happen; he could have been robbing the place or he could have been going to jump (the building wasn't that high but you never know), or he could have fallen. I think I would have felt like a bigger ass if something terrible had happened and I hadn't called. Although now he knows that we can see directly into his window, hopefully he's not a perv

I read an article today titled: "The Actual Difference Between Women who are Hot and who are Beautiful". It seemed like it might be kind of interesting, especially to reflect upon NN interactions while reading it but it turned out to be a bit misogynistic (why must these articles always try to pit women against each other or encourage us to pass judgement on each other?!? Ugh.). Anyway it ended with a list about how hot differs from beauty. I was going to post just the list but then I read it. Lol. Completely misogynistic, slut shaming, bullshit. So I didn't. But, I'd like to know what you think. What's the actual difference, if any, between hot and beautiful?

who reads.

Reposting because I love it and well, because it's my blog and I can .

It's finally official, I'm going back to school in September. I'm going to get a second undergrad degree in English with a minor in Creative Writing which will take me about 2 years... maybe an extra semester or two due to the minor. Then I intend to do the teaching certificate which is a year and a half at the school I'll be going to.

I'm really excited, but I'm also starting to feel overwhelmed. I'm moving to another city to go to school and it's a few hours away (1 hour 40 minute ferry ride included). I'm not moving until August 1st but I'm just feeling like I have so much to do and not enough time to do it. On the other hand I have to wait until July to really start looking and applying for housing because everything right now is listed for July. I would really love to be working a second job right now and saving for tuition, damage deposit, and cost of living while I look for a job over there but I feel like I don't have enough time to work at another job. I'm just a mess LOL. Fingers crossed that I will be asked to work some OT in the near future!! Realistically, I'm okay. I have enough savings to cover the move, one semester of tuition and at least a month if not 2 months of living without a job. I'm GOOD at saving money but I get nervous when I need to use it because I like having it sit in my bank account .

I've toyed with the idea of going the roommate route but.... I haven't had the best of luck with roommate's in the past and I'm really happy living by myself. At least the cost of living seems considerably lower in the city that I'm moving to. It's going to be strange getting used to a new city again, not to mention a bit lonely to start since I don't know anyone there. Maybe I'll join a book club .