Move along folks, nothing to see here.

The action now happens at:
www.xanga.com/opheliaisthirsty

Hope to see you there.

Inhale, exhale.

I put in my two weeks notice at the bakery today. It's a nice little letter, about a half-page long, filled with all sorts of trite platitudes that I really do mean despite how horrible they feel to write. 
This has been a valuble experience. I've made good friends. I'm going to miss you all.

It's not like my managers weren't expecting this...at least, I hope that's the case. I told them that everything depended on what my school schedule ended up looking like. I got it recently, and it didn't look good. So I talked to the management and wrote up that cliche-ridden notice of resignation. Everything by the book.

And yet I still feel bad. They were grooming me for a promotion to Sales Team Leader, and here I am crapping out on them. A part of me wants to say that it's for good reason -- education is hugely important to me and no matter how much I love the job and the people, I can't be expected to put off my degree for the sake of a dime-a-dozen job in the service industry. Then there's the other half of me, that paranoid part of me that double checks locks out of some ill-placed obsessive fear, that's scared I've let them down somehow. That I'm a horrible person and I ought to be ashamed for putting them through all this trouble.

This second part is currently the louder one.

It's suggesting that people are talking smack about me behind my back, and looking down on me because I'm not sticking around. I'm worthless because I can't/won't stick it out. I'm giving up and giving in and somehow less because of it.

Inhale, exhale.

I did everything properly.  It's all going to be okay.  It has to be.

I believe I can see the future,
'Cause I repeat the same routine...

I haven't really updated lately because there hasn't really been much to say. It's high time for an update though, and here I am.

I spent the next few days after the last entry being angry with my body for crapping out, and didn't say much to anyone. My pillow, on the other hand, certainly heard all about it. I don't really have the words to explain what it's like to lose total control of your body, to not be able to rely on your brain chemistry to stay balanced. Your body is fully capable of betraying you, and it has no qualms about doing so. Language isn't capable of expressing that kind of experience. I'm getting frustrated just trying here, so I'll say that I've recovered to relative normalcy and leave it at that. And so the count to six months begins again.

Aside from the occasional venture out with some friends for coffee or movies or whatever, it's been working and sleeping.  It's the occasional ventures that are making life very good right now, and making it worth getting through the week. I'm counting days between music at the Monk and trips to the cinema, because they're the only real touchstones I have to give me any sense of time. Working seven days a week tends to do that to your way of thinking. Don't get me wrong, I like working. I just wish it were more a nine to five, Monday to Friday sort of thing. Carlos, I'm holding you to our planned movie marathons. Countess, we need to see "The Bourne Ultimatum". Cha-Cha, I'm counting on you to press me to write.

Tried to buy me some X-Men TPBs (The early X-treme line to be precise) through Chapters, and have failed. This is looking to me like another sign that I need to go out and find a proper comic shop within the local area. It's one more good reason anyhow; the trick is finding one that I can get to via the bus system with relative ease. I ordered in the complete boxset of "Vision of Escaflowne" in the meantime. It's going to be in sometime before the eighteenth of July, or so my confirmation e-mail says, and I can hardly wait.

I've just about finished the fifth volume of Stephen King's The Dark Tower. It's good stuff, may it do ya fine. I don't think I'm going to read any more of his stuff once I'm done it though -- I already have a huge list of books I want to get through before the end of the summer. Don't even get me started on the books I want to buy ('The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girl' not only has the most awesome title to ever awesome, I do believe that it comes Neil Gaiman approved), and the books I want to reread ('The Historian' and 'Dracula', not to mention 'Jonothan Strange and Mr. Norell' are at the top).

That's my life then, in a few paragraphs. And it's now just shy of eleven. Watch this -- I'm going to end up watching 'The Bourne Identity' before bed. I'll get away with it too...one of the perks of working in the afternoon.

It's an hour before work and she's wandering in to a Starbucks to take in a dose of pretension with her morning cup of java.

After ordering her drink (for once, a latte instead of her typical black-as-night beverage of choice) she makes her way towards the corner where you stand while waiting for your drink. As she leans against the window, backpack slung over her shoulder and the shadows of a sleepless night under her eyes, she observes the people around her.

The usual suspects are all present: uniformed folk from the grocery store next door, sharp dressed men and women on their way to the office. It's then that the door swings open to let someone in that Percy's eyes narrow somewhat.

The stranger who enters now is the typical emo-child. She's well aware that he's got to be at least a few years older than she is, though the cigarettes in the mesh pocket of his messenger bag suggest maybe he's just nicotine-aged, but there's no other term for it. Black hair, carefully swooped over one eye. Big, dark sunglasses. Tight, tight jeans that would look more at home on a female figure. Tight fitting sweater in alternating black and grey stripes.

It's his choice of jewelery that stands out.

Around his neck hangs a rosary, made up of black beads and silver chain. It's a pretty thing that he wears with a certain nonchalance as he blows past her for the waiting barista.

You know what that's for, babe? She wonders, and there's a cynical part of her that very much doubts he does. Rosaries were fashion statements in her high school the last year she was there, and she's reminded of this as that cynical part of her suggests a derrisive and superiority-laden smirk is in order. She keeps herself in check though, regarding the rosary and wondering whose bright idea it was to make a religious symbol, a religious tool in to nothing more than a pretty necklace.

Her beverage is called, and she is thereby distracted. She takes a seat at a small table decides that she would rather be entertained than frustrated as she digs a thick paperback novel out of her pack. Stephen King and  Hazelnut latte await her, and she highly doubts either of them will irk her as much as Mr. Rosary Emo-Child.