So, technically speaking, my etsy shop is up and running!

angelanicole.etsy.com

There's still lots of work to do on it, and obviously my inventory needs some beefing up.

I've been making these little pies for months now, and it was so cute because as I started listing them last night, G asked me to keep almost all of them cause he likes them so much, lol! I think it's so sweet how he supports me in these strange hobbies of mine. And adorable how he's become a little attached to them <3

So now I'll be working on making more little pies, which is totally fine because they're so much fun to make.

Leave me a comment with a knock knock joke.

• I'll respond by asking you five questions so I can satisfy my curiosity
• Update your journal with the answers to the questions
• Include this explanation in the post and offer to ask other people questions

1. animal, vegetable or mineral?

vegetable

2. what was one significant thing that you remember happening when you were in elementary school?

Aw, this one was kind of sad cause I can only remember significant things that were bad. I have a very vivid memory of not being able to do a math quiz in 3rd grade, so I drew frowny faces in all my zeroes. My teacher was such a bitch about it!

3. tell me about your handwriting.

It's a mess! I think it reveals that I am impatient, because I rarely finish forming one letter before I move onto the next. But I at least make an effort to be neater when I know someone else will have to read it :)

4. where do you see yourself in 5 years?

Well, to be on the optimistic side, in 5 years I *hope* I will have a master's degree, a decent paying, respectable job that I like, and a husband instead of a boyfriend ;)

5. if you could talk to animals or babies which would you chose and why?

Definitely animals! I think a conversation with a baby would be pretty boring, whereas communication with animals has always fascinated me.

Here I was feeling like everything was going so well. In the span of one awesome week, I got a job and saw Owl City and everything was great. But then I got sick, worked some really tough shifts at work and overdrew my bank account and now I feel crappy.

I've only worked a few days so far, but I'm already starting to worry about the future. I went after this kind of job (residential counselor in a group home) to see if I'm cut out for counseling. Figuring that, if I like it, I could go for a master's degree in the future.

But now I'm kind of panicing. What if I don't like it? Now don't get me wrong, it will pay the bills and I'm grateful to finally have a job. But I also want a stable career, the kind of long term calling that other people in my life seem to have found. My mom didn't get her teaching career going until pretty late in life and I just don't want to wait that long.

Ugh, rambling. I need my morning coffee. And my first paycheck ASAP, cause this bank thing is stressing me out SO much. :(

Aahh, this is getting ridiculous. As my money rapidly runs out and the phone remains silent, I suddenly realize that the last time I was looking for a job, it was totally different than this.

I was living with my parents at the time, about 2.5 years ago, and even had a (very low paying, very far away) part-time job at the time. It was frustrating and all, but I had a roof over my head and food on the table.

I'm debating the possibility of piecing together part time jobs, instead of holding out for a full time opurtunity. The main problem with this is that the most promising part-time opening is roughly 45 minutes away. But the plus is that I'd be gaining experience.

There's the added complications of benefits/insurance, but for the moment I'm still covered under my dad's plan. So little stuff like going to the doctor/dentist will remain impossible ($5,000 deductable means I can't afford to actually use the insurance), but if I get hit by a bus or something, I'll be covered.

Ugh. My theory that adult life sucks and is a total joke remains unchallenged.

G came home from class today with an interesting anecdote from his advisor:

A teacher comes to class one day with an empty fish bowl and asks his class "Is this full?"
They reply, "No."
He fills it with a few large rocks and asks again, "Is it full?"
They reply, "Yes."
He then gets out a bag of gravel and fills in the empty spaces and asks again.
By now they're confused, having just been proven wrong, so their answers vary.
Now he gets out a bag of sand and fills in even more space and asks again, "Is it full now?"
The students confidently answer, "Yes." After all, how could it possibly be more full?
But then he pulls out a pitcher of water and fills the bowl with as much as he can.

The lesson? Make sure you put your big rocks in first.

I thought that was a good story, especially for a grad advisor to be telling his students. Figure out what your biggest priorities are and make sure they get taken care of first before all the sand and gravel and water of life takes up all the room.

I felt warm and fuzzy when G told me I'm one of the "big rocks" in his life :)

It got me thinking about my own life, too. I have always defined myself by what I do, either a job or being a student. But now that I don't have either, I feel really lost. I'm working on little stuff, like painting in the apartment and being domestic (the "sand" and "gravel" of my life at the moment), but a career is one of my biggest rocks, so I really hope I get a job soon.

I got to see my boy (henceforth "G") this weekend, which was nice :)

I was super disappointed with our trip to look at rings, though. :( For starters, salespeople in jewelry stores are FAR too pushy. I've been feeling very little social anxiety lately, but it totally flared up yesterday.

Out of 4 stores, one had never heard of claddagh rings (!), the other 3 all showed us the EXACT same catalog and said we could order them. But I didn't really like any of the rings in it.

After telling one girl we were "just browsing“, she said ok then literally FOLLOWED our every move through the empty store, it was so awkward.

In another store, G and I had been looking at the catalog for about 30 seconds when the girl prodded us with," So, are you going to order now?" I said I needed to think about it and she said rudely,” Well, do you know WHEN you're going to order the ring?" But we got sized by a much nicer lady at another store, so I guess we'll just order them online.

And then this morning I left work early, which I felt awful about.

Long story short (and possibly TMI), I realized rather painfully this morning that I have a UTI. I take every precaution in the world, but still seem to get one or two of them a year.

I texted G to ask him to bring my debit card by, so I could buy some uristat on my break. Then the shift manager started scolding me about texting. I apologized and told him it was an emergency.

The pain escalated quickly and became totally unbearable. I texted G again asking if he could just buy the medicine for me and bring it by, cause I couldn't last til my break. And I get scolded AGAIN. I responded curtly that I needed my bf to bring me some medicine. By the time he got there, I just decided that I could either be in pain at work while getting chewed out, or at home with G in the comfort of my bed, and I left.

I'm still mad about this though and need to get it of my chest. I have been working at this place for almost 1 and a half years and have been the perfect employee, even though it is a total crap job. I'm a cashier for fuck's sake. I make it to my shifts on time, I call if I'm running late, I give appropriate notice if I need time off.

And the ONE time I have a personal problem at work, I get in trouble. I see people texting all the fucking time and no one gives a shit. Ugh. Lame.

My boy and I have been together just shy of 2 years, living together for about 1. He left 2 weeks ago for a summer job in another state and mentioned that some of his female co-workers were "giving him eyes" and trying to flirt with him. He has told all of them about me, but commented that he wished there was a way people could tell he was taken just by looking at him. And he followed that up with "you know, like a ring or something."

**squeeeee!!**

While neither of us is ready for engagement or marriage, we've talked about it and are open to it happening in the future. For now he's suggested getting claddagh rings, which sounds like a perfect solution and I'm so super excited about it.

It's so nice because I love the idea, but I love even more that he suggested it himself. What a sweetheart!

So far I've found these two that I like, what do you guys think?

The ridiculousness of this day was simply unheard of.

There's this ongoing project in my office that started in about October. It went through some protocol changes but was set with a final procedure by about mid November, courtesy of my boss. I send him a daily report of it's progress.

So this morning, he sends me an email, basically asking why in the hell am I doing it the way I am. Basically, he'd forgotten that he TOLD me to do it that way. I have emails and notes from meetings to prove it, but I can't call him out. He made sure to cc my colleagues on these emails, so he was basically calling me an idiot in front of everyone I work with.

After the stupid emergency meeting he made us have (and yeah, that was about as fun as you can imagine), I got a message from my psychiatrist. All my potential ideas for getting my meds are falling through, and as of right now they are still going to cost $300 a month. For perspective, my rent is $332 a month.

THEN I got home and told my bf about the meds stuff and the awful meeting and asked for a hug. He backed away and said he couldn't handle me talking about work and my boss "all the time."

I make a point of NEVER talking about work at home; I try to leave my stress at work, but today I just needed to talk.

My boy, in comparison, just quit a job he hated and he talked to me about hating it nearly 24/7 for like the past month. And even though it grated on my nerves, I LISTENED because I was trying to be supportive. And he couldn't even give me five minutes of the same support today!

So I went out in the rain to buy some wine and cake. The boy has to go back to work later tonight at one of his other jobs. I’m kind of glad to have the opportunity to get tipsy and sing out loud all by myself.

It's official, I feel like I am not in the place in my life that I'd like to be in.

One of the best (and by best, I mean worst) ways to see this in a very concrete fashion is to go on facebook and see what people from my graduating class are doing.

Now, on a very shallow level it's easy to see some things I'm envious of: crisp wedding photos (not that I'm ready for that), very official looking jobs, perfect hair, shiny lipgloss, professional looking stuff.

On a deeper level there are some academic achievements I'm a bit jealous of. Yeah, so Maria is going to be a doctor, I knew that since the moment I met her freshman year. Some random girl I don't remember at all is in vet school. And I'll admit, I'm pretty jealous of that.

But I think this is all stemming from the fact that I thought I knew what I wanted to do, but don't anymore. It's not like I dilly-dallied through college like a lot of people I knew. I picked what I wanted to do freshman year, worked hard, got good grades, did internships and finally graduated and got an applicable job.

I feel like anything I do now, career-wise, is either going to make me miserable or be back tracking. It's days like these I wish I could go back in time and do things differently.

I am having such an incredibly hard time right now :-(

I am indecisive to begin with, which makes things even worse.

A quick run down of the problem, as quick as is possible:

My boyfriend is waiting to find out about grad school. He already knows he's been accepted, but still hasn't heard if they actually have enough funding to take him.

All along, I think, we've been planning to make this next move together, but now things are falling apart. He says it's my depression that's the problem, and I'm getting help for it, but it has put a huge strain on us.

He seems to think me moving back home with my parents wouldn't necessarily break us up, but it's on the other side of the country! That's so unrealistic.

I want all these things right now that I just don't think he can give me. I want stability, an apartment I'm staying in long enough that I can decorate it, I job I don't hate, and a puppy.

His program would be 3 years long, which is fine, but then he's guaranteed to have to move again after that. Maybe once, maybe twice, who knows?

Meanwhile, my job is over in exactly 3 months, and I feel this huge strain because I want to find a job and an apartment and make plans NOW, not later, but until we sort this out I don't even know which side of the country I'm going to end up on.

My bf and I live in a small town, he has a car and I don't. It's worked out so far, I lived here for an entire year without a car and still got around just fine.

I like to be active on the weekends, do errands, take walks, bike rides, explore neighboring cities. He wants to watch TV, play video games and sleep. I'm not thrilled with that, but figure it's his time and he can spend it how he wants.

In events where we share the car, I split gas with him, but the situation doesn't come up often because I walk or take the bus to work anyway. I rarely ask him to drive me anyplace. Almost never, in fact.

I found a volunteer opportunity in a neighboring city to do wildlife rehab, something I've been talking about wanting to do for ages. My only free time is on the weekends, which coincides with his sleeping/tv watching time, so I figured, perfect! Since there's no bus route to where I want to go I could borrow his car since he won't be using it anyway. And pay for gas and maintenance, of course.

He hates this idea. He's entitled to his opinion, but his reasons are what really bothers me.

He thinks volunteering is stupid. He said he's never cared about anything enough that he would make an effort without getting paid, which I think is shitty.

He seems resentful of the fact that I asked for a favor, and even though accommodating it would take minimal effort on his part, the fact that he's not willing to help me feels like a red flag.

He has other reasons, like he's worried because we live in a "dangerous" area for driving, but that's just not true. I think he thinks I'm an unsafe driver, even though I've never given him any reason to think that.

Was it unreasonable to ask if we could work out a way for me to borrow his car for this opportunity? Is he being a jerk in refusing?

I think the thing that makes me the angriest is that I know if the situation were reversed, I'd help in a heartbeat if I could help him accomplish something that was important to him.

 totally new journal...a work in progress :-)