Haircut Success

The haircut was a success. Very cute and it works. Everyone at the belated Halloween party last night thought it was cute. I also had it faux-hawked all day. I had the stylist do it and it stayed up and spiked all day and night. Very cool. This morning it looked like a mixture of bed head and intentional spikes. Not sure if I can do anything spiky or hawked for work though. But regardless, it’s super soft because of the texturing that the stylist did, which is awesome.

The party last night was a lot of fun. Most people came costumed, as requested. Many also brought shareables, which is always awesome. The DrunkScience portion of the evening was in the form of Pictionary. At the beginning of the night, the group solved 21 words in 5 minutes. Two hours later, that number decreased to 16 in 5 minutes. Obviously the alcohol had an effect on the group’s guessing and the abilities of the drawer (me). To make this a better experiment, I should have remained sober the whole time. But what fun would that have been? Heh. As it was, the party was great and everyone seems to have had a good time. Though I was exhausted by 2am and was the first to fall asleep. It happens.

Spike and I were laying around all day today relaxing and watching Psych. He had to go to work so I continued without him for awhile. But then got bored and played some Borderlands 2. Got bored with that pretty quickly too and now I’m back to Psych. I don’t know why I’ve had such a short attention span for things recently. That or I just feel blah and don’t want to do anything at all. The feeling is resurfacing so I think I’ll just go to bed now. Goodnight all.

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Haircut Hopes

Last night we worked on getting Spike’s new apartment looking like a real apartment and not a storage unit full of boxes. I helped by alphabetizing his DVDs because I’m crazy like that. I also put little felt footies on things so that his hardwood floor doesn’t get all scratched up from chairs sliding and such.

Now I’m sitting at the hair salon waiting for my turn. For the first time in my life, I’m early for a haircut appointment. I’ve been coming to the same girl a couple times now and haven’t been let down yet. But I’m getting it cut even shorter than before so we’ll see how this goes.

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Catchup 2012

A whole lot has happened since last I posted with any sort of frequency. I have a new boyfriend, again. And we’ve been together for almost 8 months. It’s the best relationship I’ve ever had, so it definitely has promise. Spike even lived with me for a little bit in-between his leases and we got along really well. I’m kinda sad that he’s moved out now, though it’s nice to have my own space again. I do miss having him around all the time though.

I have a new job, and a side job too. I’ve been an Illustrator at a patent drawing company for almost a year now. It’s going great and my coworkers are all pretty cool. I’ve even made some decent friends that hang with me outside of work. I just got a side job doing WordPress and webmaster duties  for a woman near BWI, but that’s just a part-time gig and hasn’t grossed much work just yet. Our schedules have both been crazy busy as of late, so neither of us has had time to get together and work. I’ve also been doing a lot of tech support work on the side as well, but that’s basically over now since she bought a Mac Mini and won’t be having as many problems as when she had a PC.

Spike just moved into his new apartment and is very happy to have his own space. I’m gonna go over and visit tonight and see what he’s done with the place in just a week of unpacking. We got him a nice little table from Kmart on Saturday, so at least I know there’s somewhere to eat other than the recliners. Heh. It will be nice to have a night together without Thomas being underfoot and such all evening. Knocking things over and getting in the way and trying to eat our food.

Well, I’m off to grab a few things before heading over to Spike’s place. Hopefully it won’t be so long between posts anymore. Sigh. Though I’ve said that before.

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Election 2012

The election is finally over. HUZZAH! No more campaign ads! No more pressure! No more awful Facebook arguments clogging up my news feed!

The things I was hoping for all happened, so that’s awesome. Especially Question 6. Very glad that Maryland has legalized gay marriage. Way to go MD! I have many friends who are looking forward to the prospect of officially marrying their significant other now that it’s legalized. This is just one step along the road to really change America.

Also, immensely happy that Romney didn’t win, just because he’s a dolt. We picked the lesser of two evils, really.

I’m not gonna go on a rant about politics because, well, no one wants that. Also, lazy. So in closing, I just wanted to share my political stance: Vote Brony. 20% Cooler than those other guys.

Vote Brony 2012

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New Sites

Check out my new portfolio site: http://jenndahlke.com/ and the site for my D&D Campaign: http://blog.datapike.com/dnd.

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This post could also be called: How A Book Saved My Life.

Okay, so maybe it wasn’t just the cat. It was also ArtPunk, and through him, Chris Hardwick.

During my lowest times of depression, ArtPunk kept telling me to listen to an audiobook by Chris Hardwick, and I kept blowing him off with things like “I’ve never heard of him, so how can he help me?” (which was the STUPIDEST thought ever) and “I can’t listen to audiobooks and get anything out of them” (which was wrong).

Then I started my new job. And I needed something to listen to while working besides pandora. Music was beginning to bore me. That’s when I thought about the audiobook he mentioned and thought “Meh, what the heck? It’s worth a listen.” And the next few days were amazing.

As I listened to this book, called The Nerdist Way, it really sank into my head and hit me deep inside. It was probably one of  the best decisions I’ve ever made about a book. It literally changed my outlook on life. I was laughing along with it and really analyzing myself and my thoughts. It really made me think about the way I’ve handled things in my life. And the day I finished it was absolutely amazing.

I left work that day feeling like I could take on the world. And maybe win. I was so incredibly happy and felt like things were finally going my way. For the first time in a long time, I felt like everything was going to be ok and I was going to make it. I realized that things would eventually get better. I learned to enjoy the good things while they last, but without stressing about when they’re going to end. I learned to enjoy my burrito. I resolved to not take the easy way out. All because of this book.

The Nerdist Way is a phenomenal book that saved my life and all nerds and geeks should read it. Chris Hardwick and his humor really hit home for me and I think it will for many others who grew up awkward and socially inept, and even those who didn’t. He talks about making a character tome to keep track of your achievements and goals. It serves as a motivator and is kind of like D&D. ArtPunk and I are starting ours together.

Also, you should listen to his podcast, The Nerdist, free on iTunes. It’s full of humor and it’s “amaze-balls”. I listen to it at work and I’m on episode 50 already. He even does live versions of the podcast for audiences around the country, one of which I am attending THIS VERY NIGHT in DC. With ArtPunk. Cuz he’s awesome. I’m hoping to get our books signed by Hardwick tonight. Funny story about that too: I bought him the hardback copy of The Nerdist Way for Christmas and he bought me one too. Best present exchange ever. Then I gave him a graph paper moleskine notebook for his birthday for his character tome. I have a matching one that’s lined. The biggest geeks.

So yes the cat saved my life while I was deep in depression, but it was also ArtPunk and Chris Hardwick. I realize that I may have glossed over ArtPunk’s involvement in my recent life in my last post, but I was in a very bad place right then. Hating the holidays and all. But he really was there for me and tried to help me through all of it. I just wasn’t too receptive of his help. Which I regret. He’s been through a lot of crap with me ever since we met in freshman year of college, and I am unabashedly grateful for it. I just don’t know how to show him that all the time. Which makes me seem like a jerk occasionally. But he understands, because we’re both not the best socially and he knows I don’t say everything I should. And sometimes I say a lot of things I shouldn’t.

But anyway, I’m really excited to see Chris Hardwick in person tonight. I doubt I’ll get a hug like I did from Schaffer when I saw him in DC, but it’ll still be awesome. And I will enjoy that burrito. So much.

Chris Hardwick. ArtPunk. I heart you.

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It’s been awhile. I’ve failed at the PostAWeek thing. I’ve failed a lot this year. And others have failed me.

October 6 – lost my job. Brutally. They didn’t give me a good answer as to why. Just a lame “you don’t have the skills and experience we require”, a severance agreement to sign, and a failed attempt to transfer my work computer files over to my server. There was little to no sympathy from the person I needed it from the most. But that’s to be expected and will make sense in the next paragraph.

November 4/5 (late night/early morning) – Irish broke up with me. Another brutal blow. Spurred by AngryGinger, who had the best of intentions to see his friends happy. I get that, though it didn’t exactly help us be happy. And now I will always “remember, remember the 5th of November” as that day. The day I lost everything. Again. The day I had to find a way back into AngryGinger’s locked house to get my glasses so I could drive home at 7am after not sleeping at all, but just crying for 6 hours. The day I twisted my ankle horribly in those stupid 4 inch heel boots while trying to find the back porch to try the sliding door to get inside. The day I again got no sympathy from those closest to me.

I don’t know if it helped him be happy, but it sure didn’t work for me. I was suddenly very much alone. And fragile. And there were at least 2 weeks with daily breakdowns, crying, yelling, anger, more crying, emptiness, and general misery. The breakdowns slowed to a few times per week, and have now abated to about twice per week.

This whole situation, including the job loss, the heartbreak, and the lack of a proper support system, succeeded in setting off my latent depression and suicidal tendencies. I was struggling everyday to even function. I wouldn’t get out of bed until after noon, would cry uncontrollably for hours, and started staying up until 4am, doing nothing at all. I constantly considered the possibilities before me. The easy solution became very appealing. With the only thought against it being, who would take care of Thomas? I’ve never had something depend on me for life. And I couldn’t do that to him. Somehow I could deal with upsetting the very few people who would really feel pain by it, but I couldn’t let Thomas become homeless again, or die in a shelter, or be raised by someone who isn’t good enough. That amuses me in a very morbid way. But still, it’s funny to think that the cat saved my life. He kept me from doing the unmentionable. So I thank him for that. Especially because things have slightly improved.

December 6 – started a new job. Not perfect, but it’s a good atmosphere, good people, great commute, and easy work.

December 9 – realized I love my job, causing my first positive manic state in a long, long time. It didn’t last long though.

December 15 – tried to reach out and open myself up to someone, and was instead torn apart, heartbroken, and then resolved not to do it again. And found that I’m definitely not ready for anything at all. Even if it seems safe.

December 16 – went to a doctor. Now I’m back on the medication. Hopefully this will help with the depression. We’ll see in a few weeks or so.

I haven’t had the energy to do anything over the last few months. Especially in the last several weeks. Hence the lack of posting. Hopefully this will be the renewal of my blogging and I’ll get back into it. One can only hope.

I’ve been avoiding writing this post because I knew what it would mean. It’d be admitting that this has all happened. Admitting that I am alone, now more than ever. That no matter what I do, and how good my life is going, something is going to come along and fuck it all up. That I can’t stop the inevitable and to try is futile, painful, and just makes it worse for everyone in the end. That enjoying the moment is all well and good, but it comes with the knowledge that there will be bad to outweigh that good, eventually. Basically that life sucks and I need to get used to having my heart broken and being disappointed and alone. But also that I need to see what I have, when I have it, and before it’s gone – but not to hold onto it too tightly, because it’ll just shrink from my affections and run away, leaving me more alone and confused than I can imagine.

Things need to change. Hopefully the new year will bring that for me.

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Well, the east side of the beltway, compared to my current home. But still west of Baltimore.

In case someone has missed out on the news, I am moving to a new abode this week. I’ve already moved a few things in and Saturday will be a huge furniture moving day. My first night sleeping there will be tonight after my free viewing of the Killer Elite premiere. (So awesome.) Thomas will be coming with me so today is his last day of lonely freedom at Irish’s house. And last night was the final time that he will be jumping on the headboard and annoying us all night, since he’ll have to just curl up on the futon with me now.

I had been apartment hunting for a few months, then got really serious about it a month or so ago. I asked around on Facebook first and got a few hits, but only from people who don’t have jobs or the money to move out just yet. Which is totally understandable. Then I got on Roommates.com and did some searching. Most things were out of my price range, and unless I paid for a membership, I couldn’t receive messages from the people directly, so I had to send them a message with my email and hope they cared enough to get back to me. That didn’t work out too well. Then I hit Craigslist – a veritable gold mine of listings that I had somehow never used before. I replied to a bunch of people looking for roommates or renters, about 8 per day for a week or so.

The first day of my search, I came upon a gem of a post that was so specific about what the girl wanted in a roommate that I just couldn’t pass it up. She clearly knew what it was like to have a crappy roommate. And she knew how to be an adult and deal with household problems. And she’d accept another pet in the house, since she has a dog. And she was looking for someone right away. And the rent wasn’t too high. So I dropped her a line. Not 30 minutes later, I received a heartfelt and excited reply confirming my hopes – the room was still available and she loved my email, which included a detailed description of my habits, interests, etc. So we setup a date and time to meet and for me to checkout the house. Yes, HOUSE. It’s a small townhouse. Not a crummy little apartment thing.

The hurricane had knocked out her power, so when I came over it was light outside, but getting dark by the minute. We hung out for 3 hours in the dark and just chatted and got to know each other. It was pretty awesome. Her dog was friendly and fun. We talked about so many things I can’t even remember it all, but it ranged from our favorite shows to video games to boyfriends to dinner/cooking arrangements (she’s vegetarian and I wanted to make sure I wouldn’t be offending her by eating meat).

Finally, we said our goodbyes and I went home to Irish. I practically exploded with information when I sat down on the couch next to him. Babbling on and on about the things we talked about and the pros/cons of the house and potential situation. He just smiled and nodded as he continued watching TV or playing a game or whatever he was doing.

I let it simmer for a few days, widening my search and continuing to reply to Craigslist people, even getting onto the Facebook Marketplace thing for housing – Roomster or something – but that didn’t last long. I couldn’t find anything cheaper that I liked better or that would accept Thomas, so I emailed the girl again and we kept talking about prospective details and becoming more and more friendly.

Now, about a month later, we’ve exchanged several emails (90% of them longer than 400 words apiece, some about 800, like this post), had a lasagna dinner together at the house with our boyfriends, watched a movie together (As Good As It Gets), and had a pet visit so the dog, Biloxi could meet Thomas and they could get over the initial shock of “What the hell is that furry thing looking at me?!”

I’ve already moved in a few boxes and small furniture, there’s a futon for a bed from the previous roommate (yes, I washed the cover), and I’m moving the rest of the big furniture on Saturday with Irish, Grapple, and my parents. Thomas and I will start sleeping there tonight, as I mentioned, so that’ll be the true test of the futon’s sleepability.

And I realize that between house hunting and looking for a second job, I haven’t really bothered blogging. Shame on me. I’m 10 posts behind for PostAWeek2011. Must… catch… up… but that won’t be happening anytime soon. Maybe another post will pop up on here today about the job. Who knows?

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Friday was the Welcome Home party for ArmyHusband, BoobsMcGee’s hubby, who has been in the Stanistan for a very long time. Friday was also LaserProm. We all dressed up in formal attire and played lasertag after partying with ArmyHusband at his house. It was awesome. I actually got rank 5 on the second game which was Virus (aka Zombie) which dwarfed my rank 24(ish) of the previous game.

Then we went back to AH’s place for some midnight swimming. Irish left me there to play and swim as he was tired and not a swimmer. So I had some fun with Demon and Bedlam and the others. Then ArtPunk showed up and we did some cartching up. That was awesome, since we hadn’t seen each other in over a year. We hung out til about 3am then went home.

Saturday started around noon with some Mimi’s cafe breakfast and errands. Then 7 hours of making shirts for that night’s Team DrunkScience meeting with Guardian, AngryGinger, Irish, and crew. After hours of stress and backfiring on the shirts, it was time to call it and get to the party.

Well no one really showed up because of the hurricane. But they missed out. There was plenty of drinking before and after we lost power at AngryGinger’s house. We skipped the science part and went straight to the drunk. General fun, games, and debauchery were had. It was pretty great. Then we all went to sleep around 4 or 5am. Yay for getting back onto a college schedule for the weekend.

Power was still out when we woke up Sunday morning. Luckily we had running water and such or we would’ve been very unhappy campers.We grabbed some Wendy’s for lunch and sat around to chat some more before heading home to check on the house and Thomas and then we both passed out for several hours.

The weekend went really fast but we had a lot of fun and a lot of booze. I also discovered a boxed wine I enjoy (which is an odd sentence for me). Fun times. I believe it was Franzia and it’s a white wine (of course).

No matter how much the hurricane tried to cancel our fun this weekend, it didn’t really succeed. By the time it got to us, it was out at sea and downgraded to tropical storm conditions for our area. We got lucky. I know many others weren’t so lucky and I hope very much for their fast recovery be it from physical injury or power outage or house damage. This could have been so much worse, but I’m glad it turned out the way I thought it would here – just some wind and some rain.

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Just realized that it’s been over a week since I said I’d post a review of American Gods and of the movie Cowboys and Aliens. Well I’ve finally stopped failing and have decided that it’s about time I post this.

American Gods

This is, shockingly, my first real exposure to Neil Gaiman’s work. And what a good choice it was. I originally picked the book up on a whim shopping spree at my local used bookstore, Second Edition, where the clerk recommended it as my “4th book is free” or something like that. I am now forever grateful to that man. He has officially rekindled my love for sci-fi reading. Thank you, random guy! I think his name was Josh or something… I don’t know, but anyway, bakc to the actual book.

The book starts out a tad oddly and at the end of the first chapter you’re taken into a scene where a man is swallowed by a vagina. It scared me a bit, and I definitely said “What the FUCK?!” but it didn’t put me off from reading the book. In fact, it made me want to figure out how the hell that scene makes ANY sense based on the things I had read so far, which was not too much, as it was the first chapter. So Mr. Gaiman, I have this to say to you: “What the FUCK? And also, good job sir. That was amazing and ridiculous and kept me reading.”

There are random bits toward the end of almost every chapter where the time perspective switches to show a bit of history and backstory of events leading up to modern times. These little bits progress through time as the book goes along, eventually catching up to the present. It was an interesting technique and at first it confused me, but hey I’m easily confused. Har. Some of them weren’t nearly as interesting and some were rushed, like the story of a pair of twins that depicts their entire lives. But still, an interesting technique.

I don’t want to give too much away, but this is a really great read for Sci-Fi and Fantasy fans. It is engaging, it is clearly written for adults, and it almost mocks religion, but doesn’t cross the line. Overall, it was about 500 pages of “what happens now?” and then a few “I KNEW IT” occurrences. But also a few great “abuh?” and “WTF?!” spots. Action, mystery, science fiction, fantasy, love, betrayal, sex, murder, war, drama, and comedy and probably more that I just can’t think of right now. Mr. Gaiman, I would tell you to pick a genre, but you seem to handle 17 at once just fine. Wow. Applause.

Five stars.

Cowboys and Aliens

This movie was a fun little summer blockbuster from which I expected nothing. I had zero expectations walking into this film. All I knew was that it had New James Bond (Daniel Craig), Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford), and Thirteen (Olivia Wilde). I went in there wanting to enjoy it and just have some fun.

Upon my exit, I was very much satisfied. The trailers I had seen didn’t give away any of the resolution, which was a pleasant surprise. Sometimes I knew just what would happen next. Sometimes I was blown away and completely surprised.

The characters were simple, but deep enough to make a bit of a connection to them before too long. The plot was very 1-2-3 and straightforward. The glimpses of Jake’s past were interestingly portrayed and well-placed, though his history with the wife wasn’t full of all the information I’d wanted, but it was all that was necessary.

A simple tale of bad to good mixed with an old west environment makes for a shoot-em-up time and an entertaining result. Simple and satisfying.

Four stars. Maybe four and a half.

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