The fact that I did not watch this on first air becomes more infuriating with each episode. I know once I watch S2 it will be over and that makes me mad and sad :( Firefly V2.0

I wanna know where the pitch mentioned "...and then you're all going to sing and dance with the waitresses in the maid cafe!" At that point do you question where your career is going?



This is one of the dozens of songs I have on a playlist called, "I really wanna dance to this at the reception, but people might actually listen to the lyrics." It's a long name, but specifically descriptive.

I bought running shoes today! My current sneakers have been with me since, well, high school, and putting so much stress on them was a last gasp. The bottoms started peeling off :( So now my slightly protesting feet are laced into a stiff new pair of running sneakers!

The walking drive has come to a close, and so today Aaron added me to his gym membership. The gym is only a few miles from work, so my plan is to swap my 4 walking miles in the morning with cardio at the gym. Doing it at the gym will allow me to shower after I exercise, which I'm sure my co-workers will appreciate, and also I hated walking around the building at work while people from my office arrived in the morning. I'd rather be sweaty and gross in front of strangers. Plus I need to vary my workout a bit because I am ending each day with grotesquely swollen ankles from all the walking. Ew.

My next goal is to lose 10 more pounds and buy a new pair of jeans! Because hopefully, I will need a new pair of jeans.

All that walking (115 miles in August- less than my goal) kicked in, somewhat. I've been losing about 5lbs a week for the past 2 weeks, then gaining a pound back over each weekend because I am lazy on the weekend. Lazy, lazy. I'm getting my gym membership back so that I can work out there on the weekends and hopefully fix that! Still, I think it will be 10-20lbs more until I see any noticable reduction in size, because in the other direction I barely noticed it was happening for the last stretch.

It's insanely hot right now, not to mention on fire. I hate walking out in the morning to the overpowering stench of smoke.

I have a wedding to go to at the end of the year- that means a plane ticket and a rental car and a motel room for the night... only a day or so, so I suppose it won't break the bank. I just don't like traveling, I guess. Plus the fact that I'm flying across country and then driving 2 hours and then going to a wedding for someone at whose last wedding I was fat and disgusting and was informed by the bride afterward that I was embarrassing everyone there and pretty much white trash. So, no pressure.

At least this time around I can wear a conservative pantsuit and sit quietly in the back and attempt not to make a fool of myself- it's in December so unfortunately I will still be unattractive at that time. I bizarrely feel the urge to apologize for that in advance, just in case I ruin another wedding.

Speaking of MY wedding... well, let's not. It's puttering along at its usual level of preparation, which is "none whatsoever." I am not displeased, at this point.

Well, no.

I mope about a variety of things, though, so at least I'm covering bases and such.

Looked in the mirror and thought, "ew" so amped up (fast!) walking at work until I was doing 5 miles a day- 2 at 5:30 before work, 1 on break, 1-2 at lunch and maybe 1 on break after for makeupsies if I wasn't going to run an errand on foot after work. Also added in a workout at home 3 nights a week, but I don't count that because nothing is sillier than the sight of me doing leg lifts and jogging in place while waving cans of refried beans around. And went on a (healthy, balanced) diet, which mostly included cutting out booze, juice and cheese since I eat pretty well to start with. I buckled down, didn't skimp on the mileage and journaled everything I ate and drank, just to be sure I wasn't cheating. I walked so much I'm even 2/50 in our fitness competition at work. End results nearing the middle of the third week? Gained 3 pounds. That takes a pro.

My goal was to lose some weight until I felt comfortable jogging in the mornings instead of powerwalking, but it looks like I may just have to resign myself to the fact that I can't wait for that to happen and buy a girdle so my flab doesn't bounce this way and that while I jog. And start jogging earlier so it's dark the whole time I'm out. Bought a serviceable sports bra at Target, but I got the largest size they had and it's still a little small (yes, I know they are meant to compress). Curse these mountainous bosoms! Promised myself when I hit 50 miles I would buy myself a nice, pricey Lane Bryant bra (I postponed this until payday but it will still be a treat then, I suppose) and just my luck, they're having a buy one get one half sale- sounds like a great excuse to also buy an awesome Cacique sports bra to me!

I guess life isn't all bad.

Life with Aaron is... life with Aaron. We get along great, as we always have. It's just, he's never much help when I'm all self-pitying like this because he just doesn't understand it. He's one of those charmed souls who throw themselves into life, gathering lots of friends and experiences along the way, and to be faced with someone like me- few friends, quiet, socially inept and prone to random bouts of crying about nothing... he's at a loss. He can't give me support or advice about being friend-light because he's always been surrounded by them. He doesn't understand my "quirky" little anxieties because he's never been afraid of anything. He has no frame of reference when I talk about feeling ugly and awkward and isolated at parties, because he's the one in the center of everything orchestrating shots and punching people in the arm. Being on this diet (and cutting down even before that) has been especially hard because I can't fall back on drinking as my social lubricant and so must rely on my own personality. I usually just end up going home early in leiu of developing one.

I always read over these after I post them and think, "Man! I whine a lot!" That doesn't stop me any, just pointing it out in case you ever wonder if I realize how pathetic and whiny I sound in journal entries. Yes. I do.

Having a bizarre e-mail back-and-forth with Pandora Support about my mysterious upgrade to Pandora One.

Me: "Hey I don't remember upgrading to Pandora One, do you know what's up?"
Pandora: "We have no idea what you're talking about you don't have Pandora One"
Me: "Uh I totally do cause I have this cool custom skin and it says PANDORA ONE in the logo at the top."
Pandora: "Um.... we'll get back to you."

After googling, all I can suss is that it may be connected with the Pre somehow? But I am very confused and I don't like being confused :(

Or as I call it, "LOL FAT LAWYER"

Will they ever move beyond the formula of "Jane ALMOST loses a case but then has an epiphany and WINS IT ALL"?

So predictable D; Messing with my enjoyment.

Let's get drunk!

Sounds like 1999. UGH.

This is a bonus track I would have skipped past on Millenium.

In 2 years of use, I have purchased around 550 songs from the iTunes Store! That seemed like a lot but April pointed out that's 275 a year, and THAT is about 21 a month, so it works out to about 2 albums. I've actually had to set limits for myself- only ONE album, right after payday, or I'll just click click clickclickclick that buy button. Downloadable content is more convenient than brick-and-mortar shopping but at least having to get to the store and browse and stand in line to check out placed a barrier to my impulse buying. With iTunes I have no willpower- I've bought more than one album based on a facebook sidebar ad.

I suppose the bright side has been that I haven't been dissapointed with a purchase since I bought Mandy Moore's latest, which I anticipated breathlessly and regretted endlessly. "Wild Hope" grew on me but I can't see the same happening for "Amanda Leigh"- I at least liked SOME songs on "Wild Hope" to begin with, if not all of them from the start. "Amanda Leigh" is just filled with charmless songs and bizarre style choices, and I took it off of my work playlist within a week of release.

Shameful Impulse Buy: Demi Lovato. Oh catchy focus-group pop-rock, I just can't quit you. :( Also, I watch Sonny With a Chance, so I think I'm marked as effectively lost to good taste.
Why I Put Up With Genius Impulse Buy: "Waves and the Both of Us" by Charlotte Sometimes. I even sang along with it in the car during the day, which got me a look from the people in the car next to me during traffic. Usually I am too timid to sing in the car unless it's dark out because I don't like the feeling that people could be watching me. So self-concious! Genius has generally been useless in the past- the suggestions are usually along the lines of, "Hi, I see you like Star Trek! Have you heard about this other little series you might also enjoy? It's called STAR WARS." But very, very rarely I get a hit that's completely on point- like this, or Kate Nash, both of which spawned from Lily Allen in a Genius category that I can only assume is "sassy girls singing with naughty words"
I Can't Resist an iTunes Banner Ad Impulse Buys: New A Fine Frenzy single, new Shakira single, new Imogen Heap single. Clicky clicky clicky.
Seriously, a Facebook Ad Impulse Buy: "Like Lily Allen? You might also like Florence + the Machine!" I suppose because they're both... female? The comparison is bizarre but I can't be too mad because I am completely obsessed with this album. I listened to "Cosmic Love" alone on repeat for 30 minutes of a 45 minute commute. I think everyone else is sick of hearing it in the car but I fully intend on listening to this album until I'm completely sick of it, like I used to do with the Backstreet Boys or Sophie B. Hawkins.

Last night, I lost my wallet.

This morning, I went into work and sighed, "Man, what a bad day, I think I left my wallet in the sushi bar last night." April nodded in sympathy, then got a call on her cell phone. I hear, "She thinks she left it at a sushi bar." Her head popped over my cubicle wall.

"Gayle, your wallet is at the Simi Valley Police Department!"

Wow, April is a magician!

It would seem that last night, as I was climbing into a friend's car after a night of tofu and sakebombs, my wallet escaped my purse and landed on the mean streets of a Simi Valley subdivision. Once discovered, the hunt for me was on. My wallet doesn't contain my phone number, but it DOES contain my travel agent ID card, which lists the company where I work. So the police ran my workplace through their files and came up with... April. It seems that some "youthful indiscretion" had landed April on the books (international pineapple theivery, but you didn't hear it from me), along with her place of employment. So they pulled up HER file, and instead of contacting her, they called... her godmother?

April's godmother wakes up to a message on her home phone informing her that the police had the wallet of me, a person she had never met, and that I could pick it up anytime today. The police ended up calling a person who had never heard of me, who also just coincidentally happened to be related to the person who sits 10 feet away from me at work.

---

Then I accidentially deleted all the ad specials in the database.

Win some, lose some.

what comes after "But I'm a Cheerleader" and "Moulin Rouge"?

Me. Aaron. My little sister.

AX. Tomorrow.

If you're there, try to seek out a fat drunk white girl. It will probably be me???

Also if you're in LA and you wanna do something for July 4th leave a message~

A few years ago, I'd be moaning about missing Dynamis this weekend, but these days it's lower on the priority list than "drive 7 hours into the mountains of Northern California". Dad and Merilee were in Oakland for the week doing business, and tried to convince me to fly up for the weekend and drive to Georgetown to visit Grandma. Of course, they asked this 4 days before the weekend, so a roundtrip flight was approximately $500 at that point. Uh, pass? Then I thought, "Well, I have no social life, why don't I just drive there?"

It's ONLY 7 hours!

I don't mind driving alone for long distances- I even drove down from Seattle when I moved to L.A. If I have music playing I don't get very bored, and my action-packed gamer lifestyle has prepared me well to sit on my ass for hours at a time without cramping. Oddly enough I can't stomach long drives with Aaron- we would have flown if he had the weekend off. I would have flown ANYWAYS if my dad had mentioned he was ok picking me up from SFO ($49 each way on VA! Woo!) but that's beside the point since I've already, you know, DRIVEN 7 HOURS TO GET HERE.

I'm leeching wireless of someone's unsecured home network, so more later I suppose. But yay for vacations! Yaaaaaaay!

I've written before about the issues involved in, to use a technical term, "never having grown up". As I get older I'm realizing that the major problem is not the simple embarassment of liking the same music as 10-year-olds, it's MUCH WORSE THAN THAT.

Yes, that's right.

I'm a 25-year-old woman with a job, my own apartment, and an engagement.

And I know which Jonas Brother is which.

And I possibly have their Disney Channel show DVR'd.

Who am I kidding, I have the whole Sunday block DVR'd. Hannah Montana, Jonas, SONNY WITH A CHANCE.

Woe.

Of course, I am very insecure, so maybe they didn't really like my -

Now, if I were telling this story to you IRL, that would have been the point in which I went entirely silent for a half hour. That's because Aaron called and offhanded, "oh btw in 20 minutes i'm bringing my work friends over who make you extremely nervous because you don't think they like you and you're always like that around new people anyways and could you order some pizza?"

If this were a teen comedy, I'd pull away from the phone and gaze around me, the house in utter shambles from 90 minutes of cheap gags. Those who have lived with me previous know that my flair for housekeeping... well, isn't. It tends less towards "sparkling" and more towards, "oh my GOD, is that MOVING?" So in true "Hi kids, we're home early!" form, I dash around the apartment and manage to clear up most of the traces of 2 months of Mopey Miss Moocow Living on the Couch. The clothes were shoved out of sight. The endless Super Saver junk mail was poured into shopping bags (that's recycling!). The bathroom was scrubbed and windexed in a haze of life-expectancy-reducing chemicals that probably shouldn't be mixed. The pile of dishes in the kitch... they were re-stacked, at least. The plates and silverware were staged appropriately, submerged in sudsy water. I made crust and baked pie yesterday, so there was no chance of getting all of the dirtied bakeware and prepware hidden, but I hoped maybe it would make me look... like a homemaker?

By this time I am soaked in nervous sweat and smelling like a sewer, so Aaron saunters in to a precariously clean house and a Little Missus that looks like one of those drunk driving mug shots. HOW IMPRESSIVE.

But I tried.

In true Gayle fashion, I spent my 3 day weekend being sick. Because who wants to have fun anyways?

Woo!

OK, I get that Bones is the "smart" investigation drama, but is it REALLY considered so high brow that they now need a mid-episode recap for the people too dumb to pay attention for a WHOLE HOUR? To keep my brain from hurting I will hold out a hope that they're trying to catch people coming off a popular 30 minute show on another channel- but in that case why is it phrased like they're talking to a group of preschoolers?

"What a fun episode so far! A guy was shot! Wow! Did you miss when that car exploded? Boom!"

---

Today when I got off the freeway I started hearing this noise from my back right wheel. *shnk* *shnk* *shnk shnk shnkshnkshnkshnk*.... So of course I freak out, as all sorts of nightmare wheel-popping-off scenarios run through my head. I wanted to go to the mechanic right then but it was already almost 6PM and by this time I was sobbing heavily and working myself up into a nice panic. So I limp home and call Aaron at work to panic at him a little, and he rolled his eyes (well, I couldn't hear this over the phone, but I always imagine that's what happens when I call him in a tizzy) and told me he'd look at it when he got home. The cause of the CAR DESTROYING AXLE BREAKING WHEEL LOSING ENGINE ON FIRE *SHNK* noise?

A liiiittle piece of mesh grating from the road had gotten stuck under the car and was hitting the wheel in a little pattycake motion. But on the bright side I DID get Aaron's special look, the one that says "I think you're an idiot but I love you too much to say it out loud."

TB has his headphones up so loud that I can hear Dusk's every word on Vent right now- and they're in the other room.

EDIT: NO I DON'T DUSK

EDIT2: SO MANY TEARS