Hmmm...

The Grad Tab came in today, and I'm beating myself up over it. I looked through it and found a million things wrong with it. I could have done this or that or changed this or that. I'm generally beating myself up over it in my head.



Not a lot of people know that I went through a deep, horrifying depression last year around this time. It was scary, because it was the worst I have felt mentally and emotionally in a long time. I caught myself many times looking at the medicine cabinet and telling myself in my head that if all else failed, I had two bottles of pain pills that could make me feel better. All at once. If you get my drift.



Somehow, I was able to pull myself out of it. Without any help from anyone or any medicine. In fact, only one person knew how bad it really was. The worst part of all this was while I was feeling really down, I also felt embarrassed and ashamed that I was feeling down.



Last year, it was loneliness creeping in and it settled for about six months. It's rearing it's ugly head again. And I think it's brought on by the fact that I have maybe 3 best friends, and that all my other friends and acquaintances are getting married and having babies.



God forbid, I don't want kids right now. Couldn't even fathom it. But when people are getting engaged and married and friends are generally having a great time, I get sad. While I know I should be happy for people being happy, I'm not.



It's rough right now in my emotional life. Professional life is great, and it's probably the one thing that's been keeping me somewhat reasonably smiling. It's the part of my life where I walk in to an empty apartment and the phone never rings. Or the part where I see no one other than work. And hell, when I do go out, I can't have a good time, because I can't get my brain to stop working.



I'm always the funny best friend or the cool one of the guys or the awesome little/big sister that no one ever had. It's rough not going out on a date, being wined and dined and other hoopla that it seems like everyone is doing. I think two years of this is quite enough.



It's just that at night, I don't like the only thing I hear are the crickets chirping. I'm Little Miss Ray of Sunshine with a storm cloud forming over my head.



Folks, here it goes again. I'm about sick of this shit.

Wow, twice in one day...

I don't know what the world is coming to. I've blogged twice in one day. I think the devil has officially put on his L.L. Bean parka, because, ladies and gentlemen, Hell just froze over.

I've changed my layout. I'm in a pink sort of mood. I don't necessarily like wearing pink, but every once in a while, pink does you good.

I'm excited about tomorrow's front page and Graduation insert. Granted, if someone calls me and complains about it, I'll be forced to reach through the phone and rip out their vocal chords. I take constructive criticism well, but I don't take hateful, verbal ass rapes all that great. I take them with a smidgen of violence or at least a little blood splatter.

The new job is pretty sweet. One reason why it's sweet is because I'm not in charge. (Insert sigh of relief here.) I enjoy being the low man on the totem pole working in the shadows trying to get everything just right. Second reason why it's pretty fucking awesome is because I'm doing everything. Well, it's not like I'm running around like an Energizer Bunny trying to literally do everything. I've just got my hand in everything.

Design? Yep. Copy editing? Yep. Writing? Yep. Taking pictures? Yep. Making coffee? Yep. Making advertisements? I've tried. Stuffing coupons? Only with threats of physical harm. Cleaning the toilets? Not yet, but I feel like my time is coming.

Before starting, I loathed writing. Hated it. I don't know why. I think it's because I hadn't found my niche yet. I think I'm kind of a weird writer, because I don't like the dark alley, go for the jugular type journalism. Everyone has a story and not all of them are heart-wrenching. However, at the same time, not all of them are filled with butterflies and kittens.

Another reason why I like writing again is because there's no pressure. My stories don't have to be so fucking awesome that it comes out of the printer coated in sparkles.

There's a lot of pressure working at a college newspaper that's been in the top ten of the "Best College Newspapers in the Southeast" three years running. Even worse is becoming the new editor the year after the newspaper wins "Best College Newspaper in the South."

I felt like I had to (quoting Talladega Nights) wake up in the morning and piss excellence. Not saying that my current employer isn't good. Actually, it's very good and once the dynamic duo, Boss Lady and Guinness Techy Guy, has the new website up and running you should take a look. But it almost felt like every week, every story had to rock the foundation of the college and town and make people's head spin.

I don't want to rock your foundation and don't want to make your head spin. I just want you to read it, enjoy it, and maybe learn something.

And that's why I like where I'm at. Because there's no pressure. I don't have to keep proving myself week after week that I was the right one for the job. I can write because I enjoy it, not because I'm trying to win an award.

And to quote the Boss Lady, that's pretty fucking groovy.

--snarl--

I'm updating before work, because I'm dragging my feet. One of the reasons I've avoided the real world is that I hate going to work at 8 a.m. 9 a.m. would be much better, and 10 a.m. would be awesome like eating the last piece of cheesecake.

I'm a night owl. I get all my best ideas and best writing at around 1 a.m. For the past four years at college, I avoided taking an 8 a.m. class. I know that I'm getting exhausted because I'm hitting the snooze button a little bit more each day. Oh, and the fact that I'm having to trick myself to get out of bed. My clock is set 30 minutes fast.

We're heading up to the lake this weekend, and I'm absolutely ecstatic. There's only so many weekends of my mom that I can handle in one month. It's the whole "we're exactly alike and we don't like spending the weekend with a version of ourselves." Except that I'm a night owl and she's a morning person. The horror!!!

Oh, and that she wakes me up at 5 a.m. everyday on the weekend. I'm sure you're asking yourself, "But Elizabeth, why don't you just roll over and go back to sleep?" My answer to you, ye naive one, is that it's hard to sleep when someone flips on the light, pulls the covers off of you, grabs you by the ankles and yanks you out of bed all while screaming in your ear at the volume only dogs can hear.

All this so I'll have a cup of coffee and watch the squirrels. And then she gets perturbed when for the first two hours, I talk like a caveman. Grunts, snorts, snarls and beating on my chest for added emphasis. Everyone who knows me knows that you don't talk to me in the morning until I talk to you first, but apparently, after 22 years, Momma hasn't figure it out yet. Or she chooses to ignore it.

I'd feel much better if I had a cup of coffee in the morning. But here's a little secret. The coffee at work sucks. I've been spoiled, because my coffee pot is an old Bunn from a restaurant. Makes some damn fine coffee. One of these days, I'm coming up there armed with a good coffee pot and going to page everyone and say, "Gather around kiddos. Let Auntie Lizzie show you what a good cup of coffee tastes like." And then I shall cackle and clap my hands with glee as everyone takes the first sip and they start drooling at the mouth and their eyes roll back in a caffeine, coffee bean induced orgasm.

Speaking of coffee and orgasms, I'm going to work.

Technical Difficulties...

Apparently, the photos did upload. There are little blue boxes that you have to right click and select view image.



One of these days, I'll figure out how to work the damn thing.

Graduation and all that other grown up stuff...

Haven't updated in forever, because I haven't had the time, energy, or the motivation. But you try working at a place where half of the people blog. You'll start blogging again. It's inevitable.



Graduated Cum Laude on May 12th, which by the way is complete bullshit. I made a 3.6 my final semester, which was enough to bump me up to Magna Cum Laude, because I had the highest GPA you could have and still only be Cum Laude. Now, I could have a diploma that said Magna Cum Laude at the bottom, but I would have to pay $50 to have my diploma reprinted. So, I'll settle for my lowly title.



Which, by the way, I received my diploma as a pleasant surprise after I got off work. Since I can't seem to get this image uploader to work on my piece of shit widget I have, you'll have to go to my flickr to see the diploma. Search for weebly91.



I need to get back to work. Gotta do the whole journalist thing, you know.