Collections.

So, let me start this by saying I'm not exactly normal....

In point of fact, I'm slightly quirky.

In addition to the odd personality quirks, I go through stages in my life where I start collecting random things. Usually it's just because something catches my eye, or I randomly think "Oh, that would be fun!"...but, needless to say, my apartment is full of some things that you people might think are a little off the beaten path of normal...

I'll start with the simple, semi-everyday things....

1. Books. How does one collect books, you may ask? Wellllll.....see below:

(yes, those are double front stacked on each shelf)

Not to outdo my reading material, there was a time, a few years ago, that I was shipped off to India for work. And I came back with a new obsession....

2. Elephants. They are everywhere in my house. In random spots, like an Indian elephant baby mobile hanging from my ceiling, or on my bookshelf, hanging out in corners, and in a special little shelf thing I devoted especially to them:


After the elephants came something else I decided one day would be fun...

3. Gnomes. Yes, gnomes, okay?? Shut up! I TOLD you I'm not normal! Anyhow, I have one on my computer desk...one in my bathroom...some outside...inside...you name it:


After the gnomes, my friend Stacey got hooked on collecting poppets. And after many months of watching her take picture after picture with her roaming poppets, I finally broke down and got my own...I mean, just one couldn't hurt, right? Which leads us to...

4. Poppets.



*Ahem*....MOVING ON....below are some other random things that haven't quite grown enough to be considered "collections"....yet. Give me a little time and I'm sure I can rectify that.

(This is the area above the sink in my kitchen)

But, before you think I'm some kind of crazy cat lady in the making, living amongst piles of newspaper 10 feet high, etc....I'm really not!! I promise! I can prove it!!

So there!

Friends.

It's 5 am, I've got a headache from the depths of hell, and it's actually worse when I am sitting in the dark...and, amazingly, staring at a computer screen may be helping. And, unfortunately, maybe I tend to be a little too "deep" in the wee hours of the morning. Sorry about that.

Anyhow, I know I promised light-hearted fare here...but, hey...it's a personal blog, and sometimes I may get personal. I'm usually a "stomp it all down deep and don't let anyone see the crap" type of girl, but maybe that's a bad thing? I've done a lot lately to help myself grow and try to be a better person, so maybe I should open my soul a little? Who knows...but, it's still dark outside, my head is pounding, and I have nothing better to do. So here goes.

I've been thinking a lot lately on the subject of friends.

I guess maybe because of how I grew up I've always been a little wary of letting people completely in. I have always been the girl who on the surface looks like she has tons of friends and is really open with them, but that's just the surface...for the most part, I am super-secret-agent about protecting myself, and keeping parts of the "real me" hidden from people. However, with that said, I have lots of people I genuinely LIKE, and people I know fairly well, but I honestly don't know how you really classify friends. There are people who have been in my life FOREVER (some since before I was born, even...hi, Kristin!), and then there are people who are far more recent, but yet they feel like they've been in my life forever. They are few and far between, but I tend to hold on to the really important ones...they make my life a much better place, they put up with my shit and don't give up on me, and I love them for it.

I've been criticized for having an online life. That I tend to hide behind a computer instead of going out and dealing with actual people. But, maybe that's easier for me. It's natural for me to hide behind the written word...it always has been. I come from a wordy-writing family...I think it's how we communicated best. My father wrote me stories when I was little, instead of actually showing me that I was important. Instead of sitting down to talk to me, he gave me fables in which I was the heroine, facing big, bad dragons, etc. Which was pretty cool as a kid, but looking back, wow...that's kind-of a sad testament to our relationship.

ANYhow....the point is, I have tons of people online who I can consider "friends" in the most shallow sense of the word...but I don't have a lot of people in my day-to-day, tangible life who I can do the same with. I rarely let the walls down enough. The people (and you know who you are) who have gotten past that giant, brick wall beneath my skin are in there forever....and with a few of them, that's a very good thing. With some of them, it's proved not to be. But, you live and learn, and sadly, that's been the prevailing motto of my life.

I've had people tell me that I come across like a bitch in social settings, because I do not jump into conversation and emote myself all over the place. But, the thing is, I CAN'T. I am the girl that sits in the back and observes. I can see where this could come across as cold and distant....and distant, yeah I can see that...that's just who I am...but, cold? I don't think I'm a cold person. It makes me sad that some people think that, but I can't physically be "happy gushy sunshine girl" in a public setting, 100% of the time. Maybe sometimes I can pull it off, but I mostly think that is me over-compensating for what I know people perceive me as. I don't like people thinking badly of me, so the actress comes out.

But, I don't see myself as a bitch, and genuinely, I don't think I always come across that way. I mean, I am quiet, but I have absolutely no problem getting people to talk to me...my recent foray into the higher education system has shown that to me. I've been able to make friends in class really easily, and even somehow managed to wind up being the mouthpiece for study groups, which is crazy, since I hate being the person in the spotlight.

Anyhow, here comes the point of this ramble....

What do you do when someone you've let get past the walls turns out to be a giant fraud, and you find out that they've shit all over you, said horrible things and generally treated you - behind your back - like you are the lowest-of-low life forms...when to your face they were still wearing the mask of "friend"?

This pisses me off on many levels, because I've always been super intuitive about people, and I can generally read in the first second whether or not they are going to be worth the trouble. But, sometimes, people fall through the cracks. Most of the time I may notice, but I overlook, and that's my own fault...but, other times, I genuinely am caught by surprise at the inner evilness of some people.

I was talking to my best friend the other day (who lives less than an hour away, and I never spend time with....see what I mean?)...anyhow, we were talking about a situation, and she expressed confusion about how I could be so crazy intuitive (and she's seen that in action throughout our lives)...and yet, how I still manage to somehow miss the insane, general blackness of soul in some people I've let get close to me. We came to the conclusion it is because those people actually BELIEVE their own web of lies...therefore, my inner radar doesn't go off, because they aren't being deceitful on the surface...they're just fucking crazy.

So, I guess my question is....how does a girl like me, who HATES confrontation, handle a situation where she finds out that someone she thought at one time was a friend has said (and I have written proof) some really horrible, shit-stirring things about me? It's not just the mean, bitchy things that were said that annoy me so much...most of the time I can be all "whatever" about them. I mean, I know who I am...I've been through enough crap in my life to be somewhat secure in my skin. But, what really gets to me is the shit-stirring. Is it really necessary to try and make my life more difficult? What is the purpose of that? Is their own life so miserable that when they see even an inkling of happiness in mine, they immediately try to stomp it down, pour gasoline on it and attempt to light it on fire?

Do I call this person on their shit, or do I just continue to cut them out of my life? Which is worse? The inner vindictive bitch in me wants to plan elaborate schemes to yank the life out of them and make them cry...but, then that just puts me on their level, doesn't it? So, I just keep ignoring...which is super easy for me to do. I can put up that ice-wall with the best of them. But, is ignoring really the best way to go? Or is that just me avoiding, and playing the "stomp it all down deep and don't let anyone see the crap" game? I really don't know what to do. I go through a daily ritual of weeble-wobbling on this issue, and I really don't want to fall down this time. I've fallen down enough in my life already.

Neighbors.

So, I am now living in a ground floor unit of an apartment complex...which really isn't so bad, because I have a nice, big private fenced back yard, and it's a pretty cute place. HOWEVER, with that said, that brings up the subject of my neighbors.

Now, I've got 2 kids, so I've gotten really good over the past nine years at being able to tune out things that would drive a normal person insane. (Yes, I know that implies I'm not normal...I'm okay with that.) But, the point is, I'm really spectacular with being able to ignore stuff when I want. Which is good, because I guess it appears my upstairs neighbors are loud. I know this, because whenever anyone comes to visit, they're here for like two minutes before their eyes get large as saucers, and they stare at the ceiling with horrified fascination.

In actuality, I'm unsure of how many people live up there, exactly. I mean, I think it's an older couple, their teenage-ish daughter and HER 1-year old baby, and POSSIBLY the daughter's boyfriend. I'm not sure if he lives there, or he just is there all the time. At any rate, it's just a 2-bedroom place, so I think it's verging on clown college up there. I mean, seriously...if they could pack anymore bodies in, I'd be amazed.

Also, I think they may possibly have a bed in the living room. I mean, judging from some occasional "sounds" I manage to notice, that's what I'm presuming. But...yeah...CLASSY.

Oh, and that 1-year old baby? I think she is the spawn of Satan. The child does not sleep. And apparently, she also feels that the period from 9 pm until roughly 3-4 am is the optimal time to shriek bloody murder, run like a water buffalo across the ENTIRE apartment, and possibly occasionally either throw dishware or large human bodies against the ground above my head. I mean,don't get me wrong...I have kids. I understand that they can be loud. But...MINE ARE ASLEEP DURING THOSE HOURS! And they were when they were babies, too. They also never murdered small villages in the wee hours of the morning.

Also, everyone up there seems to have a sick fascination with showers. Like, seriously. I don't know what they're doing up there to get as dirty as they must be getting, because in my little experiment for this post today, I counted roughly 12 showers taking place. In one day. Twelve. Maybe the bed in the living room is part of a "movie set"? Otherwise, who the hell needs a dozen showers a day? The reason this matters to me is because when they shower, it dictates my water pressure. And occasionally, I'd like more than a trickle...thanks.

So, that is the scoop on my upstairs neighbors. On to some others....

Up until the last few days, the couple that lived on my right were a nice, elderly couple that I never heard, and very rarely saw. But, in this last week they moved. And in their place, I have now acquired a cracked out version of Stephen King, complete with jet-black mad scientist hair, and torn Pantera tank top, and his wife...fat Elvira. This is the initial impression I got of them as I mowed my backyard, and watched them watch me (a little too intently, I might add) through the crack in the fence.

If you don't hear from me in the next few days, they've tunneled through the wall and eaten me.

Well, Howdy!

Well, I'm back, bitches! (I'll stop a moment to allow for the applause to die down....)

Anyhow, it's been a LONG while, and I assume I probably only have like 2.5 people with me actually still on their feed-reader. Alas... There's been a lot of changes at Casa Adena, of which I won't really go into...this was supposed to be a little, light-hearted blog, and I'd like to get back to that point. I miss the funny writing.

So, I am on my 10 day vacay in between terms at school (yes, I'm filling my brain w/ higher education now!) Once I start back up, I'm sure I will have many humorous things to relate to you...(Biology! Something funny is bound to happen!) I have filled this next term w/ far too many -ogy's, and my brain will probably be mush by the end of it, but what the heck!

The kids are growing, and cracking me up daily, so I may throw some of that in here, too. I know that I really started slacking off w/ the blogging once twitter and facebook began to suck my brain dry...bad social media!!

I may even start taking pictures again. I mean, sometimes I see some odd stuff! Like this, for instance:


So, I hope you're all still with me. Or maybe you'll trickle back. We shall see!