Thanks to hautepocket for this one. Me as a Madmen character, possibly the best thing ever.
Love it!
And then… it was wonderful October 31, 2009
Mere hours ago I wrote the biggest check of my life, nearly hyperventilating the whole time, and drove off gleefully with a gorgeous little black sports car.
This whole crazy debacle has been in the works for the past two weeks, sending me into nervous fits the whole time; the amount of stress that I put on myself for no reason almost reaches the point of insanity sometimes. But through the hours spent searching, and driving, and crying, and waiting impatiently, this Saturday finally came just when I thought it never would. After learning of the inheritance, which would add to the amount that I had already saved as a down payment on the car, the whole process of mailing and transferring multiple checks across state lines took seemingly forever, though in reality it was actually just over a week. I’m pretty sure I have some nasty control issues that I may need to work out.
In the end, through self-induced panic attacks and rabid insecurity, I got it, I got my Crossfire, and it is beautiful! It’s jet black with silver accents, fully loaded, and such a blast to drive I can’t even describe it. I’ve never owned a car like this, I’ve never owned anything like this, and I can honestly say that I already love it more than anything else that I have ever had. I even love it more than my iPhone, which is shocking, but at the cost of about 35 iPhones I certainly hope that my adoration would shift accordingly. **
I’ve been trying to justify this purchase for months now, usually being met with massive resistance on every front. I know that John still isn’t happy with the whole situation, apparently I’m “irresponsible” and it’s “unrealistic”. Whatever that means. But against his opinions and general common sense, I bought it anyway, praying that I don’t prove him right. My only reasoning for why I won’t is really just my gut. You see, (and this may sound deluded and crazy) whenever I really want something, I mean really want it, I find a way to make it happen, and I have no plan B.
I knew that I was meant to be with John, and there was no other option, so I made it happen, risking a friendship and permanent psychological damage. I knew that I was going to go to OSU, without a doubt, so I didn’t even apply to any other schools. I know that I’m going to get into the Journalism School at OSU, so I have no back up, I just know. It sounds insane, but when you know it’s right, it’s right. And with this car, from the first time that I ever saw one I knew that I was going to have it somehow, and through what I think may be the biggest piece of fate ever I got it. I mean really, finding out that you’re inheriting the exact amount that the bank had just turned you down for on the same day? Meant to be.
Fate or not I adore this car already, though I keep nervously looking out to see if it’s really there, and really mine. But it is, and it’s not the bank’s, not a boyfriend’s, not a parent’s, but mine, and I think that’s what I love the most.
** (From now on I’m just going to equate cost with iPhone prices, as in, “we pay two iPhones a month for rent”, or, “that dress cost me a half an iPhone”)
Insanity continues… October 22, 2009
Two days ago I wrote about how I had found my quasi-sensible dream car within a price range I could manage, and I was thrilled and off to go apply for a loan that day. Well…I didn’t get it. Because of everything that happened in the last year, banks have tightened up their credit limits so much that it’s extremely difficult for many to get a loan for $10,000 like I needed. At first I was heart-broken, but then, I was pissed.
Yes, I will fully admit that a few years back I had some issues with being tremendously broke and naive. I wasn’t making that much money and I didn’t check on my online bank statements because I rarely had access to a computer back then. So I went under in my account, exhorbantent fees were charged, bills were paid late… I was irresponsible, I’ll admit it. Since then however I’ve been working my ass off to save money, spend responsibly, pay off debts and credit cards, as well as old loans. So now that I’m able to pay tuition out of pocket and have no credit cards lingering, I have no credit, or not enough apparently. So because I thought I was being responsible by not having debt, my bank of over 4 years doesn’t want to give me money. So the way that the banking industry works is debt=good credit and trustworthy, no debt + money in savings = not financially reliable. The whole system is seriously damaged.
Defeated (i.e. hysterical), I call my boyfriend and then my mother to tell them my news. As I’m talking (yelling while crying) to my mom she says she’ll see what she can do and will call me back. I had no idea what she meant, but I certainly wasn’t about to let my parents give or lend me money. She calls back fairly shortly thereafter and tells me that my Grandfather, who passed away this Spring, left us an inheritance. Nothing had been officially opened with it yet as they were still undergoing legalities. However just a day or so before, my aunt had wanted to give her daughter, my cousin, her portion to pay for expensive hospital bills for her sick newborn. I’m thrown, I don’t want to get too excited until my mother tells me that I can have the car. No loans, no anything, with this money I can buy my car.
Right now my aunt is trying to fast track the cash, but there has to be a lot of signatures faxed back and forth before anything could even be deposited, so the likelihood of getting it all done by tomorrow when I’d planned on going up to see the car is slim at best. At this point I’m still not actually letting myself believe that this can actual happen, after all the massive ups and downs over just the past week. Until I’m driving away with that car, papers in hand, I won’t believe.
Dreams just may come true, if you can swing the payments October 20, 2009
The last few days I had officially decided that enough was enough with my old beater and I need to stop pushing off getting a new car and just do it already. This uncharacteristic motivation was mainly because my air-tight seal of hefty bag and double stick tape which currently resides in the place where a window used to be is shockingly not so air-tight. With all the freezing cold mornings as of late my car’s been filling with condensation and not fully getting rid of it making it a tad difficult to, you know, see .
So with that decision, and pressure from my always sensible boyfriend, I once again dove into car searches, only this time with actual results needed. Months ago I developed a crush, nay, a deep passionate lusting after a specific car: the Chrysler Crossfire. Since discovering this beauty, and realizing that I could actually afford it, I’ve been a woman obsessed. I look at other cars and just hate them, everything is so boring. The only other cars that still catch my eye are Audi TT’s, BMW’s, Mercedes, and even the random flashy Maserati’s and Lamborghini’s that you occasionally see on a Saturday night. So I think that my desiring a sports car made by Chrysler is pretty reasonable in comparison.
That’s not to say that it isn’t a fantastic car, since it’s made by Daimler-Chrysler it’s actually half Mercedes Benz under the hood. My point to all of this is that I think I may have found my next car, and I’m so sure about this that I’m driving 4 hours to meet the owner and possibly drive home with the car on Friday. I’ve already contacted the bank and should be hearing back anytime now and setting up a meeting with a loan officer after school today. I’ve already looked into and compared insurance rates and it shouldn’t actually be too bad in terms of cost.
But this car is amazing, it’s a ‘04, which is a little older than I wanted, but there are only 32,000 miles on it, so the age doesn’t really matter. The current owner has only used it as a summer car and always keeps it garaged and covered, no accidents, fully loaded, kept in pristine condition, and seriously beautiful. And it’s less than $13,000. I can’t even find an ugly car with the same mileage for that price. He also bought the full extended warranty so that will be transferrable over to me. At first I thought that this deal was too good to be true until I realized where the owner lived: near Detroit. He says that he’s selling because he barely uses it, but I can bet you that the current economic downfall of that city is largely helping me out. So hooray for crippling economic depression! I’ll keep you updated on this as the week unfolds, a lot will hinge on whether I can get a loan or not, because otherwise my dreams are quashed, and I’ll have to drive an ugly car like normal, realistic people *gross*.
Stay tuned kids…
Sample sale + me = supreme happiness October 17, 2009
Twice a year I get to revel in nothing but sheer glory as my boyfriend brings home an enormous box of fantastic goodness that is insanely cheap clothing from the Abercromie and Fitch sample sale. He works for the home office here in Columbus so every Spring and Fall he and hordes of other employees get up at the crack of dawn to scavenge through thousands of boxes of clothing.
Everything has either been tested on; so there be a weird little alteration or tiny slit in the back, or it’s just left over from the last season or so. If it has any sort of damage it is free, if not then it’s only $3. This also includes the items that designers have bought from high end boutiques from all over the world, which is needless to say, massively badass.
I’ve reveled in this glory five times now, but I think that this haul may have been my best. I paid a total of $90 and got 48 articles of clothing, their total retail value I place somewhere between $2,600 and $3,000. That’s right kids, I just got $3,000 worth of very good clothing for $90. I’d hate me too if I weren’t in this position, so don’t worry.
My favorite of the day is this amazing Italian chocolate brown, lusciously soft cropped leather vest that we got for free because of some tiny alteration on it, the original selling price? $426.
Insane right? Whoever said that material possessions don’t buy happiness was out of their mind and had clearly never reaped the rewards of a sample sale.
Dealbreakers October 12, 2009
The other night John and I got into a argument polite discussion about what was apparently his big dealbreaker: children. Apparently he wouldn’t marry someone who wouldn’t have kids with him, as for those of who know me or read this, you know that I haven’t had the fondest thoughts on reproducing little devil spawns of my own. As a “traditional” woman I’m a work in progress I suppose.
But apparently it’s very important to him, a dealbreaker he called it. When he told me this I couldn’t help but be terribly pissed off. Why do you need to have kids? What’s so wrong with the possibility of living a fabulous little life with travel, adventure, and our love for each other? Why do we have to throw someone else into the mix if it’s already good? It’s like when people have a threesome, someone always gets pushed out, and it’s never the new addition. To me I can’t see why I’m spending all this time going to school, and maybe a getting a Masters later, to stay at home for a decade or more “being a mom”, because I certainly wouldn’t want my kids to be raised my strangers or put neighbors and friends out constantly to take care of them. And what if I physically couldn’t get pregnant? Would that still be a dealbreaker? Because if so that’s the most selfish thing ever I think. I’m not “anti-kids” (entirely), but I’m unsure enough. I just don’t want to pigeon hole myself into a situation that may not nessecarily make either of us happy.
I don’t even have a dealbreaker, cheating on me I guess, but nothing else really. I suppose that children are most people’s dealbreakers, and I’m the odd man out here, but the whole thing seems rather callous. Would you really sacrifice a great thing for the possibility of children, but with someone who you wouldn’t be nearly as compatable or happy with?
Honestly though, the thing that really scared me about that whole discussion was that he had a twinge of willingness to give up on me, and give me up if I was unwilling to do this one thing; the first that I’ve sensed from him since we started dating over 2 years ago. If we broke up it would very clearly be the most heartbreaking thing that I believe would ever happen to me, as I know that he is the absolute perfect man for me, he is my balance, but at what point to you set aside happiness to stick to yourself and your values, risking all else?
The light! I see it! October 12, 2009
Last Friday I met with my advisor to do a four quarter projection for school, and what followed was glorious: I will graduate in a year and a half. Spring of ‘11 if everything goes right.
By the end of Winter quarter I am all done with any sort of lingering pre-req, the exception being one final math class for which I have the option of taking a linguistics class in luei of. What college math and linguistics have in common? Got me, but I’ll take it. I also decided on a minor. After being completely unsure of what I wanted to do, even going into the meeting, it suddenly became crystal clear: sociology. I’ve always had an interest in the way that people think and interact, plus I feel it would be beneficial to writing non-fiction, editorial, essay, and human interest stories. So now this coming Thursday I get to meet with my other advisor to try to official declare it as a minor, see if we can carry over a random speech class from my first school to use as credit, and get info on internships (I’d have to do one next summer). So by this Friday I should have everything all set up for the last of my college life 
Oh happy day!
The only thing that everything hinges on is whether or not I get accepted in the actual journalism major, it’s very selective I guess, so I have to keep my grades perfect for these first two quarters and then by 2 weeks into Spring quarter I can officially apply. So my last year would be nothing but journalism, Comm and Sociology classes, and working on “The Lantern” as well. Fingers crossed my friends, fingers crossed!
*gag* October 12, 2009
I have a Communications class that I need to take as a pre-requisite before applying to the Journalism program here, and it’s about 450 people, a large portion of whom are Freshman or Sophmores. This became obvious when discussing a sex blog that is set to become a part of the online portion of our school newspaper “The Lantern”; so many people were freaking out to the reference of drunken hookups and all the crazy partying that OSU, and all college students, do, have done, and will always do. People were massively upset by the language, and called it crass and inappropriate to put into such a prestigious paper like ”the Lantern”, also fearing what people like parents, alumni, and donors would think.
As I sat there listening to this insane discussion I couldn’t help but think: am I taking crazy pills? Why is this an issue? It’s the truth, and far, far worse things happen on every single college campus in America, as it has for decades. What the worst thing that could happen? Parents know the facts? God forbid. And as for alumni taking offense? Clearly these people have never been to an OSU tailgate and game, because prudish squares they are not. Suddenly it became painfully clear to me: these people are so young, and nieve that they are still a bunch of uptight, ill-informed, delusional morons.
It’s not their fault entirely, they just moved away from home and clearly have no idea what happens in the real world. Clearly. This didn’t make me feel old though, I just actually felt grateful to be out of that deluded, unaware phase of my life. What did make me feel old however was while talking to a girl in the class who I work with, we were discussing how I just can’t bring myself to fully get into the whole late 80’s/early 90’s revival going on in fashion right now. I said that because I remembered everything the first time around; the stir-up leggings, the big square sunglasses, the neon and/or acid washed tight jeans that everyone’s wearing today, because I remember it so clearly the first time it was popular, and you just can’t wear the same outlandish styles if you remember wearing them the first time around. To this she just responded “well, I was actually born in 1991, so I don’t remember any of it.”
At this point I almost vomited. I’m aware that these people are younger than, well.. me, but it boggles my mind to think that I have classes with people born in the 1990’s! In my mind, youth seemed to stop at 1989, when my little sister was born as she’s the youngest person who I actually know. But the 90’s?! That’s insane! they weren’t even alive when the Berlin Wall fell, they were only 1 or 2 when Kurt Cobain died, they may just barely remember the Oklahoma City bombing or Columbine. Hell, they were only 9 or 10 on Sept. 11th. I was a senior in high school! It’s as if while focussing so fiercely on how old I was getting I had entirely forgotten about the fact that there are now an increasing amount of people, who seem mind-boggelingly young, who are now a part of my every day life. And they’re just going to keep getting younger while I keep getting older, and God willing, wiser. Than them at least.
Surviving being a student, barely. God I’m too old for this crap… October 9, 2009
I thank the heavens above for the fact that not only is it Friday, but I also don’t have school for two whole glorious days and I have the night off starting at 4:00 after my last class, and I believe there will sushi to reward me for my efforts. All in all good times, I do however have an advisor meeting in about an hour to map out the next 4 quarters and potentially the remainder of my college career, and I have my first midterm at 2:30, and then I do have to work all weekend, and I do have two midterms early next week to study for. But I’m not thinking about all that mess: today will be a good(ish) day.
I’m already going into this exhausted as I had to close last night, and then in true Ginger fashion as soon as I left the building I realized that I had left all my tips and my beloved iFriend inside. Unfourtuantly, the only one left inside was the manager, buried deep inside the office, and the doors were locked. After about 10 minutes of futile window pounding and failed attempts to use the Jedi mind trick, I had to haul my ass, in the rain, several blocks up to a bar where I tried not to sound insane as I babbled on a story about how I needed their phone to look up my work number and then let me call said work number. The bartender seemed baffled that I didn’t know the number- why would I know the number?!? I have a cell phone, I don’t even know my parent’s number let alone my job’s. 40 minutes after I originally left the building I finally get home, now after midnight. Naturally I didn’t go to sleep right away because I was still wired, but mainly because we had “The Office” DVR’ed, and hello Jim and Pam get married? Like I wasn’t going to watch that.
So now I’m super tired, I’ve rarely gotten more than 6 hours of sleep a night, last night was a very nice 4 1/2 so I’m feeling great. I’ve gotten to the point where I have begun to forget my social surroundings, case in point: about 30 minutes ago I’m walking to the library, listening to music, when I feel compelled to dance a little to the song, and so I do. For only about two seconds really, before I realized where I was. So at least I’ve got crazy going for me.
Also yesterday at about 2:30 at the end of German I asked what time tomorrow the online workbook assignments were due, as I had planned to do them today before class, then she told me that they were due at midnight, that day. I had been reading the date wrong and somehow, multiple times, confused the year for the date. So apparently “09″ pertains to the year, not Oct. 9th. Weird. I freak out as I have to immediately leave to run to work and then close, I know that there’s no way that I can get the remaining 5 of 6 assignments done so I think fast and geniusly I do all my assignments, frantically, while riding the bus and parked in the campus parking lot, using only my iPhone.
Oh glorious iFriend, I could write sonnets to you. My love is deeper than you may ever know.
I got every assignment but one done because my battery was on the verge of death, but all in all I’m pretty proud of myself. I swear to God though, if I had just one week where I didn’t have a clusterfuck of overly dramatic happenings I would seriously die of shock at this point.
Ughh… October 7, 2009
Though I’m well on my way to not feeling like I may die at any given moment, the last few days sucked profoundly. After 2 years sans birth control (on my end) I finally went to the doctor and got a prescription like a “responsible adult” (*whatever…*).So Monday was finally the time to start it again, I got the Nuva ring like I had for 4-5 years before I went off of it, and within two hours of putting that little sucker in I felt so painfully nauseous that I could barely stand. At first I thought that maybe I had just eaten something bad the night before, but then it wasn’t getting any better, just worse actually.
After my first class I have a 3 hour break so I took the bus back to my car to lie down while I figured out what I wanted to do, unfortuantly I had to turn in homework to my last class, and my Comm professor only puts up partial lecture notes so I couldn’t just leave without screwing myself over pretty thoroughly. I end up falling asleep in my car, yes, like a hobo. When I wake up I muster up the strength to go back to campus for my final classes, wishing that I could just lie down and die the entire time. I barely make it through the remaining hours of classes and subsequent bus ride back to my car without puking on everyone in sight, though God knows I felt like it. Once I got home I stayed curled up in pain on the couch for the rest of the night.
Best as I can figure the hormones just sent my body into a little slice of personal hell, even now two days later I’m still no where near %100. What really confuses me though is why did the BC affect me this terribly now when it never did before, even the first time I ever took it? Makes no sense, maybe they changed the hormone levels in it. That, or I could be pregnant just like my mother fears (Hi mom!), and my feeling like Death kicked in the shins has nothing to do with birth control whatsoever. Stay tuned I suppose…
