Pumpkin Spice Latte is Back!!

That sentence is what tells most NYers that the season has changed. Yup. Pumpkin Spice Latte. Soon it will be the Gingerbread Latte (indicating we should start behaving our selves because Santa is checking his list). Time flies and soon we will start all over with the iced lattes again (summer - you get it).

Yes, time flies. Obviously I haven't been on this thing is quite sometime, but life was just whizzing along. Things happened. I moved in with the boy. I got a new job. I quite the new job and in 2 weeks I'll be starting a newer job. Details are pointless and I hate to play catch-up. So here we are in the season of Pumpkin Spice Lattes and knee-high boots. Oh and hats! Love those.

OK some catch-up I suppose would make sense. In May, the Boy and I officially moved in together. To a much bigger apartment than my suffocating studio. He even has his own room in which to keep his Playstation and other Boy things. It's no longer Manhattan, but it's a 10 minute train ride away and it's cute. He loves to cook (which is a step-up from Lean Cusine every night and Slim Fast bars every day) and it's been a surprisingly smooth transition. Even the dog seems happy. Oh - and he's the only straight boyfriend in NY that I know of who suggests we go to the Christmas Tree Shops to look for "apartment things". I love it.

My job - another longish story. I left the ER in search of bigger and better and became a nurse manager. I won't get into all the glitz and glamor of my role. Let's just say - I'll take a cracked chest, multiple trauma any day over sitting at a computer doing chart reviews. So I decided to quit. Some say bold, I say obvious. And in 2 weeks time, I will be working as a nurse again in the Neonatal ICU. Of course I will throw in a few OT ER shifts for fun because I love drunks and traumas.

In world news - The American Girl Doll Company has come out with a limited edition Homeless Girl Doll. Yes. Homeless. Her name is Gwen and she lives in a van with her mom. I kid you not - I read it in the news. They even went as far as to interview a homeless person who said she likes the representation.

WTF? My 17 year old cousin already doesn't want to go to college. Imagine if she had Homeless Gwen growing up. She'd be ditching her room for a used van down in Far Rockaway.

Anyway, I think that's enough catching up for today. I'm going to go drink my Pumpkin Spice Latte now.

Click Here for Gwen - the Homeless American Girl. Did I mention she cost 95 dollars??http://jezebel.com/5367098/the-newest-american-girl-doll-has-a-secret

What I Know I Learned from Reality TV

This is what I know:

1. my dog is a lazy bitch

2. ben and jerry's has the best ice cream

3. drunk homeless people usually say very funny things

4. girls are catty bitches

5. that no matter where you are in the country - "Raising Helen" is on somewhere

6. that smell your pee gets when you eat asparagus? it's a dominant trait - most people have it but not all

7. white tigers are NOT Siberian like everyone thinks - they are just Bengal and they have the recessive trait of being white with blue eyes.

8. that regardless of the color - all tigers have smushy faces that I want to kiss

9. wine cures anxiety

10. i can't drink on the job

11. shoes cure depression much like wine cures anxiety

12. EVERYONE in the world picks their nose. and if they say they don't they're liars. and if they cover their face with their non-dominant hand while "scratching" with the dominant hand - they're digging for gold

13. i like lists

Seriously random, but so was the day.  Life is chill these days and not much going on.

Clogged Up

I've been blocked.  At least 3 people commented on why I haven't updated in a while and the best thing I can say is - I've been blocked.  

Not that there's nothing going on in my life.  It's just that sometimes I'm just waiting for something to happen, sometimes I've got a bit on my mind and I'm not able to write it down until I know how it pans out.  Like I can't jinx it or make it real or something....

Anyway, I'm sure this will lift (like it always does) and I'll be posting again sometime soon.

Yes, another blog post about Facebook - but yet different somehow

Facebook is an essential tool for stalking.  Duh.  I'm sure this wasn't the most groundbreaking sentence since Shakespeare asked us "To be or not to be... blah blah blah some other stuff".  Which reminds me - "Hamlet 2" was hysterical.  See it.  I swear you won't burn in hell. 

Anyway, back to Facebook.  Last night, while enduring the longest night at work in ages, I decided to poke around on the the ol' book.  I joined this group called "If you lived in the Whitestone, Bayside area and grew up in the 80's, 90's..."  and managed to find all of the people I went to Jr. High with.  It was quite the event.

My personal favorite was when I discovered the boy I shared my first kiss with.  Ben.  He was a scrawny little thing with big blue eyes and a love for Green Day that I so admired.  We wrote notes in class and he would roller blade to my house and kiss me.  Then he would roller blade off into the sunset and I would walk around all dreamy-eyed for the next 6 hours and write about it in my journal.  Ben and I ended when his BFF Matt decided he liked me and sent his brother Nick to throw an egg at poor old Benny Boy.  Hit him square in the stomach.  Then Nick walked me home because Matt had baseball practice and Nick kissed me, much to Matt's dismay.  

I felt very important being the center of this dramatic love square.  I even wrote poems about it.  Sadly, it wouldn't be the last time I enjoyed the drama of friends and brothers fighting for my honor.  

Anyway, when I came across Ben's page, it turns out he's become one of those Pre-Pubescent looking Male Models.  And most likely he's gay.  I wonder if it's the bitter taste of the ill-requited love he felt for me that turned him off to women forever??  Probably not.  But I like to think I make an impact.

Facebook is like an open window into the pasts and futures of everyone you know.  If you look hard enough you could link so much together.  You could find out who they were before you knew them.  The nerds, the whores, the weird kids.  Do enough detective work and it all comes together.  Not that I have that kind of attention span.  I'm just saying - you could.

Yaz is for suckers...

The makers of Yaz promise PMS side effects will affect me no more. They promise less bloating, less hunger, less oh-my-god-the-world-is-ending anxiety attacks. They promise all of this PLUS shorter periods. "Sign me up", I said.

Well, it's been and a month and I see no change. Here I am, in the midst of PMS. I want to eat chocolate, I want to cry, I want it to rain so I can justify this cloud I'm living under. I want to press fast foward and get on with it because I am having the stupid anxiety attacks again. The one where I will never make any money and am destined to live in a studio apartment for the rest of my life.

The way I've begun to deal with this anxiety is by simply acknowledging the fact that this is all brought on by hormones. I know, logically, the world won't end. I know, eventually I will make enough money to have a savings. But it would really really help if Yaz were to hold up their end of the freakin bargin.

Bastards.

Flashy Pants, Flashy Pooch

They make diapers for dogs. I know this because, this past weekend, I bought them. It was probably one of the most embarrassing purchases I've made in the past year or so. Even more embarrassing than when I bought "Fun Betty" which is a cleverly packaged box of hair dye for your "down there hair". It wasn't that much fun - in case you're wondering. I bought hot pink and the entire process took an hour. The end result? My Betty looked a little bloody. Not as sexy as I had imagined, but I digress.

Dog diapers. Being the over protective mom of my fur kid that I am, I have a crazy mad fear of getting her fixed. I'm a nurse. I know the risks of major abdominal surgery on people. Let them take the knife to my poor, unsuspecting baby??? Never. So, once every 6 months, she gets a visit from her aunt flow.

I was out in Long Island, being a house guest of The Boy's all weekend and I did not want to have tiny drops of blood on his carpet, so I did what any other normal dog owner would do in my situation. I bought a pair of "Flashy Pants" ("for the bitch in season" read the insightful description on the box - and I ask: aren't we all?). Let's not forget the accompanying box of sanitary pads that fit inside the "washable undergarment". What the hell is it under?? The dog has fur! If anything, it's a over-garment.

This purchase was more embarrassing than the time I had to buy my own box of tampons for the first time. I was actually standing on line - in a PET store - with a box that clearly said "sanitary pads" on the front and sides. I felt like one of those sick people who paint their dog's toenails and parade them around in baby buggies.

The poor dog was so embarrassed in her Flashy Pants. She walked around with her butt to the floor the whole time. There's a ruffle on the end. Her tail peeks through. It was just a barrel of ridiculous. Not to mention the fact that she was accidentally let out in the backyard with her Flashy Pants still on. She had her first accident.

My dog wet her pants!!!

She could barely bring herself to play with the other dogs, so embarrassed was she.

Seriously, it must be love. True, unconditional, pet love. Because there I was, on the floor, the dog on her back, changing her diaper, assuring her that the accident was not her fault. She looked so confused. So fearful that her mommy had probably lost her mind.

I do have to say, though, those Flashy Pants do work. The carpet was spared. For the mere price of $15. And my dog's dignity.

Scary predictions and cucumber sandwiches

Four.  I have taken four pregnancy tests in the past week.  And my period isn't even late.

Why so obsessive? you ask?  

There are a couple of reasons.  The number 1 reason being that I've been unbearably nauseated every single day.  And in the seconds in between not being about to lose my cookies, I am ravenously hungry.  For weird things.  For the past 2 nights, I've made myself cucumber sandwiches with laughing cow cheese.  Weird, huh?

Also, I'm moody.  I've been reading "Marley and Me", the book about the crazy dog, and every other anecdote makes me cry.  

Not to mention the peeing.  I've been on like a running faucet of pee.

But each test has been (thankfully) negative.  I'll be the first to admit, when I get an obsession in my mind, a fear or a paranoia, I do not let up until it has proven itself to be impossible.

Another reason this has been on my brain is a rather silly, embarrassing one.  There is a woman I work with who swears she gets "feelings" and according to her, she is always on the mark with her "feelings".  She came up to me (unsolicited) to tell me she strongly feels I am going to be pregnant in the next 6 months.  And she reminds me of this every time I see her.  To the point where it's like "lady stop wishing your baby voodoo on me".

This alleged pregnancy, of course, is news to me.  I am on the pill.  I live in a studio apartment that barely houses me and my dog.  I have a shoe fetish.  I am not anywhere near ready to start sharing my space or my uterus.  But she swears it's coming.  

I take my pill religiously since she's said this.  If I could, I'd take 2 a day.  My mom had me while using the diaphragm (a disclosure she once made over a beer at Murphy's, my local bar - to which my dad jutted in "I have super sperm!" thanks guys, I'll forever have THAT image in my brain).  My aunt popped out 3 consecutive rugrats while on the pill.  What are the odds?

I'm sure my fears are unwarrented.  I wouldn't call them fears, really.  More like things I pray to God won't happen right now.  But I do have a very overactive imagination.  And besides, how well intuned is this psychic lady with my ovaries?  Shouldn't I be getting the strong feeling??  After all, I've housed the suckers for all these years.  Why aren't they sending me psychic visions?