The Last Puff?

As I was sitting outside of McDonlads chugging on my latte, I reached for my cigarettes while simultaneously starring out of my front windshield.  A few employees barreled through the front door of the restaurant anxious to relieve their stress with a cigarette haul.

Needless to say, as I was puffing on my own, I thought to myself  "Jesus Christ, that's me!  I look like that, I smell like that, and I'm desperate like that".

Upon realizing my own pathetic desperation, I realized how much sense my personality actually made.

I spend hundreds of dollars on things that smell good...constantly.
I spend hundreds of dollars on things that smell bad.....constantly.

See the contradiction here?

I bought a nice, expensive candle that set me back about $30.  That's almost 3 packs of cigarettes worth -  just to blast the scent right out the window to have my fix.

I buy expensive laundry soap and fabric softener sheets just so my clothes smell nice for about 5 minutes after putting them on.  Never mind the endless bottles of perfume on the bathroom shelf that no one (not even myself) can smell.

I use my car as a tool, not only to hide from most people on my work breaks, but as my traveling smoke shack.  It's fun to blow smoke into a beautiful smelling air freshener.  It's so worth it to wipe away little ash pieces that's stuck to the dash, and inside of all the vents, under and on the seats, in the floor mats - and of course - all of the particles that's plastered to the drivers side window and side mirror.

I am so sick and tired of being sick and tired.  I made it 3 and 1/2 days without a cigarette a few weeks ago.  I must say, the first day was the easiest, and then my body realized that I wasn't increasing my blood pressure every hour or so and wondered what was up.  It let me know it wasn't impressed when I ended up crashing.  I was exhausted.  I had no energy, I was shoveling food into my face ever few minutes and I was about as happy as Oprah on a diet.  Those were the only days in a long while where I actually treated myself with respect.

I drank an umpteen amount of water, ate well, exercised and went to bed at a decent hour. That all ended when I started smoking again.

Smoking makes me become a person I don't want to be.  A lazy, smelly, slob who can't go anywhere without being concerned about when and where I can smoke.  Long drives with non-smokers are torture, having a nice family dinner and being the only person to "excuse" themselves to go outside is humiliating.  I go through all of these emotions for what?  To engage in a selfish act.

I like to try to justify my addiction by saying things like "I work hard, if I want to smoke I deserve to.", "It's a social thing so I must keep smoking so I do not fall out of my group".  In reality, I am the one spending the money that I work so hard for on something that I have nothing to show for except stained teeth.

I feel like I'm done.  I don't have anymore cigarettes (I smoked the last one in the pack as I was writing this --ironically).  I don't have any money for more.  I could buy another pack and allow the pets to starve.  I could buy another pack and walk over an hour to work because I have no gas.  The big ultimatum has arrived and the answer is obvious.

Smoking is a choice.  You can choose to smoke or you can choose to quit.

I will try to quit again, only hoping to prevail this time.

Make Your Own Friends

I was never a very social person.  When I was younger I was shy and a self-proclaimed "loner" if you will.  I was happy that way and still sort of am.  I never did have many friends - so I ordered my own.

Ladies and Gentleman, I know introduce to you... the world of Sea Monkeys!

I remember the very first time I ordered a package of these little guys.  I was probably 9 or 10 years old.  They were for sale at the school book fair and also in the little booklet of books that came to the school to order from.

I hatched many of Sea Monkeys as well as Triops. I remember sitting at my little desk and watching them for hours and hours, especially waking up for school extra early to see if they've hatched.

I frequently still talk about my love of Sea Monkeys, though I have a hard time finding them anymore, especially where I currently live.

Low and behold, my boyfriend goes on a trip to Mansfield, MA for an Iron Maiden concert and comes home with.....................

SEA MONKEYS!!!!!!

I ripped that package open faster than a fat kid opens a Twinkie and set the tank up for hopeful success.  This is day one.  The water has to sit for 24 hours before you can add the Sea Money eggs.  It feels like waiting for Christmas morning.

Here's a picture of the "eggless" water:

Cheers to hatching your own friends!

A & Double-Poo

My boyfriend and I decided to try out the A&W in Summerside for the first time since it's opening.  We both had eaten at A&W before in other cities so we expected the same here.

We ordered each a Baby Burger.  One with extra pickles and onions, and the other as is.  There were 4 staff members working and about 5 customers backed up waiting for short orders.  I expected it to be a fast transaction and we would leave with onion breath and satisfied.  Not so much.

After about 15 minutes we got our small, individually wrapped burgers and headed to the neat little tables outside to eat.  Neither one of the burgers were marked so we had to inspect them to see whose was whose.  They were both identical with only ketchup, toasted buns and a small meat patty.  Well that set me off.

I marched (well, maybe walked) back inside and informed the young, spaced out looking cashier that there were no pickles OR onions on my burger.  She didn't apologize, just turned to the supervisor who seemed to be the only one doing anything to keep the "show" running, with a quizzical look on her face. The supervisor took my burger and sent it back to the burger-making-station demanding for there to be pickles and onions added to my burger and called them out on their mistake.  People make mistakes, I can understand that, so I stood there waiting for my burger with a nice, polite smile on my face.

Another 5 minutes pass while they fill some more orders without correcting mine first - which in my opinion would have been pretty simple and quick.  The supervisor calls to the back looking for my burger which then appears in the metal tray that sorts the burgers to be given to the right customer. The supervisor took my burger and held it up to the burger making people to confirm my extra condiments were added - they took the burger back AGAIN and "fixed" it.  The supervisor turned to me and mouthed "I told them 5 times!".

I was then given my burger with a smile, a nod and a statement -"Sorry for the mix-up, I would give you some apple turnovers, but we don't have any!"

WHY WOULD YOU BOTHER TELLING ME THAT!?

I scurried outside to meet Neil and finally eat.  He was already finished by this time.  The burger was decent in the end but not worth my time.

Illness for the Innocent

The more I think about illness and disease the more I realize that it only seems to torment and invade the lives of the people who least want to die.  They show strong will, determination to "beat it" <-- haha Michael Jackson reference - and pamper themselves into a total healing.  It's the slow, agonizing, goodbye process that everyone hopes that they get to have before they leave their loved ones.

I know people...probably myself included, that would embrace such a disease or illness in a different way.  As an easy, less selfish, less invasive and much less shocking way to disappear. No one can blame you for getting cancer (they may try to if you smoke, etc), no one can blame you for dying naturally, no one is angry with you for leaving them.

Sometimes I wonder what the point of going on is?  Well, there really isn't one.  You have to make it up yourself.

Some of us will grow old, feeble, alone and sick.  Taken care of by people who may not even really care.  People who have to pay their bills and didn't get hired on in a fast food chain soon enough.

No pictures of your beautiful white wedding on the wall - because you didn't have one.
No pictures of your beautiful children on the wall - because you didn't have any.

I guess you can be thankful for whatever you have, if you have anything worth being thankful for.  Then again, should I be thankful for something that I've earned?  I believe I should just expect it.

Prescription strength to live another day.  Another day to smoke.  Another day ended with wine.

Forecast Calls For Sleet

There was a storm in the forecast for Summerside last night at the Credit Union Place.  This isn't your usual storm, but the Summerside Storm.  Our very own basketball team. 

I attended my first Storm game last night, which also happened to be their last home game of the season.  The crowd packed in closely - approximately a "whopping" 4000 human bodies.

Upon entering the building, all seemed like a normal sporting event.  This all ended at the front door where we were all greeted by screeching bagpipers and a mass of extremely excited children running loose amongst the crowd.  Everywhere I turned I was greeted by someone I knew, which is to be expected in this small city.

We had standing tickets which was fine with me, because there were plenty of seats available for the taking after the game started.

I must admit, I was beginning to get a little excited as the "show" began and had unreasonable high expectations.  Out came the much anticipated cheerleaders.

The cheerleaders ......WTF?

A group of girls who couldn't have been older than 16, came rushing out waving their pom-poms in full sweat suits.  No bikini's, no twirly twirls or flippy-flips.  They were claiming they were part of a dance studio.  It must have been a hard day at school for them because they were about as enthusiastic about being there as they would have been about doing their math homework.  It was simliar to something out of the movie American Beauty - minus the typical cheer outfits.  You almost feel guilty for watching them, but you don't because after all - they are wearing full on sweatshirts and sweat pants.

Ignoring the girls, I began to focus on our team.  Most of our players are "imported", which is quite obvious and reassuring.  I would hate to see anyone from Summerside (including myself) play basketball, or worse, wear shorts and a tank top.

On with the half-time show! YAY!  This is usually one of the best parts of the whole game in itself.  At least if you're watching live NBA.  A guy I've never heard of or seen before came out with a microphone and guitar.  Not a bad singer, but definitely pub style.  He sang a song that was annoying similar to Copperhead Road - which would have been a much better choice.

The girls came back out and did their little dance while I stuffed my face with two huge slices of garlic fingers and dipping sauce.  $4.00 a slice, not bad.

Summerside Storm was in the lead for most of the night and towards the end, it was an almost obvious win.  The announcer had the entire crowd stand (good for press pictures I'm sure - makes us all look excited) so we could all watch Summerside LOSE.

With all my criticism, I did have fun.  It was something to do on a Friday night and my boyfriend and I had loads of fun people watching.

One thing to remember though, in Summerside you can never really get your hopes up because when they call for a storm, we get sleet.  Messy. Wet. Sleet.

Enchanced Productivity?

Finally paying off my laptop that was leased from Easy Home, I decided to go pick up my final receipt.  Since I am now considered a "good" customer, they suggested I take home whatever I wanted to try in the store for a month at no cost.  Needless to say, I walked out the door with an Asus Eee Pad Transformer.  It's a tablet that hooks onto an optional full keyboard turning it into an almost netbook.  I say almost because it functions on Android - so basically it's a huge smart phone minus the phone, netbook and tablet all in one.

I must say that I'm impressed with it so far.  It's  not as functional as my laptop and the typing is a little bit laggy, but at least I'm not stuck with the on-screen touch keyboard like most other tablets.

Since I did borrow it from Easy Home, there were very obvious other "owners" of the tablet.  One young girl failed to delete all the pictures she took with the built-in webcam, and another older lady seemingly forgot to sign out of Facebook.  Note to my readers - Easy Home, as nice as the staff are, do not "clean" their products as well as they should before "re-homing".

In my month of testing this thing from the future, I am hoping for more improvements on the book I hope to write.  I will be able to type anywhere and everywhere while abandoning the newly purchased laptop in the hands of my boyfriend.  My laptop is very convenient for at home use, but not for travel as it weighs a ton.

The Asus Transformer that I'm playing with is heavier than most tablets, but the screen is exceptionally large and has a better quality resolution than the ipad 2.  Also weighing in the keyboard, it's about as heavy as a netbook.

If I can produce documents, work on my book, check Facebook, watch YouTube videos and update my blog normally, then all should go well.