Post 016 - This really bothers me...

Read this article from Reuters...
China "cancer village" pays ultimate price for growth


In short it is about how an area that used to be an expanse of farmland and small rural villages, is now over run with noxious and cancerous pollution from surrounding factories. Now 1 in 50 people (even children as young as 7) in the area are being diagnosed with various cancers in a place where 30 years ago cancer was unheard of.

It is really sad the extremes people are doing to the environment, and in turn affecting human health.

Post 015 - Random Life Tidbits

(written December 5, 2008)

Blah. I'm bored. I've been cleaning house most of the day, and I really don't want to anymore. So... yay for the internet!

I've been working on some recipe books for various family members for xmas gifts. I need to work some more on them or they're never going to get done before Dec. 25th. Blah. Even when I'm not at work, I'm working on something or other.

This afternoon I will be putting in my resume at DSR, where Greg works. (The CableOne thing, unfortunately, didn't work out.) Hopefully, I'll get the job at DSR. It pays pretty well.

Reading the "Twilight" series again. It's better the second time around. Eventually, I'll go see the movie again with my buddies Stephanie and Jamie from work.

My 22nd birthday is in 9 days. (December 14th)

Post 014 - Good Times, Good Times, and Other Serious Things

So on Saturday I saw Twilight. I thought that it was pretty good. I am not trying to lower myself to fangirl status, but *damn* Rob Pattinson, the actor who played Edward was freaking hawt. Geez. I just used the word "hawt." I have lowered myself to fangirl status. *sigh*

On a slightly happier note, I can get my driver's license back today!!!!! The 180 days were up on Sunday, but I finally am able to go today. Of course, it's like an hour drive and leaves me less $300... ugh.

And on a more serious note:
Don't drink and drive. Luckily, when I was stopped it was because my husband was puking his guts out the window, not because I had run over someone or crashed into something. It is an extremely expensive and humiliating experience. After all the classes, the fines, the lawyer, the night in jail, and the license reinstatement fee it's come to over $2000 and six months of having to ask people for a ride to work all the time. Plus all the guilt that I had to deal with for months for one bad decision. IT IS NOT WORTH IT.

Post 013 - Twilight Is Coming Out This Week!

(Oh no. Not another one of those.) No, I'm not one of those stupid fan girls that want to marry Edward so badly that they could pee their pants. I just think that the movie actually looks good compared to a book. And they are really good books. I just think that some people take their love of a series a bit too far. *cough cough* harry potter.

And now, for your viewing pleasure, a nice little wallpaper of the Twilight cast.

Post 012 - Pathetically Alone

I have been so annoyed with my life lately. I never got the call from CableOne. I NEEDED that job, for more reasons than one, but I never got the damn call. I did not get the job. Greg applied for a job on the same day as I did for another job, and had the interview today. Guess what? He got the freaking job. Twelve stinking dollars an hour. It's like he doesn't even have to try. I feel so useless and pathetic. He keeps saying that I need to get another job. I've been trying!!!! Maybe I've just been thinking to high of myself. And assistant management position at Cato? CableOne? Maybe I'm just kidding myself. I did't get either job. Maybe if I apply at a fast food joint as a stinking food fryer I might get that!!!! But I hate food. And that would be worse pay than I am getting now. I want to move UP in the world.

My only social interaction besides Greg and Kaleb is work and the computer. I come home and zone out in front of this stupid screen that I love and hate so much. I love it because it gives me something to do, something to get my mind off things. I hate it because it drains me and makes me realize just how pathetic I really am.

I used to play World of Warcraft all the time, but now I barely play once or twice in a two-week span. Even then, I didn't really chat or interact with other players. It is just me, myself, and I. This stupid blog is all I really have to talk to about my problems. Greg just says "Everything will get better." "Everything will work out." But I am still recovering from September when our relationship was at rock bottom, and I left him. But I came back and Greg keeps wanting everything to be perfect and wonderful and it's not. Nothing is wonderful. I feel like he doesn't understand me.

I feel so alone.

/grumpy

Also: it is exactly one month until I turn 22. (December 14)

Post 011 - The Weekend

This weekend was pretty uneventful. I worked. And I worked some more. Nothing big or exciting. Just impatiently waiting for my phone call from CableOne. And we played Monopoly last night. I lost.... spectacularly. Todd (my mom's fiance) and Keith (my brother), who was playing for my mom who was conked out on the couch, ended up being the last two in the game.

Post 010 - The Interview at CableOne

You've been hearing all about it the past couple of days. And it actually happened! (Which means you get to hear even more about it!) It was at 1:00 yesterday. I was dressed in casual business attire. Black pinstriped shirt, my faux pearl necklace, my black dress pants which also double as my current work pants, and some black high heels. Yeah. I looked nice. (See photo of my sexy self!) I walked in confident and left confident. Of course, I still have to wait until Monday for a call for the second interview if I qualify. Hopefully I do. I NEED this job.



The perks of this job are awesome: Free digital cable, DVR recorder, internet, phone, $9.19 per hour plus commissions which can get up to $500 a month, two weeks paid vacation right off the start and six paid sick days. Of course there's also the insurance and all that other boring stuff too. And then, if I'm employed with them for 7-8 months, I get to go on an expenses paid trip to Pheonix, AZ for a training business trip. Fabulous! Of course I have to actually get the job first. Which entails a second interview, a two hour scenario test, and a drug test. But I'm feeling really good about this.

Wish me luck everyone. I hope I get that call on Monday!

Post 009 - I Got the Interview!

I got through to the interview. I got a call at work today for me to come into an interview for the position at CableOne. It is tomorrow at 1:00. I am crossing my fingers... wish me luck!

Post 008 - A New Job? Goddess, I Hope So.

So I filled out my application to CableOne (the local cable company) for the "Customer Service and Sales Representative" position. I love my job at Staples in the Copy Center, but (1) Not enough money for the stress and (2) Not enough hours to get the money to pay bills. On the other hand, I've made friends there and I pretty much love the people I work with.

I hope that I get the new job though. I feel like it's going to open up a lot of new opportunities for me.

Post 007 - Halloween

Halloween was fun. A lot more fun than I thought it would be. I dressed up Kaleb as "Little Caesar" or a Greek complete with laurel leaf head band and adorable little toga. I was a monarch butterfly. My costume was bits and pieces of costumes I had from previous years, but Kaleb's was homemade with gold scrapbook paper and a white over sized t-shirt. Talk about genius.


The night started by Kaleb and I going to get my cousin, then my mom and brother. We went trick or treating at the mall, then back to my mom's house where we went trick or treating up and down my mom's street and the next street over. Afterwards, when Greg got off work we all went to the bowling alley for "Scream Extreme" bowling.


I also probably should have taken a photo of the haul we got. We got us some candy!

Post 006 - I Don't Like Being Ignored

So... The Husband is ignoring me. Cold shoulder. As in ten words or less the past two days. I walk in the room, he leaves. Really subtle, huh dude? He won't even play with Kaleb. He was in the other room playing with him for the first time in a while, I walk in to get my clothes, he gets up and walks out. I am sick of this pathetic excuse for a relationship.

Post 005 - Baby Shower Time

So I went to a baby shower today for my friend from high school. I haven't seen her or my other friend that was there for ages. It was weird and awkward. It is strange that everyone is getting older. It makes me feel old. I have a child, my friends from school are having kids and getting married. Even though I'm just 21, I feel so old.
*le sigh*
On a happier note, there was cake! Really good white-chocolate raspberry filled cake with chocolate covered strawberries on top. Yum. And a very cute, very tiny baby girl. Her name is Kara (pronounced car-ah) Andromeda. Yeah. I know. But her mother is named Cassiopia. So that is to be expected.

Post 004 - Spelling Lessons

I ran across this article while randomly exploring the internet. It has a great explanation of Wicca and witchcraft. Enjoy!

"Spelling Lessons" An Article By Sarah Faith Alterman
(Click here to see the web page at the Boston Pheonix)

The Boston University classroom is abuzz. A dozen students, gathered for an extracurricular meeting, bounce around, sliding in and out of the kind of archaic classroom desks that feature thin beige tabletops attached by metal bars to unbearably uncomfortable seats, sucking down takeout, giggling effervescently about Facebook and 21st birthdays. Co-president Amber Dame, a BU senior, is writing out the evening's discussion agenda on the blackboard. Items include: the full moon, dark gods and goddesses, a bake sale, Salem.

"I am not going to Salem on Halloween," exclaims senior Alex DeSimone.

"But it's a really fun way to embrace the stereotype!", Dame replies.

These students are members of Nemeton, an officially recognized religious organization for people in the BU community who practice Wicca.

Oh my Goddess!

Lots of people define Wicca as “modern witchcraft,” which is partially true. Others write Wicca off as a stigma of evil and weirdness — dirty hippies and pentacle-wearing, elf-eared, 12-sided-dice rollers. The truly clueless associate Wicca with devil worship and sadistic rituals, like goat sacrifices and Republican rallies.

In truth, modern Wicca is a peaceful, ethereal sort of belief system, loosely rooted in ancient pagan custom and ritual, and based on a reverence for nature and the Earth.

"In short, being Wiccan means seeing the divine as an equal balance of feminine and masculine forces known as the Goddess and the God," explains Emerson College sophomore Emily Robinson, 19. “[It’s] worshipping these forces in nature and within ourselves, celebrating the cycles of nature, showing respect for all living things and alternate beliefs, refraining from harm wherever possible, and believing in the power of karma to punish or reward our actions."

Not as exciting as The Craft, huh?

The religion, as Robinson describes it, is relatively young, popularized in the 1950s by a British civil servant named Gerald Gardner, who published several books on the subject and is widely regarded as a central figure in the Wicca movement.

On college campuses, where teenagers struggle to define themselves outside of preconceived boundaries, a fair number of students are searching for spiritual validity. And many find their spiritual and social needs best met by adopting a belief system that is the polar opposite of the one they were introduced to as children. After all, college is famously a time of rebellion, self-expression, exploration. No better way to stick it to Mom and Dad than to cast a circle and chant incantations over an herbal sachet, right?

But Wicca isn't really too far a cry from, say, Christianity, the holidays of which are partially, sometimes outright, based on ancient pagan rituals. Those who mock Wicca with sneering indigence might take a second to meditate on the custom of bringing a pine tree inside your house and decorating it with lights and fruits, or carving a face into a pumpkin and throwing on a scary costume. Gardner himself wrote, in his 1959 book The Meaning of Witchcraft, "To a Roman Catholic who believes in transubstantiation, that is, that the bread and wine of the mass are literally changed into the flesh and blood of Christ, a ceremonial insult to the host would be the most awful blasphemy; but witches do not believe this, so it would simply be absurd to them to try to insult a piece of bread."

Many Wiccans practice "magic," a solo or group ritual effort to effect some kind of change, which seems akin to, oh, I don't know, prayer. As for dressing oneself in robes and flowers in order to perform a secret candlelit ritual, as many Wiccans do, think back to your fraternity or sorority days. See? Surprise! You're Wiccan and you didn't even know it.

Ariana Zarate, 19, a sophomore at Wellesley College, and UMass-Amherst sophomore Joshua Berkowitz, 18, were raised in Christian households, and turned away from church after years of discontent and curiosity.

"One of my friends got into Wicca, and, at the time, I was very religiously Christian," says Berkowitz. "So, I studied Wicca in order to try and persuade her out of it. The more I studied Wicca, the more I respected it."

A few years later, Berkowitz is active in the western Massachusetts Wiccan community, and he's a member of the UMass pagan organization SPIRALS (Students Pagans Integrating Religion and Life Spiritually). He recently founded a new Wiccan tradition, the Avatarian Rite of Wicca, which, he says, will function much like a secret society.

Stop rolling your eyes. William Howard Taft, Senator John Kerry, and that idiot currently running our country are members of a secret society called Skull and Bones. Which is a much, much creepier name than "The Avatarian Rite of Wicca." Plus, no Wiccans ever played Russian roulette with our tax dollars, and lost.

Both Zarate and Berkowitz say that the shift in their respective religious beliefs aligned with their decisions to come out of the closet. "Wicca felt open and accepting. While I was Catholic, I felt a little odd being queer," says Zarate. "I heard so many things about the Catholic community not being accepting of non-heterosexuality. There was no such feeling in Wicca."

Salem State sophomore Judith Valentine, 22, also raised in a Catholic household, found, like Zarate, that a religious doctrine at the opposite end of the theological spectrum was the best solution to her discontent.

"My first religion wasn't a very good fit, so I started looking for something better," says Valentine. "[Wicca] is basically the polar opposite of everything I found dissatisfying about Catholicism."

One would assume that a college like Salem State, so close to the witchcraft Motherland, would host a vibrant community of Wiccans who scatter the campus with Maypoles and garlands and positive energy galore. Not so, says Valentine. Surprisingly, there are no Wiccan organizations on campus, no galvanized community of "Magickal" students.

"During my orientation, we were given forms to fill out, if we so wished, about our religions," she says. "There was no box for Wicca, so I checked 'other' and wrote it in. About a week later, I got a letter from the school's Protestant adviser, inviting me to some group or other. I still think it's a little funny that the closest thing they have to Wicca at my school is Protestant, especially since of all the cities in the country, Salem has, arguably, the best visible representation of the Wiccan community."

Magick money

Student-run groups such as Nemeton or SPIRALS, which are well-organized, well-regarded, and meet weekly on school property, aren't easy to come by on many Massachusetts college campuses. Universities seem reluctant to recognize Wicca as an actual religion, so Wiccan groups generally don't have access to the same resources and funding as, say, a Catholic, Jewish, or Muslim organization. For that reason, students like Valentine, Zarate, and Robinson don't have a galvanized community with which to practice their religion.

It doesn't help their cause, probably, that Wicca is so often wrongly associated with cheesy occult paraphernalia and abhorrent demonic activity.

"At first, my interest in Wicca was very childish. I loved lighting candles and incense, writing 'magick' with a 'k' at the end," says. Robinson. "I was attracted to the fancy trappings of the religion — crystals, oils, ornate statues, velvet robes. Wicca had a deliciously 'forbidden' aura. The more I studied Wicca,” she continues, “the more I came to understand that the heart of this faith has nothing to do with candles, crystals, or even spells and witchcraft."

"There are people who really do believe that Wicca is a Devil-worshipping religion, which is ironic, because Wiccans don't actually believe in the Devil at all," says Berkowitz. "We're not a Satanic religion."

"Wiccans aren't trying to make Satanists into scapegoats, either," he explains, after pausing to laugh at his choice of descriptive noun. "Not only is Satanism a legal religion in the US, but Satanists don't sacrifice things. They denounce that activity. If you read The Satanic Bible, you'll see that sacrifice is actually considered a fallacy. But people are afraid of Satanists and, by proxy, witches and Wiccans."

Many young Wiccans maintain a sense of humor about their typecasting. Back at BU, Nemeton, hard up for cash like any other student organization, is discussing their latest fundraising efforts. (And, no, they can't just conjure it out of thin air. They're witches, not alchemists.) The discussion, momentarily interrupted when a cell phone erupts with a Star Trek theme song ring-tone, centers on the regular bake sales that Nemeton sponsors to earn extra money — efforts that are especially profitable around Parents' Weekend.

"When the parents realize who they're buying cookies from, it's the greatest thing ever," says Dame, and the group laughs about how awkwardly suspicious and nervous their classmates' parents grow when confronted with a pack of young Wiccans, laden with baked goods.

"I love when they get all freaked out but try to make jokes about it," says DeSimone, "and ask things like, 'Did you put a spell on this cookie?' ’’

"I like to tell them 'yes,' ” she continues. “A spell for deliciousness." Poof!

Sara Faith Alterman ensures that no goats (or even chickens) were harmed in the preparation of this article. She can be hexed at salterman@phx.com

Post 003 - Passing Out In Public Is Pretty Embarrassing

So, I passed out at work today... in front of a customer. Embarrassing.

I was checking someone out, and I got dizzy. My head started spinning and I got what I call "sparkly vision" where everything gets grayed out on the edges. I asked one of my co-workers to finish checking her out, and I went to sit down. My manager went to get me some water and I was left up there pretty much alone. Then this lady came up to the copy center and I had to get up (as much as I didn't want to...) to take care of her. I turned around, grabbed the white-out, and reached down and... I blacked out. For maybe 2 seconds, but still.

When I came to, I heard the lady yelling, "Help! Help!" My aunt, who works at the store with me, was holding me up. (Maybe I was out longer than 2 seconds? Because she must have run over there pretty damn fast.)

Everyone made me drink water and eat crackers and whatnot.

For the rest of the day:
"Are you okay?"

"Yes. For crying out loud. I am FINE." For the most part. Sheesh.

Post 002 - Depressed Post to the Multitudes of Non-Readers

I doubt anyone actually reads these things, unless of course there are a ton of really cool links, something awesome and fantastic, or tons of subscribers.

Blah. I have none of the aforementioned features. I will eventually, but as of this moment: nada. And I'm too lazy to do it right now. Well... I'm bored enough. So maybe I will.

I just need someone to talk to. I need a friend. And this sad computer is all I've got. I've already made the MySpace rounds. YouTube has gotten boring.

My son is playing around behind me, dragging out my art stuff and stringing it out all over the room, so that is another mess I have to clean up later. My worthless husband is at work after an entire day of ignoring me.

Sometimes I wonder if I made the right choice. Should I have gone back to him? Well, I did. After all that begging and the promises. Sure, everything was good for awhile. But for the week of our anniversary we were at it again. It is like a roller coaster, to use the classic cliche, living with him. I probably will end up leaving him. As soon as I get my stinking license back at the end of November.

I am so depressed. Being married sucks. My job sucks. Not having anyone to talk to sucks. My self-absorbed mother sucks. Everything sucks. (Well, except my son, but I do need a vacation from him too.) I just want to be happy...

EDIT: Nov. 7, 2008

Just letting anyone know who reads this: don't be offended. I wasn't well mentally when I wrote this, but I won't delete it because it shows how much I have changed in the past few weeks.

Post 001 - Random Blog Names

It is amazing how anyone can come up with a site name for a free blog anymore. If you think about it there have to be thousands of the damn things out there, if not millions. In a few years people will have to resort to random sequences of numbers and letters for their blog addresses. Actually, I think that Yahoo email addresses already have...