Things I want to examine in detail, but I need something to get the creative juices flowing, so I’ll come back to them later

1. I just watched the full Omarossa vs. Wendy Williams “battle.” I am sorely disappointed by both of them. They just acted like straight fools. Damn, that could have been a beautiful moment for black women, nay women everywhere. Especially with Omarossa’s book, which is basically a self help book for women to gain empowerment. But I am tempted to disregard her book because of the idiocy she displayed on that show. Wendy Williams, ech. I’ve never been about her. Seriously? Something aint right with that chick…
2. I went shooting yesterday for the second time in my life. When I was younger I used to always say that I wanted a “gun room” in my house, and that I would want to go shooting on a regular basis. Yeah the most I had shot was a bow and arrow, which btw ROCKED MY SOCKS OFF (I need to get back on that). Guns, not so much. The entire time at the range, i thought “this gun is made to kill.” I couldn’t get over that. Especially with the target I was shooting at (a man climbing through a window, who suspiciously looked like a black man who wasn’t colored in).
3. I cut off all of my hair, and this time it might have actually been a mistake.
4. “Don’t leave me” makes saying goodbye that much harder.
5. Counseling
6. Leaving Gainesville, Fl, after 6 years.
7. Donating stuff. Really do not send one guy with a flimsy furniture dolly to my house, especially when I told you that I have a lot of heavy furniture to donate (i.e. a solid wood desk, a ceramic topped table, and two desks) and then don’t take everything because the guy can’t move it by himself. I don’t do moving furniture. Sorry call me a spoiled brat, but the whole point of me spending my time searching for a company that specifically hires movers to pick up the furniture is so that I DON’T HAVE TO MOVE THE FURNITURE. Ech. Also freecycle sucks. no not the idea, but the actual execution. people are assholes and i hate having to deal with them.
8. Having to pay to get rid of furniture!!! The city of gainesville charges residents who do not live in houses to dispose of their large furniture. Half of the housing units in Gainesville are apartments, and then they wonder why people just throw stuff on the side of the curb.
9. Party monster the book and the movie. Them mofos were craaaaazy.
10. I purchased a wig today. I like the wig, but I almost had to give the lady who sold it to me the business. How you gonna make fun of the person spending money with you, so I had to give it right back to her.
11. Had the absolute worst experience at Tijuana flats in Gainesville, fl. But it evened out.

I really want to examine these issues in greater detail, but not right now. I had to get them written down before I forgot them.

peace

[initials]

things

i don’t feel like a full update.

1. I submitted my thesis! Finally that is a load off my back. Ike was beating me up on a regular basis and I had to escape from that abusive relationship. My blood pressure was 160/100 last week messing around with Ike. That’s stroke territory.
2. Everyone has insecurities. That’s just life. If you live a life completely free of insecurities, then you are dead. With that said, I absolutely hate when people act mad at me, because my insecurities are different from theirs, as a matter of fact you might not even see mine unless you get to know me. Case in point, I attended a potluck Saturday. Some guy engaged me in a conversation. Turns out he is in the navy reserve and is doing his residency for ophthalmology. At first I was not trying to talk to him, I wanted to get some food to stuff my face, but he kept talking. And when I learned that he was in the navy/doctor I became, hmm let’s say more receptive to the thought of having a discussion with him. That’s not the problem. The problem was, some chick was hating on me the entire time, because i didn’t know this man from Adam, yet you would not have gathered that from watching us interact. I am a talker, I am energetic, I am confident and I can have an interactive conversation with a brick wall. I’m just that good. Apparently Miss Thang does not like that about me, because she doesn’t have that skill. I say dude work on yourself instead of hating on me. Sometimes I get the feeling that people think I should be some shy, shut in because I am overweight. Uh ye-ah no.
3. I am going to burn Ike in effigy.
4. I graduate 08/09/2008 at 10am in the Stephen C. O’Connell center, or as us gators like to call it, the o dome!
5. i still have not purchased guitar hero 3.
6. I drive a hooptie and I am proud of it. Even if it is all kinds of jacked up
7. In a fit of uncontrollable rage, I broke my precious sidekick 3. I am now trying to find a refurbished Tilt from ATT. I will make the switch once I find this phone. Its all kinds of super awesomeness.

That is all for now.

You say [I'm] Just A Friend

Recently raving black lunatic wrote a post concerning the difference between friends and acquaintances, and the differences in how whites and blacks define these relationships. Apparently white people will claim that they have black friends, while black people claim that many of those same white people are only acquaintances. The disconnect comes from how the different racial groups define these relationships. He started the post with an anecdote about when he was younger. Back then he thought that everyone was his friend, but his mom asked him one simple question which completely changed his frame of reference. That question was “what’s your friend’s last name?” He couldn’t tell her, and this is where she explained to him, that that person was an acquaintance, and not a friend.

This post struck a deep chord in me, because I have this same problem when it comes time to place relationships into their respective categories, its hard for me to distinguish who should be a friend, an acquaintance, or a frienemy. When I really thought long and hard about these three categories, I realized that about 80% of the people who I thought were friends, are really acquaintances, 27 of those people are frienemies, and the last 3% are my real friends. This blew me away when I just sat down and thought about it, and I wish I would have had this epiphany earlier in life; it would have saved me tons of grief.

Friend: a person attached to another by feelings of affection or personal regard.

a person who is on good terms with another; a person who is not hostile

Acquaintance: a person known to one, but usually not a close friend.

the state of being acquainted.

Aren’t those definitions super vague?

No wonder, I was mixing the two up. I thought that if we shared the same classes (or worked together), hung out outside of class time (or work), shared a few laughs and/or drinks, if you have been to my house on multiple occasions, and so on meant that I could put you inside the friend box. No not that one, haha. But, apparently “not so much.” Chris Rock said it the best, fast forward to 3:12. If I don’t know your other friends, your family members, your favorite color, the make of your car, if you like tea or coffee, hell even where you live, then you are really just an acquaintance.

“But wait, there’s more!!!” (cheesy infomercial voice) When you add frienemy to the equation, the numbers just don’t add up. Damn I was never good at math anyways. A frienemy is just what it sounds like, a cross between a friend and an enemy. You can’t really discount that person’s friendship, because you have shared so much together, but if you didn’t know any better you would swear that this person hated your guts half of the time. Think of a frienemy as someone who would try to stop you from achieving your dream job, but once they saw that you were going to stick to your guns they begrudgingly stood by your side and supported you. Or, how about the person who is supposed to be your friend, but they are constantly doing things to sabotage the friendship. For example, say you have a gay friend who only wants to hang out with you with his/her other gay friends; or they only want to hang out with you in private. Or the friend who constantly rags on you, even when you told them “hey that’s not cool,” but when it comes down to it, that person would stand up for you. Or the person who flips out on you because you told them your feelings (see life keeps turning). Silly stuff like that.

(You’d think we were all adults about things but no.) If you find yourself in any of these scenarios, or if you just don’t have a good feeling about that “friend” you just might have a frienemy and its going to be rough seas from then on out. Good luck on that one…

And yet another variable is that relationships can cycle between the categories. This can become extremely confusing (especially if the involved parties do not recognize and/or accept this fact). So you have a lifelong friend, who for some reason turns into a frienemy, and you don’t realize it. This can be very disconcerting. This can happen very subtlety and for the life of you, you cannot wonder what made the friendship go sour…and you work extra hard to fix it. But it might not budge from that category. You may just have to walk away from that relationship. Period. Or you may have an acquaintance who somehow became a friend. You look up one day and it has completely thrown you for a loop, but what if for some strange reason you are just not ready to make that commitment? Someone is bound to get hurt. And the variations could go on, but the bottom line is that you have to stay on top of these things and closely monitor how you interact with people. Lest you cause serious drama, and no one wants drama right? Or maybe, I’m just not right in the head. Who goes around overly scrutinizing their relationships anyways?

I guess the point that I am trying to make is that we throw words around very liberally. And after awhile we start to believe what we say. I was throwing the f-word around all willy nilly, and then I was the person getting hurt when my “friends” started acting up and treating me like a red headed step child. That’s what approximately 50% of this year’s posts have concerned. I was freaking out about small slights that would barely register on the acquaintance radar, yet they seemed like major deals since I was using the friend radar.

Well, then. Now I know, and knowing is half the battle.

I’m not going to make any blanket statements about me changing overnight, because that’s just not how life works. But I certainly hope that I have learned from these mistakes. Because a wise man learns from his mistakes, while a fool continues to make the same ones, because he refuses to learn from them. I can’t remember who said that, or where I heard it. But it is very appropriate here.

GET THAT BITCHASSNESS UP OUT YOUR SYSTEM

I peruse several blogs that tell the perspective of teaching/college/education from the professor’s side of the podium. Although, these yarns are quite hilarious, and sometimes informative, I believe that they do not tell the whole side of the story. Many times, the professors gripe about student’s lack of intelligence. Yes there are stupid, stupid, stupid students who not only make it hard for the professors but for other student’s as well, but there are also stupid, stupid, stupid, professors who make it hard for students too.

As a result I will start a new series entitled My Guide to Getting the Bitchassness Up Out of Professors. Actually, if you are a long time reader (or if you go through the archives) you know the bitchassness that I have had to deal with, particularly from one professor. Ugh I shudder just thinking about it. The first installment will probably be posted later today. But in the meantime look through my archives (if you click on the graduate school category all of those posts will pop up) or you can visit the aforementioned blogs:

A Gentleman’s C

Cranky Epistles

Educated and Poor (specifically look at her student insanity series)

What Not To Write

Also feel free to submit any stories and/or emails that detail your run in with professors’ bitchassness

One

i want to be in love re: Love by Mos Def

I talked to Dude today.

Normally our conversations do not make for good blog fodder. But today’s did. First I must tell you a little bit about Dude. He has a special place in my heart. Well not in that “omg I so love him” kinda way, but I definitely could not imagine the last 3 years without him.We have messed around off and on since we met. He is different from the other guys I have known (in that biblical sense), because, we are actually as close to friends as fuck buddies can be. We talk several times a day and for hours on end about everything. He makes me laugh, we have a lot in common, he is actually intelligent and oh my word can he put it down in bed. Essentially the perfect guy. O I almost forgot to mention that he is 6′4″ 270lbs. Just how I like em big and cuddly. There are some things that need to be ironed out but for the most part, he works.

This still doesn’t even make our conversation today extra special. Lately, I’ve been perusing this dating blog that comes from the perspective of two brothers, appropriately titled verysmartbrothas.com. Catchy title, plus the men there are always spot on with their perspectives. One post in particular caught my eye and made lots of sense to me, Brotha’s Gonna Work It Out. Especially the idea that men want women to wait, and sometimes can eventually find love through ass. That hit me hard.

Back to dude and our convo today. Like I said we have been fucking on and off for almost 3 years now. And it originally didn’t start out as a fuck buddy arrangement, but I gave the draws up too soon. Like I won’t even tell you how soon, lest you think of me as a [insert derogatory female phrase here]. I know that he originally wanted more, because I made him jump through hoops, and basically wade through hell to get next to me in the first place. Plus the person who hooked us up, to begin with can’t hold water to save his life. Meaning he told me everything that dude told him, and subsequently his man card was revoked for life.

The point of this exercise is that no man wants to buy the cow when he can get the milk for free. And I could have had him if I had opened my mouth and said something, and if I had made him wait just a little while to get the panties. I never really brought up the subject, because shortly after our first session he made it abundantly clear that he wasn’t looking for anyone at that time. I know what that means, I can read between the lines. Translation He didn’t want me. Ok fine. But it wasn’t really fine. I wanted more than just fucking. As a matter of fact, I had just gotten out of a rotten “just fucking” relationship (ooo it was completely horrid, but that’s another blog for another day) and I told him that. But I was willing to have some of him, rather than none and I put up with the “just fucking.” Eventually, I got to this place in my life, where I thought that I didn’t want a relationship, and that I could handle just fucking.

I honestly believed that.

Yeah I can be like a guy and have sex with whomever I want, whenever. Except it doesn’t work like that for women. And to tell you the truth I don’t even think it works like that for men either. I think they can just hide it better. You can do it for only so long before that shit catches up with you.

But back to the story. Like I said we talked today on yahoo messenger and I sent him the link to the pictures from my mother’s wedding. He mentioned that my mom doesn’t look anything like how he pictured her in his head. I asked what do you mean like that. Basically, he thought my mom would be like some butch woman, because I am such a tomboy. This led to an entire side conversation where we discussed men’s expectations of how a woman should look. Which led to a converstaion about his expectations, which then led to me asking “is the reason that we never progressed past fuck buddies, because I don’t get acrylic nails, and get my hair done all the time, essentially not meeting your needs for beauty?” Apparently, no. A. I am not what he was looking for, B. he didn’t think that I was interested in a relationship, and C. we are different people.

I then proceeded to tell him that I actually wanted a relationship very much, and he said “that’s news to me!” I thought that I was being very clear about things. But I guess not. Looking back on it, we probably would not have lasted as long as our fuck buddy relationship did, because I am super brash and he is actually pretty sensitive. Like sometimes he can be a bitch!!! But damn, it would have been nice to at least try. I’d rather try something and get a no, than not try and still have a no. Either way, I get a no, but at least I gave it some effort and I would not have had to wonder.

But it doesn’t matter anyways. I’m leaving Gainesville, in 24 short days. And I really do not plan on coming back, except to graduate.

[INITIALS]

on a depressing note…

A graduate student’s body was found dead in Sun Harbor Apartment complex pool early Thursday morning.

One would think that my apartment would notify us about this tragedy somehow. Or at the very, bare minimum close the effing pool, and/or drain the pool. Host a memorial service for the student. Something, gah. This is where he lived for pete’s sake.

Do something!!!

<throws hands up in exasperation>

That just goes to show how nasty, uncaring, coldhearted, the apartment manager is.

I would have not known about this tragedy if my next door neighbor didn’t inform me. And the topic only came up because, she came over to my apartment and happened to see some people swimming in the pool that same day. I have a clearish view of the pool from my living room. Mind you it is 9pmish

This is how the exchange went:

Cool as balls neighbor (CABN): ohmigah I can’t believe they are swimming in the pool.

Me: Why? What’s wrong with that?

CABN: didn’t you hear what happened early this morning?

Me: umm like no

CABN: Girl somebody was found floating in the pool, face down, this morning. I can’t believe the complex hasn’t drained the pool, or posted notices, or closed it

Me: Nuhuh

CABN: Yup, and the police went around banging on people’s door’s to interview them about it. You didn’t hear them.

Me: Girl no, when I’m asleep, I’m asleep

This whole situation disturbs me for two reasons, I heard people swimming in the pool Wenedsday late night, early Thursday morning, and I was doing some late night drunken swimming almost a week to the date that the young man’s body was found in the pool.

I was thesisizing, all this week. This meant that I was working all day, and all night. And I like to leave my sliding glass doors open, to enjoy the summer air. I am not really that big a fan of a.c. Never have and never will. Anyways, that’s besides the point. I heard people swimming in the pool between 1am-2am. And it was kind of aggravating, but not to the point where I wanted to go outside and scream at them. That bothers me. What if me going out there bitching, could have saved that young man’s life. He was 26. About a year older than me. That could have been me.

Which brings me to my next point. I was doing that exact same thing, almost a full week before him. It was me, CABN, her godbrother, his brother, and my homegirl. I was drunk. I mean drunk. Falling down, can barely walk, and barely string two words together coherently drunk. I had no business being in the pool that inebriated, and I knew it. As a matter of fact I thought to myself, “what are you doing out here? you could die at any moment.” But I kept “swimming” anyways, and horseplaying in the pool. And it was really weird and creepy when CABN relayed the story to me. Because not even 5 minutes before it happened, I turned to another friend, a fellow URPER and said “i want to go swimming, but I don’t think so” and I proceeded to relay to her the story about my drunken swim journey.

This whole situation is really bugging me. And I really need my complex to do something about that damn pool.

life just keeps spinning and turning on itself

Drama must be my new name.

It just follows me around.

Gah.

But strangely enough I’m not freaking out about it like I normally do.

In a previous post, Cuz that’s just how I do I said that my life needed to change. Yet that post was written in anger, and was very, very, very, like did I say very, negative. But nonetheless, things have changed and for the most part the changes have been better.

I finished my thesis revisions. Yay. I thought that I would want to jump up and down for joy, and/or shout from the mountaintops. Instead, I felt very numb. Sometimes I don’t get me. After very emotionally charged episodes, or when I should feel emotions I don’t. This is one example, meeting my father for the first time in 22 years is another, and I could go on. But I won’t. Anyways, I did promise myself that I would buy a treat. It was the only thing that kept me going. I am going to purchase Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock as my gift to myself. I’ve wanted this game for about 6 months now. I rented it several months ago and me, ak, and her daughter played it, and I absolutely fell in love. I wanted to buy it so badly, but yeah about that. It’s $90 and I just could not justify the expense. Now, I can buy it with a clean conscience. You think that would be enough to satiate the capitalist in me, but nope, not me. Now I want to purchase Dance Dance Revoluioton Mario Mix. I definitely could not justify buying both of those at the same time, and I have to buy GH3 because that’s what I promised myself in the begining. At first I was bummed when I realized that, then I realized, I still have graduation to look forward to. So if my adviser approves my thesis comments, I will purchase Mario Mix as another reward.

Speaking of this lady is tripping. Here is proof of her trippage, in her own words:

Dear [redacted name]

I got your document. On the morning of the 14th I can return the
hardcopy to you with comments. If you’d like comments before July 14th,
please send me an electronic version (although I cannot be precise about
a date when I’ll have comments back to you).

[Total sidenote, I looooove redacting things]

Mind you, the deadline to submit your thesis to the graduate school to graduate this summer is the 16th. Umm why is she waiting till 2 days before the deadline to give me back my comments. I gave my thesis to her on July 3rd as per our agreement for her to review.

WTF???!!!!!????!!!????!!!???!!??!?!?!?!?!?!

Why is she doing this to me? It DOES NOT take 11 days to read 90 pages. Especially when its the summer and you do not have any pressing matters to attend to, because you only work 9 months out of the entire year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I really do not understand this woman. But I am not going to worry about it, I did my part, I am going to continue to pray about this issue and leave it in God’s hands. He can’t do his part, if I take it back from him (taking it back is worrying about it).

And then another frienenmy is acting up again.

Long story short this one girl has a penchant for giving people the silent treatment and ignoring me. The first time it was because she was breaking up with her husband. That’s straight I understand that, I don’t wanna get caught up in shit like that. Then I was facebooking her and whatnot for like an entire year. I FINALLY got a response a few months back. We started talking again, but I felt hurt, and I was being distant. I sent her this message:

i’ve been distant and i’ll tell you why. I had some sort of idea about why you disappeared but I did not know everything. The few bits and pieces that I heard were second hand and I pretty much assumed that they were gossip. Gossipers are funny, because they only tell part of a story. I refused to buy into it. I wanted to hear your side of the story. And you did not want to talk about it and I refused to pry. With that being said I knew that things were not right and that for some reason you believed that I was the person going around town telling your story to anyone who would listen. I gathered that much from the facebook message you sent me. But I really did not want to believe that you would simply assume the worst of me without attempting to get all of the facts (especially considering the fact that you knew I really could care less for your ex-in laws). That hurt. And I just did not know how to deal with that, and you coming back like nothing had happened.
I don’t want to lose our friendship, and now I think that I am ready to rebuild it. I am not trying to stir up the pot, I just felt that I needed to get this off of my chest and that we need to talk so that we can properly resume our friendship.

I will talk to you later,

If I’m wrong “amerricua” (read it like how Bernie Mac says it) let me know and I’ll apologize. I have NO problem apologizing.

Then she started getting weird on me again!!! I facebooked her yesterday and I got this message today:

Her: You said something to me that showed me that I could not trust you.

Me: I’m sorry [redacted] but you have some really “interesting” views on friendship.
First YOU not ME effectively ended our friendship. without the common courtesy to tell me that something was wrong. that means that you didn’t want to give me a chance to try to fix it.

Then you try to come back into my life as if nothing had happened. as if the months of ignoring me and the silent treatment was ok.
That hurt. And what hurts even more, is that you continue to treat me like shit. Who threw your baby shower, who was with you at the wedding rehearsal, who spent time and money helping you throw the reception. Me. And I did it happily because I was your friend. Unlike other people who talk about you like you aren’t nothing. That’s not my style. I really liked you and thought that you were (and I still think that you are) a good person. But getting upset at me for actually being a friend is extremely irrational and not cool. Please just tell me, how is telling my friend that I need more time, telling them something that you cannot trust? That’s what friends do. And I am sorry that you do not understand that.
Then when I try to tell you how i feel, and that I need time for our friendship to get back to where it used to be, you decide to ignore me yet again.
I understand that you are angry at the world.Hell I would be too, but you are angry at the wrong people. I HAVE DONE NOTHING, AND I REPEAT NOTHING to you, except be a friend. Friends tell each other what is wrong, which is what i expect, nay demand from my friends.
I hope and pray that my friends trust me enough, and value our friendship enough to tell me that they don’t feel comfortable with our friendship and that it needs work. Not only did i do that, but I told you that I was being flaky, and I told you why, AND THEN I APOLOGIZED FOR IT. I did nothing wrong and I stand by it.

Seriously though. What you are doing is not what’s up. Just do me a favor, don’t do this to any of your other friends, learn to open up and listen to people and not get offended when they tell you how they feel.

But how about this, I will respect the fact that you no longer want to be my friend (because I am NOT going to BEG anyone to like me and/or be my friend).

I wish you nothing but the best in the world.

Like I said, if I’m wrong let me know.

I just don’t understand why all of this bad karma is coming my way. I’m generally a good person, and I try to be good to everybody. So why, why am I having to deal with all this.?

I just need to focus on the good and brush the bad dirt off my shoulder.

<sigh> at least I got my thesis done! w00!

updated: the chick unfriended me on facebook. wow so mature, versus talking things out.