Just me

I hate cold pizza. I love pickles and have been known to drink from the pickle jar. I don’t like fruity sweet drinks, except sangria. I like my martinis dirty, with extra olives. It’s like a snack with my beverage. I could drink beer all day long but I’m trying to cut back because I hear the beer belly look is out this fall. I used to love to cook but I’m terrified I’ve lost it. Regardless of how I FEEL about it, I’m pretty damn good at it.

I’m anal retentive and a neat freak. My closets are organized not only by article of clothing (tops, pants, skirts, dresses) but also by sleeve length or hem length and then by color. My CDs and movies are alphabetized. I do not understand how people can ever find the CD they are looking for if they are NOT alphabetized. A couple times a year I go through and throw away food and condiments in my kitchen that are close the expiration date or have been open “too long”. The definition of “too long” varies by which germaphobic moment I’m having that day.

I cry at movies. My friends mock me for it but I’ve caught a few of them doing it too. Don’t ask why I’m the one who gets the label of “the crier”. I also cry when I’m angry, frustrated, tired or in pain. I cry a lot. Coincidentally I HATE crying. Especially when I’m angry (talk about undermining your position in an argument!), frustrated (usually I end up more frustrated with myself than what I was originally frustrated about), tired or in pain (I try to be in denial about both).

I can not go on vacation, even for a weekend, unless the house is clean. This adds lots of pre-vacation stress but I hate coming home from a relaxing time away to a messy house. It will totally negate any fun I had. Seriously. I wish I could make it so that I couldn’t go to bed at night without certain things being done. When I get tired, I am T-I-R-E-D. I can fall asleep almost anywhere and in the most amazing positions. I blame this amazing “insta-sleepy” on my inability to remember to take off my make-up before bed.

In my lifetime I have dreamed of being all of the following things: a Broadway dancer / singer / actress, a writer, an animal trainer, a missionary, a chef / restaurant owner, a social services worker, a paralegal, an attorney, a real estate agent, a caterer and most recently an event planner / wedding coordinator. Notice never once did I mention or dream of my current position… I think that is a sign.

When I was a Junior High School I told my friend Shawn that I wanted to have “enough children to have my own mini-football team.” Heh. I’ve since come to my senses and realized that I have neither the patience nor the resources for such an endeavor. I also do not have the desire. But lately? I have been thinking very small and very quiet thoughts that maybe, just maybe, I might want one.* I promptly drown that voice with another dirty martini. Let’s see if that inner monologue bitch can swim!

I have been told that I am hard to get to know. I will admit to being a little guarded. I have a busy life and I’m not about making friends just so I can say I have 50 bajillion friends. Impress me. Intrigue me. Make me laugh. But I am fiercely loyal to the friends I do have. I believe in friends for life, making it work. I would do just about anything for a select handful of people. I think they feel the same.

I love music – I feel and empathize with lyrics. I constantly have an internal soundtrack playing. When things happen to me I find songs that relate to get me through. Sometimes a song coming on the radio will take me back to a different time and place faster than if you’d brought it up specifically. There are songs I can not listen to for this reason.

I am obsessed with working out and counting calories. More than is probably healthy so I try to curb it. In the height of my MUST. LOSE. WEIGHT. frenzy I was working out with a boot camp program 5 days a week for an hour in the morning and then taking yoga 2 nights a week and on Sunday mornings PLUS fitting in 2 or 3 additional work outs during the week. It was excessive. Needless to say, this hole in my foot? Totally cramping my style!

I hate meeting new people. I hate calling people I don’t know REALLY well on the phone. I hate ordering take-out. I won’t use the bathroom of a restaurant I haven’t eaten at unless it is a DIRE emergency. I still feel the need to talk to my mother every few days to keep me grounded. I wish I had finished college when I had the chance. I am stubborn. I like rules. People don’t like to play games with me because I adhere to the rules so strictly. I’m the polar opposite of selfish. I wish sometimes that I could learn to be a little more selfish.

I read for fun. In school I used to look forward to getting homework. I’m a geek. I used to cross stitch and my grandmother once showed me how to crochet. Those are the limits of my creative talents. Knitting may be the new yoga but I’m pretty darn good at the old yoga so I’ll stick with it. I am sarcastic. I might drink too much sometimes. I am the queen of multi-tasking. I make lists. I love to cross things off a list.



*I totally blame Dooce. Seriously – read the archives of the newsletters that she writes to her daughter every month… Or maybe? Don’t. Look what it is doing to me!