First off, let me apologize profusely to my loyal readers for the immense lollyblogger-ness. My life has been a roller coaster of stress for the past two weeks, and sometimes I feel I haven't been able to fit in breathing. While that is not really an excuse for leaving you all in the dark about my life, it will have to do for now; I'm afraid I've nothing else to offer.

Excepting, of course, this update into the life of everyone's favourite Pixie. So, the past two weeks have mostly been focused around work and University. For those of you who haven't heard yet (sorry!) I have been accepted to Carleton University in Ottawa for next year. My plan is to study Political Sciences, concentrating in International Relations, while living off-campus with my good and dear friend Jess (who I have to apologize to for blowing her off on Saturday). I'm thrilled, and terrified. For as far back as I can remember, I always knew I would go to the U of A after high school, never living more than twenty minutes away from Mum and Dad, settling down like she did. But as I grew up and as I got better I realized that I'm not ready to settle here, not matter how great the guy, the friends, or the place. I need to go away first and be away from the family and make sure my head is really back the way it should be. I'll go one year, for sure, maybe two. My dad wants me to do all four there, but I'm not sure - four years is a long time to be away from the people I love, and I hate to think of losing four years of watching my nieces and nephews grow up. So I've been planning, plotting, and filling out scholarship applications for the past while. Today I had to describe my "academic and future goals" and my "most rewarding experience" each in 100 words. Yikes. I am way way too verbose to limit me to 100 words. It was brutal.

Elsewhere in my life I've been at school trying to keep my average about 90%, and failing miserably at Math (surprise, surprise). I swear I always think that I understand what we're learning and then we have an exam and I bomb it. I don't know what I'm going to do. Struggle on, I guess, and hope that my other marks are high enough not to let one 74% ruin me. Oh and Mr. Ackroyd, 74% is not a perfectly respectable mark, and if you tell me that one more time I swear to God I'll tell you where you can shove your perfectly respectable marks. My other courses are going fine though. I'm still loving my Social class more than anything, despising my English teacher but enjoying my classmates, shuddering at the pronunciation of people in my French class, and I'm getting used to Science. I just wish it weren't quite so early. I'm sorry Mr. Sadler, but my brain just doesn't seem to work until after 9:30 in the morning, or a large cup of coffee - whichever comes first.

Speaking of coffee, the money situation continues to be tight around here, even with working 15ish hours a week. I wish I had more time to work but I'm stressed out enough as it is. Plus my feet get tired of standing by the end of the night. But it's a good job. The discount is nice, I get free copies of advanced readers, and I can borrow books to read as long as they come back in mint condition. My boss isn't great but the people I work with are fun and easy to talk to. I don't get to work in the kids' area near as much as I'd like to, but it's still good. I'm really glad I was able to find another bookstore job.

And the rest of my world is occupied with attempting to fit in smidgens of a life. I missed Purgatory on Friday, due to work, which sucked enormously, but as long as nothing catastrophic comes up, I should be at the next game. On Saturday after work I went out to Sherwood Park to a Baha'i party. It was nice to see people I hadn't seen in a long time, and wasn't nearly as painful as I expected it to be. It was good to see the kids in community again, as well as all my surrogate parents and grandparents. They were all thrilled to hear about Carleton as well. Felt nice to have so many people be proud of me. On Sunday I spent the day with Rob. We went to see a grand variety of friends and family (well only one family member) in the matinee showing of Pirates of Penzance at Festival Place, which was fabulous. I was jealous of all the people on stage, and wanted to be up there with them. I got the nicest compliment after, though, when Don (The Pirate King) said that it was strange to be doing a show without me, but that I deserved a break. It was nice to know that people actually notice me sometimes. After the show it was back to my place for a brief nap - well more of a 'dying of incredibly painful headache, then falling into a drug induced sleep.' When I woke up, Rob and I went off to the Mongolie Grill for dinner, which was fabulous. We watched I Heart Huckabees in the evening, and then to sleep. Mmmmm, sleep. Tonight, Myrna and I snuck away from life and stress to see Bride and Prejudice at the Princess. Highly highly recommended! And now I'm here, filling you all in on my, ever so interesting, life. If you've made it this far without dying of boredom, congratulations.

The coming month looks to be just as stressful as this one. Near the end of it (the 29th) my wisdom teeth are coming out - something I am definitely not looking forward to - and my birthday is coming up on the 7th. Add to that a French IB oral in the middle of the month, and more scholarship applications and things are just looking peachy. I know that a lot of good things are happening in my life and that I ought to be more optimistic and grateful, but I'm afraid I've just gotten out of the habit. It seems easier to just focus on what you have to do right then, and not bother getting your hopes up for the future. That way when good things happen, you're happy about them, instead of just contented.

Well, that's it for now. You know, I'm working 64 hours in the coming month, so I should probably start stocking up on sleep now. If any wants me, I'll be here, trying to survive. Drop me an email and I'll try not to take too long to get back to you. But if I do, please forgive me - someday... someday my life will start running properly again.

"This was what she'd wanted - insisted on. To be on her own. To make her own way in the world - out in the world, not cloistered away from it like a nun, or someone who couldn't take care of herself. Only maybe I can't, she thought. It was so easy in the other world to look into this one and think, I can do that. I can live there. I can be normal. But she didn't even know what normal was. The outer trappings were easy to figure out, but not what went on inside normal people's heads, how they coped. That was more alien to her than her world would ever be to them." (Charles DeLint)

My boyfriend bought me argyll socks with skulls & crossbones on them for Valentine's Day.

Now that's romance.

I was flipping through 'Ed Magazine' this afternoon - for those unfamiliar with it, it is an insert in the Saturday edition of the Edmonton Journal - because on pages 6&7 there was a big huge article, with photos, about the Vagina Monologues. Yay publicity. It was a good article, had a particularily amusing photo of Haley, and contained al relevant info. Woot, and all that.

The point of this post however, is that afterwards I continued flipping through and there on page 10, I was faced with the ultimate horror - 8 1/2 Things To Do Today. I squeaked. I couldn't believe it. Somebody else is using my 8 1/2 lists. GAH! I could not believe it. Curse you, Mari Sasano, curse you. I feel defeated, disheartened, discouraged, and really bloody pissed off.

Which brings me to the second bad thing that has happened today. Being all upset, and cold, and having a headache, led me to the decision to make coffee. Mmm, sweet caffeine. Now, up until just after Christmas, the rare times that I did make coffee it was just instant stuff. Tasty, caffeinated, whatever. After Christmas, our house acquired a second-hand coffee maker. Whee! I didn't own any of the things required for making coffee, but that was okay because Courtney did (filters and grounds) and said that I was more than welcome to use them.

Courtney moved out today.

My little tin of instant coffee isn't going to last me much longer, and it's just not financially possible for me to keep getting it. Shit. So I have a coffe maker, but that's it. I wish I had money to buy the things I wanted sometimes. Which brings me to the plea part of this: If anyone has #4 cone disposable coffee filters that they are not using, will you please let me know. If I can at keast get this down to only one thing I have to buy (beans), I just might be able to do it.

Except of course for that whole needing to buy new clothes for work, because mine aren't good enough. And hey that's no problem 'cuz vlothes are unexpensive, right? *kills boss* I like that I got the job at Grenwoods, I do, but I hate that I know need to spend money (that I definately don't have) to be able to meet the dress code. *insert string of curses here* If only this could have all happened in a month, when it was near my birthday, and I could have just asked for these types of things as birthday gifts from family and/or friends. Rargh!

In the only happy thing so far today, I finished Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. Though it shames me slightly to admit it, this is the only computer/x-box/etc game that I have ever completly finished, so it's kind of exciting. Now if the rest of the world could just start wokring out for me, it'd be all good.

Blah.

Walking home from the bus stop in this weather, is an Olympic sport all in itself. It is possibly my world's most dangerous, complicated, and stressful obstacle course. You must hop, jump and skate through various sections. You must maintain your balance, never letting your guard down. You must plot your courses carefully, and wisely, to avoid pain, suffering, and coldness. You must be sure to include finding passage through the fijords, in your plans, as well as prepare your equipment far in advance. Shoes with strong treads are your only hope - no sissy, falling apart, duct-taped running shoes will do - and you must always wear your mittens/gloves no matter how warm your hands get. This will save them from unnecessary scrapes, cuts, or bruises, when you do fall. And then, as if remembering all that wasn't enough, you must balance a heavy bookbag, a binder, and a book, and not let them fall prey to the icy depths, even if it means sacrifcing your socks.

The only ray of sunshine to the whole damndable thing, is that if you make it home without killing yourself, your house is warm, dry, and not at all icy. And there's always the internet to bitch too.