Woman Seeking...

So apparently I shouldn’t even have a blog since I’m terrible at updating the thing. Gonna try to do better :[

Anyhoo… been here for a wee bit above a month now and I’m feeling good about it, though today was a sad day. I had been trying to find a kitten who would make a good companion for my 3 yr. old cat, Jane. I ended up finding a beautiful little calico and falling madly in love with her. However, Jane did not share my sentiments :P Though I’m sure they would’ve gotten along alright after a while, I realized that this environment probably wasn’t the best just now for a kitten with as much energy as she has. She was always ready to play, but didn’t have a playmate b/c I always had something that I needed to do and of course Jane wanted nothing to do with her :( I ended up returning her to the family I got her from today. I cried. That may make me seem like a weenie to you, but I really liked her a lot and was looking forward to watching her grow up. I figured out though that this just wasn’t the right time for me to have her.

I miss you, little cat :’(

I put my desk from IKEA together yesterday and, though one of the pieces is on backwards, it looks great haha. Now I just have to put my dresser and bookcase together and get some dining and living room furniture and I’ll be set. I have cable/internet now, too. I was forced to find an internet provider after my linksys mooching was discovered and halted by Time Warner. Jerks. So now I have AT&T U-Verse, complete w/ dvr :D

A couple of friends are set to visit in the near future - one in October, one in December - which I’m crazy excited about. Next month when my friend comes we’ll be doing some awesome things: Disneyland, roller derby, Six Flags, gallery-hopping and more. Oh yes. It shall be glorious. 

School and work are good. Had an interesting experience at our last Visiting Writers seminar. And by interesting, I mean pure greatness. One of the poets who visited admitted to getting hammered before arriving, and also proceeded to curse out one of the audience members. Well… he called the guy “motherfucker,” but they knew each other so I guess it’s ok hahaha. Either way, it was awesome.

And for a last piece of non-news, I talked to a really cute guy in the computer lab at school who I have not seen once since that day :( Life can be so effin’ cruel…

I could add a lot more, but I think I’ll stop now. And vow to try to remember to update this thing regularly. 

So here I am… in California. Been here for a week and a half. I’m really enjoying it so far! Classes start next week. I’m a little nervous, but ultimately more excited to get started than anything else. I LOVE LOVE LOVE my apartment and where I live, which is Santa Clarita; 45 minutes away from my school, the airport and most things in Los Angeles that interest me. It’s only 45 minutes if you exclude the traffic. In reality, my drive tends to be more like 1.5-2 hours on most days. But despite the sometimes crippling brutality of the daily commute (I also work in LA), I’m cool with it. I think the fact that the area surrounding my apartment has absolutely everything I could ever need has a lot to do with it. Aaaand Magic Mountain being (literally) 3 minutes away doesn’t hurt either, though I have yet to take advantage of the awesomeness that this entails. 

I’m enjoying my job so far. Haven’t had much in the way of exciting assignments, but everyone I work with is really nice and I have a feeling I could go to any one of them for help if I needed to. I hope I’ll feel as comfortable in my classes. It’s only been a little over a year since undergrad, but for some reason it feels like it’s been eons. I’m not worried about doing graduate-level work or throwing myself into writing completely. I’m actually super excited about getting to the classwork/workshop aspect of this. It’s really just the meeting new people thing that makes me kinda nervous. That’s always what makes me most anxious when I go someplace new. I know I’ll end up settling in and becoming part of a great group of friends eventually. I always do. It’s just getting past that part at the beginning that weighs on my mind a bit. 

I have a really good feeling about my experience here in general. I love that I am now allowed to care about nothing but writing. I’m really looking forward to getting better at it, meeting different people, and going to local events, festivals & things around the city. I want to get to know California, and the states surrounding it, too, if I can.

Aargh! I have so much that I want to do! And so much that I need to do. Speaking of… I have to get vaccinated next Monday. I haven’t gotten a shot in a long time. I hope I don’t have to wait too long to get it… I’m gonna have to do it during my lunch hour. 

Fun, fun, fun :3

I’ve got a job! Technically it’s off campus, but it’s still for a school department. EMPLOYMENT! YEEEEEEESSSSS!!!

The official 2 week mark was actually on Saturday, July 31st. On August 14th, I’ll be hitting the road and heading to California. I am So. Freakin’. Excited. I can’t wait to get there and move into my apartment (which will have nothing but a bed and a bookshelf in it to begin with, but I’ll fix that soon enough). I still need to get immunized before the first day of classes, which still gives me about a month, so I’ve got time. I’ll probably be pet-sitting out there, but I’ll be looking for part-time work, too, just so I can live more comfortably. GAH! I can’t wait to be there! It’s gonna be amazing and kind of scary; but mostly amazing. If I can survive living in Glasgow by myself, I think I’ll be fine in California :]

I’m so thrilled about having 2 whole years to work on my writing. I do best under the pressure of deadlines, so I think being part of a workshop again is going to be great. Plus, I love reading new work written by other people. It’s fun getting to know someone through the art that they create. Through whatever they create. A person’s creations are probably the truest representations of who they are. You can see all of those little things about them that they wouldn’t be able to articulate otherwise. It’s not just what people create. It’s whatever they love and put most of their time and energy into. For some people, that means what they create. For others, it means a hobby or an interest. For me, it’s story-telling. And literature in general. If I could wall myself up in the middle of a place where no one knew me, in a house or space that held all of my favorite literary works… I could live happily.

The other thing I’m really excited about (that I mentioned in another post) is travelling to places I’ve never been to that are nearby. Like Vegas, and Hawaii and Australia and New Zealand and Japan @_@ The thing that’s pretty ridic though is that the first place I plan to visit is somewhere I’ve been before and that I’d be closer to on the East Coast. After New Year’s, I’m going to London to visit a friend. I loooooooooooooooooooooooooove London. It wins.

But anyhoo… I’ll probably post pictures from the awesome road trip to Cali and of my apartment once I get there.

Can’t wait to get there…

I am currently re-reading Neil Gaiman’s Sandman series. I read the books years ago, but never bought them. So for my birthday this year, my mom bought me the first five. It’s so nice to re-read something you loved after you’ve grown up a little. I’m learning about so many things (mythology, writing, my point of view, this tale, etc.) - more, really, than I learned the first time around. The stories are just put together so well and the characters are constructed so beautifully. It’s great. If you haven’t read these, do it as soon as possible.

I recently (as in maybe an hour ago) finished up the portion of the story in which Morpheus (King of the realm of Dreams) returns to Hell to free the woman he loves. He walks through Hell with Lucifer as the place is closed up for good, listening as the former Lord of Hell reflects on his life before and after the creation of that place. At one point, Lucifer says this:

 ”They use my name as if I spend my entire day sitting on their shoulders, forcing them to commit acts they would otherwise find repulsive. ‘The devil made me do it.’ I have never made one of them do anything. Never. They live their own tiny lives. I do not live their lives for them.

And then they die, and they come here (having transgressed against what they believed to be right), and expect us to fulfill their desire for pain and retribution. I don’t make them come here.

They talk of me going around and buying souls, like a fishwife come market day, never stopping to ask themselves why. I need no souls.

And how can anyone own a soul?

No. They belong to themselves…

…They just hate to have to face up to it.”

I wish everyone in the world would read this.

I need to start waxing philosophical more often… I feel like I’m losing my edge… ha.

I got my apartment stuff finalized!!! It took ALL. WEEK. for the leasing agent to get someone from the company I work for to confirm that I do indeed work for them. And even then, she ended up having to wear the person down before they finally admitted it. Like it was a State secret or something. Nothing should EVER be as complicated as this has been. But now it’s finally over, and I have a wonderful apartment that I can’t wait to move into :D!!!

<3 you, LA. See you in August…

So, I just wrote an entire post about how I’m moving to LA next month and hoping to use this blog as a way to chronicle my adventures there…

…and it got erased.

Yeah. F U, too, Tumblr.