because I know you all like to laugh with me, not at me

I am a clumsy, accident-prone person. See: last Halloween, when I tripped and landed on my face, or my recently dislocated kneecap, which I acquired while sitting on the couch.

I am now in PT to fix my knee so I can run again and things were going swimmingly until…

dun dun DUN

So last Saturday was “Grace cleans all the things” day. This included my bedroom where, lurking under some laundry, I found a hair dryer. This hair dryer has been on my floor for approximately six months, since whenever I cut my hair off, and I thought this was a good time to finally put it somewhere that wasn’t my floor. So I picked up the hair dryer, put it on the top shelf of my closet, and turned away to go about my business.

BIG MISTAKE.

Representative image of evil hair dryer.

The hair dryer fell off the top shelf and landed on my left foot—but wait, it gets better. It landed prongs-first, and then the hair dryer body HIT the plug, driving the prongs farther into my foot like some sort of vindictive, hair-stylin’ pile driver. WHAT the FUCK. This does not happen to normal people. Does it?

Five days later, my foot still hurts. I’m limping and icing like it’s going out of style. According to the PT (the one fixing my knee), I have ended up with what appears to be a bone bruise. From a hair dryer.

It’s okay to laugh. Everyone else has.

file under: it’s hard to be a rock star

“How goes your life, Grace?” I hear you ask. “Glamorous as usual?”

Well, internet, let me tell you.

My Halloween costume this year involves 5-inch red stilettos (purely by accident, really—I needed cheap red heels that I could maim and that’s what Target had) which seemed like a great idea when I was standing stationary in Target but a very poor idea once I started trying to walk to the Halloween party on Saturday. Suffice to say, I was half a block out of my front door when I tripped on the crooked Boston sidewalk (it jumped at me I swear) and went ass over teakettle onto the cement.

My helpful neighbors called from their porch, asking if I needed Neosporin. Which was sweet in its way, but I was busy pretending I hadn’t fallen over so I just smiled and waved.

I don't understand why this picture exists, but it seems fitting.

You will be glad to know that I soldiered on even with a skinned knee, a square inch of skin scraped off my ankle (it is now bright bright pink), a twisted ankle, and my dignity shaken. When you’re as fabulous as I am, something like a minor abrasion does not faze you.

And then last night I was trying to re-dye the blue part of my hair and ended up looking like a Smurf, but that is a story for another day.

We rock stars must suffer for our art, truly.

searching every whiiaaiiiaaiich awayayayay*

So I am currently apartment-hunting. And LET ME TELL YOU—wtf. This shit is stressful.

#1: I hate talking on the phone. I HATE talking on the phone to strangers. If you’re lucky enough to be one of the, like, 5 people I’ve ever spoken to on the phone, you will fondly remember the giggling, the “uhhms,” the awkward pauses, and probably the fact that I didn’t actually answer the first 7 times you called. So I am restricting myself mostly to ads that have email-reply options (which, wtf Grace, get over it) and then when I DO have to talk to people on the phone I sound like a complete idiot because I’m trying to figure out the quickest way to hang up.

#2: Boston is fucking expensive, yo. I’m looking for my own place, sans roommates but with cat (yes, I’m about to join the ranks of 20-something unmarried women living by themselves with a cat) and anything above my basic standards of cleanliness and security are like $WOW$. Le sigh.

#3: My desired location, budget, and move-in date are all so flexible that I’m looking at too many properties and really have no idea what I want. I have this problem where I like whatever area I happen to be in at the moment, so I’ll go look at a place and be like “oh this neighborhood is awesome” no matter where I am. Which—yeah, I really need to narrow some of this stuff down. Rawr.

#4: I keep finding places I like that either a) aren’t as cool in person or b) GET RENTED before I even have a chance to look at them. My trigger finger is sloooow.

All this whining, I make it sound like I’ve been shopping for months. Really not. Only like, a week or two seriously. But GAH this is horrible I’m going to run away to the Appalachian Mountains and run barefoot through some meadows and camp under the stars. That sounds good. I can telecommute from there, right?

–

*name that song

will you guys still like me if I’m boring?

Got my new glasses today. Plus side: I CAN SEEEEEEEEEE!

Downside: I already miss my red stripey frames. These new frames, while doing a really good job of holding the lenses, are not nearly so interesting as my last ones. I like the shape, and I like the black (I went for a straight-up geek look), but… they’re not exactly boring, they just… aren’t as QUIRKY. And if I am anything, I am QUIRKY.

Here are the new glasses in question:

So that is what I look like now. Usually my hair is better and I’m not making that face. Usually.

And now, I am going to fight the cat out out of the EXACT MIDDLE of the bed and get some ZZZs, because tomorrow is the big company-wide outing to a fun island of fun, where I will pwn everyone with my mad softball skills.

houston, we have a problem

So I was born with a superpower.

I never get lost.

That’s right. You have no idea how awesome this is. I always know which way is north (although sometimes I have a few moments of frightening disorientation when I come out of a subway) and even if I don’t know what streets are doing I can point and say, “we want to be going that way.” Distances I’m not great with, but direction I got down.

And maps. I can look at a map once, figure out how to get from Point A to Point B, and get there no matter what. Even if I have to take a detour for some reason, I get there there 1-2-3 easy.

However.

My superpower appears to be horribly broken.

A couple of weeks ago it took me 30 minutes to walk to someone’s house 5 minutes from mine. I knew where I was going, I had looked at a map and received directions from my roommate, and seriously it was like 2 turns. 5 minutes. Took me 30. I do not know what happened. The streets just—weren’t doing the right thing. I’d find the right street and then lose it, even though I was on it. It was seriously like being in the twilight zone.

And then today.

I was on Boylston. And then I wasn’t. And then there was a train track in the way when I tried to circle back. It took me almost 45 minutes, again to go about two blocks. (I turned the wrong way at an intersection. If I had turned the correct way I would have been there in 5.)

So, seriously. WTF, world. You can’t just give a girl a superpower and then take it away without warning!! I am not used to being lost I don’t know how to handle it. HELP ME OBI-WAN KENOBI.

a writer’s life

I hate writing. I hate being a writer. It’s all so depressing. No, really, there are only 3 different options when you’re a writer, and they all suck. (by “you” here I mean “me.” I make no claims about how anyone else writes. I am not sure why I’m writing this in second person. it’s art or something.)

Option 1: You aren’t writing. You feel guilty because you aren’t writing, because you know your WIP(s) are waiting there in your computer, watching, sad. Like when you’re too tired to get off the couch and play with your puppy and it just sits there with its head cocked to the side looking at you with big sad eyes. And the longer you avoid the WIP, the more it looms over you, and the more you hate it. It’s depressing.

Option 2: You are writing, and the words pouring from your fingertips are complete and utter shit. You feel horrible as you write because what the hell use is writing if you’re going to write trash? Every word is out of place, and you can tell as you’re putting them down, and you just want to take your computer and throw it against the wall and curl up and cry. Or scream. Or both. Depressing.

Option 3: You are writing, and the words pouring forth from your fingertips are pure genius. Or at least, if not genius, they’re pretty good. You’re happy. You love it. You’re excited. You have to drag yourself away from your laptop every day to go to work, eat, etc. But then. You realize. Actually you’re writing shit. This realization may come the next day, it may come a few weeks later, it may come after you finish a draft or two. But it comes. Delayed depression.

So yeah. At the end, you’re never happy. Usually in the middle you’re never happy.

And yet you keep trying to do it. At least I do. Usually. Right now I’m swinging between #1 and #2, with an emphasis on #1. I hate it. I hate being a writer. I wish I could stop.

What a nice cheerful post to start the day.

gimme a v-a-c-a-t-i-o-n

I really should be packing now, since I’m flying away to Minnesota tomorrow. But I am not. Instead I am drinking beer and faffing around on facebook and other such productive things. I can’t even say I’m doing laundry, since I think I just heard the washing machine stop. So. Time for a bullet-point post, methinks.

• First and most importantly, if you’re in Boston this weekend you should go see Rosencranz and Guildenstern Are Dead in Cambridge. It’s being put on by Bad Habit Productions and is playing at a YMCA on Mass Ave just off of Central Square. Seriously. It is an amazing production. I love the play, I think I’d rank it at least in my Top 10 plays of all time, if not Top 5, and this production was fantastifabulous. R and G and the Player were all SPOT ON, and the troupe of players (don’t remember what they’re actually called…) were all wonderful as well. I didn’t like the King and Queen so much, but everyone else made up for it. Really, a fantastic show. I was so sad that the audience was so small when I went to see it on Saturday. SO GO SEE IT THIS WEEKEND.
• I sort of accidentally saw Harry Potter last week. I think I’ve now actually seen most of them in theaters, even though I never really want to… seeing as I don’t so much like the books… but my friends were going and I’m nothing if not a follower. So we went, and since all I really remembered was the Big Ending (which I mentioned, thereby spoiling it for one of my friends, but I didn’t think it was a secret anymore? but anyway I’m not going to mention it here.) but yeah I didn’t remember any of the smaller plot points so it was almost like watching a fresh story. I actually enjoyed it. Yanno, for Harry Potter. But I’m not going to recommend it, just on principle.
• So Tuesday morning I woke up and went to my computer and I had a google calendar alert thing informing me that I was going to a concert that night at the House of Blues. The Eagles of Death Metal, who I had never heard of. I checked my stash of tickets and sure enough there it was. This isn’t totally out of the ordinary, I love live music and tend to buy tickets to bands I’ve never heard of if the first one or two things I find on youtube is good. I decided not to remind myself who they were (I figured I’d investigated when I got the ticket and liked them, so I shouldn’t be too worried) so I just went to the concert cold. No idea what to expect.And you may recall my discomfort with the Tracy Chapman crowd? And how old and/or obnoxious and/or generally odd they all were? Well I walked into EoDM and was faced with a sea of mostly men in jeans and dark shirts, covered in tattoos and piercings. “Yessss,” I thought. “This is my crowd. I know what to do with this.”

  The show was great. EoDM isn’t actually a death metal band, which was fine with me. Good solid little rock band. Lots of fun. And they were superb performers. They all—the lead singer especially—treated the audience like it was the greatest audience they had ever performed for. It was so so so much fun.

  Which brings me to my final note of that evening. I went alone, which I usually do, and I was drinking (not excessively, really) and dancing my heart out and just generally having a blast, and apparently people noticed… Not one, no, not one but two different men commented afterwards that I had obviously had an awesome time. One of them accosted me by saying, “Hey Party Girl!” So… yeah. Just call me Party Girl. Apparently my reputation in this town is growing.

• Someone outside my window is really pissed off and yelling…
• I hit myself in the side of the head this morning (don’t ask) and my tragus piercing pushed all the way through the hole and popped out. When I stopped by the piercing place after work (conveniently located within sight of my apartment) the hole was already so healed she had to stretch the hole to get the post in.* WTF, ear. Chill the fuck out.
• It turns out I have a 35-minute layover in Atlanta, so hopefully I catch my second flight tomorrow…
• Which brings me full circle to the packing thing. Okay. Here I go. Don’t expect much bloggyness for the next week or so.

*Do with that phrase what you will…

time for a rambling sunday night post

Shockingly, having someone jab a needle into your spine repeatedly kinda hurts. (I got someone different when I called the tattoo place back, and he magically found an opening today at noon that the other woman had not been able to see somehow. So maybe that phone disaster wasn’t all me.) So now I’m sore and trying not to lean my back against things. Hard, since I’m currently lounging in bed.

Today involved a lot of Star Trek: TNG and The Avengers. Wesley Crusher is so annoying. Why does he have to be in this show? He is the main reason it’s taken me so long to get into Star Trek, all the ST episodes I saw for the longest time were Wesley-centric (like, totally coincidentally all of them—and I’ve seen that Game one like 3 times) and that just turned me off the whole series. And those episodes were after he hit puberty. I’m starting TNG from the beginning and wow he was even more annoying before his voice cracked. How did this show make it big with him in it? Okay Grace stop being mean to the boy prodigy.

Anyway, so yeah, I’m lame. First sunny weekend Boston’s seen in like eons and I spend half of it watching nerdy tv shows and making smoothies (which involved bits of the blender flying around the kitchen). In my defense, yesterday I did properly summery thing, including mini-golfing and a beach. Much fun.

Um so yeah that’s what I’ve been up to recently. Fascinating, as usual.

You will notice how I’m not give you all a writing update. Yeah, about that…

why I am a bookworm

This is why Grace doesn’t play video games: 

That would be my left knee, with a bruise that really isn’t very impressive except that I got it playing a video game. A video game. Jesus, Grace, could you be any clumsier?

boxes and books

It’s been a pretty eventful weekend here in Gracetopia. Well, really  just one major event. I unpacked my final box! I’m finally moved in!

The astute among you might remember that I moved here in December. So this is six months after I moved that I finally unpacked the final box. Hey, I’m not speedy but I get it done. Tortoise and hare, people. Tortoise and hare.

I mean, granted, there are three piles of stuff from this final box sitting on my floor, just piles because I don’t know where to put anything. But the box is gone, and that’s what’s important.

This final burst of unpacking was brought upon by a sudden desire to get my spring-cleaning done (okay, so maybe it’s summer by now, whatever I procrastinate). This process necessitated the purchase of a 2nd bookcase. Part of my cleaning yesterday was trying to get all my books on my bookcase, and I quickly came to realize that I had twice as many books as bookspace. So, 2nd bookcase! Which then led to one of my favorite activites: organizing my books. Seriously, I love organizing my books.

I may be a slight nerd.

I don’t organize by author, in case anyone was wondering. I organize by category. Within categories an author’s books are grouped together but the authors are not in alphabetical order. Mostly they’re grouped by size—my shelves must be pretty.

My categories, in descending order of size, are:

• mysteries/true crime (4x larger than next category—this always surprises me)
• sci-fi/fantasy
• 19th-century lit
• children’s books
• books on writing/writers
• graphic novels/comics (most of these could be incorporated into sci-fi/fantasy, above, but they look better if they get their own shelf)
• 1900-1950 books (mostly Waugh and Wodehouse)
• pre-1900 British lit (mostly Shakespeare)
• Oscar Wilde (this was larger before the post office lost a box of my books)
• “modern” fiction (anything after 1950 that I somehow ended up with… a complete hodgepodge)
• non-fiction (mostly Victorian history)
• my friends’ books (too small! get on it, guys)
• miscellaneous (On Bullshit, something-or-other guide to London, 100 Greatest Hockey Players of All Time)

Any books that could go in more than one category go wherever they look the best or whichever category is more specific.

And there you have it, more than you ever wanted to know about how I organize my life.

Speaking of books, there’s still a free book available. Somebody must want it!