All About Overalls

I'm blogging about how I wore overalls today. Seriously.

I don't have a picture, but it looked kind of like this.

Andrew and I crashed the mall.

My overalls were so comfortable and I didn't have to carry a purse because everything fit in my pockets. When I got cold, I just put my hands inside my of my overalls.

Here are some other overalls

Wear Overalls

Two Things I Learned About Fashion Today

I went shopping at Forever 21 today and walked away with nothing. However, I did learn two very important things.

1) This looks fucking terrible on actual human beings. If you aren't 6 feet tall and weigh 90 lbs, don't bother.

2) Super skinny jeans (you know, the kind that look more like leggings than pants) are useless. It took ten minutes to get them on and I pulled an arm muscle trying to get them off.

I wore a belly shirt today. Why? Because I'm a badass.

Feeling Girly?

I've been experiencing a surge of creativity in all things home related lately, a pretty rare thing for me. I'm actually cooking dinner tonight (grilled eggplant and roma tomatoes with goat cheese over penne pasta) and I've been wanting to do some serious decorating in my apartment. I don't even have a couch! One day I'm going to have a really cool place but right now I just don't have the funds. I need to hit up some flea markets soon. It's hard to find any inspiration when you're surrounded by four white apartment walls. Is some wood grain too much to ask for? Maybe some angles? Whenever I have my wood grained, angular, living space these are the things I'm going to fill it with.

And for my pig collection...

Paintin' That Shit Gold

This was the worst winter yet. I have felt miserable, out of my mind, hateful and possibly the lowest I've ever felt. I'm pretty sure 2010 has something personal against me and is doing her damnedest to make me give up, but I'm not going to. You may have knocked me down but I'm ready to get back up for more. I've learned that life isn't fair for anyone and you can either sit around and cry about it or say, "Fuck you." and make it work. Sometimes you'll be sad, sometimes you'll be alone, sometimes you'll feel like there's absolutely no point in trying anymore but if you're feeling these things then at least you'll be feeling something. Being a strongly self aware individual can take it's toll mentally but would you rather be a dead-eyed, ignorant little shit who floats through life without any problems never noticing a single goddamned thing around her? I didn't think so. I want to be serene. I want to be comfortable with myself exactly the way I am. I want to maintain my selfless nature without giving all of myself away. There's no starting place or ending place; life is moving around you all the time. You just have to jump in and do it. Sometimes you need to remind yourself of all of the little things that make your world a better place. Here are mine.

-Boba Tea. Yum!

-This picture of Henry Miller and a friend.

-My passport came in! It's a really wonderful feeling to know that you have the ability to go anywhere in the world.

-Used book stores.

-Netflix

-Shopping on Amazon

-Vice Magazine's Dos and Don't

-It's almost Spring and I have strong legs to go run and jump in the woods.

"This is what you shall do; Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body."
— Walt Whitman

January Recap or My Time As An Extra in "U-Turn"

Yep, I'm recapping this month 2 weeks before it ends. I'm nearly certain the rest of it will consist of me sitting right here surfing the internet and working on the three books I'm reading right now. January has felt nearly as long as June did. Almost but not quite. But then again I still have two more weeks left of it so check back with me on this. I've decided that I'm tacking January '10 onto 2009 and beginning my new year on February 1st. It seems like a reasonable idea.

Have you ever seen the movie "U-Turn"? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120399/

Sean Penn's car breaks down in a tiny desert town, Jennifer Lopez+many plot twists=calamity. It's a helluva movie. Check it out.

This information is relevant because I recently found myself in a similar situation, minus J. Lo and death. I was driving to Sikeston last week to pick up Andrew so he could have a few days in Murfreesboro before he left on tour,but my car broke down in Cairo, IL on the bridge across the Ohio River. Carry me Ohio indeed. A police officer happened by and called a tow truck for me and drove me to the motel in town. I got to ride in his cop car while he chewed dip and told me how much he loved Devo and informed me that I didn't need to wear my seat belt if I didn't want to. He didn't. The tow truck driver charged me $125 to tow my car a whopping 5 miles to the local garage.Cairo has a population of about 3,500 and one main road. I actually saw more dogs than humans while I was there. It was a river boomtown in Tom Sawyer's days but those are distant memories now. I kind of loved it there. It reminded me that there are still some real places left in the world. Shea and Matt dropped Andrew off at the motel and we made the best of our situation. We ended up lying in bed and watching TV for 2 1/2 days. We actually had a really great time. We walked to the Dollar General once and loaded up on Bowl of Noodle, hot cheetos, and sweetheart candies. Then we sat around and bitched about how much we hate TV for 48 hours. A good time was had by all. On day 3, Kevin came and picked us up and we ate in a lovely little restaurant in Kentucky. I love the South. We got home in time for Andrew to leave for tour. A few days later my aunt and uncle drove to Cairo, put my car on a trailer and brought it back to Murfreesboro. It's now sitting at the Chrysler dealership waiting to be worked on. They think it's the transmission. Nick was nice enough to let me borrow his car for the week so at least I have a way to get to work which is good because I'm broke as a joke.

But all of this is not the reason January ranks so low on my list. It was actually the highlight of my month to be completely honest. This girl is homesick as can be. I miss my hills and my friends. The week I spent there over Christmas was the nicest I've had in so long and I didn't want to leave. I'm not sure what I was trying to accomplish by moving to Murfreesboro the first or the second time but I'm almost certain I didn't do it. I don't know what to do with myself. I've been running in circles for so long that I've finally just dropped to the ground. "I think I'll just stay right down here on this floor". What's a thinking, feeling, self-aware individual to do with herself? Don't fret...I'll figure it out. Didn't I tell you that I'm useless in the winter? I think I'll just go back to Cairo and float downstream until it carries me home. Come on life, I'm almost ready.

This really isn't about anything

I'm off planet.

That's as far as I got the other night when I tried to blog while I was...well...off planet. I think I wanted to write about being frustrated with the media and our culture's obsession with the most trivial things...blah blah blah. It doesn't matter anymore. I ended up falling asleep looking at pictures of puppies and around 3 am someone gently removed the computer from my lap. Thank you.

It still isn't officially winter yet (9 more days I believe) but it's now too cold for me to want to get out of bed on my days off. If you want to know the truth I only got out of bed for a couple of hours today (grocery shopping). The rest of the day was spent under the covers planning a trip to Europe in June. A birthday present for us june bugs.

I'm going home in 10 days and I can't wait. There really is nothing like going home. It will refresh my soul and prepare me for the winter ahead. Andrew went home yesterday and I must admit that I'm jealous he gets to spend so much more time there than I do. I'm going to go to Midnight Mass with him this year. My first Catholic service ever! I've been craving a bit of spirituality lately and although Catholicism isn't quite what I'm looking for but I think the atmosphere will be nice all the same. I'm rambling now and my spiritual yearnings are to be saved for another post so I'll just stop there.

After listening to the Pharmer EP 5 or 6 times, I've moved onto Cindy Woolf and The Promise Ring because they remind me of summertime and long drives and coy glances. Mmm...I love those perfect moments. Ok, I've got to get up and do some crunches or something before I get bed sores. Peace!

Peanut Shells

I work in one of those restaurants where you can throw peanut shells on the floor. You can come in and trash the place without any fear of being reprimanded. I can't blame them but it's hell to sweep up. I'm writing this on the back of a server's notebook in between forays to the tables. I work like Charon, ushering our patrons into empty graves due to high cholesterol levels. The country hits that are (over)produced just 20 miles to the west play on the jukebox, occasionally punctuated by Credence, Jimi and the DBT. I live for these 3 minutes of sanity during my work shifts.

The restaurant is located in sleepy Smyrna, TN where nothing much has happened since Sam Davis was hailed "The Boy Hero of the Confederacy". In 1982 a large Nissan factory was built here bringing in a plethora of jobs and now the population hovers somewhere around 30,000. Our clientele is made up mostly of old families and the trickle down from Nashville. Country music star wannabes and Nissan factory workers. I don't quite know how to classify Middle Tennessee. To the East are the Appalachian Mountains and although they are a different breed of hill folk than is found in my beloved Ozark Mountains they are hill folk nonetheless with a proud and distinct heritage. To the West is the Mississippi Delta and sweet, beautiful Memphis. I love this city and it's people and I hope to make it my home soon. So where does this leave Middle Tennessee? No man's land I suppose. "Dear Nashville, stop trying to dress your shortcomings up in fancy, rhinestone clothing and maybe we'll take you more seriously.Get back to your roots for God's sake. It's never too late." But I digress. I believe I was telling you about my job.

Working here has once and for all given me the motivation to go back to school. It's not that I hunger for money. I live happily on the little money I have right now. I am able to pay my bills, I never go hungry and I can afford to buy the books and music I want. I just can't stand the atmosphere. Quiet desperation and people turned old at the age of 35. Everyone is tired and burned out. Some of us have seen better days and some of us are still waiting for them to come. Dismal and bleak accurately describes my work environment. My mood is easily affected by those around me and working here has lowered me into a depression that I have to fight from following me home. Although I am looking for another job, I have to stay at this one right now because of those goddamn bills. They tell me I should consider myself lucky to be employed but they obviously don't know me very well. So I will be awash on a sea of peanut shells until further notice and for now I will find a moment of joy in watching a baby on a leash eating the shells off the floor in the lobby.