A Heart's a Heavy Burden

Sooo, I'm reading this book based on the incredibly terrifying and gruesome Hi-Fi Murders. Steve says I'm morbid. I know I am. When I was in 11th grade and had to find a skeleton picture as the cover of my Shakespeare reviews or whatever, I spent hours discovering gory death pictures after that was the majority of search results. I haunted my dreams with awful ways people look after being murdered or committing suicide. The Hi-Fi murders are particularly horrible because they were planned deaths of random people. That is, the primary killer decided that he would horrifically murder anyone present during the robbery of an electronics store. The book is non-fiction, weaved together from interviews with the survivor and anyone involved (including the murderer) as well as testimony from the trials. The book is highly detailed to the level I desire, which only intensifies the effect. I've spent two lunch breaks with teary eyes wallowing in the despair the family experienced and is poignantly captured. I was talking to Steve about how amazing it is and at one point he burst out laughing because I "Leah'd" - a term with many definitions but is frequently referenced when I tell unnecessary details because *I* would want them (the example in question was where I was talking about an investigator and felt the need to explain that he was actually sort of retired and not the *main* investigator but it's still cool that the murderer in this case is also the murderer in the ONLY unsolved homicide he had). I was most moved by a man whose wife and 16-year-old son were both involved in the murders. He describes how it felt to face his dead wife in all her ruined glory and having to come to terms with the fact that the woman he was with for 36 years and was his "partner for life" was gone. Yep. Just gone. No more. The end. Never coming back. Over. And how he had to be strong while each of his other family members mourned after they arrived at the hospital and that he had to close off his heart to the fact that his life partner, who he was JUST talking to before she left to find their son (AND she was frantic with worry at the son not returning home yet and he told her she was overreacting. Think about THAT guilt), was dead forever. I explained to Steve that for me it would be a CONSTANT immediate back-and-forth where I would tell myself that information and then swiftly reject it with an "IMPOSSIBLE NO IT'S NOT TRUE IT'S NOT I CAN'T ACCEPT THAT FUCK YOU IT JUST SIMPLY IS NOT POSSIBLE I CAN'T DEAL WITH THIS AND NO TAKE IT BACK." Rinse and repeat.

As a result, I should not have been surprised to have a similar heart-wrenching dream in which I left a church and drove by many crazed velociraptors (naturally) and when I arrived at his office building I KNEW that Steve had been attacked by raptors and I was frantically trying to find out where he was and I went to the hospital to find him and I was screaming for him and I knew he was dead but I couldn't accept it and I knew I would try to take it back when I found his mangled body and I kept willing him to be alive and not hurt. I woke up with my "trying to cry" face on, breathing all heavy and terrified. I immediately rolled over to Steve and cuddled him super hard and could not let go of him for several hours. And of course when I tried to fall back asleep I had to try to force the remnants of the dream away so I could stop trying to manipulate it and fail. My dreams like that go in endless circles as my brain refuses to allow a proper ending. But seriously, when I imagine that he could just *poof* and be gone just like that from my life, I feel exceptionally suffocatey and hyperventilatey and will it never to come to pass (which Steve also includes in my morbid thinking category). He is just the most important person in my life. If I think about it hard enough I want to keep him locked up at home so nothing bad could ever happen to him. Thank god I don't want kids because I'd freak every time they left the driveway. This exact thing is why I HATED the movie Practical Magic - the moment when Sandra Bullock thinks that she and her husband's love will overcome the curse but then there's that stupid cricket or whatever and she tries frantically to catch it but can't and her stupid husband dies anyway. NO. NO.

In other news, I officially applied to grad school for an ABS license, which will be a broad licensure allowing me to teach levels 1 and 2 of EBD, LD, and Autism and I can go back again to get licensed for 3 and 4. I went to the informational meeting and everyone there (prospective students as well as faculty) agreed that the type of license is a great investment and there's been a growing need for me-types.

Steve and I are also doing what we're calling "ghetto week" and seeing who can make the best of of $20 from Friday to Friday. This of course does not really include not spending anything, because it kind of ruins the fun. So we each got a $20 bill to spend on whatever we like for the week and we aren't allowed to spend anything more (excludes gas). It's easily doable, but we're so frivolous with the money we don't put in savings that it's a cute game for us to be frugal. Yes, we admit we are privileged, even with me working a crappy-paying job.

I've had two dreams in the last week in which my teeth fell out. I can't remember what the first one was about but I do remember the sensation. And the second one had me pushing my sister around a grocery store in a cart, and I leaned down to say something to her and I smashed my face into her head. We both lost teeth XD I also had a HORRIBLE dream in which Steve decided to very indifferently break up with me in front of a bunch of people. Mikey was there! It's been a long, looong time since I've had a dream with Mikey in it. As a result, I spent some of last night brooding about him and missing him and such. His mom does the suicide walk near my house every year and invites me, and I have yet to go because I'm worried about not fitting in since I know no one in that group. It's his family! I didn't know his family. I'd be too uncomfortable. Oh! I also had a dream LAST NIGHT where I found a Twitter-like page and Athena had several posts talking about how much I've been annoying her XD

This was the first week Steve worked his real job at Thomson Reuters. It is definitely awesome to have the same schedules. But since he has to drive farther we actually have to get up at an early time. It's cute to shower and get ready together, and the buddy system is a good way to ensure that we're both up. And we were sad about money, as Steve's last two paychecks from Rainbow ended up being less than $150, and he won't get paid for at least another week, maybe two. But! Then he got paid out for his leftover vacation time and that was a pretty good chunk of money. He's going to buy a laptop next time I get paid and I'm getting another tattoo.

Otherwise, not much has been going on. Just chilling with Steve and having cute time. Nick and Pat moved into their own apartment finally (out of their parents' houses) and we'll probably visit them. Yay for Labor Day!

Work has kinda sucked. I'm just not feeling it right now. I don't think anyone is at this point. The move has been really hard on everyone. I almost punched a therapist through the phone when she, very bitchy-like, demanded to know when the printers would be up and WHY DIDN'T I KNOW A TIMEFRAME. Uhh, because they're not telling us anything, twat. THEY probably don't know. Go to hell. I hate people. And another provider was annoyed with me because I told them I'd transport a client to the hospital to avoid ambulance fees (I'm technically not allowed to simply transport clients places in the first place) but I was NOT waiting with her in the ER so I could be sure to talk with a social worker when she was finally seen. TOTAL waste of my time. If she wants to be sure the social worker knows the scoop, SHE can stay with the client.

I am tiiiiired. TIRED TIRED TIRED. I got an okay amount of sleep yesterday, because I napped while Steve took my car for some bday shopping for me, and then let me be a bum and lay there while he played CoD. Then I went to class, and did my pointedly not listening to half of what the professor was saying because it was stupid and I was trying to sift through all her bullshit papers. And then because I was only half listening I had to go to the front as the only person who didn't use the previous half-hour to sign up for a presentation time. Which was much more funny than embarrassing because I always blush like mad, which makes Ana laugh, and make horrified faces at her, which makes her laugh harder. She completely shut down when she thought I had to go up to sign up for the pot luck too, but turns out THAT paper was being passed around (which earned her an even more exaggerated shocked look). Our class had about 10 people yesterday, and anyone who thinks a bigger class is more embarrassing to be in front of, I think you need to rethink the amount of space a small class gets, and because it's so small, it's more intimate in general. And therefore scarier. Oh and she's usually really cute and well-spoken, but when we were doing group work in a study area and were WHISPERING (the area is not a library or even recommended for quiet), this guy kept turning around to glare in our direction. While I would giggle at him every time he did that, Ana got miffed and muttered, "Yeah well he can lick me where I pee!!! *scowl*" Dawnielle was like, "...WHAT?! Where you PEE?!" "Well, it's better than where I poop!" Yes, she 25.

After class I came home and Steve and I took a walk around the horseshoe of the neighborhood because it was really nice out - it's gonna get real cold real soon, and we gotta cherish our warmer days now. Then we layed down for sleep. It would have been a delicious 4-5 hours of sleep, except I kept waking up in a panic thinking I was late for work, and Steve was having very active dreams which caused him to speak out in his sleep at least three times - one is my subject line, another was SINGING about some dream nonsense, and the other I can't remember because I was sleepy too. And I had some weird dream where his ex BFF Andy would hide in the neighborhood and take pictures of him when he was riding his bike XD wtf. I've never even met Andy. When I got up to shower I asked Steve if he wanted to come (we shower together nearly every day - it's one of the places where we can just chat and relax. The shower is not a fun place IRL to for real mess around in) and he said yeah, so I started the shower, got in... did my shampoo... did my conditioner... no Steve? So I hopped out and he was like half sitting up with his eyes half-open, looking confused. I asked him if he was coming and he popped up and walked dazedly to the bathroom. A few minutes later he told me he'd been dreaming that we weren't in the shower yet, but sitting next to each other to wake up, so when I was suddenly in the doorway, wet and wrapped in a towel, it was very surprising. :P Silly boy.
 
I am not motivated for anything but sleep right now! It's all I can think about omg. I already told Steve that I'm probs crashing when I get home until my meeting at 6. Steve doesn't work tonight so he fell back asleep when I left even though he said he didn't want to.

Oh! I finally get to get my hair done tomorrow. I'm meeting Mom and we're going together. After that Steve and I are going to Nick's sister Megan's for a get-together. Some drinking and rock band, although it'll be very low-key. Megan just invited people from Spoogie's wedding party (and me) to hang out since there wasn't really a fun reception or anything. I'm excited because Megan and Ross are super cool. It starts at 7 so I think it'll be over around midnight. Megan and Ross are parents, after all! 

As Steve and I are running out of shows to have running in the background while we relax (and we have completely exhuasted Friends, we've seen each episode about a hundred times), I got him started on Sex and the City. The problem is, unlike Friends, I don't own Season 2 or the second half of Season 6. This is exacerbated by the fact that I had a TON of discs in a case here at work and some dumb bitch client stole it for crack money (and she was long gone by the time the theft was discovered, she left and never came back). So about half my Sex and the City discs are gone. The good news is Steve likes it anyway (and shares my INTENSE love for Aiden and Steve).

After he left for work today I went to sleep my extra 3 hours, and instead of having a pleasant, dreamless sleep I was confronted with a TERRIFYING dream about velociraptors. It was different from my normal raptor dreams because it had NOTHING to do with Jurassic Park this time, only I guess the raptors were called raptors but looked like mini versions of T-rexes and believe me, raptors look nothing like them. I woke up a couple times, heart pounding, but I had to fall back asleep and try to conclude it, ya know? It ended up turning into something like a movie, and Lost characters were there (Shannon died and Sawyer was there too and I think he died as well). I didn't die so that's the good news. Haha. It'd been awhile since I had a velociraptor dream.

My interview went well, I'll hear the results early this week. I'm sooo hoping I get it. Especially because they are closing I-94 EVERY WEEKEND and I have to drive a super long way around it to get here in 40 minutes, not to mention driving home Monday morning in rush hour. But this new position is located like 10 minutes from my house and was a dream to drive to. Plus it'll be 30 more hours a week AND as an internal transfer it won't be starting a whole new job. YES.

Lately I've been having weird vivid dreams! Some that are really long and some that are really short.

I remember dreaming in cartoon the other week, but I can't remember what show it was! I think it might have been Higurashi.

The other week I had a weird dream about me and Steve and Sally all riding together from somewhere. I was trying to be nice to Sally and so I was laughing all politely at everything she said and I had on my huge "I am totally interested in what you have to say" smile. I was uncomfortable being in the same car with them and thought it was so weird she wanted to be friends. WEEEIIIIRRRDDD. I've never even met her. But Andy is now trying to be friends with Steve so I get to tease him about it a lot :P

I dreamed the other night about being in an ambulance with a girl I've never met but have heard of because she's linked to several people I know (Kristen) so my mind couldn't decide if she looked like Generic Blond Skank or Kinda Chubby And Awkward, and she was dating Andy instead of Sally, and the paramedic knew how all of us were linked to each other?

And today I had an extremely long dream after Steve left for work where I was... Batman? Like, I was wearing an outift and chasing bad guys down with a glider that had a very sharp pointy front and it kept chopping people in half. But when I talked I sounded like me, and I had my own thoughts. I flew around A LOT on my glider because it wasn't an exact science so I had to redirect myself and stuff. After I killed this douchey fat guy that was really pissing me off (it was hard to do!), I had to go chase down the Joker. He was pretty much just a real-life version of the one in the animated series and some of the comics - skinny, but maybe a bit scrawnier than in cartoon form, evil, great (although Heath Ledger's Joker gets me too). I had to try several sneaky ways to catch him off guard, and in the end I wasn't able to sneak up on him with my glider, which was good anyway because even though I was sort of Batman, I also still found him incredibly hot. And when we had our actual confrontation in this weird rundown warehouse, I guess he doesn't like his own blood so I threatened him by cutting his face or neck with a razor blade. We were in this interesting grip where I couldn't tell if he was restraining me or I was restraining him (and I definitely was no longer Batman). And then I got real close to him slowly and kissed the corner of his mouth and told him that I loved him. Then for some reason I let him walk away from me, and as he sauntered away he turned around and said with a sexy smirk, "Maybe a little." which to my mind meant that he loved me too. But I only had time to dwell while gliding because I had to quick free some kids he trapped in a mine shaft. It was great. And I may have an unhealthy crush on the Joker.