I don't like to talk about ppl

I'm going to try and keep this to factual events and things that I would say to this person in person so I won't feel like I hope they never read this. Granted I only have one follower, but hey, you never know who is reading.

I'm going to start off by saying that I know I have a problem. I acknowledge that I have a low tolerance for people in general and that almost everyone will get on my nerves at some point or another for no real reason.I would never consider myself a people person and it amazes me I have any friends at all sometimes. Not sure how they put up with me and my moodiness. But I say that to say I know that part of this is me. That being said...

I cannot remember the last time my nerves were ever so trampled. Maybe in my old age I'm becoming even less tolerant than I was when I was younger. But whatever the reason is I have GOT to find a solution before I go crazy. Perhaps I need to take deep breaths or Wooo Saaah or something. I don't know, but I'm reaching my limit and I don't think being passive is going to solve anything.

Here's the situation. A certain individual, I'll refer to them as PM, has decided to dub me their new friend. If that's how PM feels, that's fine. But here is where I am struggling. PM calls me almost every day trying to hang out, come over or do something. Usually multiple times in that day. Most of the calls are missed calls. What I don't understand is 1.) if you call me say at 5:00 an no one picks up, then turn around and call at 5:06, still no answer. Then I get yet another missed call 30 minutes later, why then do you call a 4th time?!?! Just like PM and everyone else with a cell phone I do have caller id. If you call and I don't answer the first or second time, then you are supposed to wait for a call back. I think that is a general rule of cell phone etiquette (gotta be written down somewhere. Might have to find it). Not only that, but if there is something you really want to say so badly that you feel you gotta KEEP calling, they why not just text it to me? I will read a text loooooooong before I ever pick up the phone to call someone back. And 2.) Why u keep callin when you either don't want nothin, or I have already responded to what u callin me about.

Let's take yesterday for example, I got a call at 4:44, 4:48, 6:09 and 6:32 pm - all missed calls. Then I get a text. Finally PM realizes calling isn't getting anything accomplished. Around 7, PM text me about playing some pool or watching a movie. I think I talked to PM at some point prior to the txt msg though because originally the plan was to go play mini golf and I do recall speaking to PM. However whatever we were doing would be after PM got out of the spa or something like that. I'm like by the time u get out the spa i'mma be ready for bed. I get another call at 8:33 pm and this one I decide to pick up. PM asks me what I'm doing and I say I'm eating desert and then I'mma get ready for bed (imagine that!!). We have a small conversation in which at one point I say I'm going to block PM's number from my phone. Clearly PM though it was a joke, and it kinda was and kinda wasn't. Now I figure that since I said I'm bout to go get ready for bed, that was a clear indication that I'm done for the night. So I didn't expect my phone to be ringing any more. Even still I figured I'd try something out. I went on GoogleVoice and blocked the number anyway. Now since PM doesn't call my GV#, just my cell, I wasn't sure what would happen after I blocked it and got a call. I thought of txting LB to see if I could try it on her, but then I figured I'd just test it in the morning. I then turned the ringer off my phone just in case and laid out on the couch.

I prolly woke up a couple hours later and I decided to check my phone. Wouldn'tcha know I had 4 missed calls! The first one came at 9:51 and the last one was at 10:51. 3 showed up as from PM and the 4th was a private number but I suspect that was PM too. Not only that but I also had a txt asking what was wrong with my phone!!!

Shiiiiiid! I'll tell u what's wrong with my phone, YOU KEEP CALLING!!! WHEW! That's what I was thinking anyway. I still have no idea what this fool was calling me about at 10pm AFTER I ALREADY SAID I WAS GOING TO SLEEP!!!!! WTF?!?!?!?! GET OFF MY PHONE!!! 

It's only been about 3 weeks that I have been dealing with this, but it seems like for ever. Every week at least twice a week if not more I get a call asking to either go to see a movie, grab something to eat, ask me if I'm cooking or to just hang out at my place. The first two I don't really have a problem with so much. Only thing is I been trying to save money lately so I have pretty much cut out almost all restaurant dining and movies. But then PM offers to pay and takes away my excuse. I don't really like PM paying for everything because I feel like I'm being bought and my friendship is not for sale. But then it's like if I don't say yes, PM just keeps asking and asking and asking, until I do which is why I don't answer the phone. So I guess part of that is my fault for not sticking to my no's and I need to do that more often. But with the second 2, I do have a problem with people inviting themselves over especially if they don't usually come over or have an open invitation. There are certain ppl who can pretty much swing by whenever, long as they give me a heads up, I don't mind at all. but these people can do that cause they ASK FIRST. PM never asks. PM tries to tell me I'm cooking or that my place is going to be their hang out spot. It's never do you mind if I come over for a little while and watch a movie. Then I might say yes...might.

Ok, I think I've vented enough. I'm going to get a little break because PM will be out of town. Hopefully I'll come up with a solution during this time.

Can't do nothin nice...

A friend of mine asked me to give them a ride to a job interview today. I was working from home and could squeeze it into my lunch, so I figured, sure why not. I'm a nice person. I help my friends out when I can. That being said, I still feel a certain way about doing favors for people. I don't mind doing someone a favor. I'm happy to help out when I can because I consider myself fortunate to even be able to help them out. At the same time, I don't like it when people take advantage of the fact that I'm helping them out and are disrespectful in the process. Just makes me not want to do anything for them ever again.

When someone is doing me a favor, I try to make it as easy and convenient for them as possible because they are going out of their way to help me out. I try to be where I tell them I'm going to be when I say I'm going to be there and ready and if I'm not going to make it, then I do my best to let them know in advance. I hate when people waste my time and I really truly despise with every fiber of my being waiting around on people when I hadn't planned on it and this is why. When it comes to my time, it's just that MINE. I should be able to decide how I spend it as I see fit. It drives me up the wall when other people take that decision away from me. It's like, who are you and what makes your time so much more important than mine? It's really a form of arrogance on top of being extremely disrespectful. How would you like it if I reached in your pocket, took $20 and used to buy myself some dinner? I didn't even bother to ask if you might have been planning to use that $20 for something or offer you some of my food at the very least while I'm sittin here eating it in your face. Just disregarded you all together. Disrespectful right? Well, it's practically the same thing, difference is, you can get money back.

So back to my story. I bring this individual to their job interview and they ask me to wait a minute while they go inside. I assume it's to try and make sure its the right place and all that before I drive off. Cool, no biggie. I wait. They come back out and tell me they just have to fill out some paper work so it's not really an interview. Say it will just take 5 minutes. Cool, no biggie. I wait. I wait 5 min. then 10 min, then 18 minutes.... WTF?!?!? Needless to say I was quite irritated. I go in (mind you the door is only a few yards from the car) and see this person sitting down filling out some paper work. In my mind I'm a little perplexed. Now they tell me they are almost done, another 5 minutes. (!!!???!!!) Really? so another 20 is what you are saying? Course I didn't say that. I left, hopped in my car and went to subway. I was actually considering not going back, that's how through I was. But I figured at the very least they could sit there and wait just for me like I had to. 

So how could this situation played out differently and not left me feeling like I have to think twice about ever doing this person a favor ever again? It's actually quite simple. After 5 minutes, or even 10 minutes, they could have taken 30 seconds to come out to the car and tell me it was going to take a little longer. Then LET ME DECIDE if I want to wait or if I need to go.  Granted, they may have had to take the bus home, but that was the plan from the beginning. But at least they would not have been disrespectful.

The sad part is I don't even feel like I can say anything to this person, because I know they won't understand how they were disrespectful or what they could have done differently. All I would get is excuses as to why they didn't and that would piss me off even more... So I have to blog about it.

Happy Birthday!

Yeah, I'm not gon make it till Saturday. This week is a lot longer than I thought it would be. I still have Thursday AND Friday to get through?! WHEW! The whole shake thing is definitely not going to work. And I was ok with that cause I figured I'd cook these chicken breasts that I saw I had in my freezer when I was scavenging for food last night. That's healthy right? Mmmmm, maybe not. Not when the chicken is about to have a birthday. It's so freezer burned it might actually be cooked. I guess it had been in there a little longer than I thought. I'm not sure what the freezer shelf life of chicken breasts is, but I'm pretty certain it's not an entire year. And it's not like I haven't made chicken in the past year, so why the hell did I never cook it? Just another one of those things that I do that doesn't make any sense, yet I do it anyway... smh.

Maybe I'll go to bible study tonight. I haven't been in a while. That will be my excuse for not going to the gym.

Running out of straws...

It's day 4 and I still have not spent a dime. I think this first week is going to be a breeze. I'm not even feeling any credit card withdraw.... Unless the fact that I am looking forward to going to the eye doctors on Friday just so I can get that feeling of swiping my card and signing the little slip of paper one more time counts. Then maybe I'm feeling it a little.

Right now I think my biggest challenge is getting back to eating healthy. All I have in my house is carbs and ingredients to bake more carbs. Take last night for example. For dinner I ate a box of stuffing. That's it. No meat, no veggies no nothing. Just me and a big ol' plate of stuffing. As I was making the stuffing, I knew it didn't make any sense, but clearly I didn't care enough to stop. Smh... got to do better. Maybe I'll take a page from the book of Rolea and set up a short term goal. Something simple, something attainable,  hmmm.... Ok, here's one. For the rest of this week, I'm just going to drink my shakes. No real food til Saturday. NO EXCEPTIONS!  Damn, in my mind I'm already cheating cause I'm thinking about the change I scrounged up this morning for the vending machine. It's like I've failed before I even started... FML

So what's all this got to do with straws? Nothing really, but I am running out of straws, literally. This morning, when I realized that I was down to my last few, I was trying to decide if I would buy more when I ran out, or is this something I would sacrifice for the sake of this whole exercise in self discipline. Yeah I know it seems insignificant, but it starts with the small things. And that's what this is all really about. It's nice to be able to travel, go out to eat and things like that and know that my bills will still be paid, but it may not always like this. I need to know that if times get hard, I won't have a problem giving up all the extra stuff and just getting back to the basics.  At the same time this is also kind of my punishment for blowing my budget for the past 7 months in a row unnecessarily. Oh well, I'll just suck it up. Nothing lasts for ever.

I might have a problem... (Just one?!)

I actually have several problems, but this one happens to be the flavor of the week. Today is Friday and I have pretty much been sitting in the house ever since I got back from vacation. The reason for that is because I AM BROKE for all intents and purposes. Come Christmas time, there will be no presents for anyone, no traveling home for me and no after Christmas shopping. Gotta take some action now! Operation spend no money needs to be in full effect. Let's recap how that's been going so far....

Yesterday I went to get my oil changed. That's all, no more, no less. Now of course I already knew I needed new breaks cause my car has been screaming like it's being tortured for the past month. To make a long story short they got me for over $250... FAIL!

Ok, that was a necessary evil, I'll take the L but what about every thing else? Like I said, I've been sitting in the house all week for the most part. I figure if I stay in the house, I won't spend money right? WRONG! Online shopping might be my weakness and I swear if the devil were to take the form of a tv station it would be HSN. Buying stuff on line is WAY easy. It's almost like I'm not even really spending money, not until I get that Amex bill that is. Now, maybe someone would say oh just cut up your credit card, then you can't use it.... mmmmm, not so much. I know my credit card number better than my ABC's. It's such a problem that I was at the mail box a couple of days ago and I see the UPS truck coming down the street. I think absolutely nothing of it until she stops in front of my house. The driver gets out and tells me she has a package for me. I'm not sure if I actually had a confused look on my face, but that was definitely the tone of my thoughts at the time. I couldn't even remember what I had ordered! I didn't figure it out until I saw where the pkg came from... smh.

So today starts a new billing cycle. I'm gonna be good for one full month. I have to be cause I'm going to Vegas at the end of August and it would really be a shame if I had no money to spend out there. So Operation Spend No Money is going to be in full effect! No exceptions! Starting..... right after I submit this last order to HSN... No, I mean after I go to Sakura's tonight for Brian's B-day get together... Whew! The devil is busy, Pray for me.

Back in the swing of things

I'll start off by saying that I got my first follower today... YAY!! I'mma try and get the rest of my good friends to start keeping blogs too. Then we can all follow each other so that on the days when we can't have our conference call or someone misses out, they can just read about it later.

So just a quick recap, I've been back from my cruise for almost a week now an have been super antisocial. I can probably count on one hand the number of people I've seen and spoken to outside of work and probably include inside on one hand. But yeah, about that cruise... um, I didn't really want to say it to anyone like for real for real, but I'll say it here. I was right, it was somewhat of a waste of money. At least in the fun department. Yeah it was nice to see everyone and I'm glad that my Grandma had a good time. It was worth it in that respect because usually when that many people get together its for a funeral. But in terms of how much fun I had for the price I paid... um, I think I need a refund. I'd say at least half of the time I was bored. And while being bored that only left 2 things to do, eat an sleep. So I did both and of course I got fat. Now that I'm back I'm not even trying to be on the whole workout/eat right kick that I was on before and I really need to. Motivation is at an all time low. Maybe I'll start tomorrow... maybe.

Damn this ADD, lemme get back to the cruise. It went to 3 places. Key West, Cozumel Mexico and Coco Cay in the bahamas. I didn't do anything at key west except get off the boat and walk around in the heat for about 45 minutes until I was sweating profusely and then get back on the boat. Cozumel I swam with the dolphins and did a lil bit of snorkeling with my cousin Siera. In Coco Cay we pretty much just laid out in the sun all day on floating mats and did a lil bit of snorkeling as well. That was about it tho. The whole trip summed up in like 3 sentences. 1200 bux, gone! I will say tho that the highlight of my trip might have been the night of my grandma's birthday when we all went to the pool party and she was out there dancing. I watched the videos when I got back with Robin, and a couple other ppl and we were all crackin up. Grandma was gettin DOWN with her bad 80 yr old self. I only hope to be that lively when I'm 80. Maybe I'll have a chance if I get my butt back to the gym now 0_o.

 Grandma gettin busy!