Waiting for me

The title is a typo, but I decided I liked it better than the actual lyrics that should go there.

Anyway, Jay picked me up from my volunteer position on Thursday evening to take me out to dinner. All week he'd been saying that he wanted to take me out to dinner and "do something", the something being anything but going back to my place and probably falling asleep. Me being me, I kept asking him what the something was. I wasn't too surprised when Thursday dawned and he didn't have anything.

We went out to a nicer Italian place, about twenty minutes from my house. Maybe my palate is just a philistine, but I was less than impressed. The breadsticks were good though? And the raspberry martini I had wasn't bad either. But for as much as he paid, I would have liked to enjoy my meal more. Seriously. I might be a schlub, but I like Bertucci's better.

While I was there, I was so completely the dominant female. It was interesting, really. Jay didn't do much of the talking; I was the one interacting with the hostess, the waitress, etc. I walked in before he did, I sat down before he did, I did the ordering for the most part, I made the decision to have dessert, and when the waitress came over, she asked me if everything was okay, not Jay. It was as if he were invisible, almost. I took over, and was the smooth, in-control adult woman. It was fun, if a bit shallow on my part. That part of my personality exists, sure, but the way I was doing it was a bit too smooth and black-cocktail-dress-and-diamonds-on-everything, if you know what I mean. And here I am saying that I want a guy to Dom me!

The other thing that struck me was that everyone else in the restaurant was talking, and we were silent. Jay and I said about ten words to each other during the course of our meal. Now, it's nice to have someone with whom you can be silent, sure. But it feels like we have nothing to say to each other. My friends (and anyone who reads this blog) know that I can be a wordy, chatty bitch. Hell, I go out to dinner with Elizabeth, and we don't shut up, ever. With Jay? Nada. I resorted to watching the mock NFL draft on ESPN that they had on, and god knows that was fucking ridiculously boring. I said a prayer of thanks when a baseball game came on instead.

It was the same after dinner. We got into his car, and started driving, and I again asked him what his plans were. All he could come up with was driving an hour south to where his parents' cottage was, to show it to me. Not inside, just the outside, as he didn't have a key. Yes, he was serious as he said this. I about smacked him, but restrained myself. Don't get me wrong, I like driving, but what the fuck. He then asked me where we should go, and I suggested that we go someplace that I wasn't familiar with driving - figuring we'd get lost in one of the suburbs, which I used to do when I had a car, to my great and never-ending entertainment. Instead he drives straight west on a highway I drive all the damn time, and we wound up going past where he works. He pulled into the parking lot to show me. I could barely contain my glee, let me tell you.

I was so irritated - well, not precisely irritated, but for lack of a better word, irritated - when we got back to my house that when we parked, I got out of the car and started walking without him. I took a certain amount of satisfaction in hearing him run to catch up to me (what good are long legs if you don't put them to use?) I was so intent on walking away that I nearly walked past my own house. Not a good sign. I really think that he takes my coming back to him at some point as a given. Sure, there are days when I think that too, but there's a lot of them when I don't, and I don't think he's gotten the memo yet - despite the multiple copies I stuffed in his mailbox.

He wound up falling asleep and not going back home; his parents called in a panic at 6:15 because his car wasn't there. He got up and went to work; I went back to sleep to avoid the world for a little longer, him included. He seemed pretty happy with life; I've been trying to change mine again, in spectacular fashion.

My life is boring

Pretty much all I've been doing for the past week is sleeping and working. This is different from my normal schedule of sleeping and working in the fact that I'm doing the working part longer, and on more days. This makes me tired, and not interested in much.

The other thing occupying my mind has been finding a car. See, taking public transportation to work is completely doable, and in fact, I have been doing so for well over a year. It just takes me an hour and a half, at least, each way. Plus, my graduate school is about forty-five minutes in the opposite direction... so taking public transport from work to school would probably take about two hours. This is not acceptable, so I am working on remedying the situation with a car.

Yes, yes, cars are expensive, blah blah, you can do homework on the bus, blah blah, but let's be realistic. As an undergraduate, I also took public transport, and I never, repeat, never did homework on the bus. I was always way too interested in my iPod, or in the emulated NES games on my laptop. Plus, that hour and a half home really cuts into my unwinding and sleeping time.

So right now I'm looking at a few beaters in the area; I don't have that much money to buy a car but I do have some. So I'm scouring the classifieds, online and off, for something cheap and reliable. I've got a few leads, so with any luck, by this time next week I'll be driving to work.

Other than that, I really don't have much going on. Jay is still trying to date me, Peter shot me an email apologizing for being so busy, and a few other guys have expressed interest in me, and I'm still in the middle, completely indecisive. About the only thing that's changed is that now I'm irritated and upset about my indecisiveness. That is a ridiculous amount of fun, let me assure you.

Bah, work calls. Time to stop sitting around and moping in my pajamas and get ready to head out for the day.

Got to have faith

Good news on the work front - well, mixed news, really. One of the supervisors is leaving, and it's the one with the most experience. It's time for her to move on, and I can't blame her for that, but she'll leave a huge hole.

Part of that huge hole is her schedule, which is weekdays, which is where I want to get back to working, which I just talked to the site scheduler about, and hooray! She says I get them. No more weekends for me after mid-May! This means free time that can actually be spent with people other than my roommate. Not that she's bad, but, you know.

All just a little bit of...

Ever notice how life tends to work in cycles? I'm listening to a song right now that I obsessively listened to in high school, and it's back to being extremely relevant to my life. For a while, it was on my playlist, I listened to it, I liked it, and it reminded me of the period of my life when I first heard it, but now, eight or so years later, it's back to being "Sweet Jesus, this IS my life right now".

Not that that's necessarily a bad thing; if I have to repeat my earlier life (and I can't manage college), high school is better than junior high. At least by high school I'd attained a degree of independence, as well as a good friend, so that I wasn't completely ostracized. Plus, high school was, in large part, a holding pattern before I could get to the awesomeness of college, so if I'm feeling some of the same things, this must just be the holding pattern before something similarly awesome.

I don't necessarily have lots of evidence for this, but I have decided that I would like it very much to be true.

Are you such

I woke up this morning still dreaming that I was at my high school reunion, I naturally looked fabulous, and the guy I had a crush on all through high school was miraculously divorced, dancing with me (quite well), and interested in dating me now that I'd moved back to the home state.

That was a little disconcerting. I haven't thought about him in years.

Please stand by

"Hey babe?" he says, looking up from his intense concentration in fingering me.

"mmmm" is all I'm capable of replying.

"I want to fuck you doggy-style, with your bra on, while I'm pulling your hair."

Good thing I don't feel like turning him down, because I'm not really capable of it at this point.

It started after dinner. Jay and I had cuddled on the couch for a while, but he was complaining of being tired, so we changed venues and headed to my bed. The bed is much nicer than what it was when he was still living with me. I bought a new mattress for my birthday, and so my bed is probably the most comfortable place in the house. I couldn't blame him for wanting to relocate.

For once I was hornier than Jay, and as I started kissing him I mentioned the fact that I think he's seeing me too much; he's been far too easily able to keep his hands off of me. He chuckled a bit and allowed as I might have a point, but didn't stop my attempts to entice him.

Soon enough, my clothes were being stripped off - first my jeans and underwear, then my shirt, but not my bra, to my great surprise. Jay has told me repeatedly that he loves playing with my tits, and indeed he was, through the bra, but he usually takes that off too. I asked him about it; he replied that he felt like leaving it on, and that was that. I didn't ask again.

Jay also has this near-obsession with making me cum at least once before he fucks me. Far be it from me to complain. This usually takes the form of fingering. He says that he likes my reaction to it, which usually involves the following: not being able to speak coherently, tensing of muscles, moaning, groaning, toe-curling, and an epileptic-style seizure upon orgasm. It was during this point of the process of foreplay that he made the opening remark to me.

He went over to my dresser to grab a condom, put it on, then flipped me over and informed me that I was to get on all fours. I complied, slowly; I was still a bit caught up in the earlier fun. I'm too tall for that position to be really comfortable for me - everything is too long, not just my legs. I hate to say it, but if you've seen the photos of that statue that's supposedly of Britney Spears giving birth, my position kind of looked like that - you know, with a bra on, and without the whole "pregnant and giving birth" option.

Jay reached up and grabbed a hunk of my hair, making me pull my head up and arch my back, and started trying to fuck me. I hissed a bit; the position was stretching my vulva in less-than-optimal ways, and so the insertion of a hard cock wasn't the most pleasureable thing at that point. Jay pulled harder on my hair and pulled out, and then I heard a soft "well fuck."

I swiveled my head around.

"I hate being a guy."

And why is that, Jay.

"Because orgasm and ejaculation aren't the same thing. My dick is stupid. I guess fulfilling that fantasy was a little too much for it."

The poor boy. He took the condom off and we both watched his deflating dick. I made a remark about having technical difficulties, and cuddled up next to him to reassure him that I was not put out about the matter. I was half-asleep when I felt Jay get up, come back to bed, flip me onto my back, and proceed to fuck me stupid. Apparently the technical difficulties were solved, because we were both rewarded for our patience with a simultaneous orgasm.

And in the morning, he did it again.

Turn to face the sun, let it warm you through

You know, I've always thought of myself as a winter person, but damn if I'm not happy it's spring. 70's and sunshine have done marvels for my mental health.

There's plenty to write about Jay, and in fact he's why I haven't written in two days. He doesn't know this exists, as far as I know, so I try to keep it that way.

Instead, I will write more about me, and other people that are not Jay.

Here's the deal. Back in February, I applied for graduate school. It's a long story as to why I only applied to one school, but I only applied to one school. The entire process nearly made me ill; I was convinced that I was not good enough for grad school for a variety of reasons, most of which were bullshit, as Vinnie often told me (as well as others). I have a history of thinking I'm not good enough - thanks Dad; it was really helpful for you to never congratulate me for bringing home straight A's for years.

Anyway, I finished the application at the last possible minute, because I like to avoid things that are unpleasant for me. It's one of my big character flaws. I turned in the application, and tried to forget about the entire thing. In the back of my head, I allowed for the possibility that I might get in anyway - I have excellent references, and tons of experience in the field - but more or less had decided that I wasn't getting in.

I got out of the shower today, before going to work, and my roomate had brought in the mail, including a large envelope from the school. I picked it up and there were multiple sheets, so I figured it wasn't a rejection letter. That enabled me to bite the bullet and open the damn thing, and I was correct, it was in fact an offer to attend the school starting this fall. I screeched in joy loud enough to let the entire metropolitan area know, and promptly called my parents to tell them the good news.

Once the initial excitement wore off, the practicalities started asseting themselves. I make a pitifully small amount of money. I live in an expensive area. Grad school ain't cheap. I work in a place that's an hour and a half from my house unless I have a car, which I don't have. The school is about an hour by public transport in the other direction, but again, much shorter time by car. I don't have the money to buy a car, and gas is wicked expensive. I also hate a lot of things about being a supervisor, but I'm not sure if that's just because I'm still more or less trying the role on. Thankfully, I'm only expected to come up with $7,000 per year towards this, but still, it's not like I've got $7,000 sitting around somewhere.

But back to excitement and positive things. This is so far beyond where anyone else in my family has gotten. I was the first person on my mom's side of the family to ever even go to college, much less graduate, and only the third on my dad's side. Hell, four generations ago, both families were still in Europe. Both of my parents ended their education after high school. My brother dropped out of college. This is going way beyond where anyone else has been, and what's great about it is that not only is it fulfilling a dream for me, it's making my parents so unbearably proud. I love that.

I also love that I got in on my own merit. I got in because I'm worthy of going to grad school. Me. Just me. I rock that much sock. It's a huge self-esteem boost. I can totally kick this shit's ass.

The other thing that's wicked exciting about today is that one of my good friends (and now play-hooky-and-ski buddies) from college rang me up today to tell me that she got engaged to her long-term boyfriend, which is amazingly exciting for them and I couldn't be happier. Sure, I still don't think I'm old enough to have friends getting married, but it's not like she's the first. I was the maid of honor for a friend's wedding when I was 19, and my closest friend in the world got married last year, but I am not old enough to have friends getting married (much less get married myself). But I want kids. A lot. But I don't want to get married. Bleah.

Anyway, happiness for friend. And happiness for me. This is so fucking awesome.

Long Cool Woman

For the winter and my singledom, I admit, I got lazy when it came to shaving my legs. I had no one to impress, and my work isn't the kind where I need to wear a skirt on a regular basis. So, by the time the beginning of this month hit, my mother was calling me saying they'd spotted a Yeti in my area, and was that me? Did I need some razors or something? Because she'd send me some. Or some of that Veet stuff. Or maybe I should come back home.

It can't have been me, Mom; I've been wearing pants all winter.

Anyway, last week I finally broke down and bought myself some of that Veet stuff, thank you very much I am an independent woman. And oh, the smoothness. The very smoothness. I'd nearly forgotten what it felt like.

So yesterday, when I was at the portion of my weekly activities that did require me to wear something other than blue jeans, I decided hey! I have the smoothness. And it's spring. Let's wear a skirt!

I had completely forgotten just how fucking awesome skirts can be. And how nice my legs look in hosiery and high heels - and how nice my butt and hips look in the skirt, especially now that I've lost around forty pounds. Hot damn, I may have to keep up with this girly shit, because damn if it doesn't get lots of appreciative looks from people.

What can I say? I'm an attention whore. I like when guys (and a few girls) check me out.

Who wouldn't stand inside your love?

For the past month or so, I've taken to seeing Jay pretty regularly. Since I unceremoniously dumped his ass (on his birthday! That still entertains me, in a very perverse sort of way), I've kept up with talking to him and whatnot, as I have mentioned. But since he was living half an hour away with his parents, I didn't see him very much.

Last month, Jay got himself a car, and as soon as he possibly could, offered to pick me up from work on a Friday night and spend some time with me. Not having to face the rigors of public transportation after midnight appeals to me, so I accepted his offer graciously and thankfully, and proceeded to spend my workday slightly gleeful that I was getting a ride home. Jay picked me up, took me home, and we proceeded to fuck each other senseless, repeatedly.

Did I mention that there's still plenty of sparks there? Okay, good.

Since then, I've seen him once or twice a week. Anyway, the point of this entry was a visit last week, on Tuesday. I wound up working until 6 in the evening, which is highly late for Tuesdays for me, so Jay picked me up directly from work. I was exhausted, and starving. We came home to my place, ordered up some food. I devoured a chicken caesar wrap, after unwrapping it and stating that it was far too large to ever be completely consumed. We ate on one of my couches in the living room, because at the time my dining room table was covered with assorted crap that I hadn't gotten around to cleaning up and putting away somewhere in the past nine months.

After we ate, we sat on the couch, me leaning my head on Jay's shoulder, his arms around me. I can only take so much silence, so after a while I asked "What are we doing?" Jay being a literalist with a sense of humor, answered "Sitting on the couch." "That's not what I meant and you know that."

More silence ensued. I had asked becuase I've been pretty adamant that I don't want to date Jay, at least not right now. When I broke up with him, it was with the understanding that I wasn't going to get back together with him like last time - or if I did, it would be years down the road, after he grew up and started matching my maturity and responsibility level. I've been wavering on that position. A lot. Jay's been reminding me of all the things I really do love about him, and now that he's got a job... well, it's hard, okay?

"Nothing," he answers.

"Nothing?"

"Well," he says, "I know you're not ready to date me right now. And that's okay. I'm ready to wait until you are. And in the meantime, do nothing."

I wouldn't exactly classify what we've been doing as nothing, although we have specifically said that it is without strings, and each of us is free to do whatever - which is part of the reason why I've been going out on dates with non-Jay people.

"Who's waiting for who?"

"What?" he asks.

"Well, I've been waiting for you to grow the hell up."

"So have I. I guess I'm waiting for both of us, then."

Terminated abnormally.

I realized the other day that my old template looked like it was from about 1999. Not that 1999 was a bad year (it was probably the last time I coded anything completely independently), but since I was back, I figured it was time for a new look.

Changing my template made me remember why I gave up and left it the way it was last time.

I am not doing that again any time soon.

Moving on to the fun stuff.

My beloved laptop is back, after an absence of nearly a week. It needed a new motherboard, despite being less than a year old.

See, my birthday was back in February, but I work with kids, and they have a week of vacation off in February, that just happened to coincide with the week of my birthday. Now that I'm a manager at work, I knew for damned sure that a time-off request for that week would never fly; considering that I worked twenty extra hours that week to make sure everything was covered. So I had planned from the start to take a week off in March to celebrate my birthday. This worked out much better for all concerned.

I did however take the actual day of my birthday off; my boss is nice enough to allow that at the least.

Anyway, I took a week off in March, and invited some people out to the homestead to celebrate with me. The guest list was pretty typical me: nearly all guys. It included Jay, Vinnie and Mike, Joseph, Lawrence (who lives in England and who I see every five years or so), Cecil, and my close friend Elizabeth and her boyfriend. I also invited my roommate Rabbit, who I like, and didn't invite my roommate Chris, who I hate. Naturally, those that had to travel (which was all but Jay and Elizabeth) couldn't make it. Well, no, Vinnie and Mike drove out, so it wasn't a complete loss. I wasn't expecting most of the rest to visit - which is probably for the better. An event with both Jay and Joseph at it would probably be a poor idea.

The entire month beforehand, I agonized over what I wanted to do. Back in December, I had become obsessed with downhill skiing, after trying it for the first time. I desperately wanted to go skiing again, which would make the sixth time in the season. Jay, who has been a skier since small times, and Elizabeth and boyfriend were on board with the idea, as was Rabbit (who snowboards). Vinnie told me in no uncertain terms that he would never, ever ski, and being me, I figured that left sking right out.

I had a long talk with Vinnie, and he finally told me, as he so often does, to stop fucking worrying about making everyone else happy, because he was coming up here to visit with me, and if I wanted to go skiing, that was just fine by him. He'd gleefully check out hot guys and get drunk in the lodge, and laugh at me if I broke something.

Once he said that, I immediately called up Elizabeth and we planned out a place to stay for everyone, and the game was on. Vinnie and Mike came up a day before we left for the mountain, to stay with me as they always do when they visit. We stayed up late the first night, drinking decent red wine and playing video games and gossiping.

When we finally went to bed, I put my laptop on the floor - right-side-up and mostly closed. Usually I just leave it open and set it on its side. I was pretty toasted, and I had a half a glass of red wine sitting on my bedside table. It was close to the edge, and in a position where it could fall on the laptop, and the thought occurred to me that it would probably do so at its earliest opportunity. Being lazy, I shoved it further back on the table and went to sleep, once again being stupid and ignoring that voice in the back of my head.

The morning dawned bright, warm and sunny, and having two extra male persons in the room made it way too toasty for me to sleep. My bed's close to my windows, so I reached over and shoved open the closest window, which just happened to be the one over my bedside table.

What I forgot was that a few months ago, I had stuck a bottle of soda in the window. Well, maybe in the window isn't the right term; I have double-hung windows, and it was sitting on the top of the lower sash. I had been sick, and I stuck it up there so it would stay cold. And promptly forgot about it, in typical french fashion. When I shoved open the sash, that fell into the wine glass, toppling it over, where it broke right next to my laptop, spilling some of its contents on the top and onto me.

I hurridly tried to sop up the wine, but still ended up with a fragrant laptop for my troubles. It had been on at the time, and once I got the wine off of it, it was still on, but there was no video. I turned it off and prayed that nothing had gotten inside - it didn't look like it, but I wasn't sure, 'cause the entire thing still smelled like the bags of empties my hated roommate likes to leave in the kitchen.

I waited a few minutes, turned it on, and again, no video. I turned it off, repeated, and this time got nothing. Since I don't have too much respect for the phrase "no user-serviceable parts inside", I set about taking apart my laptop to see what I could see.

A small amount had leaked inside, and gotten on part of the internal frame, but the motherboard looked clean. I wiped up the wine, checked out everything else, and put it back together to try starting it up again. It failed, I needed to leave for the mountain, so I left it to dry over the weekend, determined to figure it out when I got back.

When I got back, it still wouldn't even come close to booting. I called Jay and asked for advice, which is usually my plan when my computer woes outstrip my IT knowledge. After talking to him, I completely disassembled the thing, and sprayed down the motherboard with some water. I was horrified when the water running off of it was pink.

I left it to dry for a day or so, and tried again. FAILURE. I was pissed at this point. I could still smell wine from one of the vents on the side, so I sprayed some more water in there and waited a day. That must have gotten the last of it out, because the next time I tried starting up, I was greeted with my desktop, which is currently a night shot of my favorite skiing mountain in the world.

I was overjoyed.

Until the screen went completely black and the computer went unresponsive.

This prompted me to creatively swear, and restart. I also went through some of the troubleshooting stuff on Dell's website, and discovered that it was booting just fine. Great. So now who knew what the hell the problem was, because it was happening randomly, both inside and out of Windows.

I put up with this for a couple of weeks, and finally got fed up. This decision was in part influenced by the fact that the warranty expires the end of this month. Since I value my sanity and low blood pressure, I chose to not call Dell tech support, but instead email them, describing the problem and steps I had taken to fix it. By now, I figured something on the motherboard was fucked.

My suspicions were confirmed when I received an email a few hours later from Dell, without the usual "Have you tried this? What about this?", but instead, instructions on what to do with the box that would shortly show up on my doorstep so that I could ship the laptop to them for repair.

I put off sending it in for a few days, because I am pathetic and can't bear to part with my beloved laptop. It came back this morning, with a brand spanking new motherboard.

I am a happy motherfucker.

That really wasn't what you were asking, was it.

Monday night, I was home from work, and probably should have been asleep. No, scratch that, I should definitely have been. I was exhausted, and on Tuesdays, I have to get up at 6:30 to get to work by 9. But instead I stayed up having a long conversation via journal comments with a good friend of mine. Good for me.

In the meantime, I was checking email, and oh look! Here's a new one from Peter, asking if I'm free Tuesday evening. I was, although I was already planning on staying at work until around five or so to catch up on some things, so I promptly emailed him back saying "Sure! Let's get dinner. Seven-ish okay?"

Not five minutes later, Jay IMs me. Oh, hi Jay, how was work wait you want to come over tomorrow night? Couldn't you have asked me this about ten minutes earlier?

I sat on the decision for about five minutes, and of course talked to Vinnie about it. What are fags for, if not for advising their Queen. He said that I should make my own decision (he's saying that a lot lately; I think I am looking for too much advice).

Now, I was already exhausted, I was stressed over work - to the point where I was nearly in tears in supervision! - and knew that Tuesday wasn't likely to make me feel better. That right there made my decision. There was no way I was going to be up to looking nice and making nice with a near-stranger in a public place with lots of complete strangers. Being social is difficult. It's taxing, and drains my reserves even on a good day. Sure, going out for a few drinks with Peter would be fun, but I don't know him well enough to be stupid with him, if that makes sense.

So I told Jay "give me five minutes", and emailed Peter. Sure, it was a lie. I said "Or maybe I could be a COMPLETE IDIOT and look at the wrong date on my dayrunner. Tuesday's not good. Is there another day this week that works for you?" and then made plans with Jay to pick me up from work and come hang out with me.

This was, by far, the better of the two options. I fell asleep in Jay's car on the way to my house. He then proceeded to buy me food and solicitously put me to bed. After the mad monkey sex we had. And oh, it was mad, and it was monkey.

I'll go out with Peter next week. This week I needed a little TLC, and Jay was the perfect person to provide it.

I need some sleep.

Over the weekend I wound up working a double on Sunday, which, as I previously mentioned, probably wasn't a good idea. I got out of work late on Saturday, lost an hour of sleep that night, and then had to be at work at 8 am, which is about three hours before I normally think about getting up. A recipe for exhaustion, is what that is.

But, it did give me the opportunity to not only spend some quality one-on-one time with the kids, it gave me the opportunity to spend some time with the staff, too. Particularly Lee.

Lee is sort of an odd duck - she and I get along fabulously on a personal level, but we definitely clash on a professional one. She's a black dyke with dreads, who's studying some sort of therapy, and has been working at the house for a few years. We've always had great conversations about relationships, and naturally, I availed myself of the opportunity to bounce my current situation off of her.

It all started when I mentioned how Peter, the so-called "new guy" stood me up on Friday night. We'd been planning to meet after I got out of work, but he totally forgot and oops, there's me standing outside the bar looking like a schmuck. I wasn't too pissed though; I was tired and kind of just wanted to go home anyway, and it worked out well, because Saturday, well, shit. Let's just say that Saturday spawned another great "So this one time at work" story to tell over beers.

So I wound up telling her all about Peter - he's 29, lives in the city, works at a political action group, liberal as fuck like me, takes his martinis dirty and dry. He's definitely my type - tall and skinny and soft-spoken, and we'd had a marvelous time on our first date. Which reminds me - I need to write about me and dating some time.

Anyway, I then mentioned how I'm still talking to Jay, my ex, and how we'd remained friends. Regardless of what has or will happen, I will always be fond of Jay. Meanwhile, since we've broken up, he's mentioned to me that yes, he does want to get back together with me once he gets his shit in order, and right, that marriage thing? He'd like that as well. When I told him that I'd been out on a date with Peter, and had a good time, he was quite honest and told me that his reaction was happiness for me, but also a good helping of "OHSHIT".

Jay then proceeded to ask me out on a date, which I gleefully accepted, because I am not above using men for car rides, drinks, and dinners.

I've definitely been using Jay for the car rides lately; he's taken to picking me up from work one night a week, and usually staying over. When he does, we proceed to have lots of amazing, fantastic sex, which I think will be my downfall. I always attach tons of emotion to sex, but it's hard not to when you still feel guilty for losing your virginity before marriage, and when the thought of sleeping with anyone else usually makes you ill. I think it would psychologically break me to fuck someone else - although I might manage to get over that with JS, which is the story of an entirely different entry. It's also hard to detach yourself from sex when you feel home, you feel complete and so fantastically alive when you have it with someone in particular.

The crux of the problem is that there were no "sparks" with Peter, and there's still plenty with Jay. I still can't forget the first time I saw him - it was from across the room, I picked him out of a group, and said "Mine." And proceeded to make him so.

Lee and I discussed the entire thing, and one thing she said really stuck with me. I've been broken up with Jay for almost a year, but we've still talked, we've still sexed, we've still seen each other, and the previous five years are nothing to sneeze at. Despite all the things I hate about him, and hated in our relationship, he still makes me smile. She called my attention to that, pretty fiercely.

Most days, I'm pretty okay with the fact that I'm pretty much still in love with Jay.

I am dumb.

Why the fuck did I think it was a good idea to sign up for a double on the day after DST starts?

Oh, well shit.

Look at me, I haven't updated in over a year! Wheeeeee!!!

I don't really have any good reasons. Sorry. All I can say is that I did this with my other journal too, and now that I'm past that year of letting it languish on the vine, I'm much better about updating it. Hopefully that holds true over here, because there are somethings that my actual, real-life friends just don't need to read.

Probably the most important thing that happened was that in May of last year, I broke up with J. On his birthday, which was so unbelievably classy I don't even have the words to describe it. I had finally gotten fed up with the fact that he was still living with me, and hadn't worked in over a year. Over a year, people. This was a long time coming.

My least favorite thing about him has always been his irresponsibility. I'm one of those damned older children that is hyper-responsible, so someone who was an only child (an only child! Aren't they supposed to be hyper-oldests?) who was completely irresponsible and unmotivated drove me completely nuts. I was turning into a shrew of the highest order, and quite frankly, I didn't like it. So for the both of us, I ended it.

I actually cried, which is highly unusual. He didn't, but I didn't really expect him to. It's been at least six years since I've met him, and he hasn't cried once. And I tried a lot when we were together.

He lived with me until the end of August, when the lease was up. I shamelessly still had sex with him. Lots of it. Lots of very, very good sex. Which was probably my worst idea to date, but it was fun, and it drove my other roommate up the wall. I have a healthy streak of schadenfreude, it seems. My other roommate, who still hates J very much so.

Anyway, J moved out in August, taking his huge desk with him, and went back to his parents' house, because, oh right, he still didn't have a job, nor did he have any money left to pay rent. We talked once in a while, because despite everything, I still can't bring myself to hate him and cut him out of my life. Some days, I get really angry with myself about that.

Which brings us to the present moment. In the past month and a half, J has suddenly turned into, well, an adult. He has a job - salaried, no less! - where he does actual work, which could actually be, you know, career-related. And he's leasing a car. A brand-spanking-new car. It's pretty hot. I'm jealous of the car.

I'm disconcerted by the change. Is it what I wanted? Oh, absolutely. But it was a little sudden, and it's a big adjustment. It's still a little weird, although I can pull off "so how was work today?" much easier now. Not really sure how I feel about the whole issue, though. I'm stuck in a position of "wait and see", which I damn well hate.

I'm also still gainfully employed, with the kids, except that I got myself promoted, so now my hours are completely different, I have way too much more responsibility, and still not enough pay. Some days I like my job. Some days it makes me physically ill. And that's about all I can say about that.

Back to work. No rest for the wicked (okay that's a lie; wicked people rest all the time).