marc's christmas presents to me revolved a lot around computer hardware, so there'd be a linux box upstairs that worked with the widescreen monitor he got me a bit back. lately i've been spending a lot of time on it, mostly doing cafepress stuff but also working on other web designs, scripts, etc. it's upstairs where the temperature is warmer and i just keep getting design ideas. anyway i told him that i was surprised to be using it so much, I didn't think it'd come in this handy but now that it's here for me i really love it. and he replied, "I knew that'd happen. I remember the last house you lived in, you were always in the basement where spacefem* was, doing creative things. I felt bad that we took over that computer for tv stuff." (*spacefem here meaning spacefem the computer, the one I built in 2002 with the light kit in the side with a planet.) Anyway I thought that was awesome in the "damn, the man knows me" sort of way.

we didn't do a thing for valentine's day. okay, we scoped out stores for clearance candy afterwards, but they're on to us now, they get rid of that stuff fast. aside from that though we both hate valentine's day and pledge to never celebrate it, and that's working out really well for us.

I had a really good day at work. Four hours of meetings... that's a pretty good ratio if they're all productive, and today they were. Rumor has it I'm supposed to move desks tomorrow or Friday? I never believe this until someone literally comes to kick me out, but I'm bringing cleaning stuff anyway. Every place I've ever moved has been filthy, and they have desk cleaner in the supply closets but it's some kind of ultra-toxic super-anti-biotic eye-burning formula that worries me. Step one: dust. Unearth the craziness. Step two: wipe down whatever bubonic plague the last person left behind. Step three: work. Step four: unpack boxes, slowly, over a period of many days. We move around a lot where I work, and unpacking is a relaxing thing that I spread out.

I went and looked at apartments yesterday.

I'm scared to death of moving out, I've just realized. I'm scared of picking the wrong apartment. Scared of being in a lease. Scared of living alone. But it would be so nice to live downtown, right smack in the middle of two offices that my job is always making me switch between, close to my college (but not too close, my college is in the ghetto!), near all the clubs I love going to. I feel guilty about considering all these expensive apartments, even though I worked my spreadsheets and it can fit in my budget, and I can still make my donation goals.

I guess I just thought I'd go check out places and there'd be a shining light from heaven pointing me towards one place, and it didn't work out like that. Here's what happened:

- I saw the most gigantic two-bedroom loft in the world for $965. That's a lot of money. It's also kind of in a warehouse basement. I mean, it's two-story, and the top part where the bedrooms are has windows but they basically look out at the ground. The windows face west. I like sunlight, especially in the morning, I don't want a place that faces west. It would be FABULOUS for parties... that's about all it'd be fabulous for though.

- I saw a one bedroom loft for $800. No washer/dryer. It's on the first floor and walks out to a little porch thing that overlooks a parking lot. Faces south. All that glass + entrance on the first level makes me worry about security.

- I saw a two bedroom on one level for $800 that has a washer/dryer, but it's not available. So I could gamble and see if one comes available, but with my luck it'll be on the fifth floor or something, total pain in the ass to move into.

I need to move, yes. This room I'm in is suffocating me. Having a loft apartment downtown is my dream, maybe I should just lease the huge one in the basement and call it good? What's the worst thing that could happen?

And I know, last time I posted about living issues like ten of you asked why I wasn't just living with Marc... we're talking, okay? But really I'm moving for myself, to get out of this house, it's an independence thing, I don't want to move in with a guy because the time is right housing-wise, I want to move in because the time is right relationship-wise. So I took marc with me to look at the apartments so I'd have someone to bounce ideas off of, but that's it. He wasn't much help. He's from atlanta, where everyone pays $1000 for rent (crappy studios, too, not giant two bedrooms, he just thinks I should take advantage of the fact that I live in Wichita). But yeah, marc and I... we're talking.

angry_amy, in an unrelated conversation, asked if marc and I had any more "plans" yet. so I figured I should post this story because it's cute.

two weeks ago marc and I went out for a lovely dinner, got drunk and started talking about The Future again, and he brought up the fact that I hadn't told him my ring size and he didn't even know his and we should go look at rings. Because even though we're not getting engaged we have looked at bands a lot and have decided that before we do too much planning it'd be nice to buy wedding bands, because then there's some hardware to make it "official" (even if we aren't going to wear it).

the next day I got home from work and he's there asking if I'd like to go get dinner and go to the mall to look for rings, which I thought was funny because I didn't think he was toooo serious about looking right this second. and who wants to go to the mall in December anyway? I reassured him that I did not want to be That Girl who's pushing a guy towards major commitment, and he reassured me that he's not that guy who would let that happen, he's in this! we have that conversation all the time. it's a not-engagement. it's awesome.

so we go out to eat first, got some pizza, then go to the mall where we do laps around the food court because that's where jewelry stores are, and we stop and stand and stare at the people there and neither of us can take a step inside. too jewelry-like. too many diamonds. too not us. once again, we're faced with balancing our love for one another against our hatred for all things commercial and wedding-industry. we hate being "sold" this idea that love=diamond (because we know that idea stemmed largely from early-19th century de beer's monopoly propoganda, not anything real) and we hate the big "every kiss begins with..." jewelry MACHINES.

so we walked around the mall and talked about it and people-watched. then we went into third planet, this cool local hippy shop that sells anti-bush t-shirts, weird swords, and stainless steel rings with gheckos and planets. we went in, and tried on all kinds of rings. we showed each other the cool spinny ones, and the big quartz stone ones, and the carved ones. and we talked with the kid working there about what kinds of "tobacco smoking accessories" people are buying loved ones for christmas.

and that's how marc and I got our ring sizes.

I hate it when couples talk tell sickeningly cute stories about their relationship but act like it's sort of a problem, but in that sarcastic way, like, "darren is so silly when he brings me mismatched silverware with my breakfast in bed!" annoying enough to make me puke. but I'm totally going to do it, so if you're like me, don't read this.

marc and I have very different ideas about surprises, and when we get presents for each other, that's when it comes to light. I love surprises! Growing up, my dad would randomly tell us to get into the car and he'd take us somewhere without telling us, and it'd drive mom crazy but it was fabulous. I mean, we love him, we trust him, he's not going to make us lay asphalt or something, it's going to be cool! If it wasn't cool, it wouldn't be worth the surprise effort! So my favorite thing about Christmas is along those lines... I love wrapping presents as soon as I buy them, love seeing the packages all lined up, spend forever perfecting bows, and unless I'm a little worried I'll personally forget what's in them, I don't label ANYTHING. I don't want people even knowing that they're getting a present in that SHAPE from me. I mean, there are so many things... shirt boxes, jewelry boxes, DVDs, that are dead giveaways if you look at the box.

On the other hand, there's my boyfriend who can't stand surprises. When I took him to see Margaret Cho without telling him what the tickets were really for, he immediately had to assume we were going to see a movie, just to avoid the uncertainty. And it goes both ways... he can't keep secrets, he's a lot like that spy on austen powers who will tell you anything if you just ask him the same question three times. It's nice knowing he can't lie to me, but he's dying to tell me everything I'm getting for christmas. He's already given me all sorts of stuff, he comes home every other night with some surprise, and it's adorable but I'm starting to feel bad because I haven't brought home anything for him since Christmas officially started. It's to the point now where if he asked me to bring home cereal on the way home, I'd probably have it gift-wrapped and he wouldn't see it for two more weeks.

I've got stuff hidden everywhere in the house so he can't find it. I've shredded the packing slips from packages that came in the mail, and asked my roommate to immediately hide any mail order boxes if I'm not home when they arrive. He asks me all the time when he's getting and I'm not telling him. He asks me if I want to know what I'm getting and I tell him no, and he almost tells me anyway, I have to run out of the room when he gets that look like he's going to break down and spill it all.

So, yup, stupidly cute I know, but I wanted to write about it because I'm kind of curious who's more normal here, me or him. And lots of times when I journal about human nature someone makes an interesting connection about what this all says about us (besides pointing out the obvious ADHD symptoms). am I right, is it okay?

made it home! it was an uneventful trip... I hitched a ride with a coworker, very college like. we stopped in emporia and ate at the planet sub because it's awesome!

somewhere on the trip I realized I had no way to get into our house. usually I just use the garage door opener, but it was in my car, which marc had safely driven back to wichita a few days earlier because he had to work friday, and it was parked in the garage. fabulous. so I called the roommates, one was in missouri and the other was in an office downtown with no intention of getting back to the house, so I called marc at work and told him I needed to stop by and get his key. ten minutes later we were there, and pulled up and there was marc, outside, and I got out of my friend's truck and hugged marc and everything just sort of stopped. i missed him. we always joke about missing each other "like the desert miss the rain" (because anything that's a line in a 90s club song gets a special place in our vocabulary) but really, missing marc is like being hungry. that's about the only way I can describe it.

itunes has a weird way of recommending the same music for me that marc does. I don't even download much electronic music at all... I tend to buy really ambient trance sort of stuff when I go that direction, and most of the time I'm logging into itunes to download college rock, soft vocal night music, the occasional party hip hop, stuff like that. Then I log on and they're like, "We think you'd like thievery corporation"... what the hell? Or today, it was Satellite by Ocean Lab, which marc plays ALL THE TIME. They find weird remixes of 70s songs that he's already got for me, bouncy dancy big house that he throws into mixes, you name it.

I don't really have anything like that on my laptop because it's on his, and it's everywhere in my car. before marc was around I'd make CDs for major roadtrips or seasons, and keep them nicely labeled and organized in a little holder. marc makes CDs for stuff like going to walgreens or the east side of town. so they're everywhere, and I try to enforce the "everything needs a label" rule but it doesn't always happen. So for a while there I was afraid that my music would be overshadowed and under played, because even though it's a huge thing in my life, it's even bigger in his. I introduce him to bands now and then but he's shown me fifty times more. I've never dated anyone like this, who really effected what I listen to or changed me. I mean, you always have your music in relationships (if it's a real relationship), but marc brought his own universe to this one. it makes everything I listened to for other people seem blurry.

in other news... I'm thinking about work. my mind was In It friday when I left at five and I'm tempted to go in and finish stuff up, because I can't put it down, I hate that. Usually I struggle with projects I'm doing at home, and I have to try not to think about them at work, and now it's reversed. This is what programming does to me, every single time, go figure.

Have yet to get a good picture of Marc and I on halloween... we were Inky and Blinky of pac-man fame. Nobody's managed to get the cool zig-zag hemming action. But they did manage to capture the idea that we are the cutest couple EVARR!!! I mean come on...



Sex and the City relationship picture caption: He looks sexy, and you look happy. Although now that I look at this some more, I look sort of drunk, too, which is a shame because I really wasn't, I behaved well this halloween.

Okay, people keep asking questions about marc and me, so in case you missed the saga, here's an FAQ: ( Read more... )

I'm laying in bed this morning. the alarm went off at 6, it was 6:30, I couldn't make myself get up. I even tried telling myself, "The sooner you get to work, the sooner you'll find out if marc e-mailed, since he always uses your work address."

but I don't get up.

our doorbell rings. I still don't get up. I don't answer the door in the dark, it's not safe. it rings again, and I hear my roommate open her door, and go answer it. seconds later my bedroom door opens... it's marc.

holy shit!

I think that's exactly what I said.

Turns out that after some conversations with his current roommate, situational analysis, and strong missing me, he decided that his time in atlanta has come to pass. he pawned some shit, packed some shit, and threw a lot of shit away, and drove 15 hours straight back to wichita. holy shit indeed!

so... yeah! I have marc now! WHOH!

Dear Mom, Dad, and Everybody:

I am in Atlanta. Now, I know you probably think this is a little irrational, but I drove down with Jason... would Jason have driven down with me if it was totally insane? He really wanted to go, and let's face it, I haven't had a good long road trip since late July. There's a good party going on tonight and I'm on fall break from classes next week, that's why we knew the trip would have to be this weekend. Hey, they wouldn't give us breaks if we weren't actually supposed to take one.

So anyway I know you'll be worried but so far I'm having the time of my life and I'm just taking a long weekend from work... I will not end up in the hospital or jail. I'm meeting lots of cool people and getting a good citizen's view of a city I've never seen before. I've already noticed how miserable the urban sprawl is here, which means I'll definitely be happy going home to Wichita when the visit's over.

Sarah, sorry I blew off your wedding. But the opportunity really wouldn't come any other weekend. You can blow off mine someday and I'll understand.

So anyway, yup, I'm fine! Don't worry about me! Hey, most kids do weird crazy stuff when they're kids and stupid and don't know how to be responsible. I'm old enough to know how to be responsible. 25 is really the perfect time for random stuff like this, am I right?

Love, Spacefem

My roommate had a really, really bad car accident today... totally rolled her car like twice! I got back from a gay rights meeting and her and her boyfriend were at the hospital. Her car is gone. But she and her boyfriend are alright. wow. yay for seat belts, huh? I guess some crazy person without a drivers license t-boned them while they were just driving down west street. that's insane.

in other news, it's been twelve hours since my last post about marc and yeah, I'm still pretty damn depressed. here's what else is awful: I really want to visit atlanta, and I don't see how I can any time soon. I mean, jason says he'll drive down with me if we want to drive, it's not too bad if you've got 2-3 people, but we don't want to just do this for a weekend, it's not worth it. and I have class tuesdays and thursdays, which kind of limits the time we can spend out there.

and there's another issue: part of me is afraid that if I visit marc in atlanta, I'll just be that much more attached to him, and I can't be, because I am NOT moving for him. flat out not. i really want to go out there just to go out there, you know? Because it's a new city, it's a road trip, all my usual reasons for wanting to go somewhere, but this time it's not just a vacation, it's prolonging a really fucked up relationship.

he texted me a lot today, and we talked on the phone. he misses me and told all his friends about me and put them on the phone to have them tell me how awesome atlanta is and how they'll have a great party for me when i visit. it's cute. and it hurts.

I was ranting to one of my gay friends about this today. You think girls can talk shit on men... shit! you should hear gay guys do it! they are men, and they talk more shit than I've ever heard, it's funny... anyway, I said I felt stupid because marc and i were together for three weeks, that's not enough to form a relationship that you miss, you know? And my friends were like, "It's enough time to get obsessive about someone, and that's what you have, obsessiveness." they're so right. that's what I'm doing, I'm not thinking logically, I'm obsessing.

so yeah, sorry my livejournal sucks now, I really am. you're all welcome to remind me how much it sucks. I won't be mad at you.

I'm going to miss marc. I'm going to miss him playing music for me, miss him making me laugh, miss cuddling, miss texting stupid movie quotes back and forth all day. miss him cooking, miss him snoring, miss him playing with the dog... miss him. I'm already missing him, and he's not leaving until saturday.

I don't know why I did this to myself... got so close to someone who lives so far away. he's over every night.

gah. sadness. when I left vegas and missed ethan, I just had a few little moments that were really cool that I remembered, along with the knowledge that I hadn't met a guy who appreciated me that much in a long time. it wasn't so much the person he was, you know? eventually, I got to know him well enough that the red flags scared me away... the three kids, the shitty little town he lived in, the fact that he's a jehovah's witness and they're basically INSANE! so yeah, maybe that'll happen with marc. but I know him a lot better, and since we met through mutual friends who are also cool, I feel like there won't be as many "surprises" with this one, ya know?

I should really try to get into a normal relationship... one where you date, and kinda slowly decide if you like each other, rather than just going crazy in a weekend and then obsessing. It's not just me obsessing, trust me, he feels the same way, it's just... weird. I'm in this same bind though now where I'm going to have to shake this guy off before I can go to another one. hell, right now, I don't even want to go to another one, or think about another one, I just want to be with marc.

I'm not moving to atlanta! georgia tech would never admit me!

marc and I are having an increasingly amazing time together, and it's starting to make me worry. at first, it was just fun, we were just friends, but we've been talking more, being together more, all that... and I'm reminded that he's leaving town at the end of the week.

WHAT IS IT WITH ME AND OUT OF TOWN BOYS?!!!

seriously! is it just that they're easier to get involved with or what? 75% of the people I've hooked up with this year live outside my area code... two in different states! I just can't seem to get with a wichita guy, I don't know what my problem is.

ideas:

1) wichita guys suck.

2) my subconscious wants me to be single, so it only lets me be attracted to guys who won't stay around.

3) out of town guys are more likely to hook up, since the strings are easier to get rid of (these aren't really hook ups though... ethan and I still talk, and marc and I are on a much more emotional level now than a hookup is supposed to be. Travis was a hookup... I didn't care anything for him, and he's the only guy I've been with recently who lives in wichita. hrm.)

4) I'm more likely to make a move on out of town guys, since my time is limited.

5) I'm cursed.

6) I'm stupid.

7) I need to get the hell out of wichita.

8) I need to get a real boyfriend, and quit hooking up.

9) I thought we decided these weren't hookups?

10) I have a blister on my left foot from the shoes I bought last friday.

I can't think, I'm just gonna quit.

Okay, if to describe Las Vegas in two words, I'd use these: Not Wichita. This place is basically insane, and the DEFCON part of the trip hasn't even started yet, so here I am checking in for a brief report on what's happened so far.

We left Wichita Wednesday night and drove... in the car was my friend from the LUG, a girl who's turning out to be a potential future roommate (PFR), a techno DJ from atlanta, and yours truly. we took 54 out of Wichita, across the end of the oklahoma panhandle, through a tiny corner of texas, and then switched to interstate to go across New Mexico and Arizona. I drove starting Thursday morning around 6 until about noon through gorgeous mountains like I'd never seen before. We drove over the hoover dam, getting out to take pictures. We showed up in vegas around noon.

From there it's kind of a blur so I'll do my best... we hit up the old strip casinos like Golden Nugget and played coin slots and ate lunch, then left to buy alcohol for the hotel room. The goal was to shop and get back to swim here but we didn't make it, because it takes us an hour and a half to get anywhere in this town, even if we think it's going to be five minutes. It also took four liquor stops, because us Kansans didn't believe people when they told us to just go to Albertson's or whatever. You can't buy liquor at grocery stores in Wichita! But as I said, Vegas is not Wichita.

We also don't have slot machines in our grocery stores, or our gas stations, or laundromats... I asked a local if there were any buildings here without slot machines and he was like, "Well, I guess some churches."

Some churches.

We got back late. Our DJ had connected with some local cousins of his, and they had free passes to a club, but the guys were concerned about dress code so they left again to go buy pants. PFM and I got clubbed up in cute skirts and then were bored so we decided to walk around and talk to Defconners around alexis park while sipping drinks we'd made.

The problem was that none of the defconners seemed interested in talking to two girls wearing skirts and tank tops. Everyone else was wearing jeans and black t-shirts. If you weren't goth, you weren't with the crowd. So I went back and changed into jeans and my thinkgeek STFU t-shirt and did another walk-around, and guess what? I didn't even make it to the first pool before some random hottie reading the defcon schedule smiled and said, "nice shirt." I was on a semi-mission to fix a broken defcon badge, so I went and did that and then came back to talk to him. Turns out he's a programmer from california, and we had lots to talk about, so we hung out for about two hours until my crew found me and said we were going out to eat. I invited my new friend.

We went to some hole in the wall italian place where wine is free with dinner. It was pretty bad wine. But dinner was good, and it had free cuppucino which was important since I hadn't really slept more than a few hours since we left Wichita. We went to Rio, but the clubs there were dead, so we left and went to Treasure Island. They have a club called Tangerine that we had to wait in line to get into, but once we were in it was packed and the music was great. In Wichita, there are no packed dance clubs on Thursday night... Saturday is pretty much the only option there. Las Vegas is not Wichita.

More differences: in Wichita, to go from club to club, you have to finish your drink first. We don't even think about it, it's just an unspoken, "Wait until I finish my drink." Our local cousin friends looked at us like we were nuts... "Just TAKE it! Walk around, nobody cares, this is NOT WICHITA!" Also, we're used to clubs closing at 2. Clubs don't close here. Nothing closes here. When we finally got tired at 4 and decided to go to Denny's for drunken breakfast, there was still traffic and everything was lit up just like it had been in the peak of the night. I'd been drunk for 12 hours straight. I laid in the back seat with my new friend from california (who was not only cute and tall and great to dance with, but a good kisser too) while my sober LUG friend drove everyone home.

Back at our hotel there was no where to sleep. The beds, couches, chairs, everything was all taken. Then sun was coming up. I rolled out my sleeping bag and the was next to me in a blanket, snoring and rolling over on me, and I slept for another two hours. Woke up. Showered. Here I am.

My feet feel like something awful happened to them. I lost my deoderant and had to use someone else's. I have on my jeans from last night and the bottoms are sticky and crunchy. I'm still drunk and might fall asleep standing up.

I absolutely love this!