Footprints on the Moon

Honestly, I’ve been debating whether to write this or not. Time stretches longer and longer between updates on this blog, and a lot of the reason is because most of my life outside of work centers around derby. And to be honest, I become more and more disillusioned with derby as the days go by. It feels like roller derby is a bad boyfriend. You know the one I’m talking about– he uses you, and doesn’t treat you all that well when you really think about it, but you love him and you remember how good things used to be so you stay anyway. Yeah… it’s kind of like that.

It’s a little weird to talk about. I usually confide in a few trusted people and outwardly pretend like everything is fine. But that’s not very genuine (or Jennuine) and anyone who knows me knows that I just don’t have it in me to fake it for very long. I’ve hit that wall, and so here it is: I’m not happy. It started with a lot of people– my support system– leaving the league for various reasons because they were unhappy. Its culminated in not being even rostered as an alternate for the only two bouts this season that I have been eligible. I’m hurt, I’m frustrated, and I don’t understand what the hell I’m doing wrong.

I wish I could wrap this all up with a nice sunshiny, happy conclusion, but I don’t have one. I wrote this whole post while mopping up huge crocodile tears. I wish I knew what to do. I am not ready to give this thing up, but I’ve also had way more “why the hell do I bother?” moments lately than I’m comfortable with. And I don’t know how to fix it.

I hope you all enjoyed your very first day of 2012! I know that I, for one, certainly enjoyed all the hangover posts rolling in on Facebook this morning!

I can’t say I did a whole lot with my day today. I’ve been desperately in need of a trip to the grocery store, so I spent my morning running errands– returning the DVDs I rented to Redbox, mailing a package, gas in the car and groceries. I made the mistake of not eating breakfast before I went to the store. I am determined to get back on plan though, so I made it back out of Meijer with very little damage. I came home with lots of fruits and veggies, and was only a little light headed by the time I got all the groceries carried in.

I spent most of the rest of the day on the couch watching Angel, but I did make a big pot of chili for dinner this week and process all the veggies I bought for lunch salads and snacking. The last two weeks have been pretty horrible, weight watchers-wise, so I’m determined to make this one a good one! So far, so good! I didn’t even use a single weekly point today and I’m already in bed and hyped up on NyQuil for the night. I have tomorrow’s food planned out already, so I’m hopeful that it will go just as well.

Are you ready to say goodbye to 2011? I know I am. It’s been a rough year for those close to me, and I think many people will breathe a sigh of relief to see it go. Of course the year couldn’t go without taking one more swing at me… I woke up with a sore throat. It’s actually not too bad at the moment, thankfully, but since I don’t know what’s causing it, I don’t want to head out and share my germs with my friends and family on the chance that it might be contagious. So what you see pictured up above is how I’m spending my new year’s eve. Even though I had invites to two great looking parties, one with friends and one with family, I’m on the couch with the kitties, movies, amaretto and Chipotle. Not the worst way to spend the evening, sure, but not exactly what I had in mind.

I think the end of November/beginning of December for me can be summed up with one word: tired.

I took the picture up top at 4:13am… on Wednesday morning, when I’d gone to bed at 12:30am. I woke up from a nightmare a little before 4 and had a hard time going back to sleep after that. In fact, I don’t think I did anything more than doze on and off until my alarm went off at 5:30am.

These were my kitties while I was waiting for an online meeting to start last night. I wanted desperately to join them!

Even as exhausted as I was after being up all day on 3-3.5 hours of sleep, I still had a hard time falling asleep last night, and was awake and unable to fall back asleep a little after 4! I was up before 5am playing games on Facebook when I would have much rather been sleeping.

Hopefully I’ll be able to get a good nap in after work tonight because today is our public scrimmage and exhaustion is just not acceptable until it’s over!

Happy Thanksgiving from me, Pudge, and Lucy! I hope you are spending the holiday exactly as you want to. I would say I hope you have a wonderful day with your families, but I know there are plenty of people who DON’T want that As for me, I’m stuck at work until 3pm and then I’m off to join part of my family for a Thanksgiving dinner already in progress. So whether you are spending the day with family, by yourself, at work, or sitting in line somewhere with your walmart coupons waiting for Black Friday deals to start, I hope you are exactly where you want to be.

I know I’m supposed to post a list of all the things I’m thankful for, but the list is too long. I’m thankful I still have a job to be stuck at today. I’m thankful for friends and family. My furry babies. And and and. Sometimes life is hard, but it’s nice to spend one day realizing how much you have in your life that is amazing.

It seems like there is a never ending list of things I need/want to buy “when I have the money.” Since I’m trying to pay off 7k in medical bills, having the money is really kind of laughable. Currently at the top of my list are:

* A new winter coat. Mine is still serviceable, but I bought it when I was quite a bit heavier so it’s pretty big on me. It will survive another winter.
* Long underwear. My work pants, they are thin. Indiana winters, they are cold. My work area, it is drafty.
* Sweatpants/comfy pants – since I gave away everything that no longer fits, I have very few comfy pants to wear. Actually, I have very few pants at all since I have one pair of track pants and one pair of jeans. That’s pretty much it.
* ace custom wheels. Okay, not really. But I do want new wheels for my roller skates. Since switching to a new setup, the ones I have now are too soft and I could really do with something a bit firmer. But the floor at the skating rink gets a lot slicker during the winter when it gets cold so hopefully they can get me through a few more months and I can look for something else with my tax check.
* Yarn! Well, why not? There’s always something I want to crochet, but yarn costs monies. Boo. This is definitely a want because I have enough unfinished projects and a cheap yarn stash to keep me busy for a year. That seems beside the point.
* Weight Watchers. We’ve discussed this.
* Many, many other things I would love to have, but can’t justify. Being a grown-up stinks, y’all.

I played with one of the derby girls’ kitten, The Flash.

I got a pretty awesome bruise on my belly from being at the bottom of a “dog pile” at a scrimmage.

I finally baked, and posted something at my cooking blog! You can check out the Cake Batter Bars at Jenn Cooks.

I painted my nails teal and black to support SBRG before a bout. (Please ignore the polish in places it’s not supposed to be.)

Lucy held me hostage on the couch. Seriously… she’s holding on to my hand, and would tighten her grip any time I tried to pull my hand away. Aww. And then she bit me. lol

Not pictured: The scale. This post brought to you by the HCG diet Austin that I need to be on. Or back on. Whatever. Point is… weight, still doing scary things. Not cool. It’s my own fault, but that’s beside the point!

My baby girl kitty in a rare calm moment.

First, the usual chart:

*Not sure? Think something auto paid that I wasn’t expecting and so my payment didn’t quite cover it. (Though, now that I think about it, may be Netflix’s cost change.)

In the first half of this month’s financial update comes the usual suspects… slow and steady progress on the credit cards and loans, two months worth of payments.
Then there’s the ** next to Nelnet. This is because, thanks to the medical bills I’ve accumulated, I’ve decided to put this student loan into forbearance to try and free up some money in order to make payments. It will accumulate approximately $386 in interest over the next year, which I can either pay off prior to my next payment being due in October 2012, or it will be rolled into my balance when payments resume.

Not really much to report there. Then there’s the new chart for the lovely medical bills that have all (I think. Please?) finally arrived.

((I have question marks in the cents column because I don’t have this bill in front of me or access to it on the internet. I’ll get that added in when I can.))

Ouch, right? So far I’ve made payment arrangements with the surgery center for $100/month, and everyone else gets…. not much. Cause there’s not much left. Don’t call me up and ask me to make an ach payment, cause it’s not going to happen. I’m doing everything I can to free up some cash to pay down balances. I called up Comcast to cancel my service, but let them talk me into keeping the internet at a discounted price for at least 6 months. That will save me around $50/month. I put one of my two student loans into forbearance. I am adjusting my tax withholding from my paycheck. I’m being extra diligent about shutting off lights, killing the power strip to my computer/wireless router when I’m gone/sleeping, keeping the heat off or extremely low… anything to keep the electric bill under budget and “snowflake” that money to one bill or another.

Hopefully it will be enough. Suffice it to say, I’m extremely stressed about money these days, but all I can do is take it one day at a time. It will all work out in the end, right?