Could be I’m happy, I’m sad, could be I’m losing my head…

-“Crazy”, by Icehouse.

Hooray for using lyrics out of context. I apologize, but I do feel a bit crazy lately, probably thanks to my new schedule. Even though I get up at 4-4:30 in the morning, I only have to be working for an hour and a half.

In that respect, I have no room to complain. However, I am just now discovering how out of shape I am. My back and knees continue to plague me today, and it’s sort of pissing me off. When the weather is gorgeous, like it was today, it makes me want to bike all over the place, but the soreness and pain keeps me from doing things. I can hardly walk up our stairs. I get halfway and have to start pulling myself up with the railing. Biking any sort of uphill incline for even a little bit is a challenge.

It’s probably just because my lazy bones aren’t used to this much action.  I imagine that most of this will get easier as my body becomes accustomed to biking a few miles a day.

There is a downside though. Biking that early in the morning is just making me want to be lazier when I get home.

I should go to bed earlier, but as I have mentioned before, I can’t sleep when it’s light out. So I’m limited to times close to 9pm before it’s dark enough. And even then, I won’t be the least bit tired until after 10, usually closer to 11. And then you count the half hour or more I spend in bed trying to fall asleep.

Sometimes I try to go back to sleep after I get back from delivering papers, but more often than not I find that I am too awake to lie down. Or I’ll be exhausted and tired, so I go up to bed, only to find that I can’t stop thinking about the day ahead.

Still, I’m liking the fact that, pain or not, I’m being forced to bike a few miles a day, every day. And pretty soon here I’m going to get tired of staying home because I’m in pain, and I’ll go out and do fun things, knowing I’m going to pay for it the next morning at 4am.

I have a bunch of photo shoots planned for my fashionable brother to star in. There are various photogenic spots in town that need to be utilized, and since I hate getting my picture taken, who better to be my photographic guinea pig than my brother. XD

Also, this summer, my family wants to have a Star Wars marathon, where we watch all six movies in a row, because we’re not purists who only watch the original trilogy. Everybody knows the new trilogy wasn’t as good, but I still enjoyed them. Actually, I might not have ever seen the original Star Wars movies if it hadn’t been for Episode 1 coming out in theatres. So shut yer traps. Actually, I had a pretty mad crush on Ewan McGregor so I might have seen it anyway.

BUT I DIGRESS.

I have a guy subbing for me on June 4th (in regards to the newspaper route), because my family is going to be out of town, but there may be an issue with Friday. My brother has to be at something in Des Moines (related to one of the college scholarships he received) and we have to be there by 7:30. It takes us about two hours to get there. Which means we have to be on the road at 5.

Now, I was told that sometimes the newspaper stacks are dropped off as early as 3:30 or possibly even before. My mom has said someone could help me out in order to get the papers delivered faster.

I would like to continue to deliberate about this but I’m sure it’s incredibly dry and boring to read so I’ll move on.

Breakfast:
+probably like 1/4th cup of chicken salad I made yesterday. That was before I delivered my newspapers. After I got home, I ate a pear.

Lunch:
+Rice, with some tuna, and green onion, and a slice of cheese.

Dinner:
+Macaroni noodles with this creamy mushroom sauce recipe out of our better homes and gardens cookbook, and I also had some lettuce with a few walnuts on it and some chopped green pepper in it.

Also I had a few gummy spiders and butterflies, and am probably going to grab a couple more. I also had a bowl of cereal today.

Seriously. I’m going to stop rambling and go put up an art blog entry for today, and then I’ll attempt to be in bed by 10. Notice how I said “attempt”. XD

Day 142 {Memorial Day}

Well, did everyone have a decent memorial day? Do anything fun? I slept in, and by slept in I mean I woke up at 7:30. When you usually get up at 4:30 to deliver papers, 7:30 is pretty much sleeping in. I had intended to sleep in longer, but once I wake up for the morning and see it’s light out, I can’t really get back to sleep.

I was in a really volatile mood today. It was weird. I think it’s the lack of sleep from the stupid paper route. I’m still not used to waking up at 4:30 in the morning.

It’s especially stupid when I can’t settle down until well after 10, and I’ll be lying awake in bed until 11 or even after.

Tomorrow I need to finish an application and turn it in. It’s to this cute little bar that I pass on my paper route in the mornings. It’s going to suck having to bike all that way a second time. I’m still really sore, and my left knee has been giving me problems.

On the upside though, I’m wearing a tee shirt that I got my sophomore year in high school. None of the size 20 jeans in my dresser fit quite yet, and most of the other shirts I have from back then don’t fit right either. I’m still just 250 pounds. I know the summer has barely started, and that biking a few miles every day for three months is going to get some results, but I’m a terribly impatient woman.  I’m not even 20 yet, and I wanted to get to size 18 before Halloween.

I’ve got quite a while before I have to worry about that. I do have some areas to work on. I’ve been snacking quite a bit less, so I guess the only thing now is to become smarter with the stuff I do eat. Like, I’m going to eat fewer taco chips and salsa. Salsa is actually pretty decent for you, so I guess I’ll have to start using like green pepper slices or something else in place of the chips. I don’t know. It’s just really hard to cut out some of those carbs.

Now, on the subject of the atkins diet bullshit, my opinion is pretty much the same as this guy’s…

…but it does do to cut back on some carbs. But I like pasta, and bread, and all that jazz.

It’s easy to talk about what you should do, but once it gets to the execution of that plan, it’s a bit more difficult.

I’m doing a lot better than I would be if I hadn’t started this food blog, but in generally I’ve just been becoming a lot more conscious about food, and a lot more interested in making my own, to avoid some of the chemicals in processed food. It’s shocking how much high fructose corn syrup is in everything, from freezer pops to fuckin’ potato chips, I swear.

Anyway. I’ve already done my art blog for the day, so I don’t need to hurry this entry on account of that, but if I start winding down now, I might actually get to bed in an hour.

Breakfast:
+Two tiny pieces of breakfast pizza.

Didn’t get a chance to eat lunch. I was about to make myself lunch after 1, but then my mom and brother were ready to leave to go shopping, and I wanted to go, so I didn’t eat. We didn’t get back home until after 5, so I just ate for dinner what I was going to have for lunch.

Dinner:
+Improvised chicken salad, with a small green onion and some green pepper. Also some taco chips and salsa. And not even a half cup of cottage cheese.

Some gummy candy, and a few lemon drops. And lots of water. I’ve been trying to stay hydrated. I’m sure it’s healthier for me, but when you drink lots and lots of water out of a giant Aladdin cup right before bed, you have to piss like a racehorse when you get up in the morning.

That sort of thing wasn’t a problem before the paper route. If you get to sleep in until whenever you want, waking up at 3 to use the bathroom isn’t that bad, but it kind of blows if you have to get up early. If I wake up within an hour of when I have to get up for the paper route, I can’t get back to sleep.

I have a strange sleep schedule.

My mom bought me a pack of three bracelets that look like they were made out of translucent curly telephone cord. There’s a purple one, a blue one, and an aqua one, and it’s just the weirdest and coolest idea that I’ve heard for a long time. It would be fun to repurpose old telephones that way, I think. I owe her five bucks for them, and I get paid around June 20th. At that time, I want to see if there are still any decent tickets left for the Def Leppard/Heart gig I want to see in August, at the Iowa State Fair. I hope there are tickets left that aren’t in the nosebleeds. If there aren’t, tough shit.

I mean, I do want to see them, really badly, but I’m not about to shell out 50 bucks and then sit so far away I have to look at the giant tv screens to tell who the hell they even are.

In the event that there aren’t any decent seats left, I might consider going to some concert at the Surf this summer. I believe Burton Cummings, the lead singer of the Guess Who, is going to play there and I wouldn’t mind seeing him. And those tickets are only 30 bucks at the door.  Still. If I don’t go to the Def Leppard concert, I may just buy myself a cd, like Duran Duran’s latest, or some random album by Def Leppard (I’m thinking Slang, or Adreanalize, or maybe X).

I can’t spell. Forgive me. Lol.

Now I’m off to finish up a few things and check my email, then I’ll be to bed.

 

Life in your new world / turning round and round / making some sense / where there’s no sense at all / no promises but if you should fall… {Day 141}

-“No Promises” by Icehouse.

Seriously guys, if you have never heard of Icehouse, you need to go to youtube right now. I only know like… four songs by them, but they’re damn good. And that lead singer has got killer eyes. They’re just insanely gorgeous.

This is probably the song you all know, but you have have HAVE to listen to a couple more.

This is like my new favorite song. Plus… god damn, is that man attractive. His name is Iva Davies, just in case you were curious. XD

Okay, one more. This is the song whose lyrics I borrowed for my title today.

 

Now, onward.

I have got a fun story to tell you about delivering newspapers this morning. I got up at my normal time, 4:30, but my stacks of papers weren’t there. So I thought, maybe they’re a tad late. I’ll wait a bit.

So I wait until roughly 5am, still no papers. I called the hotline, and the guy asked for my phone number and said he’d call when he figured shit out.

Well, time passes, and I’m getting impatient, and agitated. So I call again. I think I had to call a third time to find out what was going on. The person who delivers my stacks of papers dropped them off at the wrong location, and it would be 20 minutes before they’d get here.

By this time it’s past 6am, and normally I have all the papers delivered and I’m back home by then. My deadline was extended an hour, but I was still just really irritated.

Also, I’m really sore from all the bike riding, and marching in the Band Fest parade yesterday, so that helped. Although I did have a fun encounter. This older couple was sitting on their porch, and this particular house has a pretty black and brown furry cat that is always either on the porch, or watching from inside. It was outside this morning, and I chatted with the people a bit, and let the cat kind of sniff my hand (I don’t know why but when a cat doesn’t know you they like to kind of sniff your hand when you meet them).  The lady kind of chuckled and went “You’re lucky, usually she hisses”. I didn’t pet the cat because she had that “Eh, I’m not mad, but don’t pet me” look on her face. XD

So that was funny. Today has just been weird and trippy. I think the lack of sleep may finally be catching up with me, at least a little. Tonight isn’t going to help. Since there is no paper published on Memorial Day, I don’t have to get up early. So basically tonight I’ll be staying up pretty late, since I won’t get to do it very often.

I’m just finishing a coffee + milk now, and next on the drink menu is a cup or two of caffeinated tea, or perhaps some cappucino (from a powdered mix). Or maybe I’ll just make a cup of coffee in our tiny single serving coffee pot. I haven’t decided yet.

 

Breakfast:
+A bagel with cream cheese

Lunch:
+BLT, with slices of green and red pepper, with ranch (half regular, half reduced fat)

Dinner:
+A bit of chicken, with some rice, and a piece of bread.
Also, had three french toasts made with sandwich thins. And I may have a little bit of cereal later, but I’m not sure.

Anyway, you all have a fun, and safe Memorial Day, and all that jazz.

We must be working for the skin trade…

-Duran Duran.

{Skip ahead to the bolded text if all you care about is the food. I ramble a lot in this entry}

Let me demonstrate to you how easily I can be distracted.

I went to wordpress.com to write a blog entry for today, got distracted by my old blog header, and decided to spend at least 45 minutes making a new one. The one you see now features a picture I took on the left, and pictures of my two current crushes on the right. It’s a strange beast.

In the past, my obsessions have been fairly singular, with me usually lusting after only one band at a time, but getting way, WAY into that band. Almost unhealthily so.

Right now I’m into Duran Duran and Def Leppard again. I kind of like being in another spell for both bands at the same time. That way, I can still listen to one of my current favorite bands, and I won’t beat either’s music to death so much that I can’t listen to it for three years afterwards. Also, the obsession isn’t nearly as unhealthy as my previous ones.

For instance, I was first into Duran Duran in the summer of 2005. I was spending all sorts of money on Duran Duran stuff. I bought their first two albums on ebay, I bought two dvds from Sam Goody, back when our mall had one. I was buying online music store gift cards at walmart just so I could go back home and buy more Duran Duran songs.  And that’s been the problem with a lot of my past obsessions, I’m so obsessed with them that I blindly spend money just to further that obsession. Also, I beat their music to death. It’s fun listening to almost nothing but one band for over a year straight, but after that, you’ll be sick of that band for two or three years. That’s literally how bad I overplayed Duran Duran’s music. With the exception of three or four songs on Red Carpet Massacre, I haven’t been able to listen to Duran Duran until this year.

The Def Leppard obsession wasn’t quite as intense or long lasting, but it was still plenty strong. But enough about that.

Basically, I’ve learned to not beat a musician’s music to death, and that if you love a band enough to want to spend money on them, do so wisely.

ANYWAY.
The food, and then submitting an art blog entry, and then to bed.

 

Breakfast:
+Two small shortbread squares. Later, a diet mountain dew.

Lunch:
+Some chicken, a little bit of potato salad, some chips, and a slice of watermelon. And two vodka lemonades. There was also a bottle of white wine open but I’m not much for wine so I didn’t have any of that. Wine is the kind of shit that I go “Damn, I wish I liked this stuff”, and then every time I try it, it’s really gross. I have to melt popsicles in glasses of wine to be able to drink that shit.

Dinner:
+Cheeseburger with two strips of bacon, five onion rings, and a half cup of cottage cheese.

I was gone for a good chunk of the day, and busy doing things during the time I was home so I didn’t eat anything else.

Out of touch / Out of reach, yeah / You could try to get closer to me…

-“Hysteria”, by Def Leppard.

Well, hello kids. Today, I might actually get to bed before 11.  That’s kind of key when you have to get up early in the morning.

I have discovered I can sleep until 4:30 and still have all my papers delivered and be home just after 6. There are extra papers to deliver on Saturdays and Sundays, but during the week I might even let myself sleep in until 4:45.

I’ve been delivering papers for five days, and it’s been surprisingly easy to get into a routine. That routine might be interrupted a little on the weekends, with the extra papers being delivered, but I should be able to handle it.

On this side of this week, it seems pretty silly that I was freaking out and stressing over this so much. The hard part is getting up at 4:30 and having to package up papers in a sleepy haze, but once the papers are bagged and I’m on my bike I’m okay.

That being said, it gets ridiculously cold in the morning. I suppose that helps me wake up a bit, but it’s just not fun. Also, a lot of people in this town seem to get up really early in the morning. There aren’t very many people on the roads at 5am, but I see a lot of lights on in people’s houses.

One thing that keeps me going is the money obviously, but the thought that I may be able to buy tickets to see Def Leppard and Heart play at the Iowa State Fair in August is pretty motivating.

Now, I should get paid in three weeks or so. I plan on seeing if there are any decent seats left, and if there are, I will give my parents the money and have them use their credit card to purchase the tickets.

I know that as poor as I am, buying like 50 dollar concert tickets seems a little rash, but most of the rest of the money I earn this summer will go towards making payments on my fine. Hopefully I can get my summer job (I’m still not sure if they need me).

But whatever. I won’t worry about it just yet.

Anyway. Tomorrow is going to be weird. I deliver papers in the morning, and then there is the big Band Fest parade in Mason City, and my family will be walking with the local chapter of PFLAG, so that should be fun. We’ll all be wearing shirts that say “Gay? Fine by me.” So that will be enjoyable. I mean, my legs are already sore, so biking my route and then walking an entire parade route is going to be a little tiring, but I’ll live.

Another reason this weekend is going to rock is that I get to sleep in on Sunday night, because there are no papers printed on Memorial Day. I might still set an early alarm and then just get up and get a glass of water or something, but I’ll be going straight back to bed after that. XD I don’t want to mess myself up too much by sleeping in.

Anyway.

 

Breakfast:
+bowl of trix cereal. I personally miss the days when the cereal was actually shaped like fruit.

Lunch:
+Cornbread, and some soup I made (recipe is from a vegan cookbook my mom got as a present; but basically it’s got tomato, rice, navy beans, and spices in it).

Dinner:
+Two eggs, scrambled, with some red and green pepper, and green onion.  Also had two slices of toast.
Green onion was from the farmer’s market. I’ll be excited when they start getting serious produce. I want the lady who sells giant bags of fresh basil for 50 cents to be back. XD

I also had two s’mores, but using only 3 graham crackers instead of four. And I used mini marshmallows. Also, I had two donuts (from this awesome bakery in the town my grandma lives in), a few cookies, and a teeny tiny shortbread square. I believe that’s it.

The donuts sound kind of bad, but they weren’t two huge overly glazed and frosted donuts.  One was a long john and was really fluffy. The other was a bismark. Besides. I’ll work it off tomorrow, as you read about above.

Now, I have to finish up some facebook things and submit an art blog entry.

 

Day 138…

I’d like to use song lyrics as my blog title today, but I’m listening to the same song that I borrowed lyrics from yesterday so… yeah. You get a number.

Today has been an okay day. Lots and lots better than yesterday.

I woke up at 4:20. I felt like I was almost running a little late. Either that, or I was working faster than normal, because I packaged the papers, biked out to my route, delivered all the papers, and was home at about 6:08.  I bet I could sleep in until 4:30 or 4:45 and still have all the papers delivered on time, but I like being early. Maybe I’ll work out a system where Monday through Friday, I sleep in until 4:30 or 4:45, and then of course on Saturday and Sunday I’d get up a little earlier because there are a few extra papers to deliver. I don’t know. I’ll figure it out.

I tried to sleep at around 7 or so, but it was so cold upstairs that it kept me awake. I was actually really cold for a good portion of the day. I later found out that there was a window in the living room that was slightly open. It was cold today anyway, but that didn’t help I’m sure.

I did end up biking to the grocery store to pick up some milk, and my legs are sore. And my knees are tired and kind of hurt. Yeah, I bike around a lot, but I’m just not used to biking that far consistently, every damn day.

I know I’ll get used to it eventually, but that doesn’t help me much right now. So far I haven’t had much problem getting up so early. I pretty much wake up at the right time and don’t have to be pulled out of a deep sleep. Then again, if I don’t start getting to bed at or before 10 pm, the lack of sleep might catch up with me after a while.

I know of two dates in June that I’ll be gone with family. Well. I only know that I have a substitute for one of those dates, the other I have to make sure the guy can do that one, or else I have to contact the lady who used to deliver my route, because I was told she may be able to sub for me.

I am enjoying this route for now, but I have to say. As it’s looking now, I will probably put in my month’s notice some time in mid to late October.  It’s all well and good to deliver papers when the weather is decent, but once it gets snowy and icy, I just can’t see myself biking several miles a day, every day. Should I stop delivering papers when winter comes, I will make up the exercise with at least 45 minutes a day on the exercise bike. I do not want to let myself fall back too much.

I know that’s nothing I have to worry about right now, but I like talking it out ahead of time.

Anyway. I need to hurry up and submit this, an art blog entry, and then get to bed. Dammit, I will be in bed before 11pm tonight.

Breakfast:
+a bowl of cereal

Lunch:
+A cup or so of cottage cheese, and a piece of cornbread.

Dinner:
+This weird soup that was in a vegan cookbook my mom got as a gift once (We’re not vegans or vegetarians, but we like having meals that don’t include meat sometimes). It had tomatoes, rice, and navy beans in it. With some garlic, olive oil, and a few spices. It was actually really good. Coupled with the cornbread I made this morning, it was really awesome.

Also today, I had a couple other pieces of cornbread. I also had a tiny pastry made with a tiny bit of leftover pie crust and a small bit of leftover filling from when I made a rhubarb meringue pie a week or so ago. And I had a bowl of cereal, besides the one I had at breakfast. I believe that’s it for today, actually.

A nightengale sang above my mother’s tomb… {Day 137}

-Thomas Dolby, “Oceanea”.

I just thought that was a gorgeous line so I decided to use it as today’s title. My mother is actually alive and well. XD

Now, let me tell you a story about the shittiest day that I’ve had for a long time.

It began bright and early at 4:10 in the morning. I deliver papers, so…  yeah. I could probably get away with sleeping in until 4:30 or even slightly later, but I don’t like feeling rushed.

So anyway. I open the back door to go outside to get the bundle of papers from the curb, and it smells all skunky outside. Dad has seen skunks in our back yard before, so that made me really nervous. Luckily there were no little smelly animals about.

Once I got back inside, it started raining. I didn’t think much of it until I’d packaged up all the papers and went out to get my bike, and it was still raining.

Well. It didn’t stop raining. Not even once. In fact, it thunderstormed the entire time I was on my route. Needless to say, I got drenched. 95 percent of me was soaking wet. I just about crapped my pants every time there was thunder or lightning, but moreso for the lightning. Me on my nice metal bike would make a perfect conductor, not to mention the fact that I was soaked.

So, I got back home and had to change clothes immediately.  I did a tiny bit of internet browsing, but just after 7am or so, I went up to bed to see if I could get some more sleep. I was stupidly up until 11 pm last night working on a Labyrinth fanfiction, as I watched the movie with my brother yesterday and that kind of rekindled my interest in my story.

Anyway, I slept until 9:45 I believe, so that was good. I actually woke up briefly before that thinking “Oh my god, I’m late delivering papers!” and actually had to stop and think “Duh, I already delivered them, I went back to bed afterwards.”

When I got up, I got my phone out of the bag I’d used to deliver papers, and… it wouldn’t turn on. I took off the back and dried it out a bit, but after that, all it would do was turn on. None of the buttons worked. Naturally, I freaked out. Especially since that phone has a lot of stuff on it, and I can’t afford a replacement.

One of my facebook friends suggested putting it in a bag of uncooked rice. I used a small food container, but whatever. After hours and hours, I turned it on again to discover that most of the buttons work. The back key doesn’t work, as well as some of the letter keys… I think “c” and “b” and a few letters next to those.

But, yeah. I actually almost felt awake and normal at a few points during the day, but I still hardly had any energy at all.

So, at around 3, my brother was going to leave for work, and he dropped me off at the library. It was still pouring out, and I had a movie that was due. Plus mom had something in that she wanted me to pick up.

That was all well and good except, I walked home in the wind and rain to find that my brother had locked the house. And I don’t have a key. And, at that point my phone didn’t work at all (and was still in the house, in rice, anyway). So, my only option was to walk back to the library and ask if I could use their phone. I was swearing the entire walk there. I called my dad at work and luckily he could get away long enough to pick me up and take me home. So that was good.

Afterwards, I watched Ratatouille while I ate my dinner, and felt better after that.  But I’m still just glad this day is over. Although I am a bit peeved. I’m barely finished with this entry and it’s already damn near 10:30. I still have my art blog entry to throw together, and I need to charge my mp3 player a little for delivering papers tomorrow morning. Ugh. Looks like another 11pm or later bedtime tonight.

Breakfast:
+A piece of super thin pizza, with three tiny flatbread wedges and probably a tablespoon of spinach artichoke dip.

Lunch:
+Dad had made me breakfast, which I wasn’t aware of until after I’d already eaten, so I ate the breakfast for lunch. It was a small piece of steak, an egg, and some hash browns. And two slices of toast.

Dinner:
+A cup or so (probably a little more) of cottage cheese, with a toasted bagel. And a slice of cheese.

Also, through the course of the day, I had two bowls of cereal.  I believe that was it.

Day 136.

Today was decent in most respects. I woke up right around 4:15. I think I set my alarm for like 4:20 so that was good. Alarms I set almost never go off. I’ll wake up 5 minutes before they’re going to go off.  I can’t tell if my body would just naturally know when to wake up, or if it wakes me up so I won’t have to be scared awake by an alarm.

That really is the most unpleasant way to wake up. You’re in a deep sleep, and then you get ripped out of it by a damn alarm and you have to sit there for a few minutes before your heart stops pounding. Not fun.

I got on the road a little earlier than I did yesterday, which wasn’t really an issue except that it’s a little darker. And I did see a few bats, but I told myself they were birds over and over, so it made that a little easier (I’m afraid of bats even though they pose no threat). I did have to back track because I forgot to leave a paper at an apartment, but that was really my only issue.

I was done at around 6am,  so that was cool. I could actually sleep in until 4:45 and probably still get all the papers delivered on time,(by 6:30) but I don’t like feeling rushed.

I tried to sleep at like, 7am, but mom was getting ready for work, and there was just too much ambient noise. And it was way too light out. I need one of those eye masks, I think. I don’t know. I like having some ambient noise, but with all the birds chirping, and people driving to work, and the tv and my parents talking, I couldn’t sleep.

I was kind of tired all day and didn’t really have much energy. I’m just going to have to get calibrated to this new system of doing things. I’m sure that in a week or two it’ll be second nature to go to bed at 9 or 10 and wake up at 4:15 or 4:30. It’s just the getting there that’s going to be weird.

I have to get used to eating at different times. I’m used to eating breakfast at 7:30 or 8. This morning I ate a granola bar and drank  a glass of water while I was packing up the newspapers, and that helped a lot, but when I get home I’m hungry. I did eat a little bit when I got home. I hadn’t intended the granola bar to be my breakfast anyway. I just wanted to avoid that unpleasant low blood sugar feeling I had yesterday.

ANYWAY. It’s really strange eating breakfast so early, because then it’ll only be 9:30, and I’ll be starving because usually when I’ve been up for 5 hours, it’s time for lunch. And it can’t be time for lunch when it’s only 9:30. So from 9:30 until about 11 I end up having to fight off the urge to eat.

I don’t go overboard and eat a lot, but I am going to have to manage that hunger so I don’t undo all the exercise I’m getting every day. I’m excited about that, actually.  I want to keep delivering the paper for as long as I can (because I kind of actually enjoy it) but I just can’t see myself biking clear across town in mid December, you know? The roads will be too icy/snowy, and my bike is not built for that kind of terrain, but I won’t want to quit because I’ll be losing my exercise regimen, and possibly my only source of income.

I hope to get a permanent job, and in the event that I do, I won’t put in my 30 days notice until early or mid October. Eh, whatever. I don’t have to worry about that for a while, so I won’t.

Breakfast:
+A granola bar, at 4:20 in the morning.
+One toaster strudel

Lunch:
+a spicy black bean meatless burger (Morningstar farms) and some cheddar sun chips.

Dinner:
+Chunks of beef marinated in this sesame ginger marinade, a bottle of which has been in our pantry for ages. Also had some minute rice, and some lettuce with ranch and a few walnuts on it.

Also, I had like… two fortune cookies, a bowl of cereal, some graham crackers with this praline pecan stuff on them, and some circus peanuts (Every time I talk about those online I want to say “packing peanuts” and those are certainly not things I eat.. Lol).

Now, I’m off to make my nightly cup of calm down time tea (chamomile, usually) and submit an art blog entry.

See the paper layin’ in the sidewalk, a little music from the house next door. So I walked on up to the doorstep, through the screen and across the floor…

-“Summer Breeze”, by Seals and Crofts.

Well, today was my first day delivering papers. I have delivered shoppers in the past, and had a paper route in 2006 I believe.

I had my phone alarm set for 4:30, but I was awake at 3:45. I went to bed at like 9:30 last night so it wasn’t too bad. I tried to doze a little but I ended up just getting up at around 4:15 or so. I was out the door slightly before 5. On the bike ride to the area my route is in, I snorted a mayfly. I assume it was a mayfly, there were tons of those things everywhere.

It wasn’t actually that dark, and there is literally no traffic on the road at that hour, so I felt pretty good about that. The houses were pretty easy to find. I had been worried about that, but the streets on my route are pretty much all scrunched together.

I was two papers short when I got to the end of the route. I went and bought a paper at Casey’s, and then I biked home and I was going to ask for money to buy another paper (I was going to deal with telling the manager later) when my mom informed me I had left two papers on the kitchen floor. I was so mad, I swore the entire way back to my route to deliver the last paper. Not loudly, but I swore. Lol.

All in all, even with having to bike all the way home and back to the route, I was only 3 minutes late. The papers are supposed to be delivered by 6:30. So that was pretty cool.

The only thing I need to do differently is either eat breakfast before I leave, or take a small snack with me to eat halfway through, because when I got home, I was feeling a little loopy. I’m sure my blood sugar would appreciate if I didn’t repeat that. When I got home, I ate a bowl of cereal, a piece of candy (they’re called cow tails or whatever), and two fortune cookies. And I drank a diet dr pepper. And then I felt okay

I felt kind of tired for most of the day,  and I probably should have tried to get back to sleep right away, but I didn’t for some reason. I want to go to bed here before too long, but I’m just feeling too… awake. Like, I’m thinking too much and I’m too tense. I’m going to go make a cup of tea, actually, hopefully that calms me down.

It’s hard to get yourself to stop thinking. And you have to avoid going “Oh, you have to calm down, you have to get to sleep because you have to wake up at 4:30” and then you just start thinking about how you can’t sleep because you NEED to sleep…

And also, it’s going to take some getting used to. Usually I start winding down at like… 10:30, maybe even 11pm.  Tonight I’ll probably give it until 9:45 or so.

Breakfast:
+cereal, and what I talked about above.

Lunch:
+turkey lunchmeat sandwich, with some taco chips and salsa

Dinner:
+a small cheeseburger, with some cheddar sun chips.

Also had some circus peanuts, a caramel with nougat center, and two fortune cookies (so a total of four today then) .

I need to throw together an art blog entry so I’m running off to do that.

I read the news today, oh boy… {Day 134}

-The Beatles.

Actually that was a lie. I didn’t read the news today, unless Yahoo news counts. I just wanted to find a news related lyric in relation to the newspaper route I’m going to begin tomorrow. If I’m still delivering papers in February, I can sing along with American Pie and I will actually mean it, i.e. “but February made me shiver, with every paper I’d deliver…”.

Out of context lyrics for the win.

Anyway. Today was… windy and stormy. It was stormy and windy at the same time, and remained windy when the storms passed. It’s calmed down a bit now. Actually, I have even given some thought to biking my paper route to see if my plan will work, but I’m in the middle of eating dinner, and it is still windy enough to make bike riding a pain in the ass.

I will be getting up at 4:30, and seeing as I only  have 20 papers to deliver tomorrow, I think I should be able to do that. *knocks on wood* Don’t want to jinx myself. Lol.

Tentatively, I’m thinking it should take about half an hour for me to bag the papers and bike out to the area where my route is. That would put me there at 5am. Which would give me four and a half minutes to deliver each paper. And I seriously doubt that all the houses on my route are filled with cratchety old geezers who will phone in and complain if their paper isn’t there right at 6:30. And hey, if they do, it’s my first day. I’m pretty sure that most people starting a new job are allowed a mistake or two on their first day.

I won’t get paid until like, June 20th or so, but I seriously hope that there are still seats open at the Def Leppard/Heart concert at the Iowa State Fair in August. That is basically going to be my only so called frivolous purchase this entire summer; that and a pair of cheap 80s sunglasses. It’s quite possible that the entire first check I get will go towards that, because I do not want a seat way off to the side, in the nosebleeds. This could possibly be my only chance to see Def Leppard (or Heart, but mostly I care about DL) so… if there are still decent seats left when I get paid, I will be going for them.

ANYWAY.

Tonight I’m probably going to get to bed at like 9-9:30. I don’t know how tired I’ll be yet, but I want to go to bed early enough so that waking up at 4:30 won’t be so terrible. If I get to sleep around 9:30, I’ll get 7 hours of sleep, which is pretty much my normal amount anyway. I probably won’t get to sleep “right on time” as it were, but it should be fine.

Anyway.

Breakfast:
+A pancake

Lunch:
+a half cup of pretzels (I’m guessing, but it couldn’t have been much more than that) and a small slice of cheddar cheese. I ate lunch at like, after 2, and since we usually eat dinner at like… 5 or 6, I thought it was too close to dinner to eat an actual lunch like a sandwich or something.

Dinner:
+two pieces of thin cheese pizza, with two tiny flatbread wedges and probably a spoonful of spinach artichoke dip.

I also had a piece of this caramel candy with a nougat center, a rice krispie treat, a few small pieces torn off the leftover pancake, and I’ll probably eat a cup of yogurt and a couple fortune cookies later.