I’m Hearing: Underworld - Surfboy

I’m feeling anxious and upset today. I’ve been sick since Christmas Eve; I got a cold that night and had a nasty headache, and as a result didn’t sleep very well. After that the cold basically kept me in bed for the whole week. I’ve been doped up on Nyquil and DayQuil pretty much ever since then. :\

The cold is pretty much gone now; at least I can breathe now. But I still feel sick. I went in to work yesterday but suddenly got cold sweats and stomach cramps so I had to leave. I went home and slept for awhile then finished Dean Koontz’s By the Light of the Moon. Typical Koontz, not a whole lot more to say about it, other than Koontz really does have an understanding of the mind of a "real" artist, one who isn’t just an "artfag." I give him a lot of credit for that.

I took my car into the mechanic’s a few weeks ago and he told me my floor was about to rust through. That didn’t make me too happy (as you might imagine). So on a whim I took a look at the car lot where I got that car, and to my amazement there was a 2002 Grand Am SE in there. Before I got going on my Mitsubishi Eclipse kick, the Grand Am was my favorite car, and the type that I’ve wanted since I was 12. So I talked to my parents about it and eventually we decided that my dad would co-sign a loan with me so I could get it. We were supposed to get the car today (and trade in my rustbucket shitmobile) but the bank needed more papers for the loan so it got delayed. I rather expected this to happen so I can’t say I’m all that surprised…but admittedly I am disappointed. I was looking forward to being able to drive the car today for awhile and to show it off but I guess that’s going to have to wait until at least Friday. :\

Another disappointment is about tonight. I was planning on having a get-together at my place for New Year’s but the fact that I’m sick kind of put a damper on those plans. Jeff has another commitment and can’t make it, TR is working a double shift today and has work tomorrow and also is planning on hitting up Becky’s party so he won’t be here long, Dave went back to Milwaukee on my advice because I knew he’d have more fun with people whose bodies could tolerate mass quantities of alcohol…meh. So if I’m lucky it’ll be hachi and Brian tonight…and Brian doesn’t drink. So I’ll have 5 bottles of champagne sitting in the cupboard for several months, I’d imagine. *sigh*

I just feel….drained. There’s no other way to describe it. I don’t feel like I’m being abandoned or anything…being sick has a way of distancing you from activities and people, after all. But I do feel disappointment in the situation, that I couldn’t be at my full potential to enjoy it. I’ve had a lot of time off from work, which has been nice, but I’ve slept most of it away unfortunately. I made a mistake the other night by spending the day car shopping, going out to dinner with the guys, then staying up too late (TR came over for a bit) after I played a bit of DDR, then had a 40 with him. :\ I’m sure that, combined with the fact that I wasn’t over my sickness, was what caused the reaction the next day that forced me to leave work. I just have a hard time sitting still and waiting it out…I want to do things again, to live the life that makes me comfortable and happy.

Last night I worked on some logo ideas for "the company." It was nice to know that I could still do something with graphics, but it did exhaust me a great deal and I was blocked beyond creating one idea with several variations. I just can’t get past a single idea when it works right away. :\ Dunno if that’s a gift or a curse really, but it makes me feel really uncreative.

I took NyQuil before bed, and as expected, I had an odd dream. Somehow I was pregnant, and I gave birth to a human child that transformed into a kitten. The birth was practically painless…I just felt a little bit of pressure, and suddenly I had a child. I know it had a name of some kind, but I don’t remember what it was anymore. After the child became a kitten, it was really popular. In the dream, I woke up and noticed the kitten was gone and someone told me the father had taken it for the day. I didn’t know who the father was, so I wanted to find out. When I went to get it back, there were a ton of other people who wanted to spend time with it and suddenly it became impossible for me to be with it at all. Then I woke up in reality to the ringing of the phone.

Today was a really low-energy day. I didn’t really do…anything. I’m just dragging.

I just talked to the loan officer from the bank and I guess I’ll be getting the loan on Friday, which means I’ll be getting the car on Friday if everything goes well. She also signed me up for a bank credit card that I can transfer a balance to with no financing for 6 months. At first I was hesitant, but the more I thought about it, the better the idea seemed because I still have a helluva balance on my University credit card…and I’ve wanted to get rid of that for some time now. So it’ll give me 6 months to pay off basically my tuition from this semester. (Assuming the whole balance transfers over…I have no idea what the credit line on the new card will be…) So that makes me a little happier.

I do feel really really rotten about having to rely on my parents to help with paying for this car…with the loan and the insurance and everything…mostly right now I feel shitty because I don’t have another job lined up and I don’t know if I will have one after the middle of January. Which means there is a lot of uncertainty ahead of me. My dad told me not to worry about it…after all, the reason he was willing to co-sign the loan was because he wanted to help me build credit and get me into my new life as smoothly as possible. But I still feel like a third-rate loser for not having the money or financial stability necessary to own a decent car. I would feel so much better if I knew I’d be employed.

As uncertain as this situation has left me…there is one other situation that offsets it. Some friends and I are talking about starting a company. I have an idea of what is going to have to happen in order for this to work, and I feel absolutely no hesitation about it. As up-in-the-air as my "job" situation is right now…everything about this business venture just feels *right*. Usually when I’m faced with an uncertain situation, I get anxious and upset (like I demonstrated above) but with this, there has been none of that. I truly, honestly, and wholeheartedly feel that this will work out. I’ll just have to keep pushing it forward until it gets out of the idea stage and into the reality stage, and as long as I stay focused on it and not let things slip, its prospects are high. The great majority of my confidence in this lies in the people I’m working with, namely Will, hachi, and Brian. Each of them is talented and motivated in different but equally important ways, and it is their strength and interest in the project that makes me certain about its success. Other people have already expressed interest in it (after it gets off the ground) so that just steels my determination. Hopefully Brian and I can meet with a Small Business Development Center sometime in January so we can figure out where to go from here. In the end, though, what it comes down to is this is right.

I hope everyone else had a decent New Year’s. This year has been the hardest of my life because of school, but one of the most significant ever. The upcoming year holds a lot more surprises in store, I know, because my life as I’ve known it for 17 years has come to an end. Here’s to hoping it will be a positive and prosperous endeavor…or if not, at least a "breaking even" endeavor. *raises glass of NyQuil*