The 5:30 Blues

First, look at how adorable this is:


They fell asleep like this with the light on.

The dog is actually awake in that picture, but they were both totally asleep before I tried to document the adorbs.

Anyway, this is going up on Friday, which will be the end of the very first week of my freelancing life, and there are some things I have discovered about myself. I miss my co-workers so much more than I thought I would, and will probably start either having the radio on more, or going to acceptable public places like Starbucks and the library to work, because I start to feel kind of lonely. Also, every day around 5:30, which is when I decided my work day would end, but that has really not been the case so far (hello from 11:30 p.m.), I get pretty down in the dumps and need to be reminded of the good things I’m accomplishing and not just all the stuff I didn’t get to.

I have this very false expectation that I’m supposed to be elated all the time now, and it’s not good for my health because when I start to feel disappointed at the disparity between my reality and my goals, I get upset about my lack of joy on top of already being disappointed by my lack of accomplishment. It’s like a suck lasagna in my head.

Anyway, first week down, every week for the rest of my life to go. One way or another.

What About Day Three?

On his album Final Engagement, Marc Maron has a joke about “day three.” And you’ll have to go find it yourself because I could not produce that piece of audio/video to save my miserable life right now. The man seems like such a mess all the time, but he’s got his copyright shit on point. Anyway, the gist of the joke is basically how every hair-brained scheme eventually has a day three, which is where the inevitable press of reality finally catches up with declining adrenaline and you realize you’re stick on Mount Rainier, dressed in a bearskin rug, holding a pairing knife and half a week before you had nothing but the very best intentions for yourself.

I feel a little bit like that, except that the bearskin is really warm and it turns out I’m pretty handy with a tiny little knife. Like, I’m totally freaking out over here, but kind of still think I’m going to land on my feet, although I wasn’t feeling that for all of today. I called a couple of my friends, and my old roommate reminded me of the time I decided to live in my car because I didn’t want to quit school and I wasn’t in a position to pay for college and rent at the same time. I had done test runs, moved all my stuff into the car, made a really amazingly comfortable bed, checked the local laws, and had safe overnight parking before I even spent one night in it. Turns out Ben took pity on me and let me fuck him and sleep in his bed until we officially moved in together, so I only actually slept in my car on three separate occasions. I tend to think of myself as an up by the boot-straps lady, and that’s partially true. But I’m also very well cared for when the shit really hits the fan because honestly, it rarely does. I am a super-prepared person and I will work my ass off by default.

So, basically, I’m too tired to write any sort of real post because I am freaking out about the possibility and the reality of being able to be my own boss. It’s nice to know where the buck stops, I just didn’t realize how stressful it would be for it to stop here.

3 Things You Should Never Buy the Target Version Of

I love Target. I especially love that their generic stuff is almost always just as good as the regular version. However, there are three products that you should never buy the generic version of in any instance. Seriously, nothing at all is better than these three terrible options.


Facewash


The original


The imposter

We were recently reminded of this rule, as I accidentally purchased the generic instead of the original because we’re on a budget now and I completely forgot my first traumatic facial scalding from this shit. If you’ve never been a theater kid, a drag queen or a 1940′s housewife, you are probably unfamiliar with a product called Noxema Cleansing Cream. A condition for which you should be very grateful. It smells like paint stripper, and it burns like fuck sauce. If you’re not careful, this shit will change your race. And the Target knock-off of Saint Ives Apricot Scrub is basically Noxema with sand in it. Even after you wash it off, the burn remains. It’s the most horrible thing I’ve ever done to my face, and I used to be a punk.

Don’t buy it. Wash your face with nothing, just scrub it with a wash cloth or use fucking Dial or something.


Trash Bags


The good


The bad and the ugly

I know other bloggers have been making sponsored posts about Glad Forceflex, but I am not nearly popular enough to be on the trash bag circuit. So please know that this review comes from the bottom of my real and true heart. I love a name brand trash bag. Hefty are also good, but I have been enjoying the Forceflex lately. Against what they imply in the commercial, you can not just shove random pointy shit into it forever and ever, but you can put a lot of stuff in one of these babies, and I appreciate that kind of economy.

The generic Target trash bag, however, might as well be made of tissue paper and hemorrhoids for all the good it does. The strings will come out of the bag at some point, usually when you’re half way down the stairs with a bag in each hand and you had fish on Monday which means its at the bottom of the bag and you want to die because you were wearing flip flops and now it’s all over your toes and you resolve to never tell anyone about the morning you spent cleaning fish off everything and crying like a bitch.


Bras


This is how a bra should fit (borrowed from biggerbras.com)


What is this, a bra for ants?

In addition to their Mossimo brand, Target also sells name brand bras and unless you’re the type of person that doesn’t really need a bra, never buy one anywhere they can’t do a proper fitting. So get thee to a Victoria’s Secret, Lane Bryant/Cacique or some other bra-centric specialty store. When you’re wearing a fitted bra, the entire universe is your comfort zone. I mean, you’re still wearing a bra, so it’s not all good, but you haven’t been this comfortable since you hit puberty, I guarantee it. And don’t think that because you know your size now you can go back to Target and get the cheap and shitty bras because you can not. A good bra isn’t just a good fit, it’s quality materials mixed with superior craftsmanship. Your boobs will thank you. Your clothes will thank you. Consider it your good deed for the year.

Day 1: Success

So this morning I was having an absolute heart attack because I drew up our new budget and realized that in order to keep the lights on and the rent paid, I’d have to bring in at least $300 a week from freelancing. That probably doesn’t seem like much to someone who’s already a freelancer, but since I probably only made that much in the last 7 months, it’s a pretty terrifying concept. Especially since that was the absolute bare bones: no health insurance, no extra money or entertainment budget except our weekly grocery allowance plus $20 each. The only luxury we’ve kept is $15 for streaming Hulu and Netflix because we would go completely insane without them.

When I broke it down to a per day rate ($60) it didn’t seem so bad, although I already felt terrible because there was no way that I would be able to make that goal on the first day. And then I did. On day one, I made one day’s portion of the money I need to keep the electricity on. Isn’t that all anybody wants? That and scheduling a planning meeting that happens in a camp chair on the veranda (read apartment walk-way) in the cool ocean breeze. Because that also happened. I know, my life is a ball of contradictions.

I credit how very serious I actually am taking this whole thing. I put on make-up this morning. Lipstick even.


I look sweaty because I was sweaty. It was kind of a hot day and we have no AC and only two shitty fans.

I used to be annoyed at how red lips highlighted my Mexican lady-stache, but I I like it now. It’s very Frida Kahlo.


OMG, twinzies.

Out of respect to past work-a-day me. I did refuse to wear a real bra. Due to my considerable natural talents, I had to wear a sports bra or it would have gotten uncomfortable, but I did go the whole day without under-wires, which has always been a dream of mine. Well, not like I didn’t live that dream for the entire last semester of my senior year at college, but I don’t like to think about that part of my life. I was a very dark, unflattering-boob shapey time.

Anyway, Ben and I finished the fourth season of Parks and Recreation and I miss it already. No joke, I’m really considering starting over at the beginning of the second season and watching it all again. Whoever told us to skip the first season is an angel because that show is so amazingly good with the glaring exception of the first season.

Oh. My. Jesus, I just learned that Hulu has season five: full episodes starting at one. Leslie Knope is my spirit animal. No spoilers, but that part in the last episode of season four where she starts laughing at the least appropriate time, and Ben is all “Why are you laughing?” and she answers “Because my dream is dead.” I HAVE DONE THAT. THAT’S A THING I DO.

Okay, so I maybe am not as high-strung as her, I certainly am not as positive or as knowledgeable, but I swear Leslie Knope and I have the same personality type or something.


I couldn’t find the appropriate gif, so here’s this one. Just as good.

Oh, and Ben’s already asleep, so I’ll make this quick, but we just stared watching House of Cards and I want to say two things:

1. I love it. I’m usually not one for intrigue (too few explosions), but I enjoy it a lot.

2. This is one of the few dramatic shows I’ve seen where the cast actually look like distinctly separate people. In other shows there’s usually 23 blond ones, and a scattering of brunettes who all look exactly the same. And you can’t tell any of them apart except for the black guy who’s only safe until there’s another black guy in the room and then all bets are off because they’re both 6’2″ with mocha skin, hazel eyes and tasteful fades as if there’s not other shapes or shades of ethnic people in the world. All of the actors on House of Cards catch my eye. I want to look at them because they have interesting and different features. They look like humans instead of dolls. In other words, I approve.

New Job

I know, it was really fast, but I’ve already found my new job and I start today. It’s Puzzle and Dragons.

All joking aside, if you’re not playing this game right now, you’re not living any kind of life. If Pokemon and Bejeweled had a baby, it would be this game’s fat friend. Nothing else matters.

Puzzle and Dragons forever.


Back in reality, I still have no actual means of income. So that’s nice. But my last day of the old job was only just on Friday. I mean, I have a good hustle, but very few people are actually that good. Especially coming off five years in captivity. I got fat, okay*.

Anyway, I’m taking this shit seriously and making income generation my new full time job. However that happens. I’m not in a position to ask a lot of questions, if you catch my drift. So if you happen to need a favor, let’s just say I’m really good at multi-tasking.

I’ll keep it off the blog, but only for a price.


Honestly, though, I kind of feel like I’m playing house over here. But the stakes are so much higher. I mean, I’m taking it seriously too. I even set up an all staff meeting first thing Monday. I’d invite the dog and the cat, but their email skills are abysmal. Also, they lack the entrepreneurial spirit.

I’m really trying hard not to look like a desperate wreck, and I promise you, I am way more competent than my jokes would suggest, but everything’s kind of terrifying and I’m more than a little concerned that this is the time-frame people will point to when other future people ask them what went wrong with me.


*Actually, technically, I lost weight at that job, but let’s not split hairs.

Two Corns Passing in the Night

If you weren’t aware, (how could you not be) the amazing and wonderful Hyperbole and a Half has come back to us with two consecutive posts on two consecutive days and you need to go read yesterday’s (today for me) post right now, because if you don’t what I’m about to say won’t make much sense, also spoilers.

I have had that corn moment. It’s like the random symmetry of the universe brings together a woman and a piece of corn at the exact same place in their respective human/grain lives and all of a sudden you find yourself staring directly into the soul of an inanimate object which you are somehow more able to relate to than any human being you’ve ever known. And the resulting biofeedback loop is fucking hilarious. Because aren’t we all just piles of matter decaying under the fridge of our collective fate? I can’t remember what my piece of corn was, but it was amazing and no one got it. Actually I think it may have been a bug. Maybe a dead bug. Maybe I’m making this up.

Anyway, I had to go to work today, and I have to go back tomorrow. As I told my co-worker, this is strangely like that time in 6th grade when I accidentally got an incredibly attractive and fashionable haircut. Suddenly I am visible to the rest of the inmates, and I’m not sure I don’t prefer my previous anonymity. I was all excited to start this new life where ANYTHING COULD HAPPEN OMG and then I just went through an entire day of people stopping at my desk to look sad at me, and people stopping in the halls to look sad at me. I mean, I’m sad too, I will miss all those people and I agree that we did some really great work together, work I’ll be proud of maybe for the rest of my life. But it’s just bringing me down.

And when I tell people I’m trying to see if I can support myself freelancing, nobody seems really interested in the idea. They think it’s an unwise move, or that I’m adorable.

Granted, I am really precious. But this is serious. I’ve had to hustle work for myself for basically my entire life. When I got this job, I thought I was going to be able to relax and let somebody else find the work. My long struggle was over, I was now on the company dime.

But the truth is that I couldn’t turn it off. I just pushed and pushed for projects and work, and did all this extra stuff for no extra money until I was half crazy. I mean, I learned a lot and accomplished a lot and I’d never take it back. But then, despite all my hard work, I got brushed off into a corner to correct grammar mistakes for a year while I tried in vain to convince myself that my contribution still mattered. Or alternately, that my contribution mattering or not mattering was just a function of my ego and therefore irrelevant. Also, I planned and attempted my escape.

There was a lot of movement, but ultimately things didn’t really go my way.

And now I feel very sad and not at all motivated to work towards my dream of never again being in a position where other people get to decide what I do, when I do it, or even if I am employed or not at the end of the day.

I’m not sure which of the Kübler-Ross stages of grief I’m in. Maybe depression, although I don’t recall anger or bargaining. Yesterday was definitely denial. “I feel really blessed.” Yeah, well, eat a dick past me. Things just went from bad to worse and you’re over there in yesterday, daisy chaining with hope and faith. Fuck that.

It has occurred to me that I may be in anger now. That means depression is ahead of me?

Laid Off

I knew this was coming, I made all the plans and preparations a person in that situation can possibly make before they really know for sure. But I still cried my eyes out. My last day is on Friday, and they’re throwing me a goodbye lunch Thursday (today for you, tomorrow for me.) It’s the best possible version of getting laid off that I could have hoped for. The last few months especially have been very obvious to me that I was superfluous. There’s no other way to say it and it’s no one’s fault, it’s just how the cards fell.

So many people have reached out to me on social media and in meatspace and I feel really blessed. There’s no other word for it. It really made my day.

And get this, I already have my first client.

As usual, I am exhausted, but I have a feeling I’ll be sleeping a real sleep tonight, and that’s something I haven’t had in awhile.

UPDATE: I must have been in some kind of exhaustive delirium when I wrote all that mess up there. It’s currently 2:30 a.m. and I am freaked the fuck out. Yeah, I did actually fall asleep when I got in bed but I’m awake as hell now and I can’t seem to do anything but blink. I have no job, you guys. What the actual fuck? I need to calm down.

Headaches from All Directions

I’ve had a killer headache since lunch. So I’ll be quick.

You might be wondering if I’ve gotten laid off. I’m wondering too. Still no word amongst mounting tensions.

The night before last I accidentally stabbed myself in the palm with a fork so hard that I started bleeding. Then I checked my phone, saw that one of my very favorite coworkers got her notice, went to dramatically sink to the couch but hit my head instead and spent the next ten minutes ugly crying while Ben petted me and Pepper licked my hand.

I’m really, extraordinarily high strung. My contingency plans have contingency plans. I’m so tired and I’m a complete mess. Something’s to give.

To the Man I Shushed

Dear Sir,

You were sweeping up paper bits in front of the elevators at approximately 9:40 Monday morning at 2001 Wilshire in Santa Monica when I came blustering out into the lobby, talking loudly on my phone about how to get to my doctor’s office, which seemed to have disappeared. The completely different facade, parking, elevators and hallways should have been a clue that I was in the wrong building, which you so politely pointed out. In fact, you even knew what building I should have been in. Apparently this happens a lot.

I’m sorry I shushed you, that was rude. Please know that I’m not normally like that, it’s just that driving in Santa Monica really freaks me out, I’m afraid I may get laid off this week, and they told me not to eat after midnight so I can get my blood tested. They said I could have coffee, but only if it was black, and what on earth would be the point of that? Why don’t I just punch myself in the stomach with a molten lava hulk fist?

Anyway, I wanted to say that you were right, the receptionist at my doctor’s office was just as confused as I was, and it was really cunty of me to keep making the “I’m on the phone” sign and shushing you when you were a) just trying to help and b) the only person who actually knew what was going on. I have been on the other side of that kind of bullshit and all I can say is I understand how awful that was.

Hopefully some day I will have need of the services of the insurance broker whose building I was in, and we can meet again on better terms wherein you can discover that I am actually really delightful most of the time.

In unity,

Marina

A Shack of My Own

So this happened:

I was feeling kind of shitty Friday night, so I was marathoning Amy Poehler’s Ask Amy, and this commercial came on which I think is hilarious because Ask Amy is essentially for children.

I’m amused because I was basically sitting in the dark in my underwear, kind of sort of crying about the turn my life has taken and the Gods of the Internet were like “this looks like a woman who needs luxury accommodations quickly and easily.” Like, I know that it was probably just reading all the cookies I got from ogling rich people’s houses on Curbed, or however that works, but I thought it was hilarious, so I tweeted about it.

Good to know that whatever fate this shitshow deals me, I will at least have the support of whoever runs the twitter for an upscale Manhattan real estate broker. That’s all that really counts, isn’t it?


We also saw Iron Man 3 this weekend. I’m already guilty about spending good money on a movie when I still don’t know if I’m about to get laid off, but I feel like sometimes you just need to escape into an action film. They’re so full of innocent hope that the impossible could just be possible if we were only wonderful enough. I think a person needs that when things are difficult.

You know, sometimes you just have to drag your iron man through the snow for a little bit (don’t trip, it’s in the trailer), but you’ll be back on your feet soon enough. I know Tony Stark is a super genius and I’m just a fat whore but we do actually have some things in common. For example, we both suffer from insomnia. We’re both brunettes, and we’re both to some extent fictional characters. And No, I’m not going to think of the emotional implications of believing I could prevent bad things if I were just smart enough, cool enough, or possessing of enough firepower. That’s not what were doing right now.

Anyway, no spoilers but my one major complaint about any movie with women in it is how the writers so frequently use the irrational behavior and/or demands of female characters instead of actual writing in order to advance the plot. Can we please fucking stop this? For real, Pepper Potts is just a screaming plot device this entire film. If it weren’t for her, the movie would have been great. And it’s not like it would have taken that long to figure out some other, better motivation for half the shit Tony does than “well, my girlfriend said…” It pisses me off so much. If you don’t want spoilers, don’t click this link behind which I talk about my growing hatred for Pepper Stupid Potts. I can’t believe she’s named after my dog.


Who’s the best Pepper?


P.S. You probably noticed that I still don’t know if I’m going to get laid off. To my knowledge I am still employed thus far, and in fact may be employed for this entire week without knowing if it’s me on the list. Since I already had some really great getting laid off contingency plans, as well as some not getting laid off contingency plans, hearing that I may not know for at least one more week was basically the worst news I could have gotten. One more week of not knowing and not being able to do anything but impotently apply for jobs that never call me back. I’d be really frustrated if I weren’t almost completely numb. I can’t possibly deal with this stress any longer.