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m&ms487
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2007 26 July :: 4.24pm
:: Mood: contemplative
I finally have it all figured out. Well, for now, at least.
I got ahold of the Mt. Pleasant Meijer, and my first day there will be August 19th. I called my apartment place and arranged for early move in on the 17th (four days early, and an extra $68, but at least I'll have a job, now).
Now I just have to get the electric turned on and buy a shower curtain. Oh joy.
I've begun packing today. We're all moving on, and, fittingly, I'm listening to 100 years by Five for Fighting.
Charlie moved out today. He's gone. I'll be leaving in three weeks. I'll be gone. My parents are moving to their new house in October.
When I come back next summer, everything will be different. My parents are ignoring the fact that I might be coming back. Every time I talk about my bedroom in the new house, they correct me, saying that it's the "guest bedroom."
How horrible is that? I'll be a guest in my parent's house. I'm in limbo. I don't have a 'home'. There is my parent's house, and then the place(s) that Rueben and I will be renting for the next three or four years.
Unfortunatly, I get very attatched to places. I've lived in this house, in the same room, for my whole life. Going off to college helped a lot to break that attatchment, but still.....everything is changing...
It's just all so......scary.
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m&ms487
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2007 22 July :: 11.06pm
:: Mood: pissed off
Today was definately a bad day. I worked from 10:45-7:15pm and there were tons of mean people. I was about on the verge of crying the whole day because one customer after another treated me like shit. There was an old man that came up to the counter and said "You charged me wrong," and marked off three items on his receipt that he didn't think rang up correctly. Of course, I thouroughly investigated it, and called the grocery department. He was wrong on all of them, he got the wrong kind, the wrong size, and looked a wrong sign. When i explained to him why each of his items was correct, he looked at me like I was the stupidest person in the entire world and then grabbed his receipt out of my hands and tromped away.
Then there was the Michigan Scanning Award lady. She got this doll that had a clearance sticker on it for 5.50. It said "originally 7.99, now 5.50," the only problem was, the item was originally 9.99, and rang up accordingly at 30% off to 6.20. I was sure that she must have switched the sticker, because that usually doesn't happen, so I said, and as follows:
"Hi, can I help you?"
"Yeah, this rang up wrong."
"Okay, let me see. Oh, this is the wrong sticker, were there more back there like this?"
"Yeah, there was another one right next to it" (she said this annoyed)
"Oh, Okay, well, let me call back there real quick and see what's going on."
And I processed the transaction while I was on the phone trying to get the guy back there to look for more so we could fix it and see if she was lying, but he couldn't find them.
"Did you want that back on your credit card?"
"Yeah, and you owe me five bucks"
"I know, you received the Michigan Scanning Award, so there is going to be extra money. Did you want that in cash or on your card?"
"On my card"
"Do you have it with you so I can put it back on there?" (we need the account number to put it back on)
I hung up with the guy from Toys.
"There you go, you're all set, six whatever has been credited back to your card"
"You owe me more money."
"Umm, actually, the difference was x amount, and here is the five dollars for the award" (I point it out on the receipt)
"You didn't give it to me"
"Yes, I did, it's right here" (I point again).
At this point I'm getting pretty pissed, so I walk away before I say anything else, plus I had to get on the computer to look up the item to see if we had any left.
So...at seven, fifteen minutes before I had to leave, I got called into the manager's office.
Manager- "I had a complaint about you, what can you tell me about a lady with a price adjustment"
Me- "Oh, that lady, yeah, she was really mean, and kept telling me I owed her more money, and I gave it to her, but she was mean to me"
"Well, I've called you in here because she said you were rude and that's not the first complaint I've gotten about you. That's actually the third where they said you were rude and snotty. Yeah, they all said you were snotty."
And he presents the following paper that I have to sign that goes into my permanant Meijer file:
Michelle, on 7-22-07, we received a complaint from a customer you waited on at the Service Desk. This customer said that you were very rude and snotty when confronted with a problem she had with an overcharge. Please realize that customer service is our top priority, and that it is your job to handle these delicate situations with tact. Additional incidents of this nature will result in further discipline up to and including termination"
So i signed the damn piece of paper (and I got to keep a copy for fond memories) and left the office, went into the bathroom and balled my eyes out. I was still crying when I left, and until about ten.
I'm just so frustrated. I did absolutely nothing wrong (I have a co-worker that was there when I was "rudely" helping the lady that backs me up saying that I was nothing but professional), and I get in trouble. This might even affect my transfer to the Mt. Pleasant Meijer that I'm relying on.
I was not rude. I may not have acted like her best fucking friend, but I was not rude. I might have been short with her because she was insulting my intelligence. Hmm. There's a thought.
Whatever. I almost wanted to go back and tell my manager to go fuck himself and quit, but unfortunatly, I need my job because I need the money for rent. I am so fed up with people.
Friday a guy threw his change at me because I had to call return checks to make sure it was okay to cash his payroll check (because the company was on a do not cash list). I made him wait like seven minutes because I was on hold. HE THREW HIS CHANGE AT ME!!!!
I do not deserve to be treated like a piece of shit, and then get blamed for being rude when I wasn't. Especially for a job that screws me over at every turn. I lost all my seniority because I went on educational leave to go to school. I kept my seniority to get my benefits, but I can't get those because I don't work enough because I don't have enough seniority to get enough HOURS!!! I've worked there for three fucking years and I make fucking minimum wage, the same amount that any person getting hired in gets....
I'm just so fed up with people fucking me over every fucking day.
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m&ms487
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2007 19 July :: 12.33pm
:: Mood: contemplative
I saw Marty (Metzger) yesterday at Meijer. I didn't even realize it was him until I carded him (he was buying a tobacco product). He looked so worn down. Not out, just down. Then I realized, we had never met.
And it's so ironic that we went to the same high school and I knew of him, but not him, because everyone at Cedar knows of everyone else, but not as much as others. But I knew him, well, a little. I've read his woohu, and I've read Jessa's journals, and I've kept tabs on Clem's "journal" and watched her grow from a newborn into a curious toddler.
I know things in about his life that I shouldn't, because we've never actually met. It was the oddest realization in the world. The internet does strange things to our perceptions. I wanted to ask him how he was doing, and how Clem was, and then I realized, he doesn't know me, but I know him. He probably would have thought I was crazy. He might have recognized me as Charlie's little sister, but I bet he had no idea how much I knew. It was just one of those moments in life when you realize you know more than your suppose to, intimate details, really, and you're nothing but a stranger off the streets who shouldn't have such precious information.
I guess I could go on and on, but I think my point has been made. It just makes me wonder who reads MY journal that I don't know, but they know me. Have I ever run into them, not suspecting they know a touch of the interworkings of my brain? Have they wanted to ask me an intimate question about my life, but realized, seconds before the words were going to spill out, that they didn't have the right, or rather, the social allowance, to do such a thing? Did they realize they knew me, but have never met me? A wonder of the internet, I guess.
I had a creative burst last night, when all I wanted to do was sleep, of course. Here is a bit of it, and of course, all that stuff about copyrighting applies.
My mind is full
Overflowing
To the point of
Nearly Breaking.
The days to come
Have worried me
I have fretted, thought,
Become senselessly
Engtangled.
In situations
Times and places
That will never
Come to Be
Yet, here they are
In my mind.
Alternate Reality.
Cannot sleep
Mind overflowing
This and that
Tomorrows coming
And unprepared
Am I for
Tomorrow and after
And Forever After.
This planning,
incessant planning
Never.
Ceases.
I plan and fret
Plan and fret
A plan for every
Imaginable
Possibility
And then the rest.
I need to sleep
Stop planning Stop
racing Stop-
JUST STOP.
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m&ms487
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2007 12 July :: 11.54pm
:: Mood: busy
I often circulate between two modes of myself. The first is carefree, living for the moment, passing by, still in the game, but on the bench for a while. The second is careful. As in full-of-care. The root of the word. Caring to the point of being downtrodden and worried by the state of the world and the direction of the human race. I'm in the second mode, and let me tell you why I'm weary tonight.
Since I've been working mostly nights lately, I've had the opportunity to watch a lot of C-Span and C-Span2. If you don't know, they are both television stations that broadcast, usually live, the goings on of both the Senate and the House of Representatives. Today, both bodies were discussing the Iraq war in different aspects-legislation to withdraw, veteran's affairs, and other such amendments. I was stuck to the television for almost three and a half hours flipping between the two channels (interspersed with the occasional local weather update from the weather channel). I also watched most of the President's speech today.
I'm usually a hardlined Democrat, but I haven't been quite sure of what to make of Iraq until today. As I watched the President talk of "his war," the war of "ideologies," I realized exactly why. I have been getting the story two different ways from two different places. I admit, I don't think we should have been there in the first place. No matter how many times you try to say it, Iraq had nothing to do with September 11. But, that is no longer the issue. We're there, and we can't change history.
As I was watching Mr. Bush, I realized his side of the arguement. He was explaining to the press that was eagerly pelting him with all kinds of questions, that Alqueda was in Iraq. He suggested that the Iraq government was failing because of the violence perpetrated by them. His reasoning was, get rid of Alqueda in Iraq (though, there isn't much evidence they are there, but I'll give him the benefit of the doubt), and the country should be a fertile womb, ready to grow a cute little democracy just like the big kids over in America.
Then I flipped the channel to the Senate. One Senator from New York was demanding withdrawl stating that the US should not be caught up in a civil war amongst people that do not want peace. He insisted that a democracy will never work because they don't want it to, and thus our mission is hopeless.
Now, I understand how I feel about this, finally.
It's not as simple as either side would wish you to believe. Iraq is both a haven for terrorists trying to damage America in anyway possible, and it is in the midst of a civil war. The solution is not staying the course, nor is withdrawl. But, then, what is the answer?
I believe we should withdraw from Iraq (except for a few forces that would be left to train more Iraqi military and police, and keeps some locations secure). Those troops should then be stationed in Afghanistan (where we are ALSO having a "conflict"). By refocusing attention to Afghanistan, the home of Alquada and other terrorists, it will force them to return to fight for their homeland, leaving Iraq free to sort out it's own civil war (which may never happen).
It may not be perfect, but it's a different option rather than pull out or stay the course.
The other thing that struck me during Mr. Bush's speech was his complete lack of humility. He knows he's the top dog, and no one can take him down. He said that he would listen to the opinions of congress, but flat out said it didn't matter, because he was the Commander-In-Chief, and he would do what he wanted. I believe he's done more harm to this country than good, and I don't know if the next President is going to be able to fix that or not, Democrat, or Republican.
O, Mr. President, why don't you listen to your own people? You are not a king on your royal throne. You are servant to your people. We are not your servants, rather, you are our's. You say this is your war, well, it is our's too. Don't be so selfish as to think you are the only one that loses sleep over this at night, if you do at all. You were right, this war is about ideologies, but it's as much about you forcing American ideology on the country of Iraq, as it is about AlQueda trying to prove their ideologies by hurting us. You are playing a dangerous game, and your time will come to an end.
As Barbara Kingsolver wrote, "Where in the Bill of Rights is it written that the entitlement to bear arms-and use them-trumps any aspiration to peaceful solutions? I search my soul and find I cannot rejoice over killing, but that does not make me any less a citizen. When I look at the flag, why must I see it backlit with the rockets' red glare?"
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m&ms487
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2007 4 July :: 12.47am
It hurts me when my friends are hurting. I understand. I do. I'm here, but that's all I can do, really.
It's raining outside for the first time in a long time. When I was driving home from work tonight, there were flashes all around me. At first I thought it was fireworks, but then straight ahead, I caught a glimpse of a spectacular lightening bolt. It was amazing.
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jayzulla
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2007 2 July :: 11.34am
Why do people compare themselves with others? Why dont you just live your life for yourself and let other people do their own thing without your two cents? If people want your opinion, give it to them. If not, shut the fuck up. Pull your head out of your ass and open your eyes.
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m&ms487
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2007 30 June :: 2.50pm
I can't help but laugh...
If you'd like the WHOLE story, go to Gillette's post about Jesus Camp. Get in on the debate if you'd like. For now, an excerpt that is, well, awesome.
"i'm happy how i am. living my life day to day trying to be the best person i can be and let me tell you when i die i will go to wherever i wish to. if it is my own paradise then so be it. perhaps i'll go to disney world. i don't fucking know. i'm not dead yet.
btw how do you know all these things are real. has a dead person come to your hosue and knocked on the door and said i died and went to heaven i also went on a fieldtrip to hell. no i don't fucking think so. it's only what people tell you. read a history book or ask a fucking history fucking teacher.
the bible was written by men. men lie. they are all liars. but aren't we all? we all must repent. if we want to live eternal life in the joys of jesus with golden roads and lollipops."
-Jessie Gillette
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m&ms487
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2007 28 June :: 10.59pm
:: Mood: contemplative
I was sitting in the middle of Zach's field watching him and Rueben build their earth bag structure and watching the sun, shrouded in clouds like holy cloths, sink slowly behind a grove of trees and down into the horizon...and the clouds that were in the sky above me were very tall and large and loomed bright and purple and pink, slowly drifting to the west...and I sat there in thought, the clink of shovels filling bags with earth as my background music, my medium of meditation, while I braided grass that I collected from around me...the conclusion came suddenly of the selfishness of it all. We live for each other. Humanity is too wrapped up in itself, and that's where all the problems come from. Too involved, too lost in self absorbtion to get even a glimpse of the real, big picture...and it was just me wedged between the earth and the sky, the clouds pressing down on me as the light diminished to shine in another place. What does it matter? It's all too big. We live as if it matters what we do. It might, for a moment...but not for long.
I spend my days in a large building with no windows. Eventually, the field that was raped to put that building there, will destroy it. The grass and trees, and the little insects we sell repelents to destroy will consume it. It will take years, but what does that matter? The earth has years.
And then, when it's gone, what will it matter that I spent my days locked inside that building, wrapped up in the price adjustments, and money transfers, and the selling of overpriced synthetic food items?
I should have spent them else where, doing something else. But alas, I'm wrapped up tightly in it, playing by all the rules, doing what is expected, what is supposedly right.
And even if it's right, or wrong, or indifferent, what will it matter?
And it's hard to live with these kinds of questions in my head. It's hard to wake up in the morning with no purpose, with up becomind down and down turning up. Confusion is the name of the game. I don't know if I have a purpose. I know it's not to do the bidding of some guy up in the sky.
But somehow, I have this, this seemingly eternal hope. Hope for what? I have no idea. But it keeps me going when it seems like there is no purpose, no reason for it all. I suppose it's just some animal instinct that's buried deep in my subconscious, the message in the DNA to keep going, to procreate...
But we've created such an elaborate game of it all. If the goal is to procreate, why don't we just do that? Why are there so many other factors involved? Byproducts of something of evolution. It seems that everything we've created is so unnatural...
Why can't we be like every other animal and fuck each other and then die?
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2007 25 June :: 2.24pm
:: Mood: contemplative
:: Music: "Along for the Ride" Vannessa Carlton
I'm in a rut. A summer rut. I don't like summer. It's too...loose. There is little structure, routine. I find myself wasting time. I dislike wasting time. I don't have time to waste, yet, that's what I do, I waste it.
Right before I fall asleep at night, my mind races with a thousand things that I should do the next day. I can't remember them when I wake up in the morning, and I'm caught in an endless cycle of waking up, eating, watching t.v, usually going to work, coming home emotionally and physically exhausted, reading for a while in bed, and going to sleep.
This is the point where I think there is more. And there is, but I just don't have the [drive, motivation, energy] to do whatever it is.
I just felt a horrible, unexplainable loss when I woke up this morning.
I'm way too uptight. And I don't think I know how to relax.
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jayzulla
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2007 20 June :: 8.56am
I hear on the tv "A Might Heart is truly the first greatest film of the year"
ummmmm, 300.
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jayzulla
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2007 19 June :: 12.15pm
celica and focus > avenger
edit: also think about reverting to the total ass i was. to everyone except my crew. some of you might think that that never really ended. you dont even know what ass means if thats the case. bout' to get down and dirty.
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2007 15 June :: 11.27pm
A tragic flood this morning destroyed the personal library of President George W. Bush. The flood began in the presidential bathroom where both of the books were kept. Both of the books have been lost.
A Presidential spokesperson said the President was devastated, as he had not quite finished coloring the second one.
The White House tried to call FEMA, but there was no answer.
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2007 15 June :: 10.59pm
Rueben and I rented a few documentaries today. One was called Maxed Out, and it was about how credit card debt, and debt in general, is ruining the country. Well, not the whole country, just the majority of the people who aren't millionaires.
Then we watched Jesus Camp. If you haven't watched this, you really need to. For the first time, I found myself, as an agnostic/atheistic liberal, as the enemy. It really makes you wonder about religion. It can be taken to so many extremes. This is about radical Christianity, in our own country. We are fighting radical Islam, killing in the name of freedom, when the Christian Evangelicals are on the same path, except they're predominately white, upper middle class, and are fighting in the name of a different God, one that most of Americans can claim some type of allegiance to.
They "love" the United States, but are attempting to dissolve the separation of Church and State, and take away anything that isn't set out in the Bible. Homosexuality? Wrong. Abortion? No way. Violence? well, they're training their children to be an "Army of God." I'll leave it at that.
To all of you out there that think you're better because you have "God in your Heart," I understand that you might not agree with hardly anything that the Evangelicals are preaching, but you have to at least agree that almost all religion, whether it be Islam, or Christianity, is almost like playing with fire. It can easily be taken to the extreme. Can you understand? Can you understand how dangerous it can be to believe in something so much that you're willing to kill for your cause? To secure a place in heaven? Don't even get me into if heaven really exists, or what heaven can be defined as, if there is such a thing. Can you understand the necessity of the Separation? Can you understand that anything to do with a great mass of people can be dangerous?
No, I don't believe that some God waved his hand and made up the earth and the trees and man (and woman for that matter). Neither do I believe that the world is held up on the shoulders of a really strong man (Greek and Roman) or that the world sprung up on the back of a turtle (Iroquois).
I believe that every person should go through the day trying not to hurt anyone else, and maybe even trying to make someone else's life a little better. I believe in respect, and I believe in the idea that everyone is equal, even if it doesn't happen that way. I truly believe that I am a good person if I follow these few simple guidelines, and I don't need someone telling me to live "for God". I'm living for me, because really, I don't believe that there is anything once I die. I could be proven wrong, but for the time being, I'd like to know that I'm using my life for something, because that's all there is. You are born, you live, you change a few things, for the better, hopefully, and then you die. That's it.
And no, I don't go around telling people that they should become agnostics or atheists like a lot of others go around trying to recruit others to their religion. You know why? Because what I've choosen is right for me. And no one can talk me out of it. No one can scare me out of it. If I have to die for my right not to believe, to die with the knowledge that I don't have a eternal life, or eternal hope, I'm okay with that. Just as long as I don't kill others because they don't believe the same things as me. Just as long as I don't hurt anyone else, because in my mind, that's what good human beings do. They help, not harm.
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2007 15 June :: 12.36pm
penDUBS says "pistol grip pump on my lap at all times. they can be fucking with other doggys shit but they cant be fucking with mine. i think ill take out all you motherfuckers without dely"
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m&ms487
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2007 13 June :: 1.49pm
:: Mood: tired
:: Music: Delila - Plan White T's
The summer is catching up on me. And I just realized it. I've been home for about a month and a half, and I'm still readjusting...in little ways, but readjusting nonetheless.
After a long, horrible night of work, I got home at eleven thirty last night to a letter sitting on my bed. It informed me that I had been awarded a $1000 scholarship from the GR community foundation. I'm relieved. I'm definitely in a safe spot with my financials for next year right now, and there is even a bit of a surplus.
Lately, it seems like I'm biding my time, just waiting to get to the real "life," the one where I'm suppose to do something meaningful, where I enjoy what I do. The life when I come home from a day on the job and I can say to myself, "I made a difference."
The only difference I've been making lately is on the stains on the tile floor behind the service desk.
I've been doing announcements lately, over the PA at Meijer. Just for stupid crap, like the credit card..."Attention Meijer guests, Would you like to save 10% off your entire order today...." and "Currently we have patio sets for 15-33% off thier original price in the garden center..."
A few people have told me that I should be a radio DJ. That got me thinking. I would like to do something with my voice. When I was a little kid, I wanted to be the voice of an animated character in a movie or on a tv show. I think it would be really fun to do something like that. If only...
Well, I have to go to work now, unfortunately. I get to work with Phil tonight, so that should be fun. I like working with people who are very laid back, because I'm really uptight, and I need that reassurance that everything isn't as bad as it seems.
All for now.
Michelle
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