It's more than Nature; It's like My Destiny...

Three guesses where I am.

I'm totally at church.

Oh wait, that's hilarious.

Yup. Work.

It sucks because Robert sooooo gets lucky with the on-call thing. He was on-call when we had our epic until 7am Monday. Not lucky in the sense of WHEEE! but he was already working. Me? I'd be home if it wasn't for this on-call business. Not so lucky, I'd say.

Last night I went to a Ghost Runner show. It had been a while, and it's probably very tragic that as much as the emotional side of me would recommend staying away from all of them forever, I happen to really, really love their music. Including their new stuff.

But it was strange. It was the most sober I had ever been at one of their shows (I'm not stupid, I knew I'd be on call tonight), and yet, it was the most comfortable I felt. Either they're used to my presence, or I'm finally getting used to theirs. I am very new to the seeing-people-who-you-have-seen-naked again, so maybe and probably most of the awkwardness falls on my door. And then I'd compensate for my own mix-mashed stew of emotions by drowning them in alcohol and doing something so ridiculous it takes away from the fact that I've seen them naked. Hard to think about the guys that have seen you naked when you're throwing up in the street or losing your wallet.

But not last night. I still don't really know how to talk to people I've slept with, but I think I'm getting there.

And it was Sharon's birthday and we jumped around and danced and Spring kicked my ass in pool and the band before was the most painful collection of noise I have ever heard and it united us all in our utter pain of listening to them. Chris had a theory that they were trying to get a rise out of people by playing sheer noise, like it was a Theatre of Cruelty experiment or something (here, for those of you who don't know). I personally thought that they had to have been warming up, until I realized that their warming up wasn't ending and no real music was ever going to play. Sleazy postulated that even if they wanted to get a rise out of the audience and have someone throw something, then we'd all win. They'd achieve their goal, and hopefully we'd be able to take out at least one of the members to stop them from offending our ears.

I laughed. I danced. I listened. I stayed sober. I didn't lose anything. I didn't cry. I didn't say more than I meant to (though sometimes it is hard because I feel like I'm carrying a very ill-hidden secret around with me).

I came home and for all the drama that this life has brought me, I was happy to be a part of it. I love these kids. We are fucked up beyond belief, but we have each other's backs, and that's saying something.

And I come to work and I'm sleepy and I realize I absolutely adore the people I work with here. The job itself is obviously not so great, seeing as I would like nothing more than to be at home in my PJ's, but I'm making decent overtime and the other night? Not that bad. We all went mad at about 2am and I actually have to say I had a shitload of fun. Not the actual working part, but when we'd break, we'd get silly and have dance breaks and act like total asses. But we have similar senses of humor and I can't tell you how much that counts in the end. I'd be more miserable at a better job with worse people. So it's okay. It's not a place you can stay too long at, the hours don't allow for it. The pace will kill you. But for now, though the hours are long and my body is weary, the pay is good and the people are great.

All in all, I'm pretty happy with my life. I desperately want to get laid, but I guess a girl can't get too greedy, eh?

All in good time, I guess. Though I have never been known for my patience.

Got a job, got a life,
got a four-door and a faithless wife.
Got those nice copper pipes,
got an ex, got a room for the night.
Aren't you such a catch? What a prize!
Got a body like a battle axe...
Love that perfect frown, honest eyes
We ought to buy you a Cadillac

The last thing I'll say about that email...

And then I'm done with it.

But, of course, Ani says it best:

everything i do is judged
and they mostly get it wrong
but oh well
'cuz the bathroom mirror has not budged
and the woman who lives there can tell
the truth from the stuff that they say
and she looks me in the eye
and says would you prefer the easy way?
no, well o.k. then
don't cry

I'll sleep easy tonight.

Who take to the Yard like a Cock Fight...

And guess who's struttin' now?

ACK!

It's gonna be another crazy one today, kids. And for the rest of the week, as well.

I only wish I had the time to do all the things I was accused of.

This is just how I roll.

I need a very good orgasm at the end of all of this.

Seriously. Hit Me Baby One More Time. Like With a Bat.

Talked to Ashlee. Once again, she made me feel better about life. That girl is my Dumbledore (wait, oh uh, nevermind. Harry Potter on the brain still).

Check the time stamp on this bad boy. I'm still at work. And I'm nowhere near leaving. I'm not coming in tomorrow. Or wait. I'm not coming in anymore today.

There.

Wow. We all went mad about two hours ago.

I Gots Ya All in Check...

"We're probably going to be here past 3."

*Cry*

I haven't slept yet. I got a viscious email about something I did not do. I can't take this today. I can't take this any day.

Seriously, kill me now. I think I've crossed my threshold.

I know there was a time when things were simpler. I seem to feel there had to have been. But all I feel right now is overwhelming sadness. I know it's lack of sleep and being overworked, overtired, oversensitive...but I just want it to be over. And I don't know what "it" I'm referring to, but something's gotta stop. This job. These hours. My life in general.

And when she is good
she is very very good
and when she is bad
She is Carrie.

And you Melted, Started to Talk Crazy...

This on call thing helps me keep up with my blogging, but man, does it blow.

I don't know if it's a matter of principle, maybe it's the rebel in me that refuses to give up my weekend for work and so I end up getting as drunk as I normally would and then enduring the most hellish hangovers while already in on the weekend. In the end, I suppose I'm only punishing myself. But we all know how much I love to punish myself.

So whatever. I'm stationed at my desk, clutching my Vitamin Water like it's the Holy Grail and praying that they don't actually expect me to do anything because the level of functioning right now is laughable.

Friday I got drunk off just a few beers while making CDs for our fundraiser. That was a bit odd, since over the course of the night, I'd only had 3 or 4 beers. I stood up from the computer and suddenly felt like I had just done a power hour or something. It was odd. But I raided Flatplex for music (since if you're gonna have boys that will always love their music more than you, you might as well take the music) and so at least today I'm sitting here with loads and loads of new good stuff.

Right now:

I woke up alarmed
I didn't know where I was at first
Just that I woke up in your arms
And almost immediately I felt sorry
Cause I didn't think this would happen again
No matter what I could do or say
Just that I didn't think this would happen again
With or without my best intentions
And whatever happened to a boyfriend
The kind of guy that tries to win you over?
And whatever happened to a boyfriend
The kind of guy who makes love cause he's in it?

Thanks, Liz. Before Liz all went crappy and stuff. Exile in Guyville could be the name of my memoir if it already wasn't someone's album. Damn! Beat me to it.

I am gonna spend another year alone. It's true.

On Saturday, I lounged around and read Harry Potter. While listening to my new stock of tasty music goodness, Ani came along and I got the overwhelming urge to call Ashlee. Luckily that's one of my urges that I DON'T have to suppress, so I went ahead. Talking to her makes me feel sane. In our goofy insanity. I don't know. But somehow she grounds me more than anybody else. I was feeling overwhelmed all of a sudden with the intensity of Ani and the feeling of "Holy crap, is this really my life?"

Seriously. Is this really my life? I often don't recognize myself. Same hair, I guess.

Now:

I am the son
and the heir
of nothing in particular

God, I love that song. I think it might be the only reason why I still watch Charmed.

Today is going to suck. And I'm only an hour in.

Boo.

So our fundraiser was last night. I was really disappointed in the turnout because we took much more care into it. At the last minute, they decided one of the raffle prizes was a lap dance from Yours Truly. Well, I was planning on dancing like a ho anyway, might as well bring in some money for the show.

I did 2. The guy that won the raffle and then some other dude wanted a dance. Aw, fuck it. I feel bad for Guy 2. I was too drunk at that point, and I think I almost killed him. AWKWARD.

Whatever. Chris and Spring came and I was really touched. We would have far more money if we let Spring do the lap dances. For reals, yo. But, per usual, the verbal vomit abounds around them. A blessing and curse that I feel really comfortable around them.

Whatever. They're good kids. They're better than they're given credit for.

Whatever.

My brain is totally fried.

Ugh. Maybe it's time to smoke a cigarette.

I'm gonna die alone. Boo.

[ed note: That's the hangover talking, dear. Go smoke.]

You're right. I feel better already.

An Epic Entry for a Little Tale...

Here I am. On call. Again. Woo, this rocks! And by rocks, I mean it blows monkey ass, but you all follow me, yes?

So I'm going to try to convey this strange occurence at work that happened last week. It's hard to describe without knowing all the players:

So there's this guy that I work with (no, it's not going to be one of those stories...). And he's a cool guy. You're typical post-grad former frat guy (he's even got a tattoo of his Greek letters in the same place where I have my tattoo). But I don't hold that against him. He's a cool guy. And he was very nice to me my first day when my boss was out of town and I didn't know anybody so he asked me to lunch and was very nice about the fact that within 5 seconds of meeting him, I spilled my coffee all over him. Classic Carrie. But I will always be grateful to him for that.

And he's cute. He's not really my type, but he's working the All-American good looks sort of thing. He was a baseball player in college and that's his body type (the cuter type of baseball player, not the ones that make you cringe that they all wear white pants). Most importantly, I'm going into all this because he's a flirt. Doesn't bug me, but you know that he's used to getting what he wants by flashing a very charming smile. I'm used to flirty men (and flamy men, and who are we kidding, I hang out with all men, so very few things shock me about the less-fair sex).

Alright. So he's set up.

And there's this temp attorney, who I'll call "Crazy." Now Crazy is the type of girl who went to Kingwood that we hated. You know, the one that came to school bitching about how daddy got her a Camaro when what she REALLY wanted was a BMW. And she's blonde. And I won't say stupid, because somehow she made it through law school, but she's a little slow on the uptake and you can see her get flustered easily when she's not surgically removed from her cell phone.

Now when I work down with the temp attorneys doing a task so menial I can't even be bothered to try to explain it, we pass the day shooting the shit and being VERY relaxed. We drop the "F" bomb like it's a George Carlin special. And we joke about sex and all the crazy things that probably shouldn't be talked about in the office. Crazy told us a story about getting a massage and she heard the masseuse next to her give a hand job to her male customer. Things like that. We all recognize that this particular task sucks and if you have to do it 10 hours a day, you should be able to enjoy the company and it's true that time passes much faster that way. Calling it informal is a bit of an understatement.

We could tell very early on that Crazy had a little crush on All-American. Like, honestly, the woman would lick her lips and arch her back when he came into the room. It's funny. And she has a boyfriend and talks about how horrified she'd be if he cheated on her. Meanwhile, she doesn't recognize the hypocracy of making googly eyes at a co-worker and not just innocent flirting, it seemed to us to be an active pursuit. She even asked that we not mention she had a boyfriend. Charming, yes?

I was down there and we get a call from our boss saying All-American won't be coming down so much anymore because he will be needed elsewhere. He's going to be her running-boy. Which, immediately after getting off the phone with us, we start laughing about what "tasks" our boss will have him do. Cuz that's how we roll. And I make an off-hand comment to Crazy about how she'll miss him coming down to our room. And we roll along in our work and she runs off with her cell phone in tow (nothing new) and when she comes back, there's all this tension in the room. Suddenly, Crazy Explodes:

"I just don't appreciate it! I think it's unprofessional and inconsiderate and rude and maybe I'm on my period but I'm offended."

"Huh? Why?" [actual look of shock on my face]

"First of all, you're in my seat [are you serious? Are we 12? And have you not noticed that technically I'm your boss and I'll sit where I goddamn please] And then you're making insinuations that I don't think are appropriate for the workplace [like hand job stories? I didn't even mention sex] and I'm offended."

OK. Fun stops. Truth be told, it is unprofessional so I apologize profusely. Homegirl has a right to be offended, I suppose.

But it doesn't stop there. She leaves the room again with that trusty cell phone of hers and comes back and it is obvious to EVERYONE that she has been crying. No, wait. The way her face looked it looked as if she had been crying in a way that implied she had to watch her entire family be slaughtered with an axe. I understand being offended, but being DESTROYED by this? Now, that's just crazy.

I pull her aside and apologize again for the comment. Not for the seat thing, cuz fuck her for that. Right? But the rest of the day, she cannot for the life of her pull her shit together. Her hands shake. She looks down. And then All-American comes down and they rush off to smoke together. God knows what she told him, and I don't really care as long as it doesn't go to my boss. Though if it did, I certainly have enough ammo on her (especially since the rumors of the sparks between the two have increasingly intensified--I don't care to share, but they're not doing a good job of NOT adding fuel to the fire) and the rest of my team has my back. Her reaction was...here it is...REDONKULOUS.

It took her a week to even look at me again. I spent as little time down there as possible. She ruined the joy in Case Room 7. All cuz she's playing puppy love with someone she works with (a bad idea all 'round, and that's even without her having a BOYFRIEND).

I was down the other day and All-American had a headache. I do the pressure-point trick my stepdad taught me, but it requires holding the person's hand. The death-look I received was priceless. And then today she was nothing but sugar and spice to me. From looking like she wanted me strung-up and paper-cut to death, to asking stupid questions about me that I don't feel like answering to someone like her. She one of those that you know is constantly plotting. She read that book The Rules and you know she follows it.

It's like that.

A long-winded way of saying my life here is very strange.

Back to Harry Potter, then. Cheerio. Carry on.

A.D.D. is the new Black...

The air is so thick and heavy you can chew on it.

"Look down that avenue, Carrie, it's raining!"

"No, I'm pretty sure that's just smog."

"Oh."

Something about the heat here is more oppressive than in Texas, though in actual degrees, I'm pretty certain that most of the state has about 10 degrees on New York. Makes me wanna stay home and watch Oprah for some reason. And I haven't watched Oprah in ages.

Just mentioning Oprah made me grow an extra uterus.

I'm re-reading the last Harry Potter so I'm all fresh and ready for the new one.

And I'm hunting cute boys on MySpace. Yup, it's come to that. And it's a more amusing way of passing the day than on LiveJournal. I figure I need to expand my social circle to include, well, anybody that it won't matter if I sleep with.

There's a whole lot of office politics going on (most of it pretty amusing). I don't have time to expound on this, but I'm on call two days in a row this week (Thursday and Friday) so there's a good chance I'll have plenty of time to try to explain the weird and wacky world of Law Firm Interactions. None of it is healthy, mind you, but if I was engaged in healthy behavior and environments, it wouldn't make for a very interesting blog, now, would it?

I'm torn between freezing my ass off inside and my soul melting outside. Bit of a quandry I find myself in, yes, indeedy.

We signed our lease for our new place. Four bedrooms. I am the only girl. Oh, lordy, let the games begin...

A Picture from Friday, While I'm Still Standing...

You must Maintain Your Charm/Same time Maintain your Halo

Well, here I am. At work.

Been here since 10. The thing that sucks is that I'm on call, so there's not actually anything for me to do. I've heard that on Saturdays the on-call usually ends about 5. Which is 7 hours of just sitting on my ass, staring at the screen.

Add to that my impressive headache and you've got one fine Saturday, kids.

Why the headache? Why do you think?

Daniel, Devon, Ian, Dru, Caleb and I went to this bar in Brooklyn that had free drinks for an hour. I think I had about 4 or 5 whiskey and cokes in that amount of time. Added to the few beers I had after work with my coworkers/friends Lee and Robert.

We smoked a joint and walked around Brooklyn. I went back with Dru to Flatplex because we were trying to convince Lucy (holy shit, remember Lucy?) and Ryan to come as well but just ended up splitting a cab and dropping them in the East Village.

We continue on, Dru and I. Like champs. I think he asked me if I wanted to make-out in the car. I'm a little fuzzy on the details of that discussion. But I didn't make-out with him. Chances are it was a drunken suggestion (as most things in my life are) and passed away just as quickly.

I told Dru that all my friends outside of them think I should not hang out with them anymore because of the weird sexual politics I find myself. Dru was very sweet and told me that he values me too much and wouldn't like that. Sometimes you just need a little reassurance. But it felt nice to know that they care.

Junebug comes home. We all smoke. I'm grilling Dru about the after-effects of his ex Karie hooking up with all his friends. I'm curious on a multitude of levels how women are viewed in this weird world I've gotten myself embroiled in. I forget that it might be awkward to discuss such things in front of Junebug. It never occurs to me what's appropriate or not. I am, if nothing else, a fairly straightforward person. So when I want to know something, I ask. Timing seems a bit moot.

I faded quickly. All that concentrated drinking tapped me out earlier than I was expecting of myself. One minute I'm upright, and the next it is the morning and I have to go into work. I'm curled up in the fetal position on the futon, and I suppose that's just the way it has to be. I know Sleazy came home at some point, since in the morning I find his crap sprawled about. I wonder if he finds it weird to come home to his ex-girlfriend passed out on his futon on a somewhat regular basisn. Well, actually, I'm very rarely on the futon. In fact, I think last night was the first night I spent the whole night on the futon without transferring to someone else's bed.

The morning in Flatplex is always my favorite part. No matter how debaucherous I get (and Lord, do I with these kids) I can never sleep in. I would never just sleep till 3 there. I always wake up, go to the living room and play on the computer, smoke a cigarette or two, maybe a bowl if it's there. And almost always have a beer, because hair of the dog ain't an idiom, it's a way of life for me. But I like Flatplex when it's quiet. All the drama is quiet and the boys are tucked safely away in their beds and I'm not anxious about anything. For once. This is my secret Flatplex ritual. I cannot think of a single time (barring times I was rushing out to work) that I haven't done it. And usually after an hour or so, I go back and join whoever I spent the night with or in this case, prepare to face the day.

I buck up and head into work. I finally put the pictures Marina gave me up at my desk. It solidifies that this is actually where I work, this is my desk, and these are my friends. A little unsettling to start to settle.

But the dust had to settle at some point. It had to. It has to. It will.

I'm a Grown-Up at the Kitchen Table Doing Shots of Resignation...

Kristen raises an interesting point.

Why don't I just let a summer associate wine and dine me? Because I don't know where they are. The only lawyer I'm ever in contact with is my boss, Lisa. And there are multiple reasons why I wouldn't want her to wine and dine me. So that leaves all the paralegals I come across on my daily travels. Most of the girls here are very cute and have probably been snatched up by the smaller population of cute guy paralegals.

Office romance seems to not be so much of an option. Which sucks, because I practically live here (I billed 244 hours last month). The only place I could meet someone new is here. But then when would we go out?

Going out seems to be a bit of a pipe dream for me these days. Although the debauchery that lead up to the last Junebug episode was pretty rowdy.

Dru was running around like a crazy person. He started throwing himself into walls and then into the piles of garbage bags on the street. He stole a construcion hard hat from a construction site and also threw his shirt over a fence, which Junebug had to scale in order to retrieve it.

Spring gave me a lap dance. Woo hoo!

Chris bitched to me about Sleazy and his girlfriend Julie. I nodded sympathetically and laughed sarcastically. And I raved about bellydancing to him.

Devon decided to start slamming the hard alcohol and by the time we wound up at the bar that has the beer bongs, he decided to tap out right there. One moment, Devon's up and laughing. I turn my head away for a moment and there he is, forehead to the bar and sleeping like a little angel.

Chris called it our Chasing Dru and Dragging Devon extravaganza. I found it all wildly amusing. It wasn't until I was sober the next day that anything was odd about any of these situations at all. Then Devon and I realized that when we get debaucherous, we go balls-to-the-wall with it. Which I suppose, if you're gonna do something, it's best to do it up right.

I have a feeling after a night like that, I need to stay quiet for a while. Lay low. At least with those cats. They never seem to see me when I'm not acting in an utterly ridiculous manner. Of course, with the way they all drink, I definitely would get caught in the crossfire of it all. 5'4'' 115 llbs. I'm surprised my liver hasn't jumped ship yet.

Watch as Her Head Actually Explodes...

I don't know why I bother to read the news. The world is sometimes too much for a girl like me to handle. I deal in fantasy.

With work and everything else, I am frustrated. Sexually is on there, too (I know, I know, I just had some, but come on--once is never enough).

I feel frazzled and worn out.

Work is crazy. The apartment stuff is crazy. Trying to figure out how I'm ever going to make a rehearsal for the show is crazy.

After all is said and done, I'm taking a sick day and frolicking around the city. Or out of the city, since less bad stuff happens to me outside city limits.

It's time for the Monday Groan...

Yup. Fucked Junebug again.

Before you get out your torches and come chase me down and set me on fire for being a fucktard, it was different.

I was all, "You're a bitch afterwards." He said sorry.

I emailed him. He emailed me back. We've decided this is not worth screwing up our friendship over, so we stop now. Clean slate. I feel a bazillion times better about the whole thing.

"I don't want to be your boyfriend."

And looking at him, and all the months of emotional confusion over the whole deal, angels sang and swirled around my booze-filled head and I thought to myself.

I don't want you to be my boyfriend, either.

It was a simple matter of laying things out on the table and it alleviated all the shame building up over time that had been acting like a crown of thorns upon my fallen angel head.

I deserve a better boyfriend. But he'll be a great friend. And if he's not, well fuck it, I have better friends, too. No sweat off my back.

Done. And done.

Heaven help the man who meets a Taylor woman.

On this Day...

A woman, sweaty and screaming, is in too much pain to notice her legs are spread very wide in front a whole group of people.

It's putting up a fight. What the hell is wrong?

Because it's Kristen. And Kristen is a Cancer. The womb is by far the more preferable option to this sterile room with people wearing masks and flourescent lighting. Kristen doesn't do flourescent lighting. Not if she can fix it with her fancy camera.

She slips and slides down the vaginal canal and is brought into the world. Her immediate thought is, "What can I get to eat around here?"

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KRISTEN!!!!

You think you can Fuck with London?

You can't fuck with London.

The terrorists are about to have crumpets shoved right up their ass.

If only my Vagina would Sparkle Like That...

Things have been insane at the office. The trial starts next week and so I worked until about 1 am yesterday. And not the kind of "work" I normally do, where I still manage to play around on my 2403928340 blogs. Actual work.

So sorry, my adoring public. And by my adoring public, I mean Kristen.

I took the opportunity of the three day weekend to, you know, actually have a weekend. I refused to do anything on Friday and Saturday night. I needed quiet time. I needed sleep. I needed to masturbate. A. Lot.

So yeah, I did that.

On Sunday me, Devon, and Daniel headed out to Westchester (ooooooo, sounds fancy) to this house party of some band member of Kevin's (Kevin being Becca's boyfriend, Becca being an NTI-er, those of you following from home). The band was cool--they're a jam band and they look the part. It felt a little like Austin. Especially the fact that beside the band, everyone else at the party looked like a Natty Light commercial or a frat party. I didn't know how I felt about them, but there was enough food, pot, and beer to keep us satisfied for the night.

And whoa, do they know how to grow it in the suburbs. I was so stoned and looking upon this scene with very few people that I knew and I felt like I had just stepped into Can't Hardly Wait--I expected Seth Green to show up at any moment and call me a ho.

"Hey, Ho!"

"Hey, Little Man! You should have never left Buffy: The Vampire Slayer. To do what, Rat Race?"

[Runs off crying in his beer]

End Scene.

We played Beer Pong, which is a famous drinking game here on the East Coast. I had first heard about it while I was at NTI. I find it amazing that we never played it at UT, since Texans love nothing more than a good drinking game, but that's how it is. Daniel and I fell in love with the game and played it pretty well for novices, I dare say.

And we woke up, groggy and in a sea of blankets; Amelia and I had surround-sound snoring (Daniel snores like a bitch and so does Devon when he goes to bed wasted, and all of us had been doing solid hours of beer-guzzling). Amelia punched Daniel and I just blocked it out in my Zen-ignore-boy way.

We lay by the pool for a few hours. Then hop back on a train and head back to the city, where I actually found the sound of sirens soothing. Proof-positive I'm adjusting to New York.

My friend Eric had me, Devon, and Blythe over to watch the Macy's fireworks from his rooftop in Brooklyn, which is actually the best vantage point to see them. And the sky lights up and sparkles and you "ooooh" and "ahhhh" despite all your cynicism and when the show ends, it looks like Manhattan was attacked by aliens with all the smoke just floating around. You know, minus the carnage. And the aliens. At least of the intergalactic kind.

Work resumed yesterday and I feel like a year has gone by, though it's just been a few days. Two weekends in a row. Something that now the case will be starting won't be happening for a little while, so I'm glad I made the most of it.

So if you don't hear from me, I'm slaving away for the Man.

It was supposed to be a Pep-Talk...

My boss

"I want you guys to have a great Fourth of July weekend and relax because next week is going to be Hell."

Like that's not going to taint the experience at all.

Weird night last night. I can't formulate it into a story, but it was weird.