Walking out to go to PetsMart to get Luna some more food for her dinner, we found the cutest little thing on our front lawn. A jack russell terrier, like Luna's favorite TV star, Wishbone. He was super friendly and wanted inside to say hi to Luna. There was no way we could turn the little guy down and let him loose back on the streets. But of course, thanks to horrible owners, the guy had a collar, but no tags.

So we posted an ad on Craigslist and put him in the backyard and headed out to the pet store with our pup. She had tons of fun, picked out a new toy for herself, and we got a couple of calls. Unfortunately, people don't know how to read ads on craigslist and think maybe jack russell terrier means boston terrier or chihuahua...I know a jack russell when I see one, my dog watches Wishbone almost daily.

When we got home and ate, I fed him a bit of Luna's food and we took him to a 24 hour vet to see if he had a microchip. No dice. Took him back home, where he now barks in our garage in a cat crate, adding to his pitifulness and making us want to keep him more and more by the minute. But we can't. We can't take on another dog, no matter how adorable and loving and fun he is. No matter if we name him Little Bob and feed him treats every time we go into the garage.

It doesn't seem like he's had a good owner. He doesn't seem to know one single command, is horrible on a leash, and behaves worse than Luna. But we're falling in love with the poor guy. We can't keep him. We have a dog, we don't need another. We have roommates that wouldn't be happy with that. We can't keep him.

Oh, but we want to!

I got a big surprise in my UCD inbox today. I didn't get into the fiction class. I guess there were twice as many applications than there were spaces, which is a lot considering that usually the fall quarter is the easiest one to get into the class.

I, however, made it into non-fiction. Which was the big surprise. I thought fiction was a given, and non-fiction was kinda sketchy. I mean, yeah, I really liked my essay. I thought it was clever and it came easy to me once I sat down and just wrote what I felt like writing. I had all these ideas for the essay, but none came easy to me until I decided to just write about why I can't write non-fiction. Seriously. And that's how I got into the class. It's kinda funny if you think about it--I write an essay about how terribly I suck at writing non-fiction and how I want to remedy the situation and I get into the class. I guess I wasn't the only one who thought it was clever and well-written.

But I'm seriously excited. It's a new realm. And if I was good enough to get in, then maybe I can actually do this non-fiction thing. I think I have an unique voice. Somewhere inside of all this babble, at least. And I can't wait to find it. The professor seems cool, from what I can tell from ratemyprofessor.com, and I think I'll have a friend in the class, which makes me super happy.

You know, I never thought I'd be the kind of kid that would make friends in class. I used to be so reserved and quiet, but last quarter I had all these friends in all these classes, and it was cool. I liked having people to hang out with and share notes with. Having friends in a class makes a horrible class bearable.

On another note, now that I have a car that can go places, I've been itching for an adventure. I want to go somewhere fun, somewhere out of range of Sacramento and all that it offers. I want a cool trip. I want to drive somewhere, anywhere, and just relax and have fun. Enjoy the moment. See new things. Experience new places. Take pictures. Feel a part of something fun.

Despite being 85% out of a job (meaning working one day a week at a bookstore that I only sometimes dislike), there's still hope. Light at the end of the tunnel. This means I don't have to choose between a paid job (and I do enjoy money, or rather spending it on unnecessary things for me, my dog, and my man) and an all-too-important-for-your-future internship. Yes, folks, I can have both. Without blowing my brains out from exhaustion or stress. Of course, the paid job will only be getting me about $80 per paycheck, and that means that, yes, I'm going to have to suck up that pride that was building inside of me to ask my parents for some help during my last sprint toward that degree, but that's alright. I'll survive. I'll make it through alright and hopefully, by this time next year, I won't have to rely on anyone for moolah and I can be a happy, productive, non-studying member of society.

Hope seems to spring eternal in me. While I'm sitting here worrying about getting into the creative writing program and thinking of how in the world I'm going to craft a well thought-out and insightful non-fiction piece, I'm sure I'm pretty much a shoe-in for the fiction stuff. Fiction comes easy to me...non-fiction, not so much. Maybe that screams some incredibly profound truth about myself, but I don't want to bother with it unless it's going to come up with some incredibly profound essay to submit in order to get into that non-fiction class.

Anyway, my point isn't about whether I complete my major with a creative writing emphasis or not, it's about the fact that I'll actually be graduating. I'll be completing this long sought-after thing and it'll be here, and I may not get a fantastic career right off the bat, but who cares? College grads struggle for a bit, that's the name of the game, and I've got all the love and support I need to go after what I want and I'm prepared to wait for it if I have to.

The really good news is, sometimes I'll randomly pop into the writing/editing jobs on Craigslist. And there's actually work available and it all sounds so wonderful and fantastic that I wish I was already a grad so I can try to snag these wonderful creatures called full-time careers. It's a grand thing, folks, and I'm getting closer and closer to it all.

So I'm not one to usually get involved in politics, but when it involves something that I think is important, I can get pretty riled up about it.

Today, I picked up a copy of The California Aggie on my way to my first class. Not the greatest news source, but it's become my ritual to get it every day and work on the crossword puzzle during the super boring parts of the lecture. Anyway, before class started I was reading the articles and on the front page, lo and behold, I see an article about the fabulous Governator proposing to cut the CalGrant program. W.T.F...?

Now, I'm not getting any money from CalGrant anyway. I filed my FAFSA and I'm getting plenty of money from that alone, so there's really no need. But still, how can he try to cut something that we need so much? Does he not understand how important educational funding is? I mean, because of this, the colleges will be effected, the students will be effected...hell, some kids may not even go to college because they're not getting the financial help they need. And others will have to work more hours to get through, causing them to take even longer to get a degree.

I text Pat about this, and he tells me that the great governor of our lovely state is also proposing to sell state landmarks, like San Quentin prison...moving all the prisoners and building housing there. Again, I say, WTF? I just don't have anything to say to this. How freaking retarded can the state government get? How can they not even SEE that this is a horrible plan?

THEN I get an e-mail from Environment California saying that the governor also wants to reduce the parks budget to zero. WTF?! According to this e-mail, for every dollar we spend on state parks they bring $2.35 back to our economy in tourism, and 100% of parks funding only makes up 0.88% of the budget shortfall. So..........WTF?

Honestly, though, I think the governor is now grasping at random straws to see what he can cut. Why doesn't he try focusing on the unnecessary spending going on? Why doesn't he try to fix the damn problem instead of making the most retarded plans in the world that, I'm sure, will never pass through because of their sheer stupidity and ridiculousness?

Like I said, I'm not one for discussing politics, but when these three things were brought to my attention today, I just had to rant. I mean, seriously...WTF?!

Oh, essay, sweet essay
how you come so quickly.
How you destroy my life
for that two or three days
that I worry sick about finishing you.
You, with your ridiculous requirements,
your four outside sources
for one
measly
work of literature.
You give me carpool tunnel, I swear,
oh dear essay,
you give me hours and hours of frustration
and the worry that you're still not good enough.
You give me a pile of books
and then you say,
"research for me,
your answer lies in these books,
somewhere among the words
you'll find your way."
Oh! How my heart pines to finish you
to caress those paragraphs
that came together so well.
Oh essay, oh essay,
what a bittersweet affair!
What a loving touch I added to your
rough drafts
to make you perfect and whole
Oh essay!
How you make me stress
and yet, dear essay,
dear, sweet, finished product,
how happy you make me feel
knowing that our work together is done
and, oh essay,
I wish you well
on your journey so long
from my laptop
to the printer
and, finally, in the fateful hands
of my professor.
Oh essay, have a good journey!
Make me proud!
As I know you will,
dear essay,
because you are, through that hard work,
an extension of me.
And an extension of our bittersweet
love.

As the school year closes and another will begin within a short amount of time, I've been faced with the all-too-intrusive question: so what do you want to do for the rest of your life? People automatically assume that since my major is English, that I want to be a teacher. They don't realize the broad category it it and the massive amount of options that are available to English grads.

I hate this question. I do. And I'm sure that I'm not the only college student that does...how many of us actually know exactly what they're going to do after receiving their Bachelor's degree? I mean, part of me is so damn excited to be done with it and to have something to remind me of all that I've achieved...but I'm really starting to feel the pressure. Being the first in your family, including cousins, aunts, grandparents, and all, to graduate from a university makes you a really big fucking deal. I realized this when talking to a friend in my class who is graduating after the fall quarter and isn't even walking because it's not such a big deal in her family...everyone has a degree. Just realizing that, that my whole family would kill me if I didn't walk, puts the pressure on.

I guess I'm just scared of graduating and then failing. Of climbing up so freaking high and then jumping off this cliff and falling flat on my face. That's my worse fear. What if I get this degree and end up working in a bookstore for the rest of my life? What if I never find something that I enjoy?

All these what ifs have been floating in my mind and I can't shake them. I don't know what I want to do. I don't know if I want to go to grad school, I kinda want to take a break from school work for a while and see how I do in the real world. My whole life has revolved around school and it's really wearing me down.

I dunno, I always seem to get this way during this time of year, when all these graduations are going on and I can't wait to get my degree and I hope I find an awesome career that I love and that I can be super great at and I hope that this is just the beginning to a great life.

If anyone has a problem with anything I say or do or am, I'd like to know. Seriously, I would. Because I think I'm a pretty good and decent person and I believe I can listen to people honestly and without prejudice. I like to be aware of problems, I like to fix things like that. And if I don't know about it, how am I going to fix it?

Let me clarify it, though. I don't want to hear it through a friend or a friend of a friend or whatever. I don't want to hear it in some vague and random blog. I want to hear it directly, because I've come to notice that any other way will skew the results so dramatically that everything becomes one big shit-talking brawl.

I think we all deserve to be awarded the humanity of honesty. Because the world isn't going to get any better without it. With it, we at least have a fighting chance.

So as soon as I get out of my third class (out of four) today, I get a call from the UC Davis Med Center bookstore.

About working there. Only 10 hours a week, but with my workload this quarter, 10 hours is fine and dandy.

So it sounds like I pretty much got the job, I just have to meet with this chick to get all thems paperworks done. If all goes well, I start on Monday.

Hells yeah.

My cousin Ashley wants me to be a bridesmaid in her wedding.

I'm kind of torn about this because I normally don't see her more than once a year and it feels like I'm sort of a stand in to make it even. On the other hand, she's family. We used to be pretty close as kids, and her boyfriend/fiance is pretty awesome.

Her mom is always trying to get us together. And while we've had fun before, it always seemed like her mom wanted us to be bff when she didn't really care. She had her own life and, at the time, I didn't.

I don't know. I think it'd be great if we could hang out...I think we're both at a similar point in our lives that we could probably find a lot in common. But at the same time, I don't want to feel like we're being forced to be friends or to hang out together.

I'm just confused. I already pretty much agreed to it, so I can't back out. I just hope it doesn't end badly.

You know what they say...when it rains, it fucking pours. Of course, they're right.

Everybody else being right has been a major thread in my life lately. I hate it. When is it my turn to be right?

My car broke down for the second time in less than a month. I fucking hate Pep Boys, they don't know how to fix a fucking car. I should've realized that when it broke down the night I brought it home and I had to take it back in that same night and walk home in the rain with Pat. And when they told me that the spark plugs I had our next door neighbor put in the week before were the wrong size.

Fucking douchebags.

Anyway, I took it to the Toyota dealership this time. Honestly, I've grown to really love that little hunk of metal and I'll miss it dearly if it's not fixable, but everybody I've talked to seems to think it's a timing issue, so hopefully that's all it is.

And of course, this is after I go through 3 damn interviews for Sacramento Animal Hospital, only to be told I wouldn't be needed. According to Pat's mom, though, they didn't hire anybody part time, even though their ad said they were looking for both full time and part time.

Fucking douchebags.

So right now, I'm constantly scanning Craigslist and looking all over the place. It's hard to find a job when your schedule is restricted by school, but I'm trying. I sent in an application to this pet care place...it's more of a contract type job, so it's not very reliable, but...it's something. I really need something.

On the upside, I totally kicked ass in my midterms and although it seems like I may have a B in one class for the quarter, it's only in Literature before the 1700s, so who can blame me? I really really really hate that shit, and it's a wonder I'm even getting a B. So I guess that means I'm still kicking ass.

But still...there's those fucking douchebags.

He's right, and I know it. I do this every year, every month it seems sometimes. I get stressed out, bottle it in until it's pretty much eaten me all up inside and I become sick. It's pathetic. It seems like there's always some kind of pressure inside me, like I'm about to burst.

So I'm trying not to do this anymore. I need to remember to take it one thing at a time...one small step in front of the other until I'm good again. There's just so many things, and as soon as I think of one thing, another one pops up, then another, until it's all just a jumble of things I need to do floating around in my mind and I go crazy and end up putting them all off until it gets to be so much and I go crazy.

I had a job interview today at Sacramento Animal Hospital. It went really good, I think, and the one doing the interview was the lady we got Luna from. It's funny, because there was a picture behind her desk of her holding our little baby Luna, and I can recognize that face anywhere. It's just weird to remember that our dog would've been somebody else's dog if things had worked out differently. It's weird to imagine how our lives would be without her. Maybe less stressful, but I never really think about the stress related to her...it just always seems worth it.

Anyway, I have another interview with them on Monday, and apparently I come highly recommended by Pat's mom, so we'll see how it goes. She asked about pay, of course, and I hate when they ask you that question. What do you say? I mean, seriously...I need a job, and if you want to pay me in Taco Bell, at this point, I'll fucking take it.

I've always known that all things that happen tend to work out for the best. Right now, times are really tough, but we're still living and as long as we have food to eat and friends to hang out with, it can't really be all that bad. It's always been my philosophy that you go through the rough times so that when the good times come, you can appreciate them more.

So since I've been home alone a lot, I've transformed myself into an expert dog trainer. Seriously, I think my next job will be as a lion tamer. I've developed an immense interest in Luna's obedience and have vowed to make her one of the most well-behaved dogs. And gain a bunch of new party tricks.

It's a long road. But we're taking it slowly. I've started a daily training routine and I feel like so obsessed with my dog right now, but it's given both me and Luna something to do instead of laying around the house all day (because if I lay around the house all day, the dog is bound to do the same). She's learning so much and it's rewarding to be teaching your dog all those things you've always wanted a dog to do.

Pretty soon, I swear it, she will be fetching beers out of the fridge. She is a retriever, after all.

I can't help but feeling worthless.

I mean, when your job tells you that they're reducing your hours because there's not much going on and they can't afford to keep you there for as many hours as you've been working, only to keep reducing those hours as things pick up, you'd feel worthless too.

And when your boss freaks out when you decide to just come in when he hasn't called you in even though you've been doing nothing but work for the past 4 hours, you'd definitely feel even more worthless.

And when you never get that call to come in from your boss, only to hear that there's no work for you when you call them, you'd feel pretty damn worthless.

So what do I do? Do I quit? Do I hang on to that slight glimmer of hope?

What are you supposed to do when you discover that your employer has no use for you anymore?

After owning a dog for so long (and being fully financially and otherwise responsible for it), you begin to notice certain things that come up quite often in the dog's life. Certain little tweaks to your life or worries that are always constant.

It's really come to my attention lately how much dogs are like kids, both in the funny and not-so-funny ways. For instance:
Luna has a favorite stuffed toy that almost always seems to be in her mouth. She's constantly dragging the thing around and will look out the window with it hanging out of her mouth. With that said, it seems to make sense while it's the only toy so far that she hasn't even TRIED to completely demolish.
Like a parent, I've found myself worrying about the slightest cough or funny looking poop. I keep an active eye on what's in her mouth at all times...and I'm serious. Even if I'm lying in bed half-awake, I can still pick out the sounds of her chewing on something that she probably isn't supposed to chew on. I've picked up the talent of being able to stick my fingers in a dog's mouth in order to find and pull out whatever foreign object it may contain. She's eaten foil and matches before (both in the same day) and within seconds of discovering the objects, we had to go online to make sure it wasn't going to hurt her.
And HOLY FUCK....grandparents. If they're this bad with a dog, I can't imagine the type of torture we'll go through if we ever have a kid. Pat's mom always seems to doubt our ability to raise a dog, and will tell us the most common knowledge things as if we haven't even researched it. (see above for our research skills.) AND THEN she'll do something like give our dog Lucy's food instead of her own (even though we packed her food up in nice little packets) because "she doesn't like her food." Bitch, please.

And then there's other things, like how we know which places we can go that are dog-friendly. And how we sometimes don't realize a place is dog-friendly until we get there, then turn to each other and say "we should've brought Luna." We've even, once, gone back home to pick her up and then take her back to a friend's house just so she can play with their dogs.

It's amazing how this happened. All of a sudden, without warning, we became "dog people". And people will bring their dogs over because the general rule of thumb for dog people is that if somebody else owns a dog, then it's probably cool to bring your dog over to their house. And the other general rule of thumb is if your dog has a playmate to play with, then it tires them out a lot easier than if you were to try to play with them for the two hours straight that they can run around for.

I honestly don't mind being dog people. Having a dog is a great excuse to just get out of the house and walk around the neighborhood. Or go to the park. Or run around like a complete ass monkey. Because, hey, if it's entertaining your dog and keeping her happy and exercised, then who cares if people driving by your house think you're running around the house to get the mailman.

Months of stress have finally paid off.
After working in the library until 8 on some nights, almost never getting time to myself between that, work, and school, and getting sick from all of it...I'm over the hump.
After having to psych myself up before leaving the house in the morning in order to get through the day.
After waiting to hear a response to UC Davis and writing 3 papers in 3 weeks.
I'm over that damn hump and I have something to show for it. In 3 weeks (can that be right? MAN!) I'll be out of the community college system. For good.
And I'll have a fucking fantastic summer with my man and my pup...we've seriously become the over-protective parents. It's funny, though, how a dog can feel so much like a kid that you actually worry that you may not be raising it right and it may be a little hell raiser for the rest of it's life.
It's been tough. More so than ever. But knowing that makes me walk a little taller and put my head up a little higher because I fucking did it. So fuck you, Sacramento City College. You can go suck my four foot wang!

I have had puppy fever for the past month. Puppy-idis. Puppy love. Whatever you want to call it. And after a month of pure puppy lust, Pat and I went to the county shelter yesterday, where we encountered a mammoth of a dog. A white Great Pyrenees with the sweetest eyes and friendliest face. Pat took a picture of him and we went along our merry way. As night came, we couldn't get this dog out of our minds.

So we went back to the shelter today and I put my name on the waiting list for the dog. I'm 3rd in line and here's hoping the first 2 don't show up so Falcor (we even gave him a name!) will be ours.

I just wasted 3 hours of my time sitting in the most boring orientation in the history of the world. Seriously, no exaggeration. First, I had to sit through 1 and 1/2 hours of how to use Blackboard which, as a seasoned Los Rios student, I know more than enough about.

Yes, I understand that this may be the first online class some of these old bags have taken (and believe me, these classes are filled with plenty of 'em), but could you at least save the Blackboard explanation for the end of the class? Let us Blackboard experts go home early and make the n00bs stay late for that...I'm so glad that I will never have to sit through another explanation of Blackboard again. And if I do? I will run screaming out of the classroom. You have my word on that.

And if the Blackboard how-to was bad enough, the professor starts talking about audio books. Audio books?! Are you freaking kidding me?! Okay, okay, so audio books aren't as familiar to some as they are to me, thanks to my two years slaving for the audio man. But seriously, even if I WAS paying attention (which I stopped doing about 2 minutes into the Blackboard lecture), I could find all this information on the Blackboard site for the course which you, oh boring library instructor, so painstakingly explained in full pornographic detail (okay, THAT was an exaggeration). You want to talk about repairing a tape? Oh yes, let's talk about how splicing those motherfuckers takes so much time and attention that you feel like making strands of Christmas lights out of them would be a better use of your time, never mind the pain (and yes, there was pain. And sometimes blood.) of getting them open in the first place. You want to talk about scratches on a CD? Well, you try checking every single CD in the unabridged version of Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged and then tell me about scratches.

Yeah, okay, so I'm hungry and tired...but this was just ridiculous. 3 hours I could've spent reading the material and finishing the homework for the class I was sitting in, doing everything I could think of EXCEPT listening.

Then, as I finally got out of that strange, new version of torture, I get to my car and find that some one has parked SO close to me, that I have to squeeze my skinny ass through...and that ass doesn't have to squeeze too often. I know I've crammed my car into a small spot before, but at least I'm courteous enough to give the guy next to a little room to get into their car. So I did what any sane, normal person would do after sitting through a class like that, only to find the only TWO cars in the row you're parked in are crammed in so tight you can barely fit through...

I hit their car with my door. I grabbed the handle, pulled as hard as I could, got in my car. Can you guess what I did next?

I did it again. I pretended like I got my seatbelt stuck in the door (which, by the way, was completely unnecessary since no one else was around), and yanked it open again.

I realize I sound like a horrible person right now.

Funny thing is, they had a car alarm. While it only did 4 quiet beeps then shut up (I didn't even know it WAS their car at first), it was still the highlight of my day.

I'm not telling this story to bitch, although I did. I'm telling it because I realized something about life tonight: Hitting an asshole's car with your door can really put your life into perspective.

You know, this semester seemed very daunting...until I started it.

So yeah, my English books happen to be the biggest (and, aside from the math books, the most expensive) ones I've ever seen. It's ridiculous that I'm going to be carrying these monstrous holders of literature around with me for the next 16 weeks. Although, I'm sure they'll come in handy if I ever need to defend myself...if all else fails, throw your English books at anybody trying to harm you.

I spent over $250 on these things, and I'm going to get as much use out of them as I can!

While I'm not too fond of poetry (can't explain why...I can analyze other pieces of fiction to death, but I never really felt comfortable with poetry), I think this class will be good for me.

My goal for this semester: Crawl out of my warm little shell and share my thoughts. If there's one thing I learned from my English class last semester, it's that I actually do have good ideas and good questions.

Who wouldda thunk?

Plus, a recent addition to my American Lit class (the prof. is so cool, he let us go from two days of Dickinson to one and took a few other authors out by vote...and let us choose something else to add in) means that Vonnegut will be included in the reading for the class. Kick. Ass. No offense to Emily Dickinson, but I'd much rather have Vonnegut.

Which leads me to my current reading: An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England by Brock Clarke...about a guy who accidentally burned down the Emily Dickinson House and killed two people. I haven't gotten too far into the book just yet, but it looks promising. I'm hoping to finish it before the required reading begins to take over what's left of my life.

If we get the chance, we'll do it. I'm sick of being restricted by things that aren't even mine because they were here first. Well, I'm here now and I want to feel like I belong here. Take care of your animal before telling us another is not allowed. Why should we be limited because of your shitty choices of a pet?

Maybe we can, and we totally would. We'd name him Captain One-Eyed Willy the Wondercat.

Man, talk about a stressful time.

Work has been super crazy. Our classes are starting soon so Mishi and I have been running around like chickens with our heads cut off trying to get everything ready. Luckily, she's my super awesome Mad Science wife so when we get a chance to take a break we do completely random and weird shit, like running around the warehouse making strange noises and freaking out the warehouse guy.
Then today, I get an email from UC Davis saying that I need to update my grades for last semester by Jan. 31. No biggie, except for one of my professors hasn't even posted my final grade on eServices, but has it posted somewhere else, so I'm trying to find out if that's the official final grade.
THEN! I have Library work experience this semester, which means not only will I be working at Mad Science, taking 17 units in classes, but I'll also be getting in about 10 hours a week at a library in order to have everything over and done with by the end of the semester. Again, Mishi has been a godsend because she's allowing me to set up a reference library for instructors and (if all goes well) I'll be earning credit for work experience with that. But I still need to work at a real library. Damn.
But there's a light at the end of the tunnel and it helps to ease my stress to know that in 16 weeks (well, more than that since the semester has yet to start) I'll be done with community college and I'll be graduating and moving on to bigger and better things. I'm really looking forward to the end of this semester and it hasn't even begun. The good thing is, I don't have to worry so much about my grades this semester since I'll know before the end if I got into Davis or not and, as far as honors go, this semester won't count, so I already know I've made "Great Distinction" (meaning I'm the smartest of the smart) AND I'll get to wear my awesome Phi Theta Kappa graduation shiznit. I'm really proud of myself for having made it this far with such great grades...it's a big accomplishment for me and it shows that my time and efforts really paid off.
And, if all goes well, I'll be heading off for two weeks to fulfill a lifelong dream . I don't want to jinx myself by going into details because everything is kind of up in the air right now, but if it all works out, let's just say I'll be taking the best pictures I've ever taken in my life.