I’m super tired from this week. I spent all day Monday traveling to McAllen and then Wednesday to El Paso for work. Yay for having the day off today. I was suppose to get my wisdom teeth removed and get my gums deep cleaned, but that ended up not happening. The dentist’s office – which I was l already weary of – messed up my appointment, so it had to be cancelled. I’m not rescheduling with them. I’m in the process of looking for a new one. Terri, your dentist isn’t a provider on my insurance plan…poo. Now that scholarship season is winding down, I need to look at my calendar and take some vacation days. Not that I can afford to go anywhere, but I guess just relaxing at home is better than being at work.

Okay…I guess on to what the post title means.

For months now I have felt like my friends are drifting apart.  Besides the fact that some of my good ones have moved away to other cities, now the ones here in Austin are splitting up. There’s been some sort of tension between some of my friends, and now everyone has been split into two distinct groups. Derek, Denise, Paul and BJ are one group; Terence, Caitlin, Taylor, Dylan, and Jacob are the other. That leaves me in the middle. For awhile I would split my time between the two groups. Then one group ganged up on me one night and yelled at me for hanging out with the other group. Childish, to say the least. Ever since that day, that group doesn’t really call me to hang out – which is completely fine. But for awhile now the other group (the less childish of the two) has only been doing things with each other. Again – completely fine. But when I hang out with either of the groups, I feel completely left out. Both groups have their own conversations – usually carrying over from the previous time they hung out. Both groups have their own inside jokes. I end up just sitting there thinking about how I don’t really belong with either of the groups.

I know it’s silly, and I’m probably starting to sound childish. But it’s extremely frustrating. We once we so close and did things together every weekend. I think the last time we were all in a room was for someone’s birthday. That’s what it has come to – both groups only hang out with each other for a birthday. I went to dinner with one of the groups tonight, and I just sat at the end of the table with a glazed look on my face as they talked. I just don’t belong – which turns out is a very lonely feeling.

Ugh. I hate thinking about stuff like this. I’m going to watch one of my rented movies – either The Bucket List or Atonement – and eat a bag of popcorn.  Another typical weekend for me.

Hope y’all have a good one.

Toodles!

The month of June is turning out to be a month of discovery.

Food: I’ve been trying new foods. I think I mentioned previously that I tried a cucumber at work and then a pear, squash, zucchini, squash and a carrot at Moonshine, and a raspberry at work. Last Monday our scholarship chair took me, Derrick, Eleanor, and her son Bobby to Uchi for dinner. I was a bit nervous because I knew it would be some sort of raw fish, but then Ann assured us that they served other things. However, when we got there Ann ordered some sort of tasting…it ended up being a 10 course tasting menu. Course after course was a different form of raw fish. I’m not sure how I ate 8 courses of it – I even ate squid!! It definitely took some getting used to. Some fish wasn’t all that bad. I also ate corn, eggplant, tomato, mango, peach…I think something else, but I can’t remember now.

So yesterday at the grocery store I bought a carrot, squash, and zucchini to grill tomorrow night when I grill some chicken. I also bought a couple of apples, a peach, a pear and strawberries. I tried a strawberry and thought it was tasty – but not tasty enough to where I can eat more than maybe two at a time. So I’m hoping that I can continue this trend of trying new foods and then more importantly, actually eat them on a daily basis.

Tonight we went to Cheesecake Factory for Paul’s birthday, and someone made a comment that they didn’t believe I was actually trying new foods since I ordered my usual pasta dish. This is why I don’t try new foods in front of my friends – some of them give me grief and rather than be supportive, they either push me or make fun of me. I wish they would just understand that I’m taking things slow and when I’m finally ready to order a full meal of fruits and/or veggies then I will. But for now I’m doing things at my own pace.

I’ve been super busy with work lately. Next week is going to be a doozy – on Monday, I’ll be leaving Austin at 12 p.m. and flying to McAllen for the send-off…I’ll get back around 10ish; Tuesday I get to work our orientation bbq for the freshmen; Wednesday I have a dermatologist appointment in the a.m. and then fly out to El Paso for the send-off…get back around 11:45 p.m. CST; maybe sleep in briefly on Thursday and then on Friday I get my wisdom teeth yanked and my gums deep cleaned. Needless to say, it will be a rough week.

Other than work being busy, not much has been going on. I start a softball league next Wednesday, but I’ll miss the first game since I’ll be in El Paso. I played on a softball team on Sunday night and I think I’ll finish off the season with them. It was a lot of fun – I guess it helped that we won 12-2.

Julia passed through Austin on Friday afternoon, so she and I hit up happy hour with Staci and Caitlin. Being with those girls is sometimes like an episode of SATC. They’re a lot of fun and it’s great being around them.

Okay, I’m rambling. I’ll think of something more interesting to say next time.

Toodles!

I’m in a bit of a sour mood. I just discovered something. I don’t understand why people feel the need to lie and hide things. I shouldn’t be surprised. Deep down I always knew something but this is the first time that I’ve seen the evidence. I know this doesn’t make any sense without details. I just need to let it go. It’s time to move past it all.

Why do the baggers/checkers at HEB always put one item into a bag?? Not even a heavy item or a big item. I had one small bag with a little bowl rice and another small bag with a mini bag of pretzels. They could have put both items into one bag and saved one…and then that would have been one less bag that I would have had to carry in.

I flew to Brownsville yesterday with President Powers in the UT System plane. I’m in charge of organizing send-offs for high school seniors coming to UT for Brownsville, Laredo, McAllen and El Paso. Anywho, we were in a little 7 passenger seat plane. All I could think of was La Bamba and Richie Valens. And the landing in Brownsville was super turbulent and windy and we were tossing about. Not fun. Today was the Laredo send-off, but my coworkers went to that one since I’ll have to go to both McAllen and El Paso in two weeks. I’m just hoping for good weather b/c I don’t know if I can take any stormy weather in that little plane.

There’s a lot going on at work lately. Well, a lot going on in my department. There is about to be some big changes and we are all unsure as to what is going to happen. Whitney and Derrick (my closest coworkers who are in my department) and I are going to lunch tomorrow to discuss. Our department head announced her retirement a few weeks ago. She’ll be gone at the end of August. When I first began working at the Alumni Center, she was my direct supervisor. I didn’t always like working under her (mainly b/c she is a big time micro-manager), but I’m super grateful for her giving me the opportunity to work for the Texas Exes. So now we are about to get a new department head…and she is also Associate Director of the entire organization, so one of the senior staffers is about to get a big time promotion. Then our Travel Director, Betty (also in our department), recently was diagnosed with cancer. Last weekend she went to the ER with chest pains, thinking she was having a heart attack. Turns out she has a renal cell carcinoma (a form of kidney cancer) which has spread to her liver and lungs. She hasn’t been at work since the diagnosis, but I hear it’s not good. One of the staffers pulled some strings and got her admitted to MD Anderson in Houston, so she’s been there since Sunday. Hopefully we’ll have an update soon and hopefully everything is okay. Her family put together a website so that we can keep track of how she’s doing and leave messages for her, but there hasn’t been an update since she checked in. I suppose no news could be good news.

My new couch was delivered today. I don’t know how I feel about it yet.

I need to start decorating my apartment…seeing how I’ll be in it for another year.

I’ve been making an effort to try some fruits and vegetables lately. Last week some coworkers and I went to lunch and they got me to try a cucumber. Not much of a taste to it…very watery. On Saturday, Caitlin, Staci, Denise and I went to Moonshine for dinner prior to seeing SATC. I tried a pear, carrot, zucchini and squash…all of which were yummy. I just don’t think that I would be able to cook them the same way so maybe I just need to keep trying them at restaurants until I figure out how to prepare them at home. Yesterday at work I tried a raspberry…didn’t really like it. It was a bit on the tart side. But at least I’m trying.

I really need to get out of my funk…