one hundred. forty nine.

We have a cat. His name is Gilbert.

Gilbert has no claws and a great personality, even though he can be a bit bipolar.

Gilbert has a orange cat girlfriend. We call her Anne.

Anne likes to come up and steal Gilbert's food that we leave out on the front porch for him.

Anne also has an orange cat friend. That cat is nameless.

Anne invites her orange cat friend to come and eat food too. We'll walk out to the front porch and it will be a little party, Gilbert entertaining his two friends. They are shy, though, and run away. Plus Gil is a terrible host because he sits in the corner sulking.

The word has gotten out to other neighborhood animals that we leave out a decent amount of food.

Bill, the friendly possum, makes his way up our stairs for a little snack on occasion.

Lou, the brave raccoon has surprised me more than one early morning when I walk out at 5 to go to work.

I send Kanoa after him. Lou climbs a tree. I have nightmares of Lou leaping onto me from some low branch on a windy morning. True story.

Anyhow. Life is madness with the show & trying to figure out what I'm doing with school [and my life].

Work stays the same. Met a voice-over actor the other day. I think he was the first voice-over actor I'd ever met [i love my job & meeting people with random professions/interests]. Unfortunately, the market isn't too huge for that kind of specialty so he's working at some world food/decor store. He says he spends all his money on European decor he doesn't need and has no place for instead of being a rich voice-over actor. He also spends his money on White Chocolate Mocha's with an extra shot. I would know.

I had so much more to write about Derek Webb and Oswald Chambers and leaves and paths that you follow. Too tired. Let's chat about it some other time, maybe while listening to music & eating nutella?

one hundred. forty eight.

why yes, i will make a yellow sweater all by myself.

thank you for asking.

took a run today. this is a case of something i like to call follow-through. rare, but delightful.

I bought a new hat just because.

it was $3.

[must stop spending money!]

I wish I could be one of the 6 items of clothing people.

Give the rest of my clothes away.

Plan a year to spend no money on clothes.

Make all my own clothes.

I also wish I was a nomad.

I think bits & pieces of me are.

I think if I was forced to be a nomad I would excel.

so lets just do it.

wouldn't that be liberating?

To travel according to weather and food, in small communities?

A gypsy.

I could be a gypsy.

Never wash my hair.

I could do that.

But then again I would miss my feet in one place.

I would miss Christmas parties & family

long weekends

a job

but Kanoa could come with me and be my guard dog, so that's good.

Kanoa would make an excellent gypsy.

one hundred. forty seven.

The interviewer from my last post was hiring guys to hang Christmas lights.

Fascinating.

That goes on the list of odd jobs I don't think about.

Others include people who write fortunes for fortune cookies & bicycle taxi drivers.

Popped some popcorn tonight.

I wonder what a spectacular phenomenon it must have been the first time someone discovered popcorn. That must have been the mystery of the ancient world. Popcorn. First a kernel, then a fluffy little puff. Incredible.

I need to start running again.

one hundred. forty six.

Sitting in Barnes & Noble.

I'm sitting in cafe section.

I could give the barista here a few good tips on being nice.

This guy is crabby.

That's one downside to being a barista, you can never have a bad day.

If you do, you'd better not let people know.

They don't know how to react.

I know this from real life experience. Tried to tell someone it was a rough weekend, they literally looked away from me. Last time I ever told someone I had a rough weekend while at work.

But really, the more I look at it

life is messy.

life and love and the whole bit.

All so messy.

Sometimes I think I have a plan

or have it all figured out

somehow it shatters

slowly I realize that more things are made of glass than I thought.

Not everything is as it seems.

I'm betting the guy sitting next to me here is getting annoyed by my incessant sniffing. Sorry.

Whoops. Better stop sniffing. He's not got an interview going now about 3 feet from me.

This is interesting.

When describing himself, the interviewee said he definitely had Christmas spirit.

He's a little portly, I wonder if there is a hot-shot Santa position that is open somewhere.

Can no longer concentrate on blogging. Must eavesdrop.

one hundred. forty five.

My new laptop has a face recognition system.

Now, instead of using a password when I log on, it scans my face.

This brings much excitement in the day-to-day because I get to feel like a spy every time I log on. Feels like I'm about to see some top secret information when I'm going to check my email.

It also has a voice recognition thing where I control the computer with my voice alone. It's very strange. It would be cool & spy-like if it actually understood what I was saying and didn't make bizarre sentences like:

Taylor is faint and lumped by all

when I'm trying to say

Taylor is fat and loathed by all.

Went to the city yesterday.

It was quite exhausting. Or maybe it was just a weary week.

Sometimes I like to think I would do really well living/studying in the city but more and more I am questioning that.

Unless the city was abroad. Maybe in England. Where I was studying for a semester....

[something to think about.]

I bought the Strict Joy songbook, so I am now going to go & play wonderfully melancholy piano music, become brilliant at it, and then wow you with it at some point.

I've decided I'm going to play at some open mic night.

At this point I just figure: why not?

one hundred. forty four.

hey hey.

What a beautiful day!

After completely losing my mind at work I stepped outside & breathed a sigh of relief.

Drove home

took a solid nap outside

did some knitting

& began to read the 7th Harry Potter over again in expectation of part 1 coming out in November.

You can say it:

I am a nerd.

I hope you spent time outside today too.

We got in a spectacular array of new teas at work.

I'm a huge tea person

as you can maybe see by the title of my blog.

[tea & whimsy]

It was a bit overwhelming though. Find places for tea, display new tea, try new tea...

I love the stressful parts of my job:

"Shoot. Today I have to measure, package & store a bunch of loose-leaf, aromatic delicious teas, and try samples along the way. Kill me now."

life plods along as merrily as always.

i alternate between writing a story & dreaming of fame

lying on my bed, flattened by thoughts of my future

making a mess while trying to cook pasta

dark anxiety

hopehopehope

one hundred. forty three.

Got a new laptop the other day. I am now officially done spending money. A car. A laptop. This is what grownup people do, so look at me, growing up.

Took Kanoa for a walk in the forest preserve yesterday. She was muddy & in all of her glory. We made her stay still so that Taylor could take a picture. She is sleeping all day today because yesterday wore her out. Old dog.

My great-grandpa passed away this morning. He renewed his wedding vows with my great-grandma last summer at the family reunion. They were married 61 years this year. He was the sort of man you never imagined passing away, because he'd always be doing push-ups at family functions and be out playing golf all the time.

I'm trying to wrap my head around everything that's happened in the past 2 months. It's too exhausting.

But I will hold on hope
And I won't let you choke
On the noose around your neck

And I'll find strength in pain
And I will change my ways
I'll know my name as it's called again

[Now let me at the truth
Which will refresh my broken mind]

one hundred. forty two.

Two things that I have been thinking of lately:

1. How sad it is when I hear people [many of them] discussing how they are looking forward to the weekend. I think there is an alarming amount of people who really just live for the weekend. I can't even count how many times in the coffee shop I see people dragging on Monday, completely cheerless for the start for another week. By the time Thursday rolls around they are living for the weekend. Literally. They live for weekends. That's a sad life when 5 days out of 7 are so dismal.

2. I would love to spend an entire day with a lovely person just listening to music. 16 hours of music straight, sitting somewhere outside, laying down in some grassy area, just listening to music.

Maybe at certain songs we'd jump around.

Or take a nap.

We'd definitely eat.

I can't even begin to explain how much I love music & how much I would love to do that.

That would be a good day.