My Life as a Soap Opera- The Chocolate Shake

Jimmy and I decided that in order to my life more interesting that I needed to write about it in a soap opera dramatic format...so here is my first attempt.

Soap Opera Life

The scene is a dark alleyway. Garbage and general filth litters the area. A stereotypical homeless man shuffles by and takes a swing out of a bottle in a brown bag. A strikingly beautiful young woman enters the alleyway, sneers repulsively at the homeless man, and ties to tiptoe down the dirty alleyway. She is clutching her designer handbag close to her as she walks up to a man dressed in black with a black ballcap on backwards.

Man: Well, well well....look at what we have here. The big fancy lady makes her way down to the inner city... and she is looking fine!
Woman: Quiet! You know why I'm here. Do you have it?
Man: I got what you want baby...do you got the money?
Woman: Yes of course I do! (she is looking around nervously)
Man: How much you need?
Woman: 20 ounces.
Man: Damn baby, that is some habit you got!
Woman: Never mind my habit, here is the money, give me the stuff!
Man: Here. (he puts a baggie into her hand)
Voice of a Man off camera: Ashley, Ashley is that you?
Woman: (looks over her shoulder quickly, shocked) John? What are you doing here?

The camera closes in on her face, shocked, terrified, and ashamed to be seen. Music swells, cut to commercial.

Real Life

After dropping off paperwork down at the courthouse I decided to treat myself to a milkshake. I am not sure when this milkshake rewarding thing started, but as I don't emotionally eat the odd rewarding milkshake isn't too bad. Anyway, I drive down to the local McDonald's and order the largest chocolate milkshake on the menu. As I was walking out of the building I saw my reflection and was painfully struck that I was just another fat person coming out from McDonald's.

However.....I am enjoying my tasty 20 ounces of chocolaty shame. :)

The Neverending Diii-vorce Ahhhaaahhhahhhh!

I know, ages since the last update-that's because I play with Twitter too much. But I wanted to quickly give a divorce update which is basically that I am still technically married and that the court wants me to file EVEN MORE paperwork to show that I have adequately tried to summons Mr.3.

Of course, I found this out from the desk clerk when I tried to file the final paperwork. She was helpful in answering my questions, unlike the first desk clerk who wouldn't answer the same exact questions that the last desk clerk did. In fact the first one just yelled at me saying that she couldn't give me "legal" advice.

So basically I need to get my act in gear, file that other set of paperwork today, and then throw myself on the mercy of the judge at the court date next Wednesday.

And in other legal matters.... I went to the free legal clinic for advice on Mr.3's student loans. The lawyer said that I was pretty much screwed over because the checks were deposited into my account. In fact everything looked pretty grim until I mentioned that I had filed for bankruptcy. He said that my only shot was to contact my bankruptcy lawyer because while I may have accepted the money into my bank account, if my information was forged on the paperwork (which it was) that it would change the nature of the debt. I might have accepted the money, not as a student-loan, but as unsecured debt. As that information was included in the bankruptcy filing it would be then charged off. So I have a meeting with my lawyer on Thursday.

Other than that....I seem to be in a general "stop-the-world-I-want-to-get-off" mode. Incidentally, does anyone remember that song "Stop the World" by Extreme? hee hee...still makes me giggle.

F-ing Diplomatic Emails

Today I had on my list of things to do was to suggest a badly needed meeting on an office report that is coming due. In telling my supervisor that I wanted to suggest the meeting, she advised me that I would be stepping on toes if I just called it. She wanted me to contact the person who is currently heading the center.....fine.

I wrote the email. And made the mistake of reading it to my supervisor. Who decided that because of a one phrase that I was too harsh on the former Director.

So I rewrote it.

The next draft she was worried that if the email was forwarded on, that a co-worker would be upset. She dropped that one when I told her that I would tell this to the face of the said co-worker...and that really I was just recounting a previous conversation.

So I rewrote another part of it to satisfy her.

This draft she felt made it look like SHE was being unreasonable and irresponsible, rather than what I was trying to go for, which was recounting my own view of the situation.

So I rewrote the email again.

The next version wasn't positive enough according to my supervisor.

So I rewrote the email yet again.

When I was trying to read this version of the email to my supervisor, I broke down into tears. All I am trying to do here is send a short email to call a meeting which everyone in the office wants to have, but no one is willing to step up and make sure that it gets done. But my supervisor made it into some BIG HUGE DEAL that I have to be diplomatic about everything and that email after email wasn't right enough.

I am seriously sick and tired of being worried about breathing wrongly around here for fear that it is going to piss one person off or another.

I spent/wasted a half hour of work (and cried) for an email that only needed to say "we need a meeting on this because no one knows what they need to do". How long did that take me to write, a couple seconds?! A half hour vs. a few seconds.

No wonder we can't get anything accomplished around here.

Word of Mouth Interview and Face Update

Howdy folks! The saga of my face continues, I am now starting to bruise up...in fact I have bruises on my stomach and on my breasts (which I will not take photos of for you-although it looks cool), my eye is trying not to totally swell....and I still just hurt EVERYWHERE. I have this headache that is completely resistant to all forms of medication.

Lesson of this story....don't fall.

Also today I did my regular segment for New Hampshire Public Radio's Word of Mouth program. I wasn't nervous at all today...but that was probably because my head hurts so badly. Got to talk about Voices Without Votes today, I could have promoted it better...oh well...

And because I have had requests for more photos....here is what I looked like today while giving my interview:
Ain't I pretty?

What Face Burn Looks Like

While this may just look like a nice cleavage shot, notice the redness and the two scrap lines....

And no, this isn't a shot of my rosy cheeks.....

So what happened? I'm still a little unsure. I had just finished having coffee with Libby and we were walking back to my house. The coffee shop has a bunch of tall, overgrown ornamental grasses. I started to run through them, with my arms in an airplane motion.

And then, I couldn't stop in the run, it was weird, like I totally lost control of my body. I crashed down in a combination of my chest, palms and knees at the same time, and then I skidded.....yes, skidded on my cheek.






Yeah I know....real smart.

So now, my chest is aching....as well as my entire face. I feel really stupid and have been crying periodically, but I am not sure if that is out of frustration of the fall or the pain of the fall. In any case, my mom captured this pretty decent photo of me starting to tear up while I was trying to take a decent photo.

I think that my face is starting to swell....ugh...I'm probably going to have a shiner in the morning.

However, I have been assured that the fall looked pretty fucking awesome. I've got that going for me.