Mr. W and I have been playing LA Noire recently and are really having a good time with the thing.  Boy, I tell you what, once we got that walk through going and knew all the right interview questions that game has become a breeze!  That’s definitely a game that I don’t mind cheating on.  Not that my cheating bar is set very high.  I cheat on games just because I can, not necessarily because I need to.  Unlimited health?  Lots of money?  Where do I sign up?

Speaking of money, if I’m investigating a crime scene and find some money on the ground and make a comment like, “Not important” or “Seems irrelevant” then I should be able to put said money in my pocket.  I keep trying and the game just does not understand.  YOU TOLD ME THE MONEY WAS IRRELEVANT, SO NOW I WANTS IT.  Also we love being able to commandeer vehicles.  We will commandeer a car, then get back in our police car and drive off.  Suck it, unsuspecting citizen!

Again, speaking of money, every once in a while I just get this urge to spend money.  For the past week or so [and especially today because it is payday] I just want to buy something outlandishly expensive.  Like a laptop.  Or an iPad.  Or something.  I don’t even know exactly what I want to buy, but it needs to have the following three characteristics:
1. Shiny [this is almost always a given]
2. Expensive
3. Has lots of buttons [or touch-screen simulated buttons]

I should probably just hid my debit card until this urge passes, because no good can come from it.  I’ve been saving money for a little while so that next weekend, on my birthday, I can go to Barnes & Noble and splurge on books.  I am very excited about this.  I can’t wait to treat myself to a Cafe Vanilla Frappuccino and browse through books.  If you have any recommendations that I simply must read then let me know.  I might believe you.

Doubly exciting is that I will be doing said browsing with one of my best friends, Stephanie, who is coming into town that weekend.  Yay!  This makes up for Mr. W missing my birthday again this year because he insists on having a life and doing things.  Pssht.  I don’t remember giving him permission for that.

Steph and I had originally planned on seeing Coldplay at Lollapalooza, but what with her being pregnant and my being cheap I think we are going to skip it.  I will just play all my Coldplay mp3s really loud in the apartment while we play board games or something.  We can turn the air conditioning off so we are sweating.  Maybe the neighbors will invite over whoever it is that smokes weed at their apartment and we can leave a door open to get the smell in the apartment.  That’s most of Lollapalooza right there.

Sometimes I am really pathetic.

Lately it seems as though our apartment is trying to force me into insanity with its numerous spiders, millipedes, and other various Minions from Hell.  Fortunately, Mr. W is able to dispose of the majority of these disgusting beasties.  Friday evening I was watching a movie alone [Mr. W works his store on Friday nights] and this quarter-sized, pale yellow spider goes streaking across the wall behind the TV.  I mean, this thing was straight out of a Silent Hill game, no doubt plotting the best way to devour my immortal soul.

“Mr. W is not here to kill it and there is NO WAY IN HELL we can let that thing go about its business!” my brain decided as it sprung my feet into a run and thoughtfully commanded my hand to pick up a shoe on the way over.  Screeching in fear, I hit the spider with the shoe as hard as I could [leaving a good shoe print on the wall while simultaneously pulverizing the spider into smaller, twitching, pale yellow spider bits].

Now, you can’t just throw something like that in the trash.  Even if it is in pieces.  In the back of my mind I can imagine it piecing itself back together and coming for me in my sleep.  No, I held the shoe away from me as far as I could as I walked to bathroom while crying and staring at the spider, daring it to move, and promptly flushed it.  Then, still shaking, I cleaned up the wall and ate some ice cream.

Last night [the other night that Mr. W works his store], I was watching Dancing with the Stars and a 2-inch millipede crawled up the wall behind the TV.  It was moving slower and I moved slower, grabbing a shoe but praying I wouldn’t have to use it.

“Okay, vile creature of Satan, I promise not to squish you if you promise not to move,” I offered.  It stopped moving, seemingly receptive to my deal.  I called Mr. W.

Me: “Hey, any chance you will be home soon?”
Mr. W: “Not for another 20 or 25 minutes.  Why?”
Me: “Giant millipede.”
Mr. W: “Ah, I’m sorry.”
[The evil millipede, sensing my purpose behind the call and realizing that he wouldn't come out of this encounter alive, started crawling again.]
Me: “Gottagobye!”

Again, another demonic creature falls pray to the shoe.  And again, it must be flushed.  I wasn’t nearly as shaky as with the spider, though still crying.  When Mr. W came home I dissolved into this pathetically pitiful pile of emotion.  He held me while I cried for a little while and reassured me that there aren’t bugs hiding around every corner waiting to overtake me.

Then we ate some ice cream.

So I had to retake the first APA Nazi’s class again [had a different teacher this time] because I got a C in the class the first time and C is not passing in graduate work.  I’ll be honest, I save all my assignments and other than modifying the dates and prof’s name, I didn’t alter my assignments much.  I finished the retake of that class with a 97% A.  Figure that one out.

The other class I just finished was with the APA Nazi, though never once did she count me off a single point for APA and was really nice to me in class.  Mr. W thinks she found out how much I complained about her teaching ability [or lack thereof].  Finishing that class with an A as well.  One more class to go!  Oh my goodness me, I can taste it.  Not the class, but the freedom that awaits me come August 21.  Would it be weird to just do all my assignments for the class right now?  Turn them all in and say “SUCK IT, SCHOOL!”  That’s what I’d like to do.

The unpacking process is progressing slowly.  I haven’t been able to get all of my books or my bookshelves yet, so any further unpacking will probably result in creating more of a mess, as I have no place to put all the books I did manage to bring with me.  I’ll stick some pictures of the place on here once it doesn’t look like a hurricane-stricken refugee camp.

Also, for the record, wine freezes pretty quickly.  Don’t stick it in the freezer, like I did, thinking that it will just chill faster that way.  Because, while it WILL chill faster that way, a solid wine mass isn’t really a complement to any meal.

It’s amazing what a full night of sleep will do.  I need more of them.

Let’s see…it’s been a couple weeks since I’ve posted [sorry about that].  Update: Mr. W is my boyfriend again.  I realized that when I ended things, I did so because I was afraid.  I “pulled a Teri,” if you will.  He’s fixed some things, I’ve fixed some things, and we’re basically going slower this time around.  I am much happier now, but grateful for the mistakes of the first try because we’ve both learned from it.

Next week is Josh and Cynthia’s wedding, which seems surreal to me.  This year is really flying by.  I’ll try to get some pictures.  I look pretty good in that bridesmaid dress, if I do say so myself.  Of course, I may be biased.  Your boyfriend giving you the pet nickname of “Beautiful” does wonders for your self-esteem.

School is going well–got A’s in both Marketing and Managerial Accounting, which seemed incredibly unlikely as roughly half of all assignments were turned in late.  I’d wager a good 75% of all assignments were also complete b.s. on my part.  [It's nice to use my undergrad.]  I’m on quarter break until Sept 8th, whereupon I will start Finance Management [which I thought I all ready took, but oh well] and Information Management [which I do everyday as part of my job].  Hopefully an easy 8 weeks ahead!

I may also be shifting into a new job.  An office elsewhere in the country is being closed and the jobs are moving to my office.  Not everyone wanted to make the move, and there are some openings.  I’ve applied for one, but I hear there is a lot of competition what with the economy being so down.  So, fingers crossed!  Perhaps soon I can start referring to myself as an account administrator.  That almost sounds impressive, eh?  I might just start referring to myself as such anyway.

So Mr. W and I have decided to try and be friends.  A precarious feat in and of itself given the mutually not-so-fond feelings between he and Tim.

I find it terribly funny how I can take a situation that is already an angry rattlesnake and accidentally poke it repeatedly with a stick.  And I mean “funny” not as is “haha funny” but more like “OH MY GOD, RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!”
Me: “Oh look, a snake!  Better be careful… [poke] Oops!  Shit [poke] I’m sorry Mr. Snake! [poke poke]“

Mr. W wants to buy me dinner for my birthday but all the days that were good for him were bad for me and vice versa.  I got confused during the planning e-mails back and forth and thought that we WEREN’T making plans for last Monday when in fact we WERE making plans for last Monday.  Thinking I had the evening free, I agreed when Tim suggested we go see a movie together.

Afterword, I got a text from Mr. W asking if we’re still on for Monday and immediately felt my stomach drop as I realized just what I had done.  All I want to do is keep things as calm and harmonious as possible so that everyone is happy [a typical Teri M.O.], and at the first opportunity I made things worse.

I am posting this to firstly demonstrate my own sheer stupidity, and secondly with the hopes that someone will get a laugh out of it.  At least then it will have been good for something.