final final tonight!
Mood:  celebratory
Topic: School
Yup, that's right! American Films final tonight and I am DONE for 3 months. Except that I have to come back on campus next Monday to be interviewed for the college website. ;-) I'm famous, ya know. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I'll be keeping my 4.0... as long as I don't majorly screw up my final, I should be okay.

My summer is filling up quickly, I have weekends booked as far out as July - it's crazy. It just seems like I have things to do every freaking day! Here's my schedule so far (take note of this!!), plus I know I'm forgetting some things!! And I have to get together with both Stef and my dad in the next few weeks- month as well. There just aren't enough hours in the day, it seems.

Okay.

Fri 5/13 Celebrating Brian's bday in Fells
Sat 5/14 Taking Brian to dinner @ Melting Pot
Mon 5/16 Interview at AACC for their website
Tue 5/17 Saleslogix training in Wilmington
Wed 5/18 New & Lost business training in Wilmington
Wed pm Perrys for karaoke of course
Thu 5/19 Show that Brian wants to go to at Powerplant
Sat 5/21 Officially getting together w/ Kathy, but I think I already have a few things going on
Thu 5/26 Cirque de soleil event for WT
Fri 5/27 More saleslogix training and Mandy's bday
Sat 5/28 Breaking Benjamin show, AC trip (think I'm going to have to skip that), and about 3 or 4 other things
Mon 5/30 Stef's bday
Wed 6/1 Portfolio training in Wilmington
Thu 6/2 Tiff's bday
Sat 6/4 Cousin Emily in town
Mon 6/6 Fee basics training in Wilmington
Sat 6/11 Shopping w/ Emily

Need I continue? I have so much other crap going on, too. If I left you or your bday out or got the dates wrong, I'm sorry, please let me know so that I can write it down.

Well, time is running out..... more later!

pardon the lack of updates
Mood:  rushed
Topic: Work
My first week went by fairly smoothly... no major mishaps except for a wrong turn on while going in on Friday morning... I've been trying to find alternate ways into the city and ended up in the Baltimore Highlands/Brooklyn/??? area. Roxy wasn't too happy with all the potholes! I'm still getting used to my new surroundings, and although I love my new job & coworkers, it's still been stressful changing jobs.

Let's see, what else? Went to Wilmington yesterday for training... that was fun, getting up at 5 am to drive for 2 hours.... UGH! Oh well, at least I get reimbursed for my travel expenses. Woo-hoo! That's going to be a welcome check. Three weeks without getting paid kinda sucks, but at least Heather is letting me pay my rent kinda late this month - I gave her half of it, so I just give her the other half next Friday. Bleh. Damn being a grown-up! haha..... all of these bills! Once I start getting paid at WT I should be in good shape, though... I might even be able to save a little money! That would really be nice.

Well, I'm sorry that this is so short and non-indepth, between finals, final projects and my new job I don't have much time for updates. Watching movies for my film class is taking up a lot of time, too. For once in my life I'm worried about watching too many movies??!?! At least I just have one left... actually, no... I have two left because one I was supposed to watch a few weeks ago and couldn't find at the video store or library. GRR.

Okay, that's it, I still have crap to research for class. *sigh*

I'm really sorry that I'm not responding to everyone's emails right now, I'm just really friggin busy....... after next week things should be calmer.

so busy!
Mood:  rushed
Topic: Work
I'm going to copy & paste an email that I sent my friend, because I don't really have time to post right now....... my job is going great, but I've been running around like crazy this week and I'm still trying to adjust to my new schedule. Hopefully I'll have some time to catch up on my emails (I had about 50 in my inbox) and blogging this weekend... there's someone from the Capital who wants to interview me about my blog, too... and of course here I am being a bad blogger!! haha. Oh well. I'm really disappointed that my posts have been so few and far between these days... It's my goal to get a laptop before the end of the summer... I need to get one for school anyway, because using the lab at school is a pain in the ass. Anyway, here's the email (with names edited to protect the guilty):

>>Hi Honey!!!!!!
>Yes, yes we do miss you. Bizzle is such a FREAK. She’s making Mattrizzle crazy
>because she’s always muttering to herself about how gross everything is and
>so on and so on. I’ve come close to asking her if she ever gets tired of
>being so miserable.

Heheh.... I'm so sorry that she's driving you guys crazy!!! Damn, she hasn't cleaned everything up yet? I wonder how long it will take her to start bitching about McIzzle and his noises? I don't understand why she doesn't just ask Dizizzle to clean up the area if she hates it so much... I think she probably enjoys complaining... she must get some sort of satisfaction out of it. Some people just enjoy being miserable!

>Apparantly Pazzle said something to Mattrizzle about how
>the way Bizzle does proposals and how they are wrong but nobody wants to say
>anything to her.

Well Fizzle never really did anything right either, so having her train her initially probably wasn't much help! However, I did try showing her how to do things once Fizzle was no longer there to rely on, but I guess you can't teach an old dog new tricks...... or something??? I don't see Bizzle ever doing anything right if no one says anything to her. It might be fun to watch her drive everyone upstairs crazy tho, hehe

> I also heard her telling Kizzle how you deleted all your
>contacts and between the two of them I wasn’t telling either one of them
>that they were in your user folder.

I'm sure that Kizzle knows where they are and how he can get them. No matter what happened between us, he knows how to do his job... he might not be giving them to her just to piss her off even more... haha! Speaking of which, he would LOVE to work at WT... their computer systems are incredible & they have an entire IT team... they have a local intranet and everything is online... it's so awesome. You can access everything from your benefits, 401k, paycheck stuff and vacation things on there... everything is completely automated. I have a shitload of software to learn, though... originally I thought there were only two new programs that I have to learn, but apparently since they're going to be 'grooming' me up into doing more of the financial type stuff, I'm going to have to learn more of the brokerage & trust side of business... it's crazy... I'm so scared that I'm going to put a decimal point in the wrong place... the amount of money that we're dealing with up there is UNBELIEVABLE... my boss said that one of our clients has recommended us to one of his friends who's worth 1.4 BILLION!!! It's definitely not anything like Harmsizzle up there!!!

> I heard her today talking to Fizzle today
>and to his face she calls him Mr. Fizzle, have I told you what a FREAK she
>is???? Mizzle doesn’t even call him that.

HAHAHA!!! The clients don't even call him Mr. Fizzle!!!

>My big thrill right now is the fact that I had a dream(that I actually
>remember) about Rob Thomas. Had to come in today and look at the internet
>just to see what he looks like(a bit too young, I would say) But a very
>nice dream, had to hold my tongue and not ask him to sing. And that old
>psychic told me there wasn’t anyone in my future, shows you what they really
>know.

Rob Thomas is a cutie! You're lucky. :) No weird dreams for me lately, other than one where me & Brian got married?? Funny. I told him about it and he said he had a dream that I got pregnant... eesh!! Let's hope that one doesn't happen anytime soon!!!

>I’m glad your job is going well. Mine of course is the same old same old.
>Ready to kill Stizzle and Brizzle but hopefully as of yesterday they never
>want to see me again either. I imagine that you heard about Mr. Ed. They
>are closing the office tomorrow for two hours so we can all go across the
>highway to church.

Still giving you trouble with the UA's? Was that what it was? No, I didn't hear about Mr. Ed... that's too bad. Wish I could go... I might have been able to if I'd known earlier. :-/

>How is everything else, job, people , Brian etc……how was your trip last
>Friday? And your party?????
>Hope to see you soon

Everything else is good --- guess where I ate for lunch today??/ hehe CHEESECAKE FACTORY!!! I'm going to start packing my lunch... it's so expensive to eat in the city... it hasn't helped that I've been trying to meet up with all of my friends now that work downtown. Karen and I met at this place called Cafe 100 in the Bank of America building and I had the most delicious cookies & cream cheesecake in my life.... MMM!! It was nice & fluffy!! Must have more! In that same building, there is a LANCOME OUTLET!!! For $15 you can buy their gift sample things! When I get paid, I'm definitely hitting them up.

Brian is still wonderful... he started playing in a soccer league on Thursdays... once class is done with I'll be able to catch a few games. We weren't able to fly on Friday because of the weather, but we're going to go sometime soon, hopefully. I was really disappointed. :( The party was a great success, I'm happy to say! :)

Well, let me know how you're doing... I miss you... give everyone a hug for me!!

Lauren

so much excitement
Mood:  crushed out
Topic: Miscellaneous goings-on
Did I mention how incredibly well my life is going right now?

My friend Dyanna told me that I've just burned off all of my bad karma and only good things will happen to me from now on... haha! Yeah, I'm not so sure about that, but I'll just enjoy things as they are.

Brian is taking me flying at 3 tomorrow... I'm really excited... kind of nervous though... I don't mind flying, but I've never been in a small plane before. It'll be fun, though... :)

Sorry that this is such a lame entry, I have to get to class! More tomorrow if I get a chance.

Yup, it's my birthday
Mood:  special
Topic: Who am I, anyway?
But I don't have time to post, because I procrastinated on my research paper for my psych class until the last minute, and I'm still writing my concluding paragraph. Class is in 50 minutes, I'll be okay I think. :-P~

Anywho, happy birthday to me!

Maybe once life slows down a little I"ll be able to create some post that I actually put some thought into... my last day at Harms is tomorrow... I'm off on Thursday & Friday. So maybe one of those days I'll be able to update my blog and overhaul my webpage. Whatcha think? haha, yeah I doubt it's gonna happen either.

Okay, back to the paper......

Anyone who is interested, come to Fins in Crofton tonight to celebrate my birthday!!!

okay, now I'm getting pissed
Mood:  irritated
Topic: Rants
I have great news and the post that I typed about it for some reason won't work... I try to copy & paste it all in here and when I submit it, it's not registering. GRRR. oh well. I'll have to retype the whole stupid thing most likely.

The good news??

I've been offered a new job!! :) YAY! I'll be working for Wilmington Trust in their Baltimore Wealth Advisory office... it's in the harborplace tower, I'll be on the 26th floor... beautiful view of the inner harbor, great benefits and pay. So I'm pretty excited... last day at Harms is next Wednesday, \the 20th... things in my life are just going really well right now... I'm very happy! :) Brian is taking me flying next Friday... I'm also having my birthday party next Friday (22nd), so if you want the details about it, email me... everyone is welcome to come, but I'm warning you in advance that it might be a little crazy... everyone is welcome to stay at la casa as well... no playing bumper cars as my ex-roomie Diesel would say. He's going to be there too, of course. Good times.

That's about it, really.......... that's the summary anyway. Start the new job on the 25th. If you email me, please email me at my hotmail address, the harms address is not defunct and I can't retrieve any of my emails. I'm pretty pissed about that, but there's not much I can do.

Hope everyone is doing well.... talk to you later!!

Test
Mood:  d'oh
Topic: Miscellaneous goings-on
I've tried posting twice with no success... I have no idea why it didn't post. Grr. Testing!!

I'm still alive!!
Mood:  spacey
Topic: Miscellaneous goings-on
Not much new to report............ Heather and I might be getting a cat... his name is Izzy & he's a gray tabby..... very cute!! :) Hmm... what else?? Brian is still wonderful... got to meet his parents on Easter sunday... it was a traumatic experience... I don't think that I've ever been so nervous to meet someone's parents before. I did okay I think, except when I said "Damn" for a bad hand I got when we were playing a card game... it got really quiet when I said that. Oops! :-P

I'm really freaking tired... I've been running all over the place today... I've been meaning to change my address at school, so I finally did that. Hmm... what else? Guess that's it. I think I'll be able to make a post tomorrow, so you'll hear from me then!

back online....... sort of
Mood:  hug me
Topic: Miscellaneous goings-on
You may have noticed that my blog has been offline for the past week or so...

That's because I found out that some people in upper management got wind of it & obviously weren't too happy about it. Consequently, I was talked to on Friday about 'job performance' type stuff... I'm guessing that since I took this thing down, they couldn't really bring up that it exists... and instead used the "it looks like you aren't very happy with your job" approach. That's the best way that I can describe it. My boss (my real boss, the one that signs my paycheck and gives me my review) was pretty cool about everything though, really... he told me that if there was anything he could do to make me happy, he would do it... even if it meant talking to contacts in other companies where I could find a job doing something more interesting. I did tell him that part of my problem at work is that I'm just not challenged and I'm bored to tears... I've been doing the same thing there for 4 years, and it's just so repetitive and I never really learn anything new. Some people can be happy doing that indefinitely, but I'm too smart for that... and I told him so. He agreed. Part of my 'punishment' or whatever you want to call it is that they pulled my internet access at work. I didn't care too much about that (my web access), but I found when I got back to my computer that they'd just pulled the plug entirely and I have no email either. That's the only thing I was pissed about. I *DO* need email for my job because I have to manage Fuzz's email lists and all that. But I guess that they'll get Bonnie (the other admin) to do it. *sigh*

So I have to decide now what I want to do... I can stay at Harms where I am comfortable, but miserable between my job duties and personality conflicts... or I can look elsewhere, somewhere that I have the opportunity to learn new skills and I have opportunity for advancement. Hmmm.

What do YOU think I'm going to do? :-P

My blog entries are obviously going to be more erratic for a while, since my internet access isn't going to be constant, so bear with me...

Everything else in life is good... I have some other worries and concerns, but I'm trying not to let a bunch of "what-ifs" get to me.

Hope that everyone is doing well... take care.

Me, me, me!!! This post is all about me. Deal with it!
Mood:  special
Now Playing: the killers
Topic: Who am I, anyway?


This post is kind of all over the place and contains a bunch of different things, but I think that the topic of Who am I anyway? is a good one to assign this post to.. it might be good as introspection too, but this is where I'm gonna put it. It says a lot about who I am and why I blog, etc.
Are people right to judge you for your past? You know, I'm not by any means proud of some of the things that I've done in my life, but you know what? I had a lot of things going on back then. 'Back then' meaning my childhood and teenage years. It's no secret that I didn't have the easiest time growing up, but I know that both of my parents love(d) me and want(ed) nothing but the best for me. I've made peace with that part of my life and I'm ready to move on with it. As a teenager, I did some pretty stupid things.. hell, I've done a lot of stupid things as an adult. I won't blame anyone for my actions or the poor decisions that I've made in my life. I won't make excuses for objectionable behavior in my past or present.. I did all of those things myself, made those decisions with my own free will.
I can't change any of those things; I can't take back past wrongs, I can't take back the things that I did that hurt people.. and as I said before, I'm not going to make excuses for doing the things that I did. All I can do now is move forward and learn from those experiences. People that blame their problems on other people get on my nerves.. the people who I have the most respect for are those who overcome adversity and are the better for it. I fully believe in that adage 'What doesn't kill you makes you stronger'.
I read something today that irked me a little bit. I feel like I can't escape from my past and people want to think that I'm the same person today that I was 5 (or even 10) years ago. People change. But some people don't change. At least they don't change much. They stagnate after years of bitterness. You know who most of the people who typically don't change are? The people who live in the same place for their entire lives, who have no goals or motivation, don't get a college education (or much of one to speak of), those who let their past dictate their future. The only thing that keeps them going is reminiscing about how things used to be, maybe embellishing stories a bit, and basically running off at the mouth about other people. That's what makes them feel good. I feel sorry for those people. It's really sad that they have no life of their own to talk about. That's all I'm going to say about that.
So here I am a month and a half from 25. I usually do a lot of thinking before my birthday and I review the last year. Was there anything I would have done differently? Are there things that need to be changed? Have I grown? Have I lived up to my full potential? Am I ENJOYING life?
I have made so many changes in the past year? have I made progress? Hells yeah!
I'm not perfect. I've made mistakes in that time. I make mistakes every day. I could have handled some situations differently. Have I paid the price for those mistakes? Yes. As far as I'm concerned, everything balances out one way or another. Guilt serves no purpose and I try to stay away from it these days. Seriously! My psych teacher says so, haha.
I'd like to highlight my accomplishments in the last year (not necessarily in the order of importance):
Went back to college after a 4 year hiatus
Continued therapy, even though things were going okay for me
Acted in my first film
Bought a car
Got a 4.0 GPA my first semester back to school
Moved out on my own (basically)
Made new friends & reestablished connections with some old ones
Lost 20 lbs between July 04 and present
I?ve kept up with my blog (for better or worse), coming up on a year & a half at Tripod

There's more than that of course, but that's all I can think of right now.
There was something else that I wanted to say as well.. The purpose of this blog is not to put anyone down, this is a commentary on my daily life. Consequently, things happen in my life that might paint some people in a bad light from time to time. These are just my opinions, and are in no way intended to slander or humiliate anyone..this blog is an online diary, and if you read it, you have to remember that you are looking into my private life, and some of the things you read ain't gonna be so pretty. This blog is about ME.. its not here just to bitch about work and/or coworkers, its not here to inform you about the daily news, its not here to even entertain you .. although if it does, that's cool. See the title 'Lauren's inane ramblings'. Well.. that's what this is! Some of it might make sense from time to time, some of it might amuse you, and some of it might piss you off. I'm not trying to piss anyone off intentionally, and if anything you read upsets or offends you in any way, maybe you shouldn't read it.
My goals for the next year:
Maintain my 4.0 and keep attending classes at least half-time, working towards a degree. (I know a 4.0 is ambitious, but I'm going to do my damnedest to keep it)
Do another film or two
Get in shape (I'm not going to concentrate on dieting, I'm just going to eat SENSIBLY and EXERCISE)
Get outdoors more. I want to go camping, hiking, canoeing
Get to Boston at least once to visit friends & family
While in Boston, go whale watching (again), see Sue?s band play
Go on a vacation with (a) girlfriend(s)
Get a passport (I've been slacking on this for a while)
Maintain & nurture healthy relationships (all types)
Set up regular dates to get together with friends
Learn to be a better cook
Volunteer
Go to a Redskins vs. Cowboys game (yeah, I know.. not much of a goal, but I want to be there when they finally beat their sorry asses)
See a Broadway show in NYC
I'm also thinking about taking up a sport or getting back into martial arts. There aren't any places to take Shotokan around here, so I'll probably end up learning a new style, but that's fine with me. I wish that I could get together with the old group on Kent Island that I used to play volleyball with.. that was a lot of fun.
Well, I think that's about all for today/this week.. this weekend I'm going to decide on an American film director for my film class project and I'll also be deciding on my research paper topic for my psych of relationships class. I'm so excited. Okay, not really. Brian called me around 2 and said that there's something going on at some bar tonight down 175..we'd talked about doing the movies tonight, but it doesn't really matter to me.. we'll probably do the movies another day. He has to fly early tomorrow, so he can be the designated driver. :-P