zig-a-zig ah.

Forty things for Monday.

1. Once, I got so shitfaced drunk that I convinced myself that forty was spelled f-o-u-r-t-y (it's important to note how monumental this is because I'm such a sucker for proper spelling). It was during a very heated game of Scrabble with two of my bestest college buddies. I should probably mention that this happened at my parents' house. In front of my parents. And we were all underage. There are pictures that I had to remove from Facebook once I grew up enough to realize that no such evidence should EVER be shared publicly. Ahh, growing pains.

2. It's Monday. I'm at work. It's Monday and I'm at work. WTF IS GOING ON HERE! At the end of the spring semester, it was decided that my work schedule would NOT include Mondays (I only work a 4-day week and having a Friday-Saturday-Sunday three-day-weekend wasn't allowed so I took the Saturday-Sunday-Monday option). My boss thinks we're on the brink of a financial crisis (editor's note: uuh, no, we're not. boss man doesn't spend nearly as much time here as I do so I'm going to consider myself the authority on the matter and I say he's way off on this one) and his solution was to move me back to Mondays. I don't mind Mondays, but it feels hella weird because I'm so used to starting my week on Tuesday morning.

3. The upside to this Monday bullshit is that I now have the Friday-Saturday-Sunday combo that I've always dreamed of. My coworkers take issue with my schedule because I tend to have the nicest hours and the easiest days. We have a real problem with people not wanting to work weekends (myself being the worst offender) but the difference between me and them is that 1) I'm supervisor, 2) I've been here the longest, 3) I have worked weekends for YEARS, and 4) I've paid my dues. THREE DAY WEEKEND FOR THE WIN.

4. I hit the motherfucking jackpot at the University Surplus store on Saturday. For those of you not familiar with the Surplus concept, here's a rundown: various University departments donate their old shit back to the University so that it can re-sell said shit to lesser endowed departments. Twice a month, a public sale is held where people can pick through the stuff that hasn't already been snatched up. It's held at a giant warehouse, the stuff that's sold ranges from furniture, file cabinets, computers, various office supplies, equipment, and my favorite... sporting goods. The UI athletic department (well, all college athletic departments do this) orders a shit ton of Hawkeye branded Nike and Adidas goods to give to student athletes. Whatever is leftover after all the athletes have helped themselves is sold to the public. Mostly, it's t-shirts and track pants from the football team in ridiculously large sizes (2x-4x), but that's perfect for boyfriend. This is where he picked up his favorite Nike Dri Fit shirts, and was exactly the reason we returned this weekend. I was hoping, with track season being over now, that I would be able to snag a pair of Nike running shorts for myself but alas all that was available was softball pants (um, eew). I poked around to help boyfriend find stuff for himself, picked up a few items for my favorite uncle's birthday this week, and figured the trip to be a wash for myself. Before stepping out, boyfriend noticed a box tucked away in a corner that read "Sports bras: $10." Scribbled roughly in Sharpie below the typed text read "XL ONLY." Thank jeebus boyfriend knows me well because he grabbed my arm and saved me from walking out on the best deal of the century.

Maybe I'm exaggerating, but for serious... a good bra is worth the money. A good bra is even better at 1/3 the price.

It was an ENTIRE box of BRAND NEW, plastic sealed, tags-on Nike Pro Victory Dri Fit sports bras. IN MY SIZE. FOR TEN BUCKS EACH. In case you're unfamiliar with these bras, they retail for $30, never go on sale, and they're easily the BEST SPORTS BRAS INVENTED. I have a full rack and running makes me wish for a mastectomy. Nike helps. Nike helps A LOT. I picked up three, ideally I should have gotten more but I just bought a stack of bras a few weeks ago when I found them on clearance at Old Navy for $5 each. I thought THAT was the deal of the century so I bought four, bringing my total to ten. Now I have three more, and my sports bras are outnumbering my actual bras and I think I have a problem.

5. I've been running outdoors, during the day, in the heat. OMG. I never thought that would be possible for me. In all honesty, it's only the 1.4 miles from the gym to my apartment and it helps tremendously to know that my suffering only lasts 20 minutes tops. If I were to just step out for a 5 mile jog under those conditions, I'm sure I'd only get 200 meters in before quitting. I've realized that running is a mind trip and I do best if I trick myself, and right now my biggest trick is convincing myself to run in 88 degrees and ENJOY IT. No, seriously. I enjoy it. Yesterday, it was a blistering 88 and sunny, but I was sad when I made it the full 1.4 miles to my apartment because the breeze I was getting was absolutely divine. If it wasn't for the fact that I was out of water and had already run 2.6 miles before at the gym, I would have kept going. Perhaps today after work.

6. This summer marks the first time in forever that I haven't been in school. You would think that means I have lots of free time and I'm on top of my shit, right? Nope. In case I haven't mentioned this before, I have really poor time management skills. Really poor. I'm in the middle of three books right now. I can't even focus enough to read ONE book start-to-finish. I'm also tending a pretty serious garden, but if you saw the state of my petunias you'd wonder why I even bother. It's a pity, really. Not to mention, I feel terrible for being responsible for the death of these helpless little plants, but Iowa is suffering from an unusually dry summer and I resent having to water my own plants. RAIN, DAMN IT! My closet's a mess, I have an entire load of FOLDED laundry in the basket that I've been too lazy to put in its proper place. For fuck's sake, it's even FOLDED and I can't even bother to put it away. My kitchen floor is a mess from when I had my dogs stay... a month ago. Basically, I'm a hot mess, and I don't know how to fix it.

7. Continuing in the trend of hot mess, I think I've gained three pounds? I put the question mark there on purpose for a reason: I could very well be wrong. You see, my BM has been off. Very, VERY off. I went three days without so much as a whisper of a poop. I don't know what's going on, but I upped my roughage hoping that would help. Fiber One and broccoli galore, nothing changed. Thankfully, I'm still very lactose intolerant so I turned to my arch nemesis, a large glass of milk, for help. I'm thinking 20 ounces was overkill, but it worked. We'll see if the scale agrees later.

8. I'm not a big TV watcher, I don't know if you have noticed. I have my shows (Grey's, Private Practice, House, South Park, L&O:SVU) that I DVR, but other than that 0.09% of my day is spent watching anything else on TV. Boyfriend has a serious TV addiction, he's a passive watcher... he'll watch if something interests him, or he'll just have the TV on in the background because I think the sound is soothing to him? I hate TV noise, it sets me on edge. But he insists (INSISTS) on watching during dinner, so my 0.09% comes from having to sit through old episodes of Storage Wars or Pawn Stars as I eat. I don't mind it so much because mouth sounds gross me out and dinner time is the worst. Buttt... something happened last night and I didn't have the energy to stop it: I watched True Blood. I had been reading on the couch while boyfriend watched Mad Men, then he left me in the living room with the TV on and I was too lazy to find the remote. So here's my two cents: firstly, Mad Men SUCKED. I don't know why people think that show is such a big fuckin deal because it's not. IT'S NOT. Secondly, I have no respect for people who watch True Blood. Vampires don't exist, this story line is stupid, grow up. PLUSSSS - what the fuck is with this show snatching up all the good actors from network TV shows? Seriously, Chris Meloni and Scott Foley, you should both be ashamed. I cried like a little baby bitch when I realized that my dreams of seeing an Elliot/Olivia hookup would never happen, and then I cried like a little baby bitch again when Henry died and left Teddy a barely functional widow, and THEN I cried like a little baby bitch AGAIN when Teddy had to leave Seattle Grace because she was only sticking around to be near her dead husband's ghost. My two favorite shows are RUINED because these ass hats decided they wanted a pay cut to work on a really terrible show. Please, Hollywood, cut this shit out.

9. I peed five times within the first two hours after waking. FIVE TIMES. And I'm not talking a little trickle. It was five full bladder dumps. I hate diuretics. HATE HATE HATE. But for some reason I always forget that when ice cream is involved. If I could just lose like 15 more pounds I'm sure I could convince my doc to cut the meds. Fifteen measly pounds. Oh, but Coldstone...

10. I can't count as high as forty today, so we're gonna cut this short and call it a day.