The Coffeehouse

so today was the first day of training for my new job and OH MY GOD do i so NOT fit in that it's a bit hilarious actually..let me tell you how everyone is, its a bit like going down a checklist.. you must have:

a) white teeth OR white teeth with braces

b) the yellow armstrong bracelet (the pink breast cancer one and the blue one are a plus)

c) flip-flops or skater shoes

d) capris or shorts

they also adhere to some kinda personality rule where everyone is an extracurricular guru at their highschool/uni and win all sorts of club awards...you must run marathons, act, dance, or draw..you are also mr./ms. sunshine cheerful and flash your teeth/braces at anything that walks.. you are best friends with your boss/supervisor/coordinator...so in conclusion: you must be a freakin preppy!!!! we have this expression where i come from where you say someone is just dripping with honey because theyre so sweet..you can kinda apply it here too..except theyre sugar-coated as well, so its sickly-sweet and slightly nauseating..

i am not a preppy, i do not have a "live strong" bracelet (okay, i am in NO WAY whatsoever exaggerating when i say EVERYONE has them, even my trainers and supervisors wear them!! huh?!) and i am not a club-awards-silver-key person..i am just a plain jane and soooo intimidated by these clones.... not scared-intimidated...but more like overwhelmed with valley talk!! 3 more days of 8 hour training left!

today, i took time to reflect on my past two months and a half of freedom....what have i done for the betterment of myself, or even for the betterment of anything, in the usual time of nothingness?...the usual nothing..although i have accomplished some of my summer goals..for example...

1- i got a job at a summer arts day camp

2- i started sewing a skirt! some of the other projects i have also begun, but the quitter in me has finally come out :p oh! my other hobby has been playing caesar III and 3D pinball on the comp!

3- i've read 4 books/novels and starting my 5th soon

4- i am majorly tanned!!

it seems like every summer there's some type of pattern among people...like this summer, everyone is travelling overseas or graduating..last year everyone was either travelling or taking summer school..

it's funny, cause as i type, my blog editor is warning me not to run with scissors...not so smart i figure because obviously i'm typing!!!... not running....

so yesterday was a great day for me in general with little moments of perfect here and there, and very few disappointments. i was going to go over to my cousins for a bbq (woho! only the second one this season!)and because two of them had graduated from university, i had to go get them presents..me and mommy dear went to the mall and planned on spending a maximum of two hours looking for gifts (including a father's day gift for dad) and we were really successful after a long search..now, one of the gifts we had was of an unlikeable brand/company (although it was very well known), i didnt tell my mom, but that thought was eating away at my brain, i tried to ignore it because i just couldnt stand looking anymore in every nook and cranny of the stupid store for a suitable present..we get back home, my sister sees what we got and starts lecturing us about the brand/company and insists we go and return it, i end up going back to get another present and exchange a buncha shirts for my dad...so i get all the junk done which takes about another hour and a half of standing around getting price checks and trying to find the right sizes..so i'm checking out, feeling annoyed and impatient and running out of time and there's about 3 cashiers working, 2 guys and a girl..and i was trying to guess who i'd end up with when i notice the one of the guys is super cute..so me, thinking that all my suffering might just be worth a 2 minute service from the cute cashier, start calculating who from the people ahead of me will go where and realize that there's a 100% chance of me getting one of the guys, therefore 50% chance i'll get the cute one..and its a showdown, i'm next in line and my eyes darting back and forth, getting nervous and anxious, i think i crossed desparate somewhere when i made eye-contact with the cute one and tried to tell him to hurry up with the old man he was with...yeah, he didn't hurry up..

i come home and eat/get ready to go to my cousins and it was so much fun! the weather was beautiful so we sat and ate outside, and had some music playing in the background..it was picture perfect..it felt so good to be with family (i dont have much family in my corner of the world)...

run back home to get ready for out-of-town guests, and then some..by the time everyone left it was around 1 am and the house was a mess...a mess that i had to clean up this morning.. :| and that was my almost perfect day...i probably didnt do it justice the way i described it, but trust me! (im a rat...bananas in pajamas anyone?)...

remember the coffee collage i was working on? check it out and tell me what you think!

since my dad's been back, we've been spending a lot of time together...but im the kinda person who can't be led into a conversation, i'll either start it, or if a conversation is already going on, i'll pitch in things that dont make sense when said aloud but my brain makes a connection....me aquarian! my dad somewhat shares my passion for coffee (but he likes his hazelnutty, while i think flavoured is also fake coffee) and we rendevouz over coffee....and he points out that i just babble endlessly about anything and everything with a cuppa in my hand, however, when we sit down at the dinner table and he asks about my day, i dont say much....so i guess we can conclude? coffee loosens the tongue..its those endorphins!

hmm...lotsa things i wanted to write about today, but i can't seem to remember the important ones..i'm pretty sure they'll come to me as i type..

here is an article about the fire at my friend's house, except they have the date wrong..i went to see the house on friday, and it seemed like they had already started fixing it up..the workers threw a tarp over the roof and they started clearing out all the burnt furniture..i talked to my friend yesterday and she told me that she had gone back to her room to try and salvage some stuff, but all she found was a couple of pictures...its times like these when we realize how stupid we are when we lose our favourite book/shoe/piece of jewellry/whatever and think the world is over...and i realize how silly i was when our computer crashed and i had (briefly) lost all my files and pictures and i got upset..even after we were able to recover almost everything except for a couple of damaged files/pics, i moped over those losses...and its silly, cause at least i have my home, at least i have my room and all my memories and i should be thankful that i am not worse off...we should all be thankful of who were and where we have reached in life....

ona lighter note, i have discovered another delightful soap opera: "general hospital". this one is mainly just for eye-candy..i watched some of it today and didn't even bother following the storyline..you see, all the actors seem to be from mediterranean descent..and i really do mean ALL of them...they all look either italian or greek or portuguese..and maaaayybe spanish...they are all dark-haired and olive-skinned (i spotted only one blondie, but it was more like blonde highlights)..anyways, so today i watched and just stared in wonder at how they could have such a good looking cast...and it comes at a perfect time too, right after my absolute favourite soap "as the world turns" (which is VERY underrated!) 

i went to another dinner party yesterday...see, the thing with me is i never learn from my mistakes...it was a night of self-indulgence..not the nice pamper-youself-and-get-a-manicure/pedicure type of self-indulgence..but a selfish, arrogant type of self-celebration where people attempt to expand their egos shamelessly...it made me sick to my stomach..it was honeslty disgusting and a waste of time and money....the desert was amazing though..yummmmm

happy b-day gilly-billy!

bitch?? well, no...bitch probably doesn't even BEGIN to cover the completely selfish and insensitive behaviour i have exhibited tonight....

at 6:45 pm today, my family and i began to smell a weird smokey smell in the house...the backyard door was open, so were a couple of windows in the house..i was kinda distracted trying to figure out what to wear to a friend's house i was going to soon, so i didnt pay much attention to it...my mom goes out into the backyard and spots a large mass of smoke coming from someone's backyard on the other side of our street, then we hear some fire trucks passing by and we realize that someone's house is on fire....i recognize wood burning and suggest that maybe someone's barbecue went out of control since the mass of smoke was low and it looked like it was in someone's backyard....our family friends live right around the corner on that side of the street, and i suggested we call to see what's going on..i try twice and get the busy signal..by then, i'm running out of time and a friend was gonna be picking me up pretty soon for our outing...i'm running around trying to get ready while my sister and mom yell at me to call our friends and i yell back that i'm busy therefore they should try..by then the mass of smoke has completey covered our house and we close every openable part of the house..five minutes later all is well and people are out and about..my mom and dad and sister hang out in the backyard, as i'm about to leave, our next door neighbours call (my sis picked up) and say that it was indeed our family friend's house that was burning.....their little child was playing with matches on the second floor in my friend's room and everything caught on fire including the roof and the whole second floor has been totalled.. (in the meantime, my parents went out for a walk and one of the neighbours tells them whose house it is, so they go over) ..my ride is here, and i leave.........

i come home 3 hours later to find that a pair of my sneakers have been replaced with ashy grey bunny slippers.... my friend (the one whose house burned down) had come over and was looking for me while i was out with other friends, and she had no other pair of shoes, so my sister gave her mine....and she was LOOKING FOR ME............. really, "bitch" is just an understatement..

i hate myself at this point..couldnt i have just cancelled my outing so i can be with someone who desparately needs...anything and everything to get her through this mess...yuck, it sucks to be me....

for the past three years, my dad has been working abroad..he'd visit every two months or so, stay for a month, then go back to work..and so on...i hate to admit it, but i'm so used to him being not around that when people ask me "do you miss him?"..i don't really know what to say..but then when we pick him up from the airport, i realize that i did really miss him..i just got used to it..but this time, he's here for good, he quit his job and has shipped/sold everything from where he used to live....and i dunno how i feel about that..i mean its great to have him back..i feel like i have a dad again..but i'm pretty sure its gonna take a while to get used to the idea of having two figures of authority instead of one, and not being just a family of four... and i know this for sure: he's gonna have a tough time getting used to our schedules and way of life etc (not that its so different from his..but we've grown up, and i don't think he realizes it)...because we've always run into those problems when he used to visit before...i'm really nervous, but i'm praying it all turns out alright...

june is officially my johnny depp movie month!! i watched "benny & joon" last week, and today i picked up "edward scissorhands" which i've seen a very small clip of..and i kinda got freaked out cause it looked like a psycho-y movie..but then again, what johnny depp movie isnt? :p oohh, i love him (marry me!!)..it looks like my next johnny movie is gonna be "what's eating gilbert grape?" anybody watched it?

i might watch george clooney next month (if it doesn't work out between johnny and me, marry me!)..any suggestions?

ahh! okay, i was surfing (i took a teeny, tiny break from writing) and i found this...for all you ebay and backstreet boys fans, this is probably some sick fantasy come true...listen! (click on the small "play" button beside the pic at the top of the page)

on sunday, i woke up extra early to go garage-sale shopping with my mom. sunday's aren't always the best, cause usually all the good stuff is gone on saturday, and my mom only goes garage-sale shopping on saturdays..but she decided to make an exception since it was a rare occasion that i wake up at 8 am to spend time with her...we drive around and around and finally find one, and look what we got!!

now, who can tell me what kinda material it's made out of?? plastic!! shocker i know.. my mom and i, when we first saw it, we both thought it was made out of metal...(maybe you did guess plastic, but lemme tell you, before we hosed it down and scrubbed it white, it could pass for metal!), we got a really good deal for the set, but now that i think about it, we coulda gotten it for lower cause they couldnt wait to get rid of it. i also got two john grisham books (the client and the brethren), hardcovers in mint condition for 75 cents each!!

my mom is a garage-sale fanatic.. every saturday she wakes up early (2abil el sha7adeh we benta! as they say) and ever so quietly drops by me and my brother and sister's rooms, looking through our wallets for coin change, anything she finds, she takes (and we never get it back)..she's gotten a lot of great stuff in the past...antique furniture, a bike, jars and coffeepots....and children's toys...her logic is that she is stockpiling items for the nursery of her future grandkids...yes, grandkids..... :|

i just like saying this --> don't phunk with my heart...but check out the song/video..

today i went to this event that people have about a month after a baby is born...they celebrate it officially, and they have a big dinner and stuff...i normally don't go to events held by this social circle cause what ends up happening is the guys stare at the girls, and the girls stare at the guys, and the mommies try to pick out potential daughter-in-laws, and it makes for one big awkward evening...plus, everyone gossips a lot..but i went anyway, i'm still not sure what possessed me to do it...ah yes, boredom..

we had our dinner and dessert and left early-ish, and i wasnt satisfied with my day, so i decided to go out again, this time, to a coffee-shop known for its rowdy-soliciting-and-loitering weekend crowd....just for some self-satisfaction (meh, explain it however you want, just keep your head out of the gutter, ya hear!)...and i had fun, it was kinda refreshing and reminded me of my old care-free highschool days..

i'm currently working on a coffee collage of some sort..i'm really psyched about it!! will share when im done with it..in the mean-time, here is a cute pic i found while surfing.. :D

i'm kinda upset...i seem to have lost my audience...WHERE ARE YOU, O HUMBLE SERVANTS OF THE COFFEEHOUSE?!

oh oh!! today, i had a caffeine packed lunch!! i didn't mean too, it just turned out that way..yesterday was a "stay in vegetative state" day, so today was my "visit a new city and bus all over" day..i had to get a copy of my criminal record for my new job, and the police headquarters are over in another city, so i bused there (took me two buses and about an hour), did my thing (which took ~15 mins), and took two more buses to get to an outlet plaza to shop, then took two more buses to get home...phewph! from the moment i left my house till right after i finished shopping, i had had nothing to eat/drink but water..so i stopped for a little pick-me-up drink and ended up getting an iced frappe and CHOCOLATE HAZELNUT ESPRESSO biscotti, woho! talk about a triple shot of caffeine... except, i'm sorry to admit that the biscotti wasnt as good as the almond-chocolate dipped one i usually have.....

not much else going on at my end of the world...how about you?