11:31 PM|so today was chock full of fiddling around with my new lomo camera.... yay! i actually walked around parts of jersey city that i'd never stepped foot in over the past 5 years of being here... a lot more restaurants than i'd realized (just what i need :)

just finished watching the Laramie Project... see it. it's really quite good.

am working on writing new material for the show (and thinking of doing a few open mics prior to it...)

got a thing for my avon 3-day walk in the mail... have to go to orientation on monday night... hopefully i will learn how to wrangle the full $1900... right not i am stuck at $160.... anyone out there that is interested in supporting the cause, there is an online form that can be found via this link.... please, this is an important issue.

if you do sponsor me, i thank you... heck, i will send a t-shirt to you if you sponsor me... or mug or whatever you want off the gigglechick/avon 3-day store

* if you only want to buy items off of the store, that's okay too, the proceeds will go to the walk....although i would prefer you go directly through the 3-day form and sponsor me as generously as you can!!!! thanks!!!!


gotta watch my boy jon stewart on SNL now...

1:02 AM|I am officially booked to participate in Lisa Lampanelli's Insult
Olympics at Carolines on Broadway. You are booked to perform on Tuesday, March 26, at 9:30 p.m.

Here are the particulars (copied from the email i got):

1) You will be competing against seven or eight other comics to qualify for the finals in May.

2) The winner will be picked by audience response.

3) We require that you bring at least 7 guests in order to perform, due to the heavy industry and press coverage at the show. Comics who bring less than 7 people will not be allowed to perform. However, comics who bring five additional people will be allowed an extra full minute of stage time. Please tell all your invited guests to check in with the Insult Olympics doorman at the downstairs podium and tell him that they are there to see you specifically so that you get full credit for your guests.

4) Your cheering section should be supportive of all the contestants, not just you. In other words, heckling and booing the other contestants or professional comics on the show will result in you being disqualified from the competition. Please warn your friends and familly in advance so they will know to behave courteously to all the performers.

5) You will have 1 to 2 minutes of stage time to perform.

(so everyone but my pal Jack is invited)

11:59 PM|The Friday Five:

1. What makes you homesick?
being away from mom and dad when they are ill... and also the summertime, when i am in the city and my family lives down at the beach

2. Where is "home" for you?
1300 Lenape Trail, Manasquan, NJ... haven't lived there in 10 years.... but it will always be my home.

but right now? erm.... my apartment.

3. What makes it home for you? People? Things?
every time i walk through the front gate... put the key in the door, take my bra off and flop onto the couch, click on the digital cable, and cook up some dinner... it's all mine. just mine. home.

4. Where is the furthest you've been from home, miles-wise?
hmmmmm.... 6880 miles (11073 km) (5979 nautical miles) when i went to Seoul, South Korea to work for Nine West for a month... stayed in the ritz-carlton...i should probably get the photos of my suite developed....that was in 1997

the second furthest was from NJ to ireland... 3188 miles (5131 km) (2771 nautical miles)

5. What are your plans for this weekend?
gonna test out my new LOMO!!!
got in a few minutes ago from getting beer n' burgers with cathy and watching the UNC/Duke game... and then had a hot fudge sundae :)

11:04 AM|hey all y’all… guess where I am writing from? yes.

work.

hey, I am insane, not an idiot...

actually my boss called me a few times and then i wrote an email last night explaining my concerns... he called me at 7:15 this morning...

and now i am in work, much happier and he ordered pizza for everyone...

i feel like Pacino in Godfather III

11:37 PM|my landlord rocks!

he came downstairs to deliver a mug that i'd bought off a certain stalker site...


i was hiding out, but the doorbell sounded persistant.... so i answered it, he gave me the parcel and then asked how work was. i told him what happened. then i said i know that i sound like a schmuck since i am behind with 2 months rent...

he said "don't worry aboutthe rent. you aren't packing up in the middle of the night and moving right? you DO plan to stay here for a while right? the economy is tough right now, i totally understand... and you will find another job soon"

then he said "we like having another person in the house. keeps people from casing the joint out"

has he HEARD my stalkers???

love him! good landlord~! that's why i haven't looked for a new bachelorette pad in 5 years


(oh yeah, AND besides all the other stuff happening today, i received my LOMO!!)

4:07 PM|not that i should have to feel like i HAVE to defend myself, since this is my journal (so to speak) but...

i am going to... for my little commenting friends out there who have laced into me.

fine. that's ok. lace into me. guess what? i can ban people who piss me off. freedom of speech is nice... but don't go growling in the margins of my diary

hold off on commenting about THAT comment... i have already heard the "oh you want comments but only ones that agree with you".... you are DAMNED right. this is MY fucking blog. if you have a problem with the "content" whatever.

Jack, i don't see YOU posting your life up on the web... which is probably a good thing. maybe if you did, then i could get some nice "shots" in about your daily ins and outs.

i am not posting this to humor you.... so you won't find my apologies floating over to you because my "blog" has gone downhill since december.

so... in layman's terms....bite me.

as for some more in-depth views on my "calling it quits" at the job...

i am really confused right now and am going to ramble because that's what one does when she's been pushed over the edge and doesn't know how to climb back up. i am not asking for you people to feel sorry for me.

before taking this job i was feeling a little uneasy about getting back into designing web stuff again. and i took the bull by the horns and by-gum, i DID create an entire site off this guy's idea. creating user-flows, site maps, homepage iterations, about 40 inner page designs/layouts... and even was writing copy.

i was happy to be working. and even happier that i was trusted enough to do the job and that i was finally starting to trust myself with designing again (and maybe this is one way of me preserving my trust and confidence in myself before it really started to get torn down).

the president of the company called me into his office before i was even made salary... i was still hourly which meant i was on probation til last thursday

... anyway, he calls me into his office, starts talking crap about the other designer there (who was mainly print, anyway)

he hands me a stack of resumes and tells me to look through them because he's firing this other guy...

um... okay... i've never really had this experience... hell, they hadn't even set my phoneline up or voicemail (they still haven't as of today, and i am going to guess that they won't be...) - they said that they didn't know when my benefits would kick-in that "Jackie" would meet with me soon, she's busy... but that they MIGHT kick-in in 6 months with a week vacation...

so that's not too terrible, i am a little put off at the backstabbing portion of this situation... apparently i was in a Deathmatch with the other designer and i won... even though he wasn't working on this project. his last day was last week and he came up to me and said "you'll get fired too, i give you 3 months"

he never consulted me on the resumes i looked at. just hired the first designer off the street. who just started this past monday. fine.

the art director who is there has been commenting to me how horrible it is to work there and such, and i tried not to let her or the previous designer's comments get me in a snit...

fine.

i have had clients that like to change their mind a lot. sure. i can deal with that. they aren't sitting at your desk 9 times a day, or calling meetings about meetings... and expecting you to whip up an entirely new site within 2 hours (which i did)...

i HAVE had clients from hell. and i have dealt with them. yessed them to death and did what they wanted. there. paycheck. good.

i HAVE had bosses from hell. i even had one a few years ago scream at me while hurling stereo boxes that i designed at me... and then an hour later say i was the best designer he'd had.

yes. it seems that a lot of the companies i work for are like dysfunctional families. with the head guy being the addicted Dad who likes to abuse you mentally. is that a healthy place to work? is that a healthy way to live? i suppose coming from a co-dependent addiction affected family and going through ala-non and ala-teen, i can recognize the signs of some dysfunctionality in companies as well as people... this was one of those times and rather than having my self-esteem dragged thru the mud again, i broke loose. blame me?

i KNOW that i had been out of work for 7.5 months. i KNOW this. people don't have to point out this fact. nor do they have to point out the fact that i will not have unemployment insurance.

i have to point out the fact that - to me - the feeling that i was dying inside was causing me to actually run into the bathroom, sit in a stall and cry for a few minutes about 6 times a day since last week.

the idea that i have been trained to design and that's what i have been doing for the past 10 years and then having this feeling that you do NOT ever want to create another thing as long as you live? well, that's not exactly a good thing.

yeah, i sat in the ladies' room after the latest conversation with the President. i couldn't stop shaking.

i had started shaking and turned pale when he WAS speaking with me. apparently so noticable that he was prompted to ask "are you feeling okay?"

to which i responded, 'erm, no, i haven't been sleeping well."

and he said "try Scotch"

(which i am hoping was a joke)

so there i was in the restroom, trying to calm down, doing breathing exercises, trying not to cry... and the voice in my head (yes. you thought i didn't have one!?) the voice says "get out of here, for your sanity"... this is my INSANE voice telling me to leave for my sanity's sake!!! that can't be good when the Insane Voice is needing a break.

so i walked back to my desk... tried breathing to calm down some more... asked myself "is this worth it? you have 2 months rent to think about, you know"

and that was when i found my hands reaching for my mousepad, my coat and my dancing cats calendar... waving to my fellow co-workers still in that room, saying "So long..." and walking briskly to the door and running to the elevator... hitting the Number One about 6 times in hope that it would speed the deathtrap up...

i walked around the corner... didn't look back.... and was able to breathe...

came home. needed to write about my day. did. and am trying not to defend myself...


i am also pro-choice, pro-death penalty, on the fence whether i am a republican or democrat and play the lottery

any comments?

11:56 AM|my cancer horoscope said:

What is going on inside your head may have little resemblance or relation to your actions. It seems that right now, you're caught between two worlds: that of intentions and that of practical possibilities, and it may seem that bridging the gap is, though possible, highly unlikely. It's time that you called a time-out and took a step back to gather your thoughts. Ask yourself repeatedly what you want to get out of a current situation and what you're willing to give in order to get it. Once you do this, it will serve you well to sit down and begin sketching out a plan.

my gemini horoscope said:

Calling on the muse of melodrama was an effective method for getting what you wanted way back when, but you still need to resist the temptations to let molehills become mountains right now. Deal with each new twist in your professional or social life as an adventure and a test. If you run around screaming about how the sky is falling, sooner or later, you'll make your prophecies come true. If, on the other hand, you trust yourself to use the tools that are at your disposal, a crisis will be averted

well.... let's see... what happened today in the life of erin?

i walked out on my job at 10:30am.

this is the most unprofessional thing i have ever done. no, i don't have another job lined up. there is the possibility of landing the position at the GSB™'s place either friday ir monday... other than that, nothing on the hook...

i called up and rescheduled my canceled substitute teacher certification appointment. instead of having to wait 2 months, i am going next tuesday at 10am

what happened today?

ah... well... see, i have been working on a project for the last month (since 2.11.02) and while it's all well and good and a great idea that i was keen on and happy to work on, it has turned into the job from hell.

at least when i was at design firms, the clients weren't coming in the room every 5 seconds with designs that they came up with... this is the president of the printing company's side project (his personal little baby) that i have been working on... as i said, it's a decent enough premise for an e-commerce site....and we'd decided on a "look" for this site. good good. fine.. cut up images. create more images, the girl that i worked with - who's having a baby in may, so that's TOTALLY unmoveable deadline - she did most of the coding and we'd had 3/4 of the site DONE already...

to follow.... a very kind and brief synopsis of what each day has been like up to this point:

[enter president]
change it...
[exit president]

erin changes design

[enter president]
why'd you change it?
[exit president]

erin scratches head, then changes design back

[enter president & friend]
meet my friend from doubleclick - friend likes what i've been working on
[exit president & friend]

erin works on changes from that meeting, because oh, there are changes

[enter president]
why'd you change it?
[exit president]

erin changes design back

[enter president]
i'm gonna work very closely on this with you
[exit president]


[enter erin's anxiety]
[see erin pick up bag, coat and pack up dancing cat calendar]

so long guys!

[exit erin]

8:27 AM|someone rang my doorbell this morning at 3am... i didn't answer it...

hmmmm, either wrong door or my stalkers are getting more brazen!

11:58 PM|heh... friends!! we have a new installment of Jackasses & Stalkers....

in this episode, we have the first photo sent that's being posted!!! enjoy!

11:54 AM|sigh...yeah yeah, i know lately i have been posting little links hither and tither, but hey, perhaps John Cusack for President is a good idea!

[link thanks to doghead]

12:38 AM|erm.... kitten population control?


[heh...visit njmike]

11:59 PM|god. i am really in a pissy mood tonight. basically from most of the day which sucked the sludge of a rotting sewer rat.

can't stop thinking. and am tired. took bath earlier to relax. couldn't. tenser getting out of tub *sigh*

it's best that i just take a bucket of nyQuil and go night-night...

8:15 PM|i can't yap about this quite yet, but there is a glimpse of light at the end of a certain tunnel

1:39 PM|ok... am writing on the sly.

3 weeks, 1 day into the job...

um... do i HAVE to go back for 3 weeks, day 2?

7:41 AM|sweet baby jeezuz i am tired... think i can nap for another 10 minutes? *sigh* so cold in my apartment...flannel sheets are so comfy and warm...

11:24 PM|on a happier note.... one of the finer personality tests out there :)

wakka wakka wakka!!!

	You are Fozzie! Wokka Wokka! You love to make lame jokes. Your sense of humor might be a bit off, but you're a great friend and can always be counted on..
Take the What Muppet Are You? Quiz!

[link via frontsideback]

8:54 PM|eric's sister died on saturday... this is just mind-boggling sad

2:16 AM|heh...


Erin

The influence of Erin makes you positive, self-assertive, and independent. You can be creative, inventive, and ingenious in practical matters, such as handicrafts. When you have the opportunity to pursue your own goals and interests free from interference, you can feel very agreeable and express a buoyant optimism. On the other hand, you can be impulsive and forceful when opposed, and act without due forethought and discretion. Hence you have many bitter experiences and generally rather unsettled conditions in your life, with little progress and financial accumulation. You cannot tolerate any domination by others, or circumstances that restrict your freedom and independence. You are inclined to make changes abruptly in your life as an escape from such conditions. When annoyed or offended, you can be very candid and sarcastic in your speech. Many disruptions in friendship and association have thus resulted. Verbal expression is difficult for you, and you can be forthright in situations requiring delicacy, even though it is not your intention to be. The intensity of your nature would cause you to suffer in the senses of the head, as well as with digestive problems. You also would have a sensitivity in your solar plexus. In extreme cases, mental turmoil, major stomach operations, and accidents of a serious nature could occur.


yep...they pretty much hit the nail on the head

1:59 AM|oh my gawd!

as i was perusing pop culture slut, i found this link off her site...


wow.

mad flash skills. (and for all you history buffs, that's the first time i have ever used the term "mad" to mean "kickass")

double yolker

go there now. do it.

5:38 PM|just went to the foodstore... got a new crockpot... a bigger one... and am now in the process of making beef stew... yum. should be ready by tomorrow...

gotta start cooking again this week. last week was a lost cause... 5 nights of ordering takeout... not good...

mainly cheesesteaks and getting ripped off by delivery guys!

1:13 PM|ooh. i found this little blog via newtonleibiz...

prevent scurvy and go check out i, lemon pie tyrant

12:18 PM|ok.... not to dredge "the past" up, but when did the word "fucknozzle" begin to sweep the nation?!?!?

12:01 PM|well... this post may be just for my benefit so i don't forget the address - then again, most of my posts are probably for my benefit :)

yarn shops:

orchard's yarn

gotta knit (uh-oh, they reviews say the owners are rude. crap.)

hmmm.,.. this lists all the knitting stores in New York and New Jersey

some quick refs (sorry guys, no, i couldn't just write 'em down):

Hoboken Handknits
720 Monroe Street, Suite E504
Hoboken, NJ 07030
+1 (201) 653 2545

The Yarn Connection
218 Madison Avenue (between 36th and 37th)
New York, NY 10016
+1 (212) 684 5099


Oooooh!!! here's one witha website! i think we've found a winner!!!
schoolproducts.com

methinks i will be sucked into the abyss of knitting (if i ever get started) and will also have to visit chicknits blog daily...

thank you. this post has been sponsored by the irish national knitting centre... just because i am missing the Belmar St. Patrick's Day Parade today.

12:13 AM|hmmmmmmph. is it weird to feel jilted when your stalker feels the need to stalk other women?