Twenty-eight

I want to quit my job. I'm tired. It's exhausting, stressful, and no longer worth it.

1.       I work insane hours because there's too much work and I'm so not in the fucking mood to be efficient about handling it all, which makes me slower.

2.       The clients are demanding shits who don't know what they want but want everything yesterday. Of course, when I do meet their insane deadlines they have the audacity to demand more and show no appreciation whatsoever.

3.       I'm burnt out and don't have the capacity to be creative to write great copy anymore. My job has made me hate writing. I don't want to write, period.

4.       I struggle to get out of bed in the morning because I don't want to face my CEO (with her fucking progress reports and guilt-inducing questions) or my deadlines or my coworkers (who always need stuff from me).

5.       I have neither a social life nor the will to socialize because of my insane hours and mental crippling.

6.       I feel like I haven't lived because I'm always either at the office or working from home, or vegetating in bed to recover from the workweek.

7.       I can't seem to find anyone qualified to hire and help with the workload, and so I'm doomed to forever deal with the same shitty situation.

8.       Apparently if I worked elsewhere I'd be getting paid more (though money at this point isn’t the issue).

9.       I'm starting to do a crap job at everything and it's killing me. I used to take so much pride in doing a job well. It's what helped me reach so far despite my lack of a university degree. It's what made my reputation. I'm about to lose it all because I can't bring myself to meet client deadlines or deliver on their expectations, or just even meet my own standards.

10.   I'm lying to cover my ass and I hate myself for it, because what kind of a functioning adult has to lie to make up for needless negligence?

I really, really want to quit, but I also want to travel to Spain in October and I need the money to do that, so I won't quit now. I'll quit in January 2015 once I've managed to save up after spending everything in Spain. Until then, it's slow death.  

Twenty-seven

It feels like I'm living in a box when at work or at home, wearing blinders when I'm actually outside. Yesterday's road trip was, really nice. At one point Z, J and I were sitting on top of a high, rocky hill overlooking the sea at sunset, and there were clear-cut sunbeams slicing through the heavy clouds right over the water. It was a moment in time I hope to never forget.

"My mother used to say that when the light shines through like that, God is talking to someone," J said.

I like J's mom.

Tim Minchin's Hilarious Insights on Life

Twenty-six

At work, I often come across some pretty shitty copy written by businessmen whose mother tongue is not English and whose appreciation for the rules of grammar is as negligible as their choppy grasp of the language. That being said, I have never had the misfortune of editing copy that is so warped, so senseless, so weak it practically crumbles under its own weight, as I have over the past few days while helping a friend proofread his LGBT e-magazine's articles.

Why? Why do you write if you clearly can't string a single coherent sentence together? I get so frustrated working on pieces like this. It takes time out of my life that I'd rather be spending reading slash, gaming, being chewed and shredded by the Flatmate, taking out the trash, vegetating in bed, ANYTHING. Just not this. Not this.

But here I am, editing article after article of utter crap. There are good pieces in there, of course. Many of which I've enjoyed reading. But it's those handful of pointless quagmires that are making life miserable at the moment. I've tried recommending scrapping them, but apparently "they're important".

Sure. Whatever. FML.  
 

Twenty-Five

This makes me a horrible person, but I can't stand my five-year-old niece. That being said, my 10-year-old nephew has always been a pleasure to be around, even during his hellion days. Hanging out with him doesn't stress me out. While he's messy, he isn't deliberately a slob, he doesn't eat crap and then ignore me when I tell him not to touch the furniture or not to drop chicken on the floor for the pets to get at. He's never demanding, he doesn't nose around and meddle in everything he can reach, he's not loud and obnoxious, and he sure doesn't try to get off as fucking cute while doing shit. You know what I mean. Kids who think they're so adorable, they lay on the coy sweetness too heavy to get attention or get away with stuff. 

Kids. I don't mind the clumsy, well-meaning ones. It's the manipulative, older-than-their-age sort that I can't stomach. And it shows on me. I can't keep it in. It doesn't phase my niece, who seems to like me just fine, but it pisses off my sister - her mom - and it draws the attention of the family. It sometimes feels like I'm the only sane person in the room. So what if my tone turns sharp when the brat is wiping her hands all across the table after eating eggs with her fingers? I'm not cussing her, I'm not traumatizing her, I'm just telling her not to do it and to go wash her hands. So what if I tell her to hold onto the new plate I bought to stop it flop slipping off her bouncing lap? I'm not "waiting for her to screw up", I KNOW she's going to screw up, I'm just trying to control the damage. That should her mom's job, but she doesn't even notice it.

Fucking kids.

Gender Change - Full Episode

FTM transition: One year on testosterone