If you're here, you could be there.

Even with my pills, my body still tried to wake up between 2-4. Lady Miss Friday to the rescue, we spent time together, I got back to sleep.

I saw at the last minute that Kathy was out, so I took all her mail.... But then Lynelle just snagged it out of my folder. I am known. I managed to get all my mail done, claims tagged, and start working up NOAs. I enter NOAs tomorrow, but I feel like I'm getting a better handle on the workload.

My session with Candace was good, though kind of unexpected. She didn't ask for my homework, thank Gawd, though I had some semblance of Goals worked out. My assignment this week is to figure out my needs from a partner (other than them wanting to fuck me literally constantly). I'm not comfortable having needs. It feels too much like Vulnerability. We also talked some about my disordered eating. I'm having this weird thing where I'm not hungry very often..... But being me, I then push that further. When I ate on Friday night, it had been 3 days, almost 4. She wants me to make a deal with myself that I eat at least twice a day. I don't wanna get fatter. We talked about enabling, substances, partner parenting, etc. There's a lot.

My session later with Moncita, the neurologist's NP, was also decent. She still wants me to go on anti-seizure medication, but was very very careful not to push. She also said she's going to recommend an EMG or something, to address that weird numbness.

Weirdly, my journal entries from yesterday were.... Gone. It was like I hadn't been there at all. I managed to get refill them okay.

Terry messaged me towards the end of work, eating some vegan nuggets in a salad, and with pics of the catnip he saved. All but two of them died. I'm trying not to scream at myself, but some part of me always will. I knocked on his door when I checked my mail, and sat with his pups while we talked. He showed me his silver wig, I put it on, and it didn't look horrid. I still want one of my favorite hairstyle of my own, though. We talked about jealousy, and cheating, and revenge. We're very similar.

Then the bad news started cascading in. Chip texted me and Tim that he had to put Olive down. Her legs just completely gave out a few days ago, and there was nothing they could do. 13 years is a long time for a dog of her lineage and size, and I called him to reinforce that, thank him for everything he did for her, and check on him. Tim called while I was on the phone with him, so I couldn't take it. Rachel was next, letting me know that Julian was back in the hospital after more seizures. And apparently can't see out of one eye. Terry wouldn't let me leave at first, worried I was going to cut or similarly self destructive coping mechanism. I'm very honest, and I told him plainly I was going to go drink myself to sleep.

I called Tim back, and he's sick. Hoping it's not covid, but going to sleep on it tonight and go to the doc tomorrow. Low key fuck 2020.

Lynelle came in early, which of course isn't a problem so much as it always feels disconcerting. I got a lot of work done in the morning, but less as the day went on. JJD came back from vacation and took an inordinately large amount of time before saying hi to me. We chatted briefly, but he was interrupted by other coworkers who wanted to hear all about his journey. He came back a while, hedging around and I was downright sitcomish in joking with him when he came in to "tell me a story."

The story, it turns out, was actually the worst thing I could imagine him telling me. He'd asked a friend to take care of his cat, Mouthy, while he was gone for a week and a half. His friend had forgotten. Completely. I'm aware that my priorities are off, but if he'd told me that he'd gone on a killing spree while in Italy, I wouldn't have been hit as hard. I gave him what advice I could, despite still flagellating myself over Mousey. Plus this isn't even something that could be chalked up to there being so many worse ways to go, as dying of thirst in your own fucking house is pretty goddamn awful. Unsurprisingly, things got worse for me as the day went on, as the water lapped over my internal levies and muddied my thoughts. I didn't really even know where I was when I finally left.

Tim emailed me in the morning to let me know that 1) he'd dropped his phone into the water and 2) his boat insurance was due today.

Much to my surprise, my apt was much cleaner than when I'd left in the morning. The trash had been taken out of the can, most things in the living room had been organized. The bathroom door was closed, and I figured that Bryan had finally heeded Tim's advice to clean up. I was somewhat pleasantly surprised to see Jeff, then, who it turns out might not have Hep C. He'd had a doctor's appt, came here to kill time, and decided the place was too messy. My living room was too messy for a meth addict.

Jeff lingered in the living room for a long time. He tried to come into my room, to say hi to Lady Miss Friday, but she gave annoyed meows when he entered the room, and Jeff is smart, so he doesn't press the issue with her. He finally left, but just then I got a text from Mason, asking about a couple of my self destructive coping mechanisms. Again, I gave what advice I could. He wants to visit me, and I guardedly want him to despite being painfully aware that he's 22.

Woke up before my alarm, but couldn't get out of bed until I forced myself. I trained on Eservice, which is nowhere near as complicated as I thought it was. Actually, Lindsay, the girl who trained me, is going to try my system. In another career, I'd have been an efficiency expert, except that's usually trying to get rid of people. Funny or cute pics are traditionally sent with the eservice notice, so I sent around the pokemons lolcats, and 10 min later Sonya comes into my office to talk about Pokemon Go. She hadn't seen the email, she just thought I'd know about it. We had our quarterly meeting, which I was no use for, and couldn't even stay focused long enough to figure out what we were supposed to be doing. Really, I was in a haze for most of the day. Understandable, I think.

Stopped at the gym on the way home, because there's no sense getting fat, and endorphins, and I don't know, but I went. It was packed, which I didn't think about until my friend came up and pointed out all these guys were doing last minute Pride workouts. Leg machine was busted, and I pulled something in my shoulder, so I did cardio instead, then headed to rehearsal. Thriller is coming along a little better, but I need to find time to rehearse it on my own.

I considered getting a tattoo. I considered a lot of things. People do all sorts of things "for" a dead loved one, but of course it's not really "for" them, it's for us. The best thing I can do is get over this as quickly as possible and adopt again. It's not "what Mousey would have wanted" - he would've wanted a yogurt treat and a cardboard tube...and to not be eaten - but saving another animal the best thing I can do. I will need to clean his cage out, probably, which is hard. Like every other grieving person ever, I keep expecting to see his bedding rustle and his head poke out any minute. Wee Companions is only open on Saturdays from 11-4. At this point, I'm not sure I'd do much at Pride but suck up everyone else's good time, so getting a new rescue sounds like a good plan.

Lady Miss Friday actually crawled under the covers with me on the couch for a little while, which was nice, but I had a harder time in the dark.

As soon as I left my room, I saw Mousey's cage in a wreck on the floor.

Mousey was a feeder mouse and over a year old - I have no idea how old he was when I rescued him from a snake cage. I was prepared for him to die. I'd be sad, but safe in the knowledge that I'd given him the best life any feeder mouse had ever had. That whatever genetic mouse-fears he'd inherited, he'd never need to face them head on. I was not prepared for him to get eaten. I've read a million books where someone searches rubble in increasing desperation for a loved one. I've lost family members and close friends. I've seen a million friends post about loved ones who've died. I've seen a million posts about how horrible the world is when something unconscionable goes viral. For some reason, none of those things impact me much.

I am so angry. I am angry that I didn't think that a predator would climb up my balcony to get to an aging mouse inside a cage. I am livid at a system where something would be so hungry to need to. FURIOUS I didn't investigate immediately. *I am out of my fucking mind* that I didn't save my mouse. That the whole fucking point of rescuing him was that he not face that. I want to scream, and smash things, and kill things, and tear my skin off, and keep smashing things with my own flayed skin.


I posted to FB, because I thought people should know. I was surprised at the reaction. I was expecting to have to delete/kill at least one person who insisted he was "just a mouse." Tim & FHA were both fantastic, of course, but I don't know what to do with any of it. It occurred to me I had rehearsal to learn Thriller. I hate that song and that video, but I will absolutely not let some personal bullshit get in the way of my responsibilities. Burned myself, buzzed my head, stamped down on tears in the shower and headed off.

I think I was also supposed to rehearse Billie Jean, but I didn't realize that until after the first rehearsal was over, and I wanted to be home. Steven Richards came over to try on the Fantastic Four costume. It fits, if only just barely. He fucked me, and waaaaaay overstayed his welcome, but finally left.

I was supposed to go to the Body Language concert with Julian, but thankfully he never called. Tim called to make sure I hadn't cut myself or anything, and suggested I tear my collars, which is the Jewish tradition for grieving parents. I laid on the bed in the living room until it got dark, on the off hand chance he was still there somewhere, hiding.

DILF was happening, but I really really did not feel like being around anyone, so I drank a half bottle of vodka and crashed.

Took the plunge and ordered a modded Xbox. I was only able to pick out about 50 games I wanted even though it comes with 100. Oh, and thousands of old school SNES, Genesis, NES, Dreamcast & arcade games. It's $300, which is a lot of money right now, but it's also probably the last gaming system I'll ever buy. My Xbox 360 has convinced me that I don't actually care for the ways that gaming is moving forward - all RPGs are 3rd person, real time, etc.

I stayed an extra couple hours at work, and happened upon a hummingbird laying on the ground, wing outstretched at a strange angle, on my way out. I thought it might have been dead at first, and just being blown by the wind, but then it blinked, so I sat down with it. The poor security guard was hoping to lock up the building early, thought the bird might have hit a glass wall. I frantically searched for various wildlife services, but all the numbers were coming up disconnected. Bea walked out and said the same - the only one she knew of was in Jamul. I finally tried to pick it up, thinking I could maybe get it to a sanctuary the next day, but it freaked out. I tried a second time a bit later, and this time it flew to a nearby tree. Maybe it was just stunned, or the wing was stuck or something. No clue.

On the walk back to my car, I got an email from the Dr; gonorrhea in my throat. And because it was so late, there was no chance I could see anyone any time soon. Lovely. Jose Martinez offered to drive me from work to my car, which was sweet, and then offered to watch movies on the couch with me. Julian, of course, also wanted me to pick him up. I declined both, drinking a bottle of wine and crashing around 10:30.

I was really sad the other day, because I hadn't seen the skunks in a few days, and I wondered if some filthy, rotten, bitch mighten have called Animal Control on them. I myslef called AC, per Amy's advice, who recommended I call Project Wildlife, who gave me two phone numbers, that were always either busy or just rang endlessly. Worse yet was the thought that someone might have taken matters into their own hands. Just before the skunks disappeared, I heard them screaming. I went to check it out, but they ran past me before I could see what was going on. They almost ran out into traffic, but stopped and ran under a parked car, instead. I'm not so blinded by my skunk love as to get in the way of two possibly rabid, possibly poisoned, and definitely panicked skunks, even if they had run into traffic, although now that I think of it, skunk smell does wash out, whereas dead skunks don't come back. But of course, then there's the whole issue of "maybe it's a kindess", if they die swiftly, as opposed to the contstant struggle that is living in the natural world. Bah. We'll be glad they didn't, so that I am not forced to ponder such things. The point of all this is that I was really, really worried that they might have been poisoned/killed, but smelled skunk on the air this morning, so I have hope that they're alright.
In other news, I auditioned for the Las Vegas show Jubilee! on Tuesday, since they were in town. I knew going into it that I wasn't going to get it; I'm not quite tall enough, not quite good enough, and I don't have the "professional dancer" body that one needs to perform in a thong, but I figured that I'm eventually going to audition for real, and this would be good experience. Also, a lot of other dance jobs no longer audition in San Diego, and I figured that the more dancers who showed up, the better chance that they would come back.
I had a BLAST, possibly because I wasn't worried about getting it or not, but mostly just because I loved the dancing. There was lots of smiling and laughing during the audition, and the folks from Vegas said that they would definitely be coming back. Thumbs up.
I had a reason for posting today, and neither of these were it, but I don't remember what it was, except possibly to declare the awesomeness of my bunny. Meh.

Squeak