Home at last, home alone

Leaving the second time was harder. A lot harder. My heart feels like it's been split in two, and it's hard to do anything that's not haunted with memories. I'm so burned out with traveling that my ability to think coherently has effectively been shattered, but what I'm left with is regrets, loneliness and tears.

And some rum and holiday candy, but that's more of a coping method for the other things.

Shout out for grad student cooking!

I have an analytical brain, and it likes to organize things, keep track of junk, and generally fixate on the future and planning ahead. It's fairly good at all of these things, but I'm a creature of my impulses and I tend to loose track of the many threads in my life, which tends to lead to problems. One of the things I started doing a while ago was keeping track of my expenses in spread sheets, which is good for my brain and for my wallet.

Well, maybe not for my wallet, but at least I had to acknowledge the over spending I was doing on a monthly basis. I'm actually really lucky and got to figure out my bad habits in a low stakes situation, but I'm on a fixed income now and I have to figure this stuff out for realsies.

When I started tallying up my spending the vast majority of it was going to food. While I was a little indiscretionary with my personal spending as well, it didn't even come close to the eating out and grocery bills. Since making the move to grad school I've had to really wake up the reality of my income, and start figuring out how to live within a budget that's going to let me do awesome things like skiing and traveling and whatever.

The biggest thing I've done since the move is absolutely slash my food budget down. Instead of indiscriminately shopping for whatever sounds good I'm like a girl on a mission. I have $25 a week to spend on groceries, plus a little extra for eating out - $50 a month or so. Booze is separated, cause lets be serious. That's the easiest way to blow a budget, and I want to keep that in it's own separate category. It's a little challenging, and I'm still getting used to giving up novelty, which can be difficult. I definitely have some meals that I just don't make any more because I don't generally have the ingredients just laying around.

But I am impressed with the experiment so far! I'm actually eating fairly well, I'm eating flavorful and decently healthy foods, and I don't have anywhere near the waste that I used to - there are no more forgotten zucchinis rotting in the back of the fridge, or excess dried foods taking up cupboard space. The amount of food I gave away when I moved was shocking, I'd rather keep on this minimalism thing I've got going. As it is right now I'm scraping through the cupboard in these last couple days before I take off; I'm going to have a mostly clean slate when I'm done traveling.

Quick thought on bikes, fashion and cultural labeling

I had a thought today on my ride into work, and while it’s a little half baked I thought it was kind of interesting. Does labeling young cyclists as hipsters unfairly stigmatize the activity?

There has been a lot written about the need to expand ridership in urban areas. There are a lot of good reasons for this, which I am not going to get into now, and it’s a subject that I care a lot about. But at the same time we have this cultural movement in the opposite direction, throwing a lot of mockery at “hipsters,” particularly about bicycling in the movement. You even get shades of this within corners of the biking community, complaining about hipsters using bikes as a fashion accessory and the rise of the fixed gear in urban environments.

This seems to go against everything we’re working for as bicycling advocates. Any person on a bike is a step forward, whatever the motivation it took to get them there. If it took fashion or perceived coolness to get them pedaling, I’m not complaining. In many ways we need more of that! Seeing attractive and/or fashionable people riding makes biking seem more accessible because it breaks down the stereotype of cyclists as competitive lycra road warriors.

Hipster is a label that a lot of people try to avoid, probably due to trying to avoid the cultural connotations the label carries (bad beer, narcissism, whatever). By throwing the label at any young and fashionable person who is into bikes are we chasing away people from an awesome activity? Especially as we are trying to get more people onto bikes, and demonstrate it as a legitimate method for transportation not limited to extreme distances and speeds or specialized bicycling clothing.

However you choose to ride is cool with me, I just want to get you out on two wheels. Anyways, that was my thought for the day.

Interesting

I've been getting some traffic here lately, which is interesting because I mostly keep this blog as a personal public diary and a place to practice writing. I have a link on my facebook, but that's fine, there's nothing I'm posting here that matters very much. Anyways, I looks like my address got posted on a webpage-ping...thing. I'm not sure why! I don't say much of value! But I guess I'll take it, it's not like anyone comments really. I'm mostly interested in how that even happened.

Sleep it off, sleep it off.

I went to bed drunk and happy last night, and I'm going to bed sober, frustrated and lonely tonight. What I bummer, I was so hopeful starting the evening. It's fine and the feelings will fade in a couple of days, but I feel thwarted and a little mad. Nothing that I'm not able to get over, but it's frustrating in the present, and kind of degrades my self confidence.

The party we threw tonight was pretty fun, and very successful - we had a lot of people from the department, and nothing got out of hand. Well, except for the noise complaint, but that was okay. Lot of people took that as a sign to go home, and the rest of us relocated to another apartment. It was nice, we wore fancy clothing and had a lot of sugar, and we really like the people in the department.

I guess I feel a little alienated and uncool. I dislike this very much, and it tends to add to my social anxiety; I think I'm a neat person most of the time, but in parties I feel completely the opposite: annoying, unfunny, unattractive. I would like to change this very much, but emotions have a way of hijacking my brain and taking over. Boooo.

I'm tired, I'll think about this and expand on it later.

Drunk drunk drunk!

I'm having an amazing day. I'm drunk and in bed, but enjoying the hell out of not wearing clothes and being warm. It's pretty great. I drank a lot of beer, I chatted with cute boys, and I made it home safe and sound. Oh, and made some egg nog. Go me!

It explains all the naps

I accidentally bought decaffeinated tea yesterday. Tasty, but that's not my primary reason for drinking tea: It's to wake myself up. I blame mental exhaustion.

Also coffee

Always say yes, always go forward.

These are my guidelines. These are the words I have burned into my brain, that come floating up whenever I want to give up and stop challenging myself. It applies intellectually, physically, emotionally, and it keeps me growing and achieving. I do not want an ordinary life, and I'm doing my damnedest within my limits to avoid one.