RAVE: The architecture profession is regulated by a group called the National Council of Architecture Registration Boards, NCARB. They set the standards for internship after graduation and develop the testing. The internship is a minimum of 3 years after graduation and usually takes people 5 or so years as you need varied experience in so many areas documented. You then get permission to take the 7 exams and then you finally are an architect. I'm still an intern and have a couple more exams to finish before I get my fancy stamp. Well, NCARB is having a think tank this December to discuss the future of how the internship process works and are trying to find ways to make it more efficient and just better in whatever ways possible. I applied and was chosen to be one of the 12 people getting together to develop ideas. It'll be some tough research and work but this is the first time people going through the process actually get a voice and can help elicit positive change and development. People in my position have been complaining for years that the process is flawed. This is also just an unbelievable opportunity and never really thought I'd get chosen. For 12 spots, there were hundreds of applicants. Best part of the whole thing is I get an at least one all expense paid trip to DC for a couple nights next month. I lived there for a bunch of years and have a lot of friends and family there. I still do a lot of work up there and go there quite frequently, but this time it's on somebody elses tab and I'll be staying somewhere in the city in a much nicer place than I usually stay.
Rave: My fiance is a huge Roy Orbison fan (and yes, she's well under 65), so I got her tickets as a birthday present to a tribute show tonight played by the band that covered him a few years ago for thousands at an event sponsored by the Rock Hall of Fame. I'm pretty much the best soon-to-be husband ever. All others can bow at my feet because I'm just that fucking awesome at the 'thoughtful presents' that girls always remember. Just means now if she doesn't get me the air intake for my car I wanted for Christmas, somebody's getting the boot......just kidding. Maybe.
RANT: Two weeks from now my friend is getting married and I'm her maid of honor. I am a very patient, easy-going person, but her shitty, selfish attitude is taking its toll on me. It's been so bad that I'm not sure we'll even have a relationship when all this is over. To call her a bridezilla would be a massive understatement. She recently announced that for her bachelorette party she wants to go to Vegas. Um, no. No fucking way. There are 4 other girls in her wedding party and they all either live with their parents or roommates because they are broke. I am the only financially stable one in the group and I've already taken a pretty big hit on all the pre-wedding events. I knew at the beginning that it would be expensive and I was prepared for it. However, there is no way in hell that any of us can afford to take a last minute trip to Vegas. I tried to tell Bridezilla that as calmly as I could, but she kept arguing that it was her big day and she "deserved" it and I pretty much flipped out. I just kept repeating, "Are you fucking high?" It's not like I expected all this shit to be pleasure, but I didn't expect it to be so fucking torturous either. I've busted my ass helping with all the wedding stuff, I personally hosted a goofy fucking tea party themed wedding shower, I've got cases of booze sitting in my living room for the reception, and the bridesmaids and I planned a really cool bachelorette party. Now all I can think is that this stupid, entitled bitch doesn't deserve a goddamn thing. If I were a lesser person, I'd just say 'fuck it' and bail on all of this bullshit, but my guilt would eat at me if I actually followed through. I'm just trying to keep in mind that in 2 weeks she'll be married and I can lock myself in my apartment and drink myself into forgetting this white hot hell. RAVE: The girl I'm dating. Goddamn. This girl is so cool and so stunning and I just keep praying that she doesn't turn out to be crazy/straight/baby-obsessed, or some combination of all three.
Rave? Bartender at a bar that I frequent seems to be into me. Yeah, I know that's on line with "I think that stripper likes me," but it seems to be a little different. (Spoilered for autistic rambling) Spoiler Generally, bartenders are flirty just because it gets guys to tip better and buy more drinks. This doesn't really apply to me, because usually I get a 32 oz draft and then drink soda / water for the rest of the night because I'm a fucking lightweight and am usually driving. She usually gives me a pouty look after I get a Coke and tells me "But you're adorable when you get drunk!" I then have to watch her pour my drink, because if I look away she spikes my drink with rum. She's gotten me a few times with it, as I'm usually talking to friends and she's pretty sly about it. A couple nights ago, she told me that "her vagina was going on strike until she finds a better guy." My response of "You taking applicants for scab labor?" made her laugh. I have no idea how to close with this girl, and I'm sure that she can do much better than me, as she is fucking gorgeous, but hey, if she's interested, I'm game. Rave: Found a solid oak desk on Craigslist for sixty bucks. Not bad. Rant: One of my Marines got arrested for fighting his wife. I don't think he's going to get in trouble, (It's PMO's policy - no matter who's at fault, no matter whether anyone got hurt or not, to handcuff the male Marine and get him out of the house. This gets pretty funny when the woman beats the shit out of her husband and the police come to arrest him. And by "funny," I mean "are you fucking serious?") but it's more drama to deal with.
Rave: New guy on the job today. While doing some metal fitment I asked him to go look at a gap between a few I-beams and give me a rough estimate so I knew what I was working with. He comes back and tells me 2/12ths of an inch, then thinks for a sec and says no probably 2/6ths. This should be awesome
Rant Fucking Everclear...that shit needs to be outlawed. I knew it was a bad idea to try a drink my friend made that he mixed with that stuff. Soon as I lay down, the room is spinning and I'm ready to throw up. So that ruined my night, and I'm still recovering. ?? Ran into my ex gf last night at the bar, even though we're back on good terms, it was still kind of awkward. Glad we are cool though, her friends kind of gave me the cold shoulder, but fuck them...they suck at life anyway. I realized I'm so much better off than to be with her. Count this as a rave I suppose
Rant: I need to do like an hour of work to put the final touches on my thesis and submit it to my advisor for final approval......and I just fucking won't do it. It is over a year of work and is one hour away from completion. It will feel so amazing when it is completed, yet I flat our refuse to do it. I don't know why.
Rant: Fuck you, coworker bitch. Do your fucking job and maybe I won't have to have to talk to you about how terrible you are and have you passive-aggressively annoy the shit out of me. This isn't Long Beach, you can't just show up and be hot and think anyone gives a shit.
Rant: Fun things to do on Sunday mornings do not include taking the cat to the emergency vet with a urinary tract infection. $350.00 later, Im finally having my morning coffee.
Rant: I am awful at sleeping - always have been, presumably always will be. Lately, I've been doing this fun thing where at around 10 or 11 I'll be so tired (or, like last night, have a really bad headache that only seems to go away with my eyes closed) and think I'll just go to sleep. But I've only ever been able to go to sleep before midnight and stay asleep when I'm really sick or depressed or ridiculously exhausted. So, I wake up somewhere between 1 and 4 feeling all refreshed from my poorly timed nap and don't fall asleep again until between 5 and 8. This happens now and then, but I've been doing this for almost a week straight now. On the plus side, the earliest I ever have to get up for work is at 10, but everything else about it is on the negative side.
Rant: Now this fucking cunt is accusing me of having sex with my co-worker at the bar, which is expressly against the rules. I hope she dies in a goddamn fire. What the fuck is wrong with some people? I'm not even interested in her personal life or her as a person, I just want her to do her goddamn job, and now she's running around trying to tell everyone I'm a bitch/whore/slut? This is really doing nothing to increase my desire to continue talking to people on any level.
RAVE: Had a great weekend seeing friends and old roommates back at my alma mater. RANT: Some shithead sucker punched me. He yelled something at my friend's wife, I said, "hey man, not cool" and turned away. 20 seconds later after I turned away, he cracked me. I was drunk and lost my balance bad and hit concrete steps. I needed 3 stitches to close a cut under my nose and I have scrapes on my nose and forehead, and a bruise/scrape by the side of my eye, back to my temple, where he hit me and where it hit the ground a bit. I don't remember a good chunk, even though I didn't have a concussion. This fucking sucks, I hate facial injuries...
Rant: My wife is a nanny, and caught the flu from the family whose kids she watches. Rant: Which, of course, means that I have now caught it. Shivers, stuffed up, and achy. Worse yet, whenever I get sick, it always goes to my chest. That means that I get to deal with Bronchitis, too. Rave: Doctor's office is able to get me in this afternoon, and it's a slow week at work. Hopefully they can prescribe me something for my inevitable chest infection and I can nip it in the bud.
Rave: Ken Burns' documentary about the Dust Bowl. It's cool to see my little corner of the world talked about. Rant: My internet is so fucking slow. I can't complain whenever some illicit video won't stream, but this is PBS FOR CHRIST SAKES! It's educational! Google Fiber on one side of this state and shit so slow I can't stream videos on the other. Fuck. Rant: Grad school.
RANT x5000: I am almost devastated by some news I heard today. The city I live in decided to "crack down" on two of my favorite bars in the entire state of Michigan. These bars are classified as "bikini bars" where the girls are allowed to wear anything that would be allowed at your local family beach. Most of the days this means a lacy bra and g-string. Well, some self-righteous cunt caught her husband at one of them the other day, hanging out with the 18 year old neighbor girl that waitresses there. So like the miserable, selfish bitch that she is, decided to ruin it for the entire city and report them to the chief of police for inappropriate uniforms. Now they are no longer allowed to wear anything other than bathing suit tops and full-cut bottoms. No more wife beaters, fish nets, thongs, etc. I have been going to this bar for almost 10 years now and this has never been a problem. It has pretty much been my after work sanctuary at least 2-3 times per week. It was like Cheers with hot, half-naked, chicks working behind the bar. Now half the fun of it has been ruined. I hope her husband divorces her over this.
Fucked Up Friendship Rant: (Spoilered for what the fuckery) Spoiler Thank you, TIB, for allowing me to rediscover you, just as this happened. I have nowhere else to write this out. The guy I tabbed to be the best man in my wedding also doubles as my very best friend and practically a brother. I grew up with his younger brother, but him and I became close. I'm talking the three of us would spend weekends at each others houses, our parents considered all of us actual brothers, etc. He got married last year to a girl he'd been dating for about 5 years. She's a bitch, but if it makes him happy, what can you do, right? We all knew it wouldn't last, but I figured it'd be a couple years before the shit hit the fan. It was six months. Six months into marriage, 5.5 years into a relationship. Just decides he's not in love with her anymore. Starts talking to someone else. Whatever, I get it, I try to be as supportive as possible. He's not getting the affection he feels he needs at home, he's getting it elsewhere, nothing physical. All of our friends keep trying to gently coerce him into the divorce, because its headed that way, but he won't budge. Finally, he admits to a meet up with the someone else. I'm slightly irritated, but still, I try to understand it. At this point, its not about judging. Its a fucked up situation and I can't say how I'd respond any better or worse than him. You try to dissociate the person from the action. The action is horrible, the person is not. Maybe its just a bullshit justification, I don't know, but it just slid by for awhile. Months later, finally get him to own up to the fact its not working and to move toward ending it. Asks me and my fiance to help his soon to be ex-wife out, because its gonna be rough on her. We agree because, come on, he's a my best friend and though she was a bitch, she wasn't a bad person. My fiance realizes just HOW rough a time it is on his now ex and starts doing everything she can to keep her from going over the edge. A couple times we thought she might actually kill herself. Week later, he lets it out that he met up with that someone else more than just once. Also, the weekend after he ended it with his now ex and the week after that. I don't know what else to be besides fucking furious at him and also really at myself. I created a huge reality distortion field because he's my best friend and I got sucked into it. Worse, my soon to be wife got sucked into it too. But what kind of slimy fucking cocksucker puts his best friend's fiance in a situation like this? Its one thing to get me involved. But to explicitly ask for her help, knowing what the true story was....I don't know. Maybe I'm overreacting, but I can't help but find it super fucked up to do something like that. How selfish could you be to involve two people, one who loves you like a brother, to clean up a mess you know is ten times worse than what you're telling them? Plus, he went and fucked this other chick multiple times while refusing to end his marriage which he knew was broken and wouldn't hide from anyone else except his wife that it was over? What kind of dishonorable pussy do you have to be to stoop that low? I've never cheated and I find it to be just reprehensible. I can't believe I didn't call him on his bullshit months ago. Long story short, I now have to consider removing my best man because he's kind of a piece of shit. Also, I've apologized to my fiance about a million times about getting her involved in this mess and she's none too happy either, now that she knows the truth. Am I overreacting? Is he not as big a piece of shit as I think he is right now? How do I approach him without starting a fist fight...or is that the only way to approach this?
Rant: Just completed 92 pages (yes, I counted) of paperwork for the new job. Most of it was beyond redundant. And I just realized I didn't touch the health benefits paperwork, which is another 10-15 pages. Is this because it is for a city job, or is every big people job like this?
Rant Stupid fucking bitch. At what point does breaking up with someone who you supposedly love make sense. The reason she cited was because I didn't spend enough time with her. I guess I had it coming, but I'm quite a bit more pissed about this than I thought I'd be. the only cure is drunk pussy, I wonder how many ladies will be out at the bar on Thanksgiving