Bad Choices are the Best Choies

Guys, I finally understand why people under twenty-one are not allowed to do fun things like drink and gamble.

 I kind of think that adults over twenty-one should not be allowed to do these things either, if I am being entirely honest. 

Let me elaborate. This weekend, I made a lot of bad choices. 

So many that I have decided to declare last Friday night as Danielle's Night of Really Bad Choices! (Note: there is capitalization involved because the choices were Really Bad and I felt like the extra emphasis was necessary.) 

But, no. It was just a night of really bad financial/life choices all around. First, my sister and I went out to expensive dinner and my wallet was sad about it. My stomach was happy because it was steak and I love steak, but that is another matter entirely.

 I also had several fruity girly drinks with dinner because I am an adult and I can drink fruity girly drinks without shame. They were really expensive and did not actually contain all the much alcohol. After like four appletinis (best drink, by the way) and a strawberry margarita, I was slightly buzzed, like, at best. 

I have no excuse for the fact that we went to the casino afterwards. Like, no excuse at all. But, yes, my sister and I went to the casino and I lost all of the money I had in my wallet. 

It wouldn't have been so bad if I would have lost it all, like, straight off the bat. But there was a point where I was legitimately doing a good job and winning money! I started off the night with thirty bucks.

 When you're a poor college student that is actually a lot of money. That is half of a power bill right there. Or a third of a grocery bill, minus the name-brand fruit juice. 

I lost ten of it real quick. There's a machine called the Zodiac Sisters and let me tell you, they are some fickle bitches. I've been to the casino three or four times and half of those times the Zodiac Sisters are like falling over each other to give me all of the money. My dad and I won a hundred bucks one time. It was great. I bought a pizza. 

But, no, other times they are just coldhearted and terrible fake people who take my ten dollars and give me nothing back. That's what happened this weekend. All of my money...poof! Gone! It was like magic,  but not the good kind. Dark magic. Evil magic. 

So, yeah. Ten dollars all gone. Three and a half bottles of name-brand crangrape juice. It was a dark ten minutes for me. 

But, once I got over that and stopped wailing in despair, my sister and I decided to play blackjack. Blackjack is a game that I am terrible at. I panic and do incredibly stupid shit like hit on an 18 or stand on a 12. 

But, no, my sister is super helpful and will usually stand next to me and tell me things like, "no Danielle that's stupid don't do that why are you making these choices no do you hate having money no no stop." So it works out. But, there were only two seats left and they were far away from each other so I had to rely on my own horrible decision making skills for once. 

I didn't lose all of my money right away. I started with twenty, got up to fifty and then refused to stop playing until I was back to zero. 

I know. 

I know. 

I know. 

I am not a functional adult and I do not make good choices. I've got that. I am crystal clear on that fact. So, yes. I left the casino minus thirty bucks which, when you make minimum wage like I do, is equal to about a whole shift of making stir fry. 

But, to celebrate our crushing and complete defeat, my sister and I went and got cigars flavored like tropical fruit. They were terrible, made me gag and I smoked mine anyway dammit. I am an adult I am so allowed to smoke cigars flavored like tropical fruit if I want to. 

After that, we almost got tattoos, wimped out on getting tattoos, went back to my apartment, watched mediocre stand-up comedians on netflix (none of them were women because women are terrible at stand-up) and ate lots of cookie dough ice cream. 

Bad choices! All of the things we did were bad choices! 

It was fun, though. 

But, yeah, the next day the people with the apartment above me made some bad choices of their own. And by the people above me, I actually mean the water-heater above me. It broke, leaked and ruined my bathroom ceiling. I woke up, went in to get a shower and saw hunks of drywall hanging down like flakes of skin hanging off of a gigantic, shedding lizard. 

I don't know.

It was unpleasant, water was still leaking down and I got hit in the head with a piece of ceiling. I called my landlord to fix it, as one does, and the maintenance guy came over, which was good of him. What wasn't good of him was how he went upstairs, stopped the leaking and then just kind of skedaddled without even kind of fixing my ceiling. 

I had to call back later and then they told me that I should be able to handle the whole "slowly crumbling bathroom ceiling" business on my own. Um, no, landlord people. That is not a thing I can do on my own. I do not have a husband or a boyfriend or even a close brofriend who I can force to do it for me. 

Even if I would have decided to date that midget little person dude, this would still be an issue. He couldn't have reached the ceiling. I mean, on a scale of one to Colorado, it is not that high, but still. That midget dude was really short. 

But, no, I can get by on my own usually. 

I can do a lot of things that most girls would have their male significant others do. I fixed a bottle-opener-shaped hole in my wall. I know how to replace fuses. I can grill burgers like a champ. I know how to fly-fish for gods sake, but I cannot fix my holey bathroom ceiling by myself, landlord. 

I was very whiny and persistent and they said he'd come back on Monday. I'm pretty sure they did that to make me stop calling them. The problem was that this was on Saturday. I didn't get to use the shower for like two days. It was horrible and I hated it. 

Anyway, my ceiling is fixed now thanks to my maintenance guy. I gave him a fist bump and told him thanks. I'm pretty sure I weirded him out. 

Whatever. 

Right now, I'm kind of chilling out in the library and avoiding thinking about work. I do not want to go to work. Do not want. 

See, I usually enjoy my job. Making stir fry is the bees knees or some other saying that means cool, but is more relevant socially. Fly? Swag? YOLO?

I don't know. 

But, no, whenever the weather is good, people decide to make the trek out to Elliot, the dining hall where I work. And the weather is really good today, guys. 

Work is going to suck, hardcore. It sucked yesterday too. I worked in the dishroom, so it was already less fun than usual. But we had so many people. Usually, we have like two-hundred and some-odd customers. That's a usual night for us. Last night we had 380, which is just insane. We haven't had that much since thanksgiving dinner last semester. 

I saw dishes in my dreams last night, guys. I'm pretty sure there is still nacho cheese lodged underneath my fingernails. 

Working in dining is so very glamorous. 

Later. 

Bars are Weird, Casinos are Depressing and So Am I

Guys, this weekend was weird. 

I turned 21. Went to bars. Drank alcoholic beverages. 

Refused to dance beyond awkward hand motions. 

You know, the usual. 

So, I accidentally hit my friend in the head with my, admittedly rather large, nose. It was pretty hard. There was blood involved. Coming from my nose, not her head. My nose is large, not sharp. 

Anyway. 

I didn't actually drink that much, for turning 21 and all. I'm kind of super lame when I'm drunk too. Mostly I wanted to go home and take a nap, but that is kind of my default setting so no one was actually surprised. 

I get really weirdly pretentious, too. I kept quoting Oscar Wilde for some reason and talking about obscure bands. I don't know. I just wanted to let everyone else know I was better than them. Because of this, I sang really loud when songs I knew were on. I also sang really loud when songs I did not know were on. 

Also, I was really cold, but refused to wear a coat because I didn't want anything obstructing the view of my very sparkly shirt. 

It was real sparkly, guys. Fishing lure sparkly. Intense amounts of sparkle. 

And for some reason, I kept calling everyone dude. I don't know why. I really, really don't. 

So, you know...shenanigans. 

But the fun doesn't stop there, oh no it does not. The drunk Danielle fun train is just leaving the station. Lots of embarrassing stops coming up, folks. 

I'm going to tell you something and you're going to think I'm lying, but I'm really not. 

A midget hit on me. And I ran away. 

And before you yell at me, I mostly ran away because a boy was talking to me. Not because he was a midget, specifically. And look, I know that "midget" is probably not the most politically correct term or whatever. But if I'm being honest here, "little people" seems way more offensive than midget. Little people is what my mom calls her kindergarteners. 

But back to my story. I was hit on. By a little person midget whatever. It wouldn't be all that extraordinary, but he was literally the only guy who hit on me. All night. Have I just been looking in the wrong niche or something? Am I, like, just attractive to midget little people whatevers? 

This is going to require some soul searching. Also, some more trips to bars in the name of scientific inquiry. 

I am nothing if not respectful of the scientific method. 

Speaking of things that are weirdly sad and smell like smoke, I went to a casino! 

It was super depressing, guys. Incredibly depressing. Depressing all around. Most of the people there were old or looked old because their skin had been exposed to lots and lots of cigarette smoke. 

It was a hotbed of sin and debauchery, let me tell you. 

I spent thirty dollars. 

And won nothing. 

I also learned that I suck at blackjack. Did you know blackjack was a thing you could, like, hardcore suck at? I so did. It was really sad. Took me like five minutes to lose twenty bucks.

My favorite machine was an under-the-sea-themed slot machine. There were sea turtles and it make a do-do-do-do sound whenever I bet anything. 

It was all very exciting.

Until I lost thirty dollars and realized that my juice would have to be store-brand this month. That shit is just unacceptable. It is either watered down or way too sugary.  

Ugh...my life. Is so. Difficult. 

I should go. I have homework that I didn't do because I was busy quoting The Picture of Dorian Gray in a bar and singing the National and Frightened Rabbit songs over Ke$ha. Loudly. 

I'm real cool guys. I so don't blame that midget for hitting on me. 

Later. 

Juice, Polygamy, Screenplays and Appletinis

Sup.

It's a Thursday. It's cold outside.

So, you know, the usual things are happening. Bad weather, day that ends in y...check marks all around.

But, I turned 21 this week. So that is an exciting thing that happened. I drank some appletinis and bought some beer even though I really hate beer. So...I have that now. I'm not going to drink it, because it is twelve kinds of nasty, but I have it. And I am legally allowed to have it.

So suck on that, everyone younger than me. I might be likely to die sooner than you, but I have beer! Legally!

Right now I'm awkwardly lingering in a Starbucks trying to kill the forty minutes or so I have between classes and work. I figured it was write a blog or work on a screenplay, so...

Oh, you think I don't have a screenplay?

You're right. I don't have a screenplay. I have, like, a dozen of them.

But anyway, I wrote a pretty fabulous paper on polygamy the other day. And by pretty fabulous, I mean that halfway through, it turned into a self-righteous rant about how it was Perfectly Fine to be single and about how other people shouldn't force their life choices on me, oh my god Mom get off my case.

Yeah...

I probably should have rewritten it, but I didn't start it until two in the morning the night before. So really I'm just lucky I wrote anything at all. It was a bit of of a mess though, I'm not gonna lie. I think at one point I combined, like, three different sociologists into one mega-sociologist.

It worked for the Power Rangers. Why not sociologists?

I'll let you know about my grade. I wonder if it's possible to give someone a negative score for an assignment.

Anyway...time for a story.

Before I tell this story, vosotros need to understand something. I have a weirdly intense, probably majorly unhealthy, love of fruit juice. Two particular types, apple and cran-grape, stand above the rest. If I don't have a bottle of each in my fridge, my mental state is less than ideal.

I honestly think I might be a little bit cripplingly dependent on cran-grape and apple juice. They are literally the only items on my grocery list that I buy name-brand. I have money in my monthly budget set aside for juice-items.

My first alcoholic beverage was an appletini because of the possibility it might taste like apple juice.

But back to my story!

So, I turned 21 Tuesday. I had a bottle of wine that I got from my parents for my birthday and I decided that I was going to open that sucker and have a glass. I'm 21, dammit. I do what I want.

Because I am a liquor novice, me and the bottle opener got into a bit of a tussle. And by bit of a tussle, I mean I threw it at my wall and now I have a hole in my wall shaped like a bottle opener. So I gave up on the bottle opener and used a knife to cut the cork in half like a really lame ninja or something. Unfortunately, that made the cork fall into the bottle.

So now I had a bottle of wine with bits of cork floating in it. It was really, really frustrating. I laid down on my kitchen floor for a while and my cat Commander Shepurred started chewing on my toes. I needed a place to put my stupid wine. And I had ruined the stupid cork.

But...what was that? And empty apple juice container in my fridge? What luck!

And it was lucky. Until this morning when I wanted a drink of apple juice. The wine was vaguely apple juice colored and I was tired enough that it passed. So I just took a big drink of of it. Of wine. That I thought was apple juice.

It was literally the worst thing that has very happened to anyone ever. I spit wine all over my kitchen.

I had to eat, like, half a dozen waffles to make myself feel better.

Anyway, in other news, the ladies at work have started to offer me rides home. Instead of being a normal human and saying something like "oh, no thanks," or, I don't know, accepting the rides so I don't have to walk a mile and a half to get home, I felt the need to explain why I hate accepting rides from other people and that my Danielle-brand of craziness that makes me unwilling, or let's beyond honest, actually physically unable to accept help from other people.

I just really hate depending on other people for things. For anything at all. A lot of me wants to get a medical degree so I'll never have to ask a doctor for help. I hate ordering things in the mail because it means depending on another person to deliver the things to me. I hate asking my landlord to fix things because it means admitting that I can't fix the things by myself.

I have problems.

Problems that require me to go now and not twenty minutes from now because I am too stubborn to take the bus.

The snow awaits.

How (Not) to Make Good Life Choices

The weather's up to double digits, you guys.

 #heatwave

There is supposedly a giant monster storm headed my way next week. So...that sucks. I almost want to have kids someday for the sole purpose of telling them I walked miles uphill in the snow to go to school and work. 

Because I legitimately do! There are hills involved in my walk. I have a hole in my favorite pair of shoes. I own a newsboy cap. I am essentially an orphan in the 1930s. 

So...valentines day is coming up.

Ugh.

I happens to be the weekend after my birthday. I plan on going up to Purdue and going to the bars with my friends. It's probably really sad that going to bars is less unhealthy than my usual coping methods. They involve me literally hiding under my bed and eating a pint of ice cream while listening to I Can't Make You Love Me on repeat. For hours.

Eh...I actually care less about the whole perpetually-single thing than I used to. I mean, even if I had a boyfriend, I wouldn't know what to do with him. I'd be like, "hey there, significant other! is it cool if we only see each other three days a week or whatever? and when we do see each other, is it okay if I mostly ignore you?" Because seeing the same person every day of the week for hours at a time...ugh. 

That sounds all kinds of horrible. 

Moving on...I made the executive decision last night to not sleep. I had to read, like, twelve court cases for my sociology of law class and write summaries and critiques on them. You know, it would have been fine if I would of started right when I got off work at 9. But I decided that watching a documentary about killer whales on netflix was something that I had to do before I could start. 

I don't know. It wasn't a good life choice. 

But, yes. I didn't finish until like 6 in the AM, so I just didn't sleep. Again, I don't know why I did that. It was another poor life choice. 

When I got home from classes at 1, the coffee wore off  and I just crashed. It was almost embarrassing. I don't think I've ever been as happy to see anything as I was to see my bed after I got home. And when I say I completely crashed, I mean it. I slept for seven hours with my coat, hat, gloves, shoes and backpack still on. 

When I woke up, I was very confused. I didn't know where I was. My scarf was sort of choking me. I was sort of sure I'd been kidnapped. 

I don't know why anyone would want to kidnap me, honestly. I have no money and no marketable skills. Other than my ability to cook stir fry. Someone might kidnap me for my stir fry skills. 

Anyway, speaking of my job...when I get bored at work, I like to do weird stuff with the food in my line. It's not creepy weird, it's just strange. Like, I'll make towers out of country fried steaks or see how many frozen shrimps I can stack on top of each other. 

(My record is five.) 

But, no. Yesterday I built a tiny and adorable little city out of corn on the cobs. Or, erm, corn cobs, I guess is what normal people call them. Whatever. I had my corn on the cob city and it was great. I decided that its name was Cornatopia. And, I don't know, I thought that was really, really, extremely funny. 

I had to go sit down in the store room for a little while because I couldn't stop laughing and it was alarming people. Nobody else could seem to comprehend just how funny it was. Cornatopia. It's just...I don't even...it's so funny! How can you not laugh helplessly about that for like a quarter of an hour?

I'm not the weird one here. 

This isn't the first time my emotions at my job have succeeded at making others uncomfortable. Sometimes, when I cook things that have onions in them my eyes will water. My customers, who are mainly high schoolers, always get really freaked out and try to talk to me about my feelings. 

Sometimes, I tell them about the onions. Other times, I just roll with it and let random sixteen year olds go all therapist on me. 

I am not a good person. 

I am also a person who really needs to go make some circus waffles with my circus waffle maker. You see, I was far too busy sleeping today to eat. So...yes. I'm off to do that. 

Politics in an Arctic Wasteland

It's cold.

It's very cold.

It's stupidly, unfairly, literally worse than the movie The Day After Tomorrow cold.
As a human person who walks literally everywhere in their life, this poses a problem. A problem called "I'm starting to think I need a dogsled team to get to work, oh my god Indiana we aren't the freaking Yukon, calm the hell down."

It's...it's a working title. I feel like it does a pretty good job of expressing the "I can't feel my ears" level of cold I am currently dealing with.

Ugh. Weather. I am pro-global warming at this point. Go ahead, ice caps. Melt already. I can kayak to work or something. So long as the temperature is never negative ever again.

The penguins can adapt. I believe in them. They can move to the cities and become stock brokers and Red Lobster waiters in their tiny little tuxedos. It will be great. Shut up.

In other news, my birthday is soon. So...get excited. I'm turning 21.

Drunk Danielle is coming to a theatre near you!

 Not really. There will be no drunk Danielle. My birthday is on a Tuesday. You can't get drunk on a Tuesday. Well, I mean you can. It's just...not advisable.

Also, I have to work that day. Stir fry is Serious Business. You shouldn't drink and fry. It's not the law...but it probably should be.

So, speaking of my job, something exciting happened the other day. It was a regular scandal. Someone wrote "Obama Sucks" in the men's employee bathroom above the urinal. You might be saying to yourself, "really, toilet graffiti? That's exciting for you?"

But it really is! It is literally the most exciting thing that has ever happened at my job ever. Well, we had a fryer sort of explode one time, but other than that this is the most exciting thing! Someone had the audacity to pen such a bold, thought-provoking political statement on the bathroom wall.

And we only have two male employees. And one of them was the one who found it! So...my first ever detective-type investigation is starting to get real exciting. I plan on buying some tacks, yarn and printing out a whole bunch of mostly-irrelevant pictures to create one of those crime-tracking-web things on my bulletin board. Also, I need a bulletin board.

Honestly, though...it was super funny to see everybody at work freak out over the "Obama Sucks" written above a urinal. It was all anyone talked about. Not just during that one shift either, no...it was for like the entire week afterwards.

Politics, am I right?

Speaking of other very exciting things, I bought a ring that looks like a watch. It's awesome and fantastic and it only cost me 99 cents (and no, I was not thrift shopping.)

I am not allowed to wear my watch-ring at work. I know because I tried to wear it at work and was forced to take it off and go put it in my locker. I attempted to protest this gross injustice by appealing to my boss. My boss said that I was not allowed to wear my ring because only wedding rings are allowed. I looked him right in the eye and told him that my watch ring was a wedding ring. He just looked kind of tired and sad and went away without saying anything else.

I don't think he's all that fond of my theatrics.

Anyway, I should probably go...it's stupidly cold outside and I have to somehow make my way to work. It's times like this when I really rue my irrational fear of buses, shuttles and all other forms of public transportation. Also my completely rational fear of attempting to drive myself anywhere.

That fear is 100% rational. One time, I jumped a round-a-bout and lost a hubcap because I was too busy yelling to pay attention the the actual driving business.

Ugh.

My life is stupid.

A Missive from the Executive Director of Stir Fry Affairs

Well, hi there. It's been awhile, hasn't it?

Things have happened, guys. So many things. 

The most relevant of those things is that I've started a new class that's really boring with a really boring professor whose only redeemable factor is that he allows me to have my computer while he drones on about criminal justice whatnot. Hence the back-from-the-dead blog. 

But, no. Seriously. I've had things going on. So many irons in fire. So many. 

I got a job. So...that's a thing. I'm in charge of all things stir fry from 4:30 to 8:30 every Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday down at Elliot dining. I also do dishes sometimes, but I'm more focused on the stir fry thing. I love cooking stir fry. I'm awesome and fantastic at it. 

I made up a job title for myself. I am a stir fry artist. Or the executive director of stir fry affairs. Not gonna lie...my boss does not appreciate these titles as much as he should. Mostly he looks tired and rolls his eyes. I'm great. I don't know what his problem is.  

I'm also in three online classes this semester. It allows me to bring my procrastination to impressive new levels. I can do all my classwork in my batman footie pajamas while watching cartoons and eating grilled cheese. 

You should all be jealous of my totally awesome life choices. 

Speaking of awesome life choices, I accidentally went waaaaaaaay over my data plan with my cellphone so...now I owe the phone company like 800 dollars. I would just like to say that this is totally not my fault. Ball State's wifi apparently has an aversion to, I don't know, actually working. So all of my awesome music listening is now threatening to bankrupt me. 

I mean, like, more than I've already been bankrupted. 

Lucky thing I have a job. 

I mean, I only got the job to buy myself a new computer. (FYI, I did buy a new computer. And it's awesome. I've played so many games on it. All the games.) But now it seems like my job will do what most other people's jobs do. You know, pay for my food and my rent and stuff. Ick. I hate being a vaguely responsible adult. 

My professor is off on a tangent about both kings and antibiotics. I...did not know those things overlapped, historically speaking. I also have no idea what it has to do with criminal justice. 

But I digress. I kind of haven't been paying even a little bit of attention. Like, I've been the opposite of paying attention. I've been actively trying not to absorb the information being presented. Kind of like I do when someone tries to explain a sport to me. 

I have literally no clue what goes on in any sort of sports game...tournament...thing. And I am proud of that. That is a point of pride for me. 

Moving on...

I turn 21 next month. And we all know what that means....

I can legally apply for a marriage licene in Mississippi without parental consent!!!

Wooo!!!

There's also the drinking and gambling bit, but I'm less excited about that. Drinking and gambling are things that require you to leave your totally awesome apartment and interact with society. And that's not cool, bro. 

Society sucks. 

Trust me on this, I'm a professional. I'm almost done with a sociology degree. Legit. One class left and then I can go and do whatever it is someone with a bachelor's degree in sociology does. 

Be unemployed? 

Continue to make stir fry? 

I wouldn't complain. I like making stir fry. I am the executive director of stir fry affairs.

Wow. Class is almost over. 

I probably should have payed attention. 

Alas, it is too late. And we should not regret the things we cannot change. Gandhi said that. Or something like that.

Probably. 

I should go. (hehe)