Brutus the Nudist and Christmas Smells

I am realizing the extent of my OCD as I sit at my computer and type with my hands hovering above the keyboard because the thought of tainting the glass on my desk with my palm prints sends chills up my spine. Do I have serious problems? Clearly.

Victor the Mexican man came and put a new window in my SUV yesterday. He had to have been the nicest guy ever. I didn't even bust out my Purell when I shook his hand and saw black crap all underneath his fingernails. It's funny how I've tried to self-counsel. When I walked down to my parking garage and saw the shattered glass everywhere and realized that my whole day was shot, all I could think was, "RayHay, this is not a catastrophe. This is an inconvenience. This is not the end of the world. It is merely an inconvenience." A little rational-emotive-behavior technique, if you will. I heard one of my professors talk about this one time. He said something about realizing what his brain was doing whenever he went through one of those senior moments where he forgot what he was saying while he was saying it. I love to think about stuff like that. It's weird. It's like this creepy out-of-body experience. Why do drugs when you can self-analyze?

I was planning to write about my trip to Vegas, but the slogan "What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas" should probably also apply to blogging. I would actually like to have a real job one day and I don't need Internet Vegas stories coming back to haunt me. I will quote what my future ex-husband said in an e-mail to me, though. This is how he described me:

You are... the blond bombshell with the quick, analytical mind and even quicker wit.

LOVE IT. This has to be one of the best descriptions of me I've heard yet. The one that took the cake was from my former counseling professor, who said:

Rachel, you're like a kid with roller skates and a rocket pack on.

Not sure what he meant by it, but I think it's dynamite.

So, Hunky McHunkerton who accused me of having a quick mind and quick wit (I'm in love) turned out to be a let down. I met this amazing guy in Vegas. I know, red flag numero uno. The chances of meeting someone decent in Vegas? Numbers are in the negatives. I guess at the end of the day I still believe in people, which normally bites me in the butt. Anyway, I don't want to get into all of the details, but he was completely captivating until I came home and googled him and found out that he was 33 (after he told me he was 28). I did that whole ten-year difference thing once. The guy was completely bonkers. I think I'm going to start cutting off the age at 28. These guys in their thirties are just.. too... I don't know what it is. Honestly, I don't even know why I try this gig anymore. It's exhausting.

There's some ass hole that lives above me who keeps stomping around like freaking Sasquatch. One of these days I am going to walk upstairs, knock on the door, wait for his or her smiling face to open that door, and shank him (or her) right in the intestines. On occasion, I take my mop out of the closet and bang on the ceiling with the handle. Not tonight. My shoulders hurt. All of my cabinets are rattling as this fat ass stomps around his or her apartment. I'm telling you. I'm going to go postal in about five seconds. Four... Three.... Two...

I was working with my student yesterday and we were writing an essay on Africa. Well, she was writing it, I was typing it for her and helping her organize her sentence structure. Anyway, in the middle of our writing session, she sees a grand daddy long legs spider, and she flips out. I told her they don't bite. She's a seventh grade hippie, so instead of squishing it, she picks it up by one leg, puts it in a tissue, and asks me to go with her to her parents' room so we could throw it out the french doors onto the balcony. I escort her, open the doors, and out the little spidy goes. Then I see these two humongous naked-ass pictures on the walls. Really. Really? Yes, really. Her mom is a yoga instructor. There are pictures of naked torsoes doing yoga. That is so flipping weird to me. I grew up somewhere where you just don't display pictures of naked people all over your house. It's just bad manners. My other student's mom has a collage in her office (where we have our sessions) where there are pics of naked kids on the walls. You can see everybody's...business. If you catch my drift.

This is California. People think it's completely okay to be prancing around naked everywhere they go. I went to a Halloween party where I survived about five seconds with my friend. I went to use the restroom and there was a big stack of porno on the back of the toilet. Is it just me, or is it totally tacky to display your porno for all to see? Especially guests. Not a fan.

I just keep thinking how weird it would be to be a little kid and to see pictures of naked people all over the house. I mean, if it's art, I understand. If you have a big oil painting with a big fat naked lady lying on a swing, that doesn't seem so weird. Or if you have a big gaudy statue of a marble torso or something, that seems okay. Only if you're a mobster or from the middle east, of course. But the point is: I find it very odd to have pictures of real live naked people hung all over the place. Weird, weird, weird.

What else.. what else. Oh yeah! I went to Target yesterday and bought some new air fresheners. Oh man. I just realized what I typed. How depressing. I'm writing about air fresheners. My life is over. 24 is quickly approaching. Anyway, I bought some nice cinnamon smells. They smell like Christmas. I don't even really get into Christmas, but my family is coming on Monday (my bday! yay!), and I wanted to have a nice seasonal scent in my house. I forgot that I put these new plug-ins in, so when I came home from class tonight, I was pleasantly surprised to walk into this nice Christmasy aroma.

Oh, man. Class tonight. OK. We took this quiz about Bipolar and manic episodes. One question went a little something like this:

When one has a manic episode, they may experience all of the following except for:
A. Elated mood
B. Irritability
C. Sense of hopelessness
D. Sexual Promiscuity

I was confused. I hate multiple choice. I remembered reading about mania and hypersexuality, but not sexual promiscuity. And I didn't think that hopelessness was right. I picked D and wrote a little note about how sexual promiscuity is not the same as hypersexuality.

So we turn in our quizzes, and after some brief discussion (and I got that question wrong, BTW), my Catholic priest prof. says,

"I see a note here about the difference between hypersexuality and promiscuity. Would you please share your thoughts with the class?"

And Rachel takes the stand.

"Yes, that was me. Well, being promiscuous could mean having multiple partners, making wreckless sexual decisions, being sexually irresponsible, etc. But you don't have to be wreckless if you're hypersexual. I mean, you may just want to go buck wild with one partner."

Poor Father. He turned bright red. He couldn't stop laughing for a second, but then he composed himself and got quite serious.

I never know how to handle stuff like this. You know, reading back on this blog makes me realize how incredibly unusual my life is.

Tonight I started thinking about how weird I must appear to other people. I was sitting on my floor filling out a Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator (my score changed one letter this time), eating chunky peanut butter out of the jar, and watching this show where a woman went nuts and chopped her husband to bits with an ax. Then I thought to myself, "Rachel... Maybe all of these douche bags that you go out with aren't the crazy ones. Maybe it's you. You're the one sitting on the floor, filling out personality tests, eating peanut butter from the jar, and watching women chop their husbands' heads off with axes." Le sigh. It is what it is. I'd rather be myself than be a mealy-mouthed mellie. That's for darn sure.

I sure wish that I could sleep. I'm back on Melatonin. I don't like taking meds for things unless I absolutely have to. For some reason, though, my sleep patterns have been very irregular for the past few weeks. It's probably because I get stressed and stay up all night on the weekends. Anyway. I think it's kicking in. Night night, fans. Night night.