It’s been three months since I started working two jobs and began this official post-college life routine. Everything has all but become a blur. When I’m not working, I’m fervently trying to get my life together like do laundry, balance checkbook (yes, I still do that), pay bills, and catch up on TV (I am now proud to say that I watch Grey’s Anatomy and Once Upon A Time on TV like normal people do…or used to do?). When I’m not trying to get my life together, I go out to socialize with people my own age and to do young-adult-like things—mainly drink in excess and watching TV lazily the morning after. As a result, when I get rare days like today (Happy Thanksgiving) where I don’t have to leave the house at all, I fail to tackle my giant to-do list and instead spend every waking hour watching The Big Bang Theory, my new favorite show. It’s all I’ve been watching this week…and I have to say, I’m quite crushing on Sheldon Cooper.

There’s so much I want to say. But my body doesn’t seem to have the ability to stay up past midnight anymore, because it’s 11 p.m. and I’m about ready to PTFO. Let me try this again tomorrow.

• I’m dangerously addicted to the Southern Vampire Mysteries. I’ve been plowing through them since I bought the first book a couple months ago when Borders was closing. To the point where I’m neglecting important things to do like shower, clean or sleep. I don’t know what it is, but I’m hopelessly in love with Eric Northman. I actually had a very…intimate dream involving him (in his Alexander Skaarsgard form, of course) last week. Eric Northman>>>>>>>>>>>>>Edward Cullen.
• I had quite possibly one of the best Halloween weekends ever possible. It ranks up there with my crazy Costa Rican Halloween last year. I drove down to my old college (can’t believe I call it that now), where many inappropriate and inebriated things happened. More details on that will have to follow.
• I went to my very first ever haunted house last night. At first I didn’t think too much of it on the way there, then while we were waiting in line I actually thought I was going to cry from fear. When we entered the attraction finally, I kept my head down and pretty much closed my eyes most of the time…until I tripped and fell promptly on my face. In all honesty, it’s not too surprising, since I’m well-known amongst my friends for falling down a lot, both sober and not sober. I ended up laughing to myself while on the ground, and my friends thought I was so hurt that I wouldn’t be able to get up and that we’d get kicked out of the haunted house. In fact, one of the actors in scary makeup shined (shone? I’m an English major, I should know this) a flashlight in my face and asked (in a normal voice) if I was okay. After that I found the haunted house to be incredibly funny and became much less scared. With the exception of the part where some psycho swung a chainsaw in our faces. That was where I screamed the loudest.
• I fear I may become addicted to 5-Hour Energy shots soon. I took some for the first time over the weekend to sustain me through all the holiday festivities, and had to take one today since I was basically running on 7-8 hours of sleep total over the past four days. In fact, I was planning to go to sleep tonight at around 9 or 10 so I could completely refreshed for the rest of the week. But like I mentioned previously…Eric Northman and those blasted Sookie Stackhouse novels got me hooked.

OK, time for bed.

I know I talk about Costa Rica a lot. I almost have to put an effort not to mention it in every entry on this blog or in my everyday conversations…but whatever, right? It was only less than a year ago. Anyway, point of this is that I’m catching up on Jersey Shore right now; specifically the episode where the gang goes to the beach and Snooki and Deena make out. And the whole time, I honestly couldn’t help but think, “Holy shit, that was me…”

Well, OK, not completely. I didn’t hook up with a girl or anything like that (although friends told me I did at the time, and I believed them). But sharing a hotel room with friends (both guys and girls), drinking on the beach, souvenir shopping in bikinis, and going crazy at the local discotecas…that was me. Totally my life a year ago. Living in another country for a few months, and then visiting beach locales on the weekend. I freaking miss it.

One thing I am totally baffled by with this new post-college life of mine is how incredibly forgetful I’m becoming. It’s come to the point where I worry myself. I left my packed lunch at home once. I’m losing items (socks, hair clips) or momentarily forgetting things to do. I don’t like it! I used to be able to keep track of things so well, I would know if someone had even stepped into my room. Very OCD-ish, I know. But I liked it that way. Now I’m feeling scatterbrained.

My brother once compared me to a Sim a couple weeks ago. He commented on how I probably go to work with my “bars” low and red (i.e., Energy, Fun, etc.), which means my performance at work would suffer and I’d get fired. And the funny thing is, today I actually took the time to watch some TV and it was as if I could feel my Fun bar rising and turning green.

I can’t believe I just compared myself to the Sims.

So I think I almost have my groove back. Friday night I went out in the city with friends. Ended up not getting home until six in the morning. Legit showed up to work at my retail job in the same tights and skirt I was wearing the night before. People were commenting on how nice I looked, and inside I just felt gross and hungover. I felt young again! Figuratively speaking, of course.

In other news, the first two weeks of the NBA regular season has been cancelled. Now, people keep pointing out to me that this doesn’t necessarily mean it’s all over, but I’m pretty sure at this point the entire season is kaput. And I know it sounds silly and trivial to you people who don’t watch sports or care or whatever, but I am literally sobbing inside. I have no idea what I’m going to do without the NBA for a whole year. And I can’t bring myself to give two shits about NFL football. I really can’t. I mean, I watch the games occasionally and read the headlines on ESPN.com and all…but as much as I try, I just don’t really care. Nothing excites me and gets to me the same way basketball does.

Lately I’ve been reading the Southern Vampire Mysteries, which is the book series True Blood is based on. I don’t know whether to say it is better or not than the show. The writing is 50/50—there’s a lot of cute funny quotes, but sometimes the pop culture references and mundane details annoy me. Charlaine Harris sure knows how to write those male characters though. Eric, Alcide…I don’t know which I’d rather do. And how the hell is it that Sookie has like 10 times more suitors in the books than in the series? Woman’s got men knocking down her door every minute! I wish my life was as exciting. Minus the blood and vampire part.

After several lengthy conversations with close friends, I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t like staying in one place for too long. At this rate it will have been 1.5 months since I last traveled somewhere outside of the Chicago area. That is a long time to me. When you’ve been used to shuffling back and forth between school and suburbs, school and other cities, country to country, you get used to the excitement. The feeling that you’re not going to be in the same place for very long.

I think that may be what’s wrong with me. Before I started working, I did a fair share of traveling during the three months I was living at home unemployed. My family and I went to the Philippines for half a month, and Cincinnati for a weekend. I drove down to Champaign to visit friends. Even before this year, I routinely visited other places like St. Louis. And when I was abroad—well, I was basically in a different place every weekend. I do believe it was this time one year ago I was getting ready to head off to Panama for a school field trip. I can remember those four or five days so clearly. So many memories. And yet if you asked me anything about the past couple weeks, I don’t think I could tell you. Other than that I worked and bummed around.

Used to be I wanted to live the rest of my life out in Chicago. I just don’t see it anymore. I don’t see myself staying here in the suburbs any longer than a couple more years. I’ve said this a thousand times, maybe more, but I want to see the world. I need to see the world. When my mom was my age, she was living and working in Saudi Arabia, thousands of miles away from her home. I need to go back to Costa Rica and remind myself that those four months there weren’t just a dream. I need to go to London, the city I’ve been dreaming about for years. I miss my friends from all over the world, the international students I met at school now living away at their homes in France, Italy, Brazil, Australia, Colombia, Austria.

An old friend (“old” meaning I’ve known him for quite a long time, obviously) last week told me he was surprised to see me finally living at home again. That I wasn’t already making plans to jet off somewhere.

It’s like Shakira said:

Mi destino es andar
Mis recuerdos
Son una estela en el mar

Yeah…I’m too lazy to translate.