turd cuts

my mom was admitted to the hospital on tuesday. she was having chest pains and after some testing they ruled out anything cardiac, but determined that it was acid reflux and some sleep apnea. basically all because of her obesity. it scares me because i believe that my mom uses food the same way that addicts use drugs or alcohol. my mom isn't an alcoholic or drug addict, but i definitely think she's got a problem with using food as a drug. as far as this stuff is concerned i can do nothing but be an example of how recovery can change your life. that's pretty hard when it's your mom.

on a lighter note, the convention is this weekend and i'm really excited. jason is getting all of his stuff together, and i think that we may be having dinner with ken and mike from black anchor tonight. i've got about 13 paintings to sell and we're going to be passing out these cute little pamphlets that jason made explaining the transition from eye candy to black cat. we took a look at the artist list last night and i've got my eye on jesse strother to tattoo me if i can grab some time with him. he's badass!

i was supposed to work today but meadow covered my shift. i'm finally going to go up to my apartment after about two weeks of ignoring that place. i've gotta pay my rent as much as i don't want to, and get a few things squared away. possibly start actually staying up there. ugh. i've just gotta do it!

i worked my ass off at work yesterday. i've been getting really tired of that place lately. i know this because i've been letting mean customers get to me. mostly i can ignore them or just be nice and forget about it, but occasionally i let them sneak in.

anyway i've gotta go get my day started. TTFN!!!!!!!!!!!

sometimes slowly

i done did another tattoo yesterday. it was on one of my very best friends tim cannon. it was so much fun and i didn't freak out nearly as much as i did before. it took less time than i thought, a mere two hours, and everytime i tattoo it gets a tiny bit easier than before. i had such a great time.

yesterday was pretty much awesome all around. my brother brought us starbucks and we all hung out for a bit. i cleaned up the apartment and did a little skull painting. tim came over and we headed to the shop where i convinced him to let me do something a little easier and more tattooable than what he wanted (about three small paragraphs of lettering scrolling around his arm. ugh) and i had the best fun doing it. i chaired the meeting and we came back home and ate village white pizza (SO DELICIOUS). tim, jason, and i had a pretty awesome convo about buddhism and i read and went to sleep. my life now is so gratifying and awesome. my relationships with people just continue to get more and more dynamic and meaningful and i'm getting used to the idea of being a respected person.

learning how to tattoo has been one of the best experiences of my life so far, and i couldn't have done it without getting sober first. i've learned to accept that doing a little bit of something at a time gradually will eventually leave you with something significant to look at, if only you work at it bit by bit. this is completely contrary to the way that my brain is used to thinking, so it takes some time to not want to expect immediate results or get an immediate solution, which using drugs and alcohol so conveniently provided. but it works and i'm feeling so awesome about the small amount of progress that i've made so far. it gives me hope and motivation to keep doing what i'm doing.

it's a new day. yay!

i didn't go to that party last night. i still felt all wonky from this weird headache i've been having and being around a bunch of drunk people in the cold in a halloween costume just didn't seem appealing. so instead jason, brent, and i made toll house cookies and ate them with ice cream while watching transamerican love story on netflix. if you don't know what that is, it's a reality show featuring a mtf transsexual who is looking for love on a reality show. it was so bizarre and we had fun making our own commentary. we watched the first and last episodes only because that's all we could stand. brent went home and while jason played diablo II i watched the amazing ladies and gentlemen the fabulous stains. this movie if you don't know, was just released on dvd and was made in 1981, the year mtv came out. not only does it really show candidly the way that the media shapes fame, it features three girls who form a punk rock band and who in the end get the fame that they deserve, by themselves and without the help of some guy that one of them is romantically involved in. it was so awesome to see that, plus diane lane and laura dern are super young and punk rock. it's really sad how much we've backslided over the past twenty years. a movie like this would never be made today.

i've been sleeping so well lately, and getting up around nine everyday which is unprecedented for me. i think it's cutting off caffeine in the afternoon and evening. hopefully my headaches won't persist. i'm pretty certain that it was caffeine withdrawal that was causing them. i did a symptom checker on webmd.

i'm tatttooing my good friend tim today. he's getting some lettering on his arm. i'm excited. i'll let yinz know how it turns out.

fat

i feel really funny today. i don't know if it's the cut down in caffeine, but i'm depressed and my head feels all fuzzy. i've been so down on myself lately, and i've not even been off my diet for a month. today was the first day in awhile that i could wear clothes that aren't clothes to go to work in and i got so upset at my body. i hate feeling like this, i feel so huge and unattractive. ugh i just had to say it. i was at the shop and i just had to leave, nothing was going to make me feel better. i'm back to weight watchers even though i just want to eat everything in the world.

weekend fun!

i had the worst headache in the world yesterday. it lasted approximately 6 hours. nothing seemed to help it. finally at about 11 it died down after i took three asprin. it's gone this morning thank goodness. we watched one of my favorite documentaries last night the legend of leigh bowery. it's really great. check it out. i'm off for the next three days! it's so exciting. i don't even know what i'm going to do with myself. we were going to see the screening of kevin smith's new movie with a q and a with him tonight at the oaks, but it's $50 to get in. i love kevin smith but i can't afford that. i think it's sort of ridiculous that it costs that much anyway. i think we're going to go to the famous evaline halloween party tonight. i posted the flyer above. it's within walking distance and the theme is pretty cool. it's always a huge party and i think it will be fun. jason is going to be an old timey tattooer with suspenders and a mustache and i'm going to be the tattooed lady i think.

oh yeah and i forgot to give a shout out to my awesome boyfriend for surprising me with these:



he's totally the best.

Black Cat Tattoos January 2009

this week has been pretty boring. go to work, go home take a nap, go to a meeting, and then eat dinner and go to sleep. i've been eating a lot of junky food lately and not really taking care of myself. i get like that when i've got a lot of other stuff going on and especially when i'm on my period. i've been feeling really guilty about it, which is completely ridiculous because all i really need to do is just stop doing it and try a little everyday. i've been cutting out caffeine for the past three days because it was getting really ridiculous the amount of espresso and coffee i drink on an everyday basis. it was starting to really make me feel awful. this is the second time i've done this and i guess that's what happens when an alchoholic works at starbucks. i've noticed that i've been sleeping a lot better. i guess that makes sense. it's like i don't even let my body get a chance to be tired i just pump it up with coffee the first chance i get. it's just a way for me not to feel an uncomfortable feeling, which is totally an alcoholic way to be. sometimes i'm powerless over caffeine and food. i'm working on it.



jason made our shop's website last night. it's really nice. we were talking about our ideas for making it look better and what cosmetic changes we're going to make and i'm getting really excited about it. i'm so pumped to have my own section on the website for my tattoos and paintings. it's super motivating and i'm so excited!!! he made one of the logos a few nights ago and has been playing around with different ones too. it's so cool to see him so into it, i really think it's going to be a great thing for him. starting in january i'll be tattooing. it's really pretty unreal that it's happening so quickly, but the way it all came about seems right. it's funny how things change when you actually show up for your life everyday and work at stuff a little bit at at time. i used to just be paralyzed by fear of doing the most mundane things and wonder if i'd ever do anything with myself besides get myself into dramatic situations and obsess over them for months at a time. i can't tell you how amazing it feels to be free from that. i really feel like i can do anything and the positive and energetic person that i've always been inside is finally coming out. it feels pretty fucking great.

our whole outlook and attitude upon life will change

i wanted to write a few quick words before i head out to the shop, just because the past couple of days have been pretty noteworthy. on sunday i tattooed that posada print i posted a week or so ago on my friend/coworker chris. it took about three hours, i outlined it and calligraphied the outside outline. it's not done yet, i still have to shade it, but it was probably the most fun i've had all year. i felt like everything else just disappeared and it was just me and that tattoo. it was so fucking awesome. it didn't hurt that it turned out way better than i thought it was going to either. jason was impressed and that's all i need to know that i did a good job. i set up the home group and chaired the meeting and that was that. a great day overall.
yesterday we had our staff meeting. i had a one on one meeting with my supervisor and was certified as a shift supervisor. she told me that i was doing a great job and for the first time ever no one had anything bad to say about my work. then she asked me how i felt about getting another promotion and that the district manager was really excited about me and thinks i'd do a great job in the company. i honestly can't tell you how vastly different this is than any other meeting i've ever had with a boss. i got really emotional because i'm just not used to being a good employee for one thing, and getting promoted once was kind of a shock. it felt so awesome and i owe it all to being sober and showing up for my life. jason and i had sushi and walked around shadyside and had an amazing day. i got new glasses that will be done on friday. here's a picture:
i love them and they are a bit classier and less hipster jokey like all my other frames. anyway things are great and i'm loving life right now. yay!!!

working for the weekend

another long shift at work. i'm fuckin beat. i have to open the store for the next four days. i'm on day three on a nine day stretch and six of the nine are opens, which means i'll be getting up at 430am for the next four days. i'm pretty exhausted. i can't do chris's tattoo today because jason is tattooing zane and i'm chairing sacred heart so i have to be there around 730 to set up and it's just not enough time. not to mention how tired i am. ugh. i hate to complain, because life is so good right now. i feel like what i'm doing is exactly right for me at this stage in my life and that feels so fucking great lemme tell you. i did the 8th step yesterday with my sponsor. i made a list of all people i had harmed and became willing to make amends to them all. i basically just have to make an effort to be selflessly involved in people's lives that i've hurt in the past, mostly my family. i was suprised at how easy it was, but then again my drinking career didn't last as long as others have. speaking of which, james is drinking again and thommy is moving back home to connecticut. i had a sort of dramatic and potentially harmful relationship with james a few months back and i'm glad i cut it out because he's really dangerous to my sobriety, he was then and he definitely is now. it was such a lesson though, my interaction with him. it helped to identify something really pertinent to making a huge change in old patterns. it's really unbelievable how much i've grown and am continuing to learn about myself through sobriety. the promise that "we will intuitively know how to handle situations that used to baffle us" is really coming true for me lately. juggling my job and painting and drawing and having tattoos set up and going to meetings, doing step work, working at the shop, etc etc., basically all of the things that i do now would have totally overwhelmed me to the point of saying "fuck this shit" a year or so ago. but for some reason doing a little bit at a time and having help just makes it so much easier and over time, i just keep gaining more and more perspective and motivation, all the while being happy and free. it's pretty incredible. i used to be so depressed and anxious all of the time. not to say i don't have bad days, but they are way fewer and far between than they used to be. i would've been overwhelmed by the very act of writing this blog a few years ago, then i would've gotten down on myself for not writing anymore and the vicious cycle of self loathing would begin. now it's easier to just do it. i'm go grateful and fortunate to have understood enough a year or so ago that i had to be willing to just listen to someone else for a change. i owe my life to that. and at the very least i owe my happiness to that.

i want these. bad.

so i have an ipod and so far it's been through about three different sets of itunes and everytime i've managed to save all of my music files, until now. i'm about to dump it all and re-start my library because frankly i just don't care enough to try to save them. it's impossible to save what's on there without it being a total pain in the ass, and to be honest i'm kind of excited to start all over with what i've got now. the only thing that i'm going to miss on it is all of the smiths and cure stuff i have. just about everything ever recorded, but oh well. i buy music so much more often now than i ever have before and i must say that i'm enjoying it much much more than just stealing it. i used to get so overwhelmed by the possibility of being able to download anything i wanted. for some reason it's much more satisfying to try to find it at the store. it may sound crazy, but i like going to record stores and when we were in seattle and found a couple of records that i was really searching for, it was so awesome and i realized how much i missed that whole experience. so here's to making things harder on myself just for the sake of fun. yay!

jason and i are both off today and we're going to draw and paint together. i'm making little paintings to go into these tiny little frames that i bought at the thrift store. hopefully i get them done in time to sell them at the convention. i'm pretty excited about the convention this year. it's always a good time and a lot of my starbucks girls are coming. they are all a bit more educated about tattoos now which i'm really proud of. i've got two appointments lined up for the next two sundays. i'm really excited and nervous a little. i don't really get nervous about it until i'm about to go to sleep and i think about it a lot. but today i'm going to draw the images a bunch and paint and hopefully get my hands in tip top shape. this apprentice thing is going pretty slowly, but i'm glad. i feel like it's moving at a comfortable pace. i'm way more comfortable with a machine in my hand now than i was a few months ago. cleaning up the station after jason is done tattooing has been a big help just getting used to being in the drivers seat. it's not the same as actually tattooing but it's definitely helpful. these next couple of tattoos are really going to be good practice and i'm super excited to do them. i'm pretty confident that i'll do a great job. yay!