Mix Tape Monday: Kickoff

I thought I'd start doing theme days. Monday is actually my 15-hour work day so...we'll see how long this lasts.

Anyway, I work with web, so I listen to Pandora and Musicovery a lot. Today my Pandora station has been playing a ton of The Smiths and Morrissey and the like. So, naturally, I got a snippet of lyric stuck in my head from a song that had not played but happened to reference "The Smiths and Morrissey." It took me a while of random google searching to find it. I was pretty sure it was either the Postal Service or Brand New, but everything I typed into the search engine just resulted in actual Smiths and Morrissey songs. Finally, I found it. It is, indeed, Brand New. The song is called Mix Tape, which is rather fitting for the theme, if I do say so myself. Here's the lyrics, I really like them. You should too.

"Mix Tape"

	Brand New - Mix Tape .mp3
	Found at bee mp3 search engine

I got a twenty-dollar bill that says no one's ever seen you without makeup.
You're always made up.
And I'm sick of your tattoos,
and the way you always criticize the Smiths... and Morrissey.
And I know that you're a sucker for anything acoustic.
But when I say let's keep in touch,
I really mean I wish that you'd grow up.
This is the first song for your mix tape.
It's short just like your temper,
but somewhat golden like the afternoons we used to spend before you got too cool...

I got a twenty-dollar bill that says no one's ever seen you without makeup.
You're always made up.
And I'm sick of your tattoos, and the way you don't appreciate Brand New or me
And I know that you're a sucker for anything acoustic.
But when I say let's keep in touch,
I hope you know I mean I wish that you'd grow up.
This is the first song for your mix tape.
It's short just like your temper,
but somewhat golden like the afternoons we used to spend before you got too cool...

(yeah, but I wish you were my shadow.)

Rolling in the Deep - Chester Bennington style

Worse Things Happen at Sea

And the insanity continues...

In my teaching certification program this semester, I am required to perform 50 clinical hours. The first 25 in a high school and the second 25 in a middle school. I am wrapping up the first half the the clinicals, so a couple weeks ago I decided it was time to make contact with the cooperating teacher for the middle school. I emailed her to let her know my availability and asked her to respond with the days in my availability that would work best for her. After a week, I still hadn't received a response. I emailed the program director and she told me to wait a couple more days and then call the school. Yesterday, I called the school and asked if there was a better way to get in touch with the teacher. She died over the summer. I emailed the program director again to update her and try to find out where to go from here. She basically told me to handle it myself rather than doing her job and finding me a new placement. Apparently she has found a new job and is quitting, so she has no intention of helping me out at all. This so would happen to me.

Excuses

Insanity Abounds: Story of my life.

He'd be all over me.

I don't know what is is about me, but I seem to be a magnet for the crazies. Maybe it's that they can all sense my own inner craziness and feel like they've found some kindred spirit. Whatever the case may be, I'm getting a little tired of it (even if it does supply me with some great blog fodder). Here's just a little taste of the crazy things people say to me:

Exhibit A -
One of the places I work is a local cafe/bakery where I am a cashier/server. One of our regulars is a forty year old mama's boy who has not changed his haircut since the 3rd grade. I don't know how he came to be wealthy, but he eats two meals a day (sometimes three) at our restaurant. And we are not cheap. Sometimes he comes in with his mother, she is a witch with a capital B, and he is no peach either. Anyway, he's a favorite among our staff to make fun of. So when I was nearly hit by a car speeding backwards in the Target parking lot the other day, I was delighted to see it was none other.

Exhibit B -
One of my good friends, we'll call her "Skinny Legs," also works at this cafe/bakery with me. She and I just have a dandy old time together...we make it interesting. So, the other day, while Skinny Legs was stocking cups next to me, a customer came in to pick up a phone in order. Her total was $9.01. She handed me a credit card, but before I could ring it up, she said, "Wait, I think I have a penny."
.....
I asked Skinny Legs to help me split the payment, but she was confused because there was only one customer, so I held out my hand and showed her the penny. She, so rudely, began laughing at me and wouldn't knock it off. So I had to laugh too. But I had to walk away to be discreet and then pull it back together to finish helping the customer, who was obviously drunk. Or just an idiot.

Exhibit C (this is a long one)-

Now accepting applications. Must be a condescending tool.

There's this new store in the mall called Teavana. (I know there are many other branches that have been around forever, but it's new to us, because we're a podunk, poor-excuse-for-a-city). I was having a pretty bad day, was unable to find what I was looking for at every store I went to, and was pretty down. So the flirty, friendly clerk at Teavana, offering me samples as I was walking past, was easily able to convince me to buy something. But not before first asking me about the kinds of tea I like and then condescendingly exclaiming that I'm "not interested in the health benefits of tea at all." He also told me I needed to buy a tin to store the tea in and that it would be cheaper to just fill it up. What he should have sad was that it is a "better deal" to fill it up, not cheaper. Because my total ended up being $36 and change for a lb of Earl Grey.

As soon as I left the store I regretted it, and the more I thought about it the angrier I got. I figured that the tea must have magical properties.

Three days later, I was still fuming. I decided that he took advantage of the fact that I didn't know how their system works. I had also talked to a friend who'd had a similar experience and learned that you do NOT have to buy the tin. But instead of telling me that, or even just simply saying that I needed A tin and not necessarily THEIR tin, he told me I needed to buy one. This was after I asked, "So how does this work?" He failed to mention that they had bags (for FREE) to transport the tea home in. It seemed pretty bizarre to me at the time, but like I said, I was feeling pretty weak.

Warning: There are no magical properties in this tea.

My friend talked me into going back and asking for a refund. I'm not an extremely assertive person, so I'm really proud of myself for following through. I went back and asked to speak to a manager. I explained calmly that I was upset with the clerk who had "helped" me three days earlier and that I felt manipulated. The manager FOUGHT with me for fifteen minutes (and this is awful. You would never hear of a manager fighting with a customer at the cafe that I work at) until I was pretty much yelling at him. Finally, he relented, and only after I threatened to tell all my friends about my awful experience and to trash the store on my blog (oops). He compromised by removing the charge for the tin and returning "half" of the tea, and I got $22 put back on my credit card.

But the best part of the story was when, before returning the tea, he tried to calm me down by soothingly asking me if he could make me a cup of tea, on him, while I waited. I said, "I don't want a cup of tea, I just want to get my money back and get out of here." The rest of the visit went as follows:

Manager - I promise, it won't take any longer.
Me - Fine.
Manager - You like the Earl Grey right? Do you know why Earl Grey is so good for you?
Me - No.
Manager - It has Bergamot in it. Do you know what the benefits of Bergamot are?
Me - No. I just like the taste.
Manager - It's an anti-depressant. It makes people happier.

No Offense, But I Won't Be Catching Any Grenades For You

I can't tell you how glad I am that the Lazy Song has finally pushed Grenade off the radio (for the most part). But, unfortunately, SiriusXM still likes to play it and it comes up two or three times a shift when I am at work. Grenade makes me want to pull my own hair out, and once it's all gone, pull out the hair of whoever is standing closest to me too. And it has nothing to do with the fact that once I hear it, it's stuck in my head for the next two days. (Although that's pretty annoying also).

Let's break it down.
"You take, take, take it all/But you never give"
Hello? Bruno? Red flag right there!!! This is obviously a one-sided relationship, if you can even call it that.

"Gave you all I had/And you tossed it in the trash"
Okay, so, not only does this chick not reciprocate your feelings, she doesn't even respect them. This is not someone worth your time!

"I’d catch a grenade for ya/Throw my hand on a blade for ya/I’d jump in front of a train for ya/You know I'd do anything for ya/I would go through all this pain/Take a bullet straight through my brain/Yes, I would die for ya baby/But you won't do the same"

I'm not going to go any further with the lyrics. It's all right here. This is some pretty serious stuff. Now, I know it's just a song and that these are figures of speech...but they irritate me all the same. The problem is that the 'unrequited love" bug is going around. I believe this is thanks in no small part to Twilight. There's something extremely fashionable right now about obsessive love that is not good for you. Something about clinging to the pain of rejection that somehow makes you deep and soulful and worldly. Remember when being emo was like totally cool?

The thing that worries me is that pre-teens and teenagers and even many adults think this is normal behavior. It's not something I can say I fully understand. Sure, I had a lot of one-sided crushes growing up. Sure, I had my fair share of teenage angst. But it was never something that defined me.

Not until my last relationship. It was not a healthy relationship. Even though my last relationship was not unrequited it was, for lack of a better word, obsessive. At that point in my life, my best friends were far away, I didn't get along with my roommate, and the friends I was closest with nearby were starting to discover different interests and head off in different directions. It was early in the college years where we were all still figuring ourselves out. I was lonely and awkward and shy in a place that was completely foreign to me. So when my ex and I first became friends and quickly learned all of the completely random things that we had in common we became really close really fast. Finally, I wasn't lonely anymore.

Because I was shy, I had a hard time making friends away from him. I used him as a crutch. And he grew increasingly frustrated with my insecurity. But, it wasn't all me. He had his insecurities as well. He would go into weeks of depression and would get mad at me when I tried to talk him through them. He also didn't help my initial cling to him by being the first to say "I love you" not even a month after we had met. He was also the first to bring up the idea that I might be someone he'd like to marry someday. This was all very early into our relationship. We both were attempting a very serious, very adult relationship while we were both just kids. It was doomed to fail.

Reading Twilight was painful - and not just because of the horrible writing - but because it was like revisiting that relationship. And the worst part about it was that, terrible as it was, it was addictive. Obsessive love is addictive, and it's destructive. And, unfortunately, there's no rehab or treatment or pill that can cure it.

Since the end of that relationship, I haven't dated anyone. I've had crushes, but no serious feelings. A big part of it is that I am living at home and don't want to be here forever. I don't want to go looking for a relationship when I can't guarantee that I'll be around long enough to see it through. I also haven't met anyone who has made me think sticking around here would be worth it, or even worth the effort and time a relationship requires which would take away the time and effort I am able to put into finishing my MA. This is not to say that if such a person comes along I won't be happy to do so.

I've had occasional crushes. But they have been fruitless, and I've moved on. So, instead of catching a grenade or jumping in front of train for someone who won't give you what you deserve, I'd recommend adopting the mindsets of these folks:

Gwyneth "Forget You"



Tom Petty "Don't Come Around Here No More"

Green Day "FOD"


Rolling Stones "It's All Over Now (I Used to Love Her)"