So, today is our 7 year anniversary. I stayed up really late last night watching a tv show on Netflix, like an idiot. So I woke up late today, around 10. I stumbled into the kitchen and saw a bag from Dunkin Donuts next to a flower on the kitchen table, and a note that said "COFFEE" on my microwave. I opened it to find a delicious Starbucks vanilla latte. I had just started digging into my munchkins when the phone rang.

Apparently, Mike came by with the stuff and I was still asleep. He didn't want to wake me up, so he sat in the living room for a half an hour waiting for me to wake up on my own. He started to feel creepy, so he drove to his office and called me to wake me up.

It was then that I really looked at the flower on the table. It's an orchid. In a pot. Like I'm supposed to water it and keep it alive. I have never in my life tried to have a plant before. I barely remember to feed and water myself most days.

So I've been doing research on how to care for an orchid, and apparently it's complex. Did you know an orchid can get a sunburn? It can. And you have to let it dry out for one day before you water it because it likes to be dry for a day before it's wet again. And you should avoid the center of the plant and just water around the edges. There are a lot of online orchid communities.

Any bets on how long it will be before I kill it?

I know I've been all Debbie Downer recently, which isn't the way I like to live my life. So today, I'm focusing on things that are making me happy:

• They're slowly tearing down a hospital that's on my way to my college. They're actually using a wrecking ball, so the whole thing looks like something out of a disaster movie. Not only is the wreckage rad to look at, but my favorite part is the old men who gather to watch every day. They bring their lawn chairs and sit line up on the sidewalk to watch the destruction. I think it's great these guys, who probably don't even know each other, have found this common ground and camaraderie. They make me smile every time I drive past.
• There's a deaf kid at my school who always parks near me. His car is covered in Daft Punk stickers. Now, he could have purchased the car used, I suppose. I like to think Daft Punk's beats appeal to everyone.
• Last night's episode of Glee. The music? Great. I loved Finn's Jessie's Girl, Puck's Lady Is A Tramp and Kurt's Roses Turn. It was nice to have an episode I really enjoyed again, because it's been a little lackluster for me recently. Also:

-"I'm a sex shark. I stop moving, I die"

-"That's the problem with your generation... you're obsessed with labels. So you like show tunes. That doesn't mean you're gay, it means you're awful!

- You’re the only guy in school I haven’t made out with, because I thought you were capital-G gay. But having a perfect record would really mean a lot to me… So, let me know if you wanna tap this.”

-“When I saw a sign on the door that said ‘do not enter under any circumstances, I’m making out with a girl,’ I thought it was the start of one of your murder mysteries.”

• The semester's over! And I passed all of my classes. Only one more semester to go after this.
• I love that you can stream whole seasons of shows on Netflix. I'm watching Prison Break now, and I'll (re)watch Buffy next, while Mike and I together are watching Bones.
  
• The National's new album High Violet. It's kind of phenomenal. I love The National more than I can describe. It's dark, moody, sexy, beautiful, intelligent, lush, haunting, complex, moving, and I could go on and on. I LOVE IT. It's not one of those bands/albums that grabs you immediately, and it's probably not for everybody (especially if you're more into pop) but it speaks to me. The National has to be the best "indie" band out there right now. Gorgeous.
  
  

First of all, I appreciate your support. It's good to know that people have your back. I'm kind of a loner, but it's easy to slip from loner to lonely when I'm having trouble because I'm not good at discussing my problems. I love to bottle things up, then push it down deep and ignore it. Expressing real emotions isn't really my thing.

I should also specify, my boyfriend and I haven't broken up. We're just going through a rough patch. Everything I said in my last post was true, but it was also written while I was crying and was maybe a little more forcefully worded than I should have.

And the truth is, I'm just as bad. That was obviously written from my point of view, which places all the blame on him, which isn't true. I have my problems as well. Neither of us are good communicators, plus we're both indecisive and we're both pushovers. We both ignore problems in hopes that they go away.

It makes it hard to have a healthy relationship that way. We are working on it though. I'm not willing to let go just yet.

I'm falling apart.

I can hardly breathe right now, again. I feel like I've been punched in the stomach, again.

I can't keep repeating myself when there's no one listening.

I can only have the same argument so many times.

You do what you want. Just like always, what you want comes first. You do what you want to do when you want to do it, then you're shocked to find out I'm upset.

How many times are you going to make the same empty promises to me? I've lost count. And faith.

I bear my heart and soul to you, and you try to explain to me why I'm wrong to feel what I feel.

Is it so hard? Is it so terrible to put someone else's needs before your own? It doesn't seem that way to me, but then again, I put you ahead of everything, because you are everything to me.

I just wish it was the same for you. I just wish I could be the most important thing.

Well, I'm alive. I survived 5 plane rides, 3 train rides, 1 ferry ride, Mike driving a rental car on the left side of the road, cab rides, multiple subway systems and various other public transportation rides. London was fantastic, Dublin was great, and Paris was... interesting. We saw phenomenal works of art, legendary architecture, and the Guinness storehouse.

I'd show you pictures but Mike has the camera. I think. I'll get them up at some point.

Right now I'm trying not to fall asleep. Our flight to St. Louis from Philly was canceled, so we had to fly to Chicago then to St. Louis, and arrived in about 7 hours later than anticipated. I still had to go to class this morning instead of sleeping in like I wanted. I think we must have terrible travel karma, because we've only been on 3 trips together where we've flown and out of those 3, we've had our return flights canceled twice. Of course, last time we were "stuck" in Vegas, so it was kind of a win.

I'll recap later when I find the camera, but for now, I'm alive and well. Mostly.

So, apparently, I only read young adult novels now. It started with the Harry Potters and the Twilights, but it's moved on from there. I know I'm an "adult", or whatever, but something about these books as really been drawing me in .Thankfully, I look like I'm 16 most days, so I don't look quite as weird checking armfuls of YA novels out at the library. I highly encourage you to check out books that aren't written just for adults.

Like chick lit and/or romance? Sarah Dessen's there for you. She has a bunch of teen romance novels, with outcast, lonely girls and wounded, sad boys that you just want to save. They're sweet in their innocence and simplicity.

Like action/adventure? The Percy Jackson and the Olympians series is excellent. I was flipping through the pages as quickly as possible to see what happened next. I read most of the series in a week. I can't wait for the movie.

A fan of Twilight? Try the Shiver, by Maggie Stiefvater. It's about werewolves, not vampires, and the quality of writing is a lot better (no murmuring) but a similar compulsive readability and love-at-first-sight plot line.

But nothing has prepared me for the sheer amazingness of the Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins. They're about a dystopian North America, where the government pits young people against each other in a televised last man standing competition. I didn't expect to love these as much as I did. I've never even seen an episode of Survivor. But these books are so freaking good, I couldn't put them down. There's a great love triangle (I love Peeta. LOVE), awesome, breathtaking action, and fascinating look at what the future could hold. I can't wait until August when the third and final book comes out.

I'm doing this again because I love it:

Copied from Avitable:

1. Go to the "Random Article" link on Wikipedia. Write down the title of the article. This is the name of your band.

2. Go to “Random Quotations” and the last four or five words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.

3. Go to Flickr and click on “Explore the Last Seven Days”. The third picture will be your album cover.

I've discovered something weird about myself.

Recently, Mike and I have been re watching Pushing Daisies. We watched all the discs in quick succession, until we reached the last disc and suddenly, I didn't want to watch anymore. I wanted to catch up on our tivo'd items, instead. Also, Mike keeps talking (incessantly) about the upcoming, final season of Lost. I'd rather it not come.

Even now, after reading the first four books of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series quickly, I have the final book sitting next to me. I'm listlessly web browsing instead of reading it.

I find myself doing this sort of thing all the time. If I really love a book, I'll read through it quickly, then put it down and it will take me days to finish reading the final chapters.

Why do I do this? Who knows. I guess I just don't like good things to come to an end. Then it's over, and I won't have it anymore. Sure, you can re read a book, or re watch the tv series, but it's not the same.

I'll only find out whether or not Percy can stand up to the Titans for the first time once. I'll only discover (hopefully) why there are two John Lockes, and what the hell the smoke monster is, and who Sawyer ends up with for the first time as the season unfolds. (Although I'm sure I'll watch Lost again on DVD once the whole boxed set is released)

You just can't rush that kind of satisfaction, for me.