For financial reasons, I went off my anti-depressants recently and now I'm sitting on the couch watching true crime shows and inexplicably feel like calling to quit my job so I can go to bed and cry.

So, stuff has happened, but most of it has been bad, which hasn't left me much to write about without sounding like a bellyacher. But absenteeism isn't acceptable to some.

As I've mentioned before, I got married on the first. Sean's family (including some that he hasn't talked to in years) sent cards and gifts (read: money) "for the newlyweds" (the thank you cards are in the mail). My parents? My father told me "when he's invited to a wedding, he'll give us a wedding present." Fair play.

Worse, my mother. She asked what we wanted, I told her that our house was stocked, but our bank accounts were not, and all we needed was money. "Okay," she replies.

A month ago.

About a week ago, I was at my mom's house and she moans that she can't get us anything just yet because "she can't move". Unfortunately, she's been going to parties, and has a trip to Edmonton (three hours away) planned for next week, and really has no excuse. That's why I'd just given up on receiving anything from her, either.

To add insult to injury, though, when I was most recently at my mom's with Shannon, the subject of Shannon's wedding came up. Her fiance has said that the wedding won't happen if his best friend from Ontario can't attend. Immediately, my mom gauchely announces "well, if that's the case I'll fly him here for a wedding present." No more talking from Ashley.

I've pretty much written my mother off as a selfish fuck.

As an aside, let me mention that my parents wouldn't even both go to the hospital when Shannon went into labor. Do I want to even try to invite them both to a small civil wedding ceremony?

Nay.

Now, my father also doesn't intend on getting me a wedding gift, but there's far worse from him and that is he married a bitch.

Last time I went to my father's for dinner, steak was served. It should be known that I like my steak rare, very rare. From the second I walk in the door, my dad's wife Carla is going on about how she's dreading "watching me eat that" because according to her, I'll be talking during my meal. The evening progresses with intermittent mockery of my meat choices until finally it's zero hour and my meat is bleeding on my plate. Carla is truly losing her shit now, incessantly going on about how much it disturbs her. Finally, I tell her, "Carla, you have no idea how badly I want to ruin your meal right now" and Sean and Jason break into a line of questioning regarding the possibility of Carla owning bovine as a pet. She decided then that she would eat outside on the deck, and my dad will join her. So, it's Sean and myself, Jason and Shannon and Carla's son Mitchell inside and our wonderful hosts outside. I wonder the whole time if this is how they treat all their guests.

My father has been absent for years. He's only reemerged since Shannon got knocked up. After some months of Carla's ham-fisted insults of my mother and myself, I'm aware that my presence is only perfunctory. It would just be rude to invite Shannon (she of the grandchild) and leave me out, and if there's only thing my dad isn't, it's blatantly rude.

I'm done with my parents and their systematic destruction of my self esteem.

I'm still looking for a job, though my desire to keep attending these interviews is ebbing drastically. I have no idea who the Hell is applying for every job I apply for, but for whatever reason, I can not get a job. Cold Lake has recently discovered foreign labor and they are completely gung ho, in spite of the fact that there is some heavy duty unemployment in the area, since a lot of oil rigs went belly up. My last interview was extra awesome since the man I was interviewing with informed me many times how much he hates hiring Canadians "because they're lazy, and the Natives are even worse". He told me that he plans on refiling an LMO (labor market opinion - basically says there is no one locally to fill a position) for a Filipino woman he has working for him. It should be mentioned that this woman is as qualified as I am (he told all of her qualifications), but is not Canadian, and is therefore better. Pretty sure this is illegal?

Otherwise, I've quit smoking and thus, compounded all my insecurities regarding my parents. It's been a week (minus about 45 minutes of slipping), and I hate every second of it. My heart often feels like it's going to explode out of my chest, my anxiety is ka-powing all over the place, I cry a lot. I hate it. Apparently it gets better. Everyone who I come in contact with better hope that is the case.

So, yeah. Right now, FML.

So, as I mentioned previously, I am not dead.

I work six days a week, nine hours a day which, to some of you, is child's play, but to lazy, diseased me, can be Hell sometimes. I like my job as a tax preparer 90% of the time (and to the 10% of you who think it's H&R Block's fault you owe money, you can fuck off) and I like the people I work with. This has become the most consuming part of my life, and I often catch myself sharing stories of irate tax-payers or the old lady who passed out in our doorway with people who don't give a damn, anyway.

I had a brief "reprieve" from work last week when I was sick in a way I haven't been since I was a kid. You remember, violently heaving and shitting away all your vital fluids while your mom brought you Pedialyte and bullion? Yeah, that was me, except my mom was absent and Sean was helplessly unaware of my needs. Bless his cotton socks, his was patient with my inert form smelling up the upholstery, though.

The other major change in my life in the past x months was the addition of a new dog to our little family. He's appropriately been renamed Odin, a name initially reserved for my first-born son (plans change, uterine tingles subside). He's from Mayday's litter and was re-adopted from a family who couldn't manage a dog his size any longer. You'd never know the two of them were related, or even the same age, though, as Odin is white with brown patches, twice as big, and already acts like an old man as Mayday does her best to eviscerate him at any given moment. I'll post some photos of him when looking at a computer screen isn't an incredibly painful chore. He's a good dog, but needs a lot of training and hurray for me, I'm doing it on my own.

Sean's been in Florida since last Saturday on some kind of an airplane trip. I don't get it all, it's for work. He hates it and to be fully honest, I revel in that a little every time I have two Tasmanian devils crashing into my legs. My insecurity always rears it's head during these times but Sean's been great about consoling my wounded ego and telling me all the things I need to hear to quit being a horrible shrew.

My family life is weird. Shannon (whose ever-increasing belly is one of the many reasons my want to reproduce has vanished) and I have figured it out: at any given moment, only one of our parents is present. After my parents separated when I was 17, my dad fucked off for about five years. We didn't see him and spoke to him only on special occasions. As two "Daddy's Girls", we were shattered and grew to hate him to compensate. Recently, however, every time my father returns home from his job in the middle of nowhere, he calls and we do something. Alternatively, my mother has essentially vanished, only occasionally coming around to tell us of her latest debauchery. And debauchery it is! When your 20-something daughters are appalled at your behavior, it's time to take a look at your life.

So that's where I've been. And you? What's new in your life (she asks, as if she hasn't been stalking your blogs this entire time)?

Here's the deal. If you want to, you can comment asking me to list 5 things I associate with you. Then you take those 5 things and expand upon them in your LJ.

Here is what Lovely Miss Vanessa wrote for me!

Yahoo

One of my earlier "jobs" and where Vanessa and I met. Additionally, I talked to the most developmentally stunted people to ever use a telephone, let alone a computer. I departed with gusto, ensuring that everyone knew just what I thought of them by shouting the word "fuck" a lot, and flipping the bird like a New York cabbie.

Art

I cringed at this. What to say? I get in moods where all I want to do is paint or draw or just create, but I'm mostly unsuccessful. Everything I've ever done is in the garbage or a half-assed "gift" (some people like it, I guess).

Tattooing

I got my first tattoo when I was 18 and haven't stopped. There's not much more that I want done in the near future, but I have to finish my half-sleeve before I die. This is my sad goal.

Anti-Porn

The one "cause" I'm passionate about. I find it horrible, degrading, misogynistic, and insulting. I refuse to allow smut into my home.

Coffee

A running joke about me is my endless need and outright gluttony for caffeine. I will get coffee at every available opportunity, and I'm terrified to think about how much I've spent on it. While I can't resist Starbucks' Christmas beverages, if I were completely honest, I'd confess that I'd prefer Denny's (non-stop and $1.50!) or 7-Eleven's coffee. I'm a cheap date.

I study about five hours a day, trying to cram as much tax prep regulation crap into my head as I possibly can so that I can get crack-a-lackin' on my job. Five hours may not seem like much, but let's see you stare at government forms and learn what all those convoluted little footnotes mean for that long!

In spite of what basically amounts to Gitmo-level torture (pre-Obama), this whole thing has made me want to go back to school (except with way less smoking in the alley during English class this time). My brain is being used for more than Dave Eggers novels and figuring out what gets dog pee out of fabric and I like it!

Does anyone want to give me a few G's, though, because filing for bankruptcy is another recent hobby of mine.

Life: Epic Fail!!111111!! LOLOL