I have been dreaming a lot lately. Dreaming of people and places I used to know. Jeff says there is nothing more boring than hearing other people's dreams (like sleepy dreams, not wishy dreams). But I disagree.

I keep showing up at my grandparents' old house or my second grade class room and old friends keep telling me about secret magic in ordinary places. It is strange and sad and then again neither. And when I wake up, I am always confused about my current life.

The saddest part about dreaming of past places is that they still exist separate from us. They have their own reality now. Like someone lives in my grandmother's old house. Right now. Someone is walking up the steps there and opening the door. Right now. My greatgrandmother's old house has been boarded up and abandoned for a long time. I dream about going there all the time. I get stuck there and it is empty except for the pinkish phone in the front room and the xmas tree and some discarded trash. The trash is always birth certificates. It is sad and weird how these places haunt us. While it is sad that places still exist, it is also amazing that we all just keep living our lives over the same space at different times. Like, I wish I could tear a tiny whole in reality and look at the lives in my apartment like 100 years ago. What would it be like? When those people moved out, did they think of it after? I guess I am just fascinated by place and time. The geography of our lives.

On the other hand, the best part of dreaming of people from our past is that they DO still exist separate from us. I always want to know what people I used to know are like now. That is prolly why I am always dreaming about them. Last night, I dreamt that Jeff and I went to some weird gaming conference and my old friend Dwayne was there. Something happened in the dream and we all had to escape from something. At the end of the ordeal, I remember hugging Dwayne, glad that we had gotten out. The hug made me realize that while he was the same Dwayne, he was this different person now. It was sad and lovely all at once. People pass through our lives so quickly. I imagine having a child will be like this. Watching them change every single day. And then one day, that 5 year old is gone and you have a 13 year old. But you never got the chance to mourn the 5 year old, ya know? One day you will hug them to see if they are the same person and they will be, but they won't be and it will be amazing.

I feel like I have a version in my mind of every person I have ever known. And when they are no longer in my life, that version gets stuck in my mind and shows up in my dreams. Like characters in a long running tv show. I suppose we all do this.

I don't know what this is all about. I think it is about how weird/cool it is that we collect these things in our minds and never let them go. People and places and even old versions of ourselves.

Posted by tina at 3:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

all morning long i have been thinky thinky.

dreamy thinky. wondering if it is the earth threatening to give me the autumn that i have been yearning for? or perhaps the new allergy meds.** no matter. i enjoy the thinky dreamy time.

walking to work, i felt a bit like the Buffy-bot or the Terminator, looking at everyone coming up to me and sizing them up. it sounds judge-y but it really isn't. tick tick tick, that person should stop smoking, that person would be happier with some comfortable shoes.

blop blop blop. my attention turns to other things. a sprinkler. the way my mary jane's frame my tinyily dotted socks. the exact size of my shadow.

i have a passport. i am passported. i can now escape this country if i have to. hello london. my shirt has a giant yeti running through paris. i am the yeti in washington, walking through the streets with big eyes and swinging arms. pretty yeti. silly yeti. me.

** i picked the zrytec because they have the best commericals with the dog like mine.

Posted by tina at 3:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

So I have been on a weight loss journey for 14 months now. I have lost 63 pounds in 14 months. I was a little concerned that my doctor would be disappointed in the amount of weight I have lost since I last saw her, when I went in for my every 6 month weigh-in. Nope, she was so happy. Duh. She said that 60 pounds in a year is an amazing success! Whoohoo. We spent some time talking about what my next goal should be. I am 31 and would like to have a kid soon, but she assured me that I have still a good deal of time.

So to recap. I have lost 63 pounds in 14 months. Gone from a BMI of 53 to a BMI of 40. Gone from 290 pounds to 227. A BMI of 30 would get me out of the "obese" range. A BMI of 30 for me would bring me to 170 pounds.

So. Here is my next goal. I need to get to 170 by this time next year. That is 57 pounds in one year. Can I do it? I think I can. So, here we go.....

It is a little discouraging that after lossing another 57 pounds I will still be considered overweight... but we will see. The goal is to stay under 200 pounds during a pregnancy and most pregnant women gain about 30 pounds in pregnancy. Perhaps this all sounds a little obsessive to some peeps, but this is serious business! :)

This whole thing has been totally amazing since a large portions of Americans are trying so hard to lose weight and just not winning. I never thought I could get this healthy and be this small! I have gone from a size 26 to a size 16 and I suppose the goal is about a 10. Crazy. Anyway, if you are struggling with this type of thing: the best advice I can give is that we all have control of these things.

Take control.
Drink your water.
Less food. More exercise.
Stop hurting yourself when you mess up. Because you will, mess up.
Every day is a new day to make the right choices.

I know that if you aren't ready to do this, this advice sounds like meaningless crap. So, first start with your emotions... get emotionally ready to help yourself. Because you can't lose weight until you are emotionally ready to stop hurting yourself with food.

Anyway. This is where I am with the Great Smallening. I am at the half way point. It would be easy to stop here. So easy. But I won't be doing that. I have come so far.

Posted by tina at 3:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Today I am 31. Jeff let me open my presents this morning, whoohoo! I was pleasantly surprised to see Season One of Six Feet Under. The first time we watched that was in the middle of a blizzard. We just kept watching and watching the DVDs that I had gotten on Netflix. At one point Jeff had to walk out to Blockbuster to get the last discs. It will be cool to revisit Nate and David and Claire from the first Season. I also got Antoine et Collete, finishing the Truffaut Doinel series. My spelling is awful today, sorry.

There are so many things that I am looking forward to. First of all, autumn! Other things that I am looking forward to:
New Wes Anderson film, The Life Aquatic
New Farscape Miniseries in October
Crafty Bastards show (if I get picked!)
Trip to London in November
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind DVD (since I have only seen the movie once!)
bunch more.

I spent all night nightmaring again. Don't feel bad for me, though. I don't mind nightmaring. This time it was a Buffy episode. An all new one created by sleeping me. There was something about a zombie virus that turned this girl into a meaty skeleton. Buffy had opened a coffee bar and this zombie girl was trying to give us all the virus. I had to keep trying to shut her in a closet. Then we stomped on the meaty bones of the skeleton. Where does this stuff come from? These weren't really nightmares, but more like fast fast exhausting dreams. Oh, and it all started when I saw this friend from high school, Heather Turnrose at the coffee bar. I tried to google her once and nothing. Where are you Heather Turnrose?

People keep asking me, what are you doing for your birthday? It is weird because everyone gets a birthday every year, why should it be special? Well, the answer is that so far today I have been thinking a lot about the weight loss journey. This time last year, I had only lost 16 pounds. Now I have lost 64. This time last year, I made a shirt that said, "Invincible like the Eiffel Tower". I think it was more to convince myself than anything. I looked at that shirt this morning, realizing that not only is it way too big now, but I don't feel like I have to wear it anymore. I don't have to convince myself of my invincibility now. I feel it deep inside, at my core. So, that is what I am doing for my birthday. Plus sushi for lunch.

Posted by tina at 3:12 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

it has been a month since my last entry. i have now lost 65 pounds. last week, increased my water drinking and that did it, brought me out of my plateau. lala. drinking 6 glasses of water a day is difficult, but i am a trooper.

this has been a long weekend. lovely weather that felt like san francisco or september or september in san francisco. i spent the weekend walking my city, watching movies and not much else.

this morning, i became a blonde for the first time. then i promptly added fish bowl-colored lines. lovely. it is weird to be a first time blonde. i kinda look like a mermaid... a punk mermaid, maybe.

off to floss and sleep. i will hopefully be updating the store this week with new necklaces including a cute little bat necklace and an ant-eater and an owl and some more ninjas. also working on some new art (FINALLY!).

and, yeah, i have a birthday coming up.

What is going on with you? I have been nightmaring about vampires, which is strange because we haven't been watching any Buffy on DVD. We are currently in the middle of Farscape Season 2 and Millenium Season 1, so Buffy in sight. Last night, the vampires were invisible and thus hard to, um, see and kill. They kept biting me. When i was a kid, I used to nightmare about vampires all the time, until I just let them catch me and nothing bad happened. Then the nightmares about Andy Griffith started. He and Barney were always chasing me with guns. They were in black and white, while I was in color. Strange.

Posted by tina at 3:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)