Okay, we're moving along much more smoothly. I'm finally getting a grip and not feeling suicidal over the lack of decor. This may be because I got bookshelves. I think that actually solved most of my problems. I'm like the guy in Fight Club before he befriends Brad Pitt. I love things. I love stuff. If I had enough money, I'd SO be sitting on the toilet ordering an entire catalog worth of furniture. Yes, I am tied down to material objects, and you know what? I LOVE IT! Whatever, it's not like I take my life, my happiness, my loved ones for granted by it. I like owning shit, a lot of shit, that looks nice. I'm allowed to care.

So, I want to know why it is that whenever the sales lady ringing you up at the counter offers that AMAZING opportunity to own one of their store cards (insert high dosage of sarcasm) and you say no-thank-you, they get SO pissed off. They look personally offended when you don't want their damn card. I always say, "No, I'm okay. I don't shop much at all." Then they give you that whole deal about how you can save 10% right now if you just get the card and use it for now. And I'm like, "Well, I'm telling you, if I have the card, it'll be an excuse to shop more, and I'll really want to use it, and I can't afford to go shopping these days anymore." THAT works. When you throw the guilt at them. What are they going to say to that? You tell someone you have no money, and they'll back off. That's how you do it. Still, I don't always take that route. Sometimes I get mad and I think, "Hey, I don't want to have to stand up here and tell some elaborate self-deprecating lie just so you leave me alone. I don't want the goddamn card, and I think it's wrong that you try to make me feel bad about that." So, I'll just say No, thank you, and I wait. Many times, I've watched that person shake her head while mumbling things to herself like, "I don't understand why you wouldn't want it, but whatever." Want to slap them. So, I'm at Pier One, and I'm like, "No, I'm fine. It takes too long to fill out, and I need to go." Then after a lot of this and that, I think, "Fine, I'll get the card." Kiss of death. So stupid. Whenever you think this, you are dumb. So, we begin the filling out process. I fill it out. That takes a little time because you're putting each letter in its own box which totally slows down the process. Then, after you do that, she's got to enter all that information in the computer. She can't tell if this letter is a this or a that. You want to jump over the counter and grab the computer and type it in yourself. Trust me, watching someone try to type in Trespicio is a living nightmare. Fine, a few minutes pass (feel like hours), and when she goes to print out the receipt, it says, "Verify credit, call Call Center." So, this girl is paging her manager to come over and tell her what this means. She's paging, paging, looking over the counter. And then says, "We're just waiting for the manager to explain this, it'll just be a minute." Several minutes pass before the manager comes over. I've smelled every scented candle in all of Pier 1 at this point. "It says to call the Call Center." The manager so WISELY replies. The issue was definitely NOT that the girl couldn't read. So, the brilliant sage of a manager walks away, and this girl looks up the number and calls. Takes a good few minutes to get through the automated messages (as I well understand since it was my job this summer to do that), and she finally reaches a woman after being on hold FOREVER who tells her she pressed the wrong extension, and rather than transfering her to the right place, tells her to hang up and call again. At this point, I'm sitting down, lounging in one of the chair displays. It all works out eventually, not really understanding what happened, but this quick-sign-up that I was talked into even though I SAID I didn't have the time turned into a 45 minute affair. The girl who was "helping" me was actually VERY nice, and I wasn't mad at her at all, if you can believe that. I was mad because I knew it was a bad situation to get a stupid card, and I SO suffered when I went against my better judgment.

I also discovered my weakness store. Lots of women have that shoe-weakness. They have to go in a shoe store when they pass it, and they have to buy at least one before they leave. No, I couldn't care less about shoes (thus my horrible shoes). My weakness is Staples. Holy SHIT do I love Staples. I walk in there, and I'm happy. I want everything they have. The variety of pens from Papermate blue medium ball-point to felt-tips. Accordian to super-sticky post-it's. So many different ways to organize things. I got this contraption thingy that holds my pens, pencils, post-its, envelops, paper-clips, and scissors. It's SO amazing, and it makes me so happy. Organization will always be wonderful to me. Staples is the place to be.

People ask me what I think of LA so far. I really don't like that question. It's a perfectly legitimate thing to ask someone who just moved somewhere, but I don't like it. Maybe because I don't have an answer. I don't know. It's fine. It's where I live. How can I love it or even care about it yet when I don't know all the places I like to go, and I don't have all different groups of friends to go with. I don't even have a job. How can you love a place when you haven't investing anything in it yet? I know a few people though who were like crazy passionate about it. "I LOVE it here!!! I think it's SO amazing." Now, I don't think I even said that I loved Boston until my sixth year of living there. I don't think I said I loved New York until after having moved out of it. A relationship with a city is a relationship like with anyone else. You can't just love someone, or even know that you like them. I'm interested in LA right now. I'm curious to see how we'll get along. I think there may be some potential there even though initially there are some things about LA that set me off a bit. This is just where I am right now, but it's too soon to have "the talk" yet with this city. Don't want to rush it. We've only just met.

I'm going to go. One hundred things to do today and I hope to complete every one of those tasks. Hope everyone is doing well out there.