I'd Like To Nominate Myself For Candidacy

Check me out...

I'm the Neighborhoodie of the Day!!!

Be prepared because next week the voting begins. I need to make Neighborhoodie of the week. I need as many votes as possible. It will count one vote per day per ip address. So hit me up from your home and your office everyday next week. Tell your friends. Vote for Liz!

Just What Was Needed! Whew!

• Sunday morning... I wake Carrie up for her flight and she is no better after the 4 hours of sleep. She keeps up the puking for her whole trip home. If I didn't know better you'd think she was coming home from Vegas. I headed off to church to teach sunday school. It was a great weekend with lots of good times and memories. Sharing all those experience really brought us close again. We both needed it so badly. We've both experienced bouts of lonliness lately and it couldn't have been more perfect timing for us. We are best friends but it's been a long time since we got to act like it. And now I've convinced her to come back for Christmas. I can't wait!
  
  
• Saturday night... We celebrated the ND victory by heading to 180 in Los Gatos with John and Jeff. Carrie being an ND alumni took her celebrating a bit too seriously. She was really keeping up with the boys. We went to the Brit to meet up with Bill, Elliott, Josh, and Samantha. It wasn't long though before Carrie was hitting the restrooms proving that she was her drunkest ever. With her condition we scratched our plans to do an all nighter over at Cardinal and just headed to my house.
  
  
• Saturday... With Butters in tow we headed to Santana Row for Wahoos. Carrie and I have a fondness for Wahoos having lived in Wahoo central down in Newport Beach. Butters fit in perfectly with the Santana Row crowd. She is the perfect shopping dog. We visited a few of Carrie's old friends before we headed to the Notre Dame vs. Stanford football game. It was the last game in the Stanford stadium before tearing it down. It was definately the best game I ever saw. It was really close there up in the last 2 minutes. But thank God... Notre Dame came though with just one second left on the clock. So off to the bowl they go. GO IRISH!
  
  
• Friday night... Patty, Carrie, and I headed to Miyake to meet up with the KAK krew. It was wild fun. And when we got there there was that Cheers moment when everybody was excited I was there and wanted to say hi. It felt great and made up for the fact that they had forgotten to invite me and that I wouldn't have known except for running into them the night before. After dinner and not enough sake bombs, the KAK went to Rudy's while we carted our little group over to Blue Chalk. We met back up at the Cardinal Lounge afterwards for a little late night eats. And then we had a little after party over at KAK house. And I didn't leave until 5am. But it was so worth it.
  
  
  
• Friday... I started out Black Friday at the Gilroy Outlets where we met up with Annie for a little Eric's Deli. I can't get enough of their holiday sandwhich. Then we stopped for a very emotional goodbye with our high school spanish teacher, Mr. Fernandez. We have always been very close to him and it was sad because it could realistically be the very last time we see him. He has been battling lymphomic cancer and although he is currently ok, there are still some spots that they are watching and he is very tired and week by it all. And now he is moving back to Spain to be with his family. We do intend to go visit in Spain, but if we put it off too long then we may miss the boat if his cancer returns. It was a tearful goodbye. After that we went to have dinner with Carrie's brother, dad and his wife. They are always alot of fun with tons of great stories and laughs.
  
  
• Thursday Night... So this weekend with Carrie was just what we both needed. She came to stay with me Thanksgiving night bringing along her pug dog, Butters. That night we headed to the Brit where we had an awesome time with a ton of friends... Billy, Elliott, Josh, Marisa, and coincidentally the KAK krew were there. So that was a fun night because I got to hang out with TiTi too.
  
  
• Thanksgiving... first I headed up into the mountains to have an early dinner with Jerome's family. His parents are so nice to me. His mom Kathy actually had offered to come pick me up the night before when I was "sick as death" and take me to their place and take care of me. Then after that I headed to Thanksgiving at my mom's house. My sister went elsewhere which was fine by me because I'm still a little pissed that she hasn't apologized for the whole kidnapping incident last week. Dinner was great. And afterwards we walked downtown to Christmas in the Park before heading back for pumpkin pie. It was very quaint. Then my sister showed up so I booked it out of there. No, kidding. I had to leave anyways. Carrie was on her way to my house with Butters.

Sick As Death

I woke up with a soar throat. That progressed into a fever with chills and body aches. And then came the headache and naseau. 102 degrees completely weak unable to move or get out of bed. My call for help falls through leaving a package of get better meds on my door step. A door step I cannot get to, a can of soup I cannot cook, a bottle of water I cannot open, a pill I cannot swallow. And unfortunately I have isolated myself so well that I have nobody to call on for help. So I sit just waiting getting ever worse until Karis comes in and brings me the doorstep package and opens the water for me. Medicine consumed and fever breaks. I still feel horrible. I hope I will be well enough to go to Thanksgiving, but it's up in the air.

TWENTY EIGHT

The best thing I received... proof of a listening ear who has made an effort to understand what I'm feeling and turned that into a little poem that I just found in my inbox. I love it! It was so special.
Thanks, Andrea!

T urning an age
W ishing for something other
E ager to move on, move up, out, away
N earer to God, to Goodness, to Truth
T rying to trust, in patience and faith
Y earning to be a part, not apart

E arnestly living
I nnocently searching
G raciously serving
H appily blogging
T enaciously turning ... 28

With Love,
31

Let It Breathe

I feel like I've been forced to take a bribe. A bribe I was avoiding and that I was not given an option in accepting. I feel like there are terms to the bribery that are forced on me... terms I had been rejecting because they required that I be fake. But I have this bribe now that I cannot return and I am forced into these undesirable terms of agreement... terms that insist I pretend and compromise my justified and valid feelings. It's a bandaid bribe mostly for the benefit of the bribers so they can feel better about things and not have to see the ugly hurting sore beneath. But my pains don't need a bandaid. They need air to breathe, to form my hard ugly scab, and let the healing occur behind the scenes, so when that scab is ready to fall off it will reveal new skin. Picking at it will only make it worse and leave a scar.

Today I am twenty eight. I do not want to celebrate it with anybody, not even with those I love. I want it to just pass. The best gift anybody could give me on this day is space.

Kidnapped

I do not get along with one of my sisters at all, although she pretends to everybody else that we are close, when in truth we do not talk hardly ever. I don't pretend. She is a much nicer person to absolutely everybody else in the world. She treats people like they were family, but her family... not so well. To me she is the most inconsiderate and rude person I know. My home group wanted to do some volunteer work with kids and christmas this year. My sister has headed up a small private toy drive called Toys For Kids through Victim Witness for over 10 years. So I offer for my group to help her out. So she asks me to accompany her to go to lunch with the lady at Victim Witness who is collecting the families we will be providing for. That went fine although I was sickened watching her tear up with love over the lady's 14 year old daughter that my sister is so fond of... someone she hardly sees or knows. We accompany the lady to her office so that my sister can hand out some wrapping paper stuff that some of the officemates had purchased from my nephew. But seriously that only takes 20 minutes. My sister is chatting it up with everyone and when she goes to drop off the last thing she doesn't come back for at least an hour and a half. I am trapped without my car or phone. I don't know where she has gone and I am just sitting in this lady's office the whole time. She's done this once before so I'm grateful that right before I left my house I grabbed my Sudoku book which helped to occupy me. But after a while it is just ridiculous as I think of all the things I needed to get done today. With that I write a note telling her I left and hop the lightrail back to my mom's house where my car is. It was so rude and inconsiderate to leave me waiting for her for an hour and a half. She has always been mean and disregarding and judgemental and manipulative (towards me). She doesn't know me or want to know me or even know I exist. She has never been nice to me or at least not since I was a child and I don't know why. It is always hard for people to believe this about her because she is always so super nice to them when they meet her. But ask Carrie. She can vouch. And this is why we are not close.

She's faking it here. I'm 13 and already we are estranged.

I'm astonished by the foe or friend outlook people have out there. It appears that in ending the disillusionment of friendship, people have taken that to mean that we are now enemies. Of course, that was in no way my intention. I did not intend to change my behavior towards people much at all. I was just changing my mindset from one of disillusionment to one of reality. I wasn't looking to become public enemy number one. None the less, people felt it necessary to retaliate to my public frustrations that were geared toward no one person in particular by dishing out personal insults and accusations. It's like having issues with the entire judicial system and then having one judge come an put you in jail for it. It only confirms your original issues you had with it in the first place.

Reactionary Revolution

So people are reacting very funny to my last post. I think the most important thing to clarify is that I am in no way suicidal. I'm just a lousy artist. It's not a heart being stabbed. It's a heart with a hard dry cracked shell being pried open by God. It's a good thing! I drew it during a church service Sunday night when I felt like God was really working on me and bringing me hope. I'm really not suicidal. I never would be. I promise. A common reaction has been this theory of ... Oh, she's not talking about me... think again. Or then there's the reaction... oh, she's just mad at so-n-so... everybody is the problem, not one individual. And then there is the concerned people who decide that all of a sudden they are there for me... too late... don't care... it's a totally insincere jesture at this point. There is the idea that I don't like the people around me. Wrong! I do like them all alot which is why I tried so hard to create friendships with them and bring them into my life. But it didn't work. We aren't really friends. And that's fine. Some have thought that by me blogging it that it was an attack or a call for help. It wasn't meant to be either. It was really meant as a wake up call... in essence an end to the disillusionments on both sides. I'm not fooled and nor should you be about the standing of our interactions. I'm not trying to fix things. There is nothing to "fix". It just is what it is. As I am challenged to examine my interactions with those around me... I should mention that there are a few people to whom although we do not spend much time together, anytime we speak I am consistently reminded that they sincerely care. People like Kelvyn, Jerome, Sheila, Polly, and the other Liz. These people have taught me that real friendships don't require a ton of time as much as they require sincerity. And Carrie is there for me even though I hate her not being here and signing stupid leases that will keep her away from me at least until August. And Nate is here for me even though I hate this completely lame going no where year and a half long psuedo anything but a relationship thing we have. And Zac never lets me slip through the cracks to which I am constantly grateful that God has made him my friend, perhaps the most perceptive friend I have. It is not to say that I am cutting all ties, just to merely admit the reality that really there are no ties.

Pried Heart

So people have asked about my big annual birthday party that for months now has been scheduled for this Saturday. So I know that this won't sound like me, but you all don't know me that well after all. I'm not having a party. I'm going to sit this one out. Primarily because I hate absolutely everybody. And by everybody I mean you. And by hate I mean hurt. Except Sheila and usually Carrie. And I could have yet another huge blowout party with a hundred people who know me but are not my friends. Often popularity is seen as friendships, but it certainly has never felt like friendship. And of the few I have had, even fewer have lasted as potentials for depth fall short. The hurts of pretend friendships have hardened me to even try anymore... betrayal, disloyalty, inconsideration, sneakiness, abandonment, manipulation, neglect, hostility, and unreciprocated relationships. I don't want to try anymore. I'm too hurt to care. It's too late for me. And the thought of a big party... to gather everyone who knows me together and look around and think to myself that not one of them is a real friend, well it's just not how I want to celebrate my birthday. So no big party. No party at all.

Help Needed

I'm about to take active steps to hire a part time personal assistant. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do. And there is too much not getting done. And still more to get done in the future. I just can't wait for Raylene to grace me with her presence one day a year to help. And frankly I am feeling overwhelmed by my personal to do list. Too overwhelmed to get anything business related accomplished in my home office where I am constantly reminded of all the other things that need to be done. Somethings gotta give.

emilys liz drawing

emilys liz drawing
Originally uploaded by Lizapalooza.

5 year old Emily's obvious rendition of me. She actually draws excellently for her age range. And this is a good likeness I would say (except for the pig like nose). The freckles are key. It's exactly what I was wearing that day too.

What Am I? A Closet.

Ok. Only Carrie will get the title. So I went to Target to get office supplies and a blender, but I also had to exchange a skirt... a skirt that was too big... a skirt that I bought because it was on clearance and I really liked the design and length, but it is actually maternity. So I just bought one 4 sizes to small and figured that would be the maternity equivolent. But it ends up that 6 sizes smaller is the right size. So anyways, I some how end up in the clothing section where I kind of go clearance crazy and never make it to the kitchenware or stationary departments. I sit here now wearing as many new clothes as possible. The new skirt over the new pants with the new shirt and the new jacket on top. None of it matching. I guess I have to go back tomorrow for a blender. Hmmm. That didn't really work out so well. At least I walked out spending less than a hundred.

Just 20 More Days

... until my birthday! I really need to get started with this party planning. I'm turning 28. Entering late twenties and can no longer pull off mid twenties. With every year are new sets of social standards that I come to realize I'm behind on. The other morning my house phone rings and oddly enough I am compelled to answer it which I normally do not. On the other end is my childhood best friend Tasia. I had lost her and she had tracked me down. Coincidentally, I had just been talking about her the night before with Jerome's mom. So it was amazing to have her pop back into the scene all of a sudden. Well, she is a year younger than me and doing amazingly. She's married with three children ages 8, 5 and 1. They just bought a house in Olivehurst. She runs a daycare out of her home. And to top it off she looks beautiful. She models. Hmmm. I'm so happy for her but with this next birthday approaching those daunting thoughts start looming in the back of my mind. Shouldn't I have something to show for by now? A relationship, a spouse, a house, children, a business, a high power promotion, a degree, a talent, a pet even? something? anything? Whatever I've been doing in life the last 10 years of my adulthood seemed to prove a bit unfruitful. And I have a feeling it doesn't appear to be so from the outsiders viewpoint, but it feels like it on the inside. And my life is full of potential and I have dreams and visions I'm working on. I think I have just traded the typical pillar points for fun and experiences, but even that has slowed these days. I have done a little bit of everything but haven't exceled in anything. So I thought it would be great to dig up that picture of me and Tasia at my 5th Birthday party to put up here, but low and behold... my yellow box of childhood pictures is missing from my room. It is no where to be found. I've just spent an hour searching and I haven't found it. Now this is a very disturbing scenario. That box hold alot of precious photos. And there is no good explanation on where it could be. But it's lack of being in any of it's obvious places is driving me crazy. Pray for me. I'm going photo hunting.
[editors note: Ok, so as it's pointed out to me... I do have a house. and a cat. and a passport more full than most. and a very comfortable stress free life.]