Get ready for a long ramble from yours truly. I MEAN LONGGGGGG (and sorry for the typos )

Rachie Heather has not written in a while (and don't worry that is the only third person sentence I will use)

Highlights and Lowlights really of the past couple of weeks. There really was nothing in between. The days are gone where I feel numb or restless (well THAT kind of restless) and I find myself almost wondering when the last time I had a day where I did absolutely nothing.

I was standing in front of the mirror in my bedroom this morning just staring at myself. Now, this might not have been the best time to do it since I went to bed at four, drunk, (more on this later), but I did anyway. I just stood there and really looked at me for a good solid 20 minutes. I did not realize I have changed so much. Physically, besides the weight thing, I have not changed much. The same eyes, the same nose, and the same red hair define me. However, I somehow now look different anyway. At that moment my hair was disheveled and last nights makeup was smudged but as it is one month before my 23 birthday I still looked like a woman. Anyone can tell me different. They can tell me I am small or I don't fill a DD cup or maybe my face looks too innocent (I do get Ariel a lot) but this morning my disheveled, hung-over, naked self looked 23 years old and no matter how much weight I think I have to loose or how much I hate my muscles sometimes I could finally see that I am a women with a body to be proud of, even if I hate it once in a while...even if it hates me once in a while (those long runs come to mind). Maybe that is what turning 23, or just going form a girl to a woman, is all about, accepting our bodies for what they are. Maybe that is what makes me look in the mirror and see someone new and different and mature and beautiful.
Or this could all just be a hangover...


I am moving in a very inconsistent timeline.

Now back to two weeks prior... We all know I have some "unique" teachers this semester. There is Mark who before I told each and every person I knew I had a crush on him. Well, ok, this is not the case. I have figured out what it is. He is hypnotizing when he speaks. He makes the world he talks about come alive and every word out of his mouth sounds poetic. It was not a crush; it was a spell. It was his brain. I know maybe 5 guys that are smart, so hey when I meet a smart guy maybe I get a little overly excited. :)

Moving on to the psych teacher. AKA the heartless psycho people hating shouldn't be a psych teacher because he himself is psychotic beast from hell teacher.... yeah him. Well I have decided I am going to drop the class. I never did send the letter to him, I thought sending an anonymous letter to my schools psyche department might be pointless. I also know dropping the class looks a little like giving up. BUT, here is the deal. 70% of the class is failing and not because 70% of the class are idiots. I am getting a D and I am a straight A student, that means something is wrong here. The guy is a bigot in the worst way and every time I sit in class I am afraid I am going to shout out something I will regret later on because somehow I always tend to say things I really regret when I am pissed. Self-preservation - not my specialty. So really I am dropping for his protection. He might get hurt and it is for his own safety. I also might still send that letter; it is a pretty damn good letter.

So the new job. You can start breathing again people and start believing the rumors, I am working. Working full time no less, not the four classes a week dance teaching gig you all made fun of me for calling a job. No sirs! This is a real job! Well one where everyone has tattoos, you can wear slippers to work if you please, and music or movies are blaring all day. Nonetheless I am working in the corporate world of Hot Topic, as you all know and the weirdest thing is I like it. The weirder thing is I am doing well. I have pretty much learned the ins and outs of the company and the people on my team. I have also figured out who is who, what is what, and who is doing what with whom. :) No one realizes how much learning the people helps but oh I do. Lets see here, surrounding my desk we have a variety of people all solid entertainment and pleasure. OK first we have Ben. Ben who is of the geeky indie variety. The kind of guy who puts movie figurines on his desk, wears black glasses and newsboy hates, knows all million seasons of the Simpsons by heart and uses sarcasm to deflect from ever having any sort of conversation that would reveal how he REALLY feels about anything. He looks very much like my cousin Shane though so I find whenever I look across at him I really miss New York and want to hand him some new toys.
Next we have James who sits to the left of me. The day I figure out if James is gay or straight will be one cold dark day in hell. Unless I actually ask him which is sort of rude. he is either gay or just very metrosexual. One day he asked me out on a date. But my gay boyfriend asks me out on dates all the time. The guy wears colored contact lenses, Von Dutch Jeans and dresses up more for work than I do on a Friday night. He also drives a Jag which I suspect he loves a little too much as evidenced by the four (out of the six) pictures on his desk that consist of various angles of said car.
There is Lola, who despite always seeming mad at the world, never ceases to amaze me with her kindness and dry sense of humor. She rides into the office on her roller-skates pretending to dread the day, but in reality I think she secretly enjoys life. It is just the "Goth" thing to do I guess, to try to act tough. I don't see her as tough, I see her as sweet.
Alan is the guy who has taken up the role of jokester quite nicely. He IM's me to make me laugh, usually by making fun of me or telling some oddball joke. He is the teaser, which helps lighten the day considerably.
Bre, one of my supervisors is that quintisential girl every girl likes. She is the girl you want to be friends with. Being that most girls are bitches to each other, this is the highest complement a female can give another. Besides the red hair solidarity, she just makes you feel like it is ok to mess up or stumble. She kept telling me stories of how she messed up on the computer systems her first week at work, which really made me feel at ease.
There are many more people there, just like little pieces of worlds I can look into and it makes my day so interesting. I don't know how anyone can think school or work or anything for that matter could be boring when we have all these people around us to give us such wonderful stories without saying a word.

Now for the most exciting news since my last entry.... three guys, three shows, a little band called REM.
This brings us to just before the hung-over morning in front of the mirror. (geez that sounded like bad detective fiction).

I need not explain my relationship too REM anymore, we all know the story, we all know how much I love them. So I will just briefly describe the shows, no background information needed.

Wednesday night was the first night of the tour (if you don't count Vote for Change) and I have to say it just started the ball rolling in the way that brings one of those "Rachel smiles" to my face. Yeah we all know the one I am talking about. That uncontrollable euphoric smile that is saturated in ecstasy. It brought THAT one. I met up with Jenni (bridesmaid Jenni) right before the show and knowing that Josh and Steve, two guys from Murmurs, were going to meet up with me we set out to look for them. However, the cell phone coverage in those hills is shit but I did not want to miss seeing Josh after almost two years and having never met Steve, so I ended up walking around the whole courtyard area screaming at the top of my lungs. Oh poor Jenni, I don't think I have ever hung out with her where she has not hung her head in shame. (It's ok I got Vegas on her hehe)
The screaming ended up working anyways, we found Josh, Steve and their friend Naomi with some other people. Ended up having a great time. Steve was not who I pictured him to be (weird how we picture things based on peoples user names and posts) and I had met Josh a few times so I knew what he looked like (always thought Mark Ruffalo) Naomi is very beautiful and has a slight English accent. She and I just got on great. It is cool meeting people you can actually see yourself being friends and such with. Most of the time, you meet people and they are interesting but you can't really "kick it g-dog style" ;) with them outside of whatever zone you know them from. This goes for a lot of people from work or school especially.
Back to the show - I told myself I would seriously have an orgasm if I ever heard them play Life and How to Live it again live (heard it at the Avalon). Well, they closed the set with it and I seriously think I had some sort of orgasmic experience.
I have said many times that as a dancer I don't just listen to a song with my head I have to listen with everything I have. Their new song, "I'm Gonna DJ" pulses through you and does not let up you almost feel out of breath by the time the song is over. The new songs sound unbelievable live, even better than on the album. Boy in the Well is chilling. Michael's voice sounded so smooth during that set but during Boy in the Well it really shined. Around the Sun had this harmony at the end that gave me goosebumps (it could also have been that I was freezing my ass off though).
After the show Ethan and Amy left while me, Josh, Jenni and Steve hung around outside. SOOOOO JAKE GYLLENHAL walks out and I swear I could see the blue in his eyes from ten feet away. He is shorter than I thought but I don't care about height anyway and oh boy is he yummy. I rarely find any guys I think are cute or hot or have that hunka hunka burnin fire. Whatever.... but oh man when I do see them that heart starts beating and I have to use all sources of my power to not run and jump and give whoever it is a big fat kiss. (However Jake is the only guy besides Johnny Depp, that is famous, that is sexy like that to me so who the hell knows what would happen if I met Johnny).
Anyway...Courtney Love then walked out and she really looked a lot better than she has been looking in the papers. She is a lot taller than I thought as well, although I remember Ethan telling me she had been tall. I don't care what people think, Courtney kicks ass and is so freaking beautiful it kills me.
Ken Stringfellow followed and I stopped him to say hi. I ended up talking to him for a good 20 minutes about God-knows-what, but it must have made some impression on him. He ended up giving Ethan such a hard time that he did not invite me backstage and he would continue to give him a hard time until ken actually gave me two passes for the Irvine show (more on that later). Bottom line, I did something to Ken in those 20 minutes. I have no idea what but its cool.

Thursdays show - well prior to the show I had some drama. Brendan did not get off of work until 6:00 and the show started at 6:30PM. BUT, I figured that if Brendan drove at about 75/80 miles the way up we would make it no problem. All was going according to plan until I got stuck in traffic on the way to Brendan's work. Now we all have our flaws and I am sure most know many of mine. The time issue is a big thing for me. I freaked out and had a panic attack right there on the five freeway because I knew I would be late according to my calculations. All hell broke loose. I called Amy crying and I thought I would miss the show. Well me and Brendan only missed the first five songs but I did pay two girls 20 dollars to let me park at their house and I paid another guy 5 to give us a ride from that house to the venue on his bike. So I could have missed more!
The Santa Barbara show was awesome. They played I wanted to be Wrong and I almost cried. That song is pretty much my favorite on the new album and it sounds astounding live.
After the show, I hung around for a bit with Brendan, Josh and Steve (the new groupies without the sex hehe...well that would be a fun night for me anyway J/K) and then had Brendan drive to LA. According to Brendan (so the source is shady haha) I was talking all kinds of funny. Maybe it was the lack of sleep or the caffeine overdose but I just started rambling on and on about gas stations and weirdness and then I most have passed out. Next thing I know I am driving home from Brendan's house and I just know I am going crazy so I call Brendan back but no answer there. I decide to call Josh to see if he is till up and lo and behold the guy is still driving home. I have him talk to me so I can stay awake and God only knows what I said but I do remember something about shadows turning into people on the freeway, me crashing my moms Mercedes and describing every color in my rooms (those of you that have seen my rooms know that probably took a while). Josh, being a sweetheart though dealt with it and kept me awake and I am happy to say I made it home safe and sound, only to have to get up for work 2 hours later. Oh the joys of trying to be a responsible adult.

I showed up for work looking positively like crap and had to endure a solid eight hours of jokes about "what Rachel did" the night before. Fun stuff.

Saturday's show was in Irvine and we decided to tailgate it early. Steve, being the sweetheart that HE is picked me up from work and we headed down where I proceeded to get drunkidy drunk drunk drunk. There were quite a few of us tailgating which made it fun. Me, Steve, Josh, his date?, Brendan, Serah, Thomas (which was not awkward considering the last time I talked to him he told me all the reasons I sucked but then again the only words exchanged were "hi"), Rick and his friend (also murmurs), and a few stranglers we pulled out of their cars. I talked to the cops for a few too and offered them my brownies but they just were not having it. I also got a free ticket to Knotts scary farm btw (and got another when asked if I could have one so I could bring another hehe). So Rachel drunk. Yeah we all know what that is like. Disclaimer right now if I offended anyone, annoyed anyone, or just plain put my foot in my mouth. I plead temporary insanity.:)

So Nir called while I was drunk and I had not talked to him in a good month. It did not damper my mood or anything but it sure made me miss him with every fiber of my being. Sometimes I wish we could go back to being the friends we used to be. Sometimes I think about how as far as guys go, no one has ever "gotten" me the way Nir did or put me in my place the way Nir can or put up with me the way Nir can. I think that is what made our friendship so good. We were like the perfect couple without any sexual or physical attraction. Now all I need is to find a guy who combines both. I am one difficult woman, this is one tough job. After all that crap, I just want to be friends, even if I can only see him once a month or so. Any of the disagreements we had just don't seem to matter anymore.

Ken, as I said before, being under my spell and all, hooked me up with TWO after show passes. So I gave one to Naomi. She also got to sit with me, which was way cool because she is just an awesome girl. She has a brother in London that she wants to hook me up with who works something in music. That will be cool. I won't know many people out there at first so I am excited to meet all the Brits I can get my hands on.
The show was a really solid set list and it even rained which made it all rock n roll. Earlier in the day I told Brendan how cool it would be if they played The Outsiders and I Wanted to be Wrong. WELL THEY DID!!!! I could have died. I think Irvine's set was my favorite for that reason alone. They also played South central Rain, which was just gorgeous.
So somehow in my drunken state I have a few new numbers in my phone, who they are, not entirely sure. It might be weird calling a number and saying, "Hi I have your number who are you"? haha

After the show we went back stage. Michael was not there, he left early, but everyone else was. Ken made me take an oath and seal it with a kiss (don't worry I made him go for the cheek). The oath basically consisted of me having to promise I will go to every single one of Ken's shows and keep in touch with him via e-mail. We originally had plans to meet up with everyone at a bar but every party has a pooper and that is why we invited EVERYONE, they all went home, except for good ole Steve who was still in the parking lot sobering up. So the five of us went to the Yard House where I proceeded to spill my meal all over me (not because I was drunk mind you I just had a quota to fill).

I believe this brings me back to my hangover. I told you this would be a long rant but it has been a while and quite a lot has happened since I last wrote so deal with it! If you have read this far it means you just really love me. :) You also know I love my new job, have some shiny pretty new friends, miss an old one and am getting all adult in the years department. My birthday is less than a month away people so get cracking on my gift! You know what I love and if you don’t get cracking in finding that one out.

Much love and kisses