Interjections! Show excitement! And emotion!

The last post of 2008, you guys. I'll try to avoid being overly "OMG, it's the end of the year! I'm going to get sentimental!"

I haven't written in a while, and a lot of stuff has been going on, but I'm not going to try to recount everything. I've been ludicrously happy here recently, and it's been nice.

It's New Year's Eve and I'll be going to Bryson City tonight to hear NewJeff's band. I'm not. . .honestly, I'm not thrilled about it, but I'm not going to sit at home by myself on New Year's Eve, a night when I tend to be a little overly emotional anyway (because it's usually a "Oh my GOD, it's been another year, and I'm STILL alone!" I'm not actually alone, but physically, I would be alone this evening.) I had New Year's plans, which I'd made. . .a month and a half/two months ago, but they were canceled last week. Now, I'm not going to lie. . .I'm still pissed about that. I've been good, especially recently, about not holding onto things that don't really matter, that I KNOW don't really matter, but this? I continue to be beyond pissed about this. Because this'll be the first New Year's in. . .well, since freshman year of high school, that I don't have someone to hang out with (or a group of people to hang out with.)

When I called NewJeff to get directions to the place, he mentioned how sad it is that I'm going by myself. Thank you, Jeff. I wasn't already aware of how pathetic it is. I really needed you to remind me. Much obliged.

However, the alternative is sitting at home alone, feeling really sorry for myself, and I refuse to do that. So I will look cute, I will go to Bryson City, and I will be sociable.

I honestly can't believe it's the end of the year. More has happened in the past year than I think has happened to me in the entirety of my life. I won't list it all, but just believe me when I say that this year was. . .eventful, to say the least. I don't profess to know what 2009 is going to bring, but I hope it's. . .you know, I don't want to say "better," because this past year wasn't bad, per se. A lot of crappy things happened, but it wasn't, in its entirety, a bad year.

Now that I've started this entry, I feel like I don't have as much to say as I thought I did. Maybe I felt guilty for not updating for a long period of time. I don't know. It seems like I start out having tons to say and then I lose steam.

Anyway, everyone have a happy New Year's Eve, be safe, and I'll catch everyone in 2009.

I take my pills. The babies cry. All I hear is what's playing through the in-flight radio.

So I'm not going to be able to put "Sarah - award-winning writer" on my resume anytime soon. The results from the NC Press Association came in today and I didn't win anything.

However, Dennis won two different awards, and as the person that was after him saying, "You're entering, right? What are you entering? Have you picked what you're entering yet?," I'm really, really excited that he won. I knew he would, because he's really good at what he does. I really and truly can not put into words how happy I am he won, because I don't think he gets enough credit, at least around here, for all the hard work he puts in and how amazing his stuff really is.

Because of this, I'm in a weird situation at the moment. I'm so happy that he won. . .but I am, in fact, devastated that I didn't. It might sound stupid, but this was. . .I needed this. I needed something to prove to my boss that I am, in fact, not worthless in this job. I get the feeling every now and then that she doesn't think I can do anything right, and winning something, ANYTHING, would have shown that, yes, I am good at what I do. Other people think I'm good at what I do. I could have brought the letter home at Christmas and said, "Look! I'm awesome!" I had all but convinced myself I'd already won, because I thought my stuff was really good. I entered my gay article, my Make-A-Wish article and. . .something else I don't remember. And I thought they were good!

One might argue that some people around here thought they were good, too, but honestly? Some of the stuff people around this town think is "good" is. . .pretty bad. So now I'm really concerned that I'm one of those writers that is good. . .to people in Western North Carolina. That I'm right on par with the people that I don't think are very good at all.

I have this one writer (had, I guess, this one writer) that is incredibly popular with people around here. I don't think she's funny at all. I'm afraid I'm that kind of writer. That people without. . .I don't want to be insulting to people around here, because not everyone is unintelligent by any stretch of the imagination, but. . .a lot of the people around here have been here their entire lives. Small town living is all they know and sometimes, that means they haven't. . .ever experienced anything outside of their own bubble.

I'm unable to relay what I'm trying to mean. All I'm saying is that I wish I were good enough that people outside of this area thought I was, too.

I really needed this, is all I'm saying. I have been, effectively, knocked down a few pegs. Maybe I deserved that.

However, I get the feeling that Dennis needed it more, so that's good. I feel I'm growing as a person because I'm honestly, really and truly not jealous that he won. I'm not angry he won. I wish I were, actually, because I would rather be angry than incredibly sad. But he deserves it. Both of them. And I don't want to take away from that.

There's the update. I'm going to go back to work. Just regular work, though. Not award-winning work.

How they dance in the courtyard, sweet summer sweat. Some dance to remember; some dance to forget.

It is currently. . .4:22 a.m. I've been lying in bed for the last hour, trying to talk myself into falling asleep, and, clearly, I did not accomplish that particular goal. I decided that getting up, turning on infomercials, blogging and finishing my freelancing projects would be more effective and time-effective than lying in bed, being really pissed off that I couldn't sleep.

Luckily, one of my absolute favorite infomercials is on: For Jack Lalanne's Power Juicer. I. . .really want this juicer. For only four payments of $49.95! It's backed by the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval! It comes with more than 60 recipes (a $25 deal for free). If you call right now, they'll make one of the payments FOR you! That's only three payments of $49.95. But wait! Fitness phenomenon Jack Lalanne wants to celebrate his birthday by taking AN AMAZING $50 dollars off! That's like paying only TWO PAYMENTS of $49.95. Hell to the yeah. I've wanted this thing, seriously, since I first saw the infomercials about a month or so ago when Carrie and I had a sleepover of sorts, where we talked about things girls talk about, ate Doritoes, drank wine, and saw the commercial for this fabulous juicer.

Really, the only infomercial that's even remotely as good is the one for those knives. I don't know the specifics of them, but you get, like 5,000 kinds of knives that can all cut through an aluminum can (and really? I know I often get the urge to cut aluminum cans in half. So these knives are pretty much essential to my everyday life.)

So the reason I'm not sleeping is because I've been trying to not take Tylenol PM. I was afraid I was going to get addicted to it or something. As it turns out, the only thing I'm really addicted to is sleep, and now I'm not getting that. Oh yeah, and crack cocaine.

No, I'm kidding. About the crack cocaine. Not the sleep.

But I really can't sleep without something to help me along. If I drink wine before I go to bed, I can GET to sleep, but I can't STAY asleep. If I just bring myself to the absolute brink of exhaustion, I can sometimes fall asleep, but, again, I can't stay asleep. And with the Tylenol PM, 9 out of 10 nights, I can fall and stay asleep.

So what's been going on with Sarah? I've been working all the time, which is nothing new, but I've also been. . .really, really happy. Like, almost ridiculously so. It's something that you can't really exhibit at work, because then you have to contend with really annoying questions, but I'm smiling a lot more. Yesterday (Monday, my production day), I was a little stressed out when I went into work (I'll get into why in a second), but it was OK. Like. . .I didn't cry, which is my usual fallback, and I just kept plugging along. And I finished by 5! One of these days, I'll finish by 4. And maybe one day, I'll meet my 2 o'clock deadline. (Oh, don't look at me like that. The guy in prepress who does the pages doesn't come in until at LEAST 3.)

So the reason I was stressed out. Friday, Vi says to me, "Sarah, can you come into my office? We need to talk about the freelancing."

At this point, I freaked out because, as I mentioned, I've been writing freelance articles, and the first thing I thought was that she'd found out, and I wasn't allowed to do that, and I was in trouble.

(I mean, I know that pretty much everyone does it. Freelances, that is. But that's where my mind immediately went.)

As it turns out, they have cut. . .all of my funding for my publication, meaning I can't pay anyone to write for me anymore. I have a little network of freelancers, three of which were paid. The rest do it because they like to/to get their name out there/whatever. Some of them used to be paid, but stayed on after Carrie told them she couldn't pay them anymore. I was hoping that these three (The Big 3, if you will) would do the same. Or, at least one of them would do the same.

So I let the three of them know what was up. One of them wrote a "humor" column twice a month and got paid $50 a pop for them. I. . .think she was entirely overpaid, but she was popular within the county and had been doing it pretty much since the beginning, so I guess they consider her worth it. I was told to tell her that she could either do one a month for the usual $50 or, if she still wanted to do two, it would have to be cut back to $25 a month. Yes, that kind of sucks, but if you really like doing something. . .well, I'll come back to that.

One of them got paid $25 for 250 word columns and $35 for 350 word columns. Again, I felt she was overpaid, because honestly? I could write the same thing in a short amount of time. (And now, I probably will have to.)

The last one, I'm not actually sure what she got paid, because she sometimes would write things just because she wanted to and only charged for the bigger ones. She was my favorite. Not just because she's the nicest of the three, but because her work. . .ethic?. . .makes more sense to me. Charge for the bigger articles (which were always really good) and write smaller ones because you want to.

The first person I heard back from was the column-writer. Literally, I cringed when I saw the e-mail from her, because, from what I remember from Carrie talking about dealing with her, I just didn't feel like it would end well.

It didn't, really.

She was kind of bitchy about the "buy-one-get-one-free" deal and said she "couldn't deal with this right now" because she was flying. . .somewhere to do some kid's show or something. She said she'd deal with it when she got back. I'm. . .guessing that's going to be a no. She said she probably wouldn't be writing for me at all anymore.

The second one wrote me back and said she wouldn't be contributing anymore. She also told me that she would cancel the two interviews she already had lined up (which is what put me in a lurch yesterday) and for me to let her know when I could pay her again. That. . .kind of pissed me off. On the one hand, I get it, kind of. On the other hand, that was a commitment she'd already made, and she ended up really screwing me.

When talking about this situation, I've told people that, in college, I worked for my college paper, and I have no idea how much I got paid to do it. I did get paid, and it wasn't a lot, but I didn't really care. I would have done it for free, because I loved doing it. Especially senior year, when I was writing my columns. I LOVED it. So I don't entirely understand why people aren't willing to at least work with me. Maybe not write articles that are as long. Maybe not write them as often. If the guy I freelance for found himself in the same situation and he said he couldn't pay me for what I was doing (which is X-number of 500-word articles), I'd say, well, if you cut the word number down, I'll still do them sometimes.

It's a little different, because he has several writers working for him, but you get the gist.

The last woman said if she had ideas or stories every now and then, she'd still send them to me. And this is why she's my favorite. She gets what I tried to explain above. She likes doing it.

So that's where I am right now. Hopefully, one of these days, the economy will turn around and people will have jobs again and will pay for their advertising (why they don't collect money BEFORE running the ad, I'll never understand) and I can pay the freelancers for their word. And I can tell you one thing: if I'm still in charge when that happens, I will first pay the people who have been writing for me for free. Because they're going to be the ones that help me through.

Oh, speaking of. Those of you who remember my past conundrum, of needing to interview the person who hates me more than probably anyone else in the county in order to write a center story? Carrie offered to write that story for me. So win-win-win, because I get the person that I feel would be the most instrumental to my story without actually having to speak to her, Carrie gets to write a center story (which. . .I'm assuming she wants to do, since she volunteered to do it), and the woman that hates me gets recognized for her work. Also, I get to be the bigger person (kind of) for including her. So, really, win-win-win-win. Wins all around.

I'm getting a vacation next week! I'll have the entire week off! Of course, that means I'm going to be working my ass off next week to get the publication finished early (early as in. . .Friday), but then I'm going to be not at work for an entire week. I'm not sure I'll really know what to do with myself. But it's not going to be work. I will absolutely NOT be answering any calls that come from the office. None. And if Vi calls me and leaves a message, I will listen to it Friday, when I come back.

Nick's coming home this week! He will be flying in Saturday. I was originally planning to go to the airport when he came in, when I thought he was coming Sunday, but as it turns out, his flight isn't expected until 10:45 p.m. Saturday, and planes are usually late, aren't they? Then he's probably going to sleep through Sunday. So. . .I don't actually know when I'll see him. But he'll be home.

So it's after 5 now. I'm going to go finish an article and maybe get like an hour of sleep.

UPDATE: It is currently 7:42 a.m., the sun is up, and I have written my final two articles so I don't have to worry about them mid-day like I'd intended to. I never went back to sleep. I also had a minor nervous breakdown because I couldn't find one of the articles I'd written, and I thought I was going to have to rewrite it. Damn you, Montpellier, France, for saving to the "My Templates" part of the computer. I'm thinking, while I'm up, I'm going to go get a biscuit for breakfast. I also anticipate being really loopy all day.

Layla. You've got me on my knees (Layla). I'm begging darling please (Layla).

Basically? Today was the best day ever.

I know that's kind of a dramatic change from last time I posted, but fact: I was in a good mood all day.

(Before I start in on all that, I want to say that my cousin's husband family is having a difficult time right now and if you're into the whole praying thing, they could probably use it. Also, Dennis' daughter is having surgery tomorrow [don't worry, nothing's wrong], and if you could keep her in your thoughts, too, that'd be cool.)

So anyway, I woke up this morning, and I was just in the best mood. It's been raining for the last few days, and I've been trying to brighten things up a little bit by wearing bright tights. Yesterday's were fuschia (magenta?), and today's were purple. And I blew out my hair, and, thanks to the humidity/rain, it did this cool flipped out thing that I got compliments on all day long. Now I just need to figure out how to make it do that when it's not raining, and I'll be good to go.

Also, I don't hate my hair anymore. I still loathe the bangs, and I will never concede on that, but now that it's not flat-ironed to my head, I think it's actually kind of cute. I'm dealing with the bangs by either spraying them back or wearing headbands.

Anyway, work was good today, Vi was in a rare good mood (she's actually likable when she chooses good moods!) and it was. . .just happy.

Looking back on it, I can't even tell you why today was so good. It just was. I had a really, really good day.

I'm not sure what I'm doing this weekend, but I don't have concrete plans.

I was going to write a big, long entry, but I took my sleep drugs already, and I'm on my way out.

Another one bites the dust.

When I get especially bored with my life, I usually end up doing something to my hair. It usually entails cutting off a great deal of hair, changing it to a different color, whatever.

So yesterday, I had an appointment in Asheville to get this haircut that I loved that I found, actually, on the salon's Web site. It was a great deal shorter, with punky, choppy bangs, and I thought, "That's it. That's exactly what my life needs right now. I need a badass haircut."

I went to get said badass haircut and ended up with. . .imagine, if you will, Catherine Zeta-Jones in Chicago, mixed with a guy (any guy), mixed with Suri Cruise. I have literal Suri Cruise bangs. People keep telling me that I shouldn't hate it but, you know what? I do. I hate it severely.

I'm. . .not pretty anymore. I've never been, you know, the girl that walks into the room and every head turns, but I have never been offensive-looking (save those years between 12 and 14, but everyone has awkward phases.) Now? I look in the mirror and just want to cry. There is nothing feminine about me anymore. I'm not pretty, I'm not cute, I'm just. . .really, really unfortunate-looking.

So much for a happy blog post, because I feel the need to mention that I'm ridiculously lonely, too. In this office at the end of the hall, I never see anyone. People used to stop at my dek to talk to me when I was at the top of the stairs, because I was right there, and now that I'm in this office, I see a lot less of people I'd like to see more of. It's just more out of the way to come talk to me now.

I'm just unhappy today. I guess that's all I really have to say.