nope

Clearly I am no good at this anymore.

May start up a new blog linked to the email account I use most often... maybe that will help? Who knows.

Ta ta for now, folks!

Hello?

Wow, a year and two days later I finally remembered how to log in to my blog!!! I'm hoping to get back into writing because I do miss it.

I'm not so grumpy anymore.
I'm not so single anymore (I'm MARRIED).
I'm not so full of rage and confusion... but I am still angered by stupid people and easily annoyed by rude people and strangely baffled by many, many others.

So a lot has changed and a lot hasn't changed. Should make for a good comeback.

I hope...

shame on me

It's a new year - nearly halfway through a new year and I haven't been on here in ages.

I can't promise that I'll get any better at updating this, so I'm going to do a little rundown of life since my 'crisis'.

The boy that I was waiting to start things up with is now my live-in beau. I moved out of London and we have a lovely little home by the sea.

I found a new job at the end of the year and started off 2010 in a new office, wearing my own clothes, feeling much better.

I am happy, healthy and looking forward to a trip back to Toronto (with my man) for my dear friend's wedding (in which I am a bridesmaid!!!!) in June.

I guess I found this blog helpful when I wasn't so happy and needed to rant and get my feelings down in front of me. It's been helpful to spell things out for myself, and now that I'm seeing things more clearly I may not write as much as I did once.

For those of you who do read this and enjoy reading it I'm sorry I haven't been better at writing.

But, I'm hoping to make more of an effort off the computer with my writing and maybe someday will be able to share it widely with everyone.

Thanks for reading : )

Quarter-life Crisis, indeed.

What is it about nice, intelligent, good-natured people in their mid to late twenties feeling like shit? Why can't the beautiful, warm, kind, generous people in their mid to late twenties seem to catch a break these days? Yes, I'm talking about me and my lack of any sort of good luck recently, but I'm also talking about more than a handful of my friends. We are all seemingly stuck at a point in our lives where nothing is going on. Actually, that is not true. Allow me to rephrase: nothing good is going on. I admit, I can be a bit dramatic at times, but I think it's fair to say that my life is in a bit of a state at the moment and (thankfully) I'm not alone.

I have a job. That is a GOOD thing. It pays the bills and allows me to be in Central London without having to live off the street scouring every corner for food and water. I work with some amazing people, but I do not enjoy what I do. I am not proud of the work that I do everyday nor am I happy to share the details of my day to day job with acquaintances who have far more challenging and mentally stimulating jobs on their hands. I am tired of forcing a smile on days when I just can't be bothered, and I am tired of saying the same four sentences over and over and over and over and over... you get the idea. I know I shouldn't really complain, because so many people have worse jobs than mine and so many more people don't have jobs at all. But, this is my blog and I can do and say whatever I want. And what I want to say is that my job leaves me feeling drained at the end of every day. Not because I've done so much work that I'm exhausted, not because it's so stressful that my mind can't handle it, but because I don't have to actually use my brain very much to do the things that are required of me and whilst doing these things I have to smile and be polite. Even when I have visitors being very rude to me and insulting me or questioning why I am working where I'm working, I have to be friendly and courteous and it's exhausting.

Now, my job isn't the only thing getting me down but I would say it is the root of all the evils in my life right now. I have friends in and around London that I would like to see more often than I do, and when they aren't free to hang out or when they don't return my messages for days or even weeks at a time, I don't know how to handle things. Normal, happy, energetic Renee knows how to handle these sorts of things, but grumpy, exhausted, confused and unhappy Renee does not. So I find myself getting very emotional and feeling very much alone. Drama queen much?

There is a boy that I like and I want to be with but we've both agreed the timing isn't quite right for us to start something up. I won't go into detail about this part of my life, because some things I like to hold a bit closer to my heart, but I will say that the decision we've made to wait until things are a bit more stable for both of us is the right one. I do not want to be with him the way things are for either of us at the moment, but wanting to be with him eventually makes it hard to not be with him now... if that makes any sense. Anyway, the point of sharing this bit of information is to illustrate how the crazy, crap job has worn me down to such a small and sometimes weak version of myself that even though I know that me and this boy are doing the right thing right now and that we'll be happier for it down the road, I sometimes freak out unnecessarily over things that needn't upset me so much. Things that I should be able to deal with, things I should be able to ignore, things that I should be able to see for what they are and not blow things out of proportion because I'm tired and cranky from spending another long day without friends returning the messages I left them about people being rude to me at work.

I think the bottom line is that I am feeling very overwhelmed by the stress I am putting on myself to find a new job. I am constantly looking for jobs to apply for, constantly sending in applications to no avail, and constantly forcing myself to grin and bear it at work when all I really want to do is quit. I am letting myself get carried away with the little things and I'm not allowing myself to enjoy the bigger, lovelier things in my life, like the fact that I live in a city where I can see or do virtually anything at any given moment. I'm getting myself worked up over things that are out of my control. I'm not allowing myself to relax when I need to. I'm not focusing on the things in my life that I can improve and change for the better. I don't know where I'm going from here, but I think getting some of this out here will help. And if it doesn't, at least I've spent the past ten minutes self-reflecting and I do believe that helps.

That is all for today.

some photos...

and the songs (those that i remember) in no particular order:

no line on the horizon
magnificent
i know i'll go crazy if i don't go crazy tonight
get on your boots
unknown caller
moment of surrender

ultra violet (light my way)
one
mysterious ways

vertigo
city of blinding lights

beautiful day
walk on

where the streets have no name
i still haven't found what i'm looking for
with or without you

pride (in the name of love)
sunday bloody sunday
angel of harlem

dubbbbbbbbbbbbblin

"Did you know that Dublin is the world's largest city?"
- "Really?"
"Yeah. It's just keeps dublin' and dublin' and dublin'"

I woke up at 4am, caught a taxi to the train station at 5am and was caught in the middle of a rowdy crowd of Ryanair passangers desperately trying to check-in before catching their budget flights by 6am. Through all of this, I kept thinking, "Is this really worth it?"

Having arrived at the airport two hours before my flight the chaos of the Ryanair check-in area didn't affect my flight, but my mood was slightly elevated by the grumpy unorganised Brits trying to get to a 6:30am flight by arriving at 6... tsk, tsk.

The flight was a breeze, I slept the entire 55 minutes length of it and woke up as we flew over Ireland's coast. When going through customs and asked the purpose of my visit I responded "I'm going to the U2 concert" to which the kind customs officer replied "Oh, another one. Enjoy the show" and sent me on my way. I was beginning to get the feeling this early start was going to be well worth it. I wasn't wrong.

The city was FULL of U2 fans. Everywhere I went shops and restaurants and pubs were playing U2's music. People were smiling and sporting their favourite U2 shirt. Far too many men were trying to pull off "Bono" style sunglasses and too many middle aged women were dolled up to the nines in hopes of wooing him, no doubt.

I met my friend American Evan and his Northern Irish friend Shelly at Trinity College where we dropped off my bag before wandering around the city. We walked all day before making the trek to Croke Park. If you've ever been to Dublin you know that the city isn't too big, but it's big enough to wear yourself out in an afternoon of walking. But we marched on and arrived at the stadium about 90 minutes before showtime... and as a result, we managed to secure spots just about twenty feet from the 'catwalk' section of the stage.

The opening bands were OK, Kaiser Chiefs putting on a VERY entertaining show, but everyone was very, very ready for U2 by the time they took the stage just after 8:30pm. Now, I wasn't too fond of their latest album (although a few of the tracks did remind me of their early 90's stuff) but as soon as the title track started up and the roar of the crowd nearly blew me away, I was impressed. They opened with four tracks from the new album and the energy only got more intense as they broke out some of the old favourites. (I can't remember the entire track list, but I will do my best later today to re-cap what I can remember).

I have to go to work now, so I will leave you all hanging here... but promise that the next installment will include at least one photo.

things i like

With nothing of much importance to share (I will share the details of my fantastic U2 weekend soon enough) I thought I'd share a few of my favourite things.

I like thunderstorms.
I like green grapes.
I like being barefoot.
I like laughing so hard that I cry.
I like striped clothing.
I like singing loudly while I bake cookies.
I like painting my fingernails.
I like riding on the top of double decker buses.
I like driving.
I like being inside a tent.
I like watching films on a big screen.