The GirlAlive Blog

This blog entry covers a variety of topics.  Try to keep up with the group.

First of all, if you're female and you have no job, and you have some kids, that does not automatically make you a "full-time mom".  If your husband is unemployed and you're living on welfare, you are just as unemployed as your husband.  If there are 2 ablebodied adults who could be working and no one is, you are both unemployed.  You are not a full-time mom if you are shooting heroin 4 times a day.  You are a full-time junkie and a part-time mom at best.  If you have one child, and a nanny who does all the childcare, you are not a full-time mom.  You are lazy and you have too much money.

My hamster is problematic.  He still stinks.  Now he has started peeing and pooping on me because apparently, he is now more comfortable with me.  And the other day, he spent a very long time "cleaning" some unmentionable regions of his anatomy.  It was gross.  He's a cute little fluff ball, with some disturbing habits.

They're giving us uniforms at work.  On one hand, that's one less thing to think about early in the morning.  On the other hand, it is a horrible light blue polyester blend that needs to be ironed.  And why are they spending money on uniforms when we can't even get office supplies or toilet paper in our office?
 
My husband and I were at the pet store the other day and we saw the cutest baby guinea pigs.  They were barely bigger than Binky.  We both wanted them, but we don't have the room or the time for many more piggies.  But if I ever win a million pounds, I'll be getting into small-scale guinea pig breeding, cause I love those little baby piggies.

Anyway, that's about it for now.

Alana

Posted by Alana at 10:57 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (1)

Please excuse the last posting.  I was having a really really bad week.  Moving to another country isn't easy.  Fitting in and making it "home" is even harder.  Imagine if there were a thousand tiny things that got on your nerves, from the way people interact to how they pronounce their words.  Imagine yourself immersed in those irritants all day every day.  Now imagine that you're facing a lifetime of being immersed in those irritants.  It has a way of making a person extremely irritable.

People here are fairly unfriendly as far as I can tell.  But they are far from being entirely evil.  I met a very nice lady on the bus today.  I get on great with the girl at the health food store.  I'm just suffering from extreme culture shock.

Part of the problem is that I am, deep down, very shy and withdrawn.  I don't interact with people easily, especially when I see them as potentially hostile.  And this whole country seems potentially hostile, so I've retreated deep into my shell to avoid them.  I've decided to try to change that.  In Seattle, I was not just more outgoing, I was a force to be reckoned with.  I'm going to spend some time trying to find my attitude again.

Alana

Posted by Alana at 10:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

My biggest fear when I moved to Scotland was that it was going to be an intolerant place.  My biggest fear is that I would never be accepted.  I was afraid that people would automatically hate me because I'm American or because I'm fat or because I'm ugly, or any of the other random reasons people decide to hate people they don't even know.  My husband assured me that it would be fine.  He was wrong.

Everything I was afraid of when moving here has come true.  I love Scotland, except for the people.  People in my office have made negative comments about foreigners "marrying all the Scottish men."  They make these comments in front of me and the other girl in the office from Slovenia who is married to a Scottish man.  No one ever sits next to me on the bus.  People stare at me like I'm a circus freak.  Complete strangers in public have mocked me and made fun of me for being fat.  It's like living in perpetual high school here.  It is my worst nightmare.

The people of Scotland could be okay if they learned to mind their own damned business.  I lived in Seattle for 5 years and I guess I got spoiled by living among friendly and accepting people.  I miss the west coast of the US.  I miss living in a place where you can be whoever you are.  I miss living among decent human beings.

Now I understand why my husband can sometimes be withdrawn and unfriendly in public.  He's just trying to get by without being noticed.  He's lucky though.  He's a big enough man that no one is going to take him on.  But I just look like a good target to the juvenile-minded Scottish public.

So far the only part of Braveheart that is true of Scotland is the line when the king of England says that the biggest problem with Scotland is that it is full of Scots.

Alana

Posted by Alana at 07:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've been very busy with work and I haven't been on my own computer in a while.  I've mostly been using my husband's computer so I can watch tv while I play around online.  But I also forget to write in my blog when I do that.

It was very hot here for a long time.  I hate hot weather, so it started to grate on me and make me grumpy.  Then I had a few things come up (my friend with the abusive husband, my other friend with ovarian cancer, and my dad with the whole heart blockage thing he talks about on his blog).  Those things made me sad about being stuck here in Scotland when all those people are still in the US.  I like it here, but it isn't easy being so far away from all of my people.

I've basically been depressed for a few weeks, and I don't post blog stuff when I'm depressed because I mostly just sleep.  I wish I was back home.

I also have been getting frustrated with my job.  I don't like working in an office.  I don't like having bosses always micro-managing how I do my job.  For a few years I've been kicking around a hundred ideas of what I could do for a career that would be better.  Lately there have been some radio commercials here that have been getting to me. 

Back up for a minute.  I have a bachelor's degree in history with a minor (3 classes away from a double major) in geography.  These degrees are worthless.  They qualify me to work at McDonald's.  I only have a nice office job because of my charm and personality.  So I'm not starting from a good place to re-train to a new job.  I'd love to re-train into something like biochemistry, but I'd have to get a whole new bachelor's degree and then a master's, and it is a lot of work and expense.  

Anyway, on the radio, they've been begging people to get trained as teachers.  So I looked into it.  It pays better than my current job, I'd have more freedom and creativity at work, and I'd get 2 months off in the summer, plus other school holidays.  It only takes a year to get a post-graduate diploma in education.

I can't do it now because I have no money.  And if I went to school right now, I'd have to apply (and pay tuition) as an international student because I haven't lived here long enough to be a resident.  But in a few years I might think about it. 

I hate kids.  I think that the teenagers here are all surly, rude, foulmouthed bastards.  But I can't complain about it unless I'm willing to do something to fix it.  So I think I might become a teacher.

Alana

www.girlalive.com 

Posted by Alana at 08:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (2)