Some Girls

So it's a well known fact that I cyber stalk.  I have had many disagreements with people I know about the morals or values in cyber stalking, but I don't care.  I'm okay with what I do.  What you put on the internet is fair game for my piqued interest.  Of course there are certain people that I stalk, a list if you will.  Some people are more regular, some have come and gone.  Generally, the rule is, if someone has done something I think is awful or ridiculous and somehow it touched me, then my stalking is generally to watch and see what happens to this (generally miserable) person.

So there is a girl that I stalk occasionally.  I used to stalk her with some degree of frequency but my interest waned, plus, she's a bit dull.  We used to be best friends.  I've written about her before.  Needless to say, our friendship ended in a rather spectacular and ugly way.  And so the die was cast.

I don't stalk her that much these days.  Occasionally.  She has a pinterest board though, that's my latest source.  That and I know two people who have friended her on facebook so I can also get details off of them sometimes.  At any rate, here's the deal.  This girl is bat-shit-crazy.  I mean seriously fucking nuts.  She may not seem nuts, but she is actually certifiable (and in fact, has been certified on more than one occasion).  So here's the thing that gets me.  Part of her psychosis if you will, is wrapped up in image and relationships.  Short version, she was (and as far as I can tell still is) an anorexic/bulimic with bipolar who needs men to love her and so always has a boyfriend.  She got married a while back, from my stalking I don't think that was going well and I'm pretty sure they were separated but then her husband died and she was a widow instead of a divorcee.

At any rate, a couple years ago she moved across country and had the man already lined up.  And from her pinterest, it's fairly clear they're going to get married.  And I have to wonder, what the fuck is it about this crazy fucked up bat shit girl.  She gets perfectly nice and generally reasonable men to just bend over backwards for her and fall in love with her.  Except fall in love with what exactly? She's full on cray-cray.  They don't love her, because no one knows the real her, and certainly not these men.  She keeps it very well hidden.  She's manipulative and intelligent.  Which goes a long way towards covering up the crazy.  She becomes the chameleon, liking everything they like and being everything they want her to be (or what she thinks they want her to be).  But seriously- who do so very many men fall for it?  And obviously, they continue to fall for it.  Because she plays helpless female when it suits her, but strong quirky renegade when it doesn't?  Because she's thin?  Because she's overly smarmy and adoring towards them?  The thing is, if this is what normal nice guys want, then what the fuck chance does any normal girl have?  They're all just going to fall for some psycho who needs them to stroke her ego.

See, I sort of wish through my stalking that I find out that things don't turn out all that well for those who aren't that nice to others in life.  And while the counterpoint to this, is that she has to forever live with herself (and herself is not a very happy bunny), the fact is she has all semblance of happiness, even if she isn't very happy.  Ugh.  This is when I think that you cant believe in karma and universal justice.  Because if you did, people like that just wouldn't succeed and clearly they do.  Nice girls finish last and all that.

**Note, wile I realize this makes me look crazy a) I don't care.  And b) one time when I was living with this girl and she had a boyfriend, she had promised him to 'try to stop purging so much' so I heard her wailing at him that he couldn't go to work/school/his parents/his friends because if he left her, then she might throw up.  Of course when he wasn't around, she just did all the binging and purging she damn well pleased, like she was always going to.  Like I said, C R A Z Y.

Anyway, I just needed to vent.  Crazy girl gets yet another guy.  Story of the century.

Busy As Usual

That's how things are around here.  Not surprising.  At least nowadays I'm actually mostly working on my own stuff, which is great.  The bad side is how little seems to get done in a day and how time just flies past.  It makes me feel like I need to ramp up my efforts at least tenfold.  Ah well.

So what exciting things have been happening in my life?  It snowed here in the UK two weeks ago.  That was nice.  Except that no one understands what to do with the snow.  It didn't really snow that much- maybe four inches max.  However, no one shovels.  So it quickly turns to slush and then ice overnight.  Treacherous at best.  At any rate, it happened to snow just when I needed to go up to Cambridge on my bike.  I did it, stupidly turned down a less clear street, was cycling in a wheel track with a car behind me and when I tried to move out of the way to let the car pass, instead managed to fall of my bike in front of the car which promptly stopped.  I was fine, and the bike was fine, although I got a wicked bruise on my inner thigh which is still not gone and that's two weeks now.  At any rate, I managed to get to where I live, but decided to walk to my office the next day instead of cycle.

Now the snow is all gone- and we're back to the temperate weather of the UK which means it's just a bit above freezing and raining instead.  I actually prefer snow, if only people would bother to deal with it.

I had a date with a guy who I will not have a date with again.  I've got another guy texting me but I haven't met up with yet.  Feeling unmotivated on the guy scene.  Oh, don't get me wrong, no less motivated that I'd love to meet someone, but ever so tired of always meeting the wrong ones.  Makes me dubious about a good one ever being out there, but it's not like the just come knocking on the door so if you don't ever put yourself out there and try, you most certainly will never get.  It's just demoralizing periodically.  C'est la vie.

I had family here, I went to a conference in Manchester where I got to present a paper I had accepted.  I saw my good friend C and her toddler and husband who I haven't been up to see for almost coming on two years, although she's come down to London and I've seen her here.  I could probably say more about these things, but I feel the moment has passed.

One outcome however, was to see some photographs of myself from the conference.  I feel fat.  Of course, I'm only ten pounds more than I've been the past eight years.  But the weight that seemed to appear this time last year and has not gone away is beginning to upset me.  So I've decided to work on my eating and am using an on-line calorie counter and phone app to track my food intake.  This has worked for quite a few people I know, so I think it's a good thing to try, and I know I tend to overeat at meals, even though I don't really snack.  I'm trying not to make a big deal out of this to people I know because I feel like weight loss should be somewhat private.  And also I don't want to see this as a 'diet' I want to see it more like a 'life change' on my eating habits to something that is a bit healthier and better for the long term for maintaining a healthier, and thereby lower, weight.