mood:
listening: october falls- tuoni
weather: clear, cool
time: 16:49

yesterday i drove to the mountains to tour a few apartment complexes. i can definitely see why this area of nc brings in so many tourists this time of year it was good weather yesterday and driving up to the mountains and seeing them turned red + orange + yellow instead of their usual dark green was so cool! i was in such a bad mood that i didn't bother to go down the parkway (except for the little bit i had to drive through to get to another end of town) and i didn't stop to take any pictures. i guess thats just the way it is.. when you're so deep in your own head its hard to stop and appreciate all the beauty around you.

the apartments themselves were really nice but there's pros and cons to everything. one of them had very nice units that would suit my needs in terms of noise/traffic levels and amenities but was a little farther away from the school i'm going to (hopefully) be going to next year. it's not that it was that far away, maybe 15-20 minutes so it's not like it's completely undoable, just something to think about. the other complex had really amazing views but the units were older and kind of had a funky smell to them. they also didn't have any with a porch which made me a little sad... living in the barracks there was no porch (this is a given .. it's the barracks) and i was always so depressed there wasn't any area i could sit outside in.

so one has nicer view + a few minutes away from the school but less amenities and no outside area. other one had more amenities and an outside area, but a little further from the school. still weighing my options, there's a third complex i was considering that's right next to the one that's closer to the school, but i wasn't able to get a tour in since they're closed on the weekends. i need to go there during the week sometime to talk to someone from the school, so maybe i'll try to check it out then.

lately i've been feeling invisible and i don't mean that in a dramatic vent way i mean literally having to check and see if i have my freaking cloaking device on... recently ive been depending on others for basically the outcome of my future and i hope i never have to do that shit again. no one will answer my calls or emails. i called one important place multiple times and the phone rang until i gave up and decided id go there in person- the civilian worker got so mad that i wasn't in uniform and kept trying to usher me back out the door until i finally managed to get a word in and tell him that i just had a question and wanted to schedule an appointment. he handed me a business card with their number on it lol so back to square one with them.

my school was supposed to reach out to me back in september but here we are at the end of october and still no word. i shot an email to one of my advisors last week but still no answer from them. 3 1/2 hours is a little too far for me to drive just to ask them basic questions but i might just have to if i keep getting ignored. it's super frustrating because if i don't know when school starts, i can't put in my GI bill benefits request and i don't know what i need to do placement test wise, etc, etc. just dead radio silence.

now i've spent my fair share of time doing admin work for years now and i know how easy it is just to reply to an email with "hey, i dont have an answer right now but give me a few hours/days/whatever and i'll get back to you" or "let me point you to the right direction" like is it that hard just to acknowledge someone instead of leaving them in the dark for weeks on end? i don't know what's going on right now and that stresses me out / pisses me off. i need to have a plan in order to feel prepared/safe and while i have a very vague plan right now i'm depending on people that are very likely going to let me down and that's just adding another layer to the pressure...

i don't feel like i respond to stress in a reasonable way anymore... feels like i can be under extreme gut wrenching pressure and have zero emotion or response to it because my brain completely shuts down or the smallest thing happens and i end up blowing my lid and going crazy. never really had a problem with feeling angry or lashing out at people until the last few years... i guess by lashing out i mean like. little stuff like flipping people off while driving or flashing my lights at them lol small stuff tht a lot of people probably dont consider lashing out but it's enough to make me step back and be like damn i should be consciously thinking about the way i act and choose to not react to things like this

but of course that is all easier said than done esp in this day and age where it feels like people are so volatile it just kind of rubs off on you. im trying to be more thought-driven instead of emotionally driven...... not in the traditional "i must become an epic logic intj" kind of sense but more of im trying to actually think before speaking or acting and try to actually figure out what emotion i'm feeling before i try to say anything about how i feel. this is probably a no brainer for most folks but well you already know.

been seriously slacking off on my walks this last week, i think i just got burned out on my route. was walking 4-5 miles a day going the exact same route with occassionally changing a small part in the middle of the route every now and then to try and keep it feeling New but it wasnt enough. went 3 miles the other night on a route that i hadn't been on in a bit and it felt nice, especially now that it's getting colder out. it feels like the sky is clearer when it's cold i guess it has something to do with the humidity maybe? not sure...... but it's nice to sit out in the chill and see the milky way. to me it'd be really cool to live in the arctic circle and experience polar nights for a few months even though pretty much everyone ive ever interacted with that lived that far north hated it. just think it would be cool to experience.

esp being from the south like people love to complain about winter snow but if you want to complain about winter go down south... nothing like 80 degrees on a december afternoon. when i went to school in the northeast we had a few weeks of heavy snow and it was the best thing in the world. granted i didn't have to drive in it because you could walk pretty much anywhere on post but it was awesome being able to see actual snow for the first time. there was a week we had like 3 feet of it and it was awesome.. besides trying to walk to and from the schoolhouse/dining facility without slipping on the ice.

should probably begin packing up my apartment- just the stuff that i dont use a lot like the stuff that's in storage and getting rid of things that i don't need to bring with me. clear out all the clothes i haven't worn in the last year and donate them. that way when it actually comes time to move i'm not swamped with 5000 tasks and can hopefully get out of here as quickly as possible. there's also some repairs that i need to make on the apartment that are all pretty small but need to get done nonetheless that i'm not looking forward to... all thanks to simon and margot of course (mostly simon)

well now i'm contemplating how to end my sunday... maybe a short walk tonight since i'm still feeling pretty tired from all the driving that i did yesterday. hopefully there's progress made this week whether it's by people finally getting back to me or myself finally finding the gall to start being a little more demanding with people when they act like i dont exist. other than that i guess there's not much to talk about this week. ill pce out for now see ya next one