So, after 8 years of neglecting myself and at the urging of Brandon, I finally went and had a full checkup done of my physical and mental health. I got ambushed (no pun intended) into an improptu lady-parts check. Good news! All my organs are where they are supposed to be. I was given a prescription finally for my migraines that luckily I only had to pay $10 for, without insurance it would have worked out to $24 PER PILL. We'll see how these treat me. After discussing in great detail my insomnia and anxiety attack issues, the Dr came to the conclusion that they are related and got me started on a daily anxiety pill and a super duper pill for the attacks that sneak past my newly elevated defenses. I've only been on these meds for 3 days now, but I swear I already feel 100 times better. I'm tired at night, awake in the mornings, cheerful throughout the day. Even my coworkers that were able to manage to bring to me homicidal rages mearly with thier repulsively annoying personalities, waaay more tolerable. Sure, these pills may be chemically lobotomizing me to some extent, but if they make me a more tolerant person I will be happy. Plus, my anxiety attacks are worse than death, so I'm happy to have those at bay. Anxious to see how awesome this makes drinking now...

Not much to report in the way of updates...my sis is coming up from Georgia for the weekend and I can't wait for her to see my new house. Also at some point this weekend might be headed back to Mathews to hang out with an old highschool/college friend of mine who is visiting from Texas. In between those happenings, plan to spend quality time with the Brandon which probably means drinking and watching my new Star Trek DVD's...DORK ALERT! Also going to put some more hours into my metal garden of doom! Ok, it's a veggie garden. But with lots of super hot peppers to jab into the open wounds of dissenters! Wish the weekends were about 4 times as long because there are lots of other things I would love to be able to do, like go to Jaxx to see Kreator and Exodus Sunday, but that is when Sarah is supposed to be coming by. Now if it can just not rain for the next week I'll be set.

Poop on a stick. Allergies are upon me. That or the Bacon Lung, not sure. Either way, balls to feeling shitty.

Keeping this short and sweet, here is the rundown of my weekend happenings...

Saturday went to see Cannibal Corpse in Richmond! It was of course about 94 degrees outside and INSIDE of the venue, much closer to 100 . Everyone was sweaty and disgusting and there was hardly any airflow. However, it was an awesome show with a great set and opening bands that I actually didn't hate. Nueraxis (sp) was probably my favorite outside of C.C. I'd heard them before on Pandora and thought highly enough of them to write down the band name for further investigation. Got to hang out with Kim a bit, though she was busy tearing up the pit. Saw some other folks I knew from Hampton Roads and had a couple of people ask about my band, only one of them I recognized. That's always awesome. Some dude got punched in the cheek so hard it cut a huge deep gash and looked horrible. Brandon being drunk decided to joke the guy about it not being that bad and the guy held up a napkin over it and let Brandon feel how deep it was through the napkin. Fucking gross.

Sunday was house-day. Bought a dishwasher and did a bunch of painting and stuff at the house to make it closer to ready for visitors. Still need a few more furniture items that I think we are going to look into picking up this weekend.

Monday I was supposed to go to work, but got a horrible migraine and stayed home instead. Pretty lame and boring, aside from Intervention.

Tuesday was the worst. Were SUPPOSED to go to Norfolk to see Amon Amarth. Were SUPPOSED to go early for a meet and greet that Shelley worked for me and Brandon. Were SUPPOSED to hang out with Kim and use her sweet hookups to hang with her the band after the show. Got all dressed up and ready to go, started pregaming a bit (ok, a lot), rode with Brandon and got to Richmond where he got a phone call from his work about an emergency in Staunton that he HAD to go to. 20 minutes of attempted negotiations later, we turned around. SO MAD! Oh well, I'm sure there will be other shows.

In other news, life is going quite well. I love my job and they seem to think highly of me, as according to my last performance review on Friday. House is AWESOME, dog is cute, and Brandon is amazing as always. I'm going to assume that the super horrible dark times that made up the beginning quarter of last year are so far behind us and we are being cosmically payed back for our suffering now. Heck ya! Now I just need my Rodeo to die so we can get my 350z replacement. Darn Isuzu and their sturdy long lasting vehicles! I thought cars were supposed to kick the bucket at 200k miles, not keep on trucking despite neglect and abuse!

Well, as my friend Kim pointed out, there are indeed giant hands of Jesus in statue form here in Tulsa at Oral Roberts University (huh huh). I took a picture:



Those hands are freaking HUGE.

I also have seen so far this week:

* An old man in a face-cast picking his nose

* A black midgit lady playing a slot machine

* A church called GUTS, complete with giant red light up sign (if you don't believe me, http://www.gutschurch.com )

* Old people literally hitting the slot machines in frustration and shooting me the death glare when they notice me watching (thank you for my paycheck)

* A Kenny Rodgers-themed slot machine

* Nice looking houses for sale for $20,000 with property

* A casino called Kickapoo (I worked here today)

Probably more before I leave on Friday, but those are some of the highlights.

I'm in Tulsa, OK right now. They just slipped a flier under my hotel door informing us that we are under a tornado watch until 10pm. I don't think I'm going to breathe for the next 3 hours. I fucking hate tornados. I am fearless and brave about most everything, but tornados scare the shit out of me. Doesn't help that my fortune cookie I just opened had NO FREAKING FORTUNE IN IT! Gah, I should not get myself all worked up about this.

I have come to realize that Tulsa is probably the most boring place I have ever been. I drove the company minivan (oh yeah, big pimpin') and there is NOTHING to do. Seriously lame. Hotel room and Chinese food it is. I seriously drove around for like 45 minutes and couldn't find a single thing worth stopping for. It's just old ass businesses and run down buildings. At least my hotel is nice.

DEAR GOD I HEAR A TRAIN. Dude, I know there are train tracks nearby, but this is fucked up. AHHH! I fucking hate tornados. I want to be back in Virginia. There is so little to be afraid of there. And I'm stuck here until Friday. Fucking great.


**Abby apologizes for the gratuitous swearing in the above post. She is terrified and this is the best she can do.**

Life is going very well for me recently. On the housing front, we totally scored the house we were after and close in two weeks. Moving sucks, but owning again is going to be so sweet. Great mountain views from the house and horse ranches on the road there...pretty nice all in all. Lots of work to be done, though the house is in great condition, but I want to get a killer garden and such in before spring starts up.

Going to be in Tulsa, OK for a week early next month for work to tour some of the Indian casinos out that way. My job rules. Not that Tulsa is all that exciting of a place, but to be paid to fly out and visit casinos for a week? Yeah, I've got it pretty good. However, this will actually be the first time I have ever traveled more than 3 hours somewhere on my own and definitely the first time I've been in a hotel or flown by myself. Slight anxiety over that (such a n00b) but I'm sure I'll do fine.

And most exciting of all...Cannibal Corpse in April! Never seen them play live so I am super stoked. And only $15 too. Life is awesome sometimes.

Lots of excitement to report. Friday night, my sister came by to hang out since she is visiting from Georgia for some sort of requirement for her master's degree something or another. Didn't realize that "Wood Grill Buffet" was Western Sizzlin AKA Walmart Feedin' Trough. Got stuck there anyway and ate food that made me feel like dying. Afterwards hung out with Brandon and the sis back at the house and drank 3 bottles of good nice wine (2 of the Merlot's that Brandon and I had made) and then the bottle of nasty white zinfindel that she insisted on. I knew it was stupid and I was going to get sick drinking that crap, and I was totally right. Saturday morning she left early and Brandon and I had planned to go and check out a list of 10 houses that we had narrowed our search down to. Took some Pepto before we left to quiet the gurgling in my tummy. The curvy mountain roads of Greene county did me in and I totally puked frothy hot pink vomit in the yard of one of the houses we were checking out. God I hate cheap wine. After looking at the homes, we further narrowed down our search to 3. Brandon called the realtor he's been working with and she was able to take us into those three that afternoon. Had some close calls of "oh my god, I'm going to have to hide somewhere and puke" but avoided that situation luckily. We got really excited about two of the 3 and took the evening to sleep on it.

Sunday we hung out in the morning at both of my brother's homes before...meeting up with the realtor and putting in a bid on one of the homes! Yippeee! We should know by Tuesday what they think of our offer. Cross your fingers for us! If we get it, we'd be 4 miles max from the Skyline Drive with a 3000 square foot aweome home with a HUGE basement (can we say JAM SPACE???) and 2.5 acres of woods complete with trails and a small river. Thier asking price is SUPER reasonable too, about 100k less than our max price. This would rule so hard. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!!!!!

In other less exciting news on the crafty side of things, I totally learned how to make mineral makeup from scratch and ordered all the supplies and chemicals and colorants and such and made 125 different eyeshadows and a tupperwear container of foundation in the first week. I love being self-sufficient.

Little Shane, *sigh*...he was 11 years old when I met him. This weekend we had his 21st birthday celebration complete with keg at the Davis boy's mother's house. And he screwed some nasty old lady in his car. They grow up so fast...*tear* We got to jam too, which felt SOOOO great after not playing together for like 6 months. Saw a few old friends and only smoked THREE cigarettes. It sucks that I smoked any because I had been doing so well with the quitting thing, but I'll chalk it up to the sheer quantity of beer that was pulsing through my viens at that point. Menthols too...uhg. Matthew got trashed and decided he wanted to have his own version of "Scared Straight" for his 15 year old sister and told her that he was so poor from buying drugs that he had to eat his own shit. He said this with a straight face and got pissed at me when I laughed my ass off at him. Oh well, his intent was good, but delivery sucked. Good times at the hillbilly abode. I have pictures I'll put up in a little bit, just so that the sheer white trashiness can fully be appreciated.

Insomnia sucks. Big time. I've been floating through life for the last 2 or 3 weeks zonked out and turning into an alcoholic. I've been drinking pretty much every night in addition to taking over the counter sleeping pills and most of the time that works, however dangerous and ill-advised it might be. I try and space it out because of the addiction aspects of the pills, but I still have to drink to get any rest. I feel like a loser drinking by myself at 1:30 in the morning each night on weekdays, usally the cheapest and shittiest stuff we have on hand at the house. Tonight might just be the leftover mudslide wine-cooler shitass thing my sis left at Christmas and mint schnopps. Yum yum. I don't know why I object to seeing a doctor so strongly, but short of having a bone sticking out of my skin, you'd be hard pressed to get me to go. Especially after what happened to my mom, you'd think I'd have better sense, but I apparently don't. My dad is sending me some prescription sleep aids that might help a bit. Uhg.

In other news, we are thinking of having a house built. We've been house shopping for a few weeks and even with our decent price range of almost twice what we were able to spend in Norfolk, we can't seem to find a decent house far enough away from other houses that isn't on the side of a cliff next to trailers and with a yard that you can only access by helicopter. I'm not exagerating by that much. I didn't realize Greene county had places that remote and crappy. At least with having a house built, we can situate it on the land we purchase wherever we want and have more freedom. And the price ain't bad neither. (Hillbilly talk attempt #1).

Ok, enough for today. Going home to make yet another feeble attempt at rest.

W00T! Have Friday's off now instead of Mondays. Anything sweet going on anywhere that anyone knows about this weekend?

Where oh where could it be? Probably down in my couch cushions somewhere. That or I left it at the grocery store somehow. Dammit, I feel naked. This sucks to be so reliant on a piece of technology that you feel crippled without it.

New Year's was quiet for once. Went to an event hosted by the radio station and won Skynryrd (however the f you spell it) tickets which looked incredibly rigged, but it wasn't. Gave them to my bro in laws which made thier days. Stopped smoking a week and a half ago! YAY ME! Got through New Year's without lighting up which was truly a feat.

Looked at some property over the weekend, hope to be in a permanent house of the ownership variety in the next month or two. Moving sucks, but as long as it's only to and from the C-ville area, I'm fine. Anything is better than the ghetto.

Hung out with my sis a lot over the holidays which is cool. It is good that we are getting close again. Holidays went smoothly and I got some good loot. A Tom Tom (finally), the Office season 4, metal shirts, video games, and a case of MRE's!!! Yay again!

I just got really shitty news about a friend of mine from work. Can't say too much right now, but I really hope he is ok. I'll know more if I hear from him. I ask that you all send good wishes his way.

Ok, here's my work Halloween festivities in photo form:




Me as Dimebag! Yes, I am holding a bottle of Jack in the workplace.




Group shot. My boss is the one dressed as Slash. There are a lot of metalheads here.




Me carving my first pumpkin, or Dime-kin as I like to call it.




And a small cell phone pic of my first pumpkin. We only had 30 minutes, so I had to rush, but it came out ok.

I'm really curious to see who actually reads my journal. Add me as a friend or leave a comment here so I can know if I'm really just writing to the 3 or 4 that comment usually. Come on, no more lurking! I am friendly enough! :) <- See? A cute little happy face! It's safe to be my pal.

Tales from the weekend! Come children, gather 'round. Haha, ok, so my original plan for the weekend was to dress as a post-zombie apocalypse soldier who had already been infected. I had it all planned out, wore my fatigues and was going to pick up my sweet gas mask from my dad's house where I was storing it for safe keeping after my house was robbed. This was to be on the way to Shelley's house where we would then leave and go to the Halloween party. So, gasmask was not at my dad's... :( *grumble grumble* I had like an hour to come up with something on the drive to Va Beach. So, a 10 minute dash through Walmart and 30 bucks later, I had my impromptu Dimebag Darrell costume! Here we are in all of our glory: (Well, sort of, bad pic that I am only partially in)



Shelley went as an evil clown and made balloon animals. It was sweet. But first, we had to go to a "Passion Party" put on by her sis. Uhg. Hell. The host tried to make me partake in a fake orgasm contest which I flatly told her I wasn't going to do. Females sitting around, drinking wine, talking about dildos? No thanks. My flight instinct was raging wildly throughout. But the Halloween party later was pretty fun, even if we weren't able to play due to some scheduling issues within the band. I'll be revisiting my costume on Friday at work, so I will hopefully have a better photo to post at that point.

Had a nice quiet weekend for once. My dad came up and visited and really loved our new house. That affirmation is always comforting. Went fishing with my brothers and my dad who are all avid fly fishermen, all decked out and sporting $200 rods. I had bought a $15 freshwater rod at Walmart for the occasion and they all laughed at me. Who was the only one to catch a fish? Moi! And a bass at that. HaHA! Went exploring in some farm land and pet a bunch of livestock. I get so giddystupid at fuzzy creatures. I got to pet some goats, a donkey, many horses, and a cow. One of the horses had just puked and had flourescent green slime coming out of his mouth, so I snubbed him. Stepped in a lot of poop and Brandon marveled at the array of mushrooms growing in the manure piles. But the smell of freshness and hay and fall was just overwhelming. I can never go back to city life at this point.

I am in need of a metal fix. Does anyone know of any shows going on Friday night?

If you know Kim from Under1Condition, make sure you come to her Halloween party on the 25th as we will be playing there! There will be a couple of bands a good time to be had by all.

In other news, it is fucking beautiful outside! This weather is amazing and I am so fortunate to be in the mountains to see it.

I had food poisoning earlier this week and it sucked. But I am slowly getting better. Yay gingerale!

I see your faces in pictures and I am still repulsed, 6 years later.

My decision to leave you all behind to wallow in your cesspool of inbred southern-pride circlejerking is justified.

There is so little to return for besides an ego boost.

Enjoy your shitty lives and dipping your wicks in 14 year old girls that cause the family tree's branches to touch.

Am I cocky? Perhaps, but I am better than you.

Mathews is the taint of Tidewater, but Norfolk is still is the anus.

Random streaming thoughts: I have been doing some thinking on the subject of my internet footprint and it's effect on future employment. I have seen many articles on this lately and it made me evaluate my stance on this. As recently as my last hiring, I was Googled and my Myspace page made the rounds with my coworkers prior to my offer. From what I was told, the videos of my performing and the idea of me being in a band that plays more extreme music than the more Charlotteville acceptable Dave Matthews crapola actually was to my benefit and made me appear more interesting and gave some insight into my personality. When I Google my name, the things that come up in the search results are various band links, my Facebook link, myspace pages that reference me, and an article that lists my time in a Cross Country running race from high school. Nothing too insidious, unless perhaps the person looking into me was turned off by the type of music I play or my stated political leanings. If someone chose to not hire me based on any of that, I am sure it would be a working environment that would not suit me. I was taught growing up never to take a picture that you would be embarassed to show your father. This has really been my philosophy and I think it is to my benefit. I don't believe in hiding who I am and no job is worth that to me. I am not a corporate ladder climber type; I am very content in the role I am in. Short of posting pictures of drug use or nudity or rants that make you sound like a risk for violence or hatred, I think that people should feel free to be who they are online without fear of it affecting job placement. That being said, the internet is a public forum despite what some people believe and any information you put online about yourself needs to pass through the "is this really what I want the world to know" filter. Everything you say or post online is available forever for scrutiny and that needs to be taken into account. I know a lot of people involved in alternative modeling and activities outside the "norm". A friend of mine was having this same discussion with me some time back and told me that they feel sorry for these poor girls and dudes because they will be stigmatized if they ever try and seek employment outside of this realm. I disagreed with him because even though this info is much more easily obtainable via the internet, it is something that felt right to them at the time and they knew what they were getting into and by making that choice they accepted the potential risks that might come along with it. Where am I going with this? I don't know, this really didn't have a point, it was just something that I was thinking about today. Moral of the story kids, don't think you can hide behind the internet and not be held accountable for what you post about yourself, but don't pretend to be something you aren't for the sake of someone else. There will always be jobs available and SOMEONE will find you interesting enough to hire.

Unrelated, I thought I would share this email I just got on Myspace from someone whom I have never met nor talked to and it makes me wonder what possesses people to find me safe enough to write things like this to:

Hello Mistress, I have seen your myspace and I would love to serve you as your slave. I will do anything you say, I have a camera and can take pictures of tasks I do for you. I will do anything from tasks for you to searching something or doing something for you that you dont want to be bothered with, I will work hard for you while you just sit back and relax and watch me work, and just laugh at me for doing it. I am a sad loser with a small cock. I can never have a proper relationship with a woman because I am so perverted. So I offer myself up to you to be abused and humiliated. I will be honest with you. I will not attempt to meet you in real life and I dont have a lot of money, which is why I will make it up by doing ANYTHING you say, I am sure people say that all the time but I am serious about it when I say it. I will speak to you with respect at all times. I will always remember that you are superior to me. I will be pathetically grateful that you are taking the time to speak to me. Thank you Mistress for wasting your time with me.


Signed : Your slave and personal bitch