I am SO glad this week is almost over.

This has been one of the worst weeks ever I think. Here's what has happened (and why I think I'm cursed).

Sunday: Hungover. Tired. Totally behind on work. Still somewhat pissed about the fact that some asshole fucked up my sideview mirror. I notice Midnight (our 22 year old cat) is not acting normally. At one point I found him in the bathroom sleeping on the floor which is not his usual place to sleep. He was hard to wake up and seemed lethargic. He wasn't interested in eating and just wanted to drink water. A lot of water. Now, having had a dog that had diabetes, I know this is not a good sign. I manage to get him to eat a little tuna fish but he still doesn't seem quite right. I decide to take him to the vet the next day.

Monday: After school I race home and pick up Midnight. We go to the vet and the news is far from good. He has kidney failure. His body temperature is low. Really low. Not good low. He is dehydrated AND he's 22. The vet says that they can give him IV antibiotics to help with the dehydration, but whenever she's seen a cat with a body temp that low, it doesn't end well. She says they can try some things, but at most he really only has a month to six weeks to live. I was afraid of this...I asked the vet what she, in all honesty, recommended. She said it might be best to put him to sleep. I called Husband and we discuss the situation. We decide that the kindest thing to do is to put him to sleep. Husband and Wife head out to Ann Arbor to be there. Jon came to the vet's to offer his support too. It was so hard...I think one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. The vet was really nice though, not condescending, friendly but not overly perky (as would not be appropriate for the situation).

Remember too, my parents are in Germany. I called them to let them know what was happening and it was heartbreaking to hear my dad cry. They both agreed though this was the right thing to do for Midnight.

So, the plan then is for me and Husband to go home and bury Midnight. Wife will follow us to the house and Jon had to go home and take care of Fina. As Jon is leaving the parking lot, his car makes a horrible noise and the driver's side wheel is at a really wrong angle. We all get out of our cars to see what happened and it is not good. The front axle has broken and the wheel is off. Wife calls AAA to get his car towed and Husband and I head home to bury Midnight.

Jon and Wife get to the house and tell us the car has been taken to a local dealer. The car has to be junked at this point, so now Jon is out a vehicle. Husband and I bury Midnight in the woods behind our house and, though I'd been relatively ok when they actually put him to sleep (had a meltdown prior to that but held it together for the actual deed), having to put poor Mr. M in his little grave and then put dirt on top of him broke my heart. I bawled my eyes out. It was awful.

Back inside the four of us decide we should probably eat something as it is now after 8pm. Husband and Wife take off before me and Jon to the local Chinese place. As I'm closing the garage door it stops and seems to be at a funny angle. I think maybe something has just gotten jammed and we just need to move it. Turns out, the garage door broke. Jon manages to get the door down and, at this point, I say fuck it. I am NOT worrying about the garage door on top of everything else. It can be fixed when my parents get home. I don't bloody care anymore.

I slept horribly that night and felt emotionally hungover the next day. It was so hard to make it through school, but I somehow did.

Now we get to Wednesday...I get an email from Jon while I'm at work that the car dealer wants his car off the lot and they are charging him a storage fee every day it's there. Jon needs me to drive him to the dealer and take care of this. Luckily, when we do get there, they decide not to charge him. Now it's an issue of where to move the car so Charity Motors can pick it up. My house is around the corner, so that's the logical place. I call AAA and we get it towed for free to the house, so that was good. What began as a potentially rotten situation actually ended up ok, so that was good. Since he'd had a rather stressful day, I offered to cook for him-so we went to his place, I cooked curry (yum), we drank wine and watched the Tenacious D movie. It was a really good night and easily the highlight of the thus far fairly shitty week. However, I didn't get home till after 1am and was a wreck this morning. It was worth it though:)

Today was ok despite being horrifically tired. Tomorrow is Friday and that is a really good thing. I'm having Jon, Husband and Wife over for dinner tomorrow. The weather is supposed to be nice so I'm grilling tostadas, making margaritas and we're going to do a little relaxing after the week we've all had. I'm pretty excited about tomorrow actually. Made an expedition to Meijers to get everything and I'm feeling good about it.

I am SO glad tomorrow is Friday. What a week...
I miss Midnight. It's so weird without him. Poor guy :(

Peace out, Starving Nachos.

I think I'm getting too old for this

Aargh, I definitely am getting too old to be surviving on how little sleep I've gotten in the past few days. I feel exhausted, kind of shakey and somewhat hungover. So, here's the rundown of the past week:

Monday: Trivia night as always. I finally got to meet Mike's girlfriend, Stephanie, who I've heard so much about. She is very sweet and cool. She's got a totally cute look too. They're a ridiculously cute couple. Good night.

Tuesday: Drove my parents to the airport (woo hoo!) and guitar at Ben's. I still feel horribly self-conscious playing in front of other people. I'm working on this and Ben is very patient with me.

Wednesday: Latest issue of the school paper came out and I am waiting for the fallout from it. The kids did a good job with their articles, but the front page story was quite critical of school policy. The principal gave the go-ahead on the article (he was interviewed for it and saw it before we ran it) but I know there are other teachers and other people in the administration that will NOT like it. Left school waiting for the emails and phone calls from parents to start. On the spur of the moment I invited Jon over for dinner-we concocted this chicken/peppers/onions dish with rice and salad. Had a bottle of white wine and 'twas a good, relaxing night. However, I went to bed MUCH too late and was horribly exhausted the next day (it was worth it though). At this point? About 5 hours of sleep that night.

Thursday: My dept head comes to my room first thing. I know it will be about the paper. The good news? She LOVED it, thought it was great and loved that the kids are finding a voice. The bad news? She agrees, I will have pissed quite a few people off with this issue. Waiting for fallout... Guitar lesson went pretty well considering I haven't been practicing nearly as much as I should.

Friday: Still waiting for the fallout. The librarian said she loved the issue but I also heard that I pissed off the vice-principal and his secretary for being "too negative" in the issue. Dept head says they should ask themselves who the paper's audience is. Them or the kids? She's still backing me AND the prinicpal liked the issue, so I guess everyone else can go fuck off. Jon and I cooked dinner again (spicy shrimp, pasta, crusty bread and wine) and then headed to a Purim party where we watched this horrible but very funny kung-fu movie. Again, too little sleep that night.

Saturday: Recovery from the night before. Had breakfast with Jon (he made me pancakes! They were really good:) He definitely spoils me) and then crashed for a while trying to make up for the lack of sleep I've been getting. Was supposed to go to the Billy Talent show with Husband and Jon but the show got rescheduled so Husband, Wife, Joel, Jon, Ben and I hit up Dominick's since the weather was so nice. The sangria was good, the pizza was yummy and the company was great. Sometimes I think Ben and Jon try to compete to see who can be more outrageous, but it's highly entertaining to watch:) We headed over to Ashley's for a bit and then all of the sudden I was EXHAUSTED. Like, I could have fallen asleep in the bar for real. We get back to my car to find someone hit the side-view mirror on the sidewalk side of the car (I was parallel parked). I was SO pissed. Completely fixated on who would be such an asshole to do something like that. I had this happen once before with my old car, and while it isn't as bad this time, it's still a huge inconvenience to now have to deal with the insurance company, get it to the dealer to get it fixed AND somehow do this all on my own AND get to work. Too little sleep again.

And today? I need to do all the grading and planning that I've put off while feeling kinda crappy. All I want to do is go to sleep for a bit, but I know that if I even allow myself a nap, I'll be out till 5pm and get NOTHING done. Oh well. I'm definitely getting too old for this.

Taste of Chaos and Snow Patrol next weekend. Better than that though? Only 8 more days of school till spring break! I can't wait. The kids think they're looking forward to vacation? They don't know the half of it;)

Recovery...

Well, it was a fun St. Patrick's day. The first bit of today was a little on the rough side, but I survived:) So, yesterday Jon and sallied forth to Dominick's for the first sangria of the season. Sure, it was a little cold sitting outside, but we were on the back patio which is sort of enclosed and we were in the sun, so it really wasn't too bad. By the time it DID get cold, I'd had enough sangria in my system that I didn't quite notice. Greg joined us for the festivities and I know at least I had a good time (I think they did too:) However, I sort of forgot how you only really notice how hard the sangria hits once you stand up. Needless to say, heading home for St. Paddy's day dinner with the parents, Husband and Wife while being rather inebriated was an interesting few hours:) Oh well, I had fun, I don't care.

Today after spending a good three hours grading papers at ERC, Jon and I ventured around town to do some shopping, had lunch at Red Hawk and then blew some money in Borders. 'Twas a fun afternoon and I really have to say that, no matter how much I love covering live shows, it was pretty great NOT having to drive out to St. Andrew's or Clutch Cargo's or the State Theater for the first weekend in maybe 6 or 7 weeks. However...next weekend is Billy Talent with Drive By and The Cancer Bats and the weekend after that is Taste of Chaos and Snow Patrol (separate shows...I can't quite see Snow Patrol and Aiden playing the same show;)

The past week was heinous though. Monday I had honors testing after school till 5:30, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday most of the day was spent doing ACT/MEAP (aka the new MME) testing. You'd think watching a bunch of kids take a test for 4 hours wouldn't be draining, but it is SO mind-numbing it was painful. I was ready to ask for a copy of the test so I at least had something to do (you really aren't supposed to do anything besides watch the kids so they don't cheat-no reading, grading papers etc.) By day three, the other teacher in my room and I didn't give a fuck and brought reading material. Friday afternoon I had more honors testing till 5:30, which was definitely the last thing I wanted to be doing on a Friday afternoon. After that I made a quick grocery run and then took over Jon's kitchen to cook us dinner (angel hair pasta with a cream sauce that had swiss cheese, asparagus, shrimp, scallops and fresh mushrooms in it. I think it came out ok.)

All in all-very fun weekend, crazy busy week. I don't feel recovered enough to go back to school tomorrow, but I guess there isn't much I can do about it. However, I AM feeling much better and was able to get to the doctor's on Thursday and she releived many of my ridiculous fears. I think much of it was actually psychological since I tend to work myself into phenomenal tizzys over things. What can I say, I'm a worrier. Can't help it and I probably won't change at this point.

Maybe best of all is that as of Tuesday evening I will have the place entirely to myself. The parents are going to be gone for almost three weeks and I am stupid excited about this. I'll be busy and all, but I just looooooove the idea of having some space...and no one waiting up for me when I get home;)

Will post photos from all the recent shows sometime soon...
Peace out, starving nachos.

Listening to: Nightmare Anatomy, Aiden

Kudos to me

Good news. A few weeks back I did a live interview (my first in a few years...) with two members of theAudition. I shot their show, wrote the feature and fired off the article and photos to my editor. The article and pics went up over the weekend (read it here) and I got the following email from my editor yesterday:

Hi,
I just wanted to send a quick email and let you know that Victory Records was EXTREMELY pleased with your feature on theAudition!
I already received two emails from people over there and a third from the Victory promotions/touring manager who set this up. See below!
Thanks for doing it! - Sherri


Sherri-

This is wonderful! The story is great, the pics are great! It’s going in my reports to make sure the whole staff takes a look at this!

-Maygen

Not to brag, but yay me! I'm pretty psyched that Victory was so happy with the article and photos. This may mean that they'll be very willing to guestlist and photo-pass me for other artists on their label.


It's been a nuts week. The MME is tiring, I've got an insane amount to do and I feel a little icky. I'm hoping I'm just run down, but of course I worry about all sorts of things. I'm trying to get in with the doctor tomorrow because I'm getting a little worried about this since I've felt sort of icky for a bit over a week. For a while I felt like I was getting better, but today I felt gross all over again. Please let it be nothing. I hate it when I feel gross enough to start to worry but not so gross that I can just say, "oh, full out cold, again, boo hiss. That sucks but it'll be gone in a few days." My problem is, growing up with a mom that's a nurse, I tend to have the attitude of "oh, it isn't bad, it'll go away on it's own." Usually that's a fine attitude, but occasionally it is bad (er, like the time I was in 8th grade and had appendicitis but didn't tell my mom about the fact my right side was killing me for a good 24 hours. It ruptured.)

Well, I have to churn out a few reviews tonight and I want to get them done so I can take a nap. I'm exhausted.

~S

I could be clever, but I'm too tired right now

Ridiculous that I'm blogging at 6am really, but if I don't do it now, I won't have time later. Things have been off-the-map busy lately and I don't forsee them slowing down a whole lot. Sorry to have to do the whole summary post, but that's the way it goes...

Last Monday: Won trivia at Conor's. A bit unreal and really, really fun.

Tuesday: Tired from Monday, general catching up on things. MME meeting after school. WHY did I agree to be part of this committee?

Thursday: Scissor Sisters show. Pretty fun once the stupid house-techno DJ got off stage. Band didn't start till 9pm but I was there at 6 pm...Wasted time, that's for sure since I abhor house techno. Got some good pictures I think, once I have time to process a few, I'll post some. Totally not my usual crowd, lots of gay men, women in boas and maybe even one or two cross-dressers. Not an emo kid in sight. I felt a little out of my element.

Friday: School, nap, general exhaustion but then Ben's birthday at The Brown Jug! I think everyone had a fun time and I got lots of compromising (and, if they'd been other people, potentially embarassing) photos of Ben and Jon. Good times.

Saturday: Recovery, some paper grading (hardly enough, I am SO behind), then Jon and I went to see 300 (pretty good even though gorier than my usual movies), hit Meijers for groceries and I let him cook me dinner. I'm still not entirely sure how it happens, but we always seem to end up taking forever to cook (maybe we talk too much while cooking? Who knows) and thus end up actually eating dinner at 9 or 10 pm. Oh well, I get a huge kick out of cooking with him, and I'm always the recipient of excellent meals, so I'm not complaining:)

Sunday: Open house at school (translation: waste of time), quick "dinner" at home and then I went out to Pontiac to cover the Cartel/Cobra Starship/Boys Like Girls show. I was the ONLY one on the list with a photo pass and Harry had a lot of trouble getting in. As much as it might make me a bit of a shit to say it, I LOVED the fact that for once I was able to easily get in and he, who usually can talk his way into anything and is more than happy enough to do so, had a little trouble. Sometimes I feel like he likes me being totally dependant on him for getting into shows, and I have to admit liking the fact that I'm NOT so dependant on him anymore. I totally appreciate his help, guidance and advice, but I also don't like feeling beholden to people. Is that weird?? Anyways, show was pretty good, lotsa emo kids and a few creepy dads. Got to help with an interview with The New Atlantic (nice guys, pretty hot lead singer;) but we had to do it in their van because, as usual, the security at Clutch Cargo's were being morons. Late night though AND I got mixed up heading home and added at least an extra 15 minutes onto my trip.

Monday: more trivia. This time it was all Irish trivia. We didn't win :( but I feel like I made some vital contributions for once. Nice to know that all those tuition dollars for my Irish Lit classes and a summer semester in Ireland paid off:)

PSYCHED for the warm weather, even if it won't be around for that long. I'm also pretty excited that I don't have any shows this coming weekend. I had offers for at least two and turned them down. I want a weekend off AND I want to have some fun on St. Patrick's day. It's silly, but I really like St. Patrick's day, maybe there's a bit of that Irish nut still in me yet:) Maybe I just like a socially sanctioned opportunity to eat soda bread (mmmm) and drink beer. :) Dominick's is open...maybe I can convince a few people to brave the cold for some pre-season sangria...


Oops, crap. Gonna be late...MME time. Blech.

Woot! We are winners!

Ok, if you've never been to Conor's for trivia night, you might not appreciate this...however, our team WON THIS WEEK! WOOT! We've done well in the past and felt pretty good about making 4th place, but to get 1st!? Pretty fucking sweet. Seriously. We won $100, but better than that is the fact we got 1st.
I'm pretty psyched. To say the least.

Great night:) I get such a kick out of trivia. I just wish it wasn't only Monday (boo hiss).

Finally, a chance to slow down

What a week and a half...it's been a lot of fun, but I was exhausted today and managed to sleep through most of the day. I probably won't be able to sleep tonight now, but I'm still tired, so maybe I'll luck out. Here's the rundown:

Friday: Dinner with Jon at Tower and then the Taking Back Sunday show at EMU. I ran into two students and the band only let photographers up front for two songs. You guys aren't that amazing to justify being dicks about how many songs we can be up there. Come on...three songs is the standard, let's stick to that.

Saturday: I got invited to check out Ganon at the Blind Pig so after letting Jon cook for me (what else is new:) we had some crap beer in the 8-Ball and then headed upstairs for the show. It was fun to finally see Ganon play since I've heard so much about them...I also got hit on as I was heading into the 8-Ball. It was kind of funny and weirdly flattering. Whatever.

Sunday: Dinner at Palio's with my parents, Husband, Wife and Jon for my belated b-day dinner. We drank a ridiculous amount of wine and then since I didn't have to work the next day, Jon and I headed to Conor's for karaoke. I refused to sing but also discovered that Jon is really good at karaoke. I learned something new:) I still don't think I could do it, I try to avoid public humiliation, but I had a lot of fun watching. Long talk with Jon afterwards, things are ok. I got home at 3am. My mom and dad were less than amused.

Monday: Writing, grading papers, hit the gym and then a celebratory dinner at Prickly Pear with Jon because he got the job at JSTOR. Then we hit trivia night at Conor's and kicked some ass. Fourth place baby! Not bad:)

Tuesday: Writing, grading papers, gym and the first early night in days. It felt like a Sunday night, boo hiss.

Wednesday: Horrid mandatory pro-life lecture at school. I wanted to cringe, argue and walk out all at once. Ugh. The joys of working in a Catholic school. MCR concert that night was amazing...Jon and I got lost on the way (you'd think I'd be better at finding my way in Detroit by this point). I get a call from Husband on the way there that they're being dicks about letting cameras in. I get really nervous because I'm supposed to have a photo pass, but what if the band's PR person screwed up? I'm also horribly anxious because I'm supposed to be on the guestlist +1. I had already gotten a ticket, but what if I wasn't on the list? Then I will have dragged Jon out to Joe Louis and wasted his time completely. I feel like I have elephants, pterydactyls (sp?) and some other large, horrible animal catapulting around in my stomach. Getting lost didn't help.

So, we finally make it to Joe Louis, find a parking spot and begin the hunt for Husband and Wife. The doors aren't open yet, so they're waiting outside sans coats among the hundreds and hundreds of angsty emo kids and their parents. Jon and I go to find the box office and get our tickets. No problem there but I then find I have to go to the media enterance to get my photo pass. We end up waiting almost half an hour to get said pass, but at least it was INSIDE and we essentially got to jump the whole line. I had to virtually sign my life away, but at least MCR granted photographers three songs unlike TBS.

Rise Against opened. I didn't care a whole lot but I got some good pics. MCR was amazing...I'm happy with the photos I got and still can't quite believe I was THAT close to them. They did two full sets...22 songs or so. The entire first half was The Black Parade, the second half was all stuff from Three Cheers. I loved every second and sang along like a total moron. Husband, Wife and Jon are all very good to put up with my silliness.

Thursday: Rough morning but not too bad. Then I had an interview with Bayside out at St. Andrews before their show. I got to do the interview on their tour bus which was pretty fun (first time I've ever been on a tour bus). The guys were nice and I think the interview went well. I had a photo pass to shoot the show and all went well until my back decided that I was an ass for essentially standing two days straight (work, MCR, work, Bayside). I was in agony but held in there to shoot the last band of the night and then took off to collapse into bed.

Friday: Frantically finishing TBS review for Static. It's now up and I got my first photo credit for them. Check it out here. Quick nap and then more cooking fun at Jon's. Great night overall.

Saturday: Frantically writing MCR review for Static. My editor wanted between 500-1,000 words. I sent him 1,300. The review and photo just went up, check it out here. Ran at the gym with Jon for a while, home to talk to my mom for the first time since Tuesday, finished MCR piece and headed back to Jon's to let him cook red beans and rice for me. Another excellent evening.

Sunday: Recovery. I have no attention span and didn't get shit done today. I needed to get a lot done but didn't. I know it'll be a busy week, but I don't think it'll be quite as awful as last week.

However, I did get offered the chance to review the Scissor Sisters show at the State on Thursday. I wasn't expecting that, but I'm not gonna turn down two free tix to the show. I may also get to interview and pretty definitely get to cover the Snow Patrol show in April (I think). I have two jobs. I just only get paid for one. BUT, I think I'm going to do quite well with my income tax refund, so I've been able to upgrade the digital SLR I want AND I should be able to get it pretty soon and have a hefty hunk of change left over. The rest I'll sock away for other big dreams of mine... (though getting another tattoo is awfully tempting...) I'm also thinking I'll work this summer at plastic surgery for the extra money. I really want to move out (I know, dropping a pile of money on a digital camera shouldn't come first then, but it does) and this will be a good way to do it. I hate the idea of working there, but the extra money is too tempting.

Mom and dad leave for Europe in 15 days, but I'm not counting. I can't wait. I guess I should go and try to finish up my crap for tomorrow now that it's 10:00 pm...

Oh, and a few of my favorite photos from MCR:





Listening to: Bayside, The Walking Wounded

i think i'm going to die

A certain someone has been out to too many concerts this week.
Last Friday: Taking Back Sunday at EMU
Saturday: Ganon at the Blind Pig
Wednesday: MCR at Joe Louis
Thursday: Anberlin, Bayside, and Meg & Dia at St. Andrews + interview with Bayside before the show (I got to go on their tour bus, so that was sort of cool:) Ok, pretty damn cool, allow me to be silly for a bit).

MCR was insane and I loved every second of the show. I have tons to say about it, but it'll have to wait for a bit. Lots of photos lately too and, though it's silly, I look at some of them (especially some of the ones of MCR) and I have that sense of "wow, what a cool photo. I wonder who took it since I could never take such cool shots or get that close to my favorite band." I'll post some photos from this plethora of shows too...probably over the weekend.

Right now I just feel like I'm going to die I'm so tired. I wish I didn't have school today. Oh well, at least it's Friday, and I DO do this to myself.
It's worth it:)

Listening to: Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge, MCR