Star Trek FTW!

Apparently it's cool to be a Trekkie, for, like, the first time ever.
I have a confession.
As a kid, my best friend loved Star Trek - meaning I had to love it too. Then, as I got older, my parents got into it. When I say "got into it", I mean we watched it every single night during supper for years. I have seen almost every episode of Star Trek Voyager, and a good deal of The Next Generation.
So, even though I'm not a bona-fide Trekkie, I still know a great deal more about the franchise than the average person.
That being said, my little sister is even more of a Trekkie than I ever will be... for a while she even walked around with The Next Generation buttons on her purse. True story. So, with me being home, on Monday, my littlest sister and I had a date to go see Star Trek.


I was excited to go see it. I'd heard really good things about it, and I know J.J. Abrams is pretty amazing. Also, I have a giant crush on Zachary Quinto, partially from Heroes, but mostly due to the fact that he is completely adorable in every single interview I have seen him in.


Um, spoiler alert: it was awesome!

Seriously, go see this right away. If you grew up with Star Trek, go see it. If you've never watched an episode of any Star Treks before this, go see it. If you need to wear your Klingon costume, go see it.
Was there a downside? No, I don't think there was.
The actors were amazing, the special effects were also amazing.
Not to mention how freaking cute Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto are. They should be reason alone to go see it.
Can I go see it again now, please?

Should Have Known Better

By 23, there are things I should know better, especially when it comes to my body. I should know how it works and how it reacts to certain things, I shouldn't end up spending the night in the hospital because of something I should know better.
Here's how it went down.
Friday morning, I get a text from one of my BFFs, asking if I wanted to go for drinks. She's had a tough week, and she also wanted to check in with me, because last weekend I found out that one of my clients passed away. So out we went, it was a beautiful Friday night and we found a pub on Bloor St. where the front windows opened garage-door style. We got a table right near the street, so we drank and ate and talked and people-watched for hours until the guy she is seeing showed up. At that point, I was already tipsy. I don't drink too much and I am on medication that lowers my alcohol tolerance, so I have a really low tolerance. So, when the boy showed up, I was already tipsy, and he then proceeded to order us drinks and shots. We made friends with the couple at the table next to us, and generally had a really good time. I usually keep myself sober enough to take transit home, because I live an hour's ride by transit away from downtown. That night, I knew that taking transit by myself would be a bad idea. I have never been that drunk before in my life. I texted friends on the way home to keep myself from passing out. I finally made it home, puked a few times, took a gravol and stumbled into my bed.
Now, I should explain why this is an extra bad idea for me. We believe that I have what's called Cyclic Vomiting Syndrome. I've had this since I was a young teen, the first time I remember it happening was in grade 10. Often it comes when I am nervous or stressed out, it has happened before when I've eaten foods that disagree with me as well. It's never happened before because of drinking, mostly because I usually keep myself in check. Basically, what happens is that I start throwing up, usually early morning, and I keep throwing up, for hours and hours, even when there isn't anything left in my stomach to throw up. It turns into dry heaving and I heave and heave for hours upon hours. Once before, I had to go to the hospital, but usually my Grandpa (a doctor) orders me a perscription of injectable gravol that Mom (a former nurse) gives to me. After an injection or two of gravol, I usually calm down and am able to stop puking, but it can take me days to really recover, because it wears me out. It hasn't happened now for almost 2 years, and it has never happened when I am so far away from home.
I woke up at 8:00 on Saturday morning and the vomiting started. Luckily, I have a cousin who lives in the same city and has helped me deal with the vomiting before, and she was able to come over and help nurse me. I don't think I could have made it through this on my own. By 6 at night, I was still vomiting and not able to keep anything inside of me, so we decided I had to go to the hospital. After what seemed like forever, I was admitted and given fluids and 3 bags of anti-nauseants before I settled down. By 5am, I was feeling better and able to keep fluids down, so my cousin took me home.
We slept all day today, with me waking up to call in to work and every once in a while drink some ginger ale and eat some crackers. My cousin went home late afternoon, and since then I've been home alone, nursing fluids and trying to make myself eat regularly.
Usually I love living by myself, but when I get sick, I hate it. I get so terribly home sick. I hate having to bother friends to come over to help me, but at the same time, I can hardly take care of myself.
But, I should have known better. I need to remember that I am not invincible and that I cannot possibly drink that much, especially when I live by myself and have no one to take care of me.
I am feeling better now, but I not only missed an incredibly beautiful weekend, I missed 2 days of work so far, and I had to cancel my interview for full-time at the shelter. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

Unpacking the Insecurities

Sometimes I think you just need to rant and get it all out, tonight is one of those nights. So here goes. Saying it's scary to have this out there is the understatement of the year...

I'm usually at least outwardly confident in regards to my relationship status. I joke with my family about my plans to be a crazy cat lady, an old maid. I groan that there may in fact be cobwebs filling up my lady parts. When someone asks, I say I just haven't met anyone I'm interested in being with, nobody I like enough to spend large amounts of time with. I shrug and mutter that I'm sure he'll show up someday.
When it's just me, though, and I get to thinking about it, the insecurities take over.
I mean, I'm 23 years old. I've only ever had one official boyfriend... and that was almost 5 years ago. 5 years. Even I know that's not normal. 5 years and not even the slightest hint of interest or action... well, other than creepers in the alley, which does not count.
Not normal at all. Those insecurities start to tug at me, what's so wrong with me that only alley creepers are interested in me? I mean, I'm not completely repulsive, I'm generally a nice person too, am I emitting some sort of "men, stay the hell away" signal?!?
I am introverted. I know that. I generally like spending time alone, so being single isn't completely terrible. I like being able to come home at night to the cat waiting for me in a quiet apartment.
Just me, and that's okay.
But it's not always okay.
I'm tired of being the odd one out. I'm tired of always being second choice. I want to be somebody's number one for once, the first one they call, the one they would rather be with. I don't think I've ever been somebody's number one.
I want a partner in crime, someone to have adventures with, someone to share my day with.
Unfortunately (or, maybe fortunately) the cat doesn't respond when I talk to him.
I wonder if part of the problem is the fear. The fear of taking a risk, of trusting someone, of new things, of new people, of communicating with someone on a real deep level, of being hurt again. I don't like uncertainties, and it takes me a long time to even build friendships with new people. I clam up. Don't tell them the stuff inside of you because they're going to judge you. I am very rarely uncensored, even around my closest friends.
And I'm picky. I've always maintained that it is a good thing to be picky. You should NOT lower your standards for anyone, I've proclaimed. But maybe my pickiness holds me back. That's what my Mom always says when I am too picky to eat foods. "Try it, you'll like it." She's been crooning that statement to me in a singsongy voice for as long as I can remember.
I am so worried about people judging me too quickly, yet I am fast to judge others.
But I suppose that pickiness has really only been applied recently to online dating. You can't be picky when there's nothing in real life to be picky about.
And so, for now, I guess I'll just pack up the insecurities, suck it up, and be happy with being second choice. He'll come along someday, right? Good thing cats have relatively long life expectancies.

This is Slightly Embarrassing.... a Vlog

It's time for the 2nd 20SB Vlog Day! Unfortunately, I am a bit of a tool and recorded my video sideways, BUT you get to hear my fantastic cat voice. Awesome.



Vlog 2 from Erin Walker on Vimeo.

Self Love

I found this over at Sizzle Says and I think it's an awesome idea. If you don't have a significant other this Valentine's Day, and even if you do, I think it's important to take this day celebrating love and use it to remember to love yourself. Here's what you've gotta do:

1.) You’re gonna grab yourself a banner. If you don’t like the one I’ve used in this post, you can find another one here.

2.) You’re gonna post that banner and then tell us all something that you really like love about yourself (thus, the “self-love” portion of our program).

3.) Ask or beg your readers to post one thing that they too love about you!!! If your blog friends are nice, you shouldn’t have to beg…much.

And here we go with my self-love part:
I love my ability to love others. I love taking care of people and things, and usually I'm pretty good at understanding what others are thinking and feeling and anticipating what they need. I think that's something that I'm good at, and I love that I finally know what I really do well, as I spent so many years in school being good at every subject but not really excelling in anything in particular. That ability is what I love about me.

And now it's your turn:
YOU are supposed to tell me what YOU love about ME. Awkward, yeah, especially if I don't get any comments. Come on guys, you've gotta comment, please, I'll develop a complex!

So Happy Valentine's Day, y'all, and remember to love yourself as well this holiday and every day.

Dating With Erin: A Gloomy Update

Alright, so an update on the adventures of dating with Erin is long since due. Remember when I decided I needed to start dating, and when I actually signed up for Plenty of Fish? And then there was the sample of barf worthy messages I have received. Well, there has been a bit since then. Let's just say though, I'm starting to feel rather like this boy:

It's getting depressing by SmartMarmot

There have been two guys so far, the first we will call West Coast and the second we will call The Teacher.
West Coast messaged me first, he seemed nice and fairly normal. He moved here from BC and seemed pretty interested in me. I think I self-sabotaged that one. I was brutally honest about myself, and when I felt like he was moving to the meeting stage fasted than I was ready for, I told him I wanted to move more slowly. Shortly after that, things slowed to a stop. He stopped messaging me, and I didn't really try to re-start it, I just wasn't that interested.
The Teacher was next. He seemed really normal and things were going really well, we seemed to have a lot in common and the messaging was good. He seemed to be really interested in me, and then all of a sudden, he stopped messaging me. He had stopped for a bit before, over the Christmas holidays, so I thought he might return. I wait, and waited, and nothing.
When I first started this, I told myself that I was not going to be the initiator. I would put myself out there by being online, and they would come to me, right?
No more have come. It could be that I'm picky. Good grammar and an education is a must. I'm more attracted to certain types of people than others.

Plenty of fish by SNOWFactory.com

I'll keep looking, but I'm not too excited about it.

And then, there was the slightly embarrassing real life incident. We'll call him Bus Boy.
The day before New Years Eve, I was riding the bus home from the subway around midnight, and saw a guy kind of looking at me. I was not attracted, so I continued to play Solitaire on my iPod (hey, it's an hour commute!). I happened to be getting off the bus at the same stop as him, there were a few people getting off, so I didn't think much of it. It was snowing and gross and I just wanted to get home and to bed because I was working at 8 the next morning. To get to my building, it is fastest to walk down this "Avenue" which is actually more like an alley. It is lined with sketchy garages, and can be a little scary at night. By the time I was at the end of the alley, close to my building, he started walking beside me, and struck up small talk about the weather. I was a little confused. Why is this guy talking to me? Is he flirting with me? Guys don't hit on me! He asked about my New Year's Eve plans, I told him I was working, he started asking questions about me and I answered politely, but did not flirt back, because I just wasn't interested. He told me he was 27 (5 years older than me) and lived in an apartment by himself in the building next to mine. He asked if I had a boyfriend, I told him I was seeing someone. Then he asked for my number. I froze. This sort of thing doesn't happen to me! Part of me figured that I can't complain about being single if I'm turning down giving guys my number, and how do you nicely turn down someone, especially at midnight in your parking lot? I thought about giving him a fake number, but was so flustered that I couldn't think up one, I was afraid I would end up giving him my parents' number or something accidentially. So I did it. I gave a random guy my phone number. That is so uncharacteristic of me, I couldn't believe I did it. We shook hands and I went inside, on my way in, he told me he thought I was hot, and, flattered, I said thank you.
Big mistake.
Less than an hour later, I recieved a picture text message, from him. The picture was of him half (?) naked and flexing. The friends who have seen it speculate that he may be pleasuring himself in it. With the picture, he asks to see one of me. My response was something along the lines of HOLYCRAPNOWAY! I ignored it. Not much later, he sends me another text message informing me that he would like to sexually pleasure me and inviting me over for a booty call.
Ladies, can I take a poll here: would this technique actually work on you???
I ignored that one too, and shared it with my friends of course. Over the course of the next few weeks, I continued to receive texts from him and voicemails, all of which I ignored, hoping he would get the point. One night, however, I accidentally picked up when he called. I pretended not to know who he was. He told me he was just going through his phone calling some people he hadn't talked to (and I am like, WTF, there's more than just me!?!). He asked what I was doing, I said I was hanging out with the guy I was seeing, and he still wanted me to call him sometime! He asked if I got text messages, I curtly said no. He said he was adding people to MSN and asked if I had it, I curtly said no. That was that. I immidiately saved his number as "Do Not Pick Up" in my phone, and got more calls/voicemails than ever before from him over the following week or so. It was starting to stress me out. I worried I would run into him, it's hard to ignore someone in person. It stressed my sister out even more, she wanted to give me her camping knife to carry around with me. I declined. Finally, one weekend, he called me Saturday night, Sunday morning, and Sunday night. That was it, I decided. If he called again, I would do something about it. That Tuesday, he called again. Right afterwards, I texted him. I told him that he needed to stop calling. I said I wasn't interested in booty calls or pictures texts, and that I had already said I was seeing someone, and I am not that kind of girl.
I haven't heard from him since.

And that is that, my friends. A Dating with Erin update. It's a sad state of affairs over here.

Kitteh Love

We had another cat photoshoot at my apartment tonight! Then I dressed the photos up using Poladroid. I am aware that I am just a few cat photoshoots and a few boyfriendless years away from crazy cat lady-dom. But will you just look at how cute he is!?

Best Child and Youth Worker EVER

15

Created by OnePlusYou

Found via Carmen in Calgary.

My Very Own Blog Secret

With no time to officially post, and an intense commitment not to fail NaBloPoMo, y'all get to hear my embarrassing confession...

I am officially a 15 year old girl again...


I had a dream involving Edward Cullen last night.


In my defense (and to make it less creepy), he was older than 17 in my dream.


I'm about half way through Twilight, in case you were wondering. I'm the girl with her headphones in her ears and her nose stuck in a book on the bus and subway... so much so that I nearly missed my stop yesterday.

Yup, officially a teenager again.