In-dep-end-ence!

Uggh. Fuuuuuuuuuuck. Dishes.

         Why are they so hard to keep up with? I feel like for every meal I make, there are eighteen dishes for each ingredient. Omelette? Pans, cutting boards, dishes, ketchup. Cereal? Bowls (yes, plural), spoons, bibs.

          And don't even talk to me about baking. Flour all over clothes - god help me if I wear black, purple, indigo, royal blue or any hue that contrasts highly with white - crusty cooling racks, egg shit everywhere, mixing bowls piled up and measuring cups strewn across the counter. All for one meal or one batch of shitty and over-crispy or undercooked, too sweet or not-sweet-enough lame-ass cookies.

And then, then, if the cookies/eggs/muffins/cereal/Easy Mac is shitty, we all eat silently as we commend the good things about the dish: "It has an interesting after taste!"; "I like the texture of these. It's a lot different than..... [trails off, wants to say "most cookies" a.k.a these cookies are shitty"; "So... what did you put in this?" And then the silent, forcing-food-down eating continues until everyone secretly goes to Wendy's later, where we all run into each other, to avoid going to bed hungry. That, to the left, is a perfect go-to desperation, stressed-eating meal. 

Alas, just some things that have recently come to my attention post-living-independently. Perhaps the Wendy's run was an exaggeration, but you see what I'm saying. And wait, when I say exaggeration, I mean that I'm unsure if others would do this. But I would do it  have done it.

         The first few weeks of living on our own have presented beautiful and typical experiences enhanced by a slight learning curve. We used duct tape to fix the door of our refrigerator (second day), our cooking set off the fire alarm and we've learned how to make quite a mess, almost equivalent to a pack of wild animals gnawing at their prey. My heart yearns for the college's weekly cleaners, as terribly frightening as they were, to just come once and clean our kitchen, even just a quick wipe-down of everything, because it's obviously too much for me to handle. Shout out to my mom for picking up my slime trail for 18 years; now I'm left to fend for myself.

         And, hey, where did all of my money go? Having your own place also means taking your savings and checking accounts, combining them, dividing by seven, and keeping one of those seven pieces for yourself and giving the other six to various vendors of necessary goods and services: utilities, internet, groceries, pizza, toiletries, gas, tacos, coffee. Before this, I had - in my opinion - a lot of cash. Now I have a lot of I.O.U.s for other people as I wait impatiently for Thursday to come around and pay me, already, for my glorious 1/7th of a paycheck. 

Grocery shopping on a budget is tough too. I would love, loooooove to buy each and every all-natural USDA Certified Organic, grass-fed, local item and piece of produce - and I strive to do well in that area! - but alas, I am often forced to choose the hydrogenated, canned, processed, pesticide-filled items to prevent myself from overriding my banking account. Wegmans mac-n-cheese: 78 cents, is it? Annie's (organic) mac-n-cheese? $2-fucking-.39. I'm sorry, Annie's, but I will buy eight of Wegmans factory farm noodles over one box of your free-range powdered cheese meals. I do really love Annie's though, and that rabbit is just real cute. 

So I'm poor, my shit's broken and I'm eating astronaut food for every meal.

          But beneath, above and around these faulty situations comes a heightened feeling of newfound independence, more so than when we first started at school. We have more choices and we think ahead of time. we plan for meals and we host gatherings (ragers); dinner is served piping hot at 5:45 p.m. and the kids are in bed by 9(:30 if they're rascals!) and the bills are paid on time, in full, every time.

Hermie (Herbie? I never know, someone help me out here) and I are on the same page now. Except I am not an elf nor do I plan on being a dentist. But same sort of.... idea.

         Even just saying, "my house," or, "my own (as in both halves are mine) room," or "our bills!" feels cool. We're growing up and venturing into the scandalous and fucked up adult world. Each step brings us closer to misery and desolation and I can taste the sweet smell of divorce around the corner. Ahh, to be old and aging. I think I'll buy some anti-aging cream tonight.

         We're learning and growing and evolving and it's wonderful. And although, although, my dad helped me pay for a car repair the other day and my mom still buys me a lot of awesome shit (Android, anyone!?), I am managing my finances and keeping track of (most  some of) my purchases. And by keeping track, I mean that I'm aware of how much I spent at the co-op the other day and how much I plan to spend on various....things.. this weekend. Awareness, that's what it's about. It's the step right before actually doing something.

See? Our very own kitchen! All with an oven, window and a clock.

Pictured above is one housemate: Uddhi. The other, Mike is lost and not present in my photos.

But he exists, I swear!

So shit's getting harder, but life's getting better. 

Tell me where else I can have all of my friends on one giant sectional couch.

Nowhere, only here. So much love up there.

And no parents to yell at us here. That is, unless the roof falls through, then we're fucked.

But for now, awesome times and cute-ass pictures will do.

Just a bunch of ADULTS on a roof. Ha. Ha. So we're all kids @ heart! It's almost like we're playing house.

And it's awesome. Can I be the baby? (I was always the baby in the '90s).

And a shout-out to dear Katy Boland (first gal from right above, and girl w/ spaghetti jar to the right) who leaves for camp this week! She will be a counselor as part of the Fresh Air Fund at a campground near NYC. The Fresh Air Fund is a nonprofit that provides free summer experiences to NYC kids from low-income or disadvantaged communities and families. Talk about good people, this girl right here. Best of luck to you, Kathryn, and thanks for making us all feel like shit for not being as selfless as you are, darling!

Note: she will be getting paid. Please, when I say selfless, I'm really using the term loosely.

Closing note: It took me so long to post this week because I kept seeing a lot of people on Facebook posting their new blogs almost completely, exactly the same as mine. Well, same sort of idea: meaningless personal posts. So I was contemplating calling it quits but after a lot of thinking, I decided to say nay, I will not let you imposters sway me! I will document my experiences and you will read them!

Besides, theirs were douchey, poorly written and tasteless anyway. (And I'm not talking about the wonderful Jesse Goldberg, Ben Cosman or Alanna Smith)
Fuck. I'm a blog snob. 

Hell yeah!