Their Specialty Is Thinking Like Criminals...

He can profile me anytime...

There are other cast members. Just none that look like this. Therefore I do not care about them.

I've jumped on the Criminal Minds bandwagon (which stars Mandy Patinkin - not as good as the guy in the above picture, but come on - he's chasing bad guys. Not unlike Inigo Montoya and his hunt for the man who killed his father and should be prepared to die). For someone who is really interested in Forensic Psychiatry, it took me a long time to start watching this show.

I'm not great with coming into shows mid-series - mostly because I have a hard time understanding what's going on and, despite what you may think, I don't start to understand the more I watch. So I started from the beginning.

And oh. My. God. I love it. It's exactly everything that I've ever wanted to know about serial killers (disclaimer: I find psychopaths/sociopaths/serial killers fascinating. I was glued to the real-time updates of Russell Williams' trial. I wanted to talk to him and find out what makes him tick. What happened to make him do the terrible things he did? I just want to get into their minds...which sounds creepy. It's not. I promise). These profilers get into the minds of criminals to figure out their next moves, and in it you find out what drives these people, what happened in their lives to make them the way that they are, and whether or not they're psychotic or psychopathic/sociopathic. Crazy stuff. I can't stop watching. I want to be them. The profilers, I mean. Not the criminals.

But. There's just one thing. As much of an interest I have in criminals of the worst kind, I also have a deep fear of them. So when they show the killers stalking their prey by looking through windows, following them, and marking their every move, I automatically think that there is a criminal outside of my house doing the same thing. And I'm terrified.

Not enough to stop watching, of course. No, that would be the obvious solution. I like the show too much to stop watching. But I'm very aware of the dark now, and whenever someone I don't know knocks on my door, I stand right beside the door until I hear them go away. Every noise is, naturally, someone coming up behind me. And I'm pretty sure I have a serial rapist/murderer watching me type this.

I often relay my fears to CD, who ranges between telling me to calm down and that no, there is not someone watching me, to advising me not to open the door to strangers (said after I jokingly - and not so jokingly - told him there was a rapist at my door...which he actually didn't find funny...like at all). I often wonder what it's like to be friends with an over-dramatic, hyper-imaginative person.

My first guess would be that it's exhausting.

Love,

M

Drinking in the Dark

Thanks Jack!

One of my girlfriends, DA, and I went into Toronto, the big city, for a conference that ended up being completely useless for our impending careers. We did, however, end up in a situation that will go down as one of the best days I’ve had in a while.

Order lunch and beer. Eavesdrop on next table over to hear about the brown guy’s random hookup. Don’t talk to each other because we’re too involved in his story.

Order beer #2, mostly because the train isn’t for another 50 minutes, and another beer is the only reasonable option.

DA gets given a free beer because they poured the wrong size. She doesn’t say no (obviously, because she is awesome). My Guinness is given in a dirty cup. Ask for a new one. DA asks the waitress not to spit in it. Valid request.

Lights in the bar go out. Still continue waiting for beer, obviously. We can drink without lights.

Given $25 gift certificate to apologize for the whole drinking in the dark thing. Excited to use that another day for more beer.

Beer arrives. Fire alarm goes off. No way in hell are we leaving our beers. Keep sitting there. People start scurrying to leave, all except us and the table beside us. We like these guys.

Smoky haze descends over bar. Still continue to drink.

Asked to leave by last waitress in the establishment. We try to put on our coats and drink our beers at the same time. DA loses an earring. Momentary lapse in exiting the restaurant as we crawl on the floor looking for said earring. Find earring. I run away.

DA is still drinking. Told we can drink on the patio. I run back to take my beloved beer.

DA and I drink on the patio in the snow on the coldest day of the year. Realize we didn’t have to pay and, because of the gift certificate, actually got paid to drink and eat. Best job ever. The conference, then, DID open us up to some career options…

Someone tells us we have to leave. We smile and raise our glasses.

Case in point.

Officially kicked off patio after everyone else has gone and fire trucks are arriving. DA chugs her beer. I try. Not as successful. Amateur.

Buzz from drinking two beers really fast hits us as we shriek and laugh our way back to the train station. I exclaim that was “fucking awesome!” Lady hears me. I apologize. She says, “Yeah, I hope so.” Bitch.

Trying to figure out the train schedule leads to us somehow speaking in British accents. DA dares me to ask for information in an accent. I do. Think the old Indian guy was on to me.

Try on hats in Union Station, exclaiming that “We don’t have these in England!”  

Due to our loud conversation in British accents, we can no longer go back to our Canadian accents. DA even has to speak to her son in an accent, and we laugh and text each other because we’re too afraid people will ask where we’re from and we didn’t come up with a back story.

Arrive back home to LM, who is there to pick us up and take us to the bar to continue drinking.

I am so lucky to have found these girls.

Love,

M

How I Feel When...

I have to go to work and it's snowing and cold and I want to not participate in life. Have a lovely Friday evening, friends!

Absolutely Unimportant Post About Cheese

I'm really finding it difficult to find things to blog about - not that I'm not having fun and living life. I actually am. I just don't know how to put into hilarious words the situations I get myself into. So until I do, the posts will largely resemble the following one about cheese.

Everyone has their kryptonite when it comes to food. Chips, chocolate, alcohol - anything besides boiled chicken breasts and broccoli, I'm assuming. At least that's how it feels for me. But I can usually control myself with the savoury snacks and alcohol, and having them around doesn't cause me to fall into a crazed, maniacal binge. Chocolate I cannot, but I still keep it in the house because resistance is futile. I know this.

What I didn't realize was such a problem for me was cheese. I cannot control my intake. It's there, and I will eat it. I will melt it, shred it, put it on the chocolate, for Christ's sake. Hell, I'll even eat it straight off the (family sized) block (not my smartest purchase, in hindsight), like a God damned cave person (if cave people had cheese...basically I'm painting the picture of a carnivorous caveman eating a drumstick, but with cheese. You get it). It's gotten to the point where I'm now eating it in great quantities so that I can no longer have it in my possession and I can go back to (relative) normalcy. Because I'm not throwing it out. That shit is expensive.

Oh cheese. You sneaky block of hard milk, you.

Love,

M

The Token New Year's Post

Happy New Year!

 

There’s something about the beginning of a new year – both in January and July, the month of my birthday – that makes me sad. Which is pretty depressing, right?! My last birthday I felt an overwhelming urge to cry. It's my birthday and I'll cry if I want to, mutha fuckas. Usually I look back on things that I was unhappy about at the time, and I can only remember the good stuff. That damn selective memory.

I’ve never been good at living in the present – I’m constantly worrying about the future or reliving my past, so when good things are happening in the moment, I rarely enjoy them. I think that’s why I’m always looking back – I want to relive the times that I took for granted, as well as the times that I didn’t stand up for myself because I thought that I had to act a certain way, instead of being who I really am. A lot of the time, I don’t truly say what I want or feel for fear of being judged, rejected, or hurt. I try to be the “cool girl” instead of me. Who is decidedly not cool. For serious.

You always hear people say to “live in the moment”. How do you appreciate what you have, really enjoy it, so you have fond memories instead of regrets for not enjoying it? OR how do you do what YOU want so that you don't look back and think, "Shit, I should have said this or done this"? I’m actually asking. Someone tell me!

This year, I want to try to live in the moment. I want to act from what I want and don’t want and how I feel instead of how I think I should be. I’ve spent so long trying to fashion myself into what I think other people want instead of who I want to be. And it’s exhausting! I rarely end up with what I want. Because in the end, I only end up regretting the chances I didn’t take, the moments I don’t appreciate, and the things I wish I could have said, had I not been such a complete boob.

Love,

M