“Run, Baby, Run”

I’m still Running.......YEah!!!!!! No, really I am. Boot-camp was a bitch but I survived. I’m sore in places I didn’t know I could be sore in but I feel alive. I do. The haze in my brain has cleared. I’m not going to go nuts with this workout stuff but I’m going to keep at it. It’s been too long since I challenged myself. Too long since I was tired from actually doing something, instead of just being tired. Being Tired for no reason can become a bad habit. You wake up, go to work and then you sit down. You go to lunch and you sit down. It’s a never ending cycle of moving a few steps and then sitting down again. In just a few weeks I feel stronger and more awake all the time. It’s crazy. Endorphins are fun. They don’t come in tall, grande or venti but I still like them. I’m not exactly addicted to this Runners High but I could get used to it. Image living in a world where you can exceed you physical limitations but being more physical? Instead of being fueled by frappucinnos I’m now fueled by activity. Crazy I know. I’m tired of sitting down. I don’t want to be an office Zombie for the rest of my life. I have a plan, an emergency exit. I can’t give it all away now but don’t you worry my virtual friends......freedom is near. I plan to shuffle off this office coil that binds me to my sadness. I’m going to break free. I have freed my mind and now I’m getting the rest of me ready to create a new reality for myself where I can actually help others. Help them move away from self-hate and towards self-acceptance. It has been too long since I have challenged myself. Too long since I stood up and made a change. I’m getting ready. Getting ready for my very own person revolution. Revolution = evolution. Stand by. The evolution will not be televised.

Social Media Masturbation

I have grown tired of everyone’s and my own social media masturbation. When you’re done tweeting, facebooking, linking-in, youtubing and digging,.....how to you have time to actually interact with human beings in person? In my case I’m too shy to actually talk to people but that’s just me. Must we all broadcast our lives and pretend that having thousands of followers equals out to some kind of internet pseudo-fame? If everyone has hundreds of followers and everyone is broadcasting their lives, then doesn’t that change what fame actually is? Doesn’t that change your ability to actually keep track of things? Do we actually really know anyone anymore?

Social Media Masturbation is when you over promote yourself online, without adding any value to the social media network. Everyone one does it but some people only SMM. If we exist in networks where everyone is social media masturbating then what do we really get out of it. Hey, LOOK AT ME!!! Hey, Look at me...... only works so many times. Please tell me something new. Please share your thoughts and your feelings. Please help stop Social Media Masturbation. Please try to add value. Please try to share. I’m going to try to be true to myself and my self-deprecation. I’m also going to try to find a way to move passed my self-hate. One day I will be a real person and I won’t have to be Measuring Tape Girl anymore. I’ll have a real name and a real life. All I can do for now is try to share my truth with you. The truth of the matter is that a blog about Social Media Masturbation, is in itself a form of Social Media Masturbation.

Splinting the Shins

I went running. I’m a running super star but I have the habit of getting shin splits. I have to get proper shoes and I have to stretch more. Without much training or equipment you can start running. It is also true that without much training or equipment you can start running and hurt yourself. Running is one of those things that makes you question a lot of things. Can I do it? Can I keep running. How much longer until I have to stop? How much longer until I have to throw up, how much longer until I throw up...again? You’re suppose to run through the pain. If you run long enough you stop calling things painful and eventually you start referring to pain as discomfort.... Which means running eventually drives you crazy. I’ll never be one of those Marathon Zombies who run around with there sugar gel packs. Eating a banana and running is also not my idea of a good time. It gets me out into the sun though. It makes me move. The more I move, the more alive I begin to feel. I’m going to try a 10k. I’m going to see if I can run for an hour. I’ll see if I can get there by labour day. Remember, remember the fourth of September......We’ll see. We’ll see. For now I’m just trying to give myself another reason to be in the sun. The shin splints aren’t so bad this time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shin_splints

Or should I say medial tibial stress syndrome, isn’t so bad this time. I have MTSS. Maybe I can start a fundraiser or get myself registered as a charity? That could help me pay for the correct kind of running shoes I need. :) Apparently, I’m suppose to put a towel under my feet and then make fists with my toes: to pull the towel towards me? This will help me with my MTSS. Anyone interested in donating to my buy proper shoes for running fund please email me directly ;) My legs do feel better today. So tomorrow I’ll be back out running. Run. Just run. It’s suppose to build self-esteem and help keep you healthy.....I hope to get both from running. For now, all I can say is “Run, Baby, Run”.

I am a hurricane of hope

I know, I know. I'm a lazy blogger. I've just been so busy, frustrated, upset, angry and mad at myself that I couldn't write anything. The whole point of this blog was to give me a reason to write. A reason to focus all my thoughts and feelings into a positive purging online exorcism of pain but I've gotten distracted. I forgot what I can get like when I don't take the time to think about who I am and what I'm trying to do. I want to be set free from my anger. I want to accept myself for who I am and move forward. I really do. I'm going to make a better effort to focus my thoughts and feelings and express them in words. I really have to, if I don't we might return back to the dark times. The times of chocolate and Frappuccino addiction. I promised to start running... I haven't yet, but I will. It's going to happen. I'm going to piece my life back together. I'm going to care about myself and I'm going to care about others. No, really. Don't make me punch you. Don't doubt me and make me punch you in the face. I will not be stopped. I will not be stopped because I am a force of nature. I am a hurricane of hope. If you think you can stop a hurricane....well, then your almost as crazy as I am. I warning all the voices in my head. The ones the judge me. The ones that tell me I'm not good enough. The voices that tell me I'm fat. All the negative voices in my head better pack their bags and buy some plane tickets because I'm not listening to you anymore. I am good enough, I am not fat and all the voice in my head can go to hell. If I could punch the voices in my head I would but I tried that once and it kinda hurts. Instead I'm standing up and saying go away. I don't need the voices in my head telling me that I can't do things. I can do things and I will. They might try to stop me. The voices in my head may start screaming at me until they regain control of my mind but they will fail. They can not stop me because I am a hurricane of hope.

Dialing 411 to find a boyfriend

I read this story online this week about a woman who called 911 because she needed a husband. It was an emergency. She felt she needed to call 911 to help her find a husband. If she can call 911 for a husband maybe I can dial 411 for information on how to get a boyfriend. I suppose I'll get a boyfriend eventually. But to get one of those there’s all these things you have to be willing to do. Like dating, Speed dating, slow dating, group dating, blind dating and my personal favorite - Online dating. Online dating is like a full time job. It’s really not anything like dating. It’s an experiment in how much online spam you can collect in one day. Never put a picture up on the first day. Wait a week and get a list of potentials. Two days after you put your picture up you’ll really have to delete your profile and leave the site. I join 10 different online dating sites on a 3 month cycle. I’m not sure I’m online dating or playing an elimination game creating a list of boys I know to never contact again. When it comes to online dating I like to be different people and have different careers from time to time. It just makes it all more interesting. Of course the only problem with this is that the boys are doing the exact same thing. Can you believe these men will lie to you online? They lie about their height, weight, age and income. It’s one thing for me to have a little fun but when one of these balding married bastards somehow gets through my security defenses and they make it to the first date....well it’s really annoying. It’s so much better than the alternative. I mean online dating is safe, its fun and provides great stories for parties. Imagine the pain of actually interacting with other singles at a singles event? Or meet up groups? Sports outings, dinner events....lock and key dances. I mean if speed dating actually worked then why are so many people still single. 20 girls and 20 guys meeting for 10 minutes and then moving on the the next person. Six ten minute meetings every hour of every day, three hundred and sixty five days a year. If these things really worked these companies would go bankrupt because we’d all be married. I’m not suggesting that meet-up groups, speed dating and online dating are designed to fail so that they can keep taking money from you.....but they are not designed to succeed either. I’m not asking for perfection. There’s just a few things that every boy needs to have before I’ll send them a smiley face or throw a sheep at them. It’s such a struggle. A life of online connections leads to false hopes and disappointment. Image what the boys think when they see me. I can’t compete with all the models in those magazines. I mean I’m just human. If I see another magazine telling me how to please my man....... I might just have torch the store I see it in. Burn it to the ground. Why is the story always about me pleasing my man. When does he learn to please me? I have enough repair work to do on my own self-image without having to worry about pleasing someone else. I’m not going to lie to you....I’m a little bit of a fixer-uper. It can almost make you lose all hope. I don’t want you to think I’m trying to bring you down. I’m not going to bring you down or take myself down any further. I’m not going to give up. It’s easy to be sarcastic and cynical for the rest of your life. It’s easy to be mad and upset at yourself and the world. Sometimes you have to hold on to hope, especially when it’s the only thing you have. So please keep hope alive.

Hot Yoga + Frappuccino = Bad idea

The final score.....

Hot Yoga: 1.......Measuring Tape Girl: 0

My addiction to Frappuccinos has hit a low point. It turns out that drinking Frappuccinos and going to Hot Yoga may not be the best idea. Maybe I didn’t eat properly but what ever it was strongly suggests that regular temperature yoga is hard enough for me. Okay. Okay. Here’s what happened. I get there, I’m ready, I’m looking cute and we go into the room. The air is dry and everyones almost naked but I’m still okay. Thirty minutes into the hot yoga class I start to feel a little weird. I’m was getting a little dizzy but nothing really that bad. At around the forty minute mark the world went a little dark for me. Luckily we were on the floor in some position or things could of gotten a little more dangerous. I got really, really dizzy and then I don’t remember. I woke up a few seconds later and okay...... I’ll admit it: My name is Measuring Tape Girl and I passed out in Hot Yoga class. I got up and grabbed my stuff and left the class early. I went to the bathroom to hide and come up with a plan. It seems body was mad at me and I was still a little dizzy. My body politic was having an election to find out if I was going to throw up or go to the bathroom. In the end the votes were so close that we were considering a recount but there wasn’t time for that. So I threw up a little and then went to the bathroom. Yeah. I said it. I want the world to know. Don’t have a Frappuccino for dinner and then go to Hot Yoga!!! Looking back know it’s kinda funny. “Did you hear the one about the girl that passed out during Hot Yoga?” Like an alcoholic who just punched his best friend, I think I just had what is called a moment of clarity. Hello, my name is Measuring Tape Girl and I have a Frappucino problem. Why do they have to mix coffee, sugar, cream and more sugar together to form the most satisfying sugae/caffeine buzz I’ve ever had? Why do the straws have to be green and so pretty? I’m taking a stand here though. I only have to pass out once to learn a lesson. The lesson is a simple one:

Hot Yoga + Frappuccino = Bad idea

I think I must be Solar Powered

The sun hits my skin and my problems go away. The wind blows the clouds in and I get cold. It was one of those hot days that gets cold. It feels like it might be late September but it’s June. The bright sun made me smile. It did. I wouldn’t lie about something like that. My energy is up by 200%. Now if only I had something to do with all this energy. I’m usually so burnt out after work that I don’t want to do anything. Maybe I should just keep eating and drinking coffee. We’ll....just one more coffee, then we’ll stop......I promise. What I really want is some ice cream with coffee in it. Everyone is out today. Taking in the sun and watching everyone else. I like watching but I don’t like being watched. I always feel like they can see right through me. Some days I just look at the sidewalk so I don’t have to notice anyone staring me down. Just once I’ll like a boy to walk by me and not look me up and down as he passes judgement on me. I guess I should be used to that. It’s the girls that do it that drive me bananas. I don’t want to be judged anymore. Not by girls, not by boys, not by anyone. I am standing up right now and looking the world in the eyes and I’m screaming: “Go Judge someone else”!!! Then the sun hits my skin and my problems go away. Lucky for me, I’m solar powered.

I fall in Love three times a day....

Every time I walk down the street I see someone and think.....they look interesting. Or I look down and see that he has nice shoes on and that’s all it takes......I’m in love. Instant love is great, no really.....it is. It saves me from ever really having to develop a true connection with anyone. I’ve spent my life pushing people away. I’ve built really high walls to keep people out. I know to never make eye contact with anyone on the street. Over the years I’ve been sharpening my sarcasm and dirty looks to the point that I’m convinced I could kill a small animal with a few of my deeper glaring looks. When you’re a girl in a city, you have to protect yourself. There’s a lot of crazies out there you know. People who can’t be trusted. People who will hurt you. So I stay inside my walls. I let people in, I do but they need to be what I’m looking for. My dreams are simple. My perfect man may not exist but I’m not looking for perfect. They need to be taller than me but not too tall. I don’t stand on phone books to kiss boys. Eyes...well blue or bluish. Athletic and strong but still gentle and sensitive. And he better be goddamn funny. But not abusive funny or sarcastic funny. Let’s say he has to be entertaining. They better have a job and some money cause I don’t spend time with struggling poets. Well unless they’re funny, blue eyed, a little taller than I am and well I guess if their a poet they’d already be sensitive but not too sensitive. I don’t want a boy who will cry every time I get upset or angry at them. They need to see beyond their own needs and honestly want to help others. Okay, maybe not too many others but at they should at least want to help me. Show a general interest in my goals, my hopes and dreams. I’d prefer if they didn’t make me watch hockey or football and that they didn’t think nights out with their friends are more important than me. It’s okay if they’re a gamer but not a hardcore gamer. If your video game time exceeds the hours of part-time job, please stay at home and play with your controller.

Instant love lasts a few seconds, a minute or two on the bus or it can take a whole hour for you to leave the restaurant without doing more then accidentally looking into my eyes. But if you do, you have me without a hello. Momentary infatuation, fleeting love or hopeless romantic. What ever words I want to use to describe my temporary delusion based love affairs, there are no words that can make them seem a bad thing. Without our delusions what would we be. One day, one of these delusions will last longer than 3 seconds and longer than two minutes. Until that day comes, I’ll just keep falling in love three times a day.

Aggressively Passive

There were things I wanted to be. Places I wanted to go. Hopes, dreams...... life goals I used to have. But I’m just so tired all the time. By the time I get to my little cubicle/prison cell at the office....I sit down for 3 minutes and then I have to go get a coffee. I’m at my desk just long enough to turn on my computer and then I try to find a way to make it through the day without punching anyone in the face. This for me, is a challenge. I used to work for myself and now I work for other people, so the transition has been a little less than smooth. I really don’t care who forgot someone’s birthday or who left an order in the warehouse for two weeks without invoicing it. It’s amazing what becomes important when you spend everyday going to the same cubicle prison. As soon as my computer turns on I hear the door shut and I’m trapped there till 5pm with no chance of parole. I’d would like to openly admit that I am more than just a little passively aggressive. Don’t piss me off or I’ll bitch slap you three weeks later for no apparent reason. The office drones I work with have taken aggressive passiveness and turned it into a art form. I like to move peoples files around sometimes just to see what happens. I’ve created a chart of what pisses everyone off the most and once a week I get someone where they live. What I’m trying to do is wake people up. I want one of my little stunts to save someone. To bring them back to life, so they stand up on the top of there desks and piss on their computer as they swear that they quit and are never coming back. You know kinda like that priest from the Exorcist, I just want to help people release their inner demons into the universe. Keeping that stuff bottle up can really give you all kinda tumors. When it comes down to it we’re all lost. And no one is trying to find us. No one. I feel like I’m the only one that’s awake and I’m walking inside of everyone else’s nightmare. The only problem is that everyone accepts this nightmare as their real lives. I’m sort of like the inverse of Freddy Krueger. I want everyone else to wake up from their own personal nightmares. I’m worried that eventually I’ll fall asleep to. That I’ll get pissed off one day because someone forwarded me 12 emails from a different department. Okay, that’s annoying. I admit it. And I may also be the one that signed up a certain email forwarding whore to the 12 different Justin Bieber online fan clubs, with her work email address. There’s also a chance that I left a note with the IT department about improper use of an office email addresses that was clogging up our servers with Justin Bieber spam. Now that doesn’t make me aggressively passive, does it?

Wanta be Haters.....you can hate me Now!!!

Let me fill you in on how this works. I’m Measuring Tape Girl. I measure myself before you can as a self-defense mechanism. I judge, prejudge and roll my eyes at myself before you can even open your mouth. A good defense is a good offense. So before you can pass judgement I’ve already cut myself down. I hate me more than any of you wanta be haters could ever dream of hating me. What I really am is a Super hero. My super power is self-doubt. I doubt and question every decision I’ve ever made. I don’t think I’ve ever been truly confident about anything. I don't know what I want and I don't know why I'm writing this blog. I think I'm trying to prove that I exist. Do you exist? Does it matter. I think I'd rather be shopping for shoes but I don't get paid for another week. What's a girl to do? I guess I start a blog. I hope that my words get out there. Where ever there is. I just don't want these thoughts stuck in my head. I'm tired of not being good enough. I'm tired of a lot of things. What is enough? When will it be enough for me. I just don't know what to think or what to write anymore. I'm going to pretend I'm shopping for shoes. If you pretend something is real for long enough. You can make it come true. I'm not going to pretend that world peaces exist or that there is a cure for cancer but I am going to pretend I'm shopping for shoes. I'm going to pretend until I'm actually in the store. Yes, I'm evil. Please Hate me. Wanta be Haters, you can hate me now.