We returned for this? I want my money back...

WARNING: Extreme bitterness ahead! Watch for falling expletives, combustible rants, cynical cliches and the mass dumping of pessimism. That, and this post is fucking long.

Hey, I've got to get this shit off my chest somehow so that I can laugh at it, and this is as good a place as any!

So our trip was a freaking blast! 48 hours, 780 photographs, and more money than I care to think about made a 5 year anniversary trip totally worth it! Well, it was a 5 year only legally. My Sweets and I have been together for 7, no splitting up, no "we were on a break" issues, nothin'! So, we actually consider this our 7 year anniversary. Like I said about my marriage before: cynics can fuck off. We're the ones doing it - if we say 7, it's 7.

The trip began with 3.5 hours of breaking the speed limit and making tree-huggers and global warming doomsayers worldwide bawl like babies at our careless use of liquified deceased dino-guts. Then again, we were driving a Honda Civic, so maybe they just got a little miffed. The company couldn't have been better and we laughed and photographed our way to the coast, turning just before being swallowed up by the ominous marine layer hovering over the mountains like the alien warships in Independence Day. We arrived just before our asses became totally numb and killed time on Cannery Row until our room was ready, checked in, oo'd and awe'd at the view, killed more time, then went to dinner. There, my smoking-hot wife and I enjoyed a tasty fillet mignon and chicken risotto. The venue, Cibo (pronounced, Chee-bow) was a bit less intimate than I would have preferred, but was very nice nonetheless; highly recommended.

I had asked the owner to have the evening's musical talent, Nadia and the Highlights, dedicate a song to us and what I got was even better: the singer came over and chatted with us, took a picture for us, congratulated us and wished us a nice visit. It was very pleasant how personal it was. When there was a gap in the flailing about of caucasoid limbs, my wife and I took to the dance floor and butchered a rumba, and had a great time doing it.

The next day involved a lot of walking, fun at the shops, biking about 4 miles on a surrey, lunch at an adorable little cafe that was popular among far more people than it could seat legally, and a nice visit to the aquarium where I took full advantage of my camera's aquarium settings and got some decent shots of jellyfish. Of course, I know my sister will want to vomit at the amateur status of these shots, but I'm proud of myself for just being able to tell what's in them! A quick trip to fisherman's wharf and a caricature later and we were on our way home. We left at 8:30, you do the math - I was not in a good mood the next day, what with having to be up at 6 am to go to work and all.

The cynicism comes into play upon our return. We suddenly have to return to work, chores, errands, money....real fucking life! Yeah, I know, "that's reality, deal with it." And I am, it just sucks and I don't want to. I want to enjoy my job, not keep myself awake on the trip home by thinking of ways I can injure myself "accidentally" that would be non-critical and recoverable but serious enough that I could get out of work.

Perhaps it would help if you knew a little bit about what I was dealing with at my place of employment. I'll keep it simple because the only thing worse than my job is explaining it to someone. I'm an Army vet (did my four years), I have an A.S. in Social Sciences and a B.S. in Business Management. I wanted to get into IT so I tried everywhere and finally got a job right after graduation doing admin for the IT department of a third party administrator for health care benefits and no, I won't bore you with what that is. Six weeks later they had an opening for a more technical position and saw my talents for organization and detail as a good fit, so they "laterally promoted" me (new responsibilities, a huge chunk of liability, and more ass-chewings than are logical but no immediate increase in pay) with the assurance that I could expect my salary to go up much faster in this new position. This was my first lesson; never do SHIT unless you're getting appropriately compensated for it. See, I'm learning and benefiting from the promotion already.

Basically, from there it was me learning the position, me making the position even better, me learning new skills that went well beyond my position, me improving the position even more, then them giving me a lousy 3.5% raise which, while you're not entitled to know my annual salary, I will tell you is absolute piss.

And from there, it's been the same thing. Every day. The same file names, the same contacts, the same psychotic fire-breathing bi-polar spawn-of-Satan boss looming overhead just waiting for someone to make an error so she can take out her aggression which stems from compensation issues relating to her feelings of a severe lack of self-efficacy. Family members have commented that my hair has turned darker; I tell them that's because the only sunlight that my cube is exposed to must pass by my boss first, where it promptly gets sucked into the black void that floats around her.

But it's not just work. There are other issues right at the moment, ones I won't get into here because they are too private and kind of scary. Suffice to say, they make me angry, scared and they definitely stress me out.

And this is what we came back for?!? Like I said, I'm dealing; I just don't wanna! I have great things to think about in my life, it's just that they come up so much less often than the stressful things. Why is that?

There, I feel better, thanks for listening.