Here is the dream: 

1. A day where I can wake up without any kind of animal, alarm, or illness causing me to get up. 
2. Able to stay in bed mostly snooze but you know, checking phone and waking up slowly. 
3. A breakfast so tasty I eat until my body is the perfect level of full. 
4. No obligations to go anywhere. 
5. Good movies, or television all day. 
6. Dogs being well behaved. 
7. Ice Cream. 
8. Go to sleep and actually fall asleep when I want to. 

IS THAT SO MUCH TO ASK FOR?! I would be happy with even ONE of these things. Really not asking for much. 

Everyone apparently needs it, but so few seem to be good at it. I, happen to be the foremost knowledgeable human on the surviving on poor sleep. Want to know how to do it? 

You don't need sleep. 
​Sleep is, a lie the world has taught us we deserve. It is something that society has used as a marketing tool. If we need sleep, we need mattresses, PJs, pillows, blankets, bed side tables, bed frames, etc etc etc. 
Sleep is a complete trick. All sleep brings is a whole other world that you have to worry about. The dream world is all nonsense. Even more than my regular life. Which I think we can all admit is complete jabberwocky. So this sleep universe is all night terrors and stress dreams, I get enough of that in the day time. Why would I go to sleep just to experience more of it and be unable to control it? At least when I am away I can eat my feelings. Sleep is a waste. 

This is what I will tell myself so that the fact that I haven't slept in months is less painful. 

On the plus side, Pinterest has given me a list of plants and essential oils I can try to sleep better. Am I one to believe in that stuff? No not usually. Am I at the point where I will try just about anything short of heroin? Yes I just might be. 

Can someone please do the following things for me? 
Cook
Clean
Wash my Hair
Do my makeup
Do my laundry
Pick my outfits
Pay my bills
Train my dogs
Build me custom furniture
and do my errands. 

And I will sit around and watch RuPaul's Drag Race and you know... Eat. 

I have never been one of those people who knew what they wanted to do since they were four years old. Instead I change my mind every couple of weeks and then quickly realize that it would be a terrible idea. Here are a few of the professions I have ever so briefly thought about getting into. 

I enjoy driving, and I enjoy being alone. The main issue for this one is that I cannot stay awake that long when I drive. I have maybe an hour of good driving unless I am ingesting a large quantity of caffeine. 

I like dogs, I hate people. This way I would spend most of the time with dogs. However I briefly did this on a small scale and let me tell you, the number of bitey dogs is high. You know what bitey dogs don't like? Being sprayed with a hose. 

I actually went to school for this. Well, the start of the schooling process. I gave up really fast when I realized I would have to give a crap about other people.

Then I immediately realized children are tiny terror monsters that are essentially unruly assholes without the ability to know why everything they do is awful. Also, their hands are always sticky. 

But then I remembered I cannot draw. 

So I guess my options are ... jobs I won't enjoy while secretly plotting novels while I drive to the jobs I don't enjoy. Ahh 2016.. so much potential for disappointment awaits. 

Hi, my name is Tanya and I am here to present to you a new and exciting project that has been recently developed by a team of genius scientists being hidden away to protect their identities. 

What is IRP you ask? Well, IRP takes your average introvert and places them in a cocoon of warm and comfortable gel that allows them the rest and retreat from the world that they need, especially after those long holiday parties and extra busy work days. 

IRP has a special program that is able to fully scan your body, adopt your mannerisms and access your memories to create a robotic copy of you that you can send out on your behalf until your metaphorical meter is filled and you no longer feel like your brain will explode! These copies are so advanced that no one but you will know they are not real! 

If you call now, you can order our special Deck the Decoy model that comes complete with holiday sweater and the ability to answer the questions "How is work?" and "How have you been lately?" without hesitation or sarcasm! 

The IRP has a limited number of copies for the time being given that it is in its initial testing phase, but if you are interested in taking part in this trial please get in contact with us as soon as possible. 

Gel has potential to cause some side effects after rest period, known side effects include and are not limited to:

• Hair loss
• Excessive hair growth in unlikely areas, specifically backs of the knees and palms of the hands
• Loss of control of left hand
• The knowledge of all the lyrics to every One Direction song but no other songs
• Everything you eat will taste like goat cheese - tends to last up to three months
• Your dogs will try to kill you
• Often your friends and family will comment how much better you were last week so you have to live knowing they like the robot version of you way better than the actual version of you. 

The Copy is very advanced but still has a few glitches and bugs that are being worked out. If you experience any of the following please report it to your technician: 

• Slapping of your grandmother without reason
• Excessive fire burps
• Inability to urinate without singing the entirety of Beauty School Dropout
• Cravings of mouldy cheese
• Tendencies to steal puppies
• Thoughts of World Domination

The year, 1996. Maybe 1998? I don't know it was the late nineties and everything was a lot of the same stuff all the time. Until one glorious band emerged from the Great United Kingdom and brought upon us bored rural youths the hope and excitement that came with Girl Power, Platform Shoes and inappropriate songs we wouldn't understand for more years than we would like to admit. 

That is right, the Spice Girls entered our lives and took them for themselves, creating an army of girls wearing really tall running shoes - or for those of us with parents more reasonable and not willing to buy such preposterous footwear, often found ourselves standing on top of two my fours or crates just to meet their friends eye line. 

The Spice Girls had it all, and most important to me at the time, a Polaroid Commercial. 

That polaroid commercial was with out a doubt one of my favourite things at the time. I actually taped it off of television using our VHS recorder and some careful timing, recording it onto my tape of various Spice Girl appearances and performances. 

This commercial featured them in some kind of school which I don't remember very well now, (sometimes things just burn so brightly they scorch the memory) but what I knew what all I ever needed in life to be who I wanted to be was a Polaroid camera. 

I never got said camera, because it was a ridiculous request. Polaroid film is ridiculously expensive and it is not really an obtainable thing for a nine year old. 

THAT IS: Until Amazon has a pre-black Friday sale and someone can order one $50 off. 

Did I have much forethought to when I would ever need a Polaroid camera given that I am literally always carrying my phone which has a fantastic built in camera? Do I know I literally have 5 other perfectly functional cameras in the room at this very moment? Do I know that the film is still more expensive than printing a picture normally? 

Apparently none of that matters now that I have a lovely baby blue Polaroid camera that takes mini polaroid pictures that I can do whatever I wish with. Probably lose immediately but let's hope I am smarter about it. 

Anyways, I just wanted to say, dreams can come true kids. Especially if your dreams are as pathetic as mine. 

UPDATE ALERT: Just watched the commercial in question - FOUND HERE 
It is exactly as I remembered it. It is important to note that I watched the behind the scenes footage before which reminded me that I had a bunch of that on my tape too. Way to go young me, just so you know, you still enjoy watching behind the scenes stuff way more than you should. 

Today is the kind of day that most people honour those who fight for all the stuff that I tend to take for granted. Thanks, I am real sorry. 

Problem is, I don't express feelings so there isn't a lot I can say about that. And I feel anything else I talk about will make me out to be some kind of monster. 

So, How about I talk about puppies? No one can be mad if I talk about puppies. 

If you don't like puppies, it is YOU who is the monster. 

Anyway, 

Remember a while ago when I was talking about ways to get puppies to hang out? No? Click that link and enjoy. But then come back. Good, you're back. How was it? Brilliant and insightful? You sure you read the right thing? No? You'll check? You're back again? It was uncomfortable and weird. Perfect. Let's continue. 

So, I found the way to get the dog therapy place set up. We put it as a doggy daycare / dog therapy place. Two for one. People bring their dogs to the doggy day care for free, so long as they don't mind a bunch of people coming in to play with them. The people who come in can pay, but it's fine because insurance will cover it. 

We can organize it into a few different areas, Puppies, One to Five year olds, Big dogs, Old dogs, Lazy dogs, Hyper dogs, The Playhouse Arena, and the Outside Run. So all the different areas will have the dogs in them, and you can hang out with them as long as you want and it will make people feel nice when they are feeling particularly unhappy or anxious. 

There can even be a study room for people going through exams with little time release puppies, so that every time you read and study for say an hour, one puppy is released but only for ten minutes then you have to study again. 

Doesn't that sound amazing?

I just wrote a whole blog post and was about to publish it. 

The blog post was about how things tend to go wrong in my life. 

The blog post was deleted and not saved in my drafts as I went to hit publish. 

How will anyone ever know of my creative genius if the internet keeps deleting it?

Let me try this again. 

​My life is consistently full of garbage. If I am not sick, Dave is sick. If Dave isn't sick, my car is broken. If my car isn't broken, my dog pooped on a rug. If my dog didn't poop on a rug then I don't know, I can't find my sweatpants. 

Seemingly trivial things to a lot of people I am sure. I appreciate your struggles, really I do, but unfortunately for you this is my website. 

What I want to know is, if there is Karma, or whatever entity you believe in, why does it constantly seem like shitty things have to happen all the time. Why can't a day just be alright sometimes? It never is just wake up and be medium all day. I am not asking for a fantastic great day, I am asking for an alright day. 

Here is what an decent day looks like: 

• Sweatpants - all day
• Ice Cream - as much as I want without judgement
• Chips - to balance out the sugar
• Netflix - half hour comedies
• Tumblr - not running out interesting things to scroll through
• Pinterest - showing me cool crafts and me attempting them
• My dogs making it one day without peeing, pooping, barfing or just generally being a pain in the ass

​That is really all I would need to have an decent day. 

A Fantastic Great Day would look more like this: 

• NEW Sweatpants - all day
• Ice Cream - that makes you lose weight the more you eat
• Chips - That give you muscles
• Netflix - releasing a secret 4th season of Happy Endings that is as good as the rest of that show
• Tumblr - promoting my blog a bunch and then it gets super popular so that a publishing company is all "Hey, you want a book deal?" 
• Pinterest - showing me cool crafts and me attempting them and succeeding 
• My dogs learning a sweet new trick like, bring me the ice cream, or push the button when Netflix thinks I am dead. 

That would be a Fantastically Great Day. 

I may not be a saint, and I sometimes do shitty things like drive too fast or laugh at kids who fall off their bikes, but I just want to go one day where everything is just decent.

​I think there should be a rule where we get like, minimum once a month a day where nothing bad, nothing ridiculously wonderful, just only decent things happen. That should be a thing. Make it happen the internet. 

I have yet to be accepted into Femsplain's submissions but I think part of that is because I am not being true to who I am. I am the weirdo who has conversations with her dogs, not the girl who actually analyzes her life to make it better. 

So inspired by their theme this month of DREAMS, here is a story about my life. 

When I was a kid, me and my sister would religiously watch the 1966 Batman series that was being replayed on television. I feel as though we may have watched it everyday but who knows I was probably only six years old. No one has a real concept of time when they are six. 

But as far as I recall, everyday (or whatever) same Bat-Time, same Bat-Channel, my sister and I would plop down on the couch and watch the hell out of that show. 

Then I would go to school and people would say things like, "when I grow up, I want to be an astronaut" or "when I grow up I want to be a cowboy" or "when I grow up I want to be a endocrinologist" (some of those are more common than the others). I would reply to their follow-up questions (or just plain out blurt it out because six-year-olds have a severe lack of give and take in general conversations) "I WANT TO BE BATMAN!" 

Here are some of the reasons why I wanted to be batman:

• Sweet Ride
• Cool Hangout
• Cool Friends
• Butler
• Rich as crap
• Swivel bookcases operated by secret switches
• Red phone in glass case that did not gain attention from any guests
• Always knows all the answers to all the problems
• Low stakes - Batman's pretty much always going to figure everything out
• Sweet Dance Moves

PS: You should all know that when I worked for the government, there was a team building exercise at a meeting where you had to write where you grew up, where you worked last and what you wanted to be when you grew up. I was honest and said Batman and everyone looked at me as though I was a crazy person. The government is onto my vigilante aspirations! ALFRED! HIDE THE BATPHONE! 

PPS: I need to name my next dog Alfred and teach him to bring me stuff. 

PPPS: Does anyone know a good dog trainer? 

PPPPS: Does anyone know a good breed of dog that will bring me a fudgecicle without eating it before it gets to me? 

As I sit in my aunt's house alone, while my house gets displayed to strangers for their commentary and suggestions on what they would do differently should they decide to purchase it, I am faced with the overwhelming knowledge that another month has passed.

The worst part about that is, I really haven't accomplished much. I haven't written much for either of the books I am working on, I still hate my job - perhaps more than ever, and I have not successfully gone to the gym more than once in a week yet this year. 

I essentially live in a world of ridiculous aspirations that I have no qualification to even dream of. I am likely never going to accomplish any of my goals, which I suppose is fine, most adults don't I think. I think what most adults do is get older, get accidentally pregnant and then lie to other people so many times saying that this is what they always wanted that it becomes their new false truth. I don't want that to be my story. 

I don't want to turn 48 years old and look at my life and say, "Oh fuck. I done fucked up." I want to look at it and say "Alright, so it might not be perfect but at least I ..." you know.. insert something that is an accomplishment of sorts. 

Preferably, I would like to be able to say the following:

"Alright, so my life isn't perfect, but at least I own jeans that don't have elastic waist bands. And also while I haven't won a pulitzer, at least I am a New York Time's Best Seller. Also, my TV show is a lot of work but at least the Emmys seem to love us and the syndication money has allowed me more freedoms and opportunities to write features that were well received."


That doesn't seem to far fetched does it? I mean, I said that I DIDN'T have a pulitzer, that is me being reasonable. I mean, New York Time's Bestseller would be honour enough. I would love to be in the company of the greats. J.K. Rowling, Steven King, Snooki. Ya, Snooki is a bestseller and I am not. Riddle me that. What's that you say? You have to actually be brave enough to let other people read your books if you want that? You have to devote time to actually editing the damn thing? Oh. Point inner voices. 


Anyways, this is a long self indulgent post about how I cannot think about anything but myself on most days. I need to get focused and do some more writing. That will be my job this summer once my work hours settle down. I expect you to hold me to it the internet - by which I mean Crystal because I don't know that anyone else reads this. 


If others read this, leave me a comment with some tough love and some just regular love to motivate me to write. I am not sure which will work better so give me both and if I don't like one I will read the other. 


Happy April.