NEWS UPDATE!!!!! September 17, 2002
Well, I am back in the land of the working!! I got a new job working for Office Depot. They built a brand new one right here in Hayward. It's about a FIVE minute commute, so I'm happy. It's so close to home that if I wanted to, I could come home for lunch. Well, breakfast, as the case may be. My lovely schedule is Monday through Friday, 5AM-12:30PM. It's SO nice to have a set schedule!!! Never EVER had that at PetsMart...ohh, and I have the weekends off!! WOOT!

I think the atmosphere is a lot better for me than at PetsMart. I miss working there with all the animals and my regular customers, but I've made new friends here, I'm a lot less stressed about things, and as I said before, there is no commute!!


This is a page about ME!! You'd never guess that, would you? To start off, here are some basics:

NAME: Karen (aka: Blue Rat)
AGE: 25
LIVE: California
WORK: Office Depot
HOBBIES: Reading and watching movies and playing The Sims
PETS: 4 cats: Josephine, Inky, Cleopatra, and J.J.; 1 fishtank, 2 birds: Kakui and Pickle.

HOW SHOULD I START?!?!
My blood family consisted of my mother, father, Kelly, Kathie, and I. After my father died, my mother got remarried and I gained two step-sisters. A couple years ago, my mother and step-father went to Russia and adopted a little boy names Eric. He's a cutey! I wish I had a scanner to show you pictures of him! Sandy is my golden retriever (actually my mom's--she's in Virginia and not here in CA) Kelly moved to North Carolina and then got married to my brother-in-law, Gary. Kathie lives in Virginia with Jonathon, the father of her baby.
I also have "adopted" families. They are the Lichvars - mom, pop, Beth, Chris, Tina, and Lee; the Bruley's - mom, pop, Jackie, Josh, and Jessica; and the Millers(which is actually two parts) mommy and Rich, Rosie and Bubba, and mommy's kids from her first marriage - Jeremy, Ben, and Christine.
I am the middle child. I have an older sister named Kelly, and a younger sister named Katherine. I was born in 1976 in West Chester, PA, where I lived for a few years. My family then moved to Centereach, Long Island, New York. We lived there for 5 years. During that time, my younger sister was born. I went to Oxhead Elementary School for K-2nd grades. We were called the "Roadrunners." I was in the reading club at the library and I took a sign language course there. My best friends name was Susan. Her aunt's fave song was "Jump For My Love" or something like that. We caught and disected fireflies in a cat dish. We spent forever together. We hung out with the guys who lived up the street: the Fonsetto's. Frankie, Vinnie, and the irritating little brother I can't remember =) (Peter?) All three of them were about the same age as Kelly, Kathie, and I.
In the summer of 1984, we moved to Sterling, VA. This is where I grew up. This is where I consider "home." I went to Guilford Elementary from 3rd - 5th grade. In 1987, I went to Sterling Middle School (original, isn't it?) from 6th - 8th grade. My best friend's name was Nicole. We walked to school every single day for 5 years together. We sold golfballs back to the golfers behind our houses. We had sleep over parties. We were always on the phone to one another, even though there were only 3 houses separating us. She moved to Florida during 8th grade. She left before I could say good-bye. I was depressed for months. I went to visit her in the summer of '91...and then we lost contact with one another. I just recently got in contact with her again!! We talk now and again. She still lives in Florida, with her man and brand new baby =)
Park View High School, Sterling, Loudoun County, Virginia. From 1990 to 1994. Kelly graduated in '91 so I only had one year to put up with her harrassing her "little sister" in front of her friends =) I spent so much time at this school. Mainly in the theater and band room. I worked in every single drama production that was put on in my 4 years there. I was on every single crew, from props and make-up to sound and lights. But my fave crew was costumes. By my junior year, I was head of the Costume Dept, following in the footsteps of Kelly. I made many friends, and though few, very tight friendships with a handful of people. I wouldn't trade those years for anything. The only thing I might have changed was the fact that my father died January of my senior year. That was a rough year. So many things happen. So many changes. So many decisions. So many things he won't see. Will he be proud of me? So little time.
Luckily I had my friends. I couldn't really turn to my family. They didn't understand. They had to deal with his death in different ways than I did. They withdrew into themselves, lashed out at others, denied it....I wanted to talk about it. I didn't want to shrink into a shell. My friends were there for me. Every step of the way. Beth, Joanie, Chris, Jeremy, Jackie, Tina, too many to name. There were all there for me. I can't tell them how much it meant to me. They were lifesavers (not the edible kind!!)
On to a brighter side now! That was depressing!
I worked on costumes for every show. I loved it! Costumes really make a character come alive. They put you in a different time period, they show you poverty levels, they put you in different lands. Anything is possible with the right costume. Props and sets help, but without the costumes....it's just a set with modern age actors and actresses.

Shows I worked on:
1991 - Sound of Music, Our Town (GROVER'S CORNER?!?!?!), Any # Can Die
1992 - She Stoops To Conquer, Robin Hood, Damn Yankees
1993 - Music Man, Fortress, Sinbad the Sailor
1994 - We only did 2 shows this year: Anything Goes & Much Ado About MacBeth (1½ hr versions each of MacBeth and Much Ado About Nothing) Chris was AD for MacBeth, I was SM for the "Much Ado" half. It was AWESOME!! I've never had so much fun!

College was next. I went to Warren Wilson College, a small college in the beautiful Blue Ridge Mountains. It is located in Swannanoa Valley, North Carolina. We called it Swanna-nowhere since it took forever to get anywhere. But Asheville was a cool town if you had your own car, or knew someone with one. I spent freshman and sophomore years there. Made some great friends, although I've unfortunately lost touch with most of them now. I still talk with two, of three, that meant the most. WWC was a 500 student college (when I was there) where you can call your teachers by their first names...a small close-knit community where everyone knows everyone else. We worked on crews around campus, did community service, went to class, and had a lot of fun. It was great! I missed home, though. A lot.
I stayed there only two years before I ran out of money and couldn't take out another school loan. I transfered to George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia. I went there because of tuition costs, the fact that I could live at home (more on that later), and my high school friends were there. BIG MISTAKE!! I hated it there. It is SO unlike WWC. Where as WWC had 500 students, George Mason had about 25, 000. Where were the trees? The hiking trails though the forest? The farm with the cows and pigs? The personality? The familiararity? GMU is where you are a number, not a name. No one knows who you are...another face in the crowd. WWC was different. I should have stayed....it's too late now.
I met my boyfriend, Greg, while I was at Warren Wilson. My roomie had introduced me to....the internet! I telnetted my way over to a BBS located in Alameda, CA called dsp.net. It's totally different now from what it was, not even a BBS anymore. Anyways, I met a guy there...Black Dragon. He was cool to chat with. I first logged onto dsp on his birthday in '95. We talked on the phone, swapped pics, and voila! We've been together for almost 6 years now. Dated LD for a year. He moved out to VA May '96 when I went home from WWC. I lived with mom and my stepdad. Bad idea...after being on my own for 2 years? Things were okay for awhile, but then went downhill. I worked at Blockbuster and PETsMART and went to school full time for a couple of months. Decided I didn't like GMU, dropped out, quit BB and went to PETsMART full time. I worked for them 5½ years. Greg stayed for a year, and then the two of us decided to move back out to California. We lived with his mom from May to August, when we got our own apartment in Hayward. I lived right next to CSUH.
We are married now. Our wedding date was August 4, 2001. It was held at the Japanese Gardens in Hayward over their beautiful koi pond. The sun was shining and the people who meant the most were there with us sharing. It was a very nice day overall. Click on the following links to see some pictures (at least until I can get a page up specifically for them). Me, Greg, both of us, and my family. In the picture left to right are: me, my Aunt Kathleen, my dad's step-father Gary, Greg, and my older sister Kelly. Kathie would have been there, but had Hendrix instead, so she couldn't come out. I forgive her =)
We went to Maui, Hawaii for our honeymoon. It was Greg's first time going there...and my 4th. It is absolutely gorgeous there!. Here is a picture of a sunset I took on one of our last nights there......SUNSET PIC!!!

In December 2001, I got the awful flu "THING" that was going around here. I was incapacitated for SIX WEEKS with the darn thing! During that time, Greg and I moved into a house!!! It's a two bedroom house for less money than if we had stayed at the apartments. My Uncle Mike died. That was hard on me. I haven't seen a lot of my relatives for a long time. I wasn't able to go east for his funeral. I had no money, and I could barely breathe. And most know how stuffy it is on planes...I would have had a very hard time breathing. I was also having worse problems at PetsMart, so I took some much needed vacation hours (I didn't want to lose them since I was leaving anyways!)
My last day at PetsMart was February 24, 2002. It was difficult to leave. It was my first REAL job. I made a lot of friends there, I loved the animals, and even though I hated cleaning!!, I enjoyed what I did. Unfortunately, it came to an end over something I just COULD NOT see eye to eye with. So close to being there for six years. 3½ months more would have seen that. I don't regret it now, though I did at first. I battled with myself over going back. When I thought was could have been done to keep me there, and the fact that it wasn't, made me realize how "replacable" I was. Someone who could be brought in at a lesser rate of pay, instead of giving me more to stay. I laugh at them now, considering the person who now runs the department has caused some financial distress in the fact that he doesn't make sales for them now!!! That'sbecause he doesn't really know anything! AND, if someone asks him a question he doesn't know the answer to, HE TELLS THEM WHATEVER HE THINKS IS RIGHT!!! Which, needless to say, has caused even MORE customer loss!! I have not stepped foot back into that store since March, after so-called "person who replaced me" and his girlfriend started harrassing my friend and myself. Thankfully, that stopped soon after we had a little, uhm, shall we say, discussion?? The threat of a restraining order, after I talked to a police officer of course, quickly stopped.
So, here I am now at Office Depot. Less stressed, much happier, and making money once again. I like the people, I like the atmosphere, I like my schedule, I like the commute, I like my JOB =) And that's the most important. To me. I don't think the day will come that I will DREAD going to work. I do almost the same thing day in and day out. With a few differences thrown in to add spice =)

There are definitely some things I would change if I could do them over, and some things I wouldn't dream of touching. I've made mistakes and learned from them. Looking back on who I was even a year ago, I still see things that I did wrong....or just not "good." But those situations, those conflicts, those "mistakes" have made me who I am today....ME! I guess what matters most is that I am proud of ME. What I have accomplished, what I procrastinate about doing, what I don't do, what I have failed.

In a nutshell....me.
(is that a walnut, peanut, brazil nut or kukui nut shell?)

LAST UPDATED SEPTEMBER 17, 2002