It's getting down to crunch time.

43 days to go. That's it. 43 days and then my life is forever tied to his.

I'm nervous, I'm excited and I'm terrified all at once. Is that normal?

This whole wedding thing freaks me out. Not that I'm scared of marrying him, but rather, that I'm going to be the centre of attention amidst a minimum of 100 people. I don't do centre of attention well.

I thought it wouldn't be so bad, but after two wedding showers, I'm really starting to question my sanity when I agreed to a full wedding instead of eloping. Wouldn't eloping have been so much easier?

At least most of the stuff is done. All that's left are the DIY stuff that I've decided I'm doing, getting the cake/cupcake ideas to our baker, and figuring out seating charts and that kind of stuff.

43 days left.

Can someone put life on pause for me for a bit?

A slight change can make a world of difference...

If you have been following me on Facebook or Twitter, than you know that I recently underwent my first surgery. It wasn't a big surgery. Fairly small, actually. I had two cysts removed. One, was a sebaceous cyst on my chest, the other, a far more apparent one on my forehead that has been there for years. 

The cyst, on a semi-bad day.

Depending on who you talk to, some people claim they have never noticed it, others that they felt it simply added to my beauty. But for me, it has always been a sore spot -- literally and figuratively. For the last several years, even moreso. It has bled, it has swollen, it has been irritated.

Some days it wasn't so bad. On really good days the colour would be so close to my natural skin colour that between my makeup and combing my hair just right I could mask it. On other days, it was so horrible that nothing could hide it. On several occasions when it was like that, I even had some small children freak out and refuse to come near me. Even my little cousin did that once. 

I think that hurt more than the actual physical pain. 

Stitches removed

There was also the fact that it took away from my ability to even consider myself slightly pretty. Sometimes I could overlook it, but most times, all I could see was that big, horrible lump, swollen, bleeding and looking horrible. I would spend hours going through photos I was included in, editing it out, just so I could pretend like I was pretty. Just so that I could hope that I might be pretty. 

I know it's silly that something like that would make me feel ugly -- that I would let how I saw myself be defined by something so small. But no matter how hard I've tried, I could never get past it. I felt as if it drew all attention away from who I was.

Stitches in (backwards, I know)

When the opportunity finally came up to get it removed because of the pain it was causing, I jumped on it. Last Monday, I went in to the hospital, and had both cysts removed. I was awake for the whole procedure, as they just froze around where they needed, and went from there. I was still terrified. I shook like a leaf the whole way through. But there was no pain. 

The whole procedure took less than an hour, and they stitched me up and sent me on my way. The stitches only had to stay in for a week, and they were bandaged up completely the first few days. It was actually quite amusing seeing the reactions of people when they first noticed either the bandaid or the stitches later on. I only had one child terrified over it, but it was still rather amusing.

Day two, stitches out.

They removed the stitches yesterday and everything is healing up rather nicely. I already feel better about myself. It's amazing, with the bump gone, I see myself differently. I no longer feel shadowed by that thing. It's something small. It's not like it overshadowed me. But just that small change is enough to allow me to see myself in a different life. To feel beautiful for the first time in my life. To feel like I am pretty, whether anyone else were to see it or not. I feel like a different person. 

It's such a slight change, but for such a small change, it's making a world of difference in my life.

When did life get so crazy?

The past year has been insanely busy. Crazy, even. So much so that I never could have anticipated the lack of time I would have for me and my personal things, like blogging and the likes. I figured, being without a job, I would have endless hours on my hands to kill.

Not so much. Though the first few months were tough, once wedding season hit, I got some offers to freelance for our local papers and I started pursuing photography a bit more, it was like someone hit the high gear and I was pushing forward full throttle.

Wedding season hasn't ended for me. The moment everyone else's was over, it rolled into time to start working on mine. It's been good. Most things are ready, but it's been hectic. Throw into that a job where playing video games has become a little more of a necessity and a little less of a past-time, moving and the likes, and finding me time is just non-existant. 

While I've missed blogging and doing all the me things insanely, I can't say I haven't enjoyed this busyness. As I said in a previous post, I'm happier in this job than I have been in a very long time.

Scott and I moved into our first apartment two weeks ago. While I'm not sleeping there yet, I'm there every day, cooking, cleaning, unpacking and settling in. Once we're unpacked, I'll show you all some pictures. The place is absolutely perfect for us. It's a two bedroom basement apartment, freshly renovated, brand-new kitchen appliances and brand new washer and dryer -- and the laundry room is NOT shared. We have a beautiful gas fireplace and my dad painted the whole apartment for us to give it a more homey look. It's so much more than I could have hoped for, especially given the price we're paying for it. 

We managed to get our internet hooked up today, which hopefully means I can get back to blogging regularly. Being without the internet has made it difficult.

The next couple months are going to be insane too. I can't believe we're less than 2 1/2 months until the wedding. But I can't wait. Not just because I get to permanently tie my life to Scott's, but because of the people I'll get to see again. Kandace will be flying in a week in advance, and Nugs (and hopefully Tits!) will be meeting up with us at the end of our honeymoon in Florida. I'm really excited to see them. 

But enough about me. I want to know what's going on with all of you! I promise, I'll get all caught up on your blogs eventually, but until then, tell me, what's new with you?

Yes, girls can do it too.

Working in a nerdy industry I've learned two major things.

1) Getting to work where I can be a nerd and it's my job to be a nerd is AMAZING.

and

2) People seriously question the validity of a girl being knowledgable about these kinds of things.

The second one came as more of a surprise to me. I don't know whether it's my appearance that has contributed to this fact (because really, we all know that sometimes I look like a girly girl) or simply the fact of my gender. I'm fairly certain it's the former over the latter.

On the one hand, we've had many customers who come in and seem thrilled at the fact that there is a girl working there and immediately want to know how much I know, and are thusly impressed by my absolute geekiness.

On the other, there are customers who seem to not want much to do with me. Just after Christmas, I had one customer come in, and after I said hello and asked what I could help with, they looked me up and down, responded "There's no way you're a geek or a gamer... is there anyone here who can actually help me?" Later, after I informed them that I was in fact both and helped them with all their needs, they sheepishly apologized admitting that I didn't look the part.

Just what exactly is a geeky gamer girl supposed to look like?

There are also customers (mostly male) I've had who refuse my help because I'm a girl. I'll approach them, ask if I can help them, get a very flat "No", and when a male colleague approaches them afterwards they'll say "Sure, I'm actually looking for blah blah blah" or "I want a game similar to blah blah blah and wanted to get some advice from the staff here."

We even have one regular who does this to me EVERY TIME THEY COME IN and won't really listen to me when I pitch things at the cash.

Now, I get that girls typically aren't experts on games and other geeky things, but I have to wonder what it is that causes people to not even give a girl a chance to prove it?

It's something that amuses and confuddles me all at the same time. I'm not too worried about it for the most part. I mean really, most people there get the opportunity to hear me talk about our products, sell them and prove that I'm knowledgable. When it comes down to it, the ones who won't speak to me about it are the ones that are losing out. 

So let's hear it -- as nerd girls, what are the misconceptions and 'stereotypes' that you find hit you when you encounter other nerds?