"Do you believe in pageantry for the sake of nothing? Right now, I am drinking a can of Tab with no witnesses. No witnesses. I bought the Tab because, upon spotting it in the downstairs convenience store, I was delighted and thought it would be funny to drink such a glamorous and elusive beverage. You don't see Tab everywhere, but when you do? Laugh city.
Tab is Liza and Halston. Tab is your older sister, lying poolside in her candy-striped, blouson-waisted one piece in the summer of 1981. Tab is your mom struggling through day three of the Cabbage Soup Diet so she'll be able to fit into that Cher costume by October 29. Tab is fashion and sacrifice, flash and trash.
Also? It tastes vaguely like cinnamon and pancreatic cancer."
i could tell you about all sorts of stuff & things happening around work that are just ridiculous and funny...
but i'm getting sick.
i'm taking something that is literally called "kick-ass immune boost".
because my immune system needs its ass kicked.
if you'll excuse me, i've worked 10 hours today, and now i must work on homework for four classes.
whine whine whine. wink.
this weekend was much different than usual.
i got to spend time with my nieces at my niece heather's birthday party. we celebrated 11 years with a hannah montana cake.
stayed late having beer and enduring a conversation about politics with people i had never met. not the most enjoyable, to be honest, but i think it is sometimes good to be around different people, even if they bug you a little.
got some homework done. not as much as i would like, but still caught up. my next two classes start tomorrow, and i officially become a full-time student and full-time worker. i am tired just thinking about it.
got to see the boy for two whole weekends in a row, since he was down last weekend, and then came down this weekend for his old young life leader's fiftieth birthday. a bunch of his friends came down as well for the occasion, and so we spent hours sitting around talking. it is a little overwhelming being apart of someone else's group of lively friends telling old stories, but it is nonetheless enjoyable.
and i got to walk around a lake at night looking at ducks and talking with the boy. he's just really my favorite. and he gets favoriter by the minute. getting to spend this next weekend with him too? fantastic.
got to eat the best nasty fast food breakfast this morning - the croissanwich. mmmmm.
took a nap and listened to this american life about matchmakers.
now tonight i am going to a friend's house for an oscar party - lots of food and discussions about dresses, movies, and everything that means nothing.
a good weekend.
abraham lincoln was sexy.
my father and i went to colorado state university last night to hear a lecture from historian doris kearns goodwin, part of their voices of america series. my father had been a fan for awhile, and recently read her latest book on lincoln, which he could not stop talking about at christmas. i happened to hear on npr that she was going to be giving a lecture, and so i investigated and off we went, on a school night.
to pueblo.
twice, actually, because we drove the 45 minutes last tuesday, mistaken about the date.
it was phenomenal. i mean, i'm a nerd anyway, so i knew i would enjoy a lecture from a lady who has written bestselling novels on subjects from the kennedy era (which was turned into an abc miniseries), to fdr, lyndon johnson (for whom she worked at the white house and on his memoirs), winning the pulitzer, and being the first female journalist to enter the red sox locker room.
she happens to be a baseball fanatic, contributing to ken burns' documentary about baseball, which if you haven't watched, is absolutely amazing. i don't care if you don't like sports. i remember watching it with my dad and brother when it aired on PBS years and years ago, riveted.
as she spoke, i remember an old episode of The West Wing, President Josiah Bartlet (Martin Sheen) comes back from church and confesses his frustration about with the homily and preacher:
He had a captive audience. The way I know that is that I tried to tunnel out of there several times. He had an audience and he didn’t know what to do with it. . . . Words, when spoken out loud for the sake of performance, are music. They have rhythm, and pitch, and timbre, and volume. These are the properties of music. And music has the ability to find us and move us and lift us up in ways that literal meaning can’t.
mrs. goodwin did not have such a problem. some of the students were required to be there, and many people there were over twice my age. but as she spoke about how she began to love history, baseball, lincoln's leadership, anecdotes about him and his life, working for president johnson, the current political climate - i was riveted.
it's no surprise to me either that she was a teacher for years. the kind i really hope to be.
anyway.
what i find myself thinking about today are the qualities lincoln had in the area of leadership. beyond the legend of lincoln there is a fascinating life. however, the legend itself is absolutely merited, and it reaches farther in world than one could imagine.
she wove many things into this lecture, but spoke much about the qualities that make lincoln the gold standard of presidential leadership. i love a list, and this is no different. i find that this list is nothing new - pick up any of the myriad of lessons on leadership, and you'll find some or all of these.nine key aspects of lincoln's leadership that brought him success. however, seeing it all in one place has stuck with me today:
1. the capacity to listen to different points of view.
he created a culture where it was safe to disagree, and even encouraged, but once he made a decision, the debate was over.
2. the ability to learn on the job.
it is not our mistakes that hurt us primarily, it is moreover how we respond to them.
3. a ready willingness to share recognition and success with others.
he created a resevoir of good will from the people he worked with.
4. the willingness to shoulder the blame of the mistakes of his subordinates.
5. an awareness of his weaknesses, which gave him the ability to compensate for them.
lincoln was born with a melancholy temperament, which made him prone to sadness. the many failures and humiliation he bore in his life contributed to this frequently. as one who tends to battle this more often than i'd like to admit, i like seeing a leader who many would describe as sad, but not a victim of it.
6. he was able to control his emotions - not ceasing to feel them, but to give them adequate place.
lincoln wrote many "hot letters" - understanding the need to verbalize the full effect of his emotional range and anger. when his letters were uncovered, you can see his notes at the bottom "never sent."
7. he understood how to relax and replenish his energies.
8. at a moment of crisis, he went onto the battlefield.
in the heart of the civil war, lincoln went on the battlefield and met more soliders than any president in history. they did not all necessarily support the way, or him, but it was important for him to be there when things were bad.
9. his remarkable ability to communicate his ideas and goals.
as mrs. goodwin said about lincoln, his greatness consisted in the greatness of his integrity, character ad the moral fiber of his being.
and that, dears, is what is on my mind today, amidst a flood of work and muddying my way through chaucer and the dream of the rood, dishes and tacos.
for all the challenges that await me, no doubt, i am still ready to leave the business world for education. and read read read read.
i should never read work related email on the weekend.
in my job i'd much rather just do my work and go home. this being a leader or management nonsense is for the birds. for the stupid pigeon birds.
i just wonder if i can absorb much more condescension...
this is not going to ruin my weekend. i've decided.
our ceo practices what i like to call "pigeon management": swoop in, shit all over everything, and then leave you with the mess.
it's like a snowstorm.
oh, and i hate playing dominoes, in case anyone wanted to know.
i have to write about sir galwain now, after i drove to pueblo and back for a lecture that is next week.
if you are thinking to yourself that this was pointless to read, you would not entirely be wrong, i'm sure.
in other news, i am mourning the loss of polaroid film today. after 2008, it will no longer be manufactured.
you may think that i learned of that and thought 'what a bummer'.
but truthfully, i'm having just a little crisis over it.
you see, i have 4 polaroid cameras. i love them. i love that they are the epitome of instant gratification, and that in order to be that, they are a pain in the ass. they are big, the film is expensive, they are low-tech and old school - and all of that is completely worth it for me.
so so sad. and now i am hoarding film like i need it for the millenium changeover that wasn't.
i envision a time that i will have to ask if a picture is polaroid-worthy, ala elaine in seinfeld when her beloved birth control was running out.
you know what i'm saying.
i had our intern get me lunch today. it was awesome.
lest we think i'm that kind of person, he totally volunteered. but i pretended that i shouted at him to get me some lunch.
i don't like knowing information sometimes. sometimes i really would like to be caught off guard.
i got to spend 2 hours in the car with my dad. although the lecture we were going to attend is next week, getting my dad out of the house and away from a computer to talk for 2 hours will always be worth it, even if we drove 45 minutes to eat at arbys and immediately came back home.
fast food gives me gut rot, and i need to remember that.
my boss decorated my office with seahorses, beach towels and sombreros. it was a theme-dress up day at work (i'm really NOT kidding) and it was summer in winter day. read: excuse to wear flip flops to work day in the dead of winter. seahorses. i'll say it again: seahorses.
i like reading my friend sara's blog, all about her kids and runny noses and all of that. i feel more connected to her, which then astonishes me because we actually haven't talked in months. anyone else find that weird?
i am in the middle of 4 books, and actively reading none of them.
i sometimes wonder if i'm really capable of loving anyone, or if i can only really accomplish trying to love them.
i communicate primarily in blurbs, hand motions and analogies.
i'm wearing a black rubber bracelet like the kind you had in 8th grade, the two thin bands wrapped together.
the number 8 is stuck on my computer, and it's driving me nuts. 888888888. unstuck.
seeing the full amount i owe thus far on my college education and realizing that it is now more than my first car, with two years left to go made me sigh.
my room smells like oranges and clorox. i like it.
i'm tired of february.
i don't like being micromanaged.
it takes 12 hours to put 600 pins in a map of the world. it doesn't seem like it should take that long, but it totally does.
i am time challenged in that i underestimate how long something is going to take me.
i am curious to know how kristin is doing being pregnant, as compared to the pregnant people i have known thus far. somehow, when i heard, i thought "well now i'll hear what parenting is REALLY about". she has that affect, i think, that people think they'll get the real truth from her, whatever it is.
you should always make friends with people like that.
i miss christopher and asia.
i hope i can go see them in thailand.
worry about money is background worry for me, but it's like a radio station always on in the background.
i hate that.
this is much longer than i thought it was going to be when i started.
i have these obnoxiously bright yellow earrings, and i want to wear them a lot, just to shout to the grey weather on my behalf.
i have no less than 4 blankets on the bed.
i cut down from 7.
i like to sleep in the same bed as the boy, even though we aren't "sleeping" together in the commonly referred to sense. and people see just this as shady. and don't believe me. but sometimes, just sometimes, i can be an adult about things and be fine.
sometimes i don't write things so that i don't have to hear the comments from some people i know read this. but at the same time, i'm friends with people not because i think they will always agree with me, but that they'll tell me the truth, and be friends with me anyway.
this may be too idealistic, but i don't care.
i can't wait two whole days.
i love mail. sending and receiving.
i wish my typewriter were fixed.
i love knowing.
i tear pages out of composition books.
i get sad more than i think i should some times. why is that?
it's really not about me and it is.
balance is important. not mediocre. not average. but balance.
i had to ground myself again from renting movies/books. i can NOT return them on time. it's a disease. a costly one.
i HATE library fines.
i like birds.
and apples.
and giraffes.
sometimes i like to just lay on the bed in complete silence and stare at the ceiling. i feel like it is my brain's version of unzipping too-tight pants after being uncomfortable all day.
i'm not looking to see how long this is now.
too late, i just looked.
i feel like i have a hard time making friends. whenever i say this, people laugh at me and find it ridiculous.
i like getting dressed up for a boy.
i like it even more when it's noticed.
i like it when people sound friendly on the phone.
i don't like people lingering in my office.
i don't like anybody at work complaining about it being too cold or hot in the office.
i don't like when people aren't resourceful.
i like knowing the code to the postage machine.
i like buying new socks.
my sheets have suspenders to keep them on the bed.
i'm procrastinating doing my homework.
my hair is 4 different shades of brown.
i think the republican party is tired.
my lips are chapped.
i can run almost 3 minutes at a time.
this is a big deal. wait. no. it's a Big Deal.
some random nights i dig out my old teddy bear and sleep with it.
i watched the entire first season of dexter. it creeped me out and i still couldn't stop watching it.
i am buried with work.
i hate it when i make people feel stupid, even though it feels very satisfying at the time. i feel immediate guilt.
my friend ryan may change his last name to his old polish name.
sigh.
okay i'm done.
so, i was supposed to drive this weekend to see the boy, and alas, february sends its most miserable regards in the form of bad weather, and the roads were closed. not just the main highway, I-70, but then other roads, further roads, roads that take me to see the boy.
februrary gets the finger, officially.
it makes me feel like they cancelled school, but we had a big party planned at school and i had a new outfit i was going to wear and i was really looking forward to it. so, on one hand, you now have all this extra time and in wonderment are thinking what you would like to do to fill it, but on the other hand, you really would have rathered just going to school since you were looking forward to it.
i need a list, of course.
things to do before monday:
. run
. make my bed
. laundry
. go to target
. run another errand
. clean out the refrigerator
. make a grocery shopping list
. do my taxes
. get the mail
. buy socks
. do stupid weather homework
. work on my brit lit journals and work ahead
. write an email to sarah
. determine how much postage to thailand would be
. go to church
. wash my hair
. watch something good
. drink
yes, that sounds like a good mix of productive and, well, absolutely nothing.
next weekend? 4 day weekend with the boy, denver, and absolutely no plans. delight.
as i have now read three posts besides mine lamenting the word choice & grammatical usage woes in recent days, i am listing my most recent cringeworthy hearings/readings:
1. valentimes. yes, i realize i already said it, but it bears repeating due to its horror.
2. paradine shift. paradine? is that like when you don't actually dine, but just eat near - so you para-dine?
3. tinter tantrum. why is it when people say catch phrases that they just stop hearing them as phrases made up of ACTUAL words and just what they like to hear? one only knows.
4. 'i train new higher's'. this was read on a resume that i got. are you sure you don't mean new hires? or is it that you are training new members of the higher family's children/pets/whathaveyou and you've just forgotten to end your sentence?
5. also in a resume:
previous employment: joe's warehouse
hours: full-time
job title: manager
supervisor: huge
duties: something that i didn't read because i couldn't get past the fact that for a supervisor's name, this applicant put the word "huge".
6. in a client file at work:
name: barbara smith
occupation: homaker
do we mean homemaker, or are we making a judgement call on the character of mrs. smith's children?
7. barnes and nobleses.
sigh. ugh.
* * * *
i digress. but only for awhile.
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