Red Nose

And Yet, I Manage To Get Things Done

I have noticed lately that I cannot focus on anything for more than, say, 10 minutes. I get distracted by anything. Yesterday I slipped my coffee cup into the fancy-one-cup-at-a-time coffee machine, pushed the button, and remembered that I should pick up my new parking pass.

I went to do that, but the woman in charge of parking passes wasn't quite ready to dole them out. I walked back to my desk and checked my email.

Then I remembered my coffee. Luckily it was still in the coffee machine; even luckier, it was still hot.

I'll think, "Time to do the checkbook" and head over to the computer and play a couple games of Snood. Then I remember the checkbook and open up Quicken. But I forgot to get the ATM and debit card receipts from my wallet, so I go back to the kitchen to get them, and notice that I have a couple pairs of shoes lolling around by the side table, so I pick them up and take them upstairs, where I notice that Joe's left my clean clothes neatly stacked on my dresser, so I put them away -- at least the shoes made it upstairs -- and then I might as well take off my jewelry. I pass the bathroom and decide to go.

I get downstairs and the phone rings; it's an Out-of-Area number so fuck that. I unload the dishwasher, or maybe load it, and look for a snack. Then I see my purse and remember the checkbook.

By this time the computer's gone to sleep so I wake it up and finally get to work on the checkbook.

Is there such a thing as adult-onset attention deficit disorder?

Stop Me Before I Open The Closet

I cleaned out my dresser drawers today. At first I was only going to put away my clean clothes, but when I took a good look at my underwear drawer I knew it was time for a purge.

So out with all the old, ill-fitting granny panties! Out with the two padded, underwired, and heavily infrastructured brassieres that I bought on the off-chance I'd actually wear such contraptions. (Actually, I think I wore each of them once -- they served their purpose each time but now? Out!) Ah, the jogbra -- as useful to me as tits on a snake. Begone! The pamphlet on how to tie a scarf in many fetching designs? Yes, oh so 80s and oh so trashed.

Then I decided that it was time to get ruthless on the pants and tops drawer. If it didn't fit or hadn't been worn in a year, buh bye! When that was done, I put in the clean stuff -- turtlenecks and long-sleeved tops on one side and short-sleeved summery tops on the other -- and miracle of miracles, it all fit with room to spare.

On to the two drawers stuffed full of t-shirts. Again, "ruthless" ruled the roost. I ditched t-shirts that I've never worn. I recycled award shirts from ancient software releases (it ran on 386s) and marketing shirts from vendors at conferences. Speaking of conferences, I no longer feel the need to keep souvenir shirts from them. Away with them all!

The tops and pants and Wonderbras went into the charity sack; the underwear got thrown away. I think donating one's used underpants is kinda nasty, so into the trash they go.

Then, since I was on a roll, I dusted my dresser and cleaned the bathroom.

All this by noon. What's gotten into me?

Down The Aisle

Today is our 28th wedding anniversary.

Seems like only yesterday that I was sitting in my parents' home, drinking coffee and thinking about my upcoming nuptials, when my Pop walked down the steps clad only in his strapless t-shirt, his size 44 boxers, his shoes and socks, and the striped tie from his rented tux.

"Well, I'm ready!" he said.

That's my Pop.

I'd gotten my hair done the day before, so I put on my own makeup and got myself dressed. The three of us drove to the church in Pop's Chevy Caprice.

My sisters were waiting in their bridesmaid finery; the ushers were waiting in their tuxes. I couldn't stop smiling. Everyone was smiling!

I'd always had visions of a slow, stately procession down the aisle, with me smiling at the friends and family gathered to watch us take our vows. I'd blow a kiss to my best pals, wink at the children, giggle at anyone with misty eyes, and allow myself to be admired.

Nope. When the time came to walk down the aisle, Pop grabbed my arm and practically ran me up to the altar. We galloped down the aisle like we were running in the Kentucky Derby and coming down the homestretch.

But that jog down the aisle just meant I got to Joe faster, so I was okay with that.

And 28 years later, I'm still okay with that.

Funny How That Works

Today was a day of obstacles. First one thing; then another. Not all bad, mind you; there were good things, but mostly it was a day of missed connections and rework.

But on the way home, driving through a minor thunderstorm, there was a rainbow. Almost a full semicircle, though it's very faint.

One end, though, was bright.

Just looking at it made me feel way better, like I'd made it through.

Once I got home, another round of thunderstorm moved through. When I looked out the back window, I noticed that it was raining rather briskly, but the sun was shining in the west. So I went out front to see if, perhaps, there was another rainbow.

And there was, and it was way more glorious then this badly merged photo can ever hope to show, but you can at least get an idea of it. And now I feel pretty good.

Not A Drop To Drink

Thanks to a break in a big old water main located under an upcounty nature center, everyone in my neck of the woods must boil their water for at least 10 minutes before drinking it, cooking with it, and baptizing people in it.

Just kidding about the baptizing.

Of course, Joe and I did not learn about this restriction until we had both showered, brushed our teeth (including big swigs of water), taken meds, and drunk a big old pot of coffee made with good old tap water.

I suppose we will know soon enough if we poured contaminated water down our gullets. I'm all atwit with the anticipation.

Groggy

Sometimes you're going along just fine, very productive, schmoozing the good schmooze with various and sundry friends and relatives and colleagues, producing and multitasking, speaking the language, hitting it out of the park, leveraging everything that can leveraged, and bam!

You wake up one day, but you're very groggy. A little too more social/business/personal overload combined with unseasonably hot and humid weather hits you upside the head and says, "No mas!"

So yeah. I'm am without energy today, even though it's only 11:14. Actually, I've already had breakfast, accompanied Joe to his shop to drop off a key, and done a minor grocery run, so perhaps I've just used up my energy quotient for the day.

My head's a little achy; it's my own fault. At a grand event yesterday, I threw caution to the winds and imbibed a glass of wine, a 007 shooter (one of the ingredients is orange vodka; I'm a little hazy on the rest), a glass of champagne, and a sip of a Cosmo.

I know, I'm a lighweight when it comes to alcohol consumption, but the mixture of all these various types of intoxicating beverages, while not exactly making me drunk, filled my head with wool and dullness.

Oh well. I think I will go to the movies today. Sometimes crawling into a nice, dark, air-conditioned cave with a big tub of salty popcorn and a sweet, sweet cup of Coca-Cola is the perfect solution.

Synchronicity, Maybe, And A Fake Peach

Perhaps I'm living right, or God has smilethed down upon my head, or there's something to this synchronicity stuff after all, but I did not get rained on once yesterday, despite several bad lines of thunderstorms and even tornadoes moving across the DC area.

It was raining as my great good friend Judy and I had a morning wake-up beverage in the hotel Starbucks; it was not raining when we walked over to the Convention Center. It stopped raining again long enough for my friend and colleague (frolleague?) Michele to traipse over to Reading Terminal Market for lunch in the Down Home Diner (excellent BLT!). The sun was even out when Judy and I grabbed a cab to go to 30th Street Station (the cabbie was miffed -- "You are not going to the airport???" "No, we are going to 30th Street Station. Deal with it."). We got to the station, we had a snack, we got on the train, had a most pleasant ride to BWI rail station. I deposited Judy in a cab, retrieved my car, and drove home, all under increasingly cloudy skies. I watched the sky grow blacker and blacker as I listened to the severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings on the radio.

Ten minutes after I walked in the door, all hell broke loose. It continued breaking loose for quite a while, too; downing trees and knocking out power and scaring the children. The power outages were so bad that the schools were closed today in our county.

We never lost power -- yay! -- so I was able to watch the Red Wings win the Stanley Cup.

Today? Muggy and warm. The office was really quiet, because everyone in my extended group was off site at something called a "Team Insight Workshop" that is supposed to increase everyone's ability to work together effectively. It started yesterday, and the Big Boss excused Michele and me on the grounds that if we missed the first day, it would be difficult to pick up on the second day.

I suppose this means that I am not in the in crowd. That's okay with me.

Anyway, I had indulged in a delightfully delicious peach ice cream cone from Bassett's the other day, so I felt that a peach milkshake might just be the ticket for lunch today. There's a new burger joint that opened near the office that proclaims "50 Flavors of Milkshakes!" so hey -- no brainer there. Certainly peach would be on such a vast menu of dairy delights.

And so it was. And so I ordered it.

But unlike the ice cream, which had a lovely fresh peach flavor with chunks of actual peach in it, the milkshake was flavored with some sort of syrup. I can't say for certain that it was artificial flavor, but it didn't taste like a creamy, friendly peach. It tasted like a sharp, in-your-face peach. A peach from the wrong side of the tracks; a peach with a little too much makeup. It was the difference between sunshine and fluorescent light.

Both are good, but you can't beat sunshine.

Still Here, Or Rather There

 Hi!

I'm still in Philadelphia at my conference. So far, I have:

• Eaten a cheesesteak
• Had a Bassett's ice cream cone
• Visited the oldest pub in downtown Philly (McGuillen's -- excellent and cheap BLTs)
• Drunk free beer (always good!)
• Attended some very good sessions on instructional design and the like
• Hugged about a million billion people
• Watched the Pens beat the Red Wings (C'mon Wings! Get it together!)
• Attended a meeting
• Crashed a lunch with some of the coolest people in the whole entire world
• Bought some good books

I plan to do more of some of those things. Guess which ones!

Philly Time

Tonight I am going to get ready -- sort of -- to go to Philadelphia for the annual STC conference. I'm not actually getting on the train until Sunday morning, but I'm picking up my great good friend Judy at the airport tomorrow. She's going to hang out with us tomorrow night. We are planning to smuggle Cosmopolitans in thermos bottles into the movie theater and see Sex and The City (Shut. Up.) and have a high old time.

So, I must change the sheets on the bed in the guest room, give the bathroom a lick an a promise (yeah, ew) and then do a preliminary packing, which I will finish up tomorrow night. We'll hop on the train Sunday morning and then, look out!

Meanwhlle, in lieu of a long Love List, I'm doing a one-item love list. I suppose, if I want to be nitpicky, that you can't really have a list with one thing in it. It simply goes against everything in the List-Making Guidebook! Okay then, it will be a Love Lone rather than a Love List.

Meet Virgil.












Virgil is the cutest stuffed Pillow Monster, handmade by Nichol Brinkman. I was monitor-shopping on Etsy and there he was, along with the other wonderful pillow monsters. He jumped out at me and said, "Hey! I know lots of jokes!" and so how could I say no to that?

Here's his bio, straight from the Pillow Monster site:

Virgil is a stand up comedian. He tells good, clean jokes and gets his audience to see the world in a new light. He has a very funny bit about "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter". He is guilty of laughing at his own jokes, but he believes ethically that he shouldn't, so his laugh comes out as suppressed, high-pitched giggle. This only adds to his comedic performance. He is a gentleman and always hold the door open for ladies.

I love Virgil.

See you in the City of Brotherly Love!

A Little Catharsis Never Hurt Anyone

Last weekend I saw quite a bit of Mom, particularly on Sunday when my older sister and I took her to lunch with my two cousins and their husbands. It was a nice lunch. My cousins were sociable and interesting, and Mom seemed to enjoy herself.

On the way home, though, she had another intestinal emergency and we made it to her room just in time. She continued to have problems for the next hour. At one point she looked so tiny and sad, sitting on her bed, that I sat down and put my arm around her shoulders. I thought she might break, but she leaned against me and sighed.

So that was that, or so I thought.

Then on Monday I went to the movies by myself. I chose Young @ Heart, a charming, poignant documentary about the Young @ Heart Chorus, a group of elders who love to sing. Their director, a precious darling boy of 53, selects the songs and leads the rehearsals. Their repertoire includes Coldplay, Sting, James Brown, Sonic Youth, The Rolling Stones... you get the idea.

And I cried and cried and cried and cried.

Oh, I laughed, too; these elders are a force to be reckoned with. I especially loved Fred Knittle, who has a rich baritone and a wicked sense of humor. He says he can sing high, too, depending on how loose his shorts are. Hah!

But I mostly cried, especially when the chorus sang at a prison and totally won over the inmates. Especially when the chorus lost two of its members one week before their show.

And I teared up, even as I laughed, when Dora and Lenny led the chorus in the Godfather of Soul's I Feel Good.

But I lost it, almost sobbed out loud, as I sat in the back row in the dark theater, when Fred sang Coldplay's Fix You.

I guess I needed that.