Discovery

I got a message on my flickr account congratulating me on having a photo chosen to appear on a travel guide website. It's a picture I took in Toledo, Spain, and I did not submit it to this site - I had never even heard of it before. I guess they search flickr for photos they might use. (You can see it here.)

So I'm thinking that it naturally follows that they will also be searching flickr for supermodels and movie stars. The only question is, how long will it take before I'm discovered? I think it must be only a matter of days before one of my many glorious human subjects is found and then seen in advertisements across the world. So, who will it be first ??

Blogging Challenge

So, my little brother asked me to do some co-blogging with him, and occasionally write on a mutual topic at the same time. I agreed, and then promptly did not attend to the first request. I am now a week late. But maybe I can make you understand my hesitancy…

Here is a small excerpt from my brother’s post:

"I’m currently reading Hilter’s Scientists: Science, War, and the Devil’s Pact by John Cornwell. The book tackles extremely important issues regarding the role of scientists within a society and their political and moral obligations. I found myself thinking that the introduction alone would have made a fantastic reading assignment in my undergraduate engineering ethics courses."

While the description of the book he’s reading uses phrases like “tackles extremely important issues” and “moral obligations”, the book I was reading was called “Zorro” and the cover featured a dramatic black background with a behind view of woman dancing in swooshy red dress. It would not have made a fantastic reading assignment for any kind of ethics course. It was the kind of cover that I was embarrassed to be seen with, so I tried to hide it while reading during lunches.

This isn’t actually a book I would have picked out for myself, but a woman here at the lab had seen me reading another book (“Love in the Time of Cholera” – which I mention in the side bar to the left) and somehow equated the two, because the next morning, I came in to find this copy of Zorro sitting on my desk. I had thought I might keep it for a while, and then hand it back, pretending to have read it, but then one day I got bored and the next thing I know I’ve got my nose buried in Zorro, and I couldn’t stop until I was done.

I wouldn’t call it a great novel by any stretch of the imagination, but it was entertaining, and a fairly brainless page turner. It focused on the origins of Zorro, and the events and people that turned him into the legend he became, rather than on his adventures once his name had been established. I don’t know much about Zorro, but I gathered a lot from what I was being fed from the book. At times, I almost chuckled out loud at how conveniently she made it all wrap together. Taken prisoner by a pirate in a dashing poofy pirate shirt! Zorro appreciates the shirt and considers what it would bring to the black costume he has been preparing for himself… See what I mean? I’m not proud.

I think part of the blogging request was to write about why we like to read what we do. The books my brother is concentrating on right now are all non-fiction (I think) – informative, historical, and largely scientific. I do like to read history at times, but the bulk of what I read tends to be fiction. I guess I read largely for escapism – to look into another world. In “Reading Lolita in Tehran”, Azar Nafisi talks about the importance of reading fiction – that it teaches us empathy for people who are not like us and in places that we do not know. I like to remind myself of that at times – makes me feel a little better about my aversion to any kind of self help book.

I’ve now started reading “Water for Elephants” by Sara Gruen. Like Brock’s book, it was also a Christmas present – but mine has a big “Costco Buyer’s Pick” on the cover. So far I’ve learned that it’s a good thing my childhood dream of being a trapeze performer in a circus didn’t come true, because living in a circus sounds stinky. See – I get informed, too!

Oh, while I'm talking about my brother... for anyone who's asked about the results of his video contest, the winner was announced this week, as he announces here. Thanks to everyone who I bothered with a vote request! I will make it up to you by using some of my work time to watch a video of your choosing.

to be obligating or not to be obligating?

A toothless man just chased me through a parking lot.  A good way to start a Wednesday morning, no?

 

See, it's been really hard to get out of bed lately.  I'm just so tired.  And my bed is so comfortable!  (New mattress, I love you.)  So sometimes I have to skip things that one might normally take care of before coming to work.  Like makeup.  Or brushing of the hair.  Or finding normal-looking clothes to wear.  Today I skipped breakfast.  And then after a bit of sitting at my desk I had really worked up an appetite - but never fear!  There's a little diner just next door that I can walk to!  Hence, the reason I was on foot and being chased.  Now, help me out here...  when you are standing in a diner waiting for your to-go food, and an employee with no teeth asks your name, don't you tell them?  Because you're in a restaurant and they do that.  And also you have been taught not to be rude.  And then when they say, "You're not married are you?" you say "no", because you are a terrible liar and you are so not married that the thought of it is actually kind of laughable. 

 

But how are you supposed to know that as you're leaving the toothless man is going to come sprinting after you through the parking lot, yelling your name?  Not that I have anything against toothless men... Ok, maybe I do a little bit.  But the running and the yelling and asking me where I work were kind of scary.  He had noticed that I was not getting into a car, and had deduced that I worked close by.  I tried to answer vaguely, with "yeah, I work around here" but he wanted to know exactly which building.  And then there was my favorite part - when he said, "You're not obligating to anyone?"  Why don't we use this phrase anymore?  I think we should bring it back.  Although it would be nice if the person saying it looked more like a movie-star cowboy and less toothless.  And then when I said "no" (again, the lying just doesn't come naturally) he said my least favorite part: "I like."

 

So, should I have said, "Yes, yes I am obligating indeed."?   Probably so... as I'm re-writing this I'm wondering why I didn't.  How did the rest of you ladies handle this - before you were married and had that easy out, I mean? I know this stuff happens to you more than it does to me. Or do the toothless ones think that you are too good for them and set their sites a bit lower - and then I come walking in?

My coworker from China, who I believe I mentioned before, was asking me for parenting advice today.  (No, no I don't have any kids locked in my basement that you don't know about.)  Her 3rd grader was coming to her with a lot of questions - God, heaven, and what do I tell my friend who likes her new glasses and asks me if I like them and I think they're really ugly?  She didn't want to tell her to lie, and she didn't want to hurt the girl's feelings, so we discussed finding something to like about the glasses and concentrating on that.  Like, "I like the color!"  or, "ooh... that's different - different can be fun!"   (hopefully the girl won't be all that bright.)   So maybe instead of saying "no- not obligating" - I should have found something else true to say.  Like, "Well, I do have a date tomorrow night.  I am very obligating."   And then leave out the part about how much I am dreading this date, because after making it, I had a phone conversation with the guy where he talked about himself for one and a half hours straight.  I didn't say much more than an occasional "uh huh", but I did wonder a lot if I would ever get off the phone, or if daylight would come and I'd have to go to work on no sleep.  When 1.5 hours feels like an eternity, I don't think it's a good sign.  But I haven't canceled (yet) - apparently I like punishment.  Even though this guy together with the last one that came a callin' have made me wonder if there are any more normal people out there.  If not, there's always my friend at the neighborhood diner.  (Which I am not realizing I can't go back to for a long time... damnit.)  He can run - and his dental bills should be minimal.  That's a start.

 

Ok, I owe my little brother a post about what I am reading, and that's what this was going to be until I got distracted by the running and the yelling in the parking lot.  But as long as he takes his sweet time returning my phone calls, I am sure he'll understand if it takes me another day to respond to his request.  I'm a busy woman.

Happy VD!

This morning my coworker was talking about the Valentine’s events at her daughter’s elementary school. The kids pay $0.50 for every student/teacher they want to send a singing valentine to, and then the school chorus comes around today and sings to the Valentines – with an announcement beforehand such as, “This is for Mason from Amanda.” Her 3rd grader is sending 23 songs, because she wants to make sure all the kids that didn’t get one last year are covered this year – isn’t she sweet?

Anyway, this got me thinking about the Valentines practices from my own old school days. Let’s review, shall we?

In elementary school, we decorated shoe boxes and brought in our little paper valentine’s cards. I’m pretty sure I selected the largest shoebox I could find, because my well developed brain reasoned that this would mean more Valentines. It’s a little strange to me that there are kids now that don’t know this tradition – the wrapping of the shoebox in pretty paper, then pasting on hearts of various sizes and colors, and of courses cutting the little mail slot in the top. I always brought a card for everyone in the class, although I was careful in which cards were selected for the boys. Especially certain boys – the ones you wanted to make sure didn’t think that you, you know, like liked them. A card that said “Happy Valentine’s Day!” was ok, but one that said, “Will you be my Valentine?” was not. Such embarrassing messages had to be avoided. After exchanging cards and pouring out our boxes, we feasted on cupcakes, punch, and candy. Mmm.

Then there was junior high. I remember absolutely nothing about Valentine’s Day during these years. If there was any kind of tradition at school, then I must have buried it so deep into my mind that it cannot be recalled. Either that, or I never acknowledged it at all in the first place.

And then there was high school. In high school, we had the option to “buy” a carnation. We’d write a message on a tiny piece of paper that would be stapled around the carnation, and these would be delivered on V-Day during homeroom. If more than one carnation was purchased for you, you still got just one, but all the pieces of paper were stapled around it together. Therefore there were always going to be some girls showing off their voluminous amounts of paper, fanning them around and giggling loudly. If you got just one, you were relieved that you barely made the flower cut. If you got no carnation at all, you were marked as unloved. But if you were my friend Lob, who is a bold sort of gal, then you made sure this didn’t happen. One year Lob picked a guy to badger for days about buying her a flower. Not because she had any romantic intentions towards him, but I think just because he was nice and she knew she could boss him around. And what made her a great friend here was that she didn’t just demand one for herself, no, she would then point to me, standing awkwardly somewhere nearby, and say, “And you better get one for Jennifer, too!” (Which makes me wonder… why doesn’t she do this any more? Does she have better things to do with her time than lobby for flowers for me from strange men? What kind of friend has she turned out to be, anyway??)
…but back to my story… I still remember seeing her poor victim that year on V-Day. He had listened well, but when he tried to buy us carnations, had found that they were all sold out! So, on the way to school that morning, he had his mom drive him to a flower store, and he bought us real carnations. Ok, the other ones were real, too, but the ones from the shop were much larger and more healthy looking! So, there he was, panicked and sweating because he was late to school due to his flower-buying, and frantically searching for us in the hallway, so that he could deliver our flowers and not get in trouble. Way to go, Lob! Bullying is always the right answer. That’s what I says.

Well, at some point during high school I guess they got cheap on us, and switched from carnations to the old grade-school style paper Valentines. Again, we’d pay around $0.25 ahead of time, pick our cards, write in them, and seal them up with our intended’s name and homeroom number. Which brings me to my second story…
I got a bunch of cards one year! I mean, a whole lot – more than anyone else in my homeroom. Because 98% of them were multiples from two different friends (Lob, ever faithful, was one of them). They were full of inside jokes and other witty things, and some were signed with fake names, although it was obvious who they were from. Here’s the problem – my home room teacher wouldn’t give me all of my Valentines because he couldn’t believe that I could get so many!! He had handed out the three that had both my first and last name on them, but all the rest, which had only my first name, he kept for himself. Now, not only was I the only Jennifer in the homeroom, but I was also the only Jennifer in the grade. But what does he do? He has the nerve to look extremely perplexed, take them all back to his desk, spread them out and stare at them some more. Finally saying, mostly to himself, “I don’t understand… I mean, they say Jennifer…. But there are just so many…. …. I mean, I guess they could be for Jennifer (my last name)….”
About this time the bell rang and I went up to his desk while he continued to mull over this strange problem, until finally he allowed me to take the Valentines, still looking unsatisfied, and I walked off with them, a bit less light-hearted than I had been at the beginning of homeroom. Thank you, Senor M., for sharing your disbelief with both me and the rest of my class. That was a lovely Valentines treat.
Perhaps I should have explained that they were all joke cards, and his world would have made sense again.

All right, now Blay, where is that worst date story you promised? I would tell mine, but I have very important work to do here… as you can tell from the sparesness of this post.

My brain knows many limits

I came across this offer today for a blog makeover. If you think this page looks pretty shabby, then you should nominate it. Even you, person who got here by googling “what a lady looks like going to the bathroom” (and by the way, is that really such a mystery?). Because, let me tell ya, I’m not going to be making it over myself. I don’t do that. That computery stuff. Hey Andy Zulauf – remember that one computer class we took together in college? That was more tortuous to me than boot camp – and that’s saying something.

So, now that I’ve asked you to help me out of my own ignorance combined with laziness for every bettering myself in this area… I feel like I pressure to not be so lazy that I can’t write anything else… hmmm…

Have I mentioned that here at work part of my unofficial job is to write emails and make phone calls for my coworker from China? Although she speaks very good English (far and away better than my two phrases of Mandarin. Let’s face it, “I want to see you naked” and “My boyfriend plays the guitar” are not going to take me very far should I ever find myself in China) she’s a little self-conscious about it being imperfect, so she will write down a little of what she wants to say, explain it to me, and then push a pen and paper in my face and say “you write it.” Then she will study what I’ve written because she actually wants to learn – unlike with me and computers. I write work and personal emails. I call doctors’ offices and her insurance company. And I don’t really mind. The only thing is, I am not a morning person. In fact, I didn’t realize the extent of this until a roommate told me that my previous roommate had given her this message, “The only thing you need to know about living with Jennifer is that she’s not a morning person.”
I was a little surprised, and mumbled a “…wha…? Am I really grumpy?” And she said no, that she was just told not to be really loud and in my face in the morning. And yes, yes I would hate this indeed. And actually, I estimate it takes me about three hours once I get to work to actually wake up. During those three hours I may look half awake, but I am actually mostly asleep.
But my coworker is a morning person, in fact, she gets here an hour before I do, and is all warmed up with her emails and ready to go when I walk in the door. So before I even get to my desk, she has run up to me and said, “Jennifer? Can you help me?” And then she will explain a very convoluted story involving several families on vacation together, and how one family only stayed one night, and one family has twice as many kids, and one has no kids, and this one already bought all the food, and this one paid so much money to this other family, and this one spent some money on everyone else in this other way, and pretty soon my brain tunes it out and drifts to whatever it does – probably my bed at home – until I hear, “Can you write for me?” And then I have to make her explain it again, and once I finally get the story straight, and write the letter, she will pull out another piece of paper with some notes for another problem, and can’t she just see that I am trying to nap here??

So today when I came in she was working on a multi-family trip to Washington, D.C., and I actually had work that needed immediate doing. So while I was trying to hold several places in various notebooks, while making calculations, and doing a little computering as well, she approached me and laid a couple of pieces of paper down on top of my work. They contained a list of attractions she found on-line, and she was asking me about each of them, and wanted to know where else she could go, how many she could see in one day, etc. And I, as usual, was very groggy. One of the sites she had found was the Korean War Memorial. “There was war in Korea? When?” “um, 1950’s? After WWII, before Vietnam…” was my less than stellar answer. Her reply: “Vietnam?! There war in Vietnam?! What for? Why there war in Vietnam and Korea? What happened?”
Me: “um… there were wars there…. and the U.S. was involved.” The end.
I am not proud, but have I mentioned that I was already trying to sleep and work at the same time? Making sense of two wars to someone who has never heard of them was too much to ask of my brain. It might have exploded.

So, to my friend Kat, who just a few days ago said that I would make a good teacher, I’d like to know what she thinks now.

Yes, this is an exciting story from my daily life, I know. I have thought of other things to write about lately, but either they are more personal than I want to divulge, or I get distracted and forget about them. I noticed on the same site that was offering the blog makeover that last year on Valentine’s day it was encouraged for readers to share their worst date stories. I like it. Maybe I will do that this year. Or maybe someone else can? Blay?

I got the smarts real good.

According to the ole Myers-Briggs, I am a feeler and not a thinker. Which means when it really comes down to decision time, I tend to let my feelings overcome that logical voice in my brain. But when it comes to elections, I try to make a thought-out, rational decision. So the day before an election (oh yeah – I am also an incredibly strong perceiver – that category that includes “tends to procrastinate” – my perceiving level towers high above all else) – I will study all the issues and the candidates’ stance on said issues, see who I agree with most, and then tell myself this is the person who I should vote for. And then my feelings may argue, “but I think I like this other person best. Based on… uh… you know… that thing they said that time… uh – I don’t remember what it was, but they sounded nice.”
And the two sides will battle it out, but so far I’ve let my logic win.

Anyway, yesterday I voted, and this year I didn’t do quite as much studying as I had intended. So my logic voice wasn’t quite as prepared as usual – and I’m not sure that my feelings side didn’t win out. I had heard about the quizzes online where you can answer state how you feel on various issues and it will spit out the name of the candidate you most agree with, but somehow I managed not to take this quiz until the day after I had voted.

But guess what??! It gave me the name of the person I had voted for! Which I actually didn’t really expect. So my ineptitude at keeping myself well educated didn’t even matter! Yay! I am inherently brilliant – I don’t need to study – I just know!

The most interesting part was not really the result, but how much reading I had to do just to get through it. There was a lot of “refreshing” needed. Fortunately, a little synopsis was available for each item with just a click of the mouse.

So I thought that maybe someone else out there might want to try this. Maybe your state hasn’t voted yet, and it could actually help you, or maybe you will just find out that you voted for the wrong person. And maybe you are like me, and although you have work to do, you really just want to put it off for as long as possible. So hey, quiz!

Pointless Drivel

Just for the sake of posting...

 

I got up extra early and voted this morning.  (By "extra early" I mean that I kept my alarm set for the same time I always do, but I only hit snooze once instead of twice.)  And I didn't really mind that I had to get up extra early - you know why?  Because I knew that where I was voting there would be a bake sale for me to peruse.  And that meant no boring Cheerios for me, nope, I will take that cinnamon swirl cake for breakfast instead, please.  The reason I knew about the bake sale is that my poll location happened to be the Family Life Center that I belong to.  I could call it "my gym", but it doesn't really seem fitting, as all the elderly people that hang out there don't fit in with the usual image of people you see at the gym.  At my Family Life Center, a man in the weight room will typically have an assistant with him to help him stand up and sit down, not just spot him with the weights.  In fact, this weekend I had intended to go to a class, but slept through both the ones that I had been considering.  Instead, I showed up in time for the "Flex and Stretch" class, and once I saw that everyone there was at least 80 years old, I didn't go in.  Because it is one thing to show off your pilates skills amongst the 50's & 60's, but stretching with the truly elderly just didn't seem right.  My parents gave me this membership as a Christmas present - an unsolicited gym membership, I might add.  Are they trying to tell me something?  Maybe.  But instead I pretend that they were just trying to be nice.

Anyway, last weekend while I was there skipping the Stretch & Flex class, I noticed a sign that read something like this, "blah blah blah will be closed Tuesday due to blah voting blah blah blah BAKE SALE."  Now I am trying, but I don't remember what part of my FLC is closed today, apparently that part wasn't important to me.  And maybe I never remember that I put clothes in the washer an hour ago and that one day they should go in the dryer.  But for five days, my brain can remember "bake sale bake sale bake sale!" and that's what got me out of bed this morning.  Sad, isn't it?

 

It kind of reminds me of this time my friend had a pot luck breakfast at his house, and a few days later we were out and he asked me what I thought of his friend, Steve, who had been there.  (I am making up the name "Steve" because I have no idea what his name was, but I really really hope it's not Steve.)  Apparently, this Steve fellow had asked about me, and so my friend was relaying the message.  After a few moments, I had to embarrassingly admit that I had no idea who he was talking about.  So he started to describe him - and he described him in detail.  And he did sound unique!  Every bit of clothing he described sounded unusual and very noticeable - eventually I was thinking, "How does one not notice a person who is dressed like this?  ...Who I apparently talked to...  And the guy is incredibly loud, too?  hmm... no idea!"  Finally I turned to another friend down the table and asked if he remembered, and he gave this simple answer, so much more simple and yet so much more enlightening than all the details that had previously been provided, "He was the one with the cookies."  And instantly a light bulb went on and I flashed on the cookies!  Oh, those glorious cookies.  They looked gorgeous as they made their entrance.  And I was so pleasantly surprised to see them - because you can't really count on cookies at a breakfast, you know?  But as much as I tried, the most I could remember about the guy who brought them were his hands.  Because they were the only part of him that was in my line of sight as I watched the cookies enter the room and make their way to the food table.  Oh well.  Steve, I applaud your breakfast vision, at least.

 

hmmm... maybe this is why I got the gym membership for Christmas... even though I've never expressed an interest in a gym before...

 

So, did anyone else have a hair dresser approach them at a bar this weekend and tell them that their layers are "not cool"?  hmm?  She also told me that my hair needed to be about four inches longer, and a bit lighter.  Now, in all fairness to my own hair person (who happens to be much nicer than this one), it's been about 3 months since I've had a haircut, so maybe it was less "uncool" at the time of the cut.  Also, this lady's hair was not looking so good itself, but did I tell her that?   No.  Mostly because I didn't want her to insult me anymore.  Are the rest of you all talking about my hair behind my back?  How it really needs to go from a dark brown to a medium brown and what could I be thinking?  I knew it.

 

I'm going to end here with a copy and paste from an email I got today.  This is from a newsletter I get daily, with little tips and news about new stuff going on around town, or just out there in general.  Here's an excerpt:

It has come to our attention that it is no longer acceptable for your bunghole to be, well, brown. (Yeah, we said bunghole.) And South Beach Skin Solutions has developed a lightening gel that is safe for that sensitive area (no, we have not tried it).

The natural product claims to give your poopshooter "a fresher, more youthful look" by making it blend in with your natural skin tone. (Seriously?) Here's how it works: The gentle formula first exfoliates then naturally depigments and whitens the backdoor by reducing the activity of tyrosinase (an enzyme responsible for darkening) in the skin.

They claim you'll see results in just a few weeks, or else you get your money back.

Consider it your ace in the hole.

Now, I have heard of this trend in celebrity land, but I had no idea that the regular people like me were considered part of the market, too!  I have some questions here...  So, say you want to check on your results and see if you need your money back... um, how do you do that?  Do you ask someone else to check weekly for you?  Because would you really want someone analyzing that?  Do you try to check yourself?  Wouldn't that take some fancy mirror work?  And wouldn't that in itself be a lot of work?  And then say you want your money back, do you have to prove that you aren't getting results?  Or are they just banking on no one actually knowing and/or having the nerve to show them?  If anyone has this much time on their hands, I would like to suggest that it could be better used by cleaning my house.

All right, I think I've bored you enough for the day.  I have some peanut butter chocolate chip cookies to eat - those ladies at the church can cook.