scenes on the subway

Proud to be an American

2008-11-05T10:41:00.003-05:00

but not in that 'rah rah, my country right or wrong' sort of way.

i have been reflecting on this as Barack freaking Obama wins the election and suddenly we feel poised for an extraordinary moment in history. i'm reading a lot of things online where people say they are finally proud to be an American.

I've always been proud to be an American. Honestly. i have very often been very unhappy with our government, or the overwhelming fear and hatred of others i feel reflected in the media. but i believe in America- in our right to vote and choose our leaders, freedom of press, freedom to criticize our goverment and all that.

2000 was scary, but... understandable. sorta. after all, in 2000, we didn't really understand the full depth of Bush's stupidity.

2004 was terrifying, and made me despair of the country. but i was still proud to be an American. after all, at least 50% or so of us were reasonable enough to vote for Kerry. it wasn't the mandate that Bush said it was. (suck on THIS political capital, idiot.)

in the last several months, i have been afraid to hope. even as i voted for Hillary in the primaries (and STILL have a sign in my window) even as i then, slowly, but surely, became more and more enthralled with Obama's message of hope and optimism. (can't tell you where or when it happened, but it did. i am all about the hairball of hope!) even as i read articles and polls that all agreed that Obama could win this thing.

even then, i was afraid to hope. it wasn't until Obama won Ohio last night that i started to cry and said 'he's going to win'. the politics of fear did not win this time. i feared the fear and racism that might make this country pass up the opportunity to elect a transformative president.

but America came through. is the popular vote overwhelmingly Obama? no. is this the end of racism? no. but i'm feeling truly hopeful about America again.

and just to make this about the streets of philadelphia:

and since i didn't blog last week- PHILLIES RULE! SUCK IT, TAMPA.

I don't like Mondays

2008-10-21T10:01:00.002-04:00

On Monday, i missed my stop on the subway. i was putting my iPhone away, looked up and said 'huh. that was spring garden.' i got off at the next stop, and had a brief moment of panic when i couldn't cross over to the southbound side, then went up to the street and realized it was a five minute walk. which made me exactly five minutes late to work.

how many times have i taken the subway to work? and i missed it? i blame the fact that i am sick, and i was feeling discombobulated. (is that a real word? i mis-spelled it either way.) i had on layers, because it's cold outside, but i've got a fever, so i was hot, yet cold, and i can't figure out where to keep things when i'm wearing a coat- it's just that change of seasons/clothes thing where i can't remember which pocket i have my subway token in. and i have a new bag and i'm trying to figure out where everything goes.

so that's the kind of week i'm having!

one of those days

2008-09-22T11:02:00.002-04:00

it has been one of those days. monday is my late day, because i stay until 6 to cover the phones. (don't even get me started on why that is.) i don't normally take advantage of it, because i have stuff to do, but i tried to get out of bed and Carter (Sheri's cat), jumped on my chest and curled up and purred. normally, he only does this to Sheri. but she's out of town, and he is a whore, and any chest will do. so i decided to lie there and read for a bit and cuddle with the cat that doesn't usually cuddle with me.

of course, i ended up lying in bed far too long, so i had to rush to get here by 10. then i couldn't find anything to wear, and i had a debate with myself over walking to work vs. packing lunch and which is better for me- i went with packing my lunch. i know i should do both, and have been better about doing both in the last week or so, but i didn't have time for both today. did i mention i didn't have to be here until TEN? and somehow i was still sacrificing walking into work. which only takes about five or ten minutes longer than taking the subway, depending on how long i have to wait for a train.

then i got here and it's taken me an hour to read 40 emails. most of which i already read this weekend because i get email on my iPhone. i just got up to get things off the printer, and realized i already did that ten minutes ago. sigh. i think it's better when i just come in to work at my normal time, instead of being all scattered and weird.

get again, i think i get an award for most boring post ever!

new school year

2008-09-16T10:23:00.002-04:00

it's that point in the new school year where i look around and go 'i have nothing to do'. this is because now i have a reasonable amount of work to do as opposed to an insane amount of work to do, which is my workload from april until september. this is the week after the first payroll closes, and before we level, which is a school district term for looking at how many kids actually showed up as compared to our projections, and we tweak the budgets a little and move around a couple dozen teachers. next week will be levelling, and the attendant wailing and crying and nashing of teeth. then that will be over in early october and then i settle into getting ready for next april.

my life is very predictable.

to tie this to what i see on my walks to work, and still make it about the new school year, there is a charter school right next to my subway stop. as i work for the public schools, i have a chip on my shoulder about charters. i think they drain our resources. but, this one has the best principal this year. every morning, she stands outside the door and starts yelling as she sees kids walking down from the subway stop. 'ms. carter, you're late! mr. thomas, it is past 8:30 already, hurry it up!'

it seems to be working, because every day there have been fewer kids getting off the 8:30 subway. today i noticed a kid walk past the door, looking gulitily inside, as he tucked his shirt in. evidently shirts must be tucked in and he was wearing his outside his baggy pants to look cool on the subway ride.

maybe one of these days i'll actually post some pictures on this blog. i have a fabulous iPhone now, and i love to take pictures of random things. i went from having a pay-as-you-go cell phone that usually just sat on the kitchen table to not being able to have my iPhone out of sight or i get twitchy.

green?

2008-04-18T09:05:00.002-04:00

why is the fountain at Love Park green? it's been green all week, and i have no idea why. they sometimes dye the fountain different colors- all of them crazy bright- for different occasions. pink for Breast Cancer Awareness month. team colors if one of the sports teams is in the playoffs or something. but green is the Eagles, and they're not playing now. when i walked by this morning, tables were set up, and there were people scurrying around, but i didn't see any signs that would explain why the fountain is green, and these are things i need to know.

this would be a more interesting post if i had a digital camera, and therefore a picture of the bright green fountain. i need to invest in one of those. i do so often see things walking too and from work that need to be immortalized. or at least blogged about.

speaking of green, it's finally freaking spring here, and i know that is true because the fruit trucks are back. woo hoo! smoothies! there are a few fruit trucks in philly that are out year round, but most of them are seasonal, just popping up when fruit is in season and cheap. the trials of living in the northeast.

and, as usual, another terribly exciting post from me. i think i felt the need to say something because sheri is on a work trip, and i've been living alone for the last couple of days. which is fine, and i enjoy having the house to myself, but i become pretty solitary when she's not around. i don't have any close friends at work, and i don't generally see my friends much during the week, since none of them are in philly, and we're all busy with stuff. so i'm speaking into the void a bit, to see if i can hear my voice.

of course, i didn't go on the trip with sheri, which was to miami, because i should have just been starting my busiest time of year at work. note i said *should*. because i haven't recieved a single budget, and by now i should have at least half. we'll still meet the deadline of getting the last budget into our office by next week, but we'll also be getting the first budget then, too. of course, if i had gone to miami, all the budgets would have been in my office by now, and i would have been hated by my co-workers.

cuteness

2008-04-10T10:21:00.002-04:00

i have been completely unable to walk into work lately. i oversleep, or its too damn cold (yes, in April- i am really ready for spring to come and to stay- today is reasonable, but it's supposed to be cold again by the weekend) or i'm just too damn lazy.

but, today, as i was walking to the subway, i passed the house on the end of the block that has the three adorable children. i know the kids enough to say 'hi' in the morning, and i've had chats with the parents. i noticed as i was walking up that all of the doors to their van were open, and i figured they were just getting the kids into it for school.

the younger boy (i think he's 5 or 6) came out of the house and looked up at me and said 'we're packing to go to new york!'

'you are?' i said.

'we're going to new york and we're going to see the statue of liberty!' he proclaimed, so excited he was nearly vibrating. i feel for his parents on the drive.

'that's so nice,' i said. 'have a great time!'

'thanks,' he replied, going back into the house.

not only are these kids adorable, they're polite. and they get excited about things like the statue of liberty.

i feel for the parents because this weekend we went to nyc with my four-year-old niece to see 'the little mermaid'. the entire drive, and then lunch, was puncuated with 'it is time for ariel yet?' which was pretty cute.

and, yes, she had a great time, altho she did tell us that she did not like the part where ariel lost her tail. because ariel should have her tail all the time. i would like to perhaps turn that into a feminist lesson that ariel should not have given up her voice to get the guy, but... i doubt the niece cares about that. she just thought it was cool that ariel had a tail. and roller skates. that's how they do the underwater stuff on stage- everyone was in skates. sounds a little dorky, but it worked.

one more cuteness thing- or pretty, i guess. when i take the subway, i walk down a block that is houses on one side and a parking garage on the other. but one of the people on the block, i hear, has taken over the strip of ground behind the parking garage and planted the most amazing garden. i don't get to pass that block if i walk all the way to work- well, i guess i could, but it would require some rerouting. anyhow, even tho it has been a stupidly cold spring so far, every day, something else is blooming in that garden. today it was yellow tulips. dozens of them. it was very pretty.

movies

2008-03-27T09:16:00.003-04:00

my LA friends who read this will be unimpressed, but there's a movie being filmed on my old block (the south street apt, for those who remember it). yesterday i walked by and noticed a storefront with a sign that said 'straighten up, chiropractic services' (only they spelled it right). i started to think 'hey, i need a chiropractor!', then i realized it was a movie set. like, i could see all the movie stuff in the middle of the street- but they weren't filming in the middle of the street, they were filming in the store.

today i walked by and it is AMAZING how many people and cameras they have crammed into that store. i don't know how they can move. it's also pouring outside, and they've got the huge bright lights shining in to make it look sunny outside.

now, maybe my LA friends can tell me how i can find out *what* movie this might be. yes, i could ask someone from the crew, but they do not invite conversation. it's still philly.

Should I be worried?

2007-12-31T10:21:00.000-05:00

on my walk to the subway this morning, not one, but TWO black cats crossed my path.

perhaps they were trying to tell me that i should have walked into work, instead of being lazy and taking the subway.

i am a bit unlucky in that allan is here today- there are three of us in my position, and at least one of us always needs to be here. i thought he was out, so i didn't take off today. dang.

i am also unlucky in that cold air is pouring over me right now. i can feel the draft. my cubicle is in between two vents and it's always freaking freezing here. i wonder if the cafe is open late today or closes at noon for the holiday? and by late, i mean two. two! who closes a coffee shop in an office building at two? i don't want a cup of tea at 1:30. that's lunch. i want a little mid-afternoon pick-me-up at 3:30.

A totally bizarre five minutes

2007-12-18T15:17:00.000-05:00

this has been my day. wake up. feel crappy. pull covers over head and oversleep.

skip breakfast and making lunch to get ride into work with best roommate ever.

manage to be early to work, get a bagel at the little coffee shop in the building for breakfast. plan to go out to lunch since a- don't have a lunch today and b- need to get a gift certificate to the lunch place for my assistant as a christmas present.

then someone brings out leftovers from yesterday's office holiday party for lunch. i didn't feel like going out anyway.

around 3, i realize i do still need to get the gift certificate, and a hot chocolate from dunkin' donuts might be good, since i have a cold. if the little coffee shop in the building stayed open past 2 in the freaking afternoon, i might not have had these bizarre five minutes.

the rant about the coffee shop not staying open past 2 is another post.

so, i pull on my coat and brave the cold. have i mentioned that i'm sick?

i go to saladworks. it's empty. 3 in the afternoon is a good time to run errands.

of course, it's so empty that no one cares that i need to buy something. i finally get someone to wait on me and i should have realized the bizarre was in the air when the person behind me asks 'chicken tortilla soup. what is that?'

umm... chicken tortilla soup. i know i may have asked about it when i first had chicken tortilla soup. TWENTY YEARS AGO. doesn't everyone have it now?

(okay, 17 years ago. nearly exactly, even. the first time i had chicken tortilla soup was with lisa, at the hard rock in nyc. she had come to visit me at rutgers, because she got out for christmas before i did, and we went to nyc to christmas shop. i remember the chicken tortilla soup because it lives in both our memories as the best chicken tortilla soup ever, and i therefore order it nearly every time i see it on a menu, but it's never as good.)

anyhow. then i go to dunkin' donuts. also empty. there is one woman in front of me at the only open register. then i realize that she and the clerk are having an intense discussion of the difference between boston cream, vanilla cream and some other kind of cream donut.

seriously. another clerk joins in, and he tries to sway her with the manager's special. this goes on for at least three minutes. the woman trying to buy the damn donut is obviously a community college student, and she sounds like an idiot. just pick a donut, woman.

they finally settle on boston cream, and here comes some crazy. the clerk takes out a donut and breaks it in half to show her the cream. the customer says okay. the clerk throws away the donut.

keep the donut. be really nice and give the customer the donut for free. but don't throw it away and then get another fresh donut out. it just seems wasteful to me.

while this is happening at some point, the guy trying to distract the customer with the manager's special (whatever that was) , asks what i want. a large hot chocolate. he goes off to make it, but doesn't take my money. evidently the clerk on the register is the only one who can take money. fine. it's not busy.

but then the stupid customer is counting out change. and THEN she has to ask how much the cookies are. babe, i just want to pay for my hot chocolate. could you stop this meaningless freaking conversation about cookies and donut cream and go away?

in another bit of bizarre, i do not get hot chocolate at the dd often enough to know how much it costs. i see that it is 2.09, but i figure there's tax, so i don't count out any change until she says how much it is. 2.02. i had to check the sign again that it said 2.09. whatever. i gave her two pennies.

(is there tax on things like coffee and hot chocolate? there's tax at resturants, right? is there tax on prepared foods?)

i finally have my hot chocolate and i can return to the office. as i approach the building, there's a guy leaning face first towards the door. like, ten or twenty feet away, where smokers stand. not far from the door, in other words. he's got a cigarette in his mouth, and he looks out of it. we have out of it guys around here all the time, but they're basically harmless.

but he's facing the wall, which is weird. i wonder for a second if he's peeing. nah. because his hands weren't anywhere near his crotch.

as i walk by- yeah. you guessed it. peeing.

what is the world coming to?

i go into the building and consider telling the security guys about peeing guy, but the security guy at the desk is one of the really inefficent ones, and what's he gonna do? say 'don't pee here?' try to get him arrested for indecent exposure? (not that i saw anything. not that i was looking.)

i just get on the elevator and hit the button for the second floor. another guy gets on in the basement with me and gets off on the first floor. as he steps off, he almost smacks into a woman who is reading something and trying to get on. she steps back, lets him off, gets on the elevator. 'i'm going down,' she announces to me. 'is this going down?'

'no,' i say. 'it's going up.' which she would have known if she was paying attention to the little lights outside the elevator, i think to myself.

'fine,' she says, getting off. 'i'll get off and wait my turn.'

you do that.

i come back to my desk and my id is sitting there. because somewhere in my travels it fell off my pants, where i clip it to my pocket.

then, as i'm writing this, something else bizarre happened- the computer guy came to install stuff on my hard drive. stuff i've been asking for since october. if that's not weird enough, i give him the cd for the Palm software and my cd drive is busted. obviously i never use it.

when the computer guy asked if he could shut down all my programs, i had to admit that i was blogging, so i posted this half-done and hopefully editing it will put it up in its entirety. because i probably should have just closed it out, but dude. i'd done a lot of ranting!

Longest Journey to Work Ever

2007-12-07T09:27:00.001-05:00

And it only took twenty five actual minutes, and I ended up early.

Wednesday it snowed. The most annoying type of snow possible. That is, barely an inch. More than a dusting, but not enough for anyone to bother shoveling. So, it melted when it hit the pavement, then started to stick, then everything froze. This was two days ago. Yesterday some of it melted, but not all, so I had to pay attention on my walk to the subway.

Which made me consider how much I don't pay attention normally. It's not like ice is the only thing to watch out for when one is walking through Center City Philadelphia. There are curbs and uneven pavement and random things on the sidewalk and cars that don't care about stop signs or even lights and people walking around you on cell phones who aren't paying attention or people in groups who are too busy talking or kissing or whatever to pay attention and dogs on leashes who might find you interesting and probably a bunch of other things that i don't even notice.

But normally on the walk in, I'm listening to some podcast or another and then i'm at work, without really paying attention to how i got there. Ice, that one thing, just completely throws me off. this is largely because i am the clumsiest person ever, and i live in mortal fear of ice. because i screwed up my ankle in june in new york city, lord knows what could happen to me if i didn't pay attention to ice.

Then I got to the subway, and I was the only person waiting on the platform for about five minutes. Which is just weird at 8:45 in the morning. I kept checking my watch, convinced it was later than I thought it was.

This was the most boring post ever.

Seriously

2007-11-15T08:35:00.000-05:00

it's pouring today, so Sheri dropped me at the subway, and as i approach the turnstiles, this woman walks up, puts down her bag in front of the turnstiles, places her coffee carefully on top, and starts rooting through her purse for a token. she's such a mess that she is blocking both turnstiles.

i had a token in my hand, because i am a considerate and organized person, and there was a train coming. 'excuse me,' i said, and moved around her to get into the turnstile she wasn't *completely* blocking. she gave me a dirty look and rolled her eyes.

seriously? *i* was the one being rude there?

people make me crazy sometimes.

we had a nice conductor who actually told us what the next stop was, but i wanted her to say something funny. i am jealous of the witty conductors in nyc, as evidenced on one of my favorite ways to waste time at work- overheardinewyork.com

some conductor is always being witty on the loudspeakers there. but it occured to me this morning that they have so many more subways than we do, that the law of averages say that they'll have more amusing conductors.

i always feel like i'm going to be so much more witty in these posts when i'm composing them in my head on the train. then i get to a computer and i'm like 'what was i going to say?' i suppose i should save the good stuff for nano. nano was my bitch this weekend, with a 6k day on saturday, then i went to nyc and had entirely too much fun with my friends and seeing duran, and barely managed 4k over three days. and yesterday just coming back to work exhausted me and we got home late because sheri and i went to dinner with birm, who just got a boot thingie for her foot that's been bothering her for two years, and she needed to get out of the house and see people for a bit.

i suppose i should do some work or something now.

It is dark at 7 am, yo

2007-10-17T17:28:00.000-04:00

and it's taken me ten and a half hours to get a minute to write about my walk into work, because it's been that sort of day.

i came in early because Colleen and I have decided to do breakfast on Wednesdays, because we are both suffering withdrawal from spending 40 hours a week together. We thought that lunch one day a week would cut it, but we were wrong, because we have that sort of friendship where we told each other most things about our lives. not everything, but a lot, and that's a lot of random stuff to squeeze into an hour.

so i left the house at 7 am, and it was dark! so dark i didn't want to have my headphones on, because i didn't want anyone sneaking up on me. it was just me and the joggers and the dogwalkers. and the homeless guys sleeping in Rittenhouse Square. they're usually up and about their day when i walk through at 8.

i was surprised at how many things aren't open at 7 am. colleen was bringing breakfast, but i was checking out my options for when it's my turn to get breakfast. the pickings were slim. Metropolitan Bakery? opens at 7:30. Marathon Grill? 8. not that i ever normally get up that early, but things to file away if i ever need an early morning breakfast!

and then on 17th and chestnut, i passed a group of people wearing red Soverign bank t-shirts. okay. slightly random, but whatever. then i realized they were unloading Segeways from a big truck. i feel if i had been walking to work at 8 am, i would have figured out what the t-shirts and the Segeways were doing.

Ghost Town

2007-08-17T09:18:00.000-04:00

It's a freaking ghost town today. I was the only person to get on the subway at South Street. It's so hot I took the subway instead of walking. Evidently, the rest of Philly is at the shore.

I sorta like the city on days like these- those of us who are left are the warriors. The ones that go to work even when it's the dog days of August. We continue the work of the world while the lazy people take vacations and enjoy the last weeks of hot weather.

The other part of me is jealous and really wants to be sitting on a beach, instead of at my desk staring at piles of paper.

I don't have much else to say, except I just loved this article from the Inquirer today. Not that I'm a huge Rufus Wainwright fan- I do enjoy his music, but made the choice that I could not sit through an entire concert because he's a little droney in long stretches- but because it's the fan thing. This woman would be my friend.

Wait, one more thing. Someone new has moved into the cubicle across from me. I don't even know her name. A new department has moved into our area, and I don't even know who they are. But this new person is on the phone CONSTANTLY. I was here late last night and from 5 until 6, she was talking. That was annoying, but she was off the clock and just killing time. But it's 9:46 now, and she's been on personal calls for at least half an hour. If I could figure who her supervisor was, I'd rat her out. Because it's annoying as hell. I don't need to know everything about her life.

Damn Bee

2007-07-19T09:52:00.001-04:00

i was about 20 feet from work this morning when i felt a bug on my wrist. i flicked it off and realized i'd been stung at the same time that i saw the yellow and black thing fly away.

so, i go into the office and wash it off. it hurt like a bitch, and all i could think about was two things. 1- my grandmother is severly allergic and i grew up knowing that, so i have this sort of 'bees could kill grandma!' fear. 2- the last time i was stung, i was about 10 or 11 and i stepped on a bee and my foot swelled up like a basketball.

i come upstairs to colleen and say,' i need your mom opinion. should i be worried about this?' claudine comes over to tell us that her daughter got stung this weekend on her forehead and she looks like Quasimodo.

so colleen takes me down to the health services. i could have gone by myself, but when i came back up, she would have been all 'did you ask this? i'm calling them.'

of course, everyone we know in health services is on vacation. they have no benadryl, but they do have ice. in the form of a rubber glove filled with water and frozen. it looks sorta kinky.

colleen and i come back up to the office and now two more people get involved, and no one has benadryl.

i finally get everyone to leave me be and i find a claritin and answer email one-handed while i rest my left hand on the ice. (thank god it's my left hand!)

it's better already. i think i'll live.

love this town

2007-07-06T09:16:00.001-04:00

which i say a lot in this thing. but today, as i passed Love Park, there was a little Asian girl dressed in her Betsy Ross bonnet and hat, posing under the Love statue, with the Art Museum in the background. it was freaking adorable.

then a couple of blocks later was the homeless guy sleeping on the corner of Vine and 15th. that's city life, as Lilly Allen would say.

and then on the cover of the Metro this morning: http://philly.metro.us/metro/local/article/A_battle_of_wits/9268.html

gotta love philly.

Pineapple

2007-06-01T08:53:00.000-04:00

i've been on a pineapple kick lately. one of the great things about the city in the summer is that every few blocks there's a cart selling fruit, and they're all pretty much cheap and yummy. my theory is that they buy cheap fruit that is a day or so from going bad, so it's super sweet. So, the last two days, i've gotten pineapple. the problem is that pineapple makes my mouth itch. today i had all pineapple and a couple of strawberries. i wonder if i'll go into anaplathic shock or something. yeah, i spelled that wrong.

i'd like to note here that i just noticed that there's a spellcheck on blogger, but all it did was highlight what i spelled wrong. if i knew how to spell it, then i wouldn't have spelled it wrong. dumbass spellcheck.

i'm posting because catty just sent me an invite to her now private blog, so i spent 15 or 20 minutes catching up on her recent posts and eating my pineapple, so now i'm thinking in blog thought, and the pile of work on my desk won't respond well to blog thought. so i'll ramble for a second and then hopefully be able to work. last night at 5:15 my brain shut off. it was like a switch. i was unable to process a fairly simple transaction, so i stopped working. i am hopeful that the switch is back on, because i have a ridiculous amount of things to do, and i need my problem solving skills.

Random things

2007-03-15T15:45:00.000-04:00

just because I have nothing to do at the moment at work. NOTHING. it's very weird. Monday and Tuesday i was searching for stuff to do. Wednesday I took a sick day. I wasn't feeling well, but it was the sort of thing that if i'd had work to do, i would have just sucked it up and come in.

so i spent the day looking at agent listings. i at least have a few possibilities on a list now. so i've done *something*. i need to look at all of the requirements together and decide if i should just start sending out queries and worry about editing the thing later, or edit it to have it ready if they'll want the manuscript. (hope springs eternal) i'm patting myself on the back for at least starting something.

to completely change the subject, i do have *something* to do, which is testing out a new system we're using. but i can't decide if i'm not using it correctly- because it's brand new and there's no documentation, not that i believe in reading documentation anyway- or if its a mess. i'll try again tomorrow when i'm not in that end of the day tired.

altho i should take wednesdays off more often. i find as i go through the week my debt of sleep catches up with me. mondays, i'm good. tuesdays, starting to drag, until fridays i'm in bed by 9. but it's thursday and i'm perky. i'm meeting a friend for dinner tonight and i've already cancelled two thursdays with her just because i'm so beat by thursday i can't be social. like, two weeks ago on thursday i was convinced i was getting sick and i cancelled on her. got a decent night's sleep and i was fine.

i realize that all of this means i should just get to bed earlier, but that's easier said than done. even though most nights all i do is sit there and watch tv, and you would think that would be like sleeping, not running around, but... i'm still always tired. sheri slept for about 90 minutes on the couch last night. i had to wake her up for american idol. i would have told her to just go to bed before that, but i knew she wanted to see american idol. (dude, sanjaya is still on that show? what is up with that? i rather liked brandon, altho, admittedly, he sucked hard on tuesday)

most of the time i'm tired and listless and i think maybe i'm just bored. as much as i enjoy sitting around and watching tv, it does get tiresome night after night. i should turn off the tv by 8 or 9 and spend a couple of hours writing.

i *should* do lots of things.

half-marathon

2007-03-07T16:24:00.000-05:00

a marathon. well, a half of one. really.

this was brought about because beth and todd did the disney half-marathon to celebrate the fact that she was a year cancer-free. as marie and sheri and i were watching people cross the finish line, we all decided we could do that. i was watching people and saying 'she's like 80. we can do this. he's like 70. we can do this. okay, that guy has ONE LEG. we can do this!'

beth managed to finish without ever really training. okay, by the end she was begging for the van to come along and scoop her up, but she made it.

i think she's a little annoyed that now we're into it. i think she was hoping to never cover 13 miles on foot again.

anyhow, weight watchers just posted a plan to get you to 13 miles by the end of the year. since the disney marathon is in january, that works out pretty well. colleen and i are doing laps at work. we're not really sure how far each of our laps is, but we're going with 300 steps and 2000 steps is a mile. heck, its better than sitting at my desk all day, right?

Big Scary Fun Thing

2007-02-28T16:34:00.000-05:00

I was listening to the NaNo podcast on my walk into work this morning. I love that they're doing the podcast year round. It's very inspiring. They're doing this push to do a Big Scary Fun thing in 2007, and of course, everyone is picking getting published. Which only makes sense. But hearing them talk about it pushes me a little more to try.

Because I've never really tried. I look at publishers, or think about cover letters, and I just shut down and run away. Because it's way too scary. I think I could even handle the rejection- well, obviously I'm scared of something, or I would have done it by now. But I could handle some rejection letters.

It might be that if I start submitting to agents, eventually I will have submitted to every agent that might possibly be interested in our stories, and what if they ALL reject us? If I start, then eventually there must be a end, and what if that end is bad? It's far easier to just hope that an agent will drop out of the sky and say 'a book about a teen movie star going to college in Philly! Just what I wanted!'

I know all of this is stupid, but there it is.

And I hate doing things I don't understand. I'm not afraid of new things, as long as I understand them. I feel like there are too many rules to submitting to agents and publishers, and if you break a rule, then you're screwed. And everything you read contradicts the last thing you read, so I have no idea what the rules are.

Maybe I just need to make up the rules as I see them and forge ahead. I know I need to make a list and start checking things off. Breaking things down into steps is my preferred method for anything.

My other immediate problem is that I'm completely uninspired by the book that has a shot at being published. I'd much rather work on my fan fic, which will never be published, but I love.

Maybe let myself write some fan fic as a reward for moving through some of my other steps.

So, next steps:

1. Make a list of steps towards publication. Do not allow myself to get scared off by the thought of editing our unweidley manuscript. Work on cover letters and research agents. Those are more manageable.
2. Write some fan fic, because it makes me happy.
3. Make a list of steps for editing. The book is too big, and I don't know where to start.

In another post, I'll talk about my other big scary fun goal of doing a half-marathon next January.

And I need to blog more. I know no one is reading, but writing this stuff down helps me organize my thoughts.

Mrs. Claus

2006-12-22T09:44:00.000-05:00

Mrs. Claus was on the subway with me this morning. (yes, i took the subway. i had presents to drag in!)

It's not like she was dressed like Mrs. Claus. She was dressed like she was going to work. She just looked like Mrs. Claus, down to the cute wire framed glasses.

And she was carrying one of those green and gold Gap bags, which was just way too hip for her. The Clauses should not shop at the Gap. They should make toys whittled from fallen twigs, so as not to disturb the ecosystem.

Then I had to muse on the fact that I make toffee and peanut brittle every year, from scratch, from my stepmother's recipes, and I avoid the Gap whenever possible. (although Old Navy is okay somehow) In true urban hipster fashion (::snort::), I package it in something interesting- this year was Chinese food containers that Sheri and I got in Miami at some Chinese superstore.

I love Chinatowns wherever I travel. Little Tokoyo in LA was not all it was cracked up to be, but still enjoyable. And it occurs to me that I almost never shop in Philadelphia's Chinatown. I will go there for dinner, but to shop? No. What's up with that? It's a pretty cool Chinatown. I don't need to go to New York for Chinatown. (while there is a store in New York's Chinatown that has bizarre Japanese notebooks and things that I've never seen anywhere else)

From Mrs. Claus to Chinatown. It's that sort of day. I wore jeans to work. I *never* do that.

weird....

2006-12-15T13:14:00.000-05:00

What American accent do you have? Your Result: Philadelphia Your accent is as Philadelphian as a cheesesteak! If you're not from Philadelphia, then you're from someplace near there like south Jersey, Baltimore, or Wilmington. if you've ever journeyed to some far off place where people don't know that Philly has an accent, someone may have thought you talked a little weird even though they didn't have a clue what accent it was they heard.
The Midland
The South
The Inland North
The Northeast
Boston
The West
North Central
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

change of venue

2006-11-21T12:32:00.000-05:00

last time i posted, i was at home, at my kitchen (or not) table.

now i'm in a house high in the hollywood hills, where every wall on the view side is glass, so that i'm constantly inspired by the twinkling lights (at night) or the hills and houses (right now).

okay, my hostess is telling me that we're actually in sherman oaks, but WHATEVER. its still freaking cool. it is far enough away from actual la that sheri and i have decided not to go to the american music awards tonight, just because we'd have to deal with the traffic.

i don't know how angelenos deal with the traffic. the 405 was backed up yesterday at 3 in the freaking afternoon.

(you can tell i am in word count mode because i almost wrote that as- the four oh five was backed up yesterday at three in the freaking afternoon)

my friend just pointed out that the mountains have disappeared, and she is correct. damn smog.

anyhow. i can't help but write lots of la scenes for the nano now, not that it needs it. we wrote a lot of la scenes last year, when all i was going on was internet research. now i'm writing lots of musings on traffic and lights and how everyone is freaking skinny.

in between sitting at my kitchen table and sitting here in the hills, i sat in a hotel room in anaheim. (or poolside- much better option, even with lots of kids around) hotel rooms are the best places to write, no matter where they are. there are no distractions, except maybe bad tv.

this is a terribly scattered post, probably because i'm feeling pretty scattered. i've been up for a while, but haven't written anything. i did some laundry, checked work email, checked home email, talked to my friends... i should write. i only did about 1000 words last night, then my brain shut off.

i'm feeling like the book sucks and makes no sense right now, which is just par for the course, i know. i think i'm pressured by the my current view. i was so excited to get here and be part of this great writing circle, since everyone currently in the house is nano-ing, but now that i'm here i feel like i should be writing great works, not just random scenes to move the plot along.

this is why i blog, to figure out why i'm not writing. i don't know that when i sit down to blog, but it always seems to happen.

that said, we're about to go out and grocery shop and find a curves. yes, i'm doing curves in la. i'm surprised there are curves out here, as they are marketed towards your average woman, and there are no average women here. they're all ridiculously skinny. maybe the curves exist just for the tourists.

comments?

2006-11-13T10:20:00.000-05:00

people are actually reading this thing? there is something to be said that when people read, i feel more compelled to post. ;->

in response to my comments:

on the tarot card- basically the ace of swords means a big change and victory, but at the loss of old ways of thinking and being. which fits pretty damn well with my story, as its about a movie star who leaves hollywood to go to college in philadelphia. the card is taped in the back of my writing notebook now.

on the last post about how LAME i am with nano this year- i remain lame. i have been on vacation for two days now and only managed about 2 k. okay, 2500, i just checked. cat, i am horrible at the process of writing every day this year. life has really kicked me in the ass this month. but, i'm on vacation for two whole weeks now- minus this weekend where i did NOTHING- and i hope that will help. part of my vacation is running around la with friends, but that's sorta research. the rest of my vacation is coveted alone time, like today, where i am sitting here at my kitchen table (i call it that, but it is not in the kitchen or even near the kitchen, and it is rarely used to eat on, but because its near the door, it just collects crap. anyhow.) (dude, i need to take this parethecial stuff to the the novel, that would so help my dismal word count)

anyhow. i've lost my train of thought. i am sitting here at the table (no modifier), waiting for the exterminator (we live in the city, and i'd rather pay for someone to check our house for pests once a month than deal with something moving in- and i saw a mouse a couple of weeks ago. useless cats.) and then delivery of a new washer. (thank god, i will be able to wash sheets again!) so, i could either be watching bad daytime tv, or i could write. obviously, i have chosen to write a blog post instead of the novel, but... whatever. its something! am i allowed to count this towards my word count? no? damn.

to both tricia and cat (cat, meet tricia, tricia, meet cat) (you are friends from very different parts of my life- tricia i've known since high school and cat is the only friend i still have from my blur obsessed days): keep writing and the good stuff will happen. cat, if you don't know where to take your story, your characters do. i know that sounds all new agey and zen, but i swear it is true and it is one of the coolest things in the world.

and i know this is my problem with nano this year, because i know where the story has to go, and my characters are like 'yeah, okay, i'll do that. you don't want to hear my opinion on the matter, so why should i bother?' damn characters.

i should probably write something now!

monday

2006-11-06T09:42:00.000-05:00

at least i've started nano now. sheri's editing what we did last year, which is great, and i'm attempting to write new stuff, but not coming up with much. it all feels trite.

i know, i'm supposed to just write and not edit, but i'm having problems with that this year. then again, i just started writing yesterday, so i should probably stop beating myself up. i'm at just about 4k, which is off the mark of 1667 a day, but according to the handy dandy spreadsheet i created last year (of course, this year, the nano site has a similar progress chart and a million other things), i can still finish if i write 2k a day for the rest of the month. which is doable. i don't have a problem doing 2k if i can get my butt in the chair. it's getting my butt in the chair that's the problem.

i'm feeling very scattered this morning. i think i'm still in nano mode, and not work mode. i need the switch to click over that makes me efficent at all things, which has happened in past nanos. then again, after this week, i'm on vacation for two weeks, so maybe if i just drag myself through this week and concentrate on work, i can crank out a couple of 6k days while i'm off.

the efficent switch probably comes when i'm happy with what i'm nano-ing, now that i consider it. since i'm not happy with it, its dragging me down in all things.

;-P

Chris Baty rules

2006-11-02T14:05:00.000-05:00

so, my nano word count is zero. zippo. nada. okay, i considered using the opening scene i'd written last year as my first 1500 words, but that makes me feel dirty.

i think part of my problem was that i just started reading 'no plot no problem' this morning. i've read it every year i've done nano (this is my third) and its such a freaking awesome book, by page 50 (where i am- i read all of that in the exam room at my doctor's, waiting for him to see me for a ten minute (maybe) consulation. good thing he's cute), i was all fired up.

actually, in 50 pages, i went from 'love my novel' to 'chris says i have to do something new, and he's got good reasons why' to contemplating other plot ideas, coming up empty and back to 'love my current novel, its got plenty of room for revision, i can do 50k NEW words'.

sheri and i (sheri's my co-writer, and that's against the nano 'rules', too, so i'm breaking rules all over the place) were talking last night and i was remembering all the stuff i LOVE about this novel. i love ani, and i adore her relationship with her brother, which a big part of the book. i love her love interest who develops later (that was a plot development that slapped us across the face around week three last year- poor rob. he'd been waiting since nano novel #1 to be appreciated). i love the dad subplot- or maybe its the main plot (bad that i'm not sure about that, huh?). i love the mom angst.

over the last 24 hours, i'm thinking that maybe i'll love the new stuff, too. ani gets three roommates, and i don't know any of them yet. we don't even know their names! there's a boyfriend that needs to be kicked up several notches from last year, and while i never call myself a romance writer, i SO AM. there's another guy who's telling me his name is mark, so i need to figure him out.

there's stuff to do here, right? i'm not shooting myself in the foot with this rewrite thing.

we'll see if we have a word count tomorrow. because friday i'm out of town, and that's not condusive to the novelling. while i'm off for two weeks this month, i can't just say 'oh, i'll write later'. gotta start now.

November 1st

2006-11-01T11:11:00.000-05:00

its november 1st, and i don't even remember the last time i posted. let me put it this way- i never take the subway to work. i'm trying to be good and walk most days.

anyway, i feel the need to write because it's November 1st, and November means National Novel Writing Month, and i'm just not feeling it. the last two years, i could not wait to get started. this year, i'm like 'and what's my plot again?'

my plot is to rewrite last year's as a young adult novel, and that is an admirable goal. doing that requires killing off two major characters from last year's draft, and therefore adding a few new ones. so it'll take at least 50k words.

i think i'm not feeling it because i know the main characters already. i love them, and want to play with them again, but in the past two years, everything was new, and i had no idea what was going to happen. i'm pretty sure what's going to happen this year. last year, i had the final scene in my head as i started the month, then sheri came in with a plot change that ruined my planned last scene, but made the book much better. so there was that element of uncertainity that i like when i write. i love just letting my characters lead me.

i feel like i'm going to be leading them this year.

huh. the things i come up with as i write.

SEE? i like finding out things as i write. which means i should just start writing and let my characters talk to me again. maybe they'll suprise me. i have these three and a half characters that might have something new to say, after all.

my other problem is that i can't get my head out of my other fictional world. i felt a great need to finish a chapter of that world before november, and after spending months wanting those characters to talk to me, i finally got them to in october. now they won't shut up. walking into work today, i was considering a new character for my nano novel and my thoughts ended up writing a scene between characters in my other opus. they need to shut up now- but i'm afraid they won't talk again if i shut them up.

sigh. and mercury's in retrograde. that can't be helping. was mercury in retrograde last november? mercury is supposed to mean change and creativity, as well as all the screwed up things that happen.

speaking of weird things, i found a tarot card on the street on monday. ace of swords, randomly blown into a planter, on a street i don't normally walk down. ace of swords means major change and victory. a double-edged sword because victory means sacrifice.

that actually really fits with the theme of my nano novel, so even tho i have considered trying to come up with something completely new, the tarot card is encouraging me to keep it.

because if you pick up a random tarot card off the street, that has to mean something, right?

yeah, it's been a while

2006-06-06T09:44:00.000-04:00

you thought i forgot all about this blog, didn't you? (i say this like anyone is reading it)

about five blocks away from work, this woman appeared from one of the parking lots. she was wearing a nice grey suit, cute shoes, and she looked pretty put together. but she had a big red leather tote bag over one arm, and a laptop case on the other. a cup of coffee in one hand, which she couldn't drink without disrupting the balance of the bags. and a cell phone glued to her ear. she could have at least waited to have the coffee until she got to work, couldn't she?

speaking of cell phones, last night i was at dinner with friends, and across from us was a couple on a date. or maybe just going out to dinner. whatever. regardless, she was on her cell phone for the entire time that we were there. if i was the guy, i would have left.

this is like when sheri and i were in miami, and near a table of four women, ALL of whom were on the phone during the entire dinner. dude, you're out to dinner with three of your friends. who else is so important that you have to be on the phone the whole time?

i could go on about cell phones for a while. i'll stop now.

i haven't written anything that wasn't email or for work for more than a month now. maybe i thought of this blog because i'm feeling the need to put words down just for me. even though i haven't written for a while, i can feel the words lurking around in my head. just... there. not even in scenes. just random ideas and sentences and snippets of conversations. they'll become scenes someday soon, i hope. i've been spending some time reading old work, hoping that these random ideas will gel into something when i remember who the heck my characters are.

Christmastime in the city

2005-12-22T15:51:00.000-05:00

which means i need to bring presents into the office. everyone in my office wanted gift cards. all from different places, which nessicitated running all over creation for them, but that's another story.

so, while everyone wants gift cards, and i got everyone the gift card they wanted, i still have to bring in gifts. it goes against everything in me to just give a gift card. i blame my mother for this. my mom gives great gifts, and lots of them. while she likes that i give her a list of requests, if she doesn't find the requests interesting enough, i get other stuff. something always has to be a surprise, otherwise, what's the fun?

my father sends me a check every year, and has since i was in high school. so, as the only child of divorced parents, i get money *and* presents and the best of both worlds. don't let anyone tell you that divorce or being an only wrecks a kid for life. i'm doing ok. ;->

(well, okay, there's the problem that now that dad's in florida, he really wants me to visit for the holidays, but christmas morning has been mom's my entire life, so... there are some guilt issues. but doesn't everyone have some form of guilt issue at the holidays? isn't someone always getting left out?)

anyhow, i am my mother's daughter, and so today i had my biggest tote bag full of crap. heavy crap. luckily, no one was on the subway with me, because evidently the rest of the city is off. i share my subway stop with the community college, and they're definately on christmas break, because there are no teenagers being loud and pushy in the station.

i was about to close with 'happy holidays,' but i just have to say a word or two about the american 'debate' over 'happy holidays' vs. 'merry christmas'. i've been using 'happy holidays' for years. know why? because there are more holidays than christmas in december. its polite. its being considerate of other people's beliefs. its nice.

am i insulted if someone says 'merry christmas' to me? or 'happy hanukah'? or whatever? no. why should i be? i further don't understand why any sane person should be offended by 'happy holidays'. what's the big freaking deal, bill o'freaking reilly? christmas, holidays, can't we all just be nice to each other?

so, happy freaking holidays.

;->

I have noticed

2005-12-15T16:49:00.000-05:00

this weird divide on the subway. this for some reason applies more to going home than coming in, altho it seems like it should be the same both ways.

City Hall is the stop where just about every line that could come into Philadelphia does. I've noticed going home that when I get on the train, there's a wide variety of people there. Then everyone in a suit gets off at City Hall, presumedly to get on the trains that take them to the 'burbs. Then continuing south its the rest of us working stiffs. Not nearly as many suits.

I'm not sure why it doesn't look the same in the morning. Maybe all the suits go to work earlier than I do.

I'm only posting because I don't want to deal with the snow that I hear is happening. I am not a fan of slippery streets.

it's freaking cold

2005-12-13T09:35:00.000-05:00

I have made a decision that if it is less than 20 degrees when I leave in the morning, I can take the subway. It means I don't get as much excercise, but it does give me the opportunity to observe my fellow Philadelphians. Since my iPod is currently out of commission (I think my cat ate through the earbud wires, and I haven't had a chance to get new ones), I have to stare at people to pass the time on the subway ride.

Today I saw a kid- maybe 16 or 17- chewing on a coffee stirrer. He had another one tucked in his hat. Reserve, maybe? Gum isn't good enough?

This reminded me of one of my favorite Nick Carter moments. During the press blitz for Black and Blue, Backstreet did one of those things where they sit in a room and reporters come in and interview them. I've got about 15 versions of this interview from different sources, where the boys are all wearing the same thing and looking increasingly more bored.

During all of them, Nick in chewing on a straw. Evidently he has an oral fixation. In one of the later interviews, Nick is sitting back in his chair, not answering questions, probably not even listening. At one point, he takes the straw out of his mouth, considers it intently, then decides there is more chewing to be done there and resumes chewing. Did he not realize he was on camera, or did he just not care?

hey, i actually agree with this one!

2005-12-09T16:51:00.000-05:00

Your 2005 Song Is

Since You've Been Gone by Kelly Clarkson

"But since you've been gone
I can breathe for the first time
I'm so moving on"

In 2005, you moved on.

What Hit Song of 2005 Are You?

snow day

2005-12-09T09:28:00.000-05:00

on the subway, getting on at south street, my stop: woman in a black coat, high black super cool boots, with red and black plaid tights, which were much groovier than that sounds. red scarf, green striped gloves, and an Andy Warhol soup can messenger bag, which was freaking awesome. best of all- she was at least 40. this contrasts with my outfit yesterday which was so frumpy i decided i looked like a grown-up. not that i usually look like a teeny bopper, but i usually just look like me. yesterday i looked old and frumpy. remind me not to wear that outfit again.

i was actually on the subway today because its a snowy sleeting mess out there. schools are closed, but admin offices are open. i find it incredibly unfair that sheri gets a snow day when the schools are closed, but i work for the schools and i have to come in. however, she was a very good friend this morning and made waffles on our new Hello Kitty waffle iron, which was a great $15 investment.

I have to apologize

2005-11-22T09:24:00.000-05:00

to myself, for making an iPod mix that contained Britney Spears' 'Overprotected', and then taking a route into work that made that the last song I heard. It will now be stuck in my head all freaking day.

It fits the novel, and I've decided one of the reasons I'm so far behind (only 27k!) is because I don't have a soundtrack. Every novel needs a soundtrack.

The problem is that the soundtrack I've created contains both 'Overprotected' and Linday Lohan's 'Confessions of a Broken Heart,' which makes me think that perhaps the novel is a bit overwrought and shallow.

Does including Click 5's 'Pop Princess' redeem me in any way? Yeah. Didn't think so.

not about subways at all

2005-11-05T18:53:00.000-05:00

i just uploaded my first excerpt to NaNoWriMo, and the 'author pages' link from my profile formats the excerpt like REAL BOOK. EEEEE!!!!

http://www.nanowrimo.org/userbook.php?uid=61256

okay, to make this about journeys in philly, i wrote a few pages while sitting in rittenhouse square this afternoon, because it is a lovely day and ani had something to say. then i came home and wrote a 2k scene set in the place where i had lunch.

writing to change the world

2005-11-04T09:27:00.000-05:00

today on my walk into work (see, i always try to tie these posts to journey-ing through the city, even if the transit strike has made the 'subway' part moot. ::kicks septa::), i listened to the Nanowrimo Radio podcast (which i finally got to download after three days of trying. of course, if you go to iTunes and type in 'nanowrimo', you get the darn podcast, just begging to be downloaded. its been a bad week.)

anyhow (i'm in a parenthetical mood today, evidently), the theme of this week's podcast is 'infinite possibilities,' and they did a few pieces on NaNo in the classroom. The woman talking about teaching NaNo to 7th graders totally made me cry. these kids went from thinking this was the most insane project in the world to becoming writers. they learned about dialogue, plotting and how to use commas. they learned how to read and look at the craft, more than just words on the page. they become novelists.

kick ass.

;->

15th and vine

2005-11-03T09:17:00.000-05:00

how do i rat out the cop on the north corner of 15th and vine? the cops on the south side worked together to get traffic moving and allow us pedestrians to cross. the guy on the north corner just stands there and watches. seriously. i need to tell on this guy.

i discovered today that the iPod makes the commute much more tolerable. i hadn't been using it for fear of insane commuters mowing me down, but i'd much rather listen to ... well, anything, than deal with the constant honking.

i passed by love park on my walk in and evidently there is free internet access there. it might be worth it to bring the laptop just to see.

cops

2005-11-01T09:23:00.000-05:00

due to the transportation strike, today the powers that be decided that cops need to be directing traffic. this would be okay if the cops were trained to be consistent. on my way in, the first cop i saw could have cared less. the second one very nicely made sure i was able to cross the street without getting killed.

at vine, which is a horrible intersection on a good day, the cops basically tried to get pedestrians killed. hey! i'm doing the RIGHT THING here! we should all be walking! take regional rail into one of the major stations and then walk, people!

oh, the septa strike is fun.

no subway

2005-10-31T09:21:00.000-05:00

well, the title for this blog is moot at the moment, since SEPTA is on strike, and there is no subway to be riding. the city is freaking out. there are about twice as many cars on the road as normal. sheri attempted to give me a ride to work, but we gave up because traffic was too heavy to get anywhere, so i walked from her office. did manage to make it to work relatively on time.

perhaps this will give me the push i need to get some excercise and get out of bed at a more reasonable hour. the last SEPTA strike lasted 40 days. great.

protesting (or not) in philly

2005-10-28T16:29:00.000-04:00

the other day, i got off the subway at city hall. for those who don't know, under city hall is a huge pedestrian concourse, that links both subways (we only have two), the trolley lines, suburban station and ... a bunch of other train related things. i always get lost under there when i try to be clever, so i just went up, knowing that once i was above ground, i could figure out where the heck i was.

i came up right at city hall, and the first thing i saw was a woman being interviewed by one of the local news stations. the iPod was pretty loud, and i didn't think much of it, then i turned around and realized i was in the middle of an anti-war demonstration.

i flicked off the iPod, but it was the quietest demonstration i'd ever heard. people just stood there with banner against the war, marking 2000 dead, that sort of thing. it was very un-Philly, really. no one tried to talk to me, or hand me a leaflet, or anything. and i'm against the war! i would have rallied with my peeps. or at least taken a flyer without getting agitated.

evidently, the anti-war people could tell that i was about to be a bad liberal. that night, i got three phone calls. the first was from NARAL, who asked if i support a woman's right to chose. if i didn't support a woman's right to chose, would i be on your freaking list? about an hour later, the democrats called. i'm about to vote for nader if the freaking democrats don't stop calling. i don't know who the last one was, because i said 'is this another political phone call? i don't give money over the phone, and i'm hanging up.'

the freaking phone calls aren't making me contribute! they're just pissing me off. is it a sign of age that i get things from NARAL now and i think 'oh, chill. if they strike down roe, there will be an injunction in about 30 seconds. just calm down and we'll get through this.' not that i don't think its an important issue, i'm just tired of all the drama.

like, miers withdrew her nomination yesterday, and i got some emails from liberal groups saying that bush shouldn't have bowed to the radical right. well, yeah, but we didn't want her either! its not like now is the time to say she was a great nominee. she was a crappy nominee, and the next one will be worse and our president just sucks. i don't have the energy to be angry about it all the time. i contribute to causes i believe in (just not over the phone), and i vote, and i count down the days until bush is out of office.

and that turned into an unintended rant.

she's unbelievable

2005-10-25T11:28:00.000-04:00

anne rice continues to amaze me. like it wasn't bad enough that she decided she didn't need editing a couple of years ago- now we've found out why. i stole this from cat's blog.

Rice Plans to Follow First Her First-Person Narrative of a Young Jesus With Further Chronicles of Christ's Life; 'I Promised That From Now On I Would Write Only For the Lord' says Author

NEW YORK, Oct. 23 /PRNewswire/ -- Anne Rice's newest book may not necessarily appeal to her longtime fans, she tells Senior Writer David Gates in the October 31 issue of Newsweek (on newsstands Monday, October 24). "For the last six months," she says, "people have been sending e-mails saying, 'What are you doing next?' And I've told them, 'You may not want what I'm doing next." We'll know soon. In two weeks, Anne Rice, the chronicler of vampires, witches and -- under the pseudonym A.N. Roquelaure -- of softcore S&M encounters, will publish "Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt," a novel about the 7-year-old Jesus, narrated by Christ himself. "I promised," she says, "that from now on I would write only for the Lord."
Rice knows "Out of Egypt" and its projected sequels -- three, she thinks - - could alienate her following; as she writes in the afterword, "I was ready to do violence to my career." But she sees a continuity with her old books, whose compulsive, conscience-stricken evildoers reflect her long spiritual unease. "I mean, I was in despair." In that afterword, she calls Christ "the ultimate supernatural hero... the ultimate immortal of them all."

it's official

2005-10-25T10:19:00.000-04:00

Click 5 rocks. How can you not love a band that sings:

"The price is right
And I'm Bob Barker..."

These are things I hear when the iPod is on shuffle. Although Cat is right, and it doesn't really shuffle. Today I got selections from B-F, with no D's. What is up with that? I think that the pink iPod might just hate Duran, but she sure likes album tracks from Backstreet.

gloves

2005-10-21T09:30:00.000-04:00

alright, its chilly today. and raining. but i don't think it's glove weather yet. the woman next to me on the subway today was wearing boots and gloves. she should have been sitting next to flip-flop girl from yesterday.

i don't get flip-flops in general. i hate that thing between my toes. so, when it is weather for sandals, i have a bitch of a time finding anything, since all sandals must now be flip-flops. and there are lots of cute flip-flops out there, i just hate the style.

i can't seem to stop talking about flip-flops.

flip-flops

2005-10-20T20:08:00.000-04:00

when is the time for flip-flops over? i sat next to a woman on the subway today who was wearing a coat, sweatpants, and flip-flops. its october in philadelphia, woman. it was about 50 degrees when i left this morning. put on some freaking shoes.

i then discovered when i got to work that i had neglected to bring socks, and was therefore stuck wearing sneakers all day with an otherwise nice outfit. karma is a bitch.

NaNo

2005-10-07T15:38:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I got an invite to join NaNoWriMo again. Since writing a novel in a month was an exhilarating experience last year, and I have an idea this year, I signed right up. Then I spent a couple of hours on the forums, and discovered there's a sophomore slump. am i doomed? i was basically doing a re-write of a longer work last year, was that too much like cheating? Heck.

and the darn thing doesn't even start for another three weeks.

i love this town

2005-10-06T12:21:00.000-04:00

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/traveler/features/philly0510/philly3.html

two days later

2005-10-06T12:09:00.000-04:00

i'm off for two days- the whole freaking place was closed, because we like rosh hashana around here- and i come in this morning to 70 emails and that freaking red voicemail light on my phone. sigh.

its all bush's fault

2005-10-03T12:21:00.000-04:00

it's all bush's fault that i was late to work today. if i hadn't gotten so sucked into his speech about his nominee for the supreme court, i would have left on time. its not because it was a good speech. it was just because i wanted to know who the heck this lady was. as i told sheri, he nominated the white house general council. ie- oliver platt. everything i know about the government, i learned from west wing. i am applying these lessons to commander in chief. yes, i love the shows about the white house, while loathing all crime and law shows. i guess i'm a political groupie on some bizarre level.

so, i was about ten minutes late, because i decided to walk down to the farther subway stop in an effort to get some excercise. i'm too stupid in the morning to realize that if i left late, walking to the next subway stop wasn't the smartest decision i could have made.

the extra time did allow me to realize that all the rock star: inxs stuff i put in my latest playlist is recorded at about half the volume of normal songs, so when 'wordplay' came on after 'trees,' i thought i was going to blow my eardrums out. i blame freaking msn and not allowing me to download the actual tracks because i'm on a mac. this is mac-ism, people. i only got the tracks for free because i had no choice. i would have happily paid for the darn songs.

why is that that every freaking morning i walk in to a message on my voicemail? i was only ten minutes late, people. who needs to call me at 8 am? shouldn't everyone in this office be home watching the today show and eating breakfast like i am at 8 am?

You never know

2005-09-30T12:18:00.000-04:00

Subway scene: Young guy, maybe 18 or so, artist. Glossy black hair, needed a cut. Blue eyes. Wearing a brown sweater that was way too big for him. Had one of those huge sketch pads leaning against his knee, and an open notebook. He was drawing one of the people sitting across from him. I'm not sure if she noticed. I took a seat, and the guy next to him leaned over and made a joke. Both guys got off at Market. I wonder where the artist was going? Maybe the Art Institute.

I was listening to John Mayer on my pink IPod mini, and I felt surrounded by art on the Broad Street line. I might need to put the artist into the novel that is in the back of my head, wanting attention. Artist boy probably saw me in my pink coat and sensible sneakers and too-long pin-striped pants (gotta get these hemmed) and thought I was a boring businesswoman. He probably didn't even see me. But I was watching him, reflecting on art. It just goes to show, you never know about a person's life.

It's like the first time I went to lunch with Beth after she started chemo. We'd known about the cancer for about two weeks by that point, and Sheri and Becky and Beth and I went to Friday's and had lunch and I know we looked completely normal. Four friends out for lunch on a Saturday. But it didn't feel normal. It felt like the world might come crashing down any moment.

Now, of course, Beth just has cancer. She's going to chemo and it sucks, and its horrible, but it's just part of her life, and everyone does what they can to help.

I'm not really sure how I got from Artist Boy to cancer, but there you go. You never know.

first post

2005-09-27T16:35:00.000-04:00

so, this is what happens when i get bored at lunch. maybe this should be my bored lunchtime blog, where i talk about nothing interesting.