It's that time of year again, the time for end of the year business. A little year review, a little year preview, and a little wild celebration. :)
Generally speaking, I try to take at least five minutes to think about the year that was. Did I learn anything new, did I make any historically important discoveries, do I feel as though forward progress was made, have I gotten any closer to becoming an actual grownup instead of an aimless wanderer?
Sadly, there were no important historic discoveries in my 2007, but in all fairness, I wasn't really looking for anything either. I guess you could say that I've learned a thing or two. I've learned that if you make a big ridiculous proclamation in your drunkenness on New Year's Eve because you're a) drunk and b) sad, there's a good chance it was a little bit of an overreaction and sticking to it all year because you're just that stubborn might look a little silly in retrospect. However, I've come this far so I'm going to go ahead and stand by the No Men in 2007 rule as a sound decision that has helped my spiritual and emotional growth immensely. :)
I've also learned that if a friend is getting married in December and the weather is going to be any kind of threat, it's better to follow my instincts and just pick the earlier flight. Work will understand.
As far as forward progress and the quest to become more than an aimless wanderer, that remains to be seen.
And now we move on to 2008. I have high hopes for 2008. I'm trying to break my usual habit of making a ridiculously long, Bridget Jones - like list of ways I'm going to improve myself, things I'm going to do, all in my quest to achieve balance and the ever elusive "inner poise". And then by approximately February 1 it becomes too overwhelming and I just give up. From now on I'm making a general proclomation of what the year is going to be about and then I'm going to do my best to stick to that general goal. This year's goal is "Making Decisions in 2008." This will be the year that I stop waffling and decide things. I'm not sure what things I'll decide per se, but mark my words, decisions will be made. I'll be sure to keep you posted on the status of the decision-making. :)
Well, that little exercise felt good. Now I just have to make it through the rest of my work day and get ready to ring in the New Year the best way I know how: with my friends, an alcoholic punch, Chinese food and some champagne!
Happy New Year!!
Monday, December 31, 2007
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Happy Day After!
Well, I hope everyone had a good Christmas! I had a good day, although Christmas doesn't feel very Christmasy when I'm not with my own family. Still though, a nice day. Christmas Eve I went over to Sacha and Toni's for a delicious dinner of ziti and meatballs with apple pie for dessert! It was yummy. Afterward we played Rock Band (of course) and determined that Wallace the bunny needed a little something extra, so Tuesday morning I whipped up this little sucker and here you have "Wallace the Christmas Bunny" :
Christmas Day Sacha and Toni took me along with them to Toni's parents' house for dinner and festivities, which was lots of fun. Good food, amazing desserts (which I probably should not have eaten) and it was a good time had by all. And then, we went and played some more Rock Band (seriously, does it sound like that's all I do when I'm here? I'm sure it's not)
I received many excellent gifts this year from many excellent friends, though I started to notice a theme.
I think if this year's collection of Christmas gifts had a title, it would be, "Jessie, You're a Girl and We'd Prefer You to Kindly Start Acting Like One By Wearing Makeup and Other Girly Things."
OK, maybe I don't actually think that's the message they were trying to send, but look at all this cool stuff I got! I will be extremely hot in 2008. The perfume is "Lovely" by SJP and it smells so unbelievably good I just can't stop taking the top off the bottle and inhaling it. I'm impatient to have something special to go to so I can wear it (New Year's Eve, anyone?). I just smelled it again after typing that sentence :)
Christmas Day Sacha and Toni took me along with them to Toni's parents' house for dinner and festivities, which was lots of fun. Good food, amazing desserts (which I probably should not have eaten) and it was a good time had by all. And then, we went and played some more Rock Band (seriously, does it sound like that's all I do when I'm here? I'm sure it's not)
I received many excellent gifts this year from many excellent friends, though I started to notice a theme.
I think if this year's collection of Christmas gifts had a title, it would be, "Jessie, You're a Girl and We'd Prefer You to Kindly Start Acting Like One By Wearing Makeup and Other Girly Things."
OK, maybe I don't actually think that's the message they were trying to send, but look at all this cool stuff I got! I will be extremely hot in 2008. The perfume is "Lovely" by SJP and it smells so unbelievably good I just can't stop taking the top off the bottle and inhaling it. I'm impatient to have something special to go to so I can wear it (New Year's Eve, anyone?). I just smelled it again after typing that sentence :)
Alisa also brought us all some fabulous Shakespearean Insult Gum (well, the gum was not so fabulous, but the insults were). Here's an example:
In case you can't read it, it says "Thy breath stinks with eating toasted cheese" It's from Henry VI. There were many others, "How foul and loathsome is thine image" from The Taming of the Shrew. I could go on and on, but I'll stop. It's probably not practical to buy a whole bunch of these little things when the gum is terrible and all I'd really want to do is rip open the packaging and see what's inside, right? Lousy practicality.
I have decided to take a momentary break from knitting socks while I try to figure out how to end the ones for my mom. I'm having knitter's block (is that real? It is now) so the second one is just sitting there, on the needles, waiting patiently to be finished, while the first sock is sitting in purgatory waiting to be ripped back a little and refinished. I've still got nothin'. Who knew it would be this hard? Instead at the moment I'm knitting the Chevron Scarf from Last Minute Knitted Gifts. This book is literally one of the best purchases I've ever made. I think to this point I've made over half of the items in the book and there's nothing in it I can say I would never make. That's a good purchase.
The pattern calls for two different colors of Koigu that you alternate every two rows. The yarn I'm using, however, is Cushy Color Sport by LynnH, in Mary Ann Green and Bonnie Blue. I've actually had the yarn for a couple of years, but I've been waiting for just the right project. So far I think this is turning out very pretty, although it's definitely not for me. Not exactly a color combination that I would wear, but a lot of people would and you know I prefer knitting gifts anyway. I did find it completely incomprehensible that the only size 5 needles I have are double points, but I'm definitely too cheap to buy any more (plus I'm so sure I have them! I know I bought them for a class I took once! Where are they?!?!), so I'm making due with my makeshift straight needles for the time being. Oh well. At least I found matching hair ties to use on the ends so they're a matching set.
Anyway, my internal clock is still completey messed up from waking up at 4am on Monday morning, so I think it's about time for me to go to bed in an effort to try and get back to normal. I thought I had it all under control after staying up late on Monday night due to the Rock Band as well as the Spanish karaoke my neighbors were engaging in until approximately 1 in the morning. Apparently not.
Monday, December 24, 2007
This is how early I was up today:
Yes, that is the sun rising. On the East Coast. After I had already been awake for almost two hours. I'm going to totally crash at about noon, I can just feel it. :)
On the plus side, it looks as though the gross rain we had yesterday may have gone far toward getting rid of some snow...which is good for commuting to work purposes, but slightly less great for White Christmas purposes. Can't have it all, I guess.
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Nothing Too Exciting
Well, as it turns out, when you have a really good, outrageous story like the one I had a few days ago it's tough to find something to follow it up with. So, this will probably be a letdown, consider that your warning. :)
As a bit of follow-up, once I actually made it to the wedding festivities on Friday night, everything went smoothly. The rehearsal dinner was lots of fun, I'm pretty sure we didn't sleep at all on Friday night (but that's sort of what you sign up for when you stay with the bride the night before the wedding, right?). Saturday was kind of a blur with the salon, getting ready, the actual ceremony, the pictures, the limo, the reception...it always goes so fast! I've been looking at pictures almost continually and I still can't believe how fast it was. I had a great time, enjoyed some cocktails (several, even), danced like a rock star, closed out the reception and even hit an after party. Good times. Here's a picture of Marie and Me, all bridesmaided up.
Anyway, after I got back I pretty much felt like a zombie for 4 days. Turns out that not sleeping for three or four days in a row will catch up with you and it won't be pretty when it does.
I kind of feel normal again, after going to bed at like 9:00 for teh last week and spending my weekend sleeping and knitting. I did accomplish the knitting of two hats as Christmas gifts for my bosses this week, but I of course forgot to take pictures of them. Take my word for it, they were pretty cute. And well received. I am now working on finishing the socks for my mom. I have actually finished Andrea's socks, but I've been carrying them around for the last week not sending them out (sorry, Andrea!). My plan had been to stop by the post office last Friday morning in between dropping my mom off at work and driving to Midland, but we all know how that turned out. Then this week we had a bunch of people on vacation and it kept snowing (25+ inches in a week! Yikes!) so I didn't make it to the post office. I have high hopes for this week, however. It'll happen, I know it!
Anyway, here is a photo for you, of my mom's almost finished socks. The color is garbage in the photo, they're much darker in person. I can't get a much better picture of the pattern, but at least you have an idea. The top part needs revising because it looks bad and is hard to get over your foot, but I don't want to do ribbing so I need to come up with a plan B. I'm sure I'll figure something out.
You know, on second thought, that color is pretty true. I think the screen on my camera may be going. Which is less than ideal, I don't really want to buy a new digital camera.
Last, after work on Friday I went to see National Treasure: Book of Secrets. I liked it, I went in not expecting much except to be entertained for a couple of hours. Mission accomplished! I think it's a good holiday movie for the fam, you'll have a good time. At least, I know my family is going to see it on Christmas and I know they'll have a good time.
Ok, Merry Christmas everybody!
Monday, December 17, 2007
I Couldn't Make This Up If I Tried
This past weekend was Amy and Todd's wedding. It was beautiful and romantic and fun. This post is not about their wedding. That's coming, but just not now. Now there is a story so ridiculous you'll probably think I'm lying when I tell it, but I promise you that's not the case. As the title suggests, I am simply not creative enough to fabricate a story like this.
My schedule for the weekend was as follows:
Thursday: leave work early, fly to Detroit, have some holiday fun with the fam
Friday: head to Midland in the morning, help Amy get ready for the big day
Saturday: Wedding
Sunday: Back to hang out with the fam for a bit before flying out of Detroit at 5pm
Anyone who tracks the weather can probably see where this is going. And now the tale begins...
Thursday morning I woke up, packed all my last minute belongings and was on my way. Got on the bus, no problem. Got on the blue line, no problem. Got to Government Center, saw the ridiculous amount of people on the platform, thought to myself "this can't be good" and decided to walk the last three or four blocks to work (typically I take the green line a couple stops, particularly when it's cold and I'm carrying luggage). Upon approaching the corner of Tremont and Boylston (where I usually get off the T) I see a collection of fire trucks and ambulances. This is because two trains had crashed into each other. This really has nothing to do with the rest of the story, it just goes to show how my morning was already on shaky ground. I got to work with plenty of time to spare (and even made a CVS stop on the way). I signed on to nwa.com to check in for my flight and see that next to my flight status it says "Cancelled." This does not make me even remotely happy. They had scheduled me for a flight out of Boston at 6am on Friday morning, but I wanted to get there THURSDAY! I had plans! I do not like it when my plans get messed with. There was an option to choose from more flights, so I clicked that and there was one leaving at noon, another leaving at 2:30. Both of those were a go, and they were on schedule. If I picked the noon flight, I would have had to leave work right then and I felt bad about that so I picked the 2:30. This would prove to be a monumental mistake.
I left work, got to the airport, through security, to the gate in record time. The sky was still clear. Right up until I sat down at about 12:45 and it started snowing. Within 20 minutes it was snowing very very hard. The plane coming in from Detroit landed safely and the ticket agents assured us that they were working to get us on the plane and off the ground as quickly as possible. We boarded the plane somewhere in the neighborhood of 2-2:30. The pilot told us we just needed to wait for the wings to be de-iced and then boom, we were off. We then proceeded to wait at the gate for two and a half hours for the de-icing trucks to get to us. They finally did, and we made our way out to the runway. Just as we were excited to be taking off, the wind blew so hard we couldn't see out one side of the plane and they couldn't tell if the wing was still clear enough to take off. The pilot announced that we would go back to the gate and de-ice again. We pulled up to the gate and the pilot once again came over the loud speaker. The tower had decided that it was not practical, given the weather, to try and take off again. The flight was cancelled. We had now been on board for over 3 hours. The pilot assured us that a ticket agent would be outside when we got off the plane to help us with booking a new flight.
This was not the case.
Finally, when I got to baggage claim and hadn't seen a single Northwest employee, I went into the baggage claim office to inquire about this aforementioned helpful ticket agent. The woman in there looked at me like I was insane and said, "no, you just call a number and book yourself a new flight." I resisted the urge to strangle her and asked politely for the number. She told me to find myself a piece of paper and something to write with (so helpful) and told me the number. I went outside the ticket office, called the number and was promptly told, "Oh, there is no way to get you out of Boston tomorrow. Everything is totally booked." I'm not ashamed to tell you that at this point I had a complete and total meltdown. I was standing in the middle of baggage claim, on the phone with this woman, crying so hard I could barely talk and reaching a level bordering on hysterical when I said to her, "My friend is getting married in Michigan on SATURDAY. I am in the wedding. I HAVE to be there. YOU HAVE TO GET ME THERE." Meanwhile, thoughts of missing Amy's wedding and ruining her day by being one bridesmaid short are spinning through my head along with flashbacks of the nightmare I'd had a few weeks before in which I was physically prevented from making it to the wedding. This did not help the crying. I started pleading with the woman on the phone, "Can't you get me into Cleveland or Chicago or somewhere CLOSE? If you can get me close I can get the rest of the way there." The woman explained that everything in the Great Lakes area goes through Detroit. The only way she could get me to that wedding was if I could fly out of a different airport. There was nothing in Providence. Nothing in Manchester. Finally, she found me a 12:30pm flight out of Hartford, CT on Friday. I do not have a car, which she was pretty unsympathetic about. She suggested I just call a friend and get them to drive me on a work day. She did not understand why this was not a reasonable choice. However, failure was simply not an option at this point. I told her to book the flight and I would figure out some way to get there.
I got my bags and boarded the first rental car shuttle bus that pulled up to the terminal. I rode this Enterprise bus with a very nice little family from Australia who had an adorable baby and kept giving me concerned looks because I was the crazy American girl who couldn't stop crying. We got to Enterprise and I asked if they had anything available even though I didn't have a reservation. They said they did. I asked if it was ok for me to rent the car in Boston and leave it in Hartford. The guy said I could do it, but they don't really do one-way rentals so there would be a $200 drop fee in addition to the rental charge. I had a mini heart attack thinking about how much this would cost me, but I told him I didn't really have a choice. This extremely sympathetic and friendly man told me that National car rental does do one-way rentals, so I should call them and see if they have anything available before I committed to this Enterprise thing. He gave me the number, and sure enough they had something for me. The woman said the rate would be $160. I said, "That's fine. Hold it for me, I'll be right there!" I got back on the Enterprise shuttle bus, headed back to the airport. And proceeded to get stuck in the snow on Route 1. I'm happy to tell you that we weren't stuck for more than a few minutes before the driver managed to get us unstuck. I got back to the airport, hopped on a National shuttle bus, and made it over there. I walked up to the counter, found the woman I had spoken to on the phone, and....
...paid $280 for a rental car that I would have for less than 24 hours. To be perfectly honest with you, at that point money was no object. They could have charged me $700 for that car and I would have taken it. Nothing was stopping me from getting to this wedding. I went out to the parking lot, selected a Pontiac G6 from the choices available (because it had the least amount of snow on it). I got in the car, got it started up, a little man from National helped me clear it off, and I couldn't get it out of the parking space. My little friend got in and rocked the car back and forth until he was able to get it out, I jumped in and was on my way.
I should tell you that at this point I had been almost continually on the phone with my mom and with Amy, keeping them updated minute by minute on my progress with getting to Michigan. I was upset, I was crying, I know for a fact it was impossible to understand at least half of what I was saying. I kept thinking about how I was ruining Amy's wedding and I hated the snow. Once I got my rental car, however, I started to calm down. I thought to myself, if nothing else, I am now in control of my own destiny. I have this car, I can get where I need to go.
Or so I thought.
I drove to Winthrop and as I was making my way into town, I noticed a flashing blue light. A very bright flashing blue light. A blue light that you can't miss. A blue light signaling that there was a parking ban on the streets because of the snow. Which meant I'd have to find a parking space in a lot somewhere. However, because basically all of Boston had shut down several hours previously and I'd spent 7 hours trying to get on a flight, get in the air, get a rental car, etc. there were no spaces to be had. Beyond that, I couldn't even get on my street if I wanted to. The plows hadn't made it that far yet. At this point I tried to call Sacha to see if I could park by his house and sleep on his floor. However, Sacha is a swim coach who had practice and was unable to take my call. I tried to call Toni who was supposed to be in town to ask her the same question. However, Toni was currently in her car experiencing what it's like when a snowstorm makes a 6 hour drive a 12 hour drive so she was clearly unavailable. I tried to call Suneil, who did not pick up his phone (not unusual). I am once again getting desperate and crazy, and to add to my long list of issues, the wipers on the rental car kept getting covered in ice so that I couldn't see out the windshield. I pulled into a Dunkin' Donuts parking lot (thankfully cleared, not full of cars, but also not an option to leave the car). I cleaned the wipers, checked my cell phone and saw that my mom had called. I hadn't spoken to her since about an hour before when I said I was actually getting a rental car and I'd call her when I was safely back home. I explained to her the situation that I was now in, and my thoughts on it which boiled down to this, "I just want to go home and have a really big drink! And I want my mom!!!" As you can see, I revert further and further back into childhood as this story goes on.
I decided at that point that I would just drive to the Target that's about 5 minutes away from my house because at least I could sit there for awhile until I figured something out. I got to Target and at this point my cell phone pretty much died. That ended up not quite being the crisis situation it could have been because I have two cell phones. One for work, one for personal use. I switched to my work phone while I continued to cry to Amy at this point. But then, using this phone I had a bright idea. I would swallow what very little pride I had left and call my boss. I got her on the phone and gave her my whole sob story and finished with something incredibly dramatic along the lines of, "And now I have nowhere to go!" She told me to calm down, to go into Target and wander around or get something to eat and she'd come to get me, I could follow her to her house, put my car in her driveway and sleep there that night. I thanked her profusely, apologized for being so pathetic that I had to call her, and went into Target. Where I called Amy back and proceeded to cry in Target. I mean, what's the use of dignity, anyway? :) I apologized for stressing her out two days before her wedding, but Amy was suprisingly and admirably calm through all this. She said she was totally fine, I wasn't stressing her out, she just felt bad for me. Honestly, one of us freaking out was probably enough.
Fairly soon my kindhearted boss came to retrieve me and I followed her to her house. By this time (approximately 9pm) the snow had stopped and the roads were fairly clear. We made it to her house without incident, she sent me upstairs to take a shower and put my pajamas on while she did a little shoveling of snow, she fed me dinner, gave me some wine and talked to me about things other than air travel which helped me to calm down. I didn't sleep much (big surprise there) and then in the morning she made me pancakes and eggs, let me borrow her GPS unit and got me on my way. I think it's safe to say I have one of the nicest and most understanding bosses ever.
I was off on my way to Hartford at this point, shortly before 7am on Friday. It took a little over two and a half hours to get there, which wasn't too bad considering we'd gotten 10 inches of snow in 5 hours the day before and I was driving during the morning commute. I dropped the rental car off in sunny Hartford, caught the shuttle to the terminal and got myself up to the ticket counter. I'm guessing it was because of the special circumstances and the booking of my ticket over the phone, but I was unable to do the e-check in. I got the attention of a ticket agent, gave her my confirmation number and ID and she set about looking for me in the system to print my boarding pass. It took a good 15 minutes for her to find me. 15 minutes in which I had what felt like a minor heart attack thinking I would not get on yet another flight to Michigan. Luckily (can you really say 'luckily' at this point?) they found me and I was good to go. It was pretty astonishing how many people flying out of Hartford were completely unfamiliar with the 3oz containers in a plastic bag rule. It took forever to get through security. Of course, I showed up two and a half hours early for my flight, so I wasn't that concerned about it. When the TSA guy asked me if I had any liquids in my bag and I said no, he breathed a sigh of relief and said, "oh thank God." I'm pretty sure he wasn't having the greatest day either.
I got on the plane, got into Detroit, got my bags, got to my parents' house, got ready, packed up the car and managed to make it to Saginaw just in time for the rehearsal dinner at 7. At which time I had a big drink and finally started to relax. Looking back I still can't believe all the things that went wrong and almost prevented me from making it there. Wow. I can't believe I didn't pick the noon flight on Thursday, I could kick myself.
There was a short time when I thought I wouldn't be able to get back to Boston on Sunday due to the snow situation in Michigan and the ice storm that was supposed to be hitting the East Coast. In the end we took off an hour late, got slowed down twice in the air, landed an hour and a half later than scheduled in Boston, had to wait 20 minutes to get off the plane because the jetway broke, and the bags took a really REALLY long time coming off the carousel. In other words, it was practically a perfect flight in comparison.
And now I am back, still totally sleep deprived, and in desperate need of a way to stop having flashbacks from Thursday that cause massive anxiety, but all in all I'm just happy to be here.
If you can top that story, please don't tell me. I don't need anything beyond this experience to make me nervous when flying in the future. I'm nervous enough in general. :)
My schedule for the weekend was as follows:
Thursday: leave work early, fly to Detroit, have some holiday fun with the fam
Friday: head to Midland in the morning, help Amy get ready for the big day
Saturday: Wedding
Sunday: Back to hang out with the fam for a bit before flying out of Detroit at 5pm
Anyone who tracks the weather can probably see where this is going. And now the tale begins...
Thursday morning I woke up, packed all my last minute belongings and was on my way. Got on the bus, no problem. Got on the blue line, no problem. Got to Government Center, saw the ridiculous amount of people on the platform, thought to myself "this can't be good" and decided to walk the last three or four blocks to work (typically I take the green line a couple stops, particularly when it's cold and I'm carrying luggage). Upon approaching the corner of Tremont and Boylston (where I usually get off the T) I see a collection of fire trucks and ambulances. This is because two trains had crashed into each other. This really has nothing to do with the rest of the story, it just goes to show how my morning was already on shaky ground. I got to work with plenty of time to spare (and even made a CVS stop on the way). I signed on to nwa.com to check in for my flight and see that next to my flight status it says "Cancelled." This does not make me even remotely happy. They had scheduled me for a flight out of Boston at 6am on Friday morning, but I wanted to get there THURSDAY! I had plans! I do not like it when my plans get messed with. There was an option to choose from more flights, so I clicked that and there was one leaving at noon, another leaving at 2:30. Both of those were a go, and they were on schedule. If I picked the noon flight, I would have had to leave work right then and I felt bad about that so I picked the 2:30. This would prove to be a monumental mistake.
I left work, got to the airport, through security, to the gate in record time. The sky was still clear. Right up until I sat down at about 12:45 and it started snowing. Within 20 minutes it was snowing very very hard. The plane coming in from Detroit landed safely and the ticket agents assured us that they were working to get us on the plane and off the ground as quickly as possible. We boarded the plane somewhere in the neighborhood of 2-2:30. The pilot told us we just needed to wait for the wings to be de-iced and then boom, we were off. We then proceeded to wait at the gate for two and a half hours for the de-icing trucks to get to us. They finally did, and we made our way out to the runway. Just as we were excited to be taking off, the wind blew so hard we couldn't see out one side of the plane and they couldn't tell if the wing was still clear enough to take off. The pilot announced that we would go back to the gate and de-ice again. We pulled up to the gate and the pilot once again came over the loud speaker. The tower had decided that it was not practical, given the weather, to try and take off again. The flight was cancelled. We had now been on board for over 3 hours. The pilot assured us that a ticket agent would be outside when we got off the plane to help us with booking a new flight.
This was not the case.
Finally, when I got to baggage claim and hadn't seen a single Northwest employee, I went into the baggage claim office to inquire about this aforementioned helpful ticket agent. The woman in there looked at me like I was insane and said, "no, you just call a number and book yourself a new flight." I resisted the urge to strangle her and asked politely for the number. She told me to find myself a piece of paper and something to write with (so helpful) and told me the number. I went outside the ticket office, called the number and was promptly told, "Oh, there is no way to get you out of Boston tomorrow. Everything is totally booked." I'm not ashamed to tell you that at this point I had a complete and total meltdown. I was standing in the middle of baggage claim, on the phone with this woman, crying so hard I could barely talk and reaching a level bordering on hysterical when I said to her, "My friend is getting married in Michigan on SATURDAY. I am in the wedding. I HAVE to be there. YOU HAVE TO GET ME THERE." Meanwhile, thoughts of missing Amy's wedding and ruining her day by being one bridesmaid short are spinning through my head along with flashbacks of the nightmare I'd had a few weeks before in which I was physically prevented from making it to the wedding. This did not help the crying. I started pleading with the woman on the phone, "Can't you get me into Cleveland or Chicago or somewhere CLOSE? If you can get me close I can get the rest of the way there." The woman explained that everything in the Great Lakes area goes through Detroit. The only way she could get me to that wedding was if I could fly out of a different airport. There was nothing in Providence. Nothing in Manchester. Finally, she found me a 12:30pm flight out of Hartford, CT on Friday. I do not have a car, which she was pretty unsympathetic about. She suggested I just call a friend and get them to drive me on a work day. She did not understand why this was not a reasonable choice. However, failure was simply not an option at this point. I told her to book the flight and I would figure out some way to get there.
I got my bags and boarded the first rental car shuttle bus that pulled up to the terminal. I rode this Enterprise bus with a very nice little family from Australia who had an adorable baby and kept giving me concerned looks because I was the crazy American girl who couldn't stop crying. We got to Enterprise and I asked if they had anything available even though I didn't have a reservation. They said they did. I asked if it was ok for me to rent the car in Boston and leave it in Hartford. The guy said I could do it, but they don't really do one-way rentals so there would be a $200 drop fee in addition to the rental charge. I had a mini heart attack thinking about how much this would cost me, but I told him I didn't really have a choice. This extremely sympathetic and friendly man told me that National car rental does do one-way rentals, so I should call them and see if they have anything available before I committed to this Enterprise thing. He gave me the number, and sure enough they had something for me. The woman said the rate would be $160. I said, "That's fine. Hold it for me, I'll be right there!" I got back on the Enterprise shuttle bus, headed back to the airport. And proceeded to get stuck in the snow on Route 1. I'm happy to tell you that we weren't stuck for more than a few minutes before the driver managed to get us unstuck. I got back to the airport, hopped on a National shuttle bus, and made it over there. I walked up to the counter, found the woman I had spoken to on the phone, and....
...paid $280 for a rental car that I would have for less than 24 hours. To be perfectly honest with you, at that point money was no object. They could have charged me $700 for that car and I would have taken it. Nothing was stopping me from getting to this wedding. I went out to the parking lot, selected a Pontiac G6 from the choices available (because it had the least amount of snow on it). I got in the car, got it started up, a little man from National helped me clear it off, and I couldn't get it out of the parking space. My little friend got in and rocked the car back and forth until he was able to get it out, I jumped in and was on my way.
I should tell you that at this point I had been almost continually on the phone with my mom and with Amy, keeping them updated minute by minute on my progress with getting to Michigan. I was upset, I was crying, I know for a fact it was impossible to understand at least half of what I was saying. I kept thinking about how I was ruining Amy's wedding and I hated the snow. Once I got my rental car, however, I started to calm down. I thought to myself, if nothing else, I am now in control of my own destiny. I have this car, I can get where I need to go.
Or so I thought.
I drove to Winthrop and as I was making my way into town, I noticed a flashing blue light. A very bright flashing blue light. A blue light that you can't miss. A blue light signaling that there was a parking ban on the streets because of the snow. Which meant I'd have to find a parking space in a lot somewhere. However, because basically all of Boston had shut down several hours previously and I'd spent 7 hours trying to get on a flight, get in the air, get a rental car, etc. there were no spaces to be had. Beyond that, I couldn't even get on my street if I wanted to. The plows hadn't made it that far yet. At this point I tried to call Sacha to see if I could park by his house and sleep on his floor. However, Sacha is a swim coach who had practice and was unable to take my call. I tried to call Toni who was supposed to be in town to ask her the same question. However, Toni was currently in her car experiencing what it's like when a snowstorm makes a 6 hour drive a 12 hour drive so she was clearly unavailable. I tried to call Suneil, who did not pick up his phone (not unusual). I am once again getting desperate and crazy, and to add to my long list of issues, the wipers on the rental car kept getting covered in ice so that I couldn't see out the windshield. I pulled into a Dunkin' Donuts parking lot (thankfully cleared, not full of cars, but also not an option to leave the car). I cleaned the wipers, checked my cell phone and saw that my mom had called. I hadn't spoken to her since about an hour before when I said I was actually getting a rental car and I'd call her when I was safely back home. I explained to her the situation that I was now in, and my thoughts on it which boiled down to this, "I just want to go home and have a really big drink! And I want my mom!!!" As you can see, I revert further and further back into childhood as this story goes on.
I decided at that point that I would just drive to the Target that's about 5 minutes away from my house because at least I could sit there for awhile until I figured something out. I got to Target and at this point my cell phone pretty much died. That ended up not quite being the crisis situation it could have been because I have two cell phones. One for work, one for personal use. I switched to my work phone while I continued to cry to Amy at this point. But then, using this phone I had a bright idea. I would swallow what very little pride I had left and call my boss. I got her on the phone and gave her my whole sob story and finished with something incredibly dramatic along the lines of, "And now I have nowhere to go!" She told me to calm down, to go into Target and wander around or get something to eat and she'd come to get me, I could follow her to her house, put my car in her driveway and sleep there that night. I thanked her profusely, apologized for being so pathetic that I had to call her, and went into Target. Where I called Amy back and proceeded to cry in Target. I mean, what's the use of dignity, anyway? :) I apologized for stressing her out two days before her wedding, but Amy was suprisingly and admirably calm through all this. She said she was totally fine, I wasn't stressing her out, she just felt bad for me. Honestly, one of us freaking out was probably enough.
Fairly soon my kindhearted boss came to retrieve me and I followed her to her house. By this time (approximately 9pm) the snow had stopped and the roads were fairly clear. We made it to her house without incident, she sent me upstairs to take a shower and put my pajamas on while she did a little shoveling of snow, she fed me dinner, gave me some wine and talked to me about things other than air travel which helped me to calm down. I didn't sleep much (big surprise there) and then in the morning she made me pancakes and eggs, let me borrow her GPS unit and got me on my way. I think it's safe to say I have one of the nicest and most understanding bosses ever.
I was off on my way to Hartford at this point, shortly before 7am on Friday. It took a little over two and a half hours to get there, which wasn't too bad considering we'd gotten 10 inches of snow in 5 hours the day before and I was driving during the morning commute. I dropped the rental car off in sunny Hartford, caught the shuttle to the terminal and got myself up to the ticket counter. I'm guessing it was because of the special circumstances and the booking of my ticket over the phone, but I was unable to do the e-check in. I got the attention of a ticket agent, gave her my confirmation number and ID and she set about looking for me in the system to print my boarding pass. It took a good 15 minutes for her to find me. 15 minutes in which I had what felt like a minor heart attack thinking I would not get on yet another flight to Michigan. Luckily (can you really say 'luckily' at this point?) they found me and I was good to go. It was pretty astonishing how many people flying out of Hartford were completely unfamiliar with the 3oz containers in a plastic bag rule. It took forever to get through security. Of course, I showed up two and a half hours early for my flight, so I wasn't that concerned about it. When the TSA guy asked me if I had any liquids in my bag and I said no, he breathed a sigh of relief and said, "oh thank God." I'm pretty sure he wasn't having the greatest day either.
I got on the plane, got into Detroit, got my bags, got to my parents' house, got ready, packed up the car and managed to make it to Saginaw just in time for the rehearsal dinner at 7. At which time I had a big drink and finally started to relax. Looking back I still can't believe all the things that went wrong and almost prevented me from making it there. Wow. I can't believe I didn't pick the noon flight on Thursday, I could kick myself.
There was a short time when I thought I wouldn't be able to get back to Boston on Sunday due to the snow situation in Michigan and the ice storm that was supposed to be hitting the East Coast. In the end we took off an hour late, got slowed down twice in the air, landed an hour and a half later than scheduled in Boston, had to wait 20 minutes to get off the plane because the jetway broke, and the bags took a really REALLY long time coming off the carousel. In other words, it was practically a perfect flight in comparison.
And now I am back, still totally sleep deprived, and in desperate need of a way to stop having flashbacks from Thursday that cause massive anxiety, but all in all I'm just happy to be here.
If you can top that story, please don't tell me. I don't need anything beyond this experience to make me nervous when flying in the future. I'm nervous enough in general. :)
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Random Boston Stories
Today, for your reading pleasure, I have stories of things very Bostony. Well, probably city in general, but mostly stuff that stands out to me for one reason or another as being different from where I spent the first 25 years of my life.
First, as I have now lived here for about a year and a half and ride public transportation every day, I've definitely noticed that I see people who remind me so strongly of someone I know back home that it led to the "Everyone has a Boston Twin" theory. It's pretty amazing. I won't go through the whole list or anything, but hardly a week goes by where I don't think to myself, "wow, that person looks/walks/acts/dresses exactly like _______." It's a fun little game I play when I don't have a book with me and I'm not pretending to sleep on the train so people won't talk to me. A large part of my energy goes to trying to make sure people don't talk to me on public transportation. That's the main reason I don't knit in public. There are some crazy people riding the train and I don't really feel like I need to draw that much attention to myself. Not to mention there just isn't any room during rush hour and I don't want to get punched in the face.
Second, last night I was walking to the train and I was stopped at a light when this person came up to me and tried to make me take a magazine on which the main headline was "Is the Devil inYour Laptop?" They guy attempting to dupe me into taking this magazine then launched into an explanation of how Bill Gates is training terrorists to take over this country and that all these shootings and acts of violence committed by teenagers seen in the news are because Bill Gates is programming their minds with video games and it's all a very carefully and elaborately planned coup. I think he got pretty mad at me when the light changed and I just shook my head, said "no thanks" and walked to the station. He called after me, "are you kidding? Don't you see what he's doing? He's training soldiers!" I was lucky enough to dodge his companion on the next corner trying to give out the same materials. This story leads me to...
Third, within the last year they started publishing a second subway newspaper in Boston. There's always been the Metro, which you can get off a stand for free as you're walking into the subway so you have something to read on the train. As you can imagine, you always find these things laying around because heaven forbid the person who takes and reads the paper actually put it in the garbage. That's just asking too much. Anyway, not the point. I can't remember exactly when this started, but at this point it seems like an eternity ago, a second paper called Boston Now started appearing. Only Boston Now comes with people who stand at every entrance, exit and sometimes inside the stations. They practically shove the paper in your face and shout "FREE BOSTON NOW, GET YOUR FREE BOSTON NOW!" They do not like to take no for an answer, and now a portion of my energy that went toward ensuring that nobody talks to me on public transportation has to be diverted into trying to avoid these Boston Now people. It's a tricky commute, I'm telling you.
Fourth, this afternoon we had a bit of excitement. At one point in the afternoon the Boston Police Department blocked off the street outside my office and surrounded a silver Explorer. At this point, we obviously needed to get to the bottom of this. Turns out that it was an operation in which they were recovering a stolen car (the Explorer) and apprehending the thief (the driver). They had like 5 police cars and a box truck deal to put the suspect in. It was pretty cool.
So there you have it. This is the most interesting thing I could come up with. :)
First, as I have now lived here for about a year and a half and ride public transportation every day, I've definitely noticed that I see people who remind me so strongly of someone I know back home that it led to the "Everyone has a Boston Twin" theory. It's pretty amazing. I won't go through the whole list or anything, but hardly a week goes by where I don't think to myself, "wow, that person looks/walks/acts/dresses exactly like _______." It's a fun little game I play when I don't have a book with me and I'm not pretending to sleep on the train so people won't talk to me. A large part of my energy goes to trying to make sure people don't talk to me on public transportation. That's the main reason I don't knit in public. There are some crazy people riding the train and I don't really feel like I need to draw that much attention to myself. Not to mention there just isn't any room during rush hour and I don't want to get punched in the face.
Second, last night I was walking to the train and I was stopped at a light when this person came up to me and tried to make me take a magazine on which the main headline was "Is the Devil inYour Laptop?" They guy attempting to dupe me into taking this magazine then launched into an explanation of how Bill Gates is training terrorists to take over this country and that all these shootings and acts of violence committed by teenagers seen in the news are because Bill Gates is programming their minds with video games and it's all a very carefully and elaborately planned coup. I think he got pretty mad at me when the light changed and I just shook my head, said "no thanks" and walked to the station. He called after me, "are you kidding? Don't you see what he's doing? He's training soldiers!" I was lucky enough to dodge his companion on the next corner trying to give out the same materials. This story leads me to...
Third, within the last year they started publishing a second subway newspaper in Boston. There's always been the Metro, which you can get off a stand for free as you're walking into the subway so you have something to read on the train. As you can imagine, you always find these things laying around because heaven forbid the person who takes and reads the paper actually put it in the garbage. That's just asking too much. Anyway, not the point. I can't remember exactly when this started, but at this point it seems like an eternity ago, a second paper called Boston Now started appearing. Only Boston Now comes with people who stand at every entrance, exit and sometimes inside the stations. They practically shove the paper in your face and shout "FREE BOSTON NOW, GET YOUR FREE BOSTON NOW!" They do not like to take no for an answer, and now a portion of my energy that went toward ensuring that nobody talks to me on public transportation has to be diverted into trying to avoid these Boston Now people. It's a tricky commute, I'm telling you.
Fourth, this afternoon we had a bit of excitement. At one point in the afternoon the Boston Police Department blocked off the street outside my office and surrounded a silver Explorer. At this point, we obviously needed to get to the bottom of this. Turns out that it was an operation in which they were recovering a stolen car (the Explorer) and apprehending the thief (the driver). They had like 5 police cars and a box truck deal to put the suspect in. It was pretty cool.
So there you have it. This is the most interesting thing I could come up with. :)
Monday, December 10, 2007
Finally!
So finally, after all this time I've had this thing-which-shall-not-be-called-the-name-I-don't like, they have made it possible to just have a profile picture uploaded from your computer instead of the overly complicated put one on the internet, paste the web address here, but good luck doing that because you're clearly not smart enough to figure out how to make that work. I was clearly not smart enough to make that other way work. But this is my profile picture du jour (myspace, facebook, etc). So in case you forgot what I look like (or are stumbling upon this for the first time and reading it) here I am. And yes, I know that's pretty small, so here I am again:
I had an action packed weekend (not really). I got up bright and early on Saturday because I had to go into the city to get my "hair did" and on Saturdays the bus runs much less frequently so it was quite a process to get there. Anyway, I was up and ready at 8:30 on Saturday morning, which is a very unusual thing for me, and there's a knock on my door. It was a couple of gentlemen looking to replace some windows in my apartment. Windows that "will be replaced within the next week" since August. I mean, I guess way to go on getting them in just befor-er at the beginning of the cold weather so everything is sealed properly, but seriously? Does it really take 4 months to get some window guys together? I'm not even going to count the fact that these windows were going to be replaced before I even moved in. A year and a half ago. Anyway, beside the point. These guys were perfectly nice and I was happy to have my windows replaced, but if I had not already needed to be up for this hair appointment, I would have been mighty unhappy about the door knocking at 8:30am on Saturday.
Yesterday I cleaned my apartment (no one is more surprised by this than I am), did some cooking and got totally hooked on this British TV show called MI-5 that I saw in the Watch Instantly section on netflix. This is a GREAT show, part of my belief system that everything is better with a British accent...and the main guy (at least for the first two seasons) is the guy that played Mr. Darcy in the most recent version of Pride & Prejudice. He's pretty unbelievably good looking, and he looks even better with short hair and a wardrobe from this century. He's quickly rising up into the ranks of the Cutest Men Ever. See?
And in the ongoing saga of Andrea's socks, here is the progress on the spiral:
Now, I know you're not thinking that in a week I've knit like 20 rows total, and you're right! One complete sock and one almost finished sock! The end is in sight!
And now I'm off to finish whitening my teeth in two hours. This stuff is pretty cool, and it's not hurting my teeth, which is pretty amazing. My teeth are pretty sensitive. The trick now is to try and avoid anything that could stain them between now and Saturday. On second thought, maybe this could've waited until Wednesday or Thursday... oh well
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
A Compromised Rant
Do you ever have a day when you're going about your business, life as usual and then suddenly, for whatever reason (or no reason at all) you're just frustrated, cranky, antisocial and the only thing you want to do is go home, put on your pajamas and not talk to another person for fear that you might unleash the fury on them? Today is that day for me. The trigger for this was when I had to go up to the front counter when "that guy" came in. "That guy" who is ALWAYS rude, ALWAYS mad about something, thinks he is entitled to get WHATEVER he wants and is seemingly incapable of solving any problems or issues that arise in any other way than getting hopping mad and yelling at people. The one good thing I can say about this guy is that his group is moving out of our building and it can't come soon enough. His encounter with our office today only involved me for about 30 seconds, but his whole presence here put me in a bad mood and my stomach is in knots just thinking about it.
I can admit that I'm probably unreasonably upset about this stupid guy and I should be able to just let it go, but I don't really see that happening. I went about reading other people's blogs about happy things to try and calm myself, went to ESPN to read up on the amazing trade the Tigers just made (yay!), checked out articles by my favorite writers, caught up on my TV and entertainment news, checked out stuff on facebook, all to no avail. I've also noticed that once I'm mad about one thing, pretty soon every other thing that makes me mad comes into focus and I become an anger ball (thank you, Playing By Heart). So I decided that I would unleash the fury into the void that is the world wide web. However, I feel bad about doing it. I'm pretty sure there's very little that I should actually complain about/get mad about/etc. Now, since I know myself well enough to know that I'm never going to become a completely easy-going, troubles roll off my back kind of girl, I thought I could at least temper the ranting with a few positive things.
Thing that makes me smile #1: I get to partake in the wonder of delivered groceries today. I know I've mentioned this before, but I'm not sure I was able to impress upon you how great of a thing I think home delivery is for groceries. You don't have to carve out a section of your day to wander through the supermarket with its headache-inducing lighting, loud people, and carts everywhere. You do have to carve out a time to be at home for the delivery folks to bring your stuff, but you can just pick a time when you would be home anyway and it's not inconvenient. You also don't have to lug them around yourself, the nice delivery people bring them right up to your door, put them down in your kitchen and all you have to do is put everything away! It's great! And it's really not that expensive, particularly when you start factoring in the convenience. And, if you're me, the fact that you don't have a car so you can only buy as many groceries as you can haul around with you walking, on the train and on the bus. The delivery guys can carry way more than I can.
Crazy rant #2: Last year my office put me in charge of decorating for the holidays. I put together what I thought was a pretty nice presentation, I spent a lot of time on it, it was carefully planned and in the two weeks following, people were up in arms about how terrible we were and anti-Christian, blah blah blah blah blah. So we took part of it down and while people still continued to complain, it got better. This year we decided to go minimalist. A couple of nice wreaths, some garlands. Festive, but not offensive (I hope). I will tell you that time got a little bit away from me this week and the decorations have not made it up quite yet. They're going up tomorrow. All week we've had people calling and walking in to ask where the holiday decorations are, when are we putting them up, what are we putting up, we better put something up because the building looks very dreary. I would like to know why these people have so much time on their hands to be that concerned about it. I know there will be complaints as soon as the decorations go up that there aren't enough/someone is offended/we're ruining Christmas. I shouldn't take it personally, but it gets tough not to after awhile. And in the meantime it totally destroys my Christmas spirit.
Thing that makes me smile #2: I'm getting my hair done this weekend! I love love love to get my hair done. I look forward to the day when I can legitimately become one of those little old ladies who goes to the hairdresser every week to get her hair done and knows everything aobut her stylist and even talks about her/him as though they were the closest of friends. It's so relaxing and refreshing. And this weekend I'm getting both a cut and a dye, which is even better. I'll just sit and relax and it'll be great. And my hair will be freshly darkened for Amy's wedding, which I'm pretty excited about. I'm telling you, dying your hair dark becomes an obsession. And I'm never convinced that it's dark enough.
Ok, well this little experiment isn't working as well as I thought. It was for a minute, but then something else came up that set me off all over again. So I think I'll just leave it at that and hope that the end of the week will turn out better than the beginning.
I can admit that I'm probably unreasonably upset about this stupid guy and I should be able to just let it go, but I don't really see that happening. I went about reading other people's blogs about happy things to try and calm myself, went to ESPN to read up on the amazing trade the Tigers just made (yay!), checked out articles by my favorite writers, caught up on my TV and entertainment news, checked out stuff on facebook, all to no avail. I've also noticed that once I'm mad about one thing, pretty soon every other thing that makes me mad comes into focus and I become an anger ball (thank you, Playing By Heart). So I decided that I would unleash the fury into the void that is the world wide web. However, I feel bad about doing it. I'm pretty sure there's very little that I should actually complain about/get mad about/etc. Now, since I know myself well enough to know that I'm never going to become a completely easy-going, troubles roll off my back kind of girl, I thought I could at least temper the ranting with a few positive things.
Thing that makes me smile #1: I get to partake in the wonder of delivered groceries today. I know I've mentioned this before, but I'm not sure I was able to impress upon you how great of a thing I think home delivery is for groceries. You don't have to carve out a section of your day to wander through the supermarket with its headache-inducing lighting, loud people, and carts everywhere. You do have to carve out a time to be at home for the delivery folks to bring your stuff, but you can just pick a time when you would be home anyway and it's not inconvenient. You also don't have to lug them around yourself, the nice delivery people bring them right up to your door, put them down in your kitchen and all you have to do is put everything away! It's great! And it's really not that expensive, particularly when you start factoring in the convenience. And, if you're me, the fact that you don't have a car so you can only buy as many groceries as you can haul around with you walking, on the train and on the bus. The delivery guys can carry way more than I can.
Crazy rant #2: Last year my office put me in charge of decorating for the holidays. I put together what I thought was a pretty nice presentation, I spent a lot of time on it, it was carefully planned and in the two weeks following, people were up in arms about how terrible we were and anti-Christian, blah blah blah blah blah. So we took part of it down and while people still continued to complain, it got better. This year we decided to go minimalist. A couple of nice wreaths, some garlands. Festive, but not offensive (I hope). I will tell you that time got a little bit away from me this week and the decorations have not made it up quite yet. They're going up tomorrow. All week we've had people calling and walking in to ask where the holiday decorations are, when are we putting them up, what are we putting up, we better put something up because the building looks very dreary. I would like to know why these people have so much time on their hands to be that concerned about it. I know there will be complaints as soon as the decorations go up that there aren't enough/someone is offended/we're ruining Christmas. I shouldn't take it personally, but it gets tough not to after awhile. And in the meantime it totally destroys my Christmas spirit.
Thing that makes me smile #2: I'm getting my hair done this weekend! I love love love to get my hair done. I look forward to the day when I can legitimately become one of those little old ladies who goes to the hairdresser every week to get her hair done and knows everything aobut her stylist and even talks about her/him as though they were the closest of friends. It's so relaxing and refreshing. And this weekend I'm getting both a cut and a dye, which is even better. I'll just sit and relax and it'll be great. And my hair will be freshly darkened for Amy's wedding, which I'm pretty excited about. I'm telling you, dying your hair dark becomes an obsession. And I'm never convinced that it's dark enough.
Ok, well this little experiment isn't working as well as I thought. It was for a minute, but then something else came up that set me off all over again. So I think I'll just leave it at that and hope that the end of the week will turn out better than the beginning.
Tuesday, December 04, 2007
A Stroke of Genius
It's official, I'm pretty amazing. Just in case you were in doubt before. So as you may recall, I was/am knitting these socks for Andrea (right now she's reading this, shaking her head saying "oh geez, what now Jessie? I'm never gonna see these things, am I?) but I didn't really like them. I showed them to her over Thanksgiving and she said she thought they were fine and she looked forward to wearing them. I continued on with the knitting of them, but the longer the cuff got, the more awkward and cumbersom it became and the less I liked even looking at it, let alone working on it. Then today I had a stroke of genius (hence the title). The reason I wasn't a fan was because it was just too much. Too busy, too eh. So I thought to myself, simplify! I came up with this:
One full round of the Bamboo Stitch, and then a spiral of it up the rest of the cuff. One spiral from the front of the sock, and one from the back. Anyway, it might be hard to get the general idea since there's only half of one side finished, but I have high hopes. Let me just tell you, the picture in my head is pretty great.
The other thing I did today was to make myself a hat. Remember the hat that Grace made? Well, I completely fell in love with the yarn (which I think I talked about a couple days ago...but I'm too lazy to go back and check) so I bought several hanks, and this one is the hat I made for myself. My favorite color combo, brown and light blue (the colors actually look better in real life, but you know, cameras, lighting, etc). I should have taken into account the fact that my head is enormous and added a few stitches to it, but it works as long as I don't need for my hair to look great or anything.
My photography skills are exemplary. :)
In Which I Even Amaze Myself
Several things about yesterday that remind me just how cool I really am:
1. I walked to the post office to mail Grace's mittens, and I didn't bother changing out of my heels because I figured, I can walk, no problem (internal alarm should have gone off right there). Well, I didn't quite take into account the icy slush that was everywhere because Boston doesn't really believe in clearing sidewalks so they're not death traps. I managed not to fall, but I came pretty close at least 3 times. The icy slush was probably not helped by the fact that I'm very clumsy in general and I should always know better than to go outside in scary heels when the weather is not good.
2. I finally got to the post office (a block away), went to mail the mittens and realized that I didn't have Grace's address with me. And I couldn't get her on the phone. So really I went all that way for nothing. It's a good thing I was sending my Christmas cards and some netflix movies back, although there's a mailbox right outside my building that would have worked just fine. Obviously, I still haven't mailed the mittens.
3. On the way back from the post office I stopped to grab lunch for my boss and myself (me? I think it's myself... I know my mom will correct me if I'm wrong) at Au Bon Pain and they have all these little stacked packages of mixed nuts and lemon drops and the like at the cash register. While I was paying I managed to knock not one, not two, but three packages of mixed nuts to the floor. I'm pretty sure the cash register lady thinks I'm a huge freak. She's probably not wrong. :)
4. Back at the office, one of my coworkers tried to cram 25 pages into the electric hole punch, THEN read the note saying to only punch 10 pages at a time. By then he couldn't get the pages back out so I tried to help him. He held down the machine while I pulled on the paper. I pulled and pulled and finally pulled so hard that the paper came out at such a speed that I accidentally punched myself in the face. Hard. I don't have a bruise or anything (thank goodness) but I do have a nice little red spot on my cheek (it's still there, this happened around 4 yesterday).
5. Getting off the bus later that night, walking down my street (this time I did have my sneakers on) and almost fell on my bottom AGAIN. I caught myself, but man! I should not be allowed outside in bad weather. It's just not safe!
I'm almost afraid for today...
1. I walked to the post office to mail Grace's mittens, and I didn't bother changing out of my heels because I figured, I can walk, no problem (internal alarm should have gone off right there). Well, I didn't quite take into account the icy slush that was everywhere because Boston doesn't really believe in clearing sidewalks so they're not death traps. I managed not to fall, but I came pretty close at least 3 times. The icy slush was probably not helped by the fact that I'm very clumsy in general and I should always know better than to go outside in scary heels when the weather is not good.
2. I finally got to the post office (a block away), went to mail the mittens and realized that I didn't have Grace's address with me. And I couldn't get her on the phone. So really I went all that way for nothing. It's a good thing I was sending my Christmas cards and some netflix movies back, although there's a mailbox right outside my building that would have worked just fine. Obviously, I still haven't mailed the mittens.
3. On the way back from the post office I stopped to grab lunch for my boss and myself (me? I think it's myself... I know my mom will correct me if I'm wrong) at Au Bon Pain and they have all these little stacked packages of mixed nuts and lemon drops and the like at the cash register. While I was paying I managed to knock not one, not two, but three packages of mixed nuts to the floor. I'm pretty sure the cash register lady thinks I'm a huge freak. She's probably not wrong. :)
4. Back at the office, one of my coworkers tried to cram 25 pages into the electric hole punch, THEN read the note saying to only punch 10 pages at a time. By then he couldn't get the pages back out so I tried to help him. He held down the machine while I pulled on the paper. I pulled and pulled and finally pulled so hard that the paper came out at such a speed that I accidentally punched myself in the face. Hard. I don't have a bruise or anything (thank goodness) but I do have a nice little red spot on my cheek (it's still there, this happened around 4 yesterday).
5. Getting off the bus later that night, walking down my street (this time I did have my sneakers on) and almost fell on my bottom AGAIN. I caught myself, but man! I should not be allowed outside in bad weather. It's just not safe!
I'm almost afraid for today...
Monday, December 03, 2007
Holy crap it's December
I feel like I took a nap for a minute, woke up and it's December. I'm still waiting for the start of summer! This is a problem. It's more of a problem because Amy's wedding is right around the corner, Christmas will be hot on its heels and the suddenly BAM! it'll be 2008. I'm so unprepared. I am looking forward to the change in year, however. I prefer even numbered years to odd numbered. I pretty much prefer even numbered everything to odd numbered anything. I can't really explain it, I just feel more balanced. I have no idea what to do about Christmas presents and I'm pretty confident that I'll totally forget about them until like the 22nd and then it'll be panic button time (that's what happens every year). I start out in January telling myself that when I see something that I think someone I know would really love, I'll buy it and then hold onto it for their birthday or Christmas or whatever. I think this is a brilliant idea in theory, but the execution is still pretty elusive. Oh well, I guess it's not really supposed to be about the presents, is it? I think I'm all set for Amy's wedding, I'm just excited and nervous (weddings always make me nervous, I'm not sure why. I become a ball of anxiety until the actual wedding has taken place and it's picture time. And it's not like I have any reason for this, I've never been married. Figure that one out).
I had a jam packed weekend of excitement. OK, maybe not, but keep in mind it doesn't take a lot to keep me entertained. On Saturday Sacha called and said that he had just purchased Rock Band for XBox 360 and would I like to come over and play it? Rock Band (for those of you who may not know) is a video game that comes with a guitar, a drum set and a microphone. You can have a person playing each instrument (or singing) and then you play actual rock songs and get scored on accuracy. It's incredibly fun and highly addictive. We played it for 12 hours. No, I'm not exagerrating. When I went to sleep on Saturday night I was dreaming of little Rock Band notes running through my head. I can't wait to play it again. :) It's a very good thing that I don't have Sacha's entertainment system because I'm pretty sure nothing would ever get done around my house (well, even less than what gets done now). Unfortunately for the boys, they decided to give me the microphone at one point and that was pretty much a disaster. I love to sing, but I have a tragically horrible voice (anyone who has seen me do karaoke can attest to this). It doesn't really bother me, but they had to listen to me for like 3 hours. They might develop an inner ear problem, but I did warn them so I refuse any responsibilty for it.
Sunday I just watched movies and knit a pair of mittens for Grace. I think I'm coming down with a cold (thanks, Sam) and my plan had been to spend my whole weekend in bed letting my immune system do its thing (alas, the Rock Band), so Sunday that's pretty much what I tried to do. I believe I watched 3 and a half movies (the half was South Pacific, that's one of those movies I only watch up to a certain point and then I imagine the ending I would have preferred in my head. I have several movies I do that with). One of the movies I watched was Waitress which I had from Netflix, that movie was very excellent. I definitely recommend it! It made me want to eat what I believe was the Bad Baby Pie... rent the movie and find out what I mean. I'm seriously considering looking for a recipe. Which would lead to cooking. Whoa.
Anyway, about the mittens. I've never actually made mittens before, but I figured I can read and follow directions (mostly) so I could probably figure it out. I found a pattern online somewhere for bulky mittens (because I was knitting them out of Malabrigo Chunky, which I'm having a little love affair with at the moment) and read it and proceeded to think that it was a little bit silly so I used it as more of a reference guide to my own pattern. The finished result is this:
Which I hope will fit the intended recipient, despite a slight disagreement between us on the size of her hands. She thinks she has these giant beastie hands and I think she has hands quite similar to mine, just a little bit longer (because not everyone was "blessed" with short, stubby fingers like me) and probably narrower. So I made some mittens that are just a little bit too long for me and I imagine they should fit her. Time will tell, I have to mail them out today so I probably won't know the actual sizing until the end of the week.
On a completely unrelated topic, in an effort to avoid rush hour on the T Friday night I decided to go check out Enchanted right after work at the theater a block away. I. Loved. It. It was so cute and fun and it's one of those that I could just watch over and over. I wouldn't have thought this was possible, but Patrick Dempsey's cuteness factor went up even further after watching it. That's tough to do.
Finally, this weekend brought with it the return of my knitting notebook so I can finally finish the projects that I had already started. I left it at Toni's a few weeks ago and I feel like I've been without my security blanket. But all is right with the world now!
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
grab your popcorn...
I'm pretty sure I can actually feel my intelligence seeping out through my ears today. I have a headache that seems to be unpacking some rather large furniture inside my brain as though it were going to stay for a very long time, which is slowly causing me to forget how to read and to lose my ability to focus. Stupid Tuesday.
Clearly, I'm in a fabulous mood and therefore thought I should for sure post something in order to spread my cheer to the rest of the world. :)
Actually, I was thinking I hadn't done a movie post in quite some time, and that's simply tragic. Here are some thoughts on my most recently watched flicks, going backward:
The Prestige which I currently have from netflix. I'm about a 50% fan of Christian Bale. I like Batman Begins and Reign of Fire a whole lot, but I'm not so into Equilibrium and The Machinist. I haven't seen American Psycho all the way through so I'll reserve judgment on that one (and I know there are a bunch of others but take my word for it that I only like him about half the time). Hugh Jackman is ok, although I prefer for him to stick to playing a romantic lead or a comic book hero. Scarlett Johannsen keeps making weird movies where her part isn't that great/likeable/interesting and I don't really get that (Match Point, anyone? No? Take my word for it, it's not a very good movie) Anyway, I heard this was a good flick, I like magic, two leading men who are easy on the eyes, figured I'd give it a shot. I watched this movie two days ago and I'm still pretty undecided about it. I'm also pretty sure I never want to go to a magic show as long as I live. It left me with a very unsatisfied feeling, which is too bad. I feel like I figured out the end pretty close to the beginning and then I was just biding time until they got around to telling me. See The Illusionist instead, it came out about the same time, got way less press and I think it's way better. Plus, it's got Edward Norton who is 100% cool all of the time and Jessica Biel whose name is Jessica and therefore must be ok.
The Incredibles, which I own. I love this movie. I've probably seen it 20+ times and I still love it. That's pretty much it on that one, I watched it Sunday during my Day of Pajamas and remembered how much I like it.
Live Free or Die Hard. Now, I saw this movie the day it came out in the theater, because it's a Die Hard movie and Bruce Willis is the star. These two things are a guaranteed recipe for me to like a movie. And yea, I know it's completely unrealistic and over half the things that happened in it are probably not even remotely possible within the laws of physics and the universe and whatever. I'll tell you right now though, it doesn't even matter. You give me a movie where Bruce is saving the world and being a carefree smartass while he does it and I'm happy. I was checking out amazon while I was at my parents' and saw that it was being released the Tuesday before Thanksgiving so I immediately purchased it and got overnight shipping so that it would be there in time to watch on Thursday. I watched it Thursday night with my brothers and my dad, and we'll just say that one of them sucked the fun out of it by refusing to suspend disbelief and just enjoy the ride. In fact, it sucked the fun out so much that I had to watch the movie again on Saturday when I got home. And guess what? I still love it. This one had the added bonus of Justin Long playing a nerdy computer genius, and I do love nerdy men. Moving along....
National Treasure. Let me preface this by telling you that outside of Moonstruck I really REALLY don't like Nicolas Cage. I think he's the king of the over-actors and he's pretty creepy in real life. That being said, I love love love this movie. It's another one of those movies that I could watch over and over again. Any movie that combines history with adventure and romance and good vs. evil, etc is a good movie. I can't wait for the sequel to come out, and here's the trick I've learned for sequels. Pretend as if the first movie was never made, pretend as though this movie has nothing to live up to and just hope that it can keep you entertained for a couple of hours. Do that and if it's still disappointing, you know it was a terrible, terrible movie and you just wasted 2 hours and $10 that you'll never get back (if you're seeing it in the theater).
Beowulf. Let me start out by telling you that no matter what forms of trickery your little brother uses to get you to go to a 3D IMAX movie the day after your friend's bachelorette party when you're completely hungover, IT'S NOT A GOOD IDEA. The form of trickery my little brother employed was very clever. He sent me a text message and the only things I paid attention to were "beowulf" and "1:30". I had already agreed to see the movie, and it was only later that I realized the full message said "...seeing beowulf 3D at 1:30 if you are interested." But by then it was too late. I was committed. To watching an animated action movie three stories high in 3 dimensions. I did manage to make it through the movie without fainting or vomiting (I'm not sure how) but I did try to swipe the things coming at me from the screen out of my way because they were way too close. There was a lot going on there. My overall impression was that it was kind of a silly movie, I have a hard time taking animated characters that seriously and I was pretty irritated that Robin Wright Penn didn't actually look like Robin Wright Penn until the end of the movie. I'm serious, that almost completely ruined it. I will say that visually it was pretty amazing and if you're going to see it, ABSOLUTELY see it in 3D IMAX, because otherwise it would be pretty disappointing.
Next I really want to see Enchanted, which Grace saw over Thanksgiving and hated, so that pretty much tells me that I'll like it. Grace and I have completely opposite taste in movies. We always end up completely surprised when we go to a movie and both have a good time. Anyway, if this writer's strike goes on for much longer, I'm pretty sure I'll get a chance to get caught up on all the movies I'm missing in the theater because of the television season.
Clearly, I'm in a fabulous mood and therefore thought I should for sure post something in order to spread my cheer to the rest of the world. :)
Actually, I was thinking I hadn't done a movie post in quite some time, and that's simply tragic. Here are some thoughts on my most recently watched flicks, going backward:
The Prestige which I currently have from netflix. I'm about a 50% fan of Christian Bale. I like Batman Begins and Reign of Fire a whole lot, but I'm not so into Equilibrium and The Machinist. I haven't seen American Psycho all the way through so I'll reserve judgment on that one (and I know there are a bunch of others but take my word for it that I only like him about half the time). Hugh Jackman is ok, although I prefer for him to stick to playing a romantic lead or a comic book hero. Scarlett Johannsen keeps making weird movies where her part isn't that great/likeable/interesting and I don't really get that (Match Point, anyone? No? Take my word for it, it's not a very good movie) Anyway, I heard this was a good flick, I like magic, two leading men who are easy on the eyes, figured I'd give it a shot. I watched this movie two days ago and I'm still pretty undecided about it. I'm also pretty sure I never want to go to a magic show as long as I live. It left me with a very unsatisfied feeling, which is too bad. I feel like I figured out the end pretty close to the beginning and then I was just biding time until they got around to telling me. See The Illusionist instead, it came out about the same time, got way less press and I think it's way better. Plus, it's got Edward Norton who is 100% cool all of the time and Jessica Biel whose name is Jessica and therefore must be ok.
The Incredibles, which I own. I love this movie. I've probably seen it 20+ times and I still love it. That's pretty much it on that one, I watched it Sunday during my Day of Pajamas and remembered how much I like it.
Live Free or Die Hard. Now, I saw this movie the day it came out in the theater, because it's a Die Hard movie and Bruce Willis is the star. These two things are a guaranteed recipe for me to like a movie. And yea, I know it's completely unrealistic and over half the things that happened in it are probably not even remotely possible within the laws of physics and the universe and whatever. I'll tell you right now though, it doesn't even matter. You give me a movie where Bruce is saving the world and being a carefree smartass while he does it and I'm happy. I was checking out amazon while I was at my parents' and saw that it was being released the Tuesday before Thanksgiving so I immediately purchased it and got overnight shipping so that it would be there in time to watch on Thursday. I watched it Thursday night with my brothers and my dad, and we'll just say that one of them sucked the fun out of it by refusing to suspend disbelief and just enjoy the ride. In fact, it sucked the fun out so much that I had to watch the movie again on Saturday when I got home. And guess what? I still love it. This one had the added bonus of Justin Long playing a nerdy computer genius, and I do love nerdy men. Moving along....
National Treasure. Let me preface this by telling you that outside of Moonstruck I really REALLY don't like Nicolas Cage. I think he's the king of the over-actors and he's pretty creepy in real life. That being said, I love love love this movie. It's another one of those movies that I could watch over and over again. Any movie that combines history with adventure and romance and good vs. evil, etc is a good movie. I can't wait for the sequel to come out, and here's the trick I've learned for sequels. Pretend as if the first movie was never made, pretend as though this movie has nothing to live up to and just hope that it can keep you entertained for a couple of hours. Do that and if it's still disappointing, you know it was a terrible, terrible movie and you just wasted 2 hours and $10 that you'll never get back (if you're seeing it in the theater).
Beowulf. Let me start out by telling you that no matter what forms of trickery your little brother uses to get you to go to a 3D IMAX movie the day after your friend's bachelorette party when you're completely hungover, IT'S NOT A GOOD IDEA. The form of trickery my little brother employed was very clever. He sent me a text message and the only things I paid attention to were "beowulf" and "1:30". I had already agreed to see the movie, and it was only later that I realized the full message said "...seeing beowulf 3D at 1:30 if you are interested." But by then it was too late. I was committed. To watching an animated action movie three stories high in 3 dimensions. I did manage to make it through the movie without fainting or vomiting (I'm not sure how) but I did try to swipe the things coming at me from the screen out of my way because they were way too close. There was a lot going on there. My overall impression was that it was kind of a silly movie, I have a hard time taking animated characters that seriously and I was pretty irritated that Robin Wright Penn didn't actually look like Robin Wright Penn until the end of the movie. I'm serious, that almost completely ruined it. I will say that visually it was pretty amazing and if you're going to see it, ABSOLUTELY see it in 3D IMAX, because otherwise it would be pretty disappointing.
Next I really want to see Enchanted, which Grace saw over Thanksgiving and hated, so that pretty much tells me that I'll like it. Grace and I have completely opposite taste in movies. We always end up completely surprised when we go to a movie and both have a good time. Anyway, if this writer's strike goes on for much longer, I'm pretty sure I'll get a chance to get caught up on all the movies I'm missing in the theater because of the television season.
Sunday, November 25, 2007
home again, home again...
Phew! What a trip! It was lots of good food, family, friends, driving, catching up, a little partying and even a couple of minutes to relax! I was in desperate need of a vacation prior to leaving and as my boss described it, I pretty much skipped out of the office last Friday. I made it into Detroit with no trouble and off we went.
Saturday was Amy's bachelorette party, and it was all the things a bachelorette party should be. It was wild and crazy and fun and outrageous and a completely great way to send Amy off from her life as a single gal. Two particular things of note from the evening: 1, it is extremely unnerving to be out at a bachelorette party with your crazy friends (trust me, we're crazy) and run into your 21 year old little brother at the bar with his friends. It was something I was just not prepared for. I mean, intellectually I know he's 21 but I hadn't seen him at the bar before and especially not some random bar in downtown Lansing that I'd never heard of before. 2, my mom is a trooper. I had asked her a few days before if she minded picking me up at the Lansing mall at 1am after the festivities because that's where the limo was dropping everyone off and I would most definitely not be in any kind of shape to drive. When she got there to pick me and the bachelorette up (Amy was staying with us) she even went so far as to take us through the drive through at Taco Bell at 1 in the morning. I don't know anyone else's mom who would pick up their intoxicated daughter and her intoxicated friend and take them to the drive through after the bar. Thanks, Mom, you're the best!
Much of the rest of my week was spent driving all over the state to see everyone I haven't seen in the last year...dinner with Lauren and her family, a meeting with the knitters, some quality time with Grace, a visit with Andrea and Tom, a mini reunion with my college roommates in Saginaw, Thanksgiving with the fam, lunch with Corene and Dan, lunch with Matt, some quality bar time with Cessa and some other cats from high school, the list keeps going. As I said, it was a busy week.
I flew back to the East Coast on Saturday, which was nice because it gave me all of Sunday to rest up and get ready to hit the grind first thing Monday morning. I was sitting in Metro airport (it seems like I spend a lot of time there these days...) and they announced that my flight had been oversold and they were looking for 8 volunteers to give up their tickets and take a flight the next morning, and that the airline would pay for overnight accomodations, food and give a free domestic roundtrip ticket. I thought that sounded like a pretty good deal and there was no pressing reason for me to come back Saturday as opposed to Sunday and I could always use a free ticket, so I volunteered. They told me to stand by and they'd let me know if they had to use all the tickets that were given up. In the end I did get on my original flight because they didn't need my ticket, but (I suspect) because I was the first person to volunteer they did upgrade me to first class. I rode first class once before and after that experience I said that coach is for suckers if you have the money, but let me tell you how much nicer it is to sit in first class when it's free. It was a good flight, I had a nice cab driver who didn't give me any attitude about having to drive to Winthrop (they hate it, because it's only like a $20 fare with tip as opposed to like $30 or $40 if they're going into the city...it drives me crazy when they complain about it) and I slept like a rock when I got home. There's something so comforting about being in your own bed after a long time away.
And now a little week in review picture show:
Next up is Grace, who decided that she wanted to make herself a new hat while back in Michigan for the weekend (she made one a couple of years ago when we were roommates) but she's a little gunshy about starting and ending it so I gave a little assistance in that department. The middle, however, is all her. Pretty nice, eh?
Saturday was Amy's bachelorette party, and it was all the things a bachelorette party should be. It was wild and crazy and fun and outrageous and a completely great way to send Amy off from her life as a single gal. Two particular things of note from the evening: 1, it is extremely unnerving to be out at a bachelorette party with your crazy friends (trust me, we're crazy) and run into your 21 year old little brother at the bar with his friends. It was something I was just not prepared for. I mean, intellectually I know he's 21 but I hadn't seen him at the bar before and especially not some random bar in downtown Lansing that I'd never heard of before. 2, my mom is a trooper. I had asked her a few days before if she minded picking me up at the Lansing mall at 1am after the festivities because that's where the limo was dropping everyone off and I would most definitely not be in any kind of shape to drive. When she got there to pick me and the bachelorette up (Amy was staying with us) she even went so far as to take us through the drive through at Taco Bell at 1 in the morning. I don't know anyone else's mom who would pick up their intoxicated daughter and her intoxicated friend and take them to the drive through after the bar. Thanks, Mom, you're the best!
Much of the rest of my week was spent driving all over the state to see everyone I haven't seen in the last year...dinner with Lauren and her family, a meeting with the knitters, some quality time with Grace, a visit with Andrea and Tom, a mini reunion with my college roommates in Saginaw, Thanksgiving with the fam, lunch with Corene and Dan, lunch with Matt, some quality bar time with Cessa and some other cats from high school, the list keeps going. As I said, it was a busy week.
I flew back to the East Coast on Saturday, which was nice because it gave me all of Sunday to rest up and get ready to hit the grind first thing Monday morning. I was sitting in Metro airport (it seems like I spend a lot of time there these days...) and they announced that my flight had been oversold and they were looking for 8 volunteers to give up their tickets and take a flight the next morning, and that the airline would pay for overnight accomodations, food and give a free domestic roundtrip ticket. I thought that sounded like a pretty good deal and there was no pressing reason for me to come back Saturday as opposed to Sunday and I could always use a free ticket, so I volunteered. They told me to stand by and they'd let me know if they had to use all the tickets that were given up. In the end I did get on my original flight because they didn't need my ticket, but (I suspect) because I was the first person to volunteer they did upgrade me to first class. I rode first class once before and after that experience I said that coach is for suckers if you have the money, but let me tell you how much nicer it is to sit in first class when it's free. It was a good flight, I had a nice cab driver who didn't give me any attitude about having to drive to Winthrop (they hate it, because it's only like a $20 fare with tip as opposed to like $30 or $40 if they're going into the city...it drives me crazy when they complain about it) and I slept like a rock when I got home. There's something so comforting about being in your own bed after a long time away.
And now a little week in review picture show:
It's sort of hard to tell, but this is actually a picture of me and Amy, it's toward the end of the evening and I'm pretty sure she was trying to smother me. :) You can only see my arm in the picture, but this should give you a pretty good idea of the tone of the evening.
Next up is the sock that I'm making for Andrea (well, the first of two, considering that Andrea does have two feet and would probably like a matching set as opposed to the bold fashion statement of one socked foot and one bare foot. I asked her to try it on just to make sure it fit and she said, "oh it's perfect! It's almost like you knew the exact dimensions of my foot!" I let her know that it turns out I do have the exact measurements of her foot, taken at some point a few years ago that neither of us remembers. Needless to say, she's pretty excited to get custom made socks. But then, who wouldn't be? Another note from my visit with Andrea and Tom. We went for dinner at the Outback and I was wearing these super cute shoes that my mom ended up giving me which I do not believe are excessively slippery but they keep the floors so shiny and slick in there that I definitely bit it walking to the table. No one from the resaurant saw it and I didn't exactly want to call attention to the fact that I appear to need walking lessons so I just got back up and tried to play it off. I think that bodes well for next month when I'll spend a day wearing a floor length bridesmaid dress with a train, don't you?
Next up is Grace, who decided that she wanted to make herself a new hat while back in Michigan for the weekend (she made one a couple of years ago when we were roommates) but she's a little gunshy about starting and ending it so I gave a little assistance in that department. The middle, however, is all her. Pretty nice, eh?
Next up is my roommate reunion in Saginaw, this is 4 out of the 6 of us who lived together. We're pretty cute. :)
I think that's about it as far as pictures go and I know there are about a million more stories I could tell but let's be honest, this is pretty long already. I'll leave you with some very good advice that came in my fortune cookie this evening:
"Clear your mental, emotional and psychic space and you'll see."
It's a little unclear as to what, exactly, you'll see, but since it comes in a fortune cookie I imagine it's pretty great. Thanks for a great trip, mitten state!!
Friday, November 16, 2007
mitten state, here I come!
Well, I'm all packed and ready to go, lugged my ridiculously heavy suitcase into work with me so that I can head straight to the airport at 5 for my 7:30 flight...that was not the most exciting part of my morning. It's actually kind of disgusting how much stuff I had to pack for this trip. But then I tell myself 8 days is a long time and a girl likes to have options. I did limit myself to 4 and a half pairs of shoes (which was not easy, I can tell you). The half pair is my flip flops. I really don't feel like you can count those as an entire pair of shoes. They're like glorified slippers that you wear in public.
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There's a small group of regulars that always gets off at my bus stop in the evenings and we walk down the street together. It's a fairly common occurence as the days get colder that one of them will mention the fact that I'm still wearing my flip flops. I always explain that I will be wearing them until the snow on the ground makes it impossible (or at least uncomfortable). A few days ago we were walking and one of the ladies said to me, "you know, I find it comforting that you're still wearing your flip flops. Every day that I see you wearing them it makes me feel like it's not that cold, and I can handle it just a little bit better." See that? Wearing flip flops, healing the world one step at a time.
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Anyway, it's pretty freezing here today, and EXTREMELY windy, so I hope it's a little better than this out yonder at my destination. Even if it's cold, I've never felt wind in Michigan like what I get coming off the ocean while I'm standing at the bus stop in the morning.
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So anyway, farewell to Mass for the next week and "yes, Michigan!" to all y'all back home.
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Looking forward to some great lakes, great times. :)
Monday, November 12, 2007
not the most exciting post ever
I do love a 4 day weekend. I went to Rochester, NY this weekend for Toni's thesis show, which was completely amazing. I'm going to do a little PR here, go check out her website and see how talented she is! http://www.tonipepe.com/ .
Rochester's about a 6 hour drive from the Boston area, but my boss let me have Friday off so we drove over during the day so we could make it to her show which started at 4pm, then we had the whole weekend to relax and party it up a bit in celebration of her accomplishment. We headed back yesterday and today is a holiday for all state buildings and because I work in a state building (albeit for a private company) I got a holiday! So I got to have a little trip and I still get to have a little weekend to accomplish all the things I didn't do because I was gone all weekend (and all of last weekend, so I'm about two weeks behind). Plus, it's probably time for me to start thinking about getting ready to leave for Michigan this coming weekend. It's a whirlwind of travels and adventures this month!!
I did (shockingly) manage to finish the socks I made for Toni in time to give them to her this weekend (I mean, I was weaving in ends in the car on the way there, but that's fine. I always put off weaving in ends until the last minute. They ended up being a birthday/congratulations gift because I was too far behind the 8 ball to come up with separate gifts. I think she liked them, she immediately put them on and then wore them all weekend! Here's a photo of her modeling them.
I'm very happy to be back home and have a day to get my act together, 6 hours is a long time in a car, and when you're forced against your will to listen to Howard Stern it tends to feel more like an eternity. Add to that a tendency to get car sick and by the time I got back here yesterday I probably looked like a crazy woman with a twitch about ready to snap. Luckily I have recovered from being on the edge of sanity and for the rest of today I will be watching movies, cleaning my apartment, waiting for my groceries to be delivered (best. idea. ever.) and doing a little work.
I will be in Michigan 4 days from today!
Wednesday, November 07, 2007
It's Wednesday slash Thursday!
I know that it's Wednesday. But it FEELS like Thursday. And not in that, "yay it's Thursday-no wait it's Wednesday, crap there goes my good mood sort of way." In the "I have Friday off and Monday is a holiday so tomorrow is my 'Friday' with 4 days before I have to return to real life!" kind of way. In case you haven't noticed, I don't have a whole lot of respect for "real life" as they call it. I think it's pretty completely overrated in every way and I'm about ready to be done with it, thankyouverymuch. Is it really bad that I've been looking forward to retirement since the minute I graduated college? I'm not looking forward to being all aged and everything (not that there's anything wrong with being aged, I'm just saying I don't want to skip all the in between parts), I'm just done with being a productive member of society, working the daily grind, paying bills, paying taxes, not getting to stay up late during the work week, waking up early every day, etc. It doesn't really hold much interest for me. And while not all of that will go away with retirement, the pieces that will hang around will be ok I think.
I digress.
With no small amount of time in the car last weekend, more in the car this weekend, and some flights and such when I go to Michigan for Thanksgiving in a week and a half (!!) I'm getting lots of knitting time in (plus during the week I'm basically a hermit because I'm afraid that my tv will be lonely without me). I'm working on the Lorna's Laces socks right now, but they might be on their way to time out again because I don't like the second pattern I've chosen for the cuff. I mean, I could just knit a straight sock and I'm sure it would be fine and Andrea wouldn't disown me as her friend or anything. But I mean, come ON. Normal, man that's so boring (that was me gratuitously stealing lines from Encino Man). Anyway, I figure if push comes to shove they can sit on the back burner for a minute while I work on some other things (like, oh, seaming a baby blanket? What? What baby blanket that still isn't seemed two and a half weeks later? I don't know what you're talking about), start some new things (2-3 other pairs of socks), etc. And you know what? I will be seeing Andrea in just two short weeks, so wouldn't it be totally worthwhile to make her try on the socks (sock) up to the point they (it) are (is) now to make sure they (it) even fit(s) before I go any further? Yes, that's very sensible. Stop it. I know you're talking to yourself about my serious lack of attention span right now (well, maybe you don't actually talk to yourself. I do). But I ask you, is it really fair to knit this lovely yarn into something for my lovely friend if I'm not terribly thrilled with how it's coming out? No, no it's not. It's not fair to the friend, the yarn, the lovely people who made the yarn, the needles, the...... ok. I get it. I'm rationalizing like it's my job. I'm just waiting for inspiration to strike.
Here are my dilemmas in no particular order. One, as you can see from these pictures is the pattern on the cuff. I'm just not crazy about it. However, I know that Andrea reads this blog so if she happens to like it, I don't have a problem with continuing on. But the question I find myself asking is, if she's going to hate it and thank me awkwardly when I give them to her and proceed to never wear them because they're scary and hideous, why would I want to waste my time? She should get some input, don't you agree??
Second, there are all the other projects that still need finishing or are waiting in the wings.
Third, look what just came today:
Another bunch of sock yarn and another set of needles with which to knit sock yarn. What is a girl to do? Also, FYI packing for Michigan just became a nightmare as far as deciding what to take and what (if anything) to leave behind knitting wise. I am out of control. You'd never guess that before September I didn't even pick up a pair of needles for pretty close to 8 months, would you?
Monday, November 05, 2007
back to reality
"Oh hey Jessie, how was your weekend?"
Well, I'm glad you asked! My weekend was super fun and more than a little bit crazy. Friday I got out of work and happily it took less than two hours to get home (which is what happened the Friday before when the blue line broke and it took over an hour for replacement shuttle buses to show up) and while on the way to dinner with Sacha he asked me if I wanted to go to New York City on Saturday. I started thinking about it and couldn't come up with a good reason not to, so I said sure why not? We talked Suneil into the plan and first thing Saturday morning, off we went!
Now, I had never been to NY before, despite having lived just 4 hours north of it for over a year. Benny and Courtney both live in NY (they're friends from high school) so it was a perfect chance to get to spend some time with them!
We got into the city at around 1 in the afternoon and did the touristy thing for awhile, since I hadn't ever been there before and those boys are regular visitors. We had lunch at the Carnegie Deli where they serve the biggest sandwiches I've ever seen. Piled at least 6 inches high with meat. I didn't even get through half of it, but it was delicious! Of course, we did have to save room for cheesecake, which I've been hearing about for years. "oh my gosh Jessie, you have to go to Carnegie Deli in New York and you have to get the cheesecake because it is the best cheesecake in the world." Well, I can now tell you with absolute certainty that they were absolutely right. This cheesecake was magical, magnificent and glorious. It completely silenced me, which you know is quite a feat. As an idea this is a picture of the dessert window outside the deli...so delicious.
After we ate, we went on a little walking tour, to Times Square, past Madame Toussaud's (in theory wax statues are a really cool idea, but in reality up close they're unbelievably creepy), down to Ground Zero, over to Battery Park to check out the Statue of Liberty, and then back to the hotel for a party nap before heading to dinner and out for the evening.
For dinner we went to this little place called "Becco" which was in this neighborhood Benny took us to on what I think was 46th street. Oh my goodness, it was unbelievably delicious. Every single thing they served was magical. Ceasar salad, veal parmesean, bread, wine, etc. It was all delicious. After dinner we went out to a couple of bars where things got out of hand as they tend to do when old friends reunite in a fun city with lots of alcohol. :)
It was a crazy weekend, it was unbelievably fun, and I'm glad to be back home in Winthrop where things move a little slower and buildings are a lot smaller. However, rest assured that I will be going back. Much more to see!
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
is this weird?
So, all day today I've been switching back and forth between two pairs of shoes. This morning as I was preparing for work I thought to myself, "oh look! Clogs! Clogs that I bought two years ago and haven't worn in at least 12 months! I should wear those! Look how cute they are!" So I put them in my bag to change into when I got to work (for walking purposes I'm strictly a flip flops girl until the snow starts to fall). So I got to work, put on the clogs and immediately remembered why it is I haven't worn them in 12 months. These clogs are only a good idea on paper. On a hard floor they sound like horses hooves which is pretty distracting. Also, they're not terribly easy to walk in and unless the pants I have on are REALLY long, they look kind of ridiculous. I have a selective memory about shoes that aren't good to wear. If I go long enough without wearing them, I'll forget why I stopped wearing them in the first place! It's ridiculous
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Anyway, I had this other pair of shoes under my desk that I wore last week and forgot to take home (due to the flip flops) that I had taken off under my desk because the strap at the back was digging into my heel. So all day, depending on which shoe was closest to my foot every time I got up from my desk, I was switching back and forth. And the whole day I was thinking, "I really need to go shoe shopping and buy some brown shoes that are better." Now is a good time to tell you that I have 3-4 pairs of brown shoes in addition to the two that were at my office today. But it's not enough. I'm still looking for that perfect pair of brown shoes. It's an ongoing quest. And inevitably, every time I find that perfect pair of brown shoes, I need a perfect pair of black shoes, then a pair of unique shoes (red, flowered, white, etc) and then the whole cycle repeats itself again.
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Elsewhere, the parade for the Red Sox was yesterday. I'm sorry to tell you that I got outside right AFTER it had passed. I took a picture anyway, of all the people and the street sweepers. It's kind of a disappointment, but so was missing the parade (although what did I expect? It was Tuesday).
Happy Halloween!
Monday, October 29, 2007
world champs
So the Red Sox won the World Series last night. Swept the Rockies. In the end I got caught up in the excitement of an entire city and cheered along with them. It's infectious, you see. And I admit, it was some pretty amazing baseball they played in the last two weeks and I can't be mad at them for playing really well and making the games something to watch. I am looking forward to the parade, I hope I get to see at least a part of it. If that's the case, I'll be sure to take some pictures because I know how everyone likes pictures. Now don't go thinking that I'm a Sox fan now or anything because I'm not, but really, who are the Rockies? They've been around for like 5 minutes and good story or not I am firmly against brand new franchises winning the World Series (or Superbowl or whatever) until they've been around for at least 25 years. They need to EARN it. So there. :)
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I'm not sure how big of a story this is outside of New England, so for those of you unfamiliar: Before the baseball season began, this furniture company out here (Jordan's furniture) had this promotion called the "Monster Deal" (after the Green Monster, get it?). The deal was that if you bought any furniture from their stores during a given time frame, it would be free if the Red Sox won the World Series. As you can imagine, for the last two weeks this deal has been talked about pretty much nonstop and we've had to endure countless commercials from this guy who is incredibly grating on my nerves (sort of a Terry Hanks type figure for those of you from mid-Michigan). It appears that 30,000+ people bought furniture during this deal and the store is on the line for millions of dollars. They had people all over the news and the pregame who had bought furniture in the deal and were going to be getting thousands back. The store took out an insurance policy to cover themselves, but that is a crazy deal. Of course I'm now wishing that I could go back in time and have bought myself a really nice couch or something that would now be free, but alas. I would say I'm glad I won't have to listen to any more of those @$^@ commercials, but I have a feeling this guy will be using this as a marketing strategy for years. He's just that kind of a guy.
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So obviously the mood out yonder in Boston is pretty good today. A little sleepy, but good
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