For the past two weeks I’ve been neck deep in the gut grinding anxiety that comes from a rapid, broadside influx of “Things I Should Know About But Don’t”. Who knew “growing up” would be a pimp slap to my intelligence? (besides both my parents, my brothers and every person older than me that I’ve ever met.)
So… What do you know that you wish you had known before you found out about it? Drop some knowledge on me… please.
So hi everybody… How ya doing? In effort to cross something off of my three page to-do list other than “watch superbowl commercials and be horribly disappointed” or “attempt to hem pants while watching superbowl commercials and completely mess it up and have to pick out the stitches one by one” I’m updating my blog. (shuddup jordan) Here goes…
Since January 9th I’ve been gainfully employed at a job where goofing off on the internet is frowned upon. The horror. It’s actually taking me more time to get used to that than to adjust to getting up at 6 every morning. Luckily besides that the job is pretty awesome. And yes… that’s all the detail you get. I’ve been a bit paranoid about identity theft lately although I could just be making that up to justify my new shredder. Funny how little obsessions work.
In other news, if for some reason you (like me) somehow missed the whole Lord of the Rings trilogy on film you should rectify that situation immediately. If you don’t happen to have a wonderful friend with an overly large television and another wonderful friend with the directors cut of Return of the King (thanks jordan and blair) as well as a spare 12 hours or so… then I just don’t know what to tell you. For those of you keeping count you can now add Frodo (complete with purple shadowed eyes… does it make me dorky that I saw that scene and immediately wanted the hex code for that shade?), Sméagol of the multiple personalities, Samwise and the unutterably badass, beautiful Legolas to the list of characters (including Capn. Jack Sparrow and Kratos) that make my giddy. Ahh… Legolas… ahem.
On a more serious note; If you’re looking to be charitable in the near future, strongly consider checking out http://www.brinkmeyer.org A friend of mine just lost her father to cancer. He was very heavily involved with Habitat for Humanity here in Tallahassee and in his honor the family is doing a celebration build (awesome idea). They need donations to reach the $47,000 they need of so if you can offer anything, go to the website and see how you can help. I know Jamie and her family will appreciate anything you can do.
In a rare occurrence I’m glad it’s Monday. Of course it’s less about Halloween and more about the fact that my weekend stunk worse than fish emulsion on a hot day. If you don’t know how that smells… count your blessings.
I’m exaggerating a bit though, so I’ll give you the high points.
For the second weekend in a row I’ve actually cooked. I think maybe it’s the weather. Fall makes me crave vegetables like nobody’s business. Last weekend I made collard greens (still good even though I scorched them a bit) and oatmeal cookie dough. This weekend I did baked chicken and potato salad. I think my next attempt will be yellow squash which is incredibly easy to make but soooo good. We’ll see though. If I’m not in the mood to cook the food never comes out right so generally I don’t force it.
I read four really good books this weekend. Yes I’m a fast reader but they are also young adult books so it’s not as amazing as it could be.
The first was incredible… as have been all of the other books I’ve read by Nancy Farmer. The House of Scorpions is a disturbing but incredibly human science fiction story that takes place some unknown time in the future. I had no expectations when I started it because I didn’t even read the cover flap. It’s probably a good thing I didn’t because I normally avoid futuristic sci-fi. I had to stop reading several times because things got too real or too overwhelmingly deep (which for me is about 6 inches… I like my reading light ;)). My little reality breaks never really lasted long because I wanted to find out what would happen next too badly. The story makes you think and for me stirred up some strong reactions. I would recommend this one to anyone of any age.
The other three were the first in Tamora Pierce‘s Protector of the Small series, her second series about a girl studying to be a knight. I’ve read them before and I will probably read them again. A bit under the radar of my audience but if you have a younger (precocious 8 to fantasy loving 16) sister, niece or cousin this is a good author to turn them onto.
When I was younger I heard that phrase a lot. It was delivered scathingly whenever I mentioned that we weren’t allowed to do whatever it was we were planning to do. It was the standard challenge whenever I refused to take sides in the frequent trivial arguments. It was the ultimate accusation of betrayal.
Perhaps because I was my Daddy’s girl, I eventually realized that I was only called a Daddy’s girl when I decided to be the voice of reason or common sense in our prepubescent band of misfits. It didn’t take long after that for me to accept the truth.
Yes, I am my Daddy’s girl, always have been always will be. And if that means that I’m not going to put up with your bullshit then that’s fine with me and I’m proud of it.
So even though he doesn’t even know I have a blog I have to say thank you Daddy. For that and the silliness and the work ethic and the nagging that drives me up the wall and so many other things I would be writing for weeks to get it all down. Because that is what you do on blogs. And because I mean it.
Happy Belated Birthday
I am very, very angry. If I were less of a geek and if my poetry didn’t suck lima beans I would write a poem expressing my anger. Since I’m not and it does here’s my version.
if isAngry(sunshine) AND reason == 'helpless' {
if isAble('sunshine')
donate('time');
anger--;
if notBroke('sunshine')
donate('money');
if isConnected('sunshine')
spreadWord('solicit', 'all');
anger--;
if(anger > normal)
explode('sunshine');
throwSomething('sunshine', 'tv', 'offBalcony');
beatSomething('sunshine', 'anything', 'bloodypulp');
}
Now I know what you’re thinking… a value of bloodypulp can’t be a good for anyone. You’re absolutely right. Good news is that the expedition to Mobile to do disaster relief for the next three weekends is full. Better news is that you can go to VolunteerLeon to sign up to hear about other such efforts or needs.
FSU has some other tips for the FSU community about how we (they) are trying to help. Check the homepage for the Hurricane Relief Effort Link under news. For example, if you’re going to the game this weekend you can take your spare cash and give it to the Red Cross volunteers that will be collecting stuff.
You can also do normal style donations to the Red Cross if the mood hits you. If you can’t give cash stay away from the Red Cross. There may be other organizations that take non-cash donations and have the manpower to process these donations and get them where they need to be but the RC isn’t having it. I don’t know of these places (beyond the normal email forward type stuff) and I can’t vouch for them so I’m not listing them. I’m sure Google and the news sites are teeming with links to charitable orgs that want to help.
In the lovely bit of code up top you’ll notice that donating money doesn’t actually decrease anger. That’s because it doesn’t make me feel anymore helpful. I’m a hands on type of girl and New Orleans is MY city so if you have some suggestions on how I can avoid getting to the bloody pulp stage I would love to hear it.