Monthly Archives: February 2009

Something I should know…?

Tomorrow is my birthday, so when I saw a package by my front door, I got excited. One would assume it was a birthday present.

If this is what you thought, then obviously you haven’t been paying attention. Those kinds of things happen to normal people. Not me.

In front of my door? An approximately 3 lb. box of baby formula samples addressed to me, courtesy of Similac.

I have no idea why and what mailing list I could have ended up on, and now I am just irritated that I have to find a food bank or something to donate this unexpected bounty.

Quoth the poet who didn’t even know it

I just read a book written in what I believe is called lyrical free verse, and it got me thinking about poetry as a whole. I never really “got” poetry, as in I have no idea what makes a good poem good, or a bad poem bad – but I do know what I like and don’t like. And I have written enough awful poetry to know that I am no natural poet.  There are a few poems that I like, and if we are considering song lyrics to be poems, then there are plenty that I absolutely love – but as for reading a book of poetry? I just don’t see it happening.

Most of what I read somehow gets lost somewhere between my short and long term memory, and often only an imprint or small phrase will remain – I remember how I felt about a poem, or one or two quick lines that must have struck some chord with me.

Except for Annabel Lee.

I don’t know if its just because it was one of the first poems I remember discussing in school, or because my inner goth loves Poe, or it’s the rhyme scheme, or just the awesomely creepy imagery about mourning a child bride based on a real life dead child bride – but it’s one of my favorites.  For your enjoyment, here it is:

It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea;
But we loved with a love that was more than love-
I and my Annabel Lee;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes!- that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we-
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling- my darling- my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.

What poems get stuck in your head? Are there poets that you are amazed I am not already in love with?  Lyrics that get stuck in your head and give you chills, no matter what?

The Gallery of Awful Art – The Velvet Elvis

I consider myself to have a pretty decent aesthetic. I can appreciate some fine art, and even own and display some in my apartment (generally photographs or collage/mixed media). But I have an unabashed love of really bad art. The bad art in my apartment outnumbers the more refined pieces (for the purpose of “my life”, I am considering pictures of gargoyles refined – they are French).

I feel like – hey, I don’t own the apartment and I don’t have young, impressionable kids to embarrass yet, so I am going to enjoy and indulge my love of awful art. One day, when I have a den or spare room, I will put it there (next to the taxidermy). Some will even go to spare bathrooms, but for now – the walls of my tiny apartment.

What is bad art? I suppose it could be badly drawn pictures, but I kind of consider it art that is earnestly created, but could either make your eyes bleed or make you wonder if I have also covered my couch in plastic. Bonus points for unicorns. Anything involving a clown, or someone with a glistening tear is bad art, except clowns will not be found in my apartment.

I will feature a piece of awful art in my apartment once a week. Consider this the opposite of dooce‘s Daily Style.

To kick it off, I want you to behold the jewel in my collection.

Behold – The Velvet Elvis!!!

The Velvet Elvis

I know. I will let you absorb that for a moment. It’s what you see when you first come to our apartment.

It’s the best of all worlds. It combines my love of Elvis, with the awesomely absurd. And speaking of absurd…

Our friend Abby gave us this painting, before we even moved out. It even came with the awesome frame. It was the first thing adorning the walls of our place, and it’s still my favorite. Frank gets really defensive when people make fun of it. It’s just that awesome.

Do you have anything in your home that just defies taste?

Family Hospital Fun

I could probably do a million posts with how awesome (and occasionally infuriating) my mom is – but I will spare you the thrill for an unexpected late breaking newsflash.

Mom went to the hospital yesterday after complaining about intense pain in her side.  After a long, long day it was determined that she has some sort of infection (low grade fever, elevated white blood cell count) and has both gall stones and kidney stones.

The kidney stones are bad, and there were two giant ones causing some sort of blockage. She thinks she passed one, but they will do more scans to check whatever it is they check. But, that’s what was causing the serious pain.

The fever and infection were apparently due to an inflamed gall bladder (filled with fun gall stones!) and so they are going to take that out tomorrow AM.

My family has no luck with gallbladders (I had mine removed when I was about 22) so I am familiar with the procedure, but am concerned about my mom’s recovery – but I guess only time will tell.

Unfortunately, because my dad has been so sick for the past few years (heart attacks, cancer) I am no stranger to the fear of having a parent in the hospital – but my mom’s mortality scares the hell out of me. I worry about her so much, and I hate to see her do things that I consider self-destructive – but really, what can I do? I am doing all I can not to be a nervous chalereh.*

Well, one thing I can do is watch over her in the hospital. I swear – she is so busy either worrying about everyone else or trying to get people to laugh or like her that it’s causing me some serious agita.

I am chatting with my sister as some nurse gets my mom ready for a scan of some sort. I hear her ask mom a question, and mom answers “not really.” My sister and my own ears perk up – “What was the question Mom?” Apparently, the nurse asked my mom if she was allergic to something, and my mom answered “Not Really.” As if you can be a little pregnant or something. It’s a “yes” or “no” question. Apparently, mom was allergic to sulfur drugs as a kid, but was under the (mistaken) impression that drugs don’t have sulfur any more, so she decided it wasn’t important.

I also caught her telling the doctor that her leg hasn’t hurt in the past few weeks, when in reality – she has been complaining about her leg for months. Apparently, they should have specific “upper leg.” And when a nurse offered her pain meds, she waffled and said “I guess it couldn’t hurt” (har-de-har-har). But when my sister came back, Mom told her, very excitedly that she was finally going to get some pain relief. When asked why the hell she didn’t seem excited to the nurse, or mention anything before? “Well, I thought they wanted me to be in pain so that I could tell them where it hurts.”

The woman is driving me insane.

Speaking of insane – you know that Crazy Grandma is involved somehow. Well, we made the decision to let Grandma know what was going on last night. She went insane – wailing, crying, my daughter, etc.  It was insanely over the top, given that we only just told her that mom had gallstones and was doing fine. Anyway, I bring her to the hospital today (after seven phone calls asking me where I was. As if on the way to pick her up, I may have forgotten I was on my way and just gone out for soup instead?) and we tell her the surgery is tomorrow at noon.  She has an accountant appointment at 10, and then a dinner engagement at her favorite restaurant at 4, so – she won’t be visiting the hospital. She was considering visiting afterwards, but when we told her that if she was driving, she can’t have a drink at dinner, no – not even at the beginning of dinner, she declined.  So much for the wailing and screaming. Let’s not talk about the 15 minute walk through the hospital where she keeps yelling at me that it can’t possibly be the main lobby because despite it being under construction, it can’t possibly look any different than it did in 1972.

* Yiddish alert!!! A nervous chalereh (yes, you do the gutteral “ch”) is a nervous wreck or a Nervous Nellie.

Grad School Waffles

I am going to apply to grad school. I think – and I need some advice, feedback and war stories. I am almost 100% applying to school for my MS in Industrial/Organizational Psychology for the Fall 2009 semester.

And in random order, some bullet points why:

  • My pretty decent GRE scores are about to “expire.” I either apply now, or re-take them later. This seems unlikely and painful.
  • It actually really upsets me that I don’t have my Masters in something. I never thought I would stop at my BA, and it’s a personal goal.
  • I really, really like the study of Industrial/Organizational Psych. I read about it anyway, and it fascinates me. I kind of think of it as anthropology applied to the corporate world
  • I am not 100% sure what direction my career is headed, but I think this degree would be a nice blanket cover no matter what I decide.
  • The economy stinks, but I still have a great job – this is a great time to build my skills and make contacts
  • Is there really a better time to go, personally? I don’t have kids, my job is great and currently requires no travel and would most likely be flexible and Frank is in grad school, so he totally understands the “leave me alone, I have 10 papers to do” mentality.

Some reasons that are giving me pause:

  • School. Again. Really? Papers, tests, anxiety, classes I don’t want to take, rushing to class from work – ugh
  • I am pretty sure I know what I want to do with my career – but not entirely. What if this is a waste of time? What if I would have been better re-taking the GMATs and getting an MBA? Or, I decide to leave the corporate world forever and go be a teacher or a librarian or forest ranger? (all unlikely scenarios)
  • Money. If I go to CUNY, I should be able to swing it financially (even if I take out loans) but – it’s still money that isn’t really pouring in at the moment.
  • It’s a Psychology degree. I got a D in my only undergrad Psych class. Not because I didn’t like it, but because I didn’t go (a bout of awful depression). But, I got a D with never going to class! Go me! But, they may not be as impressed.

Stuff I still have to do (by April 1):

  • Figure out who to get recommendations from. I am pretty sure I can secure at least one at my current company, but who should the second one be from? I don’t really want to ask my undergrad professor for another one, but will if its the best hope.
  • Figure out if I should write a supplemental essay explaining my awful Psych grade, or just hope that my first essay is that awesome.
  • Write an essay that explains why I want to go to grad school (presumably not in bulleted form). This means I have to figure out exactly why I want to go and how its going to help.
  • Gather my transcripts, and all that other fun bureaucratic stuff.

So, that’s it. Doesn’t seem that bad.  And really, I think I will feel so much better if I just go for it – even if they reject me.

Darwin and Fairy Doors

Today is Darwin’s 200th Birthday. Pretty cool. I attended a phone conference celebrating his birthday (and joined the facebook group) that is hosted by Phil Terry of Creative Good.  A friend sent me this Gallup Poll - It’s pretty depressing. But, I do think that framing it as “do you believe?” is already part of the problem. Evolution isn’t something to believe in, like a deity or a religion. I also think a lot of people don’t “believe” in Evolution because they don’t understand it. They either think its this Lemarckian concept, or they think that we decended from orangutans holding the atheist’s nightmare – a banana. In any case, it drives me crazy.

And, in case you are riled up about Creationism or mystical forces that started “macro-evolution” – I present to you the awesome catalog ever. The Pyramid Collection. I always thought this was a guilty pleasure of mine – found during my gothy teenage days.

Jezebel.com recently wrote about it for their “Day In Catalogs” feature and I am spreading the love. (I not-so-secretly love the Fairy Doors.) I love the “Goddess Plus Sizing” and the random “personal massagers” and the flowy dresses and rings that can conceal poison. And the horrible plaques about Dragons and Magick within. I highly recommend it – just don’t forget to remove yourself from the mailing list if you decide owning a small, crystal dragon collection seems like a good idea.

Choose Your Own Vacation

Frank and I need a vacation, and I have enough vacation days to take one. What we don’t have is money, but at this point – we need a vacation.

I don’t want to spend more than$1,500 and my only goal is to not think. I don’t want anything where we are doing lots of sightseeing or running around. A pool would be perfect. Except, if that’s all I do, I will go nuts. And Frank is not really the sunbathing type. So, I was thinking an all-inclusive resort of some type. Or a cruise? We also don’t really gamble and Frank doesn’t drink.

At this point, I think we have decided on a Carribean cruise. Four nights. We are trying to decide between Royal Carribean, Carnival or Celebrity. Anyone have any opinions or experience? Would it be good for two young people who act like old people?

Any press is good press?

Since about the middle of last year, I have been faithfully blogging every book I read – presumably for a year, but who knows how long I will keep it up. The blog gets some decent traffic, but it’s mainly from friends. I don’t really think about traffic or readership too much, because unlike this one, I know what it’s sole purpose is, and it’s really just to keep myself entertained and give an accounting of what I read.

I got a little behind on the blogging because I read a few good books in a row, and I ended up having to post two entries in a day, just to keep myself in line. I didn’t love the second book, and was a little burnt out about writing about how I feel about customer service books about Starbucks, so I just kind of jotted something down. Of course, that’s when the author of the book finds my post about his book and comments. How embarrassing. I stand by what I wrote – I didn’t really love the book, but most of that wasn’t the author’s fault. It didn’t come highly recommended, I am a little burnt out on books of the kind and I am not sure there is anything original left for me to hear about Starbucks. Just because he wrote it first doesn’t mean I read it first.

The only other author who has commented on my blog was the author of a book I really liked (thank goodness) – “Half of Me.”  I wish more authors would find my comments about books I loved (and offered me thousands of free books and sent me their manuscripts in gratitude with solicitations for my editing advice) but the ones I don’t fall in love with? I am not sure. If I really, really disliked it, part of me wishes they would find my review and change it or discuss it with me. The other half of me hopes they never find it because I really hate the idea of hurting someone’s feelings.

But, when I write? I have to write with the idea that someone I don’t want to read it, may.  It’s the same thing I try to keep in mind on this blog. And I should remember not to post just for the sake of posting.

Blog, blog. Blog blog blog. Blog Blogging blogger, blog. I feel like this whole post was just blog-blog!

My Part to Save the World

For a girl who works in Marketing, I really hate direct mail. It’s a waste of resources, postage and usually – it’s just trash. I know there are some people who really love catalogs, but I just can’t wrap my head around it. I do have a fondness for trade magazines, but some people are just either addicted to that pure joy of receiving mail, or too lazy to cancel stuff and would just rather toss it.

After a round of lay-offs at my company, we all started taking turns delivering the mail.  And when it was my turn, I realized  that not only were there people who really, really loved catalogs that were no longer there, or mail was coming for people who haven’t been there in years.  Or, I would give the correct or most logical person the mail, and they would glance at it, and toss it right in the trash. This was upsetting for a few reasons – one being the waste of paper and resources, and the other a pang of sympathy for my fellow marketeers and the lost money.

In an act of heroism (my term), I sent an email to the company offering to have a clearinghouse of sorts. If you receive a magazine, catalog, awful promotional plastic-y items or some other junk mail that you don’t want, give it to me. I have volunteered to remove us from all sorts of lists. I also try to deliver the mail more often, and if I see a magazine that used to go to someone else, that some one else may like, I ask them. If they want it, I have asked them to call up the company and switch the name to their own, so that it gets delivered to them in the future.

So far, so good. It takes me about a half hour each week, and I’ve been doing it about two months. Already I am seeing some improvement. I try to keep track of which companies make it easy to unsubscribe from, and which ones make it really hard. Also, I get to see all sorts of awesome trade magazines, like “the ‘only’ magazine dedicated to in house printing.” Who knew? You also wouldn’t believe how many of the same things get mailed to so many different people at the same company.

Want to do the same? Catalog Choice is pretty good for most catalogs that you may receive at home, and Ec0-Cycle has some good suggestions and links for both work and home.

The Fury of the Fridge

I am not a good person. How do I know? I am currently posting because I am worked up, in a tizzy over Caffeine Free Diet Coke. I shall explain.

I live with my boyfriend. He is a good person, albeit sometimes forgetful. He is not generally selfish or inconsiderate or any other horrible thing that should cause my mother to worry. But sometimes I think that perhaps I am one of those people that should live alone. Note – I will regret this post when either A) I am alone in the house and a very large bug has been found or B) Almost the entire summer, because Frank goes to the North Atlantic all summer, leaving me – alone. But, I digress. What does my dear, sweet boyfriend do that drives me up a wall? He eats food and beverage.

Now, some of my anger is rightly directed at him, and some of it is no fault of his own – it could be anyone. But one of my giant pet peeves is thinking I have something, that I don’t. Specifically food. (Yes, I am in therapy for my food issues. That’s a whole other post.)

I hate coming home, expecting to find something I have been saving, or just remember buying sometime in the past. Whether it’s my leftovers, or frozen pizza or whatever. When it’s not there, I experience a level of anger that I can definitely talk myself out of (usually) but it just can’t be normal.

Right now? I am heating up leftovers. I check on the top of the fridge because I know Frank bought some 100 calorie cupcake things. I had no intention of actually finding it, because hey, we bought it days ago, and if it lasted the hour I would have been shocked. And yet? Mild irritation that it’s not there. I shouldn’t be eating those anyway. I barely like them.

My microwave beeped and my questionably delicious leftovers are ready. There is no Diet Coke.  Well, the world may have just collapsed.

I need caffeine-free Diet Coke/Pepsi, because I am approximately 87 years old and the caffeine irritates my gastritis. So, Frank and I buy soda in both the Diet form (for him) and the Caffeine Free Diet form (for me). We buy him twice as much, since he drinks twice as much. Well, apparently – the well was dry, because the only soda in the house is about an 1/8th of an inch of Diet Pepsi, sitting on the counter, with the lid barely screwed on. And yet, while this isn’t a shock to me (and I have some delicious lemonade as a back-up plan), it never ceases to amaze me how annoyed I am.

And I don’t mean this to be a big post about why my boyfriend is a jerk – because he isn’t. It’s more I WANT SODA NOW and I am whining to the internet like a toddler. Am I crazy? Do other people have these tantrums?

Soda

P.S.  Update: The lemonade is awful. You fail, Stew Leonard’s.

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