meta-emotion

whom do you love?

2009-10-01T15:41:00.000-06:00

How much control do we have over whom we love? I've always assumed that I could love almost anyone if I got to know and appreciate them. Assuming, that is that the person loved me back. None of this one true love stuff for me. I'm adaptable. The problem with that is that I do actually want certain things for myself, and I'm starting to wonder whether Jason is going to be the one to provide those things. He is talking about selling the Sailport again which I find both exciting and terrifying. On the one hand, if he could develop a different career he would be so much more portable, and I really don't relish the idea of having to quit my job in Tucson because Jason is incapable of moving. On the other hand, I don't actually want to be the one who completely supports a man who doesn't work at all. Maybe that would be OK for a couple, three years if we have a young child, but not forever, and what in the world would Jason do if he didn't run the Sailport? The problem is that I don't have enough confidence in his planning abilities to feel comfortable leaving it completely to him to figure out. And that's where my wondering about him as a potential partner comes in. Do I really want to be with someone I don't feel I can depend on in that way?

work politics

2009-09-28T13:46:00.000-06:00

There's been a somewhat uncomfortable situation at work. It actually arose last week, and it's still unresolved. Briefly, what happened is this. There is a woman who wants to do an unpaid internship here and she's looking for a supervisor. She already had an arrangement with one of the other psychologists here, but she stopped going to supervision part-way theough her time and so didn't get signed off. It would be very straightforward to simply say that she isn't qualified for the experience and what's more, I don't have time to supervise anybody else except that the woman's husband is a relatively powerful physician here who apparently has grants. I guess he is threatening to leave if his wife is not supervised through the program. I really don't want to get caught up in this mess. The nightmare scenario is that she does something inappropriate while I am supervising her and then I lose my license and don't even have malpractice or legal support from the VA since we didn't have the appropriate contract with her. I'm hoping that it doesn't come to it, but I'm not going to be forced into this. I actually talked I've the whole thing on the phone with dad last night and it was really helpful. I had been hesitant to do that since I really don't like to discuss problems with them, but they were really good about this. My fear with them is that they will get really reactive and I'll spend all this time calming them down and then have to talk about it over and over again in subsequent conversations.

work politics

2009-09-28T13:36:00.001-06:00

Ring emergency

2009-08-08T20:08:00.002-06:00

Jason and I went to the mall to cruise jewelry stores and see if we could find cheaper wedding rings that we could live with. Good news, there are a number of options, and at the last store we went to, Jason found one that he really likes. The sales lady seemed a little ditsy throughout our conversation. I made a couple of comments about the reddish tinge to my ring and I could tell she just didn't get it. Then I did a very foolish thing. The lady offered to clean my rings for me. I agreed. The moment the door closed behind her I had the worst feeling. I imagined horrible things happening to the ring. Then she brought it back out. She put the ring next to a rose gold ring as we'd been talking about the difference between the shades (she seemed to think that my ring's shade of gold was some kind of coincidence of where the gold was mined rather than because it was specially produced to specifications at Neissing). Anyway, the first thing I noticed was that the ring was completely shiny. No satin finish AT ALL. For a moment I thought that was just part of the cleaning process and that she had stopped half way. Then she gave the ring back to me. I freaked. The whole point of the design is the way the satin and the shiny bits set each other off. The ring looks completely different. The woman wanted to take the ring back and satin finish it herself, but I refused. She is supposed to have her jeweler come in next weekend and he is going to do it, but I put a call in to the owner of the jewelry store where we got the ring and hopefully she can let me know whether that's a good idea or not. For myself, that will be the last time anybody touches my ring, particularly anybody in a mall!!

Current Mood: I think I'm getting an ulcer.

wedding progress

2009-08-05T21:07:00.000-06:00

So the wedding plans are proceeding apace. We have cake, atire, the site (of course), and (almost) an officiant. It feels strange to be moving into a phase of my existence in which I am so closely bound up to someone else.

Part of me really likes it, but part of me already feels confined by what I consider to be the limitations of my partner. It's a little like a tight belt has been fastened around my body and my arms have gotten caught beneath it. Most of the time I don't struggle against it, but then occasionally I stretch and remember what it was like to have complete freedom of movement.

Then again, I'm in a position where I am enjoying all of the obligations of marriage without a lot of the benefits. It's a good thing I love J as much as I do because I could end up really dissatisfied right about now.

self conscious misery

2009-08-05T19:49:00.000-06:00

It is raining outside and there is the most beautiful yellow storm light, but I feel inexplicably melancholy. It's true there is the money situation, and I really haven't been taking care of myself, subsisting as I am on binges of good food along with a steady stream of candy.

There was just a giant peel of thunder. Wonderful.

I must go back to exercising and being more moderate in my food consumption. It's a good thing that I don't drink since these are the moments where I could see myself escaping from the moment in too much alcohol. I need to make friends down here. I think of myself as a hapily solitary creature, but it just isn't true. I need the companionship of others as much as the next person.

I think the fact that I'm watching Brideshead Revisited isn't helping matters, for I've rarely seen a more self consciously miserable film in my life. It makes me sick when people who have no real problems winge all over the place, and then look at me.

and now I feel poor

2009-08-04T23:16:00.000-06:00

Jason and I have been looking at cars. And basically, it ends up that I can't afford a single one of the things we were looking at. I have this problem where I go through stages where I alternately feel rich and poor. It's like I cycle through dad's extravegant outlook and mom's frugal outlook sequentially.

This whole car thing has made me feel poor. I had gotten it into my head that this might actually be the time when Jason could get his dream car. His dream car isn't that expensive really. It's the lancer evolution, and it's basically 30,000. Could be a lot worse. Plus, I've been feeling all loving and like I want him to have the things that he really wants. The only problem is that I just computed my budget and figured out that I have about $700 per month of discretionary funds, and any one of the cars I was looking at would basically eat all of that up. Then no money for wedding dress or house maintenance, let alone remodeling. It makes me sad though because again, I want him to have the things that will make him happy and this is certainly one of them.

Then again, part of me feels just a tiny bit of resentment that Jason's wants are so expensive. I feel like the things that I enjoy are relatively modest in comparison. Though house remodeling not so much.

It smacks of illegal taxation

2009-07-28T22:33:00.001-06:00

I just discovered not one, but two parking tickets on the truck. I parked the truck facing the wrong way in front of the house, and apparently that is a $175 per day offense. What's more, on the ticket envelope it lists some of the other $175 offenses: parking within 5 feet of a drive way, blocking a driveway (even your own). One of the $75 dollar offenses is parking a for sale vehicle in an unpaved lot. It just makes me wonder what the big deal is (other than making the city money). The most annoying thing to me is that this threw me into a budgeting panic. Spending $350 on parking tickets means that I don't quite have enough money to pay for the house renovations and actually live next month. Or at least it will be close. I am expecting a check from Desert Psych which may be my saving grace. We'll see.

and now he's under the bed

2009-07-26T18:39:00.000-06:00

Xanadu only yowled for about 30 minutes I was surprised actually. I thought he would carry on for the entire 2 hour car trip. I'm a little worried though. He's gone under the bed in the hot bedroom and won't come out. I shoved his water dish in there pretty close to him, but I haven't seen him drink yet. Not that I'm watching him every minute, but I am trying to listen for kitty drinking noises. I'm sure he'll be ok in the long run, but I had hoped he would start exploring things after just a couple of hours under the bed.

The impetus for me bringing Xanadu down here was Jason's trip to Oshkosh (I assume the same place the overalls come from). He's flying to Montana today and then driving with his friend and his friend's glider the rest of the way to Wisconsin. I admit to being jealous of him going, but more because I feel like I didn't have as much warning of the trip as I usually do, not because I'm really crazy about the idea of traveling to the Midwest for a week of looking at airplanes. Not that I can afford a trip right now anyway with the $4000 tiling bill I just got and the prospect of buying a car in the next month or so.

things I've learned about contractors

2009-07-23T19:25:00.000-06:00

The contracting work on the house is almost done. Thank god. Even though it really hasn't been going on that long, I feel really fed up with it. I'm not sure how it'll be when I do eventually get around to redoing the kitchen. Here are the things I've learned from my first experience with contractors though.

1. Do not trust them to remember or do the things they say they will. Ask for pictures.
2. Use email as your primary mode of communication. It leaves a paper trail.
3. Ask for their contractor license number, a copy of their employees compensation insurance, and liability and product liability insurance.
4. Don't make final payment until the work is completed to your satisfaction.
5. Update them constantly on what still needs to be done and pester them for reports on the status of the job.
6. It really will take AT LEAST three times longer than they say it will.
7. The dirt that the construction creates everywhere else in the house is almost worse than having the area being worked on a mess.

I'm hopeful that the next time I do all of this I will be older and wiser about the process.

being vulnerable

2009-07-20T19:39:00.000-06:00

It's amazing how being willing to be vulnerable really is the essence of being in love for me. Sure, love is made up of a lot of other things too, appreciating the other person for who s/he is, enjoying their company, sex, but none of those is as hard for me as allowing myself to trust that other person enough that I will be open to the possibility of being hurt. I don't know if that is specific to me, or if that really is one of the hardest things for everybody. I certain did have a number of early life experiences in which I was rejected by peers which may have made me more sensitive to that, but I think that what makes each of us feel vulnerable may be unique enough that everyone has different flavors of the same issue.

now I remember

2009-07-19T16:40:00.000-06:00

Yesterday I got to spend the whole day with Jason. When I got there friday night I'd been obsessing bout how nice it would be to date other people, and I must admit that I was not super nice to Jason. I could feel myself being short tempered no matter what I tried. But then, saturday, we had sex in the morning, tried ran errands together, did cake tasting and some other little normal things before having dinner with Eric and Cindy. It was idyllic. Jason is so pleasant to be around and he suites me so well it's strange that I even get tempted by other men. I'm glad I never have cheated on him or anything like that. I think it really would be something I would always regret, no matter what kinds of rationalizations I can come up with in my weaker moments. It is such a wonderful thing that were getting married.

The other thing is that I actually did tell Jason that I'd like to have a kid with him. I did it in the weirdest way, and I hadn't been planning on saying anything. We had just gone to test drive a car, and I mentioned again that having a two-door might be difficult if we had a kid. Then I just went off on this kid tangent and confessed that I would really like to have a kid with him, and that the whole reason I've never wanted to actually say that is my fear that if I was the driving force behind having the kid that he would be a lot less likely to participate in the childrearing. It was a very vulnerable feeling talking about that stuff, but I'm really glad I said it. I feel a lot less deceptive and closer with Jason because of it.

how superficial am I?

2009-07-17T15:57:00.000-06:00

How superficial am I? I know there's that matching theory with mate values and such, and I know that applies to friends to some degree too, but I've noticed myself falling into the trap of judging people based on those pesky, obvious characteristics of looks, money, and intelligence.

I think intelligence is less superficial, but maybe I'm just more in denial about it. I'm thinking about the fact that I would rather invite Bruce to the wedding who has both obscene amounts of money and an IQ unlike any I've seen outside of an academic institution, than some of my less pleasant relatives. Is it because he really is a super nice guy? Or is it some combination of the money and intelligence?

I'm also thinking about the two cutest guys I've met in Tucson thus far, my tile contractor and the pain psychologist. Both cute. Pain dr also obviously a really bright guy. And interestingly, if I think about actually sleeping with one of them, the contractor sounds more appealing because there's no way he'd ever be a real threat to my relationship. It's more like sleeping with the hired help. Again, superficial?

love and temptation

2009-07-16T21:50:00.000-06:00

It's that whole deal of faithfulness vs temptation. The tile guy, Mike, was just here working on my place. He's a really cute guy. I find myself imagining all kinds of pleasant indiscretions. Totally not honorable, but part of me feels like Jason made a choice when he didn't even want us to look for a place midway where we could live together. I know that's not fair to him, but I've got pretty strong unfulfilled needs right now and it's kind of killing me. Jason and I need to have really hot, kinky sex this weekend.

I just gave Mike the key to the house (ostensibly so he can get in while I'm gone to do more tiling). I have this little fantasy of him letting himself in during the night and having his way with me. Delicious.

It's that age old question of how does one resist doing the wrong thing that feels great in the moment for the long-term good.

One marshmallow now vs two later?

pride is a very common failing

2009-07-15T19:37:00.000-06:00

The bathrooms still aren't done. What was supposted to be a week to two week job has turned into six. I'm annoyed particularly because I was planning to move Xanadu down this weekend, and at this rate that won't happen.

The one nice thing, and what my title refers to is that the tile guy just tried to pick me up. It's always flattering, particulay as he's a cute guy. Let's me know I can still pull. I was a little discombobulated when he asked me if I was single. I'm trying to remember if I said, "thank you," or the much less appropriate and arrogant-sounding, "I'm sorry."

car shopping

2009-07-13T16:18:00.000-06:00

So I have drawn the conclusion that there will come a time when my Gigi is so old and breaking with such frequency that I will need a new car. I've been test-driving all kinds of different things. Yesterday I went to the Mitsubishi dealership with Jason and we drove a new Eclipse. I wasn't too thrilled with that. Of course, most of the cars that I really do like are the more expensive ones. My favorites right now are the vw Passat cc, the Infiniti G37 coupe, the Volvo c30, the subaru wrx, and the Hyundai genesis. We'll see. I'm still hoping my car works for another couple of years.

the rest of our lives

2009-07-12T23:56:00.000-06:00

So, Jason and I had a serious life planning conversation in the car on the way back up to Phoenix today. He expressed a strong desire to move back up to Alaska. Of course, he didn't have a great sense of what he would do professionally up in Alaska. I guess he's talked to Dale some about buying commerci property together to rent out. On the one hand, the idea appeals to me. That way Jason could basically be the stay at home dad while I had my career.

But, on the other hand, the idea of actually moving to Alaska seems unnecessarily big and scarey. Idk. Part of me doesn't relish the idea of spending the rest of my life in Arizona, but I'm also so spoiled by the nice weather and having friends and family around.

Plus, I have this nagging fear that the lack of sunlight or an easily created circadian rhythm would cause me to get cancer and die the way Jason's mother did. Maybe that is kind of superstitious, but I have heard about research saying that people in Alaska get cancer at higher rates than in other places.

I guess I shouldn't really worry though. The likelihood that Jason will actually get himself together and generate a workable plan for moving to Alaska seems slim to none to me.

what must that have been like?

2009-07-09T19:39:00.000-06:00

Today I saw my first gay vet since starting this position. Gay guys were pretty common out in Palo Alto, but here in the deep West they are a lot less common. He was openly talking to me about his partner as I walked him down the hall to his next class, and I found myself worrying about whether there were any other vets nearby who might overhear us. It made me think about what it must have been like foe this guy when he was in the navy. I know the navy has that reputation for having all these gay sailors wandering around, but I would actually think that would make the straight guys harder on anybody they knew was gay. Then again, maybe there's truth in the stereotype and there is a strong underground gay culture in the navy that made it easier for this guy. Anyway, I hope that he meets with accepting guys while he's in the program.

doing brave things

2009-07-08T19:20:00.000-06:00

So, a few days ago I did something I'm really proud of. I was in a very uncomfortable psych area mtg where the area head had just been to a mtg in Phoenix where aparently my once friend now enemy from grad school, Brad had been presenting the decisions of the main office. Every time someone said Brad's name I had an uncomfortable stress reaction.

During the mtg I realized that a lot of my reaction was me feeling guilty about the way things ended up between us. I'm still convinced that he behaved very badly, but there's also no doubt in my mind that I did a lot to make him uncomfortable thereafter.

So I sent Brad a friend invitation on facebook. I was all concerned that he would reject or ignore it, but I felt so much better just knowing that I had made the overture. And lo and behold, he accepted and we've messaged back and forth a couple of times in a way that really reminds me why we were friends to begin with.

It's amazing how much better I feel about internship now that we've made up. I had no idea that there really was that much of a pall over the experience. It just goes to show how much we can get used to. I still don't think he's on the wedding guest list, but I hope we hang out the next time he's in Phoenix.

My life these days

2009-07-07T13:14:00.002-06:00

so, I'm trying to get myself to feel established here in tucson. I started out really liking the place. It's smaller than phoenix, but it has the university and what I consider to be a more quirky feeling (perhaps that quirkiness should really be labeled dumpiness). I have started exercising regularly again this past week, and obviously I'm blogging again. The things I need to do are: find a gaming group, find a knitting group, move Xanadu, and start participating in some of the work social activities. At least I am getting to hang out with Jason's grandma. She really is an advanced person. Like my mom she's had to go through so much crap in her life to get to where she is. I think one of the things she has on my mom though is that she left home without getting married right away, which lets her know that she really can be independent and function out in the world. I think I will add her to my short list of practically perfect people.

Current Mood: groggy

My series of crises

2009-07-06T21:29:00.003-06:00

so, since I last posted on here, I bought a house, have gotten settled in my new job, and Jason and I went to Italy. Despite all the food stuff, it's largely felt like a series of misadventures, with something going wrong at every turn.

The house for example. I still love it and think it's the cutest, most unique thing, but I've been broken into twice now. The most rediculous part of that is that I haven't really lost any posessions, just my sense of safety, and the abundant damage done by the criminals who broke in. The first time I was here in bed sleeping. I somehow got it into my head that the racket the burgled was making was simply my neighbors trying to wake me because a tree limb had come down or something. It wasn't until one of the men physically broke down the door that I realized something was wrong. I freaked out of course, but comforted myself with the notion that I had actually scared the burgled more than he had scared me. I started leaving lights on and brought my gun down. The second time was just last weekend. I was up in Phoenix for the weekend, and my contractor texted me saying someone had vandalized the house. Well, it turned out to be a little more than vandalism. Whomever did this took down the board covering up the bathroom window and smashed through the tile on the expensive tile bathroom. Now I just feel like I want to be back in Phoenix with Jason to help protect me.

Then there's the tile guys. The bathrooms do look pretty nice, but the guy quoted me the wrong price on the tile initially, they didn't take down the baseboards when they put in the tile flooring, and the worst thing is that they left the gap where the old window used to be as just a gap without any supports or insulation or anything. Jason is mad and is recommending that I fire the guys if they won't take down whatever parts of the walls they need to to do it correctly. I'm not so sure about that. Finding someone else to do it would be such a big hassel, unless Jason and Mark really can come down and finish the job themselves.

The trip to Italy was amazing, but colored by a very disturbing altercation with the anouncer of the wold air games. I guess he thought I was being too noisy, but he started screaming at me in Italian and then finally threw a water bottle at me when I want sufficiently cowed by his temper tantrum. I ended up in tears. I felt like such a wimp. If that had happened here I would have gone straight to security, but it seems like anger/aggression isn't considered as bad there as it is here. I have no desire to return to Italy. The alps were gorgeous though. It was amazing to feel like I was hanging out on the mountains my father climbed as a young man. The other pilots and judges were also really nice there were these two South African judges whom we rented a car with to go up to the alps. The one guy was so nice. I just wanted to find someone to set him up with. The second judge was completely prejudiced though. I told him I was half Chinese at one point and he seemed fine with that, but he made the most off-putting comments about the blacks that we saw in turino. It was really quite impressive in how bad it was. Then there was the hungarian pilot whom I imagined having a little bit of a crush on until we all came over to his hotel for a pool party and he turned out to be the biggest goof ever. He really is a big guy though, and I could imagine him giving very good spankings if he only had a different temperament. Lucky for me Jason's temperament is just about perfect.

Jason came down and spent sunday with me down here after the birthday bar-b-que at Eric and Cindy's place. I so wanted him to stay that when he went back up to Phoenix I cried. What's happened to me? I used to never cry. Now I feel like I cry at the drop of a hat. Maybe that's a sign of being less emotionally closed off. Or maybe I really need to work more at my emotion regulation.

Current Mood: recovery mode

Now I have food

2009-03-10T12:33:00.002-06:00

I'm wondering a little if I am depressed. I did go and get food to put in my fridge for the first time last night. I was all set to make a soup when I got home, but then I realized that I didn't have a couple of the ingredients. I thought about going out to get them. I thought about cleaning the house a little more. I thought about taking a bath, but in the end I just went to bed. It was 7:00. I feel perfectly fine, as well as very rested, but I definitely don't feel settled in yet. With the best of intentions I again plan to go to the supermarket, cook, and clean up the house. We'll see if I end up just going to bed again.

Current Mood: OK, I think.

Things I've learned about moving

2009-03-09T13:18:00.004-06:00

Be sure that you bring pictures and some of your favorite objects with you the first time you sleep in your new place.

Smell is important. Bake ASAP.

The first piece of furniture you should move is a comfy chair.

No matter how much you need to do to the place, take time out to go cool places and make a few friends.

Don't spend all your time working.

Extensively check the functionality of the toilets before you move in.

Buy extra light bulbs.

Have people over to your house when you can.

Bring speakers and play music a lot.

Keep it clean, even while you are updating things.

Current Mood: getting settled, sort of.

Hanh, T. N. (2008). The art of power. New York: HarperOne.

2009-02-27T07:49:00.001-07:00

02/05/09 to 02/24/09
**
In the world of current Buddhist though, Thich Nhat Hanh is a giant. Though my exposure to him is limited to only reading his books, I'm of the opinion that Hanh is a bodhisattva. That said, this is not one of his better books. The art of power puts itself forward as a guide to managing cravings for money, influence, whatever we associate with power. In that it also attempts to discuss how to bring mindfulness to our working lives. However, I found the book to be too diffuse in it's focus. I understand that it is artificial to talk about work without bringing in one's home life or how one copes with emotions or other people, but I really wanted Hanh to stick with just work and go into it more deeply. Interestingly I ended up enjoying the short section by Yvon Chouinard, the owner/CEO of Patagonia, at the end more than the rest of the book. Maybe I'll pick up his Let my people go surfing as an alternative.

Alone and confused

2009-02-27T07:37:00.004-07:00

Last night I spent my first night in my new house. Very strange to think MY new house. But in the past 14 hours I've stopped several times and thought, "What havae I gotten myself into."

When I got there after work I was pleased that it only took me 15 minutes to get house. I started moving stuff in and was immediately struck by how dirty the floors were and how much work I'm going to have to do on the place to update it.

I stashed my meager belongings and tried to set up my air mattress. Of course the pump wasn't working. I frantically moved from one outlet to another thinking that maybe the electrical system on the house had crapped out. Finally I read the directions and realized that I really needed to charge the thing before it would work.

Then I sat down on the floor and started freaking out. I had that panicy I-can't-spend-money-and-there's-nothing-to-do feeling. Jason talked me down a bit and I went and got cleaning supplies at Target after which I found a Rubios and got a burrito which I ate while sitting on the floor trying to read my book. The pump for the air mattress did finally, half-heartedly blow up the thing, but only about 70% so that if I sat up while I was on the thing my butt would sink down to the floor. Needless to say I have a back ache this morning.

As is my wont, I got up at four this morning and started cleaning. I swept and then swiffered, and then started wet mopping when time ran out and I had to come in to work.

The cleaning does make me feel better though. A clean house is so much more livable.

Current Mood: Wondering if more panic is warranted.

Mo money

2009-02-26T06:57:00.003-07:00

So I signed all kinds of papers yesterday and supposedly the house closed. Of course, there is always a caveat. Yesterday the caveat was that the lender is concerned about old termite damage in the place. At least the termite guy said the damage was old. Well, the realtor took it upon himself to use some of the repair money to have the house sprayed for termites. I was annoyed that nobody notified me before all that happened, but it doesn't sound like there was any choice in it so I guess it was OK. The realtor did say that he and his wife would pay for my home warranty. I wonder how I get that arranged. For whatever reason none of this process felt like it went as smoothly as I would have liked it to and I feel like all of it has left me a bit more cynical than I was before.

Plus, yesterday I had a mini panic attack about paying my taxes. I realized just how much I made in 08 and how little I'd paid in taxes. No wonder I was suddenly able to afford to buy a motorcycle and have a down payment on a house when I'd never had money before. Suffice it to say that I think I owe a lot of money in taxes this year, and I think it will be OK, but I doubt I'll have much left over to buy furniture or make improvements to the house until I can save money up again. Thank goodness that I'm both making more now and also having taxes taken out of my income, health insurance taken out of my income, etc.

Current Mood: tentative calm

2009-02-23T06:56:00.002-07:00

So yeah, scanty posting this month. Might be the worst month for posting ever. I don't want to post from work and I don't have email access during the week. Hopefully I will soon with the house closing and everything.

At least the house is supposed to close sometime. I have to admit I'm beginning to feel discouraged about the whole thing. Maybe the morgage guys aren't as good as I thought they were, but I was originally supposed to close a week ago Friday. I'm hoping today, but I'm feeling like it could simply get delayed again. I'm not sure why this whole process is so complicated. At leasat I do have some money to get some things on the house taken care of. I really do want to get the floors done, get the plumbing and electrical worked on, and then I can do some things in the yard myself and save up money for the kitchen.

The other big news is that now J and I are planning on not having a wedding. I think it probably is for the best, and I'm working on my attachment to the idea of a wedding. I wish we had decided this in the beginning. Before I started reading a bizillion books on how to plan a wedding. Before I created a picture in my mind of how our wedding would be. Part of me still wants to have the dress made, but maybe in a color other than white. I'm not sure where I would ever wear it again, but that and having other people to share the day with are the things I'm having the hardest time giving up. J wants simply to go on a long trip, but I'm starting to think I would rather save the money to invest in my house if we don't have the party wedding I'd wanted.

Current Mood: disappointed.

West, M. (1997). The broken crown. New York: DAW Fantasy.

2009-02-08T14:57:00.001-07:00

01/08/09 to 02/05/09
***
This book follows the stories of several characters in two lands who have historically been at odds with one another. One of the lands, the dominion, is patterned after Indian/Turkey/other middle eastern/eastern countries during approximately renaissance era. Women are subservient, and a warrior culture dominates. The other land, the empire, is patterned after renaissance europe although with the change that women are seen as relative equals. The main character, if there could be said to be one, is a noble woman in the dominion. The story follows her through upheavals in her society and her own attempts to exert influence.

As a general rule I'm fairly tired of novels set in sexist cultures. Also, as I complained in recent reviews, books that whip the reader between different peripheral characters have felt dull to me lately. That said, West did an excellent job of penning believable cultures with all of their foibles and limitations. The character descriptions, for those characters she has focused on, are nuanced and compelling. I think this is part of what made the peripheral characters feel so weak and uninteresting. I will definitely get the next book in the series, but I'm hoping that West can effectively bring all the story lines she has in play together by the end of the five-book series.

In love with work, J and life

2009-02-08T14:39:00.003-07:00

I've been playing the role of the dedicated employee and I love it! I get to work early, stay late and have been self motivated and engaged with everyone. Plus I like everyone. I'm not sure how long all of this can last, but I'm going to enjoy it as much as I can in the interim.

Being away from J does suck!! The bonus is that I am much more aware while I am with him of the wonderfulness of our relationship. So, does that mean that distance really does make the heart grow fonder? I've been meditating on this and I've decided that there is a perfect amount of space/distance that creates longing. We may have achieved it with the week long separation. Just enough to keep reminding one that things really are fabulous. More and one starts to remember the imperfections; less and it becomes difficult to stay connected.

Current Mood: enjoying

I'm off

2009-02-02T04:22:00.002-07:00

I'm about to leave for my first down at the new job. I'm somewhat thrilled despite the fact that the entire first week is going to be devoted to 8 hrs a day of orientation (someone shoot me). Right now it simply feels like I'm going on a business trip. I think once the house closes (or maybe just after this first week of sleeping on the air mattress) I'll actually feel like I'm moving. This is sappy, but last night I did just lie on the bed with J and savor the fact that at that moment I could spend as long as I wanted like that.

Current Mood: sad but excited

Done done done

2009-01-31T09:10:00.002-07:00

Thursday was my last day at work. Of course with the house and wedding dress shopping (and being generally too worked up to concentrate) I wasn't nearly finished with anything. I'm here to tell you that work marathons work. I hunkered down with a couple of two liters of Dr. Pepper, Red Vines, and a variety pack of mini Mars candybars and spent the night intermittently working and surfing Facebook. So I'm done with notes! They may not all be great masterpieces, but they work well enough. Then the problem was I was so tired (I can't do all-nighters the same way I could in undergrad and grad school) I started getting confused about which notes I had copied to the office files and which I hadn't and I spent another hour and a half double checking that I really had finished everything. By the time I left Friday morning rush hour was over, but I felt a deep sense of satisfaction.

Current Mood: Now what do I do with myself?

House poor!

2009-01-29T06:46:00.004-07:00

After much trauma, a certain amount of weeping, and a generally high stress level, I am now on the verge of house ownership. Of course I partially feel like I've signed away my freedom and much of my disposable income, but it's all worth it!

After the dismal failure of the first realtor, I found one I meshed well with in Rick Howard. Of course that was only after I had looked on my own at every potential house. I was a little miffed that he wouldn't give me a discount on his commission since I'd already found the place without his help, but he's helped enough with other things that I now think he's actually earned his keep. The house itself is adorable. There are a few things I want to do to it to (hopefully) increase its value, but we'll see. Close on the 13th!

Current Mood: trying to move out of the dense underbrush of stress

Kicking and screaming

2009-01-26T08:15:00.002-07:00

I just faxed back over the paperwork placing me one step closer to official house ownership. My sister told me yesterday that I've rocketed into full fledged adulthood all at once. Maybe that's the way it happens for everyone, but she's right. Planning a wedding, starting a real full-fledged job, buying a house.... Especially for the last month I've felt as though I'm pretending really hard to be a responsible adult and I'm not completely sure it's working.

Current Mood: A little shaky

Desolate freedom

2009-01-22T06:32:00.004-07:00

Other people constrain us. They constrain how we spend out time, use our resources, and even how we think. But our relationships also enrich us immeasurably.

When I was a kid I recognized that my parents were older than the parents of most of the other children I knew. I recognized that they would probably die when I was younger than the parents of other children I knew. And I was OK with that. In fact, I thought to myself, "that's the way to do it." That's the way I wanted to have my own children so I would be gone earlier in their lives and they would have the freedom to do whatever they wanted to. What I realize now is that the freedom I imagined then was the only type of freedom I knew then. The freedom of moments stolen away from my parents. Moments in which they simply stand a few feet behind you with their thoughts and comments. The reality is that I prefer that type of freedom to the one in which you turn around and there isn't anyone there.

Now that I am on the point of moving I am so thankful that I didn't break up with J. That we are in a stronger place now than ever before. For a while there I thought that what I wanted was the freedom of moving without any ties. Now I recognize that it would have been a desolate freedom.

Current Mood: melancholy

Personal stress and psychopathology

2009-01-21T06:51:00.004-07:00

For the last week or so I've been in the midst of the second most stressful period in my life.

Applying for fellowship was worse.

Applying for internship, taking the GRE, and moving to Phoenix were better.

trying to finish all of my outstanding work, wedding dress shopping, and driving down to Tucson every free moment I get adds up to overwhelm my usually effective coping mechanisms. I think I have found the house I want, and I do have a long time to really decide about the wedding dress, but the outstanding work has been languishing a bit. I think the next big push is going to come when I just have to sit in the closet for several days together, not moving until I get all my notes done.

Anyway, in the meanwhile I've started to develop some interesting psychopathology. I just realized that I've done these things at times before, but never really identified them as problematic. Anyway, here are my anxiety sx:

racing thoughts (particularly problematic at night)
insomnia (related to the above)
incessant eyebrow plucking/solitaire playing/house searching (compulsions?)
lastly, and this is the most disturbing, I will occasionally get fixated on the idea that we have bedbugs, mosquitoes, fleas, or some other kind of bug infestation. I'll feel like stuff is crawling on me and search through bedclothes, furniture, whatever to reassure myself that that isn't the case

I know I'm being irrational, but just can't help it. I really think my OCPD is developing into full blown OCD.

Benzo anyone?

Current Mood: rampant anxiety

And what am I paying you for again?

2009-01-10T09:57:00.004-07:00

I don't understand the business of buying and selling houses. And with this move down to Tucson I'm taking my first step into the landscape of home ownership. So far I'm not impressed.

I went down to Tucson yesterday and met with a realtor. Just observing how he works I was not impressed. For one thing, I asked to be shown certain neighborhoods, and he didn't. Then when I starting asking him whether the neighborhoods he was showing me were good neighborhoods he told me, "Every neighborhood in Tucson is a good neighborhood." I almost laughed.

Plus the guy couldn't stop talking. He kept commenting on how he would have difficulty talking and driving at the same time, and indeed, as he was driving around I had a few white knuckle moments as he made strange U turns or didn't seem to notice the presence or absence of stop signs. I'm not sure if he was anxious or not, but after three hours with him I certainly was.

The clincher though was that when I started pressing him more about neighborhoods he told me, "Well, I'm not allowed to say b/c I might steer certain racial groups toward certain neighborhoods." What!? Asking if a certain area is a good neighborhood (i.e. low crime rates, high median house price, high SES) is completely different than asking if all the purple martians live there. Maybe this is just paranoia, but by even saying that it made me think he was mentally classifying me into some racial group that would dictate how he would relate to me.

I hope his behavior is not indicative of realtors in general.

Current Mood: annoyed

uncomfortable moments

2009-01-08T10:48:00.002-07:00

I was talking to a woman about different types of counselors, and I mentioned pastoral counselors. When she expressed reservations about them I told her I had met some who were good practitioners but simply operated from a Christian (or whatever) perspective.

She then said, "Well that would be good. I'd definitely prefer that to being around an atheist."

Luckily my internal censors were working because I almost said, "But I'm an atheist," but I stopped myself.

Current Mood: strange to think I might come across like a Christian.

Ross-MacDonald, J. (1997). Alternative weddings. Lanham, MD: Taylor Trade Publishing.

2009-01-08T07:22:00.002-07:00

12/28/08 to 01/07/09
****
Of all the wedding books I've read thus far, this is my favorite. Neither my fiance nor I are religious, and we are interested in making the ritual celebrating our marriage something that is meaningful to us rather than something that simply fits a particular tradition. This book discusses the history of different aspects of wedding ceremonies and then takes you through the wording associated with various types of ceremonies, including examples of nontraditional ones. Reading the history was fascinating and made me more thoughtful about what I wanted to include, and then reading about the ceremonies themselves gave me a lot of ideas about what I would want someone to say. This is an excellent resource for the nontraditional couple who wants to move away from simply saying the same old same old.

Friendships

2009-01-08T07:17:00.002-07:00

I think I am someone whose friendships are less strong because of my romantic relationship. J is gone right now. From late Wednesday through early Saturday he's in LA having a new fabulous motor added to his fast car. Meanwhile I've gone out twice in one day. I wonder if moving to Tucson will create a similar environment. It reminds me of when I was back in CA. I think that was the longest I've ever gone living on my own and I was so much more social than I normally am. But I had to be. It's interesting how we can't really judge the impact of a place or a time in our lives until we've moved on from it. It's a shame it's so hard to appreciate what one has until it's over.

Current Mood: enjoying

House hunting

2009-01-06T12:14:00.003-07:00

So I've just gotten my mortgage preapproval in order. It's kind of strange to thing that I barely feel like an adult, but someone trusts me with hundreds of thousands of dollars. Jason and I went house hunting over the weekend. At first it was exciting, but then I began to despair of finding anything in my price range that didn't have me living in either a ghetto or a shack threatening to break apart at any moment. I was amazed at how many bad areas there are in Tucson. Yesterday I spoke to a realtor though and he was very encouraging. More driving around is scheduled for this Friday....

Current Mood: headachey

Weeks, B. (2008). Beyond the shadows. New York: Orbit.

2009-01-06T11:59:00.001-07:00

12/28/08 to 01/06/09
***
So a few things bugged me about this book, but overall it was a good read. This is the final novel in the Night Angel trilogy. In it, Kylar is faced with challenges to his emotional growth on the way to saving the world. So the things I didn't like.... Again the novel took much too long to get going. I was at least 140 pgs in before I started getting sucked into the story. Also, Weeks again chose to follow way too many characters. He jumped from one vantage point to another with each chapter in a way that became quite confusing. Additionally, he placed his chapter breaks such that you were left at a cliff hanger for one character and then jumped to another. By the time he returned to the first plot line the tension had dissipated and the next cliff hanger was obsessing me. Frustrating. Finally, and this is a minor point, when describing fight scenes, Weeks used the names of moves as stand-ins for actual description. Something like, "dark wing turn was countered by the falling eagle block." I can't imagine that and don't really care. The message of the novel obviously became that you cannot achieve good ends through evil deeds. I'm not sure I agree with that, but it was an interesting undertone. The religiosity of many of the purely "good" characters was a little annoying at times, although it was subtle. All that said, the book ended up sucking me in and I did enjoy reading it, particularly the last quarter of it.

Holiday Triumvirate

2009-01-02T09:31:00.004-07:00

I think holidays are important things. They mark the passage of time. They help us to anchor our lives and remain in contact with people who are important to us. I can't help being struck by the humor of the themes of the Thanksgiving-Christmas-New Year's holidays though, particularly given their sequence. So, first we talk about how happy we are with our lives and how fortunate we are. Then we figure out all the things we want to get and give to people to make them happier. Then we figure out how we're dissatisfied and make resolutions to fix all the things wrong with our lives. It's as though contentment degenerates to wanting things until finally we are discontent once again. Is this a mere coincidence of sequence, or is their a logic to it? Does getting gifts at Xmas prime us to see the lacks in our lives? I don't really think so and I like the idea of focusing on self improvement through making new year's resolutions whether they end up being the perpetual "lose five pounds" or "stop procrastinating" or something more altruistic like "help perpetuate world peace." Anyway, here are mine:

stop eating french fries
work for at least eight hours each day without getting distracted (by blogging for instance)
appreciate and stay in contact with my family, my friends, and J
run another marathon!
and lose five pounds

Current Mood: completely content

Books of 01/08 to 12/08

2009-01-02T08:43:00.002-07:00

Bridal bargains by Denise & Alan Fields
12/22/08 to 12/26/08

Shadow's edge by Brent Weeks
12/17/08 to 12/28/08

The way of shadows by Brent Weeks
12/13/08 to 12/17/08

Great wedding tips from the experts by Robbi G. W. Ernst III
12/13/08 to 12/21/08

[The nest] newlywed handbook: An owner's manual for modern married life by Carley Roney & the editors of TheNest.com
12/05/08 to 12/13/08

Kushiel's mercy by Jacqueline Carey
11/24/08 to 12/04/08

Before you say "I do": Important questions to ask before marriage by Todd Outcalt
11/21/08 to 11/24/08

The competitive runner's handbook by Bob Glover and Sherry-lynn Florence Glover
10/15/08 to 11/20/08

Ask again later by Jill A. Davis
10/11/08 to 10/13/08

Gold unicorn by Tanith Lee
10/11/08 to 10/11/08

Wild seed By Octavia Butler
09/12/08 to 09/27/08

The lace reader by Brunonia Barry
08/13/08 to 08/15/08

The poisonwood bible by Barbara Kingsolver
08/04/08 to 10/11/08

The outpost by Mike Resnick
07/11/08 to 08/04/08

Getting to yes: Negotiating agreement without giving in, second edition by Roger Fisher, William Ury, Bruce Patton
07/10/08 to 09/11/08

Renegade's mage by Robin Hobb
07/01/08 to 07/10/08

Kushiel's justice by Jacqueline Carey
06/23/08 to 07/01/08

The forest mage by Robin Hobb
06/17/08 to 06/23/08

True game by Sheri S. Tepper
05/30/08 to 06/16/08

Shaman's crossing by Robin Hobb
05/18/08 to 05/28/08

His dark material by Philip Pullman
04/11/08 to 05/18/08

The harsh cry of the heron by Lian Hearn
03/29/08 to 04/11/08

Green darkness by Anya Seton
02/20/08 to 03/28/08

The high lord by Trudi Canavan
02/08/08 to 02/19/08

The novice by Trudi Canavan
02/01/08 to 02/08/08

The magician's guild by Trudi Canavan
01/31/08 to 02/01/08

Jenna Starborn by Sharon Shin
01/29/08 to 01/31/08

Deerskin by Robin McKinley

01/17/08 to 01/22/08

Christmas and beyond

2008-12-29T10:30:00.001-07:00

Well, it was kind both nice and hard being with my family this past Xmas. I'm really glad I went, and it was nice that this year, once again we had a real Christmas dinner, but I was reminded how much older my parents have gotten. Dad did look pretty frail. I know the interferon has been really hard on him and I'm so hoping both that he is able to bounce back from it and that he got a large enough dose that it was able to control the cancer. One of the saddest notes of the visit was discussing with my mom what we would do about the wedding should dad's health deteriorate more between now and when we plan to have it. Maybe I should think about moving the imaginary date closer.

Current Mood: the sad happiness of being with someone you love who is sick

Weeks, B. (2008). Shadow's edge. New York: Orbit.

2008-12-29T09:28:00.003-07:00

12/17/08 to 12/28/08
***
This is the second of the Night Angel trilogy, and my impression of the book is very similar to the first. Again it took me quite a while to get into the story (about 140 pgs), but once I was there I had a hard time putting it down. Weeks does an excellent job presenting fully formed, impressive female characters that are more then just paradigm fulfilling shells. However, Kylar again has a number of mushy, cliched moments that made me squirm a little bit. Weeks is also continuing the pattern of jumping from one portion of the story to another. While I understood the necessity of this in the first books, it felt more overdone here. For instance there was one battle that was presented from the perspective of six traveling mages whom we had never heard of before and whom I cannot see having a prominent place in any future portion of the story. Rather it felt like a literary conceit to enable Weeks to give an overview rather than a first person account of the battle.

Fields, D. & Fields, A. (2009). Bridal bargainst (9th ed.). Boulder, CO: Windsor Peak Press.

2008-12-29T09:19:00.005-07:00

12/22/08 to 12/26/08
***
This book really does have good advice and I'm sure I'll save money by following it, but it feels like a necessary evil. After reading the first "bridal apparel" section I felt really depressed. One of the things I always thought would be fun about getting married was being able to justify a really cool, expensive dress. The upshot of the wedding dress section is that everyone will try to rip you off. And while it's good to know and watch out for this and their other consumer awareness tips, it does feel like it takes a lot of the fun out of planning.

Start date

2008-12-23T15:57:00.003-07:00

I've forgotten what it's like working within a large bureaucratic system. One funny thing is that right now I have a start date (2/2) for my new position, but no official offer (the HR woman said she will mail it today). Plus, I asked to have four 10s, but the hospital doesn't really like the idea of that (for no apparent reason).

I continue to be ambivalent about the move itself. I looked at condos online today and found some affordable things that seem like good possibilities, but the idea of moving has lost a lot of its appeal after the engagement. Believe it or not, the biggest problem is what to do with Xanadu. I want him to live with me, but if I am spending most of my free time (ie weekends) up here then he should stay here. Then there is the question of J getting a dog. He has wanted one for years, and he really misses his dad's dogs. I may break down and say it's OK. In fact I kind of already have with the caveats that I need to not be allergic to the beastie.

Current Mood: lethargic

What's up with Christmas

2008-12-22T10:38:00.004-07:00

So, not being the religious type, Christmas has always been a holiday devoid of substance to me. I like the idea of having traditions, of having rituals that mark the passage of time, but Jesus and Santa Clause aren't really the thing for me. Here's a list of the other things that really annoy me about Christmas:

Eating oneself sick
Wasting untold joules of energy with the insane light displays, blow up front lawn ornaments, and animatronic reindeer
the increasing rudeness factor as everyone pretends to have "Christmas spirit" while flipping you off on the highway
having to buy everyone I care about presents at the same time so I don't have time/money to buy something really special for anyone

On the whole Christmas seems like an all around bad system. I've often wondered why atheistic families can't simply pick a meaningful time at some other point in the year to have food, family gatherings, presents, traditions, etc.

I think part of the problem this year is that J and I have barely regrouped from the cruise/Thanksgiving combination....

Current Mood: trying to ignore being overwhelmed

Ernst, R. G. W., III. (2000). Great wedding tips from the experts.Los Angeles: Lowell House.

2008-12-22T10:19:00.004-07:00

12/13/08 to 12/21/08
**
This book contains a lot of helpful information on how to deal with the business/organizational side of getting married. I loved the guidance on making spreadsheets, schedules, and binders (though I don't think I'll use the binders). The interview questions for the various vendors and the ideas about what one should expect each to provide were also helpful. Despite these good things, the book on the whole was annoying. It was filled with routine assumptions about what a marriage ceremony should look like. Anyone who tells you that you must have engraved invitations for a formal wedding let alone a particular order for seating parents and receiving lines is far too traditional and rigid for my taste. I guess it's good to know these rules before one breaks them, but the fact that a wedding consultant (or whomever) spreads them around is what perpetuates the rules in the first place.

Weeks, B. (2008). The way of shadows. New York: Orbit.

2008-12-18T09:44:00.003-07:00

12/13/08 to 12/17/08
***
The plot of this book shot along at a jet-powered pace. I had a hard time putting it down. I usually don't feel as much of an attachment to male characters, but Kylar was definitely an exception. He was written with such depth and awareness that I couldn't help but empathize with him. Now for the stuff I didn't like. Weeks had a bit of a slow start to the point where I felt somewhat confused about what was happening. That really cleared up, but there continued to be a few points along the story line where I stopped and asked myself, "am I confused, is the character confused, or is this a rewrite that feels incomplete?" Not a good thought, to say the least. The level of confusion was particularly present during some of the fight scenes. When they worked they were cinematic and great, but when they didn't work I was left thinking, "who did what when?" Finally, the mushiness factor got turned up in a couple of places. It wasn't bad, but I could do without quite so much sentimentality. With all that said, the storyline and characters were so compelling that I really enjoyed the read, and even if the next books are no better, this will qualify as a great series.

You are what you speak

2008-12-17T11:10:00.002-07:00

I have prejudices. I know this and I'm trying to get over it. The thing is, much more than skin color, sexual orientation, or nationality, I think my prejudices are based upon the quality of an individual's speech. No matter what someone looks like, if s/he speaks well they are generally redeemed in my eyes. But the reverse is also often true. An individual can be well dressed, appear rich and competent, and if his/her speech is wrong, they lose all credibility in my eyes. This is particularly true when the individual is put forward as an expert.

The problem is that while vocal mannerisms and accents can say a lot about a person (in fact there is research suggesting we can pick up more from vocal inflections than facial expressions) it's just like judging someone by their clothing. You can easily be wrong. Not to mention the fact that it's hypocritical. I was reminded yesterday about how I throw my voice into this hick pattern when I'm trying to calm someone down, particularly if they have a bit of that in their own voice. I just wonder whether it actually works, or if others judge me poorly because of it.

Current Mood: lazy

Office party: Uncomfortable at best.

2008-12-16T11:20:00.002-07:00

I went to my boss's office party this past weekend. Really it wasn't so bad, but I don't like parties to begin with and I hate being forced to attend. We got their early with the intention of leaving early. That beginning part when no one you know has arrived yet is definitely the most uncomfortable part (note to self: come late in future). J of course was in his element. One thing that does make me enjoy parties more than I used to is just watching J work the room. Once I bent my no soda stricture and had a couple of cans of something with caffeine I was a lot more fun too.

Current Mood: the grinch

Roney, C. (2006). The nest newliwed handbook: An owner's manual for modern married life. New York: Clarkson Potter.

2008-12-16T11:11:00.004-07:00

12/05/08 to 12/13/08
****
This book was surprisingly good. I was expecting a froo froo discussion of tips for married folk (most of which are common sense and we already know). Instead this was a cogent summary of the main areas that cause marital distress (money, sex, living together, friendships, in-laws, kids) plus suggestions for the process of communication. While there are parts that have little to no relevance for us (in-laws, sex), there were plenty of good ideas in the other sections to make up for it. And if no section felt complete, having a good overview felt sufficiently helpful that this book can get you going in the right direction. I was particularly surprised that a section on communication strategies could have things that I hadn't thought of or addressed before.

commitment is sexy

2008-12-10T08:36:00.004-07:00

It's interesting. I thought that when you became a more deeply committed couple that some of the risky sexiness would disappear. I thought that there would be some ideal, medium-level commitment that allowed you to be unselfconsciously sexy while also maintaining appreciation for the other person.

Either I've been wrong about exactly where that level of commitment is or really the more committed you are the better.

When we announced the engagement one of my friends told me that being engaged got all those good in-love-chemicals (probably oxytocin) flowing in the same way that the initial glow of meeting someone does. He drew out this scheme whereby your brain goes through the first flush of love all over again, culminating in the hassle of getting married, followed by a post-marriage low.

I'm not in a position to comment on the full scope of that process at this point, but all I have to say is that this buzz is so much better than that first blush of love ever was. It's like being in love for the first time without any doubts, with being able to commit fully and unconditionally. So unexpected and fairy-tale-like that I keep expecting to wake up. Crazy.

Current Mood: f'n happy

Never taking it off!

2008-12-09T22:11:00.003-07:00

I picked the ring up today.

It was supposed to be here Monday, and even though I'd previously had an attitude of, "well I'm going to wear this forever, it doesn't matter how long it takes now," I found myself more and more anxious (I like to call it heightened anticipation). I was checking my email ever couple of hours to see if the jeweler had sent me anything. When today, success! The fed ex guy arrived with ring in tow.

Apparently the ring has taken a pretty circuitous route getting to me. First the factory in Germany had to make the thing, then it got shipped to LA where another representative of the company set the diamond before it finally got shipped over here to my jeweler here in AZ.

As I was driving back down from Cave Creek I kept turning the interior car light on to sneak looks at it (probably not the safest driving technique). I was struck by how real being engaged now feels. The ring is heavy, and the weight of it make the engagement feel more undeniable than all the announcements and premarital/wedding books I've bought. Definitely not underwhelming.

Current Mood: full

You are about to begin a delightful journey

2008-12-06T13:56:00.004-07:00

I went to lunch yesterday with my boss to tell her that I am taking the new hospital job in Tucson. I of course got all worked up about it. I thought about the things I wanted to say, how I should pitch things, and what my options are. My boss on the other hand was incredibly gracious. She assured me I was welcome to continue working with her a day a week if I can make that work with my Tucson schedule and that I would be welcome to come back with her full time in the future if I wanted to. Amazing!

I wonder if me gradually bringing up the idea of changing jobs made the conversation any easier.

I do think that quitting is kind of like breaking up with a boyfriend. First there's the preliminary period where you have to act dissatisfied so they know something's up. Then there's the actual conversation ("It's not you, it's me..."). Finally, there's the aftermath. In relationship terms, my boss and I decided to stay friends. Hopefully that works better than the boyfriends I've tried to stay friends with.

In a moment of irony, my fortune cookie at the end of our lunch read, "You are about to begin a delightful journey." Reading that out loud to my boss at the end of the meal created another moment of quickly glossed over discomfort.

Current Mood: relieved

cruisin'

2008-12-05T18:11:00.005-07:00

The verdict is that I had fun in spite of the cruise rather than because of it. So no more cruises for me, but as many extended parties with friends as possible.

The event was the wedding of my best friend from high school (JP). She really is a practically perfect person, and there was an amazing collection of family and friends there to celebrate. Amazingly, everyone in the group was interesting and fun to be around. JP's relatives are from all over the world and it was really an international group. Then of course, us Utahns were thrown in the mix. I'm not sure what our international friends thought of the Americans in the group, but there were plenty of people aboard the boat to give us a bad name. I think that's my main complaint about the cruise. There were all of these people (most of whom really were very nice) but you couldn't get away from them. I would look longingly out over the peaceful ocean and then turn back to the hectic clangor that was the boat. It definitely did not correspond to my vision of the contemplative voyage.

The first stop was Cozumel. Our scuba diving trip was canceled because of rough water so instead we went tide pooling. We looked at the teeming sea life (none of which I could identify) and picked up trash on the rocky outcroppings. It was so much fun just wandering around on the rocks, with the wind and the tropical plants, and then finally climbing up over a patio fence to get back to the pier.

The second stop was Progresso. Nearly the whole group went on the same excursion we did, to Chichen Itza. It is a creepy place. I'm especially fascinated by the cenote where archeologists have apparently found hundreds of bodies of men and children. I just imagine them getting tossed in. I think there are definitely aspects of that place I can use to lend atmosphere to my next Cthulhu adventure.

On the way back to Gelveston the winds picked up, and the boat was really rockin'. I kind of liked it. I still occasionally feel like the floor is moving beneath me.

Current Mood: content

Carey, J. (2008). Kushiel's mercy. Boston: Grand Central Publishing.

2008-12-05T16:48:00.002-07:00

11/24/08 to 12/04/08
****
This concludes Carey's Imriel trilogy. I had some problems with previous novels in the series. I found Imriel immature and annoying. By this book Imriel has grown up. He is mature, thoughtful, and insightful. The story involves yet another overwhelming threat to the realm, and in this book, a threat to Sidonie as well. Yet despite the fact that Imriel had to rescue her, Sidonie was never portrayed as the defenseless heroine. Instead she was as active and intelligent as ever. Brava, Carey!

Being thankful

2008-11-27T22:34:00.002-07:00

I've always in the past tried to be thankful for things. When I was young I would try to stop every so often and appreciate things like not having a sore throat. Although when I ask myself why I wanted to be thankful of those things it was because I had had them taken away before. For some reason I rarely stop and appreciate things that I've always had. It's like they aren't there any more. One thing about having a parent who is ill is that it makes me fiercely appreciative in a way that I've never been before. What's more, it makes me recognize the fragility of many of the things I care for, from my cat to my bf (oops, fiance). In working up to my next set of new year's resolutions, in addition to not procrastinating which is always on the list, I think I'm going to have to add something like living simply and appreciating the things I have.

Current Mood: sated

The Trials and Travails of ITunes

2008-11-25T09:43:00.003-07:00

I love my IPod; it was a life changing experience to be able to take my music with me anywhere, and when my IPod broke a few weeks ago I bought a new one the next day. My feelings about ITunes are more mixed. The fact that you can't burn an ITunes store song more than seven times has always annoyed me (though if you burn it to a CD and then copy it back to ITunes the program doesn't know). Too, I've always maintained that they should have a system for tagging music rather than simply making you assign one genre. And I still have yet to figure out how to have my music library on more than one computer (though I probably could if I really sat down and worked at it). All that aside I've used ITunes faithfully since buying my initial IPod two years ago.

A week ago today I got up and opened ITunes and all of my music was gone.

My theory is that some update failed to recognize my library despite the fact that the options clearly pointed to the correct file.

Stupidly I next added back all the music I could fine on my computer. Then came the realization that all the playlists I had diligently created over the course of the past two years (and there were 35 of them comprised of thousands of songs) had also disappeared. This was the moment when I decided to check online and see what I should have done. Well, if ever this happens to you, check the Apple help first b/c after re-adding all my songs the file that stored the playlists was deleted (not that I'm sure it was preserved by the initial wipe).

Now I am avoiding resyncing my IPod so I can painstakingly reconstruct the playlists. Needless to say it's hours of work. I've done nine so far.

I have gone through and reassigned stars to my thousands of songs which also took hours.

The only completely unrecoverable thing seems to be the number of times each song has been listened to.... And I'm pissed off about that.

Current Mood: pissed off

Outcalt, T. (2006). Before you say "I do": Important quesitons to ask before marriage. New York: Penguin Group.

2008-11-24T14:44:00.002-07:00

11/21/08 to 11/24/08
**
Outcalt's religious roots are evident throughout this book. The bias was pretty conservative. The author did make an attempt to be inclusive in his writing style, but the underlying paradigm was still obvious. I also got the very strong feeling that the book was intended for women to secretly read before quizzing their fiances. There were a few questions where he forgot to put in the his/her stuff and instead it degenerated into a woman's perspective. Not necessarily a bad thing, but I wish that had been stated overtly somewhere.

There were quite a few questions that were helpful and there's no doubt that having a book like this makes it easier to sit together and broach difficult topics without forgetting anything. The questions to ask one's own family were particularly nice and I plan to include my parents/sister in a discussion which I know we'll both like.

On the other hand, there were a number of inane questions and questions that made me wonder, "Who doesn't know about this about their partner before getting married!?" Here's a selection of a few of my favorites:

What was your college major?
How much have you traveled?
Are you a Democrat or a Republican?
What are your hobbies?
Do you snore?
What are your favorite colors?

Glover, B., & Gover, S. F. (1999). The competitive runner's handbook (Revised ed.). New York: Penguin Group.

2008-11-21T11:32:00.004-07:00

10/15/08 to 11/20/08
****
When I bought this book I thought the title was simply Runner's Handbook. I was a little concerned when I realized it was for competitive runners that it would be written at too high a level for my 2-half-marathon, 10-minute-per-mile-running legs. It wasn't. The book covers a broad range of topics with an easy, readable style that changed what could be stereo instructions into an amusing guide on how to get the most out of your running body. While both Bob and Shelly-lynn Glover are credited as authors, I suspect Bob was the actual writer. I think the first hint was that almost everywhere Shelly-lynn was referred to it said ...or my wife...

Anticlimactic

2008-11-20T14:18:00.003-07:00

For about half the day yesterday I had forgotten that it was my birthday. I've heard that as we get older our birthdays take on less and less significance, but I think that this was simply the excitement around the engagement overshadowing turning 32. On the whole I've wanted to celebrate more/longer as I've gotten older so far....

I did get the bigger ring and told J that he could include it as an engagement/birthday present/Christmas present, and even next year's anniversary present if he wanted to. This weekend I get to go up and see the diamond that the jeweler got in for the ring. J did get me a sweet birthday card :-)

Current Mood: preoccupied

Is bigger better?

2008-11-18T13:46:00.002-07:00

This morning I woke up with the horrible realization that I measured the ring size for my L hand when the idea is to eventually use this ring as a R hand ring and have a wedding band on the L. I emailed the jeweler at 6 AM saying stop the presses and let me come in to size the correct hand.

While I was there I started trying on the slightly larger ring that would accommodate a slightly larger diamond, and now I've decided that is what I want.

The only thing is that it would cost another $1500 more. But somehow I feel like I need to have a diamond of "decent" size in order to be competitive. Not that a .35 ct diamond would stand up to competition with any traditional engagement ring anyway....

It leaves me wondering what happened to me. In the past I've always been so proud that I've been able to stand outside of the traditional branding = worthiness/love/self esteem thing. And now I want a bigger diamond.

Maybe this is something I should resist on principle. Then again, it feels like it'll be so much prettier and more impressive just that much bigger. Poor J, he doesn't know what he's in for.

Current Mood: covetous

A "good" death

2008-11-18T07:44:00.003-07:00

I always thought that my father would go out kind of the way that his father did. We tell stories of grandpa's death as an example of a "good" death. He had been feeling a little off, but decided to go snowmobiling with friends anyway. He went out ahead and had a heart attack while pushing his snowmobile out of a drift where it had gotten stuck. I had always expected that my dad would have a heart attack while jogging home after work, or die while doing one of his force experiments. None of this long, drawn out business. My hospice supervisor told me that there is research (not that I've actually read it) suggesting that family members experience better outcomes when there is a short amount of notice (a little, but not too much) that someone is going to die. I'm not sure, but I think, because of the expectations, sudden is generally best in our family. Then again, none of us can choose and it's probably pointless to think much about it anyway.

Current Mood: anxious and activated

Then came the ring

2008-11-17T07:40:00.006-07:00

So J took yesterday off and we went ring shopping. Yes, I had already picked out almost exactly what I wanted. It was just a matter of finding a jeweler who carried it.

Years ago when J had said something about rings in a circumspect kind of way I selected this thing. Subsequent to that the original store that carried it locally closed (sad commentary on how long this process has taken for the two of us).

The Niessing website's search function is horrible, but I was finally able to fine a store in Scottsdale Mall that had it. Searching the internet led me to another in Cave Creek.

After confusion about when things opened and much driving, we discovered that the Scottsdale Mall store contained uppity people who charge four times as much for diamonds of equivalent quality. In contrast, the woman running the Cave Creek shop was delightful, showed us all of the metal, finish, and diamond options, and quoted a lower price for the whole thing. Made the choice super easy. I think we should go back and get wedding rings from her someday.... After a fairly long engagement.

The strange thing is that I don't feel nearly as leery about actual marriage now that I've realized being engaged isn't horrible and scary. Part of me thinks that we should do it after a shorter long engagement than I had originally been thinking about. That way we maximize the probability that all currently-living family members will actually be present.

J has been relatively calm about the whole thing too. I think the fact that he didn't have to shell out incredibly huge amounts of money did calm him down some. The setting I want is expensive, but since it doesn't accommodate a huge diamond the package ends up being relatively moderately priced.

Current Mood: feelin' love

And now I am engaged.

2008-11-17T07:14:00.003-07:00

Yes, we thought it would never happen, didn't know if we wanted it to happen, and agonized over the meaning of commitment or the lack thereof, but now all of that is over (or at least postponed for a week) because J and I got engaged on Saturday night.

It was nothing elaborate or overly corny, but we had gone out to our favorite Chinese restaurant (which also happens to be the site of our first date) and were talking about the prospect of me moving when J just came out with, "If you move to T----, I think we should get married." I was stunned.

I think I said something like, "If I move we can get engaged...."

Then he took my hand across the table and said, "Will you marry me?"

I of course (given the title of this post) said, "Yes." Then I cried. Then I lost all my appetite and couldn't eat any of the yummy Chinese food.

After I had recovered to some degree (though not enough to eat anything) I of course quizzed J about what had brought this on. Apparently when he and his brothers went to the football game this past Monday his married brother, in J's words, "told me I was being an idiot and that he thought we should get married and that being married isn't so bad." Boy would I like to have been privy to that conversation, not that it could have happened had I been there. Given how the boys are, it's also very possible that there wasn't any more to it than that.

What this means is that the responsibility for my new relationship status rests completely with A. During a pedicure two weeks ago I complained to her that J had no plan for our relationship. A, always helpful, was trying to think who could talk to J about the whole thing. Obviously she prodded M into it and voila, we are engaged.

Current Mood: stunned

The yowling came from the back room

2008-11-15T06:45:00.001-07:00

You know someone's getting hurt when the vet checkup culminates in your cat hissing and yowling in the back room. I was pleasantly surprised to learn that Xan actually hadn't attacked anyone, but was simply struggling while the incredibly pleasant vet restrained him and took blood.

The whole ordeal reminds me how nice it was to simply ignore the need for checkups and vaccinations and teeth cleaning. Unfortunately that only works for so long. I have finally found a vet I like well enough to replace J's high school buddy. The bad things is that she's way out in QC. That involves an hour long car ride each way. On the way there I was stupid (as I always am) and thought that if I let Xan out of the cat carrier he might calm down. Instead he perched on top of the passenger seat head-rest and yowled at passing cars. I got some pretty strange looks.

Now we just have to go back in a week for his actual teeth cleaning. What a fun way to spend $500

Current Mood: drained

What's happened to our political parties?

2008-11-13T09:48:00.002-07:00

I was listening to my Fresh Air podcast yesterday (an old one), and a Republican on the program made the point that the Republican party used to be about personal liberties and fiscal conservatism. OMG! That's what I believe in. At the same time something has happened and now Democrats believe in that stuff and the Republican party is about limitations on personal freedoms (ie no marriage equality or abortion) and increased spending. If the Republican party was still into those original ideas I would be hard pressed to choose between being a Democrat with its focus on providing services and a social welfare system and a Republican with its orientation on limiting spending.

My only question is would that be better? Right now there is a party whose values and mission I completely identify with. I like that, and win big when Democrats are successful. But I also lose big when Republicans are in power. Makes for more of a roller coaster, but less long-term stability (in my opinion) in the direction of the country.

Current Mood: Yay democrats!

Wait, what's going on?

2008-11-11T06:53:00.003-07:00

OK, it's bad when you forget about a party, but it's even worse when it's a party for you. Yesterday evening I got a call from our office manager (the party was also for her) asking where I was. I didn't exactly forget about it (I thought the party was next week) and it wasn't exactly a party, just the office manager, me and two of my colleagues going out to dinner. I still had that horrible, dream-like, "Was there a test today?" feeling. Now I am looking forward to going in today and apologetically explaining to everyone that I was confused. The problem is that I feel a little resentful at having to apologize about something that was supposed to be a good thing for me. Part of me feel like, "If I don't want to show up to my birthday celebration, I can damn well not show up." Not exactly the most pc office sentiment though.

None of that would be so bad except that when I logged onto my email this morning there was a message telling me that one of my reports didn't address the original referring question. I looked at it and they're right. I answered a completely different kind of question.

It's like things in my world that I didn't even know I should be worried about are falling apart around me.

Current Mood: general confusion

and then I traded it in....

2008-11-09T15:18:00.003-07:00

I get so unreasonably sad when I lose inanimate objects I've had for a long time.

Yesterday in the first mile of my 12 mile run my ipod stopped working. I was trying to advance to a new song and suddenly an unhappy ipod icon appeared on the screen with a web address for the ipod service. Recognizing that surviving even for a full day without a working ipod would be almost impossible for me, I went to the apple store today and made my appointment with the genius bar. The guy promptly told me that yes, the ipod is broken, and it would cost me $300 for them to swap out all the innards to fix it. Since a new ipod costs $249 the solution seemed obvious, but I momentarily considered the option of fixing my old ipod. OK, I've only had it for the past four years, but we've run countless miles together and taken dozens of road trips together. In the end I broke down and bought the new ipod. Then I also got an ipod shuffle so that the new ipod won't have its lifespan shortened by the frantic jouncing of me running. Then I found the best thing yet. These headphones actually allow you to clip the shuffle into the headphones themselves. No more cords combined with decent sound. Will the wonders never cease. At checkout though I almost cried when they took away my old beaten up ipod. As I was saying goodbye to it I felt bad that I'd never named is so the new ipod is called Francis after the heroine of Dirty Dancing, and the shuffle is called Marcee after my favorite pt (is that bad?).

If I ever really do have to get rid of my car I am going to be inconsolable.

Current Mood: Sadness out of proportion to the event

How do you spell relief?

2008-11-05T07:10:00.003-07:00

Overall yesterday was hard but ended up feeling satisfying. More than just the election, my boss finally asked me about whether I was leaving. She'd heard some things through the grapevine and wanted to know directly. When she asked me into her office I sat down on the couch thinking, "Wow, I'm already anxious about the election, I've had too much caffeine, and now we get to 'talk' about my plans." I felt a little like I was in a movie where the writers have intentionally piled all the crap into one 15 minute segment so the denouement will be that much more dramatic. I didn't say I was definitely taking the position, but I told her I was leaning in that direction and waiting for the official offer. In a way I was glad to have everything out in the open, but it makes everything feel so much more final. We're going to meet again in about a month when I will supposedly have made my decision.

Then a few things happened on the freeway to further heighten the dramatic tension. The McCain convoy passed me going the other direction up the 51. Plus I think I might have gotten photocopped on the freeway. It was almost 8PM and the traffic was generally flowing at the same speed, but I guess we'll wait and see. Big brother in action. The McCain convoy was moving pretty fast. I wonder if they got any photocop tickets on their way to the Biltmore....

On the way home I also saw an electronic billboard that say 46% vs 46% and I felt my heart sink. In retrospect, it must have just been an ad for something, but it said it had been updated just a few minutes before and I had these horrible thoughts of the voters letting the country down... again! When I got home and switched the TV on to the 200 vs 90 lead. I stayed up well past my bedtime to listen to the speeches. McCain was gracious. I liked him better in defeat than I ever had during the campaign (or during his senatorial representation of AZ for that matter). Obama struck a great note between celebrating the success and preparing everybody for the work that's going to be required to make any progress given the current mess. I thought they dwelt too much on the historic significance of the first "black" president since Obama is actually multiracial, not black. And race has little or nothing to do with the reasons why he will be a good president.

Current Mood: Restored realistic optimism re our country.

I can't restrain myself

2008-11-04T06:59:00.002-07:00

OK, I was trying to avoid an election day blog entry, but given how invested I feel in the election that was pretty much doomed to failure. After the last couple of presidential elections one would think that I would have simply descended into learned helplessness, but I've sprung up with renewed hope this election cycle. I know that the senate and congressional races are more important for actual legislation, but the president is such a symbol of our national direction, such an honor or embarrassment to our country that I can't help feeling more emotionally invested in this race than in the local house and senate races. Besides, given the staunch republicanism of my home state, there is little hope that any of the house/senate candidates I vote for will actually be elected. Not that there is much hope that my presidential vote will count for much for the same reason (continued annoyance with the electoral college process).

J just came back from voting, my attempts to get him to abstain for this election having failed. I didn't even ask who he voted for. At least the same logic that discounts my vote can be used to argue that J's doesn't make any difference to the outcome.

Current Mood: Tentatively hopeful. I would be so much more comfortable with a double digit lead though!!!

Impatience setting in

2008-11-03T09:50:00.003-07:00

Having female friends is great and awful at the same time. Men are so uncomplicated. They never want to talk about how things are going. They never want to process. This is both a good and bad phenomena. It keeps one content, but also keeps one from feeling motivated to change anything. I got a pedicure with J's sister-in-law this weekend. It felt so nice to have someone simultaneously list, and support and validate my experiences. But now I feel like J needs to step up.

I just tried to open the website for the shop that has the engagement ring I would want. In the years since I picked it, the shop has moved to Carefree. How sad is that?

Current Mood: [sigh]

Huff, T. (2007). Smoke and ashes. New York: Penguin Group.

2008-10-29T07:10:00.004-06:00

?-10/28/08
****
Hmm, I guess I didn't make a note of when we started this book, but this is a novel that J and I read together (very off and on). I love the Smoke series by Tanya Huff and then original Blood series that it spun off from. This latter series particularly is wonderfully cinematic. The descriptions are short and vivid, the dialogue is realistically terse, and the adventures are always wildly fast-paced. Her handling of the stories makes the magic feel as every-day as a toaster oven. I do worry a little that there is a lack of substance under some of the sheen, and it's true that Huff rarely deals with the deeper emotions assumably flying around beneath the surface of the galloping plot. But when she does her characters do feel something, those emotions come across as wonderfully genuine and imbued with a humor (as is the entire book) and lends them additional poignancy.

Great power that can be used for good or evil

2008-10-28T07:11:00.015-06:00

I've kind of grown resigned to the fact that it's likely the first female president will be a conservative. I have this theory that the country is more likely to be comfortable with a woman in a position of power if she appears to be traditional in all other respects. I know this isn't always the case, but many of our political firsts for women fall to the conservatives: Sandra Day O'Connor, the first woman in congress, even the first female prime minister of England was terribly conservative. This leads me to ask the question of whether it's better to have a woman in office or none at all? I haven't looked at the records, but I would argue that women with conservative views do more harm than good to traditional feminist causes. Other conservative individuals can gleefully point to a conservative woman and say, "see, women agree that the country should be pro-life, against distributive justice, and against healthcare for all....," when really the majority of women in our country are democrats (or at least women tend to support Obama).

While the importance of women in politics has increased over time, I think I would point to Sarah Palin as a woman who is likely to simply serve the purposes of others rather than holding power in her own right. The same old patriarchy tune played out to a different beat.

Current Mood: discouraged as a feminist

symphony

2008-10-27T17:46:00.002-06:00

One of the great things about J is that he knows so many people, and this past weekend his connections landed us tickets to the Phoenix Symphony. Now normally I'm not a symphony kind of gal. I can enjoy opera with the best of them, but listening nonstop to classical music, even if it is live, isn't usually my thing. This was a little different though. The program featured the debut of a Chinese piece, Mooring at Night by Maple Bridge, that was just lovely. The star of the evening was a Chinese pianist, Lang Lang, who played a Chopin symphony that I frankly could have done without, but when the crowd wouldn't stop cheering he came out for an encore. He played alone on the piano and the piece was beautiful. Plus, the look on his face was one of such ecstasy that it was almost too private to watch. To witness someone making their living at something they get such pure joy from is a marvelous and amazing thing. I love my work, but I can't remember a time when I felt ecstatic while practicing. We should all envy that.

Current Mood: slightly frazzled

Men at work

2008-10-25T10:17:00.003-06:00

Why is it that watching men work can be so sexy? I've noticed how so many TV shows and movies use men working as a way of heightening sexual tension. There is even a particular way of shooting there scenes where there is often a montage of the guy looking intently at different things as the stages of whatever he's doing progress. This is of course particularly true in workplace dramas and romances, but other shows do this to. My theory is that when men (or maybe anyone for that matter) is working there is a combination of intensity and an underlying happy playfulness that resembles the perfect attitude for sex. I do wonder if this is as true for men watching women as it seems to be in the reverse case.

Current Mood: guys are yummy

Value your elders

2008-10-20T09:04:00.006-06:00

On the day I swore to uphold the Hippocratic oath, the small hairs on the back of my neck stood up as I waited for lightning to strike. Who was I, vowing calmly among all these necktied young men to steal life out of nature's jaws, every old time we got half a chance and a paycheck?... I could not accept the contract: that every child born human upon this earth comes with a guarantee of perfect health and old age clutched in its small fist. ~Barbara Kingsolver

One of the ideas mentioned in The Poinsonwood Bible was that when you have too many people living to old age you stop valuing them in the same way. It made me think of how our advances in healthcare really have allowed almost everyone to survive to a relatively old age, and it made me wonder if those wonderful advances in healthcare are actually a factor in how we have lost our appreciation for our older adults. I definitely think that my proximity to J during his loss of his last remaining parent has made me fell particularly thankful that both of mine are still around. I'm positive that this isn't the only factor, or probably even the main one, but it is interesting to think about what our culture might be like if a smaller percentage of the population lived to be over say 70.

Current Mood: appreciative

Otsukimi

2008-10-18T13:54:00.003-06:00

J and MB and I met up with E & C at the Japanese Friendship Garden for the fall moon-viewing festival. This was the first year J and I went, and I was surprised at how much I enjoyed myself. I don't typically do so well at events that require milling with a large crowd. But here I could wander off on my own easily enough and it didn't seem so weird to just enjoy the garden and the music and the moon in a quiet corner for a moment while I recuperated from chatting. There was a moment where I was standing alone on a dark corner of the path surrounded by trees. The flute music from the stage across the lake was echoing across the water. I knew the moment would only last for a few minutes, but for those few minutes it was a perfect moment.

There was a silent auction and I so wanted to "win" the aikedo lessons, but mostly b/c the guy manning that portion of the booth was from the aikedo dojo and he seemed so cool and like such a good teacher that I just wanted to hang out with him more. Maybe I'll go and take lessons anyway.

Current Mood: contentment

Death sucks

2008-10-17T18:13:00.000-06:00

With my dad's illness and J's dad's sudden death, I think I've gotten more morbid than I was even before (yes I still hypothetically consider what manner of suicide I would use on a regular basis: mild suicidal ideation with some plan but zero intent). At least I haven't returned to the midnight panic attack mode I was in during my hospice volunteering days. I am trying different things to make myself more OK with my own and other's mortality. The problem is, I'm not sure I want to be OK with my own and (especially) other's mortality. Part of me feels like it would be callous to rach a place of deep acceptance. Like it would be too close to not caring.

I watched The Diving Bell and the Butterfly recently. It's true what everyone says, that the movie isn't as depressing or as hard to watch as you think it might be. My initial response to the movie was that it's a shame that we can't choose the time of our own death. Then again, is it worse to die when you are at a point of despair and want to be dead, or to die when you are at a point of happiness and fulfillment and a forced lose it all? My past position on this was to say that I wanted to die just before I decline, like the end of a book that comes just too soon. That seemed so much better than outliving the good stuff. But on the other hand, to have hope that life will continue in a positive and fulfilling way and then to have that hoped dashed seems worse in some ways.

Current Mood: morbid

Tired of it all

2008-10-16T09:17:00.000-06:00

I mailed my early ballot about a week ago. Of course I voted almost straight party democrat, diverging on only a few of the propositions. I couldn't be bothered to do the research to know which justices of the peace to maintain in office though. I feel a little guilty about that, but all in all my feeling is one of general relief that I've done my part and it's over. I frankly feel exhausted by this election as well as the financial news of the stock market falling... oh, maybe it's bouncing back a little... oh no, maybe it's still falling, and the price of oil. Yay, it's below $95 a barrel.... The last This American Life episode was about the financial crisis again, and one of the commentators made the point that you know something has gone wrong when you are learning about things you never thought to be interested in before (paraphrasing there). I know this is all relevant to me, but I'm running out of energy to learn about new crises.

Current Mood: drained

Notes on self

2008-10-15T08:31:00.004-06:00

Lately I've been returning to my on-again-off-again obsession with the meaning of self (or lack thereof).

I've had this idea that as I've gotten older I've become more who I actually am, that the constraints of others have sloughed off and I've become more a reflection of my genuine personality. (Of course this isn't really true since I've mostly just internalized the constraints and so don't notice the external ones to the same degree since I don't bump up against them as often.) I could also argue that I was the most a reflection of who I am when I was two-years-old which is scary since I was a mean little two-year-old.

On the note of becoming more who I am though I've started to wonder if my body is also becoming more who I really am as I get older. If all the aches and pains and chronic illnesses that I have and will get are really more of a reflection of who I am than the healthy, young body that I've enjoyed for so long. (Of course this isn't really true either since how can you say any one state occurring at one moment in time is more a reflection of who one is than any other.)

This makes me wonder whether the natural conclusion of all this, the state of being dead, is more a genuine reflection of who I am than the state of being alive. There does actually fell like there might be something to this last though. After all, I was in a state of nonexistence for the vast, vast majority of the history of the universe. It makes me think about the way Thich Nhat Hanh explained existence as a simple arising out of and then flowing back into the stuff of the universe, the way a wave pops up and then sinks back down into the ocean. I think I can be OK with death if that's what it means.... I'm not so sure about infirmity yet though.

Current Mood: contemplative

Davis, J. A. (2007). Ask again later. New York: HarperCollins Publishers.

2008-10-14T07:06:00.004-06:00

10/11/08 to 10/13/08
**
Yes, I am back to reading books in three days. This was an interesting counterpoint to the Kingsolver novel I just read. Moving from reading about all the babies dying and world injustices to the internal processes of a New Yorker is kind of like brushing your teeth and then drinking orange juice. Both are good, but you shouldn't have them in your mouth together. Davis's book follows her main character, Emily, as she attempts to work through her relationship issues, deal with her mother's dx of breast cancer, and reunite with her father. There is a psychologist (or is he a psychiatrist) who appears relatively genuine, if only moderately effective. He doesn't appear to be CBT, which I blame on the fact that the book takes place in NYC. The chapters are these tiny nuggets of two or three pages. They are filled with humorous juxtapositions and witty commentary on her experiences... much like a much better blog than mine. Overall the book felt funny and light despite addressing rather serious issues. I guess I just wanted to feel the weight of what she was going through a little bit more. Maybe if she thought about some of her problems in a less facetious way she would have dealt with them more quickly. But it would have been less amusing for the rest of us. Everyone, or well, almost everyone, ends up good in the end though.

Well, it makes sense to me

2008-10-13T17:50:00.000-06:00

You are a
Social Liberal
(81% permissive)

and an...
Economic Liberal
(18% permissive)

You are best described as a:

Socialist

Link: The Politics Test on Ok Cupid
Also : The OkCupid Dating Persona Test

Lee, T. (1994). Gold unicorn. New York: Atheneum.

2008-10-13T16:25:00.002-06:00

10/11/08 to 10/11/08
***
This was the sequel to Black unicorn. The series is intended for a young adult audience, and it does show. The book is a fairly uncomplicated story of a young girl coming of age and how she deals with her own burgeoning power, not to mention her interpersonal relationships with her family. The main character, Tanaquil is an adolescent who is learning about her powers as a sorceress, as well as about her family. She was raised by her mother and discovered her father and sister in the last book. Tanaquil is reunited with her sister in this book and has to find ways of addressing questions of individual freedoms and how one deals with the power of others. I was disappointed though that the right and wrong of it was painted with such broad strokes that it ended up not being much of a question.

Kingsolver, B. (1998). The poinsonwood bible. New York: HarperTorch.

2008-10-13T16:08:00.005-06:00

08/04/08 to 10/11/08
****
The plot was compelling from the beginning, but I really had a hard time liking any of the characters in the book for the first 100 pages. This book tells the story of a family (father, mother, and four daughters) of missionaries who go to the Belgian Congo and are caught up in the transition to independence. From the first it was apparent that no one in the family was really prepared for what they would face in the Congo either in the way of poverty or the culture. Over time I became more and more caught up in rooting for the women of the story and applauding the resourcefulness they demonstrate as things deteriorate more and more. One thing that didn't change was my annoyance with the father in the story. I think it reinforced how so often religion is a vehicle for the individual's needs as opposed to a way of improving the society as a whole. The perspective shifted between each of the daughters, and occasionally the mother, and the style of writing varied greatly depending upon whose perspective you were placed in. I almost couldn't stand the voices of the oldest and youngest daughters (Rachel and Ruth May), I was relatively indifferent to the middle daughter, Leah's voice. But Leah's twin sister, Adah, was written with such remarkable lyricism, as was the mother, Orleanna that they more than made up for any deficits in the others. I was reminded of an interview I heard where someone mentioned that sometimes when we read we simply have our own point of view repeated back to us, while other times we read and are able to take a dramatically different point of view from our own. The first is a much more comfortable experience, but I felt like I was able to accomplish the latter with this book.

Adventures in Waxing

2008-10-12T15:50:00.002-06:00

So after adding up how much money it took to make two trips to a salon to get bikini waxing done, I went out and bought a wax warmer and all the accouterments of waxing. Yesterday I waxed my legs and underarms for the second time and really felt like I was getting the hang of it (I still haven't worked up the nerve to do any bikini waxing). I was really starting to feel more confident about the whole thing. J came home a bit early just as I was finishing up and he gamely agreed to let me wax the tiny amount of hair that he has growing out of his back. We were both sitting in the bathtub and I was just finishing his neck when I must have bumped the wax warmer. It fell off the edge of the bathtub. Suddenly hot wax was poured all over my legs and the bottom of the bathtub. Before he jumped out of the bathtub, little splashes got on J who is overall hairier than I am. It sounds like it could have been kinky, but instead it was just a sticky, uncomfortable mess. I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say having a leg nearly encased in hot wax was one of the strangest sensations I've ever experienced. J kindly helped me clean up to the point where I wasn't menacing the rest of the bathroom with my stickiness, and then I spent the next 45 minutes scraping wax off of myself and various bathroom fixtures.

Current Mood: trying not to be clumsy around hot wax

Out of Town Update

2008-10-11T15:03:00.005-06:00

J and I got back on Tuesday from my (perhaps overly) ambitious mc trip to SLC. We took it really easy and stayed in hotels two nights on the road going each way. Here was the itinerary:

Day 1:: Home to Payson (breakfast); Payson to Sedona (lunch); Sedona to Flagstaff (snack); Flagstaff to Marble Canyon (Cliff Dweller's Lodge)
Day 2:: Marble Canyon to Kanab (lunch); Kanab to Panguich (snack); Panguich to Richfield (Best Western)
Day 3:: Richfield to Spanish Fork (snack); Spanish Fork to SLC
Day 4:: SLC
Day 5:: SLC to Nephi (snack); Nephi to Cedar City (lunch); Cedar City to Kanab (Qual Park Lodge)
Day 6:: Kanab to Flagstaff (lunch); Flagstaff to Pine (Pine Victorian Inn)
Day 7:: Pine to Home

Well, It didn't end up working exactly like that. The first two days were beautiful and exciting. The pic above is from Marble Canyon where I hiked around and took pictures while J slept in. We even found a relatively decent Chinese restaurant in Richfield.

Overall, we were fine until the morning we left Richfield, and then we realized that UT is cold! We froze our buts off on the drive up to SLC and it ended up taking an additional two hours or so as we stopped every 50 miles to sneak into a gas station or McDonald's to warm up. I've never seen any great advantage to hand dryers that blow hot air out at you until this trip. For the last 45 minutes of the drive from Provo to SLC we were actually rained on. It was terrifying and cold.

Seeing the fam was great. They say benefit-finding is one of the best coping strategies for individuals with life-threatening illnesses, and I have definitely taken my parents less for granted since Dad's ca dx. We celebrated J's birthday and I could see it meant a lot to him to have all of us singing "Happy Birthday" to him.

The one problem was that the weather had definitely turned. It rained almost all of our second day there and we basically decided that we needed to delay the return trip by a day when the clouds seemed to magically part and the sun came out. We had swung by REI and gotten long underwear in the hopes that we would be able to stay warm enough so we decided to chance it and hit the road. It was cold, but we did OK. Mom made a reservation for us at a Best Western in Cedar City since we weren't going to be able to make our original destination of Kanab (lost some money there). Leaving Cedar City in the morning was the worst. I had originally thought about going over the pass by Cedar Breaks, but it was so cold we thought there might be snow on the road up there. The second plan was to go through Zion. There were several moments driving out of Cedar City where I really wasn't sure I could keep going I was so cold. I slowed way down to 65 to cut down on wind chill and followed a semi almost all the way to Hurricane. Folks in the gas station at Hurricane where we stopped to warm up told us that it would probably be better to go through Colorado City than Zion since the elevation does get pretty high even in Zion. I can now boast that I have driven past the center of much of the polygamist controversy (though it should really be called polygyn since I would have much less of a problem with an equal opportunity polygamy setup).

By the time we got to Kanab I was despairing of ever being warm enough again. I made J stop and look for a parka to wear over my vented mc jacket. I would have gotten something too except that everything was shoddy quality, not particularly warm looking, and exorbitantly priced (note to self: do not shop for outdoor gear in tiny towns). In any case, everything warmed up significantly after Kanab. We stopped for lunch in Page and I was even a little too hot. The Pine Victorian Inn was pretty much as nice as I had hoped it would be (though the Richfield Best Western night really have been the nicest place we stayed), and we ended the trip gloriously hot coming down into the "valley" of the sun. Yesterday I bought the warmest mc jacket I could find at Cyclegear, and I think next time I want to go all the way up the 93 through NV which is bound to be warmer.

Current Mood: Warm again

Butler, O. (1980). Wild seed. New York: Aspect.

2008-09-29T10:05:00.003-06:00

09/12/08 to 09/27/08
****
This book tells the story of two immortal beings who have been born into this world with extraordinary powers. It starts off when the two first become aware of one another and shifts perspective between each of them. The first is a male character, Doro, who shifts from body to body, killing each individual as he goes. The second is a female character, Anyanwu, who is a healer/shape-shifter. The story follows their attraction to/repulsion from one another, as well as the psychological burden of their various gifts. The reality of the characters as well as the complexity of the emotional and ethical dilemmas they face was engrossing. The story has an epic scope, following the characters in fits and starts for a couple hundred years. I think this was necessary in order to grasp the enormity of the story, but it left the flow feeling disjointed in places. I particularly disliked the places where Butler used flashbacks to fill the reader in on things that had happened in intervening years. I understand that the story only followed those moments where the two main characters were confronting one another, but I disagree with that choice and think the story could have been more powerful if each character was allowed moments when s/he was the only one on the stage.

Not 30 people

2008-09-29T09:23:00.003-06:00

So, usually when I ask people to come over, I call everyone I know, everyone says they are busy, and the same five friends were usually hang out with come over. J turns 35 in a few days, so I went through my normal process and called everyone I know. Only this time everyone said they would come. I started to become more and more dismayed as the guest list kept expanding and I ended up not calling a couple of people towards the end of my list as we had long ago reached maximum capacity. In a further freak out I made two trips to Costco with a friend who actually has a card. We ordered a cake, bought jug after jug of alcohol, bratwursts, chicken, hamburgers.... The irony of the teetotaling, vegetarian buying the booze and meat was not lost on me, but I did it. Then the faithful evening came and we ended up with maybe an extra two in addition to our normal five friends. Now we have gallons of alcohol and packages of meat that we will never consume.

Current Mood: Not hungry

uncomfortable poking and prodding

2008-09-25T07:27:00.004-06:00

I had my hospital physical yesterday and it was the most uncomfortable thing I've gone through in quite a while.

It started out innocuously enough. I got fingerprinted and realized that though I had brought every piece of imaginable documentation, I had forgotten my driver's license somewhere. Later I realized that I hadn't returned it to my wallet after my most recent prison visit. No loss or harm. Anyway, it was good that I had brought my passport, SS card, birth certificate, everything.

For the actual physical they photocopied every piece of documentation I'd brought. I was impressed when they wanted records from 1982. Glad I kept all that stuff.

The NP tested bilateral strength, and heel and toe walking (which I can only assume was to assess neurological functioning), in addition to vision, color blindness, hearing, and all the rest of the normal things. Then they decided I didn't need a chest X-ray because of my recent PPD test, but that they wanted to give me a second PPD (even though the last one was just this past April). I also had to get my first EKG and (of course) have my blood drawn.

After wandering all over the hospital for these various tests and exams, they finally wanted me to pee in a cup. I was so exhausted by this point that I started to have performance anxiety. I drank the nasty water from the fountain for about a quarter of an hour before I could work up the nerve to do it. Then the man in the lab told me that he thought it was better for me to use the restrooms down the hall. I think he was trying to be nice and find me a more private women's restroom as opposed to the ones in the actual lab used primarily by old men rather indifferent to directional flow as they produced their samples. Really nice of him.

The only problem is that this led to the uncomfortable circumstance of having to carry a cup of pee back through the halls of the hospital after I was done. I tried not to make eye contact with anyone, but I heard a couple of conversations fall silent as I made my way back to the lab.

Current Mood: getting over the chagrin

confabulation

2008-09-24T09:15:00.002-06:00

I admit to being confused. Half the time when Obama or McCain discuss environmental issues the only thing they talk about is energy policy. I fully understand that petroleum products pollute in a way that renewable energy resources hopefully would not (aside from having to dump potentially toxic batteries after they stop being rechargable). The only problem is that energy policy fails to address wilderness preservation, delicate habitats, and the fact that international conflicts [sometimes] irreparably damage environments. At least the Sierra Club finally has descriptions of the candidates. Now the only problem is that my vote probably won't count since I don't live in a real swing state, despite our democratic governor.

Current Mood: frustrated

You can't go back, but reminiscing is fun

2008-09-22T13:17:00.002-06:00

My best friend from high school is getting married... on a cruise. At first we weren't going to go. It's really hard to justify spending about $700 each to go to someone's wedding, but just as I was going to send the email declining I starting thinking about how this might be one of the last times I would really get to spend hanging out with close friends from high school and I couldn't do it. I called J back quickly and told him that I was going to go but I'd understand if he couldn't afford it. He caved. So I guess this will be our first cruise. I just hope the hurricane season is long over and everything is repaired by then (the ship leaves from Galveston).

Current Mood: buyer's remorse, but it's worth it.

Pretty good for a picky eater

2008-09-17T08:40:00.005-06:00

1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Cross out any items that you would never consider eating.

The VGT Omnivore’s Hundred:
1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush (Yum!)
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst
~~65. Durian~~
66. Frogs’ legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash (properly spelled gulyas)
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake

As a vegetarian who doesn't drink alcohol I would strikethrough all meat and alcohol on the list. As a picky eater I would strikethrough everything I haven't already tried. In reality, the only thing you couldn't pay me enough to ever eat again is durian.

*copied from Cactus kneedle knitting*

catastrophies averted

2008-09-16T10:58:00.002-06:00

I am meditating on the benefits of having amazing, generous people around. Our plumber neighbor noticed our sad, rusting water heater and automatically offered to get us one at cost and help J put it in. They spent hours out there last night. I am always impressed when people are automatically generous like that. Plus he said that if we hadn't replaced it soon it was likely to spring a fountain-like leak in the top which would shower the garage with water (including J's car which is parked right next to it), and also likely flood the house. It was nice to take a bath this morning without worrying that the hot water would come at the price of an imminent flood.

Current Mood: <3 nice neighbors

Gong meditation: Not for me

2008-09-14T09:50:00.006-06:00

During gong meditation one is supposed to hear different things within the sound of the gong. The sound waves are supposed to "cancel out thought waves" and help to cleanse your aura. This is supposed to be a powerfully positive experience. What I felt was powerful, but not at all positive.

That's not completely true. At the beginning I did feel relaxed. We did some chi exercises and I experienced balling my chi for the first time. I remember my dad doing this a lot, but I don't think I ever really tried it. My ball was more like a 1/4 inch slab, but I still felt a resistance that was surprisingly tangible.

The problem for me was the gong. There are deep reverberations that start within the background of the gong and at first I was reminded of Gregorian chanting and cathedral bells. But then the reverberations got almost electronic-static sounding. The only way I can describe what I heard at that point is that there were malign forces trying to pull me into an evil vortex. It was rather disturbing.

I started to try to distract myself and opened my eyes, but I wasn't wearing my glasses and I had the distinct impression that the stars (or at least the one bright one over my head) were moving, which I also found disturbing. Over the course of the next hour or so I tried all kinds of distraction techniques, looking at the buildings around the garden, watching the people next to me meditate, thinking about sex, movies, anything.... Eventually I put my glasses back on and alternated between successfully distracting myself with planning the road trip and repeating over and over in my head, "Please stop, please stop, please stop." It felt interminable. I even started wondering if I should just get up and go somewhere else in the garden and wait for it to be over, but I couldn't overcome the impoliteness of that.

I can't help wondering if anyone has used gong as the background to a horror film. Based on my experience, it would work great.

To listen to a similar gong sounding, click here to open in a separate window, or play video below.

Current Mood: recovering from my trip to the dark side

Fisher, R., Ury, W., & Patton, B. (1991). Getting to yes: Negotiating agreement without giving in (2nd ed). New York: Penguin Books.

2008-09-12T09:08:00.005-06:00

07/10/08 to 09/11/08
***
This book describes the philosophy of principled negotiation. The objective is to get people away from adversarial, positional bargaining. The book was relatively readable and provided good examples of the various techniques. The sections detailing the rules for brainstorming and the recommendations for working with common tricks negotiators use seemed particularly useful. The "Analytical" table of contents in the back is also much more useful than the one up front. The most notable criticism I have of the book is that it seems like it tries to speak to too many audiences at once. It moves back and forth between using examples of negotiations from high politics to talking to the contractor working on your home. Also, the authors present a vignette at the beginning of the book in which two people are bartering over the price of an object. I remain unconvinced that there are principled negotiation alternatives to simply bartering, and the authors never return to the example with suggestions. Maybe I'm OCD, but thinking about that bothered me for the first half of the book.

My mother's nightmare

2008-09-10T11:43:00.002-06:00

So I finally told my parents about the mc this past weekend. They reacted better than I had feared they would, but it was still mildly unpleasant. Dad seemed pretty OK, and talked both about safe mc riders he'd seen on the road as well as about bad mc accidents he's seen. When I told Mom there was a long silence. She basically didn't comment much the whole time I talked about it, but I'm expecting newspaper articles detailing the risks of mc riding to arrive in the mail any day now.

They did approve the plan to come up to UT next month. Funny thing. Mom asked me to bring an air mattress up with us since their sofa bed is dying. I tried repeatedly to explain about the limited luggage capacity of the mc, but Mom insisted that there must be an easy way to fit it. Finally Mom relented, but I still think that she thinks I'm just being difficult and it really would be easy for us to take the air mattress.

We'll leave for UT the day after the first anniversary of J's dad's death and be there for J's birthday. I think that's a good thing.

Current Mood: trying to be a safe speed demon

Make up your mind

2008-09-08T12:14:00.002-06:00

Too many choices can definitely feel worse than not enough, particularly when they are high stakes choices. I really don't know what I'm doing or what the different options could mean for my future. Up to this point I've been happy the process of vetting me for the Tucson position is likely to take months. Now I'm not so sure. I feel like I'm in a no-man's-land of not knowing what I'm doing, and not being forced to make a decision. Then there's the J factor. Should I try to convince him to move? Assume that everything will be OK with us semi-long-distance? Continue to look for a job here? It's all too much.

Current Mood: emotionally labile