I keep getting all of these things via Facebook. I think there used to be a time when these were forwarded endlessly throughout a circle of friends via email. I like the Facebook method better; keeps my inbox clean. Anyway, here's my responses to ONE word answers.
Type only ONE word answers
It's harder than you think!! Here is what you are supposed to do...and please don't spoil the fun...copy and paste into your own note, type in your answers and tag a bunch of people - including me.
Where is your cell phone?..... dunno
Your hair? ......... oily :(
Your father? ........ daddy
Your favorite thing? ........... Kyle
Your dream last night?....... forgotten
Your favorite drink? ........... smoothie
Your dream/goal? ........... mastery
The room you are in? ...... bedroom
Your fear? ......... trickery
Where do you want to be in 6 years?..... adventuring
Muffins? ............. nope
One of your wish list items?.......... money
Where you grew up? ........ Chicago
The last thing you did? ....... cleaned
What are you wearing?....... pajamas
Your TV?........... nonexistent
Your pets? ......... dead
Your computer? ..... sux
Your life? ......... cluttered
Your mood? ........ resourceful
Missing someone? ...... constantly
Your car? .... sold
Favorite store?..... museum
Your summer? ..... unplanned
Your favorite color? ........ changes
When is the last time you laughed? .....yesterday
Last time you cried? ....... dunno
Last person to email me? ally
My favorite food? ........ all
A place I would rather be right now? ..... home
Showing posts with label a little more pensive. Show all posts
Showing posts with label a little more pensive. Show all posts
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Sore but Certified
To start with, the certification guy was this old southerner, who clearly had a problem with women. I don't like being one of those gals that thinks that everyone's against me because I'm a girl, so I'm only saying this because I had a feeling this was the case but then my boss brought it up, entirely unprovoked.
I kindda got the feeling immediately. The guy, my boss, and myself were having an "opening meeting". And every time I asked the guy a question, he would answer, without looking at me at all, and one time he finished by gesturing toward my boss and saying (notice the quotes) " so to answer your question, Boss's Name..." I wasn't super insulted by it at the time. I just thought this guy doesn't like women, and I thought it was kindda funny. Glasses that made him look like a fish. And all of the body language and mannerisms of someone who mail ordered a wife. The kind of mannerisms that no one would find endearing and only women sold into his clutches would tolerate. Uber dweeb with something to prove.
Ever since I got to this job my primary role has been "operations development", meaning I was writing all of the Standard Operating Procedures and Quality Manuals and lab forms, etc. Basically, I set up the entire quality system at our company, and I did it following, from the point-of-view of someone who sits outside of the certification body, difficult as hell rules straight out of the Federal Registrar!
Part of the problem is that I was supposed to make a quality system based on the "guidance" of this certification body. But they (nor other certification bodies, as it turns out) never define the terms they use, and often times they uses the same term in about 3 different ways. The example that comes to mind is "demonstration of capability". This term means that our equipment is proven to measure we say it does. It also means that our analysts have demonstrated that they can perform our experiment in a statistically reproducible way. It also means that the laboratory has the infrastructure in place to handle incoming client samples.
So the guy says he wants to see our policy on demonstration of capability, and I ask, Are you interested in our policy on analyst DOC or the instrumentation? To which he rolls his eyes (in a VERY GRATUITOUS way) and repeats himself, raising his voice and getting in my face a little. Of course I have a problem in which I mimic behaviors, and this situation escalates for two more instances of his repeating himself. So I just pick one to show him. He reads it, and starts belittling me saying it wasn't what he wanted and he's never had such a hard time dealing with a laboratory and blah blah blah. And I say, It's not in my interest to give you a hard time. But it would be helpful if you could clarify a little more about what exactly you are interested in. Then I say, maybe if you show me your checklist so I can see what you're referring to I can save us all some time. (Of course I was trying to say diplomatic words, but I was saying them aggressively enough that it was making my boss, who was in the room at the time, nervous.)
So then after that day (Wednesday), my boss, our lab tech, and myself (the fourth of our crew was on his family vacation) went out for a few drinks, and my boss kept going on and on about how the guy really was out of line, which made me a little ok, but still really annoyed.
Anyway, the second day with the certification guy worked out fine. We refused to give him any coffee (he drank 16 cups within 4 hours the day before) and then he was a bit more personable toward me, at least.
In the end, we were certified, but I still don't know what lesson I should take away from all of this? Let people beat you up verbally and hope you get what you want out of the deal in the end? Even with all of my hard work paying off and getting our place certified, it still culminated into an emotional and disappointing end.
I kindda got the feeling immediately. The guy, my boss, and myself were having an "opening meeting". And every time I asked the guy a question, he would answer, without looking at me at all, and one time he finished by gesturing toward my boss and saying (notice the quotes) " so to answer your question, Boss's Name..." I wasn't super insulted by it at the time. I just thought this guy doesn't like women, and I thought it was kindda funny. Glasses that made him look like a fish. And all of the body language and mannerisms of someone who mail ordered a wife. The kind of mannerisms that no one would find endearing and only women sold into his clutches would tolerate. Uber dweeb with something to prove.
Ever since I got to this job my primary role has been "operations development", meaning I was writing all of the Standard Operating Procedures and Quality Manuals and lab forms, etc. Basically, I set up the entire quality system at our company, and I did it following, from the point-of-view of someone who sits outside of the certification body, difficult as hell rules straight out of the Federal Registrar!
Part of the problem is that I was supposed to make a quality system based on the "guidance" of this certification body. But they (nor other certification bodies, as it turns out) never define the terms they use, and often times they uses the same term in about 3 different ways. The example that comes to mind is "demonstration of capability". This term means that our equipment is proven to measure we say it does. It also means that our analysts have demonstrated that they can perform our experiment in a statistically reproducible way. It also means that the laboratory has the infrastructure in place to handle incoming client samples.
So the guy says he wants to see our policy on demonstration of capability, and I ask, Are you interested in our policy on analyst DOC or the instrumentation? To which he rolls his eyes (in a VERY GRATUITOUS way) and repeats himself, raising his voice and getting in my face a little. Of course I have a problem in which I mimic behaviors, and this situation escalates for two more instances of his repeating himself. So I just pick one to show him. He reads it, and starts belittling me saying it wasn't what he wanted and he's never had such a hard time dealing with a laboratory and blah blah blah. And I say, It's not in my interest to give you a hard time. But it would be helpful if you could clarify a little more about what exactly you are interested in. Then I say, maybe if you show me your checklist so I can see what you're referring to I can save us all some time. (Of course I was trying to say diplomatic words, but I was saying them aggressively enough that it was making my boss, who was in the room at the time, nervous.)
So then after that day (Wednesday), my boss, our lab tech, and myself (the fourth of our crew was on his family vacation) went out for a few drinks, and my boss kept going on and on about how the guy really was out of line, which made me a little ok, but still really annoyed.
Anyway, the second day with the certification guy worked out fine. We refused to give him any coffee (he drank 16 cups within 4 hours the day before) and then he was a bit more personable toward me, at least.
In the end, we were certified, but I still don't know what lesson I should take away from all of this? Let people beat you up verbally and hope you get what you want out of the deal in the end? Even with all of my hard work paying off and getting our place certified, it still culminated into an emotional and disappointing end.
Monday, July 7, 2008
The SCARIEST statistic I ever heard!
Question
Last year there were more than 200,000 bats in a specific cave in southern Vermont. How many were there this year?
Although I am probably most concerned with the HONEYBEE CRISIS at the moment, the mass die-off of bats is beginning to muscle it's way to the front of my interest.
I had been trying to get in touch with people who study bats for the past month or two. Essentially, our laboratory had recently (and indirectly) made headlines when one of our clients got published in Science using data our lab generated. We were able to do mercury speciation of single spiders. So then I thought, what other animals eat insects? Bats.
So I called up the gal who edits Bat Research News, the premier scientific journal for bat research, because if anyone should know who in the bat science community researchers what, well it should be the editor of the only bat-exclusive journal.
Although she didn't know whether any researchers were looking into mercury in bats and bats' diets, she did offer the few names of people who conducted studies in the past.
She said it was difficult to get research permits right now because of the bat crisis. Apparently to do analytical studies, researchers have to kill the animal and analyze its organs, and with more than 90% of all bats in America having died this year, the government wasn't too interested in trace metal studies of bat kidneys.
I had heard of the White Nose Syndrome. It's a fungal infection that seems to have been the cause of death of many bats that have been found dead. However, according to my contact, there have been instances of bats being infected with the fungus, but otherwise appearing unaffected. The scientific community, she said, is now starting to question whether the fungus is an opportunistic infection. Like how people infected with HIV do not die from HIV itself, their demise is usually due to another infection that can get a foothold in the body due to a weakened immune system. Perhaps the bat's immune system is weakened due to other infections or contaminations and under these weakened conditions the fungus does the worst damage.
However, the fungus itself does not kill the bat. Instead, it causes a chain reaction that ends in starvation. White Nose Syndrome, she said, infects the bat and causes an immune response. As a typical immune response, the bat's metabolism increases. This is a problem for hibernating bats. When its metabolism increases, it comes out of hibernation and starts looking for food. In the winter, there are not enough insects available to eat, so the bat starves to death.
So far, as many as 90% of America's bats have perished! And that brings you back to the question at the beginning of this entry.
Question
Last year there were more than 200,000 bats in a specific cave in southern Vermont. How many were there this year?
Answer
Five. That's right five. 5. Cinco.
That's the most shocking statistic I ever heard!
Last year there were more than 200,000 bats in a specific cave in southern Vermont. How many were there this year?
Although I am probably most concerned with the HONEYBEE CRISIS at the moment, the mass die-off of bats is beginning to muscle it's way to the front of my interest.
I had been trying to get in touch with people who study bats for the past month or two. Essentially, our laboratory had recently (and indirectly) made headlines when one of our clients got published in Science using data our lab generated. We were able to do mercury speciation of single spiders. So then I thought, what other animals eat insects? Bats.
So I called up the gal who edits Bat Research News, the premier scientific journal for bat research, because if anyone should know who in the bat science community researchers what, well it should be the editor of the only bat-exclusive journal.
Although she didn't know whether any researchers were looking into mercury in bats and bats' diets, she did offer the few names of people who conducted studies in the past.
She said it was difficult to get research permits right now because of the bat crisis. Apparently to do analytical studies, researchers have to kill the animal and analyze its organs, and with more than 90% of all bats in America having died this year, the government wasn't too interested in trace metal studies of bat kidneys.
I had heard of the White Nose Syndrome. It's a fungal infection that seems to have been the cause of death of many bats that have been found dead. However, according to my contact, there have been instances of bats being infected with the fungus, but otherwise appearing unaffected. The scientific community, she said, is now starting to question whether the fungus is an opportunistic infection. Like how people infected with HIV do not die from HIV itself, their demise is usually due to another infection that can get a foothold in the body due to a weakened immune system. Perhaps the bat's immune system is weakened due to other infections or contaminations and under these weakened conditions the fungus does the worst damage.
However, the fungus itself does not kill the bat. Instead, it causes a chain reaction that ends in starvation. White Nose Syndrome, she said, infects the bat and causes an immune response. As a typical immune response, the bat's metabolism increases. This is a problem for hibernating bats. When its metabolism increases, it comes out of hibernation and starts looking for food. In the winter, there are not enough insects available to eat, so the bat starves to death.
So far, as many as 90% of America's bats have perished! And that brings you back to the question at the beginning of this entry.
Question
Last year there were more than 200,000 bats in a specific cave in southern Vermont. How many were there this year?
Answer
Five. That's right five. 5. Cinco.
That's the most shocking statistic I ever heard!
Sunday, June 8, 2008
I like honey bees
So, in talking with my good ole chum pals, I'm getting more and more frustrated with how little everyone knows about Colony Collapse Disorder and the American Honeybee.
I recently signed up for digg.com, which is an interesting little place to post/rank and discuss news, and while reading a story about the extinction of the Caribbean Monk Seal, I found a little comment thread of the theme "how much bad stuff has to happen before humans take a careful look at how their activities lead to extinction?"
One of the comments said, maybe if the honeybees all die and we have a food crisis, we'll all start caring. The next commenter said, humans have nothing to do with honeybees dying. ::le sigh::
So I posted this on Digg, and I'm pretty proud of it, so I'm reposting here.
1. Last I heard (let me know if you've heard something more recent) Colony Collapse Disorder was more likely the effect of a virus, not a fungus.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-09/aaft-vna083107.php
2. Whenever you have viruses, you see that some individuals in a population are genetically able to resist them.
3. Most honey bees in the U.S. are kept by bee keepers and their hives are rented to orchards and other farms. These bees are genetically uniform, meaning if one of the bees in the hive can get sick form a virus, it's highly likely that all the others are susceptible too. (This has been demonstrated through the collapse, i.e. deaths, of 50 to 90% of the American honey bee colonies kept in the U.S. in 2007.)
4. Habitat destruction (humans) reduces genetic diversity. Not only do we breed genetic diversity out of the kept hives, when we destroy habitats, the wild honey bees suffer too because the majority of these bees end up dying off as opposed to relocating.
THE POINT
Human's attempt to control the honey bee population could be the ultimate reason honey bees drift toward failure.
Luckily honeybees reproduce like mad, unlike mammals. So that have that going for them.
A little off topic from monk seals... but still...
I recently signed up for digg.com, which is an interesting little place to post/rank and discuss news, and while reading a story about the extinction of the Caribbean Monk Seal, I found a little comment thread of the theme "how much bad stuff has to happen before humans take a careful look at how their activities lead to extinction?"
One of the comments said, maybe if the honeybees all die and we have a food crisis, we'll all start caring. The next commenter said, humans have nothing to do with honeybees dying. ::le sigh::
So I posted this on Digg, and I'm pretty proud of it, so I'm reposting here.
1. Last I heard (let me know if you've heard something more recent) Colony Collapse Disorder was more likely the effect of a virus, not a fungus.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-09/aaft-vna083107.php
2. Whenever you have viruses, you see that some individuals in a population are genetically able to resist them.
3. Most honey bees in the U.S. are kept by bee keepers and their hives are rented to orchards and other farms. These bees are genetically uniform, meaning if one of the bees in the hive can get sick form a virus, it's highly likely that all the others are susceptible too. (This has been demonstrated through the collapse, i.e. deaths, of 50 to 90% of the American honey bee colonies kept in the U.S. in 2007.)
4. Habitat destruction (humans) reduces genetic diversity. Not only do we breed genetic diversity out of the kept hives, when we destroy habitats, the wild honey bees suffer too because the majority of these bees end up dying off as opposed to relocating.
THE POINT
Human's attempt to control the honey bee population could be the ultimate reason honey bees drift toward failure.
Luckily honeybees reproduce like mad, unlike mammals. So that have that going for them.
A little off topic from monk seals... but still...
Monday, May 21, 2007
Octa-Tales and The Evolution of Young Women
L and I have been utilizing company property to grow an octopus. She retrieved the prize from a bag at the end-of-the-project party last July. I, having pulled out a pencil or a toothbrush or something equally inferior, fixed on the octopus. Its orangish skin. Its fierce eyes.
The front of the package raved: "It grows 600% in only 72 hours!" The back of the package provided three drawings illustrating the progressive size increase. By drawing three, the octopus gets so big that it climbs out of its container!
The thing lay dormant and small in her cube for almost a year. This was not out of lack of excitement. Nearly every week, we'd talk about growing the octopus. The problem was remembering to bring a bucket to work on Monday so as to maximize observational time during the week.
"What will I do when you're gone?" She asked me this in a very real, non-idiomatic way.
Over the past two years, L and I have become somewhat unlikely friends. Our boss picked up on this and often announced during meetings that "the two of them seem to get along very well, even though they have nothing in common." This always strikes her as odd. Almost as much as my reprisal of last weekend in which B and I found ourselves in a cab with an unknown third passenger. ("Buddy, where did you come from?" and "What is this guy doing here?") "Wait," L stopped me, "were you drinking?"
Despite our many moral inequalities, we have compatible self-reflective natures. We both wrestle with the same questions, such as How important is family? How fulfilling should a job be? and Can one convince oneself of being happy or is happiness really based on something other than willpower?
When we decided to work from Borders one afternoon we got to talking about lamenting over mistakes in our past. "I generally don't bother with regret because it's a waste of an emotion. I'm more of a fate-believer. If I make a mistake, it was because I was supposed to make that mistake."
"What if you make the same mistake twice?"
"Then, clearly, I didn't learn enough to move on from it the first time."
I've only very recently started feeling regret, and both instances had to do with her--not calling her that week she was helping her parents move through Alabama and the weekend we were in Nashville for a conference and she got the call that her Dad, a lifetime nonsmoker, had lung cancer. Of course there was nothing I could have done. But I still feel regret. It's like Uncle Jimmy says, "There's nothing worse than not being able to help someone you love."
"You know what's a good idea?" I'd say after we'd been bleeding hearts for a bit, "We should grow that octopus." Months ago we said that. Hundreds of trips to CVS. Mid-afternoon naps in her living room. Her Dad got worse. Nana died. Friends left town. Lovers dissipated. "People come and go, but mostly they just go."
Finally one of the gumshoes in our department stayed for a late evening and found that, at the end of the day, the blue recycle bins get dumped into the same trash bag as the black trash bins. (The discovery caused quite an uproar with tons of people on the floor, all of whom religiously recycled, but none of whom ever bought recycled notepads, yarn, or bicycles.) So last Monday, after L had calculated that I only had 13 regular days left in the office, we decided to make the first good use of those recycle bins and perform our experiment.
Within 24 hours, it was slightly bigger. The researchers wondered if it would increase 600% in length or volume.
Day Two. Not much more growth. Researchers decide that, if experiment repeated, starting volume should be determined. Researchers postulate various methods that could be used to measure volume: displacement, calipers.
Day Three. Almost no change from Day Two. Researchers begin to use words such as disappointing; they flip over the package to compare the illustrated octopus climbing out of its line-art container to the real foam octopus still quite submerged in the recycle bin. Researcher bring outline of octopus, traced at the experiment's beginning, to the copier and attempt to blow it up 600%. Researchers determine what the width of one tentacle should be at 600%. Return to the recycle bin and curse the Chinese for getting their hopes up. Colleague walks by and says, "You know, 600 percent really isn't that big." Researchers consider cursing her too.
With the official experiment concluded, we just let the thing sit through the weekend. By Day Seven, when we came back into the office, two of the tentacles were stretched and reaching out of the water. "Small victories, J. Small victories."
The front of the package raved: "It grows 600% in only 72 hours!" The back of the package provided three drawings illustrating the progressive size increase. By drawing three, the octopus gets so big that it climbs out of its container!
The thing lay dormant and small in her cube for almost a year. This was not out of lack of excitement. Nearly every week, we'd talk about growing the octopus. The problem was remembering to bring a bucket to work on Monday so as to maximize observational time during the week.
"What will I do when you're gone?" She asked me this in a very real, non-idiomatic way.
Over the past two years, L and I have become somewhat unlikely friends. Our boss picked up on this and often announced during meetings that "the two of them seem to get along very well, even though they have nothing in common." This always strikes her as odd. Almost as much as my reprisal of last weekend in which B and I found ourselves in a cab with an unknown third passenger. ("Buddy, where did you come from?" and "What is this guy doing here?") "Wait," L stopped me, "were you drinking?"
Despite our many moral inequalities, we have compatible self-reflective natures. We both wrestle with the same questions, such as How important is family? How fulfilling should a job be? and Can one convince oneself of being happy or is happiness really based on something other than willpower?
When we decided to work from Borders one afternoon we got to talking about lamenting over mistakes in our past. "I generally don't bother with regret because it's a waste of an emotion. I'm more of a fate-believer. If I make a mistake, it was because I was supposed to make that mistake."
"What if you make the same mistake twice?"
"Then, clearly, I didn't learn enough to move on from it the first time."
I've only very recently started feeling regret, and both instances had to do with her--not calling her that week she was helping her parents move through Alabama and the weekend we were in Nashville for a conference and she got the call that her Dad, a lifetime nonsmoker, had lung cancer. Of course there was nothing I could have done. But I still feel regret. It's like Uncle Jimmy says, "There's nothing worse than not being able to help someone you love."
"You know what's a good idea?" I'd say after we'd been bleeding hearts for a bit, "We should grow that octopus." Months ago we said that. Hundreds of trips to CVS. Mid-afternoon naps in her living room. Her Dad got worse. Nana died. Friends left town. Lovers dissipated. "People come and go, but mostly they just go."
Finally one of the gumshoes in our department stayed for a late evening and found that, at the end of the day, the blue recycle bins get dumped into the same trash bag as the black trash bins. (The discovery caused quite an uproar with tons of people on the floor, all of whom religiously recycled, but none of whom ever bought recycled notepads, yarn, or bicycles.) So last Monday, after L had calculated that I only had 13 regular days left in the office, we decided to make the first good use of those recycle bins and perform our experiment.
Within 24 hours, it was slightly bigger. The researchers wondered if it would increase 600% in length or volume.
Day Two. Not much more growth. Researchers decide that, if experiment repeated, starting volume should be determined. Researchers postulate various methods that could be used to measure volume: displacement, calipers.
Day Three. Almost no change from Day Two. Researchers begin to use words such as disappointing; they flip over the package to compare the illustrated octopus climbing out of its line-art container to the real foam octopus still quite submerged in the recycle bin. Researcher bring outline of octopus, traced at the experiment's beginning, to the copier and attempt to blow it up 600%. Researchers determine what the width of one tentacle should be at 600%. Return to the recycle bin and curse the Chinese for getting their hopes up. Colleague walks by and says, "You know, 600 percent really isn't that big." Researchers consider cursing her too.
With the official experiment concluded, we just let the thing sit through the weekend. By Day Seven, when we came back into the office, two of the tentacles were stretched and reaching out of the water. "Small victories, J. Small victories."
Monday, April 2, 2007
It's Polite to Ask First
Although my plans are ever-changing, and I seldom feel responsiblity to account for my newest-fad train-of-throught, I would care to legitimize this one: Why I've decided to move home this summer.
Mom is really having a hard time. Last week was her spring break and most of the time, if I called home while she was alone, she was crying. So I decided to go home for the weekend.
On Saturday I wandered into Nana's room to borrow supplies from her sewing box. I walked in and said to myself: "Nana, can I borrow a needle and thread?" In my mind, I could hear her telling me it would be okay, and then she would give me detailed instructions about how to find the sewing box. 'It's in that closet, on the floor on the right. Look in there.' (She always gave specific instructions on where to find things. But for most stuff, it was pretty simple. On the closet floor, there was only the sewing box.)
When I went to return it, Mom found me and asked what I was doing. Then she said, "Did you ask to borrow Nana's sewing needle?"
Who's more nuts? Her for saying it, or me for preemptively doing it? "Yeah," I said. Then she lost it.
Sunday night, before we went to bed, Mom said, "Janet, thanks for coming home to spend time with me." Broke my heart.
Broke my heart.
Mom is really having a hard time. Last week was her spring break and most of the time, if I called home while she was alone, she was crying. So I decided to go home for the weekend.
On Saturday I wandered into Nana's room to borrow supplies from her sewing box. I walked in and said to myself: "Nana, can I borrow a needle and thread?" In my mind, I could hear her telling me it would be okay, and then she would give me detailed instructions about how to find the sewing box. 'It's in that closet, on the floor on the right. Look in there.' (She always gave specific instructions on where to find things. But for most stuff, it was pretty simple. On the closet floor, there was only the sewing box.)
When I went to return it, Mom found me and asked what I was doing. Then she said, "Did you ask to borrow Nana's sewing needle?"
Who's more nuts? Her for saying it, or me for preemptively doing it? "Yeah," I said. Then she lost it.
Sunday night, before we went to bed, Mom said, "Janet, thanks for coming home to spend time with me." Broke my heart.
Broke my heart.
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Delayed Responses and a Two-Timin' Workin' Woman
To add to the list of things you'd never suspect, why not try 'going on an interview, bombing it, and then getting hired the next day'?
I've been trying to pay off my credit cards at a quicker rate, which thus far means I've been budgeting myself better. But it's difficult to really feel progress with only one income being pinched inward from both sides. So I've been trying to get part-time gigs for a while now. Nothing has come close to an interview.
In January, I applied to work as a tutor. I didn't get an interview. Then in March, I found the ad posted again. So I looked at my old application and decided to try to make my cover letter more enthusiastic. I got a call back the day before Nana's wake.
So of course I didn't return the phone call right away. I waited about a week and finally called back. If you don't do it now, Janet, you never will.
I was not confident about the interview. I didn't have my normal levels of 'interview energy' because (1) general depression and (2) when I walked in, they had me fill out a 20-page application. Also the girl interviewing me eclipsed me in bubbliness and enthusiasm.
So then I go home, thinking, 'Another opportunity lost.'
The very next day, BAM! Phone call. Hired. Start on the 31st!
That's how a girl gets through the 3 month screening process--persistance!
I've been trying to pay off my credit cards at a quicker rate, which thus far means I've been budgeting myself better. But it's difficult to really feel progress with only one income being pinched inward from both sides. So I've been trying to get part-time gigs for a while now. Nothing has come close to an interview.
In January, I applied to work as a tutor. I didn't get an interview. Then in March, I found the ad posted again. So I looked at my old application and decided to try to make my cover letter more enthusiastic. I got a call back the day before Nana's wake.
So of course I didn't return the phone call right away. I waited about a week and finally called back. If you don't do it now, Janet, you never will.
I was not confident about the interview. I didn't have my normal levels of 'interview energy' because (1) general depression and (2) when I walked in, they had me fill out a 20-page application. Also the girl interviewing me eclipsed me in bubbliness and enthusiasm.
So then I go home, thinking, 'Another opportunity lost.'
The very next day, BAM! Phone call. Hired. Start on the 31st!
That's how a girl gets through the 3 month screening process--persistance!
Wednesday, March 21, 2007
Blind Men on the Moon, Buoys in the Sea
"You look like a blind man walking around on the moon!" That was how Mom scolded John and me as we played pool when we were younger. He or I would take a shot and walk away with our cues still held in a lateral, shooting position. And she'd tell us to hold the cue straight up and down after comparing us to the visually impared in a gravity-free environment.
I always liked the analogy. Imagine! A blind man walking on the moon! Bobbing like a buoy, just like how astronauts do in videos. Slowly trying to detect the absence of nothingness around him. And the analogy works outside of pool too!
Like when I got accepted to college. I was bobbing along, working in a craft store. I didn't want to go to college. I didn't even apply. Bob. Bob. Bob. Then I came home from a day shift, and my Mom said the U of I called and wanted to give me a scholarship. All I had to do was send in the scholarship application and do an interview. Simple enough! And completely out of nowhere! Here I was, bobbin' around, not looking for anything. Not seeing anything heading my way, and there it was: a small 4-year scholarship, but free money nonetheless.
It applies to things that aren't so pleasant too. For example, I was bobbing along the weekend before Saint Patty's Day. A group of kids and I were at the South Side Parade. Drinking. Bobbing. Oblivious to the world. Then, that night, I get the call that Nana's dying. Just like that! No major warning!
When I talk about this, it's hard for others to understand how a 90-year-old woman's death can shock me. It does seem irrational to think that a person, of any age, is perpetual--especially a 90-year-old one. But she was youthful to the point that it was easy to forget about mortality. She went on a senior citizen's bus a couple times a week and walked around a mall. She never had a major heart attack or stroke or anything like that. She told jokes. She chatted on the phone, and she remembered everything--except how to program her VCR, but she couldn't do that when she was 75, neither.
We were all bobbing along, blind men on the moon. Lazily holding out white canes, never expecting to hit an object. Just like that. Seemingly out of nowhere. You're left to consider: "If I can run into something on the moon once, surely I'll always be in danger of finding something again later." But you can't persist, vigilantly looking and remaining prepared against what you cannot see.
When you're on the moon, you encounter problems at irregular intervals. Soon your guard is down. And you're apathetically bobbing along again. Like a buoy in the sea.
I always liked the analogy. Imagine! A blind man walking on the moon! Bobbing like a buoy, just like how astronauts do in videos. Slowly trying to detect the absence of nothingness around him. And the analogy works outside of pool too!
Like when I got accepted to college. I was bobbing along, working in a craft store. I didn't want to go to college. I didn't even apply. Bob. Bob. Bob. Then I came home from a day shift, and my Mom said the U of I called and wanted to give me a scholarship. All I had to do was send in the scholarship application and do an interview. Simple enough! And completely out of nowhere! Here I was, bobbin' around, not looking for anything. Not seeing anything heading my way, and there it was: a small 4-year scholarship, but free money nonetheless.
It applies to things that aren't so pleasant too. For example, I was bobbing along the weekend before Saint Patty's Day. A group of kids and I were at the South Side Parade. Drinking. Bobbing. Oblivious to the world. Then, that night, I get the call that Nana's dying. Just like that! No major warning!
When I talk about this, it's hard for others to understand how a 90-year-old woman's death can shock me. It does seem irrational to think that a person, of any age, is perpetual--especially a 90-year-old one. But she was youthful to the point that it was easy to forget about mortality. She went on a senior citizen's bus a couple times a week and walked around a mall. She never had a major heart attack or stroke or anything like that. She told jokes. She chatted on the phone, and she remembered everything--except how to program her VCR, but she couldn't do that when she was 75, neither.
We were all bobbing along, blind men on the moon. Lazily holding out white canes, never expecting to hit an object. Just like that. Seemingly out of nowhere. You're left to consider: "If I can run into something on the moon once, surely I'll always be in danger of finding something again later." But you can't persist, vigilantly looking and remaining prepared against what you cannot see.
When you're on the moon, you encounter problems at irregular intervals. Soon your guard is down. And you're apathetically bobbing along again. Like a buoy in the sea.
Monday, March 19, 2007
Bereaved in Chicago
In a letter to K and A:
My little 90-year-old Nana died this morning :'( The events leading to that took up most of my weekend, beginning at 6 in the AM on Friday... so, nothing too fun/exciting to report, except that I was so sleep deprived at one point that I almost went for real hysterical... and that could have been real interesting, honestly... it might have been interesting in a movie or something... just so you know though, I'm doin alright. When she was in the hospital, my heart broke into tiny pieces, but once she was out of pain, I felt sorry for myself, but glad because I really do have strong faith (believe it or not)... and I've seen enough people die to come to the conclusion that the remains of a person is not really the person you knew... you know? just kind of the box that holds the present... or like how the ring symbolizes a marriage, but the spirit of the relationship is what the marriage really is... something like that. But I know I'll miss her in ways that I can't even imagine yet.
My little 90-year-old Nana died this morning :'( The events leading to that took up most of my weekend, beginning at 6 in the AM on Friday... so, nothing too fun/exciting to report, except that I was so sleep deprived at one point that I almost went for real hysterical... and that could have been real interesting, honestly... it might have been interesting in a movie or something... just so you know though, I'm doin alright. When she was in the hospital, my heart broke into tiny pieces, but once she was out of pain, I felt sorry for myself, but glad because I really do have strong faith (believe it or not)... and I've seen enough people die to come to the conclusion that the remains of a person is not really the person you knew... you know? just kind of the box that holds the present... or like how the ring symbolizes a marriage, but the spirit of the relationship is what the marriage really is... something like that. But I know I'll miss her in ways that I can't even imagine yet.
Thursday, March 1, 2007
Mom and Dad Were Once People, I Suspect
As I grow up, I'm trying harder to imagine my parents as people. Apparently, I'm not the only person grappling with this. A video documenter examined this theme in a story about his parents, and how, three months after his mother's funeral, his dad was setting up to get married again. (LINK)
When you're a kid, your parents are a single unit. If they're together, it's always mom and dad. They're almost like a law of nature—two people who have always existed together, and probably did not really begin existing until the birth of their first child. I imagine that for children--excuse me, young adults--whose parents are divorced, there's some similar feeling.
As a child, you assume that your parents know everything. You learn that your sweater is a sweater by listening to your parents talk. Your parents hold the answers to puzzles, such as how to tie a shoe. When you ask questions, such as Is there a Santa Claus, you know your parents have the authority to answer that question. They have a vast knowledge that their young children accept as their parents' own exclusive mastery of the world.
When you get into the middle years, you start questioning some of that authority. But you do not do it because you recognize that parents are fallible human beings. You question authority because you want to win some control. You want to disconnect from the people who act as if they have all of the answers. You want to learn to experience and discover things on your own, without the parental filter.
At some point, though, you learn that your parents' command of knowledge is not inherent. Their wisdom, or lack thereof, was derived from their own life experiences. When I first had this notion, all I could think was: Wow! My parents had a life outside of my brother and me! Somehow they were real people and parents all at the same time.
I knew this in a kind of second-nature way. I knew this in the way that people wake up every morning and know the sky is still going to be above their heads. But I did not feel it! I did not feel the epiphany or the eye-opening realization that Yes! My parents are real people! Real people who had lives and experiences that have had nothing to do with me.
Young Parents
I did not begin thinking about it until I graduated from college. The idea of merging the words parents and people came with my firsts job. I was working with M. He was in his low-thirties and an awesome person! He was fun and energetic and young. He would spend time downloading music, laughing. He said things such as, "When I was a kid, I wanted to be a rock star or an astronaut—or both!" His charm was so youthful, you'd never suspect that he had two kids of his own.
He didn't have that authoritative, decision-making, life-managing poise that I associated with parents. He once found and purchased a tin can of squid "in its natural ink" and displayed it in his cube. It sat for more than a year next to a company issued award certificate that he modified, with bright red pen, into a bathroom pass.
But he wasn't irresponsible or negligent as a father. He told stories about what he and his kids would do over a weekend. When his little girl became big enough, he couldn't help but tell everyone how cool it was to see her enjoying her first trip down a playground slide. Or how his son had finally gotten big enough to help his wife bake cookies.
At some point, it occurred to me: My parents must be real people too! They had lives before each other, although they don't reminisce much on times before their early dating years.
I always knew my dad played guitar and college hockey—we had the sticks and pads to prove the later. But it wasn't until last weekend, when he was showing off the ukulele he and Mom bought from Hawaii, that I had ever seen him strum strings. Mom majored in Fine Arts, and although her college pieces hang still in their house, she hasn't produced anything new in my lifetime. It's difficult to imagine Mom holding a paintbrush. It's difficult to imagine Mom and Dad as anyone but Mom and Dad.
Even when they talked about human things, I could not make the leap. Not even when, sitting around the living room, Mom and Dad were talking about what it was like when they first got married. In a side bar, Dad said, as calm as can be, "When we first got married, every Friday night, your mother and I would rent a movie and order a sausage pizza. Then, we'd have sex. Every Friday."
"Don't say things like that in front of your daughter!!"
"What? We did, didn't we? Every Friday night."
It wasn't news to me that my parents got it on. Maybe this is why I still didn't hear this information and have that epiphany: Oh, right! They're people! Silly, bickering, sex-having people!
Money Toilets
Of course, Mom and Dad still get on my nerves. Especially when Mom forgets that I am an adult, and she gives me too much nagging input. But I forget just how much more trouble I've caused them, as people, throughout their lives.
T at work is low-forties and recently divorced with two sons. The divorce didn't seem messy. But the aftermath of having only one income is. In the divorce, he got the mortgage on the house, and he still pays child support and other expenses for his kids. He keeps the house that he can hardly afford so that he can make his sons' biweekly stay comfortable. He's canceling his cable so that he can foot 100 percent of his eldest son's car insurance.
With all of the changes and difficulties, T doesn't complain really. I only know these things because we cheer on one another's get-out-of-debt plans. If T spends meagerly, he'll be out of debt in four or five years. When he talks about these things, he says, "I just have to buckle down and do it. I'm not eating out for a few months.."
The thing that really hits home for me is that his sons do not know what's going on with their father's finances. They don't realize that every activity they add to their agenda has their dad scrambling to find new freelance work. He won't tell his sons these things. And he won't deny his sons a level of normal niceties, such as car insurance, cell phones, delivered pizzas. He sucks it up silently and provides, beyond his means, so his sons can have access to the things he considers normal.
I think, then, of my parents. Both worked low-paying Joe-jobs until I was in double-digits. Mom worked for years at a grocer chain. Dad held two or three jobs at a time for my entire young life. He worked full-time as a funeral director—a job he later explained to me as: "I went to embalming school so I could marry your mother."
When I was young, my grandmother lived with us. This served the dual purpose of keeping her near family as well as providing my brother and me with a constant babysitter while Mom and Dad worked weird hours, trying to provide for us: bikes, dogs, trees in the yard, decent clothes. But they put themselves out in the process.
When Dad lost his bread-and-butter funeral-directing job, savings got depleted. They spent in the red for five years, trying to keep giving us “normal” lives. My brother and I couldn't have noticed. There were a few more arguments, but we still ate well. Still went on vacation. And I remember, as a kid, feeling as if everything they gave was owed to me. I still thought this through college. I resented my parents for not having as much money as my classmate's parents.
One hundred percent of my college expenses went on student loans. When I saw the first bill, I felt cheated that I was responsible for it. My parents, by that time, were making very good money between them. But they were still paying off debts from 10 years prior when Dad lost his job. Neither of them had a savings or retirement plan to speak of, but I felt, without rationall thinking about it, that they had let me down.
Mom once told me that she was "a slave to this house". Fifteen years later, I know it wasn't just a colorful idiom. It was a glance into her humanity. It was the lamentation of a real woman with her own life-expectations--not just those for her kids.
Where I'm At Now
Even with the things I've realized, I'm still don't think of my parents as people. I have to get from the point of meditation on the issue to the nirvana of completely understanding the many facets of adult-and parent-hood. But I think I'm well on my way. I just need to keep myself from slipping backward into forgetting that Mom and Dad are really Karen and John.
When you're a kid, your parents are a single unit. If they're together, it's always mom and dad. They're almost like a law of nature—two people who have always existed together, and probably did not really begin existing until the birth of their first child. I imagine that for children--excuse me, young adults--whose parents are divorced, there's some similar feeling.
As a child, you assume that your parents know everything. You learn that your sweater is a sweater by listening to your parents talk. Your parents hold the answers to puzzles, such as how to tie a shoe. When you ask questions, such as Is there a Santa Claus, you know your parents have the authority to answer that question. They have a vast knowledge that their young children accept as their parents' own exclusive mastery of the world.
When you get into the middle years, you start questioning some of that authority. But you do not do it because you recognize that parents are fallible human beings. You question authority because you want to win some control. You want to disconnect from the people who act as if they have all of the answers. You want to learn to experience and discover things on your own, without the parental filter.
At some point, though, you learn that your parents' command of knowledge is not inherent. Their wisdom, or lack thereof, was derived from their own life experiences. When I first had this notion, all I could think was: Wow! My parents had a life outside of my brother and me! Somehow they were real people and parents all at the same time.
I knew this in a kind of second-nature way. I knew this in the way that people wake up every morning and know the sky is still going to be above their heads. But I did not feel it! I did not feel the epiphany or the eye-opening realization that Yes! My parents are real people! Real people who had lives and experiences that have had nothing to do with me.
Young Parents
I did not begin thinking about it until I graduated from college. The idea of merging the words parents and people came with my firsts job. I was working with M. He was in his low-thirties and an awesome person! He was fun and energetic and young. He would spend time downloading music, laughing. He said things such as, "When I was a kid, I wanted to be a rock star or an astronaut—or both!" His charm was so youthful, you'd never suspect that he had two kids of his own.
He didn't have that authoritative, decision-making, life-managing poise that I associated with parents. He once found and purchased a tin can of squid "in its natural ink" and displayed it in his cube. It sat for more than a year next to a company issued award certificate that he modified, with bright red pen, into a bathroom pass.
But he wasn't irresponsible or negligent as a father. He told stories about what he and his kids would do over a weekend. When his little girl became big enough, he couldn't help but tell everyone how cool it was to see her enjoying her first trip down a playground slide. Or how his son had finally gotten big enough to help his wife bake cookies.
At some point, it occurred to me: My parents must be real people too! They had lives before each other, although they don't reminisce much on times before their early dating years.
I always knew my dad played guitar and college hockey—we had the sticks and pads to prove the later. But it wasn't until last weekend, when he was showing off the ukulele he and Mom bought from Hawaii, that I had ever seen him strum strings. Mom majored in Fine Arts, and although her college pieces hang still in their house, she hasn't produced anything new in my lifetime. It's difficult to imagine Mom holding a paintbrush. It's difficult to imagine Mom and Dad as anyone but Mom and Dad.
Even when they talked about human things, I could not make the leap. Not even when, sitting around the living room, Mom and Dad were talking about what it was like when they first got married. In a side bar, Dad said, as calm as can be, "When we first got married, every Friday night, your mother and I would rent a movie and order a sausage pizza. Then, we'd have sex. Every Friday."
"Don't say things like that in front of your daughter!!"
"What? We did, didn't we? Every Friday night."
It wasn't news to me that my parents got it on. Maybe this is why I still didn't hear this information and have that epiphany: Oh, right! They're people! Silly, bickering, sex-having people!
Money Toilets
Of course, Mom and Dad still get on my nerves. Especially when Mom forgets that I am an adult, and she gives me too much nagging input. But I forget just how much more trouble I've caused them, as people, throughout their lives.
T at work is low-forties and recently divorced with two sons. The divorce didn't seem messy. But the aftermath of having only one income is. In the divorce, he got the mortgage on the house, and he still pays child support and other expenses for his kids. He keeps the house that he can hardly afford so that he can make his sons' biweekly stay comfortable. He's canceling his cable so that he can foot 100 percent of his eldest son's car insurance.
With all of the changes and difficulties, T doesn't complain really. I only know these things because we cheer on one another's get-out-of-debt plans. If T spends meagerly, he'll be out of debt in four or five years. When he talks about these things, he says, "I just have to buckle down and do it. I'm not eating out for a few months.."
The thing that really hits home for me is that his sons do not know what's going on with their father's finances. They don't realize that every activity they add to their agenda has their dad scrambling to find new freelance work. He won't tell his sons these things. And he won't deny his sons a level of normal niceties, such as car insurance, cell phones, delivered pizzas. He sucks it up silently and provides, beyond his means, so his sons can have access to the things he considers normal.
I think, then, of my parents. Both worked low-paying Joe-jobs until I was in double-digits. Mom worked for years at a grocer chain. Dad held two or three jobs at a time for my entire young life. He worked full-time as a funeral director—a job he later explained to me as: "I went to embalming school so I could marry your mother."
When I was young, my grandmother lived with us. This served the dual purpose of keeping her near family as well as providing my brother and me with a constant babysitter while Mom and Dad worked weird hours, trying to provide for us: bikes, dogs, trees in the yard, decent clothes. But they put themselves out in the process.
When Dad lost his bread-and-butter funeral-directing job, savings got depleted. They spent in the red for five years, trying to keep giving us “normal” lives. My brother and I couldn't have noticed. There were a few more arguments, but we still ate well. Still went on vacation. And I remember, as a kid, feeling as if everything they gave was owed to me. I still thought this through college. I resented my parents for not having as much money as my classmate's parents.
One hundred percent of my college expenses went on student loans. When I saw the first bill, I felt cheated that I was responsible for it. My parents, by that time, were making very good money between them. But they were still paying off debts from 10 years prior when Dad lost his job. Neither of them had a savings or retirement plan to speak of, but I felt, without rationall thinking about it, that they had let me down.
Mom once told me that she was "a slave to this house". Fifteen years later, I know it wasn't just a colorful idiom. It was a glance into her humanity. It was the lamentation of a real woman with her own life-expectations--not just those for her kids.
Where I'm At Now
Even with the things I've realized, I'm still don't think of my parents as people. I have to get from the point of meditation on the issue to the nirvana of completely understanding the many facets of adult-and parent-hood. But I think I'm well on my way. I just need to keep myself from slipping backward into forgetting that Mom and Dad are really Karen and John.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Fashion Plates and Say What You Will
Little that J might say could surprise me. When he says something like "Did I tell you about the time I hung out with panhandlers?", as he said yesterday, I don't think "What?!" or "Really?!"
Instead, I think, Yes, that sounds about right.
Little that I say actually insults people. This is a good thing, because I don't sensor well.
The hockey game we were going to was set up to be a group event, but only J and I went. As we were training in, I chided him on his shiny shoes and long wool coat, saying I didn't realize that hockey had become a bis-cadge event. He said, " I actually bought these shoes because you were ripping on my old ones. Remember? You said it was time to put them down and I said something along the lines of piss off? Well, then I got these ones."
I didn't remember saying that. I supposed I was drunk at the time. But I said, now, completely sober: "I was thinking today that I say very personal comments to you kids. And it occurred to me that if I were a guy, you'd all consider me to be a jackass. But because I'm a girl, I can get away with it."
"Yeah. Well, you know, when you're living on your own and you don't have your mom to tell you things like, hey, buy some new shoes, you just don't think of it."
I wasn't pleased with being likened to the team mom--mostly because I think I'm pretty funky. But it's better than being a jackass, I guess...
"Do you recognize this sweater?" he asked.
"No," I said honestly.
"You found it in my closet once and said you never seen me wear it. So I thought, I'll wear it today."
"Well," I said, "that sounds like something I'd say." And I immediately decided to not tell him about the slight hole in the back neckline.
::sigh:: I'm a snob :(
Today I'm wearing a longer and bigger necklace than usual. My mom got it for me when she went to Hawaii, and it's a little more BAM! than the things I might normally wear. But there's nothing wrong with expanding your fashion tastes. This particular one, however, has made drinking from a watr fountain very difficult. And I imagine it will be the last of the long necklaces for me.
Instead, I think, Yes, that sounds about right.
Little that I say actually insults people. This is a good thing, because I don't sensor well.
The hockey game we were going to was set up to be a group event, but only J and I went. As we were training in, I chided him on his shiny shoes and long wool coat, saying I didn't realize that hockey had become a bis-cadge event. He said, " I actually bought these shoes because you were ripping on my old ones. Remember? You said it was time to put them down and I said something along the lines of piss off? Well, then I got these ones."
I didn't remember saying that. I supposed I was drunk at the time. But I said, now, completely sober: "I was thinking today that I say very personal comments to you kids. And it occurred to me that if I were a guy, you'd all consider me to be a jackass. But because I'm a girl, I can get away with it."
"Yeah. Well, you know, when you're living on your own and you don't have your mom to tell you things like, hey, buy some new shoes, you just don't think of it."
I wasn't pleased with being likened to the team mom--mostly because I think I'm pretty funky. But it's better than being a jackass, I guess...
"Do you recognize this sweater?" he asked.
"No," I said honestly.
"You found it in my closet once and said you never seen me wear it. So I thought, I'll wear it today."
"Well," I said, "that sounds like something I'd say." And I immediately decided to not tell him about the slight hole in the back neckline.
::sigh:: I'm a snob :(
Today I'm wearing a longer and bigger necklace than usual. My mom got it for me when she went to Hawaii, and it's a little more BAM! than the things I might normally wear. But there's nothing wrong with expanding your fashion tastes. This particular one, however, has made drinking from a watr fountain very difficult. And I imagine it will be the last of the long necklaces for me.
Friday, February 23, 2007
Forty Days Dry
For Lent, I decided to give up booze. Forty days on the wagon doesn't seem like a challenge to me. I've only been drinking for the past couple of years. It's just something I do to socialize.
Why are you doing this to yourself?
Here are three reasons I'm giving up the sauce:
So I went to play a soccer game on Wednesday, and I told my cohort about my new leaf. Here are some of the responses I got:
W said:
I told him that Sundays are not included in the Lent season. (If you don't believe me, start on Ash Wednesday and count days until Easter. You'll only get 40 if you don't include Sundays. A special thanks to Vatican 2!)
"Oh," J said, "so you can just come out and meet us up at midnight on Saturdays, then."
"Yeah!" agreed M, "That makes sense!"
I tried to explain that that would ruin the whole idea. Besides, I said, I'm bothered that you guys don't think I can get by without drinking! "The point is that if I get drunk on Saturday night, I won't be able to get myself up in time for church."
"Well, why don't you just not drink on Saturdays, but still come out with us on Fridays?" asked M.
It was an uphill battle against these nonCatholics. They just don't get that Lent is supposed to be a quite, calm, and reflective time.
Jeez! Even the heathen I'm boinkin' gets that!
LENT UPDATE
Two days without any desire to drink... take THAT doubting Thomases!
Why are you doing this to yourself?
Here are three reasons I'm giving up the sauce:
- If I stay out late on Saturday night, I can't motivate myself to go to church. And during Lent, I'm going to make the good effort to go every week.
- I'm getting ready for summer, and all of those calories seem to be making my daily workouts less effective than they should be.
- I would like to spend less money. The second I leave the door and head out into the city, it's $40. A $20 cab ride out to where ever I'm going, and a $20 cab ride home--nevermind the food and booze!!
So I went to play a soccer game on Wednesday, and I told my cohort about my new leaf. Here are some of the responses I got:
W said:
- "Are you kidding me? I took off work tomorrow so we could go drinking after the game!"
- "Do you really think you'll make it 40 days?"
- "You can't be serious? What are you going to do if you don't go out drinking?"
- "Are you studying for a test or something? Why would you do this?"
- "Why don't you give up something else? Like sex?"
I told him that Sundays are not included in the Lent season. (If you don't believe me, start on Ash Wednesday and count days until Easter. You'll only get 40 if you don't include Sundays. A special thanks to Vatican 2!)
"Oh," J said, "so you can just come out and meet us up at midnight on Saturdays, then."
"Yeah!" agreed M, "That makes sense!"
I tried to explain that that would ruin the whole idea. Besides, I said, I'm bothered that you guys don't think I can get by without drinking! "The point is that if I get drunk on Saturday night, I won't be able to get myself up in time for church."
"Well, why don't you just not drink on Saturdays, but still come out with us on Fridays?" asked M.
It was an uphill battle against these nonCatholics. They just don't get that Lent is supposed to be a quite, calm, and reflective time.
Jeez! Even the heathen I'm boinkin' gets that!
LENT UPDATE
Two days without any desire to drink... take THAT doubting Thomases!
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