Me, me, me

After three weeks without a good night's sleep, I'm starting to get some inkling of how crazy people feel. It's easy to let things grow out of all proportion, and to see things in an altered way. It's also easy to feel outside of the normal interactions of society, and to feel set free of the demands of normal life and politeness, etc.

That's not to say I really know how it feels to have a mental illness, but I feel a tiny bit more understanding.

I need to sleep.

Consequences? Hah!

Just in case anyone was worried, here's an update:

I didn't get in trouble for my monumental screw-up yesterday. All is forgiven; apparently everyone was just very worried about me, which is nice. I had to listen to a few well-meaning "If that ever happens again, you should do this..." which doesn't seem so bad. I'm lucky I have a very nice boss.

I did miss a nice lunch at the Arts Centre and a visit to Government House, but do I care about that stuff? Not a whit. I was much happier to get home at my normal time and give my children a bath and read bedtime stories.

Some day I'll look back and laugh, and not just about my skirt falling down. But right now I still feel guilty as hell and reeeally stupid. Shouldn't I be used to that by now?

Mmmm

Just got back from eating Pad Thai at a noodle place near here. Man that's good stuff.

My sweet sweet family came and picked me up and took me out to lunch. Food tastes so good when you're with the people you love.

Urk

Totally screwed-up morning.

I was supposed to go on a business trip today. Our team was supposed to meet here at work at 8:25 am to get in a minivan and drive to Ottawa for a day of important meetings.

My taxi arrived ten minutes late, and we got stuck in traffic, so I only got here at 8:40. I waited around the main entrance for 20 minutes, then figured that the others must have left without me because I had been 15 minutes late.

So I go to my desk and phone home, and my husband says, "They're still waiting for you. They'll wait another 5 minutes, then they have to go." By now they (and I) are 45 minutes behind schedule, and I don't know where the hell they are waiting for me, since I didn't see them anywhere.

So I phone my boss's cell and there's no answer. I leave a message.

As you may have guessed, I was waiting at the wrong entrance. I am a complete idiot. I made everybody else 45 minutes late while I was wandering back and forth at the wrong entrance, half a block from where they were.

So now they are on their merry (or grumpy, more likely) way to Ottawa, and I am sitting here at my desk writing a blog entry, feeling like a complete fool and hoping I don't get fired.

Oh, and wanna hear the most embarrassing, but only truly funny, part of it? I'm wearing a new skirt, and when I got out of the cab, my skirt fell down around my ankles! (Fortunately I was wearing a long coat, so wasn't standing there with my ass blowin' in the wind, but still!)

As the Shania Twain song says, it only goes up from here.

Fun Book

Just finished reading a really great little book. It's called Home, by Witold Rybczynski. It discusses the idea of home and of comfort, by looking at the history of house- and interior design over the last five centuries.

I haven't read a whole lot of non-fiction in the last few years, mainly because I've been enjoying fiction so much. But now I'm starting to get to some of the non-fiction works I've been meaning to read. This little book has led me to some other books on design which look interesting, so maybe I'll make that my subject of study for the next little while.

So many books, so little time in a lifetime... Sometimes I think it would be nice to be hermit, shut up in a cave somewhere with only my books for company.

Well...Nah.

Go Team!

For the first time, I'm signing my kids up for sports this summer, and I'm surprisingly nervous/excited about it!

My daughter wants to try soccer, and my son wants to try baseball. I hope they enjoy it. I happen to think that my son is a natural athlete, but what parent doesn't think that kind of thing, right? But really, I'd like to get him into gymnastics because he is like, some kind of prodigy of balance. He's four years old and I honestly can't remember him ever falling off of something. And he's a physically adventurous child; like his sister, he loves to climb things and try dangerous things, and I'm the kind of mother (frowned upon by other mothers) who lets her children try stuff, even if they might fall and get hurt, because otherwise how will they learn what they are physically capable of?

So I hope these team sports don't cost a fortune, and I hope it doesn't mean I'll spend all summer carting them around to games. But I think they're gonna have fun; and I think I'm gonna have fun watching them have fun.

Blech

Had a pretty lousy weekend; worrying, fretting, not sleeping and basically suffering the effects of too much stress.

The weather's getting me down, man. Usually I like to relieve stress by taking long, brisk walks. That's just not happenning in this frigid weather, and I'm feeling the drag.

This week is going to be hectic, but I'm hoping to take Friday off and go to the country for the weekend. Let's hope for somewhat-tolerable temperatures! (It's not so much to ask, is it?)

Not my strong suit

Lost my *&%$# bank card. Dammit!

I must be the most absent-minded person I've ever met. Sometimes it amazes me.

Of course, maybe I could blame it on the fact that I'm pregnant, or on the fact that I haven't had more than 4 hours sleep a night for 5 days. Of course, those two facts are not unrelated.

But really, I'm just a goof.

The Good, the Bad-and-the-ugly

Today seems downright balmy -- Imagine, -13 with fairly low winds!

Listened to some of Bush's State of the Union Address. I honestly can't believe that man is the President of the United States. He speaks as though he has no idea what he's saying. He's just reading, with the same lousy inflection no matter what he's talking about. He has no conviction, no belief, no detectable intellect or wisdom. None. Nothing. All he brings to the presidency, as far as I can see, is a willingness to be manipulated by stronger men than he.

If he gets re-elected this November I'm gonna freak out. Well, maybe not freak out, but possibly break down and cry. When you think of the truly great leaders the US has elected in its history, this fool makes you wonder where in the world that great country (and contrary to most of my friends, I think it is a great country) is going.

Surely there must be someone -- Republican or Democrat -- who can show this guy up and wipe the floor with him come primary or election time. Or is this the Dark Age of American politics?

Small pleasures

Reading Bill's blog, I got to thinking about luxuries and self-pampering.

What luxury do you treat yourself to?

I'm really not the kind of person who pampers herself. I only get a haircut twice a year, I wear makeup but don't buy it until the old makeup is all broken and ruined, and then I only buy the cheapest stuff there is. I've never been to a spa; the only massage I ever got was from my sister when she was training in Shiatsu; I've only had one manicure and that was free because my hair salon screwed up my appointment.

So how do I treat myself?

I like baths. I like taking an evening to read a good book. I like a glass of wine. I like an evening watching a video with my husband with a couple of beers and a bowl of popcorn.

Hubby scores points by doing a myriad of little things for me, keeping me feeling pretty spoiled all the time. What does he do?

He makes me Chai lattes from scratch, ie. no teabags, but the actual spices in the pan. He makes me toast with cheese when I'm watching TV. On cold nights he puts a hot-water bottle in the bed before I turn in. He gives great foot massages. He gives lousy back-scratches, but he's generous with 'em. He basically never refuses me anything I ask, so much so that I really think before I ask him to do something, because he never even pauses before saying yes.

Lottery dreams

Couldn't sleep last night (again. Argh.), and in order to get my mind off of what's troubling me, I fantasized about winning the lottery. This is a fairly infrequent occurence for me, because we rarely get lottery tickets. We figure we're too poor to throw away money on something like that, but every now and then I buy one just for the fun of imagining what I would do...

I thought I would give the same amount money to each member of my immediate family, regardless of need, just to avoid fights. Then I would give to a few friends who need or could really use a nice fat cheque. Then I would set aside a certain amount for immediate gifts to charity, then another amount as a kind of "foundation" to invest and keep giving money to charity over the long term.

Then we would take a big vacation, and renovate and expand our house in the city. Then I would buy a house somewhere nice to get away to.

I would have a financial advisor to help me with investments and what not, and I would put away a whack of cash for my children's education and nest egg. I might also send them to private school, but I'd have to think about that, because I'm kind of opposed to private school philosophically. Maybe it would be better to donate money to the public school board.

I might splurge on some extravagance like a Volvo station wagon, and a driver. I would love to have a driver, but since I don't really go places very much, I might need to hire a handyman-cum-driver or something like that, just to get my money's worth.

What am I saying? who cares about getting your money's worth when you're rich?


What would you do if you won?

January's Monkey

As part of the 12 Monkeys Project, here is a list of all the jobs I've held:

Sandwich counter girl in a mall food court.

My first after-school job to raise money for Cegep. They neglected to give me a plunger for the vegetable slicer, so I had to use my finger... Well, you can guess the rest. The story recently earned me $100 dollars from the Gazette, which is the only good that came of that experience. They fired me and forbade me to set foot on the premises once I got home from hospital minus some of my finger. Nice.

Shipper/Receiver in a handbags and accessories warehouse.

Not a bad job. The truck drivers were so surprised to see a girl in the warehouse they usually did all the heavy lifting for me. I liked working there, but only stayed long enough to earn the money for a trip to Europe.

Secretary, then Tech Writer/Executive Assistant in a Clinical Research firm.

A good job, where I learned much that has been of use to me since. I was literally chased around my desk by a lecherous co-worker here, something I thought only happened in cartoons. Considering I showed up the first day still drunk as a skunk from the night before and wearing my skull-buckle boots, I had a good long run at this job, and was quite a hit with the higher-ups before I left to go to University full-time. This was where I learned that I could do much much more.

Receptionist/Researcher for University Cinema Dept.

A very handy little part-time job during my university years. Learned how a university dept. works, and got enough special projects in writing and editing to keep me interested.

ESL teacher (corporate contracts)

Good Bread n' Butter job, very part-time, that taught me how to work autonomously and create my own curriculum. Did this on and off from the end of my MA degree until I was 6 months pregnant with my second child. Left when the boss insulted me by offering to split the long-distance charges incurred while teaching a correspondence course. Not a well-paid job, and finally I felt nickel-and-dimed to death.

Stay-at-home mom

It's a wonderful life.

My present job

Which I'd rather not go into; too much personal information. Suffice to say it's something of a dream job in a place where I've always wanted to work. Finally using more than 2% of my brain.

Welcome to the deep freeze


Just a note: The world was distinctly crunchy when I walked out my door this morning.

I have a friend coming to visit today, for only two days (wanh!). She's coming from England, and it just figures that she's arriving on the freakin' coldest day of the freakin' year.

Poor her. On the bright side, she has seen Montreal in summer, so this is not her only impression of our wonderful city. She also has a fascination with Canada, and let's face it, you can't have a much more Canadian experience than minus-30-degree weather!

Monkey-Woman

2004 is the year of the monkey, so I guess it's kind of like a birthday for me! I was born in the Year of the Monkey 1968.

This is what I read on a Chinese New Year site:

If you are born in the Year of the Monkey, you are very intelligent, well-liked by everyone, and will have success in any field you choose.

That sounds just about right.

Hey, my baby will be a monkey too! Excellent.

Ba-da-da da da da da...Feelin' Groovy

I so enjoyed my walk in to work this morning. The sun was bright, the snow was glittering and I just couldn't wipe the smile off my face. It's amazing how some days just seem to be good days, when others are negative from the time you roll out of bed.

Not that I don't have a million very good reasons to be happy: A happy marriage, wonderful kids who are also healthy (thank god), a nice home, a job I enjoy, a good and loving family of people I like and respect, and plenty of friends. Not to mention a bun in the oven!

I am also really enjoying the book I'm reading, The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen. I look forward to the times when I can pick it up, and luxuriate in the experience of reading it. When I see how close I am to the end, I want to slow down and prolong the pleasure! Books rule, man.

When I got to work, I told a friend (who's in her early 50s) that I wanted to play her my new favourite song Hey Ya! by OUT kast. Her response? "I love that CD! I bought if for myself for Christmas!" I want to be this person when I grow up. Her two teenage daughters are lucky to have such a mom.

It's almost summer!

Just looking out and the window and actually feeling happy that it's still light out at 4:30 in the afternoon.

Isn't that pathetic?

Meeting Report


The book club meeting was fun. Although I really wasn't a fan of the book we read, talking about it with the others made me appreciate aspects of it that I had kind of overlooked.

I didn't want to go, as I was overcome with a wave of fatigue in the hour or so before I had to leave. Then hubby suggested that a cup of tea might revive me, and it did! Enough to get me out into the bitter freezing cold for my walk up to the host's house. The stars were so bright, and the walk was invigorating, but as usual when it's this cold my body wanted to sleep once I warmed up inside after my walk.

There was a lot of nice chat, and lots of laughs. In short, just the kind of book club meeting that reaffirms my conviction that the book club is a very good thing.

The next book for us is The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver. I've read some of it, and look forward to continuing. It's very good.

Thank you, Book clubbers, for a great evening.

Book clubbin'


Tonight we will have our first book club meeting of 2004. It looks like it'll be good one, with everyone there.

This year, I believe, our book club will celebrate its 6th anniversary in April. If you had told me seven years ago that I would start up a book club and organize it for six years running, I would have thought you were crazy. I've never been a joiner, let alone a starter of things. But this was something I wanted to try, at a time in my life where I felt confident of success and was enjoying lots of new things (including my first child).

In fact, the other day I was thinking about this, and I had to laugh -- My husband organizes a hockey "league" (just 2 teams of very casual players) and I organize my book club, and neither of us is really what you'd expect, I think. For one thing, we're not terribly organized!

The book club has changed somewhat over the years; members have come and gone and a core group of 6 remains from what started as 10. We no longer drink wine, much to my chagrin; and food doesn't seem to play as much of a role in our meetings as it used to.

Unlike many other such clubs, we do really talk about the book, after an initial half hour or so of pure socialising. I admire the intelligence and wisdom of the women in this group, and I like the way everyone listens and considers the ideas of others. It's a very open-minded group, and we seem to have achieved a kind of harmony with one another. It's always a good experience going to the meetings. I always learn something new, and even when I don't like the book so much, I learn to appreciate why others might like it.

Even if I didn't get any intellectual stimulation from it, I would still be in the book club. It's a great way to get together regularly with five women I consider friends.

S'Cold

Contrary to the rest of the world, I actually like this kind of insanely freezing weather, in a perverse way.

What doesn't kill us makes us stronger. What doesn't kill us makes us stronger, etc.

Archie 101

Couldn't sleep last night. As I was lying there with my mind jumping over about a thousand ideas a minute, I started to think about Archie comic books -- more specifically, I planned a syllabus for a university course on Archie comic books and the way they reflect major changes in American society.

I love Archie comic books, and always have. The old ones are of course infinitely better than the post-80s books. I have learned a great deal about life from those silly little things.

Just a few of the things Archie comics have taught me:

Guys will always want the aloof sexy girl more than the sweet, boring girl-next-door. (Don't believe them when they say Marianne is better than Ginger or Betty is hotter than Veronica. They don't know their own minds.)

Rich, athletic guys who are full of themselves (Reggie) are much less attractive than poor guys with criss-crosses on their heads (Archie) who are fun and really into making girls happy.

Going barefoot makes you feel free and relaxed.

The hamburger is the food of the glutton.

Being lazy and liking food a lot doesn't necessarily make you a bad person.

Being temporarily broke can lead you into all kinds of adventures, good and bad.

A "jalopy" is some kind of old crappy car.


There probably already exists somewhere a university course on Archie comic books. Still, I would like to teach one. You could also teach a course on fashion in Archie comic books. Some of my favourite looks can be found on the gals in those books.

Update

Six months pregnant and expanding exponentially. Of course Christmas didn't help matters much.

But I'm feeling good; and the baby seems fine, if movement is any indication.

Only sixteen weeks to go! Anybody got a set of bunk beds they don't need? We're gonna need to make some room!

Almost forgot!

We went to see Return of the King over the holidays. Man, that is some movie. I can't even begin to say what it meant to me to watch it, but it was scary and fun and thrilling and romantic in the way movies were to me when I was a child. I love Gandalf and swoon over Aragorn and want to hang out with Legolas and Gimli and battle orcs and go to the tavern with the hobbits back in the shire. I lived inside the film while I watched it, and a little bit of me continued to do so all the next day and for a while after.

It is true that it is flawed in some serious ways. Leaving out something as crucial as The Scouring of the Shire is a mistake, overlooking one of the essential meanings of the tale. Perhaps it should have been done in six regular-length films, but it is a film experience that captures everything that film expresses best, heroic action and love and the fight between good and evil and the horror of war and the courage of the small.

It was a film adaptation whose time had come, and Peter Jackson was obviously the man for the job.

...and a happy new year

Spent new year's eve chillin' with my honey, watchin' Pirates of the Caribbean and having a very tasty beer. Beer tastes better when you only have one in six months! I didn't miss the party action, but then I was pretty tired of the social whirl by December 30th.

Thankfully the latter part of the holiday was very relaxed, with few obligations and lots of reading and playing with my children in the snow.

My new year's resolution? Well, thank you for asking. Besides my ongoing resolutions to improve my self, I decided that his year I am going to try to be more aware of and responsible for our family finances (such as they are!). We are doing all right and are not heavily in debt or behind on any payments or anything, but we treat our bank account like a mysterious entity that grows and shrinks without our knowledge and which likes to surprise us occasionally by emptying completely, just for fun.

I think that it is not too much to ask of myself to keep track of when regular payments go through our account, so that we can know to have enough in there. So far we have never missed a payment, but this is just by sheer dumb luck.

So 2004 is going to be the year when I get to know my finances on a more intimate basis. Who knows, maybe they'll be nicer to me and grow fatter and healthier with a little more attention!