i dreamed last night i got on the boat to heaven
and by some chance i had brought my vice along
and there i stood
except i wasn't passing out whiskey, i was just passing out.
victory?
i don't want to be too optimistic, but i think we may just make this deadline after all. really. things are looking up. and really, this kind of month is what it is all about. we technical types (she says with feigned authority) thrive on this sort of pressure. i wish i could say that, standing around on the assembly floor, working out the details of just how to get those last few analyzers within spec, great minds all working in concert, the pressures of time and finance and reputation all bearing down, that i could say that this is what it's all about. that it is the struggle, not the victory; the voyage, not the arrival, but really, turns out it IS the ends that justify the means, and when everything works out in the end, i have to really stop and think, boy, i don't really enjoy this all that much. sure, i enjoyed the design work, and the drop testing was a blast as always, and i even didn't mind so much the hours and hours (and hours) of paperwork, but the bottom line is, i'm ready to move on to someplace other than here.
um, don't tell my boss. there's that other ends of these means, my paycheck, and i'm going to need to hang on to that for a while.
party.
come to erik and eddie's party tomorrow night. 220A King St., Princeton, NJ 08540. There will be a keg and dancing and a very relieved and finally relaxed engineer there. seriously, you are invited. i guarantee it.
kvetch kvetch kvetch.
also, these blog entries should be getting a little more upbeat any day now. soon there will be much less talk about work, much more talk about all the great things with which i'm going to fill my time once i get my evenings back. fun things besides clean my house and row (two things i really need to do more of, soon). things like dan bern at fez, every tuesday in august. things like see tomb raider, memento, and the fast and the furious. things like replace the shocks on my car. great adventure. pool. getting my ass kicked on my bike. finishing history of the screw. reclaiming leisure -- you'll see, it will be great.
speaking of which,
mark your calendars. sunday, august 12. carnegie lake regatta. a wonderful day for all, just ask millie. $5 lunch with barbecue and rowers provide the potluck part. you are also invited to this. and you get to watch me row.
thud, despair. failed drop testing. failed thermal testing. kind of. maybe lost a whole lotta money for the company. (damn, am i slipping into haiku again? i am so affected.) it has been a shitty month, a shitty week, and a shitty day. everyone else is still optimistic but i am starting to concede the race against time. there are rumors regarding both my competency and my sanity. i have heard them. i have tattled on the rumormongers. i am now a snitch in addition to being a slave-driver. I have worked so hard and so long, and so independently, that I'm now having a hard time turning control of the project over to the powers-that-be.
diamante in the rough.
and, as if i wasn't already down, um... turns out: JOKE HAIKUS ARE USED BY PSEUDO-INTELLECTUAL POSEURS TO IMBUE BANAL AND UNINSPIRED QUIPS WITH UNDESERVED CACHET.
i was going to say something rudely vindicating here like how i could just write everyone an epitaph instead, or maybe a limerick, or perhaps just a "shout-out," but i'll refrain from that quatrain and just pick my brain for a little free-form pain. peace-out.
for tony... link to me and get your own!
tony hightower --
sing me another one, ace.
your rock band kicks ass.
I am a refresh machine.
Why, when I send an e-mail using my Hotmail account, do I always return to the Inbox screen and immediately hit refresh 3 or 4 times? I don't reply that quickly; I don't know why I expect others to do so. I do crave contact. E-mail fulfills me. I'm a natural born chatter. Got that from Mom. Seems I am particularly predisposed to this problem when said outgoing e-mail is directed at boys.
You are a refresh machine.
So, I added a separate page to list all of my archived entries, and I added permalinks (my stars, how things have changed... remember when I was archive-impaired!?) to all the entries (so you can link to one specific entry if you really love it and want to add it to your list of favorites or whatever, or if you just want to send it to your friends so you can all have a good laugh at how self-absorbed and monotonous I am, and idly chat about how if you had to talk to me instead of just read my blog you would go crazy because it is Hard to parse parenthetical phrases in real-life).
But the archive page only works once! At least for me, here at work. Yes, I am at work. I'm a bad employee. But I make up for non-productivity with extra hours. Lots and lots of extra hours. Anyway, go forward and then back from the archive index, and you get all kinds of a glimpse into the world of borrowed javascript and I'm working on that, I swear. But in the meantime, just hit refresh and all will be serene, okay? Good.
Three Blog Night.
While I was having at it, I intended to add a bunch more blogs to the links section (over there <--) but I haven't yet. Sometimes I like to blog surf. I recommend you try this. How it works is this: you start at your favorite blog, may I suggest the blog you are currently reading. Check it out, decide if you like the direction you're heading in. Be discerning. Everybody's got a voice but few can sing. When you find one you like, you find that blog's section of blog links, pick your next destination, then repeat. Before you know it, you'll be in China or something. You see what I mean? Go on, try it. I'll wait here. When you find something not dumb, come back and let me know. I've given you some good places to start.
... uh, actually, just e-mail me. Can't wait -- gotta go check Hotmail again.
So, I am not an insect person. I was a tomboy... just not a very good one. Outdoor bugs: okay, acceptable, as long as there's no touching required. Indoor bugs: absolutely unacceptable, under any circumstances. Ant in the bathroom? Call Dad in. Spider in the garage? Chase it out. No killing, no touching.
It was, then, with great trepidation that I moved into Knot Square, formerly at 25 Moran Ave in Princeton, now at 25 Nowhere Lane, Garbagetown. While living in a 180-year old house had its charms, no charm is great enough to outweigh the following... roaches, mice, leaks, stray cats, realtors, termites (sorry, "flying ants"), ladybugs, maggots, ants (non-flying), salamanders, and floodwaters... and then, finally, squirrels. Yup, that's right, and not the cute little bushy-tailed peanut-munching variety either -- rather, the Princeton Dark Side Canadian Black Squirrel... You know the one, fuliginous as midnight, occasionally hydrophobic, and sporting a closely-trimmed, strikingly rat-like tail. And the one that particularly enjoys nesting in chimneys and occasionally running rampant regardant and uninvited through the house. Michele chased out a pair (she got all the good stuff) -- one from the downstairs living room and one from her bedroom. They particularly enjoy hiding under radiators. This all happened after the previous week's refrigerator incident (largely unpublicized, we now refer to the event as "The Diaspora of Cold").
Needless to say, we moved out in order to subvert the impending yak infestation. The house was torn down and replaced with a suitably bland replacement, typical of the 2000 McMansion Movement in architecture. And Michele and I moved (separately) to condo-land, the ghettos of Plainsboro. Reasonably air-tight, with central a/c and an in-ground pool, I was suddenly living in the lap of luxury. I no longer had to worry about leaving a pizza box out on the counter -- I was the only visible eater in the house.
But nothing lasts forever, and though things aren't nearly as bad as before, I have had my fair share of visitors. There are two pigeons who get their groove on out on my deck railing. They leave me little pellets of love. Not bad. There were last year's spider mites, which decided to take up residence in my ivy plant. There was the 4-day fruit fly infestation, when I couldn't leave anything remotely organic exposed to air or these drosophilia would appear from nowhere and take up residence. There are the Jersey Bombers that flitter around my door light in the evening; I can avoid them by entering and exiting the apartment with an attention toward strategy -- maximum speed, minimum turbulence.
And then there is my latest mini-monster -- the firefly. Which, I'll grant, is kind of cool. When I was laying on the couch last night thinking about how much work I had to do today, I was truly inspired when I noticed the soft green flash above my head. Then the glow flew into the wall and crashed to the tile floor in front of the fireplace. I'm not really sure what happened, but I grabbed a paper towel intending to pick up the carcass. When I got to the scene of the accident I found the firefly was still alive, barely, sort of a steady glow rather than a flash.
I had a brief recollection of my neighbor in childhood, catching a firefly, squeezing it between his fingers, and rubbing the glowing carcass across his forehead.
I urged the firefly to crawl onto the paper towel and then took him outside and flicked him into freedom. I was still queasy about his presence within my home but I was gentle enough to make sure he didn't end up on the floormat.
I had another brief flashback, to that same neighbor and I on the side of my grandparents' house, trying to stuff fireflies into a prepared jar (holes punched in top with nail), he by catching and depositing, I by closing the jar around the still-flying flasher. He found what he thought was a cat under the bush between our yard and the yard next door -- it turned out to be a skunk.
So, I let the confused little bugger go. Then, today at work, what do I find on the floor in the women's bathroom, but another renegade firefly? This one wasn't flashing (or I couldn't see the flash, at any rate, as it was quite bright in there) but I just grabbed a paper towel and escorted another firefly to safety.
I'm beginning to feel like the pied piper of fireflies. Tonight as I was leaving rowing, I noticed that the area around the lake was absolutely swarming with fireflies. I wonder if this has something to do with the mosquito larvacide that the state of NJ may or may not be spraying on us. Circle of life and all that, you know.
Ramping up through the time of being a daughter
thrust into the world to bear the torch of a family.
The first – the oldest is for a time the youngest,
then then middlest, as the elders go and the youngers arrive.
Now, not a child, not an adult.
Trusted with independence, a satellite family of one.
It is the age of rapid mental transit.
It is the age of raped dinner and pillaged drunken Saturdays.
… the age of 50-mile drives for a movie,
of the hour’s journey from door to bedroom.
It is the longest day of life; it is the shortest night.
June comes and June goes with the arrival of one grey hair.
The frenzy slows; supervision all but disappears.
Jumping the generation gap, grasping for a grip.
Trying to remember what the other side felt like,
a vague recollection of seasons spent waiting.
day 2 of insane end-of-quarter crunch.
today's aol im count: 10 hours, 44 minutes.
not very exciting news, i know.
sorry, back to work.
... about loading aol as an item that starts when windows starts is this -- you can see exactly how long you've been at work. for me it has been 13 hours and 6 minutes, in case you were wondering.
still toiling. but very thankful for friends who bring dinner to starving engineers working all alone on boring paperwork stuff. working sucks, but working on an empty stomach sucks way worse.
13 hours 8 minutes...
what a weekend. first, my dad retired. i drove up there friday for the surprise party. i'm so glad i did -- he later told me that the only real surprise of the day was that i was there. i guess it's hard for a hundred and forty people to keep a secret from their boss.
i gave (what i would consider to be) a drop down on your knees and give me a hallelujiah, sing the praises of the day and the chance to be a witness kinda great speech. so great, in fact, that the superintendent of my parents' school district approached me afterwards to offer me a job. teaching.
so, honestly, this is something i've been thinking about for a long time. and there's something, i think, truly poetic about the idea of entering education now, at the end of my parents' careers. my grandmother also taught in the same school district. really, am i this person? i'm not a traditionalist, but i do latch onto tradition and the interleaving of family and community. i love small towns.
so, i'm going to have myself a good long think. a hard think.
first i'm going to find out exactly what's involved, how much time is will take and how much it will cost, but i'm thinking quite seriously.
and today i happened to remember, thanks joan baez, that action is the antidote to despair.
weekend part ii.
the wedding. wow. wow. a more beautiful day could not have been had.
that's all for now. feel the love. i really think i may be on the brink of a spectacular change. stay tuned.
This is my first remote blog entry, thanks to my Palm. Entering text using this stupid shorthand sucks, though I am actually doing fairly well. I forget spaces. I am actually on the train, on my way home from the bachelorette party. Thinking about how A. is getting married... Crazy. I was 17 when we met... A part of me was born through my knowing her. Marc and I used to watch cartoons in bed with her on Saturday mornings. We once put on all of our coats and our bathrobes, just for fun. I will try to find the photos in time to write a very special blog, for the blushing bride... By the way, the blush may be artificial, but the glow is real. I am so excited for her... for both of them. That is amore.
it is hot.
i am awake.
i am miserable.
can't sleep.
can't stay awake.
can't stop hating this temperature, this sweat, this hair, this night,
all i want to do is fall asleep and all i can do is think
when does growing up stop?
when do i stop moving?
where are the people who are not leaving?
i hate paying rent, living in a closet, dust everywhere:
spring dust
the last victim's dust.
i hate not knowing where to go
what to be
how to get the air conditioner to blow cold air.
the night is hot --
my body is angry --
my mind is revolting --
hope is weak
tomorrow is distant
i am stuck to the chair
i am dripping with frustration
the earth heaves with thunder
i am so small on nights like these:
searching for the cool side of hot
waiting for something to carry me home.
suck.com -- may it be remembered with favor. and vc. the first website that let me believe that content mattered. may every microsoft venture go belly up in order to restore karmic equilibrium.
dad's trying to fix me up with his masseuse. umm... okay. so, i'm going to refrain from commenting on this one. just putting it out there for y'all to consider.
maybe not the best follow up to that pronouncement, but... seems goofy has pubic lice.
while at Salon, i read a great article on jews (and basketball!) in phila. a quote:
"The reason, I suspect, that basketball appeals to the Hebrew with his Oriental background," wrote Paul Gallico, sports editor of the New York Daily News and one of the premier sports writers of the 1930s, "is that the game places a premium on an alert, scheming mind, flashy trickiness, artful dodging and general smart aleckness."
hoo boy. jews in phila. yep. course, we all know, jews kick ass, right? jews kick ass dot com. tell your mom. jews in phila mainly just ignore me, though.
and another from salon, on how the sexiest man of the week put it to the lakers for 48 points last night. yeah baby! er, ahem.
the guy may have once had big hair, but he now drives a very small car. and he has a weblog! adam curry was the pinnacle of cool. right?
i broke my cel phone. then submitted a request for tech support at audiovox. below is the text of the conversation so far... i'm so glad engineers have such a proficient voice in tech support. the previous sentence was an example of sarcasm. sometimes i just want to cold call an engineer at the company that made my broken thing, to get a real explanation for what's gone wrong.
Question Reference #010608-000021
---- 06/08/2001 10:12 AM
this has been a week of hardcore snubs. first there was the birthday party, and now a wedding, from which i will refrain from linking momentarily. what's going on? has my cynicism crossed the line into abrasiveness? has my deodorant stopped working? am i dying of an incurable disease that noone wants to tell me about? seriously. is it the blog? are people afraid i'm going to write mean things about them after i hang with them? dude, if i'm writing mean things, they're in my head already anyway, blog or no blog. deal with it.
bachelorette? me? uh, i guess...
speaking of weddings, on saturday i'll be attending my very first ever bachelorette party, for my awesome friend annisia (rhymes with i wanna piece o' ya), and i am so excited because really, how often does a girl like me get an opportunity like this? i mean, all my friends are boys! some are men. and as it turns out this week, a bunch of them don't even really seem to want to be around me all that much.
so anyway, i'm going to this shindig and i'm not really sure what to expect. i'm a little uncomfortable with the prospect of silly girl things (see notes on fancy hair, below) and i sure don't want to be taking dollars from boys so they can eat sewed-on gummi savers off of annisia's shirt. what? oh, i don't know either. it's from a bachelorette party story that i heard recently.
get your own.
i just got back from the medical design and manufacturing show at the javits center... so cool. the company i work for has really tapped the resources of that show in years past, and it shows! almost every aisle had at least one vendor with a part i've worked on in a lighted display case or out on a table for touching. the new recharging tray was there too, i was so proud!
last time i was there was three summers ago and things have really changed. used to be john was the one all the vendors recognized and wanted to talk to; now it is i. they have a great system where your nametag has a big barcode on it with all of your contact info embedded. if you want a vendor to add you to their mailing list, you ask them to swipe your badge. if you're really a coveted sales contact for them, they will ask you to surrendor your badge for swiping. i couldn't help but think of the show stef did in europe where he came back with some number of "prospects" -- i am now a prospect. i hope i'm a hot one.
slow day.
no real links today. no time to surf. stay tuned, eager readers.
So. Hoo-boy. Life flies by. June already. Taken the old mtb out a grand total of twice. That's $400 per ride, kids. I probably could have given up those two rides and purchased the bike now, and saved myself another hundred bucks. Oh well. I wish I could say it was all worth it, that those two rides were really my new reason for living, that I discovered great new friends and stretched my irrational boundaries, charting new physical and psychological territory... but I cannot.
In fact, speaking of friends, lately I'd say I'm about two friends shy of an OldKate. Coincidentally two mountain biking friends shy. I hate to be a vidictive bastard* but this is not the first time in my life that a birthday party was planned five feet away from me and I wasn't invited... and I was right about the intention of the last transgressors**. Or maybe I'm just being too sensitive. I dunno.
* oh who am I kidding?? That's my real reason for living, folks!
** it was ninth grade, it was Becky Heumann's birthday, and my friends decided to dump me. My father was the principal. Kids are cruel. I was empty.
Libby LaPier had grown-up eyes.
Hey, speaking of irrational acts of adolescent silliness, I was in the bathroom at the movies the other day, thinking about sixth grade and how I had basically the same haircut I have now, which is to say no haircut, mostly just a giant mop of knots cascading down my back or spiking off my crown, and how all the other girls in my class had perms or perfect straight braidable hair.
I was never one for hair... fancy girl hair, I mean. My mother had short hair forever and she would put my hair in a ponytail and then drag it up to the top of my head. Other mothers did pigtails, french braids, twisty sparkly ribbon-trimmed works of early morning art; my mom poured me coffee and never said anything mean when she couldn't get the comb through my knots. And that's why I love her so much. And that's also why I love my hair so much. It is real and it is big in a small way and it is me.
Anyway, this one girl had just the tamest, most braidable hair you've ever seen. And Libby LaPier, who sat next to me in desks and always looked happy, used to leave her notes like this: Wear your hair down! -Secret Admirer.
And Libby LaPier had grown-up eyes. I remember thinking that they looked blank back then. I was wrong. I get the same look from the Mexican ladies at work, from the skinny cream cheese girls at Bagel Street, and from the snottier of the grad students I know, the ones trying to induce degree envy. Heh. Just try to bring me down.
notice i am not listed.
Results from the CCW Sprints. Self-esteem can only make you so good -- Sometimes, I am only a winner in practice.
For the record, work still sucks.
Hey, does anyone want to hire a Mechanical Engineer, with 4 years of product design experience and above-average communication skills? I would sure like a new job. I'll be available starting in December of 2001 and I'd sure like to relocate to the Albany/Bennington/Saratoga area. Resume to follow.
Hopefully in my next job I can avoid debacles like this one: I am totally swamped at work and I've given up the absolute perfect vacation, so that I can stay here and dig my life away-o.
Ta.
That's all for now, mostly I just wanted to re-publish so I could get my intermediate entries*** back.
***heh, don't want to lose those. right.
don't click at work, dummy!
wotapalava live in america -- what a fuss about nothing.
can't wait to see what happens here.
in rotation: fatboy slim, shrek, adam brodsky, weezer, cibo matto.
in print: the shell game.
last item purchased: tropicana original, 16 oz.
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