Getmeonaplanegetmeonaplanegetmeonaplane

As expected, last week kind of kicked my ass. Not the whole week, more like the end of it. It started out fairly smooth and easy, then started building a crescendo by Wednesday, and by Thursday and Friday all hell was breaking loose. The good news I had sort of a cool-down period from 4:30 to 5pm on Friday. Full circle.

I have mentioned that it always rains when I work in the Beaverton branch, and this week was no exception (but they changed the filter on the water dispenser in the kitchen so it no longer take 125 seconds - I've counted - to fill a 25 oz bottle of water), but despite the bitter cold, sideways rain and general gloom of what is now a traditional northwest Oregon May, I had a pretty good time. Mostly because any time my head was about to pop off I remembered I'm leaving for vacation next Saturday morning. That makes me happy. What DOESN'T make me happy is all the crap I have to do around here between now and then.

I need a pedicure. I NEED a pedicure. I'm not kidding you, these feet are atrocious. I'm just hoping the gals at the salon I have chosen to visit today are able to understand "Be really careful around my open wound" in English and exaggerated gestures. Then I have to tan (daily, by the way), clean the house from top to bottom (but specifically the kitty bathroom) and figure out what to pack. Oh and I still need bathing suits. And my eyebrows waxed. And to get through next week.

But oh glorious three-day weekend! The biggest thing on my mind late in the evening of the Friday night before a three-day weekend is how LOOOOOONG I'm going to sleep in on Saturday. So of course I was up at 5:15am. Because there is just no sleeping in. You'd think by now I would have at least vacuumed. Best I can do for you is have a load of laundry in while I sip coffee and pretend like the internet is interesting.

So yeah, three-day weekend, then four days of oh-holy-night Judy L's desk, and then, THEN, the AIRPORT. And a PLANE RIDE. And the BAGGAGE CAROUSEL. And the CAR PICKUP. And SUN. And KING HARBOR. And then YORBA LINDA. And then PALM FRICKING SPRINGS. Where I will commence to laying down for a week.

I think I can handle just about anything this coming week throws at me provided I keep my eye on the prize. And get through all the rest of the crap I have to do around here between now and then.

Noteworthy

Another example of why having Blogger develop a device that one could implant in one's thigh and never again forget a great post idea: That Marci and I were chatting during work yesterday about something that irritated me or pissed me off or something, and all I remember now is me saying "I am SO going to blog about this" and thinking I should write a note so I didn't forget. I didn't write a note, I did forget. Now look - we ALL miss out.

So today we tried (in vain) to remember what it was about, and I DID end up writing a couple of notes on topics, but let's face it, it's not the same. My days, no matter what I'm doing, are pretty eventful when it comes to just STUFF happening, but what good is it if I don't remember or don't take the 2.7 seconds it would take to just write a note? Reading TtheD these days makes my life seem boring and stupid. It kind of is, but little stuff happens, and everyone needs a bit of spice now and again. I've totally let you down.

So what are the contents of those notes I wrote? Certainly not as exciting. But this bears noting: Marci is getting married in July and is firmly ensconced in all things wedding related. For the most part she seems to be having a pretty good time, but there are issues... Aren't there always? I may be a spinster, but I've also been in nine weddings (that's right. Nine.) and I hear the same things over and over again.

This time it's a person who seems to think that the position they are in allows them to invite all manner of crazy non-essential guests to this wedding-that-isn't-theirs. Which would be fine if Marci and her betrothed were loaded. They're not. And they're pretty much paying for everything (I'm guessing, because I'm sure I've asked but you know how I generally ask questions and don't wait around for the answers.. anyway, it sure seems like they are, because the other day she had $4 to use on groceries for the rest of the week and we all spent some time wondering what in the heck she could buy with $4. And at the Albertson's, no less. You can't find a Winco in Oregon City, for crying out loud?). So my feeling about this person throwing their weight around is that someone needs to sit them down and give them a stern talking-to. But this person being who this person is and the position they hold, well, neither one of them is going to do it. I think that's what maids of honor and/or best men are for. If I were the maid of honor I think I'd do it for her.

But then you think about it - you get a wedding invite and you don't really consider how much all these people are costing the couple, do you? I never really have. I mean, unless they've told me. You just RSVP right away and if you have a date you mark "2" and if you don't you mark "1" and you show up on time and drink all their beer and maybe eat some of the food they spent buckets of money on. You don't think about how much they spent to get you there and put this food in front of you (and you certainly don't care how much they spent on booze, especially if it's an open bar), you just make the choice to either eat it or skip it because food's a buzz kill in any social situation. Right?

So now I'm back to this person who probably KNOWS money is tight and STILL doesn't give a shit and adds thirty more people to the guest list, people the groom hasn't seen since he was six years old and the bride has never even heard of, let alone met. It's downright rude. If you want them to come, fork over some cash. Otherwise, leave the guest list to the couple, sit down, shut up, and eat your chicken cordon bleu.

Ah, weddings. I always said if I got married I'd just go to Vegas and then later have a big party. It's fun frustration that costs a fortune and yes it will make for fabulous memories and a good time will definitely be had by all, but for me, yeah. I wouldn't have the kind of focus and dedication it takes to see something like that through to the end. I mean, it took me two months to book the stupid car rental for NEXT WEEK'S VACATION. But enough about me.

The other topic I am not going to write about tonight because I think my rice is almost done. And it's a horrible subject. But the good news is I wrote myself a note and blogged tonight, because I have to blog, because I know you are dying to know what's going on in my work-a-day world and not just on Saturdays when the world is supposed to end.

Have I mentioned I'm getting tan again?

Hoping not to sleep through the rapture

Many years ago, when my friends and I decided to go back to Cancun for vacations, we met a couple from New York. Typical of couples, she was tough and opinionated and he was the nicest guy you'd ever want to meet. She turned us on to the joys of timesharing resales and long-distance friendships, and our relationship was a mix of west-coast courtesy and east-coast ball-breaking. We loved her vodka-soda-vodka cocktails and she loved our never-ending eagerness to be entertained. Despite the fact that after putting up with her increasing drunken raves at my inability to "make it" in Cancun (I wasn't trying to "make" anything, I didn't have to work and I only planned to be there for the time that I actually WAS there) I had to end our friendship, she remains a person who has made an impact on me: the best kind of impact - not all good, not all bad. Joanie died in her sleep last week. I wasn't there in the end, but she'll be with me forever in many ways. As the saying goes, rest in peace, Joan. Nobody will ever say you didn't jump into people's lives and drop anchor.

After I got the news, I started up with that introspective thinking that one entertains when the latest news one gets about a long-lost friend is about their death. I started thinking about past relationships that have fallen by the wayside, and how it's a pity that we let that happen, and how nothing couldn't be unbroken when it comes to the people that have once been important to us. I thought about mending fences and how life is short and swallowing pride and making peace. I considered phone calls and emails and looked for signs in everyday life.

Then the next day I considered something else. Everything happens for a reason. Not all broken relationships need to be mended. Sometimes people just don't come back. Isn't it better, in theory, to remember the good times and not tempt fate with the attempt to revive them? I suppose it's good to reach out, let them know you think of them sometimes, wish them well and promise to meet for coffee. But isn't it a bit self-serving to only have these inspirations when you hear that someone died?

I think I believe that the past, for the most part, should be relived in stories and not rehashed in person. Sometimes you just can't go back. Sometimes when you go back it's a disaster. Sometimes the only thing you have in common with someone IS the past, and all that does is make for a future full of awkward pauses. I'm not going to force the issue - if it doesn't happen organically, then maybe it just wasn't meant to happen anyway.

And on that note, I understand the rapture is happening this afternoon, and if that's the case, none of this matters anyway. I haven't read anything of real substance on the subject, because I don't like newspapers and long boring articles on the web - I'm more of a "brief enough for a Facebook post" kind of a gal. Apparently I think my time (even the time it takes to read a five-paragraph article) is way more valuable than that. Anyway, from what I've gleaned, all the goody-two-shoes (I mean the Saved) will be floating up to Heaven at around 6pm and the rest (of us?) will be down here for a number of days in pure pandemonium. It should be interesting. I suppose if I read any of the articles I'd know if they would actually be floating up, or if they'd just disappear in a poof of dust, but in any event, it would be interesting to see. I hope I'm not napping during that because it'd be a shame for you guys to miss out on my first hand account of it. You know, because I live right by a Christian church and I'm guessing the Saved will all be meeting up beforehand.

Pre-rapture, however, means I've got to get the hell off my ass and shower (no bad hair for the end-of-days) and then go on the hunt for some swimwear and assorted vacation-style clothing. Because the only real upward-moving I want to do is the ascent on JetBlue that levels off at 32,000 feet and takes me south.

Somebody get me on a plane already, for God's sake

Waking up to rain is not good for my psyche.

Some people find it soothing. I am not one of those people. It's been fairly dry the last few days, even sunny (I won't say "warm" because it just hasn't been and to make matters worse, the office I was in for the end of the last week has an a/c vent sitting right over the desk chair blowing cold, cold air all day. Horrific.), but that doesn't help this morning. I had every intention of going to the gym while my sheets washed, running an errand or two, maybe hitting the Nordstrom Rack, and even doing a little cleaning. Instead I've pretty much hovered around the cracktop since about 7am. My ass hurts.

I was also thinking about getting a pedicure and maybe starting the tanning process. After all, I AM taking a vacation in a few weeks.. I held off on the tanning out of deference to my dermatologist, with whom I had an appointment on Thursday, just so he wouldn't freak out at my savage tan while performing Frances-less surgery. Unfortunately for everyone, he decided not to do the surgery. He says there just isn't enough skin around the wound and that it's healing, though very slowly. He decided to just let it continue its healing process and we set a follow up for two months from now. I should be good and tan by then. That'll show him.

It's 10:16am now on Sunday and I have a) not gone tanning, b) not gone to the gym and c) not researched a pedicure destination. I wonder if today will be one of "those" days: no shower, nothing really productive gets done, half-hearted attempts at cleaning are sprinkled with lounging and reading and not much of anything else. I don't have a huge problem with "those" days, but something DOES need to be done about these feet. I feel pretty good about my yesterday, though, having shopped and hit the farmer's market and knocked out the grocery shopping, but I always feel like the weekend has been wasted if I don't at least attempt to leave the house on a Sunday.

I have to say I'm pretty fired up about the Palm Springs trip. We'll get to cruise the South Bay and see some old friends, and then there's the whole laying in the sun for a week thing. Adventure. I need it. I need it badly. I feel like I have nothing to offer if I don't have a good story to tell.

So get me on a plane already and let the mayhem begin. Or the lack of it. Just get me out of this rain. For God's sake get me out of this rain.

I'm not really expecting that I'll actually GET your thoughts, but maybe this will make you think.

So I have a friend on the other side of the country that I've known for many many years, though we have only reconnected in the last six years. He's one of those friends where you can go for months without talking and then when you hear from them, it's like time never passed and you just pick back up where you left off and everyone is happy. Those are the best kind of friends, you know, because we all have lives to live every day and sometimes if you don't have the time to phone or email someone it doesn't mean you don't care, it just means you have your life to live. I am happy to say I have a lot of friends like that, but I also have friends that are NOT like that, and that can be a little tiring. But that doesn't really have anything to do with anything right now.

So this friend of mine has been married for something like eight years (which sort of pisses me off because long, long ago we both agreed that if neither of us were married by age thirty we'd marry each other. Remember when thinking that thirty was old enough to be worried about not being married? Wow, I sure didn't know shit back then, did I? But by the time we were thirty, we had both moved on to other lives and lost touch and really, when I turned thirty I wasn't really thinking about tracking him down.), and for the most part, this marriage has been more of a cohabitation of friends rather than marital bliss. The wife is kind of a slacker. I mean, she's probably really nice (I've talked to her) but she doesn't work and alleges she is too agoraphobic to go find a job (I say "alleges" because she smokes a whole bunch of pot and it's probably that she doesn't have a lot of motivation to go get a job and ruin this idyllic life she has created). The husband, my friend, on the other hand, is hard-working and responsible and well-educated and smart and really funny and compassionate. So basically he's getting taken advantage of.

Recently he reconnected with someone from high school and they have developed a bit of a relationship. She lives in another state. She's been single for years herself and apparently isn't the most ... confident person in the world when it comes to her looks. My friend is like the perfect guy for that kind of a chick, by the way, because he's all about the compliments and the self-esteem-boosting (he's had lots of practice). Anyway, prior to their situation moving on to the "next level" (sex), he sat down with his wife and had "the talk" (I will say that I had much to do with this - simply because I think living in a love-less marriage is craziness.). "I love you but I'm not IN love with you." So they have arranged and discussed divorce and living situations and the house and the dogs (there are no kids) and all the right things and then he went down to the other state and knocked it out with the other broad and he's all happy and shit and taking it slow and being all pursue-y with her (she's been a bit leary, though, and I don't blame her) and through all this I try to give him perspective on where she might be coming from because, you know, I'm a chick and have really good intuition about human nature.

MY POINT IN WRITING ALL THIS DOWN, however, is this: What's the first thing that popped in to your mind when you read all this? If this new chick was your friend and she asked you about him and the situation, what would you say? You'd say "Watch it - he's just coming out of a relationship and he might say just about anything to get in your pants." Or you'd immediately think there was something not quite right about this, even if you didn't know what. Because we are skeptical about this kind of stuff, in general. The chick was all happy (though cautious) and then she asked her dad for advice and he said, in no uncertain terms, Run, do not walk, away from this guy.

But see, I know this guy really really well and I know that his feelings are genuine. What makes him any different from the "right" guy? What's the difference anyway? How long is a person supposed to be out of a relationship before they morph into a good catch? Everyone has baggage, everyone past the age of twenty-five, anyway.

I think we make snap decisions about other situations based upon our own past experiences (Okay, we're supposed to do that) but I think we tend to staunchly defend our advice when asked for it. All men are pigs, right? All they want is to do the deed and then they'll drop you like a hot rock, right? Well, maybe not ALL men are like that. And I think it's important to note that there is a difference between "He IS out for one thing" and "He MIGHT BE out for one thing." I don't know, I think giving advice when asked is a pretty important task that deserves thought and consideration of all the facts. Because people who ask you for advice probably respect your opinion.

I'm just throwing this out there because last night I was thinking about how sometimes all we do is throw around our opinions and treat it like advice and don't realize that others might be really listening to what we're saying. And it might keep two people apart who really should be together. Or keep two together who really should be apart.

What IS my point? Hm. I don't know. I guess maybe spend less time yammering and more time really thinking through what you say to people and it just might make a difference in our already challenging lives. That's it. I'll go with that.

Any thoughts?

Blogging for Becky

I have been neglecting TtheD of late and to my faithful seventeen readers, I apologize. I just haven't had a ton of excitement lately. Well, maybe I have, but I have retention issues and since I can't drop everything in the aftermath of something major and blog away, it's probably not going to stick with me for long.

So what's been up.. Not much, really. Just working away. Trying to be a good human. Battling TriMet buses and pedestrians and being thankful every time we get a day full of sun. The usual.

I think I'm getting allergies. Did I write about this last year? Because I find myself, on sunny days full of blossoms on the trees and that white cottony stuff that floats into your sunroof, getting kind of stuffed up. And a tiny bit sneezy. I've never been allergic to anything in my life (besides that flamboyan flower) so if this a new development of almost-middle-age, I think I want my money back.

So I started the week in Beaverton and found myself at Lincoln Tower today, which is good because it's closer to my house, and Nordstrom (which can be bad), but whenever I stop and start something midweek I'm all kerflucked and I can't get my head together. So all week I kept thinking it was the next day, and as I sit here right now I'm wondering why "Community" isn't on, and then it kind of pisses me off because I can't believe tomorrow is only Thursday. I'm Judy L. for the next four business days, and here's what I found under her desk this morning. What the heck is this? It's kind of hard NOT to put your feet on it and pedal away while you work up a HUD or quote fees to someone who doesn't believe you when you say you can't negotiate title fees or try to figure out if she actually SCHEDULED that courtesy down in Salem. Luckily I have a lot of experience on the elliptical so I don't like get short of breath or sweat or anything. I just pedal away. It's rather invigorating.

I'm a little bit sad about leaving Beaverton because the coffee shop downstairs' iced Americano with sugar free almond and room is like FOUR THOUSAND times better than the same version at the coffee shop in Lincoln Tower. The one I had today at LT tasted like foot.

On account of the sunshine and the location, I found myself at Nordstrom after work looking for pants. And here's my observation on that end: Not Your Daughter's Jeans have always kind of pissed me off, but just because of the name, and only because I feel like they are totally discriminating against me because I can't be in their stupid "I have a daughter" club. Like since I don't have any kids I can't pay $98 for a pair of obviously mom jeans. Feeling rather rebellious today, however, I tried on a pair anyway, and the end result is that it's not just the name that pisses me off, it's also all that flipping spandex and girdle-like material. I'm all J-Lo in those things. Seriously. These pants literally gave me MORE ass than I already have. Who needs that? Decision? Let's just start calling them Not Your Sister's Jeans. Or Not Your Aunt's Jeans. Because they aren't just for middle-aged mothers of girls. And they certainly aren't for someone who doesn't need more ass.

I'm exhausted right now (must have been all that footwork under the desk) and have to go, but I promise I'll be back to tell you about how I booked for Palm Springs and how I'm going to the Go-Gos with My Three Gays and other exciting things that I haven't retained long enough to tell you about.

Thanks for listening. Go Ducks.