shot-out

this one goes out to a friend of mine, a college roommate actually (do i have to start saying "old college roommate" now that i'm out of school?). she has been a boomeranger like me ever since we departed ways in may...living with her parents in new jersey. come to think of it, we have even more in common considering that both our families just built new houses and rang in the new year under completely new roofs. it's always comforting to have someone to talk to who understands what you are going through in life.

anyhow, the reason why i am dedicating this post to her is because, come tuesday morning, she will be attending her first day of work at her brand new job in the city. after extensive job searching and nearly eighty online applications to boot, she has landed "the job of her dreams". way to go mouse. i'm eager to receive the jubilant (and not so jubilant) work-related phone calls from her in the future, because half the fun of having a job is bitching about it to your friends. am i right?

perhaps the most notable impact that this job will have on my friend is its "boomerangability". no, not "drinkablility"...i made up an entirely new word. "boomerangability" shall be defined as: the degree to which an event alters the lifestyle of an individual boomeranger or group of boomerangers. her new job ranks extremely high on the boomerangability scale for not only will she be actually making money now but she is also well on her way to leaving her parent's house for a place she can call home in the city. many details remain to be figured out for this young one and her mom and dad, but the fate of that umbilical cord is one giant step closer to being severed. sorry for the visual.

damn you, plastic cups

i didn’t want to be here again. i thought i had settled my anxiety and confusion back in november, but now i find myself gasping for a way out. today, i was that employee who calls a neighboring business (while on my lunch break mind you) inquiring for a position. i was that employee who curses at her boss (silently, of course) while he hands her a receipt revealing a mistake she had made. come to think of it, i’ve been cursing to myself a lot lately. i curse at the coffee makers. i curse at the smell that the kitchen leaves on my clothes. i curse at the dishware that has become so revolting to me. about the only thing i don’t curse at are the pastries, cause what sort of person could carry a grudge against pastries? well, maybe i speak too soon...maybe next week i will start giving the evil eye to a chocolate croissant or two. i didn’t want to be here.

apparently—much to my disappointment—i am not one of a kind. what i mean to say is that according to a recent survey, only 45 percent of americans are satisfied with their work. that is the lowest level recorded by the research group who has been studying this issue for more than 22 years. yikes.

(you can find the entire article here: http://www.newsobserver.com/business/story/268355.html)

i think the article hits the nail on the head with the comment that, “workers who find their jobs interesting are more likely to be innovative, to take calculative risks and to use initiative to drive productivity and contribute to economic growth.” i can attest to this statement for i have seen my own level of satisfaction with my job plummet as my interest level and outlet for creativity have become, shall we say, near to the ground? and get this: workers under 25 expressed the highest level of dissatisfaction among any other age group. yep...definitely not one of a kind.

twentyten

so first of all, i'd like to wish anybody who is still reading my blog a happy new year. thanks for sticking with me. my first three days of 2010 were so uncharacteristic of how i normally live my life. i partied pretty hard on both new years and the first saturday with an 8-hr shift and what felt like no recovery time in between. i learned that if drinking and little sleep can give you a cold, more drinking and even less sleep can take it away just as fast. let's just say that sometimes the way to beat a cold is to ignore it with distractions like shots, private booths, glow sticks, hot dogs at 2 a.m., and, of course, friends.

good times.

but i'm back to my old self, don't you worry...eating solid foods, stressing about my job, and contemplating whether i should feel guilty or not over the fact that my mom emptied my trash for the second time since we've been here.

now i'm not going to claim that i have ever made strong new years resolutions or even really fancied the whole idea in the past, but for some reason i had an itch to dedicate myself to a few (okay, more like ten) self-improvements. amid my frenzy to create "a better me," i came up with ideas such as mastering the amazing machine known as the crock-pot, being less of a bitch to my family members on the phone, and abstaining from mindless chocolate-chip consumption. being a lover of anything related to lists (making lists, crossing things off my list, making my lists pretty...), i was excited at the thought of banging out a traditional new years resolution list. then i read in realsimple magazine that seven is the maximum number of tasks that should be on a daily-to-do list to avoid mental overflow. okay, so new years resolutions don't exactly fall under the category of daily-to-do lists, but it got me thinking about mental overflow and i decided to throw out the whole idea (i'll probably find out tomorrow that studies show writing down your resolutions increases the likelihood that you will actually adhere to them).

anyhow, below is my new years resolutions "list", a.k.a, goals that flutter in and out of my head like a coma patient in and out of consciousness (maybe a good resolution would be coming up with better metaphors).

in 2010, i will:

make time to actively educate myself (watching the news, continuing to read the paper, expanding my knowledge of topics that interest me). learn from my dad through working on creative projects together (designing and constructing furniture, gardening). living more in the present and not in the past or future.

how's that for self-improvement!? i feel like a better person already... i should really reward myself with some chocolate chi-NO!

i got nothing

suddenly not in the mood to write at all. i hate when i get like this...maybe i should suck it up and see what happens? maybe not being "in the mood to write" is actually the perfect moment to do just that because a different side of me is being expressed? or maybe i'll just call it a night because i get to go to work before the sun goes to work for the next five days.

garbage

my little, red, ford focus, tj (named after the elderly man who sold it to me), has just recently taken on a new name: the sleigh. this name came about on christmas eve as my mom, brother, sister, and i were piling our groceries into my car from the third (yes, third) grocery store we had visited that evening. we felt like four sardines packed inside a sardine can...bags of groceries weaving in and out of our confined space. to my mom’s credit, she cleverly referred to my car as “santa’s sleigh”, a befitting name for two reasons. one, because my car is both compact and red. two, because one could imagine the bountiful bags of groceries in my car to be the bags of presents santa hauls to children around the world.

as far as i know, i am sure that no one operates santa’s sleigh besides santa himself. unfortunately for me, i am not so lucky. i am all too familiar with the “vehicle shuffling” that results from a family unit with three people, three separate jobs, and only two cars. that said, i wasn’t surprised when my dad had arranged for him to drop me off at work this morning so that he could take the sleigh to his own place of work. but what did surprise me, however, was what awaited me inside the car...

bags and bags of trash. i aint joking. my dad was actually proud of the fact that he had thought of filling up my car this morning so that he could swing by the old house and have plenty for the trash man to take on trash day. lovely. i don’t think santa ever had to put up with something like this in his career, correct me if i’m wrong.

12.25.2009

from our tree to yours...





...and a glimpse of our post-present-opening morning (i instated the rule a few years back that there is absolutely no cleaning until the last gift is opened. i prefer a carpet littered with wrapping, styrofoam shapes, and empty boxes... much to my mother's dismay).

merry christmas.

your blinker is your ammunition

this afternoon i made a poor decision: i decided to go shopping at the mall.

there, in the parking lot, is where every christmas shopper's adventure begins, because even indiana jones would have a hard time locating a parking spot. i think drivers in mall parking lots may be at their most alert state--hands on the steering wheel...eyes darting in every which direction, looking for shoppers shuffling their keys or signs of human life inside a vehicle.


it's a jungle out there. but instead of feeding on the weak, we opt for the strong, because they are more likely to accurately locate their car and exit in a speedy fashion. rookie mistake number one is choosing an elderly person as your victim because the mall will close by the time they back out of their parking space. another common mistake is following the herd of cars in front of you too closely. you have to keep your distance so that you can catch shoppers who happen to be parked between you and the next car.


and isn't it funny how when we are the ones driving we are always frustrated when people zig-zag their way through the aisles to reach their own car? it makes it incredibly difficult for us to plan our parking strategy. but when we are in the other person's shoes, don't we do the same thing? it's like the driver/pedestrian relationship: when a driver we hate the pedestrian, but when a pedestrian we hate the driver.

i actually was lucky enough today to witness an animal attack, figuratively speaking. the suv directly ahead of me and the car facing us on the other side of the lane were both vying for the same spot. both drivers had their blinkers on, neither one relinquishing their position. and we all know that your blinker is your only ammunition, unless you are a complete douche-bag. i waited there, wishing i had a video camera to capture the scene that was about to unfold before my eyes. as the parked car was pulling out, both vehicles crept their way forward. the car facing me darted into the space while the car in front of me-just a beat behind the other-did the same thing, horn blaring the entire time, inches away from colliding. i smiled to myself and thought, now i'm in a christmasy mood. anyone for hot cocoa?

a white whine

as i was reading these words from my monday post...

"back to the reason why the past twelve days have been rough...my family is in the final stages of moving into our brand new home."

...i couldn't help but think to myself, did i just commit perhaps the largest white whine ever? if you are not familiar with the term i just dropped, a "white whine" is
a complaint made by an overprivileged white person, most commonly an american.

i mean, let's review for a second what i was saying on monday: basically that it has been really rough on my family, ya know, this whole moving into a brand new house in a gated community and all. cry me a river is what i think most people would say to that. could be on par with comments like:

"why do the cleaning ladies always have to be here the mornings i can sleep innnn?"

and certainly:

"i hate that fiji water is square-shaped. it won’t fit in my cup holder."

(both courtesy of whitewhine.com)

white whines will usually slip-out uncontested, unless of course you have a sister like mine who will point them out to you. we laugh about it, and then we move on. it's like a brief moment in our lives when we can pause, reflect, and be thankful for how good we really have it. i had to wake up at 4:20 a.m. this morning to be at work from 5:00 a.m. until 1:30 p.m...but after that i drove straight home and buried myself underneath my covers...caught in that moment between a shiver and being the warmest thing in the world.

home is where the...

wow. absolutely unacceptable that i haven't written in twelve days. judging by what i am doing at this very moment you wouldn't believe me when i tell you that the last twelve days have been nothing short of stressful. but if you walked into my room right now you would find that i have crawled back into bed on this monday afternoon because...because i can. i have the day off. and even though i have the day off from work i feel as if i am playing hooky. i'm up to track 16 (silent night)on kenny g's christmas album and every so often i can't help but peer out my window to see if i can spot a deer walking in the woods.

back to the reason why the past twelve days have been rough...my family is in the final stages of moving into our brand new home. mom received the house key last week and has been wearing it on a chain around her neck ever since (well, since i told her that she looked like a rapper with that ridiculous thing on. it has recently been converted into a bracelet). anyhow, the house really isn't finished yet and we are all just trying to feel at home here.

you know what helped? my mom just came in and yelled at me for leaving clothes unfolded in the other room, proof that family bickering doesn't just magically go away with new walls and fresh paint. nope. we still raise our voices and we still fight about the same things, even though a little part of us all thought that that wouldn't be the case. so home is where the...fighting is? sounds about right.

much more to come!

fresh

i have this list. a list of all the things i would like to blog about (did i just become one of those people who uses "blog" as a verb?). and, of course, my list is categorized. categorized according to levels of urgency. some of my thoughts are written under "get off my chest this week" while others can be postponed until sometime "in the near future". despite my efforts, i've been absolutely horrible at following this time table because new events keep popping up, out of turn so to speak. like this afternoon, when my dad couldn't remember where he put his shoes to dry and then pulled them out of the oven. or earlier in the day, when i learned that even having a conversation about something as innocuous as coffee at work inevitably turns into some sexual innuendo (my co-worker seems to think that decaf coffee is like masturbation...why not go out and get the real thing?). so then i have to decide whether to stick to my schedule or write about the things that are more fresh in my mind. hence, the "fresh" category, one that can only exist in my head, never on paper.

today's freshness...

i think that my inability to stick to a pre-arranged schedule is just another reminder that plans are destined to change. the world is not going to just sit back and make sure all our daily lives are followed according to plan. in fact, i think the world is doing everything in its power to screw up our plans. it took me a very long time to realize this phenomenon. i used to believe that if i planned i would be prepared and successful. ask my friends and teammates from college and they will tell you that i planned my ass off. in fact, i planned so much it often pissed them off...took the spontaneity out of things i suppose. only recently have i come to the actualization that the secret to being prepared and successful is not merely planning, but adapting. adapting to what life throws at us...because change is inevitable.

so if you must make a plan, plan for that plan to change. because it will. and if you can adapt without feeling resentment toward others or the world, you'll be much better off than i have been in the past.

oh, and keep it fresh. no one likes a stale idea.