Today I carved two pumpkins in fairly record time, dressed up as a zombie cheerleader (there was lots of glue and paper on my face and paint and it was righteous, I can assure you), handed out candy with Lacey, ate pizza, found out the Rangers lost Game 4 of the World Series (it's now 3-1, Giants), and now I am freaking the fuck out because NaNoWriMo starts in less than an hour.
It'll be posted on the other blog, Journalism's Dark Secret, and if you can't sign on to it, then there's a decent chance you're a creeper. (We're all creepers in some respects.) I haven't much decided what I'm going to write -- I thought I'd have all these nice long runs to think about what I'm going to write, while I'm training for this godforsaken half marathon, but it turns out it takes way too much effort to think about running while running. Who knew?
I might start tonight, or it might have to wait until tomorrow. I really don't know. I feel a lot more apprehensive about it this year than I did last, actually. It's probably because I've been spending so much time thinking about baseball and Halloween costumes (for the party yesterday I was Edward Scissorhands, and let me tell you, making scissorhands is a bitch) and running, along with all the usual day-to-day things that consume my thoughts.
And now I'm blogging in an attempt to get an idea. It's not really working. I'm going to go think about my scissor hands again.
Showing posts with label entertain me. Show all posts
Showing posts with label entertain me. Show all posts
Sunday, October 31, 2010
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Boulder and Beyond
I realize this is like a month after the fact, but things have been crazy with work and schedules after work and I feel like I barely get any time to just sit down, and when I do, all I want to do is nap or read. Anyway: So yes, we got to Boulder, spent a few days tooling around here, mostly eating at restaurants, wandering in and out of shops, going to the farmer's market, eating some more, taking a tour of the Avery Brewing Company, drinking beer, wading in the very cold Boulder Creek, watching street performers on the Pearl Street Mall, and getting woken up by Dan's uncles' bizarre dogs, since we were sleeping on the floor.
As I mentioned during recaps of my time in Albuquerque last year, it's very grounding to me to have mountains nearby. In Boulder, they were always there--sorry, Sandias, I love you so much, but these mountains were so much bigger--and I felt right at home. Dan was ready to move there. His uncles lived outside the city, where people had little organic farms and kept horses or a few cows, and so we got to drive through that into Boulder, which was a pretty small city. I'm not sure I could live in a city like that without a really big city (like Denver) within an hour's drive. Maybe some day I could, but not yet.
On the morning we left Boulder, we traded in the rental car for a Budget moving van, the cheapest option to get us, three bikes and a bunch of bags to Leadville and then home to Texas. We stripped everything out of Dan's car and left it with his uncles, who are mechanics--I don't know what they've done with it, but Dan told them to sell it for scrap, use it as spare parts or get a new (used) engine in there and sell it, it was up to them.
We drove to Leadville and got there midday Thursday, and we parked the Budget van in the Delaware Hotel lot and took everything up the steep stairs to our room. We showered and changed and found that the wind had picked up--it was cold and dusty--and spent the afternoon wandering in and out of little stores. Almost everything closed at 6 p.m.
On Friday we did mostly race related things--all the riders were required to do an information meeting, we had to make bags filled with spare tubes and extra clothes and food for each of the stops, and there was a free carbo-load dinner for riders and their crews (mostly friends and families and other bike bitches). We found a little bit of spare time to take a cruise around the roughly 12-mile loop known as the Mineral Belt Trail, which climbs into the hills around the town and through old mining sites. I won't lie: The ride totally kicked my ass, lung-wise; the altitude plus the climbing portions of the ride made it tough for me, even though 12 miles is an easy distance. I took lots of breaks, making it look like I was really psyched to stop and take photos. I also nearly ran over an ungodly number of chipmunks.
Saturday, people started lining up for the race before dawn, so we went to bed early, but neither of us slept very well. Dan had been training for this ride for roughly six months, and I'm the planner and the organizer for these sorts of things, and kept running over lists in my head: Did I have everything packed for the next day? I didn't have a car to get to the stops; was I going to get to all the stops and see Dan at all?
Hot damn, those alarm clocks went off early on Sunday morning.
As I mentioned during recaps of my time in Albuquerque last year, it's very grounding to me to have mountains nearby. In Boulder, they were always there--sorry, Sandias, I love you so much, but these mountains were so much bigger--and I felt right at home. Dan was ready to move there. His uncles lived outside the city, where people had little organic farms and kept horses or a few cows, and so we got to drive through that into Boulder, which was a pretty small city. I'm not sure I could live in a city like that without a really big city (like Denver) within an hour's drive. Maybe some day I could, but not yet.
On the morning we left Boulder, we traded in the rental car for a Budget moving van, the cheapest option to get us, three bikes and a bunch of bags to Leadville and then home to Texas. We stripped everything out of Dan's car and left it with his uncles, who are mechanics--I don't know what they've done with it, but Dan told them to sell it for scrap, use it as spare parts or get a new (used) engine in there and sell it, it was up to them.
We drove to Leadville and got there midday Thursday, and we parked the Budget van in the Delaware Hotel lot and took everything up the steep stairs to our room. We showered and changed and found that the wind had picked up--it was cold and dusty--and spent the afternoon wandering in and out of little stores. Almost everything closed at 6 p.m.
On Friday we did mostly race related things--all the riders were required to do an information meeting, we had to make bags filled with spare tubes and extra clothes and food for each of the stops, and there was a free carbo-load dinner for riders and their crews (mostly friends and families and other bike bitches). We found a little bit of spare time to take a cruise around the roughly 12-mile loop known as the Mineral Belt Trail, which climbs into the hills around the town and through old mining sites. I won't lie: The ride totally kicked my ass, lung-wise; the altitude plus the climbing portions of the ride made it tough for me, even though 12 miles is an easy distance. I took lots of breaks, making it look like I was really psyched to stop and take photos. I also nearly ran over an ungodly number of chipmunks.
Saturday, people started lining up for the race before dawn, so we went to bed early, but neither of us slept very well. Dan had been training for this ride for roughly six months, and I'm the planner and the organizer for these sorts of things, and kept running over lists in my head: Did I have everything packed for the next day? I didn't have a car to get to the stops; was I going to get to all the stops and see Dan at all?
Hot damn, those alarm clocks went off early on Sunday morning.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Unexpected Delays
I thought I'd be able to post about the trip to Colorado and Leadville sooner, but things devolved into utter and total chaos as soon as I got back into town, so apologies on that front. On the other hand: Look! I'm posting! And I don't think I'm posting quite as late as I did when I went to New Mexico last September/October, but I'm not going to check in case I'm wrong and then feel bad.
Dan and I left for Colorado on a Sunday, when it was beautiful outside and sunny and we could stop for breakfast in Oklahoma City at a Waffle House with his childhood best friend, who lives and works in OKC at the moment and always has great stories about how dismal it is.
We were making good time through Kansas--whole lot of nothing in that state, I found out--when Dan's car, a Honda Passport, decided to die. Not just die, but like shudder and screech to a slow halt on the freeway two miles from the Colorado border. When we cracked the hood, there was smoke. Not good.
To make a very long story short, we think the engine seized, and we got towed to the nearest Colorado town (Burlington, no use in backtracking into Kansas, since the nearest town there was also 20 miles away), and we spent the night in a gross, seedy motel until the mechanic told us the next morning that yep, the engine seized. And blew. Or something. I don't know. Dan was on the phone with them; I was on the phone with everyone else I could think of, trying to find us transportation to the race and then back home with three bikes and luggage. The 10-year old car, with 200,000 miles on it, had just become a giant, useless piece of junk.
One of Dan's uncles--we were going to stay with two of them, brothers who live together in Boulder--got a U-Haul dolly and drove about three hours out to pick us up and then make the four-hour drive back to Boulder. (It took longer going back because his car was definitely not big enough to tow Dan's, but we made it work anyway.) However, the uncle couldn't come pick us up until that night, so Dan and I had a day in Burlington, Colo. This is what we found: shitty Mexican food (possibly even worse than the stuff in Enterprise, Alabama, where I did my senior year of high school) and a 105-year-old restored antique carousel.
These people weren't kidding around with their Kit Carson County Carousel. Thing was gorgeous, hand-carved, fully suspended and made in 1905 by the Philadelphia Toboggan Company. It was for Denver, but in the late '20s that city got all fancy and wanted a jumper carousel, where all the horses went up and down individually, so Kit Carson County bought it with $1,200 of taxpayer dollars (people were ticked and several commissioners lost their seats over this, since that was the cost of an average house at the time).
When the Depression hit, the town shuttered up the shell around the carousel, the sort of building that protected it from the elements, and filled the whole damn thing with grain, like it was a silo. Grain around the horses, the smug-looking camels, the goats, the St. Bernard dog, the sleds and the lion--everything. In 1976, for the Colorado centennial and the country's bicentennial, the community decided to gather up about $16,000 to start a five-year restoration project.
The restoration project turned out to take 25 years and cost a total of about $3 million, largely raised by the town people through things like bake sales. They did get some grants, since they got the thing declared a historic landmark, but since the thing had been filled with grain and mice and God knows what else, it was a big project. There are hand-done canvas paintings around the inner core of the carousel, and there were big rips in some of those, so they had to be mended.
The great thing? Costs only 25 cents to ride it, so Dan and I definitely did. Only cost a buck to go into the museum, which we ended up not doing since we had to go meet Dan's uncle, but we spent about an hour and a half, maybe two hours, sitting outside the carousel, watching it go around. The older ladies who worked there were really nice and kept us entertained with talk and backstory, and we saw handfuls of tourists and families come through. It seems like a pit stop area, and considering the nothingness in Kansas and the general nothingness until you got to Colorado Springs or Denver, it was a nice break from the road.
If you'd been on the road, that is. We were stuck. But we did get to Boulder, and got a rental car for two days to tool around, and I'm saving Boulder and Leadville for some other posts. But let me just say: It sucked like nobody's business to have the car die on us, but we got through it and got to see something really awesome, too.
Dan and I left for Colorado on a Sunday, when it was beautiful outside and sunny and we could stop for breakfast in Oklahoma City at a Waffle House with his childhood best friend, who lives and works in OKC at the moment and always has great stories about how dismal it is.
We were making good time through Kansas--whole lot of nothing in that state, I found out--when Dan's car, a Honda Passport, decided to die. Not just die, but like shudder and screech to a slow halt on the freeway two miles from the Colorado border. When we cracked the hood, there was smoke. Not good.
To make a very long story short, we think the engine seized, and we got towed to the nearest Colorado town (Burlington, no use in backtracking into Kansas, since the nearest town there was also 20 miles away), and we spent the night in a gross, seedy motel until the mechanic told us the next morning that yep, the engine seized. And blew. Or something. I don't know. Dan was on the phone with them; I was on the phone with everyone else I could think of, trying to find us transportation to the race and then back home with three bikes and luggage. The 10-year old car, with 200,000 miles on it, had just become a giant, useless piece of junk.
One of Dan's uncles--we were going to stay with two of them, brothers who live together in Boulder--got a U-Haul dolly and drove about three hours out to pick us up and then make the four-hour drive back to Boulder. (It took longer going back because his car was definitely not big enough to tow Dan's, but we made it work anyway.) However, the uncle couldn't come pick us up until that night, so Dan and I had a day in Burlington, Colo. This is what we found: shitty Mexican food (possibly even worse than the stuff in Enterprise, Alabama, where I did my senior year of high school) and a 105-year-old restored antique carousel.
These people weren't kidding around with their Kit Carson County Carousel. Thing was gorgeous, hand-carved, fully suspended and made in 1905 by the Philadelphia Toboggan Company. It was for Denver, but in the late '20s that city got all fancy and wanted a jumper carousel, where all the horses went up and down individually, so Kit Carson County bought it with $1,200 of taxpayer dollars (people were ticked and several commissioners lost their seats over this, since that was the cost of an average house at the time).
When the Depression hit, the town shuttered up the shell around the carousel, the sort of building that protected it from the elements, and filled the whole damn thing with grain, like it was a silo. Grain around the horses, the smug-looking camels, the goats, the St. Bernard dog, the sleds and the lion--everything. In 1976, for the Colorado centennial and the country's bicentennial, the community decided to gather up about $16,000 to start a five-year restoration project.
The restoration project turned out to take 25 years and cost a total of about $3 million, largely raised by the town people through things like bake sales. They did get some grants, since they got the thing declared a historic landmark, but since the thing had been filled with grain and mice and God knows what else, it was a big project. There are hand-done canvas paintings around the inner core of the carousel, and there were big rips in some of those, so they had to be mended.
The great thing? Costs only 25 cents to ride it, so Dan and I definitely did. Only cost a buck to go into the museum, which we ended up not doing since we had to go meet Dan's uncle, but we spent about an hour and a half, maybe two hours, sitting outside the carousel, watching it go around. The older ladies who worked there were really nice and kept us entertained with talk and backstory, and we saw handfuls of tourists and families come through. It seems like a pit stop area, and considering the nothingness in Kansas and the general nothingness until you got to Colorado Springs or Denver, it was a nice break from the road.
If you'd been on the road, that is. We were stuck. But we did get to Boulder, and got a rental car for two days to tool around, and I'm saving Boulder and Leadville for some other posts. But let me just say: It sucked like nobody's business to have the car die on us, but we got through it and got to see something really awesome, too.
Saturday, August 07, 2010
On High
Tomorrow morning Dan and I head out to Colorado for a solid week of beer tastings, reading books, cycling, eating and enjoying the fact it's not 104 with a 110 heat index outside. Holla atcha altitude!
For those who are interested, the Leadville 100 bike race will be next Saturday, Aug. 14, and I will be live-tweeting the whole thing because fuck, what else am I supposed to do? No way in hell I'm riding that thing. I will be bundled up, reading books and watching riders, waving a giant TCU Horned Frogs flag so Dan can find me in all the crews (side note: Ranked No. 7 in the nation pre-season, fuck yes!).
I will also be making random tweets during the whole trip because I easily amuse myself that way. The computer is coming with, so if I get the chance I may upload photos/post while I'm away, but no guarantees.
I just looked at our list of possible things to do while we're out of town, and two-thirds of the list is restaurants/microbreweries. We're chic like that.
For those who are interested, the Leadville 100 bike race will be next Saturday, Aug. 14, and I will be live-tweeting the whole thing because fuck, what else am I supposed to do? No way in hell I'm riding that thing. I will be bundled up, reading books and watching riders, waving a giant TCU Horned Frogs flag so Dan can find me in all the crews (side note: Ranked No. 7 in the nation pre-season, fuck yes!).
I will also be making random tweets during the whole trip because I easily amuse myself that way. The computer is coming with, so if I get the chance I may upload photos/post while I'm away, but no guarantees.
I just looked at our list of possible things to do while we're out of town, and two-thirds of the list is restaurants/microbreweries. We're chic like that.
Monday, October 26, 2009
Endless Drivel
Five minutes ago I was checking my normal list of blogs for the day when I ran across this entry from Molly:
I'm going to do it! I'm going to participate in National Novel Writing Month. I don't have an idea for a plot or any characters yet, but the lovely thing about NaNoWriMo is that it places importance on quantity not quality. Starting November 1st, I will be writing a 50,000 word manuscript for a crappy (or brilliant--either works) novel. On average, that's about 5-6 pages a day. I'm excited to try out a new kind of writing for me and I hope that it helps improve my professional writing--or at least is just fun.
Here's the link if you want to find out more: http://www.nanowrimo.org/
To all this, I have just one thing to say:
Oh HELL yes.
Molly (I didn't link to her blog because I feel awkward linking to people's personal blogs without prior permission) was a classmate of mine at BU, and if there's one thing we were taught at BU, it was how to write. Copious amounts. About sometimes seemingly dull topics. So a novel? Piece of cake, right?
For all you journalists or otherwise slacker-types who may read this, I think you should also get involved. It's a fantastic excuse to procrastinate on other stuff, like work that pays the bills, hanging out with friends, and having a life.
So. Yes. I like to think I'll write faithfully with some sort of schedule, but what is more probably is I'll do one of those madcap things where I try to write the entire novel in the last week, the way I wrote all my honors thesis papers in college that were supposed to be done all semester. If anyone has any ideas--topics, characters, genres, etc--leave it in the comments. Seeing as how this will be nonsense at best, I'm sure I can fit all the suggestions in.
I'd make some punny joke about "Write on, man!" but it just feels too easy.
And of course I'm going to post this piece of shit on the internet. I even created a brand-new blog to put it all on. Few things make me as happy as creating blogs I am devoted to for a short time period and then let fall by the wayside, and on this one I can automatically forget about it by Nov. 30. Brilliant! No entries until Nov. 1, naturally, but then check back and we'll see if I've already forgotten about this.
I'm going to do it! I'm going to participate in National Novel Writing Month. I don't have an idea for a plot or any characters yet, but the lovely thing about NaNoWriMo is that it places importance on quantity not quality. Starting November 1st, I will be writing a 50,000 word manuscript for a crappy (or brilliant--either works) novel. On average, that's about 5-6 pages a day. I'm excited to try out a new kind of writing for me and I hope that it helps improve my professional writing--or at least is just fun.
Here's the link if you want to find out more: http://www.nanowrimo.org/
To all this, I have just one thing to say:
Oh HELL yes.
Molly (I didn't link to her blog because I feel awkward linking to people's personal blogs without prior permission) was a classmate of mine at BU, and if there's one thing we were taught at BU, it was how to write. Copious amounts. About sometimes seemingly dull topics. So a novel? Piece of cake, right?
For all you journalists or otherwise slacker-types who may read this, I think you should also get involved. It's a fantastic excuse to procrastinate on other stuff, like work that pays the bills, hanging out with friends, and having a life.
So. Yes. I like to think I'll write faithfully with some sort of schedule, but what is more probably is I'll do one of those madcap things where I try to write the entire novel in the last week, the way I wrote all my honors thesis papers in college that were supposed to be done all semester. If anyone has any ideas--topics, characters, genres, etc--leave it in the comments. Seeing as how this will be nonsense at best, I'm sure I can fit all the suggestions in.
I'd make some punny joke about "Write on, man!" but it just feels too easy.
And of course I'm going to post this piece of shit on the internet. I even created a brand-new blog to put it all on. Few things make me as happy as creating blogs I am devoted to for a short time period and then let fall by the wayside, and on this one I can automatically forget about it by Nov. 30. Brilliant! No entries until Nov. 1, naturally, but then check back and we'll see if I've already forgotten about this.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Twits Of A Twit
Ok, I've fiddled for a bit and had to update my template. . . but anyway, I did join Twitter in another attempt to fill my life with uselessness.
You can join me as we waste seconds that all add up to hours of our lives frittered away.
(Frittered? Is that right? Like frittering? Whatever.)
You can join me as we waste seconds that all add up to hours of our lives frittered away.
(Frittered? Is that right? Like frittering? Whatever.)
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Va-cay
Today at work we all found ourselves with five unpaid personal days that have to be taken by April 30.
Holla atcha three-day weekends!
I guess it's a good thing if it means not laying people off. On the other hand, it's sort of a pain, since it's unpaid, but I guess it would completely defeat the point if they just gave us another five days off. Less productivity, being paid the same, the company doesn't gain anything.
The first thing I thought when I heard this was, Dude, I can sleep in and ride Topper in the daylight on a week day. Sweet! Then I thought that I should take off my birthday, which is on a Wednesday this year. (My birthday was so much better when I was in school, when it was always during spring break.) Not only is it on a Wednesday, which is usually spent frantically trying to track down the fuckers who won't call me back, but it's for a health care focused issue, so I can't take off the whole day because it's an issue where I'm kind of necessary.
So I took off that afternoon, and hopefully this will motivate me to get my shit in line and work ahead. I already have one of the stories for that week, and I can do it at any point, and hopefully I can nail another two like that.
This week was a shitstorm when it came to people calling me back. I wrote two stories where I only got one real source and had to pull from studies and press releases to round them out. It was stupid. One of them was this story I was really enthusiastic about, one that I believed in, and one I actually worked on for two weeks. Unfortunately, one company had a national meeting one week and then everyone was catching up on work the next, so they didn't get back to me. Another company (thankfully) got back to me with nice, complete answers. The third company has a media guy who won't even return my phone calls or e-mails. I must have left him at least a half dozen voice mails, and in one I even asked him to please let me know if the company just didn't want to participate and I wouldn't leave him any more messages, but NOTHING. The guy sucks at life, and I can't tell him.
Sometimes I hate trying to be objective.
One thing that did make me feel better today, while I was stressed out and had high blood pressure, was listening to the White Stripes that I had on my iPod while driving to yet another interview in Arlington. My favorite song is "Ball and Biscuit," which is this brilliant (long) blues song with kind of nutty lyrics and this loud screeching guitar. Love the screech. It's from their 2003 album Elephant, and there's something intensely gratifying to me about loud guitars. Dan doesn't really get it, I don't think. He probably thinks it's just noise, and more than once I've picked him up and he immediately turns down my car radio.
Tomorrow at story meeting I'm giving a sort of presentation about blogs and what they could do for our paper. I got this task because I'm persistently asking to have a science and health care blog, and it's something I mentioned in my job interview almost two years ago. (Almost two years. I've now been at the paper as long as I was in grad school. Craziness.) I think it's the best thing for us, and I think all the reporters are enthusiastic. Cross your fingers I can convince the editors and administration, too.
Tomorrow is also Friday, and I plan on getting pretty intoxicated. It's been that kind of week.
Holla atcha three-day weekends!
I guess it's a good thing if it means not laying people off. On the other hand, it's sort of a pain, since it's unpaid, but I guess it would completely defeat the point if they just gave us another five days off. Less productivity, being paid the same, the company doesn't gain anything.
The first thing I thought when I heard this was, Dude, I can sleep in and ride Topper in the daylight on a week day. Sweet! Then I thought that I should take off my birthday, which is on a Wednesday this year. (My birthday was so much better when I was in school, when it was always during spring break.) Not only is it on a Wednesday, which is usually spent frantically trying to track down the fuckers who won't call me back, but it's for a health care focused issue, so I can't take off the whole day because it's an issue where I'm kind of necessary.
So I took off that afternoon, and hopefully this will motivate me to get my shit in line and work ahead. I already have one of the stories for that week, and I can do it at any point, and hopefully I can nail another two like that.
This week was a shitstorm when it came to people calling me back. I wrote two stories where I only got one real source and had to pull from studies and press releases to round them out. It was stupid. One of them was this story I was really enthusiastic about, one that I believed in, and one I actually worked on for two weeks. Unfortunately, one company had a national meeting one week and then everyone was catching up on work the next, so they didn't get back to me. Another company (thankfully) got back to me with nice, complete answers. The third company has a media guy who won't even return my phone calls or e-mails. I must have left him at least a half dozen voice mails, and in one I even asked him to please let me know if the company just didn't want to participate and I wouldn't leave him any more messages, but NOTHING. The guy sucks at life, and I can't tell him.
Sometimes I hate trying to be objective.
One thing that did make me feel better today, while I was stressed out and had high blood pressure, was listening to the White Stripes that I had on my iPod while driving to yet another interview in Arlington. My favorite song is "Ball and Biscuit," which is this brilliant (long) blues song with kind of nutty lyrics and this loud screeching guitar. Love the screech. It's from their 2003 album Elephant, and there's something intensely gratifying to me about loud guitars. Dan doesn't really get it, I don't think. He probably thinks it's just noise, and more than once I've picked him up and he immediately turns down my car radio.
Tomorrow at story meeting I'm giving a sort of presentation about blogs and what they could do for our paper. I got this task because I'm persistently asking to have a science and health care blog, and it's something I mentioned in my job interview almost two years ago. (Almost two years. I've now been at the paper as long as I was in grad school. Craziness.) I think it's the best thing for us, and I think all the reporters are enthusiastic. Cross your fingers I can convince the editors and administration, too.
Tomorrow is also Friday, and I plan on getting pretty intoxicated. It's been that kind of week.
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Take That!
Reporters who work for the Associated Press have been in a byline stroke, not allowing their names to be run on their stories.
Oh, silly reporters. Nice thought, though.
I've continued being slightly frenzied, working to get out of here without having to write stories from home, and right now it looks like I'll only have one story to write while I'm at home (a special pub coming to bite me in the ass again, I should have seen it coming). Today I'll write my two stories this Dec. 22, and on Friday I wrote two for the 29, and today I even did two interviews for the Jan. 5 issue. Amazing! I'm sort of proud of myself.
This weekend I also blew my eardrums out at the Eagles of Death Metal concert in Dallas (I would link to their website but I think it has some annoying background sound on it that was irritating the hell out of me last week), got guilted into buying books for Toys for Tots, got a hair cut, made cookies, ate a lot of cookies, saw Adrian for the first time in months, got a tour of the wedding gifts Adrian and April got, and pretty much wrapped up Christmas shopping.
I'm so ready to sit on my parents' couch and have them buy me stuff now. I have my eye on this book bag from Barnes and Noble (so many pockets!), and I need more socks.
Also, I've got some things going on over the time at home, so I'll probably blog about those. I may even blog about the anticipated drama regarding my sister (still doesn't have a full-time job) and my parents (who don't want to p ay her rent anymore).
I hope everyone enjoys their vacations!
Oh, silly reporters. Nice thought, though.
I've continued being slightly frenzied, working to get out of here without having to write stories from home, and right now it looks like I'll only have one story to write while I'm at home (a special pub coming to bite me in the ass again, I should have seen it coming). Today I'll write my two stories this Dec. 22, and on Friday I wrote two for the 29, and today I even did two interviews for the Jan. 5 issue. Amazing! I'm sort of proud of myself.
This weekend I also blew my eardrums out at the Eagles of Death Metal concert in Dallas (I would link to their website but I think it has some annoying background sound on it that was irritating the hell out of me last week), got guilted into buying books for Toys for Tots, got a hair cut, made cookies, ate a lot of cookies, saw Adrian for the first time in months, got a tour of the wedding gifts Adrian and April got, and pretty much wrapped up Christmas shopping.
I'm so ready to sit on my parents' couch and have them buy me stuff now. I have my eye on this book bag from Barnes and Noble (so many pockets!), and I need more socks.
Also, I've got some things going on over the time at home, so I'll probably blog about those. I may even blog about the anticipated drama regarding my sister (still doesn't have a full-time job) and my parents (who don't want to p ay her rent anymore).
I hope everyone enjoys their vacations!
Monday, November 17, 2008
Morbid Jewelry
I get this catalog called Signals, which is full of all kinds of random stuff, a lot of which appeals to middle-aged women who like to read and like cats (I'll totally be there in another 30 years). Of the whole catalog, there's usually like 5 things that I would ever get for myself, but it's amusing enough that I go through it every time I get it.
I just thought I would point out that on a page full of items like a bracelet with tiny bells hanging off it and a silver angel ornament is the Ashes Pendant. Yes--a silver heart pendant with a FUNNEL that you can pour art of your cremated dead husband in to.
They also offer the Pet Ashes Pendant. I love Topper a lot, but somehow I don't think I can carry him around with me on my neck when he dies.
Skulls are a big thing in fashion right now, but Signals magazine totally blows away all the hipsters and goth kids when it comes to ridiculous accessories. I'm constantly amazed at the random shit in catalogs.
I just thought I would point out that on a page full of items like a bracelet with tiny bells hanging off it and a silver angel ornament is the Ashes Pendant. Yes--a silver heart pendant with a FUNNEL that you can pour art of your cremated dead husband in to.
They also offer the Pet Ashes Pendant. I love Topper a lot, but somehow I don't think I can carry him around with me on my neck when he dies.
Skulls are a big thing in fashion right now, but Signals magazine totally blows away all the hipsters and goth kids when it comes to ridiculous accessories. I'm constantly amazed at the random shit in catalogs.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Fan Club Of Eight Years Olds
It was a pretty busy week; I was out half the day on Tuesday, since I was going to see a sleep study that night, and even though I went home and slept for three hours I was still exhausted and booked up on Wednesday. Busy weeks make me always focus on Thursday: If I can live through Thursday at about noon, then I'm set.
Also, I took off Friday this week, so if I could make it through until Thursday afternoon, then I was practically free.
My managing editor volunteers at a local elementary school, and they'd invited her to come present for career day. Since it was Thursday and she's busy putting out the paper, she asked us reporters if any of us wanted to go. I volunteered because it sounded like fun. I can entertain a group of third grade students for a half hour, no problem. There were many years when I was in high school and my entire income came from birthday money and babysitting.
I contacted the school counselors, who asked if I could do two classes instead of just one. I said sure, and my ME gave me little tiny notebooks with the paper's name on them to hand out to the kids, and I got a giant bag of pens from the children's hospital, since I figured a lot of kids had heard of it or been there before.
I showed up about five minutes late, parked across the street and tried to run across the street to the school. I ended up dropping most of the notebooks in the middle of the street, and a kind semi-truck driver stopped so I could pick them up without getting killed. There was a volunteer student aide in the library waiting for me, and she lead me to the first third-grade class.
When I started talking, I found myself getting flushed and my voice quaking a bit. Then I remembered that I could definitely spell better than the kids, and I was good. I talked about what I did, and they asked a lot of questions. I handed out notebooks after explaining that most of my life is spent taking notes, and they all excitedly wanted to write my e-mail address and the paper's website address in there. That took forever. Seriously. I said the website like 10 times and spelled it out and wrote it on the board and they still got it wrong.
Then my aide took me to my next class, and these kids were a little slower to get in to everything, but then they kept me there for an hour, asking question after question. The good news is they were good questions and I had plenty of good reporting stories to entertain them with. I told them about going out with a falconer to scare grackles, Dumpster-diving with anarchist freegans, finding a blind man's dog, trying my hand at being a crane operator, and doing the sleep study. I encouraged them to be nosy, ask questions, and always be curious. One girl in particular seemed to love this, and asked as many questions as she could possibly think of. The teacher finally cut them off, and as I was leaving the students all waved and the one girl wanted to get a hug.
I was smart. I didn't tell them that they won't get paid much and that journalism is changing and freaking out everyone involved in the industry. With any luck, one of those students will become a journalist and get into the business so I can someday retire. My 401k won't exist at that point, but I need some other kid to get suckered into this business so I can die anywhere but at my desk. (Just kidding. I did tell them I usually love my profession.)
So I took off Friday, and so did Dan, but he was invited to come in and speak to a couple of intro journalism classes at SMU so I tagged along. They were hour and a half classes, and Dan's presentation was about online journalism, and it was a really interesting presentation and then Q&A. (I'm not being biased, either. Not too biased. The students got into it and the discussions.) It's always strange to see someone in their professional role when you're used to seeing them elsewhere. It's like going to one of those take your kids to work days and seeing your parent doing something other than getting you snacks or telling you to clean your freaking room.
Naturally, every off day has a result, so Dan's working today. It's Saturday. It's ok, though. We got up and went to a bike race before he had to go in, and he did really well in the race, and then I went back to bed because I was cold and tired. My sister is in town today to see her best friend, so the three of us are on our way out to get lunch. Fooood. Then I'm going shopping. If I were a housewife, I could live every day like this!
Also, I took off Friday this week, so if I could make it through until Thursday afternoon, then I was practically free.
My managing editor volunteers at a local elementary school, and they'd invited her to come present for career day. Since it was Thursday and she's busy putting out the paper, she asked us reporters if any of us wanted to go. I volunteered because it sounded like fun. I can entertain a group of third grade students for a half hour, no problem. There were many years when I was in high school and my entire income came from birthday money and babysitting.
I contacted the school counselors, who asked if I could do two classes instead of just one. I said sure, and my ME gave me little tiny notebooks with the paper's name on them to hand out to the kids, and I got a giant bag of pens from the children's hospital, since I figured a lot of kids had heard of it or been there before.
I showed up about five minutes late, parked across the street and tried to run across the street to the school. I ended up dropping most of the notebooks in the middle of the street, and a kind semi-truck driver stopped so I could pick them up without getting killed. There was a volunteer student aide in the library waiting for me, and she lead me to the first third-grade class.
When I started talking, I found myself getting flushed and my voice quaking a bit. Then I remembered that I could definitely spell better than the kids, and I was good. I talked about what I did, and they asked a lot of questions. I handed out notebooks after explaining that most of my life is spent taking notes, and they all excitedly wanted to write my e-mail address and the paper's website address in there. That took forever. Seriously. I said the website like 10 times and spelled it out and wrote it on the board and they still got it wrong.
Then my aide took me to my next class, and these kids were a little slower to get in to everything, but then they kept me there for an hour, asking question after question. The good news is they were good questions and I had plenty of good reporting stories to entertain them with. I told them about going out with a falconer to scare grackles, Dumpster-diving with anarchist freegans, finding a blind man's dog, trying my hand at being a crane operator, and doing the sleep study. I encouraged them to be nosy, ask questions, and always be curious. One girl in particular seemed to love this, and asked as many questions as she could possibly think of. The teacher finally cut them off, and as I was leaving the students all waved and the one girl wanted to get a hug.
I was smart. I didn't tell them that they won't get paid much and that journalism is changing and freaking out everyone involved in the industry. With any luck, one of those students will become a journalist and get into the business so I can someday retire. My 401k won't exist at that point, but I need some other kid to get suckered into this business so I can die anywhere but at my desk. (Just kidding. I did tell them I usually love my profession.)
So I took off Friday, and so did Dan, but he was invited to come in and speak to a couple of intro journalism classes at SMU so I tagged along. They were hour and a half classes, and Dan's presentation was about online journalism, and it was a really interesting presentation and then Q&A. (I'm not being biased, either. Not too biased. The students got into it and the discussions.) It's always strange to see someone in their professional role when you're used to seeing them elsewhere. It's like going to one of those take your kids to work days and seeing your parent doing something other than getting you snacks or telling you to clean your freaking room.
Naturally, every off day has a result, so Dan's working today. It's Saturday. It's ok, though. We got up and went to a bike race before he had to go in, and he did really well in the race, and then I went back to bed because I was cold and tired. My sister is in town today to see her best friend, so the three of us are on our way out to get lunch. Fooood. Then I'm going shopping. If I were a housewife, I could live every day like this!
Friday, November 07, 2008
Who Done It?
Tomorrow night I'm going to a murder mystery dinner thingamajig at a fellow reporter's house. Most of us there will be the young staff, and we all have these characters to play, and the whole thing is set on July 20, 1969.
(An aside that proves just how much of a geek I was in middle school . . . remember the movie Apollo 13? My favorite movie in middle school. I had the sound track, which included this recording of Walter Cronkite when they landed on the moon, and and I knew it by heart, and he said "on this July 20, nineteen hundred sixty-nine" and I loved the way he said the date. Then I found out he re-recorded a lot of stuff for the movie, but anyway. I'm totally going to pretend tomorrow night that man just landed on the moon.)
I've never been to one of these things. I did a murder mystery theater thing when I was a freshman in college; it was the summer after, when I was at home, and a friend from TCU came to visit for a few days. We drove down to Florda, fell asleep on the beach, got some horrific sunburns, then went to the theater that night. This was about a month before I shattered my arm and spent all summer longingly gazing at Topper and fantasizing about tying my shoes again.
We were short a person, and I asked Dan if he wanted to go, even though I knew he'd probably say no. He did say no. This is a sticking point in our relationship. Except for modern art and some movies, we have very little in common. I grew up with the arts--going to plays, going to ballets, going to symphonies and all sorts of things. He has little patience for any of it, and it makes me sad. Not that I want him to take me to the opera while he secretly is bored out of his mind and wants to spork his eyes out, but it would be nice if we had more in common in that sense. We try once in a while to do things that we'll both enjoy with the arts. Thankfully, the things we both enjoy most are modern art museums, so at least we're good there.
I'll let everyone know how it goes and if I make a complete fool out of myself.
(An aside that proves just how much of a geek I was in middle school . . . remember the movie Apollo 13? My favorite movie in middle school. I had the sound track, which included this recording of Walter Cronkite when they landed on the moon, and and I knew it by heart, and he said "on this July 20, nineteen hundred sixty-nine" and I loved the way he said the date. Then I found out he re-recorded a lot of stuff for the movie, but anyway. I'm totally going to pretend tomorrow night that man just landed on the moon.)
I've never been to one of these things. I did a murder mystery theater thing when I was a freshman in college; it was the summer after, when I was at home, and a friend from TCU came to visit for a few days. We drove down to Florda, fell asleep on the beach, got some horrific sunburns, then went to the theater that night. This was about a month before I shattered my arm and spent all summer longingly gazing at Topper and fantasizing about tying my shoes again.
We were short a person, and I asked Dan if he wanted to go, even though I knew he'd probably say no. He did say no. This is a sticking point in our relationship. Except for modern art and some movies, we have very little in common. I grew up with the arts--going to plays, going to ballets, going to symphonies and all sorts of things. He has little patience for any of it, and it makes me sad. Not that I want him to take me to the opera while he secretly is bored out of his mind and wants to spork his eyes out, but it would be nice if we had more in common in that sense. We try once in a while to do things that we'll both enjoy with the arts. Thankfully, the things we both enjoy most are modern art museums, so at least we're good there.
I'll let everyone know how it goes and if I make a complete fool out of myself.
Thursday, November 06, 2008
Photo Links
I may throw some random pictures up here later this evening, but I thought I'd share photo links for everyone who hasn't already seen them on Facebook.
These are some photos of the city and of the California Academy of the Sciences, including the damning photo of a giant puddle in the middle of the floor. I'm hoping that the Academy will pay me an exorbitant amount of money to get me to take them down. I would, and then I'd send the photos out to everyone I knew.
Here are super touristy photos, including lots of scenic views of boats, seals, trees, water, and a giant bridge that kept getting in the way of my view of the sky.
The final album are an assortment of people dressed up for Halloween.
There are cupcakes in every single album. I'm considering seeking professional help for this.
Also, can I sing the praises of film cameras? Digital cameras are good when you need to be assured of a great photo, because you have instant gratification, but film has that element of surprise which makes it fun to work with. I have a bunch of rolls from the cyclocross race on Monday night which I'll probably post this evening, so expect more links tomorrow.
For the past year and a half or so I've been kicking around the idea of starting a science/health blog. I'd post links to breaking news or interesting information, ask a bunch of questions, maybe just spur people to think about the topic for a moment. I do have a day job that dovetails into this, sort of, but I probably wouldn't have the time to post a ton of in-depth analyses. It sounds alluring. It sounds alluring because, frankly, I'd like to morph into Carl Zimmer, and I'd very much like his day job.
These are some photos of the city and of the California Academy of the Sciences, including the damning photo of a giant puddle in the middle of the floor. I'm hoping that the Academy will pay me an exorbitant amount of money to get me to take them down. I would, and then I'd send the photos out to everyone I knew.
Here are super touristy photos, including lots of scenic views of boats, seals, trees, water, and a giant bridge that kept getting in the way of my view of the sky.
The final album are an assortment of people dressed up for Halloween.
There are cupcakes in every single album. I'm considering seeking professional help for this.
Also, can I sing the praises of film cameras? Digital cameras are good when you need to be assured of a great photo, because you have instant gratification, but film has that element of surprise which makes it fun to work with. I have a bunch of rolls from the cyclocross race on Monday night which I'll probably post this evening, so expect more links tomorrow.
For the past year and a half or so I've been kicking around the idea of starting a science/health blog. I'd post links to breaking news or interesting information, ask a bunch of questions, maybe just spur people to think about the topic for a moment. I do have a day job that dovetails into this, sort of, but I probably wouldn't have the time to post a ton of in-depth analyses. It sounds alluring. It sounds alluring because, frankly, I'd like to morph into Carl Zimmer, and I'd very much like his day job.
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
The Status
Ok, so my sister is the first one who mentioned this. Last night, after the election, she was telling me about all the people she's friends with on Facebook who have these really negative status reports posted about how Obama is a socialist (my sister got offended because they weren't using the right definition of socialism). She said she thinks a lot less of some people because of their Facebook statuses.
I noticed it again today, when I saw a bunch of comments on Jezebel about women de-friending people on Facebook because of their statuses. Leslie even posted a status saying she's disappointed to find out (via Facebook) what some people really believe.
Personally, I only have an odd one or two friends on Facebook who have posted anti-Obama statuses. Some have graciously avoided it (kudos to them), but most of my friends have political persuasions that reflect mine, so it's generally not an issue. I think a lot of it is an issue for people who A) like my sister, friend or accept friend invitations from anyone they ever meet and B) who are more liberal than most of their families and friends, usually due to culture/geographical things.
Maybe everyone on Facebook with de-friend everyone whose political statuses disagree with their own views. Maybe people on Facebook now will only accept friend invitations from people who are legitimate friends (instead of everyone you ever meet once) or who have views more closely in line with their own.
Probably not.
But wouldn't it be funny if this election changed Facebook forever? I love me some Facebook theories.
The following are comments I pulled off Jezebel, because they're funny/sad/awesome/really amusing:
"Also, reading all my friends' Facebook statuses keeps making me cry, too. It's unbelievable how many of them supported Obama and amazing how it is affecting so many people in such profound ways. "
"Some of my friends' Facebook statuses are making me cry too, but for a different reason - I can't believe people that I used to think were decent and logical have turned into crazy assholes. "
"That sucks. Shockingly, I can only think of 3 or 4 of my hundreds of Facebook friends that were McCain supporters. That makes me happy. But I am in a liberal area, went to school in a liberal city, and am queer. So that might explain that. "
"I live in Middle America (yeah that red strip down the middle) and my Facebook page is oddly silent. heh heh heh. Yesterday I was fighting with self-righteous McCain supports and today I guess they've gone to the ammo store to buy up the guns. "
"I just "de-friended" one of my best friends because he's an unthinking Republican and I cannot having him harshing my mellow right now. I feel sort of bad about it, but I just do not need shit like this in my life: "_____ is a true American because he supports even the lowest of presidents, instead of whining like liberals". God, just STFU, go crawl into a hole and build a goddamn shrine to Sarah Palin's loveliness, fuck twit. "
'MY COUSIN is pulling that shit right now. He congratulated Obama, and when someone commented on his status, he mentioned that it would be nice if the left had been as "magnanimous" about the election results in 2000 and 2004. I just told Facebook to not show me stories of his on my news feed."
I noticed it again today, when I saw a bunch of comments on Jezebel about women de-friending people on Facebook because of their statuses. Leslie even posted a status saying she's disappointed to find out (via Facebook) what some people really believe.
Personally, I only have an odd one or two friends on Facebook who have posted anti-Obama statuses. Some have graciously avoided it (kudos to them), but most of my friends have political persuasions that reflect mine, so it's generally not an issue. I think a lot of it is an issue for people who A) like my sister, friend or accept friend invitations from anyone they ever meet and B) who are more liberal than most of their families and friends, usually due to culture/geographical things.
Maybe everyone on Facebook with de-friend everyone whose political statuses disagree with their own views. Maybe people on Facebook now will only accept friend invitations from people who are legitimate friends (instead of everyone you ever meet once) or who have views more closely in line with their own.
Probably not.
But wouldn't it be funny if this election changed Facebook forever? I love me some Facebook theories.
The following are comments I pulled off Jezebel, because they're funny/sad/awesome/really amusing:
"Also, reading all my friends' Facebook statuses keeps making me cry, too. It's unbelievable how many of them supported Obama and amazing how it is affecting so many people in such profound ways. "
"Some of my friends' Facebook statuses are making me cry too, but for a different reason - I can't believe people that I used to think were decent and logical have turned into crazy assholes. "
"That sucks. Shockingly, I can only think of 3 or 4 of my hundreds of Facebook friends that were McCain supporters. That makes me happy. But I am in a liberal area, went to school in a liberal city, and am queer. So that might explain that. "
"I live in Middle America (yeah that red strip down the middle) and my Facebook page is oddly silent. heh heh heh. Yesterday I was fighting with self-righteous McCain supports and today I guess they've gone to the ammo store to buy up the guns. "
"I just "de-friended" one of my best friends because he's an unthinking Republican and I cannot having him harshing my mellow right now. I feel sort of bad about it, but I just do not need shit like this in my life: "_____ is a true American because he supports even the lowest of presidents, instead of whining like liberals". God, just STFU, go crawl into a hole and build a goddamn shrine to Sarah Palin's loveliness, fuck twit. "
'MY COUSIN is pulling that shit right now. He congratulated Obama, and when someone commented on his status, he mentioned that it would be nice if the left had been as "magnanimous" about the election results in 2000 and 2004. I just told Facebook to not show me stories of his on my news feed."
Monday, November 03, 2008
Next, A Dog
Saturday night was the first wedding of any of us out of our scijo class at BU. Some came into the class already married, like Molly and Andrea, and lots of us were dating people, but Liz and Pat were both students in our class who fell in love over science magazine articles and I am crossing my fingers they will now go on to produce a lovely second-generation of scijo dorkiness, hopefully in the form of a cute dog with an appropriately geeky name.
(I'm not ruling out children in the long-term, but seriously--everyone who starts asking married people when they're going to have kids should STOP. Immediately. The married people will have children when they want to have children. However, they should have pets when I want them to have pets. I like cutesy animal photos.)
The wedding was fantastic. Kirk, Karen, Eric, Dan and I shared a cab from the Union Square area out there, and Kate met us there. It was at the Park Chalet Garden Restauarant, and even though it was raining and blowing like a hurricane, it was very pretty and simple inside, with the giant fireplace decorated. All the friends and family stood around the fireplace as a justice of the peace married them, and then there was lots of drinking of the handcrafted beer and partaking of wines and appetizers. Food was good, later on, and the whole thing was simple and fairly casual, with about 120 people in attendance.
It was good to have most of the scijos from our class there. It made me realize how much I miss them all and that it's already been close to two years since we graduated and left for traveling or jobs or internships. These are people who came from various backgrounds but all came together to spend most classes with each other. Doug and Ellen said more than once that we were the most united class they'd ever had, and I think that's still true. Yeah, I'm shitty at keeping up with people, and I may not talk to someone for months at a time. But this weekend it felt as though when we're all in the same place again, there's that easy familiarity that comes with having seen people at their best and worst, all thrown into a new (and yet the same) situation.
There were toasts later on in the evening, and all these friends of Liz and Pat's stood and talked about hearing about them for the first time, meeting the other and hearing that they were going to be married. In the back corner of the bar, us scijos were talking about how they would come into class at the same time (usually just in the nick of time or a minute or two late) with coffee from the same place. We all knew it was a relationship before they admitted it. Perhaps one of us should have stood up and made some sort of speech, but we didn't. That's ok. Liz and Pat knew we were there; that's why we were all invited as a group.
Also, Liz and Pat (probably more Liz, if I had to guess) opted for cupcakes instead of a big traditional cake. I think I had three of them, and they were fantastic. I have also realized that I don't think I took any photos at the wedding except of the cupcakes. I'm a bad friend like that. I did see a professional photographer wandering everywhere, though, and flashing her camera in our faces, so I am hoping for a link to an online album soon.
Overall, it was a successful and wonderful trip to San Francisco. I ate cheap Asian foot, walked until my legs were going to fall off, went tourist-trap and locals-only, saw rocking Halloween costumes, got two friends married, and ate a ton of cupcakes. I even made it to the airport on time the next morning, despite being near drunk, crippled from high heels and confused by a time change.
(I'm not ruling out children in the long-term, but seriously--everyone who starts asking married people when they're going to have kids should STOP. Immediately. The married people will have children when they want to have children. However, they should have pets when I want them to have pets. I like cutesy animal photos.)
The wedding was fantastic. Kirk, Karen, Eric, Dan and I shared a cab from the Union Square area out there, and Kate met us there. It was at the Park Chalet Garden Restauarant, and even though it was raining and blowing like a hurricane, it was very pretty and simple inside, with the giant fireplace decorated. All the friends and family stood around the fireplace as a justice of the peace married them, and then there was lots of drinking of the handcrafted beer and partaking of wines and appetizers. Food was good, later on, and the whole thing was simple and fairly casual, with about 120 people in attendance.
It was good to have most of the scijos from our class there. It made me realize how much I miss them all and that it's already been close to two years since we graduated and left for traveling or jobs or internships. These are people who came from various backgrounds but all came together to spend most classes with each other. Doug and Ellen said more than once that we were the most united class they'd ever had, and I think that's still true. Yeah, I'm shitty at keeping up with people, and I may not talk to someone for months at a time. But this weekend it felt as though when we're all in the same place again, there's that easy familiarity that comes with having seen people at their best and worst, all thrown into a new (and yet the same) situation.
There were toasts later on in the evening, and all these friends of Liz and Pat's stood and talked about hearing about them for the first time, meeting the other and hearing that they were going to be married. In the back corner of the bar, us scijos were talking about how they would come into class at the same time (usually just in the nick of time or a minute or two late) with coffee from the same place. We all knew it was a relationship before they admitted it. Perhaps one of us should have stood up and made some sort of speech, but we didn't. That's ok. Liz and Pat knew we were there; that's why we were all invited as a group.
Also, Liz and Pat (probably more Liz, if I had to guess) opted for cupcakes instead of a big traditional cake. I think I had three of them, and they were fantastic. I have also realized that I don't think I took any photos at the wedding except of the cupcakes. I'm a bad friend like that. I did see a professional photographer wandering everywhere, though, and flashing her camera in our faces, so I am hoping for a link to an online album soon.
Overall, it was a successful and wonderful trip to San Francisco. I ate cheap Asian foot, walked until my legs were going to fall off, went tourist-trap and locals-only, saw rocking Halloween costumes, got two friends married, and ate a ton of cupcakes. I even made it to the airport on time the next morning, despite being near drunk, crippled from high heels and confused by a time change.
Sunday, November 02, 2008
Drowned
Saturday Dan and I got up relatively early to find it pouring in San Francisco. Rain everywhere, wind and a real chill, too. We decided it'd be worth the extra money to take a cab to the Academy, and we got there about a half hour after they opened. The building was huge, and I'd built the whole thing up a lot in my head, so I was geeking out when we got there and plopped down our $25 for each ticket.
The first thing we went through was a four-story rain forest, a giant glass dome that was humid and filled with a glass-bottomed waterway with giant fish, fake trees, real orchids, birds, little jewel-colored poisonous frogs and lots of psychedelic butterflies. You went up this spiral walkway around the exhibit, and there were little exhibits with examples of creatures found in rain forests, like really bored looking chameleons and fish. People were going nuts in there, trying to get photos of the butterflies.
Aside from the rain forest, we saw penguins, an albino alligator and the "living roof," which has seven mounds on it (to represent the seven hills of San Francisco) covered with different types of plants growing on it. They weren't in pots or planters; they were rooted into the roof itself. It was pretty, but also cold and rainy sideways, so I took quick photos and then we retreated.
Back inside we cut through the cafe/atrium area to head toward the aquarium, which was in the lowest level, under the rain forest and everything else. Cutting through the cafe I noticed they were blocking off a large section in the middle with those little A-shaped yellow "wet floor" signs, a huge wet spot on the floor, displacing families who had packed little baggies of apple slices to feed their cranky children. There were little puddles spotting the floor too, causing people to scoot their chairs out of the way.
It was brilliant. This awesome piece of architecture, this new building that cost $500 million and was 10 years in the planning, had a living roof that leaked. A lot.
Naturally, I took photos. They'll be posted, of course, as soon as I get them developed. If I'd just used a digital camera, I would have posted it already. I'd be a shitty mobile journalist. Awesomely enough, though, the San Francisco Chronicle didn't seem to do anything about the leak, so they suck too.
Maybe when people google the California Academy of the Sciences this blog post will show up and they will know that the roof leaks and AVOID THE PLACE IF IT'S RAINING. You will get wet and all the children will be in the basement aquarium, trying not to get wet and all screaming.
The aquarium was really neat, from what I could see around the strollers and children. It seemed like every kid under the age of 8 was there. Hundreds of children, running amok, looking at the fish and corals and everything else. I like aquariums, but I could hardly see anything, and I could feel myself getting more and more tense the longer we stayed. I hadn't eaten breakfast, and so was a bit frayed because of that, and then the kids just sent me over the edge. Dan and I cruised through and then went up to the bookstore, where I bought a postcard (a picture of the front of the museum, since I didn't get a good one due to the rain) and a chocolate bar. Then we took a cab back, ate food and spent the afternoon holed up in the hotel room, watching crappy movies. Really crappy movies. Seriously crappy movies.
I'll post about the wedding later, since it deserves a post of its own. I am back home right now, with my poor little neglected cat, who gets sad on his own. I am also all disoriented from the time change issues, but luckily don't have anything really scheduled at work tomorrow.
It's a bummer I've got to go back to work, though.
The first thing we went through was a four-story rain forest, a giant glass dome that was humid and filled with a glass-bottomed waterway with giant fish, fake trees, real orchids, birds, little jewel-colored poisonous frogs and lots of psychedelic butterflies. You went up this spiral walkway around the exhibit, and there were little exhibits with examples of creatures found in rain forests, like really bored looking chameleons and fish. People were going nuts in there, trying to get photos of the butterflies.
Aside from the rain forest, we saw penguins, an albino alligator and the "living roof," which has seven mounds on it (to represent the seven hills of San Francisco) covered with different types of plants growing on it. They weren't in pots or planters; they were rooted into the roof itself. It was pretty, but also cold and rainy sideways, so I took quick photos and then we retreated.
Back inside we cut through the cafe/atrium area to head toward the aquarium, which was in the lowest level, under the rain forest and everything else. Cutting through the cafe I noticed they were blocking off a large section in the middle with those little A-shaped yellow "wet floor" signs, a huge wet spot on the floor, displacing families who had packed little baggies of apple slices to feed their cranky children. There were little puddles spotting the floor too, causing people to scoot their chairs out of the way.
It was brilliant. This awesome piece of architecture, this new building that cost $500 million and was 10 years in the planning, had a living roof that leaked. A lot.
Naturally, I took photos. They'll be posted, of course, as soon as I get them developed. If I'd just used a digital camera, I would have posted it already. I'd be a shitty mobile journalist. Awesomely enough, though, the San Francisco Chronicle didn't seem to do anything about the leak, so they suck too.
Maybe when people google the California Academy of the Sciences this blog post will show up and they will know that the roof leaks and AVOID THE PLACE IF IT'S RAINING. You will get wet and all the children will be in the basement aquarium, trying not to get wet and all screaming.
The aquarium was really neat, from what I could see around the strollers and children. It seemed like every kid under the age of 8 was there. Hundreds of children, running amok, looking at the fish and corals and everything else. I like aquariums, but I could hardly see anything, and I could feel myself getting more and more tense the longer we stayed. I hadn't eaten breakfast, and so was a bit frayed because of that, and then the kids just sent me over the edge. Dan and I cruised through and then went up to the bookstore, where I bought a postcard (a picture of the front of the museum, since I didn't get a good one due to the rain) and a chocolate bar. Then we took a cab back, ate food and spent the afternoon holed up in the hotel room, watching crappy movies. Really crappy movies. Seriously crappy movies.
I'll post about the wedding later, since it deserves a post of its own. I am back home right now, with my poor little neglected cat, who gets sad on his own. I am also all disoriented from the time change issues, but luckily don't have anything really scheduled at work tomorrow.
It's a bummer I've got to go back to work, though.
Saturday, November 01, 2008
Halloween
Yesterday Dan rented a bike and took it across the Golden Gate Bridge and up Mt. Tam, a ride that took several hours and gave me lots of time to wander around the north side of San Francisco. It was raining lightly when we headed out to the bike place, out on Fisherman's Wharf, but it was also early, around 9, and the time and weather were keeping most of the tourists at bay.
(At bay. Get it? Ha!)
The bike shop dudes were bored and said no one ever comes in when it's raining. Dan got his carbon road bike and put on his helmet and shoes and headed out, and I had his digital camera, my film camera, and time on my hands.
I thought about going elsewhere, since everything I'd heard about Fisherman's Wharf and that area, including Ghirardelli Square, was fairly negative. Is it a tourist trap? Why yes, yes it is. And did I spend all morning there? Why yes, yes I did.
I didn't go into any of the super touristy shops, the ones that sell stupid Alcatraz items and vaguely dirty, sexual shirts. I wandered along the coast, looking at the boats and the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, taking photos and half reading all the signs. It was overcast, and I saw something flailing out in the bay and realized it was someone out swimming.
Ghirardelli Square is in that area, within walking distance, so I walked through but everything was still closed because it was early. I went back to the shoreline and walked out on some piers and through some Fort Mason park, going up a hill to look out toward the bridge. There were more bike people coming out at this point, and most of them got halfway up the hill, then ran out of steam and had to walk their bikes up the rest of the way, which I thought was hilarious. There was a little park up the hill, and I took photos and watched a huge out-of-control poodle tear around after a ball.
Ghirardelli was open at that point, so I went back to the cupcake shop and bought a few cupcakes. I sat outside and ate one, in front of a wine shop that had just opened, and the guy working there came outside and asked me how I was doing. I ended up going into the store and the guy convinced me to do a wine tasting, five tastes for $10. I think he was bored, though, because I got about 10 or 12 tastes for $10 and talked with him and ended up getting a little tipsy by about 11:30. It was kind of awesome. I bought a bottle of wine to take home and then went to a little woodworking shop, where the owner and artist ended up talking with me for about 45 minutes. He wanted to know what astrological sign I was, and we talked a lot about how he got into woodworking and how he ended up in San Francisco from New York during the Summer of Love. I was still feeling the wine, so everything was groovy, and I bought a bowl he made from heavy rosewood. I dunno what I'm going to do with it, but as Dan helpfully pointed out later on, I could put like one apple in it.
I put my headphones in after that and walked to the other end of Fisherman's Wharf, past the aquarium and people selling clam chowder in sourdough bread bowls. Lots of tourists. Walked by the sealions, who were noisy and surrounded by people taking photos, so naturally I stopped to take a few too. Then I went to Starbucks to sit with a coffee because I had been on my feet for a few hours and was tired, and I read and waited about an hour for Dan.
When Dan got back, we went back to the hotel, showered, got a very late lunch. After that we met up with Eric and went to an Irish bar to have some beer and wait for meeting all the wedding people at the Thirsty Bear. We didn't spent too long at the Thirsty Bear--about an hour and a half, I think, seeing Liz and Pat briefly since they were having to do the rounds talking to everyone who'd come to see them. Brad had awesomely invited us out to join a party in Noe Valley, so we hitched a cab and headed out there.
First of all, let me just say that taking cabs makes me nervous. In a new city you can never tell how much they're racking up the price by driving in roundabout ways, and then the woman who drove was like a bat out of hell last night. She was driving a small SUV-ish vehicle and then yakking on her little earpiece phone in what I think was Filipino, and she was scaring me. But we got there, and Brad was actually waiting outside the house in all his awesome glittery Blades of Gloriousness.
Brad's friend Valerie owned the house, and she was incredibly nice and gracious, bringing us in and giving us beer. The house was really nice and had a fantastic view, and it was good to see Brad, because I think the last time I spent any real time with him was when we were digging through Dumpsters at 3 a.m.
The party migrated to another party, a few blocks away, and I didn't know any of these people but they were all very welcoming and even let me harass them with my camera. (Photos to come later!) Whoever had the apartment also made kick-ass cupcakes. (I have pictures of the cupcakes, too. Because I'm not cool like that.) Stairs and a ladder went up the roof, and again there was a gorgeous view.
The whole night reminded me of a few nights I had in college, in strange cities but out partying with friends that you don't see often. You may not remember the parties you go to with friends you see on a regular basis, but you remember those odd nights. They're the nights where you don't really need a camera, because you'll have snapshots in your head, but I had one and film to use.
It took forever to find a cab back--people were wandering around in costumes all over the streets, drunken and tottering around. We finally flagged one and got home at a fairly decent time, and then naturally crashed.
This morning Dan and I hit up the California Academy of the Sciences. I'll post about it later, because it makes me tired thinking about it. Besides, we have to leave for the wedding in about an hour and ten, and I have to shave my legs. That could take forever.
(At bay. Get it? Ha!)
The bike shop dudes were bored and said no one ever comes in when it's raining. Dan got his carbon road bike and put on his helmet and shoes and headed out, and I had his digital camera, my film camera, and time on my hands.
I thought about going elsewhere, since everything I'd heard about Fisherman's Wharf and that area, including Ghirardelli Square, was fairly negative. Is it a tourist trap? Why yes, yes it is. And did I spend all morning there? Why yes, yes I did.
I didn't go into any of the super touristy shops, the ones that sell stupid Alcatraz items and vaguely dirty, sexual shirts. I wandered along the coast, looking at the boats and the San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, taking photos and half reading all the signs. It was overcast, and I saw something flailing out in the bay and realized it was someone out swimming.
Ghirardelli Square is in that area, within walking distance, so I walked through but everything was still closed because it was early. I went back to the shoreline and walked out on some piers and through some Fort Mason park, going up a hill to look out toward the bridge. There were more bike people coming out at this point, and most of them got halfway up the hill, then ran out of steam and had to walk their bikes up the rest of the way, which I thought was hilarious. There was a little park up the hill, and I took photos and watched a huge out-of-control poodle tear around after a ball.
Ghirardelli was open at that point, so I went back to the cupcake shop and bought a few cupcakes. I sat outside and ate one, in front of a wine shop that had just opened, and the guy working there came outside and asked me how I was doing. I ended up going into the store and the guy convinced me to do a wine tasting, five tastes for $10. I think he was bored, though, because I got about 10 or 12 tastes for $10 and talked with him and ended up getting a little tipsy by about 11:30. It was kind of awesome. I bought a bottle of wine to take home and then went to a little woodworking shop, where the owner and artist ended up talking with me for about 45 minutes. He wanted to know what astrological sign I was, and we talked a lot about how he got into woodworking and how he ended up in San Francisco from New York during the Summer of Love. I was still feeling the wine, so everything was groovy, and I bought a bowl he made from heavy rosewood. I dunno what I'm going to do with it, but as Dan helpfully pointed out later on, I could put like one apple in it.
I put my headphones in after that and walked to the other end of Fisherman's Wharf, past the aquarium and people selling clam chowder in sourdough bread bowls. Lots of tourists. Walked by the sealions, who were noisy and surrounded by people taking photos, so naturally I stopped to take a few too. Then I went to Starbucks to sit with a coffee because I had been on my feet for a few hours and was tired, and I read and waited about an hour for Dan.
When Dan got back, we went back to the hotel, showered, got a very late lunch. After that we met up with Eric and went to an Irish bar to have some beer and wait for meeting all the wedding people at the Thirsty Bear. We didn't spent too long at the Thirsty Bear--about an hour and a half, I think, seeing Liz and Pat briefly since they were having to do the rounds talking to everyone who'd come to see them. Brad had awesomely invited us out to join a party in Noe Valley, so we hitched a cab and headed out there.
First of all, let me just say that taking cabs makes me nervous. In a new city you can never tell how much they're racking up the price by driving in roundabout ways, and then the woman who drove was like a bat out of hell last night. She was driving a small SUV-ish vehicle and then yakking on her little earpiece phone in what I think was Filipino, and she was scaring me. But we got there, and Brad was actually waiting outside the house in all his awesome glittery Blades of Gloriousness.
Brad's friend Valerie owned the house, and she was incredibly nice and gracious, bringing us in and giving us beer. The house was really nice and had a fantastic view, and it was good to see Brad, because I think the last time I spent any real time with him was when we were digging through Dumpsters at 3 a.m.
The party migrated to another party, a few blocks away, and I didn't know any of these people but they were all very welcoming and even let me harass them with my camera. (Photos to come later!) Whoever had the apartment also made kick-ass cupcakes. (I have pictures of the cupcakes, too. Because I'm not cool like that.) Stairs and a ladder went up the roof, and again there was a gorgeous view.
The whole night reminded me of a few nights I had in college, in strange cities but out partying with friends that you don't see often. You may not remember the parties you go to with friends you see on a regular basis, but you remember those odd nights. They're the nights where you don't really need a camera, because you'll have snapshots in your head, but I had one and film to use.
It took forever to find a cab back--people were wandering around in costumes all over the streets, drunken and tottering around. We finally flagged one and got home at a fairly decent time, and then naturally crashed.
This morning Dan and I hit up the California Academy of the Sciences. I'll post about it later, because it makes me tired thinking about it. Besides, we have to leave for the wedding in about an hour and ten, and I have to shave my legs. That could take forever.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
SFMOMA
Dan and I flew out to San Francisco early this morning for Liz and Pat's wedding on Saturday night. We left DFW at 7:30, arrived in SF at 9:30, and God bless the hotel front desk people, they let us check in to the hotel around 10:30 instead of waiting until 3 p.m.
After dropping our bags, we went out looking for food because it was 12:30 Texas time and we were starving. A woman at the desk recommended a diner up about two blocks, where we stuffed ourselves on breakfast food before heading over to Chinatown, which was up a giant hill and east about three blocks. We spent a lot of time there, walking around, looking at cheap Chinese-made toys and nicer home items and going into food shops where nothing was labeled in English but lots of stuff looked sort of illegal to sell. (Shark fins? Whale baleen?) I bought some little things for myself and Julie and tried some dim sum that probably would have been better if it had been pan-fried.
Then we figured since we were halfway to Coit Tower and Telegraph Hill, we may as well go there. So we did. We walked there. The hills here are ridiculous. I'm going out tomorrow with my little film camera (I left my big one at home because I haven't had enough time to test it out all the way) and hopefully I can capture the insanity. My calves are so fucking sore. I think all told we walked four miles or so, and a lot of it was up hills that had a 30 percent grade. Tomorrow I'm taking the public transportation.
We came back to the hotel, and I tried to take a nap but it didn't work, which is too bad because I don't think I really slept at all at Dan's parents' place last night, for a lot of reasons. The nap didn't work, but the giant bathtub made my legs feel better, and Italian food helped. I had to buy Excedrin to take care of the killer lack-of-sleep migraine, and then we went to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, which is half-price Thursday nights.
I love modern art. I know a lot of people say that some of it is stupid, since some of it is absurd or looks like it could be done by anybody. That's part of what is so neat about modern art, though--it's not necessarily about the object or outcome, but at least partially about deciding that this thing can be art. Fountain by Marcel Duchamp is one of those things--it's a urinal he bought, painted "R. Mitt 1917" on the side, put it on a pedestal and called it art. It got removed from some exhibit when it debuted, I think, but this is a current version and now it's at the SFMOMA, so he wins.
There were also a few paintings that I'd seen before but just never realized how detailed they are in real life, like Diego Rivera's The Flower Carrier. I'd seen it in books, but up close the basket detailing makes it look three-dimensional, and the flowers look soft and feathery on the canvas.
Ladder for Booker T. Washington, by Martin Puryear, is part of the permanent collection at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, and yet when we walked into the SFMOMA, there it was, hanging in the giant atrium space, on loan. It looks a lot bigger in the Modern, which has it in a smaller, starker place, but it was funny to see it here when I'm so used to seeing it at home.
Then there were other staples of the modern art museums, also represented at the Modern: Clyfford Still with his huge canvases and ragged streaks of colors; Roy Lichtenstein and his dots; Donald Judd with his stacked boxes hanging from the wall; Robert Bechtle and his photo-like paintings.
There were a couple of installations at the SFMOMA that I really liked and would have put in my house if I could figure out a way. My favorite was The Structure of Light by Alyson Shotz, a beautiful, swirling, transparent and sparkling example of form in air. (I can't find a big photo, but here's a little glimpse of it.) It was made of piano wires, strung with transparent beads, and it shimmered as you walked around it. I realize how dorky this makes me sound, but it reminded me of what I imagine the principles of physics look like.
Yeah, that was geeky.
Not as geeky as how excited I got as the special exhibit Brought to Light: Photography and the Invisible, 1840-1900. It showed diatoms, snowflakes, daguerreotypes of eclipses and photos of insects. A woodburytype (I dunno what that is) of the surface of the sun, an image of the Orion nebula, circa 1900. Lightening and electrical sparks, Trouvelot figures, electrical pulses of the heartbeat. Eadweard Muybridge's galloping horses and flipping gymnasts. Ernst Mach, of supersonic fame, and photos of flying bullets and the disruption of the air around them. Radiation emitted by things and x-rays of various items, including the fetus of a river dolphin and x-rays of x-ray tubes.
All of the images were beautiful, and also so familiar, especially to those of us who spent years in science books. The photos of cells don't look much different than photos of cells today, and x-rays are x-rays. We have more advanced imaging today, like MRIs and electron microscopy, but it was amazing to see these images and realize all of them were at least 100 years old. I just never think of close-up photos of the moon being taken during the 1800s. I couldn't find any prints in the museum store, so I ended up buying a book about the exhibit instead, so I can be geeky any time I want. I wish I could find giant prints to frame and hang on my walls, but no luck yet. I'm going to do some work with Google and see what I can find in the future, though.
Tomorrow we're getting up and Dan is heading off on a bike ride, across the Golden Gate Bridge and up Mt. Tam, which I stay over here and take photos and hang off cable cars like a rhesus monkey, just like Eddie Izzard said. Then we're going to hit up the California Academy of the Sciences, go drink with the wedding people and go find Halloween parties with a friend who went through BU's science journalism program the year before me.
Dan's already decided he wants to move here. As we're sitting eating dinner he says, "I wish the Chronicle weren't such a shitty paper, because I'd totally live here." I like the city so far. If I moved here and walked around all the time, I feel like I could cut out working out from my life. That could free up a whole, oh, hour and a half of my life every week. I could do a lot with that time. Like eat chocolate and seafood.
After dropping our bags, we went out looking for food because it was 12:30 Texas time and we were starving. A woman at the desk recommended a diner up about two blocks, where we stuffed ourselves on breakfast food before heading over to Chinatown, which was up a giant hill and east about three blocks. We spent a lot of time there, walking around, looking at cheap Chinese-made toys and nicer home items and going into food shops where nothing was labeled in English but lots of stuff looked sort of illegal to sell. (Shark fins? Whale baleen?) I bought some little things for myself and Julie and tried some dim sum that probably would have been better if it had been pan-fried.
Then we figured since we were halfway to Coit Tower and Telegraph Hill, we may as well go there. So we did. We walked there. The hills here are ridiculous. I'm going out tomorrow with my little film camera (I left my big one at home because I haven't had enough time to test it out all the way) and hopefully I can capture the insanity. My calves are so fucking sore. I think all told we walked four miles or so, and a lot of it was up hills that had a 30 percent grade. Tomorrow I'm taking the public transportation.
We came back to the hotel, and I tried to take a nap but it didn't work, which is too bad because I don't think I really slept at all at Dan's parents' place last night, for a lot of reasons. The nap didn't work, but the giant bathtub made my legs feel better, and Italian food helped. I had to buy Excedrin to take care of the killer lack-of-sleep migraine, and then we went to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, which is half-price Thursday nights.
I love modern art. I know a lot of people say that some of it is stupid, since some of it is absurd or looks like it could be done by anybody. That's part of what is so neat about modern art, though--it's not necessarily about the object or outcome, but at least partially about deciding that this thing can be art. Fountain by Marcel Duchamp is one of those things--it's a urinal he bought, painted "R. Mitt 1917" on the side, put it on a pedestal and called it art. It got removed from some exhibit when it debuted, I think, but this is a current version and now it's at the SFMOMA, so he wins.
There were also a few paintings that I'd seen before but just never realized how detailed they are in real life, like Diego Rivera's The Flower Carrier. I'd seen it in books, but up close the basket detailing makes it look three-dimensional, and the flowers look soft and feathery on the canvas.
Ladder for Booker T. Washington, by Martin Puryear, is part of the permanent collection at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, and yet when we walked into the SFMOMA, there it was, hanging in the giant atrium space, on loan. It looks a lot bigger in the Modern, which has it in a smaller, starker place, but it was funny to see it here when I'm so used to seeing it at home.
Then there were other staples of the modern art museums, also represented at the Modern: Clyfford Still with his huge canvases and ragged streaks of colors; Roy Lichtenstein and his dots; Donald Judd with his stacked boxes hanging from the wall; Robert Bechtle and his photo-like paintings.
There were a couple of installations at the SFMOMA that I really liked and would have put in my house if I could figure out a way. My favorite was The Structure of Light by Alyson Shotz, a beautiful, swirling, transparent and sparkling example of form in air. (I can't find a big photo, but here's a little glimpse of it.) It was made of piano wires, strung with transparent beads, and it shimmered as you walked around it. I realize how dorky this makes me sound, but it reminded me of what I imagine the principles of physics look like.
Yeah, that was geeky.
Not as geeky as how excited I got as the special exhibit Brought to Light: Photography and the Invisible, 1840-1900. It showed diatoms, snowflakes, daguerreotypes of eclipses and photos of insects. A woodburytype (I dunno what that is) of the surface of the sun, an image of the Orion nebula, circa 1900. Lightening and electrical sparks, Trouvelot figures, electrical pulses of the heartbeat. Eadweard Muybridge's galloping horses and flipping gymnasts. Ernst Mach, of supersonic fame, and photos of flying bullets and the disruption of the air around them. Radiation emitted by things and x-rays of various items, including the fetus of a river dolphin and x-rays of x-ray tubes.
All of the images were beautiful, and also so familiar, especially to those of us who spent years in science books. The photos of cells don't look much different than photos of cells today, and x-rays are x-rays. We have more advanced imaging today, like MRIs and electron microscopy, but it was amazing to see these images and realize all of them were at least 100 years old. I just never think of close-up photos of the moon being taken during the 1800s. I couldn't find any prints in the museum store, so I ended up buying a book about the exhibit instead, so I can be geeky any time I want. I wish I could find giant prints to frame and hang on my walls, but no luck yet. I'm going to do some work with Google and see what I can find in the future, though.
Tomorrow we're getting up and Dan is heading off on a bike ride, across the Golden Gate Bridge and up Mt. Tam, which I stay over here and take photos and hang off cable cars like a rhesus monkey, just like Eddie Izzard said. Then we're going to hit up the California Academy of the Sciences, go drink with the wedding people and go find Halloween parties with a friend who went through BU's science journalism program the year before me.
Dan's already decided he wants to move here. As we're sitting eating dinner he says, "I wish the Chronicle weren't such a shitty paper, because I'd totally live here." I like the city so far. If I moved here and walked around all the time, I feel like I could cut out working out from my life. That could free up a whole, oh, hour and a half of my life every week. I could do a lot with that time. Like eat chocolate and seafood.
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Keeping Up With The Skillz
I haven't done one of these since I was 15 or so, but Dan and I had a good deal of fun on Friday night:
http://www.dallasnews.com/video/?z=y&nvid=296822
I'm hoping the Fort Worth Business Press doesn't care that I helped make a video for the Dallas Morning News. I always tell people journalism is an incestuous little world.
http://www.dallasnews.com/
I'm hoping the Fort Worth Business Press doesn't care that I helped make a video for the Dallas Morning News. I always tell people journalism is an incestuous little world.
Friday, October 24, 2008
Counting Down Til Five
Today I got to meet billionaire T. Boone Pickens. He was the guest speaker at a huge fund-raising event for the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, and the event is always held in Dallas, so John (covers energy) and I drove out to go see him.
Pickens is a pretty amazing guy--he's given hundreds of millions to charities, made billions for himself, and he got lead into the hall by the Oklahoma State University marching band, which I guess is pretty appropriate since he's got several things on that campus named after him. He was also a really great guest for the event, which was a sort of Q&A format. John got a one-on-one interview with him afterward, too, and we got signed copies of his book for being media.
We were also the only reporters there--there was supposed to be someone from the Dallas Morning News and the Dallas Business Journal, the M.D. Anderson PR person said, but they never showed. I wasn't really surprised at the DMN thing. Dan is sitting in a newsroom today quaking in his boots as people all around him get laid off. Everyone there knew last week that this would be the week for layoffs, and nothing happened, nothing happened, nothing happened, and they're doing it all today. Dan sent me a message online saying it was like a funeral in the newsroom, and he even had a scare when his editor and editor's boss called him over to have a little meeting. Turns out they only wanted to talk about what was happening, like it was some big secret that people were getting axed.
I guess yesterday was the 10th anniversary of "Baby, One More Time" by Britney Spears. Remember that? Of course you do. It was the debut of Britney, and since then tabloids and internet rumors have never been the same. The two writers behind Go Fug Yourself wrote a short piece about the video for Spears' website, and I just find that little bit of pop history trivia amusing.
Other interesting news: Dan and I will be in San Francisco in one week. Actually, less than one week, since we'll get there next Thursday. I haven't had a real vacation yet this year--three day weekends don't count--so I'm very much looking forward to it. In case you couldn't tell. Which everyone can. Because I can't shut up about it. Because I need a vacation!
Aside from that, this week has been long. Lots of issues to work out, stuff I won't get into here. Dan will be thankful when the dust settles and I'm not griping anymore, because he's obligated to listen to me when I gripe. Tonight I think he'll be the one griping, though. I'd ask all the journalists out there to raise a beer and salute the laid-off reporters and mid-level editors tonight. You know they're getting let go from more than just the DMN.
Pickens is a pretty amazing guy--he's given hundreds of millions to charities, made billions for himself, and he got lead into the hall by the Oklahoma State University marching band, which I guess is pretty appropriate since he's got several things on that campus named after him. He was also a really great guest for the event, which was a sort of Q&A format. John got a one-on-one interview with him afterward, too, and we got signed copies of his book for being media.
We were also the only reporters there--there was supposed to be someone from the Dallas Morning News and the Dallas Business Journal, the M.D. Anderson PR person said, but they never showed. I wasn't really surprised at the DMN thing. Dan is sitting in a newsroom today quaking in his boots as people all around him get laid off. Everyone there knew last week that this would be the week for layoffs, and nothing happened, nothing happened, nothing happened, and they're doing it all today. Dan sent me a message online saying it was like a funeral in the newsroom, and he even had a scare when his editor and editor's boss called him over to have a little meeting. Turns out they only wanted to talk about what was happening, like it was some big secret that people were getting axed.
I guess yesterday was the 10th anniversary of "Baby, One More Time" by Britney Spears. Remember that? Of course you do. It was the debut of Britney, and since then tabloids and internet rumors have never been the same. The two writers behind Go Fug Yourself wrote a short piece about the video for Spears' website, and I just find that little bit of pop history trivia amusing.
Other interesting news: Dan and I will be in San Francisco in one week. Actually, less than one week, since we'll get there next Thursday. I haven't had a real vacation yet this year--three day weekends don't count--so I'm very much looking forward to it. In case you couldn't tell. Which everyone can. Because I can't shut up about it. Because I need a vacation!
Aside from that, this week has been long. Lots of issues to work out, stuff I won't get into here. Dan will be thankful when the dust settles and I'm not griping anymore, because he's obligated to listen to me when I gripe. Tonight I think he'll be the one griping, though. I'd ask all the journalists out there to raise a beer and salute the laid-off reporters and mid-level editors tonight. You know they're getting let go from more than just the DMN.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Voicemail
For months now I've been getting these phone calls at work from a 312 area code and this person never leaves a voicemail. I'll come back from lunch, see my blinking voicemail light, check it, and it's a message that's two seconds long of ther person just hanging up. I figure if they don't want to leave a message, then they're creepy, and I'm not going to return a call to some unknown number with an unknown reason for calling me.
Recently, over the past 6 weeks or so, my phone would ring and I would see that 312 number and just not pick up. I'd sit there, staring at my phone, waiting for them to leave a message, and they never would. So I'd never pick up.
There's a point you reach where you don't want to pick up the phone when you see certain numbers. It's like when that drunk friend calls at 3:12 a.m. and you just don't want to deal with them. Certain area codes mean trouble, and those are:
A) Dallas area codes, like 214 and 972. Those typically mean it's a PR person in Dallas who wants you to cover something clearly outside your county coverage, and you have to come up with a nice way to say no.
B) 202, 212 and 312, which are area codes for DC, NYC and Chicago. All of these mean it's a PR person who's representing someone in North Texas who typically doesn't know jack shit about your newspaper or what you cover but they're gonna try to get an article in your paper anyway. And they want you to listen to it. They also want to call you and make sure you got the spam-ish e-mail they sent over, too.
So I just never picked up this number. It's been months now.
Today, I accidentally picked up the 312 number when I was half-distracted reading a news article online. It was a PR person I'd talked to eons ago about some start-up home health care company in the area, and she wanted to know if we'd done something about it. (Answer: No. I need a news peg, people. I know we're weekly, but I gotta get a news peg of some sort.)
She and I had a brief discussion where I told her I needed dates for openings and updated contact information for the business, and at the end of the conversation she asked if she could call me back with that info and leave me a voicemail if I wasn't there.
Seriously? Seriously.
I wanted to laugh. Of course you can leave me a voicemail. It had this vague impression that she didn't leave one because she didn't know if she could or something. I told her I check my voicemail every day and usually return calls the same day, and part of me wanted to tell her that if she'd left me a voicemail 3 months ago, she wouldn't have had problems finally reaching me.
The Red Sox lost. This means I no longer have to watch any baseball for the rest of the year. Oh well. Top Chef starts soon, and honestly, that's almost as big of a nail-biter. Project Runway would have been, but we all knew who should win, and when she did America wasn't surprised. We were just glad we didn't have to deal with any nasty dramatic turns of events.
I went through mail yesterday. My 401k lost about $236 in the period. Given how small mine is, that's a lot. It made me sad. But my mutual fund made $1.68 or something, so I'm gonna live large and buy myself that Big Gulp diet Coke I've had my eye on.
Recently, over the past 6 weeks or so, my phone would ring and I would see that 312 number and just not pick up. I'd sit there, staring at my phone, waiting for them to leave a message, and they never would. So I'd never pick up.
There's a point you reach where you don't want to pick up the phone when you see certain numbers. It's like when that drunk friend calls at 3:12 a.m. and you just don't want to deal with them. Certain area codes mean trouble, and those are:
A) Dallas area codes, like 214 and 972. Those typically mean it's a PR person in Dallas who wants you to cover something clearly outside your county coverage, and you have to come up with a nice way to say no.
B) 202, 212 and 312, which are area codes for DC, NYC and Chicago. All of these mean it's a PR person who's representing someone in North Texas who typically doesn't know jack shit about your newspaper or what you cover but they're gonna try to get an article in your paper anyway. And they want you to listen to it. They also want to call you and make sure you got the spam-ish e-mail they sent over, too.
So I just never picked up this number. It's been months now.
Today, I accidentally picked up the 312 number when I was half-distracted reading a news article online. It was a PR person I'd talked to eons ago about some start-up home health care company in the area, and she wanted to know if we'd done something about it. (Answer: No. I need a news peg, people. I know we're weekly, but I gotta get a news peg of some sort.)
She and I had a brief discussion where I told her I needed dates for openings and updated contact information for the business, and at the end of the conversation she asked if she could call me back with that info and leave me a voicemail if I wasn't there.
Seriously? Seriously.
I wanted to laugh. Of course you can leave me a voicemail. It had this vague impression that she didn't leave one because she didn't know if she could or something. I told her I check my voicemail every day and usually return calls the same day, and part of me wanted to tell her that if she'd left me a voicemail 3 months ago, she wouldn't have had problems finally reaching me.
The Red Sox lost. This means I no longer have to watch any baseball for the rest of the year. Oh well. Top Chef starts soon, and honestly, that's almost as big of a nail-biter. Project Runway would have been, but we all knew who should win, and when she did America wasn't surprised. We were just glad we didn't have to deal with any nasty dramatic turns of events.
I went through mail yesterday. My 401k lost about $236 in the period. Given how small mine is, that's a lot. It made me sad. But my mutual fund made $1.68 or something, so I'm gonna live large and buy myself that Big Gulp diet Coke I've had my eye on.
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