Christmas time in Wisconsin was fun. It usually is, though this year seemed to be especially whirlwindy. I got a fuzzy pink bathrobe, some new clothes and jewelery (including a Black Hills Gold bracelet my parents got on their trip to Rount Mushmore), Pirates of the Carribean 2, and a book called "What Should I Do With My Life?" by Po Bronson, among other things. I tried to flip to the end for the answer, but apparently it doesn't work that way.
From Joe I got a Battlestar Galactica Mug and a t-shirt that says "So Say We All." I'm the coolest nerd around, and I will wear my nerdery proudly.
Thursday, December 28, 2006
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
Paperback Joy
I decided to go to Barnes & Noble during my lunch hour and get hot chocolate and sit in the cafe reading magazines. I deserved it. It was one of those days.
On my way through the store, I noticed one of those book donation centers, where they have a bunch of tags like "Boy, Age 9" or "Girl, Age 11" that you grab and buy a book for. There were quite a lot of tags left, considering there are only 5 days until Christmas. Hmm, (I thought, as I wandered by) I should maybe do that. I like giving kids books. Maybe on my way out. Maybe next year.
My Conscience: STOP. Turn around. Actually do it, instead of thinking you SHOULD maybe do something.
Me: But I'm broke! And I just spent a whole bunch of money on gifts!
MC: If you're broke, why did you spend so much money on gifts for people who already have a lot of stuff?
Me: uhhhhh
MC: You should do something nice for someone who might not have much.
Me: But I don't donate money. It's a policy of mine. I donate time.
MC: But it's the holidays.
Me: So?
MC: And if you skip that overpriced hot chocolate you were about to buy, that'll cover at least half a kids' book, won't it?
Me: ...you win again, conscience.
Which is my long-winded way of saying I bought "Aliens Ate My Homework" by Bruce Coville for an annonymous 9-year-old boy. I do so love spreading the gospel of Coville.
On my way through the store, I noticed one of those book donation centers, where they have a bunch of tags like "Boy, Age 9" or "Girl, Age 11" that you grab and buy a book for. There were quite a lot of tags left, considering there are only 5 days until Christmas. Hmm, (I thought, as I wandered by) I should maybe do that. I like giving kids books. Maybe on my way out. Maybe next year.
My Conscience: STOP. Turn around. Actually do it, instead of thinking you SHOULD maybe do something.
Me: But I'm broke! And I just spent a whole bunch of money on gifts!
MC: If you're broke, why did you spend so much money on gifts for people who already have a lot of stuff?
Me: uhhhhh
MC: You should do something nice for someone who might not have much.
Me: But I don't donate money. It's a policy of mine. I donate time.
MC: But it's the holidays.
Me: So?
MC: And if you skip that overpriced hot chocolate you were about to buy, that'll cover at least half a kids' book, won't it?
Me: ...you win again, conscience.
Which is my long-winded way of saying I bought "Aliens Ate My Homework" by Bruce Coville for an annonymous 9-year-old boy. I do so love spreading the gospel of Coville.
Hack, Cough, Die
The cold has now moved into my lungs. I am not looking foward to flying. However, due to the magic of modern medicine, I plan to be asleep before the plane even takes off.
Merry Christmas to me.
Merry Christmas to me.
Tuesday, December 19, 2006
Ode to Cold
Do you know what it's like to WANT to be cold? To wish you could stagger around in flurries of snow that fill every nook and cranny of your eskimo outfit?
First you start with boots so big and heavy that they make you walk like a 400 pound man. Inside there are a few extra pairs of socks you stole from your dad. On your legs are long underwear, heavy jeans, and snow pants that make that zipzip sound when you walk. These are what make falling over into the snow feel like tumbling into a cloud in snow motion. On top is your brightly colored ski jacket (because they only wear black in New York and white is just silly, for many reasons). A pair of gloves, then mittens on top of those, a thick hat down around your ears, your hood pulled up tight, and a long scarf wrapped around that, keeping it all in place.
After being outside for a while, your breath will make a sheet of ice form on the inside of your scarf. You rotate the scarf, forming a sheet on the other side as well. Eventually this ice will chafe and chap the entire lower portion of your face.
Your feet will get cold. They always get cold, no matter how many pairs of socks or how expensive your ice-fishing boots are. But you wiggle your toes and feel them rubbing against each other like blocks of wood and know they will be okay for a little while longer.
As you stagger across fields of untouched, unseen, unbroken snow, you have to lift each foot as high as you can to take the next step. If you have layered your clothes properly, no snow will get in your boots. Snow whips across the field, lifting and twisting, looking like white sheets flapping in the wind on a clothesline. And when you find somewhere to hunker down, in a hollow under a pine tree, or between two small hills, you'll feel colder, somehow, but safer than you ever have in your life.
I remember when we were little my brother and I used to crawl under the one tree on the bus stop corner. Trees, no matter how much snow there is, always have that tiny clear space just around their trunks. We would huddle together there to be out of the wind and then emerge in an explosion of snow like awakened bear cubs when the bus pulled up.
When I was a teenager, I would heat my car until I could strip off my jacket inside, and somehow this felt more dangerous than they way we would all expertly slide through stop signs.
It's wishing your lungs would burn until they hurt while sledding, the way your cheeks turn an impossible red, how your hands will never get warm once your gloves are wet, and the fact that the harder it snows and the darker it gets, the harder it gets to resist going outside into it.
That is what it's like to miss the cold.
First you start with boots so big and heavy that they make you walk like a 400 pound man. Inside there are a few extra pairs of socks you stole from your dad. On your legs are long underwear, heavy jeans, and snow pants that make that zipzip sound when you walk. These are what make falling over into the snow feel like tumbling into a cloud in snow motion. On top is your brightly colored ski jacket (because they only wear black in New York and white is just silly, for many reasons). A pair of gloves, then mittens on top of those, a thick hat down around your ears, your hood pulled up tight, and a long scarf wrapped around that, keeping it all in place.
After being outside for a while, your breath will make a sheet of ice form on the inside of your scarf. You rotate the scarf, forming a sheet on the other side as well. Eventually this ice will chafe and chap the entire lower portion of your face.
Your feet will get cold. They always get cold, no matter how many pairs of socks or how expensive your ice-fishing boots are. But you wiggle your toes and feel them rubbing against each other like blocks of wood and know they will be okay for a little while longer.
As you stagger across fields of untouched, unseen, unbroken snow, you have to lift each foot as high as you can to take the next step. If you have layered your clothes properly, no snow will get in your boots. Snow whips across the field, lifting and twisting, looking like white sheets flapping in the wind on a clothesline. And when you find somewhere to hunker down, in a hollow under a pine tree, or between two small hills, you'll feel colder, somehow, but safer than you ever have in your life.
I remember when we were little my brother and I used to crawl under the one tree on the bus stop corner. Trees, no matter how much snow there is, always have that tiny clear space just around their trunks. We would huddle together there to be out of the wind and then emerge in an explosion of snow like awakened bear cubs when the bus pulled up.
When I was a teenager, I would heat my car until I could strip off my jacket inside, and somehow this felt more dangerous than they way we would all expertly slide through stop signs.
It's wishing your lungs would burn until they hurt while sledding, the way your cheeks turn an impossible red, how your hands will never get warm once your gloves are wet, and the fact that the harder it snows and the darker it gets, the harder it gets to resist going outside into it.
That is what it's like to miss the cold.
Monday, December 18, 2006
The Spirits Did It All in One Night!
Yesterday, despite a very fast-moving cold that has taken residence in my head, I went to the Great Dickens Christmas Fair out at Cow Palace in San Francisco. I didn't expect it to be so involved! Not being dressed up, we were actually in the minority here. It's sort of like a renaissance festival, only for 19th century Victorian London. I was really very impressed and had a lot of fun.
The first thing we did was hit the bar (of course). You could get mead, festival ale, irish coffee, hot toddys and hot cider & rum (my favorite!). Everywhere there was music and noise and corset shops and urchins running around. There was a Christmas parade, a bawdy dance hall revue (not recommended for children!), and drunken chimney sweeps that would bounce off you, barely muttering "sorry." Occasionally you would run into Scrooge being lead around by the Ghost of Christmas Past. There was a man walking around with a live owl on his arm. We ate fish & chips for lunch, then roasted chestnuts afterwards, which are tons of fun to eat. We ended up at Fezziwig's dance hall, where you could learn traditional Victorian dances, and were then treated to a dance troupe's display of Scottish and Irish dances and music. Scrooge even showed up there.
By the time we stumbled out, we all felt a little displaced, dehydrated, and sorely in need of fresh air. Sort of what I imagine what I would feel like if I stumbled into the real London 150 years ago!
The first thing we did was hit the bar (of course). You could get mead, festival ale, irish coffee, hot toddys and hot cider & rum (my favorite!). Everywhere there was music and noise and corset shops and urchins running around. There was a Christmas parade, a bawdy dance hall revue (not recommended for children!), and drunken chimney sweeps that would bounce off you, barely muttering "sorry." Occasionally you would run into Scrooge being lead around by the Ghost of Christmas Past. There was a man walking around with a live owl on his arm. We ate fish & chips for lunch, then roasted chestnuts afterwards, which are tons of fun to eat. We ended up at Fezziwig's dance hall, where you could learn traditional Victorian dances, and were then treated to a dance troupe's display of Scottish and Irish dances and music. Scrooge even showed up there.
By the time we stumbled out, we all felt a little displaced, dehydrated, and sorely in need of fresh air. Sort of what I imagine what I would feel like if I stumbled into the real London 150 years ago!
Friday, December 15, 2006
A Giant Burrito for Breakfast
WisCon is the feminist science-fiction convention that takes place in Madison, WI every May. I went last year and one year during college and I always have a blast.
Last night was my office holiday party. Joe's was the night before. Joe's was much more swank, with fancy appetizers being carried around and hip DJ music. I really like the people Joe works with (I met them the week before at his coworker's housewarming party where we ate Indian food and played poker). However, computer programmers get to show up to work whenever they want, which means that at midnight they were still going strong and I was whining, "I can still get five and a half hours of sleep if we leave NOW."
At my party, which significant others were not invited to, I was rather nervous, not knowing that many people. So, even though I knew better, I had a drink before dinner. It hit me hard. Dinner is hazy, and I hardly remember having my third drink. I don't drink much anymore, so it hardly takes anything these days. I still had the sense, luckily, to give away my fourth drink ticket at that point. I don't even remember who I gave it to. I just shoved it at someone walking by. I actually had a LOT of fun though. I hung out with some new people, met a girl who also went to college at Madison and even danced a little.
However, 48 hours of no sleep and too much alcohol have left me wobbly, braindead and FAMISHED. Drinking always makes you hungry the next day. One of the guys showed up with a giant burrito for breakfast. Normally that would disgust me but this morning I was rather jealous. Mmmm...beans.
Last night was my office holiday party. Joe's was the night before. Joe's was much more swank, with fancy appetizers being carried around and hip DJ music. I really like the people Joe works with (I met them the week before at his coworker's housewarming party where we ate Indian food and played poker). However, computer programmers get to show up to work whenever they want, which means that at midnight they were still going strong and I was whining, "I can still get five and a half hours of sleep if we leave NOW."
At my party, which significant others were not invited to, I was rather nervous, not knowing that many people. So, even though I knew better, I had a drink before dinner. It hit me hard. Dinner is hazy, and I hardly remember having my third drink. I don't drink much anymore, so it hardly takes anything these days. I still had the sense, luckily, to give away my fourth drink ticket at that point. I don't even remember who I gave it to. I just shoved it at someone walking by. I actually had a LOT of fun though. I hung out with some new people, met a girl who also went to college at Madison and even danced a little.
However, 48 hours of no sleep and too much alcohol have left me wobbly, braindead and FAMISHED. Drinking always makes you hungry the next day. One of the guys showed up with a giant burrito for breakfast. Normally that would disgust me but this morning I was rather jealous. Mmmm...beans.
Thursday, December 14, 2006
Christmas Present for Me!
I bought myself a Christmas present yesterday. Can you guess what it is? C'mon, guess.
You're right! It's a membership to Wiscon 2007, including a dessert salon ticket!
I've never actually signed up early enough to get dessert tickets before, so I'm especially excited. Of course, I don't actually have plane tickets yet. And I don't know what job I will have, where I will be living, where I'm going to sleep at Wiscon, or what my financial situation will be then, but dang it! I have dessert tickets!
I think I will make myself a goal now: Get something published (or accepted for publication) by the time Wiscon rolls around. It's a daunting task, but it will push me to send more stuff out. If it happens, I will be one of the beautiful people.
You're right! It's a membership to Wiscon 2007, including a dessert salon ticket!
I've never actually signed up early enough to get dessert tickets before, so I'm especially excited. Of course, I don't actually have plane tickets yet. And I don't know what job I will have, where I will be living, where I'm going to sleep at Wiscon, or what my financial situation will be then, but dang it! I have dessert tickets!
I think I will make myself a goal now: Get something published (or accepted for publication) by the time Wiscon rolls around. It's a daunting task, but it will push me to send more stuff out. If it happens, I will be one of the beautiful people.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Ooch, ouch, aahh
Sometimes a job I dislike motivates me to write. I think a part up my brain jumps up and reminds me that if I am successful in my writing career, I can get out of this rat race. At least partly.
But this particular job leaves me too mentally and physically exhausted to want to do much of anything. Mentally because all day long I focus on ridiculous little details until it drives out all creative thought. Physically because I SIT ALL DAY LONG.
You think that's not physically exhausting? Have you tried it before? Yes, I'm a writer. And I've had desk jobs. But they usually involve jumping up and down fairly often for meetings, filing, dubbing, whatever. But I don't move here. I drink water constantly just for the chance to get up and get it, and then the chance to get up and pee 20 minutes later. I spend my lunch hour walking around to work out the kinks in my body. By the time I get home my shoulders ache from un-ergonomic typing, my eyes are tired of staring at screens 12 inches away from my face, and my back is a painful rod of steel.
Thus the lack of desire to sit at another desk and type.
I think if I am really determined (which I usually am) I will figure out how to write during my lunch hour.
But this particular job leaves me too mentally and physically exhausted to want to do much of anything. Mentally because all day long I focus on ridiculous little details until it drives out all creative thought. Physically because I SIT ALL DAY LONG.
You think that's not physically exhausting? Have you tried it before? Yes, I'm a writer. And I've had desk jobs. But they usually involve jumping up and down fairly often for meetings, filing, dubbing, whatever. But I don't move here. I drink water constantly just for the chance to get up and get it, and then the chance to get up and pee 20 minutes later. I spend my lunch hour walking around to work out the kinks in my body. By the time I get home my shoulders ache from un-ergonomic typing, my eyes are tired of staring at screens 12 inches away from my face, and my back is a painful rod of steel.
Thus the lack of desire to sit at another desk and type.
I think if I am really determined (which I usually am) I will figure out how to write during my lunch hour.
Monday, December 11, 2006
Wisconsinites Are Scrappy
You gotta give 'em that. No one calls US second-rate cheeseheads!
Wisconsin Clings to Cheese Title
Wisconsin Clings to Cheese Title
Friday, December 08, 2006
The Saddest News
I think the saddest news I've ever heard is the story about the San Francisco programmer and his family who went up to Oregon. I don't know how much coverage it's getting outside of the west coast, but it's everywhere here. I've had to turn off the TV because it makes me cry and feel a little sick.
I think what makes me feel the most horrible about this is that I could see myself being there, doing all the same things. Usually news seems very distant to me and I feel bad for people, but it doesn't actually affect me. For example, there was a big story just before we left NYC about a young girl who went out to a night club and was raped and killed that night. It didn't scare me because she did so many things wrong that night. She had to call an ambulance for her friend, then left her because she was afraid of getting in trouble for drinking (never leave a man behind!). She got in a car with a bouncer she'd met that night because he said he would help her. I'm not trying to say she deserved it (obviously not) I'm saying that particular scenario would never happen to me because I would never do those things.
But the Kim family was going to stay at a lodge on the Oregon. Something I would love to do. They made a wrong turn. Something anyone could do. Their cell phones, which we all rely on so much, wouldn't work out there. The police say they did everything right. And still James Kim died, trying to save his family.
I think what makes me feel the most horrible about this is that I could see myself being there, doing all the same things. Usually news seems very distant to me and I feel bad for people, but it doesn't actually affect me. For example, there was a big story just before we left NYC about a young girl who went out to a night club and was raped and killed that night. It didn't scare me because she did so many things wrong that night. She had to call an ambulance for her friend, then left her because she was afraid of getting in trouble for drinking (never leave a man behind!). She got in a car with a bouncer she'd met that night because he said he would help her. I'm not trying to say she deserved it (obviously not) I'm saying that particular scenario would never happen to me because I would never do those things.
But the Kim family was going to stay at a lodge on the Oregon. Something I would love to do. They made a wrong turn. Something anyone could do. Their cell phones, which we all rely on so much, wouldn't work out there. The police say they did everything right. And still James Kim died, trying to save his family.
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