pause

so apparently i never came down with anything. it's a good thing, really, because i just don't have time for that right now.

i had a pretty productive weekend. got all my shopping done for the salvation army family salimah and i adopted, as well as an angel tree child i picked for myself. right now i've got 5 bags of toys and clothes sitting in my living room. some kids are gonna have a great christmas this year. that makes me feel happy:).

in other news, the tempo is definitely picking up at work. i'm trying to keep myself calm about it, but because i have a big learning curve (new job and all), i'm a bit nervous about doing a good job on my first big project. oh, and finding enough time to do my homework AND sleep. yeah, that'd be great.

speaking of biz-related items, i fly to lala land next week to meet my department and sit in on some meetings. first trip to the west coast. should be exciting to see how the other half lives:).

i need a quickie dinner (turkey sandwich) and then off to do homework. such is the story of my life these days....

just another post about me and the crazy...oh, and maybe a head cold....

i think i might be coming down with something. i'm not certain, but i've got an icky stuffy nose and a wheezy cough. i'm hopeful it's just dust and that i'll get over it, but time will tell (doesn't it always?).

in other news, i think i've become studious. i mean, i'm actually getting all my work done on time and i'm kind of obsessed with grades. this hasn't happened in, like, ever. i mean, seriously, i have this goal to graduate cum laude or magna cum laude or whatever is available that involves some honors, and i'm really hardcore about it these days....so much so that i've started making speeches to most of the people i care about that involves me announcing that it's been nice knowing them, 'see you in '09'.....stuff like that. i don't know what's come over me. i suppose i should just be thankful that i'm not slacking off and let it lie. but the nature of my obsession is that i can't let it lie. or anything lie, for that matter. in fact, i think about my grades on a regular basis. i'm constantly checking the gradebook to see if the professor du jour has posted last week's grades....and i'm all offended when he doesn't - to my specifications. and then it makes me grumpy - sometimes for days at a time. do you SEE what's going on with me? it's madness, i tell you. madness.

i bet you wish i'd just stuck with the head cold theme, don't you? but see, blog readers, it wouldn't be ME if i didn't let you in on my crazy little thoughts, now would it?

all right. that's all i've got for now. sleep beckons. i'm going to take a decongestant and get acquainted with it. 'night.

the good-bye girl

yesterday with salimah's help, i managed to get through a huge chunk of an organizing project i've been wanting to tackle for awhile now. over the last 2 years since michael moved out, my second bedroom - instead of being this place that i've been able to reclaim and use as an office again - has become a haven for all the crap i don't know where else to put (or don't have the time to deal with just yet). as a result, it's just an eyesore to me.

finally, however, i'm getting somewhere. after spending about 3 hours in that room yesterday, salimah and i emerged (covered in dust, i might add) with about 7 bags of stuff for goodwill (plus an old air mattress and pair of crutches) and just as many bags for ye olde dumpster. it felt GREAT to purge like that. i even got a huge box of stuff out of my closet (again, a storage room that never went back to its original purpose once michael moved out) and got rid of half of its contents.

more and more these days, i want to let go of things....leave a space in their stead, either to be filled with something better or, sometimes, nothing at all. empty corners are my new dream for myself.

and i suppose that part of growing up is learning to say good-bye. yesterday i found some literary magazines from high school that, for years, i felt were important to keep. seeing them again yesterday, i felt nothing for them. that let me know it was time to let them go. there was no longing attached. but heck, sometimes even if there is, i still send things off with my very best wishes that someone else will find them special for a time.

besides, i've heard it said that if there's no room in your life - your heart, your wallet, etc. - how can it be filled up with the things - or people - you want?

good point.

turkey day wrap-up

greetings, blogworld!

desipte the wackadoo weather we're having lately, i'm happy to say that i had a lovely, low-key turkey day with my friend vanessa and her fam.....a little bit of eating (not too much), a lot of talking, and some baby-watching (her 2-year-old nieces are a trip), and then i made my way back home. i was hoping to get my paper done (due today!!) but i was really tired and wound up doing a little bit of work and then a lot of vegging out - and eventual falling asleep on the couch. oh, and speaking of the couch, i managed to get chocolate on my white sofa, so i had to wash a few of the slip covers last night. honestly, that piece of furniture is starting to look a bit dingy and i'm starting to feel like i want a new couch (even though it's in perfectly good shape). am i awful?


anyhoo, this morning, i took advantage of a corporate perk from my new company - discounts at the apple store - and bought myself a new ipod. my old one is starting to show some wear, and i've had it for several years now (thank you, salimah). it's time for an upgrade to one that shows video. i'll be thankful to have that on my upcoming biz trip to LA in a few weeks. it's all about 6 to 8 hours of flight time, so you can bet i'll be watching some movies....


speaking of ipods and holidays and all things festive, i have an announcement to make:




let the countdown begin....

thank you, and good day:)

call me rip van winkle, baby

it's saturday night and i'm sitting here in my cold-as-heck apartment surveying the clutter that is on my floor (empty laptop and wireless router boxes, a partial pack of printer paper [alliteration!], some folders, and an empty pill bottle). today was weird, mostly because i didn't get up until noon. that's right. you just read that. NOON.

last night salimah and i went to our dear friend vic's 40th bday party and after coming home kinda late and spending some time fixing her ipod that had lost its mind, we both took a muscle relaxer (i was achy and she had some muscle tension headache that was driving her crazy). well, these things knocked us both for a LOOP. i had the most deliciously long sleep i've had in ages, and even after getting up and under some hot water, i still felt like i could crawl right back in and keep sleeping.

eventually we got ourselves going, went to my beloved mari luna for lunch (so delicious, i can't even tell you), and then ran some errands until early evening. our travels took us to whole foods (last stop) where i procured some yummy things for the week and some spiced shrimp with cocktail sauce for tomorrow (or maybe tonight?). i'm in the mood to mull some wine and watch a fun movie. unfortunately what i need to be doing is cleaning and homework. blech.

for now, i'll settle for a good night's rest (sans sleeping aid) and a productive day tomorrow.

'will you count me in?'

there's this quiet line at the beginning of colbie caillat's song 'bubbly' that i just love (see above). of course it refers to the act of giving someone the old '1...2...1, 2, 3, 4' but it's so much more than that at the same time.

i was just thinking in the shower this morning (where all truly good ideas come to me) how much everybody wants to belong to somebody. it seems that lately, i've met more and more people whose marriages are in shambles and i can't help but wonder - what happened in that situation to make one or both of them feel that they no longer belong? these thoughts, of course, are all juxtaposed against the fact that one of my dearest friends married her sweetheart this weekend, and i have every confidence that they will go the distance. truly, they've already walked some miles - some of them quite difficult - and all it did was bring them even closer. i'm quite certain that my friend never finds herself in that position - of having to ask to be counted. and i'm SO glad for her.

i don't know why i bring all this up this morning. maybe it's because i'm feeling sentimental. maybe i didn't get enough sleep last night. or maybe, at the heart of it all, i'm realizing that i'm in a place where i am content. i may not be in a marriage - or anywhere close to it - but i've got deep, lasting friendships with people to whom i matter a great deal. in my early 20s, i was so blazingly insecure - so concerned that no one really cared about me - and it put people at a distance, i think. no one really had a chance to care as much as i wanted them to. all my worry kept them at arms' length.

but now, it's not about that anymore. if you love me, great. if you don't, that's okay, too.... i'm not meant to be adored by everyone. and the people who matter consistently rise to the top in my life. my friends are the cream, and i'm just so glad to have them. and that counts. it really does.

...who am i to disagree?

the other night i was dating john cusack. no really, he was so sweet. then last night, i attended a large convention run by a guy from a former church of mine, and i was there cuddling with my ex-boyfriend and then i wound up driving down a dirt road with one half of a married couple i know, and there were weird things involving windows in the house in which we were staying that needed to be replaced. then eventually i went to the home of my former boss who was apparently married to this doctor i also used to work for. he said to me, 'type up this dictation, won't you, sarah?' i looked at him and said, 'dr. ___, i'm not your secretary, okay?' he looked truly ashamed of himself and went off to the room in the basement where he lived to sulk.

there was a BUNCH of other weird stuff going on, but i think that gives you enough of a taste to the inner workings of my tres bizarre psyche. devika, feel free to analyze;)

in other news, today my friend maria gets hitched! i'm off to new jersey, folks....

serenaded at the salad bar, adventures in sushi, etc.

allow me to attempt to summarize the last week of my life, in brief....

1. got a flu shot last monday. had the aches all week, although they seem to be gone now (fingers crossed).
2. started my new job on tuesday. such a different environment - which is a good thing. the people i work with/for all seem great and very knowledgeable - also a VERY good thing. i'm looking forward to learning a lot and contributing to something i believe in. i would say the only downside at this point is that my cube is quite tiny and sits on a major thoroughfare, so the noise can be a bit much, but i'm hopeful that i'll get to move at some point within the next few months. no biggie.
3. friday i was in whole foods getting a salad for lunch when i saw this man standing next to me. i kept thinking to myself, that man looks exactly like michael feinstein, the singer/pianist. so i went up to him and said, excuse me, has anyone ever told you that you look like someone? he nodded. michael feinstein? i asked.
yes, that's me, he said.
i admit that i got a tiny bit exuberant at this point and half-shouted, i love you! i have your gershwin album! he seemed genuinely pleased to hear this and we chatted for a moment about what he was doing in town, etc. when i told him that i missed his concert, like, 7 years ago because i had gotten sick, he looked me dead in the eye and started serenading me! embrace me, my sweet embraceable you....embrace me, you irreplaceable you.... honestly, how great is that?!
he was lovely and charming and i was bummed not to be able to see him at the BSO this weekend, but perhaps next time. michael feinstein, you made my week!
4. saturday was a sushi hana throwdown with salimah and my friend kim. i just love it there....so delish. so when dinner was over, we were all feeling like we wanted a little something sweet. we asked our waitress what kind of ice cream they had. she started rattling off a list of sorbets: coconut, mango, etc. and then she got this excited look on her face and said, and we have egg-soddy-bumble! the three of us all said it after her....egg. soddy. bumble?
it turned out to be an exotic bomba, which was sorbet covered in two kinds of chocolate. we all passed, but let me tell you. egg soddy bumble will never get old. welcome to the repertoire.
5. week 1 of my new class is down, 7 more to go.
6. i'm gonna be late for work if i don't get a move on.
7. the end!

and away we go....

today is my first day at the new job. here's to the next adventure....

move along

so it seems that i had sunk down into a hole and somehow over the last 24 hours, i’ve managed to pull myself back up out of it. part of my issue has been that i’ve been in pain, and although i’ve been used to it being a part of my life for awhile now, it’s gotten worse of late, and that was starting to really wear on me. i think as soon as i had enough downtime to realize this, it started to discourage me rather much.

but you know what? i’ll keep going. that’s what there is to do in life...you just keep going. if you even KNEW how significant of a statement that is in my family, you’d smile along with me right now.

even when your hope is gone, move along, move along just to make it through....

there was a time in my life where i needed to take some time…to NOT keep going. to keep going, in fact, felt so antithetical to any real progress in my life. now, however, i’ve become my mother and her mother and her mother before her. i get slapped with something unpleasant, and i fix my hair, straighten my collar, and get on with it. life might give you lemons, but instead of taking time to make lemonade, i throw them in a bag and decide i’ll deal with that later. ecclesiastes still reminds me that there’s a time for EVERY purpose under heaven—a time to deal and a time to refrain from dealing.

and outside the window of the starbucks where i’m sitting, the rain is pouring down and there are a lot of questions still left unanswered and me? i’m fine. because right now my purpose is to plow through. plow through every disappointment and heartache and bad day and pain in my foot and pain in other places and just. keep. going.

give up the funk....ow, we need the funk....we gotta have that funk....

it's 9 pm on a thursday and i've got homework due tonight. have i done it? no. why? i'm not sure. it's not like i haven't had ALL WEEK OFF, but you see, i'm just not in the mood for these things. what am i in the mood for? nothing, apparently.

i'm not sure where the majority of the last 4 days has gone. all my best laid plans have gone completely awry, and it's clear to me that i've slipped into a tiny baby bit of a funk. i'm gonna need to get myself out of it - and fast.

salimah and i hit up my beloved bj's tonight (i re-upped my membership) and picked up staples for this weekend's party. i always worry that we won't have enough food. truth be told, i feel awful about it, because my original intention was to do all the cooking, but it became rather clear earlier this week that THAT wasn't going to happen. so much of it will be prepared. oh well. it wasn't really about that anyway....

i'm off to do homework. some days i can't believe i have 1 3/4 years left of this program before it's over....i can't believe i'm even thinking that way already. see what i mean? this funk must end NOW.

why? fi.

so i'm sitting in caribou coffee in the 'burbs having a cup o' decaf with steamed milk and cinnamon and working on my grad school homework. it's hard to believe that this is the last week in my first set of classes of my MBA program and next week, i begin all over again (in more ways than one). right now, i'm just relishing in the fact that it's 3:15 on a weekday and i don't have anywhere that i HAVE to be right now.

oh, and i have to say that i heart my new dell laptop. it's red (shocker) and has a matching wireless mouse. the whole setup makes me smile.

on the docket for the rest of the day: meet up with salimah, procure some beer and wine for this weekend's autumnal fete, make more headway on my mini business plan, due thursday, and try to eat a reasonable meal that includes some vegetables. this shouldn't be so hard, right? this is what i'm thinking.

in other news, i've been truly concerned about the recent widespread fires in california. i suppose i'm thinking about it more than i might otherwise because i'm supposed to fly out there sometime in the next couple of months for work. i hope my soon-to-be colleagues are all okay....

well, john mayer and i wish you well, wherever you are right now. i think my hour is soon to be up, so i better post before i lose all this pithy stuff here. peace out for now....

respite

today is my first official day of time off (6 working days!) between jobs and i gotta tell ya - i'm loving it already! i slept in this morning until 9:00 (unprecedented!) because i was up late last night finishing up homework for grad school (what else is new these days?). it felt so good to be rested when i opened my eyes a half hour ago....

my last day at work was slightly anti-climactic because several people were off that day and they had given me a sending off on thursday. friday was really all about helping a friend with her resume, going out to lunch with a couple of girls, and basically chillin like a villain until 4:00 came. and when it did, i was surprised that i choked up a tiny bit when hugging a few people good-bye. but mostly it was all about smiles and lightheartedness and no regrets for leaving as the door closed behind me. besides, the people i've made as friends will continue to be my friends, and the rest is just a bag of experiences i take with me to apply (or not) in my next venture.

so, after leaving the job, i raced home to change and then met up with salimah, maria, and mel at christopher-daniel in timonium and had a fantastic meal to cap off the week...heck, the last 3 years. it's funny - i've been waiting for this for SO long, it seemed like it would never happen. i think it was at some point during my delicious 'diamond' martini that the realization finally came: this is actually over now.

and let me tell you, people....there was smiling. a lot of it. and it wasn't just the liquor talking:).

counting down....

as of COB today i have 3 days left at my current job....the place where i've spent a third of my life for the last 3+ years. i'm excited about my new opportunity - to be sure - but this transition away from the familiar has been more difficult than i thought. on top of it, every little thing has been stressing me out lately. i've ben sporting old school (for me) anxiety and i've gotta say - i cannot believe i used to be like this. and i don't know how anyone dealt with me - i can barely stand myself!!

thank God i have some good friends who are here to bring me back to reality when my nerves start to fray...who will tell me the truth and forgive me for talking crazy and who offer some hand-holding for those moments when i just cannot deal with the unknown. what i wouldn't do without them.

and in the midst of my freakouts of late, there have been several (nay, many) people at work who have expressed to me heartfelt good wishes and who hug me and tell me they're proud of me and that i'm gonna be just fine.

and you know what? i think maybe they're right....

have i mentioned

that i heart my new hair cut? i know, i did, but i just had to show you this:


and this (and yes, i promise, that is me, not casper the friendly ghost!):


FUN!!

today i ate an apple, which means it's definitely fall

it's friday, people, and i've had the day off. allow me to recap:

1. i slept in. until 9:30. this felt like heaven to me.
2. my hair is now at least 2 inches shorter with lots of layers again. it's gotten its mojo back and that, quite simply, makes me happy.
3. i bought a laptop. a red one!
4. it's freezing in my apartment right now. we've finally gotten a douse of fall-ish weather, and i love it! cocoa out on the balcony tonight with blankets and slippers - this is my prediction!
5. salimah is coming over and we're having dijon salmon, fresh green beans, and roasted baby potatoes for dinner. can't wait. i'm so excited, i might even crack open some wine!
6. i had a great phone call with my soon-to-be boss. she sounds fantastic and i'm truly excited about the work i'll be doing. it promises to be a great learning opportunity.
7. i'm in love with this little blue bird who sits on my desk. his name's fyodor. here's a pic of him with the as-yet unnamed sheep who hangs out there as well:

8. u.s. news and world report has been showing up at my house for the last several weeks. i have no idea why.
9. my eye is tearing and i'm not sure why my new glasses haven't come in yet.
10. a quickie vacation is just around the corner. sweet Lord, how i need it.

that's it for now. must go pick up salimah at the light rail stop. happy friday!

and it goes a little somethin like this....

okay, so now i can speak with a bit more openness about my life. when last i posted, a few details hadn't yet gone public, but now i can spill the beans, so to speak. so here's the deal: i got a new job. and not just a lateral move - a step up....a goodly sized step up. i'll be an instructional designer — not simply an editor — and this includes the opportunities to write more AND to pay all my bills without working two jobs. WOOHOO!! i gave my notice this past monday; next friday is my last day. then i take a week (6 days, actually) off and start my new gig on 10/30.

grad school is going really well, even though i'll be glad to get through my introductory classes and into the 'meat' of it; also, i'm taking 2 classes right now, and somehow i feel like things will be less confusing when i only have one at a time. we'll see.

yesterday, 10/10, salimah and i celebrated 10 years of friendship. it's astonishing to me a) that we've known each other that freaking long and b) how much has happened in our lives during that time. i was so scared and easily hurt 10 years ago....so anxious and full of shame. thank God things look so different these days....

oh, and finally, there is this boy....:)

now THAT's what i'm talking about....or not!

okay, lots going on - none of which i can discuss at this point, but let me say: today was SWEET. my life is getting quite good just now. note to self: just keep it steady.

"...you make me smile / please stay for awhile now..."

into every person's life a little craziness must fall. i know, because it's happened to me a lot over the last 32 years. it's something to which i've become quite accustomed, so i wind up expecting it....

lately, however, my life has flipped the script on me. things that normally would take extra steps or the jumping over of obstacles to attain have been practically falling into my lap. and just when i think things couldn't get better, then they do. and it's happened in nearly every area of my life over the last 3 months. i'm trying not to analyze it too much; i don't want to question or complicate. i'm just letting things be what they are.

and man, does it EVER feel good....

stay tuned. in the coming weeks i hope to be able to share more specifics....but not just yet. some things are still too new to give a name. but i'm happy. i'll just say that. and really, isn't that enough?

virtue and vice

lately i'm acutely aware of my need for reining myself in....for example, today's lunch? totally healthful. dinner? same. breakfast? a completely debauched affair. perhaps it balanced out in the end, but still....

some days i cannot make myself do grad school homework; some days i am so resolved i almost cannot bring myself to goof off. i'm not sure why i swing from one end to the other, but i know one thing for sure: consistency all too often hangs out there like a carrot on a string, taunting me.

it's a day in, day out struggle and some days i lose the game before it even starts. but then, there are the days where i come to the end feeling like a victor and let me tell you - those days make the others worthwhile.

and besides, the last time i checked, people who are all virtue aren't having nearly as much fun as those of us with a little streak of the naughty. and some of us have more of a streak than others....