It Begins Again . . .

It’s that time of year again . . . April is National Poetry Month!

If you want to read up on a little bit of the background of Poetry Month, visit here: http://www.poets.org/page.php/prmID/41

I love words. I love how words fit together, how they bring about images and emotions. I love how words sound when spoken. I love a clever turn of phrase. In a parallel universe, I am sure I am a writer and editor at some publishing company. It feels like a calling that was somehow thwarted early on in my life experience . . .

I love poetry, even though I don’t read or write much of it in my daily life. So many different things going on, so much to read, everything competing for one’s attention. My mother taught us Edgar Allan Poe poems when my sister and I were little, and I loved all of the rhyming and alliteration. Dr. Seuss. Nursery rhymes. Robert Frost. Emily Dickinson. Dorothy Parker. Chaucer. Langston Hughes. Shakespeare. So many poets, discovered and undiscovered . . .

One of the reasons that I started this blog last year was that Justrose at the Anonymous Rowhouse had been doing a poem a day on her blog, and I commented so much that I thought, “Well, why can’t I do this?” . . .

So here we all are, almost one year later. This year, I want to celebrate the whole month by doing a series of lessons that I found on the web here:

The English Room: 30 Days of Poetry
http://www.msrogers.com/English2/poetry/30_days_of_poetry.htm

The activities are geared toward middle school and high school students, which is great! I think it will be easier for me to keep up with daily if the activities aren’t too complicated. Now some of the lessons do look rather challenging, but in a good way . . .

I’d love it if some of you could do some of the exercises with me and post what you come up with in the comments for each day. I know that all of you are excellent writers and I am eager to see what other folks can pull off . . .

Are you all game? I’m so excited!

Crickets Chirp . . .

The blog sits silent.

It is like a ghost town found in a movie western. The tumbleweeds blow past the abandoned buldings. Torn curtains flit in and out of broken six-pane windows. It is night and the moonlight casts bright light on the streets, causing long shadows on the ground from the hitching posts and the dry water troughs . . .

A candle is seen in one of the upstairs windows - the only sign of life for miles. The small flame flickers and twinkles. Your eye is drawn to it. You wonder what's going on up there. Who lives there? What are they doing? Have they moved on? . . .

Do you go into the building and see if anyone is there? Do you throw rocks at the window to see if anyone comes out? Are you curious? Or do you just move on? . . .

Tuesday Quick Thoughts

. . . Random Cat now throws little "temper tantrums" if we don't respond to her requests for more food. Has anyone ever seen a cat have a hissy fit? Mr. Random said he never saw anything like it when his family had cats . . . this "cat-kins" diet is going to drive us all crazy . . .

. . . I spent most of the weekend at work, cleaning out my office and setting up files. I refuse to do anything work related this weekend - I have a migraine now as it is . . .

. . . The taste of Black Cherry Vanilla diet coke reminds me of the taste of Vick's Formula 44D cough syrup. Ick! . . .

. . . My reading list is on hold until this weekend . . .

. . . Both of my parents are turning 60 within the next few weeks. I can't believe that they are 60! It's hard enough getting my head around the fact that I'm 35 . . .

. . . ESL class tonight. I'm hoping that this migraine fades away enough in time for me to be my usual peppy teacher self. I hate teaching when I'm tired and distracted - these folks deserve better than that for only one night a week from me . . .

. . . It's been quiet around here the last few days. I know I've been super busy - I hope everyone is doing well! . . .

A Child of Friday

Monday's child is fair of face,
Tuesday's child is full of grace,
Wednesday's child is full of woe,
Thursday's child has far to go,
Friday's child is loving and giving,
Saturday's child must work for a living,
But the child that's born on the Sabbath day
Is fair and wise and good and gay.

It's Friday!

The week is finally over.

I was going to stay late tonight and start throwing out old files, but I am just so tired that I just want to go home and pass out from exhaustion in front of the TV. I'll probably come in tomorrow instead and make the most of the daylight .

Thanks for all of the comments, you guys! It really lifts my spirits to see them - then I don't feel like I am scaring everyone away with my thoughts . . .

On another blog, someone wrote about how they feel like they are writing for an audience, and because of that they are very careful that they stay to the image that they portray. (Or something like that, my brain's a little fuzzy at the moment . . .)

Sometimes I think twice about writing all of my worries and complaints onto the blog. Will everyone think I'm a real depressing person? That all I do is sit around and moan and complain?

But I think about it like this: Sometimes I am happy. Sometimes I am sad. Somtimes I am a worrywart and overscheduled and frantic and neurotic and depressed. Sometimes I am happy and laid-back and flexible and funny and cheerful and helpful and artistic. It's all me, warts and all . . . and everyone is like this. That what makes reading blogs so wonderful - we all experience similar things and can comiserate and offer suggestions and words of comfort . . .

So while I'll try to tone down the whining again, just know that I'm glad that I was able to share it with you all instead of letting it all bottle up inside . . .

Everyone have a wonderful weekend!

The Chronicles of Insomnia

(Title inspired by the Saturday Night Live Skit/Video . . . I wish I could remember the words . . .)

I haven’t been sleeping very well again this week. I fall asleep almost right away, but then I wake up again a couple of times a night and have a bit of trouble trying to get back to sleep. So much going on . . . so many things to think about . . .

Last night I had a dream that I couldn’t find my driver’s license, and my friend and I kept looking in pockets and coats and everything to try to find it, but to no avail. We found a lot of old IDs of other people, but not mine. So we tried to make a new one. I don’t remember how or if it ended, because I woke up again . . .

Gee, does this symbolize something? Hmmmm . . .

Anyway, this being the last week in the old department, I’m trying to clean things up, but not doing a good job of it. I’m not changing offices or anything, and there isn’t anyone who is going to be taking over my duties right away. So I’m going to be staring at all of the same stuff while trying to get into a new mindset. I’m going to come in sometime this weekend to purge my office and get rid of a lot of files that I haven’t looked at for years and noone else will care about. That should help a little . . .

I told the ESL people that I’m not going to teach this summer, but will do so again in the Fall. (I’ve taught through all the semesters since September 2004.) Yay! And I resigned from the church board that I had been on because I just couldn’t handle doing much more than choir. Yay! So now the summer evening should be free to do whatever! Hooray! . . .

A ton of weight should be lifted off of my shoulders . . .

But whenever I go several days without a good foundation of sleep, I start getting very cranky and extremely sensitive to everything. So today I came into the office and immediately things started to go wrong. Well, not wrong, but extremely annoying things are happening that I really didn’t want to deal with today. Can’t this stuff wait until next week? . . .

I need a vacation in the worst way . . . I want to go somewhere else for a couple of days and not have to worry about this random stuff for a little while. I need time to mentally transition and prepare. I thought things were going to get better, but they aren’t quite yet. I’m trying to keep a stiff upper lip . . .

I guess the main thing I need right now is some sleep . . .

A Gold Pin and a Hearty Handshake

My father is officially retired as of March 1 of this month. Hurray! He worked for a large multi-national corporation for 33 years, starting out in 1972 as a lowly clerk in the credit department, working his way up the ranks, getting transferred to a different state and having to move his family, surviving a corporate merger and dodging through many layoffs. The company held a retirement luncheon for him yesterday and, besides my mom, my youngest sister, Mr. Random, and myself were all in attendance . . .

There were people there from all parts of his career – from his days starting out in Philly, to those who mentored him and assisted him in his diversity training days, to those who worked with him in his current department until he retired. There were many speeches – people stating how much they learned from my dad, how much joy and professionalism he brought to his job, how he knew his stuff. My dad even mad a short speech – made all the remarkable because he never makes short speeches, but also he said told us later that he had to cut it short because he was about to cry . . .

Can anyone imagine working in the same place for 30 years anymore? I mean, even if you wanted to? This morning I was watching CNBC, and the reporters were talking about how GM and its unions were about to make a statement about buyouts for 100,000 of its workers. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/22/AR2006032200576.html) One of the reporters remarked that maybe now the GM workers would finally realize that “the gravy train was over.” Gravy train? Are these people on crack? These people work hard for their paychecks and have for most of their lives, depending on the money to live on and raise families and all people ask is to be paid a decent wage and have some decent benefits. But that’s not supposed to be a given anymore. Today the attitude seems to be “you should be glad that we even pay you . . .”

During my lunch, my dad talked about how their company was continuing to move jobs overseas, because a guy with an MBA and 10 years experience living in Bangkok only gets $20K a year – so of course it’s cheaper to go over there. Many of their departments are getting shipped elsewhere – Canada, Argentina, Thailand, Mexico . . .

I guess I’m writing this because even on this happy occasion, I am scared. I’m scared because me and Mr. Random aren’t going to have a pension to fall back on, like my parents. I’m scared because we may be fighting Random Cat #8 for the tuna fish. I’m scared, because we just may have to have kids so we have a chance of not ending up out on the street. Yes, we have our 401Ks and IRAs, but they’ve gone up and down so much who knows how much we’ll have in a 30-35 years – and even then it probably won’t be enough. I’m scared because no one seems to care that decent paying jobs are disappearing and lousy paying ones are popping up in their place – and even those aren’t certain. I’m scared because now businesses only care about employees in so much as how much they can use them up before they throw them away – and then wonder why no one feels particularly productive . . .

I guess it will be OK – working for a non-profit, people will always need help of some sort, and will need people to provide that help, person to person – but if I were just coming out of school right now, I would have no idea what to do or what sorts of plans to make . . .

Seeing someone retire just makes you start thinking of your own future all the more. Peering into the abyss, what is in store for us? I doubt that when it is our time we’ll get a gold pin and a hearty handshake. I envy my dad, now deciding what he wants to do next and having the luxury to pick and choose his projects . . . will I ever be able to do that? Will you? . . .

Random Kath's Spring Reading List

Yesterday, I promised to list the books for you that I currently have on my nightstand, just waiting to be read:

Ways of Seeing – John Berger
On Photography – Susan Sontag
How to Look at Everything – David Finn
The Language Police – Diane Ravitch
The Sound on the Page – Ben Yagoda
House Thinking – Winnifred Gallagher
Home: A Short History of an Idea – Witold Rybczynski
The Year of Magical Thinking – Joan Didion
The Crimson Petal and the White – Michel Faber

Only one of the books, The Crimson Petal, is fiction (and good and trashy fiction, at that!). The first four books are borrowed, either from the library or from a friend, so those need to be read within the next few weeks. There is a definite grouping to some of my choices. Berger, Sontag, Finn. Ravitch and Yagoda. Gallagher and Rybczynski. I’ll try to keep you up to date on what I’ve read and let you know if I’ve added any more.

Remember, this is just a small fraction of the books I have that are just waiting to be read. I have another bookcase-and-a-half of things I need to read – both fiction and non-fiction.

If anyone else has a bunch of books they are going to read this spring, please share your list in the comments – I’d love to see what other people are reading and what subjects you are interested in . . .

New Random Links

Yesterday I put some new links on the sidebar and took away some that I hardly ever clicked. Check some of the new folks out – you may or may not like them, but these links more accurately reflect my myriad interests . . .

I have that stupid “I’m in Love with a Stripper” song stuck in my head. First of all, why is this stupid song on the radio? What sort of message are people sending here? Now, if I thought the song was done tongue-in-cheek, I wouldn’t be so squeamish, but if you ever see the video – and oh, there is a video – you would think “WTF?” . . . The tune is rather catchy though, darn them . . .

Saturday, I went back to the National Cathedral. (http://www.cathedral.org/cathedral/) It is an architecturally stunning, awe inspiring and incredibly humbling building to stand inside of. Even if you aren’t religious, you can still appreciate the scale and power and resources that went into constructing such a cathedral . . . if you are ever in D.C. and tire of the Smithsonian museums, do catch a cab and see it. I would love to go back to visit during a concert – I am certain that acoustics for choir and/or organ must be amazing . . .

I might be taking a few trips this spring. My grandmother has finally settles in Birmingham, AL and it would like to go down there for a weekend and visit. Also, my friend, L, goes to law school in NYC and I’d like to visit her before she graduates and comes back down here. I’ve never been to either place before, and I am excited at the prospect of going out on my own . . .

I need to post the list of books that are on my nightstand, waiting to be read. You all might get a kick out of the list, and it might inspire me to actually start and finish reading some of them . . .

I told you all that I read Ways of Seeing, and was going to read it again, but my friend told me that I definitely should read Susan Sontag’s On Photography as a companion piece, and now I’m on a mission to get a copy. What? You say I already have too many books in stacks to read, why am I seeking out another book? . . . I’m in the mood, so sue me . . .

I hope everyone had a great weekend. This should be an interesting week . . .

To Do or Not to Do . . .

Today I happened to stop by Poetry Daily and this poem caught my attention. It means something to me, but I’m still trying to figure out what it is . . . does it mean I should stop waiting and do the somethings that I want to do? Should I stop fretting about the things that I haven’t done and just go with the flow? I can be so dense about these things sometimes . . .

Undid in the Land of Undone
By Lee Upton

All the things I wanted to do and didn't
took so long.
It was years of not doing.

You can make an allusion here to Penelope,
if you want.
See her up there in that high room undoing her art?

But enough about what she didn't do —
not doing
was what she did. Plucking out

the thread of intimacy in the frame.
If I got to
know you that would be

— something. So let's make a toast to the long art
of lingering.
We say the cake is done,

but what exactly did the cake do?
The things undid
in the land of undone call to us

in the flames. What I didn't do took
an eternity —
and it wasn't for lack of trying.

It's Not Easy Being Green

When I used to work for a large, venerable accounting/consulting firm in the eary 90's, I had a friend/co-worker, WW, with whom I used to hang out on weekends and do random stuff like go to bar crawls and clubs. He was 6-6, blond and from Iowa, and we were quite an odd pair of friends. Nothing romantic, just liked hanging out. He was like a big brother and I was like a little sister . . .

Anyway, WW had a group of friends in his apartment complex that he liked to hang out with too. They were all on a rec league volleyball team together and eventually the group all paired off and got married, including WW . . .

But before the pairing, WW always considered St. Patrick's Day to be a personal holiday. He would always take the day off work, and he and his friends would meet downtown at 11 am and start their own personal bar crawl from one Irish bar to another, eventually ending up in Old Town at Murphy's or Ireland's Own. Every year for the 4 years I knew him he did this . . .

One year I decided to meet up with him and his crew after work, meeting them all at 5:30 in Old Town . . .

Now, I'm not a big drinker - I just like hanging out and talking with folks and listening, so I'd usually order a coke, or if I'm very enterprising I'll have a cider or two, or nurse a Guinness through the evening, with a glass of water. I've never been one to get drunk, especially after walking many of my friends home and watching them puke in various places - never seemed inviting to me . . . I wonder why . . .

Anyway, I get to the pub and it is packed - line out the door - but WW told me where to walk to around back that would allow me to get inside . . .

Do you remember what keg parties smelled like at the end of the night, and the way everyone looked and acted? The sort of widespread drunken stupor, the forced hilarity, the pervasive damp, yeasty smell? That's what I walked into. Not everyone in the place was like that, but a good portion were . . . and especially WW and his group of friends . . .

It really wasn't very fun to be there. They were all three sheets to the wind, and had been for a while. They all had these inside jokes from whatever other escapades went on that day, which actually didn't sound quite as funny as they tried to convey. My friend was pretty much incoherent. I didn't stay very long . . . I normally don't like small crowded spaces, and this was way too many people for me . . . and I was kind of wondering what I was doing there . . . so I tottled off and went home . . .

So when people talk about celebrating St. Patrick's Day, I always think of my drunk, smelly friends, crammed into a bar and getting various beverages spilled on me . . . I'm all for wearing the green, but not for much else about the day . . .

. . . There is one other connotation for St. Patrick's Day that makes it a rather bittersweet day for me . . .

On St. Patrick's Day 1987, two things happened almost simultaneously: I got my acceptance letter into the college I really wanted to go to . . . and I found out that my favorite Grandpa died. . . .

I had just talked to him on the phone a week or so before, and made him promise that he would come to my high school graduation. I think at that time he knew he was dying, but he didn't want me to know. I will always remember, after the fact, the pause he gave before he said yes . . . that should have been a hint, but I wasn't looking for it . . . I wanted him to be proud of me . . . he had always encouraged me so much and always took the time to talk with me. Even after we moved away from Philly, we still felt rather close . . .

So here was what should have been one of my happiest days, mitigated by losing one of the people that I loved most in the whole wide world . . .

. . . I don't know how to end this post actually. Is it a lesson in taking the bad with the good? Am I trying to say that St. Patrick's Day is ultimately a real downer in my book?

. . . All I know is that, as I still struggle with transitioning into my promotion and dealing with life in general . . .

. . . I'm hoping that my Grandpa is looking down and being proud of me. And knowing that especially on St. Patrick's Day, I think of his jolly soul and wear green to also celebrate his spirit . . .

. . . And with that in mind, it gets easier to wear green every year . . .

Freaky Thursday

Today is the last day for the co-worker that I am replacing. I am in a full fledged, paralyzing panic at the moment - still so many questions, still not quite up to speed on a lot of stuff. After today I will be a department of one until the middle of April . . .

Since I'm so freaked out, you all won't get much of a post today. Please send any good vibes you can my way . . .

Hurry UP, Spring!

. . . Do you ever wake up with a feeling of dread sitting in the pit of your stomach, but you can't quite place why? Well, that was me this morning . . .

. . . ESL class last night was a bit of a mess, but that was entirely my fault. I couldn't really concentrate very well, and my transitions between topics were really clunky. We worked on irregular past tense verbs much longer than we should have, so we did not get to do an entire chapter that I meant to cover. Attendance has not dropped off, though, which is a good sign. Maybe people just come for the free chocolates . . .

. . . Choir practice tonight, but nothing scheduled for tomorrow night. Yay! I may actually get to start reading one of the books on my stack, or fall asleep by 9 PM - either option would be good with me . . .

. . . Hope to take some pictures this weekend using my Holga camera. It's a "toy" medium format, B&W film camera . . . it only costs $20 and is notorious for its light leaks, but I can't wait to finally try it. Loading the camera is quite challenging though - the film doesn't have a case, per se, and you have to manually spool the film into the camera. We'll see how it goes. If it does work, then I have to figure out how to get the film developed . . . maybe I can pay a photography student to do my negatives for me? . . .

. . . Spring brings thoughts of gardening. I have no garden, but I'm hoping this year we can do a container garden on the balcony, or at least do some hanging plants or something . . . our balcony is so bare . . .

. . . Did I tell you how much I hate meetings? Argggh. I have quite a few today, which means not much will get done that needs to get done . . .

. . . Today is the Ides of March. I almost forgot. Does my feeling of dread mean that some Caesar-esque calamity is about to befall me? Oy, that's just what I need now . . .

. . . Despite my many grumblings, things are going pretty well. I am still having to do way too much stuff, but promise of Spring and the sunny day today are lifting my spirits a little. I hope I can keep the optimism going . . .

Holding Patterns

I got a lot of work done today. The Random Non-profit had given us today off because of the Board meetings over the weekend, but I have so much work to get done that I just had to work on some things anyway. I finished a draft of a newsletter and made good headway on two funder reports. Sometime this evening I have to do a lesson plan for ESL class tomorrow, then I’ll be done for the day . . .

Yesterday we went out and ran a bunch of errands, taking advantage of the nice weather. We went to the bookstore so that Mr. Random could redeem his birthday gift cards, but somehow I ended up getting a couple of books for myself . . . not that I don’t already have stacks of books to read, you know. I must be stopped! However, in my defense, one of the books was a new, better Thesaurus, but there was really no good excuse for the other two . . .

Mr. Random did have a good birthday dinner on Saturday. Many of his friends showed up and brought him numerous gift cards, which were spent in the aforementioned spree . . .

Yesterday I also spent a large amount of time cleaning off my desk here in the Den – it was so covered with piles of papers that you could not actually see the surface of the desk, nor could you actually use the laptop computer that was buried somewhere in the mess. Now, there is plenty of surface area and I am happy to have my writing spot back again. Whenever I feel overwhelmed, it seems that my organization skills fall by the wayside, thus making me feel MORE scattered because everything is such a mess. I am hoping that cleaning the desk will bring good karma over into the rest of the week, so that I don’t feel so . . . so . . .

I’m hoping to have a little more time to read this week. Whenever I get to do a lot reading, the quality of my writing immediately improves. This only happens when I read actual books, though, magazines don’t quite engage the thought processes as much as reading 100 pages does . . . Is that just me? . . .

Looking at the side of the blog, I notice that I have been doing this for almost a full year. I did not think it would last this long, and it did not turn out the way I had hoped – I always imagined writing smart, sassy opinion pieces commenting on the news of the day. Instead you get semi-incoherent ramblings from someone who is neurotic and overscheduled . . .

But you know what? For better or for worse, this blog does reflect a lot of who I am and what I struggle with each day. . . and I don’t mind it at all. I do wish I could come have tea with you, my few faithful readers, to thank you for listening to my mutterings, but instead know that I think about you guys and worry about you everyday . . .

Until tomorrow! . . . unless it gets way busy – then it will be sometime soon . . .

Five Weird Things About Me

Wow, a rare Sunday morning post! I skipped church this morning, which allowed me a little time to write . . . I'm so glad to have this quiet time, and I desparately needed it, but the theological implications are a bit unsettling . . .

Virginia Gal dinged me on this meme, so here goes . . .

Only five? Dear me . . . I’m sure many of my friends can think of many more than that . . .

(1) I won’t eat anything left in the refrigerator more than 24 hours and I have the tendency to always quickly inspect and sniff at food before I eat it. This is a residue of having a father who grew up in the projects with 12 brothers and sisters and never wanted to throw food away. When my sister and I were little, my dad would heat up old stew for lunch on Saturday (even though we had it on Sunday) and it would all be a shade of GRAY. Condiments would be used for months and months after their expiration dates. My dad would cut mold off things and eat them. I think this was one of the reasons that I was very skinny as a child, because I was always too grossed out to want to eat much of anything . . .

(2) It takes me at least an hour to wake up in the morning. I am not a morning person at all. Luckily, Mr. Random wakes up first and gets ready, then he wakes me up and hands me the paper. For an hour, while still in bed, I quietly and with bleary-eyes read the Post and glance up at the Today show once in a while to see if anything is going on that merits turning the sound up. I end by doing the Sudoku puzzle in the style section. Then my brain is awake enough to get up and shower and face the day . . .

Now if I absoulely need to get up right away, I can and do, but I am horribly out of sorts for the rest of the day. And don't ask me to drive first thing . . . that's much too dangerous . . .

(3) Even the thought of mayonnaise makes me ill – don’t even think of putting any on anything that you’d want me to actually eat. See weird fact #1. However, if it is freshly-homemade I’m all for it . . .

(4) I feel like I have to be prepared at all times, so I carry a ton of stuff in my purse. I always try to have band-aids, cough drops, hand sanitizer, lotion, tissues, pens, paper, allergy medicine, etc. on hand. It does come in handy though – just on Friday at a meeting someone had a nasty paper cut and bingo! I had some band-aids. I always feel like such a Mom at times that way . . . I guess it’s a by-product of my eager-to-please mentality . . .

(5) I’m really finicky about pens – they have to feel right and flow properly, or else I throw them in the trash with disgust. I am really possessive of the pens I do like, so if you borrow one, I will actually hound you to get it back, and watch you like a hawk until you do so. I like my pencils always sharpened to a nice point, and I adore mechanical pencils most of all – but there have to be refills close by. I like my books to remain in as pristine condition as possible, and when I borrow them I try very hard to make sure not to mess them up or spill crumbs. I like writing on graph type paper best, with college ruled paper close behind. I can’t deal with blank sheets very well – I tend not to be able to write in a straight line otherwise . . .

. . . so there's a brief glimpse into Random Kath's many quirks. I'm not a tagger, so anyone who wants to do this and hasn't yet may feel free to leave their five in the comments.

The weather is gorgeous in Northern VA this weekend and I hope to take a little advantage of that today, if it doesn't rain . . .

Happy Sunday!

Treading Water

. . . It's been a hard week. Juggling the work of two departments is driving me bats. If I had quit to take a job somewhere else, I don't think they would have dumped so much on me - I would have had time to finish up my projcts and been fresh for the new position. But no - because the person I am replacing is leaving next week, I am trying to cram learning everything she knows into my head two days a week and work on things for the new department, while still dealing with the dippiness of the old department . . . Arrrggh!

. . . What's a blog for, if not for venting? . . .

. . . Yesterday, the person they hired as my new boss came to town - she's not officially starting for another month - and we went to lunch and we were talking about all the cool stuff we want to do, and about her philosophy of fostering an environment of learning and excellence in the staff, and is big on professional development. Yay! But she is also very high energy and very chatty, which could make things very interesting in our dour little Non-Profit . . .

. . . Went to my first set of meetings yesterday, and even had a dinner meeting last night, and I felt so . . . overwhelmed. Actually, that doesn't begin to describe how I felt. I felt dowdy and clueless and short and tackily dressed and very insecure about myself in these new situations. There is just so much to know and absorb, and I feel very much out of my comfort zone - which is good! - but I am totally starting to have serious doubts whether I can pull this off well enough. Everyone is really happy that I have taken this position and thinks that I am a great fit, but it brings a lot of pressure, you know? If I do badly, I fell like I'll let everyone down, myself included, and it is freaking me out to no end . . .

I know I'm putting a lot of pressure on myself, and I blame that on the fact that I haven't had a true moment's peace all week. I hope that in a month or so, things will have evened out a bit and I can actually enjoy what I am doing . . . for now, I am totally NOT . .

. . . I was going to try to do absolutely nothing this weekend, but the old department wants me to finish up some funder reports and get out a newsletter by Tuesday, so I guess I'll be working a bit . . .

. . . However, Mr. Random's birthday dinner is Saturday night and that should be fun. And I hope to go shopping at some point and get some new clothes . . . maybe a suit or two, which should make me feel a bit more professional . . . if I look professional, I tend to feel better about myself since then I can at least tell myself that I look like I can do the job . . . and sometimes appearance is the reality . . .

. . . I have finished the book, Ways of Seeing, but I have to read it again to make sure I interpreted it correctly. It is a short book and a quick read - and I did get something out of it - but it was such a quick read that I want to make sure I didn't miss anything . . .

. . . Have a great weekend everyone! I wish you all well . . .

Waking up to a big cat head staring at me . . .

. . . Since the diet started, Random Cat now jumps up on the bed and meows directly into our faces to wake us up so she can be fed. Oh joy! . . .

. . . The Strategic Planning class I had last night went OK - you can only get a brief overview of the process in less than 2 hours. A lot of it I already knew just from being around for so long, but it was good to have what I knew confirmed as correct. I'm really getting excited about learning more organizational capacity stuff, since I am genuinely interested in making non-profits work better. Maybe it is a field of study I should look into more closely . . . although I have a feeling the classes and readings would just be dreadfully boring . . .

. . . I started reading a book called Ways of Seeing by John Berger. I only had a few minutes to start it before my class last night, and now wish a had a bit more time to focus on it since it cries out to be chewed on and thought about a bit . . . if I am able to give a book report, I definitely will . . .

. . . Somebody at work shared the DVD of Lilo and Stitch with me, since I said I never saw it and it is their favorite movie. Has anyone seen it? Is it cheesy in a good way? . . .

. . . ESL class tonight, talking about parts of the body, symptoms and illnesses. This lesson is always fun . . . somebody usually says something out of left field, and I'm hoping for that tonight . . . I desparately need a good laugh . . .

. . . If you haven't noticed, I'm going back to the random blog thoughts. If I don't do that, it will be weeks between posts . . . Hope everyone's doing OK . . .

It was the Best of Weekends, It was the Worst of Weekends . . .

Some randomness to start off the week . . .

Watched most of the Oscars last night. I thought that Jon Stewart was wonderful – I actually *watched* the whole thing and enjoyed it. This year was much less schmaltzy than past years, although I did like the Ben Stiller bit and Will Ferrell and Steve Carrell . . . I’m just warped that way. Wished they had showed crowd reaction to the Three 6 Mafia playing, since I don’t think that most of the academy crowd is big on hip-hop/rap. Tom Shales wrote a scathing review of the evening in the Post today and I seriously wonder what show *he* was watching. I know that he isn’t a big JS fan, but the show actually was pretty good, IMHO . . .

Saturday was just awesome. Went out to lunch with some “Odd Couple”-type friends in Old Town and got to see a bit of the St. Patrick’s Day parade. Any event in Old Town brings out everyone and their dogs, and there were quite a few cute little outfits and cute little dogs about . . . and really huge dogs, too. Then we hung out a bit and went to the National Cathedral, but didn’t get there in time to get a tour. It was really cold and windy, so while we started to walk around the gardens, it was just too cold to really enjoy. We’ll have to go back again when it is a little warmer. We then went and got coffee/tea and hung out a bit more. It was such a nice relaxing day, which has been so rare lately . . . I need to do that more often – I came home with such a smile on my face and so wide awake (although that may have been the caffeine from the chai . . .)

When I got home, Mr. Random was working on taking down more of the bathroom wallpaper. We try to give each other a day to do whatever on our own, since we see each other all day, everyday at the office . . .

I am so incredibly tired though . . . I haven’t been sleeping very well during the week again, and my attempts at catching up on sleep are always thwarted for some reason. On Sunday, I was just a mess – all of the stress of the past few weeks just caught up with me and I pretty much burst into tears after church was over. I was exhausted and probably should have just stayed home and slept that morning, but we had some pretty cool choir songs that we had been practicing for this week and I didn’t want to miss it. However, when I got there I still wasn’t quite awake, and then they started practicing a song where I had to hit a pretty high “G,” kind of out of nowhere and I couldn’t do it. I sounded AWFUL. And I felt so embarrassed and frustrated that I just nipped down to the bathroom and had a mini-breakdown. There is just too much going on right now, and I have to keep track of too many things in my brain, and I’m going to have to jettison something – probably something church-related because I’m already doing Choir on Wednesday nights, which is quite enough, I think . . .

I need to take some days off, but I can’t even consider it for another couple of weeks until after the Random Non-Profit’s Board meetings are over and my new boss comes on board. Yes, I know . . . there’s always an excuse . . .

I have another professional development class tonight, ESL tomorrow night, Choir on Wednesday night, and dinner with a couple of Board members on Thursday night. At some point, I have to get Mr. Random some presents for his birthday on Friday – I know exactly what I’m going to get him now – a couple of Jared Diamond (Germs, Guns and Steel and Collapse) paperbacks and a DVD or two. Saturday night we have dinner with a bunch of work friends, but Sunday I’m not going anywhere or doing anything . . . at least at this point . . .

I need to do some more book reading . . . maybe once I get a couple of books completed, I’ll feel more like actually writing something useful . . . my brain is such Swiss cheese right now, I couldn’t write a coherent thought even if I wanted to . . . this Blog is exhibit A on that right now . . .

I hope everyone else had fun this weekend – do share! It's been pretty quiet here for a while . . .

Slimming Down with the "Cat"kins Diet

Mr. Random's TV debut didn't turn out quite as hoped, but it was a great show otherwise. I could only recognize Mr. Random's calves and back of his hair, and that's because I'm his wife and am supposed to know stuff like that. It turns out more people were wearing red socks than I remembered - who knew? . . .

Mr. Random took the Random Cat to the vet for the first time since we adopted her four years ago. We generally have shied away from taking her out of the house since as a "shelter cat" who had been left at the shelter by *two* sets of previous owners, we really didn't want to cause her any more trauma than she's already had. However, Mr. Random's sister just had her two cats die within a week of each other, and Mr. Random was sufficiently spooked enough to want to get Random Cat checked out . . .

I wasn't able to go with them since I had meetings that morning, so Mr. Random had to go solo. He said it was heart-wrenching hearing her meows of fright as she was transported in the carrier in the car to the vet. That's why I'm glad I couldn't go - it would have made me so sad . . .

So the vet says that Random Cat is a bit overweight, which we knew . . . it's kind of obvious. It turns out that she is 12 pounds - 4 pounds over her proper weight. Wow! I didn’t know she was that much bigger . . . it would be like you had to lose 30% of your body weight in a year. So the vet has put her on a “cat”kins diet – now we have to give her ONLY wet food, which I don’t think she will mind very much. Dry food isn’t good for her, the vet said, because it is full of carbs and empty calories. Odd thing is that the canned food is better for her than the weight-loss pellets we had been mostly feeding her . . .

In this job transition period, I feel myself getting dumber. I am trying to keep so much stuff straight in my head, and I have so many people asking me about so many different questions about different things, my brain just can't take it anymore. I have taken to giving glazed, puzzled looks whenever anyone asks me anything - and usually the question is wildly out of context, so I have to respond "And this has to do with . . . ?"

This has been such a long week . . . I hope everyone has a great weekend - I certainly am going to try! Haven't ended with a poem in a while, so I hope you like this one . . .

Elegance
By Linda Gregg

All that is uncared for.
Left alone in the stillness
in that pure silence married
to the stillness of nature.
A door off its hinges,
shade and shadows in an empty room.
Leaks for light. Raw where
the tin roof rusted through.
The rustle of weeds in their
different kinds of air in the mornings,
year after year.
A pecan tree, and the house
made out of mud bricks. Accurate
and unexpected beauty, rattling
and singing. If not to the sun,
then to nothing and to no one.

Sunshine and Rain

. . . Tonight, 10 PM ET on Discovery Health, the show "Rebuilt" - if you watch you may see Mr. Random, he's on the subject's coed soccer team, they are all wearing orange team shirts. We haven't seen the show yet, but if you think you can pick out who Mr. Random is let me know and I'll tell you if you've guessed right. He would probably be very distinctive . . . the hint is the color of his socks . . .

. . . Things are fine between me and Mr. Random, Monday wasn't as dramatic as it sounded, although it seemed so at the time - it WAS a cranky day though. When you're working with your husband, everyday has the potential for drama as personal life sometimes seeps into the workday . . .

. . . I am overwhelmed with work transition stuff! What am I getting myself into? . . .

. . . ESL class went well last night - we are finally getting into a groove and the group is starting to gel. One of the students asked me about why "Flour, Flower, and Floor" all were spelled and sounded differently. Probably because they all come from different roots in different languages, I guessed, reiterating that "English makes no sense . . ."

. . . The air is so dry everywhere and it is driving me simply bats. My throat is constantly starting to bother me and I am getting sick of liquids and cough drops . . . I wouldn't mind a little humidity now and then to break up all of this recirculating air . . .

. . . For Lent, I am giving up anything "chip-related" - no potato chips, Doritos, tortilla chips . . . anything of that sort. I was pretty good about it last year, but in the last few months I've been downing chips like no tomorrow . . . this will be a good transition to help me get into shape for the spring and running season . . .

Hope everyone's weeks are going well! If you celebrate Lent, please share what you are doing for it, if anything . . .