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August 2003

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Generally I have a policy against writing about my job.  I don't even write about non-job things that happen at the place where I have my job, or have to do with people I work with.  Because my workplace has a public face, I have a job face, and this is my public face and it is something completely different.  But I'm going to tell this story.

     I haven't written much lately because the last two weeks have been in a complete flux as I've been working on getting a new job.  As in puck - every - day - because - my - life - is - completely - out - of - control flux.  And now that it is over, I have this to say: "What was the point?!!!"

     Puke #1: "My current job is unbearable and if I stay here one more minute I will go into a deep depression and have to be hospitalized."  No I won't, and no, it isn't that bad.  But I have found that every time I have a good chance of getting a new job, my current job immediately becomes unbearable.  So much so that if I don't get that job I have to keep looking and get out immediately anyway.  For them, there is no "apply for this interesting job and if it don't happen just keeping kicking around here."

     Puke #2:  "They called me because they want to hire me, and now all I've got to do is screw it up."  Somehow, I think that I've already got the job.  I've got myself moved in already.  Even this time, where I had two job offers going at the same time, I was still 100% committed to both jobs.  Okay, last time too, when I had four job offers.  (Somehow I always end up getting more than one job offer on the same day, so even up to the bitter end I can have something to puke about.)

     Puke #3:  "They seemed really nice in the interview, but they were on their best behavior.  Really they are probably wolves."  I've actually had this happen to me before.  That is why you always ask the question, "Why is there an opening in this position?"  And keep pressing until you have a good idea what the truth is.  And another question is: How come that very important person in the management team is never available to meet me?  It may be because the fangs are too long to hide and the fur pokes out of the collar even in broad daylight.

     Puke #4:  "They may have decided to hire me, but that doesn't mean I can actually cut it."  This actually doesn't happen to me any more.  I've been through quite a few jobs now, and I know that I'm at least as competent as the average bear.  Besides, my new job is in an industry that I'm already in and I am trained for the job.  So I know I can do it.

     Puke #5:  "I've got to get new clothes!"  Whenever I start a job, I want to make a good impression.  Suits and stockings every day.  Real shoes.  I've been at my current job for nearly 4 years.  I'd come to work in my bathrobe if I didn't have anything else.  I don't own any stockings, and I haven't seen my shoes for at least 2 years.  I'm actually not going to buy new clothes.  The new place is supposed to have a reputation for casual and they are just going to have to accept my sandals.

This just in- free extra puking.  Because there seems to be something wrong with my gallbladder.

I'm against violence.  I eat meat, but I believe vegetarianism is the moral choice.  And I'm against the penalty and killing people.  But I still feel good that someone took it upon himself to kill Geoghan.

What happens when the MPAA/RIAA sends one of their "cease and desist file swapping" letters to the... um... Palestinians?  This is not a joke.  This actually happened.  And this is what the Palestinians have to say about it. [via PontifexExMachina]

Updates noted:

     Abbie the Cat Has A Posse

     The Primary Main Objective

     LT SMASH

     ...turning tables...

     A Minute Longer

     Chief Wiggles

Oh my, I need to move beyond these war blogs or I'm not going to have anything to read pretty soon....

http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/08/24/geoghan/index.html

http://us.imdb.com/StudioBrief/#3 

Heart Transplant Recipient Ready to Give Birth: Garner Woman To Name Son After Heart Donor.  And there is more: her mother and her brother are both transplant recipients.

"I'm troubled by the way the great intellectual traditions of Catholic and Protestant churches alike are withering, leaving the scholarly and religious worlds increasingly antagonistic."  Nicholas D. Kristof, Op-Ed Columnist, New York Times.  It is a sad trend in America: increased ignorance + increased religion = increased ignorant religion.

Iraqis' top 10 tips for enduring blackout in the heat  (from CNN).  My favorite is #2.

A hero's honor, overdue.  A World War II veteran receives the Purple Heart his World War I father never received.

Metafilter conversation on the power outage.  I thought this was a pretty neat entry by Lisa Gidley:

"So when it happened I was in Rockaway Beach, Queens -- which for those of you who don't know NYC, is about the furthest away from midtown Manhattan you can be and still be in New York City. On a good day it's still more than an hour's subway ride from there to my home in Long Island City, Queens (across the East River from the U.N.). So I knew I'd have an adventure getting home without the subway. But some great things happened along the way:

* At the time I was eating in a restaurant in Rockaway, and since I couldn't pay for it with my credit card or go to an ATM, I used the last of my cash in my wallet -- $10 -- to pay for my meal. When a waitress found out I had to get home with only my Metrocard (which works on buses as well as the subway) but no cash, she gave me $10 of her own just in case I needed it, and her address so I could repay her "whenever."

* With my Metrocard I began taking any combination of random buses that would get me away from Rockaway, and ended up riding through various Brooklyn neighborhoods that I'd never seen from above ground. People were just hanging out on the sidewalks, having barbecues and playing cards, while the people driving cars became amazingly polite and turned every intersection with useless streetlights into a four-way stop. Never heard a damn horn, which is pretty amazing.

* I ended up in South Williamsburg, on a street where I knew I could catch one final bus, the B61, back to my own neighborhood. But I stood there for more than an hour, and the few buses that passed were packed sardine-like and wouldn't stop. Finally a guy in a big car slowed down and offered me and the six people I was standing with a ride to Greenpoint, which was much closer to where we needed to be. So we all piled in his car as he talked about the blackouts of '77 and '68. I gave him the $10 bill the waitress had given me, and some of the other strangers gave me dollar bills.

* From where he dropped us off, it was only about a 20-minute walk back to my place. By this point the sun had set and it was completely dark, but people had put candles on the sidewalks to help pedestrians navigate. One guy passed us carrying a torch.

* As I approached home, I was pretty dehydrated from my three-hour journey; all the 24-hour delis and various places where one could get water were shut down. And I'd called my husband and learned that our building didn't have running water, as the pump was electric. On my otherwise empty street, though, there was a Vitamin Water truck, with a guy behind the wheel who was starting it up. I asked if he was selling any Vitamin Water -- I had $4 in my pocket -- and he said, no, he'd just been giving away promotional bottles, but he was out of the promo packs. When I mentioned that my building had no water, he looked alarmed and said, "Well, we might have a few bottles in back." He fished out five for me and my neighbors, and refused to take any cash.

* And I made it home. I like New York."

And this one:

...

After walking about ten blocks and shaking a few of their hands, I remembered thinking post-9/11 how I wished I had gone down to ground zero and helped. So I decided to help and with two other guys, manned the intersection at 25th and 6th right after the intersection f (big street) 23rd and right before Herald Square (huge intersection where Macy's is).

It was surprisingly hard (we really needed three people, one to guide the westbound traffic, another to stop the cars and another to stop the pedestrians at the crosswalk).
...

http://www.wral.com/health/2408648/detail.html 

http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/08/15/nyt.kristof/index.html 

http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/meast/08/15/iraqi.advice.ap/index.html 

http://newsobserver.com/news/story/2780607p-2576786c.html 

That's not a power outage; this is a power outage!  After all the snippy comments about how the TV networks must be very disappointed that this is such a benign non-event sort of giant event, and after all the 9/11 flashbacks have come under control, how about thinking about it this way:

     This is like a healing experience for 9/11 and two years of wars and anxiety.  Like God saying, "Look, this is what it is like when everyone is on the streets of New York and the sky isn't falling in."  Also, I remember those images from space of Ground Zero, and tonight New Yorker's and a lot of other city people can see the stars.  Two years ago everything living was focused on the tragedy in New York.  Last night everyone could take a deep breath and look back at God.

Oh it was quite a busy week.  Activities after work every single day, trying to be on my best behavior all the time, and then to top it all off the power out one entire evening and the following morning.

Updates Noted:

     Salam Pax (links to an amazing photo of the burial of Saddam's sons)

     G in Baghdad

     Abbie the Cat Has a Posse

     ...turning tables...

     Chief Wiggles has moved

     Whatever

http://graphics7.nytimes.com/images/2003/08/02/international/03iraq.large2.jpg 

Man's doubts key to finding abducted boy (N & O).  All it took was someone a little willingness to get involved.  Something didn't seem right, so he checked missing children websites for the name of his new roommate and his son.

Remember Herb?  I've read a bit further into my journal and I found the actual bit of wisdom about seagulls: "Seagulls will eat anything.  They like strawberry ice cream." (journal, 07/22/1993)

More from 1993:

"I feel my personality developing so much.  I feel like a rocket bursting through layers of- I don't know, but suddenly I'm somewhere else and I feel like everyone around me should literally be blown back by how strong I've become." (journal, 07/24/1993)

Is that not exactly what being 18 is all about?!  On to have the energy and the growth of that time, instead of just being a very tired working stiff...

"I think I will become quite 'home-sick' in North Carolina.  I can't imagine spending the vast majority of my time so far from Morro Bay and San Diego and San Francisco and all the other places that are so mine.  Living in a place where it's a huge journey and expense just to go to Huntington Lake." (journal, 07/24/1993)

This was of course before I moved to North Carolina.  After nearly ten years in North Carolina, I now feel a lot differently!  Don't tear me away from Chapel Hill and Asheville and Charlotte and the Outer Banks.  I actually never even went back to Huntington Lake a single time.  Everything has changed; "You can't step in the same river twice."

http://newsobserver.com/news/story/2744788p-2544741c.html 

I'm not completely on track with Christianity Today's political positions, but nonetheless there are a lot of good articles on their site, so I stopped by for a visit today.

     There is one whole section of the site called Marriage Partnership.  Read this article on relationships today.  And this article on making it through a lifelong marriage.  And the inevitable advice column.

     And here is why I read this magazine- a very thoughtful and intelligent interview article with Lynn Schofield Clark on the popularity of myths examining evilness, e.g. Harry Potter.  From the article:

"I think there is a tendency in some evangelical circles to define the way issues should be understood. That can be limiting to discussion on a more local level for young people who might be interested in talking about religion and spirituality."

Tom Friedman's column was on "A New 'New Mideast'".  Friedman is pointing out that a New Mideast can only come from a serious commitment from the players.  But strangely he only asks the Palestinians and the Iraqis to find this new level of commitment.  In general I find Friedman to be relatively fair, but everything seems to end up being just a little bit skewed, always.

     For me, it is stuck in my brain.  Even though I am angry about the unfairness and the lies and certain evil acts of Israel and America which are glossed over, the party line that exaggerates the evil acts of others and exaggerates the good will of ourselves keeps playing over and over in my mind.

     So anyway, it is just a little strange that Friedman is writing about a serious change of vision, and yet in the culminating paragraph his vision only has the Palestinians and the Iraqis changing.

'Extraordinary Life': Hitchhiking Through Iraq.  Article in Newsday.  This is what caught my attention:

"Hitchhiking around Chechnya was scary," says Bolotov. "Chechnyans don't like Russians. Iraqis, they don't care about Russians."

Yes, two Russians hitchhiking through Iraq.  But before that they hitchhiked through Chechnya!

http://www.christianitytoday.com/mp/2003/002/16.56.html 

http://www.christianitytoday.com/mp/2003/002/1.26.html 

http://www.christianitytoday.com/mp/2003/002/11.18.html 

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2003/127/51.0.html  

http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/07/30/nyt.friedman/index.html 

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/ny-wohike
0731,0,4717469.story?coll=ny-nationworld-headlines 

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This page last updated 01 September 2003.

thecactus@loafingcactus.com

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