Listen UP!

So today I'm just sitting at home, veggin' out, watching the TV -- when all of a sudden I see a commercial for Listen Up, the personal sound amplifier. If you have not seen this add, find a way to watch it: like clicking here , because it's hilarious. So this device is essentially a walkman-style hearing aid. However to increase the target audience Listen Up has come up with a broad range of uses such as listening to your kids on the playground, hearing the birds chirp, listening for prey while hunting. OR my personal favorite "Listen in on people talking about you at the gym" (at which point the ad shows a middle age man lifting weights and listening to girls saying "Oh, he's hot!")

OR you could "hear everything in church." For this usage of the Listen Up device, the ad shows 2 elderly people calmly sitting in church holding their listen up walkman-like-box up in the air smiling contently while people pretend to not be starring at the old people with their hands in the air.

Thank God it's Saturday

I had kind of a tough week. As previously stated, my Mom was here until Tuesday morning, which was great! However, it did leave me a little tired and absent of things like clean laundry, food in the fridge and an abundance of things like errands and the like. I say this not to complain but simply to say I was already counting down the days to Friday.

However as an added bonus my shortened work week SUCKED. Seriously S-U-C-K-E-D. As a further added bonus, my shortened work week was not shortened at all but rather lengthed. I had one whole extra day of suckitude added when today became a business day AND I have to go in to work tomorrow as well (though only for like an hour, but with the new changes on the CTA? That will probably take me 4 hours).

All of this incredible suckiness has left me thoughtful. What better place to talk about one's thoughts than an incredibly public blog? Clearly you all believe I am right or else you wouldn't read said blog. Also, clearly I am not a secretive person.

I've been struck by the frequency of which I live in the moment. Perhaps far to often, I do what is best for the short term, allowing myself to be swayed by a second of triumph or feeling of personal determination. The result of this week has been that perhaps I made a very big mistake last year right around this time and committed myself to an endeavor which will not have the rewards or even personal gratification originally promised. I have the very strong feeling that though I gave my word to stay in Chicago and have now been true to my word for 1 full year and counting, my boss may not value the tremendous personal sacrifice that I made and furthermore may not actually fulfill his end of the bargain. Which would be fine. If he did so in an honorable way. And I'm not sure that he isn't running scared.

In juxtaposition to my real life, I've been rereading Gone With the Wind lately (not cover to cover but sort of a general skimming). Rob and I then rewatch the movie. As a fun side story and completely unrelated tangent, I got Gone With the Wind in mind, when I saw a picture in Martha Stewart Living of people in a typical Martha Living Room, watching GWTW and eating ginormous chocolate chip cookies. Which is exactly what Rob and I did.

To return to my point -- say what you will about Gone With the Wind, but there is a great deal of depth in those characters. Everytime I read that book I find myself drawn to sooo many people within the story. This time I found myself wondering, in my life am I a Scarlett or a Melanie? I fully well realize that I have some Scarlett tendencies, but I would truthfully prefer to be a Melanie 9 days out of 10 (that 10th day being the day when Melanie is too weak to get herself away from Sherman's army and is passed out in a buggy).

So I guess my point is, why is it that I'm still waiting to become the things that I want to be? I always have this rather vague feeling like there will always be second chances. I often find myself thinking that at the end of my life I will be ridiculously wise and conscious of all the mistakes I made and all of the successes I enjoyed. Only occassionally am I struck by the idea that by that time it will all be over with no opportunity to do it all again.

In summation, I have come to some conclusions tonight which I share with you all in hopes that this struggle may someday help each of you as well. I will never again loose sight of the things that I want in my life. And I will stop waiting around for the time to be right to go after those things. Please believe me when I say those things very much involve the friends and family that I know read this (and Rob, who I know does not).

Don't expect any life mystery solving...

I really feel far too tired to concentrate on writing today, but those of you who read this blog know not to expect much anyway. I wanted to give a little update on my life for those of you who have been wondering why I have been MIA.

My Mom was here this weekend. We had a really great visit, and went shopping a lot (though once was for quilt stuff, but still it was fun.) I got to show Mom my office that I always talk about, and we went to see Miss Pettigrew, which was seriously right up my alley. AND I cooked my very first holiday dinner that we ate on my wedding china that I have never used before (half of it is in Buffalo in my old attic room)!

The loveliness of this weekend is of course countered by 7:30 am wake up times everyday, which really do sometimes set me off schedule. So now I'm tired, very tired. I always love company but I often spend days cleaning the house prior to their visits, and then days after recovering.

Additionally, I had the added strain of Comcast cable. I tell you that I've heard enough stories about comcast to not truly be surprised by this, but...

• I came home last Monday to discover that I had no cable, internet or phone service (Thanks Comcast for your irrestible bundling prices!) Since I am a freak of nature and don't have a cell phone, I sat around my house wondering if there had been some sort of Armagedon. Then I figured out I can tap into the library's wireless and contacted Comcast's Live Chat. They told me there was an outage in the area, and I should try again in "24-48 hours."
  
• Tuesday night I discovered that the situation had not changed.
  
• I had live-chat number 2 in which I was told there was no outage in my area at all! I was told I had an appointment for Wednesday and was given an appointment confirmation number (I know, mythical, but it does sometimes happen)
  
• Wednesday, Rob's only day off in a 8 day stretch, we decide to check in with comcast to verify the time of the appointment
  
• Alas, I'm told my confirmation number is in fact a myth
  
• I am then told that the phone operators can't verify appointments, and I should live chat someone.
  
• I live chat with a lovely girl named Pursima. (At this point you might be bored with this play by play action, but I have to get this out or I will fester and rot with hatred and animosity). I tell Pursima, "I have an appointment, Confirmation # 123, can you verify what time to expect the maintenance guy?" Pursima tells me, "How can I help you today?" So I repeat myself. Pursima tells me, "I can get you an appointment for March 24 between 8 am and 12 pm."
  
• Pursima and I engage in a long game of back and forth chatting in which I am forced to say, "I don't know if I'm making myself clear, but what I want to know is what time is the dude coming to my house." And which Pursima is forced to say,"Oh, I canceled your appointment to make you a new one on Monday."
  
• Sadly, I am then forced to say, "I'd like to speak with your supervisor." To which Pursima is forced to say "You can take your cable box to the local shop, but I'm not helping you."
  
• I screen shot my live chat dialogue box and save it for retribution.
  
• I call Comcast and make a new appointment for the following morning, using a voice which clearly indicated I have the weight of the world on my shoulders.
  
• I take off Thursday to sit at home, and actually do work.
  
• Again, I TAKE OFF a day of work so that I can DO WORK.
  
• Because I am dumb.
  
• Between 8 and 5, I manage to do an inordinately large amount of work with Rob's cell phone in my hand and my feet propped on the window sill, and one eye on the parking lot in front of our building.
  
• At 4:55 pm, a Comcast truck pulls up and sits in front of my building for 10 minutes without any one getting out.
  
• The Door of the comcast truck opens to reveal a very nice man who comes into my apartment, tests wires, goes out into the back porch-like area, comes in and tells me, "Well it looks like Comcast cut your line." I say, "I don't understand. I paid my bill and wouldn't Comcast have a record of shutting off my service?" And he says, "No, I mean literally they cut your line. They opened the locked box, took a pair of wire cutters cut the line, closed the box, and left all the wires inside."
  
• The conversation ends with me saying, "Why would they do that?" and Jose saying, "I just don't know ma'am."

Wow, I'm really sad that I wrote all that. It must have really, really been bugging me.

I'm even more sad that you read all that. Poor you. You must be a good friend to read all of my story without me having to dramatize it in any way. So I say, "Thank you."

A Happy St. Patty's Day to you!

For some reason this year I am really into St. Patrick's Day. Normally I've never been all that enthused by the holiday, except maybe when I was a kid and we would go see my Dad walk in the parade (after you've been to Mardi Gras those parades are kind of boring, plus it's cold.) I keep thinking if we were in Buffalo we would go someplace to listen to Jackdaw! What better way to spend the most Irish day of the year. If you don't know what Jackdaw is, go here.

But instead of going out and drinking, which I don't do any day of the year actually, I'm sitting at home eating a lovely dinner of yellow rice and fajitas. Yup I'm Irish. The other thing I'm doing is sitting here not watching TV. And not using the phone. And not using my DSL (I'm using the Library's Wireless). This is why you should never bundle all of these services. And also why I should own a cell phone. So that when our Comcast goes out, we can call and report it! Lucky me I live in the parking lot of lovely, wonderful Sulzer Library, 2nd largest library in Chicagoland.

And though I could be reading or writing my actual book, I am instead going to blog! I wanted to let you all know that this week, I've decided to take a cue from one of my favorite blogs, The Collective and am giving myself a little theme for the week at my Recipe Blog. I've decided to write about the people who have most inspired my cooking, and provide you with my favorite recipes from them. Stay tuned! (Second night in a row I'm saying that!)