Today

6:15am: Wake abruptly, having realized what was bugging me about that request-for-proposal I got yesterday.


6:18am: Lie in bed, figuring out what to do about it and designing the presentation slides to explain it to others.

7:15am: Get up and draw the slides on some scrap paper.

8:50am: Breakfast

9:45am: Get lost on way to doctor appointment.

10:05am: Doctor appointment.

10:50am: Stop for a cupcake. I *need* a cupcake.

11am: Accidentally (ie, due to cupcake stop) miss my team’s daily standup meeting.

11:30am: Realize that *this* meeting can be cancelled. Aha! Reply to email instead.

12noon: Meeting about taxes.

1pm: Meeting about ... I’ve forgotten.

2pm: Training session about how to be a better Product Manager.

3:30pm: Meeting about whether this thing I’m designing will also work for somebody else’s team.

4pm: Meeting about the overlap between that presentation I started this morning and R’s designs.

5pm: Start getting the slides off my scrap paper and into the computer.

6:30pm: Oh, right, I needed to pay those bills. Online bill pay. And did Fry’s actually refund me for that thing I returned? Yes? Okay, good. 

7pm: Inner monologue:

- You said you were going to leave work earlier today.

- Uh-huh.

- So. You going to get out of here and go work on your book?

- I’m tired! I’ve been up since 6:15!


7:10pm: Get up, leave desk, out to car, start driving to library. Inner monologue continues: 

- But if you don’t work on the book tonight, then when are you going to?

- But I’m tired!

- [Pause] Well, what would you rather do instead? Watch TV?

- [Sighs] There’s never anything on....

- You could go to the gym.

- [Disdainful silence]

- Or go home and vacuum. How about vacuuming?

- [More disdainful silence]

- Well, you could read.

- [Inner inner monologue] But you know, lately reading seems so flat compared to writing!

- Well, what are you going to do then? Come on, it’s only 7pm. You know you won’t go to sleep for at least a couple of hours. What would you rather do than write? There must be something.

- [Inspiration!] I could write a blog post to procrastinate!

7:47pm: Finish blog post....

Seasonal

The pumpkin cake with cream cheese frosting is calling. Also the donut, the caramel apple, the frosted cookie, the cream of chestnut soup, the jamon-manchego sandwiches, the green beans with blue cheese cream sauce, the deep-fried artichoke hearts....

The air has gotten colder, the trees are changing color, I turned the heater on for the first time last night, and my body desperately, desperately wants to gain about eight pounds - ideally in the next week.

So far I'm holding it off at two.

But in the back of my head, I wonder: isn't gaining weight for the cold season exactly what mammals are supposed to do? Wouldn't I be warmer over the next few months if I gained a nice cozy layer of insulating fat?

Then I think about going shopping for a whole new set of jeans.

My hand hovers, hesitating, over the oh-so-tempting plate of Friday morning donuts.

The Over-Scheduled Adult

(The person who inspired this post doesn’t read this blog. And I’m at least as bad at this as her, anyway!)

I had plans tonight. I really did. But when my husband asked me this morning what I was doing tonight, I told him, then added, “... but she’ll probably cancel. I did, last time,” and he nodded, understanding.

So off I went to work. I sent an email: “we still on?” and got back, no surprise, “Actually, I’m sorry but....”

And thus the round continues. I forget which of us cancelled first, but this is about the fourth time, or maybe the sixth. Last time it was me. It’s easy: we email, we ping, we add to our various electronic calendars. We agree and then at the last minute...we had a prior engagement. We’re getting sick. I’m so sorry but.... Meeting up for dinner sounds oh-so-attractive when it’s a couple of weeks away. Up close...other things impinge.

I can’t help contrasting it with a recent trip to NY, where social plans went something like this: “...dinner...?” “Love to! 7pm?” over and over and over, so that I wound up with plans on no fewer than six nights out of eight. Not one person cancelled; not one person changed a time or a place. And one, I swear, sounded surprised when I emailed her on day-of to confirm.

Which leads me to wonder: what’s different about New York? It’s sure not less busy; there’s just as much going on. (“Oh, please, there’s more going on!” the average New Yorker would probably claim.) And the usual human priorities remain: self, significant other, friends, work, in some combination of importance and varieties of labelling.

So what’s the difference?

Out here in CA I am situated in, living on, gripping with the edges of my psychological fingers, the edge of the crazy roiling tech-hub of the world. New York, as far as I can tell, thinks cellphones and "The InterWebz" are nice and all but is still inclined to give a virtual shrug and go do something else.

So is it just the technology? Is it knowing that thanks to a last-minute text, no one is left standing at the bar? The ability to change plans at the last minute means that instead of shamefacedly getting up from a restaurant table, whoever got stood up can quietly drive from work to home, shrug it off in an empty kitchen, move on with an evening only slightly different than planned.

Rescheduling is easy too: an email, an invitation online. No cost, no effort, except that we’ve done it over and again now how many times?

In theory, I’d imagine that with constant connection we’d make more plans, not fewer; see each other more frequently, not less. I love the idea of being able to plan something at the last minute. There was the day another friend called, “I have to run an errand near your house. Want to get coffee?” and she reached me even though I was out for a walk - I had my phone. I love this. I do.

But that's the exception. And so I wonder, if we couldn’t do all this, if plans were harder to make and harder to break - would we be more inclined to show up?

You know what the problem is?

Everyone tells you you should have a baby. And then...

...if you think maybe you do want one, you wonder if you're just succumbing to peer pressure. But...

...if you think maybe you don't want one, you wonder if you're just reacting to peer pressure.

Sigh.

Surprise!

"Hey!" said a voice to my right. Late afternoon or early evening in Palo Alto: quiet streets, the sun still high enough to cast patches of brightness and shadow on the sidewalk. I stopped and looked around. Sitting at a small table outside a newish Mexican place were two guys I used to work with. "How's it going?" said B. "Sit down, have some food!"

So I did. "How are things?" I asked. B's at a startup, his own. Two years ago I was following in his footsteps - literally, as I stepped in to take over his role at the Big Tech Company when B switched projects. Now B's life is so different from mine that I barely know what to ask about. He's happy, clearly, but it's a dream I don't understand. He has a one-room office in a VC's building, and a rooftop seating area enclosed by paintings of a beautiful marsh, and a whole lot of candy next to the desk he shares with his co-founders, and a giant model airplane in the lobby, and fifteen engineers in India. To him it's freedom. To me it's ... alien. And irrelevant. I can't imagine choosing it. But I like B, and I keep thinking that what he wants is going to start making sense to me just as soon as I figure it out.

"It's great!" B said. "Things are good!" We ate chips and ordered: mole, tostadas, soup. "How about you?" he asked. I thought I saw doubt in his eyes. I've been working on the same team for a long time; at the same company, even longer. It feels strange even to me. I never expected to be this stable, and in many ways I don't like it at all. And yet....

"Things are good!" I said. "I'm working on stuff I'm really happy about, things that're going to make a difference in the world."

And only once I said it did I realize it was true. I've been so focused on wondering if I was doing the right thing, wondering if I was returning to work in a sustainable way that would let me stay, wondering if I was stupid not to be chasing a startup dream or a higher salary, wondering if I had the right job and the right project and the right manager, that I haven't really stopped to think about the project at hand and whether it matters that anyone is doing it, let alone me. And yet in this case, the project does matter - or has the potential to matter, or so I believe. Conditionally, for now, at least. And apparently that's enough to make me happy.

Sometimes it's good that people ask how things are going.

If you get a chance to try red Oaxacan mole, you really should. That's good, too.

I Was Here

Back in the day, a good friend of mine used to say she was making all her old theater t-shirts into a quilt. Into the Woods, Fiddler on the Roof, You Can’t Take It With You: all there, in warm and snuggly knit, ready for winter nights. 

A few days ago, inspired by purchase of a new skateboard, I dug through my parents’ garage in search of the wristguards I got during a rollerblading phase. Among other things, I found the chain-cleaner for my bike; steel-toed boots; a metric tape measure; a small pink baby carriage; a black widow spider (I think); a couple of magnetic flashlights; and not one, but two pairs of the rollerblades themselves. I’d forgotten I had two pairs. 

Eventually I found the wristguards. I’d also forgotten how scraped up they were. 

I looked at the things spread around me. I looked at the rollerblades & the steel-toed boots; these are not things that last if they’re not used. It was surprisingly easy to send them off to the charitable organization that would be making the rounds the next week. 

Before I remembered that the wristguards were in the garage, I made a briefer foray into the closet of my childhood-teenage-high-school bedroom. In one end were two boxes labelled “Clothes to sort.” 

The morning after I dug up the wristguards, I opened the boxes. 

Again, most of it was surprisingly easy to let go. Query: am I going to wear velvet floral leggings again? Answer: I most sincerely hope not. Let’s help things turn out that way, huh? But at the bottom of one box I found them: Fiddler on the Roof, Jesus Christ Superstar, Class of ‘95, and a red tank top that somehow always wound up on my best nights out. 

I’m thinking of making a quilt. 

In memoriam to a material thing

Today my French press broke and I started crying. So here's this post to record the fact. I'm writing about this mostly because I can't remember the last time I cried from sadness rather than anger or frustration. It must have been years ago. 

And yet this French press.... I brought it back with me from England just a little over ten years ago. I carried it across large portions of the British countryside in a backpack, carefully stuffed with t-shirts and clean socks. When I travelled around the country after college it came with me. I made tea in it, and coffee. I've had it almost as long as I've had anything. I've had it longer than I've had my car. I think it was the first kitchen thing I ever bought that I still have. Had. 

I wasn't even home when it cracked. 

I'm half-reluctant to get a new one and yet ... the coffee it made was so much better than from the drip machine that I'm equally inclined to replace it as soon as possible. 

Meanwhile, here's this photo. I haven't put my finger on exactly why it means so much to me. I haven't come up with a reason it shouldn't, either. 

Identity = ? (part 3)

Or heck, I could just post it all on that cooking blog I started a while back.

You tired of this topic yet, dear reader? I appear to have bored even myself.

Identity = ? (part 2)

... no, what I originally intended to write about was the tricky, slippery nature of online identity. In my quest for a blog I can share on various profiles that have my name on them, I went looking for a URL I could love.

So far, the ones I’ve tried are all taken: http://thisfar.blogspot.com/, http://highway1.blogspot.com/, and http://101books.blogspot.com/.

I wish the 101books person had kept writing; it seemed like a neat idea, and her comments made me laugh. Highway1: whatever I was expecting, it wasn’t German. Thisfar: I wonder what this was about...it looks like a list of books, but which books? Why? Blogs should have introductions, I think, a “this is why I’m writing” section for the curious reader.

On top of all that, naming things is not my forte. As a child, I named my stuffed animals things like “Kitty” and “Lion.” As an adult, I name my work projects things like “[Feature description] v2” and “Make [desired behavior] work.” I ask my engineers to name things, and their names are consistently better, funnier, and more on-point than mine.

So what’s a would-be blogger to do? I have no idea. I claimed [myfirstname][mylastname].blogspot.com, and even posted a first post, but it doesn’t feel quite right and I’m half-tempted to delete it. The thing about writing on The Internets is that, unlike in the real world, you have to name yourself. And if you’re not good at naming ... well, you write blog posts like this in an attempt to stall, hoping that a brilliant idea sneaks up on you while you distracted yourself.

Nope, nothing yet. I’ve got my eyes closed, I’m not looking....

Identity = ?

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about social networks: not the online kind, the which-of-my-friends-have-ever-met kind. A blog is a way of putting communication out in public for others to see, and this blog in particular is pretty anonymous. If you read it, you’re either a very close friend and know who I am or you’re the opposite: a total stranger with no way to track me down.

So what do I do if I write something I want to share with someone who’s an acquaintance? Worse yet, a work acquaintance? What if I want to link it from FaceBook & Twitter & LinkedIn?

I’m certainly not going to link here; that would mean I’ve got no outlet for the things I want to be truly anonymous. So currently, I just don’t write whatever it is. Or I write it but don’t post it, or I write it but send it only to my Mom (thanks for being my outlet, Mom!). This is ... to borrow a high school term I sometimes can’t resist ... lame.

I want to go public. Sort of. I want a single place to post everything I think is worth writing, and then I want to control who sees it.

Believe it or not, though, that is not what this post started off being about....

Finding peace

Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about peace. I don’t mean peace like the opposite of war; I mean peace like inner calm (if there is such a thing), peace as contentment, like the opposite of a noisy brain.

My conclusion is that it’s weird that there’s no peace-oriented Western tradition to follow. There’s yoga; there’s meditation; but where’s the European tradition I can pick up on? I don’t want to chant things in a foreign language or focus on my third eye or imagine chakras. I want my head to feel a bit clearer, but adding poorly translated Sanskrit phrases to the list of things I think about doesn’t seem like a particularly reasonable way to go about this.

Maybe this is why Catholics say the rosary? Of course, I’m not Catholic either....

And so I sit here, my computer’s screen blank except for this text. Laptop on my lap, I stare into the white-ish glow, legs crossed under me, and I type. I take a sip of water. I backspace a word or two, sculpting paragraphs and sentences into shapes that please me.

And I wonder:

Maybe a Western contemplative tradition is something I could just invent?

The size of money

This is one of those "because I think this is cool" posts. Somebody has digitally modelled exactly how big $10 trillion dollars is, physically: http://www.pagetutor.com/trillion/index.html

Interestingly, $10 thousand was a lot smaller than I thought, but $10 trillion was a lot bigger. I thought that familiarity would build accuracy (ok, no, I'm not familiar with a stack of $10 thousand in cash, but it is at least a number I can understand in terms of what it would get me; $10 trillion, not so much), but it doesn't. 

In which I am a little too good at research

At Christmas, my husband received a book called The Green Guide. As you might imagine, it’s intended to be a resource for how to live one’s life and buy one’s stuff in a more environmentally friendly way. It’s published by National Geographic, so it ought to be reasonably reputable.

I made the mistake of reading it.

Specifically, I ran across this section: The Dirty Dozen, which calls out various chemicals which one should attempt to avoid in personal care products. I read my shampoo bottle labels.

I read my makeup-container labels.

I threw out most of my lipstick, a couple of mascaras, and some concealer. I threw out the partially-used bar of soap in the shower. I bought new stuff from Burt’s Bees and Origins, and spent an evening happily playing with it (I know, I know, a whole evening? But I’ve been the only woman in the office for a good few days now; I needed some girlie time).

Then I started wondering a little more. I started doing searches for unlovely phrases such as [ cosmetics safety ], and I ran across the Cosmetics Database, and ran searches on some of the ingredients on the back of my packages, and realized I’d effectively gone from threat level 8 to threat level 2 or 3 or 4, which is nice and all, but fundamentally, there are no safe cosmetics which I was able to locate.

I haven’t even started on deoderant. I’m too scared.

I mean, I see hints that okay stuff might be out there, but they sure aren’t available in stores. And no one really agrees on what’s safe (is it disturbing that there are studies done about how well some of this stuff works for embalming purposes?) And who buys lipstick online? Please. I work for a tech company; I know enough not to trust the color I see on my screen.

To make myself feel better, I did a few more searches. I confirmed that yes, most household products are also unsafe. As is the off-gassing from the fabric-covered walls of my cubicle at work, the particle-board furniture in this apartment I’m staying in while I’m in NY, and certainly the bus fumes I walked past on my way home. If it’s all dangerous, I figure, why not look nice?!

Sigh. At least threat level 2 or 3 or 4 is an improvement on threat level 8.

My favorite things (I)

I know, I know, I spin myself as the anti-consumerist. But what I really am is discriminating. Every now and then I try something and find myself unexpectedly amazed. So here's the current list of stuff & services I love: 

Ultimate Ears Super.Fi 4 headphones. Seriously. They fit perfectly, and the minute I put them on the outside world just faded away, leaving me with only the Scissor Sisters for company. And that was with the volume on my computer dialed down to level one. I can't even hear myself type, must less the people chattering away around me. 

Virgin America airlines. Such good customer service that if they didn't have seats on my monthly flight to NY, I'd probably reschedule. 

Monica at DS Newman salon. She cuts my hair such that it looks good even though I never blow-dry and only get it cut twice a year. I don't actually know how this is possible, but wow is it wonderful. 

Last.fm. All I'm listening to right now (other than my husband's DJ-ing on our home stereo, but I can't take him to work with me unfortunately). And their Android app works with no hiccups when I go to the gym! 

Le Creuset and Lodge cast-iron cookware. I have abandoned all other pots and pans. Also, these two are pretty much opposite ends of the cost spectrum, which amuses me. 

Facebook: slightly less evil than previously assumed

They switched back to their previous terms of service: http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=54746167130

So I suppose I'll re-enable my account. Facebook is a convenient way to make myself findable. But ... will I ever upload very much info? Photos? Status updates? Comments on other people's messages? 

Probably not. And I'm starting to create backup methods to achieve the "make myself findable" goal. I've got a nicely-linked LinkedIn profile, and a brand-new blog on myname.blogspot.com where I'm planning to post just enough info to make it clear to anyone looking for me that they've found the right person, plus a way to contact me.... It turns out that no one owns myname.com, for crying out loud. Real Soon Now I'll get hold of it myself. 

Because given the economy, I want to be findable. I've already gotten a couple of emails from people asking about job leads, and if it all goes to pieces ("hope for the best, plan for the worst" - no, I'm not worried, just prepared) I might even want to send some of my own. 

Interesting times. 

Goodbye, Facebook

To anyone who's used to seeing me on Facebook, you may notice that I've suddenly disappeared. I'm one of the people who figures Facebook's new Terms of Service is unacceptable. Here's the guilty paragraph: 

You hereby grant Facebook an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to (a) use, copy, publish, stream, store, retain, publicly perform or display, transmit, scan, reformat, modify, edit, frame, translate, excerpt, adapt, create derivative works and distribute (through multiple tiers), any User Content you (i) Post on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof subject only to your privacy settings or (ii) enable a user to Post, including by offering a Share Link on your website and (b) to use your name, likeness and image for any purpose, including commercial or advertising, each of (a) and (b) on or in connection with the Facebook Service or the promotion thereof.

Nope, I'm not OK with any of that (and here's the full details, plus news stories). 

When I deleted my account, the screen showed the following message: 

Your account has been deactivated from the site and will be permanently deleted within 14 days. If you log into your account within the next 14 days, your account will be reactivated and you will have the option to cancel your request.

I wondered briefly whether I'd miss Facebook. It was nice that a few people I missed had found me using it. But you know, I still show up on LinkedIn, which means that by extension I show up in a Google search. That's good enough. 

Good enough

“It’s ... pleasant,” said S. 

We sat, half-turned toward each other, on a deep couch in the back of the wine bar. The wine bar is like something out of a movie, although a movie I haven’t seen, something about the tech industry and hedonism and the valley and the magnetic attraction everybody around here feels for things that are “cute.” The wine bar is in an old adobe building, and the ceilings are low, and the waiters use phrases like “not too heavy on the fruit” without thinking much about it, and the upholstery is vaguely mahogany-colored. In the back room, where S and I sat, there’s a fireplace with a semi-sculptured mural above it and, at least tonight, a Real Fire burning in the grate.

“Me too,” I said, and sighed. “It’s pleasant.” 

We’d been talking about all the things that aren’t quite right, from work to geography to relationships. We’d agreed that it was hard to complain, because things are ... pleasant.

“We cook dinner,” one of us said, and the other nodded.

“It’s nice. Domestic.”

“I’ve been working out a lot.”

“Work’s okay.”

“I think I’m in line for promotion,” one of us said, and the one who hadn’t said it nodded in turn.

A while later, we paid the tab, hugged goodbye, and went our separate ways. I drove the short distance home, pulled into my usual parking place, and walked down the red-painted path to my front door. I slipped the key in the lock, turned it, and went inside: home. It felt good to be here.

And yet I wonder: is this underlying something the famous, originally unvoiced female complaint? Is this what fifties and sixties feminism was about, this lurking feeling that there’s something ... more ... out there, that “pleasant” isn’t quite enough? Don’t get me wrong, I know this is 2009; I know S and I have it better, far better, than did our forebears. I know that.

And yet. Things are ... pleasant.

And pleasant isn’t quite enough.

Dear Sprint: Your billing is deceptive and unethical. I'm never using you again. And I'm telling my friends.

To: dan@sprint.com

Hi. I'm writing to object to the way Sprint handles billing for closed accounts which are out of the contract period.

I was a satisfied Sprint customer several times over the past few years, but when I cancelled my account, Sprint charged me for an entire month's service even though I only used three days. I am now *very* unlikely to ever use Sprint again. I certainly wouldn't recommend it to a friend - even though Sprint had great call quality & data speed!

And no, not all your competitors do this. Verizon doesn't do this. I once cancelled a Verizon account (to switch to Sprint, actually!), and they very nicely prorated my final month. So the next time I want a phone, Verizon's on my good-company list. And because you didn't prorate that final month, Sprint isn't even a possibility.

I know Sprint's been working hard on improving customer satisfaction, and fixing this policy so that you prorate billing for a customer's final month - not just for me but for everyone who cancels - would be a pretty easy way to do it. Even if you're short on cash, is it really worth knowing that you're not on my shopping list the next time I want a new phone? It's pretty common for people to switch carriers. Don't you want people like me to switch back to you? I seriously doubt I'm the only person who thinks this is not OK.

My account number is [xxxxxxxxx] if you want to fix things. Although what I'd really like is a refund, AND an apology, AND hearing that you've changed this practice.

I'm very disappointed.

Sincerely,
I.E.

The Big Important Meeting (fiction)

In honor of Joshua Ferris’ Then We Came To The End, I’ve written a short piece of office-set fiction:

Here’s how it began:

We were all - four from my team and four from our partner team, plus our Sponsor, and the Legend, and the Dragon, and the Grownup, and someone’s Admin, sitting around the table in the Room for Important Meetings.

My hands were shaking. I’d never presented to the Legend before. I had never even met the Dragon - and she was known to make grown programmers cry, much less very junior Planners like me.

The Dragon took a pen out of the plastic coffee mug in the center of the table and rapped it loudly on the table. She took out another pen and stacked it on top of the first. Very rapidly, using all the pens in the mug, she began to build a log-cabin type of structure out of ballpoints and softgels. As she did this, she glanced pointedly at the Legend.

“What’s with the pens?” asked our Sponsor.

“Oh!” said the Dragon. “Earlier on, my Junior lost a pen. The Legend thinks we’re stealing them.”

“You need a personal stash. A locked cabinet or a helicopter delivery,” said our Sponsor to the Legend.

The Legend nodded. Those of us who were there to present waited for some signal that the meeting should begin. We had handed out our handouts; my counterpart had his computer all set to display the Flowcharts, and I had my printed notes laid out in front of me, marked with red pen, ready to explain the Plan.

It was a Plan not unrelated to Plans that other junior Planners had presented before me. These previous Plans had all more or less gone down in flames. My ambitions for success were pretty much limited to avoiding derision and the sort of embarrassing screw-ups that lead to multiple nights of insomnia. If I came away with a good story, that would be a golden success. If no one asked how I’d gotten hired and no one said, “It sucks, go away and come back when you have your heads out of your asses,” I would be ecstatic.

The Legend got up and left the room. The rest of us waited. In most meetings, we would have opened our laptops and started checking our email or sending instant messages to one another. In this meeting, we sat quiet, our hands folded. We waited.

After a while the Legend came back and sat down.

“Let’s get started,” said our Sponsor. She reminded everyone of why were here, what we were here to talk about, and what we wanted from the Titled in the room.

“Thanks,” said the Senior on our team. He gave a followup introduction, explaining in a little more detail why we were here. He introduced those of us the Legend hadn’t met.

And then it began. My counterpart gave the first section, brought up the first Flowchart on the projector screen, and then nodded at me. I explained the Flowchart, what we wanted to do and why. My counterpart and I had carefully laid out the rhythm of the presentation: he would lead in; I would explain the What, which was the longest section and most prone to questions; he would explain the Why; he would close and I would support. Our Seniors were there for backup. Our Engineers would take any technical questions.

I got about halfway into my section.

“We get it,” said the Legend. “But why not....” and explained what he wanted.

“Oh, sure,” said the Dragon derisively. “We could just....” and spun out her own idea.

“We need to consider the revenue from...” said our Sponsor.

My counterpart and I sat quiet. Every now and then I asked a question or ventured a statement; every now and then my counterpart attempted to bring the conversation back to our presentation. He didn’t have much luck. Once one of our engineers raised a point about data flow. The Legend answered, and the conversation returned to its previous track of possibilities.

About an hour later, our Sponsor asked the Grownup for his opinion. “It sounds okay,” the Grownup said.

My team, and our partner team, and the Dragon, and our Sponsor, all nodded, stood up, and left. The Legend and the Grownup and the Admin stayed behind. Already there was another junior Planner waiting to present. We were two and a half hours late.

We went to the room next door and Debriefed. What was the outcome? What were our next steps? Who would drive? An hour and a half later we had made our way through a Thought Experiment and were on to Deliverables.

Outside the window we could see it was growing dark.

“Okay,” we said to one another, “okay.” We wished each other good weekends and good Friday nights. We wished these things sincerely. One person who knew I still had to pack a bunch of stuff before the movers came wished me good luck.

We picked up our laptops and car keys and notebooks and pens and empty recyclable coffee cups. We gathered our jackets in our arms, balancing everything carefully (but some of us would drop things anyway).

“Later,” we said, as we left the room. We did not specify what would happen later, or what we were referring to. Tired, exhausted, with a sense of the week having drawn finally - gratefully! - to a close, we followed one another out into the darkened hallway, and dispersed into Friday Night, and the Weekend.

Book #8: The Louisville Review, Spring 2005

I bought this a few years back because it was edited by my favorite author. Surely it must therefore be a trove of wonderful writing, poetry and stories I would enjoy for years to come!

Sadly, no.

Last night I reread it, skimming over poems that didn’t grab me, sinking into the one short story that did, always with the standard question in the back of my mind: do I give it shelf space?

Shelf space is at a premium. So no - no, I do not give it shelf space. Out it goes.

In memoriam, here are the poems I liked:

• Maureen Morehead: Morning
• Brad Davis: Anticipating Retirement
• Jonathan Weinert: Blazes
• Amy M Clark: Do you want to hold the baby?

All of these appeal due to the sense of recognition I get from reading them: here is someone who has described something I encounter, something I understand, pretty much exactly. I think I recall reading somewhere that appreciation due to recognition is the lowest form of enjoyment - but a) so what and b) I’m not sure I agree anyway. If someone has put into a words a feeling I’ve had trouble pinning down, and reading it helps me understand it, why isn’t that as artistically compelling as opening up a new idea?

I also sank into one story: David Brendan Hopes’ “Night, Sleep, and the Dreams of Lovers.” This wasn’t great - it was a little contrived and the ending didn’t match up with what had gone before - but I liked the idea. I liked what I imagine the story could have been. General idea is that a painter, very skilled, has his paintings stolen by a fellow student (an MBA, amusingly) - but the fellow student is stealing the paintings and resellling them for the painter’s benefit. In the end, the two characters interact less & less, and finally the painter disappears - which I thought was a bit of a cop-out. I would have rather seen the two characters go at it. There was nothing in the story itself that precluded interaction, fireworks, etc. - so why not indulge the reader’s curiousity?

Book #7: Reading, Writing, and Leaving Home, by Lynn Freed

For about a year I have been searching out books about writing: Stephen King’s On Writing, one by Annie Dillard, a couple of workbook-y things that appear to be part of a series, and most recently, Reading, Writing, and Leaving Home by Lynn Freed.
I have no idea who Lynn Freed is. I bought the book because of the picture on the cover: a young woman with neat 1950s hair, wearing a green dress and carrying a typewriter.
A chapter in, I almost gave up on the book. It was all about the writer’s childhood, her reactions to South Africa and her family, ie things guaranteed to bore me. I find that books about place which are written by people with a strong emotional connection to that place almost always do bore me. There’s no element of discovery, only justification of why the writer is writing about this. Ugh.
At any rate, I plowed on. The book was a convenient size for tossing in my backpack and reading in bed. And I still liked the picture on the cover.
Partway in, the author finally got around to talking about writing: the frustration of false starts, the need to bury or immerse oneself in words to make anything work. “Fiction does not come out of ideas....” “I had deafened myself with thinking....” “A wonderful thing happened. I gave up.” “I opened the notebook and wrote ‘Untitled.’ Then I had to lie down on the bed and sleep for the rest of the day.”
And from talking about writing, to talking about travel: “I have always been a natural foreigner.”
And about the course of life: “still I was asking myself the question I had been asking for as long as I can remember: Is this what you want? ... only now did an answer arrive without a hint of prevarication: No.”
And finally, and most important to me currently, about writing programs, about workshops, about MFAs: a long chapter about the misery of teaching in such, about the inherent contradiction between an environment of incremental progress in a group setting and the solitary nature of getting words down on the page. I read this as justification for not studying what I spend time on, both visual and textual, for the arrogance of thinking I can churn out a manuscript in the next few months. I read this as a challenge, or, better-phrased (since my response to challenges is usually to glare and decide not to play) as inspiration.
Those parts of the book, I couldn’t put down.
I only wish those parts of the book composed more than half.
So I am left with a quandary: give it shelf space? Photocopy the chapters that matter to me and sell it off? Reread it again in a year and see what I think?
I still like the photo of the girl in the green dress, staring out so precisely with her typewriter in hand.

Menus for the week: Jan 18

Brussels Sprout & Mushroom Ragout
from Vegetarian Suppers
~~
Walnut Crostini with Cambozola & Pears
from Small Plates
~~
Buckwheat Crepes with Fried Eggs
from Vegetarian Suppers
~~
Guacamole & Chips
n/a
~~
Leap year cocktail
from what’s-its-name cocktail book

The media tells me that during a recession, people nest (tangential: and so big-screen TVs may do OK after all). During a recession, we all hunker down: conserve resources, have friends over for dinner, reduce-reuse-recycle, save.

And indeed, this weekend I spent two nights out of town, but at a friend’s house rather than a hotel, and contrary to custom there was no fancy restaurant involved. Instead, last night H made paella and we played with the baby and drank wine in the living room and looked out at the lake.

Today I logged on to PlanetOrganics.com to check out my upcoming produce order, and rather than my usual attitude of ‘let’s see what’s in the vegetable box and cross our fingers that it goes together to create dinner,’ which does occasionally result in my throwing out things that I either didn’t have time to prepare or just didn’t get around to, this week I planned what I will cook. See above. I’m assuming some nights of bread and cheese and a frozen pizza or two and fruit salad and mac-and-cheese and a couple of nights out.

Given that this week I’m also going to a Sharks game and presenting to one of our Most Senior Execs at work and trying to make progress on the Crazy Project and going to the gym three times (three! not two like last week!) and probably some other stuff too, I figure this is plenty ambitious. One relatively fancy thing, two simple yummy standbys, and a medium-difficulty. Not bad, I hope. The mushrooms are there as a tease, to get me to do the most complicated thing early-on, before they have time to go bad. If I can pull that off, the others will be easy by comparison.

Social graces

In Peets this afternoon:

Me (taking out computer powerplug out of bag and looking down at electrical outlet, which is full): Um....
Guy at next table: Oh, do you need one of those?
Me: Yeah, I’m about out of power.
Guy: Ok, can you wait like five minutes? I’m almost done.
Me (thinking: WTF? You’re one guy using two plugs! And you ask me to wait?!): Oh, are those both yours?
Guy, tone very annoyed: Yeah, are you like totally out of power?
Me (relieved I won’t actually have to point out that one person using two outlets and then refusing to share is ridiculous): Yeah, I have about thirty seconds before this dies.
Guy, after a pause where we stare awkwardly at one another: Okay, you can unplug the computer. The lower one.
Me, unplugging: Thanks.

And we return in silence to our screens.

And I think to myself:

WHO DOES THAT?! Really?! You use up both available electrical outlets and then act like you’re doing someone else a big favor by giving one up a little earlier than you want to?! Really?! That is SO RUDE! And it just totally violates the unspoken ethical code (“share stuff”) of People Who Take Laptops to Cafes!!!

And okay, fine, taking a laptop to a cafe may be a little pretentious, but I’m testing the theory that I’ll get more done on the Crazy Project if I don’t go straight home first so I have a Worthy Goal and anyway at least I’m not charging my *!/$% phone at the same time!!!

I mean, come on. You’ve been here for at least twenty minutes so you’ve had time to get your battery partly refilled.

SO RUDE!!!

Of course, I didn’t actually say any of that....

A study in contrasts

Yesterday evening, at about 11:30pm, I finished reading War and Peace.

This evening, at about 9:30pm, I finished reading Stephanie Meyer’s New Moon.

I’m sure that says something about ... something, but I don’t really want to think too hard about it.