So, here I am, another nearly 3 months later between updates.   Sorry!  Its been busy...

Labels: Boston, diet, Guitar Hero, house hunting, ICA, mortgage

So. I've really been sucking big time at this blog writing thing. And in fairness to me, I've really had no time that I'm not working madly at work, working madly at home, or piled into a heap on my living room couch with a brain made of mush.

Labels: IRS, Keith, life, new year, taxes, work

The month has been a busy one, filled with non-stop travel back to Pennsylvania and/or volunteer commitments. Therefore, I am just getting the chance to type this entry in the last 20 minutes of my lunch hour.

I read an article a few days ago that talked about how many New Englanders feel that this year's as well as the most recent years autumnal display of color has been lacking. I've been hearing that a lot lately and have to agree. This year in particular, it seemed that only parts of trees lit up with their fire-y reds, brilliant oranges, and bright yellows, while other tree limbs and other entire trees seemed to from green to a faded brown, papery mustard, or dried burnt russet color. Having grown up in the southern Allegheny Mountains of Pennsylvania, I know something of leaf peeping--but even at home the leaves seemed to lack some of the former splendor I remember vividly from my childhood. Some of my favorite trees in my yard, more than three hundred years old, were felled during my college days due to disease and age, and so, perhaps its just that I'm missing my favorite red oak in our backyard.

Bedford County has been suffering a bad drought the last few years, this year being the worst--Boston's been luckier to have some late summer and early fall rains, but not much more than my hometown. When I was growing up, every summer night almost was filled with torrential thunderstorms on hot and humid summer days (and most of them were hot, sticky, and muggy) and most Indian summer nights. I used to sit in the bay window of the living room eating popcorn and watching Evitts Mountain to see the lightening striking at various points across the night sky.

The lackluster leaves seemed to be a parallel representation of my life this month which has had its brilliant sparkling bits, but was otherwise blase, sometimes decidedly frustrating in its discouragement. Sure, it started out nice enough with the chapters meeting in Lancaster for Franklin & Marshall on Sept. 29-30, and then my birthday, and then my trip to Bedford October 3-8. Regrettably, I found through that my stress levels in getting my work done betweens days off and a burdening workload, home errands run, packing and unpacking, the added expense of all these trips, and having exhaustion as my frequent companion overshadowed much of the enjoyment I typically feel in this favorite season of the year.

It was Tuesday last week sometime when I commuted home feeling utterly frustrated and near weeping, in the twilight (yet again, even though my day's supposed to end at 4 p.m.)--angry yet again that my plans to leave on time and reclaim some of my life had again been thwarted by a lack of planning and not seeing any way out of not having exhausted evenings for the next 5 months. It was windy and the skies were almost purplish owing to the late hour of the day and the hazy clouds that had blown in. The leaves on the broken sidewalks below me seemed to almost take on an otherworldly brilliance--the leaves became peach, mint, saffron, white, soft scarlet, and soft chartreuse---the dim light contrasting with the duller color of the leaves and making something very soft and beautiful. As the wind blew, and the glinting leaves rolled across and around my legs in cascades, I felt disappointed that in some odd way, I couldn't feel any pleasure in seeing these colors and watching the leaves flutter in the breeze--all I could think about was the stress I had leaving work that day and already dreading my return the following morning.

The contrast between now and October 23, 2006, when I began my work here at HBS is startling. While no where near the level of constant pressure and stress that came with working in BU Housing, I'm definitely feeling the time is ripe for transition. I have yet to have a job that leaves me feeling, well...intellectually fufilled. Perhaps my expectations of the "real world" are just too high coming out of a liberal arts college education topped off with a master's in education. I don't know. In meeting with Suzanne, a career development guide at HBS, she agrees that I'm way overqualified for what I do. I'm glad someone does. I can't help but worry that the concept of starting low, working hard, and being promoted at work is going the way of the dinosaur. My greatest fear is that by doing this work, which my faculty really appreciate, that I'll become pigeonholed and be seen as completely unable to step up for greater things--and I know I can! There must be more to work life.

Since then, I've thought about the leaves I saw around me on the broken sidewalks of Allston on that smoky Tuesday autumn night and their meaning--nearing darkness and dullness inadvertently colluding to create something that looked so soft and yet so vibrant at the same time. Is there a meaning or a metaphor to be glanced from this? Or is it just something beautiful, just like all the other something-beautifuls of no particular significance?

Labels: autumn, Bedford, Boston, busy, drought, fall, October, stress

So I needed something mindless to do and took this rather tilted, not very subtle test (well, two polls--one on being a Democrat and the other on being GOP).  My results were:

You Are 8% Republican

If you have anything in common with the Republican party, it's by sheer chance. You're a staunch liberal, and nothing is going to change that!

and...

You Are 88% Democrat

You are a card carrying Democrat, and a pretty far left one at that! There's no chance anyone would ever mistake you for a Republican.

If I was to ante up a guess, it'd probably be something like 70% Democrat/30% Republican. Oh well.

Labels: Democrat, political philosophy, poll, Republican

Finally an opportunity to sit and think...

I’m writing this over the air above Boston--we’ve just taken off for Harrisburg, which means I’ll have a precious 1 hour and 45 minutes or so until I will be again amongst people for the weekend--until I go to Harrisburg to fly home Sunday.

I am in a back row with ah hem, a rather large woman, who is nice and friendly but making me contort my body in my seat. Its sad she’s obese and furthermore sad for me that she turned down the lady next to us who has a whole row to herself who offered to switch seats.  I’d rather act kindly to her, so I’ve been making some chit chat. She’s now dosing a bit and I’m typing this blog since its one of the rare times I get with being so busy to reflect and write a bit.

Just now it occurred to me that my 27th birthday is 5 days away. My birthday always sneaks up on me--perhaps becaue it is right at the beginning of October. Lately, I haven’t even had time to talk to my own husband, as we’ve been out in the evenings or just too tired to think, let alone talk about our lives and going ons together.

I think I should take the next few days to decide what I want the 28th year of my existence to be about. 2-8 was always the age I said I wanted to be when I would have children. Still, that seems awfully close and I feel awfully unprepared and not at the level of seniority and responsibilty career-wise that I want to be.

I’m a little sad that Keith is working today and not coming on this trip. We always travel together. We’re rarely apart. In fact, the last time we were apart was...hmmm...

...maybe June 2005? I went to a camp in early June 2005 for three days. I can’t think of any other time we’ve been away from each other for more than 24 hours.

Thinking back, maybe its a little amazing that we haven’t killed each other living together for 4 years and married for two years, considering we’re constantly around each other. On one hand, I miss him. On the other hand, the idea of sleeping in a bed without him snoring next to me has be a little excited (and a little guilty feeling).

Meanwhile, back in Boston, which is now 10 minutes of flying behind me, I’m sure Keith’s a little sad, but probably quite content that he’s got the whole apartment to himself until mid-Sunday. I think the freedom will go to his head probably, like a heady class of wine.

Last night was nice because we were able to use a $10 off voucher at Legal Sea Foods in Harvard Square. I got the mussels I wanted weeks ago from Polcari’s (where we dined for our anniversary), and lobster bisque, and the shrimp trio dish they didn’t have at the waterfront Legal’s in early August. We got to see and talk with each other too.

I hope I don’t look like the dumbass young alum this weekend. I’ve been barely coherent all week being run off my feet with my mind absolutely spent. Still, I’m really glad I have the opportunity to be asked to sit in and weigh in on this alumni board meeting to talk about ways to engage alumni around the country. And of course, I’m excited to see how the campus has changed--since its open unlike it usually is when I’m in Lancaster over a holiday weekend or break.

Labels: air travel, alumni, college, Franklin and Marshall, Harrisburg, obese

Labels: cooking, cuisine, engrish, mama, wii

Alyssa's computer bit the dust the other week, so we buckled down and ordered a bunch of new Mac gear.

Since she had an iBook from three-and-a-half-years ago, we decided the best fit (since she likes them small - and she doesn't need anything overpowered, albeit something peppy enough to last a few years is of course ideal) would be the Macbook. And she likes the white ones (like me).

Since I just got the Macbook a few months ago, we know first-hand what is up (except the new ones with the Superdrive come with more hard drive space and a faster processor), so we were pretty happy with that. At first, Alyssa was thinking that maybe we throw more memory in that one and switch, since I want more eventually, and since mine was a replacement and was stock, I didn't have the option at the time. We decided it could wait on my end and Alyssa deserves to have the new one with no marks or scratches. Even though mine is for professional purposes, the specs on the new one wouldn't be any real significant boon, so she should have the joy of a new machine.

Well, since we got this done online via the education discount, she qualified for a new (albeit not the new design) 4GB iPod Nano (free iPod - cool). Her iPod from two years ago has been doing great, but can't argue with free.

Also, she was offered (I guess another 'Back to School' thing) $100 off select printers - so we got a pretty nice $130 Cannon. So score again.

So we got the essential item (a new laptop for Alyssa) plus AppleCare - not that we didn't spend enough money - but Alyssa brought up on thing that we were on watch for... a new monitor for me... You can see where this is going... no?

For the work that I do, I need extra real estate for graphics and layout - hence the 70 lb. CRT that was on my desk. I also need things to be as spot-on as possible for the color - which also explains the giant pre-owned CRT. But in the end, I have a 10+ year old CRT which occasionally flickers and takes up far too much of my desk. It so was ready to be replaced, and we were thinking high-end, widescreen LCD.

So, Alyssa asked if the Cinema Displays at Apple would be good, and I let her know they are very high-quality for the work I needed to do, but were a little pricey. I do stuff freelance, so it not like I need to spend tons of money and get the best, but we looked at the price for the 23" widescreen with the education discount. We happened to also see a factory refurb in stock and snagged it.

So these trickled in, one by one, through the week, culminating (for me) with the display on Tuesday of this week. It is very nice. I haven't had tons of opportunity to use it for work, but it is very nice and it alleviates the clutter and nastiness of my desk.

We also picked up the other week some keyboard-protector things for our laptop. Alyssa's is clear and mine is black with white letters printed - so we can tell them apart (well, at least when they are open). So we are set for gear for quite a while.

Now for rearranging my workspace so I can make good use of all the new room on the desk.