The next day

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Today is my 4 years.

Today is the day I was sitting at my desk in my shared office in the basement of my work building in Vermont, collaborating with my officemate Carol and our very creative and artistic colleague about what design to put on shirts for our walk-in computer clinic.

We were brainstorming. Kicking around ideas. Justin was super animated, bouncing around like a caged bee between my desk and Carol’s across the room. iChat was open on my MacBook Pro, and it was chiming A LOT, but I absentmindedly turned off the sound because I was busy with the people in front of me.

And then my phone started buzzing. A text I will never forget. A text I didn’t believe. A text I truly hoped was a very cruel joke. A text from the person who had introduced me to Dawg’s Cereal Wednesday world, and therefore the world of Puppy Monster. A text telling me of the events the day before.

I excused myself from the brainstorm, went into the room with all the filing cabinets, and called Adam. I asked him if he was joking; he was not. I became more hysterical than I already was. I don’t remember the conversation because I was shutting down emotionally, but I eventually hung up. I went into the dark stairwell. I went into the bathroom no one ever dared go into. I went back into the room with all the filing cabinets. I just wandered while my mind raced.

And then I went back to my office and sat at my desk, stunned. I asked that we table our brainstorm discussion for a later time. Justin left the room and Carol went back to work. I just sat at my desk, frozen.

Before that text Dawg was an Internet friend. Puppy Monster was a special guest on his Internet cereal show. After that text, DJ was the first person I truly mourned and Dawg was someone I wish I could find in the world and give a hug until I could make it all better.

Today is the day four years ago that changed me as a person forever. The day I truly understood that life is too short and should not be wasted on a life lived without purpose.

Today is the day I celebrate DJ’s short life, even though I never got to be with him a day he was alive. Today, and every day, I think fondly of how DJ has his dad’s ears, his dad’s arms, his dad’s hands, his dad’s eyes, his dad’s button nose, his dad’s hammy smile for the camera. Today, and every day, I keep him in my heart where he belongs.

Thanks for reading.

Decisions

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It seems a little premature to announce that I’ve decided to become a member of the same volunteer ambulance organization that Dawg is part of, since I have to go through an interview process and be accepted, but could actually be rejected as a new member. I’m going to take the jinx risk and let the universe know about this before it becomes a sure thing.

It’s a world I will be honored to be a part of if they let me in. A lot of the people who volunteer there are my family without the blood relation, I feel very comfortable there, and I’ve done everything for them from raising money to washing dishes to directing traffic to waving in parades. I’ve attended memorials, dedications, celebrations, award shows, fundraiser events, and blood drives. What I haven’t done yet is dispatch or ride on the ambulance to go save a life or stick a Band-Aid on a boo-boo.

I don’t actually know if I have it in me to be on the ambulance, but secretly I hope I have what it takes to be in the back helping someone be stable enough for transport to the hospital. I think I want to be part of this world. And I’m willing to lose my $10 bet with Dawg that I won’t be on the back of that bus by June 12, 2012.


Me and Dawg working the Austin Street Fair
June 12, 2011

No intention of quitting the day job. I just need something… more.

Like Mother Like Daughter

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A bunch of people did this meme and I p’shawed every single post until I saw that my mommy did this meme too.

Have I ever mentioned that my mom is one of my most favorite people in the entire universe? She is.

  1. ONE OF YOUR SCARS, HOW DID YOU GET IT? I set myself on fire by leaning over the stove with a loose shirt on
  2. WHAT IS ON THE WALLS IN YOUR BEDROOM? Photos of people, kitties, and dogggies we love
  3. WHAT DOES YOUR MOBILE PHONE LOOK LIKE? It looks like a Droid X
  4. WHAT MUSIC DO YOU LISTEN TO? Trance and hip hop and electronic and pop and jazz and stuff
  5. DO YOU KNOW WHAT TIME YOU WERE BORN? I think about 1:45pm on a Thursday.
  6. WHAT DO YOU WANT MORE THAN ANYTHING RIGHT NOW? To go to bed
  7. WHO DO YOU MISS? I miss a lot of people and a lot of furry kids/siblings
  8. IS ANYONE IN LOVE WITH YOU OR HAS A CRUSH ON YOU? My boyfriend is crazy about me
  9. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU KISSED? My boyfriend
  10. WHAT’S YOUR MIDDLE NAME? sigh… it used to be Lynn
  11. THE BEST TV SHOW EVER CREATED? Family Feud! (I dunno)
  12. THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO? My boyfriend
  13. DO YOU GET SCARED IN THE DARK? Late at night, yup
  14. THE LAST PERSON TO MAKE YOU CRY? Me
  15. WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE COLOGNE / PERFUME? Axe Vice / Romance
  16. WHAT KIND OF HAIR/EYE COLOUR DO YOU LIKE ON THE OPPOSITE SEX? I’m not specific about it, but I adore Dawg’s very dark hair with his beautiful brown eyes
  17. WOULD YOU RATHER BE SMART OR FUNNY? Smart
  18. COFFEE OR ENERGY DRINKS? Coffee
  19. WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE PIZZA TOPPING? Pepperoni or garlic, depending
  20. IF YOU CAN EAT ANYTHING RIGHT NOW, WHAT WOULD IT BE? Steak, well done and cheese fondue
  21. WHO IS THE LAST PERSON WHO MADE YOU MAD? The guy who kept opening the train door between cars to stick his head in there and watch the train ride the tracks 4 stories in the air
  22. DO YOU SPEAK ANOTHER LANGUAGE? Sometimes
  23. WHAT WAS THE FIRST GIFT SOMEONE EVER GAVE YOU? A wombat? An eggplant? (Mom?)
  24. DO YOU LIKE SOMEONE? I like my boyfriend
  25. ARE YOU DOUBLE JOINTED? No
  26. FAVOURITE CLOTHING BRAND? I don’t know
  27. WHAT’S YOUR DREAM CAR? Kia Sportage
  28. WHAT COLOUR IS IT? Silvery/Grey Greenish
  29. WHAT’S YOUR FAVOURITE KIND OF EXERCISE? Brain Games
  30. WOULD YOU FALL IN LOVE KNOWING THAT THE PERSON IS LEAVING? I can’t help falling in love, so yup
  31. WHAT IS THE BEST WAY TO TELL SOMEONE HOW MUCH THEY MEAN TO YOU? A hug and words out my mouth, or a card if I am nowhere near them
  32. WRITE A NUMBER FROM ONE TO A HUNDRED? 4
  33. BLONDES OR BRUNETTES? Silver foxes
  34. WHAT IS THE ONE NUMBER YOU CALL OFTEN? My boyfriend
  35. WHAT ANNOYS YOU MOST? People who try to engage you in things that are none of your business
  36. HAVE YOU BEEN OUT OF YOUR COUNTRY? WHERE DID YOU GO? WHAT PLACE DID YOU LIKE BEST? England, Belgium, Canada. I really like all three of them, actually.
  37. YOUR WEAKNESSES? Dawg, the kitties, and savory snacks… and cute animals
  38. FRIES/CHIPS, RICE, OR BEANS? Fries with a side of rice and beans
  39. FIRST JOB? Computer lab lackey
  40. EVER PRANK CALLED SOMEONE? Yes
  41. WHAT WERE YOU DOING BEFORE YOU FILLED OUT THIS? Watching The Good Wife
  42. IF YOU COULD GET PLASTIC SURGERY WHAT WOULD IT BE? Um… *shrug*
  43. WHY DID YOU FILL OUT THIS MEME? Because my mom did :)
  44. WHAT DO YOU GET COMPLIMENTED ABOUT MOST? My knowledge and/or helpful nature
  45. WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF ALCOHOL BECAME ILLEGAL? I would rejoice in the fact that I would have less of a chance to receive drunk emails
  46. WHAT DO YOU WANT FOR YOUR BIRTHDAY? Steak, fondue, my mom’s camera, and a hot bedroom romp with my boyfriend. Maybe a movie, too. (I REALLY LIKE MY BIRTHDAY.)
  47. HOW MANY KIDS DO YOU WANT? I have four furry kids, and if they are all the kids I ever have that is fine by me, although I know Dawg and I would make adorable human babies
  48. WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE? I have heard I am named after my father’s middle name but I’m not sure both of my creators actually know that (my dad seems oblivious to this fact when asked)
  49. DO YOU WISH ON STARS? I have done that, and the wish has never come true
  50. WHICH FINGER[S] IS YOUR FAVOURITE? Middle (LOL, Mom!)
  51. WHAT WAS THE LAST THING YOU ATE? Sesame tofu with vegetable roll
  52. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING? Love it! Much messier now that I rarely use it, though…
  53. WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE LUNCH MEAT? Cheese!
  54. ANY BAD HABITS? Yes
  55. WHAT IS YOUR MOST EMBARRASSING CD ON THE SHELF? Perhaps one of Pitbull’s earlier albums, although I only have the electronic version of that album
  56. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON, WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOU? Yes
  57. HAVE YOU EVER TOLD A SECRET YOU SWORE NOT TO TELL? Yes
  58. DO LOOKS MATTER? Yes
  59. YOU RELEASE YOUR ANGER? I have a very vivid imagination.
  60. WHERE IS YOUR SECOND HOME? I feel 100% comfortable showing up at Dawg’s parents’ house and making myself right at home
  61. DO YOU TRUST OTHERS EASILY? No, I do not.
  62. WHAT WAS YOUR FAVOURITE TOY AS A CHILD? My books, my TV, my Atari, and my furry siblings
  63. HOW MANY NUMBERS ARE IN YOUR MOBILE PHONE? I hate the phone part of my phone, so I’m not getting up to go look at it
  64. DO YOU USE SARCASM? Every chance I get
  65. DO YOU KNOW ANYONE FAMOUS? Yup.
  66. HAVE YOU EVER BEEN IN A MOSH PIT? I have been in the very direct vicinity of one, but not in the path of the actual moshers
  67. WHAT DO YOU LOOK FOR IN A PLACE TO LIVE? The potential for excitement without the forced necessity of it
  68. WHAT ARE YOUR NICKNAMES? Poppy, Stef, and a variety of pet names
  69. HOW MANY HATS DO YOU OWN? WHAT’S YOUR HAT SIZE? More than 3 and less than 10. I don’t know what size hat I wear. Probably small like my mom.
  70. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? I seem to have over 25 pairs of shoes, none of which tie… I hate untying my shoes, although I love tying shoes. I still remember being taught about the bunny ears.
  71. WERE YOU UPSET ABOUT STEVE IRWIN DYING? Yes, and it made me cry to see Bindi talk about her dad
  72. WHAT’S YOUR FAVOURITE ICE CREAM FLAVOR? Mint chocolate chip
  73. ARE YOU LAZY? Yes, yes I am
  74. WHAT ARE YOUR FAVOURITE SONGS AT THE MOMENT? I don’t even know their names, I just know when they start playing on my iPod Touch all is right with the world
  75. WHAT IS YOUR FAVOURITE BAND? Daft Punk
  76. HOW MANY WISDOM TEETH DO YOU HAVE? None
  77. DO YOU WANT TO GO ANYWHERE SPECIAL THIS YEAR? Texas to visit Bdogg’s new BABY!!!!
  78. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? The Good Wife
  79. LAST THING YOU ATE? Sesame tofu with vegetable roll
  80. LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? My boyfriend
  81. WHATS THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT YOURSELF IN THE MORNING? I am surrounded by family I love very much, both furry and human
  82. FAVOURITE THOUGHT PROVOKING SONG? Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
  83. FAVOURITE TWO THINGS TO HATE? Incompetence and people too stupid to understand they’re incompetent
  84. FAVOURITE DRINK? Fat free milk on the rocks in a frosty mug
  85. FAVOURITE ZODIAC SIGN? LEO!
  86. SPORTS YOU LIKE TO WATCH? Wrestling on a regular basis, then anything else that happens to be on the TV in front of me
  87. WHAT IS YOUR HAIR COLOUR? Dirty/strawberry blonde with the beginnings of straight up white hair intermingled… and red at the tips because I haven’t had my hair cut officially since July 2008
  88. EYE COLOUR? Hazel
  89. DO YOU WEAR GLASSES? Yes
  90. SIBLINGS? 1 brother, 1 stepbrother, 3 stepsisters, and a wonderful woman who was my sister for a large portion of my life but no longer is technically, so she instead named her daughter after me
  91. FAVOURITE MONTH(s)? July
  92. DO YOU LIKE SUSHI? I hate fish and I hate seaweed, but I like all the other bits of it! WASABI!
  93. LAST THING YOU WATCHED? The Good Wife
  94. FAVOURITE DAY OF THE YEAR? Christmas in July (my birthday :)
  95. ARE YOU TOO SHY TO ASK SOMEONE OUT? No
  96. SUMMER OR WINTER? Summer
  97. KISSES OR HUGS? Kisses from Dawg, kisses on the cheek from New Yawkahs, hugs from everyone else. I’m picky that way.
  98. RELATIONSHIPS OR ONE-NIGHT STANDS? Relationships
  99. WHO IS YOUR FAVOURITE CELEBRITY? Randy Orton. *ahem* I MEAN NYC WATCHDOG!
  100. WHO IS THE LEAST LIKELY TO ASK YOU ON A DATE? People of a fancy pedigree (*burp*)
  101. BOOKS YOU’D LIKE TO SEE TURNED INTO A FILM? Scott Sigler’s books Infected and Contagious

I would like to write on my blog.

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The other night I tried to publish a post about my anger over a family member not being able to be buried because Vermont is in Mud Season and the ground does not meet the correct conditions for the gravesite to be dug up.

It’s very upsetting to wait for closure. And each day that we wait for the cemetery conditions to be right I find myself becoming more and more angry that my family must put a hold on their grieving process.

This family member lived a very long life, filled with both good things and challenging things, and deserves to be put to rest.

I’m borrowing that word my brother taught me at 3 so I can say:

Fuck you, Mother Nature.

Thanks to my blog for cooperating today, and for letting me post a much less polished display of my feelings on this subject so that I look like an idiot. You may not be renewed the next time your domain comes due.

Great expectations

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I take my work very seriously. I take pride in what I do and want to do the very best I can. If there is a portion of my job I’m not good at I want to do what I can to improve my skillset in that area. A portion of my job is to supervise. I have supervised in the past, and have acted as a mentor and advanced resource to my colleagues in other positions, but being a supervisor is something I haven’t had a lot of formal training in, so since my place of employment offers courses in the subject I’ve been taking as many training sessions as I can.

One common theme is emerging: Setting expectations.

If I expect something of you and you don’t deliver what I expected, but I never told you that I had that expectation, then is it fair of me to be mad at you when you fail in my eyes?

Our feelings are fair to have, but if you don’t set someone up for success then chances are they will inadvertently fail you.

A scenario, if you will: I expect you to pick up a loaf of bread on the way home, because this morning I was making sandwiches for your lunch and ended up using the last of the bread. You see in your lunch that one of your sandwiches is a crust sandwich (the sandwich using the beginning and end pieces of the loaf). But I never explicitly asked you to get that loaf of bread. I’m perfectly capable of getting that loaf of bread myself and I didn’t specifically mention that I used the last of the bread on your sandwiches today. You come home from work after a long day, expecting that I will make you sandwiches for the next day, but you didn’t bring home any bread.

Murky double-fault/no-fault/depends who you ask situation there.

Excuses I could come up with to blame you for this situation: I make the sandwiches so why should I have to buy the bread? I make the sandwiches with double-crust to signal it’s the end of the loaf, so why should I have to say anything? You’re a mind reader and you know when I am throwing away the bread wrapper that I don’t already have a second loaf of bread in the kitchen, even though you know I’ve been to the store at least three times this week because I brought home other groceries three different days this week.

I think you get the point of how assuming without setting expectations up front can lead to a lot of ridiculously stupid assumptions on the other end of something as simple as sandwiches for lunch.

I’m just curious where you are in the Expectations cycle. Are you still expecting without communicating your expectations? Or have you figured out that the secret to successful communication is to clearly state your expectations, make sure the person on the other end of those expectations is willing to agree to those expectations, and you both follow through with your part of the expectations?

SEDUCTION! SEDUCTION!

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My first day feeling like a human again was spent at work until 6:15pm. That’s a touch later than usual. Know what happens when I work a touch later than usual?

All the skip-stop trains are finished running for the rush hour.

AWESOME.

I waited 15 minutes for my first train, then another 10 for the connecting one, only to see that it was so packed that there was no way I was getting on it. So I waited for another train to arrive. And got a good train! With seats! Woo! A local train… but, still a train! To home! Where my family is! Except… the only seat left on said local train was next to a woman who apparently doesn’t like touching men because she wouldn’t move to her left or her right so there wasn’t actually a seat. I could have pushed the issue, and definitely would have if it had been a day earlier when me being able to stand wouldn’t have been an option, but I was feeling good so I stayed standing.

And then two stops later That Guy got on the train.

The guy who has to feel everyone up as he walks by, but does it in a way that it would be SUPER HARD to prosecute. He used his backpack to rub up against my calves. Thank goodness for knee-high boots underneath my dress pants.

And then he started out-of-tune humming along to his music which no one else could hear because he was being (considerate?) by not blasting his music to the train.

And then he started going from out-of-tune humming to saying “SEDUCTION! SEDUCTION!” and I went from bothered to pissed.

At the next stop the chick with the man issue got off the train and a woman who had gotten on the train after me looked at me to bargain for the seat. I waved my Vanna hand at it and said “ENJOY!” and walked to the other side of the car, which happened to be extremely packed, but no one was trying to be sexually inappropriate in any manner physically or vocally.

I knew if I had stayed near the man who was what other people would consider the equivalent of eating spaghetti on the train

(provided for your reference:

) I would have had to go Kung Fu Popstar on his ass… and for crying out loud I just wanted to go home so I chose to move myself out of that situation.

Moral of the story: If someone’s bothering you, you have three choices…

1. Confront
2. Act all bothered and pissy and passive-aggressive
3. Remove yourself from the situation and choose a more important battle in life

Today option number 3 was my choice. And it’s a choice I made after a lot of times making choice 1 or choice 2 and finally learning that there is another option.

Irony is a dish best served in a cast. What? Oh, stop, I’m sick.

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It’s no fun to see famous people and not be able to tell you I saw them.

Today nothing of consequence occurred.

Well, I did buy some soup and popsicles. And interrupt a meeting, at the presenter’s request, to install software. (… oh hai, i’m just the it guy bustin in on your MEETING, what WHAT! …) And make an entire train car of people think I was going to turn them into zombies with my sneezing.

But you know that’s not what I actually want to tell you and can’t. Ohh, what good Cereal Wednesday episodes I would have if I was allowed to ask them to participate…

*sneeze* *sneeze* *sneeze* Someone else help Dawg put the laundry together? Please?

ok, bye.