On Deadlines

In college I had a professor who said he assigned term papers to give his students a chance to do their laundry.

That's the thing about deadlines, when you have one you'll do whatever you can to avoid it.

Sadly, my laundry is done. My kitchen is clean and my baseboards shining. There's nothing to do but write the flippin' things.

That's why I'm blogging.

500 words. It's not so many, not so long. This isn't a thesis or even a term paper. I'm 10% done-- I have 50 words written and yet I'm paralyzed.

I haven't had a writing deadline since the spring of 2002. I'm out of practice. I can't churn things out any more. Still, a journey of 1000 miles start with one step, an essay of 500 words with a sentence.

I have to keep my eye on the prize-- the way it will feel when it's all done!

Update: It's 7pm, well, 5 past. I have 138 words. 362 left to go. Say a prayer, gang. Say a prayer.

Update, 2: 4 minutes before 8 and I have 250 words. I'll get to 400 easy, 500 may be a stretch. If I can get it out by 10, I'll be happy. Dear Lord, how do people do this for a living? I'd go barmy.

Update, 2.5: 8:28, 300 words. Yee haw!

Walking Girl

Well the frost is on the pumpkin and hay is in the barn.

Or, rather, the homeless guy is burning trash and the radiators on.

I guess James Taylor lyrics don’t really transfer from the Berkshires to Manhattan. Le sigh.

Indecision 2008

HELP!

I've been afflicted with a terrible disorder.

It's interfering with my life.
Robbing me of my sleep.
Doing away with my appetite.
Making me question my sanity.

I'm watching the prices fall on airfares. $539 return to London. It's fallen $15 dollars since Monday and $49 since Friday.
I'm obsessed with it and have put off buying a ticket.
I'm like Ebenezer Scrouge here.
Ebenezer Scrouge and Hamlet, a combination of the two. A Victorian miser and a Danish prince who may or may not have been insane but certainly couldn't make up his mind.

This is no good my friends. No good.

Do I bite the bullet and just buy the darn ticket, falling prices be damned?
Do I fly into Gatwick or Heathrow?Do I leave bright and early Monday morning (as is my custom) or do I take an afternoon/evening flight and give myself another day?

Please, give me insight oh wise ones. Or just, you know, make the decision for me!

Immature

Several years ago, round about my (first) junior year of college I had the strangest dream. I dreamt that all the families for whom I baby-sat got together and gave me a child. They presented it to me, faces beaming, saying, “we know how much you love children, and how upset you are that you can’t get pregnant. We decided to give you a baby.”

I remember the feeling of panic, of thinking, “yes, of course this is what I want, but not now. Now is not the time.”Of course, what I said was, “I can’t have a baby now! I get drunk on a regular basis!”

Clearly articulates my position, no?

There seems to be a bit of a baby boom happening. The Clinton D. Kemps, The Devin L. Burgesses and, of course, The Mary-Knight T. B. Youngs (Mr. David B. Young), are all pregnant.

Babies, they’re on my mind.

Last night, I walked home from the gym. At the grocery store I realized I didn’t have my keys with me. Oh, and my roommates weren’t home. So, I did what any normal person does in such a situation:I entered my apt building through the restaurant downstairs.I went to my downstairs neighbor’s apt and climbed out her window and up the fire escape. Yes, that’s right, I climbed into my apt through the fire escape.

I CAN’T HAVE A BABY NOW! I CLIMB UP FIRE ESCAPES INSTEAD OF USING THE FRONT DOOR!

going mobile

Blogging from my blackberry! Will wonders never cease? Will this prompt me to post with greater regularity? Stay tuned...

8,760 Little Hours

A film came out a while back, I’m not sure how long ago, entitled Things We Lost in the Fire.
I never saw it, I think I may have seen a preview, but I’m not sure.
In any case, I have the impression the film is about more than the material goods that burned.
It deals with the “everything now is different” experience. Life was X it is now Y and it is Y because of Z; the fire in this case being Z and providing a line of demarcation between X and Y.

I am, given my general personality, inclined to view lines of demarcation in a negative way. Before I got sick. After my grandmother died. After I crashed my car. Rarely do I highlight the positive changes. After I moved to London. After I redid my apartment.

This summer was, of course, filled with change. For that matter, so has this year. It’s puerile, I think, to mark this change as “new job” or “family death.” It doesn’t capture exactly how different my life feels in now from before, the exciting and (mostly) positive ways in which it is different. Today though, I think I stumbled upon it.

It’s Thursday. The Thursday before pay day. I asked my assistant if she was going out for lunch and rolled her eyes and said, “nope, brought.” Then it dawned on me. Of COURSE she brought her lunch. Tomorrow’s payday who has lunch money today?

So that’s it. I’m now living AFTER I stopped worrying about having enough money to buy lunch.

This feels good.

Extemporanious

In 4th grade my mother gave me a book of poetry by Judith Voirst (she of Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day fame). If I Were in Charge of the World was the title and my mother inscribed it with the message, "Don't you wish you were!"

What can I say? I like to hear myself talk. I also like to tell people what to do. That I am the eldest daughter of 4 children is not unrelated. But, I digress.

I especially like to hold court as it were (ed., perhaps that's why I have a blog). Give me a drink or two and well, my usually loose lips come unhinged.

Fortunately for me, my roommate adores these ramblings and calls them my “Dr. Seuss’s Guides.” As in “Doctor Seuss’s Guide to Having an Affair and Managing a Business,” the title of one of my more recent monologues (ed., I am neither having an affair nor running a business). I make pronouncements, give advice and make commentary on a variety of subjects. Monday’s subject was, predictably, relationships. The details of these lectures are always fuzzy for me, but apparently the phrase “corn-fed thighs” came up, several times.


Corn fed thighs. Just the phrase makes me laugh.