Anti-reflection-fest

Fully aware that I'm (still) avoiding my Christmas letter because I don't feel yet like reflecting upon 2009.

Fully aware that it didn't even register until 2 days ago that we are also at the end of a decade (that every media outlet in creation is making top-10 lists about), which has caused me to be even more overwhelmed at the pressure to reflect -- either here, or in the Christmas letter.

Fully aware this all sounds terribly negative ... when truly, I don't feel all that negative. Just curious about why and how a writer loses desire to reflect. Or maybe trying to pretend this is not, indeed, how I often seize up when trying to write something "important." I often do.

No. Reflection is good. Living in the moment works, too, effortlessly combining old and new.

Which is how I plan to spend tonight's bridge between the decades: at my old grad-school friend A's place with a bunch of her friends. Drinking wine. Making a new mushroom and caramelized-onion risotto recipe from ye olde creative chef friend, Chris. Eating the last dessert before the diet. Game-playing, hanging with her cats. We might reflect. Although I kind of hope not.

Tomorrow morning I mean to start the new year with a couple shots of espresso, then get in the Mazda and head up the coast to Salisbury. There's a 10K I've registered for.

The NYD run has been constant of my time in Boston .... and the seaside's forecasted bluster (rain, they say) should be no match for last year's post-blizzard ice skitter ... so I'm not worried.

And I'm not planning to give it any symbolism, either. So don't ask.

But Happy New Year. With all due merriment. Really.

Casual ≠ easy (a.k.a. come on, boys)

I know y'all are going to bash me over the head for even having this conversation.

But I'm still incredulous. (Even though I shouldn't be.)

Incredulous at the number of adult males convinced life would be easier if they just had a girl on the side to sleep with them when they had the time, magically requiring nothing else.

I find this increasingly with online dating. Men for whom a commitment would be a burden. Despite getting along conversationally and us finding each other relatively fascinating -- they have no interest going on a date to see if we get along. They'd like to have me around for a hook-up. If I'm not up for that, they're not up for me.

Today's lunch-hour example: Local. My age. Nice eyes. A skydiving instructor in his spare time. Hit me up to say hi, and we let forth 20 minutes before we got to the crux. (And there is always a crux.)

Local Man: so how are things going for you on OK?

Karin: OKC and I have a bit of a history. It goes in fits and starts.

LM: i hear that

K: How about you?

LM: well I signed up a while ago but then work got very busy so I hadn't checked in a while. just kind of checking it out again now

K: I always like hearing the honest male perspective about the site.

LM: it's been ok i guess, have only met one person

K: I have met some normal, non-crazies on here.

LM: well that's good. I have faith that there are a few normal people left in the world haha

K: Well, I worry about that more and more the older I get... ;-) But, me too.

LM: haha, yes thats true. so are you looking for something more serious or casual?

K: Well, to be blunt. I have been-there-done-that with casual, at least for now.

LM: i hear ya

K: I am definitely trending wanting something more regular. "serious" might not be the word. Serious sounds too scary.

LM: haha

K: "serious" -- amazingly at this age -- seems to scare the shit out of most guys I've talked to.

LM: yes I'm sure

K: What about you?

LM: Well to be honest, I think with my schedule at this point, I think something a bit more casual

Naturally. Line in the sand.

I should know better ... but would you believe I actually tried to sound rational and persuade him in a different direction?

Silly me.

We stayed all dignified and respectful, but the result was the same.

K: this isn't a criticism but just an observation ..... why does "casual" always seem like an easier option to people? I find it rather stressful!

LM: i can understand that too. seems so non committal

K: Yeah.

LM: but I just think with how my work schedule is and planning on going ... to teach skydiving for a few weeks, that I wouldn't want to lead anyone in the wrong direction. not being able to be there for someone the way a person should be ... I wouldn't want to start something and then say, oh by the way I'm going away for a few weeks

K: But wouldn't it be great to just go into meeting someone and seeing what happened first, before deciding what you wanted out of it?

LM: yes that's true but again, you don't want to lead anyone on or make them feel like they have wasted their time

K: I understand where you're coming from. But just being upfront about your schedule should usually cull the field. If she can't deal with the 3 weeks away then you wouldn't want her around, anyway, eh?

LM: true. but i think that also limits the potential

K: You asked me about my experiences on here ... and almost every guy I talk to has a reason upfront for wanting to have a casual relationship. And it seems to also limit the potential.

LM: true

K: Why not just meet someone and see what the possibilities are? Then go from there.

LM: well again you just want to be upfront about it

K: True.

LM: especially if someone has Casual in their profile. Good to ask.

Yes, folks. I still have it on there.

I also have 100 other things in my profile. Including "looking for a long-term relationship." And he didn't ask me about being Lutheran.

K: True. Good idea. So what is your definition of "casual?"

LM: just someone who is comfortable getting together when they have time and having some mutual fun together ...

The fantasy of every man.

Every man, perhaps, who hasn't tried it yet.

K: Got it. Well I've done that. I can understand the appeal.

LM: and i understand it's not for everyone. hence why i ask upfront

What I love is his suggestion that he's unusual for wanting to have sex without commitment. If he were a woman on OKC, approached by men across the age spectrum for exactly that ...

K: Did you hit me up because I listed casual?

LM: well I liked your profile and your pictures and was curious to see what you were open to

This is where I'm always lost in the male rationale. If he likes my profile and my pictures, why wouldn't he want something more?

Our discussion went for a bit about how not very many women list casual as an option. I tried to explain my relative dilemma at doing so.

K: There are some fine lines to being a woman here. I get almost ZERO hits if I take casual out of my profile. I used to have it on there, had some experiences, kind of got it out of my system. So I took it off. Like I said....no hits. Not even views. So I put it back on.

LM: i can understand that

K: hence why I reacted like I did when you brought it up.

LM: but it might save you from having waste of time conversations if that isn't something you are looking for

K: Well it is a matter of then having no conversations at all...;-) Trying to find the middle ground, I guess. Still working on it.

Thus, we ended. Amicably, yes. Agreeing that if either of us changed our minds about what we were looking for, we should reconnect.

But, neither of us are any better off for having found each other both date-able and desirable. A lunch hour I'll never get back.

Perhaps I'm naïve thinking I could persuade him by saying I've tried casual relationships and, that while sometimes they work and are often fun for a time, they are no easier than being in love or being committed. They still can take up your time, still can make it hard to sleep a good-night's sleep, still can be rife with unfulfilled expectations.

(P.S. Being naïve isn't easy, either.)

Still in the office

Can't decide why it's 9:07 p.m. and I'm still in the office.

Because ....

.... once I decide to work past 7 p.m., I might as well stay the whole night?

.... I'm wearing my fall coat and a skirt and don't feel like walking down the sub-zero wind tunnel called "Clarendon Street" towards a car that has been sitting in a sub-zero wind tunnel for 15 hours? (not like it's getting any warmer the longer I wait)

.... I know the gym closes at 10 and the longer I wait to go there, the less time I have to spend running inclines on the treadmill? (unfortunately necessary to prep for the 10K I'm doing in 2 days, since training in sub-zero wind tunnels is equally unfortunate)

.... I'm in mad, passionate love with the growl of industrial vacuum cleaners late at night, second only to the squeal made when a cleaning crew wheels industrial garbage cans across marble floors?

.... I'm really, really, really, really, really, really avoiding writing my Christmas letter?

.... going home and going to bed because I'm sleepy would be too easy and lame ....?

Probably the last of the latter.

Oy.

Almost (!)

You know you've been blogging for awhile, too long -- maybe, when you find yourself mimicking the exact same subject you wrote about on the exact same occasion you did the year before not once, not twice ...

(been there with the identical 2008 and 2009 pre-Christmas snow-ins .... and duplicate O'Hare outgoing madness )

.... but 3 times in 1 week.

This time the culprit was (wait for it) the return Christmas flight from Minneapolis.

I am always wistful on my return flight to Boston, from wherever. Even the rare times when a man is waiting at Logan to pick me up, me dying to see him. Even when there's an afghan to crochet or a pile of Christmas letters to address. Even when I'm drenched in a cynical, non-focused haze of self-regard like the one I can't seem to shake this season.

I desire, more than I desire most things, the possibility of a connection with a fellow traveller. I'm not a romantic. But what is romantic in me is easily stirred by the random encounter and (what seems could be) its endless possibilities.

Sunday, it actually kind of happened at MSP.

The storyline isn't special:

Brief flight delay, an hour to spare. Feel restless, carrying too much baggage to walk laps, with no desire to sit waiting. Desire instead a mid-afternoon Chardonnay and the Packers game at the bar across from the gate. Find a man on the next stool on his 8th hour of trying to get to Chicago, on his 3rd standby list, on his 3rd (or 4th?) tall Bud Light. (Gregarious, blond, animated.)

Enjoy inebriated bitch session about O'Hare and standby lists. Discover you both work in finance. You both love Boston. Pending his place on the list, you are on the same flight at 3:19. Talk so animatedly the guy on the other side of him leaves in annoyance at being left out.

Then ... lose track of each other in the slightly confused rush to gate upon realizing the time.

It's a natural part of the storyline: you will always lose each other in the slightly confused rush to the gate. As if stepping outside the bar confines is the harsh light of day after a one-night stand.

It was OK. He's a youngin'. He lives in Chicago. He drinks Bud Light.

But even that remote connection, for 15-minutes on the E Concourse at MSP, gave me and my resident cynicism a lift, at least until I stepped off the plane in Boston and resumed my real life.

Greetings from Minnesota

It's been snowing for 2 days. Christmas just ended. Two days full of Swedish meatballs and prime rib and candy up the wazoo and singing and lounging and driving over the, amazingly, drivable highways of the central part of the state, to the various homes of various family.

Now I'm just back from a late night tromp down the road from my mom and dad's place, here in Buffalo, for fresh air and some quiet after these days of talking. The streets are slushy, so I stayed on the sidewalk. Or what used to be a sidewalk. Tonight it evidently doubled as a snowmobile path.

It's so very Minnesota.

This is a good thing. Minnesota is a good thing. This girl's reflectivenss gene has lain dormant these last several weeks .... stymieing production of a Christmas letter and Christmas gifts and general goodwill to all people. Which is a fancy way for saying that I've been damn crabby.

It's difficult to stay crabby when hanging out with family members who drive through both slush and wind to be there, and the toddler nephew toddles about dressed in a toddler Santa outfit and the red zinfandel is flowing, followed by coffee and then a couple cans of Grain Belt beer apiece and dozens of tangential conversations and so much homemade food goodness there's no room here to elaborate.

Here is when I must recall some folks don't get even one of these many luxuries .... and when I know I must be so. very. grateful.

And then, after all that, I get home safely. And I get to put on the Sperry Topsiders and skate down the snowmobile paths of a traffic-free road as the flakes just keep falling on my bare head and hands.

Crabbiness, begone.

Inside joke

Presenting .... the original Sage Risotto.

(If you get why this matters ... you get it.

If you don't get it .... well ... it was some cheesy goodness spiced up with Jimmy Dean sausage and washed down with a zesty Chardonnay. And that's all you really need get.)

Dateline: United Airlines 541 12/22/09

Ah, air travel at Christmas.

The predictable delayed connection through

the great black hole of the Midwest,

Chicago O'Hare.

(Fog.

Something about a low ceiling and limited landings.

Your typical cluster-f@#$.)

Although, had our departure not been pushed back 90 minutes,

we would have missed taking off into the sunset.

Heading west from Logan, 4:45 p.m.

The bad news ....

I was supposed to be in Minneapolis about 20 minutes ago.

The good news ....

ostensibly, I'll get there yet tonight.

Merry merry.

The more things change...

This I can live with.

December 20, 2008

December 20, 2009

The good news, though,

is this year I'm flying out on

December 22 instead of December 24,

possibly precluding the normal

travel hell deja-vu / Christmas Eve in Logan affair?

One can hope.

Saturday (so far)

Sleeping in until 12:15 p.m ...... necessary.

Braving the 20-deep line at the Family Dollar Store on West Broadway, all for the sake of cheap dishwasher soap .... grateful for survival.

Realizing it was inadvertantly wise to have parked on a Non-Snow-Emergency Route when a Snow Emergency has just been declared in a neighborhood of Snow Emergency Routes .... priceless.

Realizing soon after a drive to Target at the South Bay Shopping Plaza for the sake of cheap, bulk cat litter and food is a necessity, not an option .... inevitable.

Realizing that giving up a prime parking spot to hang out at Target with the 800 other people who had the same idea ..... headache-inducing.

Realizing that once I get home and find a new parking spot, I must stay in all night and make Christmas cookies and drink wine and anticipate a snowy day tomorrow that includes a dear friends' open house followed by a date with a man I had a first date with just on Wednesday, but which went well enough (including a deal-breaker of an unexpected goodnight kiss at the Copley Square bus shelter) that we needed to set a second date sooner than later .... nice.

Very nice.

Now I just have to a find a parking spot .....

Basic algebra

First, let's say you sleep on the same side of the bed every night.

Then, let's say you have a cat who likes to sleep on the same side of you every night.

(Do also factor in habit of said cat to never jump on bed directly from floor; he must jump onto nightstand before climbing past your face to settle his massive rear end against your hip.)

Then, add the first really cold night of the season, a night where you might choose to light a votive candle in the candleholder on the nightstand next to your face because it cozies up the place.

Knowing this, please calculate the odds that when you climb into bed, said cat will jump on the nightstand and catch on fire before leaping onto the bed, causing a brief vision of a charred bed and cat skeletons and the phone call the police will make to your parents in Minnesota, informing them that their daughter made it to 36 without knowing how to put 1 and 1 together.

Oy. Oy, indeed.

Need for Speed(o) VII: Dénouement

Since we're 4 days and a full mindset past this august event, I'll keep my reflections brief.

(Ha! again.)


1) People who run can drink a lot. I've never seen so many folks slugging back Long Island Teas at 11 a.m. while at the same time exposing 98 percent of their completely ripped physiques:

Gives credence to the twin adages that alcohol contains performance-inducing carbohydrates and that I'm not the only one who runs primarily to eat and drink whatever I want.


2) A lot of folks I know read Boston.com. And wanted to know about this race. Because a lot of folks I know directed me to this link as early as late Saturday afternoon:

It pays to make friends with the Globe photographer, because a professional wouldn't put a bad picture in his paper.


3) The cold really was more tolerable than you might expect. With the wind chill the air felt like about 5°F.

But a scarf and arm warmers helped. A shot of Grey Goose did, too. It also helped, once on Boylston and huddled in a clump like so much cattle, we jumped up and down en masse for 10+ minutes screaming "Spee-DO! Spee-DO! Spee-DO!"

Even if it caused wicked-cramped calf muscles and endless armpit views like this:

I mean, I shaved.....but hey.

4) Sometimes naked flesh is sexy. Sometimes not. From the middle of the pack, this was my view for most of the run.

Proves that even folks with chutzpah and defined abs are human in their underwear.

Seeking the groove

Last night at 10:50 I went running through Southie until exactly 11:20.

It was a hard 30 minutes. Creaky knees, creaky ankles. Labored breathing. I looked at my watch every 90 seconds. While slogging the final 3/4 mile uphill on Dorchester Street to the intersection at Broadway, I was convinced my lungs were going to give way.

(They didn't. A relief to my neighbors, I'm sure, to not have to endure a 911 ambulance call at that hour.)

Other than the frozen pseudo-mile of the Speedo run Saturday, I haven't run in 16 days, my longest break since a 2005 hand-surgery hiatus. Last night felt like I'd never run.

But it was good to seek the groove again. Many nights in the last month I've talked myself out of needing to do this, convincing myself I had drinks to drink or stair-climbers at the gym more weather-friendly or laundry to do. Just like anything, then, the longer you talk yourself out of getting back to a habit you want to get back to, the higher the hill to overcome.

It was a g-mail conversation on Saturday with the Young Scientist (a serious speedster if you remember) that gave me an opening:

YS: You been running a lot recently?

K: Eh. Not at all, actually. I'm not running cause I feel sluggish....and feeling sluggish since I'm not running. I just signed up for a 10K on NYD, though, hoping that will spur me. Yourself?

YS: Been running with the intention of training again starting on the new year.

K: Like you ... I need a fresh start...

YS: start now by doing 30 min per day, or so. after the race do the real training

That was the key: the 30 minutes a day. I can run 30 minutes a day.... can't I?

I'm not going to keep a running (ha!) tabulation in this space to prove I can. Although I'll most likely publicly flog myself if I don't. Stay tuned.

Holiday reflection (kind of)

Since living in Boston, every year when this week arrives -- the week before I get on a plane to Minneapolis -- I love it and hate it.

I'm a last-minute Christmas person in every sense of the bad cliché, true to my nature for last-minute everything, and this week gives me the proverbial ulcer.

Ask my family. Christmas makes me a wreck. I have never not stayed up all night before the morning I fly out .... finishing afghans, doing laundry, making presents, hunting down cat-sitters, writing the annual letter ..... and then I'm usually addressing the envelopes for said letter (and still making presents) while on the plane. Cousin J once told me that it wouldn't be Christmas if she picked me up at the MSP airport and I didn't have rolls of wrapping paper sticking out of my carry-on.

This year is trending worse than most, since work has been crazy busy, the Santa Speedo event took up most of my last Saturday, and all my friends seem to be in similar last-minute social-planning mode. Believe me: I'm not complaining about parties. I love parties. I love the people that organize them. Yesterday I got 3 invitations that gave me someplace possibly else to go tonight (already got one planned!), Thursday and Friday. This is on top of an Advent commitment at church Wednesday night, an all-day-baking extravaganza on Saturday (part of my Grandma's Christmas present), and more church and parties already on Sunday.

But I fly out next Tuesday. I want to celebrate this season with my friends. In between now and then I could conceivably do all the above, and then I also need to work every day. Compile the Christmas letter. Buy presents. Wrap presents. Find the cat-sitter. Occasionally sleep. Etc.

It never changes.

Don't know where I'm going with this, other than to get it off my brain, where it had been since I woke up this morning at 5, too tired to get up but too wound-up to sleep. I'm certainly not alone in this embarrassment of riches that despite all intentions, causes more angst than joy.

But indeed, if having too much is my greatest concern, my life is a cakewalk.

Friends Who Are Boys: The (First) Editor

And now a break from our regularly scheduled narcissism to shout out to my friend Alan, who on Friday was elected president of the National Press Club.

Not just the regional press club. The National Press Club, the "world's leading professional organization for journalists." The kind of club that interviews the Rev. Jeremiah Wright. The kind that, for Alan's inauguration ball in January, is featuring Honky Tonk Confidential, a band led by CBS "Face The Nation" host Bob Schieffer.

Of course, the story is that I knew Alan "when." Since April 1993, my first day as features editor of our college newspaper and he, assistant editor, sat with his feet on the desk, dressed in standard-issue tie-dye, Chuck Taylor All Stars, and Kurt Cobain hair.

Looking back at who I was then, it was rather unlikely that I'd hit it off with someone as outspoken and gregarious as Alan -- known on campus at that time, primarily, for antagonizing the College Republicans. He grew up near Motley, Minnesota and was planning to be a history professor, I believe, and he turned me on to REM during that year of long nights in the newsroom.

But we did hit it off. We rode bike down to Fargo's first trendy coffee shop. He taught me chess. I wrote a long non-fiction profile of him for my senior seminar and he made me a tape of Nirvana's Heart-Shaped Box on repeat. He took a road trip with his girlfriend to see my hometown. Here we are in front of the Concordia bell tower in 1995:

I'll fast-forward through our intervening years. Obviously, Alan did not become a history professor. He helped run the newspaper at the University of Minnesota, followed it with jobs at a series of Midwestern dailies, and landed in Washington in 2001. He now covers agricultural policy for Bloomberg News and has traveled on fellowships to China and Ethiopia, among many other achievements.

We've always stayed in touch, some years meeting up at the NPC for karaoke night (true!) or other years, time only for a cup of coffee on the fly. He's a runner, so we'll talk about running. Or the incongruity of me working in finance. Or pop culture of any sort. Or about what we miss about Minnesota.

It's good to have old friends. Especially one whom, from the first day, was so smart and ambitious and chutzpah-driven and curious and a cut-above that you knew he was capable of achieving anything he chose to do, and that some day you'd be writing a piece about "Alan Bjerga .... yeah, the guy standing there with Dick Cheney on The Daily Show .... I knew him when ...."

So of course I'm not surprised he is in charge of this country's journalists, 15 years after being in charge of me.

Many congratulations, my friend.

Need for Speed(o) VI: Proof

Yup.

Tales to follow.

Nerve

While walking through the Back Bay this morning, sun beaming, wind howling up Boylston Street and straight through my knee-length fuzzy-hooded parka and into the depths of my pancreatic region, I could only think (and, begging your pardon for invoking the colloquial cliché) that it was cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey.

And that was while wearing a down parka.

I don't think I'm ready for this cold. Particularly because boston.com gave today's weather forecast as this:

Friday, Dec 11 Windy and colder
32°F 21°F

Then, they say tomorrow looks like this:

Saturday, Dec 12 Partly sunny; breezy
36°F 26°F

See that Friday notation of 32°F for a high? See my comment about the brass monkey?

That doesn't give me a lot of faith in the improvement to 36°F. Nor does the important omission on Saturday of the word "warmer" after "breezy."

Oy. You may think, next, that I'm going to whine, now, about the whole swimsuit bare-tush jog up the same street tomorrow, and that I've lost my nerve.

Hell no. Bring it on.

(But I am going to go shopping for leg warmers after work.)

Me & Kurt .....

My new, recent, method for painlessly enduring the #9 bus commute has been to delve into our city's esteemed free daily, the Metro.

(I know, I know. If you're a Bostonite, do not mock. Please. Simply easier reading to hold with one hand when you're standing in the aisle gripping onto a seat back, your backpack and your coffee with the other.)

This new habit comes from a renewal of my love for Sudoku. The Metro features 2 daily, and I do the "easy" level while still waking up in the morning and the "hard" on the way home. Focusing on the puzzles allows me to suppress any aggravation from fellow passengers, stoplights, squawking brakes and jerk-stops.

That aside -- after 2 weeks of such Sudoku-ing, it was only today that I noticed another daily Metro feature, just above the puzzle boxes: Word of the Day. Partially because the word is so foreign, so cool, so normally unused by most ...

maunder (MON-duhr), intransitive verb: 1. To talk incoherently; to speak in a rambling manner. 2. To wander aimlessly or confusedly.

Quote: "Now I find myself maundering about parts of plays hardly anybody knows or cares about anymore, such as the graveyard scene in 'Our Town.'" -- Kurt Vonnegut, "Timequake"

Do I even need to explain why this applies to me?

As of today, all posts on this blog labeled as "Rambling" will now be tagged with this more appropriate intransitive verb.

Dateline: View from the Office, 12/9/09

2:34 p.m. Looking through the hurricane to Boylston Street, the Back Bay beyond, and the Mass Ave Bridge and the Charles undiscernible in the back.

(Not pictured: 45-mph winds & the creak of the Hancock counterweights as we sway in the breeze.)

(Not pictured, either: Snow. That which we were supposed to get. That which every other town in Massachusetts got today, instead. Oh well .... a grey Christmas, perhaps ...)

If only he never had to write....

A couple nights ago, in the OKC inbox:

hello dear

what a nice lady u are I would like to talk to you more and know u better if you interrest just keep in touch see you bye!

Spam alert, of course.

Or maybe not. Just a moment later, he had sent a second message, this one more targeted :

awwwww

and I saw that u are a pianist also Im a pianist too I got dgree from julliard school in newyork:)

Ah, the courting ritual on OKC these days: first, troll for sex; second, check for common interests.

But Julliard for piano? Worth at least a minor delve.

It was as expected .... the prose of someone not familiar with English.. Half-Turkish half-Italian, he says, and in Boston as a concert pianist. Three of his 4 photos are of him playing, 1 showing him furiously ripping on a Chopin score. He is 26. When he is not practicing, he likes to go clubbing. (Or, in his spelling, "clupping.")

One of the very first posts on this blog described how a perfectly nice guy with a perfectly nice profile lost my allegiance when he revealed himself as a poor writer. More recently, I connected with a young man in Wisconsin with whom I almost fell in love on the strength of his wit and our shared facility for literary seduction, even if he proved to be a total troll.

I want to be attracted to talented, fun-loving people even if their language skills grind obnoxiously on my ear .... my brain .... my sensibility .... my libido ....

But it's not happening.

Writing isn't everything. Although, perhaps good writing is just too crucial and I'll have to face it, Julliard or not.

Perhaps I need to stress that criteria next time I update the profile?

Need for Speed(o) V: Oy.

So campers, mea culpa:

I did indeed buy a swimsuit that will cover my stomach

(figuring that--despite my vow to eschew carbs for the next 5 days and do nothing in my spare time but push-ups and planks--exposed winter-white glutes will be humbling enough).

Today I was walking to the bus dressed in sweater, long skirt, knee-high boots, wool coat, hat and gloves ..... and felt a bit chilly. I then realized that in this whole equation, the second thing I forgot to factor in (after realizing I'd actually have to buy a swimming suit, evidently) was that it could possibly be really, really cold next Saturday....

... like the windy and high-of-32 that Boston.com is forecasting.

I don't know about you, but I'm getting wicked excited. Wicked.

Start of the season

I was running over the ice-covered streets o' Southie this morning, iPod set to the newly-loaded Christmas-themed mix, when this twirpy little Sufjan Stevens tune popped up:

Put the lights on the tree

(put them on the tree, put them on the tree)

Put the ribbon on the wreath

(put it on the wreath, put it on the wreath)

And call your Grandma on the phone

(call her on the phone, call her on the phone)

If she's living all alone

(living all alone, living all alone)

Tell her Jesus Christ is here

(tell her he is here, tell her he is here)

Tell her she has none to fear

(there is none to fear, there is none to fear)

If she's crying on the phone

(crying on the phone, crying on the phone)

Tell her you are coming home

(you are coming home, you are coming home)

If anyone has a theory as to why it is the most unlikely of holiday songs that will make me cry out loud on the street .... do share.

Thankful (Redux) ...

.... for 69 degrees and sunny in December, even though simultaneously frightening ....

.... for Glenn Gould's existence and what he does to Bach's Bb Major Partita No 2 ....

.... for the no-news-is-good-news news from the doctor appointment yesterday ....

.... for Joy & Brian and Nick & Kelly and Lisa & Sam and Christine & Mark and your other (seemingly hundreds of) friends whose babies are being born healthy this month ...

.... for other friends who invite you for walks on lunch hours, others who invite you to their home for a Nepalese feast, for still others who agree to spend a Saturday baking Christmas cookies for homebound folks from church ....

.... for another friend who knows where all the last calls are and meets you at one, who buys you the $13 martini, then stands on the street in Brattle Square and listens to your historical litany of bad-romance-and oversexed-inconsiderate-male stories and laughs with you until 3:25 a.m. on a Friday morning, without himself acting the part of oversexed-inconsiderate male, then after making sure you get home OK, texts again at 3:55 to invite you back out for diner breakfast at IHOP ....

.... for the miraculous ability to function at work on 4 hours sleep, which only manifests when the lack of rest seems to have actually rejuvenated you ...

.... and for whatever inspires an attitude adjustment that allows you to balance out the cosmos and remedy the bad mood of a day before and enter the weekend with equanimity.

Thank you. Peace out.

Deep Thought: Whose Fault is it Anyway?

Rhetorically ....

.... on the days that, despite working very hard to be equable in face of overwhelming chaos, you manage to directly or indirectly offend everyone you encounter ....

.... from the Southie meter maids ($100 for being too close to an unmarked "handicapped ramp" abutting, of all things, a marked driveway?), to your first direct manager and then your second direct manager and then the sales manager and then his internal sales associate and then one of your service contacts in Tampa and then another service contact at Schwab, followed by the doctor you ended up seeing because your own doctor was unavailable, followed by the office manager at your church, to a recent date who won't answer your e-mail .....

.... and you haven't even gotten to 4 p.m. and think of all the folks you should encounter in the next 8 hours and can't wait to see what kinds of shenanigans you'll resultingly kick up, if trends continue .....

.... do you ever just wonder if the problem is you? ....

..... or, could there possibly be a city-wide conspiracy of dunces pulling the strings to ensure your relative insanity?

On days like this, I do.

Need for Speed(o) IV: Distressed Garment(s)

You know how some days you just got nothin'?

Today, I got nothin'.

The adjective to best describe current state: Drained.

(Like the stack of turkey-leftover soup pots in my kitchen sink are not.)

That said, it occurred to me with all this talk of squats and lunges and abdominal discipline and fundraising to get ready for the Santa Speedo Run, I have many times intimated what it was I was planning to wear. However, I really have no idea what I'm going to wear. All I know is:

1) It needs to be cherry red.
2) It needs to be runnable.
3) It needs to be mildly tasteful.
4) It needs to smack of heedless Christmas cheer.

(What the hell? This is going to be more of a challenge than sucking in my stomach.)

I went down the street a few days ago to my favorite running attire store, City Sports, for inspiration and discovered that they have everything in pink and nothing in red. Meaning my inspiration has been curbed ..... and, being Drained and all, the thought of a massive www search is beyond me today.

Are any of y'all willing to pass on suggestions that meet my criteria?

December Firsts

.... first day the Mazda 626 will have a bonafide, legal South Boston Resident Parking Permit Sticker.

.... first day of Facebook life after getting over the incredulity that my 67-y-old father, who doesn't even have his own e-mail account, has friend-requested me and, now that I've accepted said friendship, have to think twice about any future status updates.

.... first day wearing the BCBG Paris Braden Platform Leather Mary Janes I scored at DSW in my first (yes, first) shopping spree of 2009 a few days ago. Which was also the first time I have willingly entered a department store on the Saturday after Thanksgiving.

.... first date tonight (beers and eats in Harvard Square) with the first guy who, responding in a discussion of my 5'2" stature, said, "Don't feel the need to wear heels. I like short girls."