Unsubtle Druthers May 28, 2008

Time to rip on work again. I don’t really care if you believe everything I say about what happens where I work. I don’t lie. I know some of you might get sick of hearing about it. Sorry. It’s kind of a big deal, ok. But hopefully this will be funny.

I am going to list the not-so-ordinary, unsubtle things I’d rather do than work this job:

Go to the dentist.
Get another allergy scratch test. All 4 hours of it.
Paint my fingernails and get my ears pierced (if you know me you’ll understand this one).
Wear makeup for a month (ditto).
Shovel (literal) horse crap for a living.
Use the fonts Comic Sans and Sand (limit 3 uses, ever… let’s not get crazy).
Undergo another 6am 5-hour glucose resistance test.
Have a gynocological exam.
Shower only every other day for several months.
Listen to an entire O-Town album. Or, any album of questionable value. Ever. Make that.. 13 in a row.
Give up one of my favorite foods.
Leave my toes dislocated for one hour per day.

Note: I will probably update this list a few times. RIght now I have to get back to work.

Re: Unsubtle Unstable (Update) May 24, 2008

Perhaps you read a couple posts ago about “something big” happening this week? FYI, it was further maddening/heartbreaking.

Oh well.

For Jenna May 22, 2008

For those of you who don’t know Jenna, she has been my friend since we were early teenager-age. We met riding at the same stable, painting the same fences, shoveling the same horse poo, and carpooling and trailer-buddying like it was our job.

Continuing in her awesomeness, Jenna is now in vet school, and even doing some research into melanoma, the cancer that ended up taking the life of her trusty, dopey, lovable first horse, Apollo. With her crazy schedule, she is dearly missing that personal interaction with the horses that our whole group of “barn girls” used to thrive on.

We can’t really tell you why we love horses so much. They are large. They have their own minds. Therefore they are dangerous, and we’ve all been hurt by them. But we keep going back. I know I’ve had a few people ask “… and WHY do you like them?”… especially after I’ve sustained one of my famous equine-induced injuries. No, there is no freaky Freudian controlling thing going on. They are just amazing beings, especially if you have seen one fighting injury or death, or felt their nose nudge when you’re feeling like you haven’t got a friend in the world.

So, after hearing about Jenna missing her horsetime earlier today, I took my camera when I went riding tonight, and put together a few shots that will hopefully make her smell hay and horse and sweat and leather and manure; feel the heat from their skin and the hair gobs from shedding and the dust clinging to the curry combs; hear the munching and nose blowing and friendly nickers and stamping feet; and taste the chaff and dust and hard work.

I don’t know how you possibly stay away, Jenna. To you and all the rest of the Barn Girls, “don’t forget to spit!”

Riding clothes are always so sexy.

Sassy the Barn Cat hides in the saddle pad pile.

I think my hands were attached to one of these for years.

If this doesn’t say “barn” I don’t know what does (note dust)!

Rachel the Old Pony was watching me.

Our black trailer reminds me of Trailer Buddying with Jenna :)

Unsubtle Unstable May 20, 2008

Is joy a skill?

A lot of times I’m pretty sure I’ve forgotten how to truly be joyful. I’ve learned a lot about being “content” – which is not accepting status quo or stooping in any way, but rather not falling into depression or a constant brooding state of whiney bitchery. “Content” does not mean you give up. “Content” does not mean you don’t look for improvement. “Content” is, “Ok, I’m going to learn from this. Character, prepare to be built.”

With the possibility of something big (and joyful) (or, big and further heartbreaking) (or, big and completely tearing and tormenting to the core of everything I believe and know) happening this week, I have thought about this more.

I don’t know what I want.

But I’m pretty sure of what I need.

Wants don’t create content. They erase it. They weigh and weigh on content until is is deformed and crushed into a fine, monotone, hueless gray powder.

Pursuing needs brings a balance of contentment and clarity with learning to avoid the wants for the needs. The wants are like a cold bottomless empty pit, damp with greed; the needs are the attainable (although sometimes it seems impossible), satisfying, soul-quenching, victorious warm pools of sunshine.

Unsubtle Retorts May 18, 2008

Here’s another thing I like to do. Pick a common question / phrase / axiom / idiom / euphemism / blurted statement and pick some nice retorts to it. Feel free to join in!

Today’s victim
“They don’t make ‘em like they used to!”

Just off the top of my head, here are some fun retorts:

In China, they do.
Thanks to inflation.
Because we have to be more oil dependent.
Well good, because, like, LOOK at that color. Ugh.
Inconceivable!
<Insert quote from a Transcendentalist>
That’s because Al Gore reinvented it.
That’s what she said.
Just flush.
Tell me about it! It’s like the cost of advertising has driven down product quality or somethin’!
You don’t need this, why are you buying it?
No, they sure don’t, Grandpa.
Maybe if you had followed the assembly directions…
God does.

The Color of Soul-Sucking is Gray May 18, 2008

This is what I see when I rest/bang/drop/collapse my head onto my desk. Everything in our workspaces is gray. Everything. Ok, the walls are a cold white.

Did they really have to make being trapped in a 5×7 foot three walled zero privacy poorly lit carpal tunnel inducing sorry excuse for a cube any worse?

I am trying not to rant about work here. But it’s going to happen. Unsubtly.

Not ironically at all, my synesthetic* response to that sinking loss of hope is about the exact gray of my phone, maybe a little darker. It was like that before I worked in my first cube (which was larger, bluer, and much quieter). And they wonder why depression is a problem with office workers?

Here is your work environment. It will now proceed to be the politically correct sieve for your joy.

*(Synesthesia is crossing senses, I see shapes and colors for noises/sounds/music, some emotions, time is 3-dimensional, and some things like days of the week and some random concepts or things have something like personality, and these are things I can’t change, they are as much part of the thing as its name. Wikipedia it to learn more.)

Ampersand Hundred is Haunted! May 18, 2008

This place always used this sign before they moved. Why did they not get the set of numbers? Of course, they also “closed” the carwash out back by putting one barrel of junk in each bay.

Enjoy &00 Rac Street! I hear 800 Race Street is also free…

Petal Envy? May 18, 2008

Petal envy?

(This is an unsubtle break from serious thoughts.)

Time, Unsubtle May 18, 2008

The following is from some nearly unreadable things I wrote on a napkin during lunch. Yeah, I really wrote on a napkin. Actually the napkin is an interesting story itself. But for another post.

I’m sure there must be a reason why there are 60 minutes in an hour, and 60 seconds in a minute, etc etc etc. That’s not my point.

My point is, we do not measure time. We just standardize it.

(For someone who worked for a couple years as a math tutor in college, I am being rough on numbers lately. They aren’t all bad.)

Anyway, time is different for each person. I’m sure you know someone who is always early; always late; seems to run on a precision perpetual motion meter; that person that says, “just a minute!” and really means about 6.354 standardized minutes.

But we all know what it’s like when a standardized second becomes an unmesureable period of time. It’s subjective to what happens.

Remember that “second” that you gained relief?
Remember that “second” that your heart broke?
Remember that “second” when life and death changed places?
Remember that “second” when normal was destroyed?
Remember that “second” when the present became the past?

Depression and stress make your weeks feel like months. Joy makes them slip away faster than you can grasp the feeling of everything. I guess it all has to do with your frame of mind/turn of events/capacity for heart.

(No I am not going to quote “525,600 minutes” from Rent or even “Time” by Ben Folds. This isn’t that kind of blog.)

Patriotism May 18, 2008

So, here’s an unsubtle train of thought that occurred to me while eating outside a grocery store on my lunch hour.

How would patriotism be measured? There are some people who believe numbers can express anything. I disagree.

How about counting the number of flags per capita? But not on a national patriotic holiday. And not little ones, like ones printed on pencils. And not ones used in parody. Obviously, this approach will get you nowhere.

Next thought: Square inches of flag per capita? This would eliminate the flag-on-pencil problem. But, you’d have to measure all that crap. Forget it.

Here’s a real one: Percentage of volunteerism in the armed forces. Oh wait. That depends on the evil machine known as advertising (or in this case, straight propoganda). Thrown out.

This one could do you a solid: The percent of purchases that are domestically produced products. Oh wait. You’d have to factor in each country’s economy, workforce, industrial capability, GDP, yada yada snore drool roll over mumble. Next.

Just another “subtle” case where numbers will fail. That is all.