My Reality

The weekend passed without too much fanfare, which sometimes is a good feeling. Lots of chores at home including piles of laundry in preparation for my vacation. Not that I plan on taking a lot of things, but I want to return to a closet full of clean clothes, a tidy house and a freshly washed comforter.

This means before Thursday I'll have to set foot in a laundry mat. I feel the dread. It's supposed to rain tomorrow, so hopefully that will help me motivate.

I made homemade and healthy carrot cake cupcakes this weekend. Went and sat on the roof of Memphis Smoke and had a beer in the sunshine, tried to watch this movie, "This Property is Condemned," but alas, I couldn't get into it.

Went to Victoria Secret where I bought both a bra and undies for a reasonable almost normal price due to my coupon and the fact it was the semi-annual sale time.

Chatted with a friend who moved away. And I mentioned I was going to Seattle in a few days. To which she replies: "Oh, did you get a good sale on the airfare?" She always assumes, the only way I can do anything is if it is on sale. I did in fact, get a decent airfare, but I'm going because I want to see my friend that moved there.

She has always been unduly judgemental, especially considering her parents just bought her a condo. Ah well. That's why we aren't that close anymore.

Watched an episode of my new guilty pleasure, Tori and Dean in Hollywood. Yes, it's a show about Tori Spelling and her family.

And you know what? I think it's really good. She isn't bitchy or stupid. She seems pretty normal and most of it, is her doing normal things. And she's funny. But since she is a celebrity, occasionally you see her doing events or TV shows, and that just makes it fun. Because really?

In my opinion, a reality show should be an escape from my normal life. And I don't think I'll be having my own reality show anytime soon.

What would that consist of? Oh look, there's Kelly on a date. I'm cringing for her. Oh man. She got stood up. Now we'll all watch her sit on the couch or in her backyard and read. Look at that, now she's making lunch. There she is doing laundry. Why is she eating standing at the kitchen sink? Let's follow her to the gym. No wait, it sure is boring to watch her wait to get on the damn weight machine.

There she is at work. Why is she just typing all day? I thought advertising was glamorous like it is on Mad Men.

If only people, if only.

Assorted Ramblings

*I celebrated a birthday this week.
By all accounts it was a good one. I spent some time with family, assorted friends, pampered myself with a pedicure and tried not to dwell on my age or the fact that I'm still single. Not much good comes from that line of thinking. Instead I tried to embrace the good things in my life and the people who love me. Even when I'm crabby or sad.

*I LOVE Levi jeans. They just fit me. And while I still have the goal to go down one more size, the current pair I do own make me feel good in body and soul. Applying this logic, I was shopping recently and noticed that Levi's makes shorts too. Why in the world then, are the shorts so horribly unflattering? I mean seriously god-awful.

*Which came first the alcoholic or the cancer patient? Both are battling in my life at the moment.

*I finished Beach Music recently. I loved it. It will certainly become a favorite in my book reading mind. There is something truly extraordinary about the way that Pat Conroy tells a story. There is clearly one main protagonist, but he writes so richly that all the characters become important and beloved. And the ending. I won't spoil it, but I was happy with the story from start to finish and will still never be able to fully convey how wonderful it was.

* Mad Men. In prepartion for season 2's release on DVD, I've started to re-watch season 1, and it is incredible. The way that Betty was so adoring of Don in season 1, and his blatant disregard for his marriage vows during the entire season. And yet, Don Draper is somehow, still like-able, still charming.
Which got me thinking.
Would I still think that about him, if he looked like a regular guy rather than so incredibly hot and charismatic?

Update

My Life to date:

Beach Music-Fantastic. Still not finished. Plan to finish it by the weekend for sure.

Work- Summer Fridays start this week for me. Hooray!

Movies- Saw the new Star Trek. It was a fun movie and I'm in no way a Trekkie. Still haven't watched, Benjamin Button. Can't seem to sit down for a three hour movie.

Dating- Yes. Could be better. Could be worse.

Working Out- Need more Elliptical machines. My biceps are becoming shapely.

Music- The new Eminem cd is a good summertime choice.

TV- Waiting for new season of Mad Men that starts in August. Sigh. Enjoying Rescue Me. Good like it was the first few years.

Trips- Several long weekends up north, some solo some with friends. The first of the season, to come Thursday. A "real" vacation to Seattle over the July 4th holiday.

Almost the Weekend

Since it's almost May and an entire month has gone by, I thought maybe it was time to update the blog.

Problem is, I don't have anything I need to share. Hopefully though typing will get my brain working and remind me that I do indeed enjoy this blog writing.

Can't believe the holiday weekend is almost here. I'm breaking tradition and going up north a week or two after this year. I can't wait to get up there though. I really love it.

My weekend plans here consist of the following:

1. Scary movie night outing a friend's house Friday
2. Party in Royal Oak Saturday
3. Matinee with dad and brothers at some point during the weekend to see the new Terminator movie. Boy friendly flicks work best.
4. Possible scouting of new cell phone
5. Maybe cleaning out my car
6. Misc. trips to the gym
7. A farmers market outing
8. Watching Curious Case of Benjamin Button-Have had it a while
9. Finishing my book, Beach Music.
10. Start writing story ideas or even better stories
11. Finish sort out closets and see what kind of work out clothes I currently own

Check back after the weekend, to see how many of these things I've completed. I'm kind of curious myself.

Seriously?

Does anyone else that works in an office, loathe the term, "webinar?"

Or instead of asking, "Do you have free time to work on X project?"

We are asked if we have "bandwidth?"


No. I have no bandwidth because I'll be attending webinar's the rest of the week.

Sometimes I feel like a nut

Things that need to leave and or drive me nuts:

1. Croc shoes- Oh how I wished this was a fleeting trend. Yet, it appears this "shoes" are sticking around for god knows how long. Plastic shoe? Come on people. And just because you pair them with wool socks, that doesn't mean they're good for the winter.

2. Beware emails: The ones that are for your own good. But for somebody like me who is already paranoid sometimes, I don't need constant reminders about how not to roll down car window because a masked gun man will shove his hand in my car, and I should carry around a club or something.

I know it's good to be prepared, but all the warnings tend to freak me out more. I think the old rule of, Don't talk to strangers is still valid. Enough said.

3. Noisy co-workers who leave their cell phone set at full volume and then leave it all afternoon. Yes, we all know you have a message now. Thanks for sharing.

4.People on the free way who act like they're entitled to drive in the exact same spot, even when one is trying to merge.

5. Girls with fake nails and tans. Trouble. All of it. Steer clear or dramatics will ensue.


That's enough for today.

My work day is slowing down and soon I'll be having happy hour. Score one for half off drinks. It makes the other things on the list just a tad more bearable.


Hooray!

Bodice Ripping for the Ages

Real life isn't a romance novel. Which any single woman can tell you. Or married ones can tell you the same thing. But more on them next time.

The whole premise of these books is completely over the top anyway.

Amazingly beautiful, extremely intelligent, and sassy (the women are always sassy), woman just hasn't met THE ONE.

Insert dream man who is equally attractive, perfectly sculpted body, kind and generous to a fault, and you've got your two main leads. Their names must be as exotic as the tropical island they live on together. Women have names like Raven. Men are Ridge or Thor.

Because romance novel characters are never Bob and Sally. That's just not romantic.

Having read my share of the romance genre in high school, I can assure the plots never twisted in this way:

Guy finds girl on a social networking site. We’ll call him Thor.

They were former high school classmates, and it's 20 years later. Thor and Raven strike up a friendship, which the relationship turns flirty, and then guy asks girl out.

The plot glitch?

He lives several hours away, but makes the trip and the date is by all accounts a success. Thor and Raven continue chatting and it seems like this is heading somewhere.

But it reaches an impasse when Thor is invited to return for a visit and he explains he can't make it. But wants to know if they're dating.

Raven isn't sure, but wants to spend more time together and offers above mentioned invite, which is rebuffed. In the meantime, hours upon hours are spent talking, instant messaging and texting.

After several months, Raven has had enough of the status quo and tells Thor she'd like to date him. Thor says, I'll have to think about it.

Thor has fallen off the face of the earth.


2nd plot twist:

Raven is sad. But knows she needs to try again, so with the push of some good friends puts out a personal ad and gets a ton of responses. So she isn't really into it, but tries to go along with it.

After a few weeks one guy, we'll call him Quinn appears interesting, smart and funny.

They begin talking and decide to meet. After the date, Raven has a freak out and realizes it's too soon and she shouldn't be dating anyone.

She tells Quinn of this, who is understanding.

Does the story end there? No.

Raven has a change of heart and explains to Quinn.

He is amazingly responsive and they agree to slow down and see how it goes.

A few weeks go by and Raven is now ready and likes Quinn, who all along appears to like her, and tells her often.

They've agreed to meet and talk about it if both are ready to go forward. No, not with marriage or anything serious. Just to see if they'd like to date. Have some fun.

Raven asks Quinn to meet up. He initially says yes, and then later in the week, Raven is broken up by Quinn via text message. A modern tool that hasn’t made its way into romance novels as a plot device.

But it is out here with the real people.

In the novel, Quinn will have a change of heart and realize he can’t live without Raven for one more second.

In real life, Raven is sad right now. But she is on her way to get her haircut. And she’ll continue to live her life the best way she knows how.

And that apparently does not include men named Quinn, Ridge, or Thor.

Poetry for the Pained

Dating Haiku's:


You sir, give good phone
When I want you in person,
the phone stops ringing.


He was a nice man
Witty, smart and full of charm
Alas, I was thrown down.


You, in hot pursuit
Broken hearted, I try again
Then, it is over.


I expect a slap
and a tidal wave of pain,
Please cure my cynicism.


She, a soulful girl.
Funny, caring and thoughtful
When will it happen?


If one more person
tells me to love myself, I
could retire in Prague.

Home Again

My trip to Chicago was fantastic. An oversell? Nope.

Two days of good friends, drinks, good food, a trip to a comedy club, and a snow storm with nothing but my spring coat?

Priceless.

Now, it's time to plot my next trip. It really helps brighten my day to day mood to know I have something to look forward to.

That and Johnny Cash's music, and springs arrival.

And yesterday morning on my way to work, my neighbor's cat, Sushi was apparently so excited to see me that after I petted him, he leapt onto my back.

He stayed there for several minutes.

"Everybody wants to be a cat."*

*Nashville joke.

My Kind of Town

"My baby takes the morning train."

That's right. Tomorrow morning, Nevada and I are boarding a train to Chicago to see Rina. Drinking, laughing, shopping and eating shall commence.

Can't wait. I love trips with good friends, where the only thing on the agenda is to enjoy one self.

These women have been here for me through some messy life things. My dad's cancer, my skin cancer, day in and day out at an ad agency antics, and everything in between.

"Some people come into your lives and quickly go. Others come into your life, leave foot prints on your heart and you are never ever the same.

Looking forward to a few days with people who make sure I'm doing ok and always have my best interest at heart, and mine in theirs.

Wow! This is sappy. :)

Happy Weekend.

Strike Out

Today is a company sponsored bowling party in Dearborn to celebrate an award on some of our work.

Free food, beer, and pizza. I don't know that I'll be particpating in the bowling part of the afternoon.

I bowl like I dance, which is to say awful and laughable. I think the last time I went bowling it was about 15 years ago with my mom and Shane on a Sunday morning.

We had Bloody Mary's and for some reason, my thumb kept getting stuck in the thumb hole and making this odd popping sound.

And the last time I was hanging in a bowling alley, Karlene and I decided to go there to see if we could meet any men. It was not to be.

As soon as we sat down, Karlene says:

"The cutest guy here doesn't have any teeth."

My Older Brother

Shane

Nobody asked you to do it
Feeding me peanut butter and cornflakes
Through the crib rails
Before mom got up-

Sharing luke-warm fruit cocktail
Out of the can.
Sticky, syrup
Dripping from our hands
Saving the cherry till the end-

Defending my honor
Against a giant named Billy
Ruining your white Converse
You’d bought with paper-route money.
Splashed muddy brown.

Giving me a white cross necklace
Decorated with pink roses
Was even sweeter than
Strawberry Shortcake’s hair,
And my favorite present on
My 7th birthday.

Hugging me
With warm arms
That bent like Silly Putty

Sitting quietly
Talking,
About nothing

That was
Everything.

Wednesday

Last night was awesome. There is something so liberating about hanging out real friends, where anything can be said. You won't be judged. Mocked perhaps.

But at least it will have an undertone of love attached.

The only down-fall to my night of revelery was that it wasn't a Friday. It was a Wednesday and now I'm having a long work day.

Still, it was worth it and I'd do it all over again given the chance.

I See!

I did it. Lasik is done.

This week my eyes are recovering and for the most part, it's fantastic. Occasionally up close, things look a little blurry. But the doctor says that's normal and considering without contacts everything in my life was blurry, this is a bonus.

No other news to share, so I'll go back to work while listening to my ipod and sipping on my Diet Dr. Thunder.

Rose's Glasses

It isn't often that you can actually type:

"My life is going to change." But today I can type it and mean.

Tomorrow morning, I'm getting Lasik eye surgery. So what does that mean?

Well, it means that the glasses I've had since I was in the 5th grade are going to obselete. My first pair, I remember having a blueish pink tint, and my mom wanted to make them pretty for me, so we picked out little gold stickers. A KQ to stick in the corner of my glasses.

Sure wish I had a picture of that. My glasses that I have now are simple wire framed, slightly cat eye-ish and have suited my needs just fine for the small amount of time I actually wear them, which was usually as little as possible.

Glasses made me feel ugly and nerdy. Not smart. I know I'm smart, but that didn't mean I wanted to put glasses on my face to prove a point.

When I started high school, I was horribly shy and insecure. My mom took pity on me and allowed me to get my first pair of contacts.

This was long before the disposal trend, and so contacts were to be treated like gold coins. Not like paper cups. And I was fairly responsible, but I was still 14.

And often dropped them in the morning when putting them on. I'd have to wake my mom up and she'd help me hunt for them while grumbling about it. But hey, at least she helped.

Tomorrow I'm facing a new frontier. One where I'll never again have to blindly stare at my alarm clock, haulcinate that there's a man on my neighbor's roof, or wear lenses that I'd accidently soaked all night in my mom's homemade face cream.

No more "faking it" at the eye doctor, or trying to discern was 1 really bettter than 2 or is that P actually an R?

Oh and the next time I go to the renew my driver's license, I'll be able to uncheck the box that says corrective lens.

Movie Night

No Oscar fever this year. Usually I'm excited to watch and do what I can do particapate, but this year, "I just wasn't that into it."

Instead I went to my new friend Monica's house and hung out with her, her husband and their freind Steve. Every month they host what's called, Scary Movie Night.

Now, scary movies aren't my thing, but this movie was more campy than scary and it was really all of just laughing, talking and snacking. I had a lot of fun.

Saturday, I had lapsed myself into a coma with to much snow and tv.

Yesterday, I decided to go get a pedicure, then walked around Royal Oak, got some mexican take out, and picked up my house a bit.

But socailizing was just what I needed to break me out of my slump.

The movie by the way was some Werewolf movie. Not scary, except for the wooden dialogue.

More Texts with Brian

In an ongoing series, I'll share text messages from my dad. A man who about a month ago bought a new Macbook, and has already burned a few keys off with a stray cigarette.

I'm so glad to see him embrace technology in new ways.



1. Roses are red. So what? I like daisy's. HAPPY VALENTINE DAY!


2.Just like Ernest Hemingway said: All true stories end by having a drink somewhere.

3. Are you having a mint Julip or ya'll settling for a Bud Light?

4. You Nashville Cats know all the little tricks don't you?

5. Do you want to go to a movie today?

6. Sunday is Super Bowl Sunday. A good day for football, bad day for shopping.

7. Thanks for everything.

Moody Blues

Women.

We are all over the place. Yesterday, I was crabby and mad.

Today I want to cry and I don't know why. One could say it was hormones, but I don't know if that's it. I kind of hope it is, because that means these mood swings are just a temporary thing and I'm not actually having a freak out for no reason.

Honestly, I'm a pretty level-headed person. And I don't suffer from mood swings too often.

Anyway, I thought writing about it would help, but it hasn't. So, back to work.

Wrong Side of the Bed

I'm a crabby ass bitch today.

Stay away if you know what's good for you or I'm likely to yell at you, like I yelled at my co-worker this morning. I was coming up the stairs, holding hot coffee which is a scary situation for anybody that knows me. As I'm holding the door, in an attempt to be polite despite my inner bitch, E. decides that I no longer need to hold the door.

In fact, he decides he will go around me and makes me almost spill my coffee. To which I finally say: Just go. I'm already holding the door. Just go through it. I appreicate the chivilary, but seriously this coffee is burning my hand through this thin paper cup.

He said he appreciated my brutal honesty. Not sure if that's true, but today I don't care.

Nashville and a vintage poem

Nashville was a fantastic time, and I'm in fact having withdrawal today. As there are no other female Quinlan's, BBQ, beer or good country music here in my cubicle.

What an office it would be, if there was. :)

I'm certain next year's trip will be even more fantastic, when even more attend the Quinlan extravaganza.

Today, I found this poem and it's a couple years old, I'm posting it below. I'm sensing a theme, some are less angry, but they all seem to center on loneliness. I'm all the more lucky for such a great family and support system.



Stir (ing) Crazy

In the middle a lecture on algae,
From a guy wearing corduroy pants,
you realize you’re jealous of your laundry,
and you would rather be home folding it.
He wasn’t worth the effort of shaving.

But being single is knowing the kicked-in–the-teeth, sharp pang of
loneliness will pass.

Being single is realizing that a bad relationship isn’t better than being alone.
He tells you on a weekend in the Hamptons,
he knows what he wants,
And its not you.

No guest to bring, you will spend the slow dances of wedding receptions
sitting at the table smiling, when you want to scream,
at the happy couples
Fuck you.

Every night is girls’ night out when you’re single.
Your girlfriends are sympathetic,
until a boyfriend blots their memories
like a Rorschach test.

Being single is knowing a good date is not a promise of happiness,
but maybe,
a chance to test the effectiveness of the pill.

It’s Sex and the City without the designer shoes,
It’s eating Ben and Jerry’s,
straight from the carton.

There’s no point in settling.
Being single is about enjoying your own company,
and hoping someday
so will someone else.