no thesarus tonight

Nope. So don't be too disappointed if this blog entry lacks the usual spunk and vigor. I honestly am too exhausted to do much more than lay motionless in the recliner, but it's been a really long time since I've posted. My apologies to any who may have missed me.

I think I'll take a moment here to do a couple of "shout outs"...

Hello to my newest blogger fans, Aunt Betty and my beloved cousin Martha. Glad you're reading. I look forward to your comments! My father's side of the family is the one most known for speaking their minds, so I look forward to antagonizing them through this new medium.

And hello to my grandmother. I heard a rumor she's going to be stopping by once in awhile.

Well that's that. I haven't neglected my blogger page because I've been out on some fantastic adventure. Quite the opposite. Just more work, more of the endless cycling of laundry and dishes. Oh and the season premiere of my newest addiction, Grey's Anatomy. I was such a fool to pass by such riveting television for nearly two seasons. I truly don't know what Meredith sees in that Derek guy or "McDreamy" as he is referred. I find him to be rather McBoring and McNotThatHot. George is my favorite. He's a McSweetie.

Okay, okay, okay. I'll quit it.

In spite of being so tired much of the time, I'm pleased with how things at work are progressing. I feel like I'm getting very close (frighteningly close, really) to my much sought-after promotion to manager. Temporarily, I am working at another shop in our district that is short-staffed and I am the monkey in charge. I've got the big girl set of keys this week. The only thing is that this shop is the one I worked at up until about a year and a half ago. So it's sort of awkward and strange to be there again. The last time I helped out at another location, I came back into my shop and practically kissed the floor as soon as I stepped in. I certainly appreciated my environment and my co-workers after working six hours in somebody else's train wreck. I do think this week will be good; it will force me to deal with some issues I haven't before and interact with my old co-workers as a manager.

I'm still mildly disturbed about missing that concert I wrote about in my last entry. That's a fair amount of time to be upset about something so minor, but it's just been in the back of my mind ever since. I've become more consciously aware of my daily routines and rituals and I'm realizing that they consume a significant portion of my life. It's not that I don't like my little personal rituals, I actually enjoy them. They are a part of what makes me just a little bit strange. But I just don't want to become all routine and no risk. I took comfort in the days after the concert that I could go see them again. My husband said that one of their albums is painted on the exterior of the venue they played at, so chances are decent that they would come back there on their next tour. That thought was working pretty well for me until I read on their site that they were not going to record together as a group anymore and would end their tour next year. I was beyond stunned. And somewhat surprised by my intense reaction after the shock wore off. Never in my life have I gotten too upset over something like that. I consider myself a big Nickel Creek fan, but not a crazed one. I can't imagine how so many people felt when Elvis died or when John Lennon got shot. This band represents one of the few musical genres that my husband and I enjoy together. After the concert that night, the lead singer spotted Jonathan amidst the crowd of excited faces and outstreched hands. He ran up to him and hugged him in front of hundreds of people. I think Chris Thile was as happy to see Jonathan as the fans were to see the band.

So I've been reevaluating how I spend my free time. I may not be on any African safaris anytime soon or meeting anyone terribly famous, but I will be trying to make a memory or two in between clocking out and clocking back in. My life is still wonderful in spite of its lack of legendary stories. I'm not dead yet so I'll be trying a bit harder to do something just a little special before that time comes.

AACP plus TCW equals me, annoyed.

I got friggin' rear ended AGAIN earlier tonight. Sheesh! I don't know what it is about this Buick I'm driving, but I've got other people's bumpers on me like flies on poo. I just went through this two or three months ago and my muffler has yet to fully recover. At least in this instance, the other car only managed to smudge the healthy layer of dirt on my rear bumper. Unfortunately that was little consolation for the Terrified Crying Waitress that hit me. I put my arm around her shoulders and tried to steer her away from the oncoming traffic. "Here, sweetie. Let's move out of the road, okay?" Thanks to my vast experience with inconveniences such as these, I found myself in the unusual role of Calm Adult who Knows What to Do. In the car behind Terrified Crying Waitress (henceforth to be known as TCW), was Apologetic Adolescent with Cell Phone. AACP looked like he was fully expecting to get a black eye from me or TCW. So he just apologized over and over and blamed the incident on his mom calling him regarding his whereabouts. I don't know what happened to TCW and AACP. I was on my way to the gym and I wasn't going to let this collision keep me from that new rowing machine that I have fallen in love with.

Right now, my husband is at this Nickel Creek concert that we both wanted to go to. Nickel Creek is pretty much my favorite band; Jonathan and I went to college with the lead singer of the group so the element of nostalgia is definitely there. We were planning on going together if our schedules allowed it, but this week my boss is out of town at our company's annual manager's meeting/boozefest. I ended up being the one making everyone's work schedule for the next couple of weeks and I put down my hours wherever I was needed and assumed the concert was off. Kind of a bummer, but I wasn't counting on it too much anyway. However I was kind of surprised tonight when Jonathan called me at work and said he was thinking about going. He's working long hours these days and the concert location was a fair distance away. But I was kind of glad for him, to be honest. He deserves some leisure time as much as anyone. It just made me sad because I realized that I was off yesterday and I could have easily scheduled my hours to accomodate the concert.

Why all the fuss about one concert? At times like this, I feel like I'm missing out on the things in this world that make life worth living. I work full time with some overtime whenever I can sneak it in. When I'm not pounding away in the shop, I'm flopped out on the couch, exhausted. When I'm not working or vegetating, I'm worrying about: A. how I'm a failure as a wife and homemaker, B. how I'll someday fit a family into my growing obsession with work, or C. how life is quite possibly passing me by. Missing the concert tonight brought item C to the surface. Twenty-six is a wonderful age to be. But have I really done anything with it? Am I squandering it by evolving into a workaholic? Don't get me wrong. I am surrounded by tons of cool and wonderful people who challenge me and make me laugh every day. I wouldn't trade my church family for anyone. I am married to my best friend, my favorite person in the whole wide world. When I have days when I don't like anyone or anything, I still like him. I know all those things count for something. But I suppose I wouldn't be myself if I didn't have several things to overanalyze and worry about.

You know, I think Dr. Phil could fix me and make me sort of normal. I'd be "excited about my life" and be "plugged in" to my marriage and family. Hmmmm. Maybe I don't need him after all since I know all his little Dr. Phil-isms.

Okay, it is now 11:31 and I have 11:15 programmed into my body as my bedtime. I'm sure my hubby is having a blast at the concert, despite my absence. I really am looking forward to hearing about how great it was. I just hope his evening won't get spoiled by one of our all-too-frequent car accidents. If AACP messes with my husband's truck (we've had 3 fenders in 12 months), he can count on that black eye.

www.amandaisawesome.com

Today I have reigned victorious over a couple of things in my life that I find challenging: HTML and cooking. The fact that I have really no idea how to deal with them is really the only thing they have in common.

For those of you who don't know what HTML is--cough my mother cough--let me enlighten you. Hang on a sec, gotta consult my online dictionary. HTML is an acronym for Hypertext Markup Language and if that sounds confusing, you should see what it looks like. Eeeek. It's basically a computer language that helps you create webpages. I was tired of the same colors and layout on my blogger page, so I decided to go in an choose a new template. Click here, click there, done. Well, my new layout didn't sit all that well with me, so I went in and started messing with the HTML codes. Since I can't even really define HTML without professional assistance, I wasn't terribly optimistic about improving my page in this manner. All I could do was find words I could understand like COLOR and FONT and begin making random changes until I got the desired effect. Two or three hours later, this is the result. Pretty sweet, huh? And if you're super bored, go look at my friend Tracey's page: http://traceyslp.blogspot.com. It's what my original template looked like.

Okay, okay. So I didn't exactly conquer the world of HTML. But I managed to make some minor alterations without my brain or my computer blowing up.

And for my second round of boasting for today? I cooked dinner. With my stupid hours at work that will only get progressively worse, preparing a lovely meal for two kinda gets put on the back burner. Ha, get it? Put on the back burner? Man, I am such a genius. Anyhoo. I had the day off today so I figured I had no excuse to not fix something. After a brief consultation with my mother in law, two and a half hours of chopping and basting and broiling and praying, this was the result.





Oh, how the Lord provided. After this garlic and rosemary laden beauty, I should quit beating myself up over being an idiot in the kitchen. Because I'm not! Bo Pilgrim would be so proud of how well I handled his bird. I shouldn't get so worked up, millions of women cook like this every day and I'm acting like I just split the atom. Enough of that silliness. Must go now. Jonathan has an old episode of Monty Python's Flying Circus on and I should go join him before he starts watching CNBC (snore). And make him tell me over and over how amazing dinner was. And lay enough guilt on him to force him go take care of the dishes and leftovers. Ooooooo. Triple word score: the computer gobbledegook, the juicy bird, and the husband. Who could ask for a more perfect day?

1,825 days later

At long last, after weeks of television documentaries and seemingly endless news segments, the five year anniversary of September 11th has arrived and I sort of don't know how I feel. My memories are no longer vivid and fresh, but they often come to the surface of my mind throughout the day. They center around the fact that I watched the footage of the first plane for a few minutes and then turned off Katie Couric's commentary just moments before the second plane hit. I went about my business that day thinking about that strange plane crash in New York, having no idea that we were in the midst of a terrorist attack. I remember buying gas for an ungodly 1.59 a gallon and picking up a USA today in the MSU bookstore the following Wednesday morning. Five years has dulled immeasurable grief into a mild sadness whenever I call up these memories.

And today? I turned on the Today show this morning because I always want to see the day's news headlines at the top of the hour. Instead I got the live coverage of the ceremony at Ground Zero. Just like five years ago, this story is the only story. It reminds me of the way that Princess Diana's death in 1997 overshadowed the passing of Mother Theresa just a day or two later. Several days after 9-11, I knew life was beginning to show signs of normal when I heard a weather report on the radio. It stood out so loudly against the relentless descriptions of the most tragic stories one could imagine. A woman loses her husband in the south tower, five months pregnant with triplets. Another decides to go into work on his day off and dies when the towers collapse. Others choose to jump out the windows to escape the fire from the plane crash. The stories were apalling, sickening and you couldn't escape them. But part of me felt like I had to listen, that it was the least that I could do. I was hundreds of miles away, safe and sound, beginning my senior year in college. When I heard that weather report as I sat at a traffic light, I was stunned. It was something mundane, something familiar. For me, it was a moment when the events of 9-11 began to slip from the here and now and into our country's history. My grandparents' generation had Pearl Harbor. My parents' had the Kennedy assassination. My generation will carry memories of September 11 whenever the next tragedy stops this nation in its tracks.

It amazes me how quickly this country returned to some state of normal in the weeks after 9-11. Those far removed from the tragedy went on about their lives while those deeply affected are forever altered by it. To me, today is just another day. I'll probably set two or three diamonds at work this afternoon and deal with an angry customer since I'm in charge again this week. I'll listen to Jim Croce in the car and sing along even though I might get strange looks from other drivers. And when I get home from work I'll unwind with a bag of Reese's Pieces and a Star Trek rerun. All in all, just your average, forgettable day. Compared to the kind of day we all went through five years ago, "average" and "forgettable" sounds pretty good.

Chips, but not the Eric Estrada kind

I suppose you could say that after today, my "honeymoon" period as a jeweler officially came to an abrupt close. Crap happens every day in a repair shop and there's not much you can do to avoid human mistakes. I'm trying to keep my aggravation in perspective here, but it's difficult.

I chipped my first stone today.

Crunch. Not unlike the sound a Cheerio would make under one's shoe.

Let me rewind a bit. I have, in fact broken many a stone during my tenure as a bench jeweler, but they were always little teeny ones, replaceable, with few worries. This one was a 1.44 carat emerald cut aquamarine I was setting into a white gold ring. Oh, and I was so careful!!!! I mean, I was checking it every time I moved a prong, keeping it straight from every angle, polishing up my toolmarks in the metal, and on and on and on.

(insert primal scream here)

At times such as these, I remind myself of a long-ago conversation when my mom told me that we should be grateful for the industries we work in instead of being brain surgeons. The worst thing I could do would be to ruin someone's surprise engagement or inconvenience a wedding. There will be no deaths or critical injuries due to my chipping this stone. It will cost my shop around two hundred bucks or so and the customer will probably be mildly annoyed, but that's pretty much it. The planets will remain in alignment (i suppose Pluto can do as he wishes), no meteor will wipe us out like the dinosaurs, and life will continue on as it has.

Thanks, momma.

Still sucks, though. I should have knocked on wood the other day when I was telling someone that I had never chipped a stone while doing a head and set. I can't help but remember back when I was in college and I told someone that I had never gotten a speeding ticket. Within two hours, I got pulled over by a state trooper for going 70 in a 45, having expired tags, and being too panicked and disorganized to find my car insurance.

I can either blame the cruelty of fate for this, or the simple fact that I've been out of the shop for a week and a half and sort of lost my mojo. And half of my tools--most of which I'm still hunting for. I'm counting on tomorrow being a better day. I'm sure all the little tourmalines and sapphires and diamonds are counting on it too.

what happens in Akron, stays in Akron

Didya miss me?

(uncomfortable pause)

Okay, I know you probably didn't feel a distubance in the force while I was away, but you could just humor me here.

Oh! You did miss me? Really, you guys are just too kind.

All in all, I had a great week. Despite the fact that I was actually working, it felt more like a vacation. The company flew me up there, put me up in the Hilton, wined me and dined me, and taught me some advanced stone setting techniques. Sweet. Now I can go back to work and (theoretically) set pretty much any stone they put in front of me. I've been a jeweler for just under a year, so it is extremely gratifying to be able to use more advanced skills this early in my career; many jewelers go years without learning these kind of techniques. I can't imagine what I will be able to do a year from now or five years from now.

Whenever you go on a business trip with this company, you have to be ever so careful if you want to remain employed. As soon as meetings and training sessions are done for the day, the levees in Akron open up and the alchohol begins to flow around you in dangerous amounts. It amazes me how some people find it impossible to relax or enjoy themselves without vast quantities of liquor. I understand that flying and being away from home and all that can be stressful and some folks simply want to unwind with a beer. Fine. But if there are more than two people together, booze is a requirement. You can' t just go to the pool and hang out, you have to get sloshed and throw somebody in (last week, that somebody was a fully dressed me). You can't just sit around and get to know each other, you have to engage in deep discussions on religion and politics before a smorgasboard of cheap beer and hot wings. I enjoy a drink from time to time, but some folks have no concept of moderation. So you have to work hard to navigate all this and still have a job when you get home. There's always someone who has way too much fun at a meeting and wakes up from a drunken slumber to find a pink slip taped to their forehead. These stories become legends and serve as warnings to new employees traveling for the first time.

That's why I want a T-shirt that says, what happens in akron, stays in akron. I've gone on two trips during my three year tenure here and both times, I managed to work my butt off and enjoy myself without getting reprimanded or fired. Not everyone is so wise.

Aside from all the fun and the training and the beer, being gone for a week was harder on me than I originally thought. I got home late Friday night and spent most of Saturday in sort of a shocked stupor. For five days, I was told when to get up, when to eat, when to pee, when to party and now I suddenly have my old life back. I kept having this vague feeling that I should be doing something productive, but I wasn't sure what. So I just escaped into a slew of Grey's Anatomy reruns on my TiVo, finished this jacked-up book I bought at the airport, and pretty much avoided all household and marital-related responsibilities. I think I'm back to myself, though. I go back to work tomorrow and once again, I will be the one in charge. It will be an interesting experience. I just spent five days being shoveled around, three days being a lazy slob and tomorrow I'll go back to being everyone's mama.

I'm not too worried. Even if you all didn't miss me, I know my shop did.