Sprechen sie Englisch?

I got an e-mail yesterday from an old friend (and by old I really mean past and by friend I mean someone I am no longer friends with) and this e-mail literally left me baffled by the entire male species. Sometimes I wonder if we're even speaking the same language, us women and those men; mostly I feel like we're not. This time is one of those times when we most definitely are not. In all fairness to this person, which I don't know why I feel like I have to be fair (but I'm a nice person) it sucks to have a broken heart. I should know. Regardless, a broken heart is not the invitation to start acting like a complete moron and say things that do not have any semblance of how we agreed, sort of, in the end, that we would no longer be friends. This e-mail might as well have said Dear Lamo, I don't listen to anything you say, ever, and am sticking to my convictions so go fuck yourself. Love, the idiot or more specifically the entire male species.

The entire argument which lead to us no longer being friends in the first place all stemmed from a serious serious communication breakdown. Well that's only half true. But I can't really unveil what happened right here on this blog without being overcome by both extreme sadness and then extreme ANGER followed by rage. And nobody wants that. Plus, you never know when my mom will welcome herself into the Internet age and learn how to navigate to my blog. And the last thing on earth I need is for my mom to find out just how it all went down with said idiot; I will never hear the end of it. You don't know my mother!

I can't figure out why women and men can't always seem to speak the language. While most of me thinks that it's because we are wired differently, not wired to understand something we are not, there's a small part of me that thinks "God" is just really mean. I want to live in a world where no means no, and yes means yes, not a world where no secretly means please beg me until I give in, and yes means throw all caution to the wind and ruin everything in one single moment! I want to move there and live happily ever after with the other people who live there and all speak THE SAME LANGUAGE.

Like the Movie, Only Better

To compensate during the writer's strike I've been reading a lot more, perhaps ripping through a book or two every week. I've also been watching a lot of movies and much to [probably] my mother's dismay, I've been going out with friends too much and drinking too much but subsequently been having a lot of fun, perhaps too much fun? This is one of those moments that feels so good but is also so scary. It's like I'm on the first page of a new chapter of my life...

Anyway, right now I am reading a book that I can feel changing me with every page I turn. It's so good that I want to sit down and read it all in one bite, like a giant Magnolia cupcake. Except it's so good that I also want to savor it, much like said cupcake. I find myself wishing I could read faster so I could get to the good parts (my friend tells me the best is the last section) but then again, I'm enjoying the middle section so much that I almost want to leave it untouched. I almost want to stop reading it so that I don't have to finish it; I have commitment issues. It's this sort of double-edged sword. And I absolutely love that! I love falling in love with a book, with a movie, with a moment so much that I wished it never had to end but am so anxious for it to end so it can be a complete love. So I can relish in its every complex moment, its every last detail. So I can share the love and pass on the joy that this book/movie/moment has brought to my life. The clarity. The AH HA moments and the moments where I pause to to reflect on just how it is that this is affecting me. Just what it is the author is trying to really say, beyond the words written on the page. I love this book so much I might read it again, which, for the record I've only done with two other books in my entire life: The DaVinci Code and To Kill a Mockingbird. I'll rewatch a movie fifty zillion times (hello, Garden State) but when it comes to taking the time and the effort to reread a book, I always somehow say no.

I've been replaying this one specific paragraph in my head for the last 24 hours. The author talks about how every city has a word that describes it and its people perfectly. Rome, for example is "sex." She goes on to say that NYC's word is "achieve" or "succeed" which, who can argue with either one of those? She was then asked what her own word would be, and was unable to come up with an answer. If someone were to ask me what my word is I don't think I'd be able to come up with an answer, at least not right away. Trying to quantify your entire life and existence on this planet using one and only one word is no easy task. It's like asking an artist what inspires them; there is never just one answer. The possibilities, in a way, are endless. But. If I really had to, if I was with my back against the wall and absolutely had to come up with one word; one single answer; for right now, in this present moment, I'd have to say...


ALIVE!

The Day the [Internet] Died

In the past few weeks, irony has followed me everywhere I go in every instance of my life, like a shadow, a dark and haunting shadow. My life is stuck on repeat and no matter how hard I try, I can't change the track to something more upbeat like Money, Time or hell even a truly appropriate song I heard just now called Better Days by the Goo Goo Dolls, of all bands. It's not that my days aren't better than they have been, because they are. They really are. But I could deal without the extreme irony breathing down my neck.

Yesterday I came into my office and started my computer the same way I have every day since I started at this new job. I logged into my gmail, opened a few more tabs for all the daily blogs I read and of course, opened a tab for facebook. You can imagine my surprise when this mean little window popped open and said it was...BLOCKED. I blinked. And thought, this just can't be. I was on it yesterday. I was on it Tuesday. So then I tried a few of the blogs I read. BLOCKED. I tried my own blogger dashboard. BLOCKED. I went across the hall and asked our web designer just what in the hell was going on and to my dismay he told me that overnight my company had installed a new Internet service provider. Remember, back in the day when we had our competition and I was basically working on dial-up. Yeah well, now we've got this super, lightning- fast, blink and you are there Internet but wait...what's the irony of it all. You can't go anywhere! Almost every website, even ones that are somewhat "related" to my job or at the very least, my field, are blocked. If I want to go check out any upcoming speakers on the AIGA website, I can't. If I need to troubleshoot my mac by using a mac blog, I can't! Unless I get permission from my director first. In reality that seems like a great loop hole, but in all actuality, I can't spend everyday of my life asking my director for permission to access the web. Look it's fine if you want to block facebook or myspace (hell what do I care, I don't even have a myspace account) but when you start blocking things that are, in fact, related to my JOB that's when the world starts turning on a crooked axis. And above all, that's when I stop liking it here and start hating my job and further hating corporate America. If you want to block it fine. But don't give me full access for four months and then take it away. When you take away my Internet, you take away the trust. And we all know what happens when you take away the trust...the shit hits the fan like big time!

My boss put in a request for his entire department to be released from the blocked list. I can now access Internet on my PC (that's right, I'm so cool that this new job gave me 2 computers) but the irony, that's right, more irony of that is that my PC has a hard drive as small as a thumb drive. It's 9.5 GB. I don't think most of you are as nerdy as I, so for the record, that's about as big as a Nano or a whopping one third of most of our video iPods. So any time I open even the lousy Internet, the damn thing can't handle it and crashes. And then it takes me roughly 15 minutes to reboot only to have it freeze again. I haven't decided yet if this cycle is irony or just plain shitty circumstances.

Regardless, until they clear our mac stations my postings will be scattered because I can't choose between my love of sanity or my love for writing in this blog. Either I post on the freeze-n-go PC or I wait till I get home at like 11:30 when the last thing I feel like doing is sitting in front of my computer. It's way more likely at that point that I will snuggle into my bed with my puppy than rant about how my stupid company ruined the Internet!

Something Borrowed

While reading one of my daily/favorite blogs, I came across this list that asks where you learned to do the following things. I've added a few of my own after the break.

• How to hunt for bargains: My college best friend, my current roommate
• How to choose colors: Grad school, my old job
• How to rescue old furniture: My dad and brother/AT website/DIY websites
• How to sew: My mom/7th grade home-ec
• How to make compromises in decorating: Oh boy do I, thanks to my current roommate
• How to love modernism: "The" ex
• How to like doing the dishes: My current roommate
• How to cook: What is this cook you speak of?


• How to love danish design: Grad school, D*Sponge blog, my brother, subletting, my most recent ex
• How to appreciate minimalism: My best guy friend from college, Justin
• How to use writing as an outlet: Karen, my 11th grade creative writing teacher
• How to love living in NYC: My brother, my friend Kristen, gothamist, Broadway, only in NYC moments, the marathon, leaving NYC and coming back even after just a weekend in the country
• How to stay sane: By running. Far.
• How to forgive: Working on it but my gay boyfriend is to blame!
• How to forget: A fifth of anything usually does the trick

Fresh Out

I wish I knew more about dreams and what they mean because maybe then I could make some sense about the kind of insane week I've been having whilst sleeping. If I didn't know any better I would assume I had taken five hits of acid and then tried to take a little nap; or better yet, taken anti-malaria pills again because holy shit those were some crazy dreams that week in Africa and the three weeks prior. This morning I had a dream that quite literally left me in a full-body sweat. It's been a tough week, and I've been so tired every single day that getting through the entire workday is the ultimate challenge. At the very least I've had to drink four cups of coffee, sometimes even more. I was so tired yesterday morning that I put both contacts in the same eye and then couldn't figure out why I couldn't see clearly. No seriously. I ended up getting so frustrated with the complex situation that I wore my glasses to work. Today I was so tired that I put the cereal box in the fridge. This would be the moment when I'm thankful I don't have to operate machinery in order to get to and from work. The thing is, I've been getting plenty of exercise, and for the most part have been eating right, so this absolute exhaustion is completely random and uncalled for. Unless of course you factor in the stress caused by losing something you can't replace and having to start over from scratch.

I think loss causes us to do strange things and it takes its toll differently on everyone. I used to let grief manifest itself by curling up in my bed for days at a time, blaring some sort of suicidal music like Damien Rice "O" and crying until my jaw hurt. But I can't remember the last time I cried, and if you knew me three years ago I know you don't believe that statement in the very least. But I honestly can't. I guess I cried on Christmas Day when my brother announced that he's going to be a father. But those weren't actual sad tears. I feel almost as if my crying mechanism is broken. And sometimes, even when something is incredibly sad and I want to cry or feel like I should cry...I don't. I'm fresh out out of tears. I think I wasted them all in college on a dead-end relationship. I think I wasted them in the two years after college on nasty professors and rude comments about how I suck/sucked as a designer. I wasted them on good-byes and starting over and letting go and trying to pick the pieces and reconfigure them into something resembling a happy life. I think I've done a pretty good job in retrospect so in a way, this time shouldn't be any different. Except I can't figure out why it feels so totally different. I'm right back where I started and I seem to have misplaced my manual.

Among Other Things

Now that you're gone I've switched back to non-waterproof mascara; does that mean I cry less?

Now that you're gone I've wrestled with anger and rage, but seen the good in humankind; does that mean the hate depreciates?

Now that you're gone I've started writing and reading and learning again, I've started formulating and calculating and analyzing again; is that the formula for happiness?

Now that you're gone I've slept less and spent too much time dreaming; does that mean one day happily ever after prevails?

Now that you're gone I've toasted to life and to change and to good things to come, to new beginnings and to starting over. Again. Only this time not with you.

What! Oh what! What have you done other than play catalyst and wrecking ball.

[On] People & Things that IRK Me

It's been awhile since I did a bitter New Yorker rant post in which I just list a bunch of things that bothered me today, yesterday or everyday of my life as a New Yorker or perhaps just as a human. And with everything that's been going on the last few days, I feel like I have a solid case. So without further ado:

Wanda Sykes' new voice-overs for Applebees. Wanda Sykes voice period
Any design where I'm forced to use papyrus, comic sans or arial; it's just not right and it's against everything I was taught in grad school.
When you ask for someone's opinion re: said design and they say "well it's not bad." Oh well thanks, so is it also not good? I'm not using this font by choice, FYI.
People who wear puffy coats with the fur hoods when it's 50+ degrees out
People who don't wear a coat or who wear shorts when it's really freaking cold out
People who use an umbrella when it's not raining. People who use giant umbrellas large enough to shelter a family of 9 and are clueless as they knock into everyone on the sidewalk. People who don't put their umbrellas down when walking under 2 or more blocks of covered scaffolding.
People who stop in the middle of the sidewalk to text or e-mail on their blackberry.
People who stop at the bottom of the escalator like holy shit, this thing moves?! That's new.
People who push to get into the escalator line, as if pushing makes me move faster. No, it just pisses me off!
People who push the elevator button over and over and over as if that makes it come faster; everyone knows it doesn't.
People who say the word important and don't pronounce the Ts and therefore slur the whole word together..like impordnt. There's 2 "Ts" in that word, people. 2!
People who leave spin or other such workout classes as soon as the workout portion is over, like, oooo I'm too cool to stretch. Also, people that come to class late. I got here on time, why are you so imporTanT that you couldn't. If you're going to come to class 25 minutes you really just shouldn't come.

In Times Like These I Turn to:

my best friend and confidant who is 250 miles away, my local girls that understand what I'm saying even when I'm not talking

staying busy, not watching the clock

singing in the street, skipping down the sidewalk, humming on the elevator

hour long lunches, sweedish fish

long and deep conversations with my favorite man on planet earth (after my dad) that remind me of better times, true love and honesty

jewel, kelly and channel 30

fantasy trip planning, fantasy house shopping

actual trip planning

the treadmill, the spin bike, the elliptical

dance divas II

movies, repeats of my favorite shows on DVR, OnDemand Sex and the City

flipping and flipping and flipping through the pages of my past favorite Print annuals, west elm and ikea catalogs

cracking the spine of a new book, one that requires no thinking

B&N twenty minutes before it closes

prose

green tea

cooking dinner while listening to music from the 90s

plum toenails and a massage chair

talk radio, following the news very closely, more talk radio, more NPR, more voices

Fucking Ouch, Dude

My favorite aunt always tells me that "it only takes a day." It only take a day for your life to change. One person. One incident. One phone call. All it takes is one day. And she's right I mean, it does in fact, only take one day to meet someone and fall in love or to get the job offering of a lifetime, have a child etc. But on the flip side to that, sometimes it only takes a minute, a split second for your life to change in a negative, heart wrenching, inexplicably upsetting, mind numbing manner. And when that happens, you wish it took longer.

I'm not going to say much more than that, because I'm still processing that moment. And even though I could say so much more, I'm still trying to figure it out and stop blaming myself for not having seen it coming. I'm trying to get through the hurt. For as much learning and growing and observation as I've done in the past 15 or so months, I expect more from myself and maybe that's why this moment hurts so much more. Because I let myself down and sometimes that is far worse than being let down by someone else, even if it is by someone you never expected would, or at least hoped would not....



But did.

Year of the Rat

Despite it being the year of the second most disgusting creature on planet earth (just a hair short of the cockroach, both of which we have plenty of here in the big apple) I, like most of the world, am always highly optimistic at the beginning of a New Year. And I, like most of the world am always disappointed about three days into said new year, when nothing seems to glitter like gold. In Corporate America we call this: SSDD, but instead of it being the same shit, different day, it's a different year or SSDY. Big whoop. That's right, I said big whoop. And maybe your 86 year old great Aunt from Canada says that too!

Anyway, maybe this will be the year it all changes, what changes I'm not so sure, but by golly (that's right, I said by golly) "it" will change!! [Double bang there for emphasis.] Maybe this will be the year I get up the gumption to move "west" to Chicago, buy a brownstone with a fenced in yard, get another puppy, name him Duke or Scooter and live happily ever after in the bitter cold long winters. Or...maybe not. Maybe this will be the year my blog is nominated for a Blogger's Choice Award and I get so much publicity from it that I can quit my day job and blog for a living making enough money to pay off my loans AND buy a place in Manhattan. Then I can just take pictures for pocket money and fun and travel around the world in my super awesome private plane and can then afford to buy the things I see on all my design blogs or more specifically from the store design within reach which is LIE for nothing is within reach from that store, except for millionaires, I mean. Or...maybe not! Probably most definitely not. Maybe this will be the year I win the lottery and can do all of those things and throw in a place in Hawaii and pay off all my friends' loans. This would be a good time to step forward if you are in fact, a loyal reader of my blog.

The truth is, I don't have any super big plans or resolutions to make and then later break for this new year. I want to run another marathon, or two. I'd like get back into taking lots of pictures. I'd like to learn Spanish. And do more charity work. We'll see. There's plenty more fun to come; stay tuned...it's gonna be a good* year!

*By good I mean mediocre, a solid medium