I haven't blogged in a few days, partly due to a lack of enthusiasm and partly due to a lack of adventures. I'm once again feeling downtrodden by my lack of famousness and the fact that I am pretty sure there are only two people who read this blog. (Woo Katherine and Shiri! Also occasionally Katrina. I think Barrett has given up.)
Anywho, still not many tales of adventure to share, and I'm anticipating a fairly chill weekend. So instead perhaps I'll share a few mini-adventures of the past few days, attempting to inject my trademark pithiness whenever possible.
1) Ellie's roommate saga: resolved! Last night the girl I met for a coffee a long time ago and liked came over to our apartment to meet my current roomie (whose sister is not taking the third spot, as had been a possibility) and check out the place. She liked the apartment, we liked her, everything is copacetic. Although I'll miss my departing roommate, it's exciting to get some new energy and a new friend in my life. I've also decided to stay in my current room, which means I won't have to move (huzzah) but am considering getting a new bed, likely upgrading to a full-size. Prepare for an entry down the way on Ellie's attempts to purchase a non-terrifying bed in which no via Craigslist and/or Goodwill.
2) I finished Breaking Bad! Or rather, caught up with it. I plan to watch it live when it comes back in August, and then try and get the complete series on DVD for my birthday. At that point I may do a full rewatch with Barrett and start a splinter blog from this one where I try my hand at recapping/reviewing, because that's a career path I'd be interested in pursuing some day. So I hope you're excited for that!
3) Another follow-up on a previous adventure: The Blackhawks won the Stanley Cup! It was super exciting, dampened a bit by the fact that I watched the third period by myself in my living room, drinking a beer and eating Hershey's Cookies and Creme drops, quietly cheering and fist pumping because my roommate had gone to bed and needed to wake up at like 5 a.m. I'm missing the parade today, another consequence of living hundreds of miles away from home. But still, hooray for a sports team I care about succeeding.
4) Recently, a group of schoolchildren came by desk at work and took pictures of me. It was super weird. That is all.
Friday, June 28, 2013
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Someday everyone will care what I think...
That's a pretty ominous blog title, I think, but I couldn't really come up with one that accurately describes the subject of today's adventure: my attempt to catalog and express my thoughts on Breaking Bad.
But wait! Don't be dissuaded if you have not watched the television show or have and don't enjoy it. This is all about my thoughts on it, not really the show itself, and, as mentioned in the title - you should care what I think.
For a long time I resisted watching Breaking Bad, Mad Man, The Wire, etc., because I didn't really see the appeal of watching an hour of dramatic television that was, at the end of it, going to make me sad. I will happily devour every critically acclaimed comedy I can - the I haven't gotten into Girls yet, also kind of because it seems like it will make me sad - because laughing is fun and happy and whatnot. And it's much easier, generally, to get into comedies even if you're late jumping on the bandwagon because they're generally less serialized and, again, happy.
In my youth, of course, I watched a fair number of dramas, especially those of the Joss Whedon oeuvre. Now you may argue that Buffy and and Angel were more dramedies then straight-up dramas, which for the most part I'd agree with. But the difference between a show like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which got more and more dramatic as the years went on, and a show like Breaking Bad isn't just that BTVS has its moments of humor - Breaking Bad is at many times really a black comedy.
No, the difference is that even though the characters of Buffy are well-written, fully realized and engaging and I cared about what happened to them, I at no point thought of them as real people. Why, you ask? Because the external conflicts that were causing the plot movement of the show were, literally, not real people. They were vampires, demons, gods, bunnies, etc. So as much as I cared deeply about these characters, I did not think that the things happening to them were things that could happen to anyone.
Not so the characters of Breaking Bad or, I theorize, most of the prestige dramas I've so put off getting invested in. The Walter White character - a broken down schoolteacher, wasting his potential at a low-paying high school job, coming to grips with a terminal cancer diagnosis and faced with leaving behind a life that in so many ways falls short of expectations - seems painfully, painfully real.
His decision to start cooking meth? Well, I suppose that's less real, but the way the show handles all the ensuing conflicts is grounded in a realism that indicates this is what really could happen. I got frustrated in the early seasons by the way that Walter and Jesse seemed to take one step forward followed by two steps back (a description Walter himself uses at one point) but I suppose that's actually what would happen if a mild-mannered high school teacher tried to ingratiate himself into the criminal underbelly of New Mexico.
It's this reality that made the show unappealing to me at first - I want to watch television to escape, not to watch the moral destruction of people who I could, theoretically, meet walking down the street. But once I started, that's what got me hooked. Breaking Bad is exhilaratingly unpredictable, just like normal people are. You may know how the plot would unfold if this were a television show, but in a way, it's not, because the characters on it don't behave like they're on a television show (other than the whole meth cooking drug empire thing).
By now you're probably really bored of me thinking out loud about my television tastes and making uninformed pronouncements about what makes this show both uncomfortable to watch and impossible to stop watching. But onward I will push, because I have some thoughts about the episode I watched last night that tie back to an earlier post about why we real people get so invested in the lives of fictional people.
(Plus, it's my ultimate goal to someday write for The A.V. Club, and I need to work on fine tuning my pop culture analysis and online brand. So expect these sorts of entries every once in a while.)
This entry is long and rambling and probably uninteresting and I'm unlikely to edit it for grammar slip-ups, but I promise to end it after the following list. Without further ado, a list of things this show makes me think about, especially thoughts inspired by a powerful scene in the season four episode "Salud" where Walter breaks down while conversing with his son, Walter, Jr.
1. While watching Breaking Bad, I am almost always thinking about death. This would probably be more the case if I was watching the show live, as it happened, instead of binge watching where I generally know what characters make it to what season, but even so I'm never quite sure if everyone's going to make it through an episode - and frequently they don't.
2. As a result, this show makes me think about God, religion, the afterlife, etc. quite a bit, probably more than I'd like to. Because it's so real, I sometimes think of myself as a character in the universe of the show. One of the recurring themes of the show is the interconnectedness of everyone's lives...therefore, what if a decision made by Walter White leads to me getting hit by a car tomorrow? Obviously that's not going to happen, but it still raises the issue in an uncomfortable and stimulating way.
3. The conversation I alluded to made me think about parental relationships in a way the show has danced around before but never confronted as directly as it did last night. The image of a parent literally apologizing, in tears, to his son, weeping that he's "made mistakes" - makes me think about the difficulty of being a parent and the high standards we children hold them to, when really, do we think we'll be any better? It's amazing, I think because of my age I simultaneously related to both the father and son. If your parents have screwed something up, you don't want your parents to apologize to you when you're the child, you just want them to be better. But when you're the parent, you need them to understand that you did your best, and that it's hard. Not being a parent, at least, that's what I imagine, and the show makes me a little bit terrified about that prospect. (Disclaimer: My parents are wonderful people and I love them very much. That doesn't mean that any of us are not flawed people with issues and conflict and all the ordinary parts of such a relationship.)
4. A secondary point on number three, and then I'll be done. The next day, on the episode, Walter and Walt. Jr. have another conversation where the father explains his ultimate concern is how his son will remember him. In that moment, we touch on basically all the big thoughts mentioned above: death, the afterlife and parental relationships. But it also makes me think about a general theme of my life, as I'm a person who's moved halfway across the country and rarely speaks to many of the people I knew in grade school and high school. I know I was annoying then, and I regret it. I think I'm way cooler now, but it doesn't matter, because many of the people I knew in the past already have their memories of me locked in. This is fodder for another, longer blog post down the road, but it's something I didn't even realize Breaking Bad was spurring me to think about until I, you know, thought about it.
So there you go. Now you should go start watching Breaking Bad.
But wait! Don't be dissuaded if you have not watched the television show or have and don't enjoy it. This is all about my thoughts on it, not really the show itself, and, as mentioned in the title - you should care what I think.
For a long time I resisted watching Breaking Bad, Mad Man, The Wire, etc., because I didn't really see the appeal of watching an hour of dramatic television that was, at the end of it, going to make me sad. I will happily devour every critically acclaimed comedy I can - the I haven't gotten into Girls yet, also kind of because it seems like it will make me sad - because laughing is fun and happy and whatnot. And it's much easier, generally, to get into comedies even if you're late jumping on the bandwagon because they're generally less serialized and, again, happy.
In my youth, of course, I watched a fair number of dramas, especially those of the Joss Whedon oeuvre. Now you may argue that Buffy and and Angel were more dramedies then straight-up dramas, which for the most part I'd agree with. But the difference between a show like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, which got more and more dramatic as the years went on, and a show like Breaking Bad isn't just that BTVS has its moments of humor - Breaking Bad is at many times really a black comedy.
No, the difference is that even though the characters of Buffy are well-written, fully realized and engaging and I cared about what happened to them, I at no point thought of them as real people. Why, you ask? Because the external conflicts that were causing the plot movement of the show were, literally, not real people. They were vampires, demons, gods, bunnies, etc. So as much as I cared deeply about these characters, I did not think that the things happening to them were things that could happen to anyone.
Not so the characters of Breaking Bad or, I theorize, most of the prestige dramas I've so put off getting invested in. The Walter White character - a broken down schoolteacher, wasting his potential at a low-paying high school job, coming to grips with a terminal cancer diagnosis and faced with leaving behind a life that in so many ways falls short of expectations - seems painfully, painfully real.
His decision to start cooking meth? Well, I suppose that's less real, but the way the show handles all the ensuing conflicts is grounded in a realism that indicates this is what really could happen. I got frustrated in the early seasons by the way that Walter and Jesse seemed to take one step forward followed by two steps back (a description Walter himself uses at one point) but I suppose that's actually what would happen if a mild-mannered high school teacher tried to ingratiate himself into the criminal underbelly of New Mexico.
It's this reality that made the show unappealing to me at first - I want to watch television to escape, not to watch the moral destruction of people who I could, theoretically, meet walking down the street. But once I started, that's what got me hooked. Breaking Bad is exhilaratingly unpredictable, just like normal people are. You may know how the plot would unfold if this were a television show, but in a way, it's not, because the characters on it don't behave like they're on a television show (other than the whole meth cooking drug empire thing).
By now you're probably really bored of me thinking out loud about my television tastes and making uninformed pronouncements about what makes this show both uncomfortable to watch and impossible to stop watching. But onward I will push, because I have some thoughts about the episode I watched last night that tie back to an earlier post about why we real people get so invested in the lives of fictional people.
(Plus, it's my ultimate goal to someday write for The A.V. Club, and I need to work on fine tuning my pop culture analysis and online brand. So expect these sorts of entries every once in a while.)
This entry is long and rambling and probably uninteresting and I'm unlikely to edit it for grammar slip-ups, but I promise to end it after the following list. Without further ado, a list of things this show makes me think about, especially thoughts inspired by a powerful scene in the season four episode "Salud" where Walter breaks down while conversing with his son, Walter, Jr.
1. While watching Breaking Bad, I am almost always thinking about death. This would probably be more the case if I was watching the show live, as it happened, instead of binge watching where I generally know what characters make it to what season, but even so I'm never quite sure if everyone's going to make it through an episode - and frequently they don't.
2. As a result, this show makes me think about God, religion, the afterlife, etc. quite a bit, probably more than I'd like to. Because it's so real, I sometimes think of myself as a character in the universe of the show. One of the recurring themes of the show is the interconnectedness of everyone's lives...therefore, what if a decision made by Walter White leads to me getting hit by a car tomorrow? Obviously that's not going to happen, but it still raises the issue in an uncomfortable and stimulating way.
3. The conversation I alluded to made me think about parental relationships in a way the show has danced around before but never confronted as directly as it did last night. The image of a parent literally apologizing, in tears, to his son, weeping that he's "made mistakes" - makes me think about the difficulty of being a parent and the high standards we children hold them to, when really, do we think we'll be any better? It's amazing, I think because of my age I simultaneously related to both the father and son. If your parents have screwed something up, you don't want your parents to apologize to you when you're the child, you just want them to be better. But when you're the parent, you need them to understand that you did your best, and that it's hard. Not being a parent, at least, that's what I imagine, and the show makes me a little bit terrified about that prospect. (Disclaimer: My parents are wonderful people and I love them very much. That doesn't mean that any of us are not flawed people with issues and conflict and all the ordinary parts of such a relationship.)
4. A secondary point on number three, and then I'll be done. The next day, on the episode, Walter and Walt. Jr. have another conversation where the father explains his ultimate concern is how his son will remember him. In that moment, we touch on basically all the big thoughts mentioned above: death, the afterlife and parental relationships. But it also makes me think about a general theme of my life, as I'm a person who's moved halfway across the country and rarely speaks to many of the people I knew in grade school and high school. I know I was annoying then, and I regret it. I think I'm way cooler now, but it doesn't matter, because many of the people I knew in the past already have their memories of me locked in. This is fodder for another, longer blog post down the road, but it's something I didn't even realize Breaking Bad was spurring me to think about until I, you know, thought about it.
So there you go. Now you should go start watching Breaking Bad.
Monday, June 24, 2013
So many blog ideas, so little time...
Last Thursday, as I drove home from a long day at work, I cycled through - literally - dozens of blog post ideas in my head. These would be the metaphorical adventures I'm fond of going on, so maybe not that interesting to people who actually know me and don't care much what I think about things. But I suspect it's the metaphorical adventures - complete with my unique sense of humor and trademark pithiness - that will bring the fame and the fortune and the whatnot.
Unfortunately, though, weekends are busy. That's right, dear readers, my life is just too fabulous to sit down at my computer and write up these pithy observations, until it comes to the work week and I need a distraction for a bit. And at that point, generally, I have actual adventure from said fabulous weekend to recount, and therefore you'll never get to hear about my pithy observations because I didn't write down my ideas.
So that's a bummer, I suppose, for all of us. But onward I must push, with the tale of an actual adventure: Eleanor goes to the wine festival.
The biggest allure of Central Virginia, for those who don't love beautiful mountains and hiking, is the overabundance of wineries. Before moving here, I've encountered one winery in my travels: Rockbridge Vineyards in good ol' Rockbridge County. The time I went there was a pleasant little trip with my brother and sister-in-law, and I thought to myself, 'Gee, wineries are neat.'
What I did not think to myself, and this was foolish, is how much neater it would be to have more than half a dozen wineries gathered in the same place, pouring me free samples of their sweet nectar to my heart's content.
That's overselling it a bit, but that is the magic of a wine festival. Generally you have to pay about $20 to get in, so it's not really free samples, and there's a lot of theoretical pressure to eventually purchase a bottle of wine from one of the vendors kind enough to explain to you the "oaky" nature of their table red (that probably makes no sense).
But there are so many different wines to sample, it's often overwhelming to remember which ones you enjoyed and how much you liked them. (Plus, you know, the drinking all afternoon can make the mind a bit fuzzy.) At these festivals, it's best to live in the moment, enjoy as many samples as you can, and then just choose a winery at random to throw 20 bucks at and take home your delicious souvenir. (Better yet, you can purchase a chilled bottle and drink it as you walk around. That is a quality, quality choice.)
At this weekend's Summer Solstice Wine Festival at Lazy Days Winery in Amherst, Katrina, Alicia and I got to sample the wines of, I believe, eight different local wine-makers, pet animals in the petting zoo (it was terrifying, fo'realz), purchase some delicious cheese from the fairly bro-y cheese man, listen to some music, attempt (and fail) to go on the bouncy slide and, best of all, purchase a bucket of sangria.
Read that again: one of the wineries was selling $25 buckets of sangria.
Unfortunately, though, weekends are busy. That's right, dear readers, my life is just too fabulous to sit down at my computer and write up these pithy observations, until it comes to the work week and I need a distraction for a bit. And at that point, generally, I have actual adventure from said fabulous weekend to recount, and therefore you'll never get to hear about my pithy observations because I didn't write down my ideas.
So that's a bummer, I suppose, for all of us. But onward I must push, with the tale of an actual adventure: Eleanor goes to the wine festival.
The biggest allure of Central Virginia, for those who don't love beautiful mountains and hiking, is the overabundance of wineries. Before moving here, I've encountered one winery in my travels: Rockbridge Vineyards in good ol' Rockbridge County. The time I went there was a pleasant little trip with my brother and sister-in-law, and I thought to myself, 'Gee, wineries are neat.'
What I did not think to myself, and this was foolish, is how much neater it would be to have more than half a dozen wineries gathered in the same place, pouring me free samples of their sweet nectar to my heart's content.
That's overselling it a bit, but that is the magic of a wine festival. Generally you have to pay about $20 to get in, so it's not really free samples, and there's a lot of theoretical pressure to eventually purchase a bottle of wine from one of the vendors kind enough to explain to you the "oaky" nature of their table red (that probably makes no sense).
But there are so many different wines to sample, it's often overwhelming to remember which ones you enjoyed and how much you liked them. (Plus, you know, the drinking all afternoon can make the mind a bit fuzzy.) At these festivals, it's best to live in the moment, enjoy as many samples as you can, and then just choose a winery at random to throw 20 bucks at and take home your delicious souvenir. (Better yet, you can purchase a chilled bottle and drink it as you walk around. That is a quality, quality choice.)
At this weekend's Summer Solstice Wine Festival at Lazy Days Winery in Amherst, Katrina, Alicia and I got to sample the wines of, I believe, eight different local wine-makers, pet animals in the petting zoo (it was terrifying, fo'realz), purchase some delicious cheese from the fairly bro-y cheese man, listen to some music, attempt (and fail) to go on the bouncy slide and, best of all, purchase a bucket of sangria.
Read that again: one of the wineries was selling $25 buckets of sangria.
I did not drink the whole bucket this way, but this photo basically captures the awesomeness of the situation. Photo by Alicia, who split the bucket with me.
I was going to write more about the festival, like tell you about the hard core salesmanship of The Amazing Dress vendor (YOU CAN WEAR IT 100 DIFFERENT WAYS) but maybe I'll save that for a later blog post. I think we just need to end with this, once more.
I may never be happier than I was with that bucket.
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Growing up is hard...
When I was younger, I remember my dad's description of the way that children impact your ability to party, for lack of a better word.
There's no stronger impediment to drinking, he would say, than a 3-year-old perching on the edge of your bed at 7 in the morning asking, "Why are you holding your head, daddy?"
Well, I'm nowhere near having a three-year-old to perch on the edge of my bed. But when the alarm on my telephone started chirping its wake-up call at 6:50 this morning, I thought back to that fourth glass of wine and foolish margarita last night with powerful regret.
When you're a college student, you have an advantage as a drinker. First off, it's definitely true that the older you get and the longer you've been consuming alcohol, the worse the hangovers get. As someone who was law-abiding and generally kind of a goodie-two-shoes in high school, I didn't start drinking until my freshman year of college, meaning I was blessed with about thee years of essentially hangover-free consumption.
And, in college, even if you do get saddled with a truly powerful pounding of the head the next morning (I'm thinking back to the morning after I made - and won - a slap bet with a friend over spilling champagne in his house, then threw my wallet at the sophomores in the sorority house so they would go make me puppy chow - they did), you're not facing eight straight hours of sitting up, concentrating and staring at a shiny headache-producing computer monitor.
Even a nerd like me who rarely skipped class, even under the roughest of circumstances, knew that I was at most committing myself to about three hours away from the comfort of my comfy bed and then I could return home, shotgun gallons of water and Powerade, and pass out.
Not so, these days. Waking up for an 8:30 a.m. meeting this morning, I pondered calling in sick to work today, then remembered 1) I am not the type of person who does that and 2) I had a lot of things I needed to get done today. So I forced myself up, downed a glass of ice water, showered and headed out for a tortuous day during which I've occasionally had to will my head not to explode.
What's the point of today's adventure, dear readers? That the older you get, the more weeknight consumption seems like a bad idea (even if done in the classiest of circumstances). I suppose if and when that 3-year-old comes around, weekend drinking will follow a similar path, though here's hoping that's a ways away.
I have a lot of partying I need to accomplish in the meantime.
There's no stronger impediment to drinking, he would say, than a 3-year-old perching on the edge of your bed at 7 in the morning asking, "Why are you holding your head, daddy?"
Well, I'm nowhere near having a three-year-old to perch on the edge of my bed. But when the alarm on my telephone started chirping its wake-up call at 6:50 this morning, I thought back to that fourth glass of wine and foolish margarita last night with powerful regret.
When you're a college student, you have an advantage as a drinker. First off, it's definitely true that the older you get and the longer you've been consuming alcohol, the worse the hangovers get. As someone who was law-abiding and generally kind of a goodie-two-shoes in high school, I didn't start drinking until my freshman year of college, meaning I was blessed with about thee years of essentially hangover-free consumption.
And, in college, even if you do get saddled with a truly powerful pounding of the head the next morning (I'm thinking back to the morning after I made - and won - a slap bet with a friend over spilling champagne in his house, then threw my wallet at the sophomores in the sorority house so they would go make me puppy chow - they did), you're not facing eight straight hours of sitting up, concentrating and staring at a shiny headache-producing computer monitor.
Even a nerd like me who rarely skipped class, even under the roughest of circumstances, knew that I was at most committing myself to about three hours away from the comfort of my comfy bed and then I could return home, shotgun gallons of water and Powerade, and pass out.
Not so, these days. Waking up for an 8:30 a.m. meeting this morning, I pondered calling in sick to work today, then remembered 1) I am not the type of person who does that and 2) I had a lot of things I needed to get done today. So I forced myself up, downed a glass of ice water, showered and headed out for a tortuous day during which I've occasionally had to will my head not to explode.
What's the point of today's adventure, dear readers? That the older you get, the more weeknight consumption seems like a bad idea (even if done in the classiest of circumstances). I suppose if and when that 3-year-old comes around, weekend drinking will follow a similar path, though here's hoping that's a ways away.
I have a lot of partying I need to accomplish in the meantime.
Monday, June 17, 2013
Remember how I said Flat Top was the worst...
It still is.
And yet, despite this, I hiked it once again this Sunday with Barrett and co-reporters and friends Alicia and Katrina. This was a day after we went to the Batteau Festival (Don't know what that is? Read all about it here) and I got seriously, seriously sunburned, so I was already struggling a bit. Plus I'd run about four and a half miles Saturday afternoon, meaning my legs were on the weaker side and would have much preferred spending the day reclined on the couch.
But I am committed to physical fitness and nature and fun, so off we went. The hike was grueling, as it had been the last time, though I think I was aided by having slept in a real bed the night before.
The thing about Flat Top is that it seems easy at first, and is, in fact, never quite as steep as Sharp Top at its worst. But after about two miles of endless gently upwardly sloping switchbacks, you reach a sign that tells you there's only half a mile to go.
First off, it always seems like you should have gone a lot further than just two miles at that point. Second, I'm fairly convinced that last half mile is the longest half mile in the history of the world. And after climbing steadily upward for it for a while, it has the audacity to drop downward before turning back toward the summit, meaning you have to cover the same ground you just covered! RIDICULOUS!
Anywho, we finally made it to the top, and found a slightly better viewing spot than Barrett and I enjoyed the first time, so I suppose it was worth it. I haven't uploaded all my photos yet, but here's a sampling from my phone, slightly more picturesque than the summit photo I posted before.
And yet, despite this, I hiked it once again this Sunday with Barrett and co-reporters and friends Alicia and Katrina. This was a day after we went to the Batteau Festival (Don't know what that is? Read all about it here) and I got seriously, seriously sunburned, so I was already struggling a bit. Plus I'd run about four and a half miles Saturday afternoon, meaning my legs were on the weaker side and would have much preferred spending the day reclined on the couch.
But I am committed to physical fitness and nature and fun, so off we went. The hike was grueling, as it had been the last time, though I think I was aided by having slept in a real bed the night before.
The thing about Flat Top is that it seems easy at first, and is, in fact, never quite as steep as Sharp Top at its worst. But after about two miles of endless gently upwardly sloping switchbacks, you reach a sign that tells you there's only half a mile to go.
First off, it always seems like you should have gone a lot further than just two miles at that point. Second, I'm fairly convinced that last half mile is the longest half mile in the history of the world. And after climbing steadily upward for it for a while, it has the audacity to drop downward before turning back toward the summit, meaning you have to cover the same ground you just covered! RIDICULOUS!
Anywho, we finally made it to the top, and found a slightly better viewing spot than Barrett and I enjoyed the first time, so I suppose it was worth it. I haven't uploaded all my photos yet, but here's a sampling from my phone, slightly more picturesque than the summit photo I posted before.
I'll paste a better one when either I or one of my companions sees fit to upload more camera pictures. This is small and clearly a bit hazy. But it was still cool.
After the hike, Katrina, Alicia and I celebrated with frozen yogurt. It was delicious and well-earned.
Friday, June 14, 2013
So many first world problems...
It is astonishing how many things we need electricity for. Unfortunately, it's impossible to really grasp the spectrum of things in our lives made exponentially more difficult by the loss of power until we - wait for it - lose power.
Consider my adventure last night upon returning home to discover that I was one of the several thousand to lose power in Virginia during yesterday afternoon's Derecho Part Two: Electric Boogalo.
Luckily, I'd stopped to pick up a pizza on the way home, otherwise I would have, like my roommates, been at a complete loss as to what to eat. The only food I currently have in my apartment is pancake mix - not much use without a functioning stove. If I'd gone to the grocery store after work, as originally planned, I likely would've picked up some delicious frozen meals, only to return home and, heartbroken, find them rendered utterly worthless by the lack of a functioning microwave.
As my roommate struggled to pack for a weekend out of town without being able to see her clothes, I plopped down on my couch to enjoy my pizza, instinctively looking up at the television despite my inability to turn it on. That day's newspaper was sitting on the couch next to me, and so, like a old man in the 1920's, I ate my dinner while catching up on the day's events, all of which I'd spent most of the day reading about a fancy new intervention called the Internet.
Searching for other activities to distract myself, I remembered that my laptop had been charging most of the day, and could therefore be used to finish my episode of Breaking Bad.
You, clever reader, have undoubtedly noted the impediment I missed; the Internet, which powers the magical Netflix, needs electricity to function.
'Perhaps I'll take a shower,' I thought to myself, only to enter a pitch-black bathroom and literally not be able to see anything. I quickly downloaded the flashlight app on my phone and washed the way the stress of the day with eerie backlight and shadows dancing around the room.
(Confession: I own no real flashlights. I should probably fix this before the next time the power goes out, because there's no guarantee I'll have a fully charged phone at that point. Still, technology is great.)
Of course, then I was faced with the challenge of sopping wet hair and no way to dry it, but luckily some people in my life were lucky enough not to lose electricity. Lucky bastards.
(I guess I should be nice though, as I may be without power through Monday. HOW WILL I LIVE? I NEED TO KNOW HOW WALTER AND JESSE GET OUT OF THE DESERT!!!)
Consider my adventure last night upon returning home to discover that I was one of the several thousand to lose power in Virginia during yesterday afternoon's Derecho Part Two: Electric Boogalo.
Luckily, I'd stopped to pick up a pizza on the way home, otherwise I would have, like my roommates, been at a complete loss as to what to eat. The only food I currently have in my apartment is pancake mix - not much use without a functioning stove. If I'd gone to the grocery store after work, as originally planned, I likely would've picked up some delicious frozen meals, only to return home and, heartbroken, find them rendered utterly worthless by the lack of a functioning microwave.
As my roommate struggled to pack for a weekend out of town without being able to see her clothes, I plopped down on my couch to enjoy my pizza, instinctively looking up at the television despite my inability to turn it on. That day's newspaper was sitting on the couch next to me, and so, like a old man in the 1920's, I ate my dinner while catching up on the day's events, all of which I'd spent most of the day reading about a fancy new intervention called the Internet.
Searching for other activities to distract myself, I remembered that my laptop had been charging most of the day, and could therefore be used to finish my episode of Breaking Bad.
You, clever reader, have undoubtedly noted the impediment I missed; the Internet, which powers the magical Netflix, needs electricity to function.
'Perhaps I'll take a shower,' I thought to myself, only to enter a pitch-black bathroom and literally not be able to see anything. I quickly downloaded the flashlight app on my phone and washed the way the stress of the day with eerie backlight and shadows dancing around the room.
(Confession: I own no real flashlights. I should probably fix this before the next time the power goes out, because there's no guarantee I'll have a fully charged phone at that point. Still, technology is great.)
Of course, then I was faced with the challenge of sopping wet hair and no way to dry it, but luckily some people in my life were lucky enough not to lose electricity. Lucky bastards.
(I guess I should be nice though, as I may be without power through Monday. HOW WILL I LIVE? I NEED TO KNOW HOW WALTER AND JESSE GET OUT OF THE DESERT!!!)
Thursday, June 13, 2013
Growing up a Cubs fan made me a cynic...
...but becoming a Blackhawks fan has made me a believer. Today we've got a metaphorical adventure, about fandom, heartbreak, elation, loyalty, etc.
Last night I was up until the wee hours of the morning watching a tiny black disc travel at lightning speeds across a sheet of frozen water approximately 700 miles away from my living room. The Chicago Blackhawks were playing the Boston Bruins in the first game of the Stanley Cup Finals, an original six match-up between two of the greatest sporting cities in the country.
A little more than five hours after the initial puck drop, the Hawks walked away victorious. Somehow they'll have to spend the next three days recuperating, repairing and rebuilding all the energy they expelled over five and a half periods of hockey Wednesday night and be full-powered and ready to go Saturday night for game two. It will be an impressive feat, for sure; I can barely keep my eyes open today and I didn't play a single minute of hockey last night, let alone more than 100.
(I did go on about a three-mile run last night. Needless to say, I was a lot less proud of myself after watching guys my own age keep skating with a level of intensity I could never reach well into the third overtime.)
As I sat there watching the blurs of red and white whiz by, I was hit by a strange realization. As the game went longer and longer and sudden death become more sudden and deadlier, I found myself cringing every time the puck entered the Hawks zone. I sat on the edge of my seat, convinced the puck was going to slip by, that there were too many white jerseys in relation to red, and soon it would all be for naught.
But when the puck inevitably did not go in, and instead found itself on the other side of the ice, there was no corresponding optimism, elation or confidence that the red jerseys outnumbered the white and surely the puck would find its way into the back of the net. I was certain that, with the game on the line, the puck would instantly be cleared, find its way to the other side, and we'd be right where we started again.
I suppose every fan probably feels this way; being optimistic is too much of a risk. This column does a solid job of capturing the feelings that come with watching hockey, especially in overtime - every possession change is heartbreaking, every near miss is a moment of pure terror.
But I think I'm more prone to this feeling of abject fear after years spent believing in the Cubs only to watch my dreams be crushed, mercilessly, time after time. I just read another article about the difference between Red Sox fans and Cubs fans, as explained by Theo Epstein, that I think captured part, but not all, of the truth.
Epstein, who grew up a Sox fan before leading the team to its first World Series championship since 1918 as general manger, theorized that even in the good times, Red Sox fans are always preparing for the worst. Cubs fans, on the other hand, find optimism even in the worst stretches. The team may be terrible, but a game-saving catch is still a highlight worthy of hours of celebration.
I think he's right, in that the defining characteristic of Cubs fans is that we always, always believe. Even in 2003, as game six of the NLCS slipped away in tragic fashion, my 13-year-old self was confident Kerry Wood would come out, pitch the game of his life, and the Cubs would be headed to the World Series once again.
But that didn't happen, and my little heart broke, not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, because of the Cubs' fate. I think that's the important corollary to the undying belief - when that belief is shattered, when the other shoe drops, it stings all the more painfully.
So now, I think, I've learned to be more guarded. I still fully believe in the Cubs every time I watch them, but I've learned to protect my heart when it comes to my other sports idols - the Bears, the Hoosiers, the Hawks. For the most part my caution has been rewarded, in a way; it's not as difficult to watch IU fall far too early in the NCAA if I was kind of expecting it all along, and I've learned to just take what I can get with the often good but never great Monsters of the Midway.
The Hawks, though, are teaching me to shed that cynicism. I started paying attention to hockey and cheering for the team a few years prior to the 2010 Cup win, jumping on the bandwagon when the team added two young, dynamic players named Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews, stopped blacking out games on television, and overall acted like it cared about having fans and winning hockey games.
And lo and behold, my fandom was rewarded. I still can't quite believe they won in 2010; Kane's game winner was so hard to see for several seconds he was the only one who knew it had gone in and the Hawks were the champs. But they did win, and they've continued to be good, often great, making it back to the Cup finals in tidy fashion and grinding out an impressive victory against what looks to be a fairly formidable Bruins team.
For the next two weeks, I'll likely spend many a night perched on the edge of my seat, pulling at my cheeks and burying my head in my hands when I can't bear to watch. I'll still, I expect, be surprised every time Corey Crawford makes an improbable save or somehow Kane finds the net in a way I did not think possible. Cubbie-bred cynicism won't be that easy to shed.
But I suspect another year with Chicago as the keeper of the Stanley Cup will go a ways towards helping.
Last night I was up until the wee hours of the morning watching a tiny black disc travel at lightning speeds across a sheet of frozen water approximately 700 miles away from my living room. The Chicago Blackhawks were playing the Boston Bruins in the first game of the Stanley Cup Finals, an original six match-up between two of the greatest sporting cities in the country.
A little more than five hours after the initial puck drop, the Hawks walked away victorious. Somehow they'll have to spend the next three days recuperating, repairing and rebuilding all the energy they expelled over five and a half periods of hockey Wednesday night and be full-powered and ready to go Saturday night for game two. It will be an impressive feat, for sure; I can barely keep my eyes open today and I didn't play a single minute of hockey last night, let alone more than 100.
(I did go on about a three-mile run last night. Needless to say, I was a lot less proud of myself after watching guys my own age keep skating with a level of intensity I could never reach well into the third overtime.)
As I sat there watching the blurs of red and white whiz by, I was hit by a strange realization. As the game went longer and longer and sudden death become more sudden and deadlier, I found myself cringing every time the puck entered the Hawks zone. I sat on the edge of my seat, convinced the puck was going to slip by, that there were too many white jerseys in relation to red, and soon it would all be for naught.
But when the puck inevitably did not go in, and instead found itself on the other side of the ice, there was no corresponding optimism, elation or confidence that the red jerseys outnumbered the white and surely the puck would find its way into the back of the net. I was certain that, with the game on the line, the puck would instantly be cleared, find its way to the other side, and we'd be right where we started again.
I suppose every fan probably feels this way; being optimistic is too much of a risk. This column does a solid job of capturing the feelings that come with watching hockey, especially in overtime - every possession change is heartbreaking, every near miss is a moment of pure terror.
But I think I'm more prone to this feeling of abject fear after years spent believing in the Cubs only to watch my dreams be crushed, mercilessly, time after time. I just read another article about the difference between Red Sox fans and Cubs fans, as explained by Theo Epstein, that I think captured part, but not all, of the truth.
Epstein, who grew up a Sox fan before leading the team to its first World Series championship since 1918 as general manger, theorized that even in the good times, Red Sox fans are always preparing for the worst. Cubs fans, on the other hand, find optimism even in the worst stretches. The team may be terrible, but a game-saving catch is still a highlight worthy of hours of celebration.
I think he's right, in that the defining characteristic of Cubs fans is that we always, always believe. Even in 2003, as game six of the NLCS slipped away in tragic fashion, my 13-year-old self was confident Kerry Wood would come out, pitch the game of his life, and the Cubs would be headed to the World Series once again.
But that didn't happen, and my little heart broke, not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, because of the Cubs' fate. I think that's the important corollary to the undying belief - when that belief is shattered, when the other shoe drops, it stings all the more painfully.
So now, I think, I've learned to be more guarded. I still fully believe in the Cubs every time I watch them, but I've learned to protect my heart when it comes to my other sports idols - the Bears, the Hoosiers, the Hawks. For the most part my caution has been rewarded, in a way; it's not as difficult to watch IU fall far too early in the NCAA if I was kind of expecting it all along, and I've learned to just take what I can get with the often good but never great Monsters of the Midway.
The Hawks, though, are teaching me to shed that cynicism. I started paying attention to hockey and cheering for the team a few years prior to the 2010 Cup win, jumping on the bandwagon when the team added two young, dynamic players named Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews, stopped blacking out games on television, and overall acted like it cared about having fans and winning hockey games.
And lo and behold, my fandom was rewarded. I still can't quite believe they won in 2010; Kane's game winner was so hard to see for several seconds he was the only one who knew it had gone in and the Hawks were the champs. But they did win, and they've continued to be good, often great, making it back to the Cup finals in tidy fashion and grinding out an impressive victory against what looks to be a fairly formidable Bruins team.
For the next two weeks, I'll likely spend many a night perched on the edge of my seat, pulling at my cheeks and burying my head in my hands when I can't bear to watch. I'll still, I expect, be surprised every time Corey Crawford makes an improbable save or somehow Kane finds the net in a way I did not think possible. Cubbie-bred cynicism won't be that easy to shed.
But I suspect another year with Chicago as the keeper of the Stanley Cup will go a ways towards helping.
Wednesday, June 12, 2013
My weekends are too adventure-filled...
Or, more accurately, my weekdays are a bit low on the adventure quotient. I know everyone's super interested in my ramblings about boring metaphorical adventures, but you'll just have to make do with another quasi-adventure that took place Sunday evening.
(Confession time: I'm losing some of the motivation when it comes to this blog. I seem to be nowhere closer to becoming famous, and even I am finding myself boring. Maybe I'll try and bring in my controversy. Or maybe someone connected to me just needs to commit a major crime - Snowden's girlfriend's blog blew up shortly after his reveal and now she's super famous! Although she has deleted the blog.)
After our hike Sunday afternoon, Barrett and I picked up our dear friend Katrina for a trip out to Nelson County to celebrate here birthday! Woo, so exciting!
If you ever lived in this part of Virginia, you may find yourself asking, "Why on Earth would you head to Nelson County for a celebration?"
Your question would not be wrongheaded; there is not a ton to do out there. The county has one stoplight. That is all.
The people of Nelson County, noting this problem, decided the best solution to living in the middle of nowhere was to start drinking. Perhaps because of the difficulty of traversing the miles and miles of emptiness to find adequate amounts of booze and other spirits, these industrious folk decided not only to drink, but to make said drink themselves.
And so the quiet country county is a hotbed of breweries, wineries and soon, distilleries. I've already sampled two of the Nelson County breweries: Blue Mountain and Devil's Backbone (which has an outpost in Rockbridge County, hollaaa). We decided to give a new one a try for Katrina's celebration and set out on the hour-ish drive to Wild Wolf Brewing Company.
The building that houses the brewery is simultaneously cute and creepy. It's a former schoolhouse, which, combined with these three little girls dressed in matching white dresses, made for a slightly uncomfortable vibe. Seriously, these girls. If only I'd taken a picture - they would haunt your nightmares.
Anywho, we sat outside and enjoyed a giant soft pretzel (finally! there's a been an ongoing war against me enjoying a soft pretzel) and some delicious craft beers to start out with. Luckily, we chose a table under an umbrella, because shortly after we ordered our entrees, the rain began to pour down.
And continued to pour down. And poured, and poured, and poured.
Our umbrella served us well, but we finally had to give up and literally sprint to the indoor shelter of the creepy schoolhouse building. Unfortunately, that was near the end of our stay, and we had to drive back from the middle of nowhere caught in this hellish storm.
It was not great, but we survived and made it back to the booming metropolis of Lynchburg.
The highlight of the return, though, was an impromptu rendition of "My Favorite Things." I know those of you know who know me can appreciate my impressive musical talent, and let me tell you, if you were not in that car, you missed out.
(Confession time: I'm losing some of the motivation when it comes to this blog. I seem to be nowhere closer to becoming famous, and even I am finding myself boring. Maybe I'll try and bring in my controversy. Or maybe someone connected to me just needs to commit a major crime - Snowden's girlfriend's blog blew up shortly after his reveal and now she's super famous! Although she has deleted the blog.)
After our hike Sunday afternoon, Barrett and I picked up our dear friend Katrina for a trip out to Nelson County to celebrate here birthday! Woo, so exciting!
If you ever lived in this part of Virginia, you may find yourself asking, "Why on Earth would you head to Nelson County for a celebration?"
Your question would not be wrongheaded; there is not a ton to do out there. The county has one stoplight. That is all.
The people of Nelson County, noting this problem, decided the best solution to living in the middle of nowhere was to start drinking. Perhaps because of the difficulty of traversing the miles and miles of emptiness to find adequate amounts of booze and other spirits, these industrious folk decided not only to drink, but to make said drink themselves.
And so the quiet country county is a hotbed of breweries, wineries and soon, distilleries. I've already sampled two of the Nelson County breweries: Blue Mountain and Devil's Backbone (which has an outpost in Rockbridge County, hollaaa). We decided to give a new one a try for Katrina's celebration and set out on the hour-ish drive to Wild Wolf Brewing Company.
The building that houses the brewery is simultaneously cute and creepy. It's a former schoolhouse, which, combined with these three little girls dressed in matching white dresses, made for a slightly uncomfortable vibe. Seriously, these girls. If only I'd taken a picture - they would haunt your nightmares.
Anywho, we sat outside and enjoyed a giant soft pretzel (finally! there's a been an ongoing war against me enjoying a soft pretzel) and some delicious craft beers to start out with. Luckily, we chose a table under an umbrella, because shortly after we ordered our entrees, the rain began to pour down.
And continued to pour down. And poured, and poured, and poured.
Our umbrella served us well, but we finally had to give up and literally sprint to the indoor shelter of the creepy schoolhouse building. Unfortunately, that was near the end of our stay, and we had to drive back from the middle of nowhere caught in this hellish storm.
It was not great, but we survived and made it back to the booming metropolis of Lynchburg.
The highlight of the return, though, was an impromptu rendition of "My Favorite Things." I know those of you know who know me can appreciate my impressive musical talent, and let me tell you, if you were not in that car, you missed out.
Monday, June 10, 2013
Hiking is hard and it's hot and I'm tired...
The above is almost a word for word quote I expressed this weekend while on one of my actual adventures. It's amazing anyone puts up with me, or that I continue to do any physical activity rather than just sitting on the couch eating Cheetos. That would be a sweet life, indeed.
But then I'd likely be fat and my fingers would continually be covered in cheese dust. That would be less great.
This weekend, in place of our usual Sunday run, Barrett and I set out to hike Harkening Hill, one of the slightly less daunting trails nestled in the Peaks of Otter. That "slightly" is an important modifier, though, because there are still some less than gradual slopes along the way (thankfully broken up by plenty of easier climbs) that can cause one to opine about the difficulty of hiking, especially when coming off a not-stellar night of sleep due to partying, partying, yeah.
Still, Sunday's hike was actually a very pleasant adventure, as adventures go. The hill is super shaded, protecting us from the 80-degree temperatures. Like Flat Top, Harkening Hill is far less popular than Sharp Top, so we were able to scale it and return down without fighting off hordes of other hikers - usually groups that include tiny, tiny children literally sprinting up the mountain and making me feel extremely inferior about my state of physical fitness.
Sadly, I did not take any pictures on Sunday's hike, but plan to steal some from Barrett - expect an updated post at some point. But there are a few physical features of the Harkening Hill trial worth pointing out.
As I mentioned, it's very well-shaded. I've now hiked this trail about once a season, and it's amazing to observe the changes in its scenery over the course of just a few months. When I hiked it with friends in late April, we saw newly blossoming trees and a slight proliferation of ground cover, but the trail was still frequently discernible and we had fairly clear views of the surrounding mountains all along our route.
Not so in early June. At times the trail was almost completely overtaken by ground-level fauna; we might have been wise to bring a machete. I was in constant fear of treading over some poison ivy or attracting some ticks - worse, I at one point expressed my fear of brushing up against tick-infested poison ivy. How bad would that be?
The trees are thick with bright green foliage these days, obscuring the views of surrounding mountains for most of the trail, but not making those views or the hill itself any less beautiful. There are several points along the ways with rocks perfectly suited for sitting and looking out at the beauty of the Blue Ridge, plus the summit itself has a nice flat rock that would be perfect for tanning - if giving myself skin cancer was worth that level of effort.
On the way back down, we passed through two meadows of various wild grasses, that are well above knee-high nowhere near the Fourth of July. It was in these meadows that I loudly proclaimed "It's hot!" apropos of nothing and in the same tone I would likely have used if we'd encountered a bear - which, luckily, we did not.
The final section of the trail passes over and near a cute little creek and then back around to the picturesque parking lot. (Okay, obviously I'm joking about the parking lot, but Barrett claimed there was a tourist video taping the outside of the blase visitor center and bathrooms, so you never know. People can find beauty anywhere, I suppose.)
All in all, it was a quality way to spend a Sunday, and an actual adventure for me to recount here. No super pithy observations to share, other than that hiking is indeed hard, it is often hot outside, and being tired is the worst.
But I suppose that's all better than being permanently coated in cheese dust.
But then I'd likely be fat and my fingers would continually be covered in cheese dust. That would be less great.
This weekend, in place of our usual Sunday run, Barrett and I set out to hike Harkening Hill, one of the slightly less daunting trails nestled in the Peaks of Otter. That "slightly" is an important modifier, though, because there are still some less than gradual slopes along the way (thankfully broken up by plenty of easier climbs) that can cause one to opine about the difficulty of hiking, especially when coming off a not-stellar night of sleep due to partying, partying, yeah.
Still, Sunday's hike was actually a very pleasant adventure, as adventures go. The hill is super shaded, protecting us from the 80-degree temperatures. Like Flat Top, Harkening Hill is far less popular than Sharp Top, so we were able to scale it and return down without fighting off hordes of other hikers - usually groups that include tiny, tiny children literally sprinting up the mountain and making me feel extremely inferior about my state of physical fitness.
Sadly, I did not take any pictures on Sunday's hike, but plan to steal some from Barrett - expect an updated post at some point. But there are a few physical features of the Harkening Hill trial worth pointing out.
As I mentioned, it's very well-shaded. I've now hiked this trail about once a season, and it's amazing to observe the changes in its scenery over the course of just a few months. When I hiked it with friends in late April, we saw newly blossoming trees and a slight proliferation of ground cover, but the trail was still frequently discernible and we had fairly clear views of the surrounding mountains all along our route.
Not so in early June. At times the trail was almost completely overtaken by ground-level fauna; we might have been wise to bring a machete. I was in constant fear of treading over some poison ivy or attracting some ticks - worse, I at one point expressed my fear of brushing up against tick-infested poison ivy. How bad would that be?
The trees are thick with bright green foliage these days, obscuring the views of surrounding mountains for most of the trail, but not making those views or the hill itself any less beautiful. There are several points along the ways with rocks perfectly suited for sitting and looking out at the beauty of the Blue Ridge, plus the summit itself has a nice flat rock that would be perfect for tanning - if giving myself skin cancer was worth that level of effort.
On the way back down, we passed through two meadows of various wild grasses, that are well above knee-high nowhere near the Fourth of July. It was in these meadows that I loudly proclaimed "It's hot!" apropos of nothing and in the same tone I would likely have used if we'd encountered a bear - which, luckily, we did not.
The final section of the trail passes over and near a cute little creek and then back around to the picturesque parking lot. (Okay, obviously I'm joking about the parking lot, but Barrett claimed there was a tourist video taping the outside of the blase visitor center and bathrooms, so you never know. People can find beauty anywhere, I suppose.)
All in all, it was a quality way to spend a Sunday, and an actual adventure for me to recount here. No super pithy observations to share, other than that hiking is indeed hard, it is often hot outside, and being tired is the worst.
But I suppose that's all better than being permanently coated in cheese dust.
Friday, June 7, 2013
I just look like I know what I'm doing...
So I failed to post yesterday, and then had written most of a blog post today when a guy called me back I needed to talk to, then I ate lunch and then I got sleepy. Initial blog post derailed, but I will persevere and give you all an adventure if it kills me!
My original plan was to write about my attempts at being a business reporter despite not actually knowing anything about business. I lost the thread of how I was expressing it before, but I'll do my best to express my thoughts on this subject in a fresh, engaging, pithy (OH SO PITHY) way.
Almost two years ago to the day, I started my first business reporting internship. At the time, I had quite possibly negative levels of interest in business reporting, but needed an internship to, you know, graduate, so I took the job.
It was not, I will say, a summer filled with mystery and intrigue. I covered a few cool things, learned some stuff and become mildly interested in business reporting, but did not decide it was my life's calling. Still, when it came time to look for post-grad internships/jobs, the idea of branding myself as a "business reporter" seemed like a good way to give myself a niche and avoid the tortuous hell of being a full-time night cops reporter. (I hope you're sensing a theme about my feelings toward working nights cops.)
So here I am, gainfully (ha, that's a good one) employed as a business reporter, faking it until I make it. Today I pulled together a story on the housing market, despite the fact that I quite literally have no understanding of how the housing market works, at a very basic level. But when I look through data and talk to people I'm generally able to comprehend the important stuff and see the trends that are there to be seen.
I do think this field has bettered my life in a lot of ways, as well. Although I still don't feel like a housing expert by any stretch of the imagination, nor do I really get how bank earnings reports work or what REO's are (true story, when a banker mentioned REO's once I though he meant the cookie). But I know a lot more about those things - and a lot of other stuff - than I did two years ago.
So here's to the adventure of challenging yourself, pretending that you know what you're talking about until people believe you and to having a job - even a low-paying one.
Not the greatest post ever, I know. Hopefully my weekend will be filled with endless fun times and I'll be able to keep you readers engaged shortly.
For now, I am sleepy.
My original plan was to write about my attempts at being a business reporter despite not actually knowing anything about business. I lost the thread of how I was expressing it before, but I'll do my best to express my thoughts on this subject in a fresh, engaging, pithy (OH SO PITHY) way.
Almost two years ago to the day, I started my first business reporting internship. At the time, I had quite possibly negative levels of interest in business reporting, but needed an internship to, you know, graduate, so I took the job.
It was not, I will say, a summer filled with mystery and intrigue. I covered a few cool things, learned some stuff and become mildly interested in business reporting, but did not decide it was my life's calling. Still, when it came time to look for post-grad internships/jobs, the idea of branding myself as a "business reporter" seemed like a good way to give myself a niche and avoid the tortuous hell of being a full-time night cops reporter. (I hope you're sensing a theme about my feelings toward working nights cops.)
So here I am, gainfully (ha, that's a good one) employed as a business reporter, faking it until I make it. Today I pulled together a story on the housing market, despite the fact that I quite literally have no understanding of how the housing market works, at a very basic level. But when I look through data and talk to people I'm generally able to comprehend the important stuff and see the trends that are there to be seen.
I do think this field has bettered my life in a lot of ways, as well. Although I still don't feel like a housing expert by any stretch of the imagination, nor do I really get how bank earnings reports work or what REO's are (true story, when a banker mentioned REO's once I though he meant the cookie). But I know a lot more about those things - and a lot of other stuff - than I did two years ago.
So here's to the adventure of challenging yourself, pretending that you know what you're talking about until people believe you and to having a job - even a low-paying one.
Not the greatest post ever, I know. Hopefully my weekend will be filled with endless fun times and I'll be able to keep you readers engaged shortly.
For now, I am sleepy.
Wednesday, June 5, 2013
What this blog could have been...
When I began tossing around ideas in my head for potential blog subjects that would lead to a devoted Internet falling and guaranteed worldwide stardom, fame and fortune, I considered making it a running blog.
Now when I say running blog, I don't mean one of the real running blogs, where people outline training regimens, shoe choices, ideal diets and, occasionally, wax poetic about the bond that all runners share or how soothing it is for your soul. (I do enjoy the last two types of pieces a good deal, but don't feel like I'm quite qualified to write them or even really participate in said bond as a casual runner who only picked up the activity about a year ago and is still frequently certain that jogging is, in fact, the worst. That being said, this article makes me feel good about myself and running and says everything I'd want to say, if I were to write that type of blog: http://thoughtcatalog.com/2013/17-things-running-teaches-you-about-life/.)
No, I planned to use my infrequent runs as a Bridget Jones-esque framing device and have each entry focus on my various musings on the course of these runs.
Obviously, that fell through. First off, I'm not really running that often these days, usually just a long run on Sunday with Barrett and a few trips to the gym during the week. We're training for a Tough Mudder in November, so I know I need to up my game, but...laziness. Still, Wednesdays are going to become my new secondary running day and I plan to do about four miles this evening. Fingers crossed.
Today's adventure, though, will recount Monday's run - Sunday's was relocated due to me having to work that godawful night cops shift. When being lazy about a run in late April, I suggested that we do six miles in April, seven in May, eight in June, etc. Although at the time it allowed me to avoid a seven-mile run in late April, it presented me the challenge of running eight miles two days ago, having not run more than four in several weeks (the previous week's Sunday run was replaced by lots and lots of hiking).
About a mile and a half into Monday's run, I literally almost started crying. Some of the elderly folk taking advantage of the trail's relative low occupancy on a casual Monday morning were probably taken aback by my whimpering. The problem, you see, was that I was pretty sure I just couldn't do it anymore. I kept telling myself that I'd run seven miles plenty of times before, and that the time we ran six miles in early April for our 10K I'd trained a hell of lot less than I had up to this point.
And yet, that first mile and a half felt like abject torture. That's the weird thing about running, I think, although it's not unique to that activity - some days you have good days, and sometimes you just don't. (To quote a favorite movie of my father's, "Sometimes the magic works, and sometimes it doesn't." Ten points if you can name the film.)
I remember times in my softball-playing days where my fastball just wouldn't pop, my curve wouldn't curve or my rise didn't feel like rising. Demoralized, I'd go home certain I'd never win another game, only to pitch the game of my life the next day.
The important thing to remember in those moments, I suppose, is to power through. I kept going, as much as I really, really, really wanted to stop, and eventually was able to push the defeatist attitude out of my brain. It popped back up around two and a half, three and a half, at at the four-mile break, where I literally collapsed on the ground because the benches were all covered in rain.
I suppose I didn't quite conquer all though, as Barrett was trying to break in some new boots that messed up his ankle so we went with a more casual three-mile walk on the return trip. I guess I'll have to wait until next week to see if I can actually run eight miles. Maybe once I get there I'll experience the illusive runners' high and be able to run forever.
It's unlikely.
p.s. This is a nice article, that you should all read, if you care about happiness, or baseball, or love, or just good writing. http://joeposnanski.blogspot.com/2013/06/fifteen-years.html
Now when I say running blog, I don't mean one of the real running blogs, where people outline training regimens, shoe choices, ideal diets and, occasionally, wax poetic about the bond that all runners share or how soothing it is for your soul. (I do enjoy the last two types of pieces a good deal, but don't feel like I'm quite qualified to write them or even really participate in said bond as a casual runner who only picked up the activity about a year ago and is still frequently certain that jogging is, in fact, the worst. That being said, this article makes me feel good about myself and running and says everything I'd want to say, if I were to write that type of blog: http://thoughtcatalog.com/2013/17-things-running-teaches-you-about-life/.)
No, I planned to use my infrequent runs as a Bridget Jones-esque framing device and have each entry focus on my various musings on the course of these runs.
Obviously, that fell through. First off, I'm not really running that often these days, usually just a long run on Sunday with Barrett and a few trips to the gym during the week. We're training for a Tough Mudder in November, so I know I need to up my game, but...laziness. Still, Wednesdays are going to become my new secondary running day and I plan to do about four miles this evening. Fingers crossed.
Today's adventure, though, will recount Monday's run - Sunday's was relocated due to me having to work that godawful night cops shift. When being lazy about a run in late April, I suggested that we do six miles in April, seven in May, eight in June, etc. Although at the time it allowed me to avoid a seven-mile run in late April, it presented me the challenge of running eight miles two days ago, having not run more than four in several weeks (the previous week's Sunday run was replaced by lots and lots of hiking).
About a mile and a half into Monday's run, I literally almost started crying. Some of the elderly folk taking advantage of the trail's relative low occupancy on a casual Monday morning were probably taken aback by my whimpering. The problem, you see, was that I was pretty sure I just couldn't do it anymore. I kept telling myself that I'd run seven miles plenty of times before, and that the time we ran six miles in early April for our 10K I'd trained a hell of lot less than I had up to this point.
And yet, that first mile and a half felt like abject torture. That's the weird thing about running, I think, although it's not unique to that activity - some days you have good days, and sometimes you just don't. (To quote a favorite movie of my father's, "Sometimes the magic works, and sometimes it doesn't." Ten points if you can name the film.)
I remember times in my softball-playing days where my fastball just wouldn't pop, my curve wouldn't curve or my rise didn't feel like rising. Demoralized, I'd go home certain I'd never win another game, only to pitch the game of my life the next day.
The important thing to remember in those moments, I suppose, is to power through. I kept going, as much as I really, really, really wanted to stop, and eventually was able to push the defeatist attitude out of my brain. It popped back up around two and a half, three and a half, at at the four-mile break, where I literally collapsed on the ground because the benches were all covered in rain.
I suppose I didn't quite conquer all though, as Barrett was trying to break in some new boots that messed up his ankle so we went with a more casual three-mile walk on the return trip. I guess I'll have to wait until next week to see if I can actually run eight miles. Maybe once I get there I'll experience the illusive runners' high and be able to run forever.
It's unlikely.
p.s. This is a nice article, that you should all read, if you care about happiness, or baseball, or love, or just good writing. http://joeposnanski.blogspot.com/2013/06/fifteen-years.html
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
So...what happened here?
The ellipsis are in a different place in today's title, but they're still there. It still counts, and I'm a bit of a mess today because I slightly overslept and my right contact lens is messed up. But I'm overdue for recounting and adventure, so you'll take what you can get.
Today's adventure comes courtesy of my job. Every so often, I have to work the night cops shift, the bane of most non-cops reporters. It involves working late into the night, listening to the police scanners and, if need be, driving out to the scene of serious and/or fatal car accidents, fires, murders, etc. When those things don't happen, it involves staring at your computer for approximately eight hours trying to combat mind-numbing boredom.
Most of my night cops shift, to this point, have fallen into the latter category. It can be terrible, to be sure, but after working a semi-real shift this past Sunday I'm all for getting lost in Sporcle quizzes, Thought Catalog articles, etc. and hope every shift I work from now on is the calmest day in the history of Lynchburg.
Upon arrival Sunday afternoon, I prepared myself for my usual boredom killing endeavors. But after only about an hour on the job, the scanners piped up with activity. A tractor trailer, it seemed, had "run over" another vehicle. There wasn't any information immediately shared about the severity of the resultant injuries, but it seemed pretty likely the second vehicle's occupants weren't going to be in the best of shape.
Begrudgingly, I packed up my notebook and the scanner, pulled out my umbrella (oh yeah, we were in the midst of a giant rainstorm), got in my car and headed out to the scene of the accident. On the way I called our usual cops reporter (who is not at all a Jerk McJerkface and whose help I greatly appreciated) to get some instruction on how I should proceed, as I'd never gone out to the scene of anything before.
I heard on the scanner that traffic was blocked from both directions around the scene, so I pulled into a parking lot near by and set out on foot. My black flats, so cute in appearance, are probably the world shoes one can wear on a rainy day. With sopping wet feet and a soggy notebook, I encountered a kind young fireman who led me down to the crash site.
I was directed to the fire chief and, with absolutely no confidence, I asked him quite simply, "so...what happened here?"
His answer: "This truck hit that truck."
He went on to explain that the damage was not as bad as it appeared and the smaller truck's occupants had only minor injuries. The whole "tractor trailer ran over other vehicle" call had apparently been a bit of an exaggeration.
I thanked him and began the trudge back to my car, only realizing once I'd arrived at it the myriad questions I failed to ask. I did my best to get them answered upon my return to the newsroom, all the while feeling pretty not confident and unhappy. I also had to get information on a fire, try to track down a story about a Ferris wheel getting stuck, and otherwise direct myself from the all-important Sporcle.
All in all, it was a rough day, and I was reminded why I don't cover cops. The only upside was that I got to take Monday off, and finally see Iron Man 3.
It was a much better use of my time.
Today's adventure comes courtesy of my job. Every so often, I have to work the night cops shift, the bane of most non-cops reporters. It involves working late into the night, listening to the police scanners and, if need be, driving out to the scene of serious and/or fatal car accidents, fires, murders, etc. When those things don't happen, it involves staring at your computer for approximately eight hours trying to combat mind-numbing boredom.
Most of my night cops shift, to this point, have fallen into the latter category. It can be terrible, to be sure, but after working a semi-real shift this past Sunday I'm all for getting lost in Sporcle quizzes, Thought Catalog articles, etc. and hope every shift I work from now on is the calmest day in the history of Lynchburg.
Upon arrival Sunday afternoon, I prepared myself for my usual boredom killing endeavors. But after only about an hour on the job, the scanners piped up with activity. A tractor trailer, it seemed, had "run over" another vehicle. There wasn't any information immediately shared about the severity of the resultant injuries, but it seemed pretty likely the second vehicle's occupants weren't going to be in the best of shape.
Begrudgingly, I packed up my notebook and the scanner, pulled out my umbrella (oh yeah, we were in the midst of a giant rainstorm), got in my car and headed out to the scene of the accident. On the way I called our usual cops reporter (who is not at all a Jerk McJerkface and whose help I greatly appreciated) to get some instruction on how I should proceed, as I'd never gone out to the scene of anything before.
I heard on the scanner that traffic was blocked from both directions around the scene, so I pulled into a parking lot near by and set out on foot. My black flats, so cute in appearance, are probably the world shoes one can wear on a rainy day. With sopping wet feet and a soggy notebook, I encountered a kind young fireman who led me down to the crash site.
I was directed to the fire chief and, with absolutely no confidence, I asked him quite simply, "so...what happened here?"
His answer: "This truck hit that truck."
He went on to explain that the damage was not as bad as it appeared and the smaller truck's occupants had only minor injuries. The whole "tractor trailer ran over other vehicle" call had apparently been a bit of an exaggeration.
I thanked him and began the trudge back to my car, only realizing once I'd arrived at it the myriad questions I failed to ask. I did my best to get them answered upon my return to the newsroom, all the while feeling pretty not confident and unhappy. I also had to get information on a fire, try to track down a story about a Ferris wheel getting stuck, and otherwise direct myself from the all-important Sporcle.
All in all, it was a rough day, and I was reminded why I don't cover cops. The only upside was that I got to take Monday off, and finally see Iron Man 3.
It was a much better use of my time.
Sunday, June 2, 2013
Drinking coffee with strangers...
As I write today's blog post, I'm in the midst of the most active night cops shift I've ever had at my job. (A clue to my identity, for my myriad readers who don't know who I am, I'm a newspaper reporter!) What this means for you all is that you're going to get a truly enthralling blog post TOMORROW, filled with the exciting story of my adventure to go cover a car accident and do other things that I am not super confident doing.
But for today, you must settle for the more ho-hum story of my current roommate search. I've begun the quest because one of my two roommates is getting married this fall and, therefore, moving out of our apartment when our lease runs out this July. Although my experience searching for a place to live in Lynchburg last summer convinced me that most people wait until the absolute last minute to find new roomies, I am a planner and have already posted my Craigslist ad.
The adventure of finding a roommate is kind of like dating, especially when the use of Craigslist makes it feel like online dating. (Disclaimer: I've never online dated, nor have a I really "dated" in the traditional meet cute at the bus station, go get coffee and then dinner and then maybe a movie type way. That's really the W&L-way. I still feel totally qualified, however, to draw my comparisons, Carrie Bradshaw style.)
When I posted my Craigslist ad, I did everything I could to make the apartment seem attractive to like-minded people, without giving away enough information to make myself vulnerable to spammers and, worse, murderers. I made sure to include "affordable" in the title, because I see that as the main appeal of my apartment, but wanted to emphasize that I actually live in a very nice complex, it just happens to be in the cheapest part of the world.
I didn't want to post pictures with the ad itself, because that seemed to be inviting the whole murdering thing (really though because I was lazy), but I tried to paint a word picture of how luxurious my place of living is. I vaguely described myself and the remaining roommates as "young female professionals seeking similar types," or something like that. (I did say we would not turn away a male roommate, but I've since ignored all e-mails from men. Turns out I'm not actually that hip.)
Anywho, after carefully crafting this post, I put it out on the Internet, fully expecting not to hear anything until we got closer to the Aug. 1 move-in date.
Apparently though, I was wrong, and the world is filled with people just as planning-obsessed as I am (or who can't read - I've gotten a few people who need a room TOMORROW, and have chosen to ignore the "Aug. 1" in the ad title). E-mails have flowed in at a fairly steady pace for about two weeks now, and I've set up a few coffee dates.
It's a tricky line to walk, though, because how am I to tell people I don't like enough to live with them that I've found someone else? Will "it's not you, it's me" work? (Real talk: does anyone in the real world use that, or is it solely a television and movie trope? I'm curious.) To limit the heartbreak I spread around, I've responded positively to only three of my e-mailers and left the rest hanging, for now. They'll get responses if these are all duds.
The first girl was nice enough, but, to borrow a phrase I believe Katherine once told me her parents use, meeting her felt like work. (Her context it was actually work, I think, because her dad's job involves meeting people. It still applies.) I've turned myself into a much more outgoing person in the past five or so years, but I still feel that little surge of stress every time I expected to have flawless engaging conversation with strangers. I can do it, but if it's strenuous the whole time I don't enjoy it. That's how felt about contestant number one.
At that point I was beginning to wonder if I was going to meet someone I felt natural with, and the dating comparison popped up in my head once more. What if I'm the problem? What if she didn't like me, and that's why it was hard to talk to her? What if I never meet someone who won't judge me for consuming alcohol in public?
Anxiety shoved down deep, I set out for my second coffee date Saturday. I was running late and dressed in gym clothes to motivate myself to run afterward - not the best first impression to make. I foresaw things going terribly, being super awkward, and just overall not fun.
But it wasn't! Contestant number two and I got along great. After the preliminary small talk about how damn hot it was, we slipped into natural conversation about how weird a city we live in, how it's hard to find roommates in a town where people use certain code words in their Craigslist posts to indicate what behaviors are and aren't okay, and our relative level of interest in being outside, working out and overall doing difficult things in the interest of getting in shape.
Now, though, I'm faced with a situation more in line with polygamy than traditional dating; playing the waiting game until my roommate returns from out-of-town and she can decide if she likes this potential housing buddy.
Meanwhile I'm worrying if she'll find someone else or a better offer and leave us behind. I have one more coffee date schedule and scores of other Craigslist offers. But if this falls through, she may just be the one that got away.
Cue sad, wistful music.
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