praying for the worst

i believe there are times of great stress and workload when you can, with no shame, pray for the worst.
agree? disagree?
traveled to san antonio Tuesday for meetings Tuesday and Wednesday evening. Have just finished up. It's nearly 11 PM.
Scheduled to fly to Chicago tomorrow morning at 6:45 AM to arrive at 9:20 to attend and present at a new business pitch from 1-3 PM.
Scheduled to fly out of Chicago at 5:35 to arrive home in NY at 8:45.

I am hoping, praying, NEEDING the weather to flare up, and for my Chicago flight to be cancelled.

Please, please let the god's of business travel rear their heads and make the passage from the southwest to the northern-midwest impassable. Let them blow a cold, ice forming wind over the path and stop my flight from getting through to Chicago. Another acceptable option would be to divert my plane to some other location. I would happily sit on the runway for an extended period of time if it means that my opportunity to present in Chicago is hopelessly ruined.

yes. i may have no shame, but i also have no desire to present on very few hours of sleep and a lot of hours of travel.
call me crazy

alyce

respect

for the eagles for playing the game.

the pats better pull this shit out tho


alyce

bollocks to turkey

we had duck

my parents came to new york. i think this is the first time i haven't had to travel on thanksgiving since... i was a kid living at home?

it's nice to be the host.

feeling a little overwhelmed now though.

parents are wonderful, and they love and care and nurture, but they also always think that their way of doing things is the best way. which is fine for the big things. but seriously. furniture placement? shouldn't the person who lives in the house get to decide how the furniture should be?

i guess not

i think the lesson really is just that parents can't ever stop being parents.



god bless 'em



alyce

You tell 'em!

This man is my new hero. Wrote a paper many years ago. When he found out how many people were using his theories to promote their own creationist ideas? He retracted his paper!

Genius. My hat's off to you:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/25/science/25jacobson.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

alyce

i think

that i was drunk the last time i posted.
but anyhow, the sox are in it. game 1 just started, so this may be a bit of a disjointed, distracted post. forgive me

i was walking down the street the other day and i saw a man lying on the sidewalk against a building with the upper half of his body out of sight in a cardboard box. The thought that popped into my head was "I could curl up in a cardboard box right now". what? that came out of nowhere. i was so confused because even when i thought it, it was totally deadpan in my head. so strange.

naomi and shoshana. they were both on the bus this evening, and she spoke to them both in the same tone of voice.
naomi is her mentally challenged adult daughter. shoshana is the dog

plenty to post

i have plenty to say
really i do
i have plenty of stories to tell
and you will enjoy them
but right now, all i have in me to say is:

Come On Sox!

xo
alyce

routine

the joy of coming home is such a contradiction. i always want to come home so badly, i always feel out of sorts, out of my regular routine.
and then i get home, and i feel so put off by my house and needing to clean and the empty fridge and the laundry and the unpacking and the mail sorting, and i realize that i shouldn't be such a slave to my routines. i should revel in the different schedules i need to bow to while on the road and try to incorporate pieces into my day to day


xo
alyce

what is it about me?

is it my innocent face?
my purity of soul?
or my total lack of caring and compunction?
who the fuck knows what it is, my REAL question is this- why am i the girl to be confided in when you have some sort of gross, "i am an adulterer and we are in love" type confession to make?
why am i the go to girl for the confession that "we are in love but nobody can know because it will hurt too many people" or "i will get fired" or "i am a complete degenerate but we LOOOOVVVVEEE each other so it's ok"

seriously, why me? i am the most skeptical person about love and sacrificing for love, especially sacrificing other relationships, especially sacrificing friendships, especially sacrificing your own personal goals and integrity, especially sacrificing the lives of your children, excuse me, but fuck you for being so goddamn selfish.

i mean the truth is that i'm sure i am wrong about love in general and in practice, obviously my jaded opinions on love haven't really ever gotten me that far, but trust me i have no desire to get "far" if it means i have to sell out every moral fiber in my body.
which brings me back to my original question-

Why. why in the name of anything that is holy to anybody, but clearly not me, why am I of all people the confidant?
is it because normally nothing can phase me and i usually think that for the most part everyone should do the things that make themselves happy?

maybe the problem is that you don't understand that i think that only applies when you are the only person affected, maybe the problem is that you don't understand that i think that you are ABHORRENT when you sell out other people and lie and cheat and do things that make it impossible for other people to live their lives honestly.
maybe that's my problem
maybe that' s one of my many problems.
maybe people need to stop telling me things.
maybe i need to shut up and go to sleep

abhorrent
bitches


xo
alyce

that apartment

it's so odd because i never would have noticed that apartment before... maybe not NEVER but most probably i wouldn't have noticed it before. maybe i would have noticed it, but it would never have become a regular something that i made a point to take notice of because of its oddity, excepting for the fact that i now have a dog.

it all sounds circular until i explain that i have a dog, so i walk said dog, and i walk said dog in the mornings and the evenings on a relatively regular route so that we can do all the business that dogs need to do when they wake up and before they go to sleep. of course when i get home from work we normally take a rambling, who-knows-where type walk, but i digress.

so on these relatively regular routes, i have come to notice this apartment. it is 2 blocks away from my house. it is a ground level apartment, and the lights are always on. always. at first i didn't think it was strange, you know, someone is trying to rent said apartment so it is always ready for showing.

it's a rather straightforward apartment. you can see the main room and the kitchen. they are divided by an island, which provides some nice counter space. it isn't too fancy, your regular "i designed for a rental" plastic counter tops and hanging cabinets that look super generic.

but i've been walking by it for weeks now. literally weeks. the lights are still on and it's still completely vacant, and now every time i go by i crane my neck to see- what is that room back there? is it a room? is it a closet? is that apartment a studio? is it a one bedroom? is it a magical wonderland that opens up into narnia?

but i can't help that i want to know. what is this vacant apartment in which the lights never go out? why does it sit there vacant, yet completely illuminated?

i always expect it to satisfy the peeping tom in me- it has no occupants, so i can rightly stare into the windows to my hearts content without fear of being caught, however it always leaves me vaguely dissatisfied because of course it has no occupants to make it interesting, and i can't quite ever know what the place really is until i've been inside.
it's beautiful really, the perfect lesson of how you can never know.

and if you don't know, now you know.

whoa
that was bad

xo
alyce

Marnie?

Who else has seen this movie? It's Hitchcock, and it's got Tippi and Sean Connery, and it really is beautifully shot. but the plot
my god the plot
it was just so strange, my favorite scene was at the end when Marnie regresses and talks in her little girl voice about what she's seeing.
anyhow, i am not sure exactly why i am posting about it, but while i was watching it, i just kept thinking.
seriously?

the best part of the movie was Sean Connery's sister-in-law, Lil, played by Diane Baker.
what a fox

xo
alyce

eekers

the good thing about breakdowns is that they do pass. and when they do pass, you do feel better. and when you do feel better, you realize that you HAD to have that breakdown because obviously it came from somewhere and THANKS GOD you had that breakdown.
really
cause now it's gone and you can feel better
especially because it's fall and there is just so much to feel better about.
well
not work or anything, and not money, and not so much newly acquired responsiblity.
HOWEVER,
there is football. yes there is, and when one gets to go to 2 regular season Patriot's games (yes Belichick cheated and yes i still love him so) the world is just that much rosier.
so, i am toasting the passing of storms, the advent of fall, and the glorious season that is football season, may it last as long as it can without all my dearest players injuring themselves beyond the point of playing next season

xo
alyce

sails minus wind

where to begin?
i've been sitting at the keyboard for minutes. not moving. unable to really process the strange feeling of numbness.
nothing shocking, nothing totally outlandish or completely unexpected, just a heavy heavy left hook that connected hard. followed by a fast right jab that pretty much took my eye out.
what to do?

when the project you have worked on for a year and a half suddenly comes to a screeching halt. when the backbone account, your account is told it has no product. what happens?
i feel fine. i feel ok. i know there will be changes, but there is still a lot to do. i know i am expected to play a larger role. i know i will have to get more organized, but, i optimistically think, now there will be time.

i feel fine. i feel ok. i really do. i have always been able to roll with the punches.

at least when the punches are coming from one direction.

and then i find out he's with someone else.
again, not surprising, not completely unexpected, but it still feels like a betrayal, because what was all the fussing about over me a couple of months ago, why were you trying to pull me back in when you were clearly done? what were you trying to prove?

and the one-two gets me.
and i'm down for the count.

thankfully the count is only 3, and i'm almost 10 times that far along

xo
alyce

terrible nature

is it human nature to be more miserable because someone else is happy?
i mean is it normal to feel bad all on your own, and then suddenly worse when you find out someone you have no contact with is now doing all the things they were supposed to do with you?
i think it is. i hope it is. i want it to be.

but it's all shit. i don't want to feel bad, and i don't want anyone else to feel bad, i want everything to go on hunky dory, everyone enjoying their lives, living the way they have always aspired to live.

but then i hear that you are going on vacation, while i continue to drone on- an overworking self absorbed asshole who can't seem to break out- and i want to cry. and the real kicker is that i'm crying for myself. poor me.

i guess that's the lesson, it's more about me than you. it always was. i said i am self absorbed. it was always about me being unhappy with my own shit. it never had anything to do with you. i think that's the one thing that should comfort me.

i should just aim to laugh at my total ineptitude on how to make myself happy. it should become my greatest accomplishment and i should revel in it

huzzah for me, perpetual self loather!

that actually made me laugh. fucking huzzah

Uppsala

It's 10 PM in Sweden right now. The sun has still not completely set. It has been years since i was far enough north of the equator to witness the "midnight sunset" or whatever they call it, leading up to the shortest night of the year on June 21st.
Uppsala is beautiful. Driving in from Arlanda airport revealed a lot of green, farm land, and even a parked crop duster-looking plane.
I am staying here at Krusenberg Herrgård:
http://www.krusenbergherrgard.se/krusenbergherrgard/inenglish.4.7671d7bb110e3dcb1fd800063071.html
I got in at 7:30 and for 2 hours it was just me and the attendant at the reception desk. it felt good to be so isolated. when i travel for work, i am normally alone while in transit and in the evenings (unless we are having some sort of function). arriving at this hotel/manor and being one of 2 people on the property (that i was aware of), being told that the chef waited, but had left as it was so late, and that 5 people who were here for the meeting had all gone into town, was a lovely physical manifestation of the loneliness of business travel.
maybe not loneliness persay, but more isolation. it's not really a bad thing- sometimes i wonder if i had someone that traveled with me, maybe i would make more of an effort to go out and do things.
maybe, maybe not.
the Krusenberg manor house is beautiful, and i think i will enjoy our two day meeting.
then it's off to Malta!

alyce

real estate

is madness
i know that is cliche, but what can you do?
being a novice is almost comforting, because you can't be too surprised as it's all brand spanking new.

that is all

arrival

my niece is here. she arrived today, but managed to squirm and wriggle her way into a twisted connection that delayed her arrival.
They have taken her to a different location for observation and monitoring. Everyone closest to her is wiped out and, exhausted, and i am going for reinforcement. In the world for less than 24 hours, and she has managed to tax her parents to no end.
i always knew, in the back of my mind, that entering the world could be a perilous endeavour, but until i was awaiting the entrance of a specific person, i never knew how perilous, how much of a cliff hanger it could all be.
but i'm on my way to meet the newest person in my family, and damned if i'm not excited.

mode of operation

We are so easily lulled into our own lives.
People we used to connect to easily become more and more distant. A lot of the time we can reconnect for short periods of time without too much strain. We catch up, we discuss the latest and greatest, we feel more in touch.
People we used to have difficulty connecting with only become more difficult. Especially the more lulled we are.
We get used to speaking our daily speak, walking our daily walk, developing patterns and habits that stick to us, that color our perceptions.
Different people all over have different modes of operation. Sometimes it's easy to accept someone else's MO. Other times it's not.
But I think that this lack of acceptance stems from not understanding that there exists a language barrier between two different MOs


I watch two people who have so much love for each other, and so much anger. The anger rules because they have not been able to establish a common language. A way that they both feel they are being directly addressed and understood.
Who the hell knows how to help two people start building a common language. Why do I feel compelled to try?

I think that without knowing it people want either to be right, or to be happy. Sometimes I think that people feel one or the other, or some painful conflict between the two.

It's tough