Either Way You're Screwed

An introvert surrounded by extraverts June 18, 2010

A lot of my friends are extraverts, and some of them have a hard time understanding why I am different from them. They love to go out every night with other friends or aquaintances and they always seem to have some sort of plan in the works for every moment of the weekend. I, on the other hand, feel exhausted just at the thought of all that going on.  I need to re-charge my batteries at home, though spending time with just my husband and my daughter is just as relaxing to me as being by myself. 

I also don’t have hundreds of Facebook friends like some people I know. I have 67, and that number is not likely to ever reach one hundred, which is fine with me.  Its not that I’m an un-likeable person (I hope) I just don’t keep more than a handful of really close friends at any one time.  My husband serves double-duty as a best friend too.  He is also an introvert so imagine how much fun we have at a party.  We stick to each like glue.

Lately at my job I’ve been learning how I work differently from my extraverted colleagues.  I’ve learned that when I am listening in meetings and gathering my thoughts, they might be thinking that I’m not paying attenion.  I am, really, I just don’t feel the need to speak up until I’m good and ready, or I may even do so after the meeting is over and I’ve had a chance to think about it some more.  I’m hoping that by writing this blog and putting thoughts out there more often, that I will occassionally succeed in breaking out of the introverted state that I am in.  But not too often though, because then I would need a vacation…

This is Progress? June 16, 2010

I am grateful to have air conditioning, a car that gets me from point A to point B, and for the million little things like deodorant and toothpaste, but it is disturbing to think of the cost to the environment that results from having these things.  I am not a tree hugger, not exactly, since I am not going to start using crystals for deodorant because that just seems silly to me and I’m not going to start keeping sheep in my back yard and weave my own wool, but I do want to do what I can to make things better for my daughter’s future.  It worries me to think of what things will be like for her 30-40 years from now.  The Gulf spill can’t help but remind me of that.  This article (http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/06/11/gulf-oil-spill-deepwater/) is quite disturbing as it points out just how much we are dependent on oil in our daily lives.  It is not just for fuel to run our cars or other things that are equally as obvious. 

Thinking about the  oil spill in the Gulf makes my stomach queasy because of the huge impact it will have both in the region and the environment as a whole.  I’d like for us to stop drilling offshore altogether, but I can’t imagine what impact on our economy that would have.  There are long-term solutions to the problem such as alternative energy from sustainable resources, but I worry that we are so addicted to oil that we won’t be able to do what it takes to make such a transition and that the use of those resources will have other costs to the environment that we won’t be expecting (like growing so much corn for ethanol production that food prices go up, soil erosion occurs, increased use of pesticides seep into the Gulf of Mexico and create a deadzone, etc….). 

It is all quite depressing and I will do what I can to help.  I resolve to recycle even more than I already do, try to be more energy efficient, and to buy an electric car when I can afford to do so…then again it probably will take oil or some other fossil fuel to generate the electricity I’ll need to charge the car’s battery and…sigh.

Almost there… June 8, 2010

Construction on our addition is almost complete.  It cannot come soon enough because even though it has only taken 3 months, its been a looooong three months with at least 9 months of pre-planning and design before that.  I’m a little tired of workers walking through the house and hammering, sawing and drilling throughout the day.  Oddly enough I’ve actually gotten used to complete strangers coming out of our basement with only socks on their feet as they walk through the place (though I will say that taking off their shoes so as not to track more dust and dirt throughout the already incredibly dusty and dirty house is quite considerate, albeit entirely unnecessary as every surface in the house is already coated with a layer of grime).

Everyone who has gone through such a renovation or construction always says that it is going to cost more than you think it will because something unexpected happens.  Damnit, I hate it when “everyone” is right.  Granted, it could have been worse, but I hate it when my carefully crafted budget gets blown up.  It ruins my day. 

But, like I said, it is almost done.  The workers will be gone, the house will be clean, my husband and I will have a wonderful master suite all to ourselves – it will be glorious.  And of course our contractor did not cheat us out of tens of thousands of dollars like we had seen on countless sob stories on HGTV, so all in all, not bad.

I really hope we never have to do it again though. Once is enough, thank you.

I am a terrible singer…but I will take requests May 10, 2010

I’ve just had my second Mother’s Day, and I’ve gotta say, that it is nice to be appreciated.  Since becoming a mother I’ve learned that multi-tasking is absolutely essential to survival – remembering to pack diapers to leave at daycare, scheduling doctor’s appointments, paying bills, remembering to clip Belle’s tiny little finger nails, figuring out what to cook for dinner, working full time, etc.  I’ve decided that for that one day a year I will always request to be able to sleep in, no matter that yesterday instead of getting up at 6am I only slept an hour later until 7am, but it felt pretty damn good regardless.

I don’t just feel appreciated because of a national holiday though, but in the million little ways that Isabelle shows to me at times.  We have had a devil of a time getting her to brush her teeth but after trying many different methods to get her to cooperate I made up a silly little song “brush, brush brush your teeth, brush your little teeth…” and so on.  And I’ll be damned if that didn’t work like a charm.  The moment I run through the 10 second song she’ll say “again! again!”  All the while dutifully opening her mouth so that I can brush or she’ll do it herself.  That same night I sang some lullabies to her after putting her in bed.  She sat up in bed and looked at me raptly as I sang and “again!” was said after each rendition.  I did a little singing when she was a tiny baby but it never really seemed to have much effect so I stopped doing it.  I guess that will be a nightly thing now, so I will have to learn some more tunes.

I may be a terrible singer, but I do at least have one fan.

So close… May 5, 2010

I really want an iPad.  I had resolved to NOT buy it the moment it debuted or to pre-order one, but had instead decided to see what kind of reviews it gets.  Well, so far so good, though it does have some features I’m not too sure about, such as the fact that it doesn’t support Flash.  I may be able to get over that.  I have also wrestled with the question of whether to buy the WiFi or the 3G-enabled version and even as I nearly broke down and hit the Submit Order button on Apple’s website I was still on the fence as to which one to get.  Yes, I even had an iPad in my shopping cart and almost ordered it.  But then I realized that I should discuss such a large purchase with my husband first.  He never minds when I buy my little techie toys or anything else for that matter and has never told me not to (or rather asked me not to since I don’t go for the whole “obey” thing), but just because I have a higher salary does not mean that I should spend hundreds of dollars without telling him about it first.  I was SO close though…

How to Raise a Well-behaved child? April 26, 2010

I have no idea, but I do my best.  We’ve taught Belle to say please and thank you (most of the time) and she is usually very sweet except for the occasional melt down usually precipitated by one of us denying her something (a cookie, a dangerous object, etc.)  We just found out a few days ago that our daughter has become the trouble-maker of her daycare class, pushing other kids down, maybe even hitting. Sigh.  The unfortunate thing is, even at not quite 2 years old she knows just how adorable she is, since everyone treats her like the cutest kid in the class and possibly gives her more leeway than others.  I’m sure she now uses that to her advantage.  I heard that one day she pushed another girl down and then when she saw everyone’s shocked reaction, she was the one who started crying so everybody came over to comfort her.  Um, I wonder what happened to the girl she pushed? I sure hope they didn’t step over her to get to Belle.

My point is that hopefully we can find a way to correct this behavior, and FAST.  I don’t want a truly terrible two on my hands.  Wish me luck, I’m gonna need it.

The scary world of contractors April 22, 2010

And I don’t mean government contractors (like me). Why is it that even with a signed contract and permits, homeowners still have to be wary of general contractors cheating them out of tens of thousands of dollars? Why isn’t there more regulation? My husband and I have been obsessed with watching Holmes on Homes on HGTV up to and during our home remodeling project. Mike Holmes films his show in Canada and the more we watch it, it seems like all contractors must be crooked and he has to go in and fix their mistakes and save the homeowners from disaster. We’re adding an addition on to the side of our house with a master bedroom, bathroom and the all-important walk-in closet. I read books about it, designed the addition myself with software at home, got a recommendation from a friend (who recommended his own cousin), had him sign a contract and get permits and yet I’m still terrified.

I am happy to say though, that our contractor has been wonderful so far. But see, even after months of working with him and him doing is job well, I still caveat that with “so far.” Like I still think he may cheat us somehow. He knows we watch Holmes on Homes and we ask a lot of questions so maybe we’ve terrified him enough that he will stay honest. Or maybe he is truly an honest, hard-working guy. How sad is it that I won’t truly believe that until the whole thing is finished and paid for?

First Ever Blog Post…Seriously April 21, 2010

Now, what to write about. In this blog I plan to be witty, funny, erudite (not really) and hopefully entertaining. The title “Either way, you’re screwed” comes from one the bizarre conversations that my best friend and I had during college. “Think Thoughts” was already taken, unfortunately. Only one person on this Earth actually knows what that means, and that is OK with me. The rest of you can just be puzzled.

I just started a new job but I haven’t had a chance to do much real work yet. I just find that frustrating given the fact that I hate twiddling my thumbs and waiting for assignments. I would much rather be really busy and in some cases create work because I’ve come up with new ideas for how to do things and how to make work easier or more efficient.

Just a sidebar, while I am a mother, I don’t plan on making this a “mommy blog” though I am telling you right now that I will tell stories about her, because frankly, I can’t help it. Two year olds say and do funny things, that’s just a given at their age.

And a p.s., I’ve been terrified at the thought of blogging up until this point because I didn’t want to put myself out there for possible ridicule if I say something stupid. But, oh well. Have at it.