20) Have a kick-ass Halloween costume for this year's Halloween event at work

My work does a really fun halloween event each year for kids. It's free, it's fun, it's the one family-friendly event we do and I've loved it each time I've worked it. So, last year, I couldn't think of a costume so I ended up just wearing lots of clothing and being a gypsy. This year I wanted to put a bit more effort into it and gave a lot of thought to a costume. I really enjoy working a certain part of the event that is a kid's cave, which means my costume has to allow me to crawl through a cave and also not be too terrifying for kids. This year, I decided to be a little scary. I creeped myself out with it a bit, actually. I decided to be a mime (although, a talking one...which took some explaining. I made up the mime rule that mimes can speak on special occasions to really special people, which is why I could speak at the event to each child...because they were really special people.)

I only terrified one child into not wanting to crawl through the cave. But, I still think it was a good costume. I painted my whole face in the whole mime thing, had the black and white striped shirt, the black pants, the red beret...the whole deal. I was proud of myself. Of course, I didn't get a picture of me because I was really busy with setting up the cave and dealing with everything of the event, but I consider it a successful kick-ass costume.

I sort of looked like this, except without the blond hair. My face was very similar to this one.

12) Apply for a job I think I'd enjoy, whether I feel that I'm qualified for it or not.

I don't have a photograph to prove this, but you just have to trust me that I've completed this one!

9) Go 'glamping'

Despite being really un-communicative of late, I've not forgotten about my 27x30 challenge! I've been slowly knocking them out. I'm closing in on the end of a three week vacay in the Southwestern US and have officially gone glamping! (That's 'glamorous camping' for those unaccustomed to outdoorsy hipster jargon.)

I glamped at El Cosmico, in Marfa, Texas and spent one night in a safari tent and the next night in a teepee. Both were great, I really enjoyed my time there. I love these sorts of unique places to stay. I haven't had the chance to stay in too many really unique hotels, but I think I'll try to incorporate them more into my travels because it was really cool.

Safari Tent

Safari tents, bath house, and full moon. Beautiful.

Teepee! The floor was covered in deer skins, which made it nicer to walk around the teepee than if it had just been cement or wood planks. All the beds in the tents and teepees had electric mattress pads, so you were warm and cozy in the desert night.

So long, September.

Last weekend I traveled a few hours south and took part in my good friend Anna's wedding! It was a beautiful ceremony in a really pretty church. Congrats to the newlyweds! Anna is a high school teacher and taking a honeymoon during the school session is sort of rough so the happy couple is going to Tahiti around Christmas. Lovely choice, yes?

Tahiti!

When I returned home from the wedding on Sunday, I was greeted by Beatrix, whose face had swelled up enormously on her left side. There were also small blood spots around some areas of the apartment and I couldn't figure out what in the world she had gotten into or how she could have hurt herself. After cleaning up and trying to get a good look at her, I called the ER veterinary hospital to ask about hours, costs of visits, etc. It was mind-boggling how expensive they were and since Bea wasn't actively bleeding any longer and she seemed to be acting pretty normal at that point, I decided to let us give it a night and I would take her to a vet in the morning. She had a pretty rough evening, though and spent much of it hiding and feeling kind of rough. Her poor face was so swollen and I had decided it was probably an abscessed tooth. But, it turns out she had played and played and played with Watson when he was staying with us, and at some point she caught a claw to her face and neck and the wounds were infected. So, on Monday night when I picked her up from the vet's office, she looked much more like Two-Face, the character from Batman comics? Her left side of her face was completely shaved, her left whiskers were all cut off, and there were open bloody wounds on her cheek and a big one on the left side of her neck. She was feeling much better though, despite how terrible she looked. We've been dealing with that all week, but she's healing pretty nicely and just about back to her full ornery self. I took a picture of her wounds, but it's sort of gross, so I won't share it. She'll go back for her progress check-up later next week and hopefully then she can get her annual vaccines, which she also needs.  Caching, caching. Sometimes, a little lotto win would come in handy, you know? I don't mean a giant powerball, just a nice hundred or two hundred Scratchers win to cover those unexpected (and expected) pet bills?

The Art & Archaeology Museum on campus that I worked for during my grad school days is officially leaving campus on Monday. They are moving to a facility on the north side of town so that decisions can be made about the radiation levels of their current campus building. I think everyone is hoping this will be a very temporary move, but moving an entire museum is hardly something that you take on lightly and my feeling is (sadly) that this might be more permanent than not. I can't really see Mizzou making the clean-up of the building their number one priority, but it is really inconvenient to have them secluded on a far side of town where there is no easy way for students to get there. On the other hand, perhaps this could be a chance for the museum to make themselves better known outside the campus bubble? I'm not sure how it will all play out, but I am hoping to go say goodbye on Monday and see it in its "real" home (however radioactive it may be) one last time. There's a reception planned for it and everything. Aw.

Pickard Hall - Museum of Art & Archaeology @ Mizzou

I can hardly believe October is almost here. I'm struggling with costume ideas for Halloween. I had really wanted to do something fun and different this year. I am working a Halloween event at work and it's a lot more fun to dress up for it than to just stay in my work clothing. We also have a big annual meeting for work in October, which is always somewhat of a stressful time in the office. I've only been to one annual meeting for the society before and it was interesting. I think it will be fine in the end but the organization and prep-work that the staff are doing is starting to take its toll. That's why the universe has Hot Box Cookies, I think. Six of us went to this place on Thursday evening after work, and two of the six are some of the most over-worked and over-stressed for this annual meeting deal. It's amazing how much your stress can dissipate with a warm chocolate chip cookie, followed by a warm snickerdoodle, all accompanied by chocolate milk and laughing with co-workers over non-work related topics. It was nice. We decided it should be something we "do" from now on. I had never been to Hot Box before, but I tell ya: I'm a convert, big time. Every single cookie they have on the menu, I want to gobble up. Red velvet? Yes. Peanut butter w/ reese's pieces? Yes. White chocolate chocolate chip? Yes. Monster cookies? Yes yes yes. Plus, they do those giant cookie cakes that used to be all the rage in the early 1990s. I love those. Nom nom nom!

6.) See The Blue Man Group in concert

I saw the Blue Man Group on Tuesday night and it was definitely an experience! It was strange, funny, and unexpected all at the same time. They came to Mizzou and sold out the auditorium. It's a fun experience, if you get the chance to go! They are very interactive with the audience, despite the Blue Men never speaking a word. It was cool.

By all means, move at a glacial pace. You know how that thrills me.

I'm in the midst of learning a universal lesson: the art of patience. I am not a patient person. I struggle with the waiting game. The waiting game just wipes me out. I'm feeling continuously exhausted from trying to learn to be okay with things moving at their own pace. I like to get things done and I like to be done with things, not let things linger for months on end. Lingering is lame, but I need to remember:

15.) Get a virtual pen pal.

#15 on my 27 by 30 list is completed!

I am a part of a new program that has just come out of its pilot round: International Librarians Network. It's a free organization that partners librarians from one area of the world with a fellow librarian and you  correspond each week on professional matters for 6 months. After 6 months, the ILN allows you to sign up for a new partner librarian for another six months. You don't have to stop speaking to your new librarian friends from previous rounds, but it just gives you an end point (because sometimes you need one, you know?), plus a great way to meet other librarians, as well as get global perspectives on the field. It's pretty awesome.

My virtual pen pal is a public librarian and library student in Geelong, Australia. We've only been talking for a few days but this whole 'librarian pen pal' network is enlightening already.

Challenges ahead

The holiday weekend is rapidly approaching and I couldn't be happier about it. Labor Day sort of signifies the end of Summer, although it certainly feels more like Summer right now than it has much of the season so far. After last year's terrible drought and heat, we've lucked out this year with some really nice weather. I was able to spend much of it with the windows open and the air conditioner off. Good for me, good for Bea and good for the electricity bill. This week has changed all that with the typical Missouri summer weather arriving, at last. We're in the upper nineties every day with the heat index in the low 100s. Not as awesome.

Still, Labor Day is almost here and soon enough Fall will really arrive. I love Fall. The semester has already begun at Mizzou. We're into our second week of classes and things are slowly getting into a bit of a regular routine. The parking garages are becoming less of a traffic jam each day. Fewer students are getting lost and needing directions. The classes are coming in for their tours and orientations. At work, we've had an onslaught of professor requests for tours and orientations this semester. I don't remember it being this hectic before. We're scheduling multiple tours per day in some instances and re-opening the library after hours in other instances. It's nice, but I think we'll all be happy when those settle down, too.

I finished my summer reading challenge last week. "...And the Ladies of the Club" was a great book and I recommend it for people who like historical fiction and for those who have the time to commit to an epic story...(I mean epic in the real word, not slang terminology). After hanging out with the women of Waynesboro, Ohio for months now, I needed something completely different to read. So, I finally dug into the Advanced Reader Copies that the publishers were handing out at ALA in June. I picked up over a dozen ARCs and galleys and decided it was high time I I'm starting to read those and first decided to read a mystery set in the Amazon called "The Ways of Evil Men", which will be published in January. I'm only a few chapters in so far, but it's pretty interesting at this point. As I read my ARCs, I'll try to review them on here if I care to recommend them. I use Goodreads for my book tracking and always always always try to review the books that I read.

I'm finding that I always need a challenge of some sort. Always need something to be sort of reaching toward. A goal or program that I impose upon myself just to see if I can do it. I have no challenge right now. I could use selling my house as a challenge, but that's not what I mean. I mean challenge in the sense that I alone control my success or failure. In the past several years I've found that I work best under some sort of challenge. Like, the 365 photo challenge, the nothing over $30.00 wardrobe challenge, various reading challenges and other photo challenges, etc. I've found that these things really give me something to focus on, but also have a pretty big impact on my life. The 365 photo challenge made me view the world around me a lot more closely and become much more aware of my surroundings. It was great to get outside of myself and spend a lot of time finding beauty and creativity in my ordinary surroundings. It made me a better photographer, too. The wardrobe challenge had a huge impact on me, not only in the ways in which my spending habits changed, but also the ways in which I view quality of clothing. Before I did that project, I would buy mediocre clothing at ludicrous prices because I thought that was just what you had to do. Getting screwed by labels was just the way of the world. Afterward, I find that I refuse to buy things full price; I do a lot more with less, and I really think hard before buying clothes. I still adhere to a lot of the principles that I followed when I was in the $30.00 or less project. I really just don't buy clothes much anymore. I have become a lot more creative about my wardrobe and throw together combos of pieces to see if they work or how I feel about them. When I was a little girl, I had all the confidence in the world about putting together outfits and creating a wardrobe out of different pieces my parents would find for me. I look at pictures of me when I was young and think, 'Nice style, little one.' But, once I got to be about 12 and then all the way through probably my early 20s, I got really boring in my style. It's part of the awkward phase where I wanted to blend in more than stand out. I was awkwardly tall and clothing often just didn't fit right. I chose the path of least bullying and sort of hunkered down and bought the labels that everyone else had just to get through it, you know? But, in the last several years, I've sort of re-discovered the creative fashion girl that I used to be. I'm so glad to have found her again. People used to stare (and they still do) at some of the outfits I will wear. I have purple hair now, which also gets some comments, but mostly I get compliments about outfits and hairstyles and accessories that I throw together. I'm not sure I'm as confident as I was when I was the little girl in the pictures, and I don't know that I ever will be that sure of myself again, but I'm a long way from the insecure and awkward girl I see in pictures from my teenage years.This is all to say that I'm not sure what to do next? I've tackled photography, clothing, and reading... I can't really think of any sort of movie/tv challenge that I'd actually want to do. I know people do "Life Lists" and list out accomplishments or things they want to do before they die. That seems overwhelming. I kind of prefer to work in the semi-present. Challenges that I can see to the end in a year or less, you know? My life is not so stable that I actually know where I will be a year from now, either. I think it's best to keep my goals short-sighted.

Therefore, I'm sorta halfway thinking of doing one of those 30 by 30 lists. I turn 30 next Spring and, by all accounts, it seems like people kind of expect you to have your shit together by that time. I don't feel like I'm flailing about without any sort of direction, I just feel like my direction changes a lot. I cyber-stalked other peoples 30 by 30 lists and find many of them less than inspiring or I've already done the things on their list (i.e. buy a home, visit Machu Picchu (word!), get a real job) or things I have no inclination to do (i.e. have a baby, get married, skydive, hold a tarantula). I have about 8 months to finish this list, or decide that I don't want to do some of the tasks I put on here now (to be fair, some of these were already scheduled events between now and Spring, so it's not like I'm pulling all of these out of thin air). I could only think of 27, so these are the 27 things I'd like to do by the time I turn 30:

1) Be a vegetarian for a week
2) Keep a plant alive for at least two months
3) Take a tai chi class
4) Make my own jar of pasta sauce
5) Go on a road trip - solo. (I did a baby version of this last year, but I mean, a multi-state-American-Dream sort of road trip)
6) See The Blue Man Group in concert
7) Sell my house
8) Say 'Yes' to invitations (I realize this is sort of abstract, but you know...attempt to be more outgoing and  and less hermit-ish)
9) Go 'glamping'
10) Eat only at local establishments for a week...no chains.
11) Learn the "Single Ladies" dance from Beyonce's video
12) Apply for a job I think I'd enjoy, whether I feel that I'm qualified for it or not.
13) Register for a class at the adult education place in town
14) Attend class at the adult education place in town (I have a habit of registering and then punking out once the scheduled day of the class arrives.)
15) Get a virtual pen pal. (I miss receiving actual e-mails about friends and I long ago gave up on the project a friend and I were doing of actually sending letters through the mail.)
16) Chill out on the beach
17) Pick up someone else's tab at a restaurant
18) Archive my grandparents WWII letters
19) Teach Beatrix to walk on a leash (bwaahahahah.)
20) Have a kick-ass Halloween costume for this year's Halloween event at work
21) Write a fan letter to someone (My dad recently found a letter that my mom wrote to Jimmy Buffett and it has made me want to write a fan letter to somebody. But...to whom?)
22) Listen to every cd and every record I own all the way through
23) See a professional ballet/stay awake through a professional ballet
24) Go to more than one film screening during True/False 2014
25) Become more confident at giving tours and lectures at work
26) Read all of the books I picked up from ALA 2013 (alternatively: vow to not pick up as many the next time I attend ALA.)
27) Cook chicken fried rice all by myself (obviously, not the same week that I'm attempting #1)

Well...

Cutie pie overload.

Seriously, this is how life should be everyday:

Gold Cup Final!

I spent the weekend in Chicago and went to the Gold Cup Final at Soldier Field on Sunday afternoon. It was USA v. Panama and it was such a blast. There were a lot of USA fans, a lot of Panama fans, and some fans who thought Mexico would be there instead and were there just to be at a Final. If the US hadn't made the Final, that's how it would have been for me. I would still have gone, but it was so much more fun being able to root for my own team. It was my first professional soccer game and the seats were fantastic, the crowd was fun, and the US Men's National Team won the game and the trophy (WOOOOT!)! I got to see Landon Donovan on his comeback run to try to make the World Cup team next year (I think he's probably a shoe-in at this point), and see some of the younger guys who are trying to prove they should be on the WC team, also. It was exciting to be a part of it and it was such a wonderful time!

Soccer isn't really a big deal in the US. It's been slowly gaining momentum over the last decade or so, especially with the broadening of the Major League Soccer organization in the US. I remember the 1994 World Cup that the US hosted and what a big deal that was. 69,000 people on average attended the world cup games that year, which (surprisingly) is still the record of average attendance at World Cup matches. So far, no other World Cup has brought so many people consistently into the seats to watch soccer as the one hosted by the US nearly 20 years ago. 

So, that stat would seem to show that USA loves soccer, yes? Except, they sorta don't. A lot of people around the globe love it, and a lot of people in the US love it, but it's hard, as a fan, to get others excited about it in the USA if they can't watch it on tv each week. They didn't grow up watching it and dreaming of being a pro soccer player because they weren't able to watch the games on tv each week of the season like they could with football, baseball or basketball. I think it could catch on and I think there are several networks that are finally figuring out the market for soccer fans. We don't have to be satisfied to only watch the English Premier League games once in a blue moon, or wait every four years to be able to see some of the World Cup games.

I am still waiting for the day when St. Louis gets an MLS team (c'mon, fools!) and the day when I can watch soccer on tv as regularly as I can see a football game, basketball game, or (ugh) golf during their seasons.  MLS is slowly taking off and I've even caught a few of the Sporting KC games on my tv, and I don't have cable. It's a good thing for soccer and for those of us who have been patiently trying to watch it for years in the US. Also good is that a lot of the guys who just won the Gold Cup play in the MLS, not on the European teams. They had a great showing, which is good for MLS and US soccer in general. 

Even though it isn't easy to be a soccer fan and stay up to date on what's up with the team, going to see the US play in the Gold Cup Final was awesome. I'll try to upload some pictures later if I can because we had fantastic seats just 16 rows from the field and the crowd was excited and upbeat for the Final. Being a part of that was wonderful and definitely something to remember.

Throwback Movie Night: Some Like It Hot

In 1959, Marilyn Monroe's most popular movie, "Some Like It Hot" was released. Billy Wilder directed the film and it starred MM, Jack Lemmon, and Tony Curtis as three members of an all-girl traveling band. Lemmon and Curtis are musicians who were witness to a mob hit in Chicago and dressed as women to escape the mob, who were hunting them down.



This was the first movie I'd watched with Marilyn Monroe in it. I think I mentioned several weeks ago how I has seen the biopic on Marilyn Monroe and thought it would be nice to see the real thing in a movie someday. I have to say that I wasn't all that impressed with Ms. Monroe's acting ability as Sugar Kane Kowalczyk, a ukelele/singer in the band. Tony Curtis plays Josephine and Jack Lemmon plays Daphne. Of course, each have their own girl problems...just of different sorts. Tony Curtis wants to woo Sugar, and so he has to go back and forth between pretending to be her friend Josephine, and pretending to be a male millionaire on vacation. Jack Lemmon has other problems and a millionaire has fallen in love with Daphne and he has to try to keep up the charade and try to escape the affectionate nature of the smitten millionaire, but gets sort of caught up in the romance and soon finds himself happily engaged, all while still running from the mob.

I thought Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon completely stole the show. I find Jack Lemmon hilarious in almost everything and Tony Curtis wasn't half bad, either. Marilyn Monroe wasn't terrible, but sort of predictable. Admittedly, she wasn't cast to be a comic. Her sex appeal got her the part and a lot of the movie was specifically designed with that in mind. I did like some of her outfits... I usually do like the costumes in a lot of these older movies. I might try to watch her in a different movie sometime. One where she's not so out-acted. Maybe she'd be better. This was the one that seemed to be her most well-known film, though.

Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis were very funny at times. I think the movie was worthwhile to see, but I don't know that I need to watch it over and over again. I also didn't think it was amazingly hilarious. It was good and Lemmon had some really classic lines and scenes, but the story really dragged on at some points. I was surprised to learn that "Some Like It Hot" was voted #1 on AFI's 100 Funniest Movies of all time... Hmm.

Through the perilous fight

YAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAYAY!!! The US Men's National Team has made it to the finals of the Gold Cup on Sunday! This is fantastic news because months ago I bought tickets for the final in the hopes of seeing the US play! It was a bit of a gamble, since the men have a history of floundering, but this year they've been on a tear. As it turns out, our head coach was booted out of tonight's game and therefore won't be allowed to coach on Sunday, but none of the players were kicked out, so they'll all be eligible to play!

My first international soccer game! My first tournament final of any sport! My first time at Soldier Field! GO USA SOCCER!

It's a neighborly day in this beauty wood.

Somebody sent me a link to another blog post on the generation sort of caught between the so-called Gen Xers and Millennials. To the blogger, this is the group of folks born between 1978 and 1983. Well, I am not technically in that group, which I suppose makes me a Millennial? I have no idea. But, at any rate, the sender seemingly felt that I would identify with this blogger.

I have to say that I found it more troubling than anything else. It's a well-written blog. Very poetic, in a way. Very clever. But...at the bottom of it all, I think I disagree with it. Here's a bit of it:

"I was born in the 1979-1983 generation gap—a few years short of X, a few years ahead of Millennials. We’re a generation defined by disaster: Columbine, 9/11. We came of age at the peak of the War on Terror, came into the job market just in time to lose everything in the crash.

We stayed up past our bedtimes to watch the Berlin Wall come down, and the fall of the Soviet Union. We spent elementary school learning and re-learning geography. Generation Change.

[...]

We never had air-raid drills, because we were born into a world that understood there was no real point to them. Generation Mortality.

We are not the Lost Generation. No great war stripped us of our innocence in a deafening blast; instead, it was eaten away layer by layer in a sandstorm of small atrocities that scattered us as they wore us away. Our apocalypse is one of inexorable decay, not sudden catastrophe. Generation Entropy.

[...]

We were the last generation to be told repeatedly that no one would hire us with purple hair and nose rings.

Financially, we’re closer to the Millennials than Gen X. We can’t afford to wait for glamorously nonspecific media jobs. We grew up in the shadow of the dot-com boom and bust: close enough to the eye of the storm to know that we are unlikely to have nice things.

We were the first generation in nearly a century to enter a workforce defined by underemployment and defanged unions. By and large, we don’t know what it feels like to go to work with the power of collective bargaining at our backs.

We’ve seen just enough of the other side to know what we’re missing.

Our American Dream isn’t a house in the suburbs. It’s being able to afford to go to the doctor when we get sick. It’s not getting ahead so much as finally maybe breaking even.

We’re a generation of reluctant entrepreneurs, empowered to make the leap to creative careers and self-employment largely because our “real" jobs have left us with so little to lose. We know better than to trust anyone else to provide us with stability."

How depressing is that? How very self-pitying? I sort of wanted to just respond to the person who sent this to me with a short "Shit happens, man." response. I can't argue with the truth of the blogger. I'm sure lots of people (clearly, friends of mine) agree with the writer. It makes me sort of disappointed in them, though. Maybe I'm too optimistic, or naive, or whatever. But, its too easy to be so cynical and self-pitying. What a cop out. Yes, we grew up in a time when things have been sort of rough, but (I've said this before, I think) it makes you a stronger person. All of the examples that this blogger uses seem to boil down to 'nothing stays the same' mixed with a little 'expect the worst'. It's an entire group of people just waiting for the other shoe to drop. How lame. What about a group of people who deal well with a changing world? Who learned tolerance at an early age? Who grew up watching Mr. Rogers and Sesame Street and singing along with them about the alphabet and 'won't you be my neighbor'? Who don't look twice at people of different races or hearing different languages because we've been around that our entire lives? Who see the beauty in diversity instead of feeling threatened by it? Who don't tell their kids 'you won't get a job with purple hair and a nose ring'? Who, yes, have seen evil, but who have also seen the wonder and beauty of people flying across oceans in a hot air balloon, baseball figures turning back flips in the infield (Yeah, Ozzie Smith!), grew up knowing a woman could become Secretary of State for the United States, saw the Hubble space telescope launched into space, saw Nelson Mandela finally freed after nearly three decades, saw the Million Man March, watched the world change on a personal level when our own families got computers and the amazement of having the world at our fingertips, we saw them build a road under the English Channel (I have always found this particularly fascinating...). We grew up in an amazing time, that doesn't have to be defined by school shootings, wars on terror, and doping in sports. I'm not saying ignore the rough stuff; I'm saying stop ignoring the good stuff. I don't want to be included in a group that paints itself as down-on-their-luck and to-be-pitied. And, again, I'm not technically part of this blogger's view of Generation Nothing, but I'm close enough that it bothers me that there are apparently a lot of people who do feel like they are Nothing. Can't you remember Sesame Street and Mr. Rogers? Big Bird and Mr. Rogers would be so disappointed in you right now.

"“When I say it's you I like, I'm talking about that part of you that knows that life is far more than anything you can ever see or hear or touch. That deep part of you that allows you to stand for those things without which humankind cannot survive. Love that conquers hate, peace that rises triumphant over war, and justice that proves more powerful than greed.” --Fred Rogers

Throwback Movie Night: Grumpy Old Men

Yay! We're back with TMN!

No better way to welcome back TMN than with "Grumpy Old Men"! I love this movie, but had forgotten how much I loved it until watching it again. Made in 1993, it stars Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau as two elderly men who grew up together in this small Minnesota town. They raised their families next-door to each other and spent most of their adult lives at each others throats. For fifty years, they have insulted each other at every turn. Now, a new neighbor, played by Ann Margaret, moves in across the street and they begin competing for her affections.


Jack Lemmon plays John Gustafson, Walter Matthau plays Max Goldman, and Ann Margaret plays Ariel Truax. Ariel moves in and sets the small town upside down. She snowmobiles at midnight, runs into the snow and flops around in broad daylight, and generally is everything that John and Max haven't seen in a long time. They both set their sights on her and their ugly relationship gets even worse.

It's a great movie because of the dialogue between Lemmon and Matthau. Lines like:

"Do me a favor. Put your lip over your head... and swallow."

"Mind your own business, will ya? Mind your own business. Why don't you tie your shoelace, you'll fall on your stupid head."


This was the 6th of a total of 10 times that the two would do a movie together. They were really great friends, but after shooting this movie in Minnesota, Matthau ended up with double pneumonia and spent a while in the hospital. They did a follow-up to this movie with a sequel in 1995.

nom nom ALL THE SMOOTHIES nom nom.

While there is not a Jamba Juice coming to town (boo), there is a hometown smoothie shop opening up a couple of blocks from my work! They are opening for staff training in a few weeks and for the first several days while smoothie training is happening, they'll be giving away the 'mistakes' for free! Yay! I might just stand there and be like, 'ALL THE SMOOTHIES. Nom. Nom. Nom.' I also have been looking on pinterest for different smoothie recipes, since I've actually had a smoothie maker for a couple of years now. My Aunt and Uncle got me a smoothie maker several Christmases ago, probably foretelling the fact that I would become a fan of smoothies some day. And that day has arrived, my friends. Plus, there are oodles of places on the web that offer knock-off Jamba Juice recipes such as this doozie:

CARIBBEAN PASSION
12 oz. Mango-passion juice
2 scoops strawberries
1 scoop peaches
2 scoops orange sherbet
1 scoop ice

Another thing coming nearby is Fazoli's, which makes my world brighter. I loooove Fazoli's. And the one in town is too far away for me to ever go to. So, I expect lots of pizza and really yummy breadsticks in my future this fall after it opens.

I decided to become a bird rescuer on Monday. I was recycling newspapers in a back room at work and walked out of the room and heard a bird hit the window and looked over and it was trapped in an underground area. It was a little chickadee and it would flap and flap against the windows and then fall to the bottom of the area and chirp chirp chirp in frustration. It breaks my heart to see that sort of thing. One of the archivists has told stories of her father's work as a conservation ranger in Michigan for much of his career, so I went to find her and ask for her if she'd inherited any of that ranger-y stuff. She thought she had, so I asked her to be a co-rescuer in my plan. It took a little wrangling of wire mesh and some temporary shifting of the security system the landscapers on campus implemented, but eventually the bird flew out and hopefully won't do that again. It made us feel like awesome humanitarians for an afternoon, at least.

I also just learned that Kentucky marriage records are online. FamilySearch.org is sort of a savior to those of us in the genealogy world. Ancestry is fine, but it's nice to have a free alternative to offer genealogists who don't necessarily have the funds to pay the Ancestry subscription fees at home. And FamilySearch just helped me possibly narrow down a search for a name of a groom in an 1820s marriage somewhere in Kentucky. Maybe I've only confused the poor genealogists even more, but at least there are a couple of new roads that they can go down in their searching. I hate to send people away empty-handed, although it can't be helped sometimes.

I watched a bit of the MLB All star game last night, but around 9:30 (I know 'cuz I checked the clock), there was a gun shot near my apartment building. It sounded like someone shot it off in the adjoining apartment or the one above the adjoining apartment. However, it could have been in the parking lot or, maybe even out on the street. Sounds play such funny tricks on you. It was just definitely just one shot, which I thought was odd, but plenty enough for my imagination to go running wild. I never heard fighting or shouting or screaming or sirens or anything, and it was just a single shot. It's amazing how quickly your imagination can run away with you, like, I quickly had decided on several possible scenarios of a single gun shot:
1) the gun accidentally went off.
2) the person hit their target with just one shot.
3) really sniper-like drive-by?

When it's dark outside and you're just chilling out in your little apartment deciding whether or not to head to sleep, the sound of a pistol does tend to jolt you into awake-ness. And then, because I was in my jammies, I was hit with the conundrum of whether to change into real clothes in case I had to talk to police. And then, I started wondering about the thickness of the walls and whether the walls would stop a bullet (doubtful). At any rate, I spent a lot of time last night in my head running through the various scenarios and whether it was okay to go to sleep or whether it would be better to stay up longer and wait to see if anything else happened and if someone was going to knock on my door. But, I decided to go read my book (more on that later) and eventually went to sleep, never awakened by police or more gunfire.

My challenge for the summer is to finally read a book that has been on my shelf for a couple of years now. The most glaringly obvious trait of the book is its length. At nearly 1400 pages long and is certainly an epic novel. But, if you're going to choose a book to spend all Summer reading, you need a big book, right? First published in the 1980s, it's called "...And Ladies of the Club". I'm around page 750, and it's mid-Summer so I figure I'm on track to finish it by Summer's end. It's a really great read. If you have some time and aren't the sort who feel like a failure if they don't finish a book really quickly, try this one on for size. Don't let the page count intimidate you...it's a wonderful story. It follows a little Ohio town from the end of the Civil War through the Great Depression. It focuses on the women of the town and a literary club that they start in the 1860s. I'm only in the late 1880s right now, but the author does a fantastic job of keeping the various families' story lines going and not mixing things up. I haven't noticed glaring mix-ups or anything. That's my continuing Summer Reading Challenge. I'm not reading anything else right now. The only downside to reading a book so big is it's not really that portable. It doesn't fit in my purse, so you really do have to carry it around. I carried it with me to a doctor's appointment to read in the waiting room and it certainly did get a lot of comments from other 'waiters'. I'm not sure if people are already losing the familiarity of seeing people with real paper books or if it's just the ginormous size of this novel that causes the commotion, but I recommend it, for realz.

Oh my darling, housey house.

Happy Friday! I'm finally feeling a bit more like myself, health-wise. The person who developed cold medicine is great and I'm appreciative of it, but I hate cough syrup. Drinking syrup is just awful. I bought a combo pack of Nyquil/Dayquil syrup because it was cheaper than buying them separately in either pill form or syrup form. I challenge anybody to drink the adult (or child) recommended amount of that stuff without making a really awful face or gagging. I tend to sort of let out a squeal and a 'blllaarggh' after each medication dose, along with a scrunched up face and a couple of jerking hand motions. I'll be really happy when my cold is gone.

My house is getting an additional deck this week! A platform deck over where a cistern is located in the back yard. It's a long story, but suffice it to say, that there is a new outdoor area at the old house now! I'm heading back down this weekend to check it out. I hope it doesn't rain and I can sort of hang out on it for a bit. I haven't talked much about it, but I moved out of my house late last year after my dad sold his house in town and moved into mine. It was a temporary situation and next week at this time, my dad is closing on a house in New Mexico and moving his permanent residence down there. I have no intention of moving back to the town where my house is located, so my adorable old house is going to be put up for sale later this year. I'm not too sad about it. It's such a lovely house and I'm so happy to have been able to buy it when I was pretty young and enjoy living there for the time I needed it. I have zero qualms about living in old houses and I've learned to not be afraid to fix things in old houses, too. Between roofing, getting new appliances, learning cleaning tricks, staining decks, painting, putting up wall textures, and general upkeep of an old house, I've learned so much in the four years I've been owner of this awesome place. It's been a pretty cool experience and a really great transition into being a real-life adult. I remember when I first moved in, my neighbors would tell me about how I was too young to appreciate what I had bought. Even though I'm not that much older than I was then, I can understand what they meant a little bit now. I think I understood what I had bought, but I perhaps didn't understand the significance of what I had done. Being barely 25 and deciding to buy a century-old house on my own and live there alone with a blind cat and no experience in home improvements aside from a few experiments with painting seems like something sort of...naive. But, I never thought anything of it. It is a house that I would have always been angry at myself for not buying when I had the chance. I couldn't afford to buy a house now, not with student loans and car loans and things. That time of my life was unique in that I had no debt and all these incentives to buy a house for the first time in a neighborhood 'on the brink' (of being awesome) in town. Why not? It was a good idea and, despite perhaps not knowing exactly what I was doing or understanding how some people strive for home ownership all their life and don't achieve it, I was able to afford my little dream home at a young age and I've enjoyed it. I don't know if I'll ever buy another house, but I feel like if I move to some urban area and end up renting forever, I'll never wonder about home ownership because I really have had the most awesome house. Despite the love-fest here about the house, not living in it for a long while now has allowed me to distance myself from it and I'm feeling pretty good about selling it and letting another family have the awesome house. I'm not into becoming a landlord and having strangers move in and have to deal with being an absentee landlord. I care too much about the neighbors to let that happen, so I'll sell it to a new owner who can have the responsibility of its awesomeness. It will still be a couple of months before it can actually be sold because my dad is going to be slowly moving his stuff down to New Mexico, but I'm looking forward to it all! If it doesn't sell immediately, it's okay, too. I'm not sure how I feel about trying to sell a house in a down market, but you gotta give it a shot, yes? Getting this deck built was sort of the last big thing that I wanted to have done with the house. I'm hoping my dad and I can enjoy it for a short amount of time the rest of this summer. But, if in the coming months I start to gripe about more house-y things, you'll know why.

Make way for Miss Watery Eyes.

I have a burst of energy, blogging-wise. I'm still fighting off a cold. I think I'm losing as I have spent much of today sneezing and my eyes are watery and I generally feel sort of off as far as my alertness goes. I'm just running on auto-pilot, pretty much.

I was really excited last night because MeTV (probably my second favorite tv channel after PBS) started showing "Rhoda" last night! I'd never actually seen "Rhoda", but I always liked Rhoda better than Mary on the Mary Tyler Moore Show (I do like Mary Tyler Moore, too. But, identity-wise, I sort of feel more like a Rhoda than a Mary...) I don't think "Rhoda" is going to disappoint me. I saw the pilot last night and it was great. Love it! Plan to watch it most nights, I think.

My lunch today cost a total of $2.02, which is really why I think I love the Bread Basket Cafe! It's practically unheard of to be a grown-up and have a sit-down meal for less than $5.00 and, routinely, I get a great lunch for under $5 at that place. They make the best grilled cheese sandwiches in town. They also make the best snickerdoodles. And the place is always clean, and they have an outdoor patio, too. Plus, they are always part of the weekly Add Sheet, which allows me to get a dollar off my grilled cheese sandwich. It's a match made in heaven. In my cold-induced haze of happiness at paying barely over two bucks, I decided that I would go there every single day and that way, I could eat out every day for lunch and still not spend more than $15.00 all week on meals! But, on the walk back to work I decided a big flaw in that plan would be that I really only eat that one awesome sandwich there, and while it is AWESOME, would I really want it every single day? Probably not. And, I'd have to always print out the Add Sheet coupon every single day and that would end up amounting to a lot of trees dying for a daily $1.00 off my grilled cheese. So...I don't know. I was/am still happy about $2.02 for a great, filling lunch, though. Good day, Tuesday!

The Gold Cup has started! USA plays Belize tonight in their first game. They did really well in their pre-Gold Cup friendly match. Landon Donovan, who made the squad after coming out of retirement earlier this year and working his way back into shape, made two goals. I'm still hoping to see the US in the final in a couple of weeks. I know it's early, but I'm hoping that Donovan knows he has to prove to the US men's coach that he's fit enough to play at the international level again. He really wants to be on the World Cup team and play in Brazil, but I admire the coach's stance and making him earn his spot on it. Plus, this way, there's a slight chance I will get to see Donovan play in person! Plus, Mexico has already lost their first game, and they are historically one of the top teams in the tournament. That doesn't necessarily make USA's road to the finals any easier, because the men can always screw it up, but it makes it all the more interesting. After Belize, they play Cuba and then Costa Rica before hoping going into the next round.

My eyes are really getting agitated. Being sick is such a bummer.

Cough, cough. moan.

I'm fighting off an illness this weekend, which leaves me with lots of time to sit around and moan. Or, blog/mess about on the interwebs (while I have internet, which is spotty at best).

Yahoo is reporting that Kaley Cuoco from The Big Bang Theory is dating the newest Superman actor, Henry Cavill. I find this funny in a life-imitates-art sort of way.

I had a wonderful time at my conference in Chicago. It was super cool and I wrote a lot about it on my actual travel blog: GadaboutGetaways.wordpress.com. I decided to move to another blog site for the travel stuff because I might share that more than I want to share this with some folks.

Returning to work yesterday wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. It was really really quiet, except for a woman from the "God, Please Don't Ever Let Me Be Like This" file:  a woman (probably in her mid-to-late 30s) came in and threw a temper tantrum that would have made any teenager envious. She was upset about our 'no bags or purses in the research center' policy. She had told me when she signed in that she'd been here before and she flashed a patron card at me, which means she signed a sheet saying she'd read and agreed to our policies. I always try not to laugh at people when they throw tantrums, because it seems like it would only make things worse. But, God, it's hard to hide my amusement sometimes. Especially when it's something so petty as the fact that she had to put her purse in a locker. She stomped out of the research center and down the hall about halfway, before stomping back in and dramatically scratching her name off the sign-in sheet at the front desk and then stomping back down the hall and then doing her best to slam the swinging door to leave. It was all hilarious. I figured she'd be back though, because people who come to us usually need us for some reason. The things we have, other places don't. You can't just leave and go to another library to get it. Sure enough, about five minutes later she slinks back in (without her purse) and uses the computer for a while and then leaves, without throwing another tantrum. We were all laughing about it later. I think I generally have a higher tolerance for people younger than me throwing tantrums about stuff. But, when you're older than me, I find you really ridiculous, but also really amusing. Especially ones like this woman, who become so dramatic, you want to rush after them with an Oscar for their performance.

I won't have a Throwback Movie Night review to share tonight, but while in Chicago, I caught the middle of the movie "Marilyn and Me" with Michelle Williams as Marilyn Monroe. The little bit I saw wasn't awful. It did make me want to see the real Marilyn Monroe in a movie, so I'm going to add that to the list of possible upcoming TMNs.

I think I'm going to go back to sleep and see if I can get over this cold or whatever it is. I hate being sick, but especially when it's really nice weather outside.

What I learned at my first ALA conference...

Things I learned at my first American Library Association conference:

•  Being part of a conference attended by 28,000 other people means things will get overwhelming. Just find a spot out of the way to look over the giant conference manual and drink your Jamba Juice. (I never had Jamba Juice until this conference and I'm totally hooked now. It's way better than Starbuck's sad attempts at smoothies.)
• Fight the instinct to take reading material along. You won't need it, and you'll get oodles of free books in the exhibit hall from publishers and authors alike. 
• Use the post-office in the convention center. You can mail the boxes of books to your home or office via media rate, which saves you money and there's the added bonus of not pulling a muscle trying to shove the books into your suitcase and/or lug the books onto the plane, train, automobile, mule, camel, bicycle, pedicab, etc. on your way home.
• Be a little outgoing. This is tricky for me because I tend to like to sit back and just observe. Forcing myself to start conversations with strangers was daunting, but totally worth it. Literary professionals are awesome people. The hotel shuttles to and from the convention center are the perfect time to strike up conversations with fellow riders.
• No line is too long to stand in when you're going to meet Lois Lowry!
• When attempting to go through the exhibits hall, do it in stages. Plan it out. Remember that you are an information professional and use the information available to you to not get killed by the annual "Running of the Librarians" for free books on the first night. Avoid the big publishing houses (Scholastic, HarperCollins, Random House, etc.) on the first night, unless you are 100% committed to wall-to-wall people in a book-grabbing frenzy. If you are someone who really enjoys a "Black Friday" atmosphere, then take on the publishing booths that first night. Otherwise, avoid it at all costs. Vendors will do giveaways on the first night to try to lure you in, but a lot of the giveaways continue through the rest of the conference. Don't get trampled for an ipad giveaway that lasts all week by a 5,000+ crowd rushing for a one-night-only pie giveaway at a nearby booth. Do your research pre-exhibit hall opening and you will be a happier person.
• Wear comfy shoes. I saw so many women wearing sky-high heels. Why, why, why would you do that to yourself? Sessions are miles apart and you have to walk so far every day. Be kind to your piggies. Those super-cute heels aren't giving the intended impression that you are stylish or professional, they give the impression that you are an idiot to bring those to a conference this size.
• On the topic of wardrobe: a lot of people pack cute dresses and wear those the entire time. Others wear jeans. I went with brightly colored pants and bright tops. Wear clothing that you are comfortable wearing as you walk around in a busy city. Breezes happen...keep that in mind when you pack those dresses, ladies. Librarians are a group that tend to keep their cardigans close. You can always wrap the cardi around your waist to keep the mooning to a minimum, if it gets that bad.
• Do bring a cardigan or shawl or jacket because it is chilly in the sessions. It was actually kind of chilly in Chicago one day with the wind whipping off the lake. 
• When a session you wanted to be a part of is standing-room only, don't be afraid to find out what's happening next door or two doors down and sitting in on those, instead. I found a really awesome graphic novel discussion going on in a nearby room when the session I wanted to see was too full to get a seat.
• You can bring your family and friends to ALA! I didn't realize this. People brought siblings, spouses, friends, children, parents, everybody with them to the conference. I would say half the people in the lines for the author signings, 1/4 of the people in the auditoriums for the speakers, and most of the people in the film screenings are friends and family members of a librarian at the conference. There were so many children at the conference that ALA actually provides day care for when the parent(s) are busy with sessions.
• Have fun! It is a professional conference and it's easy to get conference fatigue, but remember that these ALA conferences are unique opportunities to talk over ideas, problems, and issues that you have at your library with like-minded people from all over the world. I met librarians from China, Guatemala, Denmark, Nigeria, and Chile. Not to mention the librarians that work in the US, but are from other countries, like my seat-mate on the train back to St. Louis, who was from Bulgaria. Several years ago, she won a green card through the USA's immigration lotto (Yes, there is such a thing! I had no idea...) and so she came to live and work here. I went to Chicago excited to be attending the conference, but left ALA even more amped about my profession as a whole and the awesome people that have decided to work in this field.

Chicago, we're coming for you!

Get excited! It's officially ALA week in Chicago! 25,000 librarians, writers, publishers, bookshop owners, and library students all invading one city for a week of awesomeness! I've never gotten the chance to go, so this is my first trip to the Conference of Win. [I might meet Lois Lowry!! EEEEEE!]

There are so many people coming to speak that I'm sad I won't get to hear and see everyone! I'm bummed especially about my train schedule meaning I have to leave the conference in the morning of the last day before Octavia Spencer takes the floor for her big talk to close the conference. Remember Octavia Spencer? She was on Ugly Betty, Big Bang Theory, and most notably as Minny Jackson in The Help (for which she won an Oscar! Yay!). She's taking the leap into a mystery series for children that features a Ninja Detective and she is the keynote for the closing of the conference. I'm sure she's awesome. Plus, she's writing books for kids about Ninja Detectives, how can that flop?

Octavia Spencer as Minny Jackson. She was my favorite character in The Help!

Speaking of non-floppers on the children's lit scene: Mo Willems is going to be there and I've got a book for him to sign for my friend's son. Elephant and Piggie books are all the rage! I love his work. He's such an amazing author, it'll be interesting to hear him talk about how he comes up with all of his ideas.

Giada DeLaurentis is going to be there, and I'm really hoping she's actually cooking. Cookbooks don't do a whole lot for me, but I'd like to eat free food! Especially free food prepared in front of me by a famous chef I've seen on tv before.

Khaled Hosseini is coming to talk about his newest book that came out last month, And the Mountains Echoed, which is sitting at #3 on NY Times Best Seller list this week. I always wanted to read The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns, but I still haven't gotten around to it. Maybe hearing him speak will inspire me to finally read these books?

Oliver Stone is coming to talk about his new documentary, which I might stop in to hear a bit about. It's called "The Untold History of the United States" and is going to be challenging the traditional history taught to students. I'm all for it.

And Alice Walker is coming! I don't actually own a copy of "The Color Purple", but I might see if I could get one and see if she could sign it? She's got a new book of poetry coming out and I hope she reads some from it. It'd be pretty cool to hear her read a little.

And, as I mentioned at the start: LOIS LOWRY! This is probably the coolest thing, ever. Because Number the Stars and The Giver are two of my favorite books in the world, I actually don't have full copies of them any longer. Books that I love, I tend to tear pages out and frame for decoration in my house. So, unless I track one down, I won't have one for her to sign. I don't know that I'll actually be able to meet her. I mean, I might stand in front of her and just sort of stare awkwardly and then be like, 'hi?' But, regardless of whether I can actually form a coherent sentence and have some actual dialogue with the woman, I'm going to hear her speak about dystopian fiction on the first night. She's part of a panel of other young adult fiction writers who are going to be holding a discussion on the topic. Maybe hearing her speak first and not having the chance to meet her face-to-face until the next day will give me some sort of conversation starter, like, 'I really agreed with what you said last night about....' Or, I'll just hover and hear what other people say to her and inwardly go 'EEEEEEEEE!!' the entire time.

Plus all the actual sessions and things I have to go to for work and networking and generally having a blast with fellow bookish people! It actually doesn't start until Friday, but I've been so looking forward to this for months that I'm already overcome with joy! That being said, there will be no Throwback Movie Night this weekend...possibly not next weekend, either?

Speak for me.

Happy Sunday! I finally turned the air conditioning on last night for a while. It was uncomfortable in the apartment. I think it's really the mugginess that eventually gets to you.

I worked a photo conservation workshop yesterday. We had about 14 people attend and I think everyone was pretty pleased about it. It was the first workshop for our photo archivist, who started a year ago. She did a great job and went into a lot of detail about the history of photography, the chemistry of the processes, etc. I was in and out a lot, but I was learning plenty of things when I was in there. Good job! I was sort of the go-to person for taking money for registration, making sure lunch showed up, etc. But there were also some newspaper microfilm problems in the Research Center and I was called in there to help. One poor woman was having the worst luck finding an article. She finally found it, but it took three reels of film for her to locate it. I think we could do more workshops, actually. Maybe split the photo one into a couple of different shorter workshops. I think maybe a document mending and storing workshop would be good, too. I know plenty of people have tons of papers and letters and things just sitting in boxes and maybe they just don't know what to do with them? We can help! We're having a strategic planning meeting tomorrow at work and I might bring it up.

After work, I headed over to sell some of my clothes at a consignment store and all of the power was out on that side of town. It apparently had just happened. It's always nerve-wracking trying to go through busy intersections in those first few minutes of a power outage, when the stoplights are out, but not everybody realizes it yet. I was happy to see the stoplights working on my side of town, but it was a very careful drive home after I dropped my clothes off. The cashier called me last night to tell me that their computers had come back on and that I could get my money today, so I'm planning to head back out that way again. I don't know why the power was out; I didn't actually hear what had happened.

I think I might have an allergic reaction to the violet hair color I've got right now... I got my hair re-dyed last week and my scalp is so irritated since then. I remember that it was sort of itchy the first time I got it dyed violet. I don't remember it ever happening with any other color. It makes me wonder what exactly the violet is. Aveda uses natural dyes and non-petroleum agents for their hair colors, so it's always better for the hair to use their system, but I wonder what sort of flower extract they get the violet color from? Maybe I'm allergic to it. I wanted to go more intense violet next month, but maybe I'll just return to brown. Ho hum.

Throwback Movie Night: Clue

Clue! I love this movie! My dad had never seen it before, so we watched it this week. I think he enjoyed it! If you've never seen it, it is indeed based upon the beloved board game. The premise is just as you would expect it to be: Col. Mustard, Miss Scarlett, Mrs. White, Mrs. Peacock, Prof. Plum, Mr. Green all show up to a house party and then people start dying. Whoddunit?!

The movie was filmed in 1985 with a pretty stand-out group of actors (Tim Curry, Madeline Kahn, Christopher Lloyd, and Leslie Ann Warren to name a few), but it opened to mediocre reviews and didn't even make enough money to cover the cost of filming.

But, it has since garnered a cult-following. Yay, cults?!

Tim Curry plays the butler, Wadsworth, and he's also sort of the mastermind behind the house party. The movie is full of comedy, but not always with an 'in-your-face' sort of way. Sometimes it's very subtle, which makes the movie enjoyable time after time. Another reason to watch this movie repeatedly? There are three endings! When the movie was released to theaters, the studio sent an random ending to each theater, so that if you went and saw the movie in the theater in Denver and then asked your sister what she thought of the movie when she saw it in Little Rock, she might have seen a completely different ending than you. The dvd version allows you to see all three or have the dvd choose a random ending. I usually like to be surprised and have it choose a random ending. We watched it through once with its random endings and then went into the scenes and had it show us the other two. All really intriguing and, for me, I never know who's the murderer (much like when I play the board game). The set is pretty awesome and at the time, the old house was furnished with various antiques, including things from Teddy Roosevelt's home. Sadly, the actual set itself burned up in a fire on the studio lot in 2005, I'm assuming long after Roosevelt's things had returned to their true home.

Librarian love.

I have a secret to tell you about librarians: the reason people become librarians is not because they love books (although, many do), it's not because they want to get paid to read (I don't know a single librarian who gets to do this), and its not because they live to 'shush' people. It's because they have absolutely no ability to commit to anything.

It's true. Librarians are those people who could never choose a major. We're the people who could never really commit to a future career path. I wanted to be an interior designer, a paleontologist, a bed & breakfast operator, a meteorologist, a speech pathologist, and a museum exhibit designer in college--just in college, mind you. That doesn't even count the millions of professions I decided upon during high school, my first attempt at grad school, the gap between grad school attempt 1 and 2, the academic probationary "break" in the middle of grad school 2, and finally getting my MLS). I have a theory that librarians are the ones who never could settle down with anything in particular. Never stick with anything for very long before they get tired and have to move on. The sort who feel like they would rather scratch the surface of knowledge of tons of topics than delve too deeply into any one in particular. I have absolutely no desire to become an expert on anything. Nothing. It scares the hell out of me to have to devote much time to anything because of what I feel I'll be missing if I focus too long on one thing. I look at my co-librarians and see that we are all very similar in this way. It's both alarming and hilarious to me at the same time. We're an industry full of people who can't stand to tie ourselves down and truly commit to something, so we spend our whole lives committing to the awesomeness of everything for short periods of time.

I find this so true to myself and can laugh at it, to a point. But, it's also sort of frustrating to know you have such a short attention span. Part of it can be blamed on my generation, I guess. Growing up as part of that group who first dealt with computers as children, saw the internet, realized information really was at our fingertips is heady stuff. It's hard to focus when you can flit from one thing to the next, literally at the click of a button. I have a bad habit of dropping things and moving on, leaving things less than tidy in my wake. I have a really bad habit of getting anxious if I start to feel tied down by something. I get the overwhelming urge to flee, regardless of what I leave behind. This happens even during the minutest of things, like if I'm supposed to be driving my car and following people on a trip to somewhere, or if I'm in a group of friends for too long (even just for a long evening). I start to feel really stuck in a situation and I just flee. I push down on the pedal and speed around the leaders and am off, usually to parts unknown. Or, I just take off on my own and walk for a while, whether I know the city my friends and I are in or not. Not the smartest thing to do, but the only way I've ever been able to quell the feeling of being 'stuck'. I'm lucky in that I have a Dad who seems to understand this about me and I've learned that when I feel like this, I can often talk to him and he'll logically punch holes in my anxiety, and soon enough I'm floating back down to my status-quo of happiness and zen while immersing myself in latin dance, origami crane-making, baking, some photo challenge, sewing clothes, searching for the perfect mashed potatoes in town, or whatever interest I happen to be indulging that day.

Even though I frustrate myself with my total lack of commitment, I think it makes me love being a librarian even more, because never at any moment are my co-workers and I interested in the same thing, and this adds such diversity to a workplace. I love it, even when I'm tired of my job and want to flee to Alabama (because Daphne and Fairhope look like the loveliest places), I still love the career that finally chose me.

Throwback Movie Night: Gigi

Tonight's movie is the 1958 film version of "Gigi" starring Leslie Caron in the title role and Louis Jourdan as the main male actor (he was in "Three Coins in the Foutain", a possible future TMN feature film).

"Gigi" was directed by Vincent Minelli (Liza's dad), and one of the supporting actresses was Eva Gabor, who was Zsa Zsa's younger sister (and also the voice of Miss Bianca in Disney's "The Rescuers").The songs were written by the fantastic duo known as Lerner and Lowe (Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Lowe), who were also responsible for the songs of the film version of "My Fair Lady". They actually wanted Audrey Hepburn to be the leading lady in "Gigi" as she was in "My Fair Lady" but Hepburn turned them down, so they went for Caron instead.

The setting is Paris in 1900 and Gigi is a teenager who finds it difficult to fit in. She lives with her grandma and her mom (but you never see her mother, only hear her practicing her opera in some back room of the apartment), but takes courtesan lessons from her great-aunt Alecia. She learns things like how to tell if pearls are real and which jewels are the most precious, how to eat certain meals correctly, how to choose a cigar for a man, etc. Gigi would rather play cards with Gaston Lachaille, a very wealthy Parisian who, somehow, knows her grandma and has been a part of Gigi's extended family for years. Great-Aunt Alecia decides that Gaston is the perfect test for Gigi's courtesan training and sets out to 'glamify' the awkward teenager and turn her into a beauty. Gaston is at first completely shocked by the change, but of course, he comes around and in the end the two are married (happily).

There are songs galore in this film, and overall, I really liked this musical. It's not hard to see that it's done by the same people behind the 1950s classic "My Fair Lady". In some ways, it's "My Fair Lady"-Parisian style, but that didn't stop it from breaking records at the Oscars in 1959: It won 9 Oscars. It's reign atop the Oscar ladder didn't last long because Ben Hur came the next year and won even more, but still: It was beloved, despite being somewhat of a repeated storyline. According to Wikipedia, the day after Gigi won so many Oscars, the MGM studios switchboard operators answered their phones with "M-Gigi-M".

Get lost in all the little things.

I've been spending a lot of time lately vacation planning. Road trip planning, really. Discovering places to see, places to stay, that sort of thing. Roadtrippers.com is a pretty cool website to help plan destinations. I've got about three different road trips somewhat-mapped out on there right now. It's been a cool site to work with for a bit. They send you e-mails about trip ideas, but usually they're focused on California or the NE, neither of which fall into the category of 'Rad Weekend Roadtrips' if you live in the middle of the country.

Earlier today I was at Barnes & Noble trying to decide whether or not to buy a book and started shelf browsing through the history area, which ended up becoming the music section and the society section, or something like that. It had memoirs of celebrities, but also it had the Postsecret books. I think I've mentioned that a personal hope of mine has been to randomly find a secret or something stuck inside a Postsecret book in a bookstore. People tend to do that with those books and so whenever I see one on a bookstore shelf, I flip through them to see if anybody left any secret or anything in the book for another stranger to find. And today, it happened! Someone left this (not so much secret as much as note of encouragement from a stranger) in one of the Postsecret books in the Columbia Barnes & Noble and now I have it, stuck to my fridge:

I was pretty excited when I found it. I love stuff like this. Back when I used to pick up stones from places and paint sayings on them and leave them in random spots all over the country, I used to hope people felt a sense of excitement when they saw one. I think they must have, because I've never seen any of my rocks again. I would go back weeks later to see if they were still where I left them and they never were. Even ones that were slightly obscure in their new locations. Whoever found them, took them someplace else. It's nice to see fun, happy-go-lucky sorts of things from strangers. It helps to make someone else's day, you know? And today's note from a stranger has made my day! I ended up not buying anything at the mall today, but came away with this note and a realization that I can now say I found something a stranger shared in a book! After I found this in one of books I had to stop myself from flipping through all the other ones on the shelf to see if I could find more. But I thought that if someone had hidden something in the others, I would leave it for another person to find in case someone else has this same hidden hope of finding something in a Postsecret book someday.

Also, earlier this week I got a free download of the new full album of Green River Ordinance. This is a band that I learned about a couple of years ago through Birchbox. They shared a free download of a GRO song in one of their monthly boxes one time and I fell in love with the songs and somehow ended up on a mailing list from the band. Earlier this week they sent out an e-mail to the list with a link to download their new album, so I did. I like them a lot. Sometimes they remind me of Jimmy Eat World, if you remember them from the last decade? That's the only band that comes to mind that they remind me of. But they also have a tiny bit of a country/folk feel to some of their songs sometimes...in an instrumental way, not vocally. Anyway, here's one of their new songs that I've gotten stuck in my head: 

Throwback Movie Night: Driving Miss Daisy

In 1989, Jessica Tandy and Morgan Freeman agreed to play the lead roles in the movie version of "Driving Miss Daisy", and it was good.



Tandy plays Miss Daisy, a rich, old Jewish woman who is hesitant to accept the fact that she's both rich and old. Freeman plays Hoke, an elderly black man who agrees to work as Miss Daisy's chauffeur. He actually is hired and is paid by Daisy's son after Daisy drives her car into the neighbor's yard and can't get auto insurance any longer. At first, Daisy is stubborn and refuses to allow Hoke to drive her around, but she doesn't want him doing anything else around her house either. He's just stuck sitting around doing nothing and getting paid for it, which for some people might sound nice, but Hoke wants to feel useful. He finally convinces Daisy to allow him to drive her to the Piggly Wiggly for groceries one day and from that day on, the two seem to strike a wonderful friendship that lasts for a quarter of a century.

This is such a fantastic story. It was adapted into a movie from a play. Morgan Freeman played Hoke in the play and reprises his role in the film. Jessica Tandy signed on for the movie version, but wasn't part of the play at all. The film garnered lots of Oscar nominations, including for Best Actress and Best Actor and Best Picture. It won four Oscars including Best Picture and Best Actress. I personally think Morgan Freeman steals the show in this movie. I like Jessica Tandy and think Miss Daisy was a perfect character for her, but Freeman is out-of-this-world awesome as Hoke. I especially love his laugh in the movie. It's completely infectious.

There is also a pretty infectious tune as part of the soundtrack, which was composed by Hans Zimmer. The entire score was done by Zimmer without using a single live instrument, but using electronic samplers and synthesizers! (I found that factoid very interesting for a 1989 movie about two elderly people.)

The movie is wonderful, sad, and touching all rolled into one. The friendship between the two is strengthened due to the prejudice that both face in the South, one as a Jew and the other as an African-American. At one point, the synagogue that Hoke is driving Miss Daisy to is fire-bombed, and at another point during a road trip through Alabama, both are insulted by a highway patrolman. The movie covers a span of 25 years, which includes the death of some characters and, of course, the aging of the rest. The sad part, to me, is the aging of the characters, and the death of some, which is inevitable. On a personal note, in this movie, Jessica Tandy is the spitting image of my grandma, and watching her just grow very old is sad. The touching part though, and one of my favorite aspects of the entire story, (spoiler?) is that the movie doesn't end with their deaths. In a story that begins with people in their 70s and which covers decades, I think it's sensible to think the main characters are going to die, but they don't. And I love that about this movie. It's a much better this way.

Paint you by number and color you in.

Happy Tuesday! It's June already. May went by pretty quickly, it seems to me. We're getting into the swing of Summer now. Road trips! Vacations! Conferences! What do you need for all of these things? Music to help you on the way to and fro.

Weeks ago I watched the (horrendous disaster that was the) Billboard Awards ceremony on tv. I realized it had been a long time since I'd seen a music awards show all the way through and I heard early on that they were going to give Prince a big award and I really like to see Prince perform on these shows. He's always pretty awesome. Well, of course he was awesome, but he was also dead last on the broadcast so I had to sit through a lot of horrible things to get to it. I mean really horrible things like artists kicking fans, terrible performances, even more terrible introductions and uber-pretentious acceptance speeches, and the boos-heard-'round-the-world of Justin Bieber (who is apparently only 19 years old??? Really? I thought the dude was at least in his early 20s by now...seems like he's been around a long time). Anyway, it was basically a broadcast of the worst music has to offer until: the one (really, the only...) highlight of the entire night other than Prince was this performance by Ed Sheeran. I really didn't have a feeling one way or the other about Sheeran's music, but this performance completely made me into a fan. It was beautifully done and so simple. I'd heard the song on the radio but never really listened to it. It's a beautiful song! He's quite talented, I think. So, the evening wasn't an entire waste thanks to Mr. Sheeran and Prince. They saved it. Well done, you! I haven't bought his entire cd, but I did at least buy this song and it's becoming a staple on my playlists:




Summer also brings us soccer! Yay!! A friend of mine went to a Sporting KC match over the weekend and got me a poster of the team. I've never been able to make it up to KC to see them play, but I know they're really really good. I've seen them play on tv a few times. Several of the Sporting KC players play for the national team. Speaking of the national team, they beat Germany over the weekend in Washington D.C.! Germany wasn't at its full strength, but still, it's a top-ranked team in the world and to beat them is a pretty awesome thing. Admittedly, the German goalie did help us out by scoring a goal for our side by accidentally hitting it into his own net, but hey: every little bit helps, you know? I hope it helped the US men's team in their confidence level since they got their butts handed to them by Belgium earlier last week. Neither of those games were World Cup Qualifiers, they were just friendlies for experience. US play a WC qualifier on Friday, so hopefully that goes well. There's still a long way to go to make it into the World Cup, but the US is tied with two other countries for third place at the moment and our region only allows three berths into the World Cup before you have to 'play-in' against a team in the Pacific region for the last spot. I think we can claim one of the top three spots out-right, our team has some really outstanding talent. But, for some reason, we seem to fall flat on our face when we really can't afford to fall flat on our face. The Gold Cup begins next month, too. That's a big deal for other reasons. I had thought that the winner of that competition got an automatic berth into the World Cup, but I'm not so sure now. It might be an automatic berth into the Confederations Cup, which will actually be the year after the World Cup. But, anyway, I hope the US does well. We need experience in international games and the more we have, the better we'll be, I suppose. I'm also hoping for a good showing in the Gold Cup because one of my summer plans includes a trip to the Finals of the Gold Cup this year. My first ever real soccer match! And an international final of a tournament, at that! The last two Gold Cup finals have been Mexico vs. USA, so I'm sorta hoping for something like that again. That would be pretty exciting, I hope. Although, Mexico isn't as good as they used to be and USA is sort of unpredictable. Plus, countries sometimes send their B-squads to the Gold Cup instead of their A-teams who are trying to play for the World Cup qualifiers. Still, CONCACAF's World Cup qualifying matches end in the middle of June and don't pick up again til September so that teams can send their best players to take part in the Gold Cup. We'll see what happens, eh? I've got my fingers crossed that the US will do well and maybe I'll get to cheer on the USA from my really fantastic seats. Regardless, I hope to see a good game no matter who I see play. And, the best part of seeing a final is that you know it won't be a draw! And penalty kicks are super exciting, if it comes to that! They just released the preliminary roster for the Gold Cup for the USA men's team and there are some really fantastic players on the roster including Landon Donovan, who retired and then decided earlier this year that he wanted to play again and he's been fighting to get back into shape and onto the team. I wasn't sure if the coach would allow him back on or not, but he's on the preliminary roster and I'd love to see him play in person. He's not on the final cut for the team yet, but at least he's made it onto the prelim roster, yeah? Other guys that I was really excited to see on the roster is Gooch Onyewu, Carlos Bocanegra (yayay! I thought he might be too old to be on the team, but he's on the prelim list!), Herculez Gomez (I really just want to cheer for Herculez...), Graham Zusi (who had an assist for a goal against Germany over the weekend and normally plays for KC), DaMarcus Beasley, and Bill Hamid and Sean Johnson (who I think are both pretty awesome goalies, and we need somebody who can back up for Tim Howard on the national team...and hopefully either of these guys can become that dependable back-up.). Seeing the preliminary roster made me happy about the chances of the guys making it to the final. The preliminary roster has to be cut down by about 12 guys within a couple of weeks before the final roster is ready, but this is a pretty good team already, I think. Here's hoping!