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September 16, 2002Two YearsYesterday was ~Snerkology~'s two year anniversary. 293 entries (unless I counted wrong). Who knew I had so much to say? I've been incredibly pleased (and surprised) with the interaction I've had with my readers (or really, the fact that I have readers at all) - the feedback, good and not-so-good; the friendships that have developed and resulted in meeting Dawn in real life; the creative outlet of the collab I run and the collabs I participate in; the ongoing quest for that as-yet-achieved Diarist Award (and someday I'll make it to a JournalCon). It really has been a lot of fun. So I guess I'll keep on going! Really, OLJ-ing has become such a part of my life that I don't really remember how I spent my free time before it. Oh yeah. Getting writers cramp and collecting an obscene amount of notebooks. I like this way much better. Carpal Tunnel either way, but hey. I've had a request to please post links to the entries that are my personal favorites. Here are a handful of them: "Things That Go "Blarg!" In The Night" - October 26, 2000. I like this one because it so vividly recaptures that particular time in our lives. Particularly one of the things that the kids used to drive me crazy with, but now happens not at all. "O Holy Night" - December 7, 2000. I like the first part of this one - it sends me back to my childhood. And completely captures the anticipation of Christmas that I still feel. "This is Arizona?" - July 6, 2001. The story of the best camping trip ever. "Brad" - July 24, 2001. This is the story of my childhood friend Brad, who died when he was eleven. This entry means a lot to me because I printed it out and sent it to his parents and sister, who I still stay in touch with. His mother was delighted (although still heartbroken) and grateful that Brad is still thought of and missed. "Aboard the Depot" - September 5-9, 2001. The account of Michael's graduation from Boot Camp. "Dancing in a Downpour" - November 5, 2001. Just because that was such a good memory. "Me-n-Marie" - November 16, 2001. The transcribed conversation between Marie and I that I recorded one night over coffee and hot chocolate. "Joyful Hand Holders" - November 28, 2001. All about my beautiful relationship with Calvin. "I must bide" - February 4, 2002. Missing Grandma, and a funny account of a conversation between her and her sister Margaret. "Life is lived in moments" - February 27, 2002. Some snippets of our family life, which I treasure. "Dearest Grammy" - May 13, 2002. A Mother's Day letter to Grandma. "Part One - The Wedding" - July 16, 2002. The full accounting of the wedding, with a plethora of pictures. And I haven't gotten around to writing "Part Two - The Vacation" yet. Calvin's been bugging me about it, too. There are other entries that I especially like, too, but these are the ones that are jumping out at me right now. Hmm... in looking at recent entries, it looks like I haven't written anything of particular interest since the wedding entry. It must've taken more out of me than I thought. ********************* So! Maybe recording minutiae will prompt something more interesting. Friday night Calvin and I attended a happy hour with some of my co-workers. It was an impromptu thing, with my boss' boss' boss practically ordering the whole department to show up. Well, really what he wanted was a show of hands, and if you said you were going to show, you'd *better* show. It's part of this whole new initiative to have more fun at work, and provide opportunities for team bonding. They've put us all through a training session on "The FISH! Philosophy(tm)" - based off of the working philosophy of the Pike Place Fish Market in Oregon. You know, the place where they throw the fish around. You've seen it in movies, I guarantee. The caveat to the training at AcronymCo, of course, is that we're not allowed to throw anything. I don't see how the program could work, without that. ANYway. To promote The FISH! Philosophy(tm) (isn't that capitalization and punctuation in the middle of the title annoying?), we've started this thing where once a month at lunchtime we all gather in a conference room and celebrate the birthdays of co-workers who were born in that month. Last Thursday was September's birthdays, during which the happy hour was arranged. A long way around just to explain how we decided to go to happy hour, wasn't it? I should have just said "We all decided to meet for drinks after work." But it's such a telling part of my life at AcronymCo that we actually have to TRAIN the employees on how to have fun, and then give them a structured environment in which to do it. So. Happy Hour was at Redfish, and they had a wonderful beverage called a Hurricane. I had three. Calvin (who is SO not a frou-frou drink, ah... drinker) had three. They were two dollars apiece. Happy Hour was, indeed, Happy. There was a decent turn-out, though I'm sure not everyone who raised their hands showed up. I wonder what bossX3 will do about their lack of FISH! (gah) mongering. There is a huge and distinct difference between how Calvin acts in social circumstances, and how my ex acted in social circumstances. Calvin can strike up, participate in, and maintain a conversation with anyone. He's open, comfortable, witty, and generally entertaining. He knows my co-workers only barely, and yet they are already asking for him (and greet him with a Norm-esque "Calvin!") when social occasions arise. Put my ex in with the same group of people, and he'd be sullen and silent in a corner, pouting because we had to go out of the house at all. Everyone would look askance at him, and on Monday ask me what his problem was. Yet another reason in the existing myriad of while Life Is So Much Better With Calvin. ******************** Saturday we cleaned and went to finish up the shopping for Marie's birthday (it's on Wednesday - she'll be 14 - can you say ACK!?). We entertained AB and Mark, and Calvin's childhood friend Geo, that evening. As a grown-up, did you ever look up from a social evening at your home - one where you've cleaned and prepared, cooked dinner and lingered around the table with drinks and good conversation - and think, "Hey, when did I turn into an adult?" I mean, it was one thing to have friends over when you're a kid, but *entertaining* as an adult is a whole different feeling. It was nice. AB and I had a nice conversation and got all caught up while the men were hanging around the pool table, shooting a game and talking about cars. She and I went into the bedroom and watched their video taped version of our wedding, and I was very pleased to hear that all of the Rev.'s ceremony came out on the audio, heard over the noise of the stream. It was neat to compare the angles and footage they got (including the meal we all had the night before the wedding, and their drive through Sedona up to L'Auberge the morning of the ceremony), to the video that our brother-in-law took (commentary from the relatives, different angles on the ceremony, the Beanie Bears humping in the end). After the video was over, the guys were still gabbing and playing pool. AB and I tossed a few games of darts (she won two, I won one), then, bored, cracked out the Scrabble game. We played the Rated R version. Actually, she was better at it than I was. I know a LOT of three letter words. Fog. Fag. Pal. Not. Pot. Pan. Sit. I think the longest word I came up with was "Naples", and by that time we were playing by "House Rules". The letters in the diagonal didn't have to spell a word. We could use names. We could fudge the spelling. I wish I could remember more of what we came up with, but I'd had a bit to drink by then. I'm sure we were only funny to ourselves, though. Annoyingly, as soon as we took out the game, the guys stopped playing pool and hovered around us. "Helping". (In the "No, you're playing it wrong" kind of way.) Gr. ********************* There's not much to report on Sunday's activities. We read the paper. We watched the Arizona/Seattle football game, and some thing on The Travel Channel about The Osbornes. We worked out. We hot-tubbed. I folded laundry. We watched "The Jeff Corwin Experience" on the Discovery Channel (love that guy), followed by Angel (well, I did. Calvin escaped to the bedroom). The Sopranos season premiere followed that (yay!), then 15 minutes of The Man Show and 15 minutes of Curb Your Enthusiasm, then the season premiere of Mind of a Married Man (which I'm thinking of giving up - it's getting lame and whiney). And here are the obligatory Oz pictures, photographed while sitting on my lap, while I was watching Angel. Am I turning into a Robyn, or what? (More stuff below the pics...)      ******************** And finally, what kind of things are people searching for out there, and finding ~Snerkology~ along the way? Another episode of "It Came From The Referrer Logs": 3: snoopy dance 2: american consumerism 2: truck speaker boxes 1: what changes the latitude 1: miss suzy had a steamboat 1: white house black market clothes store 1: run of the mill and origins 1: donkey lips 1: white house black market 1: bruschetta recipes 1: recipes lettus wraps 1: verklempt 1: weird habits 1: book sensorship 1: renaissance fair pictures breasts 1: headlights arizona 1: aerosmith angel off soundtrack 1: shibu inu 1: steve perry against the wall lyrics 1: hi there little dude Man. Donkey lips? And renaissance boobies?? I like that last one, though. "Hi there, little dude!" Heh. Take care, all! |