September 24, 2006
~ Blue Lake in the Fall ~
On Saturday, Josh and I went to Blue Lake. As usual, it was absolutely stunning. I've never been there so late in the year, and I found the fall colors beautiful. We hiked around the lake and captured some views, relaxed a bit. Then we continued our journey up to the top of the mountains where we were able to see on both sides to the east and to the west. It was awesome. Josh spent a good time with his gazetteer to determine what all of the different landmarks were that we could see. What was particularly amazing was that we could actually see far enough to the east to see the tips of the Sawtooths, which were 58 miles away as a crow flies. Here's a link to my flikr set to view the photos. See if you can see me in the below photo.
September 20, 2006
~ On Enthusiasm or a Lack Thereof ~
Part of the problem of subscribing to the New Yorker is that there is generally not enough time during a normal week to read it. Yet, as I have investigated monthly alternatives to the New Yorker, such as Harper's and the Atlantic Monthly, I don't feel that they offer me the same sort of stimulation and gratification as the New Yorker.
In other news, last night Josh and I were wondering exactly how many monkeys are contained within a barrel. We were examining some data provided by John Stewart about the level of funness (represented by monkeys and barrels of monkeys) versus the level of danger (represented by daggers and death squad icons) of travelling to various South American countries. The data served to reinforce my desire to spend some time in Chile, but only because there is no fun without danger. *rowr*
"I cannot help but wonder"...why is this whole "applying to graduate school" thing so difficult??? Last night, I went off on a huge tirade against wanker academia pretention, and the result was that I merely became more inflamed on the subject. To summarize, GIVE ME A BREAK! Sheesh! And I don't mean to come off as elitist, but I'm not applying to the Ivy League School of Rocket Science. COME ON...!!! I have made a detailed pro/con list to help me decide which program at which school to focus my application energies. It appears that the brunt of my decision has been made based upon having had an extremely horrid application experience with one school, and a pleasant and uncomplicated application experience with another. And the horrid experience with the one school just doesn't go away. Each and every single dingle wingle day they hand me yet another straw...and I keep saying, "Now, THAT is the last straw!" only to receive another. I continually sigh in exasperation.
Anyhoot, it doesn't matter because I've submitted my final application materials to the one school and am not returning the emails/phonecalls of the other (which is giving me reason to contemplate the concept of burning bridges, but I am way too annoyed and fed up). What's funny now, ha ha ha, is that today I called the graduate school to verify that they have received all of my materials. And they hadn't. They were missing transcripts for two of my three undergraduate schools. Good grief! I then proceeded to have an anxiety attack and verified that the transcripts were sent over a month ago. I can't quite articulate how I was feeling, but I am a very anal retentive person about these sorts of things and I felt so hypertensive. After a time, the person from the graduate school called me to tell me that they had assumed the person attached to each of those two first schools was an international student, so they had forwarded my transcripts to the international student office. The other issue, 'cause there's never just one issue, is that I have a very common name and that needed all kinds of itemized explanations.
September 19, 2006
~ a bivalve mollusk ~
Yesterday, I submitted all of the final application materials for the graduate program of my choice. What a long road this has been. I feel as though I have gone through so much just to get to this decision. The funny thing about it, ha ha, is that this is the very same program that I've almost applied to several times. I've convinced myself that it was necessary to go through all of this rigmarole in order to feel confident about my decision. ...Of course, today I have descended back into indecision. Christ Amighty!
Anyhoo, I had a rather epic weekend. It all began on Friday afternoon when I got off of work. This has been a crazy time at work, incidentally, and the only thing to say is "busy, busy, busy." Which may incline one to think, correctly, that I was happy to transition from work to weekend. And it was such a lovely weekend. It's fall, and the air quality has cleaned up, and I feel better about a variety of things. Josh and I had some lovely hanging out. Neither of us had much money to spend, so we found ways to spend the time that did not require many funds. On Friday evening, we went to see a band, Snowden, who were awesome. After the show, I simply had to purchase their c.d., which basically shot down the whole idea of not spending any money. It was fantastic.
On Saturday, Josh and I met at the M for a morning coffee experience. A bicycling dude and his girlfriend, with whom Josh and I are acquainted, were there having an intense conversation, to which I listened intently, about his needs to be with her more frequently. From what I have heard, this dude is kind of obsessed with sex, but as I was eavesdropping on their conversation (hey! they were discussing this while being adjacent to my person in a public place!) he came off as a tad needy to me. Then again, I sense that his girlfriend is totally cool and independent, so perhaps anyone would seem needy when placed alongside her. Josh later told me that if I was a pilot and gone most of the time, that he would be very clingy, which was kind of romantic in this strange way. After some time, we left the M and had a downtown-appreciation day. We walked all around, ventured through the free community gathering dealies, into the shops without buying anything, and then ate some much needed lunch. At some point, we decided to be productive, so we took all of our oodles of recycling to the recycling center and then went grocery shopping. Then we took some time to ourselves to arrange our respective lives.
That evening we met at the Egyptian to see Ted Rall speak about his new book "Central Asia: Silk Road to Ruin". What an intellectually-stimulating experience that was! Except that it was depressing and pessimistic and made me feel really super duper shitty about the world and the country in which I reside. God, talk about making me want to die. But, as I said, very intellectually stimulating!!! Josh and I have been making an effort to attend more lectures ; last week we saw a lecture about sex education in Texas, which was very good. Anyway, it proved good that I refuse to bring credit cards or checks around with me because I am always faced with temptations to spend money. Like, Ted Rall's book, for example. Oh, I wanted to buy it so badly. Actually, I want to buy all of the half-dozen books he recommended. So interesting! I cannot refrain from exclaiming! Also, it serves to reinforce my leftism, seeing Ted Rall, which I feel is important to maintaining one's sanity while living in Idaho, which is a state in the USA, both of which are lame. Grunt, grunt.
Caution: the following paragraph contains disturbing material which might keep you up at night. So if you are one of those sorts of people who lay awake at night, mulling over disturbing things as though they were the nightmare that happened to you, I would advise skipping to the next paragraph.
At some point during the lecture, Ted Rall began to discuss torture, and to bring his point home, he opted to show a photo of a man who had been boiled to death. While I thought his lecture was awesome, I felt it was insensitive of him to show this photo without any kind of advance warning. There I was, examining a map of Tajikistan (or Uzbekistan?), when all of a sudden this photo of an obviously dead body comes up and I'm left to stare in morbid fascination. Ted Rall left the photo up for a moment before saying that the person had been boiled to death - - apparently it was a man who had had the audacity to distribute fliers to the public containing his opinions about the country. As I said, I was staring, morbidly fascinated, at the photo. Then I realized the source of his injuries and began to have some kind of inkling about what a body would have sustained to die in such a way, and I became rather overwhelmed. Of course, because I am who I am, I laid in bed that night thinking about what it might be like to be boiled to death. And I had difficulty getting to sleep. I kept thinking about how, since the whole point of his death was torture, they probably didn't just throw his body into boiling water all at once. They probably dipped him in slowly so that he had the opportunity to feel his person cook. Can you imagine – being arrested for distributing your opinion, and then you're on a platter screaming as your toes are boiled, your feet, your ankles. 'Cause boiled toes never killed no one. A slowly boiled body...eep. Yea, so the photo also made evident several bruises that he had on his person. To me, they spoke of a massive amount of restraint being applied to him, likely while he was being boiled. Anyway, it was horrible and I am thoroughly disturbed.
On Sunday, we met for some morning coffee at the bagel place with cooshy couches. After Josh had gone to work, I made use of my time by designing a knitting pattern of a bicycle. It was fun and creative. I spent the day doing all kinds of things that I found awesome. When Josh got off work, we went on a mountain bike ride on a trail we've never been on before off of Rocky Canyon Road. We rode our bikes through the whole Shane's Loop area, connected with Rocky Canyon Road, rode up and up, and turned onto a trail for "Orchard Loop". I had a strange feeling of deja vue once on this trail, but I couldn't put my finger on it. At some point, we decided to connect with a trail that was branching off of the main trail, and it was this exciting exploration adventure thing. We didn't have a good sense about where we were going or what the trail would be like, but we just kept going. I was having difficulties with my gears, so we took more moments of pause than necessary. We made it to the top and began our descent, which was obviously on a motorcycle trail. I was getting super cold, my warming layers weren't quite enough to keep me warm after having worked up a sweat on the climb and then rushing into a descent into the shade on a cool fall evening. So I felt shaky. But it was quite fun and I felt that, if I wasn't preoccupied with my coldness, that I could have gone quite fast on the downhill. The loop came back onto Rocky Canyon Road, and we had quite a distance to ride down. Now, I do not ever want to be a party pooper, but I dislike riding my bicycle down Rocky Canyon Road. This is due, mainly, to the fact that I have a poor suspension system on my bicycle. My suspension gets me through most everything that I ride, and I tend to prefer less gnarly trails. But Rocky Canyon Road is a never ending washboard of jittering ricketty racketty rocky sandy plunketty plonketty jirating eee-aaa-eee-aaa-eee and I find it quite unpleasant to ride down on, on my bicycle with barely two inches of front suspension. Trust me, once I have the money I have every intention of investing in a better front fork, but I really have no money for that right now. And good lord, I felt that we were riding down Rocky Canyon Road for so long. And what made it worse was that my hands were partially numb from the cold, not numb enough so that I couldn't feel them, but numb enough so that a constant gyration against my carbon fiber handle bars was very very very very very very painful. I spent the duration of the decent with a look of pure agony upon my face. But see, I don't want to seem like a woosy who never tries. I have made it up the long hard road of finding some enjoyment in riding UP Rocky Canyon Road. As I tend to ride much slower during an uphill than a downhill, the gyrations against my lack of suspension are less bothersome. Anyway, twenty minutes after the ride, I was in the shower wimpering over my poor sore hands who were sadly abused.
Anyhoot, I am a very busy bee right now so I need to return to my buzying.
September 8, 2006
~ The Cold Air of Distance Learning ~
Last night, I attended a student orientation deal at a prospective distance learning site. The process of my graduate program decision has been long and waffly. I have now met with the Director's of three different programs at two distinct graduate schools. And I remain indecisive. The crux of the matter is my overwhelming need to get on with doing something more challenging and fulfilling than what I currently do. In the way of employment, I recognize that the most obvious catalyst would be a practical masters degree that taps into the sort of work that I have been doing and would like to do. Part of this process is doing a regular career search to locate those opportunities that I would like to shoot for, and also to create a map of how to access those opportunities. Through this process, I have discovered many more ideal career opportunities than I had any idea existed. Additionally, I have determined that, along with pertinent experience which I am in the long arduous process of attaining, the letters MPH after my name are what I need.
There is only one nationally accredited MPH program in Idaho. And, quite frankly, I'm not all that excited about it. I have tried to justify doing another program that excites me more, there are two such programs that excite me, but one is not nationally accredited and the other has nothing to do with my career objectives. There are several underlying reasons why I feel the way that I do about this program.
- The history of Jennifer is a history of glorifying idyllic university studies. Well, I had my idyllic university experience at the Harvard of Canada...it was beautiful, academic, stimulating, stressful hell, and totally useless. From this, I try to remind myself that I have already had the idyllic university experience, to convince myself that the time might be ripe to go for a completely functional experience and throw idyllicism to the wind. The MPH degree appears to be nothing but practical.
- I am a downtown gal. I have crafted my life to live, work, and play exclusively downtown. I prefer to commit to those quotidian activities to which I can walk or ride my bicycle. I don't go outside of my niche except for extraordinary purposes. That said, the location of the MPH program is less than ideal. It is housed mainly in an Eastern Idaho town called Pocatello. Yet, it has a distance learning site here in Boise...at the far west end of town, a shit hole, the commute to which is through a series of never ending trailer parks and strip malls. Gag. I am considering the notion of riding my bicycle to and from there (as the classes are normally in the evening after the buses have stopped running), but I would literally be afraid of being attacked in some manner riding my bicycle out there twice in the evenings, especially when it begins to get dark earlier and earlier. Yet, I may be exaggerating the danger. Who knows. My sources indicate that some road construction along the way is going to yeild a bike lane, which would allow me to avoid the dark and shady places and reduce my fear of being run over.
- As the elitist snob that I admit to be, I feel my nose rising in the air when I think about this program. While I don't want to be this much of a snob, it can be difficult to lower one's nose. The orientation deal last night was a meeting between all of the current students and faculty, via video conferencing between the program's three sites (Pocatello, Boise, and Idaho Falls). It is quite a concept for me to wrap my mind around getting an accredited masters degree in this "distance learning" fashion. While the video conferencing seemed sophistocated, the other resources available did not. Back to the notion of the idyllic university experience...the building for the Boise program is in a small warehouse-looking square, the room was cold and empty except for the AV equipment and three rows of tables & chairs, and there were strange microphones so that the students can communicate with their instructors. Additionally, I didn't think much of some of the faculty. The woman who coordinates internships, for example, seemed like this hiddeous grouchy witch who hates everyone, who was talking to all of the students in a very disrespectful and condescending manner, and was going on about how her primary research area is homeland security and how to make this country safer. Belch.
Despite all of that, there are some positives about the program. The director of the Boise site (Dr. Firstname, as I like to call him), who would be the main person I would interact with, is wonderful and it sounds like he would be a very good mentor-sort of person for me and my objectives. And I have decided that having quality mentor-sorts of people in my life is good. Additionally, on the Boise site, there are some institutes which would mesh well with my experience and objectives, that I could tap into. Classes would be in the evening, so I could still work. There is an express bus that stops near to the site, and I could ride that out there before the class and ride my bike along a newly-constructed bike lane. And, there is a chance that I would not need to spend a single cent of my own money on this experience. So my hands continue to raise and lower, simulating scales weighing pros and cons.
September 7, 2006
~ Dumpster Diving: the ultimate recycling ~
I have recently increased my committment to recycling. Until this, I had been kinda recycling based upon the pick-up-from-my-house method. I have been having doubts about the efficacy of this method, however, as my neighbors appear to utilize the recycle bins as trash bins. Lame. So I am now incorporating the method of hauling my recycling out to the recycle place. It's a bit more of a pain, but not only do I feel that my recycling is of a higher quality, there also appear to be some added benefits, such as what I shall now describe.
The other day while I was at the big recycling place, I noticed some people rummaging around in the dumpsters. At first I assumed they were some random white trash people who spent their Sunday mornings rummaging around in dumpsters. Upon further inspection, I realized that they were carefully sifting through the dumpsters containing all of the magazines, and were taking magazines, heretofore abandoned at the recycling place, for themselves. I felt a light go off above my head: what a brilliant idea. Since rummaging around in a dumpster isn't the sort of thing I feel comfortable doing by myself, I waited until an opportune moment arose when I had Josh captive in the car to drive him out to go dumpster diving with me. We did this just the other day. He heaved me into one of the dumpsters, climbed into one himself, and we sifted through hundreds of magazines, locating a few gems to take home with us.
While most of the magazines were not very appealing, being such things as Sears catalogues, Women's Day, Forbes, and Business Weekly, we did pull out several exciting travel magazines, many issues of Bon Apetit, a Vogue, Outdoors Magazine, Men's Fitness (for Josh, obvs), and neat gardening magazines (for me). Magazines have been on my mind recently. I have felt a hankering to subscribe to a magazine, such as the New Yorker, but have hesitated because, as I used to be a New Yorker and an Economist subscriber, I have found that there is not enough time in a week for me to thoroughly read through such a weekly magazine. I have heard several people give props to this magazine known as Harper's, but I dunno, it's all so overwhelming you know. Hence, the dumpster diving.
In other news, I stayed up last night baking banana bread from my Moosewood. For those interested in banana bread, I find this to be an interesting recipe, as it has the baker make one's own flour through a combination of flax seeds, rolled oats, and whole wheat pastry flour. So, not only is it healthy, but delicious! For my birthday, my mother purchased me a Magic Bullet Blender and I have found it to be a perfect food processor for such things as making one's own flour with the above ingredients, as well as pureeing a variety of things into sauces, and mixing protein drinks. It's small, so it easily fits within the confines of my itsy bitsy apartment and my teeny tiny kitchen, but wow, it's wonderful.
September 5, 2006
~ Regarding the Decline of the Robotical Interface known as The Television ~
I threw something of a coniption fit yesterday. I was at the grocery store, selecting my week's worth of groceries. This process took about twenty minutes. I then waited in a line for about fifteen minutes...it was the end of a three day weekend and the store was busier than I've ever before witnessed. During my wait, I was patient and perused a celebrity magazine, catching up on the goings on of the real world. When it was my turn, I loaded all of my groceries onto the conveyer belt dealie. Then I took note of the world around me. Everyone seemed to be frustrated and having a cow. I overheard the cashier saying that their technological thingies required for completing credit and debit transactions were down. I then noticed a long line of people at the ATM. I joined them and waited another ten minutes to slide my card. Upon sliding my card, the machine indicated that it was unable to give me money, as it had just given away all of the money contained within it. I returned to my cashier and informed him that the ATM wasn't working now either. He looked at me. I looked at him. He continued to look at me. I asked him what I should do with the groceries. He tried to get someone to assist me to return all of the groceries. But all of the employees were running around in a crazy-fasion, seeming to be very stressed out. I wondered why there was no announcement over the intercom regarding the lack of financial technology dealies so to avoid my having waited in lines for almost a half an hour. The cashier then proceeded to process the order of the people behind me who had cash. I placed all of my items back into the cart and wondered what I should do, and whether someone was going to help me. Then I got really lamed out, had my coniption fit, and went home to lie in bed. I later had to go to a grocery store (albeit, a different one) to procure my needed groceries.
After I had been lying in bed for sometime, the phone rang and I had the following conversation with Josh.
Hello.
I'm making some major changes over here.
Huh?
I'm purging a lot of crap. It's exciting.
Huh?
I just threw out my tv.
What?
It was a distraction. So I put it next to the dumpster with a sign "Free to anyone who wants it."
Oh...I haven't had a tv for years. ...And look how enriched my life is...
Now I have this amazing space to work with.
So what, when we're at your place, we'll...(gulp)...have conversations?
Over the weekend, I also restructured my living space. I did some much needed re-organization and also incorporated some new furniture items and organizational methods. I am excited about my new space.
September 4, 2006
~ September 2nd - 4th !!! a long weekend ~
Josh and I have taken up smoking. Or, we might as well, considering the air quality. I have avoided going outside to do such things like mountain biking, which inclines me to inhale and exhale heavily. I am prone to inactivity depression so I've decided to screw my lungs and go outside to have some fun. On Saturday, Josh and I drove up to Bogus to do some mountain biking. We thought that we might be able to get above the smoke, but the air seemed much more toxic. The trail we found was a lot of fun. It started out with a series of tight switchbacks and then turned into a woodland rollercoastery fast riding experience. After a time, we caught up with Ridge Road and rode up and up. It was a this point when I was paricularly aware of the fact that I might as well have been smoking, the air was burning my lungs so. After riding up and up, we connected with the Mores Mountain Trail, which is a trail that I rode fairly early in my mountain biking career with Josh and Eric. It was beautiful. We snapped a few photographs of the experience, but I look ugly in them, so I will not be posting those photos onto the internet.
That evening, we went to the Stagecoach Theater to see a play called "Pizza Man". The theater is located in the Hillcrest Shopping Mall, which is one of those malls that had some action during the late '80's and early '90's but now everything has closed, and it's full of vacant shops and dust. The Hillcrest mall used to be home to a certain dollar theater that, upon getting my driver's liscense, my sister and I saw many dollar movies at. The mall is also home to one "Mike's Diner" which is a piece of Jennifer history: having gone there since I was very young, regularly with my grandma and sister. Mike's is the only vestige of the olden days that is still in existence. Before the play, Josh and I went to Mike's (which I haven't been to for about ten years), for dinner. Talk about a blast from the past. The place has not changed one bit.
The play was entertaining. It was somewhat sick and twisted, as it was a "comedy about rape" but there were some redeeming qualities. What I was most entertained by, however, were the inadvertent features of the production. For example, one of the actors had a particularly cute face and she was always making the cutest entertaining expressions. I could have sat there for an hour being totally entertained by her cuteness. Also, at some point, one of the actors had a humorous wardrobe malfunction that none of the actors noticed which looked quite silly. Additionally, it was interesting when the male in the play made his entrance and he was some guy I went to high school with. The play was about how he was going to be raped by these two distraught females, and it was strange for me to see this person I knew as a totally nerdy dorky shy guy in high school, being taken advantage of on stage.
On Sunday, I persuaded Josh to take me on the "Dump Loop." The Dump Loop has been this mysterious road biking loop which I have wanted to ride ever since I first got my road bike, but Josh has made a big point of instilling in me the fear of God with regard to this ride that I have felt sheepish about trying it. Yet again, I was reminded of Josh's proclivity towards exaggeration when he convinces me of the insurmountability of a particular bike ride. The loop was great. Josh and I rode with great speed out Hill Road and connected with the turnoff to "the Dump". We rode up and over the overpass dealie, down through Hidden Springs, and around Dry Creek Road. Part of what is supposed to be so incredibly difficult about this ride is a climb called "The Wall". There is a female at work who is a passionate cyclist and one day she was telling me about "The Dump Loop" and she said that the first time she rode "the Wall" that she almost cried. This female appears to be no faint-of-heart cyclist, so I gathered that this really is a challenging hill. As we approached "the Wall", Josh was providing me with all kinds of tips, such as keeping my speed up to avoid tipping over (it is apparently "that" steep). I literally gasped when we came around the bend and I beheld "the Wall" in front of me. Imagine, if you will, a wall roughly 100 feet high with the length around 800 feet. It was by no means a long climb, but the steepness was crazy. As we approached, I got into my climbing zone and focused my eyes on the road right in front of me. I refused to look far enough ahead of me so that I could tell how steep the road was or how much farther I had to ride to get over it, as those tend to be self-defeating activities on challenging climbs. I was breathing very hard and was well into the red zone. Then I realized that I had made it to the top and didn't feel that it was all that bad. I then proceeded to brag about how it wasn't all THAT hard and how everyone has been exaggerating their descriptions of the wall.
That evening, we had drinks and shared a plate of food at Bittercreek. Josh was an active listener while I decribed my strategy towards magazines in depth. Later, he said that I was beautiful and I responded that we are human. It was one of those silly moments in which we were talking about totally different things.
Today, the plan is to enjoy some Labor Day sales and ride our road bikes up Bogus.
September 1, 2006
~ A Drawing in of Breath which is also called Inspiration ~
This morning, I was reminded about the changing of the season and how this is happening to coincide with a fine-tuning of my personal charge. After a period of mild depression, I have made the decision to alter some bits and pieces of my existence to thwart said depression. There is a female in my life with a predisposition to corny self-improvment motivational activities and I have resolved to follow her counsel and engage in some purpose-oriented exercises. Additionally, I have elected to incorporate some of the strategic planning processes from one of the nonprofits I work for, to come up with some strategic initiatives for myself. I know how dorky and corny this is, but I feel that I have hit a point of stagnation, experiencing a dearth of purposeful activities for my spare time.
Stage one of this process involves both a purging of everything that is wasteful, pointless, or unhealthy as well as a refurbishing of my space to make it "fresh and alive with enthusiasm and joy" (as quoted from the motivational book previously-mentioned female loaned to me). The nice thing about the latter activity is that it is a handy excuse to do some enjoyable shopping. Not that I plan on going bananas, but I definitely experience boosts of serotonin after the purchase of material goods.
I now feel myself in the process of digression...
The other day, under the guise of improving my personal space, I finally purchased for myself a full-length mirror for $5.99 at Target. $5.99! I had no idea they were so affordable...why have I waited so long, unable to properly evaluate my personal appearance before entering into the public sphere, to procure one of these handy devices??? For two days now I have been able to see my person from an outside perspective and have been able to make appropriate modifications to my appearance in order to maximize my looking good. For example, this morning before going to work, I threw on some clothes using my pre-mirror technique. I then stood in front of the mirror and made note of the travesty that was my outfit. I then proceeded to select some different clothing options, shoes, and accessories and the end product was a very attractive little number. Once at work, I was immediately validated by my partner in fashion, who observed that I was very well coordinated in a non-matching sort of way.
This ties into some inappropriate behavior that a person who works on my floor has been exhibiting towards me. He is this ex-Army guy, or Marines (I dunno), who is simply overflowing with patriotism and American zeal. He and I maintain a very distant relationship, as I try to avoid individuals such as himself. At staff meetings, he has said some offensive things regarding the rights of minorities and people who are not of his persuasion. As I indicated, I endeavor to keep my distance. Recently, he has been pressuring the entire floor to wear red on Fridays as some kind of patriotic support for the troops. Last Friday, I was one of the only persons without a red garment and everyone (at least, those participating) felt that it was their purpose in life to direct my attention to how I "forgot" to wear red. Now, I am kind of reserved in the way of expressing my true opinions about life and politics at work, it's this whole "professionalism" thing I have...but also, this whole "survival of a pinky liberal in a conservative place" thing. So, while everyone was going on about supporting the troops by wearing red, I just kind of stood there feeling out of place in a pool of crazies, and when they had finished I indicated that I would wear red at my discretion. Today is yet another Friday. During the past week, I have had all kinds of more important things to think about and basically forgot about all this "red" crap. As I discussed in the above paragraph, I spent some time this morning putting together a marvelous outfit. Upon my arrival at work, I observed that everyone in the office is wearing red and, yet again, I am the odd duck out. After my observation, I promptly forgot about this and began my busy day. After a time, the patriotic ex-Army guy walked by. Two minutes later I received the following email.
The daughter of a Soldier
Last week I was in Atlanta, Georgia attending a conference. While I was in the airport, returning home, I heard several people behind me beginning to clap and cheer. I immediately turned around and witnessed one of the greatest act's of patriotism I have ever seen.
Moving thru the terminal was a group of soldiers in their camo's, as they began heading to their gate everyone (well almost everyone) was abruptly to their feet with their hands waving and cheering. When I saw the soldiers, probably 30-40 of them, being applauded and cheered for it hit me. I'm not alone. I'm not the only red blooded American who still loves this country and supports our troops and their families.
Of course I immediately stopped and began clapping for these young unsung heroes who are putting their lives on the line everyday for us so we can go to school, work and home without fear or reprisal. Just when I thought I could not be more proud of my country or of our service men and women a young girl, not more than 6 or 7 years old, ran up to one of the male soldiers. He kneeled down and said "hi," the little girl then she asked him if he would give something to her daddy for her. The young soldier, he didn't look any older than maybe 22 himself, said he would try and what did she want to give to her daddy. Then suddenly the little girl grabbed the neck of this soldier, gave him the biggest hug she could muster and then kissed him on the cheek.
The mother of the little girl, who said her daughters name was Courtney, told the young soldier that her husband was a Marine and had been in Iraq for 11 months now. As the mom was explaining how much her daughter, Courtney, missed her father, the young soldier began to tear up. When this temporarily single mom was done explaining her situation, all of the soldiers huddled together for a brief second. Then one of the other servicemen pulled out a military looking walkie-talkie. They started playing with the device and talking back and forth on it.
After about 10-15 seconds of this, the young soldier walked back over to Courtney, bent down and said this to her, "I spoke to your daddy and he told me to give this to you." He then hugged this little girl that he had just met and gave her a kiss on the cheek. He finished by saying "your daddy told me to tell you that he loves you more than anything and he is coming home very soon."
The mom at this point was crying almost uncontrollably and as the young soldier stood to his feet he saluted Courtney and her mom. I was standing no more than 6 feet away from this entire event unfolded. As the soldiers began to leave, heading towards their gate, people resumed their applause. As I stood there applauding and looked around, their were very few dry eyes, including my own. That young soldier in one last act of selflessness, turned around and blew a kiss to Courtney with a tear rolling down his cheek.
We need to remember everyday all of our soldiers and their families and thank God for them and their sacrifices. At the end of the day, it's good to be an American.
Red Friday
Just keeping you "in the loop" so you'll know what's going on in case this takes off.
RED FRIDAYS ----- Very soon, you will see a great many people wearing Red every Friday. The reason? Americans who support our troops used to be called the "silent majority". We are no longer silent, and are voicing our love for God, country and home in record breaking numbers. We are not organized, boisterous or over-bearing. We get no liberal media coverage on TV, to reflect our message or our opinions.
Many Americans, like you, me and all our friends, simply want to recognize that the vast majority of America supports our troops.
Our idea of showing solidarity and support for our troops with dignity and respect starts this Friday -and continues each and every Friday until the troops all come home, sending a deafening message that.. Every red-blooded American who supports our men and women afar will wear something red.
By word of mouth, press, TV -- let's make the United States on every Friday a sea of red much like a homecoming football game in the bleachers.
If every one of us who loves this country will share this with acquaintances, co-workers, friends, and family. It will not be long
before the USA is covered in RED and it will let our troops know the once "silent" majority is on their side more than ever, certainly more than the media lets on.
The first thing a soldier says when asked "What can we do to make things better for you?" is...We need your support and your prayers.
Let's get the word out and lead with class and dignity, by example; and wear something red every Friday.
IF YOU AGREE -- THEN SEND THIS ON
IF YOU COULD CARE LESS THEN HIT THE DELETE BUTTON --- IT IS YOUR CHOICE. WE LIVE IN THE LAND OF THE FREE, ONLY BECAUSE OF THE BRAVE.
THEIR BLOOD RUNS RED---- SO WEAR RED! --- MAY GOD HELP AMERICA TO BECOME "ONE NATION UNDER GOD".
HAVE A GREAT DAY.
Yea...anyway, back to what I'm going to spend my mental energy on...my strategic initiatives. I have borrowed/been loaned this motivational book about finding one's life purpose. I've decided to throw coolness to the wind and read the book as though it were my own personal bible. On those occasions when the corniness is such that I almost barf, I endeavor throw my revulsion out the window and perform the super dorky self-improvement exercises. In a way, it's kinda fun and interesting....not that I'm into it or anything. But I've been coming up with a series of projects to give myself something productive to do in my spare time (you know, besides reading, knitting, or going on bike rides) and it's working fantastically. I am pretty excited...in a somewhat humiliated way.
