Springtime Sadness

Today was absolutely gorgeous here. The air was warm, but not humid or overbearing or stagnant. There was a slight breeze, but it wasn't obnoxious or freezing. The sun was out, there were picture-perfect clouds in the sky, and everything had a fresh, clean smell. I woke up grateful and in love with spring, and then I got sad.

Why? I have no idea. I'm not about to diagnose myself with Reverse SAD (which I'm sure we all experience to a point), but I think that's where my feelings of ho-humness came from today. I think that nagging feeling of gray/blue at the back of my brain is my body's way of keeping my excitement in check - "Don't get too happy," it says, "it's just weather/it won't last/sunny days don't mean your life will suddenly improve."

It could also just be that I was still bummed about a fun weekend ending, my brother going back home, and having to go back to work. I guess we'll see how I feel tomorrow, on Tuesday Bluesday. And be on the lookout for regularly scheduled posts to come back! I have a movie review, restaurant reviews, and tips on frugal living in the works. I've got a lot to share before poetry month!

What I Know About...Getting (and Staying) in a Good Mood

Welcome to Farch, loyal readers. Farch is that ugly and gray time of the year between February and March when you're sick of winter, but it's not spring yet. (Maybe that happened way back in December for some of you?) In Farch, the novelty of snow has long worn off and now everything just looks dirty. If you can't hop on a plane and recharge somewhere tropical, you've gotta have a Good Mood Plan.

I really needed this plan today. (I won't go describe why, as I think everyone has mood issues on Mondays in late February.) Even if I don't always follow my own rules, I know:

1. Keep On The Sunny Side. No, really - literally walk on the brightest side of the street. You need all the sunshine you can get, even if it's extremely filtered through thick clouds.
2. Fake It 'Til You Make It. Pretend to be in a good mood until it feels like you are in a good mood. Smile at people. Make conversation with cashiers. Whistle. Our bodies/brains are easily tricked. (Other people might not believe you, but you're doing this for you, not them.)
3. Heighten Your Senses. When the outside world is gray/dead/frozen, bring color into your home and wardrobe, cook fabulous meals, light candles, turn up the music, and make sure you have your softest Snuggie on hand.
4. Treat Yo'Self. Similarly, when vacations aren't an option, make sure there's something fun in your life during this time of year. It might be something that plays to one of your senses, a little window shopping, a day trip, or even planning a far flung vacation for when it does become an option.

I wanted to add more tips to this list, but anything else I'd suggest is just a different way of saying what I already said. There's no magic phrase to take away the winter gray, so we just gotta do what we can until Spring (which on the calendar is in 20ish days, but in real life is in more like 2 months). Sigh.

The Mondays

Today greeted me with a strong case of the Mondays. I couldn't want to do anything. Here's what Did and Did Not help along the way.

DID HELP:

Sunshine & 74 degree weather.

Coffee.

Listening to the most recent episode of Serial.

The practice of doing just one thing at a time. Then the next. And the next.

Knowing I had leftovers at home for dinner and wouldn't have to cook anything.

This video.

Pulling out my blog calendar and planning out November.

Part of a Seroogy's Mint Meltaway.

DID NOT HELP:

74 degree weather & my layered fall outfit.

Still being sore from this weekend's 5K.

Bear & Packer losses.

Getting spit on by some old guy at Whole Foods.

Wind.

Shout Outs & Shame Ons Vol 2

Do you ever have a really awesome Friday that also kind of sucks? Welcome to my today.

Shame Ons:

The dumb biker who went through a red light on my commute, for making me wait at my green for him to finish crossing and for giving us law-abiding bikers a bad reputation.

Canon's MX922 printer, for being defective and making me spend several hours trying to fix it.

Customer Service Rep at Canon who told me to "unplug, wait ten seconds, and plug it back in"....guess what...THAT DIDN'T HELP.

My fellow block members, for posting No Parking signs on my street for tomorrow's block party--no, I don't mind the No Parking--what I mean is: my fellow block members, for not inviting me to tomorrow's block party. I've lived at this address for three years, you'd think that would warrant an invitation. Or maybe more of a heads-up than a No Parking sign posted the night before the party. RUDE.

Shout Outs: (I'm hoping this list grows as the night goes on.)

DAN, the second Canon Customer Service Rep I spoke to gets the A++ Shout Out of the Day for helping me through printer troubleshooting at work. When our combined efforts still didn't fix the issue, he decided to send a replacement, but before that he calmly brought down my stress levels with his joking and easygoing manner.

Dan, another shout out for these great one-liners: "It's easier than falling off a log, and only half as dangerous!" and "I have no musical talent...I can play a mean radio though!"

Zappos, for free returns.

Freeze Pops, for never disappointing.

My bed, for never judging.

My past self, for washing dishes before I went to work.

Redbox, for the random free movie and weekend movie discount.

My neighbors, for playing their radio loud enough for me to not have to play my own music. (Okay, yes, this started as a Shame On...but I'm in a better mood after recounting the good stuff, so this is now a not-sarcastic Shout Out.)

This video.

My dinner, for hopefully manifesting itself soon...? I guess I should work on that. I hope everyone had a challenging yet rewarding Friday. Have a good weekend!

Saltiest Day 2.0

It's the Second Annual Saltiest Day--did you remember to mark your calendars? A year ago, I "celebrated" by doing dishes and eating whatever I found in the fridge. This year, Saltiest Day takes on a new meaning--with all the snow and ice, everything is actually salty. The roads (when not snow-covered) are white with salt and my boots have a nice crusty layer of salt around the bottoms. Besides the literal salt, my mood is, as per usual in February, on the salty side as well--I suspect I'm not alone here.

I have a vision for Saltiest Day--we may only be two years in, but I think the holiday people should hop on this train. Why not Saltiest Day cards? They would have to be plenty sarcastic: "Happy Saltiest Day! I love it when you throw your socks on the floor." Flowers for your Saltiest would look more like funky cheese. We could eat Ramen, Chinese delivery, asparagus, tuna, and broccoli. Got beef with someone? Let them know on Saltiest Day.

Until that takes off, though, I'm going to battle these salty Saltiest Day feelings. It's Friday, so already we're doing better than last year. As for me, I'm making my signature Friday Night Pizza (perhaps pizzas?), watching the Winter Games Opening Ceremony, and snuggling my boyfriend, who also (conveniently right now, annoyingly in the summer) doubles as a space heater.

---



---

Shout Outs & Shame Ons

Some cool things happened this week...along with some uncool things. I'm trying this thing where I write down positives, since I know I'll remember them better that way...but sometimes the negatives need a place to go as well.

Shout out:

• Random Man who spent several minutes hailing a cab for an elderly couple outside the hospital.
• Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus, Barney's, and Bloomingdale's customer service representatives for helping me chase the wild goose that is an unavailable sweater.
• My old bus driver for dropping me off at a more convenient corner than where the stop actually is.
• The table of old men playing Backgammon next to me at Starbucks, especially for singing along with the Christmas songs on the radio. 
• My new bus driver for letting me ride even though my Ventra-linked bank card hasn't been working.

Shame on:

• World Market for awful aisle configurations, cramped corners, and never having what I (my boss) need(s) in stock. 
• Ventra for suddenly not working on my bank card after two weeks of zero problems.
• Fifteen-Year Old Girl on the bus for TALKING SO LOUD ABOUT HOW MUCH MONEY HER PARENTS DID/DID NOT GIVE HER FOR HER BIRTHDAY AND/OR CHRISTMAS.
• My other new bus driver for not believing that my bank card has worked the past two weeks with zero problems.
• And for dropping me off in an inconvenient location/at the actual bus stop. (Okay, not a real complaint...that is her job.)

---

Linking up with the moonshine grid at yeah write today. Non-Competitive + Almost Anything Goes = My Kind of Night.

Hump Day

As a house manager I've dealt with my fair share of home improvement projects--I've jump-started cars, replaced leaky sink cartridges and water filtration systems, fixed broken lamps and garage door openers, installed widow treatments, configured home wireless networks, repaired storm doors and shower doors, and re-lit gas-powered water heaters--so I know each project has unique challenges. Knowing this doesn't make it any easier for me to stay calm about what needs to be done around the house, though--until I remember "around the house" means "at work" for me.

I recently took a step back to remind myself that at the end of the day, my work is just work, not my life, and that helps me to let a lot of little things go. (Is the dirty laundry piling up and the clean laundry not put away? C'est la vie.) I can't stress out about someone else's problems. It's not my place, or my responsibility, to do anyone else's worrying.

Still...it will make me feel a little bit better if I can share some of the annoying things that happened today.

• When I called Kohler customer service for help removing a stuck toilet seat bolt and anchor and the customer service representative read to me word-for-word from the anchor removal kit manual.  I had the manual in front of me. I didn't call for story time, I called because the manual does not explain what to do in case of product operation failure.
• When the removal/repair part I bought didn't work for what it's advertised for, despite promises from the man who sold the parts to me that "this is the only thing that works, short of replacing the entire toilet," forcing me to call customer service. Also when the manual even admitted this might be a possibility, and here I quote step two (which was later read to me over the phone): "If that doesn't work, the bolt might need to be pried out of the anchor or drilled through."
• When the fence repair company I called two weeks ago was no-call/no-show for a price quote appointment, then told me they are "too far away to just do a repair" when I called to ask why they never came. Uh, you already set up the appointment. If we are out of your service area, why didn't you mention that before I made the appointment? Let me also add that this is a repair for something the company itself installed. We weren't too far away then, were we?
• When the fence repair company spokeswoman told me they don't do "just repairs" or are "too far away to just do a repair," but had no suggestion for other, closer, companies for me to try because they are "the only company who does these repairs." What?

These are only two of my current ongoing projects. I think it's safe to say they won't be resolved within the week, and possibly not even within the year if today's progress is anything to go by. I commend all homeowners who survive home improvement projects with their sanity intact. It's a mad world out there.

Rachel & The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Night

Yesterday started out with so much promise. I was up early to work at Mercy, and my shift passed by quickly and smoothly--the kids were in good moods, they kept busy, and I had enough free time on the train and during down time to finish an entire book (a free verse fiction, it went fast).

I went home and made lunch, read some more, watered my thriving plants, and awaited the arrival of Jesus (boyfriend variety, not the Second Coming). We walked down to Humboldt Park and caught the last night of Puerto Rican Fest, with its crowds of people, street vendors selling anything you could want with the Puerto Rican flag on it, flashing carnival rides and games, and FOOD.

We ate arepas, tostones, arroz con gandules, alcapurrias, and pastelillos. It was pretty typical fare, though to be honest, writing about it makes me hungry for a jibarito. We walked around the carnival area, people-watching and listening to music. For those of you from Colby, imagine Cheese Days in a giant grassy/tree-lined park with reggaeton playing and Puerto Rican flags adorning everything.

The rest of the night is where things fell apart. We returned home to change and go to the gym. (Okay, Jesus changed and I gathered books to read in the gym's lounge area while Jesus worked out.) As I got in the car, I stepped in a puddle of something nasty in the gutter, so we endured the smell of sewage on the way there. When we got to the gym, we saw that all the lights were off and no cars were in the parking lot: the gym was closed. That one was on us for forgetting Planet Fitness is only 24/5, not 24/7.

After that failure, we decided to continue on with the night's plans: rent a Redbox movie. I had reserved Oz: The Great and Powerful earlier that day, but I forgot my wallet at home, so back to the Naw we went. I grabbed my credit card and we went in search of the only Redbox in my neighborhood to still have a copy of the movie. Here's where my morale really hit a low. The Redbox was located at a Walgreens. Inside a Walgreens. Inside a Walgreens THAT HAD ALREADY CLOSED FOR THE NIGHT. First, I couldn't believe it. Walgreens doesn't close, does it? And even if it does, they don't keep their 24-hour, no-human-supervision-needed, movie rental kiosk BEHIND LOCKED DOORS, do they? They do.

I can get over the $1.30, and even having a fun movie to watch--we'll try again another night--but the principal of the matter really got me. Who made that inane decision? There are thousands of outdoor Redboxes. THOUSANDS. Why, why, why put this one indoors, where it is unavailable for several hours each day?

We were defeated. We stopped trying to get plans back on track and just went home...but of course, there was no parking to be found. Jesus drove loops around my surrounding blocks for about 15 minutes before reversing down a one-way to grab a parking spot. We were done. No more trying to do anything except cheer on the Spurs in Game Four (they did win).

Last night wasn't our night. I should say, though, we got through it together. I think I made Jesus sad when I kept over-dramatizing how awful I thought the night was going. It was less awful with him around. :)

Salt

For best results, they say, eliminate
sodium consumption, but I am not a snail.
I want Lot's wife to shake herself
over my soup. Give me a Roman soldier's salary,
I would march with Ghandi for independence
and flavor, anything to preserve
my sanity during a bland diet.
I don't mind water retention, I like my blood
with some pressure.

Saltiest Day

Welcome to the First Annual Saltiest Day. What is Saltiest Day? A while back, on October 20 to be exact, my roommates and I decided that America needs a Saltiest Day to complement Sweetest Day. When would Saltiest Day fall on the calendar? Far enough away from Sweetest Day to offset it, and during a really crappy time of year, when things are salty anyway.

Today was the perfect salty day because:

1) It's still not Friday.
2) The weather is awful--rain and snow together, wind, cold, clouds--just awful.
3) M was in full teenage don't want to do anything mode tonight.
4) I was on the phone with AT&T for at least an hour and the problem still wasn't solved (and that was for work--we still need to call them about an issue here at home).
5) Because of the extended phone call, I nearly burnt the burgers I was cooking.
6) We had a super huge pile of dishes to do at home (it's been a salty week here)--before you start worrying about our apartment hygiene, I rolled up my sleeves and powered through them tonight.
7) I had to do all the dishes tonight.
8) We are almost out of groceries, so dinner was: onion, canned beans, cheese. (Ok, ok, that's not all that salty/strange for me...it was actually a good dinner.)

I would go on, but this is just turning into a list of things I didn't like about today and that's depressing. Saltiest Day is almost over, bring on a less salty day and a February that's closer to being over!

Love the One You're With

It's been one of those days, where all of these things happen:

--Forgot to put on deodorant this morning.
--Fish juice spilled out of the package I was buying and it got all over my hands at the grocery store.
--I put my hair in a bun, but it's so high I keep hitting it on things (car door, grocery shelves when I bend over to get something from the bottom shelf, knocking boxes of cookies onto the floor).
--Had a super long list of errands to run, almost all of which were time-sensitive (appointments, getting places before closing time) & I am awful at time-sensitivity.
--In all of the hectic errand-running, my appetite grew obnoxiously, so I grabbed car snacks...aka I ate a lot of candy and gave myself a headache.
--Shut the cloth belt to my sweater in the car door without realizing it, so when I got out half of my belt was soaked/dirty from flapping about outside the car.
--Came home & took a big bite of some chocolate I found in the cupboard...BAKING CHOCOLATE. So gross.

Even so, today redeemed itself with several silver linings:

--The guy at the Apple Store gave me a new power cord for free, because he was 'in a good mood.' Brilliant!
--I ended up getting the big errands done earlyish, enough so that I didn't feel rushed towards the end of the day (I over-exaggerated my timings).
--I'm pretty sure my super high bun made at least one woman envious...and I credit it for my overall errand efficiency.
--The rain let up right before I headed home, so I biked in only a light drizzle as opposed to actual rain or snow.
--My Chromebook was waiting for me at home! I left it unplugged all day and it still has several hours of power.
--Leftovers in the fridge. YESSSSSSSS.

It's like my good friend Stephen Stills sings, "If you can't have the day you want, love the day you're having." Did I quote that wrong? Sounds right enough... "If you can't quote the song you want, change the lyrics to fit what you're saying." Or write your own song.

One man's smut is actually just smut.

It's funny; February felt like the longest month this year. The snow, the cold, the days seemed to never end. But it's March now--no snow, sunshine--and even my homework and other stressors couldn't get me down this week.

A short segment on the news almost did. (Read the story here.) A group called Atheist Agenda ran its annual event, Smut for Smut, on the University of Texas-San Antonio campus on Monday. Hand in a religious text, get free porn. I'm not here to debate the existence of God or to complain about atheism. I believe in God and some people don't, but what really saddens me about this event is the misguided, uneducated air about it.

Even for atheists the Bible (along with the Qur'an, Torah, etc.) is not smut--it's a historical document, a cultural artifact, a literary text.On the other hand, even for atheists, porn is smut. I'll be the first to admit there are certainly racy passages in the Bible, but they aren't pornography. And again--a lot of atheists don't appreciate or support porn. I'm not sure what the point is. This isn't like trading your Pepsi for a Coke. It's like trading your bowl of chocolate pudding for a bowl of manure.

Atheists hoping this somehow gives them credibility or brings about some sort of awareness should know that they are offending believers of all creeds along with any self-respecting atheist. If they just wanted attention (even negative attention is attention) and confusion, well they got it.