Google has revolutionized my technological life. Gmail, Picasa, Blogspot, GoogleScholar, GoogleMaps...I'll feel forever indebted to these Silicon Valley geniuses. But it's time.
It's time to move.
You can now find me on WordPress, a more highly functioning blogging site. Come visit me there!
http://dispatchesfromdairyland.wordpress.com
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Airport Adventures
I have really bad luck with airports.
The worst was probably when I got trapped on board a plane in Madison, sitting on the tarmac, knowing I was missing the last flight to New Orleans for Mardi Gras for the next four days, and then having to fly to Chicago anyways. It was hell. It was so bad that The Capital Times, our local newspaper, even ran a feature story on it. After that trip, I vowed to avoid flying through O'Hare at all costs. On one of our next trips--via Midway--we got stuck for a day in Atlanta when some light stopped working in the cockpit. Ross finagled a few thousand frequent flier miles for that one. Then on another one, I got bumped three times in a row as I tried to make my connection in Dallas to Las Vegas. At least I got a free flight voucher out of that one.
This weekend, as I tried to get out to the Bay Area for an annual roommate reunion, was no different. My crack-of-dawn flight arrived at MSP, the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport, right on schedule. I sleepily lumbered over to the next concourse to catch my flight to San Francisco, sat down for what I thought would be fifteen minutes, and then discovered that, in fact, the fog and rain would keep us delayed for a few hours. There went my sushi lunch, my pre-lunch nap on the plane, and my arrival shower. Ugh.
What did I get for this delay? Nothing. It was just weather, after all. (At least, though, this was real weather, not the made-up bad weather O'Hare peddles as a way to get itself out of trouble for endless delayed flights. Once they wouldn't let our flight take off for bad weather in the immediate region. It was sixty-five and sunny, from Chicago to Kansas.)
Well, I didn't exactly get nothing. I did get these amazing pictures of the Segway-riding airport cops in the airport. Yep: The MSP police ride around the airport on Segways. I was dying (although my delirious laughter may have also been caused by sleep deprivation). And yes, I know the picture's blurry. But I didn't want to use the flash, lest the cop think I was mocking his Segway riding and arrest me. So blurry it is. But you can still make him out, riding off into the sunrise.
I discovered on this trip, however, that my growing disdain for airports and flying is not merely due to the fact that my flying karma is bad. (Or even to the fact that I'm a terrible packer, which means that schlepping miles around the airport with my five-thousad-pound carry-on is hellish. And this, by the way, takes guts to admit. I always prided myself on being this phenomenally economical, space-saving packer. That was a lie. I was deluded. My carry-ons are bursting at the seams, and I always end up wearing/using one-third of what I've packed.) No, my disdain is neither circumstantial nor personal. Nope. My disdain stems from the fact that most people behave like MORONS at the airport.
In my three hours of sitting outside gate C12 in MSP, I saw one mom let her three-year-old son run away from her (And by let, I really do mean allow: She said, "Go ahead. Run away if you want," and he did), and then she complained loudly that she couldn't chase him in her stiletto heels. I saw a group of hung-over teenagers lay down in the middle of the walkway in the terminal. Not near seats, not off to the sides. Nope: They sat down, then napped, in the middle of the flow of traffic in the terminal. And there are the people who get onto the moving walkway and stand, right on top of the big word on the right side: "Walk Right." Then there's the whole cops-on-Segways thing. But my favorite (and by favorite I mean most annoying ever) were the hordes of people vulturously descending on the gate as boarding began.
This is my biggest pet peeve. Ever. The flight attendant/organizer person makes it very clear that boarding will proceed in an orderly fashion, starting with first class. Then every single person in the waiting area gets up and runs to the gate, blocking the pathway to the ticket-checker person. The announcer comes on and asks people to back away from the gate until their section is called. Which makes them all smoosh in closer, as if one of those Tokyo subway monitor people is brandishing the big stick he uses to squeeze an infinite number of people onto the already-crowded subway car. Then some poor mom with two kids under five and at least six carry-ons (plus a stroller and a car seat) tries to get to the gate for pre-boarding for those who need assistance. A woman in a wheelchair isn't far behind. And instead of parting the crowd and helping these people out, instead, the passengers smoosh up to make a human Great Wall of China. The pre-boarders are stymied and are too polite (or too bewildered) to shove their way through. (I, personally, have no qualms about using my elbows to say, "Get the f* out of my way." With a sweet Midwestern smile, of course.) Then, when the announcer starts calling boarding groups, some dufus always walks up, immediately after each announcement, and asks, "Did you call section X yet?"
And finally, when general boarding begins, what happens? All hundred passengers herd like cattle into the gate area only to get bottlenecked into the ticket checker line. They push, they shove, they jockey for position. And for what? For the best seat on the plane? For some coveted overhead storage space? (And don't get me started on the stupid squandering of overhead space on coats and bags that will fit by your feet.) Does all the pushing and shoving and body-blocking get them what they want? What do they get in return? To wait some more on the jetway and then again in the aisles of the plane. What is wrong with people?
Worst of all: It wasn't even a full flight.
Isn't there supposed to be a high-speed rail program in the stimulus package? Maybe I oughta get some Amtrak frequent rider miles....
(Good thing the rest of the weekend was fun. See? We even practiced our Top Model moves!)
The worst was probably when I got trapped on board a plane in Madison, sitting on the tarmac, knowing I was missing the last flight to New Orleans for Mardi Gras for the next four days, and then having to fly to Chicago anyways. It was hell. It was so bad that The Capital Times, our local newspaper, even ran a feature story on it. After that trip, I vowed to avoid flying through O'Hare at all costs. On one of our next trips--via Midway--we got stuck for a day in Atlanta when some light stopped working in the cockpit. Ross finagled a few thousand frequent flier miles for that one. Then on another one, I got bumped three times in a row as I tried to make my connection in Dallas to Las Vegas. At least I got a free flight voucher out of that one.
This weekend, as I tried to get out to the Bay Area for an annual roommate reunion, was no different. My crack-of-dawn flight arrived at MSP, the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport, right on schedule. I sleepily lumbered over to the next concourse to catch my flight to San Francisco, sat down for what I thought would be fifteen minutes, and then discovered that, in fact, the fog and rain would keep us delayed for a few hours. There went my sushi lunch, my pre-lunch nap on the plane, and my arrival shower. Ugh.
What did I get for this delay? Nothing. It was just weather, after all. (At least, though, this was real weather, not the made-up bad weather O'Hare peddles as a way to get itself out of trouble for endless delayed flights. Once they wouldn't let our flight take off for bad weather in the immediate region. It was sixty-five and sunny, from Chicago to Kansas.)
Well, I didn't exactly get nothing. I did get these amazing pictures of the Segway-riding airport cops in the airport. Yep: The MSP police ride around the airport on Segways. I was dying (although my delirious laughter may have also been caused by sleep deprivation). And yes, I know the picture's blurry. But I didn't want to use the flash, lest the cop think I was mocking his Segway riding and arrest me. So blurry it is. But you can still make him out, riding off into the sunrise.
I discovered on this trip, however, that my growing disdain for airports and flying is not merely due to the fact that my flying karma is bad. (Or even to the fact that I'm a terrible packer, which means that schlepping miles around the airport with my five-thousad-pound carry-on is hellish. And this, by the way, takes guts to admit. I always prided myself on being this phenomenally economical, space-saving packer. That was a lie. I was deluded. My carry-ons are bursting at the seams, and I always end up wearing/using one-third of what I've packed.) No, my disdain is neither circumstantial nor personal. Nope. My disdain stems from the fact that most people behave like MORONS at the airport.
In my three hours of sitting outside gate C12 in MSP, I saw one mom let her three-year-old son run away from her (And by let, I really do mean allow: She said, "Go ahead. Run away if you want," and he did), and then she complained loudly that she couldn't chase him in her stiletto heels. I saw a group of hung-over teenagers lay down in the middle of the walkway in the terminal. Not near seats, not off to the sides. Nope: They sat down, then napped, in the middle of the flow of traffic in the terminal. And there are the people who get onto the moving walkway and stand, right on top of the big word on the right side: "Walk Right." Then there's the whole cops-on-Segways thing. But my favorite (and by favorite I mean most annoying ever) were the hordes of people vulturously descending on the gate as boarding began.
This is my biggest pet peeve. Ever. The flight attendant/organizer person makes it very clear that boarding will proceed in an orderly fashion, starting with first class. Then every single person in the waiting area gets up and runs to the gate, blocking the pathway to the ticket-checker person. The announcer comes on and asks people to back away from the gate until their section is called. Which makes them all smoosh in closer, as if one of those Tokyo subway monitor people is brandishing the big stick he uses to squeeze an infinite number of people onto the already-crowded subway car. Then some poor mom with two kids under five and at least six carry-ons (plus a stroller and a car seat) tries to get to the gate for pre-boarding for those who need assistance. A woman in a wheelchair isn't far behind. And instead of parting the crowd and helping these people out, instead, the passengers smoosh up to make a human Great Wall of China. The pre-boarders are stymied and are too polite (or too bewildered) to shove their way through. (I, personally, have no qualms about using my elbows to say, "Get the f* out of my way." With a sweet Midwestern smile, of course.) Then, when the announcer starts calling boarding groups, some dufus always walks up, immediately after each announcement, and asks, "Did you call section X yet?"
And finally, when general boarding begins, what happens? All hundred passengers herd like cattle into the gate area only to get bottlenecked into the ticket checker line. They push, they shove, they jockey for position. And for what? For the best seat on the plane? For some coveted overhead storage space? (And don't get me started on the stupid squandering of overhead space on coats and bags that will fit by your feet.) Does all the pushing and shoving and body-blocking get them what they want? What do they get in return? To wait some more on the jetway and then again in the aisles of the plane. What is wrong with people?
Worst of all: It wasn't even a full flight.
Isn't there supposed to be a high-speed rail program in the stimulus package? Maybe I oughta get some Amtrak frequent rider miles....
(Good thing the rest of the weekend was fun. See? We even practiced our Top Model moves!)
Friday, February 06, 2009
Wrinkles, Pimples, and Other Thirtysomething Trials
I’ve been in my thirties for a year and a half, and I have been waiting for disaster to strike.
You see, every woman I know who is older than me has warned me—for the decade leading up to my thirties—of just what awaited me when I hit the dreaded 3-0. Overnight, I could expect: Instant weight gain as soon as I looked at food. Hangovers that took a week to recover from. Wrinkles that sprouted like weeds every night, no matter how much CoQ10 I applied or how much sleep I got. An inability to take up new sports or activities because my body had reached its physical programming peak. Disastrous side effects should I get pregnant. Gray hair that would start by tricking me with a strand here, a strand here, but would soon reveal a silver crown. A full-blown beard.
Age. Ugly aging. That’s what awaited me when I hit 3-0.
But none of this has happened. Sure, I’ve got a few more laugh lines, and I’ve been wondering if my surge in blonde hairs is nature’s gentle segue to going gray. And yeah, it’s taken a bit longer to bounce back from injuries than it ever has before. But I’ve also started playing soccer again after a fourteen-year hiatus. And my whole body loves it. I’ve lost more weight since turning thirty than I have in the entire three decades prior. And while the verdict’s still out on getting and being pregnant in your thirties, I’ve got plenty of happy and healthy mom friends to make me think that even that will be fine, should we be so blessed. The beard? Nowhere in sight.
There is, however, one side effect of thirtysomethingness that nobody prepared me for. My bones might creak a little, my hair might dwindle in luster, but in all other respects, I’m not aging. In fact, I’m experiencing a delayed adolescence. My dry skin has turned oily. Hormones surge for wicked mood swings. My braces ache and require regular waxing. And worst of all: Acne. I thought I was immune. A pimple here, a blackhead there. But never more than a freakish loner, easily popped and put in its place. But now, at 31, I own a whole arsenal of salicylic acid products. I'm even embarking on a new dermatologist-recommended skincare regime! Why? Acne. Full blown, recurring pimples, eruptions daily. On my chin, my nose, my forehead, my temples, my eyebrows. Too big to pop, too red to cover with a dash of cover up, and apparently too hearty for over-the-counter pimple busters. What’s a thirtysomething to do?!
It’s not so much that pimples are inherently traumatic. It’s just that, more than anything else—more than wrinkles or gray hair or love handles or achy joints—they mess with my sense of self. You expect all the rest as you age. You’ve seen it happen to everyone around you. It’s the natural course of things. But adolescence and all of its traumas are supposed to be long gone. You sigh with relief every time you reminisce on those god-awful years and realize you’ll never have to go through that again. Or so I thought. But here they are, right back at me. And worse than they ever were the first time around. In my real adolescence, I’d escaped the ravages of acne. I was always pimple-free. The good skin girl. In fact, I’d escaped most of the physical traumas of adolescence—the oily skin and hair, the tinsel teeth, the hourly mood swings. I’ve actually never known the person now staring back at me from the bathroom mirror—where I am spending way too many hours staring these days as I try to figure out where all these pimples are coming from—and I don’t know what to do with her now that she’s here. Sure, she gets me carded all the time (and for the first time ever, the look of shock when clerks/waiters see my 1977 birth date is not feigned), and sure, she seems to be staving off most signs of aging quite well. But still. Who is she? And why did she arrive twenty years too late?!
And I really don’t know what to do about these zits.
You see, every woman I know who is older than me has warned me—for the decade leading up to my thirties—of just what awaited me when I hit the dreaded 3-0. Overnight, I could expect: Instant weight gain as soon as I looked at food. Hangovers that took a week to recover from. Wrinkles that sprouted like weeds every night, no matter how much CoQ10 I applied or how much sleep I got. An inability to take up new sports or activities because my body had reached its physical programming peak. Disastrous side effects should I get pregnant. Gray hair that would start by tricking me with a strand here, a strand here, but would soon reveal a silver crown. A full-blown beard.
Age. Ugly aging. That’s what awaited me when I hit 3-0.
But none of this has happened. Sure, I’ve got a few more laugh lines, and I’ve been wondering if my surge in blonde hairs is nature’s gentle segue to going gray. And yeah, it’s taken a bit longer to bounce back from injuries than it ever has before. But I’ve also started playing soccer again after a fourteen-year hiatus. And my whole body loves it. I’ve lost more weight since turning thirty than I have in the entire three decades prior. And while the verdict’s still out on getting and being pregnant in your thirties, I’ve got plenty of happy and healthy mom friends to make me think that even that will be fine, should we be so blessed. The beard? Nowhere in sight.
There is, however, one side effect of thirtysomethingness that nobody prepared me for. My bones might creak a little, my hair might dwindle in luster, but in all other respects, I’m not aging. In fact, I’m experiencing a delayed adolescence. My dry skin has turned oily. Hormones surge for wicked mood swings. My braces ache and require regular waxing. And worst of all: Acne. I thought I was immune. A pimple here, a blackhead there. But never more than a freakish loner, easily popped and put in its place. But now, at 31, I own a whole arsenal of salicylic acid products. I'm even embarking on a new dermatologist-recommended skincare regime! Why? Acne. Full blown, recurring pimples, eruptions daily. On my chin, my nose, my forehead, my temples, my eyebrows. Too big to pop, too red to cover with a dash of cover up, and apparently too hearty for over-the-counter pimple busters. What’s a thirtysomething to do?!
It’s not so much that pimples are inherently traumatic. It’s just that, more than anything else—more than wrinkles or gray hair or love handles or achy joints—they mess with my sense of self. You expect all the rest as you age. You’ve seen it happen to everyone around you. It’s the natural course of things. But adolescence and all of its traumas are supposed to be long gone. You sigh with relief every time you reminisce on those god-awful years and realize you’ll never have to go through that again. Or so I thought. But here they are, right back at me. And worse than they ever were the first time around. In my real adolescence, I’d escaped the ravages of acne. I was always pimple-free. The good skin girl. In fact, I’d escaped most of the physical traumas of adolescence—the oily skin and hair, the tinsel teeth, the hourly mood swings. I’ve actually never known the person now staring back at me from the bathroom mirror—where I am spending way too many hours staring these days as I try to figure out where all these pimples are coming from—and I don’t know what to do with her now that she’s here. Sure, she gets me carded all the time (and for the first time ever, the look of shock when clerks/waiters see my 1977 birth date is not feigned), and sure, she seems to be staving off most signs of aging quite well. But still. Who is she? And why did she arrive twenty years too late?!
And I really don’t know what to do about these zits.
Tuesday, February 03, 2009
Welcome to Siberia
Apparently, Chicago is Siberia. Or so I hear from a friend who has recently relocated from the East Coast to Chitown. She thinks she has moved to the arctic hinterlands. This makes me laugh.See, I'm a native Midwesterner, a Chicagoan now living in Wisconsin. To me, there's no day more beautiful than a January morning, sky blazing blue, perfect poofs of white clouds dotting it (and coming not from natural precipitation but from heaters, cars, mouths), and air so freaking cold that it simply hurts to be alive. I admit: I'm not always the best winter dweller, and I insist on jacking the heat to a level that makes everyone else sweat (while I'm still wearing my wool cap, indoors), but still. Siberia? It's not that bad. Maybe, though, I'm just inured to it. It's all just part of the routine. Plus, I've developed some handy skills as a result.
I can tell the weather--windchill included--with my body.
This morning, walking to my 8am yoga class, I got a brain freeze. Most probably associate this sensation with the rapid consumption of ice cream or slushies. Your brain (and sometimes your neck, your back, and your upper chest) ache from a sudden burst of frozen-ness. You might even get an uncontrollable shudder running from the top of your head, through your shoulders, down to your tailbone. Well, I got a brain freeze this morning, and there was no ice cream involved. Nope. Just breathing in the brisk morning air. Definitely a below zero windchill.
Or the other day, as Fresh and I walked from the Memorial Union to our offices, we made a bet about the weather. Silly Fresh--he tried to tell the temperature by paying attention to the environment. Slight cloud cover, indicating a warmish day; the trees were pretty still, indicating only a moderate windchill. He guessed 15--this looked like it was shaping up to be a warm January morning! Me, I just noticed that with every inhale, my nose froze on itself, then opened back up on the exhale. This was snot-freezing weather. Definitely near zero. And what do you know: It was seven, with a windchill of -1. But you can't blame Fresh...he grew up in Cincinnati, which is downright balmy in the winter.Then there's the hair-freezing weather. If you forget to blow dry before you leave the house, your hair will chunk into soft-ish icicles that disappear as soon as you go inside. Usually 20 to 30 degrees on those mornings.
Clothes are also a great meteorological resource. As a kid, if I could go outside in shorts and still feel my legs--despite the goose bumps and sickening blue color they were turning--it was around 40. That's spring! Or if I could go outside with my winter jacket open, no scarf, no hat--around 30. Or these days: If my fingers are numb inside my regular REI gloves but sweaty inside my jumbo Solomon outdoorsman gloves, it's around -10. And if I can go outside in my multilayered, polartec, wind- and water-proof Marmot fleece/shell duo without shivering uncontrollably, definitely above fifteen. If I can wear the down, knee-length stadium jacket comfortably--not too hot, not too cold-- it's somewhere between -20 and 15. And if even the down sheath leaves me chilly, well, it's one of those really cold days. You
know--those insanely cold Midwestern days you've been hearing about on the news, -40 with windchill. Yep. If even the down sheath won't cut it, it's one of those. If the only thing that will warm you up is a quick shot of whiskey, at breakfast, it's one of those days.And while I might be able to predict the temperature with accuracy using my body on any other day, if somebody asks about the weather on one of these days, my response is simple: "Really f'ing cold."
(PS: If you like the picture in this post, you should check out Fresh's blog. He's the photographer in the house. He took all the snowy, wintery pics here. He's pretty talented, if I do say so myself.)
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