I'm back, if only briefly

I was thinking, as I often do, of when my man is finally going to freaking show up, and I started laughing at how awesome he's going to have to be to get (a) the approval of my posse and (b) get along with my posse's husbands.  I'm going to be one lucky bitch.

Layoffs today at work.  I survived, barely, and in changed circumstances if I accept them.  I'm drinking bourbon and watching The Princess Bride.  Love it.

I promise I'm coming back more regularly when things settle down a bit, probably later this week.

The "Sorry I Haven't Updated in So Long" Post

It's been kind of a crazy few weeks! My vacation in Italy was fantastic -- I have pictures and video, but I haven't been able to get everything up. (The pictures and one video are up on Facebook, so that's a good place to start.) I liked the cooking school so much, I think I'm going to back next year. And I'm going to learn some Italian. They're so laid back there that I think it's really good for me.

The villa is about a 40-minute taxi ride away from the Arezzo train station, which is itself an hour train ride away from Florence. The last 15-20 minutes of the taxi ride are up a pretty steep gravel trail (it's really deceptive to call it a road) with many switchbacks, so getting to Torre del Tartufo isn't easy. It's absolutely stunning there -- beautiful views of the mountains and valleys, and the sky was so clear at night, you could see thousands of stars. I only left twice -- once on the excursion that's an official part of the week, and once to get some cash from the closest ATM (30 minutes away). Other folks went to Florence and Arezzo and Cortona during the week, but I had a stack of 6 books to read, and I read them. Heavenly.

I was supposed to go to New Orleans the following week, but when my plane from Florence landed in Paris, I had an e-mail from the W there saying that because of Gustav, they weren't going to be able to honor my reservation. It gave me a chance to clean up my apartment some (not completely -- I hate cleaning) and sleep in some, so that was ok. I ran some errands and slowed down my calorie intake (Italian cooking school is not for people on diets) and got some work done, too, so it was more like my usual staycation.

Sunday, I left for Dallas to spend some time with my parents, Monday I was writing script for Tuesday's meeting, which went well. I had dinner with my parents after the AER on Tuesday, and then jumped on a delayed flight to San Jose. And that's when my plans started to fall apart.

The meeting went relatively well on Thursday, but the IRO for El Paso Energy was there, and he was scheduled to be on the 6pm flight from SFO to IAH (I was originally scheduled on the 6:10am from San Jose to IAH on FRIDAY, but changed it to the 6pm from SFO on Thursday when I started paying attention to Ike). He'd been tracking Ike all through dinner on Wednesday night and all through the first part of the morning on Thursday, and during the break, he informed me that he was now taking the 2pm from SFO to IAH, that he had to leave right after noon, and that I should get on the same plane. I present in both the morning and the afternoon, so that wasn't really an option for me.

After he left, the other 15 IROs and my colleagues all started telling me that I was crazy to try to hurry back to Houston to beat a hurricane. So I switched my ticket to go back on Monday, found a cheaper rental car, and started the search for a cheaper hotel (I don't think the company will cover my expenses).

Luckily, the company has a San Francisco office, and I have two lovely colleagues who work there who happened to be in town. They organized dinner, and then we went to karaoke (SO MUCH FUN), and then we spent Saturday in the Alexander Valley. They both invited me to join them in their plans on Saturday night, but I was tired, and I wanted to watch the Weather Channel obsessively and check in on my friends who stayed in Houston. I've gotten updates from most, but I'm encouraged by what I'm hearing from folks.

I'm not flying to Houston on Monday -- there's no point. My understanding is that they've barricaded the downtown area and won't be starting on cleanup until they've made good headway in the Medical Center (which makes perfect sense). I've called my number, and my answering machine is not picking up, which tells me the electricity is still out (I'm NOT looking forward to cleaning out the fridge and freezer when I get back). And the answering service for the apartment complex is not picking up. I'm just really hoping that my windows made it. If they did, everything will be fine, but if they didn't, I'll have a huge amount of debris and dirty water to clean up, and I suspect I'll have to throw away most of my belongings. Plus, I'll be vulnerable to looters, curfew or not.

Because of that curfew, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to get home on Friday night. My flight won't land at the airport until after 8pm, which is when it starts, and since I'm not certain what I'll be going home to, I'm not sure what to do. Is there any point in rushing home to an apartment where there's no power and water (for whatever reason, if the power goes out in my place, so does the water)?

In any event, I'm happy to be safe. I felt a little guilty while I was having fun with Carlos and Judith on Friday and Saturday, knowing that so many of my neighbors are miserable in the heat without AC. Part of me felt like I should have been there, too, hunkering down and trying to outlast Ike, but the rational part of me (the part that took the advice of all those smart people on Thursday) is really glad to be here in San Francisco, making plans to go karaokeing again tonight.

Depending on what's happened with my place (power? windows? looters?), I'm going to try to get video up this weekend, which I'll post here. I hope everyone is doing well!!

All I Ever Wanted

Oh, my gosh -- I'm going on a real vacation! I'm taking the last week of August off, and possibly the first week of September, and I was toying with the idea of going on a road trip to South Dakota to see Mount Rushmore and the Badlands (I love saying "Badlands" -- try saying it with gusto, and you'll understand why). But the thought of being in the car for 20 hours there and 20 hours back made me feel tired, and while I can accept the idea of being tired after vacation, it seems wrong to dread vacation.

I've been wanting to go to Italian cooking school. I read about it somewhere four years ago, and bookmarked it on my computer. And every now and then, I'd pull up the page and think "next year." It's not a cheap vacation, and I doubt Suze Orman would approve of me going (she's the reason I'm not buying a new car), but I'm excited about going, and I need a real vacation. I think the last one I went on was in 2004 when Heather and I took the QM2 from New York City to Southampton and then spent a week in Ireland.

I do a lot of staycations -- vacations where I stay at home. I'll clean my pigsty of an apartment and run errands, basically taking time off to do the things I don't do because I'm traveling. I get a lot of rest during these vacations, but I don't think they actually recharge my batteries, and I desperately need my batteries to be recharged.

My mom's worried that I'm traveling by myself, and she thinks I'd have more fun if I were with a friend (she was gracious enough not to suggest it as a honeymoon), but I explained to her that I've been wanting to do this for four years, and it's hard to find someone willing to drop the amount of money this is going to take. The only reason I can sort of afford it is because I'm using (a lot of) miles for the plane ticket. She's still worried, thinking that there's safety in numbers, which, of course, there is, but I feel like I delay doing a lot of things because there's safety in numbers, and I'm just one. I'm in a rut, and I need to shake things up and get out of it.

I'm looking forward to walking around in the hazelnut and apple orchards on the property of the school. I'm looking forward to sitting by the pool, slathered in sunblock and catching up on my reading (I think my suitcase is going to be kind of heavy). I'm looking forward to not having any connectivity and not being able to check e-mail. And most of all, I'm looking forward to having the time away from my life to figure out what I really want and what I should be doing.

After I get back, I'm going to take a day to catch my breath, and then Liz and I have plans to go to New Orleans. The W in the French Quarter is having a crazy deal, probably because it's hotter than hell in Louisiana in the late summer and nobody in their right minds wants to be there. I've never been to New Orleans, though, and the shorter road trip sounds like fun rather than a burden. And also -- BEIGNETS. I'm a sucker for deep fried dough.

I'm hoping that at the end of it all, I'll be exhausted but rejuvenated with a fresh outlook on life and some mad Italian cooking skillz. I'll let you know how it goes!

Fairy Godmother

I'm lucky to have a lot of really great friends. It's arguable as to whether it's right or nice for me to drop friends the way I do when I stop having respect for them or when I have the realization that I don't enjoy spending time with them at all, but what it means is that the friends I do have are all amazing.

Yesterday, one of those friends showed me just how amazing she is. Tuesday was a horrible day at the office, mostly because it wasn't supposed to be a day at the office. I'll go into more detail in another entry about what happened from my perspective (because as usual at the office, my perspective doesn't matter), but it's enough to know that I spent a good two hours of the day crying.

On Wednesday morning, Shana sent me an e-mail message that she had a present for me. That's Shana all over -- even though she's had a horrible year, not just a horrible day, and she needs to take a break more than any other person I know, she got me a present to make me feel better.

Only it wasn't a present. It was a MILLION presents. I walked into her office and found a huge, yellow gift bag (the size of a Nordstrom shopping bag) with an 8.5X11 label that said "The 'Because I Can't Stand to See Catherine This Unhappy' Present'" (paraphrasing) FILLED with individually wrapped gifts, all with funny notes on them (again, paraphrased so you at least get an idea of how awesome this bag was).

I'm going to try to list them, but I know I'll forget some because there was SO MUCH (I had to leave the bag at the office because there was TOO MUCH STUFF to fit in my suitcase!!): a package of plastic paratroopers ("for when you feel like throwing something"), a pack of kiwi-watermelon gum, Tootsie Rolls, animal crackers ("it's a snack AND a purse -- what could be better?"), Kashi cookies, a fuzzy poster, a Bratz paper doll book, lip gloss, a yellow bracelet (which I wore home), star-shaped Post-It notes, multi-colored pens ("because you are also colorful and bold!"), a self-inking stamp that says "Terrific!", stickers that say "A+" and "Great Job!", a huge, smelly candle, bubble bath, and a tiny, stuffed rabbit. I know there's more (I'm surprised the bag was strong enough to hold everything), and when I'm back in the office and can do an in-person inventory, I will.

That gift bag might have been the nicest thing that anyone has ever done for me. Just knowing that Shana got me a present was enough to lift my spirits yesterday, but seeing the thought and effort that she put into it got me peacefully and affably through a dress rehearsal where I actually wanted to set people on fire many times.

I have a fairy godmother, and her name is Shana.

DEPENDENCE SUCKS

In the space of a couple of weeks, the transmission in my car has started doing weird things, my BlackBerry can't hold a signal, and my laptop has refused to start up (I had to FedEx it to my office today in the hopes that they can fix it tomorrow and FedEx it back for Wednesday morning delivery).

Without my Mac and my bicycle (and the car I rented), I'd be trapped in my apartment with no contact with the outside world.  It's like the Apocalypse!!

I am a total nerd

Here's one for the category of "everything happens for a reason." Yesterday, I left the office at 6pm for my 7:30pm flight out of DCA. The new office in Rosslyn is only about 15 minutes away from the airport, so that's a little on the early side, but I'd left my jacket at the salad place earlier in the day when I went for a little snack, and I had to grab that. I caught a taxi at 6:10, thinking I'd have time to get a sandwich or something to supplement whatever snack they served on the plane.

I didn't notice that the cab was a DC cab, and I don't know if that even played a part in it, but when the road forked, instead of taking the GW Parkway, the cab driver decided to take the Roosevelt Bridge into DC. (DC cabs aren't allowed to pick up AND drop off fares in Virginia, so this might have been a way for him to bend the rules instead of breaking them.) What my taxi driver forgot was that because of rush hour, all of the roads and exits that he wanted to take were closed.

We ended up driving past the Kennedy Center, being forced onto Rock Creek Parkway, and exiting Massachusetts Avenue and driving through Dupont. We drove past the old building at 2000 Penn, and then took 17th Street all the way down to whatever street goes past the Jefferson Memorial and then took 395 to the GW Parkway exit to go to the airport. Yes, the same GW Parkway he had rejected 25 minutes earlier.

He finally got me to the airport at 6:40, and because he was so frustrated and tense during the drive, I didn't say anything to him about my frustration and tension. He apologized when we got there and only charged me what it would have cost to take the direct route.

That's good fun in and of itself, but for me, it got better. I got my boarding pass and went to the security line, where I used my FlyClear card for the first time. FlyClear allows me to go to a special line where I can go faster than the regular line or even the frequent flyer line. What I didn't realize is that once I get my fingerprint scanned, one of the FlyClear employees will cut me into the regular line, give my boarding pass and license to get checked by TSA, and while that's happening, get my bins set up for me so I can cut into the x-ray line as well. It's AWESOME!

This is the best part, though. Because I was running a little late, I jumped on the moving sidewalk to the Continental gates, and I noticed that a gentleman who looked a lot like Larry Kellner, the Chairman and CEO of Continental Airlines, was on the moving sidewalk going the opposite direction. His head was down, and he looked kind of tired, so I couldn't tell for sure. I noted he was wearing a Continental employee badge around his neck, and as I got closer, I saw that the first name said "Larry." So as the sidewalk moved me away, over my shoulder I yelled out, "Thank you for not merging with United!" His head popped up, it was DEFINITELY Larry Kellner, and he started laughing and yelled back, "Thank you for your business."

It totally made my evening. And that's reason number 4,578,932 that I am a nerd.

Match is WORK

And I don't know if I want a second job.

Losing My Mind

I completely forgot dinner with friends and the play I was supposed to attend tonight.  If Liz hadn't called me asking me where I was for dinner, I would never have remembered.  As it was, I didn't figure it out in time to get my stuff together and go.  

If I can make it to Friday, I'll have the whole next week off to catch up with myself.  It's kind of turning into a bigger if than I thought.

Fun weekend!

Just got back from a weekend in Austin! It was really fun, but I'm really stressed. First, the fun.

I picked Liz up at her place around 2:30, and we followed the directions that my GPS gave us and took 290. It turns out that this is not the fastest way (you should take 10 to 71). It may be the shortest way and seem like the fastest way, but it isn't. And it's REALLY BORING. I made Liz bust out Roadtrip Bingo, which we were unable to win (we were playing blackout) because there aren't really that many silos in central Texas.

Traffic was great until we hit 35 in Austin. I stayed on the feeder road, partly because it was moving more quickly than the freeway, and partly because there was no way I would be able to merge with the stationary cars on the freeway. We got to the hotel FINALLY, met up with my sister, checked in, and headed out to meet Suzanne and Brady at the restaurant.

If you haven't eaten at the Moonshine Grill in Austin, you're seriously missing out. Because we ate early, like the senior citizens we are (except for Judy), we managed to catch the last 10 minutes of happy hour -- half-price appetizers and $4 specialty drinks. We ordered deep-fried asparagus (amazing), spinach and artichoke fondue (delicious), and "corn dog shrimp" (love!), and everyone but Judy ordered a Ruby Slipper Martini. Mmmmm... Ruby Slipper Martini. Here's why the Ruby Slipper Martini is so good: 1) it's pink like a Cosmopolitan, so it's got the silly girl factor, but 2) it's NOT SWEET. It's vodka and grapefruit juice with some champagne for fizz, and it all works together like alchemy.

Then the serious negotiations began. Judy got a delicious spinach salad while the rest of us ate like it was our last meal on earth. Brady ordered a flat-iron steak, while Liz, Suzanne, and I decided to split the trout and the flat-iron steak among the three of us. Fabulous choices, and a fabulous decision, because then we had room left to do the the peanut butter mousse pie and red velvet cake justice.

We laughed and laughed and laughed the whole time, and I wish I could remember what was so funny, but I think it was just eating outside in perfect spring weather, delicious cocktails and wine, amazing food, and the best company ever. It was relaxed and relaxing, and the next time I go to Austin, I'm definitely going back to the Moonshine.

The next day, we drove out to Pedernales Falls State Park. We did a short hike that started with a sharp decline and then an excursion in fording the river -- really fun and very refreshing. This was followed by a sharp incline (not so fun) and a loop where we saw some trees that hurt my eyes: the leaves (needles?) were a vivid, spring green, and the bark was a silvery-blue, and the contrast was jarring. Anyone know what kind of tree this is?

After our little, sweaty (warm weather, occasional breezes, sweat happens) hike, we headed over to the falls. This was my favorite part of the day. They've created a lookout so you can enjoy the amazing views, but the Park Service has also built some steps down to the falls. There hasn't been much rain in Texas the past few weeks, so we didn't have to worry about flash floods, and so we took advantage. Because the river was so low, there were so many places to do some really fun rock scrambling. I think I've figured out that the reason I like the Billy Goat Trail so much is the rock scrambles. I'm not fast at scrambling, but I think I'm better than mediocre, and I scrambled and frolicked on the boulders and came away feeling refreshed.

We went to a winery afterward, dirty and stinky, but the people there didn't care. They must be used to it. I wasn't blown away by most of the wines I tasted, but they had a lovely, light, not-too-sweet dessert wine, and I bought myself a bottle, along with an olive tray. Brady, Suzanne, Liz, and I each bought a glass of wine, and we supplemented the grape juice with cheddar cheese, summer sausage, crackers, and some scrumptious artichoke and garlic dip, all of which we attacked with gusto (and a sad, tiny, plastic knife).

Suzanne, Brady, and Liz continued onto more wineries, and I went back to the hotel to get a little work done. That's where the stress started. I got a little bit of work done on my BlackBerry, but I didn't take my computer with me -- seemed like that would ruin the point of the weekend away.

Sunday, we went to the Whole Foods Flagship in Austin. This is another "must-visit" if you're ever in Austin. I went to get some freshly ground, chocoloate-almond butter and left with much, much more. After a light snack, we headed out to Daryl Howard's 2008 spring party at her ranch. Daryl is a wonderful artist who does most of her work in woodblock prints. Liz had introduced all of us to her at the Bayou City Art Festival over the years. Liz's family owns a lot of Daryl's work, and Liz has several pieces as well. I bought a triptych that I love last year, and today, Brady and Suzanne saw something that grabbed them (the first ever print of "Yellow Tree"), so they grabbed it!

I spent most of today feeling really stressed. I've over-committed myself at work this week with a trip to Atlanta, which means a lot of late nights between now and Wednesday. I had hoped that by coming home a little early I'd be able to get some work done, but after checking my e-mail and my calendar for tomorrow, I'm feeling overwhelmed. I have an early start tomorrow, which means I'm not going to be able to get what I want to done tonight.

I still think I made the right decision by not taking my laptop, and it was nice to see Judy doing so well and to spend quality time with good friends, but holy moly, sometimes taking some time off to get away from the stress and to relax turns into more stress and a bigger need for a vacation.