A couple of months ago I wrote about my restless nature – how I felt like I was killing time and was ready for change.

Change comes.

About 2 weeks ago I was told that the position I’m here for – the position I’ve been waiting for – is opening up. That conversation happened on a Wednesday. By Saturday, I had realized I don’t want it anymore. See link on restlessness and running my course and being tired – oh, so tired – of the politics in my work. And, if I’m not in Seattle for my job, Why am I here?

So…while I haven’t given notice, I’ve given intention of notice. I’m openly looking for jobs back in Minnesota, where I can tap into networks that I know, and work toward something that combines two of the things that drive me – intercultural relations and political campaigns.

Specialize much? I know.

Pathologically stupid time to be looking to switch careers? I know.

Regardless, it feels right and once again, I’m excited about working toward something. It’s also really sweet that people here are disappointed that I’m skipping town. Awww. [insert Sally Fields moment here]

Again with the change, I’m also batting around ideas about what to do with this space. Maybe a facelift will be enough to remedy my displeasure with The Blog, but… I’m trying to figure out how to more fully engage with fandom online and I can’t see how to do that outside of LiveJournal. Fandom lives, eats, sleeps, breathes in LiveJournal. There’s a bit of a defection going on to Dreamwidth, but the vast majority of the action is still on LJ and seems like it will be for some time to come.

But I don’t wanna support LiveJournal. LiveJournal goes down. LiveJournal limits content. Everybody hates LiveJournal. LiveJournal users hate LiveJournal. Dreamwidth is better and it’s dumb to get on LiveJournal now when there’s a better option…that no one is using yet.

If anyone has any brilliant suggestions on combating that whine, I’m all for it. That said, I think that the OpenID feature in LJ sucks (hard) and it restricts functionality / access to comms, which defeats my purpose of participating more actively. I also can’t really see myself maintaining two spaces in the blogosphere. Hell, I wouldn’t even say this one is maintained. [pouts about the perpetual lack of funds to repair the laptop]

Did I just talk myself into switching from WordPress to LiveJournal? [sigh]

Plus – LiveJournal has that cheesy little feature where you can easily cite a song with every post. So then I wouldn’t have to tell you that the title of this post comes from Rufus Wainwright’s I Don’t Know What It Is, which is just so very much where I am at this point.

At the core of all of this, is more fully integrating who I am.

I’ve run away from my insane love of political campaigns for far too long. Really. I am the girl who took 3 weeks off from work to go back to Minnesota to volunteer full time with the Obama campaign; the girl who has volunteered in every election since 2000 (except 2007 because I was in DC and there weren’t any); the girl who spent the months leading up to the 2004 election working from 9-5 and then volunteering from 5-9 or 10 or 11 or midnight; the girl who made her sister schedule her wedding ceremony around the 2006 election. I thrive on campaigns, twisted as that may seem to the majority.

I’ve also run away from fandom for most of my life and I’m finally to a place where I’m (mostly) over the stigma of being a fangirl and the judgment that comes with that. (Why do you care what I like? Sounds like a personal problem to me.)

Change, change, change… It’s good. And I’m ridiculously – OMG so – excited about my (short) long-term plans. I just need to get back home to Minnesota so I can harass work with the people that I know who can help me make it happen.

~~~~Sends out job-attracting vibes to the Twin Cities~~~~
~~~~you love me St. Paul…you always have~~~~

I am annoyed. Hard. Core. Annoyed.

A couple of weeks ago, I ended up quite inadvertently Twittering an event sponsored by my place of work. Based on that stream of Twitterhea, I ended up with ~10 new followers. Having recently sat through a board (honestly, typo: bored) meeting in which The Powers That Claim To Be decried the dangers of “Tweeter,” I decided to offer a bit of evidence that OH MY GOD, THIS MIGHT NOT BE THE ANTICHRIST AND MIGHT BE A USEFUL MARKETING TOOL.

I deleted the links to my account, edited out any times I had Jesus fucking, and sent the Twitter stream to the relevant people in my office, explaining that I am on Twitter anonymously and will remain as such. I thought I made it quite clear that Twitter is my private space and is not connected to my work life.

Apparently this was not so clear.

One of my co-workers immediately began following me and after a couple of days of thought, I blocked him and locked my account. Since then, I’ve received two – two – requests from my place of work to follow me. Obviously, I’ve declined them both.

I’m also annoyed because I feel like this space is now corrupted, since I link here from my Twitter account.

It’s not that I post anything on the web that would, could, or even should get me fired. Hell, I don’t even have anything that would fit that category at this point. Sure, I have my annoyances with my job, but everyone does and mine aren’t particularly concerning.

I actually sent the link to this blog to my former boss while she was still my boss, mostly because she and I share a sense of humor and I thought she’d enjoy some of what I post here. (And she’s a good friend and I trust her with the personal content here.) I’m not hiding anything. I blog openly enough and my writing style is distinctive enough that, if you know me or much about me, it’s quite clear who I am.

That’s not the point.

This is a place where I try not to censor myself. Much. There’s nothing here that’s detrimental in any capacity, but there’s a lot here that’s personal. I don’t need people I supervise or who supervise me knowing the inner workings of my brain unless I choose to share them.

That’s my issue – this space is non-anonymous on my terms.

Or it was.

We’ll see.

I’ve toyed around with abandoning this space and setting up shop with a blog that I could let my family read as well, which would definitely mean more self-censorship, but it would alleviate the feeling that I’m hiding something from people that I care about…And all of this is pretty moot anyway until I recover from moving and have enough money to, oh, get my laptop fixed so I can write outside of work.

Blarg.

After a truly decadent weekend of road-tripping to Portland with a friend, luxury accommodations (for next to nothing) at a swank hotel, FRONT ROW SEATS at a kickass Coldplay concert (which were completely unexpected), a meandering drive home (including detours to raspberry farms and Mount St. Helens, simply because they were there), and a Sunday of sleep, sleep, and more sleep…coming into the office this morning was not pleasant.

I have a cool job – this is universally accepted. It’s rarely boring, it’s frequently challenging, I’m always learning new things, and I get to meet super-cool people like the First Turkish!First Muslim!First Immigrant!Austrian!Green Party!Member of Parliament. I Heart Effi.

And yet, this morning I had to give myself a five minute pep talk about the fact that I do like my job. I do. Really.

I get that this is totally normal but it doesn’t change the fact that, frankly, I’m kind of bored.  I’m not here to be the Deputy Director of the program I work on, I’m here to be the Director. That was very clear to all parties. It could be more imminent than I think but, at present, there are no signs. (Yes, yes, there is a frank conversation in my future.)

I’m also wondering if I’ve run my course in this program. It’s been five years and I love it – I really do – but loving something doesn’t mean I have to work on it. I’ve had a positive impact on this network – some of it in tangible ways that are very cool to contemplate. That said, I’m tired of the politics. I’m tired of the game when we’re all on the same team.

My restless nature was exacerbated both by hanging out with my friend this weekend (who does what I do and is her own boss) and by reading this interview in Die Presse today. For those who can’t read German (try a Google translation for a very rough version), the aforementioned Austrian MP kicks some serious Freedom Party ass. He’s on message, articulate, and meeting his far-right opponent’s opinions with facts. Yes. This.

Me, restless?

Me, drawn to campaigns?

Me, looking for any excuse to go back to Austria?

All of this led to a GChat this evening with my former boss, who is now “just” an effortless amalgam of mentor/friend/colleague/mom/partner in crime. As ever, she hits the nail on the head and minces no words:

Me: *sigh* I really do like my job, right?

Me: I’m not just killing time before I run off to Austria to work on a campaign?

Her: Um. I think you are killing time…but I don’t know if it’s because you are destined to work on an Austrian campaign…

Me: Wow

Me: So what should I be doing instead of killing time?

Her: Not “instead of;” “in addition to” –

That is the question, isn’t it? “In addition to…”

I’m in the odd position…the uncomfortable and unfamiliar position…the unique position in my life where I am making plans. I don’t plan my life. I go with it and I let things happen. It’s worked remarkably well for me thus far.

For the first time, I’m contemplating a plan. A goal. An objective. A long-term, multi-step process in which, if I’m wrong, I will have wasted time, energy, money, and confidence.

It’s more than a little bit terrifying.

But isn’t that what life’s about?

Given my ridiculous affinity for memes…well, Amber did it first. I blame her.

“This meme asks for a quick list of 15 books you’ve read that will always stick with you – list the first 15 you can recall in 15 minutes. Don’t take too long to think about it.”

In absolutely no order whatsoever…

• A Murder for Her Majesty – Beth Hilgartner – I read this for the first time when I was nine. The protagonists are eleven, they’re smart, they’re sassy, and they’re self-sufficient. They’re also musicians and it’s historical fiction. And they take down the hypocritical authority figure. It really could have been written just for me.
• Between the Bridge and the River – Craig Ferguson – I knew Craig was a little smartypants from devotedly following The Late Late Show, but this just proved it – in spades. It’s well-written, beautiful, funny, thoughtful, tongue-in-cheek…it’s Craig. Read it, dammit.
• The Trial / Der Prozess – Franz Kafka – I was approaching the end of this book and didn’t really feel like I got it until one sentence made the entire novel coalesce for me. This book can be interpreted so many ways and some days, I swear, I am Joseph K. It pains me that Kafka wanted all his writing destroyed upon his death and it pains me that his friend didn’t follow his wishes. But I’m so, so grateful for it.
• The Book of Laughter and Forgetting – Milan Kundera – Reading this book felt like crawling inside the consciousness of the Prague Spring – the elation and jubilation, followed by bitter disappointment and disillusion. I really don’t like the way Kundera treats women (characters), but I can’t bring myself to stop reading him. And I’m yet to see anyone else come close to illustrating the yearning, desperation, and frustration of 20th century Central Europe.
• Jonathan Livingston Seagull – Richard Bach – I remember the aesthetic of this book and the determination. Mostly, for me, it’s about aesthetics.
• The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins – Dr. Seuss – This was the longest book we had in our regular cycle of bedtime stories when I was a kid. It was my top choice, to stay up later. In retrospect, it’s all about othering and tolerance and typical Seussian brilliance. Geisel really was a genius.
• To Kill A Mockingbird – Harper Lee – Somehow I didn’t read this book until I was 27 years old and it pissed me off that I’d been deprived for so long. It might be the most perfect novel written, to date.
• The Book of Esther – Yes, the one in The Bible – Esther was my hero as a kid. She was a kid, who kicked some serious ass. She outsmarted the adults and the scheming men to, oh, prevent the genocide of her people. Esther fucking rocked and I totally wanted to be like her.
• Haroun and the Sea of Stories – Salman Rushdie – Again, with aesthetics. This book is all about the imagery for me. Yes, it’s Rushdie and there are 5 million layers and references I know I’m missing, but…it’s gorgeous and lush and decadent writing. Glorious.
• The Giant Jam Sandwich – John Vernon Lord & Janet Burroway – This book has been read aloud so many times by so many members of my family, we can all recite portions of it at will. “‘What can we do?’ And they said, ‘Good question.’ But nobody had a good suggestion. The Bap the baker leaped to his feet, ‘Let’s make something good to eat!’”
• The Long Winter – Laura Ingalls Wilder – Aesthetics yet again. I would physically get cold while reading this book. The story was so powerful for me – cold, hunger, desperation – I would read it curled up as tightly as I could under my comforter and take the tiniest nibbles off a piece of bread.

Is this more information about me than you should know?

• Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen – I kind of hate that this makes the list, but that’s part of why it makes the list. I don’t want to like Jane Austen nearly as much as I do. But I do love Lizzie and, dammit, Mr. Darcy. The bastard. *sigh* Yes, I’m a fucking cliche. Shuddup.
• The Devil Wears Prada – Lauren Weisberger – I was an executive assistant when this book came out and OH MY GOD THIS WAS MY LIFE. So. Damn. True.
• Survivor: A Novel – Chuck Palahniuk – This was the first Palahniuk novel I read…and then read them all (to date) in the span of about 3 weeks. By the end, I was sort of ready to slit my wrists. Love this book though. Love them all.
• The Eyre Affair – Jasper Fforde – I went into Micawber’s Books after my Palahniuk spree and told them what I’d done. The gayboys looked at me in horror, and led me to Jasper. This book is so hilariously brilliant, fresh, smart, and surprising. Fforde is a bibliophile’s dream and this is one where you know you’re missing countless inside jokes, but it’s totally worth it for the ones you catch.

It’s late. I’m caffeinated from watching fireworks with Palestinians, and I’m getting up at 5am to watch Roger in the Wimbledon final. I am so screwed.

There are days when the universe looks you straight in the face, points and laughs. Hard.

For more than two years, I’ve fought an on-and-off battle with The Powers That Claim To Be about distributing basic, fundamental information in our work. The information is readily available in DC, but seldom makes it outside the beltway. The irony is that the information seldom matters in DC, but can be critical elsewhere.

Naturally.

I’ve written about my increasing frustration and descent into insanity over this a time or two. A couple of months ago, I had a falling out, via email, with a friend who represents TPTCTB and recently we’ve both made quiet gestures toward reconciliation which, unfortunately, means this is going to surface again. There’s really just no way around it.

It’s been on my mind every day lately and I know I need to push forward. There’s no sense in waiting. My anger has subsided; I can deal with this constructively; my persuasive argument is solidifying in my head. The time, alas, is here.

The universe, it seems, agrees.

This afternoon at work, I got a phone call from our Tech Support Guy. He asked if I could have everyone log off of our database, so that he could run a routine update. Annoyed, because there is nothing I had less time for today than a trivial database update, I nonetheless ran around the office to ensure compliance. Minutes later, over the phone, he directed me to the new location of the updated database on our server to test it. When he told me the name of the execute command, I paused.

Really? I asked. I know, he said. It’s different…but I asked [the person who is supposed to know everything about this]. She said that this is the right file.

I stuttered to find words as I opened the database format that is used in DC.

Well, um, it seems to be working, I fumbled. It’s definitely different, but it looks like all of our records are here.

Tech Support Guy was thrilled and told me to be sure to call him if there were any problems and, not to worry, he had a full back-up of our database from before the update.

After two years of advising, explaining, nudging, pleading, begging, ranting – I have mistakenly been handed exactly what I wanted.

Before we get too excited, don’t think this is a solution. I might have this, but there are more than 90 other organizations out there that still don’t.

Regardless.

The irony – the sheer absurdity – still leaves me without words.

Because I’m an ethical fool – and because future updates will probably fuck things up – I’ll report this next week, and they’ll undoubtedly “fix” it so I have access to less information again. Additionally, for this to be an actual solution for anyone – one with any sort of reliability or consistency – the entire way data is entered in DC would have to change.

But still.

Two years of lobbying gets me nowhere. A five minute fuck-up gets me exactly what I would need, maybe 95% of the time.

My life is a French film, I swear. As perpetually implied, I live in Theatre of the Absurd.

You’d think I’d at least get to have coffee with Tom Stoppard.

Maybe it’s that my mom, two aunts and grandma were all teachers, or maybe it’s just cultural. Regardless, I tend to self-evaluate in educational terms. Lately, the comments on my personal report card haven’t been so stellar:

Doesn’t play well with others.

I fail at life.

Cognitively, I’m aware that neither of those are true and that the latter is just a tich melodramatic. I do not fail at melodrama.  A more accurate assessment might be:

I’m introverted.

My work/life balance issues are exacerbated by being in a new place and not knowing people.

Terminology doesn’t change the fact that I don’t make friends easily and that my community is ridiculously far-flung at this point in my life. This week I’ve heard or read the words, “I miss you” from people in New York, DC, Minnesota and Florida. And it’s only Wednesday. I’ve decided I need a more positive construction for that phrase.

“I miss you” sucks on all fronts, unless you’re going to see that person again in the immediate future. It accomplishes nothing. We don’t always have to accomplish something and it’s okay to just sit with missing someone but, given that everyone I know and love is more than a thousand miles away from me, “I miss you” is not a phrase that does me any good.

I miss everyone. I miss my friends that I’ve known for a decade (or decades) who know me, backwards and forwards. I miss my friends through work that I only see once a year but connect with so innately that it doesn’t lessen the friendship. I miss my friends who are just easy, casual acquaintances I can meet for lunch and laugh with. I miss my friends that I met last month and knew for 48 hours before I sent them home to countries I’ve never seen.

Isolation hit me hard this week when I had a scary allergic reaction on Monday night and realized, there isn’t a single person in this city I would call to take me to the emergency room. There are people in Minneapolis, in Amman, in DC, in Belgrade, in Albany, in Vienna, in Atlanta, in Pensacola, in Miami, in New York…and not one in Seattle.

I’m not sure how to build that community. I’m great at building a superficial one – Trevor makes my latte and Keith has my scone in a bag before I ask for it. Paul and I compete for who’s had, or will have, the longest day when he lets me into the building. Stephanie pushes her co-workers aside to find out if I want organic strawberries or local cherries this afternoon.  I kick ass at the local life – and I love that about Seattle. It’s something I missed every day when I was in DC. Here, after just a couple of months, my day-to-day community was well-established and thoroughly charmed.

It’s the 4 a.m. phone call to take me to a doctor when my throat’s closing off that I’m missing. It’s the people whose couch I can just fling myself down on and talk. Or not talk.  It’s connection.

I’ve never had large cadres of friends. I don’t do parties or group events, which seems to be everyone’s method of choice here for introducing me to people.

I connect with people pretty intuitively. When it happens, it usually happens fast – almost instantaneously – and I don’t know how to facilitate that. I can’t walk down the hall and say hello to someone and make it turn into a 3 hour conversation. I can’t attend a meeting and offer an opinion and guarantee that the person who leeches onto me afterward will become a lifelong friend. It just seems to happen in my world and I don’t know how (and I don’t want) to force it.

Part of my challenge is that pieces of me want to be elsewhere. A substantive part of me wants nothing more than to go back to St. Paul and slip into comfortable places and activities like I never left. Another part of me yearns for Vienna, where everything is familiar but simultaneously challenging and intriguing.

I think in order to settle in Seattle, I need to find a way to let go of that – not permanently – just for a while. I excel at living in the past and the future – at living inside my head. I need to let go of what else is possible, of what else I want, just a little bit, and let myself be here.

It’s scary here. And it’s cozy inside my head. I’m not here yet, but I’m trying.

I still don’t have a positive construction for “I miss you” though.

As ever, I need a piano. Tonight, we hand it over to a straight boy with a piano. I know – what are the odds? Skim forward to around 52 seconds in to avoid a brutally annoying “interview.” And no, the irony of this song’s title and premise is not lost on me. But it works.

Yes, I am posting about the Obamas’ new puppy.

I can’t help it – it’s too too adorable.

Look at him!  He’s wearing a rainbow lei!

It’s an adorable puppy, wearing a gay pride Easter lei. You cannot expect me to not flail my hands above my head and eep with happiness.

What, it’s not a gay pride Easter lei, you say? Nuh-uh. You don’t get to rain on my happy little parade of fabulosity. For the first time ever gay couples were invited to the Easter Egg Roll at the White House. It’s a Yay! Gay! Easter lei!

On such a cute widdle puppy. Wook at the cute widdle puppy in his gay widdle Easter lei.

With all of the NOM, 2M4M, AmazonFail what the fuckery of late, this just makes me happy, Happy, HAPPY!

As if that weren’t enough (um, so clearly, it is), they released this photo, which makes me happier beyond anything rational:

They’re just so real. So authentic. I mean…is it “presidential” to run through the halls with your new puppy? Probably not. Is that exactly what you do with a new puppy? Um, yeah. Because they’re cute and they’re widdle and you want to see them run and get excited. Oh, yes you do. Yes you do! With those cute little white paws, you do!

And then your mom gives you a stern look and tells you not to rile up the puppy.

Seriously, is there more than this? Because I have rainbows (and unicorns) exploding out of my ears right now. And there is because someecards had to get in the game with the most perfect card about this silliness:

*snerk*

Okay, Bo appears to only be white on his paws, but…oh, how I love someecards. Hi. Larious. As always.

Quick question though…how long do you suppose it takes for Fox “News” to start commenting on the ego/arrogance/bullshit that…the dog’s name is Barack Obama’s initials. That’s, um…okay?

Since I’m quite certain Sasha and Malia probably had naming rights, I’m going to assume there are other reasons. Or maybe their dad is gone a lot and Bo’s a cheeky, deliberate stand-in. Whatever.

So freakin’ adorable. *flail*

I love everything about this puppy. Love.

And yes, I’m pulling from an Easter hymn for this title. It feels appropriate. And I’ll see you in hell.

Really?

I’m starting to think that news sites should pay me to catch their errors. It’s been less than a month since I posted the last one and I know I’ve spotted at least three others since.

And I’m not looking for them.

This is nothing to do with me; none of these are remotely difficult to spot. Frankly, that makes it all the more offensive. Don’t they pay people to catch this shit? Just what are their editors editing?

Get it together, lovelies. Because you’re still infinitely better than mainstream American media…even if you can’t spell “Michelle.”

/haughty rant

All of the melodrama that’s been rearing its butt-ugly head lately at work…oh, bleh. I’m so fucking sick of it.

Here are some things that are making me happy today:

The fangirls who run the Face of Joe community over at LiveJournal generally do a bang-up job and are reliable for a giggle. I’m not sure why this one got me any more than their usual standard, but it did.

Bear in mind, my subset of this fandom is predicated on the character of John Sheppard (played by Joe Flanigan) being a closeted little slut (because he’s military and DADT is oppressive) who’s pining for his oblivious BFF Rodney McKay.  The comment (if you click through to the actual page) that John looks good on his knees is what really makes it for me.

Monty Python reference + Slutty!John reference = Happy

And John does look good on his knees. But then, when doesn’t John look good?

Completely à propos of nothing, I also have Jenny Lewis’ Rise Up With Fists in my head and there is the best video of a performance (With Sarah Silverman? What’s this from?) on YouTube. Because I am a YouTube whore:

After a ridiculous day at work and continuing melodrama blatant stupidity from people in DC, what this boils down to for me is: I will rise up with fists and bite your legs off.

Try me.

I think I am, generally, a pretty patient person. I let waiting cars turn in front of me in traffic. I’m nice to the hotel staff member who gets to apologize because someone else fucked up my bill. I edit documents three times that I could do once on my own so my interns can learn from their mistakes.

I believe I am, on the whole, a patient, flexible kind of girl.

This situation, however, has me stretched a bit tight.

I’m beginning to feel it in my heart. I feel…thin. Sort of stretched, like…butter scraped over too much bread. I need a holiday. A very long holiday.

I’m tired of being pressured to use software that doesn’t work, that isn’t accessible and disenfranchises people, and that has a support team that is never – ever – capable of fixing a problem.

This software was designed by a former Microsoft employee, specifically for a Large Government Agency. The joke writes itself: What do you get when you cross a Large Government Agency with Microsoft?

Not only is the ghastly result of that combination self-evident to anyone who’s ever a) used Microsoft products, b) worked on a government project, or c) filed their own taxes, but let me point out a key flaw in that logic. I do not work for a Large Government Agency. Why does said agency think they are capable of designing software for my use? I work at a nonprofit, which contracts with the LGA on specific projects, but I do not work for the government.

God help me, I do not work for the government, and until the day they fully fund my work – as opposed to 10% of it – they do not get to dictate how I do my job.

Today we installed an update on this software that we’re constantly pressured to use. This new version was supposed to do three things:

1. Create two new reports to reformat information.
2. Remove information, now to be placed in the new reports, from an existing report.
3. Allow us to export information without the system crashing.

After rebooting a server for the entire office (always a popular thing to do), the software indicated that everything installed correctly – Version 2.2.3 is now up and running. This new version does the following:

1. No new reports are available.
2. The information from the existing report was removed.
3. The system crashed when we tried to export data.

To sum up: We now have access to less information than we did this morning.

And people get pissy at me because I resist? It’s been a long week. I’m not in the best of moods but, really.

I’m tired of tilting at windmills. I’m ready to burn them down.