Jill in San Diego

Milestone Birthday

2011-08-14T22:25:00.000-07:00

I will turn 30 in a few short hours. After several months of wondering what I would do for my 30th, I'm feeling very content and celebratory. I had a fantastic party last night with the people who have made San Diego so special for me, and I felt very loved and happy. And I would be remiss not to mention that my girlfriends and I went through five bottles of champagne. And maybe J. Ram and I sang along to N*Sync songs and did a little ridiculous dancing at 2 in the morning. Everyone also enjoyed making fun of my fat cat Ollie, who is too slow-moving to avoid such humiliation as this:

It was a wonderful evening of talking, hugging, laughing, and just enjoying the bubbly chemistry that arises when a bunch of awesome people get together and get along. I posed with some gorgeous birthday flowers...

And wore my own party hat...

As I said earlier, for the last several months, I've been putting a lot of pressure on Turning Thirty. I felt like I needed to do something grand, like take a trip out of the country or stay at some luxurious local hotel. I'm glad I stopped feeling that way, because this weekend has been absolutely perfect. I'm so thankful for everyone in my life, and I'm also grateful that I am where I am.

I know that my 30th birthday is, for all intents and purposes, just another day. But it's also the turnover from one decade of experiences to another. I've been feeling very introspective these last few weeks, especially after a visit last month to my parents' home in Pennsylvania, where I went through years of The Memorabilia of Jill's Life. I have a hope chest that is filled with assignments and notes and journals from elementary school all the way through college. And I have another chest filled with the same from my post-college years. And last week, I skimmed through my journal from my senior year of college and the first year after, which gave me an amusing refresher on who I was nearly ten years ago.

In my very early twenties, I was fairly boy crazy. That's pretty much all I wrote about and thought about, when I wasn't angsting about what will I do with my life? When I was 20, I broke up with my first long-term boyfriend and commenced an epic crush on an unattainable fellow student, a charmingly weird guitar player my friends eventually christened my "Ungettable Get" after my overtures of affection were rejected. When I was 21, Ungettable and I became friends, I dated a bunch of not-right-for-me boys, and then I fell for someone again. Things were great, then they were not great, and at age 22 I suffered a notably painful broken heart, which I followed with a string of bad decisions. Fortunately, I lived through it all and became smarter and wiser and all around better, and at 23, I met a new boy. Over the next four years, we laughed, declared our love, adopted cats, and got married. He is what was waiting for me on the other side. It's weird to go through my journals and not find him in there, because I feel like he was the right one all along. As I said to him once, "Why would I ever look for anyone else, when everything I ever wanted is right here?"

T was with me when I applied to grad school and ultimately decided not to go. He was with me when I had a starring role in Our Town and then when I auditioned for show after show only to never get a lead role again. He was with me when I got my first 9-5 job, a temp-to-hire position in a department with the funniest, kindest coworkers I'd ever had. I left them for my first Big Girl job in an academic setting, which is where I was when T and I decided to move to San Diego together, and where I suffered serious separation anxiety when T moved six months before I did.

I think for a lot of people the 20s are about finding out who you will be. That was certainly the case for me, and it wasn't a smooth ride. Finding a job after college graduation was difficult and disheartening, and an internship that was supposed to springboard a career (that I wasn't even sure I wanted) ended early and I spent a summer in Philadelphia living alone with no money. I had some fun in Philly, sure, but mainly what I remember about living there was watching a lot of Sex and the City and eating Ben & Jerry's for dinner. Perhaps I was not the wisest 22 year old. I moved home after that and did temp work for a year, all the while wondering when my "real" life was going to start.

And the thing is, all the experiences in my early 20s created this wonderful little path that led me to where I am today. I couldn't see the path at the time, of course, and I felt like everything I was doing was boring and sooooo haaaaaard why can't life just be eeeeeeasy, but it was actually the perfect path for me to take. A year ago, I started grad school, and I've met some amazing friends who I would otherwise have missed had I gone to grad school at 24. The hours I spent at rehearsals as Portia's Servant or Random Character With Four Lines showed me a different appreciation for theatre and allowed me to let go of my striving to be the star. My first job in academia led to my first job in San Diego, and pretty much all of my experience -- theatre, academia, writing -- aligned when I applied for my current job, a position that makes my heart happy.

There is always something to strive for. In no way do I feel like I have everything figured out. But I do feel like I can leave my 20s proud of what I've done and who I've become. I think the past decade was a good starting point of learning from my mistakes, trying to be a good person, and pushing through the anxiety that comes with being human. It's a good blueprint for the next decade.

Sigh.

2011-05-28T14:17:00.000-07:00

I'm such a curmudgeon.

It's a holiday weekend, which means the very nice neighborhood in which I live becomes a REPOSITORY OF NOISE. And I hate it. Right now we've got the all the occupants of the house on the corner and their associated friends and children hanging out in the front lawn, with the kids all running around and screaming. Hooray for children playing outside and all, but cripes. Couldn't they be a little more quiet about it?

Then there's the neighbor who has a new bench press. He's using his weights in the alley behind our house, and every time he put the weights down, it sounds like the T-Rex from Jurassic Park is on its ominous path to destruction.

And at Weight Neighbor's house, shitty 80s rock is drifting out the front door. They are out to get me, I swear to God. These neighbors are also the owners of Barky McBarkerson. They actually seem like very nice people, which makes me wonder why they are so painfully oblivious.

Now, okay, I understand that it's Saturday afternoon and it's a holiday weekend and people are allowed to live their lives and make noise. Logically, I get it. But viscerally, it makes me want to throw a temper tantrum.

Anyway. I hope you're all having a good Memorial Day weekend. I intend to, after I cram in some earplugs and settle in with the best book ever. I'll tell you more about it some other time.

Fancy time!

2011-02-27T12:21:00.000-08:00

Last night I attended a fundraising gala for my employer. The theme was "roll out the red carpet," and I had a fantastic time getting all dolled up for the event. Prepare to be dazzled by my crap self-photography (my photographer husband was elsewhere so I had to make do):

I loooove this dress. I borrowed it from my friend Amanda, and I want to keep it just to walk around and feel like a rockstar. It is at once sleek and vintagey, and it was super comfortable and perfect for when I became a dancing fiend after dinner. I also felt fierce in the shoes, until they started hurting about an hour into the evening and I hobbled more than strutted. Four inch heels on a girl who usually wears flats = lots of teeth gritting.

Back home at the end of the night: bonding time with the dog.

Dress: Express

Shoes: Target

Pearls: My grandmother

Headpiece: Etsy

Ring: Forever 21

Oh hi!

2010-12-18T20:15:00.000-08:00

Remember me?

I'm meant to be working on a long-ass paper right now.

Clearly I'm not.

But I will be... starting NOW.

Stress cramp?

2010-09-28T11:37:00.000-07:00

So, I have a question. It needs some background:

For the last few weeks, I have been getting a persistent side-stitch about two inches to the left of my navel. The ache starts shortly after I begin walking -- and I'm talking easy-stroll kind of walking, not strenuous power strides.

I spent the past weekend hiking in Colorado with friends, and I didn't get the side-stitch once. Not once. I hiked about five mountainous miles on Saturday, and another six on Sunday. Flat, uphill, downhill. Leisurely to strenuous. No side-stitch.

But today, I'm back at work, back in real life, and I started feeling my g.d. side-stitch on a very short walk to the ATM.

Now, I have an incredible amount of things to get done this week with very limited time. (Um, I got a new job. This is my last week at UC, and I start my new job next Monday. More on that later, because it deserves its own post. But I will say that I'm really freaking excited!) I'm also loaded down with reading for school this week, and I'm preparing for friends coming to visit this weekend. But these are all good things. There is a lot to do, and I feel a little overwhelmed, but I don't feel any urgent panic.

But despite my relative calm about my schedule, I am wondering if this cramp is actually stress related. So my question is this: is it possible to get a stress-related side-stitch? And if I'm feeling relatively calm about everything, how am I supposed to manage a stress-related cramp?

Help me! What do you think?

Non-updates

2010-09-02T15:42:00.000-07:00

Wow, according to my little sidebar there, I've been "currently reading" To Kill a Mockingbird for a long time, huh? I should probably take that sidebar down, since I fail to update it and have read a good four or five books since TKMB. Also, now that I have started grad school, I will be currently reading several books at once, including some riveting literary theory that is, you will be surprised to hear, not actually riveting. But it is necessary, so the profs tell us.

This has been an insanely long week, and it's only Thursday. I had class on Tuesday and Wednesday and I have my Spanish lesson tonight and a concert tomorrow and a fried chicken par-tay (right A?) on Saturday. All good, stimulating stuff, but wowee have I been thrumming along full-throttle this week. And it's only the FIRST WEEK of school, you guys!

Also, my coworker and I sat down today and hammered out our schedule of visiting fellows for the fall. Let's just say I will probably be neglecting this blog again.

The Tale of Barky McBarkerson

2010-08-27T09:45:00.000-07:00

Our next door neighbors' dog barked for 40 minutes straight last night, starting at 11 and waking me from a wonderful just-fell-asleep-early feeling. He would stop for maybe two minutes, during which time I would start to drift off, and then he would start again. And then eventually his lapses lasted for a mere few seconds. Barkbarkhowl. Howlbark. Barkhowl. Howlhowl. Barkhowlhowl. For 40 minutes. Through closed windows and earplugs.

Here's what I thought:
"Kill. Kill. Kill."
"Will I get in trouble if I tranq my neighbors' dog?"
"How about if I open the gate and urge him to run free?"
"Do we have any hunks of meat I can soak with Benadryl?"
"Kill. Kill. Kill."

Eventually T, my hero, got up and went outside to tell the damn dog to STFU. We do this often, because our houses are so close together that Barky McBarkerson is all but in our yard. So his barks are our barks. Usually it's not late at night, though. Usually he has STFU'd by then.

He's a huge dog in a little house, so it makes sense that his owners leave him outside most of the time. What doesn't make as much sense is how little training they seem to have done for him. Plus, their work hours are irregular and so Barky McB is left alone a lot. He's pretty cute and pathetic, I'll admit -- his barks seem to cry "I'm lonely! Where are my humans? I miss them! Why am I all alone with these mean neighbors who tell me to shut up?" I might be anthropomorphizing just a tad, but that's what I'm hearing. He often sees us and comes up to the fence around his yard, sticking his sad little nose into the lattice opening, whining. We greet him kindly and remind him to be quiet, then we go about our business in our own house with our own dog, who is perfect.

Seriously, I can't help but feel a little smug about how well-behaved and quiet our dog is. She barks on occasion, sure, but last night as McB was singing his obnoxious song, Rosie just stayed curled up on her nest next to our bed, only stirring to come snuggle with me when T went outside to be the disciplinarian for our neighbors' dog.

Barky McB could take a cue from Rosie McSweetiepants.

A few things

2010-08-18T10:42:00.000-07:00

* So. I'm 29 now. That's fine. I had a fantastic birthday on Sunday up in Santa Barbara County, wine-tasting in Buellton. T and I returned home with a lot of wine -- good wine -- in tow. I will post pictures and more details from our trip in another entry, after I post pictures and details from our July trip back East.

* My glasses never did find their way back to me. The consensus from most people I've talked to (at work and socially) is that they've been nicked. A note to the glasses thief: You suck. You are lucky that I had contacts to wear the day you stole my glasses, because, as I'm sure you've noticed by now, the prescription in those expensive lenses is very strong. Your thieving was nefarious at best. I wish you would return the lenses to me. I also wish scurvy and boils and goiters upon you.

* It's finally warm in San Diego! Oh, hooray of hoorays, summer is finally upon the coastal region! While all you East-Coasters gear up for a welcome, crisp September, I am looking forward to reveling in the hot, dry heat of SoCal autumn.

* I have had one hell of an easy summer at work. I spent the first week of July home sick from a killer sinus infection, then I returned to work for two days before leaving for my Pennsylvania vacation. Then after two more weeks of work (during which I did complete a big project), I took off for my birthday coastal jaunt with T. Now I'm back at work, it's August 18th, and on September 1st, I will go down to 30 hours a week to accommodate...

* ...grad school. That's right. I'm finally taking the plunge and starting a graduate program in English lit! Back when I was applying (last January), I was so sure that I would quit my job and go full-time if I was accepted. I envisioned a joyful post on this blog announcing my new status as a full-time graduate student. But once I got my acceptance notification via email at the end of April (for which I did a happy dance in my office), I started to think about the logistics. I talked to T, I talked to my advisor, I talked to my mom, and I thought a lot. I also started shopping a lot. And I determined that I didn't really want to leave my job, which is a good gig. That I would like to have money for a while longer and that I wasn't digging the idea of being a destitute student again. It's not like I have a boatload of money or anything, but I do appreciate being able to buy things when I need them and go out to dinner when neither T nor I feels like cooking. I like that I have some padding in my bank account, which was a luxury I couldn't afford for the first half of my twenties. I like that I feel like a grown-up now and have the semblance of a career, one that will be enhanced by my graduate studies.

So here's the plan: I'm taking six credit hours this semester (two classes), and I'll have Mondays off from work to be a student. I want to manage my time well. My boss knows (and my grad advisor suggested) that I plan to take it slow, to ease myself back into being a student and see where it goes from there. I'm seeking a spark for a PhD study someday, but I'm also open to the possibility that I may not find it. I know that I have to be passionate about it if I want to keep going beyond the MA, and I'm really excited to get started and see what awaits me. :)

* I have another sinus infection. It's going to make downward dog in yoga today a painful process. I have a neti pot at home, which I used a couple of times back in July when I was dealing with sinus infection #1. I'm hoping I can ward off full-on sinus infection #2 this time. Wtf, sinuses? Wtf, indeed.

Time-wasters for a Monday

2010-08-09T15:14:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everyone who commented or talked to me about Friday's glasses catastrophe. Your commiseration and/or sympathy made me feel much better! My glasses haven't shown up yet, and I'm not holding out too much hope, but you never know. T and I are off for a summer getaway and birthday celebration for me this week, so maybe when I return to work next week, I'll find my glasses waiting for me, jaunty as ever. If not, well, I will pretend that they fell off while I was gazing over a cliff in Big Sur.

As thanks to everyone for being awesome, I would like to share this wonderful time-wasting website I found today: http://www.11points.com. There are many Simpsons-related entries, so if you're a fan like I am (or a fan much greater than I am, Kevin), you will be delighted. And even if you don't like the Simpsons (why are we friends?), there are many other pop-culture related lists of inanity. Just brush past the occasional misspellings and grammatical flubs; they're few and far between compared to many other sites I use as time-wasters.

See you when I'm 29!

Moron

2010-08-06T14:35:00.000-07:00

Class A. That's what I am.

I feel really sick to my stomach right now, and I can't concentrate on anything.

It's because I'm a moron.

Really, it's because I have misplaced my expensive prescription glasses. I can't believe they're gone. I can't believe I would be so stupid to just LEAVE THEM IN THE BATHROOM AT WORK.

Why am I an idiot?

Here's what happened: I brought my contacts to work and put them in around 11:50, right before I left for my yoga class. I was in the bathroom, which is a one-holer. I unclipped a barrette from my hair and put that on the top of the toilet paper dispenser. I had my glasses tucked into the front of my shirt. I took the glasses and put them with the clip, reasoning that I would remember them since 1) they are IMPORTANT and EXPENSIVE, and 2) they were with my clip. Two things to remember! That will make it easier!

Off I went to my yoga class. Relax, breathe, relax, la la la... 1:15 I come back. I'm hungry and ready for lunch. My hair is in my face, and I remember that I'd had it clipped back earlier. I search my desk for my barrette... then remember. I rush to the bathroom, where I find the goddamn $2 clip still sitting on the top of the toilet paper dispenser. And no glasses. No glasses, which cost approximately 15 times the cheap barrette. Prescription glasses, which I need for, you know, vision. Brand-name frames, which I bought for myself in April as a special treat, since I hadn't bought new glasses in four years.

I'm the only staff member on my floor today, but there are two ESL classes happening right outside the bathroom. (Actually, one classroom is the next floor up, but the students still use this bathroom.) So in a state of utter panic, I hassled the teacher of the first class to see if anyone had found glasses. No one seemed to have found any. We went upstairs and asked the other class. Nope. At least, no one was saying so. It's possible they didn't understand exactly what I was asking.

The instructors of both classes were really nice and have said they'll keep an eye out. One of the students made an announcement in both classes. I sent an email to all of my co-workers. I checked at the front desk. I've done pretty much all I can do, save for calling the Lost and Found of the entire 30,000-person university. I will do that this afternoon, and again on Monday.

I haven't eaten lunch yet. I'm still too shaky and upset. I just want my damn glasses back, and I want to understand why I am so hopelessly absentminded.

So here's the thing I'm wondering: If someone found the glasses and thought "Oh, I should turn these in to lost and found," why wouldn't they grab the barrette too?

I'll admit I'm kind of assuming the worst. I am assuming that someone saw that the frames are Juicy Couture, a designer brand, and decided that they would take them and sell them. That's what I'm assuming. Joke's on them, though, since the goddamn lenses cost more than the frames, because I have TERRIBLE VISION. So maybe that person could just pop the lenses out and GIVE THEM BACK, so that I could replace the frames without too much hassle.

I want to cry. I know they're just a pair of glasses. In the grand scheme of things, they are trivial. And if someone was desperate enough to steal them, maybe that person is destitute and needs the money more than I do. Or maybe that person is just a goddamn asshole.

Ugh.

Hi, my name is Jill, and I'm addicted to Athropologie

2010-07-22T16:00:00.000-07:00

T and I just got back from a short trip to visit our families in Pennsylvania, where I reveled in the velvety warmth of what summer is supposed to feel like. It's still gloomy and cloudy along the coast in San Diego, which makes me miss the humidity back east even more. Soon enough I'll post some photos and details from our trip, but in the meantime, I'm going to talk about addiction. Specifically, shopping addiction.

A couple of months ago, I discovered Anthropologie blogs. The amount of time and money I have spent at Anthropologie stores since then is directly proportional to the amount of times I check these blogs daily. That is to say, substantial.

I've loved Athropologie for years. Even when I was a poverty-stricken college graduate serving an unpaid internship in Philadelphia in 2004, I would roam the sale racks hoping for something within my price range of zero dollars. I still have and wear a couple of shirts and a skirt that I picked up for a little bit more than $0 that summer -- Anthro clothing withstands the years. As I started making more money, working my way up through the ranks of intern to temp to professional, I allowed myself the occasional splurge at Anthro, still usually off the sale racks. When I lived in PA, the closest Anthro was a good hour away, so my trips were few and far between, which, I realize now, was kind of a blessing. Eventually I unsubscribed from the store's beautiful catalogs, because I didn't need the temptation. I very rarely ordered anything online, because the shipping fees were exorbitant.

Then I moved to San Diego. And I discovered three Anthropologie stores within 25 minutes of my house. When I got my job out here, the first thing I did was go to Anthro and drop a pretty penny on clothing (all sale items, I'll have you know). Still, my visits were limited to every other month or so. Until I found the fashion blogs.

See, on these blogs, the lovely bloggers scope out the new arrivals and write reviews, and they also alert their readers any time there's a sale at the store, which, since the middle of May, has been almost weekly. And remember what I said about only buying sale items? Well, that's still mostly true, except now I'm buying a lot more of them, because I know when they're available. And thanks to these bloggers, I know which ones are prettiest and most obsession-worthy.

I've tried to keep myself restrained to sale items that I really, really want and can't stop thinking about. But I've slipped a little; I've bought a couple of things full-price because they were getting low on stock, and I've bought another couple of items that were cute just because they were on sale, not because they were on my wish list. So... I've got a pretty stocked closet right now. And I think it's okay, but I also think I've hit my limit. I think I have managed to acquire most of the items I was drooling over, so now might be a good time to cut myself off. So, it's time for a shopping moratorium. It's time to have fun with what's already in my closet. It's time to save my damn money, already.

I don't think I can quit the blogs, though. I like looking at the pretty clothes! But of course, this might be kind of like staring at a dessert case when you're on a diet, so perhaps I'm a little masochistic?

In closing, I present to you my Anthropologie outfit of the day, which I am totally in love with. Yes, I took this photo in the bathroom at work. Don't judge me.

And in post-closing, I want to direct you to two giveaways happening right now on two of my favorite Anthro blogs. If I post about them here, I get an extra entry for a gift card!

Roxy at Effortless Anthropologie, a blog that's pretty much the mother ship for all things Anthro, is giving away a $250 gift card. Yes, that much!

And Kramey at Kramey Martin is giving away a $25 gift card because she is awesome. Go look at these blogs and see what I mean about pretty things!

These little earthquakes

2010-07-09T10:05:00.000-07:00

T and I both dreamed about earthquakes last night. My dream was that I was rolling, shuddering in my bed. I woke up and thought, casually, "Oh, another earthquake," and I went back to sleep.

Earlier this week, I was in the kitchen and T said from the living room "We're having an earthquake." A moment later our entire house jittered and jolted for about two seconds. The dog barked. T jumped from his chair and I ran to the living room. After the jolting stopped, the house continued to shudder, like there was a fun-house motor under our floorboards. The open front door waved, our welcome bells jingling. When it subsided, T and I looked at each other and shared shaky laughs. "I don't like earthquakes," I said.

We have had maybe a dozen little earthquakes since Easter, when a 7.2 quake struck Mexicali and waved its way up to San Diego, causing the ground to undulate like we were on a suspension bridge. T and I went outside for that one, since it lasted longer than we expected. We sat down on the front stoop as the ground gently moved. We were at sea on dry land.

Most of the other quakes I've felt have been minor. At dinner at a friend's apartment, where we all looked around as the table trembled, commenting that we were tired of earthquakes. At work where I felt like I was having a bout of vertigo, until I realized it was the building that was moving ever so slightly, not me. On the phone with a friend who lives 20 minutes away, with her squealing "Oh my God, did you feel that?" In my bedroom watching the bathroom door sway and realizing that none of the windows were open to cause a breeze.

It's definitely a weird feeling, unsettling, and I'm thankful that we've only experienced brief jolts and little tremors. We are in an area that is mostly up to code in case a big one comes. (Knock on wood.) Our house has been around for 80 years. (Again, knock on wood.)

We think the ground isn't supposed to move, but it's always shifting somewhere. Still, that doesn't make it any less disconcerting when you actually feel it.

I don't like earthquakes.

The 3rd of July

2010-07-03T16:35:00.000-07:00

Who knew that the little town where I live, filled with retirees and military families, was the party hub of California for this holiday weekend? There are dozens of people riding bikes around and shouting, handlebar in one hand and a beer in the other. I like to call these people "douchebags," but you may have a more affectionate term for them.

There's a house party going on in the alleyway behind our place, with a rising rendition of "Another Brick in the Wall" set to techno thumping through the streets. And before that, I believe I heard lyrics with some derivation of "slap my d**k." Neat.

It's not really a bother -- it is a holiday weekend after all, and I'm trying not to be a Scrooge. It's just... I didn't sleep very well last night, and I have a sinus headache. (I seriously have been sick-ish since Memorial Day, but all along it's been that low-grade kind of sick where I've been functioning just fine. I am having a party of my own tomorrow and my sinuses can suck it.) So to indulge myself, I have been wearing mesh gym shorts that I've had since college and a ratty New York City t-shirt that I've had since I was ten. I've made tomato soup and blondies, and I've watched four episodes of Arrested Development and read several chapters of The Help (which is fantastic, btw).

I did actually leave the house this morning to take the dog for a walk, during which we encountered several floats, a couple of antique roadsters, and also some horses. It was... a little surreal.

An old man just walked by wearing salmon-colored trousers and a star-spangled hat. Good for him.

All of this revelry does lead me to wonder if I've been missing out. See, I've never really felt particularly festive regarding the 4th of July. We always went to see fireworks when I was a kid, but that's really all I remember. From what I recall, it's a day like any other until the fireworks at night. And those sparklers -- the kind that are supposed to be safe but actually send little sparks onto to your hands that sting your skin. But apparently the 4th of July is meant to be a weekend of drunken merry-making? I intend to make plenty of merry tomorrow, but for now, I guess I want all the damn party-goers to get off my lawn. That, and for my sinuses to leave me the eff alone already.

Some photos from today:

Oliver has found another box:

Jack has found the warmest spot in the house:

My Saturday finest:

Now if you'll excuse me, I think I'm going to eat my fifth blondie of the day. Happy 3rd!

Self-portrait and the weather

2010-07-01T17:30:00.000-07:00

May and June are so cloud-covered in San Diego that the months have clever monikers: May Gray and June Gloom. After a particularly glum June this year, I was really hoping that the weather would bloom into the soft, dry heat I've come to expect from San Diego summers. Come July 1st, my wishes have been ignored. It's chilly and misty today -- maybe 65 at most, with very little sunshine. It's felt very San Fran lately.

The view from my office building this morning:

It's warmer inland, but I work and live along the coast. (I know, poor me with my access to the Pacific. Life sucks.) But seriously -- the marine layer of fog *does* get old. I want sunshine and heat. I'm looking forward to my trip back East in a couple of weeks just to bask in the glowing warmth of summer. Eventually it will be blazing hot here, with the beachside towns finally getting to embrace their desert roots. But for now, even when I wear a new summer dress in hopes of teasing out the sun, it's still June Gloom.

Safe for vegetarians... probably

2010-06-30T14:13:00.000-07:00

I try to avoid processed crap like this, but sometimes I just neeeeeeed this kind of chocolatey cookie goodness. Today is one of those days.

Plus, this one was good for a giggle:

Phew! What a relief!

What We Eat

2010-06-29T17:12:00.000-07:00

T and I really, really like cereal. And there was a special on Rice Chex at Target -- $2.50 a box! But honestly, we're almost always this stocked up. I eat Rice Chex every day. I loves it.

My People

2010-06-28T09:52:00.000-07:00

I had a fantastic group of friends in college. I love them, and they are still the easiest people in the world to be around. I guess that's just what happens when you spend hours in pajamas and towels together. Regular clothing, too, but really, I think it's the pj's and shower garb that cinched these friendships.

Most of them live in the DC/Baltimore area, and those lucky bastards get to see each other all the time. I struggled a bit with feeling removed and out of the loop when I moved 3000 miles away, but I dealt with it. Now I want to introduce you to the people I spend the most time with out here. And by people, I mean people, and also animals.

I've never been particularly outgoing. Sure, I can talk up a storm -- and really loudly -- when I'm in the right crowd. But I'm not one of those people who makes friends with everyone they meet. It's just kind of hard for me to reach out, and when I do make a connection with someone, I'm a little shy about maintaining that link. It's a lot like dating -- you meet someone, you have fun talking to them, then you really want to see them again, but what if they don't want to see you? What if they were just being polite? What if they already have so many friends that they just don't need any more??*

(*I may still be a little traumatized from being a new student in 9th grade at a tiny school where everyone was practically born from the same womb. Making friends in high school? Torture, y'all.)

When I moved out to SD, I took a job where I had my own office on the floor above most of my other coworkers. It can be pretty lonely, and for someone who is a natural introvert, it's a dangerous arrangement. I think people forgot I existed for a good year or so, and any hopes I had of becoming besties with my coworkers were dashed pretty quickly. Now that I've been there for almost two years, I've learned to emerge from my cave on a regular basis for some social interaction, so I feel less like a troglobite most days. But anyway, the point is that it took me two years to really consider my coworkers friends.

But even though I'm not the extrovert with a billion friends (and neither is my husband), I have discovered that T and I have developed a solid circle of peeps out here. They make me feel smiley.

So here's my cast of characters:

My husband, T. I adore him like whoa.

Jack:

Jack was first owned as a kitten by one of T's high school friends, who then passed him on to another high school friend. Eventually T got custody when High School Friend #2 moved away. Despite his tumultuous upbringing, Jack is the sweetest cat in the world. He's also very talkative.

Oliver:

T and I got Oliver together when we realized that Jack was awesome and that a baby cat would only double the fun. We were living in separate apartments, but I spent most of my time at T's with baby Ollie, who liked to attack my hair when I slept. Just a few months after we got Ollie, T moved to San Diego. I blame T's abandonment for Oliver's current grumbly curmudgeon tendencies.

Rosie:

She is so damn cute. I love her. But it wasn't always so. I'll tell you about it sometime.

Our friends J-Ram & J-Gun:

J-Gun went to college around the corner from my apartment in Pennsylvania, and then he and J-Ram lived in the same apartment complex as T. Despite our East Coast proximity, it wasn't until we all moved out to San Diego coincidentally at the same time that we became frequent collaborators in friendship.

Chris:

He's Greek. He went to Penn State. He and T write about local music together.

J-D and S-K:

J-D is T's old college roommate. J & S are also from Pennsylvania. They moved to SD last year and now we see them all the time. Apparently, T and I are not good at making friends with people who don't have ties to Pennsylvania.

Just kidding! Amanda here is from Ohio:

She's also a prolific food blogger, PhD student, and one of the most hard-working people I know. Sometimes I think I'd like to emulate her work ethic. But then I'm distracted by something shiny and TV-series-on-DVD-like.

I also have to give shout-outs to the lovely ladies in my writing group, with whom I enjoy dinner and lively conversation once a month, and to mi linda amiga Chilena, who is teaching me Spanish.

I still miss my East Coast friends like crazy. Our friendships have shifted, adopted more of a catch-up tone than a share-everything tone, but when I do see them, it's like nothing ever changed. And just for one more photo, look how pretty my East Coast bffs are:

Okay, one more:

To sum up: Even though T and I both yearn for the friends who are 3000 miles away, our group in SD has become a pretty snuggly little West Coast family. Except that we don't snuggle. But maybe we should.

Reboot

2010-06-25T10:00:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking a lot about blogging lately. Namely, blogging *consistently.* After starting a blog in 2004 and trying valiantly to update it on a regular basis, you'd think I would have mastered the craft by now. But no, not so much. I tend to DECIDE TO BLOG!!!! and then... I find too many things to distract me from putting my words to paper. Er, cyberspace.

Lately, though, I've felt the urge to blog. To write. To share and communicate and think and make an attempt to be funny, coherent, and thoughtful. With a little dash of charm, if I can summon it. And also, curse words.

Here's a story: almost a year ago, I decided to start a food blog. I thought that would be my creative outlet, my place for public words. And for the first few months of food-blogging, I really enjoyed it. I reveled in having an excuse to make delicious recipes and try new things. I played around with food photography and made full use of Photoshop. (Tangent -- access to Photoshop does not a good photographer make. You'll notice this if you look at some of my lackluster food photos. Some turned out really well, but a lot of them were... ehm... shitty. If only my brilliant photographer husband would have been willing to spend a little more time with me as I fussed about in the kitchen. But for some reason, he had other things to do that took precedence over tracking my every stir and slice with his camera. Hmph.)

So anyway, after a relentless, all-consuming, mad rush of Christmas-cookie-baking -- most of which I didn't even post on the blog -- I found myself a little burned out on being a "foodie." I started to bake things just so I could "put them on the blog later," which I wouldn't get around to doing. Eventually, the only evidence I really had of my foray into food blogging was a little extra padding around my ass.

My food blog is not defunct. If you'll notice, I've put a pretty little strawberried button in the sidebar to link to my online cooking diary. I still participate in Daring Bakers, and when I'm feeling extra motivated, I still get new recipes & photos posted. But it's just not my focus anymore (if it ever was).

Now I'm trying to figure out what my focus is. I feel like blogs are supposed to have a theme, and it's very difficult for me to find my own niche. This is, I think, because I tend to obsess-obsess-obsess over something for a while, then I get bored with it. My Google Reader is schizophrenic, full of a mishmash of categories that only I can decipher. I've got my food blogs, collected over the period of time where I ogled food photographs and thought about dessert nonstop; photography blogs, which are full of gorgeousness; book blogs, because I am never without books in my life; blogs written by people I know; blogs written by people I feel like I know; ridiculous, hilarious time-wasting websites; Anthropologie blogs; and Weddingbee.

Let me talk about Weddingbee for a minute. I started reading it when I was planning my wedding two years ago, and while I also subscribed to a dozen other wedding inspiration blogs, Weddingbee is the only one I still read. You get to know all these blogging brides while they're planning their weddings, and then they recap their weddings, and while they're doing that, a new generation of blogging brides starts sharing. It's a difficult site to quit, lemme tell you. And all those "bees" who were blogging when I was planning my wedding too? They're all married now, dealing with adult life and the same kind of issues I think about a lot, so now I read their personal blogs. I feel a little bit like a stalker, but I also know I'm not the only WB reader out there. So. There's a whole spiel about Weddingbee and how it feeds my Google Reader a proliferation of new blogs.

Finally I will come to my point. I'm sorry it's taken so long -- I've been brewing this blog entry for a while, so just bear with me, okay? My point is that I want to start blogging again, regularly, here on Jill in San Diego. Whether I have zero readers or 100. And I want to write about whatever the hell is on my mind, which will include but not be limited to the following: books, cookies, idiots, insecurity, contentment, joy, the ocean, the weather, Anthropologie, pets, concerts, theatre, plants, my husband (hereby called Terwilliger), homesickness, writing, yoga, jogging, and learning.

So tell me about yourself. Do you have a schizophrenic Google Reader too? Do you find it hard to focus on one theme or topic? I hope I'm not alone in this.

New hair

2010-05-03T11:03:00.001-07:00

I got a haircut over the weekend. I'm not sure if I like it. I've taken a dozen photos of it this morning, hoping with each click of the shutter that I would like the shape of my hair better. But... it's just so different than any haircut I've ever had.

Here it is:

I asked for layering and some height around my face, which I definitely got. But I'm used to having a much fuller look around my chin, and this structure is just weird to me. I hope it fills in fast.

I don't know. What do you guys think?

One Year

2010-04-18T21:24:00.001-07:00

One year ago today, T and I got married. It doesn't feel like it's possible for a year to have gone by, but here we are. We had a really mellow anniversary day today, and it was perfect: a walk around our town with our dog (who wasn't even a gleam in our eyes last year), al fresco sandwiches, mutual writing time this afternoon, and a fantastic dinner at a local Italian restaurant (where they gave us a free dessert because it was our anniversary -- yay!).

Then I twirled around the living room at home in a new dress. I may have had a lot of really yummy wine at said Italian restaurant.

April 18th: the day of awesome dresses. Also, the day of T and J. I like that.

On Candy and Cravings

2010-03-24T09:19:00.000-07:00

I'd been thinking about Ben & Jerry's Everything But The ice cream all day. Sometimes a girl just has a craving that must be satisfied -- dear God I must have it NOW -- in a timely manner, you know?

"I'm going to stop at the store on the way home -- do you need anything?" I asked my husband before I left work yesterday.

"Nope. See you in a bit."

I just wanted the ice cream. But then I passed the Easter candy. And I always enjoy Easter candy. Cadbury mini eggs, in particular. Also, Reese's peanut butter eggs in miniature. I've bought a package of them every year since they were first introduced, and who am I to shirk tradition?

In the ice cream aisle, they didn't have the flavor I wanted. So I bought another flavor -- Boston Cream Pie. It's a new concoction, and I just read a review of it the other day on Serious Eats. And then, well, then I stopped at the independent market around the corner, where I know they have Everything But The, the flavor that started this whole thing.

I came home, giggling, with a bag full of chocolate and ice cream. I swung the bag around and said "Look, look!" to my husband.

"What did you do?" he asked.

"Look!" I said again.

"I can see what's in there," he said, a smile twitching at the corners of his mouth.

"It's a good thing I'm not pregnant," I said, unloading my chocolate treasures in the kitchen. "Can you imagine the damage I would do?"

"You'd be obese within the first trimester."

New Year, Old Me

2010-01-04T11:07:00.000-08:00

Here’s why I don’t make New Year’s resolutions: because I am who I am. Any resolution I make to “better” myself — be more organized, stop losing my keys, stop biting my nails, stop eating so much chocolate — will inevitably fall by the wayside as I slip back into being who I am. I lose things and I am disorganized — I try to keep it under control. I like biting my nails, and it’s not harming anyone. And I often eat chocolate at 10 a.m. at my desk at work. No biggie; I eat cereal at home first.

I have goals for this year: I want to get accepted to graduate school (but once my application is in, that’s out of my hands). I want to run a 5K race, and then if I can work up to it, a 10K race. I want to start doing yoga. I want to wean myself off my Google reader obsession and start using that wasted internet time to center myself and deal with stress in a more helpful manner. I want to be as ready as I can for a busy spring at work and, here's hoping, a lot of reading and writing at grad school next fall.

These are all achievable goals, I think. And if I don’t achieve them, there’s always next year.

Also, obviously I'm not blogging all that often here anymore. But you can find me writing about recipes over at my cooking blog, Strawberry Spice. If you are craving some cute words and crappy photography from Jill in San Diego, that's where you'll find it.

Happy 2010 to all.

All internet, all the time! Also, shiny!

2009-08-25T15:35:00.001-07:00

I have a new toy.

Even though I'd seen it in the media for months, I had paid it little mind. I bought one for Husband T last Christmas, and still thought nothing of it. I didn't need one. I was perfectly fine to go without.

Now I have one. An iPhone. A glossy, sleek, full-of-applications iPhone, in which I can check my email and surf the internet from the comfort of EVERYWHERE.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to be one of those people who never has any idea of just how powerful her phone can be, but I'm okay with that for now. My last phone? Was five years old and didn't even have the ubiquitous camera in it. So, baby steps here, people. I'm also one of those people who just needs a damn break from the internet every now and then, so to me, iPhone does not equal constant contact. (Apologies. I know you were all totally thinking "Yes! Now I can send Jill an email and she will FINALLY respond in a timely manner, while she is waiting in line at a coffee shop!")

Not so much. But I am still completely enthralled with my new phone, which was acquired quickly, but also with some thought:

While I was visiting my parents in PA for a whirlwind trip last week, my dad mentioned that my old phone was probably due to crap out very soon. I agreed. I have dropped it so many times that I'm amazed it's still kicking. I have no sentimental attachment to this phone, but I also figure that I don't need to replace an electronic item unless its Time Has Come. This is also why I only got myself a new digital camera a month ago, after using the same one for four years.

So while we were home in PA, T signed me up on his cell phone plan, and I was finally removed from my dad's plan. (Thanks for the memories, Dad!) T and I took a short trip to the AT&T store, where I realized that if I was going to go with a phone upgrade, I might as well go with a smartphone, and if I was going to get a smartphone, it might as well be an iBrand. And voila! A blissful 6% sales tax later (hooray for PA!), I had a literally shiny new iPhone. And it is awesome.

Do you have an iPhone? What's your favorite application? What should I absolutely not neglect?

28 Random Things

2009-08-14T15:46:00.000-07:00

It’s my birthday tomorrow, and in honor of my new age, I have compiled a list of 28 things about me. I would like to do a more reflective piece about the things I’m learning about myself as I get older, but one of those things is that I am really terrible at budgeting time, and therefore I don’t have the time to write something reflective right now.

So a list it is!

1. I can’t fall asleep without earplugs.
2. I often have trouble falling asleep anyway, and Benadryl is a good friend of mine.
3. I really, really love olives.
4. I always yield to the dominant personality in the room.
5. I kept my name when I got married. Sometimes I feel like I have to apologize for that.
6. I have had to get stitches twice — both times were on my face.
7. I was bitten in the face by a dog when I was four.
8. I am still afraid of dogs.
9. I am an introvert through and through. I simultaneously admire and shy away from true extroverts.
10. I eat Rice Chex with vanilla soy milk every day for breakfast. I could probably eat it for every meal, I love it so much.
11. I can very rarely read a whole book without skipping ahead to see what's going to happen.
12. Similarly, I like knowing how a movie will end before I watch it.
13. I have a "worry queue," wherein once I finish worrying about one thing, something else immediately takes its place.
14. I kick ass at proofreading and grammar. It's the one thing I know I can do tremendously well, and I'm proud of that skill.
15. I work with professors almost every day. It makes me want to be one.
16. I love live music, but I'm always relieved when the encore is over and I can go home.
17. I am not in any way whatsoever a morning person. If you ask me to do something in the morning, I will secretly resent you.
18. I think hot dogs are horrifying.
19. I love to bake and find it to be a wonderful stress reliever.
20. I can’t read anything more in-depth than a magazine if there is music playing in the background.
21. I daydream constantly.
22. I have really nice parents.
23. I’m kind of rigid about my routines. I’d like to try to be a little more easy-going, but I’m not sure it’s in my nature.
24. I have a huge sweet tooth. If it were physically represented in my body, my mouth would not be big enough to contain the tooth.
25. My husband makes me laugh every day, and that is one of the (many) reasons I married him.
26. I love to buy cute clothes and new shoes, but I always end up wearing the same items (that I've owned for years) over and over.
27. I really want everyone to like me.
28. I'm only now beginning to realize how being the baby of the family affects me as a grown-up. Let's just say I have a very patient husband.

Happy weekend!

Honeymoon honeymoon honeymoon!

2009-07-14T11:18:00.001-07:00

So, T and I have decided to drive up the California coast for our delayed honeymoon. We had talked about Hawaii when we first got back from our wedding in April, but eventually we determined that we'd rather go domestic, have a car, and see more of the state we live in. Maybe next summer we'll have the opportunity to go somewhere off the continent, but currently, I am really freaking excited for our coastal plans.

We're leaving this Thursday, and then taking a little over a week to see the sights. We'll be starting off with a night in Solvang, a little Dutch-inspired town in Santa Barbara wine country. Then we'll do two nights at an organic farm and b&b in Templeton, which is part of the Central Coast wineries (I think). From there we'll hit up Hearst Castle, the famed Big Sur coastline (and I really want to eat here), and then we'll spend a couple of nights in Monterey, then San Fran, and finally Bodega Bay. Anybody have any suggestions for must-sees in any of these places? I am looking forward to doing a lot of eating, drinking, and hiking.

You know what else I am looking forward to? Harry Freakin' Potter! We're seeing it tomorrow with friends, and I am so giddy about it I am like a child on the last day of school, bouncing in my seat. I've been re-reading the sixth book and have happily settled back into that world -- it's like revisiting somewhere I used to live. If you are also highly anticipating HP6 and are looking for something to tide you over for the next 12 hours, I recommend this and this.

Cheers!

Cooking & Socializing = Happy Jill

2009-06-29T12:12:00.000-07:00

I had such a nice weekend. Pretty much my idea of perfection: theatre, baking, reading, good food, good drinks, new friends, old friends, and the beach.

My friend and former roommate Lydia has been in town with her family to visit her sister, and on Friday she and I met up at Balboa Park to see a show at The Old Globe. There was something so incredibly random and yet also completely normal about meeting Lydia in the park, 3000 miles away from our mutual hometown. She visited T and me back in January, so maybe it’s because I’ve already shared some touristy time with her, but she really fits right in out here. Anyway, we caught up over some snack-bar chicken gumbo (surprisingly tasty) and then saw the Globe’s production of Cyrano, which was just breathtaking. At first I was a little distracted by the opulent costumes — there was just so much going on visually — but they blended into the background once the title character appeared. The actor, Patrick Page, was captivating, and the script was so gorgeous, it was just... how do I even describe it? Seeing good theatre is always a treat, but seeing a three-hour play where you don’t even notice the time, and when it’s over, you just want more? It’s magical. I blubbered like a little baby during the curtain call, anticipating the standing o Cyrano would receive when he took his bows, and if I weren’t embarrassed about crying in public, I would have had tears streaming down my cheeks when he finally did take the stage.

On Saturday, T and I had new friends over for dinner, and I spent most of the afternoon preparing for it and delighting in the excuse to use all the goodies we received as wedding gifts. (I heart my food processor and stand mixer.) I baked cookies and a cake, made an artichoke-olive spread, and prepared a salmon dinner with T while we waited for the couple, Micheline and Jack, to arrive. Miche is from Chile and was introduced to me by a family friend, and I’m just delighted to have met her. I have discovered since moving out here that making new friends can be really difficult and slow-going (especially when you’re relatively isolated at work, like I am, or when you only work with one other person, like T does), but I feel like we’re making progress. We’re starting to get a core group we can rely on, and that feels good. Anyway, we enjoyed dinner outside in our yard and worked our way through a pitcher of Micheline’s made-from-scratch pisco sours. I didn’t realize how tipsy I was until the end of the evening, when I decided it would be a good idea to 1) put a bottle of wine in the freezer, and 2) read before bed. Tristan passed out in our bed while I curled up in an armchair, convinced I needed some reading time. Let me tell you, if one can slur one’s words while reading, I definitely did it.

Yesterday was a hot, sun-soaked Sunday. I joined Lydia and her family at the beach for a little while, and then they came over to our house, along with our friends Jeff and Jenn. Tristan fired up our microscopic charcoal grill and we took advantage of our nice little yard yet again, finally getting our turn as the obnoxious, noise-making neighbors. I gotta say, I freaking love using our house as a gathering place. We may have ugly curtains, but we have happy yellow walls, sideshow cats, and a fully-functional midget grill. Yep, that's some good times, I'd say.

Fridays off...

2009-06-26T11:13:00.001-07:00

Hi there. It's been a while. I have a new secret project I'm working, to be unveiled soon. Intriguing, no?

And today -- today is my last working Friday until September! Woo hoo! My place of employment offers a voluntary furlough program where you can reduce your hours but still keep 100% of your vacation accrual and benefits. I'm part-timing it this summer, baby!

On my summer-freedom agenda? A scenic, leisurely drive up the California coast. Yes, that will require more than a long weekend, so I'm taking several days off from work. T and I will hit up Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, Big Sur, and Monterey on our way to San Francisco as a belated honeymoon-type trip. Good times, my friends, good freakin' times.

And yeah, so, I feel like I have to mention Michael Jackson. I really liked his Black or White video from the 90s. Morphing faces, ya'll. Inspired. I remember watching it on this tiny little television we had in the dining room cabinet.

Anyway. I'll leave the tributes up to the gabillion other websites.

Random Thoughts for a Monday

2009-06-08T10:53:00.000-07:00

* I’m wearing a short-sleeved shirt and cropped pants today, and I’m a little cold. May and June are not San Diego’s prettiest months. Cloudy and 70 degrees, max.

* It smells like spring here so much of the year that I’ve nearly forgotten about the delicious, soft, humid warmth of East Coast June.

* I still don’t know what I want to do with my life. My job is easy, but unfulfilling and so out of my range of interest that it’s kind of hilarious. I want to go to graduate school and I’m finally taking steps to make it happen, but what if I finish as clueless as ever?

* Sometimes I wish I had more of an internet presence, but I get so overwhelmed. When I get home, I want to be with a book, not with my computer. It takes me weeks just to get around to uploading photos. What makes me think I can be a prolific blogger?

* I miss my mom and dad, and I’m thinking I might try to fly home for my birthday if I can find a good rate (pipe dream?). We used to do late-summer crab feasts, and I want one.

* Also, if I go home, I can go to Mt. Gretna, a storybook summer town with an unrivaled sundae shop that’s only open from Memorial Day to Labor Day. I want an ice cream sundae with marshmallow crème slathered on top, and I can’t just make that myself, you know.

* I kind of wonder about my obsession with food sometimes. I really love food, and I have a feeling that any time T and I visit home, it will involve a race against time to hit up all our favorite restaurants. Crunchy-chewy bagels from the coffee shop. The Vietnamese restaurant with the best spring rolls I’ve ever had. Our favorite sushi spot that’s in the middle of cornfields and yet still has better sushi than our place out here, in a town next to the beach. The Mexican restaurant with a Peruvian flair and the best taco salad I’ve ever had. Yes, folks. I live in San Diego, and I want to go to Pennsylvania to get Mexican food. What is wrong with me?

* I have so many things I want to do that I’m utterly paralyzed: Make a blog to recap the wedding and to post photos. Start a food blog to document the process of working through five new cookbooks. Email old professors to ask for advice and letters of recommendation. Study vocab for the GREs. (Say “fuck you” to the math section.) Continue writing fiction and meeting with writing group. Where do I start? The answer is not “by working through your Google reader,” but that is always the choice I make.

* I've been on the computer for two hours, and my eyes are already glazing over. My days are full of computer comas.

* I like ice cream. Soon it will be lunch time: yay! There is no ice cream in my office: booo. I have ice cream at home: yay!

New hair!

2009-05-31T11:39:00.000-07:00

If you recall, I was fed up with my excessively long, excessively big hair long before my wedding, but I kept the length because I wanted a good updo. And also because my mom has always cut my hair and in California, 3000 miles away from her, I had no idea which salon to go to for a simple trim. After years of free hair care, I blanched at the idea of spending $50 (plus tip, for god's sake) for someone to run scissors through my hair for all of 15 minutes.

Anyway, I digress. My excessively long hair -- probably the longest it's been... like, ever -- was getting excessively crispy and ratty at the ends, and the layers had lengthened out and left me with an overgrown haystack flopping around on my head. Good hair days were few and far between, and I had taken to either pulling my hair back in a ponytail that inevitably sagged down to the nape of my neck, giving me a depressing, long-faced look, or giving myself a fat side braid that, while more attractive, tickled my neck and generally annoyed me.

So, yeah. It was time for a change. I called Carol, a family friend who lives in San Diego, and asked for her recommendation for a hairdresser. She enthusiastically recommended her regular (and reasonably priced) hairdresser, Ruthy, and God bless her, she even made an appointment for me and offered to come along. I am lazy enough that if Carol hadn't taken the reins, I might still be sitting here thinking "I really should get my hair cut soon."

And yesterday, I took the plunge! I was quite nervous, because I had committed to giving my hair to Locks of Love, for which you need to have at least a 10-inch ponytail, which meant I would be getting a chin-length bob, for sure.

Let me get this out there right away: I freaking love my new hair. I thought I might yearn for my long, hippie hair right away, but having a short 'do feels so fresh! I love love love it! You want to see it? Here are some pictures of the process (click on the photo to see a larger version):

The before photos. Ruthy had brushed out my hair, resulting in what I like to call my "frightened cat look."

Immediately afterward, before any washing and styling.

Styled and set!

A few hours later, after my curls had a chance to settle into their normal state.

Awww, look at those twin Jills! I always wanted a twin sister when I was growing up -- how is it that I'm just now realizing I can fake a fantasy life using Photoshop? Jill and Sister, hanging out with their new matching haircuts.

Ohhhkay. Enough of that.

Anyway, yay! I feel good!

Lemon Tart

2009-05-27T13:34:00.000-07:00

Well, I don't have a picture of my dessert because I forgot my camera, but it was a lemon tart piled with fresh berries and topped off with a generous dollop of silky, sticky meringue. It was effing amazing, as usual.

That is all.

(This post really would have been a lot better with a photograph or two.)

My three favorite food groups: cheese, wine, and sugar

2009-05-26T17:35:00.001-07:00

I think if I were to get an FMRI right now, my brain would be showing happy colors. This is not because anything phenomenal has happened, or because today is a good day. It’s because in an hour, I will be at Extraordinary Desserts with my girlfriends, and we will be eating cheese, drinking wine, and anticipating a spectacular dessert. Tonight will be my fourth visit to this mecca of edible indulgence, and I’m sure I will leave with the conviction that I could eat there every day.

I was afraid I wouldn’t enjoy Extraordinary Desserts today, because T and I went out for a decadent dinner last night. I had creamy lobster bisque and honey-glazed salmon and pre-dinner bread that was more like cake. We came home and had some mixed berry cobbler a la Chef Jill, and then I was uncomfortably stuffed. I thought, “I don’t think I’m going to enjoy Extraordinary Desserts as much as usual tomorrow, because I am currently a beached whale and I do not like that feeling.” I thought, “Maybe I’ll just meet the girls for dessert.” But today, oh, today, I am thrumming with desire... for cheese. And wine. And a luxurious sweet treat. Where else can I get aged pecorino with a truffle spread? Or a dessert that’s so gorgeous to look at it’s almost a shame to eat it? Where each bite is enough to savor for several minutes?

Tomorrow, I will tell you what dessert I got. And you will cry because you were not there.

Presents!

2009-05-24T12:14:00.000-07:00

I love wine. Sometimes I wish I were an oenophile, but as it is, I just really enjoy drinking wine and making note of the ones I like most. I love to browse the wine section of the grocery store and try new brands (usually whatever's on sale, because I'm cheap like that). And now, thanks to my brother, I have 12 new bottles to try.

I gotta say, my family really stepped up with the wedding gifts. My parents sent us a lovely gift that will keep us occupied for a full year, my brother Paul fulfilled what was left on our Amazon registry (which means lots of cookbooks I'd been coveting, which is part of the reason I want to start a food blog), and my brother Tim sent us a case of wine from a winery he likes. An entire case! It covers pretty much the whole of the wine gamut, from Cabernet to Voignier and all the varieties in between. Plus there are two dessert wines, a pomegranate and a blackberry. It is fantastic. I just like to look at all the bottles. All mine! Mine and T's, of course.

And while I'm on the subject, I have to add that all the wedding gifts we've received have been pretty awesome, from both families and all friends. I know that you're not supposed to expect gifts, and it's pretty true that having everybody with us on April 18 was a gift in itself, but let's be honest here: presents rock. Especially when they look like this:

Compulsive neighbor

2009-05-22T09:48:00.000-07:00

I think my next door neighbor has an addiction. Does anyone know if there's a support group for people who always, every minute of the day, every single effing day have to be working on a construction project?

I'm home from work today because I'm sick. I have a headache and a cough and it's not fun. I was looking forward to stretching out on my bed, reading a good book, taking a break and maybe watching some fluffy television. But now I have to do it all to the soundtrack of Construction Neighbor. Let's call him Dirt.

When we moved in last year, Dirt was building a house in his backyard. Yes, a house. A crappy crappy house that is an eyesore, but now someone lives in it and seems to think it's lovely. But whatever. That project took forever, and T and I were miserable on 4th of July weekend because of the noise Dirt was producing. (We don't have a/c either, so windows open!) Now that his second house is done, he's trying to sell his first house, in which he already refinished the floors, kitchen, bath, bedrooms, lug nuts, mouse holes... Today apparently he has decided to strip out the moulding and... and then god knows what he'll do instead. Something noisy, I'm sure.

I have a headache. I hate you, Dirt.

I want:

2009-05-20T17:01:00.000-07:00

To go to graduate school
To figure out what I want to go to graduate school for
To make running a regular routine
To eat only baked goods
To manage my time better
To update photos on Facebook much quicker than I do
To drink beer/wine with friends on a regular basis
To write more
To be content every once in a while
To have unlimited vacation time
To drive up the coast
To be more productive
To blog more often
To make my blog prettier
To start a cooking blog
To start cooking
To have more energy to write/run/blog/cook
To be more technologically savvy
To care just a little more about it all

Married!

2009-05-05T14:00:00.001-07:00

A little over two weeks ago, T and I got hitched. It was awesome.

All of my planning and preparation and fretting and blog-reading didn’t prepare me for how excited I was going to be. I was just so freaking happy and excited all day long — nothing could have bummed me out. Not even when a gust of wind blew over a vase of altar flowers just as I was about to begin my vows during our outside wedding. Not even when I noticed the lame table numbers supplied by the venue (they looked like deli-counter order numbers). And honestly... those are the only two details I can look at and think “that wasn’t what I expected.”

Sure, I have a bunch of I-wish-I’d-remembered, I-wish-I-had, and I-wish-I-hadn’ts, but I’m trying very hard to hold on to the good feelings of love and excitement and happiness that I felt all day long.

First, marrying Tristan. I read a blog entry the other day where the author talks about bringing her boyfriend on a family visit and how he just fit in, like a corner puzzle piece, like “Oh, there you are.” I love that description, because I think it sums up how I’ve felt about Tristan since we first started dating. “Oh!” I’ve thought. “It’s you!” And a couple of Saturdays ago, I got to marry him. I got to grin like an idiot at him in front of everyone we love, grip his hands, and make a tremendously meaningful promise. We were in it together then, and we are in it together now.

I have so much more to say about the wedding — how ridiculously fast it went by, how heartwarming it was to see so many people I love in one place, smiling at T and me, and how heartsick I am at how little time I got to spend with them. How fantastic our hotel room was, how much I enjoyed eating my wedding dinner leftovers at 11:30 p.m. the next night, how lovely it was to walk our old streets with the air heavy with warm rain.

Also -- how bummed I am now to be back at work, how T and I both had brief “What are we doing with our lives now?” existential crises when we came home, how I really wish I had the anniversary cake to eat, but instead it’s wrapped in plastic in the freezer at my parents’ house in Pennsylvania.

There are all those things to address, plus more enduring stories, like when my 3-year-old nephew pulled the fire alarm at our rehearsal lunch. Those will come when the professional photos do and when I embark on a more comprehensive online journal of Jill & Tristan’s wedding.

Until then, it’s back to work and reality. Oh, and honeymoon planning!

In my head, I'm stranded on Craphole Island

2009-03-23T20:10:00.000-07:00

T and I are obsessed with Lost right now. Long have I wanted to watch it, and long has T resisted the siren lure of such a serial drama. When we would pass the Lost DVDs in the library, I would point eagerly at them and T would move me right along, saying, "I really don't want to get into it, because I know we won't be able to stop."

He was totally right. And he can't even gloat about it, because in our obsession we can't really understand why we didn't do this sooner. We're about halfway through Season 2, and this is after I resisted valiantly when we finished Season 1. "No more Lost until the wedding is over!" I declared.

Two days later, I sheepishly came home with disc 1 of Season 2 from the library. In fact, I'm embarrassed to admit that I pretty much thought about it all day long. In my defense, I was feeling under-the-weather that day and wanted nothing more than to lie on the couch with a DVD. So why shouldn't it be a DVD of something I'm already invested in?

Now I'm dreaming about Lost. Like, actually dreaming about the characters, where I wake up in the middle of the night and wonder if I've slept or if I've just been viewing hours and hours of television. Coming home from work stimulates a whole new pleasure center in my brain, because it's almost Lost-watching time. Our television is no longer a television -- it's a Lost-watching unit. We don't even have a house anymore; we have a dwelling in which we watch Lost.

As a duo, we are unstoppable. While one of us might have the willpower to hit "stop" on the DVD player, it's not enough willpower to say no to the other one of us who is wearing the desperate puppy-dog "more please" expression.

It's pretty hard to avoid spoilers, I'll admit. Especially with my habit of reading the TWOP recaps after we watch an episode. But I think we're both still in the dark about most of the big reveals, and we have been warned by friends that Season 3 is kind of a snoozefest. So we can fast-forward through those episodes, make our way through Season 4, and then I'm pretty sure we'll be all caught up by the end of the summer, just in time for the show's final year. That means that we probably won't have taken a honeymoon or unpacked from the wedding trip to PA or possibly fed our cats, but it's a sacrifice I'm willing to make.

One month

2009-03-18T15:46:00.000-07:00

In one month, T & I will get hitched. One little month! Now that we're down to the wire I'm feeling more and more resentful that I have so much to do at work. It just doesn't seem fair that I'm in such a busy period at my day job -- I would like more time to reflect and think and relish the fact that T and I are about to make an incredibly meaningful commitment to each other. And yep, there are still dozens of little wedding details we need to finalize before the big day, and that also distracts me from the pondering and journaling I like to do.

I regret that I have not journaled more throughout this process. I journaled a lot over the big things, but I've really fallen away from my tendency to write for an hour, just getting all my thoughts out. I've always liked to muse, and I'm sad that I haven't allowed myself more time for that. No, instead of writing out my own thoughts, I've flipped aimlessly through bridal magazines, read my Google reader for literally hours at a time, watched a lot of TV on DVD, and just generally wasted a lot of time on unimportant things.

I had a total Emily Webb moment last week when I was driving home from work. I was thinking about how many times over the last several months I've driven home, thought of something wedding-related, and gotten all teary and emotional about it. This time, I got all teary and emotional about how fast this time has gone, how it seemed like we would always be engaged, always have time to anticipate. Now the anticipation is coming to a head, and before we know it we'll be in PA with our families and friends and then we'll be at our hotel (eating leftovers at midnight, I hope), married. That will be the start of something greater.

"It all goes so fast! We don't have time to look at one another!"

Now that's it's getting closer, it's hard not to think about the fact that after the wedding is over, we have to come back and return to work right the hell away. It's just not fair that we're both in the busiest seasons EVER right after we get married. Going back to the grind just doesn't seem right. At least we have our yet-to-be-scheduled honeymoon to look forward to this summer.

Oh my God. I just realized that my post-wedding crash is starting already. Abort! Abort! Okay, thinking of happy things... Vows, friends, soft light, dancing, lace, love.

Anyway. I'm hoping to take a couple of days off work over the next two weeks to finalize wedding things and to give myself a solid few hours at a coffee shop or the beach to just write. I can't let this all slip by without giving Journaling Jill a chance to document it all. To savor the pre-marriage present while I'm in it. The way I lingered over my favorite spots in college, pen and paper in hand, right before I graduated. Monumental events deserve lingering.

I just always wish I had more time.

Hair Woes

2009-03-12T15:29:00.001-07:00

I desperately need a haircut. My hair is the longest it has been since college, and the ends are as crispy and split as they come. (And this is coming from a girl who never blow-dries her hair. This is not heat-induced damage.) I’m planning to wear it up for the wedding, so I’m not too worried about the fact that right now it’s pretty unruly. I haven’t had a cut since Thanksgiving, when my parents were visiting and my mom could do the trim.

Behold:

Don't let that smile fool you; I'm not happy about my current resemblance to Cousin It.

See, all my life, my mom has cut my hair. I have been to a salon for a trim exactly once, and that was last September. I paid $50 for something that was very blah, and in fact the layers weren’t thin enough so I had a random chunk on the side of my head that wasn’t lying right. My curly hair is very forgiving, though, so after a couple of days the weird part was camouflaged by the rest of my scattered curls.

But oh my God I need a haircut now. I’m daydreaming about the short, sassy style I will sport post-wedding. I’m definitely planning on quite the chop. But. This style I am daydreaming about is apparently imaginary. I cannot find a good picture of a short curly haircut. I know it’s possible, because my mom cut my hair nearly chin-length after I graduated from college. It definitely looked cute. (Though I will never forget the first post-graduation party I went to with my college chums and not a one of them commented on the fact that ALL MY HAIR WAS GONE. Sheesh, people. Of course, my best girlfriends were not there. If they had been, I’m sure they would have squealed appropriately.)

So come on, internets! I expect more of a treasure-trove of curly hair ideas and hairstyle images. And while I’m at it: it’s not a style for girls with curly hair if it’s just a celebrity whose normally straight hair has been curled. That does me NO GOOD. I don’t need a freaking curling iron or hot rollers, okay? I just need some ideas for naturally curly hair!

Okay, I just did another google search, this time adding “naturally” in front of curly. That’s proving to be more fruitful. But I still stand by my irritation at googling “curly hairstyles” and finding nothing but straight-haired celebrities.

Invitations: Addendum

2009-03-06T09:46:00.000-08:00

I just read on a calligrapher's blog that "it is not appropriate to address envelopes as 'Mr. and Mrs. John and Jane Adams.'" Oh noes! I totally did that for a number of the invitations. (As I mentioned, I was pretty inconsistent with my addressing format.) Oh, the horror! You know, for someone who is a true stickler for the rules of grammar, I sure don't give a shit about envelope etiquette. I'm thinking as long as it's not addressed to "Hey you" or "The man of the house and his wifey," it's probably not going to raise any eyebrows.

Shiny!

2009-03-05T09:51:00.000-08:00

We ordered our wedding rings yesterday. T's boss recommended an independent jeweler he knows in downtown San Diego, and at first I was a little reluctant. (Largely because I am all about internet shopping and thought we could just order our rings wham-bang-zoom from Blue Nile.) But I was also reluctant because the jeweler is only there by appointment on weekdays, and I thought it was silly for me to take time off of work to go to a jewelry store when we could always go somewhere mainstream on the weekend.

But I'm so glad we went with this guy! We met with him early yesterday morning, and he resized and cleaned my engagement ring, and while we waited for that, we picked our simple, white-gold bands (mine will have milgrain on either side, like this) and chatted with the jeweler about his childhood in our current adopted hometown. He told us about silly games and he and friends played on the beach and how pretty much all the kids ran wild back in the 50s. Now they have video games.

But anyway. We oped to get one little word engraved in our bands, and we'll pick them up sometime in the next week or two. I'm so excited! Even T was excited! Picking out wedding rings, wow. And I've gotta say, I am still completely entranced by how shiny my engagement ring is now that it's had a good cleaning. The jeweler also added little bumps on the inside to make it fit more snugly. It kind of works, but my fingers are freakishly slender at the base, so I'm still getting some twirling. Any smaller and the ring wouldn't fit over my attractive bulbous knuckles.

Six more weeks until T starts wearing jewelry for the first time in his life!

Weddings + Decisions = Jill Short-Circuiting

2009-03-03T17:50:00.000-08:00

Something I should share with you that you probably already know if you’ve ever talked to me for more than five minutes: I am indecisive. Like, cripplingly indecisive sometimes. I’m that person in Target who stares at the shelves of hand soap for ten minutes, wondering whether I want the brand X milk & honey scent for less than $2, or the more expensive and exotic green tea and basil, but I have a coupon for Sofsoap so maybe I should go with that. I smell several different soaps. Sometimes I’ll leave and come back, just so nobody actually sees me standing in front of the soap shelves for 10 minutes straight.

Fortunately, once I pick a soap, I don’t regret it, because, you know, it’s hand soap. There is no bad choice, unless it smells like poop or gives my hands a rash (and I have experienced neither). But with bigger decisions? I’ll take the Buyer’s Remorse, please! Because that’s what I’m going to end up with anyway.

As you can imagine, wedding planning has been rather difficult for me. I’ve had a nebulous grand vision for the colors and atmosphere I want, and that’s pretty much it. The rest of the decisions have been arduous, because I care too much about nonsense and I overthink everything. (Except for invitations, save-the-dates, and wedding favors. Those were all easy, thank Christ. Oh! And the cake. I can definitely pick dessert flavors, especially when I get three options thanks to the logic of layers.)

And those fifteen wedding blogs I mentioned in my post yesterday? Not a good idea for someone without strong opinions. These blogs are supposed to serve as inspiration, but they can definitely twist themselves into overload. And weddingbee.com, where dozens of brides blog about their planning processes, serves as negative reinforcement for indecisive people. Sure, there are lots of lovely ideas, but too many ideas can be paralyzing. And when you’ve got a bunch of brides all talking about their indecision and buyer’s remorse, well, it makes you feel like maybe it’s not so bad that you’re changing your mind about your shoes/flowers/first dance song/undergarments/program font. For the tenth time.

But you know what? As I am writing this, I’m realizing that most of my decisions are made, and I don’t even have time to dither anymore anyway. The biggest headache was my wedding dress (to be discussed in another post) and all of the fussing and second-guessing that came with that. Then there was the color-combo decision-making, which had me starting with my original idea (sage green, pale peach, and ivory), using crayons to sketch out other color combos, flirting very seriously with pale green and pale yellow, and finally returning to the colors I liked all along. I also spent a lot of time thinking about the bridesmaid dresses. I have probably spent more time searching the internet for dresses (both bridesmaid and bride) than I have actually wearing dresses.

So yes, planning a wedding has not brought out my most efficient side. But guys, I’m almost done! And I’m going to continue reading my wedding blogs for the next several weeks, because it's a part of appreciating my dwindling time as a fiancee. I’ll break up with the blogs at the end of April. I will say “Wedding blogs, we’ve had a good run, but as I am no longer a bride, it’s time for me to move on.” And then I will hope to never plan a party for 150 people again.

What I will obsess about post-wedding?

2009-03-02T14:13:00.000-08:00

Six weeks from today, T and I will be going to get our marriage license. And then, six weeks and five days from today, we will be getting married. In honor of the six week mark, I’m going to do six posts on wedding stuff. I’m itching to write about it, and since I rarely give myself the time to sit down and write in my wedding journal, I figure a typing session is acceptable. Plus, I read about 15 wedding blogs (yes, it is excessive) and I’m feeling inspired by those. So without further ado...

The Invitations

If someone had told me that addressing the wedding invitations was going to be the most annoying part of this whole process, I would have chuckled and said, all Pollyanna-optimistic, “But I like to make my handwriting pretty! I like writing addresses! And ooh! I can buy a nice, felt-tip pen!”

But as usual, it came down to the wire and yesterday was really the only time I had to do all the addressing so that we can get the invites out this week. I used a nice black pen of T’s, though I had a twinge of wishing it was brown ink to match the return address on the envelope flap. The twinge was overridden by my desire not to procrastinate any longer, and also my desire to stay home instead of driving somewhere to find a craft or art store. I spent a bunch of time researching wording on the internet, only to be incredibly inconsistent when I got down to it. (Mr. and Mrs. Dad’s Name for my parents, Mr. and Mrs. Dad’s Name and Mom’s Name for T’s parents, no formal titles for our younger guests, etc.) Sometimes my handwriting was excellent and neat and straight. Other times it was more scrawly and a little slanted. I ran out of our perfect sage green stamps. I wasted a couple of envelopes due to mistakes. And by the end, my knuckles really hurt.

When I looked back through all of the addressed envelopes, I felt relieved that it was done, annoyed that my handwriting wasn’t consistent and perfect as a calligrapher’s, and ultimately indifferent to the lack of perfection. If anyone is offended that their name isn’t perfectly straight on the envelope, well, honestly I can’t imagine that person exists. There’s all this pressure from the Wedding Etiquette Committee (found in droves on the internet) to make sure the outside of your wedding invitation sets the tone for your wedding and oh my goodness it should be flawless and don’t forget to be formal if you’re having a formal wedding and don’t forget to be informal if you’re not having a formal wedding and oh by the way, addendum in fine print: it doesn’t really matter that much so don’t let it stress you out. Thanks, internets!

How many of you remember the way a wedding invitation you’ve received in the past was addressed? I don’t, unless I’ve kept the envelope, which I usually haven’t, because I figure the important stuff is inside the envelope. If someone receives our invitations and figures that because it was addressed to First Name Last Name and not to Mr. First Name Last Name, they should show up in a Hawaiian shirt and denim cut-offs because clearly it’s a casual wedding, well, again, does that person even exist?

All this etiquette stuff reminds me of when I was first fretting about possible menu selections a year ago. I wrote to my friend and bridesmaid Jessie and asked something along the lines of this: “I want it to be an elegant wedding, but I don’t want to be so formal that we’re not being true to ourselves. How can fancy food be reconciled with our desire to be goofy and non-pretentious, like we generally are in real life?” Jessie wisely told me that I was over-thinking things, and that nobody was going to go home saying “Well, after those sirloin tips, I just don’t feel like I know Jill at all anymore!” In retrospect, my fretting was kind of hilarious (“oh my god we’re not FANCY!”), and Jessie’s down-to-earth response still makes me giggle.

So. The invitations are done. They have been tissue-papered, arranged, and stuffed. There is one more insert we have to add, and then tonight we’ll seal them up with sponges, not with tongues, because goodness knows we don’t want to die from envelope glue poisoning.

And on a Pollyanna note, I’m very happy with the invitations themselves. They are cream and pale green with raised flowers, and they are made from 30% post-consumer recycled materials. They were also one decision I didn't dither over. I saw them, liked them, liked the price, and that was that. And tomorrow, they will be dispersed throughout the United States.

Filibuster? I hardly know her!

2009-02-17T17:07:00.000-08:00

I attended an event today where the featured speaker discussed Japanese legislation, comparing it to the U.S. and the U.K. Here’s what I took out of it:

The United States has a president. The U.K. has a prime minister. Japan something something.

I am not an idiot. I’m really not. But I do have a mental block against all things legislative. I did badly in AP Government when I was a sophomore in high school. I remember falling further and further behind while my classmates soared ahead. Bewildered at not being a top-notch, a-one, super-student at a subject, I made flash cards and tried really freaking hard to remember what I was learning. But when it came time for testing, oh man, I sucked.

It didn’t help that the teacher was kind of a prick — he had his favorites (girls), especially if they flirted with him. (I wouldn’t have known how to flirt if an instruction manual had been uploaded into my brain, Matrix-style.) The teacher did karate. Apparently people thought that was awesome. I thought he was kind of smarmy and gross. But who knows, maybe I would have thought he was dreamy and charming if I had gotten a goddamn A in the class like the other kids of my intelligence caliber. Of course, seeing that I was BORED TO DEATH by the subject matter, I wouldn’t have deserved that A anyway.

This teacher was also the adviser of the Mock Trial club, of which I was a member. I won some dopey-ass award certificate for being the “Best Witness” at one of our, erm, mock trials. I was the only witness, but still. I rocked that bereaved mother role. And I only bring that up to point out that even when I endeavored to understand law and lawerly-ness in an extracurricular setting, I had more fun acting than I did learning anything about the U.S. judicial system, which...zzzzzz... God, I’m boring myself just writing this post.

Anyway. That was a fun (except it was not fun) little trip down memory lane. I have friends who are lawyers or studying to become lawyers, and they have my abiding respect. But I will never listen if they try to tell me about the nuts and bolts of law, legislation, and government. Tell me about kooky clients, fascinating cases, people you’ve met along the way — then I’ll eat it up. Tell me about interaction and the human side. Tell me stories.

I like stories.

Forgive me. It’s been a long, tedious day.

Cracker Snack

2009-02-12T16:21:00.001-08:00

I am pretty sure I've eaten half a box of Wheat Thins between yesterday and today. I brought them into work because I like to snack at my desk, but I wasn't prepared for the hand-to-mouth crackerfest I was about to embark upon. I'm taking them back home, where they will probably go stale.

That's my anecdote for the day.

This Week is Better

2009-02-05T12:11:00.000-08:00

The other night, we left the keys in the door. On the outside.

I think our screen door was latched. But still. Oops.

I am feeling less stressed this week. Most of the time. Project: Get Organized is off to a start, and that matters. Thank you for your commiserating and comments.

Help

2009-01-27T21:29:00.000-08:00

I am so, so stressed out. It's because of many things:

1. I am nonstop busy at work. There is always, always something to do, so even if I decide to take a few minutes of downtime, I am probably falling behind. As someone whose last three jobs allowed me ~~excessive~~ reasonable time to surf the internet, write emails, and g-chat with friends, I am ~~pretty much always~~ occasionally overwhelmed by this influx of busy-ness.

2. I am disorganized, both at work and at home. It's obvious that this contributes to my stress, but I don't know *how* to get organized. If I did, I would be. And I can't even begin to envision an organized desk and notebooks for every different project at work, because guess what? There's no extra time!

3. I am taking a writing class. It was supposed to be fun. I took the first section of the class during the fall quarter, and I loved it. I started writing again. My classmates and teacher said nice things. I remembered how much a part of me writing is. I remembered that I am good at it. (Although maybe you can't tell by this blog entry. I am very tired.) But this quarter, I haven't had any solid chunks of time to write, and the reading I have to do for class is just another goddamn thing on my to-do list. I am sad to feel that way about my class, but I wish I could take it off my plate. No refunds, though.

4. I am participating in a peer writing group with three girls from my class. I'm looking forward to our get-togethers, but our first one is on Thursday and I am having the week from hell at work, which is a continuation of last week's week from hell at work, which is a continuation of... you get it. Once again, it's something else I'm trying to cram into the cracks of time I have when I am not at work, which is where I feel like I always am these days.

5. I get heart palpitations when I'm stressed. This freaks me out, which is turn causes more stress. It's neat.

6. I am getting married in less than three months. Which is good! But. There are many details to take care of. There are many things I allow myself to worry about. I forget about things, and then remember them and realize they must be done NOW and then I groan as I add something else to my to-do list. I want to enjoy this time planning a wedding, because there are parts of it that are so much fun. And I want to enjoy these last few weeks of being engaged. I love my boy, and engagement has been good to us. But if I had known that I would be insanely busy at work for the three months leading up to our wedding date, maybe I would have taken another job or asked T if we could push the wedding until the summer.

7. My wedding dress came in, and it was not as I had envisioned. I have to go in and speak with the manager and the dress customizer to get what I want. The manager I have spoken with on the phone is only there 11 - 3 on weekdays. Guess what? I'm at work.

8. I feel guilty 95% of the time for a) feeling stressed (my life's not so bad, you know?) and b) not being available 24/7 to whoever and c) turning down a social invitation when I really just need a night in.

So. Deconstructing time: I am pretty sure that I'm stressed out by my job because deep down, I know I'm not cut out for the line of work that I'm in. I am an introvert. I like books and silence and the smell of libraries. I like reading other people's writing and correcting typos. I like interviewing interesting people (I may be an introvert, but I still like to connect with people) and then writing about it (because I get to be alone again while I rally my thoughts into something cohesive).

But at my job, I'm in marketing and communications and I have to be very organized if I want to stay on top of everything (and organizing myself is HARD. I've tried it, you guys. I stick with it for about two weeks until I suddenly realize that I have a notebook page full of information from ALL SORTS of different categories, because that's what happens in meetings when people are brainstorming), and I have to be ON for events and fellows. I have to be Type A, and I'm pretty sure I'm more Type B trapped in an A's life.

It takes a lot out of me, and I am afraid that I'm going to be so drained by the time April comes around that I'm going to be all "Wedding? The what? Oh, okay. I do. Can we go to sleep now, because I have a big week at work when we get back."

So, help me out. My job is a fact of life, so for now it's not going to do me much good to wish I could just go be introverted somewhere. Help me destress.

What do you recommend for stress management?

Coming up for air

2009-01-09T14:41:00.000-08:00

Hello 2009. So far in your presence, I have been working on my ass off. I had a couple of blissful days of staying in my pajamas until 2 p.m. EST, but then it was back to SD and the kitties (yay! and oh my, Oliver is fatter than ever) and back to the Monday-Friday grind (booo). I went straight to work helping to train a new employee, planning and marketing events for our current visiting dignitary, attending working lunches, and trying to make sense of the mess of my desk while also attempting to organize about 12 different projects in a logical way. (I have so not figured that out yet.)

I am a tired Jill. I like being busy at work, I think, but also... I'm pretty sure I'm getting more and more scattered, which is not a good thing. (I wonder if my new co-worker thinks I have the attention span of a gnat. Also not a good thing.) I used to get so frustrated in my first days in the "real world" when whoever was training me went off on some tangent and then muttered to themselves as they redirected their thoughts. But now. Oh god. That is me.

Potential resolution: organize self? Procrastinating and not filing make work more difficult, both in the 9-5 and also in life. I have checks to deposit. I think I have a bill to pay. I have questions I'm supposed to ask wedding vendors. There are too many things to remember, people! My to-do list is as long as Rapunzel's freakin' hair.

Mmm... fairy-tales... La la la...

~Shakes head~

But yes. I'm making a long non-work to-do list tomorrow (and it will include going for a bike ride to the beach, because a girl needs a break sometimes). Then I have to make a list for the class I'm taking. And starting in a couple of hours, I'm ignoring my to-do list for work until I get back to the office on Monday.

I keep learning, though, that I can't go and go and go without some time to just shut off for a bit (as evidenced by my supreme desire to while away the evenings with T over dinner and a couple episodes of House). I need breaks. Time to myself. Time to journal. But even that time is hard to find.

Busy. Disorganized. That is me in this first week of 2009. Good times.

Tomorrow: bills, thank-you notes, bike-ride, dinner with the good friends T & I haven't seen for a month. Then Sunday. Then it starts again.

Year in review, but not really

2008-12-31T09:14:00.000-08:00

Well, as is usually my problem, I don't really have the time for an in-depth year-in-review blog entry. Not that you'd all be jumping in your seats to read something "in-depth." But it's the last day of 2008, which compels me to reflect a little, just like everybody else. It doesn't feel like some monumentous turnover, though -- it might just be because I'm still on the East coast and have done nothing but go-go-go and socialize since arriving late on Christmas Eve and I'm confused about which day it is. In many ways, it's been a wonderful visit so far. I've hugged so many people and smiled a lot, and I was even treated to a surprise bridal shower, which was emotional and fun and over way too quickly. But I am kind of exhausted, and I miss my kitties. Tristan and I have a quiet little life in California, and we're realizing now just how much we value that time together. Also, adjusting to the three-hour time change? Really hard. I try to go to bed at a reasonable time, and I just lie there awake. It makes me a little nervous for adjusting to the time difference when we come back for our wedding in April.

Anyway, where was I? Reflection, right. So, the biggie: I moved across the country in 2008. After several cold, miserable winter months where I honestly wasn't sure how much longer I could stand the separation from Tristan, I officially moved to San Diego in the spring. It was a blissful, warm, color-drenched reunion. Everything was blooming in our neighborhood. I came back East for a couple of beautiful weddings, then drove across the country with my mom, then got a job, then started to settle in, and I still find it hard to believe it's already December 30.

2009 is the year I will get married. In less than four months, Tristan and I will be back on the East coast for our wedding. I'm really excited to have all of our friends and loved ones in the same place, and all of the little wedding details are starting to fall into place. But what I'm really excited about is marrying T. That's what I think the most about when I envision our wedding day -- that brief moment when we stand in front of everyone and take our vows. That's gonna be pretty cool.

Happy New Year, all.

Happy happy

2008-12-23T10:35:00.000-08:00

Aw, man, I was doing so well! I might have to cheat and back-date a few entries just to fill in those days that I missed. I was really enjoying being all disciplined and posting every day, and the days that I actually strung a lot of words together were good writing exercises for me. What I should have done was set Dec. 19 as cut-off for the post-every-day marathon. In fact, let's just pretend that's the case, shall we? Hurrah! I made my goal!

I got really busy at work last week, and now I'm in a flurry of last-minute shopping and preparing for our day of travel tomorrow. It's back to the frigid east for T and me, to friends and pie and family and seeing our breath. I'm going to take a break from blogging until we get back on January 3rd, so I will see you then, or perhaps sooner if I'm inspired or whatever.

Posting resolution for the new year: three times a week. Let's see just how disciplined I can be. Happy holidays, guys!

Someone else's story

2008-12-19T20:48:00.000-08:00

The waiting room was packed and it was after 4 p.m., the time of my appointment. I signed in late at 4:15, right after a young-ish couple who seemed to be having a great time. I noticed that their appointment time was 4:15 — after mine. But we signed in at the same time, so would the doctor see us in order of appointment or arrival? I was guessing the latter, considering the existence of the sign-in sheet in the first place.

I sat. For a while. Paged through a Ladies Home Journal, which was uninteresting. One by one the people around me were called in by the nurse, and the realization that I was probably in last place sank in with alternate bouts of extreme irritation and submissive acceptance. The young-ish couple laughed and chatted and pointed at pictures in a magazine. It was just the three of us left in the waiting room, still un-admitted at 5:15.

Then it was just me. When I finally went in for my appointment at — 5:30 by then — it took all of 10 minutes. The doctor answered a phone call on his bluetooth in the middle of our consultation. I waited, because what else was I going to do at that point?

I went into the hallway after we were finished, where I saw the couple waiting. The doctor swept through a door and said "Now, what's the number one reason a woman misses her period?" The woman stared blankly at the doctor. "Come on," Doctor Busy said with a grin. "You tell me."

Slowly it dawned on the couple. I smiled and slipped past them, through the door to lobby to take care of my co-pay. I heard the woman sniffling, the guy cooing incredulity, then laughing. "It's all her fault!" said the male half. "My fault," she squealed. "I think you may have had something to do with it."

"Congratulations," I said to the strangers when they came into the lobby. I wanted to tell them that being a witness to their moment made the long wait worth it. But I just smiled again, took my receipt, and left.

It's still December 18th in California

2008-12-18T22:17:00.000-08:00

I don't have time to post anything substantial today, but I am still valiantly fulfilling my post-every-day-until-December-24 mission. I will spare you another cat photo. (But come on, cats are cute! And MY cats are the cutest of all! Especially with their little red tongues sticking out. Right now, the cats are rubbing their faces all over their cat-nip covered Super Scratchers. Oliver's eyes are glazed over, his pupils dilated. Jack is trying to eat his Super Scratcher, which is made of cardboard. Okay. I'll stop with that.)

My friend Jenn and I checked out my wedding dress tonight and then ate our weight in deliciousness at the Cheesecake Factory. We were seated on the porch underneath the powerful outdoor heaters, and let me tell you, we needed them. It's in the 40s tonight! What the hay, San Diego? But I guess it feels more Christmassy this way, even though I can't believe the holiday is only a week away.

Well, that's all. It's sleeping time now for tired people.

Quiz

2008-12-17T21:40:00.000-08:00

Is this a...

a) Santa Cat
b) Slurping Cat
c) Disfigured Cat
d) Other_____

The correct answer is "a." I also would have accepted Grimace Cat or Triangle Cat.

Wrong-Seasonal Photos

2008-12-16T21:04:00.000-08:00

Rambling, Still Cold

2008-12-15T11:40:00.000-08:00

Thank you, adulthood and commute, for making me hate variations in weather. In Pennsylvania, my heart went cold if snow was in the forecast. My neuroses about driving in snow got so noticeable that even my boss, bless her, would say “Jill, it’s starting to snow. You might as well leave now and work from home.” (Cut me some slack, though — I totaled my car five years ago driving in wintry conditions. It’s similar to how I’m still afraid of dogs because I was bitten in the face when I was four. These things stick with you.)

Now it’s rain that makes me sigh in frustration. Usually, I love rain. I desperately miss thunderstorms. I love rainy Saturdays forcing me to stay indoors and watch movies and make baked goods. I love the patter of drops on a window and the sheeting-slooshing sound of a downpour on the streets. But in San Diego, rain is pretty much equivalent to snow when it comes to pain-in-the-ass driving. If it’s raining, I know it will take me at least an hour to get to work, thanks to people either rear-ending each other or driving 35 mph to avoid rear-ending each other.

And okay, driving in wet conditions here is in fact more dangerous than driving in rain on the East coast. Because it’s always so dry, the oils on the roadways aren’t slicked away on a regular basis, which means that a deluge creates serious slipperiness on our highways. But still... It’s RAIN, people. Do we really need to be driving 35 mph?

Today is a bona fide miserable day here in Southern California. Windy, 55 degrees, raining. There are “OMG BE CAREFUL!” advisories all over the radio, threats of flooding, warnings about wind. It is amusing to me that this little storm — which seems like any old run-of-the-mill stormy day in PA or MD — is akin to a hurricane around here. I’m surprised people aren’t stocking up on milk and bread. Maybe they already are in my neighborhood, where the main drag floods so badly that it often gets closed off by the authorities.

My office is unheated and in an open-air building. Today the doors are shut to our open hallways, which I discovered after taking the long way back to my office after going to the kitchen downstairs. I was tired of getting rained on in the open steps that I usually take up to my office, so I went through the hallway beneath mine, skipped up some less-rain-soaked steps, and then got stuck at the locked door. Up through the third-floor hallway I went, getting doused on my way back down the other stairs to my office floor.

That probably doesn’t make any sense to you. But to sum up: Jill goes to work, gets rained on.

I’ve also discovered that when it’s windy, the vent in my office (but why is it there? There’s no heat or a/c) rattles and screeches, metal against metal. It’s awesome.

So yeah, I’m still cold. That’s what happens when it’s 55 degrees everywhere, including inside. I might as well hang out in the frozen foods section of a grocery store on my way home, just to extend the pleasure. And also to pick up some bread and milk, because “Omigod it’s raining in San Diego! Apocalypse!!!!”

Cold!

2008-12-14T20:03:00.000-08:00

Well what do you know, guys? San Diego gets cold. Yeah, yeah, plenty of you already knew, and of course there's snow in the mountains and all that. But we're having a cold snap right now that I think might be a little unusual? It felt like a brisk fall day today, which was actually kind of awesome.

According to weather.com, it's 56 degrees out right now, which I know isn't that cold. If I were in PA right now and it was 56 degrees, I'd be all "Yay! It's so warm today!" But I can really feel that 56 degrees in my house. I'm in a sweater and slippers and the heat is on in the living room, seeping out of the one vent we have in this whole place. (Because it's San Diego, of course! Who needs central heating?) And my nose is cold and runny, and my rings are twirling loosely around my fingers thanks to the cold shrinking my hands. My hands get so cold it's ridiculous. In the middle of summer, I can press a hand on T's back and make him yelp.

In my apartment in Lancaster, my roommate and I kept our heat at 56 during the day if we weren't going to be home. It was always very chilly in our drafty old apartment, but we made do by wearing layers and, in my case, sleeping with about four blankets (which I always tossed off in the middle of the night when I woke up clammy with sweat from smothering myself on purpose). And when I moved out here and asked T what I could expect from winter, he warned me that it would probably be colder in our house than it was in my apartment in the dead of Pennsylvania winter. Oh, whatever, I thought, snickering. No way will it be that cold.

But it is. Our house is not warm and toasty, like many homes during East coast winters. In fact when it's sunny, it's actually warmer outside than in. It's alright, though. I haven't had a winter without cold, shrunken hands and a perpetually runny nose pretty much ever in my life, so it feels good to maintain tradition.

Yay!

2008-12-13T16:29:00.000-08:00

My wedding dress is in! I ordered it back in July and I've been eagerly anticipating its arrival since then. I'm getting it altered quite a bit, so even if I had a photo, I wouldn't be posting it, because the dress currently has sleeves and it won't by the time the seamstress has her way with me. But just to amuse you (or not, whatever), here is what my dress does *not* look like:

Yep, that's see through.

Kissiversary

2008-12-12T16:34:00.000-08:00

Today marks four years since the Mister and I started officially dating. We had hung out a few times already, seeing movies, drinking beer, talking for hours at a time, and we were on a daily instant messaging schedule. We knew we liked each other. We had exchanged compliments. But we hadn't smooched.

Four years ago, I drove over to his parents' house to meet him for a movie non-date. He hurried out the front door, and his mom leaned out behind him and waved at me and called hello. I shyly waved back, and then I noted with amusement that T was wearing track pants. (But I think I had the courtesy to wait until we'd been dating for a few months before I made fun of his pants.)

We drove to a quaint coffeehouse/old-fashioned movie theater in a quaint nearby town to see "Finding Neverland." (Which, in my opinion, was kind of boring. But I still cried at the end.) Before the movie started, we browsed in a small gift shop that was packed with Amish kitsch. I showed Tristan my blazing-red nails, courtesy of a manicure Christmas gift from a friend, and hoped that he didn't notice that my hand was shaking.

Some time into the movie, T took my hand. It was a sudden, almost stealthy movement, and my heart thump-thump-thumped and I grinned. We didn't look at each other. I think we might have acknowledged it after the movie was over and I was crying from the sad ending and we were among the few left in the space.

So that was the beginning. After a good-night kiss, I went home feeling like the happiest kid on the block. I've had six different jobs since then, I got a new car, and I've lived in three different residences. T and I are now literally 3000 miles away from where we started. And after all this time, when it comes to him, I'm still the happiest kid on the block.

In Which Jill Whines About Her Commute

2008-12-11T16:19:00.000-08:00

I hate my commute. There, I said it. In fact, I DREAD it. It is a crappy commute that saps my energy and makes me wonder how long I will find myself doing it. I have a family friend out here who tells me that she did a similar commute -- up the I-5 for 20 miles one way to the highly traversed Silicon Valley of San Diego -- for 10 years, and that long about year seven she started thinking she was going to lose her mind. She had calluses on her palms from gripping the steering wheel so hard, she says.

20 miles? Seems like nothing, doesn't it? That would be the commute from heaven for someone like my friend Kevin, who drives from Baltimore to D.C. with some metro-riding in there every day, resulting in a few solid hours of commuting a day. So yeah, he has it worse. And so do a lot of people, probably. My pissing and moaning about my 45-minute, 20-mile drive to work is totally disproportionate to how bad it actually is.

But it doesn't change the fact that I still hate my commute. 45 minutes to drive 20 miles, people! On a highway the entire time. And, okay, until I moved to San Diego, I had piece-of-cake commutes in small towns with unpopulated highways. Actually, it occurs to me just now that my commute has gotten longer with each new job I've taken. Hunh. I started with a one-block walk from my apartment to the frame shop, then I moved up to a 10-block walk from my apartment in Philly to the theatre where I interned, then to a 4-mile drive from my parents house to gainful employment, then to an 18-mile drive from my apartment to my last job before I moved. And now here I am with 20 miles and about a hundred-thousand-million cars on the road with me.

Sometimes I'm really irritated by the sheer number of people on the roads with me, all seemingly going to same goddamn place. And then I appreciate the irony that I am, in fact, just one more car on the Road of Commuting. And I'm definitely an addition to the traffic -- the person who had my job before me was married to a professor, so I'm sure they carpooled at least on occasion. But because of where I live, public transportation isn't much of an option for me unless I want to add another hour to the time it takes me to get to work. Thanks, buses and trains, for not being helpful to me at all.

The morning isn't so bad; sometimes I luck out and it only takes me 30 minutes. But usually there are the random pockets of slowing, where suddenly the average speed of traffic is somewhere around 25 and there is absolutely no explanation. Sometimes the left lane comes to a complete halt, while all the other cars in all the other lanes whoosh on by, leaving no room for a quick maneuver out of the not-so-fast lane. If I hear on the radio that any of the connecting highways are backed up, I know I'm in for a treat.

The drive home is what sucks out my soul, chews it up, and spits it down the drain. It takes me a good 15 minutes just to get from my parking garage to the highway, because I have to go the roundabout way around the university and through a thousand traffic lights. I learned the hard way that if I try to get on the highway at the closest location -- maybe a mile from my office -- I will sit trapped in gridlock for half an hour before I even reach the 5.

Once I'm on the highway, I fold myself into the traffic, then sit some more. Move at 10 mph, sit, move at 20 mph, slam on the brakes, avoid hitting motorcyclists, repeat. (The motorcyclists are allowed to drive on the dotted line, in between the rows of cars, if traffic is moving less than 25 mph. Of course they do not follow that rule and sometimes they zip past when we're all going 65. Death wish, much?) We finally start to move, and I think I'm home free until I get downtown to the S-curve that winds through the city. Usually that's backed up for another inexplicable reason. Sometimes there is an accident and then by the time I get home, I'm an unrecognizable bitch whose nerves are so frayed they probably resemble Fraggle Rock hair. One time I even screamed and then cried, I was so frustrated.

Maybe I need to chill out a little?

Sometimes I remind myself that it's probably not that bad. I'm fairly certain it's not as bad as the D.C. beltway, and I'm positive it's not as heart-attack-inducing as the Schuylkill in Philly. And I do get a gorgeous glimpse of the lit-up skyline on my way home. Even frazzled, I love that view.

But I still hate my commute.

Do you like to read?

2008-12-10T15:27:00.000-08:00

I do. I could use an extra, say, seven hours in the day just for reading. I would plow through my to-be-read list, and I would wander in the library stacks for hours. But sadly, reading is something I have to cram in between work and eating and paying attention to T, who tends to read more biographies and anthologies and giant books about geography, so he doesn't usually get immersed in a book the way I do. A typical interaction:

T: Observation about something interesting.
J: ....
T: Are you listening?
J: Hm?

Or, if I am especially wrapped up, T can expect to be treated to something like this:

J: Shhhhhh! Grumble grrr... Shhhh!
T: Poor T. No one likes me.

Now, T could grab his John McPhee doorstop and we could read together, but it's still a solitary activity. And while he can read me excerpts about tectonic plates and mountains that have sunk into the ground, I can't very well read him an out-of-context bit of whatever page-turner I'm engrossed in. And besides, I don't want to stop or be interrupted, because can't you see I'm reading, dammit!

Someday, I am going to convince T to read the Harry Potter septilogy (no, it's not a word), and then he will be the one shushing me. I am also dying for him to read The Hunger Games, which was, I think, the most captivating novel I've read this year. I highly recommend it. (Though I was disappointed to see grammatical errors in it. How many eyes see these books before they go to print? Why don't they catch the typos? Or the egregious flaws such as using "I" after a preposition? Should I just surrender and deal with it? At least when "Just between you and I" becomes universally accepted and grammar changes forever and breaks my heart, I'll know that I WAS RIGHT ONCE. I even got into a spitfire argument with a kid in high school who kept telling me that "These cookies are for my friend and I" was correct, because that's what his grandmother taught him. For shame, kid's grandmother. For shame.)

Anyway. The Hunger Games. Suspenseful, thoughtful, awesome. T, you should read it. It's on the little shelf under my nightstand. Go on now.

Now, the prompt for this post was my friend Jess, another voracious reader whose to-be-read piles are twice as big as mine. She ferrets out all the wonderful YA novels and then I read whatever she suggests. Today, she kindly pointed me to a giveaway for a gift certificate to Powell's Books, an independent bookstore based in Portland, Oregon (but with an online store, duh). I think you might have to enter, like, now, because the contest is ending soon, so if you're interested, go over here and post a comment. You have to have a live journal account, so if you don't, just go marvel at the wonder that is Powell's instead. Here's to indie bookstores.

Oh, The Pressure!

2008-12-09T15:41:00.000-08:00

This daily posting thing stresses me out sometimes, especially when I realize that it’s 3:30 in the afternoon and I still have a to-do list so long I could wrap around my office building a couple of times. And what happens when I have a to-do list like that? I do... nothing. This is the curse of crippling indecision. Or perhaps it’s crippling procrastination. Or a combination of both, which is probably the worst of all. So I need to start crossing things off the list, right? Like in the next two hours. Starting now. The first thing I’m crossing off the list is the daily blog entry.

Hey, I never said I was going to do daily meaningful blog entries.

Whoa

2008-12-08T16:30:00.001-08:00

A fighter jet crashed into a neighborhood about 20 minutes from where I work. It's also relatively close to where a friend of mine lives. I don't really know what to say about it other than "Holy shit." My heart goes out to the families of the people who were killed and the homeowners whose houses were destroyed by a complete freak accident.

I've often felt a little more safe living in a military town (for no reason other than the thought that should something dreadful happen, San Diego is equipped with all sorts of military goods, sailors, and SEALs), but it also makes me uneasy sometimes when I see the jets flying low over my own neighborhood. They cruise down low over the beach to their landing strip, and it's hard not to wonder if maybe they're not supposed to be that low. But they are, T always reassures me, and I've gotten accustomed to it.

But... they're definitely not supposed to land on houses. Yikes, just yikes.

Thumbs Down: Burger Lounge

2008-12-07T11:05:00.001-08:00

I'm not much of a burger eater. I tend to avoid red meat altogether, because I just don't really like it. I remember a dinner when I was six or seven, and I surreptitiously slipped some icky bites of beef into my napkin and then into a little purse I had taken to carrying. I must have tired of the purse quickly thereafter, or maybe I realized it was ruined from beef juice or something, because I found the purse a few years later, with petrified chunks of meat still wrapped in the paper napkin inside. I mean, that's pretty gross, right? It's enough to turn a kid off beef, for sure. Shortly thereafter, I gave up pork as well, and I embarked on a long and unstoried period of being a semi-vegetarian. Eventually I got tired of saying "No, I don't eat red meat" or "Was this chicken cooked on the same grill as the beef?" and I started eating the occasional red meat, and the occasional bacon. But no pork chops, please. Blech.

Anyway, all that leads up to this little confession: I love In-N-Out burgers. They are delicious, absolutely delicious. Apparently their beef is premium quality and there are no additives or preservatives blah blah blah, and I guess that's what makes their burgers so very tasty. Their french fries are kind of light and airy as fries go, so you don't feel like you're saturating every pore and cell in your body with grease. You're still eating a burger and fries, so you're not gonna leave the place feeling all healthy and refreshed, but for a junk food run, it's the best.

So I can't say I don't eat hamburgers. I can, however, still shrug and say "meh" when a new, fancy burger joint opens in my neighborhood. Until I start to pass it on my walks in town, and I'm intrigued by its shiny sign, its stainless-steel decorations, its sleek interior. Burger Lounge. A lounge for burger-eating. Hmmm... So Tristan and I checked it out last night. Their beef is organic and grass-fed, so in other words, it's the trendy beef for hipsters. It's still shipped from Kansas, so come on, we're not saving the planet by eating at this place. But it definitely capitalizes on the organic, there's-whole-grain-involved-so-it's-good-for-you movement.

What they don't mention in their advertising, though, is that everything is greasy and seasoned with enough salt to turn Lake Superior to brine. From the butter-soaked buns to the crispy beef to the see-through fries, everything was far less whole-body, whole-food than I was expecting. Even my veggie burger (yes, I went with the veggie burger anyway) was shiny and crisp on the outside from whatever fry-grill-heat method they used to cook it. And oh my God, the sodium. Their cooking directions must read "Mash raw beef in bowl, add one can of Morton, shape into patties, throw on grill." Or "Mix healthy-sounding veggie-burger ingredients in bowl, add one salt-lick, let dissolve, throw patties on grill."

But here's the thing: we had a really pleasant ordering experience, the atmosphere of the place was welcoming, and the burger buns, from what I could taste of the parts that weren't drenched in butter, did actually seem wholesome, yeasty, and fresh. So... why all the grease and salt? It seems to me that if Burger Lounge wants to set itself apart with their hormone-free, grass-fed beef and organic ingredients, they ought to make the experience indulgent without the gluttony. When I leave a restaurant feeling like I kind of want to throw up from eating a veggie burger and a few fries, I'm not likely to go back.

So, In-N-Out it is, unless Burger Lounge puts away their industrial salt machine. And if I find myself there again, once again drawn in by the minimalist decor and Archie-esque charm of a burger, fries, and milkshake, I'm asking for my bun unbuttered, please.

Blurry Banana Tree at Night

2008-12-06T18:32:00.001-08:00

Bananas! In someone's yard! This is down the street from my house. I like walking at night around here, because it's not very dark toward the bay, where all the city light reflects into the sky. But when I turn around and head toward the ocean, it's a silky dark black that I like to pretend is a storm sky. We don't get many of those around here.

But anyway. Bananas! In someone's yard!

Twilight, I would write a poem about thee

2008-12-05T12:29:00.000-08:00

Oh, Twilight, how you seduced me with your sexless pages. You pulled me in with your whisper-touch love scenes that had me running at mach speed into the arms of my boyfriend because I had to just make out already, and then you made my heart pound during your suspenseful last third, which had me telling said boyfriend to leave me alone already so I could finish the book. You started to gain fame and recognition as woman after woman and tween after tween turned to her friends and said “You HAVE to read this. It’s as addictive as crack. READ IT. JOIN THE CULT.”

And then you kind of disappointed me with a few weird moves that felt inauthentic, but apparently some other people were okay with those changes. (But they’re wrong.) So I started to simmer down, only giddily anticipating your next installment right before it was due to come out. No countdowns for me. Well, maybe a couple of weeks’ worth. But I did start to get tired of all the hype, especially with your movie doppelganger picking up steam. Whatever, I thought. I’m over it. Nothing else will match the magic of reading that first book for the first time.

But now, oh now, Twilight, you have seduced me with your sexless movie.

That’s right, I am on the Twilight bandwagon again, full speed ahead, cap off and flapping in the wind. I’m looking at photo galleries (because the movie version of Victoria is the PRETTIEST) and I’m kind of embarrassed to admit that I finally understand the mentality of this crowd (specifically in the last couple of paragraphs). Because Edward Cullen is the dreamiest fictional character EVER. He’s Mr. Darcy’s sexy, brooding son who also happens to have supernatural powers that are awesome. And he’s going to glower at you, and you are going to be captivated by the glowering, because for some reason, oh God do we women like our bad boys who are really good boys.

Man. I’m getting all wound up just thinking about it. What is up with that? I saw the movie last night and was left with that same feeling of delicious unfulfilled longing that I had when I read the first book. Even though I think Kristen Stewart was either high or just really uncomfortable the entire time she was filming, because wow that was a lot of open-mouthed breathing, glazed-over staring, and poor line-delivering. Now, any missteps made by Robert Pattinson are completely forgiven, because he’s playing Edward-freaking-Cullen, and mmmmmmm. (Disclaimer: I know he’s fictional. I love you, Tristan!) And even though I cracked up on many occasions over utter cheesiness, overwrought symbolism, tortured gazes, and some forced dialogue, I had an absolutely fantastic time watching the film.

Now, my unsolicited opinion on a few things of my choosing that will only matter to people who have read the book:

Regarding casting — Esme was perfect, Carlisle & Rosalie were underwhelming, Emmet was adorable if a little more jockish than I envisioned him, Jasper was hilariously stiff and Edward Scissorhands-like (credit for that observation goes to my friend J. Ram) and not quite as leonine as I’d imagined. I pictured him more James Dean-like. Alice was almost perfect. Mike Newton was definitely perfect, Jacob was way cuter than I had anticipated (and I like the easygoing friendship between him and Bella in the movie), and Billy Black was rather more attractive than I imagined. Charlie was not as I’d pictured but the actor brought it home, Renee was pretty much spot-on, and I think I’m tired of this now.

Moving on: Why was Billy Black, the cripple who needs to be pushed around in a wheelchair, in the driver’s seat when he passed Edward in the car? Come on, editors! Or whoever’s call that was. Yeesh.

Shout-out of appreciation to the actor who played Mike Newton, because he was just superb. I wish he had been my friend in high school. And also an honorable mention to poor, dead-eyed Kristen Stewart for her screaming in pain in the ballet studio. That was some serious, visceral screaming. It made me want to giggle inappropriately, because that is how I deal with intense emotions.

What are your thoughts on the movie, Twilight readers?

Cat in a Box!

2008-12-04T15:31:00.000-08:00

Because I am busy today.

In Which Jill Grudgingly Admires Economics

2008-12-03T16:17:00.000-08:00

One of the interesting things about being surrounded by a bunch of economists at my job is the pervading doom-and-gloom outlook on the next year. Thanks to NPR, I know that this current recession is expected to last longer than any since WWII, but the professors I work with are at the front-and-center of economic research. They're not just a bunch of news followers spouting whatever they hear on the radio (like I tend to do -- thanks, long commute, for giving me time to educate myself with NPR); they actually know stuff about the grim economic situation.

Today at our staff Christmas party, the acting dean (who is "acting" because our usual dean is on Obama's transition team -- how awesome is that?) wished us a happy new year next year, after we endure 2009, which is going to be devoid of pay raises. How's that for a cheery speech?

I'm grateful to have a decent job in a shaky economy. And even though I'm pretty apolitical and the one* bad grade I got in high school was in AP Government, I do find it fascinating to work in a graduate school of international economic research during one of the most volatile economic periods in my lifetime. I'm kind of picking up new knowledge along the way, but I'll admit that it gets pushed out by things I'm more interested in, like fancy vocabulary words and how to make the perfect chocolate chip cookie.

But as it stands, sometimes it seems kind of serendipitous that I work here right now. So even if I don't actually remember anything about microinsurance, bioeconomics, or resource economics, I can appreciate, intellectually, where I am at this moment in time.

And on another note, here is the view from my office building. The gray line under the clouds is the Pacific. It's pretty awesome being able to see the ocean from my stairwell.

*Okay, okay, fine -- I got two bad grades. The other one was in Geometry. And I spent like five hours making a goddamn Moravian star for a class project and STILL got a C! Mothereffing high school geometry...

In Which Jill Takes the Low Road

2008-12-02T16:23:00.001-08:00

T and I went to Santa Monica back in August right before I started my job. We took a quick weekend trip up to L.A. as a sort of last hurrah, a celebration of our summer days of freedom, which I kind of squandered with that whole job search thing. But anyway, we went to Santa Monica, where we wandered through throngs of teenagers on the Promenade – a landmark that apparently used to be quaint and pleasant, according to T’s memory of childhood visits. Now it’s a study in gentrification, a long cobblestone avenue of every mainstream store you can dream of, ice cream stands, movie theaters, restaurants, ghetto alleyways with public restrooms, plus grifters and buskers and probably a few circus ringmasters if you look in the right places.

The music from the various street performers collided with the throbbing techno from teenybopper clothing stores, creating the kind of cacophony that emotionally wounds the gentle likes of T and me, so we started looking for a restaurant for respite. We found an Italian place with a pretty outdoor patio, but we asked the hostess for inside seating.

“Inside?” she asked, astonished. After all, why would we want to sit inside when there’s a perfectly lovely outdoor space all decked out with white fairy lights and ambience galore? In Southern California, where rain is scarce and outdoor seating abundant? Still, we took our unconventional indoor seats at our freakish indoor table and waited a long time for a server.

Man, it was worth the wait. My spaghetti marinara with fresh mozzarella was so good I wanted to cry, and it was also so huge that I asked for a takeout container, half-wondering if there was even a refrigerator in our hotel room. On our way to the car to deposit my leftovers, an overweight homeless woman wailed her need, asking for cash.

We kept walking, without stopping, and I officially became the shittiest person in Santa Monica that evening for not handing over my doggie bag. I still feel guilty about it. But in my defense, she wasn’t wasting away, and she was asking for money, not food!

I know, I know. SHITTY PERSON. I belong in a Seinfeld episode.

There I am. Guiltily putting on chapstick -- not eating more precious food, as the picture may lead you to believe.

A Letter

2008-12-01T16:46:00.000-08:00

Dear Utilitarian Blog,

You need to be spiced up. Maybe a couple of photographs, some color? What's the deal, blog? Is your moderator too busy with her fancy-sounding job in higher ed to stop on by and give you some personality? Why are you only updated once every month or so? It's not like there's nothing interesting going on: we all know that Jill lives in "America's Finest City," and that she must be doing something with her west coast time other than surfing the internet and developing a baking compulsion. Perhaps Jill's parents came to visit? And maybe Jill's fiance's mom came to visit, too, and now the house has been cleaned out? Maybe Jill has read some good books and has rediscovered her love of writing. I think Jill and Tristan also have some friends now -- ones they've gone camping with?

I'm pretty sure as well that Jill and Tristan are getting married in a few months and have made lots of fun little decisions pertaining to their wedding. Maybe that's something that could be posted on here? That's better than nothing, right?

And as far as I know, the town where Jill and Tristan live is all but storybook ideal -- what's the big idea with not posting any photos from there, hm? It's not like Jill and Tristan don't ride their bikes to their favorite sushi place for dinner or walk down to bay to look at the skyline at night. I have it on good authority that Jill feels pretty blissed out about being able to walk two blocks to the library, where she goes into a book coma while Tristan picks out Miss Marple rentals for 50 cents.

I do have a sneaking suspicion, though, that the mistress of this blog has a supremely lazy streak, and she likes to spend around three months gearing up to do something that will take her about two minutes, such as uploading photos or changing the colors on this boring blog template. Maybe she'll take a break from all of her daydreaming and wondering what in the hell she's going to do with her life and actually attempt to be a little more proactive. Maybe she'll be a little bit more of a doer instead of a uselessly pondering worrier.

Ask her about that, will you, blog? Tell her that December on the internet is calling her name, requesting a blog post a day until Christmas Eve. See if she'll deliver.

Sincerely,

Obsessive Observer

Dear San Diego Weather: WTF? Love, Jill

2008-10-22T11:58:00.000-07:00

The San Diego weather baffles me. It is also PISSING ME OFF. We had two beautiful, damp, fall-like days on Monday and Tuesday this week; it was probably 60 degrees in the shade, and even in the sunshine there was a nice chill to the air. I was wearing long sleeves to bed and huddling up under the comforter instead of sprawling out and kicking off the covers like usual. I put on my warm slippers when I got home from work. And I even picked out pumpkins this weekend wearing a long-sleeved shirt and a cardigan. (Of course, I started to sweat from the exertion of lifting pumpkin after pumpkin, trying to find two that weren’t deformed. Apparently the selection at the local grocery store isn’t as aesthetically appealing as the selection you might find at a farmer’s market or an actual pumpkin patch. But whatever. They were there.)

And today? Death Valley paid La Jolla a little visit. Today is still, and dry, and hot, and I could practically sense the vultures circling overhead as I power-walked my way to run errands at the Student Center this morning. And why did I power-walk in such a heat, you wonder? Because I wanted to get the hell out of the BOILING SUN.

WHY IS IT 85 DEGREES TODAY?

And it’s not that I’m eager for cold weather — 60 degrees is cold enough for me, thankyouverymuch. But when the weather goes from 60 to 85? That is some frustrating weather craziness right there. It makes getting dressed rather difficult, because you never know whether you're going to be shivering or sweating. Really, it seems the only reasonable outfit for a woman is this: flats, tights, a skirt, a tank top, a t-shirt, a cardigan, and a trendy little scarf. Then you can mix and match throughout the day according to the weather. Suddenly, randomly hot? Take off those tights! And don’t forget to put a pair of sandals in your bag, because otherwise your toes are going to feel the heat. But oh, wait, it’s 4:00 now and the clouds are rolling in, and suddenly the temperature has plummeted ten degrees. Good thing you have that scarf and cardigan. But ooh, too bad you didn’t bring your jacket today, because now it’s dark out, and dark means cold. Sucker. You have not mastered the art of dressing for San Diego weather. You lose!

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to go sit directly in front of my fan and get a chill as the breeze hits the sweaty sheen on my skin.

Low Marks for Fashion Valley

2008-10-18T20:52:00.001-07:00

Gah. For a few weeks now, Tristan and I have been saying "We need to register soon." We've been procrastinating on creating our wedding registry for a number of reasons: Tristan hates to shop, I'm indecisive, Fashion Valley (where the nearest Crate & Barrel is) is a pain in the ass to get to because of all the traffic, and there are books to be read and episodes of Miss Marple to be watched. Basically, we'd rather clean the toilets and wash the kitchen floor before facing the Wedding Registry Experience.

But today. Saturday. We were GOING TO GO today. And we did. Oh, we did. We drove to Fashion Valley, planning to get something to eat before we started. It was only 5:30 -- we didn't think that every restaurant under the sun would have a 45-minute wait. But no, apparently it was Homecoming night for numerous scantily clad teenagers, and it's also Saturday night at the biggest mall in a bigger city. So... yeah. We were kind of dumb for expecting a convenient meal at one of the chain restaurants at the mall.

So instead, we wandered the food court, I bumped into a pre-teen who gave me a Death Stare, Tristan talked about how much he hates the mall, and I talked about how hungry and crabby I was feeling.

"I have to eat before we go in there," I snapped as we approached Crate & Barrel. "I can't pick out a bunch of kitchen stuff when my blood sugar is this low."

So we finally settled on Pizzeria Uno, which had a bearable 20-minute wait. When we finally got our table, we noticed that the restaurant was basically a pimped-out Friendly's. Waxy vinyl booths, orange track lighting, cheap wood partitions, greasy menus, a stale cheese smell.

Whatever, we agreed. We'd share a pizza and get the hell out of there.

7:08, we were out the door and on our way to Crate & Barrel.

Then the power went out on the left side of the mall. But no matter, Crate & Barrel was on the right side. We got to the doors, pulled on them, and they were locked. Yep. Crate & Barrel closes at 7 p.m. on Saturdays at Fashion Valley.

We cried a little and tore our hair out in frustration, then decided to see a movie, since we were out. At the theater, we approached an enormous line as we heard this on the loudspeaker: "Sorry everyone, since the power has gone out twice in the last 20 minutes, we will not be selling any more tickets tonight."

So, that settled that. Back out to the parking lot, where there was a ridiculously long line of cars trying to get out at the intersection, which was blocked off by police because the stoplights weren't working.

Awesome. Okay, so we had some time to kill. We went The Container Store and marveled at the overpriced containers. And then the power went out. Again. We were trapped in the freaking Container Store.

Thankfully, the automatic doors had frozen in mid-close, leaving a Tristan-and-Jill-sized opening for us to escape through.

We got home about an hour ago, after stopping at the store for some milk and ice cream. Now we are going to watch a DVD. We are not speaking of our failed trip to the mall.

Tomorrow, we will try again.

Oh, and on a more cheerful note, our wedding is exactly six months away! Woot!

Lack of Autumn

2008-09-22T10:54:00.000-07:00

Today is the first day of autumn. Aside from a few whiffs of chimney smoke and slightly cooler evenings, I don’t think I’m going to get much in the way of vivid leaves and crisp breezes this year. I’m already a little nostalgic for East Coast autumn. In fact, autumn would have been my favorite season if it weren’t the precursor to evil, evil winter. I love to feel the first chill in the air as it sneaks in between leaves and bricks and alleyways. I love snuggling into a sweater and drinking something warm and cinnamony. I always miss the start of school, since I’m not a part of that anymore, and sometimes I think of autumn on my college campus and it makes me feel so wistful that it actually hurts.

I had a very blah day yesterday, nursing a quasi-hangover after drinking a lot of wine with friends on Saturday night. As I crawled back in bed to take a nap around 2 p.m., I started thinking about my first autumn at college. I was a loner that semester, wandering among the orange leaves and brick walkways thinking about Thackeray, Hardy, and my own unhappiness. I tripped across the uneven stone sidewalks in the historic part of town, surreptitiously staring into the back-lit windows of rambling old houses, imagining warmth and community within. Worn wood floors, apple cake, pumpkin pie, teenagers still at home, not yet released into the jarring independence of college.

The homesickness wore away quickly enough, and I made the best friends of my life in college. Maybe that is why my nostalgia interrupted my nap yesterday with a creeping ache. I don’t miss that period of my life with the fierce yearning I felt during my first year out of school. But it’s when I’m not expecting it that I remember the smells, the sounds, the faces. Parties in the dark, dungeon-like basement of the theater (and crossing under the stage during shows, accompanied only by mechanical thrumming, dim lights, and whisper-warm musty air, trying not to think of ghost stories). Maryland winters — messy. slushy. cold air slicing off the river — and the roof of my first dorm — steam, stars, the hum of the hospital behind us. The scent of the library, filling me with both a sense of peace and trepidation as I tackled some project too big for me to work on in my room. Trying to find the quietest carrel on the top floor. Salinger. Hemingway. Acting. The slip of literature and writing from my fingers as I became more invested in theatre.

Among all of these, friends. Companionship when I needed it, companionship when I didn’t. The occasional spat, the random month or so of dissatisfaction and loneliness.

I couldn't sleep yesterday, though my body was craving a nap. My thoughts were too busy. I had to get away from the nostalgia, push it back to wherever it goes, ready to spring up again when the wind blows the right way. I stayed in my pajamas anyway, watched something mindless and ate cottage cheese and fruit while I waited for Tristan to return from his errands.

It was cool and cloudy this morning. I like the marine layer along the coast, fogging up La Jolla before it burns away to a bright blue again. I haven’t figured out a pattern to the cloudy mornings — they just show up.

July in San Diego

2008-07-28T09:48:00.000-07:00

I am a bad blogger. No, wait, I take that back. I am not a blogger. The four weeks between posts clearly marks me as a sporadic blog-updater at best. I would like to be one of those people who updates every day, or every other day, and through the frequency of her posts gains legions of commenting fans, but alas. That's not me.

If you want to comment, though, please do. Seriously. Just the slightest urge to comment? Do it. I implore you. I need some love!

Anyway. July is almost over, I drove across the country more than six weeks ago, and in a week, I will begin my new job as the publications coordinator of a visiting fellows program in a graduate school at UC San Diego. I'm really excited about this new job -- it's the full-time one I wrote about earlier -- and it will be wonderful to meet new people and have health insurance again, but I will miss my seemingly endless days of freedom. I think soon enough I would start to go a little stir-crazy not having a job, but so far, these three months off from the daily 9-5 have been awesome. For the last few years, I've worked pretty damn hard most of the time: working full time, freelancing articles, attending theatre board meetings, auditioning for shows, and filling my evenings with rehearsals. And it feels really good not to worry about go-go-going and getting everything done. I've had a few moments in the last couple of months where I've thought, "Oh shit, I have a lot to do," mainly regarding packing, moving, settling in, changing addresses, and booking wedding vendors. But those moments have passed quickly, and oh my God, I love it.

I also love that I feel really good about this job I'm starting. It's the right step for me, and it's the first time that I'm thinking in terms of "career." Before I moved out here, I was plagued with thoughts like "What if I don't get a job in San Diego?" and "What if I have to do temp work again? Will that be a step backward?" and "Maybe I should just do the audition circuit and try to get paid as a an actor." And as usual, my worries were excessive, because I went on a bunch of interviews and actually got three job offers in the last two weeks, and I also realized that I don't want to be an actor. The prospect of a career working with words in higher education makes me feel a happy combination of confidence and peace that theatre never did.

Ah, epiphanies.

As for the rest of July in San Diego, I spent most of my weekdays during the first half of the month writing cover letters and researching job opportunities and the latter half swallowing my nerves as I prepared for interviews.

T and I have also been cultivating our domestic side, trying new recipes and actually getting passably good at cooking. Our goal was to, you know, stop eating at restaurants pretty much every night. We've done a bang-up job, if I do say so myself. We also paid Target a little visit to buy home furnishing goodies, and the new rug we picked up for our living room totally transforms the space! It's the best purchase ever. I had a little flurry of worry when I walked into Target and actually didn't feel like shopping -- I've had a self-imposed moratorium on buying things for months, since I didn't know how long I would be unemployed, and walking into Target, I wondered if I had managed to smother an entire lifetime's worth of shopping exultation. It was in the rug section of the store, though, that I felt the burning desire to buy things resurface. I started getting ideas, color schemes, dreams, and oh! How I wanted to buy out the whole freaking store! Jill SPEND!!!!!!!

But T doesn't like to shop, so we left before I could lose control. My pulse returned to normal as we traveled back down the escalator of the glorious two-story Target.

T and I did get out of the house every now and then for fun excursions -- we wandered around Balboa Park and checked out the Museum of Photographic Arts, which had an exhibit of nudes that set any nearby adolescents into fits of gawking and giggles. We took bike rides around our neighborhood, spent a couple of afternoons on the beach (by the way, the Pacific Ocean? Unbelievably cold.), saw The Dark Knight in Imax, enjoyed a lot of live music, and had our friends Jeff and Jenn -- whom we know from Pennsylvania; they moved out here this spring, too -- over for dinner. I made vegetarian lasagna. It was good. We laughed a lot. That was also good.

And for the Fourth of July, T and I watched the fireworks over the bay, which is a short bike ride from our house. There were four sets of the same fireworks, released in synchronicity, all around the curve of the bay. The night was very still, so the smoke from the fireworks just hung in the air and began to obscure the lights. I wished for wind. It was still very beautiful, and I was reminded of watching fireworks over the Chesapeake Bay when I was a wee little thing. I felt nostalgic and homesick for a while after the fourth.

That's all for now. Stay tuned, please. And leave some comments, will ya?

Sushi!

2008-07-01T22:50:00.000-07:00

Tristan and I found our sushi place! This is significant because we were pretty sure no other restaurant would measure up to our local stop in Pennsylvania: a random little restaurant called Wasabi in the middle of the shopping center I hung out at in high school (I led a wild life, lemme tell ya). Somehow they had the freshest fish and tastiest sushi I've ever tried. T and I have sampled our share of sushi at big-city restaurants over the years, and none of it ever came close to Wasabi.

But now we've tried The Fish Company. Or Fish Co, if you're feeling pressed for time. Delicious, fresh seafood, beautiful presentation, awesome sushi chef. We tried a lemon salmon roll, which had extremely thin slices of lemon nestled with a sliver of avocado on top of the salmon, and the flavor combination was *amazing.*

Best of all, we can bike to this place! Things are good, friends. Things are good.

Jobs for Jill

2008-06-28T14:31:00.000-07:00

Well, if I have accomplished anything this week, it's that I've learned a few of the ins and outs of employment at College X, one of San Diego's behemoth universities with a hiring process so complex they actually offer a course in how to get hired. So I feel pretty good about the fact that I've already had three interviews there - one for full-time permanent work, one for part-time permanent, and one for full-time temp. In the first interview, I met with several people and yakked about my marketing skills, which was actually pretty fun. I also interviewed with a professor and totally felt like I was in class again with all the questions he asked me. I heart being a student!

After that meeting, I interviewed at the temp services office, where I took a computer-skills test that I was terrified would reveal that I'm actually quite dumb, when all this time I thought I was smart. Fortunately, though, I passed with lazily floating colors, surprising myself by getting better scores on my Microsoft Excel abilities than on Word. Hooray for random guessing! It was a really frustrating program simulator, though, and any time I couldn't find what I was looking for in the menu, I got an "Incorrect! You're screwed!" notice. Yeah, it didn't actually say that, but that's how it felt. I did get a 100% score on the proofreading part of the test, which I knew I would because I kick ass at that, but it was still extremely gratifying when the HR guy congratulated me on backing up all my big talk about my abilities. Yes, I do love me some approval. Ties in with that whole love-of-being-a-student thing.

Anyway. I had an interview for the part-time position on Wednesday, and then on Thursday I went back to campus for my temp services orientation, during which I learned that parking on campus is labyrinthine and costly. Apparently everyone has to buy a monthly permit, which is expensive enough that I should probably continue my self-imposed moratorium on buying pretty things for myself.

I did get a taste of the parking craziness on Monday, when I got to my temp interview and realized I didn't have any quarters for the meters. I had, however, purchased a parking permit earlier in the day for my first interview, so I just drove back to that first parking garage and set out to walk the .3 miles to the temp building. But .3 miles is a lot of freaking miles when you're worried about getting there on time and you're also wearing 3-inch heels. And 3-inch heels are akin to shoes made of glass shards and razors when you're accustomed to wearing flats all the time. And also? A temperate 75 degrees quickly translates to Sahara heat when you're clomping along in heels and long pants and an elbow-length black shirt and the sun is absolutely relentless.

So I got to the office with five minutes to spare, and I breathlessly gave my name to the girl at the front desk. She took in my red face and the strands of hair sweatily pasted to my forehead and said "Do you want some water or something?" She summoned my interviewer and then disappeared behind a partition, and I limped to the water cooler and guzzled a styrofoam cup-full of water. I refilled it and blew into it, hoping the cool air from my breath hitting the water would erase all marks of my less-than-graceful arrival. Then I took a tissue and swiped at my sweaty temples, tried to regulate my breathing, and composed myself on a chair in the waiting area. "Oh for God's sake," I muttered, horrified, as I felt more droplets of sweat trickle down the sides of my face.

Thank goodness my interviewer was too busy to collect me promptly at 1:30 - by the time he came into the hallway, I had dried off and was no longer breathing like an asthmatic on a triathlon course. We had a pleasant chat, and because none of his questions were "Are you good at judging your ability to walk city blocks in high heels?" or "Did you remember to bring change for the meter?", I am now part of the temporary employee pool.

We'll see what happens with the other opportunities. I need to hem my pants before any future interviews, though, so that I can wear flats.

Here, permanently

2008-06-21T13:21:00.000-07:00

After 2,912.9 miles, my car and I are safely in San Diego! I arrived on Tuesday night after a week of driving. My little Toyota Echo, which I have whined about in the past for being as utilitarian as it gets, deserves high marks for hauling a load of clothes and knick-knacks plus two people across the country during the hottest week of the year. Just so you know, Arizona is incredibly fucking hot. So is New Mexico. Also, West Texas is the most desolate place I have ever had the misfortune of visiting. Arkansas is not much better.

But Virginia, as I already knew, is a beautiful state, especially through the Shenandoah Valley, and Memphis, Tennessee has a certain charm. And Graceland? Surprisingly tastefully done. (This is not counting Elvis' own garish style. One image: 15-foot white sofa. Another image: hallway of mirrors.) And despite the heat, our stops in New Mexico and Arizona proved to be close to amazing.

I will blog my little heart out about it soon, transcribing the brief scrawls in my travel journal into something more cohesive and interesting to read. But first I have to unpack and organize using the limited surface and shelf area I have, and then I need to prepare for the two job interviews I have on Monday.

More to come!

Lately...

2008-05-19T20:06:00.000-07:00

Ah, yes, two weeks between posts. This is more my style. I have the best intentions to write fiendishly on this here blog, but, really, my intentions are pretty worthless. Like those intentions I had in my second week here to really buckle down and apply to dozens (approx.) of jobs and be all sorts of productive.

But the truth is, I am really loving this unemployment thing. (Well, except on the days that I feel so excessively lazy that I might as well be an actual sloth. Those days are not worth relishing.) Plus, on Wednesday night I'm flying back to Pennsylvania for two weddings, a massive closet-cleaning-out in my old bedroom at my parents' house, and happy reunions with the friends I won't see again for several months. This will be capped off with a drive across the country, so all in all, I'll be away from my little personal paradise for almost four weeks. Which hardly makes it worth it to diligently apply for jobs right now. However, despite this hiccup in my transition to constant West Coast occupancy, I do still have those good intentions to apply to a few more jobs before I take my red-eye on Wednesday.

I haven't updated this blog in the last two weeks because I haven't done anything particularly of note, though I do still want to post photos of the house and town. I will, as soon as I find my camera's USB cord. I... have no idea where it is. And I don't even know if it's in California. So... it could be a while on the photo front, but dammit, I'll do it.

Some highlights from the last two weeks:
*Visiting a mega-Target. Two floors! (It was while I wandered and gaped in Target that I realized what a freaking yokel I am. Cripes. Stupid Lancaster, depriving me of city-type-things and therefore making my transition to city living as pathetically awe-inspiring as possible.)

*Another one on the unused-to-the-city front: being greatly amused by the surging amount of hipsters in bars. It's like a nonstop costume party. More on that in another post, maybe.

*Eating the most amazing French toast I have ever tasted at brunch with our friends Chris and Katie last week. Thick slabs of baguette with gooey swirls of cinnamon running through the middle, cooked to tender perfection. Oh. My. God. Good.

*Meeting up with my mom's friend Carol, whom my parents have known since they were all in their very-early twenties. Carol and I had gourmet sandwiches and coffee at the slowest restaurant ever, and then she took me to the Navy base (North Island), where we checked out the exchange (I smelled all the designer perfumes I read about in fashion mags) and the commissary, where all the food is on average $2 cheaper than the civilian grocery store.

*The summery weather we've been having lately. Today, the warm breeze was dry, papery, and full of the earthy scent of sun-soaked trees. I coated myself in sunscreen before jogging off to the beach, where I arrived red-faced, sweaty, and utterly devoid of bikini-clad, oversized-sunglasses glamour.

*This past weekend, which was idyllic in its bike-riding, sundae-eating, barbeque-attending summeriness.

Not on the list of highlights is the extreme wordiness of this most recent blog entry. Apologies.

Herping: Not a Dirty Word

2008-05-05T15:41:00.000-07:00

It’s cloudy and chilly today in the Land of Perpetual Sunshine, so I’m using that as an excuse to stay inside and be kind of lazy. And by lazy I mean that it’s 4:00 in the afternoon and all I’ve really done today is clean out the cat box and eat breakfast, lunch, and some snacks. I have, however, managed to shower and dress myself, and I intend to get up soon and do some cleaning and straightening. And in my defense, I spent an hour and a half this morning with a cat purring and snuggling on my lap, so I simply couldn’t get up and be productive.

I think I can attribute part of my desire to laze today to the fact that I got up at 4:45 a.m. yesterday to go the Mojave Desert with Tristan. It was a three-hour drive, and we were meeting a herpetology student at 8:30 a.m. to help him look for fringe-toed lizards.

Herpetology student, you ask? Look for lizards, you say? Well, yes. I may be as scientifically minded as a tray of watercolor paints, but my dear Nature Boy Tristan has a thing for lizards and snakes and environmental science of all kinds. And seeing as I didn’t want to spend my Sunday all alone, and I also wanted to see the Mojave, I joined T on his excursion to help out Andy the Graduate Student, who is studying fringe-toed lizards. Which, we discovered, are elusive little bastards.

On our drive east, we passed Temecula, Riverside, San Bernardino, and Twentynine Palms, going from Surburbia Paradise (Target and Starbucks on every corner, anyone?) to Wind Farm Alley (surrounded by stunning mountains) to Depressed Desert Wasteland. The only thing of note near Twentynine Palms is the Joshua Tree National Park and a giant Marine Corps base. The Joshua trees we passed along the highway were fascinating, but not the sort of tree I’d be all excited to have in my yard.

Then we hit the desert. We were meeting Andy the Graduate Student at a latitude/longitude destination, which we arrived at after miles of a straight road with no landmarks. Andy told us what to look for and how to approach the fringe-toeds if we saw any. Tristan already knows how to look for lizards, but this was my maiden voyage. After a quick glance at the landscape, Andy casually pointed out a whiptail lizard, which I totally wouldn’t have noticed otherwise. Then he caught an iguana with a lizard noose (gentler than it sounds) and showed it to us. It was very cute, and I felt sorry for it, trapped and squirming in Andy’s palm. This is just reason #1 why I won’t be a herpetology hobbyist any time soon.

The three of us set out into the desert, sunscreened to the max and wearing long sleeves, pants, boots, and hats. I was delighted that there was a random streak of clouds obscuring the sun, but apparently that makes for bad herping. We didn’t find any fringe-toed lizards in our nearly two of hours of looking. Below is a picture of the area we scoured. Or somewhere near it. I don’t actually know. I was kind of deliriously tired and hungry by then.

Andy did catch a whiptail lizard for us to see. He was pretty cute:

So, after a short break, Andy found a sunnier spot with softer sand for us to look for fringe-toeds, and he saw one right before it scampered down a hole. We looked and looked some more, but found nothing. And I’ll tell you, I really wanted to find one of these damn lizards. According to Tristan and Andy, it’s hard work and you can sometimes look for hours to no avail (obviously), but when you find one, it’s exhilarating. So, I wanted some exhilaration, dammit! I was picturing a landscape teeming with lizards, but I think I may just be a science simpleton who imagines everything to be like a children’s picture book. Dozens of lizards! All skittering around and looking cute! And maybe chatting about the weather and wearing tiny straw hats!

Anyway. We called it a day around 1 p.m. and went for lunch at a Mexican restaurant in Twentynine Palms, where we had the grossest, greasiest food ever. I’m pretty sure they used a pound of cheese on my chili relleno, and the salad I ordered was a tempting combination of iceberg lettuce, mushy diced tomatoes, and – that’s right – more cheese.

After our three-hour trip back – during which both Tristan and I had to struggle to stay awake (methods included and were limited to the following: eating candy) – we combed through our piles of newspaper – Tristan recently subscribed to both the San Diego Union Tribune and the LA Times – and ate delicious, non-cheese-covered cereal for dinner. Overall, a good day, despite the utter exhaustion.

To sum up, my personal pros and cons:

Seeing and walking through part of the Mojave = Pro
Seeing the San Jacinto mountain from the highway = Pro, gorgeous
Holding a little lizard = Pro, even though he was scared and I felt sorry for him
Learning what this whole herping thing is all about = Pro
Wearing long pants and long sleeves in 85-degree heat = Con
Not finding what we were there for = Con
Generally sucking at this whole herping thing = Con
Gallons of cheese for lunch = Con

And we’ll leave it at that.

Cooking

2008-05-01T10:49:00.000-07:00

I have a confession to make:

I am terrified of gas stoves.

I hear that they're great for cooking, which is all well and good. But I'm not much of a cook yet, so I'm not all "Finally! A stove suitable for my gourmet-caliber abilities!" I'm more like "Oh dear God, there it goes with its clicking and lighting. Please don't explode!" When I first turned on a burner last week, I did so at arm's length as I averted my face. Oh, and we also get a good breeze from the kitchen window, which enthuses any open flame with an unnerving whoosh.

That said, I think maybe I'm getting the hang of it. I'm very proud of myself, because I made an entire dinner yesterday, including dessert, which baked while I was cooking the meal. To those of you who have been cooking for years, or those of you who are not intimidated by a stove of all things, I probably sound like a ten-year-old who has discovered how to boil water in a teakettle. But I tell you, I made salmon with orange sauce, non-gummy rice, and asparagus for dinner, all ready at the same time! And it even tasted good!

Tonight I'm giving a recipe for vegetable lasagna a go. I've never cooked lasagna noodles before, so it could be disastrous. But hey, at least I'm trying new things, right?

New Job?

2008-04-29T13:26:00.000-07:00

How does this one look, guys? Yeah, it's a little weird that they ask for your pant size, but it's probably just for the cocktail server pants, right? Right?

"Female Models Needed for Event

"A Couple of New Openings...

"We are looking for Servers / Cocktail Servers who are Model types to work a Very Exclusive Lounge [at an event in May].

"Please no prima donnas... [seeking] down to earth people who are friendly, outgoing, and can hold a conversation with a stranger and make them feel special ...

"You will have the best view [of the event].... [and] you will be among some of the world's most elite wealth.

"If you are interested please email a photo with your age, your pant size...(0,2,4,6?) as well as your waist size and inner leg length, and finally your Cocktail / Restaurant service experience. (YOU MUST BE 21 or older)"

Weekend

2008-04-28T12:51:00.000-07:00

I’ve been here for a week already! Soon I’ll need to start job hunting and networking in earnest – I would love to get a job at San Diego State, because I’m hoping to be a student in their English Lit MA program eventually. But I would be happy to land a position at any of the local colleges or universities – I have the experience, and also, the benefits rock. But essentially, I need to send out about a million resumes and hope that at least one gives me a lead. Can you blame me for not diving right into that? Especially when the unemployment period is so sweet? I love getting up and enjoying the warm, summery scent of the Coronado air, making my way to the glittery beach (the sand has gold flecks in it. Gold flecks!), leisurely unpacking, and making a happy little home with Tristan.

We tried our hand at cooking together on Friday, and after an hour-and-a-half, we had acceptable chicken and spaghetti. After dinner, we went to the beach for a bonfire Tristan’s friend Sarah had put together as a little welcome gathering for me, and Sarah showed everyone the culinary delight that is s’mores made with peanut butter cups instead of Hershey bars. Highly recommended. There was also a round of Truth or Dare, which I kind of hate unless I’m with people I know really well. So most of the girls shared wild stories while the guys and I looked uncomfortable. Or maybe we were all just lost in our own wild stories that would remain securely in our brains and not carried over the cool breeze of Coronado beach. But it was a lovely evening – I’ve never been to a bonfire on the beach, which seems so quintessentially California, and which I was nerdily delighted to attend.

On Saturday, Tristan got to experience the joy – or tedium, if you wish – of shopping with me at Target. While he zipped about the store and got all the practical things on our list, I dreamily wandered the toiletry aisles, comparing different soap scents and pricing lip gloss. (You know how there have been studies that show that people have way more difficulty making a decision when there are a dozen varieties of something? I am the prime example of that study, times one hundred.)

And yesterday? Yesterday we drove the two hours to Los Angeles, where we attended the LA Times Festival of Books on the campus of UCLA. It was August-in-Pennsylvania hot with relentless sunshine, and it was fun to see the campus overrun with book lovers. It’s a beautiful campus, too, full of non-native plants and trees that give it that green academic atmosphere I’m so used to. Tristan knew a poet, Marty Williams, who was giving a reading as well as emceeing the Poetry Stage, so we listened to him read. After Marty, former Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky took the stage, and oh, he was amazing. Exactly what you want in a poet reading his own work – relishing the words and growling the emotion. He had a regal air on stage as well as a laugh that was just this side of unhinged, and half an hour was not long enough.

After Pinsky, Tristan and I wandered the food tents and a museum to drink in some air conditioning, and then we checked out a panel on Young Adult literature with four local published YA authors. (Jessie, you would have loved it!) Tristan zoned out while I sat enraptured as the four authors talked about their influences – Madeleine L’Engle, Judy Blume, S.E. Hinton, Grover – why YA literature is so accessible (everybody has a high school experience), and if there’s a way to market more YA lit to boys. It was just really cool to hear these authors discuss their experiences and perspectives on this genre that Tristan teases me for enjoying so much.

If we had had more energy, we could have stuck around to see Padma Lakshmi give a presentation on cooking or Danica McKellar talk about why math is cool (which I will never relate to, but it would have been cool to see Winnie, after all), but we were both drained from getting up at 6 a.m. and getting pulverized by the L.A. sun. So we headed back to San Diego without even driving into the Bel Air neighborhood to ogle the huge houses, which I kind of wanted to do, superficial celebrity-gossip-monger that I am. Not that I thought we’d see celebrities walking down the street or anything. But I am ashamed to admit that if we had, I totally would have gawked. I’m sorry.

Seeing the San Diego skyline as we drove back from LA yesterday felt like coming home. I don’t even know the city that well yet, but I know that I love the way it looks, neatly lined up against the bay, and I love the weather, and I love this neighborhood. I feel relieved to be here, like I can let out a huge breath I didn’t know I was holding. It feels amazing. I am happy.

Coming soon: some photographs.

Proximity

2008-04-25T14:00:00.000-07:00

Another wonderful thing about living here, on a pseudo-island with a small-town vibe: I can get fresh produce any time I want! Sure, in Lancaster, I could go to Central Market on Saturday mornings if I wanted to drag my ass out of the house early enough and then brave the throngs of Saturday shoppers, shouting over the din to whoever was closest at a rambling fruit and vegetable stand. It had its charm, it really did.

But here… Here I can walk four blocks to Boney’s Bayside Market and get 30-cent grapefruit, any dried fruit I can imagine, soy cheese (which, okay, I’ve never tried, but maybe I will someday), more than two dozen varieties of fresh, expensive dairy cheese, organic fruits and veggies, “natural” candy that is, strangely, infused with 100% of your daily recommended dose of calcium, wonderful pastries and breads, Burt’s Bees, and, of course, wine and beer. All in one place, people!

If Boney’s were a Trader Joe’s or a Whole Foods, I would be just as excited. You see, unlike my D.C.- and Baltimore-located chums, I’ve never had such a store within easy distance. If I wanted organic food in Lancaster, it was either Market on Saturdays or the overpriced natural foods store that I had to hop in the car and drive to. In Lancaster, I kind of had to work to embrace organic living, which I did rather half-heartedly anyway. Here, it’s four blocks away! In Lancaster, you have to drive to pick up dinner ingredients from the grocery store. Here, I can pick a recipe on a whim and then walk to the grocery store – either Boney’s or the less-expensive Albertson’s – for whatever I need. As someone who is used to having quesadillas for dinner because it was easiest, this convenience for cooking is a total freakin’ thrill.

I'm here!

2008-04-25T13:01:00.000-07:00

And I’ve started a “Jill in San Diego” blog, which I will try to update frequently with my West Coast discoveries and shenanigans. I’m hoping that soon enough, that will include updates on job interviews and new volunteer opportunities, but for now, I’m relaxing and enjoying seeing Tristan every day after six difficult months of separation. So, the experience so far:

After 12 hours of traveling with a cat, I arrived in San Diego at 10 p.m. PST on Monday, April 21. Now it's April 25 and I am absolutely relishing my free time and the fact that I am living in a place so beautiful I can't believe I'm not just on vacation.

Monday's day of travel with Ollie the yearling was relatively stress-free, except for the constant, insidious stress that occurs when you feel really terrible about the fact that your pet hasn't peed in eight hours and is giving you the most pathetic little mews while looking at you sadly with glassy eyes through the sheer pane of his pet carrier. By the time we got to San Diego, Ollie had pretty much lost his will to live, but he got it back when we arrived at the house: he hissed heartily at his friend Jack, our other cat, and growled angrily when Tristan tried to pick him up. It was a good time in the world of pet ownership.

But anyway. I have to say that despite the angst, it was pretty fun traveling with a cat. Pretty much everyone who saw that I had an animal beamed at me and cooed at Ollie – I’ll bet mothers with newborns don’t hear that much baby talk on the airplane. On the flight, I sat next to a woman who was even more interested in comforting my cat than I was. She was also interested in telling me stories about her stray-animal-collecting niece (“She has even taken in a stray horse!”) while I was quite obviously trying to read. Still, I’m glad I was seated by someone who really likes cats.

Moving on. Like I said above, I’m having a hard time believing I’m not on vacation. Tristan and I have gone out to dinner each night this week, and I’ve spent my mornings lounging around in my pajamas and then jogging to the beach in my scrubby old college-logoed gym shorts and a “Go Navy” T-shirt. It’s interesting to be in a place where wearing a Navy tee isn’t an anomaly (half of Coronado is North Island, a Navy base). I grin when I run down these streets, because it is absolutely, amazingly beautiful, and I can’t believe I live here. Yesterday, I passed a man with two parrots – yes, parrots, one on his shoulder and one on his arm, squawking away – and also the most beautiful roses I have ever seen in my life. Huge, multi-colored, ruffled blossoms all sprawling and hovering around some lucky resident’s gate.

Apparently, spring is the most lush and beautiful time of year here, so I’m getting a full blast in the face of Coronado at its most glorious. It’s a blissful welcome.