Allison’s Eclectic Expatiation

Boredom + Unemployment x Low Self Esteem X Scissors = chopping off about 4 inches off your hair and giving yourself bangs.

Luckily, it turned out better than I hoped.  Go me!

Ignore the emo expression, I’m actually quite pleased with the result

There is nothing quite like putting some goals in PRINT so that they can dissapoint you later!  Woo!

This is specific, though.  These are things I want to LEARN, and if not master, build fairly competent skills with.  I hope to have accomplished these within the next year.  And I have no excuses not to (TERRIFYING!)

* Photoshop, and another basic commonly used graphic design suite. (any idea what that is?)

* Excel.  I need to learn more about it.  At this point, all I know is how to input data in the most superficial sense. 

* I want, no, NEED, to re-learn guitar.  I’ve been saying this for years.  I have lots of musician friends, surely I can do a trade with SOMEONE.  I used to love playing.

* I should learn how to knit hats.  All I know how to knit now are blankets and scarves (anything in a box shape.)  Hats make great gifts.

* Change a tire.  I just think that’s smart thinking.

There.  This is it.  Done.

So many unpleasant things going on in my life right now.  Don’t feel like listing them all, but all money and unemployment related.  Things breaking or not working properly, all at the worst possible times.

Don’t sweat the small stuff they say, but what happens when it all comes raining down at once?  A grain of sand falling on your head is nothing, but get enough of them together, and you’ll suffocate.

I’m trying really hard not to let myself suffocate.  I find that as long as I have a distraction (reading, blasting music while driving, visiting with friends, trying to teach myself Photoshop), I’m fine…but it’s all just temporary.  The moment I stop and think…I’m grasping to breathe.

I left my sketch books at Sid’s house, which saddens me.  I’ve just recently started up drawing again after an artist friend of mine pushed me to pursue that talent of mine after seeing some sketchs of mine.  It feels good to just DRAW.  When I was younger, I was constantly drawing, designing, creating.  You put a stack of colored pens/markers and some paper in front of me, and I would be good to go for hours.  When I worked at Starbucks, I would put little designs on the cups, and was in charge of the chalk drawings.  It’s minor, I know, but I haven’t had any sort of outlet like that, really (haven’t GIVEN myself one to be fair.), and I’m trying to pursue it some more.  I might take a design course next semester.  Lots of things are up in the air right now.  I just take it as a good sign when a professional designer compliments my stuff

I got this email from MoveOn.org today, and I felt that I should pass it along:

Yesterday was John McCain’s 72nd birthday. If elected, he’d be the oldest president ever inaugurated. And after months of slamming Barack Obama for “inexperience,” here’s who John McCain has chosen to be one heartbeat away from the presidency: a right-wing religious conservative with no foreign policy experience, who until recently was mayor of a town of 9,000 people.

Huh?

Who is Sarah Palin? Here’s some basic background:

She was elected Alaska’s governor a little over a year and a half ago. Her previous office was mayor of Wasilla, a small town outside Anchorage. She has no foreign policy experience.

1 Palin is strongly anti-choice, opposing abortion even in the case of rape or incest.

2 She supported right-wing extremist Pat Buchanan for president in 2000.

3 Palin thinks creationism should be taught in public schools.

4 She doesn’t think humans are the cause of climate change.

5 She’s solidly in line with John McCain’s “Big Oil first” energy policy. She’s pushed hard for more oil drilling and says renewables won’t be ready for years. She also sued the Bush administration for listing polar bears as an endangered species—she was worried it would interfere with more oil drilling in Alaska.

6 How closely did John McCain vet this choice? He met Sarah Palin once at a meeting. They spoke a second time, last Sunday, when he called her about being vice-president. Then he offered her the position.

7 This is information the American people need to see. Please take a moment to forward this email to your friends and family.

We also asked Alaska MoveOn members what the rest of us should know about their governor. The response was striking.

Here’s a sample:

She is really just a mayor from a small town outside Anchorage who has been a governor for only 1.5 years, and has ZERO national and international experience. I shudder to think that she could be the person taking that 3AM call on the White House hotline, and the one who could potentially be charged with leading the US in the volatile international scene that exists today. —Rose M.

, Fairbanks, AK

She is VERY, VERY conservative, and far from perfect. She’s a hunter and fisherwoman, but votes against the environment again and again. She ran on ethics reform, but is currently under investigation for several charges involving hiring and firing of state officials. She has NO experience beyond Alaska. —Christine B.

, Denali Park, AK

As an Alaskan and a feminist, I am beyond words at this announcement. Palin is not a feminist, and she is not the reformer she claims to be. —Karen L.

, Anchorage, AK

Alaskans, collectively, are just as stunned as the rest of the nation. She is doing well running our State, but is totally inexperienced on the national level, and very much unequipped to run the nation, if it came to that. She is as far right as one can get, which has already been communicated on the news. In our office of thirty employees (dems, republicans, and nonpartisans), not one person feels she is ready for the V.P. position.—Sherry C.

, Anchorage, AK

She’s vehemently anti-choice and doesn’t care about protecting our natural resources, even though she has worked as a fisherman. McCain chose her to pick up the Hillary voters, but Palin is no Hillary. —Marina L.

, Juneau, AK

I think she’s far too inexperienced to be in this position. I’m all for a woman in the White House, but not one who hasn’t done anything to deserve it. There are far many other women who have worked their way up and have much more experience that would have been better choices. This is a patronizing decision on John McCain’s part- and insulting to females everywhere that he would assume he’ll get our vote by putting “A Woman” in that position.—Jennifer M.

, Anchorage, AK

So Governor Palin is a staunch anti-choice religious conservative. She’s a global warming denier who shares John McCain’s commitment to Big Oil. And she’s dramatically inexperienced.

In picking Sarah Palin, John McCain has made the religious right very happy. And he’s made a very dangerous decision for our country.

In the next few days, many Americans will be wondering what McCain’s vice-presidential choice means. Please pass this information along to your friends and family.

This is the longest I have ever gone without a job.

It was easy to ignore at first.  I was focused on the move, packing everything up, going through everything and throwing things away.  I was still job hunting of course, but the move itself felt like a full time job.

Now I’m settled in… and I’m starting to feel like a schlub.  I sit around the house all day while my mom is at work.  I feel so useless.  I’ve only been here about 4 days, and my mom, to her credit, has been really great.  She hasn’t been pushing me or criticizing me ( much. ), but I know that’s not going to last forever.  I want to be out of her hair as much as possible, and not feel as much as an imposition as I know I am.

There is a job that I’m really interested in, thats out in Orange County.  I feel kind of ridiculous, because when my friend told me it was open at her company, I was all “Oh, I would love to, but I really don’t want to live out in Orange County”.

But I kept thinking about it and thinking about it.  It seemed like a great opportunity that does not come along very often.  And as my mom put it, MOST people don’t look for jobs, really GOOD, FULFILLING, CAREER jobs in conjunction with where they live.  They look for a great job, and THEN figure out where to live.

So I contacted my friend, said I was interested, and what would I need to do.

I feel so foolish, because, even though they train, it seems like I don’t have the experience that they need.  Don’t get me wrong, I think I could do this job, and do it WELL, but the chances of me getting the job are slim.  I feel silly for a) hemming and hawing about it in the first place, and b) thinking I had a great chance of getting it.  It’s still not out of the realm of possibility… but it’s an odd sensation, setting aside your plans and expectations for something truly great, only to have it not really matter.

“hey, Allison… You are a fairly mature woman…why do you freak out like a 10 year old without their Ritalin whenever you see a Rabbit?

Well, first off, I don’t freak out over rabbits so much as I do over BUNNIES.  Rabbits and hares are fine and all, but BUNNIES… well, bunnies are the cutest thing in the world.

I must admit, it started with my mother.  Anyone who has ever been inside my mother’s house knows that her love of bunnies is displayed ALLL over her house.  On the bookshelves,

on the walls,

in the backyard

You aren’t hit over the head with bunnies, exactly. But there is a healthy sprinkling wherever you go.

When I was little, one of the books my mom read to me all the time was “The Runaway Bunny”

and would call me her little rabbit.

All that aside… bunnies are just the cutest thing in the world. I mean, C’MON!

They always look so perplexed, and yet oddly all knowing. If there were a scientific formula for cuteness, I think it would equal BUNNY.

So thats what’s up with all the bunnies. And just so you know, my powers are far reaching. I got my ex to be so enamored with bunnies, that we created “Bunasaurus”, aka, the biggest bunny in the world.

Just finished watching the second day of the Democratic National convention with my Mom and Eddie.  Nice family activity.  I’m so proud to belong to a long line of Democrats.  I didn’t really know much about Joe Biden, but I really got a good feeling from him.

And Bill Clinton is one of the most charismatic speakers I have ever seen.

I’m very much looking forward to Barack Obama’s acceptance speech tomorrow.

I love you “Weeds”.  First you give me Albert Brooks, and now Bob Odenkirk of my beloved Mr. Show!

I love me some Mr Show.

So thank you Weeds, for bringing more talented people to this cast. This almost makes up for the decline in storytelling this season.

This is probably going to sound really weird.

I just got proof that a married couple who both have webjournals that I enjoy are no longer together.  I had suspected this for a few months now, but I finally saw that stuff on her “About Me” page pertaining to him had been deleted.

I had suspected it for a while, there had been clues.  But seeing undeniable proof of it makes me really sad.

It’s silly, really.  I’ve never met these people, though I have exchanged a couple emails in the past with them (silly things, pertaining to the “Silence of the Lambs” Musical, and the most recent writers strike).  But I’ve been fans of both of them for years, and suspecting and knowing are too different things.

It seems like everyone is breaking up these days.  Maybe thats why it’s making me so sad.  It’s making my faith in Love harder and harder to keep strong.

(A Gold Star to you if you know what song the lyrics in the title of this post are from.)

(I’m pretty sure Elaine will know.)