Resolutions 2009 and Best of 2008

New Year's Resolutions, Best/Worst of lists, I love the end of the year for that. I don't like saying goodbye to the old year, but the proliferation of 100-best moments on E! makes it easier to bear.
Here is my list

Best Things about 2008:

1. Barack Obama's winning the Presidency. Best day in American history, hands down.
2. Tina Fey's impression of Sarah Palin.

To be finished later.

Songs about Boyfriends

Ah, in my eternal quest to catalog my love life, I've put together a list of songs that remind me of past boyfriends/lovers/or times in my life.

Boyfriend #3 (AR)

• "Sea of love" by Cat Power.
• "The Way I Are" - Timbaland.
• "Anyone Else But You" - Antsy Pants
• "I'm only Sleeping" - the Beatles
• "Maybe I'm Amazed" - Paul McCartney
• "How does it feel" - Voodoo
• "Great Divide" - the Cardigans

Boyfriend #2 (JK)

• "Don't you want me baby?" by Human League because I first heard the song when we were dancing at a bar.
• "Reflections" by Atmosphere, because I learned the song the day before we met.
• "Where'd You Go?" by Fort Minor because he kept leaving on trips.
• "Littlest Things" by Lily Allen.
• IF you go away - Emilina Torrini
• The Sweet Escape - Gwen Stefani

College Crush #3 (MG)

• "Portions for Foxes" by Rilo Kiley because he was 'bad news', my friends told me to forget him, and I liked him anyway.
• Girlfriend by Avril Levigne. I did not like his girlfriend.
• "Fidelity" = hmmm everyone

College Boyfriend #4 (PM)

• "Strong Enough" by Sheryl Crowe, because his wishy-washyness often made me feel like hell, and I was perfectly prepared to believe anything he said as long as it was what I wanted to hear.
• "My Humps" by Black Eyed Peas.

Boyfriend #1 (PK)

• "Amber" by 311 because he tried to play it on the guitar for me

Crush #1 (KE)

• "Kamasutra by Adassa, and "My Love" J-Timberlake because we danced to those. And then he said that he didn't want our relationship to go in  "that" direction. 

College Boyfriend #4 (AC)

• "Don't Matter" by Akon, because nobody wanted to see us together.

Washington DC Non-boyfriend #1 (JD)

• "Cold Shoulder" by Adele. Because everything he told me was lies, and his kept giving me the cold shoulder. Jerk.

Pregnant with Wedding Envy

My friend is pregnant and I am totally jealous.
You get so much attention when you are pregnant and everybody loves you.

You are your boyfriend/husband's primary concern.

People throw showers for you.

You get to pick out birth announcement stationery.

And names.

You get to eat and sleep a lot. And be fussed over.

You don't have to work full-time. (if your partner is rich enough)

My bra is too tight and my stomach has been upset all day. Was it Monday, my skirt being too tight? or was the jealousy eating my stomach lining? At any rate, I felt really beat today, so I found an empty committee room and took a nap. Felt awesome. Then I had to return to my desk and feel deadened by my job. ugh.

I super want to get married. It's a terrible desire when you have no money and a boyfriend of only a few months who is younger than you and has no expectation to propose.

Another high school friend was married yesterday.

Wish I had some witty line to insert somewhere, such as "I like to picture Jesus like a mischievous badger."

By the way, Cold Case Files was really good today. It was the episode about the serial rapist who asks to be put away for life.

I'm also pissed because I've gained 3-4 lbs in the past month or so. I'm betting 50% of is is a direct result of my newfound penchant for homemade cookies with my coffee in the morning (and the afternoon, evening, night). Or it could be that I've stopped exercising...Well I never really exercised. I did have a free gym membership for a week. And then I walked more before the blizzard and nasty weather set in. I have the Cherry Blossom 5k to run in a month. Fortunately, today I kicked myself into sending in the application for the AOC Fitness Center. Agh. Time for more wine.

Thoughts

I often think about this blog and feel guilty for abandoning it. One should always finish what one starts!
The place where I work has expressly forbidden its employees to blog about the office, so that takes away a great topic of conversation. And somehow writing about going to Marshalls just isn't exciting. I did, however, finally get to Sticky Fingers Bakery. Their carrot cake cupcake was DELICIOUS and I couldn't tell that it was vegan at all.
I spent a lot of time outside today. I walked to the bakery and back (2-3 miles), ran to DuPont Circle this morning because I was terribly late to proctor tests, walked to the circle again this evening.
I've been reading "Appointment in Samara" by John O'Hara. Its setting is similar to the early novels of F. Scott Fitzgerald. (My favorite author, with Edith Wharton and Margaret Atwood.)
Last night I watched "Revolutionary Road" which is a quietly devastating film. I had sympathy for Leonardo DiCaprio's character - a boy trying to figure out how to be a man/husband and father. Kate Winslet's character, April, the wife of Frank Wheeler, was less sympathetic. She really was a drama queen and pushing her husband to be whom she wanted  to be herself. It was all rather odd. And deeply sad. I like the Mad Men look of the film, though.
Tonight I also talked to a former lover, which was nice and melancholic at the same time. We've been through so much together - put each other through so much! - and now we are like combat buddies. Time and distance has cleared away the relationship debris (what a furious storm it was at times) and I can look back with calm and some nostalgia. I was so happy when he would let me be.
Enough about all that! What an odd place for my mind to go at this late hour. I must be very tired.

Since I'm not going to be dramatic in person...

Why doesn't he wear a wedding ring? Why did he not tell me he is married until I asked a month after we met? Why did he do all those exceptional things for me? It doesn't make any sense. Why did he talk about how much he loves his wife and children the whole time? agh!!!!!!!!

A New Vegan?

So I was reading "Skinny Bitch" which I finally broke down and paid for (discount through Amazon of course! So much for supporting local Kramerbooks). And it details the meat and poultry industry in a way that turns your stomach. Reading the history of the dairy movement and how it's really not designed for human bodies, and thus we have trouble digesting it, brought back the words of my dermatologist who suggested that I might have a dairy allergy. Last December I had tried to replace milk with soy milk on my morning cereal but found that I'd rather have rosacea than do that.
Finally, this morning I managed to break out of my denial and lethargy, went to Whole Foods, bought a different brand of soy milk. Had it on my granola, didn't taste super good but it was also warm and I'm used to cold milk. Anyway, I'm going to have to cut out cheese (which apparently is designed to make us crave it like little crack addicts), and eggs.
To this Herculean task I raise a glass. I told myself that if I can eat dairy free for a week then I will reward myself with Bloom lip gloss ($20) which I love love love.
As luck would have it, I found a store that carries Bloom on my walk this afternoon. I've run across only one other store that carries it, in Chicago, and they stopped a year ago. It seems to be fate!
Alright, I will keep you apprised of my challenges and success.
On another note, I think about boys too much.
I had the idea today, what if I had not called and pursued the young man who became my boyfriend my freshman year of college? Would my college life have been easier?
Enough for tonight.

Cry me a river, bankers.

Hey folks,
I've been so caught up in the whirlwind of Washington DC that I have ignored my blog. Unfortunately for me, we are absolutely forbidden to blog at work (above all other things that we could do on the internet) so I have to wait until I come home. By then I'm either tipsy or exhausted and it doesn't happen. Fortunately, I just had to get rid of my cable because I couldn't afford it, so I will have more free time on my hands. When I was paying an exorbitant amount for cable I felt that I ought to be watching it all the time.
Lots of bankers from JP Morgan Chase, Citibank, and Smith Barney called the office today crying aobut the possible loss of their bonuses if the Senate approves S. 651 (HR. 1586). "It will ruin my life!" one man wailed. I told him that losing a loved one would ruin his life, but losing his bonus would merely alter it significantly. He agreed.
So many of the people were whining as if their bubble of privilege had never been pricked. It was amusing, and hard to grasp. One person couldn't understand why my boss would vote for the tax on bonuses and he was a political science major. It was utterly bizarre.
Okay I'm exhausted. That's all for now. Must pick out an outfit for tomorrow and floss my teeth. In that order.

PS - I added the picture of the flowers because I love orchids. There was a room dedicated to them at the National Botanic Gardens.

RIP Paul

From left to right: Leon, Hugh, Dwight, Donna, Coloma and Paul Glenn. c. 1918


Paul Stanley Glenn died this morning at 5:35 a.m. He was 95 years old - so he had as long a life as anyone can ask for. He was in a lot of pain, though and it sounds like death did not come easily.
I will miss him. I will miss his link to the past - he is the last of the generation that saw two world wars, the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl, and the decimation of hegemonic white patriarchy. Apparently, he was rather cantankerous and gave his wife a hard time. I remember him as a jeweler (and I loved jewelry!), an old man with a big heart for his grand-nieces, and a gardener/apiarist.
I just feel so sad. I wish I could go to the funeral. He and my grandma were close and whenever I visited her (which I did at least once a year) we would usually visit Paul and Margaret in their home in Golden, CO. He is another lost link to my grandmother. sigh.
The funeral will be next Saturday. I send my love out into the universe, hopefully it will reach him somewhere. Hopefully he is near my grandmother now.