…so far…
–finally met B&D’s baby. I don’t like babies because I don’t find them very amusing, but she was not too bad. Mainly we thought of stupid ways to pose her (my brilliant idea was to put her in a flower pot like a cheesy anne geddes portrait–but only bc her outfit made her look like a snow pea) and then took like 10 billion pictures. I also fed B’s baby, and got B’s breast milk all over my sweater thanks to Baby spitting up on me.
–Work went ballistic about me ‘working remotely’, even though its been on the calendar for months now, and even tho my boss knew about it. It’s actually my boss’ boss who is like 1950s old school devil wears prada that was going nuts. She likes to have me in the office not because she has anything important to say, but bc she is the most frazzled person I know, and has to have me and my boss there to calm her down. I am not joking. She comes by his or my desk no fewer than 10 times a day to “download” the same information at 4:30pm that she told us at 10am. It drives me fucking crazy. Anyway, my boss got yelled at because apparently managers should always be in office (isnt this contrary to what it should be?) and then when we were talking about it, I got so pissed off I guilt tripped him and said, “well guess what? Last year, after my dad died, I worked the entire christmas season alone. I didn’t get to be with my family. I got to be here when nobody else was. And I won’t do that again. Honestly, it’s not worth it to me.” Which made him feel really bad. I think he told Devil wears Prada, because she kept sending me emails about how much she missed me and how she hopes me and my family are doing ok. Weird.
–Unlike most people who work from home, I really work from home. During my working hours, I am 100% available and on call. I am at my computer. I am at my phone. I am online. I answer all messages/emails/calls/IMs. I am not: at the hot tub, away on vacation, being a ‘couch potato,’ shopping, getting my nails done, traveling, fill in other things people have told me that they do when they are working remotely. I say this bc last week, I only volunteered to work bc it is one of our busiest weeks. I would have preferred to had the time off to…well, have time off. Fat chance. It was so frustratingly stressful and busy, and I wasn’t even actually in office. But, the silver lining to all of this was, that, during all the back-and-forth, and waiting, and dilly dallying while the execs went back and forth on business decisions, I was able to update my resume and have it proofread by 2 people whose opinions I trust. *Relief* Go me.
–NG came Weds night and left this afternoon. We did nothing but eat, shop, and watch movies. Literally, that’s all we did. I enjoyed it. It was nice having another person here. In fact, it felt pretty natural. We did venture back to Gunspoint to my favorite clearance store (daylight this time) and he bought me a pretty cool dress. We also went to Old Towne Spring and walked around. I don’t know why, but I love that place. I especially love going there during Christmas. Lots of memories, I guess, but something about the way the light filters through the trees there make it seem like another time; another place.
–We discovered and are in love with redbox videos. Those are the video stands (i.e. red boxes) that you see in walmarts, at grocery stores, outside of mcdonalds (of all places). New release movies go for one buck a day. Oh technology. We are having a great time figuring out how to burn our stash of dollar dvds to watch at a later date.
–We had our Christmas feast tonight–Christmas Eve. Tomorrow, we have been invited to have Chinese food with our Viet side of the family at one of our most-visited restaurants. I really do not feel like going.
–Christmas 2007 is finally here, and as always, I was waiting for some miraculous spirit of christmas reindeer landing on my roof with peace on earth and all that. Of course, it is just another day, or i guess, to be more optimistic, it is like any day in that it is what you make of it. I guess I always expect some sort of “magic” to occur, but now I don’t even feel the build up, the anticipation, the excitement. It comes, it goes, and it just feels like…nothing. Maybe this is why people have kids–so they can enjoy Christmas for 18 more years of their lives. There was one thing that felt kind of “Christmassy” though–and that was when It’s a Wonderful Life came on network tv. I’ve pretty much watched that movie every Christmas (except maybe the last few). Watching that movie holds a lot of memories for me as a kid, and seeing it again…well, it kind of made me feel like a kid again, in my room with the 2 candelabras in my window, listening to Billie Holiday Christmas music, and wrapping silly presents like Mambo Bars and Life Saver Books for my family.
Merry Christmas.
