Month: February 2004

Can’t wait to get my CD Price-fixing check. Whoo-hoo. A grand total of $13.86. It guess it’s better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, and since I didn’t purchase that many CDs during the time covered by the class-action suit, I suppose I’m ahead. Still seems almost pointless. Lawyers get richer, the folks accused of wrong-doing admit no wrong, and consumers get a check for less than the cost of one new retail CD.

Um, nifty.

Exercise / Diet update:

Diet-wise, not bad, but not good. I’m keeping with the Atkins plan… except for the candy I sneak in (I had at least three small pieces of chocolate today, and a cookie. Mmm… cookie.) Not to mention the soy latte I had (although, honestly, that’s only 10 grams of carbs.)

Also, I had carbs, evil, empty carbs, with each meal: breakfast included an English muffin, lunch and dinner both included tortillas, although dinner was a spinach tortilla (green veggies, good; flour, bad.) So, out of a ten possible points, ten being a perfect, less-than-20-grams-of-carbs Atkins-y day, I give myself a 4.5. OK, maybe a 5.

Exercise-wise, though, I did very good today. I started the day with my usual .5 mile walk to the bus stop, and went in early and ran on the elliptical trainer for a full 34 minutes (last four minutes were a cool-down.) I mostly took the stairs in the Mead building today, and then tonight, when I had to go to the union hall and vote, I took the bus from home to about 17th and Powell, then walked up to 26th and Powell, voted, and then walked all the way home — a total of about 3.4 miles, in about an hour, which Prevent Disease tells me burned an extra 366 calories, hopefully making up for the soy latte and the candy and cookies I ate today.

I know I feel better having walked all that way. Kinda nice to be alone in my head, too. Relaxing.

The following is a helpful discussion of how to identify and deal with
an introvert.

article by J. Rauch in the Atlantic Monthly

It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a while, at least since Jake tried multiple times to get a hold me me the weekend I disappeared to the coast, and why I reacted so strongly. I told Jake that he’d “freaked out” (he’d called me several times over the course of the weekend, left at least five messages, and drove over to my apartment to see if I was around but not answering my phone). His response was that he was just being a friend and checking on me.

It came up again last night in a conversation with my friends. Caleb was talking about how to cheer up his girlfriend, who was going through a bad time. Both Jake and Caleb seemed mildly shocked when I asserted that, if someone I knew was depressed, I do not think it possible to “try to cheer them up”. In fact, I think it’s nearly impossible to do, and I wouldn’t even make the attempt.

I really think that, for myself, if I’m feeling low or sad or depressed, that the best thing for my friends to do is to ignore it, allow me some space, assume that if I appear grumpy or irritable that it’s not directed at them personally, maybe make ONE gentle offer to be available IF I ASK FOR HELP, and then to stop asking me if I’m OK.

I’m now putting in a smiley face to soften what I just said; it reads grumpier than I meant it –>

🙂

The problem with the assumption that you (the generic “you” of whoever is reading this) can cheer me up is that, from my point of view, it’s also the assumption that I am not able to deal with it myself… which translates to me thinking that you think I’m not capable or strong, that I am, in fact, weak. Which is why I bristle at the suggestion.

I understand that others don’t think that way. In fact, it appears that the majority of people don’t feel that way (depending on what research you dig up).

It’s just been something on my mind lately.

I love reading the “Chance Meetings” page in the Willy Week. All those people who want a second chance, after they realized that they should have done something different the first frickin’ time.

I think this one is my favorite this week:

“Let planets align.It’s not surreal, it hovers the edge of insane- yet.. I am broken almost beyond hope,still must try. Damned surrounding walls. Hear it too. It begins.”

So much emotional turmoil. Out of context, it’s difficult to find any clues as to who posted it, or who it’s intended for. The author must think that the person who is supposed to respond will recognize themselves, or the author, or something. Maybe it’s an inside joke? Or, not “joke”, really, but something else…

Or maybe it’s deliberately cryptic. No one is supposed to get it. I can see that angle, too.

Went to Everyday Music (they don’t actually have a website, the losers¹) the other night, and lurking in the used bins I found an out-of-print (is that even the right term for a CD?) EP by Radiohead that was released in 1998, made up of B-sides that didn’t make the cut for their “OK Computer” album. The CD is called “Airbag / How Am I Driving”. Seven songs total, one of them just the album version of “Airbag”, which I’d already heard.

I bought it, just because I already know I like Radiohead, and I thought I had all their music. It’s kind of cool finding brand-new music like that; I thought I’d memorized their entire catalog.

After I bought it, plunking down eight dollars and fifty cents, I went to Starbucks and ripped it to my iPod (I love that!) and listened to it on the bus home. While ripping it, I checked Amazon and found that it went, used, for fifty bucks or more! Guess I got a good deal, then…

Anyway, these songs are great… and seem to represent a transition from their earlier stuff, like “Creep”, to their newer, more electronica stuff. Nifty.

I don’t know if it’s jut the novelty of stuff I hadn’t heard before, or just the fact that I used to think “The Bends” was their greatest album and these remind me a little of that CD, but a couple of the songs on here have really stuck with me.

Like this one:

Palo Alto

In a city of the future
It is difficult to concentrate
Meet the boss, meet the wife
Everybody’s happy
Everyone is made for life

In a city of the future
It is difficult to find a space
I’m too busy to see you
You’re too busy to wait

But I’m okay, how are you?
Thanks for asking, thanks for asking
But I’m okay, how are you?
I hope you’re okay too

Everyone one of those days
When the sky’s California blue
With a beautiful bombshell
I throw myself into my work
I’m too lazy, I’ve been kidding myself for so long

I’m okay, how are you?
Thanks for asking, thanks for asking
But I’m okay, how are you?
I hope you’re okay too