The Not-So-Secret Diary of a Bad Luck Girl

Tag, I’m it! By Running42K.

My eyes are different sizes. My right one is bigger and prettier, I have to say.

7) The one cuisine I dislike is Ethiopian. I’ve tried it a few times and I just can’t get into it. I don’t like the bread, and I don’t like that it’s messy.

6) When I was a baby, I was so shy that I’d freak out when anyone besides my parents or grandmother came near me. When we had guests, my father would have to hide out with me in the next room. Yes, neurotic baby.

5) I’m a bit agoraphobic. Wide open spaces, especially at night, freak me out a little. Tall buildings and trees feel like shelter.

4) In kindergarten my best friend Kristen always talked about how she was Catholic. I had no idea what this meant. My five-year old brain assessed what made Kristen different from me and I saw that she had very hairy arms. So I assumed that Catholics were people with hirsute limbs.

3) When I was 12, I used to lipsynch in my room to Olivia Newton-John. Not just lipsynch but put on full-length concerts. With costume changes.

2) My childhood/preteen/teenager crushes in chronological order were: 1) John Schneider (better known as Bo Duke of The Dukes of Hazzard), 2) Ralph Macchio, the Karate Kid himself, 3) C. Thomas Howell, 4) John Taylor of Duran Duran, and 5) River Phoenix.

1) I love looking at Flickr Explore. As a result, I’ve noticed the current influx of cupcake pictures. As a result, I ingested a giant s’mores cupcake this evening. Oink.

I know I’ve been tagged by Running42K – yay! blogger fodder! – but I had to share this first.

I might have mentioned there’s a woman, B., from my writing class who wanted to start a writing group after class ended. She asked me and another individual to join. I was all for it – till the other individual decided not to do it. Then I did too since it wasn’t so much a group anymore, and, to be honest, the other individual is a really good writer and B., well, isn’t. Still, I said maybe I’d join again if we could find some more people.

So now there are two of them, both from class. B. invited me to join their next meeting. I said yes, then about a week before decided I didn’t have enough time. I was going on vacation and then away again the following week. Lame of me? Probably.

Why have I been so reluctant?

1) I don’t think B. or the other woman, L., are that great writers. Sometimes they gave okay feedback, but those were one or two nuggets in an hour-long workshop session involving several other people, including the teacher, a pro.

2) They insist on meeting in Brooklyn. Not Williamsburg, which is two stops from Union Square, but another area, which would take me an hour to get to. An HOUR. And two subways.

Recently they asked me a third time to join. This time I decided to be honest. I said I’d like to, but could we meet in Manhattan instead. It would be very difficult for me to get to that part of Brooklyn by 6 PM on a work day, and then would take me even longer to get back home (next day was a work day too). I also offered to provide comments via email if Manhattan was a no go.

Shortly after my message, I got the following from L:

B. –

Here’s Anna May’s reply. As usual, the distance from Manhattan to Brooklyn is far longer than the distance from Brooklyn to Manhattan. Or: two Brooklynites are worth one Manhattanite? I’m so tired of it!

What she asks isn’t, in my opinion, reasonable. We could offer to change the time, and to drive her to where she can pick up the 4,5 afterwards. Depending on where she works, it might not be hard to get to where you think we could eat.

But I fear she will, in the grand tradition, decline. Oh well.

Let me know what you think.

L.

Obviously she sent the message to me by mistake. Hello, basic email skills? And double hello, you asked me to join your group. YOU asked ME. I didn’t say, “Hey, I want to have a writing group, schlep to the Upper East Side from Brooklyn!” I didn’t say, “Please, please, please, can I join your writing group?” No, I passive aggressively declined twice.

Sure, I should be more honest and up front. But they could also buy a clue. PLUS, I offered up my feedback via email. That entails reading 20 some odd pages – sometimes twice – and providing extensive comments and, in my case, edits because I can’t help it. That’s a lot in my book.

Like I’m really going to want to join their group now.

I didn’t respond right away, and didn’t even know if I should. I asked YP for advice and he kindly crafted the following:

L. –

I’m terribly sorry if my request offended you. I certainly didn’t mean to imply that those who live in Manhattan are in any way better than those who live in Brooklyn. Your email has made me realize that my request was, in fact, unreasonable, as was my hope to be able to fit this into my schedule.

Best of luck to the both of you and, again, thank you for thinking of me.

Anna May

Awesome.

She wrote back apologizing profusely and saying it wasn’t personal but a general gripe about Manhattanites not wanting to come to Brooklyn, and then asked me AGAIN to join, and also that they were thinking of forming a bigger group in the fall.

I haven’t written back yet. I guess I could respond, No hard feeling but no thanks, citing scheduling issues and also the fact that I’ll most likely be taking a class in the fall. Haven’t decided yet.

I find it all more hilarious than upsetting.

As for the freelance journalist, we successfully set up a meeting time for Monday. In that case, I don’t mind heading down to her ‘hood since I’m aware that she’s doing me a favor. Some other people should take a lesson from that.

As I write like crazy for submission to online and other publications, I can’t think of anything to write for this blog, except to complain that:

It’s noisy as my office windows are being worked on. Okay, at least I have an office. And a window.

It’s too hot.

The journalist daughter of my parents’ friends is beginning to annoy me. I wrote to her last week, and she suggested meeting up Thursday or Friday this week. I said, okay Thursday night, and wrote today to confirm. She wrote back, “Sorry Anna May, things have been crazed. Tomorrow night? Did we set something up? It’s doable, although I have a dinner from 6:30-9:30. What did you have in mind?”

Um, what I had in mind was our whole email conversation.

I hate it when people use their “crazy lives” as an excuse for disorganization and forgetfulness. Still, I know she’s doing me a favor so I nicely suggested tomorrow afternoon instead, if that would be easier for her. Sorry to be a nerd, but I don’t feel like schlepping out at 9:30 when I have to get up early for work tomorrow.

If the chat doesn’t work out with her, I’m not going to sweat it. There are other writers I can talk to.

But I’m not all about the complaints (really, I’m not!). This week I’m happy that:

Work has been pretty quiet (knock wood). My boss is caught up in this other project and has pretty much been leaving me alone. Except tomorrow morning we have a catch-up meeting, which usually opens the floodgates for lots of unnecessary work.

I’m home this weekend. I love traveling and visiting friends and family, but I also love having the balance of time at home. Plus my apartment needs a good scrubbing.

ES invited me up to Boston next weekend. More traveling, woohoo!

My 1 PM meeting just got canceled. Double woohoo!

Now if I’d just win the lottery. Though I guess I should start to play first. Details, details.

“I’m sorry I have to pee.”
On Friday the train ride down was semi-nice. It was sort of crowded, and unfortunately I got stuck with a snotty seatmate, ie, when I had to get by her to go to the bathroom – very politely saying, “Excuse me” – she stared at me like it was a huge inconvenience. Hey, you pick an outside seat next to someone, that’s the risk you’re gonna take.

Still, I was afraid to go to the bathroom again. I waited till my bladder was near-bursting, then did gymnastics to get over her without her having to move.

SG picked me up at Union Station, and after dropping off my stuff, we had a delicious dinner of of wood fire pizza at Ella’s Pizza. I had the four-cheese one – sometimes I feel like I can eat cheese all day long – and we ended up getting free dessert.

The manager had very kindly asked if we could move tables so that he could put two two-persons one together to make one four. It wasn’t a big deal since there was an empty two-person right behind us. Plus chocolate pudding on the house! Woohoo!

That’s a damned good breakfast roll.
I told SG the one thing I wanted to do was to visit the Amish market we went to last time. It was funny because she had been thinking she needed to go there but that I wouldn’t want to.

Saturday mornings, the place gets pretty crowded, but the food is oh so very good. I had a vanilla latte and this bacon, egg, and cheese breakfast roll. Let me make this clear: it was no ordinary breakfast roll. The outside was made out of this pretzel dough that is at once salty and sweet, not to mention buttery, and the ingredients were all good and fresh and the perfect melted-ness and temperature. I wish I had one right now.

Getting crafty
Later that afternoon we went to SG’s friend’s T-shirt stenciling party. I haven’t done arts and crafts since junior high when I made a pillow in the shape of a surf board (don’t ask) so I was a bit nervous.

When we walked in, everyone was already hard at work, heads bent over stenciling like they were taking the SATs. Someone very quickly explained the how-to’s, which to us sounded like, “Blah blah blah, exacto knife, yadda yadda yadda, iron, etc etc, paint.”

I realized the print out I brought was way too complicated, and opted for a very simple graphic instead. SG finished hers first, and seeing the stencil in action, I finally got it.

It was pretty fun. In three short hours, I made one shirt with an octopus that kind of looks like an alien, and another with a row of penguins. I want to add to the octopus shirt – perhaps other sea creatures as one of the more experienced T-shirt makers suggested – and fix the penguins with another coat of paint.

Please excuse me while my mouth burns down.
Saturday night we went to this Korean restaurant that SG has been wanting to try. Overall the food was excellent. SG got bibimbap, while I had a spicy beef soup. While for some reason I could handle the soup, the seafood pancake we shared was almost unbearably hot. The pajeans I’ve had are usually mild.

A funny thing happened on the way to the library.
While we were driving around on Saturday, I told SG my possible plans for a career change, among them getting a degree in library science.

At one point we drove past the convention center and saw these sort of nerdy looking folks still wearing their nametags on the street (which I do at conventions as well, then wonder how complete strangers know my name).

The next morning SG found out that it was the American Library Association’s Annual Conference. Weird!

Now before anyone protests about librarians and nerdiness, I have one thing to say: evening wear and birkenstocks.

Yeah.

“A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction.”

“. . .to work, even in poverty and obscurity, is worthwhile.”

Yep, traveling again, crazy girl I am. This time it’s to our nation’s capital to see my pal SG. Luckily the weather is pretty bearable so far. In fact today it’s rather cool.

I’m looking forward to the three-hour train ride. Unlike flying, I can ride the train forever. All that leg room, plus being able to walk around, plus not having to go through all that security, plus none of that awful high-altitude dry air.

I Googled my parents’ friend’s daughter. She’s quite an accomplished food/travel writer. She even has a book. And yet her parents are unhappy. Go figure.

Next weekend I was supposed to go to my parents’ but my mom has extended her stay in Cali. My grandmother had a fall a week or so ago, and she hurt something, though what we don’t know yet. What we do know is that she’s in a lot of pain. My mother said she couldn’t lie down all night and just sat in a chair, and that she has trouble moving at all.

At the hospital, they tested for blood clots. None to be had. Maybe she slipped a disc or hurt her pelvis.

I feel bad she’s in so much pain, which she has been for many years due to a calcification of her knee, but I feel worse imagining everyone’s grief – my mom’s especially – if my grandmother, well you know (since I’m a wee bit superstitious, I’ll refrain from spelling it out), though she is over 90.

My grandmother has changed so much over the years; we’re guessing she’s had a series of mini-strokes. She used to be loud, stubborn, and vivacious. When she laughed, she laughed hard. She never held back criticism, which could be sort of annoying.

Now she talks and moves in slow motion, as though underwater. I’m almost surprised that she still recognizes everybody, but she does. She’s still cognizant – it’s her body that’s failing her.

What makes me want to cry is remembering in Vegas, while we were taking group photos, I knelt down by her wheelchair and she looked at me with such delight, this huge slow smile on her face, as though she were saying, “There’s my first granddaughter!”

I hope she’ll be okay.

Except that I’m oh so very tired.

Monday night I took the red eye back to New York. Unlike the first leg of my trip, this one left early and got in early. Unfortunately, the bags took for-EV-er to arrive. I was at baggage claim at 6:15 AM, but didn’t get to leave till 7.

At home I crashed till about 12:30. That, in combination with my having become accustomed to Pacific time, meant I didn’t go to sleep that night till after 1. Then up at 7.

Not bad, but while last night I drifted off at 10:30, I woke up at 4, started thinking about work, then couldn’t sleep anymore. At least I got a lot of personal stuff done at home before I left – polishing my resume, working on a short story – as well as actual work stuff this morning.

I’ve been craving salty foods and have been totally going overboard. Between all the miso soup, crunchy Asian snacks, and sausage this morning, my mouth is a pickle.

I applied for a few positions here at my company. Wait and see. Also yesterday an agency person approached me about applying for a job. That’s appealing because we’ve done so much work with that agency, and I really like the person who approached me. But it’s in New Jersey so the commute might be a pain. Then again, a lot of their clients are in New York.

I’m back and forth about what I want to do. While I do think another corporate job wouldn’t be that different from my current one, at least the people would be different. That’s the real kicker.

For the long-term I’m exploring a variety of options. The freelance writing/travel thing, the library science thing (why, I’m not even sure). In August a school here is having an open house about their program so I can see if it’s even something I want to do.

Next week I’m meeting up with the daughter of my parents’ friends. I believe she’s a freelance journalist. She *was* an attorney, but then she got divorced, said screw it all, and pursued her real dream.

Her parents aren’t happy but who cares. It’s not like they’re supporting her financially. They’re just worried since freelancing is less “stable” than a corporate job. But what’s the worst that could happen? It’s not like she has kids to feed. And she could probably find another corporate job if need be.

I’m really looking forward to speaking with her. Makes me feel like I’m actually doing something about my writing, beyond just, well, writing.

I’ve been so occupied these past couple of weeks, I’ve hardly thought about H. He’s reactivated his online ad. I went in to find email messages from DK (fodder for an essay) and noticed. I was surprised that it didn’t bother me. I mean, why should it? I went on a dating site too (for a split second anyway).

Poor guy. He won’t find anyone else as cool as me.

(It’s long but it’ll go fast. I promise.)

Number of hours it should theoretically take to drive from Los Angeles to Las Vegas: 4.3

Number of hours one will inevitably stuck in traffic because people with broken down cars don’t know how to properly pull off to the side of the road: 1.2

Percentage of scenery on the drive from L.A. to Las Vegas that is barren desert wasteland: 90

Number of yucca trees in attendance: 5,235

Number of In-N-Out Burgers along the way: 2

Number of Peggy Sue’s ’50s Diners: 1

Number of phone calls made to mother, uncle, and cousin regarding hotel check-in, after which we still won’t have a clear answer: 4

Number of times mother says, “Everyone’s at the buffet”: 7

Number of minutes we realize it shouldn’t take so long for our uncle to walk from the buffet to hotel check-in: 20

Number of phone calls to find out that mother, uncle, and uncle’s family aren’t in the buffet but on their way from the airport: 1

Ounces of coffee ingested collectively by this point: 72 (24 per person)

Number of times cousin and I will be grossed out when a random lady implies that we’re hooking up when I say, “We’ll meet you in your room”: 1

Number of changes of clothes I brought for a weekend in Vegas: 3

Number I actually needed: 6

Number of buffets attended by Won’t clan: 3

Number of buffets attended before getting sick of buffet: 1

Average number of plate refills by Won’t clan: 3

Number of plate refills by cousin TL: 6

Average temperature on a typical June day in Las Vegas: 115 F

Average temperature on a typical June evening in Las Vegas: 114 F (kidding, more like upper 80s, but still felt like an oven)

Number of minutes one can spend outside during the day before one feels one will burst into flames: .5

Number of “ones” mentioned in the sentence above: 3

Minimum degree of SPF protection one needs to keep skin from burning to a crisp: 50

Number of sakes it takes to get me bright red: .75

Average number of pounds the typical Las Vegas tourist is overweight: 78.9

Average number of Asians in traveling Asian packs: 8.6

Ratio between decrepit-looking cocktail waitresses and attractive cocktail waitresses: 1:1

Difference between decrepit-looking and attractive waitress’ cocktail uniforms: 0

Number of minutes between uncle saying, “We’ll be there soon,” and actual arrival: 30

Ratio between amount of exertion it takes to walk from Bally’s to the Mirage at noon on a typical June day in Las Vegas (see average tempature above) and the quality of the buffet at the Mirage: 2:1

Number of people who will almost faint upon the walk back from the Mirage to Bally’s: 2

Amount of money lost by me on video poker: $10

Amount of money spent by me on the rip-off of a gym at Bally’s: $22

Number of bottles of water and pieces of fruit pilfered by me from said rip-off of a gym: 4, 2

Average cost of 16 oz bottle of water: $4

Average cost of 16 oz bottle of beer: $4

Number of jokes my aunt will tell that involves the very loud pronouncement, “Woof! woof!”: 1

Number of times she’ll tell it within a 5-minute span: 2

Number of languages she’ll use to tell it: 2

Times my mother gets the joke: .3

Number of jokes my aunt will tell that involves breasts, penises, camels, and elephants: 1

Average duration of time my cousins and I will be mortified: 44.6 years

Number of combinations of family members the Won’t clan can devise for group pictures: 136

Number of times Caesar’s Palace is bigger than my apartment: 10,000,000,000

Coolness factor on a scale of 1 to 10 of the fountain show at Bellagio: 10

Cheesiness factor of Neptune/Fire and Ice fountain show at Caesar’s: 10

Number of girls in slutty outfits waiting in line to get in a nightclub called Pure at Caesar’s: 136

Flabbergastedness factor: 10

Number of mothers, aunts, and uncles it takes to come to a decision about where to eat for brunch on the last day: 0

Number of neices named Anna May: 1

Number of items I will break in one minute on the drive back from Las Vegas to L.A.: 2 (my sunglasses and my iPod holder)

Number of times I’ll return to Las Vegas in the summer: 0