You're Doing It Wrong

One project on my list that I can’t seem to get to is to the seasonal cleaning of the clothes closet. One brilliant thing about our house, that I don’t think we understood the importance of when we bought it, is that we each have our own closet. I’m not sure how spacious it is by average woman standards but I’m not a woman who needs racks and racks of clothes so for me, the closet is perfect.

It took me years to figure this out but when winter is over I take all my wool stuff to the cleaners and then take the clean, plastic-wrapped stuff and stick it in the back of the closet. Then that first blustery day in November I have clean warm clothes to wear. I used to shove them to the back dirty and nothing like pulling out dirty clothes from 6 months earlier when you need something to wear.

I don’t have very many outfits to begin with and now I’ve put most of them away. But I’ve never pulled out all the spring/summer stuff and checked that it’s cleaned, ironed, mended and/or has matching parts. So every morning I have to scrounge around to find clothes and basically just recycle the same 4 outfits over and over. We’ll see if I’m inspired to clean it this weekend.

This afternoon I’m taking off for a Leadership Conference for Native American Women hosted by the Coquille Tribe. The most gorgeous man I have ever spoken face-to-face with in my life was from the Coquille Tribe. I have high hopes for this adventure. Plus I haven’t done anything like this in ages and could use the pick-me-up. It’s at least a 4 hour drive and I get to pick all the music so I headed for the basement in search of the mix tapes. I found the college music tape, the Cathouse tape and a tape my sister did for me and a tape one of her friends did for me, both featuring stuff like Throwing Muses, Screaming Trees and a lot of Bob Mould.

One more musical note: last night on The Tube they showed the Talk Talk video. Amazing coincidence or cosmic voodoo?

I’ll be offline until at least Friday night. Enjoy the rest of your week.

Right now I’m reading Love is A Mix Tape by Rob Sheffield given to me by Hannah. I didn’t intend to read this book right now because I’m still reading The Leopard that I started last weekend plus I went to the library and brought home a stack of fun books and started reading some of those plus I bought a couple books and started reading those. I normally don’t start 10 books at once and I’m not sure why I’m doing it now but I suspect it’s some sort of knee-jerk reaction from the four months wasted with The Fortress of Solitude and besides, it’s good for my brain to be fed from so many different directions. I intended to just read the first chapter of the Sheffield book and you know how it goes sometimes, next thing you know I was “one more chapter”-ing until dinner.

The book is a memoir where everything relates to the author’s love of music. Sorta like Nick Hornby. Each chapter starts with a cassette label with the song list of a mix tape.

Now that I’ve started writing this I realize that discussing mix tapes is going to have to be it’s own separate post because I have a lot to say about this. I’m going to try to write it tomorrow. I have a gnarly week at the office because I have a lot to do and I’m taking some time off so not very much time to do it.

So quickly: Mad Hot Ballroom.
Have you heard of this movie? It’s a documentary about these kids in NYC who learn ballroom dancing in school and the schools compete against each other. It’s fabulous. The kids and their teachers are amazing. Recommended.

Lost
Anyone else finding it funny how so many people seeming to be finding their way to this island?

Sourdough
Remember the sourdough? It’s been neglected in the fridge for almost a month. I fed it on Saturday and it just sat in the bottom of the bowl doing little so yesterday I fed it again and put it in a plastic canister (can’t think of a better way to describe and didn’t think to photo the process), then put the container in a dish with warm water and tented it. This was the method suggested at class and I have no idea why I didn’t try it sooner. The sourdough loved it. It doubled and fourpled in volume exactly like it was supposed to. I made some biscuits that were a huge hit and put the rest in the fridge. I’m going to give the bread making another go next week.

In the 80’s during the big hair band era I spent my weekends hanging out on the Sunset Strip and a small portion of my professional life working on music videos for a variety of performers but a lot of them were hair bands.

I don’t like to use the word “collect” because it wasn’t like I was out on the hunt, but I did manage to accumulate a small collection of guitar picks which I was pretty excited about at the time. Of course half of them don’t say the name of the band and now I can’t remember what band they came from. If I was really clever I’d think up a word for it like worthless nostalgia or collectible amnesia that conveys the sense of saving something that has personal importance only to forget what it is rendering it meaningless. There’s probably a great philosophical nugget in there somewhere because don’t all our material objects eventually become meaningless?

I’ve been sitting at my desk all day accomplishing things and dinner is in 3 minutes so I’m in no position to put together a coherent discussion.

The far left pick, no idea but looks cool so let’s say The Cult. I worked on the first video Extreme ever did. I remember talking to Gary Cherone and him telling me how crazy it was to be in Los Angeles making a video. Tesla was a favorite that I’d seen in concert. You think after hearing the song 1000 times at the video shoot, I would remember which one it was but, nope. Guns N’Roses was a huge thrill as they were the biggest thing on the planet at the time. And Jailhouse was my favorite local band (dang, even found a photo) who I would go see every time they played. I still have the t-shirt. I think I even have a cassette somewhere with some Jailhouse songs.

Yesterday was my busiest day at work that I can remember in eons. At the old office I took all the incoming calls so if it was a busy phone day, sometimes I couldn’t get anything done.

At the new office the receptionist directs the attorney calls to the attorney or their voicemail unless the person wants to speak to the assistant. Yesterday, everyone wanted to speak to the assistant. Plus some new things came up for me and some old things that I thought were gone came back and I ended up jumping around all day, took a 15 minute lunch and didn’t fool around at all. It was great and the day flew by.

Two quick updates. #1 — my car is finished and pretty again. Excellent to have it back. They did a very nice job but it’s hard not to feel a teeny bit wistful about how much more fun it would have been to spend that money on a plane ticket to somewhere exotic. They also made the inside smell like new car again. I didn’t know that was possible. #2 — the great ant elimination continues. I tried to take a picture of the shop to show you the carpet of ants of every shape, size and wing configuration that is spread across the floor but the outcome didn’t look too impressive.

I had some more comments on yesterday’s post. One is that I realize I write a “Why Can’t I get Anything Done?” post at least every other month. This is an ongoing issue that a number of years ago felt like “I never have any time.” Now I feel like I have time but can’t get anything done. Perhaps it would be a valuable exercise to explore the difference is but either I don’t have time or I should put it on my list.

I can remember being in my 20’s and spending oodles of time sitting in my room listening to records or sleeping in Sunday, reading the paper with a pot of coffee, going out to breakfast, then coming home and taking a nap. I have no recollection of worrying about getting things done back then.

Using what I learned from my “Get More Done Than Ever Before!” article I read yesterday, I made a list of three things that I wanted to do this weekend that would give me a sense of accomplishment. None of those things is blogging about ants so I’m off.

I feel like I’ve been spinning my wheels. Forever.

This is not a new feeling and seems to run in cycles where I feel more and more mired in the routine every day crap until finally something comes along to shake me out of it. Then life rolls on again until the next cycle of stuck. I should probably be careful about complaining about this because there are all kinds of bad things that could shake things up and that’s not what I’m going for.

I thought the NYC trip would stir me up a bit more but not really.

I’m having a hard time articulating myself this morning. This week has been extra long. With one car I’ve been leaving earlier and we’ve had something going on after work every night this week. And I have a couple of huge projects at the office that require a lot of brain juice that I’m trying to keep reeled in.

What happens on these longs days is I start to think about all the things I want to get done on the weekend when I have time. Then when the time finally rolls around I’m tired and my brain is squeezed dry and once I’ve run an errand or two and run the laundry then my motivation vanishes and I end up organizing my envelope collection in front of the TV.

I was going to go into a thing about the big rocks first and blah blah blah being productive. But really, productive compared to what? I have too many internal rules. I should spend all day Saturday finger painting. (Even just joking about it is giving me a small coronary. Finger painting? But how will all the stuff get done?)

Just now when I plugged “big rocks first” into a search engine to find a link to that story I got a bunch of hits on productivity articles. Does anyone else find it funny how many online sites are devoted to ideas for productivity? You could spend all day doing nothing except keeping up with the latest on productivity.

The reason I bring up productivity articles is that I can never resist the urge to read an article that promises to teach me the secrets to be more productive. It’s sort of like all those articles I read between the ages of 15-35 that promised to teach me the secrets of losing weight.

I already know: There is no secret. You have to do it. Weight loss? Burn more than you take in. There is no secret formula of grapefruit and cauliflower that’s going to make it easier. It’s not like pie crust where there might actually be a secret like chill the butter or roll it out between two sheets of wax paper (which totally didn’t work).

I already know if I want to get stuff done I have to do it. My big productivity tip, which I have trouble implementing: want to do less stuff.

1. Paranormal Stories. I loved stories about the Bermuda Triangle. The missing air patrol – how could they have just vanished? And I loved the stories about abandoned ships that were found with warm cups of coffee sitting on the table and bacon frying in the pan but no sign of people. I also read everything about UFOs, Atlantis, ghosts, Big Foot and the Abominable Snowman, and Loch Ness monster. I also had a book that told about unexplained mysteries like people who walked under a ladder and disappeared. But sometimes you might hear their voice if you stood near where they disappeared.

2. Bible Stories at the Dentist’s Office. My family never went to church when we were growing up (or ever). My sister and I went to Sunday School a little bit with our babysitter but overall my exposure to Bible stories was minimal. My dentist office had these big books of illustrated Bible stories which I loved and looked forward to reading every time I had to sit in that waiting room. Of course now I’m drawing a big blank on the stories I liked except Androcles and the lion. The other part I remember is when Jesus floated up into the sky to Heaven. This caused me a bit of worry because I wanted to know how far he floated and was he scared when he got up high and could this happen to me and what sort of outer space/heaven transition was there and how long did it take to get there?

3. Guiness Book of World Records. Is there any kid who didn’t LOVE this book? I always wanted to find a record I could break. Remember the photo of the guy with the crazy long curled fingernails? I also remember The Who had the loudest rock concert. I was always fascinated by the oldest living people and the oldest lady who’d had a child. One of the editors was on the Daily Show and he was funny. He said people send them all sorts of weird stuff like huge pieces of skin or stuff he didn’t even want to talk about.

4. 1972 World Book Encyclopedia. We had a set of encyclopedias that were handy for homework projects. No Google in the Seventies. There was a human body section with several clear pages with a slice of the human body so you could see bones on one page, muscles on another page, guts on another page.

I’m not sure how this happened, but it’s only first thing Monday morning and I’m already feeling a bit frazzled. I hope I can shake it off otherwise this is going to be a long week.

I forgot to mention earlier that I enjoyed Jonathan Lethem at the lecture and also officially gave up on his book and put it in the “to return” pile. He has a non-fiction collection and I’m going to give that a try someday.

Meanwhile, I recently found Shorpy which is “a photo blog about what life a hundred years ago was like: How people looked and what they did for a living, back when not having a job usually meant not eating.” It’s very cool and I highly recommend checking it out.

It’s hard to feel good about yourself when every time you walk out the front or back door you see a giant pile of ants staggering around in crooked circles. Whenever people charge me a large sum of money to solve a problem I’ve diagnosed myself on a matter I have zero experience with I’m always worried I’m getting hosed. Not this time. I didn’t realize there were piles of giant ants living around the front door or back door. The ants I was calling about are (were) on the side of the house. How close they came to conquering us.

The sun is out but I see clouds and I have some work to do out there so I’m going to cut my planned post short.

I finally finished my book, Annie Proulx, Accordion Crimes which brings me up to 4 for this year.

Years and years ago I started a notebook where I write authors, titles and notes about books I wanted to read. Most of them come from book reviews but also from recommendations, best books lists and books mentioned by guests at Arts & Lectures.

This morning I went through the notebook to see if any titles sounded good right now. I also make notes if I decide not to read the book. Maybe I picked it up at the library and decided upon closer inspection that it doesn’t look like something I want to read. Or I make a big check mark if I’ve read it and write what I thought of the book which ranges from “awesome!” to “okay” to “dreadful.”

I found that Entertainment Weekly was consistently unreliable and even the starred reviews were books that I could barely hold in my hands for 5 pages. Esquire Magazine once printed a comprehensive list of books everybody should read and most were literary classics but the kind of literary classics that you’ve barely heard of and I was rarely tempted by the list.

After I finished Accordion I started a book called The Leopard which I’ve seen mentioned in The Week numerous times and so far I like it. That should keep me busy until I have time to go to the library with my new list.