Where Has My Time Gone?

Oh, Lord do I have a lot to do! Why do I have so much to do? How did being unemployed take away all of my freetime?

NPR recently did a series of stories on leisure. One of the installments I caught was on housework and about time-saving devices (like washing machines) and how they have changed -- in particular -- the role of women in the household, and how they haven't. One particular line from Susan Strasser caught me. She said, essentially, "we have found that time-saving devices have not necessarily contributed to increased leisure time." I don't know why, but that idea really struck me. I hadn't seen that reality so clearly before.

So, I'm busy with my usual volunteer duties and I've added some occasional hourly work (paid?!) to the mix. This year's Oktoberfest is taking up the most time and effort right now. I'll include more details later -- our website should launch soon. Ofest will be on Friday, September 24 and Saturday, September 25 this year -- and oh wow do we have a lot to do!

Black and Blue

So some of you may know that I have klutz tendencies. I remember my mother telling me once about her and my father being concerned about my muscular development as a child. I apparently fell often. They decided to take me to the doctor -- surely there must be something wrong with a little girl who is constantly falling, knocking into things, and has needed stitches enough times to be recognized by name upon entering the emergency room at Cardinal Glennon's Children's Hospital. Apparently, after several informal tests my pediatrician comforted my parents with the news that I had a serious condition of being a klutz.

Fast forward thirty-some-odd years to a couple of weeks ago. I was working on one of our several "project piles" set off on the side table in the dining room. I can't remember what I was looking for -- but it was something that I wanted to find pronto. Upon not finding it, I became frustrated and turned to storm across the dining room to the office to hunt there. Unfortunately, my planned route did not take into account the dining room table that is in the middle of our dining room. My path was immediately and abruptly blocked by said dining room table which made contact with my left thigh. Or my left thigh made contact with it. Regardless, the table was pushed a good two inches off center (which is really impressive when you know that I actually had to push it up hill as our dining room floor is a bit sloped).

I knew immediately that I had done something awful. I knew immediately that it was really going to be bad since my visceral reaction did not include swearing or rubbing the injured thigh. I remember hearing David from the other room -- "You okay?"

I fought the urge to cry. I cursed the dining room table (clearly, it was the table's fault) and tried to figure out how long I could go without looking at my thigh. I was sure I would not be able to handle seeing the bone sticking out of the flesh. Well, that's what it felt like. I'm fairly convinced that had I hit the table with the same force with a bone other than my femur, I would have shattered it. When Dave finally got the chance to see the damage, all he could muster was "Ohhhhhh, Katie, that must hurt!"

It was red and purple within a few minutes, black and blue with red squiggly lines in the middle within a few days. I realized in the days following the incident that I often touch that part of my leg -- something I had never realized before touching it resulted in such searing pain. The bruise has now passed through its rainbow of colors. I still have a gray shadow of a bruise at the exact height of our dining room table just in case I forget too soon.

Another St. Louisan

I attended a choir party the other night. I won't bore you with all the reasons or details. However, at one point I was briefly introduced to a new choir member. Later, she looked across the deck at my shoes and exclaimed, "I love your shoes."

Now, I was wearing one of my all time favorite pairs of shoes -- my red shoes. Well, my first pair of red shoes (I now have a couple). The pair of shoes that I had convinced myself I could not afford, did not deserve, and would not be practical -- as they are red. I do not fit the woman-with-shoe-fetish stereotype, but I was able to come up with a rationalization for buying and wearing these red shoes: I had just completed my master's thesis and it was about time I actually started wearing things that exhibited the personal style that I had always imagined for myself but hid behind and under more practical pieces.

So I've had these red shoes for years and they have been worn and loved and inspired subsequent wardrobe pieces. I occasionally receive compliments on these shoes. This compliment was a little different -- the woman who paid me the compliment came closer to admire the shoes allowing me to see her choice in footwear: my shoe splurge of last fall while down in Urbana at my favorite good-for-your-feet shoe store! Yes, she was wearing these great Dansko's with a button! (I love Dansko everything.)

Okay, but here's the weird part beyond the fact that we appear to be shoe sisters: she grew up in, yes -- wait for it, Webster Groves! I won't bore you with a list of the families that we both know or the fact that she went to my grade school . . . wow, which just now reminds me that the guy from the Oktoberfest committee who is the nephew of my grade school soccer coach also went to my grade school, though long after me. The woman at the choir party also seemed young -- I wonder if they know each other or that they are both at St. Al's.

Funny small world.

Rooster

This is a test to see if I can post photos to my blog. I'd like to post the occasional photo that I've taken -- you know that whole "a picture is worth a thousand words" thing.

This is a picture I took a few years ago at Barb and Ed's farm.

It's Beginning to Feel A Lot Like...

...October?! The sky is gray, the wind is blustery, there are intermittent light rains, and the temperature at O'Hare at 2:00 this afternoon was 63 degrees. Throw in some turning leaves and autumn is upon us. In August.

I actually love this weather. I love the fall. I love cool temperatures and the smell of fireplaces in use. I love wearing layers to guard against a chill or the chance of dropping temperatures at nightfall. Today I am wearing jeans and a cardigan and shoes that don't simply slip on and off. In August.

The weather is actually strangely appropriate for the preparation instinct I am feeling -- it's time to start shopping for school supplies! This will be the start of academic year number three that I am missing out on and I still feel the need to stock up on loose leaf, pens, binders, ooooh! maybe I'll upgrade my label maker, and make the necessary outlay for new office organizational tools that will foster my most organized and efficient school year yet!

I was at Target the other day -- so I'm sure you can see where the impulse to buy school supplies was born. Oh the myriad of supplies offered to today's students! Forget the Trapper Keepers, I want a backpack on wheels. I want a binder that folds back -- have you seen these? They are regular binders, with my favorite D-shaped rings, and the front flap folds back under the binder to make it feasible on those tiny college desks. I'm in love.

With my renewed infatuation with the handwritten word, I could not keep myself from browsing the pen section. I think today's gel pens are yesterday's erasable pens. I want them all. And post-it notes. And a mirror and dry-erase board conveniently backed with magnets to hang in my locker. And magnetic pouches that are the exact size of a locker door that can hold all of my gel pens so as to rescue them from the dark bottom of the locker beneath so many textbooks.

I want a beanbag chair for my dorm room and coordinated bedding for my bed. I want to save the article from the Sunday New York Times of a couple of weeks ago that had designers design and make suggestions for dorm room living that avoids the institutional look of a cell block and tack it to my magnetic message board. I want a hot pot to make tea and Ramen noodles -- even if today's dorm dwellers would be astonished by such ancient technology.

"Back to School" has become its own full-fledged season. It keeps the Halloween decorations, costumes, and candy from encroaching on Labor Day. I have always secretly loved Back to School. I was never too terribly upset to see summer end -- though there were many an August in a sweltering classroom that made me wish the temperatures would reflect the season -- especially in high school when I had to wear a wool skirt and blazer (okay, we only had to wear the blazer on some occasions, but now I'm old enough to bitch about it especially upon learning that the young women who currently attend my alma mater have warm weather uniforms?!). I love the excitement of a new schedule and new textbooks that seem oh so much more advanced than the ones we used the year before. I'm an even bigger sucker for the beginning of a new college semester -- but you've already had to deal with me wax crazy about that…

St. Louisans Everywhere

So, remember how I was talking about bumping into St. Louisans here in the big city (click here and read Home Away From Home)? So I'm neck-deep in Oktoberfest planning, right? A few new suckers, I mean volunteers, have been added to the logistics ranks of the committee as we move into the final stretch. I met one man the other night -- he had a familiar name and look about him. Turns out he is the brother-in-law of the St. Louisan I know in choir. While we were chatting, someone at the meeting mentioned that another new committee member who had arrived late is also from St. Louis. I didn't get the chance to talk to him.

And then today I volunteered to put together a contact list with all the names, numbers, emails, etc. of the committee members so that we can hunt each other down. Someone sent me the name of the supposed St. Louisan whom I hadn't met. He had a very familiar last name...and a cell phone number with the area code for St. Louis...Oh God! could he be the little brother of a grade school classmate of mine and the son of the soccer coach I had for eight years of grade school?! No, after checking with my brother Matt, it turns out that he is said classmate's cousin and said coach's nephew.

It's a small freaking world my friends.

One Year

Well, it's been one year. Can you believe it? I can't. One year ago today I started this blog. I feel bad sometimes that I don't blog more often, but now that I realize that I've kept it somewhat together for a year, I'm kinda proud. I enjoy writing a lot, I just can't seem to find the time to do as often as I would like. I've actually resorted to keeping a list (I love lists) of blog topics on an index card in one of those clip thingys that you can stand up in front of your computer so that you are reminded every day of all the things you want to do or have to do but still haven't done.

My next blog is going to be about school supplies and how much I love them. I've been meaning to write it for a week now. I was in Target last week and saw that they had the school supplies out.

I'll get to it soon. For now, just a note to mark a milestone.