Bye Bye Blog-tober

So as I said I am going to New Orleans this weekend. I am going not only for Halloween, but also for my sister's bachelorette party. This is going to be crazy fun because all 8 of us are dressing up as a version of Jennifer. In light of this excellent group Halloween theme (thanks to KK for the coordinated costume idea) I have decided to redo a subject that I have already written about this month: my sister Jennifer.

This one is a little different though, because it spells out what each of our costumes were. How fun to be able to dress as someone you know and love, and how cool to have 8 people walking around dressed as past, present, and future versions of you. Jen herself got to be "bridezilla." Good times!

Anyway, I think I owed a good longer length poem because honestly, I skimped on a few this month.

Jennifer

Jumper pajamas wearing a pillow on her head.
Embarrassing poop costume with a story she dreads.
No longer newlywed with her girly parts "closed."
'N plaid high school uniform with a little leg exposed.
In sorority shirt with a hangover after a night that was wild.
Filling maternity clothes when she is with child.
Evaluation Jen who tests and cares for students.
Raging bridezilla for fun, but she is actually quite prudent.

NOLA

I'm going to New Orleans for the weekend. Let me just say this, if you have never been to New Orleans for Halloween, you have never really done Halloween.

The End.

NOLA

Numerous costumes that won't make you yawn
Overly cheap booze until (at least) dawn.
Listening to music like Taj Mahal.
Awaiting a burger at Port of Call.

The Blahs

I have been down in the dumps lately. I have a week-long case of the Mondays. I have lost the glimmer in my eye. I have no more rattle in my snake. I am ready for the fat lady to sing (for law school I mean, so stop dialing the suicide hotline already.)

Anyway, you get the point. That is probably why I have been remiss in my daily postings - my apologies one reader.

Blah

Boring myself nearly to death.
Lounging around like I'm hooked on meth.*
Almost no reason to get off my butt.
Have to get myself out of this rut.

* You can tell I know nothing about meth, since I think it actually makes people jump around and go crazy and turn green. Or something.

Job

Just an update for my family out there, I still don't have a job. So you don't really have to ask now, unless it seems that important to you.

Seriously though, I know what I want to do but now I just have to find a job doing it. 'Cause for Pete's sake I did not leave a good career where I was at a good level to go back to school forever to do something I don't want to do, that's for sure.

And furthermore, I am adding this to the list of things I don't think I want to do: be a trial lawyer.

Job

Jeering at the thought of interviewing.
Only marginally interested in helping with suing.
Believing in something I have to be doing.

Tad

Today is my friend Tad's birthday. Tad is a lovely fellow, and his father is my favorite local politician of all times even though he is in an entirely different state.

Tad would help you feel better even when you are experiencing women problems which makes him very uncomfortable. He would also feel terrible if he ever spilled beer all the way down your Halloween costume but he would be gentleman enough to let you wipe the foam from your cleavage on your own.

He would take care of your dog for a week if you needed him to, but don't expect that dog to have any respect for authority when you get it back. I will always keep him very close to my heart, but very far from my golf cart.

Tad

Thickly accented - clearly from South Carolina
Apt to be a politician, but not the kind that causes angina.
Defends insurance companies and their defective products from China.*

*Actually his court cases are usually car accidents, but do you have any idea how hard it is to rhyme Carolina and keep it PG-13? Also I looked up angina and you can say it both ways.

In Reponse to Anonymous Father

This is in response to a comment made by Anonymous Father on my Penny Pinching Jews in SC posting. He had a very demonstrative response which shows why it is not ok to claim ignorance to racially sensitive issues. If you haven't read it you should.

But even though these are his feelings I can't quite agree. I see his point - we should have high expectations of our election/appointed officials. But I can't help but think that the more I learn, I realize how little I know (to paraphrase Socrates or another philosopher I may have heard about in Philosophy 101 which I obviously didn't ace.)

Anyway, my point is this: the more I learn about other cultures, the more I realize how much I don't know. I think of myself as a sensitive and fairly worldly person but I often learn something and think "wow, I bet when I didn't 'get' that I said something offensive." And in those times I just hope that someone looked at me and thought that I was so very wrong but rather than being offended that they chalked it up to my ignorance and didn't hold it against me.

I'm sure we have all done something like that at one point or another and I wouldn't want to measure other people on a radically different yardstick than I hope they use to measure me.

And when you focus on the results, slamming people makes them defensive and less likely to take responsibility for what they have said and done, so it just seems to me that it is best to be kind, correct them, and move on because a little tolerance goes a long way.

Tolerant

Taking your world view and imposing it
On others.
Luxuriation in folks mistakes doesn't
Educate our brothers.
Real understanding
And well-intentioned correction but
Not sharp-tongued criticism will help
To correct our world direction.

Nameless but not Shameless or Blameless

I have a friend who shall remain nameless, but let's just say he promised to guest blog for me at some point and he has not come through.

Perhaps he has spent all of his time with his new job at D Mag-Jas-ine, or checking out the art of Jasper Johns. Or taking luxurious Jasmine-scented baths. Or just enjoying his time back in TeJas.

[Figure it out yourself]

Jabberwocky poems have suffered without
Any guest blogging promised by some old lout.
Somehow he has not contributed, even during this creative drought.

Jen

My sister Jen has been requesting that I cover her at some point this month.

I have tried to do this but there are many obstacles to accomplishing this task. First, her name is long. (I have solved this by using her nickname.) Second, even her nickname includes common letters for names (J and E) and it is hard to keep it creative and not use just, even, every and boring words like that.

But the real reason I have been putting her poem off is this: she is a difficult person to sum up in one poem. There are many wonderful, complicated layers to her and I was having trouble writing anything that did her justice. Peeling away those layers, like an onion, also makes me get a little teary.

Since there is no O for onion in Jen, this was the best I could do, abbreviated as it is.

Jen

Jaunty and supportive during your worst of days.
Energetically helping children whose problems amaze.
Nice, kind, and feminine without submitting to cliches.

Managing Tasks and Leading People

I went to a Birkman seminar this past weekend.

If you don't know what a Birmkan test or analysis is (I surely didn't) then think of it as a "What color is your parachute?" kind of training where huge corporations pay psychologists to evaluate their staff to see how to best maximize the variable coefficients between different personality grid alignments. Or in other words to teach co-workers not to be jerks to each other.

Normally I am a little skeptical of these things but this one was pretty good. One of the best things I think the facilitator said was that you manage tasks and you lead people. This was an important distinction for a those people who want to manage everything and those people who want to lead everything. You shouldn't try to "manage" a personality and you should try to "lead" a project.

This was the first time I have been exposed to these ideas and my gut instinct was to disagree, but then I remembered times when I had been "managed" and how annoying it was. And I definitely have tried to "lead" projects before when I should have been either brainstorming, planning, organizing, or implementing. So kudos to Birkman for pointing that out.

Manage or Lead

Multiple duties still undone
Accomplishments
Not yet realized.
Authoring to do lists
Gorged with tasks and
Engagements to be idealized. But

Other techniques apply when
Requesting people to see eye to eye.

Leadership is a skill
Encouraging learning of tasks and qualities anew.
A much better tact to take when
Developing members of your crew.

Television

I am terribly behind on posting with little to no excuse. (But seriously, I don't have an internet connection at home right now!) Anyway, I have been wasting a lot of time lately doing something pointless - watching television.

I like a good program as much as the next gal but turning on the old boob tube just to have something to distract yourself. Unacceptable!

Television

Thoughtless oasis to
Entertain my stress away.
Leave me on the couch as I'm
Escaping for a day.
Veritable universes take over my mentality.
In the meantime wheels grind on the machinery of reality.
Spring or fall? I don't know while
Images flicker across the screen
Outside my living room is the
Nuisance of duties in a house that remains uncleaned.

Penny-pinching Jews in SC

Well apparently some county chairmen in South Carolina made a comment in an editorial that has people all atwitter. (That word had a real meaning before Twittering, you know.) Read more about it here but basically they tried to encourage a penny-wise, pound-rich philosophy for Congress that they took from a saying about wealthy Jews.

If you look at the comment, it is at worst uninformed. Sometimes I get nervous that our over-sensitivity to racial issues has a reverse effect. Follow me here: someone makes a comment like this which seemed to have complimentary intent. Considering the positive intention and the fact that it was willingly submitted for publication, it is doubtful that the chairmen knew they were being offensive.

If we constantly condemn people for their ignorance, we are not solving any problems. Incidents like these shouldn't go unmentioned, but there is no reason to call for someone's resignation over an incident like this. It seems like overreaction in these situations will push people to stop trying and to discount the value in examining stereotypes.

The worst part of all in my book is that the only people calling for their resignation are Democrats. And I'm only 5'2" but I have had it up to here with this partisan crapola! Politicians don't even try to appear fair anymore. How stingy is that?

Penny (Pinching)

Prejudice can be reinforced based on its handling.
Every now and then people just require understanding.
Not every statement
Needs to be analyzed to death.
You can sometimes gain perspective by stopping to take a breath.

Divorce

All of the cute celebrity couples get divorced. I know the "regular people" divorce rate is also quite high, but almost no celebrity couples make it. Their divorce rate is much higher than just a majority.

I was just thinking that maybe this is because men and women don't need each other as much anymore. To oversimplify, Back in the day there were prescribed roles for men and women and not much straying from those roles, but things have obviously changed. In fact there is very little that either a man or a woman can't provide for himself.

But paradoxically we still want to be with others people, though we no longer have need to drive us together or keep us together. Discuss amongst yourselves.

Need

Nothing wanting
Essentials are all self-provided
Excluding mutual benefit can leave a couple
Divided.

Lebanon-omination*

I have a class on how to do business in Middle Eastern countries. I am currently in this class and bored. Today's topic is Lebanon, so maybe you will accidentally learn from this poem.

For your benefit, single reader, I have excluded the most boring facts (the taxing structure and what kind of corporations you can form) but left things that you may need to know one day. For example if you have an Israeli visa in your passport you can't get in Lebanon. Or maybe you will never need to know that and you will never get back the minute and a half it took you to read this blog entry.

Lebanon

Levi jeans
Excepted from items you may import
Beirut is the capital and where you will
Arrive at the airport.
Never mention that you've been to Israel
Or they won't let you in.
Not likely to agree to peace, much to the World's chagrin.

*Annonimination = play on words, seriously, look it up. Or don't. Either way you are not going to get that time back either.

Corpsing

This week's Saturday Night Live had clips during the commercial breaks of old shows where actors or weekly hosts cracked up and just could NOT stop laughing.

This happens to everyone: something funny happens or sometimes just jumps into your head at an inappropriate time and you have to physically restrain yourself from cracking up. Sometimes even that doesn't help and you just break up with laughter anyway.

The SNL clips reminded me of what British actors call "corpsing" named for the practice of trying to make your live costar laugh while he or she was playing a corpse. For a few good clips on corpsing from the TV show Extras, check out this clip and then this clip. If you are still ready for more, check out these TV corpsing moments. (Particularly good example at 8:50 who finally has to slap himself in the face around 10:00)

Just don't watch them at work, or you may not be able to stifle your amusement.

Corpsing

Cadaverous roles
Often can't include wriggling.
Realistically playing dead
Probably means no giggling.
Still when that funny thing gets
Into your head
Nothing is harder than
Going on like you're dead.

So-da Radio is Educational?

This post is going to be a long one, but it is about several things that particularly interest me: the Diane Rehm Show, childhood obesity, and public policy among other things. So grab a (non-soda) drink and make yourself comfortable if you plan on reading it.

The first hour of the Diane Rehm show (best radio program ever) yesterday was about how soda drinks contribute to childhood obesity. Now first a note on childhood obesity: this is a subject that particularly interests me. In fact I am considering a career in public policy and am certainly better qualified to work in other areas but childhood nutrition particularly interests me.

Being in England for the summer, I realized how bad our food is. Now please stop eye rolling, I don't mean to get into a diatribe about the downfall of America because I think we are generally pretty awesome. However we are not up to snuff with other first-world countries in areas like nutrition and physical activity. This opinion is roughly based on an unscientific survey of other countries during my vacation travels but just stick with me.

In England in particular, the grocery stores are filled with fresh, simple foods. And furthermore, the food stores are small and nearby. People visit the grocery stores more often and walk there, come away with a few bags, and carry them home. So not only do people eat fresher food, but they do it more frequently with a built in workout.

I do volunteer work whenever I can, often with children. About six months ago, I volunteered at my old high school for a school-activities fair for the attached feeder school. Here is the sad thing: about 80% of the kids were overweight. Four out of five kids. I don't remember seeing one non-white child over about 8 who was not overweight. And the white kids were not much better off.

Briefly, here are a few reasons I think this situation is worthy of "epidemic" status. First, an eight year old may not be able to dress himself, he surely cannot make informed and mature decisions about what to eat. Second, there were no skinny parents with overweight kids, this problem was indicative of the entire family's health. Third, lower-income families are more susceptible to targeted advertising and pricing of crappy food.

I guess that is the end of my rant, but maybe stop feeding your kids soda.

Soda

Small kids at risk for
Obesity before they can read.
Diet coke
And Sunny Delight are not things that children need.