Eric and I went to Toledo this weekend for Keegan Edward's, Eric's nephew/godson's, baptism. It was a whirlwind trip but so worth it! Keegan is ridiculously cute and makes me melt with each little yawn and stretch and smile.

We stayed with Meaghan's parents the whole weekend and it was fun to hang with her big family. They made us feel so welcome. Some of the joking and teasing reminded me of my own family. Saturday night, we spent about an hour looking through old family pictures - and laughing so hard that we cried (and woke up Keegan at least once). I love seeing Chad and Meaghan as parents. Being around them, plus Meaghan's sister with her two young children, made the weekend completely different from all those I've spent in New York. There's something about being around kids that puts everyone in a good mood, no matter what. I think it makes us all feel young.

I think Keegan liked his present. He even tried to roar. Or maybe he was just yawning. You decide.

I talked to Erin today.

"So I saw you made me an ugly doll!" she said.

"What? How did you know?"

"I saw pictures."

"Where? From who?"

"I saw them on your blog."

"You read that? I thought no one read that."

"I'm totally a blog stalker."



So now Erin knows what her present is. Eric and I named him Siegmund. Today, since the temp agency didn't need me, I stayed home and made yet another stuffie. It's Keegan's baptism present. Eric just found out he'll be Keegan's godfather, and we're going to Toledo this weekend for the ceremony. I figured that after his eternal soul is saved, he might need a lion to slobber on.

This morning I woke up early to call in to the temp agency - and of course they didn't have any work for me today. Instead of going back to bed (the construction workers brought out the world's loudest-ever saw - AGAIN) I got out my newly organized crafting supplies. While the plumber fixed our broken and leaking kitchen sink, I sat on the couch and made Erin's birthday present. I'm happy with how it turned out.

I said I'd try to post more pictures, so here's hoping these upload ok. Wee!

Since I got to leave my temp receptionist job early last night, I made it to the gym in time for this Indian dance-workout class I’d never heard of. It was super hard but ridiculously fun. At the end, the instructor kept speeding up the music and we’d run through the routine faster and faster and faster. My shoulders and thighs were so sore afterwards!

As I was walking to the subway afterwards, I got a message from Self’s fitness director saying that they’d hired someone else for the editorial assistant job. She said that I’d done the best edit test but they hired someone with more fitness background. Awesome. Especially awesome because I’d just left the gym.

When I got home I decided to soak my soreness and disappointment in a hot bath, but I was hungry, too. The only snack with easy access was a mostly empty bag of Lay’s, so I brought them in with me. As I munched potato chips in the bath, I realized how pathetic and ridiculous I must look, and I couldn’t help but laugh. That made me feel a little better, as did reading The Hounds of the Morrigan – the best book ever. Beth read it to me and Amy years ago, and I have the most vivid memories of listening to her mimic Irish brogue accents while I sat in front of the heater and played with plastic animal toys. That book is like eating mac n’ cheese or cuddling in a quilt by the Christmas tree: pure, unadulterated comfort.

In other news, when I stepped outside this morning, I realized that it had snowed overnight! I didn’t get to enjoy the half-inch or so of it, though, b/c I was sprinting to the subway after being called in to temp. Of course there wasn’t even a trace of it in Midtown, and by lunch, even the puddles had dried up. But tomorrow’s supposed to be frigid with a high wind warning. I got another warning today, from an Eastern European cleaning lady in the building. She told me to bundle up and buy a fur coat. “There’s nothing better!” she said. “The fur is glamorous and keeps you from shivering. Go buy one at a President’s Day sale. They think it is Spring, and so they give 50% off, and 20% on top of that. From how I’m talking you would think I am advertising, but I’m not!” She left with a wave goodbye, making all her gold jewelry jangle together. She was one snazzy cleaning lady, I tell you.

Last night I finally got my digi prints from Snapfish and so could begin the scrapbook on Europe. I’ve been meaning to start it since I got back in November, but a combination of making handmade gifts for almost everyone on my XMAS XMAS list and a failure to get my supplies delayed me until last night. Unfortunately, only a few pages in, I ran out of photo corners and had to stop. I wasn’t even through Slovenia yet!

So among this weekend’s missions is to buy photo corners and hinges for the book. I still don’t know how I want to make the cover, but I’m leaving it til last to give me plenty of time for a “eureka!”

I’m trying to do something creative every day now. I should also make it a goal to post more pictures and images on here. The blog is quite plain, eh?

In other news, today is my official last day at Self, for realsies this time. I’m trying to get ahold of my contact at a temp agency, and hopefully I’ll be working tomorrow – and every weekday after that until I get a permanent full-time job. I’m hoping on a couple and waiting to hear, but I don’t want to jinx myself and so will try to keep mum. Wish me luck!

On Friday night, Eric and I went to James’s house to watch football and play drinking games. On the subway ride there, we dashed from the C (local) to the A (express) across the platform. Eric made it through before me, though, and without the usual “Stand clear of the closing doors, please,” they slid shut on me. Normally, too, they open up once something obstructs them, but we must have had a sadistic subway driver b/c the doors only got tighter as I struggled. Eric had to help pull them apart for me to get on.



Three people watched the scene and talked about it for the next 30 blocks. “Ladies always go first!” the woman said. “If that was my man, I’d have cussed ‘im out.” The two men, though, backed Eric up. “They gotta keep up, man!”

I consider myself warned.

Last night, President Bush gave his much-touted speech on the new Iraq plan. I couldn’t handle watching it and instead dealt with a phantom bill from a credit card I don’t own. While I was on hold, though, I could hear Eric from the other room — sometimes laughing (incredulously, usually), sometimes swearing at the TV. He gave me an update afterwards.

I, for one, can’t understand the president’s logic and stubborn refusal to deal with the facts — and then fix them (or at least adopt a feasible plan to fix them). True, Bush acknowledged some mistakes he and his administration made, and he made a fairly accurate assessment of the Iraq disaster, but his plan just does not make sense to me.

I don’t believe that pulling out of Iraq will help. The Iraqi people didn’t ask for us to invade their country; we did that all on our own, so we should at least try to fix the mess that we created. So an immediate withdrawal doesn’t make sense to me. But to throw more US troops at the problem just will not work.

It’s like we have a bucket with a hole in the bottom. The water is spilling out, but instead of recognizing the issue and stopping the leak, we just dump more water in. I know it’s a flawed analogy, but it’s as close as I can get right now. Dedicating more soldiers to a flawed strategy will only make Iraqis, Americans and the international community more resentful if they don’t have a way to alleviate the problems. We have obvious and bloody evidence of this: When Baghdad began its most recent spiral into absolute chaos a few months ago, Bush and his generals pulled troops from other parts of the country to support those fighting in Baghdad. And look how well that turned out.

What we really need to do is search out the reasons WHY the situation is so terrible. (True, we shouldn’t have invaded in the first place, and we had too few troops to do so from the start, but we can’t change the past so there’s no point in arguing over or wishing about it.) There is no Iraqi infrastructure. There are no jobs. People are scared to go in the streets. The police and Iraqi military are undertrained and ill-equipped. The list goes on. Unless we — or the Iraqi government, or an international coalition — address the fundamental problems, there will be no security, and the US mission will fail. I hate to say it, but it sounds like common sense and I can’t understand how our leaders fail to see it. It’s like that obnoxious TV commercial that plays all the time during football games: A family is watching golf on TV, and the guy hits the ball into the rough. Everyone’s looking for it, but the family watching it on TV can see it clearly. “It’s right there! Right – there! Can’t you see it?” Sometimes, with politics, I feel like that. I know I oversimplify things, because if it were easy, then we wouldn’t have these massive and complicated problems. But if the logic is sound, you can extend it to work for any issue, no matter how complex.

It’s been almost four years, and the war is getting bloodier. Thousands of people are dying, even more are fleeing, and the violence doesn’t show any sign of stopping. This is too terrible a situation to “stay the course,” or to pretend to adopt a new policy merely by adding troops and shifting responsibility. We need a real change.

As no one in New York can resist talking about weather ALL THE TIME, why should I be left out of the forecaster fun?

On Saturday, after eating breakfast burritos with leftover avocado-mango salsa, Eric and I headed to Soho to enjoy the record-breaking weather. We walked around and did a little arts and crafts shopping in the 72 degree sun, both of us wearing t-shirts. (tangent: I finally discovered a cheap, somewhat-skeezy fabric store between Chinatown and Soho, right next to Pearl Paint! It puts Eugene’s low-budget Factory Fabrics to shame.)

Every shaggy-haired NYU student, 60-year-old hippie and chess hustler descended upon Washington Square. A unicycle-riding entertainer swallowed swords; four guitarists and a flautist played an impromptu rendition of the Beatles’ “Something in the Way She Moves;” and a dozen tiny dogs chased each other in a New York-sized “dog park” (a fenced-in patch of dirt no bigger than my living room). And as no visit to Washington Square would be complete without it, a tall dude in sunglasses offered to sell us weed, coke — or anything we wanted. It was wonderful.

The next day I mostly enjoyed the sun from my couch, in my PJs, watching football and sewing. But around 4, Eric and I walked through Central Park and played with his new digicam, a Christmas present from his parents. We took artsy fartsy photos of streetlamps and skylines. We got to the reservoir at nightfall. Although I liked to run there when we lived on the Upper East Side, I’d never been there at night. The reflections of the lit-up, majestic buildings were gorgeous – worthy of artsy fartsy pictures, even.

Before we went to bed, it started to pour and hasn’t stopped since. This morning, as I was walking to work early for Pilates, the top of my 99 Cent Store umbrella popped off — no warning, not even any wind to give it a good reason. I managed to stick the top back on but had to throw it away before getting on the subway. I hope it stays dry on my walk home. I don’t think there are any 99 Cent Stores with high-quality umbrellas on the way home, after all.

True, it might be January 3rd, but tons of sparkling confetti is still swirling outside the office window in Times Square. (Self is located behind the Nasdaq sign at 42nd and Times Square, which gives me a great view of the pandemonium outside.) On New Year’s Eve, Eric and I checked out the beginnings of the insanity in Tourist Central. Vendors had, for the time, swapped fake Rolexes and pashminas for 2007 joke glasses and noisemakers. We came around 2 or 3 in the afternoon, and people had already staked out their spots. Um, thanks, but sitting on cold concrete for 12 hours to see a flashing ball drop for 3 seconds doesn’t sound like fun.

What did sound like fun: Playing drinking games with Eric and James at Donna and Dave’s studio in Midtown. We brought a 12-pack of Coronas to supplement the MGD bottles and Jell-O shots, then played 99, Asshole and Smoke/Fire. To attest to the mind-changing properties of alcohol, Eric and I agreed to go to a bar afterwards to watch the ball drop. I can’t remember exactly seeing the ball drop, but I do remember that the entire bar counted down from 10 at least three times. We were a little confused.

On the long walk back to the subway, I shouted “happy New Year!” to almost everyone we passed – especially the zillions of cops on the streets. Most of them were nice and waved back to me.

Yesterday was not so nice, though. Eric and I slept til 2 – the longest I’ve slept in since I don’t know when – and stumbled through the day with an upset stomach and a raging headache. I was grateful for the rainy weather because I didn’t feel guilty for not being able to move from the couch or get out of my bathrobe.

I’ve been reading random Web sites today at work and all of them seem to talk about New Year’s resolutions. I guess since this note will go on the Web, I should have a resolution, too, but I’ve had trouble coming up with a worthwhile one. Perhaps I’ll write a follow-up post: New Year’s: The Sequel.

Until then, happy 2007!