Well, a month in and still no job leads. I'm finally having to accept how tight money is on unemployment and for the second time in my adult life, am going to move back in with my parents. I'm in Yakima until April 30 and then it's back to the hometown. Hopefully not for long. It's not my ideal option but at least I won't have to pay rent. The worst part? It's not possible to buy a national newspaper in Klamath Falls. No NY Times, no Wall Street Journal, not even USA Today! I'm going to go crazy. In the meantime, my friend Brant posted this link on my Facebook that pretty much sums up how each day has gone since I lost my job.
This week, I'm meeting my parents at the Oregon Coast for a short vacation and then it's back to Yakima to start packing and getting rid of stuff. Anyone want to drive a U-Haul from Yakima to Klamath Falls for me?
On Friday, I mentored a student in a journalism workshop at my old paper. It's a workshop they've been doing for seven years. After a Friday night dinner, the kids -- all in high school, except my student, who's an eighth grader -- come in on Saturday, report in the morning and write a story in the afternoon. I took my student to a DVD release party for "Twilight" on Friday night and we came back and wrote in the morning. Since we had free time, we went out to report on a yard sale at one of the high schools. So my student was not only the youngest ever to do the workshop, she was the first to do a Friday night assignment and the first to do two stories! It was really fun. Walking around helping her do interviews just served to remind me how much I love reporting. This is not the time for me to find more reasons that I want to stay in newspapers. I've been trying to convince myself to look in other industries, but this is all I want to do. Something's going to have to give.
Edited to add: When I made the reservation for this hotel in Portland (staying here tonight to make it easier to get to Lincoln City early tomorrow), I wondered why it was so cheap. It's a pretty nice place. A train just went past, and I think I have my answer. Here's hoping the conductors don't blow the whistle in the middle of the night.
Monday, March 23, 2009
Wednesday, March 04, 2009
Homesick
I went down to Eugene this weekend for a visit. I hung out with several, but not all, of my friends and had some delicious food (no good restaurants in the current town). I've only been there twice since I moved away, and I'd forgotten how pretty it is. The winter rain may be a bit depressing, but everything is so green. I'd also forgotten how much I love just walking around Eugene. I always felt so at home there and nothing's changed. Whenever I go back to Oregon, there's a moment in the drive at which the vegetation starts to change from the desert of Eastern Oregon/Washington to the lush green grass of the more rainy Willamette Valley, and right about then, every part of my body relaxes. I felt that way when I was a college freshman, brand new to the area, and I feel that way now. It feels like home. Some part of me knows I'm supposed to be there.
As I drove away, the homesickness set in. I was relatively happy in the current city, even though I only moved here for the job, but leaving Eugene felt like leaving home to stay in a temporary place. I also know I can't go back there to live. I've started to look around the country for new work and have accepted that I'll have to leave the Pacific Northwest. But as I watched Eugene get smaller in my rearview mirror, I realized I may not be back for quite some time, and it made me sad. Moving away to a new part of the country will be an adventure, and one I'm ready for, but being far away from Oregon will be hard.
As I drove away, the homesickness set in. I was relatively happy in the current city, even though I only moved here for the job, but leaving Eugene felt like leaving home to stay in a temporary place. I also know I can't go back there to live. I've started to look around the country for new work and have accepted that I'll have to leave the Pacific Northwest. But as I watched Eugene get smaller in my rearview mirror, I realized I may not be back for quite some time, and it made me sad. Moving away to a new part of the country will be an adventure, and one I'm ready for, but being far away from Oregon will be hard.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Gee, I wonder why the cirucuits are busy ...
This morning, I needed to call and file my weekly unemployment claim. Because I've never done it, I had some questions about what I had to report out of my last check.
Over the course of a half hour, I kept dialing, only to have the automatic system tell me there were too many callers and hang up. I must have dialed 20 times before I finally got put through the call tree, and even then, I sat on hold for half an hour (thank god for speakerphone) before someone answered.
Nothing like spending an hour trying to ask a yes-or-no question about benefits to make the current unemployment problem seem real.
Over the course of a half hour, I kept dialing, only to have the automatic system tell me there were too many callers and hang up. I must have dialed 20 times before I finally got put through the call tree, and even then, I sat on hold for half an hour (thank god for speakerphone) before someone answered.
Nothing like spending an hour trying to ask a yes-or-no question about benefits to make the current unemployment problem seem real.
Saturday, February 21, 2009
It's only a month too late ...
To blog about my experience going to Washington for President Obama's inauguration. It's a very long post, but I'm writing as much for myself as anyone else, so I'd love if people read it. Photos are down below because I couldn't figure out how to make the formatting look decent any other way.
My wonderful friend Rachel and her boyfriend drove all the way from Virginia to come pick me up in Baltimore at 11:30 Saturday night. I spent the night with them and then got on a Metro to meet my friends Anna, Lila and Andrea for the inauguration concert.
The concert began at 2:30 and we made it to the National Mall around 1:30. We stood by the Washington Monument, quite far away from any of the jumbotrons and a mile away from the Lincoln Memorial, where the concert was. Most people were friendly and everyone was happy to be there. At one point, someone in front of us got on her boyfriend's shoulders, blocking everyone's view of the jumobtron. The guy behind us earned the quote of the day when he yelled, "No you CAN'T" in response to the rude shoulder-rider. She got down immediately.
We spent Monday roaming around DC, taking pictures and being generally touristy. I was amazed at how many vendors were around. Anything it is possible to print on had Obama's face on it. The crowds were getting heavier and it was wonderful to see so many different people. Washington is always diverse, but during inauguration week you saw people representing every race, religion, orientation, nationality, etc. and everyone was smiling. There's nothing to compare to the energy and positivity in the city that day. It was a mixture of anticipation and pure elation that you could see in the faces of everyone there.
On Monday, I broke off from my friends for an hour or so and went to visit the newsroom where I worked in the summer of 2007. It was great to see my old boss and coworker again and I remembered how much I loved working there.
Monday night, Anna and I, who were both staying at Andrea's house, put all of our clothes together -- about six layers -- and got ready for bed. In the morning, we bundled up, picked up Lila at her house, and headed off on foot. Arlington is about three miles from the National Mall, but we'd seen on CNN that morning that the Metro was already completely packed.
It was cold, but the walk warmed us up. Soon, we were watching the sun come up over the frozen Potomac as the Lincoln Memorial and Washington Monument came into view. When we got to the first row of port-a-potties, we decided it would be a god time to take a bathroom break. Only about 8 a.m., and they were already gross. I think every port-a-potty in the nation must have been in Washington. Everywhere you looked, you could spot another group of the big blue boxes.
About half an hour later, we found a spot near the Washington Monument. We could have gotten a little closer to the jumbotron, but were up on a slope, so we thought we'd have a better chance of being able to see. That turned out to be very wishful thinking. I'm just about 4 inches too short to be able to see past anyone in front of me. It was going to be cold. Very cold. All of our layers helped, but it was definitely chilly. We'd brought along some thermalcare wraps, and I slapped one on, which seemed to help things a bit. Anna and Lila headed off to buy some hot chocolate. At the time, we could see the concessions line and were in a spot that was pretty easy to find. Forty minutes later, what had been a sparse crowd was turning into mosh-pit conditions. Anna called me and asked me to describe where our spot was, so I threw a sweater in the air and she saw it and found me. Ten minutes after that, it was too packed for anyone to be able to find the same spot again.
As I spoke to the people around us, I was struck again by the different types of people represented in the crowd. A small group of people behind me had come from Kenya just for the inauguration. There were college kids and grandmothers and kids too young to truly understand the significance of the day. I spoke to an interracial lesbian couple there with their kid (who, about an hour before the ceremony began, was drawing on a notepad a list of "reasons why this is boring") and then an 18-year-old kid and his mother moved next to me. The kid turned 18 in August and voted for the first time in his life in the November election. He told me about his experience in the voting booth and how his mom (who booed every time Bush's name was mentioned) wanted him to take photos of himself in the voting booth. I told him that because I grew up in Oregon, I've never been in a voting booth or even gone to a polling place. His mom asked me if mail elections have more potential for fraud. I was struck that there were people surrounding us who, at his age, could have been beaten up for even attempting to register to vote, but now we were all there together to watch a black man take the oath of office. You don't have to have voted for Obama to appreciate the significance of that image.
As with the concert, it was hard to judge the size of the crowd. Looking over the sea of people was an overwhelming feeling, and while it felt dense and claustrophobic, it didn't feel as big as it was. There were people as far as you could see, but the human eye can only pick out details for a short distance and I don't think the mind can comprehend that many people in time to translate the information to the optic nerve. What really shocked me was that it did not SOUND like that many people I've left Autzen stadium, which holds close to 60,000 on it's best days, with my ears ringing, but the crowd at the Mall didn't seem loud. Obviously that has to do with the way sound travels on a flat outdoor space, but it was odd.
What I'll remember more than the sound of 2 million people talking, singing, cheering, is the sound of 2 million people being quiet. The moment that Obama raised his hand, you heard a collective "SHHHHHHH" and the crowd held its breath. The closest thing I've felt to the emotion from the crowd in the moment he raised his hand was the feeling of watching a basketball fly through the air in the split second before it swishes through the net for a championship-winning shot, or the time it takes to watch a home run leave the ballpark to win a World Series. The second that Justice Roberts said, "Congratulations Mr. President," the crowd exploded. Everyone hugged and cried. For many in the crowd, the moment was a catharsis and a release of a lifetime of hoping for the moment.
At the time, I didn't think the speech was particularly amazing -- I thought the one he gave at the concert was better -- but the more I think about it, the better I think it was. He said what he needed to say and the tone was right for what is going on in the country.
While we didn't feel like the crowd was that big during the ceremony, that changed when all 2 million people tried to leave at once. While we tried to get off the mall, some people even walked across the tops of the port-a-potties. As we waited, I snapped a picture of the White House. It wasn't until I uploaded it days later that I noticed I'd captured moving trucks in front of the building.
Google Maps says that from the corner of 18th and Constitution, where we exited the Mall after a long shuffle, to the restaurant in Georgetown where we ate is 2.5 miles. It took us nearly 3 hours to get there. For about a mile of that walk, we were shoulder to shoulder with people in every direction. Several times, ambulances moved through the crowd on the street, and a few people chased the ambulance through the break in the crowd. Lila said, "Hey, it's all the lawyers!" I replied that it was probably the journalists, too. Everyone in our part of the crowd was very nice. People in crowds that dense sometimes get irritable and stressed out, but everyone was understanding and relaxed. I heard from people I spoke to later in the week that the crowds were not so positive in other parts of the city, but I felt nothing but positivity from the people around me.
We spent the rest of the afternoon at a delicious Mexican restaurant, watching the parade on television with some of Lila's friends, both of whom were awesome (and who'd been smart enough to make reservations before the inauguration day). It was one of the longest days of my life, but I know that when I'm 90, I'll be telling my great-grandkids about what I think will go down as one of the most significant days of my life. They'll bring their history books (or pocket-sized electronic hologram readers, whatever) to me, and I'll tell them about the time I went to watch President Obama's inauguration and shared the moment not only with my friends, but with 2 million of the happiest people you've ever seen.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
At least I'll have more time to read ...
Cross posted from my other blog, which is now public again and will hopefully be updated frequently, so please read if you want. Tomorrow I'm finally going to get around to posting about the inauguration, but today's been bad.
Thanks to the economic crisis and the state of the newspaper industry, I am no longer employed. I was laid off today. We actually were informed of the impending layoffs about three weeks ago and I knew that because I'm the newest person in my position, I had a big target on my back. Through a rather long process, the union members agreed to some concessions involving the 401K and holiday pay and that cut the number of layoffs, as did the generosity of the people in the newsroom, many of whom volunteered to reduce hours and/or take unpaid time off to try to save jobs. It worked -- I lost my job, but I'm the only one in the newsroom to go. It's depressing and I'm freaked out, but I'm happy that all the reporters get to stay. We have some great people who do excellent work and frankly, the paper needs them.
Truthfully, the three weeks of not knowing whether I was going to be able to stay was way worse than getting the news. I didn't tell many people about the layoffs when we first found out because I didn't want to jinx it. But honestly, I'm relieved that I finally just know.
So tomorrow I will go to an unemployment office for the first time in my life and hope that the check will be enough to live on until I find a new job and move out of this town. I was given a severance that's more generous than what the union contract required, so there will be enough money in my savings account to pay for the move. I won't be staying here -- there aren't any other media jobs (at least not the type I want to do) and I didn't want to be here forever anyway -- but it will do until I find a new job.
The thing that makes me sad is that while I have gone through phases of questioning what to do with my life, nothing feels as right as being a working journalist. It's an industry I am passionate about and one that I believe is essential to the maintenance of the entire democratic system. It's hard to even consider leaving that behind. People will say "You have to be flexible and look in other industries," but this is something that I love and something that I want to do. I may have to be flexible about what type of journalism to do, but leaving media behind in general is not an option. If nothing else, I went very far in debt for a master's degree and dammit, I'm going to stay in the field that degree is in.
On to update my resume and think about possible freelance opportunities.
Thanks to the economic crisis and the state of the newspaper industry, I am no longer employed. I was laid off today. We actually were informed of the impending layoffs about three weeks ago and I knew that because I'm the newest person in my position, I had a big target on my back. Through a rather long process, the union members agreed to some concessions involving the 401K and holiday pay and that cut the number of layoffs, as did the generosity of the people in the newsroom, many of whom volunteered to reduce hours and/or take unpaid time off to try to save jobs. It worked -- I lost my job, but I'm the only one in the newsroom to go. It's depressing and I'm freaked out, but I'm happy that all the reporters get to stay. We have some great people who do excellent work and frankly, the paper needs them.
Truthfully, the three weeks of not knowing whether I was going to be able to stay was way worse than getting the news. I didn't tell many people about the layoffs when we first found out because I didn't want to jinx it. But honestly, I'm relieved that I finally just know.
So tomorrow I will go to an unemployment office for the first time in my life and hope that the check will be enough to live on until I find a new job and move out of this town. I was given a severance that's more generous than what the union contract required, so there will be enough money in my savings account to pay for the move. I won't be staying here -- there aren't any other media jobs (at least not the type I want to do) and I didn't want to be here forever anyway -- but it will do until I find a new job.
The thing that makes me sad is that while I have gone through phases of questioning what to do with my life, nothing feels as right as being a working journalist. It's an industry I am passionate about and one that I believe is essential to the maintenance of the entire democratic system. It's hard to even consider leaving that behind. People will say "You have to be flexible and look in other industries," but this is something that I love and something that I want to do. I may have to be flexible about what type of journalism to do, but leaving media behind in general is not an option. If nothing else, I went very far in debt for a master's degree and dammit, I'm going to stay in the field that degree is in.
On to update my resume and think about possible freelance opportunities.
Tuesday, February 03, 2009
Quick update and a fun meme
Ok, first: I know, I know. I need to write about the inauguration. Too much to say, too many concerns about being objective. But I will write something. Or just ask me about it.
In the meantime, I found this fun survey at a great book blog called "Hey Lady! Whatcha Readin?" You make a list of 10 things you love that all start with the same letter and if people want to be tagged, they comment and the original poster assigns them a letter. So Trish, who runs that blog, assigned me the letter m. In no particular order:
1. Michelle Obama -- I've always liked Michelle. She's so smart and independent and it's obvious Barack thinks the world of her. So many political wives come across in public as though their entire identity is being Mrs. So-and-So, but Michelle really seems to be her own person. Politics aside, I think she's fabulous.
2. Magazines -- I subscribe to three and have to restrain from buying news magazines every week. As it is, I'm always at least two issues behind on the New Yorker.
3. Motown -- When I was a kid and didn't want to clean, my mom would put on old Motown music (The Temptations, Jackson 5, Smokey Robinson, etc) and we'd play it really loud while we did housework. That's my favorite music to this day.
4. Maya Angelou
5. Moonlight walks
6. Museums -- Specifically, the Smithsonian
7. "Macbeth" -- My absolute favorite play of all time. I read it in 8th grade and saw a fantastic production at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and have been obsessed ever since. Love it.
8. Mentalfloss.com
9. Michael Jordan -- I was a RABID Chicago Bulls fan as a young teen and Michael Jordan was of course my favorite player.
10. Music
OK, so anyone who wants to be tagged, leave me a comment and I'll assign you a letter. Then you post on your blog.
In the meantime, I found this fun survey at a great book blog called "Hey Lady! Whatcha Readin?" You make a list of 10 things you love that all start with the same letter and if people want to be tagged, they comment and the original poster assigns them a letter. So Trish, who runs that blog, assigned me the letter m. In no particular order:
1. Michelle Obama -- I've always liked Michelle. She's so smart and independent and it's obvious Barack thinks the world of her. So many political wives come across in public as though their entire identity is being Mrs. So-and-So, but Michelle really seems to be her own person. Politics aside, I think she's fabulous.
2. Magazines -- I subscribe to three and have to restrain from buying news magazines every week. As it is, I'm always at least two issues behind on the New Yorker.
3. Motown -- When I was a kid and didn't want to clean, my mom would put on old Motown music (The Temptations, Jackson 5, Smokey Robinson, etc) and we'd play it really loud while we did housework. That's my favorite music to this day.
4. Maya Angelou
5. Moonlight walks
6. Museums -- Specifically, the Smithsonian
7. "Macbeth" -- My absolute favorite play of all time. I read it in 8th grade and saw a fantastic production at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and have been obsessed ever since. Love it.
8. Mentalfloss.com
9. Michael Jordan -- I was a RABID Chicago Bulls fan as a young teen and Michael Jordan was of course my favorite player.
10. Music
OK, so anyone who wants to be tagged, leave me a comment and I'll assign you a letter. Then you post on your blog.
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Wednesday, January 07, 2009
2008
Because I haven't posted in weeks, I thought I'd blatantly steal my friends' idea and recap 2008.
At the beginning of '08, I ditch my plan to finish grad school by the end of Winter term and decide to just finish my courses and stay enrolled for spring term to buy myself more time to finish my terminal project. This is partly due to spending most of my time working at the Emerald, partly due to laziness, and partly due to not wanting to speed up the whole becoming-an-adult-paying-off-loans process.
I start applying for jobs and send applications to every posting I find that will keep me within a day's drive of home. I decide that I need to stay in the Northwest. A few applications fall through or turn out to be offering far less money than I need to live, but I get a call from a paper in Washington state and head up for an interview in early April (I try my best to be cryptic about where I live and work). I decide to make a small vacation of it and head up for a two-day interview, followed by a trip to Seattle. I'm in the Experience Music Project, learning to play the bass line of "Smells Like Teen Spirit," when my cell phone rings. It's the news editor at the paper calling to offer me a position. I happily accept.
On the way home, I stop in Portland to see Margaret Cho perform. She is every bit as fabulous as expected. My friends Matt and Tiffany are there as well and they meet her.
In May, I finish up my terminal project just before leaving Eugene. I'm excited for my new, grown-up job with real benefits and a good salary, but am sad to leave all my friends behind. It is the first time in my life I've moved somewhere where I didn't know anyone. Even when I interned in Washington, D.C., in 2007, I already had three friends there and then had roommates and met another friend at my internship training.
The new job is great, although working the late-night copy editing shift on weekends makes it hard to get out and do stuff or meet anyone. As the summer wears on, I slowly start to make friends with coworkers, but I find that I'm out of my comfort zone a bit in terms of meeting people. I've always considered myself an extrovert and have had an easy time making friends in the context of extra-curricular activities or school, but in a new job and new place, it's hard. I feel like it's high school and I'm the new kid in school. I miss having friends who know me -- know my stories, understand my sense of humor, etc.
In June, I head back to Eugene for graduation weekend. Getting my master's is exciting, but feels strange after having already been working for a month. It's fun to get back and see a few friends, though.
In July, I buy a new car with the help of my grandfather, who loves to research cars and told me what to get and even called a dealership in Seattle to find me a good deal. I expected to buy a used car, but managed to get approved for a loan for a brand-new Chevy Aveo that I LOVE. It's the first time in my life I've had a car of my own that I know will start every time I put the key in and that I don't have to teach people how to use. The loan is a little scary and a very adult thing to deal with, but six months later, I'm still in love with this car.
Two of my friends get married in August. One is my best friend, Kim, who I met in driver's ed class the summer after my freshman year of high school, and I'm the maid of honor. It's a lovely, short ceremony and the reception is a lot of fun. The second wedding is my friend Luci, who I've known since she was a fetus. (Our parents met when her mom and my mom were in childbirth class together and are still good friends.) My dad performed the ceremony, which was held in the yard of her grandmother's house. The Applegate river runs through the backyard and it's a beautiful location. I have great memories of floating down that river on inner tubes in the summer, picking fresh blackberries off the bushes along the bank. The reception is also at the house and they have a zip line that runs across the river. It's fantastic. A lovely outdoor ceremony with a zip line over a river seems like the way to go.
September is fairly uneventful. Some friends from Eugene and their adorable little genius baby, Avery, come to visit. He's 2 and spends the weekend counting the wrenches in my toolbox and telling me how many I had. I wish I were that easily amused. My birthday comes and goes without me really doing anything. A few weeks later, a friend from work buys me a belated birthday dinner, which is nice.
By October, I'm working a new schedule that reflects the paper's move toward a "Web first" philosophy, which requires the Web copy editor (me) to be there early in the day to post updates as they come in. It's hard to adjust to being at work at 8:30 5 days a week, but it's nice to have my evenings free again and I get the weekends off, which I love. I make it down to Eugene for homecoming even though it turns out the Emerald is not having a tailgate party this year. It's fun anyway and I get to see my friends.
In November, the election ends, and suddenly I have nothing to do with my free time because I no longer need to read political blogs or check fivethirtyeight.com every hour. Working election night is really fun. I love being in a newsroom on such busy nights. I thrive on the stress and energy.
Later in the month, I fulfill a childhood dream when I go see the New Kids On The Block in concert with my friend Kat. Amazing concert, awesome friend, hours (and gallons of gas) lost to driving around Seattle looking for parking/freeway on ramps, shitty hotel shuttle driver who leaves us stranded at the Tacoma Dome ... memories will last a lifetime.
December's pretty uneventful, except that the weather starts to go bad. Most of the Northwest is hit by weather that makes traveling out of town by car quite scary. I realize quickly that while it's nice to see the sun most days, I'd take Eugene's six months of grey skies and rain with temperatures above freezing over snow and single-digit temperatures.
January '09: So far, so good. New schedule at work again. But I'm going to Washington, D.C., to go to the inaugural address (and hopefully to see the Newseum), which is very exciting. Having a bit more of a social life but still miss my group of friends in Eugene.
At the beginning of '08, I ditch my plan to finish grad school by the end of Winter term and decide to just finish my courses and stay enrolled for spring term to buy myself more time to finish my terminal project. This is partly due to spending most of my time working at the Emerald, partly due to laziness, and partly due to not wanting to speed up the whole becoming-an-adult-paying-off-loans process.
I start applying for jobs and send applications to every posting I find that will keep me within a day's drive of home. I decide that I need to stay in the Northwest. A few applications fall through or turn out to be offering far less money than I need to live, but I get a call from a paper in Washington state and head up for an interview in early April (I try my best to be cryptic about where I live and work). I decide to make a small vacation of it and head up for a two-day interview, followed by a trip to Seattle. I'm in the Experience Music Project, learning to play the bass line of "Smells Like Teen Spirit," when my cell phone rings. It's the news editor at the paper calling to offer me a position. I happily accept.
On the way home, I stop in Portland to see Margaret Cho perform. She is every bit as fabulous as expected. My friends Matt and Tiffany are there as well and they meet her.
In May, I finish up my terminal project just before leaving Eugene. I'm excited for my new, grown-up job with real benefits and a good salary, but am sad to leave all my friends behind. It is the first time in my life I've moved somewhere where I didn't know anyone. Even when I interned in Washington, D.C., in 2007, I already had three friends there and then had roommates and met another friend at my internship training.
The new job is great, although working the late-night copy editing shift on weekends makes it hard to get out and do stuff or meet anyone. As the summer wears on, I slowly start to make friends with coworkers, but I find that I'm out of my comfort zone a bit in terms of meeting people. I've always considered myself an extrovert and have had an easy time making friends in the context of extra-curricular activities or school, but in a new job and new place, it's hard. I feel like it's high school and I'm the new kid in school. I miss having friends who know me -- know my stories, understand my sense of humor, etc.
In June, I head back to Eugene for graduation weekend. Getting my master's is exciting, but feels strange after having already been working for a month. It's fun to get back and see a few friends, though.
In July, I buy a new car with the help of my grandfather, who loves to research cars and told me what to get and even called a dealership in Seattle to find me a good deal. I expected to buy a used car, but managed to get approved for a loan for a brand-new Chevy Aveo that I LOVE. It's the first time in my life I've had a car of my own that I know will start every time I put the key in and that I don't have to teach people how to use. The loan is a little scary and a very adult thing to deal with, but six months later, I'm still in love with this car.
Two of my friends get married in August. One is my best friend, Kim, who I met in driver's ed class the summer after my freshman year of high school, and I'm the maid of honor. It's a lovely, short ceremony and the reception is a lot of fun. The second wedding is my friend Luci, who I've known since she was a fetus. (Our parents met when her mom and my mom were in childbirth class together and are still good friends.) My dad performed the ceremony, which was held in the yard of her grandmother's house. The Applegate river runs through the backyard and it's a beautiful location. I have great memories of floating down that river on inner tubes in the summer, picking fresh blackberries off the bushes along the bank. The reception is also at the house and they have a zip line that runs across the river. It's fantastic. A lovely outdoor ceremony with a zip line over a river seems like the way to go.
September is fairly uneventful. Some friends from Eugene and their adorable little genius baby, Avery, come to visit. He's 2 and spends the weekend counting the wrenches in my toolbox and telling me how many I had. I wish I were that easily amused. My birthday comes and goes without me really doing anything. A few weeks later, a friend from work buys me a belated birthday dinner, which is nice.
By October, I'm working a new schedule that reflects the paper's move toward a "Web first" philosophy, which requires the Web copy editor (me) to be there early in the day to post updates as they come in. It's hard to adjust to being at work at 8:30 5 days a week, but it's nice to have my evenings free again and I get the weekends off, which I love. I make it down to Eugene for homecoming even though it turns out the Emerald is not having a tailgate party this year. It's fun anyway and I get to see my friends.
In November, the election ends, and suddenly I have nothing to do with my free time because I no longer need to read political blogs or check fivethirtyeight.com every hour. Working election night is really fun. I love being in a newsroom on such busy nights. I thrive on the stress and energy.
Later in the month, I fulfill a childhood dream when I go see the New Kids On The Block in concert with my friend Kat. Amazing concert, awesome friend, hours (and gallons of gas) lost to driving around Seattle looking for parking/freeway on ramps, shitty hotel shuttle driver who leaves us stranded at the Tacoma Dome ... memories will last a lifetime.
December's pretty uneventful, except that the weather starts to go bad. Most of the Northwest is hit by weather that makes traveling out of town by car quite scary. I realize quickly that while it's nice to see the sun most days, I'd take Eugene's six months of grey skies and rain with temperatures above freezing over snow and single-digit temperatures.
January '09: So far, so good. New schedule at work again. But I'm going to Washington, D.C., to go to the inaugural address (and hopefully to see the Newseum), which is very exciting. Having a bit more of a social life but still miss my group of friends in Eugene.
Monday, November 24, 2008
[Cheesy pun based on a song title]
This weekend, my friend Kat flew out to Seattle to meet me for an event we've been waiting for our entire lives — a New Kids On The Block concert. Kat and I met at summer day camp in 1991 and bonded over our love for the group. She had been to a concert and I hadn't, so I thought she was totally cool. Words can't quite express just how obsessed I was with the New Kids, but the one thing I've ever really felt sad about in my childhood was that I didn't go to concert.
At some point in the very early part of this year, when word spread that the boys from Boston had reunited, Kat called and said "Girl, we HAVE to go to that concert."
So, when we learned the group was coming to the Northwest, I bought tickets to the Portland concert for Kat's birthday. In September or October, when we found out the group canceled the Rose Garden appearance to perform on the American Music Awards, I called in a panic to make sure she could change her travel plans and then I bought tickets to the Tacoma show, conveniently scheduled for the day before the Portland show.
Anyway, I hardly ever see Kat, so hanging out with her was awesome, and it was so great to have a friend to share the concert with who understands why it was so exciting for me. I've been waiting 18 years to see the New Kids in concert. They were my first loves, after all.
We got to the arena and discovered that our seats were phenomenal. Far better than I thought they would be from looking at the seating chart. We were only 14 rows off the floor and maybe about 200 feet from the stage. The opening acts were Lady Ga Ga, who was OK, and Natasha Bedingfield, who was actually fantastic. I wouldn't have known from the one song of hers that ever plays on the radio, but she has a really beautiful voice and seemed like a genuinely sweet person.
At 9:30 (the show started at 8), the New Kids finally came on stage and the place went insane. The stage had a raised platform and the group was raised up so they appeared out of nowhere as columns of smoke shot into the air. The entire floor lit up with the display screens from digital cameras and when Kat laughed about it, I said "Uhm, digital cameras didn't exist at the show you went to. We're old."
They started out with "Single," a song that is performed with Ne-Yo on their new album, "The Block." It was fantastic. The vocals were spot-on and the balance between the vocals and instruments was perfect. I've been to a lot of shows where the music was so loud and the balance so bad that you can't understand the vocals, but it was perfect. Aside from the screaming, we could have been the only people in the room. Big kudos to the sound guys at the show.
The next song was "My Favorite Girl," which was one of my two favorite songs when I was a kid. The audience went nuts. Everyone was singing and dancing along -- I'm guessing a lot of fans don't know the new album as well, so the crowd's energy was best on the old songs that we all remember (and that some of us never saw live before).
Throughout the show, they kept the energy up. You'd never know those guys were pushing 40 (although they make the late 30s look pretty damn hot). Even with all the performances I've seen on TV and all the YouTube videos I've seen from shows on this tour, I had NO idea these guys were such good live performances. Joe McIntyre really does have a way of making you feel like he's singing directly to you, even in a crowd of thousands.
They did a two-hour set with no intermission, although there was time for the guys to take turns resting while Joe, Jordan and Donnie sang solos. Jordan sang "Baby I Believe in You," which, like he did back in the day, he did with a fan blowing his shirt open. Now, at 10, that would have embarrassed me. At 28 ... it got pretty hot in that room during that song. He also performed "Give it to You," from the solo album he did about 8 years ago. Something was a little off about it. It's a fun song, but there was a point where it sounded like he messed up. I'll forgive him for it.
Joe sang the song "Stay the Same" from his own solo album, and while I don't remember ever hearing it before, I loved it. I'll have to get it on iTunes. Again, he's just an incredible performer.
About halfway through the show, the lights went down and when they came back up, the guys were on a small circular stage in the middle of the arena, where they performed "Dirty Dancing" off the new album and "Tonight," which is a song a lot of people dislike, but which really translates well to a live performance. It was harder for me to see during that portion, but it was fun.
I'm not sure I've ever heard screaming so loud. I was in Autzen Stadium when the Ducks beat Oklahoma in 2006, and I was in Mac Court when we beat then Number 1 UCLA the same year, both of which are places that are so loud other teams complain about it, and I've never heard screaming as loud as what I heard in the Tacoma Dome Saturday night. As Kat put it, "You know, it's one thing when the place is full of 10-year-olds. It's another when it's full of grown women." I swear to you, the screaming actually created overtones (ask me sometime about the piece I sang in choir that uses overtones).
They did every single song I wanted to hear, including "Please Don't Go Girl," which is my favorite "old" song. I always loved how sweet and sincere Joe was (they recorded that song when he was about 15), and he still is. He may have a deeper voice, but he still puts everything into it. It was beautiful. And they sang "I'll be Loving You Forever," which I think every fan thinks is just about her.
All the effects were fantastic (Fireworks! Smoke! Confetti streamers exploding out of the ceiling!) and everything was just really well put together. Their roadies and production people and the band really deserve big props for how well-done the entire show is. Never a dull moment. It really was a phenomenal show. The energy of the crowd and the fact that I've been waiting my entire life for the show aside, it really was the best concert I've ever been to. Absolutely incredible.
The set list was (although not in order, because I don't remember the order):
"Twisted" (from "The Block")
"Single" ("The Block")
"Grown Man" ("The Block")
"Summertime"("The Block)
"Click Click Click" ("The Block")
"2 in the Morning" ("The Block")
"Dirty Dancing" ("The Block")
"If You Go Away" (from "Face the Music" -- the last single they did before they broke up)
"The Right Stuff"
"Please Don't Go Girl"
"I'll be Loving You Forever"
"My Favorite Girl"
"Hangin' Tough"
"Cover Girl"
"Didn't I Blow Your Mind" (from their first album)
"Baby I Believe in You"
"Step by Step"
"Tonight"
"Valentine Girl"
"Give it to You" (from Jordan Knight's solo album)
"Stay the Same" (from Joe McIntyre's solo album)
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Happy Punctuation Day!
Today is my birthday.
It is also National Punctuation Day. You should celebrate both.
The day should be celebrated by everyone on the Internet. Moderators should insist that everyone on message forums begin using periods and commas correctly. The semi-colon is optional.
Next, we'll work on teaching people the difference between their, there and they're.
Those of us with good grammar will take over the world. ...
No, I didn't get enough sleep last night. Why do you ask?
It is also National Punctuation Day. You should celebrate both.
The day should be celebrated by everyone on the Internet. Moderators should insist that everyone on message forums begin using periods and commas correctly. The semi-colon is optional.
Next, we'll work on teaching people the difference between their, there and they're.
Those of us with good grammar will take over the world. ...
No, I didn't get enough sleep last night. Why do you ask?
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