2007 Redux
It has been a hectic week, so I am only now getting to my New Year post. I guess, in part, it is an Old Year post, as I wanted to take a little time to reflect on 2007 before looking ahead to 2008.
I think that 2007 might have been the year of the most obvious progress for me. It was a very good year, all in all. Here are
The Good:
1. The Radisson: I was always kind of frustrated with the fact that I worked as a waitress, but I sure had a good time there. Billy, my immediate supervisor, had a wonderfully inappropriate sense of humor. Tom, the curmudgeonly manager, seemed to think well of me. Becky was always great to talk to, whether I needed a laugh or a confidant. Mohammad and I had some pretty interesting conversations, mostly pseudo-philosophical. And Tony looked out for me (and was always willing to make me something not on the employee menu). I got promoted to Supervisor, which was financially helpful and gave me plenty of time to knit or play on the internet while I was at work. And I always enjoyed standing at the host stand and staring out at Triangle Park. Ultimately, it wasn’t the best situation for me, but I still count it as one of the highlights. It helped to remind me that, no matter what, I could always get some kind of employment. It also reminded me that I am capable of making friends.
2. AMSP and the University of Kentucky: In March, I quit my job at the Radisson and went full time at UK. I loved: having loads of free time to surf the internet or, on occasion, knit at work; eating Jimmy John’s for free every time there was a meeting; talking fiber with Sarah; working with an administrator, Dr. Yopp, who respected me and who taught me that the university can be used as a resource for the community; going to lunch with Barbara; the soup at Linaugh’s, which was amazing; working with the internationalization task force, which was by far the most professional experience I’ve ever had. I don’t think I can adequately express how important my experience at UK was for me, personally and professionally. I’m not sure I would me and less lost than I was before if it weren’t for the people there.
3. “That’s What She Said”: While there were a lot of really great things about my job at UK, the very best part was my co-worker, Josh. I think Josh might be the only friend I’ve made in the past two or three years. We never really hung out after work, so it’s not like we were all that close. But at work, we had a good time. We quoted The Office, argued about movies, talked politics (he’s conservative, where I am moderate/schizophrenic and lean to the left), and tried to one-up each other in “That’s What She Said” jokes. He’s very close with his family and devoted to his wife. An overall good person, and I feel lucky to have spent time with him. Without him, I would have never discovered Blue Moon with an orange slice or Flight of the Conchords. I might also have forgotten what a good movie Blazing Saddles is (though he was totally wrong about Transformers, which was awful).
4. My Going Away Party: Ok, this is the last I’ll say about my job at UK. Possibly the most fun I had all year was my going away party. We met at Marikka’s, the German restaurant and bar that serves 500 kinds of beer. Dr. Yopp’s wife made me a strawberry cake. We ate German food and pretzels and cake and drank. We talked and played pool. We complained about the music. Barbara stayed out till 10:00 (we got there around 5:30-6:00) and was terrible at darts. Josh and I stayed a little while longer, and Megan, his wife, was kind enough to come get me. There were some people playing volleyball outside and wearing t-shirts with the names of characters from Top Gun on them. Josh told me some story about a guy he knew in college, but I don’t remember what the story was. I drank a Blue Moon, a cider, an oatmeal stout, a lager of some kind, an apple lambic, and a vodka cranberry, plus a taste here and there of other people’s drinks (the pumpkin ale was good). I had a hangover the next day, but it was well worth it.
5. Kentucky Fudge Company: In the summer, Kevin bought a digital camera, and he started photographing small towns. We would drive to these towns, and he would spend hours taking pictures. Sometimes I would walk with him, but usually I would find something else to do. In Harrodsburg, I spent a good deal of time at the Kentucky Fudge Company. It’s an old restored drug store with the big counter and lovely ceiling. They had wonderful coffee (especially the Kentucky Bourbon flavored coffee), good ice cream, and the best chicken salad sandwich and quiche I’ve ever had. Mostly I would knit or play around on the computer. It got to be a favorite place for me. I hope to see it again someday
6. Mammoth Cave and Land Between the Lakes: In the summer, Kevin and I took a short overnight trip to Mammoth Cave and Land Between the Lakes. Mammoth Cave is always a good trip, even though we got caught in the rain and were as drenched as if we had jumped in a pool with our clothes on. Even that was kind of fun, though, and we changed into dry clothes in our car, watching for anyone who might pass by. The tour was excellent, and the dinner at the hotel was good too. At Land Between the Lakes, we hoped to see some bison at the elk and bison preserve, but all we saw were a few elk laying down in the shade quite a ways off. Still fun, and the whole area is beautiful. There’s this little bakery that makes all low-fat muffins where we got breakfast. We also went to a… I’m not sure what you’d call it. It’s a place where kids can go and learn about wildlife. They had what was essential a tiny zoo with a few birds of prey and other local animals (they said they had a possum, but I didn’t see it). We got there just in time for the snake feeding, and I held one of them. Pretty cool. On the way home, we saw a bison farm. Mission Accomplished.
7. Anniversary: First, I was just happy to have a second anniversary. Kevin and I took a week off from work and went up to the UP. The entire week was fun, but for our anniversary proper, we drove up the Houghton for a night. On the way, we stopped in L’Anse, where I had an experience of the sublime in an Indian cemetery. It was perhaps the most significant moment of the year. We stayed the night in a pretty nice Super 8 in Houghton and ate at an awesome, very local restaurant in Hancock. The next day, we drove up to the Copper Harbor, stopping along the way at roadside parks and any place that looked picture-worthy. In Copper Harbor, we saw Fort Wilkins (where we kept seeing the same group of the most redneck people you’ve ever seen in your life, one of whom stunk so bad he mademe gag), the Copper Harbor lighthouse, stopped for coffee at a tiny coffee shop and saw the cutest orange Persian cat, ate lunch at a touristy restaurant (where we saw the smelly people again), drove the Brockway Mountain Drive and the wind was so strong it rocked the car and I thought we were going to die, and took the long way home. It was beautiful and fun and emotional and I think, at least for that day, we both enjoyed our marriage very much.
8. Fayette: On the way home from that trip to the UP, Kevin and I stopped at Fayette in the Garden Peninsula. Fayette used to be an iron smelting town, and many of the structures and buildings have been restored and recreated. It was an important experience at the time for both of us, and we decided we would come back. Sometimes later (August or September, I think) we decided to make another trip and camp. We never told any of Kevin’s family we were going so we wouldn’t feel obligated to visit anyone. We left on Friday after work and arrived around 7:00am on Saturday (after a quick stop in St. Ignace to see the Father Marquette memorial). I spent some time walking around the park by myself, took a long afternoon nap in the tent, and spent some time knitting and listening to Mere Christianity on audio tape. Kevin took some very nice pictures. We visited a winery, which had a very nice dog and some unimpressive wine, but I bought a bottle anyway. We ate bad food at a strange restaurant. We made a trip to a gas station for treats, but the smell inside (maybe from the onions, maybe from meat, I’m not sure) made me gag so much I had to wait in the car. We had taken Monday off, but on Saturday night, we decided head out early and drive through the night so we would have some time at home before going back to work. I ate at a Big Boy for the first time ever. A very good time was had.
9. Labor Day Weekend: Danie, Tim, Layla and Vince came down to visit. This was the first time anyone from Kevin’s family had visited us in Lexington. In fact, it was the only time anyone from his family ever visited us, except for our wedding. While Tim was a bit of a downer, we had a very good time entertaining the kids. We took them to the Kentucky Horse Park, Boyd’s Orchard, a Civil War re-enactment train ride in Versailles (kind of lame, kind of fun, depending on point of view), and GattiTown. Elsie, our gregarious cat, was very tolerant of the kids petting her, and we were sad to see them go.
10. Ian and Hope: While Ian is no longer a part of my life in any significant sense, when I heard they were married and that Ian seemed happier than ever, it made me very happy for them. I wish them a long and happy life together.
11. Grand Forks: This is a big one. The decision to move to Grand Forks was the first positive, deliberate step Kevin and I have ever made, certainly in our married life, and possibly ever in our separate lives. I had my reasons and Kevin had his, and even though everyone said we were crazy, we did it. I am falling in love with the town, with its tree-lined streets and the accents for the residents and the coffee shops and walking downtown in the cold and snow to have French toast at the Dakota Harvest Bakers on Sunday morning or to see a movie in downtown East Grand Forks and driving outside of town where the land is flat and spare and the skeletal beauty of bare trees against white-blue skies. And we decided to move here together. That is important.
The Bad
1. Death: In the summer, a poet from SIU committed suicide. I knew him, though not well. His death affected me for a while, and I find myself thinking about him still sometimes. I guess I don’t have much to say about it, just that it is profoundly sad. Also, a woman who lived on my floor here in Grand Forks died just before Christmas. We were home that night, and we hear loud noises and someone sobbing uncontrollably I went to the peephole and saw some paramedics pulling stretcher, and I think the sheet was pulled over the woman’s face. We weren’t sure who it was at the time, but it turned out to be Millie. When we came back to our apartment in early November after being gone for six weeks, there was a bag hanging on our doorknob with a decorative kitchen towel and a note that said “Welcome here” which was signed by Millie. And now she is gone. Again, it is very sad.
2. Taxes: Jackson Hewitt screwed up our taxes so badly that it took until September for everything to get cleared up (and actually, we never got our Illinois taxes cleared up, but no one has yet called us on it). The State of Kentucky thought we owed them gobs of money, and we thought the State of Kentucky owed us a little money, and it was one great big mess for a while.
3. Drunk Bitches: For a while, one of the women I worked with at AMSP was making me crazy. She was an alcoholic vegan weirdo who enjoyed craziness and drama in general, but she especially enjoyed passive aggression. At some point, I showed up on her radar, and she started making me feel kind of awful. Then she quit. Problem solved.
4. Cancer: My mom’s husband, Kevin, was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. At first they thought it was cancer, then they thought it wasn’t, then they knew it was. Thyroid cancer is totally treatable, and it hadn’t spread anywhere else. But my mom, who is never particularly calm anyway, went emotionally haywire. She started getting grumpy with me (she was particularly critical of my decision to move to North Dakota during this time), was very grumpy with Kevin, and she cried a lot. I went down to Fayetteville to try to help out as much as I could (Kevin had to be on a very strict no-iodine diet, and my mom doesn’t cook). After about four days, I was ready to leave. Kevin spent all of his time on the couch, and my mom was extra crazy. I spent most of my time in my room upstairs, hiding. I couldn’t really tell my mom that she was being a bitch, but I couldn’t stand being around her either. We had a bit of a fight one night when I told her she was being very disrespectful by calling Grand Forks “a God-forsaken place” and continuing to refer to me as crazy and act like I’m stupid by constantly telling me that it’s cold in North Dakota. I also nearly ripped into her husband one night when we watched a show about global warming. The time at my mom’s, sadly, was probably the lowest part of the year for me. Overwhelmingly disappointing and frustrating.
5. Unemployment: It’s never fun to look for a job, and luckily, I wasn’t out of work that long. That I managed to get a job at the university so quickly is actually kind of surprising. But the 6 weeks I spent without work got more and more miserable. I went on several interviews, but I only got offered part-time jobs that paid little. I got a letter back from one place I interviewed that said that I was ranked 8th out of ten candidates and my interview received at score of 78%. That hurt, especially when I thought I was plenty qualified. During another interview, the guy stopped me in the middle and asked why I wanted the job. He said I was overqualified, having worked for an associate provost and holding a master’s degree. It was very frustrating, realizing that I am both over- and under-qualified for most jobs. I have not managed to create anything coherent in my work experience. It’s time to get cracking on that.
I think that 2007 might have been the year of the most obvious progress for me. It was a very good year, all in all. Here are
The Good:
1. The Radisson: I was always kind of frustrated with the fact that I worked as a waitress, but I sure had a good time there. Billy, my immediate supervisor, had a wonderfully inappropriate sense of humor. Tom, the curmudgeonly manager, seemed to think well of me. Becky was always great to talk to, whether I needed a laugh or a confidant. Mohammad and I had some pretty interesting conversations, mostly pseudo-philosophical. And Tony looked out for me (and was always willing to make me something not on the employee menu). I got promoted to Supervisor, which was financially helpful and gave me plenty of time to knit or play on the internet while I was at work. And I always enjoyed standing at the host stand and staring out at Triangle Park. Ultimately, it wasn’t the best situation for me, but I still count it as one of the highlights. It helped to remind me that, no matter what, I could always get some kind of employment. It also reminded me that I am capable of making friends.
2. AMSP and the University of Kentucky: In March, I quit my job at the Radisson and went full time at UK. I loved: having loads of free time to surf the internet or, on occasion, knit at work; eating Jimmy John’s for free every time there was a meeting; talking fiber with Sarah; working with an administrator, Dr. Yopp, who respected me and who taught me that the university can be used as a resource for the community; going to lunch with Barbara; the soup at Linaugh’s, which was amazing; working with the internationalization task force, which was by far the most professional experience I’ve ever had. I don’t think I can adequately express how important my experience at UK was for me, personally and professionally. I’m not sure I would me and less lost than I was before if it weren’t for the people there.
3. “That’s What She Said”: While there were a lot of really great things about my job at UK, the very best part was my co-worker, Josh. I think Josh might be the only friend I’ve made in the past two or three years. We never really hung out after work, so it’s not like we were all that close. But at work, we had a good time. We quoted The Office, argued about movies, talked politics (he’s conservative, where I am moderate/schizophrenic and lean to the left), and tried to one-up each other in “That’s What She Said” jokes. He’s very close with his family and devoted to his wife. An overall good person, and I feel lucky to have spent time with him. Without him, I would have never discovered Blue Moon with an orange slice or Flight of the Conchords. I might also have forgotten what a good movie Blazing Saddles is (though he was totally wrong about Transformers, which was awful).
4. My Going Away Party: Ok, this is the last I’ll say about my job at UK. Possibly the most fun I had all year was my going away party. We met at Marikka’s, the German restaurant and bar that serves 500 kinds of beer. Dr. Yopp’s wife made me a strawberry cake. We ate German food and pretzels and cake and drank. We talked and played pool. We complained about the music. Barbara stayed out till 10:00 (we got there around 5:30-6:00) and was terrible at darts. Josh and I stayed a little while longer, and Megan, his wife, was kind enough to come get me. There were some people playing volleyball outside and wearing t-shirts with the names of characters from Top Gun on them. Josh told me some story about a guy he knew in college, but I don’t remember what the story was. I drank a Blue Moon, a cider, an oatmeal stout, a lager of some kind, an apple lambic, and a vodka cranberry, plus a taste here and there of other people’s drinks (the pumpkin ale was good). I had a hangover the next day, but it was well worth it.
5. Kentucky Fudge Company: In the summer, Kevin bought a digital camera, and he started photographing small towns. We would drive to these towns, and he would spend hours taking pictures. Sometimes I would walk with him, but usually I would find something else to do. In Harrodsburg, I spent a good deal of time at the Kentucky Fudge Company. It’s an old restored drug store with the big counter and lovely ceiling. They had wonderful coffee (especially the Kentucky Bourbon flavored coffee), good ice cream, and the best chicken salad sandwich and quiche I’ve ever had. Mostly I would knit or play around on the computer. It got to be a favorite place for me. I hope to see it again someday
6. Mammoth Cave and Land Between the Lakes: In the summer, Kevin and I took a short overnight trip to Mammoth Cave and Land Between the Lakes. Mammoth Cave is always a good trip, even though we got caught in the rain and were as drenched as if we had jumped in a pool with our clothes on. Even that was kind of fun, though, and we changed into dry clothes in our car, watching for anyone who might pass by. The tour was excellent, and the dinner at the hotel was good too. At Land Between the Lakes, we hoped to see some bison at the elk and bison preserve, but all we saw were a few elk laying down in the shade quite a ways off. Still fun, and the whole area is beautiful. There’s this little bakery that makes all low-fat muffins where we got breakfast. We also went to a… I’m not sure what you’d call it. It’s a place where kids can go and learn about wildlife. They had what was essential a tiny zoo with a few birds of prey and other local animals (they said they had a possum, but I didn’t see it). We got there just in time for the snake feeding, and I held one of them. Pretty cool. On the way home, we saw a bison farm. Mission Accomplished.
7. Anniversary: First, I was just happy to have a second anniversary. Kevin and I took a week off from work and went up to the UP. The entire week was fun, but for our anniversary proper, we drove up the Houghton for a night. On the way, we stopped in L’Anse, where I had an experience of the sublime in an Indian cemetery. It was perhaps the most significant moment of the year. We stayed the night in a pretty nice Super 8 in Houghton and ate at an awesome, very local restaurant in Hancock. The next day, we drove up to the Copper Harbor, stopping along the way at roadside parks and any place that looked picture-worthy. In Copper Harbor, we saw Fort Wilkins (where we kept seeing the same group of the most redneck people you’ve ever seen in your life, one of whom stunk so bad he mademe gag), the Copper Harbor lighthouse, stopped for coffee at a tiny coffee shop and saw the cutest orange Persian cat, ate lunch at a touristy restaurant (where we saw the smelly people again), drove the Brockway Mountain Drive and the wind was so strong it rocked the car and I thought we were going to die, and took the long way home. It was beautiful and fun and emotional and I think, at least for that day, we both enjoyed our marriage very much.
8. Fayette: On the way home from that trip to the UP, Kevin and I stopped at Fayette in the Garden Peninsula. Fayette used to be an iron smelting town, and many of the structures and buildings have been restored and recreated. It was an important experience at the time for both of us, and we decided we would come back. Sometimes later (August or September, I think) we decided to make another trip and camp. We never told any of Kevin’s family we were going so we wouldn’t feel obligated to visit anyone. We left on Friday after work and arrived around 7:00am on Saturday (after a quick stop in St. Ignace to see the Father Marquette memorial). I spent some time walking around the park by myself, took a long afternoon nap in the tent, and spent some time knitting and listening to Mere Christianity on audio tape. Kevin took some very nice pictures. We visited a winery, which had a very nice dog and some unimpressive wine, but I bought a bottle anyway. We ate bad food at a strange restaurant. We made a trip to a gas station for treats, but the smell inside (maybe from the onions, maybe from meat, I’m not sure) made me gag so much I had to wait in the car. We had taken Monday off, but on Saturday night, we decided head out early and drive through the night so we would have some time at home before going back to work. I ate at a Big Boy for the first time ever. A very good time was had.
9. Labor Day Weekend: Danie, Tim, Layla and Vince came down to visit. This was the first time anyone from Kevin’s family had visited us in Lexington. In fact, it was the only time anyone from his family ever visited us, except for our wedding. While Tim was a bit of a downer, we had a very good time entertaining the kids. We took them to the Kentucky Horse Park, Boyd’s Orchard, a Civil War re-enactment train ride in Versailles (kind of lame, kind of fun, depending on point of view), and GattiTown. Elsie, our gregarious cat, was very tolerant of the kids petting her, and we were sad to see them go.
10. Ian and Hope: While Ian is no longer a part of my life in any significant sense, when I heard they were married and that Ian seemed happier than ever, it made me very happy for them. I wish them a long and happy life together.
11. Grand Forks: This is a big one. The decision to move to Grand Forks was the first positive, deliberate step Kevin and I have ever made, certainly in our married life, and possibly ever in our separate lives. I had my reasons and Kevin had his, and even though everyone said we were crazy, we did it. I am falling in love with the town, with its tree-lined streets and the accents for the residents and the coffee shops and walking downtown in the cold and snow to have French toast at the Dakota Harvest Bakers on Sunday morning or to see a movie in downtown East Grand Forks and driving outside of town where the land is flat and spare and the skeletal beauty of bare trees against white-blue skies. And we decided to move here together. That is important.
The Bad
1. Death: In the summer, a poet from SIU committed suicide. I knew him, though not well. His death affected me for a while, and I find myself thinking about him still sometimes. I guess I don’t have much to say about it, just that it is profoundly sad. Also, a woman who lived on my floor here in Grand Forks died just before Christmas. We were home that night, and we hear loud noises and someone sobbing uncontrollably I went to the peephole and saw some paramedics pulling stretcher, and I think the sheet was pulled over the woman’s face. We weren’t sure who it was at the time, but it turned out to be Millie. When we came back to our apartment in early November after being gone for six weeks, there was a bag hanging on our doorknob with a decorative kitchen towel and a note that said “Welcome here” which was signed by Millie. And now she is gone. Again, it is very sad.
2. Taxes: Jackson Hewitt screwed up our taxes so badly that it took until September for everything to get cleared up (and actually, we never got our Illinois taxes cleared up, but no one has yet called us on it). The State of Kentucky thought we owed them gobs of money, and we thought the State of Kentucky owed us a little money, and it was one great big mess for a while.
3. Drunk Bitches: For a while, one of the women I worked with at AMSP was making me crazy. She was an alcoholic vegan weirdo who enjoyed craziness and drama in general, but she especially enjoyed passive aggression. At some point, I showed up on her radar, and she started making me feel kind of awful. Then she quit. Problem solved.
4. Cancer: My mom’s husband, Kevin, was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. At first they thought it was cancer, then they thought it wasn’t, then they knew it was. Thyroid cancer is totally treatable, and it hadn’t spread anywhere else. But my mom, who is never particularly calm anyway, went emotionally haywire. She started getting grumpy with me (she was particularly critical of my decision to move to North Dakota during this time), was very grumpy with Kevin, and she cried a lot. I went down to Fayetteville to try to help out as much as I could (Kevin had to be on a very strict no-iodine diet, and my mom doesn’t cook). After about four days, I was ready to leave. Kevin spent all of his time on the couch, and my mom was extra crazy. I spent most of my time in my room upstairs, hiding. I couldn’t really tell my mom that she was being a bitch, but I couldn’t stand being around her either. We had a bit of a fight one night when I told her she was being very disrespectful by calling Grand Forks “a God-forsaken place” and continuing to refer to me as crazy and act like I’m stupid by constantly telling me that it’s cold in North Dakota. I also nearly ripped into her husband one night when we watched a show about global warming. The time at my mom’s, sadly, was probably the lowest part of the year for me. Overwhelmingly disappointing and frustrating.
5. Unemployment: It’s never fun to look for a job, and luckily, I wasn’t out of work that long. That I managed to get a job at the university so quickly is actually kind of surprising. But the 6 weeks I spent without work got more and more miserable. I went on several interviews, but I only got offered part-time jobs that paid little. I got a letter back from one place I interviewed that said that I was ranked 8th out of ten candidates and my interview received at score of 78%. That hurt, especially when I thought I was plenty qualified. During another interview, the guy stopped me in the middle and asked why I wanted the job. He said I was overqualified, having worked for an associate provost and holding a master’s degree. It was very frustrating, realizing that I am both over- and under-qualified for most jobs. I have not managed to create anything coherent in my work experience. It’s time to get cracking on that.