I'll try to be more considerate. How 'bout I break one of my rules and talk a bit about work? Sort of....
Last night, I went hunting for a storytime in Fullerton with one of my coworkers who's soon to be doing a storytime of her own once a week. It was a research trip. We had faulty directions from one of our managers, but the fault began with us not paying attention to our exit. A couple streets were missing from the directive and signs were also misleading, the result being that we had to make four phone calls to different people during the drive and arrived twenty-five minutes late. Only to find that there was no storytime to begin with. Grr...
Lesson learned: call in advance, get directions beforehand from reliable source (i.e. a map), and allot significant extra time for the journey.
Our attempt to go incognito failed as well, since two of the managers recognized me immediately. They were really excited to see us though, thrilled to give us over an hour's worth of suggestions and advice (mostly the same few words of wisdom repeated in a variety of ways: 'don't forget to stamp it!' - 'and you can use a stamp' - 'when they see that stamp'). Not a wasted trip, overall, though thoroughly exhausting. After the driving adventure, we decided to forgo hunting for the cute restaurant downtown and just walked across the parking lot to Islands. Sometimes you make sacrifices for sanity. Beauty and adventure fall subject to stability and familiarity. The conversation, I think, does not suffer much from lack of ambiance or taste.
(sidebar: a girl is running down the sidewalk across the street with her hands in heavy black mits making broad swimming motions around and around above her head, freestyle in boxing gloves. the strokes are distracting from her pace, so her jogging has become a kind of shuffling run. bizarre. i love this street.)
When I got home, Uncle Bob was seated cozily in my living room. He had made a spontaneous visit just that afternoon and is in the house even now. Emily will be driving down later on today, and Tara and Spencer are also in town for a little while. There's a sandcastle competition down the beach a ways, Amanda's home sick, and Jenny B is back in town. Lots to do, people to see, places to go. But I don't feel busy. Maybe there's a resting somewhere inside that defies all the activity around me. Maybe it's the fog over the water. Maybe it's watching my cat sleep in her seafood box for hours on end.
Last night, I went hunting for a storytime in Fullerton with one of my coworkers who's soon to be doing a storytime of her own once a week. It was a research trip. We had faulty directions from one of our managers, but the fault began with us not paying attention to our exit. A couple streets were missing from the directive and signs were also misleading, the result being that we had to make four phone calls to different people during the drive and arrived twenty-five minutes late. Only to find that there was no storytime to begin with. Grr...
Lesson learned: call in advance, get directions beforehand from reliable source (i.e. a map), and allot significant extra time for the journey.
Our attempt to go incognito failed as well, since two of the managers recognized me immediately. They were really excited to see us though, thrilled to give us over an hour's worth of suggestions and advice (mostly the same few words of wisdom repeated in a variety of ways: 'don't forget to stamp it!' - 'and you can use a stamp' - 'when they see that stamp'). Not a wasted trip, overall, though thoroughly exhausting. After the driving adventure, we decided to forgo hunting for the cute restaurant downtown and just walked across the parking lot to Islands. Sometimes you make sacrifices for sanity. Beauty and adventure fall subject to stability and familiarity. The conversation, I think, does not suffer much from lack of ambiance or taste.
(sidebar: a girl is running down the sidewalk across the street with her hands in heavy black mits making broad swimming motions around and around above her head, freestyle in boxing gloves. the strokes are distracting from her pace, so her jogging has become a kind of shuffling run. bizarre. i love this street.)
When I got home, Uncle Bob was seated cozily in my living room. He had made a spontaneous visit just that afternoon and is in the house even now. Emily will be driving down later on today, and Tara and Spencer are also in town for a little while. There's a sandcastle competition down the beach a ways, Amanda's home sick, and Jenny B is back in town. Lots to do, people to see, places to go. But I don't feel busy. Maybe there's a resting somewhere inside that defies all the activity around me. Maybe it's the fog over the water. Maybe it's watching my cat sleep in her seafood box for hours on end.
Strange as that
ReplyDelete