About This Blog
A blog about my life, universe, etc. At any given time you might find something endlessly interesting or just me ruminating on something else, which no one (not even myself) finds interesting. That's the way blogs go, I suppose. Anyway, I was eleventh in line, and you weren't. Hah!

About Me
Name:
Sarah
Age:
26
Residence:
Columbus, OH
Religion:
LDS
Political Score:
5.00/-2.15
Job:
Temp @ JPMorgan Chase
College:
Ohio State University
Majors:
Political Science, International Studies
High School: Home Educated
Hobbies:
Reading, standing in line for things, writing, research
Resume:
HotJobs
Email:
lloannna@gmail.com

About My Family
My mom is a lawyer in Pickerington; my stepdad and dad are computer guys, and my stepmom (who works with my dad) is an engineer. My sisters are, in order of age, a photographer, an artist, and a person too young to have her own website. My brothers are, in order of age, living up north, and again, a person too young to have a website. At some point soon I'll be collecting links for my aunts, uncle, and cousins. ^_^

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Message Services
(Please see the notes below the Comment Policy before sending me a message)
AIM:
lloannna
ICQ:
29395930
Yahoo:
lloannna

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My CafePress Designs

Even More CafePress Designs

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Star Wars: Episode 3 Line (Hollywood)
My Star Wars Line page

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NaNoWriMo 2007:
My Novel: Cipere Lumen




NaNoWriMo 2006:
My Novel: The Manatee Conspiracy




NaNoWriMo 2005:
My Novel: Beyond the Cliffs of Kefira





NaNoWriMo 2004:
My Novel: sul Okyar tir taTz'ileea

 
  JUST WANTED TO LET YOU ALL KNOW: That you can now once again Join My Army!!! Seriously, this thing is a great way to waste a few minutes out of your day. Gotta love anything like that.

I plan to post some substantive... stuff... tonight.
posted by Sarah at 4:04 PM. | 0 comments |

 
  HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY, WWdN: Apparently, three years and one day ago, Wil Wheaton started his first blog. Coincidentally, twelve years and five days ago, I started sixth grade. Also, ten years and eight days ago, my brother James was born. WOOT! Remembering when stuff happened is cool.
posted by Sarah at 6:59 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  HEY YOU GUYS!!!! So, anyway, those of you who are here from my Craigslist ad, welcome, welcome, welcome. This little itty bit of cyberspace is what I like to call Mine, so it's a little messy and sometimes a bit weird, but overall I like it nonetheless. This is a good way of finding out what I'm like (which you already got from my ad), and apparently the way I talk (which you won't find much of in my ad), and all the rest of it. And yes, that was a quote from Goonies, one of the Best Movies Ever. And if that doesn't say enough about me, I can't think of what will...
posted by Sarah at 6:00 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  NOT THAT I BELIEVE IN THE PLACE OR ANYTHING... I got this from Lex's LJ. I think it's a nice way of illustrating my priorities.


posted by Sarah at 4:02 PM. | 0 comments |

 
  MAKE THAT TEN DAYS... All right, so I was wrong. To be more accurate, I was right, then I came home, gained access to incorrect information, became wrong, and found out my error rather late in the actual process. Yes, that's right, I was supposed to go to work yesterday at 4:30pm. Fortunately, I noticed my error at 5:30pm, which means that while I did have to work 10 days straight, I will at the least be getting 2.5 hours of overtime for my trouble. Never mind that I now have 10.5 points at work (that means I've been late 7 times since January 4th). I probably should have called out dependent, but I felt REALLY bad about leaving them alone to try and cope without me... stupid morals.
posted by Sarah at 3:06 PM. | 0 comments |

 
  I HAVE SOME THOUGHTS: Truly, I know I do. Sorry for the long delay between updates, everyone, but I've just finished working nine days straight at DL. If I didn't have tomorrow (which is to say, today, unless you're reading in... Hawaii...) off, I'd be working (if I've calculated this right) at least 15 days straight. Anyway, I plan to spend a good chunk of tomorrow catching up. AND it seems that Schwarzenegger is going to hold a press Q&A tomorrow, in honor of my day off. WOOT!

posted by Sarah at 5:50 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  HOUSEKEEPING: I don't appreciate or tolerate thread-hijacking. If you want to make a comment about something I've said elsewhere, there are plenty of opportunties to do so. I post my email on this front page, as well as in all forums and comment sections in which I take part. If you're looking for free publicity, try indices like Weblogs. If you're looking for a fight, go somewhere else. All comments which are not germane to the post to which they are appended will be deleted; I may choose to repost them in their own post here at my discretion.

Having said that, please consider the comments that Nitin made today (on the post that happened to be at the top of the page, about Anna and Barb and so forth) regarding what I said on CalPundit, regarding a list of good conservative blogs (CalPundit's owner is a self-described liberal):

""I haven't seen any lists like this on conservative blogs"

I hope you weren't implying anything, like the close-mindedness of Conservatives or Libertarians. Before I even saw this list, I had made a very similar post at my blog, hawken.blogspot.com . Also, I have always maintained a list of Liberal bloggers on my blogroll, that I check frequently.

Also, even though I am a conservative, I am very interested in ideas from all sides of the spectrum. This is the basis of my blog. It is a collection of my friends from high school, and we come from all different ends of the political spectrum. Traditional conservatives. Libertarian/conservative mixes (like myself). Moderate liberals. Extreme nader-supporting liberals. And we dish it out in an online crossfire.

So yeah, lists like that exist, and conservatives are just as open-minded to discussion as liberals are. While you are at it, make your way to a college campus, and ask if the liberal students are as open-minded to conservative thought. When conservative speakers are being booed, interrupted, and attacked, I hope this makes you double-check the supposed "open-mindedness" of liberals."

(link given: Hawken; email link not given in original comment)

For the record, here's what I said:

"Good to see blogs other than the big few that are always linked to by everyone. Though I've only been seriously perusing the political zone of the blogosphere for about two months now, I was surprised to see so many excellent blogs on the list that I haven't seen before. My "blogs to check daily" list is becoming oppressively long.

I haven't seen any lists like this on conservative blogs, but again it's only been since late May/early June for me. I must point out, though, that I started looking primarily at blogs that I agree with (e.g. SamizData) and branched out enough to find CalPundit and other liberal blogs. So, it's not like you all are being shunned."

You be the judge. And if you have something to say, say it here, in the comment section to this post. Thanks!

(note to Nitin: sorry, I meant "impugn")
[update: changed Nitin's name to reflect reality, thanks for the comment alerting me to the error.]
posted by Sarah at 3:30 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  AMEN, SISTER: Kira has an insightful post about Queer Eye for the Straight Guy, and sexual conversation etiquette in general. A good read all around...

And stop feeling up the straight guys already. They don't like it.

posted by Sarah at 7:00 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  REALITY BITES: Let's face facts here, for a moment, people: there are a lot of Sarahs in the world (and plenty of Saras, too). I'm quite used to being the "other" Sarah, have been referred to by monikers such as "Disneyland Sarah" and "Sarah the Younger," have become inurred to the effects of being called "SMPA" or "Parker-Allen," and at my place of work, when I'm in New Orleans Square, the other Sarahs know me as "Hermione" (everyone picked a name, you see). So I'd like to make one thing very clear to the 43 of you who, in the last two days, have come to this site in search of a different Sarah (who, apparently, has graced a certain... risque publication, shall we say, with her likeness): I'm not that Sarah. Understood? Hopefully some of you thought this place was nice enough to stick around and read more of, but considering the search terms you used to get here (besides "Sarah," I mean), I sort of doubt it. By the by, try searching on Google instead of Popdex. I don't rank highly there at all...

(note: 43 people makes 78.2% of my total traffic since yesterday...)

By the way, "hi" to the 11 of you (20% of my total traffic!!) who aren't me and weren't looking for that other Sarah. Please, feel free to look around, make a comment, etc. I sure do appreciate you being here!

[update: please also let me express my sincerest condolances to those of you who thought you were going to get an ex-reality TV show nudie type... it was never my intent for you to think you could get that kind of stuff here, but nonetheless I feel sad on your behalf that you were disappointed...]
posted by Sarah at 5:50 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT: I just thought I'd share my thoughts about Anna finally updating Last Tango in Paris again. I suppose I really shouldn't say "finally," not when I haven't put out an original work OR bit of fanfic since... well, gosh, March? But anyway, LTiP got updated again, and praise be to the heavens. Except... every chapter of this fic saga, just like every chapter of Triangle Prophecy, brings us all one step closer to the end (as far as I know, Anna isn't planning a fourth venture into the Roman Holiday world, and Barb has said many times she will not write anything else in the Psychic Serpent universe). This is sort of like original Harry Potter novels, episodes of Babylon 5, etc.; the feeling is only marginally less depressing than what you get when reading one of the last few books in the Chronicles of Narnia (for some reason, it always hits me in "The Silver Chair"). But at the same time, it isn't half as demoralizing as what I feel when something is stretched beyond it's elastic capacity -- take, for example, the Star Trek franchise and "Enterprise." There's beating a dead horse, and on Disneyland's Main Street to boot. It seems like you just can't win, and I find it sad.

Another sad thing? I'm not even REMOTELY well-placed in Google searches for "sarah." I know I'm in there (because when I search all the results for "lloannna," there's something like 20 hits), but nowhere near any kind of relevant ranking. In fact, I'm not even really very well placed on "sarah blog." Recent topics ("schwarzenegger," "harry potter," etc.) don't rank well at all, either. The SarahFinder doesn't turn up when you search "sarah disneyland." I find it vaguely disappointing, and yet reassuring in a "stalkers have to at least know my username to find me" sort of way. Of course, I've had the same username since 1992, so it's not hard (and, no one else has it... every hit on "lloannna" is me). So there's something to be comforted by. Or, freaked out by, depending on how you want to think about these things...

Realistically I think it's time we all admitted there's no real cause for optimism and everything's going to turn out badly for the rest of forever.
posted by Sarah at 5:22 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  WEDNESDAY IS GONE, AND I SAY GOOD RIDDANCE: You ever have one of those days when the only thing you manage to do well is convince yourself of your own incompetence? One of those days where you know you'll actually lose more than you spend if you go gambling, and where you know that if you come up with an idea, you should at all costs do its exact opposite, because all your ideas are turning into disasters? That's what August 13th, 2003, was to me, and I'm glad it's done. Now, let's move on; I hear Thursday is looking quite promising. Especially since they're not letting me near any money or cash register buttons or job interviewers or washing machines. Don't ask.

However, a real live blogging pro type person commented on my blog on Wednesday. I'm pretty sure Xrlq was just hear to see the train wreck (the scent of blood was probably in the blogosphere), but I'm pleased he stopped by nonetheless. And yeah, I know that Davis said "8 million," but he's an idiot and I'm not. Plus, my parents' co-Davis-voter-types deserve to be insulted. In fact, I say, we should be handing out commendations to everyone who signed the recall petitions, on the grounds that it was a big fat raspberry to everyone who voted for him in November. And because it's now Thursday, that means my idea isn't automatically false on principle, anymore.
posted by Sarah at 3:51 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  TAKE THE GOOD WITH THE... WORST AMERICANS IN HISTORY? Everyone has seen the RWN Survey of bloggers' views of who was the worst American in history. Now, the focus has been on the ones that each side (the lists are divided -- liberal bloggers' opinions vs. conservative bloggers' opinions) finds completely unbelievable, like FDR on the conservative list or Ronald Reagan on the liberal list. The thing is, standing here in the middle of the American political scene, I think I could have guessed 90% of the names that each side came up with that the other side would wail about. What I find interesting, instead, are the ones that both sides agreed on -- because frankly, there's three names on there (and I find this absolutely AMAZING) that I would have guessed one side would hate and the other side would be annoyed by, and they're on BOTH lists. I've aggregated and ordered the names that appeared on both lists, by total number of votes received.

Boss Tweed (10) (5 + 5)
John Walker Lindh (11) (6 + 5)
Aldrich Ames (13) (6 + 7)
Aaron Burr (14) (6 + 8)
Charles Manson (14) (5 + 9)
Lee Harvey Oswald (14) (6 + 8)
John Wilkes Booth (24) (10 +14)
The Rosenbergs (26) (20 + 6)
Timothy McVeigh (26) (10 + 16)
Benedict Arnold (33) (14 + 19)
Richard Nixon (33) (25 + 8)

Hang on, waitasecond... eight conservative people voted for Nixon? Six liberals voted for the Rosenbergs (on RWN and on my list, the Rosenbergs are counted as one vote even if the respondent said "Julius Rosenberg")??? While it is disheartening that Charles Manson didn't get more votes, and that Benedict Arnold ranks so high on both (thus demonstrating that far too many people still take their high school history class textbooks too seriously), I'm quite impressed that there were this many people who got a large number of votes. What's more, except for the Rosenbergs and Nixon, all the other matches got roughly the same number of votes (out of 36 liberals and 39 conservatives polled). Given that each respondent could vote for up to 20 people, I think that's pretty good. More than half of the overall respondants voted for Nixon and Arnold (we'll just ignore the reasons why voting either of them the Worst American In History is a bit silly, considering how complex both situations were). And it is heartening that agreements can be reached even amongst the flamewar set of opinion-holders. Now we just have to inject some political and historical reality into the proceedings...
posted by Sarah at 8:02 PM. | 0 comments |

 
  NOT JUST ANOTHER PRETTY MODERATE: CalBlog has some really interesting things to say about the Schwarzenegger campaign, and the idea (which I favor on a gut-instinct level, but can't explain rationally) that Mr. Universe has some intellectual credentials that make the former Rush fan (who got tired of the Dittohead/t-shirt/bumper music faddishness of the whole thing, as a 10th grader) in me get all goosebumpy. And, considering that we know that conservative Republicans all seem to have a political deathwish, if I were on Arnold's team, I'd certainly advocate spending about 58 campaign days in the armor of moderate thinking, too.

(George Will link courtesy of Matt Welch at National Review Hit & Run)
posted by Sarah at 6:53 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  NEW LINK OF THE MOMENT: Thanks to Koettke.Org, we now have a new link of the moment. Yes, folks, Jackie's moving onto the Honor Roll of past recipients of this tremendous honor... because, you see, we must make room for...

Computer 20 Questions

That's right, you can play 20 Questions with a computer. It took 29 guesses for it to realize I was thinking of a theme park (apparently it, like the majority of the Free World, doesn't read this blog very often), and 20 for it to realize I was thinking of a spaceship. The more you play (and millions of other people play, too) the smarter it gets. It thinks that theme parks are probably shaped like hot dogs, so I think we all ought to chip in for those lessons. Go on, click on the link. You know you want to!
posted by Sarah at 6:36 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  PERSONAL LIFE UPDATE:

Today has been quite a day on the political front (well, not really, but you'll see in a second) and more importantly, on the apartment front.

First of all, I finally was able to get ahold of the state Republican party (LA headquarters -- this is the only state I've ever lived in where there were two equal HQs for a single state party, further evidence of the north/south split here in CA), and it turns out that it didn't matter that I wasn't able to get to them on Friday. The Schwarzenegger campaign still hasn't released any information in terms of a phone number or physical address to reach them. What's more, my email to info@joinarnold.com (the email was posted this afternoon on the website) bounced. State HQ says call back on Thursday, they should have info then. If I didn't think that Tom McClintock's campaign (http://www.tommcclintock.com/) has chances of succeeding roughly comparable to a snowball's chance in Satan's parlor, I'd go and volunteer for him. After all, I've already got an address, phone number, and information on how to volunteer. Suffice to say that Arnold's team needs to get a move on, already; every single day represents fully 3% of the total campaign time.

Second, I have to make four phone calls tomorrow: to Marilyn (the woman who lives in the house I probably won't be renting a room out of; the utilities added an additional $150/month to the total, bringing it well above my hard ceiling of $600), to Lisa (I think she's the $380/month girl), Carmen (the $400/month plus $30-50 in utilities), and some girl named Yen, who didn't say more than that I had emailed her (which doesn't help; I emailed 8 people, four of whom had no clear ethnicity associated with them and one more who was definitely Asian ["we speak Chinese/English at home"]). We shall see.

[update: had to make the links, you know, actually link to something...]
posted by Sarah at 4:11 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  GRAY DAVIS SAYS THE RECALL ELECTION IS AN INSULT TO EVERYONE WHO VOTED FOR HIM: Fortunately, there's really not that many of them. I mean, when you look at the numbers, it seems to me, each person who signed the recall petition was insulting maybe 4.3 people who voted for Davis. And sure, that means that 0.45 people are insulting my California set of parents (who both voted for Davis), but anyone who listens to me talk knows that that's only a 0.45 increase on how many people insult them on a daily basis (particularly on political matters).

What I'm trying to say is, basically, that Davis is a twit who is making himself increasingly irrelevant and foolish-looking each and every day that this recall campaign continues. I look forward to seeing just how stupid he comes across as on October 6th!

[update: I had some issues with division earlier today, which have since been corrected... and no, I don't know why I thought that 800,000 was sixty percent of 3.5 million)

(link: The Associated Press, via Rough & Tumble)
posted by Sarah at 5:15 PM. | 0 comments |

 
  I JUST READ SOMETHING I HAD TO SHARE: I was clicking through my (now rather extensive) set of links to the blogging community (yes, I'm going to get a BlogRolling account, probably on the 12th), and I noticed a new link on InstaPundit (as if Glenn Reynolds needs more links), to the USS Clueless, aka Steven Den Beste's blog. And the article rocks, and I see that it rocks, and you should go read it so you can see it too. In fact, as they say, RTWT -- read the whole thing.

I also liked Steven's link to an OJ article (no, not THAT OJ, the Opinion Journal) about the non-boycott which has, nonetheless, proven quite effective. If you don't read all of SDB's stuff, at least read the whole OJ article, which is quite informative and makes a point I wish more people would (regarding France's less than stellar history with us... most of us seem to act as though the Statue of Liberty outbalances the rest of it!!)
posted by Sarah at 1:38 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  THE RELATIVE VALUE OF CONFORMISM: So, let's face it, I'm never going to get straight-As when it comes to conforming. Oh, sure, I try hard enough on occasion, but I can't even really fit in with Libertarians or Disney cast members, and well all know how accepting those people are.

Anyway, on one of my many email lists (I eschew message boards, which require clickthroughs and refreshes and other nasty interactions with my evil browser), one of the perennial topics of discussion has to do with conforming, and its relative usefulness/unacceptableness. In this case, all the members of the group are professing Introverts (in the Jungian/Kiersey school of personality typing), and the topic is conforming in a world (or at least nation) dominated by extraversion and extraverts.

Maybe it's just that I can't see conforming with ANYONE (even people who are adamant about not conforming and Denying One's True Nature), but I don't see how I can buy into the idea that adopting extraverted techniques while in situations where that proves advantageous is anything other than Plain Old Good Sense. I'm down with Plain Old Good Sense, since it usually encompasses most major Ways To Actually Succeed In Life. I appreciate not having more problems than are absolutely necessary, which is why I insist on keeping my personal time/space, well, personal, and why I make an effort to engage in chit-chat and socialization with Work People (this doesn't mean you, Jackie, you're not strictly a Work Person) even when I don't really mean most any of it and would rather just be left alone to accomplish my work. Why? Because the effort to do both (and many other things) is less than the effort and hassle and general unpleasantness of trying to deal with the consequences of not doing them. You don't want to see me with a migraine or having a weird depressive "sleep for three days straight" episode due to being forcibly exposed to endless social situations when I really just needed to be left alone. Nor do I want to have to work in a department with 2,000 people who think of me as a prickly, creepy, uncooperative, unfriendly Loner Who Might Be Dangerous. It's not about denying my true nature, it's about making my life as easy as it can be while still accomplishing my goals.

Note: this pragmatic streak is what keeps me from being a very good Libertarian even on the best of days... despite scoring as Libertarian as you CAN score on the World's Smallest Political Test...
posted by Sarah at 10:08 PM. | 0 comments |

 
  A FEW RANDOM THINGS: So, anyway, it's occurred to me that I don't update nearly often enough. Especially in terms of a day-to-day update thing (I do well on individual days, except when I don't update for ten such days all in a row), and not just hour-to-hour. Perhaps I'm not as bad as some people are, but it's not about comparisons. So, let's actually go about the business of blogging.

Recall Stuff
I've decided, as I'm sure you all know, to volunteer for the Schwarzenegger campaign. Well, that's becoming a bit of a pain. It turns out the California Republican Party can't quite be bothered to answer their phones on the weekend. So, as JAC (as I will henceforth be referring to the JoinArnold.Com website) STILL isn't updated with anything useful (there's a nice little bit about how great it was that in 1911, this one guy thought that a recall would be a good idea) beyond an online contribution form, I have to wait until tomorrow to get a phone number for volunteering and stuff. I have not, BTW, completely rejected the idea of voting for McClintock. I do wish I knew more about him, and less about his seeming need to just keep running for stuff till he wins again.

Also, just a warning, expect high levels of Recall-related stuff in my posts to pretty much every email list I'm on. Yes, even the Harry Potter fanfiction commentary ones. Sorry, just can't help it.


The Value of Independence
I'm going to be calling and emailing a few dozen people in the next three weeks, looking for a place to live. After 19 months of overstaying my welcome at my father's house (note to self: don't do that ever again), I've decided I would rather live on Ramen noodles than live here anymore. Also, once I'm out of the house, I can justifiably claim to be poor, and get reduced payments on my student loans.


The September That Never Ended
I finally have a name for the nightmare I experienced as a only-marginally-experienced Internet type, shortly before I started ninth grade. I wasn't really "in" the online world (Usenet, etc.) for very long before the day that AOL opened their portal to the Web (I remember trying to get through that portal during our brief and tortuous experience with AOL in 1991-92, and seeing a notice saying "Available Soon"), but it was still very much an us-vs-them thing for me (the "them" being AOL users), and for years I've recalled the time when the internet got flooded with neophytes and idiots with regret and sorrow (though actually, it was 1994, when AOLers started making websites and everyone started putting URLs in commercials, before I felt much of anything -- I was never really into Usenet except as a lurker). Considering that I wasn't even a teenager at the time, it's amazing how judgemental I was. Anyway, one hopes that the imminent arrival of AOL Journals won't have the same effect...
posted by Sarah at 8:51 PM. | 0 comments |

 
  THIS HERE WAR IS LIKE UNTO QUAGMIRES IN THE PAST: That's right, I'm dead serious about it. In just 102 days, an overwhelming 53 (American soldier type) people (actually engaged in combat) died (of combat-type injuries) in this conflict. Therefore, in approximately 279 years this will be just as bad as Vietnam.
See, it's clear-cut and reasonable, anyone would agree. And this is why I totally support us withdrawing due to the excessive loss of American soldiers (and the distastefulness and overwhelminghood of all of this to us poor idiot Home Front folk), absolutely NO LATER THAN the year 2284. I mean it this time.

Numbers and the idea and so forth all came from the Powerline Blog. ("Hat Tip" to PoliPundit)

Also, I like this site and think it says some Important Stuff About Voting. But I can't remember which blog I got it from. Sorry, will do better next time.
posted by Sarah at 6:27 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  UPON FURTHER CONSIDERATION... I think it's unlikely I'll be working for any Simon campaign. Guess that means I'll have to learn how to spell Schwarzenegger properly.
posted by Sarah at 4:53 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY OUT OF DATE... Sometimes, you start to take care of something, and then you forget to finish taking care of it. This is what happened with this post from like, two weeks ago...

THIS DAY JUST HAD TO BE INTERESTING: And I mean that at least partially in the "Chinese curse" sense of the word "interesting." But not entirely. Things looked up, then down, then sideways, then put on some funky glasses and rode around Space Mountain and got really dizzy. Or they would have, except that Space Mountain is STILL DOWN and will be until I'm old enough to run for Congress. Maybe.

Let's begin at the beginning, shall we? Last night, 2am. I sit down, finally home and all that, thinking about watching some of the TV shows I've got taped (I'm 8 hours behind right now). I lie down for a second; there are commercials and stuff and I want to see if this episode of Seven Days is interesting enough to put off catching up on old Stargate reruns. Next thing I know, it's 5am, my stepmother is waking up, and the dishes didn't get done. At least the cars are on the right side of the street, because I'm so out of it I stumble back to my room, strip, and fall asleep without even setting the alarm. Barely even heard Carol's usual "why didn't you wash the dishes, and you had better get your stuff out of the living room" version of "good morning" (and mind, a cheery "good morning" isn't likely to make me happy in the morning; I haven't been an AM kind of person since ever). Woke up again around 11am to say "wow, it's 11am" and then slept until around 1:30pm. Then I woke up, took a shower, begged Maria not to wash the dishes (I get in trouble if anyone other than me does it), wash the dishes, check email (seems I won something from the OC Star Wars society, but I'm too busy to think about it), talk to my dad, run to Albertson's, cash my puny check from last week (should have cashed in vacation hours instead of taking unpaid days off for Comic-Con), get lunch at Joe's before I literally faint with hunger, and then drive to Anaheim. It's 5pm.

I get to Anaheim around 5:30pm, and go to the OC Credit Union office by Edison Field, to deposit last week's check (Albertson's won't cash it, it's too old). Realize I left all my account numbers here at home the last time I cleaned out my car. Drive to Mickey And Friends parking lot, park on level 2 (Daisy!), and walk to the AMC. I decide to see Pirates again (GREAT FILM), for the third time. Choose the 6:15pm showing, sit in one of the rows that has spots for wheelchairs (yes, I would have given up my spot for the party of anyone who needed it). Fully 77% of the theatre was unsold as of 6:11pm. I sit there until the previews are almost done and this... this... PERSON insists that I move my bag so she and her NOISY, TALKATIVE, MUST-COMMENT-UPON-EVERYTHING family can sit in all the rest of the spots. I look around, noticing the approximately 300 empty seats (most of which are better than mine; I choose slightly-bad seats a lot of the time in the hopes no one will sit near me), move my bag, and don't put the armrest down. I took scary amounts of satisfaction in the fact that she put her drink on the ground rather than either ask me to put the armrest back down (did you know that AMC first took out the patents on those armrests? They put that on the tour I took when I worked for AMC back in 1997) or get her noisy obnoxious sit-down-halfway-through-a-brilliant-scene family to move all their drinks so she could use the cupholder to her right. Hah! Luckily they weren't REALLY noisy until the credits (I was TRYING to listen to the soundtrack), and I think she got enough "WHY couldn't you have sat somewhere else" vibes from me, which is why she leaned heavily on the right-hand armrest the whole time. If the bottom of my bookbag is sticky in the morning I'll be blaming her, though.

There were other annoyances, most notably a family who shouted at each other in Spanish while trying to decide where to sit, during the early Port Royale scenes. Luckily, I took two Advil before the invading families began showing up, so I didn't really feel any actual pain. The movie was still brilliant; I left and went to the restroom and ran into That Kind of Women. They're the ones who have to continue extremely loud conversations about inane things while using the restroom; today the topic was "movies that Johnny Depp -- isn't he just great -- was in that I either saw or didn't see, and why they were great." Considering I had just suffered through Mrs. Comment About Everything's discussion of how ILM is "the best in the business" and how funny it is that two people were credited as "Dauntless crew" (suffering through such things from a seatmate is MUCH worse when you've had those same conversations, in the same multiplex, on the exact same topic [well, the Dauntless crew bit, anyway], only two weeks earlier), I was NOT in the mood. I nearly walked on top of the lady who was salsa-ing outside to the recordings that the current evening performance group was playing between sets. And it was a good thing that I was still somewhat cheery, and that I always try to remember how much I don't want to get fired, because I was seriously tempted to HURT the smokers in the area. Blowing smoke in my face isn't a good idea on the best of days.

Anyway, so I walk back to M&F structure, which is always a nice walk since (much like the walk from World of Disney to M&F) even on the busiest days almost no one walks it. And as I wait for the signal to allow me to cross, what do I see? A guy driving a white extended cab pickup truck (I would SO put the license plate number here, but he didn't have a plate on the front of the truck) BACKWARDS into the Pinocchio parking area (for larger cars and RVs and buses we have a lot next door to the structure; you have to pay a bit more to park there -- maybe $10), narrowly avoiding the bars and things which are supposed to prevent you from doing what he does. Basically he does this to avoid the parking charges. I was so annoyed by this, I watched him do it, tried to be certain of which car it was, and reported it to the first Traffic and Parking guy I saw. Unfortunately, as with so many other things at DL, if Security doesn't actually see it happen, we can't do anything. Still, I hope they caught it on the cameras. Then I walked upstairs, got in my car, and drove home. I hardly had any supernegative thoughts about how many things I do to make my life harder just to follow the rules, when so many other people flaunt them and face no real consequences, and didn't go through any of my fantasies about that kind of person getting caught. In fact, until now, I didn't even contemplate my secret thrill at seeing a couple of people getting citations on the San Diego trolley the last day of Comic-Con, for not having proper fares paid...

Anyway, I have to work at 5am (day 2 Stock training -- Receiver stuff), and so I have to at least give sleep a decent shot. Plus I have some laundry to do. Though I write this at 10:45pm, Surfside isn't letting me connect -- it may be tomorrow before this actually gets posted.


posted by Sarah at 4:25 AM. | 0 comments |

 
  WILL I OR WON'T I? So, now we know what Ahnold is going to do, which leaves me in a pickle, because it means now (or rather, as soon as he files papers) I have a candidate I could conceivably work on a campaign for (no, Larry Flynt was never an option). It depends on whether Bill Simon runs, and what the Ahnold campaign does in the next two days. But by Saturday, I expect to know three things: whether I'm eligible to move on to Part Two of the GR transfer deal (getting a recommendation, probably from Rigo), whether I want to apply to become a West Side trainer (basically contingent on the answer to the first one), and whether I'll be actively campaigning for a gubenatorial candidate (and which one I'll be campaigning for). Should be an exciting weekend, eh? 5pm Saturday...
posted by Sarah at 4:23 AM. | 0 comments |