Man, I have problems with that kind of thinking.

I went a regular monthly meeting tonight; this month’s presentation was given by a “life coach”. One of those people who hasn’t yet quit the boring, unfulfilling day job, yet has a second career coaching others how to manifest prosperity by thinking differently.

And if you just clap your hands, boys and girls, Tinkerbell will be saved!

I am a believer in the power of positive thinking. I am also a believer in the power of logical thought, weighing your options, understanding your audience/market, offering something your audience/market wants, and plain old-fashioned hard work.

I think it’s critical to believe you will be successful in your endeavors, otherwise you will not take the first step. I don’t think there’s any magic in that, just common sense.

I think that people who make a career out of preaching positive thinking (with an 8-week course, credit cards accepted), without acknowledging that success requires much more than just positive thinking, are exploiting people’s hope, fear, and laziness.

I think people who spout pseudo-science and pseudo-religion do justice to neither science nor religion. Give me some real data other than “the top 3% of rich people all think like this!” Don’t tell me that no religion honors the poor…ever hear of the Sermon on the Mount? Jesus did not preach Blessed are Those Who Think Prosperity, for They Will Get Whatever They Visualize. Like a house on a lake!

I think telling someone that her husband’s year and a half of unemployment is his fault for not thinking about it in the right way is an insult. To do so in front of an audience including several who have been unemployed, or whose spouses are unemployed, who are wondering what the fuck to do with that MBA or the 30 year’s journalism experience that nobody seems to want anymore, is rude, naive and ignorant.

I think that countering objections by stating that the objector (umm, that would be me, yeah) is Unenlightened and ignorant, because the objector has objections, while sidestepping the objections themselves, is an ad hominem reaction, not a defense of reasonable ideas.

It is the core of cult thinking. And that’s not positive.

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We were in the middle of the no-man’s-land between Roxboro & Markham…you know, that part of The Worst-Designed Intersection in Durham (or is it in all of North Carolina?) where you’ve already crossed northbound Roxboro and are waiting for a break in the southbound traffic…when a car with a carousel horse on the roof pulls up next to us. It’s Madame deNerve and Miss Andrews…and a puppy. They found said critter running across Washington Street, chasing a mama bear that looked none too interested in continuing her role as Supplier of Free Milk. Mama had the remnants of a chain around her neck; either she had liberated herself or her human companions decided to comply with the new No Chained Dogs ordinance by contributing to Durham’s thriving population of stray dogs.

They knew we’d been discussing the possibility of getting a new dog, so they were actually on their way over to see us before bringing the little fella to the pound. Barry asked if I’d be OK with adopting the dog. I looked at his furry little face framed in their car window, the serious expression, the adorable brown puppy eyebrows, and said “I’m already in love with him.”

So we went to the brunch for a bit, then returned to pick up our new dog from the neighbors. They were calling him Elijah, after Barry’s favorite bourbon, although we’re not committed on a name yet. He’s probably part rottweiler, although the mom was something different. He’s a furry little bear cub, who likes to snuggle in a den, and already runs after Barry with his tail wagging every time the Big Dog walks across the room.

Our New Puppy

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I believe the other term of choice is “Chick Flick”. Or, as my husband would say, “That looks like something you can go see with your women’s movie group”.

So the first tenet of a date movie: the man on the date would rather be in the next theatre watching Avatar.

Then why would a man subject himself to testicle-shrinking tortures of the Popular Romantic Comedy genre? To movies which must, according to law, include at least one scene of the cast gleefully singing or dancing to a pop song? To Hugh Grant? To male characters spouting effusive declarations of love in Unlikely Places with people watching who all clap afterward, perhaps a cue that we should applaud as well? Does he really think that enduring this will help him get laid after the movie?

Does it ever work?

I once went to see Last of the Mohicans with a boyfriend. Daniel Day Lewis is pretty hot in that movie; you’d think it would be an inspirational film in the Chick Flick as Soft-Core Porn for Women kinda way. But when I looked at my boyfriend afterward, my thought was: Damn. You’d never save me from a Huron war party.

I’ve only been on two date-movie-dates in my life, where the movie was a First Date, rather than just a fun thing to do with someone I was already dating.

I cringe to think of both of those dates.

The first was to see Alladin (my choice; I forget exactly why I wanted to see it but I did. I’ve always been a sucker for animation, what can I tell you). Before the date we went out for pizza. My date was belligerently rude to the waitress for no reason that I could see, other than that he thought this proved his suitability for mating according to some manliness=assholeness equation. By the time we reached the theatre I knew that a second date was not gonna happen.

Halfway through the movie, he abruptly took my hand and said “May I hold your hand?”

Ummmm….no.

My other date-movie-date was with a man who, on the phone arranging our date, asked if he should pick me up in the Mercedes or the Range Rover. Gosh, I don’t know, which one do you think will be more reliable to get us all the way to the theater 3 miles away?

We saw Forrest Gump, a decent movie, although I never found it as brilliant as others did. At every poignant moment, my date uttered a little “Ooooh” moan of sympathy. Wow, sensitive and a Mercedes!

There wasn’t much chemistry, so we didn’t last past a second or third date. Just as well…he had basset hounds.

Last night Barry and I went to see Up in the Air. We’re about to hit the 10-year-mark as a couple, so we dispensed with all that holding of hands and muttering of sympathetic noises. The film has some elements of Date Movieness: Flirting. A wedding. A woman wearing nothing but a necktie. George Clooney.

Although I didn’t expect a date movie, it starts veering into that territory about 2/3 of the way in. You see George on the verge of Being Transformed by the Love of a Woman: one of the other tenets of Date Movies. There’s an epiphany, a shocked crowd as the Transformed Man goes running off to find the arms of the Woman of his Dreams. Transformation Happens, but not according to the well-worn grooves of Date Moviedom, a plot turn that violates the Laws of the Chick Flick.

Up in the Air met my criteria for a good date movie, though: we talked about it afterward. Was it a good ending or weak? What was he thinking when he stared at the Departures/Arrivals board? At the map full of photos before the wedding? Where was he going at the end? Were the shots of angry people about to be laid off a plot device, a nod towards relevancy, or central to the theme? How enjoyable can a movie be if the main characters are unlikable? Would you ever really meet a woman like that in real life?

Maybe a true Date Movie is to get a woman in an, umm, romantic mood, to equate the handsome and affectionate man on the screen with the mundane and hopeful man in the next seat at the theatre. A good Old Married Couple Date Movie opens a new conversation, something that can be rare when you see each other day after day…

Oops, I lost my train of thought. Barry came in to ask me: do you think he was lying to his boss at the end of the movie?

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The weekend before Christmas is good a time as any for some weather-dictated stay-at-home time. The tree is up but not decorated; butter is defrosting for cookie baking; there are presents to be wrapped. I haven’t even put all the groceries away from last night. I even picked up a few logs in case the power knocks out the heat. As long as the power doesn’t fail while cookies are in the oven, and the outage doesn’t last more than a night, I’m OK with it. I don’t need a repeat of the eight days without power we had in 2002. Although a few hours with a roaring fire, candlelight, snow falling and quality time with my sweetie doesn’t sound too bad either.

UPDATE: A completely underwhelming weather event. Other than a brief flurry, the snow didn’t start until 5pm, then turned to sleet within a few hours. There’s a dusting of snow on the grass but it looks like the storm was saving its wrath to dump on DC and NY. Have a snowball fight for me, y’all!

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I don’t need Blue Cross Blue Shield telling me what I should be telling my senator about health care. I need them to be covering my health care costs for a full 12 months of the year.

But I see no reason to not make use of a prepaid mailer to let Senator Hagan know my views on single payer healthcare.

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When I arrived home in early October, after nearly a month in San Francisco, the contents of the bedroom were still in a P.O.D.S. storage unit in the driveway. The bedroom floor had been ripped up and the subfloor rebuilt, and during the ensuing weeks Barry has been painting the walls and laying down new bamboo floors. We’ve been sleeping on a sofabed mattress on the living room floor, and dressing out of respective hampers, mine in my office and his in the man-cave, with the dirties in the hallway in between.

Needless to say, we haven’t been doing a lot of entertaining of late.

Besides cycling through the same set of clothes that I packed for my trip on 9/10, I’ve been wearing the same pair of earrings since I returned: a pair of tiny silver knots. Today, with the weather in the last gasp of Indian summer, I decided it was time for a change. The jewelry I’d packed for San Francisco was in a tangled mess in a small purse on my desk next to the stapler. Already running late for lunch with my financial advisor, I grabbed the first pair I could successfully disentangle—a pair of dangly gold earrings that complemented my ivory shell. Perhaps a bit overdressed for a plate of shrimp ‘n’ grits while discussing annuities, but I was just darned sick of the little silver knots.

After lunch, I arrived at my client’s office to train her on the subtler points of Cascading Style Sheets. After the bottomless sweet tea for lunch, my first stop in her office was the bathroom. Which is when I saw the earring.

The silver earring.

The silver earring hanging from the gold earring hanging from my ear.

Bless his heart, my financial advisor, a soft-spoken gem of a Southern gentleman, as far as I could tell did not so much as glance at the extra earring hanging from my  earlobe through a 75-minute lunch meeting. He counseled me on the pros and cons of a variable annuity without once saying “Why the hell do you have a silver Aztec calendar earring hanging from the bottom of your antique gold earring? Do you realize you have a good three inches of metal daisy-chaining its way to your shoulder? Did you dress in the dark today or something?”

I will be so, so glad to have all my stuff back where it belongs.

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“The key to life is to surround yourself with lots of women,” Oliver said. “Men would just lie to me. Girls say, ‘Give me half an hour and I’ll find out.’ They’re intelligent, more loyal and they make things happen. Everything I do is about team, really. So 90 percent of my team are women.”

“Putting America’s Diet on a Diet” (profile of chef Jamie Oliver), NY Times, October 6, 2009

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With a background in Architectural Design, I am currently looking to expand my design expertise and start a career in the marketing and advertising fields.  I believe that my background in Architecture uniquely qualifies me for a position with Red Beret Design…As a Project Designer for an Architecture firm, I have had the opportunity to design buildings as well as produce all of the graphics for each project that I worked on…Designing logos for various people and businesses is a strong passion of mine…With my work experience, education and practice in logo design, I believe that I strongly qualify for a design position at Red Beret Design. I would welcome the opportunity of being a member of your team.

What’s wrong with this picture?

1. The web makes it  crazy easy to do research on your prospective employer. My name is right there on my website in the “About” page, which, by the way, does not show any team. Addressing a resume to “To Whom It May Concern” reflects a lack of initiative.
2. What about a background in architectural design would “uniquely qualify” someone to work for me? I have one client who recently needed an architectural illustration. That’s the only example I can think of, in 5+ years in business, that would require the skills of someone with a background in architectural design. Tell me more about the skill set you acquired as an architectural designer that gives you an edge over graphic designers. Is it an appreciation for structure? For ambience? Did conceptualizing the branding for developments lead you to your love of logo design?
3. What would make this person uniquely qualified to work for me? The lack of personal address leads me to believe that this person has probably sent this letter to dozens of firms, and that s/he believes him/herself to be “uniquely qualified” to work for all of them.
4. You believe that you “strongly qualify” for a design position with my firm, while displaying zero knowledge of my firm other than that you can spell the name (which not everyone can do, sad to say. And you’d be surprised how many telemarketers think “beret” rhymes with “ferret”.) Since you know nothing of my firm or my firm’s needs, it’s rather presumptuous to say that you “strongly qualify”. Now if you’d said “I’m sort of a cross between a system administrator and an office manager who has a passion for researching drupal and wordpress modules who also knows Photoshop and InDesign”, then I’d say you were uniquely qualified.

I have had emails from people who have not only addressed me by name, but have made specific comments about my portfolio, and about what they saw in my portfolio that made them want to work with me. Flattery? Of course. And flattery is always nice to hear. But it also means they took the time to learn about my work. And telling me the particulars that they responded to gives me an idea about their design style, even before I look at their portfolio.

Contrast the above email with someone who wrote “I really appreciate your elegant style (I did not find one random filigree or graffiti-style typeface!)”. That tells me that she actually looked at my portfolio, and has a specific idea of the type of designer she wants to work with (and she got a return email and offer of an internship, BTW).

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(Sung to the tune of the Mickey Mouse Club Theme Song)

Now’s the time to say goodbye to all our family
C - H - A,    R - L - Y,    M - A - N - S - O - N
Charly Manson (Squeaky Fromme!)
Charly Manson (Squeaky Fromme!)
Sex and violence always get us high (High! HIGH!)

Now’s the time to say goodbye to all our family
C - H - A… (Eh! Come over here!)
R - L - Y… (Why? I want to kill you!)
M - A - N - S - O - N

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PS–For the record, I don’t think Wayne Sutton is an alien. But I’m thinking his mispronunciation got stuck between my nerves.

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