jack of all trades
today i was a marketer. and a business developer. and a program manager. and a data analyst. oh, and a chef, of course. are these all part of my job? well... yes and no. the world of alumni affairs has been one of upheaval and change in the last few weeks, with our staff leaving the office for one reason or another (grad school, moving across the state, family emergency, etc). and being the jill-of-all-trades i am, it often falls to me to be the fix-it girl. and i'm tired. and a bit grumpy. and kinda sad. i apologize.
current mood: "busy" rhymes with "dizzy"

it's a rich man's world
here's a secret... if you want to stress me out, you have two easy options: 1) bring up the topic of my current finances, or 2) wave a piñata in front of my face, though maybe with consequence of your own personal peril. right now, i'm super-stressed, and i'll give you one guess as to why...
it's the 10th of the month, and i got paid on the first. to date, 80% of my paycheck is gone. (79.60408049525454% to be exact). and i still have 66% of the month to face. i'm not much of a numbers girl, but i'm pretty sure that's a pretty bad spot to be in.
i know a lot of the world has already hit bottom, and are maybe seeing things start to even out for them. it's not like i'm going on vacations or buying high-ticket items. these are just the everyday bills for the everyday things: gas, groceries, rent, etc. it really stinks that i have made the cuts i need to make, and i still have to go to the savings account. not only that, but i'm not even in a position to jockey for more money in salary... the perks of being an university employee. even with a promotion in title and an awesome body of work i'm producing, i have absolutely no leverage.
lame. and scary. and stressy. and boo. i wonder what my second job will have to be?
current mood: stomach-knotty

tears for a stranger
yesterday, i attended a funeral for a woman i barely knew. kim was once removed in my circle of friends; we shared some acquaintances in the dodgeball world, and i saw her maybe once a year during the annual beer tasting party concocted by her fiancee and another friend. r has a connection there too, having had kim and fiancee chris on a team sometime in the past. a thin thread of a connection through a web of friends, that's how i knew kim. but, when i think of her, my heart hurts.
kim was bright, like king midas turning everything to gold, she lit up a room. she emanated love in all her being, and her love with her fiancee was epic. and that is what makes me weep. i can't even begin to fathom the void left in chris' life now. though i hardly know chris either, all i want to do is make it better for him, to take away the pain of her passing and the emptiness he faces on a daily basis. at the church yesterday, i wept for each person in attendance, each had lost a brightness in their life. i didn't know what to say, i didn't know how to make it better. so i wept.
current mood: sad

not so good for the tread
i was trying to enjoy some summer weather that has finally decided to grace us with its presence here in san diego, so i rolled down the passenger window on the way to work this morning. cruising along happily, i noticed a yellow-ish object about window-height to my right, so i carefully glanced over. it took a few tries at carefully glancing for me to finally discern what the object was. what i first mistook for a bee that had blown in to the car and was buzzily trying to get back out against the wind coming through the window, i finally made out to be a big ol' yellow SPIDER, dangling and swinging in the air about the passenger seat. i grabbed my purse, which the spider was aiming to land on, and spent a few too many moments glancing when i skidded my front tire up against the curb. this, of course, caused me to jerk the car back in to the center of the lane, and probably scare my fellow motorists. the spider finally landed on the door, and crawled in to the door handle space on the inside of the door, where i was able to blow it out and in to the parking garage once i got to work. it's not that i mind spiders, for the most part. they have an important job to do in this world, and far be it from me to interfere with anyone (or anything) just trying to do its job. however, their sneak attacks rattle my nerves sometimes, and i do have to dispatch of them on occasion. this guy survived, i think, but is now in a new location probably quite far from where he was originally headed. i just didn't want that destination to be my purse, mostly for the fact that it is also yellow, and i'm not sure i could have taken the surprise of a piece of my purse suddenly crawling up my arm lightly. so, for all involved, i thought it best to get him out of the car as quickly as possible (and still get to work on time), and with as little damage... and, i needed to get those tires realigned anyway.
current mood: heeby-jeebafied