unless you are actually good

I’m addicted to passiveaggressivenotes.com*. So hilarious!

This is my favorite entry so far. Is it bad that I feel sympathy for the person who wrote the note on the grand piano?

*Warning: proceed with caution if profanity offends you.

parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme…

I like having fresh herbs around for my cooking experiments. So far I’ve managed to keep three varieties of mint, rosemary, and basil alive. The latter is now inside, having visibly protested when I found a semi-shaded spot for it on the balcony. I think it doesn’t like the heat. The mint, however, is growing in full balcony sun by leaps and bounds as mint is wont to do. The rosemary….well, it’s alive, but I’m getting the impression that rosemary grows slowly.

Furthermore, the hearts and flowers on the porch is happy as a clam, as are my house plants. So far, so good. Maybe I’ll overcome my black thumb after all.

perhaps

Things that are occupying my time lately:

German-American Lutherans and their stubbornness…oh, the thesis

attempting to be a good plant mommy (stop laughing, Elise)

trying not to be offended pissed off at people who try to tell me how to live my life, unasked

avoiding the infernal desert heat

I’m all finished moving and unpacking and am now launching an all-out attack on the thesis, which needs to be finished ASAP.  Had it been finished this semester, I could have reminisced in years to come that Obama gave a most excellent speech at my commencement, but sadly it was not to be. It looks like I’ll have plenty of time to write this summer, though, as summer piano camp enrollment numbers are way, way down which means no job. This also means less money, which presents a few problems, but also means that next fall will be a little easier because more of thesis will be written. In a totally unexpected turn of events, I will be working full-time as a piano teacher at a public school around here come August. Yay for benefits during a recession!

However, I don’t know how I feel about simultaneously having a blog and teaching technologically-savvy kids…seems like a disaster waiting to happen. The point of having a blog is airing your thoughts to the general public, but the wisest course of action when you are a teacher is to keep those same thoughts to yourself. You can see the conflict. I haven’t fully settled on what to do yet, but I’m leaning towards password protecting the blog or giving it up altogether.  I’d like to keep my job without looking over my shoulder all the time, you know.

holy week!

A note. Never move on Holy Week if you work at a church that observes all the festivities. Midweek Wednesday Lenten service, Maundy Thursday service, Good Friday service, 5:30 am call time on Sunday morning for two services.

At least we don’t have Easter Vigil on Saturday night.

I love Holy Week. Just not this year.

More later, after the madness dies down.

how I almost met the president

President Carter, that is.

Let me go back a few days. Brian received an invitation to a Bat Mitzvah for one of his guitar students, to be held this coming Saturday. He had no idea what one brings to a Bat Mitzvah (card? gift? both?). I didn’t know either, but I called up one of my charming adult piano students who just happens to be Jewish and she determined that a card and small gift would be appropriate. She also suggested that I go to a local bookstore, Changing Hands, as they have a decent selection of Bat Mitzvah cards. Brian works pretty much all the time, so I was dispatched to pick up the card and gift. I put it off until today. No big deal, right? Just run over to Changing Hands and pick up a card and something appropriate to go with it…shouldn’t take more than a half hour. Right?

Wrong. The parking lot was a madhouse and there was a line from the front door of Changing Hands to Baskin Robbins, three doors down. Channel Five was there with their van and reporter and cameraman. I still thought maybe I’d find a parking spot and dash in quickly since the line was for clearly for some random event that didn’t pertain to me. Alas, as I drove past the front door, I noticed that it was completely blocked off. Eh. No big deal, I’d go somewhere else, like the Borders in Mesa.

Mission accomplished, I went home to eat a quick dinner before heading out to Scottsdale with Elise and Jeremy for a art opening at the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art. Jeremy knew all about the madness at Changing Hands. Jimmy Carter was there, signing autographs to promote his new book,  Palestine: Peace Not Aparteid.

Just think—President Carter could have potentially helped me pick out the perfect Bat Mitzvah card, had I waited in line long enough. How oddly appropriate.

eating habits

Recession cooking for one—fake pilaf! Half a cup of rice (jasmine, basmati, whatever’s on hand), one and a quarter cup water, a sprinkle each of salt, pepper, and thyme, and a bit of butter. Also a chopped tomato if on hand. Heat on high with lid on until boiling, reduce heat to low and and stir. Replace lid and wait fifteen minutes or so. Top with Greek style yogurt (or sour cream) and eat.  Cheap and yummy. Also good if paired with some sort of green vegetable…chard is my favorite right now. But no meat, at least when I eat alone.

I’ve decided that eating meat is not really my thing. I don’t have a moral objection to it, but my stomach definitely has a physical objection to it. Red meat of the steak variety is always a bad idea lately, and I’m not too fond of chicken. That leaves pork, lamb, and fish, [edit: and turkey and ham], all of which are only ok in small portions. Still, Brian often ends up with half of my meat portion during dinner because I can’t finish it.

I can get my protein in other ways, though—tofu, for instance. Not in a disgusting tofu-as-a-substitute-for-some-other-non-tofu-food way though, because I am too Asian to eat tofu as anything other than tofu. Sorry, vegetarian and vegan readers! Raw with soy sauce and grated ginger and a tiny bit of sesame oil is my favorite way to eat it. Yum.

indulge me

I’m not sure whether to be amused or disgusted by the Catholic church’s recent offer of plenary indulgences to its parishioners. The indulgence practice was, obviously, one of the major reasons Luther split from the Catholic church. As I am Lutheran (more or less, depending on who you talk to since I didn’t go through Confirmation, the horror!), I look at the practice with a great deal of eye-rolling. Since I don’t believe in Purgatory and think that we can’t influence God’s grace, it just seems rather silly to even bother. Somehow I think even God probably rolls his eyes at the whole business.

Mostly, though, it reminds me of my good old Baptist high school upbringing. “When a coin in the coffer rings, a soul from Purgatory springs!” All those Baptist Bible teachers at schools across the country must be having a field day.

health care

It’s a big topic right now, especially with the advent of a new government administration. I can’t help but think that a lot of countries have a much better system of keeping their citizens healthy than the US does. Many countries in Europe have a system of socialized medicine.  The medical community in Japan is not allowed to make above a certain percentage of profit from their trade even though everyone is required to have some sort of health insurance (which has its own problems, but still…). But here we are in the US, being legally scalped (or just unable to pay) for basic medical care, all in the name of Making Money.

It’s one thing if you have the luxury of a full-time job with benefits which exempt you from being passed over for a pre-existing medical condition. It’s quite another when your occupation involves several part-time jobs and you have to take care of that medical insurance on your own. You have a pre-existing condition? Sorry, we think there’s a good chance that we won’t make a ridiculous amount of money off you, so we don’t want you as a client.

Bottom line, it’s unethical for a human being (or corporation) to make money from another human being’s misfortune.  You’d think, in a civilized society, that we would be beyond the point of suffering from curable medical conditions or even death because we can’t pay for treatment. But that’s where we’re headed if health care stays the way it is and the economy continues to plummet. I think that our new president is great—such a welcome and refreshing change from the last eight years. I don’t, however, think that he’s going to change health care in four or even eight years, much as I admire him. He’s not perfect and there are so many variables that will make changing the system a difficult, if not impossible task. Meanwhile, I’ll continue to hope that nothing catastrophic happens to me or my loved ones.

intentions and verbiage

I think New Year’s resolutions are stupid, but I’m making one anyway. I will get this thesis done by the end of 2009, so there!

On an unrelated note, this 2009 list of banished words from Lake Superior State University is awesome. I especially dislike the term “green”. Not the concept, but the term. If you mean that you’re being a responsible with earth’s resources, just say it—no need to substitute a cute one-syllable word.

beating the odds

Stomach flu is an effective vacation-killer, but can also help you to bond with your boyfriend’s mother. Brian promptly got sick about six hours after I arrived in Pittsburgh. We decided earlier to stay at his mom’s place because his dad was already sick with the stomach flu on Christmas day, but since Brian had already stayed there before I arrived, he got infected. His mother and I, united with a mutual desire to Not Get Sick, wiped down everything repeatedly with clorox disinfecting wipes, laundered towels and clothes and everything else with gloves, washed our hands obsessively, and banished poor Brian to the basement bathroom and couch for the duration. Possibly a tad cruel, but it did the trick—if we were going to get sick, we would have by now.

Just FYI, the “stomach flu” is actually either a bacterial or viral infection and isn’t transmitted through the air or saliva. You can get it if someone who is sick doesn’t wash their hands after using the bathroom and contaminates a surface (door handles, switches, dishes, etc.) , or if you use the same bathroom that they do. You can’t get sick from being in the same room with someone who is. It’s totally so much more disgusting than having a cold or the flu, but it’s somewhat less contagious if you take lots of extra precautions.