Hump day stories

Wow, sometimes this job is the most boring thing I've ever done. So today I'm going to tell some stories that I meant to post on here and haven't gotten around to doing yet.

Story the First
Last night Irene and I went on a bike ride down the bike trail along the Hudson River. The path is pretty nice, but parts of it make you wonder if the person who designed it had ever ridden a bike in his or her life. It runs along the West Side Highway, often separated from the cars by only a little guardrail fence. This is fine most of the time, but then the sun goes down. It was getting dark last night as we rode back uptown and the headlights were absolutely blinding, especially on the sections of the path that had no lighting. Yes, there are parts of the path that have no lighting at all, including the part that runs underneath the highway, where it is really really dark!

At another point the path divides into two parts: the part near the water for the pedestrians and the upper part through a park for the cyclists. I don't have a problem with this, as generally the pedestrians on the path are more annoying than anything else. The issue I have with it is that the short hills going up to the path both end in sharp curves. Sharp as in shoot-off-the-curve-and-into-traffic on the one and sharp as in run-into-a-cement-wall on the other. Not exactly great places for a curve and a wall as one picks up speed coming downhill. Sheesh.

So that's my bit about the path. The ride was actually lovely...in the setting sun on a cool day. Don't get me wrong...after 250 blocks I was ready to die. My knees hurt, my shoulders hurt, my butt hurt. I'd do it again though. Once I get a gel seat of course.

Story the Second
The great weekends continue their tour-de-force in New York City. Last weekend was actually pretty average, but there was nothing unpleasant about it. But the weekend before that was phenomenal. I spent the entire weekend outdoors, speaking German or frolicking in the ocean waves, which to me consitutes a wonderful weekend. I kicked off the morning with a brunch for the members of the German Language Meet-up Group that I joined a few weeks ago. Around noon the entire brunch group traipsed to the start of the Steuben Parade, which goes up 5th Avenue on the Saturday during German-American Friendship Week. Cheesy, I know. So I walked up Fifth with the other parade people, waving at the crowd. After that the fun really began when some friends and I went down to the Oktoberfest in Central Park. The whole thing was so authentic that my Austrian friends said they could have easily forgotten they were in NYC for a few hours. After that we went to a German bar on the Lower East Side and mingled with the crowd until late. Sunday morning I went to Far Rockaway with my Austrian friends and jumped around in the waves like a fool. The whole weekend was perfect. Feel free to visit and experience one of these weekend with me!

Story the Third
I chose that heading color because it most closely resembles the color of the remainder of the bruise I still have left from when I attempted to give blood two weeks ago! Can you even believe that the bruise from the needle is still there? They must have really wreaked havoc on that poor little vein...

why can't I see?

It started today at high noon. Ominous right? I walked into a meeting about tomorrow night's Management Consulting Forum, for which I have to make nametags. Not particularly stressful. As the meeting began, my vision started to blur. First it was a thin J-shaped spot just left of the center of my left eye. As the meeting continue, the J-shaped spot expanded until it encompassed the entire lower left quadrant of my left eye. I wasn't sure what was going on, but it was sort of scary and annoying. Then a J-shaped spot appeared on my right eye as well. I told a colleague about it and they forced me to go to an opthamologist, which was a good idea. I called my primary physician for a referal, which took her about an hour to get back to me about. In that hour I drank a lot of water, ate lunch and went to the bathroom numerous times (due to the excessive water intake). My vision gradually returned to normal and when the doctor called me about the referal, my vision was ok again.

The primary physician referred me to Dr. P. I got down to his office on 70th and West End Avenue and waited. He was a very nice guy and not at all intimidating, so I felt free to ask lots of questions. After I described my symptoms to him, he said it was a classic ophthalmic migraine. A blood vessel in the brain spasms, restricting blood flow and causing vision issues. When the spasm ends, the vision gradually normalizes when the blood flows again. Weird! I hope this doesn't turn into a reoccuring problem, because I'm not interested in that. Dr. P. also thought my optical nerve looked a little thin, so I have to go back in three weeks and get a picture of my retina and optical nerve taken, as a thinning optical nerve could mean glaucoma, which my maternal grandmother in fact has. So keep your fingers crossed for my eyes.

the slow bleeder

I went to give blood for the first time ever yesterday. That's actually only partially true, since I've gone before but didn't actually do through with the blood giving process, so this was the first time I ever got stuck with the needle. I met Irene at the permanent blood dontation center in the Citigroup Center on 53rd and Lex, where she almost always goes. Irene is one of those regular donors who even writes the 60 day mark on her calendar so she can go give again. Yesterday she was foiled in her attempt to save lives however, because her iron count was too low. I, however, was perfectly healthy and deemed eligible to give blood even though I spent a lot of time outside the United States and had taken Benadryl Allergy Sinus within the last three days. I went back to the extremely unfriendly nurses and sat on the cushy reclining chair. The nurse hemmed and hawed about my tiny veins and decided to go for the outside vein on the side of my right arm. She didn't have to do too much digging around before she got the needle in place and then my life force began to drain out. V e r y v e r y s l o w l y. They repositioned the needle several times and admonished me for jerkily squeezing the squeezer thingy, which probably caused the needle to move, as well as for squeezing the thingy too often. How was I supposed to know? No one told me I only needed to squeeze once every five seconds! Gimme a break folks, it's my first time! After twenty-some-odd minutes they stopped the bleed and told me that they hadn't gotten enough blood to even use for a transfusion, so it would just be used for research somewhere. Doesn't that suck? I mean, I'm sure that using my blood for research could prove useful, but that isn't why I was there. I felt like such a loser, unable to coax enough blood out of my body to give to someone else. *sigh* I was told over and over not to be discouraged from coming back to try again, but I'm not really feeling it. Maybe I will, just to figure out my blood type, which I feel I should know at the age of 26 . However, if I can't get enough blood to come out, then I'll just end up feeling like a loser again and they won't test my blood anyway! Plus I came away with a nice bruise and two funky red lines on my elbow, plus one very thick needle hole, none of which are great souveniers from the experience. Whatever...I'll let 60 days pass and see how I feel about trying to do it again.

Music and memory, music and emotion

The other morning I woke up at 5:56 am to go to the gym after apparently snoozing the first round of alarm beeping, which I have no recollection of doing. Isn't it strange when that happens? Anyway, I went to "The Ride", my gym's fancy name for a Spinning class, which is every other gym's fancy name for riding a stationary bike in a weirdly air conditioned, semi-dark room with at least a dozen sweaty strangers. Irene and I were actually trying to figure out why the instructor dims the lights as soon as class starts, but we couldn't come up with a good explanation. About halfway through the class a song that I only know from Austria came on our otherwise mellow soundtrack. The song is face-paced and has an Indian beat accompanied by a lot of wailing in some foreign tongue I can't understand. This song played very frequently in the clubs in Vienna and my particular memories of it playing all connect to Aux Gazelles, the Middle Eastern inspired club just off the foot of Mariahilferstrasse in the 6th district. I distinctly remember it playing on both occassions I was there: first with people I met through Webster University's European soccer tournament and the second time with an ex-Marine I met at Webster's graduation ball. It is a great club song and was very inspirational during The Ride. I made my legs spin faster and thought that perhaps I could just pedal all the way to Vienna, but when I got off the bike I was still in a semi-dark room full of sweaty strangers at 83rd and Amsterdam.

Isn't it interesting how music is connected to memory? And also to emotion? Some songs evoke particularly strong memories for me, like "Free Falling" by Tom Petty, which takes me back to drives home from Pella in the Mally with the window down, when gas cost $0.90/gallon and fields rolled by my window like waves on the ocean. Or the oldie "Hey Baby (I Wanna Know If You'll Be My Girl)", which puts me on a bus full of middle aged Germans swilling champagne from the bottle and belting out only the song's extremely repetitive chorus on the way back from a weekend ski trip. Then there are the songs that make you weep or make you euphoric, like hymns at church or certain pop songs. I'm also fascinated by my ability to remember the lyrics to thousands of songs when I can't even remember what I wore yesterday. I suppose song memorization is a repetition thing. At any rate, I'm glad that we have songs. How else would I remember those times flinging my friends around the roller rink in Strawberry Point (Hungry Eyes) or riding in Amy's big brown car in Northwood, IA with Martine, waiting for Amy to get back in the car with Theresa (Tupac's "Can'tC Me")? Those memories might just be lost to me without songs as an external reminder of all the good (and bad) times.

The triathlete

The triathlete on her run

Ok, so I didn't get around to posting the pictures earlier, but here are a couple from our weekend in Chicago for Irene's triathlon.

Mo, Irene & me reflected in Millenium Park's Jelly Bean

Irene did really really well. Her feat inspires me to think about doing one myself. Not that I'm committing, but I'm thinking about it. She has put a bug in my ear about a triathlon in Des Moines next June. We would each have to do a full one, which sounds a bit scary to me! I would rather do a sprint triathlon like she did the first time just to make sure. I'm afraid I would drown...even after 10 years of swimming lessons I still can't do the crawl, which would make swimming a mile in a lake sorta difficult!

I have a bed!

My parents and great aunt arrived safely in NYC on Sunday afternoon, after buying two new batteries for the great big Ford F350 they're driving (two batteries, isn't that nuts???) and new windshield wipers in Dubois, PA. We unloaded my stuff with the help of two guys from the street, which cost a little bit but was sooooo worth it. They carried the really awkward and heavy stuff, like the mattress (why aren't handles standard on those things?) and the dresser. My mom and I spent some time going through stuff and putting it away on Sunday evening, but then I got too tired and gave up. More unpacking is on the agenda tonight, along with some DIY home improvement. The ceilings in my apartment are really really tall and there is so much free space in my closet that I could be using if I would just screw in a couple little boards and lay a bigger board across them. So that's the plan, which will involve a trip to the Home Depot on 59th & 3rd. They're supposed to take off tomorrow morning at some point and drive back, so if I want to make use of the power tools and DIY knowledge, I have to do it tonight.

In other exciting news, I spoke for about 5 minutes at the international student orientation this morning! I got all dressed up and even wore mascara for this important event in my new career. There were 28 of them in total and it felt very much like being back in the classroom, maybe because I was at the front of a classroom? My face got really hot while I stood up at the front of the room for the other 25 minutes and listened to my colleague speak, which made me feel slightly stupid, but whatever. These students can come to me if they have questions on recruiting, which is a fun way to get some student access, as I have precious little in this position. Plus they're international, so it's almost like doing the job I really want for about 30 minutes a year. Speaking of, I should check out the Teacher's College website in this little lull today and see what sort of Master's programs they offer.