tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1296405321565067982024-03-13T08:07:08.079-04:00The Goldilocks ComplexFinding a bed, a chair and a bowl of porridge that's just rightNaugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.comBlogger296125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-32466419292529844012017-01-11T09:01:00.002-05:002017-01-11T09:06:02.330-05:00Dear 20 Year Old Selfanother letter, cause, why not? a prompt based on <a href="http://therumpus.net/2011/02/dear-sugar-the-rumpus-advice-column-64/">the brilliance of Dear Sugar</a>/homework for my group next week...<br />
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<span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dear 20 Year Old Self,</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The good news is, this will be one of the hardest years of your life, and in the scheme of things, it’s nothing. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Just wait until you've been around the world and back, and to war with the bugs, and to the mansion where they filmed a season of The Bachelor… you’ll see. You’re struggling to find and define yourself, wearing a gajillion hats and scheduling your weeks so tightly, because you’re convinced you can catch up to your parents, but it was their path to “have all the answers” by twenty one. It’s yours to keep uncovering questions well in to your thirties, and probably forties and fifties and beyond.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Luckily that means you’ll get to re-claim Rome, and you’ll get called to live the fourth like all your friends have been a decade later, once you’ve made your way out west - homeward bound unbeknownst to you. You’ll wear a fig leaf bikini on stage that makes you, your friends and your family forget you were ever a pink sheep. You’ll come to believe in the existence of Einstein time on a train that’s actually going to Switzerland when you’re supposed to be going to the Brussels airport. You’ll teach your sister, both of your sisters, so much. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">You could snoop in July instead of August of 2008, and cancel that second flight to Australia, because the money you’re going to spend simultaneously having your heart broken and going to the third of thirty six weddings in eight years would be better spent bouncing over to Beijing while you have a couch to crash on there. You might also decline the invite to rendezvous in New Mexico in June of 2013 and instead ask your international man of mystery to put his money where his mouth is. But if you don’t, fear not, because without having the memories of making that Facebook album you title Aussie Love or sitting in a church in Denver, Colorado weeping as quietly as you can through a long, cold, hour of mass, you might not have the appreciation you do today for the gifts of good love, good friends, good relationships, and goodness in others.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">You can’t fix anyone, or just “do it for them,” and the sooner you learn that the lighter you’ll feel. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">You actually do like broccoli, and strawberries, and zucchini, and peppers, and bananas, and pears, and salad in general. Not cucumbers. Not celery. But brussel sprouts, believe it or not, and salsa - oh my God, salsa.</span></span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">You’re so lucky, and you’re so young, and you’re just getting started doing the things you say you’re going to. Be patient. Be kind. Be a good listener. Be gentle on yourself. Be honest with the people who mean the most to you, and be open. It’s always worth the wait. </span></span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">dry those tears, daniella....</td></tr>
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Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-18069112306895418282017-01-01T21:33:00.000-05:002017-01-10T22:41:59.067-05:00Dear Fear of Appearing NeedyIn 2015, a few of my girlfriends and I picked up copies of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Calling-One-Weeks-Attract-Love/dp/1400049296">a how-to book</a>. I was sold on doing so easily because I'm a sucker for self-help and secreting. I also love a good guided meditation and journaling prompt. Basically the book was right up my alley. <br />
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Recently I re-read my response to one of the exercises ... Lesson 38. I've since thrown the book out (the book itself <a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/life-changing-magic-tidying/id892137138?mt=11">didn't bring me joy anymore</a> but the journals I had kept while reading it did), so I don't know the exact assignment, but from what I gather it asked the reader to create a list of fears and imagine written correspondence with the fear found most nagging at the moment.<br />
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Here is what I wrote:<br />
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"Dear Danielle,<br />
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You run the risk of hating yourself, finding yourself weak and dependent like you've accused all of the women on your mother's side of being. You will suck the life, energy and availability out of your oneday boyfriend/partner/husband, and they will come to resent you, and the relationship will implode. You will show yourself to be a fraud having posed as independent and self reliant all these years, and you will sabotage the heights you've reached.<br />
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Sincerely,<br />
Fear of Appearing Needy<br />
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Dear Fear of Appearing Needy,<br />
<br />
You need to the chill the f*** out. OK? You actually <u>do</u> <u>have</u> <u>needs</u>. And that is OK. That is not a sign of weakness. No one is going to question your competency because you also want to be shown love, respect, appreciation and adoration. You have to love who you are 100%, and who you are includes what you want and need. And if and when those wants and needs show themselves you need to own them, not try to hide them, not be embarrassed by them, not think they're evidence of your fragility. You can withstand hurt, you can relinquish control, and you can be a little needy. It's not gonna kill you. And what's more, some man is going to want <u>so</u> badly to fulfill those needs and cater to your ever-so-human neediness. Don't worry. Okay?<br />
<br />
Love,<br />
Me"<br />
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I think I may need to add "write more letters to myself" to my list of resolutions for this new year.Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-77446664472319476262016-12-14T22:10:00.000-05:002016-12-14T22:10:11.215-05:00The Pink Fleece<div style="-webkit-text-stroke-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); -webkit-text-stroke-width: initial; line-height: normal;">
<span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">Before I moved from New York to LA, I made a point of ridding my closet of the majority of my black. I kept some basics: pants, a cardigan, a mini skirt, a cami, and I left a handful of black long sleeve shirts and sweaters in a bin at my parents’ house in Boston, because I figured I’d be back for enough visits between Thanksgiving and the holidays to want to bust those out for family and work gatherings - less to pack for longer trips - but otherwise my goal was to go bright. I stocked up on linens, white peasant blouses, turquoise and salmon tank tops, some nautical looking sweaters and neon work out garb. When I walked in to my walk-in closet in Woodland Hills - I had a walk in closet for the first time in my life for the first year I spent out west! - I wanted to see and feel lighter and brighter than I’d ever been able to donning my New York uniform of black on black on black. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">If over the holidays I received gifts that were reminiscent of my east coast attire, I simply added to the collection in that bin at my parents’. They’d be staples of my “home visiting” wardrobe… hats, scarves, turtlenecks, fleece-lined cold weather running gear.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">My Nanny Janny (my mother’s mother) is infamous for the Christmas bags she doles out as gifts each year. They typically contain an assortment of soaps from Marshalls, flannel pajama pants from Building 19 1/2, fuzzy socks from the Hallmark store sale section, and bright colored zip up fleeces from Ocean State Job Lot. The fleeces were new to the lineup the first Christmas after I’d moved to LA, and the one that graced my gift bag was a putrid pink. Just shy of neon that could have been considered trendy, too dark to be soft and becoming, close to the shade of magenta you can imagine being a kindergartener’s favorite crayola color, and sort of like a step sister of Pepto Bismol’s it was the kind of thing no New Yorker or Angelino would dare to be caught dead in. </span></span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-font-kerning: none;"><span style="font-family: Trebuchet MS, sans-serif;">And yet… it found its way back in to the suitcase I packed to go home to Los Angeles with that Christmas, and it’s come back with me to Boston since I moved east again last summer. It’s warm and it’s relentless in its ugliness. I’ve worn it around the house more often than I am keen to admit. Whenever the temperature has dropped below 60. Pretty much any and every day I don’t have somewhere to be - any morning I’m waiting for my hair to dry or only running out to the drive through Starbucks a town over. And every once in a while when I’m dropping by my parents’ where the bin no longer resides but my grandparents have moved in to an in-law apartment. Whenever Nanny sees me in it, she beams. </span></span></div>
Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-16727466887858719152016-11-30T20:36:00.001-05:002016-11-30T21:06:20.856-05:00Check yourself...Because I have some of the best friends in the world, I get birthday gifts from time to time even though all I really ever need to feel spoiled already is the gift of their presence in my life. <br />
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This year I got a book of story prompts and a couple years back I got two books with autobiographical prompts. Prompts are my jam. Prompts are all I need to be off and running my fingers over the keyboard or pen over paper. <br />
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And in honor of the new book I went back to look at one of the old ones... they were selling it at Paper Source's and stores like that in the fall of 2013 <a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-js3BHHVfNZ0/WD97xjAdBdI/AAAAAAAACxU/V8QKnWU1HeYVHyRmT-tiZHtbSzhtjpUiQCK4B/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-11-30%2Bat%2B8.23.40%2BPM.png" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="318" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-js3BHHVfNZ0/WD97xjAdBdI/AAAAAAAACxU/V8QKnWU1HeYVHyRmT-tiZHtbSzhtjpUiQCK4B/s320/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-11-30%2Bat%2B8.23.40%2BPM.png" width="320" /></a><br />
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Glorious, right?! I had filled it cover to cover by mid January of 2014. The other one I got<br />
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I have on my to-do list to complete when I'm approaching 35 (the age I'd be privy to becoming president if I were so inclined... ahhh how I love arbitrary rationalizations)!<br />
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Anyway, I thought I'd post two of the essays I wrote in late November/early December of 2013. I thought maybe I wasn't posting much around then on here, but it looks like I did <a href="http://thegoldilockscomplex.blogspot.com/2013/12/lovely.html">at least a handful of times</a>. Nevertheless, it's still pseudo noteworthy... here's my answer to the question "how would you describe yourself" as of this time of year three years ago...<br />
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"Is it a bad thing talking about myself comes so easily to me? Self-aware - that's the way I'd start describing myself I guess. Eternally if not relentlessly optimistic. A glass half full kind of girl. A type A person who wishes she could be a free spirit. A "Yes" person with a high tolerance for bullshit. Remarkably unobservant. Pretty impressively patient in my personal opinion. Loyal. Loving. Lovable I 'd like to think. I love to laugh, love to learn, love to lean in when I feel like I have something worthwhile to bring to the table. I'm a homebody who loves to travel and loves to make the world feel a little smaller with each new trip around it. I'd say I'm a leader by nature most likely due to my eldest sibling role. I'm a straight shooting sagittarius and a little slight of tact sometimes if I'm being honest. I have high expectations of the people I love because I believe in them with every fiber of my being, but I'm pretty hard to disappoint because I'm pretty level-headed anreven keeled. I'm not a very passionate person, but I love to do the things I say I'm going to, andI am great at committing for the long haul to projects that I either believe in or think are important. I'm pretty maternal, but also self-serving. Self motivated, easily excitable, always open to being newly inspired. I'm open and accepting and always trying to stop my natural instincts to judge. I'm Catholic with a little 'c.' The oldest of 5 kids. Irish/Catholic/Italian/French Canadian and a couple other things. A boston girl at heart. And way more of a city girl than country bumpkin."<br />
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This all still applies.<br />
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I'll add that I'm grateful.Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-41355305889098349032016-11-13T19:13:00.001-05:002016-12-14T22:17:01.979-05:00SnarlsWhen I was little, my curls were unruly. They had a mind of their own and a traffic pattern my mother, God love her, couldn't seem to navigate gracefully for the life of her.<br />
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She'd rake through my hair with a brush when I got out of the bath, and as my head was yanked backwards with each stroke, she'd relent, "you've got snarls in there..."<br />
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I haven't heard or even thought of that word in decades. By the time my sisters were born there were detangling shampoos for kids and no-more-tangles sprays my mom would use on their manes to make the process more bearable. <br />
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These days I know how to work with my curls. "People pay good money for curls like those," people used to say to me when I was little, and these days I pay good money to manicure mine. <br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/beauty/12-curly-hair-hacks-that-will-completely-change-your-life/ss-AAk5rt1?li=BBnbcA0#image=1">I've been devoted to the devachan method for five years</a><br />
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The process is 100% worth the time it took to learn and master.<br />
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The point of this post though... I just realized, is that I will always have snarls, I have just acquired patience and tools necessary to smooth them.<br />
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There is so much to say about this mess of a week and the messy divide our country is raking through in the aftermath of the election. For tonight I can rest resolved to be willing to figure out how to work through the snarls. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My first day as a Deva girl</td></tr>
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<br />Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-85827877659712629492016-11-06T21:20:00.000-05:002016-11-06T21:20:00.797-05:00Falling backMy issue with falling back is the falling part.<br />
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I love getting back the hour. I will always take and maximize free time, bonus hours, minutes that are up for grabs.<br />
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But I can't help falling a little when the days get short.<br />
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The SAD in the air is contagious if not oppressive.<br />
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And I will find rays of sun shine like it's my job. I will, I can, I have.<br />
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It's a fight though, and I hate fights. I don't fight, in fact. I say it often, "I don't fight, I win," but winning is exhausting, it's draining. I don't know how Hillary's doing it. I am positive the toll it will take on her. She fights to win. I wonder if she knew all along 2008 wasn't hers, and just made the bid to get people ready for this run....<br />
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Anyway, election talk gets so dark. Now I'm doing this to myself. It's awful. <br />
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I think a cop out's in order. Here let me fall back on this: <a href="http://thegoldilockscomplex.blogspot.com/2011/08/oh-autumn-in-new-york.html?q=autumn+in+new+york">Oh, Autumn in New York :)</a><br />
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It's relative - I spent the second half of this last week pounding the pavement and checking out my bff's new digs<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6nj4mgrbTz0/WB_khR7V31I/AAAAAAAACwY/D6cEe9jsYo8NT7oMY8jzYTnJq4PRwAOcwCK4B/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-11-06%2Bat%2B9.18.12%2BPM.png" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6nj4mgrbTz0/WB_khR7V31I/AAAAAAAACwY/D6cEe9jsYo8NT7oMY8jzYTnJq4PRwAOcwCK4B/s320/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-11-06%2Bat%2B9.18.12%2BPM.png" width="320" /></a>Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-8251428546853608972016-10-30T19:53:00.000-04:002016-10-30T19:53:01.003-04:00ImWithHer I'm just not sure where from isidewith.com reinforced what I was confident about already. HRC is my candidate of choice in this year's wild and crazy election.<br />
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My "loft" portion of our place on Taylor is my abode of choice at this point in the crazy adventure called life.</div>
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And I'm confident about residing here. I think I'm doing good work, saving money, being creative, filling up my love tank, taking advantage of being conveniently located close to the majority of my favorite people in the world and only 20 minutes from an airport.</div>
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But I certainly wouldn't hate if someone came up with the sort of questionnaire they have you fill out on isidewith.com to validate a vast range of my life decisions. </div>
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A girl can dream, can't she?</div>
Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-21526070286154469802016-10-19T11:59:00.000-04:002016-10-19T11:59:04.717-04:00The Year of Magical Manifesting...Out of thin air two writing opportunities came in to my life earlier this week.<br />
<br />
I'm applying to <a href="https://grubstreet.org/programs/intensives/generators/novel-generator/">Grubstreet's Novel Generator </a>(fingers crossed) and I'm signed up for a writing group with a gaggle of women I've deemed new-age-Newton-moms. They may or may not actually be Newton moms. I only assume as much because the instructor suggested we find time to write 10 minutes a day "even if it's while waiting to pick up a kid after soccer practice" or something to that effect. <br />
<br />
I loved my essay writing workshop earlier this year, so I'm pretty stoked for this group and excited about the prompts the organizer is coming to the table with especially after getting an email from her last night that included some inspiration from Joan Didion. She sent us Joan's essay "Why I Write," in which Joan admits she stole the title from George Orwell in part because she just liked the way the words sounded strung along the way they are and that "<span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT; font-size: 12pt;">there’s no getting around the fact that setting words on paper is the
</span><span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT; font-size: 12pt;">tactic of a secret bully, an invasion, an imposition of </span><span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT; font-size: 12pt;">the writer’s sensibility on the
reader’s most private space."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT; font-size: 12pt;">I am 100% guilty of being a secret bully. Case in point: my relentless emails to the men in my life.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT;">More on that tactic later. For now, it delights me that Joan Didion's <i>Year of Magical Thinking</i> (which I picked up on a Barnes & Noble detour one day three or four years ago between when I'd done the Artist's Way and when I'd moved to California) made it through my purge earlier this year. It brings me joy - her writing about writing.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT;">So does writing, so does identifying as a writer, so does associating with other writers, and so does trusting in the magic a year can possess. </span>Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-70810902893372919032016-10-12T21:45:00.000-04:002016-10-12T23:15:14.773-04:00The World ClockMy uncle asked to talk to me a couple hours ago when he called my mom and I happened to be at my parents' house.<br />
<br />
He was in LA for work last week, and his Iranian Uber driver told him to check out this site with <a href="http://www.poodwaddle.com/worldclock/">The World Clock</a>. Checking it out reinforced the hunch my uncle's had for a while that it's time to invest in property... Maybe we'll go in to business together, start an LLC, get my other uncle to be the property manager for the multi family houses the first uncle, our godson, and I start buying and flipping and/or renting out. We'll see... The wheels are turning, and the point, my uncle said, is the population is ever growing. His Iranian Uber driver was making the point that humans are most definitely going to devour the earth's resources at the rate we're operating. Which is another concern altogether, but my uncle's conclusion is if there's one thing that's a given it's that people need places to live. Investing in places people will want to live is the way to go.<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zctFbAYoZbA/V_7lIkNIUoI/AAAAAAAACvI/2eUjZLgpm6w2wf2W1BYytYImYurfDP_YwCK4B/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-10-12%2Bat%2B9.35.55%2BPM.png" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="57" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-zctFbAYoZbA/V_7lIkNIUoI/AAAAAAAACvI/2eUjZLgpm6w2wf2W1BYytYImYurfDP_YwCK4B/s320/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-10-12%2Bat%2B9.35.55%2BPM.png" width="320" /></a></div>
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My uncle's in sales, so naturally he had me hooked on the phone. I was ready to buy in before even checking the site out.<br />
<br />
And then I got home and had a minute or two to sit and watch the numbers tick, up in the births bubble, up in deaths bubble, up in the deforestation bubble. As usual seeing the US National debt exposed to the dollar did the trick putting my own debt in perspective.<br />
<br />
And as the icing on the cake of a day and week I'm having, I also felt a wave of relief wash up on the shore of anxiety I've had in recent weeks that I'm living in too small a corner of the world at the moment. I'm not alone... I'm one of 7,456,193,445 and counting individuals occupying my own space in the world. We're all mere sequins on the stage of this planet reflecting the spotlight of the sun.Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-79591454271198517242016-10-02T22:40:00.000-04:002016-10-12T23:02:59.260-04:00Red Rover OctoberThis is the second time in eight years I've spent two Octobers in a row with the same residence.<br />
<br />
So not surprisingly, I was asked at a family function this afternoon if I'm "here to stay."<br />
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People have grown accustomed to hearing I'm here there and anywhere at any given point, and I've grown accustom to re-adjusting, recalibrating, relocating.<br />
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It's hard to say if I'm here to stay. I'm here for now. And I'm happy. So there's that. There's just still SO MUCH WORLD.<br />
<br />
So it remains to be seen, where the wind will take me and whether my nomadic tendencies have truly subsided.<br />
<br />
When I was little, I could never break through the linked arms of opposing red rover team members. I was inevitably traded to the team who called me over. Inevitably trapped until the next time I heard my name.<br />
<br />
In a way, I guess I'm always still listening and ready to make a run for it. Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-16016220267081555282016-09-28T18:41:00.004-04:002016-09-28T18:41:48.828-04:00All about the greenJust stumbled upon this interview with <a href="http://www.msn.com/en-us/lifestyle/smart-living/4-millennial-men-with-4-very-different-incomes-open-up-about-the-lives-they-can-afford/ar-AAifWDG#page=1">4 Millennial Men with 4 Very Different Salaries</a>.<br />
<br />
How absolutely mind boggling a time this is.<br />
<br />
Election season - of course.<br />
<br />
But this era too. Wherein one millennial can be making $2,489,000 more or less than the next.<br />
<br />
How can anyone in the various circles I run with complain? We are all so beyond #blessed. We joke about <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/annehelenpetersen/basic-class-anxiety?utm_term=.mrwl7AbB2A#.teVoyM2ARM">#basic-ness</a>. We are doing more than great. We have so much to be grateful for.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-7013844516379570522016-09-18T09:19:00.000-04:002016-10-12T23:03:39.923-04:00Training RunsThree things have dramatically impacted my philosophy on life in the past ten years: proximity to untimely death, running the Boston Marathon, and jumping out of a plane.<br />
<br />
The other night one of my girlfriends posited it's impossible to truly comprehend missing something like one's health or a loved one until you've lost it.<br />
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I think we all have our own ideas of what counts as a defining experience, our own framing constructs for how we can make sense of the parts of life that are too big and too beyond us to ever truly know inside and out.<br />
<br />
Anyway, I'm writing... morning pages, a revision of "the book," these blog posts, emails for work, and I'm looking at the writing I'm doing as exercises. An exercise in this or that... finding an arc, being concise, dialoguing in different voices. <br />
<br />
It's a little bit aimless. <br />
<br />
Less so when I sit down and type out a syllabus for myself - do this outline one week, edit that screenplay next month, write the book proposal by December, send out queries after the first of the year, and so on.<br />
<br />
I just had this great aha moment though. The impulse to add up the number of training runs I've done vs actual half marathon and marathon races... The number of times I've run at least eight miles vs the number of times I've gotten medals for doing so.<br />
<br />
10 halves, 1 Cherry Blossom 10 miler, 1 full.<br />
<br />
12 medals, 5 times as many runs 8 miles or longer.<br />
<br />
Gotta put the time in.<br />
<br />Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-65334702906228971522016-09-14T21:08:00.004-04:002016-09-14T21:08:58.915-04:00The WorstI know... I've been missing my Sunday posts. <br />
<br />
Wedding season will do that.<br />
<br />
Speaking of wedding season (what else is there to touch upon at present?) I got this from one of my modmates earlier today:<br />
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<a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?hl=en&q=http://the-toast.net/2013/08/01/bachelorette-party-emails/&source=gmail&ust=1473987716961000&usg=AFQjCNEq3eRat7WwBNGOeYQH29rhBy1CGQ" href="http://the-toast.net/2013/08/01/bachelorette-party-emails/" style="color: #1155cc; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;" target="_blank">http://the-toast.net/2013/08/<wbr></wbr>01/bachelorette-party-emails/</a><br />
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Simply put, it's the WORST. Mostly because it's not that funny. I mean it's hilarious, but it's so on the nose. It's not funny how accurate a representation of the process it is. <br />
<br />
Surely people don't throw out unrealistic suggestions, disregard voiced opinions and concerns and, worst of all - JUST NOT RESPOND or else neglect to answer the questions an organizer has posed, right!?!<br />
<br />
There must be an unspoken girl code in place about these things.<br />
<br />
No!?!?<br />
<br />
We must all have the bride's best interest at heart and one another's financial and social circumstances in mind when coming together to orchestrate shenanigans. <br />
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Mustn't we!?!?<br />
<br />
I am eternally grateful to the point people who have organized my girlfriends' bachelorette parties of late. They have gone above and beyond, and they have the patience of saints.<br />
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Bitches be crazy though.<br />
<br />
Without fail. We're all <a href="http://www.fxnetworks.com/shows/youre-the-worst/episodes">the worst</a> in our own right.<br />
<br />Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-49363727972803579532016-09-07T15:49:00.002-04:002016-09-07T15:49:25.920-04:00Let's Talk About Trees For a SecMy little cousin is visiting this week from Washington state. We took her for lunch by the BC campus yesterday and she got such a kick out of the way people dress "on the east coast" / "in Boston" as she referred to it. Way less hippy, way more preppy... She's visiting her sister in DC for the weekend and going to a political event with her. She's worried she doesn't have anything to wear, but I assured her after 5 years in our nation's capital, I'm sure her sis has prep and or conservative garb to spare.<br />
<br />
I thought if we'd brought her to Cambridge she may see more of the aesthetic she's accustomed to, but I knew exactly the difference she meant between the way people dressed generally on one side of the country vs the other.<br />
<br />
One of the main reasons I elected to go to BC was that on my tour there I noted there were countless kids going to class in University gear. Hoodies, t-shirts, sweatpants...these kids wore their pride all across campus and not just when it was football season or spirit week.<br />
<br />
One of the main reasons I told my dad I had no desire to attend UNH - despite having found its library utterly breathtaking - was that there were simply too many trees on the campus.<br />
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I've had time to ruminate on my aversion to forestry over the years, and I would like to say I've come to appreciate woodedness with age, but beyond the marveling I did at the tree tops I soared above while skydiving the other weekend, I've remained pretty impartial to everything from ferns to oaks and even apple trees.<br />
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I love them cause they give us life, but I simply don't need them near by.<br />
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I'll still take a jungle of pavement any day. Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-36654937100430322132016-08-31T22:14:00.001-04:002016-08-31T22:14:31.463-04:00When the sky's no longer the limit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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You really start to believe in the power of manifestation.<br />
<br />
5,000 feet above land, suspended in air, I giggled out of sheer euphoria and I teared up at the sheer beauty of New England with all its trees. And I'll write this coming Sunday about how much I hate trees. But I swear the perspective I'd gained when I walked out of the air and stepped back on solid ground was like nothing I could have acquired before last Sunday.<br />
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Nothing seems impossible. Everything seems relative. "Life is not a matter of milestones but of moments."Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-87679794315376423522016-08-24T08:55:00.000-04:002016-08-24T08:55:01.351-04:00Goody bag<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-59YhL1UT0MY/V72XwlXTuPI/AAAAAAAACs8/gO1LWcJDhYsfS_ApBXvk3QhKsWoCEjpuwCK4B/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-08-22%2Bat%2B11.41.37%2BAM.png" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-59YhL1UT0MY/V72XwlXTuPI/AAAAAAAACs8/gO1LWcJDhYsfS_ApBXvk3QhKsWoCEjpuwCK4B/s320/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-08-22%2Bat%2B11.41.37%2BAM.png" width="202" /></a><br />
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Sometimes I take away a renewed commitment to waiting for "the one." Sometimes I take away a feeling of relief I haven't "settled." Sometimes I take away ideas about flowers, readings, bridesmaid dresses, place cards, signature cocktails, and scheduling. Sometimes I just take away the box of chocolates with the bride & groom's name on it, or the flip flops they had on the dance floor, or bag of sweets from the candy bar, the swarovski swan, or the strip of pictures from the photo booth.<br />
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But this past weekend I took away a sentiment similar to sweet Anne Frank's here.<br />
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The wonderful thought that I have a wonderful day or weekend I'll simultaneously "never want to end" and never get the chance to recreate yet to come.<br />
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How lucky, right? Put that in your proverbial goody bag.Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-69510918223116224452016-08-21T21:23:00.002-04:002016-08-21T21:23:50.255-04:00Love is what we celebrate(c) song by my CFF.... I'll share a clip when he and my BFF have cut their EP and I've figured out how to do so on the blogosphere.<br />
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2/5 weddings in to the season, I'm going strong and learning a LOT.<br />
<br />
I'm also working on a major book edit right now. So I want credit (doled out by yours truly to yours truly) for posting regularly, but I need to be okay with not generating cool content.<br />
<br />
Consistently inconsistent's going to have to do for a spell.Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-26646191683954606302016-08-17T14:11:00.003-04:002016-08-17T14:11:57.362-04:00This scene...It's classic for so many lines in it... "it's not gonna be easy, it's gonna be really hard," and "well, that's what we do, we fight... You tell me when I am being an arrogant son of a bitch and I tell you when you are a pain in the ass..." <br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/E1I0hAxGFXw" width="560"></iframe>
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But the one I think of on average once or twice a week (I wish I were joking) is "what do you want? What do YOU want? WHAT - DO - YOU - WANT?"<br />
<br />
The idea of asking for what you want is so simple. The practice even, is so simple. My middle/baby brother, the head of his own household and father of this <a href="http://thegoldilockscomplex.blogspot.com/2016/05/city-living.html">unbelievable source of limitless joy</a>, told me yesterday he's taking his career in to his own hands.... "All you have to do is ask for what you want," he said.<br />
<br />
And I know he's right. I've done that professionally.<br />
<br />
I do that at restaurants.<br />
<br />
I know what I want when I go to the hair salon.<br />
<br />
I know what I want for breakfast on a morning after I've had too much wine the night before (bacon).<br />
<br />
But to be able to ask for what you want, you need to first KNOW what you want.<br />
<br />
And I'd be lying if I said there weren't corners of my life where I still don't know what I want.<br />
<br />
So lest my sweeping generalizations fool folks, have no fear, my Goldilocks Complex is alive and well...Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-6366834752639884762016-08-14T21:12:00.001-04:002016-08-14T21:14:19.526-04:00Hey BartenderWhen my heart got stepped on in September of 2013 and then further mangled around May/June of 2014 by <a href="http://thegoldilockscomplex.blogspot.com/2013/04/true-romance.html">a southerner</a> who sold me for a country song, I made the mistake of thinking wine would help.<br />
<br />
It didn't.<br />
<br />
Then this Lady Antebellum song came out conveniently a week or so after a NOLA bartender named a drink after me and booked a trip to Boston to overlap with a week I was spending there with my family.<br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/_rHuitW9xDc" width="560"></iframe><br />
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Throughout my late teens and in to my late twenties, I drank for a lot of reasons. I copied pages of my diary to show my parents when I got caught drinking my senior year of high school. I wanted them to see how I'd struggled to decide to deceive them, how I hadn't simply caved to peer pressure, and how I was actively attempting to lower my inhibitions.<br />
<br />
Prude, first born, over achieving, daughter of squares that I was, I had A LOT of inhibitions blocking my access to what I believed to be the full teenage experience. So quarters games led to funneling and I toasted to "the nights we'd never remember with the people we'd never forget" for about a decade before waking up with a resolution on my 28th birthday. Never again did I want to have that "oh shit" moment upon opening my eyes for the first time after a night out....<br />
<br />
I didn't want to regret or forget conversations, canoodling sessions, or any uncharacteristic behaviors that might have been benchmarks of the evening prior. Ever again.<br />
<br />
So far so good since then. <br />
<br />
A big trick I've been using: drinking less... even not drinking at all, especially in circumstances where I'm prone to experiencing emotion. Because emotion + alcohol = a lack of cognitive control.<br />
<br />
It's actually like only now, at 31, I understand the value of inhibition. Only now do I appreciate and honor my internal barometer for what I'm comfortable with.<br />
<br />
I wasn't lying to my parents, I didn't follow others in their decision to drink. I definitely made my own and had so much fun in the years I spent drinking recreationally. Once in a blue moon, I love a few too many blue moons or vodka sodas or what have you.<br />
<br />
But I'm actually really content with the decisions and lifestyle of Sober Naugs. She's still super fun. She just also never needs her parents to pick her up from the party because she's gotten too sloppy. And she just doesn't chase that disco ball around till she can't remember.Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-76083994400337169442016-08-10T19:10:00.001-04:002016-08-10T19:10:42.390-04:00Take me to New York, I'd love to see LATwo weekends, two whirlwind trips...<br />
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Not everyone's game for redeyes and volunteering to take the first shower, but I do what it takes to get the most out of my time away. So I packed meetings, a movie, a beach day, mass and a girls' dinner in Santa Monica into my 46 hour excursion to my home away from home away from home away from home.<br />
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f0qtTRSE00Q/V6uwFDP-dsI/AAAAAAAACsc/QrQ8LeNFvbQKgSr9ES5Hm-2IW5SZyXqZwCK4B/s1600/FullSizeRender.jpg" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-f0qtTRSE00Q/V6uwFDP-dsI/AAAAAAAACsc/QrQ8LeNFvbQKgSr9ES5Hm-2IW5SZyXqZwCK4B/s320/FullSizeRender.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
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Was technically there to drop this little one off in LaLa Land for a week of living la vida entertainment industry. She's "a peach" who'll "do great there" according to a friend of mine who's been going for it for the past three years after first dipping his toe in the water with a move west eight years ago (right around when I Boltbussed out of Boston with my 3 bags, 2 bucks and pocket full of NYCity dreams).<br />
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And I couldn't agree more.<br />
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<br />Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-76854179353264885032016-08-03T21:36:00.002-04:002016-08-03T21:37:40.855-04:00Wedding Season of LifeMonday was August 1st, and while Wedding Season 2016 kicked off for me at a bridal shower in Long Island back in early April<br />
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PyWc7SYKpOs/V6Kadod_AnI/AAAAAAAACr4/A1ucJd44AjU8UmAoeoySbiGZsui-wk5ZwCLcB/s1600/IMG_2668.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-PyWc7SYKpOs/V6Kadod_AnI/AAAAAAAACr4/A1ucJd44AjU8UmAoeoySbiGZsui-wk5ZwCLcB/s320/IMG_2668.JPG" width="179" /></a></div>
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it being August now means shit's about to get REAL for the next four months.</div>
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So as I prepare to be my most fun and love-loving self, I have to sort of issue a fair warning to the people in my inner most circles. Cause month after month revolving around the love and commitment and progress and joint filing status of my dear friends and family will simultaneously fill me with immeasurable joy in general and deplete me of just shy of every last ounce of my seemingly limitless joie de vivre.</div>
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This is the reality of the (going on 9 year long) wedding season of my life.</div>
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<a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-upul5fF96po/V6Kb49AjHXI/AAAAAAAACsE/v4IUBV9F1yY2lJBlwjN_cwWGxMgfh23DACLcB/s1600/Slide1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="292" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-upul5fF96po/V6Kb49AjHXI/AAAAAAAACsE/v4IUBV9F1yY2lJBlwjN_cwWGxMgfh23DACLcB/s320/Slide1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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100% worth it for the picture, pride and preservation of my belief in fairytales.</div>
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A doozy nonetheless.</div>
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Wish me luck ;)</div>
Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-20428057462109294132016-07-31T19:59:00.002-04:002016-07-31T19:59:46.411-04:00Sleep Some MoreSometimes you need a throwback thirty-six hours, so you hit the road with your besties from forever and remind yourself why it's called the city that never sleeps.<br />
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Here's what so.much.glee - pure glee really - looks like:<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Jh2RoQhEb1M/V56Pg6evv8I/AAAAAAAACrc/I0hHvoamLIA9vd2FX-8P3IDaZtFkaKAIQCK4B/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-07-31%2Bat%2B7.53.15%2BPM.png" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Jh2RoQhEb1M/V56Pg6evv8I/AAAAAAAACrc/I0hHvoamLIA9vd2FX-8P3IDaZtFkaKAIQCK4B/s320/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-07-31%2Bat%2B7.53.15%2BPM.png" width="280" /></a><br />
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Basically, pure glee looks like a helping hand pitching in so you can at least attempt to pucker up like a pro.<br />
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We went "so New York" and saw <i>Sleep No More, </i>so now I can say I've done that. (I can't believe it was <a href="http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2011/08/emma-stone-201108">four years ago I caught wind of Emma Stone loving it</a>). And I wasn't the biggest fan, but I'm awfully glad to have gone when we did. Because who's to say it'll be here another 5 years from now? Time flies, after all.<br />
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Two 2 AM nights back to back are officially my limit this side of 30. It's fun to know you've still got it though. <br />
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<br />Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-25297941190367407892016-07-28T16:20:00.001-04:002016-07-28T16:20:19.460-04:00Why I didn't vote for Hillary - a chauvenistic feminist's confession*Note: this post is a day late and a dollar short and a combo of a post I started writing months ago and some thoughts I've had in light of this week's DNC.<br />
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You guys - WOMEN ARE CRAZY*<br />
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Humans in general are crazy. Life is crazy. Everyone I love and have ever loved is crazy**. And so on, but I have concluded that even when <a href="http://leanin.org/">Leaning In</a>, even when running things like the bosses they are, even when winning at life, <i>women</i> are just cursed by being prone to behaving more crazily than men, and that's just <i>unfortunate</i>.<br />
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I have no idea how valid <a href="https://shine.yahoo.com/healthy-living/9-crazy-things-period-makes-204400427.html">THIS ARTICLE</a> is, but it's being presented here for all intents and purposes as EXHIBIT A. And I'm using it to launch into my point.<br />
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Remember Hamlet slaying Ophelia and all women thereafter with a single line? "<i>Frailty, thy name is woman.</i>" I love a good conspiracy theory, so I'm gonna go ahead and hop on the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_Tudor_theory">Prince Tudor</a> train, and say that line was inspired by "Shakespeare" believing his own mom to be whackadoo and helpless insomuch as she couldn't even own up to him being her son. <br />
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And I'm not sure that helps or hurts or validates my argument here, but I work in a field that is predominantly women run and have seen the CRAZY come into play more times than I count. And I was just informed by a friend that works in another field predominantly women run that she got smacked in the face with CRAZY this morning.<br />
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I'm talking irrational, unprofessional seeming, blind siding, the likes of which <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Oher">Michael Oher</a> wouldn't have been able to protect someone from <br />
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And this friend of mine, called me in tears, because she had been hurt and confused by the outrageous antics of her female employers.<br />
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So to diminish her despair I turned ultimately to a "joke" I often tell: "<i>this</i> is why I didn't vote for Hillary."<br />
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*******okay that's where the initial post stopped, so picking up at present:<br />
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Make no bones about it, these days, I'm With Her. This November, I will probably cry casting my vote for the first women with a real deal shot of setting up shop in the Oval Office.<br />
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Eight years ago, I had yet to start working remotely, so I was in a bubble of estrogen 40 - 60 hours per week and pretty sure that not liking having a woman boss meant I would not like having a woman be the boss of the country.<br />
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I was young, and I was inexperienced. And in my defense, Obama had the zeitgeist in his corner. How could I, as an aspirational millennial not look to his youth and optimism and think it was what we needed to bounce back from the banality of Bush being puppetted through his second term?<br />
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I wanted the sure thing. Obama was the sure thing. Hillary, what with all her hormones, didn't strike me as the sure thing, she struck me as a wild card.<br />
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The thing is: hormones shmormones. Let's talk about putting in the time. And being, as so many have acknowledged, over qualified for the job at this point. Let's talk about a ceiling in need of crashing through and let's talk about the type of people that crash through ceilings:<br />
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CRAZY PEOPLE.<br />
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I think I just brought this all back to home, no? You'd have to be crazy to want to smash through a ceiling made of glass. So bring on the crazy. Bring on the first Gentleman. <br />
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This world is crazy, but I'd take Hills' crazy over TheDonald's any day.<br />
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Let's get to work, and let's see this lady's crazy love for these United States do its thing.<br />
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*Full disclosure, I am making sweeping generalizations here and exaggerating (to some extent) because it's helpful to do so when ranting "comically."<br />
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**Note: I like that crazy can be defined as both "mentally deranged, especially as manifested in a wild or aggressive way" and "extremely enthusiastic." It's not necessarily a bad thing!!!Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-71223524208588124542016-07-24T21:46:00.000-04:002016-07-24T21:46:32.785-04:00Pink hatted, full heartedI spent the afternoon at Fenway Park, in good company.<br />
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I gave fair warning though: I know nothing about the team right now, other than that I love them today as much as ever, which has been unconditionally for as long as I can remember.<br />
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My first trip to the park, I was all of three. There with my Great Grandpy and Great Nana Dougherty, who loved all things Americana, especially the songs of John Philip Sousa, the Red Sox and the Camelot Kennedys.<br />
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If that doesn't lay the foundation for a lifetime of fandom, I don't know what does.<br />
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And I don't know that I ever have or ever will be a real fan of the team to the extent of knowing averages, jersey numbers, positions... but I am sure there will be series that familiarize me with most of the names on the roster, the way the 2003 and 2004 and 2008 post seasons did.<br />
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Because I'm a proud proverbial pink hat wearing full heartedly bandwagon fan.<br />
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You know what I like the most about baseball? It's a long game. You can't rush it.<br />
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CNQSpQfRXN8/V5VvdeRsyPI/AAAAAAAACrE/c7nc9-nezkoULXTPxfiTC1iRp-HJ_DRygCK4B/s1600/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-07-24%2Bat%2B9.45.47%2BPM.png" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CNQSpQfRXN8/V5VvdeRsyPI/AAAAAAAACrE/c7nc9-nezkoULXTPxfiTC1iRp-HJ_DRygCK4B/s320/Screen%2BShot%2B2016-07-24%2Bat%2B9.45.47%2BPM.png" width="157" /></a>Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-129640532156506798.post-73794456015434567482016-07-20T20:31:00.000-04:002016-07-20T20:31:24.798-04:00FearsI'm so anti-fear. I don't like to say or admit I'm afraid of anything. I'm not really afraid of anything. I think getting out from under the fear of death we're basically all born with has helped me get to a perpetual place of "this too shall pass." It's a perk of being catholist (a combo of Catholic and Buddhist). This<a href="http://tinybuddha.com/blog/facing-the-fear-of-death-and-really-living-now/"> writer gets it</a>. <br />
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But I have to confess. I was scared shitless twice while away earlier this month. Once when a riptide made me reckon with how I've always said "I'm not a great swimmer, but I could swim to save my life," and that is true but by the grace of God. My aunt sent me this article after the fact with a note: "we're glad you're still here." It was that close a call. <br />
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And once when a bird of prey swooped down and nearly took my curly topped head off in his successful attempt to snag half my sandwich. I have been sent articles pertaining to this horrifying incident as well. Get this http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/stop-feeding-seagulls_us_578cc60be4b0867123e1be2e?section= AND http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3175036/Now-seagulls-cunning-Packs-birds-target-women-develop-new-tactics-steal-lunch.html<br />
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Basically... the fear is justified.Naugs http://www.blogger.com/profile/00186774090061891671noreply@blogger.com0