Halfway there

My life is full of dichotomies. On the one hand, I get to travel all the time. On the other, I have to travel all the time. Room upgrades are fun. Sleeping in a strange bed not so much. Sometimes it's awesome to be me, but sometimes it sucks. I suppose it all evens out in the end, right?

This morning I had a massage (nice) then worked through lunch (not so nice). After office yoga with Pam and perky Bethany, I worked a bit more then went to a business after hours event. Now I'm sitting at the Fairfield Inn in Russellville, where I got upgraded to a suite for no apparent reason (they know I used to be Miss Tech, I'm sure). But when you arrive around 10 p.m., there's not much time to enjoy the luxury.

Tomorrow I'm working in the Little Rock office, then it's dinner with Estella, Joe and Kevin before my night at the Capital Hotel (which is very, very nice). Saturday's the Race for the Cure in Little Rock, so I'm happy to be staying downtown and not fighting traffic.

The point of all of this, you wonder? I spend half of my days thinking how very lucky I am to have a cool job where I get to stay in nice hotels and eat at nice restaurants, and the other half of my days thinking how uncool it is that my job stresses me out so much. I get sick of the car. I forgot to pay my house payment. I obsessively check my BlackBerry. But at least I often do it in a hotel suite or while eating a fabulous meal.

My boss was right. I do need to get a life. And perhaps sleep in my own bed.

Won't you be my neighbor?

Smokey Smokerson has a cousin. And she lives across the street.

When I lived in Russellville, my mom was mortified that I didn't know my neighbors. Oh sure, I'd wave as I passed them on the street. I'd speak at the mailbox. But it's not like I invited them over for parties or borrowed cups of sugar.

I'm a very social person. On the Strenghthsfinder test, I have "woo" as one of my top strengths. Give me a room of 50, and I'll meet 49 of 'em. I am a social butterfly. I have a lot of contacts, meet people easily, and generally have no trouble making small talk with total strangers.

My downfall is that I don't have many deep, meaningful relationships. Don't get me wrong, I have several close friends and am fiercely loyal to those I love. It's just that moving from an casual acquaintance to a person I'll confide in is a giant leap. Unless you read the Drivel, of course.

So maybe that's why I never make an effort to know my neighbors' names. Instead, I give them all nicknames based on experiences or personal characteristics. To the east of me is the Fuller Family, so named because they each share a very large characteristic... one that follows them around everywhere they go. Mr. Fuller evidently is something of a mechanic, as he has several vehicles in varying stages of repair that he likes to park in front of my house. The Fullers' garage is, much like their dinner plates, always full of junk, making it impossible to park a vehicle in there. Mrs. Fuller does, however, enjoy sitting just outside of the garage door in a plastic lawn chair, yelling at Baby Fuller, who always needs his mouth washed and diaper changed. My favorite thing about the Fuller family, without a doubt, is Mr. Fuller's propensity to work on cars in the middle of the night. There's nothing like a revving engine to increase the ol' heart rate. Lucky for you all, tonight was one of those nights. So now I'm wide awake to update the Drivel. If you see Mr. Fuller, buy him a cheeseburger and pray for his cardiovascular health.

Chick to the west is a young college coed, and evidently one of the more popular ones at that. A bevy of vehicles take turns parking in her driveway nightly. I especially appreciate the loud crotch rocket that often pulls in after midnight. Couple that with Mr. Fuller's engine revving, and you've got the perfect storm of noise. College Coed does have a respite of visitors on Monday and Thursday mornings, when her grandfather comes by early to take out her trash. He doesn't realize that most of the trash frequenting the premisis is of the human form. I speak to him politely two mornings a week as I take out my own trash after squashing my own bugs.

Smokey and the Bandit Green directly across the street have some unusual habits. I'm unaware if they have a home-based business or merely benefit from some sort of economic stimulus plan, but they always seem to be home. The Greens (I call them that because they're from OK according to their car tags) are also unable to park in their garage. I venture to guess you couldn't fit a Q-tip in there, and I wonder if Mrs. Green would be better off to light a match (or a cigarette) rather than sort through the colossal pile of garbage that she keeps stored. Mr. Green likes to mow but not trim, which adds a certain unfinished appeal to the neighborhood. Mrs. Green chain smokes while talking on her cell phone sitting in the driveway in her pajamas. And when I say sitting, I mean she literally sits on the concrete. No chair. A few months ago, back when I was still speaking to LB, he was at my house for four hours or so, and she was sitting in the driveway when he got here and still sitting there when he left.

Oh, and Jose one street over really wanted to off-road in his ca. 1989 S10, so he spray painted "4x4" on the side of his truck. I'm thinking of painting "Mercedes" on the back of my Toyota. Just because you say it, doesn't make it so.

I'm sure there are some normal people in my neighborhood, but they don't live near me. I'm so ready to move.

Ah, elusive sleep. I'm considering making a lot of noise when my alarm goes off in four hours.

Russ-vegas

Today was a great day in many ways because I got to see three of my favorite people in the whole wide world: Alisa, Amy and Shauna. We enjoyed lunch at our favorite place, Italian Gardens, and we ordered the same things we always do. We talked for two hours (we did do some work, in case you were wondering), and our waitress quickly crossed the line from attentive to annoying.

It was the first time I've seen them in months, so we had a lot of catching up to do. About work. About family. About LB.

Shauna and Alisa have recommended that I profess my like for the boy by sticking my tongue in his ear Saturday night. Yeah, I don't see that happening, but I am gearing up for an opportunity this weekend, and I hope I'll have the courage to take it.

So here's your task for the day... I'm soliciting advice about what to say, how to say it, and where. Post some comments, please. I'm totally serious. Obviously I can't be trusted.

The long way home

Jen's probably the only one who cares, but I'll try to update my blog for the rest of the masses who might care about what's going on in my life.

I've been in Central Arkansas since Friday, and I got the brilliant idea to go home north by northwest this morning rather than my normal west then north route, which showcased the beautiful fall foliage but made my trip 4.5 hours from Little Rock to Siloam. It was a gorgeous drive, but by the time I got back to my beloved NWA, I napped through the entire Cowboys game. Turns out that wasn't such a tragedy.

To catch you up, I was a moron who gave myself a mere 24 hours to recover from anesthesia and being sliced open with a large knife, so I presided over a day-long meeting on Wednesday and marched into the very large home office of the world's largest retailer on Thursday to pretend that I'm a big girl with marketing prowess. Luckily both meetings went well and were very productive, but I was in pain for the whole two days that I pretended to be invincible. Sometimes the Superwoman cape feels a bit snug.

On Friday I stopped in Russellville to say hello to Alisa and Shauna before meeting my friend Erin for coffee in Conway to discuss politics, violence on college campuses and the need for responsible choices. Oh, and world peace. When you're getting ready for a pageant interview you have to work that in, right? Joe and I had dinner at Kobe on Friday evening (he brought me some gorgeous pink roses because he's amazing).

Yesterday I spent six hours talking to people from all over the state who want to be teachers. Okay, I talked to two. So it was a very long day, saved by the fact that two pals from the Center of Learning were there to catch me up on my former coworkers and eat lunch with me so I didn't look like such a loser. Then, last night, I went to dinner with my good friends Dave and Brent at one of my all-time favorite restaurants, Sonny Williams.

Now I'm home, punch drunk from the long nap and needing to do laundry. But at least inquiring minds no longer need to wonder what's new with me. Not much.