Milestones

This Tuesday, I left for Colorado Springs on adventure that is most appropriately titled, "My First Business Trip". I've always wanted to go on a business trip! It wasn't nearly has glamorous as most. It was a quick trip and completely devoid of company perks and luxurious amenities. Nonetheless, it was an adventure and I had a great time.

Here's a photo of me arriving in Colorado Springs on Tuesday evening:


I went straightway to my rental car provider where my chariot awaited, in the form of a Dodge Caliber. After having asked the rental car staff for directions, they had a bit of advice for me: "Uhh, you should be careful. That's not exactly the best part of town." Nice!

I went straightway to my luxurious accommodations at the swanky Travelodge -- not exactly the Broadmoor. But hey! We're nonprofit. What do you expect? It didn't seem too bad, really. Of course, I'm from New Jersey, so I might have a skewed perspective. But there were no sketchy broken windows with creepy prowlers and dealers on the corner. Travelodge had internet access in the lobby only (but it was TOTALLY free), so I hung out there till about 12 sending emails and.. well, goofing off really. There was a lovely, friendly-looking dog behind the counter of the front desk and lots of asian people, who appeared to be management, hanging out and starting to play old 80's ballads as we approached the 12 o'clock hour (which is apparently also the karaoke hour?). Despite they're eccentricities, the crowd proved harmless.

The next morning I got free breakfast! Travelodge is seriously growing on me at this point. Especially when I found my hotel room free of hair in the sink and all other forms of ickiness. Ok, so my standards aren't very high. But the fun asian management people were a total perk. Who wouldn't be endeared to petite, middle-aged, balding men who sing power ballads at midnight?

After breakfast I wisked myself away to training. It was hosted by the Olympic Complex. I didn't know the official complex for the Olympics was in Colorado Springs. But it is. So, now you know. It was pretty cool. My favorite feature was the juice station they had in the hallway. YUM!

After the conference, I had an afternoon to kill before my flight. the gentleman that was next to me on my flight the day before had recommended some local attractions. The most appealing to me of his suggestions was the Garden of the Gods. Here's a couple pic's of its beautiful vistas:





As you can probably tell, the rock formations were HUGE and totally cool. Here's a close up:


I also encountered another close up. There was a deer right on the walking paths there who didn't seem phased by the tourists. I admit, I've seen a million deer before and it's NOT a big event, but he was so CLOSE. And I had a camera!! I had to take a picture. Several pictures. I was trying to photograph him/her in a discreet manner so as not to startle the beast. Well, I was successful in being discreet. AND so was the deer. So, they're a bit more of a "Where's Waldo" experience rather than "Look How Close the Deer Is." But I'll post them anyway. Can you find the deer?




I was disappointed to find there was no fitness center at the luxurious yet amenity-lacking Travelodge. To my rescue and my delight, there were trails at the Garden of the Gods. Most accomodating. Here's me at the Garden of the Gods after my run:


After that, I went through the shops in Historic Old Colorado City, which was lovely. At last, I was kind of done with everything and lost my adventurous spirit. I also worried I might run out of luck and actually get myself lost, so I decided to head back to the airport and get some work done till my flight left for home.

I'm amazied I managed to get to everything without screwing it up. You'd almost think I was a responsible adult. Well, not quite, but there may be hope for me yet.

Other career news: I was actually on the news Wednesday morning w/ the KJZZ Cafe. My organization sent a shipment of supplies to Myanmar, so they featured a bit about us and apparently almost everyone else at my organization is camera-shy. Good thing their PR girl is a total ham! :)

Thoughts On Cleaning

I'm not sure who thought up "spring cleaning". How is it considered a given that "spring" and "cleaning" go together? Spring signals to me running outside, more sunlight, taking walks, wearing lighter coats and playing frisbee. All of those things usually provide me with LESS time for cleaning.

More appropos for me would be "guest cleaning". I'm much more likely to tidy up for guests rather than spring. I just don't care what the heck spring thinks of my home. But my friends -- I like to make them feel comfortable. I also don't like to be dubbed "the total slob who lives in a den of filth." Don't get me wrong. I do clean for my own joy and benefit -- and to keep away icky things like vermin and ants. But, hands down, my best cleaning spells are in the wake of hosting.

So,the Book Club, comprised of various friends, is coming to my house this evening. Thus, yesterday was a cleaning extravaganza. Boy was THAT an eye opener. Truly. I wondered if my blinds had been dusted EVER. It took some time, but they made an amazing transformation from dark brown to actual white (who knew?) last night.

The most hilarious moment in the evening came when I gave the living room a thorough visual inspection to assess where I should start. I was alarmed to find the nativity set was still up. Oh, and look! A festive poinsetta atop one of the speakers on the other side of the room. And the minorah in the window. So, being the wise and savvy task manager that I am, I decided a good place to start would be to put away the Christmas decorations. Naturally.

It's the end of MAY! Wow! I could blame my distraction on my busy schedule. I have one of those. But I won't, because we all know --- I can be THAT oblivious. I had an old roommate who used to get bugged that I would forget to shut cupboard doors in the kitchen after I opened them (among other things that I do which bugged her -- and may still bug her and other people, I'm sure). I warned my new roommate, before she moved in, of this quirk and also added that this would be one of many. I believe in open disclosure.

Somehow I didn't get the female gene that mandates I think lots of things are "icky", scream at spiders and must meticulously clean my bathroom on a weekly basis. This is partially because I just don't notice half the stuff(note the Christmas decor experience listed above).

And I'm just not a squeamish, "that's gross" kind of girl. I find dramatic reactions tiring and silly. Not because all people who squeal at a spider are silly. No, indeed. But because I am silly when I do it because I have no natural inclination to do so. It'd be pure theatrics. Honest. I've tried it. I just felt silly. Instinctively, when I encounter a crawling thing, I just debate on whether to kill it or let it live as long as it doesn't crawl on ME. After all, what did the spider ever do to me? But if it DOES crawl on me,-- well that is an offense, justifiably punishable by death to the spider. So, is it worth the risk to let one of God's creatures live? Dilemmas.....

Another element is that I didn't observe peculiar activities like that thing called "dusting" unless I was at a friend's house -- my mother just wasn't a neat freak. At all. She still isn't. I can recall one occasion, just before my parents were leaving for their mission this past fall, in fact. We were having company over and I was "guest cleaning" the house completely, as my mother had broken her ankles and wasn't really able to help. I asked her about a couple of things she might like me to do to make the house look really nice. Her response was, "No, that's alright. It's ok if the house looks like we live here."

I love that about my mom. We didn't grow up in a meticulously clean home, but it was relatively orderly, very open to people (who seemed to like to be there) and, reflectively, I appreciate that I got to spend time with my mother rather than watch her clean a lot.

I am also grateful she made us clean on occasion, taught us HOW to clean (though I have had to learn a couple things since having left the nest.... like dusting), and that I can make a bathroom sparkle when given the right motivation. But I just don't care to do it all the time. Unless of course, you're coming over. In which case, maybe you could give me a day's notice? I might suddenly feel inspired to do a few things...

Customer Service At It's Best

Work is sometimes a joy. It is also sometimes frustrating. One of my most recent joys and irks has been the organization's Annual Report. Lately, I have been DYING to have the annual report finished, printed and thereafter BURNED so I never have to see it again (save one copy to keep for my portfolio, of course). It has been a project that was a pleasure to work on at the beginning, full of creative outlets and fun. It has felt more like a disease that will not leave me for the last month and a half. I sent it to the printers to have it be out of my hair, FREE AT LAST, over 2 weeks ago. You think that would cure me, right? Not so.

Problem #1. The program I created it in does not communicate well with PDF files, so any color fields I had created on the document would not "bleed off the page" when I sent it in pdf format to the printers. So, The printers tell me they want to cut an 8th of an inch off each side of the page so the colors are flush with the paper edge.

Trim the document?!?! Are you serious? You are giving me this as legitimate fix for the problem? Really? Um... No.

So I dig, search, ask, re-maneuver and fix the problem. Funny how a girl with NO PRINTING EXPERIENCE is the one telling the printers how to get the bleeds to work. I mean really. Let's be honest. We all know I'm not the brightest tool in the shed. The easiest fix would have been to just switch printers. And I would have, but they already ordered our paper. Note to self: when you meet the person who started working with them last year, give them the stink eye. A really big, obvious, long-lasting stink eye.

Next -- They tell me, "Sharon, every logo on the document has a funky grey background." Really? Odd. When they used the logo in last year's version, it didn't do that. Ok, I'll switch them all out. I do. One of them is still doing it. What!?!? How is that possible? I do some more changes to try to fix it. They send it to template to print. Lo and behold -- STILL SHOWING UP IN GREY!

"This is going to be an expensive mistake," they tell me, because they have already run the templates.

What lovely news. Working with you brings smiles to my face. "Well," I tell them, "I have no more versions of the logo to play with and I have no more fixes up my sleeve. I don't know what to tell you."

"We can fix it for you in another program."

I'm sorry. What? You can fix it? YOU CAN FIX IT?!?!?!? Thanks. Would ya? That'd be just peachy. You're a gem. I won't mention that you could have offered that up about TWENTY LOGOS AND A WASTED TEMPLATE AGO!"

Somewhere in their training manual, they must have the phrase: "When encountering a printing problem, first bring problem to customer and offer ridiculous solutions and make them solve it. Do NOT OFFER PROFESSIONAL, WORKABLE SOLUTIONS if you don't have to."

Where do they find these people? I should hang out with them. They would make me look very intelligent.

Eight Things

It's not that surprising that I love to do these little self-reflective lists. In actuality, I am addicted to list-making. I don't often do to-do lists (at least not lately). But I write 6 month goals for life, yearly goals, and a 5 year plan. And I do that whenever I feel like it, which is sometimes more frequent than every 6 months, year or 5 years. :) I just like to look out over the future at all that could happen and where I think I'm headed at the moment.

And I like to go back over them and read and see how my course in life has changed and what I've done and what I haven't. For me, they're just an list of ideas, a general direction.. a jumping off point. I could care less if I stick to them. But I think it's helpful to know where you're trying to go. It's helpful to finitely articulate what you want in life. And in that, to get to those goals, I wholeheartedly believe you also need to understand where you are and where you've been. So, I like all these kinds of lists.

Not to mention, should my progeny ever wonder what was my state of mind during this time, I think these are very insightful. And I believe my progeny will want to know my state of mind because I'm just so darn interesting. Crazy people are always fascinating. Didn't you know?

8 things I am passionate about:
1. dancing
2. music
3. working
4. running
5. people I love
6. being dependable
7. understanding why I do things
8. learning more

8 past books I have read (umm, and enjoyed):
1. Life of Pi
2. Three Cups of Tee
3. The Book Thief
4. Tale of Two Cities
5. Catcher in the Rye
6. The Harry Potter Books
7. Ender's Game
8. The Little Prince

8 things I often say:
1. That's fabulous!
2. I don't know
3. No worries
4. I'm so glad
5. "Aunt," which is pronounced very differently than "laugh"
6. Rad
7. I think not
8. Shall we?


8 things I look for in a friend:
1. some grasp of reality
2. honesty
3. consistency
4. positive reinforcement (aka compliments. I really like those)
5. an adventurous spirit
6. intelligence -- it impresses and fascinates me all at the same time.
7. somebody who likes me -- this narrows down my options considerably
8. a sense of humor.

8 things I want to do before I die:
1. be rich
2. build my dream house
3. travel more
4. help people. A lot of them.
5. adopt a child
6. work less (for money, that is)
7. have a dog
8. conquer the difficult level of spider solitaire. That game!

8 things I have learned this past year:
1. I am much more imperfect than I thought I was last year.
2. Ebay. Ah yeah.
3. A mortgage makes you feel a lot older
4. I am not built to be an ultra-athlete (I relearn this just about every year)
5. Good Housekeeping Cook Book has the best chocolate chip cookie recipe I've found
6. Life is full of surprises and unexpected opportunities
7. I might not be hopeless
8. The reasons I do the things I do and am the way I am are more my own than I ever thought. A pleasant discovery.

8 people I want to do the 8 things:
1. Chamaine
2. Beth
3. Mikol
4. Andrea
5. Eclaires
6. Brian
7. Sassy the Master
8. Anne
9. Phew. I'm done. Thank goodness. I wasn't sure I had that many blogging friends.