What Day is Today?

The human spirit is an amazing thing.

It's 9:20 GMT which means it's 4:20 EST which means I've been awake going on 32 hours. I lie - I took an hourlong nap. Still...

Somehow I managed to remain remotely human, somewhat intelligent, and mostly cheery during my inter-human-interactions today. No idea how.

I did manage to smack my hand into a railing while climbing stairs (my balance isn't even that good when I'm rested, you should see me now. Vrksasana? Not on your life.) But otherwise I don't have too many injuries to show for the ordeal.

Still, as I sit in my room, not really listening to SkyNews, I realize that I'm just not ready to go to sleep. My body thinks it's dinner time. (Note - I just ate a ginormous plate of pasta - YUM! Whole thing! YUM!) So I'm contemplating breaking down and indulging in a remnant of some mind-altering substances prescribed to help me sleep during my oral surgery nightmares. I'm not proud that I'm thinking of it, but if I don't get some sleep I might actually lose my mind. Besides, if I'm moderately screwed up tomorrow (read chemical hangover) I can blame EXTREME JETLAG! Sorry, I was channeling my inner hardcore rocker...

Today begins one of the more stressful weeks of my life. Wish me luck.

When Good Hosts Get Real

I am a big fan of the Daily Show w/ Jon Stewart. Heck, I'm a big fan of Jon Stewart in general. I'm no obsessive, but the interviews I've seen or read with him lead to me to think of him as an intelligent, poignant and pointed, critical mind.

On tonight's show, I actually think he lost his cool. And I applaud him. He did a bit on G. W.'s use of "In Other Words." It was fairly Bushism standard. But Jon ended with this rant: "When you say "in other words" it's because you think we don't understand. We understand. We just don't "BLEEPING" get it!"

I truly and honestly try not to out and out hate people. It's bad karma, among a dozen other things. But as I read more and more about people dying needlessly in this war he lied us into and all of the domestic Cluster Effs that are happening, I'm having more and more trouble staying on my happy side of the fence.

I just don't bleeping get it.

Back to the Grind

I won't bore anyone with the trials and tribulations of returning back to work after so long in the beautiful Maine woods. Almost everyone knows what it's like to return to an overflowing inbox and a mile-long task list.

Of course, not everyone works for Napolean.

Suffice to say, his newest kick is to make sure that every single thing I write for this company doesn't use a "z" (read "zed") so as to not offend our European and Australia/New Zealand colleagues. Optimize? Forget it. Analyze? No way. Standardize? Not on your life.

I tend to think that there comes a time when the awkwardness of phrasing that must be employed to avoid the use of the zed outweighs the need for universality of spelling. But, hey, I'm no CMO.

At least yesterday, I got a little bright spot in my life. Witness this view from the parking lot.

Loser's Club Vacations in Maine, Pt. 2

If you're ridiculously afraid of a) heights and b) wind (don't ask) what makes more sense than to go mountain climbing on a blustery day?

Mr. Zips and I got up early as usual on Day 1 of vacation. Off we scoot to Jordan Lake in Acadia National Park for a "moderate" hike around the lake. 3.5 miles - a couple of hours - no big deal, eh?

And to start, it was a perfect hike. Cool and foggy, which meant Mr. Zips was in photog heaven. (In addition to cat paws, animal tongues, and mushrooms, Mr. Zips is a sucker for pictures of mist.)

Then we decided to take the "South Bubble Mountain Summit Trail."

Here's what South Bubble Mountain looks like in the early morning mist.

The hike up was challenging but none too scary. A glacier deposited thousands of rocks which provided a natural staircase for the mile-long vertical climb. And we were rewarded with quite the view.


What they don't tell you in the guidebooks is that the other side of the South Bubble Mountain Summit Trail is down a sheer cliff face. Straight down. Overlooking 600 feet of FALLING. See the rocky mountaintop hiding behind the trees in the rightside of the picture below? Yea, that's where we almost died.




I started panicking even before we began our descent. A short way down and we passed a rugged looking family backtracking because the mom had gotten too scared to make it any further. "Coming up was bad enough," they told us, "I'd hate to have to go down this one."

Right.

So, we in fact turned around and shamefacedly made our way down the same way we came up the mountain. It wasn't as adventurous, but then again, we're not dead now.

All in all, Mr. Zips took 384 photos of our amazing time in Maine. You can see more of them by going to his amazing Flickr site.

Does my heart good to look through them as I prepare for another 10 plus hour day in the office. Maybe we should have stayed on that trail....

Loser's Club Vacations in Maine, Pt. 1

Well, I am back from vacation. And although I was nearly in tears by 8:15 a.m. after downloading all the emails I received while I was away (gone for 2 days and I have 137 emails? Surely I am NOT that important...) I think the trip was well worth it.

Except for the fairly losers' clubish stuff that happened....

I have to hold off on telling the first tale as it will be greatly enhanced by the photographs Mr. Zips took. Suffice to say it involves rocks, heights, and a panic attack.

Yesterday, we got up n' at em, had a lovely breakfast at an outdoor cafe, and then hunkered down in the car for the 5+ hour drive. The thing with Maine is that you just can't get there from here. I kept myself occupied by reading the hilarious roadside signs including the "Hair Force One Cutting Studio" and the store named simply, "Stuff." I also enjoyed the numerous flea markets selling moose antlers and boasting "EXTREME FAMILY FUN!"

Finally, we made it back to civilization - an hour north of Boston on I-95 S in New Hampshire. Exiting the toll booth, Mr. Zips very calmly said, "And there's a flat tire." Followed immediately by the unmistakable thudding, shuddering, and all over shaking that accompanies a blowout. Somehow, we safely made it across four lanes of traffic.

Luckily, Mr. Zips had been given a AAA membership almost exactly 1 year ago - it expires Aug. 31. But that's still plenty of time for a tow. And while we got a little bit of attitude from the kid from Dave's Towing for not having a spare, we were rescued, fixed up and back on the road in record time.

Just in time for rush hour traffic.

To give him his props, Mr. Zips never once lost it. He had to shell out nearly $300 for new tires and alignment and never once whined or anything. In fact, he was comforting me as I sighed and moaned about how exhausted I was and how much I missed my kittens.

So, today, to reward him for being an all around generally fabulous human being, I bought him a membership - effective Aug. 31 - to the Better World Club. It's kinda like AAA but it has an environmental conscience and doesn't lobby for more cars, more roads, bigger badder benefits for GM, Ford, et. al. Here's hoping he never needs to use it.

Here's Mr. Zips making the best of the situation as we lurk amid the tires at the car store...