I knew I kept this blog alive for a reason.

(By the way, I'm usually over here now.)



This is for a class project. Do you love it? (Yes.)

Sad in the heart.

In 7th grade, everyone (that mattered to me at that point in my life, so we're talking like maybe 8-10 snotty middle school girls-- really no prizes in this bunch) was invited to two girls' joint birthday party.  I wasn't.  It sucked, and it hurt.


It doesn't feel any different or better at age 25.

Woo boy.

You know what sucks?  Realizing you're not as good at something in real life as you think you are in your head.

Okay, so I'm "starring" (loosely, I'm using that very loosely here) in a work video.  Goal:  To inspire dozens-- nay, THOUSANDS-- of people to create web vidz about why action on climate change is important.  Because it is, right?  Yes.  So here's the thing:  apparently I'm REALLY terrible at speaking on camera.  I practiced my script for hours, and I sounded great (I probably didn't) in my living room and in the shower and in my brain, but once that camera was on, MAN.  What the eff happened?  (And then I cursed profusely in front of/probably offended the really nice girl working the camera...nice.  I am a real a-hole, and I feel pretty bad about that.)

In my mind, I'm still the 10-year-old that can be whatever she wants to be when she grows up, like an actress or a novelist.  Well, I can't make it through a two-minute shoot without wanting to throw up, and I can't maintain a regular blog, so I guess there's no Oscar/book deal in my future.

Unless some big casting director was impressed with my skillz in this Style Network clip.  Minus the dirty hair and knock-off Ray Bans, I rocked this, no?

Thoughts of the day?

So last night, this guy and I watched The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo-- the real Swedish one, not the Hollywood version that's in the works... although I guess that's kind of obvious, given the new one hasn't even been filmed yet.

Observation:  Hollywood actors and actresses must be incredibly gross and fake.  One of the first things I noticed about the movie was the cragginess and wrinkliness and realness of the Swedish actors, and how, although they were decently attractive, none looked that significantly better than most of the people I see oot and aboot around here.  I'm trying to find photos of similarly aged American actresses to compare with the gals in the film, but it's more challenging than I thought it'd be, and I'm lazy.  Watch the movie; you'll see... and be like, "SURE, Courteney Cox hasn't had any work done."

Another observation:  Movies not made by Hollywood studios can still look like real movies?  Shocker.  Clearly, I need to broaden my cultural horizons. 

Also, that movie was all sorts of fucked up.  I know it's been awhile (two years? about) since I read the book, but I don't remember it being that graphically rape-y.  Maybe my imagination just isn't that vivid.  (Thank God for that, by the way.)

BLOG.

I wrote this for work, and for reasons I completely understand, it couldn't be posted on our official blog. Since this here blog is anything but official and I can say whatever I want, I'm going to slap it up in case someone out there really cares what I think about Donald Trump. Also, I enjoyed writing this, and I hate to think of it existing only in Microsoft Word.

I suppose I should say that I'm speaking on behalf of myself-- not my employer. So, these words are mine, represent my thoughts and no one else's, etc. Yup. Enjoy.

Working title: Donald Trump is pretty dumb, knows nothing about science.

Famed climate scientist/reality TV show host Donald Trump thinks that former VP Al Gore should turn in his Nobel Prize, since sometimes in winter, it snows.

Via The New York Post:

“With snow setting record levels up and down the coast, the Nobel committee should take the Nobel Prize back from Al Gore.”

According to Trump, who is a meteorologist by trade, we’re in the midst of “the coldest winter ever recorded.” Which is funny, because according to science, while it’s certainly very cold in some parts of the United States, other regions around the world are facing record heat waves. In fact, we’re in the midst of the warmest winter on satellite record.

It might sound crazy, but rising temperatures can actually lead to greater snowfall. Hotter air can hold more moisture, so when a storm gathers, it can unleash massive amounts of precipitation, which recently has happened to be snow. (Colder air is drier and is less likely to result in heavy snowfall.)

Trump, who intended to join the US delegation at December’s UN climate talks, but totally missed his flight to Copenhagen, continued:

“Gore wants us to clean up our factories and plants in order to protect us from global warming, when China and other countries couldn't care less. It would make us totally noncompetitive in the manufacturing world, and China, Japan and India are laughing at America's stupidity.”

China, Japan and India must care about global warming at least a little bit, because all three nations indicated that they’ll reduce their carbon emissions by at least 20% by 2020—more than America’s proposed cut of 17%-- in the Copenhagen Accord.

Currently, China is the world’s largest manufacturer of wind turbines and solar panels. The New York Times’ Bob Hebert says China’s “sprinting past everybody else in the world, including the United States, in the race to develop clean energy… They’re blowing us away—at least for the moment—in the race to the future.” Wow, what a blow to America’s competitiveness in the manufacturing world!

The Post reports that after Trump’s speech, the crowd of 500, all members of Trump National Golf Club, stood up and cheered. Scientists everywhere shook their heads in disgust. Trump’s awesome head of hair declined to comment.

#snowpocalypse2 #snOMG #dcsnow

Another snow day, hooray! I love when snow brings around the end of days.

(View from my bedroom on Friday night. Snowy as shit, yo!)

This guy and I went "sledding" down the steep hill outside our apartment on a ghetto piece of broken plastic we found in the street. We fuckin' flew! and it was so awesome and exhilarating. I haven't been sledding in years, and I guess this might not technically count, but it was probably the most (and purest) fun I've had in a long time.

Now we're just hoping our 70-year-old flat roof doesn't collapse and kill us and our neighbors, because that would seriously put a damper on the joy of being snowed in.

So I just finished a paper for my current grad school class, which I'm pretty psyched about (being done the paper more so than the actual class). I gave a presentation last week, which I'm fairly confident I bombed. Who volunteers to give a presentation the first week of class? Come on. That was totally my fault.

But I really don't know how I became such a terrible public speaker/presenter. When I was young and naive and a youth group participant, I used to speak to my entire church congregation without wanting to throw up/poop my pants, and I actually did okay. I guess I had God on my side at that time, which probably helped some.

The truth probably is that when I'm talking about stuff I know well and am personally interested/invested in and doesn't involve referring to notes for lots of data/stats, I'm not that bad at presenting. That's not exactly a revelation for anyone. Sigh.

At least I'll get a better grade than the lady who didn't even show up.

On stuff and things I like to do.

You know what I’m really bad at? Maintaining a personal blog. Specifically this one. I’m back at school next week, and I’ve updated once. Once! (I’m lying; it’s twice now.) I am the worst. Sometimes I wonder if I really actually like to write, because if I did, wouldn’t I be doing it a lot more than I am?

Similarly, this year, I’m on a mission to discover what it is I truly like, be it writing or something entirely different that I haven’t even thought about yet. I enjoy many things in life, some of which are things that involve me doing something (like walking, reading, petting dogs, baking cookies, eating cookies, eating cookie dough, etc.). I might even be good at some of these (best dog-petter EVER). But how do I translate these random, not-lucrative time-wasters into a ticket to lifelong financial security/job satisfaction?

I’m torn between two schools of career-thought, neither of which I know for sure are actual schools of thought:

1) Work 9-5 at a job that you don’t really love, but is tolerable, and pays the bills. Pursue liked things after 5 pm, before 9 am and on weekends.
2) Work 9-5 or more at a job that is so awesome and encompasses stuff you like so much that you don’t even care that it’s work.

I guess, ideally, the right career path would be a combination of both—something I enjoy doing every day, but gives me enough free time to pet dogs and eat shitty food.

So what’s the action plan here? I need to finish my library books (have I really had Scar Tissue in my possession for more than a month? Really?), return them and then pick up some lame career-y type books, like What Color is Your Parachute? and The Pathfinder (don’t laugh! Okay, I’m laughing at myself), and see what kind of enlightenment they offer. Also, I’m continuing with the grad school thing, and waiting to see what kind of doors that might open. Other thoughts? Am I being too passive? I just don’t know how to tackle this aggressively, since I don’t really know what I’m going for.

I feel like I used the word “thing” or some variation of “thing” a lot in this post. Right?