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LJI S11 Wk16 - The Streisand Effect
Over 30 years have passed, but I still remember when I finally told my parents "I'm gay."
My first serious crush on a girl was when I was 16. Her name was Elisabeth, and she was a wild, free, hippie-dippie soul with a kinda-scary butch girlfriend and absolutely zero interest in me. But as soon as I met her, there was no unringing that bell.
Other ( Read more... ) -
LJI S11 Wk15 - Busman's Holiday
MY SPREADSHEETS
(To the tune of "Vacation" by the Go-Gos)
Can't seem to keep my eyes off of you
you're my first thought for something to do
at home or away
can't skip one day
my color coded excel budget spreadsheet
When I look at you, boredom is done
cause paying bills is really fun
you may think I'm wrong
that my sanity's gone
But you don't get to choose ( Read more... ) -
LJI S11 Wk14 - Barn Raising
Nothing teaches a kid about teamwork and community the way theater does. People think that's what youth sports is about, but there's really no comparison.
Sports are great, don't get me wrong - but not everyone gets to play. Would anyone really miss that third-stringer sitting on the bench game after game, if he didn't show up one day? Even some ( Read more... ) -
LJI S11 Wk12 - Failure
I didn't mean to adopt Spot and Lucy. My girlfriend asked me to watch them for a few days while she talked her landlord into letting her have pets in her apartment, and...well...it was a ruse. She knew I'd fall in love with them.
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LJI S11 Wk11 pt.2 - If the Creek Don't Rise
Do you believe in fate? I never really have, and my family is notably non-religious, but there's one exception we all agree on: my old car, a slightly battered silver Mazda Protege, was doomed.
Shortly after we married, my husband and I traded in both our cars for one new one we would share, a Saturn station wagon that was perfect for our then- ( Read more... ) -
LJI S11 Wk11 - Wild Goose Chase
I've never been especially afraid of needles (except at the dentist! Those are a great big effing NOPE!) but if you'd told me a couple of years ago I'd be running all over town *chasing down* someone to give me unnecessary shots, I'd have said you were bananas.
It started just after Dragoncon in 2018, when one of the artists posted to a large con- ( Read more... ) -
LJ Idol S11 Wk9 - Milkshake Duck
After the first few, I stopped telling my family when I had a new job. I was just opening the door to ridicule, and I was getting enough of that from myself.
I had a simple plan for my post-grad life: get a job in my field, be outstanding, receive promotions, live happily ever after. It didn't work out quite that way.
I got the job in my field, but ( Read more... ) -
LJI S11 Week 8 - My True North
"It's always been done this way."
I'd been hired as a unit manager at Murdoch Center, a home for children with severe developmental delays. I had a BA in psych and seven years of experience working in group homes, but every suggestion I made, either to my staff or to my supervisors, was met with a withering look and the same phrase:
"It's always ( Read more... ) -
LJI S11 Wk07 - Feckless
I work with smart people. Very smart people. As I remind myself often, most of them have PhDs. Learning and research are literally their life's work. And yet...conversations like this happen almost daily.
Dear Jess,
Attached please find the receipts from my recent trip to Barcelona. Thanks!
Tina(I open the attachments and indeed - she has sent ( Read more... ) -
LJI S11 Wk06: Solvitur Ambulando
"What if I freak out??"
It was the spring of 1981, I was a junior in college, and it had just hit me that in roughly 15 months I'd be leaving the safety of the tiny university town I'd made my home and moving to... I had no idea where. Wherever I got a job.And I'd be completely alone for the first time.
Sure, I'd arrived my freshman year without ( Read more... )