NYC and the MESA Conference

Part of the recent silence on this blog has been due to me being out of town. On November 19th, I flew to New York to see my friend Sophia and attend the gala for WITNESS. So for a brief day and a half I tried not to get lost in New York, sorta learned the subway system, and tried not to get taken by the taxi drivers. I've heard many people say that you either love or hate New York. I don't hate it, but I really have no desire to go back or to ever live there.

The WITNESS gala was the real reason that I went to New York. One of the Global Voices Board Members, Joi Ito, is also on the WITNESS board and had purchased a board table for us to attend. Seeing that this must have set him back probably around 10 grand, making my meager monetary effort to go to this event was the least that I could do. It was fascinating to see from an events coordinator standpoint. At one point during the evening I had actually starting tallying the cost of what I was seeing between the event personel, the catering, the open bar, entertainment etc. Based on what was there and Utah prices I would guess that it would have been at least $50,000 to put the event on, but if it was closer to $100,000 I wouldn't have been surprised. However I figured that with the table costs and the auctions.....they probably took in close to $600,000. If I had to I could probably organize an event like this....I've done plenty of things on a smaller scale....but the purchasing of tables is an interesting new element to consider.

And before you ask, no I didn't take pictures but I can direct you to my Facebook page (if you are already my friend) and the Flickr sites of those that are MUCH better photographers than I: Joi Ito and the amazing Georgia from GV.

From my late night at the gala, to my short powernap at Sophia's, I was off on the 7am train Friday morning to Washington DC to attend the MESA conference. Of course, in our office there has been so much drama with just getting the staff to this conference it was strange to finally be there. Overall, I'm glad that I went...I needed to go and make contacts there...especially with the other Outreach people. And it was good to make an appearance and reconnect with some people I hadn't seen for several years like my old Turkish professor Roberta and with my Kurdish activist pal Kani.

Friday afternoon I presented to the Middle East Outreach Council (MEOC) about using podcasting for Outreach work, which went over very very well. I am definitely considered the "new school" generation with this group and I ended up fielding alot of tech questions from everyone there....including ways of improving the current MEOC website. They had a great book vendor sale there and I bought 6 books....which is not too bad considering that I havent bought any books for myself for 3-4 months at least.

I also ran into several people that knew Mr.3....and they all asked about him. Each person I told the whole story too.....so sorry dude.... if you hadn't totally ruined your rep as it was already, I started the MESA rumor mill on you. Speaking of Mr.3 related items on this trip, I met and had lunch with Kathy. It was great to finally meet her in person, and I am quite indebted to her for helping me learn the truth about Mr.3. She is wonderful, smart and witty... for all of Mr.3's faults he did manage to choose some pretty strong women to victimize. This will be his downfall in the end. In any case, Kathy is just tops with me!

Back to DC stuff.....I actually did some tourist stuff there for once. For a very very cold two and a half hours I took a bus tour of the city....it was a doubledecker bus and I HAD to be on the top. I do have pictures of that excursion which I will upload a bit later. Needless to say, I had a blast but I was frozen through.

So that has been some of what has been going on.....other items that I have to report on include the current dating situation and how now...I'm in a relationship. More to come!

New Personal Goal: Be More Decisive

I've decided that I need to be more decisive in life... I'm decisive if it refers to just me: life decisions that sort of thing. But when it comes to a decision that affects other people I'm useless. As an example, today Libby asked me where I wanted to go for coffee....there were two choices, and while I knew what one I wanted, I really couldn't say what I wanted to do. The other night, me and M were going out (I'll talk about this more later) and he asked me if I was hungry. I wasn't really hungry and I definitely didn't want him to go out of his way for me. I was wishy-washy and just got a pop. Later that evening, he asked me again. At this time I was....but....I couldn't tell him that. I just didn't want to impose my choices on anyone else.

And this frustrates the people that I know and love.

Now if I could figure out why I am that way, I would change it. I mean really, telling someone that I'm hungry and that something sounds good to me shouldn't be that difficult to say, right?

So right now, I am making a new personal goal for myself--- to be more decisive, to not be timid in saying what I want when someone asks me. ...working on asking for what I want at any time can come a bit later.... this is a baby step situation. I will keep you posted. Wish me luck!

Planning to Cook Today

Not that I can't cook and not that I am not an excellent cook...I just don't take the time to cook. Today I will be making (for the first time) a red lentil and mint soup. I'm quite excited about it....and because I can use my latest culinary skills....that of peeling and seeding a tomato...which I learned how to do on the internet. Yet another reason that the internet rocks my socks.

I wish that I had more time to cook....of course, I wish that I had more time in general. More, more, more..... My therapist says that I have a hard time with that....more. I always want more but because I have been denied it so often, I just sort of suck it up and accept that I will not get more. I need to ask for more.....in many things I need to ask for more. I realized that on my date last night....I held back so much, I could have done more, asked for more time with him, more of a good night kiss, just more......must work on rectifying that bit of an issue for next time.

Strange, Odd & Not At All Startling Revelations

1. After many many months of fretting over stress-related hair loss, I've realized that it has stopped. Is the stop of my hair falling out related to my divorce being final?....maybe.
2. My new little toy has arrived in the mail (no, nothing like that.... you pervert...) my new netbook arrived. We all remember the recent departure of laptop... well I wasn't able to raise up enough cash to buy a brand new laptop but I WAS able to immediately afford a netbook. Its a cross between a smart phone and laptop in its capabilities. It is also mini and cute and fits in my purse and I want to give it some cutsy muppet name.....just cause.
3. This dating thing isn't so bad. I know that I haven't mentioned the dates that I have been on much...and I probably should because it is kinda funny. In any case, I have been on 4 dates in the past 3 weeks with 3 different people and I am arranging a date with another one for this Saturday. So here is a quick run-down of the recent dating candidates:
Porn Rob: haven't met in person but have been corresponding for 3 weeks on chat. I think that he is just the one that you exchange the dirty talk and photos with but never meet.
Mailman Rob: completely and totally sweet, quite the gentleman, but no spark (at least on my part) on our date. We're at "friends" status and he's been added to the new social circle.
Poopypants Paul: local actor who I had seen and lusted a bit after before meeting him on match. Unfortuately, he doesn't have his shit together and while I was willing he turned into a total jerk.
Chemical Chris: lovable guy, a gentleman and a goofball....nice kisser. might have a second date with him, but his life is in flux at the moment...so that is a wait and see situation.
Mechanic Mark: currently setting up a Saturday night date with him....
4. Incidently.....Jimmy has a date tomorrow in addition to the fact that he ate all my bread rolls....
dork

Legally Single

Apparently I was under the impression that the court system would send you notice when something is finalized. But they don't. I called them today to find out the status of the divorce---secretly fearing that something had held it up and that was why I hadn't gotten notice. Nope. Its been signed, on November 4th.

Did you get that?

The divorce is final.

I'm legally single.

And I have been for an entire week.

Fucking A.

Death of a Laptop

If my laptop was a person, it would already be considered as in its 90's and in ailing health. Now it has advanced brain cancer and we are on death watch. It has a virus that has disabled all virus scans, spybot checker, task manager, registry, and system restore! If it is on for more than an hour it does a data dump and turns off. Up until now, I have been able to handle any virus that has come my way in the course of my internet job....but this one, this one is the fatal stroke.

So now what do I do? At the moment I'm using the office laptop...the happily virus-free Apple...which a couple of days ago I was thinking about getting a new PC...and now I am back to definitely getting an Apple. I'll go to the bank tomorrow to see if I can get a line-of-credit to buy a new computer and if that doesn't work -which I am pretty sure that it won't- I'm gonna have to keep using the work laptop until I can afford a new one.

The inconvenience of the loss of a laptop is not what is really bothering me...it is the loss of friend. This laptop has been with me for 5+ years and on 3 different continents...it has been integral in memories for years...and well....it just makes me very very sad.