November 15, 2004

All the things I should have done but I never did….

How many of you remember the movie “She’s Having a Baby”? Kevin Bacon, Alec Baldwin, Elizabeth McGovern – John Hughes movie of the 80’s about a guy who finds himself having to grow up fairly quickly when he realizes he’s a married man with a baby on the way.

Great movie – not my favourite John Hughes movie – that remains “Some Kind of Wonderful” but just a good movie regardless. Never mind that I do love me a good Kevin Bacon movie because well, I have a Kevin Bacon number of 1.

I am sitting on a plane on my way to Seattle as I write this (love having a laptop on a long flight) and I’m listening to Peppermint Patty – the i.P.O.D (iPod of Doom) and she decided I needed to hear “This Woman’s Work” by Kate Bush – a song that is featured heavily in “She’s Having a Baby.” Peppermint Patty seems to have a knack at finding exactly the songs I need to hear. And I know it’s not just me. On the Barenaked Ladies blog, Steve Page (sigh!!!) mentioned the same thing – that his iPod always seems to know exactly what he needs to hear.

So, I’m listening to that song which I have always loved – probably my favourite Kate Bush song and thought about what a great arrangement of it I could put together with just a guitar. Of course, I need to learn to play guitar, which I have been saying I am going to do for YEARS, and never seem to do. I think that will be my New Year’s resolution, learn to play the guitar and start to sing. I’m not a bad singer, I’m not fabulous but I’m not bad and the more I do it, the better I get. I used to be very good and then I had Mono and Strep throat the summer between my sophomore and junior years of college and it changed my voice forever. I don’t think I’ll ever be one of those guitarists that people say “wow, she’s just amazing.” I won’t be a Richard Thompson or a Patty Larkin but I could be ok and I could sing and I could put together a CD, which has been a dream of mine for as long as I can remember. I would love to pony up the nerve and play open mike nights. I would love to pony up the nerve and sing and not worry what anyone thinks…if I could make some music that would impact someone the way that music impacts me? Wow, that would be about the coolest thing I can think of.

November 12, 2004

All before 10

Man -- it's quite a day already and it's not even 10 yet -- hell, it's not even 9:30.

I woke up this morning -- it was cold, it was rainy, it was a day when I didn't want to get out of bed. The day could have been better had I been able to come to work in my pj's but sadly, I can't.

So, drug myself out of bed, put on some respectable looking clothes and got to work. On the way my car decided that it wanted to fishtail all over the road as I turned onto Matthews Road. Then I got on 202 which was, in essence, a parking lot. Got to work, got inside -- discovered donuts on the table near my desk -- damn the person who brought those in. Ran down to the cafe, got a drink, came back upstairs, had another donut hole and sat down to have what I was hoping would be a quiet morning. No. Got a frantic IM from someone that the guy was waiting at our training center to service our overhead projector. UGH! I completely forgot. Got up, ran to car, couldn't understand why car wasn't moving. Got scared that it died. Realized I hadn't started it yet and got to the training center. Now we are 25 minutes into something that should have taken 5 and I really need to get back to the office to do some real stuff. BAH!

November 08, 2004

More Than This...

One of my favourite movie scenes of all times has got to be the scene in "Lost In Translation" when Scarlett Johansson does a less than great karaoke version of Roxy Music's "More Than This." It's just full of all of this passion and longing -- the way she and Bill Murray look at each other is just amazing. (By the way, I think Bill Murray was ROBBED for the Oscar last year, but that's a story for another day.)

"More than this -- there is nothing
More than this -- tell me one thing
More than this -- there is nothing"

Always a lyric that has spoken to me...

It is an interesting thing to ponder these days though.

For those of you who are finding me randomly -- though I'm not entirely sure how you could, yet...you should know that I am very into politics and I am very liberal. To quote Melissa Etheridge from an episode of "Politically Incorrect" -- "I am so liberal I bleed only from the left side."

Anyway -- I digress -- for folks like me (and I know there are a lot of us -- at least 55 million) this was a very sad week indeed. For reasons that I am still trying to unpack, this country saw fit to re-elect a man who I am pretty sure history will consider to be one of the worst presidents that this country has ever seen. I could go on and on and on about the things with which I disagree with this current administration, but I think that will be for another time as well.

But we come back to the title -- More Than This....I have been struggling for a while now (not just this week though this week has certainly brought a fuzzy picture into clearer focus) with what my role in this world should be. For those who know me well, you know this is something that I struggle with all of the time...am I good person? Am I a good friend? Am I a good daughter? Am I a good citizen? The events of this week have lead me to a place where I feel I need to begin to be more active. There was a time when I was very active in politics and issues and then I stopped. I am sure there are a lot of really "good" reasons for that but really -- it just boils down to laziness so I am vowing to not be so lazy -- at least about this. That's not to say that I didn't participate in this election at all...I did some volunteer work making phone calls for a very cool group of folks at Clean Water Action so while I am very disappointed in the results of November 2, I do feel good about some of the work that I did. But I gotta do more...again, More Than This...

So for those of you who wish to be involved too -- check this out -- I have started a Yahoo Group to help us organize and I'm going to be posting a lot of the stuff that we'll be doing here as well. Keep coming back...

Decisions are made by those who show up....

Ya gotta start somewhere!

Well, it's been a while since I've been the blogging type of girl but here I am.

There's a lot to say and I'm going to say it all, I promise but as the topic says, we have to begin somewhere so this is where we begin.

Keep looking here for thoughts on the world, the universe, politics, music, reading and my inner moppet...