Back from the wild world of work

Have I told you yet how much I love my job? I could get horribly repetitive and tell you this six more times, but I'm not sure that would fully describe how much I love my job.

I've been with the American Benefits Council for nearly nine years. It's a small trade association that lobbies the federal government on employee benefits policy issues on behalf of large companies and service providers. We write talking points, testify on the Hill, make numerous Congressional and regulatory agency visits and attempt to explain this all to the media. Love of the Internal Revenue Code and all things ERISA is required.

But the best part of my job is the people. This is a small office (just 11 of us at present and two vacancies) so if you don't get along well, you're in trouble. In our case, it's one very fortunate extended family. Four of us have worked here for more than 15 years. There are another four (including me) who are circling the 10-year mark (or just past it). The other three "newbies" each have a year or more under their belts.

Why do we stay? Is it pension reform glory or the thrill of promoting HSAs?

Nope. It's the food.

Yesterday was Jason's (my counterpart in the public relations departments) birthday. This means several rituals must occur: birthday card selected by the office manager (who has dead-on taste in silly cards) was signed by all; "surprise" meeting is called for the time when everyone can be there; and of course -- food. Jason's not a cake guy so we went for gelato since he is off to Italy for the next 10 days. (Must practice eating Italian cuisine!)

Five flavors of the stuff later, our only regret is that our traditional cake server couldn't be used to scoop the wondrous frost. The cake server is a gift from my father -- flat, triangular blade you'd expect attached to an odd handle with buttons. Mash one of four choices and you get a screaming loud song relevant to the occasion (Happy Birthday, For He's a Jolly Good Fellow, Marriage Theme, and Auld Lang Sine). Years after we have run through the songs at each sitting, it still elicits giggles every time the first button gets pushed.

All this dessert did lead to discussion of our upcoming activities: the Holiday lunch and annual Cookie contest. Each December we close the office for half a day to have a holiday lunch at a nice restaurant (with secret Santa gifts, of course) -- this year it's the new Brazilian steak place that opened up the street and is affectionately referred to as "meat on a stick". We keep seeing the cute male waiters walking to work down 12th street in their plume-y pants and big black boots -- now it's time to find out more...

The Cookie contest means one morning near Christmas, the office is closed for a couple of hours and everyone totes in plates of their favorite homemade or store-bought delights. Help from children in the baking/decorating process is encouraged and everyone gets a prize once we've all sampled. Last year the judges were a member of the Board of Directors, who happened to be coming to a meeting later that day, and Helen, who was out on vacation by then. The winner was a new one for us -- the boss' potato ladkes beat all hands down (outdoing another co-worker's fruit cake bars and several batches of chocolate chip cookies) and we're still finding the occasional dribble of sour cream and apple sauce. Hope Jim brings those again this year!


The Cookie contest is also part of our office's policy of "mandatory group fun". Every now and then, when Congress is gone, we close the office for a couple of hours and do something fun together: shopping, going to a museum exhibition, attending a movie together, there's talk of bowling in our future.... Last spring it was a picnic and walk around the Tidal Basin to view the Cherry Blossoms. Here the Council president buys us all ice cream.

Like I said, I love my job!

Sunday dawns -- and the buick is here...

Well, it's too late. Abandon the dust clothes, tuck away the vacuum. The parental units have arrived. Instead of over the river and through the woods, they came up the highway -- with the promised booze, some early Christmas presents (yeah!), and the aforementioned:

Helen will be horrified when she sees this -- but my dad and mom thought it excellent fun.

So far we have managed to eat -- A LOT -- hit the grocery store for more food and play dominoes. Tonight will inaugrate the latest round of bridge -- my mother and Helen will probably again beat the pants off my father and me. It's not so embarrassing now that Helen's my height and 11. She learned to play bridge at 8 -- and could bid "no trump" but needed a box to hold up her cards because her hands were too small.

Saturday morning...nursing a blogover

Swigging instant coffee (it was faster...) and eating the last of the apple pie from the other night straight from the pan in my lap, it is too dang early for any sensible person to be conscious. I am beat.

I swear all we had to drink last night was juice boxes (Juicy Juice Apple for the record) but the giggles -- the noise -- the Moose! (mooseses? meese? I'm so tired that the plural of moose escapes me...) It was all too much. If blogovers haven't previously been recorded on the Internet, I vouch for having the first one.

Last night was also prime display of the strange dichotomy that is my child. I know other kids who do this -- but 11 years later it still catches me off guard with my own. I know her well, but every time my daughter walks into the room I don't know if it's the child or adult-wanna be entering.

Maybe this is a more prominent problem in "onlys" -- Helen would be the third generation only child following her mother and grandmother. Onlys spend their family time primarily interacting with other adults, not siblings. From the start the learned behaviors and conversations seem (at least in the Johnson household) to take on a more wizened tone. I didn't say sage, we can be as loopy as the next guy.

Don't get me wrong -- it was silly fest central here: stuffed animals parading and wild comments like "Ew, why did you put that guy on your web site? He's so old." "He's four years younger that ME, Helen!" "Warren Brown (Food Network chef) is much cuter."

Helen sat with judicial seriousness through the blog set up process. She typed in her own stuff using touch typing (they teach that in elementary school now -- not surprising as you go to computer class every week and you won't keep up if you can't touch type and turn out rockin' PowerPoint presentations by grade 2) and carefully coordinated her color scheme, posed and snapped her plush buds, and selected illustrations. Anna Wintour would have been left in the professional dust.

Then (around 11:00 p.m.) "Helen, we gotta go to bed. It's late."

"Aw, Mom! Just five more minutes!" The 11-year-old was back.

This has been going on since the little scupper could speak. Readying for day care one morning she looked past her selection of Disney princesses summer dresses and matching rumba pants (diaper covers) to give me the head-to-toe, eagle-eye once over: "Are you sure you should wear that to work? Mommy, I think I'd put on something else. That's not appropriate for the office."

The one emergency call from kindergarten had me in a total panic: your daughter split her head open on a metal horse (one of those old-fashioned monsters on a giant steel spring we all loved to bounce back and forth on until some inevitable injury from the sharp corners occurred). Whirling into school like a dervish I confronted the school principal, applying a small band-aid and some ice to Helen's forehead. She had the weirdest look on her face that I've ever seen on an education professional. And then I heard it:

"But really Mrs. Martinez, you have GOT to rethink the playground equipment. That horse is just too dangerous for small children."

And now to end the broadcast day...

Helen took this picture when we were at the beach last summer. We want to go back -- NOW.

It's the weekend and we have to stay up all night!!!

The 11-year-old just arrived. Helen had a great time tonight creating her own blog about her stuffed animals. She had so much fun that I don't think I'll ever get her in to her bed to sleep -- even with duct tape.

"But Mom, it's Friday night -- we haven't done anything yet! It's the weekend! Show me your blog again..."

Mollie has taken to chasing her tail. She loves to lounge in a large brown wing back chair that Jo (the neighbor who gave us Mollie) also had, but passed on to us when she moved to Texas. Mollie thinks its her chair as it's amazingly well color coordinated.

We're about as techno-savvy as two geeks in a basement can be on Friday night -- papers that should have been filed are strewn around the room. Digital camera flashing like a strobe light as each new set of stuffed animals pose for pictures (and pose, and turn, and pose, and turn...) along the "runway" -- our couch. Mollie seems non plussed and has found her cat toys far more intellectually stimulating at this point.

Grandma and Grandpa arrive in less than 48 hours -- what are we thinking?

And now for the obligatory cheesecake moment...

Life hooked to a blackberry is about as glamorous as being permanently attached to an orange extension cord. Looks about as hip (pun intended) too these days. In DC, everyone's now trying to walk and type at the same time. I've even seen two people at a corner lunch table typing messages at each other rather than actually speak out loud face-to-face.



If you visit, beware the DC traffic -- my coworker has managed to figure out how to drive and type at the same time, I'm too scared to ask how that works... This is an odd result of the local law requiring that cell phone calls can only be made while driving if you use a wireless handset. She can't find her replacement earbud, for the replacement earbud -- so she e-mails instead. Bet the City Council never saw that one coming.



One of the few benefits of my electronic tether is Friday morning's movie e-mail from the New York Times. Its reviews I've found to be closer to my tastes than those from the Washington Post, and they have a wider selection of movies from which to salivate. This one message of the week is enough to make me jump from the bed -- thoughts of sitting in a stadium-style theater (a must because I'm short and seem to attract other patrons whose day jobs involve the NBA), big vat of popcorn in my lap, and one of those sodas in a cup that doubles as a hat if you feel the need for a disguise when the credits roll (was the movie THAT bad?).


And guess who was there this morning?


Well, slap me silly and call him cute (even if he is a blond.) The review of Casino Royale was encouraging also and did its darn best to rest all those rumors of movie star who couldn't drive a standard shift car (didn't know they had anything in England but standard shift cars...) and wore a rather silly looking life preserver (better safe than sorry, I think -- is there a future career here in water safety PSAs if the acting thing doesn't pan out?) to a movie shoot.

Sadly for me, the theater fare of the weekend is instead Flushed Away. Can't take the young one to the Casino just yet. But I suppose I'll survive listening to a rat with Hugh Jackman's voice coming out of it. I'll take what I can get!

Art Break!

Long ago and far away when I worked as the public relations department for the Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Virginia, on particularly frustrating days I would spend my lunch time in the galleries. (Lose weight like a starving artist, clear your silly head, what could be better?!) Art breaks return the sanity to one's life. And with dust rag in hand now, I declare we need one.

Tonight as I finally resolved to start addressing some of the household chaos, the first thing I ran into was the large pile of memorabilia Helen and I bought back from our trip to Germany last year. Out of the first bag fell a small hand-cranked music box we bought at the Thomas Kirche in Leipzig, the church where J.S. Bach spent so much of his career. It plays Bach's Minute No. 3 -- which Helen once had as a piano recital piece:

Music Box #1





Moving on from the audio -- the basement continuing to look like a travel agency blew up -- I move back to the kitchen where I stumble over the tomatoes I forgot to put away after dinner. One artful turn deserves another, so here's tonight's visual:

Distractions from the task at hand

When we last left this blog, Deanna was pondering which room to clean first before the impending arrival of the aforementioned parental units, Buick, turkey and booze.

Since then, I've discovered I don't know how to operate my own vacuum cleaner (egad.), have put away nothing, tripped over my own shoes left in the front hall and forgotten during Mollie's tirade, and pondered various homework assignments as alternative means of dawdling.

Operator error when trying to drive the vacuum -- at least I have an excuse. When Dora went on vacation last spring, I got plucky and decided I'd better get the house cleaned up before she returned to clean it. (Rule one of my mother's: always clean for the cleaning lady. Helen thinks this makes no sense.) In trying to snarf up the last of the dirt on the front stairs, I dropped the vacuum accidentally -- down it crashed to the hardwood floor below and split open like Jiffy Pop.

"I'm telling Dora!" Helen threatened pulling the plug out of the wall outlet.

"Not if I get to Wal-Mart first!" I shot back. $120 and an hour later -- we were the proud owners of a knock-off of those yellow, bagless vacuums. I figured out how to turn it on that night and was thrilled that it was quiet enough to use at midnight (in case of messy snacks) without the neighbors in the next townhouse over pounding on the walls. But since, I've not had need to wield the thing and forgot how until this evening.

Darn embarrassing to mutter: "what does this button do?" while Mollie supervised from atop the fire place mantle.

Mollie musta missed me

Oddly, Mollie was at the door waiting for me when I arrived home tonight. Usually she finds a place to sleep and ignores Helen and me until we find and wake her with a good poke.

Tonight, I kicked off my shoes and started to follow her down the hall toward the kitchen -- listening to her list of grievances as we went:

• where were you and why did you allow it to rain on my house today?
• did you see that mess of leaves out there that came down with the storm?
• where's my cat food?
• why won't the fur on my back left leg sit down correctly?
• figure out how to save defined benefit pension plans today? No? Didn't you do anything constructive? I watched a bug fly by the window upstairs...
• where's my brush and why aren't you operating it yet -- can't you open a catfood packet, get me more water and handle that all at the same time?
• do those crows really have to live around here?
• the phone is ringing, do you want to get that or should I?

(This sounds to the human ear like a combination of high-pitched squeaks and throaty growls. Mollie doesn't seem to have an in-between sound.)

We got her from our neighbor Jo, whose son-in-law rescued Mollie as a very small kitten from a gang of crows trying to peck her to death in a parking garage. In the last year, Mollie has grown from palm-sized puff ball to thundering feline monster. But still afraid of crows.

I like dogs -- as long as they belong to other people. Too much hassle to maintain, more like another child. Cats are self-sufficient. Okay, I'm striving in life to live like my cat. Is this a career goal or what? They monitor their food in-take, manage their own toilet, keep an eye on the house -- Mollie could probably scribble phone messages for me if she had thumbs with which to hold up the pencil.

There's plenty of love and affection, a bit of appreciation too. When you're wearing ode 'd tuna, of course.

Bad news sometimes travels in pairs

This morning my blackberry bears the bad news of coworker Kathryn's father having died unexpectedly yesterday of a massive heart attack or stroke. Within the last week she is the second close friend at work to loose her father suddenly. Last week my friend Jan's father lost a fast-moving and difficult battle to lung cancer (diagnosed only the month before). Heartbroken for both, yet thankful that our small office has gathered around them to offer whatever support we can.

Today is also the birthday of a good friend of mine who was not expected to see this day. Penny's suffering from a stage-four brain tumor, yet ever smiling and perky when I see her at church. She sang with the choir (she has an AMAZING voice) last week for the first time since her diagnosis. What joy she gave us all and my hopes that she have as much happiness and pleasure today.

And finally the kicker -- Dora, who cleans my house and always has an exciting tale to tell and a pet for Mollie, had surgery recently to remove a brain tumor. I've been worried sick about how it all turned out. Happily her news is excellent -- she called as I was trying to get out the door this morning. Tumor is completely gone, was verified as benign, and she is recovering well. (Insert jig of joy here!) Another few weeks and she believes she'll be ready to come back and clean. (Heaven knows we need it!) I respond that we'll be ready when she is and to take her time.

Thankful am I to have both parents soon arriving on my door step, good health, and trivial silliness affecting me compared to the challenges faced by my friends. Tis' the season to reflect on it all -- both happy and sad. Am determined to turn today's grey sky (and impending downpour of rain) into as sunny an outlook as Dora and Penny portray.

Tommy Smothers keeps visiting my head...

Oh, the Slithery-dee
He crawled out of the sea.
He may catch all the others
But he won't catch me.

No, he won't catch me --
Stupid old Slithery-dee!
He may catch all the others
But (slurrp)


Why this actually got recorded on an old Smothers Brothers album I've never been able to relocate I'll never know. But every now and then it bubbles back up to the top of my memory.

Helen cried the first time I sang this to her as the ending startled her so badly. (Or maybe it was the singing...)

This day was definitely a Slithery-dee sort of day. Late start to work and school -- but the cello got in and out of the car with the sixth grader on the first try.

Computer systems at work hiccupped along as normal. Only four phone calls with the computer technician trying to scotch tape this all together for us. I actually got to write a news release today -- hizzah! Every now and then the director, communications, should actually communicate with the media. Actually I don't knock it -- my job is so varied I never know what will land on my desk each day when I arrive. (Hope tomorrow it's cake...)

The ride home from work included the daily Metro train slowdown, a car accident between the station and the house that made the whole drive more of a roll, and 25 minutes to finish sixth grade spelling and math and dinner before Girl Scouts. Wheew. Then home again to my own home work.

However the list of "we gottas" before this weekend looms like Jaws circling the boat and Helen just reminded me about a birthday present she needs for a party she's been invited to on Friday.

Wanted: one "Bratz" doll. Answers to the name of "Jade". Wears removable feet.

The parents are coming, the parents are coming!

The holidays are upon us. Thanks to my mother and my daughter, there are turkey decorations around here somewhere that should be creatively strewn and strategically placed about the house: NOW. I haven't the slightest idea where to start looking for them. Dust needs to move before they get plonked down anyway and the 209 remaining pieces of just-collected Halloween candy need a corner in which to hide.

The big silver Buick chauffeuring my parents, two large suitcases for their week-long visit, several bottles of requested booze (it's for recipes, yeah. Bourbon for the sweet potatoes and rum for something that escapes me now, yeah...) , and a thawing turkey are slated to arrive on Sunday. Before then, the house must be cleaned, homework banged out by both of us, laundry mountain surmounted, groceries purchased. Oh, and the 500 pictures of Germany Helen and I took on our trip last summer with my parents need some sort of organizing as my parents have been promised a review of them during the visit.

"They're driving with a turkey?" asks Helen incredulously.

"It won't be sitting in the back seat propped up with a book and its own window seat," I say, trying to look my part as wizened mother. "It'll be in a cooler thawing."

"Okay..."

Helen is the sensible one in this house.

Entropy lives here, or life at the Johnson home

My watch, every clock in my house and the car are all set three minutes ahead -- yet I never get anywhere on time. No matter the level of chaos or calm around here, I always seem to be playing catch-up -- apparently now assigned as my static state in life.

In high school and college physics, the one lesson for which I managed to stay awake was the lecture on entropy: The thermodynamic process of expending energy or heat to return a body to its "natural" state following environmental or chemical changes to that body.

Think of freezing water to make ice cubes and then having the cubes melt again to form water.

This has been my story since my mother and father tried desperately to get me out of bed and on the school bus with a minimum of panic 30+ years ago. Life is always moving; there's much, too much, to do. It's just getting to all of it on time, coherently, and without wearing the navy blue pantyhose and black shoes (again) that seems to be the sticky part.

Now the shove from the warm sheets and out the door is provided courtesy of the BBC and NPR from a battered clock the ex didn't care to take with him. If not greeted with the "furry eyeball" coming from the curl of brown, orange, white and black who has reconned the dead center of the bed as hers (thanks Mollie) the likelihood of being tripped by thunderpaws the flying feline remains between my room and my daughter Helen's lightswitch.

"It's seven. Get up, we're late again." Flash of light. Rumble, rumple -- mumphf from the bed. "Oh, and Grandma and Grandpa will be here on Sunday, so we better get cleaning..."