Well, once again it’s late at night here in the Barlow Center, and I find myself torn between wanting to stay up for another hour writing down everything that happened today, and going to bed so I can fall asleep in the next five minutes. I guess I’ll compromise, meaning y’all get another of those dreadfully “SHORT” posts (yeah, right) sans pictures. If it makes you feel better, my camera’s been on hiatus in the past few days. There’s just not much to photograph at work (well, other than the art there—duh—but I rarely get to see any of that while on the job) and it’s dark in the streets before and after I start and end work. This latter condition is kind of annoying; I don’t think I’ve actually seen and felt the sun outside since Sunday afternoon! Can’t we reschedule things so I can work in the office when it’s dark and be outside when it’s light? Maybe some of you who are undercover angels down on Earth (ala Jeffrey R. Holland’s fantastic talk) could pull a few strings? Oh well. In the meantime, I will look forward to getting out and about in the daytime on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
The beginning of the day went fairly quick. I had one of those really long, wonderfully involved dreams last night (and now, of course, recall nothing of it), and woke up a bit late, but still got to do my exercises downstairs while watching some more of “Redwall.” I’m trying to drag it out as long as possible until I—hint, hint—get some new watching material. I’m still planning on making it to the gym after work this week, and it looks like Thursday will be my best bet. If I can do my homework as well as go to Institute tomorrow after work, then I should have all the time after Thursday to hit the gym—yeah! I also shouldn’t have a problem going to work out on Friday and Saturday at a decently lit hour. Valerie went last night at about 9:45 pm after Family Home Evening! I was impressed with her dedication, but thought it was a little too late for my sleeping schedule to handle.
After washing up and fixing myself some breakfast (I believe I must be getting addicted to those little Apple-cinnamon oatmeal packs, they taste so good! I guess you’ll have to wean me away again to sugar-free oatmeal when I get back, Mom!), and managing NOT to cut my finger with the knife while slicing my orange, I got ready for work and took off. I didn’t get far—not even out of the Barlow Center, in fact—before realizing that I had left my bag in my room, with my purse and materials still inside! Hahaha—silly me. That’s what comes of eating many donut- shaped items the other day—your brain develops a big hole in the middle!
Once I got going, I enjoyed a brisk 30 min. walk to work, and I was overjoyed to find that my computer worked on the first try! Work wasn’t too bad; I always had something to be working on, and actually perked up in the last hour or so to finish a project for Michelle, the Comms supervisor. This rush of energy and zip was a rare occasion, since I typically start drifting off and have to fight really hard to keep focused from 2-5 pm. But I actually got so involved in the work that I didn’t leave until after 5:30!
One part of work that I did not particularly enjoy today was receiving my phone training from our receptionist (she of the “printer incident”). Fortunately, she didn’t seem to even remember the printer issue, let alone my connection to it. In fact, I’m not entirely sure whether she had any kind of memory of me whatsoever!!! Unfortunately, she didn’t seem to be having the best of days and managed to take out a lot of frustration by venting to—hopefully to and not at—me. I tried to be very smiley, nice, and friendly, but was very nervous throughout the whole thing, and particularly awkward every time she let me answer a call (those of you who know me will remember that talking on the phone is definitely one of my major weaknesses!). I tried to take notes on everything she said, but I know that I didn’t get every bit of information, and I’m kind of terrified of what she’ll do if I forget something important. So I’m hoping to—gulp—go through the whole thing again and watch her give the whole speech to the other new interns as they come. By the way, did I mention that I was the only intern to show up for this scheduled phone training? Yeeeeeah. And she wasn’t too thrilled about that either.
Receptionist: WHERE is everybody!!!@!#&&&&!!?!?
Me: (Squeaky, sweaty, panicky at sight of phone) Um, I’m not sure....
Anyway, I’m pretty nervous about having to take over the phone, but am going to pray hard that I’ll be able to remember everything, and also that the receptionist will be able to have a good attitude and better days, and that we’ll at least be able to get along in our brief interactions. I have seen this receptionist be nice and even friendly with some people in the office, but I have yet to have any of my smiles, greetings, or attempts at making conversation be rewarded with anything as simple as a friendly laugh or smile. If nothing else, this situation has made me resolve to smile and laugh more with other people—I never realized before how much trust and security comes from simply being able to smile at someone or laugh together!
On a more positive note, I do get along very well with both of my fantastic supervisors, Vivian and Michelle. They are both very eager to give me actual stuff to do, and explain what’s going on, and even joke around with me in the office. Today we were making fun of the sign Michelle has on her desk, a picture of an angry lady with the caption “Sarcasm is just one more service we offer” under it.
I got to research art around DC for part of the workload today, and found a really neat art exhibit about anorexia in a museum called the Goethe-Institut. It’s free and only a few blocks from our museum, so I asked Vivian if I could leave early tomorrow to take a look at it (It’s so inconvenient to have ALL the museums close at 5 pm!) and she said that was fine. Hooray! Which means I’ll have to remember to take my camera tomorrow. Cause you all want to see pictures of anorexia-inspired art, right? Right?!?
Well, the best part of the day by far came at 7:30 pm when I was in the Kennedy Center watching the Kirov Ballet’s performance of Don Quixote. In a word, it was FANTASTIC! I absolutely adore everything about this ballet, and I was very excited to see that they kept nearly all of the original plot, solos, and choreography. They did add on a few more dances, mostly with the toreador and his partner, and then a few fun numbers with the troupe of Gypsies, but didn’t cut out any of the original music as far as I could tell. I was a little nervous about halfway through Act III when my favorite male solo piece hadn’t been played yet (the “show-off” piece in the Mikhail Baryshnikov version, which, by the way, is the very best version of this ballet—in terms of choreography, music, casting, pretty much EVERYTHING—that I have EVER seen! I keep trying to remind myself to ask for this movie for my birthday or Christmas or something... Valentine’s Day present, perhaps!?!?), but they didn’t forget it (even if they did rearrange it in the plot so it didn’t have as much significance/subtext behind it). Hooray! And I was very impressed with the scenery (the windmills were there, and, though I was on the wrong side of the stage to see “how,” Don Quixote did get swung around briefly on one) and the corps de ballet, any one member of which could have starred in the lead part in a performance with my old ballet company! You could tell that they really did have professionals putting the show together. The props were also great—Don Quixote came into the village on a real live donkey! Pretty amazing, huh?
I had a rather puny seat, almost as far off to the side as you could get, but I actually did move to two better locations during the breaks (which are ridiculously long, like, almost 20 minutes!), and no one seemed to mind (in fact, several other people around me were doing the same thing). Another sort of ridiculous thing was the amount of clapping we did: There were three acts, and a break between each one, and all the main performers had to come out from behind the curtain and get clapped for each time! And then at the end, we couldn’t stop clapping for Kitri and Basil (the lead couple). They came out about three times after the supposedly “final” bow! I clapped until my hands hurt, and then quit. It seemed wrong to be whistling or screaming like they do for the plays at BYU, but a few ladies around me were yelling “Bravo!” so I guess that’s posh enough for the Kennedy Center. I was feeling a bit self-consciously grubby myself since I had changed out of my boots into my tough walking shoes (um, exercise Keds) before walking down. I reasoned that I could respond tartly to anyone who questioned me on them, “If this performance wasn’t so expensive, I could AFFORD to get a nice pair of shoes!” But luckily, no one questioned me, and so I didn’t have to go through the temptation of whether or not to actually be so shockingly blunt and rude. I did wear my nice work clothes underneath my coat, along with the Keds, which, come to think of it, probably made me look even more ridiculous, and more to be pitied rather than condemned. Oh well, what can I say? I still get a twinge of pain in my feet from watching those ballerinas gad about en pointe, and the soft, comfortable Keds are just helping me work through the de-stress process.
Have a good night!
2 comments:
No one can complain that you are not posting enough, so do take a rest when you need to! We had another nice quiet day here yesterday. MAM did talk to Mountainland on the phone, but still has not enrolled yet. DBM spent the day studying and playing on the computer, but has classes today. SLM and HGM started their new seminary classes and were relieved to see some familiar faces. Mom continues to work hard and fix delicious suppers. Oddly enough, my former employer (whose name we will not mention on this public forum) called and wanted to know how I was doing and if I had found a job yet, as did the recruiter from Hill AFB. I expect to sign a contract soon with the new practice, so I am not looking at other positions right now. Well, I hope you have a great day, and can learn how to answer that phone!
Hey Ruthena! You're posting ALOT actually! If you get to where you can't keep it up at this pace, don't worry about it! Most of us couldn't either! We should be sending some of the stuff you requested soon...although Daddy's idea of "soon" is probably that all that soon. But do not despair maybe in February we will have finally figured it out.
Post a Comment