Golden weekend

First, the weekend. I wrote this long, whiny post on Friday about having to stay up late doing laundry, due to the fiery and passionate hate that Calvin has for my brown wool vest, and reading Sword-Sworn, but then I had to reboot my computer for some reason, and I wasn't that attached to whining by the time I was done. That, and the caffeine had kicked in.

By Saturday, I'd finally caught up on sleep, though it took some trying - the cats love to tussle and rumpuss like elephants on crack at oh-dark-thirty in the morning. By daylight, though, it was wonderful - the sun was shining, Lori was driving us to Portland, the sun was shining, and oh, did I mention the sun?

Normally, I'd park my butt on the grass and play solar collector, but we had to watch Reel Nsync as soon as we got to Hammerhead's (moral imperative, doncha know?) And then Dine showed only a few minutes before the end, so we had to start all the way at the beginning again. Oh darn.

And the boys... they are such incredible dorks. Adorable, bored-out-of-their-skulls, easily amused dorks. I may have swooned from the cuteness. There certainly was much squeeage - my inner chihuahua got quite the workout.

My outer whatever got quite the workout later, when we went out clubbing in downtown Portland. The club was having some sort of anniversary, so there were huge bunches of spermy balloons hanging all over the place. The music rocked, though, and I was quite happy. By about one, my knees finally gave out, and my eyes were starting to complain about the smoke, but I shall have to do that again soon. Maybe even in Seattle this next time around.

I'm not really sure if the cat or the sun woke me up the next morning. The sun was right in my eyes, but the kitten was marking my toes at the end of the inflatable mattress, and it TICKLED! Ah! It was a good morning, lazy and sunny, with yummy french toast, and it segued into a giggly blast at the Chili's by the onramp. Our waiter kicked ass, and even showed us his tattoos. And then, to top it all off, he plied us with ice cream. Someone should saint the man. Or leave another outrageous tip.

I sometimes feel guilty about not driving at all when Lori plays chauffeur to and from Portland and other exotic locales. Not guilty enough to insist and steal the keys and kisk decapitation, but little nagging guilt. I'll have to remember to pay for gas sometime that's not wildly inappropriate - like in the car instead of hours later in the middle of a phone conversation with my Mom.

And yes, I called my Mommy on Mommy's Day. I wrote her a love letter the other day, and she liked it. That's good, because I adore her, and the thing with Kim losing her dad makes me appreciate how precious my parents are to me.

I'll be in Kansas in three days, and Mom's talking about curtains and painting and making myself useful, but there's also my favorite restaurants and the shoe store and other shopping funness to be had. It'll be a vacation, not anything exotic, but perhaps the more relaxing for its familiarity.

Anyway - I need to get my ass upcampus and mail this letter off to Chuckles. Ultimatums about the repairs and the deposit, only nicely worded and only a hint of how much of an ass we all think he is.

Ambition and Success

I had this chat with Ali over wings on Friday, and it's even more relevant, since I'm using it to procrastinate on my performance evaluation for work.

We'd wandered through the topic of families and perceptions and labels, and how I'm the really bookish one of the family. And somehow, in eighth grade, I got voted Most Likely to Succeed. (Alongside Dario, who's now an intellectual property lawyer in San Francisco.)

Dario, from all appearances, has succeeded. He's an associate at his law firm, got his law degree from Berkeley and graduated sum cum laude as an undergraduate.

And me? Switched majors and managed a B- average in college, lived with my parents for a couple of years, and have managed to hold onto only one job for a full year.

You see, in eighth grade, success that is most easily identified is academic success, and at that point, everything came easily to me. I was a know-it all, and though I may not have worked as hard as the other kids on a given assignment, everyone knew I was smart.

But ambitious? I never claimed that. Ambition was about rank, fame or power, and none of those things drew me. Friends, stories, knowledge are my desires.

But ambition is also about achieving a particular end. It's about seeing a goal and striving to meet it.

And I do have goals. They may be sometimes nebulous, but I get there. I got out of Georgia when I realized I was miserable down there, and I moved out of Kansas when I realized that my career was stuck. I found a goal that I knew I could realize and be happy doing it, and well...

I'm living in Seattle, with people I like, doing a job I enjoy, which enables me to pursue hobbies and classes and the degree that I used as the carrot to get me out of Kansas. And if that's not fulfilling an ambition, then I don't know what is.

Whee! I'm ambitious and successful. Go me!