Big Bang Bust

Just this past week I was minding my own business and was watching the local news. It was the usual: arson on the south side, murder on the east side, traffic on I70, and of course the rocketing property taxes. You know, all of those stories that just make your heart swell being an American. Because my family was pretty entrenched in the television industry, I don't watch the news like normal people. I notice when the chroma key is off on the weather person, when the copy editor obviously did not do a spell check on the headlines, and how many times the floor director is not queuing the anchor to look at the right camera. I also pay a lot more attention to the commercials. After all, this was our bread and butter.

At this time of year, its heavy with car sales or end of summer clearances in the seasonal wares. "Get your pool installed at 1/2 off!" This is of course in addition to the ask-your-doctor variety of new pharmaceuticals that are ALWAYS targeted to the generation seeking to ease aches and pains of growing older and who are actually watching the news. Next month I predict more office supply ads and back to school themes. What was completely off the beaten path was the museum ad for a regional site in a neighboring state.

It was a creative ad with a lot of art showing things like the Venus fly trap and reeds and other nature kinds of things. And then the tag line showed: "Prepare to Believe." My jaw dropped open. The Creation Museum. Not even Utah would go this far. Even Thanksgiving Point has a great Dinosaur museum in Lehi, Utah that has NO MENTION of God, the Bible, or anything and it is owned by a very prominent Mormon influence. The Mormons are pretty set in their doctrine that Creationism is the way to go. No big bang. No evolution. Nada.

I couldn't help but let my curiosity get out of hand and go check the site. Front page: "The Creation Museum presents a “walk through history.” Designed by a former Universal Studios exhibit director, this state-of-the-art 60,000 square foot museum brings the pages of the Bible to life."

Okey dokey. I then began to peruse other links on the site and found this:

Be prepared to experience history in a completely unprecedented way.

The state-of-the-art 60,000 square foot museum brings the pages of the Bible to life, casting its characters and animals in dynamic form and placing them in familiar settings. Adam and Eve live in the Garden of Eden. Children play and dinosaurs roam near Eden’s Rivers. The serpent coils cunningly in the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Majestic murals, great masterpieces brimming with pulsating colors and details, provide a backdrop for many of the settings.

The area within the museum has been divided into unusually configured spaces that allow for personal interaction with each of the 160 exhibits. Several parts of the museum, including the stunning forty-foot high portico with its cliff wall and floor-to-ceiling glass windows, flaunt open spaces and remarkable designs.

Walk through the Garden of Eden. The Tree of Life, central to the garden, stretches out its branches, laden with ripened fruits. Come face-to-face with a sauropod, a dinosaur of incredible dimensions. His monstrous frame moves through the low-lying thicket as he grazes on plants. Introduce yourself to our chameleons. Examine bones, a clutch of eggs from a dinosaur, an exceptional fossil collection, and a mineral collection. Walk through the Cave of Sorrows and see the horrific effects of the Fall of man. Sounds of a sin-ravaged world echo through the room. Finally, see the sacrificial Lamb on the cross, and the hope of redemption."

ARE YOU FREAKING KIDDING ME??? I'm no Bible scholar, but I don't really remember it ever mention dinosaurs hanging out around the Cave of Sorrows or the Tree of Life.

All of a sudden, the thought of raising kids in Utah is seeming a lot more appealing. Sure its behind the Zion Curtain, but its out of the Bible Belt.

Swill is Swell

Ok, its official: I'm a Potter-geek. I spent roughly 8 hours over the past 2 days blazing through all 759 pages. I even dreamed about the potential let down I would feel once the book was done and the series was over. Perhaps it just hasn't hit me yet, but I feel quite resolved about the whole epic tale. I truly only mention this because my original plan was to blog yesterday and this apparently did not happen because I was Potterized. However, I can now be devoted to my entry without any further temptings of the book calling me.

Last weekend a group of us went on an adventure to Plainsfield, Indiana. It was a Friday night which meant that one of the local wineries was doing free tastings, opened their grill, and had a band. Although it wasn't Sonoma, it sounded like a nice summer night. The winery we were heading to was Chateau Thomas Winery. Sure, the name sounded impressive. But who is this Thomas guy?

Charles Thomas used to be an OB/GYN and will not let anyone forget it. Just click on the link and you'll see what I mean. What this signifies is that he is a surgeon by training. Surgeons, especially old school ones, have a certain reputation for being a bit...well...hoity toity and arrogant. Why mention that he was a practicing doctor, let alone his specialty, if now he's a winemaker? That is really my only point.

I suppose with a name like "Chateau" I was expecting quaint, charming, cozy. Perhaps a cottage and some lovely grounds surrounded by grapevines. What we found was a warehouse surrounded by Chili's and Motel 6's right off of the freeway. A warehouse, y'all. The grounds were not landscaped, but simply a parking lot where the band played. The band was a completely different story.

The band consisted of two individuals. The man was seated with a synthesizer and a microphone and the lady was standing with a tambourine and a microphone. They were both middle aged and played, what was advertised as "contemporary," music. I heard renditions of Air Supply and "Abracadabra" that made Will Ferrel's and Cheri O'Terri's SNL skit look like it was hip. Escaping the crowds and music (and yes, there was a crowd), we went inside to the "tasting room." Before we entered the warehouse we saw that their "grille" was not a lovely restaurant with brightly colored umbrellas and wrought iron tables as I had envisioned, but simply a grill. One person charring burgers and another with a register on a card table with poster board announcing the prices.

The tasting room was a long oval bar with pourers everywhere. We muscled our way past the ever so enticing merchandise like tee-shirts with rhinestones spelling out, "Wine Diva," and what looked to be macrame hanging wine ranks to the bar. The lady handed us a sheet.
Are y'all seeing the top line? "for the discriminating wine enthusiast" Ooohkay. The descriptions of the wines were generous if not imaginary. For the first samples that each of us ordered, the looks on our faces were priceless.

"Its good, huh?" Nodded the wine pourer smiling maniacally.

There isn't much to say when your taste-buds are swimming in flavors that resemble Smuckers grape jelly that has fermented and gone bad. We were given three samples from the list. I think we were all overly optimistic when we ordered our second selections. One of us asked the pourer to give them her favorite. And, again, Welsh's grape juice would have been welcomed to our palates instead of this swill. Ah, and did I mention all of these samples were being served in essentially clear plastic dixie cups?

As we were pondering our third and final selection, grasping onto a hope and a prayer, we found it on the sheet (this alone caused me to take the menu so I could take pictures and blog about it.)
"A diabetic wine?" said one of the physician friends we were with.

There is something INHERENTLY WRONG with the idea of putting in artificial sweetener into wine, yet, only in the USA would you see this done and proudly advertised. I think it was the same friend who spoke up actually looked up the chemical formulation of Splenda on his palm pilot (yes, a bit geeky, I know.) Someone else ordered it just to see if it was as bad as it sounded.

The pourer had to get the red wine out of the fridge! Not a wine fridge, but a regular college dorm mini fridge. That should have been sign #812 as red wine, as a whole, should not be uber cold.

He managed to choke down one swallow and left the rest in the cup on the bar. As we left the rest of our semi-sipped samples on the bar and our stomachs turning, J kept apologizing about the grand idea of going to the winery. None of us really minded though. We got a lot of great laughs out of the experience.

Beauty, and "taste" for that matter, are all within the eye of the beholder. Perhaps good ol' Charlie should go back to practicing medicine and leave the wine making to others.

Professional Pontificiation

I realize I've been a bit of a slacker on the whole posting thing. Mea Culpa. (For anyone who doesn't know this phrase, you obviously are not a Catholic...look it up.) Its not like I've been completely somnolent. I actually have been doing quite a few worth while things with my time. For instance, I made an incredible bourbon marinated flank steak, chile lime roasted corn, and spinach salad the other night. I also polished my antique brass bed for when my mom comes to visit next month. (Incidentally her buying of the plane ticket was like manna from heaven; a much needed bright spot.) And I have been doing some part time consulting work.

I'm doing the whole "general" terms thing now after my readership exploded with past co-workers from my previous place of employment. Call it a Dooce-ism. (Again, if you do not know what this is, you obviously do not spend enough time surfing the internet and/or at least checking out my links of my favorite sites.) Another aside: I actually had my exit interview a la third party telemarketer last night. It was quite rewarding to actually give an honest review. I said what I meant: I love, LOVE, the CEO and would work for her directly anytime in my life. (Note, I said "directly" meaning that I would report to her.) She is bright, passionate, strategic, and a great person.

Anyhoo, this whole consulting this has been a blast. I've been able to do what I think I do best: diagnose organizations, apply brief solution focused interventions, coach individuals, and teach. Its rather funny how fate tempts you once you think you have things all figured out. For instance, just last week I was talking to a girlfriend telling her how happy I am right now with my career opportunities. I don't feel this driving need to always excel and keep raising the treadmill speed. That is quite a difference from my previous way of living. Wouldn't cha know not even 20 minutes later I got a call from a head hunter asking me to apply for a senior position with a health care org. As I was debating this over the next 24 hours of even putting my hat into the ring, the recruiter called and said that the company changed their mind and decided they wanted a RN. This is the bane of my existence as a MSW in a health care world.

Many organizations claim they are interdisciplinary. And for the most part, they are when it comes to patient care. There are docs, nurses, physical therapists, respiratory therapists, social workers, dietitians, chaplains, etc who all contribute to the whole of the patient and family. However, it is rare to find a health care system that promotes the same disciplines trusted with patient care into leadership. Most of those at the top are nurses. And you wonder why exactly we have a nursing shortage...it doesn't take a brainiac to figure this one out.

The nurses have done an incredible job lobbying themselves as the gatekeepers for monitoring care throughout all levels of an organization. I will say that my profession sucks at lobbying even though one of our hallmarks is to be advocates...hard to do when the majority of professionals are introverts.

To me, this doesn't make sense. MSW actually outranks both MD's and RN's on an academic standpoint. MD is just another bachelors, seriously look it up. And to be a RN, you just need an associates. I only point this out because the medical world is largely entrenched in hierarchy, including academics. Just look how teaching hospitals outrank community based facilities on every scale.

My next contention point has to do with the skills the job requires. I would argue that MSWs are much better equipped to handle leadership than RN's any day. (Note: I say this while the majority of my health care leaders are RN's including my old CEO. Only 3 are MSW's and 1 is a MHA.) While nurses are incredible at procedures (you wouldn't catch me doing a Foley cath) and monitoring progress according to their senses (vitals are all based on what you can hear, see, feel), MSW's are truly skilled in people. What motivates them? How do you plan strategic change? How does transformation occur? Looking at organizational systems in micro, mezzo, and macro levels simultaneously. These skills are what higher levels of leadership and administration demand. The other aspects of business, like financial skills, well, both of our educations suck at that. It is just something you learn on the job.

I actually had ruled out applying before the recruiter called me back, but I decided to push the point to see what the rationale was. Yes, I was just making a point and was hoping just to get the hamsters in their heads to run on the wheel a little bit faster. I asked for the job description and their reasoning. They said that the RN might have a better understanding of medical patient care, although with the job description medical patient care was not a component. More than anything I just found it fascinating.

Women may still be facing a glass ceiling, but in health care only the RN's hold the key to the executive boardroom.

The Family Business

Last night my husband and I rented movies and ate Mexican food. It was quite the rowdy Friday night for us. As I was getting into bed I noticed that I had received a couple of text messages from my brother. The first one made reference to my blog and something about "binomial insurgency." The second said something like he expected me to answer him personally. My reaction? WTF?

I first had to look up "binomial" and "insurgency" just to be sure I knew what he was trying to convey. The last time I heard "binomial" used in a sentence it was binomial nomenclature and I was in 8th grade Algebra. Sure enough:

Binomial: bi·no·mi·al /[bahy-noh-mee-uhl]
–noun
1. Algebra. an expression that is a sum or difference of two terms, as 3x + 2y and x2 − 4x.
2. Zoology, Botany. a taxonomic name consisting of a generic and a specific term, used to designate species.

In·sur·gen·cy
Pronunciation: in-'s&r-j&n-sE
Function: noun
Inflected Form: plural -cies
: the quality or state of being insurgent; specifically : a condition of revolt against a recognized government that does not reach the proportions of an organized revolutionary government and is not recognized as belligerency

Apparently I am a mathematical rebellion. Either that or a zoological disturbance.

Our texting back and forth finally led to a phone call. J was amused by this texting and decided to get in on the action and began to text my brother as well. My brother was just saying he was essentially just sending a message. Basically, Dad was hurt by my portrayal of him as a "monster" and that it had damaged his familial relations, but he couldn't elaborate specifically how that manifested. Huh.

My brother is a really good guy. I truly believe he was bridging family ties and he's been a peace keeper from the start. I did say that I have not talked with Dad directly and based on recent caporegime messages from both my brother and mom, I think that all I can do is deal with each relationship individually. I empathized with his predicament of being put in the middle and said that he could choose to remove himself as the middle man.

After we hung up, J and I talked. The more I discussed it with him the more I became aware of how our family operated. It was like the The Godfather. Family came first and you never betrayed the family. I guess I played the family consigliere until recently. Cooking was a huge place of bonding. Dad's lamb shank recipe could rival the Corleone's spaghetti sauce any day. And there were messages passed down from the Don (aka Dad). I'm not certain what I'd kiss considering Dad doesn't wear any rings. Perhaps his golf club?

Its not personal, its business. While I haven't had an offer I couldn't refuse or a dead horse head in my bed, I have decided to leave the guns and take the cannoli.

Just Call Him Mark Spitz

Back in 2004 my husband first came to Indy with his mother to scope out a place to live. He said he kept me in mind while touring with the real estate agent. Why, I will never know as I had dumped him the day before he left on his trip because he was taking his mother and not me with him. However, now that we are married and made it through that bump in the road I can say I'm grateful he did keep me in mind.

The condo sits on a lake (playing to my love of water), has a community pool (love of swimming), lots of light and a fireplace. J later bought a kayak to paddle around and this summer we bought a life vest for me. (Much better than me wearing a men's extra large and having it essentially strangle me every time I sit down in it.) Another aside: the life vest says "Ho Sports" on it in hot pink. That alone made me want to buy it. Every time I see it, I end up in a fit of giggles. Plus, it was from Costco, J's mecca. Ok, back to the real point of the entry.

When I was little I had a curmudgeon of a dog named Henry. Henry was a Scottie as well, but a very large Scottie who actually was the runt of the litter. We would take Henry with us to Ginny and Pop (maternal grandparents) to swim in their pool. A couple of times, maybe more, my brother and I would be playing and the dog decided to join us. This then cued Ginny to say, "Damn dog!" and jump in to save him. Scotties are shaped like mailboxes with heads and little skinny legs. Essentially they sink.

Back when I first went out with my back, J and I took Edgar to the lakeside to play fetch. The ball landed in the water and much to my surprise, Edgar went in after it. I began to panic. But Edgar is not a typical Scottie. He is very long and tall for this breed and definitely would not win best in show...well that and he doesn't have any nads.

He's always been a bit athletic. We call him Leapin' Lizards at times because he can do things like jump on beds (no other Scottie I've had could do this), jump on my counter (see previous entry with destroyed kitchen), and once jumped out of my car while we were at the park because he saw another dog. That was the scariest day of my life so far. Mom and I got home to see we only had 2 dogs, not 3. We found him in the park and all I could do was hold him and cry. We no longer roll down the windows. At any rate, back to the swimming!

Edgar and I went to play a game of fetch the other day. He loves this game. But inevitably the ball lands in the water.
The first time he went in after it I freaked out, but J held me back and Edgar found sheer joy in just wading around figuring out he could drink the water while he walked then began to venture out further. As seen here:
This progresses into more of a shore wading/venturing out further. Mind you, the ball is now being carried off further into the lake by the current.
Edgar then sees the ball (aka, eye on the prize) and begins to go after it. This usually starts with him belly flopping out into the deeper water.
And then he tries to get the ball, but ends up inhaling more water and pushing the ball further away. By now, I'm freaking out because he is so far out there and I begin to call him back while simultaneously starting to prep myself for going in after him. It takes him awhile to give up, but he will swim back to shore.We do end up losing quite a few balls, which we may go get the kayak out to retrieve. But Edgar is very very proud of himself and happy, scrawny legs and all. Good thing he likes water because he always ends up in the bathtub after a swim in the lake.

Good Friends

Well, everyone will be thrilled to know that I have made up with my mother. I know some of you were just on the edge of your seats out there, biting your nails, and holding your breath in anticipation of what would happen. Kind of like how it was cool to watch "Days of Our Lives" in junior high and just couldn't wait to see if Roman was really John or if Bo and Hope would really get back together. But, this is a really great development in my life. It also means I can dedicate more writing to stupid stuff that for some reasons my dedicated readers keep tuning in for.

One of my close girlfriends noticed, "Holy Hannah, I certainly know you've been blogging since you've been unemployed with all of the entries!" Well, yes, it is one way I like to think I'm contributing to society in my delusional state of temporary housewifedom. The same girlfriend showed me a link to someone who truly is insane and either deserves a DSM diagnosis or a cookbook publishing deal . (Hey, its my first successful embedded link! Cue the roar of approval from the peanut gallery.)

Lets talk fiber, shall we? I mean truly how many entries are there dedicated to fiber out there? I figure if one person can do a whole blog on cupcakes then I can do one little tiny entry about fiber. The first thing you should know is that my husband is obsessed with fiber. This did not come with him attending medical school. Nope, I blame/credit his family of origin for this. We cannot scan the cereal or bread aisle without him flipping the boxes over to see exactly how many grams are worthy of being in our cabinets. I've learned that 2 grams is unacceptable and that 3 grams is marginal, but anything with 4 or more is the bees knees. This is a total switch for a girl who grew up with whatever was advertised the most on Saturday morning cartoons and promised some kind of prize in the sugary melee.

He once told me a story of a friend in high school who would look for the cereal with twigs in it. I knew this particular friend. He was brilliant, but also in that way that made his view on life seem just a bit off. I thought it was just his way of being quirky and J was just relaying this in the story. The other night we went specifically to the store for cereal.

"Hey, honey, look twigs! Its the cereal (Mario/Yoshi/Ben/etc) had in high school! I found it!" I heard as he picked up a very bland looking box. There were no cartoon characters promising chocolatey goodness in every bite, no secret decoder rings to collect, and no mazes on the back to help the Captain find his crunch-o-scope. "And look at the fiber content on this!"

I further inspected the box to find the unheard of amount of 12 grams of fiber in 1 serving. 12. Yes, you read it correctly.

"They would have to be literal twigs in order to get this amount of fiber in a serving. You may as well just go gnaw on the tree in the front yard. Are you sure they aren't real twigs?" Images flooded of Edgar pooping in the front yard and J in his bathrobe gnawing at the base of our pine tree like a beaver while neighbors strolled on their merry morning walks.

"Nah, I think its just what they call them."

"Well, now that's an advertising gimmick I wouldn't have thought of. Which company actually hired this ad agency and thought that this was the BEST idea?" I prematurely concluded that it had to have been a Japanese company given the fact that my cousin's blog was filled with poorly translated English advertising concepts. See here as an example of many.

Nope it was Kashi. A company marketed to the health conscious Gen X'ers/Baby Boomers. They were located in the hoity toity area of San Diego, La Jolla. On vacation once a girlfriend and I had to rent a Mercedes car service to get back to our hotel from this area because there weren't any regular cabs to be found in this area of town.

"Good friends?" I then exclaimed looking at the P.C. correct couple on the front of the box. "That is what they are calling it? Good friends? As in, you should be good friends with your colon?"

Hell, if I ate this cereal NO ONE would want to be good friends with me because I would stink so much. But, never the less, it won a spot in our cabinet. Note that it also states "I will savor my broccoli" Not a good friend of W, who hates broccoli, so that meant it would be a friend of mine.

Too Close To Home

I hung up on my mother two nights ago.

This is not a proud moment and I'm still stewing about it. In fact it is something that I feel really bad about. I do not condone this type of acting out in others, so why I think its ok for me to do it can be a complete therapy session waiting to happen.

The fact of the matter is I got completely overwhelmed, emotionally overloaded, and took things way too personally. Once I had clicked "end" on the phone I looked for something to soothe my internal rage. It was cocktail time, but turning to alcohol was not a good choice, nor was eating (although I did promptly break out the red pepper hummus), nor would exercise because I have a tendency to over do things and with a back injury still healing, I knew better. By the time my husband came through the door I had already screwed up two recipes and was slamming things around the kitchen with tear stains on my tee shirt. He calmly led me through a debriefing session which made me think that he was the better therapist and I had the insight of a rock. However, it made me feel better.

Looking back with 20/20 vision I could see that she was leading up to the bomb dropping through the whole conversation although I didn't clue in the whole time we were on the phone. She held back. She was tentative in her conversation: not offering too much, not prodding for more from me. This guarding is always a tell tale sign something is up.

She ended the conversation by saying she could see I was busy and she would let me go, but she had one request: Stop blogging about my father. What? Hello, left field! I have to say I was racking my brain for what I last wrote about my father.

She said that I portrayed him in a mean light to which I replied, "He can be a very mean man." She said that she worried about how that impacted extended family relations and that I should have more of an edit button on because there were hurt feelings. However if I couldn't respect her request then I should change my blog address so she doesn't know about it.

That last sentence pushed me over the edge.

Has she not been reading my last entries filled with angst? I think I was very clear that I had to be authentic and that was the larger message. But what really got me was that what she was really saying was, "I feel bad, but its now your problem not mine and its inconvenient to me to change, so you need to." This is a common family message that my father sends out quite a bit. I suggested that she just stop reading the blog. She suggested I kept my relationships private. Perhaps she really doesn't know me. I'm a lot like her own mother in the fact that I call a spade a spade.

The problem was I lost my cool and didn't think about what was the larger question being asked. I've written far more unfavorable things in the past about my family and have tempered my expression to a compromised place; preserving the relationships while maintaining content. Plus, my father and I have the relationship that if he was really upset, he'd let me know. I don't even think he reads the blog anyway. I think he only hears about it from her. So really, the larger question was what button was really pushed for her?

I haven't seen my family in over 6 months. Its hard to know what dynamics are really going on back there. I do know that perhaps my recent unemployment has hit a button with her as my father went/is going through a similar predicament and she's having a hard time (naturally and normally) trying to be "supportive" to him. Its been going on now for almost a decade. (One of her first questions to me was what my plan was for a job and what my husband thought.) I've suggested therapy for her countless times to find this balance, but I also know that she will only seek it out when she's ready. For being as forward thinking as she is, I also know she struggles with the concepts of women working. She owns her own highly successful business, but I think she wishes it was just more of a hobby.

One of my biggest fears is turning into my father and I've been wrestling those demons ever since I quit the high ranking job two weeks ago. I've been madly applying to jobs because I don't want to be like him or have J struggle with "supporting" me. However, hanging up on her was mean of me too. While we've always been each other's rocks, I don't know how we can support one another in this new chapter as it hits to0 close to what is raw and what is real.