Happy Le Hearts and Le Flowers and Stuff

I meant to have one of these (love) by Christmas, hell; let alone by V Day.

Shoot, by now I was hoping I'd be having to bite down so I didn't accept a Proposal before Daylight Savings Time ends. I don't know what that means. But I moved here to a. Fall in love and b. Fall in love.
In that order.
Instead, I find I'm still mooning over That Man, who is at least one continent's width away, if not the Atlantic as well, and says he doesn't want us and while I don't think he can't walk away any more than I can, I don't have any more time to live alone waiting for him. Hell, whatever. It's only Everything.
Meanwhile, I moved here for the local talent.
I need the job/career thing to get resolved already, so I can focus on the important stuff. Like, love. I'm typing this as Lionel Hampton's vibes thrill to him playing "Tenderly"... you know what I'm sayin.
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If you've got it, enjoy it, eh?
Meanwhile, Feb 15th an official holiday for single women: chocolate, 50% off.

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Temping in the Wilderness

I could easily write a book on Temping

It's like being a waitress- a book that would write itself.

Temp jobs are not fabulous opportunities that by some terrible trick of Fate have gone overlooked by the sleek and skilled set. They're jobs no one else wants. In fact, someone else has likely walked off the job. That's why the employer has been caught flat-footed and had to call a temp agency.

However, the employer has learned nothing from the walkout. Whatever factors caused the original person or persons to refuse to stay there- even for money- still exist. Add indignant anger to a backlog of undone work. Cue the hapless temp.

Today, for example. I'm Day Two at a place I'll be at for 14 days, and I'm now counting the remaining days. Yesterday's lunch conversation by two other workers ran a gamut of Mole Surgeries That Had to Be Redone and the Deep Stitches That Had to Be Gone In and Dug Out (both persons able to contribute their own detailed stories) to The High Price of Mac and Cheese In a Supposedly Nice Restaurant, to The Stuff I'm Coughing Up Right Now With This New Flu Bug That's Going Around.

If this fell into a story I was writing, I'd toss it out in the first draft as the very dullest stereotyping. What to do when it's a factual account? I survived by thinking about what an interesting adventure into primitive society I was having. The mind as cultural machete, searching for footholds in a brackish, sucking ooze...

Today I was considered very witty, as they thought I made up the phrase "carbon footprint." Funny as when it came out of my mouth, I wondered if the saying had itself jumped the shark. Not with this crowd. They drive in from Vancouver and hadn't heard it before.

PS Illustration is apparently owned by these guys. A different Web address hops to this site.

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I miss That (Imaginary?) Man

Lynda Barry's genius art

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Consumerism: Red, White and - Blue?

Time has an interesting article about media, mood and shopping

Barbara Kiviat reports that "People who are sad tend to be willing to pay more for things — it's like going to the grocery store on an empty stomach..." She says they made two groups of people, showing a sad video to one group and the other group watched one about the Great Barrier Reef.

Then they showed then an object and asked both groups how much they'd pay for it. The people who'd been made sad said they would pay more for it.

I've seen people angrily asking why the 9/11 video and the recorded phone calls are played. Now their feeling that they are being manipulated is underscored by this study. Kiviat reports that the study was conducted by researchers at Carnegie Mellon, Harvard, Stanford and the University of Pittsburgh and will be published in the June issue of Psychological Science.

Sensationalist reporting is good for business and now you understand why your newspaper looks the way it does. It's a hand on your wallet.

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