Adventures in Being Myself

Recent posts on this blog have lamented my extended sojourns in Tallahassee for work at the Capitol. One very good thing about working in Tallahassee is 88.9FM , the local NPR station. I love, love, LOVE 88.9FM. Unlike 90.1FM in Fort Myers, 88.9FM broadcasts NPR programming 24/7. They don't stop talking at 9:00am and 7:00pm in favor of playing classical music. Oh, no. Their broadcast lineup includes all of my old favorites (Fresh Air, Talk of the Nation, Car Talk and Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me) and entices with "new" shows I didn't even know existed (Studio 360, The Splendid Table). With all due respect to Terry Gross, my new favorite is the weekly broadcast from The Commonwealth Club of California. In the last three weeks, I've managed to coincide my departure from the Capitol with the broadcast of this wonderful intellectual conversation. Yesterday, I found myself particularly rapt listening to Barbara Erenreich discuss her newest book, Dancing in the Streets...

I miss you, 143, xxoo

Today is Phil's birthday. He is 41; though, to look at him, you would swear he is not a day older than 31 (and I'm not just saying that because I think he's the hottest man on the planet...) Last year, we celebrated the big 4-OH! with a swanky party in Tallahassee. It was the first time Phil had been feted on his birthday and, since it WAS a milestone birthday, I went all out: yummy catering from M.A.D. About Food; boozy libations; sweet tunes from our favorite local band, The Recliners; and legions of friends and family surrounding the birthday boy with love and good wishes on his special day. Today, on the day of the big 4-ONE! I am in Tallahassee and Phil is at home in Fort Myers. The key clause in that sentence is "Phil is at home in Fort Myers." Yes, HOME. In FORT MYERS. The irony of that reality struck me as I was driving north on the 75, heading to Tallahassee for yet another week of Special Session/committee meetings. In the year since the "40 Is The ...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, ED! We all love you and miss you.

I have pink-eye. I shouldn't be surprised. I'm in Tallahassee this week for work and I always contract this particular plague at least once. It's an occupational hazard of working at the Capitol, a veritable vortex of disease. On any given day, thousands of people roam the halls spreading all manner of germy ickiness via handshakes and hugs, with nary a 3 oz. bottle of Purell in sight. This year it happened early: this is just the first of six committee weeks in January and February, in advance of the Legislative Session that begins on March 6th and runs for nine weeks. Fifteen weeks of work in a petri dish. Oh joy! Pink-eye is not fun, it's not at all pretty (especially when disease travels from the right eye and also infects the left eye...when that happens, I look like Kate Moss at the height of heroin chic ) and it's expensive. In addition to the cost of the medicinal eyedrops, ridding oneself of the pesky pink-eye plague requires tossing every bit of makeup and...