Almostgotit.com

Creative Commons image by Mpopp

Sometimes people come across my older posts and leave comments, which my regular readers then miss. I didn’t want you to miss this one, though.

Tanya wrote:

What if you moved to another city for your husband, ended up unemployed for 2 years, and 2 of the most potentially productive and career-making years of your life (under 30, no kids)? After you had already had to give up a very promising and well-paid job in another city? And now you realize you will never have a really cool job and kids at the same time? And you are too old with too much of a broken resume to ever apply to and get into a top business school, which you have only come to realize is essential to having transferrable job skills that people actually want to hire? How do you get over that?

Tanya’s comment hit me in the gut, and I don’t want to minimize her obvious pain in any way.  She and I have had a whole lot of experiences (and feelings!) in common*, and I don’t have any easy answers for her. 

((Except that it sounds like I’m even older, have an even worse resume, so quite possibly am even more screwed! ))

Tanya sounds pretty upset.  And pissed off, too.  The last thing I’d suggest is that she “get over it.”  Being upset isn’t wrong, because it tells you something IS wrong. You can’t just ”get over” it: you can only use it.  Anger is very powerful, and while it can destroy you, it can also give you enormous strength to do important and difficult things. 

I wonder who, or what, is telling Tanya she’s too old and too broken and can’t even APPLY to business school?  Or that people will only hire her if she does something she’s already told herself is impossible?  Those are the sorts of thing our wicked inner toad people tell us.  That’s a load of garbage.  And it hurts us very much to swallow it. 

What’s worked for me? Personal and marital counselling, talking to people who are experts in job re-entry, talking to people who know how to make my resume better, taking care of myself even when I don’t want to.

Being with supportive friends is the MOST important, studies now show… even better than exercise!

So, Tanya, what are you doing to be nice to yourself?

——————-
* I am re-activating this angry post especially for Tanya.  I’d de-activated it because it’s not me at my most attractive, and I really do like men.  But sometimes, Damitol, living with them just makes me MAD.

No decent marriage counselor would approve, but *I* thought it was funny.

Maybe after you’ve been married a few decades, you will too.

To see the original:

http://flickr.com/photos/tzofia/287170009/sizes/o/

The washing machine breaks, the relatives visit, the kids have vacation for a week, the husband goes to Europe. 

All at the same time.

Then suddenly it’s March 25th and no one is reading your blog any more because you haven’t posted anything on it.

Still don’t have a washing machine, but the relatives have left, the kids are back at school, and the husband has returned to help load the dishwasher. 

Things are improving.

Yesterday evening, though, there was a sound from the kitchen like all the dishes falling out of the cupboard, not once but repeatedly.  The dog was “helping” the husband load the dishwasher by “pre-rinsing” the especially tasty bits, and got his collar stuck on the dish rack.  Then he tried to get away.

Have I mentioned how strong our dog is? 

Pieces of the dishwasher flew in all directions.  As did pieces of our dishes, as Jerry the Rhodesian Fridge Snack dragged the fully-loaded rack out of the dishwasher, out of the kitchen, and half way around the dining room, yelping in terror the whole time. 

“Loud” doesn’t even cover it.  And we’re still picking shards of pottery out of the ceiling.

Things are getting back to normal, in other words, and I was tired of that china pattern anyway.

I am eternally grateful to Karen at Working Girl who reminded me that it’s that time of year again when each of us needs to do his or her civic duty and vote for the Oddest [Book] Title Of the Year.

This year’s finalists:

• Baboon Metaphysics
• Curbside Consultation of the Colon
• The Large Sieve and its Applications
• Strip and Knit with Style
• Techniques for Corrosion Monitoring
• The 2009-2014 World Outlook for 60-milligram Containers of Fromage Frais

Additional titles such as Excrement in the Late Middle Ages and All Dogs Have ADHD were rejected for this final round.

Last year’s winner?  The Stray Shopping Carts of Eastern North America: A Guide to Field Identification

Don’t forget to vote at The Bookseller.  This year’s winner shall be announced March 27.

Please do not blog like Almostgotit, because she isn’t very good at following the rules — and that’s the only reason, of course, that she and her blog aren’t totally famous yet. Here are the main rules for a successful blog (for those of my friends who’ve been asking.)

Image: The Mumpsimus Forum

1. The best way to build a readership is to regularly comment on other people’s blogs. A good place to find blogs related to yours are Technorati and Google Blog. Search for topics you yourself write about, and leave comments on related blogs. Then look at those blogs’ blogrolls to find OTHER related blogs, and leave comments on those blogs, too.
2. Pick a niche or focus for your blog, and stick to it as well as you can.  OCD is good for bloggers.
3. Write lots of posts, one per day if you can, and keep them short.
4. It’s good to be funny.
5. Rambling self-analysis is boring unless it is also short and funny.
6. Honor anyone who comments on YOUR blog by leaving comments on their blogs in return.
7. Honor anyone who comments more than twice on your blog by adding them to your blogroll, which gives them more link juice.
8. Thank all of your new commenters by sending them an email or at least by responding to their comments with comments of your own.
9. Respond to your commentors, and keep it friendly. Commenters are your friends. If a comment is really out of line, you can always delete it. If people see that you regularly respond, they are more likely to come back to your blog to see your responses… and are more likely to comment again in the future.
10. Participate in blog carnivals, memes, and the exchanging of blog awards with other blogs. Anytime you link to other bloggers, you are likely to receive links from them in return.  Adding Twitter or Facebook links to your blog help draw readers, too.

You can break any and all of these rules and be a blogging maverick if you like, but you’ll be the most effective in your maverickness if you understand these rules, first.

———-
Helpful Links:
How to choose a niche topic for your blog
5 Tips to choosing a blog topic
What is a Blogroll? (includes an excellent primer on blogroll etiquette, too)
Memes in blogging (the best definition I’ve found)
10 Best Twitter Tools for Wordpress blogs 
Add a Twitter widget to a Blogger blog
Create your own blog awards (award generator)

Related Posts:
How to add photos to your blog (Part 1)
Using photos on your blog (Part 2)
Copyright and Blogging: a tricky subject
Quick Lesson: Build a feed reader (essential to keeping up with your fellow bloggers)
How to get fabulously rich as a blogger

Good-mannered bloggers should add bloggers who leave comments to their own blogrolls. I am *very behind* in updating my blogroll.

Today, then, I would like to introduce you, in no particular order,  to several blogging friends whom I have just added to my blogroll.

• Lavenderbay at Voice of the Turtle.  A beautiful Canadian writer, poet, photographer, and all-around creative and thoughtful person, Lavenderbay has become one of my favorite fellow-bloggers.
• Randy at Wordnut. Randy Parker is an independent advertising copywriter, creative consultant and freelance writer working in Memphis. You can see samples of his professional work at www.wordnut.com
• Bill at Sweet William Now. Knoxville’s Bill writes on the process of recovery and renewal.
• James at  James Viscosi’s Scribblings.  James Viscosi is a California writer in the speculative fiction field, which includes the horror, fantasy, science fiction, crime, and mystery genres. James has another blog already on my blogroll, Dennis’s Diary of Destruction.
• Mrs. Dirty Boots at A Self Sufficient Life.  British ex-pats Mrs. and Mr. Dirty Boots live on a piece of Spanish mountainside harvesting olives and almonds and trying to provide for themselves for as little as possible. They’re also off-grid with no services which means they rely on solar and wind power, collect rainwater, recycle grey-water, etc., and are a pair of remarkable human beings in general.
• Goodbear at Cody Bear’s Friends. Goodbear writes about dogs and insects and other interesting stuff, and takes amazing photographs to go with what she writes.
• Jana at Fiber Art Studio. Jana is a visual artist who works conceptually through fiber, paint and language. She also uses video, photography and the internet to make sketches, document performances and construct personal narratives.
• Mel at Mental Indigestion. Mel is a blogging bud from Singapore, whom I met at the Iowa summer writer’s conference last year.
• Erin at Lucky BWay Girl. Erin is an actress in New York who dreams of being in a Broadway show. In the meantime she has had a number of interesting acting gigs, writes wonderful blog posts, and refuses to wear shorts.
• Cara at Repurposeful. Cara likes to find new uses for everyday things that are a little bit green, a little bit frugal, and 100% useful.
• Cyn at BAMWriters. Cyn is a best-selling novelist and teaches other people the essentials they need to be published, too. BAMWriters is her latest online resource for writers– check it out! Cyn is also passionate about dog rescue, and will be featured right here in a guest post soon about vocation.
• Laurie at Punk Rock HR. When she isn’t setting the world on fire with her cynical approach to Corporate America, Laurie Ruettimann is a punk rock Human Resources Professional with over a decade of experience in several large, Fortune 500 organizations.
• Leah at Five Blondes. Leah is one of five sisters from Ontario (that’s in CANADA, yo!) who have been blogging together for over a decade. Impressive, or what?
• Kieran at Zen and the Art of Redundancy. Kieren is one of many who have recently lost jobs in the current recession — but it hasn’t stopped him.

Good News:  
Almostgotit bought a new washing machine!!

Bad News: 
Only Almostgotit would buy a new washing machine that is currently the object of a class-action suit.

Good News:
Almostgotit’s new washing machine was not available for delivery or even in stock at the warehouse, so she can go back to the store tomorrow and cancel the whole thing and…

More Good News:
… buy a much cheaper one that Consumer Reports recommends. 

Which Almostgotit should have done in the first place.

Image  Paul Denton Cocker

You’ll have to click on the poster to read today’s post.

.

We got it as soon as my husband left graduate school.  What a luxury to wash diapers in my own apartment (and later, house) instead of hauling the stinky things to the grad apts. laundry room!  (we couldn’t afford disposables.)  We’ve had the thing for 18 years and have moved it five times.  Recently it started to leak.  Fortunately it sits on a cement floor that slopes away from the rest of the house, so the only damage has been peeling paint.  Last week I took the photo above to prove that there were cheap and ingenious solutions to  leaking washing machines (3 large sponges strategically placed — Ta Da!) which were  a lot cheaper than buying a new washing machine.

Particularly when it’s a lot more fun to buy new rugs for all the rooms you’re rearranging.  Even if you’re *not* shopping local.  Even if you spend *all* of your recent freelancing income on them and then some.  But look at this one! 

Just $15 on Ebay, and it’s a vintage hand-made wool braided rug, a REAL one made of fabric, not yarn, and did I mention it was just $15? (plus $20 for shipping)??  Others like it cost $100 and up.

But I digress.

The sponges did little to stem the growing river of water that flowed from my washer during every wash.  Nor did the $172 spent on a plumber who reamed out the drain lines.  Yesterday the machine gushed its last, filling the house with the smell of electronic death before going kaput.  Its final words to me were these:

You shouldn’t have bought QUITE so many rugs.

You need a bigger emergency fund.

You probably should have cleaned and otherwise maintained me better.

You will never, ever, EVER get away from the unending toil and irritation of the Laundry in your life.

You know what?  That washing machine always was a bitch.