Limited Mobility

I can't believe I used to take the bus to work, spending countless hours waiting for buses, waiting in traffic, waiting for a transfer, and then getting to my destination hopefully on time. Granted, I still prefer busing over driving, but still... I guess I've been spoiled for the last several years, being able to bike or walk to work and school, and most other places I need to go.

This week, though, I'm stuck taking the bus (which takes about 10 minutes longer to get to work, and today took me 30 minutes longer to get home -- and it wasn't even raining!). My wrists still aren't up to biking par, and I don't want to test them out at a time when I really need them... like for getting to work, or getting home from my midterm tomorrow night. So I'm practicing patience with the buses this week, and will try out some gentle test-biking this weekend when I can walk myself home if my wrists aren't ready yet.

I guess I've always taken my ability to get around by bike for granted, never assuming that there would be a time I wouldn't be able to rely on that type of transportation. When I moved to my current apartment, I was glad that my new house was by a bus line that goes downtown, but figured I'd never have to use it, since it's so easy to bike there. Well, I now have a renewed gratitude for my high degree of personal mobility in my normal, healthy state, and a renewed gratitude for Portland's generally excellent public transportation system... even if I can get there faster by bike. :)

In other news, my stitches are out, and now I just have an oddly-shaped lump on my chin. It's not really visible, but it sure feels strange! It was basically a small chunk of fat that they sewed back into my chin, so it will be interesting to see if the lumpiness subsides as it reincorporates, or if I will have a permanently lumpy chin from now on (go ahead, start making up nicknames). The skin seems to have healed over pretty well, so hopefully the scar won't be too bad, though they say it takes 6 months to a year to really be able to tell.

I will be so happy when I can get on my bike again.

"If you put makeup on your other eye and went downtown, you'd look normal!"

Um, thanks... I think.

In other news, apparently you don't know how much you use your pinky finger until you injure it. Turns out I use mine all the time! It's like a tail, infinitely useful for balance and stability in all sorts of situations (brushing my teeth, taking the milk bottle out of the fridge, holding the camera steady...). I don't think it's broken, but it sure hurts sometimes!

Yesterday was a very sore day, but I'm better now, thanks to a couple of hot baths and a terrific shoulder/neck rub that loosened up some of the major knots. My wrists still aren't happy at all, nor is the aforementioned pinky finger, but I assume my stitches are working and my chin is healing, so that's good. Also, I changed my flight and will be flying to CA today instead of tomorrow - yay! As long as I keep this band-aid on my chin, it should be difficult to over-stuff myself. :P Happy Thanksgiving, everybody!

My First Stitches

My Monday has not gone according to plan. But then, who plans to have another bicyclist pull out in front of them without a glance (and without listening to the mad ringing of one’s bike bell), on a wet and slippery downhill slope, causing one to slam on both brakes and flip head first over the handlebars into the pavement because the back brake is in need of replacement and the front brake caught first? Yes, folks, I just got back from the emergency room about an hour ago with my first ever stitches (not counting the dissolvable ones I got when my wisdom teeth were removed, though the numb-jaw feeling of having been to the dentist is ominously similar). Three of them. In my chin. Black ones. With big knots on the ends. For a week.

The semifinal toll of scrapes and bruises and soreness (I’m sure I’ll find more tomorrow when the shock has worn off): Hole in the chin with flap of fat & skin (thoroughly cleaned and sutured), slightly scraped nose, big lump over the right eyebrow (which threatens to turn purple in a few hours and develop into a beautiful black eye), skinned left knee, small skinned area on the chest (from a snap on my raincoat), badly skinned and sore right pinky finger, really bruised palms (thank goodness for padded bike gloves – no skinned palms!), and pain in both wrists when I turn them (no fractures, though). Tomorrow I expect to add some significant back and neck soreness and overall stiffness to the list. Oh, and a bloodstained white turtleneck (I knew I should have worn red today).

Many thanks go to the two very kind gentlemen who stopped and picked me (and my bike, and all of my stuff) off the ground and took the time to make sure I was okay, to the gentleman who allowed me to borrow his cell phone to “call in injured” to work, and most of all, to Catherine, my coworker who insisted upon driving out to pick me up at my house and take me to the emergency room (and home again), because I was too stubborn to admit I needed medical attention (and, by the time I got myself home (yes, on my bike), not in any condition to seek it). There are some truly wonderful people in this world.

The irony is that I was going to go to the bike shop after work today and get a new set of brakes. Maybe I should get an air horn while I’m at it. The other biker never had a clue what she caused – she just kept right on pedaling and never heard a thing. At least I managed to avoid a collision in which two people would get hurt.

Please, everybody, if you ride a bike, ALWAYS wear your helmet. It may not be able to help you predict the actions of other bikers or avoid accidents, but it can save your head – literally. Oh, and look both ways before pulling out onto a major bike thoroughfare.

I think the anesthetic is beginning to wear off. Time for more ibuprofen.

Photography Lessons

I had my first photography lesson with Mary (John's mom) last night, and came home with a camera on loan to practice! I think she taught me just enough to make me think I know what I'm doing, even though I really don't. But she also lent me a few great books, so I can read up on how the camera works and figure out if I'm doing things right -- because I can't see my pictures as I go along like with a digital camera! :P I am going to be very good and write down the settings I use for each shot, though, so I can go back later when I get the film developed and figure out how I could have improved each one.

Mary also said that her favorite darkroom teacher may be teaching a class close by during the winter quarter, so we may take that together (she uses it more as a workshop, since she already knows how to do most of her own developing, but I would learn a ton). I'm excited! It will be neat to "take photographs" instead of just "shooting pictures."

GRE-Free

Well, all I can really say is, I'm glad that's over!

The fallout (highest score is 800):
Verbal: 650 (I thought I did much better than this, but apparently I didn't)
Quantitative: 690 (not bad for an anthro major!)
Analytical Writing: I'll know in two weeks

It was quite an adventure getting to the testing location. I must say, I am eternally grateful for Portland's network of "Bike Boulevards," complete with signs, distances, and street markings. Unfortunately, the best bike directions in the world don't do anything about the fact that it's raining outside, so I sat my test completely soaked (and progressively colder, with the fan from the computer blowing directly onto my hands), and then, when my jeans had almost dried to merely damp, I got on my bike to go home. I had to wring out my jeans when I got home, and it will probably take my raincoat all weekend to dry. But I'm nice and toasty warm now, no harm done. :)

Hooray for not having to take the GRE again! (At least, not for another 5 years or however long the scores last....).

Overheard/seen in Portland

A man and a woman are walking down the street, arguing. The man steps off the sidewalk into an alcove doorway and stands facing the door while the woman walks on. After continuing to walk and rant for a few steps, the woman notices that she has lost her companion. She stops, turns around to look for him, and, when she sees him, asks, "What are you doing there?"

His response (still facing the door): "I'm hiding."

I walked past them at this point and did not catch any more, but somehow I don't think it worked. :}

Innovate or Die

I just found out about the Innovate or Die Pedal-Powered Machine Contest. It makes me wish I knew how to do things with batteries and electronics so I could design something cool. I particularly like the pedal-powered washing machine (watch the video below). The contest runs September 19 - December 15, and I'm rather surprised there haven't been more entries so far. It would be awesome if this could become something as well-known and popular as solar car competitions. But this is only the first one, so hopefully it will catch on quickly. :)

If I could build a pedal-powered machine, it would probably be a small oven so I could bake cookies by pedal power. :) What would you build?

~~~ The "Green Machine" pedal-powered washing machine:

Don't tell my co-workers...

… But I’m quitting my job in January. I’ve been thinking about it for a while, and mentioned it to a few people when I was down in CA last weekend, but I hadn’t realized that I had actually made the decision until I noticed things like this happening all week:

- My co-worker told me that she had heard that, in January, she and the rest of the team would finally get to move their offices up to the hill to join us in the Career Center (they’re currently about a mile away, which gets frustrating). My outward response: “That’s fantastic! It will be so great to have the whole team together at last!” My inward addition: “But, really, I don’t actually care all that much, because I won’t be here anymore.”

- We just got a new manager, and she has set up a half-day team strategic planning meeting for next week. In the midst of trying to prepare for it, all I can think of is, should I tell her before the meeting that I’m leaving so that we can use the time to develop a plan for hiring and training a replacement, or should I wait until afterward so the meeting isn’t awkward with everybody knowing I’m walking out on them?

So, I guess my mind has made itself up without me for once. :P The plan is to (at some point, probably soon) tell my boss and my co-workers, so that we can put out the job announcement and go through the interviewing process, hopefully in time to hire somebody about a week before I leave for my Christmas and Harmony vacation. I can train the person, then go on vacation and leave him/her at the office. Then I’ll come back from vacation for a week or so to answer all the questions that came up and tie up any loose ends (and make sure I get paid for that vacation time!), and then I’ll be out of there! (Side note: Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely love the people that I work with, and I will be honestly sorry to leave them behind. But the job’s not right for me, so I will be glad to get out of there!)

What am I going to do after I leave my job, you ask? Well, for starters, I’m going to get back on a decent sleep schedule. Then I’m going to start doing all of the things that need to get done but that I’ve been too busy with work to do, and then move on to all the other things that I want to get done but that I’ve been too busy with work to do. Things like volunteering, taking guitar lessons, doing yoga, exploring Portland on my bike, going to community events and lectures and meetings, and just participating more fully in my life in general. Because work isn't my life, and my life isn't work. Yes, I’ll have to find a way to make some money in there somehow, but honestly, I’m really not worried about that at this point. I think I am finally trusting that that part will flow easily into the rest of my life once I get a few other things figured out. (Hallelujah for that! It makes moving forward so much easier.) I just need some time to relax, to explore, to figure out who I am and how I fit into this world, how I can contribute to making it a better place while being true to myself.

So, there you have it. But, shhhh! My co-workers don’t know yet…