Weekly Dose of Ann

"History was made this week! For the first time in four election cycles, Democrats are not attacking the Diebold Corp. the day after the election, accusing it of rigging its voting machines. I guess Diebold has finally been vindicated."

If My Apartment Allowed Dogs

I would be down to the Humane Society for this dog so fast it'd make your head spin. This is exactly the kind of dog I'm looking for, a German Shepard/Lab Retriever mix.

And Then, Predictably, It All Hit the Fan

Our marketing project has run into some pretty crazy difficulties. A combination of slightly flawed strategy and bad implementation is threatening to kill the entire endeavor. I had been hoping for a kind of slow end to the week, but it looks like that's not going to be the case. We've got some last-minute insanity to take care of because everything has to be done by Tuesday, and our final presentation for the client is on the 21st. There goes my weekend. Again.

On a different note, all I can think about lately is how bad I want to adopt a dog from the humane society or something. I keep searching the classifieds on cragislist for those "free to a good home" types of ads. There are lots of them, actually. Do you ever do that? Search for stuff online that you can't have but imagine that you could anyway? I do that with cars all the time, and now I'm doing it with puppies. How sad. I guess what's really sad is that if my apartment allowed dogs I would probably have already adopted one by now. Why do I want a dog so bad?

Honors Devils Retreat

Retreat was an awesome time, with many hours spent around the roaring campfire and lots of laughing and storytelling. I am way too tired to write about it now but maybe I'll make a little iMovie about it later and post that.

Back into the grind tomorrow. Thank God in 18 days I'll be in Seattle.

jump into my nightmare - the water's warm!

It's that time of the semester where, instead of ebbing and flowing normally throughout the week, everything starts to hit the fan all at once, so it becomes difficult to even catch up, let alone actually get ahead. Like I said, I'm oddly unstressed this semester, but I am bored. And tired of school.

This weekend is the Honors Devils retreat, which I think will be a good time. But its timing isn't fantastic, since I have a test next week and I haven't even finished all the chapters yet. Not to mention that I'm behind in Finance and Legal Studies. And Supply Chain. And Management.

To add to my misery, I went in to pay my citation today (yes, I got a ticket. To make a long story short, don't ever take glass bottles into a public park). To my utter shock, the ticket cost an outrageous $250. I don't think speeding tickets even cost that much. I would have fought it but - to make another long story short - I would definitely have lost. So while the punch hurts, it's probably the best solution.

I tried to do some studying today but I just don't have the jam anymore. I'm tired, I'm bored, and I'm just plain frustrated with life's monotony right now. There are very few things going well (actually I can't think of one that is). My grades aren't stellar and I'm having a tough time just staying on top of everything. I'm starting to severely question the wisdom in taking 25 credit hours next semester.

Often when I talk to people about stuff like this they tell me, "Well, that's just the way life is. It's crazy sometimes." And you know what? I think that's bull. I think life is only as crazy as you choose to make it, and it just so happens that our society loves running at the speed of light and not taking time out to actually enjoy life anymore. And I for one have decided this is not my bandwagon. I want off. We all look down on those "crazies" who live out on communes in the wilderness or those tribes in Africa that are living in what we think is the stone age - but have you ever thought that maybe we're the crazy ones? E-mail, cell phones, computers, deadlines, meetings - they're great things, but who really needs them? I swear, sometimes I think the Amish are on to something.

The only thing keeping me alive right now is the knowledge that in just under 3 weeks I get to go home to Seattle for the short respite that will be Thanksgiving. All I can say is that it's going to be one heckuva relief to get on the plane, stick my iPod in my ear, and just sit back and leave godforsaken Phoenix behind for four days. Good riddance.

My Super Spoiled Sixteen

After coming back from my run today, as is my custom, I flipped on the TV and sat down on the floor to watch some tube while my body returned to equilibrium. Today I happened upon a show on MTV called "My Super Sweet Sixteen" which is essentially this reality TV series where they film the birthday parties that these really, really, really, really rich girls have thrown for themselves. I witnessed:

1. The booking of a $25,000 rapper to perform for the party.
2. The delivering of invitations to guests by a hired performer dressed as a French maid (party theme was French) using the girl's personal driver (by the way, it's a Bentley).
3. The booking of a troupe of circus performers to perform at the party at a cost of $3,000 each.
4. The surverying of the venue (ballroom at the Four Seasons Hotel) and the girl's hissy fit when management informed her that the circus performers would not be able to dangle on hooks from the ceiling because it wasn't designed for that purpose.
5. The girl buying - and DECIDING on - dresses for her two best friends to wear for the party (they had to look "better than all the other guests.") Total cost for this shopping trip: $3,890.
6. The hiring of "hott" models who would escort the birthday girl into the ballroom at the venue for her "entrance." Applicants were required to "show me your abs" and were rated on a sexy scale.
7. The guests of honor being brought to the party at the hotel in a huge, silver tour/party bus.
8. The girl picking out her mother's jewelry to wear to the party, including a 9 carat diamond ring. Actual quote, I kid you not: "When I finish putting on all this jewelry I'll be worth well over $1 million . . . *giggle* but I'm worth it!"
9. The presentation of the birthday present from her parents during the party: a brand-new 2007 BMW 330xi. The car cost $49,000. The girl went ballistic and exclaimed breathlessly to the camera, "I love my parents! . . . and I love showing off for everyone!"

Total cost for JUST the party: $200,000
Including the car, the cost of this girl's birthday party was well over a quarter million dollars.

Meanwhile, that same night, statistics tell us that a 16-year-old girl somewhere in the world died of starvation or disease on her birthday.

In the name of all that is holy, how can anyone justify that kind of reckless, excessive self-indulgence?

Bigot of the Day

"Radical Chrisitianity is just as threatening as radical Islam in this country."
-Rosie O' Donnell today on The View