Government Gets My Bonus

$570 bonus minus Fed Withholding minus Fed MED/EE minus Fed OASDI/EE = $384 bonus. SWEET.

And you ask, am I FOR redistribution of wealth? Hell no.

We hear stories about wealthy people trying to get out of paying taxes and whatnot, I can't say that I blame them. I look at a bonus check like that and I feel like throwing up. If I had a check for $500,000 that was taxed at the rate I'm taxed now, I'd consider it too. Oh, I'm so greedy, right? Right. I work. I went to eight years of school for that modest bonus (not that I'm complaining, ANY bonus is awesome, but the fact that the government takes their enormous share is what's unsettling). I'm paying back student loans that I will most likely carry with me for twenty years or more. I did the leg work and found the job -- the government didn't GIVE me my job. So the problem here is that I am being punished for trying hard, while people who don't seem to try at all are being coddled and pampered and certain presidential candidates are promising to CODDLE them MORE.

Here's the kicker. If I really get my shit together and hustle and somehow manage to increase my earnings, this type of proposed tax system will take MORE from me and give it to the poor. That's a real great incentive.

CNN Is the Devil

I'm wondering who, besides me, sits in their cubicles and reads the news. From time to time I do, and some days I get so DEPRESSED that I want to die.

This has led me to the conclusion that the news is the devil. Once upon a time I wrote about the devil room in the house Stoker and I bought -- which we converted to a harvest yellow in an attempt to overcome its natural gloom. So, I'm very familiar with the devil. The devil likes things to be black and dark and depressing. The devil room was black and dark and depressing . . . and it sucked the light out of the world. It took grueling hours of work to exorcise the demon and make the room livable and friendly and . . . yellow. Honestly? I wish the room wasn't yellow now. I'm probably going to have to go back and paint it again. Maybe a nice, flat black.

Anyway, the point is, I was sitting here, depressed as hell, when it dawned on me that the news is the devil, and I wanted to share this revelation with the masses, not that they'll listen, because . . . well, they're the masses and I'm not Bono or Oprah. And I guess it depends on your definition of devil. Mine is this: the devil ruins my life; the devil makes me want to give up; the devil robs me of hope; the devil makes me do my worst because I'm no good anyway.

Sound familiar? It sounds like a chant. Like I'm writing terrible lyrics to a heavy metal riff. Maybe that's why it sounds familiar. In any case, why do I read the news? I've been learning to cope with the daily onslaught of horrors, but some days they're just too terrible. Like today. Here's a sampling of stuff I read: babies in China dying because of poisoned formula; man on trial for brutally beating his ex-girlfriends' cat to death; woman still searching for her husband who disappeared over a year ago in Iran; Finnish guy murdering college students; E! online writing "obvi" to mean "obviously" (you can see why this one is so upsetting).

Ok, I don't mean to contribute by sharing the horrors myself. But I must be a masochist because I keep going back. And if I was more of an optimist, maybe I'd see more hope in those stories, hope for man's redemption or something, that there is still goodness in people, that they're all trying, they're all doing the best they can, that sometimes good people just get misled. The news doesn't cover that part of the story, and why would they? Sensationalism is what sells, right?

These days journalists suck. They have twenty seconds to pump out a story and thus their writing is awful and the stories are chopped up to fit the sensational tripe that attracts viewers. They have no pride in their stories. It's a news-mill. So what we end up with is a skewed perspective of the world and how it's doing. It feels like hell out there if we listen to the media, but it is it really any different than it's ever been?

At first I was sort of joking about calling the news the devil. I thought it would be funny to sound very fundamental, like an I-live-in-a-compound-with-my-religious-compatriots zealot that the news LOVES to crucify. I don't. That is to say, I obviously read the news and participate in the machinery of our great over-newsed society and so I'm clearly not one of THEM. I'm a news junkie. It's in my blood, I need a fix often, I've fallen prey to the CNN drug cartel. I can't believe this crap is legal. And now I realize I'm right. The news IS the devil.




Quite honestly, I do believe in a fallen angel named, variously, Lucifer, Beelzebub, Satan, Mephistopheles, Ned Flanders, etc. I think it's important to remember the things unseen that have the power to sway us, including the Internet. Can you see it? No! You see a manifestation of it, this page for example, is not real. It's ephemeral. You would not be able to touch it if you tried. It's unreal, yet its effects on you are real. Right now you may be livid with rage that someone might suggest that there is such thing as a fallen angel or that the news does more negative than positive in our society because you worship at the altar of the holy fount of CNN. Proving my point, this page is nothing. It's an idea, and yet it has the power to influence you. The most real and powerful things in our world are the unreal, the unseen. Think about it. (Yes, yes, so true, I am a genius philosopher.)

Doomsday in the Office

Well today is doomsday for me. I have a meeting at one o'clock where I will supposedly find out what will be happening with the project I've been working on. About two months ago the manager of my department called us to a meeting out of the blue and told us we'd be putting everything on hold for sixty days while they determined what our future would be.

It was one of those moments of exquisite alertness. Prior to the sudden meeting, we had all just read the president's quarterly report. It was full of awful metaphors about the workplace being like a dance and other terrible pop culture references to things like reality shows. On the one side we're congratulated for being so fruitful and making loads of money and meeting goals, and on the other side he slaps us across the face with a 2x4 for not making MORE than the goal.

And then out of nowhere, in this report, he mentions my unit and says there's room for improvement with us.

And so we were all talking about that and fretting sarcastically that we were about to get the axe as we walked to the meeting -- because why would he even mention my unit if it wasn't some kind of corporate foreshadowing? And one person* brought up the incredibly funny stuff from Arrested Development about Black Fridays, and how George Bluth had everyone take their computers out to a moving truck, telling them they were going to be getting new computers, only to close the door of the truck once the old machines were in and tell everyone they're fired. Hilarious.

Office humor is the best, except for when it's your reality. We joked about getting the axe and then the manager of my unit told us, her face grim and unreadable, that they were putting a hold on all new contracts and other stuff. I was listening mostly to my breath and how quiet it was. Noticing how everything froze and instead of feeling upset, I felt this horrifying calm. I was shocked. I've never been so aware of how my chest rises and falls with each breath. I was suddenly aware of the sickening sound of the white noise they pump into the office.

I don't even remember a time when I imagined my life would be part of a corporation. I never did. I never knew what it meant. I never understood that my mom and dad would leave for work and sit in cubicles or offices and tap at keyboards and make up ideas and design things and get paid and get benefits, all to come home at night and feel a measure of security.

It makes sense to think of the farmer out in the fields, tilling and planting and hoeing and harvesting. It makes sense to think of a man herding sheep and tending them for their wool and feeding them grass and hay and caring about the weather because it affects his livelihood in a way much more urgent than whether or not he'll need an umbrella to keep the rain off his business attire. Those things, farming, herding, taking care of animals because you both benefit, those are intrinsic. They've been a part of our identities far longer than the cubicle and concrete.

When man relied on Nature to provide rain for his crops and sunshine and good health for his animals, it inspired reverence in him for the power of the unseen. There was spiritual potential for him because there were forces beyond the realm of man at work. People took part in the role of creation and something spiritual went on.

The office life is dead. We work in cold hard spaces with cold hard machines and it makes us cold and hard inside. Doesn't it feel that way sometimes?

Anyway, I know I'm romanticizing the things of the past. I know there were probably lots of lonely farmers in the world who really wished to buy a suit and go to Wall Street and sell their souls for wealth. I'm just really bitter for feeling like my future is possibly in the hands of someone who doesn't know its worth.



*Me.

Smaller Than Life

If I really think about it, I can't believe how small my life is. And I'm getting old, but I don't feel older. I still feel like this little kid whose big dreams keep her moving forward.

It's weird. I come to work every day and I sit here being real small and unimportant. Some days I have a lot of work to do and other days, like the past few weeks, I have nothing to work on. So I sit here and try to make sense of all this free time. Stoker teases me about it and we both get a kick out of how this tiny cubicle in the basement of this ugly building has nurtured my antisocial behavior. And by antisocial, I don't mean that I'm a nutcase. Although one could argue that that's what it is.

I research things on the web that I'm curious about and I check out Phd programs and I pine for all the things I secretly want but haven't the courage to go for. If I were a hustler like Stoker (and by hustler I mean a go-getter, nothing to do with the seedy magazine. Curse them for ruining a perfectly good word), I'd be generating an income in this free time. I'd be writing magazine articles and pitching ideas to magazines and publications all over the place.

But I'm an indecisive, over-analytical sort of person who pines away but never does anything. I mean, I do some things. But I don't do the right things. And I never make my mind up about anything pertinent. Because I'm so afraid of making the wrong choice, I never make any choice. It's pathetic.

And so my life is small. And it always will be. I'll always be smaller than life. And if you met me, you'd see that it shouldn't be like that, because I don't seem like a smaller than life type. I seem like I should conquer nations and manipulate political powers. Yeah, that's how I seem. Trust me.

I realize that all this is a total contradiction of my previous post. But if you knew me like, say, Stoker does, you'd see how it fits. It does. Believe me.

How to Recognize the Creep in Yourself

If you feel like you're being creepy, chances are you're probably being perceived as creepy. What gets me is how many guys are being creepy as viewed from a female perspective. Well, at least my perspective.

Scenario: You're just a girl standing in line at the gas station, waiting to pay for your 32 ounce Dr. Pepper, a cream cheese Danish (a healthy lunch), and some gas. You're wearing your favorite t-shirt, a carry over from your past life when you actually DID rock climb and suddenly, out of the blue, a creepy, forty-something guy starts talking to you. He wants to know what Pusher is (as though drug dealers are going to shrug off the law and simply advertise their profession, unintimidated, recognizing the "it was a joke" potential). At the same time that Mr. Creepy is trying to strike up a conversation, the gas station attendant is also asking you what pump you're on. You finally get the chance to tell Mr. Creepy that it's a climbing company. He wants to know if you climb, you say yes (even though you don't, not really, anymore). He leaves.

You're a girl, do you find that creepy or just friendly?

Scenario: You're just a girl at a gas station. You're perusing the drink selection, trying to overcome the temptation of the fountain drink Dr. Pepper. Green tea? Yes, no? A young, twenty-something guy who looks obviously indie and totally harmless smiles at you. He's looking at the drinks too. You're friendly, you smile back, pick a drink, pay, and leave. You're out the door heading for your truck when you hear a voice behind you. It's the indie boy. You're wondering what the hell this could be. He asks you where you're headed, you say back to work (duh). He asks if it's by the West End area and you say no, it's in the opposite direction. Aw dang, he says, he needed a ride back to his car. You say sorry and good luck, and leave.

Creepy? I mean, just because he's not forty something and gross doesn't mean he's an angel, right? Would you give him a ride?

Scenario: You're at a local coffee shop (not a chain; shhh, it's important to the story) and you're buying some interesting drink like a Tazo plum juice or the like. It's your turn, you're paying. A sixty-something man standing behind you suddenly asks you out of the blue if you're a tourist. You're trying to pay attention to the cashier, but you look at him and say, "No." Then he asks if you're an artist. You say, "No," again. What is this anyway? He points to the Cash button on your bag and says, "I was just wondering because I saw the button." It's not making any sense to you. Only tourists like Johnny Cash? Hmmm.

In any case, creepy? As you walked back to your car would you check over your shoulder to see if he was following you?

Scenario: You're at work, heading back to the cubicle in your dungeon. A forty-something guy you have presumed to be a maintenance worker (he carries a radio and a lot of keys) sees you and starts talking to you. He tells you that you're hard to find and that he's been looking for you for a while. He says he's got it narrowed down and then he says you're first name must be "_______" [insert your name here, remember, it's got to be a girls' name]. You laugh uncomfortably*. Not knowing how to avoid this maintenance worker, you retreat to your cubicle, hoping he'll let you go. But along the way he says he's narrowed it down to a few cubicles. When you get to your cubicle you try to hide inside. He doesn't recognize any of the signs and he obviously doesn't care about the ring on your finger. Nor does he care that one time he actually happened to be at the same restaurant as you and your husband. He makes small talk, and you're polite because you're a polite person. After a few minutes of completely awkward conversation, he tells you that if you ever need new shelves in your cubicle, or hangers, anything, just to page him. Then he makes sure you write down his pager number and he leans in as if to show you the pager but you can't shake the impression that he's trying to get a whiff of your hair. He says you can call from any phone, not just your work phone.

Creepy? You decide.

The point is, men can be creepy and they need to be aware of it. It doesn't matter how attractive or wealthy, if you strike up conversation with a complete stranger, I call it creepy. Especially if you're asking for something like a ride. Women are ever aware of the physical advantage men have over them and if you don't want to be thought of as a creep, you need to be sensitive to that. I'm not saying to never approach a woman. I'm advising that you try to imagine the situation from her perspective and recognize where she, as a woman, might be coming from. Because you, as a man, have the physical advantage.

I don't speak for all women. Just this one and a couple others who put me up to it.




*All men need to learn to recognize the uncomfortable, this-is-awkward-you're-creepy laugh. It would do them good.

Run: Don't be Veal

I started running again in January. It's been an on again/off again love affair for me ever since I was a child. As a child I just ran for the hell of it. You know, like kids do. They'll run over to their friend's house and then back home, just because running is how you get places when you're a kid. It kills me.

On my daily runs I go past a YMCA and there's often an AYSO soccer game going on. I look at the kids and think, "Oh man, those were the days," because I used to be in AYSO. And they probably look at me and think, "Why the hell is that lady running like that?" The kids these days swear a lot. And yes, I'm at the age where kids call me lady. As in "old lady ____" who runs the amusement park and tried to scare everyone away by rigging sheet-ghosts on the carousel.

The kids wonder why I'm running because they run as a matter of nature. They don't understand that when you get old, your body is heavier and running is harder. Life gets harder too and often a body sits more than it walks or runs. We grow from children who die for the chance to go outside in the hot weather to play on the Big Toy or get a game of kickball going, to adults who sit like veal in cages in air-conditioned office buildings. And while some of us get to look out windows, others of us only have Office Windows and Explorer as our links to the outside world. We feel our muscles growing soft and fatty (did you know your body can store fat in your muscles and organs if you're too inactive?), we look at our once muscular, shapely legs and see the pock-marks of blubber cells beneath the surface, and wonder, "Why have I let this happen?"

And that's part of the reason this old lady runs. When I was twenty-two and a junior in college, I ran out of fear that if I didn't, I'd gain that freshman twenty (or is it sophomore twenty?) everyone talked about. I didn't really gain anything until I was twenty-six and an entry-level copy writer. See? I had become veal. Something I had gone to great lengths (three years of graduate school) to avoid.

Inevitably I landed in a cubicle. And my legs grew soft and my stomach became flabby. No matter what I did, that 32 ounce Dr. Pepper every morning took its toll. I guess you can't drink 600 calories every day at a sedentary job, and only exercise three days a week after work and expect to keep the lean, trim figure you had during college. During college I walked everywhere, sometimes up Old Main hill twice a day. It was rough.

So, I'm running again. At first it sucked. At first my legs felt like cement blocks, they screamed with every step, and a mile was like murder. I felt like a fraud, like, "What the hell, who am I kidding? This isn't me anymore." But now it is. It's better. Sometimes I think I could run forever, on days when the humidity isn't a beast and the sun isn't a wench. Even then, once I get into it, four miles doesn't feel like too much for my basic run.

I've just challenged a bunch of people to beat me to 150 miles*. I'm no ultra-marathoner, but I kind of hope to be someday. I didn't get into the St. George marathon, but maybe I'll still be able to run it, and from there I have some other Everests to conquer.


p.s. Don't EAT veal, either.


*Anyone who wants to JOIN THIS CHALLENGE, let me know. It starts May 15th. The catch is you have to do it through the Nike+ ipod feature. So, get a Nano or something, buy the Nike+ sensor, and start running! The winner gets $100 on me.

Cubicle to the Rescue

For some reason, Stoker let me leave this morning wearing brown corduroy pants, black shoes, AND cream colored socks. The socks wouldn't be so bad if I had my brown shoes on, the shoes I meant to wear, but as I was picking them, he distracted me with a work-story and I didn't realize what I was doing. Obviously he didn't either. As it is, I look like I'm trying to make some statement about the '80s. It's terrible. I feel horribly awkward.

Did I mention the pants aren't quite floods, but they hike up a little when I sit down? It wouldn't be so bad if my socks weren't in such contrast with the pants and shoes.

Luckily, I can hide in my cubicle for most of the day.

Blessed Brown Bananas

I have two extremely ripe bananas on my desk. I’m considering eating one. Mostly because with each second that passes, the yellow fades to brown. They look diseased and I’d say that if I don’t eat both of them pronto, my entire cubicle (a.k.a. cage) will begin to smell like a banana boat stuck in the doldrums.

Once, I actually found a bunch of black, shriveled bananas behind my computer monitor. Someone from my department had hidden them. I accused just about everybody and no one would admit to the crime. So now I look upon everyone with suspicion. And instead of getting a fresh bunch to put behind someone else’s computer monitor, I took the shriveled ones and hid them in my neighbor’s cubicle. Apparently I work with a bunch of jokers here and I’m just not joker material (if I was, I would have realized a shriveled bunch of bananas wouldn’t achieve the proper sense of hilarity. Then I would have stolen a fresh bunch from the break room on Monday morning to hide in a coworker’s cubicle). If you’ve read any of my previous posts, you’ll remember that no one gets my sense of humor, anyway.

So. The bananas. I don’t even really like them. But they were going bad in my mother’s pantry and I felt like it would be criminal to just to let them waste away like that in defeat of the banana’s higher calling, which is to feed me and provide me with sustenance. Blessed sustenance. So I brought two of them to work.

There’s also an apple on my desk. It’s been there since last week. I like bananas more than apples. But as you can see, I prefer pineapple. And I mean that. As far as I’m concerned, cottage cheese (of the low-fat variety) and pineapple is the breakfast of the gods. When I say gods, I mean Zeus and that lot of Greek gods who reside on gorgeous Mount Olympus, which I happen to have a great view of right outside my office window. I’m not kidding, either. Currently Olympus has a few feathery clouds crowding around it and has received a light dusting of snow. It’s been raining down here in the valley of the mortals and so I guess right now, we’ve got it better than the gods because at least it’s not snowing.

I keep eyeing the bananas. Like they’re my enemy. Like the smell is bothering me. Like I wish I hadn’t brought them to work because if I don’t eat them, I’ll feel enormously guilty. If you know me at all, you’ll know I have a deeply ingrained sense of guilt. I feel guilt for everything. For feeling annoyed at traffic. For not eating all my food at restaurants. For not recycling. For driving a car instead of riding my bike to work. For not wanting to eat the bananas. If only this guilt were balanced by an equally congratulatory feeling when I do something great, like eating a healthy dinner instead of a cheeseburger at the Dairy Queen, like when I refrain from flipping another driver off, or for recycling the rejected papers from the office printer instead of lazily throwing them in my own personal trash can. If only.

So. I’ll let you know how the bananas go down. And in case you’re wondering, the pineapple and cottage cheese this morning was divine, as was the sun momentarily shining through the clouds as it rose over blessed Mount Olympus.


p.s. My sister just came into my cubicle and asked me, as she pointed in disgust at the bananas, “You’re not going to eat those, are you?”

4th Floor Windows

I wish I could open my window and ask the window/building cleaners (yes, they're actually cleaning the building too, washing the red brick and everything) if they could please do my window again. They cleaned it yesterday. And for some reason, today they did the windows ABOVE it. The cleaning fluid has coated my window and now it's like looking out from inside a bottle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Greasy.

I can see them out there now. I wonder if they know sign language...

Sense of Humor: Some people have it....

Nobody at work gets my sense of humor. I’ve puzzled about this for some time and have decided that the only explanation is that its so cryptic and developed (and also that I’m so intelligent). Or it might be that I mainly sit in my cubicle and refrain, for the most part, from talking to anyone for longer than one minute. In the space of one minute, how could there be any time to discuss anything other than the weather? Unlike farmers, though, the weather is less consequential to corporate business types like my co-workers and me. Co-workers schmo-workers. We’re hardly co-anything, me just recently 27 and most of them 35+. So anyway, I guess there are several reasons no one gets my delightfully sarcastic sense of humor, age being one of them. Here’s an example of how I fail miserably to connect with them:


Returning from lunch, Linda* passes me on her way out of our boss’s office. And she says over her shoulder what is mostly likely intended for our boss, but could have very well been directed at me since we’re facing each other and even make direct eye-contact, “Alright, good work!”

To which I reply, “Thank you.” She breezes by in her usual efficient, brisk walk. She says nothing. In fact, I almost think not a soul has noticed my casual wittiness until I hear Bob shout from his office.

“She was talking to me!” And this is followed by small, inconsequential half-banter, with me delivering the entire half of the banter.


But you see, this is how it always is. I might mutter a smart remark from within the confines of my cubicle and everyone around me largely ignores it. Five or six other people surround me, all within earshot, and I can’t even banter with them. In any other environment, my tongue-in-cheek ‘thank-you’ would have gotten a round of applause, followed by a snide-remark in return. I.E.:


“Alright, good work!” Said over the shoulder, obviously meant for someone else.

“Thank you.” Followed by much laughter.

“Ha, good work. Work is like the f-word to you, something you’ve never done.” Followed by more laughter, and this is obviously my fantasy job as a construction worker** since nobody here EVER says the f-word (or maybe they do, just not around me).

Taking off my white glove (you didn't realize I was wearing gloves, did you), I reply by inserting a recently materialized brick into the glove, and then proceed to slap my co-worker's face several times with the brick-heavy glove, in manner of Yosemite Sam and Bugs Bunny. When I'm done, I shake the brick-remains out into a small pile at my feet. . . .


But, you get the idea.

And actually, I did have a job like this. The cd store in Logan. Graywhale. Where everything was always a joke and I was teased over everything, from my secret love for pop music to being a lesbian (which I’m not, but that didn’t stop my male co-workers. They were all male and fantasists). And actually, if I think about it a lot and am honest, I prefer the job where no one gets my sense of humor and there’s a thin pretense of respecting each other. I prefer that over the job where everything’s a joke.

But seriously. Can’t there be an in-between? If there is, sign me up.

Tomorrow,"10 things the bathroom at work is NOT intended for."



*Obviously names have been changed to protect me from losing my job over writing blog entries about work.
**Construction worker?

Old and Fat

So, I'll admit it. I've been feeling old. I've been struggling with the changes in my mental perspective (I'm more cynical and jaded than I used to be) and with my body (I've been sitting at a desk since August, drinking Coke non-stop). For 8 years I walked to school and walked around school and climbed billions of stairs and went on epic walks with lovers and friends. The last epic walk I went on was in September, with Stoker, who stoked my fire with his walking endurance and conversation. Now I hope to go on many epic walks with him, but in the meantime, Coke and sedentary 8-hour days have replaced the 8 years of being the walking woman. Finally, I know what love handles are -- intimate knowledge I could have gone 80 years without (okay, enough of the clever 8 thing). Love handles I lovingly refer to as bastards. My preferred term for anything and everything from bastard-drivers cutting me off in traffic, to the collective bastards otherwise known as The Media -- that nameless entity with enough cultural-capital to make Solomon blush.

So anyway, I've been feeling old and fat. Even though I'm not actually fat. I know. I just feel fat (last I checked I weighed 125, at 5'5). I sit around most of the day and have to take breaks to go down the stairs and then back up just to get some daily exercise. I try to work out 3 times a week, but often only get to it twice. I used to be lean. I rock climbed indoors and outdoors regularly. I used to be more athletic and tough.

About a month or so ago, my mom teased me (lovingly. An observation, not a criticism) that I'm turning into a woman. My butt is getting rounder, she said. I scorned that phrase, turning into a woman. I sneered in derision, after my shoulders slumped in defeat. I don't want to be a "woman." I want to be a girl. I've been just a girl for so long. Small. Petite. I've liked that a lot. Enjoyed being what I was. It's not about the type and development of my reproductive system. That's not what I'm protesting. I'm protesting this bastard-sedentary lifestyle that's turning the Coke calories into potential energy (and good luck ever tapping that energy), instead of beautiful kinetic energy. I want to be free and moving, liberated, for 8 hours a day*. Not kept in a cage nicknamed a "cubicle," sort of trapped. Sure, the money sets me free in another way and it's great to have it, but sometimes I feel the boundaries pressing in on me. I see the results in the flab on my once beautiful six-packed stomach.

The real point of all this was to share something I found in Utah Health magazine, under the title of "Celebrate the blessings of age." Ironically, the facing page was an advertisement for plastic/cosmetic surgery (for the following areas: breast enlargement, eyelid rejuvenation, facelift, forehead lift, tummy tuck, botox injections, collagen for your thin, lifeless lips, and collagen for facial lines and creases. "You can choose to perfect and refine whatever is making you feel self-conscious or unhappy."). A very well-placed ad, reinforcing the blessing of age.

The quote, for all you bitter, jaded 26+ers like me (my comments in brackets):

"Who says you can only bloom once in life? With each advancing year a whole new life opens before you. Recognize it and enjoy it. With age comes an inner, higher life and sense of purpose. You may try by starting each day with 60-seconds of self-apprecation [I'm smart enough]. Try standing in front of your mirror [I'm good enough]. Smile. Like yourself [And doggone it, people like me]. Examine each wrinkle, smile line, spot and dot [cancerous and non-cancerous] on your face, and see them as marks of wisdom, happiness, [not wearing sunblock] and a life richly lived. Also, release your inner child today. Do something playful [but not criminal]. Try on clothes you'd never wear in public [but don't go OUT in them.] Experiment with makeup [or just forget about makeup altogether]. Sing your favorite tune loudly in the shower. Go for a long bike ride. Go for it."


There it is. I actually like it, even though it seems like I'm making fun of it. Now, go for a long bike ride.


*Here's another contention: what bastard decided we, the American people, should work 8 hours of our day? We only have 24, and 8 of that should be spent sleeping. So thanks, thanks a lot for that measly 8 I'm left with, which isn't really 8 since 1 should be spent at lunch. And if you commute, about 1-2 are spent driving. Does that leave us enough time for nuturing our families and other relationships? 5 to 6 hours to do anything else. I'm proposing a swift change: 6 hours should be considered the new full time. Thank you very much.