Wacky lady and other observations

Riding the Metro the other day, to get to work, I was sitting in the handicap seats (hello I have a cast on my foot, oh yay did I mention I broke a bone in my left foot). This lady gets on the train and stands immediately right in front of me, facing me - though there was space to stand in the middle of train. If I had stood up this lady and I would have been kissing! Has she never heard of personal space? Sheesh!

Why John Edwards? Because I voted for him in 2004 (primaries), LOVE that he has apologized for voting for the war (owing up to his mistakes), pro-union, working for universal health care, pro-choice, not a religious fanatic, intelligent, funny, and in my opinion the best bet to win the nation-wide election.

Commuting to Richmond (two hours away from DC) on Tuesdays and Thursday's for class - why are people such stupid drivers? IQ testing as part of the driving certificate now!!

Speaking of class....I'm not enjoying some of my classmates - the course is taught in the Socrates method (question & response, not lectures). A few of the students, who work in finance (ahem unfair advantage) are always dropping acroynms and instead of being supportive, work to tear down those of us who don't understand. I HATE BEING MADE TO FEEL INFERIOR - f&$# you I say to those classmates, I'm not dumb I just don't do math that fast, super you're great at math, but you're probably crap at something else.

It's interesting, I went to P-'s wedding this past weekend. He and I had never met, only communicating via email. I was nervous to see him in person, what if it was akward, what if we had nothing to say once face to face? But no way!! - it was like we had been friends since childhood! I had a blast at his big day, will write more later.

Why do the same people who shop Wal-Mart (as Molly Malone says beating the crap out of their kid in the housecleaner's aisle) also fly Southwest? When did air travel go from glamorous to common?

Why is Elizabeth Hasselbeck a Republican? She's a young Anglo-Saxen Protestant, affluent, happily married with lots of opportunities in life handed to her without struggle - wait I just answered my question. PS I have no sympathy for her - because she supports a party that if you can't give empathy to your fellow human beings you can't expect it in return.

Pirates Three - better than Two but not as good as One, bittersweet ending.

Memorial Day

Dear Madam,

I have been shown in the files of the War Department.... that you are the mother of five sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle. I feel how weak and fruitless must be any words of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering to you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the Republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement, and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours, to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of Freedom. Yours, very sincerely and respectfully,
Abraham Lincoln

For my friends Melissa and Angela, whose husbands are serving in Iraq right now, and all the families, friends and relatives who now and in the past have given so much when asked by their country and its leaders....a rememberance and thank you on this Memorial Day, 2007.

Book Selection

Thanks so very much to everyone for their kind well wishes and congrad's on my summer gig, you guys are the bee's knees!!!!

I have to give a shout out to JoeinVegas, behind the scenes he was working to try to get me an internship out in Vegas with the hotel industry, a thousand thank-you's Joe, like I said before, above and beyond the call of blog friend duty - and as MizBohemia says, the good karma you put out will most definitely come back to you!

oh, I have to let everyone know I'm taking a summer course and its killer with lots of work (cases in financial management, a requirement or believe me I'd be out of there faster than a Muslim at a Liberty University orientation), so I won't be blogging as much. The course ends in June, so thankfully its only a month!

Right, I usually leave the book reviews to Darla D, but I had to say something after the last book I read; The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai, its a Booker Prize award winner I believe.

It's official, I'm over reading books by Indian authors. The subject material is always the same, some sad sob story set in India, constantly involving class struggles, East/West divides, religious themes and always the characters are cold to the reader, nothing makes me empathize with them, they usually have huge human faults that they tend to blame on others (is this a trait of all Indians or just a writing device used by all Indian authors?) and never learn from their mistakes. All of these stories, be it God of Small Things oor this book are cloaked in this morose somber mood. To me a good book is not something that makes me want to slit my wrists.

My avoidance of depressive, formulaic, thematic books also goes for American Southern writers, if I have to read another book about race relations, violent abuse of said relations coupled with cliched charcters (some variation of poor white girl/boy getting helped by a black mamie type character and/or innocent Black man trying to help - gets killed), I'm going to gag! Hey Harper Lee did it, what 40 years ago, and she did it best.

I don't know, I suppose if you like these plots, these books are up your alley but for Virginia Gal, I'm sticking to my historical fiction, biographies, chick lite and of course Harry Potter.

Summer Plans

With the tv season winding down and students taking final exams, as pesky insects start to come out and the days are longer, it can only mean one thing...summer is here!!! (well not offically here, it comes in like a month, but play along for my intro/lead in, it was either this or taa daa).

And now, without further ado....my summer plans. I'm working for my beloved non-descript airlines -in Recruiting!!!! Yay!!!! I'm so excited, this is EXACTLY what I wanted to be doing for the summer (not necessarily with beloved non-descript airline, any airline would have worked). As an HR professional, Recruiting is the big thing I've been missing from my HR resume and now I'll be getting it!!! Plus there is a lot of travel involved (at company expense, schwing!). So Virginia Gal not only gets to do something she wants, live at home (rent-free) but travel as well - woohoo!

Mind you this all happened recently - as late as a month ago, I was sadly depressed, having heard nothing from any of the internship places I had applied, or getting outright rejected. I felt like such an MBA loser - especially when it is understood that MBA's, who are not already full timed employed, should be doing an internship for the summer.

I emailed a friend from beloved non-descript airline asking if she had any leads on jobs, anything at the airport, four weeks later, she emailed me back, turns out she had been promoted to head of East Coast Recruiting and wanted to know if I would like to join her team for the summer....a faster, "hell yeah" could not have been uttered.

So I'm very excited and thanks to all for their well-wishes, my 11th hour miracle came true!

Vacation

I'm off to Tampa today - to attend my cousin's high school graduation, she is valdictorian (look I can't even spell valdictorian, hee hee).

My final grades are in - made a "B" in Financial Management - mixed feelings on that, happy its not a "C" but bummed not an "A" - there goes my perfect G.P.A. oh well, its not like an employer is going to ask me my GPA in an interview.

Very exciting news about my summer plans - I'll write about it when I get back.

Hope everyone has a great week!

ps - what a crappy series finale for Gilmore Girls I hope Ugly Betty's season finale is better!

Watches and Running Late

Thanks to everyone for their well-wishes regarding the foot. I did end up going to urgent care ($300 for doctor visit and x-ray, not so bad, I was afraid it would range in the $1000's). Right now the doctor has me wrapping the foot and icing it with lots of advil/ibuprofen doses. I'm wacky happy all the time, hee hee.

My accident does bring up a point about me though - I tend to always be rushing. I'm always running late. I was hurrying that day, which caused me to trip. What is this about my personality, I can't do things slowly. It plays into my inherent impatience, I hate waiting. The light turns green and I'm accelerating. I like things now, immediate. Which leads me to wonder is that why I absolutely must wear a watch? Is anybody else like this? I can't live without a watch on my right wrist. For as long as I can remember the watch has been there. I don't know how one lives without a watch. Is this particular to me? Why am I always in a rush? Does always being in a rush predispose me to perhaps not ever being satisfied? Aye what does this all mean?

oh almost all my final grades are in - straight A's, BUT (and this is a big one) my financial management grade has not been posted, I think its going to ruin my perfect 4.0 average, but as long as its a "B" and not the dreaded "C", I'll be ok. This waiting is killing me!

To all the mom's out there - Happy Mother's Day!!

Queen/Foot/Exams

Here it is, per Molly Malone's request, pic's of the queen. As you can see, we were not very close, they kept us commoners away, down at the bottom of these hill banks. The building in the background is the State Capital of Virginia. Selected people were allowed closer during her walk-about. We actually saw Prince Phillip better than the Queen herself. Plus it was raining so she didn't stay out long. It was fun though, my friend and I got there at 2:30pm for the 4pm sighting. When she got there, we mostly watched it from the tv screen, but laughed and joked with the people around us, including a very old English woman (who had a great sense of humor). I like to think we Americans like the royal family because they have all the glitz and glamour without us having to foot their bills (which irks my English friends to no end).

Sorry I haven't posted in a while, I'm thick in the middle of finals. Last night's financial management was killer, God pray he curves it!

To top that off, Virginia Gal is not well. I tripped on Sunday while running an errand and now my left foot is swollen and I can barely walk. This sucks and couldn't have come at a worst time! Suddenly I know what it truly feels like to be in this country without health care, I can't afford to go to the ER or get an X-ray, all I could do was go to the student health services and see a doctor, who told me to ice it and take ibuprofen, but if swelling doesn't go down, I'm in trouble. Again there is something seriously wrong with this country when we have money for bombs but no money to allow those who need it, health care. I hope my foot gets better because I really don't want to go throught the rigamaroll of finding or applying for reduced fee health care services. I'd like to walk normal again as well. Aye!

Econ Grade...etc.

I just found out I made an, “A” in my Econ class – yay me!!! Despite being an undergraduate course, that class was really hard! (now must conquer my super arch nemesis – graduate level financial management).

I like being the "good" student. In my Information Management class, during the mid-term I went up to the teacher to get clarity on a question and he said, "I can't explain it further, just do your best" and than he added, "you're a good student, so I'm sure you'll get it." Guess what...I made a perfect score - 100 on that test!!! The only one in the class! Isn't it the small victories in life that move us to the next day, towards the future?

Also, I have to note, while I can't stomach about 85% of the undergrad's on this campus (try to be a little less self-absorbed kidees!), the undergrad's in this Econ class were very nice - we would all chat before class and work on homework together and I'd count them as friends (they even come up to me when crossing on campus and say hello, so unheard of most undergrads!).

The Queen of England comes to Richmond, VA for a visit tomorrow, if I get anywhere near her, I'll post pictures.

Finally - if you haven't seen or don't know who Nathan Fillion is (I'm sorry) here's a link to an interview he did on the Morning Show with Mike and Juliet on a network that shall not be named.

http://www.mandjshow.com/videos/%e2%80%9cwaitress%e2%80%9d-actors-jeremy-sisto-and-nathan-fillion/http://www.mandjshow.com/videos/%e2%80%9cwaitress%e2%80%9d-actors-jeremy-sisto-and-nathan-fillion/