…and an added bonus - not at all related to Independence Day, but funny nonetheless…

Better than the latest Terminator!

“Did someone say ‘Cheetos’?”

I’ve reached a milestone in the book I’m writing: As of yesterday, I finished 2/3 of the book. Sure, it’s only the rough draft, but I feel astonishingly good. If anything, it’s a testimony of endurance and self-inflicted punishment. Whether or not it’s actually good is another question entirely — one where I don’t even care about the answer, to be honest.

I want to have this published somewhere and I’m thinking about one of those free blogspot-type websites where I can publish a new chapter every week. Just putting it out on the internet, regardless if someone actually reads it, feels really good — there’s just something about clicking that “Publish” button that feels like closure.

And then I can start on a new book.

I have a few ideas that I’m still mulling around. First, I think I want to finish the LoO story that I started. It will require an overhaul of the first 11 or so chapters, then I’m going to finish it on up and internet-publish, too. Maybe by the time I’m done posting the necromancer story, I can put the LoO story in behind it.

While Tom and I were in Vegas, we stopped at the bookstore. I had picked a book and was waiting for Tom to decide on one, and I started flipping through the romance section… Yeah, I know, I am not the target audience of the romance world.

When I first started getting serious about writing, Kerry told me that most writers break into the industry by writing smut books. His wife was also interested in writing and a while back he had gotten her a book about how to write romance and get published as a first time author. I wrote the name of the book down, but of course now I can’t find it. Anyway, so I remembered what Kerry said and started looking at the romance “featured titles”. One of the books I picked up was called “The Virgin’s Secret” or something goofy like that, and of course there’s a busty chick on the front entangled in a half dressed Fabio-clone and it’s all very wind-swept and there’s big hair everywhere. So I open this book to about the first 1/4 of the story, and our secretive virgin’s body was “exploding around his.” That’s exactly what it said. I almost started laughing in the middle of the bookstore.

I closed the book and put it back, immediately thinking that the only way that story could have interested me is if she actually exploded and her entrails were hanging from the guy’s ear and maybe there were some ninjas involved… I guess romance just isn’t my thing. I can’t even write a three sentence kissing scene without sneaking something humorous in it.

So then I started thinking about writing humorous romance novels. What if our heroine falls in love with a ninja who, even when they get into the bedroom, gets stark naked except he can’t take his mask and hood off because a ninja’s identity must never be revealed? Tom swears to me that there is no current market for humorous romance, but I think it’s something I have to do. I’m strangely compelled and I’m thinking it would make a good short story.

He’s a lover and a fighter. He is… Ninja Lover. Or something.

Anyway, that’s the latest from me. Sometime soon I’ll post some pictures from our Vegas trip.

For Memorial Day weekend/Tom’s Birthday, we are going to VEGAS! Woo hoo! I’ve never been to Vegas.

Books purchased: Storm Front - Book 1 of the Dresden Files and Shakespeare’s Landlord.

They were both in the mystery section. Nothing in the SciFi section looked interesting, sadly enough.

I’m going to be away from church through the weekend and will need someone to handle worship. Since I had already confessed to my pastor that there was no one currently on the team capable of leading in my absence, we were going to have to find someone else.

She’s connected, so I wasn’t surprised when only 48 hours later she got back to me with a name. A church in the area has “loaner” worship leaders for this very purpose. My pastor sent an email out to the both of us so we could connect, and I’ve been talking to him about the upcoming service ever since.

This guy is doing me a huge favor, which I appreciate immensely. He’s helping us out in a big way.

Unfortunately, over half of the worship set he wants to do is completely unknown to my church. I sent him a document that listed all of the songs the church knows. About 1/3 of our worship is mainstream (meaning you can hear these songs broadcast on any white, middle-class Christian radio station in North America) so it’s not like he’d be in the dark. Unfortunately he is adamant on putting in two of his songs that are going on his CD or something…

There’s a part of me that’s always going to feel like I’m not that great at what I do. I walk away from worship sets beating myself for every stupid mistake I made. I look at other amazing musicians and I know I just don’t compare. I’ll always be the little piano-playing worship leader in a small church and I’ll never get anywhere. This weekend I felt compelled to tell my team that they have just as much to bring to the table as anyone else, but it seems so hypocritical coming from me.

That’s why I’m having a really hard time with this guest worship leader. He sounds like he’s really experienced — about as much as I am, I guess, but he writes more of his own songs. He also wants to introduce two of his own songs to the church and teach one more old school Vineyard song, then do two songs that we already know.

So most of the worship set is unknown. He’s sent me three emails now with proposed set lists, and all three of my responses have been “I am not comfortable that over half of your set is unknown to the church.” Two unknown songs and four known songs is as far as I’m willing to go, and I stated it explicitly, in the nicest, most apologetic way I could. But he keeps coming back with the same or worse.

I think maybe it’s me. Maybe I’m doing it wrong. He’ll probably come in and do this amazing worship set and he’ll be so great everyone will want to keep him. I don’t know. Maybe I should just be thankful he’s going to do this worship set for me and shut up. I don’t know.

I’ve developed a theory about my PMS: I don’t think it’s a time when I get really irrational and emotional about things, rather I think it’s when my inhibitions are removed and how I really feel comes out. That has its downsides and upsides.

The downside is that sometimes I sideswipe Tom with things that seemingly come out of nowhere. At any other given time these things aren’t that big of a deal, but about once every few months I seem to really slam him with something obscure that leaves him scratching his head.

The upside is I finally unbottle something that’s been suppressed for a while because… I don’t know. I guess I feel it’s my duty to put up with something or I tell myself I’m overreacting or that if I say something about it then I’ll be a horrible person. Last week I met with my pastor over chocolate and coffee and let it all out.

For the last couple of months, church worship has been frustrating me on many different fronts. Just when I feel like things have turned a corner, I can’t yet sit back and enjoy because there are certain issues that are just not fixing themselves.

Do I really have to do everything around here?

So here’s my beef: One of the singers I’ve been working with just hasn’t been getting beyond her personal issues that are naturally stumping her own artistic growth. Aside from being incredibly needy and insecure to the point where I can’t even give her positive feedback without it being misconstrued, she hasn’t grown in her own musicianship. And I mean nothing. Zero. Zip.

For an artist, that is absolutely freaking absurd. Art can be a love-hate process because as an artist you always want to create and, once you’ve done it, we feel compelled to put ourselves through the whole process again, pushing ourselves, wanting to try something new, something better. We force ourselves to be disciplined and hone our craft to some extent.

Take, for example, your favorite comic. If it’s been around for a while, you’ll notice dramatic changes between the first comic strip and the most recent.

Art isn’t for lazy people. You can’t just want it, you have to practice it. Artistry evolves.

I think this chick doesn’t get it.

Every Sunday morning I get up early and I go down to the piano and warm up. I spend a half hour just warming up my voice — and that’s all before I even get to rehearsal. Even though I’ve been leading worship for a long time, I’m no exception to the artistic process. No one’s good naturally, so I have to work at it. Who I am as a musician will and should evolve and, if I don’t, then something is wrong — most likely with me.

After I got pissed about it, I had to decide that, while I do have to take a lot of responsibility for what’s (not) happened thus far, I’m only one person.

A viable option is I could take her in and coach her vocally. I’m classically trained and fully capable. I know how to change what she’s doing and improve her performance, but it would involve more time and energy than I have. When I vented this to my pastor, she agreed that this gal’s personal musicianship shouldn’t be on my shoulders and we should point her to a coach. I liked that and I think I’m going to pursue that route. My pastor is incredibly connected to the art scene in Rochester, so I’m thinking she could find someone. I’ll talk to her more about this later.

There are some things that did need some changing. First, I went back to the schedule system for the worship team. I had abandoned this after people were still showing up to play even though they were not scheduled to be there… And, of course, I had to smile and be gracious about the whole thing. It wasn’t always easy to do.

The other thing I did was change the Sunday practice times. Vocalists get in at 9:30 for warm up and run through to figure out harmonies and all that crap, and instrumentalists get to sleep in an extra fifteen minutes and come in at 10:00. The downside is Tom and I have to get to the church a half hour earlier than usual to haul out all the gear. But whatever.

This past Sunday was the first one up with the new schedule, and it was just myself and the gal I’ve been ranting about. I decided I was going to come straight out and tell her what I thought, how I felt, what I wanted her to do, and consequences be damned. She was five minutes late and still had to do a couple of things when she got there, so I was stern about allowing her this time, but said we needed to get started ASAP and in the future she needed to be ready to go right at 9:30. I was polite and friendly but firm.

I started out giving basic voice lessons. We spent a full 25 minutes on it. Stand straight, feet shoulder length apart, one foot slightly in front of the other, don’t lock the knees. Getting her to breathe properly was a major issue — I didn’t realize how beginner she was. We ran through basic exercises, facial warm ups, body warm ups, basic listening exercises… It was all so foreign to her. She confessed she had never been in a choir or had voice lessons…

And that’s when I understood why she was so remedial.

It was an admirable start. She sounded the best she has ever sounded. Even Tom said she sounded good. She looked like a zombie standing up straight, trying to grab the microphone out of nervous habit, listening carefully and, most importantly, keeping her voice out of her throat and making her diction clear.

Small victories.

Still, her musicianship can’t be all on my shoulders. We ran through what we could in 25 minutes, and it just wasn’t enough, but I couldn’t give her more. Regular practice ran out of time as it was.

Next up for MPV worship… I’ve asked someone to join the team on hand drums, and he’s agreed to show up at 10:00 this Sunday to slap some skins. We’re still too small for a drum set, but maybe in the future. We’re also going to be starting a monthly evening worship service… somewhere. We’re outgrowing our building. There’s a meeting at my house next Tuesday to discuss logistics and theme.

I’m even making dinner. Should be a good time… and now, I’m actually looking forward to it.

I made an account on Facebook, but only because Kerry confessed that this is where he’s hiding out at. Since then, more people have found me. Most of my Facebook friends are people from church, and I often wonder why I’m reading their Facebook messages, since I see a lot of them multiple times per week.

I’m not a huge fan of Facebook, only because I have my blog. I much prefer my blog. Tom signed AwK and me up for Twitter, and I didn’t really get that either. Until today. A switch went off and I started tweeting. It’s kind of fun.

If you’re a Twitter fan, you can find me here: MM Twitter

When I left for vacation, I spelled out everything for my (very nervous) temp who was sitting at my desk while I was out. To her credit, and perhaps mine, she did quite well. In fact, she exceeded expectation task-wise. Still, when I returned, my boss was quite happy to see me and I was happy that he preferred me over someone else.

I got back to the office feeling good and well rested, and started catching up. I also started following up.

My boss’ “Chief of Staff” sits across the hall from me, so we usually shout back and forth. We’re on great terms and we work well together. The only thing that was pending when I left was something from her desk: Blue Cross Blue Shield Association CIO Roundtable.

Yes, it’s that time again. The Spring CIO BCBSA Roundtable is being held in New Orleans, and will not require passports. Before the event, each health plan fills out a sheet that’s called “Plan Highlights” which is basically where we pick out the three big things that we’re working on and we type up little paragraphs about our progress on each. What happens during the conference (quite literally) is that all of the Plan CIO’s or their delegates will sit in a huge circle and go around the room reading off of each of their highlights. It’s a full day of serious boredom. This time around, Tony is getting out of it because he’s got a vacation planned, so we’ve delegated it to my friend and coworker, who is our VP of Applications. Sucker.

The plan highlights were due on March 31, and I checked with our Director/Chief of Staff to make sure they were going to be sent out. She said yes.

When I got back, I asked her if they were sent out. She said she had delegated it to the one I refer to as The B.O. and it should be all set. It makes sense, because The B.O. wrote them up, so I assumed our VP of Apps had a chance to look it over, make changes and whatnot, and the three page word document was sent over without problem.

You know what they say about assuming.

I should have checked up on Miss “I’m A Facilitator; I Don’t Do ‘Administrative’ Work” but I gave the wrong people the benefit of the doubt. Today, I received a nasty-gram from the LA plan, asking where our highlights are. Sigh.

I email The B.O. asking her if she sent them. An instant message box appears on my screen two minutes later with some stupid response that she delegated this to our temp who sat at my desk. What? I asked her why in the world our temp would be handling it, since she’s new and has no clue what to do with them. She says our Director/Chief of Staff said to delegate it. I said, “Really? Because I asked her on Wednesday, and she said she had asked you to do it by the 31st.”

Now, if the tables had been turned and I was in her position, I would have just apologized and emailed them out. But that’s not what happened here. Instead I got the response: “Well, I will email (Director/Chief of Staff) and ask her what she wants to do.” She then sends an email and copies me, basically asking what we should do now.

Apparently, coming to the conclusion of just emailing the f-ing document takes a rocket scientist.

I send a nasty email back to both saying I really don’t give a crap as to who was supposed to send it, I just need it sent. I ask for the document, receive it, pop it into an email with the address provided, and send it off. It took all of two seconds, and the internet did all the work for me. Done. Off my plate. It took longer to point fingers and try to get someone else to think about it than it did to actually do it.

This is the kind of garbage I’ve been inundated with lately. No one wants to think for themselves, they just want to pass it along to the next person. That’s why B.O. does it — she even confessed it to me not long ago. When she doesn’t know what to do, instead of trying to come up with the answer, she delegates it, usually to someone who is too nice to say no.

Good thing I’m not that nice.

I wish I had before and after shots of the kitchen, but I didn’t think to take any. Or maybe I did… but I have no idea where they are at now.

When we first moved into the house, the kitchen and dining room had the original wallpaper still up: White background with purple and red flowers and berries attached to crayon green stems and leaves. Horrifying. The kitchen cabinets were the original brown stained cabinetry.

It’s taken me two years, but all of the wallpaper is gone, the walls are sanded, plastered, sanded, plastered, sanded, plastered, maybe another sanded-plastered round in there, and then primed and painted. The cabinets still aren’t done, as I have to sand, primer and paint the row of cabinets in the back of the kitchen and the walls need touch up. But I’m getting closer.

So this is a shot of my kitchen with my new, spiffy under cabinet lighting on. For some reason I had left one of the cabinet doors open and didn’t realize it until I had finished taking pictures. Oh well. You can still get a good idea of what it looks like. I have a galley kitchen and it’s quite small, so I take all available space very seriously.

Here’s a shot as you walk in from the living room/hallway.

Not as pretty as the first picture. First of all, we don’t have a microwave with fan installed. Instead, the previous owner had some sort of weird shelf installed in its place. Eventually we’d like to buy one and have it installed, but it’s not a priority. I keep the microwave, espresso maker and a couple of large cutting boards up there.

From this angle, you can also see where I haven’t yet sanded and painted the cabinets. The doors have been unscrewed and the cabinets are exposed, so it looks a little ugly back there. I was also getting ready to cook dinner, so I hadn’t set anything up for a glamor shot. It’s clean and it’s lived in. That’s the best I’ve got.

The door on the left is a pantry of sorts, but it’s more like a deep closet with shelves. Once you open the door, wire racks hang on the door and that’s where I keep all my spices. I got them from Lowe’s for a few bucks. The other door, directly across from your view, leads to the garage.

Here’s the back counter for a better idea of how much more work I have to do. There’s really not much compared to how much has already been done.

I keep all of the crap to the side of the fridge, as well as a little reader board that reminds Tom what leftovers are available and still OK to eat. We’re trying to be good about eating leftovers and not letting them go to waste.

Here’s a bigger view with more of the unfinished stuff.

I’ve posted previously on the kitchen colors. Here they are again for a refresher.

I chose the browns and the white based on the existing, dated laminate counter. We have the money to replace the counter, but if you do that, you really should replace the cabinets. And of course, you can’t stop there, because you should also replace the sink and faucets. That’s all money we didn’t want to spend. So I had to make the counter look as exciting and pretty as possible, which is why I went with the darkest shade of brown in the counter, and the lightest shade of white/cream for the cabinets. Now the counter looks pretty nice. We also upgraded the hardware by buying new knobs and handles. Those aren’t cheap; we paid about $50 in total for that. Still, it’s cheaper than replacing the kitchen altogether.

For kicks, I took a picture of the cabinet lighting on without the overhead light on. Kerry told me that his lights burned out and, since they’re halogen, he hates them and hasn’t replaced them. Here’s what he’d have to work with if he had under cabinet lighting.

So it’s coming along. It’s not perfect, but it’s getting there. So far I’m really happy with the results and can’t wait to get it finished up.

I’m back from my family visit and I’m feeling rested. While I was at home, I spent good, quality time with my parents. We went up to Mt. Rainier and basically just hung out for a couple of days. It was good to visit, and now I’m happy to be back home.

I was remarking to a friend at work how my home town seems so much smaller than I remember, but that’s par for the course. The PGA tour is coming through there in a couple of years, so the town is making all kinds of obnoxious changes. Crazy flora “roundabouts” have been installed in the middle of the road to slow traffic down and all kinds of business and residential buildings are being erected as if the town was expecting a sudden influx. I can’t understand the amount of construction happening. In the last ten years, the library has been ripped down and rebuilt three times.

By the way, did you know we were in a recession? Apparently these people don’t.

Anyway, while I was back west, Mom and I ran to Ikea. I can’t say I’m a huge fan of Ikea — the stuff I love is their kitchen stuff. They have great, inexpensive kitchen stuff. While I was there, I bought these nifty strips of task lighting that can be installed under kitchen cabinets.

My kitchen only has one small, round light on the ceiling, so anytime I’m working at the counter, my shadow blocks the light. I bought two strips to go under the counters, thinking I could install them and run cords over to the sockets. Later that night, I call Tom and tell him all about my purchase. He gets really, really quiet. Conspicuously quiet. I-did-something-that-I-didn’t-tell-you quiet. I ask him what’s up. He says his parents were over and stayed until late. They fixed the garbage disposal (yay) and, at the same time I was at Ikea buying lights, he was at Lowe’s with his dad, buying cabinet lighting. They installed three strips of really nice under cabinet lighting. They’re connected to a separate light switch and the light under the oven actually tilts. (Yes, I’m excited by the little things in life!) There’s a little lever you can angle the lighting with.

I was really excited to get home and see this. Tom even reinstalled the cabinet doors on all of the sections that I had sanded and painted.Right now I only have to do the upper cabinets on one side (about three cabinets) and do touch up paint on some spots that I goobered. I know this kitchen has been taking me forever; it’s been a real pain in my rear. Now that I’m seeing the nearly-completed work, I am so excited about this stinkin’ kitchen. Pictures are coming soon.

I’ve had a few emails in response to my request for new books. Some of them were suggesting books, and others were asking what books were suggested to me. I guess everyone’s in need of book suggestions these days.

Tonight, I’ll be picking up 1776 by David McCullough (thanks, Kerry!) and World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, which Tom listened to the audio book of and Ed is now reading.

I’ll be back on Tuesday night.