In Good Company...

The other day I came out of our neighborhood supermarket which is on a busy stretch of Broadway. Standing at the kerb was a tall, somewhat lanky African-American fellow, maybe in his fifties.

He was a bit hunched over and he was smoking a cigarette. I noticed he was having an intense and animated conversation.

This would not garner my attention. The conversation he was having was with a parking meter.
I didn't mean to stare, but it was something different. He looked my way and caught me eavesdropping on his exchange - if you want to call it that. He smiled and stretched out his hand, indicating the universal request for monetary assistance. I walked over, handed him a couple of dollars that had nested in my pocket, and said hello.

He proceeded to introduce me to his friend - the parking meter. I don't remember the name, just that it was male.

"He likes to count," the guy explained.

"Pleased to meet you, sir," I said to the meter.

"Don't be rude, man...say hello to the kind gentleman. He just gave us some bread for some smokes," the guy chastised the meter.

The meter didn't say anything to me, but he must have said something to the guy because he went back to having his conversation.

"Excuse me, I need to go. Enjoy your day..." I offered.

The guy just smiled and waved.

And out of the corner of my eye, I swear, I saw the meter smile too. Then he went on with his counting.

There seems to be a malaise in the air. There seems to be tension, stress, unease, bad fortunes, and a sense that this are just a tad out of harmony. I am not sure what exactly it is I feel, but I do notice that the people around me all seem to be dealing with more troubles than the norm. Deaths, illnesses, uncertainty, confusion, anxiety, and melancholy all seem to be present.

I am facing my own challenges - both from within and beyond.

It seems that whenever there is something to celebrate, something to be proud of, some sense of accomplishment, there is, waiting just around the bend, something to temper it.

My long struggle to find permanent employment has come to an end. But rather than being something to celebrate, it poses new struggles. Moreover, something inside refuses me to be happy about this. Perhaps because it seems unreal, or perhaps because there is some bad wiring in my head.

I am entering the last few days of my break. I thought I would be able to take this time to let my new job security sink in and ponder the prospects for a more stable life. Instead it has been a time to deal with new worries. A few days ago I sat down to do our taxes. As a grad student, tax time was always a time of worry because while students grants, fellowships, and funding are taxed, usually money was not withheld. So around this time, I was always trying to figure out how to put up the money I owed.

I thought this time things would be different. Not so. I work in one state - New Jersey - and live in another - New York. My employer withholds taxes for New Jersey, but not New York. As I completed my taxes, it became clear that I owed a huge amount of money to the state of NY (and the City of New York, which also has income tax) because no money had been withheld. Grad school all over again, except this time I am making a lot more money, so the tax bill is all that much higher.

I do pay taxes in NJ, which I can deduct from NY, but those are much lower because I am not a resident and the NY tax rate is MUCH higher. No one where I worked told me that I would have to pay these taxes and that I should set funds aside. You think they would...but they didn't.

We don't have any cash reserves because we were trying to pay down our debt to hopefully buy a house. And now it is back into the debt pool to pay these taxes.

When I saw that big red number pop up on my little tax program, it really did feel like a punch in the stomach.

The tax fiasco has just fanned the flames of doubt and unhappiness that were already dancing in my mind. The gremlins of depression are fostering mischief despite my attempts to not let them. The inability to reign them in, to not let them rampage through my morale is frustrating. I am not sure what to do.

As I mentioned before, my work insurance is changing April 1, so I will have to switch doctors because the one I am seeing now does not take the new plan. I saw him yesterday and he recommended not making any drastic changes other than increase one of the meds I am on.

Over the past months, I was hoping to decrease my meds. My recent check up revealed that I was deficient in Vitamin D and Potassium and that my blood pressure was a bit high. I also have a tendency to clench my jaw when on the meds. So while they might help my mind, they probably are not doing my body much good. I guess it will all have to wait. The search for a new doctor begins - then maybe a new path to a more mentally harmonious life.

When I take a step back, all these issues seem so petty when I see what others have to deal with. But I can't escape them. The tax man (or woman) will make sure of it.

Why am I Surprised?

I cannot believe that the governor of my state was implicated in a prostitution ring. You would think that any high ranking politician would know to keep their noses clean; that there are people out there just waiting to pounce on any questionable decision they make.

It is true that the leak about his name came out of the justice department because he is a Democrat and the Republicans hold a double standard by asking for his resignation but not that of David Vitter. But still, how stupid can you be?

It looks like we are headed to become the first state with a legally blind governor. As Sara said, I should really learn his name and stop calling him the "blind, African-American guy".

.....

Ok, I looked it up - his name is David Paterson.

.....

Today I also found a roll of mentos in my coat pocket and I saw an Eagle eat a rat while walking by the Hudson river with the dogs.

Oh, and a Happy Birthday to Frankie. I hope she got to relax.

Busy day.

Reason #437 that I am ready to move

I want to be able to take a shower without having to the scalding-freezing dance.

Our shower randomly alternates from scalding to ice-cold water. If the apartment above or below us flushes the toilet, then there is a spurt of extremely hot water. Fortunately there is a five-second delay, so you can get out of the way - if you happen to hear it.

Having both burns and a loss of breath (or perhaps a mild cardiac arrest) from the alternating hot and cold water is not fun.

You would think that this "shower dance" would be unnecessary given the amount we pay in rent.

Time to move.

Dentist Day

Finally, I get to go to the dentist and figure out what is up with my tooth. In all likelihood I will have to go back and have some further dental work done.

I don't mind the dentist that much, except for those exuberant hygienists who try to slice your gums with floss.

I got word, though, that the hygienist is out today and that dentist will be doing the work. That could be good or bad. We'll see.

It's about time...

...that I grow up.

More details later.

Thank you all for the good wishes and thoughts.

The trip went well, although I am still thawing out. My tooth is still sharp and I will have to wait nine days before I get to see a dentist.

Now I need to work on my lecture for tomorrow.

Update: While flossing, a chunk of my tooth came out. Now there is a bigger hole in my molar. It still doesn't hurt, but I am wondering if I should try to get to the dentist sooner. Too bad the tooth fairy (in Mexico it was a ratoncito - little mouse), doesn't stop by our household anymore. I could use the cash.

Job Interview Fun

I am off to Wisconsin tomorrow, where the high is now forecast to be -2 degrees (F). The low is about -8 and the wind-chill is supposed to hit about -40. I am only going to be there until Monday evening, but I feel like I am taking more clothes than I usually do for a week. Mind you they are supposed to be nice clothes since it is an interview.

I will be interested in seeing how they go about trying to sell the place with that kind of weather. Needless to say, job interviews are stressful enough without having to worry about frostbite.

To add to the fun, I have a chip/crack in one of my molars. It doesn't hurt, but it is rather sharp. I have no clue how that happened. Suddenly at dinner I felt something sharp on my tooth. Little did I know it was my tooth.

It sounds like a visit to the dentist is coming up when I get back - that is if I don't end up frozen somewhere.

Don't Read: Just Complaining

From the time I was approaching the end of my dissertation until a few weeks ago, my job searches have been like sprinting through a swamp: struggling to not get very far, while getting very dirty and demoralized. I had six campus interviews, from which I got two temporary jobs and one offer I turned down.

During the month of February I have three. One as passed. I face one next Monday and one two weeks from Monday. One of them is for a permanent (tenure-track) position at the college I am at now (the one that has passes). The others: one in a very cold place and the other in a place not to far from here. It all is a bit daunting.

Academic job searches suck.

The silence and then the flow of rejection letters is extremely difficult to deal with after all the time, effort, and money you have invested in the process. On the other hand, a call or an email offering a campus visit does not bring the positive opposite you might think. It just sets a different set of worries upon your psyche - some trivial (will my "interview slacks" fit? Answer - yes, but they are quite snug), some more important.

All the thoughts set your head on a high speed spin cycle.

This all comes on the back of a psychic roller-coaster; a teetering on the edge of self-doubt, self-questioning, and an emotional downturn.

I am already exhausted after just one interview. And I did not have to travel for that one.

Sunday I head off to a place where the forecast high will be 6 degrees (Fahrenheit, mind you). Monday looks a little better at 12 degrees. Then I get to fly back and teach a class Tuesday morning.

Or not.

I am leaning towards canceling that class. It just would be a waste of class time. We shall see...

For now, I get my annual check up tomorrow. The will probably go well: all the stress is probably wrecking all kinds of havoc in my body. I am already quite aware of the tension in my neck, shoulders, and back. Who knows what else is messed up?

I better get to bed before this post gets gloomy.

Just in Case...

...you hadn't guessed who I am voting for next Tuesday. It's worth watching no matter who you support.



I have thought for a while that his words were lyrical in addition to being inspiring. I think we are witnessing one of the first great orators of the 21st century.

Huh?

Image "borrowed" from Blue Harvest Art .......

I was walking the dogs today just outside our apartment, when a police car sped up the street going the wrong way. Its lights were flashing and it definitely seemed like they were in a hurry to get somewhere.

When the car got near us, it came to an abrupt stop. It had not been the best of days, so immediately I thought I was going to be in some kind of trouble. Perhaps getting wrongly accused of not picking up after my dogs.

The window did go down and one of the two cops in the car called over to me.

"Hey, have you seen a pack of wild dogs around?"

Wild dogs?

"Um...no?" was the only response I could muster.

Wild dogs? In Manhattan?

The police car sped off...leaving me to ponder: wild dogs?

Then I realized maybe I should get back inside.

Mind you, we do live next to some large parks and I have heard stories about feral dogs living in one of them. I have never seen any of them. Cats? Yes. But dogs, no. And there isn't that much space for them to really hide.

Sara said that they must be little feral dogs. I can just imagine a wild pack of chihuahuas terrorizing northern Manhattan.

Later in the day I did notice a strong police presence on the streets around our apartment - keeping us safe from those wild dogs no doubt.

Delaware license plates look like they were made on an ink-jet printer.

I expect to see the ink start to run when it starts to rain.

Forging on into the Abyss

Well, it is not quite so melodramatic. The winter break is over and a new semester begins.

After four courses last semester, I felt like the spring would be easy and almost care free. Now I am reconsidering those feelings. Yes, there will be a lighter load, but I am teaching a new class for which there will be a lot of preparation involved. I am putting a lot of pressure on myself too because I want it to go well. The course is Food and Culture, an topic that is very dear to my heart (and gut). Perhaps I should lower my expectations. The first time you teach something is a challenge and there is a lot of trial and error.

I also had expectations for my research this spring. I was hoping to get started over the break, but that didn't happen. It wasn't a very productive break. Maybe I should not have had high expectation for that either. It may not have been realistic to think I could forge ahead with research after being mentally exhausted from the past year. I just feel like I have fallen far behind. And this is problem because....

...my employment situation is still up in the air. Things are moving along this time around more than they have in the past - so that is a bit encouraging. I have had some phone interviews and I will be having some campus interviews as well. However, Sara is going through the same process of applying and interviewing (and waiting). It is disconcerting not knowing where we will be or what we will be doing. Needless to say, this whole process lies ahead in the abyss that is the next few months and it too will eat away at my time, energy, and mental stability.

So in the meantime, I will try not to get too worked up about it, take one day at a time, and try to keep my wits about me. It certainly won't be easy, but there is no other way around the abyss. Wish me luck...

Our apartment blows out an inordinate amount of light bulbs.

It must be shoddy wiring.

Or evil spirits who delight in watching me struggle with the light covers.

And our freezer frosts up so quickly. This is a problem because the way it is designed the air flows from the freezer to the fridge. If it frosts up, the air ducts clog with ice creating two problems:

1. The thermostat is in the fridge, so it run continuously making our electric bill go way up.
2. Our food starts smelling a little wanky.

It is getting to be the time to move.

I am not sure where, but it is time to move.

On Health

I am a bit irked. No, I am very irked.

I was well on my way to having a productive day when I got an email message from our college's human resources department. The message kindly informed all employees that our health insurance coverage was changing.

Now mind you, we do have fairly good coverage and we do have multiple options in terms of companies and plans. However, the message described how several of the plans were not going to be available to us anymore.

Of course, one of the plans is the one Sara and I are on. We have spent a lot of time researching and finding doctors that we trust and like, and have since developed a good rapport with them. This is important because we both have medical issues that are ongoing and need monitoring, so having a positive relationship with our medical doctors is important.

As of now, it seems like the plans that will be available to us will no longer cover any of our medical providers. This may change as the different websites that provide information have not been updated to reflect the upcoming changes. But I would be highly surprised if they suddenly were covered.

Our health care system, while touted as so great, is really a joke. Health care may be wonderful, I do not doubt the competence of many of our health care providers, but the system in which everything operates is a disaster, at best, and unethical at worst. In a nut shell, it aims to discourage people to seek care, funneling them into the most inexperienced, underqualified, or just poor providers possible so as to save a buck. The goal of many health insurance providers is to get people to leave the program; they make it more attractive for someone to get covered through a spouse's plan.

So most of us get bounced around, being herded into the most "cost effective" system to provide health care, where the bottom line is how little do we consume, not how healthy we are, while the executives of these companies boast how well the company is doing and earning millions in bonuses. And while we may have great health care in this country, it is becoming less and less accessible. Yet we spend more and more on trying to stay healthy.

On a related note, there was an interesting post on the Daily Kos today. It discussed the health insurance coverage of each of the presidential candidates and whether they provided health care for their campaign staff.

Here is a summary:

Candidate...................Coverage......................Provides care for staff?

Democrats:
Clinton .................... Covered by federal employees plan......................Yes
Edwards....................Blue Cross (coverage for the campaign)..............Yes
Obama......................Covered by federal employees plan......................Yes
Kucinich...................Covered by federal employees plan......................No

Republicans:
Giuliani ................Decline to disclose...............................Decline to disclose
Huckabee ..............Decline to disclose...............................Decline to disclose
McCain..... ............Covered by federal employees plan.........Decline to disclose
Paul......................Covered by federal employees plan.........No (staff are volunteers)
Romney ................Decline to disclose...............................Decline to disclose
Thompson ............Decline to disclose...............................Decline to disclose


Clinton, Obama, Kucinich, McCain, and Paul have the federal employees plan because they are all members of Congress. This plan is actually a very good plan, and some candidates argue it should be made available to everyone.

Romney is a resident of Massachusetts, which per law enacted by Romney when he was governor, requires everyone to have health insurance. It is possible that Thompson is covered through the Motion Picture Health Industry Plan because he is a member of the union (a bit ironic).

It is also important to note that Giuliani, McCain, and Thompson would probably be ineligible to obtain health insurance on the market because they have all had cancer.

Unfortunately, I don't see things getting any better anytime soon. However, we need a President (and a government in general) who will not allow things to get worse. I would settle for that.

As for us, we will see what happens. Who knows, we may be moving to new jobs, to a different place, so we might just have to get by in those few months. Or we might just have to deal with going out of network to see the doctors we like. There are lot of uncertainties lying ahead - I'll need to deal with each as I come to it.

Two Developments

I have become officially invested in the Presidential race. I am waiting on pins and needles for the NH results to come in.

There has been some progress on the job search front. I am still nervous about it and the anxiety is only going to grow.

More on this later.

Burnout

Burnout

I haven't been around here for a while. I am not really sure why, but if I were to venture a guess, it would be burnout.

The past year was pretty brutal. I taught four courses in the spring, three courses in the summer, and four courses in the fall. Add to that a trip to Mexico (which almost didn't happen), applying for jobs, pretending to do some research, and a conference.

And it hardly feels like I have had a break. I was grading until the 27th. Then we had a stressful incident with Zephyr and last I got sick.

While the new semester is still two weeks away, I need to get back on the wagon and start making progress on all the things that have piled up.

I may also be a little burnt out on the whole writing online thing. But I do need a place to complain, so I will still be writing - at least for now. I think I put pressure on myself to write something of value, rather that just randomly spewing thoughts. Not that I have ever written much of value, just that my own expectations changed. I am not sure why.

Maybe I will pick this up again, maybe not.

We'll see...

I find this CNN online poll very disturbing. It isn't scientific, but it really shows how close to fascism we really are.

Are there circumstances in which waterboarding of prisoners is acceptable?

Yes	53%	17280
No	47%	15286
Total Votes: 32566

I wonder if the answers would be any different if instead of waterboarding it read torture.

Witchhunts - I can smell them coming....

There is so much to do - or better put, there is so much I need to be doing.

Yet I don't have the wherewithal to even begin.

Two notes:
1. In Italian there is a great word that fits in where I have the "better put" that does not have an English equivalent: anzi. I find this frustrating at times. I want the equivalent of a word that exists in a different language. Moral of the story: avoid learning foreign languages - it is the cause of unnecessary frustration.

Second note: ........now I forgot. I think I was going to write something about the word wherewithal. Hmmm...not sure if that was it. But since I am on that topic, wherewithal is usually I word we use when we don't have it. And it is a cumbersome word for a period of time when we are feeling overwhelmed and unable to tackle some issue(s).

So there it is. The end of the semester is upon us. The realization that break is not really a break, rather a shift in activities. I will welcome the break in teaching. Four courses is just too many. It is not fair to the teacher and not fair to the students.

I am off to find a different way to avoid what it is that I need to get done.

It was bound to happen sooner or later.

I got my first official rejection of the job hunt season. It came via email. I am not even worth a stamp. At least it is environmentally friendly.

It just came at a bad time. It has shaken my confidence a little and my sinking morale went a little lower.

I need the semester to be over.

But before I wallow in self-pity too long, I need to send positive energy to a friend who is battling her own woes: health insurance claims denied (among other things).

When will we live in a country where it isn't a privilege to be healthy?