The benefits to having two seperate user accounts on the computer is that my stuff doesn't have to fraternize with Jason's stuff, and vice versa, and my iTunes does not get littered up with Cambodian pop music.
The downside is that certain programs, if open by another user, cannot be opened until they are closed by the original user. And sometimes these programs make themselves very difficult to close. I'm looking at you, webcam.
Sometimes I'm not sure which user account is open, so I hit the homepage button: Washington Post = Mary; New York Times = Jason.
Tuesday, May 25, 2010
Saturday, May 08, 2010
The Wife Who Could Not Work
The next installment of bedtime stories from Children of Wax: African Folk Tales concerns marital relations and division of labor.
So a rich man goes adventuring and in one village, he spots the most beautiful woman he has ever seen. She is a serious catch. He approaches her father to ask for her hand in marriage and her father says he can marry her for 50 cows (a lot of cattle, in this story). The rich man agrees to pay her father 50 cows and they shake on it, after which the father says, oh, by the way, you should know--a girl as beautiful as this one is not able to work. She is too delicate. And the rich man says, no problem.
The man takes his new wife back to his village where everybody ooohs and aaaahs over her beauty. Since he travels often, he installs new wife in his house and she sits in the shade every day. After a time, the other women in the village grow weary of this and they think, seriously, there is lots of work to do: she needs to pitch in. They wait until a time when the husband is out of town and then approach her about helping with an easy task: fetch water in a jug from the river. And she's like, sure! The beautiful woman takes the jug to the river, fills it with water, and on the way back she is caught in quicksand, weighed down by her cargo, and sinks below the surface.
After they realize she is missing, the other women in the village FREAK OUT and make up a lie about how she was eaten by a lion. But the husband, upon his return, is not deceived by this story, and he goes to the local wise man to figure out how to find his wife. The wise man tells him to go to the riverbank and get a fat woman (I am not making this up) to jump up and down in the sand. Husband does this, and slowly but surely the wife emerges from the sand and everyone apologizes and promises to never make her work again.
Moral of the story? Well, that's a weighted question, now, isn't it?
If you ask me, beautiful people should surely be revered and consulted with and not forced to toil, as we have this unfortunate habit of stepping into quicksand.
On the other hand, combine a beautiful person with a control freak and she's like, "I'm cool!" even as she's sinking.
Perhaps we are all the beautiful wife, and perhaps we are all the rich man, and the fat woman. We are all too delicate for this world, and we work anyway, and we guard our possessions, and we strive for social justice.
And if we have any sense at all, when we find ourselves in quicksand we drop the jug of water and fight for our lives to get out.
So a rich man goes adventuring and in one village, he spots the most beautiful woman he has ever seen. She is a serious catch. He approaches her father to ask for her hand in marriage and her father says he can marry her for 50 cows (a lot of cattle, in this story). The rich man agrees to pay her father 50 cows and they shake on it, after which the father says, oh, by the way, you should know--a girl as beautiful as this one is not able to work. She is too delicate. And the rich man says, no problem.
The man takes his new wife back to his village where everybody ooohs and aaaahs over her beauty. Since he travels often, he installs new wife in his house and she sits in the shade every day. After a time, the other women in the village grow weary of this and they think, seriously, there is lots of work to do: she needs to pitch in. They wait until a time when the husband is out of town and then approach her about helping with an easy task: fetch water in a jug from the river. And she's like, sure! The beautiful woman takes the jug to the river, fills it with water, and on the way back she is caught in quicksand, weighed down by her cargo, and sinks below the surface.
After they realize she is missing, the other women in the village FREAK OUT and make up a lie about how she was eaten by a lion. But the husband, upon his return, is not deceived by this story, and he goes to the local wise man to figure out how to find his wife. The wise man tells him to go to the riverbank and get a fat woman (I am not making this up) to jump up and down in the sand. Husband does this, and slowly but surely the wife emerges from the sand and everyone apologizes and promises to never make her work again.
Moral of the story? Well, that's a weighted question, now, isn't it?
If you ask me, beautiful people should surely be revered and consulted with and not forced to toil, as we have this unfortunate habit of stepping into quicksand.
On the other hand, combine a beautiful person with a control freak and she's like, "I'm cool!" even as she's sinking.
Perhaps we are all the beautiful wife, and perhaps we are all the rich man, and the fat woman. We are all too delicate for this world, and we work anyway, and we guard our possessions, and we strive for social justice.
And if we have any sense at all, when we find ourselves in quicksand we drop the jug of water and fight for our lives to get out.
Thursday, May 06, 2010
Jury of Your Fears
I don't normally blog about work.
And, I'm not going to start.
Except to say, that my new office setup is something of a fishbowl.
Imagine a large room. And in every corner of that room, there is a desk. And at every desk, there is a person, staring into the fishbowl. And a large, mostly underutilized space in the middle, perfect for dance parties or cartwheels or placing a table and placing papers upon said table (some of these things happen more often than others).
So that, when a person walks into the room, they have four people staring at them from every angle, passing judgement, 360-degree-mirror style. It's not terrible user friendly.
And, I think an office should be friendly.
For the people who work in this office space, it means at any hour of the day, three people are in your direct line of sight, and vice versa. It also means that most phone conversations are extremely transparent. I did not fully comprehend the repercussions of this set-up until a co-worker in the fishbowl remarked to me, "Mary, you are very expressive."
"What??"
"You make noises, and faces, and it is very easy to see what you are thinking."
And this is all true.
And I think probably, in order to be a better professional, and hide my Achilles' heel(s), which include making commentary at the computer and making faces during phone calls and reacting to various e-mails that cross my path, that probably I should have a cubicle, or like a pizza box or something.
So I am advocating for a cubicle. Or "like a pizza box." Or something.
Which is a strange position to take, but here I am.
And I love my job, I do. I get expressive because it means something to me -- about my own professional proficiencies, about the ability of my acronym to do good in this world, about our shared future and what will become of it.
And every time someone walks into the room I want to offer them a seat, a comfortable seat with an advantageous vantage point, so they can get comfortable and we can just talk. I want to like people and be liked. I want to have the space to do this well.
I am working to get to the point where I can make these things happen.
And, I'm not going to start.
Except to say, that my new office setup is something of a fishbowl.
Imagine a large room. And in every corner of that room, there is a desk. And at every desk, there is a person, staring into the fishbowl. And a large, mostly underutilized space in the middle, perfect for dance parties or cartwheels or placing a table and placing papers upon said table (some of these things happen more often than others).
So that, when a person walks into the room, they have four people staring at them from every angle, passing judgement, 360-degree-mirror style. It's not terrible user friendly.
And, I think an office should be friendly.
For the people who work in this office space, it means at any hour of the day, three people are in your direct line of sight, and vice versa. It also means that most phone conversations are extremely transparent. I did not fully comprehend the repercussions of this set-up until a co-worker in the fishbowl remarked to me, "Mary, you are very expressive."
"What??"
"You make noises, and faces, and it is very easy to see what you are thinking."
And this is all true.
And I think probably, in order to be a better professional, and hide my Achilles' heel(s), which include making commentary at the computer and making faces during phone calls and reacting to various e-mails that cross my path, that probably I should have a cubicle, or like a pizza box or something.
So I am advocating for a cubicle. Or "like a pizza box." Or something.
Which is a strange position to take, but here I am.
And I love my job, I do. I get expressive because it means something to me -- about my own professional proficiencies, about the ability of my acronym to do good in this world, about our shared future and what will become of it.
And every time someone walks into the room I want to offer them a seat, a comfortable seat with an advantageous vantage point, so they can get comfortable and we can just talk. I want to like people and be liked. I want to have the space to do this well.
I am working to get to the point where I can make these things happen.
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