The Price of Intelligence

I've always thought of intelligence as a wonderful characteristic to have in your pocket - to pull out in a quandary, to assist in perplexing situation, to complete insanely difficult logic puzzles. But lately, I'm beginning to find it is a liability and not an asset.

People tend to think that if you are intelligent, you are always plotting some underhanded scheme or that you have ulterior motives in your actions and words. Now, this may be the case if you work in Intelligence but I don't necessarily think it's true if you are just intelligent.

Recently, I had expressed something I didn't want to do to my husband. A few hours later, I got viciously sick because I had drunk something that didn't agree with me (something that never does but that is neither here nor there). So it turned out in the end that I didn't do the thing that my husband wanted me to do. At the time, he said nothing about it. But recently, he made a comment about it saying 'Fortunately, no, I mean unfortunately, you got sick' so then I didn't have to do that thing that he wanted to do and that I said I wouldn't. This Freudian slip pissed me off for a number of reasons:

#1) Truly, if I didn't want to do something, I just wouldn't do it. I'm stubborn enough to put my foot down on many an occasion. But to suggest that I planned getting sick all along to get out of doing something is really a big cruel.

#2) This suggestion/slip also means that my husband tends to think that when I am sick, I must be faking it. My dearest, I really wouldn't bother faking that. There are a million other things I could fake and that just isn't one of them. I sincerely try to not have to force myself to throw up in order to feel better.

#3) This really makes my blood boil....in saying this, I realize that my husband is no better than his family that flies off the cuff about every little thing before thinking the consequences through. Yes, so I'm intelligent. I know enough than to say heartless things to people to hurt them. I sit and think about how I would feel in the same situation. If being nicer and thoughtful comes from my intelligence, then I'll gladly accept. But if you think that my intelligence means I'm concocting some insane attempt at manipulation, then you really don't know me.

What I've learned from my experience is that it's never the people that I think are intelligent who scheme to get ahead in the world. It's the people who think they are smarter than everyone else. They think they can pull the wool over everyone's eyes and people are none the wiser. Those are the people you have to watch out for - the ones who think they are better than everyone else. Not the people who are smart and who also usually are very humble.

Anger and Loathing in Las Puntas de Vista

The last few weeks have been anger provoking in many ways. Despite the joy that I feel about the next administration, I’m aggravated by the mistakes and burdens that the current administration has left for us. One of the biggest frustrations is the economy.

The government bail out that was passed a couple of weeks ago has absolutely angered me because I don’t think we, the American people, should have to help out the big businesses that have put us in this financial peril. I didn’t get a mortgage for a house I couldn’t afford through a bank that promised me that I could afford it. And I never played the stock market or purchased risky stocks or hedged my bets on such stocks. I’m thinking that a lot of people are a lot more like me than those people who went a little money crazy.

So why should I have to pay for these mistakes and for their greed? And what I’m also wondering is what is happening with this bail out? I have yet to see a concrete plan but I keep hearing about more money needed for more banks who continued to do business without seeing the red flags. Granted I know the plan won’t come until the next administration, but I think that the current administration is wiping their hands clean of the messy and repulsive situation that they helped to create.

I still want to know why they didn’t take a lien out on the property of the people who got enormous bonuses over the past few years to assist with the bailout. Why should they have to keep the fruits of their rapaciousness when a lot of people have managed to live within their means or have lived from paycheck to paycheck putting off the things they want for yet another year?

Maybe I’m missing part of the picture. I just know that I’m tired of these big companies – banks, insurance etc taking advantage of the little guy. And it’s little guys that created this country so stop stepping on us!

The Lady and the Tramp

I love my dogs…actually I adore them. They make me laugh and they love me no matter what I do. How can you not love that? And they aren’t only interested in me when it comes to feeding time. They enjoy the finer things in life with me – mostly television shows and a good walk in the Big Apple.

Yesterday, for instance, I had a good couple of chuckles at my dogs. I took them to the local dog run because they need to be social and to get some exercise. This is usually a mix of happiness and depression for my girls. Foxy LOVES to go out for walks no matter the weather!! And unless it’s in the teens, will go out in any of the elements with only her furriness to keep her warm. Bonnette, on the otherhand, tends to get cold very easily so she needs to be dressed up. She’s not very fond of getting dressed up because she doesn’t quite approve of getting off of her warm couch to walk in the cold. I can’t say I blame her entirely but still, we all need our exercise. Last night was a bit windy although not too chilly. As a precaution, I put Bonnette in her argyle sweater, which is a bit big on her. She got excited when I showed her the leash that she uses but when it came time to put on the sweater, she gave me a look that said ‘Must I?’, and hid her face into the couch so I couldn’t get her harness on. Somehow I got it on though. And we were off.

Bonnette thought it was a particularly nice night for scent sensing at every single corner while Foxy was in a hurry to get to the action of the dog run. When this happens I often find one arm is stretched much longer than the other to try to keep up with the dogs going in opposite directions. About a block into our walk, Bonnette decided to put on the brakes, notifying me that she’d had enough of a walk. I encouraged her that we still had a little more to go and offered her a treat in order to get her to move her romp. It took a little more cajoling and enthusiasm but we were all soon heading in the right direction. When we got to the dog run things were ok or so I thought.

After sniffing all the dogs, Foxy ran around with some of the other dogs for a while. Bonnette did a little bit of her own sniffing and then became my shadow – following me everywhere I went. I inched over to the left a bit, Bonnette trotted over in equal measure. I turned around to see Foxy chasing a Schnauzer and Bonnette spun in unison.

Then out of nowhere a little dog came up to me and threw a ball at my feet. I wasn’t entirely sure why this dog came up to me but I figured a tennis ball can mean only one thing in doggy – fetch. But instead of picking up the ball, I kicked and this dog caught it every single time! I was quite amazed by his/her goalkeeping skills and I continued to play with him as he kept dropping the ball at my feet. While this was happening, Bonnette thought it was an opportune time for her to make a run for the dog run door. She trotted off in her little sweater and when I noticed her making the break for it, I’d call her and tell her to come back. She reluctantly scampered back to my side but continuously made an attempt whenever I was a little too involved in the session of fetch with the other doggie.

Seeing me playing with the other dog bough out the fetchaholic in Foxy (a game she only plays 2-3 rounds of when it’s just her and me). She joined in on the fun with this other dog but Foxy just wasn’t as fast as this other little dog (O.L.D.). After a couple of failed attempts, she finally got the ball and decided to take it to a corner and hid it from the other dog. The other dog wondered where the ball was and then went off to say hello to some other dog owners. When Foxy left the hiding spot to play with the pack, the O.L.D. located the ball and bought it back to me to continue in another round of penalty kicks fetch.

This renewed game caught Foxy’s eye and she joined in again. This time she didn’t bother to fetch the ball. She just wanted to get the ball away from O.L.D. so it wouldn’t play with me. Foxy hid the ball again, this time lying on top of it. The O.L.D. decided to see what was going on with some little kids who entered the dog run. And there was Bonnette making a run for the door again. I gave Bonnette the ‘look’ and she returned to me and sat beside me. She created a ‘mommy’ sandwich with her sister, who was on my other side, still lying on top of leaf-covered tennis ball.

This whole thing continued for a while, Foxy got up and left the ball and the O.L.D. came to play. Foxy hid the ball again. Bonnette was waiting in front of the door again. All of this was a sign to return home. On our way back home, the girls walked in a straight line. Foxy tried to find some random evening squirrels but had no luck and Bonnette had the focus of a bullet hitting the target of ‘couch’.

When we got home, I asked Foxy’s forgiveness for not paying enough attention to her. She kissed me while Bonnette was sprawled out on the couch insisting I find another spot further from where she was.

Clan of the Cave Woman

This little piece is a homage to my friend Marni's recent e-mail called 'Caving In'. (A very small few have been privy to this email.) Marni's basic message is that she's caved into the world of blogs. As you can see, so have I! I thought I'd do a 'write out' to Marni here....and just mention why I decided to write a blog.

Some of you know that I used to contribute regularly to a website called 31mag.com. It has since taken a break (although I'm not entirely sure what the real reasons are although I've definitely got a number of 'suspected' reasons in my head). Many of the regular readers of that site have asked me what the heck has happened and when was I going to write something else. Well, the thing is, I'm always writing. But I write for myself and that site was something that I did for myself and for others. A couple of friends have suggested getting a blog going but nothing really happened until I saw Marni's blog. I said to myself, "Self, this blogger thing looks pretty darn easy!" And Voila! here it is!

I encourage all of you writers out there to just start a blog....especially if you use writing as a means of expressing yourself. It's almost better than chocolate. I did say almost, ok?

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Every year around this time, I am asked to log my accomplishments into a personnel system of some sort. It’s one of the most dreadful tasks that I have to complete annually. Why you might ask? Because what I see as accomplishments are not necessarily viewed as such by people higher up on the work food chain.

What becomes most frustrating about this task is how different parts of my company have different criteria for judging a year of work. Let me backtrack a bit.

I have to work on a daily basis with a site that is in another state. There is something wrong with the work ethic at this site. The people who work there very often do not return phone calls or answer emails. Even after numerous calls to individuals and hundreds of voicemails are left, not a single phone call is received in return. Although, I send follow up emails, cc’ing everyone higher up on a specific person’s chain of command, no replies. It’s really incredibly fascinating…the amount of work that I have to do to get an answer and the remarkably little amount of work they do to never get their jobs done.

So, here is my gripe. I’m positively sure that they get compensated very well for this kind of behavior. Whereas I’m sure I get squat in comparison. I’m held to impossibly high standards and get nothing for it even though I would consider myself a high performer. While these ninnies do nothing and get more. Does that strike you as odd? It does to me.

Now why does this happen, you might ask? I wish I knew. I attribute a lot of it to kissing derrieres and complaining - two things of which I don’t do much (although you might think differently since I’m writing a complaint here). I really can’t kiss up to people…I think it’s the visual of it that bothers me so much. If I like you, I’ll talk to you. If I don’t, I’ll avoid you. Just because you are higher up doesn’t mean you deserve my respect. Respect is a two way street. If you show me respect, I’ll reciprocate. Otherwise, you can pretty much…I’ll let you finish that sentence. And complaining, my mom always said “if you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say it.” Since I very rarely have anything nice to say, I just keep quiet. And it’s not like I’m tactless when I do give my opinions. I’ve just found that people don’t really want to hear anything negative - even though I always provide suggestions and positive spin on most of my comments.
So…that’s why I hate writing my accomplishments….Did I explain myself? Probably not.