posted by catherine / June 28, 2006 /
it is now 12:30pm, and i've been at work for six and half hours. that's right: i pull the early shift at cnn.com, and let me tell you, it's a doozy. arriving to work by 6am is going to be, at least initially, much harder than i thought. though i was fast asleep by 10:30 last night with the trust of my handy sidekick named Extra-Large Dose of Nyquil, i am zombie lady today. three cups of coffee and a diet coke later, i am doing okay. the morning, with actual real work, has flown by; i get to leave in two hours! at which point i will go to the turner gym, which i've just joined, for my first workout in many moons. pray i don't pass out on the treadmill and get swallowed under.
anyway, i've been trying to take the positive spin on my work schedule. some upsides:
i get to skip traffic! the atlanta traffic is just as horrendous as everyone told me it would be. the first two days i was showing up to work at 9 and leaving at 5:30 and hitting hellacious traffic every step of the way. the drive at that hour takes 45 minutes; this morning it took about 15.
i can work out in the afternoons! instead of trying to squeeze a workout in before work or in the evenings when the gym is slammed, i can hopefully hit a somewhat-empty gym and get a workout done in time to head home by 4 or so. if i don't fall asleep with a dumbbell in my hand, that is.
i get first crack at the food! a couple of days a week the web team gets food delivered in the early mornings. apparently their food deliverer is...chick-fil-a. guess what i had for breakfast this morning? A PIECE OF FRIED CHICKEN WRAPPED IN A BISCUIT. it was pure genius.
the early work schedule allows me a bit more evening time. in the past, i'd get home from work at 6 or 7, make some crap dinner and zone out in front of the tv until bedtime. but now i can aim to cook better dinners and get more reading done. jeanie has a bunch of books that i've been meaning to read forever lying around - fast food nation, running with scissors, the tipping point - but i'm very happy to take suggestions. currently i'm FINALLY reading everything is illuminated. but yeah, leave book suggestions in ze comments, per favore.
um, that's about all i can think of. but i think reason those are pretty good silver linings to the 4:45 alarm.
Comments
Oooh...I did not like Running with Scissors, and I typically like those NPR-gang-ish memoirs. I don't know what it was about that book but I just didn't care what happened to anyone. I thought all the characters were unlikable and not in an interesting way. I seem to be in the minority on this, though.
The morning schedule can be nice. I worked 7-3 at my last job, and I kind of miss having free time in the afternoon.
I just started Everything Is Illuminated a few days ago, I've had it for a few months but didn't get around to reading it until now. I really like it so far, particularly those flashback scenes to the 18th century which weren't in the movie version. Also, I keep hearing Alex as speaking in the voice of the Gogol Bordello guy who played him in the movie. Usually I like coming up with my own ideas of what the characters look and sound like, but I don't mind in this case.
(pm?)
oh yeah, oops! it was supposed to be 12:30pm, but i had actually started writing this at 10:30am and just forgot to change it when i published.
My day starts at 6 a.m. too, but generally it doesn't end until 7 p.m. I normally don't get to bed until 1:30 a.m. Sleep is for losers.
I agree with Becks on RWS - I didn't like a single character in the book. Most of my friends didn't like it either, kind of surprisingly. But I'd be interested to hear yr take on it. Maybe I'm wrong. After all, I'm the only living person who hated The Time Travelers Wife.
Everything Is Illuminated was okay- not brilliant like I had really hoped, but good enough that I'll read Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close. Maybe I'm just getting grumpy in my old age. BAH!
i *hated* the time travelers wife as well. i really regret the $10+ i spent on it.
Have you read Zadie Smith yet? I'd recommend both White Teeth and On Beauty. I'm currently reading a collection of entertaining essays by David Foster Wallace. Also, I enjoyed Extremely Loud more than Everything is Illuminated--mostly because it eliminated the narratives I found slightly irritating and, if I recall correctly, doesn't rely on flashbacks.
DUDE. this thread is for books you LIKED, not ones that made you want to stab your eyes out. thanks for the recs, lauren.
Post A Comment