My Favorite Week of the Year

It is Christmas, Halloween, New Years, Veterans Day, and more, all rolled into one.  I do not quite know why I enjoy this time of year best, but there you have it.  Yes my friends, it is Gay Pride 2009.  The big parade and shindig is scheduled for Sunday, but the film festival started last weekend.  I saw two different films today, one a mockumentary (or as the director called it "a documentary feature hybrid") about a popular male escort in London and the other being a documentary following a group of gay people, both Jews and Arabs, in Jerusalem.  Films like the second always illustrate for the complacent gays of San Francisco (like myself) that even though things might seem like they are getting better in this country, they still have a long way to go around the globe.  I am taking a mini stay-cation this week and next before starting on dayshift a week from Saturday.

I had a really satisfying time pursuing further shamanic studies a few weeks ago at Mt Shasta.  It is an absolutely beautiful area several hours north and most native groups of the area consider the volcanic mountain sacred ground.  There is a huge amount of natural energy there and a lot of the work we were doing was outside, so it was a nice place to de-stress.  Whenever I experience one of these weekends in a group of spiritually like minded people, it is very much reminiscent of the Circle of Life number from The Lion King.  With the crazy pace of life, it is always nice to step back and just smell the flowers and feel the wind and the sun on your face.  Even though these things are with us every day, often we are too busy to recognize them.

School has started for summer semester.  So far, the courses look manageable.  Macro should be fine and my Math course also does not seem horribly difficult.  The quadratic equation and other algebraic formulas surprisingly were still somewhere in my brain and I am dusting those off and putting them to some use.  

I have been giving some thought to my single status as of late.  It seems to be a common pattern of mine to mourn the loss of previous meaningful relationships for a year or two before seriously moving on.  There is a part of me that is frightened of letting go and getting hurt yet again.  (Yes Kalin, there is a beating heart somewhere within this ice princess.)  But I also need to stop being stubborn and reach out to people again.  I tend to fill my life with work and big plans, but not leave room for a partner.  I have made it a goal of mine to try and be more social, to see my friends and family more, and to not be such a control freak.  It is not easy, I come from a long line of them.  However, I am definitely feeling the ending of the mourning period and the urge to date again.  Wish me luck.

I had a bad health week last week, first pulling a muscle in my back while I was running followed up by a cousin of the swine flu epidemic.  I am happy to report I am well on the way to recovery in time for my favorite weekend.  

That is a quick update on me.  Hope you are all doing well and I will see a lot of you this weekend at Pride.  Cuidate.

Getting Out of Town

I burnt myself out this week; I worked six days straight at work and there is definitely a reason we work in four day blocks.  By day five, you start to loose patience with Joe Citizen and day six turns ugly.  I had no patience for anyone at work tonight.  Thankfully, I have the weekend off.  Praise be.

I need to get some more Loaded Questions to answer on here as I know the blog has been a snoozer as of late.  Sorry kids.  

People keep asking me about the house and it is stressing me out.  The bank has ninety days to decide whether or not they will accept my offer.  Only thirty five days have passed, so the waiting continues.  My realtor seemed to think that with so many properties on the market, I would not hear anything back for a while and he was right.  The whole prospect of home ownership still seems like such an anomaly to me.  Until the keys are in my hand, I refuse to get excited about anything.  So many potential things to go wrong, so little time.  If I get the place, you all will be the first to know.  Promise.

I watched Obama give his speech from the Middle East this morning; the man is an incredible communicator.  The amount of stuff piled on his plate is extraordinary, yet he seems to shoulder the pressure with relative ease.  After watching what has happened with his domestic agenda though, it is clear that he cannot do everything without some support from his party or centrist Republicans.  People need to stand up and sign on to the President's basic ideals and goals that, as a country, the United States needs to engage in genuine dialogue and cooperation with the rest of the world.  The United States cannot continue to go it alone in our rapidly shrinking (or should we say shrunk?) global economy.  Rather, we need to recognize and interact with our neighbors on an equal playing field.  Obama needs our support and we must stand up and give it to him. 

I got forced back to working day shift starting at the beginning of July for a year.  I will be working with a fun co-worker, so that should lessen the sting.  Still, moi before noon is not a pretty sight.

I finished off spring semester with my 4.0 intact!  Two more courses down in the slow slog towards my degree.  I will likely be transferring to Cal State in the next year or so and then will start taking some of the courses in my major which are really peaking my interest.  Over the summer, I will be taking Macroeconomics and Math this summer.  Macro should not be too much of a challenge, but I have not taken Math in twenty years?  I suspect my 4.0 might fall under the curse of "Math for Liberal Arts".  Wish me luck...

I am off to Mt Shasta today, doing a shaman workshop this weekend.  It will be good to rest up and recharge in a beautiful setting.

Hope you are all doing well.  Cuidate mucho.