Day 12

Today is Susan's wedding.  I'm so happy for her, but I'm also wise enough to not create a scene on someone else's day.  

It just so happened that the "reverend" joined us for a drink in the lounge after the festivities, which presented itself an opportunity.

On Day 12 I had my Lemon Drop blessed by a holy man.  It must have worked, because I'm certain that it brought me closer to God.

Day 11

Today I tempted fate and jaywalked out in front of a cop car because I had a homeless man tell me that I should never jaywalk as I'll be busted with a $170 dollar ticket while we were standing together at a crosswalk.  I told him I've never seen anyone get busted for jaywalking and he said it was because I wasn't homeless because he and his friends get popped all of the time.

I did not get a ticket.  Thank goodness.  It's clearly because I appeared to be an upstanding citizen.

Day 10

So, I've mentioned how unoriginal my idea is right?  The guy that specifically inspired me to do this challenge is self-employed, working from home as a writer and he has no kids.  Which leads me to explain what my biggest difficulty with the ONTAD Project has been, just plain finding the time.  I have a 9-5, I have a second job, I have two kids, and I have a ridiculous commute.

I started this project in part to revitalize my day to day.  I was starting to feel like I did the same thing every day and just wasn't fitting new things in.  I think I'm starting to realize that I'm just at a point in my life when the day to day is what it's all about.  It's about working for a promotion and reading to my kids at night.  Maybe I shouldn't feel as bad as I do that my days all seem mostly the same, because my days are pretty awesome, so it seems like a silly thing to complain about; that my awesome days happen over and over.

Having said that, I've realized that I need to find more new things that can happen in the workplace.  I just run out of time to fit new things in.  Let's face it, there's only so much you can do on public transportation that won't result in getting kicked off, which leaves me my work day and my time at home with the kids (one of which is young enough that it's incredibly exhausting to take him places every night just to do something new).

On Day 10, I serenaded Heidi at the copy machine.  I think she felt the love, though I'm fairly certain she also wished she had earplugs.

Day 9

I have a few lunch time favorites.  I used to eat Thai every day, but I've been branching out.  On Day 9, I stopped by the cafe to grab a greek wrap but they had just one lonely sandwich in the case.

On Day 9 I ate a corned beef sandwich on rye.

I feel like I should have had one of these before at some point, but I've never had corned beef and I avoid rye bread at all costs.  I'm not sure why, exactly.  I mean, I don't remember EVER having rye bread, but it just doesn't smell right to me.  And part of this project is to step outside of my comfort zone.

All I will say is that it was everything I expected it to be.  I will not be having that ever again.

Day 8

What I've loves so far about The One New Thing Project is that sometimes people recommend things for me to do, and sometimes it happens on accident.

On Day 8, I got on the wrong bus accidentally and almost ended up in Estacada.  

Here's how it happened:  I've had a long couple of weeks.  I have a real estate transaction that's in constant limbo and had just gotten off the phone with my client.  My brain was friend.  I had an exhausting day at the office, then had a difficult conversation at the bus stop.  The 35 was coming to the stop, and the 99 Express, my bus, was right behind.  I put my phone in the bag and dug around for my bus pass, then got in line with the masses.

The truly extraordinary thing about getting on the wrong bus is that I didn't even notice for almost 30 minutes.  But the conversation about why and how people distract themselves on the bus is too long to have here.

The most humiliating part was knowing that I needed to interrupt someone and try to figure out exactly where the hell I was headed.

Me:  Excuse me sir, I'm embarrassed that I have to ask this, but what bus are we on?

Him: The 35.

Me: Oh, hrm.  And this bus goes to Estacada?

Him: Yes.

Me:  Oh my.  I'm supposed to be on the 99.

Him: Well, you better get off at the Town Center, or you'll be headed directly into Deliverance.

Me:  Indeed!  Thanks for the heads up.

And then everyone around me broke into conversation about Tri-Met adventures, and how they've all ended up on the wrong bus at some point.  I like to think that my mistake brought people together.

When Ty arrived at the Town Center to pick me up, he asked me if I subconsciously needed something at the mall.  I told him no, but then realized yes.  Yes, I DID need something.  Plus, we ran into Shawn, which is always nice. 

Day 7

On Day 1, I got all of my news from conservative news sources.  People have been very curious about that particular task because everyone wants to know what the other side says without actually subjecting themselves to their rhetoric.  I'm still often surprised at how hard it was for me to not snuggle into some Huffington Post, Blue Oregon or to start my morning with Thom Hartman.  I wondered if conservative news was better than no news at all.

On Day 7, I avoided news altogether.  On purpose.

I'm sure there have been days when I've not seen news, but generally I catch some a few times a day.  I found it astonishingly hard to avoid all news.  Some things just become habit, and usually when Ty and I finally both make it home at night we'll chat a bit about the day's happenings, and that was the hardest part.  Ty would start with "Did you hear.." and I'd have to stop him from saying whatever it was he was going to say.

At the end of the night, he just couldn't take it anymore and said "I hope this doesn't ruin your task for the day, but 10,000 more jobs were cut today."

I guess he's as much of a news junkie as I am.

Day 6

I often wonder what the greatest joy of parenting is.  For today I've decided that the greatest joy is all of the laughing.  It's not that my daughter is a mini-Seinfeld, it's just that she laughs whenever she feels like it.  How refreshing.

On Day 6, Brynn and I played HyperDash and laughed for a good hour straight.

HyperDash is an electronic contraption, which I'm always skeptical of.  Electronic toys make a lot of noise, and while I don't expect my home to be silent, I also don't want to be slowly driven to madness by the dings and whooshes of some overpriced, battery operated doohickey.

Did I just say doohickey?

Right.  So Hyperdash is a game where you hold onto one part and then you spread out 5 bases, each with a different number and color.  When you push the start button on the part you hold, it tells you which color to tag and you run around the house seeing who can do the sequence the fastest.  If you go onto the more advanced levels it has special commands (Tag the color before last - then you have to remember what you've done previously), or it has you do basic math (Tag 5 minus 3).

As our daughter gets older, one of our biggest challenges is that we don't really have a place for her to run.  We live in a small condo with no yard, and while she can run around the parking lot, it's just not the same for a kid, but little games like this make our house feel not so limiting.

We've played every day since and we still laugh.  I give HyperDash two thumbs up.

Day 5

I have some pretty incredible friends.  I'm certainly never at a loss for someone to spend time with, if I want company, but I thought it was time to reach outside of my solid group of friends.

On Day 5, I joined a book club.

Well, technically, I joined it a month ago, but tonight was our first meeting.  We reviewed the book Then We Came To The End by Jonathan Harris (Why can't I underline?  I want you all to know, that I know the title should be underlined).

It's a book about the weird family you make at work.  It's about office gossip.  It's about being part of the collective.  It's a warning about losing yourself in the mob mentality and about the joy of being accepted into it.

I'll be honest, I really didn't like the book.  I was afraid I would go to the club and be the only one who identified with the book, hated myself for doing it and then hated the book as a result.  

So, in summary, I was afraid that I wouldn't be part of the group for identifying with a book about being part of a group but somehow ended up being part of the group for not wanting to seem like I long to be a part of the group.  In the end, I realized I liked the book, but it could just be because I raged against the machine and refused to be assimilated.  Or it could have been the fact that we met at a wine bar and I indulged in some outstanding, albeit overpriced, Pinot Noir.  I like pretty much everything when I drink wine.

Day 4

My grandmother died on Monday.  It's a strange thing to process the death of someone you have no relationship with when everyone expects you to grieve.  I'm not sad.  There, I said it.  In fact, she was a hateful woman.

That being said, I am heartbroken for my father.  He lost his father 2 years ago, and now he is also motherless.  I'm not just said for him because of his loss, I'm also sad for all of the things he never had, like the unconditional love of his parents.  Up until the day they each died, I'm sure he was trying to win their love, and I can't even imagine how hard on one's heart that would be.  

I'm blessed to have the most amazing parents.  I often say that even on the days I've disappointed them beyond what I thought possible, they've shown me nothing but love.  They knew it's what I needed the most.

On Day 4, I wrote my father a letter.

I wanted him to know that despite the constant chasing of his parent's love, he has always and will always have mine.

Day 3

I'm almost complete with Day 3, and I admit that I'm feeling the pressure.  What exactly constitutes a "new thing?"  This project didn't come with a handbook or a player's guide.  Frankly, I'm making this up as I go along.

I think it's important that I don't over think ONTAD.  I mean, some days I'll take on entirely new experiences, and some days newness finds me.  Sometimes I'll track down an activity that might inspire me, and some days I'm just challenging monotony.  Or maybe that's just how I'm excusing Day 3.

On Day 3 I tried to not use my thumbs.

At the risk of sounding like someone who has no grasp on evolution...

These thumb things are critical to everything we do as humans.  At first I thought I just needed to rethink my every task.  It's like the people who spend a day in a wheel chair to better understand the plight of the disabled.  You have to think things through more when you're in a wheelchair, I remember that much very well.

By the time I was half-way through my shower, I realized that it had nothing to do with being able to think out my task and everything to do with the sheer physics of being independent.  It took me a good 4 minutes just to turn the bath water on, and don't get me started on holding bar soap.  I'll never take my thumbs for granted again.

The truth is, what started out as spending a whole day without using my thumbs, quickly turned into considering whether doing something new had to result in success.  I decided it didn't, and called the task off after my shower, because I just don't even know how I would have functioned on the most fundamental basis.  

Sometimes failure teaches you more than success, right?

Day 2

I decided since Day 1 was well thought out that I would just let Day 2 happen organically.  I wanted to see what adventures I would find, and I assure you, everyone had a suggestion.  I can't wait for stupid people trick day because I have some extraordinarily talented coworkers.

I was starting to feel the pressure around 1pm when I still hadn't done anything new.  In fact, I didn't even know what I was going to do when a rather unusual opportunity happened upon me.

I went through someone else's bag.

Before you cringe, let me explain that I had the best intentions.  A prospective student at my place of employment had left their bag a week ago and was going to pick it up the following day.  He hasn't been back to retrieve it.  I brought up the idea of going through the bag because what if he had medications in it?  What if there was something perishable?  What if it contained a head?  (Sorry, I've been itching to misplace a plot device).

So, the bag was opened, and I realized that I had never pilfered through someone else's bag.  I won't disclose what was in it, because it's kind of embarrassing to be honest.  Let's just say that at first I laughed so hard I nearly had a seizure and then the whole ride home I considered the owner of the bag and what challenges he may face.  I considered aging and mortality.  I considered what it must feel like to not have the freedom of youth.  I considered the power of adventure and I wondered if I would have looked through the bag if I wasn't desperate for a new thing.

I felt more guilt than I should have, because I really did have good intentions.  But we all know what they say about good intentions..

Day 1

I wasn't sure how to start The Project for Day 1.  I wanted it to be challenging enough to prove commitment, but I didn't want to (excuse the term) blow my creative load on day one and then have everything else I ever do seem like a letdown.  I wanted it to take thought, but not too much thought.  It just so happened that today is Inauguration Day, which presented itself with a unique opportunity.

Day 1 of the One New Thing A Day Project (Henceforth ONTAD) was to get all of my news from conservative news sources.  

It turns out, I'm an absolute news junkie.  Some of you may be less surprised to hear me say that than I am myself.  Everywhere I turned, there was a liberal bullet to dodge!  Just getting in my car this morning required immediate reaction because my radio was on 620 am (our liberal talk radio station).  Just as I heard "In today's news..." I reached out and turned the volume all the way down.  It was then that I realized I had positively no idea how to find conservative talk radio.  

It would have been easy enough to just avoid news for the day, even with its extraordinary historic significance.  But that wouldn't have been in the spirit of The Project.  So, I made the commitment to still engage in as much news as normal, just from different sources.

In a stroke of luck (good or bad, depending on your frame of reference) it seems every other station on the AM band is conservative talk radio, so I quickly found a station that announced "Your Christian Radio station, where it's all about Jesus."  I thought it was a pretty safe bet, but lost the signal quickly, and finally settled on Fox News Radio.

At work, I spent the day flipping between actual work and sites like rightwingnews.com along with other conservative blog sites.  I had a small mishap when I had do to a screen print and email it to a coworker which showed me with open tabs for work, facebook, and a horde of right wing news sources.  She immediately asked if I was republican and now I have some damage control to tackle or I need to accept that half of the office thinks I'm ultra-conservative.

The bus ride home gave me adequate time to consider the task.  I can't really describe the incredible urge I had to migrate to a friendly news source and celebrate the inauguration.  I felt like I was at a funeral.  Fox News had articles on where all of the republicans have gone to vacation this week and rightwingnews had a blog post where I learned I was one of the vast majority who is so grossly mistaken since Obama is clearly the least accomplished of anyone ever, let alone of the people who've run for the presidency.  I also discovered that I'm an Obomunist, one of many new Obama words you can find in right wing blogs.  

It's not that I expected them to be happy or even congratulatory, I was just so surprised by how much fear there was.  They clearly (for the most part) aren't inspired by the message of hope, not yet at least.

My car offered more Fox Radio, and when I got home I once again had to dodge liberal bullets.

I arrived home prior to my husband and kids, which is unusual.  As soon as I walked in the house, I had to run to the radio which was blasting liberal talk radio.  We leave it on all day as to indoctrinate our pets, naturally.  I mean, who doesn't?

I poured myself a glass of wine, sat down to watch some news and when the TV came on I realized it was on CNN.  Again, thanks to my lightning quick reflexes I avoided news and commentary.  Everywhere I went today I had left liberal land mines.  This is just further proof that I am a total news geek.

I learned a few things today:

1.  There are some seriously bitter people out there.

2.  There are some incredibly intelligent conservatives that have legitimate concerns about the future.

3.  Near as I can tell, right-wing bloggers hate everything Canadian

4.  I have no idea how to locate Fox News on the TV or any right wing radio.

5.  My husband is hesitant at best to embrace The Project, but finally relented and we "enjoyed" a little Fox News after the kids went to sleep.

6.  I can't help but wonder if there's someone out there, a Bizarro Sarah, if you will, who spent the day trying to embrace liberal news and is struggling with it as much as I am.

7.  Star Jones just can't get enough of herself can she?

It shall all begin tomorrow

First, I feel the need to disclose that I have no misconceptions of this being a terribly original idea.  I absolutely stole the idea from Marc Acito, who I heard on the radio and I'm guessing he stole the idea from Ross Gellar, but I'm okay with that.

I turned thirty last year.  I'm still recovering.  It just seemed like yesterday I was 22 and living in Vermont with no responsibilities.  Our rent was $550 a month, our utilities around $100 a month and those were our only bills.  We came and went as we pleased, we bought whatever we wanted, we took weekend trips whenever we felt compelled and then in a blink of an eye I was 30.  I had a mortgage, a car payment, a 4 year old girl, a 6 week old boy, turned off the lights every time I left the room, looked for sales and couldn't tell you the last time I went away for a weekend just because I felt like I needed it.  And trust me, I need it.

This is no pity party!  Don't be confused!  I have an amazing life.  Even on  my worst days, I know I'm blessed.  My husband is thoughtful, patient and loving.  My kids are curious, compassionate and clever and my dog is loyal.  My house is warm, my parents are supportive and my friends are like butter cream frosting.

Like everyone else, I've just become a creature of habit.  I rarely challenge myself just to expand my comfort zone and I could use a little shot of invigoration.  So I start this journey tomorrow.  Inauguration Day.  Every day, for a year, I will do something new.  I'm open to ideas, so please share whatever you think might inspire me!