I’ll explain later what got me thinking about them.

While I’m at it, might as well share Let’s Go Sailing, another favorite from KCRW. Their song “Sideways” played on an episode of Grey’s Anatomy.

And while I’m at it, why not share this brilliant masterpiece, though I’m sure you’ve seen it already.

The good news is that my husband took care of our moth situation. When I got home tonight, he was standing in the kitchen with a satisfied and victorious look in his eye. His proud body posture said everything about the empty kitchen cabinets above the refrigerator and the cereal boxes lining the kitchen counter. If I had come in the front door, I would have seen the moth-infested boxes lined up out there. That’s the reward for stocking up on half-priced cereal–a moth invasion.

Thank goodness I have this wonderful man in my life who is even-tempered and doesn’t take these setbacks too seriously. Before he came along, I used to have a strict policy that I could not own more possessions than could fill up a box. I liked that on a moment’s impulse, if things became desperate or awful enough, I could fill up the 240, and disappear in the middle of the night, leaving behind all my tedious troubles and annoyances to create brand new ones somewhere else. Probably because I allowed myself permission to fantasize about running away, I never needed to act on the urge. Lately though the imagery of my Nissan stacked with my few treasured belongings has been popping back into my consciousness. The difference now is that my husband is in the passenger’s seat. That means I’d have to leave behind quite a stack of sweaters, so I hope he appreciates what he means to me. There will still be indentations in the melted asphalt where my tires briefly passed over. That part of the fantasy remains the same.

Anyway, tomorrow will be a brand new day and the sun will continue to rise and set. When I look at these pictures, there’s not a trace of me or my miniscule problems in this huge cosmos, so why worry about them.

Until I can figure out something interesting to say, you should broaden your horizons and take a look at these new fashions from Paris. There’s one dress that my husband very much likes and hopes catches on. See if you can figure out which one it is.

Have you been watching American Idol? Did you see that girl from Albemarle? It’s right down the road from here. You know Kelly Pickler is from Albemarle. Did I ever tell you about the story about the date I went on with a doctor from Albemarle? I met him online. He was really nice, so, so nice. Really nice guy, but his arms weren’t proportional. I felt like the shallowest person alive because the connection wasn’t there. Albemarle too, I just couldn’t see living there, what with my great career here in Charlotte and all, and Albemarle being such a small town.

Have I stalled too much?

Well, my boss did take me to lunch and my instincts were right. It wasn’t good news. My boss started our lunch with, “I want you to know I really like you.” Uh oh. The short version is it went downhill from there. He’s a kind and sincere man and the favorite boss I’ve ever had. He is a special person. He’s the front man on our customer account and takes a lot of abuse from the customer. I mean a lot of abuse. Today he told me about an incident last week when the customer called him in his hotel room, called him a variety of names and used a lot of expletives, the same ones I used when I watched Hoey pitch, and then hung up on him. I admire and respect my boss a ton, so I didn’t pull out the heat when he told me that he just gave me the only bad rating I’ve ever gotten in my life. Part of my goals were based on, for example, doing work, and since the customer didn’t buy anything, it made meeting that goal pretty difficult. The few projects I was on, the customer loved, but nevertheless, someone had to get a bad rating since we have a mandatory bell curve rating with hard numbers that 14% of people get set up to get the axe. I feel worthless and like a big loser and it’s very clear to me that I’ll be completely unemployable when I am fired, which will be any day now, though my boss promises me that he would save me if the big corporate machine made such efforts.

So, I’m still employed, but I suck and I wish I could be mad at my boss, but I’m really not, because I know he’s as much a victim of our corporate policies and our customer’s stubborn indecisiveness as I am, and it is what is anyway. I brought home my plant and took down the pictures in my cubicle anyway as an immature sign of protest.

I came home to our growing invasion of moths and a broken ice maker in the refrigerator. So I made a White Russian and waited for my husband to get home to fix things. That’s exactly what he did. He produced a mangled chip clip which somehow worked itself down into the ice maker from an unknown location on an unknown source. If it weren’t for him I’d have sucked on the tailpipe a long time ago, but he makes everything right. Thanks to him, tomorrow will just be another day.

Last night wasn’t my most restful night, but I’m sure I’ll be able to get plenty of sleep the rest of the week. I decided that if I’m going to be unemployed, I have to learn to act more like an unemployed person. To that end, I’ve started peppering my speech with words like “dude,” and “rad.” I tested out “Buddy can you spare a dime” on a coworker a few minutes ago. He just raised an eyebrow and then wordlessly swiveled his chair back around to face his computer.

One of my colleagues is sharing helpful suggestions for my future, coaching me to change my wardrobe, obtain a shopping cart and a dog, and practice the words, “Can you help a fellow American who’s down on her luck?” These are skills I’m going to need.

I know I should be grateful for my job. The Russian masseuse I visited on Saturday was telling me all about the depressed conditions of her homeland and used the expression, “no verk” a lot. I vowed to come to the office today with renewed gratitude for my paycheck, but alas, one does not turn over new leaves with such ease.

Perhaps I’ve lost my ability to disguise my apathy, because tomorrow, I’m supposed to have my annual review. My boss invited me to discuss it over lunch. That can’t be good news. He has never invited me to lunch. I’m debating whether he thinks that after nine years, I’m the type to go postal when he delivers the news that I’ve been sacked, so he wants me off-site to protect the others, or he’s just being nice. On the other hand, he said I could choose the restaurant which means he isn’t trying to steer us to a high security venue. On the other hand, he invited me to lunch.

As far as totem poles go, I’m pretty low on it, so I can’t see any reason why anyone would take me to lunch. I know I’m the most popular person in the building and all, but I really don’t anticipate my colleagues walking out the door in mass protest when I’m axed, which would be the only reason to take me off-site alone. It’s just so odd.

Two things: I’m having prime rib (it may be the last good meal I have for a while) and I’ll be packing.

It wouldn’t be the end of the world if I am fired, at least not initially. I’d have more time to exercise and play the violin, though no money to pay for the gym membership or violin lessons. It would also mean that I’d have to rely on my husband for money and let’s just say I can already anticipate a couple of arguments over wardrobe and cilantro. The only other jobs in this town are at the banks. A) I hated working for the bank in ways that I couldn’t ever possibly find words to adequately describe. B) With the sub-prime loan fall-out, I’m not sure anyone is hiring.

I found myself nodding vigorously with the author and expected the book to be interesting, but wasn’t expecting information that is actually useful to stock market investors as well. Turns out that we employ magical thinking in many realms of our lives, not just in spirituality or when watching the Orioles.

I’ll provide more info on the book later, but there is so much good information and so many great quotes that bear sharing, it will take a long time to type it all up.

Please just read the book, and if you choose to believe in ideas presented as science despite being unrepeatable and untestable, I beg that if you refuse to admit the truth to yourself, at least don’t present junk science to an audience of twenty-three million viewers who might respect you and even though they should be able to think for themselves, might think that you’re credible and give weight to believing in fanciful things and then preaching them to other people, who honestly don’t want to hear one more crackpot theory, because some of us have a need to believe that there are still some rational people left in this world.

Read the book. You’ll love it.

Life in Africa predictably proves to be a stark contrast to that lead on a continent with abundant, easily obtained food and modern conveniences. The early hardships worsen when the Congo decides to become independent and evict the Belgians. Despite the urging and advice from everyone that the Price family return to America, the stubborn Nathan decides to stay, without consideration for the wishes of his family, nor the consequences for how he is imperiling their lives. The preacher’s decision isn’t motivated by courage, but, as we later learn in more detail, from cowardice and ego. It’s clear from the first chapters, that despite Nathan’s familiarity with scripture, he has no intrinsic understanding of the finer and more respectable points of Christianity and the words that he means to bring to others he has never fully understood in any meaningful way, except where they serve his needs for punishment or humiliation. Nathan proves to be the shallowest and most soulless of any of the characters in Kingsolver’s book. It’s no surprise that his inability to respect or love anyone, even his own family, results in further repelling the community from Jesus and, eventually leads to the family’s personal tragedy.

The book is beautifully written and poetic. The unusal style in which each character writes a separate chapter doesn’t just tell the story from a different perspective, but provides insight into the character’s personality and depth while still allowing the reader to draw her own conclusions about the inner workings of each of the novel’s protagonists. My favorite part of the Poisonwood Bible is that it also provides important historical context about the struggles that Africa has faced in creating stable governments, through the eyes of someone living through the experience, instead of as an apologist for the superpowers who in so many ways created and continue to perpetuate the suffering that is so large and widespread it sometimes seems impossible to fix.