Life-in-Progress

43 Random Things About Me, in No Particular Order. Facebook-style.
There is really nothing here of value. This is simply for my own amusement.

1. I am a 100%, died-in-the-wool Bay Area Girl, born and raised. I married a 100%, died-in-the-wool New York City Boy. We now live in Texas. This is a scenario rife with fodder for endless jokes.
2. I am a dog person. There is very little I adore more than a dog, with an obvious weakness for my own. She’s a good girl and a great traveler, which is good since she’s racked up more air miles than most travel agents. She’s better behaved on planes than most children, adults or some crewmembers.
3. I am not wild about cats. I married a cat person. But a cat person who is allergic to cats. This poses a few different challenges. I enjoy that these factors make it easier for me to continue to postpone getting a cat.
4. My biggest objection in moving to Austin was a lack of ocean. But then, after living on the Atlantic coast for a few years, that wasn’t necessarily a big change. East coasters get offended when I say things like that. West coasters get it.
5. I am an ENTJ. That means I’m usually very, very direct. Some people find that to be insensitive. They mostly just need to get over it.
6. I am apparently the one woman on the planet who does not have a single romantic bone in her body. And I married the most romantic man in the world. We are like endless Reality Television for the Gods of Irony.
7. This blog was originally named “The Pragmatic Contextualist” because I am both a pragmatist and a contextualist, and I couldn’t decide which to pick. I almost went with “The Contextual Pragmatist.” Or “Bippidy Boppidy Boo.” But I was afraid of getting sued by Disney.  This blog is now names “The Pragmatic Populist” because I am still, as always, a populist, but I find entrepreneurism to be the most pragmatic approach to it in a new economy.
8. I am very political. I swing pretty far to the left, but over time that has become far less a function of emotional sentimentality and far more a function of intellectual definition. I have lost most of my zealous political fervor with age, and the nature of my liberal identification has changed with the new economy. But that hasn’t turned me into the conservative everyone used to place bets I’d become.
9. My husband and I got married on Feb. 29th. We only have an anniversary every four years. People usually assume that had to be the man’s idea. People who assume that do not know me.
10. I grew up in a family-owned business. My first job was working for my dad, driving a tortilla chip route. It honestly never occurred to me to work anywhere else.
11. I am allergic to religion. Seriously. And not just some. I have an equal opportunity allergy. They all make me sneeze. Prolonged exposure results in hives.
12. I am the Queen of Analogies. I talk in analogies. I think in analogies. I find them the most valuable tool in making a point. I make them up on the fly. Most of the time they aren’t bad. I almost always refine and improve them upon a second iteration, though, but usually by then it’s too late. That tends to frustrate me.
13. I’m not sentimental. I am funny. I tend to scuttle sappy moments by going for the joke. This is often inappropriate. I frequently do not notice that I’ve done it until it is too late.
14. I am super competitive in most ways. The person I compete with most is usually myself. This present me with lots of opportunities to win. And to lose. Mostly it just presents me with opportunities to confuse myself.
15. I think outloud. Especially in the shower or while driving. People at stop lights pretend to believe me when I act like I’m on a headset or singing along with the radio. I know they don’t, but it’s nice of them to let me save face until the light turns green.
16. I blog to help control my thinking outloud habit. Over time, however, this has become less effective, because now I am discovering that I am blogging outloud before I sit down at the keyboard. The net result is not actually an improvement. I have yet to figure out a solution to this.
17. I am a contrarian. I occasionally attempt not to be, but it doesn’t usually last long. My friends once told me that the reason I didn’t like chocolate or peanut butter was simply because everyone else in the world did. I disagreed.
18. I am a Daddy’s Girl who grew up in heavily male-dominated environments and who works in a male-dominated industry. I was also a jock and a tom boy. I was 30 before I learned to wear a dress. I’m still a tom boy, though.
19. One of my and my dad’s favorite movies is Fiddler on the Roof. One of our favorite songs in the movie is, “Tradition.” Ironically, an am an anti-traditionalist. See contrarian note above.
20. I chew ice. People around me often find this highly annoying. I do not blame them. But it’s a very strong compulsion. It’s also a way to keep from snacking. It works. But it’ll probably eventually break all of my teeth.
21. I have a sarcasm problem. I should seek treatment. But I don’t think I could take it seriously. I’d probably be sarcastic. That would probably not be very helpful.
22. I balk at zealotry, fanaticism and philosophical extremism. I have found that fanatics of all types cling to their beliefs and ignore evidence about effectiveness even if it bites them on the nose. When they ignore it, I have to resist the urge to bite them myself. Religion, in particular, seems to foster this behavior. See above re: allergy.
23. I love food. Like, a LOT. And my taste buds are the one part of me that is higher up my personal Maslow’s Need Scale than my political sensibility, because foie gras just may be my favorite thing on the planet. Or maybe truffles. I do enjoy a good veal, too.
24. I have a good friend who once decided that my perfect career would be a political cooking show: I could cook and talk politics as much as I want. A non-perky Rachael Ray meet Rachel Maddow. There are days I still cling to that fantasy.
25. I absolutely love Jack-in-the-Box two for $.99 tacos. I know. Go figure. They have damn good curly fries, too.
26. I have not had television since 1998. At first it was because I couldn’t afford it. Over time it turned into a political statement against the advertising industry. That argument stopped carrying water when I started working in the advertising industry. By then I was just used to life without it and did not want it. Now that the whole world is online, fewer people seem to find that strange than before.
27. The only place I like walking is on a treadmill. This made living in Manhattan a problem. My husband once walked from my apartment on E 75th St. to my office on Broadway at Houston. And then back again. If you don’t know how far that is, it is so far that my feet get blisters just thinking about it. He did this for fun. To me that is like saying, “I stuck my hand in boiling oil for fun.” My brain does not work that way. My feet, either.
28. I do not dance. Unless there is alcohol involved. Ideally inclusive of vodka. My Russian DNA likes vodka more than my control freak DNA dislikes dancing.
29. See’s Candy is what candy should taste like. I miss See’s. I look at their website and drool on my keyboard. I used to make chocolates as bribes for my project teams. They worked amazingly well. Gift developers coffee and chocolate and their progress is amazing.
30. I am a painter. But I gave away all my paints when I moved to New York. So I’m a paintless painter. I plan to fix this now that we are living in a place with enough space and light to paint. As a substitute in the meantime, I bake cakes and then “paint” with frosting. This is tasty, but problematic for other reasons.
31. I am from a family of immigrants, so the sport I grew up with was soccer. I don’t get American Football. I take issue with a sport with an “offense” team and a “defense” team. Any sport where athletes aren’t athletic enough to play both is not a sport I can appreciate. I love basketball.
32. The biggest adjustment about moving to Austin is the sea of burnt orange and the Religion of UT Football. Orange is one of my favorite colors. But not burnt. See above for opinions of both religion, football and fantacism.
33. If I am having a bad day, I look up the weather in Austin. Then I look up the weather in New York. This improves my mood.
34. If I am having a REALLY bad day, I look up the weather in Austin. Then I look up the weather in New York. Then I post the difference to my Facebook page for all of my friends in New York to see. This improves my mood even more. My friends don’t appreciate this, however.
35. Other than cooking, I am not domestic. Neither is my husband. The dog has no opposable thumbs. This presents a problem. I am still searching for a good solution.
36. I love Disneyland and Disney World. For an anti-consumerism, non-pop-culture contrarian, I recognize this makes no sense. But Disney makes me happy. I love Disney.
37. My favorite ‘fictional’ female characters from television are Laura Holt (Remington Steele), Miranda Hobbs (Sex and the City) and Dana Whittaker (Sports Night). There is a pretty clear and accurate psychological profile that can be drawn from that preference. It would be pretty accurate.
38. The only true downside to living in Austin is the lack of Trader Joe’s. This breaks my heart. I heart Trader Joe’s. When I travel on business, I go to Trader Joe’s and buy items to bring/ship home. I often daydream about convincing Trader Joe’s to let me start up an ecommerce division just so I can get my favorite chicken verde burritos and maple shredded wheat.
39. I love Twitter. I enjoy other social networking sites as well, but Twitter is my favorite.
40. When I try to save money and cut my dog’s hair instead of taking her to the groomer, she ends up looking like a cancer patient who is losing most of her hair. Huge, embarrassing patches just emerge. I swear I don’t know how. I’d be hard pressed to say which of us is more mortified when we go out for a walk afterward.
41. For some strange reason, despite no track record of success, I continue to try to trim my dog myself. I have trouble believing that it might just not be possible for me to ever get good at this. This is probably something for which PETA should scold me.
42. I am a morning person. I married a night person. The dog likes this arrangement because she usually gets to sleep in the bed with someone and still get half of it to herself. She just has to switch sides.
43. I had to add one more item just to make sure this list was a prime number. Odd numbers drive my husband bonkers. He likes symmetry. I amuse myself by picking odd numbers whenever possible, just to annoy him. This is one of the things his sisters like best about me.