On Tuesday night, Dan and I broke up.
There was no cheating. No unhappy feelings. No not-getting-along. From the outside looking in, we had a great relationship. Hell, even from the inside we had a great relationship. But something was missing, and I never could quite put my finger on it.
I brought up my thoughts on our relationship, and he agreed. Something really was missing. He was able to put it in words better than I could.
“When we both lived in Michigan, we were both unhappy because we were just starting out and not quite doing what we want to do. Moving to Minnesota has helped me find my happiness here through my research and the things that I do, but you haven’t found yours yet. I needed support to reach the place I am at now, and you were there for me every step of the way. Unfortunately for us, what you need is space — and I am willing to give that to you.”
I am not one to say that our 2 year and 4 month relationship was a waste. I take everything as a learning opportunity because, no matter what I am doing, I am learning about myself in one way or another. And I learned a lot with Dan. He pushed me to be a better person and supported me no matter what I was doing.
But there are only so many things you can learn in a relationship. At some point, you need to take a step out of your comfort zone and learn to live on your own. Since starting college, I was a “serial monogomist” and went from one serious relationship to the next in a matter of weeks. And lately, with all of this talk of marriage and forever, I don’t think I’ll really be ready until I get the chance to try this out.
I’m not going to go into every facet of the breakup here, but to put it plainly… I am very sad.
I am sure that I will be for a very long time.
For the last week, I have been listening to two songs over and over again. I respond to music. If any of you are having trouble with something in your life, maybe these songs can give you some much needed strength as well.
Guess what kids – today is YOUTUBE DAY!
I know I am never supposed to admit this in a professional setting (and this blog can absolutely be traced to me by a savvy HR person looking for any dirt on me that they can find), but I came across lots and lots of awesome youtube videos today. And I am going to share a few!
Or at least as many as I can remember since it has been a few hours and my short term memory is awful (again.. something I probably shouldn’t admit on the interwebs)
I love DJ Earworm. Dudes got skills. I shared his United State of Pop 2009 mashup a few months ago. Here is his 2010 Summer mashup Like, OMG Baby.
I have always thought that it takes tremendous skill to turn a song that already exists into your own creation. It’s sort of like that idea where if you ask a group of people to brainstorm and allow them to blurt out ideas, the group will often start to think along the lines of the first idea shouted out. It’s like tunnel vision. I have a soft spot for musicians who successfully pull off new versions. See below a classical violinist’s rendition of ”Crazy” by Charles Barkley
Meet the inventor of the vuvuzela (as played by Will Farrel)!
Human trebuchets = awesome.
And finally, I’m not a big fan of the original, but Ernie Halter does a GREAT cover of Miley Cyrus’ song “See You Again”. I love it!!! Pretty much everything he does is awesome.
A few of you know me in person, but most of you haven’t had the opportunity.
I was a big enough dork to audition for Glee, and an expert panel of judges (my boyfriend and very good friend Bradley) decided that one of my goof-ups really caught my personality.
So here you are… For your viewing pleasure, this is me condensed into 13 seconds.
I hate to post 2 youtube video posts in a row, but this video was cool enough to be categorized under Way Too Nerd Thursdays (a theme which I am definitely slacking on).
Watch as Liebherr builds a tower for the excavator to climb… and as the bravest man in the world (in my opinion) climbs it.
And yes, the video is a little lengthy, but you can just have it play at different points throughout and get the idea of what’s going on. Make sure you watch the end though!
And thanks Will for telling me that this thing is an excavator 
And thanks DON KEYLIPS for letting me know the existence of this video in the first place.
I saw this on Shawncita’s blog (she always finds the greatest links somehow), and thought that this video was HILARIOUS!
The poor kid.
I also want to add this video, while we’re on the themes of kid’s jamming out to music. It’s old, but still pretty awesome.
And while I tried to think up a title to this blog post, my friend Don sent me a link to another video of the ginger with the moves.
I’ve tried to steer clear from ranting and raving on this blog. It hasn’t really been a conscious effort on my part, there have just been other people that I have been able to talk to before drafting anything to share. Today there is no such luck. I have no one to complain to right now, and I really need to complain.
I took Prandtl to our local dog park today because if I don’t let her run outside once in awhile, she’ll take it out on my studio apartment. She’ll run into walls, run into me, and tackle my poor 12 year old cat, Lucy. She’ll bark at anything that moves. She’ll bounce around until I pay attention to her… and then she’ll bounce around at me. And if I don’t pay attention to her when she’s in these squirrely moods, she’ll run up behind me full speed, take a big leap that puts her head shoulder level, and nip at a bit of my shirt as she flies by. In a nutshell, she is annoying unless she gets enough exercise. And I’m sure that’s true with any dog — I just happen to have one of those “high energy” types.
Anytime we’re outdoors (or indoors when she’s not amped up on excess energy), she behaves perfectly. Her recall is fantastic, and she’ll stop on a dime if I call her to come back to me. If she’s playing chase with another dog and she runs too far away, she will stop in the middle of the game if I call her. The best part is she typically won’t wander too far away from me in the first place. I don’t have to keep an eye on her because she keeps an eye on me.
And let me make this very clear: It Took Training To Get Her That Way.
So today when I took Prandtl to the dog park to play, she found a poodle to run around with. They played chase for awhile, and then a pitbull joined in the fun. At this point I got a little uncomfortable because my dog is usually the fastest and therefore the one being chased, and because she’s so small the bigger dogs (like the pitbull and poodle) tend to run her over. But her tail was still wagging and she still had a stupid, happy look on her face so I let it go.
Fast forward to a few minutes later, and the pitbull and poodle are barking directly into her face and nipping at her. They’re running around her like they’re going to attack her or something, and when she tries to run away they chase her, trample her, and bite at her. Prandtl tries to sit on the ground to tell them she doesn’t want to play, but they bark and nip. And every dog is baring their teeth and poor Prandtl is letting out little high pitched barks and doing her best to defend herself because she’s not much of a fighter.
When it comes to dogs playing too rough, I do my best to get Prandtl out of the situation. I will walk away from the owners of the dogs, call her over, and the other dogs’ respective owners will do the same. All of the dogs will be seperated, and everyone is happy. But today’s dogs were not well trained and did not listen to their owners, so suddenly there were two dogs that were getting more and more aggressive towards mine, and all kinds of people yelling out names that weren’t really having any kind of effect. I would call Prandtl’s name, but that would cause her to run for me which would just make things worse – she was just chased, trampled, and bitten some more.
Prandtl somehow got to me, and I grabbed her collar and sat her down. The other owners came running over to grab their dogs, but they couldn’t grab a hold of them so I just kind of sat there… hoping to God I wouldn’t get bitten… while nobody else could get control over their animals. And while I admit that putting my hand on Prandtl’s collar was probably a stupid move from a safety standpoint, I didn’t know what else to do. Nobody else seemed to be doing anything.
Anyway, this whole situation probably lasted about 5 minutes. We seperated our dogs and went to different parts of the dog park. Prandtl and I ended up running into the poodle again, and they played fine for awhile. I was hoping that it was the pitbull that escalated the first “situation”, but next thing I know the poodle is harassing my dog again. Since it was only one dog instead of two this time and I was already very cautious regarding that dog, I got that situation under control very quickly, but the woman still couldn’t get her dog to listen or get it onto a leash. And so I put Prandtl on her leash and left the dog park because I didn’t want to deal with another poorly trained dog. Then we went home.
I was okay with the dogs picking on Prandtl. It happens, they are dogs, and I expect it to occur once in awhile at a dog park. But what drives me crazy is when people bring dogs to the dog park that they don’t have under control. Every dog park in this area has a requirement stating that dogs must have a reliable recall, and it’s for reasons like this. This whole thing could have been avoided very easily, but instead I almost got my arm bit off by a pitbull.
The part that really has me fuming is that I have put in the time to have a well behaved dog. Prandtl did nothing wrong at the dog park and she did exactly as I told her. She came when I called her and sat when I told her to sit. And yet we were the ones that had to leave. I basically punished my dog for being obedient while the other dogs are being rewarded for disobedience. It’s a terrible cycle that I don’t really know how to stop. I need to take care of my dog, and letting her stay there in a potentially dangerous situation is not taking care of her. I certainly told the woman that she should think about not returning to a dog park with a dog that isn’t under her control, but she just gave me some “She’s usually not like this” excuse. And I wanted to slap her.
Anyway, sorry for this long, frantically written post.
But the worst part is that even if I were to go to a different dog park, people still bring disobedient dogs. There’s not much else I can do outside of buying a house with a huge yard for Prandtl to play in… but I don’t really have $100,000 laying around.
**Imagine all of that running… inside… constantly
While working today, I was feeling a little frustrated. To overcome this, I started watching a few videos on my phone as I worked (and yes, I was still productive as I watched them).
On the recommendation of Dan, I started watching a Technology, Entertainment, Design (TED) video. TED is a nonprofit organization that focuses on Ideas Worth Spreading and is made up of “the world’s most fascinating thinkers and doers”. Their annual conference is sold out at least a year in advance and features speakers such as Al Gore (former Vice President and Nobel Peace Prize Winner, Dean Kamen (inventor of the Segway and founder of FIRST), and the subject of the video below, Sir Ken Robinson (author and advocate of creativity within schools).
He emphasizes several times throughout his video that we have no way to know what the future holds for us as a society. The conference lasts for days, and he points out that despite the expertise at that conference, nobody can predict what really will happen… and yet we are supposed to be preparing kids for the future.
Kids are not afraid to be wrong. They will take a chance. As adults, it is something that we are frightened to do. His point is that, without taking the chance, and without embracing the creativity within them, we will never come up with anything original.
Plus, lets face it, he is a really good speaker.
Want to get a room full of engineers into a frenzy? Show them the following video:
I apologize for the number of videos I’ve been posting lately. I feel like using them is cheating NaBloPoMo, so I am posting this one as a freebie. If you have never heard DJ Earworm or his music mashups, you are missing out. I heard his 2009 “United State of Pop (Blame it on the Pop)” on the radio on my way home and had to share it with all of you! DJ Earworm did an amazing job on the music, and the video is put together masterfully as well. I have played this three times in the last fifteen minutes.
If you want to know the lyrics or if you want to see the song that each lyric came from, he provided a breakdown on his website.
