I am going to take a cue from my Husband this morning and answer the Friday Five for your reading enjoyment.

1. Would you say that you're good at keeping in touch with people?
I would love to say that I'm good at keeping in touch with people, but I don't think I am. There was a time when I was really good at it. During college I was always emailing and calling friends far away (and I have the phone bills to prove it) but since then I am horrible at coming home from work and picking up the phone to call someone just to say hi. It is something I would like to get better at.

2. Which communication method do you usually prefer/use: e-mail, telephone, snail mail, blog comments, or meeting in person? Why?
I would say a combination of email and telephone. I find that most of the time I would like to call and catch up with someone, but I end up just emailing them because I can easily do that at any time of day.

3. Do you have an instant messenger program? How many? Why/why not? How often do you use it?
I have AOL so I do have an IM program, but I very rarely use it. If I use it it's to chat with my sister the most and I still talk to her on the phone regularly anyways.

4. Do most of your close friends live nearby or far away?
Anymore it's a close mix of both. We have a few really good friends that live here in Iowa City with us, however as people have graduated from college and moved away the majority of our close friends live fairly far away.

5. Are you an "out of sight, out of mind" person, or do you believe that "distance makes the heart grow fonder"?
I had never really thought of this. I think that my answer is probably that "distance makes the heart grow fonder" because while I love most of my friends dearly, if we were together all the time I think the time that we spend together wouldn't be as special as it is now that we have to appreciate the fact that we only see each other every few months.

Some days go way too fast...

Today is one of those days. 6 hours into the work day and I haven't even scratched the surface of what I need to do today....it's gonna be a long one I'm afraid....

On my way home from work yesterday I heard a report on NPR, that featured the editor of the American Heritage College Dictionary. The dictionary has published a list of the 100 words that all students should know as they enter college. The list is intriguing at the very least, especially given that according to reports the national average SAT verbal score is decreasing yearly. It's obvious that they have tried to put together a list of words that demonstrate a working knowledge of basic High School subjects: History (suffragist), Business (infrastructure), Health (hemoglobin), Mathematics (hypotenuse) and Civics/Current Events (euro). In my opinion the best part of the list is that it includes what I think of as fun words: tempestuous, loquacious, metamorphosis and supercilious. The thing that I find most frightening after reading this list is that most of the college graduates and adults that I know don't know the majority of these words. I don't have the most extended vocabulary on earth, Jeff is far more gifted in the vocabulary department than I am, but I did know at least 90% of these words.

I guess I would just be interested to see a statistic on how many college students, graduates and other adults know these words. I think we'd be ashamed of the intelligence level of our country!

There is a witchhunt going on.

And I guess I'm the witch....should be an interesting day!

I have been seriously neglecting my blog recently. Everyday I seem to think that I'll sit down and formally start my blog and everyday it seems that I run out of hours to do so. So far all I've managed to do is use this site as a source of my rants about my coworkers. They are a significant source of frustration in my everyday life, however they do not consume my life. So, I suppose that I should finally start my blog appropriately.

I am 26 years old and I am a city kid trapped in "urban" Iowa, (which might be the ultimate oxymoron). I grew up in Wheaton, Illinois, graduated from high school in 1994 and, after much deliberation, enrolled at The University of Iowa. I enrolled as a Journalism major. When I was 18 that seemed like a perfect career for me, I've always loved writing and been interested in current events. Notice I say that at 18 that seemed like the right choice, it wasn't, but we'll get to that in a minute. When I came to the University I joined the Hawkeye Marching Band in the piccolo section, which I quickly discovered was the bottom of the marching band food chain, but it was a wonderful experience none the less. Marching band gave me the opportunity to make so many wonderful friends and even meet my husband, Jeff.

Jeff is incredible. We were friends for almost 5 years before we started dating and we always kid that if someone had told us that we were going to end up marrying each other someday we would have busted up laughing. But, things change and people change and one day, after both of us had been through break-ups of 3-year old relationships our lives turned into a cliché and we realized that the person we'd been looking for had been there the whole time. Our relationship from the moment we first kissed has been pure magic. We dated for 17 months before Jeff proposed on May 6, 2000. We were engaged for 10 months and were married on March 31, 2001, my Grandparents 50th wedding anniversary. I never understood what love was, or what it could be until I fell in love with Jeff. He makes me a better more complete person and he gives me a million reasons smile every day. Our relationship is the best part of my life.

I mentioned that my journalism studies weren't the best idea that I ever had, let me explain. Coming into college I was completely clueless. I had lived under the Wheaton bubble for 18 years (think Footloose) and was fairly sheltered from how to live on my own. This lack of a clue led straight to academic failure my first semester at college. Most people presume this was because I was out drinking and partying, that really had nothing to do with my colossal belly flop into the pool of academia, rather I was so afraid to fail that I failed. Regardless, I picked myself up and took one more crack at academic success; this time going head first into my journalism studies (because way back in high school I had decided that I should be a journalist) and I started looking for a part-time job to supplement my income. This is where my life goes a little awry. I found a job. I found a job that I loved. I found a job that had nothing to do with journalism and had everything to do with Healthcare administration. I started working more and more and studying less and less. I was enamored with my work. I am still enamored with my work. Healthcare fascinates me. And I'm still a journalism major because by this point it was too late to switch majors. See the problem here? Yes, there was an obvious problem. I began to despise the idea of going to class, I still went, but my heart wasn't there. In March 1999 life became even more complicated. I was offered a higher level administration position. This is what every college graduate wants, a job that they are fascinated with, pays a decent salary and challenges them. However, the key word in that sentence is it's what every graduate. I wasn't done yet and I had this great job offer. So, I followed my heart and I took the job offer. (there are days now that I wonder why, I love the work, but the people can really get to me.) The experience I am gaining is incredible. I am 26 and I have 7 years of healthcare administration experience. But, finishing school has been a nightmare for me. A class here, a class there. I feel like I am NEVER going to get out of here. Thus explaining my previous comment about being stuck in Iowa. We are stuck here until I can finish school. Until I finish a journalism degree that I am NEVER going to use. (I wonder if I can sell it on ebay?)

Being stuck in Iowa has its positives and negatives. There are days that I love living here. It's safe, we don't have to lock our house or our cars(we do anyways, since you can take the kid out of the city, but you can't take the city out of the kid), the University is here and we are avid Hawkeye fans, some of our best friends live here and the farm fresh produce, grown literally in my back yard, is incredible. But, this place is about 15 years behind the rest of the world in urban development. Specifically when it comes to shopping and restaurants...there are none! In the last three years they've finally built a Chili's, Applebees and Olive Garden in town, note that the rest of the world had these restaurants years ago and they aren't exactly cutting the culinary edge. The fist stand alone Starbucks in the state opened last week...welcome to the '90's! The shopping in this area is dismal. In '98 they built the biggest mall in the state here in Coralville and it's a joke. No Crate and Barrel. No Pottery Barn. No Williams-Sonoma. The department stores are microscopic. It's horrible. We really miss the city. We tease that we go to Chicago to relax and be lulled by the hum of the city.

Outside of the lack of retail and culinary advances my biggest beef with living in Iowa is the local news. The local TV stations and newspapers are terrible. The 10:00pm news every night leads off with the most obscure local stories. (I kid you not, one day the news opened with a story about someone getting his hair cut. On that same day we had launched an airstrike overseas.) Every story they cover is reported from the Eastern Iowa angle. How does the WTC attack affect Eastern Iowa? What do Eastern Iowans think about Princess Diana's crash? There is life outside this state and people don't realize that.

The people that live here are kind, hard-working Midwesterners who for the most part of terrified of change. They tried to build a Home Depot and the city council was bombarded with complaints to the point that they had to hold special hearings. It's unreal. People I work with who are native Iowans are amazed when I mention that we like to eat out at upscale restaurants on a frequent basis("why would you do that?"), that I read the Wall Street Journal or New York Times ("that has nothing to do with our life they say"), and their first question about our current terrorism crisis and situation with Iran is "can he get a nuke here to me? If not...why should we care?"

So, while there are good things, as you can see there are also negative things and we can't wait until we can move. If Jeff had his ultimate desire we'd have moved yesterday, but I have that whole pesky school thing to contend with. We're hoping that by the spring of 2004 we'll be out of here.

I think I've vented about my surroundings enough for this blog. I really don't hate it as much as this might make it sound, it's just that when I get on a roll...... :+)