Makeovers

Aside from being the Second Sunday in Lent, today was Confirmation for about thirteen people at St. Michael's.  The new Bishop of Arizona, Rev. Kirk Smith, was on hand to preach and annoint and all that good stuff.  His sermon contained an extended analogy about riding on the back of a tandem bike, with Jesus on the front seat.  (I can see some of you clicking away from this page already.  Please don't.  I'll try to make it worth your while.)  According to Bishop Smith, it's a wild ride, and all you can do from the back is hang on and pedal.  I'm going to have to think about that one.  I'm about to embark on a bit of a wild ride of my own, as I leave a job I've held for over a decade and try to find my way into a new career at the age of 48 next month.  I wouldn't presume to put a religious attribution to this, but there's still some resonance there. The bishop also talked about confirmation being "Baptism, Part Two."  I suppose it can be thought of as sort of a spiritual makeover.  Or not.  I'm just using the analogy to tie several subjects together tonight.

One other thing about Bishop Smith before I move on: he incorporated a ventiloquist act into the Mass.  No, really!  Here's the picture. The bishop explained to "Dexter" and the kids about what a bishop does, and about his hat (mitre) and staff (crozier).  After church I told fellow parishoners that I was jealous.  There wasn't a ventriloquist's dummy at my confirmation at St. Ann's, about 35 years ago!

As I get closer to being ready for job hunting, I'm dieting and trying to do a makeover on myself. (Aha!)  I don't expect to lose 100 pounds in a month, but maybe I can make a little progress.  But that's just one part of it.  I was about a year overdue for a haircut, so I got one on Wednesday.  I said "shoulder length," but at that particular place, that apparently means "eight inches past the shoulder."  It was a bit of a shock, spending 40 minutes and coming out with hair so close to the previous length that nobody but me could tell the difference!   So I went back there on Saturday to get it to the length I wanted, and also to cover the mousy brown (the color I've had since childhood) tinged with gray (which started about a decade ago) with copper hair coloring (which I've had before, but not to this extreme).  The head of the barber college did it himself, and when he was done I agreed it was the color I wanted and asked for.  Except: when it was dry, my hair was about 3 shades lighter on top than at the bottom. (The flash picture makes the bottom of my hair look lighter than it is.)  Oh, well.  I got several compliments after church, so I guess it will do for now.

Stage three of the makeover was to get a decent outfit for job interviews.  The result, purchased today just before the mall closed, is in the photo.  Granted, I still won't be gracing the cover of Women's Wear Daily any time soon, but it's definitely a more professional look than anything I've worn in recent years.

Third "makeover" -- and yes, I know this whole makeover thing is a really lame way to link all this stuff together -- is on Heirs of Mâvarin.  I'm only on Chapter One of the manuscript, currently sitting in a binder on the bathroom floor, but I've already tinkered with several sentences and fixed two minor continuity glitches. Well, it's a start, and it means that I finally have enough distance from the previous edit to pay attention to the words and the plot, and notice any problems.

Fourth -- I spent FIVE HOURS tonight clearing out 1000 emails and a couple hundred pieces of alleged spam (most of which was leftover legit mail received once I hit the 1000 piece limit) on another screen name.  95% of it was from a Scott Bakula email list.  The cancellation of Enterprise accounted for part of the chattiness, but it's a very active list at the best of times.  Yeegh--I don't have time for this!  But at least now that screen name can start fresh.  Also in the deluge were two emails from the founder of the local Star Trek club I was in 30 years ago.  Hi, Carl!  Glad to hear from you!

Fifth -- Becky has generously agreed to help me with a makeover of the banner atop the Messages from Mâvarin blog.  I'll say no more for now.  I also need to try to find out why the St. Michael's blogs look bad in IE, and whether I can find a way to fix this.  But that's not tonight's problem.  Tonight I still need to do my weekly update of the St. Michael's schedule stuff.  It's 1:22 AM now, and last week the job took me an hour and a half, not the half hour I blithely predicted to Sarah.  And I'm already so tired...!

Sixth -- I gave the JW entry a makeover today, rewriting about a third of it. 

Last -- I am having a tough time with my Mâvarin stationery.  The Sun and River looks fine on screen, but the medium blue prints out as something between royal blue and navy, and the darker blue prints out as purple!  And the template won't even open properly on another computer.  I know the printer is kind of cheap and the Compaq tends to show things lighter than they are, but I can't seem to track down the source of this particular problem.  Thoughts, anyone?

Yawn.  One thing about myself that I still need to "make over" is the part about getting adequate sleep. Where's all the free time I was supposed to have once I was done with school?

Karen