Journal of Post-Ralphaelite Thought

So I had my annual review yesterday at work. For the record, everybody, EVERYBODY hates these--reviewers and reviewees. I went in not expecting much, based on my previous mid-year review. Long story short: I got the equivalent to a C+. All the traits that I value in myself (my honesty, my creativity, my ability to get along with people) I got high marks in. My downfall was in the areas in which I put little stock. My supervisor, who I manage to more or less get along with, is fairly clueless when it comes to what motivates me. So I guess in a certain sense it was a fair review. I came out of it feeling annoyed. I thought about my annoyance with my review and came to an interesting conclusion. I had been given a gift. I had been reminded of something I've known for a long time: despite being able to do what I do fairly well, I need to be doing something else. My department, for all the lip service it pays to things like this, has very little use for creativity. Our new CIO announc...

It's late and I need to go to bed, but I'm doing a long boring process for work that I'm waiting to end. What better time that have a Novel Update? I'm at close to the halfway point, which is misleading since I'll need to start on the second revision as soon as the first revision is complete. Once I finish the first revision (and a little on the second revision) I may be willing to let some people outside my writer's group see what I've written. People like my charming but demon-of-an-editor wife. I've seen what she does to my children's school work. No way is she seeing this in it's current state. My goal continues to be to finish first revision by end of summer. Ha!

It started because I was saving myself for Kinky. The Primaries are over, and I didn't vote (by design) so I could sign the Kinky Friedman petition. I mentioned this (don't ask me why) to my clever 14 year old, and he couldn't understand why I couldn't vote in the Democratic Primary and STILL sign Kinky's petition. I went through this loooong explanation, to which he would periodically insist "But what if I want to vote for the best qualified etc." You know, the ticket splitter's argument. To which I would say (again) "You can -- IN the general election." It took a while until I got across the idea that the Primary was for the Parties to choose their respective candidates, and if you didn't want to declare yourself in a particular party, you voted in the general election. He finally had an "ah ha" moment (that or he got sick of listening to me trying to teach him civics). He probably now understands it better than a large per...