dianaschnuth

Found on a scrap of paper on my desk:

“Do all your work as though you had a thousand years to live, and as you would if you knew you must die tomorrow.”

—Mother Ann Lee, of the Shakers

Again, from the depths of my stale inbox:

4/20/05
I’m such a photographer. Everybody is oooh-ing and ahh-ing over someone’s cute family picture, complete with a new baby, and all I can think is, “well, their bodies need to be overlapped more, and his head is tilted too far.”

6/20/05
you can’t leave your baby alone with your husband for three days while you go on vacation? i find that odd. i mean, when aaron and i procreate, we’ll be learning together how to take care of our kid, and most likely one of us will be watching him or her while the other parent is at work, for the most part.

I’m not a financial analyst; far from it. However, I did work for a financial institution for five years, and I lost my job as a result of that financial institution, Sky Financial Group, being acquired by Huntington Bancshares.

Since Huntington gave me a quite reasonable retention bonus and severance package (most of which still remains in my high-yield savings), and since my job loss was the catalyst for a new and better career move, and (most importantly) since my severance agreement included a clause against publishing negative commentary about the company, I’m disinclined to talk smack about Huntington.

However, that doesn’t mean I’m not curious about how they’re faring in the current financial climate. I’ve remained blissfully ignorant of most of the happenings of the bank since I left, with only a few bits and pieces making it my way through the grapevine. Now that things are coming to even more of a head in the financial world, though, I find myself wondering how that merger worked out for them.

Not so good, it seems.

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The inner workings of the brain never cease to amuse me.

This weekend, I did a few completely unrelated things:

1. Searched for Alton Brown’s lentil soup recipe
2. Took a long walk with Aaron
3. Looked to see if my hometown of Medina was recorded for Google Street View
4. Read the menu of the restaurant I’d be going to today with my co-workers, to decide on an entree in advance

Last night, my brain concocted this great dream where I’d moved into a house in Medina. (I’m pretty sure that both Aaron and my mother lived there, too.) I was walking along the streets at night, when I came across none other than Alton Brown, talking into a bluetooth digital audio recorder. When I approached him, he was friendly, and we walked together to a local drug store which, inexplicably, sold food in the middle of the night. We ordered the special — which I ate until AB pointed out that the meat in the sandwich was mainly fatty, at which point I stopped and said I should really stick to my diet. I was also giddy and fangirl-ish and more candid than I needed to be, telling embarrassing stories about myself. Afterward, as we walked back to our respective homes, I discovered that my new Medina house was only three houses down from AB’s house. I also discovered that it was 3am, and I’d been out for a Very Long Time.

Isn’t the brain fun?

From an e-mail to myself, recently discovered in the depths of my inbox:

Fri, Apr 15, 2005 at 4:54 PM

Have you been robbed by the three thieves of productivity – distraction, perfectionism and procrastination? If you are task and achievement oriented, you’ve struggled to keep these villains out of your life.

Here are some quick tips to help improve productivity.

• Spend a few moments when you get to work getting organized and creating a to-do list to reduce the risk of distraction.
• Is perfection getting in the way? That speech, project, or report is probably ready to go now. So let it fly.
• Always waiting for tomorrow? Learn how to produce a sense of urgency to ward off procrastination so you can act and avoid delays. Do it by focusing on the consequences of not completing a task and the rewards of getting it done.

There’s no citation, so I’m guessing I got it from the company intranet. I can only find it in one place online.

It’s so true, though, on all three counts. It’s an ongoing self-improvement struggle for me to combat my procrastinatory tendencies. It’s been an issue since I was a kid. Some things never change, I guess… but that doesn’t stop me from trying.