quinnkdotme

OK, among the many problems with blogging only once in a blue moon is forgetting the password to your blog. Not only problematic, I now can’t find the new password which means I need to start all over again next time.

And speaking of disasters, I broke down and went back onto a dating website. I put up new pictures and changed my personal summary – all of which seem OK. I couldn’t figure out why I wasn’t getting any visits except for some pervy 18-year-olds. Until tonight, when reviewing my profile I realized that I had put looking for guys 18-38. Whoops.

So have I scared off all the 38+? On the bright side, my friend also recently went back on and has had a bunch of messages from creepy older men. Which would you choose?

Ugh. Can you hire someone to do your dating profile?

As ever,
K. Quinn

Well, winter storm Titan is now causing me angst.  Flying back with my mother from Los Angeles, and we are now waiting in Charlotte for our connecting flight.  Our flight is still listed, but the other flights an hour earlier are all cancelled.  Hmmmm.

So as we try and figure out what is going on, we have headed to the airline’s member club.  Funny thing is, we can’t find our voucher, so my mother has decided to just walk in like we belong here.  It worked, and some nice guy just gave us free drink coupons for the club.

Interesting thing to note…. drinks in the European airline clubs are free.  Fortunately, we look sad enough that we are relying on the kindness of strangers for our beverages, and the kindness of cancelled flight chaos to waltz unremarked into the club.

Won’t this polar vortex go away?

Wish you were here.

My trip has already felt a little whirlwind.  Arrived in France, but my luggage did not.  So spent a good afternoon and morning worrying about that.  Then met new friends – new homeowners who were busy with home works… and was able to just be a, somewhat, passive observer.  Was graciously invited to join them all at a wonderful restaurant where we had incredible food, but which shall now always be referred to as the ‘duck fat dinner.’  I am still stunned that we weren’t hospitalized with coronaries after the amount of fat and butter we consumed.  Duck confit and potatoes roasted in duck fat!  I’m not even going to mention the appetizer.

Tonight is another dinner party, and what I should be doing is taking a shower to wash the mud off me – between walking the dogs and taking a riding lesson with the horses, I am filthy.  Instead, I’m nursing my wine glass and relishing sitting in a firm chair while all the while smelling  a little horsey and a little doggie.  Not sure which is the more pervasive scent.

All that said… having a wonderful time, and wish you were here.

As ever,

K. Quinn

And, not the way you would think.

Today, I was promised thunderstorms!  A deluge was promised to slam New York City.  We got a dousing but certainly not a thunderstorm.  Since I have moved to New York, with the exception of the hurricane – which even then wasn’t a thunderstorm, I have relished the idea of a dramatic thunderstorm.  Sitting cozily in my apartment, I would watch the rain pound the sidewalk as the lightening flashed and the thunder crashed outside my window.  Instead, the city sees rain.  It sees wind.  And, the few occasions when a real gothic storm has hit gotham, I have been stuck in an inner office in some sort of meeting. 

So today, I watched the early morning news which forecasted storms brewing this afternoon.  I put on my farm boots, grabbed my raincoat and umbrella.  I was armed for the worst.  Enthusiastically, I checked throughout the day on the internet for signs of when the storm would hit.  I left the office at 5PM, and it was gloriously raining!  I walked three blocks to the subway, and by block three the rain had tapered off.  Fifteen minutes later, I emerge from the subway, and the only way one could tell it had rained was by the trees which shook a flurry of small raindrops as the breeze rippled through them.

What happened to my rainstorm?  Tonight.  Tonight, I was promised a 80% chance of thunderstorms.  I wanted cats and dogs, instead, I hear crickets chirping.  They celebrate through their winged music the unexpected warmth of an unseasonable October evening while I bemoan the lack of atmospheric distrubance.  Nary a cloudburst.  I long for the roar of thunderclouds overhead.  I hear the roar of distant planes overhead headed to LaGuardia.  In lieu of dramatic flashes of light filling up the night sky, I have the constant fluorescent light of the courtyard.

It’s just another quiet evening in upper Manhattan.

As ever,

K. Quinn

For those of you in New York who know me, you will have heard me talk about the fabulous ‘Star Trek Lounge’ (not its real name)where I spend many afternoons holed up when working off-site.  Located near Penn Station, it featured a sort of upscale food court and a stadium seating room with captain’s chairs and cooler chests.  It was the perfect place to stop and grab a bite and call in for conference calls, hold impromptu meetings, and hang out for hours when you needed a place to work.   And, hello, public bathrooms that were clean and spacious.

‘Was’ is the operative word.  Yesterday, I went to my staff meeting which had recently moved to the Star Trek lounge – so named by my colleagues because of the ‘captain chairs’ in the seating area – and the doors were locked, the windows papered over, and the signage was gone!  Heart-broken!  We loved the lounge, and their falafel burger wasn’t bad either.

How could this be?  Where will I find another unknown gem in New York? 

Sigh.

As ever,

K. Quinn

Today I went to work, and I gave myself an escape hatch.  I normally don’t.  I habitually suffer through or fight or freeze when it comes to extreme challenges or high drama at work.  I don’t normally take flight.  Today I gave myself that option, and it was liberating.

 What was different about today?  Maybe that I was responsible for more than my own well-being.  Perhaps it was the fact that I spent time running through all the terrible things that could happen and realized that one of the responses could simply be to just stop and leave the room.

I had a difficult meeting planned with lots of opportunity for stakeholders to derail the conversation and for things to go terribly wrong.  I worried about my colleague, and I worried about myself.  So much could go wrong, and I didn’t feel like I would have much control over outcomes.  I talked it over with friends and my sister last night, and I finally decided that it would be ok to just end the meeting if things went so completely off kilter.  It was a relief last night to know that I really could control the situation, and I was able to get a good night’s sleep.  The old version of this would have me staring at the ceiling assessing whether my anxiety attack at 2:00 AM was worth a trip to the emergency room.  Would I wake up alive?  Would worrying about this issue kill me?

 This morning, yes, I had anxiety, but knowing that I had an escape plan or parachute really did help.  I was able to focus on my other tasks; I didn’t suffer from the normal chest tightening and stomach roiling that would normally be omni-present throughout the day.  Just knowing my escape hatch was ready and available – like swimming with a life preserver – meant I was safe and, maybe even, empowered.

 It sounds like a small thing, but I recognize now that it gave me the space to listen to the people talking in the room.  I wasn’t afraid of what could be brought up because I knew that I had planned a safety net for my colleague and myself.

 It was small, it was simple, and I didn’t even need to use it.  

It also helped that I had the song Hamster on a Piano stuck in my head and used it as my mantra whenever the nerves started to fray. 

Every little bit helps, right?

As ever,

K. Quinn

It’s autumn in New York… well, almost.  Most of the songs and poems are about spring in New York, but it seems like so many New Yorkers actually prefer the fall.  Maybe it’s the steamy summer, packing into stifling subways where your stop involves stepping onto the humid platforms suffocating you with a sort of slimy scum of sweat and grime that makes for such a grateful welcome to the crisp chill that signifies the change of seasons.

 September, for me, reminds me of the Santa Ana winds of California.  When summer lingers and turns to dry, hot days that compete with the brush fires to desiccate the landscape.  I remember last year, my first autumn in Manhattan, I watched the news out of California – the devastating fires… with a sad sort of homesickness.  Saying good bye to the warmth of the summer days makes me homesick for dazzling, ever sunny Southern California. 

 Perversely, I remember being in LA and wishing for the change of colors – the falling leaves, the cool winds as children headed back to school, and the rains that required rain boots and rain slickers.  Now, I live here, and I face each of these harbingers of autumn with a certain reticence and even a little bit of dread.

Tonight… horrors.. a frost warning!  My body cringes in anticipation of the shivering, bluster of cold air, howling winds, and soon to be acknowledged temperatures plunging below 60!  How do I reconcile the pleasure of falling asleep with the windows open and snuggling deep under the duvet with the disappointment of waking to the early morning chill and walking to work with my chin tucked firmly into my collar, bracing against the wind of the Hudson?

 It’s autumn in New York.

As ever,

K. Quin

So I took a Broadway dance class tonight.  So, what I’m really saying  is that I spent 60 minutes laughing at my somewhat lack of coordination and my total lack of hipness.  I and my fellow classmates learned the choreography for ‘Ease on down the road’ from The Wiz.  My white girl dance instincts really challenged my ability to dance like I had any rhythm. 

And, yet, it was fun.  I shuffled along, waved my arms (maybe it was flailing), did a few grapevines and was gasping for air.   I was also able to turn off my brain from everything else but what was in that room.  As I worked to make my body go in the opposite direction from where it wanted go, it was all I could do to focus on what the next move was.  We repeated the steps, and my heart pounded harder.  Add sweating buckets to my gasping for air.

Sixty minutes later at the end of class, I’ve gained a little bit of rhythm and a whole lot of easin down the road.  Thank you Broadway!

As ever,

K. Quinn

OK… ‘attacked’ might be too strong a word. But a small parrot insisted on reprising the role from the children’s book – Are You My Mother? – by dive-bombing me on the way to work. I ducked and then turned around to look where the little guy had gone. As I turned around, I heard a scream and looked to see a woman pointing at me. About that time I heard a rustling on my neck and realized the parrot had landed on me and was perched on the back collar of my jacket. I tried to shake him off, but he was bound and determined to latch on to me.

I have to confess, as much as I like animals, birds in close proximity tend to freak me out. The wings flapping and sharp, pointy beaks do not endear me to the avian species. As I shook my coat and tried to sweep him away, he insisted on flapping about and hopping from my neck to my shoulder to my back.

Finally, the parrot gave up and flitted to a nearby tree. He eyed me with what had to have been bird disdain and then resigned himself to chirping on the branch. I peered up at him and then glanced around my surroundings. Where could he have come from? He had to have been lost. I was across from the hospital where I work and next to the library and a school – none of which would be home to a small parrot.

Other people came to gather around the tree and discussed what could be done, and I slunk off – guilty of not rescuing the little guy and a little worried that the back of my jacket might be marked with his fear.

Yes, today’s blog will be a whining ode to anxiety. 

For example, I haven’t blogged in a while because it’s been so long that I’m worried that I am being annoying for being inconsistent.  And, then I wonder, does anyone really want to know what is going on with me in New York?  Because it’s not that exciting.  And, I don’t have an issue I want to promote, an observation I want to share, or really anything worth posting on cyberspace that will end up on my few followers junkmail inbox.  Ugh, how can I contribute to other people’s spam when I have so very little to say.  And this is before we even go into my true anxieties about the sky falling, not getting phone calls, getting too many phone calls, am I getting enough folic acid, should I floss more, what if there is a power outage an my air conditioner goes out…. there are people that have so many more things to be truly worried over that now I’m worried that I sound ungrateful, or petty, or heaven forbid…whining!

Ah, anxiety, my foul-weather friend.  How I wish to lose you.  How I loathe your frequent visits.  You really are a most unwanted house-guest.