Appropos

The viola has always appealed to me. It's not the showiest string (that distinction goes to the violin), and it has a such a nice mellow sound to it. It's the support line of the string section.

With my summer Spanish class cancelled, and a bit more free time on my hands, I've decided to give the viola a three-month try. My neighbor Melissa, an orchestra teacher, has offered to give me lessons and loan me a few books. I begin next week!

While at the music store yesterday, the salesman measured my arm length to see which size of viola would suit me best. Most adults play a 15", but since my arms more resemble those of a spider monkey than a human, I thought that I might need something larger. As the salesman looked at the measurement, his eyes widened: "Wow, you could easily play a 16 1/2!" Alas, 16 1/2" violas are few and far between, and hardly ever for rent, so I'll have to be content to learn on a 15", until I decide to give up on the project or buy my own instrument.

An interesting note: most musicians who play a 16" or 16 1/2" viola are virtuosos and soloists who want a bit more volume and depth of sound from their instruments. Does this mean that I am destined to become a sensational musician, or that I have freakishly long arms? You make the call. (My bet's on the latter.)

We're Famous!

Guess what little town in Idaho was mentioned on this CNN.com online article?

Cool Things

Today's Cool Thing:

The EVCast podcast. Started just a week or two ago, this is a weekday-daily podcast designed to bring laymen and laywomen (such as myself) up to speed on the different technologies, companies, and politics surrounding the development and release of electric vehicles. The multiple technologies used in this race to create commercially-viable EVs are really fascinating, even to someone who doesn't understand them much. Give it a try!

And just to give you some visuals concerning the podcast's contents, here are some of my favorite up and coming EVs:


The Fisker Karma. Showy and pricey, but you can't deny the waves of sex appeal wafting from this car.


The Imperia GP by Miysis. My current favorite EV - it's may not be as flashy as the Karma, but it's classic roadster design shows a respect for automotive history that true car lovers can appreciate. If I could buy any EV for myself, this would be it.


And, of course, the Tesla Roadster, featured several times on this blog. Man, I hope that Tesla can establish themselves as a permanent presence on the automotive scene. They're preparing to open their second store in New York sometime this summer. Keep an eye out for the unveiling of the Tesla Whitestar sedan concept later this year.

Change is Difficult

Don’t get me wrong. I adore my new office space. Currently, I am inhaling through my nose and still enjoying that new carpet smell. The taller cubicle walls offer more privacy – I can finally play The Barber of Seville over my computer’s tiny, built-in speaker without seriously disturbing my coworkers. The rooms themselves have a lot of character to them, with exposed brick, and rough-hewn rafters and support beams, and exposed piping and tubing running criss-cross along the ceiling.

Being the only female on the second floor of our renovated building, I realized several weeks ago, I get a bathroom all to myself. Considering that I’ve worked in emergency rooms, in which I was regularly dirtied with various fluids not my own and maintained my professionalism, one would think that I wouldn’t have any qualms about sharing a few square inches of porcelain and plastic with my fellow humans. But one would be very, very, very wrong in assuming that. We had a unisex bathroom in our old department, but considering that my male employees outnumber me twenty to one, and are not known for their stringent position on hygiene, I was happy to walk to another department to use the ladies’ room. And only once, during a dire emergency, have I entered a men’s room for business purposes. (Okay, it was on a dare during high school to see if I could actually use a urinal. It’s harder than it looks, believe me.)

So you can imagine my joy when I discovered that a women’s bathroom was marked and set aside for the sole representative of my sex in this department. I walked in for the first time, enjoying the pristine sinks, the sparkling chrome in the place.

But then, the horror began.

You see, due to the artsy exposed rafters, the newly-erected walls cannot go all the way up to the ceiling. And because of this, and the hardwood floors and bare walls of the restrooms, the slightest noise in one restroom can be heard audibly both in the other restroom and the hallway outside, where the engineers often linger to have a private conversation or phone call. I realized this just as one of the engineers entered the next room and began to do his business.

It was all there. I tried to control my mind, but really, how could I block it out? I stayed in the restroom until long after he was gone (I had no intention of allowing myself to discover who I had just heard – that could haunt me for years), then quickly sneaked out and headed downstairs to a ladies’ room that I know has four solid walls and more privacy than a porto-potty.

Change may be wonderful, but it’s not always easy.

- Addendum this afternoon -
And now I've just spotted the second man come out of the ladies' room. Ick. I guess I'll throw in with the small number of females downstairs, adding my strength to their restroom defenses. Perhaps, with my help, we'll be able to keep one restroom exclusive.