Art Cars and Other Cool Things

Part of today's run took me up Allen Parkway where I got to see the art cars lining up for the annual Art Car Parade. We have one of the best art car parades in the country, and people bring entries from all over.

I tried to find a permalink for the Houston Chronicle's coverage of the parade, but no luck. Anyone who goes to the Chronicle's website this weekend can pick up some of the photo galleries and videos. It's pretty amazing how elaborate some of the cars are.

I once had a "retired" car that I wanted to convert into an art car. I was going to make it into a giant rabbit. Seriously. But I lacked the time and resources for it, so I never got into that particular project.

One of the things I'm looking forward to in my new job is having a little more time for myself. From all appearances, I'll be working forty-hour weeks most of the time instead of fifty. And what's probably even more significant is that it won't be such a pressure cooker environment. Oh, sure, there will be crunch times like in any line of work, but the whole stupid year won't be a crunch time.

The head of my new department is very into her Myers-Briggs. She said when she interviewed me that she knew I was an introvert (we knew each other before she began recruiting me) and she's big on respecting the work styles of both introverts and extroverts. I so hope it's true! I've always tried to do that with my own staff because when a person has to spend half the work day fighting their own personality, it has a negative impact on attitude, work quality, and even personal life (which bleeds back into work performance).

Maybe soon I'll have evenings and weekends where I won't have to turn into a hermit just to keep from going crazy. There are a lot of things I'd like to do with my life that get put on hold when I need every free moment as down time so I can re-charge and be "on" again for everyone the next day. People, even when I love them, bleed me dry. Here's a good explanation of Extroversion vs Introversion, for anyone who is unclear on what the terms really mean, and not just the pop culture meaning.

Recent Baking
Friday: banana bread
Saturday: carrot-apple bread (2 loaves)

Recent Workouts
Monday: 35 minute elliptical
Tuesday: worked late - no workout
Wednesday: 40 minute spin
Thursday: worked late - no workout
Friday: scheduled rest day
Saturday: 20 mile run
Note: My job interviews and resignation really took a toll on my workday and ate into my workout time. I had thought to carve out a little workout time on Friday, but that got nixed by all the people calling and dropping by to congratulate me, further impacting my ability to actually work. If this sort of thing keeps up I'm going to have to stay home to get anything done!