Julie & Julia

Sunday, June 06, 2010

Today I watched Julie & Julia. It’s about a woman named Julie Powell who started a blog when she decided to try to re-create 524 recipes from Julia Child’s cookbook in a year’s time. The woman truly dedicated herself to the mission. And it made me wonder? Why am I not that dedicated? Why am I so easily distracted? Didn’t I once write a blog? Hahahaha, yah, for a bleep of a second.

Now I wouldn’t try to make Julia Child’s recipes for many reasons. 1) I truly can’t cook. Bone a duck? Steam a live lobster? Oh hell no. Not me. I’m lucky to cook frozen chicken breasts. 2) I can’t eat all of that butter and fat. Oh my word. How did she not weigh 200 lbs? OK, strike that. Maybe she did. I don’t know.

I don’t think I could have Julie Powell’s dedication to one woman’s cookbook. For one, Julie didn’t have kids, picky “I don’t eat green” kids. For another, Julie had a nice 9-5 job. My job is 24/7…and after this weekend, I don’t like it very much.

Dear Job, why do I hate thee?

·         Because you’ve ruined the wonderful balance I had in my life. OK, maybe it wasn’t balanced, but my life used to be all about ME, wonderful ME….and my family. Now it’s about baseball, rained out games, chlorine, poop in the pool, purchasing drumsticks, nachos and pizza, dealing with disgruntled employees and people who don’t like the park district in general because of some small slight they received over 10 years ago from people who are no longer even involved in the park district.
·         Because working for 60-70 hours a week is not healthy for anyone let alone someone who loves to do other things, like exercise and spend time with my family and friends.
·         Because people in general rarely put themselves into someone else’s shoes and consider what might be happening in their lives, like lack of electricity and a husband out of town to help you out.
·         Because not everyone takes their job as seriously as you do….i.e. employees who don’t let you know they are taking ANOTHER vacation for 2 weeks of the 5 weeks during the summer they are actually available.

BUT I know that this too will pass. Some other thing will come along to distract me from my misery and I won’t mind my job….until the next weekend is blown and I’m back to pulling my hair out. Until then, be safe, be healthy and be happy.