christine

Christine is mad for the podcasts. She listens to them while she does her logic puzzles.*

Yesterday, she wandered downstairs to tell me about a science one where some cardiovascular guy was talking about how if you listen to your favourite song it will expand your blood vessels as if you've done an aerobic workout and make you very happy. But only if you don't listen to it more than once every two weeks. Any more than that, the desensitization sets in.

Today, this afternoon, after the market and the Herb and the Hartmans, I was puttering, cleaning for dinner, chopping for dinner, sifting for dinner, my iTunes providing the background. She was feeling a bit blue, with the hormones, with the grey sky and impending winter. I was trying to be entertaining. She was lying herself out on the couch.

"Is there anything I can do?" I asked.
"No, no."
"You sure? Tea? Food? Hot toddy?"
"Oh, yes maybe."

That helped somewhat, the whisky and the cloves and the lemon. I kept on with the cleaning and the chopping. She was a muddier and muddier puddle every time I look over.

"Oh chicken. I feel terrible. Are you sure there's nothing I can do?"
"No," she sighed. "There's really nothing. Exercise would help, but I'm not prepared for that here. I need to get my light box out when I get home. But thank you."

The song changed. Moved seamlessly from one angular and melodiously melancholic song to another. The light bulb above my head went on.

"If you could listen to any song in the world, what song would it be? What song would expand your blood vessels?"

In short order, Rubberband Man was coming through the speakers. She was up off the couch almost immediately. As it was ending, she hauled out her iPod and off we went. When Shelley and Steve got here for dinner, we had a dance party in the kitchen. Chris was smiling and laughing and neither puddly nor muddy at all.

The moral of this story? If your dear dear friend has the random sads alongside wicked fierce seasonal affective disorder, don't be confused as she gets more and more deflated as an album called Autumn of the Seraphs winds through a darkening mid-November afternoon. No, dear internet, at that point you should know that it is time to get out the funk.

*1) Yes, you read that right. 2) That tickles me to no end. While I can deduce that there are other people who do logic puzzles, as evidenced by the giant website she uses to get her fix I do not personally know of any others. Though maybe I know dozens, and they're all too embarrassed to admit it. Fear not! my logicians, for your kind is a kind I love.

Chris says "Okay. They're applying metadata to these photos they're digitizing, right? Except it's students creating the metadata. So I look at this one photo, of the legislative buildings, and the student has applied the subject 'government'."

And I hoot, say, "You've got to be fucking kidding me. Like who is often inside?"

The same conversation, an hour later...

I say, "So I have to send out this cranky email today saying 'Hi everyone, Just a reminder that on the shared drive our capitalization convention is not ALL CAPS.'"

"Good for you," she says. "We've got to fight the good fight."

And I say, "I know, and thank you. But guess what was all caps. In amongst all the folders I set up for the major bits of our work, like "website" and "catalogue" and "networking" and "admin," there's a new folder called TRACKING MESSENGER. I'm curious, so I open it, and what's inside? One file. Called TRACKING MESSENGER."

And she can't speak, she's laughing so hard.