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About Amy
Formerly a corporate paralegal, I ditched the pantyhose to begin freelancing in 2004. I enjoy long walks to the coffee maker, never setting an alarm clock, and not wearing a bra to "work."
amy(dot)derby(at)gmail(dot)com -
May
11
These & Other Things Arbitrary
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The lovely Customer Service Guru Kelly hath taggeth me for the “8 random facts about me” meme, which to the best of my recollection I have done at least eight times on other various blogs. But since I’ve never done it on this particular blog, and because Kelly was nice enough to come stalk me down out of my semi-coma, I’ll play along. However, because I have UMS (Useless Memory Syndrome), I’ve gotta add the disclaimer: if you’ve been stalking me for a while, I can’t promise these will be new things… just things you didn’t know before I told you the first time. [insert winkage here]
1. I regularly obsess over stupid shit. Like how many jelly beans are really in the “guess how many” jar at the ice cream shop. When I buy my coffee there, I tell the woman who owns the place that if she doesn’t let me dump the jar out and count them, then organize them by color, I won’t come back. But she knows I’m a liar.
2. I like to tell people I’m batshit crazy. Because I like to say “batshit,” and I’m not really sure there’s another context for it.
3. I quit smoking in February, but I still reach for the cigarette pack at least twice a day.
4. I haven’t watched the news since 9/11. I don’t read the news either, except for what I have to for work.
5. I didn’t know who was running for president until a few weeks ago.
6. When Bush — the original, not the extra-crispy — got elected, I said I was going to move the Canada. I was nine, I think.
7. People all my life have said I’m an old soul. I have no idea what that means, or whether it’s an insult.
8. I’m not religious. My beliefs/philosophies come closer to paganism than anything else. Which is something I don’t generally tell most folks, because then they want to know if I boil kittens.
Since everyone I know well enough to tag has done this meme at least twice, I’m not tagging anyone. But if you’d like to play along, please do tag thyself. Go on. You know you wanna.
May
5
Imaginary Therapist Syndrome for OCD: a Batshit Crazy Guide to Productivity
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I’m on vacation. And I try hard not to do any real work while I’m on vacation. Which, I’ve recently decided, includes blogging about working.
But my new best friend Tei — who is a real person but who hasn’t actually agreed to be my best friend — emailed me the link to her recent post on why freelancers should have imaginary friends. And since I’ve selfishly decided the entire point of her post was to spark my ass back into some semblance of a better blogging routine (by pretending she’s listening when I’m talking to myself out loud from several states away), I had to get to a real computer to blog about this. Otherwise, I’d forget.
If you’re new here, let me catch you up: I am batshit crazy. In addition to other more serious life-debilitating diagnoses, I have OCD with ADHD tendencies. I deal with work, my inbox and blogging all very much the same way; I’m either all over it or I’m hitting the delete button. I get bored in 2.3 seconds, and I have no patience for anything I’m not passionate about. Regarding work: if I hate you or your project, or you piss me off more than once a week, you will be outsourced. Regarding life: same general principles apply, except substitute “outsource” with my showing you the pretty little non-revolving door I mentally pushed you out of last Monday. Either way — I assure you — it isn’t personal. You’ve heard the “It’s not you; it’s me” line from every lover who kicked you to the curb? Well I didn’t sleep with you, but I really mean it. I blame my gene pool and childhood conditioning. I’ve paid approximately 407 therapists over the past decade to tell me so.
Which brings me to my next under-caffeinated, slow-to-reach segue: Imaginary Therapist Syndrome (ITS). I liked Tei right away, because she posted something someplace in the comments of some post here that her therapist is imaginary. This sounded practical to me, so I took it upon myself to stalk her blog. I was not altogether surprised to learn that she has the same first name as my real best friend — who is NOT imaginary and who DOES know she’s my best friend, much to her detriment most days.
My real best friend Taylor’s primary purpose in my life is to keep me from doing stupid shit. She exists to convince me that 3am is NOT the best time to start a new blog just because I’m on a roll. She keeps shiny objects like paperclips out of my reach after midnight, because she knows otherwise I will spend several hours stringing them together or twisting them into stickmen rather than finishing the thing I’m up late to finish. She is the part of my brain I’m missing; the part that knows a pile of rubber bands can exist on its own without having to become a rubber band ball. Without her, I’m all Les Miserables On My Own. This was proved by the “Tay goes to visit her parents and leaves Amy in a heightened state of crash-and-burn workmode” case study I had going on last week. I got 47 things half-finished, fucked up 24 others and had 9000 new ideas I thought were brilliant at the time but have since forgotten because I didn’t write them down.
But now, thanks to the lovely Tei, I too can have an imaginary therapist. I know Taylor will love this, because now she can go visit her mommy out of Jewish guilt without feeling Jewish guilty for leaving me home alone. Tei’s guide is brilliant. Kind of like Be Your Own Boss, but it’s Be Your Own Guru. Read all about it. Or, if you’re super lazy, here’s my favorite part:
“You don’t have to talk to an imaginary person. I understand I am the only person wearing that particular brand of crazy. Try just talking to yourself. Say what you’re doing out loud. It will keep you from going on random tangents, because those thought-jumps make sense in your unconscious mind, where nothing has to be articulated, but once you start saying things out loud like, “I wonder how many pairs of black underwear I actually have. I am going to go look in my underwear drawer right now,” you will pull yourself up short.
Seriously. Try it. If it sounds stupid out loud, it is probably not something that needs your attention.”
And now, dear friends, I resume my vacation mode. At least until tomorrow.
Apr
28
The Birds, The Birds
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Hitchcock’s film: the inspiration for “revenge of nature” disaster films everywhere. But if you’ve never read the short story The Birds, by Daphne du Maurier, do it.
Back on track… (she says while laughing loudly, wondering when the neighbors are going to call the men with the white coats.)
Once upon a time, I had an uncle who was a real nutjob. (Seriously, he was the kind of man who makes me look sane, but he did shed some light on the places the insanity gene on my mother’s side could go if provoked.) He juggled. I saw him do it once and thought, “I need to learn how to do that!” So I taught myself. I’ve always loved him for that, because I can entertain children for hours with this skill. Although this post isn’t supposed to be about juggling…
My nutty uncle liked to scare the crap out of little blond children in that “I’m gonna get you” kind of way that ends with the grabbing and the tickling and the lifting the child upside-down and flailing them around until their heads are full of blood kind of way. I hated that. I also hated that he’d hide around corners and jump out with “The birds! The birds!” I was three, I think. I’d never seen the movie. But the first time I did, as a teenager years after my uncle died, I had a traumatic little flashback.
Words stick. If you make them.
Apr
24
Make a Wish
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The comedian Gallagher — yes, the one who smashes the watermellons with the sledge-o-matic — does this bit about weeds. He says it’s hard to teach a three-year-old about gardening, because they’re not sophisticated enough yet to know the difference between a plant and a weed… That if you water it and it dies, it’s a plant; if you pull it out and it grows back, it’s a weed.
Whenever I see dandelions, I think of that joke. But lately, I’ve been thinking that maybe it’s better to be a weed than a plant. All this nourishing and nurturing — it’s hard work. Perhaps it’s best to be the kind of person whose juice ignites the field in a mass take-over of yellow wish-potential.
Apr
19
I’ve received a lot of concerned emails lately. I guess it didn’t occur to me that not everyone reads the comments section… and not everyone knows where else to find me.
So no — I haven’t jumped off a bridge.
My computer melted down. Actually, I melted down and then the computer melted down. But all is well now. I just haven’t felt like writing. And when I don’t feel like writing — or blogging about writing — I know better than to bother, because everything I write turns out like garbage. So I’ve been conserving my energy for clients and for more creative projects — ones I actually feel inspired to deal with. Unfortunately right now, this blog isn’t one of them, as much as I adore all my writing/blogging friends.
But for those of you who are concerned about me… don’t be. I’m fine. I am still online, still around… just not making all of my usual blog-stalking rounds, and not posting here. I’ve tried to respond to all the concerned emails, but I have a few thousand unread messages in my inbox that say stuff like “can you help me learn how to…” and “I thought you might like to know that…” I’m not up for dealing with those yet.
Be well, friends. I do miss you. I just don’t have anything worthwhile to say about writing at the moment.