i fuckin love coloring

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ready now to blog about my trip to nicaragua

oooh, it was so great.

it was pretty exhausting and sweaty and dirty and mosquito-y, just like i wanted! i ended up being totally useless as far as the actual hands-on engineering projects went, but i was super useful as a translator and left the country feeling pretty excited about my spanish skills.

first we flew into managua where we discovered that one of our expensive boxes of tools did not make it into the country (or at least onto the conveyor belt). then we went to the hotel where the power was out and it was hot hot hot and dark dark dark.

the next day we toured around some major city landmarks in managua and also went to check out the dump, where people live in shacks on trash heaps and spend all day sorting through the trash for recyclables to sell and other odds and ends. there is an AWESOME SCHOOL on the fringe of the dump that is run by some christian organization and teaches all the dump kids for free. see adorable pictures below.




the next day we left for granada, a touristy cute town where we spent a day on a long and pretty serious hike followed by a ridiculously cool CANOPY TOUR in which i zoomed around the cloud forest on a zip line. AWESOME.

at this point we were still in our unwieldy group of 22. then the next day the groups split and i ventured off with the engineering students (my favorites) to the TOTALLY GREAT town of jinotepe, not far from managua. there we stayed at a pretty ridiculously cool hotel that apparently used to be the toast of the town and a favorite party location for the somoza dynasty. the hotel has a big roof where we spent our nights drinking rum and looking over the town.

in jinotepe we got up every day at 7 am and headed off to the local old folks home, called a hogar, where various projects took place, such as water tank installation, roof tile fixing, seismic upgrading, and electrical rewiring. also some house painting.




at the hogar we met up with a group of local engineering students who quickly became our best friends and worked with us every day on the job site, actually making it so that there was too much work for the number of people there. so i wasn't able to do any actual work, which was too bad. i spent my days shuttling around helping with translations between the portland students, almost none of whom spoke spanish, and the nicaragua students, almost none of whom spoke english. i also led an exercise class at the hogar every day (see picture) and coordinated things like transportation, lunch delivery, goodbye party, etc. for the goodbye party i was the MC and i forgot to line up a translator for the event so i was also the translator. kind of extremely stressful because the mayor came and made a speech and everything. eek!



throughout this time all the engineering students adopted me and it was great. we formed a united front against keren, just like i had dreamed we would. they offered me support and most importantly pity and when keren would call and act like a psycho, i could look over my shoulder and receive thumbs up. so, that was pretty great.

things with keren not so great. what a jerk.

finally after 8 or so days in jinotepe we packed up, said our tearful goodbyes to our nicaraguan engineering counterparts.

back in managua we did this and that, but most importantly i invited the architect who is designing the expansion of the jinotepe hogar to dinner with us, and he came and he and i talked the whole time and "hit it off" if you will, and then i walked him back to his car where we told each other we liked each other and then had a sad hug and he said "i like you too much" and i felt warm and fuzzy and wanted.

carlos the architect is the one on the far right. keren, my boss, is pretending to dig the first hole on an expansion of the building that isn't actually beginning for a couple of months.



then i walked back to the hotel, where the students were in the process of getting extremely drunk. i caught up with them in no time and then we packed our bags drunkenly at 3 in the morning and got to the airport and 4:30 in the morning and were on a plane by 6:30, at which point corianne, my best student buddy, passed out and puked in first class.

she's alright, though.

after only a 5 and a half hour layover in houston, we were on our way to portland!

now i am in email correspondence with carlos the architect, who so far has not seemed any less cool than before. nice to have a crush. i think i forgot to mention he is married? very married. this is why the hug and no kiss and the sadness. but of course, all for the best.

that's all my friends! now i am back in clackamas and holding up reasonably well. haven't done all that much work yet. mostly thinking about nicaragua and catching up on personal matters. whoops.

la la laaaa la la laaaa

boo hoo! super stressful! aggghhh!

On 6/13/07, Megan Harrington wrote:

So, have you talked with Margaret/Keren about your plans to not return
with the group? And do you have some kind of letter you are signing
releasing the University from all responsibility?

Thanks…

___________________________________________
Megan Harrington Wilson
Jessie F. Richardson Foundation
15900 SE 82nd Drive, Clackamas, OR 97015
mharrington@jfrfoundation.org
Ph: 503.408.4754 F: 503.255.5929

______________________

Megan,

I have expressed my intention to remain in country, both to you and Keren from the very beginning of involvement with the service project and it has not changed.

I was not informed that I had to release the University from liability or get an OK from Margaret when making a free will decision..
If this is necessary I will happily do so.

Iam now going to express my dissatisfaction with you and the level of organization surrounding our travel and other arrangements.
Myself and two other members of the group have repeatedly expressed our plans to stay in Central America beyond the dates of the service project and you either didn't believe us or ignored the issue. Wyatt, Steven and myself where informed by you that the change fees would be nominal (around $100+fare deviation or none at all if arrangments where made pre-purchase, see 25 Jan em from Michelle) and so we planned our budgets around these numbers, as it turns out the additional fare is, as outlined in the below em from Laura dated May 27, $392 + $100 change fee, not to mention the fact that this information only came to light 3 days before final changes to the tickets could be made (May 30) and I did not get this info until June 4th, for days after any changes could be made.
The result is that Wyatt decided to discontinue travel post project due to increased cost. I have no idea how Steven's plans have changed.
I have payed for a round trip ticket, will likely only be able to use half and then have to buy another one way so that I may fly out from the city i desire and return on the date desired. At this time it will cost approximately $545, one way, from Managua.
I have arranged travel for groups of up to 17, taking into account personal desires and wants, it's can be difficult but issues are resolved easily when delt with promtly.
I know that it can be difficult to deal with travel agents and time crunch's but we are the customers and they are providing a service.
If the service is not acceptable go somewhere else or deal directly with the source(airline) of the service.

Money is money, it comes and goes but I like to decide where my money goes.
I think your a good person but I believe you have continously discounted and ignored Wyatt, Steven and myself in regards to these travel arrangments. It has cost Wyatt an additional life experience, myself, at min, an additional $486 to continue my trip plus some fast taliking in Managua to salvage some of my return fare, I don't know what Steven is doing.

I will not be unhappy for long but be aware that I am not interested in any more wasted time or money.

I have CC'd Keren and Margaret as I believe they should be made of aware of the issues surrounding this episode.

Seth Moody

____________________

Seth-

Thanks for expressing your feelings about this. I understand why you are frustrated/angry and it is definitely best to get this out of the way now. I am sorry for any role I may have played in causing you stress and costing you money.

My role is difficult because I am an intermediary who often does not have complete information and is not able to make final decisions. I had heard early on from you, Wyatt and Steven (and Norm actually) that you interested in extending your stays, and I brought it up with Margaret and Keren, who expressed serious reservations. And I had thought that several months ago when you dropped by the IOA to discuss it with me, I had said that you should really just approach Margaret or Keren directly about the issue, since they would have to give the final approval and I would not be able to help much. I told Wyatt and Steven the same, and Wyatt did eventually do that, and when I heard back from Margaret and Keren I immediately contacted the travel agent who gave us the information.

Most importantly, I sent the email below back in February, and you did not respond. I took your lack of response as a lack of interest, which was probably a mistake.

Again, this is not to say that I don't understand your frustration or refuse to admit any guilt! I just want you to know that I really have tried to be responsive throughout this process.

Thanks,
Megan

___________________________________
From: Megan Harrington
Sent: Monday, February 05, 2007 2:08 PM
To: 'earp1420@yahoo.com'; 'Steven Zarnfaller'; 'norb@pdx.edu'; 'Seth Moody'
Subject: Extended Stays

It looks like we may have some issues with the University and with IOA regarding student extended stays. Keren requests that each of you write up a little proposal with your reasons for wanting to stay longer in Nicaragua and your plans, and then we’ll take those proposals to the various administrative parties and see what we come up with.

One thing to think about is that if students do end up staying past the date that everyone else returns, the University would want to completely write off any official connections to that student’s further travels, for liability reasons. This probably means that anyone who is considering a Capstone project should not consider any work done in an extended stay in Nicaragua to be part of that Capstone. I know that some of the projects we’ve proposed seem like they would necessarily include some time on the ground in Nicaragua, so I’m not sure exactly what Keren has in mind for these ones… But you’ll need to think about your Capstone projects as things you will accomplish here in Portland, as far as I know.

Thanks!

___________________________________________
Megan Harrington Wilson
Jessie F. Richardson Foundation
15900 SE 82nd Drive, Clackamas, OR 97015
mharrington@jfrfoundation.org
Ph: 503.408.4754 F: 503.255.5929

twichily caffeinated

this is now a regular form of correspondence

________________________________________
From: Megan Harrington
Sent: Tuesday, June 12, 2007 10:05 AM
To: Patience Tolentino
Subject: good morning

I don’t know if you’ve talked with keren much this morning but I would avoid it as much as possible.


________________________________________
From: Patience Tolentino
Sent: Tuesday, June 12, 2007 10:07 AM
To: Megan Harrington
Subject: RE: good morning

Oh trust me I know I tried to get back and warn you but was unable before you talked to her.






***
also my boss just referred to one of the students, one of the completely not annoying and reasonable nice little students, as a fuckjob.

things that annoy me

this morning i did not feel super sporty so i decided i should take the bus to work. once i make this decision i am wearing office clothes rather than biking clothes, and i go to 82nd rather than the bike path, so the decision is difficult to reverse. when i got to 82nd my bus came by with 2 bikes on the rack so i let it go by. the next bus was due in 15 minutes so i ran across the street and got a cup of coffee. another bus came by in the like 6 minutes it took me to get back across the street, and i missed it. stupid. then a third bus finally came, also with 2 bikes on it. so i called the office and told patience i would be late. then i got on the 4th bus and got off at clackamas town center and biked from there.
so anyway, i was late today.
now it is really dumb because my boss is super pissy and she is in her office making sweeping and ridiculous edits to a powerpoint presentation me and patience are supposed to give in 45 minutes. and what is annoying about this is that we sent her this presentation a week ago for review and she is waiting until now to change it. but she is annoyed at me for being late. even though she will not allow me to do anything to help while she works away at bungling my presentation. when i get it back, 5 minutes before go time, the formatting will be completely wack and there will be various and sundry grammatical and spelling errors. she will have changed the order of the slides, eliminated important information, and generally made everything extremely confusing. when i arrived at the office and asked if i could help (e.g. snatch the presentation out of her hands before she could do further damage) she said in a huff, "leave me alone. i have a lot of work to do on this."
so anyway. 45 minutes before this 2-hour presentation, i am over here in my office completely powerless to prepare in any way. so so so annoying.
another thing that annoys me is that they are doing lots of construction on and around my bike path. there has been one long annoying detour for over a month now, which i have grown to accept, but starting yesterday afternoon they fenced off another section and now i get spilled out into the parking lot of clackamas town center and then have to weave my way west for a while before turning and climbing up a stupid unnecessary hill to the east before reentering the bike path. it's like, WHY? WHY?? WHY???

this is a picture of my high school boyfriend with his two sons

and it is making me feel weird about life.

not gay just happy

o come, all ye faithful

i hadn't done anything to my own blog in so long, nor even checked mercedes' blog (!), that when i typed in the first letters of their respective URLs, FIREFOX DID NOT AUTOFILL.

view outside office window today

i was relieved to see that mercedes has been equally neglectful, but is equally now going to start trying again.

news in my life:

1. boss continues to be obnoxious, but my specific relationship with her is restored to pre-one-year's-notice-giving levels
2. we're going to nicaragua four weeks from today
3. some of the students are stressing me out about money issues
4. i finished reading harry potter 5 in spanish
5. mercedes is arriving tomorrow late night
6. i drive the company car around all the time, and my boss's fancy schmancy car, and have had no incidents since the no-headlights incident
7. i have slipped right back into pre-6-month-review appearance levels; see attached picture
8. i got glasses again. i had contacts for a while, but then i got pinkeye, and generally found the whole process difficult and probably didn't do a good enough job of keeping the lenses clean, etc.
9. i need to clean out my office
10. i was playing snood for a while and then uninstalled the program; feeling good about myself.
11. i watched the movie "volver" last night; it was good (of course)
12. i don't have any meaningful crushes on anyone. have had no romantic episodes since micha and mercedes moved away, that i can think of. feel pretty ok about this.
    
13. i have been failing completely to go to the gym, ever.
14. my room smells like cat pee.
15. i visit an old guy every week as a volunteer; am struggling with the fact that i find these visits boring and stifling. (i'm going over there today after work.)

me smiling in my office

that's all for now! mercedes, looking forward to seeing you!

-megan

store wars

i'm checking out some new craziness

i guess i downloaded this new firefox add on called scribe, and then i forgot about it. or, maybe it is called "scribefire". in any case, i just hit "F8" for whatever reason on my keyboard.

then this half page window popped up in the bottom of my screen. (i was looking for the PC keyboard shortcut for the degree symbol. you know, the little circle. what is that?).

but this seems to be some kind of universal blog editor, is the point. like, i just hit "F8", this window pops up (still allowing me to see the page i was poking around on,) and now there is this button on the bottom that says: "Publish To:" and i'm guessing i can just tell it to publish to my blog!? pretty cool. also, there is a "save as note" button, could also be interesting.

probably not the most fascinating blog entry in the world!

i will try to add a human interest spin:

my name is megan harrington.

i grew up in a very poor family.

my mother visited me yesterday and told me that she doesn't believe in germs and that no one would get cancer or the common cold if they processed their emotions correctly.

she also referred me to an article that says:

The most stunning statistic, however, is

that the total number of deaths caused by conventional medicine is an

astounding 783,936 per year. It is now evident that the American

medical system is the leading cause of death and injury in the US. (By

contrast, the number of deaths attributable to heart disease in 2001

was 699,697, while the number of deaths attributable to cancer was

553,251.)

please refute.



°

i found the degree symbol!

i'll do a real post sometime soon

suffice it to say, omg

Beatbox Fame Game
Uploaded by loranger

god

a post from clackamas, oregon

[above: not clackamas, oregon]

all of you but max and mercedes (i.e., tara and micha) have received lengthy, overly lengthy, overly boy-centric accounts of my mexico vacation. so here i offer a brief synopsis with pictures and commentary.


i went to mexico


with liz cartozian and karolina puk


and two dudes i haven't been sent digital pictures of yet.

i am wishing i were writing this blog using iweb, with which i now have a .mac account, since that would be going much more quickly and easily. but alas, due to problems of remote access, i am here now with blogger.

moving along....

we went to a beach in mexico at a town called "san felipe," which, contrary to reuben's belief, is in fact very much a tourist town.



we got suntans and sand chafe and salt in our hair and eyes. we bought a large inflatable crocodile on which liz, karolina and i paddled out to sea like ducks in a row, and a boat came toward us, and in it i recognized the large white boots of a rather creepy man who had approached me in the women's bathroom the night before, and we declared an about face too abruptly, and fell plummeting off the crocodile. and then we laughed and laughed and laughed.

we met a large group of mexican boys/men and adopted them as our boyfriends, and they made us a large delicious meal and brought coffees and said we were pretty. we now have an extensive and somewhat discouraging email correspondence with these boys.



when i returned from beautiful mexico i was at first quite taken aback by the puking and diarrhea i suddenly experienced, as well as the dread and horrors of the professional social nightmare i experience daily. however, i Have Since Adjusted, and the Monster Next Door is Acting Human, and Everything Will Be Just Fine.

just you wait, enry iggins, just you wait

http://www.myspace.com/nagemarat

more reflections, plus resolutions, this time with pictures

yesterday i gave my boss one year's notice, saying that i would most likely be leaving this job in march of 2008. this is because i will hopefully be going to gambia with taya and others in march and april of that year, and because i am not happy here.

i decided leaving any earlier wouldn't be smart because my resume needs me to stay here for a respectable amount of time, and i need a good reference, and i'm terrified of unemployment, and i need to be saving money, etc. and i have great benefits, blah blah blah.

[below: me wanting a good reference]

(my boss was her usual unmovable, dry, blow-offy self about my announcement. reminded me of how important i am to her (not))

so, this is good. on the other hand, it does mean that i actually have to be here for an entire other year. tara is under the impression that my snappiness/easy-to-irritateyness of late is work related, since i usually have crappy days and come home feeling frustrated. i hope that this is true, because otherwise i might just be a snappy/easy to irritate kind of a person. but max visited last week, and said that i seemed to have "hardened" a bit since the time when we were close... and i think maybe i do remember being brighter-eyed, nicer, softer.

[below: al franken hating hip hop]

so... i'm going to try to be more cheerful, less negative. complain less and try to judge others less. be less annoyed by people's annoyingnesses. also, maybe even curse less? i'll have to think about that last one.

we'll see how it goes... i may not be as committed to the project next week as i feel now, since sometimes it's just easier to go through the world in a sardonic and you-can't-touch-me-i'm-too-tough mode, rather than a dewey-eyed, benefit-of-the-doubt-giving mode. my work environment requires sundry and complex defense mechanisms.

i think things have been a bit hard for the whole friend group recently. there is a general impression that people feel stuck in ruts, like our social interactions are predictable and repetitive, nobody likes their jobs (tara and sheila are also miserable at work) people's idiosyncrasies and neuroticisms are annoying other people's idiosyncrasies and neuroticisms, and maybe it's all weather-related. we need to get out more, do more stuff, remember why we all like each other so much.

[below: yeah!]

this all makes it sound like i have been going around acting like a snappy jerk all the time, and that all of our social interactions are lame. this isn't true of course, i'm (for better or worse) more snappy with tara than most people (she's so available for that kind of thing) and you know, i'm my usual self, really. and dork club continues on, laughing is to be had, fun is around, etc. it's just that everything could be a bit more awesome, given our awesomeness resources.

in other news, i converted my desk into a standing desk, and am standing right now, and my feet kind of hurt but i'm into it! overall.

[below: this is how we do it]

i'm excited about many things, including visits and springtime and travels! here's to a bright new future!

farewell to max

max visited town and it was great!

and this is a farewell blog for max: until another time. when we shall romp through the streets of portland once again.

in other news, i think i am dehydrated.

whizzinator

http://www.whizzinator.com/whiz2.htm

alarming slide show in spanish

click here for alarming slide show in spanish