Tomorrow I am going to have lunch with Mr. Hyper-Sensitive. Yes, I have decided to keep following this opportunity. Who knows. By the end of lunch I will either have a job or I will have dumped a glass of water on his head.

Time flew since my little phone meeting ended! I cant believe it’s after 4. I feel in a bit of a daze. Almost like I was in a fight for my life that just ended. It’s a good thing I am going to work out tonight. That makes it three days in a row I worked out. Yesterday I went to a Latin Impact Aerobics class. It was a lot of fun but I really struggled. My internal rhythm is not salsa. My feet were mimicking the instructor’s feet just fine. The problem was that she was clearly dancing the Cha-Cha while I appeared to be doing the Charleston. As in most things in life, I have found that if you put a big silly smile on your face you can get away with almost anything. Probably because most people just assume you are retarded. At one point the instructor said, “The group to my left is B, the group to my right is A. Group B, we’re gonna Cha-Cha right. Group A you will Cha-Cha left. Donna, you lead group A!” Well I just about fell over! Maybe I was doing better than I thought! I looked over to Lisa and said, “Can you believe it!?!” Lisa said, “Not you dumbass— there’s another girl named Donna in the group.” Just then a girl in a half top stepped to the front of Group A and started leading the Cha-Cha left. Ultimately I was relieved because I had no idea how to Cha-Cha left or right.

I named this entry Freckles because I started noticing I am getting a smattering of freckles across my face. I am wondering what is causing them to pop out? I have been spending a lot of time sitting by a window that gets quite a bit of sun. It’s my own way of combating Seasonal Affective Disorder. Could the sun through the window be the cause? …OR MAYBE THEY AREN’T FRECKLES BUT AGE SPOTS!?!?! ARGH!

What an interesting conversation I had with the owner. Last week he said, “Send me a quick email just letting me know you took the evaluation.” When I finished the evaluation, I did just that. I sent him a real quick email telling him I finished the evaluation. You won’t believe this but 80% of the conversation we had this morning was concerning how terse that email was and how it really made him doubt making me an offer. Yes, I found myself apologizing because the email I wrote was too short. He also said he felt I was over-confident. The good news is that the psych profile showed that I was on the cusp of good/best match for their company. Of the 5 traits they look for in a person, I possessed 3. Of the other two traits, my process orientation is apparently really lacking. I said to him that I don’t recall any questions that specifically asked about process orientation. He said they can tell this by asking me my favorite color. Why did I say red?! (I think he was joking) He wants to meet with me on Friday. Unless he continues to over analyze our phone conversation and deems I didn’t use enough words to describe how I could improve my process orientation and then he may just decide to scrap me totally. I wrote him an email after our phone conversation confirming the date and time of our meeting. I then started to worry that maybe this too was too short of an email and so I added: This email serves an ulterior motive: I want to prove to you I am capable of writing a better email than that last one. I hope he appreciates my stab at humor– if he has a problem with this email I will know this job is not for me. But I have learned my lesson. The email I wrote was too casual. I am still in that wooing phase and I should have made it more formal. I am not used to being so heavily scrutinized! (Or at least aware that I am being scrutinized) But I do understand where this man is coming from, I really do. He doesn’t want to make a hiring mistake that will cost him time, money and lost opportunity. The thing is, I am in the same situation! I don’t want to make a mistake either– like finding myself in a job I hate. And I am worrying that I am taking the easy way out by accepting the very first job offered. But that’s how I always do it. Mainly because I HATE looking for a job. But also because I feel like I am blessed. I truly believe that I am being guided and that this is the opportunity that was meant for me. Jump and a net will appear. I felt that way the last time too and it worked out for me… until December, that is. It’s going to be okay. Like I said, things have always worked out for me and I just need to trust it– all will be okay. (Do I sound over-confident?)

Last Tuesday I had my 3rd interview with a company. It went well. All signs pointed to positive. The recruiter called and said they would make me an offer by Monday. I fell asleep on Sunday certain I would have an offer in hand shortly. Monday came and Monday went. No one called me, no one emailed me. Tuesday morning came. Nothing. Tuesday afternoon came. Nothing. Why aren’t they calling me!!!!! The last bit of communication I had with them happened last week. The owner asked me to take an online assessment. “Sure! Just send me the link!” I assumed it had to do with assessing my sales skills. It turned out to be a psychological evaluation. As I went through the questions I felt extremely uncomfortable. I can understand asking a potential employee to take a drug test but a psychological evaluation seems like a huge breach of privacy. I considered closing the browser window and letting them know I refuse to take such an assessment. But I really like this company and I like the job. I NEED to work! I WANT to work. “Suck it up, Donna,” I said to myself. I finished the assessment feeling violated. And then came the silence. I suddenly started to worry that they got the report and decided I was too much of a risk. Did I answer the questions incorrectly? Am I psychotic? My stomach started to dissolve itself.

My Gmail notifier finally chimed. I got an email from the owner asking to call him tomorrow. It should take about 30 minutes. Perhaps my psychological evaluation didn’t show me to be as mentally incompetent as I thought? We shall see.

I was over my parents’ house yesterday helping my dad with his computer. I opened donnaville in IE and I was really surprised to see how it was riddled with layout errors. The WordPress theme I had been using was pretty old. I looked to see if there was an update to it but no such luck. What to do? What to do? Even though I use FireFox and donnaville looks fine in it, there are people out there using IE and I can’t have my Internet outpost looking shabby! Guess it’s time for a new theme. I whipped this baby up rather quickly using the fSpring widgets theme. What do you think? Is it okay? Is it readable? If you don’t like it, let me know. Maybe I’ll just go back to the old theme and to heck on IE. I dunno.

Looking over this new theme, I am really surprised at the sheer length of my archives column. I’ve been doing this a very long time. I can’t believe I’ve been able to produce so much on so little. I remember awhile ago Charles had an entry in which he gave a template of his typical post. I think if I was to do it, it would like like this:

I [generic content]. I [generic content]. I [generic content]. Stupid remark for conclusion, probably beginning with I.

I watched most of the Oscars last night. That was not my intention. Last year I turned it on, caught Alec Baldwin’s smug face and had to turn it off. Quickly. Very quickly. Yesterday I had dinner at my parents’ and afterward my mom and I were sitting in the living room and it seemed like a good time to put on the Oscars and catch the opening number. I love musicals so I got a kick out of it. And I was able to handle the acceptance speeches better than normal because I kept seeing old actresses from the past that got me excited: “SOFIA LOREN!!! EVA MARIE SAINT!” The one thing that I found extremely silly and I couldn’t help but scoff at were the number of celebrities that kept getting teary-eyed! What is wrong with these people? I will tell you. They are drama queens. And it’s a good thing they are actors because the real world would whip their cry baby asses. My favorite moment was when Japanese filmmaker, Kunio Kato (I looked him up on Google) won for his animated short, La Maison en Petits Cubes and he said, in very halting English, “Thank you very much. Thank you, pencil. Thank you, all my staff. Thank you, academy. . . . Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto.” He totally cracked me up!

I missed the very end so I didn’t get to see Mr. Sean Penn calling the crowd a bunch of commie, homo-loving, sons of guns. I do miss the old days when calling someone a commie… was a bad thing. Yes I am a little ashamed I watched the Oscars but I enjoyed Hugh Jackman’s song and dance routines– he kept me entertained.

Isn’t Dave Foley the spitting image of Zooey Deschanel?

Over the weekend I watched the movie Hancock for a second time. It’s not that I loved it so much I had to watch it again but when I saw it the first time I knew pookie would love it so I watched it again with him. And truthfully, I really did enjoy it. I love superheroes! The one thing I really liked is how Charlize looked like a super heroine even without having to don spandex. I kept trying to figure out what it was that made her look so Wonder Woman-ish. Unfortunately I think it has to do with her being breathtakingly gorgeous. I was really hoping the reason was more attainable like wearing clothes that she bought at Ann Taylor Loft— that way I could look like a Super Heroine too!

Yesterday I had my third interview with a company that I quite like– I wore my kickass wrap dress that I bought at Macy’s last year on sale. I also put my hair in hot rollers in the morning so I could achieve that Mary Tyler Moore, Paula Prentiss, Mrs Emma Peel FLIP. The meeting went well. Apparently I said the right things since the owner just called me and said he would be calling me later in the week with an offer. What am I saying? It had nothing to do with what I said and everything to do with my flip, my wrap and how I tried to channel the vibes of a SUPER HEROINE. 🙂 I hope to gosh this is the right move for me. It’s not like there’s a lot of stuff out there right now. But even more so, I am honestly going crazy not working. Truth is, I think this is a good opportunity. So let’s see how it continues to unfold, I don’t have it yet.

This really freaks me out– I found this URL listed in my referrers list. It is a direct copy of Donnaville’s homepage from August 2008. Why is it there? What is this person doing with it? I went to the root of the site but it isn’t a Web page– it’s more like someone’s using it for online storage. I am not finding any email address where I can write and ask him to cease and desist. Should I just ignore it? What should I do?

I have a couple hobbies. I just recently came upon a new one; it’s called geocaching. Here’s a description:

Geocaching is a high-tech treasure hunting game played throughout the world by adventure seekers equipped with GPS devices. The basic idea is to locate hidden containers, called geocaches, outdoors and then share your experiences online. Geocaching is enjoyed by people from all age groups, with a strong sense of community and support for the environment.

Lisa and I spent President’s Day tromping around the local park with our TomTom Ones trying to find hidden tupperware boxes. It was fun. I am sure we will do it again.

My other hobby isn’t as structured as geocaching nor does it have any strong sense of community or environment. Basically I enjoy getting drunk and surfing Youtube. Just the other day I opened a bottle of Three Buck Chuck and poured myself a glass. I clicked on Youtube and started some free association searching. Valentine’s Day was coming up and I wanted to find some goopy, goofy love scenes. I found myself watching Dolly Parton singing I will Always Love you to Burt Reynold’s in The Greatest Little Whorehouse in Texas:

Gosh I love this movie! And I totally love this scene! It’s so romantic! (Too bad the very last bit is cut off the clip above)

I started thinking of other romantic scenes and tried queuing up Hugh Grant in Three Weddings and A Funeral where he tells Andi MacDowell, “…in the immortal words of David Cassidy, I think I love you.” Unfortunately I couldn’t find this scene but I did find David Cassidy in tight silver pants:

I tried to continue on the path of romantic scenes but I veered off and did searches on The Night Porter, Water Drops on Burning Rocks, and Querelle. I don’t know what it is about Fassbinder and me. He’s like a drug to me– a depressant. I drank more wine and tried to think about beauty. Next thing I know I am typing Rudolph Nureyev into the search box and watching him perform on the Muppet Show. Can you believe this clip? It’s Miss Piggy raping Rudolph Nureyev:

Who thought of this? Is it just me or is that really sick?

I kept searching around but my memory at this point becomes hazy. I don’t know what other videos I watched. All I can say is Youtubing under the influence is fun and I recommend it to young and old!

Found the movie The Snows of Kilimanjaro in a 75% off sale bin at Walmart. There was a $1 sticker on it. I paid .25 for it. Gave it to pookie for Valentine’s Day (amongst other things). We read the short story when we were on the cruise ship to Bermuda back in July. The movie drastically departed from the original story. It was fleshed out with material from other Hemingway’s novels as well as his own life. The best part, the end, was totally removed. Considering how much I like movies which feature characters with limb infections, I wasn’t terribly fond of this one. I was surprised to see Hildegard Knef in a small role in the film. She was a German actress — rather similar to Marlene Dietrich although Knef came a little bit later. Both recorded songs and both had very deep, smoky voices.

I found this song Knef did on Youtube. It feels light years ahead of 1971.

Maybe it’s just the lyrics:
The dollar is climbing, the dollar is falling
Inflation, stagflation
Yes, yes, I know you know…

On Sunday I noticed that the (blonde) woman on the cover of the Parade magazine looks just like Hildegard Knef. How is it I go years without thinking of her and suddenly she’s everywhere to me?

Well I think she looks like Knef.

Searching around Rhapsody for her recordings, I found a pretty awesome album: The In-Kraut Vol. 3 Hip Shaking Grooves Made In Germany 1967-1974 Don’t get the idea it’s German Schlager music, it’s not– it’s actually really good stuff. Unfortunately Rhapsody doesn’t have vol. 1 or 2.