Day 2: The Rolodex Makes Me Feel Powerful. Also, struggle with food.

As luck would have it, Day 2 was equally as successful as Day 1, if not more so. And my morning schedule was considerably more pleasant than the day before. Today I woke up at 7:15—*miracle*. It felt pretty much like magic, and because I woke up feeling so magical, I felt more ready to take on the day.

So I arrived at the office this morning around 8:20—my initial goal was 8:00, but, probably because they aren't paying me a dime, my internship doesn't really care what time I come in and leave each day, so I thought 8:20 was pretty dedicated when I for sure could have showed up at 9:00 and no one would have cared. I got right to work on the subject index of all the back issues so I could get the boring stuff out of the way while I was still high on the magical feeling of adequate sleep. Next, I compiled copies of all the articles a famous rider has written for the magazine, which is where I made my greatest discovery of the day. Let me share a brief background: The rider's name is Courtney King-Dye who competed for the US Olympic Dressage Team and is an incredible rider. However, last year she took a really bad fall on her horse when she wasn't wearing a helmet and ended up in a coma. She is slowly recovering, but will probably never be able to ride again. Instead, she now spends a lot of time writing articles and columns for the magazine, and she was looking to create an archive for herself of all the articles. So I was asked to compile hard copies of all the articles, put them in an envelope, and mail them to Courtney's house. Once I had gathered all the articles, I placed them in a giant manilla folder, and then I opened... the ROLODEX. Ok, so its not a physical Rolodex because, since we are a technologically-minded society, tiny address cards on a rotating file are not necessary so we just keep all of the addresses in an Excel file on the computer, but the concept is the same. To every horse lover and dressage enthusiast, this is the Rolodex to end all Rolodexes. In fact, when referring to this Rolodex, we would use a capital T and label it "The Rolodex." This Rolodex contains all of the addresses, phone numbers, and emails of all the top dressage riders and experts in the WORLD. Anyone who is anyone in the world of dressage and who may ever need to be reached or referenced by the magazine, which is the expert word in the sport of dressage, can be found (with all of their contact information) inside this very Rolodex.

So I casually opened the file and found Courtney King-Dye's address, wrote it on a Dressage Today return address mailing label, and tried to pretend like I couldn't feel the power emanating for the world's most magical spreadsheet. It's no big deal really, I just know where all of the top professionals, olympians, and experts in the sport of dressage live. Yes, I really am this cool.

In addition to stalking all of my favorite dressage athletes (just kidding, I promise I'm not abusing the awesomeness of The Rolodex), I spent much of my afternoon researching the history of horse breeds in England, which was actually pretty interesting. And when I wasn't doing that, I was eating.

Let me tell you my dilemma with food. Two nights a week while I'm doing my internship, I stay with a family who, until yesterday, I had never met before, but who we know remotely through a family friend. Not wanting to inconvenience them or impose on their time or resources, I've decided to be completely self-sufficient while I'm here, including providing all my own meals. However, I don't want to take up too much room in their fridge or have to use their kitchen to cook, and it's a little awkward always making my food and then eating it all by myself in their kitchen. So I've decided to solve this problem by eating all my meals at my internship, starting today. This is also an interesting feat because there is no lunch/break room area with a table, so I eat at my desk while doing research and try (in vain) not to spill crumbs all over my computer and floor and try to look as natural and as comfortable as possible with my bizarre eating arrangement. So I stated my day with a Tastykake at my computer, interrupted my afternoon with some Crab and Corn Chowder that I picked up at Trader Joe's, and then finished my day with my leftover burrito from Chipotle, which was my dinner last night. The Tastykake was not much of a problem, and the soup turned out to be a pretty low-mess, low-embarrassment food, even though it decided to bubble over and leak all over the inside of the microwave and drew much attention to itself because it smelled strongly of seafood (luckily the attention was positive, which doesn't always happen due to many people's bias's against seafood). No, the real problem was the leftover burrito, the contents of which were much too abundant to fit properly inside the tortilla. Luckily, I decided not to undertake the burrito challenge until after many of the people in the office had gone home, or the experience might have been that much more humiliating. The contents kept overflowing and spilling out onto my napkin, and with every bite, the burrito become more difficult to hold onto. So there I was, awkwardly hunched over my computer desk, picking up rouge beans that escaped into my lap or onto the floor and trying to keep the picture of myself out of the visible range of the offices around me. The experience was awkward enough without an audience. In the end, I managed to conquer the burrito, finishing the entire thing with only a few loose beans and rice morsels. I just hope the janitor does a really good vacuum under my desk tonight....