Im a slacking blogger....again

So the last time I posted it was July and my summer had just really gotten underway, OMG so much has happened since then, geez it's almost Christmas!! Okay so crazy but here is a short recap on all of the stuff that's been going on since then. (WARNING: some stuff will probably get left out because the only thing I have to reference from is my calendar and unfortunately I don't schedule fun events into my calendar so some of those things may get left out..which just means I will have a "I'm a slacking blogger....again part II that will come out about a year from now to wrap everything up--just kidding! That was a reference to Breaking Dawn, It won't really be that long, that's just mean)

So, here goes (these may not be in chronological order)

Summer time stuff:
-My friend from School (Alicia) came to visit and go to a Braves game, yup she drove all the way from Rock Hill to experience a Braves games for the first time, what a trooper! And I don't think she could have picked a more perfect game, well actually she could because the Braves lost, BUT we got to witness something pretty epic! During like the 7th inning (maybe) a guy wearing a wedding dress ran onto the field in the middle of the game. And you know the security guys were thinking "Yes, finally, some action!" Those security guys chased after the wedding dress guy, who actually didn't try to run from them at all and just stood still. But that didn't stop the security guys from defending their honor and tackling the willing and cooperative wedding dress guy to the ground, at which point the whole crowd starts chanting, "Let him go, let him go!" Which of course they didn't. Oh well. The funny thing was that before the game Alicia and I were at the chop house getting some food and she spotted the wedding dress guy and went into tourist mode and had to get a picture of him so she tried to be sneaky about getting a picture without him noticing, but then he figured it out and gave her a nice pose, what a guy!
--Another great thing about this is that now Ben has met 2-out-of the 9 people I go to school with so only 7 people can now say that he is made up:)
I am not sure if this is the guy (you never know, I am sure there has been more then one person to run onto the field at a Braves game wearing a wedding dress)

-Jessica's Bachelorette Party in New Orleans = Awesome! The most amazing part was that there were 17 of us all together and we managed to pretty much all stay together at night when we went out, which if you have ever been out on Bourbon Street at night you know how crazy it is! It was great to get to spend this girls weekend with Jessica about a month away from her wedding. Here is a picture from Saturday night when we had the lingerie party for Jessica.

The great Sims Garcia had a really good idea of talking with Jessica's man (Ashley) and finding out what his favorite desserts are and then having everyone plan their lingerie around his favorite desserts. For example, I chose a navy lingerie piece because Ashley likes Blueberry Cobbler:)
-Playing dress up with some of my favorite gents and gals was a lot of fun this summer. The boys (Ben and his roomies Ben Spears and Lake, and their good buddy Luke) prefer to call it "suiting up" because they put on suits and make up these scenarios about how they are business men and just scored some big deal and now they are out to celebrate (which Ben Spears was the only one who ever truly stayed in character), but I like to call is dress up. But anyways we would start off the night by having people over to the Timothy house (where Ben, Ben, and Lake live) and have a cookout and then we would all go out to East Andrews and have some fun. And one of my good friends Jen always joined the party and we had lots of fun. Here's a picture of us that I am obsessed with because it tells a story and documents the first experience Jen tried to pick me up or lift me up in her pictures, these attempts continued.

-The summer for me ended with a little trip to Auburn to celebrate the wedding of Josh and Jaclyn. John is a fraternity brother of Ben's and they have grown really close over the years. Ben was asked to be one of the groomsmen, and I know he was really honored by that and enjoyed the experience. Here is a picture of Josh and Jaclyn cutting the cake at their wedding

Their wedding was Auburn/Country themed. It was set out doors with this barn and old country style house they incorporated Auburn into every part of the wedding (true hardcore Auburn fans). It was great to be a part of the beginning of their (Josh and Jaclyn) lives together! P.s. I love this picture of Cary, Joey, and I = priceless

Back to School
-School started back towards the end of August and with it came CRAZY CHOAS. This semester is nearing its end and I can say that I have never owned the saying "fake it till you make it" like I have this semester. But more about that later. As soon as school started I got the opportunity to take a little trip to Mobile to see my good friend Jessica get married. I am so glad that I got the opportunity to experience the whole thing with her, and what I mean by that is I arrived on Thursday afternoon and pretty much didn't leave Jessica's side until she started getting ready on Saturday morning. She is such an amazing person and to get to spend those moments with her is something I will never forget:) Here is a picture from her wedding right after the ceremony

-Once school started I really  had very little time for fun events on the weekend, but I did get to visit Auburn a few times. I decided once I graduated from Auburn that I would AT LEAST go to one home Auburn game every year until the day I die, so I started off this promise to myself very well by going to the first home football game of the season with Ben (thanks Addison for the tickets). Here is a picture of Ben and I tailgating before the game.

Ben and I also came back for the Florida game to hang out and see everybody, but we didn't have tickets to the game, so we just spent all of our time at the TKE house hanging out and playing corn hole:) Here is a picture from Florida weekend.

I love how when Mark Rapp took this picture I went to Andrew's side and Cary went to Ben's side:)
I also got the opportunity to go to Athens last weekend for the Auburn/Georgia game, which was a reunion with some of my high school best friends Jen and Julie. We had a lot of fun just catching up and doing the crazy things that we do. The thing that sticks out to me about the weekend (minus the fact that the Auburn football team never got off the bus and a high school team played for them) the most is that Julie and I discovered that Jen has some serious game, she just walks into a room and boys just walk up to her and buy her a drink. She just really has this rockstar quality about her

I mean she was Pope High School's Best Dressed of the 06 class (obviously). Here is a picture of us before we went out on Friday night (which is either right before or right after Julie played the "shot" song from her phone and had at it:)

And here is another one of us from game day. I am trying to distract UGA by tickling him. Thanks for taking the picture Kevin (and for rescuing me pillow:)

Well I believe that is it, that's all I have been up to since the summer. This just continues to prove that I am a big nerd and grad school takes over my life (more on that later)!!!

over and out,
kristen

Moderation

You know that saying "everything in moderation"

Well I have decided that I need to apply this little saying to all aspects of my life...therefore I have decided what my resolution will be for this year (better late than never..right?)


(unfortunately) I have this habit of having a laser focus when it comes to my interests and not remembering to look at the bigger picture (i.e. getting my priorities in order)


Now, for the most part, I haven't considered this problem of mine to be too much of a concern, actually to be quite honest I sometimes consider it a blessing and believe it to be a main factor in the reason that, up to this point, I have done very well in school. During the school year, I have an obsession when it comes to getting my work done (I'm a big dork, I like learning...and getting good grades:) I sometimes get so caught up in my school work that I have to remember if I have eaten lunch or try and remember when was the last time I worked out (but then again, if I am eating less then I can workout less..right?!).

But, like I said, I can usually let this obsession with school slide because it is obviously serving me well, but what I can't let slide is my obsession with non academic things, for example:

  I like to do jigsaw puzzles... A LOT. So much so, that once I start a puzzle it is really hard for me to do anything (and I mean anything) else until I finish that puzzle ( at which time I normally want to start another one). This is a bit ridiculous, and the reason why I have to limit myself to only doing puzzles during breaks from school.

 During the Casey Anthony trial I did very little from 9-5 on Mondays-Saturdays, and if I was doing anything (like babysitting Haley) the trial was always on (don't worry, she loved it too:). Looking back, this seems a little ridiculous because I could have just gotten a recap of what happened in court from the HLN people who recapped the biggest happenings from the trial every day. I could have, for example, been working on my tan!

 My final example (although there are many more) came from The Royal Wedding. Now the funny thing is that I didn't know much about the royal family (or even who Kate Middleton was) until about a month before the wedding when I saw some talk about it in People magazine. From that point on I was hooked. I watched every special there was concerning the royal family, the Middleton's, and the wedding itself (I even watched the Lifetime movie of how Kate and Wills met not once, not twice, but three times). Thankfully, my last final was the day before the wedding so I didn't have to feel bad about waking up at 3am to watch the pre-wedding coverage (side bar- I even TiVoed it, but decided that it wouldn't be the same if I didn't watch it LIVE..ya ridiculous!) and then watching the wedding coverage and then analysis of everyones thoughts of the wedding for the rest of the day. I even continued to keep up with the happenings of The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge for several weeks following their nuptials!

I am glad that I have finally taken a step back to see the BIG picture and realize that the world wont end if I take a step back from my obsessions to do other things, now the million dollar question is will I remember this the next time my latest obsession rolls around. Only time will tell (did I mention that I am really good at making excuses for myself ?!;)

over and out,
kristen

Mini road trip to Alabama the Beautiful (Birmingham)

This past weekend was spent in Birmingham because my bride-to-be friend Jessica was having a Bridal shower on Saturday afternoon. So seeing her was awesome (obviously), but I also got to see my twin (seriously people who don't know us think we are twins, or at the least sisters--and the funny thing being that I actually have a twin..brother) Katelyn and stay with her, which was so needed because we had some MAJOR catching up to do.

So here's a run down on my weekend:
-Friday night Katelyn and I met Jessica and Sims (a good friend of Jessica's--she's super fly) at this new pizza place in Bham called Slice--it was delicious, and highly recommended. Afterward we went to a whiskey bar (which is a bar that sells whiskey?!?) and met up with Jessica's fiance (Ashley) who has been spending like every waking moment of his life ( I exaggerate) studying for the bar exam he takes in about a week.

     Jessica warned me to go easy on the questions I had already complied for him while watching the           Casey Anthony trial because he is uber tired of all things related to law and studying for the bar exam. As my questions were more related to the trial-- process in general-- (and even if I had specific questions regarding the case Ashely would have not one clue what I was talking about because he didn't have time to follow the trial---I wish I could have said the same, now that it's over I miss it...but I digress, so..). I did get a chance to talk to Ashely about "beyond a reasonable doubt"and what he said made a lot of sense, but I wouldn't do it justice trying to explain it to you, so I will try and work on that for a later blog.

-The highlight of Friday night was meeting (that's probably not the best word considering that could imply that introductions were given, a better phrasing would be "my encounter") with this girl named Louise (not sure of the spelling). Oh Em Gee exclamation point (Ashely George:) she was by far one of the top five funniest people I have ever met. She was telling us about a couple she is friends with and her thoughts on when they would be getting engaged. I didn't even know the couple she was talking about, but because she was so animated and crazy and out there (in a good way) it made everything she said so entertaining:)

-Saturday morning Katelyn and I went to this breakfast place called Over Easy--it was delicious! Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day, so I am always in search of a good breakfast place (I am so sad the Flying Biscuit is gone)
-Jessica's bridal shower was Saturday afternoon. And my favorite thing about her shower was her presents; she got some really cute stuff!! The theme for the shower was monogram, so most of her presents had her (almost) new initials on them. Here is an example of my favorite gift she got (except hers says Mrs. Wright)

How cute!! You can find it (and others like it) on this website www.etsy.com

-After the shower I went back to Katelyn's and was informed that her friend (Lanier) had texted her and said that she needed to be ready by 8:30 with going out clothes and that she needed to get some mixers. This is all Lanier would tell Katelyn, Mary Frances, and Stephanie (who were at Katelyn's when I got back from the shower). So we were all left to wonder what Lanier was planning and just figured we would go pregame at someone's house and then go down town to the bars. Well, we were wrong. At 8:30 Lanier showed up with some Auburn boys and this is what was waiting outside

yup, a limo:)

and we were informed that we had the limo for the next 2 hours and then the driver was going to drop us off downtown at the bars. Um excuse me, what?! I was like "um, Katelyn is this how you normally spend your Saturday nights?" And she responds with "duh" Haha right. The limo driver just drives around Bham while we all drink and listen to music in the back. At one point Lanier even has the driver go to this point on top of a hill where you can see all of downtown Bham at night (super cool view) and has the driver take a group photo shot like we were back at prom. It was a great night, and for someone who is never spontaneous (me) it was even that much better!

Hope this weekend trumps last weekend:)

over and out,

kristen

Casey Anthony..what really does beyond a reasonable doubt mean?

So, like previously stated, I have been following the Casey Anthony trial  ever since someone (Ashley George) got me hooked on it. Sadly, I didn't get hooked on it until the prosecution had finished presenting their case and the defense had started presenting their case (which, by the way, I am not really sure I could tell you what the defense's case was)

That being stated, here are my thoughts about the whole thing (it should be said that I am a newbie to anything having to do with the law, this is my first trial to watch, my only experience is the many Law and Orders tv shows that I have seen--if that counts):

-to be honest, before I started following the trial I didn't know much about it, I probably could have been a juror because I knew so little...that being said, it didn't take me much time to have an opinion that Casey killed her daughter (It will be fair to say some of this could have been due to the bias of the media, but for the most part I think I tried to stay neutral--I think)
-it was unfortunate that the cause of death couldn't be determined because it seems that reason alone potentially held a lot of weight for the jurors, which begs the questions, do you have to know the cause of death to prove murder beyond a reasonable doubt?
-the closing statements "sealed the deal for me" so to say, I just felt the prosecution made it so clear for the jurors and I would have no problem relying on the circumstantial evidence to find Casey guilty of first degree murder

-when the verdict actually came back I was babysitting Haley and she was playing around me with all of her toys and I couldn't even move at first when she wasn't found guilty of anything except giving false testimony to the police (which is like HUGE! while she was lying to the police all of the evidence that the jurors needed to convict her was decomposing and going through a hurricane), and then once the initial shock had ended I tried to resume playing with Haley, but that was hard to do because I was so stunned and filled with so much emotion that it was hard to continue to play with Haley (sorry Hula Hoop)

-as the rest of the world started to voice their opinion on the case it was evident that a majority of people felt the way I did, even people who would have voted not guilty still thought she was guilty (just not convinced by the evidence--which seemed to be the opinion of the jurors), this is just really (I don't know the right word) unfair, and it's like the prosecution gets blamed for not doing a "good enough" job even though everyone knows she's guilty!

-i would never blame the jurors or criticize them (but I can disagree with their decision) because I do believe we have the greatest justice system in the world, but like anything else our system isn't perfect, and (unfortunately) "justice" is not going to be served for every victim; that being said, I don't think our system really "fails" us unless an innocent person gets convicted

-the biggest question that I have after all of this is what is the legal definition of beyond a reasonable doubt because (depending on who was asked) their seemed to be several definitions of it; so maybe in the future this definition should be addressed so that everyone is on the same page

All in all it is time to move on. I have been emotionally invested in this case for sometime now and (although I am not happy with the verdict) I am glad that I can now move on with my life (I've missed you SportsCenter). In the end the only judge that matters is God, and he knows what happened to little Caylee...so don't worry, JUSTICE WILL BE SERVED

over and out,
kristen

A much needed update

I feel like years have gone by since early June when I last posted a blog...so here is a little update on what I have been up to since then:

(in chronological order)
-planned a bridal shower/bachelorette party (with the help of Maritza:) for my classmate and recent bride friend Angela (formerly Benyon) Sneed:) everyone came over to my apartment and we played some bridal shower games, for example, we did a little purse scavenger hunt where Maritza and I would call out items and if you had the item in your purse you would get the number of points associated with that item and whoever had the most points at the end was the winner
sadly Angela only brought a small clutch (which made her downtown ready, but not for this game), but Alicia was the winner, probably because she received 15 points (on one item) for having a "School Psychology" related item-- a flash drive!!
after fun times at my apartment we went down town to Charlotte and went out to some of the bars at the EpiCentre, this was my fist time going out in Charlotte and man have I been missing out!
Angela had a lot of fun (ok maybe too much fun), but that's the point of the soon to be bride..right?! Here is a picture of Mrs. Sneed herself

on a final note we all decided that next time we go out someone else will be the "bride-to-be" because you get so much free stuff and attention when you are the bachelorette:)

-once summer school was over I headed back to Atlanta where I will be spending the rest of the summer because I am babysitting the cutest baby ever..Miss Haley George (a picture is needed here)

I get to enjoy Mondays-Wednesday with Haley because Haley's mom (Ashely, my babysitter when I was younger:) WAS on bed rest and needed help with Haley, but as of Saturday (June 25) Ashely had to have a C-section and deliver baby Hannah at 24 weeks

now begins the roller coaster of day-to-day life of a preemie in the NICU (Ashley and Tommy and their parents are already pros at this because Haley was a preemie- born at 28 weeks)

I write all of this in my blog because I am beyond emotionally invested in this situation because these people are basically like my family and I ask everyone for their prayers for baby Hannah and her family as they begin this long journey (more updates on Hannah to come)

-another significant portion of my day is spent following the Casey Anthony trial (thanks again Ashley for getting me addicted) and so much more analysis to come on that

Much more to from my summer back in Atlanta to come:)

over and out,

kristen

Just a man riding his riding law mower.....and a child.....on his lap

** WARNING, I am watching the Braves game and blogging..... again**

So today after class (mind you not just like 50 minutes or 90 minutes of class, but 360 minutes of class-- somehow this fact about my class will be relevant, or I just want you to feel sorry for me)
I decided to..... oh I  don't know... punish myself (yeah that's the right word) and go on a run at 4 o clock in the afternoon.

It was around 94 degrees outside. (Once again I am sure this will be relevant, but if not you will at least be proud of me/feel sorry for me)

**Yay Freddie, hit a double and sent B Mac home for an RBI**

I decided that I was tougher than the heat ( I was punished for such foolish thinking later), and if I got a little warm (yeah warm--I was drenched the moment I stepped out of my door) I would just get in the shade (yeah that's assuming there is shade like remotely close to where I will be running--oh and note to self, if it's beyond HOTT outside then the shade isn't really going to offer that much of a reprieve).

Anyways. Now to the point of this blog post.

So I was running through this neighborhood, and by this point I had probably been running for about 25 minutes, and so I was probably somewhat tired (but then you add the heat into that equation and I was a hot mess...literally).

So I pass by this house and I see this man cutting his yard on his riding law mower (ok..normal, a little jealous that he his sitting while I am running/dying, but nonetheless..normal), and as I get closer I see that he has a child (probably 2 or 3) sitting in his lap while he is riding his riding law mower and cutting his lawn( ok..abnormal, yes this is definitely not something you see everyday). Now had I been driving by I probably wouldn't have even noticed this barbaric act (ok, maybe a little harsh), but since I was running (obviously moving slower than a car) I had plenty of time to catch this man in his act.

Now I don't have children (and I won't for a long time--no worries Dad/Mom).

{Momentary Digress} So I can't imagine having kids right now (for many obvious reasons), I just am currently too selfish to be responsible for the life of another human being 24/7 (I know, hard to believe..right Mom/Dad..I am constantly reminding them in all decision making situations to think about numero uno...ME).

{Digress over} but I feel like you don't have to have children to think that a child, no toddler, (remember age 2 or 3) does not belong on the lap of someone maneuvering a riding law mower, because um that's just dangerous!! And I kind of expected the man to try and hide the child (toddler really, but child just flows better) as he saw me coming so I wouldn't find out about this reckless thing he was doing, but do you know what he did...he waved at me (yeah, now he's riding this riding law mower with a child in his lap and only one hand on the wheel).

But jokes on him (or no one..lol), because I waved first;)

over and out,
kristen

**Jump on it, Jump on it, Jump on it...Prado hits a home run**

My man Malcolm Gladwell

So Malcolm Gladwell, ever heard of him??! Well in case you haven't, he is a best-selling author and writer for The New Yorker. He is known for his books The Tipping Point, Blink, Outliers, and What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures. His books usually fall into the category of the social sciences, and make frequent and extended use of academic work, particularly in the areas of sociology, psychology, and social psychology. Needless to say, I love his books:)
(look at that hair:)

Well I have read all of the books listed above, with the exception of Blink (which I am currently reading), for some reason I just skipped over it. Anyways I started reading it the other night and wanted to share a few things from it that are super interesting

So here is a little summary of Blink thanks to wikipedia:
The author describes the main subject of his book as "thin-slicing:" our ability to gauge what's really important from a very narrow period of experience. In other words, this is an idea that spontaneous decisions are often as good--or even better than--carefully planned and considered ones.
So anyways now that you have the basic understanding you can follow my thoughts.

Chapter 1: The Theory of Thin Slices: How a Little Bit of Knowledge Goes a Long Way
-So there is this psychologist by the name of John Gottman who has done research on marriage stability and divorce prediction for over 35 years. So one of Gottman's research projects (while he was at the University of Washington) was to bring in newlyweds to his "Love Lab"and videotape their interactions for 15 minutes and then he would predict whether or not he thought they would get a divorce or not (sounds crazy right?!?)
-So here's an example of what this looked like: Bill & Susan were led into a small room and sat down about 5 ft apart on two office chairs mounted on raised platforms. They both had electrodes and sensors clipped to their fingers and ears (which measures things like heart rate, temperature or their skin, and how much they're sweating; another term for this is Galvanic Skin Responses (GSR)...O the things I know), and under their chairs a "jiggle-o-meter" measured how much they moved around (ok really, jiggle, that doesn't sound very scientific, and it makes me think of fat, um try again Gottman). Two video cameras (one pointed at each person) measured everything they said and did; for 15 minutes they were left alone with the cameras rolling with instructions to discuss any topic from their marriage that had become a point of contention.
So what did Bill and Sue discuss? Their dog. They lived in a small apartment and had a very large dog. Bill didn't like the dog; Sue did. So for 15 minutes they discussed what they were going to do about the dog. Here's a little dialogue:

Bill: I'm just not a dog person.
This is how things started off. In a perfectly reasonable tone of voice Bill complains about the dog. Susan complains a little bit too. But there are also moments when they forget about what they are supposed to be arguing about.
When the subject comes up about whether the dog smells, the two banter back and forth with a half smile on their lips.
Susan: Sweetie! She's not smelly...
Bill: Did you smell her today? (ha! touche Bill)
Susan: I smelled her, she smelled good. I petted her, and my hands didn't stink or feel oily. Your hands have never smelled oily (I'm pretty sure oil isn't the reason dogs smell)
Bill: Yes, sir.
Susan: I have never let my dog get oily.
Bill: Yes sir, she's a dog.
Susan: My dog has never gotten oily, you better be careful.
Bill: No, you'd better be careful.
Susan: No, you'd better be careful...don't call my dog oily boy.

-So can we tell if their relationship is healthy or not by watch a videotape/hearing a 15 minute dialogue on a topic they disagree about? Most of us would probably say this interaction is too short to tell, and that marriages are buffeted by more important things (like money, sex, jobs, children, in-laws, etc).

-Gottman's research has shown otherwise. Since the 1980s Gottman has brought over 3,000 couples into his "Love Lab" and videotaped and analyzed each one of them. So what is he looking for exactly? Specific Affect, or what he dubbed SPAFF: a coding system that has 20 different categories corresponding to ever conceivable emotion that married couples might express during a conversation (disgust is 1, contempt is 2, anger is 7, defensiveness is 10, whining is 11, sadness is 12, stonewalling is 13, neutral is 14, and so on). Gottman has trained his staff how to read every emotional nuance in people's facial expressions and how to interpret seemingly ambiguous bits of dialogue. When they watch a marriage videotape, they assign a SPAFF code to every second of the couple's interaction, so that a 15 minute conflict discussion ends up being translated into a row of 1,800 numbers-- 900 for the husband and 900 for the wife. The data for the sensors and electrodes is factored in, so that the coders know, for example, when the husband's or the wife's heart was pounding or when his or her temperature was rising, or when either of them was jiggling (ugh) in his or her seat, and all of that information is fed into a complex equation (yay science!)

-On the basis of those calculations, Gottman has proven (error on Gladwell's part, in the science world we never say anything is "proven") something remarkable. If he watches a couple for 15 minutes he can predict with 90% accuracy if the couple will get a divorce or not. {Pause for a moment to give you another definition of "thin-slicing"} "Thin-slicing" refers to the ability of our unconscious to find patterns in situations and behavior based on very narrow slices of experience (i.e., Gottman's work).

- So what about Bill and Susan? At a closer look it appears that Bill was being defensive (in SPAFF language he was cross-complaining, and engaging in "yes-but" tactics). As for Susan, while Bill was talking, on more than one occasion she rolled her eyes very quickly, which is a classic sign of contempt. Bill then began to talk about his objection to the pen where the dog lives. Susan replied by closing her eyes and then assuming a patronizing lecture voice. Bill went on to say that he didn't want a fence in the living room. Sue said, "I don't want to argue about that," and rolled her eyes--another indication of contempt.
At no time during the conversation did either of them show any overt signs of hostility. Some couples when they fight, they fight. But these two were less obvious.

Bill went on to complain that the dog is cutting into their social life because they have to come home early and make sure the dog hasn't chewed anything up. Susan responded that that wasn't true arguing that if the dog was going to chew anything up she would do it in the first 15 minutes. Bill seemed to agree with that. He nodded lightly and said, "Yeah, I know," and then added, "I'm not saying it's rational. I just don't want to have a dog." (this started out as a validation, but then turned into a yes-but)
Bill went on: "I'm getting way better. You've got to admit it. I'm better this week than last week, and the week before and the week before." (The researcher jumps into say that in one study they were doing it turned out that the couples who ended in divorce were the couples who wouldn't give their partner credit when the other partner asked for it; with the happier couples the partner would hear it and say "you're right.") And Susan never does it, not once in the entire session, which no one realized until they did the coding (yikes, not looking good for Susan and Bill).

- After the 15 minute recording the couple is asked to sit and watch their discussion, and Bill and Susan thought the whole thing was hilarious. Gladwell points out that they seem fine in way, but maybe its because they are still in the "honeymoon" phase of their marriage. But the fact is that she's completely inflexible (his words, not mine). They are arguing about dogs, but its really about how whenever they have a disagreement, she's completely inflexible.

- On a technical level the purpose of the coding is to measure the amount of positive and negative emotions, because one of Gottman's findings is that for a marriage to survive, the ratio of positive to negative emotions in a given encounter has to be at least five to one. On a simpler level, though, what the researcher was looking for was a pattern in Bill and Susan's marriage, because a central argument of in Gottman's work is that all marriages have a distinctive pattern, a kind of marital DNA, that surfaces in any kind of meaningful interaction.

- What Gottman is implying is that a relationship between two people has a distinctive signature that arises naturally and automatically; that is why a marriage can be read and decoded so easily, because any key part of human activity has an identifiable and stable pattern. Predicting divorce is pattern recognition. "People are in one of two states in a relationship," Gottman says. "The first is what I call positive sentiment override, where positive emotion overrides irritability. It's like a buffer. Their spouse will do something bad, and they'll say, 'Oh, he's just in a crummy mood.' Or they can be in a negative sentiment override, so that even a relatively neutral thing that a partner says gets perceived as negative. In the negative sentiment override state, people draw lasting conclusions about each other. If their spouse does something positive, it's a selfish person doing a positive thing. It's really hard to change those states, and those states determine whether when one party tries to repair things, the other party sees that as repair or hostile manipulation. "

- Pretty interesting huh?! Well there is something else interesting about Gottman's system and that is how he simplifies the task of prediction. Looking at a clip of a couple's interaction and trying to decode every nuance of emotion can be nothing short of overwhelming, and not to mention that what seems positive to one person could seem negative to another. But Gottman has gotten so good at "thin-slicing" marriages that he says he can sit at a restaurant and eavesdrop on the couple one table over and get a pretty good sense of whether they need to start thinking about hiring lawyers and dividing up custody of the children (wow). He has figured out that he doesn't need to pay attention to everything that happens, he is far more selective. He has found that he can find out much of what he needs to know just by focusing on what he calls the Four Horsemen: defensiveness, stonewalling, criticism, and contempt. Even within the Four Horsemen there is one emotion that he considers the most important of all: contempt. If Gottman observes one or both partners in a marriage showing contempt toward the other, he considers it the single most important sign that the marriage is in trouble. (bad news bears for Susan and Bill)

- One would think criticism would be worse..I mean, right?!? But Gottman says, "because criticism is a global condemnation of a person's character you think it would be worse, but contempt is qualitatively different from criticism. With criticism I might say to my wife, 'You never listen, you are really selfish and insensitive.' Well, she's going to respond defensively to that. That's not very good for our problem solving and interaction. But if I speak from a superior plane, that's far more damaging, and contempt, is any statement made from a higher level. A lot of the time it's an insult: 'You're scum.' It's trying to put that person on a lower plane than you. It's hierarchical (I can never pronounce this word)."

- Contempt (Gottman says) is closely related to disgust, and what disgust and contempt are about is completely rejecting and excluding someone from the community. The big gender difference with negative emotions is that women are more critical (true), and men are more likely to stonewall (so true). But, there isn't a gender difference when it comes to contempt (interesting).

So that concludes the section on Gottman and his "Love Lab." The book never says (or at least if it does I haven't gotten to it yet) whether Bill and Susan are still together or not, but I am thinking that one would assume there is a better chance that they have split up than stayed together due to all of that contempt Susan was throwing out there (shame on you Susan).

I really enjoyed reading this part of chapter 1 for the two reasons: (1) I love reading about research (especially when it's something as interesting as relationship stability and divorce prediction), like I am fascinated by the reasoning for it, the method, and of course the findings; (2) I think everyone could benefit from a little introspection every now and then and reading this chapter allowed me to really stop and evaluate the way I interact with others (especially Ben).
Don't get me wrong Ben and I have a great relationship, but I know that sometimes I can be a little critical and unreasonable (and I really hate that because I am his number 1 fan and I am not really showing him that when I make critical statements toward him--even though they are meant with love:)

So in conclusion, reading this little tidbit was just another reminder that when I interact with others I need to be an active listener (yay consultation terms), and to make sure my positive to negative emotions/words are always at least five-to-one.

Ok that is all for now, back to school work.
over and out,
kristen