Oh hey

So I went on that crazy trip to New Zealand, and it was amazing, and then I came back to the single busiest period at work that I have ever experienced. I seriously will bill 180 hours in 2.5 weeks this month, putting me on pace for a 270 hour month if I hadn't been on vacation until March 13th. NUTSO!

But because I've posted it everywhere else, I should post here my Flickr set of the photos I took. I'd also link to link to the photos taken by my traveling companion if he will make them publicly available. His are MUCH better than mine because I spent most of the 4 day 33.5 mile hike through the Milford Track trying not to die. He was a little more relaxed, having only to work hard at trying not to kill me. (Perhaps this explains why there were actually bets at our local bar as to whether we would still be speaking post-17 days together in New Zealand and hiking over a f*cking mountain. For the record: the answer is yes, you suckers.) The picture above is one of his that I have shamelessly stolen, and hopefully he won't mind.

Also, this Flickr set is from some guys who were on the hike with us, and they also took amazing photographs. That should give you a great sense of just what the hike was like...and someday I will find the time and energy to relive the whole trip here in great detail. But not today.

Also, I have videos on a YouTube page but I won't link them until I find the time to edit all together into one long video. Right now it has a serious case of the shakeycams, and some clips are just a few seconds. But I will get it done sometime this year, even if it has to be in July.

A Eulogy

It was late September of 2001, and I was a first year associate in a big law firm, living on Beacon Hill with my soon to be ex-boyfriend. We were still trying to find our way through the collective national nightmare and hangover of September 11th. Gabe had started smoking again, and we were both pretty frayed from the stress and anxiety. One of us, I don't even remember which, had the bright idea that what we needed to bring us out of our funk was to get a kitten. We both loved and had grown up with cats, and it seemed like the sort of thing that would bring us a sorely needed dose of happy playfulness.

We went to a pet store in a nearby suburb and signed up for a waiting list with a local shelter they worked with. A few weeks later we got a call that two black and white kittens, brothers from a mama cat that had been hit by a car when they were still just tiny, had come in from the shelter and were available for adoption. We needed to come get one that afternoon or it would be offered to someone else. So, we raced down to the pet store only to discover that one of the two kittens had already been adopted. The one that was left had been named Linus by the shelter, a beautiful little black and white kitten with one black ear and one white ear, a mask of black covering about 3/4 of his face, and along his back with a white belly and feet. His tail was black with a tiny little white tip. I wanted him immediately.

As the pet store was filling out the paperwork and loading us up with all of the gear we would need, we heard how we had just missed the family that had adopted Linus' brother Pigpen. I wondered if they had gotten the "better cat," but as we were leaving with Linus in a carrier and a sack full of food and toys, the family came back with the other kitten because they had forgotten something. Linus' brother was almost entirely white with just a few flecks of black here and there. We had clearly gotten the cuter of the two. We drove home with him in the carrier, and it was only when we exited Storrow Drive at the Esplanade that he meowed for the first time. The first of so many.

We renamed him Claudio, at my ex's urging because he was an obsessive classical music fan and at the time his obsessions were with Chilean pianist Claudio Arrau. (He first wanted to name the cat Ludwig or Wolfgang and I said no, so Claudio seemed like a bargain.) He was almost 12 weeks old when we got him, so not a tiny kitten for very long, but extremely energentic and curious. He made us so happy right away, even as he attacked our feet under the covers in the middle of the night, or bit Gabe on the nipple once when he got out of the shower, or fought a little too hard and drew blood and cries of pain when we play fought with him. Claudio played to win, all the time, every time. And as much as I didn't like the slash marks on my arms, the middle of the night attack dive-bombs as he tried to kill the snore monster in my face, or the finicky way he'd been sweet one second and then nasty the next, I loved the little booger.

He was mean to almost everyone, including sometimes me, because he very much did not like people trespassing in his home. He would howl and hiss at visitors when I had parties, and though I tried to tell them not to pet him, he invariably drew blood from someone who pushed it too far. He defied any attempts to keep him from eating people food, including thefts of meat or fish directly off of my plate on more than one occasion. When caught, he would stare you right in the eye and say "what?" like it was your fault for being dumb enough to turn your back for even a second. Even at the end, when he'd poop on the living room floor, he'd just look at me like shame or guilt were the last things on his mind. He had to go, and that was where he happened to be at the moment the urge hit, and I could just forget about talking him out of it. That's how he was.

But he was also capable of being so incredibly sweet, particularly when I was at home alone and feeling lousy. Claudio knew when to give me a nose-to-nose rub, or curl up with a purring belly at my side when I was sick, or hung over, or crying because yet another guy in my life post-Gabe decided to act like a jackass. Most of my friends and family never saw this side of him, but he brought so much comfort to me through some really tough times. Gabe and I broke up 3 months after we got him, then I got laid off and went through a period of extended unemployment, then I went to work in a job I came to hate, I moved several times, then I quit that job and moved to Georgia, then I moved twice more before settling into my house, and through all of this change and turmoil, Claudio was a source of great comfort and peace to me.

He was ridiculously smart for a cat: in Boston, when still very young he would climb my clothes while hanging in the closet, which as you might imagine was not desirable because of all the pulls and tears it caused. I put child-proofing sliders on the tops of the closet doors that were intended to keep him out of the closet. One day as I sat gape-mouthed in amazement watching, he climbed onto the elliptical trainer, jumped from there to the top of the bookshelf next to the closet, and then reached over and slid the childproofing off the door. He then dismounted and opened the closet. I have never seen anything like that in my life. But he was also stupid, and would do ridiculous things like try to sniff a burning candle and singe off half of his whiskers (this actually happened), or go chasing after a bug head-first into a wall.

He loved coffee and cigarettes, which caused my mother to call him Garfield. I don't drink coffee or own a coffeemaker, but when my parents would come to town while in Boston or as they were building their house in Georgia, they would go out to get coffee, and the cat would just go nuts to get his head in their coffee cups. Somewhere in the nascent days of this blog there was a picture of Claudio with his head stuck in a Starbucks cup, but sadly that photograph is now lost to the ether. He would lick the fingers of any smokers I brought home (of which there were...a few), right on the spot where they held their cigarettes. One night a particular guy left an open pack of smokes on the table while we slept, and Claudio ate a part of a cigarette. He looked pretty sick the next day. He also ate virtually anything I put a piece of on the floor for him, including cake, avocado, tomatoes, mushrooms, biscuits, potatoes, you name it. I think most of the time he was just happy that he didn't have to sneak bites when he thought I wasn't looking, so he was damn sure going to finish it.

The day we got him from that pet store, we purchased a cat toy that is essentially a tiny fishing rod with a string and a piece of denim at the end. He loved this toy. When I would take it out of its hiding place in the table next to my front door, he would start making this eh-eh-eh-eh-eh noise that he also made when he was hunting a bug in the house. We would play with this toy for hours, until his nose was so red that I knew he was wiped. I still have that toy, which is now reduced to a bundle of frayed denim threads at the end of that string. We played with it one day this week, but he was too tired to do too much with it.

As I wrote about a few months ago, Claudio was diagnosed with lymphoma in November just before Thanksgiving. I opted to put him on steroids, which temporarily shrank his tumors and gave me nearly three months with him at almost full speed before he started to rapidly decline last week. On Monday, he had vomited a large amount when I got home from work, and I knew the end was coming. He was better on Tuesday and Wednesday when I worked from home while sick with the flu, but he seemed tired. By Thursday and Friday, he was eating far less than usual. On Saturday I could only get him to eat a little bit of tuna, and by Sunday even tuna and chicken were not enticing him like they usually would. The vet had told me that after the steroids stopped working at the tumors started growing again, that eventually I would know it was time to end his life when he stopped eating. That would be the sign that the tumors were starting to close off his digestive system. So, knowing what was about to happen, yesterday I made an appointment at the vet. He seemed so tired and weak all day on Saturday and Sunday, and I knew I wanted to end it before he was in real pain.

Before we left, I brushed him and blow-dryed his back, which I knew he loved and made him purr for the only time that day. I carried him out to the back deck and let him feel the sun and the wind, see the trees and squirrels and birds out there, and to spend a calm and quiet moment with him before changing things forever. The vet examined him, said the tumors were fairly large and pushing on his stomach which was causing him not to eat, and confirmed there was little they could do to treat him at that point. I couldn't be there at the moment he died, so I signed the paperwork and authorized them to give him a sedative with painkiller, and then a controlled overdose of anesthesia to stop his breathing and heart. He growled the whole time while I cried and petted him, praying for a moment of peace as our last few minutes together. Then, they left with him and I waited and cried.

My baby cat is gone. He was 9 years old, would have been 10 in June. He was beautiful, and crazy, and sweet, and mean, and brazen and brilliant, and defiant, and stupid, and loving. He left scratch marks on the walls, stains on my rugs, scars on my arms, unrelenting white fur on every surface of my house, and I will miss him terribly every single day for a very, very long time.

So this is crazy, right?

My 2011 is off to a crazy start, and has the potential to be a truly whirlwind year before all is said and done. I have two trials set this year already, with two more cases to be set for trial at some point and others that could find their way onto trial calendars before too long. One of those cases is not set until May, but we have a ton of expert depositions still to be taken in the meantime, and major motions to be drafted. All of that needs to be completed by sometime in March, which will be here much sooner than we think.

I tell you this only to set up the sheer insanity of what I am about to say.

For awhile now, I have been lamenting my lack of travel partners to the many places on my travel wish list. It is sad that at 35 years old, I've only just recently acquired a passport and taken my first trip outside the U.S., and that was to Vancouver. Not exactly a stretch. Well, last year I met someone who is as down with international travel as I am, and who has traveled yearly to New Zealand for several years now. A few months ago, on a whim because of low airfares, we gave serious thought to setting a trip there in February or March of this year (the tail end of their summer, given the change in hemisphere.) Ultimately, fiscal responsibility concerns for both of us made us elect not to book...but we made a deal that if my year-end bonus was over amount X, we'd go.

Well, my year end bonus was paid out on Friday and to my complete and total shock, it was not only over amount X but almost twice that much. We talked about it over the weekend and starting planning where and when we would go. I have a settlement conference in New Jersey on February 22nd, so I cannot go before then, but I thought we could find a way to squeeze in two weeks there at the end of February and beginning of March. All I had to do was get permission from my boss.

I haven't asked her yet, but as I've spent this week trying to plan out everything that must be done for my approaching trial and to set depositions in this case and in another case in which discovery closes in February, I've realized that it is truly insane of me to try to take a two week out of pocket vacation during this time period. And yet, the more I realize that my first six months of 2011 are going to be batshit insane of the working all night and never sleeping variety, I am more convinced than ever that my sanity DEMANDS that I do this.

I should go, right? I should demand from my boss that she give me permission, and show that I can do this and still get everything done. I should go. Even though airfare is $3000 (premium economy is the only way to go when the flight is 17 hours and your legs are 47" hip to heel, dontchaknow), and even though my parents find it nutso that I will travel to a foreign country with someone they have never even met -- they're very quaint about this -- I should totally make this work.

Right?

I have only taken two real vacations in my entire adult post-graduation life, and both were only a week long. I also worked some during both trips, and stayed within the U.S. in places where I could be regularly connected if necessary. New Zealand for two weeks demands that I just accept I will be out of contact for most of the time, and if people need me they have to friggin' wait. Or figure it out on their own. I love this idea, but I know the people I work with will hate it. But instead of thinking this is why this idea is dumb and crazy and irresponsible, I'm thinking this is why I have to do it.

I just pray she says yes.

2010 Year in Review

Everyone is doing it, and I stole this from Darcey.

1. What did you do in 2010 that you’d never done before?
Went to Las Vegas, twice! Took a two day solo beach vacation. Became part of the law firm ruling class. Drank Chartreuse, which is terrible. Attended basketball and baseball playoff games (football to come in early 2011). And this one other little thing that I can't blog about because it's WAY too personal.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year? Lord, I don't even want to remember my resolutions, but I'm sure I didn't keep most of them. I didn't save money or lose weight, although I didn't gain any either (and that was a big concern throughout the year.) I know I wanted to try a half marathon by year end, but yet again it didn't happen. Maybe in 2011.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
At one point this year, I knew eight women who were all pregnant. It has felt like an oppressive plague bearing down upon every woman I know. Two have given birth, one 10 weeks early and the other on time. Six more to go between February and June! I have never been more careful about taking my pills in my entire life.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No, although we thought both of my grandparents might at various times this year. I listened to "Fairytale of New York" on the drive to my parents' house for Christmas and started crying at the line "and an old man said to me / won't see another one," because it made me think of my grandpa. I doubt he will make it to next Christmas. My grandma, however, will probably live to be 100.

5. What countries did you visit?
Sadly, just the U.S. on my dancecard this year. I'm hoping 2011 will include New Zealand.

6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you didn’t have in 2010?
A stable, serious relationship with a boy with crinkly eyes, a nice smile, and an IQ in the triple digits. And a victory at my trial in May.

7. What dates from 2010 will be etched upon your memory, and why?
January 31st (not sayin' why). September 1st, the day I was made Of Counsel by my firm. November 27th, the FSU-UF football game I attended with my father. December 20th, an amazing birthday celebration and bluegrass show at Diesel that I attended. December 27th, the epic Falcons-Saints game that I attended.

8. What was your biggest achievement of this year?
Working really hard, becoming a key member of my team again, and being rewarded by elevation to Of Counsel and a nice raise. A close second would be finally cutting a toxic situation out of my life for good.

9. What was your biggest failure?
I really tried to recapture my 2009 success on Weight Watchers and using the treadmill, and I just couldn't find the time. I have to find a way to make this a part of my life again next year.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
I was sick once or twice early in the year and in October with colds. I had UTIs in April and December. Nothing major, though, thank God.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
My new iPad. Easily. A customized Falcons jersey that brought someone special to me
great joy was a close second.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
Far too many friends to list here...and I have to give major props to my boss, who forced the firm to make me Of Counsel mid-year when they initially had told her I'd have to wait until sometime in January. She steamrolled it through like a champ.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
More Republicans than I care to count. A coworker who nearly made someone quit with particularly vitriolic criticism. The voters of Georgia.

14. Where did most of your money go?
Mortgage, car payment, veterinarian bills, and traveling. I spent a LOT of money on my two gambling trips this year. (But worth it.)

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Vegas, and the Braves, and the Falcons, and FSU football. And a boy...sometimes.

16. What song will always remind you of 2010?
I'm not sure I can associate a song with this year. Maybe the gospel choir singing in Samuel L. Jackson's "Rise Up" commercials for the Falcons?

17. Compared to this time last year, are you: a) happier or sadder? b) thinner or fatter? c) richer or poorer?
a) Happier, not that I was unhappy at this time last year. But things all feel on the right track for the most part. Kitty health issues are the only thing worse than this time last year.
b) Exactly the same.
c) Richer, but not by much.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Exercise, definitely. And cooking at home. And saving money. And snuggling my kitty, which I now feel like I will never have had enough of.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Eating and drinking. And spending. Moderation is the theme in 2011.

20. How did you spend Christmas?
We had my entire family over for dinner in the early afternoon, with me and my mother cooking all morning to prepare. Then everyone left because of the snow, and we watched Star Wars together and just basked in the beauty of my first White Christmas ever.

21. Did you fall in love in 2010?
No. I'm scared to fall in love right now.

22. What was your favorite TV program?
Dexter, probably. Mad Men, True Blood, Project Runway and Chuck are up there too. The Walking Dead was my favorite new show.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
Hate is the wrong word. Reached a place of lacking in any emotion towards...yeah, that.

24. What was the best book you read?
Probably the Blind Side. I only read 3 or 4 books this year.

25. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Langhorne Slim. I'd heard his stuff before, but his live show at the Earl back in the fall was a total revelation. Also, exposure to older Neko Case was an amazing gift to my life this year.

26. What did you want and get?
Laid. :) Also, travel with good friends, an iPad, a new HDTV for the guest room. And more time with my grandparents even though it was touch and go for awhile.

27. What did you want and not get?
Relationshiped-up. :( Also, the benches in my front porch to finally be built, a clean bill of health for my cat, and most frustratingly...closure.

28. What was your favorite film of 2010?
I cannot even remember what movies I saw this year. Crazy Heart? That was probably my favorite.

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I was 35. I went to dinner with my friend Jen, then went and got a little crazy at the bar with a boy.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
To have gotten back into regular exercise and lost another 20 pounds. I felt more accomplishment from that one feat last year than I did from making Of Counsel this year.

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept of 2010?
Same as it ever was. When I like it, I know it.

32. What kept you sane?
Alcohol and good friends.

33. What political issue stirred you the most?
I cannot even think about politics this year, it has been so disheartening to watch everything fall apart.

34. Who did you miss?
My best friend Samantha.

35. Who was the best new person you met?
Paul. (Technically we first met in late 2009 but just once, the rest was all this year.)

36. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010.
There is really so little that I absolutely cannot do.

37. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
From Guster's "Do You Love Me":
I wanna wake you from your dream
I wanna know who you're talking to
when you're singing in your sleep
I wanna find out what it means
This song has been stuck in my head for weeks.

So, yeah

I'm still around but it's going to be far less frequent going forward. Too much else in my life demanding my time right now: work, dying cat (more on that in a bit), personal entanglements, more work, etc.

I would apologize for my scarcity, but I really don't feel all that bad about it. It is a good thing to be too busy to have time to document my life here, and since I primarily used this place as catharsis when I had far more to whine about than I currently do, I instead see my lack of time or interest in blogging to mean that I am in less need of therapy than previously might have been recommended. Maybe? Let me dream for a bit, OK?

So I mentioned the dying cat, and that is something I've been reluctant to blog about precisely because it is so upsetting to me. As I posted about last year, Claudio has had an ongoing puking problem for almost 2 years now. Last year, he developed Chylothorax, which is lymphatic fluid in his chest, of unknown origin. I spent a lot of money to hospitalize him for a week and then it sort of magically got better, but the puking continued. I thought about taking him to the vet for more tests, but he seemed for the most part fine despite the puke problem (which admittedly is not ideal for the appearance of my house, but still.) I also was afraid they would want to run numerous expensive tests that would continue to reveal nothing about what was causing the problem.

Then, back in November, Claudio started pooping on the floor. He was doing it every day, and I read online that often cats do this because they are feeling ill and are trying to find a way to tell their owners. I started thinking more seriously about taking him to the vet. Then, one night a few days later, I was rubbing his belly while he was laying on my desk, and I felt something hard in his abdomen. It concerned me. I decided I would take him later that week, and he suddenly started acting like he felt awful. He was hiding under the guest bed, not eating very much, and moving very slowly. I made a vet appointment. The vet initially thought the mass I felt in his belly was just feces, and that he likely had irritable bowel syndrome after seeing some thickening of his intestine on X-ray. I went home to await the results of bloodwork, after he got some IV fluids.

Two days later the cat was not only feeling better, but I noticed that his left pupil was permanently dilated as compared to his right. In humans, differences in pupil size is nearly always a sign of serious neurological conditions (stroke, brain tumor, etc.) so this was an emergency. I took him back to the vet, and they said it could be Horner's Syndrome, a neurological condition that can be caused by infections, trauma, or tumors that result in pressure on the optic nerve that causes the dilation. He had an ear that was very sensitive and had fluid in it suggestive of ear infection, so they gave me antibiotics and told me he would hopefully get better once the infection in his ear was cleared up. I was also supposed to bring him back in a couple days for an abdominal ultrasound, because his bloodwork had been for the most part normal and they wanted to look at his intestine.

The ultrasound was finally performed, and revealed what I had been afraid of all along: a large abdominal mass either very near or wrapped around his intestines, and another spot on his liver. The vet took a sample of fluid from the mass for testing, and told me that the most likely cause of the mass was lymphoma. She started him on steroids, and told me that I could consider chemotherapy, steroid therapy alone, or do nothing. It sounded like his options ranged from a few weeks at best to potentially much longer if the chemotherapy was a success.

I'll spare you the details of some uncertainty that was injected into the diagnosis, but the steroids worked wonders--his eyes returned to normal and he was acting like his old happy self the next day. A week later the vet did a second ultrasound, and already the mass had shrunk. Though I lacked a definitive diagnosis, she told me that nothing else would have reacted so well to steroids, other than cancer. So, my kitty has lymphoma and is living on borrowed time. The vet hopes that I will get 3-6 months with him while on the steroids before they stop working, the tumor starts growing again, and he has to be put to sleep. I decided against the chemotherapy because the cat would hate it, it is insanely expensive, and ultimately in about half the cases it doesn't really prolong the cat's life that much anyhow.

He is his old sweet self, waking me up early every morning with plaintive wails for food, scratching all leather shoes and all wooden doorways, curling up next to me every night to purr while we sleep, and generally being adorable. I have to give him liquid steroids every day, which he became a total shit about taking via syringe by mouth, so I mix them into some milk. He is eating well and seems to have no obvious signs of a problem, other than a stomach that growls loudly for at least an hour after he eats.

He is on borrowed time, and my fervent desire to make sure I spend as much time with him as I can in the little time we have left together is yet another reason I never post anymore. I will miss this cat so much when is gone, that I can already feel the heartache. I'm scared of exactly how hard it will be. He has been with me for 9 years, through multiple breakups, a layoff, a move from Boston to Atlanta, an ice storm in which I had no power for three cold days, and so much more. He has been my constant little slice of happiness ever since we got him from a shelter a month after 9/11. And soon, way too soon, I will have to make the terrible decision to end his life before he suffers too much. It's going to be awful.

In which I explain my sports mojo

I've written about this before, many years ago, but here's a refresher course for those of you who weren't reading then: I am a super duper lucky charm for a city's sports teams. Don't believe me?

In 1993, I moved to Tallahassee to attend FSU. They won the national championship. They played for the national championship four more times that decade, winning it again in 1999. I had moved away back then, and thus began a decade of awfulness.

The summer of 1995, I was back in Orlando (my hometown) working at Disney World for the summer, and the Orlando Magic made it to the NBA Finals in just their 5th year of existence. (They did get swept in the Finals, but I was only in Orlando for 2 short months so my lucky effect probably had not built up enough by then.)

In 1997, I moved to Boston for law school. The Red Sox were mediocre, the Patriots were mediocre, the Celtics were awful. It took a few years for it to kick in, but in 2002 the Patriots won their first of three Super Bowls championships in four years. In 2004 the Red Sox broke an 86 year curse on their way to 2 World Series championships in four years. And in 2008 the Celtics even won a championship, the culmination of a rebuilding that started while I was still there.

In fall of 2005 I moved to Georgia, just after the Atlanta Braves made the playoffs for the last of their amazing 14 year postseason streak. In February 2006 I formally moved to Atlanta, and slowly began switching my allegiances to Atlanta sports teams. The first to go was football, because I was really bothered by the Patriots' taping/cheating scandal. Then went basketball, because I liked the young, raw talent of the Hawks and their tremendous upside. But I'd been holding onto my Red Sox love, and had a really hard time giving it up. I had been through hell and bliss with my Sox, and I just wasn't sure I could root for any other team. Still, at the start of this season, I decided I had to do it. The Braves needed me, and I told everyone I was on board.

Needless to say, it's helping. The Braves just returned to the postseason for the first time since 2005 despite having the wheels nearly fall off due to numerous injuries to critical players. The Hawks have made it to the playoffs three years in a row, and should have a very good team this year again. The Falcons made the playoffs two years ago, broke the curse of never having back to back winning seasons with their 9-7 record last year (after Matt Ryan's injury), and look great this year--so great that they have become a very trendy sleeper Super Bowl pick. I have no idea when the championships will come, but within the next five years, I think any one of the Braves, Hawks or Falcons could win it all. Maybe all three.

When I moved to Atlanta in 2006, none of our major sports teams were in the postseason. The Braves were going into rebuilding mode, the Falcons were dealing with the Michael Vick saga, and the Hawks were still a young team that had been nothing to write home about for over a decade. Since then, all 3 have made the postseason at least once, and this year we should have all 3 in the postseason in the same year. Meanwhile, the Patriots have stopped winning Super Bowls, and the Red Sox failed to make the postseason this year. Boston's reign as supreme sports town is drawing to a close, while Atlanta's is just beginning.

You can all thank me later.

Something About September

In 2005, I quit my job on the Friday before Labor Day weekend and spent the rest of the month trying to get the hell out of Dodge (aka Boston) before the rapidly-approaching winter. One of the most popular songs on the radio at that time was Green Day's "When September Ends," and it felt quite fitting to be asking the universe to hurry up and get me through this month and out of this life I had decided I didn't want anymore.

Fast-forward four years, and in September of 2009 my life was about to experience numerous earthquakes but I didn't realize it just yet. Two co-workers had left and a partner had announced he was leaving the practice of law altogether. I had taken on some of their responsibilities, and out of the blue I had also received a phone call from a federal goverment agency asking me to interview for the same job I had interviewed for in January, because I had been their #2 choice but the guy they had chosen to hire had decided to jump agencies just 6 months after starting. They were only interviewing me and one other guy, and they wanted to move quickly, so it seemed like getting hired was a VERY real possibility. At the very same time, I knew my coworker was in the final stages of interviewing for a fantastic opportunity elsewhere. We joked just before the Labor Day weekend about wanting to be the first of the two of us to give notice, because the rash of departures had started to freak people out. (Ultimately, she got the call first and put in her notice a year ago tomorrow, and I didn't get the nod for the government job because they were concerned I would decide to leave after a year or two in order to earn more money. They were probably right.)

Because the government job would have paid a lot less than my current job, my parents decided I needed to buy my house from them (long story made slightly less long: when we found my house I wasn't yet working and didn't qualify for a good mortgage rate, but they did, so they were the official buyers but I paid the mortgage for the first 3.5 years), and found a way through a mortgage broker to make this happen. We locked in a rate in late September, and a month later we closed and I took on the crushing debt load of my very own. We also discovered during this time that my roof was leaking (right after the Atlanta floods last year, September 18-22) and some other renovations were needed, so we hired a builder and started planning for the renovations that began in October.

At the same time, I had been talking off and on since July with a guy who I wanted to go out with and I was pretty sure he wanted to go out with me too, but despite a few abortive attempts to meet up somewhere we still had not yet gone out face to face. We shared a mutual friend (who had actually tried to set us up a year earlier but I said no), and she finally talked to me and then talked to him and basically found a way to push us both into getting the hell on with it, already. Right around this time we finally started talking on the phone and made plans for our first date, plans that I would ultimately have to cancel because I got sick. We ended up going out for the first time later in September, and having a great time. It was the start of something different and exciting. (Things didn't work out in the end, but it was still a VERY fun fall...)

I was about to become insanely busy at work, and I was about to get sick 5 times in 6 months (likely because of said work insanity.) Because of that sickness streak and my limited free time due to work, I would stop working out for more than six months and gain back half of the 20 pounds I had lost from March to September of last year. I would stop having time to go play poker on Thursdays, to go out with friends on Friday nights, to visit my family on Sundays, or to do anything but work all the damn time. I knew things were about to become difficult, but I had no idea just how difficult, yet.

I was also about to experience a fundamental realignment of my social circle. At the end of September I recall driving with a close friend, listening to a sad song about goodbyes and regret that suddenly brought forth the tears. I didn't know why I was crying, yet. I knew things needed to change and had already started to, but I didn't realize that what really needed to happen was finality, an ending. That earthquake came in October. But on that late September day, part of me already knew, and was already recording that moment, as one place I may never go in my life again.

Looking back now, a year ago I was on the brink of everything. I had no idea at the time how fundamental the changes would be, but it got me here, and for that I am grateful. The last year has put me in such a better place, and this September I am just hoping that I can keep building on the positive change of a year ago. Through a combination of my crash Vegas diet and a week of being sick, I've lost enough weight that my low point from last year is once again in sight and I'm inspired to keep going. I have met some fascinating and truly amazing guys in the last year, and made some fantastic new friends while strengthening existing friendships with others. I was promoted at work and got a raise after I really rededicated myself to my job and I ended up with a house that love and put my own mark on forever.

Septembers are always full of change for me, but as I sit here today reflecting on all the positive change that started a year ago, I just can't wait to see what happens next.

Quick and Dirty

I have no time or enthusiasm for blogging anymore, obviously. But I just can't bring myself to shut this place down. So, we do a quick and dirty update since the last post pre-vacation:

* I played in one poker tournament in Biloxi. Finished somewhere in the high 40's, and top 27 got paid. I had terrible cards for most of the day so even lasting that long was really surprising, and actually made me feel pretty good about my effort. I had nothing to work with, but I made it work well enough to outlast some really good players.

* The sexism in poker still gets to me, but I'm finally used to it now. I actually had a guy lay down pocket queens to my bet, and it was an older guy who had been super-flirty with me to that point. (He saw me on my cell phone at the break and asked if I was "texting with my boyfriend," kept calling me "hot stuff," etc.) Now he said he was laying them down because he had gotten burned with them several times already, and I think that was at least partially true. But I also think he was trying to do me a favor, which is fairly condescending. Of course, I had pocket jacks so I was happy for the fold, but I didn't tell him that. He had been very chatty with the whole table, trying to play the "I'm just a dumb first timer, you must be really good at this" role...meanwhile before the tournament started he was bitching about how lousy the comps were for poker players when he had gambled over $2mil. in MGM owned casinos in the last year. So, notsomuch.

* It was raining when I got to Pensacola the first day of my vacation, so I decided not to play in the Tuesday poker tournament and instead stayed all morning in Fla. to get a nice long walk on the beach in before I had to leave. It was wonderful. Despite normally not being a big Hampton Inn fan, I have to give it up for the Hampton Inn on Pensacola Beach--it is way nicer than most of the chain and I would totally stay there again. Although their "heated pool" was so cold I nearly died.

* I ate at a restaurant on the beach called Peg Leg Pete's--also highly recommended. The food was delicious and the company was good too. However, I did have an older retired couple from GA there start talking to me about why they moved to Pensacola, and at one point the guy did a quick look around the bar and then just launched into an incredibly racist statement. (Something about how the locals all call this one beach "chicken wing beach" because "that kind" hang out there.) I hate it when things like this happen, because I realize it would do no good to chide him for saying it, but I also don't want to be complicit in his racism and act like it doesn't bother me. So, inevitably, I end up sitting there with an uncomfortable look on my face, hoping he will realize he shouldn't have said it but that I am too polite or weak or whatever to flat out call him out for it. And then I wrapped up my drinking and left soon thereafter.

* In Biloxi, I lost a lot of money and ate a wonderful meal at Mary Mahoney's, as is my annual tradition. Still the best seafood gumbo I have EVER had. However, they cannot make a gimlet to save their damn lives. Here's a hint: it should not be over ice, and it should not be fizzy.

* After Biloxi, I drove back to attend a friend's show at Smith's, and the next morning on little sleep and much hangover, I flew to Vegas. We stayed at the Mandalay Bay this time, and I much preferred it to the MGM Grand where I stayed in May. I again lost money, but had a couple big slot machine wins ($350 oncer, $200 at the airport) and some good blackjack play. However, overall the trip was pricey because my gambling would swing hard in both directions. Not as bad as T., who was with us, and who lost $800 in about 20 minutes on 8 $100 hands of blackjack! LIVING THE DREAM.

* We ate our way through Vegas, and that seriously has to be the best foodie town in the universe. First night we had Border Grill mexican food that was delicious, the next day we had Burger Bar for lunch (it says a lot that this very tasty meal ended up being the least impressive of the trip but was still good), then Nobu for dinner where SOME PEOPLE ordered kobe beef steaks cooked over hot rocks at $32 an ounce, then the next day for lunch I had a lamb burger and fried dill pickles at BLT Burger that was TO DIE FOR, and finally we finished it off with an excellent Russian fusion tasting menu at Red Square. All of it was yummy.

* Good thing I went on that "crash vegas" diet...I lost 7 pounds in 17 days, and I wasn't even trying that hard for the last week or so. But I gained 4 right back in Vegas! (I've taken off 2 of those in the last week since I've been back and hitting the treadmill again.) This really inspired me to rededicate, because I do feel so much better when I am working out 4 days a week at least. Also, with the cooler weather, I am going to try walking outside on weekends more often. I still hope to get myself half-marathon ready by January...

* The craziest moment of the entire Vegas experience was when I realized while eating lunch at BLT Burger in the Mirage that my wallet was gone. I didn't know if I had dropped it, been pickpocketed, or left it in the cab I had arrived in 45 minutes earlier. I have to give major, major props to the staff of the Mirage, who got the security folks to find the cab number of the cab I got out of through their security camera footage, called the cab company and fought their way through the labyrynthic maze to reach the driver, and discovered that he had my wallet and made arrangements for him to bring it back to me. It completely saved my vacation, and then I tipped the entire world for their help. I will also probably stay at the Mirage next time I am in town, because I feel like I owe them for going over the top for me when I was not even a guest on their property.

* Speaking of next time, there is already a movement afoot to go back for Thanksgiving. I don't think I can afford it!

* This was only my second "real vacation" (i.e. not a long weekend or Christmas/Thanksgiving holiday trips home to family) since I graduated from law school. Twice I have managed to take an entire week off from work, in 10 years. This is sad. This needs to be remedied.

The Crash Vegas Diet

Having planned my vacation for the last week of August, I am faced with needing to wear a swimsuit in public in two weeks for my one night on a Florida beach, and then 5 days later while in Vegas lazing about the pool at the Mandalay Bay. But I've been a bad Sara, and do not currently feel swimsuit-worthy. The answer? A challenge to myself to see if I can drop 5 pounds by the time I leave for Vegas on Sept. 3rd.

Luckily, being tall and weighing more generally means that stringing together several pounds lost in 2.5 weeks is not as hard for me as it is for some. The bad part of that is, it takes more to make a noticeable difference. So, how am I going to do it?

1. I'm eating under 1400 calories a day. This is not that hard to do for me, but I'm going to accomplish it by eating as many fruits and vegetables as I can, and cutting meat out of my diet as much as I can for the next 17 days. I will still eat seafood, however, because it's just too hard for me to go full vegetarian. The usual breakdown of a day will look like this:

Breakfast: fruit and a diet coke, possibly with greek yogurt
Lunch: Salad or sandwich of some sort from takeout, or a frozen Lean Cuisine/Healthy Choice/etc. meal
Afternoon snack: 100 calorie popcorn bag, fruit, carrots
Dinner: takeout sushi, margherita pizza, or if I'm really good a homecooked meal of mostly vegetables with possibly some seafood.
Dessert: Sorbet du jour (I am currently obsessed with sorbet)

2. I'm spending an hour a day, EVERY DAY, on the treadmill. No ifs ands or buts. However, over the next 17 days I am giving myself 2 days off as needed for work purposes.

3. I'm doing 100 sit-ups every single morning or night. Gotta get some ab muscles back in evidence.

4. Drinking no more than twice a week, light beer or wine only. I bet you were thinking that sample menu up there looked mighty light, right? Well, I have to save the calories for an adult beverage now and then. Also the occasional inescapable chocolate craving.

I'll let you know on September 2nd how I've done...

Vacation Plans Update

So, things changed a little bit in the last couple weeks as I planned my vacation for the last week of August. I am probably NOT going to the Florida gulf coast because cost has become somewhat prohibitive. (Beach house rentals in FL are EXPENSIVE despite the whole oil spill thingee!) Instead, I will probably drive or fly straight to Biloxi on Monday for 3 days of poker tournament goodness and fun with my friend Susan (and technically it's on a beach so that should fulfill my beach-fix) thanks to free airfare and hotel deals from the Beau Rivage. I'll come back on Thursday, in time to see an awesome bluegrass band, Whoa Nelly, play at Smith's. (You should come if you're here in the ATL. Seriously. They are great.) And then early the next morning, I'll fly to Vegas for Labor Day weekend with some friends. I have free hotel offers there, too, so the only question is whether the airfare will become semi-reasonable before I give up and book a ticket. I may not even gamble all that much this time out...I probably will just hang by the pool during the days so that I resist the urge to give MGM/Mirage Corp. my hard-earned dollars. (Yeah, right.)

Woot! I'm looking forward to an entire week off. I just told my boss about it today, and she didn't balk. So it's as good as set in stone.

Help Me Plan My Vacation

I have decided to take the week leading up to Labor Day weekend off, for some sort of vacation. My friend Susan is going with some family to Biloxi in the middle of that week and has invited me to come along, and since a) there is a poker tournament that week and b) I have a million free hotel and airfare offers for the Beau Rivage anyhow, I've decided I will probably spend at least a few days down there. I also want to go visit a friend who moved to New Orleans a few months ago. And I need to satisfy my beach craving with a couple days on a beach somewhere. Can all of these things be combined into one 10 day journey? Also, a part of me just wants to fly to Vegas for Labor Day weekend. And my parents have been begging me to come up and spend a long weekend with them in the mountains.

Suggestions welcome, in particular as to beaches along the gulf coast that aren't befouled with oil and that have nice beachfront hotels.

So, I guess I'm back...kinda?

A long rambly multi-topic catchup post wherein I pretend all 3 of my remaining readers still care...

Last night I scrolled through my first two pages of posts and realized that was all I had so far for 2010, and it's nearly freakin August. This made me feel terrible about my chronic blog neglect. Luckily several massive projects completed either last week or Monday of this week, and so while I am certainly still swamped I no longer feel like I am swimming for the surface but just don't know if I will make it before I drown. Living in that feeling for the last 3 months, and in other spurts for most of the last 10 months, has really sucked. And I'm sure it will suck again soon.
...

So, like I said in the infusions post, I had 2 parties in June and July. It wasn't really the greatest idea I've ever had, but it's done now and it was for the most part fun. Also, crazy expensive. Also, this post from my dear friend Susan is like the greatest thing ever. Read it, learn it, live it.

I made so many different dishes it is hard to pick just one or two to share recipes for, but one is something I sort of invented based upon a suggestion from a friend, and it was delicious, and easy:

Feta-Stuffed Mini Peppers

2 packages of miniature red, yellow and orange peppers, tops removed, cleaned, split down one side
1 package of good feta cheese
olive oil, ideally infused with some herbs, garlic or red pepper for extra flavor
balsamic vinegar
8 leaves fresh basil (if oil is not infused)
salt and pepper

If using basil, cut into a chiffonade and place a pinch of the basil into each pepper. Stuff each pepper with feta, packing tightly. Drizzle liberally with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and sprinkle with salt, pepper, and any remaining basil. Refrigerate for at least 1 hour to allow flavors to meld. Skewer each pepper and either place on top rack of a grill away from direct flame, with uncut sides of peppers down, or place on a rimmed baking sheet and broil in a hot oven until the cheese browns and the peppers have just started to soften. Be careful when removing the peppers from the grill or oven, as the filling will want to fall out. (If it does, just discreetly stuff it back in. Nobody will notice.) Serve warm.

...

I've decided that when I get my bonus in December, I need to do something big with it. Option #1 is a major trip somewhere outside the U.S. where I can get away from it all for awhile. Suggestions on locale are welcome...right now, I am considering exotic places like Italy, France, New Zealand, Tahiti, Barbados, etc. Ideally it should be somewhere that the weather will be lovely in January or February when I can afford to go. Honestly, my biggest concern is that none of my friends will be willing to go with me because of either financial restraints, lack of interest in traveling to where I want to go, or fear of flying. I've been trying to explain to people recently that traveling alone as a single girl is just way dicier than as a guy. My friend who went to France last year by herself and got mugged 3 times in the span of a two week trip, including having her wallet stolen on the very first day she arrived in Paris, is a classic example. She hung in there, got money wired by her parents, and made the best of it, but I would probably be so dejected at that point that I'd just want to turn around and come home. I travel alone all the time for work, but that's different--I never GO anywhere or see anything, I just go from airport to hotel to deposition back to airport. But if I'm traveling abroad, I really don't want to be alone. There should be a place where you can find travel partners for things like this who aren't shady or annoying. (Feel free to also volunteer to be my travel partner in the comments, although I won't be fronting your costs if you do...)

...

On the mini-vacation front, I need to go visit a friend in New Orleans for some weekend in August, and I am also probably going back to Biloxi for the poker tournament around Labor Day. This was a total bust last year, but a friend is also going that same week for other reasons and asked me to join her, plus they have lowered the buy-ins considerably from last year. I wonder if that's the effect of the economy? At any rate, I never have the time or desire to play poker in my Thursday night game anymore, so in order to get some practice with live play I am probably going to have to start playing bar tourneys a few times a week. Suggestions for good places in Atlanta with bar tourneys that start at 9pm (not 8, which I can never make it to) are welcome. I used to play at the Brewhouse but apparently new folks are running it so it may suck now.

...

Local politics is depressing the hell out of me. I seriously don't like any of the candidates on either side of the aisle who ran for Governor of Georgia, and I will probably write in my friend Page in November. (It's a thing, we write in Page when we don't know who to vote for.) I waver between resolving not to give a shit because it's too upsetting to pay attention to, and resolving to make my own change by working to revamp the Democratic party in this state into something effective and inspiring again. Y'know, with all that free time I have.

...

So it's late July, and I resolved in March to maybe run a half marathon this year, and yet I haven't even been able to string together 13 miles on the treadmill across one whole week since that promise, let alone actually starting to train for it. I keep waiting for things at work to get less hectic so I can get home at a normal hour and have the energy and time to recommit, but it just hasn't happened. I wish I didn't have to choose between getting in shape physically and getting my career in order. But doing both at the same time has proven nearly impossible.

...

I'm getting ridiculously excited about FSU football this year, even though Vegas has apparently only pegged us to win 8 games. Still, this is one of those years that has the potential to be really special--not national championship special (despite what Tim Brando apparently predicted), but a better year than we have seen in recent memory. I think we could conceivably run the table in the ACC, which would be great if we didn't also have the incredibly difficult non-conference schedule of Oklahoma, BYU and Florida to deal with. Still, the most frustrating thing about FSU's decline this decade has been our tendency to let mediocre ACC teams beat us, and the first step to returning to former glory is to stop letting that happen and start kicking conference asses again.

...

I think that's all I got for now. Whew, I was storing up a lot of random junk!

In which I sound like a shill for a diet plan, but have a serious point under it all

So, I haven't been around much lately. (I'm sure all six of you noticed.) Work continues to be insanely busy, my personal life experienced a short-lived but dramatic uptick in activity, and I really just find political and legal developments too depressing to even talk about.

But there is something I've been meaning to write about for awhile, so here goes...

One year ago, on March 7th, I got up and registered with Weight Watchers. The morning before I had caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and realized that I just could not live with how I looked a second longer. I had always been resistant to the idea of organized diet programs, believing that I could do it on my own using common sense food choices and portion control. The problem was, of course, that I'd never actually used that common sense to lose any weight.

Being a technology lover and resistant to anything involving meetings or expensive food programs, I decided WW was the right option. For a monthly fee, I could enter my daily food and exercise into the tracker and it would calculate my daily and weekly point limits. I wasn't terribly busy at work at the time, so I quickly realized that the more I worked out, the more flex points I could save up for the weekend. I had bought a treadmill 3 years earlier but never used it, so I decided now was a good time to start. I walked on the treadmill while watching on DVD entire seasons of TV shows like Dexter that I'd been meaning to watch. Every other weekend, I'd try to do a longer walk (perhaps with less incline or at a slower speed) while watching a movie. I got to the point where I could do a 7 or 8 mile walk every once in awhile, though the last mile or so was usually pretty brutal. I had never been a regular exerciser, and I came to really enjoy it.

I also figured out that I could eat anything I wanted, as long as I planned for it. A week of fruit for breakfast and Lean Cuisine meals for lunch would mean I could eat relatively "normal" dinners and still have my 35 flex points saved up for one weekend day of drinking and eating bar food with friends. If I went out to dinner, I just tried to either have points saved up or only eat half of whatever I ordered, and I started looking up point values on the internet if I wasn't sure. I switched to Amstel Light, which is terrible but is the most widely available light beer that I can stand to drink. As a friend remarked to me recently, it wasn't even that noticeable of a change for my social life, since I could still go to the same places I always did, but just had to be careful about what I chose.

I lost 20 pounds and dropped a dress size in 5 months from March 7th-August 15th. That was a huge milestone, but about 15 pounds from my goal (which would put me back where I weighed in college.) That might sound huge to some people, but when you're 6 ft tall, 20 pounds is a mere drop in the bucket. But it still felt good to have people notice. It felt good to have my jeans become too big to wear because they were falling off and baggy in the butt. It felt great to wear a bikini in New Orleans in July for a bachelorette weekend and not feel completely self-conscious about it.

About once a month, I also went off the wagon for a few days entirely. First it was a trip to New Orleans in late March, then it was Easter Sunday with my family in April, then it was my birthday in May, then it was a conference in Vancouver in June, then it was the bachelorette in July. Every time, as long as I limited the damage to a few days and got right back on plan afterwards, I avoided any real backsliding. It slowed down my progress, but also kept me sane.

Then, in September I got busy again at work. I recall that over Labor Day weekend in Biloxi, I ate whatever I wanted and didn't work out at all, but I also was only eating one real meal a day so I didn't gain anything. I had no time to work out, though, so I knew I would stall out. Then I got sick at the end of September, and ate whatever I wanted while I was recovering. I got sick again in October, and again in December, and again last month. I might have worked out maybe 5 times in that time span until last week, because between billing 200 hours a month at work, the holidays, and constantly struggling with illnesses, I just couldn't muster the energy or the time. I also used my busy-ness at work and the holidays as an excuse to go off the wagon on tracking my points. By the new year, I had gained back 10 of the pounds I'd lost.

By last week, my one year anniversary, I'd decided I had no excuses left. I worked out 4 days last week, and I got back to calculating my points. It was hard (particularly because of some personal life drama that decided to emerge late Friday night and make me want to eat all of the fried food and chocolate in the known universe) but I stuck to it. And I'll hopefully keep sticking to it, because in 3 weeks I need to be able to wear a swimsuit in Vegas without wanting to cut myself.

I'm not writing this as some sort of testimonial for Weight Watchers or seeking a pat on the back. I'm writing this because up until a year ago I was one of those people full of excuses and distrust when it came to diet plans or my ability to get anywhere with something like this. I said I "only run when chased," I talked about my bad knees and back, I made fun of the cultishness of WW meetings. I said I knew everything I needed to know to be healthy, but food was just so delicious. I was a skeptic of the highest order, and yet a year later I have been proven wrong. And I know so many people who are in those same shoes--making excuses, doubting they could ever do it, giving all the reasons why the mere thought makes them so uncomfortable. But I want them to listen to me and think about giving it a try.

And I'm hoping that by this time next year, I'll weigh less than I did in college. Which would be awesome. If I meet this goal, I'll post a picture of myself in a bikini as proof. I make this promise to you now.

I'm also thinking of running a half marathon. Yes, really.

Counting My Blessings

I've done a lot of bitching and moaning here about life in a big law firm and my desire to escape this climate at some point. But I'm not going to do that today. I've been at my job for over four years now, and at times it has been intensely frustrating and something I just wanted to walk away from. But I didn't.

And at times I am quite certain that some people at this firm wanted to walk away from me, such as when my workload suddenly dried up and I was the heftiest salary among our group's associate ranks with not nearly enough work to stay profitable. But they didn't walk away from me even though over 10,000 BigLaw associates all over the country lost their jobs in the last 2 years, often with a lot less justification than my firm would've had for pulling the rug out from under me. They stuck by me, and so I've stuck by them. After a very rough year or so, I have good cases again, I'm busy as hell (hence no blog posts), and I have a chance for the brass ring promotion at the end of the year if I play my cards right. Much to my great amazement, things are good again.

It's been sort of like a tough marriage to a good man who can be mighty annoying sometimes. Neither of us is always happy about our mutual obligations and commitments, but during the worst economic crisis of my generation, I feel tremendously lucky to have found loyalty from a big, soulless corporate law firm...the last place I would have ever thought to find it.

I personally know at least five people who have been laid off during this recession, and it feels like that number grows every day, often when I least expect it. Every single time I hear their pained announcements of the unexpected news, I feel a gut check--like I know I am tremendously lucky not to be in their shoes. And who knows? I still could be before it is all over. But for now, I am turning over a new leaf. No more whining about it here. My law firm ain't perfect, it has its quirks and drawbacks, but we've stuck it out all these years depsite all the difficulties, and that means something.

To draw the relationship analogy out as far as it can stand, maybe after getting screwed over so many times by the dashingly handsome assholes I've made questionable commitments to in the past, I now understand and can warmly appreciate the simple pleasures of life with a decent, honorable guy who may not seem as superficially perfect at first meeting, but has turned out to be much more real and enduring than anything I've ever known.

I would never have thought I would still be here by now, but I am, and I'm learning to be happy. For a girl who has said often that my theme song is Steve Earle's "I Ain't Ever Satisfied," that is a surprise. A happy accident.

And what a decade it was...

Everyone's doing not just year-end lists, but end of the decade lists...and it has me feeling seriously nostalgic for my 24-year-old self. When the clock struck midnight on New Year's Eve 1999, I have no idea where I was (either Boston or Orlando) but I know I was about to graduate from law school and embark into real adult life for the first time ever. I had a sweet job at a big firm lined up, a boyfriend who'd asked me to marry him, and the whole world was ahead of me.

Of course, a funny thing happened on the way to perfect bliss. I got laid off from that law firm job 2 years later, I broke up with the boyfriend/fiance after finally realizing it was never going to work, and I spent months unemployed and terrified I had lost everything. And then I spent years building back to the life I wanted and hoped for, first in a small decrepit apartment in the North End where rats ran by my bedroom window every night, then getting a job at a small firm making half my former salary and barely scraping by, then on my parents' intuition and some tremendous luck buying a condo in Jamaica Plain. I spent the middle of the 2000's treading water in this way, until I realized I just wasn't going to find what I was looking for in Boston. And even though it was the scariest thing I have ever done, and perhaps the scariest thing I will ever do, I decided to quit my treading water job and leave my little condo in J.P., and move to Georgia to be closer to my family and start a new life.

The last four years have been full of highs and lows, but mostly highs. I arrived with no job, living in a small house in a small town where I only knew my aunt and uncle. I got my current job, which has been great in a lot of ways (and burnout-inducingly awful in others.) I bought my house, which has been great in a lot of ways (and terribly expensive and frustrating in others.) I made a large, wonderful and supportive group of friends that far eclipses anything I have experienced in life to this point, and who make me absolutely certain Atlanta is where I was meant to be. I have almost everything I want in life, with the glaring exception of a partner to travel through it with me.

But, if you had asked me back in 1999 where I expected to be in a decade, I would have assumed it was probably right about here. I would be at a big law firm trying to decide whether to bury myself in work and push to make shareholder, or seek greener less stressful pastures in an in-house position, government work or academia. I would be living in a house that I love, with a cat, but not married or with any children. (Somehow I knew those things would always be difficult to come by for me.) I would be closer to my family as they get older and as we need each other more. And I would be mostly happy, but still never satisfied, and always striving for more.

As I sit here and think about where I want to be on the stroke of midnight on December 31st, 2019, I am not sure what to hope for or expect. I will be 44. I would love to believe I will be a happy wife and doting mother by then, but know it becomes less likely with every passing day. I hope I will be firmly ensconced in a legal career that provides at least a little prosperity and prestige AND a liveable schedule. I hope I will have renovated my house into what I envision it to be, or sold it and moved to a new project I can keep working on. I hope I will still have this wonderful circle of friends who I adore and draw so much strength and joy from. I hope I will find time and money to enjoy life a little bit more than I currently manage to squeeze in. And I hope I will finally find peace and contentment so I can finally plant roots and be happy where I'm at, rather than always searching for something more. But, I know myself too well, and this last one is least likely of all. The road goes on forever.

Tops

Before I forget to do it, a few personal best of's for 2009...

Best 3 albums I listened to all the way through this year:
1. Black Joe Lewis--Tell 'Em What Your Name Is
2. Anya Marina--Slow & Steady Seduction: Phase II
3. Neko Case--Middle Cyclone
(Possibly the ONLY three new albums I listened to all the way through!)

Best 3 movies I saw this year:
1. The Blind Side
2. The Hangover
3. Star Trek
(Probably the only 3 I saw in theaters. Sensing a theme, here?)

Best 3 days of my year:
1. Inauguration of Barack Obama
2. Beth and Kevin's wedding ceremony
3. My walk around the Stanley Park sea wall in Vancouver in June

Best 3 nights of my year:
1. Beth and Kevin's wedding reception
2. Halloween Night
3. Dinner with Samantha, Rommel and friends in Brooklyn earlier this month

Best 3 trips I took this year:
1. New Orleans (March or July--both were great)
2. Vancouver in June
3. Washington, D.C. in Jan.

Best new hobbies I picked up this year:
1. Cupcaking
2. Treadmilling
3. Poker, the rededicated version (in which I still don't win any $.)

I have a feeling I will be making more lists of the decade-end variety soon. Feel free to add your own personal lists in the comments.

Grading Myself

I have a group of friends who I have been posting with on various forms of social media since 2001. (First we were on messageboards, then we were moved to something that tried to be like myspace plus messageboards, then about 18 months ago we moved to Facebook.) Every year, we make our new year's resolutions and then in the following December we review our list to assess our progress. Sometimes one of the people in this group will remind us that we've been resolving every year since 20o7 to leave that job or lose those 25 pounds, which makes the annual resolution review particularly painful. Not that I speak from experience or anything.

So yesterday, someone suggested our annual resolution review and I immediately felt sick over the annual recriminations after realizing I have still made no progress on my list. But then when I went and found my blog post on the topic, I realized I kind of DID make some progress on several of them, and that was a pretty cool realization. Here's my list for the past year:

1. Resolve my job situation on my own terms.
If by "resolve," I meant "realize I am stuck here until the economy turns, and make the best of it," or perhaps just "don't get fired in the worst economic disaster of my generation," then yes. I resolved. But I am still in the same job I have had since January 2006. So, you do the math.

2. Become more frugal, in order to save money for a new mortgage.
I saved over $10K in the past year, and did get a new mortgage. I also blew all those savings on home renovations that currently carry a pricetag of almost $20K, and climbing. Oh joy. But yay, I finally got that mortgage, and the crushing debt load that comes with it! (Sometimes, adult milestones don't make you feel like you thought they would.)

3. Cook dinner more often at home, and eat healthier.
I barely cooked at home at all this year, but I did manage to follow Weight Watchers for 6 months and lose 20 pounds. (I've undone 6 pounds of that in the last 3 months though, and need desperately to get back on the program in 2 weeks when the holidays are behind us.

4. Cut caffeine from my daily diet.
Oh this is just too funny. I think I reduced my intake for like a month before I gave up. In fairness, I did say it would be the hardest one on the list to stick with. I think it was when I started dieting in earnest that I realized trying to quit caffeine while trying to quit every delicious food in the world is like the single most masochistic thing I could have attempted.

5. Begin exercising regularly, including attempting to start running on a regular basis by the end of the year.
In March I started working out on a regular basis and by May I was working out 5 nights a week on a treadmill. I even managed to do several long distances of 9 or 10 miles at a time, without dying. But then I stopped because I got sick in September, and then work became unbearably busy. I also never graduated to running. But, I am resolving to get back on the horse in the new year on this one. And by horse, I mean treadmill.

6. Remove as much stress from my life as possible.
Ha! What a fool I was.

7. FINALLY finish decorating this house--just need 2 rooms painted, and possibly a new desk in the guest room.
Or, y'know, I could decide instead to completely renovate the outside of the house and make zero progress indoors. The closest I got to progress on this front was having new light fixtures installed in my kitchen, and picking paint colors for my bedroom. BUT, I hope to finally get that painting actually done in 2010. Maybe.

8. Spend more time with family, since my grandparents are here now and both rapidly approaching 90.
This went well for the first half of the year when work was slow, and badly for the second half once I got super busy at work. Sunday dinners are hard to make it to when you work every Sunday. My grandpa is declining fairly steadily, though, so I really do need to make more time to be around him while I still have the chance. He turns 90 in January.

9. Focus on my writing, and really push myself to take the time for quality over filler.
Yeah, not so much. I had a couple decent blog posts this year, perhaps ones I will even assemble into a top 10 list if I find 10 I am at least halfway proud of. But for the most part, this year was slow on the writing front. I resolve to do better next year. (She said, as she wrote a blog post that could arguably be deemed "filler.")

10. Do something big and out of character. Details to come.
So, now that I didn't do it after all, I can reveal that my plan was to run a half marathon on Thanksgiving day. That obviously didn't happen, nor will I be running the March half marathon at Disney World that I was thinking of trying. However, I do want to try and complete a half marathon at some point, so I am going to try and carry this one over to the new year as well. But I did do something fairly out of character this year, and it was scary as hell: I went to Biloxi by myself and played in a poker tournament. I nearly got hives just thinking about doing it, but I'm glad I did. Even if I lost a lot of money and came away having yet again underperformed against the big boys.

Despite what this list might indicate, 2009 was a big year for me in several ways. As I look back, I'm pleased with where I've traveled to and hopeful that 2010 will be a year of even more change. I'll be thinking about my resolutions for 2010 in the next few weeks (several of them will be virtually identical, of course), but for now I think I give my progress in 2009 a B-. But of course, I resolve to do better next year, too.

Tell me about your Christmas list

I am at a total loss in the gift-giving department this year. I just cannot figure out what any of my friends or family want or need, and since I'm unlikely to have much time to shop I need to come up with some ideas in a hurry. Unless people give me some good suggestions, virtually everyone on my Christmas list is getting a sweater, a bottle of wine, cologne/perfume, or a Snuggie. Seriously, I wish I were kidding but that's what has been purchased so far and what I think I am stuck with.

As a little quid pro quo for you sharing your wish list with me, I'll share mine with you in case you are similarly at a loss for gift ideas:

1. A Blu-ray disc player: preferably the kind that also can download movies etc. via wi-fi, because seriously, how cool is that?

2. Lolita Lempicka perfume: I wear this constantly. I got 2 bottles of it for my birthday a few years ago and I have just about used them up!

3. A dutch oven: the Le Creuset ridiculously expensive cast iron kind, not the one where you fart in my bed and pull the covers over my head, in case anyone was thinking this one sounded way too easy.

4. Gift card for a massage at a spa: always a good idea for the women in your life.

5. An FSU flag to fly outside my house: now that the team is back on the right track to its former perennial glory, I want to proudly display my allegiance in front of my soon-to-be garnet and gold house

I could probably come up with a few more, but those are the first 5 things that spring to mind. Of course, I would also be thrilled with a sweater or a bottle of wine (or tequila), because I am simple like that.

Adventures in Dating #4: One Night Only

Today as I returned to my car from withdrawing a sizeable amount of cash at the bank (long story), I noticed that I had a missed call on my phone from a guy I had been texting with earlier about meeting up tonight. I called him back without checking to see if he had left me a voicemail, and he told me he had accidentally called my phone without realizing it. Thankfully this conversation was not terribly awkward, but it did cause me to remember a similar one that inspired this Adventures in Dating story.

A few years ago when I lived in Boston, fresh off of the breakup of my 6 year relationship and some post-breakup dating disasters that included this infamous tale, I was persuaded by some friends to try internet dating for the first time. This was in approximately 2002 or 2003, when the prospect of meeting someone over the internet was still a vaguely terrifying thing to most people (as opposed to now, when it is normal for many but still creepy and/or terrifying for others), so I was very wary of trying it. Still, I created an account on Matchmaker and went on a couple dates with guys I had absolutely zero chemistry with and prayed that they would never call me again. Some will be featured on future Adventures in Dating posts, so I don't want to shoot my wad entirely here...but let's just say I was reluctant about this whole shebang.

Then I got an email from Joe (at least I think that was his name...it's all a little hazy) and we actually had several good email conversations so I let it progress to phone calls, and after several good phone calls I decided we should go out. Joe had recently left the military, and was a single dad to boot, so he'd moved back to Massachusetts from wherever the hell he had been stationed and was living in the suburbs with his parents while he got situated. He suggested that I take the T out to a stop near where he lived and we would go to dinner, so I did. We met and had a perfectly normal dinner, and then intended to see a movie but the only thing either of us wanted to see was sold out at the one theater in this sleepy suburb. So, Joe suggested he could drive me home and we could grab a drink near my place. If you are halfway intelligent, you see where this is heading.

In a move that shocked even me, and I'm the one that did it, I invited Joe back to my place and he became my first (and to date only) one night stand. It was awful, though I will spare the particular details of why it was so bad. But I fully expected never to hear from Joe again after that night, and I wasn't real bothered by that prospect because I saw nothing I felt the need to go back to.

But ego is a funny thing, and after a few days without getting a phone call or email, I was kind of bummed that he hadn't wanted to see me again and hadn't called. Then one night, I ran downstairs quickly to the CVS next door to my apartment building for something, and when I got back there was a missed call on my cell phone from Joe. Huh, maybe he did want to see me again after all! At least now I'd get the satisfaction of not feeling rejected, even if I had to decline any future dates on account of the worst sex in the history of the universe. (OK, it wasn't THAT bad, but by God it wasn't good or even decent.)

I didn't have a voicemail message icon yet, but since I had just missed the call a couple minutes earlier, I decided to call back and see what he wanted. Joe answered, and the conversation went like this:

Me: "Hi, it's Sara, I just noticed I have a missed call on my phone from you."
He: "Um, I didn't call you."
Me: "Okaaaay...but my phone says that you, in fact, did call me and I just called back the last number that called me, and it was you."
He: "Nope, didn't call you."
Me: "Hm. Nevermind then."(This is awkward.)
He: "OK, bye."
Me: *MORTIFIED*

I never heard from him again. I suppose there are a thousand reasons why he could have not realized his phone had called me. He could have accidentally hit a button, he could have been trying to delete my number and accidentally hit send, one of his parents or a girlfriend (or, God forbid, a wife he neglected to mention) could have dialed the last number in his received calls list...who knows. It was all very shady and strange and awful. But I came away from the experience feeling completely smacked down for my naivete in calling him back without thinking for a second that perhaps there had been some mistake.

And that feeling, I think, is why I have been unable to bring myself to have any one night stands since that time. I think it was just such a dehumanizing and demoralizing experience because of that stupid non-call afterwards that I decided then and there never to expose myself to such humiliation ever again.

Still alive

Despite appearances, I'm still kicking. Last week I went to Baltimore for 4 days of cupcaking and the most beautiful wedding I've ever been to. When I returned I was swamped and exhausted...and promptly got sick.

I was just sick with a cold a month ago (had to push back a first date I was eagerly anticipating, so I remember the inconvenient timing of that illness well), so this new illness concerned me. I was particularly concerned because we have a confirmed case of swine flu in my office and my secretary was out on Tuesday with a fever and vomiting. Also, I made the ill-advised joke to several people on Monday that at least if I got swine flu I could stay home from work for a week. Eek!

When I got home Tuesday night I had a fever of 101.5 and a weird rattle in my chest. I was moderately concerned, so I stayed home yesterday and worked from here under the guise of "better safe than sorry," but the earliest I could get in to see the doctor was this morning. Since my fever didn't get much worse but my cough did, I determined through intrepid hypochondriac googling that I likely had bronchitis, outside chance of pneumonia. This is exactly what the doctor told me, but thankfully the meds she prescribed (Z-pak, Albuterol inhaler) were good to treat either condition.

So, hopefully I'm on the mend now. That, or I'll get full blown pneumonia and HAVE to take time off of work.