Pre-Holiday Update

November 20, 2008 – I just bought one of the more awesome things I have spent my money on in a while. For $10, I am now the proud owner of the Holiday Fire (which includes 10 Carols to “warm your toes”). I figured since I was hosting the holidays this year (mom is in town starting tomorrow for Thanksgiving and dad will be in town for Christmas), and my apartment is not equipped with a fireplace, we need an artificial fire. I have the option for “real” fire sounds, Christmas music, or a mixture of the two; and I can choose from a regular fireplace or a campfire. The novelty has not yet worn off in the office and I’ve been asked to bring it to work with me next week so we can keep it playing on a spare laptop to keep the holiday spirit alive.

In other news, my mother will be in town tomorrow and there is still a lot to do to get the apartment to make sure it is ready and she has a place to sleep and the bathtub doesn’t have a black ring because it stopped wanting to drain. Ah, the joys of houseguests. At least if something doesn’t get done, she’ll be really cool about – usually I don’t bother to clean at all when she comes, so the fact that I’m making the effort is proof that I’m growing as a person. Also, proof that I no longer have roommates.

My moment of bragging: holiday shopping is practically done. I made Dallas and Alicia’s gifts and both have minor finishing touches needed before I wrap them (in my hand stamped wrapping paper – seriously, I gave myself a blister stamping), mom’s gifts are all done and wrapped, Justin’s are done and wrapped, I made my own Christmas cards and I only have to get daddy and Bruce’s gifts (which are picked out, I’m just waiting to get paid).

Mom and I are putting up the Christmas tree the day after Thanksgiving, so I’ll try and post some pictures once we get that done. I need to go pick up some colored lights to replace the white ones that Dallas and I had from our “designed” tree last year (I was out voted).

Hopefully this finds everyone out there happily getting ready to stuff their faces and not feeling the economic downturn too much (a girl can dream, can’t she?). Have a great day!

Holy Crap!

November 5, 2008 – Today I am basically useless for staying up all night watching history happen before my eyes, but it was totally worth it. I proudly voted yesterday for Barack Obama before taking myself out for blueberry pancakes to celebrate the day. Politics were on the minds of everyone I spoke to (my office was split 7 for Obama and 2 for McCain), and there was a sense of urgency. I’ve never been reminded to vote my so many people before. Even the people on the subway who are usually screaming obscenities or asking for change were reminding people to vote. Election parties were held all over town and when they announced that Obama had won, there were eruptions. My friends in Manhattan said you could hear the cheering spilling out of nearly every bar, out of apartment windows, from crowds gathered in Rockefeller Center. People honking and yelling a generally jubilant. In Brooklyn, we had the honking and the hoopla. Overall, it was incredibly joyful and peaceful and for the first time in a long time, I had hope.

I stayed up to hear the speeches. McCain’s concession speech was elegant and graceful. If he had spoken like that on the campaign trail and in the debates, the outcome of yesterday’s voting might have been very different. Obama’s speech left me – for lack of a better term – speechless. It made me cry, it made me feel proud, and it restored hope for the future. I liked the honesty, I liked the humility, and most of all, when the TV cameras panned over the faces in the crowd young, old, black, white, famous or not, everyone looked like they were inspired. Even if the road is hard and long and only half of what he wants to do is accomplished, when was the last time we had a leader who could inspire people to get involved, to want to be a part of something larger. My mother made a point of noting that when he gave his speech, he was standing alone on stage and the crowd was around him. There was no invite only, VIP section immediately near him (or at least that was recognizable to me), you saw Oprah and Jesse in the crowd with everyone else. If that isn’t a metaphor for what this whole thing is about, I don’t know what is.

As some of you may know, Bruce is a McCain supporter, so he has now declared this “the beginning of the end” and has said that he washes his hands of the whole thing (he voted his economic interest and isn’t taking it well that I voted my own economic interest as well). For the first time in a long time, I wouldn’t be afraid to go to a foreign country and say I was an American.

Above all, I’m very happy that I do not have to move to Canada. It’s cold in Canada (especially this time of year), and I don’t like the cold. Yay, America!

Finally: The Avon Walk NY 2008 (as per me)

October 19, 2008 – Finally an actual update for the Avon Walk! I’m sorry it took so long to get this up, but I really needed some distance on it before I could fully appreciate the whole experience. My team was called Safe at Second (that’s us in the picture) and we raised over $20,000 for breast cancer research and programs. Thank you again to everyone who supported this fantastic cause! They told us that something like 5,000 people walked this year and I believe it! We started with the opening ceremony at 6:30am at pier 84 (44th and the west side highway). We actually started walking the route around 7:00am and we were definitely in the middle of the pack, but closer to the back. By the time we reached the first rest stop, our team was 20 minutes behind where we needed to be in order to finish all 26.2 miles before they closed the course. Dallas and I really enjoyed the other women on our team, but between Maggie’s gimpy ankle (she got a stress fracture a couple of months before), Lori’s pregnancy (she had to pee every five minutes), and the other women just not having any sense of urgency, we were never going to finish. Dallas and I decided to jump ahead of the rest of our team. Our natural walking pace was faster than what they were walking anyway and on top of that, we figure we didn’t ask people to donate money because we were walking a little bit, we told them we were walking 39.3 miles! So off we went. Walking with Dallas is a little like driving with Dallas only the other “drivers” can actually hear her. It was hilarious. Along the way we got to chat with a lot of interesting people and I was surprised by how many people were walking alone and how many men were involved. On our way up a particularly steep hill in Inwood, a very kind gentleman offered to help me (I might mention at this point that I was the pack mule for both Dallas and myself – I offered to let her keep some things in my pack as long as she carried it half the time and she agreed and then couldn’t because it “hurt her back too much” – grrrr). We powered down more Gatorade than I think was probably healthy, ate our lunch on the go and made pretty good time until we were on the Manhattan bridge coming back from Brooklyn. That bridge is unexpectedly steep and we really lost our pace. The Avon walk people – the staff, the Crew, the Kids crew and the cheerers – were stationed at exactly the right points to give you a boost, especially near the end. Our last 6 miles went the fastest for us because we just wanted to be done. I got through the last 2 miles by singing the one verse I know of “Kung Fu Fighter” over and over again, sometimes out loud, and karate chopping Dallas at the right moment. She was not amused, but it got me through. We started at about 7:00am and we finished the course at about 3:30pm. We averaged 3-4 miles an hour once we left our group. We started 20 minutes behind where needed to be and ended up more than an hour ahead of where we needed to be.

We claimed our bags and our tent and some scouts set up our tent for us and then we went to eat. There was a little bit of team drama (I think because we left them behind, but also these are not people I know very well, so I don’t know), but I’m not going to dwell on that. Dallas and I ate dinner and did some yoga. They had showers and stuff like that, but we elected not to use them. #1 The weather was gorgeous and actually required layering and sleeves most of the day – so not much sweating. #2 Wet hair and 40 degree temps do not a happy and warm Ashley make. We were trying to wear the names of the women we were walking for. I had all the names hanging from my pack, but I wrote Sarah and Helia’s names on my hands and arms so that everyone could see them at all times.

It started raining at 4:30am. For those of you who have never camped in the rain, the sound of rain on tents is deafening, especially when there are so many of them in one place. Luckily, Dallas and I had set our alarms to get up at 5:30am anyway, so it wasn’t too much before that. The downside was that we had to eat, break down our tent and walk the first 3 miles in the torrential downpour. Our team was lagging in the morning and we wanted to just get the last 13.1 miles done, so we took off as soon as the route opened at 7:30am. The first three miles were miserable and since the coffee sucked at breakfast and we hadn’t passed a Starbucks to duck into yet, my Singin’ In the Rain medley was not met with happiness from Dallas (It could give a girl a complex – really), but as soon as we got real coffee and the rain stopped things started to look up. The rain and the wet shoes and clothes made the second day much more uncomfortable than the first, so we sped through it as fast as we could. I’m convinced that’s what gave me the shin splints. I started feeling that around mile 7 the second day. We swung through the medical tent at the lunch stop (which we hit around 10:30am on both days, so really they were more like brunch stops), and got some Tylenol and Bio-Freeze (like Bengay, but better), and then were on our way. We hit the finish line at about 11:30am. (And didn't I look pretty? The sweatshirt, the jacket tied around my waist, the shirt I had on underneath, my pants and my tennis shoes were still all wet - it was fun...and comfortable.) We stopped and had a beer (Dallas did, I had more Gatorade because I was pretty sure I’d throw up beer) before we went to grab our bags. Now the only two negative things I really have to say about this experience are that on the second day, there weren’t nearly enough cheering stations; and that after a person walks 39.3 miles, they shouldn’t have to walk another two blocks to get their bags. That’s just mean. We went and dug them out of the piles and changed our shoes to wait for the rest of our team who came through at about 1:00pm.

After sitting and waiting for them, I couldn’t hardly walk. Dallas and I took a cab home and getting up the stairs to my (3rd floor walk up) apartment would probably have made lots of people laugh. Overall, I was not as sore as I expected to be and the worst of the soreness was done by Sunday night/Monday morning. The shin splint stuck around and caused problems for a good two weeks, but seems to have subsided for the moment (knock on wood).
So things I have learned:
1. Body Glide is a lifesaver for marathon type walks – put it everywhere, all over your feet, around your waist where your pack sits, where your sports bra meets your skin and more. Reapply often.
2. Extra socks are a godsend – especially when your feet are wet, your shoes are wet and all your clothes are wet. Change them at least twice a day if not more often.
3. Nothing brings out the best in New Yorkers like 5000 people walking en masse through the city – I only mean that partially sarcastically (China town, I’m looking at you!).
4. Your experience with sort of thing depends largely on the sort of people you are participating with/talking to. I recommend chatting a little bit with a lot of people along the way and saving the “get to know you” conversation for after you reach your destination.

If you had asked me when I finished if I would ever do this again, my answer would probably have been a resounding NO. Now that I’ve had an opportunity to think about it, though, I am actually thinking about doing it again and signing up just on my own. Maybe I can get Bruce to do it with me (Dallas thinks she’ll be moving to CA or something by that point, but if she’s around I’d definitely do this with her again). I’ll decide for sure in January. If anyone is interested in doing the NY walk with me next October 11-12, 2009 – let me know!

I survived...

October 9, 2008 - So I officially survived walking what turned out to be about 40 miles of walking (39.3 official miles and a lot of ground to cover at the camp ground and to claim baggage at the end), with minimal soreness and a mild shin splint. Not too shabby for someone who didn't train at all for this thing. I've posted the only picture uploaded so far below. More pictures and the full story of the walk will follow hopefully this weekend!

39.2 Miles in 2 days - YIKES!

October 2, 2008 – In about 2 days I will be walking 39.2 miles and camping out on an island in the east river and spending time with 8 women I hardly know and my best friend – al for an extremely good cause. The Avon Walk for Breast Cancer is two days of walking with a record breaking number of people raising a record breaking amount of money for Breast Cancer Research. It’s not too late to donate if you are interested: http://walk.avonfoundation.org/site/TR?pg=personal&fr_id=1660&px=4289734 For those of you who have already donated, thank you, thank you, thank you for your support! You are rock stars!

While packing and getting ready for this thing I am starting to freak out an awful lot, but I know it will be loads of fun once I actually get there (at the ass crack of dawn – we start walking at 6:30am). I’ll take as many pictures as my camera will allow and do my best to post them back here.

In other news, my mother and I are starting a business together (on top of my full time job – it should be fun). I don’t want to give too much away right now, but look for more news in the coming months.

I recently started reading the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyer. I read the first two books in one weekend and finished the 3rd in a single evening. The last one is burning a whole in my bag right now, but I’m going to do my best to keep myself from staying up until all hours of the night.

Bruce is a little upset the last few days because he left the windows in the house open on Tuesday night and on Wednesday morning when he woke up, the cat was nowhere to be seen. The theory is that he escaped from the spare bedroom to the roof of the neighboring house, but we can’t find him anywhere. If anyone in Bay Ridge Brooklyn happens to come across a black cat that likes to cuddle and talks a lot, shoot me an e-mail or leave me a comment, please. Alicia thinks it’s weird that I’m not more upset about it, but what are you going to do? Rocky has his claws and is still very capable of hunting. Making a big fuss about something that’s already happened and I have no control over will only make Bruce feel bad and it isn’t his fault.

Gotta run – wish me luck on the walk and look for updates and pictures after this weekend!

Where am I and what is going on!?!?!?

August 21, 2008 – Today (Thursday) is actually my Friday! This is the first vacation day I’ve taken all summer and I’m not doing anything! Bruce and I are actually trying to plan a full week away the second week of September, which will be nice, but the day off for no good reason is sorely needed after the last few weeks.

Lots of changes are in store for my company in the coming months. I can’t talk about too many of them because I’m not sure if any of my coworkers have found my blog. We are moving into permanent space (which I am in the process of finding), and have a lot of things planned for January 2009. It seems like that is really far away, but at the rate time passes, January 2009 might as well be next week.

The apartment is just about done. Someday, I will actually get the pictures of all my hard work up here so you will all know what I’m talking about. My spare bedroom/closet has turned out a little more childish (my mother used the word “whimsical”) than I’d planned, but it works for the moment. I did finally give into my urge to purge. Last weekend I went through ever closet in my house and got rid of a pile of stuff as tall as I am. I couldn’t figure out how I had managed to accumulate so much crap, but then I realized that I’ve been in this apartment longer than I’ve lived anywhere ever. I’m used to moving every couple of years and you always do a grand purge when you move. Hence no move, no purge.

Last night I started my first Christmas present. I’m trying to get back into doing some needle work, so I’m doing some therapeutic cross stitch. I’m hoping to turn some of my therapy into gifts for friends (thus reducing the cost of the gift giving while upping the thought that went into it), but I know needle point and cross stitch aren’t very trendy/fashionable/popular for people under the age of 197. We’ll see what I can do.

This may seem a bit fractured, but it is a good representation of what I’ve been feeling like lately. Going in a hundred different directions at the same time while trying to plan for stuff that is coming faster than I’m prepared for. Happy (almost) Friday!

August? (I also thought today was Tuesday.)

August 6, 2008 – I am now convinced that New York is located in a strange time warp whereby three minutes have passed and all of a sudden it is August! This summer has been nothing like I planned in more ways than one. I meant to go on a vacation at some point, I meant to get more done around the house and I meant to spend more time with my friends. Somehow none of that happened.

What did happen was that I spent almost every weekend at the beach (which is awesome and the thing I credit with keeping me from going insane and killing people during the week), I redecorated the bedroom (while mom was here – it looks so good that Bruce called me in the middle of a meeting the day after he saw it and just wanted to reiterate to me how much he liked it), and I’m learning how to live within my means. That last one is the most difficult and probably the most useful.

I feel a little silly because “living within my means” results in me trying to eat 2 meals at home a day. Anywhere else that sounds ridiculous, but here it is pretty much the way things work. Plus I’m counting “eating out” as any meals ordered in to the apartment. I’ll keep you posted. This month is on track to being the first month where I’ve taken care of everything that I need to and I still have money to live on. Woo-hoo!

I’ve been in the mood to drastically simplify my life recently. I keep getting the urge to go through everything in my closets and just throw away everything I haven’t used/needed. I hesitate to this because normally I do it on a whim and realize that I got rid of stuff I actually needed, however I’ve been pushing this whim down for a while, so maybe it’s time.

I still have hopes for a vacation, although the chance of it happening before the fall is not high at this point. I just need some time away. Last year I didn’t take enough time off and they forced me to take three days at the last minute so I wouldn’t implode and it sucked.

The training for the Avon Walk has been nonexistent. I really need to kick that into gear, or I’ll be hurting come October. Dallas has not been wanting to train at all and I somehow got left out of the loop for training walks (I imagine because Dallas opted out, I got left out), but hopefully I’ll be in the loop coming up and really get some stuff done. I still need to raise like $1700, so if anyone out there in blog land wants to donate to my cause, please shoot me an e-mail or leave a comment and I’ll get you all the information you need.

Here’s to hoping that everyone out there in the world has been having a wonderful summer!

Hello There, It's been a while....

June 24, 2008 – So I’ve been trying to figure out how to make the dates appear on these entries, but it is beyond my technical abilities/patience to figure out. So this is my new system. Since there is no date on the last entry and it has been long enough that I don’t remember, I’m going to do a blanket update and I’m sorry for any repetitions.
Good News First:
1. I got a promotion. You are now reading the typing of the General Manager of The Talener Group. It’s been an interesting transition and we aren’t done yet, but it’s a process.
2. My cousin had a baby (Congratulations!).
3. I won the NBA Finals pool at the office (Go Boston Celtics!).
4. Saturdays have become a standard beach day for the summer.
5. I got a Wii Fit.
6. Dallas and I are on the final level of Super Mario Bros 3.
7. I will be doing the Avon Walk for the Cure in October, I need to raise $1800. If you or anyone you know is interested in donating, please visit my personal walk page: http://walk.avonfoundation.org/site/TR?pg=personal&fr_id=1660&px=4289734
8. I was the top biller for the Quarter in Q1 of 2008.
Bad News:
1. I had to put one of the cats down. It was Toby a.k.a. the angry Chinese man.
2. My dentist and I have become very good friends due to the fact that I’ve had a ridiculous amount of dental work done recently – on the upside, I like him.
3. I lost both the Masters pool and the US Open pool, but I didn’t come in last.
As you can see, the good pretty much outweighs the bad and you can’t really ask for more than that.
So last Friday afternoon I got off work early and decided there was no time like the present to start building up to a marathon and a half *for my walk in October). From my office to my house is a bit over 15 miles and my friend Dallas and I had been wandering a bit lately, so I thought "No big deal." I made it about halfway there (about 7.6 miles) before I gave up and got on a subway. I went home, sat on the couch for an hour and was sound asleep by 9:30pm because I was so exhausted.
Lessons learned:
1. This is going to be much harder than I thought.
2. Don't walk down 3rd avenue hoping to hit the Brooklyn Bridge (I always walk down Broadway, so this didn't even occur to me).
3. Don't drink beer with coworkers before walking 7+miles - it didn't end badly, but it made it harder to stay focused while passing the 9 million bars between my office and my house. More lessons to come...

Betting Pools and Finishing my Apartment…

As some may know, my office is pretty much a frat house. As a result, there is a lot of betting going on. So far, the most shameless pool we’ve had was the BKup Kidney Stone pool where we bet on the day and the window of hours when BKup would pass her kidney stone. (Full disclosure: I won.) At the moment we have a pool for The Masters (golf) where we each drafted 5 players in the tournament. I know nothing about golf, but my players are Angel Cabrera, Jim Furyk, Justin Rose, Henrik Stenson, and Steve Striker. I know nothing about golf, so if anyone knows how I picked, please let me know…

As far as finishing the apartment goes, I only need a bedside table to complete the furniture acquisition at the moment. I need to make covers for the two new chairs that we got, but the size and shape are great for my space. All I need to do structurally is patch the holes in the drywall in the living room from the shelves that were hanging up there before we got the new bar cabinet and patch and paint the wall where we took out the built in hanging rod (in the middle of the living room – why?) and I need to finish and paint the piece of drywall I had to replace after our White Trash Christmas in July party two years ago (we replaced the drywall about 6 months ago and haven’t gotten round to finishing it yet). After that, I think I can call the apartment done – until I find something else to do.

At some point I'll post pictures when I'm all done.

Nearly Done!

So, I recently painted part of my hallway with stripes. I liked it so much that I decided to do the whole hallway. Needless to say, that is a large pain in the ass to do alone. Luckily the BF is in town this week. Last night we taped out all the lines and it took only a little over an hour to tape the whole hallway (it took me an hour to just do the short wall I did by myself). He doesn’t like to paint, but he is a champion taper. We also managed to get the bedroom picked up and ever vacuumed part of the living room. It is amazing how quickly these things happen when you actually have help. I like it! I will post pictures of my beautimous hallway when it is done so everyone can appropriately “Ooooh!” and “Ahhh!” over the work.

All I have left to do in the house now is reorganize the kitchen, take the stuff for donations, buy a coffee table, figure out what we're doing for a bar area and then I think we're done. Maybe.

Pretty!

Look at what my BF sent me earlier this week!

The guys in my office think the only reason he would have sent me flowers is because he is in trouble. I tried to explain to them (using short, simple words) that perhaps they should try sending their significant others flowers just because - it might turn out well for them.

Please, Do Not Abuse Your Recruiter...

Okay, so I realize that many recruiters are no better than used car salesmen, however, some of us are not quite that bad.

As a recruiter, I want people to know a couple of things:
1. I do not get paid unless a candidate is offered a job, takes it and keeps it.
2. My livelihood depends on my relationships with the companies/managers that I work with.
3. I do not want to waste a candidates’ time with managers/jobs that are not real or a managers’ time with candidates who are not real.

Candidates – Please do not screw over your recruiter by committing any of the following atrocities:
1. Do not cancel an interview, if you must, please allow minimally 24 hours notice or at least have the courtesy to call – emails in the middle of the night are not cool, especially when they are followed by a 24-48 hour disappearing act of which Houdini would be impressed. When you cancel an interview, we (meaning me) have to make explanations to managers. It doesn’t sound good for you or us when we say, “I don’ know, I read his e-mail when I got in this morning and haven’t been able to reach him since.” Can we reschedule, can we move it up or back at all? Who knows? You didn’t give us the basic respect of a phone call. When you are in the second or third interview phase, this means you have wasted your own time, my time, my managers’ time and now you and I both look like assholes. If a company has arranged for someone to fly in form another place, or to have someone stay outside of their normal working hours, DO NOT cancel for any reason short of extreme illness or death. (Please see items 1-3 above.)
2. Do not think that an e-mail replaces the need for a phone call, ever. If I urgently need to speak to you (or vice versa), the phone is the correct way to contact you. Would you send your mother an e-mail if you ended up in the hospital? (Actually, this goes for everyone and not just candidates – support more human interaction!)
3. If you have a job you are happy at, please do not play at looking for a new job. Decide to look or stay put, but please don’t waste my time or my managers’ time by going on interviews when you have no intention of leaving your current job.

Managers – Please be aware of the following:
1. The best candidates are those that already have jobs. As such, they cannot all interview in the middle of the day or even during the “normal” working hours. Please be prepared to come early, stay late, or otherwise accommodate these candidates if you are interested in them. We will do our best to make sure that time is worth it to you.
2. We are not god and we cannot control everything. I will make sure you are aware of a candidate’s schedule, other companies they have interviewed with and any other offers that have been made. What you do with that information is your own concern and I cannot necessarily convince someone who has an offer at $100k/yr to take your offer of $85k. When I can convince them to take it, I cannot always convince them to keep it (please see item 1 in the first section).
3. Yes, your job is the sexiest. No, I don’t know why anyone would want to work anywhere else. Yes, I understand that you have a budget to work with, but please believe me when I say that if I convince that candidate to take a $20k/yr pay cut to work for you (and I am that convincing – sometimes), you must treat them very well and resign yourself to the fact that if someone else offers them more $$ they will most likely leave (please see item 1 in the first section).

Okay, rant done. I think my head is going to explode.

Weekend in Review

So, I had one of those weekends where I know I was super productive, but I don’t feel like I got enough done. Ever had one of those? I thought I’d go ahead and post my accomplishments here and see if I feel more finished and less of a mess when I write it all down. So here is my weekend recap:

Friday night (left work at 5:30pm):
1. Went to Home Depot to buy paint, Kilz, and other painting accoutrements. (Lesson learned: Do not carry three gallons of paint and painting accoutrements home on the subway – people will run into you, it will hurt.
2. Primed the second bedroom and the hallway.

Saturday:
1. Ran to the big grocery store with ex-Roomie (she had her BF’s car).
2. Painted spare room a lovely blue called Storytime.
3. Picked up living room/vacuumed couches/created coffee table out of table top and bed stilts.
4. Mad bed in spare room, cleaned up floor.
5. Cleaned kitchen/did dishes/cleaned cat box
6. Ran to drug store to pick up stuff I forgot earlier and beer and Laundry.
7. Had two girl’s over for girl’s night.

Sunday:
1. Painted hallway.
2. Moved a bookshelf into small bedroom.
3. Took down drop cloths, moved dresser in and move bedside table into spare room.
4. Set up closet in spare room and took all hanging items out of living room.
5. Moved shoes from bedroom to spare room (my clothes and shoes can breath!)

It still doesn’t feel like I got enough done, but as my mother and my BF are quick to point out, patience is not my strong suit.

I went to get dressed this morning and I could see all my suits and shirts and shoes clearly and it was heaven. Once I finish the apartment overhaul, I’ll be able to sleep again!

Cue the Choir of Angels!

I officially have no roommate! The house is completely destroyed and no one came to help her move, but she’s out and it appears like we managed to save our friendship as well. In addition to that, I got a Wii (technically it was for my birthday, but it came last Friday, so I opened it and started playing) and tonight I am getting an iPhone (which I won from the office because we did over $200,000 in billing last month $160,000 of which was billed by my team). Given all that, things are going pretty well for me these days. I’ve picked out a color for the other bedroom and I think I might paint the hallway the same color. I cannot wait to get started on that project.

Even Bruce is excited. He said that he hesitated to do anything around the house before because he didn’t want to do anything for her or that would benefit her. Now that she’s gone, he says things are going to be different. We’ll see. Both he and Justin have said that I seem noticeably happier just in the day or so since she’s been gone.

Hopefully this is just the beginning of more wonderful things to come!

Halleluiah! There is a light at the end of the tunnel!

She has an apartment and she has a move in date and, God willing, I’ll have my apartment to myself as of the weekend of March 1st. I am thinking about buying the paint to repaint her room this weekend so that I can be completely prepared to take over that room as soon as she is out. I’m taking suggestions on the color (it is two different colors of bright green now). I was thinking of just doing a much lighter green, but maybe I should let the BF pick the color since I picked out all the other ones. Maybe I’ll just give him some options to choose from…

I’ll have a closet! My clothes won’t be hanging in the living room and I’ll be able to see which suits are where rather than trying to figure out what is hanging in the bedroom and what is in the living room. I’ll have a spare room that is more than a junk room and I’ll have some storage back!

Can you tell that I am very excited?

Grr. Arg.

I was trying to wait to do another posting until I was feeling a bit more upbeat and positive. The bitter isn't quite ready to depart yet, but I don't want to get out of the habit of posting, so I thought I'd just kep it short and sweet.

There are a couple of things that really tic me off.
1. People who don’t do what they say they will (especially if they later make assholes of themselves by trying to pass it off on you or anyone else because it’s never their fault).
2. Companies that do not do business in good faith. Especially large companies who take advantage of smaller companies just because they are small. (Credit Suisse we are not going to beg to do business with you!) So far I have two companies on this list – one might come off the list if they stop being ridiculous and rectify the situation.
3. Dell. My less than 2 year old Dell computer has stopped being able to access the internet. A fun problem that started just AFTER my warranty expired.

There are also a couple of things that really make me happy.
1. Alcohol with bubbles (Champagne/Prosecco/Sparkling Wine). The bubbles make me smile.
2. My new bedroom furniture and my TVs I got for Christmas.
3. Going on vacation. This time next week I’ll be in Arizona get rubbed, scrubbed wrapped and polished.

There are deeper things that make me happy, but at the moment I’m concentrating on being superficial. Sue me.

Just had to Share...

So, FNG at work just called her brother because we can across a job that she thought he might have a shot at it.

A bit of background: FNG’s dad is a rocket scientist (no sarcasm, he’s actually a rocket scientist), her mom is on the board of a couple of companies and is a self-made millionaire. They completely support both their children (supply them both with their own private apartments in doorman buildings on the upper east side in Manhattan), but at least FNG has a job. Her older brother is trying to “write a screen play” but is really just smoking a lot of pot.

Back to our story: So FNG calls her fat slob brother and says, “Hey, we just came across a job at Forbes paying $40k/yr are you interested?” Her brother says, “Would I have to work 9-5?” FNG says, “Of course, it’s a job. People who have jobs generally work 9-5.” Fat slob brother says, “The only way I would ever consider working a 9-5 job is if I knock up my girlfriend.” His girlfriend was sitting next to him at the time.

Do I even need to point out how many things are wrong with the above situation? And can I just say that this is what happens when parents continue to completely support their adult children (especially if they put no parameters or time limits on it).

Welcome 2008! (I don't hate my life like I did this time last year!)

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Welcome to 2008 and I hope that it holds only wonderful and fantastic experiences for you all (and when wonderful and fantastic are not an option, I hope they are at least interesting “growth” experiences). My 2008 was rung in at a fantastic loft party. I apologize to anyone who was there who caught me in my bitch stage – by the time we made it to the party I was ready to be at home on my couch. Justin put it all into perspective for me by saying this:

“Deep thought for the evening: You really want to be at home on your couch right now, but instead you are in a $4 million dollar loft at a party thrown by your friend who owns an asset management firm and invites you to all his parties because he thinks you are fun – on New Year’s Eve and in New York City… How many poor slobs at home on their couch want to be you right now?”

Thank you Justin for making me feel very petty and like everyone wants to be me (strange feelings to have at the same time).

The holidays in good old Atlanta were quite interesting. I met my dad’s new BF (who I like a lot, BTW), my dad tried to convince me that I was really totally over NY and really wanted to come home, and then my grandmother was informed that if she’s not going to do something about the things that are making her unhappy that my dad wasn’t going to invite her to stay over any more. He’s trying to get to a point where he is limiting the negative influences and the drama in his life – all I can say is “It’s about damn time.” All in all, it was just another happy family Christmas at the Herron household.

I did get my first week off work since we opened the company in April. That was certainly very strange for me. Having so many days off in a row makes me feel like I have no idea what is going on now that I am back, but I had forgotten what it was like to sleep in. Also, before we left for the holidays my two bosses took me out to dinner and gave me a raise. That was pretty great and they both got completely smashed (I was a bit tipsy, but thanks to the 2-1 ratio that is the golden rule for drinking with your boss – you only have 1 drink for every 2 your boss(es) have, that way there is much less chance for embarrassment). The next day (Friday before Christmas), I walked in right on time and my boss looked at me and said, “I wasn’t sure we’d be seeing you today.” I replied, “I wasn’t aware that not seeing me was an option.” (Because in my world when you get a raise, you definitely show up to work on time the next day – call me crazy.) Apparently the big boss couldn’t quite make it, the e-mail we got was sent with the subject line “I Tried – too much Tanqueray and tonic”. Brilliant!

I don’t really do the traditional New Year’s Resolution thing, but some areas I’ve decided to focus on in 2008:

1. My Money: I’ve finally figured out how to pay all my bills, still have some fun and start clawing my way out of debt all at the same time. Next step is contributing to my shiny new 401k and building some savings (stay tuned next year for the next installment of our adventure – investing! Coming in 2009).
2. My Health: In Q4 of 2007 I started making strides in this area. I joined a gym and I started paying attention to what I eat (not really changing my eating habits or modifying what I eat at all, but I can tell you exactly how badly I do eat). The next logical step is actually going to the gym when I don’t have a session with my trainer and changing my eating habits. I think I’ll try eating at home (I swear I can cook something in my kitchen besides cookies).

Good luck to me and good luck to all of you in whatever you’ve decided to focus on.