Lady Antebellum

This week I’ve been in Houston for most of the week at Nearing’s first off-site Communications planning meeting. Although Nearing is headquartered in New Jersey, our biggest office is in my hometown of Houston, and we have more employees there than at headquarters, including a group of communications people who report to a regional vice president who reports to one of my bosses.

On Thursday we visited the Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo, the second largest rodeo in the world. On the way to our seats, I heard someone calling my name, and I was shocked to see my old colleague Norm, with whom I worked for seven years in Houston. He and his wife were there and I was overjoyed to see them, especially by chance and because we’ve missed each other the last couple times I’ve been to Houston despite our efforts to meet up. Sometimes life throws you small miracles that you can only wonder at and be thankful for.

In our suite we enjoyed a scrumptious barbecue dinner and watched the rodeo, which included bull riding, bronco busting, calf roping and wrestling, mutton busting (little kids riding on sheep), a calf scramble (older kids chasing after and subduing the animals for prizes) and chuck wagon racing. This race was a particularly close and exciting finish!

Here’s what bull riding looks like:

Plus there was an indoor fireworks show that preceded a concert by Lady Antebellum, one of the few country acts I’m familiar with. We left right after they sang their hit song, “Need You Now” so we could beat the rush and get to bed before our early flights home in the morning.

Here's the band singing the first verse of their new single, "Dancin' Away With My Heart":

All in all, it was a very fun, very busy, and very exciting day – and a very memorable trip.

The $120,000 apostrophe

On Tuesday I was at work at my desk and I got a call from the chief recruitment officer at Nearing (my company) to come see her at 2 p.m. When I get there, she's on the phone so I go over to chat with one of my friends in the HR pod, and she congratulates me for getting a full-time position. I tell her that I actually haven't gotten an offer yet and she realizes that she's just spilled the beans about the offer I'm about to get.

Loose lips sink ships, I always say.

Anyway, after two months of what was basically a tryout, I accepted an offer to become a full time Nearing employee. I feel like I've been "made" - like a Mafia boss. There are several advantages to this, not the least of which is feeling like I'm a bona fide member of the team and not an outsider, which means I can work on more confidential things. I'm also going to be doing less writing and more PR work, including media work, which is fine with me.

But mostly this is good because Nearing's benefits are better than being a contractor, and I'm eligible for a sizable annual bonus. I'm also eligible for a 3% match on a 401K contribution, an employee stock purchase plan, and most importantly, paid holidays, sick leave and vacation time off. So now I can take days off without impacting my paycheck, although my overall compensation is probably about the same, assuming I didn't take any days off as a contractor.

There's a story going around the communications department that part of the reason I was offered the position was that the communications senior vice president appreciated my attention to detail in editing documents. She is one of the most detail-oriented persons I've ever met, and unfortunately, many of the staff are not so much.

So I was editing a press release one day, and I notice that one of the apostrophes is a straight up-and-down apostrophe and not a "smart" apostrophe - one that is different for open and closed positions. I noted it, and the SVP even found another one in the same paragraph that I missed. But clearly she was impressed that I edit to the same level of detail as she does.

Later on other press releases the SVP would ask staffers if I had reviewed them yet, which people interpreted as me having "editing cred" with her. I also created a flyer for a technology expo that she reviewed with no changes. I didn't think much of that at the time, but later I found out that having something come back from her with no changes is like winning an Olympic gold medal at Nearing's communications department - most people have that happen maybe once or twice a year if they're lucky. She's quite a demanding boss, but she's actually a pretty nice person. She reminds me of my old boss in Houston at TxDOT in a lot of ways.

Anyway, the takeaway for this is that when you do your best, sometimes good things will happen, and with certain people, sometimes a thing so small as changing an apostrophe can land you a six-figure paycheck. You have to know when to sweat the small stuff.

Work update

So, as promised, there is some news about my job that is altogether encouraging. I've been working now for about six weeks in the marketing communications department of my company (codename: Nearing) as a senior writer under a contract basis, which means technically I'm a contractor for a company down in Sugar Land, Texas working onsite for Nearing in Princeton, New Jersey.

A lot of things happened just this past week. First of all, one of the junior communications associates left the company to work elsewhere. So that's good for me because it will probably mean more work to do. Also, Nearing is an open office environment, which means there are no offices or cubicles, just rows and rows of open desks divided by rows of file cabinets. Even the CEO sits at an open desk. Each section sits together in groups called pods (which means we're all pod people, a la The Invasion of the Body Snatchers).

Up until recently, there was no room in the communications pod for me or Erik, the guy who does internal communications, so we had to sit on the other side of the building with the human resources people. While that did have the advantage of being quieter, it was rather distracting overhearing all the HR chatter, like people being disciplined for sexual harrassment, talking about how much money people make, etc. But once the spot opened up with the associate leaving, my boss asked me to move over to join the pod. I think this is a good sign that she asked me and not Erik to move, even though he's been there longer and is an actual Nearing employee, not a contractor.

Also this week, I've been slammed on a project to write a proposal for a loan guarantee from the Department of Energy (DOE) for a solar power plant in New Mexico. The proposal was due on Thursday, and I was working until 9:30 or 10:30 p.m. on Wednesday and Thursday nights. While that means I was putting in 14-15 hour workdays, I also got lots of kudos from the government affairs people I was working with, which included some senior executives in the company. Another major upside is getting overtime pay since I'm a contractor, which means for every hour beyond eight hours worked in a single day, I get paid my normal rate plus 50% extra per hour. We finished the 120-page proposal and submitted it about two-and-a-half hours before the midnight deadline on Thursday. There will be a second round application in January, so I'll probably be doing the same thing in a few months.

In the meantime, on Friday I was put in charge as the project manager to redesign and build structure for Nearing's green energy, philanthropy and corporate responsibility Web sites. As you might guess, this is a pretty big job, so I'm excited about sinking my teeth into the project instead of just working on small projects that come in drips and drabs. It's also stuff that I not only have experience in (I was the New York office lead for Agent K's corporate responsibility team) but am also passionate about.

All in all, I'm getting more optimistic about my job, and if things continue to go well, I am confident that I will be able to move into Manhattan when my current apartment lease runs out in March.

Sex toy party

Guess it has been more than a week since my last post - I must be slipping. Although, truth to tell, my life is pretty much confined to the weekends since during the week I don't have much time to do anything other than work and commute. Generally speaking that is, because I took last Thursday and Friday off. Not because I necessarily wanted to - since I'm a contract employee, when I take time off, I don't get paid for it. But the rest of the communications staff was down in Baton Rouge, LA for a big company meeting, leaving me with nothing to do.

Thursday I ran a bunch of errands that were piling up on me, like taking my dress from Ella's wedding to the dry cleaners, dropping off clothes for tailoring, getting Yoshi's brakes fixed and getting my allergy shots. Then Friday I drove out to Stony Brook on Long Island to visit Polina. I watched her band practice for a while, then we went to dinner with some of her friends.

After they dropped us off at her dorm, we hung out there for the rest of the evening on her top bunk bed, playing Scrabble on Facebook, videochatting with her friend Patrick, and having some long-overdue private time. Seriously, despite all the time we've had lately, we haven't actually been in a bed together since Aug. 10, the last Poly Cocktail Hour she attended ("Polys in the wild" - Aug. 11, 2009), so that alone was worth the four-hour round-trip.

I probably would have stayed overnight in her dorm room except that Angel was having a Brown Bag Party at her house the next day, and I had invited Agnieszka to come with me, so I had to go back to New Jersey to pick her up anyway. Angel sells intimacy products (i.e. sex toys and novelties) through these Tupperware-style parties she throws, and at events like the Spice NYC party a couple weeks ago. Agnieszka and I drove out to Queens and had a fun time at the party, learning about different lubricants, stimulators, vibrators, and other somesuch. The thing I'll most remember is Agnieszka playing with a latex-like face used for fake blowjobs - she had me in stitches. I also won one of the games where the prize was a deck of Hustler playing cards that said "Barely Legal" on it - I wondered if Angel was making some comment about my girlfriend, but she denied it.

We came back to Agnieszka's place from the party, and chatted for a while to catch up. It's been quite a few months since our last outing ("Shanghai Mermaid" - May 31, 2009) so it was nice to talk with her about what's been happening. As I've mentioned elsewhere, I've known Agnieszka longer than any other friend in the northeast who is still currently in my life, and it's always nice to get her perspective on things.

On Monday, I had a second-round interview with a PR firm in the city, on Vanderbilt Avenue right next to Grand Central Station. I met with the president of the firm, and we seemed to hit it off well. He asked me what I did in my spare time, and in a burst of honesty that comes from being gainfully employed, I told him that I do volunteer work in the LGBT community. He smoothly indicated that he was fine with this by saying that he has a close friend who was the first openly gay board member of the New York Stock Exchange. So that is a plus if I decide to work for them - I wouldn't have to be evasive about Polina, who would surely visit the office at some point.

The real issue of course is whether I want to make a job change in this economy after only a month at my current job. The job I have in Princeton is in many ways my dream job - I get to do a lot of creative writing, I don't have to deal with a lot of people, it's low pressure and low stress, and in an interesting field at a very healthy company. The free lunches and free drinks are nice, and the people are great to work with. The downside is that it's not a full-time, permanent position (which is both good and bad) and the commute is wearing Yoshi and me out. So if I stay there, I will probably end up moving to south Jersey in March, and that's not really where I want to live.

I'm not supposed to think about this dilemma until it becomes one - that is, until I get a comparable job offer from the new firm, and that hasn't happened yet. But if it does, it will be one of those life-altering decisions that I'm not eager to make right now.

First day at work

Just got back from my first day at work, an 11-hour one at that, so I'm pretty beat. But there's so much going on, I have to write a few lines just to keep up with my fast-moving life.

Tuesday night I went to Madison, NJ about 30 minutes away to hang out with my friend Kerry. She's been feeling a little apprehensive about the upcoming MTV premiere of True Life titled "I'm Polyamorous" in which she and her now-ex girlfriend Diana will be featured and wanted some advice. I'll probably also appear in a cameo from the party at the Slipper Room way back in May ("Birthdays, MTV and Polina" - May 6, 2009) but not for more than a few seconds, I'm sure. If you want to catch it, the show premieres this Monday at 10 p.m. ET ("TNG poly documentary coming to MTV" - Polyamory in the News).

The worst of it was that I had a job interview the next morning with a PR firm in Hackensack, so even though I felt like crap I managed to drag myself out of bed and get to the interview, a few minutes late because I got lost due to poor directions. The interview was fine, but it will be a few weeks at least before I hear anything. I also got emails that morning saying that I wasn't going to start my job on Thursday as expected, so I figured I'd at least be able to sleep late the next day, as I had plenty left to do on Wednesday.

After the interview I went into the city for a haircut with Edison, and he did his usual thorough job. I had a few hours to kill before the Women's Poly Meeting, so I walked around the Lower East Side and had dinner at Whole Foods before my friends all showed up. We had a new woman named Sheila who had responded to my PolyNYC personal ad, and we've been emailing back and forth a bit, which is how she knew about the meeting. Afterwards, I took my friend and group co-founder Sylwia back to Weehawken before heading home.

When I got home at midnight, I found emails that contradicted the previous ones, and asked me to come in to my new job at 8 am! Yikes! So instead of sleeping in, I got about 4 hours of sleep and showed up a half-hour early (since I didn't know what traffic would be like). The first day was very good - got all set up on a computer with two screens in a quiet corner of the HR department. I found out that they serve free lunch every day, which is wonderful, and they also have free sodas and snacks for employees. They even have an indoor half-court basketball hoop and locker rooms for working out. It's a 90 minute drive down there without traffic, and god only knows how long during rush hour. At this point, I'm inclined to go early and stay late just to rack up paychecks and avoid sitting in traffic. My paycheck today is almost double my weekly unemployment check!

That is all for now - I'm off to bed.

We now return to our regular programming...

I'm really excited right now about a new job opportunity! After my eventful times earlier in the week, it's been a nice chill-out period the last couple of days to catch my breath before the next round of social events starts up.

Tonight, Agnieszka and I are going to SoHo to see a burlesque show (Anita Cookie is scheduled to perform), then Sunday is the new Star Trek movie with my family and time with Tara in the afternoon. Monday is the Poly Cocktail Hour, Wednesday is my women's poly support group, and Friday is Erika's birthday party.

Today, I woke up and watched a couple of episodes of Angel, "Double or Nothing" and "The Price" before getting up and firing up the computer to do some job searching. I submitted my resume to a couple of places, including a recruiter looking for an internal communications specialist for a confidential Fortune 500 company. About two hours after I sent that one, she called me and said when the company saw my resume they told her she had to get me on the phone - pronto.

I know I'm being modest, but frankly, it's kind of a shock. In this economy, I don't expect companies to be so eager to hire anyone, including me. But apparently, my experience with Cardtronics in my former life was especially attractive to this particular company. That's a good thing, because I loved working for Cardtronics, and I still point out their ATMs to my family whenever I see them. It's one of the few tangible things I can point to in everyday life that is a result of my work - I helped design the decorative wrapper and graphics on some Cardtronics ATMs.

Anyway, I filled out a form for the recruiter, and she's going to schedule an interview for me next week, probably on Monday, Wednesday or Friday, since I'll be in the city for the aforementioned social events anyway. The company is located at the World Trade Center, so that's a pretty convenient commute, just a little farther on the E line than I used to do, but downtown instead of uptown. So I'm crossing my fingers that this will turn out to be the end of my time off, although I will certainly miss being on extended vacation.

The downside is that I was thinking about visiting my friends who live points west of here, like Christine and Monica (who both live near Pittsburgh), Joanna and Mandy (who live in Central Ohio) and Colleen (who lives in Indianapolis) and just sleeping on people's couches or my air mattress to save on expenses.

I've also been seriously thinking about going back down to Houston and visiting my friends in the community down there, plus maybe visiting Linda and Meredith. I don't have any desire to see my parents, but I suppose I would let them know I was coming just to extend an olive branch. What I really miss is the food in Houston - when I play the "last meal" game, most of my dishes come from Houston restaurants ("4 things" - Aug. 30, 2007). If I get this job, I probably won't have the time to do that for a while. We'll have to see what transpires.

Successful day

It's been quite an exciting day on the national, local and personal levels for me today. First of all, on the national level, today Iowa became the third state to legalize same-sex marriage and the first in the Midwest to do so. It was a unanimous 7-0 decision by the Iowa Supreme Court to uphold the equal protection provision of Iowa's state constitution to include same-sex marriage as equal to heterosexual marriage. There's a rally tonight at Union Square that I would totally attend if I lived in the city.

On the local front, I've been working on promoting an appearance by Katelynn, the transgender cast member of MTV's The Real World: Brooklyn, and spoke to her by phone today. She's on a national tour of college campuses and I caught up to her in Pennsylvania. We spoke for about 15 minutes about her presentation on May 20 at the Polyamorous NYC meeting, and her experience with the media. After we hung up I informed the Board that we'd finally made contact and confirmed her appearance. I drafted a couple of announcements that will be posted in the LGBT Center's monthly newsletter and Web site and sent them out for review. I'm looking forward to meeting her next month, and we have a lot of work to do to promote her talk in the next few weeks.

On the personal front, I landed the interview with the agency I submitted the writing test for, and thankfully, they want to see me on April 15, the same day as the next PolyNYC meeting in the city. So that works out great for me since I'll already be planning to be in the city. It would be fantastic if I got this job - since it's only a block away from my old office, I wouldn't have to change my commute at all.

Dreams, job hunting and poker

I was up late last night until about 4:30 a.m. setting up equipment on my computer to enable me to convert audio from DVDs to mp3 files. This allows me to capture songs from my large catalog of concerts on DVD and put them in iTunes, on my iPod or on CD eventually.

I'm using my portable DVD player sitting on top of my printer with a 7-inch diagonal screen as the source, and an ADS Tech Instant Music USB converter for A2D processing. This also requires me to set up a second pair of speakers on the desk for audio monitoring and a lot of cables. As I mentioned in a previous post ("Movies and music" - Feb. 25, 2009) this is something I've been meaning to do for a while, and now that it's all set up, I can start capturing individual songs, which is a bit time-consuming doing it track by track. But if it's one thing I have right now, it's time on my hands.

I had a really intense and lucid dream last night where I was being recruited to become the station manager for KUHF, the Public Broadcasting System radio station in Houston, based on the campus of my alma mater, the University of Houston. My old boss from my PR agency in Houston had recommended me for the job and he was going with me to meet the station's management. I was very apprehensive because I have no experience in radio and don't have the first clue on what a station manager does, but it sounded like too good a job opportunity to pass up. And of course I was thinking about everything and everyone I would be leaving behind in the northeast, plus all the emotional baggage I'd be stepping into if I went back to Houston.

So when I woke up this morning I was determined to crank up my job search another gear and subscribed to TheLadders, a job board that specializes in positions over $100K in compensation. One of my old bosses at Agent K suggested that I try it out, and it does seem to have several positions that I would qualify for. I submitted eight applications today for several well-known companies, and some to recruiters for law firms, since I have a specialty in that area. So we'll see if my investment pays off with some interviews.

My family came over last night to watch Heroes and Saturday Night Live off my DVR, and play some poker, which we haven't done for a couple weeks since watching our Lord of the Rings cycle. I took the opportunity to teach them stud poker, the game made famous by Steve McQueen and Edward G. Robinson in The Cincinnati Kid. We are slowly getting up to the proficiency when I used to play once or twice a month with Pearl, Amy and other friends from the mid-1980s to the late 1990s. One year I codified all our poker rules and games and put them in a binder that I still have for reference. The difference is with little kids, they like to play with a lot of wild cards, and things start getting a little ridiculous. For adults, a few wild cards can be helpful to stimulate action since we're a small group of players, but we generally limit them to four or fewer.

I saw the Nicolas Cage movie Knowing this week, directed by Alex Proyas, who did one of my favorite sci-fi noir movies Dark City. Unfortunately, his new movie, while certainly interesting, was just a little too dark for me. I don't want to give away anything by explaining why, but this is not exactly an uplifting movie, so don't expect a happy ending.

City visits and job interview

Tara and I had a MOMA trip planned for Tuesday, but when we got there, we found to our dismay that the museum is closed on Tuesdays - wtf?!? That was terribly disappointing, but we managed to salvage the trip by visiting the Cloisters on a very uncrowded afternoon and spending some quiet time there. Which was a bit of a relief for both of us because we were talking about our relationship and poly issues throughout the whole trip. Not that I mind talking about relationship issues with anyone and we had a nice afternoon together, but our energy was anything but peaceful for most of the day.

Here's a picture that Tara took of a newly opened section of the main chapel section of the Cloisters:

I met with the HR guy from a PR firm yesterday in the city and had a brief but encouraging talk. I might hear back before the end of the week if they want to proceed. It was supposed to snow heavily yesterday, but it was mostly rain and ice, so at least my movement was not impeded.

After my meeting I met up with one of my friends from PolyNYC for dinner, a guy named Kyle, a 45-year-old FTM. We went to a diner in the city and had a nice chat about life and transitions and stuff - he's writing a book about his life and experiences. We stopped at a drugstore to pick up some cookies for the meeting, and then proceeded to Simon's six-story walkup apartment in the East Village.

We had nine people at the PolyNYC leadership meeting, and it was a barn-burner. I think everyone just needed some time to vent, and they did. I mostly stayed quiet and listened, and tried to input a calm, unbiased perspective where I could get a word in. I think we have a lot of work ahead of us if we are to get the boat moving in the right direction with this group.

After the meeting I met up with Penny, who was coming out of her tango dancing class, and we walked and chatted together for about 30 minutes until she had to leave. We continue to try and carve out time in our busy lives to see each other until she leaves for Argentina, but it's difficult with all our other family commitments.

Laid off at work

I found out this morning that I have been laid off at work, effective immediately. There's simply not enough work in the pipeline for Agent K to keep me on, and I understand that. I see what's going on around me, and I'm not the only one who is hurting with the economic conditions. It does kind of suck that it's happening over Christmas, but I was pretty much twiddling my thumbs at work anyway. At least I get to twiddle my thumbs at home for the next month and a half and still get paid. The company offered me a pretty generous severance so I'll be on the payroll until the end of January. After that, the clock really starts ticking.

The upside is that this is certainly not unexpected. I had seen the warning signs for several weeks now as clients slowly faded away, and work began to dry up. So I held off on spending on major items, and I kept my assets liquid so I have plenty of reserve funds to pay the rent while I'm job hunting. Of course it would be ideal if I could find something before Feb. 1 so I wouldn't have to deplete my savings, but in this economy, it might be a challenge to find something suitable. But I've been through this before, under more challenging circumstances, so I know I can get through this. If it's one thing I've learned, it's that life is full of ups and downs, and you just have to keep going and not give up.

Staying put

I got some bad news today - my biggest client, the one I spend the vast majority of my days working for, has decided to terminate the account because of the recent financial meltdown. This actually has quite a trickle-down effect for me, as I'll explain briefly.

As you know, I've been planning to buy a house next year when my apartment lease runs out. In August, I was talking seriously with my family about the possibility of all buying one together, but it didn't get very far because I don't think we're ready for that yet. So I was pretty much ready to start looking for a house for just myself, so I can get away from annoyingly noisy neighbors and start building some equity instead of paying ungodly amounts of money for rent that I'll never see again.

However, as everyone knows, in September we had the Wall Street disaster, which is still lingering in the form of tightened credit markets and stricter mortgage requirements. In a nutshell, buying a house these days requires a larger downpayment and more security in the form of co-signers or large cash reserves that I simply don't have. Consider this story in the New York Times about young couples getting help from their families to buy real estate:

"Mixing Money and Family" - Oct. 20, 2008

Now, it is entirely possible that the market can turn around, but I'm not betting on that to happen anytime soon, despite the efforts of our elected officials. Add the fact that I have a Certificate of Deposit expiring at the end of this month that I was going to use as part of my downpayment, but at this point it seems wiser to renew it and just stay in the apartment for another year. I would have to give my intention to vacate in January if I was going to leave in March when my lease is up to avoid breaking my lease, and I just can't feel secure enough with my job and the economy to make that leap.

Besides all the hard financial realities I'm dealing with, there's also the instability of my family situation. I don't know what's going to happen with all of us, and it seems unwise to make any big decisions when things are so unsettled. While I don't feel like I need to wait on them per se, in the face of all the other issues, it seems best to delay the decision until everything else improves and I'm really ready to make the jump, and then reevaluate where I am with my relationships and life in general.

I try not to worry too much about the future, but I really hope I don't have to starting looking for a new job on top of all this - that would suck. I've never been a job-hopper - my last two jobs averaged about 7 years each, and I've been here for 2 years and three months so far. I might be getting worked up for nothing, but always best to be prepared when the signs aren't favorable.

Update on busyness

I've had a post brewing in my head about my philosophy of unconditional love, ever since I wrote that post about Rent closing on Broadway. However, I haven't been able to get enough time to put it to paper because of the catastrophic events on Wall Street in the past week that has directly affected my largest client. So I've been having to stay later and even work a little at night and on weekends to keep up.

Plus, it's also been a busy week outside the office as well. Tara and I had a quiet date night on Monday watching Big Fish on my Big Screen. Tuesday night I had dinner with Lori at a diner in New York (which was rudely interrupted by a New York cockroach crawling on her side of the booth). Then we went to Barnes & Noble and I bought a couple of adult vampire books (Guilty Pleasures by Laurell K. Hamilton - I just finished the two-part graphic novel and loved it - and Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris, which inspired the current HBO show Tru Blood). Then last night was my PolyNYC meeting where we had an excellent speaker who is a poly psychologist and talked about poly compatibility.

Hopefully I will have some time soon to get back to blogging more regularly, but for right now, I'll probably have to curtail this a bit. Also, big hugs and sympathy to my Houston friends and readers who are dealing with the aftermath of Hurricane Ike. I hope everything gets back to normal soon.

Heat wave

Just a quick post before I need to get my timesheet done for last week. My company is having a contest where everyone who gets all their June timesheets in on time (by noon on Mondays) gets entered into a drawing for tickets to the Fan Fest and the Home Run Derby Contest that will take place during MLB's "All Star Week" in July at Yankee Stadium. Since I know it would be a dream come true for my family to go to this event, I'm going to try extra-hard to have a shot at this.

Friday night we went out for a late showing of The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian, our second viewing of this movie. We weren't all that keen on watching any of the new movies this week, like Kung Fu Panda or You Don't Mess With the Zohan. Saturday the heat wave came, and I tried to get my errands done early to avoid the soaring temperatures. Poor Bee was out working in the 90-degree weather all day, so everyone came over early to jump in the pool (except Bug) before dinner, then we watched our second half of the Mummy series, The Mummy Returns. We are now ready for the third installment in theaters this August.

New glasses redux

Ah, the weekend. It seems even more welcome after a short week. This week has been pretty crazy for me, actually. On Wednesday I got thrown a job to put together a response for a request for qualifications for a climate change coalition. Luckily I was able to borrow from our unsuccessful bid for the ethanol coalition last year, but I still ended up staying until about 8 pm Wednesday, then just got it wrapped up at 5 pm right before the deadline on Thursday. Lucky too because I had planned to take Karina to get her hair cut at my salon in Chinatown, and I kept her waiting for about 10 minutes because I was late getting out of the office.

The upside to this week is that we got free pizza in the office on Wednesday, and Friday we had our monthly luncheon, free lasagna and salad in lieu of our usual morning muffins and bagels. Apparently it's Italians who run things around here, or that's the safest thing to order for everyone. Personally, I'd love to see some Mediterranean food or Vietnamese food ordered once in a while. Ethiopian is probably not good for big groups since you eat with your hands - you might catch something.

Anyway, I'm sure you all want to see my new glasses, so here's a shot I took this morning from my Web cam - these frames are by designer Michael Kors:



And I also got my old Anna Sui glasses back with my new prescription lenses:



Headed out to do my errands now - the vegetable dumplings were such a hit last time with my family that we're doing it again tonight. I think I'll make some for myself this time also, and maybe I'll make a red vinegar ginger sauce to go with it. Some fresh garlic would be nice too. Hope everyone is having a nice weekend!

Job interview

I had a job interview this morning with another large PR firm that called me out of the blue last week and said they wanted to meet me. I'm not particularly job hunting, but I'm certainly open to new opportunities, especially if they want to pay me more money. I always feel like I'm paid a bit below my market value because when I got this current job, it was my first job in New York, and there's always skepticism that some people can't handle this city. I guess that's why they say if you can make it there, you'll make it anywhere. And this city certainly has it challenges, but I feel after 18 months I've proven it to myself and everybody else that I'm here to stay.

The interview went well, as they usually do when you already have a job - takes a lot of the pressure off. The office is located smack in the middle of Times Square, so if I'm working there by New Year's Eve, I'll have a great view of the ball dropping party. Luckily it's 20-something stories up, so you don't hear the noise. Their lobby is a lot nicer than ours, as it actually has windows that show something interesting, whereas our lobby's window faces another office tower in Midtown. Since it's just the first interview, I'm certainly not packing up my office yet, but I think it would be fun to get familiar with another part of the city, especially since it's so centrally located.

Today is my company's holiday party, which covered the fact that I'm wearing my new black suit and dressy flats for the interview. Like many companies these days, we're having it during working hours starting at 2 p.m. at a nearby Mexican restaurant. I can't tell you how much I appreciate the fact that we're getting time out of the workday to socialize, rather than having it after-hours like last year where I have to give up "my" time. Like I said, I'm not unhappy with my current company - it's a great company - but money talks, and the work lately has been a little dull, so speak the truth.

Speaking of how great my company is, we received the new revisions to the employee handbook yesterday, and sure enough, gender identity has been added to the list of non-discriminatory classes - huzzah! For new readers, this has been a personal quest of mine to get this changed (it wasn't included last year) and I'm pleased to say we're one less Fortune 100 company that allows job discrimination based on gender identity. Another tiny step toward an inclusive ENDA...

Tuesday night I visited the library in New York and found a Dave Grusin CD of Gershwin music that I owned a long time ago, which was a nice find. Afterwards, I had dinner with my family for the first time in a while and we had a great time laughing about interior design in the 1970s (don't ask me how we got on that topic). Afterwards I rushed off to Borders to use a coupon on a Christmas present, even though we haven't circulated our lists yet (hint, hint).

Alright, better get some work done before the party, which starts in about two hours.

Blue notes

I've been feeling a bit melancholy of late, due to a number of coinciding factors. In no particular order, here are some of these factors that contribute to my current state of mind:

The onset of the holiday season - to tell the truth, I've never been a big fan of the holidays, except for the welcome break from school or work. And being Pagan, I generally don't get as whipped up into a frenzy as some Christians do about Christmas, perhaps because they only have that and Easter to show up with bells on. To me, Yule is just another celebration of the turning of the wheel, one of eight Sabbats I celebrate quietly, generally by myself.

And yet sometimes it's hard for me to ignore the fact that for the rest of the world, the holidays are about reconnecting with one's birth family as evidenced by the upcoming busiest travel day of the year tomorrow. And while my family here in New Jersey is wonderful and we have our own traditions, I am still apprehensive about the actual appointed days (Nov. 22 and Dec. 25) when I feel like I'm the only person in the world who spends these days alone (although of course that is an imagined feeling, because I know there are many, many people who are doing the same, and perhaps in less fortunate circumstances than me). But this is my pity party, so I don't have to be reasonable about it, especially since I really don't have any desire to connect with my birth family. I think I just miss the idea of having a birth family that accepts and loves me unconditionally. Given the choice, who wouldn't want that?

Missing AP - it's been a week since meeting my friend and I miss her. Nothing too complicated about that.

Work - things have been both dull and stressful at work. My productivity numbers are down because there hasn't been a lot of work to do, which isn't my fault, but reflects poorly on me nevertheless. I've actually been sending some feelers out in the job market looking for new opportunities, but probably won't make a move before the end of the year, unless the perfect fit comes up. It's also been a strain on me to not have any days off since I took them all in January and February when I was out for surgery. The last time I had significant time off was the July 4 holiday week, then one day on Labor Day, so I'm feeling pretty burned out. I can't wait until 2008 when I have a full slate of paid time off (three weeks plus sick time and holidays). Also, we're lucky to have Christmas week off until Jan. 2, so that will be a nice break.

Health - I've been dealing with allergies pretty much constantly for the last two months, and it has taken a lot of energy out of me, not to mention enough Kleenex to reconstitute a forest. With the season's first real snow arriving this week, I'm hopeful I will start to get over that soon. Also, I still haven't done any meaningful exercise this year, while the whole rest of my family has been diligently walking each day. Gotta get around to that.

Relationship issues - too private to talk about here, but this is a pretty minor quibble. I actually had a very nice time with Tara last night. We went to Fuddruckers for hamburgers and shakes, then I wiped the table with her in a game of air hockey. Then she bested me in a car racing game, and we ended up shooting basketballs together on a mini-hoop and both made the same number of shots. It's just some of the long-term issues that we have that are always going to be a source of dissatisfaction for me.

Anyway, the thing I am looking forward to is setting up my front video projector I ordered from ProjectorPeople.com yesterday. As some of you know, when I'm feeling down, I usually cure it by shopping. I ordered a Panasonic high-definition (720p) projector, a pull-down, 16x9 Draper screen that measures 82 inches diagonal and the necessary cables. I still need to add an HD-DVD player (which I'll probably get on Black Friday coming up) so I can install the whole setup on Saturday.

I've done several such installations in the past, but this will be the first one I've done for myself. I'm excited to finally work on my own setup, although since it's in an apartment, I can't do a lot of things like I've done in the past (like ceiling mounting, in-wall speakers and wiring, etc.) Still, with the rapid progress of digital video projection, this should be by far the best-looking theater in terms of picture quality I've ever done. I can't wait to get started on it over the long holiday weekend. I'll be sure to post pictures later.

Woo-hoo!

Update: our spider pumpkin won for most creative! The prize was a $50 American Express gift check for each of our six team members. Nice way to start the weekend.

Spider pumpkin

We had a pumpkin decorating contest at work today. It started yesterday, but today was the grand show and judgement. I normally don't go in for fun stuff like this at work, but prodded by my VP, I joined our group team and wound up leading us to what I hope will be a winning entry. So here's the way it all went down.

There are three categories where prizes will be awarded - most creative, scariest and funniest. Carving was prohibited because it would be messy and increased risk of injury for employees (this is a work event, after all). We brainstormed on some ideas gathered from Web sites like ExtremePumpkins.com, where I saw one of a spider made by two pumpkins attached together. I originally wanted to go a whole set of five pumpkins painted yellow to represent the Simpsons family, but that was going to take too long, and we only had a day and a half to do it. One of the other girls suggested a "Hairy Potter" theme along the same line, but I didn't think that was particularly creative or funny. So we settled on the spider model and wanted to make it scary.

We started by jamming two chopsticks into each fruit to join them together, wrapping the joint with some black felt to cover up the gap. Then we painted both black using the poster paint provided to us. We punched holes in the felt and attached the pipe cleaner legs. The two big eyes were plastic half eyeballs and the small ones are pistachio shells, both painted with purplish-black nail polish, then a coat of clear on top to make them glassy. The fangs are whole cashew nuts, filed down with a nail file on one end to superglue them to the pumpkin, then painted with white correction fluid and tipped with blood-red nail polish. The Black Widow mark on the spider's abdomen was created by simply scratching out the familiar hourglass shape with a pencil, then carefully peeling the dried poster paint away, exposing the orange of the pumpkin skin underneath.

We sat our creation on a table spread with fake spider webbing, then scattered in the web tiny rubber mice, little glittery spiders, ladybugs made with red pipe cleaners rolled into balls and dabbed with black paint, and some feathers to suggest avian prey. The word "flack" is a derogatory name for what we do, public relations ("spin doctor" is a less offensive euphemism). The whole setup reminds me of Hagrid's pet spider Aragog as seen in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Or maybe Shelob's lair in The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.



The competition was surprising intense. I kept our project carefully under wraps the entire time so no one would steal any of our ideas, even going as far as locking my door when I left, and keeping the spider under newspaper wrapping during the day when it sat on my desk. Every once in a while, competing teams would swing by and beg for a peek, but I turned them all away. It got to the point where I caught one guy trying to sneak into my office while I was out! But the result was that there were some very strong entries. Here's my vote for funniest:



The VP was very impressed with our work (she couldn't actually participate as much because, well, she's a VP). When we were setting it up, she commented that she's never seen me so competitive. My ex used to say that too, and my family has also remarked on it. My personality is that I've very competitive on things that are supposed to be fun, like games, sports and contests (especially those that involve being creative). However, when it comes to things in life, like work, getting ahead, making money - I'm really not that aggressive. It's not in my nature to screw people over or get tough with people to get ahead or get important work done. My ex used to wish I had as much drive to succeed in business as I do to win a game of backgammon, but that's not me. I suppose we all have to have an outlet for the competitive fires that drive us. Most of us put it in our work, some put it in art, and some put it into games and contests. It's just our nature.

Anyway, in other news, I see that the Angel box set is coming out at the end of the month, so that's on my Christmas wish list!



I visited Karina today when I had to go out to the drugstore this morning next to her office to buy some superglue for the spider eyes and fangs. Her teeth are much better now, and we talked about the idea of her making a career change. She's not happy at the bank and is looking for something else to do. Tonight I'm going with Lori to visit MOMA for the first time, and it should be fun. I ate way too much at our staff lunch of Mexican food, so I won't be eating dinner tonight.

I've got my fingers crossed on the outcome of the Halloween contest which should be announced in about an hour. Wish me luck!

New friends

"A fanatic is someone who can't change his mind and won't change the subject" - Winston Churchill

I saw this quote in the elevator this morning on the way to work, and it has nothing to do with anything. I just admire the way he was able to capture the idea so eloquently and memorably that it sticks with you.

It's been a quiet week so far. My boss is again traveling around the world, and won't be back until after Thanksgiving. However, I did get a couple new projects to keep me busy - a law firm, a pharmaceutical company and a pitch for a media advertising company. Plus I'm still doing some work on the Qatar pitch. But generally it's quiet work that doesn't require a lot of meetings and phone calls.

Last Friday I had dinner with a new friend I met online, a freelance writer named Lori who lives in Queens. We were supposed to meet at the Barnes & Noble store near my office, but she went to a different one further downtown by mistake. Once we finally got together, we went to Marrakesh, a Middle Eastern bistro nearby, then back to the bookstore to shop. When the store closed at 9 p.m. (which is dreadfully early for a B&N), we went back to my office and I gave her the nickel tour. This Friday we're planning to visit the Museum of Modern Art, which I've been meaning to for ages.

I also met another new friend, purely by chance. A couple weeks ago I saw an ad in the paper for high interest rates on certificates of deposit at Wachovia and I decided to put some of my money away to earn more interest. I went to my local Wachovia branch about two blocks down Third Avenue and saw the financial specialist about the CD. Her name was Karina, and she was very helpful - we hit it off well because she is Polish and oddly enough there seems to be a disproportionate number of Poles in my circle of friends. However, nothing happened on that first visit, and I walked out of the bank with my CD, intending to return in six months when it matures.

However, when I tried to sign up for their online banking, I found that Karina had not given me a 4-digit PIN, so I went back on Tuesday and saw her again. Our second visit was very chatty and we found we have a lot in common. She had an invitation to go to an outdoor sculpture opening at lunchtime and asked if I wanted to come, so we took a walk at lunch to 49th and Second, which is a block away from the United Nations building. We watched a Hungarian band play for the opening, then took a walk around the block and saw the UN building, a first for me. She is studying hard for classes and to pass financial exams for work, plus she lives in Westchester, NY, so we probably won't be doing much together other than an occasional lunch, but it was nice to find a friendly, down-to-earth person working nearby in the city.

Diner talk

I had a nice dinner last night with my family at our local diner, the first time we've all sat down at a table to eat since Bug's birthday last month. It was great to catch up with everyone's day and hearing the little minutiae that I miss from not being around more.

I followed up dinner with a long bedtime phone talk and unfortunately got to bed a little later than I had intended and slept through my alarm clock this morning. I think it's only about the second or third time it's happened since I started this job 15 months ago, but I'm surprised it doesn't happen more often with my crazy hours. When I was in high school, the only time I ever got detention was due to excessive tardiness from not being able to wake up in the morning. I was such a good kid, just habitually lazy and a night owl to boot.

I also got the news this morning that client meeting in Utah scheduled for the end of October has been postponed to January. This is good news because by January there should be enough snow for skiing, and I'll have plenty of vacation time to extend the trip into the weekend so I can ski without having to pay for a plane ticket. Utah is such a good place to ski too, and I know the terrain well from skiing there several times in the past. I should get some rollerblades and start training since I'm so out of shape for skiing (or for anything else, for that matter). I have found in the past that getting good on blades makes a HUGE difference on the slopes. This also means I need to shop for some skiwear, which I obviously don't have anymore. I just hope some of my co-workers or clients also want to stay over, so I won't have to ski alone.

Lastly, I'm so happy the heat wave finally broke. It's rainy and drizzly here for the rest of the week, but at least the temperatures are out of the flippin' 80s! Hopefully this weekend will be wonderful for a trip into the city.