FRIDAAAAAY.

Whew. Almost through another day.

I came in late to work today, which was brilliant. Kevin has a bad flu and has been seriously down for the count for the last three days. I woke up in time to get to the office at the normal time, but I was just exhausted and as I laid there, the thought of getting up, doing some yoga, getting dressed, making breakfast, and helping my sick boyfriend wake up and resituate himself was more than I could imagine accomplishing in enough time to get to work on time. So I went back to sleep. :)

I woke up a little later, around 9, and emailed work and told them I'd be a few hours late. It was a great decision. I was able to get a boat load of dishes done (I've been really on top of keeping the house clean and tidy lately, but with Kevin being sick and home making messes that he's too sick to pick up - there's a slight backlog), make a pot of coffee, wake up the sickling, help him get inspired to finally take a shower and put on some normal clothes, tidy up his little area where he's been camped out for the last three days (he's sleeping on a little bed we made in the living room so as not to infect me), do a power yoga session (yesss!), AND make a pot of steel cut oatmeal for us for breakfast. It was a really nice morning. It's sunny and warmer this morning (high of 47 today! yes!) and the sun was streaming in the window, the cats were lounging around, and I was really grateful just to have a few extra moments to myself. Whew!

I convinced the sickling to put on a coat and walk me to the subway (about 2 blocks away) because I knew he needed to move his body, get the blood pumping, get some air into his cells so they can breathe a bit, and get some much needed sunshine on his face. He complained about it, but I think he was secretly glad I forced him outside for all of ten minutes. He's been cooped up in the house for so long, the poor guy. He's still feeling shitty today but I'm hoping the fever has mostly broken and that the aches will begin to subside soon enough. I hate to see him like this - he's so uncomfortable.

Once I was on my way, the train took its sweet time, which means I ended up being about 30 minutes later than I predicted (putting me here at 12:30, when we are supposed to be here at 10), but it was fine. It was very quiet here and everyone was in a cheery mood because of the sunny weather. Plus one of my bosses was out today. Thank god. I welcomed the lightened workload for the day. I spent some time doing personal stuff and some time banging out some work crap, ate lunch (egg salad sandwich) at my desk and just had a pre-exercise snack (small bowl of organic cereal with rasp/blueberries), and now the day is practically over.

I had a daydream on the way into work that the firm should start giving each assistant (there are 5 of us total) a "late morning" once a week. Where you can come in 2 hours late on your set morning without having to specifically request it. Someone else could cover your attorneys while you're out. I thought it was sheer brilliance in the moment, but I'm pretty sure that's never gonna happen....Alas. A girl can dream.

I'm thrilled that it's Friday. I need this weekend badly. We were slotted to go see Kevin's parents and sister/sister's husband/sister's tw0-year old 30 minutes outside the city tomorrow, but he's too sick to risk it, especially with a two-year old running around. So we'll stay home. I will miss getting to see them, because we haven't seen them in a while, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't grateful for the unexpected day to myself.

Tonight, I'm going to go kick my own ass at the gym after work. I'll probably have a good hour to spend there and I'm looking forward to it. I'm going to do probably 20 minutes on the stair machine and then a bunch of resistance and ab stuff. The power yoga was good this morning, but not enough to count as a resistance day. It will feel good to sweat and strain a little bit.

I'm doing really well on food-consumption this week. I'm not having terrible trouble staying within my points and I'm stopping when I'm full. I'm not sure if not being able to check the scale every morning has helped that or not, but not weighing myself right now is fun. It's actually taken a lot of the focus of off obsessing about the numbers/calories/points and just allowed me to listen to my body. We had chinese food last night (because I was not about to do all the dishes just so I could cook and make more dishes) and I enjoyed it a lot, stopped when I was full, and that was that. And then, as a special treat for the sickling (who ended up not having any at all! hmph!) I brought home Ben & Jerry's Cookie Dough Ice Cream! I had about a 1/4 of a cup of it with a sprinkle of some granola on top and it was just to die for. It was plenty, even though it was a very small serving. It tasted so rich and decadent that I didn't need more than the tiny amount.

After the gym tonight, I'm going to meet up with Daniel. We're gonna go get Chipotle (I'll get a salad) and sip cheap margaritas. :) Should be fun. Then we'll probably go back to his apartment (my old apartment) to hang out with our friend Randy, who is moving to LA in a little over a week! Gah! I feel bad leaving Kevin at home alone after he's spent the entire day (actually the last 3 days) sitting on the couch staring at the TV by himself, but he insisted I go out, be social, and enjoy my Friday. What a guy. He's seriously such a sweetness.

My massage last night was really nice. It wasn't the BEST massage I've ever had, but it was perfectly enjoyable. I spent a nice long hour laying on that table letting her pamper the hell out of me and it was lovely. And so cheap! I'm glad I went.

This weekend doesn't involve much: I've got a show on Saturday and a birthday party after the show, but beyond that, I'm gonna relax, exercise, do my yoga, and maybe cook some meals! Oolala! Oh and I'm also in the market for a new camera. I think I'm going to start a new photo blog about something very near and dear to me. So I might try to purchase one this weekend. Fun.

Things have been so annoyingly busy for me at work this week. I am thrilled to be finally - huge sigh - taking a break to sit here and do nothing but blog. I'm way overdue on this thing.

I wrote a post a week or so ago - with lots of detailed bullshit about all kinds of stuff - and I took it down. I decided it was way too inner-monologue/to do list to be healthy. And it was boring even for me to reread.

So, how am I. Well. I'm getting through each day. The last 3 weeks have been tough, to be honest. Some days are easier than others and I'm certainly not miserable by any means. But I'm not really happy and content right now either.

Work remains hard for me. I've been doing my yoga, reading excerpts from "The Power of NOW" about how to avoid becoming all tangled up in my own negative thoughts and experiences, about how I have control over how I react to my experiences. I've been sleeping 8 hours a night, exercising 5-6 times a week, eating well-balanced healthy meals, taking vitamins, reading, spending time with friends. But none of it takes away that I'm not happy at my job, which is where I, obviously, spend the vast majority of my time. The personalities, the tasks, the environment, the pace, the lighting, the smelly toxic printer that sits two feet from my face, the commute, the relationships - I'm struggling with all of it.

One of my bosses (I assist three people total: two attorneys and one administrative manager), A, dislikes me. I'm not sure why this is. His mother passed away at the end of the year and I'm sure it was an incredibly painful thing for him. She'd been dying of cancer for most of 2008. So his overreacting passive aggressively to every minor mistake I've made is understandable. I cannot imagine the pressure and stress of losing a parent, especially a relatively young parent. Anyone would be likely to lash out where ever possible.

Even so, it's created a bit of stress for me. He's sometimes condescending to me, quick to judge me, quick to passive-aggressively reprimand me, assumes the worst in almost every situation with me, and I'm pretty sure he doesn't keep it a secret to his colleagues. He also barely speaks to me and asks me to do things that he could and should easily do. My workload is enough that I don't need to be placing every outgoing call he makes. Even H, the partner I assist (A is just an associate), makes his own fucking phone calls.

In contrast, my other two bosses really like me, think I'm good at my job, we have pleasant, friendly interactions, they communicate to me their concerns when something I've done needs improvement, but not in unpleasant ways, nor with the preconceived assumption that I'm a moron.

I've definitely screwed things up at workplaces in the past in my life. I'm a smart girl, but I often don't give a shit. It's not a great personality trait in most workplace environments. I've been fired, reprimanded and punished. I've also been praised, adored and applauded in the workplace. It depends on the job and on my mental state in my life at the time (you can bet that when I was depressed and fat, I wasn't fun to work with; when I was depressed, fat, and homeless, I was the best employee you'd ever find - because I needed the job).

So because of my checkered employment past, I sometimes wonder if A is right: I'm a screw up, a daydreamer, I don't try hard enough, I don't care enough, I think jobs grow on trees.

I know that those things aren't true, though. I know that I work hard here, put in my hours, get my job done, am pleasant and thorough and attentive to my bosses. So he can kiss my ass.

They were going to switch assistants, give him someone new and me a new attorney to work with. And then they decided not to, decided that he's blamed some things on me unfairly, that he needs to learn to express what he needs and not be so passive aggressive. Apparently he was really unhappy to hear that they decided not to switch assistants. I have access to his email and I was looking for another work email when I found one he wrote to a friend. I stupidly read it (then again, he stupidly wrote it from his work email) and in it he wrote that he was having a shitty day, and one of the two reasons he listed was that "they decided not to switch assistants like they said they were going to." That made me feel about 2 inches tall. Stupid of me to have read it, but I did.

Kevin reminded me that this guy was also upset with his holiday bonus, complained to the partners about it, and refused (unbeknownst to anyone but me) to do any work for the last week of the year because of his bonus wasn't what he'd expected. So Kevin pointed out that A's being upset that they didn't switch assistants is more about him feeling like he can't get what he wants from HIS bosses, like they don't do what he asks them to do and he's not being respected by them, rather than it being about him desperately wanting a new assistant. I thought that was a fair point. But it's still an unpleasant relationship in my workplace.

A isn't the only reason I don't like it here. I just feel trapped. And I knew when I started this job over a year ago that a.) I would stay for a year and a half or two years (but no longer) as a thank you to the office manager for hiring me back when I really needed the job and b.) this job was a necessary stepping stone so that I could stop temping, pay off some debt, and have health insurance again. So it's not surprising that I'm anxious to get the hell out by now. I'm right on time, in fact. I feel trapped, resentful of my time not being my own, and generally disgusted that offices exist to begin with. Sure, they are necessary functions of society. They are also places that can suck a person's soul if you don't like what you're doing. And I don't.

All of this has taken its toll on me. Despite my best efforts with all the yoga, etc., I'm still constantly sore, tired, and have to fight the urge to be grouchy a lot of the time. It could be seasonal, or chemical. It might also be circumstantial. The point is, I'm exhausted. Mentally and physically exhausted. I grew a pain in my back this morning, from moving the wrong way in my office chair. Its acute and digs in sharply when I breathe in. I'm pretty sure that that would not be the case were I not sitting up at a desk, typing on a computer for 9 hours a day. It just hurts my body. And I KNOW that to complain about it is actually only making me sicker. So I'm trying to keep perspective and see it all as neutral - my thoughts about it are what's negative, but the actual circumstances simply 'are.' And I can control my negative thoughts if I stay in the moment. Easier said than done, of course. But it feels good to bitch about it on the blog just the same. ;)

I went to the doctor yesterday. I wanted to get a referral a sports medicine doc for all my aches, pains, and spasms of late. I am way too active not to be on top of that stuff. I also went to talk to her about my emotional state. Down, tired, headachy, irritable, low sex drive, sore.

I left the appointment feeling less than thrilled with her handling of my concerns. My feelings about the appointment might just be the current lens through which I'm viewing the world: "Less than thrilled." But whatever the reason for my feeling unheard, I didn't get much help in the way of the depression issue.

I felt like she was talking to me as though it were my first day being a human. Saying things like, "Well, it's normal, given the current state of the economy to feel a little down. Everyone goes through tough times. We all go through patches that feel blah."

Huge eye roll. Yes, lady. I know that. I'm alive and have been for years. I just told you that I've been feeling down, not like myself, and that I've had a low sex drive for over 3 months. I just told you that. It's not the economy. Trust me.

She basically told me I could see someone, wait it out, or...maybe...just maybe...in the case of there being a chemical imbalance, consider anti-depressants.

I told her I thought it might be seasonal. She said, "Get a light."

She had me fill out a questionnaire. Textbook anxiety and depression, she said.

She asked me if I wanted to consider seeing someone. I told her that I was not opposed to it but that I really couldn't afford it, even though insurance covers some of it. I also told her that I used to be extremely depressed in my late teens/early twenties. And that I was in therapy for 5 years. So I know the tools and the coping skills. I get it. It was very helpful and positive, therapy, and I am, for all intents and purposes, content in my life right now. Aside from my job, things are good.

So then she went back to the thing about everyone going through down times. She said it's impossible not to walk around in the state of the world today and not feel some stress or level of anxiety or depression. Sure. I agree with that to an extent. But I don't quite think that's it. Oh, and did you ask me if I'm worried about money or my job security? Because I'm not. And if you had asked me, you'd know that, and you'd quit telling me that I'm probably just stressed about the economy. I'm not. I promise.

She encouraged me to get enough sleep, exercise plenty, eat right, relax when possible. I said, "Well, I do yoga 3-4 times a week, I do cardio and resistance training 5-4 times a week, I sleep 8 hours a night every single night, and I'm incredibly conscious about what I eat." She said, "Well thank god you do that stuff!"

....okaaaaay.

I just felt like she was talking to me like I was 12 years old. I wanted to scream at her, "LADY. I'm sitting in front of you telling you that I've had this battery of symptoms for an extended period of time. AND I'm telling you that I used to be actually clinically depressed in a bad way and in hardcore twice a week therapy for it. So why on earth would I be sitting in front of you explaining these symptoms to you, a doctor, if it was probably just the economy-blues?! Don't you think I know my body and mind well enough, after 5 years of therapy and a significant experience with deep depression, to know when I'm just a little down verses when I'm feeling chemically off? I do everything you just suggested to help with depression. EVERYTHING. And I do it all with more frequency, regularity, and investment than most people my age. SO IT'S NOT THAT. It's NOT that I'm not sleeping enough or that I'm not eating the right things. I DON"T EVEN DRINK. Did you even ask me that? If I drink? Or if I'm using drugs? No. You didn't. You just assume that I am bummed because of the global climate. Just down in the dumps right now. I should probably just eat better, right? That will fix it. Do you think I'm retarded? Are YOU retarded?" That's what I wanted to say. I didn't, of course.

It was just inane. I felt like I was talking to a dumber version of myself, not to a doctor.

It's not even that I necessarily want to go on medication. And if I were to go on medication, I'd want it to be a very low dose of something that I could go off of easily. But I don't want the idea that this might be chemical to be swept under the rug with her "Go to the gym!" broom so easily.

All that said, after staring into her dead eyes for ten minutes, I didn't press the issue further. I didn't want to play doctor and suggest a drug for myself, to walk out of there with a prescription for Zoloft that I'd talked her into giving me. Because that's not what I'm looking for. I'm looking for something mild, something maybe structured to treat someone seasonally. And I might not even be looking for that. I'm just looking for someone to look at my actual history and my actual habits and say hm, it's probably chemical. And when it's chemical, you do have the option of taking medicine to help you. Or, hm, it's probably seasonal. Here are your options. Not, hm, you're stressed because of the Dow Jones.

I know that when I get out of this job, I will be infinitely happier. I know that it's not just (or maybe not at all ) the people and the environment. I know that I'm also someone who LIVES to be outside, who loves the sunshine, even when its cold out, loves to exercise and be active. I am someone who does not like sitting in front of a computer for long stretches of time, nor am I someone who has ever functioned well having to be somewhere at the same time every morning for 5 days in a row each week. The idea that entire days of my young life are passing me by in 9 hour chunks, while I sit here inside this room with people who's priorities are so vastly different from mine, is so painful to me.

So I'm going to trust that planning my escape route over the next few months and handing in my notice by the end of next January, if not sooner, is going to bring me some more contentment. I'm also going to trust that the day I actually turn my back on my office career forever is going to be one of my happiest. And I'm lastly going to trust that the return of the sunshine and warmer weather will be lovely.

I needed to get out of debt and get my fiscal and tangible life in order. This job helped me to do that. Now I need to help myself onto something more fulfilling.

But eff that stupid doctor. I do not like her.

In much lighter news, my improv team was kept together for 2009, and two amazing ladies were added to the team, to fill in the slots of two people who left the team last year for personal reasons. We had our first show of 2009 last night and it was a blast. We had so much fun and I know that improv is going to be a saving grace for me this year. The people, the community, and the art form itself are all very healing. And last night's show was no exception. I had a lot of fun. It's also a slightly earlier time slot than my Wednesday night shows were in 2008. So I'm glad for that as well.

Exercise and eating right, as I noted above, is going really well. The blip from the holidays is behind me and I'm back on track and feeling great. My scale's battery died a few weeks ago and I've yet to replace it. The freedom from weighing myself every day has been really nice. I like to weigh myself a lot. But I hadn't tried to go without it for a good chunk of time in a while. And it's so refreshing. I've decided that for as long as I can stand it, I'm only going to weigh in once a month. Crazy, right? We'll see how it goes. I will count January 1st's weight as my starting weight for 2009 (even though it was a bit high from festivities the night before), and I will weigh myself again on February 1st. I anticipate that I will have lost about 5 pounds, so I'm excited for that. Not weighing myself is actually helping me to be MORE conscious of my eating right now. Cool.

I just impulsively booked a super cheap hour long massage ($39!!) at this amazing place near my work. I'm gonna go tonight after work. My back has been spasming all day today and as much as a good workout sounds like a nice idea tonight, I think I'll take my lunch break this afternoon to go get some cardio done and then get my massage on instead tonight. Tomorrow will definitely need to include some power yoga and/or weight training for the ol' muscles.

Sweet Kevin is sick with a fever right now. So after the massage, I think I'll go home and make him some supper and put him to bed. :)

Shifts

That's my friend Daniel and me on New Year's Eve.

Anyway, I just had an unexpected snack consisting of leftover Chipotle tortilla chips. They were yummy, salty, and slightly flavored with lime. It may not have been the best snack choice, considering I have an apple and a banana sitting on my desk right now, but...whatevuh.

Kevin and I had a date last night. Asian food. So yummy. We go to this place called FriendHouse that we just love. They have sushi, Thai, and Chinese food and they do it all equally well. We ordered a few different sushi rolls, some edamame, some chicken with spicy garlic sauce and mixed veggies, and sake. It was very delicious. I possibly overate a bit. But, what can ya do. We had great, energetic conversation about some major shifts that are happening in our lives. It was nice.

He adorably showed up to meet up with me with two new DVDs for us - House, Season 4 (I'm currently beyond obsessed with House) and The Office (British version of course!), which we've both seen but are excited to see again. So we headed straight home after dinner to snuggle in and watch an episode from each.

I could barely keep my eyes open near the end of the second episode. So I excused myself to bed and fell instantly to sleep. The cat woke me up ridiculously early this morning on more than one occasion so I still feel tired despite getting a good 8.5 hours.

I ate some sweets when I got home last night. Not necessary. But it happened. I am still finding my groove after vacation. So I'm not surprised that there have been a few stumbles along the way. It will all iron itself out in good time.

I woke up in a grumpy mood this morning. I decided to sleep a bit longer rather than do my yoga, which is good and bad. The sleep was nice, but he yoga really helps me not only to feel more physically relaxed and centered throughout the day but it also helps me not be such a raving bitch inside my own head about the world around me. ;)

Work is not great today. I have a personal problem with a couple of the really brash personalities here. And lucky for me, I sit right near both of them, can hear them talking (yelling) all day long, and am unavoidably exposed to their stress/psychosis levels all day long. It's impossible not to absorb some of that energy when you're near it for 8 hours in a row. People do that, you know, absorb and can intuitively sense each other's energy even if they don't realize they're doing it. Women do it more than men, science says. We subconsciously "mirror" each other, as a highly intuitive way to communicate and relate to one another, so that we can sense danger or need in the world around us. But it can also work against us, like when someone you work with is a fucking nutcase.

One of the women in particular is off her rocker. I've probably written about her before. And I'll probably write a book about her some day. She's a long list of ugly adjectives that I probably shouldn't share because I've either shared them before, or because I, more importantly, don't need to work myself up into a fit over it. But let's just say, her personality is really difficult for me to be around. And I find myself literally having to breathe through it daily. Like, she says stuff that gets so under my skin on the regular, treats people with such ire, disrespect, and bitterness, while always playing the martyr, that my newest solution is to simply breathe, focus on my breath, and remind myself to feel sorry for her rather than rail against her inside my own head. Which is, as the saying goes "like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die."

It's tough to remind myself to breathe through her nonsense. But it has actually made a small difference from time to time. Because before the New Year (a resolution of mine is to practice more compassion and patience), my coping mechanism in 2008 for situations like this was to basically just run through a litany of nastiness in my mind, calling the subject of my rage nasty names, saying biting, sarcastic things under my breath, rolling my eyes, huffing and puffing, and complaining to whoever would listen when I got the chance. So I think I'm much better off trying to calm myself down and remind myself that I'm only making myself sick when I become infuriated by someone else's illness.

(All that nobly said, this bitch makes me want to put my - and her - head through a fucking glass wall.)

PHEW. >Breathes in and out.< Ahhhhh.....

In other news, Kevin, my darling boyfriend, just accepted a new job! He left his last job, Executive Producer of a post-production house for television commercials, in 2007. He spent 7 years at that job (and 5 at an equally intense job before that one) and it exhausted him to no end. He finally left it two summers ago to make some time and space in his life for other things, most specifically, his mental wellness and sense of self outside the workplace.

He has spent the last year and a half doing just that. He's occasionally freelanced as a producer during this time (as he's very well respected and well liked in his industry), and he's also booked voiceover jobs (he's done the voices on a couple national commercials that I'm sure you've all seen), acting jobs, and done a ton of performing with his improv group. He's also done a great deal of stuff with my sketch group - he's invaluable to us in his tireless and helpful efforts. He's also done lots of shooting, directing, and editing of comedy shorts and films. It's been impressive to watch this man unfold himself in this way; after 12 years of constant career building, he's focused on what he wanted rather than what he thought he should do, and he's had a very rich experience doing so. I remain so proud of him throughout all of it.

It has been challenging at times, of course. Not knowing what would happen next has been equally scary and freeing for him. But he's been such a soldier throughout it all, trusting above all else that staying open to what's possible would bring the next thing and the next thing into his life, without fail.

He decided at the end of this past November that he wanted to look for a full time job again. This economy makes it tough to know how stable freelance work will be in the coming months. And he's also just ready for a change of pace. He's been his own boss, had his own schedule, and done his own thing for the last 18 months. And now he's looking forward to going back to the workin' world to try to marry the two lifestyles.

Of course, that can also be scary. But he's accepted a great job that will be perfect for this time in his life, I think. In fact, he originally turned this job down but they called him back and really sweetened the deal - they just had to have him! His proud girlfriend loves that of course. ;) He's going to use this new experience to practice striking a better work/life balance. And one of the best parts about this position is how open they are to him having a life outside work. They've basically given him the go ahead to continue to pursue his artistic and creative interests as much as he wants to in order to feel fulfilled. That was part of the "sweetened" deal. So he will be making his own schedule in order to support that. The guy who hired him has been awesome about respecting who Kevin his outside what he does to earn a paycheck. I love that.

So that's a big shift that is about to happen in our lives.

I'm excited for him. And beyond how it will change his world, I will no longer be able to send him an urgent email asking that he set the DVR to record something! ;) Plus, our laundry won't be done nearly as often (nor with the incredible skill and patience). And our cats won't have their dad home with them most days. But he will also be getting up with me in the mornings (yaaay!) and maybe even traveling into the city with me for work.

Me and my needs aside, I think this is gonna be a really good thing for him. He's looking forward to it, I think, and itchy to get started. He's going in to sign the contract on Monday and will likely go into the office a little bit next week, slowly ramping up into his new life! I can't believe it. :) It's always nice to know that your income is stable and that you have a new routine to invest in.

What else - I didn't work out yesterday, consciously. I needed a day off. Plus, I expected to be pretty sore from some new leg stuff I'd done at the gym earlier in the week, but I wasn't. And then, I woke up this morning barely able to walk. Ha. Typical. I'm going to go to the gym tonight after work for a long cardio session and some ab and upper body work, so it should be all good.

I'm taking a "me" night tonight. Kevin's planning to go see an improv show (a really really good one that I love going to see) and then he's going to perform in a show of his own. Normally I'd happy to spend the night out with him, doing both of these things with perhaps some dinner somewhere in between. But I decided early in the week that I'd be taking the night off tonight. I need it. This week, my first back after vacation, has been a whirlwind, and even though it feels as though I've been back at work for at least a month already, I'm still in a bit of a tailspin from the last few weeks overall. I need to be alone and decompress tonight, before my busy weekend.

So I'll gym it tonight for as luxuriously long as my little heart desires, maybe even throw some sauna time in, since it's frigid here today. And then I'll go home, scare up some supper, and probably settle into my couch with a glass of wine and a House episode. I predict an early bedtime. :) Love it.

Tomorrow we might go see Kevin's family in the suburbs. But it's supposed to snow so that plan might get rainchecked for a better weather day. If we DO go see them, we'll also make a stop at the huge mall near their house. Kevin needs some new clothes for work and I need a new backpack, new running shoes, a cast iron skillet, new bras, and new jeans! Wahooo!!! The trip might not happen at all though. We'll see.

Then Saturday night is the HST show, and Sunday are auditions for the 2009 "house teams" at the theater where we do improv. Kevin and I are both already on house teams, but every January they re-audition the current players, audition new players, and decide if they're going to cut teams, take people off teams, add people to teams, create new teams, etc. So it's a bit of wait-n-see. I'm hoping my improv group, The Baldwins, remains together, but you never know. So that will be Sunday. I hope to get to the grocery store at some point this weekend too. We need it. We got NOTHIN'.

I am having to pull my own teeth out to get myself to do any work today. I just don't feel like it. Showing up here each morning for the last five days has been effort enough, I think. So I'll probably do whatever tasks I have to in order to make Monday bearable, and spend the rest of the day daydreaming about the Florida beach house I'll own someday. ;)

Emergence.

HI! I'm back.

I have had the desire to update this thing several times in the last days and weeks but things have been relatively nonstop. And before that, when things were stopped, I was happy to let them remain exactly that way.

All is well with me. I have been posting bits and pieces over here, at my "regular" blog (or the blog that doesn't detail my OCD weight loss habits).

I feel like there's so much to say. But is there really? I had a fantastic 2 weeks off work. It was wonderful, holidays aside, to be away from the office, away from my routine, and out of the city for most of that time. I find that my true habitual self tends to emerge, and happily so, when I'm given that kind of space and freedom. I know some people say they really thrive in a routine. And I think I like routines too, but I thrive MOST when my routine is 100% controlled by me. As opposed to being impacted by having to be at work, for example.

The holidays were great. I was in Quincy, Illinois,  (5 hours south of Chicago) where my grandparents live, for Christmas. It was so great to see the family. I'm a sucker for that kind of sentimental stuff. I love the holidays and I love the traditions that I can always count on. I got to spend a tiny bit of really great quality time with each of my grandparents, which is absolutely invaluable to me, and I got to spend plenty of time chatting and hanging out with my cousins, aunts and uncles. It was so nice. Kevin came along. He's Jewish so his family doesn't really do a Christmas celebration. They usually do get together on or near Christmas day but they all had other plans this year so I got to drag him down to the boondocks of the midwest.

The weather was cold, icy, and generally shitty, affecting lots of people's travel, but we lucked out and only experienced a few minor inconveniences in that respect. Kevin also met my dad for the first time ever (my parents are divorced and I rarely see him) which was interesting for everyone.

All in all, it gave me such a sense of peace to be in a familiar place (I was born in Quincy, IL and spent the first 4 years of my life there - and have visited a lot ever since), in a familiar house, with the people who mean the most to me in the world. It has taken me 28 years to realize what a part of them I am, what a part of me they are, and how genetically and emotionally we are all so connected, regardless of the mini dramas we might like to create for ourselves about family and how stressful it can be. I'm a sap like that.

I spent the few days there resting, eating, napping, watching TV, chatting, and generally relaxing. I also reset the hell out of my previously whacked sleep schedule. Awesome.

Backtracking a bit - the days leading up to leaving New York for the break were pretty insane, in retrospect. Every hour found both Kevin and I with some other task or errand. Kevin was working furiously on editing a short film, which had to be finished before we left town (except he wasn't able to finish it and had to bring his computer AND external hard drive along for the trip!) and I was a holiday nut.

Baking, cooking, mixing, buying, wrapping, packing, listing - it was nuts.

My master plan was to bake a good portion of my Christmas gifts because I couldn't afford to buy people presents. I baked gifts for the people at work that I had to give to, for Kevin's family, and for the handful of generous friends who agreed to come over and look in on our cats (Kevin calls them "the dogs") while we were away for 7 days. I also bought little silly presents for all the cat sitters, that I arranged on our table for them to discover when they stopped by.

Not having ever been a big baker, I didn't realize the task that lay ahead until I was well into it. It took a lot more time and energy than I'd expected, and several late late nights, for me to get all this in order:

I will say that it all turned out much better than I expected. The baked goods were a huge hit. I made dark chocolate walnut brownies, coconut chocolate chip pecan cookies, sugar star sandwich cookies, and a spiced nut and pretzel mix for the non-sweets-eaters (aka the aliens).

I discovered that I truly enjoying baking. Like, enough to add it to my list of potential dream careers. ;) So that's cool.

Flash forward to a couple days after Christmas. Kevin and I left the Quincy, IL to head to Venice, Florida. Venice is about 20 minutes south of Sarasota, about an hour south of Tampa, on the gulf coast. My mom and her husband, Tom, have a condo there, and Tom's mother (my step-grandmother) also owns a beautiful home there. Tom was in Florida on Christmas to be with his mother, but just after Christmas his mother traveled north to see more family. Tom stayed behind, my mom flew down to meet up with him after she spent Christmas day in Quincy with us, and Kevin and I flew down to meet them a few days later. My aunt Lisa, my mom's sister-in-law, was also along for the journey. We all stayed at Tom's mother's lovely Floridian home.

So the five of us, Mom, Tom, Kevin, Aunt Lisa, and I, spent an amazing 4 days together in the sunny fun. We got drunk before noon on more than one occasion, we ate merrily, we laid in the perfect perfect sun (it was nearing 80 degrees without a cloud in the sky each and every day), exercised (I had several great runs and did some lovely yoga), and most importantly we spent time together, catching up, chatting about life, chatting about bullshit, watching TV and movies, and bonding. We never get to see each other like this, since we live so far apart, where there's nothing of consequence to do but relax. So it was really nice and I was really really sad to leave. It was very hard to return to cold, lonely, non-holiday New York.

But I'm readjusting. Getting back into the groove. I had a few extra vacation days after Florida, which was really nice. Despite my winter blues upon returning to the big city, it was still good to have some time to clean the apartment and chill out in my own house.

Returning to work was, again, really tough. I was walking around the office in a cloud for the first two or three days, but today is day four and I'm feeling okay. I hate that vacation feels like it was already months ago. But I'm glad to feel the fog lifting. I was hating the world for a while there. As I detailed here.

So if you haven't surmised from the other blog, my facebook statuses, or a conversation we may have had in real life, I'm ready to quit my job. That's the long and short of what's been going on for me since the new year dawned. And for the last 12 months as well, to be honest.

In November, I celebrated one year at this job. I knew when I started it that it was just to get me back on track financially. Getting fired from my university job in October of 2006 was one of the best things that's ever happened to me. It kicked me in the stomach in a way that I needed. I temped for a year and then returned to this job (a job I had right after graduating college several years earlier) for more stability and for health insurance. But again, I've always known it would just be a place marker.

I got fired from my job at NYU at a time when I was already looking for ways "out" of the office lifestyle. But being unexpectedly without income was not the best way for me to officially make the shift. Regaining some stability became top priority and other career dreams got pushed to the back burner when I got fired.

I am thrilled to say that after a couple years of careful financial planning, combined with my nature having grown more responsible and my priorities having shifted as my age increases, I am at a place now, at age 28, that feels calm, safe, and content in comparison to the rest of my 20's. My finances are stable, my health is fantastic, my relationship is fulfilling, my living situation is lovely, my cats are happy, my job isn't in danger, I'm performing comedy and landing acting jobs. Even though things have been pretty good for me for the last 5 or 6 years in general, things have been *this* good and all-around stable, ever. So that's really awesome.

So of course, I'm ready for the next thing.  I want to find a career that is spiritually fulfilling, allows me much more control over my own reality than I currently have, and allows me the financial freedom to - say - live in Florida during the winter months. Because I love big city life. But I also LOVE the warm weather. I'm like a cat. I'm happiest when I'm laying in a spot of sun, napping.

As far as finding that career, I know it can be done, whatever "it" ends up being. The most important thing to me right now, as silly as this might sound, is finding a job where I don't have to sit at a desk. My body is suffering in immeasurable ways from the fact that my days are spent staring an electronic screen, typing, and answering the phone.

For whatever reason, whether it be my relationship to my body due to having lost a lot of weight, or my acting degree which focused a great deal on the human body and one's awareness of one's own, I am very intune to myself physically. When something feels out of whack, I know right away. It's why I love yoga, why I am a runner (because it makes my body feel incredible), and why I can't sit at this desk anymore.

Not to be dramatic or sound like an old lady but: my wrists hurt, my hips hurt, my left shoulder is in acute and active pain every single day, my back hurts, my neck hurts, I feel like my spine has rounded, my eyes hurt, I got my first ever migraine a month ago from looking at this computer screen all day. (That SUCKED. Holy shit, I had no idea.) I concentrate a lot on doing whatever I can to better these annoyances. I stretch out a few times a day in the office, I do yoga in the mornings before work now (New Year's resolution), I had them install a fancy new keyboard drawer, I changed the height of my monitor, I sit up straight like a total nerd all day long. I'm not sure what more there is to do but to simply get the fuck away from the problem: THE DESK JOB LIFE.

So that's issue #1. Issue #2 is that I don't care to be an administrative aide my whole life. Who does? The women here, and many of the others I've encountered in my career as an office employee, who have been admins for years and years don't seem very happy at all. Some of the ones I currently know are some of the most unpleasant people in my life. I can only imagine it's because it's not a very fulfilling job. Resentment breeds and regrets are many, in the case of these women I've observed. (Doesn't mean that's true for everyone, of course.)

I love acting and comedy and performing and writing comedy. But I don't think now, like I did think even just a year ago, that I can be fulfilled by that either, the way I want to be fulfilled. It's a great hobby. And I have had some of the best experiences of my life and made some of the best friends I'll ever have because of that part of my life. And if I were offered a job doing any one of those things I would eagerly accept it. It's fun and rewarding and enjoyable and easy as hell. And I'm good at it. I hope to be able to do it in some capacity for my entire life. I just recently booked and shot a web commercial for which I made a healthy chunk of cash. And it was a great experience. But it can't be counted on to be financially stable, at least not now. I will absolutely stay open to those things and when the opportunities present themselves, I will even work hard to get them. But I want more too.

I'm not sure what "more" will be yet. I have a lot of ideas. Some big, some small. Some are ideas about how I will logistically and financially move out of this current job in the next 12-14 months - what can I do that will still pay my bills and provide me with health coverage, but that doesn't involve sitting at desk and that will be in line with my passions, interests and will be a good stepping stone for whatever I end up deciding The Big Picture should include. And some are much grander ideas. About The Big Picture. The kinds of businesses I daydream of starting someday, the kinds of services I daydream of providing people someday, the kinds of industries I'd like to involve myself in, the ways I'd like to spend my time day to day someday. I have no idea what's in store. But I've decided to live by two things:

1. I am open to ANYTHING that meets the requirements of  being spiritually fulfilling and allowing me my freedom. And I will stay open to it all by being positive, welcoming, listening to my feelings, and saying yes.

2. This does not have to be hard and it will be not be. It's actually very simple.

The "simple" thing was a realization I had in Florida while taking a yoga class on the beach one morning. Desiring a different career and therefore a different lifestyle is not something only special people get to do, or only certain people get to do. It is the right of everyone who wants it. And it is only as complicated, stressful, and up-a-mountain-like as I make it. It doesn't mean the actual journey won't be difficult or confusing or won't require a great deal of patience and courage. But it does mean that I don't need to act as though it's some huge, insurmountable task. That just invites drama. And I don't want to invite drama. I want a fulfilling career. Simple. Once I choose to believe that, and live it, all that's left is to do it.

So that's where I am, mentally right now. My brain is working overtime processing it all, creating a new way of thinking and being so that I can make these dreams, whatever they end up being in their real-world form, come true.

I got a new tattoo on my forearm in Florida, which I adore. It was a spontaneous decision and I'm glad I did it.

Exercise and food (oh yeah) is as steady as ever. I lost 10.2 pounds in 2008. I gained 2.4 pounds during my vacation, and I'm feelin good. My goal for 2009 is to lose 20 pounds! Yikes! I know I can do it. I'm not going to obsess about it, it's just something to keep in the back of my mind. Losing 20 pounds will put me at a totally, completely normal healthy weight wherein I won't feel like I need to lose another single pound (hopefully). I'm content with my body now and would be fine to look exactly like this forever, but having the goal is a good motivation.

I'm enjoying exercise, doing yoga in the mornings and my regular stuff the rest of the time, and trying to get back into a normal eating groove after the freeforall at the end of December. ;)

I'm sure there's more I've forgotten but this is already long enough. In the coming days I'll post an About Me 08/09 List that I've been doing for the last couple years, courtesy of my friend Sarah, which you probably don't care about, but I do. I've got a few resolutions so I'll write them there.

Happy 2009, all! It's good to be back.