Baby steps

Posted 6:55 PM by Michelle
It's hard to believe that I've only been at my new job for five days. I've learned so much, but have so far to go, and there doesn't seem to be enough hours in the day. I've been forcing myself to go home after nine hours or so, but I could easily, easily work ten or eleven hour days and still not feel like I've done all I have to do. I dropped the ball several times at my last job, and I was afraid that I'd do that again here, but I'm getting re-acquainted with my true self: the one that needs to be busy to be successful. I had so many "Office Space" moments at my last job that it became the status quo- sometimes working for maybe fifteen or twenty minutes in an eight-hour day. I didn't have nearly enough to do.

I'm on salary for the first time in my life, which means there is no time clock, only results to show what work you've done in any given day. Before, I'd pray for the eight hours to be up, and then I'd also pray that something would keep me longer than the eight hours so I could cash in some overtime. Now, well, the only time I really look at the clock is when I feel like it might be getting close to six and so maybe I ought to think about going home. I don't have to be at work at a specific time, I just have to show up for meetings and show up for myself and the work that needs to be done. I'm already plotting tomorrow, and next week, and two weeks from now, because I want to do what I am doing. It's beyond refreshing- it's exhilarating.

I've also signed up to volunteer once a week at the Democratic Headquarters in my town. They have a huge office space, furniture and computers, all donated, and they are opening at the end of the month. Finally, something concrete to do rather than shoot off my mouth all the time. I have heard conflicting reports on the political slant in this valley, but I know there are shabbily Republicans out there somewhere and I'm just the person to sway them. Or push them over, if I have to.

In other strange news... I have two dates this week. With different people. I think I've only gone on one real "date" in over three years, and that immediately turned into a wee love affair with a baker. One date is with a winemaker, another with a restaurant GM. I can only hope they don't Google me before the dates, because it's just not fair. The GM seems like a totally cool guy... but I've gotten pretty good at being rational about this whole thing. I certainly have high hopes, but not high enough to make real disappointment a possibility. I'd sure like to meet someone wonderful, and I think it shows great strides that I'm even giving it a shot. I have to give props to my baker, my sweet baker, who was a flash of gold in the mud of my love life.

Bearing Fruit

Posted 1:59 PM by Michelle
Last night we had yet another fabulous wine dinner at Chez Elizabeth. Usually we pick a varietal and then build a menu around it; this time we all tried to bring wine that the others hadn't heard of. And just in case you think that our wine dinners are all work and no play, please notice the notebook and Elizabeth's furiously working hand in the right of this picture:





The wine we are drinking, Humanitas, is some pretty good juice. I particularly like it because like Paul Newman's company, all of the proceeds go to charity. Check it out. Drink it at your wedding. You just might up lucky like my mac-daddy friend Jon.





But in even more exciting news, I was staking my tomato plants this morning, and as I was rearragning the stalks, a little something fell from the branches:





That right there is the first fruit to fall from my garden. It is the tiniest little Green Zebra heirloom tomoato ever, but it is a testament to the sad little patch of ground I call my own.

I put the little guy next to some big brothers in hopes that he will spread the word that his fellow tomatoes should grow up big and strong.





Mom, clearly you did not know the monster you created when you bought me a digital camera. But I'm taking the advice of my big brother Ian who says he sometimes writes entire blogs, then goes back and erases them and posts nothing but a picture. I hope my days of alienating old family friends with pathetic blogs are over. Welcome to the world of my tomatoes!

I am not someone who necessarily believes in better living through pharmacueticals, but currently, technology is serving me beautifully. I'd like to give a shout out to a few things making my life a billion times better:

1. My Olympus D-540 Zoom Digital Camera
2. My iPod
3. iTunes (particularly the "Party Shuffle")
4. iPhoto
5. My Magic Chef Wine Cooler
6. My i705 Palm Pilot
7. My spanky new domain
8. Space Cat Litter (made of space-age polymers the absort both odor and liquid)