Presumed to be awesome.

In sum:

Work = CRAY. ZEE.

Home = Crowded.

Me = Losing it!



Dear gods, I feel as if I'm hanging on to my sanity by the very tips of my fingernails. At any given moment today it felt as if just one more thing was going to push me right over into a meltdown. Somehow, although there were too many one more things to even count, I didn't (a) kill anyone, (b) scream, or (c) cry. So, really, I have to call that a win.

In MUCH better news, though, Muse announced a second Arizona show, this one in Tucson on Sunday, April 11th, two days after their Phoenix show, headlining a one day music festival that's also going to include 30 Seconds to Mars, the Silversun Pickups, and Switchfoot! Awesome lineup! Needless to say, I will be in Tucson on April 11th! Muse!!! Twice!!! Pure awesomeness!!! (As an aside, though, what the hell is with still not having an L.A. show??? *boggles*)

And, also of the (extreme) good, assuming of course that I manage to survive this week, on Saturday I'm seeing ADAM LAMBERT IN CONCERT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! *flails madly* I've been so overwhelmed this week, that I haven't even been able to flail properly over this. But, OMFG, less than 72 hours!!! That's going to be my motivation for making it through this hellish week: a weekend at a casino/resort, getting to hang with coolwhipdiva and _lisalisa_, lots and lots of alcohol, and rocking the hell out with the ever fierce, ever glittery Adam Lambert! Exciting!

So, someone (*cough*azewewish*cough*) wanted me to post about something other than Adam Lambert. Seriously. What is wrong with some people? *shakes head*

Apparently, "LIFE IS GOOD," lacked sufficient details to be considered a substantive post. I thought it was both accurate and succinct. But, whatever. Here, for my friends who are less entranced by the shiny boy than I am, are some of the accompanying details:

:: Work is still going really, really well. Three months in and I'm still firmly convinced that this was the right move for me. Bossman is giving me a ton of responsibility and, based on what he's said, is really wanting me to take a prominent role in the growth and sustainability of the practice. We've just launched a new marketing campaign featuring yours truly and the other senior attorney in the office. What's really cool is that we're the only firm in the Valley who features female attorneys in our marketing. I'm really proud of this.

:: A huge factor in the LIFE IS GOOD situation is that I can definitively say that right now I have the best work/life balance that I've ever had since I started practicing law. I cannot begin to tell you how AWESOME that is! Definitely a big part of what I was going for when I chose "harmony" as my word for this year.

:: The Trainer is still regularly kicking my ass, and I sort of love it. The boxing is SO cathartic, and, now that I think about it, probably a factor in the great sense of balance I'm enjoying right now. I'm still looking to add in some dance or some regularity with Nia into my routine, but, one step at a time, you know? Also on the health and wellness front, I decided I needed a little more mindfulness in my nutritional choices, so I rejoined Weight Watchers -- two weeks and 4 pounds down! Go me!

:: The summer is at the miserably hot stage around here (I am SO over 115 degree days), but at least it's moving quickly. July is almost over. Geesh! When did that happen??? August is going to be a whirlwind. I'm heading to L.A. mid-August for a birthday weekend with my L.A. girls and then some vacay time with my family in San Diego. The following weekend hewet_ka_ptah will be here for some birthday celebrations. And then the weekend after that...well, let's just say that there are some glittery shenanigans afoot and I'm ridiculously excited about it! *g* Labor Day weekend (technically September, but it feels like part of the whirlwind), I'm heading back to L.A. to catch NIN in concert. Eeee!!! So many Good Times ahead! In between all that, I've got a birthday, a trial to prepare for, several family things planned, and, you know, LIFE to attend to. Whew. That's a crazy month coming up!

:: Since this is the extended Life is Good post, we shall not speak of The Boy, who flaked like a bad case of dandruff. Whatever, man. You gotta bring a helluva lot more than he seemed to have in order to keep my interest. Moving on. Life IS good, after all. *g*

:: We're also not going to speak of the RAGE that I feel over the D'backs' Faux Manager's decision to start Miguel Montero instead of Chris Snyder behind the plate. What the ever loving fuck??? Sure, Miguel's had a hot streak at bat, but, call me crazy, but isn't it kind of important for your catcher to be able to make the throw to second? Or call a smart game so that your depleted pitching staff doesn't run up its pitch count in less than six innings? Or, you know, have ANY defensive value at all? Argh! I, just...RAGE!!!!!

*deep breaths* Life is good, life is good, life is good.... Ok. That's better.

So, now that y'all got some of the deets, I wanna know what's good in your life too! Share with me, bbs!

Also, I'd like to point out that there is no mention of one Glittery Alien from the Planet Fierce in this post. You happy now, azewewish? :P

Today was a ridiculously long day. Seriously, meetings that are going to last 4 1/2 hours should come with a warning so that I can pack snacks (and extra coffee, lots of coffee!). I'm wiped. So this will be short. Short lists! Because lists make me feel better. :)

The suck:
- meetings that last 4 1/2 hours
- the headache that resulted from a tragic lack of caffeine during said meeting
- the unfortunate state of my "to do" list after a day spent mostly in meetings
- my bb, Chris Snyder placed on the DL *sadface*

The awesome:
- still really diggin' my job
- gorgeous rainbow arching across the sky on my drive home
- conversations with good friends
- making plans with azewewish to see Down in L.A. in August...Philip!!!!!!!!!!
- Spa Day this weekend -- I cannot even adequately explain how desperate I am for a pedicure.
- looking forward to a weekend in Ojai celebrating J's fabulousness
- ( this! )

Wow. This week just flew by. It was good though. Or mostly good. Let's discuss the good first, shall we?

First, the Awesome New Job is still AWESOME! I'm digging into to some really interesting cases, with all the responsibility and autonomy that I was promised. I'm getting to know my co-workers and my initial impression that these are folks who I'll like working with is holding true. We have lunch together as a firm on Fridays, and last night after work we all hung around having a beer! So, while everyone is expected to work hard (I didn't leave the office before 7 this week), everyone also works together and gets along, and I still think this was the perfect move for me! Yay!

Second, Supernatural rocked my world this week! I don't even want to talk about it until after the finale, but I'm so glad that the creative team aren't pulling any punches so far.

Third in the "good" column, I just had a kick ass workout with The Trainer Man. With being sick last week, and the new job this week, I hadn't had a training session in going on two weeks. Now that I have a better idea of what my schedule is going to look like, I'm hoping to bump things up to two sessions a week soon. Getting my LIFE back on a semi-predictable schedule makes me happy!

Finally, of the good, I'm getting ready to head down to Tucson for a Mothers' Day Shindig with La Familia! Yummy food, copious amounts of margaritas, and fun times by the pool! PLUS, I'll also get to hang out with hewet_ka_ptah who I haven't seen in approximately an eternity! Good times!!!

Of the not so good this week is the complete clusterfuck that is the D'backs front office and the new coaching team. *shakes head* Firing Bob Melvin was bad enough, although somewhat understandable given the crappy start the team has had this season. I still think, though, that given the success he's had with this very same team the past two seasons, they owed it to him to at least give him to the All-Star break to see if he could turn things around. But whatever. The team sucks, someone has to go. I get that. What I completely don't get is their decision to replace Bo-Mel with A.J. Hinkle who has ZERO managerial experience AT ANY LEVEL (but who does happen to be BFFs with GM Josh Byrnes). Even more incomprehensible, is that they thought it was a good idea to give this completely untried, inexperienced, newbie A THREE YEAR CONTRACT!!! WTF???? It's one thing if you want to shake things up, try something new, get some fresh blood in with an unconventional managerial choice; it's a whole other thing to tie your experiment down to a three year agreement! Seriously, I can't even begin to wrap my head around this. Apparently I'm not the only one who thinks Josh Byrnes has lost his mind. That Dilbert-speak? How is that supposed to translate to better baseball??? Seriously, man, the mind just boggles.

I'm not even going to get into the Manny fiasco. Inexcusable, man. Completely inexcusable.

So, apparently all my bad news this week centered around baseball. *laughs* In good baseball news, though, I was at the Awesome New Job exactly 2 1/2 days before I had convinced everyone that a firm field trip to a home game was ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY in the near future! With the D'backs crazy schedule, it looks as if won't happen until the Astros series in June. But, YAY! MOAR BASEBALL!!! (editorzon is right: no one is safe from the Baseball Borg!)

Anyway, I hope everyone is having a good weekend. Much happiness and love to all the moms on my flist! *mwah*

:: OMG people! Work is killing me this week! Doesn't it know that I've already mentally checked out and just want to get on with this damn job search??? Why must it continue to harangue me??? *cries*

:: In happier work-related ramblings, though, I was able to negotiate a really good result for a client today; he was very pleased and grateful and it was just SATISFYING. Go me! \o/

:: Also of the good, I have an interview this Friday with a small firm that looks promising. *fingers crossed*

:: NBC is moving Kings to Saturdays. This does not bode well for the survival of the show. This displeases me greatly because Kings is all that is awesome and fabulous!

:: I get to watch my Diamondbacks play in just 10 minutes! *glee* The Opening Day glow has not worn off. I'm still giddy over the start of the season!

:: Speaking of baseball (and I'll likely be doing a lot of that until October), how 'bout a baseball fans friending meme? MOAR BASEBALL!!! MOAR BASEBALL FANS!!! There is no bad here, people!!!


Baseball friending meme!

Today I was reminded that I do not, in fact, know what it's like to be a black man accused of a crime and tangled up in our seemingly endless and too often unjust criminal justice system. The reminder left me feeling more helpless than I've felt in a long time. And yet, while it's true that there's no way for me to understand, I'm trying to remind myself that what I can do is my best to be an effective advocate. Sometimes, though, work manages to suck the hope right out of my day.

In significantly less bleak news, my schoolgirl crush on President Obama continues unabated. Seriously, whenever I think I can't love him any more, someone goes and posts ( a picture like this: )

I prefer to think of my unabashed fangirling of our President as patriotic enthusiasm, though. *g*

And, a quick note to local flisters: Super Bowl Party!!! Whether wearing Cardinals red or waving your Terrible Towels, y'all are invited. Ping me if you need an address.

I made significant progress in organizing MY LIFE today. Well, not my entire life. But my work life is quite a bit more organized. There is still quite a ways to go, and, more than digging through the pit of chaos that is my home office, I need to work on developing PROCESSES for staying organized (without a secretary - organization was so much simpler when I had a support staff *sighs*). But the fact that tonight I can see significant portions of my desk and that most of my files are neatly labeled and that the piles of paperwork have been sorted and that I have sticky notes (bright pink ones!) on all the files indicating the next case management steps MAKES ME EXCEEDINGLY HAPPY!

You know what else is making me exceedingly happy tonight? Chris Snyder will be with the D'backs for at least the next three years!!! CHRIS!!! *so much love* And he's mine a Diamondback until at least 2011! *glee*

And since we're on the topic of all things awesome, I will be going to the Cardinals/Falcons playoff game on Saturday!!! Playoffs are a rare thing for the Cardinals. As I told my brother, we may be in our 50s the next time this opportunity rolls around again. *laughs* So I'm pretty damn excited to be going to the game. It should be fun!

Also awesome: I will be meeting ladymairwen for lunch tomorrow and a good ol' gab session. Yay! After that I have a client meeting before I call it a New Year's holiday. My New Year's celebration shall consist of fancy desserts from AJ's, and Chinese food delivery, and a bottle or so of wine, and lazying about in PJs watching movies until the New Year! Perfection! How will you be ringing in the new year?

Dear gods this day started way too early. I have a motion that I need to file today, before noon as I have an afternoon court hearing, and last night I just ran out of steam sometime after midnight. So I was up again this morning before 6 to finish it. There really isn't enough coffee in the world to make me feel awake enough to deal with this day. *cries*

The motion, though, is coming along nicely. I have just one section that I need to tweak a bit, then a final review before I send it off on the electronic highway for filing. It is, if I may say so myself, a damn fine example of legal writing and persuasive argument. I, quite obviously, rock! *g*

After court today I plan to make a bit more progress on the holiday shopping front, as I will be knee deep in trial prep for most of the weekend. I also need to get caught up on laundry and life in general as next weekend I'll be heading to California with Niece Child the Eldest for a weekend at Disneyland. How is it that December is flying by so quickly??? *boggles*

Any how, I hope y'all are enjoying the hell out of Friday. I especially hope that poisontaster is enjoying the hell out of this Friday because this one happens to be her birthday!!! Happiest of birthdays, PT! I hope the day is full of the things that make you happy and that the year ahead brings lots of love and laughter your way! *mwah*

Yesterday: In one word, MISERABLE. It was Office Moving Day -- a billion and three degrees, furniture that weighed slightly more than a fuckton, and my loser cousin bailing on me with the moving help, which meant that it was just me and my brother doing the heavy lifting. And, for reference, the loser cousin who bailed? That would be the same loser cousin who's criminal case I'm currently handling, for FREE. *hates* The only positive thing about yesterday? A very YUMMY mango smoothie for breakfast lunch dinner the only damn thing I had time to eat all day.

Today: Longest freakin' Monday in recent history of bad Mondays. Ugh. I can do without the 4 a.m. start times and the scheduled end-to-end days, thank you very much. But I did manage to squeeze in about 3 days worth of work in to today, including settling or almost settling five cases. I rock! \o/

Tomorrow: High potential for AWESOMENESS. I get annkiri here for an overnight pit stop some time in the afternoon. BECCA!!! And then we'll head over to the ballpark for the Diamondbacks/Padres game. BASEBALL!!! Tomorrow will definitely not suck. *g*

In other news:

- The work mess is still not unfucked. I'm hoping to have more answers tomorrow. *crosses fingers*

+ I just received a FABULOUS gift basket from erianne1 filled with homemade soap, bath stuffs, lotion, lip balm and candle! It all smells yummy and I can't wait to dig in! Thank you, Angi!!! ♥

- Either the air conditioner or the fan or maybe both in my Trooper seem to be crapping out. The timing couldn't possibly be worse. I'm afraid to even imagine what this is going to cost. *stabbity*

+ My mom is AWESOME!!! For many reasons, but more recently because she's buying me my airline ticket to New Orleans for my birthday! New Orleans is still a go!!! \o/

+/- Generation Kill is still some of the best television I've seen! But next week is the last episode and I'm kind of sad about that.

This day has been insane. I was scheduled in five different courtrooms this morning! I finally managed to hit them all, but I didn't get out of court until nearly noon, just in time to grab my recorder and some coffee before dashing off to an interview. I've finally managed to make it to the office, and I have reams of paperwork to work through, but first I'm giving the Excedrin I just popped a few minutes to work on this damn headache.

So, yeah. Definitely a Monday.

The weekend, however, was made of rest and relaxation, with lots of baseball, reading, Generation Kill and nothing more taxing than a family birthday party and a few loads of laundry. Just the kind of weekend I needed!

Speaking of Generation Kill, if you aren't watching it, you really should be. The show is phenomenal. I don't think I exaggerate when I say it's the same caliber of military show as was Black Hawk Down. Interesting characters and character dynamics. Gritty storytelling. Realistic dialog. Just all around good stuff. Plus? Really hot men in military uniform. Or, even better, shirtless!!! What's not to love? ( See what I mean? This is Sgt. Brad Colbert and his lovely back tattoo!!! )

Which brings me to Alexander Skarsgåd, the Swedish actor who plays Colbert. ( Isn't he just pretty? )

He really needs to be on my t.v. screen more often. And, apparently he will be as he's landed a recurring role in HBO's "True Blood". *laughs* Man, I had absolutely NO desire to see this show. In fact, the viral marketing campaign was really getting on my nerves. But, now? I don't know. I just might have to check it out.

And since my tangents have already included shirtless military men, hot Swedish boys and vampires, allow me to go one more: Marcus (of the Divine Rod of Light) has retired his dancing thong and will no longer be performing with the Hollywood Men. Apparently, gettin' naked for money is an "old habit" that he must leave behind in order to pursue his new purpose in life, coaching. *laughs and laughs*

Let's see. What else? Despite a really Monday-ish Monday, the rest of the week looks good. Work, of course, will be work. But later in the week there will be lots and lots of baseball!!! I'm dragging my mom with me to Thursday night's game against the Braves, then azewewish will be in town for the rest of the series. Yay!!! I can't wait!

I'm also back on a regular schedule with Trainer!Boy. He thoroughly kicked my ass on Friday and I felt it all weekend. He'll be back this evening for more ass-kicking. But after a few weeks off due to a crazy travel schedule, it feels good to be back on track.

Now that the headache seems to be dulling, I better get to this pile of paperwork. Why, though, is it still Monday??? *whines*