It's Britney Bitch

J and I are back from Houston and have so much to report. Except right now I am exhausted, and the camera is up two flights of stairs, so the pictures will come later. We had an awesome time, so thanks to our hosts Bizarely and THC and to TFry for making the trip.

Also, thanks to Britney Spears for singing Hit Me Baby One More Time last night. Well I guess that she technically didn't "sing" it....

Choices

Jillian has started a new habit of giving me choices. For example, the other night she told me that I had a choice - I could leave her light on "a little bit" or I could leave her door open "a little" bit. Then she forces the decision. I am not allowed to bargain for a third option or refuse to choose. It is hilarious.

She also knows where she is going to college. When we drive by Penn I ask her where I went to college and she says Penn. Then I ask her where she is going to go to school and she says "YAY PENN!" I should start saving as a year of tuition will be about $1 million dollars (said Dr. Evil style) per year.

Lastly, we have been talking alot about our trip to Texas. She knowns that we will be staying at bizarley's house, that Uncle justsomeguy and the artist formally known as TFry will be there. We have been working on our yee-haws and discussed the new friends she may meet while checking out their blogs. Watch out Texas here we come.

And the picture above is random. It is a picture of J before we went to our first bris. She actually had a good time because she loves bagels and schmears. She also found the dessert table very early. Then every time I turned around, I saw her streaking towards it in a blinding chubby fury to get some rugelach.

Wii Are Fit (Arguably)

J and I got a Wii fit for Valentine's day. I didn't set it up for a while, as I was still working on my Guitar Hero skillz, but did a few weeks ago. J obviously had to be involved. As soon as the thing was out of the box and the tv on, she jumped on and did what she thought she should do based on the picture that is on the box. No prompting from me or instruction. Here is a picture.

Then we both did the fit test. According to the mean wii fit board, I am 44 in Wii fit years. J is 22 and has like a 35% BMI. Of course she does she is two feet tall and a chub. But the wii fit does acknowledge that young children tend to have higher BMIs. Thanks wii fit. I will not put my two year old on a diet. She does, however, suck at the balance tests. Wii will work on that.

Job update. I got the job I interviewed for on Friday. I had another interview today, to go to the Plaintiffs' side of the bar. It went well, the named partner found me to be a "very impressive young lady" his words, and I have to go back to meet a few more people. We will see what happens. I am very very stressed out about it all. I do not think I am on the chopping block if layoffs happen - actually I know it - but is it time to move on anyway? Maybe.

My parents are not thrilled with me being a Plaintiff's attorney. I think that they will be embarrassed by it. Even though I will be 32 in less than a month, I still care what they think. I don't want them to be embarrassed by me, lord knows I have put them through enough over the past few years.

Class of 2013

Jillian got into pre-school! I didn't think that I would ever be so happy over something that seems so inherently obnoxious and yuppie - we had to apply, interview, and all that. Crazy. But it is a good school and a block from my house (remember I am lazy, so I will do one interview for years of convenience).

So J is a member of the class of 2013 (she has to go for 4 years because she got in as a not yet 3 year old). We got a letter in a big envelope just like colleges send out.

Now I just have to scrounge up the $9,000/year it costs to go there. Yeah that's right. 9 grand. A year.

So here is J displaying some of her intellectual fortitude. And for the record, she has been able to do this for many months - again I am lazy and haven't video taped it until now.

Oh and in other news, I was away at a week long training for work and she left me a message in which she informed me that (1) she does not have a princess dress and needs one, (2) she needs a crown, and (3) she needs glass slippers. And I have a job interview on Friday. Wish me luck.

Day of Ever Increasing Annoyance

You know how sometimes you have one of those days that starts out fine, then seems to just go downhill. And you wind up annoyed, unsettled, and arggghhhyy for no real reason. That was my day today.

There isn't a specific reason for my bad mood. If I was to lay blame anywhere, I would lay it at the feet of our jacked up economy. The economic woes are far reaching and I know that people have it much worse than I do, but still it is stressing the eff out of me. Mostly because this is the scenario that I have in my head:

I have two major filings for the same client on March 2. Thus, I am very busy. However, I cannot continue to work for this client (which is how I spend 50% of my time) for two reasons (1) they are pushing back on bills and do not want senior associates on their cases and (2) the case team is a boys club, so I never get to do anything substantial, they don't bother to review me so I don't get credit for the work I do, and it has substantially stunted my career.

So after March 2, I am done with it. Yup, done with what fills up 50% of my time. Then what will happen is that I will be alot less busy (I am trying to drum up work already and have had some success but there is just less to go around). Also, as mentioned earlier in this blog, I am not the go getter that my colleagues are. Thus, after a month or two, I get laid off.*

I have no job and have no real prospects of getting one, so I have to move in with my parents. Except they live out of state, so I have to petition the court to let me take Jillian. X fights me on this because he gets free legal assistance at his firm (I don't plus in this scenario I don't have a job anyway), and I either have to leave J in PA or figure something else out, such as asking my parents to give up their NJ home and live with me.

Thus, it is a bad scene and stresses me out on a daily basis. Stupid economy.

I also realize that this catastrophic thinking is a sign of depression. Don't worry, I know that.

But is that it? Is that all that is contributing to the mood? No. Lately I have been feeling what I call "the nothing." "The nothing" is the term for the fact that I have not felt anything about anyone in "that" way for months on end. In away the nothing is good, because if you have no real outlet for something, the nothing makes that easier to deal with. But the nothing is really unsettling as you are lonely but have nothing really to give and nothing really to motivate you to get out there again.

Then over the weekend, I lost the nothing. Nothing happened, but I spoke to someone at a bar who made me laugh, was cute, and made the nothing go away. Then I went home. Alone. No exchange of information. Today I realized why I had defensively gone into nothing mode - it sucks when you are interested in someone and they don't like you back. Trust me, I have had enough experience to speak on that as an expert. It may suck more than the nothing. So I am formulating a plan to become dead inside again (at least in that arena).

I am a big fat whiner. I know. I am going to go to book club now and drink wine and be around people. Perhaps that will cheer me up.


* Please note that I am looking for a job, rather than waiting for the moment I no longer have one. I got an interview at a company which went well, then the next week they were bought by another company. Strike one. I have an interview to go to the plaintiff's side of the bar, but they want someone much more senior. I am going to do my best. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

It means no worries....

Jillian loves "Hakunna Matata" from the Lion King. Here she is singing it. This is not her best performance, but it does involve a tutu, so it isn't half bad.

My House-mates

Tonight Jillian is sleeping in her "big girl bed." My parents came over today and the first thing that J said was "GRANDPA! Can you build my big girl bed?" Then she saw that they had donuts (she can recognize a dunkin donuts box or bag from a mile away), picked out a pink frosted donut and forgot about it for a few hours. But since she never TOTALLY forgets anything, she remembered and big girl bed it is. Above is a picture of her sleeping in it.

To be honest, I don't know the logistics of the bed. She can get out of it, fall out of it (not that far down, so that really isn't a concern), but she can also open doors. Thus, she feasibly could have run of the house. We will see how this works.



My other house-mate is Buddy the cat. He is ridiculous. Overall, he is as good a cat as one can find, no real vices except a bizarre obsession with the sink when the dishwasher is running. He does, however, sleep with his tongue out. It is super weird.

I may be a weird sleeper as well, who knows?

Tonight I spent my evening scraping wallpaper. Only I did it for about an hour and half with the wrong side of the scraper blade facing out. As J tells me, "Mommy you are not Bob the Builder." Out of the mouths of babes.....