not as dramatic as dong dong

What an amazing day! I adore the Olympics regardless of what is going on, but the last hour of primetime coverage tonight was nearly perfect. Tammy and I watched almost the entire thing live; we skipped some of the middle of the women's marathon to watch a bit of stuff that we'd Tivo'd from the afternoon, but the two women's swimming races (women's 50m individual, women's 4x100m medley relay), the men's 4x100m medley relay, and the men's 100m dash were all incredibly exciting. If my neighbors weren't watching the Olympics, they must have known that we were, since the end of the men's 4x100 (and Michael Phelps' last race) had us jumping up and down and shrieking hysterically, while the men's 100m dash just left us stunned by how fast the winner was.

I know it sounds absurd, but there was something just so awesome about watching history happen, even if I was watching it on the floor of an apartment half a world away (and three hours after it actually happened, thanks to NBC's ridiculous tape-delay-for-west-coast policy). Michael Phelps deserved all the hype, even if his teammates (Piersol, Hansen, and especially Lezak) probably deserved a bit more than they go. And Dana Torres is amazing, as is the guy who won the 100m dash.

This of course followed a full day of Olympics for us. We woke up around eleven and had brunch with Adit -- the place had the best French toast I have ever had in my entire life, and brunch was v. entertaining. Sadly Adit had to work and couldn't watch Olympics with us, but we persevered without him. I spent the whole afternoon watching various sports, like badminton, rowing, and trampoline (featuring the Chinese male trampoline gymnast Dong Dong, who was the subject of many bad jhokes). Tammy and I took a break at 6:30 to grab some Thai food down the street, and got back just in time to start watching tonight's coverage. Now we're 'warming down'; we watched a Tivo'd episode of "Dinner:Impossible" (in which a chef creates a meal for a large group in absurdly bad conditions), and are now watching latenight coverage.

Sadly, Tammy leaves tomorrow :( That means I'll have to watch track and field all by my lonesome next week. But we're saying goodbye in style -- we're meeting Shedletsky and Joanna at the Hong Kong Flower Lounge, and after watching Mary Carillo's color commentary story a couple of nights ago about the ridiculous things that you can eat in China, I'm really looking forward to some great dim sum. Then it's back to the Olympics, with perhaps a brief break to clean up my apartment, before I have to sleep so that I can go to work on Monday. Yay! Now it's time for late-night hurdles; more tomorrow!

sex, drugs, and olympic watching

Actually I'm missing the sex and drugs part, but the Olympics have taken over my entire life. I woke up this morning after 5.5hrs of sleep, quickly showered, and hoofed it up the hill to the shuttle stop in time to make it to work. I have to say that the shuttle is pretty awesome; I took it last night and this morning for the first time, and I think it's great. I didn't get carsick at all, and was able to work on my laptop both last night and this morning. I think it will be good for me to have a chance to do emails in the morning and evening; when I got to work this morning, I was already caught up with emails, and I was able to get other things done. Combine that with the fact that I've been actively avoiding all news, video, blogs, and Olympics-related conversations this week to avoid finding out anything about the Olympics, and I've been remarkably effective.

So I worked all day, came home, and sped through the coverage from last night's women's gymnastics individual all-around. I was devastated about Shawn Johnson getting silver; while Nastia Liukin did a v. good job, and obviously silver is nice, I just adore her, and she must have been sad not to make it to the very top. I also got way too angry about the judges' scoring because I get way too excited about this kind of stuff. Then I took a fifteen-minute nap before Tammy got home -- it wasn't enough to rejuvenate me, but it was enough to get me through the night.

Tammy and I went out for dinner; the criteria were a) someplace within a couple of blocks, and b) something where we could drink something alcoholic. Using Yelp, I found Fina Estampa, which was a block and a half away; it's Spanish/Peruvian, which meant sangria, which meant awesome. When we walked in we were virtually the only people there, which gave us plenty of reason to think that we should go someplace else, but it turned out to be awesome. The sangria was good, the seafood paella was just about perfect, and Tammy and I had a v. entertaining conversation.

When we got back, we actually watched tonight's Olympics -- we're finally caught up on everything that happened the last few days (except for diving, which we're powering through tomorrow morning). The Michael Phelps race was absolutely incredible, and I'm glad we're moving into track and field. I also thought that Mark Spitz's interview was great. Tammy and I are just so super psyched about the whole Olympics thing, and I'm glad we're caught up. When I was getting off the bus today, the driver probably thought I was insane; the radio announcer mentioned Michael Phelps, and I immediately blocked my ears so effectively that I couldn't hear anything else, but that also meant I looked stupid and couldn't say goodbye to the driver. Ridiculous.

Now I'm going to bed, even though there's more Olympics to watch -- I'm just too exhausted to keep going right now. Goodnight!

you know who jonathan horton needs right now? jonathan horton.

I still think Bela Karolyi is the best commentator, followed by my beloved Dick Button, but Al Trautwig gives them a run for their money. He says ridiculous things regardless of which sport he's commentating; given that he commentates some rather out-there sports (like Olympic gymnastics and the Tour de France), he gets plenty of chances to make weird comparisons and absurd references. I love him!

I'm exhausted, but I can't stop Olympics!!! I had to be at work by eight a.m. today, and I made it, but getting through the multiple meetings the rest of the day was v. difficult. I left early and came home so that Tammy and I could keep on our death march through several days' worth of tivo'd Olympics coverage. We spent a couple of hours watching the women's team gymnastics final from Wednesday night; I already knew the results, and it was heartbreaking to watch it again with Tammy, hear the hope in her voice, and then watch Alicia Sacramone's meltdown. Not that the silver medal was all her fault, but watching the beam and the floor routines again was really sad.

We took a long break from gymnastics tonight to have dinner with Shedletsky and Joanna. Tammy picked the restaurant - Bushi-Tei on Post St in San Francisco. It was incredibly good, sort of Japanese/French fusion, and we stayed there for around three hours. We had a great bottle of wine, and then I ordered three starters as dinner. This is what I had (mainly for Felicia, who loves food): a tuna tartare with tobiko, wasabi-crème fraiche, coriander seed, and herb oil, a miso-marinated Wagyu beef with upland cress, apple, fennel, and French blue cheese, and green beans with fermented black beans and almonds. Of the three, the tuna tartare was really incredible; I like raw fish, and the presentations was gorgeous. The beef dish was good but I thought that the various flavors kind of overwhelmed the meat. However, overall everything was lovely, and I really liked the atmosphere -- we sat at the end of a big banquet table like we were aristocrats waiting for a dinner party to start, which was fun. We had a great time, and it was worth hanging out even if it means that Tammy and I couldn't get caught up tonight.

Now it's almost two a.m., and I'm still watching Olympics. Tammy and I got home from dinner around eleven, and spent the last three hours speeding through Wednesday's Olympics coverage. Tivo is great for fastforwarding through beach volleyball, and we can see the results of the swimming heats without having to watch every single race. But we haven't fastforwarded through any gymnastics -- we're on the last rotation of the men's individual all-around. The Americans don't seem to be doing well, the Japanese guy had a horrific fall on the rings and has come back to fourth at this point, and there's a Russian guy in third place whose name sounds like a bird call. All in all, it's fantastic.

No sharing results with me for tonight's women's all-around or Michael Phelps' quest for the gold -- we're watching that tomorrow night, and then hopefully will get all caught up. We have to go back through this past week's recordings and watch the diving events, and then fun things like track/field, synchronized swimming, and the gymnastics event finals start this weekend. Yay! But now I need to focus on gymnastics so that I can go to bed, get a few hours' sleep, and do it all again tomorrow!

ready for action

I just got back to my apartment after a rather exhausting trip to Ann Arbor. I meant to sleep on the plane so that I could watch more Olympics tonight, but I ended up spending the majority of the flight reading a romance novel, which probably wasn't smart -- I have to be at the office at 8am tomorrow, which is not nice.

But, I just watched the 4x100 men's freestyle relay that played Sunday night while I was on my way to the airport -- I obviously knew who won because it was one of the biggest races of the entire Olympics, due to trash-talking by the French and the fact that it contributed to Michael Phelps' amazing golden journey, but the race was still awesome even if I knew what happened. Now I'm waiting for Tammy to get back from a visit to the south bay so that I can watch some gymnastics, but I can't stay up too late.

However, after work tomorrow, I'm dedicating myself solely to Olympics, and it's going to be all Olympics all the time until they're over. YAY.

just one...more...routine

I lied in my earlier post; once I started watching the women's gymnastics final (because I wanted to see the men's 4x200m freestyle relay, which was in the middle of the gymnastics), I couldn't stop. Now it's 12:30am and I have to wake up in seven hours. But for those of you who are on the west coast, where NBC says the coverage is 'live' when really it's only live in the eastern/central time zones, you're in for a treat -- Bela Karolyi has to be one of the most awesome commentators in existence, perhaps even topping my beloved Dick Button (who has commentated ice skating since the days of radio). The fact that he was able to work in allegations about the Chinese gymnasts being underage in just about every statement was nothing short of amazing.

Now, though, I really am going to bed!

nothing cutens up a country like panda bears

I love Mary Carillo -- she's the commentator on NBC who's doing the reports on Chinese culture, and she just did a story on pandas. She also sounds like a man, which makes the story about pandas even better.

Today was good, albeit exhausting; we basically sat in a conference room and brainstormed all day, which is an activity I have devoted far too much of my life to. Afterward, one of my coworkers and I had a drink at the bar on the first floor of the office building while waiting for our other coworkers to get done with their meetings; my strawberry/basil caipiroska was absolutely perfect, and I wish that I could make drinks that delicious. Then, we all went over to the team manager's house for a barbecue. The house was lovely, the barbecue was great, and we had a v. fun evening. I'm glad it ended earlier than last night, though; I hope to sleep a lot tonight so that I can make it through tomorrow, get on the plane, sleep some more, and then catch up on the Olympics coverage that I've missed.

I watched some beach volleyball tonight and I'm going to watch the Michael Phelps race, but then I'm going to go to bed without watching women's gymnastics. I think that I accidentally saw the results of the men's gymnastics; the hotel put the newspaper on my bed, and when I came in I saw a fragment of headline before hastily flipping it over. But I want to watch gymnastics with Tammy when I get home, so I'm going to go to bed before the gymnasts take the floor. And then as soon as I'm back in SF, it's all Olympics all the time until they're over. Yay!!!

wizard of the moon

I had a fabulous day in Ann Arbor, despite my almost complete lack of sleep. I slept <4 hours on the plane last night, awoke groggily at 4:45am Pacific time (7:45am Eastern) as we were getting ready to land in Detroit, and then had to find my reserved taxi and make it to the Ann Arbor office in time for our morning's meetings. The meetings throughout the day were pretty good; I was pretty proud of myself when, during the icebreak survival game, I convinced the team I was on that one of the five items we should take to a desert island was an 'enormous bucket of Legos' -- because the bucket could be used to carry/store water, and the Legos could be used as entertainment and to build useful things. I was v. proud of myself and think I demonstrated what it takes to be a manager.

After wrapping up for the day, a bunch of us crashed a happy hour for some of the other managers in the Ann Arbor office. We chatted for a couple of hours, enjoyed the Irish-pub atmosphere, and generally bonded, before the other two team leads from California and I adjourned to have dinner at a posh restaurant down the street.

However, there's a plumbers' and pipelayers' convention in town this week, which is why we had trouble finding rooms, and the restaurant we wanted to go to was participating in this downtown 'block party' for the convention. They blocked off a stretch of one of the main roads in town, played live music, and showed some great antique cars. The weather was perfect, so when we were told that it would be over an hour before we could get a table, we grabbed seats outside the bar next door and drank (Guinness, in my case) until our table was ready. Two other people who are friends with one of my team leads showed up, and the five of us had an absolutely marvelous time.

Then we went into the restaurant, and the marvelous time turned downright hysterical. It was also delicious -- I had one of the best french onion soups I've ever had, followed by an absolutely perfect filet mignon, and paired with a fabulous, expensive bottle of wine shared by the table. I'm extremely happy with the team I'm working with; I feel that the three of us have struck up some instant rapport, helped along by the camaraderie we developed tonight over several glasses of wine and beer. And I laughed harder, longer, than I have in a long time, so that says something about tonight's festivities.

Now, though, I'm desperate for sleep -- during the only break of the afternoon, I actually took a twelve-minute nap in my temporary Ann Arbor office. I just hope that the people sitting outside that office, who belong to the team that I am now involved in, don't recognize me and realize I'm the California lead -- I turned off the light, shut the door, laid facedown on the floor, spread my pashmina over me, and actually fell asleep. It was just enough to keep me going the rest of the afternoon, but I don't want to repeat that misery. The only bad thing about today was that I didn't get to watch any Olympics at all :( But Ann Arbor is totally gorgeous -- I could see myself living here, which is v. interesting, so I'll have to come back someday when I have time to explore and am not just looking forward to getting back to watching the Olympics with Tammy in the evil city. Sigh. Goodnight!

detroit rock city

I am in the San Francisco airport, awaiting my flight to Detroit for
my three-day meeting in Ann Arbor. Today was an excellent day...Tammy
and I hung out all day, walking down to Union Square, where we had an
adventure by setting a timer and picking the first food establishment
we saw after the timer went off. The ambience' what with homeless
people showing up to eat the leftovers as soon as other diners
finished, left something to be desired, but it was fine nonetheless.
Then we went shopping, and Tammy encouraged me to get a pair of
versace sunglasses, which are awesome because they are so unnecessary.

We ordered takeout sushi and spent the evening watching womens
gymnastics. The US team was pretty rough, but easily qualified for the
finals, and Iowa's sweetheart Shawn Johnson was incredible. Sadly, I
had to leave just as swimming was coming on...having to travel and do
business things during the Olympics is doing bad things to my
willingness to lead a 'productive' life. But the trip should be good,
and I'll be back Wednesday, which gives me several more days with
Tammy.

I should go. But one last thing...happy birthday to Katie!! Yay!

dazed, confused, and on fire!

Man, I absolutely adore the Olympics. Surprisingly, though, I didn't start watching until 8pm today. When I woke up, hungover, all I could think about was facilitating my recovery. I ended up meeting up with Adit and Katrina for a late brunch; by the time we actually got a table and started eating, it was 2pm. But the eggs and potatoes were just what I needed, and I felt much better afterward. After brunch, Adit and I spent a few hours working at a cafe; this was the first time I tried to write in over a month, and I'm eager to get back into the swing of things with the book. I started editing the first chapter, and I think it went pretty well. If nothing else, I feel a little bit more back into the story, and I'm hoping to get that momentum going so that I can have something more polished by mid-September. A complete second draft would be a great birthday present to myself!

After Adit and I parted ways, I came home and tackled the aftermath of the party. Cleanup was surprisingly easy; in my drunken state pre-club last night, I managed to refrigerate everything that needed refrigerated, so there was nothing truly disgusting waiting for me. I was surprised to see that we went through a whole bottle of rum, and I'm guessing we would have made it through more vodka if people had looked in the freezer to see the bottles that I had used to mix up cosmopolitans. Actually, it's a good thing they didn't, since I'm the one who would have ended up drinking it, and last night I reached the upper limit of what I can feasibly drink if I want to not vomit at some point in the next twenty-four hours. But my kitchen is nice and clean again, my living room is back in order, and other than laundry I won't have to do any other chores while the Olympics are in motion.

Tammy got stuck in traffic and was late arriving, so while I waited for her, I watched last night's Opening Ceremonies again. TiVo is a magical device during the Olympics. I got to watch the whole artistic component of the opening ceremonies, sans commercials, while recording tonight's stuff so that we could start watching it when Tammy arrived. I must say that the opening ceremonies were really incredibly impressive, and I'm glad I watched them again when I could see the whole thing and not play hostess. Tammy showed up just as the parade of nations started, which was perfect timing, so we started to watch tonight's prime time coverage. Adit also came over at the same time and did some more work while Tammy and I ran our own color commentary on swimming, gymnastics, and other events. It was awesome! And the awesomeness is going to continue for a couple of weeks! But now I should really go to bed -- Tammy and I are going to hang out tomorrow, and then I need to pack so that I can get on a red-eye flight to Ann Arbor. Goodnight!

good work, drunk sara!

After waking up, lying in bed to stop the spinning, sleeping some more, taking some advil, drinking some water, and eating some cake, I feel surprisingly alive and refreshed despite the misery of this morning's early hours. I'm getting ready to go meet Adit for brunch, but I just reread last night's post, and am amazed by the a) spelling, b) coherence, and c) truthiness of the entire narrative. If you knew how drunk I was last night, you would be too! On that self-congratulatory note, it's time to shower, eat, and then watch some more Olympics!

arrrrlympics

I'm probably too drunk to blog effectively -- it's not quite to the point of the infamous 2005 ski trip, for those of you who remember that ridiculous drunk blog post, but it's almost there. I had an excellent day! If you don't know that the Olympics started today, please stop reading my blog, since we're officially not friends and you're completely cut from the program. The Olympics are something that I look forward to with rabid enthusiasm every two years, and this year is no exception. In fact, because of the political climate and the human rights issues and the general sense of unease, I'm looking forward to these Olympics even more than I was looking forward to Athens -- which is saying something, since Athens was a complete clusterfuck from an organizational standpoint (to use more vulgar language than I do when I'm sober).

Ssss...anyway, I had a party in honor of the opening ceremonies. This was a good thing, since it encouraged me to unpack. I went a little overboard on the theme -- I baked the requisite five Olympic Rings Cakes (tm), but I added on this year with Olympic Rings Dips (salsa, guacamole, cheese, sour cream dyed blue, and spinach/artichoke dip dyed black), and Olympic Rings Fruits (pineapple, kiwi, blueberries, strawberries, and chocolate sauce). I also made cosmopolitans and mint juleps, and had ingredients for mojitos. Unfortunately, drinks are not my strong suit, but the cakes and dips were quite delicious.

The party itself was lovely. I had a good mix of old Stanford friends and new(er) work friends, although the work friends are pretty much old friends at this point. There were just enough people to feel like a party, but not so many that it was overcrowded. And some of my more ridiculous friends showed up, which is why I'm rather inebriated right now -- John and I relived old memories by drinking whatever we could come across (in this case, a 'blackberry shot', which started off as a shot of rum, club soda, black food coloring, and a single blueberry), and Adit refined the idea with some concoctions of his own (still with black food coloring and a blueberry, but I don't know what else he put in it). After two cosmos, one mojito dyed blue, four 'blackberry' shots, and then the drinks I had at the Geary Club afterwards with Adit and Oniel, I'm quite a happy camper. Tomorrow I will be a sad camper, but I will deal with that when it arrives. And I probably won't be as sad as John -- he showed up with a pirate hat, and then added to it by painting a mustache on his face w/black food coloring, but food coloring doesn't wash out easily. Too bad for him, but v. entertaining for the rest of us.

So the party was excellent. Special shoutout to Alaska Matt and his wife Alaska Kia -- they claimed this was the best party that they had been to in months, which, considering the fact that they said this after Matt was subjected to a mint julep and then watched me dye my mouth black with all the 'blackberry' shots, says a lot about their social life. I think a good time was had by all, and I'm looking forward to the games kicking off in earnest tomorrow. I tivo'd the opening ceremonies, so I'll probably have to watch again when I'm not playing hostess, but I'm glad I got to hang out with my friends.

After the party ended at midnight, Oniel and I met up with Adit at Geary Club. We hung out there for an hour and a half, which was fun, before Oniel walked me home. Initially we said that this bar was someplace we should take my parents...they actually allow smoking, which I don't understand how they can get away with in California, but whatever. However, on the way home at two am, we walked past a lot of sketchy people, including a guy walking around in pink tights and a camouflage speedo. So we decided that perhaps it wasn't safe to take my parents out in the neighborhood when all the crazies are out. But Oniel kept me from getting stabbed in the kidney, and now I'm turning in for the night. Happy Olympics, everyone!

let's melt the sugar

I just made simple syrup, two cakes, and a chocolate ganache. I also frosted two of the cakes that I made last night. This is the most cooking that I've done in months, since living at home made it v. easy to not cook (particularly since my family is unappreciative of my "California-inspired" cuisine). But I'm happy to report that I've got the cake-baking down to a science; I'm much more efficient than I was the first time that I made these things, as evidenced by the fact that my feet don't hurt -- I clearly haven't been standing over the counter mixing stuff long enough to merit foot pain. The only hard part about making these cakes is having them all sitting there taunting me, since out of principle I can't cut them until the official start of the Olympics. And from the taste-tests I took of the batters, each of them is better than the last. I can't wait!

So today was a good day; I am starting to get set up in my new office, although I'm missing a keyboard, a mouse, and the connector necessary to convert my monitor's plug to the different receptor used by my laptop's docking station. I also had lunch with one of my new team leads, which was really great; we hadn't met before today, but I had fun getting to know him at lunch. I'm having lunch with the other one tomorrow, although I know her from previous experience since she reported to me before I went on leave. And the three of us will have a chance to do some more bonding next week, since all of us are going to Ann Arbor. I spent the rest of the afternoon in various meetings of the catching-up variety, then came home to finish the baking.

Tomorrow's going to be a little hectic early on -- I have to be in the office at 8am for a videoconference, but I'm going to leave early so that I can come home and finish prepping for the Olympics. There isn't much left to do, but I have to assemble the cakes, make some spinach-artichoke dip (which I'm dying black -- I found black food coloring at Safeway! miracle!), take out the trash, and shove any remaining detritus in my closet. And then the Olympics start! It's the culmination of a long two-year wait, and I'm so excited I can barely contain myself.

I'm expecting to see some awesome sports performances and some even more awesome controversies -- like the fact that Joey Cheek, America's speed-skating darling from the Torino Olympics in 2006, just had his Chinese visa revoked because he's part of a group of athletes who are advocating for action on the Darfur/Sudan genocide situation. But even better, the guy the athletes selected to carry the American flag in the opening ceremony's parade of athletes is one of the 'Lost Boys of the Sudan', who actually escaped the violence in Sudan and sought refuge in the US. Drama! If you know anything about me, you know I love a good drama, preferably with a high portion of absurdity thrown in for flavor, so this Olympics is going to be right up my alley. Now, though, it's time for bed!

gimme gimme gimme a man after midnight

The critical advantage of a longer commute is that I have time to rock out to a full album -- which, for the past couple of days, has been the soundtrack to the 'Mamma Mia' movie. It's no wonder I'm single.

Today was great. I got my new laptop, and it's insanely small. It's also the laptop of the future; rather than having to type in my corporate password whenever I boot up/come back from screensaver, I can just scan my fingerprint! Now that I've told you this, please don't attempt to break into my company's computer system by killing me, chopping off my finger, and using it to access my computer -- you can't get to the internal stuff with the fingerprint, so all you would get is some photos and some ABBA songs.

I came home with a mission -- to get through a couple of Olympics Rings Cakes (tm) and start getting the apartment shaped up for the party I'm having on Friday. I was v. successful; I baked three cakes, cleaned the bathroom, and stacked up the boxes that I need to recycle tomorrow morning. The only snag I ran into was that I didn't get enough red food coloring; it's nearly impossible to make a white frosting look red instead of pink when you're using food coloring, and I didn't buy enough food coloring to even get close to respectable. So I'll have to make a stop to get some more tomorrow. Yes, it's silly that my self-imposed rules about these cakes include the stipulation that the colors be relatively pure; the outsides don't always look like that anyway, because I make three frosted cakes and two glazed cakes, which means the glazed ones don't look as colorful on the outside as the frosted ones do. But the Olympics only come every couple of years, and I'm determined to honor them properly!

I also had a v. exciting IM exchange with Jesse, who was my co-RA in Mirlo oh-so-many years ago. I haven't seen him in years, which is mostly my fault since any time we've tried to get together I've ended up moving to another country or not following up on the plans. But he's in town again for a few weeks, and we made plans to have dinner the week after I get back from Ann Arbor. So that should be fun; unfortunately he's out of town this weekend, or else he could see Tammy, Shedletsky, and Terry (who all lived in the dorm that year), but he'll just have to make do with me.

Now, though, it's really time for bed. Chandlord will be happy to know that, due to bitter experience with the first Olympic Rings Cakes (tm), I am v. careful to wipe up any batter/frosting spills as soon as they happen, since food coloring stains counters like nobody's business. But considering that she's leaving for Boston and has cut me from the program, maybe she's not interested :( Goodnight!

if you change your mind, i'm the first in line

Day Two at work was slightly more productive than Day One, even if I had to leave early; the snazzy new laptop that I ordered yesterday arrived this afternoon, and so I had to leave the old one with the tech people so that they could transfer my files tonight. Since I am even more useless without a laptop at work, there was no point in staying. Instead, I ran a couple of errands and had dinner with Can at Naomi Sushi. Can was even more crazed than usual because he was having issues with a project and probably should have skipped dinner to fix it, but it was great to catch up with him. After dinner, I stopped at the amazingly-beautiful new Safeway in Menlo Park that replaced the hideous, decrepit Safeway that I remember from my college years, and I stocked up on the rest of the stuff I needed to start the Olympic cake baking process. Feeling satisfied with my progress, I drove back to the evil city, arriving around 10:30pm.

The highlight/lowlight of the day, though, was saying goodbye to Chandlord. She and Katrina met in my building for a quick cup of coffee and a facilitated drop-off of various things that Vidya and I needed to give to each other. Katrina had to go early to do some usability stuff (jk - she gets horribly offended by usability, since "usability" is to "what she does" as "paint by numbers" is to "Picasso"), and then Vidya and I hung out for a few more minutes. This was our final parting before cutting each other from the program, and it was actually quite sad to watch her drive away. Of course, we'll be in touch when I give her all my money every month, but it's not the same. I'm going to print a photo of her to hang in the apartment so that I can feel near to her. Also, at her behest, I'm starting a new label regarding her apartment. I told her that this could be a liability for me since she'll have documentary evidence with which to sue me if I blog "I got drunk and defecated on the carpet". But I'm just going to have to trust that I won't ever do something that disgusting, and go with the new label anyway.

So Chandlord is not much longer for these parts. I will take solace in the fact that the Olympics are in three days!!! That means I have five cakes to bake over the next two nights, but it's no hill for a climber. Just as long as I don't burn my arm again like I did the last time I baked a substantial quantity of goods, I'll be quite pleased. Now, though, it's time for bed!

anticlimax

I made it into work by nine this morning, which I thought was impressive considering that, back when I went to work every day, I rarely made it in by nine unless I had a meeting, and even then I was usually two minutes late nine o'clock meetings. It was even more impressive considering that my commute was almost an hour, as opposed to the <15mins from Palo Alto. However, I really had v. little to do, which was obviously welcome, but also rather strange -- in many ways, it felt like I never left. I got roped into one meeting, which felt v. deja-vuish, because it was in essence the same people discussing the same topics that we were discussing when I left, and it doesn't seem like much has changed. I spent the rest of the day clearing out the 5000+ emails in my work inbox (most of which I didn't read, but I skimmed the headers and read anything that looked interesting). I also ordered a new work laptop and a new work blackberry -- as much as i may wish that I were a starving artist someplace, working for a company with a lot of resources has some obvious advantages.

So really, for a first day it wasn't too bad. I had a doctor's appointment at 3:30, and I left work after that to run some necessary errands; by the time I went to Best Buy, Bed Bath and Beyond, Target, Diddam's, REI, and Lowes, I didn't get home until after 8pm. Then I made a perfect sandwich (I actually bought a container of sprouts -- I really have become a Californian), hauled some stuff downstairs that I intend to sell tomorrow, and generally relaxed.

The other thing I did was start to fiddle around with a new blog. I had lunch with Terry today, since she sits down the hall from me, and we were discussing viral marketing for books and the importance of a strong web presence. I think that, given my age, my love for technology, and my interest in blogging, it will make sense to attempt to publicize my book as much as possible through a website, blog, Facebook/MySpace profile, possible YouTube videos, and other forms of online marketing. Terry got me really excited about thinking more about this, even though I clearly need to finish the book before I can start marketing it. But, I think it's in my best interests to start writing the romance blog early; if I do sell the book, I'll need to have a website and several weeks/months worth of blog content so that new readers aren't greeted by a blank screen or a seldomly-updated website if they decide to seek out more info about my books.

Right now it's time for bed, so I'm not going to continue the blogging conversation. But once I get the romance blog started in earnest, I'll of course link to it from here. You may unfortunately find that the amount that I write here may go down if I have to produce content for another blog as well, and obviously I shouldn't be putting blogging above actual writing, so we'll have to see how I balance that. But here's hoping that I start to get a sense of what my job at work really is; anyone who could have possibly told me what to do today was out of the office, which was a good way for me to ease back into things, but it will be easier for me in the long run if I actually know what I'm doing. Now, though, it's time for bed!

down to business

Today was my last day of freedom. I spent it in a v. laid-back way -- I woke up around nine, and spent most of the day attempting to organize the unorganized stuff in the apartment. I also talked to my parents, who were lovely, as usual, and set up my television in anticipation of needing the mind-numbing, pacifying stream of visual content when I start working in earnest.

Around 6:30, I met up with Adit and Katrina for some much-beloved family time. The dinner was originally planned in honor of three departures (Claude, Sri, and Chandlord) and one birthday (Fauxneil), but amusingly enough, none of the guests of honor could ever make it to a dinner. So Adit, Katrina and I went without them, although we did have an empty chair to which we could toast. We went to some restaurant called Beretta SF -- it's Italian, reasonably tasty, but in my opinion rather overpriced. When we got there, they told us that the wait for a table would be an hour, but about ten minutes later they offered to seat us in the basement. Adit asked if we could see the table before committing, and I have to admit that it was initially a little absurd -- there were absolutely no other guests in the basement, which had a rather dungeon-y feel. But I love absurdity and Adit was hungry, so we ended up taking the table, and the basement slowly filled up as the night progressed. The food was actually pretty good; we had some bruschetta-type thing with fava beans and cheese, and my entree was a mushroom and wine risotto, v. similar to the risotto that my parents despised when I made it for them. We also split a nice bottle of red wine. But the bill came out to ~$35/person, which seemed a little high; luckily, Adit owed me money from Chris's wedding weekend, so it felt like it was free for me, but I don't think I'll go back anytime soon.

Despite that, family time was quite nice, and I'm looking forward to exploring more city of sin restaurants in the future. But now, I really should go to bed, since I have to get up early tomorrow, make myself presentable, and venture down to the south bay and my reentry into the working world.

I don't know how exactly I feel about this. On the one hand, I got the job that I asked for, and my 'career' looks like it's moving in the right direction; I get to manage two team leads, which will be an interesting challenge. But on the other hand, I haven't had to think about 'challenges' and 'opportunities' and all that corporate-speak stuff in six months. And after the romance conference, all I really want to do is write. And really, I'm great at being unemployed -- I didn't get bored or tired of not working, even though I spent most of the time watching CSI reruns in Iowa.

I must say, though, that I feel satisfied with my break; while I didn't finish the final final draft or go to Siberia, I did accomplish much of what I set out to do. In particular, I finished the first draft and I got to go to England and Scotland, which was incredible. So at least I'm going back to work knowing that I accomplished what I set out to do and enjoyed myself while I was doing it. Now I just need to make sure that the passion that I feel for writing and revising doesn't get lost in the grind of corporate America, while also making sure that I'm contributing enough at work that I feel like I'm still a valuable member of society. And I also need to make sure that I get my beauty sleep so that I don't show up tomorrow morning looking like a hag; I want to preserve my relaxed glow for as long as possible, even if I probably don't look that relaxed since I spent the last few weeks living out of other peoples' houses, moving, and attending conferences. The next time I blog, I'll be getting paid! Yay!

money money money -- ain't it funny

If you ever consider writing romance novels, I highly, highly recommend that you go to the Romance Writers of America conference. The conference ended today, and I have to say that going to it was one of the single best things I could have done right now (even if I am in the middle of moving into a new apartment and I go back to work on Monday). The quality and variety of the workshops was amazing, and I feel that I got a lot of useful information about the craft, the industry, the research, and the mechanics of building a career. Even better, it was just so cool to see how varied and interesting the women (and handful of men) at the conference were; the professions that these women had before writing (doctors, computer systems engineers, lawyers, librarians, professors, etc.) just demonstrate how incredibly smart and talented this group is.

Today I saw several great workshops. The first was 'Writing Regency in the Here and Now', given by Stephanie Laurens (one of my favorites), Jacquie d'Alessandro (I'm sure I've read something of hers before), and Candice Hern. It was reassuring that they think that Regencies are going to stay popular for the long term, since that's what I want to write :) I then went to a session on blogging, which was good, but I was mostly interested in going because I wanted to see what they were saying about Google and the blog market, and when it became clear that I wasn't going to get a surprise, I left to grab lunch instead. After lunch, I went to "Doddering Butlers, Pert Housemaids, and Faithful Retainers", which was simply awesome -- the speaker, Janet Mullany, has done an amazing amount of research into the Regency period, and I got her card afterwards to that I can email her to ask for copies of some of the prints she was showing (via the transparencies I was so shocked to see in her presentation). I also stuck around at the end for a panel on paranormal novels; I don't have plans to write paranormals myself, but I enjoy reading them, and I was curious to learn more about that market.

I think the most useful workshop for me, though, was Stephanie Bond's workshop on how to make a living from writing romance novels. She really appealed to me, probably because she sounds really insanely organized; she was talking about how she will sign contracts to write books up to two years in advance, and all about her yearly calendar to make sure that launch weeks don't coincide with deadline weeks for a different editor. A lot of what she talked about revolved around creating a business plan for your romance novel career, but she also talked about understanding your own process. And, she made the excellent point that if you can write one page a day, you'll have a full book at the end of the year. Perhaps cutting down the goal and making it clear to myself that I just expect an attempt, and not succumbing to the 'must be 3000 words before I quit' or 'must be perfectly polished', would be a good idea.

So the conference was fantastic -- it got me reenergized for tackling the second draft and then getting some feedback and reediting as necessary before focusing on the query letter, the submission process, and the next books in the series. As long as I'm in a good place with my manuscript, I'm hoping that I can go to the next RWA national conference, which is in Washington, D.C., next summer. But by the end of the today, I was pretty conference'd out. I ended up skipping the awards ceremony dinner. Instead, I drove down to the safe and happy Mountain View area to have dinner and watch "Mamma Mia!" with Terry and Lauren (aka Subz). I'd already seen "Mamma Mia!" with Chandlord on Monday, but I was v. happy to see it again; it's just so ridiculous that you can't not love it.

Now I should really go to bed; I'm falling asleep over my laptop. One more day of freedom, and then I go back to work!

whoa

I'm in a session at the romance conference where they are using
transparencies! I haven't seen an old school projector in years! Now
back to the conference, I'll blog later!

the tears of a clown

I had another excellent day at the romance conference. I missed the 8:30 session because I was rather tired form yesterday (which doesn't bode well for going back to work next week!), but I then pulled myself out of bed and walked the ~15 blocks to the conference from my apartment, stopping along the way for one of those lattes that has firmly cemented me in the absurd California lifestyle to the detriment of my more prosaic Iowa roots.

The workshops today were mostly excellent, although I attended one in the late afternoon in which the speakers were just reading straight from their handouts; the information was good, but the delivery didn't feel as spontaneous and inviting as some of the other sessions I had been to. However, I must say that the quality of the workshops and talks over all has far, far exceeded my expectations, and left me aching to get back to revising my draft. In fact, I skipped the lunch to go to a nearby cafe, where I had an excellent tuna nicoise salad and some yogurt while contemplating my current draft, how to up the tension, and how to slightly tweak the heroine's character, while simultaneously writing down all the ideas I had for the next book in the series.

I think that this conference came at exactly the right time in my writing process -- I've finished the first draft, so I don't feel like a complete fraud or imposter by being there, but I'm not so stressed about finding a publisher or an agent that I had to worry about pitching and networking and all that other stuff that I probably should be focusing on soon. Instead, the sessions have left me really energized, with some great ideas and tips for how to improve my writing as well as a list of books and movies about a mile long that I somehow need to work into my reading/viewing time ASAP since they tripped my curiosity.

After I left the conference, I stopped by Borders; being within walking distance of Borders is dangerous for me and will likely mean that, more often than not, I'll have to take a cab back because I'll be too loaded down with stuff to attempt the walk back up the hill to my apartment. I bought three romance novels; one is a new Eloisa James, one is by Jordan Dane (who writes contemporary thriller/suspense, which I usually don't read, but I went to a panel discussion on 'Bad Boys and Naughty Girls' - essentially villains and anti-heroes - and she really intrigued me), and the third is from Gena Showalter's 'Lords of the Underworld' series (more on that in a minute). The last thing I need is more romance novels, I know, but they're my version of the drugs that have destroyed the lives of so many people that I walk by in the city of sin. So if you see someone wandering around someday, dazed and confused, wearing a tattered and dirty pink coat, give me a book rather than a quarter -- I'll appreciate it more. Or I'll start stealing shit from you and pawning it to support my reading habit. Then we can go on Dr. Phil and get our fifteen minutes of fame the easy way!

After Borders, Vidya (aka Chandlord) picked me up, and we hung out for a couple of hours. We had to pick up a cake for a party she's attending tonight, and the bakery looked like it turned out some incredible stuff; I wish I had been in the mood for dessert! Then we dropped stuff off at her sister's house before going in search of a drink and some food, which we found at Panera. The Panera here is much more expensive than the Panera in West Des Moines, and at the behest of Vidius I made the mistake of ordering the sweet green tea, which was pretty awful. But my soup and sandwich combo made for an excellent dinner. And Chandlord and I had a generally good time catching up; even though I haven't been here for the past few months, I'm still sad that she's leaving, and I'm going to miss her :( But on a brighter note, I won't have to use the 'Vidya' label quite as frequently! That may cost me the readers who only check this blog to find out what's going on with her, but I'm hopeful they'll become friends with me instead.

When Chandlord dropped me off at the apartment, I didn't even claim that I was going to continue cleaning/unpacking; instead, I stayed up and read the entire Gena Showalter book. I was going to go into more detail about it, but a) most of you don't care about romance novels, and b) I'm too tired to keep typing. Perhaps I'll review it tomorrow! But don't hold your breath -- I've got the romance conference all day tomorrow as well. Then I only have one day left before I go back to work!

so i made up my mind it must come to an end

I had a crepe for dinner! Living within walking distance of the crepe place is one of the critical benefits of living in the city; and now I just have to write a monthly check to Chandlord for the privilege, rather than going through all the jhokey rigamarole of actually being friends with her. Everybody wins!

My earlier post may not have sounded that enthusiastic, but I left the conference at the end of the day feeling like registering for the conference was one of the best decisions I've made in awhile. When I was done with my latte, I went back for the keynote lunch, where I met some lovely ladies and had a pretty great (particularly for hotel conference food) lunch. The keynote speaker was Victoria Alexander; I may need to give her books another try (if I ever tried them -- I can't remember anymore!) because the woman was a hysterical speaker. Here's a fun tidbit -- many of her books have a dead husband/boyfriend/whatever, and they are all named some derivative of Charles, after her husband Chuck. She claimed that she started doing this because her husband never reads her books, and now it's a trademark. It'll be easy to try her books, since there were copies of her two most recent books, plus a clothing/pillow spray, as a gift for everyone at the luncheon. Score!

Following lunch, I went to two workshop sessions, and was blown away by both of them. The first was a chat with Nora Roberts -- if you have ever strolled through an airport bookstore, Borders, Wal-Mart, or wherever else books are sold, you've likely seen her. She's written almost 200 romance novels and is widely recognized as the queen of the genre. I loved hearing her talk; she seems incredibly down-to-earth, blunt, and entertaining, with a voice that is much deeper than I expected (apparently the result of alcohol and cigarettes, which makes me love her even ore), and an apparent hang-up about the nuns from her Catholic childhood, since she repeatedly referenced them as the reason why she does anything disciplined/productive/guilt-inspired. She also reminded me (not me personally, I just realized this as I was listening to one of her comments) that it's okay to not want to be part of a critique group or pay too much attention to the industry/author blogs/websites/magazines -- she thinks that for some people this can all be counterproductive, and from the limited experience I've had with my own process, I would have to say that I agree with her. But whether I could ever be her is a much different issue; for one, I don't know if I could actually write for eight hours a day every single day, with most weekends off, the way that she does. It clearly didn't happen while I was one leave; but maybe if my livelihood depended on it, things would have been different.

The second talk was by Susan Elizabeth Phillips. She's basically the only contemporary author I read, and I adore her; she's known for her witty dialogue and her tendency to pair average-looking but highly-intelligent women with gorgeous athletes and actors. And her talk was also outstanding; unlike Nora Roberts' session, which was pure Q&A, SEP's talk was more along the lines of broad themes/techniques that one should consider when writing. She was a fantastic speaker, and her techniques and discussion got me all excited to make serious progress on my second draft.

I left the conference around 4:30 and walked back to my apartment, where I spent the rest of the night until now unpacking and reorganizing more stuff (with the exception of my awesome crepe break, that is). Phase One, in which things are mostly put away, is nearly complete, and will likely be done by the end of this weekend. Phase Two, in which I decorate and get shelves so that I can unpack the rest of my books, likely won't be complete for awhile. But that's okay -- as long as I can watch the Olympics without feeling like I'm living in a dump, I'll be v. happy.

One more thing -- this morning before I got my latte, I ran over to the opening of the brand-new CB2 store on Ellis St. CB2 is the trendier, hipper, slightly cheaper cousin to Crate and Barrel, and I'm such a loyal Crate and Barrel customer that they sent me several emails to say that they were having the grand opening of the CB2 store today. Since the conference was only a block from the new store, I had to swing by. If only I were cool! They had some really awesome stuff, but CB2 doesn't really fit my style; as much as i wish that I were hip or trendy or urbanized or whatever, I really just like classic styles of furniture, so CB2 probably isn't for me (although I did heart the hourglasses and one of the bookshelves, so we'll see). But if you're in SF and like furnishings, you should check it out; they've done a great job designing the displays, and if I had the money to get rid of all my stuff, move into a renovated factory-style loft, and buy a bunch of new stuff, I would probably buy it at CB2.

Okay, it's definitely bedtime -- I haven't been sleeping enough lately, and I have to get up at 7ish so that I can make it to the conference in time for the first workshop. I suppose I should get used to the lack of sleep, though; I only have three days of freedom left! That shocking realization is enough to make me want to cry, but I think I'll go to bed instead.