Brief Update on the last week of January

The rain, oh how I hate thee. It's so sad when you have a "fun" weekend planned but the rain shows up. In torrents. Unrelenting. With some wind. But all is well. We still worked it out.

Friday night. Feeling a need to help my community, I attended the Aide Haiti, Cocktail Reception held at Emily Amy Gallery. Attending this was very hard. For a rainy, stormy night there were several events going on in Atlanta that but for the rain I would have made an appearance in all of them. That was not to happen so I had to choose which ones needed my presence the most (ha!) or which ones have the strange likelihood of not sucking. My instinct told me this one. Why? These are details of the event, you be the judge.

             Aide Haiti, Poshglam and local public relations firms come together to bring relief to Haiti

Atlanta, GA- Poshglam and 3 local PR firms have come together to present the fundraising event Aide Haiti for victims of the earthquake. Event is sponsored by Goldfish restaurant and Three Olives Vodka.

WHAT: The Aide Haiti fundraiser will be a cocktail event including an art auction and auctioning of exclusive items from local businesses. The proceeds of this event will be divided into donations to Care.org and Habitat for Humanity. Both of these organizations are providing immediate and long term relief to the people of Haiti. 

            
           

That seemed like such a good recipe for a fun evening. The good cause, check! Presence of other charities, check! Food and alcohol, check and check! Creating awareness for this, uncheck! It was empty and surprisingly a dud. As I heard as the evening wore on, there was a basketball game going on that night and people were more drawn to the game than this. Also, there was a certain lack of food sponsors. All we had to chew for the evening were sushi rolls and hummus. Tasty! The alcohol which was a mix of vodka and any soda of your choice was available. But we all had to take this in standing in the gallery, surrounded by great art no doubt, but standing, still. Any way you spin the act of standing it seems like so much work. I know it's a cocktail party and that implies that everyone's supposed to stand. Yes, but a few chairs here and there wouldn't have hurt either. Worst of all I had my "party shoes" on, you know the kind that are meant to be admired and can only walk a short distance. Yes, those kinda shoes. After about 2 hours of meeting some very interesting ladies in PR, I left quite unceremoniously. It was barely 11:00pm. 

You see you always meet women. You meet interesting people and exchange business information and you make plans to meet at other artsy fartsy events. Maybe some art gallery or local play somewhere. But you never hear from these people again. Why that is so, I don't know. Maybe they were just being polite, maybe they actually meant to write but life got in the way. I don't know. However, these events are good networking tools if you are an active networker and are open to the possibility of being ignored.

I spent the rest of the evening at Sambuca Jazz Cafe, which is seemingly close to home but I have sadly never visited. It was a lively jazz bar. Not the somber jazz that makes you sleep but the Earth, Wind and Fire cover band that has everyone on their feet. I met this nice man who was trying to convince me to go volunteer in Haiti and another who had never heard of Michael Jackson until he recently saw, This Is It" on a plane. 

Like I said, you always meet people and just thinking about them, makes me laugh.  

Poetic License

For the life of me I cannot remember what particular obsession inspired this poem but it's one of my favorutes. It's not every good. I have better poems in my catologue but this particular one always occurs to me. I have memorized it a little bit and I especially love the italicized text. Every time I recite it to myself, I think who am I kidding, I do hurt. But maybe not as much.

It came from yesterday


To a time that would lead to tomorrow,

To a time that I thought you would find me,

To the time when I would look at you and


Not feel the needle pierce my skin


As I long for a way to say


I do not hurt,


I do not ache,


I do


But not as much.

Supawoman hurts...

So at 1:02 pm I sent this email to "attorney guy" and I am yet to receive a response. He gets real upset that I (i) talk about him on this blog, and (ii) that I share my personal emails to him with the rest of the world on this blog. But I do. Because it's what I am feeling at that time. At 1.02pm on the 25th of January, 2010, this is how Anita felt. And I want to remember that feeling.

I've felt certain things over the past and I can either not remember the day or the time, but I felt that hurt and sometimes I replay that hurting image in my head. Sometimes it helps you heal, you think that happened to a different Anita, this is 2020 Anita now and she doesn't feel that way. It generally helps. I remember the day I saw Shola kiss Binta from my dorm window in Law School. It hurt. I constantly replay that image in my head as one of the most hurtful images I've ever seen. That and the day my mum drove home and told me my dad had died. That hurt like shit. I still remember where I was standing and how bad I felt. How much in shock I was!

So I am not doing this to bash him. I know what is going on. He is just not that into me. He is confused. He is generally not feeling me the way I am feeling him. He doesn't know how to tell me he is not quite feeling me. I know. But the thing that gets me is I go through these motions. I spend sometime away from him and feel like I am okay but then, he comes back. It happened in 2008 and then again in 2009. All of sudden I was sitting in Twisted Taco a day before Thanksgiving and I get this email from him wishing me a Happy Thanksgiving. Why? What the fuck was that about? What are you trying to do to me?

It helps to write about these things. It's like this big 'ole secret I've had that I had no one to talk to about until now. I am not ashamed that I shared my feelings with him. One should never be ashamed for telling another person how they really feel. He is the loser for not knowing what it feels to have something real. I've never had someone in my past tell me, "Oh Anita, your letters to me were too intense." Nope, they've always come back to say, "You were the real deal and I just didn't understand it at the time." So fuck it if he doesn't know. This is it and I feel fucked and slightly disappointed but this is it. This is how I feel and I want you to know it. I hate to feel like this but I do. And that's what's most hurtful about this whole thing. You know what makes it worse is that Valentine's is just around the corner, way to get screwed when lover's day is staring you right in the fucking face. So fuck with me, why don't you Cupid?

Hey you, 

Yes it's another letter from yours truly. Another letter that would probably go unanswered. But here it goes...

Isn't it surprising that I always write you these letters. I write everything to everyone. I find it easier to express myself on paper than I do in person. That has been a pet peeve of most of my exes. I am just not that open in person I suppose. So what I wanted to say this time is to explain yesterday and some of the events of that night. 

It's not just that you did not want to make love with me, or that you were ill prepared for the "event", but it's the way you looked at me. You did not want to touch me. I touched you. You did not want to kiss me. I kissed you. And this is not something I normally do and I did and to have you react like that was weird to me. That's why I kept apologizing. Then, to apologize to you and have you not respond, it made me feel even worse. Then, cut to yesterday. All I needed was someone to hold me even if it was for 10 minutes. I rarely have those kinds of moments when I need comfort - as far as I can remember it's happened twice in the last 5 years. I know you probably already had your day planned but it would have been nice to see you for 10 minutes. I just thought that was the least you could do. I hardly ever have those moments when I need someone or where I am bold enough to ask. I’ve been single for quite awhile so I am really used to it. But I had had a shitty night that led into a day and I just needed someone to lean on. 

As it stands, I don't really know that much about you. I don't know where your head is at or what you want. But you know mine. You know it through my blog and my long letters to you. But I don't know what it is with you that I cannot figure out. All I know is we were friends almost 2 years ago, and then your ex came along and you ran off into the sunset with her and told me very hurtful things and that's about it. I don't know if you're still with her mentally or otherwise. I don't know. I don't know what you wanted when you reinstated communications with me. Did you want to go the Victor route or the friend route? From the tone of your conversation that first night, it seemed so but then, I don't know and I may never know. All I know is that it's been you, it's always been you. For some unfathomable reason it's always been. 

And for what it's worth, I didn't sleep with "dj guy." No one's ever been successful enough to get past 3rd base with me. So...it's still all yours if you want it. 

lucky f*ck

Yesterday or rather this morning between the hours of 3am and 4.30 am, someone came into my upstairs neighbor's apartment and fucked her silly. I knew he fucked her because the bed was vibrating, it shook so hard it woke me. I couldn't hear her screaming but there was some soft mumbling. I couldn't help thinking, Gosh, that must hurt, because the bed was so noisy. I wished they would take it to the floor and stop all the noise. And just as soon as it began, as I walked over to the kitchen to get a cup of water, it stopped. I heard her walk him to the door, she chuckled and her door slammed shut. It was over and he was now on his way home. It was about 4.25am at the time. I just thought sweet. He fucked her quick and he didn't even stay to cuddle. She didn't have to deal with the awkwardness afterwards, with his ugly mug in the morning, with having to remember her sordid act, with the burden of a relationship. Isn't that nice?

How do people work out such sweet deals that's what I want to know?

Need to update

It is not encouraging that the second I actually formalize my blog plans, I no longer feel like writing. I should write. I have been going out tons lately but I come home and I don't find the time to write about it. I like to write. As a matter of fact I write everything, love notes, love letters, text messages, emails, etc. But it's just so hard to summarize them on Blogger once the blank pages starts staring at you.

So I will do better to provide more updates.

Mind you we are inching closer to one of the worst periods for every single man and woman out there....yes cue Psycho theme music...yes, Valentine's Day. Oh, I hate thee. So forgive me if I go silent, I may be busy knocking down every Valentine's Day display I see and being accosted for it.

Let us do a slight recap.

Saturday Night, after the Friday Night spent at Door 44. I went to Meehan's Public House for their Robbie Burns Day Celebration. Mind you, I don't know who Robbie Burns is, or care for that matter. I'm sure he's a swell fellow. But I love all things European so it seemed like a good idea to go hang out with in some pub with some Irish people for the evening and enjoy some good ole' fashioned imbibing of beers. I won't lie I ennjoy a good pint every now and then. Plus, there was some live music from a Scottish band complete with tartan wear, skirts, bagpipes and all. Yes, you had to have been there.

The reason I like places like this, apart from the booze involved, is it's generally unpretentious fun. You meet foreigners like you and you get to share tales of foreign sojournings. Things you miss about the proper pubs in England and all the pseudo pubs in Atlanta and how they fail to cut it. No one acts like they own the place; it's just shots shared all around with some good laughs. I had so much fun I almost ended up closing the place down and let's just say certain things make you realize, you may be getting too old for this shit. But that's a story for another day.

Will I do it again? Probably not too soon. Or I'll save some energy for one of my favourite holidays...St. Patty's Day!

I'm not a supawoman

Relationships confuse me.

I feel I am very open, very verbal and also very emotional. Once you are any of these things it just sets you up for failure in the relationship world. I am just so thoroughly confused by them.

I spent all last week trying to understand why I let "attorney guy" back into my life. I had spent all that time trying to forget him, hoping to hate him, even after I had dreamt that I hadn't achieved that completely (I was up to 95% at the time I had that dream) and trying to move on to me. A year had passed from the quite so memorable I don't-want-you-I-want-her confrontation and I thought I had moved away from all that mentally and emotionally.

But now I am right back where I started. I knew I was vulnerable but I thought I was strong enough, I mean after all these months and time spent by myself, knowing myself, I should have grown considerably stronger. It's like the time spent healing didn't even happen. And you know what's so bad about all this is that he still has the upper hand. I didn't even gain some type of leverage in all this. I just totally lost, I'm losing and I feel sorry for myself.

I knew that day driving in to have drinks with him that I was setting myself up to do away with a year's worth of healing. I knew it but I thought I had moved away from all that. I thought I was a strong woman. You think you know yourself but apparently not. Not when it comes to relationships.

So I don't understand relationships. I don't understand myself for wanting them. I don't understand how to deal with the turmoil that results from them. How do you totally deal? How do you completely, I mean completely get over someone?

death to the bottle

So after careful consideration and having to undergo one of the worst drinking episodes I've had to ever endure in my life, I have decided to say goodbye to the bottle. I am officially declaring it here and now that I am saying goodbye to the bottle - death to the bottle. No more alcohol for a while. In the end, I will save myself some money, dignity and hopefully prepare myself - mentally and spiritually for a relationship.

I think in some ways you have to be prepared to be someone's wife, to be someone's lady even and no matter how I want for it and pray for it, I am not prepared for it. I am sure God knows that too. I can't cook, I hate to clean, my house is a mess, I am not nurturing, and I drink excessively. I don't go out and say, I will have only one drink or I will have no drink at all. I always drink.  That's just not civilized.

Sometime last week, the other bits sort of dawned on me. I decided to clean up. I had invited someone to my home and had to deal with them looking at it as if I was some type of slob which I am and if I had cleaned some more, it wouldn't be that way. I just need to be a better me before someone would be willing to take me on and I would only put forward the better me, not the slob, half-drunk me if I clean my shit up. Life sort of works that way.

So here's to the death to the bottle phase and all its attendant circumstances.

A Soloist's Nightlife

I had one of those weekends that would make my "faux" accountant shiver in their boots.

Friday Night.

In an effort to try to add some flair and fun to this New Year I decided that this was the night of all nights to take myself dancing. Why, what was wrong with this night, you might ask? Even though there was no rain or snow in the weather we were to deal with some very 30 below freezing cold tempratures. The kind that make you wish you spent it on the couch instead of out and about gallivanting. I was in for a rude awakening. I had neglected to check the weather before I left so I took a very light jacket and made my way out of the house. Needless to say the plan changed mindstream.

First of all, everyone had the same plan to get out of the couch and hit the streets, so the street to the club was packed. Just maneuvring to get into it was difficult and then, the parking attendants had upped their price from $5 packing fee to a whopping $10 (talk about inflation!). At this point I knew alternative arrangements had to be made. So I drove about a mile away and packed my car for $5 but this meant I had to walk the entire block to the club. For this task a light jacket would not have sufficed so I broke out the big jacket in the trunk and there I was...freezing my butt off as I walked to the club, wishing the other me had succeeded in convincing me to stay home and try this some other time.

I have to say this about going out, especially solo. It gets harder in the winter than in the summer. In the winter, it's more of a group affair. People get together and decide that instead of chugging down beers at home, they would rather all go out. People that sit at home solo never reconsider their solo plans to lay on the couch. But it's the best place to be on a cold night. I recommend it to anyone. So going out solo requires a concerted effort on your part to want to go out, meet people, break out of your comfort zone and reject confinement by the piths of winter. But it just gives you that much needed jolt, that intensity that warms you up and leaves a lingering smile on your face for the next couple of days, maybe even a week. How can you not want to do it?

Back to my night. Even though my entry to Door 44 was waived because I put myself on the guestlist, I eventually had to pay $5 plus tip to hang my big ass winter coat. At this point I was pissed beyond heavens, I just thought to myself, I better have a good time.

Inevitably I did. There were no brooding strangers waiting to have intense conversations over the loud music and I didn't "hook up" with anyone. Apparently, there's this myth that women go to clubs to "hook up," whoever started that, I don't know. Not me. And it is so not the case. Instead it was a crowd filled, really packed to the rafters of let-your-hair-down fun. Most of it was spent dancing, bumping into people dancing, trying to dance and balance my drink in one hand dancing, a little bumping and grinding against total strangers, attempted salsa dancing, spilling out of my top dancing, a stray drink from some guy who decided not to stop and chat (thank goodness), more dancing and then, yelling at the top of our lungs as we attempted to sing along, and of course, dance. What else could comprise a fun evening? We came to have fun, right?

In the end, the night all came together nicely. The music. The intense loud crowd dancing as if we were at some rave. The alcohol was on point. This place still makes it up there in my book. Plus, the lady at the door didn't think twice when I told her I was there by myself this time. We are making progress. :-)

Will do it again. Everyone should do this...dance uncontrollably. 

simple request

In the end, what I want over the years has always been the same. It actually never falters.

I want you to want to be with me as much as I want to be with you, to look forward to spending time with me. It's that simple yet over the years it's been quite so complicated and impossible to achieve. You have to pry sometime out of these guys. Some people want jewelry, guys to take them shopping, excessive everything, but not me. I just want time. Time spent talking, sharing, being.

Yep,  simple but really impossible.

Hispanic Social

I had the distinct pleasure of attending the Hispanic Professional Social mix and mingle event at Cantina (formerly known as LOLA, formerly one of my favorite places to go for Bellinis and dancing, but they didn't seem to care. They decided to switch it up into a taqueria, whatever that means!). About 2 years ago, a friend of mine at the time advised me of their monthly socials and we had planned to attend a couple of them, but things always got in the way. I signed up for their newsletter so I could be informed of their monthly hangouts and since then, circumstances always deterred my attendance at any of their gatherings.

But on Thursday evening, after ditching my Thursday workout I decided to try to make an attendance. The venue was about a mile from home so the trip to the event would not have hurt. So why not?

There's something about being one of 6 black people in an event that is catered to Hispanics that can be a little hard to take. Even though we are allpart of the "minority race" being one of about 6, (yes, I counted, 4 ladies and 2 gentlemen) even makes it more daunting. Almost like your race is extinct. To top it off they were all speaking Spanish which is not one of my strong suits. French, yes, I understand a little, but Spanish not one bit. And they all had this look like, "WTF are you doing here because you know you're not Hispanic." But it shouldn't matter. Isn't that what the freedom in the country theme is all about.

Anyway, back to the event. As soon as I walked in I knew I was in trouble. There was no host to greet me, no smiling face to meet mine. Nothing. So I found my way to a table to take my jacket off and I instantly bumped into the sole black lady in there, she was the first to arrive. She, of course, knew how to speak Spanish but was not instantly at ease because (i) everyone seemed to be ensconced in conversation with people that they may already know probably from past events, and (ii) she was black. So we struck up conversation and ended up talking the entire evening. As the evening passed there were a few members who stopped by to chat with us but I had already lost interest in the evening so I was not that much fun to talk to at all.

I know I say wait out the first hour and things would ease up, the crowd will lighten up and you will eventually end up having some measure of fun. This event was no exception to that rule. Except the snag is there has to be genuine interest in (i) having fun and (ii) the people that you aim to have fun with, are they charming, interesting, stimulating, etc. If they are not even after the first glance, then I loose interest. Which happened in this case.

So will I attend any of their events again. No, probably not. Will I advise anyone to attend one of their events? Probably, if you are Hispanic or attend with a friend. Don't go solo. I rarely say bring a friend but for them yes, just so you have someone to talk to while the rest of the crowd speaks Spanish!

chivalry died a long time ago

You know what surprises me - you would think that after all this while I shouldn't be surprised at all but I am, pleasantly so. 

What surprises me is that I can't get someone to take me on a date. A simple date. It could be very simple, as dinner and a movie. 

Just a date. 

The person puts some thought into it, plans it out, calls me ahead of time, has butterflies in his stomach while I have mine. He makes dinner reservations. I actually get to put on one of my many "date dresses". Just a date. I don't care if it's fucking Applebee's but as long as it's some evening that seems like there's some effort involved. And when we meet he's all nervous thinking, will I like it, like him, will I be impressed. And I'm just impressed that he made an effort.

Something so simple yet so unattainable.

Annie...The Musical

Went to closing night of Annie, the musical at the Fabulous Fox Theater Atlanta. 

Mind you, I've never seen the movie, the classic. I know, Where have I been? I've seen glimpses of the movie and who can forget the songs, the insufferable "Hard Knock Life" and the feel good "Tomorrow." They are indelibly etched in your brain, movie or not. With that curiousity, I wanted to know what all the fuss was about? What is this Annie that has caused quite a sensation and can I still get into it as an adult? 


It was a very pleasant, uplifting experience. Just a breath of fresh air. The story - quite so simple, the acting - poignant and innocent, extremely pleasant kid actresses with their fresh unadulterated take on acting and singing. I was totally entertained. At first, I thought it would end up as one of those kids-trying-to-act-sweet plays but not at all, these kids were total pros. They took it to the next level. At the point they started with their Broadway leg kicks, I knew that they came prepared to win me and everyone else over. I clapped so hard my hands hurt. They were so adorable. 


Sometimes, you need that refreshing innocence to sweep over you, and smack the sadness out of you, inserting the smile in its place. Like the song says, "Sometimes when I'm feeling grey, I just stick out my chin and grin and say...." So you do need that reassuring jolt every once in awhile and this play just gave me that much needed boost to just continue with this overwhelming life. 

I spent the entire night smiling and humming to myself. 

Another day, another way

Another day, another way for me to open up to you...

---Jamie Liddell

That's one of my favorite songs period. It's a very happy song and sometimes it describes how you feel.

Last night, I caught Elliot Yamin play a short, (very short) acoustic set at Smiths Olde Bar. For the price of admission at $18 and having to hear him play for roughly 30 minutes it almost didn't seem worth it. But when you think about how intimate it was, we were literally that close to him, saw him sweat it out, sing it out, etc and at the end he did a meet and greet, said hello, took pictures, it made it all worth it. It's always great to see artists right before they have their big break, grow wings and snub their fans. That moment when they suddenly care that you've come to see them and they really sing from the heart in an unpretentious heartfelt way. It's a moment every fan should live for. Even when they do make it big, it would still be nice for them to have short moments when they play small venues, give them a chance to connect and sing in tune, perform without the aid of pyrotechnics, backup dancers, the works, etc. It's always worth it.

In hindsight, I had a great time, pity it had to end early.

So sorry that I have to start a review on Elliot Yamin with a Jamie Liddell song but that's what was going through my mind at that time and Elliot's music was just the icing. His music is still good, very adult contemporary r&b.

in all things crazy

So it continues the aimless year continues. And we come to the 16th day.

I made some resolutions to myself when this year started, actually before it started. You know those things you say to yourself during Christmas and you say, yeah we'll start them when the New Year starts.

One of them was that I will start cooking more. Just because, I sat through Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners having to hear what a fantastic cook my sister is, and I thought to myself, maybe that's what's wrong with me. I don't know how to cook. I don't immediately have that motherly instinct that involves wanting to cater to someone.

The other resolution was to be more carefree. I normally over think things. I say, this is not what a lady would do. In the past year if you've been paying attention, some of those inhibitions have sort of flown out the window. But even in the brief moments that they have, when I've become this "other woman". I always wake up with some type of guilt. Overwhelming guilt and shame so that I can't even stand to look at myself in the mirror for days and I try, oh, I try so hard to forget what I just did. It takes a while but eventually it fades into my memory until the next time I get stupidly drunk and I do stupid things.

One of such moments happened last night with someone who has been featured quite a bit in this blog. I was drunk. He was not quite as drunk as I was. I let him start and I didn't stop him and he stopped but I just kept on going like a raving sex-starved lunatic. Needless to say we made it to third base and fell a few yards shy of a home run.

Since then, I've been apologizing like some type of idiot. But each one of my apologies has been met with silence on the other line thus making me feel even worse. I don't know if the going crazy route thing is for me because I seem to be doing it so badly. Some women do it so well and leave with their dignity intact ready to let their guards down another day. Apparently, not I.

I want to live life and not be filled with regrets, wishing I had let my guard down more, wishing I had done this or that. But then, I still want to be able to stand myself when I do those things and not feel like I betrayed the lady I strive so hard to be. There needs to be some type of balance in there where you can live life to the lees and not compromise certain virtues. All in all, alcohol usurps all that in the end. It clouds judgment, usurps inhibition, just becomes the owner of your mind. So where is the balance...

That's all I can say for now.

Austin talk again

I loved Austin so much that since then I've actually been nursing the opportunity to move down there.

Years ago before the word "recession" was added to our vocabularies, I had a very brief co-worker pack up and move over there. He was so excited about it too. He shared the same discontent with me in Atlanta, you know, how the people are not friendly and he had just moved here from up north, so he packed his shit and moved over there. But he's advantage was, he was a non-licensed attorney so he could easily work remotely. I can't even work remotely here in Atlanta.

So since I got down very hard from my Austin high, I've been researching jobs in Austin. Sadly, not that many. I guess the recession hit them hard. Very hard. It didn't seem that way when I was up there. Everyone seemed so quirky, educated and happy in their middle-class status. Not so in Atlanta. I should have known something was wrong with the astounding number of homeless people. I even did a cross search between Houston jobs and Austin job and a lot more jobs showed up in Houston (that wretched city) than Austin. Things that make you sad, aye!

This is my plea to the blog word: if you happen to know anyone who might need a blogger, a somewhat good writer, an international legal professional, a contract analyst, an aspiring anything in Austin, please let me know. I would even pay for my own relocation. Yes, I decided that Austin is the only city in the South I'd even consider relocating to and be that as it may be, I won't let anyone talk me out of it.

Happy New Year

So the new decade has begun. 2010. It sorta seems similar to the other one, except we have two whole digits to deal with. I won't begrudge this year anything. I will embrace it just like the other years. And give it the single status-filled enjoyment it deserves.

Last year I didn't really go out much. Instead I did more traveling. And in my new cities I went out and got to taste what it was like to gallivant solo in places like Miami, New York and most recently, Austin.

I spent New Years in Austin. Austin, the music capital of the world. I had heard so much about it before I went. I knew a co-worker who packed up his life and belongings and moved to Austin, and he did that with so much relish, I was envious. So you can see why I really wanted to go to this place. Austin did not disappoint. It was the southern version of New York, except with live music everywhere. If you know me, you know I love live music. It is music in its purest form. In Atlanta, finding a place that plays live music is like a hunt, you have to call, google, investigate. But not so in Austin, all you have to ask is: What kind of music? What band? How many bands? That's just so sick.

Going out there to take in a live band on my own was so much fun. All you have to do is let your guard down, don't think everyone is staring at you because you're there solo, (which I was thinking the entire time) and just embrace the moment, the music and the atmosphere and that's it.

With that being said, that is one of my New Year's resolutions: to let my guard down. Whenever I go out, after wrestling with my inner demons, defeating them and leaving them on the couch, I get there and I'm instantly uptight and not letting go. I just think everyone's staring at me and wondering, why are you here by yourself, which they probably are, but I shouldn't be caught up in myself thinking about it all night. Rarely have I let go. The only time I remember was probably in Miami, but everyone let's go in Miami so that's no exception. But if you're going to go out, make the best of it, live it out. So you're there by yourself, who cares, everyone would wish they had the cajones to do what you did, so make them envy you and take in the moment.

That's my vote of confidence to myself and to everyone who's ever had the guts to go it alone.

Another awesome year begins

As the year slowly gets off to speed, some things are still at full speed, like work. Usually the start of the year, I've found from previous jobs are slower times of the year, work wise. And then, they give you time to sort of unravel and plan for the future, to finalize and lay the plans for those New Year resolutions. I mean, you may have said them to yourself on the 31st or the 1st (if you were sober enough) but it would need a plan to materialize, take form. But how can it when work just gets into full steam, like hit the ground running and act like the Christmas escapism never happened.

That's the thing about this job, there is hardly a dull moment. Even when I was in litigation, there were slow moments, but this one. I've been in it for 2 years now and usually I always have these other life plans that I work on while I work, but this one, I just haven't. The most I've done is plan vacations, hence taking a break from the job, of which when I come back, it's like the vacation never even happened. I spent all that money and I am tenser than before I even left. I would like to plan, forge a way forward, have side projects like - Anita is working on her book, or Anita is taking writing classes, or Anita is taking karate classes. How can I? I come home exhausted. I use my stay at home day to clean my house because the weekend was already chockful of chores.  My day is just filled that I am mentally exhausted, all I want to do is sit indoors and act like I didn't just spend the last 8 hours being insulted or just working my butt off for some ingrates. And I would gain some type of satisfaction or respite from this if I had some other side task to keep me occupied, but how can you? It's been like this for 2 years now. As this year started I said I wouldn't do this to myself anymore...I would lay some plans down and follow through but then today at work was so busy, that even though I was at home I couldn't spare a second to harbor some stray thought.

Who lives like this, and how, have they been able to achieve some type of work/life balance?

New Years Day in Austin

I got a chance to sample some of the local music in Austin on New Year's Day. I tried this little live music bar called 1-2-1 Bar or is it One -2 -One. It was a very small hole in the wall bar that strictly plays live music for the ultra low cost of $5 for admission. And the music was just awesome, the crowd not so much.

When I called to ask who was playing that night, they described the band as a mix of Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin band, so I thought heavy guitars and bluesy rock. That was just what it was. In fact, the lead singer played so hard that he broke one of his guitar strings. Usually when they say live music for that price your mind goes to some American Idol reject, as in first week of Hollywood reject, but not in this case. These guys were the real things too authentic for American Idol.

The bar itself was some narrow hallway, dimly lit, with very few chairs and lots of room in the middle, supposedly for dancing. There were quite a few ladies dancing but I wasn't one of them. "There we go again with the not letting the hair down." I know...I just sat there taking it all in, enjoying the music, enjoying standing out as the sole black person in the place and amusing myself in my own little way. It was hard to even start some type of conversation with anybody, there was some type of tension that I couldn't cut through a knife, no matter how many smiles I flashed I just stuck out like a sore thumb. Those kind of places are hard to permeate but you always have to reassure yourself that you're there solely for the music, man and that's all you need.

After about an hour and half into it, I left. Austin music experiment over.

It wasn't a crazy night but it was a good way to wrap up the vacation.

Merry New Year from Austin!

So something totally different, and totally college...in this New Year, Austin, TX. Very different from Atlanta, very young, exuberant, weird and alternative by every means and so "all-american." So we decided to do something different this year, well they decided I started this about 4 years ago when I told myself I would no longer watch the ball drop in my home. And then last year once I saw it in another city I thought to myself this is not half bad, let's spend New Year not only away from the living room but in another city, and so here we are in Austin, TX. I had an awesome time. Totally awesome. Sadly I am so sober (and broke) but that may change tomorrow.

So Merry New Year to you all...and this year let's ask for some good news, let's stop and pray that one day good news would blow like the Santa Ana wind and just come whistling by us, and maybe, just maybe land in our laps...that's what I want this year...good news to just land on my lap.

And so much more to you all.