Home

Have you ever noticed that the people at the airport gates look stereotypically like where they are going. The people going to Albuquerque (home of the meth addiction prevention billboard) are weathered and wearing those leather string ties. The people going to LA have on flip-flops, the state shoe of California.

The people going to Texas - NO, NOT BIG HAIR - they look friendly and sharp. When I boarded the plane I noticed that everyone smiled at me as I walk down the aisle. Okay, this may have been because I was grinning at them from ear to ear, but I also tend to believe that they are friendly people. A lady was struggling getting her bag into the overhead and a business man jumped up to help her. As he leaned over me to get the bag in, he said to me, "Excuse me ma'am" in his charming cowboy accent. (My husband, who lived in Austin but is from South Carolina, will say to me "yes ma'am" when I ask him to do something and I absolutely love it.)

I had a stop-over in Austin and I cried when we landed. Good God, I thought, I am going to be a mess (a hot mess, of course) when I finally make it to Dallas. I had been warned by friends who had experienced the same thing that home, indeed, would no longer feel like home. I was actually worried about the reverse - that is, I was worried that it would feel so much like home that I wouldn't want to leave.

Sure enough, when Dallas came into view, I felt like I was going home. As soon as I stepped off the plane, I noticed it wasn't strange at all. I felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders and that my entire body that had been clenched up tight in the 9 years I had been gone finally relaxed. As I made my way into the city, it didn't seem like it had changed at all. I was home.

I cannot live here because I have joint custody of a wonderful son who loves his father who hates Dallas. Accordingly, there is no possibility of living here for a very long time. I will not take my son away from his father.

It's a strange thing, that - to be living someplace that doesn't feel like home. There's nothing wrong with where I live now. In fact, most people would love to live where I live. But Dallas is home, for reasons explainable and for reasons that escape my ability to find words.

The Franchise headquarters are right by the airport so I popped in to say hello before my day long meeting. Everyone knew exactly who I was when I walked in the door and greeted me like an old friend. I can't wait for tomorrow (today, by the time I post this.)

This post is long enough, but I can't sign off without telling each of you that part of my ability to get off the plane onto Texas soil without falling to pieces was because of all of your comments and good wishes and support through this blog. Thank you.

What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

On Friday, I will be at The Franchise headquarters in Dallas. I am, quite frankly, scared out of my wits by this whole franchise thing.

I wasn't scared when I took the California bar exam, or even the Colorado bar exam when the guy next to me said it was his 7th time trying to pass it. I wasn't scared giving birth. (The morphine drip may have helped. Oh, you're going to pull a baby out of my abdomen from an incision that's only 5 inches long. Good luck with that! Oh looky there - you did it. Good night.)

Although, of course, I have first amendment rights (At least, I'm fairly sure I do. Con law was one big snoozer - those Supreme Court guys sure do like to hear themselves write!) I will not be disclosing the name of the franchise until the franchise agreement is signed and it would be appropriate to do so. I will say that the store sells one type of dessert item and coffee.

Anyway, I am scared shitless because if I fail at this, I fail big. HUGE. Like, this is going to cost 4x as much as my law degree. However, I cannot underscore this point enough - I am assuming I get wholesale coffee.

And we have to think positively - what could possibly go wrong.

Defending Dallas

T minus 2 days until arrival in Dallas. I'm an anxious, excited wad of a ridiculous mess. (If anybody is new here, I lived in Dallas for 13 years but moved away the year my mom passed away, and I haven't been back since.)

One of the people I really want to see is my friend Gary. I love him likely family. He is my former hairdresser but we became best friends when he realized I was willing to go to the Mexican restaurant across from his salon to get margaritas while I was in foils. We're both the kind that doesn't do phone. Accordingly, we lost touch. I've called him 3 times now to tell him that I am coming in but I haven't heard from him. He's the one and only person that I absolutely have to see in Dallas.

Whenever Dallas comes up, so too the comments about big hair. Not one of my Dallas friends had big hair. Not. One. Dallas is a friendly, easy, more sophisticated place than you might think (except for the weirdos at the bar in foils).

First of all, Jane Aldridge from Sea of Shoes lives in the Dallas. She is hands down the most stylish person in blogdom. Check out her photo essay of Marfa (her March archives). I would put those pictures in my dining room right next to the Rauschenberg. And I note that girlfriend has the Prada shoes I have been lusting after this season.

Second of all, this is the line up at Trees (a totally cool concert dive in Dallas) from last weekend: Fair to Midland, Exit 380 and Serosia. Okay, I have no clue who those bands are but the point is they are not Alan Jackson or Dirks Bentley.

Third of all, margaritas in pitchers (like they are meant to be served) and Tex-Mex.

Fourth of all, Dallas is home base for the mothership (Neimans).

And home to this fine institution of higher learning on the left.
And also SMU.

Break for The Hills

Did anybody else notice that Heidi's parents seem to have made considerable strides in the Crested Butte real estate market?

Bitches No More

My arch-nemesis in high school was a girl named Brandi. She wrote on the bathroom wall that I was a fucking awful cheerleader. THE SHAME.

Now, we could debate the merits of giving your child a name that is most commonly associated with strippers, but the point here is that I was devastated.

One of my friends came to my defense on the same bathroom wall (something about Brandi not having been to cheerleading camp and not knowing what she was talking about- burn) and before I knew it, the entire stall wall was covered with a serious debate about my cheerleading skills. Later that year, somebody spray painted "Nancy is a slut" on the side of the school and the topic of debate shifted away from me.

However, both events left me absolutely reeling with the things that girls do to each other. My kind didn't impress me much more through university where I met too many girls openly proud to be getting their Mrs., and then during my pregnancy when a friend said that now I had an excuse not to get a job after law school. Ah, don't you think that if I was going to get pregnant as an excuse not to work I would have saved myself the six figure tuition and the 1L year without tv and just gone ahead and gotten pregnant.

Anyway, I was sceptical of my kind. Until recently. I have found that one of the absolutely glorious things about getting older is that we women are here for each other. We understand who we are and what we want, and we don't judge others for what they are and what they want. My stay-at-home friends offer to pick up my son if I am running late from work, and I offer to take their kids so they can get away for a long weekend.

More and more often I am meeting women who are entirely comfortable in their own skin. They have peace and confidence and self-awareness, and to be in their presence is truly inspiring. There is no force or beauty quite like it. You cannot find this type of girl in high school or university or even in her 20s. You can only find this woman many, many years later.

(P.S. I would like to state for the record that Brandi was a skanky ho.)

No I Wasn't Actually Hoping for a Girl

I have friends that asked me if I had wanted a girl. And I have friends that kept getting pregnant until they had a girl.

The only thing that I thought I might miss having a boy instead of a girl was the Saturday shopping trips. Everyone in the family would meet on Saturday for Saturday lunch, then my mom and I would go off together to shop. The purpose wasn't so much to acquire. Rather, it was walking through the Dallas Galleria that we had our best talks. Most times it was the effortless banter of a mother and daughter who were best friends, tackling topics ranging from being a wife to careers to career shoes. One time I was trying on a Dana Buchman top in the dressing room at Neimans and I got stuck with the top halfway over my head. No matter what I tried, I was stuck with my arms in the air, my torso exposed and my face covered with the shirt. My mom and I laughed pretty hard until I started to panic because I was truly stuck. My mom just kept right on laughing.

The other day I had switched out the winter Kate Spade to a summer bag I got at DSW. Try as I might, I could not find a single Kate to buy at the recent 30% off friends and family sale at katespade.com. This had me slightly worried about the state of the world but then I remembered that The Hills and The City both pick up this week and that made me feel that all was going to be okay. Except for Heidi, who truly did look better before. Much better. I predict that all is not going to go well for her.

Anyway, my son pointed out that my new bag wasn't a Kate and that I should just reuse the zebra Kate from last summer because that one was cool. God I love this kid. So then I asked him if he wanted some new clothes and we ran to the Gap and had a blast picking out jammies with sharks and a ringer t-shirt with a skeleton driving a motorcycle. And it was so much cooler than all the pink bedazzled shit on the other side of the store. Little girls are sweet, but sons rock.

Weekend Treat - Knives and Forks!

Weekend Treat is going to take a bit of a different turn. Instead of just posting pictures of things I want, I am going to post pictures of things I have and that I love. Why would I do that? Because I am a narcissist? Well, I taught my son 240 sign language symbols before he was one, got the highest grade in my business law class, personally started the Guess jeans fad in the early 80s, and can run 5 miles without breaking a sweat, but no. I'm not a narcissist.

Rather, I suspect a large majority of you read blogs for the same reason I do. I'm just plain interested in how other people live their lives and their stories and the things that make them happy. It's like when your husband is driving you to dinner and it's dark so you finally get a chance to look in all the windows of the neighbors who have left their curtains open. I love seeing what color people paint their dining room. This is infinitely fascinating to me. And it is infinitely fascinating to me what people hang on their walls and the lack of things they have to hang on their walls.

But I digress. I simply love it when people share things from their own lives that make them happy. It's interesting and, from time to time, I get an idea or two that I make my own. So, for those of you that feel the same way . . . I own this flatware and it makes me very happy. I own the tortoiseshell ones and have forever and they have held up in the dishwasher for years and years. If I didn't already have the tortoiseshell ones, I would get the orange ones. It would be impossible to stir your coffee with an orange spoon and not be happy. Sometimes I want the pink ones because I am surrounded by boyz (see yesterday's post). I have a gray dining room and an off-white living room specifically so I can add different bright colors as the mood hits.

Napoleon flatware. Horchow.com (Horchow is a division of the morthership [Niemans]).

One Summer, At Band Camp

One of my favorite scenes from American Pie is "One summer, at band camp . . ." The funny thing is, my husband actually has stories that begin, "One summer, at band camp . . ."

The other day he began one such story but it got even better. "One summer, at band camp, during nap time . . ."
"Wait a minute. Did you just say, 'during nap time'?"
"Yeah, during nap time."
"You had nap time during high school band camp?"
"Uh huh. One summer, during band camp, at nap time, I got in trouble for wearing my earphones and listening to Foreigner."

[I wanted to make sure that my husband was okay with me printing this story for the entire world to read, so I sent him a copy. He said to make sure you knew that it wasn't Foreigner that he was listening to but Styx, and in particular it was Renegade Man. Domo Arigato for clearing that up babe. Domo Arigato.]

Da Boyz.
Juliet. I love you too! That made my day.

I Don't Like Glee

There. I said it. I tried it three times because all of my favorite people really enjoy Glee. The banter can be witty, I'll certainly give it that. And I mad love Jane Lynch. The next time you don't know what to put on your Netflix's que, try Best in Show and A Mighty Wind. She is brilliant. But, in the midst of all that witty banter, do you know what they do? They break into song. Ah hell no. Not since Vanilla Sky and Born on the Forth of July have I ever been so disgruntled about my wasted time. (Huh? One of these things is not like the other. I do not know why my list of things that make me disgruntled includes two Tom Cruise movies and Glee.)

It's not necessarily a cover song thing. Some songs can be covered and they come out just fine. See Fine Young Cannibals, Suspicious Minds. Maybe it was that the show started off covering Journey. Ah, no. You don't go there. You either are Steve Perry or you are not Steve Perry and if you are not Steve Perry than you do not sing Journey songs period. It's blasphemy.

Maybe its that we dislike characteristics in others that we dislike in ourselves. I was a precocious stage child. And all I can say is that Glee makes me want to apologize to my parents for all those times my friends and I made them watch us sing and dance to my Grease record. I'm sorry.

Or maybe its because the redhead seems to be all Anthropologie all the time. I love me some Anthropologie. I have a lust-worthy collection of Anthro sweater coats. But it's best used one piece at a time.

Wow. We've covered a lot of ground. I'm off to a 7:00a.m. meeting which is just wrong.

Why I'm Scared of Dallas

The Franchise is based in Dallas and I need to go there to visit corporate headquarters.

When we (my ex-husband, me and our 4 month old baby) left Dallas 9 years ago, it made no sense to me that we should do so. My mom had just passed away and I had a brand new baby. I wanted to be around my best friends and my favorite shops. Also, I had just graduated from law school in Texas and all my professional contacts were there.

Nevertheless, for reasons and rationales I won't get into here, my then-husband took a job in a different state (after telling me earlier he would be taking a job in yet a different state thereby causing me to take the bar there so that I was then licensed to practice in a state that was neither Texas nor where we actually ended up living but I wasn't mad about that no. Bar exams are fun.)

For a very long time, I did not want to go back to Dallas. I thought that it would be too painful to see my home but not be able to live there. Still, when we have layovers in Dallas, part of me feels like I could just hop in a car and drive to my old house and then call up my friends and we would pick up where we left off without missing a beat.

The truth is, I've missed a beat - a nine year long beat. My old house has been partially demolished and replaced, one friend had two more babies and dedicated her life to the church, one spent time in jail for a DUI, one moved to a different state. My favorite hangouts are gone.

And, of course, there is grave that I haven't visited in 9 years. I do not feel any guilt about the length of time - my mother would prefer to be remembered any place else. But, of course, I have to go there.

My homecoming - a short week away. And I am absolutely terrified. Dallas means so very much to me and is such a huge part of me, but I am nothing of it.

Soft and Positive

My supervisor took a project away from me and gave it to someone else because, according to the email, this other person is better able to deliver messages in a "soft and positive" light. In what is surely a miracle, my head did not explode upon reading that email.

I have been out of my notecards with the soft-focus picture of the kittens for some time now and have instead been using the corporation's letterhead. My bad.

Deep Thoughts on Avocado Pie

I've never really thought much about pie. To me, it seems like the trailer park of the dessert world. The Cool Whip? Its hurricane.

My mother had two (okay, she had many) rules of entertaining in our house. First, we would never EVER serve guests on paper plates. Second, we would always use real whipping cream.

Where was I? Oh, yes. Pie. I saw a recipe for avocado pie in the Food Network magazine. I was so intrigued and I could not stop looking away. I didn't know whether to be disgusted or only slightly disgusted. But the more I thought about it, the more I wanted to try it. And if worse came to worse, we could use it as a dip.

Well, this pie, this pie is the cool airstream trailer of the dessert world. The picture above is Food Network's pie, mine is below. My plate is cuter. Mine actually looked and tasted better much more chilled, but it was delicious. I imagine it would go nicely with nachos and margaritas or beer.

The same recipe can be found at a charming, campy food blog called Pages, Pucks and Pantry. (She also shares a recipe for bacon jam and one for peanut butter fudge with Velvetta!) .

Weekend Treat - Immersion Blender / Spinach Smoothie

First of all - I have the best readers in all of blogdom. Thank you. I'm sure if we lived closer we could become fast friends over a bottle of wine or coffee and cupcakes. Thank you for all the notes and comments - they really do make a difference in my day and I am excited to share all this with you.

Second of all, my blender broke. (Cue Bee Gee's Tragedy) I remembered that someone had given me an immersion blender for a Christmas gift. That someone was an ex in-law who usually sent the most random gifts from Everything Is A Dollar so when she sent the immersion blender I just sort of rolled my eyes and stuck it far away.

It turns out that my immersion blender is my life. You must own one. Blender cleaning is a pain in the ass. Immersion blender cleaning is a breeze and I think it works 100 times better. Of course, when you google "immersion blender" there is large number of people that sell immersion blender parts, so maybe they aren't meant to hold up, but my Braun Turbo Immersion Blender makes me this every morning:

This Negates All The Rest Of The Crap That I Will Eat Today Spinach Smoothie
One-third of a pack of frozen blueberries
One handful of spinach, ripped up
One banana
Two heaping tablespoons of Soy Yogurt
One Tablespoon of liquid probiotics (because the salesperson at the Whole Foods swore that neither me nor my son would ever get sick again)
Whatever is leftover in my son's orange juice glass (usually about 1/4 to 1/3 cup)

Blend using your Braun turbo immersion blender.

Moving Foward

You may be wondering why, on Monday, after all this time, I just randomly decided to share with you the midmod house. Well, the franchise will most likely require the sale of it.

The Franchise. It sells two products, one of which, as an ancillary sale item, is coffee. My husband figures that we will save thousands of dollars each year if I have access to wholesale coffee. The first time I stepped into one of the stores, I was so impressed that I wanted to do a franchise. At that time, they were not franchising, but now they are. There are currently no open stores in this state.

The Franchise is going to require us to put everything on the line. The possibility of anything but a success is not an option. When I was standing in line today to get my coffee, for a brief moment I thought about not risking my family's future on this random endeavor of mine. But that thought lasted for about a second. I'm a doer. Remain in Cube World? No. Volunteer my time? I am so not of that mindset. And if I didn't work, I would feel like I had some sort of obligation to make my family reasonable meals with vegetables.

A Low Point in Boiling Crustaceans

Having spent four years in New Orleans, and having a child that went through a phase where he would only eat shrimp, I have consumed a large amount of shrimp in my time. (And have perfected the cooking thereof. See Recipe on the Zatarain's liquid crab boil bottle.)

Also, it takes a lot to make me squeamish. I do understand what happens to the animals, the living, breathing, feeling animals so that they can become my dinner. But I also understand that processing grains and produce and shipping it all over the world in great big refrigerated trucks is hard on the environment. In other words, I eat what I want and don't think too much about it. Six of one, half a dozen of the other.

But I had to give pause yesterday, and I just couldn't do it. I cooked two pounds of shrimp and decided to be extra nice to my family and peel them. (Although, I generally feel that any son of mine had better be able to peel a shrimp to take the shell off in one easy piece and, if having shrimp in sauce, also be able to do so with a knife and fork. It's my obligation as a parent to teach him that and then my work there is done.) Anyway, so I am peeling away, and I get one shrimp and I notice something strange right under the shell in the curve of its underbelly - a fully formed, about to born, baby shrimp with its little eyes and little legs and little feelers (much like the cute little shrimp on the left). I boiled a mommy. And her baby. While they were one. The mama shrimp was perfectly fine for consumption (and probably the baby too - perhaps like the veal of the crustacean world?). But I just couldn't do it.

(Even though, and you can mark my words on this, the smaller shrimp do taste better.)
(Also, Zatarain's liquid crab boil is an excellent substitute for pickling spices when making corned beef. And for chocolate syrup in milkshakes. Just kidding, but the corned beef thing is very true. Really, everybody should be required to spend four years of their life in New Orleans. You will learn more useful information there than any place you can get a four year degree.)

I See the Broad Spectrum Light

As you know, I work in the deep, dark pit of despair. At a meeting last November, my coworkers were talking about how great the build-out of our office is. I was all, "Oh no you don't!" I proceeded to explain just what a terrible color choice charcoal gray is for office walls in spaces where there is no window and only one energy saving neon light tube that is covered by a light fixture that obscures the bulb and only lets light escape back up toward the ceiling. I can only imagine that these fixtures were designed by some sort of mole-people with an aversion to light.

After explaining in glorious detail just how terrible the cubes are (in an attempt to, you know, be helpful) you should have heard the collective gasps from my fellow cube dwellers and saw their collective wide-eyes in response to my office design monologue that I present to our supervisors, which included, unbeknownst to me, the lady who designed the office. They all quickly tried to minimize my gaff by explaining how much they loved their spaces and how their cubes were all just fine. The thanks I get for being the self-appointed voice of the cube people

Anyway, the office designer lady came to me last week and asked if I might like a full spectrum lamp for my cube. Now my cube resembles a deep, dark pit of despair with one square foot of space where one might might grow "herbs" by LED or conduct vigilante interrogations.

Barefoot Contessa v. Sandra Lee

Sometimes I go to the gym during lunch. The reason I picked this particular gym is because each treadmill is attached to its own personal television. Brilliant.

First, I watch the Barefoot Contessa (Ina Garten). Most people watch CNN. I propose that this is for show and that they would rather be watching E. The Barefoot is so incredibly soothing. Her voice is like one of those pleasant meditation CDs. (I'm guessing. If I ever bought one, I would want it to have the voice of the Barefoot.) Upon hearing her, I immediately chill. I could listen to that voice for hours. And she makes cooking look so easy.

I am in my happy place after watching Barefoot but then OH BUT THEN comes Sandra Lee and her Semi-Homemade show and do you know what this woman does - SHE COORDINATES HER CURTAINS TO GO WITH HER DINNER THEME. I am no mental health expert but that is just plain psychotic. She needs meds big time. Seriously. On what planet in what universe does it ever occur to anyone to match their curtains to their dinner. This upsets me terribly and I am no longer in my happy place.

My Other Baby

Last year we were knee deep in midcentury modern renovations. I lusted after everything in Atomic Ranch with a vim that can only mean I was reincarnated after an untimely death in the 1950's (apparently from chain smoking if Mad Men is any sort of true depiction.) I love the lines of the houses and all those clothes with three-quarter sleeves and the idea of decanters of liquor on my desk at work.

The houses tend to be on the smaller size, and because we need three bedrooms and an office for my husband when he is not working in Thailand, buying one for us to live in just wasn't practical. So my husband got me this to satisfy my ranch lust and to renovate.



And thank God because if I hadn't had something to paint after I got laid off I really do think I might have gone crazy. Oh, yes, it was ugly. Purple? Seriously? Purple is like orange - as lovely as it is for a color, it should not be used for house trim. But I had a vision . . .

Is that not the finest door you have ever seen? (I mean, if it was large enough that you could see it.)

Weekend Treat. Emily Amey Jewelry

When I was at Racho Pescadero . . .

("Oh my God. Are you STILL talking about your Baja trip?"

"Why, yes, yes I am.")

. . . I met Emily Amey. She lives in Brooklyn and has her own line of jewelry. I am always immensely impressed by people who live their lives doing artsy things. I love the earrings pictured, and I love this ring - it reminds me of a crystal ball.

These pieces are beautiful and earthy. She told me they are inspired by her travels.

emilyamey.com

Super Daisies

Two interesting positions opened up recently and my resume reads consistently with the listed skills and experience requirements for both. Just today, I got a rejection from the one. Meaning, unless some additional opportunity pops up really fast, there is only one legal opportunity left before the franchise option is the reality.

You would think that after a full year of rejection letters and emails that they would roll off my back by now. But lets face it - its still a drag to be having a perfectly fine day and then have a rejection email pop up right after the kate spade email announcing the new arrivals. And, truthfully, it knocks me a bit off course for the day when I get a rejection for a position that I thought I would really like or that I had the exact experience they were looking for. At one time, I had really respectable people telling me that I was a great attorney. I had clients that appreciated what I did for them. Now I can't find anyone willing to let me practice law.

Hold up your index finger and say in your best E.T. voice . . . "Ouuuuch."

This morning I was in such a happy place that I stopped by the Whole Foods and got yellow gerbera daisies for my orange vase and put them in my cube. Thank goodness for that - right now they feel like all that is standing between me and a funk. They are, one might say, my major funk force repellent. Little did these flowers know that today they would have to serve as Super Daisies.

Happy Hour

One of my favorite hours of the day is between 6a.m and 7a.m. when I sit at my blogging spot and write my blog and read my favorite blogs and drink my coffee. Right now I am loving a few select design blogs - they start my day off with pretty. My blog spot is in our dining room/everything room where the big window faces the parkway. As dawn turns to day, I watch my fellow early birds gather at the bus stop in our yard, the joggers run through the park, and the commuters head to work.

The dining room table is a giant teak slab that gets marked up and looks better as it ages. At the two ends are the off-white parsons chairs that my mom got me for my first grown up apartment, and on the side opposite the teak bench are two red Globus chairs from dwr.com (Globus chair to the left, in ash finish). The walls are a cozy gray. (Seriously, trust me on this. At one point I had every gray paint sample available taped to the wall so I could find a gray that was warm.) And on the wall opposite the windows is my Rauschenburg, my one real piece of art.

It's a very happy hour and a very happy place. How about you? Do you have a time or a place that makes your day?

Real Housewives Recap, Episode 5

Bethenny (mug pictured here) says that the last thing she wants is her mug on a blogger site.

She also says that diarrhea of the mouth is not a real ailment. Which is false. It's called turrets syndrome. I don't have the turrets, but I have a related and very real ailment - fear of turrets. Sometimes I am sitting in business meetings and I have to concentrate very very hard to not say the inappropriate but true things that I am thinking.

At one point I was sort of a fan of Kelly's cluelessness because it kept her above all the pettiness, but she is just a Paris Hilton minus the one always semi-shut eye. Meaning, she knows how to use her cluelessness. She asks a reporter who has seen her Playboy pictorial, "What did I look like, I can't remember?" Oh please. She then tells the camera that she wants to make sure that Bethenny knows how much she doesn't care about her, which totally negates any validity that she doesn't care.

Ramona goes out to lunch and talks about her hair. We could make this a drinking game but we would all need AA by the end of the season.

I love Simon (married to Alex, on the left.) He can say "Hello, darling" to the gay fashion director for Brooklyn fashion week and totally get away with it. Simon and Alex are the only two people who are happy to be involved in Brooklyn fashion week. I think I would like it better in Brooklyn than NYC.

The Jill and Bethenny fight just makes me sad. I've lost a best friend to a stupid fight before and it does hurt, just like breaking up with someone. But here, I am on Bethenny's side. I don't like how Jill puts everyone on speaker without telling them who is listening and plays private messages for all to hear. Pretty crappy Jill.

Pictures from bravotv.com

Snack and a Wax

They were having a sale on candy today at Target (which didn't make me feel any better about the fact that the Liberty of London coffee mugs I wanted were gone).

My vegan stepdaughter likes the Swedish Fish so I picked up a bag to have waiting for her in her room. Except 3:00 came along and we all know what happens at 3:00. Nothing edible within walking distance of my cube is safe. And the Swedish Fish just happened to be in my cube because I worried that they would melt in my car and become gefilte swedish fish.

I took a look at the ingredients because sometimes candy will surprise you. Did you know that the second ingredient in Twizzlers is wheat? Anyway, the ingredients for Swedish Fish are: Sugar, Invert Sugar, Corn Syrup, Modified Corn Starch, Citric Acid, White Mineral Oil, Artificial Flavors, Red 40, and CARNUBA WAX.

Carnuba Wax? So, you would think I would be scared. But no. Those were some fine fishy. And had there been any left, I could have melted them down and used them for a bikini wax.

Perhaps I Have Been a Wee Bit Discouraging

I am very lucky to have lovely readers - law students and lawyers and former lawyers and even real people too. The emails and the comments that I receive here about my job search have been such an important part of my year since the lay off.

But this post is for the law students and the lawyers. I have received emails from lawyers telling me that, from what they have read on my blog, they are very apprehensive about starting their own job search. I am afraid that I may have been unnecessarily discouraging. So, let me clear up a few things.

First, it is notoriously hard to find legal jobs in this state, even when the economy is booming. There's just too damn many of us here, and too many people who will jump at the chance to move here. I have been on the job boards constantly and I can assure you that there are many more postings in other places.

Second, I am highly specialized. It has been very hard to convince people that I am willing to learn/want to learn something else, or find anybody who is willing to train me in another area of the law. I saw the writing on the wall when rumors were going around about lay offs at my old firm. I started to take all the partners at the law firm out to lunch to convince them to teach me what they do. I wasn't able to broaden my base in time. On the other hand, when a firm is looking to practice in my area of the law, I should be at the top of the list for consideration.

Third, I have no litigation experience. A very large majority of the posted positions over the past year have been for people with litigation experience. When I didn't get that job last fall that I was practically told was mine during the first round of interviews, it was later explained to me that they went with someone who had similar experience to mine but who also knew how to litigate.

There is good reason to believe that my results are not typical. Sadly, I have not received any return emails from the other associates who were laid off with me. I don't know whether this is because of the embarrassment over continued unemployment, whether they have moved on and want no memories of their past job, or, maybe, they just didn't like me (although nobody else in town seems to know what happened to them either). Promises to do coffee and to keep in touch just never panned out . . .

Pure Easter Joy

Every kid on the planet deserves to be this happy about something.

Moi, la Socialite.

I was tagged as a socialite by The Suburban Princess at thelifeofasuburbanprincess.blogspot.com. The cookie cutter is not from her blog but is from coppergifts.com. She should own it, no?

Per the rules, here are the answers to some important questions.

1. Who is your style icon?
Alexander McQueen (RIP), Samantha Boardman, Olivia Palerma, SJP channeling SJP.

2. What is your favorite socialite lit book?
I went through a lot of Jay McInerney and Bret Easton Ellis back in the day.

3. Favorite party theme?
80's.

4. What is your "go to" Halloween costume?
An angel. Once a Pi Phi, always a Pi Phi.

5. What is an extravagance that you can't live without?
Kate Spade. Milly. Tory Burch pumps.

6. Living person you admire?
Obama. Gavin Newsom.

7. What is your greatest fear.
Something happening to one of the boys.

8. What trait do you despise in yourself?
I'm fairly high-strung (which is fairly much an understatement).

9. Which talent would you most like to have?
Impeccable grammar and proofreading skills and the ability to speak Italian.

10. What is your greatest achievement?
Raising a child to have empathy, and passing the California and Colorado bars.

I am now tagging Juliet over at neverbeenlivedbefore.blogspot.com. It is because of her that I have connected with so many great attorney bloggers. Plus, she's got great taste and she's an excellent photographer.

Weekend Treat - CB2 Plates

My son and I are grazers, meaning we would rather eat little bits all day long than ever sit down to a meal. Accordingly, we go through lots of little plates during a day. I find CB2 to be mostly geared toward the first apartment people, but these plates are extra happy and I think my 9 year old son would like them too. Grazers of the world unite.

Top Ten

Top Ten Pet Peeves about Corporations

1. Employer mandated goal setting software and the required use thereof.
2. People in the HR Department that refer to "Cobra" instead of "COBRA." Very comforting.
3. Required meetings to learn how to use goal setting software.
4. The ability of other employees to enter goals onto my personal goal setting profile.
5. Women in professional positions with badly chipped nail polish.
6. People who take notes during the required meeting about the goal setting software. (What am I missing? What are these people writing down?)
7. Required meetings about goal setting software wherein no refreshments are provided.
8. People who eat chips in meetings.
9. Sitting through an entire mandatory goal setting meeting and not being provided a Starbucks card as a reward.
10. The word "deliverables" when it has nothing to do with my on-line shopping order.

Real Housewives Recap Kelly Kelly Kelly Kelly

Does anybody remember Cheers and the song that Woody made up for his girlfriend Kelly, and it went something like this: "Kelly Kelly Kelly Kelly." I have never been able to think of a Kelly without singing that song in my head. Anyway -

Kelly asks LuAnn whether she should still introduce LuAnn as the Countess (you know, because she is now Countless). Kelly reasons that because LuAnn is so gracious and warm and wonderful that she is still a Countess (LuAnn is one of the least warm and fuzzy housewives ever), so the two agree that LuAnn shall still be called Countess. Apparently, all it takes to be a Countess is to declare it to be so. I would suggest that all my friends start calling me Countess except that they would beat me over the head for being such an ass, even if I was really married to, or had been married to, a Count.

Kelly decides that she is going to be nice to Bethenny because, and this is a quote, "because I have no reason not to." Don't think on that too long.

Bethenny remarks that she doesn't think Kelly is that smart. Kelly posed for Playboy at age 41. Bethenny needn't worry.

But what I do love about Kelly is that she really doesn't care about what other people think about her. She asks Ramona why she wasn't invited to her Labor Day party. Ramona goes on and on and on and on with excuses and Kelly tunes her out and remarks to the camera that she could have just said she didn't want her there. Well played, Kelly. Its so obvious that Kelly doesn't care, and not even in a mean way, just in a realistic way, which makes it all the more sad how deeply Ramona does care that everyone thinks she is important.

Ramona talks about her hair again. This is more than anybody ever talked about the Jennifer Aniston shag.

Jill hosts a dinner/fashion show and Ramona truly flips out. Her issues and mental state seem so disturbing that I, in fact, wonder if Bravo's showing the footage is some sort of mental health privacy law violation.

Picture of Kelly: tvgasm.com. Picture of Ramona: bravotv.com