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I'm doing an upside-down handstand.

Mojitos

Yesterday afternoon I met up with my ex-girlfriend Heather. The last time I saw her was six years ago, and that was merely a brief, chance encounter on Walnut Street. The last time that I spent any real time with her was seven years ago. So needless to say, despite not having any intentions of anything beyond seeing her to catch up, I was still a bit excited to see her. We met at 3pm in Rittenhouse Square. Since I usually attend evening mass at 6:30pm, I figured a little more than three hours should be enough to catch up on most everything. The weather was sunny and dry and simply beautiful. Our meeting went exactly as I had hoped; I felt good that we had reconnected as friends. Now that I've seen her, though, my pre-meeting intentions have not changed. I'll be happy for she and I to be friends. Of the girls that I've dated for more than a month or so, there's now only one that I don't communicate with. All of rest care about me, just as I care about them, and they're mature enough to maintain a friendship with me. When I was younger (i.e., around the time when I broke up with Heather), I had a rigid philosophy of cutting all contact if a relationship didn't work out. But I don't feel that way any more: life is too short to hold grudges or exert mental/emotional energy to keep a wall up. Unless something really egregious happens to end a relationship, there's not much reason to turn your back on someone who you were compatible with to have a relationship with, even if it wasn't long-lasting. The reality is that the overwhelming majority of all relationships fail; relationships are the classic live-and-learn experience. So anyway, to bring it all the way back around, I'm glad that Heather and I can now be friends.

This past Saturday night was great. Wagner came by the double-deuce and Spruce to help me move out my old television and put it curbside. I had a few beers in the fridge, so we hung here for a little while. I took the opportunity to ask him some serious questions about his vision and goals for his law career. Since he's becoming one of my good friends here in Philly, I wanted to know if he would ever consider going into practice for himself, since that is my goal/hope/ambition. He said he had never really considered it, but said that he would now that I put the thought out there. It was a good, refreshing conversation before hitting the town.

Originally I had wanted to go to a new spot near me (at 20th and Sansom) called Village Whiskey. As we were walking out of my place, Wagner called up Tobin to let him know where we were going. At that moment, I took the opportunity to check my phone, lo and behold to discover that I'd missed a text message just a minute earlier. It was from Ileana, a girl who works with some of my friends at one of my old workplaces. She was out with her roommate and was inviting me to stop by if I wasn't busy. So the timing was perfect; Wagner's and my plan changed and we went to Rum Bar to meet up with them. It was a nice atmosphere in there, as there was a pretty good crowd, several of whom were wearing an eye-patch in honor of Talk Like A Pirate Day; it was pretty funny. We all spent the rest of the evening drinking mojitos. I was really happy to have the chance to talk to Ileana, since I'd only really talked to her once before for not much more than ten minutes. I kept being happily surprised to find out that we had a lot in common. So between the (strong) mojitos and the good conversation, I had a very good Saturday night.

The next morning, Sunday, I forced myself out of bed early in order to volunteer at a community event in South Philly: la Fiesta de San Mateo de Ozolco. For those of you who may not know, San Mateo de Ozolco is a village in the state of Puebla, in Mexico. And interestingly, anywhere from one-quarter to one-third of that village resides for at least part of the year in Philadelphia. Thus, to honor their community's community here in the 2-1-5, they hold an annual fiesta, with a traditional misa and dancing by los moros y cristianos and by traditional Aztecs. It was a fun cultural event to be at, although I had to leave early in order to make it back in time to meet up with Heather in Rittenhouse Square. But I have to admit that my Spanish-speaking skills were dulled as a result of all the mojitos I drank the night before. It was all worth it though.

Alright, that's all for now, folks. I hope things are well in your little part of the world, wherever that may be.

Quiet night

Today was a pretty quiet day, and tonight has been a quiet night. Being a night person, I got up late today. There are some days where I feel guilty for getting up late. Not today. Today I felt fine about getting up late. I had already set it in my mind that today was gonna be low-key. So I took the time to clean-up all the dishes and pots and utensils in the sink. I spoke on the phone with Evan for a while. And I made a call to an insurance company on behalf of one of my clients, but I only had to leave a voicemail there since no one picked up the phone.

Besides running out to Radio Shack to buy a power strip (to organize all the electrical cords now behind my television stand and to finally have an extra outlet to plug-in the antenna amplifier), I was inside all day. But I'm glad that I did run out for that quick errand, because on the walk home, coming up Walnut Street, I heard my name being called. I looked around and then across the street to the other sidewalk, and I saw my friend Nayami. So I ran across to say hi and give her a hug. We ended up walking together through Rittenhouse Square, she invited me to see her music group, PhillyBloco, perform at World Cafe Live on Halloween, and I gave her the gift of one of my two new power strips, since I only needed one. It was good to see Nayami, she's a really nice girl.

Tonight I just chilled out at home, drank a couple of my new favorite beers, Victory Whirlwind Witbier, and ate some spaghetti with sweet apple flavored chicken sausage and spinach mixed in with the sauce. While I ate, I had the Phillies game on low volume and listened to music from my iPod, played through my stereo. Overall, it was a good, chill night.

Now I think I'm gonna do some reading before going to bed. I hope you had as good a night as I did. See ya soon!

Autumn: coffee, football, and work/out

Today was a pretty good day. I met Michael for lunch today at Coventry Deli (at 20th & Market). Actually, he had lunch while I drank a coffee I had picked-up along the way at La Colombe. We were able to catch-up on some gossip, which is always a lot of fun. Afterwards, I walked across the street to the courtyard at Commerce Square, where Jeanette came down to say hi. It was nice to see her; she looked good. The three of us talked for about 15 minutes before they had to get back to work.

After getting back home, I took care of some phone calls (one to a potential client, the other to a current opposing party) -- as you can see, I'm trying to keep busy while I'm in between projects. And then I ran out to mail a bill and deposit my last paycheck at the bank (may it last for long time!). Anyway, I feel like this is turning into a play-by-play of my day, so let's move on to other topics.

The Philadelphia Eagles. Along with so many other people, I'm not expecting much from Kevin Kolb this Sunday against the Saints. I'm predicting that McNabb won't even suit up, now that they have Garcia. I think Garcia will be in by midway through the 2nd quarter. And I actually think that the Eagles will come out with a win, after the offense rallies around Garcia and the defense generally stifles the Saints' offense.

The weather. I love autumn; it's my favorite season. I wore a short-sleeve t-shirt to meet Michael and Jeanette, and I was fine. Tonight the windows are open at the double-deuce & Spruce, and there is a nice chill in the air. The weather reminds me of football. And it reminds me of long walks in the leaf-covered trails of state parks when I was a young boy. Autumn reminds me of growing up, since it reminds me of the excitement of returning to Gettysburg for four consecutive years as an undergraduate. I really love this time of the year.

Now, to return to my daily recap, I finally made it to the gym this evening, my first time there in about a week and a half. The work-out was good; I felt strong. Bench press was solid, dumbell bicep curls, lateral raises, cable tricep push-down, front raises, crunches on the Swiss ball, and an extra set of dips and push-ups at the end for good measure. I saw my recent gym buddy Brian there and talked to him for just a minute, told him that I felt good and wanna do better to make it in there more often. With the way I felt during and after the work-out, I most certainly will.

Good night folks!

Highlights from the weekend

This past Sunday I volunteered at the Mexican Independence Day Fiesta at Penn's Landing. It was a great day: the weather and the girls were beautiful. I helped out Juntos, a South Philly cultural organization, to get a ton of people to sign postcards that will be sent to our congresspeople, asking them to take the initiative to reform the immigration laws. The process by which I did this was simply walking around through the crowd with a clipboard and a bunch of postcards, and asking people to sign. It was a great opportunity to use my Spanish for an entire afternoon. And the feeling I got by approaching people was the same feeling (though perhaps not quite as nerveracking) as I get by approaching girls at a bar: the pressure of capturing someone's attention within just a couple of seconds and trying to hold their attention long enough for them to give you something (here, a signature, at the bar, a phone number). Overall I had a really good day. When I first met with Valeska, the executive director of Juntos, about a month ago, this was the sort of experience I was looking for: something where I felt useful and something that was for a good cause. Hopefully the more I help out, the better chance there may be for greater opportunities to arise, maybe even an opportunity to direct my career in a more fulfilling direction. I leave that in God's hands; but in the meantime I'll do what I can to get more involved.

So I finally have television again. As I mentioned a few posts ago, I went and visited my dad this past Saturday. Our mission for that afternoon was to hook me up with a television antenna, a digital converter box, and a television stand. Check, check, and check. After a long and harrowing afternoon trying to assemble the tv stand and negotiate all the wires, I was finally able to put on the tv by the evening. After Pito had left, I was able to watch, of all things, the women's U.S. Open semifinal between Serena Williams and Kim Clijsters; as fate would have it, it was the match where Serena blew her lid and thus blew the match by threatening to shove a tennis ball down a line-judge's throat. Great drama. Proof that sports has always been and always will be the best form of reality tv.

Finally tonight, I'd like to mention that I finished the book "My Antonia", by Willa Cather, this past Sunday night. It is one of the most beautiful novels that I have ever read. It's about the love between a boy and a girl, who eventually become man and woman, but whose love is never fulfilled, much less consummated, with anything more than a kiss. It showed that true love, as it is really felt and expressed, has very little if anything to do with sex. It showed that true love is truly beautiful. And so, although the main characters' love was never fulfilled with each other in any traditional, logical, or preordained sense, thus giving the novel a tragic feel and the reader a certain feeling of discouragement, it was ultimately a romance of the highest order. Even more than the dynamic between Antonia and Jim Burden, the book really romanticizes, in a non-proselytizing manner, the plains of the American midwest. The imagery and lyrical descriptiveness with which Cather describes the land of Nebraska was incredibly moving and simply beautiful. I'll finish this post with two beautiful quotes from "My Antonia", one of scenic imagery and the other of pure love:

"If there was a road, I could not make it out in the faint starlight. There was nothing but land: not a country at all, but the material out of which countries are made."

"The idea of you is a part of my mind; you influence my likes and dislikes, all my tastes, hundreds of times when I don't realize it. You really are a part of me."

I Can't Help It

It's been a lil' while since I posted some music. Here's "I Can't Help It" by The Roots, off their Rising Down album.

One of my favorite lines, right around the 1:05 minute mark:

"i only do what i got to do 'cause it's possible and climbing over whatever's known as a obstacle."

If this video link eventually goes dead, then I encourage you to check out The Roots website or myspace page in order to listen to this and other tracks.

End of an era . . .

. . . or at least another project. My time at Pepper Hamilton is over, at least for the time being. There was talk that we may be called back in two or three weeks to begin another phase of the case we were working on, or else for a new case. I don't necessarily mind the break, as long as it's only two or three weeks. I have to complete a case for one of my friends. And I've got a couple side projects, personal and professional, that should occupy my time for a couple weeks. I sure hope, though, that by the beginning of October, I've landed another gig. Of course I'll also take this opportunity to scope out the scene for permanent jobs, although I don't hold too much hope on that front, what with the economy and all. But who knows, it's worth a lookie-lookie.

I don't think I fully realize how excited I'm going to be by the end of tomorrow. I'm taking the R7 up to my dad's place in Levittown to have lunch and then head out to the Walmart near him to pick-up a television antenna and digital converter box. Then we'll drive down I-95 south to the Illadelph, and more specifically to the Ikea down on Del Ave so I can hook myself up with a nice television stand. After that, the project will be to put it all together. And hopefully, voila, by the end of the afternoon, I'll be able to kick back and watch some college football. And that's when it'll hit me how excited I'll be. Right now it's just a vague premonition of excitement.

Finally, I'm resolving myself to hitting the gym consistently now that I'll have no excuse. I've been too lax for too long now, and I really gotta get in there. Last time I was there, about a week ago, this guy Brian told me that he would push me back into the gym if he saw me walking around the street. I haven't seen him yet. But I'm not gonna wait to find out if he was serious; I'll get back to the gym on my own. I'm pretty sure that watching football on tv will motivate me to work-out; football fires up the athletic competitiveness within me.

Follow-up on the Baby and no NYC

The Baby is doing fine. As I write this she's sitting on my bed, grooming herself by licking her tummy. Earlier tonight, Rocky and the Baby were chasing each other around the apartment. Rocky cornered her underneath the bicycles leaning against my bedroom wall, the Baby assumed her normal defensive position by lying on her back with her four paws up in the air, trying to stiff-arm Rocky's attempts to nose-dive into her and bite her, and the two of them alternately swiped at each other's paws to create an opening for "attack." It was fun to watch them play.

I was going to go to New York City this weekend, but I think that's no longer gonna happen. First of all, there is a very strong likelihood that the project that I've been working on is going to end tomorrow. The work has simply run out. That translates into once again having to be conservative with my spending. Second, I had hoped to hear back from at least one of two girls: one, Elsa, an El Salvadoran girl I met about a month ago when I last visited New York, and the other, Anne-Sarah, a French girl I met last November when we sat next to each other on a four-hour bus ride from Vang Vieng to Vientiane, Laos. Elsa lives in New York, Anne-Sarah is currently visiting New York. I had been corresponding with both of them a couple weeks ago, and since mentioning to each that I'd be in New York this weekend, neither one has responded. This has seemed to be my luck lately, in a general sense. I write to people and they don't write back at all. Oh well, what can I say, if they haven't thought to write back, then it's probably not really worth my time to go see them, I'll just keep doing my thing here in Philly. Finally, my third reason for staying in Philly this weekend is that my dad has offered to help me pick-up a television stand from Ikea, on which I'll put my new, pre-owned television. I'll also need to buy a digital converter box and an antenna, and then I'll be set to watch football. I've effectively not had television (other than to watch dvd's) for the past three months or so (whenever the digital transition took place). Now that it's starting to get dark early, with the coming of autumn, the nights have seemed just a bit darker and lonelier lately. The distraction of television and the accompanying illusion of other human voices in my apartment will be comforting. Not to mention, watching football is one of my true and simple pleasures in life.

The Baby

I have two cats: Rocky and the Baby. Earlier this summer, when I took both of them to a veterinarian appointment, the vet noticed that the Baby had a lump on the back of her tongue. It was a raised whitish bump about the size of a Tums. Earlier tonight, when the Baby came out from underneath the bed (as she eventually does every night when I come home from work), I picked her up to pet her and to clean out her eyes (as I usually do, because they always have eye gunk collected at the corner of each eye). I noticed that she had dried blood in one of her nostrils. After I cleaned it up, it seemed that there was blood still inside her mouth. I held her for a few minutes, and she was content as always. So I just let her run around the apartment for a while with Rocky. Now, only a minute ago, I come into the bedroom to find that several streaks of blood are on her coat, indicating that she must've been licking her coat with a bloody tongue. I forced open her mouth to examine the back of her tongue, and it looks the same as it has for the past couple months. So I'm not sure what's going on. I just pray to God that it's nothing serious and that she's as healthy as she has been. On a positive note, she's acting as she always does. I'll say a prayer for her tonight when I go to bed.

Samsara

I feel like I'm stuck in a samsaric cycle, living the same general series of events over and over again. Every job I take is a temporary job, destined to end after a few weeks or months, just as every relationship I begin is a temporary relationship, similarly destined to end after a few weeks or months. After a lively Saturday night on the town, from dinner at Parc, to drinks at Oscar's, Continental Midtown, then down to Old City for drinks at Cuba Libre and Bleu Martini, the rest of my weekend was spent mostly in bed or on the couch, in a frozen stupor, not wanting to get up or get out because to do so would require energy that wouldn't change things anyway. It was a minor period of depression, of course, which looked at objectively is pretty silly, but it happened nonetheless. Oh well, knowing myself, I know that the stable framework and forced interaction of work is a good thing, and I look forward to that tomorrow. I try to step back from my situation, and I remind myself that my life is much better than it was when I was in law school; at least now I have an income and decent savings to fall back on if necessary. For whatever its evils, it's nice to have at least enough money to happily blow-off on a weekend night, and not feel too guilty about it. I'm also pleased with the fact that my evenings and weekends are free from bullshit homework and the resulting anxiety from not feeling sure if I remembered anything of what I just read and thus feeling exposed to potential embarassment in class. So yeah, life is not too bad now compared to my three years of law school. But life is more than avoiding embarassment or having a few bucks to blow. And so I'm back where I begin my thoughts: with the eerie feeling of living in a samsaric cycle, wondering when it will end. I have faith that I made the right decisions when it came to past relationships and, for the most part, I have generally steady faith that things will develop naturally. But on a weekend like this one, where my physical hangover and psychological malaise that resulted from a very drunken Saturday night prevented me, or at least discouraged me, from going out, and thus cubbyholed me in my overly self-reflective thoughts, my faith seemed to waver enough for me to notice and feel a little worried. But hey, what can I do? At least I wrote about it to get it off my chest. After an unproductive Labor Day, I'm ironically looking forward to getting back to work tomorrow, with hopes that this project will be rolled-over into another one.

Healthcare now

Squinting his eyes while gazing into the distance,
he thought back to the days of the Pistons:
when Detroit was strong, and days seemed long,
and his wages didn't seem like a pittance.
But now the plant is closed, and so his home is foreclosed,
and all his dreams are nothing but wishes.
To add one more line to this pitiful rhyme:
his efforts at healthcare are fiercely opposed
by forces that seem kinda vicious.