never fully-clothed or intentionally misinforming

I've been in my line of work for a few years now and it's no secret my favorite part is getting to know my clients. More than the friendly competition, the paid holidays, the cliche 'bankers hours,' more than all that, I love getting to know my clients personally.  I have cultivated close, trusting relationships with more clients than I can count and I pride myself on that. I think it's my leg-up, if you will, over my competition and teammates. I know my clients the moment they walk in the door. I know it, they know it. I'd go so far as to say they count on it. People come in the building, see two available teammates and yet, they'll wait for me. I am that good. All this bragging to say one of the parts I dislike the most is something about those very relationships I'm proud of cultivating. There is something about sitting with me in the lobby of the bank that makes people feel as though they are either 1. laying on a couch in their therapist'...

Spent the majority of my weekend in the company of strangers - fantastic strangers, all like-minded people. Musically, anyway. I bought tickets to three Less Than Jake shows in as many days. It was incredible. Although, the last show (Sunday night), I sat in the back for most of, due to my apparent insta-flu. This isn't really what I intend to write about though, it's just ... they always say start on a positive note. So there, I had a fantastic weekend in the musical sense.  Saturday, Jon-Michael and I took Kenneth and Susan. It was probably around 2:30 in the morning, and we were headed down 41S toward home. Well, let me back up. J.M. and Kenneth were ready to go before Susan and I were - we were hungry. So we ordered burgers from the food wagon outside the bar. They were amazing. I made a comment while we were on 121 out of Gainesville about how I couldn't believe we still hadn't made it to the railroad tracks yet. Ten seconds later, there we were, train passing,...

Surprise trip to the doctor this morning, after more than 24 hours of upset tummy for Blondie and three hours of cleaning carpets for me. Poor baby girl. Seeing her this puny just makes me so sad. I really thankful that Dr. Lee is the doctor on site today. Heart of pure gold, that one.

I learned today that I have a wonderful backyard resident. When I first saw the movement around Blondie's feet, I thought it was just the leaves flitting around, but then it traveled up the base of the tree. At which point, I said slightly aloud, "what the hell?" That's when I peeked around the tree, looked up, and saw her... frozen, not one hair moved, not even a blink, just inches from my face. I must've looked terrifying to her, so I recoiled. Then took a second look. Still frozen. For some reason seeing her and playing hide and seek on one of my shade trees took me back to my childhood, although I've really never seen one in the wild before tonight. My favorite book was Mrs Frisby and the Rats of NIMH. All I can say is I hope she sticks around. I like her.

In 2011, Jon-Michael and I decided to join a geocaching  group.We got as far as forming a username. Then while were at breakfast this morning, something reminded me about this awesome, rapidly popularizing hobby so we headed back to the house to look up some local treasures.  As it turns out, there are countless gems hidden all over Dunnellon and Rainbow Springs. We set out for a nearby cache with a difficulty level of 1.5 ... and we never found it. Maybe we're not cut out for this after all. We came home, incredibly discouraged and resigned ourselves (so JM thought) to not finding a geocache today. While he played some FIFA, I went back to the drawing board and started over. Found another cache at a familiar horse farm nearby and headed out again. This one had been found by 69 cachers, one as recently as July 4th. We parked, compass in hand, and started walking. We found nothing. This time I was beyond upset. Returning back to our neighborhood again without discovery, we...

Just wanted to update the flower box. They're growing nice and tall, but aren't as thick as I'd like them, really. Fertilize, fertilize, fertilize.

Today was a day that inspired me to exercise my seldom-flexed, heinous bitch undertone -- the tone I typically stifle at least between the hours of 9AM and 5PM. Today was a day I could have easily told any number of people to take a long walk off a short pier. And I don't say this next part lightly. Today, just today, I did not love my job. I hated it.  It seems to come in ebbs and flows - and no, I don't think I'm alone in this. I just ... today I did not want to deal with all the issues. It actually started at the end of yesterday - got an email asking me to do someone else's dirty work of calling a client and delivering bad news. Not cool. And the answer is no.  I accidentally disregarded that email. I'm in a cross-trained position - to put it more accurately, I am expected to be able to do anything, anytime. I am the face of our business and I am to ensure everyone has a positive experience within our building. Yet I am constantly battling with others to see...

I suppose this'll have to do for fireworks this year. That's okay though, there isn't much I love about seeing them alone anyway. What is it that makes humans feel a particular feeling about holidays? What I mean by that is why does Christmas makes us long for snow and to express our love? Why do we not want to be alone on New Year's Eve? Why do we feel like our Independence Day is not effectively celebrated if we don't make tons of pretty explosions? What I mean to say is I love fireworks and I don't even know why. I don't know why I pine for company more on NYE than any other day of the year and I can't decide if white Christmas would ever be worth actually living in the great white north. As for the fireworks - - they make me happy. Honestly, in my case, I think it stems from a sense of magic. How do they do that??!?

Woke up this morning without an alarm. That felt awesome. I slipped out of bed after snuggling with Olive for a few minutes, then went out to catch up on some gardening. I was inspired yesterday by the parents of the bride. One of JM's friend's got married to a beautiful young woman name Mystry - her parents, though, were my biggest interest. They have this property in Lake City that is absolutely breathtaking. The grounds are lush and full of gardens, they have chickens for fresh eggs and a green house for fresh produce (neither of which I can accomplish at my home but...). The gardens were incredibly inspiring. Granted, they've been working on their property for 37 years. Pamela, Mystry's mom, said "we started with the chicken coop. Then we saw where our natural paths were and put in gardens according to where we typically walk."It's pure awesome, truly. I have photos, but haven't uploaded any yet. The best parts were that I felt inspired to work on ...

I had this idea to make a flower box because the ground is too hard to plant around my mailbox. I expressrd this to Dad and he came up with a brautiful idea. I brought it home, planted my flowers and will wait for them to fill in perfectly. My dad is awesome for many reasons - his ability to make visions into tangible objects is just one of them.

Came to Crabby Joe's for dinner last night and enjoyed it so much we came back. Now... What to get for breakfast?

I'm writing this from the ocean's edge. With JM sleeping in the condo behind me, and nothing in front of me but the great unknown. What a way to start a day. It was 615 when I came outside; no one is or was here except the dedicated lot who wake with the ocean each day - some jog, some bike, others are just here, but who there are are few in number. I feel alone with the sun. Alone with the ocean. Alone and at peace with that.

Left work on Friday. Set sail for vacation. It started with a pool party for the beautiful twins - celebrating their third birthday. Then we spent all day Sunday with Dad for fathers day - we cooked out by the water for a change. And i gave him a 3D photograph of he and I in Fell's Point, MD. Today we drove to Daytona Beach for an impromptu getaway. I don't know why I would think I would, but I don't miss work ... at all. I'm happy not being there; seems like an obvious thing to say, but truly I am. I love the people I get to help and, of all the companies I could work for, I'm happy I'm with SunTrust, but part of me is so excited for the day I stop being a worker bee in Corporate America. On a side note, it's pouring rain with thunder and lightning at our condo and two teenagers just jumpes into the pools. JM just said "natural selection."

My sister had a surgery today. In tje recovery area, Dad and I came upon this notice.

I found a fantastic new source of visual inspiration here . I want to change the world and begin with myself. I saw a woman peacefully protesting yesterday and it truly inspired me, but I haven't written anything still. I'll share her photo tomorrow. Tonight I want to talk about expectations. Humans. We are expectedly flawed. Might go so far as to say we anticipate failure to a degree. Sure, I expect to lose sometimes -- can't win 'em all, right? Seems like the standards are always set so inconceivably high. Work. Family. Health. Friends. Fitness. Goals. Home. All supposed to be the top priority. It's all so demanding. Life -- it's getting in my way. I was asked how my day at work today went. Honestly, fantastically. Except for the fact that I had made a mistake last month that was just being addressed. Figures. I've been on a great run lately - really found a nice stride. I work in an industry with demanding referral and sales goals, high administrat...

I used to write all the time. I used to ride my bicycle. I used to do better about working out. I wonder what happened. It's too late at night to really make a change now, but I'm making the vow to change tomorrow. My life will be full of bike rides and writing in no time.

I'm going to work on cleansing my life one month at a time.  The objective - work on accomplishing one personal goal, consistently, for a month. As I finish, mark it off the list and move on to the next goal and sustain that for the month.  A month without... chocolate or candy missing a day at the gym  fast food going over my calorie limit missing my water intake fried food missing a day with fruits and veggies missing a scheduled bike ride or walk dairy - milk, ice cream, cheese pizza going to bed later than 10 missing breakfast Starting in June, I'm doing a month without chocolate and candies. Here we go.

My good friend, Anna, just finished college at UNH. We exchanged a few quick words about it over Facebook (what have my friendships come to?) that can be summed up in one quick quote from the scholar: "oh. Ok. That part of my life is over now." Weird. You know that proverbial fork in the road that we most times never actually see, but instead unconsciously make a decision one way or another about? What about the times we do see it? Very seldom can I recall being able to actively, presently recognize when my life's course was shifting. But the times I do recall are incredibly strange. "Well, I get that's the end of college." Or what about the day I woke up and knew, without a shadow of a doubt, I wanted to be a mother? And soon. I'm not so sure I saw that fork, but I knew I'd come to it in those first waking thoughts - it was uncanny; as if I awoke a different person than I was when I had fallen asleep. So, what do we do when our lives seem ...

You know, I bought a house in June of last year. I'm a suburbanite now. It's bizarre - I live in a country club, which is NOTHING like what I thought I'd do. And, almost a year in, I'm starting to get a little nervous it wasn't the right move for me. Fairly regularly I battle with emotions about growing up on the path I'm on. Why am I 28-years-old and still unmarried? Why do I have wild and awesomely accomplishable ideas, share them with friends, then learn that my friends have successfully executed my ideas, while I've anchored myself tightly to the root system in Rainbow Springs? Khuong and Shannon, who moved to NYC on a whim a few years back, just got job offers in LA, so they decided to go. There was a going away party thrown in their honor in NYC and at that party, they successfully pulled off the surprise wedding idea JM and I shared with them last year when we met up for lunch while they were in town. I'd be completely lying if I said I wasn...