I woke up this morning with a feeling reminiscent of the radiation side effects, but since I thought those had passed, maybe just a bit of bad leftovers. After Pongo takes me on my walk I find out that all three domains, (sites, emails, everything) are dead. As were my host’s site and two other blogs that I know use the same host. Despite the odds, the day didn’t really improve from there, but at least it sort of bottomed out. Sites seem to be back up, although I’ve only received about one-tenth of the e-mail I would have expected for a weekday. At least the week has to get better from here, right?

Just enjoying a San Diego Sunday after a very long week of work. I should be doing some work today but it’s not going well yet. Little Pongo had me up at 5, and since I was up, I was swimming laps by 6. I don’t know whether the rentacops here open the pool gates especially early some mornings, or they just never get around to locking them some nights, but today it worked to my advantage. Even though it was an hour before the apartment pool officially opens, I wasn’t alone. With the sun rising earlier and earlier, I guess others had similar ideas.

Then breakfast with some friends, restock on some Peet’s, and the Sunday Times. Got the paper all spread out and I’m waiting for some iced coffee (Sierra Dorada) to chill. All I’ve read so far is the sports section, but the swimmer part of me was really interested in this one, and the guy in me who used to bike a lot enjoyed reading this one. On the bicycle story, I’m not really sure if I like the article as much as the fact that he’s now probably going to have another great Armstrong post.

Continuing the sports topic, my little Palm electronic brain reminds me that next weekend is the San Diego Crew Classic. My posts from 2002 and 2003 are still available in the archives. Hopefully Cal will win again and I’ll get some pics up in about ten days or so.

And now transitioning into our fun-in-the-sun block, I received approval from the bar (after only about two months) last week to offer a CLE program through the beachlaw site. To the non-CA-lawyers reading, this hopefully means very little (thank gawd you’ve been spared); for the rest of you – one hour, self-study with a self-assessment test is currently up in a print-PDF-and-mail format. I’m still working on implementing a completely online version (the pay part became more involved then I expected it to be) but it will be up soon.

It sounds so cool when you say it that way. It sounds more dangerous when you describe it as my first foreign work assignment ever without at least the pretense of diplomatic immunity. More simply put, I spent this afternoon in Tijuana on business, in my first visit south of the border since before 9/11/01. I only got a little bit lost, the people were cool and helpful, and the work went well. The city brought back some good memories, not only of Mexico but some from Bolivia too. Something about a latin city works for me. Then the Homeland Security stormtrooper on the way home reminded me why I hadn’t left the United States. Take a happy pill dude. Despite the rhetoric that I’m sure we’ll be seeing a lot more of between now and November, the reason I haven’t traveled the last two years is that the lousy economy was prohibitive and the new security rules made it inconvenient and almost masochistic. While the microeconomy of Howling Point (pop. 2) is picking up, the other factors haven’t changed much. But now I’m going to be missing it more.

Cool holiday. Good excuse to wear the green tie to court this morning.

As an update, I’m still happy with the decision to close the practice and accept my new position. The stability has done wonders for me and I’m loving it. There are days, like today, where the whole winding up thing and fulfilling the ethical responsibilities part of closing the law practice can get old. It seems like I’ve got two full-time jobs. Wait, I do have two full-time jobs. Now if the soon-to-be-former clients would just get current so I could be paid as though I had two full-time jobs, things would be wonderful. Enough for the mid-week rant. Time to dye Pongo green for the holiday. As soon as I can find where he’s hiding.

If you came here looking for a little Friday night chatting and intelligent discussion, sorry but you’ve come to the wrong place. We’re beat. Try this or this or this.

I’ll apologize for the lack of detail, but the whole clock thing with the moving paws has never really worked for me. The big guy left really early with a bunch of files, not even eating breakfast, then came home at lunch smelling of chlorine. He left again after a much too short walk and got home a little while ago to feed me my dinner. Then he was trying to type stuff on the machine until I started dragging his belt around as a distraction. I think he needs some therapy to stop this new work-fixation thing, but I’m really enjoying my privacy, so why interfere?

Spent four days back-to-back commemorating my 40th with friends and family. Thanks to everyone who sent good wishes and generous gifts and let me enjoy the pleasure of their company. After everything else that’s happened the last six months or so, the dread with which I probably should have approached my 40th never really took place. Just another birthday, and a justifiable excuse to ignore some realities for a few days.

The new job is going great, but for the time being I’m still not linking them to me here. No advantage to it for anyone. Cube-life stories will probably start appearing soon.

The wind-up of the law practice is continuing. It’s tough just walking away from client relationships that in some cases I spent a couple of years building, but it has to be done. Others from whom I’m trying to distance myself in glee are having hard times accepting the new realities of my situation. It won’t all be pretty, but very little of it will land here except in very general comments.

I just set up the appointment for my six-month checkup with RadDoc for early April. Assuming there’s nothing bad in the lab work (and I’m feeling great), RadDoc will be forced to transfer my file back to BorgHealth for long-term monitoring of my situation. RadDoc and the people he works with were great and played a big part in keeping me sane through this, as well as hopefully curing me, but his official job was simply nuking me and now BorgHealth gets to “manage” my care in-house for a while.

In response to a recent comment, the plans are that we’ll be seeing a lot more Pongo here in the future, and maybe some weekend roadtrips as the new work situation stabilizes. Pongo’s a psychotic, neurotic, paranoid beast at times, but come June we’ll have been together for nine years. He got me through the final year in Africa, law school, the bar exam, several lousy jobs and a bout with cancer. He’s still got a muscle spasm and some cool scars from getting chomped back in 2002. Time for him to enjoy some of that retirement living.

Wow. A terrorist was convicted today. About time.

Quoting my own post made when she was indicted, “I hope she rots in a simply but tastefully decorated cell for a long, long time.”

Yep, I voted. Unfortunately this was another one of those elections with little to vote for and much to vote against, but I pressed my digits into the touchscreen proudly.

Also, getting in practice for November, I ‘wrote in’ a vote for the first time in my life. Just punched a name into the little touchscreen. Despite being registered as a Republican, and the fact that President Bush’s son is running for the party’s presidential nomination unopposed, I just couldn’t bring myself to vote for him. Can’t do it; just wouldn’t be prudent. And not voting in that category seemed too much like acceptance. So I thought about people who were qualified for the position and wrote one in. Yay democracy.