I rented Shaolin Soccer and it was such a great movie. I washed the chinese version first which was so much better than US theatrical release. They cut so much stuff out of the chinese version, and all the good parts too that gave the movie nuances. I'm glad I didn't see it in the big theatre because I think I would have been very disappointed.

I also saw "Batman Begins" over the weekend, and I was surprised by how good the movie was. Batman is an American classic, but all the actors were British. The guy who became commissioner Gordon was played by Gary Oldman. Christian Bale played Bruce Wayne. Tom Wilkinson played Carmine Falcone. I believe Katie Holmes was the only American actor.

"Batman Begins" was dark like the comic book, and it was the best Batman since Val Kilmer played him.

I am one short chapter away from finishing my Texas novel. I finished Chapter 12 yesterday, and chapter 13 today. Chapter 13 and 14 are just epilogues anyway to finish the novel. I'm excited! This will the first novel that I have finished. It gives me hope for the other three I started.

Novels are like marathons, way too long and very tiring. Speaking of mararthons I decided to workout at the downtown gym, and had the worst time finding parking because the San Francisco marathon was going on. That was dumb of me! But I like to lift weights at the gym on California street, but I guess never on a Sunday. I'm going to back to Saturday as my weightlifting day so I can take the train downtown.

On Saturday there was apparently a bonmb scare at 9th and Judah. It fouled up the N Judah schedule and I caught the last of it on my way home yesterday this afternoon. I wonder where the bomb scare was.

I think red-haired guy would be so astounded by how often I call M-Square. In one of my last conversations with the red-haired guy was all about him whining about how I never called him, which of course I totally denied. I told him I never called him because he never returned my calls.

I like have to talk to M-Square like every day! And when he's not there I always leave a message and tell him what I'm doing. He told me once that hearing my messages was like I was there with him in LA; cute huh?

And I never wished the red-haired guy "Happy 30-day anniversary", but I did it with M-Square and he wished me the same thing and said "it was sweet".

And now I started signing my emails with "xxxxooooo", but he started it first because he signed one of his emails saying "Miss you!" although now he's taking my lead and signing his emails with "xoxoxoxoxo".

And I'm like is there a difference between signing "xxxxoooo" and "xoxoxoxoxo"? Don't they mean the same thing - love and kisses or love and hugs?

One thing that I think I need to put on my list of my better qualities is I have always been able to find allies at every job I’ve been at. I’m having lunch on Thursday with a woman I worked with on a couple of projects last year, and I’m going to ask her if she’ll be a reference for me. She’ll probably say no because it’s a company policy not to give references, but I’ll be okay with that. I really liked working with this woman, and it will be good for me to tell my job sob story to another person.

Of course all this job stress these last two months have just wrecked havoc with my weight. I stepped on the scale on Friday and just about screamed. I've gained 10 pounds in two months. I was so in denial about it too, even though my acupuncturist even mentioned how fat he thought I was getting.

I didn't want to face my weight gain because it would have meant one more thing to worry bout. But I can't deny it any longer. My size 8 jeans are so cutting off the bloody supply to my legs tight. It's so horrifying to be this heavy again!

I wish I was one of those people who get sick and lose weight when they get stressed. The type that just wants to disappear from a battle. Not me. I'm the cave girl blood type 0 type, who bulks ups and screams "bring it on" while swinging her cave girl club.

When I get stressed out, my body and system become so unbalanced. I went to the vitamin store on Saturday and loaded on stress vitamins and other herbal products that are supposed to help your body deal with stress.

I should have figured I was stressed out when all I did last week was think about having a beer after a work. It's been a long time since I've craved alcohol to chill out, and this disturbs me. Sure, I've been craving ciggies all week but decided not to give into my ciggie fit. But booze? That is scary!

I think I'm getting all needy and codependent too. I think I'm driving Laguna Beach guy nuts, because I so have to call him every day. I decided I needed to stop myself from calling him on Friday, and it was so painful to do that. I don't need to be addicted some guy right now. I have my chocolate addiction to deal with, which led me to eat two huge bags of M&M's with almonds last week. Then there's my ciggie fits and not booze cravings to fuss over. I don't need Laguna Beach boy cravings.

He was really cute though last week when he emailed me and said he had "Brenda on the Brain". How corny and sweet is that? He mentioned something about flying up here which of course just freaked me out, and which he noticed right away. I am way to stressed out be entertaining anyone right now.

M-Square is very supportive in his own way, but I just don't want to see him just yet. I have so many other things to do like trying to figure out my perfect job situation. I haven't done that exercise in ages, and I know I need to do it again because I don't want to end up in another job that I'm going to want to leave in a year. I thought this current job was going to be a place that I'd want to stay for a long time, but I was wrong. I can't make that mistake again the next time around. I am tired of job hopping!

Job stress is just so bad for my writing and zaps all my creativity. Boyfriend stress does that too, but not as bad as job stress.

I'm still alive, but I've been really busy and not in the mood to write. I come home, work out, make dinner and then go to bed. Not an exciting life by any means.

Last weekend I updated my resume and sent it to my friend. I called on Friday to see how it was received and she said someone said that my resume was "aligned with what they were looking for." My friend told me that the job has still yet to post, but she was going to ask the head of the company about it again. The guy has been travelling and it could be several weeks before they make a decision.

Ah, the life of a start-up company. My friend told me that they would probably wait to hire someone until they secured another contract. And I'm like, do I really want to go back to start-up life? I told a friend of mine over the weekend that the hardest part of the job hunt is over for me, and that is the updating of the resume. From what my friend said, my resume is good and that makes me happy.

Life at work has in the meantime gone on. My boss and was up on Monday and Tuesday and she asked me if anything was wrong. Apparently people have been asking why I am so quiet at meetings? How do you tell your boss you just can't stand her boss, whom she is best friends with. You don't and say you are fine.

The HR interview on Friday went fine, which means nothing will change. A friend who works in HR law says that discriminiation cases are hard to prove. Her read on the case was that my boss' boss was an equal opportunity nasty person, and didn't just single that one guy out. I'm still planning to job hunt, but not formally until August 1.

This whole week made me realize how I just don't trust most of the people I work with, and who wants to live with that added stress. Work is already a stressful experience without feeling like you have to watch your back and what you say constantly. Life is way too short to work under those circumstances.

One way or another and I am going to be out of my job very soon.

And so the job saga continues ...

Someone from HR called to interview me to find out why so many people have left the department. I asked our department assistant about it and she said the guy who left a couple of weeks ago blasted the department and his boss in his exit interview.

Talk about karma. The person who got criticized was my boss' boss whom I do not get along with and who has been increasingly mean to me these past few weeks. She's the one who's made me like I don't fit it in. My boss even told that this woman, her boss, yelled at her a couple of weeks ago for doing something wrong. This woman is such a nightmare, and I think all her pettiness and nastiness is catching up with her. Three guys who have worked for in the past year have all left.

If HR asks me if I would work for her, I'm going to have to be honest with them and tell them "no way". I told my boss this already. She knows that if she leaves, that I would quit or try to get a position somewhere else in the company. I told her this to her face and she didn't even bat an eyelash. She knows how mean and nasty this woman is, if you don't get along with her. But my boss gets along with her and so do a couple of other people in the group.

If you get along with this nasty woman, you're fine. But if you don't like I do, she can pretty much make your life hell. There have been so many times when the whole department has been invited to meetings that I never got an invite to. I used to think it was only me, but it started to happen to the guy that quit two weeks ago. It's the nasty woman's way of making you feel left out of things.

I think my best response with HR is just to be truthful and say that me and this woman have a personality conflict. That I only know what I've experienced and cannot comment on other people's experiences. She is my boss' boss after all and I don't want this woman to retaliate against my boss because of me.

Not that it matters anyway because I've already made my decision to leave, but I don't want to burn any bridges either. Other than this nasty woman, my experience at this company has been very positive.

Yes, I think my company will be either be the victim of a hostile takeover in the next two years or they will bleed red in the next two years and the BOD will be forced to entertain acquisition offers. But I don't want to be nasty to anyone. That is so bad karma, so not christian. I try to treat others how I want to be treated, which means as much as I secretly want to to be mean, nasty and vindictive, I will not be anything but honest about my experience with my boss' boss. She's the petty vindicitve one, not me, and I'm not going to stoop to her level.

She's so unaware though, I don't think she knows how nasty she is. She hardly has any friends at work, and my boss told me that the people in the nasty woman's former department hated her there as well. When my boss told me that I felt so much better, like I wasn't the only person in the world who can't stand her.

But if my boss' boss like you, she's great. If she doesn't, then well, you might as well be thinking about getting another job like I am.

So my job saga is going into overdrive. I had lunch with a woman I haven't seen in years today. Her company does medical software consulting and I took a webinar with her company back in December. We made plans to call each other for lunch, but we both never got around to it.

Seven months later, the woman shows up in her life because we're doing an rfi for a medical consulting software firm and we decided to send one out to her company. So I called my friend and told her that we never did go out to lunch and get caught up like we said we would.

So at lunch I'm telling her how unhappy I am at my job and she says her company might have an opening and could I send her my resume on Monday. And I'm like, OH MY GOD! I would love to work with this woman. We met in growth and development seminars together years ago and became good friends. She was the person who encouraged me to change fields and go into healthcare because she felt that it might lead me into something. And you know what she was right. Taking that healthcare startup job in Silicon Valley North was one of the best moves in my life, and I learned so many unbelievable things about jobs, life, and myself.

And now this woman told me today that the job isn't even posted yet, but she thinks I'd be perfect for it. I've never gotten a job this way, through someone I know. I've always gotten a job on the strength of my resume and my interviewing skills with people I've never met before who didn't know me from a bum on the street.

I don't even know if I want to go back into a startup, because the company is a startup. I mean, do I have the energy for that now, what with my writing, but if it means the chance to work with my friend, I think I need to follow up on it. Even it doesn't pan out, I could use the interviewing practice and the excuse to get my resume roadtested.

The job would be in downtown San Francisco, a block away from where I work now and I would be doing more analytical work which I really, reallly like and excel at. I would only take it if the job was a good fit and the pay was comparable or better. But I'm thinking any job would be great for me now because I am so not feeling very appreciated at my current job. I'll have to pray about what to do with this opportunity that has suddenly fallen into my lap. I really, really love my boss but if I don't fit in and I don't feel appreciated, even having the best boss in the world is never going to be enough.

I had a brief conversation with the girl who is leaving on Friday. She said the same thing about our department that the last guy who left said. The place is disorganized and your prospects for promotion are iffy at best. She told me that the job market in the San Francisco Bay area is pretty hot right now and you have to look after your own best interests, because no matter how good your boss or your company is, they aren’t looking after your interests just their own.

I told her where I wanted to interview and she interviewed with the company as well and said it was really close to public transportation.

I keep getting the feeling if I don’t jump now, I’ll lose out on this hot job market. My company did not make money this year, and their disorganization is starting to translate into revenue. They are not the best company to do business with, and their customer service is horrible. They’ve always had that reputation, but now in this very competitive healthcare market it is seriously affecting their ability to bring business in the door. Unless the company does a serious culture change, I think they will continue to lose market share and will probably be a buy-out target in the next two years. And who the heck wants to be with a company that isn’t making any money?

This company has already started to put in some mild serious cost cutting measures, and I have a feeling the cost cutting is just going to get worse and worse.

My intuition is telling me to wait till August 1 to send my resume out there. Why I have to wait till August 1, I don’t know, but I’ll wait. But I’m going to start working on my resume and doing some serious intuitive work about my next job.

It’s not like my job hasn’t been great because it was there when I needed a place to go, but it’s like a relationship that you get into because you’re not doing well. Eventually you start feeling better about yourself and the transition relationship starts to not fit. That’s what happening to me now with this job. It was great transition job, but it’s not a place where I would want to stay for the next five years.

I had a Bridget Jones movie # 2 moment this morning with M-Square from Laguna Beach. M-Square is my new nickname for this guy because he took classes at MIT and is Mr. Scientist and his initial are MM. So M-Square is kind of like that famous Einstein equation ‘E = MC2’. Cute huh? I want to just write M2, but M-Square sounds and looks better I think.

Anyway, there was a scene in the second Bridget Jones movie where she and Mark Darcy have just spent the night together and they’re leaving her apartment at the same time. Bridget text messages Mark that she already missed him on her phone right as she was walking out of her apartment, and then Mark comes by and says he missed her too. This scene is so darn cute and romantic.

So M-Square called me this morning between 6:30 and 7 am, and thank god I was up and about and making coffee. M-Square called me to apologize because he was supposed to call me last night and didn’t. He said his boss called him last night about something and they ended up having a long conversation. Then M-Square said to me “You deserve more of my attention.” Wasn’t that just so sweet and it so made me melt inside. He was on his way to work and was waiting for his bus to come.

So on the way to work I called him on my train like an hour later and thanked him for saying that thing about attention and how sweet that was, and I felt so Bridget doing that. I mean, I just talked to the guy an hour ago and now I’m calling him telling him thank you. I really wanted to say just like Bridget Jones, “I miss you already”, but we’re both not ready for that. It was so fun to have a “Bridget Jones movie # 2 moment”.

Is this another sign? A guy I recently have had contact with in meetings just resigned. He is the IT person for our division. He was one of the few people I've met at this company who had any kind of vision which really impressed me. It must have impressed other people as well because he is going on to become the Chief Information Officer at a very well known California healthcare foundation. Talk about a huge promotion with lots of cash! Lucky guy!

Is this a sign from the universe. Someone else who just started two months ago in my group just resigned last Tuesday. The excuse was they got a job with more money, but I think it's because my group is so disorganized and finding a job with more money isn't a bad inducement either. I think it's time to put my resume together and send it out. Two people from my group have left and gotten jobs that paid more money. That's a lot! It's four people actually if I count the two guys that left last year.

I know where I want to work. I had a chat with a friend in the industry a couple of weeks ago, and she encouraged me to apply because she thought the company was great as well. It will probably mean a longer and more expensive commute, but what the hell.

I am hating coming to work every morning as it is, and I know my attitude is taking a toll on my writing and my emotional life. It's time to leave and see where fate and my resume take.

I felt it was 9/11 all over again only this time I had my tv on and I was walking out of my kitchen with coffee and breakfast in hand to check the traffic and listen to the weather, when I realize I'm watching a news conference about a terrorist attack in London. Immediately tears sprang into my eyes and it was like I was in my car on 9/11 driving to work and listening to the public radio station guy freaking about the terrorist attack on the world trade towers.

My heart and prayers go out the Londoners who lost loves ones or whose loved ones were injured in the attacks. This is what the Israelis go through every day of their lives with the Palestinians. I don't people get that sometimes.

At least the new crush/love sent me $60 worth of books that I received this morning. That's more than the red-haired guy ever did. I mean, he always paid for meals and stuff like that, but he never gave me a present. And these books will come in handy because they're like serious science books, and I think I'll be able to use them as research material for my Elfgirl novels.

Did I mention he's an editor as well? I so want to date or become very good friends with a guy who edits books for a living.

Wow, I am so in crush/love it's sad. I called this guy twice over the weekend, and then like any old needy girl I make a comment saying "did you did think about me over the weekend." Of course I thought the guy didn't give me a second thought and I'm like whatever.

But then I get this message this morning.

**************
Miss Brenda,

I thought of you often over the weekend. I did receive your message but couldn’t reply as I spent most of this weekend underwater! I got way too much sun and I can barley keep my eyes open.
***************

Okay, maybe it's like one big lie that he thought of me, but it's nice that he said he did.

Maybe it's a good idea he doesn't live near me because I'm sure I would have tried to invite myself over to his place by now and then tried to seduce him. Maybe I was a girl lion in my animal incarnation because I so prefer to do my own hunting, especially when it comes to men. I hate being chased although it is nice when a guy does that. I much prefer to be the one to do the chasing for the most part. I feel like I'm reverting back to my 18 year old self when I think like this, because at that age when I saw a guy I liked I went after him.

I'm in Pacific Grove for the July 4th holiday. Pacific Grove is home to the famous Pebble Beach Golf Course, Asilomar Conference Center and 17 Mile Drive. Pacific Grove is next to Montery, which has the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Cannery Row. Monterey is very touristy and Pacific Grove is more laid back. I'm a block away from the beach, and thankfully the place is chock full of great restaurants.

For lunch I had a millionaire margarita, which had a splash of grand marinier on the top and was made with fresh lime juice and very expensive tequilla. I also had crab ravioli in a tomato cream sauce topped with blackened swordfish, which was so fabulous and to splurge I feasted on a mocha cream cheese cake. The restaurant was called "Fishwife" and is right next to the beach.

For dinner I had fresh tuna sashimi and rice at a place called Ocean Sushi. The owner of the restaurant had a diploma up on the wall which said he graduated from some cooking school in Osaka Japan.

Sadly the weather here is like where I live in San Francisco, all fogged over. Hopefully tomorrow it will be sunnier. I am a block away from the beach, and it would be nice to have a sunny beach day.

I'm going back to Fishwife tomorrow to try their calamari and crab cake appetizers. The menu also features a calamari sandwich, which is something I've never eaten and am dying to try. I love calamari if it's cooked right.