I went to my acupuncturist today, and I told him about the pain in my shoulder and he said it was a pinched nerve. That's what I thought. My silly chiropactor didn't believe me. Honestly, I really need to figure out a way to stop seeing him without hurting his feelings. He's just not very good, but when I told him I wanted to stop seeing him because I was moving out of the neighbourhood he got so upset.

Maybe I'll tell him that company is switching health plans, because I only see him because he's contracted with my health plan. That's a good reason. It's a total lie, but I doubt I'll get found out. This way we could both save face.

My acupuncturist treated my should and gave me the best massage. He's the best, and people come from all over even from LA to see him. He's always so busy. I wanted to see him next week, but he's very expensive ($60 per visit) so I made an appointment to see him in two weeks. He is so worth every penny. He's fixed my plantar fascitis, and my heels don't hurt ever anymore.

I think after my shoulder gets fixed, I'll have him work on my left hip. Even my spiritual healer said the angels she talks to really liked my acupuncturist, and said he was a good man.

I've spending so much money on my move this month that I need to be careful. It's so easy to spend money. I went to The Container Store, and bought some stuff. All the stores on Union Square were having a sale, and I popped into Macy's to check it out. Big mistake.

I walked out of Macy's with two pairs of earrings, on sale, but still Iike I need to be spending money on earrrings. I want to replace my eating utensils and saw the cutest set. The handles had pineapples on the end. How hawaiian is that? But four place settings cost $180. Yikes! Macy's had the set on sale for $99, and I was so tempted but I passed. Maybe in a couple of months, if the set is still there and on sale again, I'll buy them. I must have forks, spoons and knives with pineapple handles.

I decided I need to check out Victoria's Secret and walked out with 5 knickers. Two were colours I've been looking for and since you had to buy 5 to get the sale price, I bought 5.

There so many other things I wanted to buy, but I stopped myself. I can barely fit the clothes I have into my new place, and I don't really need anything. I did just buy a pair of Lands End cropped khakis and a new cotton sweaters from Sears on Tuesday for my company meeting. I didn't end up wearing the khakis, but I wore the sweater.

I told myself I would never buy myself a pair of cropped khakis, but the pair from Land's are more like pedal pushers, which means they come down to mid calf. Most cropped pants end up right at your ankle, and remind me of flood pants that some kids used to wear in elementary school because their parents wouldn't buy them new pants. Remember those? Kids at my school used to tease the kids who wore flood pants mercilessly and so meanly. I never wore them, but seeing pants like that brings those memories right back.

This is why it's a bad idea for me to work at home. It's 9 pm and I'm still working. I had some oral surgery done this morning to move my gumline which took four hours out of my day. Then when I came home to finish the project I started this morning, the system was so slow and I had so many problems building my workfiles and tables that I didn't get anything built till around 7 pm. And this is just the gathering the data step.

Then I have to actually analyze the data, put it into some usable form, and send it off to my boss so he can look at it and get it ready for the big important client meeting next Tuesday. I think he'll be happy though because it does look like we're helping the client's business and yes, the magic phrases, "improving their bottom line" and "saving them money". Clients love these phrases, will be grateful to you forever if you can prove to them emperically "the magic phrases", not to mention they won't complain about the huge sum of money you're charging.

It's going to be a late night working for me, sorry to say.

So I'm sitting in my all day work meeting thinking this is the first company I've ever worked for that I don't really care that much about. It's a strange feeling. I made a deliberate choice a few years ago that in order to concentrate on my writing, I would take a job that paid reasonably well but was not demanding. I would take a job where I wasn't so emotionally invested, so I could leave it at 5 pm and work on my writing.

Well, I have that kind of job. I'm not emotionally invested, I don't work more than 40 hours a week, unless there's some huge client meeting and that's happened only twice in three years, and part of me just doesn't care about the place other than the fact that the pay me.

This is like the weirdest feeling for me because I've always been into whatever job I'm doing, and now I'm just not. A friend tells me that I'm just treating my job like how everyone else treats their job and that I was weird for taking my jobs seriously and having my self esteem so tied into my career and my job. This is a horrible feeling though, not to care that much about the company you work for. It's a new experience for me, and although I know it's good for me to think of job like this, I'm not sure i like the feeling.

Maybe if I was married and had kids I wouldn't want to be so emotionally invested in my job, but I don't. I know that some of the other people at my meeting probably treat their job like a job and have no emotional investment in it whatsoever, and that's normal for them.

I don't know how they do it. I don't know how I've done it for three yearsl, and not driven myself crazy. I know the only thing that keeps me at this job is 1) it's easy 2) it's not time consuming 3) the job market sucks and it's better to be gainfully employed at this point in time and than not and 4) the job doesn't stress me out at all like all the other jobs in my life.

I just feel so purposeless about life right now. I haven't been wriitng, so maybe I just need to get back to my writing and then I'll feel like my life has purpose again. It's like torture to feel so rootless about life, to feel like I'm just living my life without any aim or purpose in mind. That just doesn't sit right with me somehow. It's so utilitarian of me I know, but I just think my life should be for a purpose and if I don't have a purpose than honestly what is the point of living?

That's probably harsh, but it's like so true for me. I'm like one of those types who has to always feel like I'm living for something, a purpose, or cause greater than myself. I need a reason to exist, to live, to go on, so I can feel my life is worth living.

I know the times when I've felt I've had no purpose in life, no reason greater than myself to live, have been times where I've been incredibly depressed, suicidal even. Maybe it's like some gene I stood in wrong line for in heaven. The gene that says you won't ever feel you life is worth anything unless you're dedicated to something, someone greater than yourself.

Do other people have this gene, or is just me? It's so not curable either because I have tried to rid myself of need to feel like I have a purpose several time but to no avail. It's an odd way to think about life, I think sometimes, but I can't help but think of my life like this.

Okay, so this is my first night working from home. I hate this because it's so easy to get extra work done. I have TV on so I can hear the finale of American Idol.

I wouldn't be working tonight if there wasn't this huge, huge client meeting next Tuesday in Florida, and I wasn't assigned four analyses to get done for the meeting. I was supposed to only be doing three projects, but we had a data issue so to make up for the messed up data the president of the company decides let's get Brenda to do an extra project so maybe they won't notice. Isn't that nice?

I'll probably work on the weekend as well since tomorrow I have to go Sacramento for an all day meeting. If I didn't have to attend this conference, I could finish my fourth project on Thursday and then wait for changes to made on Friday. I'm finishing projects 2 and 3 tonight.

Then silly me scheduled dental surgery for Friday morning, and I don't think I'll be able to work very much when I get back. I should have taken the day off, but even if I did I'm sure I'd get a call or email asking me to work the weekend anyway. What a drag!

I've had more projects due these last two weeks working from home, then I've had in the last two months when I was still working out of my office. My paranoid self says my bosses are doing it on purpose so they can be assured that I can be a productive employee at home. Whatever.

I guess it's good to be busy. It keeps me employed and gives me a regular paycheck. I have another report project that I have to start work on next week, which I think will involve some people from my Sacramento office. I have a feeling I'll have to drive up there every other week, if not every week to get the project off the ground. I'll find out tomorrow I think.

I don't mind driving up to Sacramento every other week, but once a week would be tough. It's a two hour drive for me, and that's two solid hours of freeway driving and not stop and go traffic. The Chief Technology office suggested that the report project be a joint one, and my home is that they just the project over to the IT department to be automated and leave me out entirely. I suggested this to my boss, but I still might have to consult on the project since I helped to build the report and consulting always means meetings.

I think they're about to announce the winner of American Idol in my time zone, so I've got to go and watch. I'm torn. I really like Ruben, but I like Clay too. I should have voted, but I didn't know who to choose. I think either way, they will both get record contracts which is so great for both of them.