Going Through the Motions

Grading Myself

2009-12-17T11:53:00.003-05:00

I have a group of friends who I have been posting with on various forms of social media since 2001. (First we were on messageboards, then we were moved to something that tried to be like myspace plus messageboards, then about 18 months ago we moved to Facebook.) Every year, we make our new year's resolutions and then in the following December we review our list to assess our progress. Sometimes one of the people in this group will remind us that we've been resolving every year since 20o7 to leave that job or lose those 25 pounds, which makes the annual resolution review particularly painful. Not that I speak from experience or anything.

So yesterday, someone suggested our annual resolution review and I immediately felt sick over the annual recriminations after realizing I have still made no progress on my list. But then when I went and found my blog post on the topic, I realized I kind of DID make some progress on several of them, and that was a pretty cool realization. Here's my list for the past year:

1. Resolve my job situation on my own terms.
If by "resolve," I meant "realize I am stuck here until the economy turns, and make the best of it," or perhaps just "don't get fired in the worst economic disaster of my generation," then yes. I resolved. But I am still in the same job I have had since January 2006. So, you do the math.

2. Become more frugal, in order to save money for a new mortgage.
I saved over $10K in the past year, and did get a new mortgage. I also blew all those savings on home renovations that currently carry a pricetag of almost $20K, and climbing. Oh joy. But yay, I finally got that mortgage, and the crushing debt load that comes with it! (Sometimes, adult milestones don't make you feel like you thought they would.)

3. Cook dinner more often at home, and eat healthier.
I barely cooked at home at all this year, but I did manage to follow Weight Watchers for 6 months and lose 20 pounds. (I've undone 6 pounds of that in the last 3 months though, and need desperately to get back on the program in 2 weeks when the holidays are behind us.

4. Cut caffeine from my daily diet.
Oh this is just too funny. I think I reduced my intake for like a month before I gave up. In fairness, I did say it would be the hardest one on the list to stick with. I think it was when I started dieting in earnest that I realized trying to quit caffeine while trying to quit every delicious food in the world is like the single most masochistic thing I could have attempted.

5. Begin exercising regularly, including attempting to start running on a regular basis by the end of the year.
In March I started working out on a regular basis and by May I was working out 5 nights a week on a treadmill. I even managed to do several long distances of 9 or 10 miles at a time, without dying. But then I stopped because I got sick in September, and then work became unbearably busy. I also never graduated to running. But, I am resolving to get back on the horse in the new year on this one. And by horse, I mean treadmill.

6. Remove as much stress from my life as possible.
Ha! What a fool I was.

7. FINALLY finish decorating this house--just need 2 rooms painted, and possibly a new desk in the guest room.
Or, y'know, I could decide instead to completely renovate the outside of the house and make zero progress indoors. The closest I got to progress on this front was having new light fixtures installed in my kitchen, and picking paint colors for my bedroom. BUT, I hope to finally get that painting actually done in 2010. Maybe.

8. Spend more time with family, since my grandparents are here now and both rapidly approaching 90.
This went well for the first half of the year when work was slow, and badly for the second half once I got super busy at work. Sunday dinners are hard to make it to when you work every Sunday. My grandpa is declining fairly steadily, though, so I really do need to make more time to be around him while I still have the chance. He turns 90 in January.

9. Focus on my writing, and really push myself to take the time for quality over filler.
Yeah, not so much. I had a couple decent blog posts this year, perhaps ones I will even assemble into a top 10 list if I find 10 I am at least halfway proud of. But for the most part, this year was slow on the writing front. I resolve to do better next year. (She said, as she wrote a blog post that could arguably be deemed "filler.")

10. Do something big and out of character. Details to come.
So, now that I didn't do it after all, I can reveal that my plan was to run a half marathon on Thanksgiving day. That obviously didn't happen, nor will I be running the March half marathon at Disney World that I was thinking of trying. However, I do want to try and complete a half marathon at some point, so I am going to try and carry this one over to the new year as well. But I did do something fairly out of character this year, and it was scary as hell: I went to Biloxi by myself and played in a poker tournament. I nearly got hives just thinking about doing it, but I'm glad I did. Even if I lost a lot of money and came away having yet again underperformed against the big boys.

Despite what this list might indicate, 2009 was a big year for me in several ways. As I look back, I'm pleased with where I've traveled to and hopeful that 2010 will be a year of even more change. I'll be thinking about my resolutions for 2010 in the next few weeks (several of them will be virtually identical, of course), but for now I think I give my progress in 2009 a B-. But of course, I resolve to do better next year, too.

Motion to Scrap that whole "trial" brouhaha so we can watch some football

2009-12-16T16:31:00.002-05:00

I'd have titled this post "Only in Alabama," but apparently something similar has happened in Louisiana a time or two as well. Lawyers in a case currently set to begin trial on January 4, 2010 in Jefferson County, Alabama have filed a Motion for Continuance, asking the Court to postpone the trial of the case until February or later so that they can attend the national championship game in Pasadena to cheer on their beloved Crimson Tide.

In addition to their own plans to attend the game, the movants cited as additional grounds that many of the witnesses will also be attending the game. They also argued that any Jefferson County jury pool is going to be too distracted with the impending national championship game to actually pay attention to trial anyhow, perhaps resulting in prejudice to the parties. (Hey, I didn't write these shitty arguments, I just paraphrased them for you.)

Apparently their opposing counsel are Auburn fans, however, so they refused to consent to a continuance. Luckily for the movants, the judge is also of the crimson persuasion and is almost certainly going to grant the request.

I have to say, even if Florida State had magically made it back to the national championship game this year, if I were set for trial on the Monday before the game I would never in my wildest dreams move for a continuance just so I could attend the game. And never in my wildest dreams would I expect a judge would actually grant this sort of thing. But maybe that's why I don't litigate in Jefferson County, Alabama...

Tell me about your Christmas list

2009-12-13T17:30:00.002-05:00

I am at a total loss in the gift-giving department this year. I just cannot figure out what any of my friends or family want or need, and since I'm unlikely to have much time to shop I need to come up with some ideas in a hurry. Unless people give me some good suggestions, virtually everyone on my Christmas list is getting a sweater, a bottle of wine, cologne/perfume, or a Snuggie. Seriously, I wish I were kidding but that's what has been purchased so far and what I think I am stuck with.

As a little quid pro quo for you sharing your wish list with me, I'll share mine with you in case you are similarly at a loss for gift ideas:

1. A Blu-ray disc player: preferably the kind that also can download movies etc. via wi-fi, because seriously, how cool is that?

2. Lolita Lempicka perfume: I wear this constantly. I got 2 bottles of it for my birthday a few years ago and I have just about used them up!

3. A dutch oven: the Le Creuset ridiculously expensive cast iron kind, not the one where you fart in my bed and pull the covers over my head, in case anyone was thinking this one sounded way too easy.

4. Gift card for a massage at a spa: always a good idea for the women in your life.

5. An FSU flag to fly outside my house: now that the team is back on the right track to its former perennial glory, I want to proudly display my allegiance in front of my soon-to-be garnet and gold house

I could probably come up with a few more, but those are the first 5 things that spring to mind. Of course, I would also be thrilled with a sweater or a bottle of wine (or tequila), because I am simple like that.

NY, NY a wonderful town

2009-12-07T11:34:00.003-05:00

I'm leaving tonight for three days in New York for a conference, and it couldn't come at a better time. Just yesterday I was lamenting on the phone to someone that I really didn't want to go, because I hate the networkingfest that these conferences inevitably turn into. We spend all day in presentations that we don't pay attention to, and then all night drinking and eating with potential clients. I come home more exhausted than when I left, with fewer billable hours and a few extra pounds.

BUT, since others have chosen today as a good day to blow up the Georgia GOP, and since I have serious reservations about the methodology being utilized, I'm quite happy to have an excuse to be off the grid until this mess blows over. Why do I have reservations, you ask? Because I have always been bothered by the media utilizing the reporting of rumors on blogs or the internet as sufficient basis to run with a story they otherwise couldn't run with because they lack sufficient independent verification and sourcing. No sooner did Erick Erickson put up his post telling all the tales that everyone wanted to hear about various Georgia Republican lawmakers, and he was saying on Twitter that a reporter told him that was giving the media the cover to run with the stories they'd been holding back. I'm willing to bet a shiny nickle those stories won't be about the underlying allegations themselves but will instead be couched in terms of "there are rumors on the internets that..." This sort of backdooring of otherwise unpublishable rumors without independent verification makes me sick. It's not even the story itself that bothers me, it's the way in which it is being brought to light suddenly now, after months of people holding back because nobody could nail down first-hand verification.

But, I have already lost the battle on that one, so I might as well head out of town for a few days to let the brouhaha blow over. Since my friend Samantha has brought me back burritos from Anna's Taqueria that I will get from her when I see her tonight, I can't complain too much. That is already guaranteed to make for a wonderful week. Maybe it will even snow a little, just so I can really get into the Christmas spirit. A girl can hope.

One last take on Bowden's retirement

2009-12-03T13:13:00.002-05:00

This quote really strikes at the heart of the matter:
Maybe the rest of the Southeast did catch up the outsized football culture of the super program Bowden helped usher in and reaped the benefits as he lost the younger man's knack for adaptation after so many years of wild success. It happens to all the great ones eventually.

And if it doesn't, by some chance, the rest of us sit around wondering what might have been if only the genius had stuck around instead of going out on top. In Bowden's case, we've seen what was and wished we could have reversed the planet's orbit until we were back in 2001, encasing his legacy in carbonite, instead of watching him play out the sad spectacle of trying to resurrect the thing, always just one year away, like Joe Paterno had managed after his even more dire over-the-hill stretch at Penn State. As if it could be replicated, as if he could get all those plates spinning again at the same time. That's the thing with successful people, I guess: If they could accept walking away from their achievement when it begins to crumble, it never would have existed in the first place.

Dear Georgia Democrats,

2009-12-03T11:20:00.005-05:00

You have just been handed a massive hammer. Use it.

If you cannot and do not capitalize on the coming Georgia Republican ethicinfidelapocalypse, then there is no hope for the state party. Three of the five Republicans who are or were running for Governor have somehow been swirled up in this mess of ethical breaches and banging of women other than their spouses. (The lone girl in the field will now benefit from the prevailing myth that women don't cheat on their spouses and can therefore be presumed above the fray and untainted.) Other powerful Republican members of the Legislature are in serious danger of being pulled into the drain swirl any minute now.

So, Georgia Democrats, you have 3 tasks:

1. Make sure every single member of the Democratic caucus is clean as a whistle on professional ethics and keeping it in your pants. NO SLIP UPS, and if they do happen, punish swiftly from within. Set the example.

2. Bang the drum of the dirty cadre of Republicans running this state constantly, loudly, and brutally, for the next year. I want to hear it in every debate, I want to see it in TV commercials and in the paper. I want you to force every candidate to take a stand on whether what these guys have done is wrong, and if they waffle then I want you to use that to make them look weak in the face of clear wrongdoing. You have been handed a massive gift--USE IT.

3. Remember, it's not the boinking of a woman other than their wives that is the problem, it's when that woman is a lobbyist pushing legislation at the same time. It's not the cheating on his wife, it's making criminal threats against her after she leaves him. It's not the blowjobs from women he isn't married to, it's the fact that they work for him and could constitute sexual harassment. FOCUS ON THE DIRTY PART, NOT THE SEXY PART. That is what ties it all together and makes it politically relevant, even if the other stuff is what makes people watch the TV and read the news. And one of the huge benefits of being out of power is that you have no real power to abuse--so emphasize that dramatic difference between Rs and Ds to your advantage.

I'm warning you guys now, if you don't come away with more seats in 2010 and at least one new statewide office, then you're more inept than I thought and I will not be giving the party another red cent of my money to waste wandering in the wilderness. Opportunities like this don't come along very often.

Unmatched

2009-12-01T12:03:00.011-05:00

(Photo from TTessori's flickr page.)

I come not to bury Bobby Bowden, but to praise him. Yes, I recognize this may surprise you, since lately I have been less than kind towards Saint Bobby. But long before he angered me by holding on past his time and hurting my alma mater, I adored him. And now that he is leaving, and finally letting go of the team that he made great, it is time to thank him and to recognize that we have witnessed something that may never be matched again.

Bobby Bowden was not a great football player on his own (he enrolled at Alabama as a QB but stayed only one semester). He did not rise to the pinnacle of football coaching because a fanbase fondly remembered his playing days, or because he was from a family of football royalty. He became a coach because he loved football, and had studied it while confined to his bed for nearly a year as a child. He started off small at colleges nobody has ever heard of, then moved up to colleges nobody wanted to coach, then had moderate success at a moderately successful football program. Then he finally was recruited into a school that had only started a football program 2 decades earlier, and had lost all but one game the year before he arrived. As a friend who has a few years on me is fond of saying, things were not always rosy for Florida State football. This is something that those of us who have only known Bobby Bowden as head coach for our entire lives have a tendency to forget.

I grew up in Orlando, smack dab in the middle of a three team rivalry that was unique in the quality of the teams, the notoriety of their coaches, and the closeness of the finishes. I remember Wide Right I and II, when FSU inexplicably lost to Miami two years in a row by missed field goals in the final minute and had their national championship hopes derailed. I remember the hatred we held for Spurrier even then, before his teams were REALLY good, when he was just a nasty visor-throwing smirky jackass. And I remember how each of us along the way picked the one of the three rivals we cleaved to, either from family tradition, local proximity, or instinct. I had neither of the first two going for me, being centrally located between all three and with a family that had attended college in Iowa and Minnesota. So I was drawn to Florida State, and it was because of Bobby Bowden.

My childhood memories of Bowden are of his wisecracking press conferences and halftime interviews. He was always so blunt and honest, so down to earth, so REAL. If his team was losing at the half, he shrugged and told the reporter he was going to whip them into shape and hope they played better in the second half, as he ran to the tunnel. If his team got beat on a last second field goal missed AGAIN against the same team, he had no choice but to make a joke about it and shrug it off, because there was always another game coming and he intended to win it. His honesty and his resiliency were endearing, and made me root for him. And by rooting for him, I came to root for FSU. When it was time to pick a college, I didn't have any intention of going to Florida State. I applied to the likes of Duke, Wake Forest, and Emory, but didn't get enough scholarship money and FSU offered a full ride. My parents made me go for a weekend visit, whining all the way, and to my great surprise I loved it. I never intended to go there, but it felt meant to be the second I arrived. I never for a second considered even visiting UF, even though Gainesville is considerably closer and was arguably the "better school" academically at the time. I was an FSU girl, and if I had to go state school it was the only choice.

I enrolled in the fall of 1993, a glorious time to be an FSU student. Charlie Ward would win the Heisman, we FINALLY held on to beat Miami, we blew out every other home game by double digits, and thanks to a BC field goal against Notre Dame that sent a cheer through the campus of FSU, we played Nebraska for the National Championship and won, fittingly on a last second field goal. Bobby Bowden had finally put all the pieces together and nobody deserved it more. We did not lose a single game I attended during my four years at FSU.

In the 1990's Bobby Bowden ran up a string of records and accomplishments that may never be equalled. Just a few off the top of my head:

14 straight top 5 finishes and 10 win seasons
Most wins in a decade by any FBS/Division I-A team ever (109). This is particularly notable because in the 90's there was no ACC championship game.
an .890 winning percentage for the 1990's
Played in 5 national championship games from 1993 to 2001, won 2
First wire-to-wire AP #1 in 1999
28 straight bowl game appearances, the longest active streak in college football
Longest streak of bowl game victories (1985-1996)

We were definitely all spoiled. A "down year" for FSU was one in which we had two losses and did not play for the national championship. For the entire decade, Bobby Bowden was known as a great recruiter, a 5-star general overseeing his highly skilled assistants, and a man that his players and fans loved. Along with the other fans, I was in heaven.

But things had to turn eventually, and they did. With benefit of hindsight, the decline has been precipitous and it is not surprising that many of us eventually turned on Bobby. After Mark Richt left to coach Georgia, Bowden elevated his son Jeff to offensive coordinator with disastrous results. Bobby refused to fire him despite the team's rapid offensive decline, and eventually the boosters paid Jeff $500,000 to walk away quietly. Bobby was reportedly furious about the boosters' forceout. While the offense has rebuilt thanks to new offensive coordinator Jimbo Fisher, the team still has not managed more than 9 wins since 2000, and Bowden steadfastly resisted the many calls for change year after year. If anything, he became more defiant in the face of the criticism. But he should not have been surprised that the torches and pitchforks eventually reached his door. As one writer said today, "the first time the team went 6-6, they came for his son Jeff (offensive coordinator). The next time the team went 6-6, they came for him."

I was ready for Bobby to go three years ago. After graduating from FSU I'd moved to Boston, where college football is unimportant and it was easy to barely pay attention and only watch the big games, which we suddenly started to lose a lot of. Then I moved to Georgia in the fall of 2005, and decided that my newfound proximity to Tallahassee and my newfound prosperity meant that I should get season tickets. As a sign of how far we had fallen, I not only had no trouble obtaining season tickets, but did not even have to give a donation to get them. And so, in the fall of 2006 I walked into Doak Campbell stadium for the first time in a decade to watch us play Clemson. We lost in a squeaker and so I had my first experience of walking out of Doak forlornly while an opposing team's fans cheered. Since that game, I've been an FSU season ticketholder for four seasons now, have attended 10 games, and we've won two of them. TWO. It was bizarro world, and it seemed like it was never going to end.

But for all my rancor, and all of my wholehearted belief that the team needed a change at the helm, when Bowden finally announced his retirement yesterday I was overcome by sadness and appreciation. I was sad because I knew Bobby's heart was breaking over leaving, and how it had all come to pass. I was sad because the man who has been the coach of my team for as long as I have been alive was being shuffled off to retirement, where he had once famously said there was only one big event left, and he wasn't ready for that yet. I was sad because just like Bobby wanted to be the coach for one more great season, I wanted that for him too. But unlike Bobby, I had recognized that he could keep hanging on and hoping for that, but it just wasn't going to happen while he was there. And so I was sad that the football gods had denied him the sendoff season with a great team that he richly deserved. It simply was not meant to be.

I also wanted to make sure that the greatness that Bowden brought to my alma mater is not forgotten in how it all went down at the end. He has become an old man, lost a step as some said, but that is exactly why we should not remember him as he is now, but at his best. William O. Douglas was a lion of the Supreme Court who wrote some of the most important landmark decisions of an era, but at the end he refused to retire even after he suffered a stroke and could barely speak or read. He waited too long to go, but we do not remember him for how he fell at the end, but for how he rose before it. And we should do the same for Bobby Bowden. The man lived the life of a legend, built a program from nothing into a powerhouse that broke records and left everyone in the dust for an entire decade. That is the Bobby I will choose to remember fondly going forward. That is the Bobby who I will see in the statue outside Doak Campbell Stadium when I go to a game next year, when I watch my team run onto Bobby Bowden Field.

There is another statue outside Doak that features a Seminole warrior on horseback, holding a spear above his head. It says on the base "Unconquered." The Seminole tribe of Florida is known for having never been conquered by the U.S. government or any other tribe, despite many attempts that included driving them deep into the swamps of Florida. They may have been diminished, may have lost control of the lands they once held, but they were never conquered. Bobby Bowden may give up control of the Florida State football team, but the heights he brought our team to will never be matched again. And all of us who live this team must honor that tradition, and honor the man who gave his life to Florida State.

Goodbye, and thank you, Saint Bobby. We will never see your kind again.

Get off your ass and VOTE, Atlanta

2009-11-30T16:55:00.004-05:00

Tomorrow the City of Atlanta will hold runoff elections for the Mayor's race, City Council President, City Council Post 2 At Large, and City Council District 6. I won't be making new endorsements this time around because everyone I said I was voting for in the November 3rd general election either won outright or made the runoff, so my reasoning then still holds now.

Instead, I want to emphasize the importance of every single voter in the City of Atlanta turning out tomorrow to cast a ballot. First, let's dispel a few myths about runoff elections:

1. "It will take too long." Not so, since sadly turnout is projected to be in the ridiculously low category. In the general election, only 24% of Atlanta voters cast a ballot, and turnout for a runoff is usually below half the turnout for the general. It took me less than 5 minutes to vote on November 3rd, so really you should be able to carve out the 15 minutes it will take to find your precinct, cast a ballot, and head on to work in the morning or home after work at night. Don't be lazy!

2. "I can't vote in a runoff if I didn't vote in the general." I am not sure where this myth comes from, but it's completely not true. Nobody checks your name against voters who cast ballots on November 3rd. If you are a registered voter in the Atlanta city limits, you can vote in the runoff even if you've never cast a ballot in your life. Do NOT let anyone convince you that you have somehow waived your right to be heard.

3. "The candidate who got the most votes on election day always wins anyhow, so why bother." Oh how some candidates wish this were true! All you need to do is look at the 2008 Senate primary to see how false that is. Vernon Jones had a huge lead on the other candidates in the primary, but lost handily to Jim Martin in the runoff. In fact, runoff elections usually feature SUCH low turnout that it really is unpredictable as to who will win the race. One thing is for certain--your vote can absolutely make a difference. My City Council District, #6, was won in a runoff by just FIVE VOTES in 2005.

4. "My candidate lost the first time around, so why should I care." Most losing candidates in these crowded races have gone on to endorse someone who made it into the runoff, so why not see who they endorsed and decide if maybe they have a good reason to urge their supporters in that direction?

5. "It won't matter; this city will still be screwed up no matter who is elected." This may be true, but at least if you vote you won't feel like you squandered the opportunity to help stop it because you had a bunch of excuses and couldn't get your butt off the sofa. Besides, there are some important potential landmarks to be gained by tomorrow's races, depending on where you live--we could see the first gay man and Asian-American elected to city council, we could see the first black lesbian elected to Georgia state house. We could see Atlanta's mayorship held by a white woman for the first time in eons. It could be the first election where a major southern city's gay vote decided numerous elections. Tomorrow could be historic in so many ways--don't you want to be a part of it?

Now the details: polls are open from 7:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m tomorrow. Find your polling place here. Review a sample ballot here.

As I said above, just 24% of registered voters in City of Atlanta voted in the November 3rd general election. If we are lucky, just half of that will vote in this runoff. That means about one in eight of us will be deciding who will run this city at a crucial juncture in our governance. That, frankly, is just sad. I really hope everyone who reads this site who lives in the City of Atlanta will decide to be part of the electorate, rather than part of the problem.

OK, stepping off my soapbox now. Good luck to the candidates and the many people I know who are busting their asses to get good people elected. (You can sleep starting Wednesday!)

Serious Question of the Day

2009-11-24T14:42:00.004-05:00

Remind me again why we continue to pretend Joe Lieberman is a Democrat?

Reminder: Virtual Candidate Forum Today

2009-11-24T13:28:00.002-05:00

As I posted about on Friday, the Committee for a Better Atlanta's Virtual Candidate Forum is today from 4:30 to 7:00pm. Already, some great questions have been posted on CfaBA's website, and I am sure even better questions will be asked during the live forum itself.

Here is the schedule of candidate question sessions, if you want to ask questions or just see what each has to say:

4:30 pm Kasim Reed (Mayor)
4:45 pm Amir Faroki (City Council Post 2 At-Large)
5:00 pm Clair Muller(City Council President)
5:15 pm Ceasar Mitchell (City Council President)
5:30 pm Mary Norwood (Mayor)
5:45 pm Liz Coyle (City Council District 6)
6:00 pm Alex Wan (City Council District 6)
6:15 pm Aaron Watson (City Council Post 2 At-Large)

Depending on how much I get to participate and whether it ends up as interesting as I'm hoping for, I may have a summary up later tonight for those of you who can't make it.

Serious Question of the Day

2009-11-23T14:16:00.004-05:00

Would Sarah Palin be such a political or cultural hot commodity today if she wasn't hot (i.e., more physically attractive than average)?

I consider her to be the Anna Kournikova of politics, and I find that to be a sad and potentially dangerous thing. But I want to know if my 12 readers agree, and if so what you think it says about our culture that a hefty chunk of our population has elevated a nincompoop to politically iconic status simply because she's hot.

Questions for the Candidates?

2009-11-20T11:09:00.005-05:00

In what I can only assume was a complete and total mistake (calling me a "prominent blogger" makes me question your judgment!), the Committee for a Better Atlanta has invited me to participate in a Virtual Mayoral Forum next Tuesday from 4:30 to 7pm. The event will be hosted live on CBA’s online community at http://www.betteratlanta.org/. I have been asked to pass this information on to you, my 12 readers, so that you can submit questions for Norwood and Reed during the forum. If you aren't comfortable submitting your own questions and you want me to ask the candidates something, put it in the comments, or email me at sarawara@gmail.com if you are not comfortable posting your question for all to see.

In addition, you should tune in on Tuesday, since this really is a fairly cool concept and probably will be a little more interesting than the standard televised debates.

The Committee for a Better Atlanta will also be allowing us to pose questions to the City Council candidates in the various races that have gone to runoff--Clair Muller vs. Ceasar Mitchell for the Council President slot, Amir Farokhi vs. Aaron Watson for At Large Post 2, and Alex Wan vs. Liz Coyle for District 6. So please pass along questions for them, if you have them, as well.

If nothing else, it is nice that even local politics are embracing the power and opportunities of social media. I still am surprised I was included in this because I feel like a blogging peon, but want to give everyone the opportunity to participate. So have at it!

On Advocacy

2009-11-17T14:55:00.006-05:00

It is very easy for people to make fun of, look down upon, and pass judgment upon lawyers. As I have often said to friends, lawyers have the reputational issue they do because generally people only need one of us at the worst points in life: you have been injured, you have been accused of a crime, you have been sued, you are getting a divorce, you need to declare bankruptcy, or someone has died. As a result, it often feels to people who suddenly need to interact with lawyers that we are profiting from your misfortune, because we get paid for the work we do on some of the worst days of your life.

But on the worst days of your life, when your property, your liberty, or your rights are at risk, I assure you that you will want the most vigorous advocate you can find. You will want the person who will leave no stone unturned in trying to find the evidence of your innocence or the police misconduct that will keep you out of jail. You will want the person who persuades the judge not to give your ex sole custody of your children. You will want the person who makes sure your company is not run out of business by a massive punitive damages award simply because you made a great product that was involved in an isolated and unforeseeable injury. You will want the strongest advocate you can find and afford, and you will want that person to agree to represent you even if you are not 100% pure. Because frankly, nobody is.

When we sign up to go to law school, we know we will someday take an oath to vigorously advocate on behalf of our clients. We will agree to keep their secrets in virtually all circumstances (except when telling them can prevent death or serious injury to someone else). We will agree to take on representation we may later be ethically prohibited from withdrawing from even if we never get paid. We will agree to take positions that we may not personally agree with, because they are the best position for our client. And we will agree to put our own self-interest behind the interests of our clients virtually all the time. This is part and parcel of becoming a lawyer.

We agree to all of these things because we believe that vigorous advocacy is a necessary part of our criminal and civil justice system, which for all of its faults is the best one in the world. We recognize that we hold tremendous responsibility within that system as "officers of the court" to bring injustice to light, to prevent the entry of falsehood into the record whenever we can, and to ensure that every litigant's rights are protected whenever possible. Thought it is fashionable to assume we walk into court and lie every day, throw out the bad documents if we don't feel like turning them over to the other side, and train our witnesses how to wriggle out of responsibility for their actions, the truth down in the trenches is not even remotely close to this. In 9 years of practice, I can count on one hand, not using all of the fingers even, the number of lawyers I have worked with or battled against who I truly felt pushed the bounds of legal ethics. These people are usually treated as pariahs by the rest of us who are, by and large, passionate about upholding what we have sworn to do.

Some people can't fathom the commitments our profession requires, and for those people it is easy to announce moral absolutes about how they would rather get fired than represent this type of criminal defendant or that corporate behemoth with sketchy accusations against them. Perhaps they are incapable of compartmentalizing, and cannot understand that preventing police and prosecutorial excess is important even when doing so in defense of someone who committed armed robbery or rape. Perhaps they are incapable of anything but strict adherence to a particular ideology, and prefer not to examine it too closely to see if it should be revised from time to time. Whatever the reason, for people who recognize their own unsuitability for this profession to criticize the way in which others have performed it is ludicrous.

Kasim Reed defended large corporations accused of discrimination and other violations of employees' statutory rights. Not every case in which discrimination is alleged is meritorious, and not every corporate defendant accused of discrimination is branded an evildoer for all time.

Some plaintiffs' employment cases are bogus, and those should be weeded out and dismissed so that the meritorious cases can be resolved faster and more amicably. If a county has 20 rape allegations in one month and half of them are proven to be false accusations, then it makes it harder for the other 10 to obtain justice. The same is true with frivolous plaintiffs' litigation--it makes it harder for the meritorious cases to obtain justice more quickly.

In addition, corporations are not immutable objects incapable of change. A person may be a rapist for all time if convicted of (and actually guilty of rape.) But corporations are different--boards fire CEOs and hire new ones, company policies change, and the corporation that paid women less than men in 1979 shouldn't have that hanging over their heads thirty years later if it's no longer the case. To take Reed to task for representing Cracker Barrel in 1999 based upon cases that occurred years earlier completely ignores the potential for change within an organization. Perhaps this is by design--all large corporations are inherently evil, to some. But once we get to that point, we're demanding the sort of ideological purity that will disqualify virtually every candidate.

But even if I were retained to represent Cracker Barrel in a race discrimination case today--why shouldn't I? I am not going to lie, cheat or steal to win the case, I am only going to use the facts and evidence, legal defenses and procedural maneuvers legitimately available to me. If the company has really engaged in systemic discrimination, then that should usually result in either a verdict at trial or a settlement in the event the company's lawyers decide a trial win is unlikely. This is exactly how the free market is supposed to work--if someone is indefensibly injured or damaged by a corporation, the corporation pays. And if I am able to obtain dismissal of the case or keep the verdict/settlement low, then the case probably wasn't as meritorious is plaintiffs first believed.

What bothers me most about Cardinale's position is that he presumes all of the defendants Reed represented had violated the rights of employees, and that Reed was therefore working against workers' rights by advocating on behalf of those companies. Again, should we presume that simply because corporations are always evil and hurting people however they can? Do we really believe that? I have worked on hundreds of cases at this point in my career, and I have seen very few true slam dunks of liability. I have seen many, many cases that fall in the grey areas, and many cases that are obviously frivolous. To completely ignore the possibility that some of these companies were not liable for discrimination or statutory violations, and simply assume Reed was defending bad companies, is simplistic and unsupported by the evidence.

I've glossed over many of the points I wanted to make but struggled with, because they are difficult to wrestle with in one post. For example, the notion that a junior or midlevel associate in a large law firm gets to pick and choose what clients he wants to do work for is, frankly, ludicrous. Even now with 9 years of experience and some decent seniority, if I said "no, I can't represent Cracker Barrel because I disagree with things they've done in the past," I would expect it to potentially get me fired, and certainly lead to negative comments in performance reviews, etc. Earlier this year an associate at the law firm of Quinn Emmanuel was fired just a few days after sending an email in which he questioned whether the firm should be defending the Washington Redskins against constitutional claims brought by Native Americans. Law firms do not provide the freedom to pick and choose your clients as an associate, and I would never presume to demand that anyone to turn down an assignment when it could get them fired (and potentially blackballed within their industry to boot.)

Every single candidate for political office who is an attorney has probably represented an individual or entity who was guilty or liable of something bad. If we are going to start holding candidates to the standard that they can't have represented any client who ever committed a bad act, then we might as well just disqualify all lawyers from political office. Considering that our President, Vice President, Secretary of State, and more than half of Congress are lawyers...have fun picking from what's leftover after the disqualifications are complete.

I am not the slightest bit ashamed of my profession, or of having represented corporations accused of injuring people. They deserved a strong defense, and I provided it. I will not apologize for that simply because some people are incapable of understanding that I am fulfilling a necessary role in our justice system. Kasim Reed should not have to apologize for it either.

Let a Lawyer Show You How It's Done

2009-11-17T10:44:00.006-05:00

(This post will be a refutation of the factual assertions made by Atlanta Progressive News in two articles about Kasim Reed's representation of corporate interests in employment litigation. The background stories are here and here. I have pulled up the very same PACER dockets from which these stories were allegedly researched, except I bothered to actually read them all the way through and understand what they mean. In a separate post, I will share my strong feelings as to why it is complete garbage to make a political issue out of who a lawyer has represented.)

Dear Atlanta Progressive "News," if you weren't such lazy, biased f*cking douchebags, this is what you would have reported about Kasim Reed's representation of various corporations in employment litigation:

Kasim Reed's background

Reed was admitted to the bar in 1995. He initially joined the Atlanta law firm of Paul Hastings Janofsky & Walker, where he was an associate in their employment litigation department. In that role, he represented a variety of corporations in cases brought against them alleging various types of employment discrimination, unfair employment practices, and the usual sorts of claims that employment litigators are called upon to defend. After a few years at Paul Hastings, Reed left for Holland & Knight, where he continued to practice employment litigation. It is not clear if he is still a current H&K employee, or if he is either on leave of absence or has left the firm to concentrate on his mayoral race. My guess is that he will have left H&K for good if he is elected.

First, APN tried to make an issue out of Reed's biography no longer appearing on the H&K website:

According to a 2006 article from the Black Commentator, the job description for Mr. Reed published on Holland & Knight's website read: "M. Kasim Reed represents employers in employment law matters, including sex, age and disability discrimination, civil rights litigation, and contract-related disputes… He has extensive experience representing employers before various state and federal courts, as well as before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and other federal and state administrative agencies."

Incidentally, since that time all references for Reed have been apparently removed from Holland & Knight's website, which is unusual, especially when a firm should be proud to have a former employee running for Mayor of Atlanta.

It is not rare at all for law firms to remove the biographies of attorneys from their websites. It happens whenever an attorney leaves a firm. It happens if an attorney goes on leave. In fact, contrary to APN's assumption that H&K would want the good press of a former attorney made good on their site, I have never heard of a big firm keeping a biography of an attorney who has left the firm on their website. This argument by APN is just stupid.

Reed's Representation of Cracker Barrel

APN then attempts to stir up a storm of controversy over Reed's representation of the Cracker Barrel restaurant chain in employment litigation. As many people know, Cracker Barrel was sued for discrimination in a variety of contexts and venues over the last few decades, and did not have the greatest run of PR during that time period. APN dedicated almost an entire article to community activists and well known (and paid) Norwood supporters acting shocked that Reed would dare represent Cracker Barrel when everyone knows they're racist bad guys. And APN is correct that Reed is listed as an attorney for Cracker Barrel in the Serena McDermott case, filed in 1999. But here's the rest of the story, as deduced from the very same PACER federal court docket information that APN claims to have reviewed:

Reed was counsel of record from 1999-2001 for Cracker Barrel, in Fair Labor Standards Act case brought by a class of employees. Though the case was brought by the NAACP, and though Cracker Barrel has been sued before for discrimination, the Fair Labor Standards Act is not a race discrimination statute. The lawsuit in question sought payment of unpaid and overtime wages, based upon allegations that the employees were made to work "off the clock," putting in more hours than they actually were compensated for and accruing time that was not compensated as overtime.

In other words, Reed did not defend Cracker Barrel in any sort of race discrimination case, or ANY type of discrimination case for that matter. Shame on APN for suggesting otherwise by quoting various individuals in their article to talk about past allegations against Cracker Barrel, without making the distinction between those cases and the one case Reed worked on.

In addition, Reed worked on the McDermott case from 1999-2001. The case continued until 2005, but PACER shows he was terminated from the case on 10/16/01. He was also one of twelve different attorneys who appeared on behalf of Cracker Barrel in the litigation, according to PACER. He was a 5th-7th year associate at the time of his involvement in this case, so it is not fair to suggest that he was lead counsel or necessarily even had a significant role in crafting the defense of Cracker Barrel to this major class action litigation. Attorneys can be added to the docket of a case whenever they appear for purposes of signing a few pleadings, appearing at a deposition or hearing, or to take over temporary responsibility for another attorney. Chances are good in a case of this magnitude that many firm associates were called upon to work on the case at various times, and Reed's role may have been very small. Neither of the two articles contain any followup research by APN to review the actual pleadings in the case to attempt to deduce if Reed was signing pleadings, if he was appearing at hearings or conferences, or if he had any significant involvement in the litigation. (I have not done that yet myself, but may do so if people continue to try and insist that he was lead counsel on this case and that it somehow should matter to his mayoral chances.)

APN also apparently did not contact the Reed campaign and give them a chance to respond to the allegations that Reed defended Cracker Barrel in cases brought by aggrieved workers. (There is no reference in either of the two articles about the Cracker Barrel case that APN sought comment from Reed or his campaign.) Presumably, Reed's campaign would have provided this sort of clarification of the actual scope of his role, however vast or limited, and it would have provided the article with proper context. But proper context does not appear to be what APN was after.

Kasim Reed's Other Employment Litigation Matters

Apart from the Cracker Barrel case, APN also reported about four other employment litigation cases in which Reed was counsel of record. I've checked those dockets as well. In the case in which he represented ATC Healthcare, Reed was counsel for the defendant from 2/13/97 until the case was terimnated in 9/16/98. In the case against The Hayman Company, Reed was counsel for the defendant from 12/11/96 until the case was terminated on 5/27/97. In the case against Parsons Brinckerhoff, Reed was counsel for the defendant from 2/14/96 until the case was terminated on 3/31/98. In each of these cases, the defendants were represented by additional counsel beyond Reed, and he was only a junior or midlevel associate at the time. He was almost certainly assigned to these cases and working under the direction of a partner who actually made the strategic decisions for the direction of the case.

To act like Reed was calling the shots and standing up to defend these companies in these cases when he was probably just a BigLaw minion is either disingenous, or demonstrates complete lack of understanding for life as a BigLaw employee. Since I am a BigLaw employee, in my next post I will explain exactly why it is ridiculous for APN to expect Reed or any other law firm attorney to refuse representation of companies that have been accused of race discrimination or other bad things, and why it is even more ridiculous to hold those past representations while a BigLaw associate against Reed the mayoral candidate today.

Mood Music

2009-11-17T08:14:00.002-05:00

One of these days
you'll go out of your way sometime

Absolutely

2009-11-11T16:30:00.001-05:00

Stefan at Blog for Democracy gets it exactly right in his open letter to Kasim Reed, who I support in the Atlanta mayor's race. While I want Reed to win, Stefan is 100% correct that HOW you win elections is very nearly as important as WHETHER you win elections, at least for those of us who have to live in this city after a mayor is chosen. I want Reed to win (or rather, unfortunately, I don't want Mary Norwood to be my next mayor), but I don't want him to do it in a way that further polarizes city residents or reinforces the rest of the state's views of what's wrong with Atlanta.

I'm glad someone finally articulated the importance of how the next few weeks go down, because it definitely does matter and the stakes are huge.

As if I needed more evidence...

2009-11-11T10:30:00.008-05:00

...that FSU's defense sucks balls:

(via Tomahawk Nation)

Every single Division I-A opponent FSU has played this year had their best offensive game of the season against FSU. (Well, until USF bested its 6.3 yards per play against FSU with 6.4 yards per play against WVU last weekend. But those are pretty close, and WVU also lost that game.)

But remember, I'm crazy or stupid for blaming much of our disastrous season on the completely porous defense. Right. At least I'm not alone.

Also, if you read the linked post above, it is frightening and sad how completely out of touch Bowden is with the particulars of the game he just coached. The man has checked out.

(Though, I do not agree with the suggestion in the linked post that Bobby is going to start accidentally talking racist anytime soon. That's just silly, the man has coached hundreds of players of all races for decades.)

Adventures in Dating #4: One Night Only

2009-11-10T13:24:00.004-05:00

Today as I returned to my car from withdrawing a sizeable amount of cash at the bank (long story), I noticed that I had a missed call on my phone from a guy I had been texting with earlier about meeting up tonight. I called him back without checking to see if he had left me a voicemail, and he told me he had accidentally called my phone without realizing it. Thankfully this conversation was not terribly awkward, but it did cause me to remember a similar one that inspired this Adventures in Dating story.

A few years ago when I lived in Boston, fresh off of the breakup of my 6 year relationship and some post-breakup dating disasters that included this infamous tale, I was persuaded by some friends to try internet dating for the first time. This was in approximately 2002 or 2003, when the prospect of meeting someone over the internet was still a vaguely terrifying thing to most people (as opposed to now, when it is normal for many but still creepy and/or terrifying for others), so I was very wary of trying it. Still, I created an account on Matchmaker and went on a couple dates with guys I had absolutely zero chemistry with and prayed that they would never call me again. Some will be featured on future Adventures in Dating posts, so I don't want to shoot my wad entirely here...but let's just say I was reluctant about this whole shebang.

Then I got an email from Joe (at least I think that was his name...it's all a little hazy) and we actually had several good email conversations so I let it progress to phone calls, and after several good phone calls I decided we should go out. Joe had recently left the military, and was a single dad to boot, so he'd moved back to Massachusetts from wherever the hell he had been stationed and was living in the suburbs with his parents while he got situated. He suggested that I take the T out to a stop near where he lived and we would go to dinner, so I did. We met and had a perfectly normal dinner, and then intended to see a movie but the only thing either of us wanted to see was sold out at the one theater in this sleepy suburb. So, Joe suggested he could drive me home and we could grab a drink near my place. If you are halfway intelligent, you see where this is heading.

In a move that shocked even me, and I'm the one that did it, I invited Joe back to my place and he became my first (and to date only) one night stand. It was awful, though I will spare the particular details of why it was so bad. But I fully expected never to hear from Joe again after that night, and I wasn't real bothered by that prospect because I saw nothing I felt the need to go back to.

But ego is a funny thing, and after a few days without getting a phone call or email, I was kind of bummed that he hadn't wanted to see me again and hadn't called. Then one night, I ran downstairs quickly to the CVS next door to my apartment building for something, and when I got back there was a missed call on my cell phone from Joe. Huh, maybe he did want to see me again after all! At least now I'd get the satisfaction of not feeling rejected, even if I had to decline any future dates on account of the worst sex in the history of the universe. (OK, it wasn't THAT bad, but by God it wasn't good or even decent.)

I didn't have a voicemail message icon yet, but since I had just missed the call a couple minutes earlier, I decided to call back and see what he wanted. Joe answered, and the conversation went like this:

Me: "Hi, it's Sara, I just noticed I have a missed call on my phone from you."
He: "Um, I didn't call you."
Me: "Okaaaay...but my phone says that you, in fact, did call me and I just called back the last number that called me, and it was you."
He: "Nope, didn't call you."
Me: "Hm. Nevermind then."(This is awkward.)
He: "OK, bye."
Me: *MORTIFIED*

I never heard from him again. I suppose there are a thousand reasons why he could have not realized his phone had called me. He could have accidentally hit a button, he could have been trying to delete my number and accidentally hit send, one of his parents or a girlfriend (or, God forbid, a wife he neglected to mention) could have dialed the last number in his received calls list...who knows. It was all very shady and strange and awful. But I came away from the experience feeling completely smacked down for my naivete in calling him back without thinking for a second that perhaps there had been some mistake.

And that feeling, I think, is why I have been unable to bring myself to have any one night stands since that time. I think it was just such a dehumanizing and demoralizing experience because of that stupid non-call afterwards that I decided then and there never to expose myself to such humiliation ever again.

Mood Music: a Twofer

2009-11-09T10:07:00.002-05:00

The song I previously posted was M. Ward, featuring Zooey Deschanel. They previously collaborated together as She & Him, and this song just gets under my skin and stays there for days.

Mood Music: Just like A-B-C edition

2009-11-09T10:05:00.001-05:00

But now that I've been through that hell
I've got a story to tell...

Random Football Rant

2009-11-05T15:25:00.004-05:00

Yesterday, longtime Florida State Defensive Coordinator Mickey Andrews finally put himself out of his own misery and announced he would retire after this season. This decision couldn't come soon enough, since FSU's defense is ranked 109th out of 120 teams...in other words, there's only 11 teams WORSE than we are on defense right now.

This creates an opening for next year, which poses a problem. Bobby Bowden only has one more year that he could possibly be head coach before FSU will have to pay Jimbo Fisher $5 mil. if they decide to keep Bobby. There is virtually no way that will happen, which means Bobby either retires this year, or next year. So, since Jimbo Fisher will apparently inherit the team after one more season, there is a question of who gets to pick the new Defensive Coordinator.

Normally the head coach gets to hire his coordinators, but if Bobby hired a new one, anyone interested in the job would have to realize they'd only have one year to prove themselves before Jimbo could replace them with whoever he wants. Who would take a job in that climate? Or, since Jimbo will be the coach after next season, FSU could let him choose the new Defensie Coordinator with the expectation that his choice would stay when Jimbo is elevated to Head Coach.

Today, Bobby Bowden announced he plans to select the next Defensive Coordinator. He might let Jimbo have some input, but he's still making the selection.

This makes me so angry I want to throw things. For starters, Bobby should be out at season's end. Our team is terrible, he's completely oblivious and saying things like how we're a few big plays away from being undefeated, and the boosters have lost faith in him. But he apparently intends to coach to the bitter end of his contract and continue to blindly believe that next year we'll magically have a good team even if all evidence points to Bobby and his handpicked staff having run the program into the ground.

But even if he wanted to coach one more year (something I wish the administration would strongly discourage), why the hell does he get to pick the Defensive Coordinator who will only coach under him for one dadgum year? When will he start acknowledging that starting in 2011 this is Jimbo Fisher's team, and his era is over?

There have been rumblings on the internets that Bobby intends to appoint Chuck Amato to the Defensive Coordinator position for 1 year. Amato was a former defensive assistant at FSU before he left to become head coach of NC State, where he was horrible. Now he's back with some bullshit title like "Executive Head Coach (who also pretends to coach linebackers)." Given how bad our defense is, I don't want anyone currently affiliated with the defensive coaching staff to even be in the running. In fact, I'd like to see virtually all of them replaced when Andrews leaves, hopefully with the input of the new DC.

But if Bobby appoints Amato to DC, nothing will change. The team will still suck. And all of us who care about FSU football will be sitting here twiddling our thumbs for another wasted year waiting for him to finally retire or die so that we can start rebuilding.

We have a fantastic quarterback in Christian Ponder, something that has been completely lost in this waste of a season. Ponder has the potential to be Heisman-worthy next year, if he could get the defensive support he needs to win games. By all but announcing his intention to stay next year, Bobby is probably dooming Ponder to the trash heap of wasted potential behind an inadequate defense. In all likelihood even the best Defensive Coordinator on the market wouldn't be able to turn around this shitty defense enough to help Ponder make a run at major glory next year, but at least we'd have a fighting chance and wouldn't be stuck in defenseless shootouts against the likes of USF, Georgia Tech, and N.C. State.

I wish someone in the Athletic Department or administration of FSU would FINALLY draw a line with Bowden. It's time, because this is unacceptable. If he stays next year and hand selects a Defensive Coordinator, I will not renew my season tickets or give another dime to the school until he's gone.

Mood Music: Old school Lucinda edition

2009-11-04T09:53:00.001-05:00

Shouldn't I have this
shouldn't I have this
Shouldn't I have all of this and...

Election Day

2009-11-03T07:17:00.004-05:00

I've agonized over whether to do an endorsements post for the city elections that are happening today, because I'm concerned I will not be able to provide good strong reasons for my votes. So instead, I will just tell you who I am voting for and let you sort out whether it makes any sense or not.

Atlanta Mayor: Kasim Reed
Oh how I have struggled over this vote. I do not particularly like any of the candidates, but Reed made me cringe the least. Then Shirley Franklin gave him her quasi-endorsement yesterday, which I had feared for months. In the end, I'm going to hold my nose and vote for Reed anyhow.

City Council President: Clair Muller
When I don't really know anything about the candidates, I vote for the girl.

City Council At Large Post 1: Michael Julian Bond
Because some of my politically astute friends said so.

City Council At Large Post 2: Amir Farokhi
Because we need to build a bench of young charismatic progressives in this state.

City Council At Large Post 3: Lamar Willis
This is a hold my nose vote, since Willis has had some ethical issues but from all accounts his opponent is not a better option.

City Council District 6: Alex Wan
I've met him, and he was impressive while the other candidates are all either really unpalatable or completely unprepared for real political office, judging by their increasingly bizarre mailers and astroturf wars in the Creative Loafing blog comments. This race is guaranteed to head to runoff, so I just hope this is one of the two lucky campaigns that get to fight it out for another month so we can watch the antics continue. (In the interest of full disclosure, I also know his campaign manager.)

For all of the Board of Education races,I'll be voting for the incumbent since I have no children in school and therefore no reason to believe that Fulton county schools are being run poorly. I have met Charlie Stadtlander, who is running for one of those seats, but I recently heard he's a Republican so that pretty much nixed any desire I had to deviate from my incumbency votes.

So there you have it. I'll be heading to Inman Middle School this morning, where I expect turnout will be ridiculously light. That's sad, because this is an important election for the City of Atlanta and will impact all of us more than we may realize.

Still alive

2009-10-29T16:54:00.003-04:00

Despite appearances, I'm still kicking. Last week I went to Baltimore for 4 days of cupcaking and the most beautiful wedding I've ever been to. When I returned I was swamped and exhausted...and promptly got sick.

I was just sick with a cold a month ago (had to push back a first date I was eagerly anticipating, so I remember the inconvenient timing of that illness well), so this new illness concerned me. I was particularly concerned because we have a confirmed case of swine flu in my office and my secretary was out on Tuesday with a fever and vomiting. Also, I made the ill-advised joke to several people on Monday that at least if I got swine flu I could stay home from work for a week. Eek!

When I got home Tuesday night I had a fever of 101.5 and a weird rattle in my chest. I was moderately concerned, so I stayed home yesterday and worked from here under the guise of "better safe than sorry," but the earliest I could get in to see the doctor was this morning. Since my fever didn't get much worse but my cough did, I determined through intrepid hypochondriac googling that I likely had bronchitis, outside chance of pneumonia. This is exactly what the doctor told me, but thankfully the meds she prescribed (Z-pak, Albuterol inhaler) were good to treat either condition.

So, hopefully I'm on the mend now. That, or I'll get full blown pneumonia and HAVE to take time off of work.

Cupcaking Returns

2009-10-19T14:08:00.004-04:00

This weekend I made test batches of two new cupcake flavors that we are making later this week for my friend Beth's wedding. They were both delicious! I figured I should share.

These are the Pumpkin Cupcakes with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting, courtesy of Smitten Kitchen:

Pumpkin Cupcakes With Maple–Cream Cheese Frosting

Yield: 17 to 18 cupcakes

1 stick unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for greasing pans

1 cup firmly packed dark-brown sugar

1/3 cup granulated sugar

2 cups cake flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/8 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2 large eggs

1/2 cup buttermilk mixed with 1 teaspoon vanilla

1 1/4 cups canned solid-pack pumpkin

Frosting

Two (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened

1 stick unsalted butter, room temperature

2 cups confectioners’ sugar

1/4 cup pure maple syrup

Make the cupcakes:1. Preheat the oven to 350° (175°C). Line a cupcake pan with 18 liners.
2. In a stand mixer, beat the butter and sugars on medium speed until fluffy, about 5 minutes. Meanwhile, sift the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, cloves, salt, and pepper into a medium bowl. 3. Add the eggs 1 at a time to the mixer, scraping down the sides after each addition. Alternate adding the flour and milk mixtures, beginning and ending with the flour. Beat in the pumpkin until smooth. Scoop the batter among the cupcake liners — you’re looking to get them 3/4 full. Rap the filled pans once on the counter to release any air bubbles. Bake the cakes until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, about 20 to 25 minutes. Cool the cupcakes on racks completely.

Make the frosting:In a stand mixer beat all the ingredients on medium until fluffy. To assemble the cake, frost the top of one cake, place the other cake on top. Frost the sides and top, swirling decoratively. Refrigerate the cake for 30 minutes to set up frosting.

These are Almond Cupcakes with Amaretto Frosting, courtesy of Modern Domestic:

ALMOND CUPCAKES WITH AMARETTO FROSTING

Ingredients:
4 large eggs

1 1/3 cup sour cream

2 teaspoon almond extract

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

3 1/3 cups sifted cake flour

2/3 cup, ground, unblanched sliced almonds, toasted and finely ground

2 cup sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

3 sticks softened butter

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line two 12-cup muffin tins with paper lines, and lightly grease the top of the tins.In a medium bowl lightly combine the eggs, ¼ of the sour cream and the extracts. In a large mixing bowl combine the dry ingredients and mix on low speed for 30 seconds to blend. Add the butter and remaining sour cream. Mix on low speed until the dry ingredients are moistened. Increase to medium speed (high if using a hand mixer) and beat for 1¤½ minutes to aerate and develop the cake’s structure. Scrape down the sides. Gradually add the egg mixture in 3 batches, beating 20 seconds after each addition to incorporate the ingredients and strengthen the structure. Scrape down the sides. Spoon the batter into the paper liners – each cup should be 2/3 full. Bake 25 minutes or until a wire cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean. Let the cupcakes cool in the pan on a rack for 10 minutes, before gently transferring them to a rack to cool. Allow to cool completely before frosting with amaretto frosting.

Amaretto Frosting

1 cup unsalted butter, softened

6 to 8 cups confectioners’ sugar

1/2 cup milk

2 tsp vanilla extract

2 tbs amaretto

Place the butter in a large mixing bowl. Add 4 cups of the sugar and then the milk, vanilla, and amaretto. On the medium speed of an electric mixer, beat until smooth and creamy, about 3-5 minutes. Gradually add the remaining sugar, 1 cup at a time, beating well after each addition (about 2 minutes), until the icing is thick enough to be of good spreading consistency. You may not need to add all of the sugar. If desired, add a few drops of food coloring and mix thoroughly. (Use and store the icing at room temperature because icing will set if chilled.) Icing can be stored in an airtight container for up to 3 days. Makes 24-28 cupcakes.