It's aliiiiive.....

I don't know how, but somehow, my laptop came back from the dead just now. Oh happy day, not to have to stand on line for the Geek Squad at Best Buy!!

I think that it is possible that my laptop tapped into my own energy reserves though, for I am positively OUT of it today. I woke up at 7 a.m. to my adorable redheaded Brian telling me that it was time for my story...we had agreed the night before that he would read the first 15 pages of The Reptile Room (Book 2 of a Series of Unfortunate Events, by Lemony Snicket) to me so that I could "get into it". This is a time-honored tradition in my family...one which my own mom started when she read me the first 15 pages of Catcher in the Rye because I couldn't "get into it" on my own.

Anyway, I kept nodding off while Brian was reading to me, although he kept waking me back up. And as soon as he left my room, I passed out until 8:15 which is when my kids are supposed to leave for school...with ME. Thank goodness my babysitter was here to do some cleaning...she had seen that I was sleeping and gotten the kids ready and was just then leaving to take them herself. I passed out again, immediately. This time I woke up at half past 10. I groggily made my way out of bed, chatted with Sergio for a bit, caught up on my correspondence (emails), and decided at around noon that it was time to get myself moving. I hurled myself into the shower, blasted myself with cold water, got out and got dressed. Finally, just as I was about to walk out the door, I decided to give the laptop one more chance.

And voila.

She is up and running.

Not so much me though. I seriously think that the whole head-shrinking-biased-examination thing really took it out of me yesterday. SO stressful. SO exhaustingly boring. SO much sitting at a desk, which is exactly what I can no longer do.

And to answer some of the questions put out there, yes, I was a corporate lawyer until 2002. My most recent gig was at Hogan & Hartson, which used to be Squadron Ellenoff until the merger. I started my career at Rogers & Wells, which is now Clifford Chance, due to the merger. At various times, I was at Battle Fowler (now, some other big name, I can't remember what, due to the merger) and New York Life Insurance Company, which remains the same boring mutual life insurance company that it was when I trudged in there five days a week from 8:30 until 5:30 and was told to "work slower because it makes the restof us look bad", to "ask Dennis more questions, even if you don't have any", to "never speak to Mike M. unless spoken to first, even if you meet him in an elevator" and to switch to an area of which I had absolutely no knowledge or training "because it fits in well with when you are going out on maternity leave", and Patterson, Belknap, Webb & Tyler, which remains Patterson Belknap, Webb & Tyler.

I stopped practicing law the day I went in for my double mastectomy on Sepember 17, 2002, although I had intended to go back. I never did go back because I couldn't figure out how I was going to practice law and stay healthy at the same time, and moreover, I couldn't figure out how I could practice law when I couldn't even remember where my car was parked. A year after I went out on leave, my boss at H&H called me to relieve me of my job once and for all. It had been too long. There was no work for me to do there anyway, since I had been a member of the Technology group, and, well, we all know what happened with all those dot coms.

I do not wish to be a lawyer anymore. I do not believe that I am qualified to be a lawyer anymore. I do not believe that I would be able to remain healthy and happy being a lawyer. Besides, I was one of four women who had breast cancer in the office during a two year period. That doesn't make me want to exactly rush back to the office. What the hell was IN that office anyway??

So, there you have it. I believe I answered "true" to "I would enjoy the work of a forest ranger". Put me in, coach.

YC