A week of gifts and challenges...

It’s been a week, folks. Work has been its usual circus of deadlines, change requests, and competing priorities—basically a juggling act where someone keeps tossing in flaming bowling pins just for fun. It’s busy in a good way, but nothing kills your momentum like a client casually dropping a change request that blows up your entire timeline. Ah yes… the glamorous life of project work.

On the brighter side, one of my real estate clients had an offer accepted this week. It’s a short sale, so now we’re in that fun “hurry up and wait” phase while the seller’s lender decides whether to bless us with their approval. The listing agent swears it won’t take long. I’m choosing to believe them because optimism is cheaper than therapy.

Speaking of new developments—we added a new family member! Tilly the Turtle joined us on Monday after a glamorous pickup from Petco. She’s settling into the pond nicely. At first she was skittish, darting into the water like we were tax collectors, but now she sunbathes on the rocks every morning like she owns the place. The second we open the back door, though? Splash. Gone. She’s basically the introvert I aspire to be.

I also started a new certification class for my hypnosis credentials. I already have two—one in basic hypnosis and one in past life regression therapy—and now I’m working on smoking cessation. I’ve really enjoyed these classes and have been using self‑hypnosis to make some positive changes in my own life. I’m not sure what I’ll ultimately do with all these certifications, but friends have already started lining up with “issues” they want me to help them with. Apparently, I’m becoming the neighborhood hypnotist.

I’ve also been planning a spiritual retreat to Santa Monica in October. I’ll be gone the weekend of the 16th for three days. I hesitated because of the cost, but James and I have been blessed with extra income from real estate referrals this year. We’re working hard to become completely debt‑free in the next few years—including paying off the mortgage. Thanks to a cash‑out refinance during the housing boom, we’re underwater now, but we can make the payments. After all the layoffs I’ve lived through, we’ve realized we need to live within our means and stop borrowing for anything. So yes, I’ve been working 12–14 hour days lately trying to pay things down and build a safety net big enough to cushion another layoff if it comes.

Spiritually, I’m trying to stay on a healthier path this year. I spent too long letting negativity and cynicism pull me into petty drama. And yes, Prop 8 still ticks me off, but I’m at peace with it for now. I know in my heart it’ll be overturned eventually, and James and I weren’t personally affected. What matters is that we’re together and grateful for how much progress has been made in our lifetime.

So here I am on a Sunday morning, blogging while petting Willow and nursing a slight wine headache. I watched Push last night—Chris Evans and Dakota Fanning. Not great, not terrible. But somehow the entire bottle of wine disappeared. And since James doesn’t drink, I can’t even pretend he helped.

Hope your day is filled with blessings, love, and fewer deadlines than mine