Sometimes I forget, but when I remember, this is what I remember: I love my life! I feel incredibly lucky/blessed/fortunate.
I love my new job: being in-house is SO much better! I love my role - it's equal parts legal and business, and I actually feel everyday that I am bringing some value to my company. I love that my hours are (more or less) fixed from 9-6 pm, with absolutely zero billable hours. Here's the thing about working without billable hours: I think I'm infinitely more efficient. I don't check FB when I'm at work or fiddle around on the internet, because when you only have 8 hours to work a day, you want to make sure you do everything you need to do in those 8 hours. I'm actually amazed at how much you can accomplish in one day when you're not counting your billable hours! I have a lot on my plate for sure, but I'm having a lot of fun - I feel like I'm learning so much about the deal process that you don't get to be part of when you're outside counsel - the actual deal process begins months, sometimes years, before we engage outside counsel. I feel so fortunate to be given the opportunity to learn the business side of things while still doing what I love as a lawyer. And I love the predictability of being in-house. People plan meetings and phone calls with you days, if not weeks, in advance. Every day when I arrive at work I know exactly what my schedule for that day will be - who I'm meeting, when and for how long. Because at my company, people love to use outlook meeting requests, and every single meeting and phone call is requested days in advance. It's so awesome, because you can totally plan your life. And you can plan your vacations!! I used to not book tickets for vacations until 2 weeks before, because you never know when you're going to get on a deal that will ruin all your plans. But when you're in-house, you are expected and encouraged to take ALL of your vacation, because as it turns out, nothing is THAT urgent - and if it is, you can always make outside counsel take care of it! It's truly awesome to have control over my schedule.
I love my side gig of eating delicious food and writing about it. Sometimes the meals are not amazing, and sometimes my editor makes me travel to the "dark side" to review restaurants, but then sometimes she'll give me a super-plum assignment like tonight - HK's infamous molecular gastronomy restaurant. I can't believe I've lived here for 2 years and never tried this place, especially since I'm a huge fan of molecular (when it's done well). The meal absolutely blew my mind - it was SO delicious and fun and creative. It's definitely one of the best meals I've had in my life. Here's the thing about humans: we get so complacent and take things, even amazing things, for granted after awhile so that we forget to appreciate what we have. When I first got my food writing gig, I was ecstatic - reviewing restaurants and getting published had always been a major dream of mine. But after awhile, I kind of took the whole thing for granted - like if it wasn't an amazing assignment, I'd even get annoyed that I had to do it. When I step back and think about it, I just want to hit myself. Why should I ever get annoyed that I get to go eat a delicious meal - for FREE, then get to write about it and get published? It's been my lifelong dream, and now I'm living my dream, and I need to chastise my spoiled self for not appreciating how fortunate and amazing that is every single moment.
I love living abroad. When you break down HK into singular characteristics, it's the most awful city ever. The pollution, the crowds, the humidity, the rudeness, the cockroaches, the astronomic rents, the lack of hygiene, the germs....BUT HK is truly a city where the sum is much, much greater than the parts. This is such an amazing city - it is the most worldly, the most international, the most driven, the most busy, crowded, thriving city ever. It's just...the most. I love living here, even as I hate so many aspects about it.
I love my husband. There it is, the extent of my sappiness. I'm married now, and I really kind of love it. It's nice to be married, to be able to share life with the person you love.
Life in HK is so busy & harried sometimes that I forget to sit back, enjoy and realize how happy I am. Which goes to the first part of the title of this post. I'm happy, but I'm fat, and I need to do something about the fatness. The thing about eating so many decadent meals for my side gig is that it usually means I'm consuming more calories than I am burning. And even though I love my new job, my commute is about twice as long as it used to be and I have so far failed to wake up in time to go to the gym before work. As a result, I am uncomfortably fat. My clothes feel tight, in that disgustingly gross way where I feel uncomfortable in my own clothes. My skirts/pants are tight where they used to be loose, and all the mirrors everywhere in the city must be messed up because my cheeks look so fat! Oh, there's nothing wrong with the mirrors. I'm just fat. Ugh, need to go on a diet. Blah.
I love my new job: being in-house is SO much better! I love my role - it's equal parts legal and business, and I actually feel everyday that I am bringing some value to my company. I love that my hours are (more or less) fixed from 9-6 pm, with absolutely zero billable hours. Here's the thing about working without billable hours: I think I'm infinitely more efficient. I don't check FB when I'm at work or fiddle around on the internet, because when you only have 8 hours to work a day, you want to make sure you do everything you need to do in those 8 hours. I'm actually amazed at how much you can accomplish in one day when you're not counting your billable hours! I have a lot on my plate for sure, but I'm having a lot of fun - I feel like I'm learning so much about the deal process that you don't get to be part of when you're outside counsel - the actual deal process begins months, sometimes years, before we engage outside counsel. I feel so fortunate to be given the opportunity to learn the business side of things while still doing what I love as a lawyer. And I love the predictability of being in-house. People plan meetings and phone calls with you days, if not weeks, in advance. Every day when I arrive at work I know exactly what my schedule for that day will be - who I'm meeting, when and for how long. Because at my company, people love to use outlook meeting requests, and every single meeting and phone call is requested days in advance. It's so awesome, because you can totally plan your life. And you can plan your vacations!! I used to not book tickets for vacations until 2 weeks before, because you never know when you're going to get on a deal that will ruin all your plans. But when you're in-house, you are expected and encouraged to take ALL of your vacation, because as it turns out, nothing is THAT urgent - and if it is, you can always make outside counsel take care of it! It's truly awesome to have control over my schedule.
I love my side gig of eating delicious food and writing about it. Sometimes the meals are not amazing, and sometimes my editor makes me travel to the "dark side" to review restaurants, but then sometimes she'll give me a super-plum assignment like tonight - HK's infamous molecular gastronomy restaurant. I can't believe I've lived here for 2 years and never tried this place, especially since I'm a huge fan of molecular (when it's done well). The meal absolutely blew my mind - it was SO delicious and fun and creative. It's definitely one of the best meals I've had in my life. Here's the thing about humans: we get so complacent and take things, even amazing things, for granted after awhile so that we forget to appreciate what we have. When I first got my food writing gig, I was ecstatic - reviewing restaurants and getting published had always been a major dream of mine. But after awhile, I kind of took the whole thing for granted - like if it wasn't an amazing assignment, I'd even get annoyed that I had to do it. When I step back and think about it, I just want to hit myself. Why should I ever get annoyed that I get to go eat a delicious meal - for FREE, then get to write about it and get published? It's been my lifelong dream, and now I'm living my dream, and I need to chastise my spoiled self for not appreciating how fortunate and amazing that is every single moment.
I love living abroad. When you break down HK into singular characteristics, it's the most awful city ever. The pollution, the crowds, the humidity, the rudeness, the cockroaches, the astronomic rents, the lack of hygiene, the germs....BUT HK is truly a city where the sum is much, much greater than the parts. This is such an amazing city - it is the most worldly, the most international, the most driven, the most busy, crowded, thriving city ever. It's just...the most. I love living here, even as I hate so many aspects about it.
I love my husband. There it is, the extent of my sappiness. I'm married now, and I really kind of love it. It's nice to be married, to be able to share life with the person you love.
Life in HK is so busy & harried sometimes that I forget to sit back, enjoy and realize how happy I am. Which goes to the first part of the title of this post. I'm happy, but I'm fat, and I need to do something about the fatness. The thing about eating so many decadent meals for my side gig is that it usually means I'm consuming more calories than I am burning. And even though I love my new job, my commute is about twice as long as it used to be and I have so far failed to wake up in time to go to the gym before work. As a result, I am uncomfortably fat. My clothes feel tight, in that disgustingly gross way where I feel uncomfortable in my own clothes. My skirts/pants are tight where they used to be loose, and all the mirrors everywhere in the city must be messed up because my cheeks look so fat! Oh, there's nothing wrong with the mirrors. I'm just fat. Ugh, need to go on a diet. Blah.
No comments:
Post a Comment