did it on 'em in 2014

so much stuff. let's see what comes out of a non sequitor mind dump.

excitement abounds! i officially just brought in my very first client to my own company. so far, all of our clients have been former clients of the two other partners, or contacts of their former clients or some other connection to the two of them. since my background was a different trajectory from what i do now, it's been a struggle to bring in any of my own direct contacts. keep in mind that we are creating a bonus structure based on 1. client leads and 2. client wins. I have many client "wins" under my belt, but until now, i haven't had any client "leads."

enter my good friend since 2nd grade. she recently moved into the insights division of a large minneapolis-based retailer (just guess who that might be). she has been pushing to open her research provider roster, and when i was back in minneapolis, we chatted about why my company might be a good fit for them. once i got back, she officially got the go-ahead to send us an RFP for their next project, which was a good win by itself. but then! we pitched it and she was able to get approval to use us, based on merit alone. my proposal kicked ass, yo! i'm so excited.

also. i am leaving to go BACK to minneapolis in a week. we are bringing joaquin, but it's going to be kind of a hot mess situation, methinks. for one, i have plans for days when i'm back, and so does aaron. orginally, we thought we would be able to leave joaq with aaron's mom back in LA while we attended to very important business. but then! she had to have surgery a little over a week ago, and we don't think she'll be anywhere near recovered enough to watch him for an entire weekend, so the good news is that his airfare is stilll "free" until he's two. the bad news is: another flight within a month. also, we don't have anyone else flying with us this time (i.e. Aaron's mom, his brother and/or our niece), so it will just be aaron, joaquin and I, high in the sky. :gulp: in joaquin's defense, he's been awesome on all 4 of his flights in the past. i'm just kind of waiting for the luck to run out (I know, such an optimist).

we arrive thursday, kind of late in the evening (8:45p local time), so my dilemma on day 1 is: do we try to get him to nap on the plane (common sense says YES)? if so, how late will he stay up on thursday night ? his west coast bed time is 8p-8:30p, so will he stay up until 10p-10:30p, or worse, 11p? then what time will he wake up? if he sleeps his usual 11 hours or so, will he REALLY sleep until 10a the next day with an 11p bed time? If so, he probably won't go to sleep until 11p on friday night, and - here's the dilemma - aaron and i are running a 1/2 marathon on saturday morning. at 7a. which means WE will be up at 6a to prepare ourselves. so 11p is not an ideal bed time.

THEN. well, my mom hasn't ever watched joaquin for an extended amount of time, because she lives in minnesota and we live in california. we will need her to watch him saturday from 6:30a - 9:30a (well, depends on how long it takes me to finish the race, really). which is probably a fine amout of time. but then I'm going to be EXHAUSTED when I get done with the race, so i'd love to nap, but i'm not exactly counting on it. THEN. My high school girlfriends want to primp and pre-party and such prior to our :gulp: 20-year reunion. I'm thinking of meeting up with them around 3p, and the reunion starts at 7:30p. So my mom will likely be watching joaquin from 3p- wheneverthehellhegoestosleep. THEN. maybe? we will be getting a hotel room that night so we can whoop it up a bit with the idea that maybe we can sleep in the next morning. so that means my mom would be with Joaquin from 3p saturday to like, 9a the next day? Eek! Not to mention 3 hours the morning prior.

So it FEELS like a lot to put on her, considering she's never even had to change his diaper, and that's it's own interesting challenge.

So anyway. Oh! Did I mention that right after the race, Aaron is leaving on a 4-hour road trip to meet up with his group of guy friends in northern MN? So yeah, there's that.

Then, Sunday we fly back to MN. So, I will (may)be nursing a hangover sunday morning, Aaron will be coming BACK from his northern MN excursion, and then we are back on a plane to LAX at 7p.

It feels like a lot of YIKES, if you ask me.

Anyway. Tomorrow night I have a haircut at 1:45p and a massage from 6p-7:30p. I will focus on that for now, because I can't fixate on what's ahead. I just. can't. right now.

PS it will be all good. :) PPS Joaquin is dangerously close to turning 2 YEARS OLD! OMG. 36 days and counting.