Sooo Sick

This week I got to experience my California first...I got the flu.  It's completely frustrating because I got the flu over New Year's last year and ended up spending New Year's Eve in bed, by myself.  Then, as I was moving, I had a bug and was running a fever for most of the time I was packing.  Then, not even a month later, I got a raging case of the flu.  I blame one of my co-workers who ended up going to the hospital because her fever was so high, and then coming into work the next day because she had so much to do that just couldn't be delegated.  I now have exactly what she had.  And I'm sick as a dog.  :(

It started Wednesday with a feeling of ickyness.  Thursday I had the cough.  Friday I stayed home and went to the doctor.  It was a clinic in the ghetto somewhere, and I walked in and was the only person for blocks who didn't speak Spanish as a first language.  The doctor came in, talked to me for literally 2 minutes, listened to my lungs and told me it was a respiratory infection, gave me a shot in my butt that he said would make me feel better in 2 hours and gave me an antibiotic.  That night, I started to feel achy and my cough got worse.  The shot made my joints start to hurt and needless to say, I was not feeling better.  Saturday, I started running the high fever. I ended up going to the store to get a thermometer and tylenol...for the past 36 hours, my fever has ranged from 100.5-104.7...finally about an hour ago, it broke and I am officially at a 99.8 which is a vast improvement but I still feel like death warmed over, so I'm going back to my couch/bed and I'm going to rest up, try to get better so that I can actually enjoy a holiday with my family this week...

Boring life

I really don't have anything to share this week.  Life has been boring.  Work, come home, sleep, then work again.  Went bowling with my co-workers and then to Beso, Eva Longoria's restaurant last week.  Bowling was fun, Beso was eh...I wasn't impressed with the food.  Friday I went bowling with the trivia group I signed up for.  This weekend I ran errands.  I only have one picture...It's of my co-workers at Beso.

From Left to Right: Bryan (my boss), Amy (the rep who took us out), Andy, Daniella, Me, Karen, Stacey, Elizabeth and Courtney

Long Week

It's been a very long week.  We're still working on our launch, but I feel like I'm getting more comfortable with the programs and processes.  Although I'm not completely comfortable with anything yet.

The big event of this week is that I went to a pub crawl sponsored by TMZ.  They got us a double decker bus and paid for everyone to basically get completely wasted.  I took the photos off of my boss's facebook page, so I'm sorry that they aren't up to my usual standards.  :)

The Bus

Everyone On the Bus

I got on the bus and one of the guys looked at me and told me I looked familiar.  He asked where I went to high school and when I was like "too far away" he pressed more.  Turns out, he went to Fallston High School (one of my high school's biggest rivals) and we went to middle school together.  We were in the same class even.  It was so bizarre.  He's the guy above in the light blue shirt and the grey golf hat.

The night was weird and I think I'll be skipping out on any future pub crawls.

We have many more events coming up this week, next week and through January.  I think I'm going to a movie premiere this week but I can't quite remember.  I just have to figure out a good life/work balance.  I'm working on making some outside of work friends but that's more difficult than one might think  I'm actually getting pretty homesick and just really want to call up one of my friends and say "hey, let's go out and get a drink" or "let's go to a movie."  Since I get so nervous and uncomfortable around new people and it's only new people out here, I'm in a constant state of nervousness, but I know that I can't stick my head in the sand and that I'm the only person who can change that.  I'm going to a meeting tomorrow evening and I've been told that that kind of meeting is a good place to find friends.  I'll keep you all updated!

 

Everybody's Working for the Weekend!

I jumped into my new job on a Monday.  It started with me meeting my team who brought me breakfast, then meeting with HR, then meeting with just about everyone else.  My team was/is in the middle of a huge launch so I was kinda thrown into the mix...My team is super cool.

Starting from the top, Stacy is our assistant media director and the "team lead."  She is in her early 30's, late 20's and is really nice.  She knows a lot about the client, company, LA in general.  She's really nice and super positive.  Elizabeth is the other assistant media director is from Bethesda, also late 20's or early 30's.  Karen is our Campaign Optimization Specialist.  I think she and I are actually a lot alike.  She's in her late 20's.  Under Karen is Bryan (my boss) and Courtney.  Courtney is in her mid 20's and is from Hawaii.  She speaks in Pidgin a lot...the other day she said "Dat pow brah?" meaning "Is that finished?"  She had to translate to everyone.  It was pretty funny.  Under her is Andy.  He's 23, from Kansas City and really into pop culture.  He goes out every night and knows everything about Lady Gaga, The Real Housewives of New York...My boss's name is Bryan.  He's from Houston and is super cool.  He is very positive and never seems to get flustered.  I'm not sure if it's the West Coast or if it's Bryan, but he has the mentality that we are only two people and can't do everything in one day.

I started work in the middle of a huge campaign launch so I was kinda thrown in and told "do this, we'll explain it later."  This coming week should be a little easier, but we've been working extremely long hours.  Luckily I get paid overtime!

My first week at UM, we were invited to Mastro's, a steakhouse, in Beverly Hills.  The Washington Post took us, coincidentally.  This place was like a Ruth's Chris...I had a filet and it cost $36.  It was wonderful food and it was a great introduction to LA.

 I have to say that Los Angeles has many more perks than DC did.  So far I've been invited (for free) to the dinner with the Washington Post, a party at the Forever Hollywood Cemetery hosted by MySpace, the official opening night of "This Is It", the Michael Jackson movie, Cirque du Soleli's Kooza in Santa Monica in December, a screening of the movie 2012, a bar crawl in Hollywood by TMZ, a dinner someplace fancy by Sports Illustrated...and I've only been there for 2 weeks!!  It's unbelievable!!

Also last week, my boxes were delivered.  I got everything unpacked last weekend.  There were MAJOR issues with the movers, so for everyone reading, do not use America Vanline (based out of Owings Mills) for your next move or you might have a 300 pound Russian dude coming after you.  I may or may not have a hit out on me by the Russian Mob.  Just sayin...

Like I said everything was unpacked last weekend...What took me a week to pack took me 2 days to unpack.  That's pretty cool.

Kitchen looking to the window

Kitchen from the window looking back

Table and Pictures

New microwave!!

Looking out towards the windows, Main Room

Computer Corner

My bed and dresser, looking back towards the front door

My closet (behind the mirrors) and blue chair

Dressing room (the back wall is a mirror, it isn't that cluttered!

Bathroom

Entry Way

I don't have all of my pictures hung yet, I need to find a man to help.  I'm pretty sure the walls are brick with drywall overtop because the nails/screws won't go in all the way.  My neighbors aren't bad, but my monkey welcome mat was stolen and the neighbor to the right of me plays club music pretty loudly during the day.  I'm pretty mad about the floor mat, but what can I do?  The club music is only during the day, so even that doesn't bother me.  Everyone I've met in the elevator seems really nice so far.

My work building is really cool.  The other people in the building are OWN (the Oprah Winfrey Network), Fuzzy Door Productions (Seth MacFarlane, the creater of Family Guy and American Dad's company).  Across the street is the E! Network and Ryan Seacrest broadcasts a show that overlooks the courtyard in between our buildings.

The sign for my office building

My building from across the street

This weekend, I went up to Hanford to hang out with Kerry and Reagan for Halloween.  I wore my awesome Bumblebee costume that I could barely sit down in.  Reagan was a peanut because Kerry calls her "Peanut".  I left Saturday morning and got there around noon.  We immediately started carving pumpkins.  Reagan was less than thrilled with the orange goop on the inside, so she quickly found other ways to keep herself entertained.

She was curious about the big orange things, but didn't want to play with us...

Ewwwww!!!!

Our finished product

Reagan took a nap and Kerry and I hung out.  Finally, we all got dressed and Reagan and Kerry went trick or treating while I stayed home to hand out candy.  Reagan seemed to love trick or treating.

Reagan came to her own door to trick or treat

She liked counting her candy

In, Out, In, Out...

Bee and Peanut!

I know I'm shamelessly exploiting my niece here, but HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!