I just received my FIRST EVER issue of HR Magazine, a subscription I get for free with my $160 annual membership fee to the Society of Human Resource Management. I'm very excited about reading this issue, as the cover story is "Peak Performances: Women in HR prove there's more than one path to the top". And me? Coincidentally, I'm a woman in HR. Or rather, pretending to be in HR.

Excuse my while I digress for a second. My title around here is somewhat equivalent to that of a figure head, like the Queen of England. I sound all important, but in reality I have no ability to impact anything of any importance. Every time I tell someone I work in HR I feel like a complete fraud because I know nobody around here sees me that way. It's just a title I managed to talk someone into letting me have. Sometimes this feels demoralizing and demotivating, and other times it makes me want to fight like hell to get the recognition I've worked hard for, to make them see I have a brain and so much more to offer than what they let me do. Right now I'm in 'fight like hell' mode. I'm out to prove myself - partly to them and partly to myself - that I can do this job and I can do it well.

I'm more than a little afraid of what the outcome of this could be. It could be really successful, which would be awesome. But then I stop to think about what that would mean and it freaks me out. Lots of responsibility + not so much experience = I have no idea what I'm doing and what if I royally screw things up and make a fool out of myself. Or, it could totally blow up in my face and I will feel like I did after every break up, that I gave so much of myself to someone that wasn't willing to give as much back and couldn't appreciate what they had right in front of them. That would suck. Hard.

Either way, I'll know what I'm supposed to do next, which is more than I can say right now.

The plant in my office:

The plant in Dooce's house:

Score one for me - I got it first. Score one for her - her picture is (way) better. But in my defense mine was taken in fluorescent lighting, and I have no flash (must get one).

We're even.

Today I sent my IT guy an e-mail with this video. The subject line was "Is there any better argument to get me a Mac?" He e-mailed me back with this:

"Actually there is. It took me 5 minutes to load this on my Vista PC, and after watching the video I received an error message."

Sold.

Seriously one of the funniest things I've ever heard.

Last night I watched the premier of Knight Rider, 2 hours of the most awful non-reality show drivel I've seen on TV in quite some time. And it was awesome.

Completely awesome.

I have been entirely and unabashedly sucked into this show by nostalgia (damn those marketing geniuses!). I feel no shame, though, because the sense of excitement I get from the theme song alone is enough to convince me that the hours of my life I spend watching this show will not be wasted. That and the comfort of knowing those hours will be few as this show will SURELY be canceled within 3 weeks. But until then, I'll have the Knight Rider theme song on loop on my iTunes.

We totally did this first, although it was an attic, not a chimney, and our raccoon was WAY bigger.